Month: December 2011

Danger Close

 

image

A ship in a harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are for.  J.A. Shedd

Moving forward in any meaningful way demands a step in faith. Faith–deep soul-rooted, life-directing faith–may lead to danger. We take the steps of faith because we trust in God for what may come, whether it be into blissful comfort or the first tentative steps into the enemy’s territory, fully aware that sacrifice may be the result. A church that never moves from the sanctuary is safe, but that is not what the Church is for.

Read Paul’s boasting in 2 Corinthians 11:16-33. Contrary to the witness of those who merely call themselves Apostles, Paul has the scourge scars and water marks of one who has walked, trusting God with each step as he fulfilled His calling to bear witness to Christ to the Gentile world. We continue to marvel at his effectiveness thousands of years later as he is held up as the model for our own vocational calling. We marvel, but are tempted time and time again to retreat to the safety of tradition and practice.

Church, this is not what we were created to be or do. We are the last hope of a dying world. We possess the fire of the indwelling Spirit meant to guide our hands and feet in boldly stepping into the darkness to call others out. Like the sailor who knows nothing of buoyancy and displacement but who trusts the Oak, nails and pitch to keep them afloat in the capricious and danger-filled seas, Christians need not know how or why God may lead them into a ministry effort, only that they may trust Him that it will not be in vain. 

Grace and peace in the Spirit to you…

image National Library of New Zealand

Worship the Mystery of Christmas

imageWhen they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshipped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented and presented him with gifts of gold and incense and of myrrh. Matthew 2:10-11

For God to condescend to assume human form and to walk among a people clumsy violence known for killing their prophets is the mystery of the first Advent. He does not appear as a fully grown man of mysterious provenance, but rather, as a baby with a human mother who herself possessed the sin nature derived of her descent from Eve and Adam. The baby Jesus endures the growth process, emptied of His divine powers and prerogatives and walks sinless on the inexorable journey to Calvary.

How is it that the baby attracts the worship that He deserves? He possesses nothing outward that belies His perfection and divinity. No halo, no translucent glow surrounding him, he does not spring from the womb preaching the good news. He is a hungry, cranky, sleepy and weepy infant, despite the beatific scene painted by the hymnists. Yet worshipped He is.

He is worshipped because of the divine revelation of heavenly hosts singing Gloria in excelcis deo. He is worshipped because the archangel Gabriel left the presence of God and appeared to various people telling them that the long-awaited King had come. He is worshipped because the string of witnesses stretching from Mary to Elizabeth to John to the shepherds quietly watching over their flocks at night. He is worshipped because it is indisputable as to who He is.

With the distance of time comes a casual familiarity. We can see how the story ends and see the baby as the grown Savior. Returning to the first days of His life we return to a faith that requires trust in an unknown future. It is faith in history that is not written yet, but rooted in the signs we have seen. We may know the ultimate conclusion to the story as God has revealed it to us, we can restore the mystery about tomorrow. We can step out in faith to attempt great things according to our calling, knowing that all preceding promises have been fulfilled.

Be blessed this Christmas and in all of your days to follow…

The Big Story

Why Men Hate Going to Church by David Murrow

image

David Murrow’s updated book asks the same question as the first edition with even more vigor, why are our churches predominantly female? The answers that he proposes are, in many cases, self-evident to any churchman that cares to look. Walk through the church building, look at the dominant programs, review the bible studies and prayer meetings and you see all of the things that turn men off to becoming a part of the church. That is, if we truly want to see these things.

As much as we would like men to hear Jesus’ words two thousand years later and follow him without reservation, the reality is far different. By and large, church programs trend toward the cerebral and relational, two things that men find contrary to their nature. This doesn’t mean that men cannot identify with study, prayer, relationship building; they can but they naturally are attracted to them in less touch-feely ways that our sisters in the faith.

Why Men Hate Going to Church is far more than analysis, Murrow’s short chapters also contain answers. Not in the sense of enumerated steps to be followed to invite the men streaming back into the church but in answers broad enough that an intuitive pastor can apply them to their particular church setting. Most helpful in these is his chapter about Getting the Big Story Right. This was one of the things that Promise Keepers did without fail during their heyday. They placed men in the battle, showing them their place and their mission under Christ their leader. It inspired them in ways that the most well thought out sermon often cannot because it is designed to inspire or challenge men and women simultaneously.

Challenge them, limit hand holding and praying out loud when there is a chance that they will not look good. Small steps but big dividends.

I’m grateful to Thomas Nelson who provided this book for review.

Psalm 111 ~ Holy and Awesome is His Name

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow his precepts have good understanding. Psalm 111:10

image

The psalmist records the penultimate  bit of wisdom in the closing stanza of this psalm, immortalizing it and placing it in a context that one would find difficult to challenge. Has God not displayed miraculous works? Is His righteousness in question? Has He provided redemption for those who love Him? Without question the answers to these musings direct us to the same conclusion as the psalmist; love and obedience of the Lord is the foundation upon which wisdom is built.

The proverbial saying is not found in isolation. A survey finds that the Spirit had provided this nugget to many authors:

And he said to man, “The fear of the Lord—that is wisdom, and to shun evil is understanding.” Job 28:28

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. Proverbs 1:7

Abraham replied, “I said to myself, ‘There is surely no fear of God in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife.’” Genesis 20:11

Many are the interpersonal relationships that are marked with tension because we fail to give them the consideration that Abraham does. It is impossible to find balance if one party does not share the love of God that grips the other. Those who do not know God will default to self satisfaction rather than the self sacrifice of the follower of Jesus. Peace is found through the removal of assumptions and an extra measure of grace.

 

Grace and peace to your spirit..

image Gin Fizz

A Closer Walk with Thee

Living Close to God by Gene Edwards

image

Never forget that even those among us who are spiritually dense have a wonderful chance of knowing Christ in the depths.

Author Gene Edwards saves this pithy promise until the very end of the brief guide, though it would have served well in the introductory pages. In an everyman’s spiritual disciplines guide, Edwards attempts to remove the layers of challenge and mysticism that often accompany the Christian’s attempt to deepen the bond between Savior and self. On many levels Living Close to God succeeds in this objective, but on others the authors suggested practices don’t seem to bear fruit.

Edwards strives first to change the nature of a core spiritual practice, prayer. Laying a foundation that paints the average prayer as a one-way list of petitions, the author transforms the 23rd psalm from a memory exercise to a personal communiqué to God. He suggests that by personalizing the words we transform our prayer from impersonal to personal and feeling the presence of Christ in the words and, by extension, in real conversation with us. Nothing complicated, nothing too mystical. The simplicity of Edwards ideas is immediately applicable and can be beneficial for Christians who have tried other, more complex methods of deepening their faith.

Each of the tools that the author includes has but a single objective, a greater awareness of the presence of God. Much like Brother Lawrence, Edwards is rooted in reality of a workaday life. He strives to find “hooks” throughout the day which serve as reminders of God’s intimate immediacy and ways in which the spiritually aware Christian can partake of that communion. These tools are packed into a short book that can be read quickly. The organization could stand some improvement as the chapters that are only a few pages in length seem more like random thoughts that the author wanted to include rather than parts of a cohesive whole.

I am grateful to Waterbrook Press who provided this book for review.