Not a Fan

Greetings All!

     Today's 'thought' comes to you once again from Kyle Idleman's book, "Not a Fan."  This is another one of the testimonies of people who were either not believers at all, or "fans" of Jesus at one point in their lives, but at some point in their lives realized that they yearned for something deeper than the superficial "go through the motions" religion they had been following.  In most cases -- usually as a result of going through sickness, or trauma, or addiction, or coming close to death -- the superficial showed itself for what it was as it could not sustain them in such times.

     These people, driven by pain, or a crisis that drove them to the end of themselves (and showed them their inability to control everything in life), surrendered to the only One who is really ever in control. They ceased being a "fan" of Jesus and became a true disciple and follower of Jesus.  This is Vijay Warrier's testimony - a man raised in India in the Hindu faith who grew up believing that the gods had given him favor.  Vijay was born as a Brahman, the highest caste of priests and had a mother who served as a priestess. Yet later in life, he would meet the Jesus who would change and bring a sense of fulfillment to his soul.  Enjoy.

     "I remember when my wife Girija grew very interested in the Bible and began attending church. It wasn't something I believed in or wanted to have anything to do with. I agreed to drive her to church, but I just sat in the car and smoked a few cigarettes. Sometimes my thoughts would wander to growing up in India, and being raised in the Hindu faith where my mother was a priestess in an Indian temple.

     My marriage had been arranged, but Gurija knew that our marriage wasn't just a forced agreement that was set up by our parents; there was a chemistry between us. I tried to be patient with her interest in the Bible. Gurija had attended a Christian school some years back, and that was how she had learned about Jesus. Our differing religious beliefs didn't help our unity in marriage. Looking back on the first ten years of our marriage, I see mostly conflict and frustration. 

     By 2005 Guija was going to church every weekend. I'm not sure why, but one weekend, instead of sitting in the car smoking and waiting for Girija to get out of church, I decided to go inside for a cup of coffee in the church cafe. There was a small cafe in the church where I sat with my coffee and couldn't help but overhear the sermon that was being broadcast from the sanctuary onto the video screen in front of me. I listened to the preacher for a while, intrigued by his words. From that point on, I sat in the cafe each Sunday morning, drinking coffee and listening to the sermons.

     One week Gurija asked me to come with her into a prayer room. "We have so many problems," she said, "we need someone to pray with us."  Even though I didn't believe in this kind of prayer, I went with her. In the prayer room, we met a husband and wife named Linn and Carol, and they spent some time praying with us.  Full of questions after hearing so many sermons, I began to ask Linn about Christianity. Over the next year, he and Carol answered many of my questions. Linn studied the Bible with me, praying for me often. Still, I wasn't familiar with the idea of just one god. This went against everything I had learned as a boy. Even worse, I knew that if I were to become a Christian, my family back in India would disown me. They would be so disappointed in me.

     But after much studying, prayer, and support from church members, I began to realize something incredible. For forty-two years I had been looking for something, for someone. That person was Jesus. I decided to allow him to work in me.  I needed it.  My marriage needed it -- we'd already had divorce papers drawn up and begun living separately.  It was now or never and I knew only Jesus could save me.

     So the next Sunday I professed my belief in Christ and was baptized. Right after being baptized, I baptized my two sons who also came to believe. That same day I moved back with my family. God has a plan for me, and he can heal all wounds and answer all questions. My name is Vijay Warrier, and I am not a fan." 

     A lot of us get confused and believe we are followers of Christ, when in fact we are simply fans attending church, week after week, lacking true intimacy with Christ. Vijay started to become a fan by believing in one God, and then over time, he began to experience God by engaging in the process of developing true intimacy with Him through God's grace in Jesus Christ.  "Fans" don’t mind making minor changes, or little touch ups, to decorate their lives. But it's not until they are "followers" that they don’t even mind Jesus overhauling, severely interfering, and turning their lives upside down!  And you?

    In the Service of Jesus, Pastor Jeff

Finish Strong

Greetings All,

     This week's 'thought' comes to you from a book entitled, "Finish Strong" by Dan Green.
     It is a book of true stories about people who have overcome immense obstacles, through faith, and have "finished strong."  I found this entry particularly inspiring. I offer it to you with the hope that it might inspire you in the same way.  Enjoy.

A Spirit Forged in Steel

     "On June 23, 1940, Wilma Glodean Rudolph was born prematurely, weighing only four and a half pounds. Wilma was the twentieth of Ed and Blanche Rudolph's twenty-two children. The Rudolph's were African Americans living in a time of segregation. Since the local hospital was for whites only, and since the Rudolph's had little money, Mrs. Rudolph was forced to care for Wilma herself. The early years were rough. Wilma's mother nursed her through one illness after another -- measles, mumps, scarlet fever, chicken pox, and double pneumonia.

     A few years after Wilma's birth, her parents discovered that her left leg and foot were not developing normally and, consequently, were becoming deformed. Doctors told Blanche that Wilma had polio, and that she would have to wear steel braces on her legs. Refusing to accept this diagnosis, Mrs. Rudolph set out to find a cure. She discovered that Wilma could receive treatment at Meharry Hospital in Nashville.

     The Rudolphs also relied on their faith in God, the Great Physician. When young Wilma would ask if she would ever walk, her parents pointed her to her good God: "Honey, you only have to believe. You have to trust in God because with God all things are possible" (Luke 1:37).

     For the next two years, Mrs. Rudolph drove Wilma fifty miles each way to physical therapy appointments. Eventually, the hospital staff taught Mrs. Rudolph how to do the exercises at home. Everyone in the family worked with Wilma, providing her with encouragement to be strong and get better. Thanks to the patience, support, effort, and the love she received from her family, at the age of twelve Wilma could walk normally without the assistance of crutches, braces, or corrective shoes.

     Having spent a great deal of her life limited by illnesses, Wilma felt a freedom she had never felt before. It was then that Wilma decided to become an athlete. She chose to pursue basketball first, just as her older sister had. For three years she rode the bench, not playing in a single game.  But Wilma's spirit had been forged of steel, and she continued to practice hard, refusing to give up. In her sophomore year she became the starting guard for the team and subsequently led the team to a state championship.

     But Wilma's first love was running. At the age of sixteen (barely four years free of braces) Wilma participated in track at the 1956 Olympics and won a bronze medal in the 4 x 100 meter relay. However, it was at the state basketball tournament that she was first spotted by Ed Temple, the coach for the women's track team at Tennessee State University. Ed recruited Wilma on a track scholarship and changed the course of her athletic pursuits.

     Wilma's most famous athletic accomplishments happened during the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome. The little girl who could hardly walk without the assistance of crutches or braces had completely overcome her physical limitations. At the age of 20, she became the first American woman to win three gold medals in a single Olympics. (The 100 meter dash in 11.0 seconds, the 200 meter dash in 24.0 seconds, and the 4 x 100 Relay in 44.5 seconds.)"

     Sometimes it helps us in our own struggles to hear the stories of people who had to endure great hardships and overcome great obstacles, by faith, and with the inner strength and determination God provides. Many times we become too quickly discouraged. We give up too easily. We don't persevere and fight on until victory comes.

     A high school student in Honduras once said the following quotes inspired him. I do not know his name, but I'm sure he has pressed on! The first, by Don Juan, states: "The basic difference between an ordinary man and a warrior is that a warrior takes everything as a challenge, while the ordinary man takes everything as either a blessing or a curse."

     The second, by Ralph Parlette, says: "Strength and struggle go together. The supreme reward of struggle is strength. Life is a battle and the greatest joy is to overcome. The pursuit of easy things make men weak. It is following the lines of least resistance that makes rivers and men crooked."

     In the Christian life it's not about pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps. It's about looking in faith to 'God our Helper' (Psalm 118:7) for that which is necessary to overcome the many obstacles in life.  Sometimes He graciously does miraculous things for us.  But more often what He gives us is increased strength and resolve and determination to press on. After all, were He to do everything for us all the time, He would do us a great disservice by robbing us of the life lessons learned through perseverance, struggle and hardships overcome.

Blessings upon your day, Pastor Jeff

The Trivialization of God

Greetings All,

     This week's 'thought' comes to you from Donald W. McCullough, and is taken from his book, "The Trivialization of God."  It is a perceptive look at the ways that we, or our culture, have "shrunk" God down to make Him more manageable, and comfortable to deal with, or be around.
     This selection has to do with the three popular American deities: The god-of-my-cause, the god-of-my-understanding, and the god-of-my-experience, concluding with the much needed God- beyond-my-view-of-God. By necessity I have tried to shorten one chapter into one page, using the cut and paste method. So, if you get a chance, read it all in his book. It's well worth the time. In fact, it's a must for people who desire to avoid the all-too-easy-trap of trivializing God. Enjoy.

"God Of My Cause

     It's natural to want help... When I was younger, there was a boy named David. He could hit further, pitch harder, and field better than any kid in the neighborhood. We always wanted him on our side; he pretty much assured victory... The challenges may now be greater and the stakes higher, but I haven't grown out of wanting a David on my side. I doubt I am alone in this desire. The bigger the problem, of course, the bigger the help needed, and God is the Biggest Help available.

     So God naturally gets called in to lend almighty support to various causes -- even good causes -- holding the earth with concern, loosing the bonds of injustice, letting the oppressed go free, sharing our bread with the hungry, and bringing the poor homeless into our houses.

     What could be more appropriate than seeking God's help with these things? Indeed, this must please the God revealed in Scripture -- so long as a subtle shift does not take place. What can happen, though, is this: instead of serving God by working for a just cause, we serve a just cause by using God. The cause pushes God aside; the divine end becomes simply a useful means, and God gets trivialized. With the best of motives, we throw golden rings and bracelets of passionate concern into the fire, and a calf appears to lead the way to the Promised Land of social righteousness...

     If God is brought in secondarily, after the problem and solution have been defined (oppression and political or economic liberation), that will invariably shape our image of God. We may view God, for example, as simply an aid to fulfilling our human aspirations, or simply Big Help for what is essentially a human struggle for self-improvement... Reinhold Niebuhr wrote, 'Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith' -- faith, I would add, in a God who transcends history, who knows the beginning from the end, who holds the truth of any problem in the context of all truth. Seeing salvation from any other god will come to grief, for a god pressed into the service of a particular cause will be a god too trivial to offer significant help.

God Of My Understanding

     A child at the beach digs a hole in the sand and, with her little bucket, busily sets about transferring the ocean into it. We smile at the grandeur of her ambition, but only because we know she will soon mature beyond such pathetic futility. An ocean cannot be contained in any hole of any size on any continent. And neither can God be fully contained within any theological system.

     Yet well-meaning Christians, in seeking to bear accurate witness to God, often become so attached to their formulations they forget the discontinuity between God and what can be said about God. They forget that only in Christ Jesus has there ever been an exact correspondence between God and humanity. Doctrinal lines are routinely drawn in the dirt, enemies named and challenged, and offending notions bombed in 'jihads' of theological self-assuredness... An honest desire to think and speak accurately about God moves, too easily it seems, to a presumptuous conviction that our affirmations contain the whole truth about God, which has the practical effect of confining God to our truth statements....

     The theological enterprise demands humility as much as critical thinking. The best theologians have known this. Thomas Aquinas, after completing thirty-eight treatises, three thousand articles, and the ten thousand objections in his Summa Theologica -- one of the greatest intellectual achievements of western civilization -- abruptly quit his work on December 6, 1273.  He had a profound experience while celebrating mass in the chapel of St. Nicholas, and he announced to his secretary that he would write no more. 'I can do no more,' he tried to explain, 'such things have been revealed to me that all I have written seems to me as so much straw'...

     Our theological systems may succeed in containing the god-of-my-understanding, but never the holy God.

God Of My Experience 

     The things we experience, naturally, are the things of which we are the most certain. So, my form of worship, and my style of prayer, and my focus in service easily shape the pattern into which I squeeze spiritual reality...

     As a boy I attended a Bible camp run by a Pentecostal denomination... The preaching -- filled with interesting stories, as I recall -- aimed for our conversion and baptism in the Holy Spirit (evidenced by speaking in tongues)... One night I knelt for what seemed like enough time for God to turn me into a certified saint, let alone make me speak in tongues. A counselor did his best to help me: he prayed over me, laid his hands on me, suggested syllables for me to mouth, and held up my arms when they got weary. But he himself got tired, I suppose, and at one point I heard him whisper to someone who walked by, "He really doesn't want it." He really doesn't want it? Imagine what those words did to a boy trying his best to please God! How could I not want it? How could I not want the Holy Spirit?...

     I have no doubt that some people have been given the ability to pray in ecstatic utterance as a sign of the Spirit's presence; the New Testament validates this spiritual gift (I Cor. 14), and I have many friends who testify to its importance in their lives. But there is scant biblical evidence for turning this into a necessary proof of the Spirit-filled life. So little, in fact, that most of the church for most of its history, has seen this manifestation of the Spirit as one of the least important (I Cor. 12:31).

     What has happened, it seems, is that some have been so moved and helped by this gift, they have not only wanted others to share in their experience, but have made it normative for everyone. Those who lack the experience must therefore lack the fullness of the Spirit, which is another way of saying they lack the presence of God. The counselor of my youth assumed that the presence of God would always be shown in a certain experience, and thus without that experience, God could not really be present -- at least not fully.

     Not only does this assumption contradict the fact that the God revealed in Scripture seems to love diversity (I Cor. 12:28-30)... it also has the effect of limiting God, setting boundaries on the way God works in this world....  How easy it is to define authentic spirituality according to my particular experience and expression of it. And when I do, I end up with a very different god from the one revealed in Christ... a god, consequently, too trivial to lift me out of my self and beyond the distortions of my flawed experience.

God Beyond My View of God

     ...Concerns held with passionate conviction, theologies that provide a helpful framework, and formative spiritual experiences are not bad. A healthy Christian will have all these things!  They can be lenses through which we see important aspects of the being of God. The problem arises when we forget the vast difference between our view of God and the reality of God...

     Any god I use to support my latest cause, or who fits comfortably within my understanding or experience, will be a god no larger than I, and thus not able to save me from my sin or inspire my worship or empower my service.  Any god who fits the contours of ME will never really transcend me, never really be God.  Any god who doesn't kick the bars out of the prison of my perceptions will be nothing but a trivial god."

     I have to say that as I was reading that section of his book I thought to myself: guilty, guilty, guilty.  In fact, I had written the word "guilty" next to one of his comments in the book.

     After all, it's hard not to want God to be the way I want Him.  It's hard not to want Him to be on my side of any cause, or not want my experience to define how He is. Thank God, though, that He does not comply with my wishes! He is who He is, and remains true to who He is, even if ALL want Him to be different -- and most do on occasion -- myself included. 

     God help me -- God help us all -- to grow to learn and affirm all that you reveal about yourself in Your Word, remembering the need for humility as we try to do so, since there is so much more of You than our finite and limited minds can ever grasp.

In the service of Him who is loving, beautiful, immense, and holy beyond imagination, Pastor Jeff

Shattered Dreams

Greetings All,

     Today I would like to begin by asking you all to remember the families of those who lost loved ones on 9/11 - as tomorrow marks the 12th anniversary of that tragic and world changing event. I even read yesterday that over 1400 of the rescue workers and emergency crews who helped right after the collapse of the towers (and others I'm sure) have come down with some form of cancer from inhaling the dust, etc.  I would ask you to pray for them.
     Now, as far as our 'thought' for this week, it comes from Dr. Larry Crabb, and is taken from his book, "Shattered Dreams."
     In some ways it even relates to what I've just mentioned regarding 9/11, but I must warn you that it takes some readjusting of our minds, and a reorientation of our accepted presuppositions to comprehend what he's saying!  In a culture like ours where the "quality of life" paradigm under-girds everything we think, feel and believe, we must consider what he says lest certain portions of Scripture continue to remain a mysterious enigma to us. Are you up for the challenge?  Enjoy.

     "Shattered dreams are never random. They are always a piece in a larger puzzle, a chapter in a larger story. The Holy Spirit uses the pain of shattered dreams to help us discover our desire for God, to help us begin dreaming the highest dream. They are ordained opportunities for the Spirit to awaken, then to satisfy our highest dream... God is always working to make His children aware of a dream that remains alive beneath the rubble of every shattered dream, a new dream that when realized will release a new song, sung with tears, till God wipes them away and we sing with nothing but joy in our hearts.

     It’s hard to hear, but it is important to know, that God is not committed to supporting our ministries, to preventing our divorces, to preserving our health, to straightening out our kids, to providing a livable income, to ending famine, or to protecting us from agonizing problems that generate in our souls an experience that feels like death. We cannot count on God to arrange what happens in our lives in ways that will make us feel good. Yet we can count on God to patiently remove all the obstacles to our enjoyment of Him. He is committed to our joy, and we can depend on Him to give us enough of a taste of that joy, and enough hope that the best is still ahead, to keep us going in spite of how much pain continues to plague our hearts...

     The battle is not to improve our circumstances, to supply us with money, to protect us from suffering, to keep us safe from pain and struggle, or to quickly fix whatever problems develop in our bodies. We are encouraged to pray for all these things, but we must always finish our prayer with that wonderful caveat that in our immaturity we find so annoying: if it be Thy will be so.

     The illusion that life in a fallen world is really not all that bad must be shattered. When even the best parts of life are exposed as pathetic counterfeits of how things should be, the reality drives us to a level of distress that threatens to utterly undo us. But it’s when we’re on the brink of personal collapse that we’re best able to shift the direction of our soul from self-protection to trusting love. The more deeply we enter into the reality that life without God is sheer desolation, the more fully we can turn toward Him…

     The richest love grows in the soil of an unbearable disappointment with life. When we realize life can’t give us what we want, we can better give up our foolish demand that it do so and get on with the noble task of loving as we should. We will no longer need to demand protection from further disappointment. The deepest change will occur in the life of a bold realist who clings to God with a passion only his realistic appraisal of life can generate.

     

     Until we recognize with tears how determined we are to move away from pain and how that determination reflects our blasphemous decision to preserve our own life, we will not be able to identify the subtle ways in which our relational style violates love for others by keeping us safe… We repent by radically shifting our motivation and direction from self-preservation to trust on the basis of the belief that Christ has both given, and is preserving, our life. The fruit of repentance is a changed style of relating that replaces self-protective maneuvering with loving involvement."

     It may take a few glances to fully comprehend what he's saying since we are so convinced that God's primary purpose in our lives is, "to support our ministries, to prevent our divorces, to preserve our health, to straighten out our kids, to provide a livable income, to end famine, or to protect us from agonizing problems that generate in our souls an experience that feels like death."  We're not used to hearing that God is instead committed to, "removing all the obstacles to our enjoyment of Him." Especially When the "obstacles" He's committed to removing are those very things we have convinced ourselves He's supposed to be supplying us with (like good health, a livable income, teens that behave, a wonderful marriage, etc.).

     This is one of the reasons so many Christians in our day simply cannot grasp how James could say (and Paul with him - Romans 5:1-5) that we need to, "count it all joy when we face all kinds of trials."  One can only do that when they realize (as James did) that the purpose in our trails and difficulties is meant by God to increase our reliance or dependence upon Him, strip away our trust in false sources of joy (and thus expose idols of the heart), wean our hearts away from their fixation on earthly things, and cause us to see that He Himself is the treasure that far exceeds all that this world has to offer.  Sometimes its only though trials and hardships that the things of this earth begin to pale in comparison to God and the eternal joys He has stored up for us.

     With prayers that you might see your shattered dreams and earthly disappointments as divinely ordained ways of bringing about your enjoyment of Him -- Pastor Jeff

A Community Living like Christ

Greetings All,

This weeks 'thought' comes to you from two sources. The first is from the Dutchman Thomas A'Kempis in his classic work "The Imitation of Christ." A'Kempis lived in the 1400's, and his book has been described as, "the most influential book in Christian literature.." It has been translated in 50 languages. A'Kempis grew up amidst The Brothers of the Common Life, whose basic beliefs were, "Turn away from sin, live like Jesus, and read God's Word." They believed in living a simple life, and were humble people -- seeking to pattern their lives after the early Christians, and especially after Jesus himself..

The second thought comes from Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his book "Life Together" (probably the most helpful book on pastoral wisdom I have ever read). Bonhoeffer's book "The Cost of Discipleship" (where he takes on the concept of "cheap grace") is also a classic and well worth the read. He was a German pastor killed by the Nazis in WWII just one month prior to the war's end, though he was by no means the only one. Around 1200+ other "Confessing" evangelical pastors who vocally opposed Hitler were also martyred.

These 'thoughts' have to do with bearing with the faults of others, and how intercessory prayer helps us in that endeavor. I trust you will find them helpful. Enjoy.

A'Kempis:

"How excellent a means of sanctifying us and fitting us for heaven is the exercise of that charity by which we support in ourselves and in others, those weaknesses which we cannot correct! For nothing can humble us and confound us before God more than a sense of our own miseries, and nothing can be more just than that we should bear in others those things which we would have them support in ourselves.

We should, therefore, bear with the tempers of others and endeavor to give no cause for uneasiness in anyone, on account of the fact that we have our own. It is thus, according to St.. Paul, we shall carry one another's burdens and fulfill the law ofJesus Christ, which is a law of love, meekness and patience."

Bonhoeffer:

"A Christian fellowship lives and exists by the intercession of its members for one another, or it collapses. I can no longer condemn or hate a brother for whom I pray, no matter how much trouble he causes me. His face, that hitherto may have been strange and intolerable to me, is transformed in intercession into the countenance of a brother for whom Christ died - the face of a forgiven sinner.

This is a happy discovery for the Christian who begins to pray for others. There is no dislike, no personal tension, no estrangement that cannot be overcome by intercession as far as our side of it is concerned.

Intercessory prayer is the purifying bath into which the individual and the fellowship must enter every day. The struggle we undergo with our brother in intercession may be a hard one, but that struggle has the promise that it will gain its goal.

How does this happen? Intercession means no more than to bring our brother into the presence of God. To see him under the Cross of Jesus as a poor human being in need of grace. Then everything in him that repels falls away. We see him in all his destruction and need. His need and his sin become so heavy and oppressive that we feel them as our own, and can do nothing else but pray" 'Lord, do Thou, Thou alone, deal with him according to Thy severity and Thy goodness. To make intercession means to grant our brother the same right that we have received -- namely, to stand before Christ and share in his mercy."

In the Bonds of Christian Charity, Pastor Jeff