What Now?

What Now? It’s time to begin to make plans to put Christmas away. Some of you have already done this. It is the tradition in some families to being to de-decorate the house Christmas afternoon. There is a desire to “get things back to the way they belong,” to put the furniture that had been moved to make room for the Christmas tree back in the proper spot. We need to throw all those wrapping paper and gift bags piles away.

I am not that kind of person. I’m not as bad as the choir director who served a church with me in South Carolina, who would keep his Christmas tree up past Valentine’s Day.  

It feels like those who want to get things packed away run from the manger too quickly, something along the lines of a spiritual Scrooge. Get it over with and get back to reality! In that way of thinking, those of us who like the trappings of Christmas to stay around just a little longer feel a sense of running from the sacred, the mystical, the spiritual and back to business as usual.

Something amazing has happened and we need to take time to process it. We would be the disciples who would stand with Peter at the transfiguration, hammer in hand, and agree that the three tabernacles should be built as soon as possible and that we conduct regular pilgrimages to the spot and bask in the glow and weight of Divine history.

To those on the other side of the de-decorating issue, Christmas is a day. That day has now passed us and we need to get back to living the life that surrounds us. We feel we are more practical. Jesus didn’t come into the world to keep the shepherds at the stable forever.

No, they returned to their flocks that very same night, glorifying and praising God all the way. The purpose of the birth of Christ is not to draw us out of the world to dwell in some spiritual dream land. It is to equip us with the spiritual, that we might take the wonder of the Christ with us into the world, not hide from the world in our ritual.

The key is somewhere between the rush to take things down and the desire to leave them all up until they are totally irrelevant. Maybe the shepherds had the whole thing right. Get back to work as soon as possible but go as a totally different people from this point forward.

Pastor Craig

Christmas Eve? Or, Christmas Day?

ANTICIPATION? Which is better, Christmas Eve? Or, Christmas Day? I, myself, have a hard time choosing. Christmas day brings with it all the excitement of the day itself. For many of us it holds fond memories of family and friends gathered around our table and tree. It holds the fulfillment of the perfect gift given or received.

Ahhh, Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve holds in its grasp all the hope of Christmas Day! My most favorite time of the church year is Christmas Eve. It is contained in the few moments of quiet after the Christmas Eve service. It is after the parties, after the dinners, after the special services, music, and programs. It is five minutes in the quiet sanctuary with the scent of the candles still lingering in the air and only the lights from the tree softly glowing. It is after everyone else is gone and right before I go home myself. It is a handful of fleeting minutes to contemplate the Infinite God in the tiny manger, to think of the one who deserves the rulers of the world to bow low before Him also accepting the lowly, lonely, outcast shepherds into such a humble throne room. 

Christmas Eve requires patience, something many of us are in short supply of during the holiday season. We use it all up waiting in lines, making our list, checking it twice, wrapping, hiding, more wrapping, and on and on. Christmas Eve requires faith, faith that God will indeed deliver on the promises He has made.

Christmas Day has, at times, been a let down for some of us, a dear relative that couldn’t come, a present that did not arrive on time or was not given at all, or the less than perfect Christmas dinner. However, the prophets did not promise disappointment, but fulfillment. God does not deliver something unwanted, but that which is most needed. The quiet of Christmas Eve just gives us a few more moments to wonder at the marvel of such a timely and necessary gift!

Pastor Craig

To the Ends of the Earth

To the ends of the world . . . Greatness, it is something so fleeting. You or I may be well known within our small community, or within our sphere of expertise of vocation and totally unheard of beyond that immediate sphere of community.

I would guess that each of you could name one Nobel winner from the most recent round of nominees. However, the winner for physics, medicine, etc. is probably something we would not remember even though we may have heard it several times.

Greatness to the end of the world involves more than fame. Fame, even if it is widespread, is still only for a moment in this world. In a few weeks or months, a more recent news item or scandal will grab our attention, and the previous tabloid attention getter will quickly disappear from our memories.

The greatness that refers to power is even less than universal. There has never been a worldwide empire. There has never even been one that really came close to true, worldwide domination. Even the might of the British, Spanish, or Mongol Empires never had control of more than 10% of the world’s landmass at any one time. Each of them had their moment in the sun and quickly faded into legend.

So, to speak about one whose name is great even to the end of the earth. . .well, what exactly does that mean? Certainly, there will indeed come a day when all the word, even every atom of the entire creation, will sing the praises of our Savior. Certainly there will come a time when Christ shall truly rule as King over every corner of his creation and every knee shall bow. However, I think that is just a part of the Good News. The part that truly stirs my soul has little to do with headlines or geography. The part that stirs my soul at its greatest depths is the part that addresses completeness.

You see, we experience the kingdom of God, as the Apostle Paul, wrote, “as one looking in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as also I am known.”

Completeness. The name of Christ will be completely great, great in every possible sense of the word, great beyond simple fame or power. Christ’s greatness will be comprehensive and complete. There will be no corner in any part of the earth where his Glory does not shine. That is the coming of Christ we long for now.

The Babe in the manger, for all its majesty and wonder, is simply a dim mirror compared to the splendor we shall one day see face to face. I can’t wait!

Pastor Craig

Powerful!

Powerful! Very few of us know what true darkness is like. Even on the most cloudy of nights there are the lights from our house, the street, the occasional passing car. Shut yourself in your closet and turn out the light. Most times you can still see some things. The light from the room filters under the door. You really have to try hard to be in total darkness!

How powerful is the darkness? The darkness contains our fears, it steals our sight, and it limits our vision (both literally and figuratively).

When we were small, the darkness was the place where the things we were afraid of lived. It may have contained a nightmare of two. Not all darkness was evil, but it did seem that most of the things that were evil lived somewhere in the darkness.

So, what is more powerful than the darkness? Yes, you’re right. The picture to the left did give it away, didn’t it? Darkness goes running away when one candle is lit. One little flickering flame is all it takes.

A candle flame seems so vulnerable. A puff of breath can blow it out, so we look for other images of power. Do an internet search for pictures of power. Do you know what image showed up more often than any other? It wasn’t a picture of military might. It wasn’t a picture of a powerful waterfall. It wasn’t an image of an Olympic weight lifter. It wasn’t a picture of any of the presidents of the United States. It was pictures of Oprah.

It seems sad that very few of the pictures could have been labeled as religious, or even inspirational. Probably more than half of them were of different celebrities. And by far, the favorite celebrity was Oprah.

I like the image of the candle though. That little baby in the manger was vulnerable too. He needed to be rescued from an evil King Herod. God needed his diaper changed. He was hungry. He got tired. Young baby Jesus needed a nap just like a much younger version of you and I did.

Yet, because this young, tender light had come into the world, the world would never be a dark place again. History changed on that dark night. God’s relationship with his creation was redefined when the first rays shone from the manger.

Fear and anxiety were dispelled. Emmanuel, God with us, had brought peace. God did indeed come near.

Pastor Craig

Open the Door

Busni Me Ing Pasbul (Open the Door)

The phrase comes from the Pampanga province of the Philippines and has the idea of being prepared. Open the door! it says. It can have many different contexts. It might be spoken by one standing on the outside desiring admittance. It might just be spoken as a general command or request. However, here, it has the context of expectation. Open the door! because something good is coming. We need to be ready for it.

This second Sunday in Advent we think about John the Baptist and the phrase Prepare the way of the Lord! It is time to make things ready, simple things like opening the door to welcome him in. The problem when we open the door is that we can’t always control what comes in. During the summer, open doors invite all sorts of flies, mosquitoes, and other bugs. During the winter the frigid air rushes through every opening, regardless how small. We don’t want to open the door TOO wide.

If we open it all the way, what happens if a Jesus comes in that we don’t particularly care for?  I spent some time talking to a person who desires to bring Christmas to those less fortunate. So far the call for others to care as well and open the door of their hearts has not been met with enthusiastic response. One person offered an explanation that it could be the season. People are saving their money to spend on themselves. Aren’t you glad Jesus chose differently? Another offered that it was the particular condition of the audience to which she was talking. Either way, the door remained closed, Jesus locked safely on the other side.

Jesus Christ comes into our world and turns everything upside down. He might just ask us to sacrifice something dear. He might call us to move beyond fear and anxiety to boldness and hope. He might require us to be a little less self-centered and a little more other centered. And, somehow in the process, we just might find out that we like it.

We might recognize that peace on earth comes from God but, often, is delivered by us. We might catch on that the Christmas presents that appear under the less fortunate’s tree might have to find their way there from our tree first. We might learn that the inconvenient visit to the shut-in or nursing home resident is appreciated so much simply because they know it is so inconvenient. Prepare the way of the Lord!

Open the door, but look out when you do, blessing may just find its way in!

Pastor Craig

Be Alert!

Alert! A state of watchfulness, of wakefulness. A state of being aware of one’s surroundings. A state of paying attention.

Today is the first Sunday of Advent. The theme for this week of advent is Be Alert! We think about the coming of Christ, not just in the manger, but returning for us.

Are we ready for it? Were the shepherds ready? The magi? Mary and Joseph? Is anyone every REALLY ready for the Divine to walk into their life? How does one get ready for Jesus? Do we pray more? Become more regular in our church attendance? Read through the Bible in a year? Everything I can think of seems so inadequate. It’s sort of like preparing your little studio apartment for the President’s state dinner.

But, you know? It doesn’t say that we should be prepared, does it? It says we are to be alert, to be in a constant state of trying to GET prepared. You don’t always have to know the destination to pack your suitcase.

Think how many people missed the birth of Christ entirely! The innkeeper. The census takers. The other people in the inn who only knew that a poor woman had to have her child in a stable because everyone in the inn was too rude to give up their room for even one night to someone in such need. Think what they missed.

Think what people will miss if they fail to be alert the next time around! The people who heard about the birth of Jesus had other opportunities to welcome Him into their hearts. They heard him from the mount, they heard Him from the boat of Peter, and they saw His actions in the temple.

We hear the Gospel of Christ each Sunday. How do we respond? Do we go forth rejoicing and praising God as the shepherds did? Or do we respond as the philosophers did to Paul. “We wish to talk to you again about this matter.” In other words, when do we quit talking and start doing? We love to hear the Christmas story, but are we ready for it to be happen in our own lives? It’s one thing to think how nice and cute it is to have God born in the manger. It is something entirely different to have the Savior of the universe born again in our own hearts. Be Alert! Christ is coming!

Pastor Craig

Christ the King!

The Pastor’s Page

Today is the last day of the year, the liturgical year that is. It is Christ the King Sunday. We start anew next week as we begin the anxious wait for the coming of Jesus Christ. We relive the wait of the people of Israel, and we meditate on our own wait for Christ to come again.

However, it is on this Sunday we are reminded, once again, that Jesus Christ is Lord of all; that all things have been put under His feet, that everything, even death itself, is subject to His will.

You see, Christ isn’t King of all only when he sits on His heavenly throne, banishing all injustice, hatred, sickness, and heartache. No, Christ is King when the prayers for healing don’t result in healing. Christ is King even when the poor are still poor. Christ is King when the oppressed are still oppressed. Christ is King when the bill collector calls again, or when the power company sends the disconnect notice. Christ is King of the hospital and the nursing home.

Christ is King in the face of the Ft. Hood tragedy, and Christ was King on Friday, November 13^th, when one child of the King, L Cpl Shawn Hefner (USMC), stepped on an IED in Afghanistan just two weeks before he was scheduled to come home for the holidays. In fact, Christ is King for L Cpl Hefner in a more real way now than ever before.

It is SO easy to shout ALLELUIA when all is going well, when the unexpected financial gift helps us beat back poverty for another day, when a friend comes alongside us and banishes loneliness, or when we benefit in any unexpected way.

The challenge for most of us is to continue to give God the glory when we would really like to give Him anything but glory. We can get very angry with God. We, at least sometimes, think we deserve better than what Christ seems to dish out to us. Yet, a follower doesn’t just follow only when the road is straight and level, when the temperature is just right, when the wind is at our back. Disciples seek to follow Christ with every step of every journey. It has never been easy, and it won’t be for those families who sit down with an empty chair at the table this Thanksgiving. Hopefully, they can take comfort that their loved one sits at the Thanksgiving table of our Lord for a feast like has never been offered before.

L Cpl Hefner ended his journey home on Friday, November 20, 2009, when he was laid to rest in Hico, Texas.

Pastor Craig

Touch

The Pastor’s Page

Touch. It is something so simple and so necessary. This past week I had someone call the church office and suggest that the session visit our sick and ailing to perform the laying on of hands for each of them.

We believe in a God who has the power to call all that is out of nothing. Jesus spoke against the fig tree and it withered. Jesus commanded the lame man to get up and walk and he got up and walked. Jesus told the demons to leave the demon-possessed and enter the pigs and they did. The Canaanite woman begged for Jesus to heal her daughter and he replied, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.”

However, Jesus chose the primary method of healing to be touch. There is something about touch that transmits tremendous curative powers, powers of physical and emotional healing, powers that remind us that we are part of a family, that we have a bond with one another that is stronger than mere words.

Touching eases pain, lessens anxiety, softens the blows of life, generates hope and has the power to heal, according to most experts. In fact, modern psychology and medicine are confirming what mothers across the centuries have intuitively known--namely, the healing power of touch.[1]

Now, I don’t mean to minimize the divine touch of Jesus Christ in any way. If anything, I mean to personalize it, saying, Jesus could have spoken the word and healed anyone he wished, but much of the time he chose to incorporate touch because that was a part of the way the Triune God had created us. Jesus knew the power of touch.

Touching reminds us of relationship. It confirms that we are brothers and sisters in Christ. It claims the other person as one of the family and conveys that message to them. “You are one of us. We love you.”

With all of this in mind, we are in the process of forming a team of elders to go to our sick, our shut-ins, our spiritually weary, to anyone who will have us and. . . .touch them, reminding them that they are indeed a part of the body of Christ. We claim them. We love them. And, just maybe, through our touch, God will heal them

Pastor Craig

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[1] http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0675/is_n6_v9/ai_11489808/

Tranquility

Tranquility

It really was a beautiful day. The sun was out. The temperatures were great. The rain that seemed to have lasted all through October was finally gone. It was the kind of day to go fishing or sit on your porch in your rocking chair. Get a glass of tea and listen to the birds for a few more times before they disappear for the winter to wherever it is they go from north Texas. It was Thursday, November 5, 2009.

However, shortly after lunch the beautiful day stopped. It had turned ugly. It seemed as though the birds had stopped singing and the sun had gone away for a great long time. Something worse than rain had come. Evil had entered the day. Evil in the form of one very confused and lost person at Ft. Hood Army base in Texas. Tranquility was snatched away from so many in an instant.

What do you do to get that back? Is it possible? Are there words you can say to a spouse, to the children? How will you tell the parents who were so proud and yet so fearful for their child’s safety in a war zone that their child had been killed before they ever got there?

In our hectic society, tranquil days are so hard to come by anyway. How do you go about getting one back when it is yanked away so violently? We are indeed reminded that each breath is a gift from the Creator, each kiss from our loved one a priceless blessing beyond measure. Life is truly fleeting, but you already knew that, didn’t you?

We just want to claw our way back to the moment we had right before we knew, once again, that the world has evil in it.

Jesus told us he would indeed send a Comforter. Lord, we need that Comforter right now. Jesus promised us peace, but denied us the kind of peace that we so often look for in our world. He offers a strength through, but not a way around. We are called to walk through the pain. We are reminded that there is no bridge over the Valley of the Shadow of Death. No, we are called, so many times, to walk straight into it. Why would we ever enter such a place? We must continue the search for a way over, or around, or . . .

We go through the Valley of the Shadow because that is where Christ will meet us. “For thou art with me, thy rod and staff (the symbols of protection and guidance) comfort me.” Surely, if God is with me here, I will enjoy His presence all the days of my life and enter his house forever, one day.

Pastor Craig

A New Name

A New Name

In the stage play Man of La Mancha, Don Quixote meets a prostitute named Aldonza and says to her, “You will be my lady.” She is shocked. “Yes, you are my lady and I give you a new name – Dulcinea.” She laughs in his face. But Don Quixote affirms her to be the person he perceives and believes her to be.

As the play continues, the stage is empty. It is night. Offstage a woman screams. It is Aldonza, being raped in the hay. She appears on stage, disheveled, hysterical, terror flooding her eyes. Quixote speaks, “My lady!” She shouts back, “Don’t call me your lady. I was born in a ditch by a mother who left me there naked and cold and too hungry to cry.” Don Quixote insists, “My lady.” She shouts back, “Don’t call me your lady. I am only a strumpet to use and throw away. I am only Aldonza.” She whirls and runs off into the night as Don Quixote calls after her, “But you are my lady. You are Dulcinea.”

After a while the curtain drops and rises to the scene where Don Quixote is dying. Suddenly to his side comes a woman who appears to be a Spanish queen, dressed in lovely and lavish lace. She kneels and prays. Don Quixote opens his eyes and feebly asks, “Who are you?” She rises and stands tall. She is beautiful. She speaks softly: “Don’t you know who I am? I am your lady. I am Dulcinea.”

Imagine that. Think of the titles you could/should bear. Liar, Gossip, Adulterer, Greedy, Glutton. Those are some of the less offensive ones too!

Jesus Christ comes into our world and turns everything upside down. He strips away that which causes us shame, humiliation, and embarrassment and gives to us noble birth. He takes away our filthy rags and dresses us like royalty!

2 Cor 5:17-18

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.

All things! Everything has become new!

Let us listen to what God says about us. Let us hear who God says we are. Let us think as much of ourselves as God thinks of us!

Pastor Craig

Now, Wait Just a Minute!

Have you prayed today? Hopefully, even in the midst of our busy day, each of us took time to pray. Oh, you’ve forgotten? Don’t worry. I‘ve done the same thing more times than I would care to admit! But, how can we forget to pray? It seems it shouldn’t be possible for a Christian to forget to begin each day with the One to whom the day should be dedicated. It seems just as impossible that, having arrived at the end of the day, we would forget to thank the One who saw us through that day – thank Him for safety, for provision, for guidance, for health, for family, for. . . well, everything!

We don’t forget to breathe! You say, That’s part of our autonomic nervous system. If high school biology is a part of your too distant past think involuntary nervous system. We don’t have to think to digest our food. We can only control our breathing within certain parameters. Perspiration, heart rate, salivation – all of these are part of that same nervous system.

Why isn’t there one for praying? Why do we have to remind ourselves to pray? Make promises with dire consequences, etc? Some people seem to be able to pray about anything, at anytime, and anywhere. Others of us seem to operate under the premise that the Almighty should only be bothered under the most dire of circumstances. We believe that God isn’t really interested in us finding a parking place in the front row at Wal-mart. We can so easily forget to thank Him for the sunshine after the rain, or the rain after a long period of doing without it.

The other issue that seems to dominate our prayer life, when we do actually have it, is the inability to keep our mouths shut! When we do pray, we come with a long list of wants. We want God to heal, to help, to guide, to give, to stop something, to start something else, to protect, to keep, to forgive, to correct, to resurrect, to – I think you get the picture. Don’t get me wrong. I am a FIRM  believer that God wants us to ask for the things that are on our mind. He wants to hear from us, even if it is about that parking place at Wal-mart.

However, have you ever considered that God may have something to say to you as well. We pour out our torrent of “wants” and “gimmes” and then run on our merry way waiting for the angels to deliver our heavenly shopping list. What if God literally pulled us back, sat us down, and said, Wait a minute here! We need to spend some time together. I have some things I need to make sure you know, and I need to have your undivided attention so I know you heard them! By the way, I love you.

Remember how you felt taken advantage of as a parent when children used you as a taxi service or an ATM machine and then ran off to have their fun. Maybe, there are times our actions make God feel exactly the same way.                                   

Pastor Craig

Darkness

Unknown to most of you, there is a small group studying The Dark Side.


Before you think of Star Wars or bring up images of occult practices, understand that each of us has a Dark Side.

St. John of the Cross (16^th Century) wrote a poem that, later, he penned into a booklet entitled The Dark Night of the Soul. Most of you have been there at one time or another. It is that period in one's life where loneliness resides, where none other walks beside us, where, at times, it seems as though God Himself has left us for another path in another place. These are the times and the places we do not want to talk about. We want others to think we are on top of the world, that all is well within the scope of our life. Yet, we know it hasn’t always been true. We have wandered the lonely paths ourselves from time to time. Sometimes it seems more like a lifelong journey than one element of life’s journey.


The Dark Night is where we finally meet the Savior. It is the place where the grace of God, over time, becomes more real than ever before. It is not always a bad place. Most pastors travel it far more often than they will ever tell their congregations. Leadership lends itself to lonely journeys. It is a place of longing but not always a place of pain.

This small group is sharing a book entitled Overcoming the Dark Side of Leadership. Its pages hold up those qualities that make us the leader that we are. Then they show how those very strengths sow the seeds of something more dangerous, how confidence can be so easily transformed into PRIDE (Yes, the capitalization is intentional), how love for something or someone can become a claim of ownership and a defense of what we would consider our rights, how passion for something is a single step away from the hatred of all that is not that thing for which we are passionate, and how the desire to please and make others happy becomes an all consuming, overpowering drive for the approval of others.

It is a difficult thing to look at ourselves in this way. Most of us turn away and desire to think of “happier” and “healthier” things. However, even as Socrates said, The unexamined life is not worth living, I would challenge you by saying The unexamined life is a life lived dangerously.  To ignore the dark side in one’s self is no less dangerous than to deny any addiction. To invite people to walk along our path in that Dark Night of our soul is a terrifying thing. It speaks to vulnerability. It bares our soul, the very part of that soul we most long to cover up and conceal. So, we cover up more quickly than Adam and Eve. We hide in the bushes hoping others will not see. Yet, we live in community. Living in community implies vulnerability. We become willing, hopefully, through much effort and over a considerable length of time, to be family, for it is in those dark places we most see and appreciate our need for our Heavenly Father. 


Pastor Craig

How to make someone feel at home!

Where do you feel so welcome that you can just be yourself? Who is always glad to see you regardless of how or when you show up? OK, from the picture, you can tell that I think dogs are among those who form the most Christ-like welcoming committee anywhere. How can we welcome the community into our fellowship like that?

There are three areas of concentration the session and I have identified for 2010 – attendance, Sunday school, and support and growth of the youth program.

We want all of our areas to have the same welcoming effect you would experience if these two welcomed you home each time you arrived. Imagine feeling that accepted.

To address these three areas we are going to do four things.

1.      We are going to get up and get moving. Colossians 1:28 tells us our job. We proclaim him so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ. That is our goal. We can’t wait for them to come to us. Growth and discipleship are not optional. Each week we will find some practical way to put the lesson into practice, beginning today.

2.      We will become students of the Scriptures. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that all God’s people may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. In other words, we cannot pull of #1 unless we equip ourselves by doing this second one. We will actively use Scriptural principles in every aspect of church life. I know that sounds like something that would be a “no brainer,” but I think we often take that for granted rather than actively pursue it.

3.      We will “own” our church program. David Bish says, Church isn’t something you go to, it’s who you are!” The Church is not the building. The Church is you and me. We DO church. This is our church. It is our ministry, not the ministry of the session, the pastor, or a committee.

4.      We are the pastors to the local community. Matthew 5:14 ff says You are the light of the world. . .let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. We are called to be followers of Christ. However, we are also called to be leaders in ministry. You began this with your efforts to raise money for Helping Hands last week. May our ministry efforts reach far beyond our physical grasp!

Pastor Craig

Why did Jesus die?

Why did Jesus die?

Most of us would say, “Jesus died to save us from our sins.” What would you say if I told you that was not entirely correct? Oh, don’t get me wrong. Our sins are forgiven, and they are forgiven only because of Jesus saving work on Calvary. But is that all? Does that describe the whole picture? What does Jesus save us to in the process of saving us from something.

Jesus died to empower us to good works. We were trapped in sin. We longed to do those very things the law of God commanded us not to do (Romans 7:7ff). We now have the possibility of good works.

Do we do them? NO! You and I both know that. We are still trapped in Romans 7. We long for a way out. In fact, we do not actually become aware of our sinfulness until the Holy Spirit begins the work of salvation in us. We have no awareness on our own. We have no desire to shelter the homeless, to clothe the naked, to feed the hungry, to protect the orphan, to visit those in prison, etc.

John Austin Baker goes so far as to say that if we seek heaven only as a refuge from what we perceive hell to be, we might not comprehend either one. He describes heaven as that place where we finally attain the perfection in love that the Spirit as caused our own spirits to thirst after.

Hell is not the place of fire and torment as we see so often depicted. Hell is that place where we know we will never become the people God intended us to be! Mr. Austin argues that until we stop pursuing eternal life and, instead, pursue the infinite goodness, we will be eternally frustrated and have doubts regarding both. Once we take on the good works of Jesus Christ, not as an end to dodging hell, but simply out of the new love Christ has put within us, then that love grows and puts us more securely on the path to eternal life as well.

We are not saying that ones is not saved until that point. We are saying that one will always question their own eternal destiny until the reach the point where the eternal destiny does not matter as much as living for Christ in the here and now, doing the will of Christ out of the love of Christ helps us to fully experience the salvation of Christ. Could that possibly be what James was saying all along!?

Pastor Craig

How big did you go today?

Hansen Wednlandt writes, “I wish I could join the people, who are two spiny, massive ridgelines away, speeding in snowshoes and crampons to beat a June snowstorm on 14,235 foot Longs Peak. Driving up the mountain this morning, I passed the signs of so many other Saturday warriors: the dirt-faced smiles of casual mountain bikers, an oversized crash pad lying beneath a popular overhung boulder, empty whitewater kayak racks atop green Subarus. Somewhere down the canyon in Boulder, they are training some of the world’s fastest road and mountain bike racers, marathoners and 100 mile runners, adventure racers and Everest climbers. This is where I live, a land where “extreme” is not a yes or a no question, but a matter of How big did you go?"

How big did you go today? Did you risk it all, everything? What were the consequences of failure? What were the consequences of not even trying?

Jesus stuck his neck out for a woman caught in the very act of adultery. An awkward situation to say the least. There was no doubt that a transgression had been committed. After all, she had been caught in the very act. There was no getting around it. Jesus’ grace went big for her!

Jesus’ hypocrisy meter probably also hit a new all-time high for those that brought her to him. They knew he had preached about this forgiveness. They may have even heard that him talk about how the tax collectors and the prostitutes would enter the kingdom of God before some “good, honest, God-fearin’” folks. Well, what would he do when his grace ran contrary to what the law of Moses commanded as the punishment for this sin?! Just how big would this Jesus go?

His compassion went further, bigger than anyone else’s had ever gone before! His condemnation was close behind!

He might as well have said, You self-righteous, hateful, people. You love to put the requirements of the law on everyone else. Let’s see if any of you have kept the law. The one of you who is perfect will be allowed to throw the first stone at her!

Jesus, himself, was the only one there who met the criteria. Even today, he would rather throw God’s grace at you instead of rocks. How about you? Which are you throwing?

Pastor Craig

Busy! Busy! Busy!

How do we get so busy? Well, for most of us it is not taking care of the task at hand. We would rather be on MySpace or Facebook or anything else as opposed to the responsibility before us. We put it off and the stack of "to do's" just gets deeper.

We get 24 hours in each day. We need 6-8 to recharge from one day and rest up for the next. We spend another 8 or more at work. We spend an hour or more eating each day and an hour or more getting ready for work. That brings us up to at least 18 hours. We haven't included commute times, times spent in social or religious activities, times spent doing homework with you children, times spent playing with them in the yard, times spent doing household chores like washing and putting away the dishes. . . We haven't mowed the lawn, raked the leaves, vacuumed the carpets, scrubbed the toilets, shopped for groceries and other household needs. How could we get it all done? Is there a way out?

We do indeed need to learn to slow down. The example we are setting means our kids will quite possibly be just as hurried and frustrated with life as we are. We make rude gestures to the driver next to us who cut us off in traffic because that person is stressed for time as well. In the process, both of us are more frustrated than we were before.

God knows we need rest. He worked hard throughout the history of creation, but in the end, the thing that he did best was set the example for us by creating rest. God did not need rest for His own person. I mean, really, He is omnipotent. No, He made rest for us because He knew we needed it.

God asks us to consider the lilies (Matthew 6:28), how they don't stress about their existence and yet are so beautiful and well cared for. Well, I'm not much of a flower person. Oh, I love to look at them, but they need far too much tending for my tastes. Don't get me wrong. I am so glad that God tends to them for my enjoyment, but for all the outdoor things I love to do, gardening is not one of them.

So, I want to paraphrase this section of Scripture. Consider your dog. See how chilled he is. He neither sows or reaps. He enjoys his food! He spends his time off the leash with enthusiasm. He knows how to love and appreciate life. He knows how to love unconditionally. When he gets tired, he rests. When he needs a nap, he takes one. He knows the value of lying on his back on the grass in the warm sun and having a really good wiggle. Oh, that we could have the appreciation of life our pets do! Oh, that we could love every moment of life instead of trudge on through, just waiting for the end!

Pastor Craig

Church Names and Commitment

My friend, Ken Lane, has just returned from a trip to the Holy Land. He got to see many of the places where the Biblical story took place and, before he left, read and prayed his way through the Via Dolorosa, the path Jesus took from the time of his condemnation on through the crucifixion and burial. There are a number of holy sites along that route, yes, obviously. Churches named The Chapel of the Flagellation where Jesus was beaten by the Roman guards, and The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which contains the tomb of Jesus.

We are so used to churches being called First something or other, Grace ______, Faith ______, Mercy ________, or having the names of Saints or great people of faith. We even name them after streets. Here the church is named after an event in the life of Christ. It calls us to remember what Jesus did for us. Certainly Grace, Faith, Mercy, etc. are excellent names as well. We even prefer them to Flagellation. It reminds us of things we would rather not think about.

We certainly want to remember the love, grace, and compassion of Jesus Christ that God has extended to us. We just don't want to remember how it was procured for us. It seems way too gory and gruesome. We prefer the resurrection to the crucifixion.

Of the people I know who have seen The Passion of the Christ, the scenes they found most "offensive" have been the scenes dealing with the crucifixion. We are confronted with the selfless act, freely given for us, and we know that we take it for granted. We do not appreciate the extent to which we have been saved. We do not comprehend our lostness. Oh, we certainly can give it mental recognition, but we can't "wrap our minds around" the enormity of our lostness and the magnitude of the effort to win us back. Certainly the very battle for our soul should be an adventure story beyond any other ever written.

I teasingly mentioned to my friend Ken that I might want to send a resume' to The Chapel of the Flagellation. I could joke about the commitments sought from new members in the New Members' Classes, but the fact of the matter is that it reminds us of the commitment and provision made by Christ to our justification, sanctification, and glorification. Oh, that we would make the same commitment to Him!

Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep. . .

Did you ever have bedtime prayers? What were yours? I remember our meal time prayer. It went like this, Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest, and let this food to us be blessed.

Of course a small, small child may have some difficulty with some of those words. My prayer came out something more like this: Com'lar Jesus. . . I always wondered what Com'lar meant. I assumed it was some deep theological term that I would understand someday. I just knew I was supposed to pray it.

Our night time prayers were different. Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.

The picture above is of Marines in my son's company. Since I don't know if I can say where they are in this format, I won't. However, you can tell from the picture that they are in a place where it is best to sleep with you rifle close at hand. We rattle off our prayers with little thought. Very few, if any of us, really expected to die in our sleep that night. We simply said the words because our parents told us to say them. These guys say them for real!

I good friend of Walt's was killed back in July. He made it home in time for his parents to see him and speak to him. He stepped on an IED and had his legs blown off. It was the shrapnel and infection from all the debris blasted into the wound that finally killed him. It is a hard thing to lose someone close to you. It hit most of the company hard. I do not know the family, but I am quite sure it hit them much harder.

Even Marines in combat get some time off. Walt tends to spend some of his in the gym where he prays for the family of his friend whenever the friend comes to mind. He prays for comfort for them. He prays that there grief would be lifted. He prays that God would give them peace. I don't want to over spiritualize this prayer, but I certainly don't want to minimize it either.

A few days after Walt prayed his most recent prayer, one of his fellow sergeants called 3-4 of the guys who knew this young man best together to tell them of a dream he had. He saw this small group in a waiting room, anxiously waiting to see their friend. Everyone else finally fell asleep. At that point, the young man walked in wearing a white shirt and a white baseball cap. He told the sergeant still awake to tell everyone not to worry, to take care of one another, and to tell them he was fine. The comfort for the family was delivered first to his fellow Marines.

Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. AMEN.

War

I watched Saving Private Ryan again the other day. Fortunately, I have never been in war. I have seen pictures taken by good friends who have served in Iraq. Some, many of them, I was not supposed to see. They were not something pleasant to see. The photos were combat photos. None of them contained pictures of injured or KIA American military men and women.

If you have seen the movie, you know it is VERY graphic. War is not pretty. The injuries inflicted and the ways though involved die are beyond terrible.

I have two sons in the United States Marine Corps. I am proud of their choice of service. I am proud they volunteered to put themselves in harms way to keep America safe and free.

Is it possible to do away with war? We have been trying for decades to end war. WWI was the Great War, the War to End All Wars. It was called this because it was so horrific it was thought that countries would avoid war at all costs. Then came WWII. Power and greed takes no vacation.

Death needs to happen in the company of those one loves best, not on a beach thousands of miles from home and hearth! It can be fearful enough to face the great beyond. It is terrorfying to face it alone. I don't have a solution. I wish I did. There will always be dictators who need to be called to account. There will always be those who need America's help. There will always be those who need help to become free. We cannot close our ears. We must help. We must pray for those brave men and women who face death, and those who meet it while they stand in my place and in yours on foreign soil.

God Bless You,