Daily Java: Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings. (1 Peter 5:8-9).
Life in Christianity can sometimes take a bad turn and you wonder why. After all, you are serving God. Who can want you to stop?
We forget that there is an adversary who want to stop our relationship with God. He has tried to stop relationships with God from the beginning.
In the garden of Eden, he tried his best to stop the first real relationship with God that Adam and Eve had. He did a pretty good job, too, when it comes down to it.
From that moment on, humanity was separated from God and no longer had the relationship they had before. In fact, the very coming of Jesus was to repair that relationship rift that was created so long ago.
Each of us comes to that relationship rift with God when we begin to sin. And we come back through Jesus and his grace.
However, the devil does not want that. His whole mission is to tear and to break down. He looks for every opportunity he can get to do just that.
He walks around through our lives like a lion on the prowl looking for weakness. And he will exploit them in every circumstance and incidence he can.
On the one hand, he is nothing to laugh about. He can destroy those who are not careful and who do not have the hand of God on them.
But God is greater and you are not alone. It isn’t as if we fight this battle by ourselves, valiantly struggling against an opponent that is so much greater than us that we are doomed from the beginning.
Yes, without God we are doomed. All sin and fall short of the glory (Romans 3:23). Everybody has already failed in their lives. By ourselves we have already lost.
But we do not have to. God is greater. Jesus said that the one in us was greater than the one in the world. God is greater, God is more powerful, God is in control.
In spite of his power, the devil is so limited in what he can do. He cannot read our minds. He cannot make us do anything. He can put it in front of us that we constantly think about it and he can tailor things to our personal desires, but he cannot tell what we are thinking.
As long as God is in our minds and has control over them, the devil cannot win. Although he is not powerless, at the same time, he is not all powerful.
We can resist him and when we do, if we do it in the name of God, he will flee. He cannot stand that name.
And we are not alone. Everybody in the world goes through the same fight. Some have already given in and no longer fight. Others weakly fight feeling defeated. Still others are beginning to feel the power God gives them. But all fight that fight of faith.
Know this: God has won and the devil has lost. All he is doing now is marking time until the end when he knows he will be punished. And he wants to take as many as he can with him..
But you do not have to go. God gives power. Resist the devil. God will give you that power.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Lord, make me more like you
Lord, make me more like you. Take away that which is not in your will and make me more like you.
daily java
Daily Java: For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9).
One of the hardest things to understand in the Christian faith is the knowledge of grace. God gives us grace.
Grace is a gift, not a wage. He gives it to us. It does not depend on you to be holy, God makes you holy. We do what we do because we love him, not to make him love us. That is the beauty of God’s system: he makes failures perfect.
Of course, what we want to do is tie grace somehow to something we have to do. it is hard to understand that grace is free. It is a gift.
We live under the law of grace, someone says. (actually I said that the other day without meaning to) But there is no law of grace. Grace is a system, a gift, a bestowal.
Love is a law. That is true. James calls it the perfect law (James 1:25) and the royal law (James 2:8: If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, "Love your neighbor as yourself," you are doing right.). but grace is a gift.
Grace is a thing. You cannot serve a thing. Whereas love is an action. You can serve an action. Love, God says. We can love. But we cannot grace. We can only accept grace.
And the idea of grace is so amazing, so beautiful. The idea of grace says that it does not matter how much we have failed, how much we have sinned, no badly we have done – God makes us perfect. We cannot do it, but he can. And, to those who believe in him, he does.
Grace says that we cannot do what God wants of us, but he decides we are fine anyway. Grace says we have failed but God looks at us as perfect. Grace says that we are sinful pieces of junk, but God looks at us as sinless works of his art.
Grace and law are mutually exclusive. Law demands, grace gives. Law says, do this or die. Graces says do this because.
Under grace, the works we do are because we love God, not in order to make God love us. He loves us already. And when we believe in him and accept him, he gives us perfection. He makes us perfect. He gives us grace.
No way we can get it ourselves. It can only come from God. That is the whole point. You had your life under your control and you screwed it up. God takes it and makes it perfect.
He gives us grace.
One of the hardest things to understand in the Christian faith is the knowledge of grace. God gives us grace.
Grace is a gift, not a wage. He gives it to us. It does not depend on you to be holy, God makes you holy. We do what we do because we love him, not to make him love us. That is the beauty of God’s system: he makes failures perfect.
Of course, what we want to do is tie grace somehow to something we have to do. it is hard to understand that grace is free. It is a gift.
We live under the law of grace, someone says. (actually I said that the other day without meaning to) But there is no law of grace. Grace is a system, a gift, a bestowal.
Love is a law. That is true. James calls it the perfect law (James 1:25) and the royal law (James 2:8: If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, "Love your neighbor as yourself," you are doing right.). but grace is a gift.
Grace is a thing. You cannot serve a thing. Whereas love is an action. You can serve an action. Love, God says. We can love. But we cannot grace. We can only accept grace.
And the idea of grace is so amazing, so beautiful. The idea of grace says that it does not matter how much we have failed, how much we have sinned, no badly we have done – God makes us perfect. We cannot do it, but he can. And, to those who believe in him, he does.
Grace says that we cannot do what God wants of us, but he decides we are fine anyway. Grace says we have failed but God looks at us as perfect. Grace says that we are sinful pieces of junk, but God looks at us as sinless works of his art.
Grace and law are mutually exclusive. Law demands, grace gives. Law says, do this or die. Graces says do this because.
Under grace, the works we do are because we love God, not in order to make God love us. He loves us already. And when we believe in him and accept him, he gives us perfection. He makes us perfect. He gives us grace.
No way we can get it ourselves. It can only come from God. That is the whole point. You had your life under your control and you screwed it up. God takes it and makes it perfect.
He gives us grace.
Friday, October 29, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them. They are the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over weak-willed women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires, always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth. (2 Timothy 3:1-7))
In reading the news, it seems that everything is going to hell in a handbasket. It is getting worse and there is no society that has been or will be like this one. New evils seem to be invented daily. There is no trust, no goodness, no love – nothing good at all. It is easy to say that this is surely a sign that the Lord will be here soon.
But that is not necessarily true. The apostle is writing about that day, about the society in which he lived: the Roman Empire. It was one of the most corrupt in history. In fact, it is its corruption that is listed as one of the main reason it fell.
Those were the people he is talking about. And he says that in the last days these bad things will happen. And they will. but the Bible calls those last times as opposed to first times – the times of the Old Testament.
Paul says that problems are going to come in every society. Jesus himself said in Matthew 24:6; You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Stuff will happen until God is ready to be through.
There has never been a society that is good for long. Every society, no matter how well-meaning it may have been to start, turns. That is mainly because people get to thinking that they are so great. When they do that and began to cease their reliance on the values that made them great in the first place, they die as a great force.
It has happened before and it will happen again. Our society will not evolve to a greater level.
I love Star Trek, but the idea put forth in The Next Generation series was that they had evolved into a society that no longer needed money nor violence nor anything bad. They were different.
This was in spite of the fact that they still fought and coveted and everything else that the old societies had done.
No society has ever gotten better through time. All societies have gotten worse. And all societies have died. Every one.
I like America, but America is not the people of God. America, for all its good ideas, is a construct of humanity. Like the Tower of Babel in the Old Testament, all constructs of humanity are doomed to fall sooner or later. They cannot stand because they are founded on human wisdom, not divine authority.
Even the country founded on divine authority fell. That was Israel. It fell because humans cannot leave the things of God alone and accept them. They have to mess with them and change them. And when they do, they die.
As the scripture shows, it has happened before and will happen again. People, when given a choice, always choose the bad. It is human nature.
Only God will survive and those who rely on him will survive with him.
In reading the news, it seems that everything is going to hell in a handbasket. It is getting worse and there is no society that has been or will be like this one. New evils seem to be invented daily. There is no trust, no goodness, no love – nothing good at all. It is easy to say that this is surely a sign that the Lord will be here soon.
But that is not necessarily true. The apostle is writing about that day, about the society in which he lived: the Roman Empire. It was one of the most corrupt in history. In fact, it is its corruption that is listed as one of the main reason it fell.
Those were the people he is talking about. And he says that in the last days these bad things will happen. And they will. but the Bible calls those last times as opposed to first times – the times of the Old Testament.
Paul says that problems are going to come in every society. Jesus himself said in Matthew 24:6; You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Stuff will happen until God is ready to be through.
There has never been a society that is good for long. Every society, no matter how well-meaning it may have been to start, turns. That is mainly because people get to thinking that they are so great. When they do that and began to cease their reliance on the values that made them great in the first place, they die as a great force.
It has happened before and it will happen again. Our society will not evolve to a greater level.
I love Star Trek, but the idea put forth in The Next Generation series was that they had evolved into a society that no longer needed money nor violence nor anything bad. They were different.
This was in spite of the fact that they still fought and coveted and everything else that the old societies had done.
No society has ever gotten better through time. All societies have gotten worse. And all societies have died. Every one.
I like America, but America is not the people of God. America, for all its good ideas, is a construct of humanity. Like the Tower of Babel in the Old Testament, all constructs of humanity are doomed to fall sooner or later. They cannot stand because they are founded on human wisdom, not divine authority.
Even the country founded on divine authority fell. That was Israel. It fell because humans cannot leave the things of God alone and accept them. They have to mess with them and change them. And when they do, they die.
As the scripture shows, it has happened before and will happen again. People, when given a choice, always choose the bad. It is human nature.
Only God will survive and those who rely on him will survive with him.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: When your words came, I ate them; they were my joy and my heart's delight, for I bear your name, O LORD God Almighty. (Jeremiah 15:16)
Accepting the words of God is easier said than done. The idea of the word of God being like a sharp sword is appropriate. That is because truth can hurt, it can cut. You are doing stuff that you know to be wrong and the word points it out. It can make a person mad even.
The key is to receive the word of God in the spirit it is given. The Lord doesn’t point things out to be mean. He points them out to make you better, to refine the gold of your life.
When they come to us, we eat them. We take them in like we would take in food or drink. The words become part of us and begin to work in our lives. We do not just apply them, we let them become part of us from the inside.
We eat them. If we are in God’s will, they are joy and delight. Even if they hurt at times, we know that he wants the best for us and we are willing to go with his plan and his will.
That is not easy. But we bear his name. We are his people. We live by his rules. And we know that he loves us.
Our food becomes his will and our drink becomes his life. And we are his.
Accepting the words of God is easier said than done. The idea of the word of God being like a sharp sword is appropriate. That is because truth can hurt, it can cut. You are doing stuff that you know to be wrong and the word points it out. It can make a person mad even.
The key is to receive the word of God in the spirit it is given. The Lord doesn’t point things out to be mean. He points them out to make you better, to refine the gold of your life.
When they come to us, we eat them. We take them in like we would take in food or drink. The words become part of us and begin to work in our lives. We do not just apply them, we let them become part of us from the inside.
We eat them. If we are in God’s will, they are joy and delight. Even if they hurt at times, we know that he wants the best for us and we are willing to go with his plan and his will.
That is not easy. But we bear his name. We are his people. We live by his rules. And we know that he loves us.
Our food becomes his will and our drink becomes his life. And we are his.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
my sister, nancy lea
I was just thinking about my sister, Nancy. She will be 50 this year. It is hard to imagine her at 50.
I remember when she was born. December 9, 1960. We were so proud. We had a sister. I always wanted a sister, and evidently my mother had had trouble carrying girls in the past. So when she was born and it was a girl,w e were glad.
Nancy Lea. What a pretty name.
I was eleven years old. I loved carrying her around and holding her and playing with her. She provided a great excuse for not doing my homework that year. Firth grade at OA Fleming Elementary in Freeport, TX.
I didn’t like doing homework anyway, but she was a great excuse for a while. “I didn’t get it done because my little sister was crying all night.” I never used the excuse that she ate my homework, but I am not sure why not.
As we got older, I learned to play the guitar. She loved for me to do so. Her favorite song that I played was Alley Cat. Going on Google, I find that Alley Cat was the debut album by Danish pianist Bent Fabric. Odd name. But a fun song. I would sing it. I would sing, “She meets them” she would arch her back and sing Meow, “And loves them” Meow. “And leaves them” Meow. Like that Catsonova does.
Looking at the words after 40 some-odd years, I realize that the song was about a guy cat who prowls around. The girl cat (cattess?) doesn’t want to let him out of her sight.
But then, again, who cares. A teenaged boy and his sister singing together. It was fun.
She still remembers it, too. She mentioned it not long ago at some dinner or something at our parents’ house.
I went into the army when she was just 8. I came home to get married when she was 10. She was inordinately jealous, to the point of almost becoming obnoxious. She laid all over me until Mom made her get off so my new wife (her rival for my affections) and I could “go to sleep”.
She was just proud of having a tall, straight, rather well-built brother in the army. I looked good at the time.
I miss her. She lives in Tyler, TX and we correspond some on Facebook, but I wish I lived closer to her and her family..
I remember when she was born. December 9, 1960. We were so proud. We had a sister. I always wanted a sister, and evidently my mother had had trouble carrying girls in the past. So when she was born and it was a girl,w e were glad.
Nancy Lea. What a pretty name.
I was eleven years old. I loved carrying her around and holding her and playing with her. She provided a great excuse for not doing my homework that year. Firth grade at OA Fleming Elementary in Freeport, TX.
I didn’t like doing homework anyway, but she was a great excuse for a while. “I didn’t get it done because my little sister was crying all night.” I never used the excuse that she ate my homework, but I am not sure why not.
As we got older, I learned to play the guitar. She loved for me to do so. Her favorite song that I played was Alley Cat. Going on Google, I find that Alley Cat was the debut album by Danish pianist Bent Fabric. Odd name. But a fun song. I would sing it. I would sing, “She meets them” she would arch her back and sing Meow, “And loves them” Meow. “And leaves them” Meow. Like that Catsonova does.
Looking at the words after 40 some-odd years, I realize that the song was about a guy cat who prowls around. The girl cat (cattess?) doesn’t want to let him out of her sight.
But then, again, who cares. A teenaged boy and his sister singing together. It was fun.
She still remembers it, too. She mentioned it not long ago at some dinner or something at our parents’ house.
I went into the army when she was just 8. I came home to get married when she was 10. She was inordinately jealous, to the point of almost becoming obnoxious. She laid all over me until Mom made her get off so my new wife (her rival for my affections) and I could “go to sleep”.
She was just proud of having a tall, straight, rather well-built brother in the army. I looked good at the time.
I miss her. She lives in Tyler, TX and we correspond some on Facebook, but I wish I lived closer to her and her family..
daily java
Daily Java: You are always righteous, O LORD, when I bring a case before you.
Yet I would speak with you about your justice:
Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?
You have planted them, and they have taken root; they grow and bear fruit.
You are always on their lips but far from their hearts. (Jeremiah 12:1-2)
It is not sacrilegious to say that Jeremiah has a valid point. Why is it that people who have no love for God prosper and people who love God have a hard time?
It is not fair. Especially considering all of the scriptures that are in the Old Testament and in the New Testament telling us that God’s people will be blessed.
Then you look at the book of Job and see a man who was a righteous man who is the victim of a bet between God and the devil. The devil says that if he were blessed like Job he would be good to (a lie, but that is not surprising. He was an angel at one time, standing in the presence of God himself). God says that Job would be righteous even if he were reduced greatly in station and health.
Of course, Job stayed devoted to God. He was irritated (and had a right to be) and he questioned God (God never expected blind fools), but even in the midst of all this, he remained faithful to God. He never cursed him (as he was encouraged to do by “friends” and his poor wife who saw nothing but her husband suffering). He praised him through the pain.
God blessed him again, eventually. But he suffered the rest of his life because of it.
So look around. Idiots in Hollywood and the entertainment industry and government for that matter who make daily proclamations of their contempt for Christians and their lack of belief.
People who are godless who are rich beyond belief, people who do not care who prosper.
It is easy to say that they will get theirs. Vengeance is mine, says the Lord – we thunder. The old songs and promises of pie in the sky bye and bye, that there will be a better day coming.
They really do not matter as much when you are suffering. Why do people who are godless enjoy such good health while my godly and spiritual wife suffers in pain? Why do people who have no faith enjoy such wealth? Sure, it is only here for the moment, but the moment is, after all, what we live in.
There is no real answer. CS Lewis wrote a book on the Problem of Pain, yet ended with the acknowledgment that we do not understand it.
Jeremiah had a good point. God’s answer, a few verses later, was not a very good one. It was more or less what he told Job: deal with it. He added a comment that it would make him stronger. If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan? (12:5).
This passage, as does Job and Hebrews 11 and others, says things happen to Christians. Just remain strong and know that I am God.
One guy sang a song that said, if you can’t see his hand, trust his heart. That is all we can do. We know God loves us and has a plan for us.
Things happen and sometimes they are for no good reason. I know that because I know that God is not the sender of evil on our lives. The devil does that. But God allows it. That is hard to accept and understand. But the passage: we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose (Romans 8:28) is absolutely true.
A trite and unsatisfactory ending to a very hard problem, but things will work out and God loves you, even when bad things happen.
Yet I would speak with you about your justice:
Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?
You have planted them, and they have taken root; they grow and bear fruit.
You are always on their lips but far from their hearts. (Jeremiah 12:1-2)
It is not sacrilegious to say that Jeremiah has a valid point. Why is it that people who have no love for God prosper and people who love God have a hard time?
It is not fair. Especially considering all of the scriptures that are in the Old Testament and in the New Testament telling us that God’s people will be blessed.
Then you look at the book of Job and see a man who was a righteous man who is the victim of a bet between God and the devil. The devil says that if he were blessed like Job he would be good to (a lie, but that is not surprising. He was an angel at one time, standing in the presence of God himself). God says that Job would be righteous even if he were reduced greatly in station and health.
Of course, Job stayed devoted to God. He was irritated (and had a right to be) and he questioned God (God never expected blind fools), but even in the midst of all this, he remained faithful to God. He never cursed him (as he was encouraged to do by “friends” and his poor wife who saw nothing but her husband suffering). He praised him through the pain.
God blessed him again, eventually. But he suffered the rest of his life because of it.
So look around. Idiots in Hollywood and the entertainment industry and government for that matter who make daily proclamations of their contempt for Christians and their lack of belief.
People who are godless who are rich beyond belief, people who do not care who prosper.
It is easy to say that they will get theirs. Vengeance is mine, says the Lord – we thunder. The old songs and promises of pie in the sky bye and bye, that there will be a better day coming.
They really do not matter as much when you are suffering. Why do people who are godless enjoy such good health while my godly and spiritual wife suffers in pain? Why do people who have no faith enjoy such wealth? Sure, it is only here for the moment, but the moment is, after all, what we live in.
There is no real answer. CS Lewis wrote a book on the Problem of Pain, yet ended with the acknowledgment that we do not understand it.
Jeremiah had a good point. God’s answer, a few verses later, was not a very good one. It was more or less what he told Job: deal with it. He added a comment that it would make him stronger. If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan? (12:5).
This passage, as does Job and Hebrews 11 and others, says things happen to Christians. Just remain strong and know that I am God.
One guy sang a song that said, if you can’t see his hand, trust his heart. That is all we can do. We know God loves us and has a plan for us.
Things happen and sometimes they are for no good reason. I know that because I know that God is not the sender of evil on our lives. The devil does that. But God allows it. That is hard to accept and understand. But the passage: we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose (Romans 8:28) is absolutely true.
A trite and unsatisfactory ending to a very hard problem, but things will work out and God loves you, even when bad things happen.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: Hear what the LORD says to you, O house of Israel. This is what the LORD says:
"Do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by signs in the sky,
though the nations are terrified by them.
For the customs of the peoples are worthless; they cut a tree out of the forest,
and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel.
They adorn it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails so it will not totter.
Like a scarecrow in a melon patch, their idols cannot speak;
they must be carried because they cannot walk.
Do not fear them; they can do no harm nor can they do any good."
No one is like you, O LORD; you are great, and your name is mighty in power. (Jeremiah 10:1-6)
There is a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley called Ozymandias. In it, a traveler comes across some huge feet with broken legs. It was evident that at one time this was a massive statue. Near them is an arrogant-looking face on a broken head. At the base of the feet there was a plaque. It read:
Nothing else of the statue or the king that the statue was supposed to represent, nor his empire was still there. There was nothing but desert and sand.
The poem was about a guy who decided to make a memorial to himself and to his great kingdom. What he didn’t count on was that he would die and his kingdom would be gone and his statue broken up. No one remembered him. All that was left was a silly broken-up statue in the middle of a desert.
It is silly putting all your trust in what you yourself have done. If you can build it, it can’t be all that permanent.
Just recently, we have had a stock market downturn. A lot of people who had their stock portfolio built up for retirement lost a significant amount of the money they had laid by. What they had worked so hard for was half gone.
And sad as it may be, that happens. Anything you build can fall apart. There is no permanence in what you can do.
We are a great nation. In spite of the direction we seem to be going, I believe we will endure. For a while. Not forever. After all, we are a man-built nation. When it comes down to it, only the people of God and his ways will last forever. No nation, no corporation, no heritage formed by people will remain.
Anything we put up as permanent is like that idol. They cut the tree, they shape it, they decorate it, they put a base on it s it won’t fall and carry it into the special place they built for it. Then they fall down and worship it. Jeremiah says to not fear it. It cannot do anything.
Only God is eternal. Only his ways are forever.
"Do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by signs in the sky,
though the nations are terrified by them.
For the customs of the peoples are worthless; they cut a tree out of the forest,
and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel.
They adorn it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails so it will not totter.
Like a scarecrow in a melon patch, their idols cannot speak;
they must be carried because they cannot walk.
Do not fear them; they can do no harm nor can they do any good."
No one is like you, O LORD; you are great, and your name is mighty in power. (Jeremiah 10:1-6)
There is a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley called Ozymandias. In it, a traveler comes across some huge feet with broken legs. It was evident that at one time this was a massive statue. Near them is an arrogant-looking face on a broken head. At the base of the feet there was a plaque. It read:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing else of the statue or the king that the statue was supposed to represent, nor his empire was still there. There was nothing but desert and sand.
The poem was about a guy who decided to make a memorial to himself and to his great kingdom. What he didn’t count on was that he would die and his kingdom would be gone and his statue broken up. No one remembered him. All that was left was a silly broken-up statue in the middle of a desert.
It is silly putting all your trust in what you yourself have done. If you can build it, it can’t be all that permanent.
Just recently, we have had a stock market downturn. A lot of people who had their stock portfolio built up for retirement lost a significant amount of the money they had laid by. What they had worked so hard for was half gone.
And sad as it may be, that happens. Anything you build can fall apart. There is no permanence in what you can do.
We are a great nation. In spite of the direction we seem to be going, I believe we will endure. For a while. Not forever. After all, we are a man-built nation. When it comes down to it, only the people of God and his ways will last forever. No nation, no corporation, no heritage formed by people will remain.
Anything we put up as permanent is like that idol. They cut the tree, they shape it, they decorate it, they put a base on it s it won’t fall and carry it into the special place they built for it. Then they fall down and worship it. Jeremiah says to not fear it. It cannot do anything.
Only God is eternal. Only his ways are forever.
Monday, October 25, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. (Ephesians 5:19-20).
Singing is an amazing phenomenon. It is shared by just about everybody in the world, no matter their culture or background. It is a desire to join with others in a shared experience. It unites groups. It speaks from our hearts. It teaches and comforts and is just plain fun.
When we sing, we speak to each other and share our common ideas. The entire cultural revolution that we experienced as baby boomers was brought about by music. Our songs were, in many ways, revolutionary. We heard them, they touched us in some way, we began singing with the radio and with our friends. Before long, the songs worked their way down into our shared consciousness and we began to believe them.
Much of what our generation believed in we heard in songs. Much of it turned out to be garbage, but nonetheless we shared it with our friends by singing together. We sang everywhere. And we still do oldies radio is big and the listeners will many times get up and start dancing to the music, even in the grocery store or the mall.
Singing speaks and teaches and comforts and unites and is just plain fun. you come across them occasionally, but it is rare to find someone who at least doesn’t sing along in the car with his or her radio.
That is why we sing in church. It isn’t just to hear ourselves and show off, it is to encourage and praise. We encourage each other and we praise our God. We sing in psalms, hymns and spiritual songs.
Psalms are the sacred poetry we find in the Bible. There is not only the Book of Psalms, but also psalms written in other places throughout the Bible. A psalm is nothing more than a piece of poetry, short or long, that is written as a response to God in some way. it can be sad, or happy, or angry or just a piece of praise. It can also be any piece of scripture put to music. In general, it is the Bible put to words.
Hymns are the anthems we sing in large groups that seem to unite us. They are usually a story song, like Amazing Grace. They tell a story from start to finish. Or maybe they just take a thought or lesson and carry it from beginning to end. Some hymns are quite long, and they are what some people associate with church.
I believe that the day of hymns is gone for the present. They may enjoy a resurgence in the future, but for the most part, they are too long for most people to sing. For better or worse, our attention span is shorter today.
And hymns can be boring. At least they can be to me. Especially if you get one of the long ones like One Day When Heaven Was Filled With His Glory. 6 or 7 verses, sung slowly and majestically. In my acappella background, I hated them because they were guided by the song leader, who usually sang them slow.
Spiritual songs are the peppy ones like the Gaithers sang. No Tears in Heaven. Power in the Blood. Just a Little Talk with Jesus. This Old House. There were songs that were mostly just fun and encouraging. The lesson they taught was short and fun to sing. They were the ones that we enjoyed singing when we got together after church.
We did that a lot when I was growing up and well into my middle years. Coming from an acappella background, we enjoyed singing together and would do it for hours. The parts would all be represented and we would sing in glorious harmony.
It is the one thing I miss from the Church of Christ more than any: the shared joy of singing. Sure, people like to sing in church and all, but there was a joy in singing that has been in no other denomination I have seen.
I have always loved to sing and am glad that God gave us that avenue. Praise be to his name.
Singing is an amazing phenomenon. It is shared by just about everybody in the world, no matter their culture or background. It is a desire to join with others in a shared experience. It unites groups. It speaks from our hearts. It teaches and comforts and is just plain fun.
When we sing, we speak to each other and share our common ideas. The entire cultural revolution that we experienced as baby boomers was brought about by music. Our songs were, in many ways, revolutionary. We heard them, they touched us in some way, we began singing with the radio and with our friends. Before long, the songs worked their way down into our shared consciousness and we began to believe them.
Much of what our generation believed in we heard in songs. Much of it turned out to be garbage, but nonetheless we shared it with our friends by singing together. We sang everywhere. And we still do oldies radio is big and the listeners will many times get up and start dancing to the music, even in the grocery store or the mall.
Singing speaks and teaches and comforts and unites and is just plain fun. you come across them occasionally, but it is rare to find someone who at least doesn’t sing along in the car with his or her radio.
That is why we sing in church. It isn’t just to hear ourselves and show off, it is to encourage and praise. We encourage each other and we praise our God. We sing in psalms, hymns and spiritual songs.
Psalms are the sacred poetry we find in the Bible. There is not only the Book of Psalms, but also psalms written in other places throughout the Bible. A psalm is nothing more than a piece of poetry, short or long, that is written as a response to God in some way. it can be sad, or happy, or angry or just a piece of praise. It can also be any piece of scripture put to music. In general, it is the Bible put to words.
Hymns are the anthems we sing in large groups that seem to unite us. They are usually a story song, like Amazing Grace. They tell a story from start to finish. Or maybe they just take a thought or lesson and carry it from beginning to end. Some hymns are quite long, and they are what some people associate with church.
I believe that the day of hymns is gone for the present. They may enjoy a resurgence in the future, but for the most part, they are too long for most people to sing. For better or worse, our attention span is shorter today.
And hymns can be boring. At least they can be to me. Especially if you get one of the long ones like One Day When Heaven Was Filled With His Glory. 6 or 7 verses, sung slowly and majestically. In my acappella background, I hated them because they were guided by the song leader, who usually sang them slow.
Spiritual songs are the peppy ones like the Gaithers sang. No Tears in Heaven. Power in the Blood. Just a Little Talk with Jesus. This Old House. There were songs that were mostly just fun and encouraging. The lesson they taught was short and fun to sing. They were the ones that we enjoyed singing when we got together after church.
We did that a lot when I was growing up and well into my middle years. Coming from an acappella background, we enjoyed singing together and would do it for hours. The parts would all be represented and we would sing in glorious harmony.
It is the one thing I miss from the Church of Christ more than any: the shared joy of singing. Sure, people like to sing in church and all, but there was a joy in singing that has been in no other denomination I have seen.
I have always loved to sing and am glad that God gave us that avenue. Praise be to his name.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. (Acts 2:42-47)
When I first got married, I spent every moment I could with my new wife. She was so much fun to be with. Any chance I had to sneak away from work (I was in the army in Germany at the time), I would take it.
Some of my friends laughed at me about it. But I did not care. I just liked being with her and she liked being with me. Being married was new and fresh and fun. I never missed an opportunity to be with her, to walk around town with her, to eat with her, just to be with her.
After a while, though, the new wears off and, if you are fortunate and work at it, you move into a good relationship.
Of course, sometimes it is easy to view that new relationship – one of familiarity and solidity – as being boring. The problem is, you cannot be a newlywed all your life.
The same with church. When you first came to Jesus, it was all new. The songs were new, the stuff was new, the people were new. And it was fun because you hadn’t done it before.
After a while, though, it settles into a relationship. And if you are not careful, you can see that as being boring.
It isn’t though. It is comfortable. You are with people you know and you are comfortable with them. Instead of a new situation, it become s a good situation. It is like the lady who walked into church today. She had not been there for a week or so as she was sick. She wanted to come back and when she came in she just looked around and said, it is good to be back in church.
That is the comfortable situation. You are with friends. You eat together, you laugh together, you pray and sing together, you study together.
That is the relationship you search for in marriage, in friendships, in church. And it is good.
When I first got married, I spent every moment I could with my new wife. She was so much fun to be with. Any chance I had to sneak away from work (I was in the army in Germany at the time), I would take it.
Some of my friends laughed at me about it. But I did not care. I just liked being with her and she liked being with me. Being married was new and fresh and fun. I never missed an opportunity to be with her, to walk around town with her, to eat with her, just to be with her.
After a while, though, the new wears off and, if you are fortunate and work at it, you move into a good relationship.
Of course, sometimes it is easy to view that new relationship – one of familiarity and solidity – as being boring. The problem is, you cannot be a newlywed all your life.
The same with church. When you first came to Jesus, it was all new. The songs were new, the stuff was new, the people were new. And it was fun because you hadn’t done it before.
After a while, though, it settles into a relationship. And if you are not careful, you can see that as being boring.
It isn’t though. It is comfortable. You are with people you know and you are comfortable with them. Instead of a new situation, it become s a good situation. It is like the lady who walked into church today. She had not been there for a week or so as she was sick. She wanted to come back and when she came in she just looked around and said, it is good to be back in church.
That is the comfortable situation. You are with friends. You eat together, you laugh together, you pray and sing together, you study together.
That is the relationship you search for in marriage, in friendships, in church. And it is good.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: He said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.” (Mark 2:27-28)
There are greater things in God’s sight than doctrine. People trump doctrine.
It is our tendency to got o what is written down and say well, it says this. And the written word is important. It is God’s only sure way of communicating with us.
But there comes a time when you have to factor in the human element into it all.
In this passage, Jesus is being griped at for doing stuff on the Sabbath day. His offense? He and his disciples went through a grain field and ate some of the grain on the Sabbath day. On the Sabbath day, you were not supposed to do anything. Through the years, it had become interpreted as literally nothing done on that day.
What God had intended as a day of rest became a worshipped object. Jesus violated their interpretations of God’s word and made them mad.
He goes back to the Old Testament and the story of David. He and his men were very hungry and went into the temple and ate the special bread given to God that was kept on display. Ultimately, it was shown that it was okay in special circumstances to go around the prohibition against working. The Sabbath was meant for rest, not total turpitude.
Those in power, however, had their interpretations that were special and holy to them. You could do nothing on the Sabbath, no matter what. Jesus and the apostles needed. They even got mad when he healed people on the Sabbath, They counted that, as great as it was and as wonderful as the ability to heal was, as working. Even though it was somewhat of an emergency for them – they were traveling and had no opportunity to get anything else to eat – it didn’t matter. The law came first, people came second.
Jesus said that people came first. People trump doctrine. Sure, the Bible says something and it is absolutely true. But we have to remember that when Jesus was faced with a person and the sin that person committed, he always chose the person.
When the woman was caught in adultery in John 7-8, he didn’t condone her sin, he condemned the readiness with which people condemned. He condemned the condemnor, not the condemned. He hated the sin – he was after all God – but he loved the person. He tried to show that God was a God of second chances, that sometimes there were extenuating circumstances.
And for sure he wasn’t about to obey somebody else’s idea of God’s will. Much of their Sabbath day stuff was made up by committees of theologians who cared more about the word and cared little or none about the person the word was intended to bring to God..
The Sabbath was intended to help people rest. They had turned it into an assistant god that they felt compelled to worship.
It is kind of like people who will not allow the sanctuary to be used for anything other than common church services. Or feel so compelled to keep things the way they are – worship, prayer, translations of the Bible, preaching styles – that they drive people out.
Any time stuff gets more important than God, we are sinning. Jesus said he came to save, not condemn. He came to bring people to God, not separate them. He still hates sin, but he loves people and will give them every chance he can to come back to God.
So will I.
There are greater things in God’s sight than doctrine. People trump doctrine.
It is our tendency to got o what is written down and say well, it says this. And the written word is important. It is God’s only sure way of communicating with us.
But there comes a time when you have to factor in the human element into it all.
In this passage, Jesus is being griped at for doing stuff on the Sabbath day. His offense? He and his disciples went through a grain field and ate some of the grain on the Sabbath day. On the Sabbath day, you were not supposed to do anything. Through the years, it had become interpreted as literally nothing done on that day.
What God had intended as a day of rest became a worshipped object. Jesus violated their interpretations of God’s word and made them mad.
He goes back to the Old Testament and the story of David. He and his men were very hungry and went into the temple and ate the special bread given to God that was kept on display. Ultimately, it was shown that it was okay in special circumstances to go around the prohibition against working. The Sabbath was meant for rest, not total turpitude.
Those in power, however, had their interpretations that were special and holy to them. You could do nothing on the Sabbath, no matter what. Jesus and the apostles needed. They even got mad when he healed people on the Sabbath, They counted that, as great as it was and as wonderful as the ability to heal was, as working. Even though it was somewhat of an emergency for them – they were traveling and had no opportunity to get anything else to eat – it didn’t matter. The law came first, people came second.
Jesus said that people came first. People trump doctrine. Sure, the Bible says something and it is absolutely true. But we have to remember that when Jesus was faced with a person and the sin that person committed, he always chose the person.
When the woman was caught in adultery in John 7-8, he didn’t condone her sin, he condemned the readiness with which people condemned. He condemned the condemnor, not the condemned. He hated the sin – he was after all God – but he loved the person. He tried to show that God was a God of second chances, that sometimes there were extenuating circumstances.
And for sure he wasn’t about to obey somebody else’s idea of God’s will. Much of their Sabbath day stuff was made up by committees of theologians who cared more about the word and cared little or none about the person the word was intended to bring to God..
The Sabbath was intended to help people rest. They had turned it into an assistant god that they felt compelled to worship.
It is kind of like people who will not allow the sanctuary to be used for anything other than common church services. Or feel so compelled to keep things the way they are – worship, prayer, translations of the Bible, preaching styles – that they drive people out.
Any time stuff gets more important than God, we are sinning. Jesus said he came to save, not condemn. He came to bring people to God, not separate them. He still hates sin, but he loves people and will give them every chance he can to come back to God.
So will I.
Friday, October 22, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: A man finds joy in giving an apt reply – and how good is a timely word! (Proverbs 15:23)
Nothing is much worse that saying the first thing that comes to your mind and it turning out to be the wrong thing. It has always been a problem of my own and it is one I have always hated. If it were not for the fact that I am so absolutely big, I would have gotten hit several times when I was younger.
But to say the right thing, something that helps someone. The ability and opportunity to say the right thing and an encouraging thing to someone who needs it is a gift from God. It is something that makes you feel good, and helps you minister to someone when they need it. It isn’t a flip remark, it is a comment that comes from a heart of love. And it is good.
I really believe that having enough of the mind of God inside you makes that happen. I have an awful lot of the word of God inside me. But when I was younger, I always seemed to lack discernment. I don’t know many who can match me for knowledge, but knowledge doesn’t matter when you lack discernment. Discernment is that which causes you to see what you say through a filter, to weigh your words before you say them.
That is just plain hard.
The writer of the book of James said that we can harness any creature known to man, but we cannot harness our own tongues. And it is true. Such a small organ in our bodies, yet it causes so much pain and hurt.
But it can also heal so much. An apt reply can do a lot. I have gained the ability to defuse situations through the years, mainly by just not talking. Someone is angry or confrontational and I usually just stand and listen. Sometimes the silence is an apt reply. Sometimes you just interject a soft or soothing word, or even a word of sympathy or empathy, or even the noncommittal grunt that you learn to do as a counselor.
A lot of times it is body posture that is the apt reply. Since I am over 6 feet tall and am large, I have had to learn to stand differently with some people. Cocking the head a little, bending over a little – all these lessen a confrontational stance and help people realize you are not going to fight them or condemn them. I always thought it was great the way Christopher Reeve lessened his size when he was Clark Kent, just by standing differently. It made him unrecognizable to a degree. Just standing differently can have such an impact on people.
The classic condemnation stance – standing straight and looking down your nose at someone – does a lot of harm. You recall that Jesus never condemned anyone except for those who made it their job to condemn (Matthew 23). He was one that people could talk to and know that even though he did not approve of their lifestyle, he still loved them.
There is that old song that has a line “You don’t tug on Superman’s cape.” Someone the other day suggested that Superman was the guy that if somebody tugged on his cape, he would look around to see if he needed help. That is the apt reply, the timely word, the desire and ability to help someone by a good and comforting word.
That apt reply and timely word is the answer of the presence of the word of God and his love in your life coming out to help others. And it can be beautiful in action.
I strive daily for it. Maybe I can get it before I die.
Nothing is much worse that saying the first thing that comes to your mind and it turning out to be the wrong thing. It has always been a problem of my own and it is one I have always hated. If it were not for the fact that I am so absolutely big, I would have gotten hit several times when I was younger.
But to say the right thing, something that helps someone. The ability and opportunity to say the right thing and an encouraging thing to someone who needs it is a gift from God. It is something that makes you feel good, and helps you minister to someone when they need it. It isn’t a flip remark, it is a comment that comes from a heart of love. And it is good.
I really believe that having enough of the mind of God inside you makes that happen. I have an awful lot of the word of God inside me. But when I was younger, I always seemed to lack discernment. I don’t know many who can match me for knowledge, but knowledge doesn’t matter when you lack discernment. Discernment is that which causes you to see what you say through a filter, to weigh your words before you say them.
That is just plain hard.
The writer of the book of James said that we can harness any creature known to man, but we cannot harness our own tongues. And it is true. Such a small organ in our bodies, yet it causes so much pain and hurt.
But it can also heal so much. An apt reply can do a lot. I have gained the ability to defuse situations through the years, mainly by just not talking. Someone is angry or confrontational and I usually just stand and listen. Sometimes the silence is an apt reply. Sometimes you just interject a soft or soothing word, or even a word of sympathy or empathy, or even the noncommittal grunt that you learn to do as a counselor.
A lot of times it is body posture that is the apt reply. Since I am over 6 feet tall and am large, I have had to learn to stand differently with some people. Cocking the head a little, bending over a little – all these lessen a confrontational stance and help people realize you are not going to fight them or condemn them. I always thought it was great the way Christopher Reeve lessened his size when he was Clark Kent, just by standing differently. It made him unrecognizable to a degree. Just standing differently can have such an impact on people.
The classic condemnation stance – standing straight and looking down your nose at someone – does a lot of harm. You recall that Jesus never condemned anyone except for those who made it their job to condemn (Matthew 23). He was one that people could talk to and know that even though he did not approve of their lifestyle, he still loved them.
There is that old song that has a line “You don’t tug on Superman’s cape.” Someone the other day suggested that Superman was the guy that if somebody tugged on his cape, he would look around to see if he needed help. That is the apt reply, the timely word, the desire and ability to help someone by a good and comforting word.
That apt reply and timely word is the answer of the presence of the word of God and his love in your life coming out to help others. And it can be beautiful in action.
I strive daily for it. Maybe I can get it before I die.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Romans 9: God's Sovereign Choice and Israel's Unbelief
We are studying the book of Romans on Wednesday nights. This is our outline for tonight. Use it for your own study if you wish. May it be good and bring you closer to God.
Romans 9: God's Sovereign Choice and Israel's Unbelief
Let’s go back over the book so far and see what was talked about:
- Chapter 1:1-16 – Paul introduces himself and his position in the kingdom
- Chapter 1:17-3:31 – the need for everyone to know God and how it is the most natural thing to do so.
- Chapter 4 – an example of great faith leading to grace.
- Chapter 5 – the two sons of God, Adam (Luke 3:38) and Jesus, and how one brought death and the other brought life into the world.
- Chapter 6 – who we serve in our lives.
- Chapter 7 – the problem of trying to do it all ourselves.
- Chapter 8 – that great chapter on the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus and grace.
Chapters 9-11 go in a different direction, one that is almost odd. He leaves the discussion of faith and grace as opposed to works and law and talks about how it is we come into Jesus. He says that we are adopted. Where once the people of God – the Jews – were natural born now we are all, Jew and Gentile alike, adopted.
He also makes a big point out of the fact that it was not so unusual for God to make another choice as to who would be his people. He did that with Abraham’s sons (Isaac was chosen over Ishmael and Eliezar), he did it with Isaac’s sons, he did it with others. He is doing it again.
QUESTIONS:
1. Again in vv1-4, Paul wants us to know that he is speaking truth. You can tell that it is from his heart when he writes that he would die for his fellow Jews. Do you feel that strongly about anyone?
2. He does make mention in v6 that it is not the word of God that failed. Why would he say that? Who would think it did?
3. Not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. A rather odd comment. What do you think that means? (cf Galatians 3:29)
4. Why do you think God waited until Abraham and Sarah were so old before he started their family?
5. V8 The children of the promise. Who do you think that was? Who is it today?
6. I will have mercy on whom I have mercy. Does that mean that God can do what he wants regardless of how we feel or what we need? Can you really blame Pharaoh for just being used by God for his purposes?
7. In v25, Paul says that God changed his people. Those who were not became the sons of God. The orphans became the heirs. How does this make you feel? Does it matter to you?
8. V27 Only the remnant will be saved. Who are the remnant?
9. V29 gives a good reason God finally gave Abraham a real son. What was it?
10. Vv30-32 – the harder Israel tried, the further away God became. The Gentiles did nothing yet God blessed them. Why do you think this is so?
11. Jesus is called a stumbling block. Why do you think?
daily java
Daily Java: I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart. (Psalm 40:8).
For the will of God to truly work, it has to be in your heart. It has to be more than just something you do. Even if the something you do is special and important to you, if it is not in your heart, it is easy to quit doing it.
It may be a chore you do for a neighbor, or a committee you joined. Maybe it is an office you hold. These things are important to you and you always make time to do them.
But the will of God is different. It is not something important in your life, it is your life. If it is in your heart, you will not only do it, but you will live it and you will love it. It becomes part of you, the basis of your spiritual DNA, guiding you and directing every part of your life.
Otherwise, it is just rote memorization and stuff that you do. When it just becomes stuff you do, it ceases to be vital.
Jesus said that in order for us to be truly with him, we had to take him into us like we take in food and drink (John 6:53-56). We have to be one with him. If we aren’t, it really doesn’t make any difference.
He said at one point that calling him Lord wouldn’t matter, if we didn’t internalize him and his words. Just doing stuff doesn’t matter. Just calling him Lord doesn’t matter. The book of James says that the demons do that. They know he is God, but don’t do anything about it.
I want him in my heart. I want him to be part of me, a part that I can no longer live without than I can my heart or my lungs. I want him to be so integrated into my existence that without him, I would die.
I want him my heart.
For the will of God to truly work, it has to be in your heart. It has to be more than just something you do. Even if the something you do is special and important to you, if it is not in your heart, it is easy to quit doing it.
It may be a chore you do for a neighbor, or a committee you joined. Maybe it is an office you hold. These things are important to you and you always make time to do them.
But the will of God is different. It is not something important in your life, it is your life. If it is in your heart, you will not only do it, but you will live it and you will love it. It becomes part of you, the basis of your spiritual DNA, guiding you and directing every part of your life.
Otherwise, it is just rote memorization and stuff that you do. When it just becomes stuff you do, it ceases to be vital.
Jesus said that in order for us to be truly with him, we had to take him into us like we take in food and drink (John 6:53-56). We have to be one with him. If we aren’t, it really doesn’t make any difference.
He said at one point that calling him Lord wouldn’t matter, if we didn’t internalize him and his words. Just doing stuff doesn’t matter. Just calling him Lord doesn’t matter. The book of James says that the demons do that. They know he is God, but don’t do anything about it.
I want him in my heart. I want him to be part of me, a part that I can no longer live without than I can my heart or my lungs. I want him to be so integrated into my existence that without him, I would die.
I want him my heart.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me. (Psalm 51:12).
It is 4:30AM. For some reason, I just woke up. The sleep mask I wear suddenly was constrictive and was giving me a headache. I was stopped up and having trouble breathing in it also. I laid there and tried to make it work but I finally had to get up.
I had some a dream in which we were at a visitation meeting of some kind. Mel and Miriam Eaton from Boonville, the pastors for the church there and my friends, were there. She was wearing a large plastic hat that collected dirty rainwater. I had on a pair of pants that blew air up my legs and I was thin but crippled. There were a lot of people there. No other ideas as to what was going on.
I lose my dreams quickly, for the most part. Occasionally, I will remember one vividly and come in and write it down, but it never seems to mean anything later. Very rarely has the Lord spoken to me in a dream, and even then, I am not sure he was. Some dreams seem apocalyptic to me at the time, but for the most part, they are goofy.
I miss Mel and Miriam. Mel was pastor of the church in Boonville, MO, where I attended while I was going through my credentialing process in the foursquare Church. We got to be friends and I enjoyed talking with him. I think he had never had a friend to talk to as we did, and I rarely do. Good theology and stuff discussions. It seems that when I find a friend, I always end up leaving them. Life can be annoying.
There is a joy in salvation that is not in anything else. People can see it. It is the knowledge that one is at peace with the universe. Even though bad things still happen, and they will, there is the knowledge that God will work it out in the end. It is not up to me. I have had control and screwed it up badly. God has taken it and worked it for good, and loves me at the same time.
Of course, I have to want all this, too. Without his Spirit in me, it will do no good. I can want it and he can want it, but unless we connect, there can be no working together.
I can want to be friends with someone and they can want to be friends with me, but unless we get together and become friends, it will be for nothing. There has to be the joy of friendship, but also the willing desire to not only begin the friendship, but keep it going.
Some friendships are not worth the hassle. Maybe the other person is too weird or demanding or maybe the situation is just not right for the friendship.
God gives salvation so freely and also gives the spirit of his friendship to us if we will accept it. He not only takes us to dinner, he picks up t e check. Our response: we love him and accept his friendship. Of course, it is a little more complicated than that, but that is essentially the deal.
That joy can only come through association with him. It can’t come in any other way. no other relationship on this earth can be like that one. It is, in many ways, like the relationship a husband and wife develop over years of being married and becoming not only comfortable with each other, but also dependent on each other. It is a relationship that is in no other part of life.
There is also the relationship of two old friends who have been friends for decades and are comfortable with each other. They know each other’s problems and foibles (that’s a good word) and yet are still friends. And of course, the relationship of two people who have worked together for so long that they no longer are a single person, but have become a unit, depending upon the other person in the job, whatever it may be.
All kinds of stuff comes to mind as I sit here at 4:42 AM.
I pray that God gives me no only that joy, but also that willing spirit. May his name be praised.
It is 4:30AM. For some reason, I just woke up. The sleep mask I wear suddenly was constrictive and was giving me a headache. I was stopped up and having trouble breathing in it also. I laid there and tried to make it work but I finally had to get up.
I had some a dream in which we were at a visitation meeting of some kind. Mel and Miriam Eaton from Boonville, the pastors for the church there and my friends, were there. She was wearing a large plastic hat that collected dirty rainwater. I had on a pair of pants that blew air up my legs and I was thin but crippled. There were a lot of people there. No other ideas as to what was going on.
I lose my dreams quickly, for the most part. Occasionally, I will remember one vividly and come in and write it down, but it never seems to mean anything later. Very rarely has the Lord spoken to me in a dream, and even then, I am not sure he was. Some dreams seem apocalyptic to me at the time, but for the most part, they are goofy.
I miss Mel and Miriam. Mel was pastor of the church in Boonville, MO, where I attended while I was going through my credentialing process in the foursquare Church. We got to be friends and I enjoyed talking with him. I think he had never had a friend to talk to as we did, and I rarely do. Good theology and stuff discussions. It seems that when I find a friend, I always end up leaving them. Life can be annoying.
There is a joy in salvation that is not in anything else. People can see it. It is the knowledge that one is at peace with the universe. Even though bad things still happen, and they will, there is the knowledge that God will work it out in the end. It is not up to me. I have had control and screwed it up badly. God has taken it and worked it for good, and loves me at the same time.
Of course, I have to want all this, too. Without his Spirit in me, it will do no good. I can want it and he can want it, but unless we connect, there can be no working together.
I can want to be friends with someone and they can want to be friends with me, but unless we get together and become friends, it will be for nothing. There has to be the joy of friendship, but also the willing desire to not only begin the friendship, but keep it going.
Some friendships are not worth the hassle. Maybe the other person is too weird or demanding or maybe the situation is just not right for the friendship.
God gives salvation so freely and also gives the spirit of his friendship to us if we will accept it. He not only takes us to dinner, he picks up t e check. Our response: we love him and accept his friendship. Of course, it is a little more complicated than that, but that is essentially the deal.
That joy can only come through association with him. It can’t come in any other way. no other relationship on this earth can be like that one. It is, in many ways, like the relationship a husband and wife develop over years of being married and becoming not only comfortable with each other, but also dependent on each other. It is a relationship that is in no other part of life.
There is also the relationship of two old friends who have been friends for decades and are comfortable with each other. They know each other’s problems and foibles (that’s a good word) and yet are still friends. And of course, the relationship of two people who have worked together for so long that they no longer are a single person, but have become a unit, depending upon the other person in the job, whatever it may be.
All kinds of stuff comes to mind as I sit here at 4:42 AM.
I pray that God gives me no only that joy, but also that willing spirit. May his name be praised.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: “Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart.” (Psalm 37:4).
The desires of your heart. Everybody wants to be happy. Everybody wants a fulfilling job, a happy home, a good family, hobbies and friends and stuff. But the problem comes when all that is not enough.
There is an old song sung by Helen Reddy, I think, that says “Is that all there is?” she goes through several things in life, both good and bad and at the end of each thing asks, Is that all there is? The singer says, sure the stuff is big and important and heart breaking, but surely there is more.
It is only God who gives us what we need. That sound so churchy and simplistic. But it is true. Only God can fill what one called that God-shaped vacuum in your life.
One of the problems with our upcoming generation is that they cannot get enough. Have you noticed that the thrills are getting more dangerous? Theme parks are hard pressed to keep up with the escalating expectations of the younger bunch. The movies are hard pressed to keep up with the desire for more horror, more gore, more violence, just more in general. The stunts at skate parks are getting more and more dangerous, more and more alcohol is being consumed, on and on.
I know that my generation started a lot of this by the experimentation in sex and drugs and music and a bunch of other things, but the problem is, the more you get, the more you want. The more you experience, the more you need to experience to maintain the same high.
And when that high is only physical, it has to be higher and higher. The only real satisfaction is in God. He alone can give you the real desires of your heart.
I have always maintained that music is a call from God. When a musician answers that call in God he is happy and fulfilled. When he doesn’t, when he tries to answer it in the world, he almost always self-destructs. Look at the number of incredibly talented musicians that have died many times from their own hands.
The other day, I heard a very talented guitarist and singer that reminded me of a happy Jimi Hendrix. He had found his music in the Lord and it looked like it. He had found the desire of his heart, and it was hard for me not to envy him.
Others find that desire in other ways. It may be in mission work, or in the joy of carpentry or marriage or anything as a Christ-follower, just serving him. It may be large, it may be small, but it will be the desire of their heart.
The desire of our heart is not necessarily that which we want. It is that which fills us, which satisfies and completes us. Only in him can we be truly be satisfied in life. Everything else is temporary and ultimately useless. He will give you what lasts and really makes you happy.
That fulfillment may not be what you thought it was. In fact, it rarely ever is. What really makes you happy is not necessarily what you set out to find. But if you accept God and his will in your life and his leading and, as the scripture says, delight yourself in him, you will be happy.
The desires of your heart. Everybody wants to be happy. Everybody wants a fulfilling job, a happy home, a good family, hobbies and friends and stuff. But the problem comes when all that is not enough.
There is an old song sung by Helen Reddy, I think, that says “Is that all there is?” she goes through several things in life, both good and bad and at the end of each thing asks, Is that all there is? The singer says, sure the stuff is big and important and heart breaking, but surely there is more.
It is only God who gives us what we need. That sound so churchy and simplistic. But it is true. Only God can fill what one called that God-shaped vacuum in your life.
One of the problems with our upcoming generation is that they cannot get enough. Have you noticed that the thrills are getting more dangerous? Theme parks are hard pressed to keep up with the escalating expectations of the younger bunch. The movies are hard pressed to keep up with the desire for more horror, more gore, more violence, just more in general. The stunts at skate parks are getting more and more dangerous, more and more alcohol is being consumed, on and on.
I know that my generation started a lot of this by the experimentation in sex and drugs and music and a bunch of other things, but the problem is, the more you get, the more you want. The more you experience, the more you need to experience to maintain the same high.
And when that high is only physical, it has to be higher and higher. The only real satisfaction is in God. He alone can give you the real desires of your heart.
I have always maintained that music is a call from God. When a musician answers that call in God he is happy and fulfilled. When he doesn’t, when he tries to answer it in the world, he almost always self-destructs. Look at the number of incredibly talented musicians that have died many times from their own hands.
The other day, I heard a very talented guitarist and singer that reminded me of a happy Jimi Hendrix. He had found his music in the Lord and it looked like it. He had found the desire of his heart, and it was hard for me not to envy him.
Others find that desire in other ways. It may be in mission work, or in the joy of carpentry or marriage or anything as a Christ-follower, just serving him. It may be large, it may be small, but it will be the desire of their heart.
The desire of our heart is not necessarily that which we want. It is that which fills us, which satisfies and completes us. Only in him can we be truly be satisfied in life. Everything else is temporary and ultimately useless. He will give you what lasts and really makes you happy.
That fulfillment may not be what you thought it was. In fact, it rarely ever is. What really makes you happy is not necessarily what you set out to find. But if you accept God and his will in your life and his leading and, as the scripture says, delight yourself in him, you will be happy.
Monday, October 18, 2010
my brown fleece robe
I am wearing a brown robe that Ella made me. It is made of brown fleece and I wear it after I get through with my bath. If I had my druthers, I would wear it a lot.
There are things that you love to wear that are not really appropriate outside the house that you wish you could wear all the time. I told Ella that if she dies before me, I will probably wear nothing but brown robes like the Franciscans, and live in two rooms. One for my office and reception room and one for my small lonely bed.
I don’t know if I really will but I love my robe and I wait for winter each year to wear it. I still have a caftan my mother made me back in the early 70’s out of doubleknit that I cannot wear right now until I lose weight. One day I will. But it has been the clothing of every Bible character you could imagine in the past. It is just biblical enough to do well as Bible clothing.
Just a couple of years ago I played Judas/apostle number 4 in an Easter play. There were only four apostles due to lack of enough people, but the caftan did well.
That year I discovered that I could wear it unbelted. I had always worn a sash with it, but I discovered that it looked good unsashed. Not to mention that it was a lot more comfortable, as I have lost the sashed look long ago.
The brown robe is warm and loose and comfortable and would really make a good single piece of clothing. The Franciscan monks have a good idea, although they can’t get married and all. Ella would complain.
But still, it sure is comfortable.
There are things that you love to wear that are not really appropriate outside the house that you wish you could wear all the time. I told Ella that if she dies before me, I will probably wear nothing but brown robes like the Franciscans, and live in two rooms. One for my office and reception room and one for my small lonely bed.
I don’t know if I really will but I love my robe and I wait for winter each year to wear it. I still have a caftan my mother made me back in the early 70’s out of doubleknit that I cannot wear right now until I lose weight. One day I will. But it has been the clothing of every Bible character you could imagine in the past. It is just biblical enough to do well as Bible clothing.
Just a couple of years ago I played Judas/apostle number 4 in an Easter play. There were only four apostles due to lack of enough people, but the caftan did well.
That year I discovered that I could wear it unbelted. I had always worn a sash with it, but I discovered that it looked good unsashed. Not to mention that it was a lot more comfortable, as I have lost the sashed look long ago.
The brown robe is warm and loose and comfortable and would really make a good single piece of clothing. The Franciscan monks have a good idea, although they can’t get married and all. Ella would complain.
But still, it sure is comfortable.
daily java
Daily Java: Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters;
and you who have no money, come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost.
Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare. (Isaiah 55:1-2)
We work so hard for stuff that will be gone in a couple of years. $1000 a month or more for a house that is falling down around us. $300 a month for a car that is depreciating with ever mile. $300 for a suit that begins to wear out the minute we put it on. $75 for dinner that is going to end up as waste. A pile of money for electronics that are obsolete the moment you unpack them, for movies that you may or may not enjoy, for toys for the kids that they will outgrow in just a few months – and on and on.
Life is really depressing if you look at it this way. you work like a dog to get money to spend on stuff that will be broken in just a short time. And the money is gone. And soon, the stuff is gone.
Look back over your life. What is it that you spent a lot of money on that is really worth it? In my life, maybe the 12 string guitar. All the cars I have bought are gone and I am driving a minivan that I paid $100 for. Ella’s keyboard. I seriously cannot think if a single thing that I paid a lot of money for that I even still have.
We recently have tried to get rid of a lot of stuff. We wanted to simplify our lives. I’m not sure it worked. Things kind of find their way to our house whether we really need them or not.
But the point is, the stuff that is really worth it is either unavailable at any price or worth everything you have. You cannot buy the things of God at any price. There is not enough money in the world to get them. On the other hand, the things of God have to be gotten with the entirety of your life. They are free, yet they cost everything.
That is the thing about grace. Bonhoeffer called it cheap grace. He said grace is free, it cannot be purchased with any amount of money. However, it is not cheap. It requires your whole life.
The wine and milk is without cost. The bread is free. All we do is give our lives to him. As Jesus said, where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
and you who have no money, come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost.
Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare. (Isaiah 55:1-2)
We work so hard for stuff that will be gone in a couple of years. $1000 a month or more for a house that is falling down around us. $300 a month for a car that is depreciating with ever mile. $300 for a suit that begins to wear out the minute we put it on. $75 for dinner that is going to end up as waste. A pile of money for electronics that are obsolete the moment you unpack them, for movies that you may or may not enjoy, for toys for the kids that they will outgrow in just a few months – and on and on.
Life is really depressing if you look at it this way. you work like a dog to get money to spend on stuff that will be broken in just a short time. And the money is gone. And soon, the stuff is gone.
Look back over your life. What is it that you spent a lot of money on that is really worth it? In my life, maybe the 12 string guitar. All the cars I have bought are gone and I am driving a minivan that I paid $100 for. Ella’s keyboard. I seriously cannot think if a single thing that I paid a lot of money for that I even still have.
We recently have tried to get rid of a lot of stuff. We wanted to simplify our lives. I’m not sure it worked. Things kind of find their way to our house whether we really need them or not.
But the point is, the stuff that is really worth it is either unavailable at any price or worth everything you have. You cannot buy the things of God at any price. There is not enough money in the world to get them. On the other hand, the things of God have to be gotten with the entirety of your life. They are free, yet they cost everything.
That is the thing about grace. Bonhoeffer called it cheap grace. He said grace is free, it cannot be purchased with any amount of money. However, it is not cheap. It requires your whole life.
The wine and milk is without cost. The bread is free. All we do is give our lives to him. As Jesus said, where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
my first car
I dearly loved the car. It was my first foray into independence. With a job and an apartment and this car, I was a free man. And then a good-looking girl friend on top of it all. I had it made.
At some time in the past, the driver side rear fender had been hit and crumpled a little. The tail light (which was vaguely rocket-ship shaped) had been replaced, so it stuck out at an angle from the fender.
The day after I got it, I decided to wax it. When I did, the paint almost all came off. It had evidently never been waxed and the paint had oxidized. Even though that was extremely disappointing, I still enjoyed the car. I had it for about a year and a half, maybe two years and drove the wheels off it.
I bought it in order to be able to go to work for the telephone company. Even though I did no maintenance on it, it always started and always drove.
Ella learned to shift on that car. When Ella and I started going together, I would drive with my arm around her. Like a lot of girls of the era, she would shift while I operated the clutch. It was a fun thing and one I remember with a great degree of fondness.
I drove the car back to Fort Gordon in Augusta, GA, when I went back to AIT after Christmas break. I would drive guys to town for a dollar each with the provision that if they were drunk when it came time to go home, they had to find another way.
At times I would take up to ten guys to town. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I really hurt the car doing that. But, of course, I was 20 and somewhat oblivious to car maintenance.
On the way back to Fort Gordon I picked up Billy Brewer, a guy in my unit, in Sulphur, LA. On the way home before I went to Germany, I took him and a guy named Lincoln home.
Lincoln was a black man who lived in Mississippi in what I found out, to my amazement, extreme poverty. His family didn’t even have running water in their house. People in the army all wore the same clothes and it was a tremendous equalizer. You get to thinking that everyone is the same and they aren’t.
I loved that car. Ella and I would fill the back floorboard with empty Dr Pepper cans and various wrappers. By the time Dad got rid of it, the front seat was pretty split,
But it did us well as we were dating and we did a lot of kissing in that car.
Other than maybe my 1956 Chevrolet pickup, I never had a car that was quite as much fun.
daily java
Daily Java: But this is what the LORD says: "Yes, captives will be taken from warriors, and plunder retrieved from the fierce;
I will contend with those who contend with you, and your children I will save.
I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh; they will be drunk on their own blood, as with wine.
Then all mankind will know that I, the LORD, am your Savior, your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob." (Isaiah 49:25-26)
I really feel lousy today. I don’t know what it is except maybe a cold. And, of course, the scripture for today is depressing.
Except for a bit in the lower middle about v9 that says, say to the captives, 'Come out,' and to those in darkness, 'Be free!' , it all is rather depressing.
A lot of that is probably because I feel lousy. Maybe so. But it is a truth that much of what God said through his prophets was not happy, nor really very inspiring. Much of it was written to a group of people who were acting stupidly. God was telling them that they needed to wise up and do what was right, instead of being foolish.
That is the case today also. When you hear words from God given in the assembly, many times they are happy words: “God loves you and wants the best for you.” Things like that.
But in the Old Testament, the words came saying things like “Wise up or I will slap the fire out of you.” Rarely were the words from God happy ones. There were happy parts on occasion like the one in Isaiah 49:9. But they were not the norm.
In churches that claim to have a word from God they are the norm. people do not want to hear bad things and will make up good things to get out of it.
They did the same in the Old Testament. False prophets would come and say good stuff, tell the people good things. In his book, Jeremiah was faced with this a lot. His people liked the good stuff, too. Who wouldn’t?
But that is not what God had to say preachers have this same problem. People love good, positive preaching. However, God doesn’t always say good positive things. When the preacher says them people are sometimes angry. That is a natural reaction.
But sometimes God has to make us angry to make us realize his will.
I do wish there had been something more comforting today, though. I really feel crummy.
I will contend with those who contend with you, and your children I will save.
I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh; they will be drunk on their own blood, as with wine.
Then all mankind will know that I, the LORD, am your Savior, your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob." (Isaiah 49:25-26)
I really feel lousy today. I don’t know what it is except maybe a cold. And, of course, the scripture for today is depressing.
Except for a bit in the lower middle about v9 that says, say to the captives, 'Come out,' and to those in darkness, 'Be free!' , it all is rather depressing.
A lot of that is probably because I feel lousy. Maybe so. But it is a truth that much of what God said through his prophets was not happy, nor really very inspiring. Much of it was written to a group of people who were acting stupidly. God was telling them that they needed to wise up and do what was right, instead of being foolish.
That is the case today also. When you hear words from God given in the assembly, many times they are happy words: “God loves you and wants the best for you.” Things like that.
But in the Old Testament, the words came saying things like “Wise up or I will slap the fire out of you.” Rarely were the words from God happy ones. There were happy parts on occasion like the one in Isaiah 49:9. But they were not the norm.
In churches that claim to have a word from God they are the norm. people do not want to hear bad things and will make up good things to get out of it.
They did the same in the Old Testament. False prophets would come and say good stuff, tell the people good things. In his book, Jeremiah was faced with this a lot. His people liked the good stuff, too. Who wouldn’t?
But that is not what God had to say preachers have this same problem. People love good, positive preaching. However, God doesn’t always say good positive things. When the preacher says them people are sometimes angry. That is a natural reaction.
But sometimes God has to make us angry to make us realize his will.
I do wish there had been something more comforting today, though. I really feel crummy.
Friday, October 15, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: Some pour out gold from their bags and weigh out silver on the scales;
they hire a goldsmith to make it into a god, and they bow down and worship it.
They lift it to their shoulders and carry it; they set it up in its place, and there it stands; from that spot it cannot move.
Though one cries out to it, it does not answer; it cannot save him from his troubles. (Isaiah 46:6-7)
You work a job for almost 30 years and one day you are laid off for no real good reason. You still have your retirement, but it won’t kick in until you are 65, so for the moment, you are stuck.
You build your dream home and expect to live there forever and you have lost your job and it is gone.
You buy a new and expensive car, but with the payment and the insurance and the fact that it is a SUV and the gas is high, you can’t really go anywhere.
You set your trust in stuff and the stuff lets you down.
There is nothing wrong in trusting in your work or anything else. But when it becomes the focal point of your life, and troubles come – as they will – it cannot help you.
These guys pooled all their gold and silver and hired a guy to make them a great idol. After he did, they carried it to a special place and set it on a great looking pedestal. It was impressive. People came from miles around to see it. Newspaper articles were written about it and it was on TV and radio.
Or would have been, if they had TV and radio and newspapers.
It was considered to be a great thing.
But then problems came. There was a drought and a famine and a cholera epidemic. They came to their god and prayed and nothing happened.
Nothing is more worthless than something that you put your trust in that has no power.
Anything you can put together and guide cannot do anything for you in the long run. Anything that you were involved in the creation of is powerless to help you in the long run.
Only God is real. Only he can help you.
they hire a goldsmith to make it into a god, and they bow down and worship it.
They lift it to their shoulders and carry it; they set it up in its place, and there it stands; from that spot it cannot move.
Though one cries out to it, it does not answer; it cannot save him from his troubles. (Isaiah 46:6-7)
You work a job for almost 30 years and one day you are laid off for no real good reason. You still have your retirement, but it won’t kick in until you are 65, so for the moment, you are stuck.
You build your dream home and expect to live there forever and you have lost your job and it is gone.
You buy a new and expensive car, but with the payment and the insurance and the fact that it is a SUV and the gas is high, you can’t really go anywhere.
You set your trust in stuff and the stuff lets you down.
There is nothing wrong in trusting in your work or anything else. But when it becomes the focal point of your life, and troubles come – as they will – it cannot help you.
These guys pooled all their gold and silver and hired a guy to make them a great idol. After he did, they carried it to a special place and set it on a great looking pedestal. It was impressive. People came from miles around to see it. Newspaper articles were written about it and it was on TV and radio.
Or would have been, if they had TV and radio and newspapers.
It was considered to be a great thing.
But then problems came. There was a drought and a famine and a cholera epidemic. They came to their god and prayed and nothing happened.
Nothing is more worthless than something that you put your trust in that has no power.
Anything you can put together and guide cannot do anything for you in the long run. Anything that you were involved in the creation of is powerless to help you in the long run.
Only God is real. Only he can help you.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
another btw
a new phone
Well, alert the media, you say. So what?
We have had nothing but cell phones for quite a while now. To make it worse, they are from an area code that is in another state. And to top it all off, they are from a carrier that has lousy service here in Nebraska.
They have always been good and we have been satisfied with their service until now. Since we are in a contract that won’t expire until next month, that means that we are stuck with lousy phones.
So – we have been thinking. Dangerous pursuit, I know. From such revolutions have been born. But I have decided that I want a plain old land line. And I don’t want it attached to my cable. I want it from the phone company. Unless a line gets blown down or broken, that line stays active even in tornadoes and natural calamities.
And – here is the kicker – if I can find one, I am going to get a rotary phone. A black one. With a dial. Luddite-ville here I come.
It won’t be my primary phone of course. There is little worse than trying to dial a long distance number with a lot of zeroes on a rotary phone.
But I just want one. I think I know where I can get one for free. But if I can’t, I found a website that sells old 50 year old reconditioned Western Electric telephones for $40. These are the same kind that I worked on when I worked for Southwestern Bell Telephone back in the 17th century.
Now those phones could take a beating. They were heavy and strong and had great voice and hearing quality. It was much better than the junk we have available to us from WalMart today.
The funny thing about it is that I am excited to get it. I never thought I would. Now I do not want DSL, the phone company based internet service. It is junk compared to cable internet. But I also do not want a cable phone. Probably my dream rotary phone will not work on it.
So – there it is again – we are regressing. We will keep our cell phones. They are a handy set of cultural handcuffs so we will keep on using them, just with a new company as soon as our contract goes out.
Tell you what. I’ll dial your number and give you a call. Stay on the line.
BTW – did you know that the dial tone is an F. it is a great way to tune your guitar if your tuner’s batteries died.
daily java
Daily Java: Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past.
See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. (Isaiah 43:18-19)
Everybody has a backstory.
Sometimes it is a good one. They came from a good family and had good things happen to them, a happy childhood, they did well in their work, life was good.
Sometimes it is a bad one. Abuse and neglect characterized their past, sadness follows them today.
But whatever the backstory, God has something new for everybody. He says to forget what came in the past because he has something new, something brand new for us.
Our problem is that we dwell on the past too much. We cannot seem to get rid of it and it haunts us.
If our past was successful, we remember that, especially if we are not successful any longer. We remember our past successes and realize that the future holds something different. We may be successful again, it may be that we will be just as successful, but will we match the older success? Will things ever be as good as they were for us?
If our past was bad, and we made mistakes, we remember that. Will we make those mistakes again? We wish we had not made them, and they come back to torment us, especially at night when we are trying to get to sleep.
With churches as a corporate body, it is the same. A church was a huge, successful church back in the 70’s and remembers that. And, of course, they want to be again. Those were the days when people noticed them, asked their advice, the leaders were important people, they had tons of money to spend on stuff, missionaries begged their indulgence, the denomination had them on a special list.
Now they are small. And it may be for no real fault of their own. They may be in a changed demographic now, the neighborhood has shifted from what it was to something almost alien to many in the church. It may be that people have left the town, the dominant industry has changed or shut down. It may just be that the church is stuck in the past and cannot seem to be able to move forward.
Maybe there was open sin in the leadership in the past, or the church made some major financial blunders and people left because of it.
Maybe nothing happened at all and people just kind of drifted away to greener pastures, other churches that looked more exciting.
Maybe the church just died.
There are all kinds of reasons why a church has a bad past. The hardest thing for a church to do is to realize that the past is in the past and the future is in God. Isaiah says that God is doing a new thing. The old thing is gone.
That, of course, is the problem. The church wants to grow, but what they want is the old thing revived and for them to be the way they were 40 or 50 years ago. And it will not ever happen.
That old thing is gone. For the church to grow once again, and for it to be able to accept the leading of God it has to acknowledge that there is a new thing, something new, something completely different.
And we do perceive it. That’s why it gets so much resistance. People can see the new thing and they don’t want it. They want the old. God keeps showing them the new thing and they say no. Then, after a while, God takes away the new thing and leaves them with what they have: death.
I want to be part of the new thing. I want to live and let God live in my church.
See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. (Isaiah 43:18-19)
Everybody has a backstory.
Sometimes it is a good one. They came from a good family and had good things happen to them, a happy childhood, they did well in their work, life was good.
Sometimes it is a bad one. Abuse and neglect characterized their past, sadness follows them today.
But whatever the backstory, God has something new for everybody. He says to forget what came in the past because he has something new, something brand new for us.
Our problem is that we dwell on the past too much. We cannot seem to get rid of it and it haunts us.
If our past was successful, we remember that, especially if we are not successful any longer. We remember our past successes and realize that the future holds something different. We may be successful again, it may be that we will be just as successful, but will we match the older success? Will things ever be as good as they were for us?
If our past was bad, and we made mistakes, we remember that. Will we make those mistakes again? We wish we had not made them, and they come back to torment us, especially at night when we are trying to get to sleep.
With churches as a corporate body, it is the same. A church was a huge, successful church back in the 70’s and remembers that. And, of course, they want to be again. Those were the days when people noticed them, asked their advice, the leaders were important people, they had tons of money to spend on stuff, missionaries begged their indulgence, the denomination had them on a special list.
Now they are small. And it may be for no real fault of their own. They may be in a changed demographic now, the neighborhood has shifted from what it was to something almost alien to many in the church. It may be that people have left the town, the dominant industry has changed or shut down. It may just be that the church is stuck in the past and cannot seem to be able to move forward.
Maybe there was open sin in the leadership in the past, or the church made some major financial blunders and people left because of it.
Maybe nothing happened at all and people just kind of drifted away to greener pastures, other churches that looked more exciting.
Maybe the church just died.
There are all kinds of reasons why a church has a bad past. The hardest thing for a church to do is to realize that the past is in the past and the future is in God. Isaiah says that God is doing a new thing. The old thing is gone.
That, of course, is the problem. The church wants to grow, but what they want is the old thing revived and for them to be the way they were 40 or 50 years ago. And it will not ever happen.
That old thing is gone. For the church to grow once again, and for it to be able to accept the leading of God it has to acknowledge that there is a new thing, something new, something completely different.
And we do perceive it. That’s why it gets so much resistance. People can see the new thing and they don’t want it. They want the old. God keeps showing them the new thing and they say no. Then, after a while, God takes away the new thing and leaves them with what they have: death.
I want to be part of the new thing. I want to live and let God live in my church.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
a man like us
Elijah was a man just like us. (James 5:17)
Now there’s a weird thing. Elijah was considered to be one of the greatest men to ever live. It was he who was taken up by God in a flaming chariot before he died so he wouldn’t have to taste death. He was the one who was pitted against 850 other prophets in a fire battle – which of their gods would bring down fire from heaven – and his God did spectacularly. He performed miracle after miracle and stood up to some of the worst kings and queens in Israelite history.
In other words, if he had been in Greek mythology, he would have been a demi-god like Hercules.
But the writer James, in the New Testament, says that Elijah was like us. In other words, he did nothing that we couldn’t do if we were in tune enough with God like he was.
That’s the thing about the Bible people. When the writers, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wrote the Bible, they never whitewashed the people of God. There they were with all their faults, yet God loved them and used them.
All of them had talents, yes, but God used them. Abraham was a liar who tried to sacrifice his wife to save his own life. Samson was an idiot who never really did accomplish that much. Samuel was a lousy parent. David was a guy who couldn’t keep his hands off other women and would kill to cover up his indiscretions. Peter had a temper problem and ran away when he was confused. Paul had a pride problem and worked hard to keep it under control. On and on.
Yet God used all of these people to accomplish his ends and they were all favored by him.
Why? Good question. I don’t know. Except to maybe say that we don’t have to be Supermen to be the prophets and workers of God.
Jesus was Jesus. No one else was Jesus. He was the only one who was perfect. He did the right thing all the time.
The rest of the Bible people were flawed. They were all damaged goods. They had major faults. Elijah, the guy I was talking about at the first, had a depression problem and had the tendency to run away at the wrong time. Yet he was the one James used as an example of a powerful prayer to God.
There was a drought brought on by the Lord through the mouth of Elijah. When it came time for it to stop, Elijah prayed and it rained for a long time. It was Elijah who was there when the dry bones came to life. It was Elijah who did so much. Yet he was flawed.
All of the Bible people were flawed. Every one.
What does that mean? It means that we, though we are all flawed big-time, can be used by God to do great things. His power in us can overcome even a lifetime of goofiness and failure.
But it is his power. Just like it was through Elijah. And like it can through your life.
Now there’s a weird thing. Elijah was considered to be one of the greatest men to ever live. It was he who was taken up by God in a flaming chariot before he died so he wouldn’t have to taste death. He was the one who was pitted against 850 other prophets in a fire battle – which of their gods would bring down fire from heaven – and his God did spectacularly. He performed miracle after miracle and stood up to some of the worst kings and queens in Israelite history.
In other words, if he had been in Greek mythology, he would have been a demi-god like Hercules.
But the writer James, in the New Testament, says that Elijah was like us. In other words, he did nothing that we couldn’t do if we were in tune enough with God like he was.
That’s the thing about the Bible people. When the writers, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wrote the Bible, they never whitewashed the people of God. There they were with all their faults, yet God loved them and used them.
All of them had talents, yes, but God used them. Abraham was a liar who tried to sacrifice his wife to save his own life. Samson was an idiot who never really did accomplish that much. Samuel was a lousy parent. David was a guy who couldn’t keep his hands off other women and would kill to cover up his indiscretions. Peter had a temper problem and ran away when he was confused. Paul had a pride problem and worked hard to keep it under control. On and on.
Yet God used all of these people to accomplish his ends and they were all favored by him.
Why? Good question. I don’t know. Except to maybe say that we don’t have to be Supermen to be the prophets and workers of God.
Jesus was Jesus. No one else was Jesus. He was the only one who was perfect. He did the right thing all the time.
The rest of the Bible people were flawed. They were all damaged goods. They had major faults. Elijah, the guy I was talking about at the first, had a depression problem and had the tendency to run away at the wrong time. Yet he was the one James used as an example of a powerful prayer to God.
There was a drought brought on by the Lord through the mouth of Elijah. When it came time for it to stop, Elijah prayed and it rained for a long time. It was Elijah who was there when the dry bones came to life. It was Elijah who did so much. Yet he was flawed.
All of the Bible people were flawed. Every one.
What does that mean? It means that we, though we are all flawed big-time, can be used by God to do great things. His power in us can overcome even a lifetime of goofiness and failure.
But it is his power. Just like it was through Elijah. And like it can through your life.
daily java
Jesus Christ, by Matt Redman
Daily Java: Sing to the LORD a new song, his praise from the ends of the earth. (Isaiah 42:10)
Singing is kind of strange when you think about it. It is a group of people uniting their voices in a common series of words and tones. If you had never heard it before, it would be weird.
But we have heard it before and we like it. Almost every culture that has ever existed has some from of common singing. It just feels good.
Singing as a group of people does two things. First, it unites the group that is singing. There is something about singing together that makes people feel good about themselves and what they are doing.
We sang as we marched in the army. They were stupid and non-sensical songs, but we sang them and we marched together better. People sing to go to war or when engaged in some common activity. People enjoy hearing the singing because it imparts that bit of strength to the listener, too.
Second, singing teaches. The more you sing something, the more you begin to believe it.
That is what happened with my generation. So many of the songs we heard were revolutionary songs. They helped to change our minds about morality, war (especially in Vietnam), patriotism – a lot of stuff. Unfortunately, most of it was for the worst.
Even if you couldn’t really understand the words (and many were almost unintelligible) enough came through that it impacted your mind.
The same is true when you hear a car drive by and the young man or woman driving has a rap song blaring that talks about things that are not good, using profanity, encouraging young men to hurt young women or to rob or steal. You hear it enough and sooner or later you begin to believe it.
That is a value of Christian music radio. Yes, many of the songs are simplistic and sometimes banal. But they speak of praise. And God did say sing a new song. Sing something new. Write enough new songs and some of them are going to be good.
Christian music does three things. It teaches, it praises and it encourages. The old songs did
those well, especially the teaching. Some of them were nothing more than long musical Bible lessons. And musically, some of them were superb.
But you can only listen to the same thing long enough that sooner or later it becomes commonplace. That is why God wanted a new song. He wanted something fresh and new and able to touch us again where he wanted us touched: our minds as well as our hearts.
Nostalgia singing is big business right now and will last for another 20 years or so before it dies. Boomers love to hear their old songs. But the more you hear them, and the more you finally understand the words you couldn’t quite get before, the more you realize that these were quite simple songs, sometimes with goofy messages sung by kids. 40 years later, they sound a little silly.
Part of the problem with our national music scene now is that there are no new songs on the pop charts that are really worth anything. So we keep going back to the old.
That is not true in Christian music. There are many good ones, as well as many silly ones. But the ones that are good touch us again. They are fresh.
And I know God likes them for that reason. After all, he said so in this verse.
Daily Java: Sing to the LORD a new song, his praise from the ends of the earth. (Isaiah 42:10)
Singing is kind of strange when you think about it. It is a group of people uniting their voices in a common series of words and tones. If you had never heard it before, it would be weird.
But we have heard it before and we like it. Almost every culture that has ever existed has some from of common singing. It just feels good.
Singing as a group of people does two things. First, it unites the group that is singing. There is something about singing together that makes people feel good about themselves and what they are doing.
We sang as we marched in the army. They were stupid and non-sensical songs, but we sang them and we marched together better. People sing to go to war or when engaged in some common activity. People enjoy hearing the singing because it imparts that bit of strength to the listener, too.
Second, singing teaches. The more you sing something, the more you begin to believe it.
That is what happened with my generation. So many of the songs we heard were revolutionary songs. They helped to change our minds about morality, war (especially in Vietnam), patriotism – a lot of stuff. Unfortunately, most of it was for the worst.
Even if you couldn’t really understand the words (and many were almost unintelligible) enough came through that it impacted your mind.
The same is true when you hear a car drive by and the young man or woman driving has a rap song blaring that talks about things that are not good, using profanity, encouraging young men to hurt young women or to rob or steal. You hear it enough and sooner or later you begin to believe it.
That is a value of Christian music radio. Yes, many of the songs are simplistic and sometimes banal. But they speak of praise. And God did say sing a new song. Sing something new. Write enough new songs and some of them are going to be good.
Christian music does three things. It teaches, it praises and it encourages. The old songs did
those well, especially the teaching. Some of them were nothing more than long musical Bible lessons. And musically, some of them were superb.
But you can only listen to the same thing long enough that sooner or later it becomes commonplace. That is why God wanted a new song. He wanted something fresh and new and able to touch us again where he wanted us touched: our minds as well as our hearts.
Nostalgia singing is big business right now and will last for another 20 years or so before it dies. Boomers love to hear their old songs. But the more you hear them, and the more you finally understand the words you couldn’t quite get before, the more you realize that these were quite simple songs, sometimes with goofy messages sung by kids. 40 years later, they sound a little silly.
Part of the problem with our national music scene now is that there are no new songs on the pop charts that are really worth anything. So we keep going back to the old.
That is not true in Christian music. There are many good ones, as well as many silly ones. But the ones that are good touch us again. They are fresh.
And I know God likes them for that reason. After all, he said so in this verse.
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
daily java
Daily Java: A voice of one calling: "In the desert prepare the way for the LORD;
make straight in the wilderness a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain.
And the glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all mankind together will see it.
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken."
A voice says, "Cry out." And I said, "What shall I cry?"
"All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field.
The grass withers and the flowers fall,
because the breath of the LORD blows on them.
Surely the people are grass.
The grass withers and the flowers fall,
but the word of our God stands forever." (Isaiah 40:3-8)
We live on a beautiful earth. This time of year, as the leaves all change, we are reminded of how beautiful it is.
It is only natural that we like it, as it is, after all, all we know. It’s not like we have experience with other planets. This is our home.
But as beautiful as our earth is, it will one day die. The flowers die, the yards turn brown, the leaves fall off, time passes. But God’s word remains. No matter how many people have predicted its demise, it remains.
No matter how many TV shows and movies show a “better world” without God, he remains. No matter how many politicians or entertainers with their min-brains predict a world without God, he remains.
One of the stupidest songs to ever come down the pike is the song “Imagine” by John Lennon. “Imagine no religion, it’s easy if you try.” The idea that a person who is a hedonist and hates for people to tell him he is wrong in his life-choices has decided that it is easy to imagine a world without faith in God is ludicrous.
The problem comes, though, with us as Christians living in such a world, what many call a “post-Christian” society. We become a voice crying out in a desert, we come one who is trying to tell the word of God, to bring the grace of God into a world that increasingly denies it.
But he is eternal. He will remain. And it is becoming apparent that Christianity is not yet dead. More and more people are naming his name. America is going through a drought, but around the world the impact of Christianity is strong. You can tell by the number of time you read of Muslims and others killing Christians, trying to shut them up.
You can also tell by the amount of movies put out in which Christians are the bad guys, in which society is shown free from the “shackles” of Christianity. The forces of darkness are fighting. If Christianity were really dead, Hollywood and the Muslims would not even mention it.
These too will pass away, just like every government and popular person that ever lived. But the word of God will remain.
make straight in the wilderness a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain.
And the glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all mankind together will see it.
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken."
A voice says, "Cry out." And I said, "What shall I cry?"
"All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field.
The grass withers and the flowers fall,
because the breath of the LORD blows on them.
Surely the people are grass.
The grass withers and the flowers fall,
but the word of our God stands forever." (Isaiah 40:3-8)
It is only natural that we like it, as it is, after all, all we know. It’s not like we have experience with other planets. This is our home.
But as beautiful as our earth is, it will one day die. The flowers die, the yards turn brown, the leaves fall off, time passes. But God’s word remains. No matter how many people have predicted its demise, it remains.
No matter how many TV shows and movies show a “better world” without God, he remains. No matter how many politicians or entertainers with their min-brains predict a world without God, he remains.
One of the stupidest songs to ever come down the pike is the song “Imagine” by John Lennon. “Imagine no religion, it’s easy if you try.” The idea that a person who is a hedonist and hates for people to tell him he is wrong in his life-choices has decided that it is easy to imagine a world without faith in God is ludicrous.
The problem comes, though, with us as Christians living in such a world, what many call a “post-Christian” society. We become a voice crying out in a desert, we come one who is trying to tell the word of God, to bring the grace of God into a world that increasingly denies it.
But he is eternal. He will remain. And it is becoming apparent that Christianity is not yet dead. More and more people are naming his name. America is going through a drought, but around the world the impact of Christianity is strong. You can tell by the number of time you read of Muslims and others killing Christians, trying to shut them up.
You can also tell by the amount of movies put out in which Christians are the bad guys, in which society is shown free from the “shackles” of Christianity. The forces of darkness are fighting. If Christianity were really dead, Hollywood and the Muslims would not even mention it.
These too will pass away, just like every government and popular person that ever lived. But the word of God will remain.
Monday, October 11, 2010
living in germany
There were museums and a castle and we lived in an apartment just down a cobblestone street from the Russian Orthodox Cathedral that Czar Nicholas used when he came to visit the in-laws, Alexandra’s family. It was visible from our window – gold tipped spires and a reflecting pool inlaid with gold – and had a university attached to it.
We loved to go to the castle in the middle of Darmstadt and look at the armor and stuff. It was quite beautiful. We had a red Volkswagen, but took the bus a lot, as it was easy and cheap and had a stop just down the street from our house. Since we had to park a couple of blocks away from our apartment, it was just as easy to take the bus unless we were going a long way.
The castle had a moat around it that was empty now, grass growing in it. On one side of the platz, the plaza, in front of the castle was a large building – I am not sure what of – that had been bombed in World War II. I am sure they kept it intact as it was to remind the Americans who were, after all, the occupying forces of what had happened.
In front of the castle, out in the middle of the platz, was a little café. It had tables and chairs for the customers to sit and watch the foot traffic on the platz. It made us, at 21 and 19, feel continental as we sat sipping Coca-Cola and lemon, something we had never had before and that seemed so continental. The combination was a European one that was really quite good and just different enough to make us feel special. We were in Europe and seeing things that were European.
But to a young married couple coming into a relationship that was enhanced by the distance from our families, it was wonderful. Not every young couple gets to have a European honeymoon.
I was thinking about that tonight for no real reason. It is a special memory: us sitting on the platz drinking Coke with lemon watching people from another culture living in their world. It was so different from ours, yet so similar.
It was almost 40 years ago and it seems like just a short time ago. I love my wife and am glad I got to take that little 19 year old to Europe to immerse her in that culture. I am grateful that the little 19 year old allowed me to share her life and gave me her love. I will love her until I die.
shadow box
There is my badge and patch from when I was a cop. Next to it is German money from 1971. Next is a matchbox and train ticket stubs from Germany. The next square holds a Flagship Hotel soap and a soap from the airplane (Saturn Airways – the last of the prop-assisted jet planes) I rode coming back from Germany. Behind it is a couple of patches from Germany.
Beside the badge on the second row is a penny in a bottle. Beside it is a pin from an anniversary of Woodstock. Next to that is a house carved out of a piece of tree bark.
The next row is a group of Rosenthal cat figures Ella liked. We also got those in Germany. There is also a ceramic toucan that came from Lord knows where.
The row beneath those has some arrowheads I found and some scarabs from an Egyptian exhibit on Rameses II. Beside both of those rows is a camel carved from olive wood from Israel and a bottle of Japanese Oil, Ella’s dad’s cure-all.
Beneath that row are a knife from Ella’s dad and tie pins I used to wear. Beside that is my senior ring from seminary and a picture of Ella from 1980 that I particularly like. Next to it is another scarab, an onyx turtle, a brass frog and a mashed penny.
On the last row is a nail from an old building and a heart I carved out of a bar of Ivory soap one night while I was on guard duty. It has a peace symbol on one side and JC + EC on the other. Next to it is an old car I have had since I was a child. The last box has another nail, two civil war minie balls and a brass ankh.
It is indeed odd what you keep on your life journey.
daily java
Daily Java: Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. (Colossians 3:1-4)
It is a fact that you do not hit what you do not aim at. Rarely do you hit the target by accident.
No one ever lived the Christian life well by accident. No one ever got to heaven and said, wow, I didn’t mean to do that.
You live the Christian life on purpose by looking to the motivation: God.
I learned how to shoot in the army. I found out that I was a good shot with a rifle. I could hit whatever I aimed at. The key was to look at your target and sight over the rifle. It wasn’t so much a matter of carefully aiming, it was a matter of sighting over the rifle, looking at what you wanted to shoot, and then pulling the trigger.
You hit what you were looking at. If you were not looking at it, or if you were not concentrating on it, you did not hit it.
Guys would complain that they were not good shots and the drill sergeants or others would try to help them (or heap abuse on them, depending on the teacher), but the problem came down to the fact that they were not concentrating on the target.
They would concentrate on the rifle, on the sight, people around them, on their own eyes even, but in order to hit the target, they had to concentrate on the target.
The apostle Peter found this out in Matthew 14. He wanted to walk on the water towards Jesus. Jesus said come on. Peter stepped out and began to do so. But he quit looking at Jesus and looked at everything else. When he did he sank.
Romans 15:4 says everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. God told us about Peter in order to show us the importance of keeping our eyes on the target.
To please him, to go to him, we have to keep him in our sights. We set our hearts on things above, we set our minds on things above – we look at him. We don’t look at the Bible, or our lives, or the preacher, or the church or anything else. These are important and play a significant role.
But our primary focus is God, and Jesus Christ through him. If we set our hearts on that, we will hit what we aim at.
It is a fact that you do not hit what you do not aim at. Rarely do you hit the target by accident.
No one ever lived the Christian life well by accident. No one ever got to heaven and said, wow, I didn’t mean to do that.
You live the Christian life on purpose by looking to the motivation: God.
I learned how to shoot in the army. I found out that I was a good shot with a rifle. I could hit whatever I aimed at. The key was to look at your target and sight over the rifle. It wasn’t so much a matter of carefully aiming, it was a matter of sighting over the rifle, looking at what you wanted to shoot, and then pulling the trigger.
You hit what you were looking at. If you were not looking at it, or if you were not concentrating on it, you did not hit it.
Guys would complain that they were not good shots and the drill sergeants or others would try to help them (or heap abuse on them, depending on the teacher), but the problem came down to the fact that they were not concentrating on the target.
They would concentrate on the rifle, on the sight, people around them, on their own eyes even, but in order to hit the target, they had to concentrate on the target.
The apostle Peter found this out in Matthew 14. He wanted to walk on the water towards Jesus. Jesus said come on. Peter stepped out and began to do so. But he quit looking at Jesus and looked at everything else. When he did he sank.
Romans 15:4 says everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. God told us about Peter in order to show us the importance of keeping our eyes on the target.
To please him, to go to him, we have to keep him in our sights. We set our hearts on things above, we set our minds on things above – we look at him. We don’t look at the Bible, or our lives, or the preacher, or the church or anything else. These are important and play a significant role.
But our primary focus is God, and Jesus Christ through him. If we set our hearts on that, we will hit what we aim at.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
i am damaged goods
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. (Matthew 5:4)
I am damaged goods.
There have been a lot of things that have happened in my almost four decades as a pastor that have been truly bad. And the worst part of it is that they were done in the name of God by people who have claimed to be living by the Holy Spirit.
It has affected me in a lot of ways. And there has been a lot of anger come up because of it.
Add to that the fact that my family suffered because of it and it has sometimes been almost overwhelming.
All ministers are like that to an extent. It is one reason so many PK’s are angry about being such. They have seen the ugly side of Christians in the abuse heaped on their father in the pursuit of his ministry and because of his love for God.
Jesus knew this. After all, it was he who hung on a cross even though he had done nothing to deserve it. Those who crucified him thought that they were doing church in a normal way. Like modern folks, if they didn’t like what the preacher was saying or how he was doing his job, they would fire him. The fact that it would hurt his family and his children and him personally made no difference.
Oh, they might look sad at the meeting and say some stuff about how sorry they were to be having to do this, but they lied.
And they lied to Jesus. They told him that he was not from God because they could not believe God would say what Jesus said. They wanted a Messiah that was strong and forceful and one that would give them what they wanted, not what God wanted. After all, what they wanted took precedence over what God wanted. Did they not give to the church? They were important members.
But Jesus did what God wanted anyway and in the doing was killed.
The remarkable thing about Jesus was that as he was dying, after they had nailed nails into his hands and put a crown of thorns on his head, after they had beaten him half to death and spit on him, after they had humiliated him by his public shaming – after all this, he said Father, forgive them. They do not understand what they are doing.
He knew they thought they were doing things like they should be done, like they had always been done. He knew they didn’t understand.
They had always done that. They were like a church that has gone through minister after minister, trying to find one that would tell them what they wanted to hear. They went through prophet after prophet looking for the perfect one. The ones that told them what they wanted, they rewarded. The others they killed.
Jesus knew this and he mourned. And he said that those who know this and mourned would be comforted. He knew that there is something better than what happens here on this earth.
Those who have hurt his men and women of God will know sooner or later that they have done wrong. I do mourn for all the Preachers’ Kids that suffer for it, for all the pastors’ wives who find themselves homeless, for all the ministers who have been thrown out “in the name of God,” for all the weak members who leave the church because of the hypocrisy.
And I remember that it happened to Jesus and he forgave. I can do no less.
I am damaged goods. We all are, because we have all been damaged by sin and the effects of it.
Just like Jesus. He was the perfect man of God and still got thrown away by his church. He, like me, was damaged.
I would like to forgive like him and be like him. I am damaged goods, but I am also his child.
I am damaged goods.
There have been a lot of things that have happened in my almost four decades as a pastor that have been truly bad. And the worst part of it is that they were done in the name of God by people who have claimed to be living by the Holy Spirit.
It has affected me in a lot of ways. And there has been a lot of anger come up because of it.
Add to that the fact that my family suffered because of it and it has sometimes been almost overwhelming.
All ministers are like that to an extent. It is one reason so many PK’s are angry about being such. They have seen the ugly side of Christians in the abuse heaped on their father in the pursuit of his ministry and because of his love for God.
Jesus knew this. After all, it was he who hung on a cross even though he had done nothing to deserve it. Those who crucified him thought that they were doing church in a normal way. Like modern folks, if they didn’t like what the preacher was saying or how he was doing his job, they would fire him. The fact that it would hurt his family and his children and him personally made no difference.
Oh, they might look sad at the meeting and say some stuff about how sorry they were to be having to do this, but they lied.
And they lied to Jesus. They told him that he was not from God because they could not believe God would say what Jesus said. They wanted a Messiah that was strong and forceful and one that would give them what they wanted, not what God wanted. After all, what they wanted took precedence over what God wanted. Did they not give to the church? They were important members.
But Jesus did what God wanted anyway and in the doing was killed.
The remarkable thing about Jesus was that as he was dying, after they had nailed nails into his hands and put a crown of thorns on his head, after they had beaten him half to death and spit on him, after they had humiliated him by his public shaming – after all this, he said Father, forgive them. They do not understand what they are doing.
He knew they thought they were doing things like they should be done, like they had always been done. He knew they didn’t understand.
They had always done that. They were like a church that has gone through minister after minister, trying to find one that would tell them what they wanted to hear. They went through prophet after prophet looking for the perfect one. The ones that told them what they wanted, they rewarded. The others they killed.
Jesus knew this and he mourned. And he said that those who know this and mourned would be comforted. He knew that there is something better than what happens here on this earth.
Those who have hurt his men and women of God will know sooner or later that they have done wrong. I do mourn for all the Preachers’ Kids that suffer for it, for all the pastors’ wives who find themselves homeless, for all the ministers who have been thrown out “in the name of God,” for all the weak members who leave the church because of the hypocrisy.
And I remember that it happened to Jesus and he forgave. I can do no less.
I am damaged goods. We all are, because we have all been damaged by sin and the effects of it.
Just like Jesus. He was the perfect man of God and still got thrown away by his church. He, like me, was damaged.
I would like to forgive like him and be like him. I am damaged goods, but I am also his child.
poor reflections
Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. (1 Corinthians 13:12)
Poor reflections. That is really all we are. No matter how great the mirror, no matter how fine the silvered backing or how good the glass, we are still all poor reflections.
I was in a rather expensive hotel a few years ago which had an enormous mirror at the end of the foyer section in front of the ballrooms. It could be seen for a long ways down the hall from the check-in area clear to the other side of the ballroom foyer.
While I was in the ballroom foyer, I enjoyed it. It was a beautiful frame and was quite large.
But when I was down the hall and saw my reflection in it, I realized that it was not a good mirror at all. Until you got right up to it, the reflection was distorted. You had to be right in front of it to get even a half-way good reflection. It was a bad quality glass.
It didn’t matter that the thing probably cost over a thousand dollars. It wasn’t a good mirror. I have had better reflections out of a five dollar mirror from WalMart.
It doesn’t matter how powerful we are or how high we are in the church structure. It doesn’t matter how much we give or anything else that those in the world consider great.
The mirror reflects according to the quality of glass. If the glass is good, no matter how cheap or expensive the mirror is, the reflection will be good. If the glass is bad, again, no matter the cost, it will be bad.
If we are good, we will reflect good. If not, no matter how often we go to church or teach or preach or give, we will not reflect good.
But even if we are the best glass around, we still are poor reflections. We are, after all, bad translations of his grace. All sin and fall short of the glory. If we say we have no sin, we lie.
So if we can reflect his grace in our lives through imperfect glass, we are doing good. His grace can overcome the glass quality and his love will show through.
How’s your glass?
Poor reflections. That is really all we are. No matter how great the mirror, no matter how fine the silvered backing or how good the glass, we are still all poor reflections.
I was in a rather expensive hotel a few years ago which had an enormous mirror at the end of the foyer section in front of the ballrooms. It could be seen for a long ways down the hall from the check-in area clear to the other side of the ballroom foyer.
While I was in the ballroom foyer, I enjoyed it. It was a beautiful frame and was quite large.
But when I was down the hall and saw my reflection in it, I realized that it was not a good mirror at all. Until you got right up to it, the reflection was distorted. You had to be right in front of it to get even a half-way good reflection. It was a bad quality glass.
It didn’t matter that the thing probably cost over a thousand dollars. It wasn’t a good mirror. I have had better reflections out of a five dollar mirror from WalMart.
It doesn’t matter how powerful we are or how high we are in the church structure. It doesn’t matter how much we give or anything else that those in the world consider great.
The mirror reflects according to the quality of glass. If the glass is good, no matter how cheap or expensive the mirror is, the reflection will be good. If the glass is bad, again, no matter the cost, it will be bad.
If we are good, we will reflect good. If not, no matter how often we go to church or teach or preach or give, we will not reflect good.
But even if we are the best glass around, we still are poor reflections. We are, after all, bad translations of his grace. All sin and fall short of the glory. If we say we have no sin, we lie.
So if we can reflect his grace in our lives through imperfect glass, we are doing good. His grace can overcome the glass quality and his love will show through.
How’s your glass?
daily java
Daily Java: Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. (1 Corinthians 13:12)
We just got back from the annual Foursquare Church convention in Denver last night late. It was a long trip but it was also a good one.
It was a good week all in all. We had the chance to see and meet a lot of people. We also had the honor being ordained into the Foursquare Church.
A lot of the people I saw I had already met on Facebook, so it was funny in some ways to finally meet them in person. I don’t know who took their pictures for Facebook but they looked nothing like what I had envisioned.
But that is often, if not always, the case. The person you meet in the flesh is most of the time different than the person you meet online, or on the phone or over the mail. You have given that person characteristics that are not always reasonable.
That is because the face to face meeting is always different than the impersonal meeting over Facebook or a letter or whatever. In those kinds of meetings, we gain information based on our own thoughts and interpretations.
When we meet face to face, we see the real person that we have made in our image. Now he is real and we see the real face, hear the real voice, see the real person.
Sometimes, it is surprising. Cameras can lie, after all. There are whole websites devoted to how Facebook pictures can look different from the real thing, how they can be cropped or photoshopped or whatever to make you look better or thinner or prettier than the real thing.
Someone we think is tall is short, someone we think is thin is not, someone we think has a fine mellow voice sounds like an accordion with a hole in it. When we see people in person, then we see the real them.
We see God in his word. As we read and pray and study and gain wisdom, his Spirit gives us insight into who God is. But when we see him, we will know, because there he will be standing for us to see.
We will see the real person then, we will gaze on the real face then, we will see as we are seen and know as we are known. All of our preconceptions will be gone and we will see God. What a day that will be!
We just got back from the annual Foursquare Church convention in Denver last night late. It was a long trip but it was also a good one.
It was a good week all in all. We had the chance to see and meet a lot of people. We also had the honor being ordained into the Foursquare Church.
A lot of the people I saw I had already met on Facebook, so it was funny in some ways to finally meet them in person. I don’t know who took their pictures for Facebook but they looked nothing like what I had envisioned.
But that is often, if not always, the case. The person you meet in the flesh is most of the time different than the person you meet online, or on the phone or over the mail. You have given that person characteristics that are not always reasonable.
That is because the face to face meeting is always different than the impersonal meeting over Facebook or a letter or whatever. In those kinds of meetings, we gain information based on our own thoughts and interpretations.
When we meet face to face, we see the real person that we have made in our image. Now he is real and we see the real face, hear the real voice, see the real person.
Sometimes, it is surprising. Cameras can lie, after all. There are whole websites devoted to how Facebook pictures can look different from the real thing, how they can be cropped or photoshopped or whatever to make you look better or thinner or prettier than the real thing.
Someone we think is tall is short, someone we think is thin is not, someone we think has a fine mellow voice sounds like an accordion with a hole in it. When we see people in person, then we see the real them.
We see God in his word. As we read and pray and study and gain wisdom, his Spirit gives us insight into who God is. But when we see him, we will know, because there he will be standing for us to see.
We will see the real person then, we will gaze on the real face then, we will see as we are seen and know as we are known. All of our preconceptions will be gone and we will see God. What a day that will be!
Sunday, October 3, 2010
create in me a pure heart
Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. (Psalm 61:10)
There can be such a failure feeling in your life. you want to do what is right but you cannot seem to do it. All the things you set out to do, the good and holy things, seem to fall by the wayside the first time temptation comes.
This psalm was written by King David just after he had committed adultery with Bathsheba and the child she became pregnant with died.
He called out to God to save him from himself. Stop the desire to do wrong and the inclination to sin. Just stop it. Change him. Make his heart pure. Make the spirit within him good and holy. Make that spirit steadfast and able to overcome failure and sin.
For a clean heart, a pure heart, a heart that yearns to God. For that I would do anything, allow any change God wanted to make. For that I would die.
Of course, in Jesus I die. In him I am dead to sin, but the inclination to sin is still there and rages like a beast, snarling and spitting, straining to come out.
Make my heart pure. Calm the raging beast. Change me. Make me like you.
There can be such a failure feeling in your life. you want to do what is right but you cannot seem to do it. All the things you set out to do, the good and holy things, seem to fall by the wayside the first time temptation comes.
This psalm was written by King David just after he had committed adultery with Bathsheba and the child she became pregnant with died.
He called out to God to save him from himself. Stop the desire to do wrong and the inclination to sin. Just stop it. Change him. Make his heart pure. Make the spirit within him good and holy. Make that spirit steadfast and able to overcome failure and sin.
For a clean heart, a pure heart, a heart that yearns to God. For that I would do anything, allow any change God wanted to make. For that I would die.
Of course, in Jesus I die. In him I am dead to sin, but the inclination to sin is still there and rages like a beast, snarling and spitting, straining to come out.
Make my heart pure. Calm the raging beast. Change me. Make me like you.
daily java
Daily Java: Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. (Psalm 61:10)
There is a yearning towards the heart of God that is in every human, whether they realize it or not. it is the pull toward our Creator that all have built instinctively into their DNA, into their minds and hearts.
We feel it in every action. We may translate it differently and try to fill it with something else, to connect with some other thing, but it is there and it is strong.
It may be sports and our desire to connect with a team, or our family or our work or hobby or sex or whatever. But we are made to push towards something.
The something that we are made to push towards is God. Someone once said that we have a God-shaped vacuum in our hearts that nothing but God will fill. Only he can satisfy that deepest need.
We want to be with him. And we want to have the kind of heart that he wants us to have. That is how we were made, to want to be with him and to be like him.
But only he can make that heart. Only he can draw us and change us. Only he can create or renew that steadfast spirit that is needed to be with him
He can do it, though. If we give him our hearts, he will change them. If we give him our spirits, he will change them. He will change us. He and he alone will make us useful and holy.
Oh, that he would create that spirit in me and make me more like him. Change me, God. Make me yours.
There is a yearning towards the heart of God that is in every human, whether they realize it or not. it is the pull toward our Creator that all have built instinctively into their DNA, into their minds and hearts.
We feel it in every action. We may translate it differently and try to fill it with something else, to connect with some other thing, but it is there and it is strong.
It may be sports and our desire to connect with a team, or our family or our work or hobby or sex or whatever. But we are made to push towards something.
The something that we are made to push towards is God. Someone once said that we have a God-shaped vacuum in our hearts that nothing but God will fill. Only he can satisfy that deepest need.
We want to be with him. And we want to have the kind of heart that he wants us to have. That is how we were made, to want to be with him and to be like him.
But only he can make that heart. Only he can draw us and change us. Only he can create or renew that steadfast spirit that is needed to be with him
He can do it, though. If we give him our hearts, he will change them. If we give him our spirits, he will change them. He will change us. He and he alone will make us useful and holy.
Oh, that he would create that spirit in me and make me more like him. Change me, God. Make me yours.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
self-doubt
This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. (1 John 3:19-20)
I have always been full of self-doubt. My tendency is to be overly analytical. I have to look at everything from 16 different ways and by the time I have finished, I have analyzed all of the good motives out of what I have done.
It is a heart full of self-doubt that does it. If I ever mention it, one of the first knee-jerk reactions of a lot of preachers, especially, and Christians in general is “You just have to have faith, brother.”
Baloney. That is the original Hebrews and Greek words paraphrased. And people who say that usually do not have the slightest idea of what they are saying or the effect it has on other people.
It is not unusual for a man striving after God to have self-doubts. That is all the way through the Bible. You often see God’s men full of self-doubt. The only one who wasn’t was Jesus himself. He had enough of God in him that he never doubted his mission. However, on the other hand, on the night of his arrest, he too began to wonder if there could be another way. If this cup could pass from me. If there is any other way. Maybe not self-doubt, but more dread.
But look at all the others. Gideon worried about whether or not God wanted him particularly. Moses tried to convince God to take someone else. Jeremiah the same. David had problems with wondering if God was even with him. Psalm 22: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Elijah, a man who was so good that he was taken up into heaven bodily so he wouldn’t have to die, had depression so bad, it immobilized him at times. Even after great miracles, he would lapse into it. At one point, he said I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too. God said, no. He still had people obeying him.
Going all the way to the New Testament, there was John the Baptizer. It was him that Jesus was talking about when he said that there wasn’t anyone greater. Yet, he sent his disciples to Jesus just to make sure that he was the one God had sent. Moments of self-doubt. What if it is all not true and I die in failure?
Paul, the great apostle himself, had these doubts. What if I get to heaven and there is no one with me and my life has been wasted (1 Corinthians 3:10-14)? What if I get there and I have a bunch of people but they get to go in and I don’t because of my pride (1 Corinthians 9:27)?
I suppose that it is not uncommon for one striving after God to have these problems. In fact, I suppose that if we have no problems we are dead, so the presence of problems indicates more life to be lived in his glory.
So I doubt, but I know that God is greater than my doubt. I don’t think I am worthy, but too bad, doodad, it doesn’t matter what I think.
The thing is, God never condemned people for having self-doubts. He made us that way, os it is highly unlikely that we will be a whole lot different.
Anyone who says otherwise does not know what they are talking about and do more harm than good.
I also think they are lying to themselves as much as to others. It is a common condition of humanity. Just look at the people I just mentioned. If Elijah Moses and Paul had self-doubt and even Jesus wanted to change the way things would be done, who are you to pretend you are so good and holy.
He is my God and I will ever serve him, even if badly and unworthily. And he knows better than I do what kind of person I am.
I have always been full of self-doubt. My tendency is to be overly analytical. I have to look at everything from 16 different ways and by the time I have finished, I have analyzed all of the good motives out of what I have done.
It is a heart full of self-doubt that does it. If I ever mention it, one of the first knee-jerk reactions of a lot of preachers, especially, and Christians in general is “You just have to have faith, brother.”
Baloney. That is the original Hebrews and Greek words paraphrased. And people who say that usually do not have the slightest idea of what they are saying or the effect it has on other people.
It is not unusual for a man striving after God to have self-doubts. That is all the way through the Bible. You often see God’s men full of self-doubt. The only one who wasn’t was Jesus himself. He had enough of God in him that he never doubted his mission. However, on the other hand, on the night of his arrest, he too began to wonder if there could be another way. If this cup could pass from me. If there is any other way. Maybe not self-doubt, but more dread.
But look at all the others. Gideon worried about whether or not God wanted him particularly. Moses tried to convince God to take someone else. Jeremiah the same. David had problems with wondering if God was even with him. Psalm 22: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Elijah, a man who was so good that he was taken up into heaven bodily so he wouldn’t have to die, had depression so bad, it immobilized him at times. Even after great miracles, he would lapse into it. At one point, he said I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too. God said, no. He still had people obeying him.
Going all the way to the New Testament, there was John the Baptizer. It was him that Jesus was talking about when he said that there wasn’t anyone greater. Yet, he sent his disciples to Jesus just to make sure that he was the one God had sent. Moments of self-doubt. What if it is all not true and I die in failure?
Paul, the great apostle himself, had these doubts. What if I get to heaven and there is no one with me and my life has been wasted (1 Corinthians 3:10-14)? What if I get there and I have a bunch of people but they get to go in and I don’t because of my pride (1 Corinthians 9:27)?
I suppose that it is not uncommon for one striving after God to have these problems. In fact, I suppose that if we have no problems we are dead, so the presence of problems indicates more life to be lived in his glory.
So I doubt, but I know that God is greater than my doubt. I don’t think I am worthy, but too bad, doodad, it doesn’t matter what I think.
The thing is, God never condemned people for having self-doubts. He made us that way, os it is highly unlikely that we will be a whole lot different.
Anyone who says otherwise does not know what they are talking about and do more harm than good.
I also think they are lying to themselves as much as to others. It is a common condition of humanity. Just look at the people I just mentioned. If Elijah Moses and Paul had self-doubt and even Jesus wanted to change the way things would be done, who are you to pretend you are so good and holy.
He is my God and I will ever serve him, even if badly and unworthily. And he knows better than I do what kind of person I am.
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