No Uncertain Trumpet

“If the women can’t find you handsome, they should at least find you handy.”  That is a quote from the famous philosopher Red Green of Possum Lodge fame.  One of the shows I remember was called, “The Big Thing”.   All the activity of that misguided and testosterone-driven cabal was centered on the oversize load they heard was going to be passing near the town.  No one wanted to miss the big thing even though they didn’t know what it was or exactly when it would come.  They had a tailgate party along the highway in anticipation of seeing something larger than normal.  They were usually disappointed and frankly, I can’t remember how it ends.  Doesn’t matter to me or especially to them … they were in it for the hunt.

Here in the midst of winter drudgery, it is easy to fall into discouragement and depression, especially if we are waiting on a big thing.  Have you noticed that normal things don’t make the news?  You never see a tabloid with the headline, “Man Goes to Work” or “Mother Finally Gets Kids to Bed”.  In fact, you can do a million things well and no one notices; forget to yield the right of way and you’ll get your name in the paper.  Win the lottery and you’ll make the headlines; lose the ticket and you’ll make even larger news.

One of the writers I take like medicine is Oswald Chambers.  His daily devotional, My Utmost for His Highest, is good for the soul.  Here is what Chambers has to say, “The great hindrance in spiritual life is that we look for big things to do.  ‘Jesus took a towel…and began to wash the disciples’ feet.’ ”  Jesus did the ordinary slave thing.  It was done that day thousands of times by thousands of ordinary slaves.  He was sent here to serve, he was a servant, and he was only doing the natural thing.  Chambers also says this, “If I do my duty, not for duty’s sake, but because I believe God is engineering my circumstances, then at the very point of my obedience the whole superb grace of God is mine through the Atonement.”

Most of us will never see a big thing; but in the Lord Jesus Christ, there is purpose and meaningful endeavor all around us.  His life has made this so, and we thank Him.

Keep your stick on the ice!

If a drunken man drives his car into a tree, we do not fail to tend to him in kindness though we may attribute his negative condition to his actions.

If an angry and rebellious man shakes his fist in defiance at God and while doing so is struck by lightning, we would likewise tend to him and make note that railing at the Almighty is perhaps not the wisest thing to do.

It is not unkind to make such judgments.  In fact, it would be unwise and foolish not to observe, draw conclusions and learn from the ill-conceived actions and thoughts of others.  Let us not be unwise without being unkind.  At the same time, let not others naysay our kindness because we recognize their foolishness.

A day or so ago, I read a Facebook post from a church staff member encouraging everyone to invite Christ to be present in their family gatherings this Christmas.  He then tied that word of wisdom to a reminder about his church’s next service.  The direct connection was that Jesus was at the service and you encountered Him by bringing your family there to where He is.

The thinking Christian knows Jesus doesn’t live in a church, nor does he show up at predetermined times.  Jesus isn’t in a building unless we bring Him in with us.  He no longer sleeps in a cow feeder, or stays with Mary, Martha and Lazarus.  Today, if we ask Him, He dwells within us.  The greater part of the incarnation (God with us) is not that He was born in a stable, but that He, resurrected and glorified, comes to dwell in us.

Please do invite Him into your family gatherings, there where you are all gathered.  Then by faith acknowledge His presence for He will surely be there.

May you and those you love experience the real miracle of  the incarnation.

It’s Thanksgiving eve and many folks are planning their Black Friday excursions and getting ready for meals and family on Thursday.  We live in a blessed land that has been filled with opportunities and freedom.

I’ve heard a lot of the normal-for-the-season thank speak.   Folks are grateful for their families, homes, health and all the good things this great free country has allowed them to experience.  That is all well and good.  However, I never hear anyone say to whom they are thankful.  Folks say how glad they are to have some good thing; but there is nothing more than an awareness of possessions, certainly not an acknowledgement of a personal God from whom comes every good and perfect gift.  There is no humility; and, of course, there is no responsibility.

Real thankfulness carries responsibility to the Giver.  I think that is one of the reasons we want a generic Thanksgiving that allows us to celebrate just how pious we are in recognizing we have nice circumstances.  Sorry, that doesn’t cut it.  We have been blessed, and God is the Giver of the blessings.  It is to Him we owe (that’s right … owe) our thanks, and it is to Him we will be accountable as stewards of all that we have received.

1 Timothy 1:17  Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Marlene and I would like to thank you all for the special gift during Pastor Appreciation Month.

We are grateful the Lord has allowed us to labor alongside such generous and faithful people who love Him and want to serve Him. Thanks for being there for 10 years and for your willingness to question unprofitable conventions. It has been a joy to serve Him with you.

May the Lord bless you and those you love,

Pastor Jess

It is the little things that get us into the biggest trouble.  We live in a broken world, and we are broken ourselves.  The little things grow into big problems because this world and all that is in it is not improving; rather, it is degenerating.  This is happening because it is all broken.  Adam and Eve broke it, and it will remain broken until God is finally done and all is brought back under His authority

Many years ago, I read this in a book, “Nearly a century ago, a French sociologist wrote that every institution’s first goal is to survive and grow, not to undertake the mission it has nominally staked out for itself.”  When I read that, it helped me to understand what I saw going on around me in the Christian organization I was involved with.  Regardless of the lofty and altruistic goals of any organization, without constant restraint and discipline from people, the people will end up serving the organization rather than the organization serving the people.  It happens so often we no longer take note, but it is wrong and it happens because everything is broken.

The book of Judges tells the story of the Israelites living in their land, serving God in their families and tribes and trusting Him for their leadership.  This individual reliance upon God when shared by all produced a culture of reliance upon God that covered the land.  But they too were broken.  Their individual trust turned to individual sin and reliance upon things other than God.  Soon God allowed them to be oppressed by neighbors.  Then they repented, then God would raise up a deliverer and they would live in peace and security, then the whole cycle would start again.

In Samuel, the people cry to God for a king.  It seems they wanted to be like other nations.  God warns them about the weaknesses of kings and kingdoms, but they persist.  When God tells Samuel to anoint their king, he comforts the broken-hearted prophet by telling him that it was not he they have rejected, but God himself.

The small thing is our independent reliance upon God and no one else, every man, woman and child trusting in and being accountable to God.  This idea is so slippery; and because we are broken and lazy, we give our loyalty, our authority, to others who promise in their brokenness to help us with our responsibilities.  Every organization, be it government, labor union, service club or church, must be ruled by the independent, God-reliant people who created it, lest it rule them and destroy them.

We can do it; it’s just a little thing.

“There will never be a church where every meeting is thrilling, but there could be a church where Christians gather with the anticipation that the Spirit could invade their hearts at any moment, and think that maybe He is, without their realizing it.”    From Real Church by Larry Crabb

Great quote, but when will we define the church as people; all day, every day, in or out of a meeting?  Let’s all expect the Lord to be at work in our lives every minute of every hour whether we are conscious of it or not.  He is!

There is an instant, if only that brief, where we don’t care about ourselves.  We are lost in, engulfed in, the love of God revealed to us through the death of Jesus.  Since He died for us and made it be about us, we realize we can forget about ourselves.  Unfortunately, the moment passes.  We revert to pre-salvation, self-centered thinking, which gets married to and supported by incorrect Christian teaching.  We begin to believe that since He made it be about us, we should also.  Our liberty, freedom from self-awareness, is now gone.  We begin the slide to practical atheism that leaves us no different in outlook than the world.  If that is not tragic enough, we convince ourselves that the slide is actually maturity in Christ.

Have you ever gotten off track, made a wrong turn or something of the like, and didn’t notice it until much later?  Do you remember the sick feeling you got when you realized how far wrong you were?  Way off course and so much time and distance wasted.  There is regret mixed with acceptance that sitting there stewing doesn’t get you closer to your destination.  You figure out where you are, make the needed corrections and get back on your journey, sadder but hopefully wiser and more vigilant.

We are reading the book of Isaiah together as a church.  Actually we read through the Bible each year following a rotating plan.  My Sunday messages come from the passage we read in the preceding week.  So we are reading the heavy hitter of the Major Prophets; and it is full of reminders, reminders that we are not where we ought to be.

You cannot read the Old Testament without being aware that a relationship with God has moral requirements. Isaiah and all the prophets dealt with the moral failure of the Israelites (among others) and not only called them to live uprightly, but warned them of judgment if they continued in disobedience.

Too many people today don’t even think about what the Bible says about the way they live every day.  They are insensitive to the leading of the Lord and ignorant of His word.  In a church I used to attend, we sang a rousing chorus about the army of the Lord.  This song had uplifting music with a fast tempo, and everyone loved to sing of the triumph of the Lord.  No one, not even the song leader, thought about the passage from Joel that we were singing.  The army of the Lord was locusts sent to destroy the land (Israel), strip its crops and bring famine.  The words were about judgment; but because the music was exciting, we enjoyed the song and sang stupidly along about tragedy and death.

The prophet reminds us that we are here in our world, our culture, as standard bearers of God’s righteousness.  The church (believers in Christ) is to counter the laziness in the land, the untruthfulness, the pleasure seeking and self-indulgence.  The church is to be self-sacrificing and bearing the burdens of others, not selfishly requiring others to fulfill our obligations.  Even many of our well-known preachers talk more about getting from God than what God has already given us.  We have entrenched in our thinking a spiritualized materialism which leads us to believe that everything revolves around us.

Maybe it is time to pull over and look at the map.