Benediction (the Launching, Not the Landing

Tuesday, May 2, 2023

Now may the God of peace—who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great Shepherd of the sheep, and ratified an eternal covenant with his blood—may he equip you with all you need for doing his will.  May he produce in you, through the power of Jesus Christ, every good thing that is pleasing to him.  All glory to him forever and ever! Amen.  

Hebrews 13:20-21

A benediction is like the familiar words of Jesus when he called himself both Alpha and Omega, not just the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, but the beginning and ending of everything good, holy, and worthwhile. 

This letter of Paul the Apostle[1] to the Hebrew Christians ends with a launch.  It’s like the shuttle lifting off the pads at Cape Canaveral – there have been thousands and thousands of work hours to get to this point, but the journey is now beginning.  

Paul wrote this long explanatory letter, proclaiming to first century Jews exactly how Jesus fulfilled every part of God’s law, and then Paul offers a benediction of grace to fill the launch thrusters that will propel them into a mission to all mankind, of being God’s lighthouse to the lost.

If you’re at all like me, the benediction used to be a pause with a yawn; the worship service is ending, let the nap begin.  Not so in the real world.  A genuine benediction is commissioning…the training and planning done…now the work!

At our church we call it Commissioning and Sending.  Sunday corporate worship lifts our praises, prayers, and open hearts to the Lord’s throne.  The sermon lays out the Word to fill open hearts, and the final act is commissioning.  It’s the act of believers committing to the Kingdom work of spreading the Good News. 

I have this mental rodeo image of benedition (our commissioning and sending); it’s that last nervous moment when the bull-riding cowboy is tightening his grip on that flank rope attached to the 2,000-pound bull under him.  He’s getting ready for the launch on the wildest of rides.  The bull-riding event has been called the most dangerous eight seconds in sports.  When the gates are opened, man and beast are at 180°-odds about staying together.  Eight seconds later the journey is over. 

Unlike the lightning-fast ride and judging of bull-riding, the results of God’s Kingdom work will only be revealed in eternity.  However, the similarities end when you start to talk about value.  In bull-riding a cowboy can get instant fame and fortune, a wisp of a high (assuming he lasts the 8 seconds), and then obscurity or a footnote in rodeo lore.  In Kingdom work a witness of Jesus Christ will receive an eternal crown of glory from the White Throne in Heaven.

For You Today 

Let’s hear again from the Apostle as we begin this day in laboring for the Master:

…may he equip you with all you need for doing his will.  May he produce in you, through the power of Jesus Christ, every good thing that is pleasing to him.  All glory to him forever and ever! Amen. 

So…be commissioned…be sent…!

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

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There are about 2,500 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions library.  To dig deeper explore some of these:   White Flag of Surrender  and  May He Produce in You   

Title Image:  via Pixabay.com   Images without citation are in public domain.

Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©  

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[1] The author is not named, but most scholars place it in Paul’s hands.

When It Was Dark

[i]

Jeremiah wrote a letter from Jerusalem to the elders, priests, prophets, and all the people who had been exiled to Babylon by King Nebuchadnezzar.

This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, the God of Israel, says to all the captives he has exiled to Babylon from Jerusalem:  “Build homes, and plan to stay.  Plant gardens, and eat the food they produce.  Marry and have children. Then find spouses for them so that you may have many grandchildren.  Multiply!  Do not dwindle away!  And work for the peace and prosperity of the city where I sent you into exile.  Pray to the Lord for it, for its welfare will determine your welfare.”  Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7

During last week’s prayer time in worship one of our members[1] asked that we pray for the strength to build the church back up.  I have not been able to get that thought out of my head since.  Then Jeremiah’s message showed up in today’s lectionary, and I took that as more than a coincidence; I feel certain it was a prompting from God’s Holy Spirit to lift up His plan for what we are to do to build the church back up. 

Today Jeremiah tells us exactly how to do what we must.  I believe strongly that the Old Testament gives us understanding of what Jesus came to do in us and through us.  That is, to build the Kingdom.  And, frankly, the building process doesn’t end when you’ve got a building in Bennett or Seagrove.  That building process will be complete when Jesus comes back for His bride.  Until that time, in good times of plenty, or in lean times when it is dark, our mission is unchanged; we must be working on building the Kingdom of God until He comes.

It’s no secret that we live in a dark time.  It is culturally-dark, with ungodliness proliferating, violence and anger ruling in every dark corner.  Sexual perversion is at a height most of never dreamed possible.  Dishonesty, lying, and a complete absence of integrity in government, business, and even churches.  And, on a close-to-home note, our United Methodist tribe is in a time of divisive, vitriolic upheaval that is almost certain to end in another General Conference that will make the shootout at the OK Corral look like a minor disagreement between kindergarten children.

Now, I am not about to give you a six-step surefire plan that will fix the United Methodist church, or grow this one.  I’m not going to announce a 30 day fast, or 40 days of planning and preparation for new programs.  I just want to point to what Jeremiah said to people who were going through darker times than we are. 

He told them to live! 

Jeremiah told God’s nation, Israel, demolished and demoralized by King Nebuchadnezzar’s storm troopers, to live.

He told them to live, despite the fact that their city, Jerusalem lay in ruins; the walls of the city had been torn down, temple desecrated, looted, and burned!

But Jeremiah did more than just say live;

He told them to live…and have hope!

Notice in the text the prophet told them to build, plant, marry, have plenty of children and grandchildren, and work for peace and prosperity where they were, exiles in Babylon, nearly a thousand miles from their Jerusalem homes! 

Jeremiah demonstrated his preaching by buying a piece of property in a dead city.  He bought a plot of land in Jerusalem while he was in jail (and “jail” would’ve been a fancy name…it was actually a hole in the ground with bars overhead).  Land was worthless in the conquered city, as was the currency of Israel.  But God had said Israel still had a future.  And when you believe God, you act that way.

For this is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, the God of Israel, says: ‘Someday people will again own property here in this land and will buy and sell houses and vineyards and fields.’”  Jeremiah 32:15

Jeremiah’s preaching became Jeremiah’s practicing!  And that’s what we should begin to do…live with hope!  That means we must live like we say we believe…trusting God with our time, talent, and tithe. 

We live, not moping…but hoping…giving our best, serving like servants, even when it’s dark; we work like there really is a Kingdom in the building process!

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit…Amen!

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[1] Linda Sorrell at Mt Zion UMC

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[i] Title Image:  Courtesy of Pixabay.com.    All Scripture quoted is from The New Living Translation (unless otherwise stated) 

Like Father; Like Son

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Wednesday, August 29, 2018

You didn’t choose me.  I chose you.  I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name.  This is my command:  Love each other.   “If the world hates you, remember that it hated me first.  The world would love you as one of its own if you belonged to it, but you are no longer part of the world.  I chose you to come out of the world, so it hates you.  Do you remember what I told you?  ‘A slave is not greater than the master.’  Since they persecuted me, naturally they will persecute you.  And if they had listened to me, they would listen to you.  They will do all this to you because of me, for they have rejected the one who sent me.  They would not be guilty if I had not come and spoken to them. But now they have no excuse for their sin.  Anyone who hates me also hates my Father.  If I hadn’t done such miraculous signs among them that no one else could do, they would not be guilty.  But as it is, they have seen everything I did, yet they still hate me and my Father.  This fulfills what is written in their Scriptures:  ‘They hated me without cause.’  John 15:16-25^(NLT)

There are those who will attempt to soften what living as God’s children means.  But Jesus made it clear that’s not possible.  If we live as genuine children of God, we will bear the hatred Jesus experienced. 

What does that look like?  Jesus used three pictures to describe it:

Persecution

Persecution happens out of a guilt-driven indignation.  When someone feels morally-convicted because another lives a compelling witness to truth, while the other person is clinging to self-deception, the guilt usually winds up in hatred of the other.  That points up Jesus second picture:

Hatred without cause

Jesus obviously lived a sinless life; it drove his detractors crazy.  They couldn’t find something he did wrong to convict him, so their hatred drove them to false accusations and to have the Son of God crucified.

Separation

Jesus told the disciples that separating themselves from the selfishness and wicked ways of the world was what He expected of those who followed Him.  This separation – living Godly in a Godless world – is the heart of Jesus’ point.  When you, as a child of God, live like your Father, it causes guilt in those who choose otherwise.  That guilt makes the wedge of hatred greater.

Two things about that:

1.      When a person despises you because your Christ-centered life produces guilt in him or her, it is not on you…it is conviction, and it is driven by God’s Holy Spirit Who draws sinners back to God.  It is the way God works.

2.      You have a responsibility to continue living a holy life, so you give a consistent witness of what God expects.  Jesus didn’t soften the demands of being a child of Heaven; neither should we.  We must remain faithful.

For You Today

If bearing the unfounded hatred of my neighbor in a gracious, unselfish manner is the cost for being faithful to God and cooperating with God’s Spirit to possibly win that neighbor to faith in Jesus, so be it!

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

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[1] Title Image: Photo Courtesy of Pixabay.com