"To Him be glory forever": 2019

Saturday, December 21, 2019

Tragedy, Grief and Glory

In the past week I saw two very tragic stories in the news. They were stories that were similar in that they were both were Christian families who had suddenly been faced with the death of a child. They were different in the way that each family acted in the aftermath of that death.

One story involved a family in Redding, CA where a two year-old died. This family belong to the Bethel movement and my understanding of the basic response of the family and the church was to pray that God would resurrect the child. They thought that resurrection was not only possible, but likely, based on their particular understanding of the Bible. They prayed for resurrection for about five days before coming to the conclusion that resurrection would not happen. You may have heard about this. I saw a number of articles on this over the period of several days. I'll confess that I do not really understand Bethel theology. Here is a link to one story and if you are interested you can easily find others.

The second story concerned a family whose son died at the age of 15. He was born 10 weeks premature and had serious kidney issues since birth. He also had respiratory illness and 2 years ago had fungal meningitis. You can read his story here. What stood out to me as a I read this story was the trust that this family had in God, trusting so far as to believe that their son lived neither one day too few, nor one day too many. In Psalm 139:16 it says,

"Your eyes saw my unformed substance;

in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them."

They believed these words and trusted in the God who gave them.

I would be hard put to think of anything more tragic than to lose a child. Since coming to the reservation I have done a number of funerals for children and those deaths hit the families very hard. And I stand at those funerals understanding a bit of what those families are going through, as five years ago we lost a two year-old granddaughter. There was an accident at home and by the time 911 was called it was already too late.

Those deaths are tragic, and we grieve them, as we should. But the Christian does not grieve without hope. Paul writes to the church at Corinth,

"If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied."

His point it that if, as Christians, we are only hoping for the things of this world, we have our sights set far too low. He goes so far as to say we should be pitied, given that we have a glorious Savior and yet only long for the things of earth, and not the fulfillment of the promises of his return, when all things will be set right and we will see him in his full glory.

We are just a few days from Christmas, when Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus. His birth is indeed a wonderful thing but it not the high point of the story by any stretch of the imagination. He died, was resurrected, and then ascended to the right hand of the Father.. The high point is yet to come, when he returns in glory.

You may be approaching this Christmas with a heavy heart, having suffered tragic loss this year. Or you may be carrying grief from something that happened many years ago. But tragedy and grief are not the end of the story. The story ends in glory, glory that the Bible promises will be made very real to every person having trust in Jesus. Amen.

Wednesday, December 18, 2019

What Lies Ahead?

For the past two years, as we put the boys to bed, Robin and I have taken turns staying with them for a short while after the lights have been turned off. The boys call this "rocking" although in order to make space for their furniture we had to move the rocking chair out of the room. Our goal has been to help them settle down and get to sleep. Being 4 and 6 year-old boys this can occasionally be a challenging task! Sometimes they sit on our lap, sometimes we sing a song or two. Sometimes we talk quietly about what has happened in the day that made them sad or glad. And sometimes they just drop right off to sleep.

The other night it was my turn and shortly after the lights went out the youngest asked if he could sit on my lap. I was sitting in a chair near the bed and told him to come on over. He climbed up, with a stuffed animal in his hand, and just sat there as I gently swayed to one side and the other. As he sat, I silently prayed over him.

After praying I started to think a bit. I'm 58 years older than he is. What will the world be like for him 58 years from now? That will be the year 2077. What kinds of things will he have done? What kind of person will he be? Who will be the people who are his family? His friends?

Those are questions for which the answers, at this point, are beyond my imagination. Briefly I thought back 58 years in my own life. I know much about the circumstances of my own family in 1961 but I have exactly zero memories of my life at the age of four. So then I jumped to 1977, one century earlier from that future point in Junior's life. In December, 1977, I was 20 years-old, in the US Navy, on my second deployment, spending my second Christmas overseas. But even from that reference point in my life one wouldn’t be able to predict today's answers to those same questions of me: What kinds of things will he have done? What kind of person will he be? Who will be the people who are his family? His friends?

One thing I do know is that the God whom I prayed to as I held Junior on my lap, the God who holds all things in his hands, will still be on his throne, still holding all things, still keeping every promise that he has ever made. He will be doing it 58 years from now, just as he was doing it 58 years ago, just as he has done since the moment of creation.

What lies ahead? Truly, only God knows. Whatever else may happen over the course of Junior's life, I pray that he will come to know God, through his son, Jesus. I pray that he will know and love Jesus, deeply and dearly, as his Savior and Lord.

All of our children are learning something of the language of faith as they grow up in a Christian home. And I pray that however their lives' may unfold that one day the Lord will give each of them the precious gift of faith in himself.

Saturday, December 14, 2019

Longing For The End

For the past 18 months or so I have been working my way through a series of books, Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation. There are four volumes in the series, each volume being in the 700-800 page range, and as of this morning I have less than 200 pages to go in volume four. The title may not sound very exciting to the average Christian but I have found it to be a fascinating experience, reading the various statements of faith within the Reformed tradition that were brought forth through the first two centuries of the Reformation.

It has been an interesting reading project but as is my habit in such a project, I am getting anxious to finish as the end draws near. I've got the next book on tap and I look forward to beginning it. I am longing for the end of this reading project. It is a longing I seem to sense with just about any book or reading project I am involved with as the end approaches.

My bible reading plan brought me into Revelation this week. So far I've read from the beginning through chapter 11. There are many symbolic and confusing parts to the last book of the bible, but one thing that we glimpse along the way, and is made clear in its final chapters, is the glorious ending God will one day bring to this world he has created and the people who have lived in it who have had faith in his son, Jesus. Part of the glory is the setting right of all the things that, right now, are not as they should be because of the presence of sin. In Genesis 3 we read of the sin of Adam and Eve, a first sin that has had terrible consequences. Some of these consequences we can see fairly easily and others reveal themselves over time, often tragically so.

Right now Robin has a dear friend suffering from the what is, at root, the downstream consequences of that first sin. Her ordinary state of health has virtually disappeared, without warning. One day everything was as it always was and two days later there are no guarantees as to how things will turn out. Not only is Robin's friend suffering, but also her family and friends.

Robin's friend is a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. She has faith in Jesus and while everything else about her situation may be uncertain one thing that she can trust is the faithfulness of her Savior. He holds her and will never let her go. He holds her and nothing will ever take her from his hand. Don't take my word for it. God put those promises in his word, in Romans 8 and John 10.

Thinking about Robin's friend brings up in me a longing for the end. Not a longing that I have to finish a reading project, or a longing for Robin's friend's illness to resolve, but a longing for that day when God will bring all things together and draw all his children to his very presence, where they will worship and enjoy that presence forever. Amen.

Monday, December 2, 2019

Coincidence Or Providence?

I took a bag out to the trash this morning and found that all our trash cans were full. All five. Three of the 55 gallon variety, with their lids off, and two others, slightly smaller and never having lids since we moved here. It was curious. We left town a week ago Sunday and our trash usually gets picked up Tuesday and Friday. Where did all this trash come from while we were out of town? Then I remembered that the church gym had been rented twice while we were away. The groups usually take away their own trash but one of them must have left theirs in our cans instead. Recently the transfer station closed their 24 hour access and so I can understand why the choice between leaving the trash in the back of a pickup overnight, easy picking for crows and loose dogs, and leaving it in the cage and cans at church would be a no-brainer.

When I saw how full the cans were and thought about our garbage pickup being at least a day away, given that the garbage crews would have more to pickup after a holiday weekend, I figured that the best thing to do would be to load the garbage in the Pastormobile and take it to the transfer station myself. An hour or so later, when I knew the post office would be open and I could pick up the package waiting for us there, I got out the Pastormobile and loaded the garbage.

Picking up garbage in Dulce is an old-school process. Most of the work is done by crews of 2-4 people, driving a crew cab pickup that has been modified with a cage on the back. The crew gets out of the truck, picks the bags up from the cans, heaves then over the top of the cage, and then moves on to the next house. They have a hard and dirty job, and so I try not to make the bags too heavy. As I loaded the Pastormobile some of the bags were very heavy. Because of all the absent lids and the recent snow a number of bags were also frozen to the cans and to each other. I was glad to have a pair of work gloves in the Pastormobile as I got things loose and loaded. Then it was off to the transfer station.

Drove to the main building and backed into the bay with a chute down to a waiting dumpster. Got out of the car to sign-in and a man came out to help me unload. It was a man I haven’t seen for quite a while, the better part of a year, but someone I had been hoping to run into. Late this summer he had called the house several times, leaving me a message and asking for a call back to his number. Unfortunately I neither had his number, nor does our phone give numbers on incoming calls. Once I asked a husband and wife if they knew where I might find him. Their response was along the lines of "We don’t run with that kind of crowd."

The man and I talked briefly, including his saying that "I need to get my life turned around." I know parts of his story and those words were music to my ears. He asked how long I was planning to stay as the pastor in Dulce. That was a surprise, as we met shortly after arriving in Dulce in 2013. I told him I'm not planning to go anywhere in the next year. He also said he'd be in church this coming Sunday. I hear that a lot, often without follow through. But I know that God acts powerfully in single moments, and perhaps this coming Sunday will be one of those moments.

Or perhaps this morning was one of those moments. I could look at the various things I wrote about my morning and how they brought me face-to-face with a friend who needed some encouragement, and chalk it all up to coincidence. Nothing more than a series of random events coming together in one event that from my point-of-view seemed to have meaning.

But coincidence denies the existence and work in the world of an active and personal God. Coincidence is how the god Baal works as his prophets have their showdown with Elijah in 1 Kings 18. Yeah, he's a god, but he isn't always available, or very interested, in what is going on down on earth, even among the people who worship him.

The God of the Bible is a God of providence. He know all things and has a purpose for all things. He coordinates even minor details, even unlikely events, to serve his purposes. He reveals his purposes on his timing. His eye is never off of those children who love him, even when they are doing things that are against the very faith they profess. The God of providence is the God Elijah worships, and Elijah sees him coming through, again and again and again.

The God of providence is the God of the Old and New Testaments, the God who has drawn me to himself and the God whom I pray is at work in my friend's life. May you see him working in your life, especially in those seemingly random, seemingly coincidental moments. When it comes to God, there are no coincidences.

Friday, November 22, 2019

Why Should We Go To Church?

At 11 AM every Sunday morning people gather in our building, the Jicarilla Apache Reformed Church. Some people are present nearly every Sunday. Some are present perhaps half the time and some are very irregular in their attendance. Some people have a deep and powerful faith. They have leaned on God through hard times in their lives and know that it was Lord that carried them through. For others faith in Jesus is something that shapes who they are but they find the struggle to live by that faith each day to be a challenge. And there may be others who come on Sunday but just aren’t sure what to make of this Jesus guy they keep hearing about.

We call this gathering worship. We gather to give praise to God. To praise him for who he is, and for what he has done, looking forward to the fulfillment of the promises that he makes in the Bible. As a pastor I think those are some pretty good reasons to gather on Sunday morning, but are there any others? What other answers would we give to the question: "Why should I go to church?"

I was reading the Old Testament prophet Micah when I came across an excellent answer to that question. Like most of the Old Testament prophets Micah is speaking on behalf of God to a people who are not particularly interested in what he has to say. There are words of warning, but also glimpses of hope. In Micah 4 the prophet looks forward to a day when the house of the Lord will be established and people will come to it. In verse 2 he says:

"Come, let us go to up the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob,

that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths."

Micah gives two reason to go to church; 1) That we might be taught God's ways, and 2) That we might walk in God's paths. These two things go hand-in-hand. They are both necessary, and they are given in the right order. We learn God's ways so that we can walk in God's ways..

We live in a time when we are bombarded with information. From nearly every direction there is a voice telling us to embrace a particular truth and live a particular way. Some of those voices are speaking with God's truth, but many are not. As God's people we can, and should, open up our Bibles and read them on our own. We also can, and should, live as people of prayer, seeking for God to encourage and guide us each day. But one of the blessings of gathering each Sunday morning is moving from living as individual followers of Jesus to spending time learning God's ways together.

What was true for Micah is also true for us. God's people were coming together, to learn from God, and then to live in ways that showed the world that they were God's people. And that remains a very good reason for us to come to church each Sunday. The world can be a very confusing place but each Sunday as we sing, pray and hear from God's word we learn his ways, so that we may walk with confidence on his paths, to his praise glory.

Thursday, November 21, 2019

The Place Of Refuge

Yesterday I preached the funeral for the nephew of a friend of mine here in Dulce. I knew quite a few people from the man's extended family, but I don’t know if I had ever actually met the man or not. In the past day I find myself coming back, over and over, to the central verse of the passage I preached from, Psalm 36,

verse 7:

"How precious is your steadfast love, O God!

The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings."

God's steadfast love. A love that He sets on people and doesn't remove. It is there by His choice, regardless subsequent choices and actions of the one He has chosen to love. The love of a parent for a child has a similar nature, as we love our children when they often moments, or even seasons of their lives, where they are often so unlovable. The similarity stops when we recall that God's love is rooted in His own nature, which has infinitely more patience for the wandering and rebellious actions of His children than I do for mine.

The author of the psalm, David, is a man who's life has had quite a lot of trouble. Sometimes he's been a victim and other times his troubles are entirely self-induced. Either way, he needs refuge. He needs shelter. A place of safety, where he can catch his breath, sort out what is going on, and figure out what to do next. He needs refuge and he knows exactly where to find it. The steadfast love of God.

We have moments, days, even seasons, where the circumstances of our lives cause us to seek refuge. The refuge that David seeks has been made fully known to us in the person of Jesus. Ultimately, whether David realizes it or not, Jesus is the One who gives him refuge. And Jesus is the one, the only one, who can truly be our refuge too.

If today is a day where you need refuge, turn to Jesus. If you seek Him you will find Him. And in His arms you'll have peace, protection, comfort and guidance. Amen.

Sunday, November 17, 2019

The Solid Rock

Sunday evening. Nearly

11 PM, and for the last two hours I've been the only one up. Today was full, with worship and all the related things that I do in preparation each Sunday morning. Then a short meeting, followed by a Thanksgiving potluck with two other local congregations. Then working on the things I usually do each Sunday afternoon, in preparation for next Sunday. Robin has been ailing a bit and so I canceled our Sunday evening ministry so I could stay home to watch the kids. Someone stopped at house and needed a ride. And lastly a phone call from someone who needed to talk and be prayed for.

All that made today a bit more hectic than the average Sunday, but it's been a bit of a hectic week. Last Monday I was hoping to blog on Thursday, when the most important tasks of the week would be finished. Tuesday brought the news of a very unexpected death in our community, and so my priorities for the week changed. Still, by late Thursday I thought I might have both time and inspiration to write. But something else came up that was a higher priority. Friday brought another event that wasn't part of the plan, but needed urgent attention. Saturday was filled with the funeral and related activities. We worshipped the Lord and remembered a man who was loved deeply within this community. After that it was time to just spend a quiet evening with our family.

As I sit here I have a song that keeps passing through my mind. I chose it last week Sunday as our closing song for worship today. A bit earlier this evening I played it for Robin, who wasn't able to attend church this morning. It goes by more than one name, either "My Hope is Built," which are the opening words, or "The Solid Rock," which is from the chorus. Here is the first verse and the chorus:

"My hope is built on nothing less

than Jesus' blood and righteousness.

I dare not trust the sweetest frame,

but wholly lean on Jesus' name.

On Christ the solid rock I stand,

all other ground is sinking sand;
all other ground is sinking sand."

Having picked it last Sunday it has actually been on my mind off-and-on all week, and as the week has gone by the truth of that verse and chorus has been clearly evident. My hope, and the hope that I attempt to proclaim week-by-week from the pulpit, is built on Christ, and only Christ. He, and he alone, is the solid place for me to stand.

And those things aren’t just true for me and the week I've had, or the week that is to come, but they are true for you too. If your hope is built on anything else, if you are standing on anything else than faith in Christ, you are building and standing on something that is flawed and that will fail. The faults or flaws may not be evident today, but one day they will be clearly seen.

Faith in Christ doesn't make everything in our lives perfect. Not by any means. But it is a firm, and unfailing foundation when things seem as if they are spiraling out of control. This week it has been my privilege as a pastor to open my Bible and pray with people. I don’t have answers as to why certain things happen, but I do know whom to trust in as those events unfold.

"On Christ the solid rock I stand,
all other ground is sinking sand"

May Christ be the solid rock where you stand too. Amen.

Sunday, November 10, 2019

More Than A Story

Recently I got a call from a friend I haven't heard from for nearly 40 years. We served together in the Navy and through technology that virtually no one could have imagined in 1979, the Facebook phone call, he called me up.

My friend was working on some issues in his life and had come to the conclusion that perhaps he should read the Bible. The idea may have been suggested to him by someone else. He didn’t know where to start, but he did know that I had become a pastor, and so he gave me a ring to see what he should do.

Just hearing from him was a surprise, and I wasn't sure what kind of guidance to give him. I'm a pastor, but not his pastor. If it was someone from my congregation, or maybe someone who I was talking with in my office, I could sort things out a bit before giving him some guidance. I might have some understanding and insight as to where to begin. But…those luxuries were not mine at the time. I took what seemed to be the best route and said, "Read the gospels."

A few days later I got a message. "What gospels? My Bible doesn't have any gospels."

That caught me by surprise, but also let me know that I was assuming too much. My suggestion to "read the gospels" assumed that he would know what I was talking about. It assumed that he already had a basic understanding of the organization of the Bible. So here is the basic message I sent back:

"The first four books of the New Testament are the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. In a nutshell they are the story of Jesus, each told from a different point of view. They have some things in common, and also some differences. Maybe start with reading John. John begins by basically stating that Jesus, the man who lived on earth, was also God, no ifs ands or buts. And that sets the tone for the way he would have us read the story of Jesus' life, as he tells it. His goal is that his readers would come to believe in Jesus as their savior when they get to the end of the story. John wants his readers to see their problem with God being one of living as sinners in the presence of a holy God, a God who in his mercy offers them his son, Jesus, as the only possible remedy for dealing with their sin and coming into a relationship with God. That may sound a bit preachy, but I want you to know what you are getting into as you read."

In answering my friend I was mindful of the fact that the gospels are stories, but they are much more than stories, for they have a purpose that is greater than any other story that might come to your mind. John says it himself this way,

"Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name." John 20:30-31

The gospels are more than stories, for the story they tell is the only one that leads us into a relationship with God. No ifs, ands or buts.

Sunday, November 3, 2019

Closer Than Brothers And Sisters

Last week I preached a funeral for someone I knew here in Dulce. Over the past six years I've met a lot of people. Some I know very casually, in that their face is familiar and I may know their name and perhaps something else about them. On the other end of the spectrum are people I know very well. I have spent lots of time with them, know many of the things they have struggled with in life, and I've prayed with them. I would say that there is a large group of people who fall in between casual and close, and that this friend was of that middle group.

The scripture I preached from was Philippians 2:5-11, where Paul praises Jesus and says this in verses 10-11:

"…so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

There are a number of powerful things in that entire Philippians passage that I brought out as I preached, but there is one in particular that I want to focus on today.

As Paul looks forward to this glorious moment on a glorious day, there are no distinctions among believers in the Lord Jesus. Brand new believers, people who have believed for decades, people who believed and yet also wandered far and long into sin, and believers for whom repentance was a regular part of practicing their faith - all of them will be joined together and enthusiastically praising Jesus. Gladly bending their knee, in humility before their Savior. Gladly lifting their voice, in enthusiastic praise of their Lord.

On that great and glorious day I'll see my friend again, and on that day our relationship will be closer than brothers. Because on that day what will bring us together will not be our relationship with each other here on earth, but our shared place as children of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And that closeness, as brothers, in the best sense of the term, will be present among all believers in Jesus. Women, men, people who we knew in this life and people who we won’t meet until we get to heaven. Sisters and brothers in Christ. All gathered together, praising Jesus. It's going to be great!

Saturday, October 26, 2019

Streams of Tears

Christians rightfully say that "We live in a fallen world." I find myself saying, or thinking, that thought frequently, particularly as I hear about some of the troubles in the world and as I hear of tragedies here on the reservation. Over and over, every day, we are confronted with evidence that the world created by God in the opening verses of Genesis 1 has been corrupted by the sin that reared its ugly head in Genesis 3. I was reminded of this as I was reading Psalm 119, where verse 136 says:

"My eyes shed streams of tears, because people do not keep your law."

The author of the psalm knew that same truth we do, that the world is full of brokenness and things that just aren't right, so much so in his case that he is frequently moved to tears. He also knew the underlying reason, and in doing so he points us towards the right path. The tears come as a direct consequence of people knowing God's law, and choosing to live with disregard for it.

We might ask "What is God's law?" and the companion question "Is God's law still valid today?"

The first question has two answers, the first being the moral law recorded in the Ten Commandments and the second answer being the words Jesus spoke in Mark 12:30-31:

"And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. The second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

Both of those pieces of scripture do the same thing. They speak to how we should live in relationship towards God, and they speak to how we should live with each other.

And to the question of the validity of the law today I'll be brief and say "Oh yeah." Jesus tells us this himself in Matthew 24:35 and Luke 21:33, and even if he hadn't we can see that the things he talks about in the verses from Mark just make sense. Kind of like some wisdom your mother may have spoken to you years ago, something that sticks in your head and has always been right.

Now that we understand the problem, what are we to do? It’s a big problem and when it comes to keeping God's law the psalmist was speaking to God's people, a small and distinct group, and in our day the streams of tears include the fact that throughout the world people fail to keep his law, that is if they even know it in the first place. And in addition to that we know, often too well, the impossible nature of perfectly keeping God's law. What are we to do?

As a pastor I'm going to say that we look to the Lord and seek for him to guide our steps. Each time that we are tempted to take a side path we can turn to him for the strength to stay on course. And in those times we do wander, we should seek his forgiveness when we turn back to him for guidance. And don't try to do it all on your own but seek out another Christian who will be by your side for prayer and encouragement.

It's a fallen world but we can live and pray in such ways that one day, through God's grace, streams of tears will be turned into dry creek beds.

Wednesday, October 2, 2019

Careful Listening

This morning I went for a run on a road that I have a love/hate relationship with. I love that it is quiet, usually with light traffic for the first mile as it goes west of town, and then hardly any traffic as it reaches my turn-around 4½ miles from home. I hate that it is all downhill outbound and therefore all uphill on the way back. I'm the kind of runner whose preference is to get the hard parts of the run done early.

It is a beautiful piece of road, winding through a canyon. It follows a creek, hence its uphill/downhill nature. When the railroad was still in Dulce the tracks ran through the canyon, and at the bottom, where the creek joins the river and I turn around, there is still a water tank and railroad bridge.

I mentioned that the traffic is usually light, and this morning was no exception. Once I was past the edge of town the only vehicles I saw were dump trucks. I saw several, going downhill empty and coming back up filled with dirt.

My rule-of-thumb here for heavy trucks when they are on the same side of the road as I am is to move all the way off the shoulder. If there is a guard rail I stop and sit on it until the truck goes by. The truck drivers have enough things to pay attention to without having to worry about a possible collision with a runner. And a runner vs. dump truck incident never works out well for the runner. The trucks this morning were all from the Tribal Roads department and their drivers are very considerate when they see me. They always move way over and give me space, slowing down if need be.

So this morning I was enjoying the quiet when I heard a rumble behind me. It got a little louder as it got closer. No problem, as I was going downhill facing traffic and it would come from behind in the far lane as it went past.

It got a little louder, and then I realized it wasn't behind me but in front of me. Quickly looking ahead I saw a truck rounding the bend, and the driver saw me. We both opted for safety. I stopped on the guard rail as the truck moved to the far lane.

The presence of the truck itself didn’t surprise me, as I had already seen several. But I had been deceived by the sound bouncing off the canyon walls. I thought that it was coming from one direction, and acted accordingly, when the exact opposite was true.

As Christians we need to be careful listeners to the voices of our culture. They are many. They are often loud. They often sound so reasonable. But very often they will lead us astray from God's truth.

The remedy to this is to turn to the word that God has revealed to us in the Bible. To read it. To pray it. To ponder it. To live by it. The author of Psalm 119 says this in verses 129-130:

"Your testimonies are wonderful;
therefore my soul keeps them.
The unfolding of your words gives light;
it imparts understanding to the simple."

Those are just two verses in a long and beautiful song of praise to God, a psalm that, over and over, thanks and praises God for the gift of his word. May you carefully listen to that word as God uses it in your life each and every day.

Thursday, September 26, 2019

The More Things Change…

The more things change, the more they remain the same.

That saying came to mind this afternoon as I was reading the author's introduction to a book which, after a number of years of sitting on the shelf, I am beginning to read. He wrote these words:

"Without "absolutes" revealed from without by God Himself, we are left rudderless in a sea of conflicting ideas about manners, justice and right and wrong, issuing from a multitude of self-opinionated thinkers."

Say what? We either receive and live by God's revelation, or drift along on whatever whim is competing for our attention and driving the culture. Everything expressed in that quote would apply to our time, and yet they are the words of John Owen, an English pastor and theologian of the 17th century.

Here I was thinking that much of what is happening culturally, morally and ethically in our day was largely a product of ever faster forms of communication and methods to widely share one's opinion. Things like Twitter, Facebook and the internet, the last two of which I am using in sharing this blog post.

But Owen proves me wrong. Before "modern communication," be it the internet, television, radio, telephones, the telegraph, Pony Express, or what have you, and before any " influential thinker" you can name from the past 300+ years, the same malady was present then as today. Individual people and cultures could ground themselves in what God has revealed through the Bible, or in something else. Anything else. Everything else.

Owen declares, rightly I believe, that the Bible's position on all matters of right-and-wrong was fixed, while in comparison whatever else was used would be perpetually subject to change. Owen writes in the 17th century, but the problem he speaks to has been present throughout human history.

Three pages later in his introduction Owen says:

"The fallen nature of the human mind, to its very great detriment, is so disposed that it will trust other fallen men rather than turn in helplessness to Him whose aid and succor they ought to seek for all things."

Boom! The problem, then and now, was a natural seeking of anything but God. And the answer, then and now, is to turn to what God freely reveals, of himself and how we should live, in the Bible.

Our need is great, and in his mercy God freely meets that need. In Matthew 11:28-30 Jesus says:

"Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

Our world may be changing, but God's grace remains the same. "Come to me…" is the beginning. Yield to Jesus and he will work out the details. Amen.

Thursday, September 19, 2019

Nothing Is Perfect…

"Nothing is perfect." I heard Robin speak those words to one of the kids early in our recent vacation. We were on the road, on our first day, and something had happened which in the child's view wasn't quite right. I have no idea today what it was and I agree with the words Robin spoke at the time, with one exception.

As Robin spoke some wheels spun inside my head, bringing up this phrase from somewhere in the Bible: "The word of the Lord is perfect." Turns out the among the many imperfect things is my memory, because what the first phrase of Psalm 19:7 actually says is this:

"The law of the Lord is perfect"

I believe that the law that David had in mind as he wrote this psalm was God's moral law, or what God has declared to be right-and-wrong, from his point-of-view, which in the Old Testament is best summarized in the Ten Commandments.

The Ten Commandments. You shall not this. You shall not that. On and on. Boring. Not relevant today. We are more advanced than those folks were.

Or so many people today might have us believe. And not just today. The Bible shows the Ten Commandments being broken almost as soon as they had been given.

The truth is God's law teaches us how to live with God and how to live with other people. It teaches us from God's point-of-view, in God's own words. It is a teaching that is timeless.

The greater storyline of the Bible would also show us that there was no single person besides Jesus who perfectly kept God's perfect law. Not Adam. Not Moses. Not David. Not Daniel. Not John the Baptist. Not Peter. Not Paul. Nor any of the many other lesser characters in the Bible's pages that we would rightly look towards as heroes of the faith.

But the fact that Jesus kept the law perfectly is exactly what we need, for when we look to him and believe that he is our Savior, our sin is removed and God sees us as if we had kept the law, even though the truth is that we still break it each day.

The law of God still has a purpose for Christians. Not to condemn us as sinners, but to show us the great love of our Savior in keeping it on our behalf. God's perfect law stands before us, inviting us to do our best in keeping it each day, not to earn God's favor, but in gratitude for what Christ has done for us.

The imperfections of my daily life are many. The picture shows one example, where I recently tried to close the hood of our van without moving the arm the held it open.

God's law is perfect, as was the work done by Jesus in keeping it on my behalf. Not only is God's law perfect, but so is the love of Jesus for all of those who have faith in him. May you live today resting in the law that he kept for you.

Tuesday, August 27, 2019

Changes

Six years ago today was our first full day of living in Dulce. My, how things have changed for us since then! Some of those changes are evident in the two pictures. One, of Kat on her bike, the day after we arrived. The other, of our family this past Sunday. Robin takes a family picture in front of church on the first Sunday of September. She took it a week early this year, because we are going to be on vacation. As you can see, not only has Kat grown in six years, but also our family, as we've added Xander and Junior. Nearly two years ago we took the boys in for foster care and recently we were named their permanent guardians. We expected Kat to grow over time but we never expected our family to grow in Dulce as well.

Life is full of many changes, some of which we can anticipate. We can see things coming down the road and plan for them. Other changes catch us by surprise. Sometimes they are pleasant and sometimes they are most unwelcome, to say the least. Changes can come along that leave us gasping for air, or barely hanging on by the tips of our fingers.

God's word never changes. God tells us that himself in Isaiah 40:8.

"The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever."

And that reminder helps us to trust in God's promises, which being based in his word, also do not change. There are quite a few of them but I'm just going to mention one today that comes to mind, one that I am particularly fond of.

In Romans 8: 38-39 Paul ends a powerful personal testimony with these words:

"For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."

I have no ideas the changes that will take place in myself or my family over the next six years, or even the next week. But I do know that whatever they may be, for good or for ill, they will not separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus, my Savior and Lord.

And when you have faith in Jesus, that is your promise too. Don't take my word for it, but trust the word of God as he speaks those words to you. Amen.

Sunday, August 25, 2019

Peace, For All Who Want It

When I worked in health care I had a patient who was a member of the Saudi royal family. One day he gave several of us his business card, which had the symbol of the Saudi Arabia on it. It was a palm tree, above a pair of crossed swords. He told us the palm tree symbolized, "Peace, for all who want it." We asked about the swords. The answer was less direct, along the lines of, "The other thing…" The idea, as I recall, was that the nation of Saudi Arabia would live in peace with anyone, but if someone did not want peace with them then they would deal with them directly as their enemy.

That memory came to mind as I was reading Romans 5, where in verse 1 Paul says:

"Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ."

According to my patient, peace is the default position of anyone in relation to Saudi Arabia. That is also what we might often assume to be God's default towards people. If, first and foremost, "God is love" then God is a God who is naturally at peace with all peoples of the world. But what Paul points to in that one verse of Romans is that God's "natural" position towards humans is not peace but something quite different.

God certainly is love, but that is not the end of the story. God is many other things as well, such as good, and wise, and strong, and knowledgeable, and just, and merciful, and righteous. All of the characteristics that we might think of to describe God are all present all of the time, and they are all perfect in every way. Which is another way of saying that God is holy.

And the thing that from our side shapes the nature of our relationship with God is our sin. God has given his perfect law, and our default position is to break it continually. As sinners our place before a holy God is not one of peace, but of something far, far different, unless…

Unless we take the path that Paul points his readers towards, the path of peace with God through faith in Jesus Christ.

Jesus is the one, sent by God, to make right the terrible wrong that happened in the Garden as Adam and Eve committed the first sin. That sin broke the easy fellowship of humans with God, and faith in Jesus and what he accomplished in his death and resurrection is the only path of restoration. That’s what it means to be declared justified. By faith in Jesus our sin has been removed, every bit of it, so that we stand before God cleansed from it. Justification, by faith in Jesus alone, is the path to true and lasting peace with God.

Peace with God is an amazing and wonderful thing. It is a precious treasure, and one of the most wonderful things about it is that we can receive as a free gift of God when we have faith in Jesus as our savior.

May this be the peace that you live in each day, the peace that you can enjoy from now on and forevermore.

Tuesday, August 13, 2019

Speed Bump

Have you ever driven on a section of road that had speed bump built into it? If you see a warning sign, or the bump itself ahead of time, then you slow down a bit and hardly take notice of it. But if there is no sign, or you are looking some other direction and don't see the bump, or perhaps just don't care, and you hit the bump at full speed or faster, you are instantly very aware of its presence. The purpose of the bump is to make you moderate your speed. That may or may not happen but you can’t deny that it showed itself to be there in the middle of the road.

All people hit a variety of bumps as they go through life. Big bumps, that perhaps result in serious damage to our lives. Or little bumps that gain our attention for the briefest period of time. And lots of varieties of bumps between those to ranges.

There are no religious exemptions to the bumps of life. People who love and worship Jesus hit bumps. People who bow down to anything else as their god hit bumps. People who deny and/or disbelieve in the existence of God hit bumps. Everyone hits them at times throughout their life. But the difference is in how we respond when they happen.

This afternoon I was reading something written by Wilhelmus 'a Brakel who said this about the bumps of the Hebrews as they traveled from slavery in Egypt to the land that God had promised would be theirs:

"However, the least mishap caused them to distrust the Lord and to murmur."

Set free from slavery by God himself, and witnesses to repeated miracles that God did to save and guide his people. And yet, repeatedly, they murmured against God the moment things took a wrong turn, from their point-of-view. You can read the story yourself as you read through Exodus.

The very next sentence 'a Brakel writes tells of God's attitude toward the Hebrews, in the presence of their murmuring against him:

"Nevertheless, the Lord helped them."

The bump never changed the direction of the road they were traveling on. From God's point-of-view the bump was designed to lead them to trust in God's care, rather than to question it.

One of the great blessings of living on this side of history, after the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus, is that we see the promises of God to his people with greater clarity. Same God. Same promise to be the God of his people. But the promises being written in such a way that there can be no mistake as to what they mean, like this one from Romans 8:35-39,

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written,

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."

We all hit bumps in life. Some that are barely noticeable. Some that are bone-jarring, and worse. But the promise of God to hold his children in all things is just that. A promise. Grounded in God's character and received by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. A promise that we never need to doubt.

May the next bump in your life be one that causes you to hang on tightly to the one who is always holding on to you.

Thursday, August 8, 2019

The Foundation of Love

My family and I live in an older house. It was built in 1914 and the exterior walls were built with adobe bricks. It’s a solid house, with level floors. The main reason that it is so solid is not the walls, which are substantial, but the foundation that it was built on. The foundation was built of stone, quarried from who-knows-where, stacked and mortared by who-knows-whom, but done in such a way that over 100 years later the house is just as solid as the day the first pastor's family moved in.

A good foundation is necessary for anything that is intended to last. A building needs a good foundation to last for 100 years. A novel needs the foundation of a strong plot in order for people to want to read it 100 years later. A marriage needs a large measure of love as its foundation if it is to endure through the lifetime of those making promises to each other.

Love isn’t a word that is easy to pin down. It is both a noun, or a thing, as well as being a verb, or something that we do. And there are as many different shades of meaning to the word "love" as there are people in the world. We all have different way to define love, to experience love and to act in, or with, love. The differences can be so great that what one person might call love would be considered to be the opposite of love by another person.

The Bible has its own understating of love, and one place where we can find it is 1 John 4:7-11. John tells us that the origin of human love is in the love of God that is first poured out an humans. Said otherwise, in order for humans to love anyone else with true love they first have to have received love from God.

John goes further, to say that God's love doesn’t just come to people randomly, or willy nilly, but that it is a very specific, intentional gift of his. In verses 9 and 10 John writes:

"In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins."

God's love was made known in the sending of his son, Jesus, who was the propitiation for human sin. Propitiation is a fancy word that means atonement, which is a fancy word that means to "make reparation for a wrong or injury." All of which is to say that there is a problem between God and humans, the sin problem, which God himself makes right by giving his very Son to do the work of removing that sin and restoring wholeness with God.

If you have turned to Jesus, seeking for him to forgive your sin, then you are someone who has truly received God's love. If not, then whatever you may be calling love in your life is just a weak and poor imitation. It may feel powerful but it is not a love that is built on the very firm and unmovable foundation of God.

If you're a regular reader of my blog, then you what comes next…

Either, turn to Jesus for the forgiveness of your sin, so that you can receive and live in the true love of God, or…

…having received God's love through the saving work of Jesus on your behalf, thank God again and ask him to lead you to someone else that you can share the love of Jesus with, and…

…let all of this be to the glory of God, now and forever. Amen.

Wednesday, July 31, 2019

Ordinary Day

True story.

One day a man named Paul, and his friend, Barnabas, were walking through the city of Lystra. They were minding their own business, talking with people. A man, one with crippled feet, overheard Paul. Paul looked at the man and sensed the man believed the things Paul was talking about. And so Paul told the man to stand on his feet. And the man did. Whatever had ailed the man had been healed, in an instant.

There were some witnesses to this dramatic event, and they did what witnesses to great events often do. They hung around Paul and Barnabas, making a big fuss about them. They went so far as to give Paul and Barnabas acclaim as being gods.

This treatment was over the top, as far as Paul and Barnabas were concerned, especially since they had been about the business of proclaiming to people the good news about Jesus. Jesus, they knew, was truly God, and they most certainly were not. And so either Paul or Barnabas said this to the crowd:

“Men, why are you doing these things? We also are men, of like nature with you, and we bring you good news, that you should turn from these vain things to a living God…"

The healing that Paul did was extraordinary, but everything else in the story was ordinary. The over-reaction of the crowd, with its instantaneous elevation of Paul and Barnabas as celebrities. The teaching or preaching of Paul that preceded the healing. The call after the healing to turn from "vain things" and turn to a "living God." All very ordinary.

Things aren’t much different today. Celebrities wherever you happen to look. People's lives consumed by all kinds of things that create distance from God. Not things that are always inherently bad, but there are things that can be a problem when we pursue them to such a degree that we are moving away from God. And the call to turn from those things, and have faith in God. All very ordinary.

Jesus gave the ordinary call himself this way in Mark 1:14-15:

Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”

Here is perhaps the best part of the whole story. It hasn't all been written yet, and so you and I still have the time and opportunity to turn from vain things to a living God. To the living God.

We don’t need a special act to convince us. All we need is to see our need, and see our only hope, the hope received by faith in Jesus. An ordinary day will do. After all, it’s a true story.

Tuesday, July 23, 2019

Killing Sin

In the Old Testament book of Judges, chapters 4 and 5, there is a little detail that has mystified me. Judges 4 tells the story of Israel's oppression by an enemy, and a man named Barak being raised up to defeat them. But Barak is hesitant, refusing to do so unless Israel's judge, Deborah, goes with him. Deborah agrees, but tells Barak that because of his hesitance, the honor of the final victory will go to someone else.

The leader of the enemies is a man named Sisera, who army is crushed in the battle. Sisera escapes and takes refuge on the way home at the tent of Jael. While he naps, Judges 4:21 tells us this:

"But Jael the wife of Heber took a tent peg, and took a hammer in her hand. Then she went softly to him and drove the peg into his temple until it went down into the ground while he was lying fast asleep from weariness. So he died."

Judges 5 is the song of Deborah and Barak, basically repeating the details of the story, describing the death of Sisera like this:

"She sent her hand to the tent peg
    and her right hand to the workmen's mallet;
she struck Sisera;
    she crushed his head;
    she shattered and pierced his temple.
Between her feet
    he sank, he fell, he lay still;
between her feet
    he sank, he fell;
where he sank,
    there he fell—dead."

Judges tells the history of God's people shortly after the time they took possession of the Promised Land. Because they were often disobedient to God they had a lot of trouble with their neighbors. The story of Judges 4 & 5 is one of God's mercy as he delivers them from an enemy. But today, several thousand years later, do we read anything within the story besides a historical account? Is there anything here to guide us as we live by faith in Jesus? I believe there is, and that it is seen in the details of the death of Sisera.

Israel is victorious as Sisera flees from the battle. But Sisera is still a danger, and so his death is necessary. Similarly, sin is defeated by Jesus on the cross, but it remains a danger to those of us living with faith in Jesus as our Savior and Lord.

We cannot live lives that are free of sin, but we mustn't play with our sin, or minimize it, or ignore it, or pretend it doesn't exist. We must deal with it. We must put it to death.

We all have sins that we struggle with. The story of Sisera reminds me to see mine for what they are, and to seek God and his rescue from them. May you also seek the Lord's help as he shapes you in his image, killing the troubling, persistent sins in your life.