No...Yes...Maybe...WELL?

Friday, August 4, 2023

The Lord is merciful and compassionate, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love.  The Lord is good to everyone.  He showers compassion on all his creation….The Lord helps the fallen and lifts those bent beneath their loads.  The eyes of all look to you in hope; you give them their food as they need it.  When you open your hand, you satisfy the hunger and thirst of every living thing.  The Lord is righteous in everything he does; he is filled with kindness.  The Lord is close to all who call on him, yes, to all who call on him in truth.  He grants the desires of those who fear him; he hears their cries for help and rescues them.  The Lord protects all those who love him, but he destroys the wicked.  I will praise the Lord, and may everyone on earth bless his holy name forever and ever.  Psalm 145:8-9, 14-21

In 2011 Rob Bell, added to an ongoing enigma as old as the Garden of Eden when he published his book, Love Wins.  The debate centers-on the question:

Is God all-love, or does He judge some and save others?

Bell is the trendy preacher who began Mars Hill church in 1999.  It grew at a meteoric rate in just a few years to over 10,000 Sunday attenders.  Love Wins is, by any traditionally-accepted evangelical standards, heresy at worst, fluff masquerading as theology at least.  Mainline and Evangelical leaders alike consider Bell’s views as “universalist”, essentially meaning all humans are acceptable to God, no matter their actions, and, in the end, will be redeemed to spend eternity with God.  In short, universalist theology teaches there is no such thing as Hell; Rob Bell says it is merely a reference to suffering here on earth.  Bell also denies Scripture, saying the bodily resurrection of Jesus is a wrong interpretation of Scripture.  This places Bell in the category of heretic, according to John 20. Jesus wasn’t a ghost, as Thomas found out when he put his hands into the holes in Jesus’ hands and side!

By 2012 Rob Bell’s “church” crumbled.  He left Michigan and moved to California.  

He joined Oprah Winfry’s Supersoul Sunday podcasts, while continuing to travel the world giving seminars on spirituality and surfing.  By most accounts, he considers “church” as irrelevant. 

So, the question looms…is there punishment for sin…or not….or maybe?  Or do we just go with avoiding the question?  These questions are superfluous if you’ve taken the time and effort to read the Scriptures.  God is certainly love, and does not want anyone to suffer in Hell eternally.[1]  And if Scripture declares that punishment to be a reality, certainly it validates the existence of the place.  Hell is real, as is Heaven. 

There are (as Rob Bell holds) many things we do not know about God, or what He has in store for us.  However denying what God has plainly and categorically stated in Scripture is no way to humbly search for truth.  Faith is a matter of depending on His Word, and proclaiming it…not twisting it until it is unrecognizable.  That is what got humankind misled as far back as the Garden of Eden.  It’s Satan’s tool!

For You Today 

The Lord is compassionate, kind, and protective over those who stay close to Him and call on His name.  He is also the Creator, Sovereign God of the Universe, and destroys the wicked.  That is both sides of the entire scope of Scripture, humanity, evil, and good.  All of us, including Rob Bell, you, and I need to live with it!

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

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There are about 2,600 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions library.  

 

Title Image:  via Pixabay.com 

Images without citation are in public domain.   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from NLT^©  

[1] 2 Peter 3:9

 

The Glorious Needle in the Unfathomable Haystack

Thursday, September 29, 2022

O Lord, our Lord, your majestic name fills the earth!  Your glory is higher than the heavens.  You have taught children and infants to tell of your strength,
silencing your enemies and all who oppose you.  When I look at the night sky and see the work of your fingers—the moon and the stars you set in place—what are mere mortals that you should think about them, human beings that you should care for them?  Yet you made them only a little lower than God and crowned them with glory and honor.  You gave them charge of everything you made, putting all things under their authority—the flocks and the herds and all the wild animals, the birds in the sky, the fish in the sea, and everything that swims the ocean currents.  O Lord, our Lord, your majestic name fills the earth!  Psalm 8:1-9

The Psalmist (in a big stage whisper) wonders aloud about how God could possibly be concerned about us humans.  Calvin, the precocious (some would say “obnoxious”) kid proclaims he’s SIGNIFICANT, just before allowing he’s quite small, compared to the universe.

Calvin and Hobbes is one of my many favorite cartoon strips.  That may be due to the author’s[1] theological bent which always catches my eye, and most often my admiration. 

I admire (and often envy) the way the creator of this ‘toon can present a complex Biblical theme on the meaning of life, with just four-panels and a precocious, self-absorbed six-year-old.  That may be because the creator, Bill Watterson, modeled the main characters, the boy, Calvin, and his stuffed tiger, Hobbes, after a preacher and a moral, wondering cynic.  You gotta love it!

In the first and third panel, Calvin looks into the sky’s East, then West, as if he’s searching the whole of the heavens.  In the second panel he announces with certainty his significant place (as only a six-year-old can proclaim from his sandbox).  In the fourth, and final panel, Calvin concludes, and allows that he might be just a piece, a speck of dust in the big pile of the puzzle, and not the magnificent centerpiece his first statement demanded.

This is the ongoing human struggle for identity and perspective on the significance and purpose of life.  I suppose if I had Bill Watterson’s ability to get to the nub in so short a presentation (it only takes eight seconds to read), I guess my sermons would be a lot shorter, and my congregation would always beat the Baptist brethren to the local restaurants on Sunday.

For You Today

There will never be a test to pass on Sunday’s sermon.  So, here’s a delicious short-thought to ponder:  When the sermon is spoken this Sunday, whether you take notes, or not, take note of just one salient, provoking, life issue your pastor presents, and contemplate, think-deeply, and measure it against your life.  Take it home and see what God says to you in prayer that day, or the rest of the week.  And then find some way to put into action whatever God brings into your life that next week.  You may not have a stuffed tiger that will talk back to you like Calvin’s Hobbes, but the Holy Spirit will lead those who seriously seek the Lord.

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: 

We Mortals and How to Cure a Cosmic Headache  and When a Child Speaks

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

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[1] ©Bill Watterson named the characters Calvin (for John Calvin, 16^th century theologian) and Hobbes (for 17^th century philosopher Thomas Hobbes).  For much more background information see Wikipedia here.

Perfect Orbit

 

Wednesday, January 26, 2022

Your eternal word, O Lord, stands firm in heaven.  Your faithfulness extends to every generation, as enduring as the earth you created.  Your regulations remain true to this day, for everything serves your plans.  Psalm 119:89-91

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, launched and deployed this month, has a mission:  …the Webb mission will explore every phase of cosmic history – from within our solar system to the most distant observable galaxies in the early universe.[1]  The mirror which sits atop the rest of the orbiting craft is 21-feet in diameter, and coated with gold.  (This could explain some of the costs of government budget we hear about!) 

The panels of the mirror were folded-up and stuffed inside a rocket that was deployed earlier this month.  When it got to this point in its million-mile planned journey, the folks at mission control pressed the right buttons on the remote control, and the thing unfolded.  I suppose, if it didn’t, they’d have spent a zillion bucks to send a repairman.  That’s roughly what my plumber gets.

According to NASA’s plans, the telescope will map out the universe, that which can be known, and give scientists more understanding of how it expanded, evolved, and became what we can see, along with what will become of us.[2]  

To do all this the telescope’s mirror/receiver will travel a million miles towards the sun to enter a “perfect” orbit, circling another piece of NASA hardware, Lagrange 2, which is itself circling the sun.  You can see the animation of the orbit HERE.

The so-called “perfect” orbit is achieved in Lagrange Points, special locations in planetary systems where gravitational and rotational forces cancel out.  It’s something like having a gyro balance your iPhone’s camera, giving a clear, stable video.  I suppose if you’re going to take pictures of the universe’s 62-bazillion light year sized expanse, you need a good camera.

On the other hand, if you see the value of a stable orbit trajectory and don’t have the 9.7-billion-dollar startup cost, you could spend $12.99 at the Cokesbury store and get a copy of God’s Word.  According to what David, the Psalmist wrote, what you will find in every little nook and cranny of the universe, both seen and unseen, is the evidence of God’s faithfulness.  A “perfect” orbit is where God’s will and man’s compliance places humans and all creation in harmony with God and humankind. 

As you listen/read here today, don’t let the abrupt switch from a science observation to theological musing, turn you off.  I’m not against science.  Quite the contrary; it fascinates me.  It seems the more scientific discovery is reported, the more theology and reality come into focus.  Faith is best understood when His Creation unfolds like the James Webb telescope.

For You Today

To understand just how magnificent creation is, you must keep your eyes, ears, and heart opened to God’s ways, which is found in God’s Word, and through prayer.  That reaches far beyond what NASA has planned for Webb’s spacecraft.

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

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

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[1] NASA

[2] This is my takeaway after reading several of NASA’s website pieces

 

Circle of Life

[1]

Thursday, August 1, 2019

Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge!  How impossible it is for us to understand his decisions and his ways!  For who can know the Lord’s thoughts?  Who knows enough to give him advice?  And who has given him so much that he needs to pay it back?  For everything comes from him and exists by his power and is intended for his glory.  All glory to him forever! Amen.  Romans 11:33-36

With all due humility and respect to the popularity of Walt Disney, Tim Rice, and Elton John’s Circle of Life song in the movie, Lion King, what they give us is merely wisdom from the underside of things here on earth; they don’t begin to scratch the surface of the circle’s source.  The real circle of life begins and comes round to Heaven.

The apostle Paul rarely stuttered like Moses.  When the little, ugly student of Gamaliel, (Paul may have been a slow learner, but he turned-out to be quite a scholar) wrote his letter to the Roman Christians, his small, twisted stature, poor eyesight, and thorny side faded into the background as he gave us an eternal glimpse into our beginning and ending.  Bowing to the omniscient wisdom of JHWH, Creator of all, the apostle unfolds the simplest, most profound truth about the circle of life:  it begins with God, continues to exist because of God’s will and power, and does not simply repeat until it destroys itself…but returns unto God bringing glory, honor, and unending praise to its Maker – quite a circle!

In the movie the little lion cub, Simba, is destined to be the king after his father, Mufasa passes from the scene[2].  Dad teaches the young prince that, while they chase the gazelle and eat them, eventually lions also die, return to the soil to become the grass, which the gazelle eat.  That is Mufasa’s circle of life, sometimes you’re the windshield; sometimes you’re the bug!

But God has a much higher plan than live – deteriorate – die – rot in the ground to become fertilizer for the savannah grass, and be re-born as a well-fed antelope (only to be eaten by the next generation of lions).  With that existential philosophy (even less appealing than Akuna-matata), you’ve got nothing more to look forward to than the African proverb that whimpers:

Every morning a gazelle awakens to the reality that he must outrun the fastest lion or be eaten today, while every lion awakens to the reality that he must outrun the slowest gazelle or starve today.  Either way the dawn brings running.

And that’s the whole difference between philosophy and theology; with man’s philosophizing circle all you get is running, and someday being outrun. 

When it’s theology – God thought – it’s about living; we are created by Him, and we live for, and in His good and glory, and eventually go to Him, the giver, sustainer, and purpose of all life.  That’s a circle you can live with!

For You Today

You were created with a higher purpose than retirement to become gazelle food.  With a Creator and Savior like that, what’s not to love? 

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

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[1] Title Image:  Pixabay.com        Unless otherwise noted, Scripture used from The New Living Translation©

[2] Image:  By Абдырашит Сатылганов - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0