Welcome Home: Recent Episodes
Bryan Niebanck
Welcome home to God's faith family, where all who confess Jesus as our way to God stand together, seeking the best ways to move forward in a troubled world. Pastor Bryan Niebanck joins us, delivering messages that aim to speak to the heart of the Christian believer.
If you come to church to try to deepen your relationship with God within a hard world – which I believe many of us do – I am confident that these reflectionswill help you do just that. I am confident of this because it has helped me in my own walk pursuing my own relationship with God.
1. What keeps you from trusting God? (violence, evil, circumstances, pain)
2. What would help you trust God more? (prayer, better circumstances, a vision, a miracle)
3. How can you help your neighbor increase their faith? (be welcoming/accepting/loving, remember God’s blessings, pray for them)
Part 9 of the Lord's Prayer Series
We acknowledge God’s kingdom. Jesus is bringing God’s kingdom here on earth. To that kingdom, we give our pledge and allegiance. We pray, “May your rule and reign come in my life, in the lives of your people.” Thine is the kingdom.
We acknowledge God’s power. God is the power by which all things exist. God spoke, and things came into being. Jesus also promised that the Holy Spirit would give us power. He said that if we believe, we will be able to do the same works that Jesus himself did on earth. We also are given the power to influence others. Let us use that influence well. Thine is the power.
We acknowledge God’s glory. This is the glory the disciples witnessed on Mount Tabor on the day of transfiguration. It is the glory by which Jesus ascended into Heaven after appearing to the disciples following the Resurrection. It is the glory by which Elijah rode a chariot into the clouds. We are witnesses to God’s glory in these various deeds, and in our own experiencesof God bringing us out of places where we do not want to be. We bring honor and glory to God in the eyesof others by the way we live. We do notseek to bring glory to ourselves, but to God. Thine is the glory.
Part 8 in The Lord's Prayer Series
What is evil? Is it violence? Is it hate? When you hear the word “evil” what comes to your mind? As you pray this prayer every week, what are you asking God to deliver you from? Are you asking God to keep you safe? Are you asking not to be controlled by evil? Are you asking not to be tempted by it? Whatdoes it mean to be asking God to deliver you from evil?
Part 7 in the Lord's Prayer Series
First, when you face temptation that is anything other than God, recall your values and do your best to stick to them. Second, note that the focus of this petition in the Lord’s prayer is to ask God to lead us as opposed to leading ourselves.
Finally, recognize that we will never escape the existence of temptation on this earth. No matter how faithful you are, you will always be tempted. Some may say that you are tempted more when you become more faithful because the Devil knows you are a greater risk to His kingdom. But regardless of how much temptation we face, we can know that we will never truly be separated from God if we keep asking God to lead us. Romans 8:39 claims, “Nothing will be able toseparate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Part 6 of The Lord's Prayer Series
First, notice how Jesus comes to us even when we lock our doors. There is no door that can keep Jesus fromreaching us. We may give up on God or on ourselves at times, but Jesus will never give up on us. He just invites us into a deeper relationship. Second, Jesus wants us to believe in a brighter future, for God’s kingdom, for the church, for ourselves, and for others. We need to believe in that future in order to be a part of making that future happen. And third, forgiveness is our greatest need. We will not be forgiven by God for our debts to Him if we do not forgive others for their smaller debts against us. But if you are able to forgive others, and capture that spirit that God wants to install in all of us, which values love over hate and service over greed, then you can call Jesus the redeemer your own. Jesus will redeem your debts because Jesus has already died for them. No power can make it otherwise, no matter what doubt you have. Jesus is risen; Christ, the Redeemer! May all glory and honor be to God! Thanks be to God! Amen.
Part 4 of The Lord's Prayer Series
If everything happened by the will of God, there would be no need for Jesus to come as a Savoir from our sin! The fact that not everything that happens is the will of God should be fairly easy to accept. Do you think that everything you do is what God wants you to do? Even Paul said to his readers, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do, I do not do, but what I hate, I do” (Romans 7:15). We also do not do what God wants us to do. We do not seek God in everything and in every moment. We also do many things that God hates: we hold resentment and grudges, and we refuse to forgive. God might will us to be perfect, but we never will be because we are human (Matthew 5:48). So, first, know that not everything in the world is the will of God. The world falls short of what is perfect.
First, we recognize that what we see is not the perfect will of God. Second, we note that we can participate in an often-difficult path to make the world a bit more in align with what God wants. Third and finally, when we pray this prayer, “Thy will be done,” we must learn to be patient.
Where does the world as it is not align with the world as it should be?
Are we trying to advance the will of God more than the will of people?
We want to school ourselves to want what God wants, not to want for our own personal gain. And what God wants is more love and forgiveness in this world. May God’s will be done.
Part 3 of The Lord's Prayer SeriesWhat are you asking for when you are asking for God’s kingdom to come? “Our prayer is not simply for the end of history as we know it, but that we might experience a taste of these things here and now. And not only that we will experience a foretaste of the final kingdom, but that we might be a part of bringing that kingdom near” (Hamilton, 37). Whether you are a wolf or a lamb, what can you do to lie down with your neighbor? What can you do to promote a peaceful world, even if only in your little corner of it? First, ask God to penetrate every part of you with the love that is His kingdom. Second, may you seek God more than you seek your own good. And third, do your part to lie down with, and not to harm, your neighbors in this world. Be a part of bringing God’s kingdom to earth. God is sovereign, but we need to treat Him as such. He turns our wearied bones into new life; God also turns a wearied world into a new creation.
Part 2 of the Lord's Prayer Series
How do we protect God’s name? What does God expect us to do? First, we control ouractions. We are obedient to God when we listen, and we act according to the way Jesus taught: “We hallow God’s name by living in a way that reflects God’s goodness, majesty, beauty, and love” (Hamilton, 18). When we praise God, we hallow God’s name. All of creation is meant to praise God, and therefore hallow God’s name. How well are humans doing in their part?
And the second way we protect God’s name is by not throwing around God’s namewhenever we feel like it. We do not say that we are doing something in God’s name when God would not support it. We don’t expect God to support each one of our own earthly causes, as we pray for our baseball team to win or for our bracket to do well. Our commandment tells us, “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain” à Do not use the Lord your God’s name as if it were of no significance. “God’s name is not to be used as a rubber stamp for our causes” (Lord Teach Us, 48).
There are times where we will be right, and there are times where we will be wrong, in this world. Hopefully we will be right more than we are wrong, but in our nature, we are human. We will be rejected, and we will be challenged in our faith because of that, but this is the truth that we must hold on to: God will restore our soul. Whether we were right or wrong, God will forgive us and move us forward. So stay close to Jesus. We do not live for people in this world. We live for God. The once blind man saw that when he spoke in favor of Jesus. Samuel saw that when he trusted God over his fear of Saul finding out what he was doing and killing him. The Psalmist saw that when he saw God’s presence and hope even in his darkest valley. Do what you can control. Live for God. Live for God’s name. And may all honor and glory always be given to God. Thanks be to God! Amen.
Part 1 in The Lord's Prayer Series
Remember that no one of us ever becomes so faithful, so bold in our discipleship, that we become experts in being Christian. We need to humble ourselves and come to the one who can help us. Even if you have been Christian for fifty, sixty, seventy years, you still have your faith challenged. Even after following Jesus, Thomas still had to put his hands in the holes in Jesus’ side before he would believe in the Resurrection. It is difficult for those of us who have not seen, and yet need to believe. And surprisingly enough, Jesus knew this. He knew that the road through life would be difficult. And that is exactly why he gave us this prayer. He told us to pray like this so that we might be reunited with our neighbor. He told us to pray like this so that we might see God as our loving, caring, affectionate Father, not one who we have to be afraid of but one who chooses love over fear. He told us to pray like this so that we might see God as one having authority, but not being distant. Our Father is in Heaven. He is in the throne room, but God is also next to our ear, letting us roam in order to have our share of independence, just like a good Father, but also wishing to reel us back in whenever we make a wrong turn. First, God is ours. We share in a collective faith. Second, God is our Father. He loves us more perfectly than our earthly fathers. And third, God is in control. God art in Heaven. He has not been dethroned. God is the ultimate victor. God is our Father. May all honor and glory be to God. Thanks be to God! Amen.
We read plenty of encounters with God in the Bible. Sometimes we may ask ourselves why we do nothave encounters like those in the Bible did. However, just as each encounter with God in the Bible is a bitdifferent, so should our encounters be. Hear this from Exodus: “The Lord said to Moses, ‘Come up to me on themountain, and wait there, and I will give you the tablets of stone…’ Then Moses went up on the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain. The glory of the Lord settled on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it for six days; on the seventh day he called to Moses out of the cloud” (Exodus 24:12-16). What trust! Moses sat waiting forseven days for God to speak to him. Who here may have, after the first day or two, say, “Well, I see this cloud, but I’m starting to doubt that God told me to come up here. Surely I can be of better use down the mountain with the people?” I think that the same thought would have crossed my mind. And he was on the mountain for forty days and forty nights!
My God moment this week was seeing everyone come together for something good. It was learning how to do a new task that I had never done before. I have been on nine mission trips, and this was the first one that our project was wiring electrical. Other God moments was seeing elk in the Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area. It was also in seeing how everyone else on the trip, many of whom were on a mission trip for the first time, really were able to enjoy themselves and feel like they were contributing to the work being done. Perhaps it is being helped and cared for in one of your difficult times. We want to thank you for your prayers this week. Thank you for taking a name to pray for; we all needed and appreciated your prayers. At the end of the week, as we were leaving yesterday, we were sad that our week of work was done. But we all came away with a firmer grip on the line, which will keep us from losing our way in the blinding snow. May all glory and honor be to God! Thanks be to God! Amen.
Reaffirmation of Baptism - Part 4 of Sermon Series
I read these six baseball lessons this week, which Pastor Craig Groeschel learned from his father. I want to share them with you.
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Keep your eye on the ball.
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You can’t win with a bad attitude.
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You never score runs staying on first base.
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Always run through the bag.
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Don’t ever go down taking strike three.
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You win by moving one runner at a time.
Reaffirmation of Baptism - Part 3 of Sermon Series
I have three challenges for you to take from today: First, recommit your presence. When you were baptized, you promised that you would offer your time to grow in your faith and to be a faithful member of the church. Recommit to those goals; I hope that no one just comes to church and goes home unchanged. We are meant to be changed. We are meant to grow. Second, think about what is rich in your church experience. Take a moment to write it down in the space in your bulletin; what is rich for you about church? What makes you want to keep coming back? If you cannot think of anything that is currently rich, write down something that you think you need to make it rich, and then please share it with myself and others. Together, we can make our experience of God rich, so long as we are both committed to spending the time to make it happen. Psalm 112 tells of those who delight in the commandments being happy because they are gracious, merciful, and righteous. They “conduct their affairs with justice” (112:5) And, “in the end they will look in triumph on their foes” (112:8). Isaiah offers us a conditional statement: “If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, … the Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like the spring of water, whose waters never fail” (Is. 58:9-11). This contains your third challenge: Remove the pointing of the finger and the speaking of evil from among you. Do not cast blame. Only spread love. To fully experience God’s presence, we need to bring our presence in our commitment to our promises and to the growth of Christian love. That is why we are here. We can only grow together. May all glory and honor be to God! Thanks be to God! Amen.
Reaffirmation of Baptism - Part 2 of Sermon Series
In your bulletin you will find a space for a breath prayer. Please take a few moments. What sentence will remind you to refocus on God? What sentence will remind you to refocus on God as a commitment to your baptismal vow to serve God and continue to get to know God better? Remember that in this season of Epiphany, we are in a four part series to remind ourselves to reaffirm our baptisms. We reaffirm our baptism and our commitment to God through prayer, through presence, and through service. Last week, we talked about baptism. This week, we talk about prayer. I am challenging you to write down a sentence that you can pray over and over again, to remind you of God’s love, or God’s presence, or of the hope that you find in God. And if you cannot think of one today, take your bulletin home, go read some Psalms, and make the commitment to write something down that you can keep on your desk, or on your refrigerator, or in your car, or somewhere where you are going to see it and be reminded of it repeatedly.
Would any of you like to share your breath prayer?
Through our breath prayers, we will remind ourselves to trust God even when it is hard. And even when it is hard, we can still find a way to come to God. We read a lot in the Bible about people giving thanks. Paul begins nearly every letter to the people of various churches with a note of thanks for their work, even when he was upset with them and about to point out all the things they were doing wrong. When you have not prayed for awhile, or you are feeling lost, and you do not know what to say, thanks is a great way to start. When you know you are about to have a very difficult conversation, why not start with a word of thanks, or a word of prayer, or both? Wherever you find yourself today, I encourage you to write down your answers to these questions as well:
What are you thankful for?
What is God doing in this world to be thankful for?
What is God doing in this church for which you would like to give thanks?
Reaffirmation of Baptism - Part 1 of Sermon Series
Does public prayer need to be a more common practice in society?
How can we promote the public presence of God in our community?
Is trusting God hard when we cannot see as far as He can?
At the start of this year, I challenge you to these tasks: First, spread love. The world needs love. In order to trust in a God that is good and promises good things, the world needs to be able to believe that love still exists. When we spread love to our neighbor, we help promote the goodness of God. And in turn, we will help others trust in the goodness of God a bit more. This leads us into our second task: Trust God. As Christians, we need to trust God. Trusting God is how we find hope in good things to come. Without trust in God, we may start placing our trust in other things, and we are journeying away from God. Give God more opportunity to earn your trust, or better yet, trust in God anyway from the start. And even when God seems to break your trust by not doing what you wanted or prayed, know that God cannot control everything and sometimes is already working out something better for you that you just have to wait for and have faith for. I know it is easier said than done, which is why we are going to work this year on our theme word of “trust.” Last year was our year of prayer. This year is our year of trusting. Your third challenge is to believe in love and trust. To spread love and to trust God, we need to believe that they still exist. We need to believe that there are still people who love each other and place faith in one another. We also need to believe that we can still trust one another and God, and not assume that everyone out there is just going to break it. The world seems to want to take love and trust from us; it is our responsibility to counteract that and put a little bit of it back.
In the gospel today, we read about the angel appearing to Joseph, telling him that he should go forward with Mary and trust God. The angel confirms everything that Mary had said. The child is to be named Jesus because he saves. They shall call him Emmanuel because God is with us. He is the Messiah, the chosen one. This is more than love shared from person to person. This is love from God. God loves the people so much that He wants to be with them. He does not want them to succumb to their sins. He wants them to be saved. And God wants the same for us today. This is why, still two thousand years later, we are telling the same story of God coming down to earth for a visit. We are sharing the same story, of Joseph and Mary deciding to trust God even though everything they knew went against it. They showed an extraordinary trust in God. They trusted in God’s extraordinary love.
In Psalm 80, we find a resolve. Our focus is to resolve in God’s love. Hear these words at the end of the psalm: “Give us life, and we will call on your name. Restore us, O God of hosts; let your face shine, that we may be saved” (Psalm 80:18-19). Do you think this prayer will be answered? Perhaps we will find out this week. It is a call to God’s love. The people trusted in God’s love. They asked God to let his face shine. In the birth of the Christ child, I believe God’s face shone. I know that the people were saved. And just like the prayer in the psalm, when God gave life, God in the flesh, many people called on his name.
Do whatever you can to recognize the love of God among you, for God is with us indeed. Then, work on trusting in God’s promise more than you ever have. Pray about it if that helps; it almost always does. And once you have recognized God’s love shared with you, and faithfully trusted your life to God, you can confidently share God’s love with others, wanting nothing in return. God is with us. Let God’s love be shown. Let all honor and glory be to God. Thanks be to God! Amen.
Part 3 of The Visitor Series
Life is not measured by time. Life is measured by moments. We can experience joy in the desert because God is sending a message to us. God tells us that this is not the only way, and this is not the final end. The angel told Mary that nothing will be impossible with God.
Part 2 of The Visitor Series
When John the Baptist challenged the people with the coming of the Messiah, he called them to repent. That is, he called them to turn away from their comfortable life. He called them to make a change. This may mean that you have to do something outside your comfort zone. If you have to repent from a wrongdoing – if that has been holding you back from God – do so; if you have to take a bold step that you may have been afraid to take, try that. For some, it may be getting up in front of people to light a candle, or reading, or even doing the children’s story. For others, it may be welcoming someone into our lives who we have been afraid to face. It may be going on a mission trip even though you are not sure right now how you can help. You trust that if God has called you to something, God can use you. Being with God requires a bold step. Preparing the way for God requires us to take a bold step.
The motto of the United Church of Christ is this: “Whoever you are, and wherever you are on life’s journey, you are welcome here.” We know all too well that people in the days before Jesus would not welcome everyone; sometimes there is just no room, and sometimes someone may turn out to be a robber. We have the same barriers today, and they are legitimate barriers. But can we welcome one another into the space that is our hearts and our church? When we meet someone, can we make them feel loved? Regardless of where they or we are on controversial issues, in politics, on LGBTQ, we are called to love our neighbor. We do not have to affirm the belief of our neighbor, but we should accept them and create a welcoming space. As Paul encouraged us in Romans 15: “May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God” (Rom. 15:5-7). Acceptance makes someone feel loved. Forgiveness makes someone feel loved. Encouragement makes someone feel loved. They all make someone feel welcome. How can we be more accepting, more forgiving, and more encouraging to not only prepare the way for God in our own lives, but prepare the way for God in another’s life?
Part 1 of The Visitor Series
When we begin to see other people in our lives as opportunities to minister, and not distractions to our schedules, we are beginning to love more like God. Does God set times with us, or make us make an appointment? Did Jesus refuse to tend to those who tugged on his robes, when he was on the way to see someone else? We are often God’s unexpected visitor, and God loves it. God loves it when we make time for God, and God loves it even more so when we make time for God that was not first planned into our day.
There is a song that we sing in Scouts which is called Scout Vespers. It goes something like this: “Softly falls the light of day as our campfire fades away. Silently each scout should ask, “Have I done my daily task? Have I kept my honor bright? Can I guiltless sleep tonight? Have I done and have I dared everything to be prepared?” Have I done all I could to be prepared? Have I lived my day honorably? Have I done all I could for the Lord today?
Part 4 of our Be the Church series
As we celebrate Thanksgiving this week, we can also be unified in what we are thankful for. Many families having different political views will be brought together around one table, not separated by their differences but united by their similarities. We are each unique and we are each meant to be unique. We are going to have different opinions than other people. We are even going to interpret the same words differently than another person. We could separate on behalf of those differences if we are looking for a reason to separate. But our challenge as Christians, and my challenge for you today is this: Do not look for the differences; look for the similarities. This is the only way that God’s people are going to be able to hold together. And in a world where we need encouragement instead of despair, hope instead of disappointment, we need to be able to hold together.
When you love something, you stick with it. You do not abandon it. Whether it be food or whether it be hope through Christ, as Christians, we are called to hold on. We try to trust and believe in the new Creation that God has promised us. God has given us plenty of reasons to hope, and plenty of ways to hope. But we cannot grow in our hope and faith effectively if we keep to ourselves. We do not learn the same way and we do not learn as much by ourselves. As a closing prayer, I give you the words of Jesus as the villagers were talking about the same Jerusalem temple, and its beauty. It encourages me today, and I pray that it encourages you: “When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for these things must take place first, but the end will not follow immediately. I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. By your endurance, you will gain your souls” (Luke 21:9, 15, 19).
Part 2 of our Be the Church series
Did you know that Jesus often prayed for his disciples? In John 17:21, Jesus prayed, “I pray that they will be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. I pray that they also will be in us, so that the world will believe that you sent me.” Jesus prays for all of us to be one. What does it mean for all of us to be one? Are we one body? We are one body in Christ. Are we one people? We are one people because we follow Christ. Christ does not want us to form divisions among us. Even among people who do not follow Christ, I believe that he wants unity among all people. We are to treat everyone we meet with kindness and hospitality, because in doing so it spreads kindness and good will throughout the world. It takes all of us to create a kind culture. It takes all of us to create a sustained hope.
We read a selection from the prophet Haggai today. Haggai, as with many of the other minor prophets, speak in a time following the return of the Israelites from the Babylonian exile. The temple still lay in ruins. It was not something that the people had the time or resources to focus on right away. The people returned to Jerusalem around 537 BCE, but the second temple was not completed until about 516 BCE, twenty years after their return. It is in this context that the prophet Haggai asks, “Who is left among you that saw this house in its former glory?” (Haggai 1:3). 516 is 71 years after the exile to Babylon. In these days, it was a rarity to live to be that old. Not many people were old enough to remember what it had been like before, except for what had been described in the law. Yet, dreaming of its former glory, and hoping for its restoration, eventually spurred on the completion of the project so that the second temple ended up having more splendor even than the first, according to God’s promise: “I will fill this house with splendor” (Hag. 2:7). The people got together, knowing that it would take all of them to fulfill God’s promise of restoration.
Part 1 in our Be the Church series
Seek the Lord, as Zacchaeus sought the Lord. He could not see the Lord because of the crowds, so he ran ahead and climbed a tree so that he might be able to view him. Luke 19:4 tells us, “So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way.” Jesus probably saw him because of the earnest way that he was seeking. He probably saw the joy on his face when he was able to catch a glimpse of Jesus. Maybe this story will inspire you to start practicing climbing trees in case Jesus comes this way. But if not that, use his example. Do you do everything that is in your power to see Jesus? And when you do see Jesus in your midst, when you talk about Jesus to others, do you experience joy? Do you experience a happiness that is greater than any other when you think of our Creator and Savior? This is how Zacchaeus felt. All of a sudden, when Jesus recognized him, he lost the joy that he found in his money and wanted to give it away to right his previous wrongs, as he had cheated many in his profession of being a chief tax collector. Instead, he found joy in giving to those in need. He took an about face.
We cannot blame the disgruntled audience who mumbled, “He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner” (Luke 19:7). We can see that he was not a good guy at heart, at least originally. Being a chief tax collector, he supervised the capital gain that tax collectors were known to take for themselves. He was the rich man who was made rich by making everyone else poor. Everyone knew he was rich and why he was rich, so no one liked him. This is why they don’t like the fact that Jesus chose to stay at his house. But in doing so, Jesus sends a very important message. Jesus has come for the sinners – for those who need to be saved. Jesus is not necessarily here for those who are already pious and truthful. Luke 19:10 concludes this story aptly: “For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.” Ask yourself this: Are you Zacchaeus, who knows he was in the wrong and goes all in to seeking God and trying to fix his wrongs, or are you the crowd, who dissociates from those who have done wrong? Would you be upset if Jesus came back and chose to preach at a prison rather than the church? What if Jesus spent the night with that guy no one has heard from in years? Would we question his decision?
Part 5 in our Deeper Toward God Series
Lord, I prayed for many to be healed, and they did not. Lord, I prayed for you to fix this situation, and it did not happen. For what reason should I go on praying? If nothing else, he says, it gives us a means to be with God. It gives us an opportunity to share our grievances face to face, if that is what we want. And secondly, it gives us an opportunity to love someone else through our prayer and be more deeply connected to them. Prayer is an opportunity to love someone anonymously. When you pray for someone, you are giving your whole heart to them. God never wants us to give up praying for a situation because it connects us! It connects us with Him, it connects us with the world, and it connects us with our neighbor.
God is in our midst (Joel 2:27). We have nothing to lose, and everything to gain, by confidently, persistently, and frequently engaging with Him. As we pray, we will know God more deeply, we will connect with others more richly, we will experience peace more freshly, and we will be tools for God’s kingdom work more sharply. May all honor and glory be to God! Thanks be to God. Amen.
Part 4 in our "Deeper Toward God" Series
This is the question that we must ask ourselves: How can we faithfully live in our current circumstance? We can find faith in any circumstance. We can lead by hope whatever we may face. We may do God’s work in whatever circumstance we find ourselves in.
When we convince ourselves that God is right beside us all the time, we convince ourselves that we have consistent and easy access to God. Many of us Christians put God in a box far way and believe that we need prophets or special mediums to have any connection to God at all. But this is thankfully not the case. Each and every one of us has access to God. God is right beside us. There is a country song by Justin Moore: “If Heaven wasn’t so far away, I’d pack up the kids and go for the day, introduce them to their grandpa; watch them laugh at the way he talks…” That would be nice if we could do that. Well, we may not be able to do that for our family members, but we can do that with God. God is not so far away. For that we can be thankful. We can faithfully live in our current circumstance, first, by seeking the welfare of others, and second, by having confidence in our consistent access to God! Knowing that we have access to God, can, in turn, help us to turn to God more so that we can seek and serve the welfare of others even more efficiently.
To faithfully live in our current circumstance, we need to faithfully recognize where the source of our strength comes from.
Part 3 in our "Deeper Toward God" Series
Who here has ever wondered if you are hearing God? [raise hands?] We might liken the idea to hearing someone walk in the door at home, when we ask, “Is that you?” to confirm that it is really who we think it is and not someone else we might not be expecting. If you have ever asked that question, “Is that you?” when you are talking to a person, have you ever thought about using it with God? When have you stopped what you are doing and said, “God, is that your voice?”
We can be more assured that we hear God when we know we are focused on God and God alone, such as in deep prayer, and also when we have tested what we have heard against God’s character, which we have studied and experienced. Third, we should pay attention to what is going on around us.
May you be blessed to focus on the ray of hope that the authors of the Bible still find in the most difficult times: “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end” (Lam. 3:22). First, you know that God is with us, no matter what. God’s love does not cease. Second, knowing that God has not left us, you feel prone to pray and listen to what God tells you while you are not focused on other things. You are patient in prayer and do not give up. You test everything that you hear against God’s character. And third, you listen to other ways that God may communicate with you that is not through direct prayer. How do you know that God is the voice you hear? Keep listening. Do not end your prayer there. Keep your ears and eyes open. Pray more about it, and watch for God to confirm things in other ways. God closes doors and opens windows, places things before you in your path especially when you need them most, and guides you in your steps. May you be blessed to know the presence and the power of God through your persistency in prayer.
Part 2 in our "Deeper Toward God" Series
We are called to lessen the chasm between the known rich and the known poor. We may not think of ourselves as rich, but we are significantly richer than much of the world. And Jesus does not paint the picture of the rich man being rude or evil. Jesus paints the picture, in Luke 16:19-31, of a rich man who simply does not see the poor person at his gate.
First, do not be content to live merely in your own secluded and privileged world; get out there and make a difference in any way you can. Make someone else smile. Make someone else feel loved. Second, put your focus on God and not on the uncertainly of worldly riches: As Paul reminded Timothy, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains. But as for you, man of God, shun all this; pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, gentleness” (1 Timothy 6:10-11). And third, let God into your world so that you know you are spreading the love of God and not merely your own message. Let God not only be your focus, but your refuge as well.
Part 1 in our "Deeper Toward God" Series
Queen Elizabeth II: "When life seems hard, the courageous do not lie down and accept defeat; instead, they are all the more determined to struggle for a better future."
Remember that the Lord is looking for people who make an effort to seek God! BE one of those people.
Heaven is rejoicing when you seek God.
Psalm 14:2 The LORD looks down from heaven on humankind to see if there are any who are wise, who seek after God.
First, know that God can use the scraps and repurpose anything for God’s purposes. God promises to make all things new. And second, you need to show God trust for God to work out those new things in you. If we cannot trust God, what we should be lamenting is not the wasted scraps and the mess-ups, but the fact that we have a broken relationship with God.
Remember that God can repurpose anything to make something new. That includes your prayer life and your relationship with God. We have gone through the five major types of prayer to help you understand why each type is important. We cannot rely just on one and we cannot rely on turning to them only once a week or once a month. We need to continually turn to God every moment that we can, and we do that with prayer. If you assess that your relationship with God could be stronger at any point in your walk with the Lord, go ahead and lament that. Let God hear your distress over this realization! And then, do something about it. Repent from the mistakes you have made and promise to do better. Show God that you follow through on your promises. Show God that you can be better in your commitment to the Lord in your prayer life. Show your dedication. Show your commitment to complete it. For God has always shown His dedication to us. May all honor and glory be to God. Thanks be to God!
Our requests should not be for we ourselves to store up excess so that we may feel secure. Our security should not be in excess, but instead in the provisions of God. If we know that our God is with us, how can we be afraid?
A lack of joy and hope, and a presence of discouragement, plagues many of us today. It is a plague because it keeps us from God. The encouragement we find in turning to one of the main purposes of the book of Hebrews as well as finding consolation that we are not alone with the Christians who have gone before us, helps us to overcome that plague. The knowledge of this can encourage us to, like them, decide to trust God anyway, follow God anyway, and talk to God about what is on our mind. We cannot let discouragement keep us from engaging with God.
Do you hear God saying, “I am your God; open your mouth wide and I will fill it” (Psalm 81:10).
Billions of people in the world today do not follow God; at least a billion more claim to follow God but do not call on God regularly if at all. God grieves our lack of supplication. He asks, “Why are you not listening to me? Why are you not focused on me? Why do you not talk to me?” Calling on God is the most important thing that we can do to grow as a believer and as a citizen of the kingdom of God. When we do not call on God, we wither and fade like a flower with no water. God grieves our lack of supplication.
What supplication do you want to bring to God? Has anything kept you from doing that? Can you bring it to God anyway, just as so many faithful have done when they are discouraged? Is it not for your gain, but for God’s gain? May you be blessed to have the confidence to bring your requests to God without shame, without regret, and with plenty of adoration for the God who has always been here for us. All Christians need these moments with God so that God’s glory is revealed in the world as well as in all of our lives. Thanks be to God!
Part 3 in our The Five Types of Prayer Series
We should be giving thanksgiving to God at all times, but four specific times that we should particularly pay attention to it is when something big happens, when you are in the face of the unknown, when you are lamenting, or complaining, and when you do not feel like praying.
This week, your challenge is to pray a prayer of thanksgiving. Even if you do not feel like it, try it. Attempt to do it anyway. Thank God for waking you up this morning. Thank God for those who care about you. Thank God for those you care about. Thank God for the rain that nourishes the earth even though it cancels summer activities outdoors when they are meant to be held. Find things to thank God for. And while you are at it, thank God for what other people have done. Thank God for what they have done for you as well as for what they have done for others, and what they have done for God. Whatever you may have to thank God for, try to make a regular habit of saying these things out loud in prayer. Even if it is the same thing from week to week, even if you are sure that God knows what you are thankful for already, tell God anyway. Tell God again just as you would tell your spouse that you love them even if they already know it.
Thanksgiving may not be the first of the five types of prayers that we have reviewed, but it is a crucial one. The first four types, all part of the ACTS prayer of Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication, are ways that we communicate with God in our prayer. One prayer may contain all four elements, or it may contain one. But make sure that you do not leave out the prayer of thanksgiving. Remember to thank God for when things have gone right. Praying our prayer of thanksgiving helps us to be confident that God is still good, that God is still active, and that good can still prevail and overpower the bad in our lives. Praying our prayer of thanksgiving gives God credit where credit is due. Being thankful not only improves our own attitude; it improves the attitude of those around us and also deepens our attitude toward God. An act of thanksgiving can make someone’s day; your own, a neighbor’s, perhaps even God’s. Thanksgiving eases sorrow and despair. May all glory and honor be to God. Thanks be to God!
Part 2 in our The Five Types of Prayer Series
When we persevere through every trial and every struggle that we face, we are pressing on through whatever lies before us toward a greater kingdom of God. First, confess in a private space. Second, be humble. Third, ask for forgiveness. Fourth, ask what should be done next. Fifth, do not make the same mistake twice. Sixth, explain to God if you need to. And seventh, accept the consequences. But we know that when we do follow these steps and approach God with all of these things in mind, we are approaching God with an unhindered spirit, in an unbroken relationship that we can mend and continue mending and persevere toward, pressing on toward the goal of the kingdom of God every single moment of our lives. May all glory and honor be to God. Thanks be to God.
Part 1 in our The Five Types of Prayer Series
As I write, I love to play praise music in the background. I also love to play it as I drive. Every moment of our lives is another moment that we can spend loving and praising the Lord. Adoration is the most important form of prayer. If you have remembered that your most important conversation is prayer, remember that the most important type of prayer is adoration. Adoration gives us the confidence in a good God that we need to faithfully ask for our supplications. It helps us realize that God is all we need. It helps us to be mindful of God all the time. Whether it is fulfilling your spirit of adventure, praising God for the gifts of nature, or simply adoring God with what God has given you, be sure that your prayer life adores your God.
Adoration is a prerequisite for confident prayer. When we praise God in worship, we have set the scene for deeply connecting with God.
When we build adoration into our prayer, it not only helps us expand our confidence; it helps to pray with positivity. Our prayers can, and should, include things that we feel that God has not responded to. We should keep praying with persistence for those things. If we stop at our requests, however, we may be left wanting. If we do not start and/or end with praise, we will probably not be satisfied. Adoration in prayer helps us meet our wants, because we realize that God is all we need. The author of Psalm 50 expresses adoration in his prayer, as God is all he needs: “The mighty one, God the Lord, speaks and summons the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting” (Psalm 50:1).
Part 8 in our Introduction to Prayer Series
When Christ was born in Bethlehem, the fortunes of Judah were restored. Christ was the Savior and Messiah, and many trusted in Him. Today, we are also called to trust in Him. But where we cannot access Jesus physically, we have other means. We have scripture. And we also have prayer. If you have been struggling with your connection with God, whether it is hearing God, listening to God, experiencing God, talking to God, or all of the above, it all begins with prayer. We recognize why we pray, we remove the barriers to prayer, and then we learn how to pray. We learn that prayer is not a test; it is a conversation. It is the most important conversation because it is the one we have with God.
Most importantly, prayer revives us. We know that God never gives up on us, even when we would give up on ourselves. Where you do not feel like you have a close enough relationship with God, it is never too late in this lifetime. I would only encourage you not to wait unnecessarily. The more time that we have close with God, and in a continued prayerful relationship, the more at peace we will be. God does something out of the kindness of His heart, and when people expect Him to do it again, He does it. He responded in so many ways when the people came back to him. He has a good track record. God will respond when we come back to Him too.
Let us pray. God, help us to never tire of seeking you first. Revive us as we pray, as you have taught us, so that we seek you in every way that we can. In your name, we pray. Amen. Remember, Jesus taught the disciples to pray first, and then told them to ask, search, and knock. Prayer is always the first step to thriving in our relationship with God. Start with your prayer life. Continue with your prayer life. Renew your prayer life, and feel the joy and the praise that the angels sing. May all honor and glory be to God. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Part 7 in our Introduction to Prayer Series
In the movie, Do You Believe?, a man stops a car with a gun and asks the driver if he is ready to die. He was taken aback when the driver answered, “Yes,” and proceeded to explain that he was deeply connected to God, that he trusted God in all things, and felt he was ready because he lived each day for God. We should be prepared to meet our God every day. Our response to Amos’ plea, “Prepare to meet thy God!” can be, “I am already prepared! But I will pray to be sure that I am prepared enough!” How are you treating the people around you? In God’s eyes, that is an indicator of your true spiritual condition. When we treat them with love, we are listening to God’s command to us. We are being obedient to God’s call. Where you fall short, may you be moved to pray, “God, grant me listening ears, so that I might receive your spirit, and spread your kingdom, so that I and others are prepared to meet you at life’s end. May all glory and honor be to God! Thanks be to God! Amen.
Luke 10:38-42
10:38 Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home.
10:39 She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to what he was saying.
10:40 But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me."
10:41 But the Lord answered her, "Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things;
10:42 there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her."
Part 6 in our Introduction to Prayer Series
If we want to pray in the right mindset, and truly feel rewarded in prayer, we need to pray with confidence. And we pray in confidence by asking for God’s help in deepening that confidence. It will not come just by going to church and asking others what God said. It comes in seeking God yourself. It comes in talking with God yourself. It comes with knowing God and building a relationship with God. As we do so, we praise God and give God all the glory, with every bit of confidence we have gained. May the congregation pray, “Grant us wisdom, grant us courage! Grant us confidence. We need your help. We cannot survive this world on our own.” May all glory and honor be to God. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Part 5 in our Introduction to Prayer Series
The three keys to prayer that she mentions in her second chapter are humility, confession, and faith.
Humility means that we should make more room for God and less room for ourselves. I still remember the prayer that one of my seminary professors would pray before every class: “Lord, help me to diminish so that you may increase.”
I like to think of the following question when wondering if I need to confess something as a sin: Is this thing interfering with my relationship with God? We need to get out of our system everything that takes us away from God and hinders our prayers!
A lack of faith can stop miracles from happening. If we do not believe in God’s power to change something, it may not be changed. If we do not believe in it, why are we even praying for it? We need to pray with faith, and if we have trouble doing that, we can pray, “I believe, help my unbelief” (Mark 9:24). We can also pray, “Lord, break me of this thing that is preventing my full belief in your power to make this change.”
This is our first challenge for ourselves for today. How can we stop thinking about how unlucky or how undeserving we are, and start thinking about how to equip ourselves for work in God’s kingdom? Yes, you are worthy. You are worthy to know God. You are worthy to work for God, no matter what you might say to yourself. What steps can you take to give yourself the tools that you need to do ministry? Do you need an understanding mind? (1 Kings 3) Ask it. Do you need a double share of Elijah’s spirit? (2 Kings 2:9) Ask it. Do you need to try something new? Ask the Lord in prayer to give you the strength and courage.
I will conclude by navigating through the dramatic turn in the psalm’s focus. He says in verse 11: “I will call to mind the deeds of the Lord; I will remember your wonders of old. I will meditate on all your work, and muse on your mighty deeds.” He then goes through over the next several verses to describe why God is such a great God. Is that something that you might need to do? Remind yourself why God is so great. Engage in prayer by coming to God – whether in the silent and/or unexpected ways that we reviewed last week, or in the crying aloud, lamenting, and musing that we reviewed this week. Crying out to God, lamenting, and musing is definitely still connecting with and to God. And deepening that connection is God is our task at hand as Christians. Deepening that connection with God and learning how to better equip ourselves for our calling is our task at hand. Stop mulling about the bad from the past; start mulling about good that can be done in the future.
We often ask, what’s in it for me? We are conditioned to ask this. The act of praise inherently thwarts this vicious cycle and says, “Hey, it’s not always about you!” It brings our focus back from ourselves onto God, which is where it should be all along. It brings our focus back from how we feel mistreated or slighted in the world, and onto how we can be made better through God. We need to be reminded of this often; it is about God, and God acting through us. It is not about us.
As the Psalmist prayed, there was a definite movement from “I” to “Thou” and from “despair” to “orientation.” Perhaps your own prayers can follow the same trend. Start with what troubles you and why you may be angry at God or disturbed. Then slowly, as in verse 11, call to mind the deeds of the Lord, remember the works of old, meditate on God’s work, and muse on God’s mighty-ness. Turn the focus from you, and onto how you may be equipped to be an even more useful part of developing God’s kingdom.
Challenge yourself to listen for God in a way that you may not be expecting. That is, know that God speaks in quieter ways many times. Do not refuse something good simply because you cannot be sure it is from God. Next, remember to tell your story so that yours may help another as those before you have told their stories to help you.
We will continue to be frustrated with things that will sometimes cause us to be downtrodden. And we realize that frustration is never completely going away just because we have God on our side. “Elijah does not have to give up his frustration, but God will not let him give in to it” (FOTW C.3.151). This is your next challenge today as well. Do not give into your frustration. Do not let your frustrations either prevent you from coming to God, or from coming to God with the wrong attitude. Elijah wanted to die, but God showed him that he just needed food. Our attitude is to be one of hope, but even when we cannot have that hope, we still come to God because God will still be there to feed us, to care for us, and point us to where we need to go. God will never let us go. God loves us too much. May all honor and glory be to God. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Today, we are going to cover a few reasons why we do not pray. They are not reasons not to pray, but they are reasons that keep us from it. Perhaps they sound like excuses, but they are really tools that the Devil uses to make you think that you cannot pray. He wants to use every possible tool to prevent you from forming a close relationship with God.
The first reason why we often do not pray is because we do not think that our prayer can make a difference. We think about how our prayer has not been answered before, so there is no reason to think that it will be answered now. We wonder if God is even listening. We may feel like we are too emotional to pray rationally because we believe that we always have to come to God with a proper attitude. Or perhaps we start believing that our request must be too small. Why would God care about our small request when there are so many other people in the world with bigger ones?
Second, we often do not pray because we do not know how to pray. We are fearful that we will get it all wrong. We are afraid that our prayer may not be “good enough” for the great and holy one, who deserves only the best.
Third, we do not pray when we feel unworthy. We may feel guilty for having done something wrong and that we need to do something to cleanse ourselves in order to be worthy again to approach God.
And finally, we often do not pray when we do not manage our time consistent with our commitment to God. We set other priorities before we schedule time for prayer, and before we know it, there is no time left for God.
These are all tools that the Devil uses to try to get us to be less connected to God!!
Part 1 in our Introduction to Prayer Series
John 14:12 tells us that we can do greater works than Jesus: In the words of Jesus, “Very truly I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these.” Wow. If we work on becoming consistent in our prayer, and believe in the power of God and the difference that God still makes in this world, we can do bigger things than Jesus did. I believe that this is one of the most spectacular verses in the Bible because it is hard to believe, but it is right there in the very words of Jesus.
If we want to be an active Christian in this world, we need prayer. If we want to make a difference in this world, we need prayer. Our issue as a wider church and as a community is that prayer time has become less and less important in our lives. If we truly want to be the church of God, and be someone who God recognizes and says, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” we desperately need to rededicate our lives to prayer. Pray, and allow the Holy Spirit to act! Schedule time for prayer first, before anyone else gets to your calendar. It is a crucial part of our identity that we cannot afford to lose. May the flowers that bloom be generosity of love, bravery against resistance, loyalty with God, and wisdom in action.
Part 7 of the "Alleluia: Believing the Risen Lord" Sermon Series
Return to this question that we asked earlier: How can a person grow toward God during their lifetime on earth? A similar and just as important question: How can I grow toward God during my lifetime on earth? We should always be focused on growing toward God just as a plant grows toward the sunlight. When I offer tender loving care to a cat, for example, that cat tends to grow closer and closer to me. If I do not pay much attention to it, the opposite might happen. Although we may be moving on from our series on doubt within faith, and we will be reading about how the early church had success after success, we know that it never truly goes away either. We are confronting it every day of our lives. Even amid the success of the early church, the disciples were still called in for questioning. There were still people like Saul who fought against them in the early days. We have that today as well. If we are to sustain the church, as well as our own faith, we need to build up from our roots. We need to tell ourselves that it is okay. And most of all, we need to remain turned toward God. When we are turned toward God, God’s face will be able to shine upon our faces, and with a little effort on our part, that face will continue to shine into the rest of the world. Reflecting a little bit of God’s love in the form of tender loving care to our neighbors is a crucial part of our Christian journey. We extend it to our neighbors, we extend it to the animal family, and we extend it to our own selves.
Part 6 of the "Alleluia: Believing the Risen Lord" Sermon Series
Praise God. Make requests of God. USE the Advocate by having a teachable spirit. Just as the disciples were encouraged when they were told, “Do not let your hearts be troubled,” may you also come to believe. May you also come to expect that because your face is turned toward God, God’s face will indeed shine upon you, and you will have your small role in making God’s way known throughout the earth. The call to be a Christian is not to give in to the pain and the fear and the struggle that we all face. It is to stand up and praise God in the storm, even when our bodies and the tragedies we see scream against it. Stand up, and praise God in this storm. May all glory and honor be to God! Thanks be to God. Amen.
Psalm 67
67:1 May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us,
67:2 that your way may be known upon earth, your saving power among all nations.
67:3 Let the peoples praise you, O God; let all the peoples praise you.
67:4 Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth.
67:5 Let the peoples praise you, O God; let all the peoples praise you.
67:6 The earth has yielded its increase; God, our God, has blessed us.
67:7 May God continue to bless us; let all the ends of the earth revere him.
Love is an act of praise. To our graduates, who have graduated from a school or maybe just from a school of thought, ready to come to God with a new attitude or new opportunity, this is your message and challenge: Love one another. Make no distinction between people. Commit to live like the Lord and you will be successful. You will be made new. When you find yourself in the valley, find a way to trust. Find a way to praise. Find a way to love. And find a way to commit to the call that God wants you to accept. When we love in the valley, we admit that we go into the valley often. We are filled with despair. We are filled with doubt about our capabilities. The world tries to stop us from being more like God and from being active, encouraged Christians in the world. But if you find a way anyway to trust, praise, love, and commit, you will be able to find your way in whatever way you take. Do not forge your own way. Take the path that someone has already laid out for us. Whether you used them or not, they put advisors and professors in our lives during college for a reason. Most professors actually want to spend their office hours talking to you about your challenges. Why would God be any different? Walk boldly through this challenging world, for nothing out there can overpower the goodness and the glory of God. Nothing can stop you from being faithful to God’s plan if you choose not to let it. Nothing, that is, if you let God lead you through the valley rather than choosing to walk alone. May you take this blessing with you in everything you do and everywhere you go.
"Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and your plans will succeed." ~Proverbs 16:3
When you commit, you are never looking at God through your rearview mirror. God is your driver. May all glory and honor be to God.
Part 4 of the "Alleluia: Believing the Risen Lord" Sermon Series
We are becoming more spiritually healthy by accepting these truths in the midst of recognizing weaknesses. Even in the darkest valley, when we are surrounded by enemies, we have a table prepared for us in the midst of them. We know that we are protected from them by our Lord. We know that when we are exhausted from what life throws at us, we are refreshed by being led along still waters. We may not believe that goodness and mercy truly follow us every day of our lives, but, in fact, they do. There may be some bad things mixed in here or there, but the majority of opportunities that come your way are good. You can brighten the day of a neighbor. You can share your story with someone who needed to be encouraged. You can show someone mercy and surprise them. Our enemies include anything that causes to doubt the goodness and sovereignty of God, but God teaches that we should not be afraid of them because God is more powerful than they.
Part 3 of the "Alleluia: Believing the Risen Lord" Sermon Series
Maybe God does not cause or want to allow any suffering. In the book of Job, we are told about God wrestling with a Leviathan, which is a big beast (Job 41). Although God is ultimately the victor, God does not win easily. The same is the case here. God will be the ultimate victor, but Satan puts up a good fight. God has wins and losses; those wins are the little miracles that we celebrate, but the losses are those where God grieves with us. God is not picking and choosing because God loves us all. Ultimately, God wants to stick with us, and to have us stick with Him. Too often, the existence of suffering blinds people to the possibility of an existence of a just and good God. But our very own parents can be just and good, and still not prevent us from suffering or even from tragedy befalling us. This is not to answer for all time the problem of evil and suffering in the world, but it is to say that just like the disciples chose to stick with each other in a confusing time, and perhaps their greatest time of trial, we should stick with God through our own greatest trials – perhaps especially through them. God cares first and foremost not how far we are away from God in our faith and our trust in Him, but what direction we are facing. As long as we are facing God – turning to God in every circumstance – it does not matter whether our faith is the size of a mustard seed or the size of a mountain. Even faith the side of a mustard seed can move mountains. And further, as our Association Minister Dan Busch preached about yesterday at the annual meeting, doubt is a part of our faith journey. It was a part of the disciples’ journey. And it is also a part of ours. The Easter season - those fifty days between the Resurrection and that first day where the church actually began - which we call Pentecost, is the season of moving through doubt to come to believe. It is learning to trust God even when we do not find everything as we dreamed it would be. That’s exactly the journey that the disciples are making. It is why they trusted God when they were told to teach Saul, who had done nothing but persecute the church. It is why, when Jesus told the disciples to cast the net over the boat one more time, after they had had no luck all night and they were tired and frustrated, they obliged. It is why the Psalmist in Psalm 30 writes, “Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning” (Psalm 30:5).
Part 2 of the "Alleluia: Believing the Risen Lord" Sermon Series
The early disciples are our model for good Christian living. The text of the Bible is crucial for this as well. We can feel comforted about the doubts that we read which they felt, and we can also feel encouraged by the work they are able to do to surpass those feelings and fears. If the disciples are able to surpass those feelings and fears even amid their doubts, that must mean that wecan surpass those feelings and fears just as they did. As we read in Acts 5:29, as an example, we read about how “Peter and the apostles answered [the high priest giving them orders not to preach in the name of Jesus], “We must obey God rather than any human authority.” We too, first obey God. And to obey God confidently and consistently, we must address our own roadblocks which may include doubt, we must read the Bible which was written to help us believe, and we must be open to God’s action shown to us and by us in our own lives. These three things can give us solace in the Resurrection without a physically present Lord: qualify our doubts, read what was written to help us believe, and be open to God’s action to us and by us for others. Today, we have seen the faith and doubt of the disciples in the week immediately following the Resurrection. They did not believe until they saw the tomb themselves; last week we read about Peter physically going to the tomb before he believed the news that the women shared with them, and this week we read about Thomas not believing in the Resurrected Lord until he could touch the wounds in his side and hand. But when they saw, they believed. We are then told that we do not need to see to believe. We can have faith anyway. “Blessed are those who have not seen, and yet come to believe” (John 20:29). That “coming to believe” signifies that we are not expected to do it all at once, but that we are coming to believe: it is a work in progress throughout all of our Christian lives. We can use the experience of the disciples, and even have more faith in what we have seen than they did. Now that we have learned from the faith and doubt of the disciples, we can address our own belief when we find it a struggle during the always tumultuous times that we live in. We will move forward in this struggle next week, but first, meet this challenge this week: Discover a wonder in your life – a person, place, or thing – where you can see the face of the Lord, and where you can truly exclaim, “I have seen the Lord!” May all glory and honor be to God! Thanks be to God. Amen.
Part 1 of the "Alleluia: Believing the Risen Lord" Sermon Series
I have two challenges for you this Easter and this Easter season. First, come to God as you are. Bring to God whatever you are thinking, whatever you are ashamed of, and whoever you are now. All that God cares about is the direction you are facing; whether you are turned away from or towards God. God does not care how far or how close you are. After you resolve both to face God and to be honest with God, your next challenge is this: Believe God. This is the hardest one. It is hard to believe God when there is a world of evil, hate, and suffering all around you. It is hard to believe God when people die due to senseless acts of violence, especially when it is someone or somewhere close to your heart. But Jesus did not promise believers a life absent from suffering. Jesus promised eternity in heaven for all who believe, but warned that the road on earth would be difficult. The road on earth tries to get us to turn away from God. And sometimes it succeeds. We envision the day when God’s kingdom will reign both in heaven and on earth, but that day is not today. We are set here to be the little bit of God’s kingdom that we can be. When you realize that you cannot control the world, but you can control your reaction to it and how you interact with the world, I think that means that you believe in the power and the grace of God. You know that you cannot change the world in a day, but you can change the heart or attitude of maybe ten people in your life just by being pleasant, kind, and a generally positive person. And those ten people can then go on and make their impact on a hundred people. Some of you may recall the story of a boy throwing starfish back into the water. They had all washed up on the beach. When the boy is asked why he is doing this, because he cannot possibly help all of the starfish dying on the beach, the boy responds by picking one up, throwing it into the sea and saying, “I made a difference for that one.” Believe in God, one smile at a time.
Part 6 of the "Embracing Christ" Sermon Series
In the three acts of embracing, then, you have your three challenges this week: Show commitment, trust, and affirmation toward God, and also toward one another. And while you do this, remember to continue forward with your attitude of gratitude and all the rest you have taken with you from this journey. May you proclaim the words as the prophet Isaiah did: “I did not hide my face from insult and spitting. The Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced” (Isaiah 50:6-7). Jesus did not hide his face; neither do we have to. Let the stones speak God’s glory for themselves, or proclaim along with them. If you are still here – If I have not scared you away yet – you obviously want to be closer to God. We do not grow closer by standing idly by and waiting for something to happen. I had a fortune this week at the Chinese Restaurant in Tiffin where I had lunch with Dan Busch: It read, “Waiting sometimes has consequences.” While the Bible does affirm waiting for the Lord in hope so that we can gain back our strength, it does not support a passive waiting. While we wait, we are to embrace one another and God. We are still to seek God out, however we best do that, through a devoted life toward God. We read Scripture, we pray, and we embrace one another. In this commitment, you and I are truly ready to walk with Jesus on this road of suffering. Even where life lets us down, walking with Jesus does not. It will have it’s trying moments, and there will be times that we recognize this week where we will be tempted to turn away for fear of our lives or our reputation, but when we hold true to the path, we will always be victorious in the end. Hold true. Hold steady. And may all glory and honor be to God. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Part 5 of the "Embracing Christ" Sermon Series
Remember, as you practice your attitude of gratitude, that the promise is eternity. It is not a life free of suffering right now. Too many people turn away from God because they expect life to be free from suffering. They say, “If I am a Christian, God will bless me.” Jesus did not promise this; he only promised a life of eternity in Heaven. Do not let the little things that go wrong – nor the big things - steer you away from this path again. Stand your ground. Make gratitude a regular part of your life. Thank God. Thank your neighbor. Give yourself opportunities to change your scenery. Let go of the former things. God is doing a new thing – in the world, in your life, and in the kingdom. May all glory and honor be unto God. Thanks be to God! Amen.
Part 4 of the "Embracing Christ" Sermon Series
Today's theme is forgiveness. How do we capture God's desire for the people of the world and make it our own desire as well?
So far this Lent we have touched on three themes. First, remember what God has done for you. Remember the moments where God has met you, in trials, in joys, and in your fears. But when you do find yourself slipping, and you find yourself afraid, we come to the need for our second theme. Repent of your fears so that you can again place all of your assurances in God. If you are afraid of the future, if you do not know what is next, place all of your assurances in God. Third, we need to learn to accept everyone regardless of their race, belief, custom, or background. We do not need to accept their beliefs or customs, or not hold them accountable for a shady past, but we need to express extravagant welcome. Whoever comes into our life should feel like we welcomed them. Acceptance in our case is showing someone God’s love no matter what, and doing so under the shadow of God’s wings. Fourth, following acceptance, we need to forgive our neighbor for their wrongs, so that healing might begin. We need to give our hurt to God, praying for our enemies and not allowing the harm that anyone did to you to hurt you even more than the original harm. Pray for those who persecute you.
Part 3 of the "Embracing Christ" Sermon Series
How do we accept each other? Take on God's way of accepting others, just as God accepts you.
Part 2 of the "Embracing Christ" Sermon Series
Today, consider repentance. When the world attacks our sense of hope, how do we respond? How do we know to come back to God when our hope strays?
Part 1 of the "Embracing Christ" Sermon Series
Over the coming weeks, we will review other ways to stay true to God. Your challenge this week is to start with remembrance. Remember what God has done. What has God blessed you with?
Part 6 of the "Finding Hope in God" Sermon Series
My first challenge for you this week is to find your mountaintop. If you have not or will not share it with someone else today, give it some more thought when you get home. If you do not do this step, you are like a car without wheels. It may look pretty. The engine probably even works. But you are going nowhere. God cannot use you to the fullest extent that God wants to use you. You can keep someone warm inside the car. You can play the radio. But you cannot travel into other places of God’s coming kingdom.
If you have met this challenge, I have a follow-up challenge. Set yourself a defined time each day or each week where you will visit your mountaintop. This is crucial to staying connected to God and keeping gas in the car. If you do not believe in your destination, why drive there? If you do not feed your car, you can only get partway there. Having a regular check-in schedule with God is crucial to accomplishing what God wants for you in this life.
And if you are feeling really up to challenges this week, the final one is this: Pray about one person in the valley – that is, one who is not connected to God – who you can speak to this week. Do not try to evangelize and convert them to God straight away, but tell them you prayed for them. Tell them you believe in them. Tell them you were thinking of them. That could be exactly what they need to hear. Trust your training. God believes in you. God knows you. You DO have work to do in the valley. May all glory be to God and may all delight be in God’s purposes.
Part 5 of the "Finding Hope in God" Sermon Series
We should forgive because we would want others to do the same unto us. Further, our eternity depends on it, and it removes the vices of anger and malice from our heart that take up room from other God-given attributes. But how can you forgive someone who has hurt you quite a bit?
I have a challenge for you: Think of someone - just one person to start - who you need to forgive. Then, work on giving them forgiveness. Decide to be Christ-like. Picture yourself being kind to people. And then start being kind to anyone you meet. Then, it will be easier to be kind to the one who you are having difficulty forgiving. May God be with you.
Part 4 of the "Finding Hope in God" Sermon Series
If there is one thing you remember from this message, remember your search for delight. Do things that delight you to take care of yourself. Also delight in God as you do ministry, for we are all ministers of Christ’s church. Remember that when you spend time making a disciple, you are spending that time with God. If you enjoy it, you are delighting in God. I have two challenges for you to take with you this week. First, pray about who you can take under your wing. See if you can pick three people who wish to seek God and delight in that relationship. This enables others to keep the church growing beyond us, and the more ministers we have, the more people we can reach. Second, to enable you to be a better minister of the church, seek to learn from one person that you look up to. Learn how they are a follower of God. Learn how they devote themselves. Learn what they do from day to day. Now, you truly delight in God.
Part 3 of the "Finding Hope in God" Sermon Series
We can find hope by giving God glory. When Jesus returned to the disciples, and especially to Peter, Peter responded, “My Lord and my God!” He praised the name of the Lord when he realized that the hope he had in Jesus had not died with the crucifixion. We glorify God because it gives us something to hope in. We glorify God because God deserves it. God sends us, enables us, saves us, and amazes us. We respond by praising, praying, listening, and sharing.
Part 2 of the "Finding Hope in God" Sermon Series
Jesus did not let the reaction of one group of people halt his entire ministry. He knew that things would be difficult, but that he must do what God had called him to anyway. He did not retreat and do nothing. He did not let fear of retaliation, disapproval, or even fear for his life stop him from following his path as ordained by God. Like him, we cannot let that get in our way either. If it gets in our way, it is getting in God’s way.
Part 1 of the "Finding Hope in God" Sermon Series
We need to have a strong foundation. So, when you read Scripture, ask about what you do not understand. You may have heard this before, but there is no such thing as a dumb question. Ask. Ask God. Ask a friend. Ask the pastor. Ask whoever you want. But do ask when you do not understand. Further, try to hear the words of the Lord in awe and reverence, just as the Jews held their scared scripture in faithful awe and reverence toward God. And finally, do not gloss your eyes over Scripture and call it quits. This is what I did when I set myself the challenge to read the Bible in one year. But I have gotten a lot more out of the books reading and discussing them slowly through our Bible Study. Read and study Scripture. Talk about it. Read about what other people have to say.
If you are having trouble seeing and feeling God, God is your vindication. God is your way to turn your attitude around. Depression is just a downward spiral that goes deeper and deeper until you feel that there is no way out. This is the battle that Satan wages; it is a victory for him to get a Bible believer to give up on God. This is what he tries to do all along. Do not let him get this victory. Let people of the church journey with you and support you and love you. And for those who feel close to God right now and understand God’s hope, with God’s peace, take a look at the way you currently live a life of service for God. Where can you improve? You can find some area of the four to focus on as you place God as priority number one this year: Can you praise God more often? Do you need to reimagine your prayer dedication? Do you need to get better at listening? Or do you need get better at sharing so that all the nations might see the glory of the Lord, and so that someone new might come to find the hope that you have found? You may need growth in all four; but I challenge you to pick one to focus on in 2022. I have chosen to focus on prayer. Only you know your own deepest need. But whatever your choice; know this. God is your vindication. God is your turnaround.
In any relationship, you know that you have to give time to it to make it work. The extent to which you value your relationship to God is told in the amount of time that you spend seeking God. Do you spend time in your devotions? Do you spend time worshipping God? Do you spend time praying? Do you spend time listening?
The third sermon of a four part series: We live lives of service for God, praising God, praying to God, listening to God, and sharing God with others. We have talked about how important it is to praise God continually in all circumstances. Praising God renews our confidence and hope in God’s goodness and majesty. We have touched on coming to God in prayer, and noted that God wants to hear any prayer no matter how small it may seem to us. It is crucial that we all realize that we have access to God through prayer, and there is no such thing as a bad prayer. This week, we focus on listening toGod.
I challenge all of us over this upcoming year to focus more on prayer. Put God a bit higher on your list of priorities if God is not already your highest priority. Paul told us in Thessalonians to pray unceasingly. And when you pray, remember to pray these four things: Remember to pray God’s praise, remember to pray for God’s will, that you might know and do God’s will, remember to pray in confidence that God is here and will fulfill your every need, and remember in prayer to ask for God’s help.
Prayer is the ESSENCE of our relationship with God. EVERYONE is capable of prayer and MUST pray if you want to have a relationship with God. This year, we will put a higher emphasis on prayer.
It is better for us to join in with the churches praising God by living the lives that God has called us to live. That is, we live lives of service for God, praising God, praying to God, listening to God, and sharing God with others. We will consider all four of these areas over the coming four weeks. Today, and this week, we are talking about praising God.
We all want to stay at the manger praising the Lord Jesus, born to us from God to teach us how to live. Yet even the shepherds went their own way to glorify God to those they met. They told their story. They lived their life and worked the same job, but they did so with a new spring in their step and a new story to tell.
We read that the shepherds returned to their fields “glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them” (Luke 2:20). Also, “Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart” (Luke 2:19). This is the time to do the pondering. This is the time to go to wherever we go and glorify and praise God for what we have seen here.
Are you discouraged? How do you recapture your passion for God, especially in a season of Christmas?
Malachi 5:2-5, Luke 1
Why do you believe in God? If you don't know why you believe in God, how can you tell someone else to believe in God? God is the only source of true hope for salvation. Also, God rejoices because of you, after all. Consider why you believe, then help another to do the same.
Zephaniah 3:12-20
Instead of turning away from God when God does not answer us in the way we want, we need to call ourselves back to God. Even if God did not fix things now for reasons unknown to us, God STILL promises to fix things at the end of the story.
We can know God intimately. We just need to be in right relationship with God. First, we need to be in right relationship with others. Second, we need to come to God with proper motives. Third, we need to believe in God’s capabilities. And finally, we need to realize that we are not God.
Psalm 25 and 1 Thessalonians 3 emulate hope. The Psalm is a prayer to God, asking for God’s leadership, confident in God’s steadfast love and faithfulness. 1 Thessalonians 3 envisions an increase in abounding love for one another. If we were to see our hearts strengthened in both areas, we would see a much more confident hope in our future. May God bless us with such a vision and hope.
If we do not have wonder, we have knowledge, not faith. If we are not mystified, we have suppressed the questions that are on our hearts. Come to God with whatever you have so that others might see you and do the same.
Strive first for the kingdom of God, above all else in your life. If not, God is not in you.
Instead of worrying about where we will stay, or what we will eat, or what we will wear, we are told to strive first for the kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33).
If we pray hard enough for the people in power to either turn to God or turn closer to God, we are letting God into power. This is why we pray for our leaders, whether or not we like them. We want God to bless them and change their heart. This is why we are also called to pray for those who persecute us. We pray for everyone because we know that the more hearts that God wins, the better our world becomes.
1 Timothy 2, Matthew 6:25-33
Always seek to strengthen your faith. Especially in a world today where there are so many things that distract us from things of God, we have to put all the more effort into finding God amid it all. We are at a crossroads. Either America will continue to be secularized, and the eighty percent of children that do not belong to a church will turn to ninety percent, and before long there will be almost zero young people left in the church, or we will fight the increasing social norms and put more effort into finding God and into helping others find God. God forgives us, which gives us confidence in our ability to approach God. But this does not absolve our responsibility to others. As we wait for Christ to return, our task at hand is to be persistent in prayer, consistent in community, and coexistent between the already of the kingdom of Jesus here on earth, and the not yet of the full realization of God’s kingdom on earth. We may wait for a year, two decades, or five centuries. But while we do, we can keep our sense of thanksgiving. We can keep our confidence in prayer. And we can help others to do the same. If we do not do these things with urgency, however, we are never truly ready for the return. May you always be happy with your efforts, which you have all the more reason to increase. The world, after all, is increasing its demands and distractions from a religious lifestyle. May all glory and honor be with God’s name. May God help us remain steadfast in faith. May we be able to trust that God always hears our concerns. Hannah is a perfect model. When she was distressed and the world was distressed around here, she prayed all the more.
1 Samuel 1 and Hebrews 10
Ruth 3-4 - Scripture Reading
First, you need to rely on the saints in your life who have been placed there by the Lord. They help you return to the right track as long as you seek their help. Some may help you through mere memories, others will help you through their words and actions. But always lean on your saints. God places people into your life for a reason. Believe in that. Trust the good people in your life. Second, believe that God is working behind the scenes. When your life doesn’t seem to be going well, if you do not turn to God, you will not turn it around. Naomi had been on the road running from one problem to the next. She ran away from famine, and then she lost her husband. Nothing seemed to be going right for her. She doubted God. But Ruth was her saint. She found God again through the good that Ruth was able to bring back to her. Trust in God. Be patient for the Lord’s blessings. God will bless you. The key is to not give up on God. Third, do not be afraid to go down to your own threshing floor. Do not be afraid to take a bold step in your life. Sometimes, in order to find what is best for you, you need to take a bold step to make it happen. 1 Thessalonians 2:2 tells us, “The Spirit of God emboldens us to proclaim the gospel without fear.” In Philippians 1:14 we read, “Boldness is contagious. When we are bold for Christ, enduring hardships for our faith, others are provoked to do the same.” How can you be bold for Christ this week? Can you take a step in your personal life that may involve a risk which has prevented you to this point? Can you bless a friend who may or may not receive that blessing well? Can you join a board in our community that is working within a Christian perspective to give back to those in need? How is God full of surprises for you? Do you believe in those surprises? Remember, God wants to use you. But God cannot use you if you are afraid all the time of the risks involved in being bold and reaching out toward a destination that you cannot fully see. Martin Luther King Jr. once said that “faith is taking the first step even when you cannot see the whole staircase.” Are you faithful to God? In that case, take the first step.
Ruth 1:1-18 - Scripture Reading
First, know that you are not alone. Others before you have gone through what you are going through. You can see yourself through the characters of the Bible. You may be making the same accusations and thinking the same things about God that they did. Second, God is working behind the scenes whether you realize it right now or not. God worked by placing Ruth in Naomi’s life when she most needed her. God used Ruth to restore blessing to Naomi, as we will see later in Ruth. God will use whispers to reach out to you and restore blessings to you too, if you are open to them and do not shut God out. God will give you restoration. Third, God is using you to speak to another person. The gifts that you bring and the words that you say are inspiring another person to draw closer to God.
We ask God to bless us, but do you know that a relationship is a two way street? How are you expected to bless the Lord?
Job 42, Hebrews 7, Mark 10:46-52
"What do you desire?” Do you desire to get into trouble and get away with it? Do you desire to appear as a law-abiding Christian but you don’t actually care? Do you actually desire a close relationship with God? Is God your strongest desire? After all, you are God’s strongest desire. God wants to be close to you; God longs this. But you and I often pay more attention to other things. Don’t be asking yourselves who is the greatest among you – who is the best Christian here; who has scored the most points in heaven? – Instead, ask yourself who is the greatest in your heart. We do not get to where we want to be by desiring to be the greatest. We get to where we want to be by desiring God. For then our desire leads to action. We can desire God to the extent that we cry unless we are reassured that God will stay with us. We desire God to the extent that we long to be closer than we are right now. We desire God to the extent that we leave our comfort zone to work on that.
Proverbs 31:10-31
James 3:13-4:8
Mark 9:30-37
Perhaps we can’t all solve world hunger or the crisis of the poor. But we can create a healthy community of God. One healthy community will stem into another. James reminds us that a healthy forest is set ablaze by a small fire (3:5). The fire of the Spirit spreads in the same way. The tongue can be a curse, where gossip and poor words damage the body of Christ, but it can also be a blessing to the kingdom of God. You can stay where you are right now, comfortable, and satisfied. But Wisdom warns that you need to take her hand. You need more Wisdom, and for that you must continue going to Scripture, learning in prayer, and nurturing your faith. Who do people say that you are? Let it be shown not in your words only, when you tell them that you are Christian, but in your actions too. Let your family see the commitment that you give to devotions, to reading Scripture, and to following the ways of the Lord. Let your friends see it too. They will take notice, for better or for worse. But God will take notice for eternity. God shall tell you that you have nothing to fear, because your words are acceptable to God when they clearly are more than words. Yes, you are graded for effort. Give it everything you have, and fear nothing. Master, let us walk with thee. Teach us the wayward feet to stay. Guide them in the homeward way through a peace that only you can give. Your majesty is great! Thanks be to God! Amen.
Proverbs 1:20-33
James 3:1-12
Mark 8:27-38
We are defined in the name of God. Christ’s name is within our identity as Christians. It is up to you to live up to this name. Be astounded. Be open to seeing the majesty of God in the world around us, just as the people were astounded at Jesus performing miracles (Mark 7:24-37). First, we must open ourselves to seeing God’s majesty. We must hear God. We must see God. We must listen to God. Second, we glorify God because of this majesty, and because we need to make sure for our own sakes that we do not glorify anything else to seem higher or more important than God. Finally, we represent the magnificent God that we are glorifying by taking the faith that we have gained from seeing God, and using it to inspire faith in others – most often those who have never felt the love of God or who never feel like they will feel the love of God again. We were made to glorify God, not only in private, but through our own works and our own actions serving our neighbor and doing our best to bring more into the peaceful, enfolding, and joyful love of God. The joy of being a Christian is seeing God’s majesty all around us, through renewed hearts, new-found devotion, and hope in the middle of defeat! Wherever you are today, and wherever you are this week, challenge yourself to these three steps. Your name means something. See it. Believe it. Make it. Thanks be to God! Amen.
Scripture Readings:
Proverbs 22:1-2, 8-9, 22-23
22:1 A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches, and favor is better than silver or gold.
22:2 The rich and the poor have this in common: the LORD is the maker of them all.
22:8 Whoever sows injustice will reap calamity, and the rod of anger will fail.
22:9 Those who are generous are blessed, for they share their bread with the poor.
22:22 Do not rob the poor because they are poor, or crush the afflicted at the gate;
22:23 for the LORD pleads their cause and despoils of life those who despoil them.
James 2, Mark 7:24-37
The world aims to stain us so that we cannot carry out the will of God for our lives. The world wants to cripple us with the fear, worry, and doubt that we cannot keep the faith of God in this world. How can you capture a faith that is not torn apart by the ruin and tragedy that you see in the world?
"As shoes for your feet put on whatever will make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace." (Ephesians 6:15)
"Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God." (John 6:69)
Where do you go when you see evil, suffering, and violence in this world? Does it make you tell Jesus that the teaching of peace and faith is too difficult to hold on to? Or do you turn back to Jesus because He is the only place you can turn, and because Jesus is still the Holy One of God even despite all that we see and hear? Take a moment to really experience the fullness of God amid the pain. We are built together as a community of faith, for only together can we keep our faith in these times and make a difference to God's legacy in this world. Thanks be to God!
"At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream by night; and God said, "Ask what I should give you." (1 Kings 2 3:5).
What would you ask of God? What should we ask of God?
When you pray, be open to God giving you correction. Start by reminding yourself when you pray of what God has already done. PRAISE God. God has done so much for us already. Second, know God. God loves us and always will. Third, know ourselves. We are weak without God's help. Fourth, see God. See where God is, where God is needed, and what you must do to fulfill that need.
Will you help spread God's glory rather than the way of the world? Ask God for what you need to help God thrive!
When bad things happen, do you wonder if it is God's will? Perhaps bad things do happen, but they are not God's will. God does, however, use what happens to still allow good to come from it. God's will may be temporarily defeated, but nothing can happen which will finally defeat God's will.
We will also have moments when we feel defeated. Yet may you do your part to ensure that you are not finally defeated either - ask God to take your hand - so that you may continue being an imitator of God and a doer of God's will.
Scriptures: 2 Samuel 18, Ephesians 4:25-5:2, John 6:35-51
Mark 4:40 He said to them, "Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?"
Mark 4:41 And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?"
Just because you find yourself afraid from time to time, or even multiple times a day, does not mean that you have little faith. It only means that your faith has room to grow. We may never reach the point of a true lack of fear while we live within this world. But if we keep seeking God diligently, we will get close. Do not let the world distract you from seeking God; seek God even in the most trying and in the busiest moments. We build our hope on nothing less. If our anchor is in God, it will hold, and it will never give way. David sought God above all else. A child seeks a loving parent above all else. Like a father comforts a son, God is always helping us to win our battles, and never wants us to lose our battle to the world. Bring your rock with you to put in a prominent space, to remind yourself that the seed grows when you seek God. These rocks, which David used to slay his Goliath, can be used to slay yours too. In a busy moment, they remind you to pray. They remind you that you are blessed. They are exactly the distraction that you need. God be with you, you who seek the will of God, as your seed grows. Thanks be to God! Amen.
"when [the kingdom of God] is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade." (Mark 4:32)
We plant seeds in the young ones among us, and we hope that they will cause them to grow in the Spirit. Jesus told us that the kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, which starts out as the smallest of all seeds but then grows up and becomes one of the greatest of shrubs (Mark 4:31). Our faith may be small now, but we know that with time, if we give it the right nutrients, it will grow like the seed of a plant does in the field. When the harvest comes, we want to be able to show that we are growing fruit (or corn, or beans, or whatever the plant is meant to grow). It is okay that we are starting out small right now. It is only the spring. We are still learning, and we rely on God’s grace when we make mistakes. But if we do not give the seed what it needs, good soil, sunlight, and water, the seed will not grow. If we place the seed in the forest with so many other thoughts around it, it will not grow. The same is for the seed of faith in ourselves. The Holy Spirit is here to help it grow. The Spirit wants to enable us to plant this seed in others. It may stay unrevealed for while, but one week it is planted, and the next week, if it is free to grow unhindered, it will blossom into the magic of a green plant. Be assured; when you trust God, God will help you grow. It is okay if you do not remember the whole Bible from Sunday School; if you remember how the people taught you to live, and the spirit that Jesus taught you to live by, God gives us a promise: “in our doubt, there is believing; in our life, eternity, unrevealed until it’s season, something God alone can see.” Trust God. God will see you through. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Do you stand united with other Christians, or do you find yourself arguing, dividing, and forming walls between yourself and others? What would Jesus want us to do?
"I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit." ~ John 3:3
In Isaiah's call story, Isaiah 6:1-8, the land is in a time of mourning for their deceased king. When Isaiah sees the holiness of God, he knows that he cannot compare to God's greatness. But God grants him forgiveness, and the seraph tells him, "Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out." This allows Isaiah to feel confident enough to respond to God's call and say, "Here I am! Send me!" We have our own spiritual battles today, battling doubt, greed, fear, worry, viruses, and so much more. What will give us the confidence to win these battles? We cannot win them with our own strength; we have to rely on God's Spirit to give us this power.
"They say, 'Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.' Therefore, prophesy and say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back to the land of Israel." ~ Ezekiel 37:11-12
Do you feel lost, or that you have lost a lot, especially this past year? As Pentecost begins, we celebrate the birthday of the church, when the Spirit was poured out on the waiting disciples. You may need a fresh pouring of the Spirit as well. If you feel cut off from God, and that your soul is dried up like dry bones, open your heart to God and ask to be renewed with the Holy Spirit. Let us believe in the power of the Spirit to make things new.
"You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." ~ Acts 1:8
The disciples realized that they would miss Jesus when he went away from them, now that he had been appearing to them for the past forty days. But Jesus told them that he was sending an Advocate to give them power, and that they were to wait for it to come to them in Jerusalem. We may still find ourselves looking up to Heaven at the place where Jesus ascended, but we do not need to be socially distanced from Jesus. Our "Now What?" question is to wait for this power, to be filled with it, and to ascend to new heights as we minister in Jesus name.
Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff– they comfort me. ~Psalm 23:4
As the disciples feared no evil, we also face no evil when we face those who are against us, and those forces that try to break us! They may knock us down, but God helps us back up. We are the church. Only together can we be the church.
He said to them, “Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? ~Luke 24:38
Go into the world, encourage another, bless another, and let Jesus crowd out your doubt. Do not wait until the last five minutes. God is working through us now. Thanks be to God.
How do we reach out to others and spread the news of Christ? First, see the word; we declare what we have heard and seen. The second reason to declare what we have seen to others is so that our joy may be complete (1 John 1:4). Third, we declare what we do to others to help them gain protection from sin.
When Jesus appeared to the disciples, he said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained" (John 1:22-23). Jesus has sent the disciples to continue the work that he has been doing. Those disciples have since passed it on to us. Even when we have not seen Jesus, but have only heard about the resurrection from those who have passed it down to us, we are called to believe. We are called to work together and testify to what we have seen. That way, the rest of the world may hear and believe as we have, and be protected from the power of sin in this life. Do you believe something that you hear, or do you doubt it? It probably depends on who you hear it from. The disciples still doubted the Resurrection when they heard it from Mary. Thomas doubted it when he heard it from the other disciples. But all the writings that we read today are not playing a joke on us like Thomas may have thought. Jesus isrisen. Jesus is among us. And Jesus is working in us today! The world makes us doubt that, but that is why Jesus prays for us who are in the world (John 17:8-11). We are not to be overcome by it. We are to overcome it with the power of the Resurrection. And we are to spread that good news to others, so that they may also overcome the world, and live the life that they are meant to live. May joy abound. Christ is risen! Let us continue the celebration. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Now, we are called to spread the message. We are called as the body of Christ’s disciples to believe in the power and the occurrence of the resurrection, and to make it known through our work and through the way that we live our lives as a church. How do we believe in the power of God? By accepting the evidence of Christ’s resurrection in the empty tomb, and making the decision to believe in the power of God. If we decide that we will not accept something, we will not. It cannot be forced upon us. George Wilson was a man who was granted a pardon, but refused to accept that he deserved a pardon. While his lawyer argued that he could not face his sentence because he was pardoned, George wanted to keep his sentence. The case went to the United States Supreme Court, who ruled that without an acceptance, the pardon could not go into effect.
Jesus pardoned each of us by dying for us on the cross. We may not deserve it, but we are pardoned if we only make a conscious decision to accept that we are forgiven. We have seen the power of God in the resurrection, and that Jesus is God, as the Roman Centurion exclaimed. We have seen the love of God in the crucifixion. God is more powerful than Death, and God loves the world so much that God sacrificed God’s only son, “so that whoever might believe in him might not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16). Do you accept this pardon? If you do, Jesus has granted you eternal life, which is a life beyond death. Pray to Jesus, and tell Jesus that you want to know what he is calling you to do. Christianity is made famous by the wonder of the resurrection. Yet Christianity finds its meaning in the love and forgiveness of God. We are called to spread Christ’s sacrificial example. Not to die on a cross, but to serve others so that they may also know what we know. You can see the Lord today, like those 500 witnesses did during the Easter season that Paul described. The Lord Christ is accessible to us. He still lives. He called Mary by name so that she might recognize him; he calls us by name too. We must hear this and accept and believe that it is Christ in order to overcome our fear and follow the path that Jesus lays out for us. We have spent Lent growing closer to Jesus and becoming better disciples following Jesus. Then, we were shocked that he could be taken away from us so quickly. Now, that we are on a first name basis with him, our minds are clear and we have made a decision to accept his pardon, we are able to be witnesses. We may be timid at first, as was Mary when she said nothing to anyone. But it is our call. We have built our own selves up. Now it is time to reach out to others and spread the news of Christ. In this Easter season, we will study how we do this. First, see the word; we declare what we have heard and seen. Second, teach the word; be witnesses to what Jesus taught. Third, live the word; spread the love that Jesus shared with you. And lastly, believe the word; accept that we and you are pardoned as one of God’s children. The work of the church will know no end. Thanks be to God! Amen.
Philippians 2:5 says, “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.” This is Paul’s wish for those who follow Christ. Let us have the same mind. That is, let us have the same focus on God and love of others. Let us have the same unshakable faith. Let us not consider ourselves as more righteous than another (Phil 2:6). Let us be the spark that causes others to come to Jesus (Phil 2:10-11). People will want to know Jesus by the way that we live our lives, because of how happy we are able to live it. This is what marks a true Disciple of Christ. You are unshaken. And when you are shaken, and ask God for the cup to be taken from you, you keep the faith even when it is not. That is what Jesus did, and that is what each of us are called to do. In the face of violence and terror, as was described on the faces of those in Boulder, Colorado this week, we can still have faith. We can still ask God why. We can still lament. But we still have confidence that God is here for us, no matter what happens.
You may feel peace with God now, or you may not. Our history has shown that neither one lasts. We long for the peace, but we will not find true peace until we are with God in heaven. What we can find here, however, we can cherish. What we can find here is enough to wave our palm branches in the air and shout Hosanna, which means, “Save us, we beseech thee” in the Hebrew. We are excited for a homecoming, but the excitement will not last. We are excited to travel to a place we love, but we cannot always stay there forever. We are excited when Jesus is born and when Jesus is raised, but even then, the feeling does not last. When you find that your excitement for Jesus is not lasting, there is something that is causing it. I challenge you to continually walk through the journey that we have gone through in this series this Lent, because Lent is not the only time to try to understand how to be a better Disciple and how to draw closer to God. There is enough at work in this world to tear you away from this relationship, or this peace, even an hour after you attain it, if you do not continually ask God to search your heart to improve your relationship and faith. Turn to God in joy. Turn to God in terror. Turn to God in confusion, and in everything. The prayer of Paul is my prayer for us all: Let the same mind that was in Christ Jesus be in us as well (Phil 2:5). Then, we will turn to God on Friday too. Then, we will be as excited to see God work in the world as we are when our team wins and our family comes home. Then, we can handle anything, because we have God on our side.
Is who you serve evident by who you follow? You decide. Only you know where your heart is right now. But whenever you find that you feel far away from God, there is something that is holding you back. I challenge you to find that something by asking God to search you and purge it from you. Only God can do that. And if you do not fill it with truth, with the Holy Spirit, and with the fruits of the Spirit, it will only come right back. There is a force in the world that will do anything to keep you from experiencing God and being willing to work for God’s glory. Just ask Peter, who followed Jesus so closely yet was drawn to deny Jesus three times. Just ask David, who valued a close relationship with God but still killed Uriah in order to cover up his affair with Bathsheba. Whenever someone truly experiences God, they are willing. That is what an overflowing cup means; when the joy that we feel does not fit in our own selves, we have to give it to others (Psalm 23:5). You will serve others in your workplaces, but in doing so you are also serving God. Will we be the one who stands so calmly in a chaotic moment, in this world, or in your life, knowing that life will turn out okay? If we pledge to follow Jesus through anything, we follow Jesus through anything. Anything. Especially in the midst of violence. I am reminded by the moment a pastor stared down a criminal in the movie, Do You Believe? He was at gunpoint, and when asked if he was ready to die, he knew he would if it was his moment, and turned the question around. He was ready to die because he was in a close relationship with Jesus. He knew that because he served Jesus with a willing spirit, God would honor him whenever he were to die, even if it were today.
Others know who we serve by what we do or what we say. A popular hymn states that others “will know that we are Christians by our love.” I will close with a quote from the movie, Do You Believe? which asked, “If you were ever accused of being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?” Are you guided by God? Are you willing? Or do you still let this world get the best of you? God is good, and God will sustain in us a willing spirit. All we need to do is keep asking, and keep close, and God will honor us.
Psalm 51:1-12
John 12:20-33
The first way to fill ourselves is by accepting the movements of the Holy Spirit.
Once we have received the Holy Spirit, the rest begins to unfold from there. We must fill ourselves with love.
We need to fill ourselves with faith, or trust in God, as well.
What really keeps us going? We live in a world where we are afraid. The snake in the wilderness was a symbol of fear, but it stood as a testament to God being able to keep God’s promises, and get us through, for five hundred years until the time of King Hezekiah (2 Kings 18:4). The symbol of fear became a symbol of strength. We are not kept going by continuing on in our old habits, conquered by fear and worry, sin and doubt. We must ask God to help us purge these things. And when we turn to God, we find that the very things which brought us discomfort in this world now become a symbol of strength because God is greater than these things. When we are filled with the Holy Spirit, we are renewed. In order to stay faithful to what we have committed to this Lent, we must then fill our minds with trust in God and with love for those around us. We trust that God will keep God’s promise to us, and bring us to a place beyond this world. And while we are here in this world, it is our call to let love flow through us, even in the smallest act of kindness.
Numbers 21:4-9
John 3:14-21
Last year, Pastor Craig wrote a book called, Dangerous Prayers: Because Following Jesus was Never Meant to be Safe. He suggests that we do not feel God as much as those before us because we always pray safe prayers. We pray, “God, bless me.” We pray, “God, heal me.” He argues that if we really want God to move our lives, we need to pray more dangerous prayers. The three prayers that he suggests are: search me, break me, and send me. Search my soul, break my habits, and send me on my call to do ministry for God. We want to ask God to remove all evil within us that takes our attention away from God. David prayed to God to teach him wisdom and to purge him (Psalm 51:6-7). There are many good things about each of our spirits which we can rejoice for. Yet, if we do not continually return to our various means of building ourselves up, the things that distract us from God can build up, perhaps at a rate that we do not even notice. If we do not also ask God to take away those parts of us that distract us from God – whether it be worry, a sinful habit, hurriedness, procrastination, or anything else – we will not be able to realize our full potential of God’s will for us.
God has been working on us all along. God just needs a little help from us. What does it mean to renew our inner being? It means that we remove what builds a wall between us and God, and replace it with what builds a bridge. It means to keep our focus on God as you would a focal point as you are trying to balance on one leg. If you take away the focal point, you fall. But even then, God is there to catch us. So, let us pray together. God, we cannot search ourselves on our own. So we ask your help. Search us. Help us find what is dividing us from you, and from understanding your will for us. Break our deceitful desires, so that we may come in after our walk and know you better, with a clean heart, and a fresh perspective. Prepare us to be sent through the coming Easter season. In your name we pray. Thanks be to God. Amen.
We each have transgressed against God, and we each will again. But God continues to seek us out. God has grace where we have fallen. We may not have done enough to love God recently, but we can try again. I have let my mind wander with thoughts that I can never do enough, but what does God ask of us but to show us God’s love? What does God ask of us than to show God that we want to spend time with God, that we want to serve others, and that we want to worship God? It no longer has to be a burden to us. It is joyful. Our minds are so often distracted by human things instead of on divine things. But we can refocus our minds. We can renew our hearts. Jesus asked a rhetorical question in Mark 8:37: “What can they give in return for their life?” The short answer is to live up to our end of the covenant. Spend time with God. Love God. Love others.
The first way to recognize a transgression is if we are tired. If you feel tired, perhaps you have been relying on your own strength for too long. God gives us the strength we need to capture our love for what we do and to rediscover why we feel called to do it. If we do not make time for God in our lives, we have not made the trip to the supermarket to buy more food. We keep trying to stretch the little food we do have, and as our meals become less and less balanced, we become progressively less energized. Going to the supermarket takes time out of our lives, but we realize that it is a necessity. In the same way, while renewing our spiritual resources takes time out of our lives, it is a necessity if we do not want to keep being progressively less energized for life. We need to spend time together with God.
The second way to recognize a transgression is if we feel inadequate. Often, we may feel inadequate if we have failed at something that someone has asked us to do. And, sometimes we magnify our own failures upon ourselves so that they are greater than they really are. This distracts us from being who we are called to be, and contributes to our feeling not only of feeling exhausted, but feeling incapable of doing anything useful. We are each called to do little acts of service wherever we are, which is why I am asking all of us to think about what little acts of service that we can do and are already doing. We cannot change the world by ourselves, but when we add up the little things we all do, the world is changed. It will motivate us and help us to see that we are capable of things that work for God’s ministry. We are all participants in seeking and realizing God’s kingdom. Find something that you think you can do, and do it well. Pray about it. Write it down so that you reinforce your encouragement to yourself. Tell others about it so that they see not your boasting in yourself, but your boasting in what God can do through you. If you feel inadequate, know that God can work through you.
Every Christian has the responsibility to grow. Much of growing is growing closer to God. We have the responsibility to read the Bible, have an active prayer life, and be connected to a Christian community. Join us for the first sermon of a Lent series, sparked from how we show God our love and grow as Christians ourselves. We highlight how we realize our transgressions but accept God's grace for where we have fallen short. We then work with God's grace to ask God to renew us, by taking out those habits or desires that draw us away from God and filling us with desirable habits. Finally, we take what we have been filled with, and create for the Christian people a willing spirit, willing to serve, to suffer if necessary, and to live for the glory of the kingdom of God. The themes over the next six weeks will touch on each of these stops along our journey. Thanks be to God.
Today, we must not let up on figuring out how to be disciples of Jesus. It will start by relying more deeply on God in the midst of suffering, and to do that, we must seek to spend time with God. Practice God’s love languages. Practice with haste. The season of Epiphany has ended. The gathering of the first disciples has been done. Next, we learn more about discipleship. We learn how we can make it through this world by following Jesus. We learn how to draw closer to God, to love God, and to love one another. We prepare for the season of Lent. Have you made a commitment to spend regular time with God? Devote. Serve. Worship. It is never one and done. It is the way to make it through. It is the way that God most understands our love. Love is in the air.
God’s love languages are some combination between spending time together, doing acts of service, and giving words of affirmation (praise). We carry out these ways to express our love in Bible study and prayer, living the life of the church and serving others, and worshipping God. If we want to learn how to express our love for God in God’s love languages, we need to listen to Jesus!
Our own strength is not enough. How do we know that God is good? Because we know what the end of this story is. Jesus told us. We do not know what God has in store for us, exactly, for this knowledge is “unsearchable” (Is. 40:28). But we are not hidden from God (Is. 40:27). Jesus told us what is to come: “And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other” (Matthew 24:31). For this, we live and wait, confident in the goodness of God, and blessed with God’s strength to uphold us. Never lose this, or stop waiting or hoping, or you will lose the very strength that keeps you together.
From Zion United Church of Christ, Fireside, in Bellevue, Ohio