"To Him be glory forever": August 2018

Wednesday, August 29, 2018

PreacherMan's "Aha!" Moment

Today's big project was to outline and write a draft of my sermon for this coming Sunday. My text is John 5:1-9, and being the first Sunday in September it marks the beginning of my sixth year as a preacher. There is someone here in town who knows me a bit. I don’t know if he knows my name, because he always calls me PreacherMan, but I don’t mind, as it makes for what I think to be an honorable nickname.

Five full years in the pulpit means something on the order of 250+ sermons. I'm supposed to get four Sunday's off a year, so that would make a bit fewer than 250, but I've also done 52 funerals, and so that increases the number. There is a saying that it takes 100 sermons for a person to figure out what they are doing in the pulpit, and I think in my case it was quite a bit more than that.

Preaching is a task that I approach with a method, although my method is not static and is continually being adjusted. Some of those adjustments come in a moment of insight, and some come more deliberately, as I read preaching books and magazines, attend preaching workshops, and learn from a variety of online resources.

All of which is to say that today, while I was pretty far along on next Sunday's sermon, I had an "Aha!" moment. In that moment it occurred to me that Pastor Brad, aka PreacherMan, has a basic sermon, which is this:

· People are sinners
· There is a Savior
· Know this Savior as your savior

Things vary a bit at this point, depending on the text and/or circumstances, generally being either:

· Serve this Savior, or
· Find comfort and peace in this Savior

So, there you have it. Not saying that your preacher should pass through the same places I do time after time, but as I think about it and think of what some of the really outstanding preachers I've had the chance to learn from over the past five years consistently and persistently do, I'll take it. And may God be glorified in the proclamation of His word.

Monday, August 27, 2018

Tithing

Tithing. According to my dictionary it is "the practice of giving one-tenth of one's property or resources to support a religious institution as a response to God's blessings." We would all agree that it is good to give back to God, but a tenth of what we have received? Who's idea is that? Turns out that it is God's idea. We first see tithing mentioned in the Bible in Leviticus 30:30,

"Every tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the trees is the Lord's; it is holy to the Lord."

Moses goes on to say that animals are also to be tithed, ending the book of Leviticus saying,

"These are the commandments that the Lord commanded Moses for the people of Israel on Mount Sinai."

Whoa! That's the Old Testament. We follow Jesus and live in the days of the New Testament, and Jesus never talked about tithing.

Well…that’s not exactly true. In Matthew 23:23 he said,

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others."

As Jesus called out the hypocrisy of the Pharisee's he noted how they followed God's law as far as tithing went, but they thought it was totally fine to neglect God's call over all parts of their lives.

Going a step farther, Jesus very clearly upheld the both the attitude and practice of giving generously, even sacrificially, to the work of God. In Luke 21:1-4 he watches a woman put all she has into the offering box, and says,

"Truly, I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on."

My own understanding of the Bible would say that as a matter of law, tithing is no longer required. It was a law for the Old Testament nation of Israel, given to them through Moses. But that country ceased to exist when they were conquered and carried into exile by Babylon. All of those laws were valid for a time, and that time has passed. But the question of how much we should give towards the work of God and his church is a valid one. At the very least, the idea of tithing confronts us with the question: Am I honoring God in the way I receive and use the gifts he has given me?

When I first became a Christian it seemed natural that I would give to the church. The offering plate would be passed and I would open my wallet and put something into it. Then I joined the church I was worshipping at and they invited people to make a pledge as to how much they would give. This was basically a promise that over the course of a year I would give what I had pledged. Every year I increased my pledge, as I was only giving a small percentage of what I earned, and I could see that I viewed my money as "mine," rather than as something I received from God. Over time, increasing the percentage of my pledge changed the attitude of my heart.

When Robin and I married we made tithing our practice from the beginning. We value the work of the church, and we desire to do our share in supporting it. I invite you to ask yourself this question, as you consider your giving to the Lord: Am I honoring God in the way I receive and use the gifts he has given me?

Wednesday, August 15, 2018

No Ordinary Shepherd

This morning's bible reading was from the book of Jeremiah. Jeremiah…the prophet of doom and gloom. Much of his book is filled with telling people things they don’t want to here, particularly the people of God. He is upfront in speaking to them of their persistent disobedience to God, calling them to turn back to God before it is too late.

Too late? Too late for what?

Too late to avoid receiving from the hand of God the consequences of their disobedience. Consequences that will take shape in their defeat and exile, as God uses the enemies of God's people for God's own purposes.

But when it comes to Jeremiah and unpopular things to say, as the TV announcer used to proclaim, That's not all! Jeremiah also speaks God's judgment on those enemies. This morning I read Jeremiah 47-50, with judgment declared against the Philistines, against Moab, against Ammon, and, in chapter 50 against Babylon, the granddaddy of Old Testament bogeymen.

As chapter 50 was drawing to a close, in the midst of judgment against Babylon, a phrase in verse 44 literally jumped out at me,

"What shepherd can stand before me?"

On the one hand, that’s a rhetorical question. Facing the power of God, no shepherd could stand against God. No shepherd, no pastor, no president, no Babylonian, no nobody.

Perhaps the greatest showdown with a shepherd in the Bible was when David faced Goliath. Goliath, seemingly invincible, mocked anyone who dared approach him in combat. But David, the shepherd, had the edge, being God's man and on God's mission.

On the one hand Jeremiah's brief question is a rhetorical one, but on the other hand…

On the other hand we turn to David, again, but this time to his words in Psalm 23. From the opening words of "The Lord is my shepherd…" through the ending of "…and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever" we see a shepherd unlike any other. We see a shepherd who faithfully cares for his sheep, guarding and guiding them through all of life.

As we read Psalm 23 today in the light of God's full self-revelation in the Bible we see Jesus as the fulfillment of David's psalm. And then we read John 10:11, where Jesus says:

"I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep."

There is a shepherd who can stand before God. A shepherd who can stand before God because he is God's ordained shepherd of God's people.

With saving faith in Jesus we can read Jeremiah's question and no that no ordinary shepherd can stand before God. And we can also know that as God's dearly loved children, we are shepherded no ordinary Shepherd.

Wednesday, August 8, 2018

New Creation

Someone I know has a bit of a problem. She is a Christian, now, but in the past she lived and acted in ways that were very un-Christian, and people who remember that are bringing it to her attention. At least that is what I understand her problem to be. I'll confess that I know her, but not well. I met her, at least once, sometime since we moved to Dulce, but outside of knowing some of the people she is related to I would be unable to tell you anything about what she was like then.

More recently, I have seen her at least three times in the last month. Our conversation wasn't anything substantial, and so I could only tell a person a bit more than I could have several years ago. I do know where she goes to church, and between that fact and something I saw on Facebook I could tell anyone who cared to know that she is a new creation. She is the same person, with the same body, and the same family, but at the same time she is a totally different person. This change is true of anyone who places their faith in Jesus.

In 2 Corinthians 5:17 the apostle Paul puts it like this:

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come."

Not only did this person live and act in ways that were un-Christian before she came to faith, but everyone who calls on Jesus as their Savior and Lord did the very same thing. The specifics might have varied, but their effect was basically the same: To live as the god of our own life, rather than to live with faith in the Lord Jesus.

That difference is lost on those who don't love Jesus. When we have faith we can't wash away our past sins. Sometimes the things we did in the past have downstream consequences that will last until the day we die. But the truth of the Bible is that by faith in him, Jesus has removed the guilt and the punishment due those sins.

We still live in the world, with the memories of our past. We will continue to struggle with sin. But our identity is no longer as sinners and rebels against God. Our identity is as children of God, who has made us a "new creation," so that we can joyfully live changed lives as his children. And, perhaps, those changes will begin to show our old friends the love that Jesus will also freely give to them. Amen.