Friday, May 08, 2020
Wednesday, May 06, 2020
Tuesday, May 05, 2020
The Dark Shadow
Yesterday saw the fiftieth anniversary of the Kent State University shootings in Kent, Ohio. I wrote this early this morning over on Facebook.
It's one of those events that happen in life when you remember exactly where you were when you heard about it.
I was spending the day at Columbus North High School doing an article for our West High School Occident newspaper about a typical day at another city high school, comparing and contrasting. I even remember the name of the guy who told me about the Kent State shootings, a North High student, president of the student council, someone I met precisely once.
I don't know where he'd heard about it, but he said, "I just found out that the national guard killed four students at Kent State." I couldn't believe it!
The Ohio Primary was the next day, May 5. Jim Rhodes, who had had what many would characterize as a successful two-term governorship, was running for the Republican nomination for US Senator. His opponent was Robert Taft, Jr. Taft was the grandson of a president and the son of "Mr. Republican," Bob Taft, Sr., and the father of a future Ohio governor. Taft obviously had solid name recognition, buttressed by the fact that he had been, back when such things existed, an at-large member of the US House of Representatives, representing the whole state. But Rhodes was so popular that he was expected to win handily.
Not after Kent State. He was the one who'd sent the Ohio National Guard onto the campus and, as a friend of min rightly pointed out on Facebook those guardsmen were probably not trained in crowd control. Rhodes lost the primary to Taft.
That aside, it was a moment when middle America, until that point accepting of Lyndon Johnson's escalations of the war and Nixon's Vietnamization policy (i.e., a head fake) in which he talked about withdrawal but escalated and widened the war, began to take a second look. People forget that polling at the time still found a majority of the American people supported the war effort. Two and a half years later, Nixon would defeat the World War II-hero, but total opponent of the Vietnam War, Senator George McGovern.
But on May 5, 1970, almost everyone, I think, was sickened by the death of four kids engaging in what appeared to be peaceful protest.
Was that the day America changed, when we moved from blithe complicity with the actions of our government, believing that our presidents would never tell us lies (as polling in the 1950s and 60s repeatedly showed) to where we are now: always cynical, never trusting, susceptible to every cockamamie conspiracy theory that comes down the pike?
Things like that rarely happen on a single day. It took a succession of days corrosive of trust and cohesion to turn America into the balkanized, distrusting rabble that it is today, so divided, suspicious, and sunk in our partisan tribal silos that we can't seem to muster the patriotism or common sense to address an obvious national emergency with resolve and unity. Supporters of the respective parties don't mind the outrages committed by pols from their own tribes, so long as they believe their preferred agendas are advanced.
Human sin and selfishness were not invented on May 4, 1970 or the other sad days that fueled a cynicism as unrealistic today as the credulity that once characterized Americans was.
But since the days of Johnson, a crude, well-intentioned egomaniac who lied to get us to fight in Vietnam, and the cynic Richard Nixon, who tried to steal our Constitution, the shadow of their sins have hung over the presidency, the government, and country.
We need to learn to trust each other again and we need leaders worthy of that trust.
It's one of those events that happen in life when you remember exactly where you were when you heard about it.
I was spending the day at Columbus North High School doing an article for our West High School Occident newspaper about a typical day at another city high school, comparing and contrasting. I even remember the name of the guy who told me about the Kent State shootings, a North High student, president of the student council, someone I met precisely once.
I don't know where he'd heard about it, but he said, "I just found out that the national guard killed four students at Kent State." I couldn't believe it!
The Ohio Primary was the next day, May 5. Jim Rhodes, who had had what many would characterize as a successful two-term governorship, was running for the Republican nomination for US Senator. His opponent was Robert Taft, Jr. Taft was the grandson of a president and the son of "Mr. Republican," Bob Taft, Sr., and the father of a future Ohio governor. Taft obviously had solid name recognition, buttressed by the fact that he had been, back when such things existed, an at-large member of the US House of Representatives, representing the whole state. But Rhodes was so popular that he was expected to win handily.
Not after Kent State. He was the one who'd sent the Ohio National Guard onto the campus and, as a friend of min rightly pointed out on Facebook those guardsmen were probably not trained in crowd control. Rhodes lost the primary to Taft.
That aside, it was a moment when middle America, until that point accepting of Lyndon Johnson's escalations of the war and Nixon's Vietnamization policy (i.e., a head fake) in which he talked about withdrawal but escalated and widened the war, began to take a second look. People forget that polling at the time still found a majority of the American people supported the war effort. Two and a half years later, Nixon would defeat the World War II-hero, but total opponent of the Vietnam War, Senator George McGovern.
But on May 5, 1970, almost everyone, I think, was sickened by the death of four kids engaging in what appeared to be peaceful protest.
Was that the day America changed, when we moved from blithe complicity with the actions of our government, believing that our presidents would never tell us lies (as polling in the 1950s and 60s repeatedly showed) to where we are now: always cynical, never trusting, susceptible to every cockamamie conspiracy theory that comes down the pike?
Things like that rarely happen on a single day. It took a succession of days corrosive of trust and cohesion to turn America into the balkanized, distrusting rabble that it is today, so divided, suspicious, and sunk in our partisan tribal silos that we can't seem to muster the patriotism or common sense to address an obvious national emergency with resolve and unity. Supporters of the respective parties don't mind the outrages committed by pols from their own tribes, so long as they believe their preferred agendas are advanced.
Human sin and selfishness were not invented on May 4, 1970 or the other sad days that fueled a cynicism as unrealistic today as the credulity that once characterized Americans was.
But since the days of Johnson, a crude, well-intentioned egomaniac who lied to get us to fight in Vietnam, and the cynic Richard Nixon, who tried to steal our Constitution, the shadow of their sins have hung over the presidency, the government, and country.
We need to learn to trust each other again and we need leaders worthy of that trust.
Monday, May 04, 2020
It's Gut-Check Time for American Christians
Small groups of protesters, representing, at most, about 30% of the American people, have been protesting social distancing and sheltering-in-place orders lately, claiming them to be infringements on their personal freedom.
But here's what I think, folks, from my perspective as a Christian and a student of American history.
My freedom ends when it infringes on your freedom.
The Constitution's Framers never believed in unbridled rights or allowing freedom to become license.
Babies and adolescents believe that freedom is being able to do whatever you want to do.
But when you grow up, you understand that, in Justice Holmes' famous example, freedom of speech does not allow you to yell, "Fire!" in a crowded theater.
The vast majority of Americans want a slow, controlled, and, when needed, easily-reversed, return to more normal social distancing. They want government to fulfill its function as pronounced in the Preamble of the Constitution, to form "a more perfect union" by striving to "establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity..."
Freedom does not, whether from a Christian or a constitutional perspective, give anyone the right to willfully endanger others. The apostle Peter writes in Scripture to Christians, "Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as God's slaves." (1 Peter 2:16) To be a slave of the God we know in Jesus Christ means to be set free to live lives of love for God and love for neighbor.
Yes, there are economic implications to continued sheltering-in-place. Our unemployment systems, operating on antiquated software, need to be updated. Government and all of us will probably have to do much more over the next year-and-a-half to help each other through this unprecedented crisis.
But on our currency, we Americans claim as our motto, "In God we trust," not "In money we trust." If we can take sensible, if sometimes unpleasant, actions to get through this crisis together, we will emerge stronger for it. We will preserve the most precious economic assets we have: healthy, living human beings.
It's gut-check time for Christians in America. Will we be full-tilt pro-life? Or will we join the pro-death advocates who say that having a few more bucks in their pockets is more important than the lives of their neighbors?
The answer should be clear. And most people know that.
But here's what I think, folks, from my perspective as a Christian and a student of American history.
My freedom ends when it infringes on your freedom.
The Constitution's Framers never believed in unbridled rights or allowing freedom to become license.
Babies and adolescents believe that freedom is being able to do whatever you want to do.
But when you grow up, you understand that, in Justice Holmes' famous example, freedom of speech does not allow you to yell, "Fire!" in a crowded theater.
The vast majority of Americans want a slow, controlled, and, when needed, easily-reversed, return to more normal social distancing. They want government to fulfill its function as pronounced in the Preamble of the Constitution, to form "a more perfect union" by striving to "establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity..."
Freedom does not, whether from a Christian or a constitutional perspective, give anyone the right to willfully endanger others. The apostle Peter writes in Scripture to Christians, "Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as God's slaves." (1 Peter 2:16) To be a slave of the God we know in Jesus Christ means to be set free to live lives of love for God and love for neighbor.
Yes, there are economic implications to continued sheltering-in-place. Our unemployment systems, operating on antiquated software, need to be updated. Government and all of us will probably have to do much more over the next year-and-a-half to help each other through this unprecedented crisis.
But on our currency, we Americans claim as our motto, "In God we trust," not "In money we trust." If we can take sensible, if sometimes unpleasant, actions to get through this crisis together, we will emerge stronger for it. We will preserve the most precious economic assets we have: healthy, living human beings.
It's gut-check time for Christians in America. Will we be full-tilt pro-life? Or will we join the pro-death advocates who say that having a few more bucks in their pockets is more important than the lives of their neighbors?
The answer should be clear. And most people know that.
[Armed protesters in the gallery of the Michigan State Senate chamber in Lansing four days ago.]
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Saturday, May 02, 2020
Thursday, April 30, 2020
Wednesday, April 29, 2020
Who can stand in God's presence?
Psalm 15 was part of the appointed reading for my quiet time with God today. The psalm was composed by King David, ostensibly after the ark of the covenant was brought into Jerusalem.
In it, David describes who is qualified to, effectively, live with God.
We delude ourselves if we think that any of us intrinsically possesses these attributes. The person who reads these verses and thinks, "That looks like a picture of me, wonderful person that I am," is lying to themselves.
But we can be covered with these attributes and the Holy Spirit can begin to construct them in our lives only as we turn in daily repentance and renewal in the name of Jesus to God.
Baptized and forgiven, Christ also covers with perfect righteousness everyone who believes in Him.
Jesus' worthiness becomes our worthiness, enabling us to live with God, even though we all fall far short of being the kind of person that David describes in the psalm.
Baptized and forgiven, Christ also covers with perfect righteousness everyone who believes in Him.
Jesus' worthiness becomes our worthiness, enabling us to live with God, even though we all fall far short of being the kind of person that David describes in the psalm.
My prayer is that because of what Jesus has done for sinners like me in His death and resurrection, His Spirit will work on me again today to conform me to the image of Jesus (Romans 8:29).
Here's Psalm 15:
1 Lord, who may dwell in your sacred tent?
Who may live on your holy mountain?
Who may live on your holy mountain?
2 The one whose walk is blameless,
who does what is righteous,
who speaks the truth from their heart;
3 whose tongue utters no slander,
who does no wrong to a neighbor,
and casts no slur on others;
4 who despises a vile person
but honors those who fear the Lord;
who keeps an oath even when it hurts,
and does not change their mind;
5 who lends money to the poor without interest;
who does not accept a bribe against the innocent.
who does what is righteous,
who speaks the truth from their heart;
3 whose tongue utters no slander,
who does no wrong to a neighbor,
and casts no slur on others;
4 who despises a vile person
but honors those who fear the Lord;
who keeps an oath even when it hurts,
and does not change their mind;
5 who lends money to the poor without interest;
who does not accept a bribe against the innocent.
Whoever does these things
will never be shaken.
will never be shaken.
Father, through Jesus and by the power of the Holy Spirit, work once again today to make me this person "even when it hurts." Amen
Tuesday, April 28, 2020
Seeing the One We Need
Below you'll find online worship from Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, for this past Sunday, April 26. We hope that it will help you grow strong in faith in Jesus, whether you already know Him or not. Below that then is the written text of the message included in the worship. God bless you with a safe and healthy week.
Luke 24:13-35
In the risen Jesus, our eyes are opened to Who God really is.
We see that He is the God Who, out of His grace and love, called ancient Israel to be His own people who would carry the light of His love to all the nations, despite the smallness of Israel’s numbers and power, despite its sin, idolatry, and lies.
In Jesus too, we see the God Who sent His Son “to seek and to save the lost” (Luke 19:10).
This is the God Who, desperate to restore us to the life only He can give, is indifferent to the humiliation others might see in His becoming...
In Jesus, they had heard the voice of God and had seen, in Martin Luther’s wonderful phrase, “God’s loving face.”
But they were blind to all of Jesus’ promises, assuming that as Messiah, Jesus would go to Jerusalem and claim His kingdom.
They were right, except that the kingdom of the Messiah, the Christ, could not be claimed before Jesus dealt with our blindness. Until it was overcome forever.
All who follow Jesus must learn to see the world aright.
First, we have to see that we are sinners. Jesus didn’t just die for all those “other people” over whom we tsk and shake our heads. We too are sinners whose blindness causes us to brag, tear others down, to be unkind, to hoard paper towels, toilet paper, and disinfectant, to think we’re always right and the other guy is always wrong, to covet, steal, take God’s name in vain, gossip, and lie. The cross should open our eyes to our sin. The condition of sin into which each of us is born and which we blindly indulge, is so bad that it required the sinless God of all creation to take on human flesh, becoming the only human being who could offer a pure sacrifice acceptable to God to overcome the power of our sin.
And it’s for blind people like us, prone to look no further than our own interests, desires, and preferences, that Jesus came to die...and rise.
Which brings us back to the road to Emmaus.
Two disciples walk on that road, so blinded by sin and habitual ways of thinking and religion, that they can’t accept the report of the women who had returned from the tomb with news that Jesus was raised from the dead. “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken!” Jesus tells them while they still don’t recognize Him. (Luke 24:25)
It’s at this point that Jesus begins to open their eyes, showing them God’s Law is not meant to be the last word over their lives or their eternities. He shows them from Moses and the Prophets that the Messiah was always meant to do what Jesus did...to die and then to rise.
Jesus points them to the gospel, the good news: God has conquered our sin and our death by dying and rising and all whose eyes are opened to their need of what Jesus accomplished in His death and resurrection and trust in Jesus are no longer lost. God finds us and saves us by His grace in Jesus!
The night is closing in when Jesus and the two disciples come to Emmaus. It will soon be too dark to see and therefore, to travel. They beg Jesus to stay with them.
It’s at a table in Emmaus that it happens.
Jesus breaks the bread and blesses it and starts to give it to them, as He has so many times before, and THEY SEE.
After Jesus reveals Himself to them, their eyes are opened to what Jesus had done--died for the sin of all people and risen so that all who trust in Him can live with God now and always, the darkness outside doesn’t matter to the disciples. Despite the dangers posed by wild animals and highway bandits, they race back to Jerusalem to tell the other disciples that they have seen Jesus, risen. Their eyes are open.
They can testify in the words of John Newton’s hymn, “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found; was blind, but now I see.”
The same is true for you and me. When God’s Law shows us our need of a Savior and His Gospel presents Jesus as that Savior Who saves us by God’s charity--His grace--through faith in Jesus; whenever His Word causes our hearts to burn within us; when we are claimed by God--Father, Son, and Holy Spirit--in the waters of Holy Baptism; and when we see Him again (and we will see Him again!) in the breaking of the bread at Holy Communion, our blindness gives way to seeing God in all His glory, grace, and love.
We move out of the darkness of our cramped, self-serving lives into the bright spaciousness of His kingdom.
We can marvel, revel, and celebrate the reality that the apostle Peter says belongs to all believers in Jesus: “...you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” (1 Peter 2:9)
This week, listen to Jesus’ Word, heed His call to repentance and renewal. He will come to You not only as God the Son Who died for Your sins but also as God the Son Who rose to open Your eyes to see how much He loves you and the new life He gives to you.
Look to Jesus and you will see. And you will believe.
Amen
Luke 24:13-35
Today, I want to focus on two verses from our gospel lesson: “When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him…” (Luke 24:30-31)
Here is the moment when, on the first Easter Sunday, two of Jesus’ disciples, after walking on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus with a mysterious stranger, realize that this stranger, Whose unfolding of God’s Word had made their hearts burn while they walked together, was Jesus: crucified, dead, buried, now risen from the dead.
They’d been blind.
But now they could see.
Here is the moment when, on the first Easter Sunday, two of Jesus’ disciples, after walking on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus with a mysterious stranger, realize that this stranger, Whose unfolding of God’s Word had made their hearts burn while they walked together, was Jesus: crucified, dead, buried, now risen from the dead.
They’d been blind.
But now they could see.
During His ministry, Jesus had spoken about what He intended to accomplish in Jerusalem.
“The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.” (Luke 9:22)
“For the Son of Man in his day,” Jesus says in Luke 17:24-25, “will be like the lightning, which flashes and lights up the sky from one end to the other. But first he must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation.”
To eyes blinded by sin though, a gracious God going to the lengths that God goes to in Jesus in order to seek and save those lost in sin, death, and darkness, is beyond imagining.
The blindness of the human race goes back to Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. After they rebelled against God and ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, “...the eyes of both of them were opened” (Genesis 3:7).
Before, they had seen only God and what was good.
Now they saw evil.
From that point forward, whenever the human race gave God a thought, it imagined that God was as lacking in grace and charity they themselves.
They saw God as a Being to be placated by religious acts, a Deity who demands perfection.
Or, they were, like me at one time in my life: fools, of whom God’s Word observes, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’...” (Psalm 14:1)
“The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.” (Luke 9:22)
“For the Son of Man in his day,” Jesus says in Luke 17:24-25, “will be like the lightning, which flashes and lights up the sky from one end to the other. But first he must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation.”
To eyes blinded by sin though, a gracious God going to the lengths that God goes to in Jesus in order to seek and save those lost in sin, death, and darkness, is beyond imagining.
The blindness of the human race goes back to Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. After they rebelled against God and ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, “...the eyes of both of them were opened” (Genesis 3:7).
Before, they had seen only God and what was good.
Now they saw evil.
From that point forward, whenever the human race gave God a thought, it imagined that God was as lacking in grace and charity they themselves.
They saw God as a Being to be placated by religious acts, a Deity who demands perfection.
Or, they were, like me at one time in my life: fools, of whom God’s Word observes, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’...” (Psalm 14:1)
In the risen Jesus, our eyes are opened to Who God really is.
We see that He is the God Who, out of His grace and love, called ancient Israel to be His own people who would carry the light of His love to all the nations, despite the smallness of Israel’s numbers and power, despite its sin, idolatry, and lies.
In Jesus too, we see the God Who sent His Son “to seek and to save the lost” (Luke 19:10).
This is the God Who, desperate to restore us to the life only He can give, is indifferent to the humiliation others might see in His becoming...
- like a widow scouring her home for a single lost coin (Luke 15:8-10, or
- like a shepherd who has 99 sheep securely penned for the night, but still seeks the one that’s lost (Luke 15:3-7), or
- like a father who doesn’t care what the neighbors say because, though his son has squandered everything he gave him--every blessing--and shown him complete disrespect, will still anxiously look down the road hoping for his return and throw a party when that lost child returns. (Luke 15:11-32)
In Jesus, they had heard the voice of God and had seen, in Martin Luther’s wonderful phrase, “God’s loving face.”
But they were blind to all of Jesus’ promises, assuming that as Messiah, Jesus would go to Jerusalem and claim His kingdom.
They were right, except that the kingdom of the Messiah, the Christ, could not be claimed before Jesus dealt with our blindness. Until it was overcome forever.
All who follow Jesus must learn to see the world aright.
First, we have to see that we are sinners. Jesus didn’t just die for all those “other people” over whom we tsk and shake our heads. We too are sinners whose blindness causes us to brag, tear others down, to be unkind, to hoard paper towels, toilet paper, and disinfectant, to think we’re always right and the other guy is always wrong, to covet, steal, take God’s name in vain, gossip, and lie. The cross should open our eyes to our sin. The condition of sin into which each of us is born and which we blindly indulge, is so bad that it required the sinless God of all creation to take on human flesh, becoming the only human being who could offer a pure sacrifice acceptable to God to overcome the power of our sin.
And it’s for blind people like us, prone to look no further than our own interests, desires, and preferences, that Jesus came to die...and rise.
Which brings us back to the road to Emmaus.
Two disciples walk on that road, so blinded by sin and habitual ways of thinking and religion, that they can’t accept the report of the women who had returned from the tomb with news that Jesus was raised from the dead. “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken!” Jesus tells them while they still don’t recognize Him. (Luke 24:25)
It’s at this point that Jesus begins to open their eyes, showing them God’s Law is not meant to be the last word over their lives or their eternities. He shows them from Moses and the Prophets that the Messiah was always meant to do what Jesus did...to die and then to rise.
Jesus points them to the gospel, the good news: God has conquered our sin and our death by dying and rising and all whose eyes are opened to their need of what Jesus accomplished in His death and resurrection and trust in Jesus are no longer lost. God finds us and saves us by His grace in Jesus!
The night is closing in when Jesus and the two disciples come to Emmaus. It will soon be too dark to see and therefore, to travel. They beg Jesus to stay with them.
It’s at a table in Emmaus that it happens.
Jesus breaks the bread and blesses it and starts to give it to them, as He has so many times before, and THEY SEE.
After Jesus reveals Himself to them, their eyes are opened to what Jesus had done--died for the sin of all people and risen so that all who trust in Him can live with God now and always, the darkness outside doesn’t matter to the disciples. Despite the dangers posed by wild animals and highway bandits, they race back to Jerusalem to tell the other disciples that they have seen Jesus, risen. Their eyes are open.
They can testify in the words of John Newton’s hymn, “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found; was blind, but now I see.”
The same is true for you and me. When God’s Law shows us our need of a Savior and His Gospel presents Jesus as that Savior Who saves us by God’s charity--His grace--through faith in Jesus; whenever His Word causes our hearts to burn within us; when we are claimed by God--Father, Son, and Holy Spirit--in the waters of Holy Baptism; and when we see Him again (and we will see Him again!) in the breaking of the bread at Holy Communion, our blindness gives way to seeing God in all His glory, grace, and love.
We move out of the darkness of our cramped, self-serving lives into the bright spaciousness of His kingdom.
We can marvel, revel, and celebrate the reality that the apostle Peter says belongs to all believers in Jesus: “...you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” (1 Peter 2:9)
This week, listen to Jesus’ Word, heed His call to repentance and renewal. He will come to You not only as God the Son Who died for Your sins but also as God the Son Who rose to open Your eyes to see how much He loves you and the new life He gives to you.
Look to Jesus and you will see. And you will believe.
Amen
Overcoming Our Addiction
"The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply..." (Psalm 16:4)
This passage hit me during my quiet time with God today.
The fundamental problem we human beings have is that we have a natural inclination for worshiping false gods. Naturally unwilling to trust in the God revealed in Jesus, the God we can't presently see and can never control, we prefer to bet our lives on other gods. They're everywhere: our own smarts, talent, and strength; our feelings; our families; our countries; money, success, sex, stuff. Even Christians are prone to idol worship when they make of Jesus a demanding dictator who is only placated by our religious acts.
Idolatry is addiction. Whatever our idols are--whatever we devotedly "worship" (i.e., prioritize) for the "blessings" we think they can give us--will, in the end, leave us disappointed, depleted, and dead. Only the living God revealed in Jesus Christ can give us life to the full.
Until we heed Christ's call to turn away from the little gods that make us miserable, we will never be free. And we will know self-inflicted sorrow.
God, set us free of our penchant for idol-worship. Help us to follow Jesus--the Way, and the truth, and the life. Help us to honor You alone as God so that we can live in the joy only You can give, now and always. In Jesus' name, Amen
This passage hit me during my quiet time with God today.
The fundamental problem we human beings have is that we have a natural inclination for worshiping false gods. Naturally unwilling to trust in the God revealed in Jesus, the God we can't presently see and can never control, we prefer to bet our lives on other gods. They're everywhere: our own smarts, talent, and strength; our feelings; our families; our countries; money, success, sex, stuff. Even Christians are prone to idol worship when they make of Jesus a demanding dictator who is only placated by our religious acts.
Idolatry is addiction. Whatever our idols are--whatever we devotedly "worship" (i.e., prioritize) for the "blessings" we think they can give us--will, in the end, leave us disappointed, depleted, and dead. Only the living God revealed in Jesus Christ can give us life to the full.
Until we heed Christ's call to turn away from the little gods that make us miserable, we will never be free. And we will know self-inflicted sorrow.
God, set us free of our penchant for idol-worship. Help us to follow Jesus--the Way, and the truth, and the life. Help us to honor You alone as God so that we can live in the joy only You can give, now and always. In Jesus' name, Amen
Monday, April 27, 2020
Friday, April 24, 2020
Thursday, April 23, 2020
Tonight's Weeknight Study of the Gospel of John, Chapter 18
The actual study begins at 12:08. I was unable to edit it from the video. I had gone on earlier in hopes of including some pictures and links in the comments but was unable to do so.
Wednesday, April 22, 2020
Of Wealth and Foolish Kings
Two passages struck me from today's appointed readings from The One Year Chronological Bible, as I had my daily quiet time with God.
First: Psalm 14:6, where David writes, "...evildoers frustrate the plans of the poor, but the Lord is their refuge."
It reminds me of the parable Jesus tells of a poor man, Lazarus (not to be confused with his friend, Lazarus) and an unnamed rich man in Luke 16:19-31.
The rich man in Jesus' parable had everything he wanted in this world, the false idols of self and money that he craved...and worshiped. He passed poor Lazarus every time he went in or out through the gate of his home, evidently not giving him a second thought. Clearly, Lazarus was thwarted from enacting any plans he might have for improving his life or gaining healing by the care he might have received from the wealthy among whom he lived.
In the course of the parable, Lazarus dies and so does the rich man.
Lazarus, who has trusted in God despite his suffering, is taken by the angels to occupy an honored place next to Abraham, the patriarch of Israel who had believed in God and God's promises even though he couldn't see God.
The rich man, meanwhile, who had lived only for himself, his ambitions, and his desires, is tormented in the fires of Hades.
The rich man, evidently not much changed by the eternal condemnation under which he is living, calls out to ask Abraham to send Lazarus to serve him by giving him water. Abraham says that won't be possible: There is a chasm between God's heaven where those who have, in this lifetime, turned from sin and trusted in the God we now know in Jesus, on the one hand, and the place where those who have turned from God and trusted only in themselves or in the dying things of earth, on the other.
When the rich man finally thinks of someone other than himself, he asks that Lazarus (notice that once again, the rich man wants the beggar to serve his desires) be sent to his brothers to call them to repentance and faith in God so that the brothers won't suffer eternally as he is. The rich man figures that if they see a once-dead man in the flesh, they'll repent for their sin and believe in God. Abraham says that won't be possible either. Jesus, Who, of course, will die and be raised from the dead, says that Abraham tells the rich man, "If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead." (Luke 16:31)
This parable surely underscores what the Psalm teaches. Even if and when evildoers frustrate the plans of the poor, evil need not be the last word over their lives. God promises that all who turn from sin and trust in Christ will be with Him for eternity.
But the parable also indicates that those who spurn the freely offered gift of new life for all who repent and believe in the God revealed in Jesus, face a horrifying, eternal, and permanent prospect of separation from God and the life that only Jesus can give. Meanwhile, those who trust in Jesus, God the Son, will live with God at their sides, both in the imperfections and difficulties of this world and in the eternal perfections of life beyond our own death and resurrections.
Every believer in Jesus will be interested in caring for the poor and building others up as a matter of course. When you know that by God's grace through faith in Christ, you belong to God forever, sharing the blessings God has given to you isn't odious, it's an involuntary act of gratitude for God's goodness given in the crucified and risen Jesus.
2. "Surely I have acted like a fool and have erred greatly." (1 Samuel 26:21)
These are words spoken by Israel's first king, Saul. He has been trying to kill David, the man God clearly has in mind to be Saul's successor. Saul is consumed with murderous jealousy because he understands that while he has become, in an old phrase, "yesterday's man," David is "tomorrow's man."
Saul speaks the words cited above after David had spared Saul's life even though he could have killed the sleeping Saul with the king's own spear.
For a moment, Saul recognizes how foolishly he's acted. Consumed with himself and his desire for glory, he has sought to kill a virtuous man. (David wasn't always virtuous. But that's a story for another time.) More than that, Saul was seeking to thwart the plans of God to make David king. And so, Saul expresses regret for his foolishness and errant ways.
It's refreshing when leaders can say things like, "I'm sorry. I've been foolish. Please forgive me. I take the blame." In this moment of honest repentance and humility, Saul showed more greatness than he had at any other time in his life.
But it wasn't to last. Soon, he would be chasing after David again. Repentance and faith do not come naturally to we human beings; they only happen when, by the power of God's Holy Spirit and the Word of God working on us, we can lay aside our inborn aversion to God and trust in Him.
Father, help me to be a person humble enough to confess my foolishness and to know that having others' respect and esteem isn't important. All that matters is that I trust in You. Help me to do that today. And, God, in our world, grant us leaders who are humble enough to change course when they've gone wrong, who will listen to Your call to repentance, confess their sins, receive the forgiveness available to those who turn to Christ, and trust in You alone. In Jesus' name, I pray, Amen.
[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]
First: Psalm 14:6, where David writes, "...evildoers frustrate the plans of the poor, but the Lord is their refuge."
It reminds me of the parable Jesus tells of a poor man, Lazarus (not to be confused with his friend, Lazarus) and an unnamed rich man in Luke 16:19-31.
The rich man in Jesus' parable had everything he wanted in this world, the false idols of self and money that he craved...and worshiped. He passed poor Lazarus every time he went in or out through the gate of his home, evidently not giving him a second thought. Clearly, Lazarus was thwarted from enacting any plans he might have for improving his life or gaining healing by the care he might have received from the wealthy among whom he lived.
In the course of the parable, Lazarus dies and so does the rich man.
Lazarus, who has trusted in God despite his suffering, is taken by the angels to occupy an honored place next to Abraham, the patriarch of Israel who had believed in God and God's promises even though he couldn't see God.
The rich man, meanwhile, who had lived only for himself, his ambitions, and his desires, is tormented in the fires of Hades.
The rich man, evidently not much changed by the eternal condemnation under which he is living, calls out to ask Abraham to send Lazarus to serve him by giving him water. Abraham says that won't be possible: There is a chasm between God's heaven where those who have, in this lifetime, turned from sin and trusted in the God we now know in Jesus, on the one hand, and the place where those who have turned from God and trusted only in themselves or in the dying things of earth, on the other.
When the rich man finally thinks of someone other than himself, he asks that Lazarus (notice that once again, the rich man wants the beggar to serve his desires) be sent to his brothers to call them to repentance and faith in God so that the brothers won't suffer eternally as he is. The rich man figures that if they see a once-dead man in the flesh, they'll repent for their sin and believe in God. Abraham says that won't be possible either. Jesus, Who, of course, will die and be raised from the dead, says that Abraham tells the rich man, "If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead." (Luke 16:31)
This parable surely underscores what the Psalm teaches. Even if and when evildoers frustrate the plans of the poor, evil need not be the last word over their lives. God promises that all who turn from sin and trust in Christ will be with Him for eternity.
But the parable also indicates that those who spurn the freely offered gift of new life for all who repent and believe in the God revealed in Jesus, face a horrifying, eternal, and permanent prospect of separation from God and the life that only Jesus can give. Meanwhile, those who trust in Jesus, God the Son, will live with God at their sides, both in the imperfections and difficulties of this world and in the eternal perfections of life beyond our own death and resurrections.
Every believer in Jesus will be interested in caring for the poor and building others up as a matter of course. When you know that by God's grace through faith in Christ, you belong to God forever, sharing the blessings God has given to you isn't odious, it's an involuntary act of gratitude for God's goodness given in the crucified and risen Jesus.
2. "Surely I have acted like a fool and have erred greatly." (1 Samuel 26:21)
These are words spoken by Israel's first king, Saul. He has been trying to kill David, the man God clearly has in mind to be Saul's successor. Saul is consumed with murderous jealousy because he understands that while he has become, in an old phrase, "yesterday's man," David is "tomorrow's man."
Saul speaks the words cited above after David had spared Saul's life even though he could have killed the sleeping Saul with the king's own spear.
For a moment, Saul recognizes how foolishly he's acted. Consumed with himself and his desire for glory, he has sought to kill a virtuous man. (David wasn't always virtuous. But that's a story for another time.) More than that, Saul was seeking to thwart the plans of God to make David king. And so, Saul expresses regret for his foolishness and errant ways.
It's refreshing when leaders can say things like, "I'm sorry. I've been foolish. Please forgive me. I take the blame." In this moment of honest repentance and humility, Saul showed more greatness than he had at any other time in his life.
But it wasn't to last. Soon, he would be chasing after David again. Repentance and faith do not come naturally to we human beings; they only happen when, by the power of God's Holy Spirit and the Word of God working on us, we can lay aside our inborn aversion to God and trust in Him.
Father, help me to be a person humble enough to confess my foolishness and to know that having others' respect and esteem isn't important. All that matters is that I trust in You. Help me to do that today. And, God, in our world, grant us leaders who are humble enough to change course when they've gone wrong, who will listen to Your call to repentance, confess their sins, receive the forgiveness available to those who turn to Christ, and trust in You alone. In Jesus' name, I pray, Amen.
[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]
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