afflictions

Jan

2025

The secret of life is found in Christ

Readings for Epiphany festival, January 6th

Isaiah 60:1-6, Ephesians 3: 1-12, Matthew 2:1-12

In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising,and have come to pay him homage” (Matthew 2:1-2).

God works in mysterious ways – leading us to his grace

How did Eastern magi know to go to Jerusalem when they saw something unusual in their stargazing (Matthew 2:1,2)? What we call the Star of Bethlehem may have been miraculous in its appearance. It may have been a manifestation of the glory of the LORD—such as when the LORD led the Israelites through the wilderness, going “in front of them in a pillar of cloud by day, to lead them along the way, and in a pillar of fire by night, to give them light” (Exodus 13:21). Perhaps the wise men were led by the same glory of the LORD that shone around the angels who appeared above the fields near Bethlehem heralding Jesus’ birth (Luke 2:9).

However, many of God’s miraculous dealings with us are in and under and through things we tend to see as normal occurrences. We apply water to a person in God’s name, by Christ’s instruction, and that person is connected to Christ and made a child of God. We receive bread and wine by Christ’s instruction, and we are connected to his sufferings and death and filled with God’s grace. God’s most profound miracles often are hidden under things that seem ordinary. What the wise men saw may have been viewed by others as something natural, as no big deal. A modern astronomer who gives credence to the Bible’s story suggested that the bright object in the sky could have been a special alignment between planets and stars—a conjunction occurring when celestial bodies appear to meet in the night sky from our vantage point on earth. Astronomer Michael Molnar pointed to an alignment of Jupiter, Saturn, the moon and the sun in the constellation of Aries that occurred around the time when Jesus was born. “This conjunction happened in the early morning hours, which aligns with the Gospel’s description of the Star of Bethlehem as a rising morning star” (Space.com, 12/22/24).

Magi were scholars and advisors to the rulers in ancient Babylon and Persia. They were astronomers and astrologers who studied the skies diligently. These particular magi likely studied the Hebrew scriptures too. The magi were a class of intellectuals that once had included the brightest minds among the Jewish people taken captive by the Babylonians. In 605 BC, Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, Azariah and others were among Israelites of noble rank, “versed in every branch of wisdom, endowed with knowledge and insight,” who were deemed “competent to serve in the king’s palace” (Daniel 1:3,4). Daniel’s name as a member of the magi in Babylon was Belteshazzar. Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah were given the names Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego (Daniel 1:7). It seems that Daniel’s wisdom and writings—and other Jewish prophets’ writings—were things these magi, 600 years later, had in mind along with whatever they saw in the skies. Daniel’s prophecy had included a cryptic timeline about how long it would be between “the time that the word went out [for the Israelites] to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the time of an anointed prince”—-when the “anointed one” or Messiah would come (cf. Daniel 9:24-27 and ReasonForHopeJesus.com).

Because of the testimony Daniel gave centuries before, the wise men who traveled to find Jesus may have been searching the skies for a sign around the very time Jesus was born. We don’t know exactly what they saw. They may have seen an unusual alignment of planets and stars and understood it as an indication of the Messiah’s arrival, in keeping with prophecies about the brightness of the dawn at his coming into the world (Isaiah 60:1-3). And they may have seen a supernatural manifestation of the glory of the LORD in the skies—pointing them to the specific house where Jesus was when they went to look for him in Bethlehem.

We don’t need to belabor ourselves trying to explain exactly what the phenomenon of the Star of Bethlehem was. It’s okay to confess it as a mystery. Our faith is grounded in confessing that the workings of our God are full of mystery and wonder. As the heavens are higher than the earth, God’s ways are higher than our ways and his thoughts higher than our thoughts (Isaiah 55:9). As a hymn writer famously described, “God moves in a mysterious way, his wonders to perform.”

We don’t always like that. We want things to be obvious. We want to see signs that point directly to us and point us in a specific direction. I’ve known people who looked for signs from God to determine if they should accept a new job or stay in their current position. Others interpreted everything they saw as a message from above—such as seeing every little coincidence as a sign that the person they just met was their soulmate, destined to be the love of their life. In doing so, they rushed the relationship, not building deep connections. They ignored or downplayed frictions, convincing themselves they were meant to be together … and then they fell apart. They had seen only what they wanted to see and missed the many red flags that kept popping up all along the way.

I knew a woman who struggled over even the smallest daily decisions. She constantly wanted a sign from God to show her what to do. She asked our church’s lay minister for help knowing what God’s will was. As they talked, she put two pens on the table in front of her and asked, “Like right now, how do I know which pen God wants me to use?” We needed to encourage her to walk each day’s path with confidence that whichever thoughtful decisions she made, God would be with her.

In the daily course of our lives, God leads us in everyday ways more so than by spectacular signs or miraculous moments. He leads us by reminders of what his word has taught us. He leads us by the Christ-like actions of others who help us when we need help. We don’t want to miss those clear messages from God while we’re looking all about for some elusive supernatural signal.

We wish we could know how our story will unfold, seeing clearly what lies ahead. God asks us to trust him, confident that he knows our needs and will be blessing our futures. The apostles and prophets spoke of God’s doings and dealings with us as a mystery. Paul described how the mystery of Christ was made known to him by revelation. “In former generations,” he said, “this mystery was not made known to humankind, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.” A part of that mystery was that God’s promise was not limited to just some people. All people, Jews and Gentiles alike, were to be “fellow heirs, members of the same body, and sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” Those of us who have come to know “the boundless riches of Christ” have a role in helping others “see what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things,” so that through us, the church, “the wisdom of God in its rich variety might now be made known” and we and others may have boldness and confidence through faith in Christ (Ephesians 3: 1-12).

Maintaining faith in God continues to confront us with mystery, as much of what we experience in life seems at odds with the goodness and peace we want to have. Mary and Joseph’s early days with Jesus had bright moments. Shepherds came to the stable where the child was born, telling of a visit by angels. Later, wise men came to worship and brought expensive gifts. But Jesus’ family had been uprooted from their home in Nazareth by a government order requiring that they be in Bethlehem for census and taxation purposes. Immediately after the visit by the magi, Joseph and Mary needed to use value from their gifts to flee for their lives. The regional ruler, Herod, felt threatened when court officials from far away inquired where to find the child who had been born king of the Jews (Matthew 2:2) When the magi did not report back to him the child’s location, Herod ordered all baby boys in and around Bethlehem be killed, determined to get rid of any supposed new king by butchery (Matthew 2:16). By God’s intervention, Joseph and Mary and Jesus escaped to Egypt, remaining there until Herod’s death (around a year or so later). Things were not easy for them.

Our lives have bright moments, but also many fears and tragedies and turmoils. It is good for us to confess, “God works in mysterious ways,” rather than looking only for immediate and obvious signs of blessings. We get that phrase about God’s mysterious ways from the hymn I mentioned earlier. The hymn writer, William Cowper, had bright moments in his life but also dire struggles of heart and soul. After William was born (in 1731), his mother lost five other children in their infancy. Then, when William was six years old, his mother died while giving birth to his younger brother John—the only sibling that survived. William was traumatized by losing his mother. He was sent to boarding school, where he was severely bullied. He managed to go on to become a successful student and writer. When he was 31 years old, he was offered a prestigious position as Keeper of the Journals in the House of Lords. But his appointment was challenged and he was to undergo a public examination at the Bar of the House. His fragile psyche could not handle that, and he had a breakdown. He made attempts at suicide. He went to be treated for two years at a mental health asylum. He was befriended by faithful people and became connected to evangelical churches. In reflection on his life’s journey—including especially his bouts with suicidal thoughts and depression—William Cowper wrote these lines in a poem he originally entitled, Conflict: Light Shining out of Darkness:

God moves in a mysterious way,
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm. …

Ye fearful saints fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.*

When you are struggling to see hope in your life, bear in mind the experience of Mary and Joseph. They lived in a world where they had to make difficult journeys from Nazareth to Bethlehem and then from Bethlehem to Egypt. But God made his blessings known by visits from shepherds and wise men. Keep in mind the life of Jesus, which culminated in suffering and scorn and pain and death. But God made his victory known in Jesus’ resurrection and ascension as King of kings and Lord of lords. Keep in mind the experience of God’s people throughout the course of history who have battled stresses and strains—such as the life of William Cowper—and yet can confess that God works in mysterious ways and is with us through the storms.

When life is shrouded in mystery and difficulty, we may cry out to God like Job did long ago, “Why? Why? Why?” (Cf. Job chapter 3). We may not see obvious signs that God is still with us, watching over us. But we know that our Redeemer lives, “and that at the last he will stand upon the earth,” and we will “in our own flesh see God on our side” (Job 19:25-27). We will have a home with him.

Our hearts yearn within us for the final revealing of all God’s mysteries, “Now we know only in part; then [we] will know fully, even as [we] have been fully known” (1 Corinthians 13:12). In the meantime, we confess: “Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am” (Philippians 4:13 The Message). Our God “will fully satisfy every need according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19). That is our confidence in Jesus, born at Bethlehem, crucified at Calvary, raised to life and ascended on high. He has promised, “If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also” (John 14:3). That is the culmination of the mystery of Christ, in which we have our hope.

Life’s greatest mystery has been revealed to us in the gospel—the good news of God’s grace in Jesus. That news, the revealing of that mystery, is the truth we hold dear in our hearts and the grace we share with others.

Scripture quotations, except where otherwise indicated, are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

* Sources: Cowper & Newton Museum, Poetry Foundation, Wikipedia biography and poem page

Nov

2024

Widows, weakness, and walking in faith

God is with those who are suffering – he has suffered with us and for us

Readings for the 25th Sunday after Pentecost:

When I lived in the South, I had an acquaintance in our neighborhood who was an airplane pilot. He was working for a large televised ministry, piloting the private plane used by the ministry’s leadership. His mother watched the televangelist’s broadcasts. She was a devout believer in God, and felt that the ministry was doing God’s work. She was on a fixed income. Her Social Security benefits were not large. Nevertheless, she regularly sent in large portions of her income as gifts to the ministry—more than she could afford. She had been doing that for years, since before her son started as private pilot for the ministry. The longer her son was working for the organization, the more her habit of donations bothered him. He was fine with supporting her from his own income with anything she needed. But from the inside of the ministry, he was seeing how the mail-handling staff was tasked to go through bags and bags of mail quickly and pull out the checks. The checks were directed for deposit to the ministry’s accounts. The letters sent with them mostly were ignored. A handful of prayer requests were plucked at random from the hundreds of letters, so the preacher could feature those on air. The rest of the letters and prayer requests were thrown away without being read by anyone.

The pilot’s mother had a heart devoted to Christ, and surely the Lord was with her and loved her—whether or not she was sending in donations to the TV ministry. The duplicitous ministry, on the other hand, was veering away from truth and integrity and love. As the Book of Proverbs advises, “The Lord hates it when people cheat others” (Proverbs 11:1 NIrV). “Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord, but those who act faithfully are his delight” (Proverbs 12:22).

Eventually, the pilot walked away from his job with that ministry organization, because the arrogance and affluence of the top people—and their dishonesty—was so at odds with the trust and hopes of the people they were supposed to be serving. It’s not unlike the situation that existed when Jesus observed the way things were at the temple in Jerusalem many years ago. Jesus pointed out the contrast between the high and mighty religious leaders and the ordinary folks who came to express their faith. In that temple environment, Jesus publicly said to watch out for those who make themselves the center of attention in matters of religion. Beware of those, he said, “who like to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces” (Mark 12:38-39) and yet devour widows’ houses—taking their property from them, “exploiting the weak and helpless” (Mark 12:40 The Message). Jesus focused his attention on a poor widow who came and put into the temple offering two small copper coins, worth the equivalent of a penny. “Truly I tell you,” Jesus said, “this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury” with amounts they could afford from the abundance of their wealth. Out of her poverty, this faith-filled widow was putting in “everything she had, all she had to live on” (Mark 12:42-44).

The people who looked like they were the most important in the goings-on at the temple in Jerusalem were really only self-important. They were proud. They were puffed up. As Scripture has said in another context: “Their spirit wasn’t right in them. … Wealth is treacherous; the arrogant do not endure” (Habakkuk 2:4,5). “But the righteous will live by their faith” (Habakkuk 2:4).

Let’s take another example, going back about 900 years before Jesus’ ministry in Judea and Galilee. A king named Ahab had come to reign over Israel, with fortresses/palaces in the cities of Jezreel and Samaria. King Ahab enhanced his power by marriage to a Phoenician princess named Jezebel. Jezebel made her country’s worship of Baal and Asherah (fertility deities) a prominent part of her reign with Ahab (cf. 1 Kings 16:31-34). Ahab and Jezebel sat in the power positions and seemed like the important ones in Israel.

Bernardo Strozzi, Elijah & The Widow of Zerephath, 17th century

But that’s not how our Lord saw things. Through Elijah, the LORD announced that the opposite of fertile harvests and abundant blessings would be happening for them. Elijah prophesied, “As the Lord the God of Israel lives …there shall be neither dew nor rain these years” (1 Kings 17:1). Elijah became public enemy #1 of the Ahab and Jezebel regime. During those years, Elijah took refuge at the home of a widow in the coastal city of Zarephath, which was actually located in Jezebel’s home territory. It wasn’t where you’d expect to find an ally for the LORD’s prophet, but the LORD told Elijah, “I have commanded a widow there to feed you” (1 Kings 17:9). And indeed she did. She had almost nothing left when Elijah encountered her. She was gathering a few sticks for a fire. She planned to use her last little bit of flour and oil to make one last meal for herself and her son before they succumbed to starvation. Elijah offered her a promise from the LORD: “The jar of meal will not be emptied and the jug of oil will not fail until the day that the LORD sends rain on the earth.” (Cf. 1 Kings 17:10-16.) Later in their time together, the widow’s son became severely ill and died. Elijah prayed, “‘O Lord my God, let this child’s life come into him again.’ The Lord listened to the voice of Elijah; the life of the child came into him again, and he revived” (1 Kings 17:21-22). The widow’s faith was strengthened further in the LORD God of Israel (1 Kings 17:24). Life was not easy for them, but the LORD was with them.

Where was God in Elijah’s day? Was he with the rich and powerful, the high and mighty? No. Those at the top may have thought they had it all—but it was not by God’s blessing. An unassuming widow found favor with God. A faithful prophet found favor with God. They were the ones actually experiencing God’s blessing.

Where was God in Jesus’ day? With society’s policy makers and self-satisfied religious leaders? No. A worshipful widow, trusting God to meet her needs, was noticed by Jesus and held up as an example.

Where is God today? Do we look for God’s presence and signs of God’s blessing in the wrong places? Do we revere the wrong people or look in the wrong direction for what it means to have a blessed life? We give TV coverage to a billionaire doing the first-ever civilian spacewalk (in a flight he paid for on another billionaire’s rocket ship) and think, “Wouldn’t that be so cool if I could do that?” (See BBC story, 9/12/24.) We heap our adoration on rock stars and pop stars and country stars and sports stars and movie stars and dream of living a life like theirs.

But where does God truly show up and make his presence known in our world? “This is where God shows up: in the confessing of our sins, and the bearing of one another’s burdens, and being there in solidarity with those who are bearing crosses. That’s where God shows up” (Tripp Fuller, Faith-Lead, 2024). Another insightful writer has said, “God is more likely to be found in the lives of people at the bottom of the ladder where life is messy, than at the top where life is comfortable and secure. These hurting places are the arenas where Jesus lived, worked, and taught, and this is the arena to which his followers are called” (Kurt Struckmeyer, FollowingJesus.org, 7/1/2018).

Think of what it was like when Jesus himself was on this earth. Who seemed important then? At the time of Jesus’ death, who seemed like the winners and who seemed like the losers? Didn’t it seem like the Roman empire and the Roman governor and the mobs who screamed against Jesus had all the power? That Jesus and his followers were nobodies, rejects, worthless? Where was God when Jesus was suffering? You could even hear Jesus cry out in anguish and abandonment, “My God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46) But his Father was not abandoning Jesus forever. The divine Spirit would invigorate him again. Jesus was doing what he was doing—suffering and dying—for us, to redeem us. He came to us in our world because our world is full of misery and death. As human beings, we have flesh and blood and are subject to death. So Jesus came and “shared the same things, so that through his death he might destroy the one who has the power of death … and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death” (Hebrews 2:14, 15). Christ offered himself once, for all time, to bear the sins of all humanity. And the resurrected Jesus, having dealt with human sin and misery by his own suffering, promises us that he “will appear a second time … to save those who are eagerly waiting for him” (Hebrews 9:28).

Pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, while he was imprisoned by the Nazi government that later would put him to death, wrote in a letter from prison:

God allows himself to be edged out of the world and onto the cross. God is weak and powerless in the world, and that is exactly the way, the only way, in which God can be with us and help us. Matthew 8:17 (He took up our infirmities, and bore the burden of our sins) makes it crystal clear that it is not by his omnipotence that Christ helps us, but by his weakness and suffering.
This is the decisive difference between Christianity and all religions. Man’s religiosity makes him look in his distress to the power of God in the world [wanting God to show up with some miraculous, immediate solution.] … The Bible, however, directs us to the powerlessness and suffering of God; only a suffering God can help. … The God of the Bible conquers power and space in the world by his weakness. …
Humans are challenged to participate in the sufferings of God at the hands of a godless world. … It is not some religious act which makes a Christian what he is, but participation in the suffering of God in the life of the world. … One must abandon every attempt to make something of oneself … [and take] life in stride, with all its duties and problems, its successes and failures, its experiences and helplessness. It is in such a life that we throw ourselves utterly in the arms of God and participate in his sufferings in the world and watch with Christ in Gethsemane. That is faith, and that is what makes a human and a Christian.

(Letter from 1944—see D.Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison, 1997)

Let me close by saying this:
You might be a widow struggling with loneliness and limited resources.
You might be a common laborer, figuring out how to make a living and make ends meet.
You might be a farmer, navigating the uncertainties of unpredictable weather and an unpredictable economy.
You might be a parent, at wits’ end trying to manage family life and all its worries and difficulties.
You might be a child, not sure yet where or how you fit in or where life is going for you.
You might be a neighbor or friend, seeing other neighbors and friends who are hurting and wanting to help them—even though you may be hurting too and wondering why life is so hard.
You might be anybody, facing shortages, facing sickness, facing loss, experiencing all manner of the things that go wrong in this world. But you have one certainty: Jesus has experienced all these things and more, and he sees you. He knows you. He is with you. We do not have a Savior who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, our troubles, our struggles, our feelings of unimportance and helplessness. “We have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:15-16).

As people of God, we carry one another’s burdens (Galatians 6:2), and together we all carry our burdens to Christ, who indeed does give rest to our souls (Matthew 11:29).

Jun

2024

God is with us through the storms

A message for the 5th Sunday after Pentecost, June 23, 2024
Revised Common Lectionary Readings: Job 38:1-11, 2 Corinthians 6:1-13, Mark 4:35-41
For an additional message regarding the life experience of Job, see this previous Electric Gospel post: https://theelectricgospel.com/faith-cries-out/

God is with us through the storms

Where I live, it has been raining and raining and raining. Our rainfall totals from Thursday to yesterday (Saturday) were nearly 5 inches, and towns not far from us had over 8 inches of rain in the same span. This is on top of previous weeks’ rainfall amounts that were already double the average normally received for the whole month of June.

We appreciate rain. But we get nervous when the rains keep coming, fearing flooding that may follow. And storms scare us. Violent winds and other weather phenomena can cause all sorts of damage. We’d like our weather always to be pleasant—sunshine when we want sunshine, gentle rain when we need rain. We’d like our lives to be like that—generally pleasant overall, no major disturbances or disruptions.

We even can get confused and think when life is smooth and easy, it proves God is with us. We think if we are doing the right things, God will reward us and make material blessings flow in our direction. There’s a name for that kind of thinking. It’s called having a theology of glory. The idea is that if we are right with God, then our lives will display wonderful, visible success.

Try applying that sort of theology to a man like Job. This Sunday’s scriptures included a reading from the end of the story of Job. Job was a man who had vast wealth and a large family. In his day—perhaps as early or earlier than the time of Abraham—Job was said to be “the greatest of all the people of the east” (Job 1:3). Not only that, Job was a man of faith, attested by the LORD himself to be “blameless and upright” and God-fearing to a degree greater than any other person on earth (Job 1:1,8). Then God let the devil have his way with Job. Job’s possessions were decimated. His seven sons and three daughters all were killed. His own health was exchanged for lingering, painful illness. All that turmoil is told in just the first two chapters of Job’s book. Then for 35 chapters, we listen to Job and his friends meditate on the misery. His friends first said nothing. For seven days they sat and stared at the ground. Finally, Job spoke out in complaint. He cried out in pain. His friends then offered some advice, much of which added insult to injury. Most of what they said was theology of glory in reverse. Essentially, they said, “Job, to be suffering like you are, you must be guilty of some heinous crime or dreadful offense against God.” But that wasn’t true. There was no one more devoted to God than Job was. As patriarch of his family, he regularly offered sacrifices on behalf of his children. He honored God and shunned evil. Yet the very God whom he so revered allowed him to be engulfed by tragedy. Where was the glory in that? Where was there any hint of reward for good behavior? God took the finest example of a believing person that could be found, and let him become an example of pain and horror and loss.

And Satan was involved too. That dragon was eager to sink his claws into Job. Always looking for souls to devour (1 Peter 5:8), the devil goes after every child of God, the weak and the strong, intent on destroying the faith of any that he can. And God suffers all of his believers to endure such temptations. The LORD does not want us to become secure in ourselves, thinking we’re immune to sin’s dangers or safe from sin’s fallout—the tumult and storms that characterize life in this world. The LORD wants each of us ever more deeply, ever more personally, ever more intimately to grasp onto him in faith, trusting him as our Rescuer.

What God showed in the life of Job, he is equally ready to demonstrate in his dealings with you. He says to you what he said to his people of old: “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you” (Isaiah 43:1-2).

Notice what the LORD is saying. He does not promise that you will avoid all hurt and trouble. He does not say you will escape the floodwaters or that you won’t face danger or fire. Sometimes, in fact—as the Lord did in the case of Job—he will push you into the fire or plunge you deep underwater, letting this world’s troubles have their way with you. But God never abandons you. He always hangs onto you. He says, “Do not fear, for I am with you” (Isaiah 43:5). Being in precarious situations reminds you how much you need God’s strength, so that you wrap your arms of faith around him as tight as a child would cling to their parent during a thunderstorm. It’s like the apostle Paul (another great man of God) said about the life he and his ministry colleagues lived. They were servants of God, deeply devoted to doing God’s work, yet they endured “afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger.” Through it all, they kept demonstrating “purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God” (2 Corinthians 6:4-7). Paul told those who were led to Christ that It is through many hardships, “many persecutions that we must enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22). If the apostle Paul endured such hardships, if a righteous man such as Job endured such hardships, you and I also can expect to endure hardships as we walk in faith in this world.

The experience of Jesus’ disciples illustrates the same truth for us. They had Jesus right there with them in their boat as they crossed Lake Kinneret (commonly called the Sea of Galilee). But that didn’t mean they were immune to the meteorological events of that region. Violent storms can happen there, especially when the winds whip down from the high hills on the eastern shore. Most recently, such a storm in 2022 saw sustained winds of 50 mph with gusts up to 87 mph, causing around $50 million in damage to property and infrastructure in the city of Tiberias and other areas along sea’s shore. (Cf. Israel Today, May 17, 2022). When a great windstorm like that arose for the disciples of Jesus centuries ago, they panicked. They couldn’t believe Jesus was sleeping through it, lounging on a cushion in the back of the boat. They woke him up, yelling, “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re about to drown” (Mark 4:38 CEV)?

As disciples of Jesus, we are a lot like those first disciples. We like to think life with Jesus should be a peaceful, pleasant ride. We don’t want anything to rock the boat or cause problems for us. We have that theology of glory mindset in us. We think if Jesus is with us, then everything in our lives should be good and glorious and successful. We are dismayed when storms arise. We feel God has fallen asleep and doesn’t care about us. We start screaming at God (like Job screamed at God), “Where are you now? Why is this happening? What did I do to deserve this?” [As if our efforts are merit badges with God, and he owes us rewards for good behavior.] Then, through the storm, out of the whirlwind, we can hear what God would say to us (as he said to Job): “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge” (Job 38:2)? We question why God has let things get out of control when, of course, God always has all things under his control. He is the one who “laid the foundation of the earth” (Job 38:4). He is the one who says to the lakes and seas and oceans, “Here is where your proud waves shall be stopped’ (Job 38:11).

When the whirlwind hit the boats out on the Sea of Galilee, Jesus calmly got up, “rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm” (Mark 4:39). And Jesus said to his terrified disciples, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith” (Mark 4:40)? By this time in their journey with Jesus, the disciples had already seen him turn water into wine, cause their fishing nets to burst with an incredible number of fish, cast a demon out of a man, heal person after person of diseases and ailments. They had even seen him raise a young man, a widow’s only son, back to life after he had died. Still, Jesus had to remind them that he is indeed the Lord of all, “that even the wind and the sea obey him” (Mark 4:41). “O ye of little faith!” Jesus could say to all of us (Matthew 8:26 KJV). We all struggle to maintain trust and hope when storms come, when the circumstances of our lives suddenly are not pleasant and peaceful, or when our journey is one of chronic pain and hurt. We wonder where God is when life is a struggle.

Remember, though, that Jesus told us, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33 NIV). Satan will tempt you. Troubles will taunt you. But “God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). Through it all, come what may, look ahead to the final way out that God promises. We share the same hope Job expressed, saying: “I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth, and … then in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see on my side” (Job 19:25-27). With God on our side, no matter how scary the storms, we always have hope.

There came a time in Jesus’ ministry when many of those following him turned back and no longer went along with him (John 6:66). They had been in it for the good things, for miracles that filled baskets upon baskets with bread and fish. They looked for Jesus to make their lives content and comfortable. When Jesus told them that wasn’t what life with him was about, they walked away. Jesus then asked his core group, the twelve whom he was training to be his apostles, “‘Do you also wish to go away?’ Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God’” (John 6:67-69). Let that be our attitude also. Life isn’t all sunshine and clear skies. Storms will come. Unrest will upend our lives often. But we have a source of refuge. We have a place of safety. We have Jesus, the Holy One of God, who promises to be with us—”always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). We will hang on, we will keep going, we will get to the other side, trusting in him.

Sep

2023

Learning how to forgive

Readings for 16th Sunday after Pentecost, Sep. 17, 2023

Learning how to forgive — forgive freely, but not cheaply

by David Sellnow

We have a hard time with forgiveness. Maybe you have been on the receiving end of a grudge. You wronged someone. It was years ago, and they haven’t spoken to you since. Or maybe you’ve been the one holding a grudge. You’ve turned away from someone, ignored them, ghosted them, because they betrayed or disappointed you in some way. Or perhaps you haven’t gone that far. You’ve had your differences with a family member or friend or neighbor, and you’ve put up with them. You looked the other way; you said, “It’s OK.” Meanwhile, though, you kept a mental record of each and every infraction—what they did and when they did it. Whatever the issue or the behavior, you find yourself thinking: “How many times do I need to forgive? It’s been seven times already. Is seven enough?” Remember, though, Jesus’ response to that question: “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times” (Matthew 18:22). Jesus does not want us putting limits and restrictions on how much we’re willing to forgive. Our God certainly has not set restrictions on his own capacity to forgive us.

Jesus illustrated the too-frequent difference between God forgiving us and us forgiving others with his parable of the unmerciful servant (Matthew 18:23-35). The servant had been forgiven by the king of a debt of 10,000 talents, an unpayable debt that was simply wiped off his record. That same servant turned around and pursued legal action against a fellow servant who owed him 100 denarii. In the Roman empire, a denarius was a coin used to pay a daily wage. A talent was a unit of weight for gold or silver, about 75 pounds. To add up to one talent of value, you’d need 6,000 denarii. So a debt of 10,000 talents would be 60,000,000 denarii. After having a debt of 60,000,000 denarii expunged by the king’s grace, the man harshly refused to show any leniency with a peer who owed him 100 denarii. How often are we like that? We forget how merciful God has been in his dealings with us, and we show little or no mercy in our dealings with others.

Sometimes too, we withhold forgiveness because we have invented our own infractions and cut people off for arbitrary reasons. We are like the early church folks who were judging each other for which days they observed as holy days or what foods they did or didn’t allow themselves to eat. Christ’s apostle needed to remind them: “Those who eat must not despise those who abstain, and those who abstain must not pass judgment on those who eat; for God has welcomed them. Who are you to pass judgment on servants of another?” (Romans 14:2-4).

We get carried away in self-asserted certainties and punish people for going against our expectations—which may be far from God’s own commands. Some real-life examples:

A father hasn’t spoken to his adult son for decades, because the son joined a church of a different denomination. Is that man so sure God is present only in his own type of congregation and in no other places?
A friend has not forgiven a friend for accepting a position and moving to another part of the country. Resentment set in about being “abandoned”—as If the Lord God had issued commands that the friend should have remained forever in one place on this earth.
A student severed a friendship from a classmate who stopped letting them copy homework assignments, blaming the classmate when they failed the assignments.

Sometimes we are the ones sinning, holding grudges, creating or maintaining divisions. Yet we blame it on the other persons rather than admitting our own insincerities and inconsistencies.

I once attended a church elders meeting, where one elder came to the meeting concerned about all of the “deadwood” in the congregation (members who had not been to worship for a while). He had a proposal. He had prepared samples of a series of letters to send to people. The first letter would warn them about the dangers of not attending church. If they didn’t respond or return to worship within six weeks, the church would send the second letter, with stronger warnings. Then, if they didn’t respond or return to church within another six weeks, the church would send the third letter, informing the recipients that they would be excommunicated. All of this was planned without making any sort of personal outreach effort to those members: no phone call, no personal visit. Just a series of three form letters, then their names would be removed from the church roster. Thankfully, the other elders on the board spoke up before the pastor even had to say anything. This was not a gospel-oriented idea. This was not how they were going to do ministry. Still, the fact that the idea was raised says something about the way we sometimes feel—ready to write people off, be done with them, rather than continuing to extend forgiveness.

I wonder how such a series of letters would have affected a church member I met in a different congregation. When I came to the congregation as the new pastor, I made an effort to visit each member’s home. There were, of course, plenty of members who had not been active in church for some time. One woman had been absent for years after having been very active previously. When I asked what had caused her to pull away, she described how it had happened after she and her husband had lost a child. The experience strained their marriage. She and her husband eventually divorced. Immediately after the child’s untimely death, church members showed her much caring and concern. But as time went on, she grew tired of facing people in the congregation, who always greeted her with such a sad look, always so worried about her. It was almost pushing her to continue to dwell in the grief and loss and pain. She just couldn’t handle that anymore, so she stopped coming. She’d visited some other churches along the way, but had not felt at home yet anywhere else. It was good that I went to visit her, and it was time that she was ready to return and become part of that church family again.

We don’t always know what is going on in someone else’s mind or heart. We should not rush to judgment about their seeming lack of expression of faith, or sins or troubles they seem to keep stumbling into. Far better that we be patient with them, with everyone—as we would want people to be patient with us—when struggling through something damaging or difficult.

Think of the Lord and his dealings with Israel. The Lord did not support their patterns of wandering and straying from his side. Yet at the same time, he was always in a posture of forgiveness, ready to embrace his people when they returned to him. Think of the picture Jesus gave us of the father of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32). The father kept waiting for his son to come to his senses, to want to be home. He was watching and hoping every day for that change of heart. That is the stance of our God. He is not glad that we are doing wrong or living in senseless ways. He is always ready to grant us a place at his table and a celebration when we are back in his home and his family. As one of our most treasured psalms says of the LORD’s way of forgiveness: “The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He will not always accuse …. He does not deal with us according to our sins …. As a father has compassion for his children, so the Lord has compassion for those who fear him” (Psalm 103:8-13).

We pray that our ability to forgive will grow more and more like the compassionate heart of the LORD our God.

Having said that, let’s remember something else about the Lord’s way of forgiveness. Giving the gospel to someone who keeps wallowing in their own mud, refusing to repent, is like tossing pearls before swine (Matthew 7:6). While our usual failing is that we are too slow to forgive, there are also times when Christian people can be too quick to forgive. Excusing those who aren’t aren’t really ready for forgiveness can be harmful. We are seeking real restoration in our relationships, not simply sweeping hurts and abuses under the rug.

Let me offer an example, from a social worker in a domestic violence shelter. This was in the Bible belt; the majority of women who sought shelter there from brutal abuse were deeply religious persons. Most of the staff were not church people, though, and they were frustrated by a pattern they were seeing. The religious women believed they had to forgive immediately. The minute their man would say, ‘I’m sorry,’ they’d go back to him. The shelter would see them again within days or weeks, beaten up worse than the last time. According to Domestic Shelters.org, most women return to an abusive relationship six or more times, for various reasons, repeatedly subjecting themselves to the violence. At this Bible belt shelter, the averages were driven even higher by the religious conviction, “‘I must forgive,” pulling women back to their partners prematurely. In her work at the shelter, the Christian social worker of my acquaintance was asked to offer her perspective and counsel these women. She began pointing the women to the meaning of the word “repentance,” which indicates a change of heart and mind. It is a transformation, a turnaround, moving in new directions. As John the Baptist emphasized, those who repent will “bear fruit worthy of repentance” (Matthew 3:8). The women also needed to be reminded of how Joseph dealt with his brothers. Joseph’s brothers had sold him to slave traders when he was a teenager (cf. Genesis 37). By God’s providence over many years, Joseph went from being a slave in Egypt to becoming a government official, second only to the pharaoh himself. Then, when a famine hit, Egypt was the only place with storehouses of food. Joseph was in charge of the food program. When Joseph’s brothers came to Egypt to buy food (and didn’t recognize Joseph), he put them through quite an ordeal to test them. He wanted to verify that they were different than they had been. He didn’t rush to reunite with them. He made sure they were repentant first. So, when he did reveal his identity to his long-lost brothers and welcomed them with open arms, the reunion was real. He had the whole family come down to live in Egypt, including his aged father. Then, when father Jacob died, the brothers became worried that Joseph’s kindness to them would stop, that he had only been showing them mercy because of their father’s presence. But Joseph again reassured them and spoke kindly to them. Joseph modeled his forgiveness after the forgiveness of God himself. (Cf. Genesis 50:15-21.) God had brought about good for Joseph, and Joseph was glad his relationship with his brothers had been healed.

When it comes to forgiveness, much of the time we are too slow to forgive, too arbitrary, too stingy. We are too easily like the unmerciful servant Jesus described, wanting to take people by the throat and demand, “Pay me what you owe me!” (cf. Matthew 18:38). Other times we are too quick to forgive, too enabling, too carelessly handing out pardons while the crimes are still being committed. Our Lord, Jesus, has instructed us to “be as wary as serpents, and as innocent as doves” (Matthew 10:16 NASB). Learning how to forgive is an uphill journey for us. But with the Spirit’s wisdom guiding us on, we can learn how to forgive so that relationships are fully healed, families and friends genuinely reunited.

May God give us the wisdom to be careful when unrepented sin must be confronted with strength, and also the grace to give wholehearted forgiveness to fellow sinners in need of mercy. May we show mercy to our fellow servants of God, our King, in the same way that God, our King, has shown mercy to us (cf. Matthew 18:33).

Jun

2023

Faith follows God, overcoming fear

A lesson from Abram & Sarai

Faith follows God, overcoming fear

by David Sellnow

Bible selection to read: Genesis 12:1-9

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We live in a mobile society. People change jobs and places of residence rather frequently. A statistic based on US census data shows the average American moves 11 or more times in their life. Another statistic shows the average American changes jobs about 12 times.

Moving is expensive and challenging, but nowadays there are ample resources to aid you. You can obtain guidebooks and checklists to pilot you through the process. You can rent trailers and trucks and equipment to move yourself. Or you can go with major van lines that will do the moving for you—even the packing and unpacking if you want to pay the fees for it. When you hit the road, you’ve got navigational tools—printed maps, mapping websites, GPS on your phone. You have major roads and interstates on which to travel. Rest stops, convenience stores, and restaurants ease your journey. When you arrive at your new location, local stores and home delivery services will help set you up in your new environment. Moving has challenges, but moving is quite doable in the modern world.

When a man named Abram had to move, not in 2023, but more like 2023 BC (or thereabouts), things weren’t quite so easy. U-Haul® back then meant strapping your belongings onto your camels—if you were affluent enough to have camels. Road maps weren’t written on paper, let alone on computer or GPS. You had to feel the wind and follow the stars. Roads themselves weren’t four-lane concrete with divided lines. If you were fortunate, maybe you could see signs that someone had traveled that way ahead of you. There were no hotels or motels with pools and hot tubs to relieve travelers’ weary bones. You considered yourself blessed if you found a pond of water.

When Abram moved so many years ago, it was a monumental task compared to what we think of as moving today. And yet, the 400+ miles on foot wasn’t the biggest challenge, nor was the lack of modern travel advantages. Most fearful for Abram was that he had no clear idea of where he would end up. He was heading into an open-ended future, with nothing but a promise from the LORD God to sustain him. The promise did not include specifics and came from a God different from those his family had known. Yet Abram and his wife, Sarai, followed the LORD, overcoming their fears, trusting his promise.

Think of what God asked Abram to do. Abram was 75 years old. He’d lived in community with his relatives all of his life. He and his wife Sarai had moved once before, but the family group had moved together. They went from Ur (near the Persian Gulf) to Haran (in what is today eastern Turkey), with Abram’s father Terah as patriarch of the family. Now the LORD God had said to Abram: “Go from your country, your people, and your father’s household to the land I will show you” (Genesis 12:1 NIV). That was a big ask! We are not even sure how religious a man Abram was at the time God first called him. We know that his father Terah worshiped gods other than the LORD God who revealed himself to Abram (cf. Joshua 24:2). Now the LORD was commanding Abram to leave his father and others behind, strike out on his own, and go to a land as yet unnamed. Then, when Abram did what God asked and went to the new land, the region of Canaan, he found others were already inhabiting it. Imagine if you were told to up and move to a new home, and when you arrived found somebody else in the house who had no intention of leaving. For Abram, following God’s plan required very great faith.

That was all right, because God gave Abram great faith. God’s promise allowed Abram to face the road ahead and overcome fear. God’s promise to Abram is so beautiful it rings out like poetry. “I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 12:2-3).

Abram didn’t have hotel reservations when he left Haran. He had no lease papers for an apartment and certainly had not closed a deal on a house in the new destination. As a matter of fact, all through his life Abram would live in tents in Canaan. He had camels and herds, but the only piece of real estate he ever owned was a burial plot he later bought from the Hittites (Genesis 23). Yet in reality, Abram had something much more solid than any stone foundation under a house. He had the rock-solid promise of God. The culmination of that promise was that all peoples on earth would be blessed through Abram and his offspring, particularly through one descendant who would be the world’s Messiah. We now know that Messiah as Jesus Christ. The magnitude of God’s promise enabled Abram to follow God in faith, even if all the specifics weren’t laid out for him. Thus, when Abram arrived in the promised land and found other people already living there, he did not need to worry. The Lord assured him again: “To your offspring I will give this land” (Genesis 12:7). So, rather than fretting and worrying, Abram built altars to the LORD and worshiped him (Genesis 12:7,8).

You and I are the children of Abraham. (The LORD extended Abram’s name to Abraham, meaning “the father of many.”) Scripture calls us children of the promise given to Abraham (Galatians 4:28). All believers in the LORD, the Savior, are united by faith in the God of such great promises (cf. Galatians 3:7). We have seen what Abraham never got a chance to see—every one of the promises made to him was fulfilled. His descendants did inherit the land. His family became a prominent nation. His ancestry provided the human line for Jesus the Savior—the one through whom all peoples on earth have been blessed. Abram’s worship, his following God in faith, was not in vain. Neither is our faith in vain.

When the LORD calls us to follow him, what he asks of us is formidable. We are to love the LORD our God, with all our heart, and all our soul, and all our mind, and all our strength (Mark 12:30). We are to follow him completely, in any direction he may ask us to go. Sometimes that can be overwhelming. For instance, when a moving truck shows up in front of your residence because you need to change your occupation, change location, start over again with a new direction in life. Or the path you walk may be one you must walk haltingly, hobbling along, because a disease or accident has wracked your body or crippled your legs. Or the road God asks you to go may be lonely because it is a spiritually committed direction Instead of the easier worldly choices of those around you. Following in faith, walking after God, may mean you’re passed over for promotions or career improvements because you’re not as cutthroat in business as others, and they get ahead more than you. The journey through this world may find you laying your wife or husband or child or parent in a grave.

The story of our lives is full of upheavals and challenges, bends in the road, temptations and pressures. We are left wondering what comes next. Often we are afraid—very afraid. That’s normal for us. Our dear Lord knows we struggle with fear as we go through life and strive to follow him. Think of how many times Jesus reassured his disciples, saying, “Fear not!” and reminding them of his promises. And that was when they had him physically present with them. How much more we will be prone to fear when we face storms and changing winds in our lives, without seeing Jesus right there in the boat with us!

Actually, he is always in the boat with us—something we can’t see with our physical eyes, but do see with eyes of faith. Our Lord does not ask anything of us for which he does not also empower us. Allow me to remind you of some of Scripture’s promises, which enable us to keep going through life’s many moves and misdirections.

God says, “I am with you and will keep you wherever you go. … I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you” (Genesis 28:15).
“After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, support, strengthen, and establish you” (1 Peter 5:10).
“God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing, he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
“Be strong and courageous; do not be frightened or dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9).
“Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying: this is the way, walk in it” (Isaiah 30:21 NIV). “I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my victorious right hand” (Isaiah 41:10). “Even to your old age and gray hairs. I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you. I will sustain you and I will rescue you” (Isaiah 46:4).

Those are promises that God gives to you as his people. And those are just some of his promises. Walking through life, following God, would be a pathway filled with fear—except for God’s promises. His promises embolden us. By the promises of God, we walk in faith, overcoming fear, for the LORD is with us. He is protecting and saving us every step we take, anywhere we go. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is still our God; the Lord Almighty is our refuge (cf. Psalm 46). As he did for Abram, the LORD our Savior will lead us also—onward through our lives on this earth, and, ultimately, into the promised land of “many mansions” that he has in store for us beyond (cf. John 14:2 KJV).

Apr

2022

An Easter message

Life is eternal in Jesus

If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have died (1 Corinthians 15:19,20).

Maintaining our hope in life can be extremely challenging. In my own circle of contacts, I have known a family (mother and two daughters) that died in a house fire. I’ve sat in the ICU waiting room with a soon-to-be widow, whose husband’s body was shutting down and whose kidneys were failing after a lifelong struggle with diabetes. I knew a young bride-to-be whose fiancé died in his sleep before they were married, for no apparent cause. I’m sure each of you has known families and individuals who have experienced heartache and struggle and loss; likely, you’ve experienced tests of faith in your own household. Life in this world has many days of joy, and many days of ordinary routine … but, all too often, also has so many problems and so much pain. It can be hard to hold onto hope in day-to-day affairs. Where is hope when your car gets stolen by thieves whose only purpose is to post reckless driving videos on social media? When the job you worked in for decades tells you they’re downsizing and you’re done? When your spouse or life partner walks away, abandons you? When your doctor tells you the prognosis is not good? When wars and pandemics can turn our world upside down in a matter of days? Well-meaning friends may try to console us, saying, “Whenever God closes a door, he opens a window.” But we want to shout back, “All I see are boarded-up windows everywhere. And if there is a window, it’s a hundred feet off the ground; if I try to go in that direction, I’ll fall and be crushed.” When the worst happens–when a life ends and we lose a loved one–we want to hope for a reunion one day in the next life. But we have our doubts about that too. It’s just so hard to believe.

Think of what it was like for Jesus’ friends and followers when he died. Even though they had witnessed the astonishing miracles he had done, his death had crushed their hopes. They’d seen him multiply a handful of food into enough to feed thousands. They’d seen him give sight to the blind and cure incurable diseases. They’d seen him bring dead persons back to life. He gave a dead girl back to her father alive (cf. Luke 8:49-56). He gave a dead son back to his widowed mother, turning a funeral procession into a celebration of life (cf. Luke 7:11-17). He restored his friend, Lazarus, to his sisters Mary and Martha, after Lazarus had been in the tomb already four days (cf. John 11). Jesus’ disciples had every reason to be confident in Jesus’ power over everything, including death. But their confidence was shattered when they saw Jesus arrested, tried, beaten, whipped, convicted as a criminal, crucified, dead, and buried. The disciples of Jesus were devastated. On Sunday morning, when women who had gone to the tomb reported that the stone was rolled away and the tomb was empty and they had seen angels who said Jesus was alive again, for Jesus’ apostles, “These words seemed an idle tale, and they did not believe them” (Luke 24:11). In the evening on that day, the disciples of Jesus were still not sure what to think. They met behind locked doors out of fear (cf. John 20:19). They feared the same sort of horrors that Jesus suffered awaited them from a hostile community. Jesus needed to appear to them personally, alive and well, before they were able to believe the good news of the resurrection–even though Jesus had told them in advance this is what would happen. The experience of Thomas, who was not with them when they saw Jesus, was essentially the same experience all the disciples had. Thomas said, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in [the spear wound in] his side, I will not believe” (John 20:25). They all had been that way. The reality of the resurrection was so unbelievable, they needed to see to believe.

We struggle in that way too. We don’t visibly see the souls of our loved ones being welcomed into the arms of God in heaven. We haven’t personally witnessed anyone come back from the dead. We want to believe that decayed or cremated remains can be remade and reinvigorated by God, resurrected to life everlasting. But believing is so, so hard.

The message of Easter is the message that Jesus gave a week later when he appeared to his disciples again, this time with Thomas there too. Jesus said to Thomas, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe” (John 20:29). Those who have not yet seen and yet have come to believe–that’s us. It was hard for the friends and followers of Jesus–who knew him in person as a human being on this earth–to come to believe in him as the eternal Son of God and as the Lord who could come back even after he was brutalized, lifeless, and buried. But they saw Jesus, who “presented himself alive to them by many convincing proofs” (Acts 1:3), and the unbelievable became the rock-solid foundation of their faith. By the Spirit’s power to change hearts and minds, Jesus’ disciples’ faith in the resurrection became a witness to the world of the reality of Jesus’ power.

It is hard for us–as believers in Jesus today–to hold onto hope and faith in the face of the death of our loved ones, in the face of the struggles of our lives and the troubles of our world. But we rely on the word of the apostles who saw Jesus alive. Peter said, “We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty” (2 Peter 1:16). And Peter assured us, “Although you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, for you are receiving the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls (1 Peter 1:8-9). We have confidence in the testimony of those who were led by Jesus, who witnessed his death, and saw him alive again, and watched him ascend back into the sky (cf. Acts 1:6-11). Those first disciples of Jesus were threatened, persecuted, and even killed because they stood by their confession of his resurrection with confidence. That’s how sure they were. We have those sure promises of God, which the apostles and prophets have shared with us (cf. Ephesians 2:19-20). God guarantees his promises of life forever are true. God’s promises are our reason for hope when life becomes a struggle, when death overtakes persons that we love, when the events of our world are more chaos than calm.

“We believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have died” (1 Thessalonians 4:14). That is our hope. That is our faith. That is what enables us to keep going from one day to the next, and what enables us to face even our last days with confidence. We have been given “a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3).

Lord, we believe; help us overcome our doubts (cf. Mark 9:23-24).

Prayer: Lord of heaven and earth, help us when we experience pain and loss in our lives here on earth. Help us to have a view that includes all of life—all the way to eternal life in heaven with you. Enable us to endure sadness and tragedies by clinging to the living hope that you have given us—the hope of an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade, kept in heaven for us (cf. 1 Peter 1:4). Trusting in Jesus’ resurrection, we pray. Amen.

Mar

2022

Patience

A meditation focused on Psalm 129

PATIENCE

See Psalm 129 in The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language by Eugene Peterson

Have you heard the apocryphal story about the woman who asked her pastor to pray for patience for her? Let’s hope it’s not a true story, because it would be terrible ministry practice. (Cf. article by Tim Harvey in The Messenger, 11/13/2019.)

The story goes like this:

A woman came to see her pastor. She said, “I am struggling with losing my patience. I get so frustrated dealing with my kids. At work, the policies and procedures and red tape infuriate me. When standing in line at the grocery store, I get agitated and just want to scream. Pastor, would you pray for me, that I can learn to be more patient?”

“Sure,” her pastor replied, and began to pray: “Lord, give this woman trouble and pain. Bring about times of distress and difficulty. Cause her to suffer …”

“Wait, wait, wait!” The woman interrupted. “Please stop! I didn’t ask for you to pray for me to have pain and suffering. I asked you to pray for patience for me.”

The pastor took a Bible off the desk (King James Version, of course), opened to Romans chapter 5, and read: “We glory in tribulations … knowing that tribulation worketh patience” (Romans 5:3 KJV). If you want patience, what you need is more suffering.

I hope no pastor would take such an insensitive approach. There is, though, a grain of truth to consider. Scripture does say we welcome sufferings when they come, “knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope” (Romans 5:3-4). God doesn’t take pleasure in seeing us suffer; he loves us and strengthens us with his Spirit (Romans 5:5). When powers and people in this life kick us around and knock us to the ground, we hang on to hope in God’s promises. We trust he is working to deepen our relationship with him, build our resilience over struggles, and prepare us for an eternal reward as people called to be his own.

Our natural tendencies do not tend toward patience. As Pastor Eugene Peterson put it in his book, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, we are people who are constantly “whining and chattering … and running and fidgeting,” which causes us to miss listening to the slow, calm, merciful words and ways of God (p. 114). “The way of the world is peppered with brief enthusiasms” (p.123), of chasing after one thing and then another, because this world is a temporal, temporary, wibbly-wobbly sort of place. That which is enduring and permanent–that which is everlasting–can only be found in relationship with God. But that’s not what counts to us when we’re always tracking daily stock prices and quarterly business reports and scrolling what’s trending on social media and what’s streaming on our TVs or tablets or all the other devices we’ve accumulated to occupy our time.

Our chronic impatience–our pursuit of “brief enthusiasms”–spills over into spiritual life too. For example, a number of years ago, I attended a concert in Houston. The headline act was Leon Patillo, who had been lead singer for Santana. He had found Jesus and turned to making Christian contemporary music. His vibe was bouncy and boisterous, like you’d have heard in dance clubs, except with lyrics full of “Praise God!” and “Hallelujah!” Oodles of young kids had come to party to his synthesizer sounds, and they were bored with the opening act (the person I had actually come to see). His name was Michael Card. Those of you in my age bracket may recognize his name as the songwriter of “El Shaddai,” “Love Crucified Arose,” and other thoughtful songs focusing on the life of Christ revealed in the Gospels. Midway through his brief portion of the show, as the young people were impatient for the headline act to take the stage, Michael Card paused and spoke sincerely to the audience. He said, “Christian life is not one big party; I want you to realize that. We are not here only to jump and sing and dance, but to struggle in the name of Jesus as we proclaim him to the world.” And then he read from Philippians chapter 3 (verses 10-11): “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.”

Michael Card had it right. Jesus does not promise us constant fun or problem-free living on this earth. He does promise inner joy that transcends outward circumstances, life forever to those who endure and overcome.

Psalm 129 has a message of a similar mood. Worshipers on their way up to Jerusalem would sing this song, remembering their history as a people, trusting God’s enduring faithfulness to them, and praying that the enemies of God’s people would be thwarted.

Think of the patience needed to be an Old Testament believer in the promises of God.

Abraham was promised by God that he would be the father of a great nation, bringing about blessings through him and his descendants (Genesis 12:1). He was 75 years old at the time (Genesis 12:4). The promise was laughable. Then, Abraham was made to wait 25 years before the miraculous promise was fulfilled and the son Isaac was born, when he was 100 years old and his wife Sarah was 90 (cf. Genesis 17:17, 21:5-7).
Jacob was promised that the land inhabited by Abraham, his grandfather, and Isaac, his father, would become the homeland of that nation of their descendants (Genesis 35:11-12). Then, in his old age, Jacob and his whole extended family needed to emigrate to Egypt to survive a time of famine (cf. Genesis 42-47). Not until a couple hundred years later did the Israelites, as a people, exit Egypt and go back to the promised land.
The history of Israel from that point forward wasn’t easy either. In the days of the Judges, the people faltered in their faithfulness and experienced a series of attacks against them by surrounding peoples such as the Moabites, Midianites, Canaanites, Ammonites, and Philistines. During the time of the Kings, forces that opposed God’s plans for his people continued to afflict them from both inside and outside their nation. Eventually, the northern tribes of Israel fell under the domination of the empire of Assyria, and then the southern tribes (the nation of Judah) fell to the empire of Babylon. Some think that Psalm 129 may have been composed during the time of exile in Babylon or after Jewish exiles returned from there decades later.

With that history of Israel’s struggles in mind, the psalm writer reminisces: “They’ve kicked me around ever since I was young”–so says Israel–”but they never could keep me down” (Psalm 129:1,2 MSG). In poetic imagery, the psalm sees the history of Israel as if others were driving plows up and down their back, ripping deep into their flesh. Yet they were not destroyed. They were not defeated. God kept coming to Israel’s aid, “ripping the harnesses of the evil plowmen (Israel’s enemies) to shreds” (Psalm 129:4 MSG), rescuing his people.

When I read Psalm 129’s description of how the enemies of Israel were gouging and ripping up the back of the people of Israel, I can’t help but think of another image of suffering. Jesus Christ went through an ordeal of suffering. We call it “The Passion of the Christ” because suffering is the original meaning of the Latin term passio. When Jesus was brought before the Jewish authorities as an enemy of the people, those “who were holding Jesus began to mock him and beat him; they also blindfolded him and kept asking him, ‘Prophesy! Who is it that struck you?’” (Luke 22:63-65). Jesus was then dragged before the Roman governor Pontius Pilate as an enemy of the empire. Though there was no basis to the charges against Jesus, Pilate had him flogged–at two points during the process, it seems (cf. John 19:1 and Matthew 27:26, Mark 15:15). The 2004 movie, The Passion of the Christ, dramatized how gruesome scourging by Roman soldiers could be. Mel Gibson’s original theatrical release of the film dwelt on that torture scene for ten minutes. Subsequent editions of the film cut five minutes of the goriest visuals, because viewers and critics had found it too horrible to watch. If the image of it is too horrible for us to endure, what of the horror endured by Jesus himself, actually experiencing such a thing? And then experiencing the horrors of crucifixion, slowly suffocating to death? And the horror of soul in bearing all the weight of humanity’s separation from God as an act of atonement for us, causing him to cry out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46)?

We can have patience in our ordeals in life because we know we have a God who is on our side. He has suffered with us and for us. “We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:15-16).

Now, there’s a part of Psalm 129 that we haven’t addressed yet, which we can’t ignore. The last verses of the psalm approach the throne of God with a prayer for punishment on all those who have hated and opposed Zion–God’s holy mountain, God’s people, his church. “Oh, let all those who hate Zion grovel in humiliation; let them be like grass in shallow ground that withers before the harvest” (Psalm 129:5-6 MSG). Is that a righteous prayer? Are we allowed to pray for judgment against “the evil plowmen” who have “plowed long furrows up and down” our backs? Are we allowed to ask God to rip “the harnesses of the evil plowmen to shreds” (cf. Psalm 129:3,4 MSG)? When Christ was crucified, didn’t he say, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34)?

Yes, Christ urges us to show patience and forgiveness to all. At the same time, we also speak out against those who knowingly and persistently act against righteousness and justice and goodness. Jesus himself forcefully upended the tables of the merchants and money changers doing business in the temple area, even making a whip to drive away all their merchandise–sheep and cattle they were selling for sacrifices (John 2:13-17). God’s prophets again and again decried those who acted unjustly. The prophet Amos warned the proud and powerful in his day, saying, “I know how many are your transgressions, and how great are your sins—you who afflict the righteous, who take a bribe, and push aside the needy. … Hate evil and love good. … Is not the day of the Lord darkness, not light, and gloom with no brightness in it [to those who are wicked]?… Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” (Amos 5:12,15,21,24).

We are called to a path of patience like God’s own patience, “not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). But that doesn’t mean we wish people well in their path of sin or smile cheerfully when evil and hurtful things occur. Christians can get confused about that sometimes. I know someone who worked in a domestic violence shelter in the Bible belt. Many of the women entering the shelter were deeply Christian in their convictions. As soon as their terror subsided and their wounds and bruises began to heal, they began feeling it was their duty to go back to their husbands and forgive them. The shelter team had trouble keeping these women safely in the program, because of their compelling urge to turn the other cheek and forgive quickly. The advice I offered? Remind the battered women of the example of Joseph in dealing with his brothers. Joseph had been mistreated by his brothers and sold off into slavery by them. God kept Joseph safe and put him in a position where later his brothers came before him (not recognizing who he was, as he became a leader in Egypt and had the appearance of an Egyptian). Joseph very much wanted to forgive and reconcile with his brothers, but didn’t rush into doing so. He put his brothers through a series of tests of character to see if they were still the same uncaring men who had sold him into slavery more than a decade earlier (cf. Genesis chapters 42-45). Once it was clear they were changed, repentant persons, he revealed himself, and a genuine reunion and reconciliation occurred.

Loving Zion–loving the kingdom of God and all that is good–means we will not smile and nod toward those who hate Zion or do evil. We will, in all honesty, feel what the ancient psalm-singers felt when they sang: “Let all those who hate Zion grovel in humiliation.” We don’t say, “Congratulations on your wonderful crop! We bless you in God’s name!” (Psalm 129:8 MSG) to those who achieve their great harvest or success by abusing or exploiting or taking advantage of people to get it. We call evil evil, and we call good good. We pray for the good of all, and we pray against that which is evil. And we wait patiently while enduring suffering and hurt in a world that is plagued by much that is evil, knowing we have a God who is good and who will rescue us from all that is painful in his appointed time.

The Passion of Christ has shown us how God achieves what is valuable for us. There was nothing quick or easy about the path set before Jesus. He trod that bloody, anguished path for us. And he promises us that when our patience is tried and tested, he remains with us, building our endurance, giving us hope. As the Scriptures testify: “We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our bodies. For while we live, we are always being given up to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus may be made visible in our mortal flesh” (2 Corinthians 4:8-11). This is our calling in Christ.

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are rom the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked MSG are taken from THE MESSAGE, copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

Mar

2022

The Lord is our righteousness

A preface to this post:

Our hearts are with the people of Ukraine at this time, as they struggle to protect their country and many have been forced to flee their homes. A number of years ago, I visited Ukraine to teach a course at a seminary there. I asked a contact of mine what, if anything, those of us far away could do in the present crisis. He responded, “Thank you very much for your prayers and concern. Here is a link where you can donate to Ukrainian Army: https://uahelp.monobank.ua/.” [If you go to the site, a donation of 1000 hryven’ at today’s current exchange rate is 33.28 in US dollars.] Others may be inclined to show support via humanitarian agencies. The Guardian newspaper recently published links to charitable agencies working to alleviate suffering: “How Americans can help people of Ukraine.”

At the beginning of in Lent in 2009, I was privileged to preach to a group in Ternopil. I’ll share a version of that message for the first week in Lent here. Let us pray for and support one another in all the struggles and tests of faith that this life brings.

This is the name by which he will be called: “The Lord is our righteousness” (Jeremiah 23:6).

In the wilderness, tempted by Satan

What are your temptations in life?

Are you tempted to be greedy, to want more than you have? Are you tempted to be lazy, to do less than you can do? Or are you tempted to be a workaholic? Do you never let yourself rest?

Are you tempted to be judgmental, to look down on other people? Are you tempted by jealousy and hostility? Are there persons that make you so angry you want to hit them? Maybe you don’t actually hit them, but you’ve got a hammer in your heart that pounds and pounds with hatred or envy.

Are you tempted to be lonely? To feel isolated? To feel sorry for yourself? To feel like God has put you on a path that is too often too difficult and doesn’t give the rewards you want?

Are you tempted to be frustrated and afraid—about the state of affairs in the world or in your life or for your church? Do you keep wishing earth would be more like heaven, even though you know it is not (and cannot be)?

We all know what it is to be tempted. We are bombarded with temptations day after day. The devil knows which ones work particularly well on each of us. We are attacked at every point where we are most vulnerable.

You know your own temptations and sins. You could pour out your soul in confession all day long. You’d never run out of unpleasant thoughts and words and deeds to confess, because so very often temptation wins, godliness loses. You are at fault for this failure, that offense, those ugly behaviors, these unkind words, and countless shameful omissions of the many good things you might have done.

You are guilty, as am I. We are like the man in Jesus’ parable, standing at a distance from God, not even daring to look up to heaven, acknowledging our failings and saying, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner” (Luke 18:13). Think about it: the sins we’ve been mentioning are things that occur to us now, while we are Christians, while God’s Spirit is within us. Yet still we fall or slip or dive headfirst into sin so many times. Imagine the bondage of sin we were in before the Spirit came to us. What great need of salvation there is for every one of us!

And what a Savior we have in Jesus Christ! The first thing he did—the first, immediate task he took up after his anointing—was to expose himself to Satan’s every temptation and overcome them all. He did that for us. As soon as he was identified as the Christ by his baptism at the Jordan River, “the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan” (Mark 1:12-13). Jesus went head-to-head with Satan—and not merely for sport. As God, Jesus could trounce the devil underfoot eternally, destroy him absolutely. But the fullness of time had come, and God the Son, “born of a woman, born under law to redeem those under law” (Galatians 4:4,5), was working out our redemption under the law. He was fulfilling all righteousness for us, carrying out every commandment in our stead as a human being. He deflected every temptation, proclaiming the word of God in the face of evil. Thus, in Jesus, God has provided a record of human obedience to his will that is faultless, spotless—“one who in every respect has been tested, as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15).

What Jesus did in the desert is much more than an example for us to follow. If Jesus only serves as an example to us, our situation would still be hopeless. Who of us can follow Christ’s example and be perfect as he was and is? Christ came not merely as example. Christ is our substitute, our life, our salvation. He did all that he did to atone for us, to provide us with holiness.

The confrontation with temptation in the desert was Jesus’ first official act as the Anointed One, the Messiah. But it was not the only vicarious act he performed as atonement for us. His whole life was lived as a substitute for ours. Every time Jesus obeyed Mary and Joseph when he was a child, he was doing so in our place. Every time Jesus performed an act of love and mercy for the sick, the sorrowful, the demon-possessed, the bereaved, he was doing perfectly all the things we never could do well enough.

The forty days that Jesus spent in the desert at the beginning of his ministry were not the only occasion when the devil sought to distract Jesus, damage him, derail his mission. When this round of temptation was over, the devil left Jesus—but only for a time (Luke 4:13). He would be back. Satan would strike again and again at Jesus—just the same way that the devil strikes again and again at us. As Jesus pursued his path as the Christ on this earth, he set his face like flint and marched on (cf. Isaiah 50:7, Luke 9:51). He marched on all the way till they threw a rough-hewn wooden beam across his shoulders and told him to drag it out to the place of execution. There he was put to death in our place, just as he had lived in our place.

Jesus supplied a record of righteousness for us by his obedience to every moral duty, by his rejection of every sinful temptation. And then he removed the record of shamefulness that stained us by his anguish on the cross. He who had no sin was made to be sin for us—“the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:6)—so that “in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

Now, when we are tempted, we run for refuge into Jesus’ arms, the one who has already defeated the devil on our behalf, and we find strength in his strength.

Now, when we sin, we return to Jesus, in repentance, to be renewed by his righteousness, to be received by his love, to be revitalized for new life.

Christ is our forgiveness and hope and source of life. Through his victory, we live victoriously. Through his victory, we are given strength to overcome temptations. Through his victory, we are assured a place beside him in eternity.

Thank God that Jesus went out into the desert to be tempted by the devil. He did it for us, and he won that battle for us … just as he has won every other spiritual battle. Because of him, we are blessed “in Christ with every spiritual blessing” (Ephesians 1:3). Our trust, day after day, is in Jesus, who defeated all temptation for us.

Reading for the 1^st Sunday in Lent
The Temptation of Jesus – Luke 4:1-13

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Jan

2022

Hidden in Plain Sight

The Quiet Power of God’s Presence

Thoughts for Epiphany (January 6) and for the Baptism of our Lord (Sunday after Epiphany)
David Sellnow

They say that heaven is 10 zillion light years away
But if there is a God, we need him now
“Where is your God”
That’s what my friends ask me
And I say it’s taken him so long
‘Cause we’ve got so far to come

-Stevie Wonder, “Heaven is 10 Zillion Light Years Away,” Fulfillingness’ First Finale (Tamla, 1974)

Some of you might recognize those lyrics from a Stevie Wonder song from 1974. It was the case then–and remains the case always–that human eyes look for evidence of God’s presence in big, obvious ways. We think that if our lives are overflowing with an abundance of wealth and good health, that’s when God is with us. When times are hard, we assume we’ve been abandoned and God isn’t there. There are problems with this point of view. For one thing, having riches and success rarely indicates how close to God a person is. In fact, many powerful, successful persons often achieve such glories by godlessness–not by prioritizing kindness and walking humbly in the ways of God (cf. Micah 6:8). Another thing: The testimony of Scripture shows that God never abandons those who trust in his name, and he is especially with us in the experiences that challenge our faith in him.

Think of Job, who lost all his wealth and lost loved ones and cried out wondering where God was. God knew everything and was, in fact, striving to connect Job’s heart even closer to his own.
Think of the parables Jesus told. It was not the well-to-do Pharisee who was right with God as he bragged proudly of how much he’d done. The social pariah, the tax collector, who prayed, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner” (Luke 9:13)–that’s who Jesus said was exalted in God’s eyes.
It was not the rich man “dressed in purple and fine linen … who feasted sumptuously every day” that ascended into heaven on the day he died (Luke 18:19-31). The beggar who sat in the street outside the rich man’s home, whose only friends were stray dogs that licked his open sores–that’s the person Jesus said was blessed.

When we look at the world through our usual human perspective, we don’t see God in action in the obvious ways we want to see.

The way we see things and the way things really often are out of alignment. As we go about our lives, we focus on physical, material, tangible things that can easily be measured. We are not attuned to sensing spiritual realities–the ways that in God “we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). Psychologists have noticed something called “inattentional blindness” in how we interpret the world. Rather than noticing each detail around us, we tend to concentrate on the things most important to us. We see things in the context of existing mental frameworks that we have adopted (Kendra Cherry, “Inattentional Blindness in Psychology, VeryWellMind, 5/4/2020). If you’ll allow me to apply that principle in a broader way, our earthbound primary focus notices the flow of what’s happening outwardly in our lives, and we miss many details of what God is doing in and through and underneath those events. While “no one has ever seen God” (John 1:18), the hand of God is evident in things that can be seen. “Ever since the creation of the world, God’s eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made” (Romans 1:20). But we tend not to look past outward appearances, and so we miss seeing important truths. “Focusing our attention on one thing can cause us to overlook another” even if the other is right in front of us. (Daniel Nevers, “A Brief History of Hiding in Plain Sight, Mills College Art Museum, 2019). That’s how we tend to be with the manifestations of God that are given to us. God shows himself, but human beings mostly fail to pay attention to these evidences of God. Spiritual realities escape our notice, hidden in plain sight all around us.

Think about the ways God made himself known when Jesus Christ came into our world. There were clear manifestations of the miracle of redemption God was bringing about, but most people’s attention was aimed in other directions. When God chooses to make his presence seen and known, he often does so in what seem like insignificant ways.

When Jesus was born, he arrived in one of the world’s least significant places, the little town of Bethlehem. The King of kings might be expected to be found in a palace, at the center of politics and power. Yet when astronomers from an eastern land came looking for him in Jerusalem, the king in Jerusalem had to consult Jewish religious scholars to ask where the Messiah was to be born (Matthew 2:4).
The woman who had given birth to Jesus was no one of fame or acclaim. She and Joseph, the legal father of the virgin-born child Jesus, both were “descended from the house and family line of David” (Luke 2:4), but otherwise they were pretty much nobodies. Joseph was a carpenter (Matthew 13:55). Mary was his teenage wife, who herself said the Lord had “looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant” when choosing her to bear the Christ child in her womb (Luke 1:48).
When Jesus was anointed to begin his work as Teacher and Savior, there was no grand national ceremony with parades and dignitaries. Rather, John, a cousin of Jesus, served as the prophet to point to Jesus as the Messiah. John lived in the wilderness by the Jordan River, wearing clothing of camel’s hair and subsisting on a diet of locusts and wild honey (Matthew 3:4). John proclaimed “a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Mark 1:4), and people did come to be baptized. Then Jesus requested that John baptize him also–“to fulfill all righteousness,” as Jesus insisted (Matthew 3:15). At Jesus’ baptism, “the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased’” (Luke 3:22). But I wonder if most people who were there when that happened heard and saw things differently. “Look at that, a dove just landed on him,” I imagine many said, not understanding the spiritual significance. And, as happened on another occasion when the Father spoke audibly from heaven, rather than hearing the words “This is my Son, the Beloved,” the crowd standing there may well have thought, “Was that thunder?” (cf. John 12:28-29).

Our eyes and ears aren’t attuned in such a way that we grasp the workings of God, even when they happen right in front of us. Think of baptism itself, the holy act by which God claims us as his own. What do we see? Ordinary water, nothing special. A few simple words, as we are baptized into “the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19). When we have our baptisms, there is no dove that miraculously appears or audible voice speaking from the skies. But with eyes of faith, we confess that “baptism is not simply plain water,” but that “it is water used according to God’s command and connected with God’s word.” We believe beyond what we can see, that baptism “brings about forgiveness of sins, redeems from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe” (Martin Luther’s Small Catechism). So also with communion, the Lord’s Supper. We eat and drink the most basic sorts of things – little bits of bread, small sips of wine. But because such simple actions were directed by Christ himself, whoever believes his words “has what they declare, namely, forgiveness of sin” (Martin Luther’s Small Catechism).

Such is God’s way of making himself known to us, his way of connecting himself to us, of doing the miraculous for us. It’s not typically in the spectacular, but in things that seem everyday and ordinary. Do you remember Naaman, “commander of the army of the king of Aram, a great man and in high favor”–but who suffered from the disease of leprosy (2 Kings 5:1)? Naaman had a slave girl who had been captured from the people of Israel. The slave girl urged her master Naaman to go see the prophet in Israel for healing. Naaman went to Israel, and the prophet Elisha merely sent a messenger to tell him to go wash in the Jordan River seven times and he’d be healed (2 Kings 5:10). Naaman became angry and began to leave, because he was expecting some great and mighty prophet to “come out and stand and call on the name of the Lord” and wave his hand over Naaman in dramatic fashion and cure the disease (2 Kings 5:11). Naaman had to be convinced by others of his servants, who said to him, “If the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it” (2 Kings 5:13)? So, Naaman did the simple thing the prophet had said, and he was healed.

That’s how it often is with God. As Elisha’s teacher, Elijah, had learned, don’t expect God to show up by splitting mountains in half or shaking the earth beneath our feet. God more likely will make his presence known in what Elijah heard as the “sound of sheer silence” (1 Kings 19:12), or “a still, small voice,” as the King James Version of the Bible expressed it. Every day, in all sorts of seemingly ordinary ways, God makes his presence known and shares his grace by the life and witness of people who are acting in his name.

There is the son who visits his elderly mother every weekend, spends time with her, takes care of chores around the house for her, cooks a meal for her. And when she has to go to a nursing home, the son continues to visit, even as his mother becomes more confined, her health diminishes, and her memory fades away.
There is the mother whose toddler is throwing a tantrum and cannot calm down, so she sits down on the floor and gathers the child in her arms and just holds on, closely, securely, through all the kicks and screams, until the toddler finally melts into her embrace and hugs her back and says, “I’m sorry, Momma. I love you, Momma.”
There is the student who sees a schoolmate being picked on by others, avoided and ostracized and gossiped about for being different–and this classmate seeks out and befriends the outcast. They sit together in the cafeteria, spend time together studying and not studying (just hanging out), making it clear to everyone that acceptance and understanding are better than prejudice and pettiness.

Those could be just human actions of kindness, yes. In many cases, though, they are far more than that. They are the acts of God’s people making God’s love known in the ordinary course of events, doing things that are, in fact, extraordinary. God is working to make himself known to others through you–ordinary people in your everyday lives. Nothing spectacular. Nothing dazzling. Just you laboring patiently to serve your family, your neighbors, your community. Just you loving earnestly and committedly, caring for others with hearts that have been invigorated by the Spirit of Christ. That’s your calling as God’s people. God says to each of you, “I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. … You are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you” (Isaiah 43:1,4). He also says, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior” (Isaiah 43:2). How does that help, that strength, that rescue from the Lord usually show up in your lives when you are hurting or in trouble? Through the actions of people doing simple things, basic, necessary things, in God’s name. The neighbor who shovels your sidewalk or snowblows your driveway–because he knows you are away from home, caring for a sick relative. Fellow church members who take turns dropping off meals at your home–because you are the caregiver for a disabled family member or for your spouse who is going through chemotherapy, and they want to help bear your burdens. Complete strangers who contribute to an online plea for funds to help with extensive medical bills incurred from a major surgery or a lengthy stay in the hospital ICU recovering from disease.

Every now and then, God has intervened in history with supernatural interruptions of natural events. But more often, God does his work through us, his people, in less astonishing ways. Let me remind you again of the experience of God’s prophet Elijah. Elijah had the experience of God making his presence obvious and forceful and explosive. Elijah prevailed over the enemies of God by calling on God to do a miracle, to consume a sacrifice with fire sent from heaven. And God did so, spectacularly. “The fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering, the wood, the stones, and the dust, and even licked up the water that was in the trench” around Elijah’s offering (1 Kings 18:38). But the perspective of the world doesn’t readily change when a miracle like that happens. In fact, the enemies of God (and of Elijah) only got more determined against God’s plans and against God’s prophet. Death threats were issued from the royal household against Elijah, and he ran. He ran back to the mountain where God had once revealed himself to Moses, and felt ready to die. “I’ve had enough,” he said to God. “Take away my life” (1 Kings 19:4). Instead, God told him to get up and he would reveal himself to Elijah. God did show himself, but not in expected ways. Not in a mighty, raging wind. Not in a rock-smashing earthquake. God revealed himself In a still, small voice, in the “sound of sheer silence” (I kings 19).

God’s powerful presence is often in the still, small voice–a voice carried out into the world by individuals, one at a time, by people like Elijah, by people like you and me. God’s way of enacting change in the hearts of people, one person at a time, is by the simple testimony of his words on our lips and his love lived out in our lives. He brings about the miracle of salvation by one baptism, then another baptism, then another, sending his Spirit to live in each baptized person’s heart and life. He carries out the actions of salvation in our hearts and lives, as we who have been saved by grace through faith, “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life” (Ephesians 3:10), go about doing those works on behalf of one another, and for our neighbors, and for our communities.

When you feel like God is 10 zillion light years away, like God is so far distant from your life that you wonder if he’s even there at all, look again. Listen again. Feel again. Take notice of the little things, the inconspicuous ways that God is showing himself. Others’ actions. Your own actions. All the everyday words and actions whereby God makes his presence known and shares his peace among us. The smallest of kind words and actions toward one of the least of those whom Jesus considers his brothers and sisters are gifts to Jesus and blessings from Jesus (cf. Matthew 25:40). As Martin Luther taught, “God is so in control that the good we do is really God’s work. We’re nothing but the hands of Christ …. In the good we do, we are ‘little Christs’ to each other” (Luther’s Works, Vol.34, p.111, Volu.24, p.226, Vol. 31, p.367-368, quoted by Mark Ellingson in Living Lutheran, August 11, 2017). May our lives each day appreciate and extend the Epiphany of Christ in this way.

Dec

2021

Living in hope (though life is difficult)

We wait for the Lord — hopefully, patiently, responsibly

Message for 3rd Sunday of Advent
by David Sellnow

Readings for the day: Zephaniah 3:14-20, Philippians 4:4-7, Luke 3:7-18

Stephanie grew up under the weight of demanding, overbearing parents. Their way was always the right way, and their children were going to toe the line and become obedient, upstanding, model citizens. Stephanie’s older sister fit the model perfectly. At the strict religious school their parents enrolled them in, Stephanie’s sister got all A’s and was considered the impeccable child. Stephanie lived in her sister’s shadow, got mostly C’s, and was seen as far less than ideal. Later in life, Stephanie gave up on church, because the sternness of the church in which she was raised made her feel that who she was and how she was always was wrong. Her parents were mortified when she stopped going to church, and they distanced themselves more and more from her. Stephanie lived her life, but she lived with a sense of shame, felt like an outcast from her family, and was haunted by a lingering sense of judgment looming over her.

Derrick had labored diligently year after year. He always had a job, sometimes a couple of jobs at a time. He would do whatever he could to keep shoes on his kids’ feet and food on the table. He didn’t give a lot of attention to his own needs, because he was too busy taking care of the needs of others. If he could do that, he was happy. Then one day, the manufacturing plant where Derrick worked shut down. He found himself out of work for the first time in his life. The town where he lived with his family was shrinking. Derrick was in his mid-50s. Finding a new job was no easy task. The bills began to pile up while Derrick kept applying for any and every position (but not getting hired). He told employers in the bigger city 40 miles away that he could commute. They looked at him skeptically when he got as far as getting an interview … and that’s as far as he ever got, it seemed. Derrick began to feel worthless to anyone and a failure to his family. When he started feeling fatigued and worn down physically, he figured it was all part of how generally low he was feeling. But the physical symptoms got worse and worse. He wouldn’t go to the doctor because he no longer had insurance. He eventually did go to the emergency room–when his wife, who had struggled by his side during the difficult months, found him collapsed on the floor and had to call an ambulance. Derrick’s life had gone from stability to disaster in a short span of time. He needed help. He needed health. He needed to find hope again somehow.

Those are just a couple of stories of shame, of judgment, of disability, of disaster. What is your story? What is your shame? What makes you feel weak and lame and hopeless and helpless? What are the judgments against you that make you feel like an outcast? What difficulties and disasters have you encountered? I’m not asking you to give those testimonials here in comments/replies to this blog post. I anticipate, though, that each of you has had (or now has or will have) tales you could tell of troubles and worries and woes. What do you do in the midst of your hurts and hardships and upheavals? Where do you turn?

Listen to the voice of a prophet calling out to you, telling you where to turn. Inspired by the Lord, Zephaniah said:

The Lord has taken away the judgments against you; he has turned away your enemies. … You shall fear disaster no more. … Do not let your hands grow weak. The Lord, your God, is in your midst. … He will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love. “I will remove disaster from you, so that you will not bear reproach for it. I will deal with all your oppressors. … I will save the lame and gather the outcast,and I will change their shame into praise. … I will bring you home, at the time when I gather you; for I will make you renowned and praised among all the peoples of the earth, when I restore your fortunes before your eyes,” says the Lord (Zephaniah 3:14-20 selected verses).

You may be unfamiliar with the context of the times in which Zephaniah was writing. His ministry was, after all, over 26 centuries ago, around 630 BC (Christianity.com, Bible.org). Zephaniah’s ministry likely was very early in the reign of King Josiah. Josiah came to the throne as just a boy, and later in his career sought to institute religious reforms in the nation of Judah, because the people had lost track of the law of God (cf. 2 Kings 22, 23). But those reform attempts hadn’t happened yet. Zephaniah was speaking to a nation that had been living under God’s blessing for several hundred years and was growing distant in their hearts from God. They were worshiping other things, following other priorities, with individuals seeking their own advantage and ignoring their neighbor’s needs. Sound familiar? Sound a little like our own lives in our own times? Back in those Old Testament times, Josiah’s reforms were short-lived. A couple decades after Zephaniah, the prophet Jeremiah would be speaking out again, even more dramatically. When Zephaniah called for repentance and a return to God, regular, everyday people in Judah lived under the sway of the powerful and immoral in their own nation—and they were caught up in plenty of apostasy themselves. One commentator described the cultural context as a time “of great darkness … of violence and pain,” adding: “God never brings destruction to a place or a people that haven’t already destroyed themselves” (April Motl on Crosswalk.com). As Zephaniah (and later Jeremiah) foretold, there next would come a time when the regular, everyday people of God would live under the sway of other powerful nations and people, their fates held in the hands of first the Bablylonians and then the Medes and the Persians.

At the same time as Zephaniah prophesied impending judgment from God, however, he also gave the people a message of hope. When God judges or destroys, he does so “for the purpose of protecting or rebuilding” (April Motl on Crosswalk.com). The hope held out by Zephaniah would find some fulfillment when Judah was restored from captivity under Babylon and Persia. Hope would be fulfilled still more when the Messiah would come, when Jesus was born and brought new hope to this world. Hope will be fulfilled ultimately when Jesus comes again at the end of time, vindicating the faith of those who have continued to trust in him through all the pains and shames and sins and disasters of this life.

We are called to hope as the people in Zephaniah’s day were called to hope. That same call to hope was issued by the apostle Paul in New Testament times. When Paul wrote his letter of encouragement to the church in Philippi, he was being held imprisoned in Rome, and the Philippian church members were facing an array of troubles and persecutions. They had judgments against them. They had enemies. They were reproached. People in their community opposed and oppressed them. But, at the beginning of his letter, Paul told them, “[God] has graciously granted you the privilege not only of believing in Christ, but of suffering for him as well—since you are having the same struggle that you saw I had and now hear that I still have” (Philippians 1:29,30). Many of our churches and church members today are facing struggles and challenges of their own. You may be feeling insecurity about where things are at right now, and much uncertainty about where things are headed in the future. But listen to the voice of Christ’s apostle calling out to you, telling you where to turn. Paul urges you, as he did the Philippians:

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:4-7).

We don’t know what tomorrow will bring. But we do know what forever holds in store for us, through our hope in Christ. And so as we wait for Christ—for Christmas in this season and for Christ’s return to us at the end of days—we strive to live with hope in our hearts. We encourage one another to be hopeful, even when the circumstances in which we find ourselves look bleak. We wait for the Lord hopefully, hanging onto his promises as the gospel truth.

And we wait patiently … or at least try to be patient. We are, by nature, impatient people. We tend to want what we want and we want it now. If the package we ordered doesn’t arrive in a couple of days, we get irritated. If the trip to the store takes up too much time with too long of lines, we get irritated. If something we want for ourselves, for our house, for our farm or business, or for our church is not available to us right now or is out of reach of our budget or unrealistic in our present situation, we get irritated. We are impatient.

Life as it is, in the here and now, often doesn’t align with our ambitions or with the comfort and stability we want. Life is often painful and hard. Things don’t go our way. Things get in our way. Sickness interrupts health. Lack of resources limits our options. Other people don’t think the way we think they should think, or do what we want them to do. We turn from hopeful and happy to being frustrated and ornery. We may take out our frustrations against others, even those closest to us. Within our families and within our churches, each of us starts seeking our own interests rather than maintaining concern for one another and for the well-being of all. So we become less ethical, more self-centered in our own attitudes and behaviors.

Our impatience and frustrations lead us to become ungrateful, uncooperative, unyielding–all of which, of course, are the opposite of God’s call to us. We are called to “lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely and … run with perseverance the race that is set before us” (Hebrews 12:1). Only by keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus as the author and perfecter of our faith (Hebrews 12:2) can we stay on a path of rejoicing always, displaying gentleness to everyone, not worrying about things but maintaining thankfulness. It feels so impossible for us to live in such an attitude, but we are assured: “The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard [our] hearts and … minds in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:7).

So we strive to live hopefully and to live patiently–hoping in Christ and his promises, patient with each other as we face life’s challenges, and leaning on each other as brothers and sisters. Living such a life together as God’s people calls us to live honestly, ethically, responsibly with one another.

Listen to the call of another of God’s prophets, John the Baptist. When the crowds asked John, “What then should we do?” (Luke 3:10) …

In reply he said to them, “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” [When] tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, “Teacher, what should we do?” [John] said to them, “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.” Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what should we do?” He said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages” (Luke 3:11-14).

You get John’s point. Be ethical. Be responsible. Be thinking of others, not just of yourselves. “Do to others as you would have them do to you,” as Jesus said (Luke 6:31). Treat everyone with respect and consideration and caring as you interact with one another. That is our calling in our communities, with every neighbor in our world. That is equally and especially our calling also within our churches, as we plan and work and do ministry together.

Many small and medium-size churches today are facing significant challenges as they seek to carry out ministry. A national survey of churches conducted just prior to COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020 found that “half of the country’s estimated 350,000 religious congregations had 65 or fewer people in attendance on any given weekend … a drop of more than half from a median attendance level of 137 people in 2000” (Religious News Service, October 14, 2021). The pandemic has reduced worship attendance even further, standing now at about three-fourths of pre-pandemic levels as of August of this year (Baptist Standard, November 4, 2021).

Maybe the way you’re feeling about your own life or your congregational life these days is something like the feelings of Stephanie or Derrick (whom I described at the start of this message). Feeling like you’re the outcast, the down-and-out little sister, not as good as big churches somewhere else that seem to be flourishing. Feeling like you have labored and toiled and worked hard for many years, and now are up against challenges that have you searching desperately for resources and answers that are nowhere to be seen. Again, we don’t know what tomorrow will bring. We can’t cast our eyes into the near (or far) future here on earth and know exactly what plans the Lord is working out for us. But we do have his promise “that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28). And we do know what forever holds in store for us, through our hope in Christ. And so as we wait for Christ—in this Christmas season and anticipating his return to us at the end of days—we will strive to live in dignity and love with one another. We will set our minds on thinking about things that are true and honorable and pure and pleasing (cf. Philippians 4:8), rejoicing in the Lord always (Philippians 4:4). And we will set our hands about whatever tasks we can take on–to advance our relationships with one another, our care for others in our communities, and our commitment to honoring Christ in everything we say and do.

Life on this earth is not easy. It was not easy in Zephaniah’s day, nor in the days of John the Baptist and the apostle Paul. It’s never easy. As Paul and his missionary companions said to the members of churches they had established, “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22 NIV). But we have God’s promise that he doesn’t abandon us. So we will not abandon him in our hearts, but keep trusting and hoping and persevering. We will not abandon him in our actions, but keep loving and helping and befriending. This is the life to which we are called by the prophets and apostles. This is our calling in Christ. “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7). Amen.

Scripture quotations, except where indicated otherwise are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture quotation marked (NIV) taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

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