Not Much Left

Thursday, September 15, 2022

This is what the Lord said to me:  “Go and buy a linen loincloth and put it on, but do not wash it.”  So I bought the loincloth as the Lord directed me, and I put it on.  Then the Lord gave me another message:  “Take the linen loincloth you are wearing, and go to the Euphrates River.  Hide it there in a hole in the rocks.”  So I went and hid it by the Euphrates as the Lord had instructed me.   A long time afterward the Lord said to me, “Go back to the Euphrates and get the loincloth I told you to hide there.”  So I went to the Euphrates and dug it out of the hole where I had hidden it.  But now it was rotting and falling apart. The loincloth was good for nothing.  Then I received this message from the Lord:  “This is what the Lord says:  This shows how I will rot away the pride of Judah and Jerusalem.  These wicked people refuse to listen to me.  They stubbornly follow their own desires and worship other gods.  Therefore, they will become like this loincloth—good for nothing!  As a loincloth clings to a man’s waist, so I created Judah and Israel to cling to me, says the Lord.  They were to be my people, my pride, my glory—an honor to my name.  But they would not listen to me.  Jeremiah 13:1-11

This sermon of Jeremiah’s was a long time cooking.  God had told the prophet to buy some new underwear, put it on for a while, and then go bury it under a rock near the river.  Then, after a long time, God instructed Jeremiah to dig it up.  When the cloth was retrieved, there wasn’t much left.

Why would God orchestrate this strange behavior?  What was the Lord doing?  Well, it’s not too difficult to figure out…a garment that’s meant to be worn doesn’t do well buried in the damp ground…it will rot. 

The meaning in the story’s impact makes Israel God’s undergarment, meant to stay closely-wrapped to the One who saved them, and led them to the land flowing with milk and honey.  The short version is painful…they wouldn’t, and they didn’t.

To sensible people it seems odd that anyone who had been carried like a child by a loving parent would want to stray from that relationship.  But, as seen over and again in Scripture’s account of Israel’s history, God’s people left the calling of JHWH in the dust to serve other gods.  Chalk up a win for stubbornness and pride!

Over the course of human history the willfulness, and very stubborn pride of humans, has preciptated much grief and pain.  People leave the one true God to serve all kinds of other gods, easier gods, gods that will let you indulge your own whims, and applaude your decision.  In the end, when you dig up what is left of their life’s record, it is as rotten as discarded underwear, buried on the riverbank.

For You Today

A Christian is a person who has surrendered all rights to self-determination, committing his or her life to following the one, true, living God’s will and calling.  And that calling, no matter if it is to business, church, government, or a billion other occupations and ways to spend your days on earth…unequivocally means staying close to the God who loves and saves you.  To do anything other makes the human the god.  That didn’t work for Israel, and it will not fare better for any of us.

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

Go to VIDEO (read by author)

There are about 2,000 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions library.  To dig deeper on today’s topic, explore some of these: 

Nervous Kings and When Faith is Discarded

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

 

God's Handful

 

Tuesday, September 6, 2022

This is what the Lord said to me:  “Go and buy a clay jar.  Then ask some of the leaders of the people and of the priests to follow you.  Go out through the Gate of Broken Pots to the garbage dump in the valley of Ben-Hinnom, and give them this message.  Say to them, ‘Listen to this message from the Lord, you kings of Judah and citizens of Jerusalem! This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, the God of Israel, says:  I will bring a terrible disaster on this place, and the ears of those who hear about it will ring!  “‘For Israel has forsaken me and turned this valley into a place of wickedness.  The people burn incense to foreign gods—idols never before acknowledged by this generation, by their ancestors, or by the kings of Judah.  And they have filled this place with the blood of innocent children.  They have built pagan shrines to Baal, and there they burn their sons as sacrifices to Baal.  I have never commanded such a horrible deed; it never even crossed my mind to command such a thing!  So beware, for the time is coming, says the Lord, when this garbage dump will no longer be called Topheth or the valley of Ben-Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.  “‘For I will upset the careful plans of Judah and Jerusalem.  I will allow the people to be slaughtered by invading armies, and I will leave their dead bodies as food for the vultures and wild animals.  I will reduce Jerusalem to ruins, making it a monument to their stupidity.  All who pass by will be astonished and will gasp at the destruction they see there.  I will see to it that your enemies lay siege to the city until all the food is gone.  Then those trapped inside will eat their own sons and daughters and friends.  They will be driven to utter despair.’  Jeremiah 19:1-9

Jeremiah certainly did not soften his words when he delivered God’s message of doom to Jerusalem’s ruling highbrows.  And why should he?  Jeremiah said the leaders of Judah and Israel’s downward spiral, away from God, would have a ringing-in-their-ears over God’s judgment for gross, eyes-open-wide sin.  That kind of message should never be blunted; a death sentence is a grave matter (literally).

Anyone with even a small portion of decency in their soul who reads or hears these words of Jeremiah’s sermon could not mistake the connection with what is happening in 21^st century culture – particularly in America.  We have earned the name Jeremiah said would be Ben Hinnom’s new legacy:  The Valley of Slaughter.  

Respect for life hangs by the weakest of threads in the land.  Decency and modesty are up for grabs to the highest bidder in Hollywood.  There is so little credence given to decorum, and kindness.  We are a land of selfish entitlement, lasciviousness, and disingenuousness when it comes to even a nod towards God’s sovereignty.  It is surprising to me that our Godless culture is still standing.

Now, this is not to say there are no Godly people left on our planet; the Lord always has a remnant who serve Him well.  That said, we must recognize that the days of Noah are upon us.  Those who faithfully serve God’s will are in a pitiful miniority.  There is coming a time, perhaps in my lifetime, perhaps in the next generation, but certainly a time of God’s own choosing…that the bill for thumbing America’s collective nose at God’s laws from the bedroom to the boardroom and big screen will come due.  The bankruptcy of our unrighteousness will be upon us!

For You Today

If you will serve God’s bidding these days, you’ll be branded a throw-back to Queen Victoria’s day, a prude, or do-gooder.  If you get labeled that way, wear it well; God’s handful of a remnant are the apple of His eye!

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

Go to VIDEO (read by author)

There are about 2,000 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions library.  To dig deeper on today’s topic, explore some of these: 

Ambush and Consider the Rock

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

Stubborn As a...Well, You Know

 

Thursday, May 12, 2022

Then he said, “Son of man, go to the people of Israel and give them my messages.  I am not sending you to a foreign people whose language you cannot understand.  No, I am not sending you to people with strange and difficult speech.  If I did, they would listen!  But the people of Israel won’t listen to you any more than they listen to me!  For the whole lot of them are hard-hearted and stubborn.  But look, I have made you as obstinate and hard-hearted as they are.  I have made your forehead as hard as the hardest rock!  So don’t be afraid of them or fear their angry looks, even though they are rebels.”  Ezekiel 3:4-9

A dear friend of mine recently said to me right after Sunday’s sermon:  I’d like to say I enjoyed the sermon, but my toes are really sore.  My response was:  When I was preparing that sermon, God’s Word broke MY toes to pieces before it got here to you today.  I’ve had to say that quite a few times over the years.

God gave Ezekiel a message, and, as a throwaway line, the Lord told him He had made the prophet as obstinate and hard-hearted as the people to whom he would preach.  Hmmmm. 

There are two thoughts that always come to my mind when the topic of a congregation’s sore toes comes up:

1.    I’m not sure many in the congregation understand how much it costs a preacher to deliver such a sermon.

2.    I’m not sure many in the pulpit understand how much the thought of how the sermon will alienate them to the congregation causes them to soften the blow, to the point of God’s Word being unrecognizable in Heaven.

These are human factors, indicators of our fallen nature, unwilling and stubborn to hear the corrective of God’s will.  It is the evidence of our pride of life which keeps us alienated from God, instead of that hoped-for intimate communion.

One of the harshest messages I’ve ever read was Jonathan Edwards’ Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.  Here is an excerpt of what he preached in 1741 to the congregation filled with people he loved:

The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes, than the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours. You have offended him infinitely more than ever a stubborn rebel did his prince; and yet it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the fire every moment. It is to be ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go to hell the last night; that you were suffered to awake again in this world, after you closed your eyes to sleep. And there is no other reason to be given, why you have not dropped into hell since you arose in the morning, but that God’s hand has held you up. There is no other reason to be given why you have not gone to hell, since you have sat here in the house of God, provoking his pure eyes by your sinful wicked manner of attending his solemn worship. Yea, there is nothing else that is to be given as a reason why you do not this very moment drop down into hell.[1]

For You Today

You may never have pictured your “just deserts” including being held over the flames of hell, roasted like a spider, dangling by a thread.  I’m certain there were those in the congregation that day who rather objected to the very idea.  Yet, historians hold that sermon was the kick-off incident that started the Great Awakening in America, a moral revival and turning to God we could certainly use today.  Words for a people as stubborn as a….well, you know.

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

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

---

[1] BlueLetterBible.org (Edwards’ sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, Enfield, July 8, 1741)

The Long Sermon

 

Tuesday, March 22, 2022

On the first day of the week, we gathered with the local believers to share in the Lord’s Supper.  Paul was preaching to them, and since he was leaving the next day, he kept talking until midnight.  The upstairs room where we met was lighted with many flickering lamps.  As Paul spoke on and on, a young man named Eutychus, sitting on the windowsill, became very drowsy.  Finally, he fell sound asleep and dropped three stories to his death below.  Paul went down, bent over him, and took him into his arms.  “Don’t worry,” he said, “he’s alive!”  Then they all went back upstairs, shared in the Lord’s Supper, and ate together.  Paul continued talking to them until dawn, and then he left.  Meanwhile, the young man was taken home alive and well, and everyone was greatly relieved.  Acts 20:7-12

Paul’s sermon may have begun in the afternoon, but it continued past midnight.  Poor Eutychus had probably worked a double-shift the previous day, and just couldn’t stay awake.  He fell through the window in which he was sitting, and dropped three stories.  A long sermon can have serious consequences.

One of the turns that seems to always be part of any discussion on sermons is the length, and whether or not people were bored to death.  I took the time this past Sunday to come near that discussion before my sermon began.  I told them to note that it was 11:30 AM, and that Spring had arrived 6 minutes prior at 11:24.  Therefore, I didn’t want anyone thinking they would spread the word that it was the preacher who began in Winter, but didn’t stop talking until Spring.

Preachers all have their internal clock about length of sermon.  Unfortunately many of us do our best to ignore that clock, and it can lead to drowsy congregations.  The famed Baptist preacher, Charles Haddon Spurgeon was known for the lengthy approach to Sunday’s sermon.  He ministered many miles from where his mother lived, so she had never heard him preach.  When she visited him and came to church that Sunday, after the service Spurgeon asked his mother what she thought of the sermon.  Her answer:  I believe you missed several opportunities to stop.

Now, before this devotion misses the opportunity to reach a conclusion, I suppose it would be best to point out that Paul’s sermon did not kill Eutychus, it was the fall he took, caused by sitting still too long.  In Paul’s defense we should also remember that it was he who rushed to Euty’s rescue, and witnessed (or caused) his revival.

For You Today

If you are one who puts the cares of life on hold during the worship hour, and digs-in deeply to worship, listen, learn, and be strengthend by God’s Word, and God’s Holy Spirit speaking to your heart through song, prayer, giving, and preaching, you’re on the right track. 

If any preacher got a wakeup call about long sermons, it was Paul.  He probably vowed to God on his way out of town the next day, that he would watch out for being too wordy, or repetitive.  But, still, there’s something to be said for a congregation that worships whole-heartedly, and awake!

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

[1] Title image: Wikimedia Commons   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©    

A Different Kind of Sermon

[1]

Tuesday, January 23, 2018

He was oppressed and treated harshly, yet he never said a word.  He was led like a lamb to the slaughter.  And as a sheep is silent before the shearers, he did not open his mouth.  Isaiah 53:7^(NLT)

I cannot recall the source, but heard one time about Billy Graham playing golf with a rather famous politician and two pro athletes.  After the round reporters asked the politician and ball players what it was like to play golf with the world's most famous evangelist.  Both athletes said they respected Mr. Graham, but didn’t like him pushing religion down their throats for 18 holes.  The politician said that he and Billy talked politics and golf grips the whole day; religion never came up.  Sometimes without saying a word our witness is a stronger conviction than anything we might say.  Billy Graham's integrity at that point makes his words (and therefore his witness) a lot stronger!

The golf course must be something of a magnet place for that kind of thing to happen.  Over the years I have played more with strangers than friends.  When you go to the golf course by yourself the “starter” will put you with a group of two or three other golfers to help keep the pace of play the same for everyone.  First names and handshakes are exchanged, and off you go. 

Invariably when you ride in a golf cart for four hours with a stranger the question will happen:  what do you do for a living?  I always wait for that question with a little anxious (but somewhat perverted) anticipation.  Mostly the question will come around the fifth hole or so.  By then most players will have managed to make at least a few bad shots.  Swearing and other foulness are pretty common.  I have witnessed one player quit after three holes, breaking a club and, with a practiced string of cuss-words swear to never play this stupid game again!  

But that’s not what I anticipate.  It’s the look that happens when the question comes about what I do for a living.  What I just can’t wait to see is that look on their faces when I say, I’m a minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

I know, I know; I’m a bit of a dweeb to relish that kind of moment, especially when your playing partner has just turned the air blue with his language.  The apologies come fast and furious, and there’s something of an awkward silence that follows.  I usually break the ice with a smile and say something like:  it’s OK, boys, it’s not me you have to worry about; it’s my boss.  At that point there’s some nervous laughter and we’re back to golf…but the air doesn’t turn blue the next dozen holes (at least within earshot of the preacher).

But what does happen is some pretty interesting questions that get thrown my way in the quiet times of waiting for another to take a shot.  It usually starts off:  Preacher, tell me....

          ·       Why do you think God does … or

          ·       Why is it that people won’t… or

          ·       Let me tell you about what happened when…

The bottom line about this kind of thing is that I get asked questions that are revealing about the kinds of struggles people have with faith.  And in that context – (remember, they have asked me…I haven’t beaten down their door with a twelve pound Bible under my arm)…in that context I get to answer conversationally, without being in pursuit of an evangelism scalp.  It’s genuine evangelism, the kind that can focus on Good News without a competition; it’s the kind of Good News conversation Jesus had at a well with a woman, or with a little man in a tree, or a religious big-wig under cover of night.  It’s the kind of conversation that can lead to some thought-provocation.  It’s the kind of thing that can help a person reflect on where they’re going in life, and why.

That’s a different kind of sermon.

For You Today

When you meet someone today, don’t get all flustered if they turn the air blue; just wait for it…God may be setting up one of those conversations that will allow for a genuine meeting with the Holy Spirit.

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

Go to VIDEO

---

[1] Title Image: Pixabay.com

Subway Sermon

[i]

Wednesday, July 26, 2017

You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb.  Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex!  Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.  You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb.  You saw me before I was born.  Every day of my life was recorded in your book.  Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.  How precious are your thoughts about me, O God.  They cannot be numbered!  I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand!  And when I wake up, you are still with me!  Psalm 139:13-18^(NLT)

We wandered, my bride and I, into the sandwich shop unknowing we were going to be running smack into a Subway sermon!  We went through the process of ordering.   Elizabeth chose  her sandwich, low calorie, low fat, healthy stuff (naturally), and the preacher opted for his normal stuff too…stuff as much stuff as possible on that big ol’ hunk of bread!  While the server used a backhoe to load up my sandwich, I slipped over to the drink cooler to grab a Diet Coke™ to go with my diet sandwich. 

And there it was!!  Or rather, there was RUSSELL!

I couldn’t believe the Subway people knew I would be there that day, and were nice enough to put my monogrammed Diet Russell Coke right up front! 

Wow, what service!

Now, I’m not certain the Subway folks had really planned for my visit, making that one bottle with “Russell” on it because they knew I’d be there.  It was one of perhaps a thousand bottles of Diet Coke I’ve had, and have never seen a Russell bottle!

But the coincidence of finding your name staring back at you is kind of cool, and really interesting, as it reminded me of the Psalmist’s awe when he recalled just how intimately God had known him from before he was a gleam in his earthly father’s eye.

This leads me quite naturally to the whole idea of what many call a fetus.  Now, I know that’s the technical name for the little person being formed in the womb of a woman; I prefer, however, to call that little person a baby. 

And that Diet Coke bottle is a little example of contrast as to why a fetus is a baby to me.  In the manufacturing buildings of Coca Cola, some marketing genius thought it would be a good idea to put names on the bottles.  Great strategy, that…people love to be recognized…even if it’s only an impersonal printed label with their name.  They put thousands, perhaps millions of Janes, Johns, Bills, Harrys and Joans…and perhaps a few Russells on cases and cases of Cokes.  The chances are some crossed paths with people who had those names.  Right place, right time, and the coincidence made Coke fans!

Contrast that with a God who knows not only the possibilities of how many Russells might be out there, but actually knows all the Russells, personally, and even better than Russell knows Russell.  In fact, before Russell was born, this God knew all about what he would be named, what he would look like, and what his whole life would be about.  And this God knows all the Janes, Johns, Bills and all the rest just that intimately.  He knows our rising and our lying down, our goodness and the blackest thought we’ve ever entertained.  He knows all about us, and loves us deeply; in fact God is so mad in love with each of us He was willing to die for us, so we could experience eternal life.

Somehow, that’s a whole lot better than coming face to face with a marketing scheme coincidence in a sandwich shop!

For You Today

It’s no coincidence that He knows your name; he’s the one who inspired your parents to put that name on you!

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

Go to VIDEO

NOTES

---

[i] Title Image: Ian Thomson, via Wikimedia Commons

A Sermon to the Stubborn

[i]

Tuesday, May 16, 2017

“David found favor with God and asked for the privilege of building a permanent Temple for the God of Jacob.  But it was Solomon who actually built it.  However, the Most High doesn’t live in temples made by human hands.  As the prophet says, ‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool.  Could you build me a temple as good as that?’ asks the Lord.  ‘Could you build me such a resting place?  Didn’t my hands make both heaven and earth?’  “You stubborn people!  You are heathen at heart and deaf to the truth.  Must you forever resist the Holy Spirit?  That’s what your ancestors did, and so do you!  Name one prophet your ancestors didn’t persecute!  They even killed the ones who predicted the coming of the Righteous One—the Messiah whom you betrayed and murdered.  You deliberately disobeyed God’s law, even though you received it from the hands of angels.”  The Jewish leaders were infuriated by Stephen’s accusation, and they shook their fists at him in rage.  Acts 7:46-54^(NLT)

Stephen is generally considered the first one chosen to be a deacon to assist the apostles in spreading the Gospel, and also the first martyr for the cause of Christ.  I’m not surprised when I read the account.  He was falsely accused of blasphemy (talking against God), and distorting the truth about Moses, as well as how Jesus wanted to destroy the Temple and change everything ^{(Acts 6:11-14)}. 

The accusations were outlandish, so as Stephen stood before the ruling elders of the Sanhedrin council, he began his defense with an excellent lesson for the scholars, recounting Israel’s history, beginning at Abraham, and rolling all the way to the cross. 

Stephen’s sermon was going just fine with the historical background, fifty verses of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and the Exodus under Moses.  He could have ended it there and gotten a seminary doctoral degree, not to mention staving off execution!  Whenever I read these chapters I want to stop at the end of the history lesson, close my Bible and pretend everything ended well.  I think of what’s coming next and get that, Oh, Stephen, you were sooooo….. close!

But Stephen was a true meddling preacher!  After the historical introduction to his sermon he delivered the punch line:  looking the ruling elders in the eye he declared in no unmistakable way, that THEY, not he, were the stubborn blasphemers who had put the Son of God on a cross, just as they had done with every prophet that God, in His kindness, had ever sent to open up their blinded eyes.  And with that, the elders lost it and had Stephen stoned to death.  (More about that tomorrow).

What is it that makes a person step over the line when standing before powerful people when those very people hold your future, even your life in their hands? 

·       It’s the same force that compels a mother to block out every fear of oncoming traffic and rescue her child who has wandered into the street… 

·       It is the same overwhelming compulsion that causes a man to choose fight or flight depending on which better protects his family… 

·       It was the same driving pressure that moved Jesus to become the sacrifice for our sins…

It was love.

Stephen could no sooner have closed his mouth at that point in his sermon, just to keep breathing, because he knew without telling the truth to deluded, stubborn people, he would only be breathing; his living would have ended with his words.

It’s not love to stay silent if you’ve been charged with the responsibility to tell the truth!

For You Today

If you’ve ever gotten mad at a preacher for saying something that really ticked you off, well, this might be a good time to check the Stephen meter.  Was it the truth?  Did it tick you off because it hit too close to budging you out of your comfort zone?  Were you about to shoot the messenger?

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

Go to VIDEO

NOTES

---

 ^I Title image:  Fra Angelico [Public domain], via Wjikimedia Commons