Hope | Discipleship at Messiah

Power AND Love

Posted on 11/22/13 by On the road with Jesus.

More than once I have heard God say that power belongs to him and that his love is constant. –Psalm 62:11,12 b (GN trans)

Recently a young woman came to our church saying she was overwhelmed with life. She thought it hopeless and didn’t see how she could go on.

Do you sometimes feel a little overwhelmed with life? Does it sometimes seem like no matter how hard you try, no matter how many times you overcome particular obstacles, life just keeps relentlessly eroding your strength, your resolve, your confidence? Does it seem to you, that life just becomes more and more complicated and harder to keep together?

Flip Wilson once expressed it this way. “If I had my entire life to live over, I doubt if I’d have the strength.” Dilbert, the comic strip character had this advice: “When you don’t know what to do, walk fast and look worried. Eat one live toad the first thing in the morning, and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.”

Jesus warned his disciples these times would come. He paints a rather gloomy picture of the course of history. We are specifically told that it is not about progress—things aren’t getting better and better. To the contrary, civilization will become more and more dangerous, more and more ungodly, more and more inhuman. Only God’s personal intervention will bring this to an end.

He warned of the threat it poses to our spirit. He described it in terms of its effect on the heart. Hearts will fail for fear. There is the danger of our hearts becoming “weighed down” so much that we would be unable to keep our spiritual perspective and could even be caught unprepared for God’s glorious intervention.

At her request, I prayed with the young woman mentioned earlier. I also shared with her these words from Psalm 62: One thing God has spoken, two things have I heard: that you O God, are strong, and that you O Lord, are loving. It is critical that we hold those two things together. But it is not easy. We tend to either emphasize God’s love or God’s power. Put those two things together and nothing is hopeless. God cares about you and will use his power for your good.

Yes, we live in perilous times for the human spirit. Yet we live in times of unprecedented opportunities and are closer to God’s final victory than any people have ever been.

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“God’s Children Bear A Family Resemblence”

Posted on 7/9/13 by On the road with Jesus.

I John 3:2 we are God’s children now; …we will be like him.

All important events in the life cycle are connected to certain rituals which most of us know and in which we readily share. For instance—when a baby is born:

“Who does she/he look like?”
“He has his Dad’s nose.”
“Her face is shaped just like her mother’s.”

Now, often that is not a fact so much as expectation. We look for and expect a child to resemble its parents and family members. As a child grows it usually exhibits more and more traits of family. It may not be so noticeable to those who see it every day but is often obvious to others.

So when John says we are God’s children, it raises some expectations. If you were reading this in the Greek text, it would say “NOW we are God’s children.” The emphasis is on the “now.” In context, it is clear that those who are trusting Jesus belong to God’s family.

To say we are God’s children has powerful implications. Not the least of which is that it establishes our identity. To know who you are, to have a sense of identity, may well be one of the most important factors in your mental and emotional health. If you do not have a sense of identity, if you do not know who you are, chances are, you have some real problems in your life. This is especially important in our day, because we live in a world where there is a tendency to treat a person as an object, to manipulate a person, to see a person as disposable, to see one as useful only as he/she serves me and my ends.

To have a sense of belonging, to have a sense of identity is also vital to our spiritual health. Often when someone introduces me, they tell my name but add something to that. He’s our neighbor, a pastor at Messiah Church, Alana’s husband. And the less they know me personally, the more likely they are to do that, to identify me by my function, my job.

Probably you have been identified, not by who you are so much, as by some relationship—Joe Blow’s wife or Susie Blow’s husband, or by some job you perform.

But when we say we are God’s children, it establishes our identity, not by our function or even just our relationship but OUR NATURE. The CHRISTIAN LIFE IS NOT SIMPLY TAKING ORDERS FROM GOD OR EVEN FOLLOWING JESUS’ EXAMPLE. THE CHRISTIAN LIFE IS LIVING OUT A NEW NATURE, being part of a new kind of people. Obviously as to “behaving like God’s children” most of us have a ways to go. The child is not yet what he/she may become. But the genes are there and with normal growth and development maturity will come.

And we have that amazing promise: “We shall be like Him!” “Not yet but shall be” is essential to being human. There is always the tension between what I am (performance) and what I shall be. As Gordon Allport has said, “All people are in transit.”

Are you anxious to be like Jesus? Keep trusting him and following and it will happen.

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Living In the Present—For the Future

Posted on 4/12/13 by On the road with Jesus.

“Wait.” “Now is the time…now is the day.” -Acts 1:4, I Corinthians 6:2

Do you remember the Fram oil filter commercial. A mechanic tells about a major repair job on a car, and suggests that if the owner had spent a little more on a Fram filter it could have been avoided. And then, he holds up a filter and utters the ultimate advertising wisdom, “Pay me now or pay me later.”

It is a classic human dilemma—tension between having it now or later, living for the present or the future. For almost all of our early lives, there is someone telling us to wait for something:

            wait until you’re old enough to go to school
            wait until you’re in High School
            wait until you’re married
            wait until you’re through with your education
            wait until you have a good job
            wait until you have some security to get married

There are right and wrong times to wait. Some years ago this story appeared in Reader’s Digest:

An Air Force TAIL-GUNNER was being court-martialed. “What did you hear in your headset?” demanded a superior officer. “Well,” replied the airman, “I heard my squadron leader holler, ‘Enemy planes at five o’clock!'” “What action did you take?” persisted another officer. “Why, sir,” replied the gunner, “I just sat back and waited. It was only 4:30.”

There are some people who live their whole lives in the waiting mode. They never seem to “experience life.” Totally goal oriented, so much so that when they get there, satisfaction, fulfillment seems to allude them.

On the other hand, there are competing voices saying do it now. Our desires often want it now, want immediate gratification. Our environment, advertising says, “Have it now, buy now, pay later.” “Grab all the gusto you can.”

When life is lived on this basis—pursuit of immediate gratification, we are robbed of the most important things in life, like character, meaning, joy. These things only come with time.

Some might suggest that this is a non-issue from a Christian perspective. All Christian living is future oriented, is lived for future results/rewards. And in one sense that is true but it is short of the whole truth. You will find both “wait” and “now” in the Bible:

The problem is that we are inclined to want to put off what we ought to do now and to want now what can only come in time. How can we live making the most of the present but also building for the future?

Know that life as God intends it is both an experience to be appreciated/ enjoyed/ lived now and a goal, destination to be anticipated. The living now and the future are part of the same parcel. The secret is trusting God and living with sensitivity to God’s timing.

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This Is True Grace

Posted on 2/27/13 by On the road with Jesus.

After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace,…will himself RESTORE (PERFECT) you. I Peter 5:10

One evening, G.K. Chesterton and some writers were discussing what single book they would choose if they were stranded on a desert island. One writer quickly said, “The complete works of Shakespeare.” Another responded, “I’d choose the Bible.” When Chesterton was asked, he replied, “I would choose Thomas’s Guide to Practical Shipbuilding.”

Now what Thomas’s Guide to Practical Shipbuilding would be to a person stranded on a desert island, the Bible is to those whom Peter says are “strangers in the world.”

All through this letter of 105 verses Peter has talked of what it means for them to live as followers of Jesus:

Joy in midst of sadness,
holy,
submissive,
loving life,
and stewards of the grace of God.

He sums it up in a final and wonderful encouragement to stand firm, because God will “exalt you” (v 6).

Then he adds one more basic necessity for spiritual victory, to come out of a world like this intact: v10- “After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace,…will himself RESTORE (PERFECT) you.

It is not easy to live as strangers in the world. There are pressures—our internal weaknesses, circumstances, others, even persecution. Most of all Peter reminds us of the enemy of souls, who like a roaring lion prowls looking for victims. Living in a world where we are strangers and which is often hostile can take its toll—deterioration, wearing and tearing.

Who of us have not retreated from engagement with life, the worse for wear—wounded, damaged, broken. What congregation has not known conflict, division, in the struggle to be God’s people.

But Peter reminds us, restoration is God’s special work. God is not a throw-away God. He puts things back together, restores, perfects. Frazzled, at loose ends, in pieces? God will repair to perfection.

What is special here is the emphasis—it is God’s personal work. God does not leave this to instrumental means, but it is His own “personal active ministry to His people.” And it is true grace. Peter was exhibit A. This could not have been lost on those to whom he wrote. They were too near to it.

When the struggle, the battle has taken its toll, God’s word to us is not just “try again”, “try harder” but grace, “true grace” which is all we need.

And now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all who are sanctified. (Acts 20:32)

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“Why Does God Permit Evil?”

Posted on 2/7/13 by On the road with Jesus.

And 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 (NIV)

Some years ago, I sat in a doctor’s office and he told me he was an atheist because of the evil in the world.

There is perhaps no problem, no question which troubles more people about the Christian idea of God that this one: “Why does God permit evil and suffering?

A couple of months ago, in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook shootings, there was a lot of discussion of this. A full range of opinions from those like the doctor to those who suggested that somehow God willed this event were expressed.

Some people deal with this question by explaining it away—nothing is really bad. It’s just that we don’t have enough knowledge. If we knew all we would see that really it wasn’t evil at all, just shadows that add depth to a beautiful picture. In our world it is increasingly difficult to hold to that idea.

For others it is God’s will. We may not understand but we must simply accept it. Whatever will be will be. It is punishment for sin. He sends it for trial or testing.

More than 30 years ago, a Jewish Rabbi, Harold Kushner wrote a best selling book—Why Bad Things Happen to Good People. Churches all over the country studied it. His answer to the question was basically that God is limited in power and cannot prevent some things.

While it is true that many find comfort in some of these ideas the Bible says something different.

God is the creator and all powerful. So, in one sense, it can be said that God is responsible for evil in that He created a world in which it is possible. He gave human beings a choice and they made the wrong one. Since all creation is woven together and interrelated, as the weaving of a fine fabric, those choices affect everybody and everything. It is not just a spiritual flaw but even the natural order is affected. Read the creation account about how humans’ relation to the earth is changed. In short, we blew it and ruined everything.

But there is good news. God did not give up, abandon creation, us. He set in motion a plan to do it over, even better than before. The key in this plan is Jesus Christ. Through him God gives us a second chance to make the right choice—that is to trust God with our lives.

The good news is not that it is a cure for suffering and evil in this world but that God has a means for using suffering and evil to defeat itself (signified by the cross). God’s great power is shown in, not that everything that happens is good but, that God uses even evil to carry out His great plan.

Evil and suffering are a reality in this life, but God is not pleased, in fact, suffers with us. And He is doing something about it. A new age has begun, a new creation described by John (Rev. 21:1-4). The whole creation, Paul says, has been groaning, as in pains of childbirth…as we wait eagerly for…redemption. In the meantime: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ…(Romans 8:35-39).

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His Eye Is On the Sparrow

Posted on 11/15/12 by On the road with Jesus.

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny ? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father…. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows. –Matthew10:29,31

For those of us living in the NE corridor of the United States and the path of Hurricane Sandy, today we are either breathing a sigh of relief because we were spared or we are assessing the damage and trying to make sense of it all. And in the midst of a disaster like this we need perspective. As I have been thinking about it I just want to share what I wrote after the Haitian earthquake of 2010. Read it.

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Abundant Life

Posted on 7/31/12 by On the road with Jesus.

I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. John 10:10 (NRSV)

          The bumper sticker said: “If you don’t think money can bring happiness, you don’t know where to shop.”
          I read about a church near San Francisco that recently advertised a “money-back guarantee”? “Donate to the church for 90 days, and, if you aren’t blessed, you can have your money returned.”
          As these two anecdotes illustrate, we live in a consumer oriented society. Someone has said, we chose “churches not so much to meet God and surrender to his revealed ways as to satisfy some personal need.”
            It is hard for a culture—materialistic, affluent, and self-indulgent like ours–to hear a Biblical text like the one this morning without distorting its meaning. “I am come that they might have life…abundantly.”
            On the other hand, in southern Mexico where believers are being persecuted, how does it apply to the widow and children of Presbyterian. lay preacher, Malecio Gomez, 32, killed in a hail of gunfire and whose body was hacked with a machete? In a world where a child dies of hunger every 5-6 seconds, 18,000 a day, what does it mean?
            It certainly does not mean security from illness, pain, death, or provision for everything we want. With almost monotonous repetition, John keeps telling us, not new things but confronting us with the choice to trust Jesus.
            For those who have trouble experiencing the reality of the abundant life or who confuse it with worldly goods and comfort, Jesus offers himself. It is about our relation to Him. We belong to Him and He is that life, the abundant life.

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“Helpless No More”

Posted on 6/5/12 by On the road with Jesus.

At just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. –Romans 5:6

Did you hear about the plane that left Chicago bound for LA. As it leveled out at 40,000 ft., a voice came over the loudspeaker:

“This is a recording. You have the privilege of being the first to fly in a wholly electronic jet. This plane took off electronically. It is now flying a 40,000 feet electronically. It will land in LA electronically.
This plane has no pilot, no co-pilot, no flight engineer. But don’t worry. Nothing can go wrong…go wrong…go wrong…go wrong…go wrong.”

          There is perhaps no human predicament more frightening or unsettling than that of
                   helplessness,
                   to be out of control,
                   unable to do anything,
                   to alter a particular circumstance,
                   to be at the mercy of events or another person.
          John Bunyan begins Pilgrim’s Progress by describing the despair of helplessness.
          Therefore it is particularly important to remember:
          It was hard to be a Christian under Roman Empire.
          It was hard to be a Christian during the time of Martin Luther.
          It was hard to be a Christian during the time of John Wesley.
          It was hard to be a Christian early in our history.
Well, we’ve moved beyond a lot of the problems of those times but it is still hard to be a Christian.
          I remember an Annual Conference (yearly regional gathering of our denomination’s leadership) when we heard a wonderful sermon during the ordination service. It was on being servants of God, how that is our calling—to express God’s love.
           The sermon was delivered with great zeal and in an inspiring way. It      was true. You could hear and see the consensus, the affirmation of those who heard it. My good friend expressed it—“It needed to be said.” There, however   is a catch.
          The Bible says we are helpless. And there is nothing more frustrating or discouraging than to be told what we ought to do or how we ought to live and not to be able to do it. It is hard to be a Christian—i.e. to live like one!
          But the good news is not first about what we are to do. It is about what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. We were helpless/powerless but by now trusting in Jesus we have a new life that makes it possible to live as followers of Jesus. God’s love becomes the central driving force of our life. We are helpless no more.

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What Are You So Happy About?

Posted on 5/29/12 by On the road with Jesus.

“Rejoice because your names are written in Heaven.” -Luke 10:20

There are some great benefits to being a Christian.

There is purpose and meaning for life,
peace with God and with ourselves.
There is opportunity to see the remarkable power of God to affect individual lives, to bring healing, both spiritual and physical.
The power to change society–
- greed, hatred, corruption, indifference, self-centeredness all have been overcome when the gospel has been heeded.
Hospitals and churches have been built.
the poor and the sick have been helped.
And there is opportunity to be part of the family of God.

But Jesus had a way of getting to the real issue, and he reminded his disciples of a very important fact. Though the benefits of responding to God’s good news are many and varied, there is one central cause for the Christian’s joy—your names are written in heaven. The ultimate reward is heaven, with all that involves. The real benefit of knowing Jesus as Savior and Lord is life, eternal life, i.e. heaven.
How important those words, how important that is for us to remember in a world like this, when life isn’t going well for us. It was Malcom Muggeridge who said, “The only ultimate disaster that can befall us,”…is to feel ourselves at home here on earth.”¹ This is especially true when we are faced with our mortality, our death. Death for the believer is simply arrival at the final destination.
The Gospel, the good news gives us that hope. It is a simple (yet profound) story which we often make very complicated. The Bible teaches that each person has a fatal affliction called sin. The basic element in this affliction is failure to believe, to trust God, “un”faith.
However God, has provided the remedy—“God loved the world so much that he gave his only son [Jesus] so that whoever believes in him will not die but have life.”
In short, the gospel, the good news is that though each of us has been infected with sin, if we acknowledge it, confess it, place our trust in Jesus by surrendering our life to him, he will give us eternal life—ultimately heaven.
Every other benefit pales in comparison.

¹quoted in Christianity Today, 12/8/72, p.54

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The Abundant Life

Posted on 4/18/12 by On the road with Jesus.

I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. -John 10:10

The bumper sticker said: “If you don’t think money can bring happiness, you don’t know where to shop.” I read about the Lutheran church near San Francisco that recently advertised a “money-back guarantee”? “Donate to the church for 90 days, and, if you aren’t blessed, you can have your money returned.”

As these two anecdotes illustrate, we live in a consumer oriented society. Someone has said, we chose “churches not so much to meet God and surrender to his revealed ways as to satisfy some personal need.”

It is hard for a culture—materialistic, affluent, and self-indulgent like ours–to hear a Biblical text like the one this morning without distorting its meaning. “I am come that they might have life…abundantly.”

On the other hand, in southern Mexico where believers are being persecuted, how does it apply to the widow and children of Presbyterian. lay preacher, Malecio Gomez, 32, killed in a hail of gunfire and whose body was hacked with a machete? In a world where a child dies of hunger every 5-6 seconds, 18000 a day, what does it mean?

It certainly does not mean security from illness, pain, death, or provision for everything we want. With almost monotonous repetition, John keeps telling us, not new things but confronting us with the choice to trust Jesus.

For those who have trouble experiencing the reality of the abundant life or who confuse it with worldly goods and comfort Jesus offers himself. It is about our relation to Him. We belong to Him and He is that life, the abundant life.

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