Solid food not milk

According to a recent church study of those who value church attendance and strongly identify as evangelical Christians, almost two thirds state their reason for attending is to learn more about God.  This is a good thing.  The church should be an avenue of learning; it should be a place where good teachers and preachers provide the vehicle of understanding and sanctuary of study.  But the study went on to say of those self-identified church attendees, only 6% say they learned something about God or Jesus the last time they attended.

Why is this happening?  Why is the very place where we come to know our God so without what we yearn for?  Where is the meat of the Gospel?  I believe the Gospel has not changed.  The Gospel as Paul would characterize it in his first letter to the church in Corinth (15:1-7), was Jesus who died, Jesus who was buried, Jesus who rose again, and Jesus who was seen. Is it that we know it all and nothing new is being taught?  Is the church satisfied to live on the milk as Paul stated in this same letter (3:2)?

The early church leaders did not have the things we consider essential for our faith.  They had no official church buildings, no vision statements, or even statements of core values. There was no social media, radio broadcasts, well-constructed web pages. They didn't even have the completed New Testament. Christ-followers were often deeply misunderstood, persecuted and some gave their lives for their faith. Yet they loved and they served and they prayed and they blessed—and slowly, over hundreds of years, they brought the Roman Empire to its knees.

Today’s Christian culture has more tools at its fingertips than any since creation. You can go to any Walmart or Dollar Store and purchase Bibles for less that we spend at Starbucks.  The most gifted preachers are available on the web. We can watch video sermons on our electronic of choice.  We may listen to live worship CDs as we drive down the road.  We have bible software on our phones.  We can read in depth studies in Greek and Hebrew on our favorite texts. We have Bible conferences on growth, denominational systems, leadership, missions, church planting, evangelism and even conferences for church leadership on people who don’t want to go to church.  We have Christian TV, Christian radio, short term mission trips for anyone who has the dollars to go, and we get a federal deduction for our giving to the Church.

Yet the very place where we should learn of Jesus we are not learning anything that would change our lives.  The emphasis is on decisions not discipleship. Relationship is not dependent on change on our part, but a free gift.  We are justified by our faith not by works.  But the Church is not going to the next level.  Discipleship, growth, maturity comes from knowledge and a changeable spirit; it is a constant giving up as we are enlightened.

Wake up Church.

Willingness of God

Matthew 8:1-4
Being an outcast throughout his life a leper was willing to try most anything to be included.  I heard a song today about a woman who was struggling to be included.  She sung, "We are all the same inside but everyone wants to compare me by my outside."  The leper was just like you and I on the inside but the only thing that was seen was his medical handicap. 
So he came to Jesus and  made the statement: "Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean." He had acknowledged the very evident power of God.  He acknowledged the ability of Jesus to heal.  He didn't ask to be healed he just stated facts.  His willingness was a statement, not a question or even a request.  He had fallen down at the feet of Jesus and in an attitude of worship he proclaimed that the power of God through his Only Begotten Son can heal. God in human form was able to make the outside just like the inside. To become like everyone else.
Jesus stretched out his hand and made the astonishing statement, "I am willing, and you are clean."  the leper was as clean on the outside as he was on the inside.  The scabs fell off.  The red splotches that had itched and pained this man for years turned like a pale rose.
He was probably very excited and wanted to tell everyone around him the news. But Jesus told him to keep his tongue, and to perform some required tasks in the local synagogue.
Not words, not exciting verbosities exclaimed to everyone around him proclaiming the Chosen One of Israel.
Go and make sacrifices. Do what Moses would have him do.  Do the things that normal Israelites would do if healed.  Let the outside be the same as the inside.
His actions were his testimony.  And the result of being normal in the middle of everyone else that once saw him as different, was spectacular.  The non-verbal became the verbal.  Action became the testimony.  The testimony became a calling to those who are not the same on the inside and the outside.  His miracle in itself became a shout to the world of the healing power of God. 
God is still making the unlovely, the strange, the unique, the ones that shrink from the norm, the ones that are different inside and the ones that different on the outside, in an instant to become whole.
He is willing as soon as you are willing.

That still small voice

Deep in the soul of every person on earth is a longing for something more than self. We try to stuff all sorts of things into our lives in an effort to sooth that longing.  But it will not be quieted. it is a little voice that in our quiet times becomes louder and disturbs us.
Entertainments distract us with even louder voices. Things are gathered around us to fill the the gaps in our lives but the voice continues on.  I believe this voice is in the heart of every human being and it calls to us to the eternal.  It calls us from the material to the spiritual.  It speaks to us and makes us dissatisfied with the normal.
It is sad for those who only see God in the big things.  When disaster strikes in a land far away there is a national outcry for prayer. But in reality we need to be still and know in all circumstances.
In the heart of everyone is something that is constantly drawing us from the normal to the sublime.
A week ago or so all the churches in our area of Sacramento gathered together.  There were Lutherans, Presbyterians, Baptists, Nazarene, Assembly of God, Community churches all gathered for a single cause.  The cause of just being the Body of Christ.  The redeemed met together to celebrate there small voices and together touch more than the usual.
We sang, we prayed, we listened to scripture, we heard a little gifted preaching, but most of all we celebrated the eternal.
We worshiped in unity and in truth.  Denominations were set aside for a few moments and in place eternity split open for a moment.  A fleeting moment we pulled back the curtain of the tabernacle and looked into the Holy of Holys and were amazed.  Like Isaiah in ISAIAH 6:1 In the year King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne, high and lifted up.  

The Dog that would not swim.

Charles Swindoll, in his book "Three Steps Forward, Two Steps Back," tells the story of a farmer who wanted to impress his hunting buddies. So, he bought the smartest, most expensive hunting dog he could find and he trained this dog to do things no other dog on earth could do---impossible things that would surely amaze anyone. Then he invited his buddies to go duck hunting with him. After a while a group of ducks flew over and the hunters were able to make a few hits. Several ducks fell in the water and the proud owner shouted to his magnificent dog, "Go get ‘em!" The dog leapt out of the boat, walked on the water, picked up a bird and returned to the boat. As soon as he dropped the duck in the boat he trotted off across the water again and grabbed another duck and brought it back to the boat.
The owner beamed with pride as his wonderful dog walked across the water and retrieved each of the birds one by one. Unable to resist the opportunity to brag a little he asked his buddies, "Do you notice anything unusual about my dog?"
One of them rubbed his chin and said, "Yes. Come to think of it, I do! That silly dog doesn’t know how to swim does he??"
When Peter in Mathew 14 stepped out of the boat in the middle of a storm to walk on the water to Jesus, many people have the same reaction. Instead of recognizing that he was the only disciple to have the faith to even step out of the boat, he is criticized for his lack of faith when he sank in the waves. But in reality, he was the only one with enough faith to go to Christ. The other disciples sat in the boat and they almost always get overlooked in this story.
But they were there, still in the boat.

Déjà vu all over again!

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. Ecclesiastes 1:9

I stand on the shoulders of thousands of preachers of thousands of sermons, thoughts, ideas, illustrations and I completely understand the writer of Ecclesiastes.  There is no new thought, there is no new sermon, and there is no new study of scriptures that has not been done before.  There is little that we encounter in our studies of God that is different. 

There is transience about the human existence on this earth.  There is little that brings us face to face with something absolutely new. Nothing really changes except for the faces and the names.  History repeats itself over and over again.  We are born.  We live.  We die. The elevations are built up and the elevations are brought down.  History is repeated over and over again.  No great thing emerges from “under the sun” that would change our fleet moment on this earth.  The world is a very repetitive place.  Solomon was stating the obvious.  Nothing ever changes.

Any search for meaningfulness, any grasping out for thing that would excite our souls of the new has to come from somewhere else.

In this hopeless weariness we wait for the people around us to come up with something new.  We crave something new to make our existence more relevant. But Solomon is telling us “It isn’t happening”.  Here “under the sun” our world is always looking and listening, attempting to be satisfied, but always wanting more.  Each succeeding generation seeks to find what was not discovered before and fail.

In the current society we always want something to be different. Every technology screams to us “I am new”. iPod, iPhone, iTunes, TV sets the size of small cars, YouTube, Xfinity, Netflix, blogs, FaceBook, Twitter, Instagram, and yet our eyes and our ears are not satisfied.  We want more.  The overwhelming information that assaults our senses are but symptoms of the lack of change.  There will always be one more show to watch, one more game to play, one more song to hear, one more update from people we hardly know. So we keep on text-messaging, webcasting, Facebooking, Twittering, Flickering, uploading, downloading, and spewing the same ideas that someone else has said a thousand times.  But what have we gained? What have we accomplished?  Is there any profit?

Now before you get really depressed at the monotony of existence, the key understanding here is found when you understand “there is nothing new under the sun”.  Here at ground level everything is pretty much the same. Yogi Berra may have said it well: “déjà vu all over again!”  Meaningfulness is knowing and knowing without a doubt that there is a God in heaven who rules OVER the sun.  Meaningfulness can only be found in the context of Him.  When we come to the realization God in our lives does it make life here tolerable, even delightful, and making ultimate perfect existence possible, through Jesus Christ. All those things that make life here so weary and boring can have new meaning, when you understand who God is, what Christ did and you connect yourself to the genuineness of being a child of God. “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man,” (Eccl. 12:13).

Teachable men willing to change.

In Sunday School this week we had a challenging discussion on the calling of Peter.  But we asked why was the call extended to Peter over some more learned and sophisticated individual on the other side of the lake.  What was the criteria for calling Peter or for that matter any of the twelve?  What is the criteria for a calling today?

By consensus it was written upon the white board, “Teachable men willing to change.” OK, I can go along with that but what about the one that got away?  What about Judas that allowed him to elude the net by the Greatest Fisher of Men?  Jesus during this three year teaching and preaching period cast a wide net, but not all were wrestled into the boat.

Only the twelve men in all history have had the intimate, personal relationship to Jesus the incarnate Son of God.  Judas along with the other eleven has ever been more exposed to God’s perfect truth.  No other has had the crash course in experiential love.  They all were exposed in an intimate first hand washing of God’s love, compassion, power, kindness, forgiveness and grace. No group of followers could come close to the very essence of God.  Yet through it all Judas escaped the net.  In the most indescribably precious, and blessed years the heart of Judas was not softened.

Judas defies comprehension.  Judas constantly and with persistence of mind rejected the very truth of God in the flesh.  And he hid it from everyone around him with skill.  The only one to see into the heart of this chosen fisher of men and see the wicked rebellion was Jesus.  And He called him a devil.

Judas did not escape from guilt. Just like the pain we feel as we accidentally burn ourselves. So guilt is an intrinsic and automatic warning of spiritual danger.  It was guilt that drove Judas to remorse which in turn led to his death.  Do not confuse guilt and remorse with the requisite answer to both.  The answer to both is repentance.  Repentance is an act of the will. Judas was teachable but he was not willing to change.  And in the last moment of his life his willingness not to change condemned him.

What is preaching?

I have been impressed lately on the necessity of preaching in the church.  I have read much on why preaching should be the pinnacle of the gatherings of the Body of Christ.  The words of Jack Hyles have refreshed my concept of preaching more than all the others. I humbly take his ideas and thoughts and share them with you.

Preaching is taking a risk in explaining the mind of God.  Preaching is teaching with a tear in the eye.  Preaching is explaining the unexplainable.  Preaching is facts on fire.  Preaching is the very thoughts of God in the hand, the fire of God in the heart and the zeal of God in the soul.  It is, in the words of Pastor Jack Hyles, “Preaching is the gift of God wrapped in an excited voice.” Preaching has to be more than a 30 minute speech.  It has to be the moral conscience of the church, the nation and the world.  Preaching is the soul of the body of Christ.

All the major colleges in the east were built because of preaching. It was preaching that originally built our public school system. It was preaching that originally established our law system. In the early days of our country, a degree in theology was a prerequisite to a law degree. Every great denomination was founded on preaching. It was John Wesley who said, "I just set myself on fire and folks come to watch me as I burn.”

John Newton said, "Preaching is breaking the hard heart and healing the broken one.

Abraham Lincoln said, 'When I hear a man preaching, I like to see him act as if he were fighting bees."

Preaching is the answer to what troubles the church. We cannot allow any substitute for preaching. The church should never settle for something less. Sacred music is admirable, but it is no substitute of preaching. An inspired cantata may be uplifting but is not substitute for preaching.  A poignant dramatic presentation of drama is not a substitute for preaching.  Preaching is the highest of professions and the greatest of pure art. 

Again as Pastor Jack Hyles in his book “Teaching on Preaching,” emphatically stated:

Preaching is truth set on fire. Preaching is demolition of error. Preaching is doubt's healing balm. Preaching is the Holy Spirit's amplifier. Preaching is the Savior's projector. Preaching is fact on fire and truth aflame. Preaching is worship's entrée. Preaching is the adornment of the Bible. Preaching is the power of God unto salvation. Preaching is revival's forerunner. Preaching is the church's heart. Preaching is doctrine clothed in excitement. Preaching is love's smile. Preaching is sin's greatest adversary. Preaching is frustration's funeral.  Preaching is doubt's demise.  Preaching is fear's failure. Preaching is depression's death. Preaching is disappointment's decline.  Preaching is faith's food.  Preaching is profundity delivered in simplicity. Preaching was the first thing done by the Mayflower pilgrims.  Preaching is the mender of broken relationships.  Preaching is the healer of broken hearts. Preaching is the revival of broken dreams. Preaching is Hell's greatest enemy Preaching is the sinner's best friend.  Preaching is the saint's dinner.  Preaching is genius with a halo.  Preaching is fire in the pulpit that melts the ice in the pew.

When the preacher approaches the pulpit, all must stop.  Angels must cease their wings, let holy awe inspired hush come upon heaven itself. This folly of preaching is the most important task of the hour, the day, even of the week. Let Heaven give voice and unction, let the gates of hell shake in fear, let the church wait in a holy expectation.  Quiet the children, let the ushers sit down, let all the past pass away, let the stew boil in the pot, the future can wait, let Satan and his angles be overcome with fear.

Hallelujah for preaching!