Jesus is born. Now what?

There is this time in the calendar year when it seems that a lot of things just plain shut down.  It's that week between Christmas and New Year.  While quite a few businesses are open (after all, profit is god for so many), so many things are closed down.  Schools, more than a few businesses, and even many church events shut down, essentially.  A lot of church staff take time off to recharge, recouperate, and recover.

That can leave you with a sense of, Jesus is born.  Now what?  The thing is, the accounts of Jesus' life in the Gospels can even lend themselves to this kind of thinking.  If you have ever read them, you might notice that Jesus' birth is only mentioned in two, and only one of those goes into any kind of an extended look at the birth and His childhood.  By the time we hit chapter 3 in Luke's Gospel (the most extended look at Jesus' birth and childhood), we already have Jesus full grown, beginning His itenerant ministry.

Traditionally, this period of time is when we observe the twelve days of Christmas.  Perhaps you never knew where that came from.  That's the period of time between Christmas and the day we observe called Epiphany (some others call it Three Kings Day, as observance of the Magi coming to see Jesus).  From then on, we begin to see Jesus revealing who He is, which the Magi do as they bring gifts appropriate for the King of the Jews. 

So, Jesus is born.  Now what?  Now we focus on what He came to do.  Part of that means that He has to show who He really is, with His teachings and His miracles.  These are to point to who He is, and not to describe God as just someone who does whatever we want Him to do.  Jesus' miracles have a very specific purpose: to show that He is the Son of God, as had been promised.

Jesus is born.  Now what?  Now get ready to see Him for Who He really is.  King of Kings, Lord of Lords, come to serve and to pay the price to redeem a sinful, fallen world.

A Season of Excessive Obligation

"For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?  And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?"  Matthew 5:46-47

Let's all admit it.  There is one part of this Advent season, leading up to Christmas, that so many of us genuinely dislike.  I will call it the Sense of Obligation.  Here is what it looks like.  You get your Christmas cards all printed out and in the mail.  Suddenly the next day, you get a card in the mail from someone to whom you didn't send a card.  What do you do?  For many of us, we feel this sense of obligation to send them a card.  After all, we can't have it seeming that we mean more to them than they mean to us, right?

Sure, this is something we deal with throughout the year, but this time of year it seems to hit particularly strongly.  If you get a gift from someone, don't you almost feel obligated to get them on in return?  (And think, the concept of a gift is that it is something given without any sense of return on the part of the person receiving it.  So if you are giving a gift with the expectation that you will get one in return, you aren't really giving a gift.  You are giving an obligation, a debt, that you are expecting to be repaid.)  During this season, though, with the giving of many gifts and the catching up of the year, it seems to hit particularly powerfully.

As you read the verses above from Jesus' sermon on the mount, you kind of get a sense of what He thought of these kinds of obligation.  He just doesn't seem to be that fond of them.  After all, it doesn't show any kind of compassion toward others, since they don't really need what you are giving them.  It's easy to love those who love you.  But what about those who give you trouble, or who are thorns in your side?  It's easy to greet the people who are friendly to you, but what about that person that shuns you, or the kind of person that you may be afraid of, or that you are suspicious of?  That truly starts to intrude into the realm of grace, which should show us something, since grace does make us uneasy in just how stringless it really is.

Just imagine adding a line like this to your card next year.  "If you are getting this, and you didn't have us on your list, please do not feel obligated to send something back.  We are simply wanting to share our life with you, and are glad that you are part of it, even if you may not share that same sense of connectedness."  True, this sense of obligation is so ingrained in us that the person receiving it probably would still feel obligated to send something back, but it gets back to the whole "freely sharing" of oneself, which is really what Christmas is all about, Jesus freely giving of Himself to make us right with God.

Does God Repel People?

"After this, many of His disciples turned back and no longer followed Him."  John 6:66

As we journey this season of Advent to the manger and celebrate the birth of Jesus, one thing we often see is that a lot of people come to celebrate the day in worship.  Typically, there are two times of the year when quite a few people who claim to be Christian will attend worship: Christmas and Easter.  Two big days, to be sure, and when you think of it, these are two days where we celebrate big things that God has done, the first in sending His Son into the world, and the second, when the Son wins the victory of death and the grave.

Yes, we love to hear those kind of themes.  We love to hear that God loves us, which is probably why John 3:16 is the most well-known Bible verse.  And it is an undeniable fact.  God does love this world, and especially His human creation. Yes, it is significant that God's Son was born in the manger in Bethlehem.  Yes, it is extremely significant that God's Son rose from the dead.

Yet, God would also have us know that there is much more to Him than those three things we've hit on so far.  In fact, I would actually encourage you to read through the whole chapter of John 6 to get an idea of why the verse quoted above came about.  Jesus taught some hard things.  He taught things that don't make sense to human ears.  And in this, He very much shows us His nature as God.

There is much that God chooses not to explain to us.  If you ever read through the book of Job, one thing should stand out in the end: God doesn't explain why the things that happened to Job happened.  When Jesus encounters the man born blind later in John's account of the Gospel, Jesus says that the man was born blind to demonstrate God's glory (think for a moment about being born with a significant handicap, so that Jesus could demonstrate who He is by your healing.  For many of us, we wouldn't really want that, right?).  Throughout the Scriptures, God says that His people are going to suffer, and many even die, for being His people.

That kind of thing doesn't exactly serve to draw people closer to God, at least on the surface.  In fact, it would seem to be the kind of thing that, if you focused exclusively on it, would repel people.  Shoot, even bringing it up will repel a lot of people, who don't want to think that God might use hard times, trials, and even suffering and death to advance His message of Good News.  Is it that God wants them repelled?  No, but He also knows that His will and design isn't going to be universally adored, sadly.

Does God repel people?  Well, yes, if you think that some people are always going to be repelled by the truth, and by having high standards.  Yet, that is the God who reveals Himself to us, but who holds Himself to that high standard, as He redeemed us through the Son's life, suffering, death, and resurrection.  Thanks be to God for that!

Are you ready?

Prepare the way!  Preyare the way of the Lord!  The voice cries out, "In the wilderness, prepare a way!"  Throughout Advent, that theme resounds.  God is coming.  God's Servant is coming.  God will come and render justice to the nations, and to all people, for their wrong.  God is coming to make the wrongs right, and to turn injustice into justice.  God is coming.  Prepare the way!

God gave His people a lot in order to prepare them for when He would come crashing into this world.  But for a moment, consider this.  How many people were there, waiting to welcome Jesus, God's servant, at His birth?  None.  No one, it seemed, was ready.  Okay, so you might say that the shepherds were there, but why did they make their way to the manger?  Because God's messengers announced the birth and told them to go to Bethlehem to see Jesus.  Without that, they would have contentedly watched their sheep that night, oblivious to the significance of that infant and His birth.

Wise men, or Magi, you say?  They had to follow a star.  Were they watching the skies because they thought God was about to send His servant, or did they happen to see something new in the heavens and go?  Well, we aren't told the answer to that, but it would seem that the star had more to do with it than the infant Himself.

God's people in Israel?  They sure didn't seem to see it coming.  Shoot, the inhabitants of the town that had been spoken of as the birthplace of the King couldn't even find room for His pregnant mother and her fiance.  Despite the sheer volume of warnings and preparations that God had given, they didn't seem to be ready.

Are you ready?  Okay, now it's a bit of a different question.  After all, Jesus' first coming has already taken place, and we see how those seemingly clear Scripture references look very clear in hindsight.  But what about for His final coming, in power, with judgment in hand?  Are you ready?

The good thing is, you can say yes to that, even if you may not be living every day as though it could be the day of Jesus' reappearance.  Jesus has lived, died, and risen for you.  Though you may not consciously be thinking about Jesus' reappearance every moment, by faith you are prepared.  Yes, it's very likely that His second appearance will still catch us all off guard, just like His first.  When we look back at what all He said about that time, we may wonder how we missed it.  Regardless, you have the assurance that you are ready, because you believe that, what Jesus did, He did for you. 

What about God and Dishonor?

From yesterday's blog.  "Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?"  Romans 9:21


Yesterday I wrote a bit about God and the clay that He molds.  I talked about how that can be a painful thing for the clay, and how I have seen that at work in my life quite frequently.  But I also included the above verse from Romans 9, about how the potter makes some clay into honorable use vessels, and others into vessels for dishonorable use.  So let's talk about that a little today.

What would be a vessel for dishonorable use?  Well, think about some of the ceramic fixtures in your house that you don't exactly show off a lot.  Maybe the first one to jump to mind is found in your bathroom.  Let's face it, going to the bathroom is not exactly something that springs to mind when we think about honorable use.  We treat it with more modesty, hiding it behind closed doors, precisely for that reason: it isn't the most honorable thing in our house.

So, if God molds the clay, and some of it is for honorable use, and others for dishonorable use, then what would be those vessels of dishonorable use?  Or, to put it in a slightly different way, what would be the equivalent of the toilet when God fashions people?  A necessary part of life in this world, but not exactly one that we are proud to admit that we need to use, or that we even really want to admit to having to use.  So what would be the people equivalent of that?

Well, God does actually paint a few pictures of that for us.  Think about Pharoah at the time of the Exodus.  God actually speaks that He put Pharoah in charge so that He could demonstrate His power in freeing His people.  Pharoah would seem to be a vessel for dishonorable use.  Or, at the time of the exile, when God would utilize the Babylonian army to destroy the temple, Jerusalem, and Judah, eventually to bring about their downfall because they overshot what God had given them to do.  It may seem that they were set up for a dishonorable purpose, to be God's sword against His people, only to be discarded for what they had done.

The point I basically make is really the same as yesterday.  If God decides to do that, what can we really say against it?  Can we say that He is wrong to do such things, especially as it serves the purpose of His will and design?  Can we say He is wrong in that at all?  After all, who are we to question the one who makes us, and who has His design for our role in the grand scheme of things?

Really, I think it boils down to this one thing.  How comfortable are we with really saying, believing, and knowing that God is the one who gets to call the shots, and we really don't have much say in the matter?  But don't we say that our lives are in His hands, and that He should do with us what He sees fit?  What if He decided that you were to be a vessel of dishonorable use?  Would you still be able to say, "Praise the Lord"?  If not, what would be getting in the way of that?  It's a thought well worth thinking about. 

The Pain of the Clay

"But now, O LORD, You are our Father; we are the clay and You are our potter; we are all the work of Your hand."  Isaiah 64:8

"Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?"  Romans 9:21

"Daddy, make a ball for me."  That was the request of my three year old the other day, as she played with some play-doh.  So I dutifully rolled a ball out for her.  However, she noticed that there was a small "crack" in it, where it had folded over on itself, and I hadn't done an adequate job of getting rid of the "crack".  So she made me roll another one, watching as I squeezed it and pushed it, making sure that it was one solid ball, rather than just several clumps of play-doh pressed together.

At times, it seems that I find God doing much that same thing to me.  He takes this lump of play-doh or clay, and He mashes it together according to His will and design.  Now, I have never heard the play-doh scream out in pain when I've rolled it or pressed it before.  However, it does seem to me that, when God is doing that same thing in my life, it can be rather painful.

There are times in life where I think I have discovered something that looks promising, and then God shows me how He wants the thing to be formed by having me ask others about what I am considering.  Quite often, I have discovered that other people have insights or viewpoints that I had not considered, which sometimes means that the "brilliant" thing I am considering needs considerable refinement.  That is painful, especially to the ego, though I admit that it is a pain that I take rather willingly and joyfully, especially as it pertains to God's kingdom and His people.

There are other times where it seems that God is intent on pressing me in an effort for me to realize just how resiliant He created me to be.  Stringing together nights of little sleep, caring for children who suffer from illness, God has, on a few occasions, shown me just how resilient He created me to be.  I have been amazed how much I have been able to do after nights of only 2-3 hours of interrupted sleep.  The pain of the clay, but done willingly (not always joyfully) for the good of other loved ones.

Let's face it.  It hurts when God forms us.  And yet, I would dare to suggest that this is necessary pain.  How can we be the creation that He intends for us to be if we aren't open to His pressing, pushing, and pounding?  Yes, He loves us with love beyond measure, but He also intends to form us into something incredible in His eyes, and that involves us being formed.  (I actually think this is a great challenge for the men of God, and men in general.  How manly is it to run from the pain of being formed, and how much more manly is it to stand up and be formed by the God of all creation?)

The thing is, being God's vessel means letting Him do with the clay what He wants.  It may even seem that He is forming us to be a vessel of dishonorable use (maybe tomorrow I'll write about that one a bit, because it seems significant).  And you know what?  That's okay.  It's still Him forming us, and when we are formed into what He wants us to be, I dare say we will find ourselves closer to Him than if we resist His formation, even if it would save us a little pain.

It's neither left nor right

As you likely have heard, there was another mass shooting here in our nation again yesterday.  I actually looked up some statistics earlier today, which pointed out that, in our nation this year, this marked day 209 in which there was a shooting killing and/or injuring at least two people.  That means that, no matter what, this year is going to have more days in which death or injury happened by gun than days that didn't contain such an event.

The aftermath of such events, especially if you happen to watch the news, is fairly predictable.  One side of the political spectrum will call for tighter gun control laws, and the other will argue that such laws don't truly hit at the problem and therefore, the rights of Americans shouldn't be infringed upon.  That's the standard response now in our nation, in this day and age, at this time. 

However, I have a different question.  How should we as Christians respond?  The truth is, when we witness such things, as Christians, we should realize that neither the left nor the right offer up any alternatives that will actually work.  That's because both attempt to work within the realm of this world, in a nation that is filled with sinful people.  And no matter what solution you may try, when sinful people are involved, sinful outcomes are always going to be what comes, no matter how well-thought out the solution may seem.

Sure, it sounds good to tighten up laws on how people come to own guns.  However, this rarely serves the purpose of keeping guns out of the hands of those who are dangerous.  Likewise, while it may sound all good and right that, the more people who have guns in their possession, the more that can stand up to those who would bring harm, the reality is that I haven't heard of a single instance where any of these shooters were brought down by a law-abiding, gun carrying citizen. 

The problem from both the left and the right is that they are seeking solutions within the world's realm that simply cannot deal effectively with the problem.  The problem is that we humans are sinful.  When we are isolated, cut off, or hurt, we often respond by lashing out.  No amount of laws will ever prevent this.  And no gun carrying citizen is probably equipped or prepared for that moment when one of those who feel cut off lash out at their fellow humans.

While we can never remedy the sin problem involved in all of these, that doesn't mean we are helpless.  What can we do to work to prevent such events from happening again?  What about reaching out in love to those who feel that they are isolated and cut off from their fellow human beings?  Yes, that is a very difficult thing to do, perhaps mostly because it opens us up to the sin that lies within us as well as them.  It's difficult because it means investing our lives in a person that may not really want that closeness, but that desperately needs that closeness.

More laws, or the absence of such laws, will never be the answer.  Genuine, caring love for one's neighbor, especially that neighbor that feels cut off and isolated, may not fully remove the danger, but will likely bear far greater results than any number of laws that could ever be passed.  Also, sharing the news of a God who cares for them enough to rescue them from their situations and struggles, and who provides a loving body that we call the Church to care for them, well, let's just say that this kind of reaching out may truly prove to be the saving of many lives, in more ways than one.

"Coming In"

At times, Christian vocabulary can be kind of like speaking a different language (coincidentally, half the time it is, as I'll be explaining a bit here).  It's true that, in our day and age, each "section" of life has its own language and jargon.  Whether it's plumbing, technology, computer software, or office equipment, everything has words that are specific to that realm.  It's no different for the Christian Church.

Many traditional churches observe this season called Advent.  For many, they know the season, but I would venture that, if you were to ask them what the meaning of the word is, well, they might look back at you with a bit of a blank look on their face.  But have no fear!  After reading this blog entry, you will be able to share the meaning with them, and perhaps set yourself up to answer a trivia question along these lines somewhere down the line!

Literally, according to its Latin roots, the word "advent" means "coming in".  A very appropriate meaning and name, as the thing we observe in this season is that Jesus was "coming in" to this world in a new way.  Yes, as God, He fills all creation.  But in the birth in the manger in Bethlehem, God did something that had never been done before.  He came in, in a way never before imagined.

During Advent, we see and hear about the ways that God prepared the world for Jesus' "coming in".  That's why we hear so many of the Old Testament promises during this season.  God was setting things up to happen in His time, according to His will and design.  And so, as we go through this season leading up to our celebration of Jesus' first coming, we hear about the promises of Jesus coming in to this world.

So now you know the meaning of a Latin word, used to name this season we are observing.  Truthfully, for traditional churches, there are many elements drawn from either Greek, Hebrew, or Latin.  So next time you are in worship and hear a funny sounding word, go ask the pastor or someone who may be "in the know" what that word means.  Who knows, you just might be expanding your language skills into another language!

Rockin' Around the Advent Wreath

Okay, so perhaps the Advent wreath doesn't seem to carry nearly the same fun as the Christmas tree in the popular song of the season, but it is much more applicable this time of year.  While the general public is now in their mad rush to Christmas with the fury of fervent shopping, many Christians, especially those who observe particular seasons of the year and holy days, focus on something a little different.  Advent, rather than Christmas (a season of its own, which will be arriving soon enough, no worries).

For Christians of this particular liturgical leaning, Advent is very much like new year.  We start our new annual journey to the manger in Bethlehem, where we observe God's greatest gift, His own Son Jesus, given to us to make us new and restore us to Himself.  Just as God prepared for the arrival of Jesus for centuries, we Christians take a brief, four week time of preparation for that great event.  This season kicks off our new year as we anticipate once again how God prepared the way for sending His one and only begotten Son.

So, yes, we probably should be rockin' around the Advent wreath.  As we add to the light of the Advent wreath week by week, we enjoy our festival of lights, preparing our hearts for our yearly celebration of God sending the Light of the world into the world, born as a tiny infant in a stall, with a feeding trough for His first bed.  And as we rock around the Advent wreath, we remember and give thanks that God had prepared all of this well in advance of the events of that night so many years ago.

Happy first Tuesday in Advent, all!

Standing on the Eve of Anticipation

Those of you who closely follow this blog may know that the particular church body tradition that I come from is fairly liturgical.  That is, we follow a somewhat standard "order" to how we do things.  While this is evident in your typical Lutheran worship service, it also is found in how we structure the themes we observe throughout the year. 

This coming Sunday marks a "new year" for our church calendar.  As we begin approaching Christmas, we take the four weeks (or, more specifically, the four Sundays) prior to Christmas to remember that God had promised the sending of Jesus for centuries.  This season is called Advent, as God made known His coming into the world, which happened when Jesus was conceived and then born as an infant.

That means that, for many Christians including our tradition, that we stand on the eve of anticipation.  Our new year in God is about to begin.  Our focus will be on the way that God prepared for the sending of His Son.  God long spoke through those called prophets, who not only faithfully spoke God's Word to the people of their time, but in doing so, often spoke that word which would tell of the coming of Jesus.  And now, God speaks to us through those same prophets, but now has added the strong voice of His very own Son.

So, Christians, happy new year!  As we get ready for Advent, may this new church year bring God's hope flowing abundantly into your life as He pours a new life into you through His Spirit.

Comic Relief

Our humorous sheep, as we prepare to observe Christ the King Sunday, the last Sunday of the Church year.

Humorous Sheep

Here they are, getting us ready for this coming Sunday with their words of wisdom in a gentle way.



By the way, our reading for Sunday that this is based upon is Mark 12:38-44.

Love and Forgiveness

I've often heard that the most important factor in what Jesus has done for us is that He won forgiveness for us.  The reality is, there is a lot of truth to that statement.  Without the forgiveness of Jesus, we simply cannot stand in the presence of God the Father and hope to have a word of welcome.  God's holiness and our sin simply cannot coexist.  We need the forgiveness that Jesus obtained for us at such a high cost.

And yet, as a Lutheran, I'm often drawn back to some of the confessions of faith that we cling to. In one of those, we have the writers of those Lutheran documents contrasting the writers of the Catholic Church of the day, especially over a verse that comes at the end of 1 Corinthians 13, the "love" chapter of Paul's letter.  That last verse says that these three remain: faith, hope, and love, and the greatest of these is love.

The Lutheran writers, clinging to faith as the means by which we have assurance of God's forgiveness of us, highlight the importance of faith in that.  The Catholic writers highlight the importance of love, especially actions of love done on the part of human beings.  (As an aside, these are important, but as the rest of the Scriptures make pretty clear, our greatest actions of love still don't make us right with God, a point the Lutherans wanted to emphasize.)

As I have grown more experienced in ministry, I have started to see this in a bit of a different light.  I honestly do think that, in some respects, those involved in the dispute kind of "talked past" each other.  In some ways, when we look at these three, and then also at the role of forgiveness, there seems to be a bit of an apples and oranges thing going on here.

The forgiveness of Jesus is vital to restoring our relationship with God.  However, what moved God to even want to restore that relationship?  Love, specifically, God's love for fallen, sinful humanity.  Love is vitally important, not as the means by which God restored us, but as the motivation that drove God to forgive us.  Our faith then clings to what God has told us that He did in Jesus, with His love for us as the motivation.  Our faith looks to that, and then, as God's Spirit does His work, inspires us toward that same kind of love toward others.

As you read through that paragraph, you perhaps can see why it's impossible to actually "rank" one thing higher than the other.  They are all different parts of something that is necessary.  At the back of it all, though, is the fact that God does it because of His great love for us.  That love inspires the work of forgiveness in Jesus, which we then cling to in faith.  It sounds a bit like a process, even though it takes place constantly in the life of a believer.

I can't say why this has been on my mind lately, other than that I think there is a life application to be made from it.  We usually don't forgive someone that we don't have a relationship with.  Love tends to be the driving force behind our forgiveness.  Let me use the example of a husband and wife for a moment.  Love is the prevalent thing in the relationship.  That love is what drives forgiveness when it is called for in the relationship.  If the forgiveness is absent, you can question the presence of love.  Yet, forgiveness is not all that is there to the relationship.  But the reason that the couple can continue is because they believe (put their faith in) the fact that the other has forgiven them.  The forgiveness is vital, but not the driving force.  Love is the driving force.

As I said, this is kind of thinking out loud, and I think I also need more time to flesh it out more.

Moving Forward in Galatians

Today we are going to take our next baby step forward.  Galatians 2:11-14 will be our short focus set of verses.  Here, we hear about something that makes a lot of people uncomfortable: Conflict.  It seems that, sometime after Paul went to Jerusalem and he and the other apostles "compared notes", that Peter came north to Antioch, the place that Paul kind of set as a home base of operations.  We aren't told why Peter came up there, or any of the circumstances, merely that he came up to Antioch.

What happened at Antioch, though, is significant.  Paul noticed that Peter was being kind of two-faced about things.  Among the Jewish circumsized group, Peter was acting one way, and around the Gentiles, Peter was acting a bit differently.  While Peter may have had his reasons for doing this, the fact that he, who was seen as influential, was doing it also caused others to do the same thing.  They started to make distinctions that were not supposed to be made, and Peter was the main culprit in the situation.

So, what did this relative newcomer into the leadership circles of the Christians do?  He opposed Peter, and not privately, but in front of everyone!  Now, this is really kind of startling for us for a few reasons.  First, most of us simply aren't all the comfortable initiating conflict, even when it is something that really needs to be done.  Especially in church circles, we can fall into the trap of thinking that dealing with each other according to the Gospel means that we let sinful behaviors and attitudes go.  That simply isn't the case.  Now, to be certain, we deal with such situations in love, and with an eye toward restoration, but the thing is, we deal with them.  The conflict is essential and inevitable, as we are all sinful people.  How we handle the situation will speak volumes about how God has been forming us by His Spirit.

The second thing that I want to highlight here is less clear in the text.  It seems that this confrontation led Peter to repent of his sin and change his ways.  He was open to hearing Paul's rebuke and correction.  While he likely continued to struggle with it, he also seems to have been strong enough in his faith that he could be corrected.

How open are we when others show us our sin and our fault, regardless of their standing or station in life?  We probably find that we are less than open to hearing the correction of a brother or sister in Christ, and maybe even will disregard it if they aren't in our circle of friendship.  However, I hardly think that God would say we should discard their words simply because they aren't close to us, or in a similar position to us.  Whether they are the highest or the lowest, we should be open to hearing our sin and their rebuke, and then have a heart to change as God's Spirit works the image of Christ Jesus within us.

Humorous Sheep

Here they are again.  It's a bit of an older one, but fits Reformation that we are celebrating this week.

Coffee with Jesus

I really like this little strip.  Another good one today.

Galatians, moving through chapter 2

Today, as we close out this first little section consisting of Galatians 2:1-10, I want to take a few moments to focus on verse 10 itself.  "Only, they asked us to remember the poor, the very thing I was eager to do."

If you read through any of the parts of the Bible where God lays out some of His expectations and guidelines for His people, one thing you will find quite consistently is His desire that His people care for those who are less well off than they are.  As example, to His Old Testament people who happened to be landowners, they were to leave the edges for the poor of the community.  When it came to debts, God's people were to take those individuals in as family and care for them.  Even when we get to places like the celebration of the Passover, we see that the families with enough were to invite their neighbors in if they did not have a lamb of their own.

While the specifics of what God calls for may change from place to place and culture to culture, the heart of what God looks to create within His people remains the same.  God wants His people to have generous hearts toward others.  He wants us not to look down on them for the circumstances that they happen to be in, but to look upon them with compassion and care.  That's the heart of God Himself, a generous God who gives, and gives, and gives, even to the point of giving to the wicked and the evil in addition to the righteous.

It seems that this is the kind of heart that had grown in Paul following his encounter with Jesus.  In fact, one of his voyages that we call his missionary voyages was not so much missionary in nature as it was putting together a mercy gift for those in need.  When you read through places like 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, you may wonder at the gift that Paul is arranging.  It's the gift that he is collecting from the various congregations to give to the poor and hungry who were suffering from a famine in Jerusalem.  Paul's heart for the poor actually led him back to those congregations that he had helped establish to get their offerings for those in need.

Yes, I realize we quickly have our minds jump to money when we think about caring for the poor around us.  Yet, I would encourage you to think in other ways, as well.  What about the single parent who lives down the street?  Sure, a little extra income may be nice, but what about giving them the gift of an evening to themselves by watching over their kids for a night?  Or the neighbor who has physical limitations by helping with yardwork or household chores and repairs?  Sometimes we simply have to think beyond the dollar sign when we think of ways to help those who may not have as we have.

Of course, we want to treat such situations with dignity, as well.  We don't want to barge in where help may not be appreciated.  Yet, I would also suggest that we sometimes just simply need to do a better job of listening.  When that neighbor starts to tell you about something that isn't going right in their life, who is to say that God isn't opening up a door of opportunity to love your neighbor by caring for their need?  I think, if we just listened closely, we would probably hear all different opportunities to live out our faith by responding to our neighbors in their need.

Returning to Galatians!

Well, after a bit more than a week off, with a number of other things going on, we are returning back to our look through Paul's letter to the Galatians.  Today we'll dive into Galatians 2:1-10.

As you read through this section, you see something about Paul that really seems to stand out.  If you look at verses 4 through 6, Paul basically says that the Gospel message that he had been preaching was the true one.  There were others who were trying to say that Paul was saying something different from the rest of the apostles, but Paul was so sure of what he was preaching that even Peter and the other original apostles didn't have anything to add to what Paul was teaching and preaching.  Paul seems rather confident about this. 

This would be kind of like you doing the work that you know to be doing, even in the absence of the presence of your boss.  You are so sure that you are doing what he/she wants you to be doing that no one can really convince you otherwise.  In fact, you are so sure of what you are doing that you don't mind picking up the phone and calling the boss, knowing that he/she will come down on your side.  Just imagine having that much confidence in knowing that you are doing the right thing.

Now, we might be tempted to think that Paul is kind of arrogant to be taking this kind of approach.  It seems to stand out rather boldly.  After all, when we think about Jesus, He often seems to indicate that humility and looking to the good of others is better than standing up for yourself and what you have done.  So, is Paul doing something different here?  Why can Paul do this and still say that he is upholding the Gospel message?

Well, some of that has to do with the fact that he had to essentially "prove his credentials" again to the Galatian Christians.  In fact, when you look at this letter of Paul's and other places, such as Acts 15, you see that Paul and the rest of the apostles were indeed on the same page.  Paul could be confident in that.  In addition, if other people were leading God's people astray in Galatia, we would hope that Paul would point out why what he was saying was the good and right thing to listen to, rather than that of the others.  He almost needs to point out his credentials to show that he is the one teaching the right way of Jesus, rather than those opponents of his.

There is a time and place for humility (actually, pretty much all the time).  However, there is also a time and place to stand confident in what you believe and in what you say.  My church and church body are observing that very thing this week, as we reflect on Martin Luther nailing 95 theses to a church door in Wittenberg, Germany, way back in 1517.  Later on, Luther would truly become known for standing for what he understood from the Bible and for what he was teaching when he would basically say, I'm standing on this unless you can prove it otherwise from the pages of the Bible.  Here I stand, I can do nothing else.

As Christians, we can and should have that same confidence.  We have the life-giving message of what God has done in Jesus for us, and for every neighbor that we encounter.  We can stand with boldness in all of our interactions, sharing the message of Good News with them, since God did send Jesus for them, after all.  We don't need to be timid.  We can be humble, and yet, at the same time, be confident that the message and good news we bring is just what they need to hear.  Confidence and humility, wrapped up together.

Sheep Who Think for October 18, 2015

This week's strip from AgnusDay.org.

Sheep who Think

A little strip from sheep who think about the Gospel message, from what we heard a couple of weeks ago.

Galatians 2, Finally!

Yes, we have been moving through Galatians at far less than light speed, but nonetheless, we find ourselves moving into what we now call chapter 2.  Remember, Paul wouldn't have written his letter with chapters and verses, which were added centuries later as a means of reference. 

Galatians 2:1-10 continues Paul's story.  We left off in chapter 1 with Paul having been converted by Jesus, and then spending three years in Arabia, after which he went to Jerusalem and met Peter and James.  It seems that Paul didn't return to Jerusalem for another decade and a half after that, as he speaks quite clearly that his next visit was 14 years later.  Even then, he went up because something had been revealed to him, and he felt compelled to go and once again touch base to make sure that everyone involved was teaching the same thing.  Paul's interest in this was to make sure that the message he had been sharing was accurate.

For a moment, I want to dwell on this point.  Paul went to check that he was preaching accurately.  Yes, he had Jesus reveal Himself to him.  Yes, he likely went and intensively studied the Scriptures and saw Jesus throughout the Old Testament.  Yes, he had been preaching and teaching and converting the Gentiles to the faith.  Yet, even Paul felt that it was a good idea to check in and make sure that the message he preached and taught was accurate and true.

As we consider those who preach and teach the good news today, we really do need to ask how they continue to make sure that their message is in line with what God has said.  It may sound like something that we would take for granted, that our preachers are regularly being in God's Word, testing what they are saying and teaching, and seeking to ensure that it lines up with God's revelation to us.  Yet, I can tell you from experience that there are times when that study simply doesn't easily present itself.  The demands of caring for God's people can, at times, get in the way of that study time.

What would you do if you walked into your preacher's office and found that he had blocked out an hour of time where he wasn't answering phones or taking calls, and instead was engaged in reading his Bible?  Would you expect him to drop that if you had a question that he could answer, but could wait until later?  Would you be upset that he was spending time in something that he should already know?  Yet, if God's Word isn't speaking to him, if he isn't engaged in continuing to grow in God's Word, how is he making sure that he is speaking God's message, and not his own? 

As a preacher, time spent with God and with His Word is never wasted.   Sure, it can become an excuse not to do the other things that pertain to the tasks of serving God and His people, but at the same time, it simply cannot be neglected.  We dive into the Scriptures to ensure that the message God's people hear is from God, and not from us.  Time with our Bible is of vital importance.  I would even suggest that you ask your preacher how he is doing in spending time with his Bible, and if you discover that he doesn't get enough time for it, that you then "go to bat" for him in front of the congregation to see that he receives that time.  Everyone will benefit from it.

Moving right along

Moving along to Galatians 1:18-24, and closing out the first chapter, we find Paul writing about some of the history of what happened after Jesus rather dramatically encountered Paul on the road to Damascus.  So far, Paul has said that Jesus revealed Himself, and that Paul didn't immediately see any of the other apostles.  Instead, he went away into Arabia, where it is very likely that he engaged in a deep study of the Old Testament, and discovered just how prevalent the foretelling of Jesus was throughout those words from God.

The timeline is a bit sketchy, but as we take Paul's words here and the book of Acts, we find Paul spending approximately three years before he really meets any of the eye witnesses of Jesus.  In Acts, we are told that Barnabas is the one who risks himself to bring Paul to the apostles.  Regardless of the circumstances, Paul meets Peter and chats with him (very likely in depth about Jesus) for a little over two weeks.  It's also very likely that Paul told Peter exactly what he had been set apart to do by Jesus Himself, and then set out on what we call one of his missionary voyages.

What is signifcant about all this?  As it concerns the letter to the Galatian Christians, it is that Paul had been preaching the Gospel for about three years before he met any of the other apostles.  Even then, he only met with Peter and James for a short time, which seemed to be enough to verify for them that the message Paul was preaching was in tune with what they were preaching.  For those who had been saying that Paul had been preaching a different gospel message from the rest of the apostles, this would seem to back up Paul's assertion that his was the true gospel message, and the others were the ones with the wrong message, which was to be ignored.  The Galatian Christians could trust Paul because his message was the true gospel, regardless of what others were saying about him.

And then, we have that beautiful verse that rounds out chapter 1.  They glorified God because of me.  That is, ultimately, the hope of all who speak the message.  Not that the messenger gets glorified, but that God gets glorified through the one who speaks His message.  The churches that Paul had created, at which he had preached the message, were turning to God and giving him glory.  Yes, Paul was instrumental in their hearing of the message of the gospel, but Paul wasn't the point.  Jesus was the point, as the one who restored them to God.  It wasn't about Paul's credentials, but about Jesus' credentials.  And in Jesus, they would find one who would bring them to God, thus giving them reason to glorify God because of the message that Paul was speaking.

Galatians, Yet Again!

As we continue to work our way through Paul's letter, I was particularly struck in my reading today by Galatians 1:15-17.  Paul speaks that Jesus had set him apart, even before he (Paul) was born.  Now, on the surface, that might seem somewhat overstated on Paul's part.  After all, we might ask, if he had been set aside to do this work even before he was born, then we could righly ask why God would have him do everything that he had done prior to his conversion, even to the point of overseeing the stoning of Stephen.

So there are two things at work right here.  First, Paul was indeed set apart by God for the work that he would do, and that same thing can be said for every one of us.  To think of it in a slightly different way, God had set me apart from before I was born to be typing these very words, even though they are words that I myself am typing.  I am doing so because God has been at work in my life, even before I was born, to bring me to the point that I would type these things, and for what I will do later on today, and this week, and next week as well.  Being set apart is a gracious and wondrous gift from our God, who sees the worth in our lives, and in fact, in every little work and action and word that we do and say.

You, also, are set apart by God, and have been even before you were born.  That gives eternal meaning to every action that you take part in, and every word that you speak.  It starts there within your family and then ripples out to touch everyone whose life you touch.  You have been set apart by God to do those things, even if it as simple as giving a needy coworker a cup of cold water, or feeding your children as they throw their food around the kitchen yet again, or as you engage people with the saving word of the Gospel. 

Now, that can easily lead us to have an overinflated sense of the work we do, and indeed, of who we are.  Yes, it is a great and awesome thing to have God appointed tasks thoughout the day, but the next words of Paul in this letter remind us that we aren't do to this as though we are "God's gift to everyone whose lives we touch" (even though we are, we don't want to come across as that in an arrogant kind of way).  Paul writes, "who called me by his grace."  As we read that, we are reminded that, yes, we are God's gift to everyone that we encounter, but in a way that honors God and draws attention to Him, and not to us.  Yes, people will notice us as we deliver God's good works prepared for us to do ahead of time, but we don't do them so that we get noticed.  We do them so that God the Father gets noticed in us and through us. 

Paul's whole life would be dedicated to pointing people to their place of salvation, the cross and resurrection of Jesus.  Paul was instrumental in that message going forth, as God's chosen instrument to do so.  Yet, Paul only did that by God's grace, a message that we remember to keep us in the humble spirit of our Savior, Jesus.

Galatians, Continued

Moving right along, today we come across the next paragraph or so of this letter to the Christians in Galatia.  But before jumping in there, a brief note.  Galatia was not a city, it was a region.  So, way back in verse 2, when Paul wrote that this letter was going to the churches (plural), he was writing it to several different churches meeting in several different cities.  Galatia was the region, and so this letter was intended to be read in multiple congregations, who seemed to have all been facing some similar challenges.

Moving along, though.  Galatians 1:11-17.  Now, Paul wants the Galatian Christians to know the source of the good news that he had brought to them.  In many respects, Paul's story of coming to know Jesus, and of coming to know what Jesus meant for him and for the Galatians, was a vital part of the message of the good news that Paul had preached.  Paul's story of his encounter with Jesus on the Damascus road quite literally changed his life.  Before that time, Paul had been the rising star of Judaism.  Very likely, when Jesus met him on the road to Damascus, Paul was a fairly young man.  He had studied under Gamaliel, a respected teacher who had actually counseled the Jewish leaders to bascially leave the Christians alone.  If what they taught was from God, then it couldn't be stopped, and if it weren't then it would die away quickly.  However, it doesn't seem as though his star pupil shared that same approach.

As I reflect on this letter, and on Paul's story of coming to faith, I have noticed over the years that I have come to a significant conclusion regarding how Jesus chose His apostles.  You may recall that, as Jesus began His ministry on earth, He started by calling disciples to follow Him.  Later, He would designate 12 to be His apostles in addition to His disciples.  One of those, Judas, would fall away and betray Him, and early in the Acts of the Apostles, we see the desire to replace Judas.  When you read Acts 1:12-26, you see how they go about doing this.  For the longest, I assumed that Matthias was the chosen 12th apostle.

However, that one thing stuck with me in my mind.  Jesus said, "You did not choose Me, but I chose you."  When you get to Acts 9, it becomes very clear that Jesus chose Paul to be His apostle.  He did so in a manner very differently than how Matthias came to be numbered with the apostles.  It often makes me wonder if the other apostles didn't jump the gun a bit.  And in many ways, Paul seems to fit the criteria of one who would replace Judas even more than Matthias.  Judas betrayed his Master, so it would make a certain amount of sense that Jesus would then replace His lost apostle with someone from the other side. 

Additionally, the apostles seemed to decide that the person to replace Matthias had to have been with them almost from the beginning.  Yet, there is one very clear thing.  Matthias was determined by the casting of lots.  He was not chosen by Jesus specifically and directly.  When it comes to Paul, though, we have a very clear calling to be an apostle from Jesus.  That would seem to be a rather large trump card when it comes to who served as an apostle.

One final thing stands out to me, too.  What do we hear of Matthias after he is chosen as an apostle?  Nothing.  Yet, once Jesus chooses Paul to be His apostle, what do we hear of him?  The rest of Acts is practically about Paul.  Paul's letters fill the New Testament in terms of number, if not content.  When it comes to effective ministry work, it would seem that Paul greatly outdistances Matthias.  And in a way, that shouldn't be a surprise.  After all, Paul was chosen directly by Jesus to be His apostle. 

Galatians, Continued

I want to continue a couple of thoughts from Galatians 1:6-10, before we move on ahead.  Last week, I wrote a bit about how Paul would have actually been an ideal choice for Jesus' work of spreading the good news, as well as the ideal one to combat the thought of requiring circumcision to become a Christian.  After all, he knew the Old Testament Scriptures forward and backward, and after Jesus revealed Himself to Paul, he then spent some time, it seems, relearning the focus of the Scriptures.

But for a few minutes today, let's focus on what Paul writes is the outcome of anyone who preaches something other than the good news of God in Jesus.  Twice in these verses, he emphasizes that those who preach a contrary Gospel should be cursed (or accursed, depending on your edition of the Bible).  If someone teaches something other than what God has done in Jesus to restore people back to Himself, Paul calls for them to be cursed.

Now, a curse is a powerful thing.  Basically, this calls for a person or persons to be eternally separated from God.  When we think of curses, we could go all the way back to Genesis 3, where, after the man and the woman disobeyed God, God didn't curse them, but instead cursed Satan and cursed the ground.  To curse the man or the woman would have been to put them permanently beyond the hope of redemption.  Satan was already there, so God was declaring something that had already been decreed.  In cursing the ground or the earth, God was cursing something that could be renewed. 

If someone teaches something other than that which comes from God, they stand in the place of receiving God's curse.  That means eternal condemnation.  While that is nothing that we would ever wish on anyone, we also recognize two things here.  First, cursing and eternal damnation are a reality.  Anytime you say something along the lines of "Damn it", you are cursing that thing.  And God would have us take our words seriously.  This isn't a light thing, and truthfully, something that I would love to see removed from our vocabulary completely.  After all, only God can truly condemn, but for us to wish that eternal separation on someone or something, well, that just doesn't seem fitting, especially for one of God's people.

Second thing, there is a great price to pay for those who teach if they teach wrongly.  Whether it be from ignorance, or from willful misunderstanding, the penalty for teaching wrongly is steep.  That is why, in the New Testament, we are also told that not many should strive to be teachers, because they are held to a higher standard, in that what they teach and how it gets lived out in the hearers is also on their heads.  While there is great joy in teaching the things of God, great care also needs to be taken on the part of the one teaching.

Galatians, Continued

Keeping on with our Galatians study, we now dive into the next few verses.  There's a lot in these verses, so we may take our time working through it.  That means we may spend two or three extra days on these verses, but that's okay.  Sometimes the riches of God's Word means that we have to spend some extra time in order to dig deeply into it.  True, we will never exhaust everything we can learn, but we also want to keep on moving through to get the full content of this letter.

So, Galatians 1:11-17.  Now, Paul starts to get into what his complaint is against the Galatian Christians.  It seems that they have been saying that Paul didn't preach the full Gospel message to them.  They also seem to have called into question whether or not Paul was teaching what others had taught him.  It seemed to be a question of Paul's credentials, which he seeks to emphasize here.  No one gave him the Gospel message.  It came to him from Jesus Himself.  Paul even emphasizes here how drastic it is that Jesus would have chosen him to be His apostle.  Paul had tried to wipe out those who put their faith in Jesus.  Not only that, he was a shooting star in the ranks of his former way of life.  Paul was the most unlikely of people to be a person sent by Jesus.

Now, to some degree, this may sound almost as though Paul is uncertain about his right to preach the Gospel.  It almost sounds like he is insecure about how the Galatian Christians see him.  However, I would actually venture a slightly different view of it.  Because these others who are coming among the Galatians are saying something along the lines of circumcision being required to receive the good news of Jesus, it would seem that Paul could assert that he knew the Old Testament Scriptures far better than any of them.  In other words, if that were really something that God was calling for, who would have been better to know this than Paul?  No one surpassed him in zeal.  Very few others could compare to what he knew of God's revelation of Himself in the Scriptures.

And yet, Paul also points out how humbling it is to receive this great gift.  Upon being called by Jesus to be an apostle, Paul was made to realize that God had set him apart for this task long before Paul ever would have anticipated it.  Perhaps he realized that he had been set apart in a way similar to Jeremiah, who was told that he was known even before he had been born.  As the realization sank in, that God had called Paul to this even before he was born, it seems that Paul truly realized what a great gift it was that he had received from God.  And how better to respond than to share that same gift with others!

That seems to be a hinge point for Paul throughout this letter.  God had prepared Paul for this by his intensive study of the Scriptures, and then, at just the right time (a phrase we will later hear in this letter), Jesus encountered Paul and put that knowledge to work in sharing God's redemption with many. If anyone would know whether circumcision was required or not, who better to say it than someone fully versed in what the Scriptures say?

We'll spend a little more time on this section, but this seems a good amount of thinking for today!

Galatians, Continued

Okay, I'm not known for my dynamic titles for these posts.  You'll probably see Galatians, Continued, all the way through the Bible study.  I hope you can bear with me despite the lack of clever titles.

Anyway, on to Galatians.  Today we will look at Galatians 1:6-10.  After greeting God's people in Jesus found throughout Galatia, Paul jumps right in with his astonishment.  Apparently, the Galatian Christians are coming to believe something other than the message that Paul had been sent (as an apostle) to bring to them.  We will find out later in this letter some of what they are coming to believe, but for the moment, at this point in the letter, Paul is basically expressing his astonishment that they would wander so far from what he had shared with them.

Basically, Paul expresses one thing of significance here.  There is only one Gospel.  The literal meaning of that word is "good news".  There is only one good news, that of what God had accomplished in Jesus.  Anything else that got tied to that message meant that there was a different good news being taught.  Paul's good news, that God had redeemed the Galatians through Jesus, was the one Gospel message, and the only Gospel message.  No additions needed, and no subtractions possible, or else it isn't good news.

Along those same lines, it doesn't matter who the person is who shares the good news, or who the person is who shares something that is a different kind of good news.  Okay, what do I mean by that?  As humans, we can be susceptible to thinking that, the more educated or "higher up" a person is in importance, the more believable they are.  While it can be shown that this simply isn't true, it's something that we can fall into.  We think the word of the pastor is more believable than the word of another fellow Christian, without asking if the pastor has the necessary background to make such a determination.  It's not only in this area of life, but throughout.

That's what makes what Paul says even more astonishing.  Even if one of God's own messengers from the heavenly throne room were to bring a message other than Christ Jesus, he is to be seen as accursed, as put away from God.  Credentials and the like simply don't matter when it comes to the sharing of the good news.  Now, yes, we do want pastors who have studied the Word so that they can speak with some level of expertise on the good news.  But it isn't a guarantee that, just because the pastor says it, that's how it is.  That's part of the reason why our particular tradition requires a longer schooling process for training pastors, and calls for much study and reflection on the word as part of the life of the pastor.

Here's the rub, though.  It can be tempting to speak about the things that people want to hear, rather than strictly focusing on what God reveals and says through His Word.  I hear, from time to time, people say that there are topics or events of which they would like to hear from the pulpit.  While Paul isn't directly addressing that situation, he does make it clear toward the end of our little section that the preaching of the good news is for the approval of God, and not necessarily for the approval of what the hearers want to hear.  Now, to be sure, there is a time and place to spend on how the life and culture around us impacts our Christian faith, and we will respond to that.  However, the message that gets declared is the message of good news in Jesus, and not merely what people want to hear.  To put it in a slightly different way, if the preacher only preaches what the people want to hear, he will miss so many opportunities to point the people back to the one thing that really matters: the good news of God in Jesus.  That really is what matters.  The Good News is the most important thing that can be proclaimed, even if it may seem boring, or if the hearers have heard it hundreds of times before.  They still need to hear it again and again and again.

Jesus and Pet Peeves

For those who aren't acquainted with Radio Free Babylon, or their comic strip, Coffee With Jesus, this particular one also hits on one of my pet peeves. 

Let's Talk Galatians!

As we venture through this letter, let me say this up front.  This is not intended to be a really deep, in-depth study of the letter.  Rather, this is more of a look at the letter, seeing what it says, and then seeing how these words still fit and apply to our lives as God's people in Jesus today.  It will be rare that we pull in Greek words, though if it is something that appears helpful, we will do so.  I may make some notes about the background of the letter from time to time, as they have some application to our understanding of what Paul is saying there. 

If there are elements of this that you would like to dive deeper into, please make use of the comments section to do so.  I will try to respond knowledgably.

As we jump in, I have set up my blog so that, when I enter in a Bible reference, you should be able to read it by scrolling your mouse over the reference.  So, for instance, today we will look at Galatians 1:1-5.  By scrolling over the reference, you hopefully see the whole reading pop up.  That way, if you don't happen to be near your Bible, you can see it here.  I will be making use of the ESV edition, which you can also find at www.esvonline.org.

As Paul opens this letter, he reminds the readers that he has been sent.  The literal meaning of the word apostle is "sent one".  He reminds them that he has been sent by Jesus Himself, who called him on the road to Damascus.  Given some of the matters about which Paul writes, this reminder is important to put before the Galatian Christians.

Also, I would like to point out one other thing briefly.  Paul isn't writing this to one single church, but to several churches.  There were likely several churches in various towns in Galatia, and all of them stood in need of hearing what Paul would write.

Finally, as we look at the end of our section for today, we see Paul announcing God's grace and peace to his fellow Christians.  As Paul so often does, he points back to God's work in Jesus on behalf of others.  Jesus came to deliver them from the evil they would see so often in their world, and Jesus did what He did according to the will of God the Father.

As we think about this for a moment, I think it is worth highlighting that you and I are different from Paul.  Paul was personally sent by Jesus.  Jesus Himself appeared to Paul and sent him on a very specific mission.  In many ways, that seems to be the requirement to be called an apostle.  You are sent by one who sends you in his name, with his authority, to speak in his name.  So, while we may still be going forth with Jesus' name upon us in our baptism and on our lips, we are not sent in the same fashion that Paul was.

However, that same message that Paul carried is still one that we have within us.  We have been taught and instructed, and as people who have been thus instructed, we are sent out into our daily lives as God's salt and light in the world.  It may not be required that we speak of Jesus frequently and boldly as Paul did, but when others see our lives, our hope would be that they see evidence of the name of Jesus upon us.  In fact, we do have to ask ourselves that, if they aren't seeing the name and presence of Jesus upon us, is there something missing as we live out our lives of faith?

As we say that, we also need to remember that we live in a certain reality and state of being.  God's grace and peace has been spoken to us and delivered to us.  We live with those as part of our lives of faith.  It isn't a one time action, but rather, a state of being that we were brought into, and in which we live, through no action of our own.  In the same way, we have the deliverance that Jesus promised, even as we await the day when that deliverance becomes the full reality in which we live.  We have the forgiveness of our sins, even as we still struggle with our sin and the temptations to sin that the world throws our way.  Our state of being is that of belonging to God in Jesus, and the only thing that can change that is not believing this to be the case.

As a bit of an aside, these are also those kind of "unproveable" things that can be seen only with the eyes of faith.  We cannot see "peace" or "forgiveness", but rather, put our trust in the one who declares such a thing to us.  While we have been raised and conditioned to have something proven to us (even to the point where someone might say "prove it" if we say we have forgiven them), the reality is that there simply are matters of our faith that cannot be proven.  We simply rely upon the integrity and character of the one who says such a thing to us, and when it comes to something as important as God's peace and forgiveness, it is good to know that we can put our trust in Him, who keeps His Word to us.

A Little Catching Up

If you are a regular follower of this blog, I really want to commend you for a moment.  You have likely noticed that I have times where I suddenly seem to disappear.  This honestly is one of those areas that I wrestle with.  I see the importance of expressing our Christian faith, and in being sharpened in those interactions with others, and yet, I also find that it's easy to overlook such a forum as this when other matters become pressing.

So I am thinking that I may try something a little different for a time.  Since our life together in Jesus begins with God speaking His Word to us, I would like to adopt the form of a Bible study for a regular series of posts.  In this, I would be looking to put forth a few things as we would walk through portions of God's word, and I will also do something that I don't normally do.  If you post comments, I will be more diligent about responding, especially to questions or other matters of that nature.  I will not promise to respond to each one (just in case a lot of you have thoughts or questions!), but I will engage in the conversation with you in the comments section.

So, for a time, I will be starting us off with a simple walk through Paul's letter to the Galatians.  Each day, I will start off with the section we are focusing on for that day, and will give a few key items from the reading.  I will likely also include a few thoughts of my own to wrap it up, as I don't want to write you a book each time.  I hope that this will then spur us on to deeper discussion and dialogue on God's Word.

We will kick this off tomorrow!  I look forward to growing in God's Word with you all!

Devoted...to the teaching...and the fellowship

Upon the heels of Peter delivering his great Pentecost day sermon, the people who listened and were touched by God's Spirit responded.  Luke tells us that about 3k people were added to their number that day, as they heard of God's care and forgiveness to them through Jesus.  And then, even as those were added, we see something else happening, as well.

These people become devoted to this new calling in their lives.  That's the word that the ESV uses in verse 42.  They devoted themselves.  And before we move much further, think about what it means to be devoted to something.  I would say that we often water down this word among ourselves.  We think about daily devotions, something that is a good thing to start the day or end the day, or fall somewhere in between.  Yet, these are often a few moments, and then we are on to the next thing.  Again, a good thing for us to be including in our lives, and a sign of our faith.  But in many ways, that seems to be how we come to consider our new life in Jesus.

They were devoted.  This was something that filled them and their days.  God's Spirit filled them, and they devoted themselves to this new endeavor.  So, we should look at what they then devoted themselves to.  The apostles' teaching.  When Jesus told those original apostles to go and make disciples, He also told them to teach everything that He had commanded to them.  So, as God's Spirit brought people into belief, they were devoted to learning more about what Jesus taught, and what that meant for their newly created lives in Jesus.

That's not the only thing to which they were devoted, either.  They also devoted themselves to the fellowship.  They were devoted to the others who believed as they did, who had received the same Spirit and same gifts as they had.  They weren't devoted simply to a church, or a particular place of gathering, but to all the people whom God had called in Jesus through His Spirit, as we see in the verses that follow.

Being devoted to the teachings and to the fellowship.  In our day and age of church hopping, and of looking for a church that fills "my needs", this kind of thought is rather provoking.  That God might call us into a fellowship, and then have us show such devotion, no matter what may happen, even to the point of selling our things to support our brothers and sisters in Jesus, is truly a radical thought for many.

And yet, isn't that the devotion of our God toward us?  He who would give all good things for His people, who is so devoted that He not only sent His Son, but who gives them their daily bread, who daily renews them in their baptism, and who promises them a new, renewed life with Him that will never end.  Why wouldn't He look to see that same kind of devotion from His people, especially toward one another? 

So, how would that look in your life?  Are there ways in which this kind of devotion could be played out in your life even more?  Perhaps it's the first time you have considered this kind of devotion.  Perhaps it seems kind of intimidating, and even impossible.  And yet, it's all created by the one who sent a messenger to a young virgin about to have a child through the Holy Spirit, with that simple message being, with God, nothing is impossible.

Our Father, One Big Beginning Place

We say it so often that it may actually lose the significance of what we are saying.  "Our Father, who art in heaven."  These words of Jesus teach us, as we learn in Martin Luther's small catechism, that "With these words God tenderly invites us to believe that He is our true Father and that we are His true children, so that with all boldness and confidence we may ask Him as dear children ask their dear father." 

God is our Father.  That's what Jesus teaches us.  And that introduces something significant for us.  If God is the father of us all, that means that have a unique connection with each other.  If we have a common Father, then we are all His dear children, and that makes us a family.  Perhaps, in your reading of the New Testament, you catch the frequency with which God's people address each other as brothers, or as brothers and sisters.  This is because, through Jesus, God creates a new family.

This creates a new dynamic for God's people as they gather together.  It isn't just simply coming together for worship, or for fellowship, or for learning.  It is coming together as a family gathering.  Think about the ways that you greet your family members when you see each other.  It's a joy to be with them.  You give hugs (and maybe even kisses).  You have smiles on your faces.  You have things you want to talk about.  You want to hear what is going on in their lives.  Sometimes you simply want to spend some time with them, and at other times, you have one or two matters that need to be worked through.

When you look around your gathering of God's saints, you are looking at your brothers and sisters.  Now, as I go through this series of blog posts, we are going to see how God intends for this family and its connections to be even more powerful than the "blood" family connections that we have, at least when it comes to the family He creates.  In many cases, it shouldn't introduce too much of a challenge to us.  Yet, there will also be times when it presents a major challenge to us.  Plus, as a family, it means that there are things we work toward with each other, and there are things that we simply do not do to family members.  We will be covering a lot of these things as we "think out loud" here.

For now, give some thought to how you would approach God's people at your congregation if you were to think of them as your family.  Think about how you would be different toward them, and in what ways you would remain the same.  

Oh, The Wealth

From the top, I want to make one thing perfectly clear.  There is NOT a set order of worship outlined by our God in His holy Word.  For something that is as important to Him as giving us His gifts, and in us offering our praise and thanks, it may seem strange that God didn't see fit to include a "do it this way" set of instructions on gathering for worship. 

And yet, that's very much like our God, who refuses to be easily simplified down.  Without a set "form" for recieving God's gifts and returning thanks and praise, that means that God's people are left with a great deal of latitude in how this takes place.  So, you might think that this would mean that there are a whole host of ways in which God's people gather for worship.

However, history paints a bit of a different story.  It seems that there are certain parts of worship that have remained fairly consistent through the ages, regardless of where Christians live or when they live(d).  Christians sing thanks and praise to God.  Christians hear God's Word and reflect upon it.  Christians confess their need for God's forgiveness in Jesus, and hear the certainty of that forgiveness.  Christians unite hearts and voices in prayer.  Christians receive the holy meal that Jesus Himself instituted.  And as they do these things, they typically occur in a rather unified fashion.

So what does this have to do with our celebration of the Lord's Supper?  Well, as we gather as Christians in worship, we have a rather set "form" that we tend to follow, one which has its roots all the way back to the earliest of Christians.  And yet, we have variations to that order which displays the freedom and openness that God allows in worship. 

In particular, included in the hymnal our church uses are five different orders of worship for celebrating the Lord's Supper.  They have an order or form in common, and yet, each is also highly unique, with music and wording that fits the form, and yet allows a certain amount of diversity.  We have a wealth of worship, especially when it comes to celebrating the Lord's Supper. 

But what if we don't regularly enjoy this wealth?  True, we will almost always have our certain "one" that we like more than the others.  At the same time, celebrating the Lord's Supper each week at our early time of worship will also allow us to make use of this wealth of worship as we celebrate God's gifts to us.  We may even find that there are parts of each of them that speak our heart language more than others, and thus serve to draw us closer to our God as He gives us His good and gracious gifts.

Oh, the wealth.  As God's people, our desire is always to utilize that which our God so freely gives. 

What Do You Believe?

In one of the statements we make to God in our typical times of worship, we state that we are "by nature sinful and unclean."  We admit in the statement that we have sinned "by what we have done, and by what we have left undone", or in other words, we did what God says not to do, and we haven't done what God has told us to be doing.  In a different statement that we make to God, we say that we "cannot free ourselves from our sinful condition."  All of these are reflections of what we find God telling us about ourselves in His revealed Word.

If we think through that completely, we realize that we are sinful throughout in every moment of every day.  From the time we are conceived until we pass from this life, our condition is that of sinful.  And as such, if we are to stand in the presence of God and be welcomed into His eternal kingdom, that also means that something needs to change for us.

That's where we enter with Jesus' forgiveness, and specifically for our post today, the role that the Lord's Supper plays.  We need that forgiveness fully and completely, and we need it every moment of every day.  So, when Jesus offers us a place in which we receive His own body and blood, it should make sense that we want to receive such a gift as often as we can get our hands on it.  We want to be forgiven for all those things listed in the first paragraph.  We want to be connected to the pure, perfect, holy, everlasting life of Jesus.

As Christians, it would make a great deal of sense to have the Lord's Supper offered then on a weekly basis.  In fact, most Lutheran churches approach somewhat of this frequency.  Yes, some do it by alternating the worship time at which they offer it, but I also believe that there is something to offering it at an expected time and place. 

In the past, I have found it very helpful to have the following practice.  Offer the Lord's Supper at the earlier time of worship every Sunday, and then have variation in the later time of worship.  That way, God's people can always know when and where to go to receive this great gift which connects us to our Savior in a very real way. 

Do This!

It was the day/evening just prior to an event that would change the course of history for a great number of people.  Most of the participants didn't really understand what would take place that night, and through the next day.  Yet, God was about to do something truly powerful.  He was set to deliver His people.  So, standing on the eve of the day when He would do great things, He commanded His people to partake of a meal. 

Essentially, God commanded His people to "Do this!"  In the context when this command was first given, God was about to free His people from slavery, slavery in Egypt.  As they sat down to the meal, God had commanded them to "Do this," not merely on that evening, but every year, as a reminder of God's mighty action in freeing His people from slavery and bringing them to freedom.

"Do this!"  Sure, it sounds almost like a military style command.  Yet, I would suggest that we can also look at it another way.  "Do this", as in, remember what I have done for you with thankfulness.  God had brought His people out of their suffering and slavery, with the intent to bring them to the land He had promised their ancestors.  Do this, and remember that I am a God who is for you, who is on your side, and who wants to do good for you.  Do this, because this meal will remind you of the extent of my grace and goodness for you.

So, in the context of a future celebration of that same meal, Jesus was set to change the course of history for many people of this world.  He was about to do mighty things, such as conquering sin, death, and the power of the devil.  So, on the eve of such titanic events, as He sat at the meal with His followers, He told them to "Do this, in remembrance of me."

Why do we want to celebrate the holy Supper of our Lord frequently?  Because every time we do, we are reminded of the extent of God's grace to us.  We remember that Jesus loves us enough to give His very life for us.  Every time we receive the bread and wine, which is His body and blood, we are brought back to the price He paid on the cross, and to His victorious resurrection from the dead.  We are reminded of how valuable we are to God, that He would send His Son to do such things for us.

I don't know about you, but knowing such a thing makes me want to "Do this" as often as I can.  So, as we ponder changing our earlier time of worship to celebrating the supper every week, I think that these words of our Lord Jesus speak powerfully as to why we should "Do this" every week.

This is...

Most Christians are intimately familiar with Jesus' words as He observed the Passover with His disciples, just hours before He was arrested, tried, and crucified.  During two significant segments of the Passover celebration, Jesus took what had been in place for centuries and added new meaning to it.  Taking the bread, Jesus broke it, and as He gave it to the disciples, He proclaimed, "This is my body, given for you."  And then later, taking one of the four cups (very likely the cup of redemption), He gave it to them, telling them to, "Drink of this, all of you, for this is the new covenant in my blood, shed for you for the forgiveness of sins."

Now, I understand that there are Christians who take Jesus' words as symbolic more than literal.  The next few blog posts won't actually be addressing anything related to that issue.  Suffice it to say that, for our reflection over the next few days, we will be taking Jesus at His word, that He can indeed cause His body and His blood to be present in the Supper, even if we cannot reasonably fathom how such a thing can be so.

The first thing I want to point out from the mouth of our Lord is that He says this is done "for you".  Jesus gives His body into death "for you".  Jesus shed His blood "for you".  And so, as you take the breach which contains His body, He gives it "for you".  As you receive His blood in, with, and under the wine, He gives it "for you". 

These two words carry a great deal of importance for us as Christians.  We have a connection with Jesus that is renewed every time we receive this holy Supper from the hands of our Lord.  Jesus pours His forgiveness into us as we receive His body, broken for us, and His blood, shed for us.  And the thing for you and I to reflect upon is that we need this forgiveness so often.  Not only do we daily sin in what we do and in what we fail to do, but our inherited state from our first father and mother is that we are sinful.  This means that we desperately need that forgiveness and our connection to Jesus.  We daily sin much, and stand in need of God's forgiveness in Jesus just as much.  We also live in a state of separation from God, and need that forgiven every moment of every day. 

The connection we have with this holy Supper of our Lord Jesus is such that we need it "often".  Truly, we could spend every moment of every day receiving it, as that is just how deep our sinfulness runs, and how deep the forgiveness of Jesus runs.  But since a constant side of bread, blessed with the body of Jesus, and an IV of wine, blessed with Jesus' blood, isn't that practical, we desire to have this great gift as frequently as can be available.

If Not Equality, Then What?

Yesterday, I began to make the case that God is not overly concerned about equality.  While some attribute this to the culture and time in which the events of the Scriptures occured, what we actually find is that God really hasn't created us to be all equal.  Sure, when it comes to sin, we're all equally guilty, and Jesus' forgiveness and blood cover us equally, but outside of that, God doesn't seem overly concerned with equality.

So, if that's the case, then what is God concerned with?  Does He want to see abuses practiced upon those who have more, or does He want to see those without a voice or without "rights" abused and mistreated?  Well, no.  In fact, throughout His revealed Word to us, God makes it very clear that His expectation of His people (and that does mean that it covers all people of the world) is that they love their neighbors as they love their own selves.

So, if God happens to give some set of spiritual gifts to one individual, it doesn't mean that God is exalting that person above others.  It means, instead, that this person, in love for neighbor, is to utilize those gifts in service to others.  He or she isn't to keep them wrapped up, or to use them to exalt oneself.  They are to be used to build up and grow others around them.

In fact, that's the design that we see with our God and His creation.  He doesn't give equally, or else we would not have to rely upon and live in community with each other.  But God created us to have to rely upon others.  He created the people of this world in a way that some would raise crops, others would transport the crops, others would sell the crops, some would have the skills to make clothing, others would be builders, and the like.  Instead of equality, God created a system in which everyone has to rely upon each other (and upon God) for the needs and necessities of life.

God is concerned with love for neighbor, and with our interdependence upon one another.  If one is lazy, it affects all the rest.  If one exalts oneself over others, it affects all the rest.  If one part is missing, it affects all the rest.  St. Paul paints this picture beautifully using the illustration of the body.  The various parts all work together, even though they are not created equally, but all are equally needed for the body to operate as it does.

God is less concerned with equality, and more concerned with love for neighbor and reliance upon one another.  That cuts to the heart of an individualistic society such as we live in, but that's also why we acknowledge that following God's will and design truly is a counter-cultural thing.

Is God Concerned about Equality?

Equality is a buzz word in our current day and society.  We seem to be truly concerned about equality (and yes, I say we seem to be concerned with it, as I will explain in a moment).  Recent events like the Supreme Court ruling on homosexual marriage has the word "equality" attached to it.  We hold to things like an equal right to vote, or to an equal right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

That sounds really good.  In fact, I would dare say that if you went and asked your average Christian in the USA if God is for equality, he or she would probably say yes.  And yet, there are a large number of sections of God's Word that truly challenge this notion that everyone should be equal.  (And as a bit of a side note, think about it from this standpoint.  What does it truly mean to have equality?  Does it mean that everyone gets the same?  Does it mean that everyone's voice is heard the same?  Does it mean that everyone gets the same opportunities regardless of education, intelligence, opportunity, and the like?  Challenging questions to consider in this discussion.)

So, is God concerned with equality?  I would venture to say that He is not.  Sure, He created us all to be equally loved and cared for by Him, and He has equally purchased and redeemed us from sin, death, and the devil through His Son Jesus.  But that seems to be about the extent to which God concerns Himself with equality. 

Think about some of the topics that would create a controversy in a congregation.  Women's rights is one that jumps to mind for many.  Some would say that women deserve an equal right to serve as pastors.  Yet, from the pages of Scripture, you have a rather challenging time to hold that argument up.  So, what do those who support such a notion do?  They try to change the context.  "It was a cultural thing," they say.  And yet, the idea that God may not be a great promoter of equality may not seem to cross their minds.

Think about it this way, too.  When the various gifts of the Spirit are given out, does it say that all are given them equally?  No.  Rather, it quite pointedly shows that some get one or two gifts, others get one or two gifts, and that means that there are those who get less, or practically none, of a particular gift.  God is not so much about equality when it comes to spiritual gifts, it seems, or else all could heal equally, speak in languages equally, discern spirits equally, teach equally, and the like.

Tomorrow I plan to post about why I believe God isn't about equality.  But for today, I've given us enough to chew on.

Life as Community, or as Individual?

Years ago, I watched a fairly forgettable movie entitled "Bend it like Beckham".  As a young man playing soccer at the time, it held some appeal to me.  The movie wasn't quite what I was expecting, but there is a subplot that occurs during the movie that has stuck with me for some time.

In the movie, a young British girl is playing soccer, and on her team, there also comes to be a young lady whose family is from India (I believe).  The family of the girl from India is very adamant that she not play soccer, and she is willing to lay aside what she personally wants for what her family sees as good for her.  Of course, to a Western society focused on the individual over the community, this makes little sense, and so, of course, we cheer in the end when the family relents and the young lady is free to do what she wants, which is, of course, to play futbol.

In recent years, I've come to see this dynamic in a different light.  Our western focus on the individual has its strengths, no doubt, but it also comes with its great weaknesses.  A focus on community (or on family) means that a person always has a place where they are welcome (which makes the parable of the Prodigal son much more understandable in that light.).  However, a focus on the individual means that we often only welcome others as long as they "do" something for us.  If we encounter conflict, we run away to another place where others, hopefully, won't be in conflict with us.  When hard times come along, it's easier to leave when you don't have a community to be answerable to, and so we fail to grow and mature in our lives as we fail to stick it out with our community.

Sadly, this reality has greatly infiltrated God's Church.  How many people look around for a church that fits their needs, rather than asking how they can work themselves into the church?  How often do we look for what we want in the church, rather than asking what would be best for the family overall?  How often do we treat each other as family (yes, even with the quarrels and the good times)?  How often do we sacrifice what we want for what is good for the family overall?

God has created this wonderful gathering of His people called the Church, a place where God's people are renewed in the image of the sacrificing God who sacrificed for His people.  Should we be surprised that our lives, as we are renewed in Christ each day through our baptism, should actually look the same?