Optional or Vital?

 

Monday, January 31, 2022

Let us hold tightly without wavering to the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise.  Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works.  And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.  Hebrews 10:23-25

I came across a quote attributed to C.S. Lewis the other day about genuine faith:

The oft stated, I don’t need to go to church to be a Christian, will spasm and die out when the threat of persecution comes.  If one can’t commit themselves to the most basic task of the Christian faith when it costs them very little, it is a fanciful dream to believe they will pay the ultimate price when the stakes are highest.[1]

The writer of Hebrews seemed to think the church gathering was vital for several critical issues:

1.    Shoring-up faith that could waver.  Another quote…one I heard drop from the lips of Evangelist Vance Havner when I was attending New Orleans Seminary, was:  Faith that was fickle at the first will fizzle at the finish.  That was a homestyle version of Hebrews.  The basis in fact is that we are prone to wander, we humans.  We need our faith strengthened.

2.    Motivating us in the right direction.  I’ve heard motivational speakers all my life.  Most of them do well, and are helpful; many are less so.  But the motivational forces that have always served to make me a better man are those of personal testimony, whose lives I saw up close over time.  Jerry was a businessman, Ossie, a laborer, and Marshal was a steelworker.  These men helped form me by their character.  I met them all in church.

3.    Encouraging – putting faith’s wheels on the rocky road of this life.  In days like these, with challenges political, societal, personal, medical, and every other way imaginable, it takes faith just to get out of bed in the morning. 

I could and would say so much more about the virtues and benefits of church if we had a couple of months this morning.  Let it suffice here:  it’s VITAL!  And the only evidence I need is what Jesus said: 

So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other.  Just as I have loved you, you should love each other.  John 13:34

For You Today

So, here I am, Monday-Morning-Quarterbacking…but I will press the question, nonetheless:

Did you go yesterday?  And if you did, was it habit, or because it was as vital as your next breath?

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!  

[1] Title and Other Images:  Pixabay.com   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©   

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[1] Quote attributed to C.S. Lewis (source uncertain, but it sounds like him, and fits his thinking)

A Pathway Through the Darkness

 

Friday, December 3, 2021

Because of God’s tender mercy, the morning light from heaven is about to break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and to guide us to the path of peace.”  Luke 1:78-79

Each morning I sit in darkness in the wee hours before dawn’s first light.  There’s a lamp at my desk, and I’m typing words about how God’s light dispels darkness.  This is the beginning of my day, writing about the Daystar, the one John the Baptist’s mother said would break upon us.  When the light breaks things become much clearer.

Each year, at the beginning of the Christian Year cycle, this text bids us to turn to the light and be guided through the darkness that surrounds us.  Sin, the source of all anger, violence, injustice, and other callous attitudes we humans can fling around, is the darkness of our souls.  And, just as we cannot escape the rising and setting of the sun, no human is exempt from the touch of darkness.  We all walk through the valley of the shadow of sin’s death.  We all participate in adding to the darkness, and we all groan in waiting for the light to dawn.  It is as if we cannot wait for the darkness in our souls to produce death, the door to light.

A reflection of that valley (and the pathway of light that guides us through it) has become my traveling companion of late.  A few months ago I was told my heart is not performing well.  Since that time more test results have given me more information than I ever wanted to hear.  And it makes you think…deeply.  When I was attending Duke Divinity School to learn how to be a Methodist, I would walk past many doors in hallways on the path to daily chapel services.  One of those doors nearest the chapel was the Department of End-of-Life Studies.  In retrospect, I could swear there were cobwebs on the door hinges to that room.  None of the student-preachers wanted to be chaplains in death’s waiting room.  We wanted to point to eternal life, happiness of soul, and God’s love, not death.

Of late, the theoretical garment of the end-of-life’s journey has begun to unravel; in its’ stead is the haunting specter of Russell putting-on the practical shroud.  It’s haunting because it’s inevitable.  As I recently said to one of my loved ones, none of us gets off this planet alive!  A few notable exceptions are Elijah and Enoch; God took them home without tasting the transition we call death.

Without getting too maudlin on a Friday, let me say that I’m not totally preoccupied with the idea of death; being 74 years old I’ve had a lot of time to think about it up to this point…not to mention the truckload of funerals and hospital room conversations ministry has visited upon me.  I am, as Jesus was, well-acquainted with sorrows and grief[1].  What I am preoccupied with is finishing well.  I want to walk through that valley with wonder, amazement, faith, and an abiding sense of well-being.  I want to do what I’ve been preaching for forty years; I want to trust all to He Who judges justly[2] and who is also merciful for the sake of His Son, Jesus Christ.

I want for my life – whatever legacy that might be to my family, friends, and whomever God may choose – to offer hope in Christ and no other.  I want to experience what the Apostle Paul told the Philippian believers he craved above all, the fellowship of His sufferings, and the power of His resurrection!

For You Today

The Psalmist has the last word today; He knew what finishing well looks like on that final journey:

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.  He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.  He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.  Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.  Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.  Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.  Psalm 23:1-6

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!  

[1] Title and Other Images:  Pixabay.com  Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©   

For another post on this text see Zechariah's Song

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[1] Read Isaiah 53:3

[2] Read Jeremiah 11:20