Amazing Grace – Dr. Kirk Lewis

My Lord and My God

Background Passages: John 20:24-29; I Corinthians 15:14-15,17, 19

Nokolai Ivanovich Bukharin was once one of the most powerful men on earth. An ardent communist and a leader in the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, Bukharin became the editor of Pravada, the Soviet newspaper and a full member of the Soviet Politburo.

Bukharin was sent to Kiev in 1930 to deliver a major address on atheism to a huge assembly of Communist Part officials. He spent much of his time attacking Christianity, arguing against its influence and hurling insults at those who embraced it’s beliefs.

When he finished he asked if anyone had a question or comment. After a period of deafening silence a solitary man approached the platform and walked to the microphone. After scanning the crowd. He uttered three words in a strong voice he uttered the traditional greeting of the Russian Orthodox Church. “Christ is risen!”

To the astonishment and embarrassment of Bukharin, the entire assembly rose and shouted in a thundering chorus, “He is risen, indeed!”

Such is the power of Easter. “Christ is risen!”

Of the various accounts of Christ’s resurrection recorded in the gospels, I find myself drawn time and time again not to the reaction of Mary, or Peter and John, or even to the the two men on the Road to Emmaus.

I find in Thomas the most honest response to the resurrection.

If you remember, the followers of Jesus sought comfort from one another in the hours immediately after Jesus’ death and burial. They huddled together in fear of Roman or Jewish retribution. Even after the women reported that they had seen Jesus, the others were slow to grasp its truth.

Then, Jesus appeared among them, revealing his nail scarred hands and feet, munching on a piece of bread, as physically present as he had been the last time they were with him in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Though we are not told why, Thomas was not with them when Jesus first showed himself to the disciples.

It would be within his character to believe the worst. I can see Thomas, the hood of his robe draped low across his face, walking without purpose or direction through the streets of Jerusalem. Hands thrust in his pockets, trying to make sense of the horror he had witnessed from a distance and the things he thought he understood. Where would he go now that everything for which he had hoped was lost?

As he wearily climbs the steps into the upper room where he left the disciples in despair, he hears excited voices and laughter. It was not what he was expecting.

When he enters, John rushes to him, lifts him in a big bear hug, spinning him around, “He is risen! He is risen, Thomas! We’ve seen Jesus! We have seen the Lord!”

I think their excitement confounded Thomas. As they tried to explain what they had seen, none of it made sense. All of it filled him with doubt and anxiety. Finally, Thomas throws up his hands exasperated, confused, maybe even a little embarrassed and guilt-ridden.

He said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”

He stewed in that uncertain misery for seven long days, unable to join in the excitement of his friends. John tells us in his gospel…

A week later, the disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them, and said, “Peace be with you!”

For seven days, Thomas probably sat in the corner of the room, listening to the buzz of excitement, hearing the testimony of the two men from Emmaus who very nearly busted the door open in their desire to tell their story.

The cloud that settled over Thomas grew darker every day until Jesus stood again in the middle of the room, greeting all those who saw him and rushed to his side. Can you put yourself in Thomas’ sandals now? Stunned to see the truth that others proclaimed and instantly filled with shame and regret for not believing them.

As Jesus patiently greeted those who swarmed around him, his eyes searched the room for Thomas. Finding him, Jesus quietly excused himself, pushed through the throng and stood before his pessimistic disciple, stretching out his hands.

Then, he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here. See my hands. Reach out your hand and put into my side. Stop doubting and believe. Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God.”

Despite his pessimism, despite his struggle to believe, Thomas offered the only response to Jesus that really matters. “My Lord and my God.”

What a superb and perfectly simply declaration of faith. The resurrection matters. “He is risen” is more than a religious catchphrase, it is the cornerstone of all we believe. It is what made Paul lay it on the line with the Corinthian church.

If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then proved to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. If Christ has not been raised, then your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. (I Corinthians 15:14-15, 17,19)

So what made the difference for this tough and hard-nosed disciple? What precipitated this radical change from skeptic to believer?

Simply, he saw Jesus.

Some consider Jesus response to Thomas’ declaration an admonition of some sort. “Tsk, tsk. You had to see to believe. Such little faith.”

I don’t see it that way. Look at what he said.

Jesus said to him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen, and yet have believed.”

Jesus rejoiced that for Thomas “seeing was believing.” I think he showed up that day in the upper room for that reason only. To show himself to Thomas. To bring him back into the fold because he wanted and needed Thomas to believe.

Though we may not see Jesus in the flesh as did Thomas, we “see” him in his words recorded in the Bible as they come to life under the inspired presence of his spirit as it convicts us of our need for him. We “see” him in the faith and witness of others whose lives reflect his image.

When we finally “see” him for who he is, our response ought to be the same response proclaimed boldly by Thomas, “My Lord and my God.”

That’s the blessing Jesus refers to at the end of the passage. Blessed, happy and content are those who don’t get the chance to see as Thomas saw and yet still put their faith and trust in him.

I will be far from home on this Easter Sunday, sailing somewhere off the coast of southern Argentina, on a day on which my oldest granddaughter Lena will be baptized because several months ago she “saw” Jesus and made him her Lord and her God.

Thanks to the technology of live streaming, Robin and I will get to rejoice with her in that special moment.

Her testimony of God’s saving grace in Christ Jesus is a blessing to her and to our entire family as we are reminded again that Easter celebrates a risen and living Lord.

“Blessed are those who have not seen (as you did Thomas), but still believed.”

Christ is risen!

Peace and Goodwill

Background Passages: Luke 2:9-14; Philippians 2:5-8; Ephesians 2:8; John 14:27; Isaiah 26:3; Philippians 4:11-13

You may know Henry Wadsworth Longfellow as the author of The Song of Hiawatha or Paul Revere’s Ride. One of America’s best and most prolific poets, Longfellow penned many poems, novels and anthologies. I found out recently that he also translated many European literary works into English, including Dante’s The Divine Comedy.

Like many poets, Longfellow experienced his fair share of tragedy. His first wife, Mary Potter, died suddenly while he was overseas. After a long courtship, he married Mary Frances Appleton in 1843. Together, they had six children. By all accounts, the marriage was a happy one until Frances died tragically in a fire in 1861.

With the outbreak of the American Civil war, Longfellow became a stout abolitionist. His oldest son, Charley enlisted on the Union side only to be wounded severely. In December of 1863, Longfellow found himself entering the Christmas season as a widower, with five dependent children and his oldest son on the brink of death.

As he tended to his son’s wounds, imagining the sounds of gunfire and cannon that injured him, he heard the bells of the local church ringing on Christmas morning. Longfellow sat down that evening, intent upon losing himself for a few hours in his writing. The result of that late night session was a poem entitled, I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day. Throughout the poem, the poet seemed to believe that the strife of the world had drowned out all hope of peace on earth and driven out any semblance of goodwill toward men.

Until he penned the last verse.

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth he sleep;”
The Wrong shall fail,
The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, goodwill to men.

A few years later, the poem was set to music by British organist John Baptiste Calkin, becoming the familiar Christmas carol we know today.

The song, particularly the version sung by Casting Crowns, is beautifully poignant, confronting us of the turmoil of our world while also reminding us that God, through his son, offers peace and goodwill to a troubled world. Luke, the gospel writer, introduces the phrase to us in his account of the birth of Jesus. However, I might suggest to Longfellow that the phrase does not mean what you thought it meant.

When the angels sang their praise, they were not exalting God for bringing about the absence of conflict and harmony among all people. They were praising the father for his steps in bringing about, as Paul says in Philippians 4:7, “a peace that surpasses all understanding.”

Let’s take a closer look at the story as it develops.

After Mary gave birth in the dingy confines of a cave turned stable, God sent an angel…one angel…to announce the birth of his son to shepherds tending their flock in the hills overlooking Bethlehem.

An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” (Luke 2:9-12)

It is after this initial explanation that the angelic host appeared singing in heavenly harmony.

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” (Luke 2:13-14)

Longfellow and the King James Version deeply ingrained the phrase as “peace on earth, goodwill toward men.” The New International Version of the phrase I used here reads differently. However, it is possibly more accurate to the original Greek, according to biblical scholars.

“Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”

Amid his tragic circumstances, I’m not sure peace and goodwill meant the same thing to Longfellow as it did to Luke. As we enter this season of advent, maybe it’s a good idea for us to consider what the angels proclaimed to the shepherds with such joy and happiness.

First, the object of their apparent joy was not the anticipated peace and goodwill, but God who reigns in the highest heaven. By sending his son as a baby born in a lowly manger, God finally put in motion his path of redemption which he had planned before he breathed life into his creation.

Jesus, God’s son, would live his life among us, demonstrating how we are to live the life that God envisioned for us, ultimately giving his life in exchange for my sin and yours.

As Paul is urging the Philippians to model their lives after Christ, he tells them:

…have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on the cross.” (Philippians 2:5-8)

The angels recognized that the child born in Bethlehem was God’s great gift to a lost and troubled world. It would be this baby wrapped in cloth and resting in a manager filled with hay that would through his life, death and resurrection make joy of salvation available and attainable by all people. (See Luke 2:10)

For God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)

It was this act of great love and grace that brought the angels to their feet in rising chorus to give all the glory and praise to a Father/God for what he had just done. The cries of a child in Bethlehem still reverberate through the lives of all who believe.

Glory to God in the highest heaven!

I was reminded again of the beauty of that gift when my eight-year-old granddaughter Lena called us over Facetime to tell us that she had made her faith commitment to Jesus. As I took in the expression of joy on her smiling face, I could hear the angels sing.

Glory to God in the highest heaven, indeed! For every man, woman and child who trusts Jesus as savior, the angels still sing God’s praise. Jesus told us as much in his parable of the lost coin.

In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. (Luke 15:10)

While the heavens were praising God, the angels acknowledged the peace now available to those who find favor with God. That’s an important distinction. The angel who first appeared to the shepherds told them a child was born in Bethlehem who would be the long-anticipated Messiah. He announced it as good news of great joy to all people. The Messiah. Sent by God. Making salvation available to anyone and everyone.

However, peace is the gift offered to those “on whom his (God’s) favor rests.”

Good news offered to all. Peace offered only to those on whom his favor rests. It begs the question then, on whom does God’s favor rest? God’s favor rests on “whoever believes in him,” according to John 3:16. This is the gospel message that the angels shared. This is the good news.

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not of your own doing, but it is the gift of God. (Ephesians 2:8)

I see a connection here through the definition of grace I learned as a teenager. Grace is defined as God’s unmerited or undeserved favor. When I put my faith and trust in Jesus, I entered into right relationship with God only by his grace. Only when he extended this unmerited favor to me upon my faith commitment to him.

Because that grace was extended, because God rests his favor upon me, I find his promised peace. It’s the same peace Jesus promised his disciples in the upper room before he was crucified.

Peace I leave with you. My peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” (John 14:27)

Every person in this world, whether or not he or she is a believer in Christ, longs for peace. The difference in the peace of a believer and a nonbeliever is where they acquire their peace. A nonbeliever depends on his own resourcefulness or his own resources. He seeks peace through social causes, financial gain or temporary distractions.

Believers find peace not from things the world offers, but from God. Where earthly peace depends on circumstances and individual ability, godly peace does not. God’s peace proclaimed and promised by the angels singing to shepherds transcends our circumstances.

We live lives that can in one moment be divine and in the next be dreadful. The peace God provides goes beyond those up and down seasons of life. This ability to find contentment, to live in the moment in the joy of Christ, regardless of life’s circumstance is completely dependent upon the depth of our faith and trust in God’s presence and promise.

Look at what Isaiah said.

You (God) will keep the mind that is dependent on you in perfect peace, for it is trusting in you. (Isaiah 26:3)

God will keep our hearts and minds at peace when we remain dependent upon him in all things by trusting in him through all things. Peace is not surrendering to the circumstance. Peace is surrendering everything in every circumstance to God. Trusting that he will be with us always…even when we “walk through the valley of the shadow of death.”

Paul addressed the issue in his letter to the Philippian church.

I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well-fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength. (Philippians 4: 11-13)

We find peace and contentment only when we know that God will give us the strength we need to live faithfully in any and every situation. It comes when we listen to the words of Jesus when he says, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” When he says, “Do not be afraid.”

I’m certain you will read the Christmas story this year or have it read to you. I pray that you will not only hear the angels singing to the shepherds, but that you will join them in giving glory to God in the highest heaven for through his son he gives peace to those on whom his favor rests.

As he listened to those bells on Christmas day, Longfellow understood one thing when faced with all the hardships he encountered. “God is not dead, nor does he sleep.” Because he is ever with us, we can give Glory to God on high for the miraculous gift of his son Jesus. The one who brings peace to those on whom his favor rests. To all who believe in his name.

A Hidden Treasure

Background Passages: I Chronicles 4:9-10; Jeremiah 33:3

The Antiques Road Show on PBS has become our default television program when there is absolutely nothing else to watch. If you’re not familiar with the show, hopeful people bring an item to an appraiser in hopes that what looks like a throw-away might actually be treasure.

I find most intriguing the items bought in a garage sale or sitting in the family attic for years. Some pieces are trash. Some pieces prove to be worth far more than expected.

On one recent program, a Corpus Christi family brought in a painting that hung behind a utility room door at his parents’ home for decades. Purchased in Mexico around 1930, the artist was a teenaged Diego Rivera, who would become one of the most influential Latin American painters of the 20th century.

Purchased for pesos, the painting was appraised at the Antique Road Show for $1 million.

It may be a lesson for everyone who bought one of my recent watercolors for a paltry amount. Hang it behind a door in your utility room, but don’t let your grandkids throw it away. It might be worth something 75 years after I’m gone. Another garage sale throw-away that turns out to be a hidden treasure.

I suppose that’s why I’m also drawn to the parenthetical tidbits I discover in scripture…those short, almost throw away passages hidden within the context of a broader story. I often find that the small tidbit becomes spiritual treasure.

I discovered another of those gems this week as I glanced through the early chapters of I Chronicles. Buried in the middle of a list of begats and begots that begin with Adam and end with David, you’ll find a parenthetical statement about a man named Jabez…a prayer of a righteous man hidden among the branches of an extended family tree between the sons of Helah and the sons of Kelub.

Jabez was more honorable than his brothers. His mother had named him Jabez, saying, “I gave birth to him in pain.” Jabez cried out to the God of Israel, “Oh that you would bless me and enlarge my territory. Let your hand be with me and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain.” And God granted his request. (I Chronicles 4:9-10)

While this scriptural insert tells us a little about Jabez, it tells us more about God. It tells us of the connection between the man and the God who blessed him. I find it instructive in my life.
Within these two verses, one can find three characteristics of the kind of life that a gracious God chooses to bless.

First, we see that God blesses those who walk the path of righteousness.

Jabez was more honorable than his brothers.

Little else is known of Jabez or his family, but clearly his brothers missed the mark set by those recording the genealogy. Their lives served as a footnote to the spiritual maturity of their brother. The honor attributed to Jabez seems spiritual in nature…not so much in the physical, financial, social or political realms.

Jabez was a godly man whose moral character, convictions and conduct stood out from those around him. Jabez was honorable, living his life in right relationship with God.

Honorable doesn’t mean perfect. However, if God had a spiritual destination in mind for Jabez…an idea of who he was now, growing into the man God wanted him to be…Jabez was headed in the right direction. He walked a path marked by righteousness.

David could have been talking about Jabez when he opened his Book of Psalms.

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. (Psalm 1:1-3)

Jabez chose to ignore the advice of men who lived only for themselves. He chose to avoid the life of intentional sin. He refused to mock God or those around him. Rather, he found joy thinking about and living according to the law of God. As a result, his impact on others yielded fruit of the spirit, finding success in the work God called him to do. Jabez was honorable.

The passage shows us that God blesses those who remain faithful through the pain life brings.

Did you catch the meaning of his name? In the Hebrew culture of the day, a male child received his name when he was circumcised eight days after he was born. It must have been an extraordinarily painful childbirth for his loving mother to give him a name that means “pain,” “grief,” of “suffering.”

The name evidently proved a predictor of the hardships experienced in his life. That his brothers were less honorable might tell us that Jabez suffered hardship at the hands of his family. Maybe he had to assume debt his brothers incurred. Maybe their dishonesty brought shame on the family name. Perhaps Jabez endured health issues that impacted his ability to live as he desired. I’m guessing he struggled and suffered in much the same way we do.

Whatever the cause of his suffering throughout his life, we see in vs. 10 Jabez prays that God would protect him from harm so he would finally be “free of pain.” He longs for a time when pain and hardship are behind him.

God has a way of blessing a life scarred with pain. The Rev. H. B. Charles, Jr., wrote that “Candles must be burned in order to give light. Wheat must be ground to make bread,” he added. “We must experience some pain to experience true blessedness.”

Turning to the Psalmist again we find these words.

It is good for me I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes. (Psalm 119:71)

Charles wrote, “Pain is not the blessing, but it sets us up for blessing.” Puts us in position to be blessed. Opens our hearts to the lessons God can teach us through our experiences.

The final trait in the life of Jabez shows that God chooses also to bless the life of the one who talks to God regularly about the concerns of their hearts.

Jabez was a godly man with more than his share of pain throughout his life. In the middle of all of that, he prayed for God’s blessing. He talked to the source of all blessing.

Can’t you relate to Jabez? Scripture does not praise him for the things the world values. Things like wisdom, strength or wealth. Jabez is not celebrated for being gifted or accomplished. We’re not even told what made him honorable or the depth of pain he experienced. Scripture singles him out simply as a man who prayed for that which God laid on his heart.

You see, Jabez learned what we all need to learn. God answers prayer. Prayer is our connection to God who wants nothing more than to bless his people.

The famed pastor Charles Spurgeon said, “Prayer is the slender nerve that moves the hand of omnipotence.” We receive our greatest blessings after we pray within his will. For his blessing in my life, not my blessing.

This obscure snippet about Jabez teaches us a little about the life God chooses to bless. It also tells us that God’s blessings come in the form of his provision, his presence and his protection.

Look at what Jabez asked of God.

Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory. Let your hand be with me and keep me from harm so I will be free of pain.

Jabez asked that God’s favor would fall on him (bless me) and his situation (enlarge my borders). God knows what we’re going through. God cares about our struggles, needs, dreams and fears. Just as Jabez prayed believing that God was ready, willing and able to answer his heart’s cry, we, too, need to pray for God’s provision with expectation of his blessing.

I initially read the passage and thought Jabez was praying for greater territory and wealth. One commentary suggested his honor would have precluded that. The writer suggested that the enlarged border would strengthen the influence of Jabez to share of his relationship to God.

That makes some sense to me. As God continues to bless us, we ought to be using all he provides to extend our influence with others as a way of testifying to the world of God’s love for them through Jesus Christ. To ask him to give us a platform to share the grace of a loving God.

Jabez asked also for the blessing of God’s presence.

Let your hand be with me…

It is a sentence that speaks to the powerful presence of God in his life. As such it complements the previous request for his expanded influence. Jabez wisely knew that God’s provision and his presence presents a problem. Incapable of managing God’s provision on our own, we need his presence and power.

It’s the Psalmist again who reinforces this truth.

Let your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen your precepts. (Psalm 119:173)

Finally, God’s blessing is found in his protection.

…keep me from harm so I will be free of pain.

One commentary suggest that a more apt translation of the Hebrew is to “Keep me from doing wrong so I might not cause suffering in my life and the life of others.” In other words, protect me, God, from me. My own bad choices. My own hardheadedness. My own ego. Keep me from hurting myself and those you love.

What a blessing of protection that would be?

Every little segment of Antiques Road Show ends with the appraiser sharing with the owner what his “find” is worth. More often than not, during the show, the owner is overwhelmed by the moment when the throw-away item becomes treasure.

We may attempt to live an honorable life. Not perfect, but over the course of life walking in the general direction God desires for us. We may remain faithful through the inevitable suffering. We may even engage in the kind of deep conversations with God concerning the desires of our heart. Those things open the doors to God’s blessings.

The real treasure I needed to discover this week is found in vs. 10. Look at it.

And God granted his request.

You see, the point is not so much that Jabez was honorable, that he experienced the same kind of pain we experience or even that he prayed. The real treasure is that God answered his prayer…just as he will answer ours.

I’m grateful for a man pulled from the pages of obscurity to remind me that God is a God who looks for every chance he can to bless me with is provision, presence and protection.

I find rest in that thought and the words of God to the prophet Jeremiah.

Call to me and I will answer you and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known. (Jeremiah 33:3)

Way to go, Jabez!

Praise God from whom all blessings flow!

My Dad

Background Passages: Psalm 73:26; Galatians 5:22-23; John 1: 45-51; Psalm 23

I seldom use this space to get personal, I generally prefer to stay with the lessons God is teaching me each week. Today seems an exception.

My Dad passed away on October 5, just five days short of his 98th birthday. In the days since, we’ve been busy arranging the memorial service he planned years ago, pulling all the pieces together to reflect on a life lived so well for so long.

On one hand, it’s hard to grieve deeply when he lived independently every day of his life except for the last week before he died, even if his ability to do everything he wanted to do was somewhat restricted by the ordinary frailties caused by almost a century of living. He lived in the moments God gave him, knowing others had it much worse than he did.

On the other hand, the grief I feel runs deep, measured by the tightness in my chest caused by this new hole in a heart already riddled with the scarred holes of those loved ones lost over time.

The last time Robin and I visited with my 97-year-old Dad in Amarillo and the last two times we spoke on the phone he talked about being tired. While there may have been real physical manifestations of fatigue, I suspect he meant something much different. I think he was ready to go whenever God was ready for him.

The doctors could not give us a medical reason for Dad’s death. In language that Dad would probably enjoy, I think his tractor just ran out of butane.

David, the Psalmist, might have diagnosed Dad’s situation more eloquently.

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. (Psalm 73:26)

Dad’s flesh and his heart failed. I’m confident, however, that he knew God as his portion and strength for eternity.

I believe it is God’s desire for us to live our lives as Christ lived his. To be Christlike in the things we say and do. To me and to many he touched through his life, Dad was a mirror image of Jesus. Paul described what being a reflection of Jesus looks like in his letter to the Galatians.

“But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” (Galatians 5:22-23)

In all I read in scripture, those words describe my Jesus. I look at that list and know my Dad exhibited that same fruit like he was working a spiritual farmer’s market. Those traits were on display in his life for all to see and share, offered without cost or expectation.

If you needed love, he gave it. Peace, he shared it. Patience, he extended it. Kindness, he showed it. Goodness, he breathed it. Faithfulness, he lived it. Gentleness, he exuded it. Self-control, he modeled a bushel of it.

I wrote an article about my Dad on Father’s Day a few years ago. Dad never liked being the center of attention and fussed at me lightheartedly for “writing his eulogy” before he was gone. It wasn’t intended as a eulogy, but under today’s circumstances, it seems to fit.

What follows below is an excerpt from that article. I’m cutting out the things that tell you what Dad did and leaving the part that tells you who he was. For that, I’ll simply remind you of the story Nathaniel, of one of Jesus’ disciples.

Nathaniel, born and raised in Cana in lower Galilee just a few miles from Nazareth, worked as a part-time fisherman and a full-time seeker of God’s truth. As Jesus began his ministry, Nathaniel followed the new rabbi for several weeks, listening to his teaching, probably sitting in the back row or on the edge of the crowd, getting his own measure of his teaching. He found Jesus’ conversations in the synagogue rich with meaning and purpose. The stories told to the multitudes penetrating…challenging the listener to think more deeply about God’s word. Nathaniel was intrigued by this carpenter from Nazareth.

On one particular day, Phillip, one of Jesus’ new disciples, grabbed Nathaniel’s arm with a sense of urgency and excitement. “Come and see,” he said. “We have found the one whom Moses wrote about and about whom the prophets also wrote. Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”

Knowing the scripture as he did, Nathaniel had trouble believing that the promised one would come from Nazareth. Not yet knowing that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, he states as fact, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”

It was not a putdown as we have been made to believe through the years. He questioned because this “fact” didn’t align with scripture. When Phillip and Nathaniel approached, Jesus stood to greet him. With a smile and comment that conveyed immense respect, Jesus said, “Here is a true Israelite in whom there is nothing false.”

Whenever I think of that story and the high praise Jesus rained upon Nathaniel, I think of my Dad…My Dad is a true child of God in whom there is nothing false. While certainly not infallible, he lives his life with the utmost integrity. What you see is what you get. And you get a whole lot of good.

As a child growing up and an adult trying to find my own way in the world, Dad’s lifestyle laid out a set of undeclared expectations I still try to meet. He loved my Mom completely and with full devotion. That was a gift to his three children that he modeled each day. They endured good-natured ribbing, with a healthy dose of sarcasm, and laughed freely. Dad was her biggest supporter and she was his. His ability to love his wife and family openly was, and is, one of my greatest blessings in life.

Farming was not the easiest life to live. Dad would have supported any career path we chose, but we all knew his preference was for us to find another line of work. As a result, he raised a lawyer, a doctor and me. Dad instilled in all of us a serious work ethic, an attitude I see reflected in my brother and sister in the work they do. He worked hard and did what was necessary to support his family.

While we may not have had a lot of material things, we were never poor…in reality nor in spirit.

Dad spent long hours in the field, but he also knew how to rest. He understood that there was a time and place for everything. He learned how to leave the worries of work on the tractor and come home focused on his family. He could also put things beyond his control in proper perspective. If the crop was hailed out, he spent little time moaning about his bad luck and more time thinking about his next steps. This attitude toward life impacted me greatly.

Dad continues to teach me a great deal about our relationship to others. I don’t think I ever heard a prejudiced word escape my father’s lips. Given the time period in which he grew up, that’s pretty amazing. He taught all of us that a person’s worth is measured by who he is and not by what he looks lie. Worth, to Dad, is not measured by political preferences, religious beliefs or immigrant status. A person should be measured by how he lives each day, how he treats others, the value he adds to the world. To treat anyone differently is just wrong.

I watched Dad as I grew up. If he found himself in a fractured relationship for any reason, he did his best to set it right, even if it meant having difficult conversations. Most of the time, those conversations led to a deeper friendship or, at least a mutual, respectful understanding of the other’s position.

These things and so many others make my Dad a great man in my eyes. However, if you know my Dad or ever met him, it would not take long to understand that his relationship with God is his greatest gift to his family and friends.

If you look back to Nathaniel’s encounter with Jesus, you find Nathaniel stunned that Jesus used such kind words to describe him. “How do you know me?” asked Nathaniel. Jesus replied, “I saw you under the fig tree.” Sounds rather cryptic to us, but Bible scholars say it was not an uncommon occurrence for students of scripture to congregate under the trees, unroll a scroll to study and discuss God’s word. I like to think that Jesus was so aware of his surrounding that Nathaniel’s desire to know God more intimately did not go unnoticed by the savior.

After a long day at work, it was not uncommon to see Dad sitting in his recliner, studying his Sunday School lesson…His discussions and debates with my Mom about scripture were often lively and always deep. Just reading the words of the Bible at face value is not enough for Dad. He wants to find its core meaning and its common sense application. The Bible for Dad is not spiritual pabulum or an outline of denominational theology, it is a blueprint for practical daily living. Its message drives the way he lives and loves.

I read back through that study and see it written in present tense. It’s difficult to shift into past tense. Because his memory lives on, he will always be.

I could regale you with stories about my Dad in hopes that you could know him as I did, but I can think of nothing better than this. Dad was Nathaniel in my eyes…a man in whom there was nothing false. He was and will always be that man. Though it is probably a pale shadow, I sure hope you can see a little of him in me.

My uncle, Les, Dad’s brother, is a retired pastor and chaplain. He has a gift for words. In his recent blog about his grief at Dad’s death, he paraphrased Psalm 23. Maybe the language isn’t as poetic as David’s, but it’s written in the practical language of West Texas. I think Dad would have liked it. May it bring you the same comfort it brings me.

The Lord is like my shepherd; I really don’t need a thing. It’s like I’m walking in these green pastures among rippling streams. Maybe I should be afraid, but I’m not; God and I seem the same, and everything’s great. I am comfortable here. They’re setting a huge table and there’s a ceremony to welcome me: Me! Warts and all. I think I’m going to be just fine here. I feel only goodness and love in my soul. I live in the Lord’s house, and besides, I have an eternal contract. (Psalm 23)

That about sums it up. As Les added, “Resurrection boasts nothing good ever dies.”

I will rejoice for a life well lived.

But God

Background Passages: Genesis 50:16-21; Romans 5:6,8; Ephesians 2:1-7

Every English teacher I ever had in school harped constantly on the use of strong, active verbs, almost to the point of sucking the joy out of writing.

I can still see that smattering of red ink circles drawn around certain verbs in my essays with a line to the margin indicating, in no uncertain terms, that my teacher was disappointed in my verb choice. I measured the quality of my paper less on the grade and more on the number of times I had to read Ms. Falks’ scribbled note in the margin that just said, “weak.”

I will come out of the closet today and admit that I have always enjoyed grammar. One of my favorite parts of speech is the lowly conjunction. In case you need a reminder, conjunctions are words that link other words, phrases or clauses together. Conjunctions allow a writer to form complex, elegant sentences by avoiding the choppiness of multiple short sentences.

My favorite conjunction is the word but. Its most common usage introduces a phrase or clause that contrasts with another phrase or clause which has already been stated. For instance, “He stumbled, but did not fall.”

But always makes a bolder and grander statement in a sentence than does and, if, or so. When it comes to these statements like these, the bigger, the better.

My thoughts this week germinated during last week’s Sunday School lesson about Joseph and his brothers. Near the end of that biblical narrative in Genesis 50, Joseph’s father Jacob had died. His brothers, who sold him into slavery when he was young, feared that Joseph would seek revenge on them now that Jacob was no longer in the picture.

They concocted a lie, putting words in Jacob’s mouth. Read what the Bible says about it. Look for that conjunctive phrase.

So they sent word to Joseph, saying, “Your father left these instructions before he died. This is what you are to say to Joseph: ‘I ask you to forgive your brothers the sins and the wrongs they have committed in treating you so badly. Now please forgive the sins of the servants of the God of your father.’” When the message came, Joseph wept.

His brothers then came and threw themselves down before him. “We are your slaves,” they said. (Genesis 50:16-18)

Joseph responded to their deceitful plea in an unexpected way.

Don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God? You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives. So then, don’t be afraid, I will provide for you and your children. And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them. (Genesis 50:19-21)

Did you see it? “You intended harm, BUT GOD…”

What a big but! The words written after but God suggests a biblical truth written in a slightly different manner in the New Testament.

For we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:28)

It’s a great lesson, but not today’s lesson.

As I reflected on that lesson last Sunday, those two words kept resurfacing. But God. We see the use of but God or but the Lord at least 61 times in scripture. One thing unfolds, but God uses it to reveal his character, to teach us something we need to learn or accomplish, or to bring about his will or his purpose.

The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days, but God remembered Noah… (Genesis 7:24-8:1)

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. (Psalm 73:26)

The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. (I Samuel 16:7)

Similar instances occur in the New Testament.

No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you can bear. (I Corinthians 10:13)

He said to them, “You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with or visit a Gentile. But God has shown me that I should not call anyone impure or unclean.” (Acts 10:28)

Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David. This is my gospel, for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal. But God’s word is not chained.”(2 Timothy 2:8-9)

Study those passages on your own if you choose but notice how the phrase that comes after but God reveals so much about who God is and what he desires for us. The more I find that phrase mentioned in the Bible, the keener I am to pay attention to the words that follow. In every instance, there is a truth I probably need to hear.

The phrase, time and time again, introduces the gracious and compassionate intervention of God. He redeems. He resurrects. He makes all things new. He instructs. He is strength. He provides. He is faithful. When we erect a façade as a barrier to keep the world away, he sees straight into our hearts.

I said all of that to say this. This weekend is Palm Sunday, leading up to our celebration on Easter. There may be no greater use of the phrase but God among Christians than what you find in the Easter narrative.

Here’s the message of Easter in one simple but God statement.

You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:6, 8)

The message of Easter is one big but God. All hope seems gone. All seems lost. Then, we see this but God moment on the cross and in the empty tomb. Those words should have been the sign Pilate inscribed for his cross…not “He claimed to be King of the Jews,” but God.… It is the crux of his redemptive work and Paul knew it.

God waited until just the right moment when we could understand the depth of his sacrificial love. When the time was right, he sent his son, even though we were powerless to do anything about it on our own and ungodly in our actions.

This inconceivable act of love was in the mind and heart of our omnipotent creator from the beginning. Even before God brought those first molecules of creation together, he knew his most precious creation would rebel against him. He knew you and I would be steeped in sin and in need of a way back to him. And he provided the way.

Paul testified as much to the church in Ephesus when he wrote these words.

As for you, you were dead in in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of the world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But God, being rich in mercy and because of his great love for us, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.” (Ephesians 2:1-5)

Through an act of unmitigated love and mercy, through an act of grace, you and I, as believers in Christ, experienced our but God moment at some point in our past. We find that the celebration will continue forever, according to Paul’s next words.

But God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in the kindness in Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2:6-7)

This is the ultimate reason for sacrificing his son on the cross. This is his reason for emptying the tomb. He wants us to one day experience his eternal grace…the joy of which is indescribable.

“No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him. These are thing revealed to us by his spirit.” (I Corinthians 2:9-10)

“…But God…”

Maybe that’s the message some need to hear today. A simple paraphrase of one of the Bible’s most cherished verses.

But God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)

Maybe today can be their “but God” moment, making this Easter even more special.

For those of us who have already claimed that eternal promise and experienced our personal but God moment, what about here? What about now?

Because they reveal to me the character of the God I serve and the life he demands I live, every but God statement in scripture calls me to live a Christ-like life…even when I’m overwhelmed by the circumstances in which I’m living.

Claiming the promises of God is never easy, especially when overwhelming circumstances put us at wits end. You and I will struggle as we try to live as a disciple of Christ. While I don’t always follow through, it has been my experience that we can trust in those but God lessons we find in scripture.

In a recent blog, Lisa Appelo wrote, “But God brings hope when we can’t see a way through. But God means ashes aren’t the end of our story. And but God, not our circumstances, always gets the last word.”

In other words, go back to Joseph’s story, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done…”

That’s the story of Easter. Every but God is his grace gift and promise of eternity in heaven, but it is so much more. It is life abundant. Here. Now. But God is the peace that surpasses our understanding. It is knowing that God walks with us through the good and bad times of life, actively working in all things for the good of those who love him. But God is knowing that he has a plan for us and will actively work in our lives to see it happen in our lives.

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. (Jeremiah 29:11)

Wow! Just wow!

But God.

The Cradle, The Child, The Change

Background Passage: Luke 1:26-38; Luke 2:1-52; Matthew 1:20-21, John 3:16-17, Romans 12:2

The Christmas story of the Bible remains one of the world’s most cherished stories for more than one-third of the world’s population. We find a measure of comfort that we are somehow not alone in this world…that God is with us.

I wonder if the story has grown too familiar. Sometimes, it feels as though the luster of God’s amazing gift is dimmed by time and diminished in its telling and retelling. To keep God’s grace gift fresh, I urge you to look beyond the familiar and find…

The Cradle

Crudely cut and hastily made, the innkeeper long ago fashioned a stable from the small cave cut into the limestone behind his home. An afterthought. A casual convenience for travelers who needed a place to livery their animals for an evening.

Within the rocky cave, he chiseled a manger from a protruding slab of rock, hollowing out the stone as a roughly cut and casually built feed trough. The man was no craftsman. He took little time to measure its dimensions or smooth its sides. He left it crude and rough around the edges. A coarse creation, suitable only, it seemed, for one insignificant purpose.

A manger.

A feed trough.

A construction scarcely given a second thought. Invisible to the world around it.

Until this day.

Inside the stable, despite the chill of the evening, a young woman lay drenched in sweat, exhausted by days of travel and hours in labor. Her husband, a young carpenter, paced outside the shelter. Though sympathetic to the pain she bore, like most fathers, he was clueless to its intensity.

He heard a midwife urging one more push. With a guttural groan that made the nervous animals scatter in their stalls and pull against their reins, the woman delivered her son. Tears and laughter comingled with each exhausted breath.

The midwife cleaned the baby as he shivered and cried in the night. The old woman rested the swaddled child upon the mother’s chest. The baby’s cries calmed as he heard the reassuring rhythm of her heart.

While Mary sang a lullaby to her child, Joseph quickly swept the stable of its filth-stained dirt. As he pulled the animal-stained hay from the manger, he noticed its sharp edges. A stone mason and carpenter, Joseph pulled a mallet and chisel from the knapsack. With practiced hands, he smoothed the sharp edges and rough bottom, added new hay and a soft blanket. In the glow of that first Christmas morning, the manger, no longer a rough-hewn feed trough, became a cradle.

In one moment beyond comprehension, God entered his creation as a baby born into a world that had grown as spiritually cold as the cave in which he was born. A world as morally crude as the manger in which he rested.

When filled with God’s love personified in the Christ-child, the unsightly manger became the cradle of Life Abundant, transformed in its purpose by the presence of Emmanuel.

God with us.

Perhaps the manger and its crude construction mirror the mess we’ve made in our lives. We hurriedly chisel our life from the stone, giving little thought to the purpose for which we were created. Whether we live a life of irreverent insurrection or one of unintentional indifference, we find our spiritual edges a little too sharp, a little too crude, a little too rough around the edges. A coarse creation, suitable only, it seems, for insignificant purposes.

Yet, in one miraculous birth, in one divine delivery, God changed everything.

When the manger became a cradle, God came to His world as one of us. To offer himself as the perfect portrait of Godly living.

Because the manger became a cradle, the baby would grow into a savior, to offer himself as a perfect sacrifice for a world that lost its way.

Because the manger became a cradle, Christmas means more than the tinsel and trimmings that the world celebrates.

Because the manger became a cradle, the Christ-Child gives us the chance to turn our empty lives into Life Abundant. God smooths the rough edges and transforms our hearts and our purpose through the constant presence of Emmanuel.

God with us.

Then, to keep God’s grace gift fresh, I urge you to look beyond the cradle and find…

The Child

Born to human parents, but also divine. It is a difficult concept to grasp. Impossible to truly understand. So, we who believe accept it by faith just as his earthly parents did.

Though implanted with God’s DNA, to understand the full measure of what it meant to be Savior did not come instinctively to Jesus. He learned. He learned at the feet of Joseph who surely shared his dream.

“Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:20-21)

He learned on the lap of his mother who surely shared the angel’s words.

“Do not be afraid, Mary. You have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”

As he grew, he learned from the teachers of God’s word. When he turned 12-years-old, he journeyed to the Temple with his parents. The child immersed himself in his father’s word, failing to join his family for the trip home.

“They found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking questions…” (Luke 2:46)

Jesus spent time learning more about “his Father’s business.” Eventually, he returned with his parents to Nazareth where “Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and men.” (Luke 2:41-52)

God continued to prepare the child for the purpose for which he was sent. This child, who heard his parents’ stories, who studied scripture with the learned men of his day, constantly felt the tug of God’s voice revealing to him who he was and the purpose for which he was sent. This same child, born in a manger, stood as a man at a wedding feast in Cana, looking into the eyes of his mother telling her, “My hour has not yet come.” This same child read in his mother’s eyes and heard her tell the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” Her way of saying, “It is time.”

From that day forward, Jesus went about doing his father’s business, drawing others to him, performing miracles and teaching them about repentance and the depth of God’s love…teaching them about grace.

That child from the manger sat in an olive grove answering the probing questions of Nicodemus about the path to eternal life. Jesus surely reflected upon his own birth when he said, “You must be born again.”

That child from the manger told that religious leader that he had come to take on the sins of a world because “God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3:16-17)

That child in a cradle was God’s grace gift of salvation. The man he grew to be…became a savior.

Understanding our relationship to God and his will for our lives is not implanted naturally into our DNA just because we are born to Christian parents or attend church regularly. Our understanding of what God requires of us comes from listening to God’s spirit and following Jesus’ lead.

We learn. We grow. We spend time sitting among the teachers, studying scripture and asking questions with a heart’s desire to grow in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and men…just as Jesus did. We see the child in the cradle and are reminded that God loved us so much that he sent his son to save us and the world around us through him.

Then, to keep God’s grace gift fresh this Christmas, I urge you to look beyond the cradle, see the savior and commit to…

The Change

As Christians, we get pulled into the celebration of the Christmas holiday. We delight in the lights, the decorations and the excited faces of the children opening Santa’s presents. We enjoy our parties with friends and visits with our extended families. It’s easy to be lost in the business and busyness of Christmas.

Those of us who celebrate the birth of Jesus ought to reflect upon its meaning, using the day as a reminder of God’s plan and purpose to bring the world back into relationship with him by sending is Son. It is far too easy for many of us to revel in the birth of the child and forget that God expects more from us.

What do we do after we read that beautiful story for the last time this year? After we snuff out the Advent candles? After we sing the last carol? After we dismantle the Nativity scenes? What do we do after we celebrate the birth of the Christ child? What do we do when Christmas is over? What change does it bring to our lives?

You see, the Christmas story does not end with the birth of Jesus. It doesn’t even end with his death and resurrection. Once the baby is born and a savior’s act complete, the story and its impact should serve as a catalyst for God to change our lives.

Christmas is a reminder that God will work in our lives, but only to the extent that we allow him. Christmas must change our hearts and our minds, not just on the surface, but from the inside out.

Though he didn’t celebrate Christmas as we do, the Apostle Paul would be the first to tell you about being changed. In a blinding revelation on the road to Damascus, he saw before him God’s plan of redemption evidenced in the life of Christ…from his birth to his resurrection and his ever-present spirit. It was a life-changing encounter. It’s one reason he could encourage the Christians in Rome to set aside the ways of the world for the life Christ offers.

“Do not conform to the pattern of the world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. (Romans 12:2)

You see, Christmas is just a holiday unless we let God chisel away the rough edges of our lives to make our hearts a comfortable place for the Christ child to rest. It is just a holiday unless we see Jesus as more than a baby in a manger and accept him as a savior and Lord. Christmas is just a holiday unless we allow the child who became savior to transform our hearts and minds in such a way that we are ever obedient to his will in all things.

“You shall call him Jesus, Emmanuel…God with us.”

That’s Christmas to me.

In the Potter’s Hands

Background Passages: Jeremiah 18:1-6; 2 Chronicles 1:7,10; Luke 22:42 Ephesians 2:10

A confluence of disconnected spiritual thoughts joined into one idea this week…rivulets of scripture and song flowing from different places to form one lesson, one powerful reminder of what it means to live a life obedient to God’s will. See if you can follow the path of my warped mind.

……….

Sunday’s Random Thought…

It came to mind again this week when I was lost in thought while exercising. Out of nowhere, I thought of the song, Have Thine Own Way, by Adelaide Pollard. The lines that kept repeating in my head were:

“Have Thine own way, Lord.
Have Thine own way.
Thou art the potter,
I am the clay.
Mold me and make me,
after thy will,
while I am waiting,
yielded and still.”

It seems that after graduating from college in Boston, Pollard moved to Chicago to teach in a girl’s school there. In frail health, she was drawn to first a faith healer and then to an evangelist who preached only about the end times and the second coming of Christ.

She moved back to New England feeling called to be a missionary in Africa. A series of health setbacks, detours and roadblocks derailed her plans. Despondent, she attended a prayer meeting one evening and heard an elderly woman pray: “It doesn’t matter what you bring into our lives, Lord, just have your own way with us.”

Before the evening was over, Pollard penned the words to the song that kept repeating in my brain.

“Have Thine own way…mold me and make me…Thou art the potter. I am the clay.”

It is a metaphor not uncommon in scripture. Jeremiah used it to make a point. Paul hinted at it several times in his letters.

Let that tickle the corners of your heart for a bit. We’ll come back to it.

……….

Tuesday’s Random Thought…

They had been a rebellious people. Having grown indifferent to the covenant they made with God, the people of Israel grew obstinate and defiant toward the word of the Lord. Shedding the commands of God like a dirty cloak, they held God’s law in contempt, comfortable doing their own thing.

God called them “stiff-necked.” Stubborn. Intractable. Hard to lead.

I find the term descriptively appropriate to my life at times. “Stiff-necked” was a term intimately familiar to the Jewish people. Most farmed small plots to feed their families and livestock. With oxen to pull the plow, they used an ox-goad, a pointed stick or metal rod to poke the ox to direct its path. The stubborn or stiff-necked ox would ignore the prod and go where it wanted to go.

The Hebrew people lived a roller coaster life of obedience and stubbornness. This was one of those moments at the bottom of the ride. God called Jeremiah to give a word of warning to his stiff-necked people.
Weary of their rebelliousness, God told Jeremiah to “go to the potter’s house” and wait for his word. Jeremiah sat down beside the potter and watched him work the wheel.

“But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as it seemed best to him.” Then the word of the Lord came to me. He said, “Can I not do with you, Israel, as this potter does? Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, Israel.” (Jeremiah 18:1-6)

I like that idea. When I am misshapen, God can form me into another pot as it seems best to him.

Let that germinate in your fertile soil for a little while.

……….

Thursday’s Random Thought…

The day had been a glorious day. Jesus’ entry into the City of David found him surrounding by an adoring multitude, waving palm branches and singing praises. They wanted nothing more than to be near the one who had done so many miraculous things. Jesus spent the day preaching and teaching all who would listen.

After an evening meal that left his closest followers bewildered and perplexed, Jesus took them back out of the city into the Garden of Gethsemane to pray. Settling his weary band of disciples onto the rocky hillside, Jesus took a handful of his closest friends a little farther up the hill. “Come, pray with me,” he implored them.

Jesus walked a few steps away before falling on his knees. Leaning against a boulder with his head searching the heavens, Jesus prayed for a way out of the horror that awaited him.

“Father, if you are willing,” he prayed, “let this cup pass from me.”

I can only imagine Jesus recalling Abraham, hovering over his son, Isaac, with a knife prepped and ready to take his life in sacrifice to God. As Jesus recalled how God stayed the hand of Abraham, telling him to find the ram trapped in the thicket as a substitute for his son, I can see Jesus hoping that God would find a ram to take his place.

No new word came from above. No ram in the garden. Jesus, ever obedient to his father, prayed, what Bill Wilson, with the Center for Healthy Churches, calls the “prayer of holy indifference.”

“Yet, not my will, by thine be done.” (Luke 22:42)

Such sweet surrender. A sobering thought for any day. Take a moment. Consider its implications.

……….

Friday’s Random Thought…

In a recent study of Solomon’s life, we find him taking the reins of leadership from his father David. The task ahead must have seemed daunting. His first official act was to bring the people together to worship. A thousand sacrifices were made. Prayers voiced. Songs played and sung in adoration of their Creator God. Deliverer. Lord Almighty.

God honored Solomon’s worship. That evening he spoke to the new king and offered him a blank check of God’s promise.

“Ask me whatever you want me to give you.” Solomon answered God, “…Give me wisdom and knowledge, that I might lead this people, for who is able to govern this great people of yours.” (2 Chronicles 1:7,10)

God delivered in a significant way. Through his life, Solomon was noted for his wisdom. Scripture tells us kings and queens from all over the known world journeyed to Jerusalem to sit in counsel with the man. To pick his brain.

“All the kings of the earth sought audience with Solomon to hear the wisdom God had put on his heart.” (2 Chronicles 9:23)

Solomon allowed God to teach him. To reveal truth to him. To apply that truth to everyday life. Solomon looked at the world around him and understood how much he did not know about governing…about life…about how to be who God needed him to be. His prayer for wisdom and knowledge reveals his humility before God. In praying for God’s help, he made himself clay in the potter’s hands, a person to be molded and shaped.

Hang on to that bit of wisdom just a moment longer.

……….

There you go. Four seemingly random thoughts entering my brain at different times and for very different reasons. Let me share with you, if I can, where these streams of thought came together.

If I’m honest, I suspect my life is not that different from the lives of those who frustrated God and Jeremiah. One minute faithful. The next minute faithless. One moment seeking God. The next moment scorning God. While I want to believe I live my life more in those faithful, seeking moments, those times when I am faithless and scorning haunt me profoundly. Create more turmoil than necessary.

That’s why I the words of Have Thine Own Way resonate so deeply. Adelaide Pollard nailed it. Despite the turmoil in her life, despite every obstacle that kept her from going where she wanted to go, she penned words that speak to me every time I hear them.

“Thou art the potter. I am the clay.
Mold me. Make me.
After thy will.”

That’s the prayer of one hoping to let go of the arrogance and ignorance that tends to walk it’s own road, unwilling to listen to either the still, small voice or the clap of thunder.

The sweetest times of life come when I make myself pliable enough for God to begin again to shape me into the man he desires me to be. I see myself sitting next to Jeremiah, learning a valuable lesson from the potter. When my life is marred in God’s hands, I am glad he reshapes it as a “another pot,” remolding me in ways that seem “best to him.”

That only happens when let go of my stubborn pride and my stiff-necked attitude.

That’s where I draw inspiration from Solomon. God offered Solomon anything…everything. Yet, Solomon did not ask for riches. He did not ask for possessions or honor. He did not ask for the death of his enemies. He did not ask for a long life.

Solomon asked for God’s wisdom. I shudder to think of my response if I were allowed to rub God’s genie lamp and claim my wish. Seeking God’s will for our lives is the ultimate act of wisdom. Understanding that God’s skill at the potter’s wheel outshines our clumsy attempts to shape our own lives. Think about Pollard’s fervent prayer of submission. Solomon’s humble request for wisdom.

Then, we find ourselves in the Garden of Gethsemane. Listening to Jesus plead for God to find another way that would not take him to the cross. Spending hours agonizing over that which he was called to do.

As he prayed and listened for his Father’s word, he got to a decision point where he could walk on or walk away. His prayer was perfect. A prayer indifferent to his own will and wish. “Not my will, but yours be done.”

In the silence immediately after that prayer, I believe a calm settled in Jesus’ heart. A peace in knowing that if he remained obedient, all would be well. That God’s purpose and plan for his life and for the world, would be satisfied.

So, recognizing my tendency to be stiff-necked when it comes to what God desires of me, I lean upon a song that asks God to mold me, like a potter, after his will, not mine. I seek his wisdom, knowing his understanding far exceeds my limited abilities. When submission and humility united, the prayer of holy indifference is so much easier to pray.

Nevertheless, Father, not my will, but yours be done. weet surrender of one completely in God’s will.

Today’s Last Random Thought…

As I finished this meandering idea, hoping it would make sense, one more verse came to mind. One more random…God-inspired…thought.

Paul, writing to the church in Ephesus, reminded them that the grace gift of salvation that God provided gave them divine purpose. He said,

“We are God’s workmanship, created in Jesus Christ, to do good works, which he determined in advance for us to do.’” (Ephesians 2:10)

The word Paul uses for “workmanship” can be translated “work or art” or “masterpiece.” I like that idea, particularly in light of my other random thoughts.

The potter is also an artist. As capable with a cup as with a sculpture. As the works of God’s hand, carefully shaped and molded into a masterpiece of his will and way, we are called then to do the good work he has planned for us to do. Capable of doing it well. Capable of doing it right. Capable of doing it consistently.

All it required is submission, humility, surrender and the willingness to let the potter work.

Now, you catch a glimpse of how my mind works. I just hope there is a clear message buried in the meandering madness.

No Longer Bent

Background Passages: Luke 13:10-17 and I John 1:8-9

I like to think I’m related to him. After all, we all would like to be related to someone famous.

C.S. Lewis, one of the 20th century’s most dynamic apologists of the Christian faith, is best known in the modern world as the author of The Chronicles of Narnia, a story rich in Christian symbolism. I first encountered his writings when I read The Screwtape Letters and Mere Christianity in college. The former an intriguing look at how Satan manipulates us; the latter a deep presentation of the validity of Christianity and what the life of a Christian is like.

He penned a lesser known book called Out of the Silent Planet. Similar to Narnia, it is a science fiction book written in the 1930s in which his protagonist journeys to another world. Like Narnia, he weaves Christian symbolism through the pages of Silent Planet. I admit I’ve only read snippets of this book, but within its pages Lewis uses his space traveler to explain sin to a people who never heard the concept.

After searching for a definition that would make sense to these aliens, the hero settled on the words “bent” and “bound.” Lewis defined sin as “misshapen.” “Not the way we were made to be.” “Not fit for our intended purpose.”

It is as good a definition as any. When a nail is bent, it cannot be hammered unless it is straightened. When an arrow is bent, it cannot fly straight. When we are bent, we are not shaped in the way God intended us to be. Lewis speaks of the sinner as one bound. Tied up. Unable to shake free. Trapped.

To paraphrase Romans, “For all are bent, and fall short of God’s glory.”

I’m writing today, recognizing my “bentness.” Okay, I made up that word, but you get the point. Sin makes us uncomfortable. We don’t like to think about our failings. While we know we sin, we also know that we don’t sin constantly. That we do some things right. We want to focus on that to make ourselves feel a bit better.

Here’s the truth about sin, however. When we break our arm, the rest of our body still functions as designed. We are not capable of doing everything we want to do until the arm is healed. Sin works the same way. While we can still do some good things, as long as sin is in our lives, we aren’t everything God needs us to be. We are not fit for our intended purpose.

Thank God his forgiveness is not just a heavenly thing that comes at the end of our time. Forgiveness is a daily gift for those who seek it.

Luke may not have written this story with that in mind, but it made me think again that God doesn’t wish for us to live bent and bound by sin. Look at Luke 13.

Jesus sat among the people in a local synagogue on the Sabbath, likely at the invitation of the local church officials who were somewhat excited to have this popular rabbi passing through their village. Chances are Jesus had never taught in this synagogue. He probably didn’t know too many people in the crowd. Teaching in the synagogue was simply his practice during his earthly ministry. Something he wanted to do. Something he enjoyed.

In the middle of his dialogue with the people about some passage of scripture, a woman captured Jesus’ attention, stopping him in mid-sentence. In those seconds of silence, you can hear the rustle of robes as the crowd turns to follow Jesus’ gaze.

What Jesus saw broke his heart. He swallowed a wave of overwhelming, God-inspired empathy. A lump of emotion filled his throat and the tears well up in his eyes.

“…a woman was there, crippled by a spirit for 18 years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all.” (Luke 13:11)

When you picture this woman, you have to picture a posture more than stooped. The curvature of her spine forced her shoulders forward and downward. Bent at the waist, hobbling on unsteady legs and a knobby walking stick. Unable to lift her head above her horizon. The woman lived with a stark debilitation that left her crippled and unable to function.

As Jesus’ voice trailed off, he watched as the woman shuffled for her seat along the wall. She didn’t approach Jesus. Made no request of him. She didn’t proclaim her faith in him as a miracle worker. She just wanted to sit to take the burden off her feet and her back.

The rustle of robes returns as the crowd turns back to Jesus, as if to say, “It’s just Miriam. She’s been like that forever.” They know her. They have seen her around the village. Some of them probably even checked on her from time to time.

“Miriam,” my name for her, does today what she has probably done every Sabbath for the past 18 years. There is no indication in scripture that this was an unusual event. No indication that today the spirit moved her to get out of bed and make the difficult journey to the synagogue.

She came, as she always did, to be taught. To worship and learn. Today was no different. She probably didn’t even now there would be a guest teacher in the pulpit. This was just her place on the Sabbath. Jesus called her a “daughter of Abraham” in verse 16, possibly recognizing that this was her faithful pattern on the Sabbath, the place she needed and wanted to be on any Lord’s day.

In the midst of the ordinary, something extraordinary happened in this synagogue on this day.

Jesus swallowed the lump in his throat, choking back his emotion. He stood and called to her before she sat down, asking her to come forward. With difficulty she tilted her head to see who called out to her. As she looked sidelong at Jesus, she sidled slowly, and probably a bit suspiciously, his direction until she stood, hunched over in front of him.

Jesus dropped to a knee with his hand lightly on her shoulder, the tilt of his head matching hers until he looks her in the eyes.

His word is simple. His intent clear.

“Woman, you are set free from you infirmity. He put his hands upon her; and immediately she straightened up and praised God.”

The woman came to God’s house bent and broken, bound by her affliction. Jesus set her free. The root word in Greek for “set free” is to “loosen” or “untie.” She was no longer bent by or bound to her ailment. She had been released from almost two decades of physical torment.

Jesus set her free, released her from her bonds, not because she begged him to, but because he wanted to. He set her free because he wanted her to be free. To be what God intended her to be. It was, after all, the reason he came.

I find that an excellent illustration of our sin and God’s forgiveness. C. S. Lewis says sin misshapes us. Leaves us bent and broken. Paul talks about being bound in sin. Tied up and shackled by it. A slave to it.

I think when Jesus sees us bound in our sin, he still gets that same lump in his throat. That same overwhelming sense of empathy that he learned while hanging on a cross. It is what compelled him to die for us…an empathic love that says, “I can’t stand to see you this way.”

It is what keeps him reminding us, through his spirit, that God stands ready to forgive our sins.

God does not wait for us to come to grips with our bent and misshapen selves. Through Jesus Christ, he called us to himself, looked us in the eye, and took the full burden of our “bentness” all the way to Calvary. In doing so, he said to us, “Straighten up. You are set free.”

Once set free, we can respond as this woman did and praise God who loves us.

But, there is another character in this story. The administrator of the synagogue, the one responsible for proper protocol, objected indignantly to the healing. He quieted the crowd with a stern, “holier-than-thou” stare and a thunderous exclamation.

Rather than challenge this upstart rabbi directly, he turned his back to Jesus and admonished the astonished crowd for getting excited about a breach in protocol, putting Jesus in his place and indirectly chastising the woman whom Jesus healed.

In the arrogant tone of the righteously misguided, he said, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

Protocol over people. Ritual over right.

Jesus would have none of it.

“You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water?” (Luke 13:15)

There’s that word again. The word Jesus used when he told the woman she had been “set free” from her disability, is the same word translated “untie” in this passage. He’s saying, “You willing set your donkey free on the Sabbath to give him a drink. Yet, you balk at setting this woman free from an 18-year trauma.”

Jesus said it better than I did. He said,

“Then should not this woman, this daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for 18 long years, be set free (untied, released) on the Sabbath day from what bound her?” (Luke 13:16)

Here’s the kicker in this part of the story. We see clearly that the woman was set free, but what of the church official. His strict adherence to a distorted interpretation of scripture and church tradition, left him criticizing when he ought to be celebrating. His objection revealed just how bent out of shape he was. Revealed the sin in his life.

You have to wonder about the administrator. I wonder how many times this poor woman sought his prayers for healing over 18 years. I wonder if seeing her every Sabbath and now seeing her healed shamed him for his failure to invoke God’s healing.

This poor church official fell victim to a distorted spiritual view that at times inflicts all of us. C. S. Lewis said, “Those of us who do not think about our own sins make up for it by thinking incessantly about the sins of others.” It was and is a myopic view.

This church official, like me at times, got so busy “doing church” that he “did no good.” He could not recognize that his reliance on ritual blinded him to his own “bentness.” Bound to sin he didn’t know he had. Thinking that his body was functioning at 100 percent efficiency without acknowledging that his arm was broken.

When faced with our own sin, we have two choices.

We can fail to recognize that we are as bent spiritually as this woman was physically. Without recognizing our hypocrisy and seeking God’s forgiveness, we remain tied and bound to the sin.

“If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us…” (I John 1:8)

Or…

We can recognize our misshapen selves. That we are living in a way that is not what God intended. A burdened, but repentant heart that stands hunched over before God seeking his forgiveness and willing to accept the grace gift of his forgiveness.

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (I John 1:9)

The attitude of the contrite gives God the chance to put his hand lightly on our shoulder and tell us to straighten up. It is a moment for praising God and celebrating our new freedom in him.

When we have been untied from the sin in our lives, Jesus gives us the opportunity to be “surprised by joy,” to use again the words of C. S. Lewis. The woman in our story praised the one who set her free.

I’m grateful for my God who is relentless in his desire to forgive.

A Seat at His Table

Background Passages: I Samuel 30:1-6; 2 Samuel 9:1-12; I Peter 1:4; and Romans 1:17

I was probably 12 years old when it happened. During our extended family gatherings, the children piled their plates with food and sat around folding tables in my grandmother’s living room, listening surreptitiously to the adult conversations in the dining room next door, longing for the day when we could sit at the big table.

There was something maturing about sitting among the adults. The teasing among cousins in the “kid’s room” gave way to the easy listening to life lessons and good-natured banter among my parents and my uncles and aunts. I found it riveting. I also found it much easier to reach the ham and coconut cream pie.

I thought of that today when in my Bible study I came across I story I read long ago and forgot. It’s a great reminder today about why we get to sit at the big table.

Bad news travels fast.
Israel’s army routed.
Saul and Jonathan slain in battle.
As the news breaks,
panic ran rampant throughout the encampment.

We’ll call her “Eglah.”
A nursemaid for Jonathan’s son,
Mephibosheth.
The young maiden scooped the frightened five-year-old
into her arms,
raced passed the tents,
pushed through the throng of terrified people.

Into the hills they escaped,
as far from the battlefield as possible.
As she climbed the rocky path carrying the young child,
Eglah tripped on a tree root.
Stumbled and fell to the ground,
crushing the child between her and the unyielding rocks.

He shrieked in pain.
Both ankles broken,
twisted at unnatural angles.

Alone and scared,
Eglah wrapped the shattered bones as best she could,
lifted the sobbing child again into her arms
and continued her flight to the east.
Five days later, the two refugees crossed the Jordan River
Finding a safe haven in the home of a friend in Lo Debar.
A nothing place.
Off the beaten path.
A great place to hide.

Eglah.
A simple maiden.
Knew enough of the world to know
that a new king
would seek out all descendants of the old ruler
to eliminate every threat to his reign.

In terror they hid in Lo Debar
Fearful of every stranger
who chanced upon their village.
In hiding for 15 years.
Mephibosheth’s feet never healed properly,
Leaving him a cripple both in body and spirit.

Meanwhile, across the Jordan in a
conquered Jerusalem…

King David.
Stood on the balcony of his palace
overlooking the valley below.
The journey to this place difficult.
Anointed by God as a child.
The future king of Israel.
A youth spent avoiding the insanity of Saul.
Fighting battles with the Philistines.
Leading armies against the
Moabites and the Edomites.

Finally, after years of war,
surveyed the land he now controlled from Jerusalem’s walls
and declared peace.
Standing at last where God
called him to stand.

Yet on a day when all was right,
his heart rang hollow…empty.
He always envisioned sharing moments like this
with his best friend Jonathan.
David still mourned his death
after so many years.
Jonathan’s friendship had been a
God-given gift.

Standing on the balcony this day,
David remembered the promise Jonathan
asked of David so long ago.

“Please show to me your unfailing kindness
like the Lord’s kindness
as long as I live,
so that I may not be killed,
and do not ever cut off your kindness from my family…”
(I Samuel 20:14-15)

David intended to honor that covenant.
Calling for his advisors,
David asked,

“Is there anyone still left of the house of Saul
to whom I can show kindness for
Jonathan’s sake?”
(2 Samuel 9:1)

And the search began.

Eventually, David discovered Mephibosheth,
living under the radar,
out of sight,
in a nothing place on the
outer edge of the kingdom.

Read the rest of the story for yourself.

“When Mephibosheth, son of Jonathan, son of Saul,
came to David, he bowed down to pay him honor.

“David said, ‘Mephibosheth!’

“’Your servant,’ he replied.

“’Don’t be afraid,’ David said to him,
‘for I will surely show you kindness
for the sake of your father Jonathan.
I will restore to you all the land that
belonged to your grandfather Saul,
and you will always eat at my table.’

“Mephibosheth bowed down and said,
‘What is your servant,
that you should notice a dead dog like me?’

“So Mephibosheth ate at David’s table
like one of the king’s sons.”

(2 Samuel 9:6-8, 11)

I find in this heart-warming Bible story, a clear message of God’s desire for a relationship with a broken and self-isolated world. I find common ground with Mephibosheth. Any believer redeemed by God should relate to the experience of being granted grace undeserved by a king. The budding relationship between God and Mephibosheth is a perfect picture of God’s relationship to you and me.

Nothing in the realm of world politics required David to care for Mephibosheth. In fact, David’s advisors surely warned him against bringing Saul’s grandson into the city. For his part, Mephibosheth understood enough to know his life was not his own. He harbored no illusions that if he were ever discovered by the king, his life was forfeit. Kingdom politics at play. When he dragged his useless feet into the throne room, bowed before the king in sincere humility, he knew mercy was his only hope.

Nothing in the spiritual realm requires God to reach out to a sinful humanity. He is the Creator God. Our rebellion deserved punishment. Yet, he made a covenant of grace with his people. A promise he would eternally keep. Kingdom reality at play. While we deserved death, he found a way to give us new life. Mercy is our only hope.

For his part, David made a promise long ago to Jonathan, a man he viewed as a brother. It was a covenant rooted in love and watered by grace. Once he got wind of a living child of Jonathan, David found him in a desolate place…disabled, disheartened, defeated by the cruelty of life. But when he looked into his eyes, he saw the eyes of Jonathan and his heart leapt with joy. “Mephibosheth!”

It is the same celebration enjoyed by the Father and his angels when a sinner repents. God looks into the eyes of the sinner and sees the eyes of Jesus and his heart leaps with joy. “Kirk!” God celebrated in the same way when every believer bowed before the king. He longs to celebrate with every lost child who now lives in Lo Debar fearful of being discovered by a God whose heart he does not understand.

David did two things for Mephibosheth so illustrative of God’s compassion and grace toward us. First, he returned his dignity. Living so long in his nothing place, Mephibosheth saw himself equal to his surroundings. A bundle of self-loathing on crutches. Wretched. Crippled. Unworthy. A mirror image of every humiliating taunt the misguided attached to his name. In his own words, a “dead dog.” Dogs were detested in Jewish culture, considered unclean. A dead dog was a double whammy.

David did the unthinkable. He called him by name. No longer “crippled.” No longer “damaged goods.” No longer “lost,” “forgotten,” or “alone.” Look at it in the scripture. He was “Mephibosheth!” With an exclamation point, not a question mark or a simple period.

The first gift David gave to Mephibosheth was to return to him his dignity. The first gift God gives to us is to call us by name and declare us worthy of his love through the sacrificial death and miraculous resurrection of his son, Jesus Christ. All dignity we lost as sinners returned when he called us by name.

Secondly, David restored Mephibosheth all he had lost. By adopting him into his family, David restored his inheritance and gave him a seat at the king’s table. Think prodigal son. The father, watching every day, praying for his son’s return. Seeing him returning on the horizon he calls for the ring and robe and prepared a banquet in his honor. Returning him to the seat he once occupied. Far more than Mephibosheth could have hoped. Far more, he knew, than he deserved.

Is that not an amazing example of God’s grace toward us?

In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade…kept in heaven for you…” (I Peter 1:4)

Now, if we are children, then we are heirs…heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may share in his glory.” Romans 1:17

Through the salvation he offers, he grants us an eternal seat at his table. Forever a child of the king. A place of belonging.

Grace is not an easy concept to grasp. We define it with two words. “Unmerited favor.” We trust it as the basis of our salvation. Though we sing it with fervor I’m not sure we understand how amazing it truly is.

God painted this beautiful picture of grace and the story of Mephibosheth was its canvas. All I know is that I was Mephibosheth and Mephibosheth was me. And today, by the good grace of God, I have a place at the king’s table.

An Inconvenient Faith

Background Passages: Jude; Romans 8:28, Luke 14:28-33; Matthew 16:25-26

We live in a culture that carries with it a sense of entitlement to the good life. A belief that the world owes us a certain standard of living. An expected quality of life. There is an increasing number of people in our culture who hold an unrealistic, unmerited and inappropriate expectation that others should extend to them favorable treatment or conditions to make their lives easier. Our culture seems to have abandoned, to a large degree, the idea of personal accountability.

Everyone signs off on the idea of our responsibility of helping others, but we tend to qualify that assistance with “as long as its convenient and benefits me.”

It’s a sad enough perspective when taken at a culture level, when this sense of entitlement creeps into the life of the church it weakens our message and our ministry. Yet, there is a thread of entitlement weaving its way into the gospel turning worship into entertainment and God’s word into a watered down “make me feel good about myself” version of truth.

The brightly colored billboard advertising a mega-church led with this…

“All things work together for good…” (Rom. 8:28)

On its surface, a positive and encouraging message. The snippet suggests that God loves me so much that he will prevent bad things from happening to me. That I am somehow entitled to his blessing. That his will for my life is filled with financial blessing and physical health. That all I need to do is to stay positive. To think positive thoughts. It is the root of the prosperity gospel so prevalent today.

The trouble with faith grounded in entitlement is as life takes a turn for the worse, which it will inevitably do, the roots of our belief barely stretch beyond the topsoil, depriving us of the strength we need in troubled times. When life and faith fail to match our expectations, we question the reality of God’s love.

The problem with the truncated message of the billboard is that it left out the important part.

“For we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” (Romans 8:28)

I have learned in my life that God works through tragedy and turmoil to teach me…and grow me…and nurture me…and sustain me. To make his presence known. To allow me to feel his presence through his perpetual love and perfect will for my life. For me to understand his working in my life I must focus my love, faith and trust on him. Whatever the outcome, God’s result will always be better than anything I try to do on my own.

The conflict between authentic faith and convenient faith is not new. It has been an issue for the church from the beginning. The rich young ruler turned away from Jesus because the demands of discipleship were too high. Judas betrayed Jesus because his gospel didn’t fit his world perspective.

Demas, a cohort of Paul’s during his second missionary journey, shirked his responsibilities and abandoned Paul while the apostle languished in a Roman prison. When Demas faced a difficult moment of ministry, God’s way looked too steep. The world’s way looked easier, more prosperous…more convenient…and he walked away.

Yet, there is an answer. Buried in plain view in one of the most obscure books of the New Testament.

Despite its rapid growth, the early Christian church fought through serious issues that challenged the nature of faith. By the time Jude wrote his letter to a group of Jewish converts, the battle for authentic faith hit with full force.

It didn’t take long for folks to try and make the Christian life more convenient by distorting the teachings of Christ. Within a few years of Jesus’ time on earth, there were those who perverted the concept of God’s grace. Since grace trumped the law, they reasoned, then morality doesn’t matter. You can live anyway you please knowing that God’s grace covers all sin. They took this idea so far that these false teachers declared that the more you sinned, the more grace was revealed, adding to your testimony of God’s goodness. As Dana Carvey’s “Church Lady” once proclaimed, “How convenient.”

The early church also wrestled with those who believed that God granted special knowledge to some people that made them more godly than others to whom this knowledge was denied. That true salvation depended upon receiving this special knowledge.

Early in his letter, Jude tells us he intended to write them about the faith they share. Helping them grow deeper in that faith. Because of the issues they faced, his message changed, urging them, instead, to be prepared to defend the faith against those who would distort the truth. Jude recognized that the greatest danger to the Christian faith was not the opposition from outside the church, but from those inside the faith who would lessen the demands of discipleship to make it more palatable…easier…convenient. Jude called these folks, “clouds that drop no rain but are blown away by the wind.”

Authentic faith is never convenient. Authentic faith never promises personal prosperity. It never promises an easier life by the world’s standards. Authentic faith always calls us to step outside our comfort zones to be obedient to his will and to meet the needs of others. To live the life he called us to live. Authentic faith requires us to set aside any sense of entitlement and live in service to others.

The question is how do we do that?

Jude gives us the blueprint.

“But you, beloved, you must build yourselves up on the foundation of your most holy faith; you must pray in the Holy spirit; you must keep yourselves in the love of God; while you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ which will bring you life eternal.” {Jude 20-21)

Build our lives on the foundation of faith handed down through Jesus Christ. The person of faith rests his life not on personal opinion or a man-inspired gospel, but upon the words and truth of Jesus. A few verses earlier he called upon his brothers and sisters in Christ to “remember the words of the apostles.” To ground ourselves in scripture. Yet, he adds a clear distinctive. It’s not enough for us to rely on our own interpretations, but to look at the gospel of Christ under the prayerful guidance of the God’s spirit. Testing what we think we think we know against his word and the spirit’s revelation to us.

Jude also teaches that the foundation of our faith will be evidence in our love for God. God loves us unconditionally. His love is a gift of grace. Such grace…such love…demands that we make the effort to stay in close, intimate relationship with the God we love. Pure. Real. Honest. True. Demonstrated by our obedience to his will and the life he calls us to live.

You see, genuine faith is not designed to make the world different, but to make us different. Faith can never be an intellectual belief nor a cultural perspective. It is meant to be a life-changing, moral imperative.

Jesus told us there would be a price to pay for following him.

“For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it…so, likewise, whoever of you does not forsake all he has cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:28, 33)

“For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul?” (Matthew 16:25-26)

We are called to an inconvenient faith. It will be hard…demanding…difficult…and, if expressed well, more joyous that you can ever hope to experience any other way.