January 2016
Sabbath, January 2, 2016 -  Matthew 14:17: What Do You Have?

Sabbath, January 9, 2016 -  Matthew 19:17:  Good

Sabbath, January 16, 2016 - Matthew 20:33:  Open Our Eyes

Sabbath, January 23, 2016 - Matthew 22:40:  Hangers

Sabbath, January 30, 2016 -  Matthew 24:13: Never Give Up


February
Sabbath, February 6th - Matthew 24:46: So Doing

Sabbath, February 13th - Mark 2:9: Healing

Sabbath, February 20th - Mark 4:40: When You're Afraid

Sabbath, February 27th - Mark 7:8: Our Rules or God's?


March

Sabbath, March 5th - Mark 13:36: While You Were Sleeping

Sabbath, March 12th - Mark 14:26: Praise God Anyway

Sabbath, March 19th -   Luke 3:6 - Salvation

Sabbath, March 26th -  Luke 12:34 - Treasure Hunt


April
​Sabbath, April 2nd - Luke 1:68 - Redeemed! How I Love to Proclaim It!

Sabbath, April 9th -   Luke 4:19 - Jubilee!

Sabbath, April 16th -  Luke 6:31 - The Golden Rule

Sabbath, April 23rd -  Luke 6:36 - Mercy

Friday, April 29th & Sabbath, April 30th - Luke 9:23 - Following Christ and Participation, Not Imitation


May
Sabbath, May 7th -  Luke 11:28 - The Blessing of God's Law

Sabbath, May 14th -  Luke 15:10 - Whiter Than Snow

Sabbath, May 21st - Luke 19:40 - The Stones Would Cry Out

Sabbath, May 28th -  Luke 24:35 - Recognizing Jesus


June
​Sabbath, June 4th - Luke 18:27 - Impossible!!

Sabbath, June 11th and Pentecost, June 12th - Luke 21:19 - Endurance and Solving the Puzzle

Sabbath, June 18th - John 1:1 - The Word of God

Sabbath, June 25th - John 4:34 - My Food


July
Sabbath, July 16th -   John 3:16 - The Love of God

Sabbath, July 23rd -  John 3:17 - Bloom and Be Beautiful

Sabbath, July 30th -  John 3:19 - Darkness


August
Sabbath, Aug 5th -   John 6:29 - Work


Sabbath, Aug 12th - John 7:24 - Judging Right Judgment


Sabbath, Aug 19th - John 10:14 - Knowing the Good Shepherd


Sabbath, Aug 26th - John 12:32 - Lifted Up


September
Sabbath, September 3rd -   John 13:6 - Learning to Submit


Sabbath, September 10th - John 13:35 - Love One Another


Sabbath, September 17th -  John 14:2 - Going Home


Sabbath, September  24th -  John 14:15 - Obedience and Love

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October
Sabbath, October 1st - John 14:27 - Peace

Monday, October 3rd - Feast of Trumpets - John 14:27 - Prince of Peace


Sabbath, October 8th - John 15:1 - The True Vine and Vinedresser


Wed, October 12th - John 15:11 - Atonement


Sabbath, October 29th - John 16:31 - Believe!


November

Sabbath, November 5th -  John 16:1 - Falling Away

Sabbath, November 12th - John 17:3 - Eternal Life

Sabbath, Nov 19th -  John 17:15 - Rescued by the Father

Sabbath, November 26th - John 19:37 - Pierced for Us


December
Sabbath, December 3rd - Acts 3:6 - Better Than Silver or Gold


Sabbath, December 10th -  Acts 5:41 - Counted Worthy


Sabbath, December 17th - Acts 9:10b - Here I Am


Sabbath, December 31st -  Acts 12:5 - Trouble and Prayer

Sabbath, January 2, 2016 
What Do You Have?
They said to him, “We have only five loaves here and two fish.” (Matthew 14:17)


Country singer Dolly Parton sang a song several years ago called “My Coat of Many Colors.” It was about growing up poor and needing a coat one winter. Someone had given their family a box of rags. Her mother took those tiny pieces of rags and sewed them into a coat. It would be enough to keep the little girl warm going to school. It’s a heart-warming story about a family having so little but using what they’d been given. It was enough. Making good use of what you have been given is also seen in the parable of the talent (Matthew 25) or the parable of the pounds (Luke 19).


The Philadelphia church in Revelation 3 also had very little. Jesus tells them, “I know that you have but little power, and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name” (Revelation 3:8). Jesus doesn’t talk about them having something tangible like a box of rags. He talks about their reserves of strength, their desire to persevere in righteousness, holding onto their faith in God and His promises to those who love and seek Him. They have just a little strength, but they have the willingness to do what is right and the heart to act on that desire. Jesus encourages them to persevere.


But neither of these stories (the coat made of rags or the perseverance of the Philadelphia church) show exactly the principle in Matthew 14, when Jesus fed the 5000. It’s not really a story about having very little and making do with it. It’s not a story of persevering with the little you have. It’s a story about having very little and taking it to God, asking Him to do something with it. There are stories in the Bible which talk about having a little, but God doing so much with it. 


David slew Goliath with a sling and a stone. God used just a little stone from the brook and a young shepherd to defeat the entire army of the Philistines. 


The widow in 2 Kings 4 only had a little oil. Elisha told her to borrow as many vessels as she could and pour the oil from her jar into the vessels. She did and when the last vessel was filled, the oil stopped flowing. Elisha told her to sell the oil. It was just a little oil, but with God’s intervention, it was enough to pay her debts and to live on.


Then there’s this story in Matthew about Jesus feeding the 5000 (That’s just the men; it didn’t include the women and children.) with just five loaves and two fish. They picked up 12 basketfuls afterwards! That’s a very little for so many people, but it was more than enough in God’s hands.


God didn’t chose the largest and most impressive nation to be His people. He chose the least. The apostle Paul says that not many wise, powerful, and important people were called (1 Corinthians 1:26), but God chose to work through the lowly things to display His power, to show how much God can do with so little.


So what do you have? What is it that you feel God wants you to do? Do you feel like you have the ability and the resources to do that job? Perhaps you only have a little oil. Perhaps you only have five smooth stones and a sling. Perhaps you only have five loaves and two fish. What do you think God can do with your resources if your heart is to serve Him and to do the right thing?


There are so many instances where God takes the little that people have and increases it to fulfill His purposes for His glory.  David’s stones. The widow’s little oil. The boy’s five loaves and two fish. We need to stop looking at our resources through the world’s eyes. According to the world, David would have been soundly defeated and killed by Goliath. The widow’s sons would have been taken by her creditors. The 5000+ people who came to hear Jesus would’ve gone away hungry.  We need to realize that we serve the Great God of the Universe. If He wants to accomplish something for His glory, He can do great things with a very little amount. And, as in the case of the five loaves and the two fish, more can be collected afterward than what you started with.


Our job is not to worry about resources. Our job is to make sure we’re walking according to God’s will, we have the heart for righteousness, and the willingness to act. Who knows? Maybe God will take what we have and do great things - even if it’s just five loaves and two fish.


Sabbath, January 9th
​Good
And he said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God: but if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments. Matthew 19:17


If I asked you how you are, you might say, “Good.” You might tell me that you just saw a good movie. You might even tell me that we’re having good weather. The word “good” is almost as ubiquitous as dirt or bugs or the oxygen we breathe. And you can even hear people tell you that “this is good dirt” or “this is a good bug.” But Jesus made an emphatic point that no one is good but God. He must have had a different definition of the word “good” than what we normally use.


This word translated “good” in Matthew 19:17 is the Greek work agathos, Strongs #18. It’s meanings range from “useful, salutary; of good constitution or nature; good, pleasant, agreeable, joyful, happy; excellent, distinguished; to upright, honorable.”


That doesn’t help us much because there are many things around us which are of excellent nature, which are useful, which are upright and honorable. In fact, Jesus himself in the parable of the sower and the seeds (Matthew 13) talked about the seed falling on good soil. In Matthew 12:35, Jesus states, “A good G18 man out of the good G18 treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: G18 and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.” Here Jesus calls things, treasure of the heart, and even a man, good. So why does Jesus make the point of telling the young man that only God is good?


The young man wanted some specific information - how to gain eternal life. And I wonder if he’d asked other rabbis the same question. I think Jesus wanted to make sure the young man understood that he wasn’t just talking to another rabbi. I think Jesus wanted to make it very clear that He, Jesus, was and is God and He has the authority and the knowledge to answer the young man’s question accurately. 


Some people read this verse and say, “See, Jesus is telling the young ruler than He’s not God.” But that’s not what Jesus said. In fact, it’s like Jesus is saying, “I am Good. I am God and you would do well to recognize that.” God is good in the ultimate sense of the word; He is not marred in any way.


The rest of the conversation is likewise very interesting. Jesus tells him, “If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” There are some who say, “See. You have to do something to earn salvation. It’s not a free gift. Jesus said so.” But I don’t think this is what Jesus is saying. Based on how the rest of the conversation went, I think Jesus had something more in mind. The young man wanted to specifically know which commandments were necessary. Jesus named a few. The young man assured Jesus that he’d done all of those things from his youth. Then he wanted to know what else he needed to do. Jesus told him that if he wanted to be perfect, he should sell all he had, give it to the poor, and come follow Jesus. 


Salvation is about giving up everything you are and everything you have, turning it all over to the lordship of Jesus Christ, and then seeking His will in everything you do. The commandments, and all of “the Holy Scriptures, are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus” (2 Timothy 3:15). The purpose of God’s law is to teach you God’s ways. As Paul says, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). It is God’s law which makes you see your need for the Savior. It is faith in Jesus Christ, in His sacrifice and resurrection - for you - which leads to your salvation.


In the end, Jesus’ message to the rich young ruler is the same message He gives to us all. We must keep God’s commandments because they are holy and righteous and good (Romans 7:12). Then, when we keep God’s law, it brings us to God. It shows our need for the Savior and how to have a relationship with God. So we keep God’s laws. We learn to submit everything to God - our possessions, our goals, our priorities, our lives, even our thoughts (2 Corinthians 10:5). When we learn to put God first in everything, we learn to follow His leading with all of our hearts. He shepherds us because we hear His voice, because we know Him, because we have a relationship with Him to be able to recognize which voice is His! We follow because we’ve learned He is good, all the time; we trust Him.


Jesus is the Good Shepherd (John 10:11-18). If we follow Him, we will be that good soil (Matthew 13:8), producing good fruit. We will be able to produce good fruit because we have a good relationship with our Savior and God. We will hear Jesus say at His return, “Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord” (Matthew 25:23). It will be very good.


Sabbath, January 16th
Open Our Eyes
They said to him, “Lord, let our eyes be opened.”  Matthew 20:33


Have you ever played that game to show how observant/unobservant you are? You intentionally look around the room for one minute. Then you close your eyes and someone asks you questions about what’s in the room. Most people don’t do very well, even when they know what’s coming. If they didn’t have even a minute to look . . . well, suffice it to say: most people are not very observant.


Helen Keller wrote an essay about having the gift of sight so that she could see for three days. She listed the things she most wanted to see: a sunrise, the outdoor delights in the woods, a busy city street, museums, women’s clothing, and the theatre. But I don’t remember her writing about seeing more than just surface things. For instance, you can see that someone has a red shirt on, but you can also see their expression and judge their emotions, whether they’re having a good day or a bad day. Would they appreciate a silly joke or do they need some serious encouragement?  But to a blind person, one who has never had their sight, they don’t realize the depths to which they can’t see. They may only have an idea of what is possible.


I suspect that it’s like that with us too. We may be able to see, but we don’t realize the depths to which we can’t see. Think about the time (2 Kings 6:8-23) when the Syrians were attacking Israel. Elisha’s servant was afraid of the besieging army. Elisha prayed that God would open his eyes; Elisha’s servant saw that “the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire around Elisha” (vs. 17).


Elisa’s servant could see the Syrian army, but he didn’t have eyes to see the army of the LORD. He didn’t realize the depths to which he couldn’t see - at least not until Elisha prayed that his eyes be opened.


It’s curious, this event recorded in Matthew 20:29-34. As Jesus left Jericho, a great crowd followed him. Two blind men called to Jesus. When He asked them what they wanted, they said to him, “Lord, let our eyes be opened.” Immediately following this healing of the sight comes the account of the triumphal entry. What an event to be able to see! Immediately preceding the healing of the two blind men is the incident when the mother of James and John, the sons of Zebedee, asked Jesus that they be allowed to sit on either side of Jesus in the kingdom. Jesus took the opportunity to help the disciples see that “whoever would be great among you must be your servant” (Matthew 20:26).



There’s obviously more to seeing than just observing the surface facts. They’re like water bugs skittering on the surface. There’s so much more that we could see. 


There’s a current Christian song by Brandon Heath which goes “Give me Your eyes for just one second. Give me your eyes so I can see everything that I keep missing.” What are we missing? Like Helen Keller, it’s kind of hard to know what to ask for when we don’t have it.


Perhaps we could ask to see God’s will in our life, to know what path He wants us to take. I’d like to understand how the unfolding of events, leading me in a certain direction, fits into God’s plan. When I run into obstacles, is that God telling me to go a different direction? Is He telling me to wait? Is He waiting to see how very much I want a thing? Is an obstacle a “no” from God or is it the enemy trying to discourage me from something good?


Perhaps we could ask to see more clearly how to interact with others. What is it that they need to hear that will encourage them today in their walk with Christ?


Perhaps we could ask to see, with God’s eyes, the potential of each person. If we could see, as C.S. Lewis describes in The Weight of Glory, what is possible for each person who becomes a child of God, we might have more compassion and patience with each one. We might be more willing to share Jesus Christ with them.


I don’t know. What am I missing that I don’t even realize? I suspect that, like the two blind men, it would behoove me to ask, “Lord, let my eyes be opened.”


What about you?


Sabbath, January 23
Hangers 

On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets. Matthew 22:40


The hanger is a wonderful invention. Before the hanger, people would throw their clothes over the end of the bed, over the top of chairs, hang them on hooks or pegs, fold them into chests, or just pile them on the floor.  Walking into homes today, we might be tempted to wonder if a particular family has discovered this wonderful invention. There are coats thrown across chairs. There are piles of clothes, more or less neat, on the bedroom floors and in the closets. And, within five feet of the coat closet, there are mounds of coats and jackets hung on top of each other on the pegs. Is it just too hard to hang a jacket on a hanger?


On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets. 


It’s interesting that the ESV renders this verse “depend.” The KJV, the NKJV, and the NIV all render it “hang.” The ESV, RSV, and NAS all say “depend.” The Greek word here is #2910, and means “to hang up, suspend” and is used in two ways: 1) of one hanging on a cross, and 2) of the Law and the Prophets - they are summed up, they hang on two precepts.


So Jesus is telling his listeners that the Law and the Prophets hang, or depend, or are summed up, by two commandments. What are we hanging up? What are the Law and the Prophets? The law is the law of God. It’s His directions to His creation for making life work. But it’s more than that. Because God is the Creator, His laws for making things work right are also an expression of God’s character. When God’s people weren’t following His laws, He sent the prophets to try to get them back on track. Over and over, the prophets tell the people to repent, to change their ways, to return to God. They warn God’s people of the consequences of continuing their rebellious ways, but every one of them has a message of hope embedded in their prophesy. If you repent and humble yourself and return to God, He will turn from the calamity He has decreed for you! So it is these two things, God’s law and the message of the prophets, which are hung.


But what are they hung on? Matthew 22:40 says “on these two commandments.” What two commandments are they? 


And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him.“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.This is the great and first commandment.And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself (vs 35-39).


Here’s the hanger: love God with everything you are and love people around you as much as you love yourself.


Too many times people try to hang God’s law and His message of repentance on something other than these two commandments. That is, they keep God’s law because they want to appear important to the people around them. It’s just an outward show. It’s like they’re saying, “Look at how religious I am.” That’s not loving God. That’s hypocrisy.


Or perhaps they keep God’s law because they think they can show God how righteous they are. Let me assure you: God is not fooled by our religious antics. Our righteous is an filthy rags to Him. Jesus Christ is our righteousness!


Sometimes people think they can keep God’s laws as a bargaining chip with God. That goes something like this: If I keep the Sabbath this week, you’ll make all my problems disappear for the next week. If I don’t eat pork, you’ll keep me healthy all my life. If I pay a tithe to the church, you’ll make me win the lottery. Those people aren’t keeping the law because they love God, they’re keeping the law because they hope they can influence God to bless them if they keep the law!


God wants a relationship, a close relationship, with each and every one of His people. He loves us so much that He sent His Son to die because we were sinners. We were separated from Him because we wouldn’t obey His laws. We couldn’t obey His laws because of our carnal nature. So God sent His Son to make a way for us to be bought back from sin, to put to death the carnal nature and to be new creatures in Christ. He paid our sin debt. That’s how much God loves us. So what’s our response? If we truly understand, then we love God - and we obey His commandments because we love God.


You know, God’s love is so great! If we would respond to His call to love Him with all of our hearts and all of our minds and all of our souls, we would find His laws easier to obey. They would begin to be part of our nature; we would obey because we couldn’t imagine not obeying.


You know, the hanger is an incredible invention! Perhaps we should use it more frequently to hang up our clothes. And we really should use God’s hanger - loving God with everything we are, and loving our neighbor as ourself.


Sabbath, January 30th
Never Give Up
But the one who endures to the end will be saved.  Matthew 24:13  


Can you think of something that would be very difficult to do? I can. Climb Mt. Everest. Explore the Amazon Rainforest. Travel from Independence, MO to Oregon in a covered wagon. Keep all the weeds out of my garden. Keep the house clean. From the “I’m never going to do that” category to the “every day” category, there are tasks which require us to persevere. We have to be very diligent, to keep working at it, to persist in our endeavor to attain our goal. 


All of life is like that. You persevere in school to learn so that you can get a good job, so that you can make enough money to live comfortably and be generous to others. You persevere in relationships: it’s not always easy living with a sibling, but if you can learn to get along with him, or her, you can probably get along with anyone. You persevere in jobs that have to be done: painting the house, fencing the yard, cutting firewood - because all of these tasks make your life better.


You are probably old enough to realize that there is more to do than you can possibly get done. So the key is to figure out what really has value to God. What will bring glory and honor to Him? What will bring you closer to Him? Think about it for a minute. You could set a goal to watch every vile and nasty show on television for the next six months. You would really have to persevere, but it wouldn’t bring glory and honor to God and it would likely take you farther from God in your relationship to Him. You could set a goal to read three chapters in the Bible every day. That would take a lot of perseverance and dedication - and, if you asked God for wisdom to understand, that would be a very God-honoring goal. It would also be very beneficial to you because you would be getting God’s word into your mind every day!


But the one who endures to the end will be saved.  Matthew 24:13  


So what was Jesus talking about in Matthew 24:13?  He was talking about being a Christian, holding onto the truths of God, conducting yourself in a God-honoring way - no matter what. This verse comes right in the middle of the prophecies about the  end time, prophecies which describe the persecution Christians will endure before Jesus Christ comes back to set up His kingdom on this earth. Jesus’ message is to keep fighting the good fight, to run with endurance the race set before us, to overcome, and to endure to the end. The implication here is that it won’t be easy. It will be difficult to endure to the end, to persevere in doing what is right.


It’s going to require a determination from each of us to rely on God for our strength and a dedication to the goal. Sometimes we look at the big projects - like painting the whole house or reading all of the Bible from cover to cover - and we’re totally overwhelmed by how big the task is. But each task is made up of smaller actions. You don’t walk outside and paint the whole house. You paint one brushstroke at a time. You don’t open the Bible and read the whole thing. You read one word at a time, one sentence at a time, perhaps three chapters every day. In anything that you accomplish, you do one small thing, and then you do it again, and then you do it again. Pretty soon, the whole house is painted, the whole garden is weeded, the entire Bible has been read. 


Enduring to the end means setting the pattern of your life - daily prayer, daily Bible study, fellowshipping with the body of believers on a consistent basis, and constant reliance on God’s guidance. Then, when something comes along which doesn’t fit with the Godly pattern of your life, you can look at it and evaluate it: Does this honor God? Because you’ve been persevering in your efforts to seek God with all of your heart, it will be much easier to determine whether it’s a good thing or not. 


Enduring to the end also means sticking to that pattern - unless God shows you differently. It’s exhausting to keep pulling up weeds. It’s tiring to clean house. There are days when you just don’t feel like reading your Bible. There are times when you are angry at someone so you don’t feel like praying to God. Those are the times when you do it anyway. You persevere in doing what is right even when you don’t feel like it because one action leads to another action until it becomes a habit.


I love the quote from Winston Churchill: “Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never-in nothing, great or small, large or petty - never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense.” 


Fight the good fight. Run with endurance the race set before you. Endure to the end. Never give up.

Sabbath, February 6th
So Doing
Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Matthew 24:46


Have you ever been given a job to do? Of course! People are given jobs to do from the time they are old enough to understand directions! Pick up your room. Put your toys away. Hang up your coat. Wash the dishes. Most of these kinds of jobs are short-term tasks. You do them, and they’re done, at least until the dishes are dirty again. Other jobs are long-term jobs: fence the property, teach your children until they move out of the house, work for AT&T for 33 years. 


There’s an interesting thing about most jobs: there’s a certain amount of freedom in how the job is done. If you are supposed to wash the supper dishes, you get to choose which dish you’re going to wash first. A very particular dish washer might tell you to wash the glasses first, then the silverware, then the bowls and plates, and finish with the cooking pots and pans. But, in many cases, your mom is just glad you’re washing the dishes! Even in working for AT&T for 33 years, I know Ron had a certain amount of freedom to accomplish the job. It had to be done correctly, and in the shortest amount of time. But as long as Ron did his work, management didn’t tell him exactly how that was to be accomplished. Or think about teaching children. There’s a lot of freedom there!! Each child learns a little differently; that’s why there are so many different curriculum choices. How to present a topic can vary from teacher to teacher, from child to child, and from day to day. There are many such jobs which are more of an art than an exact science.


So, considering how ubiquitous jobs are, you probably won’t be surprised to learn that God has likewise given you a job - if you are His, if He is your God. Can you think of what that job might be?


Jesus said we are to be the light of the world (Matthew 5:14-16). We are supposed to shine the gospel of who Jesus Christ is to everyone around us. But as long as we do that accurately, God doesn’t dictate in the Bible exactly how that should look for each person.


We are to make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19-20). In order to do that we have to be disciples of Jesus ourselves, seeking Him with all of our heart so that we know Him well enough to share Him with others, encouraging them to likewise follow Him.


Hebrews 10:24-25 says that we are to consider how to stir up one another to love and good works. Did you know that you may have a special talent of encouragement to the church family? Your smile and hugs may mean the world to many.


Do you know that God gave a special job to children? Psalm 8:2 (and Matthew 21:16) say that from children He has ordained praise to silence the foe! But God doesn’t say what that praise should exactly look like. It could be singing songs of praise to God. It could be thanking God for what He has done that day.


John the Baptist was given a very specific job. He was to prepare the way of the Lord. He knew this. But John didn’t know exactly what that looked like. Remember? He didn’t want to baptize Jesus; he felt that he should be baptized by Jesus. Isn’t that encouraging to you?! Even a great man like John had to rely on God to show him how to accomplish the job that he’d been given.


There’s one other important thing to remember about your job, the one God gives to you. You have to do it. Too many people in our world today think that “work” is a four-letter word, that having a job is a bad thing. (Oh, they like the pay check; they just don’t like the work.) But God works. Adam and Eve worked in the garden before sin ever entered the world - and God said His creation was very good. Work doesn’t have to be a bad thing. Still, many people groan when they think about having to go to work.  They put off doing jobs that need to be done. They procrastinate. They try to find someone else to do the job. They find excuses. They find diversions to keep them from accomplishing the job that they’ve been given to do. And sometimes, those jobs, which really need to be done, are done poorly or not at all. Sometimes they’re done, but with lots of grumbling!! That’s really unfortunate because enjoying your work is truly a blessing from God (Ecclesiastes 5:19). When you enjoy it, you don’t mind getting to work. It’s a pleasure. 


So what’s your attitude towards the job that God has given you to do. Are you procrastinating? Are you too busy doing something else? Are you trying to get someone else to do what you should be doing for the Master? Or are you looking for opportunities to be a light, to encourage the church family, or to praise God with all of your heart. We should be ready, willing, eager to do the job God has given us to do. We get to do something for our God - for the One who has given us everything, the One who loves us enough to make a way to adopt us into His family! 


When Jesus Christ comes back, He’s going to be looking to see how you’re doing your job. There’s lots of freedom in how you want to do your job. You might not know how to accomplish your job today, but He’s promised to guide you and give you wisdom (Proverbs 3:5-6). Regardless, you’ve got a job to do. Isn’t it time to get busy working for our Lord? When He comes back, I want Him to find me “so doing.”


Sabbath, February 13th
Healing
Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, “Your sins are forgiven,” or to say, “Rise, take up your bed and walk”? Mark 2:9

How great is our God? When you think of the amazing things that He can do, what comes to mind? What kind of power does He have?

One day when Jesus was at home in Capernaum, he was teaching. There were so many people listening to him that the house was crowded full. Four men wanted to bring a paralytic to Jesus to heal, but they couldn't get close to Him because of the number of people gathered around Jesus. So they hoisted the paralytic up onto the roof. They dug through the roof and lowered the paralytic on his mat right in front of Jesus. 

Now, Mark is known for his brevity. He doesn’t give us lots of details. But can you imagine what this would have been like? Perhaps the roof was a thatch roof with branches, straw, reed, or palm leaves. It could possibly been a roof with branches covered with sod. It could have had rough shingles. Either way, it would have been full of leaves, dirt, insects, perhaps a mouse or two. These four men are digging through this roof to make an opening large enough to lower the paralytic through on his mat. Can you imagine the debris (leaves, dirt, insects) falling on the people in the home? I can imagine they weren’t feeling too charitable towards these guys. And I imagine the owner wasn’t either!

But Jesus’ reaction is so different. He doesn’t rebuke them for disturbing his teaching. He doesn’t chide them for messing up the house. He doesn’t seem upset at them at all. In fact, He sees their faith. What faith? They have to have really believed that Jesus could heal their friend. If you only think Jesus can do it, you don’t go to all the work to hoist a friend up on a roof, dig through the roof, and lower him in front of Jesus. If you think there’s a good possibility that maybe Jesus can do something, you might wait for Jesus to come out of the house; He’s got to come out some time!! But, these men truly believed that Jesus could heal him. And they cared enough about their friend to want it to happen now. Jesus saw their faith . . . so He healed their friend. Right? Well, not immediately.

Jesus told the paralytic, “Your sins are forgiven.”

Can you imagine the reaction of the four friends? They might have been thinking, “Wait a minute! That’s not what we came for. We wanted him to walk.” The reaction of the scribes was very negative! They thought in their hearts that Jesus was blaspheming because only God can forgive sins. If Jesus is forgiving this man’s sins, then Jesus is claiming to be God. The scribes were not happy with Jesus’ statement. And Jesus knew it. So He said to the paralytic: Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, “Your sins are forgiven,” or to say, “Rise, take up your bed and walk”? Mark 2:9

Think about this for a minute. Which is easier to say: your sins are forgiven or take up your bed and walk? We may be thinking that it’s a whole lot easier to forgive someone of their sins. You just say, “O.K. I forgive you” and you’re done. But you actually have to change something, to heal something, to fix something in order for the paralytic to walk again. But Jesus simply said, “Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your bed and walk.’?”

It causes us to stop and think, doesn’t it? What is involved in forgiving sins? It’s more than just saying the words, isn’t it? Hebrews 9:22 says that without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins. That’s a lot more than just saying words. The forgiveness of sins requires a blood sacrifice, specifically, Jesus’ blood sacrifice on our behalf. Yet, Isaiah 53:5 says that by Jesus stripes, the suffering He endured as He was being crucified, we are healed. Our physical healing and our spiritual healing is possible because of our Messiah’s death and resurrection.

Jesus also made it quite plain, to anyone who heard Him that day, that He had the authority to forgive sin. He was, in fact, telling them all that He was, and is, God - God, the Son and the Son of God.

The paralytic was healed that day. Jesus told him to pick up his bed and go home. The crowd was amazed, saying that they’d never seen anything like it. They were amazed the man was walking. Did they miss the significance of what Jesus had said? Did they not realize that he’d forgiven the man’s sins - that he was clean before God?  Maybe not - because, after all, we can’t really see anything when a person’s sins are forgiven.

At any rate, I’m so very glad those four men had the faith to dig through the roof. I’m glad this event is recorded for us to read and to consider. Think about it: what if Jesus had healed the man so he could walk and yet he carried his sin debt. He would have died, eventually. But if Jesus had forgiven his sins and left him a paralytic, he would have been assured of eternal life in God’s kingdom. Which do you think is more important to God? It’s a poignant reminder to us that we don’t see things the way God does. 
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Something to think about, isn’t it?


Sabbath, February 20th
When You’re Afraid
He said to them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?” Mark 4:40


Do you know that some people ride rollercoasters on purpose so they can be scared? They like the feeling of being so terrified that they might die that they scream at the top of their lungs! And, if they’ve ridden the roller coaster so many times that the scariness is wearing off, they raise their hands into the air. It’s like telling their brains that they aren’t holding onto anything. They could, just possibly, die. But, 99.9999% of the time, the roller coaster works like it’s supposed to, and no one dies.


Some people drive their cars really fast, or bungee jump off cliffs, or sky dive, or go rock climbing for the same reason. It’s almost as if they are sitting next to themselves and they want to scare their brains - the brains which know that what they’re doing is very dangerous and they could actually die. But, for one reason or another, they think that nothing will happen to them.


Sometimes when there’s a really scary thing, we play games with our brains. We make up rules to convince ourselves that there’s really no danger, even though our brains know there really is. When I was 12 years old, I decided I didn’t want to share a room with my sister anymore. So one day, when I got home from school, I moved all of my stuff to the basement. When Mom got home, I had a bed made up downstairs and all my clothes were moved. Mom agreed I could sleep downstairs, but I don’t think she thought I’d last too long. Since we lived in Wyoming, there weren’t many spiders (at least compared to Missouri), but there were still spiders. I knew we had spiders because we had spider webs. But I really wanted to sleep downstairs, so first I tried sleeping with the covers over my head. I couldn’t breathe. So eventually  I made up a rule for the spiders. As long as my body was covered up, they weren’t allowed to crawl on my face. I don’t know how I managed to convince my brain that the spiders could actually hear those rules, understand those rules, and actually abide by those rules - especially since I don’t ever remember speaking those rules out loud. 


I think about that now and just shake my head. And I shake my head over the people who do very dangerous things because they like the adrenaline rush. We don’t need to add more danger  to our lives because the reality is that we live in a very dangerous world. There are unexpected things, things over which we have no control, which can injure or even kill us. They’re all around us.


That’s what the disciples of Jesus were experiencing. When it was evening, they’d gotten into the boat to cross the Sea of Galilee. A terrible storm blew up. Jesus was sleeping in the stern of the boat, and the disciples were more and more afraid that they were going to die. They didn’t know what else to do: they woke up Jesus. He said to them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?” 


Now think about this for a minute! At least four of these men were fishermen. They knew the power of the storm. They knew what a storm could do to the boat, and they had a healthy respect for the water. They knew they could die - at least under normal circumstances. But Jesus, the One who was, and is, the Son of God was with them. The winds and the waves were under His authority. The winds and the waves had to obey Him. Nothing was going to happen that He didn’t allow to happen.


Sometimes I think about the storms in my life. Those storms are the scary things that happen - the scary things that I wasn’t expecting and that I have no control over. God is still in control and nothing will happen that He doesn’t allow.


Having said that, I’m not planning to go rock climbing. I’m not planning to bungee jump off a cliff. And I don’t need the adrenaline rush of a roller coaster. There are too many truly scary things without intentionally adding a few scary things to my life. I’m not going to intentionally do dangerous things either. I don’t play with poisonous snakes. I don’t drive my car too fast. Some people say that God will protect you from getting hurt. I don’t believe that God will protect you from getting hurt if you are  intentionally trying to get hurt. 


But when scary things happen in my life, I try to remember that God is in control. He has promised to never leave me or to forsake me. He has promised never to give me more than I can bear. And I know that He loves me - He calls me His treasured possession!


Believing these promises is part of having faith in God. That faith in God helps to keep me from being terrified when the storms of life come. And you know what? Having faith in God is much more rational than believing the spiders will obey your rules just because you want to sleep in the basement.


So what do you do when you are afraid?

February 27th
Our Rules or God’s?
You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men. Mark 7:8


I have played a few card games in my life: Canasta, 500, Cribbage, Spades, Hearts, Spoons, Golf, Kings in the Corner, War with Your Neighbor, and Solitaire in numerous varieties. I don’t mind learning a new game, but I like knowing what the rules are going in. There have been a few times when the rules were explained as we went along - and that’s no fun. Imagine playing hearts for the first time and leading the queen of spades, only to find your opponents chortling with glee because you’ve just eaten the queen. There are times when you might want to play a few practice hands that don’t count because sometimes it’s easier to understand the rules as you see the game unfold, but that’s a totally different thing. Still, it at least makes sense to know the basic rules going in.


So imagine playing a game where the rules change at the whim of the rule maker. I think there are games like that - the wild card and certain values are determined by the dealer before he starts the hand. But once the cards are dealt, even in that game, the dealer can’t change the rules in the middle of the hand. Imagine the frustration of the players if the rules were changed in the middle of the game. What if, in Monopoly, you had built up your kingdom, you had Boardwalk and Parkway with hotels on each and you had several other monopolies. You look like you’re well on the way to creaming everyone else. Then someone says, “We’ve been playing for two hours, so now it’s time to play that when you land on your own property, you have to pay everyone else the rental.” In a democratic gesture, everyone votes for the new measure (over your protests) and you suddenly find yourself losing big time! You know that’s not what the game directions say, that’s not what the game inventor intended, and, frankly, it’s not fair. You played by the rules; you should be winning the game. But some people want to win at all costs - some will cheat, some will lie, some will try to change the rules of the game. Their goal is to come out the victor over everyone else. It’s not much fun to “play” with those kind of people.


Did you know that some people approach the law of God in the same way? Here are the ground rules for the game of life: All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). All need a Savior. There is only One Savior, Jesus Christ (Acts 4:12). He is the only Way to Eternal Life (John 14:6). Salvation and Eternal Life are free gifts from God when you accept Jesus Christ as your Savior, the Lord of your life. There is nothing you can do to earn salvation; it is a free gift. Once you accept Jesus Christ as your Savior, you have entered into a covenant with Him. He will be your God; you will be part of His people. As your God and King, He gets to make the rules by which you live your life - as subjects of the King of the Universe (Ephesians 2:8-10).


Here’s where it gets kind of tricky for people. They like being saved from the penalty of sin, which is death.  Some argue that there are many ways to the kingdom of heaven - you don’t have to have a relationship with Jesus. Others argue that since your goal is salvation, once you’ve accepted Jesus as your Savior, you’re home free; you don’t have to be concerned about observing any of God’s laws. Still others argue that when Jesus died, He did away with a lot of the old rules (called commandments or laws) - like keeping the Sabbath, or eating unclean foods, or keeping the holy days of God. But Jesus kept the rules of don’t murder, don’t steal, don’t commit adultery, don’t bear false witness, don’t covet, honor your father and your mother  - and these other rules as well. Shouldn’t you?!


God’s laws are a reflection of His character, of who He is. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8). Similarly, God’s laws are still in effect (Romans 3:31). They don’t save you, but they are evidence that you are saved. When you keep God’s laws, you show that you have a relationship with God, that you belong to Him and that He is your Savior from sin and death.


Too many people over the centuries have tried to change the rules - because they don’t want to submit to God, they think His laws are too difficult, or they just want to improve upon His commandments. The Pharisees of Jesus’ day came into conflict with Jesus over this very thing. They had a whole set of laws which were based on their traditions which could be traced back to the law of God, but which had basically changed the law to fit their agenda, their goals, their priorities. Following their tradition had taken them away from following God. Jesus told them, “You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men” (Mark 7:8).


Think about that for a minute. Here’s a game that you’re playing, and you want to win. Only you think the rules are different than what the inventor of the game says they are! That means, if you keep playing using your rules, you’re never going to win. You’re going to lose. The Pharisees didn’t like being told that they were ignoring God’s law in favor of their own. The implication of Jesus’ words was that they were not going to be in God’s kingdom. They were going to lose.


Once again, observing God’s laws don’t earn salvation. Once you have accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior, keeping God’s laws is evidence that you have been saved. These laws change how you live and shape you into the image of Christ. 


Those are the rules of the game. And unlike Monopoly, the game players don’t have the option of democratically voting a change of the rules. We play by God’s rules.

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Sabbath, March 5th
While You Were Sleeping
Lest he come suddenly and find you asleep. Mark 13:36


Sometimes kids don’t want to go to bed. Perhaps they think they’re going to miss something important. While it is true that some parents wait to eat ice cream until after the kids are in bed, more often parents stay up a little later to have important conversations with each other, or to pay bills and do laundry, or just to have a little piece of quiet! But kids don’t know that. They are sure that Mom and Dad are waiting until they go to bed. Then the parents will have FUN!


But I’m pretty sure that’s not why Jesus told his disciples to stay awake.   . . . lest he come suddenly and find you asleep. And what I say to you I say to all: Stay awake.” (Mark 13:36-27). In fact, Jesus wasn’t advocating staying awake all the time, never going to sleep. God designed our bodies to recharge during sleep. Studies have shown that kids grow when they’re asleep. While you’re sleeping, your brain processes everything that happened during the day and files it away, or sometimes it spends all night working out an algebra problem you were stuck on when you went to bed, or sometimes it reviews all of the stuff you were supposed to remember for tomorrow’s big test. Researchers have found that it’s much more important to get a good night’s sleep than it is to spend all night cramming for tomorrow’s test.  But still, Jesus did tell his disciples to stay awake. So what’s He talking about?


When you’re asleep, you don’t know what’s going on around you. You are completely unaware of what is happening. You’re unconscious. You’re asleep. The family dog could be chewing up your homework. Your older brother could be reorganizing your stuff. Your parents could bring clean clothes into your room. You just don’t know because you’re asleep. It’s such a good analogy for Jesus to use because everyone has experienced waking up in the morning to find something has happened while they were sleeping. Sometimes it’s a big snowstorm. Sometimes you wake up to find out that your mom had the baby in the night. There are sometimes great things that have happened - but you didn’t know because you were asleep. 


But for those things, it doesn’t really matter. So what if it snowed while you were sleeping. You can’t go sledding until the sun comes up anyway. If you try to sled at night, you’re likely to run headfirst into a tree.


What really does matter is being awake when Jesus comes back. But I’m still not talking about sleeping. Not really. I’m talking about being aware. Pay attention to the events going on around you. But more importantly, pay attention to yourself. Are you aware of what you’re doing in your daily life? Are you aware of the choices you are making? Are they good choices? And more importantly, are they Godly choices?


We are so busy, and there are so many things that grab our attention during the day. (And no, I’m not saying that we should have less school or less homework.) We can become distracted by the things around us and forget that our most important job is to glorify God in everything we think, everything we say, and everything we do. We can become so preoccupied with what we’re going to do tomorrow, or what someone just said to us, or what happened last week, that we turn on the autopilot and just kind of let our day happen. We aren’t really paying attention to what’s going on around us and we’re certainly not making thoughtful choices about our words and our actions. We’re just moving through our day, reacting to things - almost like we’re sleep-walking.


That’s what Jesus is talking about. When we take the name of Jesu Christ - when we call ourself a Christian - we are representing Him in every one of our thoughts and words and actions. We bring dishonor to Him when we thoughtlessly say something to our brother or sister. We bring dishonor to God when we just don’t think, when we’re careless about what we do or say around other people.  Stay awake! Be aware of what you’re doing or saying. Make good choices. No, make Godly choices! God has given you a job to do - to bring glory and honor to Him, and to share the gospel with the people around you (with your words and with how you live your life). Be aware of what you’re doing. Stay awake. Don’t fall asleep on the job. You don’t want to find out that Jesus Christ has returned while you were sleeping, and you’re not ready.


Sabbath, March 12th
Praise God Anyway
And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives. Mark 14:26

One summer, my brother, sister, and I went to the Vacation Bible School done by the non-denominational church that my grandparents attended. I really liked the young lady who did the music, Jecca. So when she talked about praising God no matter what’s going on in your life, I listened. Jecca had painted a big sign on their barn, “Praise God anyway,” to remind herself that no matter what was happening in her life, her first priority was to praise God.  That idea has rattled around in my mind for almost forty years now, and in my mind, I can still see Jecca teaching us songs and encouraging us to praise God.
  
Perhaps that theme, of praising God no matter what, is one of the reasons I like Facing the Giants so much. Coach Taylor told his team, “If we win, we praise Him. If we lose, we  praise Him.” No matter what would happen in their football season, they had determined to praise God.
    
So we come to the night that Jesus met with his disciples in the upper room. He’d shared the bread and wine with them. He’d washed their feet.  He told Judas Iscariot that what he was about to do, he should do quickly. And then, knowing what was coming - the beating, the travesty of justice, the abandonment, the crucifixion and agonizing death - Jesus got ready to go with his disciples out to the Mount of Olives. Jesus was going to pray to His Father. It was a sobering night, a dreadful night. But here’s how Mark records it: And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives (Mark 14:26). Even knowing what was coming, Jesus was praising God anyway.
    
It makes you think, doesn’t it? I can think of so many psalms which talk about praising God. “Let everything that has breath praise the LORD” (Psalm 150:6).  “Praise the Eternal with a psalm” (Psalm 81). “Praise ye the LORD, O, praise ye the LORD. Praise from the heavens and praise in the heights” (Psalm 148:1). But you know, I can think of nowhere that we’re commanded to praise God only when things are going well, or when we are happy, or when we feel like it. We’re told to sing and make music in our hearts to God (Ephesians 5:19). We’re told to speak to one another in hymns and psalms and spiritual songs (Col 3:16). We are told to praise God . . . period.
    
We’re given examples of when people did sing praises to God: two of my favorites are King Jehoshaphat (2 Chronicles 20) and Paul and Silas in prison (Acts 16:16-40). Jehoshaphat sent out the singers first and God fought the battle against Ammon and Moab. When Paul and Silas began to sing and praise God, an earthquake loosed every prisoners’ chains and the jail doors flew open. The jailer and his entire household were baptized that night. But, just like in Facing the Giants, there are stories of praise even when things didn’t go the way people wanted them to. When the Titanic was sinking, those left on board gathered together and sang “Abide With Me.” Even though they were going to drown, they chose to praise God anyway!
    
When Jonathan was born, I sang “Come, Thou Fount of every blessing; tune my heart to sing Thy praise.” When Christopher broke His jaw in 2006, I sang “Be not dismayed at what e’re betide; God will take care of you.” When we were visiting my grandmother’s ranch that June, I was singing “For His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.”  When we took Ken to his first Feast of Tabernacles in 1997, we stood around the piano one evening and I taught the family “As the Deer.”  The night before the Last Great Day in 1991, the whole family walked out through the ponderosa pines at Lake Tahoe to the tennis courts. We lay down and looked at the stars. Almost simultaneously, we started singing “How Great Thou Art.” I can remember so many times in my life when a song was running through my head, both encouraging me and reminding me to praise God from Whom all blessings flow. 
    
Music is a great blessing! It’s a wonderful tool for praising God - whether things are going well or whether you’re experiencing some storms of life. So take a moment. Think about your favorite hymn or Christian song. Which one comes to mind right now? Perhaps it’s the one that God has given you right now to help you praise Him - because of what’s happening in your life, for both the good and the bad.
    
​I’m so encouraged by Mark’s reminder that as Jesus walked into the most difficult day of His life, He sang a hymn of praise to God. Can we but do likewise?


Sabbath, March 19th
Salvation
And all flesh shall see the salvation of God.  Luke 3:6

There are all sorts of summer jobs. Some high school or college students work at Six Flags. Some work in the bean fields or the corn fields. Some work in fast food restaurants. Some get to life guard at community pools. I spent one summer detasseling corn. That was probably the hardest physical job I ever had! I spent three summers cooking for a hay crew on a ranch in Western Nebraska. Two summers I worked in a chocolate factory. You could eat as much as you wanted, but the overpowering smell of chocolate rather curbed our desire to eat any of it! Three summers I taught swimming lessons in the morning and life guarded in the afternoon and evening. That was probably the most stressful job I ever had.

Most people think that lifeguards just sit on their chairs, blow their whistles at rowdy kids, and work on getting a great tan. Actually, lifeguards are there to do just what their name says: to guard lives. You see, many kids underestimate their swimming abilities. If they can’t swim well and they get into water over their head, they are in serious trouble right away. Water is not very forgiving. The first year I guarded, I dove in to save one kid. For ten weeks, that’s not too bad. The next year, I saved two kids. The third year, I went in for ten saves in ten weeks! I started dreaming that I was saving kids. It was very stressful because I knew just how quickly a kid could get into trouble.

But it’s not just kids who can quickly get into trouble. Trouble comes in many shapes and sizes, and we all, at different times in our lives, need to be rescued. Sometimes other people can help you get out of a bad situation. Sometimes money can solve your troubles. Sometimes it’s a pet that rescues its owner. But ultimately, God is the One who saves us. He sends the right person just at the right time to rescue us. He helps us earn money so we can pay our debts. He instills the desire in us to take home the pet that might one day save our life. He gives the doctor the wisdom to know how to treat a patient, but God is the One who heals that person. He gives the life guard the swimming skills, strength, and alertness to potential problems.

How often do you stop to thank God for all the times He’s rescued you out of trouble? Sometimes I wonder if God rescues us from trouble to remind us that we need a Savior to rescue us from sin. We can’t rely on other people, or money, or our good looks to save us from our sin. There is only One person who is able to save us - Jesus Christ.

So when Luke says, “And all flesh shall see the salvation of God”  (Luke 3:6), what salvation is he talking about? He’s talking about Jesus Christ. 

Jesus Christ is the One who saves us. Even His name, Jesus or Joshua, means salvation. So, think about this: Jesus can rescue us from trouble in this life - from problems and catastrophes. But even if He doesn’t, Jesus can save us from our sin. He’s the One who took our sin for us and makes it possible for us to have eternal life in God’s kingdom. Hebrews 7:25 puts it this way: Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. Jesus is our Savior. There is no other! In Him we have salvation.

Because Jesus is the Son of God, and God the Son, He is able to rescue us in this life from major and minor troubles, and He’s able to give eternal life because He saves us from our sin. There is no One like our God!!!

I saw a sign the other day that I really liked - maybe because I spent those three summer lifeguarding, and maybe just because it just sums up so well how great our God is. It said: My Lifeguard walks on water.


Sabbath, March 26th
​Treasure Hunt
For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Luke 12:34


When I was a kid, I loved treasure hunts. I don’t remember any of the treasures we found, but I remember the process of figuring out the clues and searching for the next one. When I was older, I loved making treasure hunts for my fourth grade students. But I still think of the fun of the process more than the finding of the treasure itself.


So what is treasure? When I say the word treasure, I think of pirates’ treasure: a chest of gold and jewels. But treasure can be almost anything. It is simply something that holds great value to you. For instance, you might think that money is treasure. Many people do. It’s valuable. It can buy you lots of things. 


What else is valuable? What else could be a treasure? It might be an antique lamp or pocket watch. It could be an expensive car. It could be a horse that has won lots of ribbons at horse shows. That horse becomes very valuable and is a treasure both because of its money-making abilities and its potential descendants.


Land can be a treasure. If you have a piece of property where there is water and good soil, relatively pleasant neighbors, and peace and quiet, then you have a treasure. It’s hard to find a place where you can be at home and be at rest.


But other people might say that treasure is the family photo album. It can have photos that could never be replaced. You’ll never be in that exact same place with those exact same people again. Puppies and children grow up. Grandparents get old and die. Accidents happen. A family photo album is precious because it contains so many memories of people that are special to you.


So a treasure can be many things to different people. But, basically, it is the thing that has great value to you. You would give up everything, or perhaps a lot, to have that one thing. But a treasure also tugs at your heart strings. You value this treasure so much that you want to be where that treasure is.


Some people value their job so much that it consumes their entire life. They are motivated not only by the money, but by the power and prestige they can get. Some people spend all their time working with dogs or horses or alpacas, to get them ready for shows so they can win ribbons. The prestige of having the best drives them and they spend incredible amounts of time pursuing that treasure.


The first year my two sons spent a couple of weeks with Grandma and Grandpa, I called at least once a day. It was obvious that I was spending a lot of time thinking about them because every time the phone rang, Grandpa knew it was going to be me - checking on the boys. That’s where my heart and my thoughts were those two weeks. Two of my treasures were far away from me.


So, let me ask you again, what is your treasure? What do you spend most of your time thinking about? What do you spend most of your time pursuing? Money, pleasure, friends, power, prestige, a healthy body? What is at the top of the list of your priorities, what you can’t quit thinking of every day?


I hope it’s God.


Yes, we need to work to get money to live in this world. Yes, we need to spend time with friends and family. Yes, we should take care of our bodies. There’s nothing wrong with hobbies which can bring you pleasure and even prestige. But, when it’s all said and done, where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. If we’re truly Christians, if we truly belong to God, then we should be spending a lot of our day thinking about God, talking with God in prayer, reading our Bible, talking about Him with others, and living our life in a way that pleases Him. God is our Provider, Sustainer, our Guide and Savior. He’s everything that we need and more. And if we treasure Him and a relationship with Him, it will be obvious because that’s where our heart will be.


I find it so interesting that what I loved about treasure hunts as a kid was the process. The treasure at the end wasn’t all that valuable. In a similar way, many people live their lives in such a way that the treasure at the end isn’t all that valuable. In a word, they aren’t seeking God. I believe that this life is preparation for God’s kingdom. I believe that this life is not the goal and shouldn’t be our focus. But God, in His mercy, has made this life pleasurable in many ways. He gives us bright colors to look at in nature. He gives us good food to eat and wonderful friends to spend time with. But our goal isn’t this life and accumulating things in in. Our goal is living this life in a way that pleases and honors God, looking forward to His kingdom and life with God eternally. 


So, where is your heart? What do you treasure?

Sabbath, April 2nd
Redeemed! How I Love to Proclaim It!
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people . . . Luke 1:68


We sing about Jesus visiting us and redeeming us. There’s a plethora of songs! Seriously!
Joy to the World! The Lord is come! Let earth receive her King!


Redeemed! How I love to proclaim it! Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb!
Redeemed in His infinite mercy; His child and forever I am!


Man of Sorrows! What a name for the Son of God who came -
ruined sinners to reclaim! Hallelujah! What a Savior!


We even sing about how Jesus redeemed us!


 I’ve been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb; filled with the Holy Spirit I am.
All my sins are washed away; I’ve been redeemed!


Jesus paid it all; all to Him I owe! 
Sin had left a crimson stain - He washed it white as snow.


We understand that Jesus is our Savior. He has saved us from the penalty of our sins. He has reconciled us to the Father, making it possible for us to be adopted into the Family of God. So now what?


There’s another whole set of hymns and songs which talk about Jesus being the Light. 


Light of the world, You step down into darkness, opened my eyes. Let me see.


Shine, Jesus shine. Fill this land with the Father’s glory.


Why do we need light? If it’s night and you’re trying to sleep, the light can keep you awake. But if it’s night and you’re trying to do something, you have to have light to see!


Part of the chorus in “Shine, Jesus Shine” sings, Blaze, Spirit blaze. Set our hearts on fire. Set our hearts on fire for what? For following the Light, Jesus Christ, in His ways!


We also sing about that. Sweetly Lord have we heard Thee calling, “Come, follow me.” If we’re going to follow Jesus, we have to have light to see where we’re going.


Lead, Kindly Light amid th’encircling gloom. Lead Thou me on. 
The night is dark and I am far from home. Lead Thou me on.


The truth is that this world is growing darker - which means it’s become more evil and more rebellious against God. The pulls of society and the people around us are away from God and His ways. We have to rely on the Light of God to show us what to do and where to go. Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.


So when Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, began his prophecy (in Luke 1:68-79) Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people . . . it’s very appropriate that Zechariah would end the prophecy with whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.


These verses form the bookends, the A and A’, of Zechariah’s prophecy because it’s a chiasm. (We can talk about the rest of the chiasm at another time.) Isn’t it interesting that Zechariah prophecies that Jesus Christ will visit and redeem His people - because they need to be redeemed; they’re sitting in darkness and have no hope. Without the redemption from Jesus’ death and resurrection, we have nothing to look forward to except death! But once redeemed, God’s people don’t continue to just sit there. We don’t take the attitude, “O.K. I’m saved. Guess I can do whatever I want.” We walk in the Light. We walk in newness of life through Jesus Christ, following His leading into the way of peace. 


There are even songs about that! 
When we walk with the Lord in the light of His word,
What a glory He sheds on our way!
While we do His good will, He abides with us still,
And with all who will trust and obey.


We trust Jesus that He has visited us and redeemed us. He’s the Light who shows us which way to walk. Now we just need to obey. 


Isn’t it wonderful how God has inspired hymn writers and poets and musicians to compose music which encourages us! It assures us we’ve been redeemed. It reminds us that Jesus is the Light which guides our path. It exhorts us to walk worthy of the calling we have received. I hope you use these musical tools to prepare your hearts as we approach the anniversary of Jesus’  death and resurrection, when He redeemed us.


Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people . . . Luke 1:68

Sabbath, April 9th
Jubilee!
 . . . to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. Luke 4:19

Happy New Year’s!!

Today is New Year’s Day. Most people think that New Year’s comes in January, but not according to God’s calendar. God created the year to start during the spring - when everything is getting green, new buds are popping out on the trees, and everything is new. What a beautiful time for the new year to begin!!

God also designed in His calendar a very special year: the year of Jubilee. Once every fifty years, on the year of jubilee, slaves were released, debts were forgiven, and everyone returned to the land that was their inheritance given to them by God. Think about that!! If you had made some really bad decisions and had gotten yourself into debt, those debts were wiped clean. If you’d made some really, really bad decisions and had to sell your family’s inheritance to pay those debts, the debts were wiped clean and you got the land back!  If you’d really, really, really made some bad decisions, so bad that you had to sell yourself into slavery - to work for someone else to pay off a debt - in that fiftieth year, not only would your debt be forgiven, you were also set free! The Year of Jubilee was a time to proclaim liberty throughout the land! It was a wonderful year. It was a time for great celebration! Everyone was free from debt to other people!

God designed the Year of Jubilee, and the idea of freedom from debt, to demonstrate to His people that they were also in debt to Him. Once they sinned, they had a debt that could only be paid in blood. 

Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. Hebrews 9:22 

Once they sinned, they were sold as slaves to sin. 

Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, geveryone who practices sin is a slave to sin. John 8:34  

and 

For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. Romans 7:14

But Isaiah prophesied about a time when the Messiah would come, when things would be set right again:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

This is what Jesus found in the scroll on that Sabbath in the synagogue in Nazareth. He read this out loud to the people, and then sat down and began to teach them. We don’t know what all He said, but he started by saying, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” (Luke 4:22)

In a powerful say, Jesus began His ministry by telling the people in His hometown that He was the Messiah, that good news would be proclaimed to the poor, that the blind would be healed, that the oppressed would be liberated.  Think about Jesus’ ministry. He healed blind people. He set people free from demon possession and long-term illnesses. He proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of heaven. He also forgave people of their sins. He even brought back to life those that had died. Jesus lived His life on this earth, giving people a taste of what it means to be free from their sin debt.  

And then, Jesus died on the cross so that the sin debt of all who would believe on Him might be canceled. 

But what Jesus did, in dying for your sin and for my sin, was even greater than that! He restored to us the inheritance that we lost - the inheritance that Adam sold way back in the Garden of Eden when he sinned. Jesus gives us back our inheritace as children of God, with the assurance of eternal life in His kingdom. 

What Jesus did is so huge, it’s hard to comprehend all the ramifications! So God, in His mercy, gives us pictures to help us understand. One of those pictures was the Year of Jubilee - called the year of the Lord’s favor. Remember: it was a year when all debts were forgiven, when the inheritance was given back, when slaves were set free.

But Christians don’t have to wait for that fiftieth year for their sin debts to be forgiven and to be given the promise of their inheritance. They know that Jesus is the Jubilee! He is the One who has set us free and the Holy Spirit inside us testifies that we are the children of God. We’ve been adopted into His family! When you respond to God’s call and confess that Jesus is Lord of your life, you get to experience Jesus as your Jubilee. You get to experience being set free from sin and death.

I can just imagine the joy people must have felt when the high priest would proclaim the Jubilee, the year of the Lord’s favor. Jesus is our Jubilee, and because of what He did, we get to experience the Lord’s favor.

It’s New Year’s today. You’ve got two weeks before Passover will be here, two weeks to think about the liberty that Jesus gave to each of us when He died. As we celebrate the Passover, we proclaim the Lord’s death ‘til He comes. But He proclaims the year of the Lord’s favor.


Sabbath, April 16th
​The Golden Rule
and as you wish others would do to you, do so to them. Luke 6:31


What does this mean? Does it mean that if you like roses on your birthday, you should give everyone else roses on their birthday? If you like to be taken to Italian restaurants on special occasions, should you take your friends to Italian restaurants on special occasions? If you like to play video games, should you insist that your friends play video games when they come over to visit? If you love chocolate, should you give everyone else chocolate? 


When you look at it that way, it doesn’t make sense. We all like different things. I might appreciate a homegrown ripe cantaloup, but I know a lady who thought it was disgustingly smelly. A good friend eats a piece of dark chocolate every day (at least once), but other people don’t like the bitter taste and would prefer not to ever have to eat dark chocolate. Someone else likes really hot stuff, but really hot stuff makes me sick. 


So, many people take the Golden Rule to mean that whatever you want others to do to you, you should do them. But that’s not what it says. There are two little words that make all the difference: as and so. As you wish others would do to you, do so to them. In other words, if you want to be treated in a certain way, that’s the way you should treat others.


We get this. We have sayings which reflect this verse.


If you want a friend, be a friend.


What goes around, comes around.


What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.


If you are rude and obnoxious to people around you, they are likely to respond in kind. If you talk disrespectfully to them, they are likely to respond the same way. If you yell at someone, they will probably yell back. If you are gentle and soft-spoken, people are likely to respond to you that way.


It truly is the law of the harvest: whatever you sow, that shall you reap. If you sow peace, you reap peace. If you sow lies and deceit, you’ll get lies and deceit. If you sow discord, fighting, and chaos, that’s exactly what you’ll get back - and likely much more than you could ever imagine.
There’s a direct correlation to getting back what you sow. Most of the time, how you act towards others is how they will act towards you.


O.K. So let’s say that you have a friend. You call them on the phone every once in a while, but you only talk about your day and what’s gone wrong. And, usually you only call when you’re upset and in trouble and you want them to help. You never call just to talk to them and hear what they have to say. You don’t express your appreciation that they are your friend. Would that friend consider you a good friend, a close friend? Are you kidding?


Unfortunately, some people think they can treat God this way and still think they have a good relationship with the Lord. They only pray when they’re upset or in trouble. They want God to rescue them from their problems. Their prayers are a grocery list of what they want God to do but there’s no expression of appreciation for how great He is and how worthy of praise. 


And as you wish others would do to you, do so to them.


If you want your friend to listen to you, you have to listen to him. But we all know it doesn’t always work that way. You can treat people nicely, and they still are mean to you. You can be polite, and they still yell. You can be quiet, and they are still rude. You can listen all day long, and your friend doesn’t even pause to listen to you. So here’s the hard part: you continue to listen to your friend, even if your friend doesn’t do a good job of listening to you. 


If you want your older brother to treat you nicely, you treat him nicely - even if he continues to tease you. You do the right thing no matter what he does. If you do the right thing and he responds badly, you continue to do the right thing. Do you know why? Because you serve God - and God says to do good - even to those who are not treating you well. Why? Because then you will be like your Father in heaven, who is kind to the unmerciful and the evil (Luke 6:27-36).


And as you wish others would do to you, do so to them.


This is not about forcing others to treat you well. This is about honoring God with your life, in all of your choices, big or small. You know how you want to be treated. That’s how you treat other people - no matter what they do. It’s not an if-then proposition. If they are nice to me, then I’ll be nice to them. God simply says, “And as you wish others would do to you, do so to them.”  If you want to be treated respectfully, nicely, fairly, honestly, then that’s how you treat others - not to necessarily get anything back, but because God says to.


It’s a much different idea than most people have about the Golden Rule, isn’t it?!


Sabbath, April 23rd
Mercy
Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. Luke 6:36

What is mercy? When you have the power and authority to punish someone because of their bad behavior, and you choose to show forgiveness and compassion instead - that’s mercy.

So when you’ve been bad, when you’ve done something that you know will get you into trouble with your parents, you expect to be punished. You could be grounded. You could lose privileges. You could be spanked. But you know that you’ve done the wrong thing. You know that you made a bad choice. Now you’re going to have to suffer the consequences. It’s a natural progression: if you’re bad, then you’ll be punished. But sometimes, just sometimes, your parents don’t punish you. They forgive you without you suffering the consequence of your bad behavior. Parents have to make a wise choice - because they love you - what will be better for you? Is it better that you suffer for your bad choice so that you won’t do it again? Or do they think you’ve learned your lesson and don’t need the consequence?

Regardless, the definition of mercy means that justice - the administration of consequences and punishment - is the expected, usual, normal result of transgressing the laws of your parents! Mercy is the exception, not the rule! Still, God has quite a bit to say about mercy - and how prevalent it should be in our lives.

Micah 6:8 - . . . what does the Lord require of you but to act justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?

God expects you to do what is right, but He also wants you to love mercy - to look for the oportunities to be merciful to other people. 

Why do you think mercy would be so important to God? Part of the answer is the law of the harvest: whatever you sow, that’s what you reap. If you are merciful to others, you will receive mercy.

Matthew 5:7 - Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.

And we have to work at showing mercy to others. If it’s in our power to punish someone because of their bad behavior, many times that’s what we want to do. They did the crime, we’re more than willing that they do the time.
But twice in Matthew (9:13 and 12:7) Jesus told the religious leaders that they didn’t know and needed to learn what this meant: I desire mercy and not sacrifice. It’s a quote from Hosea 6:6

For I desire steadfast love (mercy) and not sacrifice,
the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

You can make a sacrifice, offer something to God, and think that you’re a good person because you’ve given something to God. But then you go out and you’re nasty to your older brother or to your neighbor or to the dog. God can see what’s really in your heart by how you treat other people. It’s one thing to go through the motions of a relationship with God, but when you demonstrate that you have the love of God within you because of how you act towards others, that’s evidence of God in your life.

But why is mercy so important to God? This is the same God who caused the ground to open up and swallow Korah, Dothan, and Abiram and to consume 250 elders in Israel with fire because of their rebellion (Numbers 16). We often think of the wrath and judgment of God against all unrighteousness. But Jeremiah says 

The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end. Lamentations 3:22

God, in describing Himself says,

The LORD, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness . . . (Exodus 34:6)

The first attribute God applies to Himself, in this verse, is merciful.

We know God is merciful. He has not given us what we all deserve - which is death! In fact, He made a way that we would be forgiven, through the death and resurrection of His Son. Jesus died a horrible death so that we might be forgiven for what we did. Because Jesus was raised from the dead, we are adopted into the family of God and given the hope of eternal life! No, God did not give us what we deserved; He gave us mercy.

So Jesus says, “Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.”

We just celebrated and commemorated what God the Father and Jesus Christ did for us in their mercy towards us. Now we get to demonstrate that we understand just how great that mercy is - by being merciful to those around us. We are acting like our Father as well as our Older Brother and Savior - who are merciful. 

But then, that’s what these seven days picture - taking into ourselves Jesus Christ, learning to live as He would have us to live. That’s the symbolism of eating the unleavened bread every day. It’s not enough to avoid leavening - to avoid sin; that’s like the sacrifice God was talking about in Hosea 6:6. We are commanded to eat the unleavened bread - which represents living without sin, living as Christ lived, which means being merciful to those around us. As you sacrifice your leavened bread this week - you don’t get to eat pizza or cheese and gherkin sandwiches or pancakes, as you instead eat the unleavened bread, remember that it is supposed to be teaching you to live God’s way. It’s supposed to be teaching you to be merciful.


Friday, April 29th - Last Day of Unleavened Bread
Following Christ
And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. Luke 9:23


Have you ever seen a mama duck and a line of ducklings trailing behind her? Why do they do that? Or perhaps you’ve seen a dad with his son, doing what he’s doing, acting like he’s acting? Why do they do that?


My family laughs because Pepper, and sometimes Velvet, follow me. If Ron finds the dogs upstairs, he knows there’s a pretty good chance I’m up there too. One day, they were laughing about Pepper following me, so I got up and started walking around the living room. Pepper started following me as I wove my way around chairs and the coffee table. But the really funny thing was when Velvet fell in line! Why do they do that?


My mom sometimes takes her chickens for a walk. She’ll let them out of the chicken coop and call to them. Dad says they follow her all over the backyard. Why do they do that? Well, the chickens follow Mom because she points out grasshoppers to eat. And I suspect that’s why Pepper and Velvet follow me, although the dogs likely follow me for other reasons too: I might be doing something interesting or I might give them some attention.


But the ducklings following Mama and the little boy following his father are after more than just food or entertainment. The parent is instructing the little one in how to live. Finding food and entertainment might be part of it, but following mama or daddy also involves life lessons along the way. Mama duck is teaching the little ones how to grow up to be a duck. Daddy is teaching his son how to grow up to be a man.


It’s called mentoring or discipleship. Discipleship is a relationship, usually with someone you hopefully like, or at least, respect. In that discipleship relationship, you learn to be like that person, to learn how to do what that person can do. You learn more than just the skill they know (like carpentry or plumbing or farming), you learn how to think about various situations, how to react to circumstances, and how to interact with others. As you follow that person, you become very much like that person - not just in behavior, but in thoughts and words too, because you spend so much time with them.


So why did people follow Jesus? After He fed the 5000, some of them might have followed Jesus because they wanted more food. In fact, Jesus said that to them! (John 6:26)  Maybe though, some followed him because he was doing or saying something interesting. They liked the entertainment. Others may have followed him because of what he could do for them, healing them or casting out demons. How many of them really wanted to learn how to truly live as a child of God, as only the Son of God could mentor them to do?


So it’s very curious in our own lives today: we see a lot of people around us who say they are following Jesus. Why are they doing that? Some are looking for what He can do for them. They talk a lot about how God provided in certain situations. Some are looking for the entertainment value. That is, church is just the social club they belong do; they attend meetings once a week to see what everyone else is wearing, what Bible study they’re doing, what trials they’ve endured this week. Then there are those who truly follow Jesus because they want to be like Him.


Sometimes when the mama duck leads her little ones, most of them on right on her tail. But sometimes there’s one straggler who keeps getting distracted. He catches up, gets a scolding from mama, but over and over he’s the one who falls behind, goes off on his own, and basically does his own thing. He’s following mama duck in a sense, but he’s not learning how to act like a duck from her. He’s doing his own thing. He’s not learning where to find food. He’s not learning how to interact with other ducks. He’s not learning how to anticipate danger. He’s following mama’s trail, but he’s not very close to her. 


People are sometimes like these baby ducks in how they follow Jesus. There are those read their Bible selection for the day, do Bible studies, and do the things that look “Christian.” But they are like that last little duck: they’re just trailing Jesus, imitating in some ways what Jesus would do, but they don’t have the relationship with Him that they should. They’re not walking their way down the road of life in company with the Lord. There’s a big difference between trailing Jesus and walking with Jesus. When you live your life seeking God, in a covenant relationship with Jesus, you become more and more like Him because you’re with Him. You’re being changed from the inside out. You’re not just acting like a Christian, you are a Christian. Your thoughts and your words and your deeds all flow naturally, and Christlike, from you because of the relationship you have with God.


It’s a very good thing to think about: Are you really following Jesus? Or are you just trailing behind?

​
Sabbath, April 30th
Participation, Not Imitation
And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. Luke 9:23


When we were small, Mom would put us kids down for a nap after lunch. Then she would sit in her rocking chair, with her feet up, and read. It was her habit and we three were very used to seeing Mom that way. One day, Mom walked into the living room. Tricia had pulled her rocking chair over next to Mom’s. Tricia was sitting with her feet propped up, reading. I remember that Mom got out the camera to take a picture because it really was cute. But there was one problem with Tricia’s imitation of Mom’s habit: her book was upside down. She wasn’t really reading; she was just imitating.


Yesterday we talked about trailing Jesus vs. following Jesus. That is, people can make choices they think make them look like a Christian, or they can make choices because they are truly in a relationship with the One who can guide them into making good choices. In other words, you can act like you think a Christian should act. Or you can act like God thinks a Christian should act. You can decide for yourself what Christian behavior looks like. Or you can follow God’s definition of what Christian behavior looks like. The difference between trailing Jesus and following Jesus all comes down to relationship. Do you have a close relationship with Jesus?


Do you know what a relationship is? It is the interaction you have with another person. A distant relationship is one where there’s not much communication, you don’t have much in common, and you don’t care too much about the opinion of the other person. A close relationship depends upon lots of communication, common interests and goals, and valuing the other person’s thoughts and opinions. So if you really like talking about baseball and you have a friend who can’t stand baseball, you might find your relationship becoming more distant. If you find a person who loves watching hummingbirds, you might find yourself talking with that person more and more; as you spend more time with them, you find other things in common. Eventually, they are the person you talk with the most, you share your thoughts and goals with, and they become more and more important to you. When that happens, you have a close relationship with them.


A relationship with God works much the same way. God, because He is our Creator, our King, our Redeemer, He has the right and the authority to decide the terms of the relationship. In order for us to have a relationship with Him, there are certain requirements that have to be met. First, we have to be willing to follow His ways. God’s ways are beautiful and right. He’s not going to go any other way. So if we want a relationship with God, we have to do things His way. Secondly, if we want a relationship with God, we have to communicate with Him. That means reading the Bible and praying to Him daily. Thirdly, if we want a relationship with God, we have to value what He says and what’s important to Him. In any relationship, the more I do what pleases the other person, the more I communicate with them, and the more I value them and their ideas, the closer my relationship will be with them.


That’s the point of Luke 9:23: And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. If we’re going to follow Him, to come after Him, to truly be a Christian, we have to be wiling to have a relationship with God on His terms. We give up what we want, because what the carnal nature wants is not good for us and it’s the opposite of what God wants (Romans 8:7). Secondly, Jesus says that we have to take up our cross daily. That means we have to do violence to those things which are against God’s way. We have to be willing to put to death the carnal nature. We have to be willing to render ineffectual the pull of our flesh. That is, we have to learn to bring every thought into submission to Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). He’s our Savior and the Captain of our Salvation. He’s our Sovereign and our King. He’s the Creator and Sustainer of all things. If we want to truly be a Christian, we have to give up everything we are and follow Him without reservation.


If you don’t seek a close relationship with God, then you’ll find yourself trailing along behind Jesus - having a form of godliness, but denying its power (2 Timothy 3:5). You might look like a Christian to other people, but you aren’t one in your heart. You may do many great things and say, “Lord, Lord,” but if you don’t have a relationship with Him, He’s going to say, “Depart from me, you workers of iniquity. I never knew you.” (Matthew 7:23). If God is not your God in everything, then you haven’t really submitted your life to Him. You are either all in or all out. You are either a Christian all the time, a follower of the Messiah. Or you’re not. You are either in a relationship with Jesus, allowing Him to participate in your daily decisions, or you aren’t. It’s not enough to just imitate Jesus. You have to participate with Him in living out your life.


Otherwise, when it all comes down to the end, you might find yourself sitting in a chair, reading your book upside down.


Sabbath, May 7th
The Blessing of God’s Law
 But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear God’s word and keep it!” Luke 11:28
​

Jesus made this statement in response a woman in the crowd saying, “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts at which you nursed!” In other words, she was saying, “Blessed is your mom.” Have you ever heard that? “Your mom is so blessed because you are her child. You must make your mom so happy.” And truly, the relationship between a mother and her child is very special. In most cases, it’s very close. The bond between a parent and a child is unmatched by any other relationship, except perhaps marriage. And that’s the way God designed it. We see it in nature. We see it in our own families. This parent-child bond is very special.


So it’s very striking that Jesus would respond to this woman’s blessing upon Jesus’ mother by saying, “Blessed rather are those who hear God’s word and keep it.” Think about Jesus’ response when the crowd was close around Him and His mother and brothers couldn’t get to Him. Someone told Him that His mother and brothers wanted to see Him. Do you remember Jesus’ response? But he answered them, “My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.” (Luke 8:21) 


That’s how important God’s law is to God! That’s how important it is that we hear and obey God’s law!


To help us understand how important it is to hear and obey His law, God gives us parents. Parents give us rules to obey - for our own good. If we break those rules, there are consequences. If you eat the cookies you were told to stay out of,  you might get spanked. If you break your sister’s toy, maybe you won’t be allowed to watch tv that evening and you will have to buy her a new toy. If you come into the house with mud on your shoes, you have to clean it up and you have to sweep the living room every day for a week. We understand that when we break our parents’ rules, there are consequences. But somewhere along the line in our maturing process, we realize that it’s not being grounded, or having extra chores assigned to us, or even being spanked - those consequences aren’t the big deterrent anymore. We have grown up enough to realize that when we break Mom and Dad’s rules, we impair our relationship with them. We’ve damaged it. If we tell a lie (and get caught), they may impose a consequence like being grounded. But once we’ve been caught in a lie, they now know that we will lie and they can’t trust us anymore - not completely. Our behavior, our lie, our sin has impaired that relationship. And when we don’t want to impair that relationship, then we no longer have any desire to break the rules. But even more than that, we start thinking in these terms: I don’t want to do anything that might disappoint Mom and Dad. Suddenly, that relationship is so important to you that you view everything from your parents’ perspective. You don’t have to call and see if they’ll give you permission to do something; you don’t call because you know they wouldn’t approve, so you naturally wouldn’t consider doing such a thing.


It’s the same way with God. God gives us His laws for our good. If we break His laws, there are consequences. And sometimes, we, as children of God, fail to see the most serious consequence of our sin - the damage we do to our relationship with God.


If asked what sin is, many people could quote 1 John 3:4: Sin is the transgression of the law. We know that it’s missing the mark, being off target, missing the way, missing the true goal in life. We could define sin this way. We might even say that sin is falling short of God’s standard. That’s also true. But the most important part of the definition of sin is that it is the serious breakdown in our relationship with God. Somehow we don’t think of that part of the definition of sin. We think about natural consequences, but we don’t think about being so close to God that we don’t want to disappoint Him.  We don’t think of God’s law this way: I value my relationship with God more than my desire to go my own way. Somehow there’s still an immature child within us thinking that if we sin, God’s going to hit us with a lightning bolt or a 2x4. But that’s not the biggest consequence to our sin. The health of our relationship with God should be the first consideration always when we’re choosing our path. When we see that our choice will cause us to miss the mark, our first thought should be not wanting to disappoint God, not what sort of consequence there might be.


It all comes down to this: If we love our parents, we do those things which please them, including hearing their rules and obeying them. It’s the same thing with God: If we love God, if we truly value our relationship with Him, we will hear and keep His laws. Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments .  . . . If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him” (John 14:15, 23, ESV).


This is the blessing of God’s law.

Sabbath, May 14th
[This is a lesson with a very visual object lesson/demonstration. You’ll need three clear glasses. One is half full of water - labeled “you;” one is half full of water with enough iodine to make the water stained - labeled “sin;” the third is half full of water with a good dose of chlorine in it - labeled “Jesus.”]

Whiter Than Snow!!
Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”  Luke 15:10


Why, do you suppose, are the angels of God so joyful over a sinner who repents? 


Have you ever been really dirty - I mean the roll-in-the-mud, change-your-hair-color kind of dirty? There have been a few times - staining the house, working on tractors - when I wasn’t sure I was ever going to be clean again, to say nothing of my clothes.


That’s what sin does. It makes us unclean, in the Biblical sense.  God says in Isaiah 1:18, “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” 
Isaiah 64:6 says that even our righteous acts are like filthy rags. But sin does more than make us unclean, it separates us from God (Isaiah 59:2).


So, here’s how it works:
1.  You were born a carnal human being, with carnal nature that is enmity against God (Romans 8:7). Because of the choice that Adam made in the Garden of Eden, all of humanity is born with a carnal, sinful nature (1 Cor. 15:21; Romans 5:12).  [Pour some of the “sin” cup into the “you” cup, discoloring the “you”  cup.]

2.  There is nothing you can do to get the “sin” out of your cup; it’s thoroughly mixed with “you.” Similarly, there’s nothing you can do, by yourself, to get rid of your sin nature. You can’t clean yourself up enough to make you righteous in God’s eyes. But Jesus can cleanse you. We sing “Washed By the Blood of the Lamb” because of the verses in Revelation (7:14; 22:14) which talk about the saints washing their robes and making them white in the blood of the Lamb. Psalm 51:7 says, “Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.” [Pour “Jesus” cup into “you” cup.] 

3.  But, while “sin” makes you unclean, stained scarlet, “sin” has no effect on “Jesus.”  God cannot sin. He never becomes unclean. God is never even tempted by evil (James 1:13). [Pour some of the “sin” cup into the “Jesus” cup.]

4.  Even more than that, there is coming a time when Jesus will deal with sin forever. Because the wages of sin is death, and death will be swallowed up in victory (Romans 6:23; 1 Corinthians 15:54; Revelation 21:4-5), there will be no more sin. Jesus will conquer sin forever. [Pour “Jesus” cup into “sin” cup.]

When one sinner repents, there is joy before the angels of God. It’s not only one more person who will be in God’s kingdom, it’s also a harbinger of a time when sin is dealt with forever, for all of humanity. It will be a time of great joy and rejoicing because there is no more sin, no more death, no more crying or mourning. There will be peace and love and joy. The Sovereignty of our God and of His Christ will be manifest everywhere. Nowhere will it be more profound than those sin-stained garments which are washed whiter than snow.


[You can watch a youtube video of this demonstration at   https://youtu.be/sc3-Vmnt9w0]


Sabbath, May 21st
The Stones Would Cry Out
He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.” Luke 19:40 


I’ve seen a lot of stones. I’ve never heard one of them make a noise. Oh, there’s a click when you strike two of them together. There’s a satisfying splash when one is thrown into the lake. There’s a terrifying rumbling thunder when hundreds roll together in an avalanche. But individually, I’ve never heard one make a noise. Not a chirp. Not a whistle. Not a word.


But Jesus said, as He was walking into Jerusalem before His crucifixion, death, and resurrection, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.”  That’s how important Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem was! This is the entry of the King into the capital city. And that’s what Jesus’ disciples were saying: “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!”
​

This whole event was a fulfillment of Zechariah’s prophecy (Zechariah 9:9): 
Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem!
Behold, your king is coming to you;
righteous and having salvation is he,
humble and mounted on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.


It was another witness that Jesus was, and is, the Son of God, the Savior of the world, the soon coming King of kings and Lord of lords. 


So the disciples of Jesus were spreading their cloaks on the road, signifying that Jesus is the King. And they were shouting, “Blessed is the King who comes in name of Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”


Hmm. That’s very reminiscent of another time, another very special coming of our Lord Jesus Christ: when He was born. There were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night. An angel appeared to them to tell them of the birth of Jesus.  “Fear not, for behold I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” (Luke 2:8-14)


Did you notice the similarities between the announcements? The angels said “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased.” The disciples, at Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem said, “Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”


So we have prophecies which tell us what each of these events will look like (the angel telling the shepherds the sign and Zechariah prophesying about the colt), and we have announcements of peace and glory to God!


There is another event, still in the future, when Jesus will come again. Like His birth and the events surrounding His death and resurrection, there are many prophecies about Jesus’ second coming. Zechariah 14:4 says, “On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives . . . and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two . . .” The angels told Jesus’ disciples in Acts 1:10-11 that “this Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” Paul tells us in his first letter to Thessalonica, “For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God” (1 Thessalonians 4:16).


This is going to be incredibly exciting! But nowhere does the Bible tell us what God’s people are going to be saying as Jesus returns as the conquering King. Or maybe it does. Revelation 19 is filled with exclamations of “Hallelujah!!” John records (19:6), “Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out, ‘Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns!’ ”  Then in vision, John sees heaven open and Jesus Christ sitting on a white horse, coming to conquer the world. On his robe and on his thigh he has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords (Rev. 19:16).


There’s a popular Christian song, “I Can Only Imagine.” One of the verses goes, 
I can only imagine what my eyes will see
when Your face is before me.
Will I stand in Your presence
or to my knees will I fall?
Will I sing Hallelujah?
Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine.


If the first two recorded events are any indication, we will be shouting with joy - shouts of hallelujah, exclamations of glory to God, and affirmations of the coming of the Prince of Peace. I don’t think there’s any way we will be silent.


It will be such an incredible, fantastic event! This coming of Jesus Christ, this ushering in of the Creator of the Universe, the King of kings, it will ultimately bring such joy and peace. We almost certainly will be praising God will all of our being. And you know, even as we are praising God, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear the stones praising God too!
​

Sabbath, May 28th
Recognizing Jesus
Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread. Luke 24:35


How do you eat oreos? Do you take the cookie apart? Do you eat the inside first? Do you eat it as a sandwich? Do you eat it in one bite - like my black labs like to do? How do you eat an oreo?


How does your mom eat an oreo? How does your little sister eat an oreo? I know one little cutie who has more oreo on her face when she’s finished than actually ends up in her tummy. 


You may not have paid any attention to how your family eats oreos. So I’ll give you another question: when someone comes down the stairs, do you know who it is before you see them? I can usually tell which of my children is coming down the stairs just by the way they sound.


In the middle of the night, when the dogs come up to tell me they have to go outside, I know which one is there without even being able to see. I know how they sound. I know what they do.


So it’s hard to understand how it could be that the disciples, having met Jesus on the road to Emmaus after His crucifixion and resurrection, wouldn’t have recognized Him. After all, they’d followed Him. They’d walked down the road with Him. They’d heard Him teach. As the disciples walked down the road to Emmaus with Jesus, He explained scriptures to them that they’d never before understood. When they got to the village, they strongly urged Jesus to stay and eat with them. How many times had they eaten with Him? But it was when Jesus broke the bread and gave it to them that their eyes were opened so they could realize Who had been with them, walking on the road, explaining the scriptures to them. 


Luke 24:16 says that they were kept from recognizing Him. And later, when they talked about what had happened, they knew the whole event was something out of the ordinary - even before they’d recognized who He was. They said, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:32)


What made it possible for them to recognize Jesus? 


What makes it possible for you to recognize who’s coming into the room before you see them? What makes it possible for you to know, beforehand, how a family member or friend will eat an oreo?


You know because you spend time with them. You have a relationship with them. You know them.


In the same way, the disciples knew Jesus. They’d spent time with Him. They had a relationship with Him. If their eyes hadn’t been closed, if they hadn’t been kept from recognizing Jesus, they probably would have recognized Him just as soon as He started teaching. They definitely knew Jesus as soon as He broke the bread.


There is a day coming, sometime soon probably, when Jesus will return. There will be no doubt about who He is, but will you know Him, really know Him? If you’re not sure, maybe you’d better spend some more time talking with Him in prayer. Maybe you’d better spend some more time reading His word. Maybe you’d better spend some more time with people who love Him, who talk about Him, and who encourage you to live like He wants you to live. Then, when He comes, you’ll be confident about your relationship with Him, even if you don’t know how he might eat an oreo.


Sabbath, June 4th
Impossible!!
But he said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.” Luke 18:27


One of my most favorite scenes in The Princess Bride is when the rope is cut, but the man in black doesn’t fall down the Cliffs of Insanity.
Vizzini: HE DIDN'T FALL? INCONCEIVABLE.
Inigo Montoya: You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.


Can’t you just see the non-believer’s reaction to God’s greatness in a similar way?!


Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego are thrown into the furnace, a furnace whose temperature is so high that the guards throwing them in are killed by the heat. Then, what does King Nebuchadnezzar see? There are four men walking around in the fire!! And when he calls for Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to come out, not even their hair is so much as singed! Impossible!


How about when Jesus fed the 5000 with five loaves and two fish - and the disciples picked up twelves baskets of food that were left over after everyone had eaten their fill!! Impossible! That just doesn’t happen.


How about Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead - after he had been dead for four days!? Decay would have already started to set in! Impossible!


Some people think that these Bible stories are just stories. There must be some other explanation for what happened.


So let’s talk about some other things that my God can do:
Psalm 147:4 and Isaiah 40:26 says that not only did God create all the stars, He can also count them all. Have you ever tried to count all the stars? Impossible - for you and me! But not for God, and He calls each of them by name.


Can you number every hair on your head? (Matthew 10:30; Luke 12:7) How would you keep track of which hair was what number? Impossible for you and me! But not for God.


Do you know whenever a sparrow falls to the ground? Are you kidding? How in the world would anyone ever be able to keep track of every single bird all the time? Impossible -for you and me. But not only does God know whenever a sparrow falls to the ground, they cannot fall unless it is His will (Matthew 10:29). He’s in control!


Can you walk on water (Matthew 14:22-33)? Jesus did. Can you restore the sight of a man born blind (John 9)? Can you speak the world into existence (Psalm 33:9; Hebrews 11:3)? The non-believer would say each of these is impossible. They are - for you and me. But our great God can, and did, do each!


I love the joke about the atheist scientists who tell God that they have figured out how to create life from dirt and they don’t need Him anymore. God tells them to get their own dirt. But the joke gets even better: even if scientists could get all of the elements and DNA strands in the right order, they still can’t put the spark of life into anything! And the reality is that we can’t create anything out of nothing. But God can . . . and did. 


We cannot save ourselves. People have been looking for a way to live forever - outside of a relationship with God - and they’ve never been able to find the Holy Grail, the Fountain of Youth. But God can save to the uttermost those who come to Him (Hebrew 7:25) through the blood of Jesus Christ.


We can’t make ourselves clean. But God can (1 John 1:7). The blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.


When you start to think about how great our God is, you find yourself echoing David’s words (Psalm 8:4), “What is man that you are mindful of him?” Our great God created us, redeemed us from our sin, provides for us, protects us, and loves us enough to adopt us into His family. And then He throws in delightful tastes and vivid colors and tantalizing smells and hysterical puppies just because He can.


At the end of the day, we find ourselves knowing with all of our heart that “impossible” doesn’t apply to God - either that or impossible just doesn’t mean what we think it means.


 “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”

Sabbath, June 11th
Endurance
By your endurance you will gain your lives. Luke 21:19


Winston Churchill gave a speech in October 1941. He said, “Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never-in nothing, great or small, large or petty - never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense.” Now, that may not seem like a big thing some people, but knowing that someone never gives up, someone continues to fight, matters a whole lot to his opponent. In Winston Churchill’s case, his opponent was Adolf Hitler. When Hitler heard that Great Britain had installed Churchill as prime minister, he is reported to have said, “Now we’re going to have to fight.” He had assessed the former prime minister of Great Britain and figured that Germany and the Third Reich could run right over the top of England.


Never, never, never give in.


How many stories there are of people who were so close to winning a game, so close to finding their way out of a forest, so close to finishing a degree - but they didn’t persevere. They gave up. They figured it wasn’t worth the fight. They just didn’t have the endurance to get to the goal.


That’s what endurance is. It is the determination to continue, to persevere to reach a goal.


Have you ever demonstrated endurance?  When I was thirteen, I spent the summer (or part of the summer) detasseling corn.  We’d start early in the morning. It’d be cold, so the crew would all be wearing jeans and long sleeved shirts. By about ten o’clock in the morning, we were very warm and were shedding that heavy outside layer down to the shorts and t-shirts.  Sometimes we were required to detassel corn in a field where the herbicides hadn’t worked very well. We waded through velvet leaf (and I sneezed the whole time) trying to pull the tassels out of the tops of the corn. There were fields that had had the irrigation system going until we got there, so we had mud to tramp through as we pulled the tassels. There was even one field where the farmer ran the irrigation system while we worked the field. What a shock to be pulling tassels and suddenly get hit by the spraying water! De-tasseling itself was not easy. We pulled the top of the corn out of the corn plant so that it couldn’t pollinate the corn. Obviously then, if we missed any tassels, the whole purpose of detasseling was defeated; we weren’t doing our job. I remember having to go back and do a field over again because we’d done such a lousy job! It was tough! The field boss wanted us to go fast, pulling tassels out of the rows on either side of us, and we couldn’t miss any plants! On top of that, corn leaves are sharp and it’s very easy to slice open the sides of your hands. After a couple of weeks, I was ready to quit. I wasn’t sure minimum wage was worth the misery. But one night when I’d gotten home, sunburned and exhausted - because once I got done in the field, the bus would drop us at the city bus terminal. I’d ride the city bus to within a couple of miles to our house and then walk uphill all the way home - so one night, exhausted beyond belief, I remember thinking that I was going to tell Mom that I was quitting. She started the conversation. I’ll never forget what she said, “Dad is so proud of you and Bob for working so hard. He doesn’t think he would’ve stuck with it when he was your ages.” I couldn’t quit. There was no way I wanted to diminish the pride my dad had in me. All of a sudden, detasseling corn wasn’t about earning money; it was about my relationship with my dad.


All these years later, I think about that experience and can’t help comparing it to the relationship I have with my Heavenly Father. Where does he expect me to demonstrate endurance - because I know He does?


Think about these verses:


To him who endures I will 

• grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God (Rev 2:7)
• give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, with a new name written on the stone that no one knows except the one who receives it (Rev 2:17).
• give authority over the nations (Rev 2:26).
• clothe in white garments and I will never blot his name out of the book of life (Rev 3:5).
• make a pillar in the temple of my God . . . I will write on him the name of my God (Rev 3:12).
• grant him to sit with with me on my throne (Rev 3:21).

I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance . . .(Rev 2:2).


I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance (Rev 2:19).


Because you have kept my word about patient endurance . . .(Rev 3:10).


By your endurance you will gain your lives (Luke 21:19, ESV).


I want you to think about endurance and why a Christian needs endurance. We’ll talk about it tomorrow.


Pentecost, June 12th
Solving the Puzzle
By your endurance you will gain your lives. Luke 21:19


I have a little puzzle box. It’s not a difficult puzzle. There are only four pieces. But whenever I give it to someone, they always want to figure out so they can see what’s inside.


I have a nine-piece puzzle. It’s only nine pieces, but it’s very difficult. I know that it kept Steve and Jon busy for hours! 


Whether you’re figuring out a hard puzzle or an easy puzzle, you have to work at it. You have to show some endurance. That means you don’t give up when you can’t figure it out right away! But the question is: Is it worth it? What do you get at the end? I have to tell you: I rarely keep anything in my puzzle box, and every time someone opens it, they are disappointed. You can see it all over their faces!


Our lives as Christians are a little like the puzzle box or the nine-piece puzzle. All of our lives are different. No one’s life looks just like the person next to them, just as none of your puzzles are the same. Some puzzles are harder than others. Some people have harder things to endure in their lives than others. Nevertheless, we all have a life to live, and today, you have a puzzle to solve. We all have a choice of which piece to put where. If it doesn’t work, we can try something else. But unlike solving the puzzle, sometimes the choices we make in our lives can have serious consequences. We want to make our choices wisely. 


Like solving the puzzle, living our lives in a way that is pleasing to God requires us to persevere, to endure, to keep trying. 


Sometimes people get frustrated with puzzles and they just give up. They don’t care if they get the puzzle figured out or not. Sometimes people get frustrated with life. They don’t want to put out the effort to solve the puzzle. They don’t care if they follow God’s laws; they’re going to live any way they want to.


If you don’t solve a puzzle, it doesn’t really matter. But if you don’t live your life trusting and obeying God, it can have eternal consequences.


Life is often hard. The choices we have to make are sometimes difficult. It’s like putting a puzzle together where it’s just a solid color. There’s no picture to help you figure out what the puzzle is supposed to look like.


The blessing of Pentecost is that God has poured out His Holy Spirit on all believers. The Holy Spirit teaches us (John 16:13). The Holy Spirit helps us pray (Romans 8:26). The Holy Spirit strengthens us (Ephesians 3:16). The Holy Spirit helps us to solve the puzzle of how to live right.


It’s kind of like God giving us a puzzle to solve - and then He gives us the picture, a few hints of how to solve it, and encouragement to keep trying.


You’re here right now because your parents brought you. You might not have any idea why we celebrate Pentecost. But your parents will teach you. All of the people in this room are willing to encourage you. And this day, Pentecost, is about God giving the Holy Spirit to people so they will endure, never give up, but rather become the people we should be to live forever.


By your endurance you will gain your lives. Luke 21:19


Sabbath, June 18th
The Word of God 
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:1


Sticks and stone may break my bones,
but words can never hurt me.


I don’t know what idiot came up with this phrase, but it’s not true. Words can do incredible damage, more lasting to who you are as a person than a broken bone! Words are powerful. Think of Hawk Nelson’s song, “Words:”


They've made me feel like a prisoner; They’ve made me feel set free
They've made me feel like a criminal; Made me feel like a king
They've lifted my heart To places I'd never been
And they've dragged me down, Back to where I began


Words can build you up; Words can break you down
Start a fire in your heart or Put it out
Let my words be life; Let my words be truth
I don't wanna say a word Unless it points the world back to You


You can heal the heartache; Speak over the fear
God, Your voice is the only thing We need to hear


Let the words I say Be the sound of Your grace
I don't wanna say a word Unless it points the world back to You


I wanna speak Your love; Not just another noise
Oh, I wanna be Your light; I wanna be Your voice


Hawk Nelson is right: we’re supposed to use our words to encourage people to seek God, no matter whether they are believers or not. Hebrews 10:24-25 says, “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”  


Perhaps that’s why we will give an account for every idle (literally: unprofitable or insincere) word that we speak (Matthew 12:36). An idle word means that not only did we not engage our brains before our lips started moving, but it’s also quite possible we neglected an opportunity to praise God or to encourage someone or to speak life.


Or perhaps it’s more than this even. 


Consider that Jesus spoke the world into existence (Hebrews 11:3, Psalm 33:9, Col 1:16). The One who is the Word of God spoke and created the world. Jesus is the Logos (G3056), the cause of all life, divine reason and intelligence. So it’s no wonder that Jesus spoke and the official’s son was healed (John 4:50). It’s no wonder that Jesus spoke and the wind and the waves immediately calmed (Matthew 8:27). Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come forth,” and he was resurrected from the dead (John 11:43). Jesus told the paralytic, “Take up your bed and walk (Mark 2:9-11), and he did.


Genesis 1:26 records God saying, “Let us make man in our image.” Someday then, perhaps, we may also be able to accomplish great things - just by speaking. We get an indication of this in Matthew 17:20, when Jesus said to His disciples, “For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.”


This is Jesus, the Logos, the First Cause, the Creator, speaking to His disciples.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God (John 1:1).


We will never be just like God. But if we’re His, if we are believers, then He’s gone to prepare a place for us. He’s creating a job just for us, a job where we’ll have responsibility in His kingdom as part of the family of God.  By His power, by His will, we may be more like Jesus than we had ever considered.


The Sidewalk Prophets sing, 
Be strong in the LORD, And never give up hope
You're gonna do great things; I already know
God's got His hand on You, So don't live life in fear
Forgive and forget, But don't forget why you're here
Take your time and pray, These are the words I would say


What words would you say? We’re following in the footsteps of our Older Brother, Jesus Christ, the Logos, the Word of God. We’d better learn to discipline our tongue, to judiciously and carefully use our words.


Sabbath, June 25th
My Food
Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.” John 4:34


What’s your favorite food? Do you have different favorites for different times? I really like homemade angel food cake with fresh strawberries. After Thanksgiving, I really like turkey sandwiches with mustard and salt and pepper. On a cold day, I really like stuffed pepper soup. Enchiladas are one of my all-time favorite meals. And probably whatever Diane made for potluck today is also one of my favorites.


It’s really quite amazing how much of our lives are directly connected to food and eating. I spend a lot of time in the garden every year - hundreds of hours planting, weeding, watering, harvesting, processing and preserving. I spend lots of time shopping for food, preparing meals, cleaning up after the meals, and, of course, eating the food. Literally hundreds of hours every year are spent  dealing with food in some way.


Why?


I remember an Archie comic book one time in which Archie and Jughead thought it’d be a great idea to develop a pill that would give you all the nutrition you needed. It’d be a great time-saver and money-saver. But, it wouldn’t be nearly as much fun. Not only do we need food to supply energy to our bodies, we enjoy our food. It is a simple pleasure to pick a handful of ripe blueberries and eat them straight off the bush. It’s delightful to churn some homemade ice cream and lick the paddles when it’s done. It’s relaxing and mentally refreshing to sit on the front porch swing with an icy glass of fresh lemonade.


We are all taught in school that nutritious food helps to keep our bodies healthy. We need to eat the right foods and the right amounts. But we also learn that food is also closely connected to good times with friends and family. Food, in a word, is a major part of our lives.


So our ears perk up when we read,  “Jesus said to them, ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.’ ”  What does Jesus mean that his food is to do the will of God? How does doing the will of God nourish you? Obviously, we need physical food to keep our physical bodies healthy, but we also need spiritual food to keep our minds spiritually healthy. Do you get this? Doing the will of the Father feeds us spiritually. It’s what keeps us healthy.   But it’s more than that even. Just as we derive pleasure from eating a tree-ripened peach, obeying our Heavenly Father and working as His servant should give us a great deal of pleasure. After all, a peach will last for a few minutes; the relationship with our Father will last for eternity.  


But the food analogy goes even deeper than physical and spiritual health and pleasure. Doing God’s will, accomplishing His work, building our relationship with Him satisfies us like nothing else on this earth will satisfy - not a juicy slice of watermelon on a hot day, not a cheesy, spicy piece of lasagna. Our physical food is so temporary. And on some level, we know that. We know that eventually even all the left-overs are eaten and we rarely remember from week to week what we had to eat a week ago. But when we do the will of the Father, there is a deep and abiding satisfaction that we’ve done something worthwhile and lasting.


It’s an interesting thing: God made our food so pleasurable and varied. Perhaps, just perhaps, we’re supposed to realize that there’s something more nourishing, more pleasurable, more satisfying than the physical food He blesses us with. Maybe we’re supposed to attain the goal of the kind of relationship with our great God where doing His will and working on His agenda feeds us, grows us more into the image of His Son, gives us great pleasure, and satisfies us beyond words. The next time you take a bite and say, “Ummm!” for the sheer delight of the taste, I encourage you to think of Jesus’ words, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work,” and to realize the incredible significance of His words.


Sabbath, July 9th
Birthday Celebrations


Do you like celebrating birthdays? How do you celebrate? And how do you celebrate your birthday? Do you get to choose what you get to eat? Do you get a cake? Do you get to do something fun? 


This past Monday, we got to celebrate a very special birthday. There was a special meal - barbecue! We didn’t eat cake because not everyone likes cake, but we had pie. And we watched a little baseball. For those people who don’t particularly like baseball, our fun activity was shooting off fireworks!


Yes. You’re right. We celebrated the Fourth of July, Independence Day, our nation’s birthday. We sang songs like “My Country Tis of Thee,” “God of our Fathers,” and “The Star-Spangled Banner.”  Since it’s a national holiday, there were people all over the place celebrating, going to Fourth of July parades and softball games. Most people didn’t have to work.  Sigh! It’s a fun day to celebrate right in the middle of summer.


Except. . .


as the song goes, “This world is not my home. I’m just a-passin’ through.” Hebrews 11 says that we are strangers and exiles (vs 13) on this earth. Like Abraham, we have our eyes on “the city that has foundations, designer and builder is God” (vs 10). We are eagerly anticipating the establishment of God’s kingdom on this earth - the time when every knee will bow - every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord. It’s the time when the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ! We are eagerly anticipating that time!! Why? Because then everything will be right. There will be no more crying or tears or pain or sorrow (Revelation 21:3-4). Sin will be dealt with. There will no longer be an injustice. Jesus Christ will be on the throne and things will be right! 


So, yes. We look forward to the time when Jesus will set up His kingdom on this earth. The start of His kingdom . . . you could call it, I suppose, the birthday of God’s kingdom on this earth. When will that be? You could make a good case for Jesus’ return to this earth on the Feast of Trumpets, but no one knows for sure, exactly when Jesus Christ will return (Matthew 24:36).  But I can tell you this: there will be a celebration unlike anything you’ve ever seen. There will be food and singing and dancing and maybe even some fireworks.


The celebration of the birthday of God’s kingdom on this earth will be so much greater and wonderful than our Independence Day celebrations. It’ll kind of be like the difference between a little party popper (Fourth of July celebrations) and huge, loud artillery shells (God’s kingdom celebrations).


I hope you had a great Fourth of July. I hope you were safe and had a lot of fun. But keep in mind that we have a bigger, better, more wonderful celebration coming. And I hope it’s coming soon!


Sabbath, July 16th
God’s Love
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  John 3:16


If you were going to show someone that you love them, how would you do it? Perhaps you’d do something special for them. Maybe you’d clean their house or mow their lawn. Maybe you get them a sun catcher or a bouquet of flowers. Perhaps you’d spend as much time with them as you could. Maybe you’d make a point of telling them how much they mean to you. 


How does God show us how much He loves us? He gave His only Son. Do you realize how momentous this is? Jesus is God the Father’s only begotten Son. Furthermore, Jesus is the beloved Son of the Father (Matthew 3:17).  Jesus is incredibly important to the Father, very much loved and valued by the Father. So for God the Father to give His Son because He loves us, you and me, that is almost more than we can comprehend!


Think about it. Not only did Jesus leave His home in glory and become human (Hebrews 2:5-18), He also learned obedience through the things He suffered (Hebrews 5:8). His life on this earth was not always easy, especially at the end. He submitted His will to God even to death on the cross (Phil 2:8).  It wasn’t just a quick death either. Jesus suffered for you and for me - because God loves us - because there was no other way to save us (Matthew 26:42) - because we are sinners in desperate need of the only possible Savior, Jesus Christ.


But there’s more to John 3:16 than God the Father giving His only Son because the Father loves the world so much! This is not like salt and pepper sprinkled over your plate. The gift of the Savior is to those who believe in Him. Just because a person is alive somewhere on planet Earth, just because they are part of “the world,” they are not automatically saved just because they are alive. Jesus is more precious than that! Incredible as it may seem, God is willing to give Jesus Christ to be killed for all people - if they believe in Him.  But this believing has to be a life-changing believing. But James tells us the demons believe (2:19), but they certainly will not be saved by the blood of Jesus Christ. No. Our belief has to be obvious in the way our life is changed because of that belief. Do we steal? No, we don’t steal because it would displease God. Do we lie? No. Do we murder? No. Do we keep the Sabbath holy? Yes. Do we honor our father and our mother? Yes. Because we believe in God, we do certain things and we avoid doing other things. It’s called obedience. We obey God’s commands because we believe that He is God, His is the Sovereign Creator and King and therefore has the right to tell us what to do. He has the right to expect our obedience. That’s what believing in God looks like. If you’re not obeying God, maybe you should check to see if you really believe in Him.


But John 3:16 goes on. Our belief in God leads to eternal life - life in God’s kingdom. That means that without belief in Jesus, we don’t have eternal life - not in His kingdom, not on this earth, not in an ever-burning hell. The opposite of eternal life is eternal death, and that’s what the word “perish” means. So when we believe in Jesus, John 3:16 says, we won’t perish (die), but we will have eternal life. 


What God has prepared for those who love Him is going to be incredible (2 Cor 4:17; 1 Cor 2:9)!! And it’s hard to get our minds completely wrapped around that too!! Not only did God give us His Son to save us from our sin debt and from eternal death, God has also given us the promise of eternal life in His kingdom! What love the Father has bestowed upon us!!


John 3:16 is probably one of the most recognizable verses from the New Testament, and if we believe what John wrote, it can change our lives.


Sabbath, July 23rd
Bloom and Be Beautiful
For God  did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. John 3:17

We have some friends who have four dogs, four cats, and four goats. We have Pepper. I have a big box of seeds. Do you know what these three things have in common? They were all rescued from death and/or destructiion.

Most, if not all, of Caitie and Kyle’s pets were rescues. They were animals that were sick or injuried or animals that the owners just didn’t want anymore. If Caitie and Kyle’s family hadn’t stepped in, those animals almost certainly wouldn’t be alive today.

Pepper was dumped up the road from our house. We are pretty sure that the van which came down our road the night before we found Pepper was just looking for a place where they could dump him. No water. No food. A little puppy that still had the puppy smell, little puppy teeth, that could slide under the futon without pausing in his headlong run, that had already spent almost 24 hours outside where coyotes or owls could’ve eaten him - Pepper could very easily have been a dead little puppy when we found him. And furthermore, we didn’t have to take him in. We could’ve taken him to an animal shelter, where they may or may not have euthanized him because of overcrowding.

Then there’s this box of seeds. Phil found these seeds thrown in the trash. Because they are packaged for sale in 2016, it’s hard for a business to sell them. It’s just more cost efficient to throw them in the trash and make room for items the business can sell. The seeds just weren’t going to make the business enough money to be worth keeping them. Phil rescued them from the trash.

In each of these cases, Kyle and Caitie’s pets, Pepper, the seeds, they were headed for death or destruction. But someone intervened and saved them.

That’s what going on in John 3:17 - For God  did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.  When Jesus came into this world, as the Light of the world, the Logos, the Bread of Life, He didn’t come to condemn the world. John 3:18 says that anyone who didn’t believe in Jesus was condemned anyway. We, as a human race, all of mankind, were already deserving of death. We all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We, if we don’t have a relationship with God through Jesus Christ, stand condemned. We only look forward to living this life and then there’s nothing but death.

But God sent His Son, His only Son, Jesus, our Messiah, to save us, to rescue us from our sins, to give us eternal life in His kingdom - if we believe in Him. 

When you know that, then what? Does that change your life and how you live?

The seeds don’t know that Phil rescued them. And I don’t know Caitie and Kyle’s pets. But I know how Pepper responded to being rescued. He follows me everywhere. He wants to know where I am and what I’m doing. If he’s on the other side of the door from where I am, he lets everyone know. I can be sitting in one room with Pepper alseep (I think) on the floor. When I move to another room to do something, Pepper gets up and follows me - even if he only moves into the new room to collapse on the floor. And I thought he was asleep!! My mom says Pepper will never forget who rescued him.

Think about that. Here’s this dog that follows me around and wants to be where I am because we gave him food and water and brought him home. I don’t know that Pepper is thinking all that out, and it’s nothing like being given the hope of eternal life. So what Jesus did for us is so much more incredible! At the very least, when we realize what God has done for us, when we believe in Jesus, it should change our lives. We should be willing to follow Him anywhere. We should be willing to do whatever He says we should do. As John Newton wrote in “Amazing Grace,” “I once was lost, but now I’m found!” Think about it! If a little dog can show gratitude by following me around, what should our reaction be to our Savior and God who has given us so much at so great a cost?!

Too much of the time, we say that we believe in God and then we blithely go about our lives, doing whatever we want. We know God wants us to worship Him on the Sabbath, but we have other things we want to do. We know that God wants us to say nice things to our brothers (or sister), but we don’t particularly like what they’ve done today, so we say mean and hurtful things instead. We know that God wants us to honor our father and our mother, but - for crying out loud - mom and dad want us to keep our room clean, and eat our vegetables, and not spend too much time with our electronic devices (tv, computer, tablets). So when Mom and Dad ask us to do something, we roll our eyes and say, “Right now?” Think about it: God the Father loved you so much that He sent His Son to save you from death, to give you hope of eternal life in His kingdom as part of the family of God. So, now it’s up to you. How are you going to spend the rest of your life? How are you going to spend the rest of this day? How are you going to spend the next five minutes? Perhaps you should spend some time thinking about what pleases the One who saved you.

You know, these little packages of seeds were in the trash. They were never going to germinate and grow. Now, they have the opportunity to sprout and bloom and be beautiful. You, too, can make the most of the opportunity that God has given you to bloom where you are, to be beautiful for God. After all, God has saved you; what are you going to do with this opportunity to show Him how much that means to you?

Sabbath, July 30th
Darkness
 And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. John 3:19

Are you afraid of the dark? I remember when I was a kid, I was very scared of the dark. I remember having my  mom check my closet to see if there was anything in it before I went to sleep. Even as a teenager, I hated being home alone after dark. There’s something in us that knows that the dark can be hiding something which could hurt us.

O.K. so do you ever prefer the darkness? Amazingly enough, yes. I prefer it to be dark when I want to sleep. Having the light on bothers me.

I would also suspect that when I do something wrong, I would prefer it to be dark so that no one can see what I’ve done. It’s a silly notion, really, because the One who created light can see into the dark as well. God knows what I’m doing whether it is light or whether it is dark.

But I think there’s also another aspect to this verse. Consider the verse again. How does it apply to you? Do you love the darkness rather than the light? Are your works evil? I suspect that most of you, like me, would say that you do not love the darkness, but the second question gives me a bit of a pause. Are my works evil? Jesus told those listening to Him in Matthew 7:11 “If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” Jesus didn’t just say that their works were evil; He said they were evil.

Take a look at this word “evil.” It is the Greek word “poneros” which can apply in the moral or spiritual sense and means sorrow, pain, or wicked, malicious or mischievous. It can apply to Satan. But it can also apply to sinners as a whole. It is that group of people who are in rebellion against, transgressing against, God.

Thankfully, those who are Christ’s, who have accepted His shed blood for their sins, who are in Christ, who are called Christians, who have a relationship with God the Father through the Son, have been bought from being slaves to sin. We still sin. We still transgress God’s holy and righteous law, but we are no longer numbered among transgressors. Jesus’ sacrifice put an end of that for us!

Nevertheless, that relationship with God needs continual work. If you have a friend, but over time, you spend less and less time with him, how close are you truly to that friend? God is our Friend, but we won’t be very close to Him if we don’t spend time walking in His ways (because He will walk in no other way), talking with Him (because He won’t force Himself on us), and preferring Him above all others (because that’s what love means in this verse: “Loved” is “agapao” (25):  to love, a direction of the will and finding one’s joy in something (derived from agape). It’s an interesting phenomenon: you sin, and you’re so guilt-ridden over your sin that you are ashamed to go to God and ask for forgiveness. So you quit praying because you know that when you talk with Him, you have to confess and repent of what you’ve done. You are so upset over the damage you’ve done to the relationship that you do the very worst thing - to start avoiding God. Avoiding prayer leads to avoiding Bible study which leads to staying home from church which leads to gradually pushing God out of your life. In essence, you’ve rejected the Light for darkness - even though, intellectually you know that God already knows what you’ve done.  And in a very real sense, the physical darkness of which you were afraid, because of what harmful thing might be in it, symbolizes the spiritual darkness in which you find yourself. There is definitely something that can hurt you in that spiritual darkness, that place where you’ve gone, where God is not. Ultimately, life apart from God is eternal death.

So sometimes, in His great agape for you, God needs to send you some adversity to get you to run to Him, begging Him to forgive you and restore the relationship between you. And just like the Sun coming out after a storm, you rejoice with exceeding gladness that you’re walking in the Light, that your relationship with God has been restored.

I hope, when you read this verse, that it reminds you to keep that relationship with God close, repenting of your sins as soon as you’re aware of them. I hope you will love the Light rather than the darkness.

EXTRA!  Here are the lexicon’s definitions for the Greek words found in this verse. Enjoy!

Light is “phos” (5457):  light of the sun or of the day; never kindled therefore never quenched

World is “kosmos”(2889):  the sum total of the material universe, the beauty in it, or the sum total of the persons living in it

Loved is “agapao” (25):  to love, a direction of the will and finding one’s joy in something (derived from agape).

Darkness is “skotos”(4655): physical darkness or spiritual darkness, implying ignorance or error

Evil is “poneros”(4190): wicked, malicious, mischievous. Satan is the author of all the poneros (mischief) in the world
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Sabbath, August 6th
Work
Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.” John 6:29


Have you ever worked really hard? Hard work can be something that takes a lot of effort or takes a long time. Can you think of something that you really worked at?


Do you know anyone who works hard? What kind of work do they do? A lot of people work hard - building houses, flying airplanes, fighting fires, protecting people from criminals, taking care of people - lots of people work hard.


How much of the hard work we do is really important? I built a fence several years ago. I worked hard building that fence, digging post holes, stapling fencing, reinforcing with chicken wire, building a gate. It was hard work. But a few years later, we pulled that fence out with the tractor in about thirty minutes. Today it’s hard to see where the fence was - and it really doesn’t matter now because it’s not there.


Sometimes kids think that cleaning their room or making their bed falls into the same category. That is, they wonder if it really matters if they clean their room or make their bed. It’s just going to get messed up again anyway. The funny thing is, there are a lot of things that adults do that don’t really matter in the end; ten years from now whether that “thing” was done or not won’t matter.


So, if you’re going to work hard, you should work at something that matters.


I know that God never has that problem. Whatever God does is important, and it matters. Can you think of some of the incredible things that God has done? He made all the animals perfectly. He set the stars precisely in their place in the sky and He knows them each by name. He created beautiful flowers in a myriad of colors. He created taste and pleasure in tasting things. Our God has done great things. 


Why did God do everything that He did? Why didn’t He just make all dogs the same shape, size and bark? Why didn’t He create flowers in one color with one beautiful smell? Why didn’t He just give us all manna to eat all the time so that your mom wouldn’t have to figure out different things for you to eat every day? Why did God create our world in such variety and intricacies?


But God did more than just create the world. He walked with Adam in the garden. He told Noah to build an ark. He called Abram out of Ur, into the place that God would show him. God used Joseph to save his whole family during a famine. God rescued Daniel from the lions’ den. God sent down fire from heaven to consume not only the sacrifice on the altar on Mt. Carmel, but also the stones and the water. God rescued His people from Egypt. We could go on and on. Our God has done incredibly great and marvelous things. Why?


We get a very cool glimpse into why God does all that He does. John 6:29 says, Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”   What did Jesus say is God’s work? That you, and I, and those God calls, would believe in him whom he has sent. Don’t let all of the pronouns confuse you. Jesus simply is saying that the work of the Father is that you would believe in Jesus, the One God sent to this world to redeem it.


Think about that for a minute!


Adam’s choice is an object lesson so that you would learn to believe in Jesus. God means it when He tells us to obey Him. When we choose to disobey, we choose to be separated from God. We can’t have fellowship with God if we don’t obey His commandments.


Noah’s flood was an object lesson so that you would learn to believe in Jesus. Noah’s story teaches us that we are sinful and we are headed for death unless we are rescued. Our only hope of rescue is Jesus Christ.


Abram’s life is an object lesson so that you would learn to believe in Jesus. Abram’s story teaches us to go wherever God tells us to go because He is trustworthy.


Joseph’s life is an object lesson that things don’t always go well and people don’t always treat you fairly. But God is sovereign and He can rescue you out of bad situations.


And the creation around is an object lesson so that you would learn to believe in Jesus. Romans tells us that the invisible things of God are clearly seen in the creation! You cannot look at the variety of dogs, the myriad of flower colors, the diversity of smells - all of the different and intricate pieces of creation without knowing that we have a Creator, and that He is good.


Think about everything that God has done, and continues to do, so that you (and I) will believe in Jesus Christ! It’s absolutely phenomenal! So they next time you are working hard, stop and think about God’s work - that you would believe in Jesus Christ. It must be very important to God that you believe because He’s gone to an awful lot of work so that you will.

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Sabbath, August 13th
Judging Right Judgment
Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment. John 7:24


I saw a story on Facebook a couple of weeks ago. 
A 24 year-old son seeing out from the train’s window shouted: “Dad, look the trees are going behind!” Dad smiled and the young couple sitting nearby, were looking at the 24 year old’s childish behavior with pity.


Suddenly he again exclaimed:  “Dad, look the clouds are running with us!” The couple couldn’t resist and said to the old man: “Why don’t you take your son to a good doctor?” The old man smiled and said: “I did and we are just coming from the hospital, my son was blind from birth, he just got his eyes today.


When  I looked the story up on the internet, there was a moral printed with it: 
Every single person on the planet has a story. Don’t judge people before you truly know them. The truth might surprise you.


We have a saying in our culture: Don’t judge a book by its cover. That’s the lesson of this story. So, what does it mean to not judge a book by its cover? Let’s say that I have two books. They have the identical words inside, but the covers are different. You don’t know, before you read both books, that the words are the same. All you see are the covers. And oftentimes, you make your choice of which book to read just by looking at the covers - because that’s all the information you have.


That’s what Jesus is saying in John 7:24: Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.


The Jewish leaders were seeking to kill Jesus because He had healed on the Sabbath. Yet, Jesus pointed out to the people that these same leaders would circumcise their baby boys on the sabbath in order to do what Moses commanded. Jesus tried to point out the incongruity of their reasoning: the leaders were willing to circumcise a baby, the symbol of the covenant between God and the physical children of Abraham. But they weren’t willing for Jesus to make a man well.  You see, the Jewish leaders had taken God’s law and added more rules to it so that they wouldn’t come close to breaking the law. But in putting that fence around the law, they were making God’s law a burden. And God’s law is not a burden! It gives life. It is the way that makes life work. It’s the instruction manual given by the Creator for how to run this life the best way, really - the only way.
Yes, you are not supposed to work on the Sabbath. However, if an ox was in the ditch (if it was an emergency), you could help the ox. There are examples throughout the Bible of exceptions to God’s law, i.e. it was not lawful for David to eat the showbread. But he and his men were running from Saul and they were hungry. He was held guiltless by God. You are not supposed to work on the Sabbath, but the Sabbath was perhaps the busiest day of the week for the  priests. The high priest worked all day long, even on Atonement. But they were held guiltless by God. There are times when the law is set aside because of the specific circumstance.


Children have trouble with this concept. At a pool you are never to run on the deck. It’s wet. It’s slippery. You could easily fall. The lifeguard will blow his whistle at you every time! Don’t run. But if the lifeguard sees someone injured, that very same lifeguard, who told you not to run, will run to help the injured person. And it’s okay, even good, that he’s breaking the law of not running. That person needs help. If he wasn’t running, it would be terrible. He could be fired for not running.


You see, you have to know a little more information before you make a judgment. This is a hard thing for even adults to learn to do: the next time someone does something that you think is wrong, the next time someone says something that you think shouldn’t have been said, try to find out why before you make a judgment. There could be more to the story. They might not be trying to insult you. They might have meant something else. There could be a lot more to the story.


Don’t judge a book by its cover. What’s inside could surprise you.


Sabbath, August 20th
​Knowing the Good Shepherd
I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, John 10:14


The other day I walked up to the mailbox to get the mail. I was almost back to the gate of our property when I met Pepper trailing me up the road. Now, I’m very suspicious that dogs don’t see well, or they don’t trust what they see. I know they have a highly developed sense of smell, but they must not trust that either. I know he saw me, and I know he smelled me because he was tracking me up the road. But as soon as I saw him, I ducked out of sight and crept up to the gate, walking stealthily along the fence. Suddenly, I jumped out and yelled. Pepper tucked tail and ran. But as soon as he heard me laughing he came back to tell me, “I knew it was you all the time, and, by the way, here’s a bite for trying to trick me.” What threw Pepper was my behavior. I don’t normally walk like that, so he wasn’t sure what was going on and who I was - for sure.


If you were in a room packed full of people, would you be able to pick out your parents? What if you were blind-folded? Could you still pick out your parents?
Your answer depends on how well you know your parents and how much time you’ve spent with them. The better you know your parents, the more clues there are to help you recognize them. You should know them by sight. But even if you were blind-folded, you would know them by the sound of their voices. What other characteristics would help you recognize your parents? Drinking coffee, singing songs while working, their gait, their habits. I usually know which kid is coming down the stairs by the way they move, the speed, the volume. 


So how would you recognize Jesus? That could be a very difficult question to answer - how do physical people recognize a spiritual being, the Great Jehovah, the I Am? Thankfully, Jesus gave His disciples (and, by extension, all of us) a metaphor to which they could relate.  He said, “I am the good shepherd.” What does that mean to you? To His audience, a shepherd was someone who guided, protected, and provided for his sheep. The sheep knew the shepherd’s voice and would follow that voice even if there were other shepherds calling. They trusted Him and relied on Him for everything. The shepherd knew each sheep. If one was missing, he knew exactly which one was missing. You have to know your sheep really well to be able to do that! And you only know your sheep that well when you really care about your sheep. So in using that metaphor, Jesus was very clearly telling the people that those who belong to Him know Him and are known by Him. It’s not just a casual relationship either. If you belong to God, God knows you. Matthew 10:30 says that even the hair on your head is numbered by God. 


But think about the shepherd’s job. He not only gave them food and found a safe pasture for them to lie in, he also made sure they stayed out of trouble. He guided their steps. If one did happen to go astray, he’d go after it. Then, when he found the lost sheep, he’d bring it back. The sheep would listen, would heed, the calling shepherd and would come. 


Some people think they know Jesus. But in John 14:15 Jesus says, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” So if you know Jesus and love Him, you’re going to obey Him - even when it’s not easy, even when people around you don’t agree with you, even when it’s not what you really want to do. If you love God, you want to do the things that please Him. Like the sheep, you come to Jesus when He calls. You listen to His guidance.


Some people think they know Jesus, but they don’t take the time they need to listen to His voice. They don’t read their Bible every day. They don’t pray every day. They don’t simplify their lives enough so that they can have time every day to just be quiet. So how can they hear His voice?


Are you listening to Jesus? Do you know Him? Are you known by Him?



*Look up: John 14:15; Galatians 5:22-23; John 13:35; Micah 6:8



Sabbath, August 27th
Lifted Up
And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” John 12:32


Hillsong sings, “You are high and lifted up; You are high and lifted up; And my soul sings hallelujah; To the Lamb; The Lamb of God.”


There’s a song called  “Lift Him Up.”  The fourth stanza goes, “Lift Him up by living as a Christian ought, Let the world in you the Savior see;”  


There’s a song in our hymnal called “Lift High the Lord, Our Banner.” A banner was another name for a flag, standard, or signal. It was lifted up so the army could follow the commander of the army.  This is definitely scriptural. In Isaiah 11, one of the most beautiful descriptions of the millennial reign, there’s this verse: In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his resting place will be glorious. (vs 10, NIV). 


In all three of these songs, you could replace the word “lift” with “exalt”- to show honor and reverence and hold in high esteem. And that fits in this context: when Jesus was lifted up from the earth, He drew all people to Himself. It’s a restatement of John 3:16: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life (KJV). For after Jesus died, He was resurrected on the third day. His life was given for our sins, and He sat down at the right hand of the Father, with great honor (Hebrews 1:3-4).


In fact, the word that is translated “lifted up” is translated “exalted” is every other instance in the New Testament (except for everywhere in John - and in James 4:10).


So it’s curious - because there seems to be another meaning in this verse; look at the very next verse in John 12: He said this to show by what kind of death he was going to die (vs 33). In other words, Jesus was telling His audience that He was going to be crucified. He was going to be lifted up on a cross to die. In the Old Testament, being hung on a tree was reserved for those people who were thought to be guilty of truly terrible crimes or sins. In fact, Deuteronomy records that anyone hung on a tree was cursed! (Deut 21:22-23) This kind of lifted up seems absolutely opposite of being exalted!


And then there’s another reference to Jesus being lifted up - and it has to do with a serpent! The story is in Numbers 21. The Israelites were wandering in the wilderness, and they started complaining against Moses and against God, saying that God had brought them into the wilderness to kill them. There was no food and no water, and they absolutely hated the manna. So God sent fiery serpents among the people to bite them. Many people died. Then the LORD said to Moses, "Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a standard; and it shall come about, that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, he will live.” And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on the standard; and it came about, that if a serpent bit any man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived (vs 8-9).


We know that the bronze serpent pointed to Jesus because Jesus said to Nicodemus, “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up” (John 3:14).


O.K. So we know that the figure of speech “lifted up” could mean crucifixion.


We know that the bronze serpent was literally lifted up so that when the people looked at it, they lived.


We know that Jesus humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Phil. 2:8-11).


So you could say that when Jesus was “lifted up” (crucified), He was lifted up (exalted) again to the glory that He had had with the Father before the world began - and is looking forward to that time when His enemies shall be made His footstool (Hebrews 10:13).


It’s another one of those paradoxes found in scripture, like: the first shall be last and the last shall be first; or: if you want to be great in God’s kingdom, you must be servant of all. Jesus would be lifted up and draw all people to Himself after He had submitted His will to the Father’s will - even to the shame of being crucified on a cross.  


It’s a good lesson for us. This life is not about getting honor and glory for ourselves. There are too many scriptures which tell us that!! God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble (James 4:6). There are six things the Lord hates . . . haughty eyes . . . (Proverbs 6:16-19).  And James 4:10, Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up, takes on greater meaning when we think about what Jesus did for us, how He humbled Himself - even to death on a cross - and was lifted up by the Father.


Sabbath, September 3rd
Learning to Submit
He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?”  John 13:6


It’s the Lord’s Supper. The disciples are in the upper room with Jesus. At one point in the evening, in the middle of supper, Jesus stands up, puts a towel around his waist, pours water into a basin, and begins to wash the disciples’ feet. When he comes to Peter, Peter says to Jesus, “Lord, do you wash my feet?”


We don’t know why, exactly, Peter said this. We don’t know what he was thinking. But we do know that it was the servant’s job, the lowliest servant’s job, to wash the feet of the guests. We know that no one’s feet had been washed, so Jesus was doing it. And we know that Peter was questioning what Jesus was doing?


We would never do that.  Would we?  Would we question how God works in our life?


Peter not only questioned Jesus, he also emphatically stated that Jesus would never wash his feet!


We would never tell God that He couldn’t do something in our life. Would we?


Jesus, in His mercy, explained to Peter that, unless He washed him, Peter would have no part with Him. If Peter wanted a close relationship with the Lord, Jesus needed to wash his feet. Peter’s reaction was immediate. He wanted his feet and his hands and his head washed too.


We would never demand that God modify His plan and purpose in our life? Would we?


There’s a big difference between asking questions and demanding answers. Every time I imagine approaching God to ask Him what He’s doing, I think of God’s response in Job, “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? . . Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding” (Job 38:2, 4).


There’s a big difference between telling God “no” and expressing a lack of understanding of how or why He will do something. Think of the difference between Zecharias’ reaction to being told he and Elizabeth would have a baby and Mary’s reaction.


There’s a big difference between doing what God tells you to do - and you taking it upon yourself to improve upon God’s plan. I shudder when I think of the consequence of Moses striking the rock twice, instead of speaking to it as God had commanded. God said Moses disobeyed because Moses did not believe in God, to uphold Him as holy (Numbers 20:8-12).


That lack of belief in God is what leads us to question Him, to tell Him no, or to modify what He wants us to do. That lack of belief is also evidence of a lack of trust. It’s neglecting to recognize God as Holy, as Sovereign, as God.


So how do we know when we are recognizing God as Holy, when we are demonstrating in our lives that we know He is Sovereign, and when we are believing that He is God? I believe it’s all in how we react to the things that happen to us in our daily lives.


Do you work on your relationship with God? Do you read your Bible? Do you sing God-honoring songs as you mow the lawn? Do you pray to Him? And do you pray that He would direct your steps? Do you tell Him that your life is in His hands? If you do, then when things happen, do you recognize that God is sovereign? Do you understand that He’s in absolute control of what happens to you? It doesn’t mean that bad things won’t happen; it means that He allows things to happen  to you - according to His will. 


So when things don’t go your way, do you praise God anyway? When you’re having a bad day, do you think about the blessings you’ve already received from His hand and ask yourself, Why are you downcast, O my soul?, as David did? When you think maybe you could improve upon what God has asked you to do, do you pull yourself up short, shake your head, and tell yourself not to be that stupid today?


It’s a process of learning to submit our will to His - in everything. No matter what God asks us to do, we are willing to do it. That’s our goal as servants of the Most High. The apostle Paul put it this way . . . “we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Cor. 10:5b, NIV). I like the way Paul phrases it - taking captive every thought - as if they were butterflies (flighty thoughts), chickens (fearful thoughts), Pepper (headstrong thoughts) or wood bees (destructive/enemy thoughts).


I’m so glad Peter had this episode with Jesus because we can see ourselves, at different points in our lives, doing the exact same thing, acting in the exact same way towards God and His will in our lives. Rather, we should work diligently to take captive every thought to make  it obedient to Christ - especially if Jesus wants to wash  our feet.

Sabbath, September 10th
Love One Another
By this all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. John 13:35


Love is an important part of determining who is a disciple of Jesus. So maybe we’d better know what love looks like. What is love? Who gets to define what love looks like? One memorable movie had this definition: Love means never having to say you’re sorry. I’m not sure too many people agree with that definition; there are plenty of friendships and marriages which have worked through conflicts because they were willing to tell one another that they were sorry!! So who gets to decide what love looks like? You can’t count on Hollywood. They certainly don’t know. You can’t ask a child. Most children’s definition of love is “Give me everything I want. Then I’ll know you love me.”  


We have to use God’s definition of love. The first is found in John 15:13: Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. Our first definition makes it VERY plain that love is self-sacrificing. It’s not easy. True love may demand everything you have.


The definition given in 1 Corinthians 13 isn’t easy to do either: Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.


This is likewise tough! This is not the feel-good, hugs and kisses kind of love. This is the kind of love that does what is best for the other person, even when you don’t feel like it and even when it’s not what they want either!


Let me give you an example. Pepper loves playing fetch. He barks incessantly if the boys go out on the front porch. He will bounce up and down. When they throw the ball for him, he runs and leaps and often catches the ball in midair. He lopes back, drops the ball at their feet, and barks (teeth snapping in his enthusiasm) until they throw the ball again. I think he would keep going until his heart gave out. I know he’s continued until he couldn’t even bark because he was panting so hard. Is it loving that dog to continue giving him what he wants, even though it could also kill him? Or is it loving to take the ball away before he’s ready to be done playing?


Let’s use chocolate as an example. There’s someone who loves chocolate. And you love that person. So should you give him lots of chocolate? Well, chocolate isn’t the best dietary choice. It’s okay to give him some, but not anywhere near as much as he’d like and nowhere near as much as you could.


Love means helping when they need it. And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken. Ecclesiastes 4:12


Love means encouraging them when they need it. not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. Hebrews 10:25


Love means letting others see Jesus in you. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. Matthew 5:16 


Love means pointing others to Jesus Christ, that they might have a closer relationship with Him - which translates into greater peace, deeper joy, and an unconquerable hope! Love means gently telling someone they are wrong, if they’re walking contrary to God’s word. Love means rejoicing at their victories. Love means giving them a Levitical war sermon when they need the encouragement. Love means providing a listening ear when they need to talk. Love means giving them your shoulder to cry on when they are sorrowing. Love means walking beside them, sharing their life. 


Love is tough. It’s not about what you get back; that’s not your purpose. Love is about what you give to someone else. It’s a high calling. It’s what Jesus said would set apart those who are His disciples.


By this all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. John 13:35

Sabbath, September 17th
Going Home
In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? John 14:2


When I was a kid, one of my most favorite things to do when I went back to Grandma and Grandad’s house was riding horses. Usually, I rode Buster. “Buster” wasn’t his registered name; that was Danny Boy, I think. But “Buster” fit him better. He’d been a stallion until Uncle Mike had to geld him because he wouldn’t let Mike catch any of the mares. Gelding him made Buster better, but he was still ornery. He was gentle with kids, but when he had had enough of going around in circles and not doing any work, he’d head for the barn, hoping to get some oats. No matter how hard a kid tried, pulling on the reins didn’t work. Buster was going home. He was done.


We all need a place to call home, a place where we belong. Like Buster, when we’re done working for the day, we want to be home, with our own things, able to sleep in our own bed, where we belong.


But there’s one problem. We are temporary. And worse than that, where we belong in this world is temporary. And we experience that reality in many ways. When you get straight A’s on your report card and are passed to the second grade, you don’t belong in first grade any more. You can go visit last year’s teacher, but it doesn’t feel the same because you don’t belong there any more. When you move from one house or apartment into another one, you can drive past where you used to live. You can remember things that you did there once upon a time, but you don’t belong there anymore. You can graduate from college, having spent four years studying and living on campus. But as soon as you graduate, you don’t belong there any more and going back for Homecoming isn’t the same. You don’t have a purpose for being there, not really.


So people search for the place where they belong. Psychologists say that belonging somewhere is one of the three most basic needs of humans. But it’s all an illusion - because this life is temporary, and these bodies are temporary, and the houses we dwell in are temporary. And, at some level, we know it! Looking for the place where we will always belong is like chasing after the wind . . . unless you are a Christian. 


If you’re a Christian, you still live in a temporary world, in a temporary body, and a temporary dwelling, but you know this life is not the goal. Hebrews 11 says that we’re looking for better country, a heavenly one - that we’re aliens and strangers in this world. Many Christian songs and hymns express that sentiment:


“This world is not my home; I’m just a-passin’ through.
My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue.”


“All I know is I’m not home yet; this is not where I belong.
Take this world and give me Jesus; this is not where I belong.”


The good news is found in John 14:2: In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?  There’s a place for us in God’s kingdom. If you belong to God, if you have been bought and paid for by the blood of Jesus Christ, then there’s a room for you in God’s house. But it gets even better than just knowing there’s room for you. Jesus has prepared a place especially for you. It was made with you in mind. It’s designed exactly to fit you - a place where you belong.


Do you remember when you were a kid and had gone to stay with friends or your grandparents? When you got home, your parents were waiting for you. They were glad to see you. All of your stuff was waiting for you, and you were content to be home. I’m so glad God gave us that experience so we’d have an idea of what it will feel like to finally be home, where our Heavenly Father wants us, and where we belong . . .


 . . . because we don’t belong in this world. We grieve over the pain we see around us - people getting old and dying, accidents, illnesses. We get angry over the lawlessness and selfishness, the persecution and wickedness. We despair over destructive choices and willful disregard of other people. The closer we get in our relationship to God, the farther we are from fitting in and belong in this world.


I am so thankful that God gave us the Sabbath (to remind us to rest in Him; He’s Sovereign and it’s all in His control.) I am so grateful that He gave us the Feast of Trumpets (to remind us that He is coming back; things will be set right again). I am looking forward to the Day of Atonement (picturing reconciliation with God, freedom once and for all from who we are and what we’ve done because of the blood of Jesus Christ). And I’m so very glad we have the Feast of Tabernacles (to rejoice before God for seven days, dwelling in temporary dwellings, knowing that He has a plan to take us all home).


There are days when I’ve had enough of this world, the pain and the trouble that is here. Like Buster, I’ve got my eyes fixed on the barn. I’m ready to go home.

Sabbath, September 24th
Obedience and Love
If you love me, you will keep my commandments.  John 14:15

Why does your little brother obey your mom? I suspect that he knows he’ll get a swift swat on the seat of his pants if he disobeys.  Even for older children, they know if they disobey Mom and Dad, they are going to be punished. Punishment can be anything from limiting privileges to assigning extra chores. But there’s a consequence to disobedience.

So, somewhere along the line, every child figures out that, if Mom and Dad don't know about the infraction, the child won’t be punished. They are going to get off scot-free. Only . . . most of the time, Mom knows how much ice cream there should have been in the freezer. Or she knows that you didn’t really clean your room. Or, if you’re little, and you’ve been told not to touch a hot stove, and you do it anyway, the consequence is built in. Mom doesn’t have to catch you; you’re going to get burned.

Trying to get away with breaking the rules can lead a child to the next realization about rules: they are for their own good. Most parents don’t make rules just so the kids will have a miserable life. Good parents try to rear their children to know right from wrong, things that will benefit you from things that will hurt you. So eventually a child gets to the point where they understand they should obey because they know it’s for their own good.

But warring with that concept is another childish concept: the rules don’t apply to me. The rules apply to everyone else, but I have a good reason for why they don’t apply to me. That’s why you see people speeding. That’s why you see children riding their bikes at breakneck speed down the hill. That’s why kids go outside, in the middle of winter, without mittens, a hat, or even a coat. The rules don’t apply to them. Only, they do. You might be able to get away with breaking the rules for a while, but eventually, they will catch up with you and you will suffer the consequences of disobedience.

But the best reason for obeying Mom and Dad’s rules is because you love them so much, you value your relationship with them so much, that it hurts you to think of disappointing them. Some children eventually get to the point that they’d rather be beaten than have to tell their parents what they did. It acts as a huge deterrent to disobedience.

I’m so glad God gave us the physical to help us understand the spiritual. We can apply the same stages of development to Christians and their obedience of God. They start out believing that they obey God because if they don’t, God will strike them with a lightning bolt, smack them with a 2 x 4, or punish them in some way.  Isn’t that why some Christians ask, “Is that required for salvation?”

Some Christians, who haven’t thought things through very well, think that maybe God will be busy somewhere else and they can just get away with disobedience. Perhaps that’s why so many evil things are done under the cover of darkness. But God knows. There’s no where you can go that God is unaware of your deeds.

Eventually a lightbulb goes off for the maturing Christian. They realize that God’s laws are for their own good. As Ron Dart used to say, “They are what makes life work.” God’s laws are for our benefit. They help us to live wisely, avoiding unnecessary suffering and pain.

But many Christians experience the same war as children do: they think that maybe God’s laws don’t apply to them. They know God’s laws are good, but they rationalize that God understands why they just can’t obey this time. They say things like: “Jesus kept the law for me, so I don’t have to.” They misapply religious phrases like “David ate the showbread and was guiltless” or “It’s an ox in the ditch.” They have all these reasons why God’s laws, which are holy and righteous and good, don’t apply to themselves. Only . . . they do. Eventually not obeying God’s laws will catch up with them, and they will suffer the consequences of disobedience.

Some Christians value their relationship with God so much that they don’t want to disappoint Him. They don’t want to make choices which would bring Him dishonor. They want to conduct themselves in such a way in this world that God is given the glory and the honor. In a word, they love God.

That’s the goal. Yes, there are consequences to breaking God’s laws. No, you can’t get away with breaking them. Yes, they are for your own good. No, you don’t get a free pass to break God’s laws whenever you feel like it. Yes, sometimes there are exceptions. But when you get to the heart of the matter, the best reason, the most pleasing reason to God to keep His commandments, is because you love Him.

If you love me, you will keep my commandments.  John 14:15

So why should you keep God’s commandments?

Sabbath, October 1st
Peace

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.  John 14:27


I thank God for the wonderful Christian music which points us to Him, helps us to see more deeply into His word, and helps us to remember different portions of Scripture. For instance, this verse in John 14:27 makes me think of Twyla Paris’ song, “Peace, Be Still.” In it, she applies Mark 4:35-41 to our personal lives. It is not the physical storms of which she is speaking; it is the storms of life, the illnesses, the trouble, the tribulations which cause us to become, as she puts it, “a churning sea.”


We are in the world (kosmos), so we’re going to experience some of the storms. When I was growing up in Casper, WY, we lived three blocks from the elementary school. It was difficult to get home on days when the wind was violently howling down from Casper Mountain into the city below! The wind would pick up pebbles and throw them in our faces. It would impede our progress. It would seem to go right through us so that we were chilled to the bone. Similarly, there are events in our lives which hurt us. Other events cause us to struggle to get anything accomplished. Sometimes we just feel so cold and uncomfortable. We just want peace.


The Greek word for “peace” is eirene. Like the Hebrew Shalom, eirene means more than just the end of strife or the state of untroubled, undisturbed well-being. It also has the connotation of positive blessing, especially in terms of a right relationship with God.


Look at the words Jesus uses:
    troubled: Greek tarasso meaning to stir, to agitate, trouble; roil water


    be afraid: Greek  deiliao meaning to be timid; be afraid


Our peace is in Jesus. He makes it possible for us to not only have a cessation of strife, but positive blessing as well.  It’s very much what we find in Isaiah 26:3 “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.” This is the exact opposite of Jonah 2:8. In the NIV it says, “Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.”


Do you want peace in your heart regardless of what is going on around you? That kind of peace is not available in the world. The world might give you a cessation of strife. But the world cannot give you a positive blessing or a right relationship with God. In Jonah’s terminology, the world is the vain idol to whom we cling, hoping to find peace.” Instead, by going our own way and rejecting God, we’re also rejecting the grace that could be ours through a relationship with Him.


So, how peaceful is your life?

Trumpets, October 3rd
The Prince of Peace
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.  John 14:27


Do you come when you’re called? It really depends on who is calling you, doesn’t it! You wouldn’t want to respond to just anyone.


What if, when you responded to the call, you were given a gift? Would you open it right away? What if you were given the gift, and you knew what it was, but you couldn’t enjoy the gift as completely as you would later? Would that make the gift less special to you?


The Feast of Trumpets reminds us, as Christians, that there is coming a day when Jesus Christ will return “with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God” (1Thes 4:16). It goes to say that the dead in Christ will rise first and we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them (vs.17). At that trumpet call, we, if we belong to God, will respond.


Do you believe that? Really believe? Because if you do, then you have the opportunity to respond to the call of God today - to come into a closer relationship with Him. He says to us all, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). 


God is calling us today, to a closer walk with Him. And there are so many blessings from walking with God. Rest is one of the gifts we find in Jesus, but rest is not the only gift that Jesus gives. Look at the memory verse: Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.  John 14:27


Peace. What an incredible gift!! But, maybe you don’t feel like you need that particular gift right now. Maybe your life is peaceful enough. Maybe you think you’d like to swap it for another gift. 


But there’s something very special about peace. The more you live in this world, the older you get, the more you realize that people all around you are looking for peace - a lack of conflict, no tension, contentment, peace. And they are looking for it in the world. The peace that the world gives doesn’t last very long. It’s only an imitation of true peace. And many people don’t know that true peace comes only from the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ.


Hopefully someday soon, on one Feast of Trumpets in the future, Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, will return to this world and bring peace once and for all. ‘Cause to tell you the truth, the peace that this world gives - it’s for the birds.

Sabbath, October 8th
The True Vine and Vinedresser
I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. John 15:1 


Several years ago, I was delighted to see a bunch of volunteer marigolds sprouting up from the flowers Christopher had planted the year before. But I didn’t want them in my beans and beets, so I painstakingly transplanted them - a couple of dozen of them - around the base of the oak tree in the yard. I thought the marigolds would be pretty far into the fall. The only problem was that as the seedlings grew, it became very apparent that I’d transplanted a bunch of weeds. There wasn’t a single marigold in the bunch. I was chagrined at the mistake and the waste of time and effort.


So when Jesus says that He is the true vine, I can’t help thinking of the converse: the false vine. What would a false vine be? It would be a vine that looks like the real vine (like those weeds I transplanted), but the vine wouldn’t give you the desired fruit. (I certainly didn’t get any marigolds.) The ESV study Bible says that the analogy of a vine is used of Israel in the Old Testament, particularly Isaiah 5:1-7. Here Israel was likened to a vine or a vineyard - but one that, despite all the care and attention, produced only wild grapes. The disciples listening to Jesus would have known about this passage in Isaiah. They would have made the connection between the kind of relationship Israel had with God and the relationship Jesus was offering to them. Jesus had just offered them the symbols of his body and blood - the new covenant. He’d washed their feet. He’d promised them the gift of the Holy Spirit and He told them He was giving them peace. 


But the analogy didn’t stop there. Jesus went on to say that the Father is the vinedresser. What does a vinedresser do? He cuts off the branches which aren’t producing fruit. Those branches are thrown into the fire and burned. Then the vinedresser trims back the fruitful branches so they will be more fruitful. He makes sure the vine has what it needs to grow and be fruitful. 


Israel was not fruitful. They had a form of godliness, but their hearts were far from God. They looked like they were serving God, but it was only surface. They went through all the rituals and holy days without loving God with all their heart. God tried pruning Israel, sending prophets and problems and even captivity. It didn’t change their hearts. So God the Father sent His Son, Jesus, to start the process of transforming us into the image of His Son through the power of the Holy Spirit.  


What Israel was unable to do - because they were carnal and slaves to the sinful nature - Jesus made possible for us to do - because He bought us with His blood, forming a new creation through His Spirit.


So. Here’s the analogy. Jesus is the Vine. The true Vine. We are the branches. As branches, we can’t just sit there and do nothing. We are supposed to be bearing fruit for the kingdom. If we aren’t bearing fruit, the Father, the Vinedresser, will cut us off and throw us away. If we are bearing fruit, He’ll prune us (It’s called discipline.) so that we’ll be more fruitful.


Some Christians think that once they accept the blood of Jesus Christ, that’s all there is to it. Now they can live any way they want. But Jesus makes it very clear that He, and the Father, expect us to bear fruit. We are supposed to be profitable for the kingdom. We’re supposed to be living our lives in a way that brings glory and honor to God. We’re supposed to be lights in a darkened world. 


If we are bearing fruit, we should expect some pruning, some pain and discipline, to make us more fruitful. That discipline doesn’t mean God doesn’t love us; it means He’s set the bar high. He doesn’t want us to settle for just good enough. Trouble and pain shouldn’t discourage us; it should make us look to God for our strength and direction - if we’re in the Vine and bearing fruit.


If we’re not bearing fruit, why would we expect a free ride in the vine? Like those weeds I’d thought were marigolds, we should expect to be plucked up so that there’s room for someone who will do God’s will.
​

Take some time to examine the fruit of your life.


Day of Atonement
Joy Unspeakable
​These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. John 15:11 


What makes you feel joy?


I can be moved to joy by music. Certain songs fill me with a sense of rightness and peace. I love singing them and could almost, almost, start dancing whenever they pop into my head.


I feel great joy about celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles. It’s the highlight of the year for me. I not only get to worship the King of kings for eight days, I get to see people who are likewise worshipping my Lord, people that I haven’t seen for a year or twenty years or  people that I haven’t yet met but are destined to be great friends. (Incidentally, the first time the word “rejoice” is seen in the Bible is in connection with rejoicing before the Lord at the Feast of Tabernacles.


I felt great joy when my babies were placed into my arms for the very first time. What an incredible blessing and responsibility God placed into my hands! I remember counting little fingers and toes and being in complete awe at the perfect child in my arms.


Jesus told his disciples, “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” What things had He told them? He had told them He was going to prepare a place for them. He’d told them they would receive the Holy Spirit to help them. He’d told them He was giving them peace. He’d encouraged them to keep His commandments and to abide, not only in His love, but also in the love of the Father. These things would indeed bring joy! 


But this wasn’t the complete picture. Jesus had also told them, that evening, that one of them would betray Him, that  Peter would deny Him three times, and that He was going where they could not follow; Jesus was going to the Father. The disciples were understandably upset by these things. They were not feeling joy.


But Jesus knew the betrayal, the denial, and His death were necessary for the rest of the promises of God. It’s kind of like the joy of having Jonathan was worth what it would take to have Christopher. And the joy of holding Christopher in my arms after he was born was worth it enough to go through it all again to have Jennifer. The pain was worth the joy that would come. Jesus’ death would be followed by His resurrection, a place being prepared for us, for the gift of the Holy Spirit to be poured out on God’s people, and the gift of true peace.


Atonement is very much like this! We are told to afflict our souls. That’s not something we look forward to. It’s afflicting. It’s not fun. But it’s part of this day - this day when atonement was made for the meeting place and for the people, for what they had done and for who they were. It  points to Jesus Christ who ever makes intercession for us before His Father. It points to a time in the future when we are, once and for all, reconciled to God, when complete atonement is made for the meeting place and for us. What an incredible feeling of joy we will have at that time!!


Atonement isn’t a fun day. Nevertheless, look past the affliction part of the day, to the reason for the day. Set your mind on the incredible blessing of being one with God. 
​

When Jesus was facing the cross, this was his mindset, according to Paul: “for the joy that was set before him [He] endured the cross, despising the shame” (Hebrews 12:2). For the joy that is set before you, being in God’s kingdom, being part of the very family of God, having true peace, afflict your soul on Atonement. It’s for joy unspeakable.


Sabbath, October 29th
Believe!
Jesus answered them, “Do you now believe? John 16:31


Belief is such a funny thing. You can truly believe something and be totally wrong. But you believe it - and that belief affects your behavior.


When I was probably about 10 years old, my older brother Bob and I were “helping” Uncle Mike clean up the shop, picking things up, putting things in their place, sweeping the floor. Mike picked up a huge hammer and off-handedly told Bob that if he put his finger up on the anvil, Mike would hit it with the hammer. So Bob did. And Mike brought that hammer down on the anvil. Bob pulled his finger away at the very last minute. They did this a couple of times. Then Bob decided that Mike wouldn’t really hit his finger, so he left it on the anvil. Mike felt really badly afterwards, but Mike really thought that Bob was going to pull his finger away at the last minute, just as he had before. What Bob and Mike both believed was totally wrong, but it determined what each was going to do. 


What you believe is obvious by the way you act.


Think about Pepper. Do you know what he believes will happen every time he comes in the front door? Absolutely! You know what he believes because he stands in front of the treat jar looking at it, and you if you’re too slow, waiting for his treat. It’s so funny because sometimes he goes on the front door, zips right back inside and then stands, waiting to get a treat. His belief is obvious by the way he acts.


So when we get to John 16, Jesus’ disciples had just heard many very important things from Jesus - to wash each others’ feet, to stay in the Vine, that Jesus was going to  prepare a place for them, that He would send them the Comforter. They responded by saying that they believed Jesus had come from God. This is when Jesus answered them, “Do you now believe?” Jesus knew that they didn’t fully believe, not yet, because their behavior was going to show just how much they didn’t yet believe. They would all abandon Jesus when He was arrested.


It makes you stop and think, doesn’t it. 


The ASL sign for believe is pointing to the head with the right index finger and then joining hands as if taking hold of something. This is the way one author describes: “It’s knowledge in your head that you grab hold of.”


The disciples knew Jesus was from God, that He was the Son of God; they just hadn’t grabbed hold of it yet. It hadn’t yet changed their behavior.
Think about what you believe. 


Do you really believe that thing? How can you tell? Because it will change your behavior.


Have you seen little, little kids jump off the diving board into their daddy’s arms? They really believe he will catch them and keep them safe. They believe it so much, they overcome their fear of the diving board and their fear of deep water to jump.


Think about what you believe. Do you just know something but are not acting on that knowledge? Or do you really believe and it has changed your life?


​Sabbath, November 5th

Falling Away
 I have said all these things to keep you from falling away.  John 16:1


Have you ever known anyone who was once trying to do something, trying to get somewhere, pursing a goal . . . and then just quit? Sure you have! We’ve known people who were part of our 4H family and then just quit; they decided it wasn’t worth the time and effort anymore. They just couldn’t see the benefit of staying with the 4H family. So they quit. We’ve experienced it ourselves - just this week: we were pulling the sassafras saplings out of the mulch pile. Our goal was to pull all of them out, but we got hot and tired . .  . and quit. That was Sunday. We could’ve gone out any day this week and finished the job, but we haven’t quite made it back yet. We needed to take a break, but there’s a difference between taking a break and not going back at all. And we’ve also seen the pursuit of a goal abandoned in a very sad way: those people who quit coming to church. We pretty much know they aren’t going anywhere for church; it doesn’t seem like it’s worth the time and the effort to them.


That’s the idea of “falling away” in John 16:1 - the idea of no longer following Jesus. Jesus told His disciples a great many things the night He was betrayed: He talked about foot washing, the gift of the Holy Spirit, going to prepare a place for them. But I would not have thought that one of the reasons Jesus told them all of these things was to keep them from falling away.  Jesus told them all these things to encourage them. And the disciples needed the encouragement because there was the possibility that they would fall away.


I shake my head because I can’t quite believe that Peter, Andrew, James, John or any of the eleven would fall away . . . and yet, they all abandoned Christ when He was arrested.


What would cause the disciples to fall away? Fear? Maybe. Disappointment? Maybe. Not comprehending God’s overall plan? Maybe. And maybe the answer was different for each one of the disciples. So Jesus told them what they needed to hear that night so they would have the courage and understanding to do the job He’d given them, to preach the gospel to all the world even after Jesus was gone.


So what do you do when you’re feeling discouraged by events around you? What do you do when you’re tired and you just want to give up? What do you do when it doesn’t seem like it’s worth while?


You pick up the Word of God and you read. You read the God-inspired words that were written for you so that you wouldn’t fall away. You need strength. You need encouragement. You need comfort. You need the reiteration of promises that tell you what God’s plan is and how much He loves you.


Or you can do what I used to do a lot when I was in college. I used to call up Mom and tell her, “I need a Levitical war sermon.” She wouldn’t ask what was wrong, she’d just start telling me of God’s promises, that He’d never promised it would be easy, but He’d promised never to leave me or to give me more than I could stand. Why did she do that? Because before the Israelites would go into battle, the Levites would stand before the army and remind them that they belonged to God, that as long as they were following His ways, He would fight for them and with them and give them the victory. In many ways, that’s what Jesus was doing. He was giving His disciples a Levitical war sermon. He was giving them promises of the coming Holy Spirit, the  place He was going to prepare for them, that they were going to experience difficulties, but that He had overcome them for them.


There’s something about hearing someone speaking the promises of God out loud to you. That’s part of why we go to church each week; we want to hear the encouragement both in the study and from one another. We’re in a battle and we need that Levitical war sermon from one another and from the word of God . . . so that we won’t give up the fight, so that we won’t quit following God with all of our hearts, so that we won’t fall away.


So, do you need the Levitical war sermon today? Or maybe it’s the person sitting next to you who needs to hear it from you.


Sabbath, November 12th
Eternal Life
And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.  John 17:3


I want you to think about these three people: Elvis, someone in your church family, and your brother. What can you tell me about these three people? You may never have even heard of Elvis (much to the amazement of those older than 50). You might be able to tell me some information about Ken or Jim. But I am pretty certain you have a lot you could tell me about your brother. Why is that?


It’s all about the closeness that you have with each of these people. It’s called relationship.


Oh, you could do some research and tell me lots about Elvis. You could know his most popular song. You could know that he wanted to be an FBI agent. You could know the name of his estate. But if you walked up to the door of that estate and knocked, would he let you in (if he were still alive) and greet you as a friend? No, of course not. You would know a lot about him, but you don’t really know him. 


You might have a good friendship with someone in church or someone in 4H. And they might even ask you to pray for them. But they might not feel close enough to you to tell you exactly what’s going on in their life and why they need prayer. You have a good friendship, but it’s not a close relationship.


Your brother is a different story. There’s not too much that families keep secret from each other - even if they want to. Why is that? Because we live together. (And when you are homeschooled, you live together 24/7). You know what each other likes and dislikes, you know how to instantly make one another mad (You know what buttons to push.), and you know how they are going to react in most situations. You know your brother, especially if you are a close family.


Think about a close family relationship. Think about how well you know your immediate family members. This is the level of “knowing” that Jesus is referring to in John 17:3: And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.  It’s not enough to know that God is God, the only true God. It’s not enough to know that Jesus Christ was sent by the Father - although those are good starting points. You have to really know God.


How do you do that? You have to have a relationship with God. You accept Jesus Christ as your Savior. You are baptized and receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, dwelling within you, leads you into all truth. You seek God with all of your heart. God becomes first in your life. You prefer Him over all others. You want to be close to Him. That’s a good starting point.


Once you have been drawn by the Father into a relationship with Him, you read your Bible every day and pray every day. Why would you do that? It’s called relationship. How will you know what is important to God if you don’t know what He says is important to Him? What kind of relationship do you have if you don’t talk to Him?


So you know that God is. You enter into covenant with Him. You start reading your Bible and praying. Is that it? No! You have to make choices, daily choices, to do what pleases God. It’s called obedience. That’s why you are in church today: Hebrews tells us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together. But just obedience to His word isn’t enough. You have to obey God because you love Him. And it’s not enough to just love Him. You show your love by your obedience. You have to have both. That’s the definition of an intimate relationship with our Great God.


Then, here’s the cool part: because you have an intimate relationship with God, a relationship in which you truly know Him, you have eternal life. You get to spend eternity with the One you have come to desire above all others, the One you want to please, the One you have a close relationship with, the One who is the only true God, the One you know.


​Sabbath, November 19th
Rescued by Our Father
I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. John 17:15


When I was very little, I insisted that Mom close the closet door before she tucked Tricia and me in and said, “Good night.” I don’t know where I got the idea that something could be in that closet. And I don’t know why I thought that closing the door would keep me safe. But I did.


The reality is there are many things “out there” in this world that can hurt you, and it’s very normal for children to be afraid of whatever could be under the bed, or in the closet, or behind the curtains. Even some adults are afraid of snakes or mice or heights. There’s a possibility you could get hurt in so many ways!


As Christians, I believe we are especially at risk because Satan prowls about like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8). I believe Satan hates Christians because we have a relationship with God and we are destined not only to be kings and priests (Rev 1:6), reigning with Him in the Kingdom (Rev 20:6), but we will also be adopted into the very family of God (Romans 8:15-16). So if Satan can tempt us into making bad choices that will hurt us, if he can entice us into saying things that damage our relationships with the people around us, and if he can deceive us into ungodly behaviors, he will. Satan might not necessarily want us to die, if he can use us to spread some alarm and despondency  among the people with whom we come into contact.


One of Satan’s greatest weapons is our pride. If he can get us to thinking that we’re better than the people around us, if he can get us to thinking that someone is mistreating us and we deserve to be treated better, or if he can get us to thinking that someone is doing something just to stand on our last nerve, he has us right where he wants us - ready to hurt those around us with our words and actions.


Sometimes Satan uses the insane tendency of human beings to believe that “this thing” happens to a lot of people, but “it” will never happen to me. The other insane behavior is people’s attraction to being scared to death! Seriously! Just look at how many people go to Six Flags every summer. They like the adrenaline rush. Why do they get an adrenaline rush? Because it’s scary. Because your mind tells you you’re going to die. And then you don’t. It’s a very human thing to try to cheat death, to get as close to it as possible and then escape. And I just wonder if liking that isn’t instigated by Satan because eventually the addiction to adrenaline will cause people to take bigger and bigger risks. And risks are risks because you could actually die.


One summer, Bob, Tricia, and I spent a lot of time on the roof of either Grandad’s barn or his shop. The shop roof was cedar shakes and not very steep, so it wasn’t so scary. But Bob’s rule was that we had to get from one side of the corrals to the other side without touching the ground, and that meant going over the shop and over the barn. The barn roof was corrugated metal and fairly steep. But Bob always made Tricia and me go barefooted so we’d have better traction. Only, when you’re really, really scared of heights, your feet start sweating. Sweating feet aren’t so good at stopping you when you start sliding down a steep, metal roof. However nails sticking up which catch the seat of your pants at the last minute have a way of stopping you from falling over the edge - however painful the rescue may be.


So I love this verse in the middle of Jesus’ prayer to the Father. He says,“I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one.”  Jesus didn’t ask the Father to take us out of the world, to wrap us in bubble wrap or a strait-jacket, or to even let us live as hermits somewhere remote. Jesus asked the Father that He would keep us from the evil one, from Satan and his designs to cause us harm.


Our Heavenly Father will not prevent us from making bad choices or ungodly decisions. It’s kind of like taking Pepper for a walk. He’s roaming all over the place. But he keeps an eye on where I am. If something scares him, he comes directly to me for protection. God allows us a great deal of freedom. But we should keep our eyes on Him and have a good enough relationship with Him that we know we can run to Him for protection when we feel threatened.


And maybe - if we have a good relationship with our Father -  when we’re so foolish that we make a stupid mistake, because we’re careless or impetuous or just plain dumb, maybe, just maybe He’ll rescue us anyway. That’s the hope implicit in this verse: I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. Maybe He’ll rescue us with a close friend, or a Bible verse that just happens to pop into our head at the right time, or maybe He’ll use a nail to catch us by the seat of the pants.

Sabbath, November 26th
Pierced for Us
And again another Scripture says, They will look on him whom they have pierced. John 19:37


American Sign Language is very interesting. It’s really fun to see the reasoning behind some signs. Two signs I really like are the sign for God and the sign for Jesus. The God sign is the B hand moving vertically downward in front of you, i.e. “The self-existent One  - the One who was and is and is to come - coming down from heaven to earth.”  The Jesus sign is right hand pointing to left palm and left hand pointing to right palm. The first time you see the sign, you know what it stands for. It’s unmistakable - especially for someone who knows Jesus. A Christian will immediately identify with the nail-pierced hands of Jesus.


Literally, it was the Romans who physically pierced Jesus. They are the ones who put Him on the stake, nailing His hands and feet. And they were the ones who thrust the spear into His side. It was the Romans who pierced Jesus. But . . . it was the Jewish religious leaders who insisted that Jesus be crucified. Pilate would have released Jesus, but those Jews wouldn’t hear of it!  Jesus’ own countrymen, the chief priests and religious leaders, were responsible for His crucifixion and death.


Zechariah 12:10 foretold Jesus’ crucifixion. It says: “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that, when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced,”  . . . But then the verse goes on to talk about the time in the future when Jesus returns, “they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn.”  Those who were responsible for His death will look on Him and will be extremely sorry for what they have done.


You and I are in the middle of this prophecy from Zechariah. The first part has already happened: Jesus was crucified. That is in the past. But, the second part of the prophecy is still to come: they will look on Him whom they have pierced, and “they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child.” But we’re in the middle of this for another reason.


Think about a time when your brother or sister was in trouble with Mom. You could hear the scolding he was getting. Did you think to yourself, “He deserves that”? Sometimes we start to feel a little smug or even a little happy that our brother (or sister) is in trouble. You might be sitting there thinking that you’re glad it’s your brother who is being grounded, and not you, and then all of a sudden, Mom turns and looks at you. You know you’re in trouble too.


That’s kind of what this prophecy is like.  John 19:37 in context, is specifically talking about the Roman soldier who thrust his spear into Jesus’ side. But John 19:37 is a quote from the prophecy in Zechariah 12:10 which specifically refers to Jesus being pierced by the inhabitants of Jerusalem, i.e. the Romans incited by the Jewish religious leaders. But that’s not the end of the story because Isaiah 53:5 says: But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. Even though our brother or sister might be the one being scolded, we often find we are not completely innocent either.


Jesus was pierced to save us from our sins. He was crucified that we might be reconciled to God. In a literal sense, it was the Romans who actually nailed Jesus on the stake and pierced his side. It was the Jewish leaders who actually insisted on his death. But in a very real sense, it is each person who calls upon the name of the Lord for salvation for whom Jesus was pierced. We are all guilty of doing things which are wrong and which required Jesus to die for us, if we are to be saved from death.


So when Revelation 1:7 says, “Behold, [Jesus] is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him . . .” suddenly we understand that although we didn’t actually pierce Him, He was pierced for us - because Jesus is my Savior and your Savior.


God the Son came down from His throne in heaven to become a man on earth to save us from our sins. Jesus died on the cross for us. Someday we will all look on the One who was pierced for us - Jesus.

Sabbath, December 3rd
Better Than Silver and Gold
But Peter said, “I have no silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” Acts 3:6


    There was a beggar who had been unable to walk from his birth. So every day someone carried him to the Beautiful Gate where he could beg for money. Peter and John were walking by on their way to the temple. The beggar called to them, asking for money. Can you see this in your mind? Can you hear the hustle and bustle of Jerusalem at the prayer time? Can you hear the lame man crying out for anyone to help him by giving him money? So he calls out to Peter and John. Now Peter and John have a choice. They can keep walking and ignore his calls. But they didn’t. They stopped and they told the beggar, “Look at us.” The beggar looked at them, expecting that Peter and John were going to give him something.
    What do you think he was expecting? Maybe money. Maybe clothes. Maybe some food. What do you think he wanted? What was he hoping for? What was the best that he could hope for? When you’re a beggar and you’ve been carried to this gate every day to beg, how much hope do you have left for something good to be given to you?
    I suspect that his expectations weren’t very great. Maybe he thought Peter and John would give him a little money. So when Peter said, “I have no silver and gold,” the beggar’s heart must have sunk. That’s what he wanted. That’s what he hoped for. 
    And then . . . the beggar hears something absolutely astounding. Peter says, “but what I do have I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” Then Peter takes him by the right hand and helps him get to his feet. His feet and ankles were immediately made strong. 
    So what does he do? What would you do? Would you fall over in shock? Would you say, “No, thank you, I’d prefer to spend my life begging. Put me back!!”? No, you’d do exactly what this man did. He started leaping and praising God! Think about it. This man had never walked; he’d been lame from birth. So not only was there a miracle in his feet and ankles being made strong, but he also knew not only how to walk, but how to leap and jump up and down for joy! And the people all around? They were astounded! They knew who this man was. Maybe some of them had helped to carry him to where he begged every day! The crowd was amazed at what had happened to him!
    We live in a world where there are sick people all around us. They desperately need something and so many of them are crying out for help. Some of them think that money will help. Maybe a new car or a new house. They are looking for people to give them something that will make them feel better. What do you have that you could give them?
    You don’t have silver and gold - or at least, you don’t have very much. You don’t have enough money to satisfy anyone. You can’t lift them up on their feet like Peter did. You aren’t a doctor either. So what do you have? You, like every other Christian, are coming to know God. So you have something more valuable than silver or god.
    So, how does this work? Do you believe that God is? That’s something you can share with people who don’t know God. Do you pray to God? Do you know that He answers prayers? If you know that God has answered your prayers, that’s something you can share with someone who doesn’t know that yet.   Do you read your Bible every day? Do you know how valuable it is to hide God’s word in your heart? That’s something you can share with people  who just think the Bible is a book of old stories.  Do you thank God for the things He has given you? That’s something you can remind people to do - giving thanks to God is so very important!  Are you certain that Jesus is coming back to this world, to set up His kingdom? You have a precious gift that you can give to people in this sin-sick world: you can remind people to place their hope in Jesus Christ. 
    And you don’t have to go looking for an opportunity to share God with someone else; God will arrange the opportunities. You just need to be ready to give an answer to anyone who asks you for the reason for the hope that lies within you (1 Peter 3:15). Your answer or your actions don’t have to be a big thing. It doesn’t have to be a long sermon. It can be the way you live your life, praising God and doing what’s pleasing to Him. Think of it: you can be the tool God uses to draw someone to Him.
    And that’s better than silver and gold.


Sabbath, December 10th
Counted Worthy
Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name.  Acts 5:41


If you look around you, there’s a lot of suffering in the world. Have you ever thought about why people suffer? We suffer because of

• Stupid Decisions or Bad Choices. One such stupid decision happened when I was 14 or 15 years old. I thought it would be fun to surprise the family with homemade doughnuts when everyone got home. So I made the batter, rolled and cut out the doughnuts, and started frying them. But I’d turned the stove on high and the oil got really hot. I got scared. So I picked up that pot of hot oil, set it carefully in the sink, and turned on the water. Ooop! You see, water and oil don’t mix, and when you add cold water to hot oil, it explodes. I spent the next hour cleaning up oil from all over the kitchen. And I had little blister burns all over my face, my neck, and my arms. It was a bad choice, and I suffered for it.

• Sin. The fifth commandment is to honor your father and you mother that your days may be long upon the land. Well, I remember one such time when I broke that commandment. You see, my dad had told the three of us kids to clean the house, vacuum, etc., before 4:00 one particular day. Well, none of us really liked house cleaning, and we knew that Dad wouldn’t be home before 5:30, so we were nowhere near finished cleaning by 4:00. In fact, the vacuum was plugged in, but sitting unused in the middle of the floor, when Dad walked in at 3:55. I don’t have to tell you that we were in trouble. We’d broken one of God’s commandments; we sinned, and we suffered the consequences for it.

• the Sinful World in which we live. There’s a lot of evil in our world. People do things to hurt you just because you’re there. Or they hurt you because they don’t like your looks, your attitude, your religion, the honor you get from others. There are all kinds of senseless excuses for why people harm other people in this world, but it basically comes down to a rejection of God and a pervasive air of evil and death in our society. I guess that’s the reason why another first grader threw the basketball into my face one cold winter day. I hadn’t ever done anything to him. And it hurt. I suffered because of the sinful world in which we live.

• Entropy. This is the second law of thermodynamics - the natural law that everything in the material universe is breaking down or moving towards chaos. An example of this might be the water pipe which broke before it came into the house, not once it was inside where it’d be easier to get to. Apparently the house settled and the ground did not settle as much, so the pipe just snapped right along the outside wall. The water just shot into the basement with no way of turning it off without contacting the city water department for them to send out an employee. By the time he got there, the basement was a huge mess. And, it happened twice. Whatever they did to fix it the first time didn’t work. They had to bring in a backhoe the second time, dig out the pipe and fix it correctly. And to make matters worse, both times the pipe broke when Dad was out of town. Mom had to deal with it by herself. This isn’t completely true entropy; there were some poor decisions made to exacerbate the situation, but there was still suffering due to entropy.

• God’s correction. Sometimes we suffer, and we know we’re suffering, because God’s correcting us. God has gotten our attention so that we’ll stop doing whatever it is that we’re doing.

• God’s discipline. This is similar to God’s correction, except that God’s discipline doesn’t necessarily come because of something we’ve done wrong. It could be to give us strength for what is still coming, or  it could be so that we’ll be a useful tool to help someone else somewhere down the road. In either case, we are suffering because of God’s love in changing our direction.

We’re going to suffer in this world. The question is, then, how are you going to react to your suffering. If you’re suffering because of your own bad choices or sin, you can repent and make better choices in the future. If you’re the victim in this sinful world, or if you’re the victim of entropy, you can take some precautions, but you have to trust that your life is in God’s hands. If it’s God’s direct action of correcting and disciplining, the best response is prayer, praise, and Bible study. And truly, that’s the best response in any suffering, regardless of its cause. Trusting God, seeking His will, praying to Him and praising Him is always a proper response.


I marvel at Peter and John’s response to suffering dishonor for the name of Jesus. They were teaching the word of God. They’d been thrown into prison. When the angel let them out, miraculously, they went right back to teaching in the temple. They were beaten by the Jewish religious leaders and told to stop. They didn’t get angry. They didn’t complain. They didn’t stop seeking and serving God. They rejoiced that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name.


Mostly I find myself suffering because of my own bad decisions or my own sins. In those cases, I deserve to suffer. I hope that if I’m ever really faced with persecution and suffering, for the name of Jesus Christ, that I will rejoice because I’ve been counted worthy to suffer for His name.


Saturday, December 17th
Here I Am
And he said, “Here I am, Lord.” Acts 9:10b 


When Jonathan was little, Ken decided to teach him how to play hide -n- seek in the huge sanctuary of the Salvation Army building. He’d tell Jonathan to go hide and then he, Ken, would look for him. Much to Ken’s surprise, Ken would walk into the room after giving Jonathan time to hide, he’d call Jonathan’s name, and Jonathan would respond, “Here I am.” Ken’s reaction was similar to Peter’s reaction to Lucy in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, “I don’t think you quite have the idea of this game.”


In actuality, Jonathan was just responding as he was taught; when your mom (or Ken, in this case) calls you, you answer. So how do you respond when your mom calls? In our house, I hear, “Just a minute,” or “I’ll be right there,” or “Coming.” I never expect silence or an exasperated “What?”


That’s the background perspective I bring to reading this verse in Acts 9:10: And he said, “Here I am, Lord.”


How many people can you think of who responded to God’s call with “Here I am!”?


Abraham responded this way in Genesis 22:1 when God called him and told him to sacrifice Isaac. Abraham responded again in verse 11, when the angel of the Lord called to him and told him not to kill Isaac. Jacob responded with, “Here I am!” when the angel of God called to him in a dream, telling him to leave Laban and go home with his family and flocks (Genesis 31:11). Later in his life (Genesis 46:2), God spoke to Jacob, or Israel, in vision of the night, and told him not to be afraid to go to Egypt. Similarly, Samuel responded (in 1 Samuel 3:4-8) when he heard God calling to him in the night. Not knowing it was God, he ran to Eli. It was Eli who realized it was the LORD. Then in Isaiah 6:8, God asked the question, “Who shall I send?” Isaiah responded, “Here am I! Send me.” 


In the instances of Abraham, Jacob, and Samuel, God called them each by name. In the commissioning of Isaiah, when God asked, Isaiah volunteered. They were each given something to do. Each instruction, each task, meant obedience and submission to God, even if the person didn’t particularly want to do the task (with the exception of God staying Abraham’s hand when he would have sacrificed Isaac). It was a similar situation in Acts 9 for Ananias. 


God had blinded Saul, who would become Paul, on the road to Damascus. Then he called Ananias and specifically told him where to go (Go to the street called Straight.) and why (Saul had seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him so that he would regain his sight.). Ananias responded to God by confirming that he’d heard of this man, Saul. “Lord, I have heard from many about this man,  how much evil he has done to your saints at Jerusalem. And here he has authority fro the chief priests to bind all who call on your name.” But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel (Acts 9:13-15, ESV). 


Do you know what Ananias did? He did exactly as God had told him to do.


It’s interesting to think about one other case of God calling someone - Adam. When Adam and Eve heard God walking in the garden, they didn’t go to greet Him; they hid. When God called, Adam did answer, but he explained that he and Eve realized they were naked and they hid from God (Genesis 3:8-10). Their relationship with God was impaired because of their sin.


So. What do you do when you know God is calling you? Do you hide as Adam and Eve did? Or do you respond, “Here I am!” like Abraham did, or Jacob did, or Ananias did? God already knows what you’ve done, and it does no good to hide. Where would you go that God couldn’t find you? If you feel like hiding, then you’ve got some repenting to do - because when God calls you, you want to be willing to respond, “Here I am.”


God may have a job for you. He may decide to send you somewhere, to reach out to someone, to be the tool He uses to impact another person’s life. You may not particularly like the idea of where God is sending you. It wasn’t easy for Abraham to make preparations to sacrifice his son Isaac, but he trusted God. It would have been difficult for Jacob to get up and go home, knowing that Esau was still there and they hadn’t exactly parted on good terms. Samuel wouldn’t have wanted to tell Eli of God’s judgment on him and his household. Ananias probably had some reservations about healing the sight of Saul, the one who had been so vigorously persecuting the church.  But if God is your God, then you are His servant. That means you go when He says “Go.” 
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You don’t want to be like Adam and Eve; you don’t want to hide when you know God is coming. A true servant of God is going to respond to God’s calling, “Here I am.”

Sabbath, December 31st
Trouble and Prayer
So Peter was kept in prison, but earnest prayer for him was made to God by the church. Acts 12:5

Two very important concepts are on display in this verse in Acts: one deals with trouble and one deals with the effectiveness of prayer.

Acts 12:5 says, “So Peter was kept in prison.”  This is one of the apostles, one of the eleven to whom was given the mandate to preach the gospel to all the world. But he’s in prison. He’s being persecuted for the name of Jesus Christ. He may have been given a job by our Lord, but that didn’t exempt him from experiencing trouble in the course of doing that job.

I find that very encouraging. Trouble comes to all people, but it’s comforting to know that sometimes the trouble you’re experiencing is because you’re doing what you’re supposed to be doing. Yes, you can experience trouble because you made a stupid mistake. Yes, you can experience trouble because God is discipling you. Yes, you can experience trouble because of your sin. But sometimes, you can experience persecution and trouble because you’re obedient to Jesus Christ and the adversary doesn’t like that.

The other concept is the effectiveness of prayer. Many people would take a Que será, será attitude when faced with difficulty. After all, God knows what’s going on. He’s in control. Therefore, whatever will be will be. There’s no fighting it. If it’s happening, it must be God’s will.

But that’s not what we see here. The church family saw Peter in prison and they made earnest prayer for him to God. But was it effective? Absolutely! In the middle of the night, an angel struck Peter in the side, telling him to get up and get dressed. The chains fell from his hands, they walked past the guards, and the gate opened to allow them passage. God delivered Peter from Herod’s hands.  And lest you think that it was just a one-time occurrence, there are other passages which indicate the power of prayer:

Hannah prayed for a son (1 Samuel 1). In verse 17, “Then Eli answered, ‘Go in peace, and the God of Israel grant your petition that you have made to him.’ ”

In Judges 16, Samson asks God to restore his strength just one more time. When God did, Samson pushed over the supporting pillars of the building, effectively killing more Philistines in his death than he had in his life.

David repeatedly asked God for direction: 1 Samuel 23:10-12; 1 Samuel 30:8; 2 Samuel 2:1; and 2 Samuel 5:19-25. Each time David asked if he should go up against his enemies, God answered.

1 Kings 17:22 records, “The LORD heard the voice of Elijah, and the life of the child returned to him and he revived.”

At Mt. Carmel (1 Kings 18), Elijah prayed that God would answer him and let the people know that Jehovah is God. The fire of God not only consumed the drenched sacrifice, wood, stones and dust, it also licked up the water in the trench around the altar.

Hezekiah (2 Kings 19; 2 Chronicles 32:20-23) laid before God the insult of Sennacherib against God. “And the LORD sent an angel who destroyed every mighty warrior, commander and officer in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he returned in shame to his own land. And when he had entered the temple of his god, some of his own children killed him there with the sword. So the LORD saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib the king of Assyria and from the hand of all others, and guided them on every side.”

Psalm 6:9; Psalm 66:19; Psalm 116:1; and Psalm 118:21 all speak of God hearing and answering prayers.

James 5:16 says, “The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.” It can be alternately translated, “The effective prayer of a righteous person has great power.” James 4:2 says, “You do not have because you do not ask.”

This one little verse in Acts reminds us that we can’t automatically assume that trouble means we’re not in God’s will. It also reminds us of how very important it is to pray, earnestly laying our petitions before God. Sometimes the answer is “yes,” sometimes it’s “no,” and sometimes it’s “wait.” But we have been given the privilege of taking everything to God in prayer, coming boldly before the throne of grace. It would be foolish to neglect so great a gift.
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