Cheerios

  I've entered a new stage of parenting, one previously witnessed but never completely grasped.  I have entered the stage of life that will be primarily defined by finding Cheerios in every possible place.

They will be underfoot, trod into crumbs in the kitchen.
They will nestle into every crack and crevice of the house and car.
They will be found in creases in clothes, tucked under dirty bibs, and somehow adhered to the backs of hands and the underside of the chin.
They shall navigate perilous journeys to scale furniture and tunnel beneath furniture.
The cats will discover them in their food bowls and water dishes.
They will be consumed by the metric ton, and yet for every one that is eaten by Caleb, four more will escape his clutches and disappear, to be discovered years later in yet-to-be-discovered locales.  They shall multiple and grow, their power and presence in my life growing exponentially as I drive myself batty in search of these outliers.
There shall be no more peace in this house, for the Cheerios shall rule us all.

11/29 E-News

Announcements

Poinsettia—This Sunday will be the last day to order them. Please sign up in the Narthex. $7.00 each.

Wednesday Night Suppers—The last Supper of the year will be 12/19.

New Hope News

Sunday School—This Sunday, the adult class with discuss Haggai.

Potluck—This Sunday! Please bring a dish to share.

Pray For:

Lynn Meyer

Karen Sanislo, as she begins a new journey in the Army!

Pray for those who do not know Christ.

Links

Some thoughts on simplifying

The star of Two & a Half Men calls himself a 'paid hypocrite'

3rd century fragment of Romans found

The study of happiness

One way to change the world: a $20 tablet

"Can we keep him?”

Keith's Random Thoughts

I don't have too many thoughts today. I'm pretty tired of being sick, and I'd really like to be healthy. I don't know which medicines to take, although I'm pretty sure that I know which ones not to take. A medical degree would have been handy.

My spiritual life isn't that different. I'm tired of making commitments to prayer or devotion and finding myself breaking them later. I'm tired of sin, and wish that I could turn from it. I know that I will never shake sin's presence this side of heaven, but I desperately wish to live a life faithful to the Gospels. The only problem (alright, one of many problems), is that I'm not entirely sure what to do, although I know there are certain things that I should definitely not do!

It's hard to rely on God for our everyday needs. We can't see God, and we don't always know exactly what God wills for us. I do believe that if we commit ourselves to growing in faith and spending time with God, each and every day we'll grow a little closer, each and every day we'll be a little more faithful, each and every day we'll fall a little more in love with God. It's not a matter of our works earning revelation from God—it's a simple matter of tuning our minds to search for God's presence in our lives. The more we pay attention, the more we see. If you're driving home tonight and look for red cars, you'll notice a lot more red cars. There aren't any more than there would have been otherwise, but you're looking for them, and so you notice them.

I know that I am fearfully and wonderfully made. I worship a Savior who would have come and died to atone for the sins of one individual, let alone any and all who come to him. He loves me more deeply than I can fathom, and I give thanks, bowing low before the cross and praying for his love to enfold me, that I might go forth in my feeble way and serve him, serve others, and in so doing take part in God's kingdom here on earth.

Text for this Sunday

Ephesians 2:1-10

You were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once lived, following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient. All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else.

But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.

NewHopeChattanooga.org

New Hope on Facebook & Twitter

New Hope on iTunes

Keith's Blog & Devotionals for your Kindle

Wednesday Letter

Friends in Christ,
  I love the South.  Years ago, the end of November would find me huddled up in jackets and lumbering through the snow to get where I needed to be.  Checking the weather was a depressing task.  Now, I check the weather to see whether or not I'll need a sweater, let alone a jacket.
  But the cold is coming.  Winter has a way of sneaking up on us.  (I know, winter doesn't officially begin for another three weeks.  Tell that to the folks getting snow in the Northwest.)  It gets a little colder every day, but often not enough to notice, and then suddenly you find yourself walking outside and wondering how it got so cold so quickly.  The reality is that the weather was changing every day, but just in such small increments that it doesn't seem to be changing at all.

  I think the same holds true for our discipleship, particularly our prayer life.  When we pray, we are waking ourselves up to what God is doing around us.  The more often we pray, the more often our eyes and our hearts are opened to God's work in the world.  If we focus ourselves on improving our prayer habits, spending a little more time in prayer every day, then we'll notice a change in the way we see the world.  It won't be immediate, and many of the changes may be imperceptible, but years down the road we'll suddenly realize how different our life is.  It's not the work of one dramatic shift, but a thousand little ones.  In the conference I attended this spring, Eugene Peterson said that not everything is prayer, but everything can be prayer.  It's all about our attitude and our willingness to focus on God in the midst of our lives.

  There's an old saying that the best time to plant a tree was 25 years ago, and the 2nd best time is now.  So how will you devote yourself to prayer now, that years down the road, your life may be centered around an awareness of God's presence?

In Christ,
Keith

Come, Holy Spirit

Come, Holy Spirit
  Come & breathe new life into this weary soul.
  Carve new channels into my life
  That living water might course through them.

Come, Holy Spirit
  Come with wind & fire
  Consume all that is within me that is not of you
  Create in me a new landscape
  That I might frolic in the everlasting & abundant joy of God.

Come, Holy Spirit
  Shatter the ties that bind
  This confined life to the darkened dungeons of despair
  I have come to this place of my own accord
  Tied my own fetters and closed my own eyes
  Shine your illuminating light
  Show me the path home

Come, Holy Spirit
  Quicken the pulse in my chest
  Awaken me to the life of Christ within
  That leads me onward, upward, outward
  To dance with the divine
  To love without concern
  To live without regret

Come, Holy Spirit
  Gleefully abide
  Among the common and the frail
  The faith that peeks and hides

Come, Holy Spirit
  Illumine once again
  That I might hear the tale of God
  Mercifully sublime

Come, Holy Spirit
  Surprise my heart once more
  To live for God and let Christ reign
  To sing forevermore

Effective Prayer

  The longest book isn't always the best book.  For example, the US tax code is 7 times longer than the Bible.

  The newest book isn't always the best book.  It almost always looks better on the shelf, but that doesn't mean it's preferable.

  R.C. Sproul wrote a wonderful little book (it's probably more of a booklet--it's only 80 pages, and can fit in your pocket) called Effective Prayer.  The first printing was in 1984, when I was three years old.  The pages of my copy are yellowed and feel old.  The cover illustration is probably not what it would be if the book were first published today.  But the wisdom contained in this little book make it well worthy of the short amount of time it takes to read.

  The book is broken up in to six chapters--the purpose, place, pattern, practice, prohibitions and power of prayer.  Sproul talks about the reasons to pray, the ways to pray, ways not to pray, different methods to prayer, and the outcomes of prayer.  Sproul doesn't linger too long on any particular chapter, but each one is focused and well developed.

  In the end, though, the point is well-made:  to develop in prayer, you have to spend time doing it.  All the books in the world and all the seminars in the world won't make you into a dedicated person of prayer.  Spending time before God, pouring your heart out and letting God fill you, will make you a person of prayer. Dedicating ourselves to a life of prayer is the most important thing--our abilities to pray and to listen to God develop over time, but they will not develop if we spend our lives waiting to be perfect at prayer.

  So let us pray.  Deeply, often, depending on God to lead us forward.

11-25-12 Sermon

2 Kings 2:1-14
  Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. Elijah said to Elisha, ‘Stay here; for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel.’ But Elisha said, ‘As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.’ So they went down to Bethel. The company of prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha, and said to him, ‘Do you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?’ And he said, ‘Yes, I know; keep silent.’

   Elijah said to him, ‘Elisha, stay here; for the Lord has sent me to Jericho.’ But he said, ‘As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.’ So they came to Jericho. The company of prophets who were at Jericho drew near to Elisha, and said to him, ‘Do you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?’ And he answered, ‘Yes, I know; be silent.’

  Then Elijah said to him, ‘Stay here; for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan.’ But he said, ‘As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.’ So the two of them went on. Fifty men of the company of prophets also went, and stood at some distance from them, as they both were standing by the Jordan. Then Elijah took his mantle and rolled it up, and struck the water; the water was parted to the one side and to the other, until the two of them crossed on dry ground.

  When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, ‘Tell me what I may do for you, before I am taken from you.’ Elisha said, ‘Please let me inherit a double share of your spirit.’ He responded, ‘You have asked a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it will be granted you; if not, it will not.’ As they continued walking and talking, a chariot of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them, and Elijah ascended in a whirlwind into heaven. Elisha kept watching and crying out, ‘Father, father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!’ But when he could no longer see him, he grasped his own clothes and tore them in two pieces.

  He picked up the mantle of Elijah that had fallen from him, and went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan. He took the mantle of Elijah that had fallen from him, and struck the water, saying, ‘Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?’ When he had struck the water, the water was parted to the one side and to the other, and Elisha went over.
************************************

How many of you have ever spent much time studying the life of Elijah before we did this sermon series on him?

How many of you knew he had raised someone from the dead?

Knew that he had miraculously fed a widow and her household?

Knew that he had dueled with 450 prophets of Baal?

Knew about the chariots of fire?

Elijah’s life is pretty extraordinary, and it ends in a spectacular way.  This is another one of these grand images of the Bible, one that is probably more famous than most.  Elijah is walking along and chariots of fire, led by horses of fire, descend and scoop Elijah up, taking him up to heaven.  Elisha is left behind to watch all of this unfold.  In the section just following this, some other prophets believe that Elijah has been transported somewhere else and want to go look for them.  Elisha can’t put into words what he has seen, so he finally tells them to go and look, even though he knows it is a waste of their time.  He doesn’t act surprised when they return without having found him.

So Elijah’s life has this incredible capstone, a dramatic moment to conclude his life and ministry.

We’d all agree that Elijah lived an incredible life, right?

We’d all agree that he was completely and entirely faithful to God, right?

We’d agree that he’s one of the best images of what a faithful disciple should look like, right?

So we’re all in agreement that Elijah lived as near a perfect, faithful life as anyone on this earth can, right?  I don’t see a record of sin in his life.  I’m sure he had sin, but there doesn’t seem to be much.  We could all trump Elijah in this category.

So notice, then, what happens at the end of his life.  First of all, Elijah cannot write the end of his own story.  Only God can complete our lives.  Only God can bring us through the shadow of death and into the eternal realm of heaven.  Even Elijah could not do that on his own.  God does it with chariots of fire for some, and he uses more ordinary means for many, but for all who believe, God saves.  But only God can save—we cannot.

Secondly, pay attention to the mantle.  This is Elijah’s cloak, the same cloak he threw over Elisha when he called him into ministry, the same mantle with which he covered his face when he stood on the mountain before God.  The mantle has no magical powers, and isn’t the source of anything, but it’s symbolic.  When Elijah dies, the mantle passes from Elijah to Elisha, and the work of God in the world continues.

It’s tempting to look at some of the characters in the Bible and wonder, at the time, how the story ever would have moved along without them.  Once Moses left, how would the Israelites get along?  Or Abraham, or David?  Elijah, too—he is such a giant at the time, but yet we see here that God’s work in the world moves right along—Elisha picks up where Elijah left off, dividing the river and going through on dry ground.

There is an old saying that the graveyards are full of men who thought the world could not go on without them.  As Christians, it’s wise for us to consider the same—this story we are living, the novel in which we play a role, is not our story.  It’s not about us.  The story is God’s story, and God is the central character.  None of us are indispensable to the plot, but each of us is precious, valuable in God’s eyes.  But it is God who invites us in, and it is God who gives us the chance to participate.

I want to invite you to think about puzzles.  How many of you have ever done a puzzle?  How many of you have ever had one of those puzzles that you could not complete?

I have one, and it’s my favorite puzzle.  It’s a 3,000 piece puzzle that was a gift to me many years ago.  It’s of St. Mark’s Square in Venice, and I’ve attempted it a number of times.  I can do the first 2,000 pieces alright, but I get to the last thousand and realize that it’s all sky and that every single piece looks the same.  Every time, I promise that I’ll take it slowly, going piece by piece, and that if I am patient enough I will eventually finish it.  Every time, I make it about twenty minutes before giving up and taking the puzzle apart, realizing that this is an impossible process. 

I want us to think about our life of Christian witness in the same vein.  You have a role to play.  God graciously invites us in, gives us a part to play.  Think about it this way—God gives us a bunch of pieces to the puzzle.  What God is trying to do is build his kingdom on earth, and he gives us some of the pieces to put together.

Notice that I said some.  He doesn’t give us all the pieces.  You are not responsible for this whole puzzle.  The weight of the kingdom does not rest on your shoulders.  Just like Elijah’s life, we cannot finish this work.  Only God can do this.  We are called to do our part, to live faithfully in the situation we have before us, to use the pieces in our hands.  We aren’t called to look with jealousy at the pieces someone else has.  We aren’t called to despise our own pieces.  We’re called to serve God with what is right in front of us, with what we have, rather than worrying about everything else.

Some of you may wonder how you can put the pieces together.  Well, I have good news for you.  How do you know what a puzzle is supposed to look like?  We look at the picture on the box, right?  Well, the Christian life is the same—only Scripture serves as our picture on the box.  We read Scriptures to know what the Christian life is supposed to look like.  Christ shows us what that life is like.  Other Biblical characters show us how to live, and how not to live.  By reading the Bible, we get the picture of the Christian life.  Then, and only then, can we turn to the pieces before us and try to put together our own lives, piecing together our own part of God’s story.

Now, it can be frustrating to know that we’re not going to finish the whole thing.  We want to do that.  In this country, we make a bad habit of worshipping individual achievement.  We elevate those particular individuals who seem to have it all together, who pull themselves up to success by hard work.  But this puzzle isn’t ours to complete.  We need to recognize that it’s not about us—this is about what God is doing, and God is using the church for this work.  We have a part to play, and it’s a small part, but that’s ok.  It’s not our story.  We are called to be grateful that God invites us to play a role—God doesn’t need us, but it is out of love that he calls us to live life with him.

Now, we’re not going to put all our pieces in perfectly.  We’re not always going to make the right decisions.  The puzzle isn’t going to look like a perfect representation of the picture on the front of the box.  Here is where we remember the gracious love of Christ and his atoning death.  In his death on the cross, he atoned for our sins.  In short, he corrected all of the mistakes we have made and will make in our attempt to put together our part of the puzzle.  His love washes us clean, covers us with his grace and his glory.  It is this love that completes the puzzle.

At some point we will die.  We will be caught up by a chariot of fire and taken into the halls of heaven, ferried through the shadow of death.  And this is ok—it’s part of God’s plan.  Someone else will pick up the mantle and carryon the work.  When it’s not about us, we can realize that our death isn’t the end of God’s work in the world.  God has plans to use all of us, and this is a work we do together.  When I do puzzles I don’t share well—I tend to get impatient with other people who may not work as fast as I do.  But in the work of God’s kingdom, we work together, because it’s not just about getting the puzzle finished.  It’s not about how much I can do compared to someone else.  It’s about what God is doing in and through all of us.  It’s not about me.  It’s about God.

I want to close with my dream for the church.  Now, I don’t do puzzles very often because I have a bit of an obsessive personality when it comes to puzzles.  I’m a ‘just one more piece’ kind of guy.  What that means is that I’ll start saying ‘just one more piece’ around 9:30, and I’ll finally go to bed sometime around 4:00 in the morning.  I can’t go to bed without putting that piece in, and now that piece should be easy, and then I’ll try that one, and I’m almost done with that part… you get the picture.

I want each and every one of us to have that same kind of commitment to ministry.  It’s easy to give up on the puzzle when it gets tough, to go find something more entertaining.  I don’t know if people still do puzzles—they’re probably too old-fashioned for a lot of people now.  There aren’t many electronics and flashing lights on puzzles.  We do the same to Christianity we don’t read the Bible or pray because there are more entertaining things to do.  We don’t serve others because it will involve giving up some of the things we like to do.  We place ourselves at the center of our own story and, when we do, focusing on others isn’t very appealing.  But when we recognize that it’s God’s story, to which he has called us to take part, we can set our ego aside.  We can serve others.  We can involve ourselves in lives of ministry with passion, constantly reaching out, not to earn God’s love, but because we’re so grateful for his love that we can’t stop—‘just one more piece’ in the puzzle of God’s kingdom, doing whatever we can with all the life we have to proclaim God’s work of peace, love and justice through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Let us pray

Gethsemani Abbey

  It's hard to define grace at times.  I know that it's a free gift, but it's hard to put that into terms in a world so caught up in the idea that there is no such thing as a free lunch.
  But this past weekend was grace.  It was a gift, and one I was so grateful for.

  I spent the weekend at Gethsemani Abbey, near Bardstown, KY.  I'd been making plans to spend some time there for two years, and it all finally fell into place.  I give thanks for a gracious and wonderful wife who encourages me to go and do such things, and as hard as it was to leave Rachel & Caleb behind for a weekend, I knew that the time at the abbey would be time well spent.

  I just didn't know how wonderful it would be.

  It's hard to describe what life at the abbey is like.  It's so easy to pray there.  I noticed it while I was there, and it's been compounded since I have been back.  There are no pressing things to do at the abbey.  There aren't a million other distractions that float in and out of your mind while you pray.  There isn't anything tempting you away from time in prayer.  You can just sit and be in prayer, sit in silence and let the love of God wash over you, sit and pour your heart out to Christ.  It's wonderful, and I don't know if I'll be able to duplicate it at home.  I will certainly try, but an unscheduled weekend is a rare commodity, especially in a world of sermons and Bible studies!

  There is a bit of a schedule--they do pray the hours there, which are a welcome distraction.  Some of these last fifteen minutes, some last up to an hour, depending on which service it is.  I went to the Vigil service at 3:15 AM once.  I thought it would be a quiet, dark, short prayer service.  The lights in the church were on full blast, and the service lasted an hour!  It was nice, but I couldn't fall back asleep afterward, meaning that I was pretty tired the next day.

  I spent a lot of time in prayer while at the abbey.  I rested some and caught up on some reading.  My primary goal had been to let the love of God embrace me, and I had a wonderful experience of God's love.  I took a walk to their sculpture garden and spent some time before a beautiful statue of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemani... I imagined Christ embracing me, wrapping his arms around me and letting his love complete me.  It was pure gift, and I'll hold that memory in my heart.  When the winds of the world buffet my life, I'll return to that place, to that feeling of warmth and grace, and let the love of Christ hold me up.

  I give thanks that there are those individuals who are called to the monastic life, who dedicate their lives to prayer for others.  I certainly am not... I can't sing on key, and they do a lot of singing.  They go through the entire Psalter every two weeks!  I imagine that the wife and child would eliminate me as well.  It's a wonderful life to join with for a period of time, but as I rejoin the world I pray that I have the dedication to continue to spend time in prayer, to continue to let the love of God wash over me, lift me up and send me outward.  I pray that the unhurried pace of life there will somehow open my eyes to the rush in which I too often find myself, and that I will slow down, take a deep breath, and trust Christ to lead me forward, single step by single step, and that I do not have to do everything at once.  I hope to continue to grow and mature in Christ, but it is a process that takes decades, not minutes.  I hope that I will find the wisdom and revelation to slow down, to breathe, and let God do a work in me.

11-15 E-News

Announcements

Thanksgiving Lunch—Thursday, Nov. 22 @ 2:00 at the church. Please talk to JoAn Wright if you're interested in joining this wonderful tradition.

Wednesday Night Suppers—There will be no Wed. Night Supper next week, Nov. 21. The following week, guests associated with Fair Trade products will present on the work of the church through fair trade, and they'll also bring some products to sell that would be great Christmas gifts!

New Hope News

Sunday School—This Sunday, the adult class with discuss generosity.

Pray For:

Lynn Meyer

The new elders of New Hope—Larrie, Walt, Pete & JoAn.

Give thanks. Think about how you might display your gratitude to the world.

Pray for those who do not know Christ.

Links

The Common Good

What Christianity can look like

Do we need a food ethic?

Yes, I'd like to see Skyfall. I feel like The Line might be a more effective use of time, though.

Some info on the neighbors

The Grateful Gobbler is November 22. (Monies raised go to support Chattanooga Regional Homeless Coalition.

Keith's Random Thoughts

I don't ask for prayers very often, but I would be most grateful if you would take a moment or two to lift me up before our God in heaven. See, I'm going to be spending a few days at Gethsemani Abbey, a Trappist monastery in Kentucky. It's a place of silent retreat, meant to cultivate the growth of the soul. I'm greatly looking forward to my time there, hopeful that Christ will do a work in me—I'm hoping that He will slow me down, calm me down, enough to hear his voice.

I have many hopes for my time there. I hope to have my sins revealed, that I may repent of them and turn from them. I hope to see where my own brokenness is preventing Christ's work through me, that I may get out of the way of grace. I hope to vision forward, to see how the Lord is calling me to serve. I hope to rest, secure in the love of our eternal God.

I have many hopes, but I also need to set them aside and let God do a work. I want to let God lead me, to use the time as God sees fit. I could effectively design a retreat that left out room for God, therein defeating the entire purpose. I'm taking some books and journals, but in the end I simply desire stillness before God, that the love and power of God may surround me and entice my soul to lay down the burdens it has picked up and revel in the amazing love of God. I hope to worship unencumbered, to be without restraint, to listen without anxiety and grow as a disciple.

So I ask for your prayers. I shall spend much time in prayer there, and perhaps the Lord might speak to all of us, calling us back to him, back to faithfulness, and together we might walk the road that Christ has set before us.

Thank you.

Text for this Sunday

2 Kings 2:1-13

Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. Elijah said to Elisha, “Stay here; for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel.” But Elisha said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So they went down to Bethel. The company of prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha, and said to him, “Do you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?” And he said, “Yes, I know; keep silent.” Elijah said to him, “Elisha, stay here; for the Lord has sent me to Jericho.” But he said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So they came to Jericho. The company of prophets who were at Jericho drew near to Elisha, and said to him, “Do you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?” And he answered, “Yes, I know; be silent.” Then Elijah said to him, “Stay here; for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan.” But he said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So the two of them went on. Fifty men of the company of prophets also went, and stood at some distance from them, as they both were standing by the Jordan. Then Elijah took his mantle and rolled it up, and struck the water; the water was parted to the one side and to the other, until the two of them crossed on dry ground.

When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me what I may do for you, before I am taken from you.” Elisha said, “Please let me inherit a double share of your spirit.” He responded, “You have asked a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it will be granted you; if not, it will not.” As they continued walking and talking, a chariot of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them, and Elijah ascended in a whirlwind into heaven. Elisha kept watching and crying out, “Father, father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!” But when he could no longer see him, he grasped his own clothes and tore them in two pieces.

He picked up the mantle of Elijah that had fallen from him, and went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan. He took the mantle of Elijah that had fallen from him, and struck the water, saying, ‘Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?’ When he had struck the water, the water was parted to the one side and to the other, and Elisha went over.

NewHopeChattanooga.org

New Hope on Facebook & Twitter

New Hope on iTunes

Keith's Blog & Devotionals for your Kindle

Veterans' Day Thoughts

  Yesterday was Veterans' Day, a time set aside for slowing down and giving thanks for those who have served this country and those who continue to do so.  I've always had a lot of respect for the Armed Forces--as a kid who spent his formative years reading Tom Clancy novels, the Armed Forces was always portrayed as powerful and fast, two aspects that tend to capture the fascination of little boys.  As I've grown, I've continued to admire those who have chosen to go and serve.  I was ready to enlist as a chaplain in the Air Force Reserves at one point, but the unpredictability of it scared me off, as well as the requirement of one weekend a month, a sacrifice that would be quite challenging as a solo pastor in a small church.  The decision to serve is not an easy one, and I am grateful for those who have chosen to make it, often placing their own lives in harm's way so that others may enjoy the freedoms that come with living in this country.

  As I was lying in bed this morning, I was thinking about what it means to honor those who serve. It's an easy thing to say thank you once, but it's much harder to live in a way that reflects our gratitude.  In essence, this is the struggle of Christianity, too--how to express gratitude continuously, rather than just doing so on certain occasions.

  It seems to me that one way to honor the service of our veterans is to live in such a way that strives for peace.  We certainly look forward to the day when our guns will no longer be needed, and when we will no longer have to send men and women to places where death looms around every unknown corner.  While the reality of sin mean we will not achieve this until Christ returns, we can do our best to strive for this now, to live for peace and work for peace, urging peaceful solutions to the conflicts that arise as well as reaching out to political leaders in the hopes that they, too, might lift their voices and work for peace.  Perhaps the cries for peace would be so overwhelming that the ears of those who sow violence would be overwhelmed by those who surround them.  Perhaps the seeds of hatred that have been planted would be trampled by feet that are willing to serve and to love, selflessly, and war will be no more.

  I know that such dreams are too lofty for these chaotic times.  We have been at war in Afghanistan for far too long.  There is war in Syria, and turbulence in many other spots around the globe.  Peace seems like a distant dream.

  But Christ has promised to bring us peace at the last.  We can dream of it, we can hope of it, because our dreams and hopes are rooted in him.  We will not need guns to achieve peace--the Son of Man will come riding on the clouds, and death and violence will be no more.  May our very lives reflect this hope--may we demonstrate to the world a little slice of what peace looks like, that our love may overwhelm.

Sermon for 11/11/12

1 Kings 19:19-21 

  So he set out from there, and found Elisha son of Shaphat, who was ploughing. There were twelve yoke of oxen ahead of him, and he was with the twelfth. Elijah passed by him and threw his mantle over him. He left the oxen, ran after Elijah, and said, ‘Let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you.’ Then Elijah said to him, ‘Go back again; for what have I done to you?’ He returned from following him, took the yoke of oxen, and slaughtered them; using the equipment from the oxen, he boiled their flesh, and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out and followed Elijah, and became his servant.

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I was going to begin this sermon with an illustration from one of my favorite movies, The Hunt for Red October. But no one has seen it. I tried to make Rachel watch it, and she fell asleep halfway through. So we're going to reach a little farther back in history...

When the Spaniards were invading Mexico, they had a leader named Hernan Cortes. He was a leader who made some enemies, and some of the men in his expedition decided to overthrow him, probably to claim riches for themselves. When Cortes learned about their plans to take over the expedition and sail back to Cuba, he had all of his ships taken out to sea and sunk. This demonstrative action destroyed any path backward—the only way the expedition could go was forwards. It was decisive and complete, and there would be no looking back.

It's tempting to look back. It's an easy thing to do—we can spend our entire lives looking over our shoulders, wondering what might have been or what could have happened. We can invest all of our energy into reliving previous experiences. Of course, if we do so, we miss out on most of what life offers today. Looking back has a real cost to it.

Now, there is some benefit in looking back. Obviously, we're preaching out of a book written almost 2,000 years ago, telling a story of an event that happened well before that. We value our history—but we don't live in history. We let our history inform and guide us in the present, but as the faithful people of God, we're called to discern what God is doing in the world and in our lives today. God is on the move, and he wants us to be a part of it.

So we can't spend all of our energy looking back. We'll miss the doors God is calling us to walk through today.

Cortes was aware of the danger of looking back. He knew that if he destroyed his ships, the decisive action would force his troops to look forward. There would be no going back.

In today's story, the prophet Elijah is told by God to call Elisha as his servant, that Elisha may one day assume Elijah's ministry. So Elijah goes and calls Elisha, but Elisha has a life. He has a job and responsibilities. There is a lot for him to leave behind. Elisha might have spent his entire life looking back at what might have been without a decisive action, so he takes an action to sever his ties with his old life—before leaving the fields, he slaughters his oxen and feeds them to his fellow workers. Once his oxen are gone, there is no going back for Elisha. He has said goodbye to the old, and he is looking ahead to the new. A serious action pushed him out into the world to follow Elijah into ministry, and all he has now is the way forward.

Now, we could go one of two ways with this, and I think there's value in both. One of the possibilities is to talk about what the oxen are in your life that you need to leave behind in order to go forward into the life God is calling you to live. Maybe you have something that you're in the midst of that is preventing you from entering fully into the ministry you feel called into. That's an oxen that needs to be slaughtered. When Christ calls us, he calls us into the new, and he often calls us to give up something. It's not going to be easy, but each of us can examine our lives to see if there is something we need to give up. Might be a habit or a particular sin of which we are fond—whatever it may be, I pray that you have the courage to set it down and move forward.

The other path we could go, though, and the one that I think is the most helpful, is to remember the actions of God, for God has acted decisvely when it comes to dealing with the past. Let's talk about Jesus Christ.

See, we all have sin in our past. We all have sins in our lives. It's part of being human—we're imperfect. We can't live the perfect Christian life like we want to—sin gets in the way. For many of us, there are very different sins, but each of us has our own sins. And it would be easy to spend our entire lives beating ourselves up, berating ourselves for our faults. We could be so incredibly negative that all of our energy would be invested in looking back in regret.

But God has acted, and done so with great drama. In Jesus Christ, God sent his own Son to sever the power sin has over us. In this one dramatic act, God destroys sins power and breaks the bonds our sinful pasts have over us. In doing so, he promises each of us that our sins will not have power over us—we don't have to look back upon them. In Christ's atoning death, he releases us from a life of regret and pain and releases us into freedom—freedom to be used for God, a responsibility to others to proclaim the truth that sin no longer has power over us. Our past will not determine our destiny.

So Christ has acted to sever our ties with our sinful pasts. We are released from the need to atone for our sins.

What are we released into?

This is where we can marvel at this story. I believe that we are freed from sin and death for a purpose—to be at work in the world, helping others to come to know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. And the way that happens is personal relationships.

Notice the call of Elisha. Elisha's out working in the field, guiding his oxen along with 11 other workers. Then Elijah shows up and invites him into a wild life of ministry. What does Elisha do? He agrees! He gives up his steady, stable job and chooses to follow God. Elijah's personal relationship is the tool God uses to bring Elisha into ministry.

Let's recognize something here—God was at work in Elisha long before Elijah showed up. This was part of God's plan—and he was just using Elijah to call Elisha to claim Elisha's role in God's story. God was at work in Elisha's heart and his life long before Elijah appears on the scene.

In the same way, you and I are each called, as disciples, to form personal relationships with other people. Some of these people will not be Christians. And so we are called to be a witness to them—to show them selfless love. God is at work in these people. We're called to help them see God at work. It's not about us—it's about us getting out of the way and letting God do a work in them through us. We are the channels God uses to reach out to others. Evangelism is about building up personal relationships and letting God use those for his glory, for his purposes. Elisha was called through a personal relationship—not by anything Elijah did, but by what God did through Elijah.

So let God use you in the same way. Build relationships and see what God does. Look for openings to talk about your faith—and let God do the heavy-lifting. Amazing things will happen.

Let us pray 

11/8 E-News

Announcements

Shoeboxes—These are due this Sunday! Please remember to bring them in.

Relief Drive—The Samaritan Center, Adventist Disaster Relief and Bill Brown Trucking are partnering to collect donations for the Hurricane Sandy relief efforts. A truck will be set up as a donation drop-off point at the Samaritan Center from 10am to 6pm on Tuesday, November 6 thru Monday, November 12. A list of items that will be welcome is available on the Samaritan Center's website. Thank you for helping us come together to share with our brothers and sisters in New England!

New Hope News

Sunday School—This Sunday, the adult class with study the book of Habakkuk.

Men's Breakfast—Saturday, November 10th @ 8 am. We've got something exciting to talk about!

Pray For:

Lynn Meyer

Roger Meyer & Linda Brandon, as they heal from their surgeries

All those who are un-employed & under-employed

Pray for those who do not know Christ.

Links

Church & State for the Homeless

A question for every man and father

A new idea: the un-sale

How exercise affects your lifespan

The Grateful Gobbler is November 22. (Monies raised go to support Chattanooga Regional Homeless Coalition.

Keith's Random Thoughts

In case you spent your week watching the live feed from Loch Ness in search of the monster, there was a little election that went on Tuesday. Barack Obama won, Mitt Romney lost, and Roseanne Barr received 21,000 votes.

Much has been written about the reasons Obama won and the reasons Romney lost. I don't know how much has been written about the reasons Roseanne had 21,000 people voting for her. One of the things I've heard from many corners is that the Republicans lost because the party hasn't responded to the shifting demographics of the country. You and I can both pick apart this argument and examine its merits and downsides, but I think it's more helpful to examine whether the same can be said about the church. You don't read this for my political thoughts, anyway.

Today, the church in America looks out the window and sees a very different world than it did thirty years ago. Society has changed. Families look different, and they interact differently, too. Schedules are based around soccer, and the family meal is often the exception rather than the rule. Sundays are often no different than Saturdays, another hectic day. Several states voted to legalize recreational marijuana use, while others voted to allow gay marriage. The world is changing.

The church worships a sovereign God who is still Lord of all of life. God hasn't handed over the reins to go on vacation. God hasn't given up on us. God still wants to use his disciples as channels through which to announce the Good News of God's Kingdom to the world. All of it. Including every single person in this country.

But we need to take some time and examine our hearts. The minor prophets talk repeatedly about how God wanted the hearts of the people, and if their hearts were turned from God, the worship of the people was empty.

Are our hearts focused and centered on God? Is the church today passionately in love with God? Or is church a habit, a routine? Is God the Lord of every moment of your life, or someone to whom we turn in a crisis?

As the church falls in love with Christ, we recognize that Christ leads us out to love the world, to embrace the world, to flee from our own sin and embrace God's holiness, letting God's Spirit set our agenda and our values. Then, we live a Christ-centered life, one that is focused on selfless love of the other. We stop worrying about ourselves and pick up the needs of those around us. We demonstrate to the world a church that is absolutely relevant. We show them a God who cares about every need, from drug abuse to broken homes to underemployment to overwhelming debt, and we demonstrate a Christ who has love enough to meet every true need that we have and who helps reveal to us the lies that bind us.

I don't have all the answers. But I know the church has some self-examination to do, and we need to focus our eyes on Christ and run our race with faithfulness and passion, that Christ might use us to reach out to a changing world.

Text for this Sunday

1 Kings 19:19-21

So he set out from there, and found Elisha son of Shaphat, who was plowing. There were twelve yoke of oxen ahead of him, and he was with the twelfth. Elijah passed by him and threw his mantle over him. He left the oxen, ran after Elijah, and said, ‘Let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you.’ Then Elijah said to him, ‘Go back again; for what have I done to you?’ He returned from following him, took the yoke of oxen, and slaughtered them; using the equipment from the oxen, he boiled their flesh, and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out and followed Elijah, and became his servant.

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Sermon for 11-4-12

1 Kings 19:9b-18

Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ He answered, ‘I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.’

Elijah Meets God at Horeb

 He said, ‘Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for theLord is about to pass by.’ Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence.When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ He answered, ‘I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.’ Then the Lord said to him, ‘Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus; when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael as king over Aram. Also you shall anoint Jehu son of Nimshi as king over Israel; and you shall anoint Elisha son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah as prophet in your place. Whoever escapes from the sword of Hazael, Jehu shall kill; and whoever escapes from the sword of Jehu, Elisha shall kill. Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.’

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Rachel and I went out to dinner on Wednesday evening. It was lovely. Well, except for the part where we can't have a normal conversation because we're busy trying to keep Caleb from fussing too much. We still haven't grown accustomed to that feature of parenthood quite yet. We thought about leaving him at home, but I read somewhere you should wait until they're 2 to do that.

But I'd like you to picture yourself sitting at the table next to us, observing us eat dinner. Now, imagine that we went through the entire dinner and I was the only one that said anything. Imagine that I talked and talked and talked, and every time Rachel started to interject, I talked over her.

What would you think about me?

What would you assume about our relationship?

What would you recommend that we do?

The first thing you might do is offer the suggestion that Rachel could do much better. When she insisted that she wasn't going to try and was devoted to me, you'd shake your head, wondering why, and turn to me, telling me to shape up and pay attention. You'd tell me that it was clear that she was wiser than I, and that I should listen more than I talk. You'd leave the restaurant wondering what she was doing with me, right?

Well, think about your prayer life and your relationship to God. Think about your life as a continual conversation between you and God. How would you describe the relationship? Is it balanced? Or has it become, over the years, a little one-sided? Do you dominate the conversation, or do you leave room in your life for God to speak?

Friends, I'm not going to pretend that I know exactly what the voice of God sounds like. I know that it's strong enough to split the cedars, and I know that there is real power in God's Word, but I've never heard the voice of God speaking clearly from the heavens. I'm also not going to tell you that if you're silent for five minutes, God's voice will suddenly start echoing around the room. But I am going to tell you that you need to cultivate rhythms and patterns in your life that leave room for God to speak. I'm going to say that we each need silence in our lives, we need places to just be, to be still, and give God the chance to speak. We often complain about how we don't hear God's voice—but do we spend as much time listening as we do talking? My mother always told me I have two ears and one mouth because I'm supposed to listen twice as much as I speak. But it seems like my prayer life is comprised of me telling God a lot of things and never bothering to give God the chance to tell me a few things. I dominate the conversation, and I'm finished when I need to be somewhere else, rarely leaving God the opportunity to respond to my supplications. It's childish, really.

So we're going to focus on patterns, on rhythms, on cultivating a two-part relationship with the living God of heaven and earth.

Notice what happens in our story today.

Elijah gets word that the Lord is going to pass by. This is the same mountain where Moses and the Israelites began their journey into the wilderness. Here on the mountain God hands down the 10 Commandments to Moses. Here on the mountain God descends and reveals his holy presence to Moses. God has a history of showing up on this mountain. What's the lesson here? Find the places in your life that cultivate a sense of the holy and go back to them. Don't always be searching out new places because you think the old ones are used up—places with a history tend to also have a future.

So Elijah hears word that God is going to appear, and Elijah was in a cave. Before God appeared, however, there was quite a commotion outside that cave. There was a wind, a wind so strong that mountains and rocks fell before it. This was a wind of apocalyptic strength, of intensity and violence, and yet Elijah waited in his cave, because the Lord wasn't in the wind.

Then there was an earthquake and a fire, and through it all, Elijah waited. He was patient before the Lord, trusting that he would know when it was that God would reveal himself.

It was only after all the storms and chaos passed that there was a silence. A silence made even starker by the turbulence that had preceded it. This silence was so striking that it was here that Elijah realized God would be, and so he went out of his cave and waited on the Lord.

Here, at the entrance to his cave, he heard God speak.

Only then does he respond.

Then, after responding, God sends him out with a mission.

There is a rhythm here. There is a pattern, one that we can cultivate. Listen again.

Elijah trusts that the Lord will fulfill his promise. He then waits through the chaos, then going out in the midst of silence and listening for the Lord. Once the Lord speaks, Elijah then responds, and after his response God sends him out.

I've talked a lot recently about the importance of trusting in the Lord. He will fulfill his promises. He will be faithful to us. That's a part of his unchanging nature—he is absolutely reliable and trustworthy. We gathered on Tuesday to celebrate this fact—that Marcia Young passed through the shadow of death and into life everlasting. God is faithful to his promises. In John, Jesus promises that none of those entrusted to him will be lost. So trust God—he is active and working in your life.

So we trust in the Lord, and then we have to discern when he is speaking. This is the tough part for us, especially for the North American church in the 21st century. It's a loud world. We have loud lives. We are constantly bombarded by noise. We have a strong desire to be entertained, and the interests competing for our attention believe the best way to obtain it is to shout louder than everything else. What this leads to is an increasingly noisy world in which it is harder and harder to discern what God is saying.

So what to do?

The first step is for us to recognize all of the noise in our lives. Many of us are so accustomed to it that we scarcely notice it anymore. Many of us leave the television or radio on for background noise—we're completely unaccustomed to silence. It's cultural.

Think about a football game. I'd imagine all of you have, at some point, either attended a football game or watched one on tv. The first thing you notice is how loud it is. At a game, you are surrounded by fans, cheering at the game or yelling at each other. There are ads all over the stadium and a thousand things to grab your attention. It's interesting to take Caleb out in such settings—he gets so visually overstimulated he can barely take it all in. Watching him be overstimulated makes me aware of how much there is to see. If you're not at the stadium and watching it on tv, it's still loud. There are still commercials to grab your attention. There are announcers to tell you what you're watching. There are the sounds of grown men running into each other. It's loud.

And America loves it. It's loud. It's entertaining. We have a need to be entertained. From football games to movies to television shows to websites, we love to be entertained. And there's nothing wrong with good entertainment.

Except when it's not feeding us, when we're not engaged and growing, and empty entertainment is just consuming our time and our energy and it's not art, just time-killers. When large chunks of our time go into being entertained, we're losing something. We're cultivating unhealthy patterns, passively watching life go by.

It's chaos, no different than the storms outside Elijah's cave. God is not in a lot of the junk entertainment that is out there. We need to be vigilant, be watchful, be alert.

We need some silence, too.

We need to create space for God to speak to us, to call us out of our caves and into the world, to send us out. We need this—we need to find places and ways in our lives to be passive before God, to let God speak, to listen for his voice. We need to make sure that our lives, all of them, are conversations between ourselves and God—so we need to listen as much as we speak. It may not be entertaining—but it's soul work, hard work, and it's so important, because it's how we grow. It's how we are led. It's how we receive our guidance from God—but we need to make sure that we can hear God speaking. If the volume in our lives is turned up to full blast and we don't ever bother to turn it down, how can we ever expect to hear the voice of God? It's like shouting at someone for an hour and then wondering why they don't respond. They may well have responded, but you didn't bother to listen for their answer.

Friends, God wants to speak into your lives, into your hearts, and guide you, call you out of whatever cave you are in and send you into the world on a mission, to join with the faithful ones and transform the world.

But in order for you to hear your marching orders, you need to be still and wait upon the Lord. You need to cultivate silence, quiet, so that you can hear God's voice speaking into the madness of our loud world. You need to create rhythms and patterns in your life so that you are continually in conversation with God, praying and listening, hearing and responding, letting God guide you in all you do.

Let us pray     

Witness to the Resurrection of Marcia Young

We are gathered together this day to celebrate the life of Marcia Young. In order to do this properly, we have to celebrate her whole life, not only the last five years of it. We have to celebrate the youthful energy she had as a girl, the academic life she had at Tennessee Tech, the encouragement she offered a young man to graduate. That young man would go on to become her husband, Ron, and they would spend almost 44 years together, raising two daughters, Sarah and Laurie, and seeing the arrival of grandchildren, from Elizabeth and Lydia to the birth of Amelia a little more than a year ago.

Marcia was a fiercely independent woman, a woman who viewed life without limits and sought to pass those traits along. She loved to volunteer for Sunday School and Vacation Bible School, preferring to help with the crafts if she could. She drove for as long as she could, figuring out how to take herself to the grocery store even when a wheelchair was required to walk the aisles. She was not going to let a disease get in the way of living her life for as long as she had control over it. She refused to be a specimen, refused to complain about the lot that she had been dealt. Most Friedrich's patients die in their 30s—today we celebrate a woman who made it well into her 6th decade of life.

How did she make it that long? That independence and determination certainly played a key role. She refused to give up and simply let life slip away. She was determined to stay active in the lives of Ron and her children, and they returned her devotion, often asking 'How can Momma come?' when an opportunity arose, making sure that their destination was wheelchair accessible.

As far as her independence could carry her, though, she needed some help. Luckily, she had chosen for a husband a man who would faithfully stay by her side, day and night, every step of the journey, from Tennessee Tech to Chattanooga, walking with her when they could, carrying her when that was needed, attending to her every need with faithful devotion. Marcia was blessed to have Ron in her life, to have someone to depend on when her own strength was failing her.

Dependence can be a scary thing, especially for people who cling to independence. Each of us, no matter how determined we are to be independent, will find ourselves dependent on someone else at some point in our lives. We can only go so far on our own. At times, our bodies fail us, our minds fail us, the world fails us—and we find ourselves in need of assistance, in need of a shoulder to lean upon, in need of someone to help us carry the burdens we have accumulated along the way.

Fortunately, though there are plenty of people in this world who can help us along the way, we worship a God who promises to never let us down, to always abide with us, to walk with us along the journey of life and carry us when our own strength fails us. Our God promises to never let us fail—and he offers his shoulder, promising that when we are weak and weary, he will offer us rest.

God invites us into his rest during this life, and while we get glimpses of it here and there, it is only after passing through the shadow of death where we fully enter into his rest, where we dwell in God's unapproachable light, where we are made whole. Revelation 21 tells us that God himself will be with us, wiping the tears away from our eyes, and that death will have been defeated—not by anything we have done, but rather by what Christ has done on the cross. In the cross we see the fullness of God's love, a love that reaches out to us, that beckons us to come, to worship, to rest.

It is this rest that Marcia has entered into. It is this rest that we are all invited into. It is a rest that lasts forever, that never changes, that awaits those who believe. In 1 Corinthians Paul tells us that at the sound of that trumpet, the dead will be raised, and that we will all be changed. Our perishable bodies, each and every one of them, will put on imperishability, immortality. Marcia's body has been transformed just as your body and my body will be—our earthly bodies will be swallowed up in the resurrection and we will have resurrection bodies, bodies made for eternity, bodies made to worship, to dwell in the holy and awesome light and love of God. In the resurrection accounts of the Gospels, when the disciples encounter the risen Lord, they often struggle to identify him at first—he has a body, but something about it has changed, has been transformed. It's no longer the same—in resurrection, we are changed.

Friends, Marcia has entered into this rest. She has lived well, loved freely. She has been loved on this earth and has been supported by her family and friends. Her Savior walked with her every step of the way, and when her body gave up the fight, her Savior transformed her perishable body into an imperishable one.

This is the invitation given to each and every one of us—to let Christ transform us, in this life and the one to come. We're invited to lay our burdens upon him, to gather around the cross, and marvel at the God who creates life out of a place of death. God has defeated death, and he welcomes each and every believer into his eternal and imperishable kingdom.

Let us pray