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Psalm 32

25 Mar

Psalm 32 [NIV]
[1] Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. [2] Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord does not count against them and in whose spirit is no deceit. [3] When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. [4] For day and night your hand was heavy on me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer. [5] Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” And you forgave the guilt of my sin. [6] Therefore let all the faithful pray to you while you may be found; surely the rising of the mighty waters will not reach them. [7] You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance. [8] I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you. [9] Do not be like the horse or the mule, which have no understanding but must be controlled by bit and bridle or they will not come to you. [10] Many are the woes of the wicked, but the Lord’s unfailing love surrounds the one who trusts in him. [11] Rejoice in the Lord and be glad, you righteous; sing, all you who are upright in heart!

Dear God, I double checked to see who wrote this. It is one of David’s. I love that David knew the value of repentance. I love that he told others through things like these psalms that he is blessed because of his repentance, and his bones waste away when he remains silent (verse 3).

One of the great things that I love about the 12 Steps in AA is that you start off with acknowledging something that has either been a secret addiction or that you have been holding on to for a while. Then as you work through the steps you take a personal inventory and make amends when appropriate. That is great stuff.

I have a friend who went off the rails about 10 years ago, and I am convinced that something happened that either he did, was done to him, or both. I am of the firm belief that he won’t be free until he confesses it to you, and perhaps to someone else. Satan’s power is in the secret. He blackmails us. Shames us. Lies to us. And all it takes to break the power is your blood and repenting to you.

Father, help me to be fully repentant to you and to share my repentance with others when I need to. Help me to not hold onto my own idols and sin, but to let go and embrace the love you have for me. Do it all or your glory, Father.

I pray all of this by the power of Jesus’ blood and in His name,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 25, 2019 in Psalms

 

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Joshua 5:9-12

24 Mar

Joshua 5:9-12
9 Then the LORD said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away the shame of your slavery in Egypt.” So that place has been called Gilgal to this day.
10 While the Israelites were camped at Gilgal on the plains of Jericho, they celebrated Passover on the evening of the fourteenth day of the first month. 11 The very next day they began to eat unleavened bread and roasted grain harvested from the land. 12 No manna appeared on the day they first ate from the crops of the land, and it was never seen again. So from that time on the Israelites ate from the crops of Canaan.
Dear God, to put this story into context, chapter 4 is about them passing through the Jordan and into the Promised Land. Then verse 1-8 (really 2-8) of this chapter tell about having all of the males who were born in route from Egypt over the previous 40 years circumcised and letting them heal from that (gotta say, that sounds barbaric and horrible). Now, you have a message for them: You’re here. Your baby food is over. It’s time to start treating this place like your home, and that means providing for yourselves here.

I’m going to be preaching at a church next Sunday, and this is the Old Testament reading. As I think about that church, I am thinking about some of the trials they have been through over the last several years. Perhaps the message you have for me to give them is that the time of sitting around and eating manna is over. They have their settlement of a legal action where a trusted staff member embezzled hundreds of thousands of dollars behind them. They were fortunate enough to receive a gift from someone that helped to make them whole from that unfortunate situation. They have crossed through the Jordan. It is time to start planting crops and setting up shop. It is time to advance on the enemy around them. It’s time to reach out into the neighborhood around them and start bringing your light into the families and individuals within their reach. No more complaining. No more feeling sorry for themselves. No more fear. It’s time to go.

Father, prepare my heart this week for the words you have for me to share with them. Love them through me. Speak to them through me. Give them peace. Give them vision. Give them victory. Give them healing. And do all of this because they are worshipping you, bringing you glory, and then taking that glory into the world. And help me to live up to all of this in my personal life as well.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 24, 2019 in Joshua

 

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The Binding – Genesis 22:9-18

23 Mar

IMG_1724
The image above is from Redeemed: A Storybook Bible for Grown-ups by Ned Bustard. This particular piece of art was done by Kevin Lindholm and is called “Knight of Faith.”

Genesis 22:9-18 [NLT]
9 When they arrived at the place where God had told him to go, Abraham built an altar and arranged the wood on it. Then he tied his son, Isaac, and laid him on the altar on top of the wood. 10 And Abraham picked up the knife to kill his son as a sacrifice. 11 At that moment the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”
“Yes,” Abraham replied. “Here I am!”
12 “Don’t lay a hand on the boy!” the angel said. “Do not hurt him in any way, for now I know that you truly fear God. You have not withheld from me even your son, your only son.”
13 Then Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught by its horns in a thicket. So he took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering in place of his son. 14 Abraham named the place Yahweh-Yireh (which means “the Lord will provide”). To this day, people still use that name as a proverb: “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”
15 Then the angel of the Lord called again to Abraham from heaven. 16 “This is what the Lord says: Because you have obeyed me and have not withheld even your son, your only son, I swear by my own name that 17 I will certainly bless you. I will multiply your descendants[a] beyond number, like the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will conquer the cities of their enemies. 18 And through your descendants all the nations of the earth will be blessed—all because you have obeyed me.”

Dear God, I’ve spent some time with this story in the past. So much time, in fact, that I’m curious to see what I might have missed.

It’s interesting to me that Bustard chose, in this book’s telling of the story of Abraham being asked to sacrifice Isaac, to start with their arrival at the place for the sacrifice. I’ve usually spent more time in verses 1-8 than I have 9-18. So what is here that I might have missed in the past? Or what have I seen before of which you need to remind me?

Verse 9 alone must have really done something to alter the relationship between Isaac and Abraham. Frankly, I’m a little surprised that Isaac even worshipped you after that. If I had been him, I would have thought my dad was crazy and that would have included his worship of you. If I try to imagine this scene, it’s horrific. I almost need to just set that aside before I get deeper into the story because if I start to look at this story through Isaac’s eyes it freaks me out a little.

The thing I’ve noticed in this story in the past is Abraham’s possible idolization of his son and the promise that you gave him about his descendants. In verses 1-8, as he is lying to Sarah, to the servant, and to Isaac; as he is walking for a few days to reach the site; as he is eating and talking with Isaac; as he is silently thinking and praying; I am sure that he was doing a lot of repenting and wondering how much he had failed you by taking his eyes off of you and giving in to his own vanity.

With all of that said, let me see what I notice in this image:

  • The most prominent thing in the image is the knife. It seems like it’s the first thing Lindholm wants me to see. The knife, gripped by Abraham’s fist. Something horrific is about to happen and I don’t think the artist wants me to miss that fact.
  • The next thing I notice is Abraham’s face. He is staring up. Is the look in his eyes desperation? Despair? Anguish? Surprise?
  • There is a hand with two fingers touching Abraham’s hand. The fingers are no bigger than Abraham’s. They are a different color.
  • There is the boy. His eyes are closed. Given the comments I made earlier about the horror of verse 9, it would have been an interesting choice to leave Isaac’s eyes open. Did Lindholm consider that? Was that perhaps just too hard to see so he closed them instead? Was Isaac just waiting for the end? Another choice would have been to make Isaac look afraid. Terrified. But Lindholm chose to make him asleep. Interesting. Perhaps he envisioned that Abraham knocked him out.
  • There is the ram, already there, with his horns stuck in the thicket. If I had been the artist I might have shown a larger, more dense thicket, but perhaps Lindholm is suggesting that you didn’t need to do much to provide this ram for the sacrifice.

In the description of this picture, Bustard quotes Tim Keller: “God saw Abraham’s sacrifice and said, ‘Now I know that you love me, because you did not withhold your only son from me.’ But how much more can we look at his sacrifice on the cross and say to God, ‘Now we know that you love us. For you did not withhold your son, your only son, whom you love, from us.”

Father, search me today and help me to see what I have not sacrificed to you. Which parts of my vanity are still too important to me? Deal with me gently, Father. I know I am proud. I know I am vain. I know I can be selfish. Help me, Father to not get to a point where you have to go to these lengths to get my attention and repentance.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 23, 2019 in Genesis, Revealed: A Storybook Bible for Grown-Ups

 

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Corruption

22 Mar

No verse.

Dear God, I was talking yesterday with a young woman in her 20s who works with me. She was interviewing me for a college class assignment and she asked me about my attitudes towards the American Dream and the current ability for people to advance. It was an interesting question. Then a friend with whom I talk every week mentioned the recent scandal with the people using their money to get their children access to college. That topic kind of supported the answer I gave to the young woman.

When I was in my 20s, I didn’t really think of people here as being corrupt. I thought that was something that happened more in other countries. But we (the U.S.) have our systems in place that depend on law and order. We have our rules to prevent corruption. No, I thought there was fairness here.

Now, about 25 years later, I’ve seen plenty of corruption, both in person and through the news. Maybe I’ve even participated a little here an there unwittingly. So what does my faith in you tell me to do about this? Do I address it? Do I accept it? I honestly don’t know. As a man who has benefited from White Privilege his whole life, it is pretty easy to ignore it because I have never been at the other end of an unjust legal situation or even a cashier at the grocery store who seemingly treated me rudely because of my skin color. Therefore, I’m not terribly motivated to do anything about it. Where would I even begin to start?

Father, I’m not saying that that is the answer. I’m not saying that you are calling me to ignore corruption. Far from it. But what to do about it is something else entirely. Perhaps my role is to reach out and help those who are close to me who are victims of a corrupt system. I don’t know where you are leading me in this. Please guide my heart and show me in each moment what I should do.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 22, 2019 in Miscellaneous, Musings and Stories

 

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Narrowing on Jesus and Widening my Love

21 Mar

No verse.

Dear God, I had a great conversation with some old friends of my wife last night, and one part of my conversation with the husband of the couple has kind of stuck with me this morning. I want to spend some time with you unpacking it a little this morning.

We were talking about loving other people who don’t believe the same things we do (religiously, politically, etc.) and he said (paraphrasing), the more I live the wider and wider my love for others gets and, simultaneously, the narrower and narrower I focus on Jesus. I really liked that, and I can relate. I know I still have a long way to go in loving others and not judging them, but I know I was better yesterday that I was the day before, and I hope I am going to be better today than I was yesterday. The more I focus on you/Jesus/the Holy Spirit (the Trinity), the more I start to see others with your eyes, and your eyes seem to be so merciful and loving. And then the ability to give that love and grace to others brings me a peace that I cannot have when I am judging them.

Father, thank you for sharpening me with some other pieces of iron yesterday. Thank you for sharpening me through my wife, my friends, and really everyone with whom you bring me into contact. Thank you for sharpening me through your scripture and through my prayer time with you. Thank you for caring enough about me to take the time to sharpen me. Thank you for loving me. Thank you for forgiving me. Thank you.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 21, 2019 in Miscellaneous, Musings and Stories

 

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Genesis 18:17

20 Mar

Genesis 18:17 [NLT]
“Should I hide my plan from Abraham?” the Lord asked.

Dear God, yes, please hide from me what you are doing. That’s my first response when I read this verse and I think back on my life so far. Very rarely would it have benefited me to know what you were doing in advance. I heard your call in a given moment and sometimes I obeyed it regardless of what the future held. And sometimes it was a hard future. But I am glad that I didn’t know how hard it would be going into it.

Even now, as I think of some of the challenges ahead of me and two that involve work that are predominantly on my heart, it really is better that I don’t know everything that will happen between now and when you resolve these situations. After the journey my wife and I took over 15 years ago, I came up with a saying that you keep me on a need-to-know basis and I very rarely need to know. I still think that is true.

Father, I have a couple of difficult situations with which I’m currently dealing, and I have friends who are also dealing with hard things. Please help us all. Help us to, first, cry out to you. I’ve been praying to you about one of my things all morning. Please hear my cry. Help me to do everything according to your plan and your will. Holy Spirit, fill me, pour through me, and bring glory to your name through me, even if it costs me something. Not my will, but your will be done.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 20, 2019 in Genesis

 

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Galatians 5:22-23

19 Mar

Galatians 5:22-23 [NLT]
But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!

Dear God, this is one of my favorite passages and also one of the few that I can pretty much quote chapter and verse. It’s something that I use to look at my own life and try to get some sort of perspective on how I’m doing. I also use it when I’m evaluating people who claim to be Christians. I try to see if their lives, words, and actions match up with these things. A lot of people can say the right words, but they simply can’t grow this fruit without you.

Then there are the verses that precede it. Galatians 5:19-21 gives us a look at the other side of the coin. The life lived completely away from you:

When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

How am I doing when I hold those things up to the mirror my life reflects. Do I say that pornography is awful and yet engage in it? Do I preach patience and gentleness and yet exhibit hostility and jealousy? Do I claim to have peace, but live a life of dissension, division and envy?

Father, help me to allow the Spirit just a little more access to my being today so that you will continue to grow over and choke out the desires of my sinful nature. I am getting the image of St. Augustine grass. The stronger it gets the more it will choke out the weeds growing around it. The problem is, it needs A LOT of water to be that strong. Help me to do what I can to water the Spirit in my life so that it will choke out the weeds that I allow to still grow in me.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 19, 2019 in Galatians

 

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Romans 15:13

18 Mar

Romans 15:13 [NLT]
13 I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Dear God, what a great thing for me to pray for others. To pray for my children that you would completely fill them with joy and peace because they trust you. That they will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s also a great thing to pray for my wife, my extended family, the significant others of my children, my coworkers, my friends, etc.

And how about myself? Do I trust you so much that you completely fill me with joy and peace? Sometimes. Do I overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit? Occasionally I get there. How can I be a better example of this?

I guess it starts by deciding in what or whom I put my trust. I confess that it is usually me. I usually look to my own solutions. My own ideas. My own skills. But guess what—that method never leads me to joy and peace. Even if it all works out, there is an emptiness to it.

Right now, I am facing a couple of significant challenges at work. I know I have brought one of them to you in prayer and you seem to be moving, but as I sit here and type this, I realize that I have been trying to do the others in my own strength. I have not brought them to you in prayer. I have not put my hope and trust in you to get them resolved. And guess what. About one of my challenges I am feeling peace and joy and about the other two I am not.

Father, help me to surrender my whole life to you so that I might experience your peace and joy. Please guide me in my challenges. Please provide for the needs I have and the needs for which I am responsible at work, in my home, and in my community. Help me to turn it all over to you so that you might use my life to ripple through time as you need it to.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 18, 2019 in Romans

 

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The Woman at the Well – John 4:13-26

16 Mar

Woman at the Well
The image above is from Revealed: A Storybook Bible for Grown-Ups by Ned Bustard. The image itself was created by Diego Jourdan Pereira and is called “Woman at the Well.”

John 4:13-26 [NLT]
13 Jesus replied, “Anyone who drinks this water will soon become thirsty again. 14 But those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty again. It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life.”
15 “Please, sir,” the woman said, “give me this water! Then I’ll never be thirsty again, and I won’t have to come here to get water.”
16 “Go and get your husband,” Jesus told her.
17 “I don’t have a husband,” the woman replied.
Jesus said, “You’re right! You don’t have a husband— 18 for you have had five husbands, and you aren’t even married to the man you’re living with now. You certainly spoke the truth!”
19 “Sir,” the woman said, “you must be a prophet. 20 So tell me, why is it that you Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place of worship, while we Samaritans claim it is here at Mount Gerizim, where our ancestors worshiped?”
21 Jesus replied, “Believe me, dear woman, the time is coming when it will no longer matter whether you worship the Father on this mountain or in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans know very little about the one you worship, while we Jews know all about him, for salvation comes through the Jews. 23 But the time is coming—indeed it’s here now—when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The Father is looking for those who will worship him that way. 24 For God is Spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.”
25 The woman said, “I know the Messiah is coming—the one who is called Christ. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”
26 Then Jesus told her, “I am the Messiah!”

 

Dear God, I’ve heard this story so many times that I want to see if I can enter it through the image created by Diego Jourdan Pereira instead of starting with the passage.

Knowing what I know of the story, what is it that I see here?

  • First I suppose I have to admit that it’s a little hard for a left-brained person like me to make out everything in this image.
  • I see the woman first. She is the center of the story, and she is holding a pitcher in which she can carry the water she’s come to get.
  • There’s the well. It has water at the bottom and rocks surrounding it at the top.
  • Jesus has his back to us and is sitting on the well. Okay, maybe I am noticing something interesting that Mr. Jourdan Pereira did here–he kept the woman the center of the story. Jesus is looking at her just like we are.
  • I never imagined Jesus sitting on the actual well itself talking to the woman. That’s interesting.
  • Jesus seems to have the holiness halo around his head that a lot of Catholic artwork does for the Holy Family and saints. (Bustard’s commentary mentions that “the circle of Christ’s halo is repeated in the well, connecting the water with the Living Water.)
  • I can’t tell what it is, but there seems to be a subtle cross that is upside down and crooked just above Jesus hands–between him and the woman.
  • I suppose those are mountains in the distance behind her.

I really like the idea that this image and this story are all about the woman. It’s not about Jesus needing water. It’s about Jesus entering this woman’s life and world. She is holding her pitcher, in need of some water. She came to the well for the water, but what she found there was Jesus sitting on the well. He’s in the same place as the water for which she came, but he has a different water to offer her.

Of course, there is the story itself. What is the living water of which Jesus speaks? The first thing he has to do is get her sin out on the table. She is going to be ashamed of it, and she’ll get mad, change the subject, and try to fight back by drawing a line between them: We Samaritans think this while you Jews think that. But Jesus changes the premise of her argument and tells her that all of it is wrong: Jesus replied, “Believe me, dear woman, the time is coming when it will no longer matter whether you worship the Father on this mountain or in Jerusalem.” (verse 21)

Then he has to teach her about worshiping “in spirit and in truth.” (verses 23 and 24) We’ve put so many constructs on what worshiping you looks like, when the truth is that you are so much bigger than our constructs.

My wife and I were talking this morning about death and afterlife. We discussed the difference between those who believe that we are dormant until Jesus comes again and those who believe we enter the afterlife immediately (whether it be heaven, hell or even purgatory). We finally concluded that all of this is problematic because we are putting our earthly construct of “time” onto the construct of your timelessness. My personal belief is that I don’t know how it will all happen, but I’m confident that I’m not capable of understanding it on this side of death because it is through death that I will cross through the veil.

Okay, now I’m rambling. I guess the point I am getting from this story this morning is that you are there to meet us where we are, get us to discuss our sin and deal with it through your grace and your call to holiness, and then worship you in spirit and in truth, which is possible because you are the Messiah. How’s that for a summary?

Father, help me to really worship you today. I started this day with a secular song in my head and I played it while I made my breakfast. It was a nice love song. Then I decided that I needed to prepare my heart for this time with you so I put on some Christian songs that would lead me into worship and bring me into a place of wanting to spend this time with you. Thankfully, it worked. So, like I said at the beginning of this paragraph, help me to worship you today, but to do it in spirit and in truth. Help me to deal with my sin in a humble way before you. Help me to do what you would have me to do for your glory.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 

 
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Posted by on March 16, 2019 in John, Revealed: A Storybook Bible for Grown-Ups

 

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Mark 10:32

15 Mar

Mark 10:32
32 They were now on the way up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them. The disciples were filled with awe, and the people following behind were overwhelmed with fear. Taking the twelve disciples aside, Jesus once more began to describe everything that was about to happen to him.

Dear God, there seems to be a throwaway line here in the middle of this passage: “…and the people following behind were overwhelmed with fear.” I looked up several different translations, and I really didn’t get a better description of why these people we so afraid. Or maybe another way of looking at it is to wonder why the twelve were not afraid. Why did Jesus keep having to explain his impending suffering and death to them?

But back on the people following being “overwhelmed with fear.” I wonder why they kept following. They apparently had enough perspective to sense the danger ahead (maybe the twelve were too close to it to see it). Yet they pressed on in their fear. Maybe it was their faith in Jesus that propelled them on. Maybe it was morbid curiosity. Maybe it was a sense of calling. I wonder what happened to them on that Good Friday/Passover evening after Jesus was dead. I just realized I’ve used the word “wonder” several times this morning. I suppose that’s what I’m left with at this point, just to wonder.

As for me, even now, I have things about which I am afraid. I have challenges at work, with my children, with family members, with friends, etc. And that doesn’t even count politics, societal issues, and what’s going on around the world. Yes, there can even be times when I am “overwhelmed with fear.” But I follow because there is no other hope for me outside of you.

Father, I have a lot of things to do today, including one very important thing that I have to get right. Please give me wisdom and discernment as I evaluate my options Thank you for putting options before me in the first place. A week ago at this time I felt like I was at square one. But I prayed to you and followed a path, and it feels like you have brought the right person to me. I just need to figure out which one it is. Be with me as I have lunch with a friend who is battling cancer. Thank you that what he has is very treatable. Be with my wife’s and my time with our daughter tonight as we celebrate her birthday. Give her a sense of your love for her and our love for her through our time together. Help her to make the decisions that are in front of her as well. And I guess, going back to the passage today, I pledge to you that I will take my fears, lay them at the foot of your cross, and take up your yoke. You are my only path to a peace that passes understanding. Thank you for being my God.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 15, 2019 in Mark

 

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