God's blessings

Paul went through serious affliction in his life having been stoned twice, left for dead, jailed in chains at least twice, reviled, beaten, ridiculed even by supposed Christians.

Yet in a clear moment he could write, "For momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond comparison, when we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen, for the things which are not seen are eternal." 2 Cor. 4:17-18

So no matter how hard I may feel that I have it (and Paul had it much worse, obviously) for God's sake, the glory of his gift given as a reward, which God is glad to give, will be so immensely much greater.

"Who is like the Lord our God? Who enthroned on high? Who humbles himself to behold the things that are in heaven and on the earth?

"He raised the poor from the dust, the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes. He makes the barren woman to live in the house as a joyful mother of children." Psalm 113:5-9

The unadulterated gospel

2 Corinthians 4:1-8

Paul states in more than one place that he is preaching the pure unadulterated gospel. He is contrasting his message with that of others who were willing to alter it, if only a little, in order to gain something for themselves.

It could be simply more approval of men. Or it could be to gain money or power. In any case Paul got very upset when he felt that other evangelists were changing the message to make it easier for seekers to accept.

I think the temptation to change our message to make it more acceptable is strong. We can even rationalize doing it as a good thing. As we relate to the culture we are tempted to deemphasize things and emphasize others.

For example sin and repentance. We emphasize accepting Jesus and forget to mention asking God for the forgiveness of our sins. Or we imply that all life will be worry free from the point that we accept Jesus. That has not been my experience, how about you?

People need to know the whole truth. They will not thank you later if they accept Jesus by you ministry and later discover you did explain sin or discipleship.

I am further reminded that God is the one who inspires the one who receives. We do well to tell the gospel truthfully. This will make it easier for the seeker to accept it, not harder, in my opinion. We use our reason, but our reason is flawed. So as I tell people the Good News, God, who wants them to accept Jesus much more than I do will touch their hearts and minds, confirming the truth to them. I do not know all that is going on in them, all the foundation that God has already built up in them.

I am also concerned that though I think I know the gospel purely and am fairly bold to tell it completely I will be wrong. My understanding or the life I lead will distort the gospel message. Those we know who might be seeking certainly at us to be a model of how a Christian should live. Our worldview is mostly picked up by those around us by how we act. I may be able to speak it correctly but do my actions conflict with what I speak?

Nevertheless I pray that God give me boldness and make up in me deficiencies in my life to be a conduit for people coming to know Jesus. The world needs the Savior, Jesus.

BTW: Saturday I will be grilling. If you want to get in on it we can spare some, come on by. Bring some more meat if you want to do you own grilling and take some home. We always have hot coals left at the end that go to waste. I always hate that. If need be we can always add some more.

I can get excited after Sunday but then loss interest as the week goes on. My Greek studies are getting overwhelmed mostly by my Facebook addiction. Sigh.

Let me just comment QUICKLY on MP's sermon because I need to get to the gym. And maybe some Greek homework.

MP started out by talking about movie: Searching for Bobby Fischer. I suspect half the crowd had never heard of it. As a chess player (?) and Chess Life reader I loved it. I know Bruce Pandolfini as a columnist in Chess Life (magazine). He gets a little cameo as an onlooker in the crowd. Of course an actor plays Pandolfini in the movie. This movie does have a nice moral and its cool.

MP mentioned the scene where Pandolfini sweeps all the pieces off the board and exclaims, "Do you see it better now?" He doesn't mention earlier scenes where he playing his dad and is getting bored so he goes about the house doing other things while calling out his moves from the other room. His dad say for him to come back and he declares checkmate. So they set us up. Natural chess players usually can see the board and prospective moves in their head without needing to actually see the board. I once played a blind player. He beat me badly. He had a special board but of course he could not see it. He could feel it but still he has a disadvantage unless he is good, and he was.

Anyway the hero Josh Waitzken is given a balanced education. They contrast that with another child prodigy who is just given chess work. He does not get to play or learn other things. So under pressure he does not know how to lose. You have to learn to deal with losing, no one wins every time.

I am looking forward to Hogg Middle school "Turbo Tuesday". I always meet a nice kid and hope it helps some. I know I have a good time.

Sermon highlights

In the morning MP stopped and said he was going to get into trouble for saying this. He said listening to talk shows was problematical. So many of the talk show hosts were jerks. They got listeners by riling people up. So now I am thinking, why is this so especially controversial? Is it? If so how? And does it directly effect me?

Now at the time all I could think of was political talk shows. I was getting sensitive and trying not to feel defensive. But hey, I figured, if he is talking about me he's got me wrong. I don't listen to political talk shows. But I am still defensive about Rush Limbaugh, I like what he does but find it too boring to listen, certainly for three hours a day. Sometimes if I am traveling I might listen for fifteen minutes. For me Limbaugh is not annoying, I agree with most everything he says. No he keeps repeating himself, that's why he is boring. So I figure I get out of this one.

But the jokes on me. I mention this at lunch at the Chinese buffet. My wife and daughter immediately thought of sports talk shows. Oops guilty as charged. I listen to them at home and the girls have the noise pollution. Often they listen more closer than I do, I keep it on for background noise. They immediately pointed out what jerks the talk hosts are and how they are working to rile people up. They manage to succeed with me. So the sermon point hits me square. I was thinking along the wrong lines. Leave it to my loving family to point out the truth.

Daughter mentioned that for the things I agree with I don't listen to. Limbaugh is like that for me. At first he was fresh. I listened for a few years. But now I can go months without ever hearing his show at all.

At night we have Greg Buffone for preacher. He discussed the Greek concept of disciple which is not found in the Old Testament culture. For example Elisha is never described as anything other than a servant to Elijah. He had a couple of other examples but I have forgotten them. The word that we often translate as disciple he said was "aceite". I think that is how he pronounced it, I'm not sure the spelling either in English or in Greek. That word is what we describe as disciple or maybe more accurately apprentice. He spent a lot of time speaking of examples of apprenticeship, that Abe Lincoln did not go to school to become a lawyer, he apprenticed under another lawyer who assigned him books to read. But nowadays even trades, such as carpentry and electrician are taught in trade schools. We have almost totally gotten away from apprenticeships. Anyway that was the important idea I got out of the evening service.

Neither of these points was the main points of the sermons. Maybe I can grab my notes and cover that some other time.

Sunday worship

Yesterday was full with three services and three communions. I did not take it at Brighton since there was only enough for the residents. But I made up for it by taking twice at Vineyard. (hehe) We always take communion in the evenings.

I spoke at Brighton about trusting God for your daily needs. It morphed a little into ways we are tempted to compromise in this world. DW thought it was good and that is high praise. We were both on a high when we got to Vineyard.

We helped with communion at Vineyard. Those highs I told you about probably made us freer to stick our necks out a little bit when we prayed over those who came up for prayer. We always pray a prayer of blessing over them after we take the elements. We got specific in a way that was hopefully prophetic. If not I pray they immediately forgot what was prayered.

My tooth was killing me last night so I really did not get to sleep until about 4 AM. I ended up taking about five aspirin.

I needed to take a morning walk but I got out fairly late at 7 AM. Then I got back late, around 8:30 AM so with cool down and shower we were 20 minutes late to Brighton. We arrived about 9:20. The Jones' expressed perfect faith that we would show up. I wonder how much of that was ironic. But it went smoothly.

After church and lunch at a favorite restaurant I was pretty sleepy. And my tooth was hurting again. But by faith I got up at 4 PM and drove to SJD for choral group practice. It went well. I have learned that room temperature water is best for my tooth. Coffee with aspartame seems to make my tooth hurt. So I drank nothing during our rest time between practice and the service. All they had was coffee and iced water. Both would likely cause my tooth some pain.

I should be using this to eat and drink less. But I'm not really. However Sunday may have been the closest to doing it. I certainly felt hungry a few times. But I may have made up for it at lunch. Yeah I did.

Two things were amazing in the day was how well the anthem we sang fit in with the sermon given by our deacon, GB. I mentioned it to our director JF afterwards and he too had noticed and called it the Holy Spirit's direction. Praise God. I also felt that, at least for me, the sermon by MP in the morning fit in well with thoughts I was having after my talk at Brighton. I felt the Holy Spirit's leading there too.

I decided to come this week on the week of the communion service at Brighton, something I never do. That might have been the Holy Spirit's leading too since I found out after the service that SJ was going to be out of town visiting his mom next week. His wife NJ will give the sermon. It was probably good that we did not confuse the issue by offering to come next week, the week we usually come to help.

So after the day I felt good about all that had happened. Praise God.

Secular compromises

As this world goes more secular, the U.S.A. anyway, that's where I live, we as intentional Christians are tempted to make moral compromises in order to not be ridiculed or marginalized.

A big one with some people is accepting homosexuality as something other than sin. It's just sin. There is nothing normal about it. We have not discovered something new. It's is awful. It is often caused by the sins of our parents or others around us. Our culture has not all of a sudden discovered something overlooked by all the cultures that came before us over thousands of years. People who feel abnormal sexual cravings of any kind can get help. But some would ridicule you if you do decide you want a normal family with children and you have been formerly labeled a homosexual or lesbian. I know several people who have resisted sin and gone on to have normal families with children.

Others will make "green" or environmental issues into something of a religious cause, worthy of persecution if you do not agree. In some circles you can lie, overstate, make outlandish, unproved (and often unprovable) statements in the name of the environment and be applauded for your care. There is nothing wrong with being environmentally friendly. I hope I am. But we do it out of love for God and the wonderful world he gave us to take care of. Nature is not a god or gods in and of itself. We have a wonderful God who created the world. The world itself is not to be worshiped for itself alone.

Others will allow the business of making money to be all important. Any tactic goes it seems with some people. You can get ridiculed for not accepting the adage, taken from sports, "You ain't trying if you ain't cheating." This might be amusing when applied to sports but it is dangerous and sinister when applied to financial markets.

Governmental rules will never stop all cheating. We in business must be self-policing or the whole structure of capitalism will fall apart. Much of the reason for the horrible morass we are in now economically is because too many people are cheating, trying to beat the system, trying to find a loophole.

After the fact people will create more rules. And in so doing it will make life harder for the many people trying to follow the rules, trying to do the right thing. Others ridicule those trying to do business ethically. One can apply many proverbs here. But we trust that God will reward those who do ethically, who do try to keep honest weights, to use an old analogy found in the prophets.

It is good for a businessman or woman to look at the spirit of the rules and not just the letter. Some encourage us to look for the loopholes but we know that doing as they advise will be immoral. Some will ridicule us for taking a higher road. But often later the rules that looked OK will be reinterpreted by regulators as illegal causing you financial harm. We can look at the Enron debacle as a case in point. Many of the men who were prosecuted here were active Christians who allowed themselves compromises. I can just imagine them thinking, "Well, everyone else is doing it." This is not good enough. One must think for himself. Because of the financial ramifications for others their actions were found criminal.

Christian businessmen must take their faith to work with them. Trust God for the increase. Be patient, do it right, you will get there. Do not be tempted with short cuts. Pray for your business dealings. Ask God for wisdom in your decisions. Think of the proverbs. God will ultimately judge even when he looks like he is tarrying. He can judge through government regulators later.

1 Peter 4:17-18 - Let Us Share our Faith

I keep remembering the adage, "It is better to be a Christian than not to be a Christian." I guess it's not confirmed in me, sadly. The world tells us all paths are equal. Let people do their own thing. Alternative lifestyle is a buzzword these days. But it is not true! Allowing people to stay in their sinful ways without at least offering them a better alternative is wrong. It is wrong headed to think we do not have something to offer. WE HAVE THE PEARL OF GREAT PRICE. Let us rejoice.

And let us offer it to those of our friends who have not accepted Christ. They are worse off. God will use them after they decide to accept him. It is not for us to make them little clones of us. Heaven forbid. But if they do accept Jesus they will be better off in so many ways. They will be more blessed in this life and have the promise of a place in God's kingdom afterward.

I was reminded of this in reading 1 Peter 4:18. Peter is quoting Proverbs 11:31. "And it is with difficulty that that the righteous one is save, what will become of the godless man and the sinner?"

Do you feel that it is with difficulty that you are saved? I do. I know my flesh, my emotions still struggle. I still squirm.

But remember we are righteous, not because we are perfect but because we are saved. It is not because we always act correctly or perfectly Godly. But we are found innocent by the basis of Jesus' testimony. He has already promised us our reward.

1 Peter 1:17, the verse before, says "Judgment will begin with the household of God." It will begin with us first. We are the easy cases, we will be dealt with first. Then those "who do not obey the gospel of God" i.e. those who do not believe. It will be judged against them.

So we need to share the good news as we are able, as we find opportunity. Pray for the opportunity.