Several years ago, as a church planting missionary, I took on secular employment to supplement our family income. In addition to my work as a planter-pastor, I worked with the United States Postal Service, first as a clerk, then as a mail carrier. I learned a great deal about people and life as a postman.
As you are probably aware, every postal worker who walks a route tries to be on the alert for dogs in the neighborhood. Seems every puppy is born with an innate dislike for uniforms and the people who wear them. So, on my routes I used to carry a box of dog biscuits with the hope of making friends with any canine that crossed my path. Like the other mail carriers, I also carried pepper spray in case I met a pooch who did not want to be friends. One day, I discovered a new technology called the Invisible Fence®.
Invisible Fence® is an electronic pet containment system. Essentially, in order to keep their pet in the yard, pet owners install an underground wire around the perimeter of their home. The wire carries a radio signal, which emits a warning beep when the pet, sporting a lightweight receiver collar, gets too close to the boundary. If the pet ignores the warning signal and crosses beyond the boundary of the fence, the pet receives a mild electric shock.
One of my earliest encounters with the Invisible Fence® occurred while I delivered the mail to a family with a large Rottweiler who had not been impressed with my previous visits nor with my dog biscuits. One day I noticed little flags surrounding the yard’s border. I had no sooner noticed the flags than the guard dog noticed me. He came charging from the front porch barking threats that made clear his intentions whether or not you understood dog-talk. He was going to eat me alive! What happened next startled and amazed me. About four feet from the flags – and one flustered young pastor about to go postal with mace – the beast came to an abrupt halt and timidly backed away. You see, in his little canine mind he had been convinced that, although no chain link or bars were visible, he was in a cage.
That containment system is very much like a chain around an elephant’s leg. The chain attached to a stake in the ground is actually no match for the brawn of a mature elephant. However, what that elephant believes about the chain carries more weight than the truth.
We may think these poor pitiful animals are all too easily conned into compliance. Moreover, we may consider ourselves too intelligent for such deception. Tragically, however, I have come to believe we have been even more duped into sorry submission by our enemy.
As children, we happily understood God to be the Great Adventurer, to be everything the Bible and our Sunday School teachers portray Him to be. As we get older, our rubs against a twisted, jaded, fallen world cause us to become more … practical. God becomes more distant, less accessible, and the Bible seems less reliable to us. But the enemy has tricked us. As the serpent beguiled Eve, he challenges us to question what God really said and did and what His intentions truly were (Genesis 3:1-5).
This is why Jesus says we must become like little children if we will enter the kingdom of heaven. We need to rediscover the wonder and awe of a God bigger than us, bigger than the universe. We must learn again to walk, relying on stronger hands than ours to support us. We must run to Christ like little children who throw themselves into their parent’s arms when Dad comes home from work and kneels to receive them at the front door. We need to remember that God is great and God is good.
I began reciting daily and teaching our children this week a five-statement pledge of faith. Donna and I learned this from Beth Moore’s Bible study, Believing God. As a person, I want to see my walk with Christ Jesus become all He intends for it to be. As a partner, I want to help my wife be all she can be in Christ. As a parent, I am devoted to see them grow like Jesus: “… in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man” (Luke 2:52). And as a pastor, I yearn to see the flock I shepherd know Jesus more intimately and make Him known more intentionally. To that end, I want you to learn these declarations with us:
God is Who He says He is.
God can do what He says He can do.
I am who God says I am.
I can do all things through Christ.
God’s Word is alive and active in me.
I’m believing God!
Pastor Rob
Friday, October 19, 2007
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Last-minute Reminders
I have eagerly anticipated this weekend all year. The Fall Festival of Marriage at Ridgecrest – driving through the fall colors of the Smoky Mountains in autumn – worshiping our Lord Jesus Christ with hundreds of other couples at Ridgecrest – celebrating God’s grace and the gift of marriage – spending four days away with my bride and best friend – what’s not to love?
As eager as I have been for this retreat with Donna, a distinct melancholy crept in Thursday morning before we hit the road. Actually, it began to edge in Wednesday night. The most difficult aspect of any out-of-town trip is leaving home – not leaving the house, mind you, but leaving home, leaving our kids.
Our youngest are growing up … fast. In significant ways and beyond what their age typically suggests, they are responsible and reliable. They have demonstrated to their mother and me that they can be trusted. Still, even a grumpy old papa bear like me pauses when he hugs the cubs as they leave for school knowing he won’t be home when they return in the afternoon. Will they be okay? Will they be safe? Will the house still be standing when we return? I don’t mean to sound gloomy, but when Donna and I leave the family for short trips like this, I often wonder, “What if something happens to us? Will they know what to do? Will they remember what really matters?”
So, those last few moments before we head out are filled with longer hugs and last-minute instructions. Then, we write what we forgot to say on a note left behind.
Make sure to clean up. No television or computer games until the homework is done. Help each other. The meals are in the fridge. Be nice. Check on Papa – but don’t eat all his snacks. Have fun at Homecoming. Here’s the number to call if you need us. We will call to check on you. See you Sunday. Oh, don’t miss Sunday School and worship! Love, Mom and Dad
Deadlines and schedules and departure times have a way of clearing the fog of the day-to-day and reviving our focus on what matters most. When it’s time for “good-byes” and “see ya laters,” we want to make sure the important stuff is related one more time. We want the message to be clear and the transmission to be received intact. And we trust our expectations are as precious to those we leave behind as they are to us.
Hmmm. I wonder if Christ experienced any of these emotions or longings when He bid farewell to His disciples? Can our experiences give us any insight into our Lord’s instructions to us on that Galilean mountain: “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations … observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:19-20).
Before He departed, Jesus Christ wanted to make sure His followers understood His heart and knew what was really important. He says, in effect: “As you go from this moment, make your life count – make disciples – remember what I have told you and trained you to do and be. Above all, remember, I love you and I am with you.”
I wonder if Jesus would have liked to add anything or repeat anything in a note like those we leave for our kids? But wait! Isn’t that precisely what we have in the New Testament? In fact, I find a remarkable parallel between our notes to our kids and Father’s letter to His children. He writes (hint: compare the note below with the note to our kids):
Stay clean. Stay pure. Don’t get distracted from the joyful work of the Kingdom by too much worldly leisure. Keep first things first. Finish your assignment, and finish well. Help one another. Encourage one another. I have meals prepared for you in My Word. Be kind to one another. Care for the people around you. Look out for one another. Find joy in this life’s foretastes of your glorious Homecoming. Remember, you can call on Me anytime. I am watching over you, protecting you, providing for you. I am coming back. I will see you soon. Until then, seize every opportunity to love your neighbors, love one another, and love Me! Love, Abba
I must be yours for I am His!
My Biggest Problem Ever
My twelve-year-old son, Joshua, got my attention Monday after school. He asked me, “Dad, what’s the biggest problem you have ever faced and how did you solve it?”
As any sane father should always do before blurting out whatever comes to mind, I responded to Joshua’s question with one of my own. “Why do you ask?”
“I need to interview someone and write about it for school tomorrow,” he responded.
Immediately, I began to make a mental short list of the biggest challenges I have faced so far. I processed my inventory and arranged the list in order of degree of difficulty. The degree of difficulty is directly proportional to the degree of despair and need for prayer each problem produced in me. I thought something like this:
1. Tearing out our kitchen floor (Degree of Difficulty: 10).
2. Maintaining some degree of civility and Christlikeness while tearing out our kitchen floor (Degree of Difficulty: 9.97).
3. Resisting the urge to burn the house down while tearing out our kitchen floor (Degree of Difficulty: 9.925).
4. Refraining from the desire to eat the cookies my wife bought for my children’s lunches and snacks (Degree of Difficulty: 9.9)
5. Muting my enthusiasm for Ohio State while my Michigan friends cope with disappointment and exchange national title hopes for Big Ten Championship aspirations (Degree of Difficulty: 9.875).
Okay. Maybe that’s not exactly the list I imagined when Joshua posed his question to me; although, I am certain the kitchen floor lurked in my subconscious. When my son asked about the biggest problem I had ever faced, my first thoughts were about relational challenges I meet every day, issues like these:
· How will I ever understand women – especially Donna, Lauryn, Bethany, Caitlyn … and my mom?
· How do I become the sort of man who can with integrity instruct and inspire my boys to become men?
· How can I lead each member of my family to love God with all their being, to love one another in the same way Jesus Christ loves us, and to love other people like themselves?
· How do I walk with God, truly walk the Talk or practice what I preach, in such a winsome way that will encourage and enable other people to walk with God?
· How do I ever hope to pastor this church to become what Father has called us to be and do – to make a total world impact to the glory of the Son in the advance of His Kingdom?
Intuitively awareness crept to my consciousness of two realities: First, even more than kitchen floors and Oreo cookies, these matters often bring me to a place of profound desperation and prayer. Second, these musings were not the stuff Joshua needed right at that moment. This was a school project after all!
So, I mulled over personal challenges and problems I have wrestled with over the years. In a flash I recalled a host of big-time, life-altering decisions (What career path should I pursue? Should I go to college? Where? Could Donna be the one? Should we answer the call to this church or that?). I thought about choices I had made – some good, some bad – and the consequences they brought into my life.
Suddenly, a fleeting moment of insight flashed across my mind. Every single challenge I have faced and each problem I have struggled to solve have shared the same common lineage. My biggest problem, I told my son, is my sin problem. The solution to my biggest problem – indeed, the solution of every challenge I have or ever will face – is found in the daily appropriation of the Gospel, the Good News, of Jesus Christ to my life. In every circumstance and decision, victory is realized only when I recognize I cannot solve this myself, I need help, and God extends that help to me in the person and provision of Jesus Christ. This is how my biggest problem was resolved, how my soul was saved, how my life continues to find meaning and purpose, and how I successfully meet the challenges every day presents – in Christ alone!
To the ends of the earth until the end of time!
Making Music Together
Beloved, tonight we will have a special kind of service. I have asked Randy to enlist as many people as possible to bring some special music. Call it a concert of praise or a singspiration service, I anticipate a worship gathering this evening made more meaningful as several of our faith family present special gifts and messages in song to the ear of the King in the hearing of His people.
This is not intended to be a talent showcase but a venue for folks to express their love to Jesus in a personal yet public way. Both are valuable – personal and public. My experience has been that music has a way of helping me open my heart to God’s mercies and majesty. So, when I make music to Him I worship Him in a very personal way. Moreover, when I make music to Him, because it is intended to bring Him glory, it should be witnessed by other people who may also consider His glory and praise Him.
I love to sing. I enjoy playing piano and guitar. Many and precious to me are the reverent times I spend with an instrument privately singing praise and petitions to an audience of One. When I can steal away for an hour or so simply to sit at the piano or take up my guitar and sing, my spirit is refreshed and my heart, relieved of the barnacles of this world, begins to believe again in His love, to hope and dream again.
Strangely, however, these private solo concerts are only a shadow of a deeper longing I have to praise my Redeemer. You see, I have enjoyed some rather lofty heights musically. I have experienced the thrill of joining my voice with large, well-trained choirs, with warm, folksy quartets, and with polished bands equally devoted to excellence in musicianship and in worship. Mine has been the pleasure to perform with other musicians high-brow classical music (a la Bach and Handel), southern Gospel (a la Rambo and Gaither), and more contemporary worship music (a la Moen, Redman, and original compositions), all “to the praise of His glorious grace” (Ephesians 1).
I have discovered something mysteriously satisfying in these group musical ventures – the unexpected fulfillment harmony with other voices and instruments provides. Something of a showman at heart and by experience, I rarely back away from opportunities to go solo. But were I given my druthers, I would heartily opt for the deep sense of satisfaction and completeness of sound and spirit making music with an ensemble gives me. The only provision I would require is that we not be satisfied simply making noise together but that we strive to make music that would thrill Father together.
I have heard it said, “A thousand voices tuned to the same instrument are automatically in tune with each other.” As a music lover and devotee of Christ, this statement resonates with me. That seems to me to be a worthy aim for you and me as we endeavor to do life together in and through Jesus Christ. The New Testament word is fellowship, from the rich term koinōnia. In the Bible, koinōnia describes the living communion of the saints – a close, three-sided relationship (God-you-me) characterized by “a readiness to share, a sense of equality among the participants, and a unity among the members.”
Sadly, the beautiful brawn of that word has been lost to us. When we hear the word “fellowship”, we may think of church dinners to which everyone brings a covered dish to share. Or, the more cynical among us – those who have been hurt over the years by toxic church-ianity – may imagine a clique who smile a lot and do their best to impress other people with their spirituality. Our unchurched neighbors may attach a similarly low view to the word. Weary of what they regard as feel-good religion and bothered by what they presume to be our charade of solidarity, they may think our fellowship is little more than an escape by which we Christians enclose ourselves in stagnant little huddles designed to affirm one another more than transform each other. Unfortunately, they probably have some grounds for their poor understanding of Christian fellowship. Of course, they may also be frightened by the powerful impact and considerable claims an authentic biblical fellowship portend for those who dare to live the real thing.
Beloved, we are meant to be “voices tuned to the same instrument,” Jesus Christ. We are each designed to produce harmonies rich and appealing that draw attention to our Melody. Our fellowship is a splendid symphony intended to manifest the truth about God and to draw people to Him. Let’s continue to learn to make beautiful music together and say like Bach: “Soli Deo gloria!” (To God alone be glory)!
To the ends of the earth until the end of time!
Live in the Plural
I have been reading the book of Hebrews as part of my devotional discipline the past week or so. I try to read and meditate over one chapter a day. What a tremendous manual of instruction, inspiration, and encouragement the Spirit has provided us through the pen of Hebrews’ author!
This week, Lord Holy Spirit ministered to me powerfully from Hebrews 10:19-25. Please take a moment to read that paragraph of Scripture. Keep your Bible open alongside this article as you read.
Hebrews 10:19-21 reminds me that through nothing attractive on my part, through no goodness of my own, but solely through the grace and mercy and love of God in Christ Jesus I have been offered intimate access to the Father. In the wonderful hymn, “Man of Sorrows, What a Name,” Philip Bliss wrote:
Bearing shame and scoffing rude, in my place condemned He stood,
sealed my pardon with His blood; Hallelujah! What a Savior!
Guilty, vile, and helpless we, spotless Lamb of God was He;
full atonement, can it be? Hallelujah! What a Savior!
Hebrews 10:22-25 reminds me that God has not only given me eternal life but also a prescription for the development of my new life here while I strain for eternity and Home. I find four admonitions in these verses that are essential to my growth and development. Real contentment and joy are found only here.
1. Get close to God every day – “Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith (v 22).”
I am so thankful that when I came to Christ Jesus God did not say, “Okay, that’s good enough. Now hang in there until you get Home. I’ll see you then.” To be saved does not only mean we will go to heaven when we die. To be saved means I have been found and brought back to a place of belonging and worth and celebration today. God longs for me to begin and continue to know Him more intimately every day. He wants me to draw near to Him with confidence and joy – and that is where my deepest longings are met.
2. Hold on tight to hope – “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering (v 23).”
Lately, for me, the biggest threat to my hope has been my schedule. Almost every morning, as I leave the house for work, I wrestle with feelings of failure – missed opportunities to cherish my wife, to laugh with my children, to finish the floor. Every evening, as I head home, I struggle with a sense of failure – so many calls left unmade, so many people not seen, so many tasks undone, so much study untouched. God wants me to focus on right priorities and trust Him to make hope reality in my day-to-day experiences.
3. Provoke the saints – “Let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works (v 24).”
The Master’s aim is for you and me to stimulate Christ’s activity in and through each other’s lives. As parents, Donna and I will not be satisfied, nor considered good parents, if our children never grow. So, we try to nurture and guide our children to make choices that will lead them to be productive participants in life. As followers of Jesus Christ, we should have the same devotion to our brothers and sisters in Christ.
4. Live in the plural – “Meet together … encouraging one another (v 25).”
John Wesley said, “There is simply no such thing as a solitary Christian.” We need each other. God has designed us so that the primary proving ground of our growth in Christlikeness is in the context of open, honest, bold relationships and fellowship. The New Testament calls believers in Jesus “saints.” And that word is never used in the singular – it is always saints, never saint. We must learn to live in the plural!
By the way, Hebrews 10:25 closes with this: “… all the more as you see the Day drawing near.” Paul told Timothy: “In the last days there will come times of great difficulty” (2 Timothy 3:1). Probably most of us could attest to increasing difficulties and discouragements. This makes our meeting together all the more urgent. Don’t let the enemy or the world or the flesh confuse you or lead you to believe you do not have time to meet with the body of Christ. The truth is we cannot afford not to live in the plural!
To the ends of the earth until the end of time!
In over Your Head?
Once again, I find myself in over my head. This is an all-too-frequent state of being for me, I think. On second thought, perhaps because I am not often enough in over my head I actually need to be in over my head more often, perhaps even perpetually. Sounds like an Aflac commercial, I know. Read on if you have any desire or hope to understand what you just read.
This past Monday I began a loathsome task – loathsome because it required me to handle tools with which I am not particularly familiar nor even remotely adept. What tools? Does it matter? Tools are tools. Hammers, saws, drills, planes – the proper identification and implementation of building and maintenance tools are all Greek to me! Actually, that is not quite accurate. I can read Greek with a modicum of understanding and appreciation! Fix-it books, the projects they assure me are do-able, and tools they recommend for success – these are foreign languages to me!
You see, my sweet wife suffers with a problem. Her first husband – that would be me – has little or no handyman skills whatsoever. Moreover, she has misguidedly determined that my shortcomings can be easily overcome by experience. So, six days ago I set myself to pulling up the old vinyl floor in our kitchen with a mind to put in a new tile floor by week’s end. With all the tools I could imagine would aid me on my quest, then, I started pulling up floor around 10:30 Monday morning.
Two and a half hours later the old floor was gone. “Not bad for an amateur,” thought I, but by then we had discovered a new problem. Underneath the old floor lurked an older floor, an uglier floor, a more stubborn floor. Despite my druthers to the contrary, we knew this floor had to come up also to get us to the original sub-floor. At the time that I write this article we are now at least 20 hours into the removal of this second vile layer and have succeeded only in the deletion of perhaps two-thirds.
In addition to our primary objective – the eradication of all floors not essential to the laying of a fine tile floor – we have had to deal with the repair of a water leak triggered by the removal of the old dishwasher. This water leak led to some damage to the drywall downstairs. When in the course of our corrections to said leak a certain member of my construction team fell from the ladder nearly breaking their crown, we incurred further damage to the aforementioned drywall. Why were none of these interruptions even hinted at in my fix-it book? Not even in a footnote!
The troubling flipside of dreams and visions is the doing of them. I have discovered it is one thing to aspire to climb to the mountaintop, and it is an entirely other thing actually to set your feet on the incline and start to climb. My wife and I have dreamed of a particular design and upgrade in our kitchen. I was happy with the ideas and the development of the design up to a point. That point revealed itself recently at the painful crossroads of its impact on my pocketbook, my schedule, and my body.
Get ready for an abrupt change of direction. Follow on to the end and you may find a reward.
This week I have been looking at our Annual Church Profile (ACP). Suffice it to say here that this is a report designed to reflect our growth in key areas over the previous twelve months. The numbers trouble me. Indications are prevalent that we are like the majority of churches in our land plateaued – a polite way of saying we are declining.
This is not really news to me. I knew when you agreed with God to call me as your pastor that we are a church who needs to transition and to rediscover God’s purpose for us. I have reckoned with God and our leaders that in order for us to grow again we must undergo a period of adjustment and modification that could reasonably require at least three years and perhaps as many as seven before we begin to see momentum in our advance of the kingdom. I must confess, I was a little disappointed to find our first year together has not already begun to produce the results and impact I believe God intends for us.
Then I looked at my kitchen floor again. Dreams take time and energy … and often the pursuit of vision presents detours. These unexpected layers are opportunities in disguise by which God may mold our character, or make us more fit and ready for the ultimate end, or test our devotion to finish the task and finish well, or to remind us that when we are in over our heads we are more apt to ask for His help.
I must be yours for I am His!
What's Your IQ?
What is your IQ? No, I don’t mean Intelligence Quotient. I am wondering this week about our Influence Quotient. What is our capacity to influence our circles of connection? How far can God count on us to share Jesus Christ? My study for today’s message from John 7 intersected with unexpected news this week, and led me to ponder a new take on my IQ and to provoke you to think again about your IQ also.
Here’s the unexpected news. Two men died this week. In fact, over a million people died this week across the planet. According to the Census Bureau, someone dies every 1.8 seconds. When you do the math that translates into 155,520 deaths every day. Anyway, back to my original statement.
Two men died this week. To the best of my knowledge, both men had trusted Jesus Christ as their Savior and Lord in this life. So, both men passed from the Shadowlands to a splendid reception in Heaven! Although both men had struggled with serious and debilitating health issues for the past year or so, today they are running and shouting without losing their breath. They are more vigorous and vibrant today than they ever dreamed of being here on earth. Indeed, they are more alive right now than any of us can begin to imagine.
As much as I would like to go on and on about Home, other thoughts about their lives intrigued me this week. For example, the respective impact each of these men made for King Jesus while here on earth fascinates me. It will help if you knew something about these two men.
One man I came to know personally. I cannot say I knew him well. I only met him within the last 10 months or so. In that time, however, I had several very pleasant conversations with him. I learned some admirable things about him. I liked this man. He exuded a pleasant, peaceful spirit and grinned broadly when I asked him if he had believed in Jesus Christ and received Him for all He is. He assured me He was born again.
I was troubled, however, by how easily he dismissed any notions of uniting with the Lord’s people, the body of Christ, the family of God, in worship, fellowship, or ministry. And I wondered as I attended his memorial service at the small number of people in attendance – less than 50 people, most of them family (his wife, their children, their grandchildren and great-grandchildren). I wondered how many lives he may have influenced for Christ.
The other man many of us have been familiar with over the years. Although I have yet to meet Dr. D. James Kennedy personally (I will look for him when I get Home), I have felt for years a strong bond to him. He has long been renowned as an eloquent and powerful preacher, a devoted and principled patriot, and a champion for the advance of Christ’s reign.
The scope of Dr. Kennedy’s impact in this life has been nothing less than … explosive. Indeed, his most remarkable contribution is the soul-winning resource he designed called Evangelism Explosion (EE). I read estimates that more than 5 million people have professed faith in Jesus Christ in over 211 nations through EE. I am not certain that would include hundreds of thousands of people in the
I marvel at how one man can be so mightily used of God! John Steinbeck wrote in The Grapes of Wrath: “One little man, with his mind made up, can move a lot of folks.” I imagine Steinbeck may have read Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring when Galadriel says: “One small person can change the course of the future.” I am certain Tolkien was well aware of what God can do with a band of unschooled men, hardly any more impressive than four hobbits, with whom He would spread the Gospel of grace from
Today, with John 7 as our base, allow the Holy Spirit to ask: What is your IQ? Does it need to be raised?
To the ends of the earth until the end of time!
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