We’ve just witnessed another changing of the guard as we do every 4 – 8 years. However, this one was historic and in some ways monumental.
For some teary-eyed elderly African-Americans, it signals the fulfillment of a dream few dared to hope would ever come true: a black man in the white house, a symbolic end to years of very real and very unjust treatment of their race, and the thrill of victory after the agony of long defeat.
For others, it was the transition from 8 years of George W. Bush whom the main stream media has relentlessly schooled Americans to hate for his “hawkish” diplomacy and his conservative moral values.
For others, it was the fragile hope that this was “a change they could believe in” and a new chapter in American progress toward something they can’t quite define but still hope to experience.
As a Christian, I appreciate the significance of a fairly elected president from a minority race whose past has been one of oppression and exploitation. But I fear that no living man, regardless of skin color, education, political experience, rhetorical skills, or brilliance, is equal to the near messianic expectations of Barack Obama’s euphoric supporters.
Do I hope he fails? I hope his promise of a quick enactment of FOCA will fail, I hope his promise to normalize the gay-lesbian lifestyle will fail. But I hope the man will grow as a statesman, mature as a leader, and come to embrace a personal faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. I hope his family will thrive and not fragment in their “White House experience”. I hope and pray that he will succeed in brokering a measure of peace in a world ripped apart by violence and hatred. I hope and pray that in 4 years Christian men and women like myself who are pro-life, pro-marriage, and pro-biblical values, will have good reason to affirm his re-election.
So I offer this prayer:
Our Father who is in Heaven, may your name be regarded with awe and held in reverence because you alone are holy. May your kingdom come and your will be done on earth just as it is being done in heaven!
We delight and trust in your complete sovereignty over the affairs of all nations, including our beloved United States of America. We fully acknowledge your elevation of President Barack Obama as the sovereignly appointed means to fulfill your glorious purposes. We firmly believe that our times are in your hands and we take great comfort in the truth that, “the king’s heart is like channels of water in the hand of the Lord” (Proverbs 21:1). Our confidence is in you alone and we stand before you admitting our constant need for your provision, wisdom, and protection.
We thank you for free and orderly elections, for economic prosperity, and for religious liberties long enjoyed. We savor the satisfaction of electing an African-American to the highest office in a land where few had dared to dream of such a day. We pray that this choice will be more than symbolic and that racial tensions and hatreds will truly be resolved and that we will achieve, by your grace, a national unity that is more than political rhetoric.
We ask, Father, that you would preserve our president from the hatred and calumny often heaped on our more visible leaders, that his family would be strengthened and not fractured by the very conspicuous nature of their new life and that his daughters would find sanctuary from the inevitable scrutiny that comes with their father’s office. We also pray that our president would give serious attention to the life-transforming claims of your gospel and that your Spirit would draw him to a personal relationship with your Son as Redeemer and Lord.
Father, we sincerely and earnestly pray that you would turn the will of our new president from his aggressively stated purpose to enact sweeping legislation making it easy for unborn children to be ruthlessly slaughtered in our nation’s health care facilities and nearly impossible to legislate in their defense. We plead mercy for the unborn and hitherto unprotected in this culture otherwise biased toward protection.
May we, your children and servants represent you and your kingdom values well as we live as citizens, vote as freemen, and serve as neighbors. Where we need to disagree, grant us the grace to do so with dignity, moral clarity, and a firm voice. As we have reason to agree, let us be the first to point out successes and affirm good decisions. Deliver us from the mean-spirited criticism that attacks people and not problems and give us wisdom to offer solutions respectfully. Above all, Lord, grant your servants boldness to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ, share the love of our Savior to those less fortunate than ourselves, and set our hopes fully on the grace that is to appear at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Father, please heal our nation, guide the minds and hands of our leaders, and keep us looking for the blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the Great God and our Savior, Jesus Christ. A-men
Time is a stewardship from a loving God who made us for his glory and fully intends that we will prove faithful with this trust. Unlike talents, IQ, wealth, and spiritual gifts, God gives us all the same measure of time. The plain fact is that I am more busy than some and less than others. So wouldn’t it seem logical that God would distribute time according to need. If God is a fiscal capitalist (traditional assumption of Western Christians), why does he seem to be a socialist when it comes to time? Much of my frustration and a large measure of my angst comes from having more “to do’s” than time to do them.
Years ago I heard Dr. Earnest Pickering preaching on WCTS radio and he said something very close to these words: “God gives every one of us the same amount of time and he gives us all that we need to accomplish what he intends for us to do. Therefore, if we find ouselves running out of time it’s because we’re trying to do things he never intended for us to do.”
This makes me want to pull in a long deep breath, settle back in my chair, and consider which of the things on my list I should run a line through so as to rediscover spiritual joy!
But wait! There’s a spoiler I forgot to mention–efficiency in the use of God’s gifts is critical to proper stewardship also. Is it possible that I’m running out of time for undisclosed reasons like failing to stay focused on the immediate task, over-googling, slavish attention to emails, or too many “power lunches”?
The story of the visiting magi has taken on new meaning for me this year. Since Dennis was planning to preach on the visit of the wise men from Arabia (Matthew 2:1-12), I read the text through a couple time looking for the “big picture” so I could build a worship plan for Sunday morning. What emerged from the text and from Dennis’ exposition was the stunning realization that God is MUCH more intentional about worship than any of us are. Consider:
A prophetic word regarding a “star” 1,000 yrs before it appears
Men looking for that star and discovering it hundreds of miles from Bethlehem
A major trans-desert expedition involving a year of more of round-trip travel
Lavish gifts
Men of significance prostrating themselves before a 2 year old child in a peasant’s home
All of this was a worship event orchestrated by a sovereign God who is “seeking such people to worship him” (John 4:23). This narrative tells us much less about unnamed “magi” than it tells us about God and particularly about his view of worship. Worship is not an event that commences with the first verse of a worship chorus in a worship center during a scheduled worship event, but the stirring of Godward affections in the soul of a believer immersing himself in Scripture, giving thoughtful meditation to its themes, and delighting in all that God discloses of himself in both Word and world. As this happens in scores or hundreds of believers’ souls who then converge on a worship center for collective “overspill”, what a grand event this becomes. What can be bland takes on the energy and thrill of a heavenly foretaste!
I love the security of knowing that God is our Father and is committed to meeting every one of our needs, but Peter says we’re supposed to fear him (1 Pet. 1:17; cf 2:17).
OK, we’re supposed to fear God full time, but our lives are to be marked by joy, peace, hope, and love. How do these positive values not suffer loss when fear is added and how does fear remain fear in the presence of such positives?
The shepherds who first heard the news of Jesus’ birth were terrified by angels who told them to put away their fears in the face of joyful news (Luke 2:9-10). I guess anyone who sees an angel or angels is right to react with terror but once we are reconciled to God shouldn’t the joy of regeneration displace the terror of alienation?
Are we to do both at once like Jesus’ devoted women followers who came grieving to his tomb, heard news of his resurrection, and departed “with fear and great joy” (Mat. 28:8). What a mixed bag of incompatible emotions! How does one soul contain both at the same time?
Or how about three at once like the churches of Judea, Galilee, and Samaria who Luke describes as “enjoying peace . . . living in the fear of the Lord and the encouragement of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 9:31).
So, what kind of fear is it that I must embrace without damaging my peace, joy, encouragement, or hope?
Some of you will answer that biblical fear is what we call “reverence”. That does bring together some of the disconnects, but while the lexicons do list “reverence” as a possible meaning for phobos, it does not seem to fit the context of 1 Pet. 1:17.
Please share some of your thoughts while I harvest a few of my own. Thanks!
Eric Redmond is an African American pastor/theologian with keen insight into the Word and the culture. He was invited by Justin Taylor to share his thoughts on the election of Barak Obama. I heartily recommend a careful and thoughtful reading of his perspective. You can find it here.
Researchers at Oxford University have compiled a list of the top ten most irritating phrases:
1 – At the end of the day
2 – Fairly unique
3 – I personally
4 – At this moment in time
5 – With all due respect
6 – Absolutely
7 – It’s a nightmare
8 – Shouldn’t of
9 – 24/7
10 – It’s not rocket science
This is definitely going to affect my communication habits. I personally find several of these fairly unique and, with all due respect, some of them shouldn’t of been included but, at the end of the day it’s absolutely true that conversation is not rocket science but still deserves close monitoring 24/7.
They were trendy 20 years ago, they were fairly well accepted 15 years ago, and small groups seem to be around for the long haul. Why? Is it merely a necessary corollary of the mega church movement? Is it just that people can’t find meaningful connections in large churches? It’s pretty obvious that churches of 500 or more members/attendees cannot extend caring ministry, adequately disciple the undiscipled, or integrate everyone into a gift-specific ministries.
Truth be known, small groups may have found their genesis in the mega-church movement, but they find their genius in the New Testament. Few churches of any size are properly implementing the “one anothers” without some kind of small group configuration. They may have accountability groups, Bible study fellowships, Men’s Fraternity Groups, or prayer fellowships, but the “one anothers” simply cannot be done while sitting in rows facing a pulpit.
The writer of Hebrews makes a good case for small groups when he calls on his believing readers to “stir up one another to love and good works” and to “encourage one another” in their times of coming together (Heb. 10:24-25). Paul certainly had something like small groups or house fellowships in mind when he charged gifted leaders to “equip the saints for ministry” so that “when each part is working properly, [it] makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love” (Eph. 4:11-12, 16).
The congregational model is well suited for preaching and preaching is a vital part of church life. But a casual reading of the “one another” texts would never bring that same model to mind. Rather, the logical and intuitive configuration would look like 12-15 believers digesting truth, applying truth, discovering needs, setting in motion plans to meet those needs, praying specifically and passionately for each other, and encouraging each other with the great promises of God’s Word. Small groups may sound irreverently novel to Christians who love to be ministered to, but they sound necessary to those who insist on ministering to the body.
I have loved the psalms for years! It all started about the time my life became more predicamentarian (marked by predicaments). I had lived the lived the insulatarian (insulated from predicaments) life throughout my childhood and teen years. When the markets crashed, my parents took the hit. When medical bills shot the budget, they handled that too. When there was tension in the church, people didn’t criticize me, others felt the heat. My greatest crises was a flat tire on my bike more than 2 blocks from home! But, when I became a man I quickly transitioned from the insulatarian to the predicamentarian life. Then the Psalms became meaningful.
Suddenly, I realized that there was more to the Psalter than the 23rd and the 100th psalms. The church has a way of institutionalizing happy texts and ignoring the inspired complaints of godly people who are finding their friends treacherous, their circumstances painful, and their God silent and distant. I have never preached a sermon or heard a sermon on Psalm 109. I have never been in a worship service where it was the call to worship. At first reading the words and spirit of this psalm appear to fall considerably short of worship, reverence, or even entry-level spirituality. How do we justify inspired complaints revved up with poetic emotion and then offered for public worship? Given our current worship wars over choruses that fail the “reverence test”, imagine introducing a musical ballad with these lines: “Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rocks” (Psa. 137:9).
Words like this in a context of Babylonian exile were wrung from the tortured but trusting souls of suffering Jews whose ragged and unvarnished faith consisted in saying “no” to personal retaliation and remanding their persecutors to the God of lex talionis (Ex. 21:22-25; Lev. 24:17-22; Deut. 19:19-21). My issue with these psalms is beyond Theodicy–it’s a worship issue. Can the hymnbook of the Hebrews be used as a source or even a model for Christian worship? In my humble opinion, expressions of tenacious faith struggling against monstrous evil can be worship when all the vengeful options are left to God. That is the function of a faith that hopes in a God who is just and upholds his word and his law. Is not hope-filled faith a category in our worship index?
Suffering has value because it inclines us to thoughtful solitude (Lam. 3:28; Jer. 15:17; Psa. 4:4)
God has made man a social creature but sin tends to morph this blessing into a soul-twisting curse. For many, the very thought of prolonged seasons of quiet and solitary meditation is an intolerable disruption of their desperate need for amusement. Suffering is one tool of a kind and caring God to introduce his children to the value of God-focused solitude. Having preached the value of youthful affliction, Jeremiah counseled the atypical youthful response, “Let him sit alone in silence when it is laid on him” (Lam. 3:28). How can such solitude be beneficial?
1. Suffering grants respite from the normal flood of banality.
2. Overmuch conversation tends to evil.
3. Crowds typically prefer chipper talk over serious talk.
4. Meditation is not a group exercise.
5. Solitude is the most desirable venue for prayer.
The same prophet, who came to embrace affliction as a way of life, said, “I did not sit in the company of revelers, nor did I rejoice; I sat alone, because your hand was upon me, for you had filled me with indignation” (Jer. 15:17). David counseled those around him who were easily stirred to sinful responses by overmuch conversation to, “Stand in awe and sin not: commune with your own heart upon your bed and be still” (Psa. 4:2,4). This, he said, would lead to better and more holy actions, “Offer right sacrifices and put your trust in the Lord” (v 5).
My daughter and son-in-law announced to Lanette and me several weeks ago that we are going to have a grandchild in April, 2009. It’s been a terribly difficult bit of news to sit on while waiting for their permission to tell the world. I’m beginning to think that this is one of the real reasons why God has us here. God gives us children so we can shape, discipline, train, and prepare them to give us grandchildren so we can spoil, indulge, pamper, and enjoy them with little or no parenting skills needed. Ever hear of anyone taking a seminar called, “Growing Grand-kids God’s Way?” Never! I’ll admit I’m counting the days, reading no books, just saving money for candy, carnivals, drum sets, and an aerodynamic infant seat for my motorcycle! Not to worry, however, this child will be safe and healthy, because behind every irresponsible grandpa is a mature, clear thinking grandma–Lanette will be a stellar role model and bring balance to this otherwise problematic equation.