Another senseless tragedy

A six year old, Jacob Hall, died today. He had been shot this past week as he was heading for the playground at the elementary school he attended. The shooter was a teen who had earlier killed his father and who, after shooting Jacob, drove to the high school he attended and opened fire on people there.

According to The Washington Post:

Jacob Hall had been in critical condition on life support since Wednesday, when he, another student and a teacher were wounded at Townville Elementary School, about 40 miles west of Greenville, S.C.

A bullet struck the boy’s leg as he burst through the school door for recess, striking his femoral artery. He was resuscitated twice and underwent surgery, but he bled so much from the wound that it caused brain damage.

I offer no political opinions here.

But, while homicides are generally down in the United States, we do have a disturbing problem with these kinds of shootings and killings.

They happen at schools, universities, shopping malls, and movie theaters with sickening frequency.

Other first world countries, I'm sure, have as many disturbed people per capita as the United States. But this kind of thing happens with far less regularity in other advanced nations than it does here. The carnage thus appears unnecessary.

I pray that God will give us the wisdom to find the combination of solutions needed to end this horrible scourge. It's almost unbearable to think that more parents and loved ones, like the parents and family of Jacob Hall, should face what they're now going through if we can find ways to prevent such tragedies.

[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Here to Stay by Sophie Lockhart

Here's the lyric video for the title track of Sophie's new EP. I heard her perform this live some months back and it was great. But this version produced in a studio is particularly fetching. The EP will be available on iTunes and Amazon tomorrow.

Can I Lose Jesus? No!

My quiet time with God these days has revolved around the New Testament book of 1 John. Thought to be written between 85-90 AD from Ephesus to groups of Gentile Christians by the apostle John, it embodies timeless, authoritative words for today. Two verses struck me this morning:

No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him...No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God. [1 John 3:6, 9]

Clearly, John doesn't mean to say that those who "abide" in the God we know in Jesus are incapable of sinning. In the previous chapter, for example, he writes: "My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." [1 John 2:1]

I think instead, that John is saying, first of all, that when we abide in Jesus, our desire for sin is changed. We recognize that the life God has in mind for us--and modeled for us perfectly in Jesus--is so much better than the sins we might choose, developing a passion, a thirst for seeking to live according to God's will as revealed in the Bible.

Secondly, when we abide in Jesus, we're tuned into His voice, His Word, His will. When He calls us back from sin, we hear it. Habitual sin drowns out His voice.

A big key to understanding this verse, I think, is that word, abide. In the Greek in which John composed his letter, the word is meno. It has the idea of remaining, sticking with it, always coming back to. We might say, faithfulness.

The bottom line is that Christ is ushered into our lives at our Baptism or when we come to trust in Him as Lord. So long as we continue to trust in Him, keep inviting Him in, He will abide with us. In fact, the only way Christ will fail to be present with us is we willfully evict Him from our lives. Otherwise, He will abide.

The risen Jesus gives us an idea of His intention to stick with us--to literally live with and in us--no matter what in Revelation 3:20: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me."

If we make a habit of a particular sin though, we turn Jesus out. If that habitual sin is done willfully, Jesus is turned away. Jesus will not coexist with willful rejection of Him and His Word.

John is saying that no one grateful for what Jesus accomplished for us on the cross--taking the punishment for sin that we deserve--is going to keep willfully sinning.

They will (I will), of course, sin a thousand times a day. Until our old selves are finally crucified at our deaths, the new self that Jesus has already brought to life in those who believe in Him will not live in perfect fellowship with Christ.

But no one grateful for what Christ accomplished for us on the cross will fail to hear God speaking to them through His Word, through the Sacraments, through prayer, through the fellowship of the Church. Even in this life. The call to repentance, renewal, reform, and restoration will be clear.

I find this immensely comforting. Christ doesn't give up on us.

In my life as a Christian, I have engaged in habitual sin. These sins became so ingrained in me that I nearly forgot Christ. Thank God for all the things I mentioned above--God's Word, the Sacraments, prayer in Jesus' name, and the fellowship of other Christians who give me a kick in the pants and the kiss of grace--for waking me up. Like Jesus calling His dead friend Lazarus back to life from his tomb, Jesus never ties of calling us back from the dead ends of sin, back to life with Him.

So, can I lose Jesus? No. But I can get lost.

What I know is this: I want to abide in Jesus and Him to abide in me for eternity. And as long as I want Jesus, He will stick it out with me.

[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Way to Go, Sophie!

Sophie Lockhart's new EP, Here to Stay, arrived yesterday.

I haven't had the chance to listen to it yet. But this young woman from Dayton is a phenomenal talent.

I'm really looking forward to listening.

Way to go, Sophie!

Heartbreaking

"For Small-Town Cops, Opioid Scourge Hits Close to Home"

Let Me Roll It by Paul McCartney

And since I posted one from Band on the Run, here's another.

I want to tell you
And now's the time
I want to tell you that
You're going to be mine

An emphatic declarative statement to go with a rocker.

Mrs. Vandebilt by Paul McCartney

Speaking of Ho Hey, here's a 1974 tune in which Paul McCartney uses the phrase, "Ho hey ho, ho hey ho," Mrs. Vandebilt. It comes from one of Macca's best solo LPs, Band on the Run.

Ho Hey by the Lumineers

A New York City love folk song.

Now is the Moment

Luke 16:19-31
The basic story that Jesus tells in today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 16:19-31, had, scholars say, been around for centuries before Jesus told it. But as was true of everything Jesus said and did, He turned the old tale on its head in His telling of it. The twist Jesus gives it is designed to get our attention and to remind us of the urgent need each of us has to turn from sin and claim God’s grace now.

Jesus says: “There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day.” Purple was, in the ancient world, the color of royalty and of the wealthy. The “fine linen” referred to here is an expensive underwear imported from Egypt. Ordinary folks couldn’t afford it. This first character mentioned in the parable really is a rich guy then.

Read on, please. “At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.” The verb translated here as laid literally means thrown. This beggar has been tossed aside by a world that has no use for the poor, the powerless, the incapacitated, the racially different. For all of the indignities to which this man is subjected though, the beggar is the only fictional character in any of Jesus’ parables given a name: Lazarus, meaning God is my help. (He’s not to be confused with the real man Jesus raised from the dead in Bethany.) The fact that Jesus gives this character a name indicates that God has a high regard for every human being made in His image, no matter what their status among other people may be. The name is ironic though, because no one seems to help Lazarus.

In those days, there were no napkins. (Or silverware.) So the wealthy used scraps of bread to wipe the residue of food off of the fingers they’d just used to eat, then tossed the bread scraps to the floor. And since this was in an age before Hoovers or Dysons, often, dogs, which no one kept as pets and lived as scavengers, would come along and eat the scraps from the floor. In Jesus' parable, Lazarus, desperately hungry, wishes that, like a dog, he could get to the bread scraps the rich man and his guests tossed on the floor. He can’t even do that! He occupies a place lower than dogs.

No two people could be more different than Lazarus and the unnamed rich man in Jesus’ parable. But the difference between them is greater than what can be observed by the naked eye.

See what happens next. “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’”

Don’t be misled here. Lazarus isn’t saved from hellish torment by his poverty and the rich man isn’t denied entrance into the heavenly banquet because of his wealth.

Abraham, the ancestor of all of God’s people, to whose side Lazarus is carried by the angels in Jesus' parable, was himself a wealthy man, wealthy enough to duke it out with kings and kingdoms. But his wealth didn’t keep him out of God’s kingdom.

There are poor people in God’s Kingdom. There are rich people in God’s Kingdom.

Entrance into God's Kingdom happens by a different route.

Genesis 15:6 says that Abraham (then Abram) “believed the Lord, and [God] credited it to [Abraham] as righteousness.” Abraham trusted the promises of God. He trusted God to cover his sins and give him a future. That’s what faith does. Its gifts are available today to all people who turn from sin and trust in the God we now know definitively in Jesus.

The rich man clearly had no faith in God. He lived in unrepentant disrespect for the God he knew about as a Jew, a descendant of Abraham, and as a consequence, with callous disregard for the poor man at his gate.

The rich man seems to feel no sense of irony about asking Abraham to send Lazarus to serve him by cooling his tongue, even though he had, in this life, passed on the opportunity to serve Lazarus in his need.

And it’s here that Jesus’ parable differs from the usual popular tale. Go to verse 25, please: “But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’”

In the common folk tale, Abraham granted the rich man’s wish and sent Lazarus to Hades to give the man relief. But not in Jesus’ parable! Abraham refuses the request.

Why?

Because the rich man had countless opportunities in this life to repent for sin and trust in God as Lord of his life, Lord of his pocketbook, Lord of his attitudes and actions. He had chosen instead to be his own lord, to live for the moment, for his own convenience and comfort.

But time was up. He was past the point of God’s consolation.

Listen: God never tires of forgiving, renewing, and helping those who repent and trust in Him. Even the woeful Old Testament book of Lamentations declares: “...Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” [Lamentations 3:22-23].

God loves to forgive us and give us new life! As long as we are on this earth, we human beings, like the thief of the cross, can turn to Him.

But because this life is so fragile, so unpredictable, and because life with God here and now is indescribably better than it is without Him, the best time to turn to the God we know in Christ is now, this moment, every moment.

As the apostle Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 6:2: “...now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.”

The rich man had wasted the gift of now--the gift of this life. Now it was over and he was inconsolable. Beyond the gates of death, there is and will always be a great chasm between those who trust in the Lord and those who trust in other things.

But, for all his lack of faith or compassion, the rich man in Jesus’ parable does seem to have what we would call “family values.” He thinks of his brothers, all evidently as unrepentant and disbelieving as he had been.

Verse 27: “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’ Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’”

For centuries, God had spoken to His people through “Moses [or the Law] and the Prophets,” what we call the Old Testament. That book, the record of God’s encounters with His people over centuries, had called God’s people--and even Gentiles who heard it--to repent and trust in God.

This Word, Abraham is telling the rich man, is sufficient to communicate God’s call to repent and believe...if people will only pay attention to it. This same Word should have been sufficient for Jesus’ fellow Jews to know that He was God in the flesh when they saw Him.

But people always seem to want one more thing for God to prove Himself and His authority to them.

Years ago, I got to know a Pentecostal pastor named Howard, a wonderful man. He and I had traveled to an event in downtown Cincinnati and, stuck in traffic, we talked about things that mattered to us. At one point, Howard said, "One of the things that bothers me about Pentecostals is that they're always looking for some new revelation from God, some fresh word of prophecy or direction. But the thing is, God has already told us everything we need to know on the pages of the Bible." I chuckled and said, "Howard, you sound like a Lutheran!"

What Howard was saying is exactly what Abraham tells the rich man in Jesus' parable: "God's Word is sufficient. You don't need to ask God to do something special to prove His Lordship or people's need to repent and believe. It's all there in black and white."

The rich man isn’t done, though. “‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’ He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”

‘No,’ Abraham says to the rich man in the parable, ‘if your brothers refuse to trust in God when they have the testimony of God’s faithfulness found in the Old Testament, they won’t believe a man risen from the dead.’

In our home church was a woman named Rosie. Rosie was older. She lived by herself and didn't say much. We were in an adult Sunday School class being taught by a seminarian, who asked us, "If you could add a commemoration or holiday to the church calendar, what would it be?" The question was met with silence until, of all people, Rosie spoke up. "Well, I always thought that we should have a day to thank God that we live now because if I'd been alive when Jesus walked the earth, I might not have believed in Him. Now, I know that He died and He rose and it makes it easier for me to believe."

You and I are especially blessed. We live on the other side of Easter: Jesus has died and He has risen from the dead. The Old Testament pointed forward to Jesus, God on earth. And we have the testimony of the New Testament about Jesus, how He died and rose to set free all people--Jews and Gentiles--from sin and death and to live in God’s kingdom now and for all eternity, if they will do what the rich man never saw the need to do until it was too late: To daily turn from sin and daily trust in Christ above all. Rosie was right!

“In the past,” Hebrews 1:1-2 in the New Testament tells us, “God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe.”

Jesus has spoken to us, not just or even primarily with His words, but with one eternity-changing action, the sacrifice of His earthly life on the cross, where He took our punishment for sin and gained life for all who trust in Him.

Today and every today is a good day to repent and follow Jesus.

But watch out! When we do that, God will enlarge our hearts and help us see the poor men at our gates and even learn from them more deeply what it means to be a disciple. Amen

[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio. This was presented during both worship services this morning.]

Museum memorializes "the perpetual struggle to live up" to our national ideas

The museum, Mr. Obama said, would make visitors face uncomfortable truths. But it would also capture the essential greatness of the United States — the perpetual struggle to live up to its highest ideals.

Mr. Obama spoke emotionally of his many flights on Marine One across the Mall, past the alabaster spire of the Washington Monument and the lighted figure of Abraham Lincoln, sheltered in his memorial. He said he had watched the museum rise from the ground and thought of the days when he and his family would return to visit it as private citizens.

“We’ll walk away that much more in love with this country,” he said, “the only place on earth where this story could have unfolded.”

From The New York Times' coverage of the dedication of the new National Museum of African-American History and Culture, located on the Mall in Washington, D.C.

I hope to see the museum the next time I'm in Washington.

As season winds down, Brandon Phillips' days as a Red may be numbered

The player who may be remembered as the second-best second baseman in Cincinnati Reds history--after Joe Morgan--seems likely to be traded during the off-season. Since he has the right to veto any trade, it's likely, based on remarks he makes in the linked article, that he'll only go to a contender. I will hate to see Phillips go; he's one of my all time favorites.

Would selection committee give Houston a chance?

According to a survey of fifteen Power Five Conference ADs conducted by USA Today, yes, the Cougars could have a path to the College Football Playoff. But there are a lot of games to be played yet, including a game against #3 Louisville in Houston on November 17.

The way things look right now, the match-up versus Louisville would be even more demanding than the game the Cougars won in Norman over Oklahoma, which was also ranked #3 on the opening Saturday of college football season when the two teams played. Louisville impressively dismantled Florida State last week; so, they are likely to be a team to be reckoned with.

I'm pulling for the Cougars for a great season, not just because they play in the non-Power Five American Athletic Conference and I love rooting for the "little guys," but mostly because the Cougars' head coach is Tom Herman. Herman was the offensive coordinator for my Ohio State Buckeyes when OSU won the first College Football Playoff championship two seasons ago. His play-calling then was masterful. And he's done an amazing job with all facets of his job with the Cougars.

Houston is rumored to be one of the schools that the Big 12, a Power Five conference, is looking to add to their number. Should the Cougars go 13-0 in regular season play, as seems likely, it would only burnish the case for their admission among major colleges.

Admission into the Big 12 might also entice Herman, who could probably write his own ticket to any available major college program, to stay at Houston. The heightened level of competition and the bigger salary he could likely count on might keep him on. Houston is already a major hotbed for high school football player recruitment and Herman is winning many of them over. He's building something there.

[UPDATE: The likeliest scenario by which Houston could get into the playoffs, I think, is for Oklahoma, now 1-2, to win out the rest of the season as Houston similarly takes care of business in their own weaker conference. This will make their win over Oklahoma a more impressive item on their resume. Houston is still a long shot.]

Of course, if, improbably, Houston gets into the College Football Playoff and faces off against my Buckeyes, who have a great chance to make it to the final four this year, I'll hope that the Cougars just roll over and play dead.

How losing weight and eating healthfully are going

I've written here and here about my quest to lose weight and eat more healthfully after I tipped my doctor's scales at a gargantuan 189.7-pounds. That weigh-in occurred on June 13. On June 14, I began to cut my daily calorie intake.

In the first linked post, I talked about what I'd learned after about a month of more sensible eating. In the second linked post, I gave a progress report; at that point I weighed in at 176.5 pounds.

Yesterday, I went to the local Little Clinic because of a cough and cold. The examination room had scales in it and since I'd not weighed myself since September 1, I decided to bite the bullet.

I wasn't hopeful. I'd fallen off the calorie wagon several times over the past few weeks. On the other side of the ledger though, I had, a few days before, bought a new pair of jeans with a size 34 waist and felt comfortable in them. But when I put my hands on my belly, I could tell that it wasn't shrinking as dramatically as it did when I first began the process or when I'd been more consistently disciplined. (Many people have commented to me how weight comes off readily initially, but gets tougher as time goes on.)

I climbed on the scales. I couldn't believe it! I had lost more weight. I was now at 173 pounds. Not a dramatic reduction, of course, but I had half expected a gain.

In addition to all the lessons this process is teaching me, which I mentioned here, I guess I would point to another one: Maintaining a daily positive discipline isn't easy. (I know that's obvious. But I think it's worth noting.)

Whether, we're establishing disciplines to lose weight, get fit, be financially responsible, serve others, inform ourselves as voting citizens, or keep a daily quiet time with God, all positive things, there will always be some urgent or more compelling thing that keeps us from being disciplined. The hardest thing in the world to do is the right thing.

I've learned that truth more from my failures--including my failures at eating more healthfully--than I have from my successes.

But even that phrase "my successes" makes me laugh. The reason is simple: The reason that I've lost more than 16-pounds since June 14, a paltry amount if the diet technique commercials are to be believed, is not because of my will power. My will is to eat what I want, do what I want, spend as I want, look out for myself with no regard to others as I want.

But God is in the process of taming this rebel sinner. Each day, often many times a day, I turn to the God I know in Jesus Christ and ask Him, despite my self-will and stubbornness, to bring me under His control, to meet my willing but weak spirit and create and deepen faith in Christ within me, to create and deepen my dependence on Christ. And, I also pray that as Christ does this, He will cultivate in me the habits that will cause me to daily welcome Christ as Lord over my whole being.

The old Mark--sinful, selfish, willful--my default mode is always trying to steer me away from letting Christ have charge of my whole life. My only defense is the disciplines of Christian life, the means by which Christ comes to us and strengthens us to be who we know, through Christ, we can be:

• God's Word, the Bible;
• worship with fellow believers;
• the sacrament of Holy Communion, the true body and blood of Jesus;
• prayer;
• the fellowship of other believers;
• serving in Christ's name. 

As I indicated here, I regard this movement toward more healthy eating and a lower weight as a spiritual battle. There is nothing that the devil, the world, and our sinful selves (our old selves) like more than for us to be on "cruise control": self-satisfied, resigned to being who we are, unconcerned with others, unconcerned with taking care of the bodies that God has given to us.

When we follow these ordinary pathways of the world, we take ourselves out of the game in which God enlists us at our Baptism--and in which God wants to enlist all people: to love God, to love our neighbor, to surrender to the life-changing grace of God given only in Jesus, to make disciples.

I want to be in God's game until the moment I draw my last breath on earth. That's why I'm trying to eat healthfully and get to a good weight. Despite all the roadblocks I put in God's way, I keep turning back to Him to help me to make this new life style stick.

He can do the same thing for you.

Being Shrewd Managers of God's Graces

Luke 16:1-15
[Audio of this message can be found here.]

Let’s get one thing off the table immediately as we look at the strange parable Jesus tells us in today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 16:1-15. The God we know in Jesus Christ does not commend thievery or dishonesty.

The seventh commandment still says, “You shall not steal.”

The eighth commandment still tells us: “You shall not bear false witness.”

The Savior Jesus, the foundational Truth of the universe, Who came into our world not to abolish God’s Law, but to fulfill it, would never compliment dishonesty in financial dealings. Nor would He compliment cheating. But Jesus does commend the manager’s shrewdness. And He commends the shrewd use of all that has come under His disciples’ control in this life. It remains commendable for you and me. Let's find out why.

This parable is, above all, about stewardship. Not just the stewardship of our money, but the stewardship of our whole lives.

Each of us has been given the gift of life. Stewardship is about what we do with this gift.

James 1:17 reminds us: “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” We tend to forget this and the moment we take something in hand--be it a job, a house, a car, a career, whatever--we think of it as being intrinsically, by right, ours. In perpetuity...or, until we decide to get rid of it or trade up or sell it or will it to our kids.

But that’s not what God’s Word tells us. Psalm 24:1 says: “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it.”

Whatever we have, not just property and goods, but also our minds, our bodies, our health, our friends and family and spouses, aren’t ours. We only have them on loan from God. So, how will we use this life that God has given to us? That is the question Jesus challenges us to answer in this parable.

Let’s look at verse 1: “Jesus told his disciples: There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. So he called him in and asked him, “What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management, because you cannot be manager any longer.”’”

The rich man isn’t quite ready to give his manager a pink slip. Maybe he’ll give the guy another--less cushy--assignment. But the rich man has heard that the manager is wasting his money.

This is curious! The manager is on the brink of getting fired or demoted because the rich man has heard rumors from gossips. He tells the manager, in effect, “I find you guilty. Now give me the evidence.”

Now, in your experiences, what sort of person is quickest to believe that someone else is cheating them, that someone else has lied to them? It’s usually someone who’s an accomplished cheat and liar themselves. They figure that everyone is as bad as untrustworthy as they are. So, when the rich man hears rumors about his manager, he believes them. We’ll get confirmation of this later in the parable.

Read on, please. “‘The manager said to himself, ‘What shall I do now? My master is taking away my job. I’m not strong enough to dig, and I’m ashamed to beg—I know what I’ll do so that, when I lose my job here, people will welcome me into their houses.” [The manager’s career options are dwindling.] So he called in each one of his master’s debtors. He asked the first, “How much do you owe my master?” “Nine hundred gallons of olive oil,” he replied. The manager told him, “Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it four hundred and fifty.” “Then he asked the second, “And how much do you owe?” “A thousand bushels of wheat,” he replied. He told him, “Take your bill and make it eight hundred.”’”

Let's be clear: the manager is being completely self-serving. That's not the thing Jesus is commending.

But Jesus says that the manager is using the money owed to his master--or more accurately, forgiven portions of money owed to his master--to create a soft landing for himself--a golden parachute--after he gets fired. The manager figures that each of those whose debts were forgiven will be grateful to him and welcome them into their own households. We still have no idea from what Jesus tells us whether the manager actually had, as the gossips had reported, wasted the rich man’s possessions. But we do know this: That the IOUs the rich man was waiting to come due were now worth a lot less than they had been before.

And there’s something else we know now for sure: This rich man himself isn’t such an upright character. Old Testament law was clear in condemning usury, which it defined as loaning fellow Jews money with interest. Deuteronomy 23:19 says: “Do not charge a fellow Israelite interest, whether on money or food or anything else that may earn interest.”

Yet, here was the fictional rich man in Jesus’ parable likely making loans to other Jews with interest. Why do I say that was likely? Stick with me. But I will tell you now that I believe that the rich man violated God’s law and the law of his country to make money. He was a crook. No wonder he was suspicious of the manager without a shred of evidence.

And here’s the deal. There’s a good chance that the manager reduced what the rich man’s debtors actually owed him, without interest added, under the laws of Israel. It’s likely that one guy really only owed the rich man 450 gallons of olive oil and the other really only had borrowed 800 bushels of wheat. Either way you slice it, the manager was being shrewd. The debtors would appreciate his action. And the rich man would be more likely to get a 450 gallon payback of olive oil than 900 or 800 bushel payback of wheat than 1000...just as today, lenders will pay collection agencies to get at least something out of overdue loans, pennies on the dollar.

This may explain the next verse: “[Jesus says:] The master [didn’t fire the manager, but] commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For [Jesus goes on to explain] the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light [‘People of the light’ being disciples of Jesus]. I tell you [Jesus continues], use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.”

Now, don’t miss Jesus’ point. Jesus is talking about how we are to manage every blessing that comes to us in this world and whether we will be prepared for what happens beyond death. Hebrews 9:27 reminds us that “people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment.”

Death, for we fallen descendants of Adam and Eve, is inevitable. It hangs over each of us, just as the loss of his way of life hung over the manager in Jesus’ parable. The question for us, as it was for the manager, is this: Will we prepare for the life to come by being good stewards--good managers--of the lives we’re living right now? Will we share the riches of God's grace with others so that, by our sharing of the Gospel and of our lives with them, they too will become Christ's disciples and be there to welcome us gratefully in eternity? This is an enormous question!

One scholar says, rightly, I think, that there are three ways we can “manage” this life that God gives to us.

One way is to be like the rich fool of Jesus’ parable in Luke 12. Jesus tells about a man who acquired so much that he decided to build bigger barns to hold all his stuff. Then, he told himself, he would relax, eat, drink, and be merry. But Jesus says: “...God said to [this rich man], ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’ This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.” [Luke 12:20-21] Watch out, Jesus says, that whenever you come to life’s end, you haven’t been spending all of God’s gifts on this life. That’s short-sighted: There will be no soft landing in eternity for people like this.

Another way we can “manage” the gifts of this life--and this life itself--is to, understanding that this life will pass from our hands one day and so, ignore taking care of God's gifts to us in this life. This what fifty years ago, the hippies in communes tried to do. They weren’t going to own anything. Or take care of anything. They were just passing through, man.

Through the centuries, there have been Christian movements that have adopted this line of thinking. These folks can be, as the saying puts it, so heavenly minded that they’re no earthly good. Short as this life may be though, the gifts that come to us from God are to be taken care of, even our bodies. (By the way, have you had a physical lately?)

By His death on the cross, Jesus paid the ransom to buy us out of captivity to sin and death; even as we look forward to eternity, we owe it to Him to take care of this life and this world.

That entails being faithful to the promises we made to God and the Church when we were confirmed:

...to live among God’s faithful people, to hear His Word and share in His supper, to proclaim the good news of God in Christ through word and deed, to serve all people, following the example of our Lord Jesus, and to strive for justice and peace in all the earth.

That’s how we’re to use the gifts God has given to us. That's how we're to live and celebrate the free gift of grace given in Christ. That’s how we’re to manage our lives while on this planet!

This leads us to the third way we can live our lives. It’s the way of the manager in Jesus’ parable. It’s the way of shrewdness. One scholar has written that the manager uses “the authority he still has in the present [world] to feather his bed for the future [world].”

Every bit of this life God has given to us is meant to be invested in eternity, in the things of Christ’s eternal kingdom. Invest your life, wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, in glorifying the God Who has saved you through the death and resurrection of Jesus.

We all will get pink slips someday, our time and work on earth will be through.

But when it happens, may we stand before our Lord, gloriously spent, good managers who gave this life our all for Christ’s glory, people who, by the way we have entrusted all that we have and all the we are to Christ, have lived faithfully and wisely in response to God's goodness to us.

It will be the ultimate soft landing, right into the hand of God.

And Christ will tell us: “Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.” [Matthew 25:34] It’s then that all will know beyond a shadow of a doubt that those who have managed their lives with gratitude for all that God has done for them are the shrewdest people of all. Amen

[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio. This message was shared during worship on September 18.]

Does 1 Timothy 2:8-15 Show That Paul Was a Sexist?

Not being aware during this morning's worship of the events in New York, New Jersey, and Minnesota, I called two of the appointed lessons for this Sunday "fire bombs" because of their power to disturb. Late in the week, I got an email from a member of the Living Water family asking if I would say a few words of explanation of 1 Timothy 2:1-15, the last eight verses of which might raise questions, to say the least. (The other disturbing passage appointed for the day was the Gospel lesson, Luke 16:1-15, which includes a parable in which Jesus tells Christians to be shrewd.)

Anyway, I decided to spend some time talking about these verses, 1 Timothy 2:8-15, before preaching:

⁸ Therefore I want the men everywhere to pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or disputing. ⁹ I also want the women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, adorning themselves, not with elaborate hairstyles or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, ¹⁰ but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God.

Here's a link to that discussion. It's about seven and a half minutes long.

[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Old As Religion by John Reuben

It's been seven years since rapper (and Columbus native) John Reuben released his last LP, the phenomenal, Sex, Drugs, and Self Control.

I'd read a few months ago that he was back in a recording studio. On Friday, he dropped this new track onto the Internet. It's a great tune that I look forward to getting to know better. Welcome back, Johnny Reubonic!

(The words to Old As Religion can be found right now on Reuben's home page.)

Please pray for Nabeel Qureshi

Please pray for Nabeel Qureshi. This extraordinary scholar and man of God came to faith in Christ, after being a devout Muslim, eleven years ago.

Since then, he has sought both to reach Muslims with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to help other Christians to reach out lovingly to their Muslim neighbors.

Qureshi has learned that he has stomach cancer. The cancer is in the advanced stages and he reports that doctors say he has a 4% chance of surviving.

Qureshi is the author of the extraordinary, Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus: A Devout Muslim Encounters Christianity. Just this past week, his latest book, No God but One: Allah or Jesus?: A Former Muslim Investigates the Evidence for Islam and Christianity was published recently.

Please ask God to bring him healing.

Just finished reading...

Here are two books I finished reading this week.

Transforming Discipleship by Greg Ogden is a great overview for church leaders interested in helping their congregations to develop cultures of disciple making. Ogden's model is built on triads, groups of three people, including a convener or catalyst, and two other people who all covenant to grow together in their faith through study, prayer, action based on what God's Word says, and mutual accountability. It eschews programs and opts instead for the relational methods employed by Jesus, Paul, and Barnabas. We are in the process of implementing a discipleship culture at Living Water Lutheran Church, where I serve as pastor, and it's exciting to see how God is moving us toward the fulfillment of the only mission Jesus ever gave to the Church: making disciples. Ogden is a helpful resource. I give this book 4 out of 5 stars.

The Element by Ken Robinson with Lou Aronica is all about finding the thing we're passionate about to determine what we should do in life. That's a thin (and obvious) reed on which to hang a 270-page book and, let's be honest, not everyone has the opportunity to pursue their passions in life. But, as Artemis Ward (not Abraham Lincoln, as I had long believed) once said of a book he'd been asked to review: "People who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like." The book is filled with interesting anecdotes. I rate this book at 2.5 stars out of a possible 5.

Truth

Love this quote from the late Dallas Willard: "The average church-going Christian has a headful of vital truths about God and a body unable to fend off sin."

True...and virtually the same as Jesus said of His disciples: "the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak."

All the more reason for we who confess Christ as God and Savior to pray, "Lead us not into temptation and deliver us from evil."

Handle with Care by The Traveling Wilburys

Just before reading The Economist's piece on George Frideric Handel (mentioned in the previous post), I read about another musician called George from across the pond and a trip he took to America before he became famous. That other George was George Harrison.

Harrison visited his sister Louise in Benton, Illinois, along with his brother Peter, a few months before the US was infected with Beatlemania. I was sent down the rabbit hole of reading about Harrison in Illinois by the announcement from a high school classmate, Peter Conrad, that a song of his is included in the soundtrack of a film about Harrison's visit to Benton.

Harrison wrote Handle with Care as a B-side and thought it would be fun to get some others involved in its recording, namely, Jeff Lynne (who was producing the LP on which the A-side of the single was to appear), Tom Petty, Bob Dylan, and Roy Orbison. After the recording proved to be satisfying and fun, the five musicians decided to do more tracks, resulting in the LP, The Traveling Wilburys.

Handel was unavailable to record with other five musicians at the time, though his name (sort of) appears in the title of this track.