Cords and Chains

The Bible has a lot to say about cords, chains and binding and loosing.  We might think of cords and chains as ways of tying things/people up.  But in Scripture, these two things are treated very differently.

Chains are usually spoken of in terms of holding and confining someone.  The demon-possessed man in Mark 5 was bound with chains, though it didn't work.  Peter was bound with chains in Acts 12.  Paul and Silas were bound with chains in Acts 16.  Chains were used to confine and imprison.

Cords are different.  In Ecclesiastes 4:12 we find that cords bind things together in a unity of strength.  "Though one may be overpowered by another, two can withstand him.  And a threefold cord is not quickly broken."

Chains confine us.  Cords hold us in a unity that is hard to break.  So, how is this relevant in the Church?

During recovery month, I want us all to pray and practice binding and loosing.  In Matthew 16:19 Jesus tells Peter (and the Church) "I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven."  Jesus describes a church with powers beyond our sight ... powers that transcend from the seen realm to the unseen realm.  Read carefully what this says ... through Christ's gift and authority, we have the power to bind and loose.

Here are a few observations about these passages and about chains and cords.

1. We, the Church, can bind things.  I think (this is purely my take) we bind things mostly with cords.  Why?  Because we, God, Jesus aren't into confining and conscription as a method of operation.  I think Ecclesiastes 4 uses cords because cords hold things and people with gentleness.  A threefold cord is hard to break, but if we work hard enough we can break it.  And a threefold cord can be untied.  You are not confined!  You have free will to follow or not.  You have our love and our support, but if you try hard enough you can either break or untie cords.  But remember ... God put those cords in place.  So let's bind up the wounded, unite with our fellow workers and allow God to "bind us together with cords that cannot be broken."

2. We, the Church, can be agents of release, freedom and loosing people from bondage.  Let's pray, practice and persevere so that chains are broken, bonds are loosed and people can live in the freedom God has graciously given.  The Tasha Cobb song says, "There is power, in the name of Jesus ... to break every chain, break every chain, break every chain."  Let's become chain breakers that loose people from the bondage of culture, possessions, control, drugs, alcohol and pride (yes, pride is an addictive behavior).

Let us bind each other up in the love of Christ and the nurture of the Church, on earth as it is in heaven.  Let us loose each other from all those things that chain our souls, our potential and our witness so we are able to do what Paul said in Ephesians 5:8 ... "For you were once in darkness.  But now you have light from the Lord.  So live as people of light!"  Worship passionately ... love extravagantly ... witness boldly! Jesus said, when we appropriate His gift of the "keys to the kingdom of heaven" the very gates of hell will not prevail against us (the Church)." AMEN

Trying Harder or Letting Go?

Our culture says, "Try harder!" ... "Believe in yourself!" ... "Be determined!"  Our culture loves self-help gurus and self-focused ways of dealing with our problems.  But anyone who has been in recovery and has emerged from the process with success, sings a different tune.  "I admit that I am powerless over my addictions and compulsive behaviors and my life has become unmanageable ... I know that nothing good lives in me!"  Paul said it this way ... "For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.  For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do, I keep on doing (Romans 17:18b-19)!"  So, I want to ask some questions.

1. Do you repeat behaviors that keep placing you in troubling situations?  Every addicted person will answer "yes" but many of us are unwilling to see and admit our addictive patterns, so we miss the first step of leaving them behind.

2. Do you find yourself saying, "I've seen this before ... why does this keep happening to me?"  See question 1 and reread it!

3. Do you believe Scripture?  If the answer is yes, Paul is right and he might be addressing something universally true, both in his congregations and over history!  God/Scripture is accurate and applicable!

4. What can we learn from Paul here?  Glad you asked!

J.D. Watt, in Still Day One has the crazy idea that the repeated practice of trying harder and believing in yourself is a certain entry into a repeated pattern of behavior that has no end.  It doesn't work.  What works is what always works ... applying God's word:

1. "But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away (2 Cor. 3:16)."  Turn to the Lord and you will begin to see clearly.  Which means you must turn away from YOU/SELF.

2. "Now the Lord is spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom (2 Cor. 3:17)." Freedom from our patterns and addictions comes from getting out of your will and your spirit and allowing God's Spirit to fill you.

Bishop Scott Jones, at Annual Conference and in other conversations, told us we must be willing to leave our previous connection by forgetting many of the ways of thinking we have been practicing over the last 50 years.  He says if we fail here we will become a different version of the institution we left.  Dr. Jeff Greenway, this past Friday evening, said we must leave our addictive patterns behind, especially those that were focused on building a denomination ... for if God desires the denomination, it will build itself!

"Kicked out and fired!"  That was the story from my buddy in West Alabama.  "What can we do?"  I sent the message all the way up the line to Rev. Keith Boyette and Rev. Angela Pleasants.  They said, "We will do whatever it takes to get them planted in a new location, and get my friend on board as a GMC pastor."  6 months later, that new church is planted in West Alabama with hymnals from Abbeville Methodist, administrative help from another GMC church, resources from the River Network, and lots of faithful prayers from all over.  Angela Pleasants and I have been there.  I served their 1st communion.  And (Andy and Tina) they have a 12 member choir!  Yesterday, my friend was ordained as a Deacon in the GMC.  That same story is being played out all over America, Asia, Africa, Europe and the whole world.  As many as 15 new congregations are in their infancy, just in the Alabama, Emerald Coast Conference.  I will begin work with a church plant (this coming week to a town near you) that already bursting at the seams!!! How is this happening?  Because we are part of a movement that says, "What is Jesus doing?"  and then says, "How can we help?"

Twila Paris writes (from Romans 10:15) "How beautiful, are the hands that serve, the wine and the bread and the sons of the earth, how beautiful are the feet that walked, the long dusty roads and the hill to the cross."  When we let go and allow God's Spirit to run the show we find healing from our patterns, freedom from our intuitional bonds, flight from the cages we have built around ourselves, and freedom in Christ.  That little church in West Alabama thanks you for beautiful feet!  May God's Good News be proclaimed over the whole world!  AMEN

Influenced or Influencer?

As we begin our journey together as an official part of the Alabama Emerald Coast Conference of the Global Methodist Church, I remember a statement I read in "Still Day One."  The statement quotes E. Stanley Jones on the subject of faith.  Jones says our faith isn't about an "it" (denomination, rites, our traditions, any 'trappings' of our history) ... it is about a person named Jesus.

I have a friend that often talks about each of us being leaders that are here to influence people toward faith, belief and religion.  This is not a bad thought on the surface.  But I believe I would disagree about the primacy of our being agents of influence.  Here's why:

1. The Holy Spirit (God in us) is always directing us to/toward Jesus.  When I become the influencer, I view the influence through MY lens.  MY lens is clouded by so many things, I can't write them all down!

2. When I become the influencer, my human reaction is to plan my direction and head that way.  This is fine if MY direction and God's direction are the same.  But I am human and flawed.  My direction/plan flows from my understanding and from my needs/desires/fears/situation.  While my intentions may be noble, my application isn't always what it should be.  Persuasion can become ego-driven and prideful.  I can use ultimatums/titles/organizations as devices for controlling and steering others.  For me, these are why I cannot (and should not) become the great influencer my friend teaches about.

Here's a better way.  Become one who is "influenced" by Jesus.  Ask, "What is Jesus doing?"  Here is how Paul words this in Philippians 2:

"Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from His love, if any common sharing from His Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind.  Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.  Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests, but each of you to the interests of the others.  [and here is the secret!!] In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus ... " (Philippians 2:1-5).

Paul says the key is for each of us to be influenced by Jesus ... not to become "great leaders" or "great influencers."  We are not followers of an "it."  We are followers of a "Him."  So follow!  Randy

The Otherness Of Prayer

There are lots of things we can learn from the early Church.  Dealing with persecution ... placing our "stuff" in the right perspective ... and the ultimate focus of prayer.  These are a few of the many lessons.  In our series of sermons on Still Day One After Pentecost, I want to grab on to one of those lessons about prayer.

I have heard lots of prayers in my life of ministry.  Some have been beautiful.  Many have been needs-oriented.  But the Acts Church teaches us something worth learning about the "otherness" of prayer.  Here goes!

In Acts 4:24 the prayer begins ... "Sovereign Lord, You made the heavens and the earth and everything in them" PRAISE OF GOD ... "You spoke through Your Holy Spirit through our father David" GOD'S INVOLVEMENT IN/THROUGH TIME ... "Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?  The kings of the earth rise up and the rulers band together against the Lord and against His anointed one" GOD'S HISTORIC UNDERSTANDING AND PERSPECTIVE ,,, "Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed" GOD'S CURRENT UNDERSTANDING/PERSPECTIVE ... "They did what Your power and will had decided beforehand should happen" GOD'S SOVEREIGNTY.  Let's stop here.  Did you notice whom this prayer is about up to this point?  God!

Now the meat of the prayer for God's Church and God's people.  "Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable Your servants to speak Your Word with boldness" EQUIP US TO WITNESS BOLDLY ... "Stretch out Your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders," LET US EXTRAVAGANTLY OFFER YOUR LOVE/HEALING ... "Through the name of Your Holy servant, Jesus" LET US OFFER CHRIST.

Do you see it?  It is not about us at all!  It is about Jesus, the work and plan of God in the world and the prayerful worship of a God worthy of our worship!  Here is part of a very Wesleyan prayer that tracks alongside the Acts 4 Church ... "I am no longer my own, but thine. Put me to what thy wilt.  Rank me with whom thou wilt.  Put me to doing.  Put me to suffering.  Let me be employed by thee or laid aside for thee, exalted for the or brought low for thee. Let me be full, let me be empty.  Let me have all things, let me have nothing.  I freely and heartily yield all things to thy pleasure and disposal.  And now, O glorious and blessed God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, thou art mine and I am thine ... so be it!  And the covenant which I have made on earth, let it be ratified in Heaven! Amen!

Jesus prayed, "not my will but thine."  For us, not about us.  Wesley was right!  Acts was right!  Jesus was right! AMEN

Interpolation

Interpolation is a term used generally in math.  It means the insertion of something of a different nature into something else.  In math it is a way of estimation.  In life it should remind us of something that happened on Pentecost ... God's insertion of the Holy Spirit into the church (people like you and me).

I prefer to think of this in the context of wind and waves (Mark 4:35-41).  Jesus is teaching by the Sea of Galilee.  Jesus says, "Let us go over to the other side."  So they get into a boat, and other boats are with them, and they proceed across the "lake."  The Scripture says a furious squall comes up, and waves are breaking over the side of the boat.  Jesus is taking a nap on a cushion.  The disciples are distressed ... "Teacher, don't you acre if we drown?"  Jesus gets up, rebukes the wind, and the lake becomes calm.  The disciples ask a pointed question ... "Who is this that even the wind and the waves obey him?"

There are beings of different natures in the boat.  There is Jesus, fully God and fully human ... a unique being unlike any other.  There are disciples and followers of Jesus who are people like you and me.  Jesus is supernatural (above nature).  The followers are as bewildered as I would be if a storm arises.  What does this teach us about Jesus and ourselves?

First, the miracle of calming the storm wasn't done as a show for the disciples or as a exhibition of Jesus' power.  Jesus performed miracles that mirrored the saving grace of God while pointing to the glory of the Father in Heaven.  They are for us to see, but not about us.  

Second, as we learn about Jesus and grow into Christlikeness, we grow (become sanctified) in how we deal with life's wind and waves.  The disciples are puzzled by Jesus' calm demeanor inside a terrible storm.  They even accuse Him of not caring, because he sleeps through the storm.  But as we grow, we become more able to 1) trust God in the storm, 2) be patient in the storm, 3) believe that God somehow has a long-term plan that trumps the storm.  Jesus is for us, but about greater/higher things.

Finally, we should see this story as a preview of life in an unpredictable world.  Jesus didn't prevent the storm, even for Himself and his closest followers.  Jesus knows a lot of learning, and possibly even healing, happens in the storm.  In her song, Skellig, Lorena McKennitt writes about a monk travelling from Ireland to Rome to save the writings of the saints.  The trip was long and arduous, and one line recounts the lessons of a hard journey ... "the waves would wash my tears, the wind my memory."  

In the good times, God provides.  In the struggles and storms, God provides.  In the boat, tossed about by the wind and the waves, God teaches.  And God brings His Spirit, His lessons and His beautiful (and very different) perspective into our chaos and says, "peace ... be still."  Because it is exactly what we need, God brings something of a different nature (His Spirit) into something else (us) and it changes us.  We are a new creation!  Randy

Refreshed

Last Saturday we had a tree-planting party at the Youth Activities Center (I'm trying that name on for size).  About 5 of us gathered in this oppressive heat, dug some holes, and now we have about 26 or so trees planted as a border.  It didn't take long, but when we finished we were all hot and sweaty.  So we sat under the awning and had bottled water and biscuits ... the breakfast of champions.  That water wasn't so cold, but it was certainly refreshing.

In Acts 3, Peter speaks to a people who are depleted, diminished and discouraged.  They are occupied by the Romans and their self-governance has been depleted ... they are discouraged.  The Scriptures call the time they are in "famine."  "Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord God, when I will send a famine upon the land.  Not a famine of bread or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the word of the Lord (Amos 8:11)."  For 400 years, no prophets and no sign of spiritual rain.  Then, Jesus comes, preaching, teaching and healing ... living water and the "word made flesh."  They killed him.  But God is beautifully persistent and doggedly determined.  On day one after Pentecost, Peter (again) preaches the message of salvation to the guilty.  "Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord (Acts 3:19)."

Two commands and three results can happen from Peter's message.  First, repent ... turn around ... change direction.  A golf teacher I watch on TV says, "If you keep doing what you are doing, you will keep getting what you are getting."  There is a simple depth to this command, and we would be well-advised to follow Peter's wisdom.  If you want to be refreshed, change direction!

Second, turn to God.  The gathered crowd had turned to false leaders, a dead legalistic system and their own understanding.  Peter's message, "run to the one you crucified" doesn't make much sense to those who are doubling-down on the status quo, but to those who are starving and dying of thirst, it is life!  Turn to God ... it is the only solution!

What happens when we repent and turn to God?  Our sins can be wiped out ... the burden of guilt can be lifted!  Refreshing times from the Lord can happen!

I think we all want to be refreshed.  But I wonder if we do what the writer of "Still Day One" suggested ... we get stuck reflecting on "What would Jesus do?"  It is not a bad question ... it just stops short of what I think we are called to do.  What would happen if we asked, "What is Jesus doing?"  And what if we responded by joining in with Jesus to bring the "kingdom on earth as it is in heaven."  Church-light (really not Church at all) is coming for our weekly feeding.  Church-deep (what Jesus is doing) is being in the game of kingdom-bringing.

I think God is (right now) in the business of famine-breaking.  Do you ask yourself, "What is Jesus doing?"  Maybe little girls ringing bells on Sunday morning?  Maybe new people, excited to jump in and invest in kingdom-building?  Maybe trees at the Youth Activities Center?  Maybe a little girl showing me the beautiful craft she made during children's church?  Maybe our little ones singing "This little light of mine!?"  What is Jesus doing?

Peter preached the message of salvation to a huge crowd that had seen a miraculous healing.  Peter told them Jesus wanted to refresh them.  Some believed.  Some just stood there, enjoying the show.  The religious leaders dragged Peter and John before the authorities, and chastised them.  All had a choice.  You, too, have a choice.  Will you leave this blog refreshed and empowered, just amused, or angry at the message that messes with your status-quo?  Do you REALLY want to know what Jesus is doing?  Randy

Shlne All Your Light

In our sermon series, Still Day One After Pentecost, I was reading the story about the man begging at the "gate called Beautiful."  The identity of the gate is a historical mystery, because the location could be several places.  I am buying that this is the Shushan Gate, the gate where the Jewish "scapegoat" was sent into the wilderness, carrying the sins of the people (an annual ritual of the Day of Atonement in Jewish practice).  What could be more beautiful than seeing your sins walk out into the wilderness to their rightful place with Azazel, the fallen angel.  Although, I can think of one thing far more beautiful ... having the Son of God cast your sins as far as the east is from the west.

This little story comes as a post-Pentecost event, and Peter and John are living out "still day one" after Pentecost.  They are filled with God's Spirit and arrive at the temple, at this gate where both gentiles and women might gather.  Worship was common at temple entrances, but on this day, about three in the afternoon, they are "fixin" to have Church!  A beggar, lame from birth, asks Peter and John for a handout.  Peter responds, "I don't have any silver or gold for you, but I'll give you what I have.  In the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazarene, get up and walk (Acts 3:6)!"  The Scripture says, when Peter helped him up his feet and ankles were healed and strengthened, and he jumped up!  Yep, that's Church all right!  Jesus' name proclaimed, people healed, people joyful because of what God has done.

In Matthew 5:14-16, Jesus calls us light that is not to be hidden ... it is to be shone before others with good deeds, and it is to glorify our father in heaven.  In day one after Pentecost, Jesus calls us to be "the light of the world."  But, in the grind of daily life, I wonder if we forget the power and light of the gospel and become content with just lighting our own way through the darkness.  And here, at least in my estimation, is where we miss the point.

1) Maybe we just want to make it through the day.  Events, weariness, kids, work, the problems of the world, remind us that the world is dark.  But Isaiah said, "The people walking in darkness have seen a great light."  Do you live in the darkness, or do you live in the light?  It is a choice.

2) Maybe we have decided that the little bit of light we have is only enough to supply our needs.  But Matthew 5:14-16 reminds us that we are only given the light to "shine before others."  The light only does its job when we let it out.  That, is also a choice.

3) Maybe we think that our little light is so weak, so insufficient and so dim, it can't be of help to anyone.  And this thought caused me to remember a song. In 1999 Amt Grant wrote a lyric about this.  The tag line in the song is, shine all your light in the sun.  The song reminds us that we don't operate out of a dim little light that is only for us and is powerless in a dark world.  We are, what Paul calls (1 Thessalonians 5:5) "children of the light ... we do not belong to the darkness." 

In day one after Pentecost, we do not operate under our power, and we do not operate in a vacuum.  We do what the song says ... we shine ALL our light in the sun.  We are like Peter and John who have nothing that can do much, except through the power of Jesus the Nazarene.  We are the light of the world, but we are agents of Jesus, THE Light of the world ... the light that overcomes the darkness ... the light that heals beggars that are lame from birth.  So, as Amy Grant writes so well ... do all you can, clap with one hand, and shine all your light in the sun!  Randy