Sorry for the posting delays. With vacation, work, and the connecting with the needs of my mom since her stroke, my blog has bogged down. But I'm turning over a new leaf!

WHAT WE LEARN ABOUT OURSELVES FROM JOHN 9 …

FIRST, WE HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PAIN AND SUFFERING WE SEE IN OUR OWN LIVES AND IN THE WORLD.

This is natural. If we didn’t have these questions then we’d be living life with our eyes closed and our minds shut down.

Disease and all the other results of the fact that sin entered the world in the Garden of Eden … these things are experienced by everyone. Those who aren’t in relationship and fellowship with God, and those who are. All of us have sinned and live under the curse of sin. In MATTHEW 5:45 Jesus taught this lesson clearly when He said that the rain falls equally on the crops of the righteous and the unrighteous.

At times Jesus removes certain aspects of sin's curse – like in this story in JOHN 9 … the man was born blind, but God restored his sight. But even this man’s healing doesn’t automatically remove him from all the physical aspects of the curse in a fallen world as it relates to aging, susceptibility to sickness etc … but what it does give in this life is restoration of fellowship with God in the Spirit. And that’s priceless!

SECOND, GOD WILL GIVE US OPPORTUNITIES TO TELL OTHERS ABOUT HIM, ABOUT WHAT HE’S DOING IN OUR LIVES (THE INSTRUCTION, THE HEALING, AND THE DIRECTION HE’S GIVING US). WE NEED TO BE WILLING TO WALK THROUGH THESE DOORS GOD OPENS UP FOR US.

vv. 13-34 … We don’t need to be afraid of this, even if we don’t have all the answers. We just need to be willing to offer the testimony of our mouths (our "story") concerning what Jesus has done and is doing in our lives. Here's a simple outline to use as you think about how to share your story ...

1. My life before Jesus … what was missing?
2. How I met Jesus … what He brought to me and filled up the missing places of my life with.
3. How my life has changed and is changing since coming into a relationship with Jesus Christ … what I’m learning.

THIRD, IT CAN BE EASY TO TRY TO TAKE GLORY FROM GOD. WE’VE GOT TO STAY AWAY FROM THIS TRAP.

vv. 24-34 … Gang, God doesn’t share His glory with anyone.

FOURTH, WISDOM WILL COME TO THOSE WHO GIVE GOD THE GLORY FOR WHAT HE IS DOING IN THEIR LIVES.

vv. 30-34 … Wisdom isn’t the “possession” of those with great “knowledge.” No way. Rather, wisdom is the gift of God to those with great humility, who exhibit great surrender, and who are willing to share the life of faith they have with God with the people God brings across their paths.

FIFTH, GREAT BELIEF IN GOD LEADS TO GREAT WORSHIP OF GOD.

v. 38 … God has hard-wired us to be in communion with Him. Rich Mullin’s wrote a song called “Screen Door” that talks about this. The main line says, “Faith without works is like a screen door on a submarine. Faith without works. It just ain’t happening!”

SIXTH, AS HUMAN BEINGS, WE’RE PRONE TO PRIDE AND ARROGANCE … AND BLINDNESS IS THE FRUIT OF BOTH OF THESE SINS.

vv. 39-41 … Getting to know Jesus, touching Jesus, obeying Jesus, and believing into Jesus this is where healing and the answers to our questions will be found.

Godspeed.

read.think.pray.live.

Gregg

Friends,

Remember being in elementary school and doing Show And Tell? I went to First, Second, Third, and Fourth Grades at Pioneer Elementary School in Quincy, Washington, and I remember some great Show and Tells.

One day in Second Grade, a kid named Bobby brought something in a bag that he was really excited to TELL us about and then SHOW us. But I’ll never forget the collective gasp that sucked all the oxygen out of the room when he opened up the bag and shook out a dead bunny that he’d found the night before. It wasn’t bloody or anything. It just basically looked like it was sleeping. And Bobby (along with most of the kids) thought it was so cool. But the teacher? Not so much.

Then in Third Grade, when it was GRANDPARENT WEEK, a girl named Janet wanted to bring her grandfather to school for Show and Tell. I guess our teacher thought that maybe Janet’s grandpa could tell the class about all the ways he’d seen the world change since the turn of the 20th Century or something instructive like that. But of course that wasn’t what happened. Because Janet brought her grandfather to class all right – but he was in an urn. Which of course was something that most of us in the class hadn’t ever seen before. Again, very cool. I remembered those two Show And Tells, that’s for sure.

Well this morning the story John tells us in JOHN 9 is kind of like Show And Tell. Actually it’s more like Tell And Show … I did the Tell earlier in the service when I read through JOHN 9:1-41 and shared a bit of commentary with you along the way. And now I’ll do the Show part of the equation, as I share with you some of the things I believe God wants to teach us through this story …

1. SOME IMPORTANT LESSONS ABOUT JESUS
2. SOME IMPORTANT LESSONS ABOUT US, AND …
3. SOME IMPORTANT LESSONS ABOUT HEALING

This is an exciting section of God’s WORD, and as I’ve been studying it and praying through it, and preparing to share it with you this past week, I’ve been really blessed to see how God wants me to open it up for us here this morning. Unlike most of the chapters of John’s Gospel, JOHN 9:1-41 is ONE COMPLETE STORY. In this and the next two blog postings, I'll share these three sets of lessons I'm learning from JOHN 9.

1. WHAT WE LEARN ABOUT JESUS FROM JOHN 9 …

v. 1 … FIRST, JESUS LOOKS AT YOU AND ME WITH EYES OF COMPASSION AND HOPE.

His COMPASSION enables Jesus to see us as we really are, and love us anyway. And His HOPE enables Jesus to see what we can become if we’ll surrender our brokenness and our pain to His touch.

Sometimes Jesus invites us to put our faith in Him and THEN He brings healing into our lives. And sometimes He brings healing into our lives and THEN He calls us to faith in Him. It’s not a fixed formula that has to be followed.

Jesus is God. He can do this however He wants to do it. I don’t want to KNOW, SERVE and SURRENDER MY LIFE to a God that I can completely understand … a God that I put into a box. Because that would mean that I’d be KNOWING, SERVING and SURRENDERING to a God who is less powerful and wise and me. And believe me, I know how low that sets that bar!

I want to KNOW and SERVE and SURRENDER my life to a God who is full of mystery, and who doesn’t do whatever I ask Him to do … but Who’s character is consistent, whose compassion is deep, and whose plans can be trusted.

vv. 6-7 … SECOND, JESUS LONGS TO TOUCH US (WE NEED TO BE WILLING) … GOD LONGS TO INSTRUCT US (WE NEED TO BE TEACHABLE) … GOD LONGS TO HEAL US (WE NEED TO BE OBEDIENT). WILLING, TEACHABLE, OBEDIENT … they’re all about SURRENDER.

vv. 1-41 … THIRD, JESUS WANTS TO TEACH US ABOUT HEALING, AND ABOUT WHO HE IS AS JEHOVAH-RAPHA, “THE GOD WHO HEALS”.

God first revealed this “healing” part of His nature to the Israelites in EXODUS 15 …

After God took the Children of Israel out of Egypt and through the Red Sea, He brought them into the wilderness of Shur, where for three days they wandered around without water. For seventy-two hours the scorching sun of the desert beat down on them, and the sand burned their feet. Their livestock was dying, their children’s tongues were swollen, and their lips were parched to the point of cracking.

Then, they came to the waters of Marah. Imagine how their hearts must have leaped in their chests when they saw it! They could almost taste it, and feel it cooling them down and refreshing their swollen mouths. But when they got there, the water was bitter, dank and literally undrinkable.

And so immediately they turned on Moses and started to blame him. And isn’t this what we do when we come into hard times, when we have an area of our lives that isn’t working out the way we thought it should, or the way we hoped it would, or even the way we prayed it would? We all too easily grumble, murmur, and complain … instead of believing, hoping, and praying. And yet, God still has plans for us, just waiting for us to discover and live into.

Yes they were in a hard chapter of their lives, but God had brought them out of Egypt, and He would take care of them. And that day God used Moses to make the bitter water sweet by taking a nearby tree and placing it into the water. Mysterious. God-like. God’s care and provision made visible.

And just like the Israelites, God has brought you and me through so much. He hasn’t turned His back on us . Not by a long shot. And so it was here at the waters of Marah that God taught the Israelites that He was Jehovah-Rapha, the God who heals.

FIRST CORINTHIANS 10:11 (CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH VERSION)

11 These things happened to them as a warning to us. All this was written in the Scriptures to teach us who live in these last days.

v. 31 … FOURTH, OUR SIN BUILDS A WALL BETWEEN US AND GOD. CONFESSION AND REPENTANCE REMOVES THIS WALL, AND OPENS US UP MORE FULLY TO THE LIFE OF REDEMPTION GOD HAS FOR US. THE RESULT OF CONFESSION AND REPENTANCE IS THE RECEIVING OF GRACE AND PEACE.

Maybe you’re here this morning and God wants to bring His healing to your life … but there’s something in the way, there’s some sin you need to confess, repent of, and move away from. If that’s you, what are you going to do about it?

v. 35 … Jesus knows us and stays in touch with us in the midst of our pain and our rejection. We’re not alone. HEBREWS 4:13 …

FIRST CORINTHIANS 10:13 (THE MESSAGE)

13 No test or temptation that comes your way is beyond the course of what others have had to face. All you need to remember is that God will never let you down; he’ll never let you be pushed past your limit; he’ll always be there to help you come through it.

HEBREWS 4:13, 15-16 (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE)

13 And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.
15 For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.
16 Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

vv. 39-41 … FIFTH, JESUS CAME TO TURN THE WORLD UPSIDE DOWN, AND TO RIGHT THE WRONG THAT SIN HAS BROUGHT INTO THE WORLD.

Again, this bring us back to the great COMPASSION and HOPE Jesus has for us … that He brings to us, that motivates His desire to bring His healing to our lives.

In the next posting I'll share with you what I'm learning about myself as a human being from JOHN 9. Godspeed.

read.think.pray.live.

Gregg

NATURAL CHURCH GROWTH ...
WHICH WAY THE WIND IS BLOWING

The change and growth of a church community can be dumbfounding. At times the numbers diminish, and it's a sign of winnowing, cleansing, and sharpening. At other times the numbers increase and it's a sign of hero-worship instead of Jesus-worship. But whether a church's growth curve is spiking up or tumbling down -- change is more than likely reflective of what is happening in the root system of the tree called "the church".

But let me focus on growth, not decline for a few minutes. Like the old AA saying, "Sometimes quickly. Sometimes slowly." Sometimes growth comes as the result of a sovereign move of God -- catching us totally off-guard. And at other times growth comes as the result of intentionally discerning what God is doing and then partnering with Him. Sometimes when growth comes we're ready spiritually, but unprepared organizationally. And at other times when growth comes we've been looking for it for a long time but fail to see what God is up to, and quickly attribute it to our own efforts, or even "the luck of the draw."

Teresa and I recently spent time at the annual pastor's conference, sponsored by NW Yearly Meeting of Friends Church (www.nwfriends.org) and hosted by Twin Rocks Friends Camp in Rockaway Beach, OR (www.twinrocks.org). We had a great time there and during one of our meals a fellow pastor asked me what 2nd Street can attribute it's recent growth to, and here's a synopsis of what I shared with him ...

• Elders and leaders who worship, pray, and even fast together. This brings humility, insight, courage, and stamina.
• Worship that is varied, contemporary, contemplative, with many different instruments and teams ... always focusing on Jesus Christ ... interspersed with Scripture. This draws people's hearts and minds away from ego, fear and tradition.
• People telling their stories ... up front and personal about how Jesus Christ is changing the way they think, what they feel, what they're saying, and what they are doing. This helps create an "us story", not a "me and them story" within our midst.
• Teaching from God's Word that is in-depth, and yet that leaves most of the individual application up to the Holy Spirit. This helps those who gather remain God-dependent, not Gregg-dependent. I just finished teaching # 30 out of John's Gospel -- and next week I'm studying for, praying through, and preparing to teach on JOHN 9:1-7. Before John I taught from FIRST PETER and HAGGAI. Remember that the tortoise won the race, not the hare. Slow doesn't have to equal boring. Rather, intentional can equal thorough, engaging, and deep. I believe that when it comes to the teaching of Gods' WORD, this is what people are longing for in their spirits. To come to worship and drink deeply of the things of God. And people become hungry and thirsty for what they eat and drink. And so as they eat and drink deeply on Sunday, that becomes the desire of their hearts throughout the week. Little will no longer satisfy. Shallow will no longer sustain.
  
• A leadership team who are more concerned about their own (and one another's) faithfulness than about their qualifications. Much of the time when our qualifications are what is being focused on, we will remain unwilling (or not even see the need) for the discipline it takes to become a faithful follower of Jesus Christ. But when faithfulness is what is pursued, focused on, and desired, most of the time, God will get the person qualified (in His way, in His time, and with the person's cooperation) to do whatever He has planned for them to do in the Kingdom. This posture leads to teamwork, not competition.
• Working with other local churches in a spirit of cooperation (Community Health Day in August, Serve and Celebration in September, Feed the Need Community Food Drive in October). We pray for another church, and or local ministry every Sunday. We are contending nor in competition with no one. As each Christ-honoring church in Newberg thrives, we all become stronger. "Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done".
• We "weigh and measure" everything we do against our Mission Statement and and our Values ... discerning our annual Ministry Plans before we design them and then letting our Ministry Funding Plans simply follow them, not the other way around. This keeps us lean and attentive to the purpose of our life-together. God has used this methodology to help us increase our Ministry Funding Plan by over 125K in the past two years.
  
• We regularly invite people on Sunday morning to make the choice to become devoted followers of Jesus Christ. There should be no shame or privatizing of our faith. The inner must turn outward with celebration and the strength of community.
• Community Groups (small groups) are growing because we have a Community Group Facilitator who is making them visible. One year ago we had 6 Community Groups meeting regularly. Now we have 18. This is where much of the pastoral care and serving takes place -- as all Community Groups have a service component built into them ... we study and learn together, we seek and find together, and we serve God and the world together. This is knitting our hearts to God and one another at a deeper level.
• We highly value and model authenticity, surrender, brokenness, and transparency. Our Celebrate Recovery (www.celebraterecovery.com) has grown from around twenty people a week 18 months ago to over 50 weekly ... including big group, small group, and step-studies. With great surrender, great healing comes, with great healing, great discipleship happens, and with great discipleship, great leadership develops, and with great leadership, more people will be drawn towards Jesus Christ and into a life with Him.

I know that not everything that works at one church will work at another church. But that's mostly just true with programs. But notice that what I've written about above has very, very little to do with programs. It has to do with posture, with heart, with attitude, with desires, with mission, with passion, and with focus. Godspeed.

read.think.pray.live.

Gregg

SMALL STEPS. BIG GOD

My mom Nancy had a stroke last Thursday. I feel helpless because I am ... just as I'm sure my mom feels helpless. Larry Hine, a man who has been a spiritual director to both the late Henri Nouwen, and to Brennan Manning often used a blessing with these two men, that for some reason keeps coming to mind during these days and nights ...

"May all your expectations be
frustrated. May all your plans
be thwarted. May all of your
desires be withered into nothing-
ness, that you may experience
the powerlessness and poverty of
a child and sing and dance in the
love of God the Father the Son,
and the Spirit." Amen!

Like you, I wish I knew the way the road ahead is going to turn -- up, down, right, or left. But of course, we cannot know such things. And so I make the choice to surrender, to trust, to wait, to pray, to listen, to hope, to embrace, and to cherish.

The picture above this post was taken by my brother Brad. It's his hand holding my mom's as she lays in her hospital bed. I believe it's a good visual metaphor of how God is holding onto my mom right now -- and of course, to me and to you. Small steps. Big God. Godspeed.

read.think.pray.live.

Gregg

THE SHACK
BY WILLIAM P. YOUNG

I just finished shacking up with William P. Young. I guess William's middle name is Paul -- and from reading his blog and others, and while following but not joining in the conversations about The Shack I found there -- I discovered that he goes by Paul. So that's what I'll call him from now on in this short email.

I found little in Paul's words to be fearful of and much about them ponder-able.

I think that building theology on the Bible and not on literature, sacred or secular is always a good idea. So I'll keep building my ragamuffin beliefs on God's Word and not, for instance, on Flannery O'Connor, Eugene Peterson, J.R.R. Tolkien, Dr. Seuss, Anne Lamott, C.S. Lewis, or Paul Young for that matter. And I'd issue the same caution for building our theology on our experiences. Sandy ground to be sure. At least my experiences. Maybe yours are more sacredly sound than my own adolescent fumblings.

I found Paul's writing getting better from the front of the book to the back. This seems like something an editor could have helped him with. And yet, overall, if I was grading him on "improvement of thought, writing, structure and the portrayal of intent" I'd give him pretty high marks. But I can't say the same thing for his belief-system. It seemed rickety at best, and downright fragile at worst. But then I'm sure some might say the same thing about mine.

And the reason I see Paul's belief system as rickety and fragile is because it seems to have been primarily built on his experiences and disappointments with God, rather than with his interaction with God's written and living Word. At least 1/2 and 1/2 would have been an improvement.

I think that when we have a single-hearted devotion to Jesus Christ we can (and should) read books like this that have somehow caught the hearts, minds, and imaginations of God-seekers and Christ-followers from across a broad spectrum of denominational and transdenominational flavors.

But I also want to temper that belief with by following Paul's keen advice in ROMANS 16:19 that Christ-followers be wise in what is good and innocent in what is evil -- because I believe that to do so will save us not only from doctrinal error, but from spiritual heartache and regret.

I see Paul simply trying to share his with-God experiences -- however "sketchy and/or freely expanded-upon" they seem to be. Is what he shares incomplete? Sure. And yet, let's not expect a book to be different than the intention it was birthed from. I don't see it was Paul's goal to write a volume of systematic theology. Like all things written down in words, Paul's describing the God he has experienced, and not the God he is experiencing. But is it heresy? No, I don't think so. Maybe it's kind of how I view the 7th Day Adventist Church? Is it a cult? No. Do I want to sign up to let them teach me about end times, angels, and dietary laws? No thanks. Likewise, I don't want Paul to teach me theology. But I do think I can learn some things from him ... more about that in a future post.

Maybe Paul will write a belief-stepped sequel and call it The Condo. If he does, I hope it includes some of the life-lessons and God-lessons he's no doubt learning and taking for a test-drive now that his book is such a big hit (# 9 last week on www.amazon.com out of millions of books).

Unlike some of my friends and colleagues, I don't see Paul's words marketing "cheap grace". Rather, I see them revealing to us his incomplete understanding of grace. He's on a journey. And while I don't see myself walking side-by-side him right now, I have great hopes that he's authentically seeking the One True God.

Some web-postings about Paul and The Shack seem like they want to canonize the book and beatify the man. While others seem like they want to burn the book, and excommunicate the author. I see little need to give either extreme much attention.

But neither does Paul seem to me like a wolf in sheep's clothing. He's a man in process. Not everybody can embrace the neat-and-tidy-black-and-white theological categories of MacArthur and Piper. Nor can everyone feel at home in the bend-over-backwards-while-sticking-your-head-between-your-thighs flexible dogma of the emergent church movement's McLaren and Driscolll. Maybe Paul fancies himself living and believing somewhere in between. I know I do. But that doesn't make me a Youngite. It just makes me human.

I'm glad I read The Shack. But I'm also glad that my doubts and questions don't outweigh my beliefs and convictions 10 to 1 (it's probably more like a 80/20 split), that it's my goal to have my faith be both reasoned and experiential, and that I can know the intimacy of God as my "Abba" and Jesus as my "friend" while at the same time be in speechless awe that God is infinite, unknowable, and completely other to all I am and all I can know on my own. Godspeed.

read.think.pray.live.

Gregg

WERE YOU THERE WHEN THEY CRUCIFIED MY LORD?

In MATTHEW 11:28 (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE) Jesus says, Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden and I will give you rest. Jesus didn’t say, “Come unto Me all you who are wise or wealthy or worthy.” He said, Come unto Me, all you who are weary.

Or remember when Jesus said in MATTHEW 9:12 (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE), I haven’t come for the well, but for the sick.

In FIRST CORINTHIANS 1:26-27 (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE) the Apostle Paul says, Are there any among you who are wise? [implying that “no, there is not”] but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong …

Our God is in the business of choosing down-and-outers – people who’ve known rejection … and then He gets busy about transforming them from death into life. And this isn’t just some new plan God started using when Jesus came to earth. God has always used this method. It’s the same method God used in The Old Testament when He came to David in the wilderness and gave him some good, true, righteous men to stand and fight at his side. Listen to the description of who these God brought alongside David ...

FIRST SAMUEL 22:2 (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE) ... Everyone who was in distress, and everyone who was in debt, and everyone who was disoriented gathered to him; and he became captain over them. Now there were about four hundred men with him.

Distressed, in debt and disoriented. Now that’s a great resume! Do any of those descriptions ring a bell from your own life, from your own experience, from your own choices? Distressed, in debt and disoriented? And yet as this group of men followed David, they learned from him, they changed, and eventually they became a powerful, purposeful righteous band of brothers.

Or consider Jesus’ own disciples and His other followers. Three years before the cross came into the picture, Jesus asked this ragtag group of men and women to follow Him, and they weren’t exactly magna cum laude material. In JOHN 15:18 (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE) Jesus said to them … If the world hates and rejects you, you know that it has hated and rejected Me before it hated you.

And in the final hours of His life … when Jesus hung on the cross for you and for me, He was rejected, despised and forsaken. And nobody who’s ever walked this world has known the kind of rejection Jesus knew that day.

As Jesus went through the last days and hours leading up to the cross … and as the crown of thorns was forced down onto His head … and as He hung, nearly naked on the cross of Calvary … He experienced a gut-wrenching kind of rejection.

• Jesus was alone as He prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night of His arrest.
  
• Jesus was alone before Caiaphas the High Priest.
• Jesus was alone when He stood before Pilate and Herod.
• Jesus was alone as He was nailed to the cross.
• And ultimately, as Jesus tried to breathe, His body heaving up and down, and up and down on the cross, He was abandoned by His Father.

The Apostle Paul wrote in … SECOND CORINTHIANS 5:21 (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE) God made Him [Jesus Christ] who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

And when that happened, when Jesus became sin, God the Father had to look away from Him, reject Him, and abandon Him. Maybe you’ve felt some of the rejection Jesus felt on the days leading up to the cross and as He hung there on the cross.

Maybe you’ve felt alone … Maybe you can relate to Jesus in the Garden that night … maybe you’ve prayed prayers that didn’t seem to get out of the room, let alone make it all the way to God. Maybe, while going through hard things, it’s felt like God has forgotten about you, that you weren’t on God’s radar, or that God didn’t even know you existed.

Maybe you’ve felt alone … Maybe friends have turned their backs on you. You thought they were loyal … real friends. But when you needed them most they were nowhere to be found, or even worse, maybe they turned against you.

Maybe you’ve felt alone … Maybe the church hasn’t been there for you like you thought it should, hoped it could, or prayed it would. Maybe that’s the reason it’s been hard for you to trust the church, or really get involved in the church – because somewhere in your past it’s let you down.

Maybe you’ve felt alone … Maybe the government or other people in authority over you haven’t given you a fair shake, haven’t really heard your side of the story, haven’t stood with you when you needed them to.

If you’ve felt rejected or forsaken by God sometime during your life, I want to tell you that you haven’t been. Because the truth of the matter is that nothing can separate you and me from the love of God that is found in Christ Jesus.

ISAIAH 53:3a (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE) says that He [Jesus Christ] was despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.

Because of what Jesus went through during His thirty-three years here on earth, and during the last week of His life, and on the last hours when He hung on the cross … Believe me when I tell you that He is “acquainted with grief.” In other words, He can relate to our hurts, to our pains, to our hang-ups, to our sorrows, to our disappointments.

To the teenager who doesn’t know how to fit in … or where to fit in. Jesus says, “Because of the Cross I’m acquainted with that kind of sorrow, with that kind of pain.”

To the man or woman whose spouse walked out on them … or to the man or woman whose spouse cheated on them, breaking their vows and their trust … Jesus says, “Because of the Cross I’m acquainted with that kind of desertion.”

To the student who tried to get into a certain school but was rejected. To the guy who had his heart stomped on by the girl who he thought loved him. To the employee who heard the words, “We’re downsizing” … whatever it is, Jesus says, “Because of the Cross I know about grief … I know about rejection … I know about pain.”

Again, the Apostle Paul writes, this time to the believers in the town of Ephesus (which was in what is now modern-day Turkey) EPHESIANS 1:6 (NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE) the praise of the glory of His [God the Father’s] grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved [Jesus Christ].

The NEW KING JAMES VERSION of the Bible puts this verse this way … to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has made us accepted in the Beloved.

In God’s WORD we read that we are …

• The apple of God’s eye.
• That we are the Bride of Christ.
• That we are the Rose of Sharon.
• That we are a Royal Priesthood, a Chosen People, and a Holy Nation.

This is who we are before God because of what happened on the Cross.

AMAZING LOVE
Chris Tomlin

I’m forgiven because You were forsaken,
I’m accepted … You were condemned.
I am alive and well … Your spirit is within me,
Because You died and rose again.

CHORUS …
Amazing love … How can it be?
That You, my King would die for me?
Amazing love … I know it’s true.
It’s my joy to honor You … In all I do, I honor You.

I’m forgiven because You were forsaken,
I’m accepted … You were condemned.
I am alive and well … Your spirit is within me,
Because You died and rose again.

You are my King
You are my King

God, thank You for Your willingness to send Your Son, Jesus Christ to the cross so that we can know You, be loved by You, and accepted by You. Thank you that in Jesus Christ, we are embraced by You. May the price Jesus paid on the cross drive our priorities deeper into Your heart. May the price Jesus paid on the cross convict us of shallow living, of half-hearted discipleship, of the cheapening of grace that we so easy participate in.

Thank You God for picking a "down and outer" like me. Today I choose to remember what You’ve done for me. What You alone could have done for me. And I thank You. And I embrace You. And I bow down before You. Amen.

Godspeed.

read.think.pray.live.

Gregg

LETTER TO A LEADER ...

Earlier this week I wrote the following letter to a friend of mine in leadership. After reading back through it, I feel that it has more to say than to just this one person. So I'm sharing it here with you ...

Friend,

I'm glad that God's plans for your life and your gifts have included you being in the role you are in. I'm know that your journey to this place has included much praying, dreaming, envisioning, planning, waiting, learning, cooperating, leading, applying, serving, knowing, not knowing, and discovery. A Christ-follower, a leader of leaders, a parent, a Sunday School teacher, a friend, a sibling, a child ... you have worn and are wearing many hats.

I'm sure that old saying, "Be careful of what you hope and pray for!" has come to mind more than once in the past three decades of life, ministry and career. What a rare combination of gifts and callings you are. And through it all I have watched you stand strong with God. Thank you for your witness of what it means to have what Frederick Nietzsche said was lacking in so much of Christianity ... a "long obedience in the same direction."

Today while thinking about you my mind has gone to GENESIS 22:14 where God revealed Himself to Abraham, Isaac and the ram, and where Abraham named the place God showed up "Jehovah Yireh" which doesn't exactly mean what the 1970's worship song says ... "Jehovah Jireh, my provider". And at the end of the day, the One who had issued the call, watched the obedience of Abraham and became his provider. Abraham didn't have to think long and hard about what to call the hilltop.

Again, the translation "Jehovah Jireh, my provider" is too "present and immediate" in it's tense for what this expression of God's character means. You and I both know from our own life-experiences what Abraham learned after climbing that mountain -- that as God leads, God also provides. But when you look at the Hebrew tense of the words in this verse (as The Emphasized Version of the Bible does), here is what's really being said ...

"So Abraham called the name of that place Yahweh, - as to which it is still said today, 'In the mountain of Yahweh, will provision be made.'" (italics mine)

In other words, "God's provision" isn't always quickly, or easily discovered, looked upon, or lived into. And yet, somehow, in response to our faithfulness, and our humble choice to look beyond the potentially flimsiness of our qualifications, God takes us on a journey of heart, mind and soul, that allows us to trust Him deeper, to depend on Him more consistently, to walk by faith and not by sight, and to hand over the outcomes of our lives into His hands in ways that move past stubborn obedience to true and total surrender."

And when we do this as GENESIS 22:14 says, "God's "provision will (in His timing, and in His way) be made."

Like they say in AA, "sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly." Trust God's timing. Trust the nudges God gives you and that you will only notice by being attentive, dey pendent upon Him, and fully surrendered to Him. Like what the Apostle Paul wrote to His friends in GALATIANS 3:3, I write to you ...

Are you going to continue this craziness? For only crazy people would think they could complete by their own efforts what was begun by God. If you weren't smart enough or strong enough to begin it, how do you suppose you could perfect it? (The Message)

And I love how this verse is rendered by J.B. Phillips ...

Surely you can't be so idiotic as to think that a man begins his spiritual life in the Spirit and then completes it by reverting to outward observances? Has all your painful experience brought you nowhere? I simply cannot believe it of you! (The J.B. Phillips New Testament In Modern English)

A person wouldn't start out a horse race, be way out in front of the pack, and then say, "I don't need this horse. I'm going to jump off it and finish this race on my own two legs. I'm fast enough. I can do this." They'd be a fool to try this. And yet this is the "craziness" and the "idiocy" we all-too-easily fall for when promoted by God to do greater things for Him in His Kingdom. What God has begun, let God continue doing.

So let me remind you today to let God's provision be seen in your visions, in your decisions AND IN the processes you take with God discerning and implementing them. Allow God to truly lead you, and then you can lead the others God has called you and equipped you to lead by simply staying in His footsteps.

Don't sprint ahead of God because of pride. Don't lag behind God because of fear. And as you stay in step with God, listen with the intention and humility of a servant listening for the voice and directions of the master. For a servant is what and who you are ... and what you must remain if you're to continue being God's person for the job He has called you to do. PSALM 123:1-2 speaks so beautifully of this ...

I lift my eyes to you, O God, enthroned in heaven. We look to the LORD our God for his mercy, just as servants keep their eyes on their master, as a slave girl watches her mistress for the slightest signal. (New Living Translation)

Blessings to you dear friend. Your master is signaling, so keep your eyes on Him. Godspeed.

read.think.pray.live.

Gregg