Some Thanksgiving Thoughts

This week is a bit odd for me. Part of my work time has been about preparing for the Thanksgiving Eve service on Wednesday night and part of it has been about getting ready for Sunday and the start of new series from John 1 for Advent. Yet I have also been asked to take part in a discussion about physician assisted suicide, and probably like many of you, I was deeply saddened to hear the protests in Ferguson turned destructive. We are living in a context that is dark, which means distress and gloom of anguish are around us. That is a very sad and even disturbing thought, especially as we prepare for Thanksgiving and anticipate Christmas. And yet, maybe that thought brings Thanksgiving and Christmas into focus. The Lord Jesus did not come to earth because everything was rosy and bright. He came because we desperately need Him to be the Light of the world. Our world needs the reality of Christmas.

But what about Thanksgiving? 1 Thessalonians 5:18 states, “give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” How can we give thanks when businesses are burning and people are looting? Please note carefully that we are not called to give thanks for all circumstances, but rather in all circumstances. How can we do that? Perhaps Christmas, the coming of the Lord Jesus can be the spark for our giving of thanks. Even though circumstances are not great, the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. He sent His Son for us, and part of the Son coming, dying, rising again, and returning to heaven leads to His soon return to earth to put all things in subjection (1 Corinthians 15:24-28). We can give thanks because God’s past actions on behalf of His people provide confident hope that He will complete His plan and as Revelation 22:5 tells us, night will be no more. Darkness and that all comes with darkness will be done. The Lord God will our light. Let us give thanks because the God of Christmas calls us out of darkness and into His marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9).

Thoughts About a Tough Message

I write this blog with a heavy heart. For the next two Sundays we will be doing a short series called, “What is Next?” The series is a brief look at heaven and hell.  This Sunday we will start with hell.  I just finished my notes for Sunday, and I can say this message has been one of the more difficult messages I have ever prepared. In preparing I read some words of a theologian, Sinclair B. Ferguson that perhaps set some of the tone for my heart and mind. He wrote, “To speak of hell is to speak of things so overwhelming that it cannot be done with ease. . . . The contemplation of hell prostrated holy humanity. Our Lord never spoke of it with relish.”[i]  In light of my inner turmoil you might be wondering why we are doing this series or at least this message. Perhaps these words written by Timothy Keller express it best: “If Jesus, the Lord of Love and Author of Grace spoke about hell more often, and in a more vivid, blood-curdling manner than anyone else, it must be a crucial truth.”[ii]

I believe the wisest attitudes and actions to hold in life are attitudes and actions that align with the Lord Jesus. Hell is not an easy subject, but it is a subject that the Lord Jesus spoke about. It is something that He took seriously. That should lead us to also take it seriously. In the fall of 1939, C. S. Lewis preached a sermon, “Learning in War-Time” in the Church of St. Mary the Virgin in Oxford, England. Early in the message he said concerning the Lord Jesus and our attitude to hell, “I know, too, that nearly all the references to this subject in the New Testament come from a single source. But then that source is Our Lord Himself. . . . They are not really removable from the teaching of Christ or of His Church. If we do not believe them, our presence in this church is great tomfoolery. If we do, we must sometime overcome our spiritual prudery and mention them.”[iii] Please pray for our time together on Sunday, please come on Sunday expecting for the Lord Jesus to speak to us through His Word about a tough subject.

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[i] Sinclair B. Ferguson, “Pastoral Theology: The Preacher and Hell,” in Hell Under Fire, ed. Christopher W. Morgan and Robert A. Peterson (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2004), 220.

[ii] http://www.redeemer.com/redeemer-report/article/the_importance_of_hell

[iii] The text of this message can be accessed by a Googling “C. S. Lewis Learning in wartime”

Getting Ready for Sunday

I have been pondering ideas related to love, gratitude, attitude, and worship that were sparked by looking at a story Jesus told in Luke 7. Given that we gather as a church every Sunday, it is possible for us to think of church simply as a routine that might be a good thing in our lives, but hey, we all get tired or even bored of routines. 

The main thrust of the story in Luke 7 is not about worship, but is about love and gratitude. As I thought about my love for and gratitude toward God for what He has done for me, I was challenged to consider my attitude toward worship and how love and gratitude impact my attitude toward worship. Here is where my pondering took me: when we gather on a Sunday morning for a time of group worship, I believe that my love and gratitude toward God should be the motivator for me to be present in a service and for me to participate in the service. But clearly, my love and gratitude do not start with me. I do not create them. They are products of or responses to God’s love and forgiveness freely given to me through the Lord Jesus. To me there should be a wow in our lives, even in the context of a routine, when we consider what God has done for us. A wow that ignites me to action. When I ponder the truth of what God has done for me, the idea of gathering with others to worship seems like an incredible blessing, one in which I want and need to be a part of. Those thoughts are making me very eager to participate in our worship service on Sunday. Yes we gather every week, but when I consider what God has done, we need to gather very week and give thanks. I hope you are eager to participate too when you consider what God has done through Christ. 

A Prayer for 2014

When one year ends and another one begins, it is pretty common for us to stop, though maybe only for a moment, to take stock of our lives. But should we take the time to do this kind of thing? According to Plato, during Socrates’ trial for corrupting the youth of Athens in 399 B.C. Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” (http://www.patheos.com/blogs/scriptorium/2010/02/the-examined-life-of-socrates/). Should you take some time and examine your life?

I believe the quick answer to that question is a qualified yes. Your life should be examined, but it is nothing something that you can do alone, you need help, honestly we all need help to accomplish such a task. Recently I was reminded of why that is in fact the case. Jeremiah wrote these words a long time ago:

Jeremiah 17:9-10 – The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?  ¹⁰ "I the LORD search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds."

Our hearts, not the physical organ, by heart Jeremiah was speaking of the totality of our inner lives, are not something we understand. And sadly, our inner lives are not very pretty sometimes, yet how we act and the attitudes we project come from that mess. Though we need to be examined, it is not a private activity. As verse 10 shows us, the Lord alone is the One who can do such an examination.

As we embark on a new year, I would like to suggest that with some measure of regularity we need to pray a couple of verses of Scripture and wait and listen carefully for the Lord to answer that prayer. The verses are Psalm 139:23-24:

Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! ²⁴ And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!

Most men and undoubtedly many women go through each day at full speed and do not carve out time for the discipline of praying, contemplating, and reflecting over God’s answers. Such an activity may sound to some as a type of useless nasal gazing. But I believe it should sound to us like an incredible gift from God to us. Psalm 139 is written in the context of distress – note the harsh words of verses 19-22. And in that context, the psalmist, presumably David has noted that God’s knowledge of his life is complete and full (verses 1-12). Such knowledge should not surprise us given that God is the One who made us (verses 13-16) and should drive us to worship God (verses 17-18). If the first parts of the Psalm are true, then in a world that is not always what it should be, we may not always be the people we should be. We probably need an examination.

Maybe I am alone in this concern, but I wish I could do parts of 2013 over again, and way too many previous years. I made choices and mistakes that were ill informed, hurtful to others, and just plain stupid.  I know that I am capable of repeating the same actions in 2014 without inviting and heeding God’s examination. I need Him to help me see His discernment of my motives and actions. I need to move toward His transformative work in my life. Without asking for His examination, I will miss what I truly need, which only He can give.

Please pray Psalm 139:23-24 regularly this year.