John 12:12-16
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, April 4, 2004)
About a year ago, I was working at home and decided to take a lunch break. I turned on the TV and tuned into one of the news channels. What I saw was a sight I’ll wager many of you have seen many times in the intervening year: videotape of grateful, excited Iraqis cheering as US military personnel used a tank to pull down an enormous statue of Saddam Hussein. Do you remember what happened after the statue was toppled? Many startled and grateful Iraqis shook the Americans’ hands, thumped them on the backs, and cheered them. It was a moment of celebration and victory!
Contrast those images to the ones we saw this past week from Fallujah in Iraq. American engineers, civilian workers, in that city to help rebuild the country, were ambushed and killed. A mob then gleefully desecrated their bodies. While that mob and that city don’t represent all of Iraq, one couldn’t help but wonder, “What happened this past year?”
The events we celebrate this Holy Week—the period between today, Palm Sunday, and Easter Sunday—teach us how quickly things can change in life. The events we remember this morning, everything associated with Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem as He prepared to celebrate the Jewish holiday of Passover, are well-known to you. Back in the first-century and for eons before, Jews from all over the known world would travel to Jerusalem three times a year to celebrate important religious festivals. Passover was one of those festivals. So, Jerusalem was packed with crowds of people as Jesus arrived.
Ever since Jesus’ dinner in the Jerusalem suburb of Bethany with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, which we talked about last week, there had been a buzz about the possibility of Jesus coming into town. Everybody knew that if Jesus did show up for these holy days, He would provoke a confrontation. The Roman occupiers wouldn’t like it. And the Jewish religious authorities, who had already plotted to murder Jesus’ friend, Lazarus, wouldn’t like it either.
The crowds though, ate it up! They were fed up with their religious leaders, who laid stern demands on them and told them that the only way they could live with God and avoid His punishment was by obeying a lot of human laws. They were fed up with religion! They were also fed up with these Roman outsiders running the show in the land God had given to them. But Jesus aroused a hope within them. Maybe, they probably thought, Jesus would lead the charge and throw the Romans out and bring down the religious elite and let them all do what they wanted to do.
Even the way the crowd chose to welcome Jesus indicated that they completely misunderstood Him. They waved palm leaves, something which in ancient times, Jews had used to welcome conquering military heroes. At the moment of Jesus’ arrival, the crowd didn’t think of the fact that Jesus didn’t speak in “Us vs. Them” terms. Jesus said that everybody was a sinner, everybody needed a Savior, and everybody—Jew, Roman, Iraqi, American—could follow Him and live forever with God. They certainly were ignoring Jesus’ words that their old sinful selves needed to die so that Jesus could help them become people on their way to being just like Jesus: loving servants who put the interests and needs of God and neighbor ahead of their own. As they shouted, “Hosanna!,” a word that means, “Lord, save” or “Lord, mercy!,” what they really meant was, “Give us what we want, Jesus. Treat us like kings!”
But if that’s the way they felt, events of that week would quickly leave them disappointed. The text of a Valentine’s card I recently found on the web said, “To my love. You've taken care of me when I was sick, cheered me up when I was sad, comforted me when I was in trouble. But what have you done for me lately?” Within days of their conquering hero’s welcome for Jesus, the crowd’s feelings about Him would be similar. Jesus had given them a feel-good celebration on Palm Sunday. Jesus had brought them healing and hope and the good news that God’s forgiveness and new life were free gifts for all with faith in Him. But as Sunday gave way to Monday and drifted onto become Tuesday and Wednesday, they became impatient and angry with Him. Jesus was offering them the most precious gift in the universe—life forever with God, but they weren’t interested. By Thursday, the crowd had turned completely from Jesus and wanted Him dead. Things can change quickly!
But if people are fickle, Jesus is faithful. Of all the thousands of people on the streets of Jerusalem that Palm Sunday, Jesus alone knew what was going to happen. While He wished—and even prayed—that He wouldn’t have to go through the agony of the cross, He forged ahead.
That really is the wonder of Palm Sunday: Jesus was obedient to His mission. He didn’t let the crowd, His desire for safety or popularity, or His instinct for self-preservation prevent Him from going to the cross for us. He didn’t whine about how His suffering and death were unfair. He knew that if He remained faithful to God’s plan for Him, the payoff would be enormous. And it was. At the end of the first Holy Week, Jesus Who had endured death rose again and through that miracle, opened the possibility of everlasting life to all who follow Him!
Some of you have read the phenomenal Rick Warren book, The Purpose Driven Life. Do you remember the book’s very first sentence? Warren writes, “It’s not about you.” I don’t know for certain why the people of Iraq who oppose American occupation there feel the way they do, but I have a pretty good idea why the crowds in Jerusalem turned on Jesus. I have a pretty fair idea why people turn on Him even today. I have a good idea as to why I turn on Jesus myself sometimes.
I’ll never forget a lecture given by one of my seminary professors when I was preparing to become a pastor. He had been through a lot in his life, tragedies and challenges. So, I felt that he had the right to say what he did. He talked about how difficult it was for him, after all he’d been through, to be with people who, confronting challenges in life, would ask, “Why is this happening to me?” The professor said that while he would never be so insensitive, he often wanted to shake these people and ask them, “Why shouldn’t this be happening to you?” This is not heaven. Yes, God has invaded our world and our lives through Jesus Christ. And He promises to be with us. But Jesus’ reason for coming into this world wasn’t to make this life easy. He came to change us from the inside out.
There’s a good reason for Jesus not making everything easy for us in this life. When I was growing up, my family spent time with two other families. In one of these families, the dad was a tyrant. On occasion, when the kids misbehaved, I watched him grab his kids by the throats and smack them on the ears until he thought he had control. All of those children ended up getting into lots of trouble as adolescents and adults. In the other family, the parents doted on the kids, let them have temper tantrums, and never told their children, “No.” Those kids also had grave problems as adolescents and adults. God is neither a dictator or a doormat. He so wants what is best for us that He sometimes says No and He loves us even in life’s tough times. God isn’t monster. God doesn’t bring tragedy or pain to us. But the New Testament book of Hebrews tells us that God does use the circumstances of our lives to discipline us, to help us, and fit us for the work God has for us in eternity. The Jerusalem crowd—and I suppose, you and I—would rather that God made this life a trouble-free existence. When life throws us difficulties, it’s easy for us to join the crowd and complain that God isn’t bowing down to serve us. But life isn’t about us!
Listen: Don’t pay attention to the changeable crowd! Don’t listen to the fickle interior voices of our own selfishness! Listen instead to God and the powerful message He’s sent to us through Jesus the Christ. Let God love you into a life made new by Jesus. Let Him love you into a life of boldness and risk, of hope and fulfillment, of eternity with Him! In the foreword for the book accompanying his new movie, The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson talks about why he made this movie about Jesus in Holy Week:
“This had its genesis during a time when I found myself feeling trapped with feelings of terrible, isolated emptiness...during...[a] time period of meditation and prayer...I first conceived the idea of making a film about The Passion. The idea took root very gradually...I wanted the effort to be a testament to infinite love of Jesus the Christ, which has saved, and continues to save, many the world over. It seems that in our modern secular existence we tend to forget...I wanted to remember to unforget...the Passion of Christ which cannot be articulated, only experienced..."
Jesus came into this world to die and to rise for you. You don’t have to earn that love. It’s God’s gift to you. Through all the seasons of life, whether it’s popular or convenient to follow Jesus or not, whether we feel like following Jesus or not, Jesus is still the Savior Who gave His life for you. As long as you and I still have breath, we can still decide to follow Him. The question of Holy Week—the question for each day of our lives is, “Will we follow Jesus?” All of heaven for all of eternity is waiting to hear our answers.
[The quote from Mel Gibson is cited in a sermon by Michael Foss.
[I highly recommend Rick Warren's book, The Purpose Driven Life. While I don't agree with everything Warren says in his book (ie, I disagree with his understanding of Holy Baptism for one thing), I nonetheless love the book and think that it can contribute mightily to one's spiritual growth, as it has to mine.]
Sunday, April 04, 2004
Sunday, March 28, 2004
The Journey, Through Lent...Through Life, March 28, 2004
The Best Time to Follow Jesus
John 12:1-8
[shared with the people of Friendship Church, March 28, 2004]
Some of you have heard me speak before of the TV interview that happened in Chicago when a replica of the Vietnam Memorial Wall had gone to that town. A reporter asked one man why he was there. “Because,” the man replied, running his fingers across a particular name, “when I was in Vietnam, that man saved my life.”
As followers of Jesus Christ, you and I can readily understand that man’s emotions. We know Someone Who sacrificed His own life to save ours. Jesus Christ, God-on-the-earth and perfect, sinless human being, died on a cross. Jesus accepted our punishment so that all who believe in Him can live with God forever.
But let me ask you some questions, ones that I ask myself from time to time. I'm not always proud of my answers.
How much does Jesus’ death for you mean to you?
How grateful are you for what Jesus has done for you?
How does your gratitude to Jesus show in your everyday life?
Our Bible lesson records an almost bizarre incident that occurred just six days before the Passover Feast that would see Jesus’ arrest and execution. At the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, his friends in Bethany, Jesus is having dinner. In the midst of it all, Mary walks over to Jesus and pours a costly ointment, imported from India, on Jesus’ feet. She dabs the liquid with her hair.
If this scene is strange to us, it would have been downright offensive to the people of first-century Judea where Jesus lived.
For one thing, washing or anointing feet was slave’s work.
For another, a woman was never to let her hair down in public as Mary does here.
And of course, there is the cost of the ointment, the equivalent of about one year’s wages. Judas, Jesus’ treasurer who will soon betray Jesus, says the money that’s being "wasted" at that moment could be given to the poor. But Jesus upbraids Judas. You see, Mary is grateful for what Jesus has done for her family: in the preceding chapter of John's Gospel you can read about Jesus bringing her brother, Lazarus, back to life.
I believe that this incident has valuable things to teach you and me and I’d like to talk about them this morning. The lessons can be summed up in this way: In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do whatever good we can, whenever we can, for whomever we can. And for God’s sake, we should never worry about either what it costs us or about our ability. Let’s consider that.
In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do whatever good we can. Donald Berwick is a pediatrician and speaker. Once, he was speaking to a convention in Boston. During his presentation, he shared that he and some friends had started a medical clinic to help the poor in his community. During a Q-and-A session afterwards, one man challenged Berwick. “Don’t you realize how many poor people there are in New England? What good do you think that you’re accomplishing with your clinic?” Berwick said that he understood what the man was getting at and then said, “You want me to boil the ocean. I can’t. I can boil a pot for tea. So, I’ll boil my pot for tea and, if enough of us boil a pot of water, the ocean will boil.”
Mary and her family were people of modest means. We know this because servants weren’t preparing the meal that Jesus was enjoying. Mary’s sister Martha was the one in the kitchen. Yet they had this expensive ointment, something for which they’d probably scrimped and saved for eons. Putting it on Jesus’ feet was an extravagant, unnecessary, and altogether loving thing to do. Mary did what she could do. That’s our call too.
In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do good whenever we can. Bishop Thomas Clary tells the story of a conversation that happened after the meeting of a board on which he served. They were telling stories about their most embarrassing moments. One man, Frank, talked about his dad, a fisherman who loved the sea and was devoted to his entire extended family. As the Bishop tells it:
“[Frank said,] 'When the weather was bad he would drive me to school. He had this old truck that he used in his fishing business...[It made lots of noise, announcing its presence wherever it went.]...As [Dad] would drive toward the school, I would shrink down into the seat hoping to disappear...[so I wouldn’t be embarrassed in front of my schoolmates]...He would drive right up in front [of the school], and it seemed like everybody would be standing around and watching. Then he would lean over and give me a big kiss on the cheek and tell me to be a good boy. It was so embarrassing...Here I was twelve years old, and my dad would lean over and kiss me goodbye!
“'I remember the day I decided I was too old for a goodbye kiss. When we got to school and came to a stop, he had his usual big smile. He started to lean toward me, but I put my hand up and said, "No, Dad."
"[Frank explained that he was too old to be kissed by his father. His dad’s eyes teared up.] 'He turned and looked out the windshield. "You’re right...You are a big boy, a man. I won’t kiss you any more."'
"Frank got a funny look on his face and the tears began to well up in his eyes as he spoke. ‘It wasn’t long after that when my dad went to sea and never came back. It was a day when most of the fleet stayed in, but not Dad. He had a big family to feed. They found his boat adrift with its nets half in and half out...'
"Frank spoke again, ‘Guys, you don’t know what I’d give to have my Dad give me just one more kiss on the cheek, to feel his rough old face, to smell the ocean in him, to feel his arm around my neck. I wish I had been a man then. If I had been a man, I would never have told my Dad I was too old for a goodbye kiss.'"
In response to Jesus’ love, like Mary, we’re to do good whenever we can. That includes giving and receiving genuine love.
Third: In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do good for whomever we can. Max Lucado tells the story of a friend’s visit to Disney World. This friend had been at Cinderella’s Castle in the Magic Kingdom. There was a huge crowd and a beautiful girl was playing the part of Cinderella. In a corner opposite from where this young woman stood in the castle was a boy of about seven, holding onto the hand of his older brother. The younger boy was small for his age, his face terribly deformed. He watched as “Cinderella” showered attention on all the other children around her. But then something wonderful happened! Cinderella saw this little boy just standing there watching wistfully. She politely but resolutely walked through the crowd of adoring children right up to the little boy. She knelt down next to him with a smile on her face and then leaned forward and kissed him. The joy that overtook that little guy bespoke his gratitude. When we do good even for the unlovely, the joy of heaven enters our world!
In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do whatever good we can, whenever we can, for whomever we can. And for God’s sake, we shouldn’t worry about the cost. Mary didn’t worry about the cost when she poured that expensive ointment on Jesus’ feet! ! A few years ago, a man in New York City was kidnapped. In a telephone call, the kidnappers demanded a $100,000.00 ransom from the man’s wife. She thought about that and negotiated them down to $30,000.00! The man was ultimately freed. But I wonder how he felt after he got home and learned that his wife seemingly decided that he was worth $30,000.00, but not $100,000.00!
Jesus went to a cross knowing that in order to save us, it would cost Him His earthly life. He tells us that those who lose their lives—those who give up their own priorities and preferences and let Him be our highest priorities—will in the end, save their lives. When we truly value Jesus and what He has done for us, no cost is too great. Whatever it costs us in time, effort, money is worth it in order to tell Jesus thank You!
And we shouldn’t worry about our ability either. A man happened to walk by a building that was on fire before firefighters arrived. A woman on the second floor called out to him and asked, “Will you save me?” The man said that he would and proceeded to walk away. “Where are you going?” the woman asked hysterically. “I’m going to get life-saving training. I’ll be back as soon as I graduate.”
That’s what lots of people do when it comes to Jesus’ call in their lives. They don’t participate in or teach Sunday School, help with the church youth, do a Kindness Outreach, ask a friend to worship, clean up the building, lead or get involved with a small group, or read a lesson on Sunday morning because they don’t feel qualified. Mary, in our Bible lesson today, apparently wasn’t much of a cook. But grateful for Jesus’ love, she soothed his aching feet at the dinner. There’s no reason for us to worry about what we can’t do. That’s because God can do everything through the hearts, hands, and lives of people who put themselves at His disposal. Paul writes in the New Testament, "I can do all things through Christ Who strengthens me!" I've said it before and I'll say it again, "The most important ability that Jesus is seeking in us is availability."
As people grateful for what Jesus has done for us, our call is clear. We’re to do whatever good we can, whenever we can, for whomever we can. And for God’s sake, we should never worry about either what it costs us or about our ability. God has so much He wants to do in our lives and through our lives. Now is the time to let Him live in us. This is the place. Amen!
[The true story of the Chicagolander at the replica of the Vietnam Memorial Wall has been told by Bill Hybels in messages and in at least one of his books.
[The true story of Donald Berwick was recently shared by Pastor Michael Foss in the latest issue of The Toolkit: Equipping Disciple Making Ministries.
[The true story of Frank from Bishop Clary was recently recounted by Steve Goodier in his fantastic emailed inspiration, LifeSupport. To subscribe, contact Steve at LifeSupport-subscribe@yahoogroups.com .
[The true story of 'Cinderella' at Disney World comes from a book by Max Lucado. I found it however, in a wonderful book of sermons by the late Philip Longfellow Anderson. The book is The Gospel in Disney: Christian Values in the Early Animated Classics (Minneapolis: Augsburg Books, 2004).
[The true story of the kidnapped man is from e-sermons.com.]
John 12:1-8
[shared with the people of Friendship Church, March 28, 2004]
Some of you have heard me speak before of the TV interview that happened in Chicago when a replica of the Vietnam Memorial Wall had gone to that town. A reporter asked one man why he was there. “Because,” the man replied, running his fingers across a particular name, “when I was in Vietnam, that man saved my life.”
As followers of Jesus Christ, you and I can readily understand that man’s emotions. We know Someone Who sacrificed His own life to save ours. Jesus Christ, God-on-the-earth and perfect, sinless human being, died on a cross. Jesus accepted our punishment so that all who believe in Him can live with God forever.
But let me ask you some questions, ones that I ask myself from time to time. I'm not always proud of my answers.
How much does Jesus’ death for you mean to you?
How grateful are you for what Jesus has done for you?
How does your gratitude to Jesus show in your everyday life?
Our Bible lesson records an almost bizarre incident that occurred just six days before the Passover Feast that would see Jesus’ arrest and execution. At the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, his friends in Bethany, Jesus is having dinner. In the midst of it all, Mary walks over to Jesus and pours a costly ointment, imported from India, on Jesus’ feet. She dabs the liquid with her hair.
If this scene is strange to us, it would have been downright offensive to the people of first-century Judea where Jesus lived.
For one thing, washing or anointing feet was slave’s work.
For another, a woman was never to let her hair down in public as Mary does here.
And of course, there is the cost of the ointment, the equivalent of about one year’s wages. Judas, Jesus’ treasurer who will soon betray Jesus, says the money that’s being "wasted" at that moment could be given to the poor. But Jesus upbraids Judas. You see, Mary is grateful for what Jesus has done for her family: in the preceding chapter of John's Gospel you can read about Jesus bringing her brother, Lazarus, back to life.
I believe that this incident has valuable things to teach you and me and I’d like to talk about them this morning. The lessons can be summed up in this way: In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do whatever good we can, whenever we can, for whomever we can. And for God’s sake, we should never worry about either what it costs us or about our ability. Let’s consider that.
In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do whatever good we can. Donald Berwick is a pediatrician and speaker. Once, he was speaking to a convention in Boston. During his presentation, he shared that he and some friends had started a medical clinic to help the poor in his community. During a Q-and-A session afterwards, one man challenged Berwick. “Don’t you realize how many poor people there are in New England? What good do you think that you’re accomplishing with your clinic?” Berwick said that he understood what the man was getting at and then said, “You want me to boil the ocean. I can’t. I can boil a pot for tea. So, I’ll boil my pot for tea and, if enough of us boil a pot of water, the ocean will boil.”
Mary and her family were people of modest means. We know this because servants weren’t preparing the meal that Jesus was enjoying. Mary’s sister Martha was the one in the kitchen. Yet they had this expensive ointment, something for which they’d probably scrimped and saved for eons. Putting it on Jesus’ feet was an extravagant, unnecessary, and altogether loving thing to do. Mary did what she could do. That’s our call too.
In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do good whenever we can. Bishop Thomas Clary tells the story of a conversation that happened after the meeting of a board on which he served. They were telling stories about their most embarrassing moments. One man, Frank, talked about his dad, a fisherman who loved the sea and was devoted to his entire extended family. As the Bishop tells it:
“[Frank said,] 'When the weather was bad he would drive me to school. He had this old truck that he used in his fishing business...[It made lots of noise, announcing its presence wherever it went.]...As [Dad] would drive toward the school, I would shrink down into the seat hoping to disappear...[so I wouldn’t be embarrassed in front of my schoolmates]...He would drive right up in front [of the school], and it seemed like everybody would be standing around and watching. Then he would lean over and give me a big kiss on the cheek and tell me to be a good boy. It was so embarrassing...Here I was twelve years old, and my dad would lean over and kiss me goodbye!
“'I remember the day I decided I was too old for a goodbye kiss. When we got to school and came to a stop, he had his usual big smile. He started to lean toward me, but I put my hand up and said, "No, Dad."
"[Frank explained that he was too old to be kissed by his father. His dad’s eyes teared up.] 'He turned and looked out the windshield. "You’re right...You are a big boy, a man. I won’t kiss you any more."'
"Frank got a funny look on his face and the tears began to well up in his eyes as he spoke. ‘It wasn’t long after that when my dad went to sea and never came back. It was a day when most of the fleet stayed in, but not Dad. He had a big family to feed. They found his boat adrift with its nets half in and half out...'
"Frank spoke again, ‘Guys, you don’t know what I’d give to have my Dad give me just one more kiss on the cheek, to feel his rough old face, to smell the ocean in him, to feel his arm around my neck. I wish I had been a man then. If I had been a man, I would never have told my Dad I was too old for a goodbye kiss.'"
In response to Jesus’ love, like Mary, we’re to do good whenever we can. That includes giving and receiving genuine love.
Third: In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do good for whomever we can. Max Lucado tells the story of a friend’s visit to Disney World. This friend had been at Cinderella’s Castle in the Magic Kingdom. There was a huge crowd and a beautiful girl was playing the part of Cinderella. In a corner opposite from where this young woman stood in the castle was a boy of about seven, holding onto the hand of his older brother. The younger boy was small for his age, his face terribly deformed. He watched as “Cinderella” showered attention on all the other children around her. But then something wonderful happened! Cinderella saw this little boy just standing there watching wistfully. She politely but resolutely walked through the crowd of adoring children right up to the little boy. She knelt down next to him with a smile on her face and then leaned forward and kissed him. The joy that overtook that little guy bespoke his gratitude. When we do good even for the unlovely, the joy of heaven enters our world!
In response to Jesus’ love, we’re to do whatever good we can, whenever we can, for whomever we can. And for God’s sake, we shouldn’t worry about the cost. Mary didn’t worry about the cost when she poured that expensive ointment on Jesus’ feet! ! A few years ago, a man in New York City was kidnapped. In a telephone call, the kidnappers demanded a $100,000.00 ransom from the man’s wife. She thought about that and negotiated them down to $30,000.00! The man was ultimately freed. But I wonder how he felt after he got home and learned that his wife seemingly decided that he was worth $30,000.00, but not $100,000.00!
Jesus went to a cross knowing that in order to save us, it would cost Him His earthly life. He tells us that those who lose their lives—those who give up their own priorities and preferences and let Him be our highest priorities—will in the end, save their lives. When we truly value Jesus and what He has done for us, no cost is too great. Whatever it costs us in time, effort, money is worth it in order to tell Jesus thank You!
And we shouldn’t worry about our ability either. A man happened to walk by a building that was on fire before firefighters arrived. A woman on the second floor called out to him and asked, “Will you save me?” The man said that he would and proceeded to walk away. “Where are you going?” the woman asked hysterically. “I’m going to get life-saving training. I’ll be back as soon as I graduate.”
That’s what lots of people do when it comes to Jesus’ call in their lives. They don’t participate in or teach Sunday School, help with the church youth, do a Kindness Outreach, ask a friend to worship, clean up the building, lead or get involved with a small group, or read a lesson on Sunday morning because they don’t feel qualified. Mary, in our Bible lesson today, apparently wasn’t much of a cook. But grateful for Jesus’ love, she soothed his aching feet at the dinner. There’s no reason for us to worry about what we can’t do. That’s because God can do everything through the hearts, hands, and lives of people who put themselves at His disposal. Paul writes in the New Testament, "I can do all things through Christ Who strengthens me!" I've said it before and I'll say it again, "The most important ability that Jesus is seeking in us is availability."
As people grateful for what Jesus has done for us, our call is clear. We’re to do whatever good we can, whenever we can, for whomever we can. And for God’s sake, we should never worry about either what it costs us or about our ability. God has so much He wants to do in our lives and through our lives. Now is the time to let Him live in us. This is the place. Amen!
[The true story of the Chicagolander at the replica of the Vietnam Memorial Wall has been told by Bill Hybels in messages and in at least one of his books.
[The true story of Donald Berwick was recently shared by Pastor Michael Foss in the latest issue of The Toolkit: Equipping Disciple Making Ministries.
[The true story of Frank from Bishop Clary was recently recounted by Steve Goodier in his fantastic emailed inspiration, LifeSupport. To subscribe, contact Steve at LifeSupport-subscribe@yahoogroups.com .
[The true story of 'Cinderella' at Disney World comes from a book by Max Lucado. I found it however, in a wonderful book of sermons by the late Philip Longfellow Anderson. The book is The Gospel in Disney: Christian Values in the Early Animated Classics (Minneapolis: Augsburg Books, 2004).
[The true story of the kidnapped man is from e-sermons.com.]
Sunday, March 21, 2004
The Journey, Through Lent...Through Life, March 21, 2004
Welcome Home!
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
[shared with the people of Friendship Church, March 21, 2004]
The story that Jesus tells in our Bible lesson for this morning is well-known. A young son, anxious to get his hands on the fortune his father has amassed, demands his inheritance before his father has died. The money burning a hole in his pocket and infantile notions of freedom calling him, the boy takes off for a distant country. He wastes every penny on parties and prostitutes when a famine hits. Penniless, the boy takes a low-paying job with a pig-farmer. Realizing how badly he's wasted everything that he's been given and remembering how well his dad treated the hired help, the boy decides to tell his dad how sorry he is and ask if he could have a job. He wouldn't even claim the privileges of family membership. Jesus says that even before the boy walks up to his father's house, dad charges down the road and locks the boy in a bear hug of forgiveness, acceptance, and love. Grateful for the restoration of this son who was lost and had been found, who was dead and had come back to life, his father threw a tremendous welcome home celebration. Jesus says this is what it's like when anyone turns from the sins that erect walls between God and us, between God and others, and humbly comes home to God. Like the father in Jesus' parable, God gives us freedom. So long as we use it in constructive ways, expressing love for God and love for neighbor, good things come from the freedom God gives to each of us to make decisions about our lives. Through Jesus Christ, God runs to those who, like the son, understand that living alienated from God and others, our lives are messes. When we "come home" to God, God gives us the freedom to become our best selves! For a prodigal sinner like me, a person prone to want to do and say and be things with no concern for God or others, the fact that God loves me like the father in Jesus' story loved his son, comes as very good news. It gives me hope that even I can have a place in God's Kingdom. That's why I love this story so!
But there's also something about this story that is disturbing. Speaker and writer Glenna Salsbury tells another story, a true one, about a tribe in South Africa and of how they deal with wrong-doers in their villages. They apprehend the person who has committed a crime and place him, unshackled at the center of the village. All the villagers form a large circle around the person. Then, one by one, every single villager begins to recount all the good points of the person who has done wrong. They tell stories applauding the person's kindnesses, his positive contributions to community life, and his good character traits. Amid a village-wide party, this festival devoted to complimenting a person we would describe as a criminal and a gross sinner goes on sometimes for two days. At the end of it all, like the prodigal son in Jesus' parable, the wrong-doer is forgiven, restored to the community, and able to resume his life and work.
It is a happy ending and yet, it may bother us a little. In our righteous indignation, it doesn't seem fair that a sinner should get off so easily. This is the very concern that throbs in the mind of the other son in Jesus' parable of the prodigal son, the older son. He comes upon the noisy party happening in his father's house and asks one of the servants what exactly is going on. The servant tells the older son the happy news. His younger brother has returned. The older son is furious with resentment and envy. It doesn't seem fair! Refusing to even go into his father's house, he calls his dad to come outside. What gives?, he wonders. Here he had already abided by the rules, done everything that his father wanted him to do, and yet, not once, did the old man offer to throw a party for him and his friends. But when "your son"—the older boy won't even refer to his younger sibling as "my brother"—comes back home, having wasted everything on parties and prostitutes, you treat him like the returning hero. The father says, "Son, everything I have is yours. If you'd wanted to have a party, you could have any old time. But your brother is back and we need to celebrate!" The older son though, refused to listen to his father.
Fess up now. Don't you feel a bit of the older son's resentment? If you were him, wouldn't you resent your dad welcoming the rebel home when you yourself had never once rebelled? The father in Jesus' story of course, is a figure of God the Father, always willing to welcome His rebel children home. And sometimes, God's willingness to forgive people bothers us! We love God's forgiveness when it comes to us. We love being the prodigals welcomed into the Father's loving arms. But we're not always so keen on how forgiving God is toward others.
This is a dangerous attitude for us to even flirt with. An old saying tells us, "What's good for the goose is good for the gander." If forgiveness is good for us, it must certainly be good for all the other sinners of the world who need God. Jesus tells us that we block God's forgiveness from our lives when we are unwilling to forgive others. In his model for prayer, called the Lord's Prayer or the Our Father, Jesus teaches us to pray, "Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us."
Jesus teaches us this, I think, for an important reason. Steve Goodier is a Methodist pastor and writer who serves a church in Utah. Recently, I read his account of a lesson he learned from his father. Writes Goodier:
"His own father was a mining engineer and his family lived in the Philippines prior to World War II. They were captured by the Japanese and incarcerated there during World War II. He, his mother and sisters were sent to a prison camp at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila where they remained until the Philippine Islands were freed at the end of the war. His father, an enlisted man, was separated from the family and imprisoned with captured military personnel.
"My dad was a teenager at the time. He, like other prisoners, struggled to survive. To keep from starving, he learned to eat his small, daily rations of rice without first removing the carcasses of worms in the bowl. But he ate better than most prisoners - he worked as an orderly in the prison hospital and, on occasion, was able to finish leftover food from patients. Though almost six feet tall, when he was finally freed he weighed only 95 pounds.
"Life was difficult there by any standards. Numerous prisoners became ill and many died. Anger and bitterness toward their captors abounded. For years, even decades, after their eventual release from the prison camp, the men and women of Santo Tomas (like other prisoners of war)
felt a smoldering bitterness toward the people who incarcerated them. My father lost almost everything. His family lost their home. They lost their possessions. And harder still, they lost their freedom. But he also lost his father. My grandfather did not survive his captivity. Yet I never heard my dad express any anger or resentment toward the Japanese soldiers or the Japanese people. Just the opposite. He taught me to regard ALL people with respect. He taught me to honor people of
all races, nationalities and religions. He knew that bitterness only kept his wounds open and infected. Like a disease, his festering resentments could even infect others. And they could kill."
When we fail to forgive others as God has forgiven us through Jesus Christ, we prevent not only God's forgiveness, but also all the other blessings God wants to give to us, from entering our lives. The older son in Jesus' parable refused to join the big forgiveness party his dad threw for his younger brother, even when his father begged him to come inside.
And that's how I end this message this morning. Jesus Christ died on a cross and rose from the dead so that the walls that our sin and selfishness builds between God and us, as well as between us and others, can be brought crashing down. God wants to throw a forgiveness party for each of us and live with us every day in order to free us become our God-designed selves. He wants us to help others experience His freeing, forgiving love, too.
And I'm begging you: If you haven't ever let God welcome you home to His Kingdom, let Him do it now. Like the prodigal, turn from the sin and selfishness that prevent you from experiencing life with God and come back to your Father.
I beg you: If there are people against whom you've been holding grudges, don't let that failure to forgive poison your life and destroy your relationship with God any longer.
And I beg you: If there are folks who you know are in need of God in their lives, invite them to experience the warm embrace God extends to all through Jesus Christ—maybe you could even invite them to be in worship with us on Easter Sunday morning.
The Father is patient and loving. He wants to free all of us from sin and death to become our God-designed selves. God wants to welcome everyone of us home right here, right now, and always!
[The story of the tribe in South Africa appears on Glenna Salsbury's CD, Something to Think About.
[Steve Goodier told the story in his emailed inspiration, called Life Support. To receive this from Steve, contact him at lss_publishing@yahoo.com.]
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
[shared with the people of Friendship Church, March 21, 2004]
The story that Jesus tells in our Bible lesson for this morning is well-known. A young son, anxious to get his hands on the fortune his father has amassed, demands his inheritance before his father has died. The money burning a hole in his pocket and infantile notions of freedom calling him, the boy takes off for a distant country. He wastes every penny on parties and prostitutes when a famine hits. Penniless, the boy takes a low-paying job with a pig-farmer. Realizing how badly he's wasted everything that he's been given and remembering how well his dad treated the hired help, the boy decides to tell his dad how sorry he is and ask if he could have a job. He wouldn't even claim the privileges of family membership. Jesus says that even before the boy walks up to his father's house, dad charges down the road and locks the boy in a bear hug of forgiveness, acceptance, and love. Grateful for the restoration of this son who was lost and had been found, who was dead and had come back to life, his father threw a tremendous welcome home celebration. Jesus says this is what it's like when anyone turns from the sins that erect walls between God and us, between God and others, and humbly comes home to God. Like the father in Jesus' parable, God gives us freedom. So long as we use it in constructive ways, expressing love for God and love for neighbor, good things come from the freedom God gives to each of us to make decisions about our lives. Through Jesus Christ, God runs to those who, like the son, understand that living alienated from God and others, our lives are messes. When we "come home" to God, God gives us the freedom to become our best selves! For a prodigal sinner like me, a person prone to want to do and say and be things with no concern for God or others, the fact that God loves me like the father in Jesus' story loved his son, comes as very good news. It gives me hope that even I can have a place in God's Kingdom. That's why I love this story so!
But there's also something about this story that is disturbing. Speaker and writer Glenna Salsbury tells another story, a true one, about a tribe in South Africa and of how they deal with wrong-doers in their villages. They apprehend the person who has committed a crime and place him, unshackled at the center of the village. All the villagers form a large circle around the person. Then, one by one, every single villager begins to recount all the good points of the person who has done wrong. They tell stories applauding the person's kindnesses, his positive contributions to community life, and his good character traits. Amid a village-wide party, this festival devoted to complimenting a person we would describe as a criminal and a gross sinner goes on sometimes for two days. At the end of it all, like the prodigal son in Jesus' parable, the wrong-doer is forgiven, restored to the community, and able to resume his life and work.
It is a happy ending and yet, it may bother us a little. In our righteous indignation, it doesn't seem fair that a sinner should get off so easily. This is the very concern that throbs in the mind of the other son in Jesus' parable of the prodigal son, the older son. He comes upon the noisy party happening in his father's house and asks one of the servants what exactly is going on. The servant tells the older son the happy news. His younger brother has returned. The older son is furious with resentment and envy. It doesn't seem fair! Refusing to even go into his father's house, he calls his dad to come outside. What gives?, he wonders. Here he had already abided by the rules, done everything that his father wanted him to do, and yet, not once, did the old man offer to throw a party for him and his friends. But when "your son"—the older boy won't even refer to his younger sibling as "my brother"—comes back home, having wasted everything on parties and prostitutes, you treat him like the returning hero. The father says, "Son, everything I have is yours. If you'd wanted to have a party, you could have any old time. But your brother is back and we need to celebrate!" The older son though, refused to listen to his father.
Fess up now. Don't you feel a bit of the older son's resentment? If you were him, wouldn't you resent your dad welcoming the rebel home when you yourself had never once rebelled? The father in Jesus' story of course, is a figure of God the Father, always willing to welcome His rebel children home. And sometimes, God's willingness to forgive people bothers us! We love God's forgiveness when it comes to us. We love being the prodigals welcomed into the Father's loving arms. But we're not always so keen on how forgiving God is toward others.
This is a dangerous attitude for us to even flirt with. An old saying tells us, "What's good for the goose is good for the gander." If forgiveness is good for us, it must certainly be good for all the other sinners of the world who need God. Jesus tells us that we block God's forgiveness from our lives when we are unwilling to forgive others. In his model for prayer, called the Lord's Prayer or the Our Father, Jesus teaches us to pray, "Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us."
Jesus teaches us this, I think, for an important reason. Steve Goodier is a Methodist pastor and writer who serves a church in Utah. Recently, I read his account of a lesson he learned from his father. Writes Goodier:
"His own father was a mining engineer and his family lived in the Philippines prior to World War II. They were captured by the Japanese and incarcerated there during World War II. He, his mother and sisters were sent to a prison camp at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila where they remained until the Philippine Islands were freed at the end of the war. His father, an enlisted man, was separated from the family and imprisoned with captured military personnel.
"My dad was a teenager at the time. He, like other prisoners, struggled to survive. To keep from starving, he learned to eat his small, daily rations of rice without first removing the carcasses of worms in the bowl. But he ate better than most prisoners - he worked as an orderly in the prison hospital and, on occasion, was able to finish leftover food from patients. Though almost six feet tall, when he was finally freed he weighed only 95 pounds.
"Life was difficult there by any standards. Numerous prisoners became ill and many died. Anger and bitterness toward their captors abounded. For years, even decades, after their eventual release from the prison camp, the men and women of Santo Tomas (like other prisoners of war)
felt a smoldering bitterness toward the people who incarcerated them. My father lost almost everything. His family lost their home. They lost their possessions. And harder still, they lost their freedom. But he also lost his father. My grandfather did not survive his captivity. Yet I never heard my dad express any anger or resentment toward the Japanese soldiers or the Japanese people. Just the opposite. He taught me to regard ALL people with respect. He taught me to honor people of
all races, nationalities and religions. He knew that bitterness only kept his wounds open and infected. Like a disease, his festering resentments could even infect others. And they could kill."
When we fail to forgive others as God has forgiven us through Jesus Christ, we prevent not only God's forgiveness, but also all the other blessings God wants to give to us, from entering our lives. The older son in Jesus' parable refused to join the big forgiveness party his dad threw for his younger brother, even when his father begged him to come inside.
And that's how I end this message this morning. Jesus Christ died on a cross and rose from the dead so that the walls that our sin and selfishness builds between God and us, as well as between us and others, can be brought crashing down. God wants to throw a forgiveness party for each of us and live with us every day in order to free us become our God-designed selves. He wants us to help others experience His freeing, forgiving love, too.
And I'm begging you: If you haven't ever let God welcome you home to His Kingdom, let Him do it now. Like the prodigal, turn from the sin and selfishness that prevent you from experiencing life with God and come back to your Father.
I beg you: If there are people against whom you've been holding grudges, don't let that failure to forgive poison your life and destroy your relationship with God any longer.
And I beg you: If there are folks who you know are in need of God in their lives, invite them to experience the warm embrace God extends to all through Jesus Christ—maybe you could even invite them to be in worship with us on Easter Sunday morning.
The Father is patient and loving. He wants to free all of us from sin and death to become our God-designed selves. God wants to welcome everyone of us home right here, right now, and always!
[The story of the tribe in South Africa appears on Glenna Salsbury's CD, Something to Think About.
[Steve Goodier told the story in his emailed inspiration, called Life Support. To receive this from Steve, contact him at lss_publishing@yahoo.com.]
Wednesday, March 17, 2004
Funeral Message for Diane, Member of Our Congregation,
March is a month that can be many things. This March began with sunny, shirt-sleeve weather. Today, it seems that winter has returned. Much of the natural world is still asleep, awaiting rebirth and renewal. Yet for now, the cold remains and in truth, this morning, it's also winter in our souls.
To varying degrees, everybody here today suffers from a sense of loss. Nobody of course, suffers from that loss more greatly than Eric, Sean, Adam, Betty, and Diane's family. But Diane's life and her tough-as-nails fight with leukemia over these past two years have touched us all. As we prepare to take Diane's earthly body to its resting place, I can tell you that my family and I personally feel a sense of loss too. Diane came into our lives, along with the rest of the family, nearly ten years ago. Our son had invited Sean to worship with us at Friendship Church and the whole Binder brood came along. Through the years, our sons graduated together and played softball together. For several years, Diane and my wife held a garage sale at our place, with Eric and I acting as official go-fers. Through the years, we came to appreciate and love Diane's unshakable commitment to her family and her wonderfully silly sense of humor.
And so this morning, in the winter of our souls, our minds and hearts are a tangle of unanswered questions, dashed hopes, and fractured dreams. We wonder why all our prayers for Diane seem to have gone unanswered. We wonder why she had to suffer so long. We can't understand why she lost her life at such a young age, before she was able to see her boys married, before she was able to see any grandchildren. We ask why, so soon after Diane had found work that stirred her soul, she was taken from us and from the children she was committed to helping on the job. We're human and we can't help but ask, Where is God?
Though every death and loss are unique tragedies, we aren't the first to ask such questions. Back in the Old Testament portion of the Bible, you can find the true story of a man named Job. Job was a man who loved God and loved his family with passion and devotion. He was also a man with many friends. In a short amount of time though, Job lost everything. His ten children, who had been celebrating, were wiped out in an instant. So, too were all of his property and holdings. Job was without his children and living in poverty. Grief-stricken, the winter of his soul was compounded when his own body began to rebel against him, breaking out in painful sores all over. All Job had left now was his wife and she was no help. Observing everything and apparently intent on finding a different life, she told Job, "Why don't you just curse God and die?"
Job did question God. Like Diane on occasion, Job wondered what God was allowing to happen to him. He wondered what God was doing. Job even shook an angry fist at God and asked, "What did I ever do to You, Lord, that all of this has befallen me?" I admire the honesty of the Bible that it includes the prayers of saints who questioned God or were angry at God. But as I pointed out to Diane many times, when she had her Job-like questions, only those who believe in God bother asking Him questions or getting angry with Him. Like Job, Diane believed. And she wondered.
Yet like Job, I believe that if Diane could speak to you today, she would make an incredible affirmation of God's love and care for us when winter hits and an affirmation of the hope with which all of us should live each day. Job said, even as he grieved and suffered:
"For I know that my Redeemer [God] lives, and that at the last He will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God, Whom I shall see on my side, and my eyes shall behold, not another."
Thousands of years before the birth of Jesus, Job was pointing to the hope that the New Testament tells us belongs to all who will turn from sin and entrust their lives to Jesus Christ. Death doesn't have the final say in the life of the person who follows Jesus Christ. Jesus, truly God and truly Man, died and rose so that death doesn't have the last word in the lives of His followers.
In Christian tradition, Jesus has been pictured as a butterfly. After He died an excruciating death on a cross, He was laid in a tomb that became His cocoon. On the third day, He rose again. Jesus is God's answer to all our wonderings and questionings today. He doesn't erase the mysteries that we can't comprehend. He doesn't reveal why Diane suffered so or was taken from us at such a young age or any of the rest. But He does make a promise:
"For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him may not perish but may have eternal life."
Like butterflies, if we follow Him by faith, Jesus Christ will allow us to emerge from our cocoons and from our souls' winter to live new and an everlasting lives with God. And in the meantime—through winter and all the seasons of goodness and laughter, along with those of hardship and tears, Jesus makes another promise: that He will be with us always. God, Who learned personally all about suffering and loss and feeling alone in grief when Jesus went to the cross, is on our side! He also knows the wonderful tomorrow He has waiting for all who believe in Him!
The Bible says that nothing can separate us from the love of God, given to us through Jesus Christ. If that's not true today, it simply isn't true. But it is true, a truth affirmed by hundreds of people who saw Jesus risen from the dead and by the changed lives of millions who have come to believe in Jesus through the centuries.
This morning I don't have all the answers to your questions. But I can offer you Jesus Christ and I can beg you to follow Him. Jesus gives the promise that God stands with you in your grief and the certainty that through His forgiving love and power over death, winter will give way to spring...death will yield to life...tears will all be dried...and pain will be a thing of the past.
To varying degrees, everybody here today suffers from a sense of loss. Nobody of course, suffers from that loss more greatly than Eric, Sean, Adam, Betty, and Diane's family. But Diane's life and her tough-as-nails fight with leukemia over these past two years have touched us all. As we prepare to take Diane's earthly body to its resting place, I can tell you that my family and I personally feel a sense of loss too. Diane came into our lives, along with the rest of the family, nearly ten years ago. Our son had invited Sean to worship with us at Friendship Church and the whole Binder brood came along. Through the years, our sons graduated together and played softball together. For several years, Diane and my wife held a garage sale at our place, with Eric and I acting as official go-fers. Through the years, we came to appreciate and love Diane's unshakable commitment to her family and her wonderfully silly sense of humor.
And so this morning, in the winter of our souls, our minds and hearts are a tangle of unanswered questions, dashed hopes, and fractured dreams. We wonder why all our prayers for Diane seem to have gone unanswered. We wonder why she had to suffer so long. We can't understand why she lost her life at such a young age, before she was able to see her boys married, before she was able to see any grandchildren. We ask why, so soon after Diane had found work that stirred her soul, she was taken from us and from the children she was committed to helping on the job. We're human and we can't help but ask, Where is God?
Though every death and loss are unique tragedies, we aren't the first to ask such questions. Back in the Old Testament portion of the Bible, you can find the true story of a man named Job. Job was a man who loved God and loved his family with passion and devotion. He was also a man with many friends. In a short amount of time though, Job lost everything. His ten children, who had been celebrating, were wiped out in an instant. So, too were all of his property and holdings. Job was without his children and living in poverty. Grief-stricken, the winter of his soul was compounded when his own body began to rebel against him, breaking out in painful sores all over. All Job had left now was his wife and she was no help. Observing everything and apparently intent on finding a different life, she told Job, "Why don't you just curse God and die?"
Job did question God. Like Diane on occasion, Job wondered what God was allowing to happen to him. He wondered what God was doing. Job even shook an angry fist at God and asked, "What did I ever do to You, Lord, that all of this has befallen me?" I admire the honesty of the Bible that it includes the prayers of saints who questioned God or were angry at God. But as I pointed out to Diane many times, when she had her Job-like questions, only those who believe in God bother asking Him questions or getting angry with Him. Like Job, Diane believed. And she wondered.
Yet like Job, I believe that if Diane could speak to you today, she would make an incredible affirmation of God's love and care for us when winter hits and an affirmation of the hope with which all of us should live each day. Job said, even as he grieved and suffered:
"For I know that my Redeemer [God] lives, and that at the last He will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God, Whom I shall see on my side, and my eyes shall behold, not another."
Thousands of years before the birth of Jesus, Job was pointing to the hope that the New Testament tells us belongs to all who will turn from sin and entrust their lives to Jesus Christ. Death doesn't have the final say in the life of the person who follows Jesus Christ. Jesus, truly God and truly Man, died and rose so that death doesn't have the last word in the lives of His followers.
In Christian tradition, Jesus has been pictured as a butterfly. After He died an excruciating death on a cross, He was laid in a tomb that became His cocoon. On the third day, He rose again. Jesus is God's answer to all our wonderings and questionings today. He doesn't erase the mysteries that we can't comprehend. He doesn't reveal why Diane suffered so or was taken from us at such a young age or any of the rest. But He does make a promise:
"For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him may not perish but may have eternal life."
Like butterflies, if we follow Him by faith, Jesus Christ will allow us to emerge from our cocoons and from our souls' winter to live new and an everlasting lives with God. And in the meantime—through winter and all the seasons of goodness and laughter, along with those of hardship and tears, Jesus makes another promise: that He will be with us always. God, Who learned personally all about suffering and loss and feeling alone in grief when Jesus went to the cross, is on our side! He also knows the wonderful tomorrow He has waiting for all who believe in Him!
The Bible says that nothing can separate us from the love of God, given to us through Jesus Christ. If that's not true today, it simply isn't true. But it is true, a truth affirmed by hundreds of people who saw Jesus risen from the dead and by the changed lives of millions who have come to believe in Jesus through the centuries.
This morning I don't have all the answers to your questions. But I can offer you Jesus Christ and I can beg you to follow Him. Jesus gives the promise that God stands with you in your grief and the certainty that through His forgiving love and power over death, winter will give way to spring...death will yield to life...tears will all be dried...and pain will be a thing of the past.
Sunday, March 14, 2004
The Journey, Through Lent...Through Life, March 14, 2004
Facing Life, Bearing Fruit
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, March 14, 2004)
Back in the day when farm folks didn’t get to big cities very often, a young boy went on such an excursion with his grandparents. After stopping at a few places, grandma could tell that her husband and grandson were less interested in shopping than they were in exploring. So, she arranged to meet them later at a particular landmark and let them go. Soon, they came to a large skyscraper. They eyed it up and down and decided to have a closer look. As they approached the building, they saw something they’d never seen before: a revolving door. They couldn’t quite figure it out when they saw a stunning thing. An old haggard woman, stooped over, with a cane, walked through the revolving door and out came a young, shapely, attractive girl. Hardly daring to believe the miracle he’d just witnessed, the grandfather became agitated, turned to the boy, and said, “Tell your grandma to get over here right away. I’ve got a door I want her to walk through!”
We have to be careful about jumping to conclusions too quickly in life. The easy answers that seem so obviously true can be dead wrong. One day, Jesus met people who were abuzz about a recent event. People from Jesus’ native region of Galilee had been massacred by the Roman governor Pilate. Their blood, the people told Jesus, was mingled with the blood of the sacrificial animals at the temple in Jerusalem. Evidently, these people had been murdered in the very act of worshiping God. From Jesus’ words to them, we glean that this crowd had jumped to a conclusion about people who would have died such untimely and tragic deaths. Jesus asks them:
“Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did."
It’s amazing to consider how quickly we condemn people for the tragedies that befall them. Desperate to make sense of life’s senseless suffering, wanting to believe that there is something about us that will give us a pass when it comes to the possibility of tragedy, we adopt easy answers.
Sometimes we offer such explanations of tragedy to make ourselves feel superior. When AIDS first hit the radar screens of our consciousness, those who engage in the homosexual life style were the hardest hit. I remember a woman approaching me at the time and saying that God was giving those people a message. She was shocked when I disagreed with her. I told her that like her, I thought that homosexual behavior is contrary to the will of God. But if God passed a death sentence on every human being who did things that are contrary to the will of God, the population of Planet Earth would be erased in a second! The Bible makes it clear that we all fall short of God’s minimal expectations for human beings. We all sin. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus–an act God did for us–proves that God loves sinners and isn’t out to get anyone.
Jesus drives this point home in our lesson for today when He mentions another event which must have recently happened in Judea. He asks the crowd so quick to offer easy answers for others’ misfortune, “How about those eighteen people killed when the tower of Siloam crashed down on them? Do you think that they were worse sinners than everybody else and that God targeted them that day to die?” To this explanation, Jesus gives a resounding NO!
We live in an untidy world where bad things happen and there are no tidy explanations for when they do. Part of growing up as followers of Jesus, Jesus Himself seems to be telling us today, is accepting the ambiguities of life on this planet where sin and death still have their say. We don’t live in a perfect place and this side of heaven, we won't.
Some people observe these realities and fall apart or adopt the ethic of ‘eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.’
Still others slump into despair or cynicism.
But for the follower of Jesus Christ, none of these reactions will do. That’s because unlike any other group of people in the world, the follower of Jesus Christ always has hope!
After confronting the crowd–and us–with the sobering fact that suffering happens in this life, Jesus tells one of His parables, a story. In it, a man plants a fig tree. Apparently, you don’t even look for a fig tree to bear fruit until three years after you plant it. So, six years after planting the tree and three years after he began looking regularly for fruit to show up on it, the man who planted it has had enough. He says to his hired hand, “Cut the thing down! It’s wasting soil!” But the hired hand–the gardener–begs the owner to hold off on his decision for just a little while. He asks for permission to lavish the tree with some TLC for another year. Then, he says, if it sprouts figs next year, great! If it doesn’t, then he’ll happily cut it down.
What exactly does this little story mean? God lavishes one blessing after another on us. The greatest blessing of all, of course, is His offer of forgiveness and life forever with Him which He gives to us through Jesus Christ. Followers of Jesus have no reason to be paralyzed by fear or indifference or laziness in our lives. Jesus, the great God-Man went to a cross, taking the penalty for sin that you and I deserve. On the third day following His death, He rose again. Like the gardener in the story, for as long as we live on this earth, Jesus, the Risen King, gives us everything we need to “bear fruit,” everything we need to live meaningful, purposeful lives. That’s why, just before telling the story of the fruitless fig tree, Jesus says, “...unless you repent, you will all perish...” Literally, Jesus says, “...unless you are repenting, you will all perish.”
Jesus isn’t saying that in order for us to live, we have to go around with glum faces feeling sorry all the time. This is what He’s saying...
Yesterday, during Catechism class, Cori volunteered to be an object lesson. Tim asked her if she liked snacks. She said yes and he handed her a bag of chips to hold. He asked if she liked to sleep. Yes, she answered; so, Tim threw her a pillow to hold. Cori said she also liked soccer. So, she got a soccer ball to hold. She also said yes to reading for school and reading for pleasure and got books to hold symbolizing those loves. As you can imagine, after a few moments, Cori’s arms got pretty full. Then, standing here with all this stuff, Tim pulled out a rope and said, “Cori, you’re in the middle of a flood. The waters are rising. You need to catch this rope in order to be pulled to safety. What do you have to do?” The answer is obvious: to live, Cori had to be willing to empty her arms of everything but that rope.
That’s what Jesus means when He tells us to be repenting. You see, there are two parts to repentance. There is sorrow for past sins, to be sure. But there’s also opening ourselves to go where God sends us, do what God wants us to do, be who God wants us to be. To be repentant means to hold on for dear life to Jesus Christ no matter what fake comforts and joys the world may offer to us. When we live each day with a life style of repentance, God sets us loose to live with all the passion and power we were made to have as human beings! That’s what the Bible and Jesus mean when they talk about you and me “bearing fruit.”
Ever since I lost the primary election on March 2, I’ve had people trying to console me. I never needed consoling. I did what I did because I knew that Jesus Christ has set me free, not to succeed, but to try...to live...to risk...to do my best in all aspects of my life. This includes the political arena, an area in which I felt I could in practical ways, love my God and love my neighbor. That’s bearing fruit and that’s what I want to do with my fleeting time on earth.
When we make living a repentatn life style our aim, win or lose, you and I can’t do anything but succeed because win or lose, seeking to love God and neighbor, we know that God is with us!
The novelist Herman Wouk, who wrote The Winds of War and The Caine Mutiny, once visited David Ben-Gurion, the first president of modern Israel. Ben Gurion kept telling Wouk, that as a Jew, he should move to Israel. “Here,” Ben-Gurion told him, “you will be free.” Wouk could hardly believe his ears. “Free?” he wondered. Israel was surrounded by enemies and some roads in the country were impassable after sundown because of sniper fire. What did the old man mean by saying he would be free? “I did not say safe,” Ben-Gurion replied, “I said free.”
Many of you are familiar with the series of novels called, The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis. In these novels, children from our world keep having encounters with another universe in a land called Narnia, most memorably with a Christ-like figure named Aslan. In the book called, The Silver Chair, two children are joined by a strange creature from that land in liberating a prince named Rilian from the enchantments of a devil-like witch. But they find Rilian in an undeworld city whose inhabitants they feel certain will fight their escape with tooth-and-tong. No longer under any spell, Rilian and the others were all free, even if they weren’t safe. That’s why Rilian tells the others, “Let us descend into the city and take the adventure that is sent us.”
As long as you and I live here on this earth, God makes no guarantees about our being safe from the tragedies and losses that may be sent to us. Jesus says that the rain falls on the just and the unjust alike. Cancer, bankruptcies, tragedies, defeats, mishaps, and even death come to Christians and non-Christians alike.
But only followers of Jesus Christ, absolutely certain that we will live with God forever, are free to live life to the maximum, loving God and loving neighbor with passion, seeking to be and do our best no matter how hard the devil, the world, and our sinful selves may oppose us...to take whatever adventure is sent to us.
For the follower of Jesus, the key issue isn’t how many days to our lives; it’s how much life in our days.
This morning, Jesus’ message for us is simple: “Be free, be fearless, and live like people who, through Jesus Christ, have been given eternity!" Because through Christ, we have been given eternity!
[The inspiration for this message came from the work of the pastors and staff of Prince of Peace Lutheran Church of Burnsville, Minnesota.
[The true story of Herman Wouk's encounter with David Ben-Gurion comes from Perfect Illustrations For Every Topic and Occasion, edited by the folks of PreachingToday.com and published by Tyndale.
[The joke about the grandparents and their grandson was told by Pastor Gerald Mann in one of his audiotaped messages.
[I heartily recommend The Chronicles of Narnia series by C.S. Lewis to children of every age. I have read the series several times. ]
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, March 14, 2004)
Back in the day when farm folks didn’t get to big cities very often, a young boy went on such an excursion with his grandparents. After stopping at a few places, grandma could tell that her husband and grandson were less interested in shopping than they were in exploring. So, she arranged to meet them later at a particular landmark and let them go. Soon, they came to a large skyscraper. They eyed it up and down and decided to have a closer look. As they approached the building, they saw something they’d never seen before: a revolving door. They couldn’t quite figure it out when they saw a stunning thing. An old haggard woman, stooped over, with a cane, walked through the revolving door and out came a young, shapely, attractive girl. Hardly daring to believe the miracle he’d just witnessed, the grandfather became agitated, turned to the boy, and said, “Tell your grandma to get over here right away. I’ve got a door I want her to walk through!”
We have to be careful about jumping to conclusions too quickly in life. The easy answers that seem so obviously true can be dead wrong. One day, Jesus met people who were abuzz about a recent event. People from Jesus’ native region of Galilee had been massacred by the Roman governor Pilate. Their blood, the people told Jesus, was mingled with the blood of the sacrificial animals at the temple in Jerusalem. Evidently, these people had been murdered in the very act of worshiping God. From Jesus’ words to them, we glean that this crowd had jumped to a conclusion about people who would have died such untimely and tragic deaths. Jesus asks them:
“Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did."
It’s amazing to consider how quickly we condemn people for the tragedies that befall them. Desperate to make sense of life’s senseless suffering, wanting to believe that there is something about us that will give us a pass when it comes to the possibility of tragedy, we adopt easy answers.
Sometimes we offer such explanations of tragedy to make ourselves feel superior. When AIDS first hit the radar screens of our consciousness, those who engage in the homosexual life style were the hardest hit. I remember a woman approaching me at the time and saying that God was giving those people a message. She was shocked when I disagreed with her. I told her that like her, I thought that homosexual behavior is contrary to the will of God. But if God passed a death sentence on every human being who did things that are contrary to the will of God, the population of Planet Earth would be erased in a second! The Bible makes it clear that we all fall short of God’s minimal expectations for human beings. We all sin. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus–an act God did for us–proves that God loves sinners and isn’t out to get anyone.
Jesus drives this point home in our lesson for today when He mentions another event which must have recently happened in Judea. He asks the crowd so quick to offer easy answers for others’ misfortune, “How about those eighteen people killed when the tower of Siloam crashed down on them? Do you think that they were worse sinners than everybody else and that God targeted them that day to die?” To this explanation, Jesus gives a resounding NO!
We live in an untidy world where bad things happen and there are no tidy explanations for when they do. Part of growing up as followers of Jesus, Jesus Himself seems to be telling us today, is accepting the ambiguities of life on this planet where sin and death still have their say. We don’t live in a perfect place and this side of heaven, we won't.
Some people observe these realities and fall apart or adopt the ethic of ‘eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.’
Still others slump into despair or cynicism.
But for the follower of Jesus Christ, none of these reactions will do. That’s because unlike any other group of people in the world, the follower of Jesus Christ always has hope!
After confronting the crowd–and us–with the sobering fact that suffering happens in this life, Jesus tells one of His parables, a story. In it, a man plants a fig tree. Apparently, you don’t even look for a fig tree to bear fruit until three years after you plant it. So, six years after planting the tree and three years after he began looking regularly for fruit to show up on it, the man who planted it has had enough. He says to his hired hand, “Cut the thing down! It’s wasting soil!” But the hired hand–the gardener–begs the owner to hold off on his decision for just a little while. He asks for permission to lavish the tree with some TLC for another year. Then, he says, if it sprouts figs next year, great! If it doesn’t, then he’ll happily cut it down.
What exactly does this little story mean? God lavishes one blessing after another on us. The greatest blessing of all, of course, is His offer of forgiveness and life forever with Him which He gives to us through Jesus Christ. Followers of Jesus have no reason to be paralyzed by fear or indifference or laziness in our lives. Jesus, the great God-Man went to a cross, taking the penalty for sin that you and I deserve. On the third day following His death, He rose again. Like the gardener in the story, for as long as we live on this earth, Jesus, the Risen King, gives us everything we need to “bear fruit,” everything we need to live meaningful, purposeful lives. That’s why, just before telling the story of the fruitless fig tree, Jesus says, “...unless you repent, you will all perish...” Literally, Jesus says, “...unless you are repenting, you will all perish.”
Jesus isn’t saying that in order for us to live, we have to go around with glum faces feeling sorry all the time. This is what He’s saying...
Yesterday, during Catechism class, Cori volunteered to be an object lesson. Tim asked her if she liked snacks. She said yes and he handed her a bag of chips to hold. He asked if she liked to sleep. Yes, she answered; so, Tim threw her a pillow to hold. Cori said she also liked soccer. So, she got a soccer ball to hold. She also said yes to reading for school and reading for pleasure and got books to hold symbolizing those loves. As you can imagine, after a few moments, Cori’s arms got pretty full. Then, standing here with all this stuff, Tim pulled out a rope and said, “Cori, you’re in the middle of a flood. The waters are rising. You need to catch this rope in order to be pulled to safety. What do you have to do?” The answer is obvious: to live, Cori had to be willing to empty her arms of everything but that rope.
That’s what Jesus means when He tells us to be repenting. You see, there are two parts to repentance. There is sorrow for past sins, to be sure. But there’s also opening ourselves to go where God sends us, do what God wants us to do, be who God wants us to be. To be repentant means to hold on for dear life to Jesus Christ no matter what fake comforts and joys the world may offer to us. When we live each day with a life style of repentance, God sets us loose to live with all the passion and power we were made to have as human beings! That’s what the Bible and Jesus mean when they talk about you and me “bearing fruit.”
Ever since I lost the primary election on March 2, I’ve had people trying to console me. I never needed consoling. I did what I did because I knew that Jesus Christ has set me free, not to succeed, but to try...to live...to risk...to do my best in all aspects of my life. This includes the political arena, an area in which I felt I could in practical ways, love my God and love my neighbor. That’s bearing fruit and that’s what I want to do with my fleeting time on earth.
When we make living a repentatn life style our aim, win or lose, you and I can’t do anything but succeed because win or lose, seeking to love God and neighbor, we know that God is with us!
The novelist Herman Wouk, who wrote The Winds of War and The Caine Mutiny, once visited David Ben-Gurion, the first president of modern Israel. Ben Gurion kept telling Wouk, that as a Jew, he should move to Israel. “Here,” Ben-Gurion told him, “you will be free.” Wouk could hardly believe his ears. “Free?” he wondered. Israel was surrounded by enemies and some roads in the country were impassable after sundown because of sniper fire. What did the old man mean by saying he would be free? “I did not say safe,” Ben-Gurion replied, “I said free.”
Many of you are familiar with the series of novels called, The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis. In these novels, children from our world keep having encounters with another universe in a land called Narnia, most memorably with a Christ-like figure named Aslan. In the book called, The Silver Chair, two children are joined by a strange creature from that land in liberating a prince named Rilian from the enchantments of a devil-like witch. But they find Rilian in an undeworld city whose inhabitants they feel certain will fight their escape with tooth-and-tong. No longer under any spell, Rilian and the others were all free, even if they weren’t safe. That’s why Rilian tells the others, “Let us descend into the city and take the adventure that is sent us.”
As long as you and I live here on this earth, God makes no guarantees about our being safe from the tragedies and losses that may be sent to us. Jesus says that the rain falls on the just and the unjust alike. Cancer, bankruptcies, tragedies, defeats, mishaps, and even death come to Christians and non-Christians alike.
But only followers of Jesus Christ, absolutely certain that we will live with God forever, are free to live life to the maximum, loving God and loving neighbor with passion, seeking to be and do our best no matter how hard the devil, the world, and our sinful selves may oppose us...to take whatever adventure is sent to us.
For the follower of Jesus, the key issue isn’t how many days to our lives; it’s how much life in our days.
This morning, Jesus’ message for us is simple: “Be free, be fearless, and live like people who, through Jesus Christ, have been given eternity!" Because through Christ, we have been given eternity!
[The inspiration for this message came from the work of the pastors and staff of Prince of Peace Lutheran Church of Burnsville, Minnesota.
[The true story of Herman Wouk's encounter with David Ben-Gurion comes from Perfect Illustrations For Every Topic and Occasion, edited by the folks of PreachingToday.com and published by Tyndale.
[The joke about the grandparents and their grandson was told by Pastor Gerald Mann in one of his audiotaped messages.
[I heartily recommend The Chronicles of Narnia series by C.S. Lewis to children of every age. I have read the series several times. ]
Wednesday, March 10, 2004
How to Have a Positive Impact
During my recent and short-lived political career (I was running for the Ohio House of Representatives), I was invited to speak at a meeting of the Loveland Women's Club. This organization is inspiring because they do so many great things for the community.
Their efforts set me to thinking about what the essential ingredients are for anyone---be they community organization, school group, government agency, charity, church, coach, teacher, parent, or grandparent---to have a positive impact on the lives of others.
The first ingredient, I think, is love. I'm not talking about an emotion here, but a tough-minded commitment. Love, in contemporary thinking, is too bathed in sentimentality. We confuse loving people with liking them. You don't always like the people you love.
A famed speaker and author was married for more than forty years to a fiery woman, gifted in her own right. One morning, they had a fierce argument. Because he had an appointment and needed to go, the man left before things were resolved. When he returned later, his wife was away. But there was a note in the kitchen. "Dear Charlie," it said, "I hate you. Love, Martha."
Love makes a tough commitment to the good of others. We must have this if we're to have a positive impact on the people in our world. Locally, I have seen this in some friends I've made recently---Tom Wildey of New Richmond and Bruce and Krista Dunham of Pierce Township. Their commitment to helping kids they'll probably never meet has been important in the recent expansion of the Boys and Girls Club of Clermont County.
The second essential ingredient is attitude. An elderly woman sat at a banquet table and stared at a man her own age all evening long. Unnerved, the man finally asked the woman why she was doing this. "You remind me of my third husband," she said. "Oh, really," the man responded, "how many husbands have you had?" "Two." That woman had the right attitude!
The right attitude when it comes to positively impacting others is one that says, "Yes, this task---be it parenting or reaching a lofty goal to benefit our community---is bigger than me. But I'm sure that at the right time, God will bring the right people along to compensate for my deficiencies!" Leadership guru John Maxwell says, "Attitude is altitude!" He's right. We can never rise higher than our attitudes.
The final essential ingredient for having a positive impact on others is faith. When I first came to Clermont County to start Friendship Church almost fourteen years ago, it was clear that many "experts" thought the congregation would go belly-up. It's been a long climb and we're surely not a megachurch. But on Christmas Eve, 2002, we had the first worship celebration in our first building facility. That happened because, through years of worshiping in a school gym, the people of the congregation had faith in God and faith that He would help us pursue His call for us to create a congregation that welcomes people who never liked church. It's inspiring to be the pastor of such selfless, faithful people!
Want to have a positive impact on others? Ask God to help you face each day with love, a positive attitude, and faith in Him...then watch how God uses you to do great things!
[This is the newest installment of a column I write for a chain of suburban Cincinnati newspapers. I wasn't writing it during my recent campaign for the Ohio House of Representatives.]
Their efforts set me to thinking about what the essential ingredients are for anyone---be they community organization, school group, government agency, charity, church, coach, teacher, parent, or grandparent---to have a positive impact on the lives of others.
The first ingredient, I think, is love. I'm not talking about an emotion here, but a tough-minded commitment. Love, in contemporary thinking, is too bathed in sentimentality. We confuse loving people with liking them. You don't always like the people you love.
A famed speaker and author was married for more than forty years to a fiery woman, gifted in her own right. One morning, they had a fierce argument. Because he had an appointment and needed to go, the man left before things were resolved. When he returned later, his wife was away. But there was a note in the kitchen. "Dear Charlie," it said, "I hate you. Love, Martha."
Love makes a tough commitment to the good of others. We must have this if we're to have a positive impact on the people in our world. Locally, I have seen this in some friends I've made recently---Tom Wildey of New Richmond and Bruce and Krista Dunham of Pierce Township. Their commitment to helping kids they'll probably never meet has been important in the recent expansion of the Boys and Girls Club of Clermont County.
The second essential ingredient is attitude. An elderly woman sat at a banquet table and stared at a man her own age all evening long. Unnerved, the man finally asked the woman why she was doing this. "You remind me of my third husband," she said. "Oh, really," the man responded, "how many husbands have you had?" "Two." That woman had the right attitude!
The right attitude when it comes to positively impacting others is one that says, "Yes, this task---be it parenting or reaching a lofty goal to benefit our community---is bigger than me. But I'm sure that at the right time, God will bring the right people along to compensate for my deficiencies!" Leadership guru John Maxwell says, "Attitude is altitude!" He's right. We can never rise higher than our attitudes.
The final essential ingredient for having a positive impact on others is faith. When I first came to Clermont County to start Friendship Church almost fourteen years ago, it was clear that many "experts" thought the congregation would go belly-up. It's been a long climb and we're surely not a megachurch. But on Christmas Eve, 2002, we had the first worship celebration in our first building facility. That happened because, through years of worshiping in a school gym, the people of the congregation had faith in God and faith that He would help us pursue His call for us to create a congregation that welcomes people who never liked church. It's inspiring to be the pastor of such selfless, faithful people!
Want to have a positive impact on others? Ask God to help you face each day with love, a positive attitude, and faith in Him...then watch how God uses you to do great things!
[This is the newest installment of a column I write for a chain of suburban Cincinnati newspapers. I wasn't writing it during my recent campaign for the Ohio House of Representatives.]
Friday, March 05, 2004
The Journey,
Through Lent...Through Life:
Surmounting the Roadblock of Desire
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 29, 2004)
In the wilds of Alaska, native peoples kill a wolf by coating several layers of frozen blood on a sharp knife which they pound, point down, into the tundra. The wolf smells the scent of the blood and after circling the knife, begins to lick it. He licks the frozen blood faster and faster until he’s crazy with bloodlust and desire. His craving becomes so frenzied that he never notices the blade cut his tongue or that the blood he so ravenously consumes is his own. By the morning, the wolf lies dead in the snow.
For us, temptations are like that knife driven into the tundra is for the wolf: alluring, exciting. But temptations can also leave us dead—spiritually, psychologically, physically, eternally...separated from God when we let them lead us to rebellion against God.
Our Bible lesson for this morning recounts a famous incident in Jesus’ life on this earth. Fresh from being baptized in the Jordan River by the John the Baptizer, Jesus—full of the Holy Spirit and driven by the Holy Spirit—goes into the wilderness. There, we’re told, Jesus is tempted by the devil. From this incident, I want to hold up several important lessons for your life and mine.
One lesson is that temptation often begins in the wilderness. In the movie, Moonstruck, there’s a scene set in an Italian restaurant involving a middle-aged woman dining alone and a middle-aged male, married college professor obviously on the prowl for young female companionship. The woman strikes up a conversation with the man and asks him why he turns from his wife and looks for younger women. The professor explains that a person gets to a certain point in his life where he’s established in his profession and begins to bore himself. You think, he tells her, nothing of your mastery of your profession until one day, you look up and see some impressionable co-ed dazzled by your knowledge and maturity.
What that character was saying is that sometimes life becomes a wilderness—barren, un-fulfilling, boring. It usually happens after you’ve conquered a mountain, established a beach head of security or recognition in your life. Then, boom, you’re in a wilderness. And that’s true of more than just middle-agers. Studies of Olympic gold medalists and of athletes who win championships in their sports show that within weeks of attaining their lofty goals, most go into a tailspin of deep depression. In the Old Testament, the prophet Elijah achieves a great victory for God’s cause over his adversaries. But instead of celebrating, Elijah goes into the wilderness and asks God to kill him. Elijah felt he had nothing left to live for. And King David, also in the Old Testament, had consolidated his kingdom after decades of struggle only to decide that in the spring when kings would be expected to lead their armies against foreign nations, to take it easy in his castle. Having reached the pinnacle with no new mountains to conquer in sight, David was bored in the wilderness. It was then that he saw another man’s wife and had an affair with her that led to tragic consequences for himself and for his rule.
Jesus was tempted in the wilderness immediately after He had been baptized in the Jordan River and the Holy Spirit had miraculously affirmed that He was God in the flesh. Pretty heady stuff! I’m convinced that the Holy Spirit led Jesus to the wilderness at precisely that moment so that He would know how vulnerable to temptation we become on the heels of life’s high points. God created us to keep striving, to keep struggling to stretch and grow and achieve. If our lives consist mostly of going to work and then plopping down in front of the TV set or the computer, we may be in the wilderness and temptation may be close at hand.
Another lesson we learn from Jesus’ time in the wilderness is that the things that tempt us usually seem harmless. In fact, they can actually be good things in themselves. Think for a second about the temptations with which the devil presents Jesus. He says to Jesus, “You’re hungry; make bread from these stones.” And, “These kingdoms really belong to you. How about skipping the cross and taking them from me by worshiping me?” Then finally, “God the Father promises to take care of you. Why not take a nose dive from the top of the temple?” These temptations really, seem so harmless, so reasonable, so non-threatening, don’t they?
Brian Stoffregen, a Lutheran pastor in California, writes about what happens when a child is told, “Don’t eat those cookies right now.” There’s nothing wrong with eating cookies per se. But if a mom says that doing so at that time will spoil her child’s appetite or that she’s donating the cookies to the local scout troop’s bake sale, then it becomes wrong for the child to eat a perfectly good cookie. When Jesus refused the devil’s first temptation, He reminded the devil that life—real life comes only from God and His Word in our lives. There are times when it seems perfectly reasonable to do things our own way, or our friends’ way, or our boss’ way. But our call is to live on the basis of every word that comes from the mouth of God. Period. I thank God for the forgiveness He has granted to me when I’ve forgotten this!
A related lesson is that temptation stems from legitimate desires. Jesus had a legitimate desire for food while in the wilderness. He also wanted to take control of the kingdoms of the world from the devil. He wanted to live in absolute dependence on God. All of those desires were legitimate and appropriate for Him. But the devil tried to lure him into fulfilling these desires in illegitimate, ungodly ways.
Gerald Mann, a Baptist pastor in Texas, tells about receiving a telephone call from an attractive female member of his church. “I know that your wife is going to be away this weekend. Would you like to come over to my house?” “Yes, I would,” he told her, “but I’m not going to do it.” God creates us all with desires—for love, success, fulfillment, physical health, friendship, sexual intimacy. Those are all legitimate desires. Temptation comes when the devil, the world, or our own sinful selves try to convince us to fulfill those desires on the cheap, apart from God’s will for our lives. When that happens, we need to be prepared to say “No!” so that we can say “Yes!” to God!
A fourth lesson from Jesus’ time in the wilderness is that temptation lures us away from God’s kingdom toward the kingdom of selfishness. We all want to be comfortable, popular, successful. But if we strive for these things apart from God, we can lose our eternal lives if we’re not careful. Jesus refused to do any of the things the devil tempted Him with because had He done so, He would have been acting selfishly. He would have been putting Himself ahead of God the Father’s plan for Him. He would have skipped His cross and you and I would have been dead in our sins, destined for hell forever.
In the kingdom of God, we make serving God and our neighbor our highest priorities. We only have the strength to do that when we surrender each day to Christ and let the power of His Spirit live within us.
A fifth lesson in Jesus’ temptations is this: We need to be prepared to face temptation. Temptation is a part of everyday life. Each tiny temptation that we cave into can lead us further and further from God until we think nothing of ignoring God and the free gifts of life, forgiveness, and joy that He offers when we put our lives under His control. You and I need to face off against the small temptations in order to forestall the big ones from ever hitting us. When the devil tempted Jesus, he quoted Scripture, making his temptations sound so reasonable. But Jesus was able to resist the devil because while the devil knew the written word of God, Jesus knew the God behind the written Word. Jesus lived in intimate fellowship with God the Father. His death and resurrection make it possible for us to have that kind of relationship with God, the kind of relationship that helps us to live each day God’s way and because of that to experience all the fulfillment of the legitimate, godly desires God has planted in each of us.
On Ash Wednesday, I asked the people who were here to use the Lenten season through which we’re now going to grow closer to God. To help with that, over the next several Wednesday evenings, starting at 7:00, we’re going to have a time of prayer. But I also asked folks to take little half-sheets of paper, like the ones you received this morning as you arrived, and jot down a few things in your life that you think are keeping you from having a close relationship with God. Chances are that these “God-blockers” are the very places where you’re being tempted the most—a sour relationship with a child or a parent, a tendency to work too many hours, a valuation of money and possessions even though you know neither can last forever, a need to control others, whatever. Jot those God-blockers down on your half sheet, fold it, put it in your wallet or purse, and then, at least once a day, take a look at it and ask God to help you to do His will and resist temptation even in this challenging part of your life. Like the wolf on the frozen tundra, those who let their own desires take control of their lives, end up dead in the wilderness of selfishness and self-will. But when we let God control our desires, Jesus comes to us, full of goodness and power and life. Today and each day, let’s invite Jesus into the center of our desires and wills. We were made for intimacy with God. Let’s not allow any temptation to prevent us from experiencing that!
[The story of the wolf is taken from a sermon by Pastor Mike Foss; his source was Larry Davies, Turning Points: A Bloody Knife and Growing Hair.
[Brian Stoffregen's discussion of the mom, kid, and freshly-baked cookies appears in his emailed exegetical commentaries, which are excellent!
[Gerald Mann's true story of the attractive woman who called him up occurs on an audiotape of one of his messages. You can secure audio copies of this fantastic preacher's messages from Gerald Mann Ministries, which has a presence on the web.]
Through Lent...Through Life:
Surmounting the Roadblock of Desire
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 29, 2004)
In the wilds of Alaska, native peoples kill a wolf by coating several layers of frozen blood on a sharp knife which they pound, point down, into the tundra. The wolf smells the scent of the blood and after circling the knife, begins to lick it. He licks the frozen blood faster and faster until he’s crazy with bloodlust and desire. His craving becomes so frenzied that he never notices the blade cut his tongue or that the blood he so ravenously consumes is his own. By the morning, the wolf lies dead in the snow.
For us, temptations are like that knife driven into the tundra is for the wolf: alluring, exciting. But temptations can also leave us dead—spiritually, psychologically, physically, eternally...separated from God when we let them lead us to rebellion against God.
Our Bible lesson for this morning recounts a famous incident in Jesus’ life on this earth. Fresh from being baptized in the Jordan River by the John the Baptizer, Jesus—full of the Holy Spirit and driven by the Holy Spirit—goes into the wilderness. There, we’re told, Jesus is tempted by the devil. From this incident, I want to hold up several important lessons for your life and mine.
One lesson is that temptation often begins in the wilderness. In the movie, Moonstruck, there’s a scene set in an Italian restaurant involving a middle-aged woman dining alone and a middle-aged male, married college professor obviously on the prowl for young female companionship. The woman strikes up a conversation with the man and asks him why he turns from his wife and looks for younger women. The professor explains that a person gets to a certain point in his life where he’s established in his profession and begins to bore himself. You think, he tells her, nothing of your mastery of your profession until one day, you look up and see some impressionable co-ed dazzled by your knowledge and maturity.
What that character was saying is that sometimes life becomes a wilderness—barren, un-fulfilling, boring. It usually happens after you’ve conquered a mountain, established a beach head of security or recognition in your life. Then, boom, you’re in a wilderness. And that’s true of more than just middle-agers. Studies of Olympic gold medalists and of athletes who win championships in their sports show that within weeks of attaining their lofty goals, most go into a tailspin of deep depression. In the Old Testament, the prophet Elijah achieves a great victory for God’s cause over his adversaries. But instead of celebrating, Elijah goes into the wilderness and asks God to kill him. Elijah felt he had nothing left to live for. And King David, also in the Old Testament, had consolidated his kingdom after decades of struggle only to decide that in the spring when kings would be expected to lead their armies against foreign nations, to take it easy in his castle. Having reached the pinnacle with no new mountains to conquer in sight, David was bored in the wilderness. It was then that he saw another man’s wife and had an affair with her that led to tragic consequences for himself and for his rule.
Jesus was tempted in the wilderness immediately after He had been baptized in the Jordan River and the Holy Spirit had miraculously affirmed that He was God in the flesh. Pretty heady stuff! I’m convinced that the Holy Spirit led Jesus to the wilderness at precisely that moment so that He would know how vulnerable to temptation we become on the heels of life’s high points. God created us to keep striving, to keep struggling to stretch and grow and achieve. If our lives consist mostly of going to work and then plopping down in front of the TV set or the computer, we may be in the wilderness and temptation may be close at hand.
Another lesson we learn from Jesus’ time in the wilderness is that the things that tempt us usually seem harmless. In fact, they can actually be good things in themselves. Think for a second about the temptations with which the devil presents Jesus. He says to Jesus, “You’re hungry; make bread from these stones.” And, “These kingdoms really belong to you. How about skipping the cross and taking them from me by worshiping me?” Then finally, “God the Father promises to take care of you. Why not take a nose dive from the top of the temple?” These temptations really, seem so harmless, so reasonable, so non-threatening, don’t they?
Brian Stoffregen, a Lutheran pastor in California, writes about what happens when a child is told, “Don’t eat those cookies right now.” There’s nothing wrong with eating cookies per se. But if a mom says that doing so at that time will spoil her child’s appetite or that she’s donating the cookies to the local scout troop’s bake sale, then it becomes wrong for the child to eat a perfectly good cookie. When Jesus refused the devil’s first temptation, He reminded the devil that life—real life comes only from God and His Word in our lives. There are times when it seems perfectly reasonable to do things our own way, or our friends’ way, or our boss’ way. But our call is to live on the basis of every word that comes from the mouth of God. Period. I thank God for the forgiveness He has granted to me when I’ve forgotten this!
A related lesson is that temptation stems from legitimate desires. Jesus had a legitimate desire for food while in the wilderness. He also wanted to take control of the kingdoms of the world from the devil. He wanted to live in absolute dependence on God. All of those desires were legitimate and appropriate for Him. But the devil tried to lure him into fulfilling these desires in illegitimate, ungodly ways.
Gerald Mann, a Baptist pastor in Texas, tells about receiving a telephone call from an attractive female member of his church. “I know that your wife is going to be away this weekend. Would you like to come over to my house?” “Yes, I would,” he told her, “but I’m not going to do it.” God creates us all with desires—for love, success, fulfillment, physical health, friendship, sexual intimacy. Those are all legitimate desires. Temptation comes when the devil, the world, or our own sinful selves try to convince us to fulfill those desires on the cheap, apart from God’s will for our lives. When that happens, we need to be prepared to say “No!” so that we can say “Yes!” to God!
A fourth lesson from Jesus’ time in the wilderness is that temptation lures us away from God’s kingdom toward the kingdom of selfishness. We all want to be comfortable, popular, successful. But if we strive for these things apart from God, we can lose our eternal lives if we’re not careful. Jesus refused to do any of the things the devil tempted Him with because had He done so, He would have been acting selfishly. He would have been putting Himself ahead of God the Father’s plan for Him. He would have skipped His cross and you and I would have been dead in our sins, destined for hell forever.
In the kingdom of God, we make serving God and our neighbor our highest priorities. We only have the strength to do that when we surrender each day to Christ and let the power of His Spirit live within us.
A fifth lesson in Jesus’ temptations is this: We need to be prepared to face temptation. Temptation is a part of everyday life. Each tiny temptation that we cave into can lead us further and further from God until we think nothing of ignoring God and the free gifts of life, forgiveness, and joy that He offers when we put our lives under His control. You and I need to face off against the small temptations in order to forestall the big ones from ever hitting us. When the devil tempted Jesus, he quoted Scripture, making his temptations sound so reasonable. But Jesus was able to resist the devil because while the devil knew the written word of God, Jesus knew the God behind the written Word. Jesus lived in intimate fellowship with God the Father. His death and resurrection make it possible for us to have that kind of relationship with God, the kind of relationship that helps us to live each day God’s way and because of that to experience all the fulfillment of the legitimate, godly desires God has planted in each of us.
On Ash Wednesday, I asked the people who were here to use the Lenten season through which we’re now going to grow closer to God. To help with that, over the next several Wednesday evenings, starting at 7:00, we’re going to have a time of prayer. But I also asked folks to take little half-sheets of paper, like the ones you received this morning as you arrived, and jot down a few things in your life that you think are keeping you from having a close relationship with God. Chances are that these “God-blockers” are the very places where you’re being tempted the most—a sour relationship with a child or a parent, a tendency to work too many hours, a valuation of money and possessions even though you know neither can last forever, a need to control others, whatever. Jot those God-blockers down on your half sheet, fold it, put it in your wallet or purse, and then, at least once a day, take a look at it and ask God to help you to do His will and resist temptation even in this challenging part of your life. Like the wolf on the frozen tundra, those who let their own desires take control of their lives, end up dead in the wilderness of selfishness and self-will. But when we let God control our desires, Jesus comes to us, full of goodness and power and life. Today and each day, let’s invite Jesus into the center of our desires and wills. We were made for intimacy with God. Let’s not allow any temptation to prevent us from experiencing that!
[The story of the wolf is taken from a sermon by Pastor Mike Foss; his source was Larry Davies, Turning Points: A Bloody Knife and Growing Hair.
[Brian Stoffregen's discussion of the mom, kid, and freshly-baked cookies appears in his emailed exegetical commentaries, which are excellent!
[Gerald Mann's true story of the attractive woman who called him up occurs on an audiotape of one of his messages. You can secure audio copies of this fantastic preacher's messages from Gerald Mann Ministries, which has a presence on the web.]
Wednesday, February 25, 2004
Get Real
Ash Wednesday
Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 25, 2004)
This past Sunday afternoon, Mike Cheney and I had to go to Loveland on an errand. That’s simple enough, isn’t it? We just had to take I-275 up to Loveland, make a few turns, and we’d be where we needed to be.
Somewhere around Milford, Mike said, “Hey, pull off here. There are some things I want to show you.” Since we both knew our way around and this would only be a minor detour, I readily agreed.
But you can guess what happened. We got thoroughly lost. There was one road I know that we must have either been on or crossed five times. Forty minutes into our little side excursion, we realized that we had succeeded in making a gigantic circle and still weren’t sure how to get to our original destination.
While I did gain some comfort from finally meeting a person with as poor a sense of direction as I have, I had to agree with Mike about the lesson we’d learned. “Next time,” Mike said, “we’d better bring a map.” Or, at least, I thought, we should ask for directions.
Life on this earth is a journey. God’s Word, the Bible, says that it’s a journey through a foreign land. Our real home is in heaven with God. If we’re to make it through this life and get to our ultimate destination, we dare not go through this life without a map, without direction from God.
Lent is a season devoted to our getting real with God and recommitting ourselves to getting our directions from Him. We know that this life is only practice for the real life that awaits us beyond the grave. We won’t get this life perfect. Our sin will get in the way of that. But we can be moving in the right direction. Our hearts can be in the right places. We can be moving toward God.
And make no mistake: This is deadly serious business. A young boy was excited to be taking a beach vacation with his family. His parents were excited for him too. But during the trip to the beach and even after they’d arrived at their condo, they warned their son, “Billy, the ocean is big and powerful. We want you to have fun here. But remember, never venture into the water unless one of us is with you. Never go to the beach without telling us where you want to go.” It can be deadly when you and I ignore God’s directions for us. It’s deadly when we rely on anything or anyone more than God. It’s deadly when we quit moving toward God. It brings eternal death when we try to earn God’s love or other people’s appreciation.
In our Bible lesson for this evening, Jesus warns us about one of the false directions we can take in life, thinking that we know what we’re doing. Jesus tells us that we need to quit fibbing to ourselves, as Mike and I did when we got lost last Sunday. And we need to stop fibbing to God and the world. We need to get real.
Above all, Jesus tells us tonight, we need to get real when, as He says, it comes to “practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them.” Piety, dictionaries tell us, is religious devotion. People who make a show of their religious devotion are moving in the wrong direction. They think that by convincing others (or themselves) of how devoted they are to God, they’re doing things God’s way. But Jesus says they’re more lost and separated from God than people who’ve never heard of God or darkened the door of a church building.
So, Jesus says, when you give charity to the poor, don’t make a show of it; do it quietly.
When you pray, don’t pray out in the public square, using flowery words; even public prayer is meant to be communication as intimate as what goes on between a husband and wife.
When you give up food in order to focus on God, don’t begin every sentence with, “I’ve been fasting now for five days...”; instead privately empty yourself of your dependence on the things of this world so that you can fill up on God.
And don’t use your money so that you can live like a sated lab rat; instead, use the riches God gives to you to glorify God and love others.
Jesus doesn’t condemn these actions. God likes it when we give to the poor, when we pray, when we fast, and even when we spend and save money. But Jesus says, God wants us to do these things in the right ways, for the right reasons. If we do any of these acts in order to be noticed or applauded for how wonderful we are, Jesus says, we’ll get precisely the reward we seek. Other people will say nice things about us. They may even give us honors and erect plaques in the town square. But inside, out of the glare of public scrutiny, our hearts will be as dark and selfish and far from God as the hearts of the local pornographer, prostitute, drug dealer, or murderer.
In Psalm 51, ancient Israel’s King David, having been confronted by the prophet Nathan for committing adultery and murder, tells God, “You desire truth in the inward being...” It’s only when we get real with God that our hearts and wills become tuned to Him and He can give us direction for our lives.
In just a few moments, I’m going to ask you to take a short amount of time and write on the little half-sheets we gave you as you arrived tonight. On those sheets, I want you to write those things in your life that may be preventing you from loving God and loving your neighbor completely. I don’t want you to show what you write to anyone. Instead, I want you to fold those sheets and put them in your pocket or your purse or your wallet. And then, sometime each day throughout this Lenten season, I ask you to pull out that half-sheet and tell God something like, “Lord, without You, I’m lost. Through prayer, Bible-reading, worship, and fellowship with other believers, give me Your direction. Show me how I can overcome these things that are preventing me from living life Your way.”
God is anxious to give us direction as we journey through life. But, He won't force direction on us; we need to ask Him for it.
Tonight I want to tell you that no matter how lost you may feel, God can change the direction of your life. Turn to Him each day, be honest with Him, be real about your hurts and hopes, your sins and your failings, and He will fill you with life, purpose, and peace. Tonight, as this Lenten season begins, let’s ask God to help us to not be religious and instead, be completely devoted to Him. Let’s resolve each day to turn to God and become the people God made us to be!
Ash Wednesday
Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 25, 2004)
This past Sunday afternoon, Mike Cheney and I had to go to Loveland on an errand. That’s simple enough, isn’t it? We just had to take I-275 up to Loveland, make a few turns, and we’d be where we needed to be.
Somewhere around Milford, Mike said, “Hey, pull off here. There are some things I want to show you.” Since we both knew our way around and this would only be a minor detour, I readily agreed.
But you can guess what happened. We got thoroughly lost. There was one road I know that we must have either been on or crossed five times. Forty minutes into our little side excursion, we realized that we had succeeded in making a gigantic circle and still weren’t sure how to get to our original destination.
While I did gain some comfort from finally meeting a person with as poor a sense of direction as I have, I had to agree with Mike about the lesson we’d learned. “Next time,” Mike said, “we’d better bring a map.” Or, at least, I thought, we should ask for directions.
Life on this earth is a journey. God’s Word, the Bible, says that it’s a journey through a foreign land. Our real home is in heaven with God. If we’re to make it through this life and get to our ultimate destination, we dare not go through this life without a map, without direction from God.
Lent is a season devoted to our getting real with God and recommitting ourselves to getting our directions from Him. We know that this life is only practice for the real life that awaits us beyond the grave. We won’t get this life perfect. Our sin will get in the way of that. But we can be moving in the right direction. Our hearts can be in the right places. We can be moving toward God.
And make no mistake: This is deadly serious business. A young boy was excited to be taking a beach vacation with his family. His parents were excited for him too. But during the trip to the beach and even after they’d arrived at their condo, they warned their son, “Billy, the ocean is big and powerful. We want you to have fun here. But remember, never venture into the water unless one of us is with you. Never go to the beach without telling us where you want to go.” It can be deadly when you and I ignore God’s directions for us. It’s deadly when we rely on anything or anyone more than God. It’s deadly when we quit moving toward God. It brings eternal death when we try to earn God’s love or other people’s appreciation.
In our Bible lesson for this evening, Jesus warns us about one of the false directions we can take in life, thinking that we know what we’re doing. Jesus tells us that we need to quit fibbing to ourselves, as Mike and I did when we got lost last Sunday. And we need to stop fibbing to God and the world. We need to get real.
Above all, Jesus tells us tonight, we need to get real when, as He says, it comes to “practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them.” Piety, dictionaries tell us, is religious devotion. People who make a show of their religious devotion are moving in the wrong direction. They think that by convincing others (or themselves) of how devoted they are to God, they’re doing things God’s way. But Jesus says they’re more lost and separated from God than people who’ve never heard of God or darkened the door of a church building.
So, Jesus says, when you give charity to the poor, don’t make a show of it; do it quietly.
When you pray, don’t pray out in the public square, using flowery words; even public prayer is meant to be communication as intimate as what goes on between a husband and wife.
When you give up food in order to focus on God, don’t begin every sentence with, “I’ve been fasting now for five days...”; instead privately empty yourself of your dependence on the things of this world so that you can fill up on God.
And don’t use your money so that you can live like a sated lab rat; instead, use the riches God gives to you to glorify God and love others.
Jesus doesn’t condemn these actions. God likes it when we give to the poor, when we pray, when we fast, and even when we spend and save money. But Jesus says, God wants us to do these things in the right ways, for the right reasons. If we do any of these acts in order to be noticed or applauded for how wonderful we are, Jesus says, we’ll get precisely the reward we seek. Other people will say nice things about us. They may even give us honors and erect plaques in the town square. But inside, out of the glare of public scrutiny, our hearts will be as dark and selfish and far from God as the hearts of the local pornographer, prostitute, drug dealer, or murderer.
In Psalm 51, ancient Israel’s King David, having been confronted by the prophet Nathan for committing adultery and murder, tells God, “You desire truth in the inward being...” It’s only when we get real with God that our hearts and wills become tuned to Him and He can give us direction for our lives.
In just a few moments, I’m going to ask you to take a short amount of time and write on the little half-sheets we gave you as you arrived tonight. On those sheets, I want you to write those things in your life that may be preventing you from loving God and loving your neighbor completely. I don’t want you to show what you write to anyone. Instead, I want you to fold those sheets and put them in your pocket or your purse or your wallet. And then, sometime each day throughout this Lenten season, I ask you to pull out that half-sheet and tell God something like, “Lord, without You, I’m lost. Through prayer, Bible-reading, worship, and fellowship with other believers, give me Your direction. Show me how I can overcome these things that are preventing me from living life Your way.”
God is anxious to give us direction as we journey through life. But, He won't force direction on us; we need to ask Him for it.
Tonight I want to tell you that no matter how lost you may feel, God can change the direction of your life. Turn to Him each day, be honest with Him, be real about your hurts and hopes, your sins and your failings, and He will fill you with life, purpose, and peace. Tonight, as this Lenten season begins, let’s ask God to help us to not be religious and instead, be completely devoted to Him. Let’s resolve each day to turn to God and become the people God made us to be!
Sunday, February 22, 2004
The Friendship Vision,
Faith on Fire:
Change, For God's Sake
Acts 18:1-11
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 22, 2004)
A young pastor had just finished delivering his first message at a new church. Afterwards, a member approached him and said, “That was a really dull sermon.” All week long, the pastor was haunted by that comment. The next Sunday, the same man approached him and said, “That message was one of the shallowest I’ve ever heard.” By the third Sunday, the young pastor was shaken, his self-esteem about as low as it could get. Craving affirmation, he asked this same man, “Did today’s message help you at all?” The man told him, “That was the worst one yet. You didn’t say anything worthwhile.” Crushed, the pastor pointed the man out to the church council president and asked about him. “Oh, don’t pay any attention to him,” the council president said, “He just repeats whatever he hears everybody else saying.”
Criticism is part of this life. And, it’s a fact that in order for us to grow in our personal relationships with Jesus Christ, in order for us to be useful to God and others, in order for us to fulfill our missions in life, we will usually have to endure criticism.
In the whole history of the Church, God has used the criticism of others to make His people’s faith stronger and to help His Church reach out to others with God’s love. In today’s Bible lesson, the first century preacher and evangelist Paul travels to the Greek city of Corinth, the center of Greek business and politics. When Paul arrived in Corinth, he did the sensible thing—he carried the good news of Jesus to the people most likely to be open to it first, his fellow Jews. But after trying and trying to tell them that Jesus had fulfilled the Old Testament’s promise of a Savior, Paul just ran into one critical, disbelieving comment after another.
Frustrated, Paul “shook the dust from his clothes,” his culture’s way of saying, “Forget about you,” and said, “From now on, I’ll just hang out with and share the Good News of Jesus with non-Jews, Gentiles.” He even moved into the house of a non-Jew who believed in the God proclaimed by the Jews and who had come to follow Jesus.
When Paul did that, amazing things happened! First, the leader of the synagogue, a devout Jew, came to faith in Christ, along with his family and slaves. The company of believers in Jesus—Jewish and Gentile—began to grow in numbers and one night, Paul received a vision telling him to, “Go for it! Tell everybody about Jesus Christ because there are many people here just waiting to be told that all who believe in Jesus don’t face eternal separation from God. They hunger to know that God loves them and wants to have them with Him forever!”
Paul learned, as we must learn, that as hurtful as criticism may be, it cannot destroy the follower of Jesus. In fact, if we will let God do it, He can use others’ criticism to bring positive changes in our lives. We see this in three ways in our Bible lesson.
First: We see that we can learn from criticism. God can use even unfair criticism to help us grow. Today is the actual birthday of one of my heroes, George Washington. As a young man, hungry for glory and fame, Washington led an ill-conceived attack by colonial soldiers during the French and Indian War. Not only were many of the men under Washington’s command slaughtered, he barely escaped with his own life. Prominent people in Britain and the American colonies all wanted to see the young Washington court martialed or hanged for his rashness. If Jay Leno or David Letterman had been around, Washington would have been humiliated and forced from public life forever. Instead, Washington learned from his critics. He took a look at himself and gave up being a glory-hound. Honors and accolades came to Washington later in his life precisely because he put his duty ahead of those things. He’d learned from his critics.
In our Bible lesson, Paul listens to the critics who savage him and decides to change tactics. He began sharing Jesus’ offer of new life for all who turn away from sin and let Him be the Boss of their lives with people he might otherwise have ignored.
Second: From our lesson, we see that our critics can strengthen our resolve. When we’re criticized for doing the right thing, we can either cave into peer pressure or we can reaffirm our resolve to do the right thing. Criticism forces us to take a new look at our actions and values. Our college-age daughter loves the internship she's doing right now, loves the work, loves the class on organizational leadership she’s taking, is getting to know some wonderful people. But she catches flak all the time from lots of her fellow interns because, while not condemning anybody else, she refuses to be on the prowl for sex or booze or drugs. There have been times when she has had to decide to do the right things in the face of withering criticism...and worse. But the criticism has only strengthened her resolve to live her life God’s way and that makes us very proud...and very grateful.
When Paul caught criticism from his fellow Jews for proclaiming Jesus, he became more firmly resolved to share Jesus, even if it meant changing his target audience and his tactics.
Third: We see that criticism should lead us to seek comfort from our fellow believers in the Church. That was certainly true for Paul, as he found a whole city ready to hear the Good News of Jesus he wanted to share. It’s true today!
When little Bobby was a boy, his farm home in Iowa was all abuzz when an uncle, a missionary to China home on furlough, came to visit. Bobby never forgot the moment when this godly uncle put his arms around the boy’s shoulders and said, “So, this is Bobby? Bobby, I have been praying for you and I am sure that one day, you will be a well-known preacher of God’s Word.” The boy grew up and moved to California. In spite of critics who condemned him, Bob became certain that God wanted him to change the way the Church usually reached out to others with the love of Christ. At an Orange County drive-in movie theater, he and his wife started a new church. Often, when critics hounded him and there was no money to pay the bills, Bob was sustained by the encouragement he’d received long before from his uncle. It’s a good thing because the ministry of Robert Schuller and his Crystal Cathedral Church have touched millions around the world with the love of Jesus Christ!
My prayer is that Friendship Church will also be a fellowship of believers that gives encouragement to people as they face their critics and adversaries in life!
When criticism comes to the follower of Jesus, we can learn from it, we can be strengthened in our resolve to do things God’s way, and we can seek comfort from the community of believers. When we let God do these three things in our lives, we will grow, we will change for God’s sake. Knowing this, the first prayer we can offer when a critic comes after us is not, “God, make this criticism go away,” but “God, help me to change for the better in the face of this criticism.” (Hard as that is!)
A few weeks ago, Ann asked me, “Mark, what will you do if you lose this election?” I told her, “You know, I’ve thought about that and I’ve decided that I’ll just go back to being a regular old preacher.” Ann smiled and said, “Honey, you may grow old. But you will never be just a regular preacher.”
I’m not sure what she meant by that, but I got to thinking: that’s true for all who follow Jesus. The Bible says that God has made everyone who follows Jesus brand new. God’s Spirit has come to live inside of us and our call is to keep changing...for the better, turning from sin and death and getting pumped full of God’s life, love, and goodness. We may all grow old, but we never need to be just "regular" believers. If we will let the God we know in Jesus Christ be the Lord and God of our every moment, He can help us to learn from our critics, to be strengthened in our resolve to follow Jesus, and gain comfort from other believers as each day God makes us newer and better than we were the day before! We can change...for God's sake and by God's power.
[The story of the young pastor is told by Philip Longfellow Anderson in his book, The Gospel in Disney: Christian Values in the Early Animated Classics (Minneapolis: Augsburg Books, 2004).
[The true incident of George Washington's humiliating defeat resulting from poor judgment is told in many biographies. My personal favorite is Patriarch by Richard Norton Smith.
[My memory of Robert Schuller's encounter with his missionary uncle---told in Schuller's book on prayer, among others---was refreshed by a sermon written by Michael Foss.]
Faith on Fire:
Change, For God's Sake
Acts 18:1-11
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 22, 2004)
A young pastor had just finished delivering his first message at a new church. Afterwards, a member approached him and said, “That was a really dull sermon.” All week long, the pastor was haunted by that comment. The next Sunday, the same man approached him and said, “That message was one of the shallowest I’ve ever heard.” By the third Sunday, the young pastor was shaken, his self-esteem about as low as it could get. Craving affirmation, he asked this same man, “Did today’s message help you at all?” The man told him, “That was the worst one yet. You didn’t say anything worthwhile.” Crushed, the pastor pointed the man out to the church council president and asked about him. “Oh, don’t pay any attention to him,” the council president said, “He just repeats whatever he hears everybody else saying.”
Criticism is part of this life. And, it’s a fact that in order for us to grow in our personal relationships with Jesus Christ, in order for us to be useful to God and others, in order for us to fulfill our missions in life, we will usually have to endure criticism.
In the whole history of the Church, God has used the criticism of others to make His people’s faith stronger and to help His Church reach out to others with God’s love. In today’s Bible lesson, the first century preacher and evangelist Paul travels to the Greek city of Corinth, the center of Greek business and politics. When Paul arrived in Corinth, he did the sensible thing—he carried the good news of Jesus to the people most likely to be open to it first, his fellow Jews. But after trying and trying to tell them that Jesus had fulfilled the Old Testament’s promise of a Savior, Paul just ran into one critical, disbelieving comment after another.
Frustrated, Paul “shook the dust from his clothes,” his culture’s way of saying, “Forget about you,” and said, “From now on, I’ll just hang out with and share the Good News of Jesus with non-Jews, Gentiles.” He even moved into the house of a non-Jew who believed in the God proclaimed by the Jews and who had come to follow Jesus.
When Paul did that, amazing things happened! First, the leader of the synagogue, a devout Jew, came to faith in Christ, along with his family and slaves. The company of believers in Jesus—Jewish and Gentile—began to grow in numbers and one night, Paul received a vision telling him to, “Go for it! Tell everybody about Jesus Christ because there are many people here just waiting to be told that all who believe in Jesus don’t face eternal separation from God. They hunger to know that God loves them and wants to have them with Him forever!”
Paul learned, as we must learn, that as hurtful as criticism may be, it cannot destroy the follower of Jesus. In fact, if we will let God do it, He can use others’ criticism to bring positive changes in our lives. We see this in three ways in our Bible lesson.
First: We see that we can learn from criticism. God can use even unfair criticism to help us grow. Today is the actual birthday of one of my heroes, George Washington. As a young man, hungry for glory and fame, Washington led an ill-conceived attack by colonial soldiers during the French and Indian War. Not only were many of the men under Washington’s command slaughtered, he barely escaped with his own life. Prominent people in Britain and the American colonies all wanted to see the young Washington court martialed or hanged for his rashness. If Jay Leno or David Letterman had been around, Washington would have been humiliated and forced from public life forever. Instead, Washington learned from his critics. He took a look at himself and gave up being a glory-hound. Honors and accolades came to Washington later in his life precisely because he put his duty ahead of those things. He’d learned from his critics.
In our Bible lesson, Paul listens to the critics who savage him and decides to change tactics. He began sharing Jesus’ offer of new life for all who turn away from sin and let Him be the Boss of their lives with people he might otherwise have ignored.
Second: From our lesson, we see that our critics can strengthen our resolve. When we’re criticized for doing the right thing, we can either cave into peer pressure or we can reaffirm our resolve to do the right thing. Criticism forces us to take a new look at our actions and values. Our college-age daughter loves the internship she's doing right now, loves the work, loves the class on organizational leadership she’s taking, is getting to know some wonderful people. But she catches flak all the time from lots of her fellow interns because, while not condemning anybody else, she refuses to be on the prowl for sex or booze or drugs. There have been times when she has had to decide to do the right things in the face of withering criticism...and worse. But the criticism has only strengthened her resolve to live her life God’s way and that makes us very proud...and very grateful.
When Paul caught criticism from his fellow Jews for proclaiming Jesus, he became more firmly resolved to share Jesus, even if it meant changing his target audience and his tactics.
Third: We see that criticism should lead us to seek comfort from our fellow believers in the Church. That was certainly true for Paul, as he found a whole city ready to hear the Good News of Jesus he wanted to share. It’s true today!
When little Bobby was a boy, his farm home in Iowa was all abuzz when an uncle, a missionary to China home on furlough, came to visit. Bobby never forgot the moment when this godly uncle put his arms around the boy’s shoulders and said, “So, this is Bobby? Bobby, I have been praying for you and I am sure that one day, you will be a well-known preacher of God’s Word.” The boy grew up and moved to California. In spite of critics who condemned him, Bob became certain that God wanted him to change the way the Church usually reached out to others with the love of Christ. At an Orange County drive-in movie theater, he and his wife started a new church. Often, when critics hounded him and there was no money to pay the bills, Bob was sustained by the encouragement he’d received long before from his uncle. It’s a good thing because the ministry of Robert Schuller and his Crystal Cathedral Church have touched millions around the world with the love of Jesus Christ!
My prayer is that Friendship Church will also be a fellowship of believers that gives encouragement to people as they face their critics and adversaries in life!
When criticism comes to the follower of Jesus, we can learn from it, we can be strengthened in our resolve to do things God’s way, and we can seek comfort from the community of believers. When we let God do these three things in our lives, we will grow, we will change for God’s sake. Knowing this, the first prayer we can offer when a critic comes after us is not, “God, make this criticism go away,” but “God, help me to change for the better in the face of this criticism.” (Hard as that is!)
A few weeks ago, Ann asked me, “Mark, what will you do if you lose this election?” I told her, “You know, I’ve thought about that and I’ve decided that I’ll just go back to being a regular old preacher.” Ann smiled and said, “Honey, you may grow old. But you will never be just a regular preacher.”
I’m not sure what she meant by that, but I got to thinking: that’s true for all who follow Jesus. The Bible says that God has made everyone who follows Jesus brand new. God’s Spirit has come to live inside of us and our call is to keep changing...for the better, turning from sin and death and getting pumped full of God’s life, love, and goodness. We may all grow old, but we never need to be just "regular" believers. If we will let the God we know in Jesus Christ be the Lord and God of our every moment, He can help us to learn from our critics, to be strengthened in our resolve to follow Jesus, and gain comfort from other believers as each day God makes us newer and better than we were the day before! We can change...for God's sake and by God's power.
[The story of the young pastor is told by Philip Longfellow Anderson in his book, The Gospel in Disney: Christian Values in the Early Animated Classics (Minneapolis: Augsburg Books, 2004).
[The true incident of George Washington's humiliating defeat resulting from poor judgment is told in many biographies. My personal favorite is Patriarch by Richard Norton Smith.
[My memory of Robert Schuller's encounter with his missionary uncle---told in Schuller's book on prayer, among others---was refreshed by a sermon written by Michael Foss.]
Sunday, February 15, 2004
The Friendship Vision,
Faith on Fire:
Following Holy Nudges Through God's Open Doors
Acts 16:6-10
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 15, 2004)
Several months ago, Ann and I joined a local gym. In the course of my time there, we’ve become somewhat acquainted with a young man who works there. I’ll call him Chad. Chad has always struck me as a hard-working guy. He gives tours of the place to potential members about the gym. Often, when I’m on the elliptical running device or straining to push a five-pound weight, I’ll see him, exuding enthusiasm, as he talks about various exercise stations. While Chad and I have had a few conversations over time, none of them have been much beyond perfunctory. Nonetheless, we always seem to run into one another when I go to the gym.
The other night as I was leaving the gym, I had the sense that I should seek Chad out in his office. To tell you the truth, I was busy and had other things to do. But I had this feeling that wouldn’t go away. Even as I walked toward Chad’s office though, I kept thinking, “This is silly, Mark. You should just leave.” But something told me to see Chad.
I wasn’t even sure what I was going to say. When I reached his office, Chad looked up at me with a tired look on his face, something not characteristic of someone usually so energetic and so young. I plopped down in the chair in front of his desk and, not really knowing what I was going to say, asked, “Chad, are you happy working here?” Before I even had the chance to wonder why I’d said that, Chad said, “I’m not going to lie to you. I’ve been looking.” He went on to tell me that he was working close to seventy hours a week and hardly had time to see his fiancé. He told me that while he loved the job and the opportunity to help people, it was beginning to wear him down. He’s a young guy, just out of college and I remembered those days in my life—I’d worked in a paint store and as a substitute teacher that first year I was out of college. “Can I sound like a father for a second, Chad?” I asked him. “This working lots for little pay right out of school is usually just part of the drill. You will be okay.” We talked more and eventually, I was able to give Chad the name and telephone number of someone I thought might be able to mentor him a little in his field. Chad shook my hand and thanked me as I got up to leave.
Driving home, I wondered, “What made me do that? And what exactly caused me to begin my conversation with Chad with a question about whether he was happy with his job?” You know something? God has an impeccable sense of timing. He also knows how thick I can be. He laid in my lap an example of the very thing He knew that I was going to talk with you about this morning. You see, God had given me what I call a holy nudge.
A holy nudge is that prompting that God’s Holy Spirit gives to people who follow Jesus Christ. It’s that sense we have of things we should do and things we shouldn’t do, of doors we should enter and doors we should pass by. Lest you misunderstand me, I am not talking about living life on the bases of hunches, good luck charms, and voices in our heads. People who live life like that are superstitious or, in some cases, even psychotic. But when we have a relationship with the God we know through Jesus Christ, when we get to know Him and His character, His love, and His holiness through His Word, the Bible, God gives us discernment.
Discernment is the ability to tell the difference between what’s true and false, right and wrong, necessary and unneeded, helpful and hurtful. Discernment allows us to know whether the prompting that crossed our minds is likely a holy nudge or the result of last night’s stop at Gold Star Chili or worse, the sin that lives inside us.
When God nudges us, He may prompt us to do things that will express our love for Him or for others. He may also prompt us to avoid things that will be hurtful to Him, to others, or to ourselves. Bill Hybels is the senior pastor of Willow Creek Community Church, a massive congregation near Chicago. The congregation was in need of a staffer to head a major ministry arm. One man’s name had come up time and time again as Hybels made inquiries about the right person for the job. He and others from the congregation had interviewed the man several times. The entire leadership team had been favorably impressed and Hybels was authorized to offer the man the job. A luncheon appointment was arranged. During lunch, every time Hybels began to make the offer, he sensed he was being told, “Don’t do it, Bill. Don’t do it.” Lunch came to a close and the man asked Hybels, “Was there any particular reason you wanted to get together today?” Hybels said, “No, no. Just wanted to get to know you better.” After the lunch, Hybels was unable to explain to his mystified staff and volunteer leadership why he hadn’t made the job offer to the man. But a few weeks later, it was clear why. The man to whom Hybels had been prepared to give a major job at his church was at the center of a huge scandal that broke in the news. Hybels said that after learning of the man’s scandal, he ran to his office and prayed, “Thank You, God. Thank You for watching out for us.”
Part of the vision for Friendship Church is that we will enjoy such a close relationship with Jesus Christ, that we will all learn to be sensitive and respond to the nudges of God in our every day lives and in the life of our congregation.
Our Bible lesson for today is an intriguing one for several reasons. One reason is that it’s part of that section of the New Testament book of Acts that contains what are known as the “we” passages. You see, Acts was the second volume of two written by the Jesus-follower, Luke. The first volume, the Gospel of Luke, is one of four New Testament books that tell us the story of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. Acts then takes the story from Jesus’ return to heaven—His ascension—through the first thirty years or so of the Church. Through most of those two books, Luke tells the story in the third person: He did this, He said that, she went here. But in some sections of Acts, Luke recounts events in which he was immediately involved and he switches to the first person: we did this, we went there, and so on.
In today’s lesson, Luke is traveling from town to town with Paul and Silas, sharing the Good News that Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen Lord of the world, offers new life to all who will turn from sin and receive forgiveness from Him. During their travels, the group gets a series of holy nudges—don’t go into this place right now and do go there. What amazes me is that they are immediately responsive to these nudges. They accept the doors that God closed and they boldly walk through the ones God opens.
I don’t know about you. But I have wasted an awful lot of time in my life trying to force my way through doors that were locked to me and I should have just moved on with my life.
There have been other times when I knew God didn’t want me to take a certain pathway, but bent on doing things my own way, I crashed through locked doors! Doing that has caused the saddest, most regrettable passages of my life, creating pain in the heart of God, the lives of others, and in my own life.
So, just a few points for you to think and pray about this week. First: The best way to become sensitive to God’s holy nudges in your life is to get to know Him intimately. God will never give you a bum steer. When we take time to know God through Bible reading and prayer, we’ll get to know His character so well that we’ll know the difference between His nudge, on the one hand, and Satan pushing us over a cliff, on the other.
Second: Decide in advance to be open to the crazy things God may call you to do, as well as to the sensible ones He may call you not to do. If the thing you feel nudged to do entails foregoing short-term pleasure in order to please God over the long-haul of your life, it’s probably a holy nudge. If your nudge asks you to do something too big for you to accomplish in your own power, it’s probably from God. If people around you might consider you nuts to do the thing you feel nudged into doing, it’s probably from God.
Ann and I were happy as I served as pastor of my first congregation. We loved the church and the community. Some of you have met the people from that first parish and you know how wonderful they were. I just assumed that I would die there. (Not because I thought folks would kill me...but because it was so wonderful.) Then, one day I received a telephone call from a representative of the Lutheran Church, asking if I would be interested in starting a new congregation in southern Ohio. While I prayed long and hard about it, I know that even as I spoke with that man, I was packing my bags in my mind. It was a crazy thing to do...and it was so right! This congregation is the result of Ann and I opening ourselves to God’s nudge...and we feel so blessed for it!
Finally, when confronted with situations in which you’re not sure what to do, Know that as long as your intent is to love God and love your neighbor, you can’t go very wrong in the eyes of God. God understands our hearts and when our hearts are with Him, He is quick to forgive and gently correct.
A woman once asked a prominent English preacher, “Do you think we ought to pray about even little things in life?” The preacher replied, “Madam, can you think of anything in your life that is big to God?” The fact is that God is bigger than our little and our big problems. If we will tune into Him and surrender our every moment to Him, He will guide us through all the problems, challenges, mountains, and valleys—big and little—that we may face. The God we know through the risen Jesus Christ has offered to be with us always. Let’s take Him up on that offer and follow whenever and wherever He nudges us to be. Amen!
Faith on Fire:
Following Holy Nudges Through God's Open Doors
Acts 16:6-10
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 15, 2004)
Several months ago, Ann and I joined a local gym. In the course of my time there, we’ve become somewhat acquainted with a young man who works there. I’ll call him Chad. Chad has always struck me as a hard-working guy. He gives tours of the place to potential members about the gym. Often, when I’m on the elliptical running device or straining to push a five-pound weight, I’ll see him, exuding enthusiasm, as he talks about various exercise stations. While Chad and I have had a few conversations over time, none of them have been much beyond perfunctory. Nonetheless, we always seem to run into one another when I go to the gym.
The other night as I was leaving the gym, I had the sense that I should seek Chad out in his office. To tell you the truth, I was busy and had other things to do. But I had this feeling that wouldn’t go away. Even as I walked toward Chad’s office though, I kept thinking, “This is silly, Mark. You should just leave.” But something told me to see Chad.
I wasn’t even sure what I was going to say. When I reached his office, Chad looked up at me with a tired look on his face, something not characteristic of someone usually so energetic and so young. I plopped down in the chair in front of his desk and, not really knowing what I was going to say, asked, “Chad, are you happy working here?” Before I even had the chance to wonder why I’d said that, Chad said, “I’m not going to lie to you. I’ve been looking.” He went on to tell me that he was working close to seventy hours a week and hardly had time to see his fiancé. He told me that while he loved the job and the opportunity to help people, it was beginning to wear him down. He’s a young guy, just out of college and I remembered those days in my life—I’d worked in a paint store and as a substitute teacher that first year I was out of college. “Can I sound like a father for a second, Chad?” I asked him. “This working lots for little pay right out of school is usually just part of the drill. You will be okay.” We talked more and eventually, I was able to give Chad the name and telephone number of someone I thought might be able to mentor him a little in his field. Chad shook my hand and thanked me as I got up to leave.
Driving home, I wondered, “What made me do that? And what exactly caused me to begin my conversation with Chad with a question about whether he was happy with his job?” You know something? God has an impeccable sense of timing. He also knows how thick I can be. He laid in my lap an example of the very thing He knew that I was going to talk with you about this morning. You see, God had given me what I call a holy nudge.
A holy nudge is that prompting that God’s Holy Spirit gives to people who follow Jesus Christ. It’s that sense we have of things we should do and things we shouldn’t do, of doors we should enter and doors we should pass by. Lest you misunderstand me, I am not talking about living life on the bases of hunches, good luck charms, and voices in our heads. People who live life like that are superstitious or, in some cases, even psychotic. But when we have a relationship with the God we know through Jesus Christ, when we get to know Him and His character, His love, and His holiness through His Word, the Bible, God gives us discernment.
Discernment is the ability to tell the difference between what’s true and false, right and wrong, necessary and unneeded, helpful and hurtful. Discernment allows us to know whether the prompting that crossed our minds is likely a holy nudge or the result of last night’s stop at Gold Star Chili or worse, the sin that lives inside us.
When God nudges us, He may prompt us to do things that will express our love for Him or for others. He may also prompt us to avoid things that will be hurtful to Him, to others, or to ourselves. Bill Hybels is the senior pastor of Willow Creek Community Church, a massive congregation near Chicago. The congregation was in need of a staffer to head a major ministry arm. One man’s name had come up time and time again as Hybels made inquiries about the right person for the job. He and others from the congregation had interviewed the man several times. The entire leadership team had been favorably impressed and Hybels was authorized to offer the man the job. A luncheon appointment was arranged. During lunch, every time Hybels began to make the offer, he sensed he was being told, “Don’t do it, Bill. Don’t do it.” Lunch came to a close and the man asked Hybels, “Was there any particular reason you wanted to get together today?” Hybels said, “No, no. Just wanted to get to know you better.” After the lunch, Hybels was unable to explain to his mystified staff and volunteer leadership why he hadn’t made the job offer to the man. But a few weeks later, it was clear why. The man to whom Hybels had been prepared to give a major job at his church was at the center of a huge scandal that broke in the news. Hybels said that after learning of the man’s scandal, he ran to his office and prayed, “Thank You, God. Thank You for watching out for us.”
Part of the vision for Friendship Church is that we will enjoy such a close relationship with Jesus Christ, that we will all learn to be sensitive and respond to the nudges of God in our every day lives and in the life of our congregation.
Our Bible lesson for today is an intriguing one for several reasons. One reason is that it’s part of that section of the New Testament book of Acts that contains what are known as the “we” passages. You see, Acts was the second volume of two written by the Jesus-follower, Luke. The first volume, the Gospel of Luke, is one of four New Testament books that tell us the story of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. Acts then takes the story from Jesus’ return to heaven—His ascension—through the first thirty years or so of the Church. Through most of those two books, Luke tells the story in the third person: He did this, He said that, she went here. But in some sections of Acts, Luke recounts events in which he was immediately involved and he switches to the first person: we did this, we went there, and so on.
In today’s lesson, Luke is traveling from town to town with Paul and Silas, sharing the Good News that Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen Lord of the world, offers new life to all who will turn from sin and receive forgiveness from Him. During their travels, the group gets a series of holy nudges—don’t go into this place right now and do go there. What amazes me is that they are immediately responsive to these nudges. They accept the doors that God closed and they boldly walk through the ones God opens.
I don’t know about you. But I have wasted an awful lot of time in my life trying to force my way through doors that were locked to me and I should have just moved on with my life.
There have been other times when I knew God didn’t want me to take a certain pathway, but bent on doing things my own way, I crashed through locked doors! Doing that has caused the saddest, most regrettable passages of my life, creating pain in the heart of God, the lives of others, and in my own life.
So, just a few points for you to think and pray about this week. First: The best way to become sensitive to God’s holy nudges in your life is to get to know Him intimately. God will never give you a bum steer. When we take time to know God through Bible reading and prayer, we’ll get to know His character so well that we’ll know the difference between His nudge, on the one hand, and Satan pushing us over a cliff, on the other.
Second: Decide in advance to be open to the crazy things God may call you to do, as well as to the sensible ones He may call you not to do. If the thing you feel nudged to do entails foregoing short-term pleasure in order to please God over the long-haul of your life, it’s probably a holy nudge. If your nudge asks you to do something too big for you to accomplish in your own power, it’s probably from God. If people around you might consider you nuts to do the thing you feel nudged into doing, it’s probably from God.
Ann and I were happy as I served as pastor of my first congregation. We loved the church and the community. Some of you have met the people from that first parish and you know how wonderful they were. I just assumed that I would die there. (Not because I thought folks would kill me...but because it was so wonderful.) Then, one day I received a telephone call from a representative of the Lutheran Church, asking if I would be interested in starting a new congregation in southern Ohio. While I prayed long and hard about it, I know that even as I spoke with that man, I was packing my bags in my mind. It was a crazy thing to do...and it was so right! This congregation is the result of Ann and I opening ourselves to God’s nudge...and we feel so blessed for it!
Finally, when confronted with situations in which you’re not sure what to do, Know that as long as your intent is to love God and love your neighbor, you can’t go very wrong in the eyes of God. God understands our hearts and when our hearts are with Him, He is quick to forgive and gently correct.
A woman once asked a prominent English preacher, “Do you think we ought to pray about even little things in life?” The preacher replied, “Madam, can you think of anything in your life that is big to God?” The fact is that God is bigger than our little and our big problems. If we will tune into Him and surrender our every moment to Him, He will guide us through all the problems, challenges, mountains, and valleys—big and little—that we may face. The God we know through the risen Jesus Christ has offered to be with us always. Let’s take Him up on that offer and follow whenever and wherever He nudges us to be. Amen!
Thursday, February 12, 2004
Today is the birthday of America's sixteenth president, Abraham Lincoln. He was born on February 12, 1809.
While Lincoln was far from perfect, he is an enduringly intriguing character. He wrestled with the great moral questions of his day and, as is true of all great people who have left their marks on nations, families, or individuals, showed an enormous capacity for personal growth and change.
Today, my colleague Glen VanderKloot, pastor of Faith Lutheran Church of Springfield, Illinois (Lincoln's home throughout much of his adult years and the place where he is buried), shared these devotional thoughts in his daily emailed inspiration called, OnLine with Faith.
It's true that life only makes sense when the God we know through Jesus Christ is at the center of it all.
Your Friend in Christ,
Mark
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
A Thought for the Day
Some of Abraham Lincoln's famous quotes about God:
In 1861:Lincoln leaves Springfield after a stirring address at train depot, including these words: "Without the assistance of that Divine being…I cannot succeed. With that assistance, I cannot fail."
Civil War starts on April 12, a month after being sworn in as president.
In 1862: Lincolnn states privately, "God's purposes" may be "something different from the purpose of either party."
In 1863: On March 30, he calls for a national fast for the nation that in his words has "forgotten God."
On Oct 24, he tells a delegation of Presbyterians from Baltimore, "…amid the great difficulties of my administration , when I could not see any other resort , I would place my whole reliance in God, knowing that all would go well, and that He would decide for the right"
On Nov. 19, he gives the Gettysburg Address. Read the Gettysburg Address and highlight the phrase "this nation, under God!"
In 1864: Lincoln tells a group of African Americans who have given him a special presentation Bible. "In regard to this Great Book, I have but to say, it is the best gift God has given to man. All the good the Savior gave to the world was communicated through this book. But for it we could know right from wrong. All things most desirable for man's welfare, here and hereafter, are to be found portrayed in it."
Special Note: "In God We Trust" first appears on US coins in 1864.
In 1865: On March 4, in the Second Inaugural Address Lincoln says that both North and South "read the same Bible, and pray to the same God," and also quoting Psalm 19:9 "that even if God should let the war continue until "every drop of blood drawn with the slavers lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword,…still it must be said `the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether'"
April 9 Lee surrenders.
On April 14th, Lincoln is shot by John Wilkes Booth and on April 15th, he dies.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Bible Verse
Ezekiel 36:23 –
"I will show the holiness of my great name, which has
been profaned among the nations, the name you have profaned
among them. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord,
declares the Sovereign Lord, when I show myself holy through you before their eyes."
Prayer
Lord, let us learn like President Lincoln that life only makes sense when it is centered in you.
Help us to depend on you for guidance in all things. Let us keep your name holy. Amen.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
While Lincoln was far from perfect, he is an enduringly intriguing character. He wrestled with the great moral questions of his day and, as is true of all great people who have left their marks on nations, families, or individuals, showed an enormous capacity for personal growth and change.
Today, my colleague Glen VanderKloot, pastor of Faith Lutheran Church of Springfield, Illinois (Lincoln's home throughout much of his adult years and the place where he is buried), shared these devotional thoughts in his daily emailed inspiration called, OnLine with Faith.
It's true that life only makes sense when the God we know through Jesus Christ is at the center of it all.
Your Friend in Christ,
Mark
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
A Thought for the Day
Some of Abraham Lincoln's famous quotes about God:
In 1861:Lincoln leaves Springfield after a stirring address at train depot, including these words: "Without the assistance of that Divine being…I cannot succeed. With that assistance, I cannot fail."
Civil War starts on April 12, a month after being sworn in as president.
In 1862: Lincolnn states privately, "God's purposes" may be "something different from the purpose of either party."
In 1863: On March 30, he calls for a national fast for the nation that in his words has "forgotten God."
On Oct 24, he tells a delegation of Presbyterians from Baltimore, "…amid the great difficulties of my administration , when I could not see any other resort , I would place my whole reliance in God, knowing that all would go well, and that He would decide for the right"
On Nov. 19, he gives the Gettysburg Address. Read the Gettysburg Address and highlight the phrase "this nation, under God!"
In 1864: Lincoln tells a group of African Americans who have given him a special presentation Bible. "In regard to this Great Book, I have but to say, it is the best gift God has given to man. All the good the Savior gave to the world was communicated through this book. But for it we could know right from wrong. All things most desirable for man's welfare, here and hereafter, are to be found portrayed in it."
Special Note: "In God We Trust" first appears on US coins in 1864.
In 1865: On March 4, in the Second Inaugural Address Lincoln says that both North and South "read the same Bible, and pray to the same God," and also quoting Psalm 19:9 "that even if God should let the war continue until "every drop of blood drawn with the slavers lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword,…still it must be said `the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether'"
April 9 Lee surrenders.
On April 14th, Lincoln is shot by John Wilkes Booth and on April 15th, he dies.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Bible Verse
Ezekiel 36:23 –
"I will show the holiness of my great name, which has
been profaned among the nations, the name you have profaned
among them. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord,
declares the Sovereign Lord, when I show myself holy through you before their eyes."
Prayer
Lord, let us learn like President Lincoln that life only makes sense when it is centered in you.
Help us to depend on you for guidance in all things. Let us keep your name holy. Amen.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Monday, February 09, 2004
The Friendship Vision,
Faith on Fire:
Seeing and Showing God Clearly
Acts 14:8-18
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 8, 2004)
Don, a member of our congregation, sent a story to me this week via email. It may not be factual, but it sure has a lot of truth to it. One Sunday morning an old biker entered a church building just before services were to begin. Although the old man and his clothes were spotlessly clean, he wore jeans, a denim shirt and boots that were very worn and ragged. In his hand, he carried a worn out old leather jacket and an equally worn out Bible. The congregation was made of people from an upscale and exclusive part of the city. The building was the largest and most beautiful church facility the old biker had ever seen.
The people of the congregation were dressed in expensive clothing with all the right appointments. As the biker took a seat, people moved away from him. No one greeted him, spoke to him, or welcomed him. Everybody was appalled at his appearance and didn’t attempt to hide it. The pastor gave a long sermon that included hellfire and brimstone and a stern lecture on how much money the church needed to do God's work.
As the old biker was leaving the church, the pastor approached him and asked the biker to do him a favor. “Before you come back in here again, have a talk with God and ask him what He thinks would be appropriate attire for worship." The old biker assured the pastor he would do just that.
The next Sunday, he showed back up for the worship service of that same church wearing the same ragged jeans, shirt, boots, and leather jacket. Once again, he was completely shunned and ignored. The pastor approached the man and said, "I thought I asked you to speak to God before you came back here." "I did," replied the old biker.
"If you spoke to God, what did he tell you the proper attire should be for worshiping with us?" asked the pastor. "Well, sir, God told me that He didn't have a clue what I should wear. He says He's never been in this church before."
The Church, you know, isn’t a building. For twelve years, this congregation worshiped in a school gym, held Catechism class in the basement of my house, held small group Bible studies in mall restaurants and food courts and living rooms. We didn’t have a building, but we were a church. Part of the vision for Friendship Church is that we would be a people so on fire from our relationship with Jesus Christ that whether in worship or out in our everyday lives, we will see God working clearly in our lives and unlike the congregation the biker visited, we’ll show God clearly to others as well.
In our Bible lesson for this morning, two early evangelists of the Church were in a town called Lystra. One was Paul, about whom you likely know a lot. The other was a more obscure figure and one of my favorites, Barnabas. While in Lystra, Paul and Barnabas encounter a man who has been crippled since birth, as happened when two other early evangelists, Peter and John, were in the Jerusalem in our Bible lesson of a few weeks ago. Paul saw faith in this paralyzed man and “in a loud voice,” tells the man in the Name of Jesus Christ, to rise and walk. The man does just that!
The crowd was, as you can imagine, stunned and amazed. Believers in the false idols of Greek and Roman mythology, they begin shouting that Paul and Barnabas are gods walking among them. They’re certain that the two of them are really Zeus and Hermes. Local legend in Lystra said that once upon a time, those two Greek gods had visited their town and because only one old couple offered them hospitality, they killed everyone in the city but them. Anxious to avoid a similar fate, the fearful people begin to fall down and worship Paul and Barnabas. Even the local priest gets in on the act, bringing some oxen to sacrifice to these gods so powerful that they healed a paralyzed man.
When Paul and Barnabas see what’s happening, they’re shocked and appalled. (And unlike Justin Timberlake, who claimed to have been shocked and appalled by what happened at the end of his Super Bowl appearance with Janet Jackson, Paul and Branabas really are shocked and appalled.) In the ancient Jewish gesture of grief, they tear their clothes and shout to the people, “Knock it off! We’re only ordinary people like you, not gods. But we’ve got good news. You don’t have to live in mortal terror of God or fear that your sins have given you one-way tickets to hell.”
They go on to explain to the crowd that they can turn from their sin and receive the free gifts of forgiveness, hope, and everlasting life that goes to all with faith in Jesus Christ. “Surrender to Jesus,” they tell the crowds. “Jesus is God in human flesh and He can change your lives forever! He’s the One you need to worship.”
Paul and Barnabas were desperate to show people that the God we meet in Jesus Christ is the One Who can help our lives make sense. They wanted people to see God clearly in Jesus Christ. That’s what we need to be about at Friendship as well.
I can’t tell you how happy as I am as the pastor of this congregation to hear evidence that because you let Jesus live in you, people do see God a bit more clearly. This past Wednesday night, as the latest session of Friendship 101, our new members class, began, I asked folks to talk about how they’d come to Friendship and what their first impressions were. I was really interested when Gary E. said that in most other churches, he felt that people were judging him right away. It seemed to him that they were saying, “Why haven’t you been here before?” But, Gary says, he immediately felt welcomed at Friendship.
That’s the way it should be in Christ’s Church. We should never forget that the most important people among us are people who don’t belong to our congregation. That’s who you and I are here to serve and welcome and shower kindness upon. Like Barnabas and Paul, we’re ordinary human beings whose sins have been forgiven and whose lives are being transformed by the extraordinary God of the universe Who sent His Son Jesus to die and rise for us and the world around us needs to see that!
And it seems that even young people who are touched by the ministry of Friendship Church get to see God clearly and pick up on how large His love is. This past Thursday, I was chatting with Stephanie W. about her trip to the emergency room on Sunday. She’s doing pretty well now and will undergo an ultrasound on Tuesday. But Stephanie also wanted to tell me something that Sydney, her and Mark’s four year old daughter, had said during nighttime prayers that evening. Unprompted, Sydney offered prayers for the troops in Iraq. She also asked God to bless “the bad guys.” Sydney sees clearly that God loves all of us, good guys and bad guys.
People have lots of wrong-headed ideas about God. Like the people in Lystra, they can think that He’s a bloodthirsty tyrant just looking for the chance to kill people who don’t please them. But I have also learned something over the years. People are desperate to see God, desperate to know that God cares, that God forgives them their faults, that God wants what’s best for them.
This past week, the interim pastor of Peace Lutheran Church of Georgetown, Ohio, was on vacation and I was asked to visit a man from that church who was having quadruple bypass surgery at Good Samaritan Hospital. There was a mixup on the time of the operation and so I arrived just as he was being wheeled into the cardiac intensive care unit following surgery. I found the family in the waiting room. We talked for about ten minutes and we prayed together. Nothing could have been more ordinary. But the next day, after the man had been moved to a regular hospital room, his wife called me up to say, “I just wanted to thank you for being here. It meant so much to us.” I remembered Paul and Barnabas, I suppose, and I told the woman, “Thank you. But remember, whatever good I do in my life...and I mean whatever good I do, comes from God, not me.”
There is absolutely nothing of lasting value we can accomplish if God’s hand isn’t in it. But when we surrender our lives and wills to the gracious, charitable God we know through Jesus Christ, there is no end to what He can accomplish in and through us. As long as we let Jesus have control of our lives, Friendship Church will always be a people in whom others can see God clearly. May it always be so!
Faith on Fire:
Seeing and Showing God Clearly
Acts 14:8-18
(shared with the people of Friendship Church, February 8, 2004)
Don, a member of our congregation, sent a story to me this week via email. It may not be factual, but it sure has a lot of truth to it. One Sunday morning an old biker entered a church building just before services were to begin. Although the old man and his clothes were spotlessly clean, he wore jeans, a denim shirt and boots that were very worn and ragged. In his hand, he carried a worn out old leather jacket and an equally worn out Bible. The congregation was made of people from an upscale and exclusive part of the city. The building was the largest and most beautiful church facility the old biker had ever seen.
The people of the congregation were dressed in expensive clothing with all the right appointments. As the biker took a seat, people moved away from him. No one greeted him, spoke to him, or welcomed him. Everybody was appalled at his appearance and didn’t attempt to hide it. The pastor gave a long sermon that included hellfire and brimstone and a stern lecture on how much money the church needed to do God's work.
As the old biker was leaving the church, the pastor approached him and asked the biker to do him a favor. “Before you come back in here again, have a talk with God and ask him what He thinks would be appropriate attire for worship." The old biker assured the pastor he would do just that.
The next Sunday, he showed back up for the worship service of that same church wearing the same ragged jeans, shirt, boots, and leather jacket. Once again, he was completely shunned and ignored. The pastor approached the man and said, "I thought I asked you to speak to God before you came back here." "I did," replied the old biker.
"If you spoke to God, what did he tell you the proper attire should be for worshiping with us?" asked the pastor. "Well, sir, God told me that He didn't have a clue what I should wear. He says He's never been in this church before."
The Church, you know, isn’t a building. For twelve years, this congregation worshiped in a school gym, held Catechism class in the basement of my house, held small group Bible studies in mall restaurants and food courts and living rooms. We didn’t have a building, but we were a church. Part of the vision for Friendship Church is that we would be a people so on fire from our relationship with Jesus Christ that whether in worship or out in our everyday lives, we will see God working clearly in our lives and unlike the congregation the biker visited, we’ll show God clearly to others as well.
In our Bible lesson for this morning, two early evangelists of the Church were in a town called Lystra. One was Paul, about whom you likely know a lot. The other was a more obscure figure and one of my favorites, Barnabas. While in Lystra, Paul and Barnabas encounter a man who has been crippled since birth, as happened when two other early evangelists, Peter and John, were in the Jerusalem in our Bible lesson of a few weeks ago. Paul saw faith in this paralyzed man and “in a loud voice,” tells the man in the Name of Jesus Christ, to rise and walk. The man does just that!
The crowd was, as you can imagine, stunned and amazed. Believers in the false idols of Greek and Roman mythology, they begin shouting that Paul and Barnabas are gods walking among them. They’re certain that the two of them are really Zeus and Hermes. Local legend in Lystra said that once upon a time, those two Greek gods had visited their town and because only one old couple offered them hospitality, they killed everyone in the city but them. Anxious to avoid a similar fate, the fearful people begin to fall down and worship Paul and Barnabas. Even the local priest gets in on the act, bringing some oxen to sacrifice to these gods so powerful that they healed a paralyzed man.
When Paul and Barnabas see what’s happening, they’re shocked and appalled. (And unlike Justin Timberlake, who claimed to have been shocked and appalled by what happened at the end of his Super Bowl appearance with Janet Jackson, Paul and Branabas really are shocked and appalled.) In the ancient Jewish gesture of grief, they tear their clothes and shout to the people, “Knock it off! We’re only ordinary people like you, not gods. But we’ve got good news. You don’t have to live in mortal terror of God or fear that your sins have given you one-way tickets to hell.”
They go on to explain to the crowd that they can turn from their sin and receive the free gifts of forgiveness, hope, and everlasting life that goes to all with faith in Jesus Christ. “Surrender to Jesus,” they tell the crowds. “Jesus is God in human flesh and He can change your lives forever! He’s the One you need to worship.”
Paul and Barnabas were desperate to show people that the God we meet in Jesus Christ is the One Who can help our lives make sense. They wanted people to see God clearly in Jesus Christ. That’s what we need to be about at Friendship as well.
I can’t tell you how happy as I am as the pastor of this congregation to hear evidence that because you let Jesus live in you, people do see God a bit more clearly. This past Wednesday night, as the latest session of Friendship 101, our new members class, began, I asked folks to talk about how they’d come to Friendship and what their first impressions were. I was really interested when Gary E. said that in most other churches, he felt that people were judging him right away. It seemed to him that they were saying, “Why haven’t you been here before?” But, Gary says, he immediately felt welcomed at Friendship.
That’s the way it should be in Christ’s Church. We should never forget that the most important people among us are people who don’t belong to our congregation. That’s who you and I are here to serve and welcome and shower kindness upon. Like Barnabas and Paul, we’re ordinary human beings whose sins have been forgiven and whose lives are being transformed by the extraordinary God of the universe Who sent His Son Jesus to die and rise for us and the world around us needs to see that!
And it seems that even young people who are touched by the ministry of Friendship Church get to see God clearly and pick up on how large His love is. This past Thursday, I was chatting with Stephanie W. about her trip to the emergency room on Sunday. She’s doing pretty well now and will undergo an ultrasound on Tuesday. But Stephanie also wanted to tell me something that Sydney, her and Mark’s four year old daughter, had said during nighttime prayers that evening. Unprompted, Sydney offered prayers for the troops in Iraq. She also asked God to bless “the bad guys.” Sydney sees clearly that God loves all of us, good guys and bad guys.
People have lots of wrong-headed ideas about God. Like the people in Lystra, they can think that He’s a bloodthirsty tyrant just looking for the chance to kill people who don’t please them. But I have also learned something over the years. People are desperate to see God, desperate to know that God cares, that God forgives them their faults, that God wants what’s best for them.
This past week, the interim pastor of Peace Lutheran Church of Georgetown, Ohio, was on vacation and I was asked to visit a man from that church who was having quadruple bypass surgery at Good Samaritan Hospital. There was a mixup on the time of the operation and so I arrived just as he was being wheeled into the cardiac intensive care unit following surgery. I found the family in the waiting room. We talked for about ten minutes and we prayed together. Nothing could have been more ordinary. But the next day, after the man had been moved to a regular hospital room, his wife called me up to say, “I just wanted to thank you for being here. It meant so much to us.” I remembered Paul and Barnabas, I suppose, and I told the woman, “Thank you. But remember, whatever good I do in my life...and I mean whatever good I do, comes from God, not me.”
There is absolutely nothing of lasting value we can accomplish if God’s hand isn’t in it. But when we surrender our lives and wills to the gracious, charitable God we know through Jesus Christ, there is no end to what He can accomplish in and through us. As long as we let Jesus have control of our lives, Friendship Church will always be a people in whom others can see God clearly. May it always be so!
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