The Resurrection Message

By the time I made it to seminary in 1970, it was obvious the church was not too concerned with heaven.  It was the beginning of an era when the church did not want to be regarded as being other worldly.  There was not really much need to worry since the church was in the process of becoming too earthly.  The church which was being accused of having been too other worldly was moving toward becoming a church that could only see what was in this world.  Service took the place of spirituality.  Sermons about life after death were reserved for the final words at the cemetery.   

At some point the church seems to have come to a place of being embarrassed to preach the resurrection of Jesus and the life that is promised in the heavenly place.  It became something which was out of step with the secularism of the culture and the church out of its desire to be attractive and to blend with culture started watering down what was left of any proclamations about the resurrected Jesus.  Easter Sunday sermons became messages about difficult things being made new instead of of preaching which announced that death has been overcome by the pioneer and perfecter of our faith.  

I Corinthians 15 makes it clear that the resurrection of Jesus is the primary doctrine of our faith.  Without the resurrection of Jesus, the church has no message and the only task remaining for it is to lock the doors after a final benediction.  The message that Jesus has died for us and has risen from the grave is a message which shakes the foundation of every power of evil and, yet, even now a congregation is fortunate to hear it boldly proclaimed at least one Sunday out of the year.  Anyone wanting to hear about heaven needs to go to a funeral instead of the church.  

The Muller Way

George Muller served God in 19th century England.  Though he struggled early in his life as he tried to figure out where God could best be served, God put him among the poor of Bristol.  He is known for establishing a network of orphanages to provide for the forgotten children who lived around him.  What made Muller and his ministry so unusual was his trust in God.  In his biography entitled "George Muller of Bristol," Arthur T. Pierson wrote, "George Muller believed, and because he believed, prayed; and praying, expected; and expecting, received."   

Muller was a man guided by the Word.  It is said that he made no decision without praying and seeking God's direction.  It was his policy to never ask anyone for funds to support his work among the children.  He was convinced that God would provide and He did.  When he and the children were eating the last morsel of food in the house, he was sure God would provide the food needed for the next.  He believed in God, the Word, and prayer.  Being one familiar with Muller and his faith in God, I was often ashamed of spending so much time during the years of my ministry with fund raising.  

It always concerned me that the church could do nothing unless it was budgeted and the promise of funding had been made through a stewardship campaign in the fall.  I often tried to find some way of getting the work of the church done without so much effort going to raising funds.  Actually, I did not try every way known to me because I knew the story of George Muller.  Muller's faith and God's generosity always provided enough.  I should have tried the Muller way. 

Weakness and Power

Anyone who reads the letters of Paul is going to discover that Paul's body was abused by hardship, suffering, and persecution. In his second letter to the church at Corinth, he spoke of "...imprisonments...floggings, and often near death...forty lashes minus one...stoning...shipwrecked...adrift at sea...hungry and thirsty, often without food, cold and naked..." (II Corinthians 11:23-27).  In addition to all of the pains inflicted by others, he wrote, "a thorn was given me in the flesh..." (II Corinthians 12:7).  Three times he asked the Lord for relief, but it never came. Instead of healing, he heard the Lord say to him, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness." (II Corinthians 12:9).  

Scholars have speculated about this thorn in the flesh.  Some have said epilepsy and others declared it to be a nagging wife.  Whatever it was, it seems to be something which caused him to experience a weakness which hindered him in doing the work he felt God was calling him to do.  There is a difference in being tired and experiencing weakness.  Sleep and rest can overcome being tired.  Weakness is not something which disappears.  It is something which greets us in the morning and goes to bed with us in the evening. 

There are times such as Paul experienced when the weakness we know is chronic and mental determination has no power to overcome it.  To hear God saying, "My grace is sufficient for you..." is to hear a Word which tells us that despite what we cannot see, God can see what is invisible to us and that we remain in His ongoing plan.  We remain in it and continue to be useful to Him not because of what we are able to do, but because of what He can and wants to do through us.  Even as we live in weakness, we know, too, that the resurrected power and presence of Christ dwells in us.   

I Resent That!

It was a big church on as much acreage, if not more, than the farm.  The buildings were many and massive.  The parking lots stretched forever.  Police show up every Sunday morning to direct the traffic. The grounds were manicured.  The grass was lush green and was so thick had my cows been turned loose in such grass they would have thought they were in cow heaven.  I had seen it all many since it was on a much traveled road.  This time it was different.  

When I left home, I had been watching news about the wildfires that were raging in south Georgia not far from where I was born and the 50 homes which were burned and gone in an instant.  As I drove by the church, I suddenly could see nothing but sprinkler systems shooting water on that lush green grass. Without even thinking I said aloud, "I resent that!"  A few hours south of those sprinklers, the land is so dry farmers can not plant.  Churches and communities are gathering to pray for rain.  People are cleaning out closets to provide clothing for folks whose homes are gone and collections of water and eye drops are being given to those fighting the smoke and fire.    

Neighbors are enduring a drought, the land is burning, and there was water being thrown into the air on grass that looked like a great green carpet.  "What about a little solidarity?" I thought,  "How can you water grass when the land in which your neighbor lives is burning?"  We are capable of being such an uncaring society and, unfortunately, the church often seems to be as uncaring as the secular culture.  Jesus said to love your neighbor as yourself and just maybe turning off those sprinklers could become more of an expression of care and love than just saying we are praying for rain to come where the land is burning.

Psalm 118:14

Tonight during a random reading of the Word, I came across a Word which sent me back sixty years to the moment I said "Yes" to Jesus.  It was a few weeks before my high school graduation that I knelt beside my bed to pray.  Before I knelt to pray, the Holy Spirit had already put a Word in my heart through a visiting Methodist preacher.  I remember his words, "If you see a need and do nothing, you may be neglecting the call of God on your life."  It was one of those moments experienced by many us when we know it is God speaking and not just the one speaking in His behalf.  

As I knelt alone in my room, I confessed what I knew to be my sins, asked for God's forgiveness, and gave my life to Jesus.  Although I had gone to many altars and gone through the motions of repentance, this time it stuck.  When I raised myself from my knees that night, I was not the same young man who knelt to pray.  As I sat there on my bed, I opened my King James Version of the Bible and found myself reading Psalm 118:14.  "The Lord is my strength and my song, and is become my salvation."  It was the verse the Spirit gave me that night and I have carried it with me for these sixty years.  

As that verse given so long ago comes into view again, I testify that it has been true all these years and I am convinced that it will continue to be true for the rest of the journey.  God's grace has brought me thus far.  It is His strength which has always been under me.  He is the song which has always been in my heart.  He has indeed become the One who has saved me from a wasted life.  What I started learning to believe back then has become what I know beyond a shadow of a doubt to be true.  Thanks be to God for a Word given long ago and for loving me with a love that will always be more than I could ever thought possible.

Blessings

In the years since I left the pulpit, I have been blessed with space.  I have been blessed with silence.  And while life has not been like the life of a hermit, I have been blessed with solitude.  It has been said that the. house which I call home sits in the middle of a hay field.  Strangers seldom wander up the road which is little more than a two rut lane.  Most visitors who come announce themselves with the honk of a horn from the yard and do not stay so long that the tail lights of their car is a welcomed sight.  For some reason my first thoughts this morning centered on the way this place has had such shaping power in my life these past sixteen years.   

Having spent most of the forty years of my ministry career in more urban settings, I was surprised by the experience of living immersed in the Creation.  It has made me more aware of the presence of God in my daily life which seems strange to admit when most of my life has been lived within the shadow of the steeple.  Living midst the Creation encourages embracing a different rhythm.  It calls for a slower pace.  It reminds me to enter into the stillness.  It enables me to pay attention to the present moment.

As I sat on the porch the other morning, I realized that I did not need to plan quiet times; instead, I simply need to step into them and become a part of what is already present.  Is that not how it is with God?  We talk about seeking His presence through devotional moments and through worship when He is always present and a part of what is going on around us.  His presence does not need to be manufactured or even sought, but stepped into as one might step across the threshold of one room into a room which has always been a part of where life is lived. 

Praying For Rain

The western boundary of the farm is a branch that is as crooked as a slithering snake.  In my neck of the woods a branch is a term which means about the same thing as a creek, or a stream.  I call the branch on the edge of the farm "The Runoff Branch" because it depends not on a natural source of water, but upon the rain which runs off higher ground.  When it rains, it is full and flowing.  When there is no rain such as is the case in these drought stricken days, there is only dry caked dirt where water is supposed to be.  

The other day when I drove over the branch and saw it dried up, I thought of the prophet Elijah.  The story of his great battle with King Ahab and the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel began three years earlier "by the Wadi Cherith."  (I Kings 17:3).  Elijah lived by it, drank water from it, and ate the meat and bread brought to him by ravens.  Before he went there, he said to Ahab the King, "As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my Word."  (I Kings 17:1).  Each day Elijah drank from that stream, but there came that time when "the wadi dried up, because there was no rain in the land."  (I Kings 17:7).   

The epic battle between Elijah and the prophets of Baal ended with the defeat of those prophets and Elijah bowed down with his face between his knees.  Eight times he told his servants to look toward the sea and finally they reported "a little cloud no bigger than a person's hand rising out of the sea." (I Kings 18:44).  In a short time, heavy rain fell upon that land parched from a three year drought.  In the New Testament the Apostle James wrote, "Elijah...prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain...Then he prayed again, and the heavens gave rain and the earth yielded its harvest." (James 5:17-18).  Farmers around the farm are facing a terrible drought.  Churches and communities are gathering to pray for rain.  May heavy life giving rains fall once again on dry thirsty land.