Look Mom, NO BRAKES!*

photo credit someone on Ebay 

My uncle once showed up at our house with an old motorized go kart he found at a flea market and had been working on. What fun for us in early elementary school… at least for a moment.  We cousins took turns driving the go cart in small slow circles in the driveway while my uncle and father stopped us every once in a while to adjust something. We kept it slow because, oh yeah, there were NO BRAKES yet! Everything was fine and fun as we pretended to be racing on the big track. This, of course, was back when helmets were optional and maybe even frowned on for go karts, bikes, motorcycles, etc… I guess they thought we were hard headed enough or maybe it just wasn’t a part of the go kart package at the flea market.  When my cousin began his slow circle around the driveway for what would be his last one on that kart, my uncle, for some strange reason, jumped on the side of the kart, Thunderdome style, and pressed the accelerator to the floor, saying "Go faster son!” The accelerator spring that is supposed to “unrev” the engine when the accelerator is released, snapped and the kart began accelerating out of control. My uncle began falling and jumped off, my cousin, however, was seated and un-able to escape. He was wide-eyed and headed for the very steep hill with lots of big trees.  He lined up the driveway’s turnaround pad which launched the cart into the air. It hit a tree about 4 feet high and slammed to the ground. Fortunately the impact slowed the engine as my father and uncle ran to pull my cousin, crying and shaking from the kart. My uncle, embarrassed by it all, said to him, “oh, quit crying, you're not hurt.” And that about did it for the go kart thing.  Everytime I hear the words, “go kart,” I can see my cousin flying through the air, impacting the tree and slamming to the ground. Interestingly, as teens, my cousin and I would go to the go kart slick track extravaganza in Pigeon Forge to race against each other, accelerator to the floor, drifting through the turns, but this time with actual brakes (but still no helmets). 

The apostle John was worried about the early church. He didn’t want them going around accelerating through life with “no brakes.” He told them when we belong to Christ we can stop when it comes to sin. He reminded them (and us) that we who belong to Christ, act like Him, and He did not sin. He says, “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure. Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.” (1 John 3:1–6) So, we need to remind ourselves the next time we are operating with no brakes, feeling out of control, unable to stop ourselves from sinning, that we are children of God and He gave us brakes.  He makes us like Jesus whose brakes worked perfectly his whole life.  Sure, we’re all going to mess up, that’s why Jesus had to come save us, but when we belong to Him, we begin to mature in Him and learn how to use the brakes and turn around when we are heading for trouble.  

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!

I Love My Church!**

 

Wow! I’m thanking God for a wonderful “I Love My Church” Sunday. God involved so many people in this experience. I want to say thank you to everyone who said “Yes!,” when God asked them to engage in this week’s unifying, connecting, fun, worshiping, baptizing Gospel event. I would like to follow one particular God story that changed the lives of one family and blessed many others. I am sure there are many stories like this one, but this is the one God allowed me to see firsthand. I watched and listened as the staff talked about and planned the “I Love My Church!” Sunday. First, there needed to be an outreach to invite those people that either didn’t know Jesus or were not engaged in a church. Jonathan had asked us all to be praying for folks who need Jesus during our October Missions Month. A decision was made to make invitation bags available to take to these people for whom we were praying. The bag was simple: a card and a couple of cookies that said, “You belong here.” Bags, cookies, cards, and crinkle stuffing paper were ordered. A crew of several ABC volunteers came to stuff bags, stage them and pray over them before they were to be picked up. People picked up the bags the Sunday before to deliver them to invite friends, neighbors, family and coworkers. One ABC 2nd grader who herself had been baptized just a few weeks ago wanted 15 bags to take to her friends. Her mother said, “maybe a few,” but this little girl was insistent that she wanted her friends to know Jesus. I’m not sure how many she ended up giving away, but one of the bags she delivered ended up in the hands of a classmate. This classmate showed up to ABC for “I Love My Church!” Sunday. I happened to be in the lobby when this 2nd grader and his mother arrived. I was able to take the two of them to meet Rachel so he could join the Children’s Worship, Bible study, and fun. Mom then went to the worship center. The Holy Spirit moved Mom’s heart with the worship music, compelling Gospel message, and the sweet fellowship of 1000 worshipers. At the invitation to be baptized this woman came to the front of the room full of strangers and said, “Yes!” to Jesus. When she went to the baptistry changing room she was met by Adrian, who talked with her and learned that it was her first time to ABC and that her son was in the Children’s wing. Bill, Jo and the baptism team helped her get ready to be baptized. Adrian went to get this woman’s son, so he could watch his mother’s testimony that she belongs to Jesus through the waters of baptism. He watched his mother, then came to see her afterwards and gave her a big hug. He too wants to be baptized. Conversations about that are ongoing. I love how many people were involved in this continuing God story! There were planners, preparers, goers, givers, teachers, servers, cooks, cleaners, children’s workers, table setters, runners, towel washers… all involved in God’s plan to impact the lives of this family and others with the Gospel. 

Pastor Jonathan has been preaching on the Great Commission for the month of October. Matthew 28:18-20 says, “... Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:18–20 ESV) There was a lot involved in the GO-ing (planning, ordering, stuffing, baking, staging, delivering…). But this little girl decided to GO to her friends with bags to invite them to ABC. This young man and his mother came because they were invited. His mother heard the Word of God, the Truth of the Gospel, and was BAPTIZED (and her son may be baptized too). Next in the MAKING DISCIPLES plan that Jesus gave us is the teaching part. This 2nd grader has already connected with the Children’s Ministry director and teachers who are TEACHING him and other kids what life is like when you belong to Jesus. Mom is being invited to an Adult Bible Fellow-ship Group to learn alongside other believers all the blessings, joys, and opportunities of belonging to Jesus. Lord, give us the boldness to GO and MAKE DISCIPLES like this 2nd grader! 

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all! 

And The Flames Went Higher!*

 

When I was a teenager, my family owned some property on the lake, with plans to one day build a house on it. It was across the street and down a house or two from the house I grew up in, but we liked it because, “it was on the lake.” My father was trying to determine the best plan to dispose of a large amount of driftwood debris that had floated into our cove and was left stranded there as the water lowered. The idea was to just do a controlled burn. The wood pile was bordered by water on one side, was pretty far from the grass,  and with some shovels and hoes, he reasoned that we should be able to handle any sparks that got upwind on the grass. East Tennessee winters are usually very moist, but for some reason not that year.  Things were very dry on that sunny February day. We ignited the fire and things were going swimmingly until the wind changed and whipped the small fire into a very large fire, a fire larger than any of us had ever experienced.  The embers were jumping several feet into the air and then falling onto the dry grass. Initially we were doing pretty well putting out the small fires with the shovel, but then there were just too many. As the fire began to get out of control, I jumped on my motorcycle and rode quickly across and up the street to my house, while Dad continued fighting the fire. I called the volunteer fire department (with a rotary dial phone that seemed to take forever).  The dispatcher informed me that there were several out of control fires in the county that day, and they would try to get there when they could. I rode back to find that much of the field was now burning and my father was working feverishly to prevent the flames from getting to a fence row which would have involved another large adjacent field and no telling how much of the neighborhood. In the meantime, the flames were headed toward the street and whirlwinds of fire were leaping several feet at a time. Fortunately the wind was blowing away from the adjacent neighbor’s house. But unfortunately, the wind was blowing toward the historic “Harvey Farmhouse” directly across the street. “Rivermont” as it was also called, was built before 1900 and we knew it would ignite like a tender box. We were all praying a lot as we frantically tried to keep the conflagration in check. My mother, sister and neighbors had shown up trying to corral the flames.  All I could do was try to put out a few small flames as the fire devil jumped the road and lurched toward the old wooden house. My sister had brought a fire extinguisher, but wasn’t sure how to operate it. A neighbor grabbed it and quickly put out the largest flames before they reached the crispy, dry, unraked leaves around the house.  Mercifully, after a couple of hours, the wind and the flames died down enough and the old house was spared. God had answered and the fire was contained to only our property.  Needless to say, we never tried a controlled burn again.  We also, for some reason, never built on that property. 

When the prophet Isaiah was telling God’s people to remember Who they belonged to, he also warned them with fiery imagery about what would happen to those who were against God.  Isaiah 66:14-16 says, “When you see this (God’s restoration, protection, comfort, and blessing on His people), your heart will rejoice and you will flourish like grass; the hand of the LORD will be made known to his servants, but his fury will be shown to his foes. See, the LORD is coming with fire, and his chariots are like a whirlwind; he will bring down his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire. For with fire and with his sword the LORD will execute judgment upon all men, and many will be those slain by the LORD.”  I definitely don’t want to be on the wrong side of God’s angry, fiery rebuke.  My experience that day on our lake property makes this picture very vivid to me. This is a good reminder to be sure we know we belong to God, because there is no neutral ground.  Jesus tells us, ““He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me, scatters.”(Luke 11:23) Believe and belong to Him and flourish like grass! 

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!

When You Can See It Coming, But Can't Stop It?*

Photo credit: spreadricenothate

When my kids were in preschool and early elementary, we moved to Nashville to serve an urban church. The parsonage was situated on a large hill between the Baptist church at the bottom, where I pastored, and the Methodist church at the top. In the Summers we loved that hill for a homemade slip and slide, we loathed it when kicking the soccer ball, which usually ended up in or near the creek at the bottom of the hill. My son, while learning to ride a bike, took an unfortunate wobble then an uncontrolled turn down the hill. Frozen in fear, he forgot how to use the coaster brakes. Fortunately, he was not injured badly.  One of my toddler daughters was in the back yard when I came home from work. She smiled and turned to run to me. I was standing on the asphalt driveway below her and I could see what was coming. She was laughing and running toward me, which in one sense made my day, however,  I knew her little legs would not be able to keep up with her quickly growing head and body as she accelerated down the hill. I started saying, “stop!, stop!” and running toward her, but she was just too excited to see her Daddy.  She was doing well keeping up with gravity until just before the asphalt and then I saw it happening in slow motion, but I still couldn’t get to her in time. She fell face first on the driveway and her little head bounced when she hit. I finally got to her an instant later (which seemed like an eternity) I scooped her up and waited for tears. Surprisingly there were just a few, but she did have a scrape and pumpknot (hematoma) on her forehead.  

Don’t you hate it when you see the life choices of someone you care about that will lead to a big crash? You do all you can to warn them: “Stop! Stop!” but they just don’t yet understand all the forces at work in this world. When Paul was encouraging the Corinthian church, he could see that they were highlighting one Spiritual Gift over all the others. Even something as good as a Spiritual Gift could be used as something bad and divisive for the church.  Speaking in tongues became the gift that if you didn’t have it, you were not one of the cool kids at church.  Those who had it considered it so important they forgot that when we belong to Jesus, love is the most important thing.  Paul tells them, “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.”(1 Corinthians 13:1)  Paul knows what is coming, that the evil forces at work in this world are going to take even this (and other) spiritual gift(s) and use it against the church. Those with the coveted gift will be filled with pride and those without it will feel belittled and devalued. Both, in their immaturity, will forget that love is greater than any gift. They will forget how it is like them to act toward those around them.  Paul tells them, “Brothers, stop thinking like children. In regard to evil be infants, but in your thinking be adults.” (1 Corinthians 14:20) Paul loved the Corinthian church, but they were forgetting Who they belonged to. When we see an unavoidable social, emotional, Spiritual train wreck coming in someone’s life, like when an adult child chooses the wrong friend group, or significant other, or career choice, sometimes all we can do is try to tell them to stop. But then we gotta be ready to scoop them up and love them “no matter what” as they heal even if they don’t yet understand why they should stop.   

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!

Good Fish, Bad Fish...**

 

During those long Summer days, My Dad would sometimes come home from a busy day at Norwood Medical Clinic and say, “let’s go fishing!” In addition to being a physician he was also an avid sportsman. It was how he unwound after a stressful day of doctoring.  We would hook up the boat and head to the lake. Sometimes we would go right down the street to the boat ramp if we were bowfishing. Sometimes it was a few miles away if we were fishing the mouth of the creeks that fed the Tennessee River and Ft. Loudon Lake. At Stock Creek one evening, I casted my lure and BAM! a fish hit it so hard, I almost dropped my rod. I began to reel and the fish just kept spooling the line…zzzzz… Dad was so excited. He kept saying, "keep his head up!” as I struggled to stay upright fighting the fish.   I would reel a little, then the fish would take off again. My dad was sure by the fight of this fish that it was the biggest bass he had seen come out of that lake. The fish and I fought for several more minutes and when I got it to the boat, we discovered it was a freshwater drum.  Though this fish is the bane of serious bass fishermen, it sure was fun to catch.  It generally is called a trash or “rough” fish rather than a game fish. Drum are not considered a good fish to eat unless you have a Cajun chef close by, because they apparently call it a “gaspergou” and can make it quite tasty. This fish is a freshwater relative of the better tasting saltwater red drum found at seafood restaurants. 

From the Bible we can see that the Israelites are generally land dwellers, sheep herders and farmers from way back. But when Jesus came, He found a handful of Jewish fishermen living on the Sea of Galilee as the first ones He called to be his disciples. He was trying to describe what His Kingdom was like to them and said,  “... the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was let down into the lake and caught all kinds of fish. When it was full, the fishermen pulled it up on the shore. Then they sat down and collected the good fish in baskets, but threw the bad away. This is how it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”(Matthew 13:47–50 NIV) The amazing thing to me is that Jesus loves all of us and can take the trashiest of us “rough” fish and make us good. Jesus is in the business of changing bad wicked people into good and righteous. The truth is, we are all bad (not one of us is good according to Romans. 3:23), until we belong to Him and His connection with us changes our wicked hearts to make us good. He pays the price and suffers because of our badness. Those who belong to Him He saves from an eternity of weeping and gnashing of teeth in a fiery horrible place called Hell and lets us hang out with Him and all those who belong to Him in a wonderful place called heaven. Gaspergou and Red Drum will all be considered either good or bad. We will either be considered wicked or righteous at the end of our lives on earth and the only way to be righteous is through a real loving relationship with Jesus, He is the only one who can make us right. He died to make everyone good, but we have to choose to belong to Him, He won’t force us to be one of His good fish. 

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!

In Perfect Harmony**

Credit Adage.com

 One Christmas my family was to drive across Tennessee from Knoxville to Memphis, then down into Mississippi to visit some cousins. As we passed Nashville we hit a rare Tennessee snow storm. Traffic slowed to a snail’s pace. Because many southern drivers are not used to driving in the frozen white stuff, traffic crawled like sloths on a skating rink. My Dad, who was an exceptional driver, also had an “I-can-drive-through-anything” attitude and a Jeep Wagoneer. He was a very confident driver (with the exception of an infamous ice storm that froze him out of the car and sent him sliding underneath it only able to crawl back to the garage to abandon the trip he planned to rescue someone else, but that is a story for another day) As we traveled we saw some cars off in the ditch, some spinning tires, and others just sitting on the side of the road with their flashers on. As we progressed single file down I-40, the road oil and dirt flung from the tires of the cars ahead of us mixed with the snow and was smeared by the wipers to create a frozen oil slick on our (and everyone else’s) windshield. It was like looking through gray frosted glass, making travel even more hazardous. When we stopped for gas, everyone was trying to wipe and scrape their windshields but only smearing the frozen mess more. Until a northerner, who was used to driving in the stuff, gave some neighborly advice to those of us blessed to be born South of the Mason Dixson line. The fast talkin’ (expletive) Yankee told us what to do. Everyone really wanted to try this fix, but had to wait until he was gone, so we wouldn’t have to say he was right if it worked. However, behold, it worked! After pouring this stuff on, the icy road slime formed a slush and slid right off with a paper towel and we were back on the road with clear windshields. What was this magical solution? Good ol’ Coca-cola. You know the “I’d like to teach the world to sing, in perfect harmony… it’s the real thing…” stuff, developed right smack dab in the middle of the South in Atlanta, Ga. (for you youngsters here’s the famous commercial https://adage.com/videos/cocacola-hilltop/395) Who knew that the phosphoric acid that gives Coke its slightly tart taste is also good for cleaning glass. (BTW this phosphoric acid is now associated with causing low bone density for those who consume a lot of sodas - uh oh! Who knew?) We finally arrived in Mississippi several hours later than planned, but had a blast with the cousins for Christmas. Maybe our prejudices were challenged when this “Yankee” was kind, neighborly, and eager to help people be just a little safer in a challenging situation. 

Jesus told a story that confronted the prejudices of his hearers in which He made a Samaritan the hero of the story instead of the respected ones they held in highest esteem. Luke tells it like this, “And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”

But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”(Luke 10:25–37 ESV)  Let’s go and do likewise people! 

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all! 

HotWired!**

Photo Credit Outdoor Discovery

 When in high school, a church friend and I were excited to go water skiing one Summer afternoon after we got off work. He had a real job… helping run a bearing business. I had the morning shift as a lifeguard at the local pool. We quickly drove the 45 minute drive to the lake, maybe a little quicker than the posted speed limit… at that age, we did everything as quickly as we could to make sure we got every last drop out of our days. People used to say we were either out on the lake running wide open or tied to the dock… asleep, there was no in between. We got to his Dad’s boat slip, threw our skis, vests, and rope into the boat and I started untying from the dock. Then he said, “oh man! I forgot the keys!”  He said, “no skiing today, it will be dark before we get back home and come back up here.” I said, “Hang on! Do you have a screwdriver?”  I had never hotwired a boat, but had watched McGuiver and thought, “how hard can this be?”   He found a screwdriver, turned on the blower to get any flammable gasses out of the engine compartment,  and I went to look under the driving console.  I touched some wires with the screwdriver and a lot of sparks flew out, tried some other wires and more sparks, but then the engine started.  We were in business! We skied hard until dusk, never turning the boat off, and we idled into the dock in the dark. We were quite proud of ourselves until we arrived at his house to see his dad standing in the door with the boat keys in his hand, laughing at us. He said, “you guys didn’t get to ski, did you?” To which we replied, “Sure we did, Bill hotwired your boat.” This, as you might imagine, was not the right answer. He was not happy with us at all. As a matter of fact, he grounded us from using his boat for several days. We were thinking, “how resourceful we are to make this happen.” He was thinking, “they ruined my boat.” 

As Jesus was talking to the crowds about his cousin, John the Baptist, who had been imprisoned, He highlighted his extraordinary ministry as a prophet. Jesus said that John the Baptist was the greatest man to ever live. John was a rough and tumble prophet who told it like it was, and didn’t pull any punches. He said what he was going to say, regardless of how it landed. John the Baptist carried a heavy mantle to further God’s Kingdom.  Jesus says, “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing, and forceful men lay hold of it” (Matthew 11:12) However, Jesus also told the crowds there is an easier and better way.  He told them, ““Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”(Matthew 11:28–30)  Sometimes we can try to force our lives to give us what we feel we need or deserve. We can force our faith on ourselves and others. We say, “life is only what you make it.”  We hotwire it, jumpstart it, and fake it ‘til we make it, but Jesus says, simply connect your life to me and you no longer have to go around kicking down doors and hotwiring boats to find what faith and life are really about. Jesus says, “I’m gentle and humble in heart.” There is an easiness to our faith life when we connect with Jesus.  When Simon Peter connected with the fact that Jesus was, “the Christ, the Son of the Living God,”  Jesus told him, “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”(Matthew 16:19) We gotta quit trying so hard to hotwire life and faith and remember that Jesus not only holds the keys and He gives them to us to share with others. Real life is more about connection with Jesus than a forceful determination to make our faith happen.

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!

A Visitation!**

 Back when churches did Tuesday night visitation to meet the people who had come as guests on the Sunday before, sometimes those doorstep visits seemed to make a difference in the lives of our guests, but sometimes the visits could seem ineffective and even annoying to those we visited. Some people would not come to the door, pretending not to be home, even though I could hear them telling other family members to be quiet until I went away. One particular Tuesday night, I had collected a handful of names and addresses to go visit.  I went to several homes and no one was home. I had one more visitation card in my stack, but I was already late trying to get home and tell my kids “goodnight” and this house was another 30 minutes from where I was and another 45 back to my house. So, I started to head home, so I could join Anita in the bedtime routine of  reading, rocking, tucking-in, and praying with our 4 preschoolers.  I decided I would visit this couple the next Tuesday. However, I got this overwhelming feeling that I needed to go to this particular house that night. I tried to ignore it and then began arguing in my head with God that I needed to go home. God, of course won the argument, and compelled me to go.  So, I turned around to go to this house that would add another hour plus to my evening.  I would have to trust that God would give Anita grace, once again, to put all four kids to bed by herself. When I got to the last visitation, the house was huge, but it was dark. I was miffed… thinking that I came all the way out here to visit an empty house. I said a prayer and walked to the door to ring the doorbell; it was worth a try, maybe they were in another part of the house. When I  did, lights came on and a young couple came to the door with a somewhat surprised look on their faces. I told them who I was and they invited me in. There were large, dark, empty rooms sparsely decorated. We found some chairs and sat down.  They explained they had planned to sell the house, so there wasn’t much furniture left. They also explained that they had visited the church on Sunday in a last ditch hope to save their marriage. They said, “we just prayed at dinner tonight, that if God didn’t show us something, we would be filing for an amicable divorce tomorrow.” I was able to talk with them and tell them I believed the solution was a real and vital relationship with Jesus Christ. They both were saved that night! A few weeks later, they were baptized and invited their friends to come watch. Their friends, who had noticed a dramatic difference in their marriage and lives, became curious, came to church with them and were saved too. All in all about a dozen people began to follow Christ. Wow! And to think that I almost didn’t go that night! I know God didn’t need me to go to their house that night. He would have accomplished His will in their lives in any way He wanted, but He invited me to join Him in that work and what a blessing it was.  

The apostle Paul was telling the leaders of the church at Ephesus about how God had urged him to keep going even when it meant sacrifices on his part. He told them, “And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. I only know that in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me. However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace.” (Acts 20:22–24) My being late getting home that night was definitely worth it. God chose to use me to lead that couple to hear and receive the Gospel. My being inconvenienced one night seems silly compared to the hardship, beatings and prison Paul endured. I’m humbled that God had compelled me to join Him and testify to the Good News of His grace.  If you feel compelled by God to do something, don’t miss it. God is including us in His plan to save people, their marriages, their lives, their friends!   

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all! 

Are You In Over Your Head?**

 My father and I had been at our houseboat doing some work on it. It was a very hot day, so several people had come to the shore at the state park swimming area about 500 yards from where our houseboat was moored just in front of Norris Dam. You could hear lots of laughing and squealing of kids as their voices echoed over the water and bounced off the dam concrete. At one point the squealing turned to screaming and then yells for help. We stopped our work and listened to see if this was just kids' playful joking or actual screams for help, but after a few minutes of it we jumped in the bass boat and motored through the “no wake” zone toward the shore. It took us several minutes to navigate around the other boats toward the buoys that marked the swim area. At some point the yelling stopped. We arrived in time to see the body of a man with blue jeans, blue face, and no shirt laying motionless on the shore. Everyone had left but a few people who had pulled him out of the water.  This man had ridden his motorcycle to the lake and decided to take a swim in his jeans. Apparently, he didn’t realize how steeply the shore dropped off to deep water and was in over his head before he knew it. He was unable to turn around and to get back to the shore. Despite the attempts of others to get to him and bring him back, he had already drowned.  Knowing there was nothing we could do, we turned the boat around and let the officials do their work.  My father, who was a physician, had seen people who had expired before during his medical training in the Emergency Room and Med School, but this was a first experience for me as a young teen, aside from those bodies in the funeral home who had been carefully made up and prepared for a half-open casket and public viewing.  I had lots of questions about what happens to the body when someone drowns.  My father answered all my questions from a medical viewpoint. Then as I quietly processed the incident on the way back to the houseboat and the car ride back home, I wondered about this man’s soul. Was he ready to leave this earth? Did he have a relationship with Jesus? Was he in heaven now? Or somewhere else, i.e. hell?  

Israel had rebelled against God and had followed the occult gods of the land.  Because God loved His people, He wanted them to repent, but they were in way over their heads and unable to give up their connection to the evil ways of foreign gods. So, God allowed them to be defeated and taken into captivity. Jeremiah the eccentric prophet, had warned Israel to repent and turn around, head back toward God.  The leaders did not like what Jeremiah had to say against them and at one point threw him into a cistern full of mud, but God had him rescued and pulled out (Jer. 38). Jeremiah never quit trusting God.  In one of his writings Jeremiah says, “... the waters closed over my head, and I thought I was about to be cut off. I called on your name, O LORD, from the depths of the pit. You heard my plea: “Do not close your ears to my cry for relief.” You came near when I called you, and you said, “Do not fear.” O Lord, you took up my case; you redeemed my life.”(Lamentations 3:53b–58 NIV) God still hears our cries for help. No matter how deep in the pit of sin and rebellion, or hopeless despair we are, God hears our cries when we call out to Him. The apostle Paul says, “for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”(Romans 10:13 NIV) We are all in over our heads. We cannot save ourselves from sin and death, but God made a way through Jesus to be rescued from the pit of hell. He loves us and wants us to spend eternity with Him and has made a way for us to graciously be saved, but it is our choice whether we call out for a relationship with Jesus to be rescued from the evil that has us overwhelmed. 

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all! 

A Seat At The Table!**

 A seat at the table. My paternal grandmother was a widow, she had been since her 40’s. A child of the Great Depression, she was very shrewd with her money, she saved everything… used aluminum foil, small pieces of string, rubber bands, ketchup and pads of butter from a restaurant, and anything else of any perceived value. Interestingly, in spite of her frugality, she was very generous with those she loved. She lived very humbly, except for her car, she loved a Cadillac. Arthritis had crippled her, she walked very slowly and with great pain. Though knee replacement had become an option in her lifetime, she never felt comfortable with spending that kind of money on herself. My family saw her at least once a week. My cousins stayed with her every day after school. She was a smart and curious woman. Her curiosity about people could come off as unkind, or at least insensitive. For example, she once asked a very tall check out clerk at the grocery if she was standing on a box. Mother Mac was not a cook and didn’t have a large place to host people, but she loved good food and her family.  Nearly every Sunday after church, she invited my family and my cousins’ family to lunch. One of her favorite places was called Pero’s Restaurant owned and operated by the Peroulas family. It had delicious Greek and Italian food. It was like my big fat Greek lunch, only we were Irish, Scottish, and some Jewish mixed in. They put two tables together to accommodate the 9 of us who enjoyed the crackers with butter before the meal, a great salad, and the veal parmigiana was the best in town. She had a sweet tooth, so we always enjoyed dessert, besides it came with the meal (another great value). We all laughed and teased each other a lot (teasing was one of our love languages). We always left there full of good food, good memories and good times together. This was Mother Mac’s way of taking care of her own and keeping her family together.  Later, we all appreciated her intentionality in making this a family tradition, though at the time we may not have recognized it. It helped establish our identity and sense of belonging. If you belonged to Mother Mac you ate lunch together on Sundays.  Sunday lunch with Mother Mac was the place we wanted to be, she even welcomed our friends and significant others as we grew older. She used her resources for something important to her, her family. Because of her smart investments, and great generosity, she also helped two generations in her family go to college.  Unfortunately, her digestive tract was so compromised by all the aspirin she had to take for arthritic pain, she had to have part of it removed and it eventually took her life. 

God’s people had lost their sense of identity as His people. They had forgotten that they belonged to Yaweh. They had run after other gods that provided no real help or provision. Their gods were not capable of the loving covenant connection that Yaweh provided them. Spiritually, they were bankrupt. Isaiah reminded them as he prophesied of a coming Messiah, that belonging to God means that He loves and provides for those who are His and He has a place for them at the table.  “Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat!   Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost.Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare. Give ear and come to me; hear me, that your soul may live. I will make an everlasting covenant with you, my faithful love promised to David.” (Isaiah 55:1–3 NIV)  Jesus himself speaks of the kingdom of God as a banquet prepared for all who will come (Matt. 22).  If we belong to Him, if we are one of His, if we identify as His, if we are connected to Him, we have a seat at the table. 

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all! 

Stretched!**

 

 Photo: cordelegeorgia.blogspot.com

As a young student pastor in my first church after seminary, I was excited to take my students on a mission trip to work with another church in our state outside of their cultural white suburban comfort zone. So our student leader team prayed together and I felt led to call a seminary friend who was the Pastor of a new African-American church plant in his hometown of Cordele, GA. He invited us to come and help him do a Vacation Bible School and a Revival. He was trying to reach the families in the public housing area where he had grown up. Many of the people worked very hard in the watermelon fields in season. Cordele is actually the self-proclaimed "Watermelon Capital"! I had called my friend and asked him if he was ready for 25 kids and 5 adults to come help him with his church plant for a week. He said, “Yes,” and told us he had everything planned. When we arrived, he had not secured us a place to stay! This was my rookie minister's mistake for not securing these important details myself (kinda silly of me considering that the internships I had were with guys who were planners and overly prepared). He made a phone call and within a few hours we were putting together army cots at the National Guard Armory in town, where we would stay for the week.  He had a connection having served in Desert Storm, and still served in the Guard. We then assumed we needed to figure out how and where to feed our kids, so we sent some of our adults to get breakfast foods, lunch sandwich fixin’s and some easy dinners for three days. Before we began he shared this scripture with us: “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”(Isaiah 41:10 NIV) The first evening he had us go to the government apartments to invite kids to the Vacation Bible School the next day. We were received well. My friend said he would greet the people and introduce us as the students from church in Columbus, GA who were here to create a fun VBS week for their kids. I thought we would pray, sing a hymn, and go meet the people face to face, hand out balloons and invitations. The pastor got on top of our van with a speaker and microphone, and introduced us. We smiled and waved. Then an instant later he said he felt moved by the Spirit to start preaching.  He began calling out the sins of the people in that community by name. We had never heard that kind of preaching and we were taken aback. The tension, as you can imagine, was growing quickly.  As his preaching  became more animated and intense the crowds began to surround the van and move angrily toward him, shouting, and encircling us. These were not the face to face interactions we were hoping for when we imagined how this event would go. We were still standing there holding balloons and invitations with fear on our faces, unable to fully understand what was happening. He finished preaching and one of our musically inclined adults began to pray then sing Amazing Grace and our kids  and a few neighbors joined in. It was enough to calm everyone a bit. My friend got down from the van and instructed us to leave immediately.  However, we had earlier instructed our teens to go door to door and invite the children to our VBS after the pastor had introduced us. Before we could stop him, a wonderful big hearted young man with special needs made it to an apartment and knocked on a screen door and the man angrily said, “go away, NOW!” The student was unable to read the elevated emotions of the situation and he was just doing as he had been instructed. The man became more angry as the student continued with his genuine smile and rehearsed invitation. Fortunately, one of the other students saw what was happening, apologized to the man and grabbed this student and they quickly made their way to the van, just as the angry man emerged from the apartment with a knife. We gathered all the kids and instructed them to immediately get in the van and we left with dust flying before a vigilante force came together.   

We arrived at the Armory wide eyed and hungry. The adults who had stayed to cook, had dinner ready and got an ear full.  That night, one of the ladies who had done student ministry for many years started an all night prayer vigil that continued each night. She said she would start and pray for 1 hour and wake up the next volunteer, who would pray and wake the next volunteer. I and 4 others volunteered and more joined us each night. We were like prayer vigil-antes. After some dodgy sleep and lots of prayer on a squeaky cot, we woke up each morning to fresh breakfast. 

The VBS went well for the few kids that attended. On the last night, Ira held a revival at his church housed in an old warehouse. He preached again, but not as angry this time, and several teens from his community made decisions for Christ. He paired them up with some of our students to lead them through a prayer of repentance and connection with Christ. This was another first time experience for our students.  They were scared and somewhat timid, then invigorated and emboldened as the Holy Spirit led them through the experience of talking and praying with those who had just made the decision to belong to Jesus. We ended the week, and came back to Columbus with some stories that the parents would not believe. The students said their faith had been stretched, challenged, and strengthened that week. Oh yeah, the next year's mission to Florida was very well planned, but maybe a little less stretching.  

The apostle Paul had stirred up some people with his preaching and they followed him to the next city to cause him trouble. They formed a vigilante group and came after him. Acts 14:19–23 tells us,  “Then some Jews came from Antioch and Iconium and won the crowd over. They stoned Paul and dragged him outside the city, thinking he was dead. But after the disciples had gathered around him, he got up and went back into the city. The next day he and Barnabas left for Derbe. They preached the good news in that city and won a large number of disciples. Then they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God,” they said. Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church and, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord, in whom they had put their trust.” Sometimes our faith journey stretches us and doesn’t look like we thought it would, but God uses it to all accomplish His Gospel plans. BTW Some of those Georgia kids went on to be missionaries, ministers, and teachers of the Gospel of Christ and point to that experience as a significant event in beginning to realize their calling. 

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!

Feet of Clay: Learning Love from a Tennis Story!*

I had played tennis several times a week in Middle School at the asphalt courts owned by the church next to my home and loved it. I was hopeful in trying for a spot on the team at my new high school, my freshman year.  I was a little intimidated because I was largely self-taught, unconventional and modestly equipped compared to the kids that I would be competing with. They were the well-coached kids. They were every-summer-all-summer tennis camp kids, with elite equipment and facilities. The tryout was a simple challenge system. You could challenge someone for the vacant spot on the team and you got to name the court. If you won you earned your spot, if you lost you were out, no challenge backs. There were 4 of us freshmen trying to make a spot on the team. I had defeated two others and thought I was assured of a spot at least playing doubles (the top 6 players play singles and 7&8 play doubles). My insecurity began displaying itself in pride about those first wins.  However, there was a late challenge from classmate #4. He had done his homework and strategically selected a clay court, first, because he knew I had likely never played on clay (his country club was the only place in town that had clay courts) and, second, because he knew the moist court would slow down my serve and forehand. He also knew my feet would slide a little on clay, unlike asphalt and it would slow my quickness. We were fairly evenly matched going to deuce several times. In the end, his strategy had served him well.  He had changed the whole game with his court selection and turned my strengths into weaknesses. My dreams of playing high school tennis were dashed to the clay.  (I ended up on the swim team, but that’s another story for another day). 

The Apostle Paul was concerned because there were Judizers who had come to the church in Philippi.  These hyper-religious people were very impressive with how well they could follow the rules and they insisted that everyone else do the same. These admirable attributes of rule following, sounded like something every Jesus follower should do, but actually this self-righteousness threatened the very core of what it means to belong to Jesus. This salvation based on ascetic rigor AND following Jesus was antithetical to a simple humble relational connection with Jesus. Sure, acting rightly is what happens when we begin to mature in Christ, but the Judiazers made it sound like it was necessary for salvation. Having a place on Jesus' team has nothing to do with our own strength or rule-following ability, and everything to do with a real attachment to Jesus, who changes us and then matures us through relationships with other true believers to do the right things. God's plan, through Jesus, had turned all the strengths of Judaizers into weaknesses.  Paul knew this first hand, he used to be one of the best of those super-rule followers. He tells his friends, “Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ  and become one with him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ. For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith.  Philippians 3:8-9 (NLT2) We all have feet of clay, our greatest strengths can be considered our greatest weakness if we value them more than our relationship with Jesus. God's love for us is immeasurably greater than our ability to follow the rules.

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!

Hot Buttery Popcorn, Warm and Safe Hospitality!*

Photo: Simply Recipes / Mihaela Kozaric Sebrek

Mrs. Blackburn made the most delicious skillet popcorn, salted and buttered just right, served warm, right out of the pan, with lots of smiles and laughter, and a glass of lemonade in the Summer, or cup of hot cocoa in the Winter. Miss Bonny was a neighbor on our cul-de-sac on Fox Chase Lane with a long straight uphill driveway, so she could see all who entered the cul-de-sac. The driveway up to this lookout was built where an old wagon trail had traversed the neighborhood a hundred years before.  She was quite a golfer, who loved to coach teenage girls to play the links, some of whom went on to play in college. Though her husband, Henry, was kind of sickly and ill, she was gregarious and very social. She loved to host my sister and me for impromptu snacks when she saw us playing or riding our bikes around the end of the street circle.  The cul-de-sac oval, with four houses,  had a little patch of grass inside the asphalt loop, a perfect place to play “rolly bat" or find 4 leaf clovers, but watch out for the bees! Miss Bonny would come out her front door, see us playing, smile and wave us up to her house. We knew that meant a delightful snack was coming. One particular day, my sister decided to ride her bike by herself around the circle, on our little hill in Lakemoore Hills.  She was gone for a long time, but when she returned, she was talking a mile a minute, eyebrows up, and smelling like hot buttered popcorn. We knew where she had been. She explained that she had run over a black snake that was so long, it stretched all the way across the driveway.  She was so scared that she didn’t stop pedaling until she got to the top of Miss Bonny’s drive. She knocked on the door and Miss Bonnie welcomed her, fixed her the wonderful skillet corn, and later sent her home after making sure the snake was gone. Whenever we heard the 1972 international hit, a cool Moog synthesizer instrumental song, “Hot Butter - Popcorn,” we were reminded of sitting in Miss Bonny’s kitchen watching her pour the oil into the large skillet, waiting for the test kernels to pop, pouring in the rest of the kernels, then shaking the pan like crazy it until the last pops sounded, dumping the steamy white mushroomed puffs into a bowl, drenching them with melted butter and generously sprinkled salt, then putting them in little bowls for each of us. Though I don’t remember her being an overly religious person, Miss Bonny acted like Jesus, welcoming people, protecting them from scary things, offering warm hospitality, and feeding them puffy delicious grains with salty melty butter.  More of us need to be like Miss Bonny, a safe, caring, fun, friend to those who are in the cul-de-sacs of our lives. 

Before Moses died, he wanted to bless and encourage God’s people, reminding them of His kind protection, provision, and care. God had used him to bring them out of Egypt, he had been with them in their desert wanderings, and rescued them many times from danger. He knew there would be more difficulties to come, but he also knew Yahweh’s arms were not weak. God had already brought them through many trials. Moses told the children of Israel, “There is no one like the God of Israel. He rides across the heavens to help you, across the skies in majestic splendor. The eternal God is your refuge, and his everlasting arms are under you. He drives out the enemy before you; he cries out, ‘Destroy them!’ So Israel will live in safety, prosperous Jacob in security, in a land of grain and new wine, while the heavens drop down dew. How blessed you are, O Israel! Who else is like you, a people saved by the LORD? He is your protecting shield and your triumphant sword! Your enemies will cringe before you, and you will stomp on their backs!”(Deuteronomy 33:26–29 NLT-SE)  Hymn writer A.J. Showalter was encouraging some of his former students who had just experienced tremendous loss with these verses. He reminds them, “What a fellowship, what a joy divine, Leaning on the everlasting arms; What a blessedness, what a peace is mine, Leaning on the everlasting arms. Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarms; Leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms.” We can take comfort in God’s care and great love for us, but we also need to give that comfort to others in real, tangible ways, just like Miss Bonny Blackburn. It's a great excuse to make hot buttered popcorn for some friends! (Oh and you are welcome for putting these two songs in your head today!)

Hang in there people! God is glad to be with us! I’m praying for us all!