A Pastor's Thoughts

I find so much comfort in Hebrews 4:15-16.  It says that “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tested in every way aswe are, yet without sin.  Therefore let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us at the proper time.”  Jesus lived a hard life on earth.  Yes, He is God, but He suffered and lived as a man.  There is no denying that.  The comfort is found here in Hebrews 4 to remind us that Jesus knows our struggles.

You might say, “of course He knows, He is God.”  That is true, yet He has an even more intimate knowledge of the struggles we face since He Himself faced them.  That brings us even more comfort.  For some reason we find comfort when we can talk with someone who has gone through the same difficulties we face.  We listen a little closer to them when we see they have come through the struggles.  Their words carry more weight in our hearts.  Hebrews 4 gives us that same encouragement.  We are reminded that Jesus experienced all that we experience, yet was without sin.  He had victory.  We must learn from that.

I once knew of a man who was on his third marriage and his “profession” as being a marriage counselor!  If I need marriage counseling, I want it from someone who has been through the struggles (as all marriages have) and comes out with a healthier marriage.  We can find such encouragement from the fact that Jesus was tempted, yet He did not sin.  He knows the way of victory.  He can show us the path of victory.  Will we follow Him?  Verse 16 reminds us we can come to His throne with boldness.  Not because of who we are, but because of who He is.  We can come boldly and find mercy from the One who understands our trials.  He will give us mercy and grace, at the proper time!  Jesus knows what we go through because He too went through those things.

I am sitting here this morning putting the finishing touches on my sermon.  I am excited today.  Well, I am excited every Sunday morning since I have the privilege to share the best news in the world, but I am really excited today.  The Lord has put a great passage of Scripture on my heart for my first Sunday here at Cresset.  I do regret that for the time being, technological restraints will prevent me from posting my sermons.  Hopefully that will change.

Matthea and I began talking with members from Cresset in October.  It has been 20 weeks since our first meeting together.  Here we are.  We moved Monday and are getting settled in nicely.  So many from Cresset have pitched in to help us this week.  Thanks!

I am excited this morning as I reflect in Col. 1:25.  Paul says that by God’s stewardship he is given the task of making God’s message known.  What a privilege!  God could use me for anything that He desires.  Any task would be equally as exciting since God calls us to serve Him according to how He created us.  He created me to proclaim the message, and I love to do just that.  There is a great deal of responsibility to stand before people and proclaim, “God’s Word says…”  He has called me to it.  I echo the words of Paul from 1 Cor. 4:2, “it is required of managers that they be found faithful.”  Lord, help me be faithful.

We moved to Durham on Monday.  Everything went well.  The kids are adjusting great to the new place.  I am glad that God didn’t move anywhere!  I preached my final sermon at Ca-Vel on Sunday.  It was a bittersweet time with the precious people there.  I shared from 1 Corinthians 3.  Paul said, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase.”  What a reminder that God is the one who works in our lives.  It is not from a preacher, teacher, etc…God is the one who speaks to our hearts and works.  May we keep our eyes and attention on Him!  He is the Master-Builder.  Faithfully building His Kingdom, one person at a time.

I hope to have my sermon from Sunday on here soon.  I have to find the box it is in!

I had the joy of speaking Friday in chapel for Roxboro Christian Academy.  I taught High School Bible there for 2 1/2 years.  It was a real joy in my life.  I ended my time there a few weeks, at the end of the first semester.  It was the best time to leave as our family prepares for the transition to Durham.  They asked me to come back and speak for chapel on Friday.  It was good to see the students one more time.

I brought a simple message about boasting only in the cross (Gal. 6:14).  I talked a lot about how we like to focus on external “results” in ministry.  It is in our human (fallen) nature to do so.  Paul reminds the Galatians that what counts is a changed life; our only boasting should be in the cross of Christ.  After all, anything we have to boast about in our life we owe to Jesus anyway!  I am not the person I used to be, thanks to Him.  I have not changed because I have such a strong will, or self-discipline.  I am different because Jesus is working in me.  I have learned that He is very patient!

This type of message was a little different than what these students often hear at home, church, Youth Group, and even a Christian School.  I was glad for the opportunity once again to bring them to the Word.  This is how I taught them each day, this is how I minister His Word as a Pastor.  Perhaps thinking differently, outside the box if you will, is the way my mind works at times.  Too often we get into our routines because we find comfort there.  We find security in what is familiar to us.  Some things in our Christian lives, Christian sub-culture, and our churches are rooted more in tradition than in the Scriptures.  We Baptists pride ourselves in being “People of the Book”.  Sadly, we tend to stand closer to our traditions than the Book!

It is refreshing to think outside the box sometimes.  I didn’t grow up “in church”.  I met Jesus when I was 20 years old.  So many things cause me to ask “why this?” or “why that?”  It is a healthy exercise to go back to the Book and see what is there.  In fact, be sure to stay in the Book.  We can think outside the box, examine our traditions, and follow Jesus as we study His Word.  Whatever we do in this process, we must be sure to stay inside His Word.  The way we do some ministry is different today than it was 50 years ago, or a hundred years ago.  It is certainly different than it was 2000 years ago.  What has not changed is the Word of God.  We must stay faithful to it!  So as we think outside the box, let’s be sure to stay within the Book.

I am normally a fan of all things Southern Baptist.  I even preach from the Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB…”Hard-Core Southern Baptist”).  I have been troubled by something that continues to appear in the Sunday Literature from Lifeway that my pre-school children have been using.  The literature continues to talk about the Temple in the Old Testament and use the word “church” instead of Temple.  At first I used to think it was semantics.  Until I really started to understand what the church is (and is not) and what the Temple is.

I know, you have to teach children at their level.  I understand that.  Can’t we teach children what the Temple really was?  Why must we call it a “church” for simplicity sake?  Many people (myself included) are troubled at statistics which tell us more and more young people are dropping out of church after high school.  Maybe it is because we don’t teach them the truth?

In the Old Testament the Temple was the place where God dwelt.  Yes, they understood that He was everywhere, but if you wanted to be near God, you had to go to the Temple.  It was a special building that God Himself designed and gave the people the blueprint.  There was no other building like the Temple.  God’s people had unusual reverance for the building.  In the New Testament, believers are the temple of the Holy Spirit.  1 Cor. 6:19 is clear on this matter.  When you put your faith in Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit takes up residence in you.  You are now the Temple of the Holy Spirit.  God’s people used to go to the Temple to offer sacrifices to the Lord, but Jesus is our sacrifice once for all.  We don’t need to go to a building and slaughter one of our animals.

The church is a whole other matter.  In the New Testament the “church” never means a building.  The church is never a “place” it is always “people”  We are the church.  For that matter we are the Temple as well (that may be the only similarity!)  When we begin to think of our church building as an equal to the Temple of the Old Testament, we are thinking unbiblically.  When we teach our children that the Church where they have their Sunday School class is just like the Temple in the Old Testament, we are teaching them unbiblical things.  I would go as far to say that we are teaching them harmful things.

When the church building is seen as the Temple it reinforces our cultural idea that there is something special about the building we use on Sunday.  It is a subtle way of making the children think they have to act differently at church because it is “God’s House” (did He ever give us the blueprint for it?)  We do more for our children when we teach them what the Temple was, and that they are the Temple.  It will give them more respect for their own bodies.  In fact, Paul is speaking in 1 Cor. 6 about not sleeping with prostitutes at the pagan temples.  He says not to join your body (the temple of the Holy Spirit) with the prostitutes.  We need to teach our young people that their body belongs to the Lord, He dwells there!  We also need to teach them that the place where we worship on Sundays is only a building.  It is not mandated by God.  It is amazing that the church got along so well for 300 years without their own buildings!  We would do well with that today!  How many billions of dollars have we spent on our buildings, stained glass windows, steeples, and pews that get used for a couple of hours each week!!  Many believers know the frustration in their churches when people will spend tens of thousands of dollars to pretty-up our buildings while we have to squeeze out a few thousand to help people hear the Gospel.

If we continue to teach young ones that the Temple is a church, what will we say when they ask where we are to sacrifice, or ceremonially wash, or where are the places that only the priests (pastors) can go?  We have to correct them on these matters.  It seems to me that it would be easier to explain thing correctly from the start.

I am often amazed at how the Lord uses His Word.  I am humbled that He would use me to teach His Word to others, and then He works through that ministry.  In my life, I came to know Jesus by reading His Word.  The Holy Spirit spoke to my heart that night and Jesus became “a real person” to me.  God doesn’t need anything else to communicate to the hearts of men.  As Paul said, God has chosen to use the foolishness of preaching to proclaim the message of life.

It is an awesome thing to stand before people, share God’s Word, teach what the text is saying, and watch the Holy Spirit work among people!  I am no fancy preacher.  I am not a gifted orator.  I am not creative.  I desire to share God’s Word and help people understand the Book.  The rest of the work is up to the Lord.  His Word never returns void.  His Word is eternal.  His Word doesn’t change.  I am glad that it will never go out of style.  The only thing that I strive to do in my preaching and teaching is never to be boring.  God’s Word is not boring and I don’t want to make it appear boring when I speak.

Christians in America are always ready to buy the newest book on growing closer to God, or learning more about God.  The truth is, read His book.  We don’t need another book published in order to grow.  Amazingly the Church survived well for almost 1500 years without a Christian Publishing House.  Reading a book about growing closer to Him and not reading the Bible is like reading a detailed description of strawberry cheesecake.  It sounds good, it sounds delicious.  I can describe the ingredients, the texture, the flavor, and the feeling.  But if you really want to know about a Strawberry Cheesecake…eat one!  As the Psalmist says, “taste and see that the Lord is good!”

12-2-08

So many seemingly insignificant things in life can have an eternal impact.  1 Cor. 15:58 comes to mind.  Today has been a long day of ministry.  After 6 hours of teaching the Men’s Bible Conference, I spent 90 minutes with the Youth for our English class.  It has been a long day.

In the Conference we talked about chapters 5-7 in 1 Corinthians.  We dealt much with the marriage issue.  I’m so glad Dave and I talked about Polygamy and how to respond to it.  I had never given it much thought, but it is an issue here in Ethiopia.  I am thankful that the Lord allowed me to have a conversation about it beforehand so I could give a Biblically based answer to these men.

In our English Class we had a good talk about the pitfalls of technology and “civilization”.  I can see how it has been detrimental in so many ways to us in America.  Here in Ethiopia they don’t have so many things demanding their time.  They are able to spend time with each other, they build such close community.

Some things are good though, I brought a can of peanuts/m&m’s to share with these young men.  They had never had this before.  They weren’t too sure about the colored pieces of food, but once they tried them, they were hooked.  One of them said, “I have heard about chocolate before!”  Maybe there are a few good things about civilization!

Here is what I saw on several morning.  I guess it was their lawnmower.

Back in the early part of August I was preparing for my sermon.  There was something in the passage that resonated in my heart.  Little did I know then what God was preparing for Matthea and I.  I am re-posting that post here:

I am preaching this week from Acts 12:25-13:3 where Paul and Barnabas are set apart for their first missionary journey.  I have been struck by this idea…God won’t use you for something else until you are done what He has called you to do.  This is what I mean; in this passage Paul and Barnabas return to Antioch after they had completed their relief mission to Jerusalem.  It goes without saying they could not be sent out from Antioch until they returned from their previous assignment.  Verse 2 goes on to say while they were ministering the Holy Spirit spoke to them about their next assignment.  You see, they were working faithfully in what they had been called to do and then the Holy Spirit calls them to something else.

Everyone else probably understands this already.  To me it was like a fresh perspective this morning.  God calls us to serve Him in various ways and at various times.  We don’t get the next assignment until we have faithfully completed the first one.  Wherever we are, we must be serving Christ.  To do any less may keep the Holy Spirit from revealing His will for us.  I guess here is a bottom line…continue doing what God has called you to right now and keep doing it faithfully until He calls you to something else!

We have faithfully served the Lord at Ca-Vel Baptist for over 4 1/2 years now.  God has called us to a new place.  Lord willing we will be moving Feb. 16th to Durham, NC to Cresset Baptist Church.  We have prayed much over these past 3 months and met some wonderful people who love Jesus at Cresset.  It has been very obvious to me what the Lord is appointing us to in this next phase our our lives.  We thank the Lord for the opportunity to minister to the precious people at Ca-Vel these past years.  I thank Ca-Vel Church for asking a young guy right out of Seminary, who had never been a Senior Pastor, to be their Pastor.

I saw this video a couple of days ago and it is worth watching.  Penn Gillette, a well-known atheist, talks about receiving a Bible from a man after a show one night.  He has some very strong feelings about evangelism that may surprise you.

In teaching my class this week at Roxboro Christian Academy, I was struck by a pattern in the Old Testament.  I was talking about the results of the Babylonian Captivity.  This was the time the Lord sent His people into exile for 70 years because of their disobedience.  They had worshiped idols, intermarried with Gentiles, and continued to go to the Temple in the midst of their in ward disobedience.

After their captivity, there were some changes in the lives of these Israelites.  First, they would no longer worship idols.  Second, they would follow the Law as closely as possible.  Third, there was an emphasis on the coming Messiah.  And fourth, they separated themselves from the Gentiles.  All of these, except the last one, were good things in and of themselves.  However, they pursued them with a diligence and fear that caused the pendulum to swing too far in the other direction.

The Israelites were so afraid of being forced out of the Promised Land, they took a long look at what brought God’s judgment and they decided to never go down that road again.  They reacted with some good things.  But so often we as people tend to react so firmly, that we miss the point.  In the Bible, there was 400 years between the Old and New Testament.  God didn’t speak to His people through a prophet for 400 years.  In the days of Jesus, we see that the Israelites had moved far away from God.  They followed the Law closely, too closely (read: Pharisees).  They were careful not to mix with the Gentiles (read: look how they treated them at the Temples).  They swore to never again worship idols (they had a problem with Jesus being the Son of God).  And finally they were expecting the Messiah with such fervency that they missed Him when He came since He was not what they were expecting.

The Israelites returned from Babylon in a good way.  They set themselves up to serve God more faithfully, yet they again fell into the routine of an external religion.  That’s what got them in trouble the first time around.  We are so much like them.  We do good things as Christians.  We go to church, read our Bibles, pray, give money, do nice things, etc.  But often we are no better than the Israelites because we have done “good” things for so long that we now only do them because it is routine.  Our hearts can often grow cold toward the Lord, even though we haven’t missed church in 10 years!

Jesus was clear in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) we can do many good things with the wrong motives and God is not impressed or moved by such empty practices.  Let us not go from good to bad, but from good to better.