God's Way of Holiness

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes to you from one of my favorite authors -- Horatius Bonar (1808-1889).  Few people I've ever read have had such an insightful grasp of the Gospel and its power to transform the human soul. This book is religious and theological psychology at its best -- explaining how Gospel grace, freely offered and received, is God's intended means for changing the hearts of even the worst of sinners. This particular quote comes from his book, "God's Way of Holiness." 

It is taken from chapter three, which speaks of the root and soil from which true holiness, and not just outward moral compliance, grows. To follow it you need to know that he is chastising those Christians who feel that its morally dangerous to offer the Gospel of God's free love and free forgiveness to sinners without adding numerous guards, conditions and stipulations -- so many conditions, in fact, that by the time they are done, the Gospel has ceased to be free, and thus ceased to be the Gospel.  For a Gospel whose benefits are conditioned on our first changing, or promising to change, and then waiting to see if we really do, is not the biblical Gospel.  After all, how could we possibly say we are preaching the same Gospel as Paul if we are never (like Paul) accused (even though unfairly) of preaching that we should, "sin all the more that grace may abound" (Rom. 6:1).  Enjoy.

The Free Love and Forgiveness of God

"The divine order, then, is first pardon, then holiness [not the withholding of the assurance of pardon until there are signs of holiness]. It is first peace with God, and then conformity to the image of that God with whom we have been brought to be at peace. For as likeness to God is produced by beholding His glory (II Cor. 3:18), and as we cannot look upon Him until we know that He has ceased to condemn us; and as we cannot trust Him until we know that He is gracious; so we cannot be transformed into His image until we have received pardon at His hands.  Reconciliation is indispensable to resemblance. Personal friendship must begin a holy life...

The apostles evidently had great confidence in the Gospel. They spoke it out in all its absolute freeness, as men who could trust it for its moral influence, as well as for its saving power, and who felt that the more speedily and certainly its good news were realized by the sinner, the more that moral influence would come into play. They did not hide it, nor trammel it, nor fence it round with conditions, as if doubtful of the policy of preaching it freely... They had no misgivings as to its bearings on morality, nor were they afraid of people believing too soon, or getting too immediate a relief from it. The idea does not seem to have entered their minds that men could betake themselves of Christ too soon, or too confidently, or without sufficient preparation...

Though some would say it is very dangerous for a sinner to be persuaded too soon that he is loved and forgiven, I confess I do not see how my being thoroughly persuaded that a holy God loves me with a holy love, and has forgiven me all my sins, has a tendency to evil.  It seems, of all truths, one of the likeliest to make me holy, to kindle love, to stimulate me to good works, and to abase all pride; whereas uncertainty in this matter enfeebles me, darkens me, bewilders me, incapacitates me for service, or, at the best, sets me striving to work my way into the favor of God under the influence of a subordinate and mercenary class of motives which can do nothing but keep me dreading and doubting all the days of my life, and leave me, perhaps at the close, in hopeless darkness... "However, to him who does not work, but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is counted for righteousness'  (Rom. 4:5), is a bold statement. It's the statement of one who had great confidence in the gospel which he preached, and had no misgivings that it would lead to unholy tendencies...

The gospel is the proclamation of free love; the revelation of the boundless charity of God. Nothing less than this will suit our world. Nothing else is so likely to touch the heart, or to go down to the lowest depths of depraved humanity, as the assurance that the sinner has been loved -- loved by God, loved with a righteous love, loved with a free love that makes no bargain as to merit, or fitness, or goodness. 'Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us!'  As the lord of the vineyard, after sending servant upon servant (prophet upon prophet) to the laborers in vain, sent at last his 'one and only well-beloved son' (Mark 12:6), so, law having failed, God has dispatched to us the message of His love as that which is by far likeliest to secure His ends.

With nothing less than this free love will He trust our fallen race.  He will not trust them with the Law, or judgment, or terror (though these are well in their place), but He will trust them with His love! Not with a stinted or conditional love, with half pardons or an uncertain salvation, or a tardy peace, or a doubtful invitation, or an all but impractical amnesty.  Not with these does He cheat the heavy laden or mock the weary sons of men. He wants them to be holy, as well as safe, and He knows that there is nothing in heaven or earth so likely to produce holiness, under the teaching of the Spirit of holiness, as the knowledge of His own free love.

It is not law, but 'the love of Christ' that constrains us. The strength of sin is the law (I Cor. 15:56), so the strength of holiness is deliverance from the law (Rom. 7:6)... While the preaching of a guarded gospel may lead to no backslidings, it will accomplish no awakenings... The whole Galatian church had lapsed into error and sin. How does the apostle cure the evil? By fencing or paring down the gospel and making it less free? NO! But by reiterating its freeness and stating it more freely than ever!" 

To the end that you might be changed through seeing how truly free the Gospel is, and all its promised benefits of pardon, forgiveness, adoption, divine acceptance and irrevocable love.  That you may believe, and by believing, discover yourself to have been miraculously and mysteriously changed, Pastor Jeff

Managing Anger from Painful Experiences

Greetings All,

    This week's 'thought'  is for those who have had to wrestle with any type of underlying anger or rage resulting from painful experiences in their past.  In the following prayer, it was the rage of a lady who had been sexually abused as a young child.  Such abuse, unfortunately, is more common than we would like to believe (as is the suppressed anger or rage that often goes with it).  In fact, recent studies indicate that 38% of all women have been sexually abused at one time or another (at least the ones who have come forward to acknowledge it) -- though not necessarily in childhood.
     Thus I send out this thought/prayer for those who may fall into that category, or know someone who falls into that category.  It was written by Richard Foster to help one particular lady work through her anger. It is not (as he makes clear) a quick fix, nor is it a substitute for professional help, but simply a prayer offered to help people move forward in that long process toward healing. It is found in his superb book, "Prayer Treasury."  Foster advises that this prayer be read and prayed in small portions, over time, "allowing the Spirit to search your mind and heal your heart" as you do.
     I have encouraged the use of this prayer in counseling sessions, and have had people come to me after doing so, expressing that they found help for their soul in praying through it.  I trust it may minister to some who receive it in this mailing and see it now for the first time -- not just in regard to sexual abuse, but any abuse. Sometimes we speak of the healing that needs to take place, but fail to give the steps toward attaining it. This prayer gives some of those steps.

          A Prayer for Rage

      I. Acknowledgement
  

 

 Dear God, I come to you with an overwhelming anger, a burning rage.
  This rage is like a cancer shut up in my bones, eating away at my soul.

  Today, O God, I acknowledge this rage.
  I do not suppress it, or hide from it.
  Thank you, Lord, thank you for accepting me, rage and all.
 
      II. Expression

  O God, I feel a burning rage within.
  A fire gone wild.  Burning, always burning.
  God, I hate what was done to me.
  It was so evil. So wrong.

  Why this evil?
  Why this degradation?
  Why, why, why?

  My rage, O God, is the only power I have against this vicious world.
  That's why I cannot let it go.
  Please, God, don't ask me to let it go.

III. Turning

  God, I cannot separate my hatred for what was done,
  from the person who did it.
  I despise the deed.
  I loathe the person who did the deed.
  My rage is my only revenge.
  

  But, God, my rage destroys me too.
  I feel this seething anger searing my own soul.
  O Lord, my God, deliver me from the evil I would do to myself.
 

 IV. Forgiving

  I refuse to allow this evil to control me any more.
  I will not be held in bondage to my hate any longer.
  But, the strength to love is not in me.
  I must wait for your enabling.

 

  Now, in your great power, and with a trembling heart,
  I speak your word of forgiveness.
 
     

V. Healing

 

May your healing light shine, O God, into every crevice of my soul.
  Rage once made me feel strong.
  But now I receive your light, encircling me with love.

  I have not forgotten what was done to me.
  I will never forget.
  But today I choose to live as your child of infinite worth. 
  Amen."

    His prayer is followed by the words of Lady Julian of Norwich (1342-1413 A.D.) who said that God, in tender love, comforts all those trapped in pain and sin by speaking these words:


 

          "But all shall be well,
              and all shall be well,
                  and all manner of thing shall be well."

      May the healing power of Jesus touch touch your heart, Pastor Jeff

 

Easter Sunday 1973 at a Church in Uganda

Greetings All,

     Today's 'thought' comes from a magazine/newsletter called "Weavings" (Vol. III, No. 3, May/June 1988).  I do not know the author's name since the photocopy of the article which I possess (given to me by a pastor friend) does not
include it.  Although, since its merely a true story recounting the events that ocurred at a church in Uganda on Easter Sunday of 1973, the facts really speak for themselves despite who put them together.  
  
    During the absolute rule of Islamic dictator Idi Amin, over 500,000 people were killed.  And since the persecution did have religious overtones, many targeted for death were Christians, including Janani Luwum, the Anglican Archbishop murdered during that time. I found it to be an inspiring testimony of a faithful Christian pastor in the face of severe persecution. I trust his story might speak to you as it did to me.  Enjoy.

     "It was Easter Sunday, 1973.  Uganda was under the absolute dictator, Idi Amin.  Kefa Sempangi was a pastor in that tortured land. Under the growing shadow of Amin, Uganda was becoming a land of terror.  Still fresh in Sempangi's memory was a face burned beyond recognition, the sight of soldiers cruelly beating a man, and the horrible sound of boots crushing bones.  Sempangi was exhausted and wondered what difference his sermon that morning could make.  He prayed for wisdom and strength and then delivered his sermon to seven thousand people.

       Afterward he made his way to the vestry, tired but joyful.  Five men followed him into the small building and closed the door behind them.  Sempangi turned around to find five rifles pointed at his face.  He had never seen any of them before, but immediately recognized them as the secret police of the State Research Bureau -- Idi Amin's assassins.  Their faces were full of pure hate and rage.     

    'We are going to kill you,' said the leader.  'If you have something to say, say it now before you die.'  Sempangi stood there feeling himself lose control.  He thought of his wife and child and began to shake. Somehow he managed to speak.

        'I do not need to plead my own cause,' he said, 'I am a dead man already. My life is dead and hidden in Christ. It is your lives that are in danger, you are dead in your sins. I will pray to God that after you have killed me, He will spare you from eternal destruction.'
       The leader looked at him with curiosity.  Then he lowered his gun and ordered the others to do the same. 'Will you pray now?' the leader of the assassins asked. Though fearing it was a trick, Sempangi asked them to bow their heads and close their eyes. 'Father in heaven,' he prayed, 'you have forgiven men in the past, forgive these men also. Do not let them perish in their sins, but bring them unto yourself.' 
        Sempangi lifted his head waiting for the men to pull their triggers. But then he noticed their faces.  Gone was the hate and rage, and when the leader spoke again, it was without contempt.
        'You have helped us,' he said, 'and we will help you. We will speak to the rest of our company and they will leave you alone. Do not fear for your life. It is in our hands and you will be protected.'
        Relief and joy flooded through Sempangi's heart.  God's love had given him the strength to say a simple prayer --  one that changed the lives of thse five men forever and saved his own."

        Sempangi's story made me think:  What would I do, say, or pray, if I had five angry, hateful men pointing their rifles at my face and telling me I would die because of my faith in a matter of minutes?  Would I have the confidence in Christ, and His love, and the eternal life He promises, that would give me the courage to confirm the truth they were going to kill me for and pray for their salvation?  Only God knows for sure. 
         Yet simply asking the question is helpful, since it calls us to ponder if we truly believe what we say or claim to believe.  It's one thing to bodly and joyfully confess our faith in a room full of similarly-minded Christian people.  It's something altogether different to do it when our lives (here on earth) might end because of it, leaving our spouse widowed, and our children fatherless or motherless.  And given the fact that the persecution of Christians worldwide has increased dramatically in the past century (more Christians have been martyred in the past 100 years than in all the previous 1900 combined) -- it's not a simple flight of fancy to at least consider the possibility, remote as it may still be. 

                        Soli Deo Gloria, Pastor Jeff

The Seed Fell and Died

Greetings All,

 

        It's been a while since I sent one of these thoughts out. (Hope you missed them!)  We had a long anticipated day of outreach to our community this past Saturday called "Ridge Fest" (which went very well, thanks to the help of many!) and it consumed much of my time, thus making it hard to find the time to send out a weekly thought. 

 

        So, as I get back to it today I'm simply going to send you a story.  A true story.  An amazing story which I hope will touch you as it did me when I read it this past Sunday morning as the sun was rising.  It comes from Jim Cymbala's book, "Fresh Power."  For those who love stories that touch and inspire the heart its hard to find one better than this. For it reminds us that even the littlest things we do, and the hardships we endure, and the sacrifices we make -- even our failures -- can, when taken into the hands of our Sovereign God, who breathes His grace upon them, bear fruit in amazing ways. Fruit that we ourselves may never know about until eternity. Enjoy!

 

   "Back in 1921, a missionary couple named David and Svea Flood went with their two year old son from Sweden to the heart of Africa -- to what was then called the Belgian Congo. They met up with another young Scandinavian couple, the Ericksons, and the four sought God for direction.  In those days of much tenderness and devotion and sacrifice, they felt led of the Lord to set out from the main mission station and take the gospel to a remote area. This was a huge step of faith.  

 

     At the village of N'dolera they were rebuffed by the chief, who would not let them enter his town for fear of alienating the gods.  The two couples opted to go a half a mile up the slope and build their own mud huts.  They prayed for a spiritual breakthrough, but there was none.  The only contact with the villagers was a young boy, who was allowed to sell them chickens and eggs twice a week. S vea Flood -- a tiny woman only four feet, eight inches tall -- decided that if this was the only African she could talk to, she would try to lead the boy to Jesus.  And in fact, she succeeded. But there were no other encouragements. 

 

    Meanwhile, malaria continued to strike one member of the family after another.  In time the Ericksons decided they had had enough suffering and left to return to the central mission station. David and Svea Flood remained near N'dolera to go on alone. Then, of all things, Svea found herself pregnant in the middle of the primitive wilderness.  When the time came for her to give birth, the village chief softened enough to allow a midwife to help her.  A little girl was born, whom they named Aina.

 

    The delivery, however, was exhausting, and Svea Flood was already weak from bouts of malaria.  The birth process was a heavy toll to her stamina.  She lasted only another seventeen days.  Inside David Flood something snapped in that moment. He dug a crude grave, buried his twenty-seven-year-old wife, and then took his children back down the mountain to the mission station. Giving his newborn daughter to the Ericksons, he snarled, "I'm going back to Sweden. I've lost my wife, and I obviously can't take care of this baby. God has ruined my life." With that, he headed for the port, rejecting not only his calling, but God himself. 

 

    Within eight months both the Ericksons were stricken with a mysterious malady and died within days of each other.  The baby was then turned over to some American missionaries who adjusted her Swedish name to 'Aggie" and eventually brought her back to the United States at age three. This family loved the little girl and were afraid that if they tried to return to Africa, some legal obstacle might separate her from them. So they decided to stay in their home country and switch from missionary work to pastoral ministry.  And that is how Aggie grew up in South Dakota. 

 

     As a young woman, she attended North Central Bible College in Minneapolis where she met and married a young man named Dewey Hurst. Years passed. The Hursts enjoyed a fruitful ministry, and Aggie gave birth to a daughter, then a son an in time her husband became president of a Christian college in the Seatle area.  Aggie was intrigued to find so much Scandinavian heritage there. 

 

      One day a Swedish religious magazine appeared in her mailbox.  She had no idea who had sent it, and of course she couldn't read the words.  But as she turned the pages, all of a sudden a photo stopped her cold.  There in a primitive setting was a grave with a white cross -- and on the cross were the words SVEA FLOOD.  Aggie jumped in her car and went straight for a college faculty member who, she knew, could translate the article.  'What does it say?' she demanded.  The instructor summarized the story:  It was about missionaries who had come to N'dolera long ago...the birth of a white baby...the death of the young mother...the one little African boy who had been led to Christ...and how, after the whites had all left, the boy had grown up and finally persuaded the chief to let him build a school in the village. The article said that gradually he won all his students to Christ...the children led their parents to Christ...even the chief had become a Christian.  Today there were six hundred Christian believers in thet one village... All because of the sacrifice of David and Svea Flood.

 

     For the Hursts twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, the college Dewey now presided over presented them with the gift of a vacation to Sweden.  There Aggie sought to find her real father. An old man now, David Flood had remarried, fathered four more children, and generally dissipated his life with alcohol.  He had recently suffered a stroke.  Still bitter, he had one rule in his family: 'Never mention the name of God -- because God took everything from me.' 

 

     After an emotional reunion with her half brothers and half sister, Aggie, brought up the subject of seeing her father.  The others hesitated. 'You can talk to him,' they replied, 'even though he's very ill now. But you need to know that whenever he hears the name of God, he flies into a rage.'  Aggie was not to be deterred.  She walked into the squalid apartment, with liquor bottles everywhere, and approached the seventy-three-year-old man lying in a rumpled bed. 'Papa?' she said tentatively. He turned and began to cry. 'Aina,' he said.  'I never meant to give you away.'  'It's all right, Papa,' she replied, taking him gently in her arms.  'God took care of me.' 

 

     The man stiffened.  The tears stopped.  'God forgot all of us. Our lives have been like this because of him.'  He turned his face back to the wall. Aggie stroked his face and then continued, undaunted.  'Papa, I've got a little story to tell you, and its a true one. You didn't go to Africa in vain.  Mama didn't die in vain.  The little boy you won to the Lord grew up to win that whole village to Jesus Christ. The one seed you planted just kept growing and growing.  Today there are six hundred people serving the Lord because you were faithful to the call of God in your life... Papa, Jesus loves you. He has never hated you.'  

 

      The old man turned back to look into his daughter's eyes. His body relaxed. He began to talk.  And by the end of the afternoon, he had come back to the God he had resented for so many decades.  Over the next few days, father and daughter enjoyed warm moments together.  Aggie and her husband soon had to return to America -- and within a few weeks, David Flood had gone into eternity. 

     

      A few years later, the Hursts were attending a high-level evangelism conference in London, England, when a report was given from the nation of Zaire (the former Belgian Congo). The superintendent of the national church, representing some 110,000 baptized believers, spoke eloquently of the gospel's spread in his nation.  Aggie could not help going to ask him afterward if he had ever heard of David and Svea Flood.  

 

      'Yes, madam,' the man replied in French, his words then being translated into English.  'It was Svea Flood who led me to Jesus Christ. I was the boy who brought food to your parents before you were born. In fact, to this day your mother's grave and her memory are honored by all of us.' He embraced her in a long, sobbing hug.  Then he continued, 'You must come to Africa to see, because your mother is the most famous person in our history.'  

 

        In time that is exactly what Aggie Hurst and her husband did.  They were welcomed by cheering throngs of villagers.  She even met the man who had been hired by her father many years before to carry her back down the mountain in a hammock-cradle. But the most dramatic moment, of course, was when the pastor escorted Aggie to see her mother's white cross for herself.  She knelt in the soil to pray and give thanks.  Later that day, in the church, the pastor read from John 12:24: 'I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed.  But if it dies, it produces many seeds.'  He then followed with Psalm 126:5: 'Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy.' "  

 

    

           What can one say except that God is amazing!  He's the artful weaver who can make a beautiful tapestry even out of broken threads.  We may never know whose lives we have touched, or what seeds we've sown that God has used to bring forth fruit in the lives of others. Our job is to sow, His job is to bring forth the fruit -- for only He can.  And we must be continue to sow whether we ever see the fruit of our labors in this life or not.

 

           To Him alone be the glory, Pastor Jeff

Forgiveness

Greetings All,

     This week's 'thoughts' come from a British lady named Joyce Huggett, and are taken from her book, "All Through the Year."  They have to do with one of the most difficult of all biblical commands -- the command to forgive others, as well as the command to believe the promise of forgiveness (the Gospel) for ourselves.  

 

     And if you're wondering if the the first of these thoughts (about forgiving others) might apply to you, it doesn't usually take much time.  For when we harbor unforgiveness, a person, or a face, or a memory usually pops up within just a few seconds of even hearing the challenge to do so.  One may have popped up for you while you were reading that sentence, reminding you of the need to forgive someone, or forgive them again. Because as I have learned, in cases of deep hurt or offense, forgiveness usually involves more than a one time, "I forgive them."  It involves an ongoing commitment to release the person from what we believe is our justifiable right to harbor anger, retaliate, desire them harm, or refuse them the grace of forgiveness. 

 

    And I say, "the grace of forgiveness," because oftentimes it's a forgiveness they don't deserve, and grace is undeserved favor.  It means extending a grace which allows us to practice the very difficult obedience of "forgiving others as God in Christ has forgiven us"  (Eph. 4:32 / Matt. 6:14-15).

 

    The second thought also addresses something difficult for us to do (as I pointed out in my message on Sunday). It's the difficulty believers often have in fully accepting the forgiveness Christ secured for them on the cross when He poured out His life-blood unto death to atone for all of their sins -- even the worst ones.  Something that is often much harder for us to do than we tend to think.

 

    These thoughts, then, address both aspects of forgiveness: The need for believers to forgive others, and the need for those same believers to fully embrace and accept the forgiveness Christ purchased for them.  Enjoy.

 

   " 'I don't get mad. I just get even.' We smile when slogans like that greet us from the back window of people's cars.  Yet such tit-for-tat thinking is part of the clutter which sometimes hinders our prayer, because it is incompatible with Jesus' teaching on forgiveness.  To forgive means to let go of resentment and bitterness, hatred and anger.  To forgive means to let the offending person off the hook. To forgive means to cancel the debt we feel they owe us.  To forgive is therefore extremely costly. And it happens in stages.  

 

    Forgiveness begins by feeling the full brunt of the pain and recognising that we have every reason to feel hurt as well as every right to want to retaliate; to hit back; to hurt as we've been hurt.  But forgiveness continues by making a deliberate choice to refuse to exercise that right.  By engaging the will, forgiveness drops any accusations we might wish to make and switches off the gas which has kept our anger simmering.  Yet forgiveness goes even further.  While refusing to deny that we have been hurt, it searches for acceptable and significant ways of serving the one who harmed us in the first place.  This, as least, is forgiveness following the pattern of Jesus." 

 

     Sometimes we forget that forgiveness (in Christian circles) is defined by what Jesus did on the cross.  And since it is, forgiveness means "paying for another the debt they deserve for their sins against us."  That's what Jesus did to purchase and secure our forgiveness -- He paid the penalty for our offenses against God (which, as those who believe in the Trinity, means sins committed against Himself).  He freed us from the penalty we deserve for our willful, and intentional, as well as unintentional, offenses against Him. That's what forgiveness is: Choosing, like Jesus, to pay the debt of sin, or cancel the debt of sins, which someone has committed against us -- hard as that always seems to be.  

 

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    

   

  Then Huggett moves on to what may be an equally difficult thing for us to do -- fully embrace and accept the complete forgiveness Christ purchased and secured on the cross for all who would ever place their faith and trust for salvation in Him.

 

     "Introverts are good at confessing and bad at receiving forgiveness, particularly if they come from an evangelical background.  I am an introvert, and an evangelical, and these words of Thomas Merton never cease to amaze me.

 

        'We are not permitted to nurse a sense of guilt. We must fully and completely accept

         and embrace His forgiveness and love.  Guilt feeling and inferiority feeling before God

         are expressions of selfishness, of self-centeredness. We give greater importance to 

         our little sinful self than to His immense and never-ending love.  We must surrender

         our guilt and our inferiority to Him.  His goodness is greater than our badness.  We

         must accept His joy in loving and forgiving us (Heb. 12:2).  It is healing grace to

         surrender our sinfulness to His mercy.' " 

 

           With you in the battle to forgive and fully accept forgiveness 

 

Pastor Jeff

Accepted by Grace

Greetings All,

This weeks 'thought' comes to you from a recently published book entitled, "Red Like Blood," by Joe Coffey and Bob Bevington. The subtitle is "Confrontations with Grace" -- and that's exactly what the book is about -- the uncanny nature of God's grace as he works in the life of a pastor's kid and a prodigal who strayed far from God.

Derek Thomas of Reformed Theological Seminary sums up this book well when he writes: "It is difficult to exaggerate the usefulness of this book in communicating what grace means in the lives of individuals." And I would add, there are few books as candid and real and transparent as this one -- which may make some Christians a bit uneasy if they prefer a more sanitized expression of faith and trust in Christ.

Yet, if you have an unbelieving friend who wants to see if Christianity is real, and wants to know if Christians will jump down into the trenches of life with them and get a little mud on their clothes in order to rescue the lost or straying, this is the book for them. Likewise, after you read the book, the authors would like to hear from you on their blog, which you can access by going to: www.RedLikeBlood.com Enjoy.

(This particular selection is by Bob, the "prodigal," who is now an eye doctor)

"I have found that I am like a balloon. I inflate quite easily, meaning it doesn't take much to make me feel like I am better than everyone else. It never has. And I am never more dangerous than when I am feeling good about me.

was flying high in the sixth grade because of school and sports and mostly because I had the cutest girlfriend on the face of the earth. One day our bald and muscular gym teacher, Mr. Boyle, picked me as his partner to take on the entire sixth grade in dodgeball. That alone started my balloon inflating. And when we actually beat them three times in a row, my balloon couldn't have possibly held more air.

I proceeded to the locker room, found the weakest kid in the school, and repeatedly snapped him with a towel while the other kids laughed. He was naked and wet from the shower. That kid was known for only one thing -- a very bad case of psoriasis or eczema or both. Scaly brown skin covered most of his body. Ironically, he also had the misfortune of having a matching name, Mark Weltyde. When I was done tormenting him with the towel, I christened him, Marks of Welted Hyde.

As soon as I walked out of the locker room, Mr. Boyle called me into his office. I cringe when I think of how cocky I was in this next part. I actually sauntered into his office, saluted, and said, "Bob Bevington reporting for duty, sir!" I must have thought he wanted to talk about us taking on the sixth grade in a tug-of-war. Instead, he told me he was ashamed to find out how I treated Mark. My balloon instantly popped and my body went limp. He told me to think about it, and I've done so for more than forty years. But amazingly I still inflate almost as fast as ever.

I have never forgotten Mark or Mr. Boyle or what an ass I can be. I apologized to Mark within the hour, but not the way I would today. For the next couple years, I attempted to make up for the locker room episode by treating Mark like a brother. I protected him from all lurking dangers. And I grew to like him. He was gentle and kind. And he could be funny. I wish I could find him. If you can help me with that, I'd appreciate it..."

Then he goes on to speak of one of his regular patients who was distraught over the fact that her grandson was in prison (a Christian man who had never really done anything terribly wrong) for shaking his baby son to death. He continues:

"I immediately had a flashback. The wee hours of a night twenty years prior when, exhausted and sleep-deprived and angry because Rita refused to get up, I stormed into the nursery and found myself within a hair's breadth of shaking my own son.

I exchanged letters with that young man while he was in jail awaiting his sentencing. He said he didn't mean to do it. He said he was ready to accept the consequences, which was a good thing, because he got life in prison with no chance of parole for fifteen years. His wife divorced him, sued him, and swore he would never see their two other children. There, but for the grace of God, go I. And I shudder to know it's true.

The world is broken and you and I are broken for the same reason: sin. Our sins fly under the banner of a Declaration of Independence from God. They are acts of cosmic treason in which we disregard God and put other gods in his place. I began consciously worshipping other gods at eleven and have been rotating gods in ever since.

Ultimately our displays of sin reveal the fact that although we say we love God, we love ourselves more. We fail to uphold his glory because we want it for ourselves.

Our default mode is self-centeredness and not God-centeredness. Our sins throw us out of tune, out of touch, and eventually out of joy and out of hope because we are not doing what we were created to do. We're sad and disappointed, and our relationships are messy. Our happiness, pleasure, and contentment are either artificial or short-lived or both. And collectively we account for the brokenness of the world.

Only Jesus lived a sinless life, so only Jesus was perfectly whole. Jesus never failed to love the Father. Jesus never hid any secret objects of worship in the rafters of his basement. He never inflated like a balloon. He could look his enemies in the eye and say, 'I always do the things that are pleasing to the Father.' Jesus hung on the cross where his body was broken so that our souls could be made whole. Not only was his body broken for us, his relationship with the Father was broken as well. Why? So that our relationship with a holy God could be restored forever. We are accepted, approved, and blessed by God on behalf of another -- Jesus, Son of God and Son of Man. He's my Savior. He's my hope. Even if I had shaken my son to death and spent the rest of my life in prison, he's my hope."

The Good News is that He can be your Savior and your hope, as well. You can be "accepted and approved and blessed by God," not because you deserve it (no one does) but because the Sinless One bore the guilt, and took upon Himself both the condemnation and punishment of all who would ever believe in Jesus.

"He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree," says I Peter 2:24, "that we might die to sins and live to righteousness -- by His wounds you have been healed." (See also Isaiah 52:13-53:12)

"Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved," says the apostle Paul in Acts 16:31. Look to Him, lean on Him, trust in Him, cast the full weight of your lost soul upon Him alone to save you and all that He purchased for the ungodly will become your personal and eternal possession. Your past will be erased, and your future secured, regardless of what that past may include.

In the Service of the Gospel, Pastor Jeff