Ready

Friday, April 24, 2020

So prepare your minds for action and exercise self-control.  Put all your hope in the gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world.  So you must live as God’s obedient children.  Don’t slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires.  You didn’t know any better then.  But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy.  For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.”  1 Peter 1:13-16

It wasn’t long ago that I heard news of the passing of my 9^th grade English teacher, Joe Gulizio.  His students referred to him as Jumping Joe, because when it came time for the annual faculty vs. student basketball game, for a 5’9” guy, he could mix it up with the biggest and best of them.  He also had an amazingly accurate two-handed “set-shot”.   

For an English nerd he was quite the athlete.  Given my love of any sport where you could catch, kick, throw, hit, or bounce a ball, I admired Mr. Gulizio.  I also kind of feared being around him.  He made me do things like stand in front of the class to give a book report.  I once pretended to be sick for a whole week because I knew my turn was coming up.  In my weakened condition on the first day back, there was little mercy from behind the teacher’s throne; Mr. Brownworth, welcome back…you can now give your report.  It probably would’ve hurt less if it wasn’t for that smile silently bellowing, I’ve been in touch with your parents, you slacker…get up here and squirm.  I didn’t hate the book; actually, I loved it.  I just hated standing in front of people who were expecting me to talk.  My way of avoiding my distaste for doing that was to avoid preparing for it, hoping the day wouldn’t arrive.  I think Jumping Joe knew that…what a sadist!

Sixty years is a long time to arrive at the understanding that Mr. Gulizio was teaching much more than English literature in 1961; he was bent on forming strong character.  Jumping Joe was teaching me to be ready.  He wanted my head to be in the game, prepared and focused on thinking, learning, speaking up, and remembering that life isn’t just a ball game (which isn’t a bad background for a future preacher). 

So, there is a definite parallel between 9^th Grade English Lit and life as a believer.  Peter’s admonition to the church was to be ready, prepared for the spiritual battle of your lives!  And, to do that, it was, as Peter’s friend and co-laborer, Paul wrote, necessary to put on the armor of a Christ-warrior:

Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.  Put on all of God’s armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil.  For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.  Therefore, put on every piece of God’s armor so you will be able to resist the enemy in the time of evil.  Then after the battle you will still be standing firm.  Stand your ground, putting on the belt of truth and the body armor of God’s righteousness.  For shoes, put on the peace that comes from the Good News so that you will be fully prepared.  In addition to all of these, hold up the shield of faith to stop the fiery arrows of the devil.  Put on salvation as your helmet, and take the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.  Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion.  Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere.   Ephesians 6:10-18

For You Today

Our spiritual battles are no different than Peter’s or Paul’s.  Every day we are faced with an enemy that would rob us of our joy, our witness, and our faith.  The choices for life as a disciple of Jesus Christ are only two – faithful or not faithful. 

Jumping Joe Gulizio would say, it’s your turn; he must have been quoting Jesus.

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

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

For other posts on 1 Peter see Standing in the Sweet Spot and The Sacrifice of Self-Control

Seeing Trouble and Sorrow

Thursday, April 23, 2020

Death wrapped its ropes around me; the terrors of the grave overtook me.  I saw only trouble and sorrow.  Psalm 116:3

You cannot watch a news program without sensing what the Psalmist wrote about death’s ropes we’re currently experiencing in the wake of the deadly COVID-19 virus.  The terrors of the grave are being counted like cattle passing through the slaughter pens.  The news channels have the counter graphics listing how many infected, how many deaths; we tabulate the terror, moment by moment.

I am nearly 73 years old and I have never met my aunts, who were twins.  They were born shortly before they died in the 1918 Influenza Pandemic.  All I have to know about them is a few sketchy details told me by family members and this picture showing a strong family resemblance on my mother’s side.  And, my reaction to all of this, more than 100 years after these baby aunts of mine became part of a frightening statistic (estimated at somewhere between 50 and 100 million deaths worldwide[1]), is a sense of trouble and sorrow.  It troubles me that I know so little about these babes who are elder sisters to my mother; it holds me in sorrow for the grave shadows we see cast over cradles of those who have hardly begun to live.

My aunts died 30 years before I was born, but the grief is still there for having never met them; there is a sense of loss that mingles with those who suffer the loss of their blood.  From every record of wars, we count the dead.  We mourn the losses of senseless violence in the streets, unthinking carelessness of unsecured firearms, and infanticide of the abortion clinics…chosen grief, trouble and sorrow.  To be certain, Adam and Eve still mourn the loss of Abel to violence, and Cain to his own sin.

But the one who suffered and grieved most in the eons of time and eternity is Yahweh, Almighty God, who, grieved over the suffering of humankind.  After all, what parent will not have a part of the death of his child?  Who is unmoved by the suffering of a loved one?  Multiply that by the billions of souls God has created and watched to the grave.

And what, pray tell, does this all-powerful God do about all this suffering?  Amid the worst of it God gives hope…and even joy.  Peter understood that:

You love him even though you have never seen him.  Though you do not see him now, you trust him; and you rejoice with a glorious, inexpressible joy.  The reward for trusting him will be the salvation of your souls.  This salvation was something even the prophets wanted to know more about when they prophesied about this gracious salvation prepared for you.  They wondered what time or situation the Spirit of Christ within them was talking about when he told them in advance about Christ’s suffering and his great glory afterward.  They were told that their messages were not for themselves, but for you.  And now this Good News has been announced to you by those who preached in the power of the Holy Spirit sent from heaven.  It is all so wonderful that even the angels are eagerly watching these things happen.  1 Peter 1:8-12

To go along with my sense of trouble, sorrow, and loss of the aunts I will never truly know until I enter Heaven’s gates and finally see them, there is that inexpressible, yet joyful knowing the angels are eagerly looking forward to God’s full reunion and restoration of all things.  They can’t wait to see me, and see all my family, and the human family completely at home, completely fulfilled in the glory of Christ.

For You Today

As you watch the counters tick off how many infected, and how many deaths, remember the statistic for death is 1 out of every 1; our mortality is assured by the fact that we are human and it is appointed that we shall not live forever in these bodies.  But, just as assuredly, our eternity of joy with God is securely offered at the cross.  For those who place their trust in Jesus the counters are sad for today, but a strong reminder of God’s love and power to save us from trouble and sorrow.

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

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

For other posts on 1 Peter see Rotweiler Joy and Joy Unspeakable and Better Than Baby Toes and New

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[1] 1918 H1N1 Virus Pandemic – CDC website

The Sign of Jonah

Wednesday, April 22, 2020

One day some teachers of religious law and Pharisees came to Jesus and said, “Teacher, we want you to show us a miraculous sign to prove your authority.”  But Jesus replied, “Only an evil, adulterous generation would demand a miraculous sign; but the only sign I will give them is the sign of the prophet Jonah.  For as Jonah was in the belly of the great fish for three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights.  “The people of Nineveh will stand up against this generation on judgment day and condemn it, for they repented of their sins at the preaching of Jonah.  Now someone greater than Jonah is here—but you refuse to repent.  The queen of Sheba will also stand up against this generation on judgment day and condemn it, for she came from a distant land to hear the wisdom of Solomon.  Now someone greater than Solomon is here—but you refuse to listen.         Matthew 12:38-42

To understand the sign of Jonah (a metaphor comparing the resurrection of Jesus with Jonah’s three-day ride inside God’s fish-taxi) we must understand to whom Jesus was talking.  Matthew tells us the group that came seeking a sign were teachers of the law and Pharisees; these were the religious professionals (clergy) of Israel.  The teachers of the law (rabbis) did just that, taught each jot and tittle of Scripture’s laws.  Their entire focus was zoomed-in on legal correctness, making certain no law was forgotten.  The Pharisees were more interested in living-out [applying] the law daily.  They took what the rabbis taught and tried to walk the tightrope of never crossing the line of transgression.  This group was made up of teachers of the law and keepers of the law.  Their tribe is legion to this day.

I recently had a conversation with a young man who had been raised in church but hadn’t been for some time.  It was a conversation that lasted awhile, and eventually turned to faith.  He explained that his main life’s goal was to treat other people like he wanted to be treated.  It was a golden rule approach of which the Pharisees would be proud.

This group of teachers and keepers of the law were also inspectors of anyone who infringed on their domain.  They came to Jesus looking for proof; they wanted a look at Christ’s credentials.  And so, Jesus held up Jonah and the queen of Sheba.  One was a Jewish prophet who had trouble obeying God’s command, but eventually had to repent and obey; the other was a non-Jew, and a woman, hardly representative of authority to rabbis and Pharisees, but displaying the utmost of wisdom when she came to sit at the feet of Solomon.

By holding up Jonah and Ethiopia’s queen as righteousness, juxtaposed to the rabbis and Pharisees who prided themselves on self-righteousness, Jesus turned everything upside-down.  And, the teaching for us is that the humility of repentance trumps the pride of righteousness every time.

Veiled [thinly] in Jesus’ teaching is the sign; the Lord is telling the teachers and Pharisees to watch for the humility of the grave to be overthrown with the power of God on the third day.  He was saying to them, you’re like little children if you don’t understand…you think you’ll be done with me if you put me in a grave…but you can’t keep God in a grave!

Here’s the apostle Paul’s commentary on the rabbis and Pharisees:

The message of the cross is foolish to those who are headed for destruction!  But we who are being saved know it is the very power of God.  As the Scriptures say, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and discard the intelligence of the intelligent.”                                             1 Corinthians 1:18-19

For You Today

If you’re like my young friend, trying to keep the Golden Rule, but forgetting the humility of worshipping the God of that Golden Rule, you’re missing true wisdom and the power of God.  Start looking at the third day’s empty tomb.

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

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

For another post on 1 Corinthians 15 see Signs

Whatever I Am Now

Monday, April 20, 2020

Let me now remind you, dear brothers and sisters, of the Good News I preached to you before.  You welcomed it then, and you still stand firm in it.     It is this Good News that saves you if you continue to believe the message I told you—unless, of course, you believed something that was never true in the first place.  I passed on to you what was most important and what had also been passed on to me.  Christ died for our sins, just as the Scriptures said.  He was buried, and he was raised from the dead on the third day, just as the Scriptures said.  He was seen by Peter and then by the Twelve.  After that, he was seen by more than 500 of his followers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died.  Then he was seen by James and later by all the apostles.  Last of all, as though I had been born at the wrong time, I also saw him.  For I am the least of all the apostles.  In fact, I’m not even worthy to be called an apostle after the way I persecuted God’s church.  But whatever I am now, it is all because God poured out his special favor on me—and not without results.  For I have worked harder than any of the other apostles; yet it was not I but God who was working through me by his grace.  So it makes no difference whether I preach or they preach, for we all preach the same message you have already believed.  1 Corinthians 15:1-11 

There are some settled principles in life upon which you can count; one of those is hindsight.  For the early part of Saul’s life, he had a settled conviction that the followers of Jesus were misguided (at least) and (at worst) evil, cultish devils, and they had to be stopped.  Saul did his best to accomplish that goal, until one day amid his frenzied push to rid the earth of any Christianity, he met their namesake on the road to Damascus.  Saul got a name-change to Paul; more importantly he got a heart-change from hard to compassionate, and a mind-change from hatred to accepting the love of God.  In our hindsight we see this as that whatever I am now Paul meant when he wrote to the Corinthians.  He was what God made of him.

You have probably experienced that in your life, and hopefully in your walk with Christ.  As I look back on my life, ministry, relationships, and development as a human being, I’m more convinced of seeing the hand of God guiding me into whatever I am now.  Somehow that makes some of the hardships endured in this process we call life, circumstances, joys, and strength to endure with joy, an absolute amazement to me.

Paul mentioned one thing to the Corinthian believers that used to make me tremble.  He pointed to their faith as what they believed when he first preached the Gospel to them, and then wrote:

You welcomed it then, and you still stand firm in it.  It is this Good News that saves you if you continue to believe the message I told you-unless, of course, you believed something that was never true in the first place.

Honestly, what used to worry me about that is the fear of believing something that isn’t true, staking my life and eternity on a fairy tale, and having it blow up in the end.  And so, the question that gets begged is:

Russell, why doesn’t it still worry you?

And the answer is Paul’s whatever I am now.  Paul could look back at every step of his journey in Christ and sense the guiding hand of that which is bigger, and outside of himself.  He had experienced the power of God moving his life and destiny.  And, at this point, doubt in the garden of his life had been treated with the weed and feed of faith.

When dealing with the weeds of doubt becomes your daily discipline of strengthening your faith with God’s Word, prayer, and submission to God’s will, you will not have a weak faith, and that makes for a strong warrior-tool in God’s hands.

For You Today

When doubt (as the chief tool in Satan’s arsenal) rises in you, as to God’s care, or even His love and guidance, do what the old English proverb suggests:

Fear knocked at the door.  Faith answered.  No one was there.

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

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

For another post on 1 Corinthians 15 see Just As the Scripture Said

Hidden Brides and Little Foxes

Thursday, April 16, 2020

The Young Woman

My lover said to me, “Rise up, my darling!  Come away with me, my fair one!  Look, the winter is past, and the rains are over and gone.  The flowers are springing up, the season of singing birds has come, and the cooing of turtledoves fills the air.  The fig trees are forming young fruit, and the fragrant grapevines are blossoming.  

The Young Man

Rise up, my darling!  Come away with me, my fair one!”  My dove is hiding behind the rocks, behind an outcrop on the cliff.  Let me see your face; let me hear your voice.  For your voice is pleasant, and your face is lovely. 

Young Women of Jerusalem

Catch all the foxes, those little foxes, before they ruin the vineyard of love, for the grapevines are blossoming!  Song of Solomon 2:10-15

There are a lot of interpretations for The Song.  There is relatively modern thought that it is just straightforward poetry about love.  Solomon was not only wise he was a brilliant composer of artistic bent.  Some see the Shulamite version where Solomon is so captured by the princess of Ethiopia, he attempts to win her heart by whisking her away to Jerusalem, and dazzling her with his accomplishments, but she is in love with another.  And there is also the metaphor for God as the Bridegroom, with Israel as His bride.  Of course many New Testament era scholars also accept this for the church as the Bride of Christ.  I’m not taking issue with any of this thinking. 

This morning I’m seeing in Solomon’s verse the hidden bride, the church behind the rocks, with her lovelier side of beauty nearly altogether unseen by the rest of the world.  In recent years the gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach is growing because the bride, Christ’s church, looks bedraggled and haggard with all her knock-down, drag-out brawling over doctrines, and who is fit to do whatever.  The little foxes of selfishness and hedonism are taking bites out of the bride and knocking a good bit of luster off the wedding pictures.

I’ve never been a wedding planner, or coordinator, but I’ve been close enough to weddings for a long time to know there’s a lot of holding-it-together that happens on the big day.  There are wardrobe failures, missing people and forgotten essentials to be found.  And if you throw-in melt downs from flower girls, or a ring-bearing 4-year-old boy who would rather be doing anything than wearing shiny shoes that hurt and a tuxedo (whatever that might be)…it’s a wonder you ever get to the I do’s.

Drama is a very real part of life; I think we all know that.  But the church is not a place for the kind of drama with which we’ve all become familiar – that kind of drama, caused by selfish control issues, rigid religiosity, and tradition-bound gate-keepers who couldn’t recognize a new wineskin if it jumped out from their musty closet and screamed, use me before it’s too late, or that new wine will spill all over your carpeted faith.

The Bride has been fighting again is how Chuck Swindoll so picturesquely characterized the lack of love we see in a bride, the church, which fails in her lover’s request to Rise up, my darling, come away with me….  Instead, the bride now hears (and fears) the same voice heard so long ago in that beautiful garden, when forbidden fruit was sweeter than obedience:  Where are you, my darling?  What have you done? 

For You Today

The response of one who is loved is, rightly, to love.  And so, it is not up for debate what the church needs to do as the object of God’s love.  What the church needs to do is rise up like the “darling” she was created to be and bring that beautiful face of loving service out from behind the rocks.

We know what she must do; the real question is, will she do it?

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

Go to VIDEO 

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

For other posts on The Song of Solomon 2 see Arise and Foxes and Grapes