Perfect Peace; a Glorious River

 

Always be full of joy in the Lord.  I say it again—rejoice!  Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do.  Remember, the Lord is coming soon.  Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything.  Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.  Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand.  His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.  Philippians 4:4-7

The writer of the hymn Like a River Glorious, which we sang earlier in the service, was Frances Ridley Havergal.  She lived a short life (1836-79) in the middle part of the 19^th century.  She wrote about 50 hymns, many of which are still in church hymnals around the world.  This hymn came about because a friend wrote her a letter, in which she shared her struggle with faith, particularly about her salvation.  Frances wrote back to her quoting one of Paul’s other letters:

Therefore, since we have been made right in God’s sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us.  Romans 5:1

She went on to say that this peace is ‘yours already, purchased for you, made for you, sealed for you, pledged to you – by the word of the Father and the ‘precious blood of Jesus!’  Apparently, Frances recognized the vicious circle that many Christians get into, struggling to feel at peace.  The harder they struggle, the less peace they feel, which makes them struggle more.  But God’s peace is a gift already given.  We don’t have to fight for it.[1]

When it comes to struggling to feel at peace, I find two dangers and one safe place. 

Danger #1.  Always struggling, never finding

Some of us are perfectionists (how many of you are married to one?).  In Frances Havergal’s day there was a rash of that amongst Christian churches.  Many were trying to be the perfect Christian.  Somehow, they’d forgotten that job had already been filled…perfectly…on Calvary. 

As Methodists we sling around the term perfection.  Sometimes we say it like the man who just announced to a worldwide audience on CNN that he had achieved perfect humility.  Rather, we are to be going on to perfection in love as John Wesley had it.  This means acting with humility, kindness, and grace towards others – NOT perfectly knowing everything and doing everything without flaw.  That’s not a possibility for fallen humans, albeit redeemed. 

Somehow, grasping at perfection, as if it is something you could master within you, misses the point Paul made about finding peace.  He spoke to real people who had the same kinds of sin problems we do; they weren’t perfect and they knew it.  So Paul told them rejoice – and then he said it a second time again…I say REJOICE.  I believe he said it in his best capital letters voice so they’d get it.  People who are forever struggling over finding peace are like folks who bring an elephant gun to a mosquito fight…they make a lot of noise, but kill very few bugs.  Struggle doesn’t produce peace; rather it’s a formula for a spiritual coronary.

Danger #2.  Hardly struggling, despairing finding peace

This is the other side of struggle as a vocation, pursuing peace as if a prize to be locked away in a trophy closet; this is fatalism, resigning to the difficulty of peace in a warring world, and writing-off having any part of it.  This is losing the desire to even pray for peace, the essence of despair, giving up! 

Paul’s letters are filled with military and athletic competition analogies.  Paul encourages us to run the race ^{(Galatians 5)}, fight a good fight ^{(1 Timothy 6)}_,  and when it comes to being God’s worker in the field, Paul encourages us to give everything we’ve got to please God. 

Work hard so you can present yourself to God and receive his approval. Be a good worker, one who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly explains the word of truth.  2 Timothy 2:15

But as God’s co-laborers, we’re not struggling to find peace; in His vineyard we are laboring to show others the Prince of Peace.  We haven’t given-up in despair and unbelief.  There, in the fields of God’s vineyard, when we labor shoulder to shoulder, not complaining, but learning to rejoice in all things, we are the very essence of the hard-working servant hearing well done, enter into thy Master’s joy…that’s a place of peace and rest!

These are two dangers, the first is always struggling, and the second is never hoping…and then:

The Safe Place – Resting in His Unchanging Grace  and finding peace like a glorious river…Always!

In the second verse of Havergal’s Like a Glorious River, we have the image of Moses hidden in the hollow place, the cleft of the rock, both metaphors for being like the children’s song, He’s Got the Whole World (where?) In His Hand. 

And covered there with the hand of God, there is no foe, surge of worry, or care, that can touch us.  Nothing can assail or corrupt God’s plans; He is entirely unhurried by both joys or sorrows and trials. 

And in that condition, you and I experience the river, gloriously and victoriously, in perfect grace and peace; it is there we experience God’s grace and peace fuller and deeper every day.

And so, to the business of the day, which the apostle Paul called the peace that passes understanding.  It’s found not in struggle, or giving up hope…that perfect peace is found in surrendering to the safe place of communion with God.  It is when we place our hand firmly in His, trusting him fully for that peace.

We do this because, as Frances Ridley Havergal understood and wrote,

they who trust him wholly find him whole true

stayed upon Jehovah, hearts are fully blest,

finding, as he promised, perfect peace and rest.

This is the essence of that glorious river of communion, the peace of a heart unhurried and unworried, firmly planted in Christ, and in sweet fellowship with all who are in that communion with Jesus.

Our Prayer

As we move to this place of perfect peace and rest in communion with our blessed Lord, I want to give Frances Havergal the last word from another hymn she wrote.  The hymn is very short, but it helps us open the front-entry door to perfect communion, and thereby perfect peace:

In full and glad surrender, I give myself to thee,

Thine utterly and only, and evermore to be.

O Son of God, who lov’st me, I will be thine alone;

And all I have and am, Lord, shall henceforth be thine own.

Reign over me Lord Jesus, O make my heart thy throne;

It shall be thine, dear Savior, it shall be thine alone.

O come and reign, Lord Jesus, rule over ev’rything!

And keep me always loyal and true to thee, my King.[2]

Come, sweet Holy Spirit, embrace us with thy power and love as we dine together in perfect peace and rest.

Title Image:  via Pixabay.com   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation 

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[1] Perfect Peace – Frances Ridley Havergal (Excerpted from Women in Christian History, Petersen & Shreeves)

[2] The Methodist Hymn-Book with Tunes, Methodist Conference Office, London, 1933, page 567 (Hymnary.org)

Trials Stink!

 

Wednesday, January 27, 2021

“For I am persuaded that neither life nor death, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” Romans 8:38-39

Note:  our guest columnist today is our beautiful daughter, Jennifer.  She and husband Ken have three children, two grandchildren, and a lock on my heart.  As a vibrant Christian with more than a little experience facing life’s difficult side, she writes from walking with God during the trials that inhabit the Rocky Road.

Trials stink. 

It is so hard to change mindset when being hurt, or struggling financially or emotionally or relationally. 

But, trials can be a purifying fire and a cleansing water.  Although we don’t want to get burned or drown, we do want to be refined and renewed through the Lord.  God uses trials for His purpose. 

If you are struggling through all the turmoil in our country right now and the depressing nature of social media and mainstream media, be encouraged - God is with you through all these things!  He is always there in our midst, working through things. Carry it in prayer, but do not carry the burden!  Stay out of God’s way and let Him do the heavy work.  If you feel crushed, fearful, strain in your relationships, or been through any kind of personal disaster, invite the Holy Spirit into these circumstances because only God can transform them!  Our suffering will seem like nothing compared to the glory of God worked in us.  And know that nothing can separate you from the ENDURING LOVE of God![1]

For You Today

Thank you, Jen, for a great reminder that we are not designed to do it all.  God’s way is for us to join Him in the next great adventure; our job is to listen, be ready, and always give thanks. 

Even though trials do stink, some suffering in this life, even great suffering, is for a short time compared to an eternity with our Lord and His family. 

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

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

For other posts on Romans 8:38-39 see Afraid to Die? and The Confident Hope of All Saints      

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[1] Jennifer Brownworth Klim, Facebook.com post, January 15, 2021

 

Learning to Use Good Judgment

Tuesday, April 28, 2020

I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate.  Romans 7:15

Leave your simple ways behind, and begin to live; learn to use good judgment.”  Proverbs 9:6

If you’ve ever had a wood splinter in your finger, you know it will nag you with a painful reminder everytime you grip something.  If you’ve ever had a paper-cut, you understand you will manage to rub it the wrong way twenty-eight times a day.  And if you’ve ever read what Paul wrote about doing stupid stuff, while failing to do smart stuff, you are well on your way to comprehending why the whole idea of wisdom is not to cram your head full of thoughts, good, bad, or trivial; it’s all about being able to live in a way that makes sense in three ways:

          1.     The ability to be in right relationship with your Creator

          2.     The pathway to being in right relationship with your Community

          3.     The pathway to being at rest…having peace within your own heart.

The apostle Paul had a hard-driving way about him; he was a Type-A that made obsessive-compulsive people look like slugs.  He had to get clobbered on the Damascus Road with a spiritual 2” x 4” to wake-up to the fact that his wisdom was nothing but a splinter of foolishness driving him into the ground. 

Paul knew this every day like a paper cut; it nagged him, but he couldn’t shake living like that.  And then he met Jesus, and things began to change.  His so-called wisdom began to show itself for what it really was, pride masquerading as being right.  He not only had to re-think his behavior, but everything about his life.  It took a long time to sink-in (about fourteen years in all ^{see Galatians 1-2}), but he finally learned how to submit his life to Godly control – and with that came wisdom for really living.

The apostle Peter had much the same problem, but with a different pedigree.  Peter was not an astute rubber of elbows with the higher-ups.  Peter was a common, uneducated fisherman.  But he occupied a big space, having been on the inner-circle with Jesus, and a chief leader of the early church.  Peter’s impetuous roller coaster life of being hero one moment, and coward the next, made him a perfect pastor.  By the time he figured out his selfish, prideful ways were destroying whatever manhood God had given him, and he was making a mess of his life and witness, Peter had grown to know how to counsel the rest of us who would come behind.  Peter had walked with Christ, denied him three times, and been forgiven; that was a taste of the divine, and Peter had learned to cling to God’s ways over his own way of crashing through life like a bull in a china shop.  Peter’s advice to us is born of his own testimony of what real living is all about:

So get rid of all evil behavior.  Be done with all deceit, hypocrisy, jealousy, and all unkind speech.  Like newborn babies, you must crave pure spiritual milk so that you will grow into a full experience of salvation.  Cry out for this nourishment, now that you have had a taste of the Lord’s kindness.  1 Peter 2:1-3

For You Today

If you’ve been driven with trying to do better, do more, get more, and experience everything, you’re in a place where Peter and Paul called home.  Solomon also tried to live life on his own terms.  Maybe it’s time to heed what these wise men had to learn the hard way.  Wisdom is hard to come by, but when you give-in to God’s way, good judgment is on the way.

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

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Title Image:  Pixabay.com      Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©

For another post on Proverbs 9:6 see Standing in the Sweet Spot

An Apostate Comes Home

[1]

Monday, May 10, 2019

Again a message came to me from the Lord:  “Son of man, take a piece of wood and carve on it these words: ‘This represents Judah and its allied tribes.’ Then take another piece and carve these words on it:  ‘This represents Ephraim and the northern tribes of Israel.’  Now hold them together in your hand as if they were one piece of wood.  When your people ask you what your actions mean, say to them, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I will take Ephraim and the northern tribes and join them to Judah.  I will make them one piece of wood in my hand.’  “Then hold out the pieces of wood you have inscribed, so the people can see them.  And give them this message from the Sovereign Lord:  I will gather the people of Israel from among the nations.  I will bring them home to their own land from the places where they have been scattered.  I will unify them into one nation on the mountains of Israel.  One king will rule them all; no longer will they be divided into two nations or into two kingdoms.  They will never again pollute themselves with their idols and vile images and rebellion, for I will save them from their sinful apostasy.  I will cleanse them.  Then they will truly be my people, and I will be their God.  Ezekiel 37:15-23

I learned a long time ago that interpreting Scripture is to resist reading-into a passage what you want to see.  But there are immutable principles contained in Old Testament promises (to Israel, for instance) that apply across all experience.

God did not want a divided Israel any more than He would want a divided church.  However, God would not approve of a polluted, but united church either.  In God’s message to Ezekiel, the wooden pieces represented the divided kingdoms, put back together to be one united Israel.  The caveat for God’s covenant people is that re-uniting isn’t the whole deal; sin, pollution and apostasy cannot remain.  If Israel would continue to enjoy the blessing of God’s promised covenant they must put away their rebellious ways.  Apostasy (being fallen) must go!

In keeping with ascribing the nature of Israel’s relationship with God to the contemporary church, I see a parallel in the struggle of my own Methodist tribe.  There has been a decades-long struggle for unity in a dilemma over the acceptance of LGBTQ+ persons as normative and co-equally acceptable with heterosexuality.  This conundrum cannot be resolved absent from the apostate coming home.  The question then is, which side is apostate?

That IS the bottom line.  Either the LGBTQ+ are willful sinners and must repent of their behavior, or the Traditionalists are being Pharisaical, again-nailing Christ to the cross, and persecuting true believers; in which case, those are the ones who must come to the altar and repent.  Without humble repentance this impasse will continue like the two wood pieces of Israel, arms folded, unwilling to face each other, and refusing to come together; we remain the divided apostate church.

In this state I am so reminded of two children, fighting, angry, churlish, truculent, and so very far from their parents’ heart-hope to see maturity develop.  These children are fighting each other and cannot see how their real enemy is within, each thinking the other is the problem, when their own attitude is the real issue.

To quote Forrest Gump’s mama, stupid is as stupid does.

It would seem to me we are defining ourselves by our behavior, and Father God isn’t at all pleased with His offspring.  Perhaps it would be a good thing to divide the wood pieces and go to our neutral corners, face the wall and return to the table when we can be civil.

For You Today

I would invite you to join me in not worrying too much about the tremendous stress we see in today’s culture over the sexuality war and how it is dividing the church into fragments.  End time portions of Scripture predict the apostate church, and we are inexorably moving towards that day.  Keep your head clear to see the fields white for harvest and keep your heart open to love everyone!

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

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[1] Title Image: Christian Rohlfs [Public domain] via  Wikimedia Commons  
             Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from The New Living Translation©

Simon Peter's Ordination

[i][ii]

Tuesday, April 16, 2019

Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of the two who heard John’s witness and followed Jesus.  The first thing he did after finding where Jesus lived was find his own brother, Simon, telling him, “We’ve found the Messiah” (that is, “Christ”).  He immediately led him to Jesus. Jesus took one look up and said, “You’re John’s son, Simon?  From now on your name is Cephas” (or Peter, which means “Rock”).  John 1:40-42(MSG)

“Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift each of you like wheat.  But I have pleaded in prayer for you, Simon, that your faith should not fail.  So when you have repented and turned to me again, strengthen your brothers.”  Peter said, “Lord, I am ready to go to prison with you, and even to die with you.”  But Jesus said, “Peter, let me tell you something. Before the rooster crows tomorrow morning, you will deny three times that you even know me.”  Luke 22:31-34

If ever there was a portrait of a conflicted man it is Simon Peter.  The fact that we know this man by two names owes to Jesus renaming the Apostle.  But the struggle was Peter’s, not the name.  From the Gospel accounts, and even the epistles we find Peter’s epic war with his own nature.  He had an intense desire to follow and serve Jesus, but, like all of us, he had his baser instincts that caused him to shrink-back from the very Lord he loved. 

Peter could boast one evening that, if need be, he’d die for and with Jesus; before the rooster crowed in the morning, we hear him cursing that he doesn’t even know the carpenter.  Peter would embrace serving one day and fall to cowardice the next day.  He was impetuous and often wrong.  But when he was right, people just had to step out of the way, because the power of God worked in his life like the crashing of waters over the Niagara Falls.

His parents named him Simon…a good Jewish name.  Jesus nicknamed him Cephas, or Rocky, in connection with how Simon would answer Jesus’ direct question to the disciples; Jesus asked them who do YOU say I am?  Simon Peter is the one who got an A+ on this test; he said:  You’re Messiah, the son of the living God.  You’re the One we’ve all been waiting for.

Here we have a man who could be so spiritually-connected and holy, living in the same body with a fearful, survival-minded weasel shamefully avoiding the possibility of being known as a disciple of Jesus…will the real Peter…or Simon please stand up?  The fact is BOTH are Simon Peter, the conflicted, but consecrated servant of God.  And when Peter stands up, we stand with him…because we ARE him.  Each of us has Peter inside…a human nature, willing to rebel and deny Christ…and a spiritual image of the Living God, stamped on our souls, calling us to look and live higher.  We ARE Simon-Peter!

In Luke’s Gospel text for this morning there are just six sentences.  In that is the germ of Peter’s ordination, his call and sending into the ministry.  At first Jesus calls him by the human name his parents gave him, Simon.  Jesus tells him his human nature will be under assault by the evil one, Satan.  Then Jesus gives him assurance that he’s being prayed for in heaven, and Simon’s call is to repent of his own sins, and then strengthen all the other conflicted servants.  He is called to be the leader of the band. 

But then, by the sixth sentence Jesus reminds him that even Peter – the rock – will be subject to abject failure.  Peter is not going to be the infallible “pope” – he’s going to continue the struggle with that old man inside who is fearful sometimes, and wonderfully-powerful at other times.  He will be Simon-Peter.

For You Today

All who have called upon the glorious name of Jesus Christ in humble faith have a new nature birthed in them by the presence of God’s Holy Spirit living within; they’re just like, and no-different from, Simon Peter.  It never means the old nature has been taken away; it does mean we’ve been given the tools to fight the good fight and win over that old nature. 

Today’s simple question is…are you still fighting the good fight?

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

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[i] Title Image:   Rembrandt's The Apostle Peter (Public Domain - via Wikimedia Commons)

[ii] Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from The New Living Translation©

Against the Tide

[i]

Friday, February 22, 2019

Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you.  For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions.  These are not from the Father, but are from this world.  And this world is fading away, along with everything that people crave.  But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever.    1 John 2:15-17^(NLT)

It’s amazing how often things just seem to fall in place.  The first thing I do in the morning (after letting the dogs out to prevent a tragedy) is post the day’s devotion, on social media.  I had already begun considering what to write about on this text, and the first item in my Facebook news feed was an article posted by my next-door neighbor, Matt, who is a police sergeant, as well as worship music leader at his church.  The article quoted today’s verses and ended this way:

We must not dilute our message, ignore Bible principles, employ worship music that is dissonant, harsh, sensual and suggestive, or seek to make the church appealing to the appetites of ungodly people, even to reach them. The true gospel will never be attractive to the unsaved in general, nor will it ever make them feel comfortable. Paul declared, “The preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness….” (1 Corinthians 1:18)[ii]

This is so appropriate for how today’s church attempts to hold the Gospel in worldly hands.  It reminds me of gift-wrapping a Jared’s ring in a garbage bag; the Gospel is too precious to be treated that lightly.  And yet, too many pastors and church leadership buy-into the trap of trying to present the Gospel in inoffensive, bland ways, when Scripture clearly states just the opposite.

The Gospel represents following Christ as swimming against the tide, not cruising down the river the way it wants to take you.  Discipleship is not about ease and getting what you want (as you’re liable to hear when you tune into the Texas smile hour on Sunday mornings).

Have you ever heard this phrase coming out of a parent’s mouth:  I want my kids to have it better than I did?  You may have said that yourself; I did!  But that’s because difficulty is just that…difficult, hard, adversity, struggle.  Any parent in his right mind knows it’s hard to watch your kid suffer.  But, if history is a teacher in any way, we must pay attention to the reality that the struggles of life are the best teachers.  That’s because in adversity we are strengthened.  Cut down a tree

[iii] and look closely at the rings; each one represents a year of growth.  They’re not all the same because the weather conditions, sun, rain, storms, soil, and diseases are so variable.  The hardest woods, used for the best construction and fine furniture, have faced more difficult circumstances than those growing under the best conditions.  Pain in a human life, as C.S. Lewis put it, is God’s megaphone, speaking in the loudest way, the most vitally-important life-changing words to our hearts.  Storms aren’t easy or welcome, but (again with C.S. Lewis), my God how we learn!

John, the beloved disciple, Apostle, and perhaps the closest to Jesus during His earthly ministry, said to be careful about the things that appeal to physical pleasure and pride in possessions or accomplishments; these things are not gifts from the Father in heaven…they’re temptations from the ruler of Hell.

For You Today

It’s hard to do that…push away from the physically-appealing, especially when every corner of this world’s system punches all the right buttons to make the good life of affluence, ease, and coolness seem like the brass ring to be grabbed! 

But this begs the question:  Whom you want to please?  Pleasing self with physical pleasure, possessions, and accomplishments will seem just great…for a while; but the end picture isn’t pretty.  Pleasing God by serving Christ in a surrender of self is what leads to eternity of joy, peace, and fulfillment.

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

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[i] Title Image:  via Pixabay.com

[ii] Paul Alexander, Why We Don’t Have Contemporary Music In our Church

[iii] Tree image via Pixabay.com