"...it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be MAGNIFIED in my body, whether by life or by death." Philippians 1:21 NKJV
I have a regular habit in my life to go outside on a clear night, lay down on my driveway, and look up at the stars. Stargazing causes me to dream, long, pray, worship, and wonder at their grandeur, beauty and the infinite glory of my creator's brilliant design. As I observe the vast blanket in the night sky riddled with pinprick little lights I wonder,"what do these stars really look like?" My limited knowledge in astronomy reminds me that there is vastly more to these little bright dots then meets my naked eye. So, occasionally I will bring out my high powered binoculars to get a better glimpse of what is really there. Someday, I would love to have a telescope to catch even a greater glimpse.
Recently, while gazing from my driveway at the night sky, my mind wandered to an amazing statement by the apostle Paul. When the apostle Paul thought of his time here on earth as he wrote to his beloved friends in Philippi, he wrote one of his most inspiring purpose statements, "now as always, Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether by life, or by death."
King David was a like minded, God entranced, God besotted, God loving man who echoed a very similar phrase: "I will magnify God with thanksgiving."(Psalm 69:30). Another time he sang in Psalm 34:3, "O magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt his name together," This was the heart cry of every Old Testament saint. Mary said in Luke 1:46, "My soul magnifies the Lord." And now it is the longing of every true Christian.
In Philippians 1:20 Paul applies this thought to his own experience, desiring that Christ will be magnified in his body whether by his life or his death. Paul wanted to magnify Christ in the way he lived, in the way he died, and he wanted to show it now and always in his body!
The word "magnify" can be used in two different senses. It can mean: make something appear greater than it is, as with a microscope or a magnifying glass. When I was a kid I used to love to take tiny spiders and put them under the microscope and see their frightening heads magnified. It would scare the daylights out of me. I am glad that spiders are so tiny.
Or it can mean, make something that may seem small or insignificant appear to be as great as it really is. This is what our great telescopes help us begin to do with the magnificent universe that once upon a time spilled over from the brim of God's glory. Look out at the those pinprick lights with a telescope and you begin seeing an amazing world that is vastly more glorious than what you see with the naked eye: nebula's, red giant stars, white dwarf stars, binary star systems, comets, distant and vast spiral galaxies, novas and supernovas and all are glorious to be seen.
So there are two kinds of magnifying: microscope magnifying and telescope magnifying. The one makes a small thing look bigger than it is. The other makes a big thing begin to look as big as it really is.
So when Paul Paul does not mean: "I will make a small God look bigger than He is. He means: "I will make a big God begin to look as big as He really is." We are not called to be microscopes, but telescopes. Christians are not called to be con men who magnify their product out of all proportion to reality when they know the competitor's product is far superior. There is nothing and nobody superior to God. And so the calling of those who love God is to make his greatness begin to look as great as it really is. The whole duty of the Christian can be summed up in this: feel, think and act in a way that will make God look as great as He really is. Be a telescope for the world of the infinite starry wealth of the glory of God.
We may think, “Christ is the Almighty God, Creator of the universe. How can I possibly magnify, exalt or glorify Him?” Think of Him as being a distant star. It may be more brilliant than our own sun, but to the human eye, it is just a dim speck in the night sky. To many in this world, Christ is that way. He is the very splendor of God, brighter than a billion suns. But the world does not see Him that way. So God has purposed that the believer is to be a telescope to bring the truth about Christ into view for the unbeliever. Through us, and especially through how we handle trials, Christ is magnified to a skeptical, unbelieving world. The calling of those who love God is to make his greatness begin to look as great as it really is.
Let us catch this purpose and it will revolutionize the kind of questions we ask in our daily lives. In view of Paul’s circumstances, it is remarkable that his main focus was not on getting released from prison, but rather on magnifying Christ. How can I magnify Christ in this situation, this relationship, this trial? If this world is going to see Christ, they will see Him in our lives. He will be revealed through our bodies. Paul desires that Christ “be magnified in my body” Our hands must be His hands, our eyes His eyes, our mouth His mouth our feet His feet. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6:19-20, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body”. In this life Christ must be exalted and magnified in the bodies of those who believe in Him, or He will not be magnified at all. The reason for this is that God dwells only within His children. And if He is to be seen at all in this life, He must be seen in the lives of those who know Him.
Isn't this wonderful? Does this excite you like it does me?
Paul's passion was that his tongue will speak warmly of his Savior. He will exalt his name in testimony, in prayer, and in preaching. His knees will bend before the great, high and holy Lord. His hands will be zealous in serving the cause of such a Friend. His feet will run messages for the Lord. His eyes will see His glories everywhere and His likeness in all his people. His ears will hear his word and in His heart there will be a melody of praise to Him. Always in his body he will exalt the Messiah.
Oh dear reader, you were made for this and you were redeemed for this. This is your purpose ordained by God for His glory and your soul’s satisfaction and delight! There will always be a serious or mild sickness in your soul until you embrace this calling. So be encouraged, be focused, Let Christ be Magnified Through You! “Now! Always!" says Paul. So let us Magnify Christ now and always no matter what.
Pastor Bill
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
Monday, October 25, 2010
WHAT IT MEANS TO RECEIVE CHRIST
"But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God" John 1:12 ESV
Recently I was discussing with a dear friend about the gospel and communicating it to others. So I asked my friend to share with me her understanding of the gospel. As she began sharing she threw out biblical terms such as glory, fellowship, sin, wrath, judgement, redemption,God's righteousness, holy, grace,believe, receive, and repent. When I pretended I was a non-Christian and asked her what these terms meant, she had a great difficulty defining those terms for me. Now this is a seasoned, on fire, and godly woman. it came to me, if she had such difficulty defining her terms, what about the rest of the Christian community?
When sharing the gospel or anything pertaining to our faith, it is imperative that we know what we are talking about. Ignorance is not bliss and having wrong ideas of what the bible teaches can lead ourselves and others to false conclusions and convictions.
I was especially thinking about the term we use of "receiving Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior". I have had so many tell me about so and so receiving Jesus into their heart or someone who was led to make a decision for Jesus Christ. Now the bible speaks of receiving Jesus, but what does that mean and what does it not mean? There are so many people who say they have received Christ and believed Christ who give little or no evidence that they are spiritually alive. We will often times say that because Fred once received Christ, even though his life demonstrates little or no evidence of change, that because he received Christ, he is in no matter what.
Last week I wrote about what it means to love God. The bible defines loving God in terms of treasuring Christ, savoring Christ, cherishing Christ, or supremely valuing Christ.
But what of those who are unresponsive to the spiritual beauty of Jesus? Who are unmoved by the glories of Christ. Who don't have the spirit of the apostle Paul when he said, "I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ" (Philippians 3:8)? This is not their spirit, yet they say they have received Christ. So to me it looks as though it is possible to "receive Christ" and yet to not " receive Him" for who and what He really is. Thus, we demean His worth and do not really "receive" Christ at all.
This is why I so strongly believe we need to add a new term in defining what it means for someone to become a Christian and receive Christ: Make Jesus Christ Your Supreme Treasure. I think it is much more helpful and forthright in clearly telling others what it means to love, follow, and receive Jesus. Treasuring God is the essence of loving God.
Let me describe why I think this is so important. One way to describe this problem is to say that when these people "receive Christ," they do not receive him as supremely valuable. They receive him simply as sin-forgiver (because they love being guilt-free), and as rescuer-from-hell (because they love being pain-free), and as healer (because they love being disease-free), and as protector (because they love being safe), and as prosperity-giver (because they love being wealthy). They don't receive him the way Paul did when he spoke of "the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord." They don't receive him as he really is—more glorious, more beautiful, more wonderful, more satisfying, than everything else in this world, this life, and the whole universe. They don't prize him or treasure him or cherish him or delight in him.
Such a "receiving" of Christ is the kind of receiving that anyone can do. Any unregenerate, "natural" person can do this. This is very doable. This is a "receiving" of Christ that requires no change in human nature. You don't have to be born again to love being guilt-free and pain-free and disease-free and safe and wealthy. All natural men without any spiritual life love these things. But to embrace Jesus as your supreme treasure requires a new nature. No one does this naturally. You must be born again (John 3:3). You must be a new creation in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17; Galatians 6:15). You must be made spiritually alive (Ephesians 2:1-4). "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord' [and mean it!] except in the Holy Spirit" (1 Corinthians 12:3).
True saving faith is a receiving of Christ for who He really is and what He really is, namely, more glorious, more wonderful, more satisfying, and, therefore, more valuable than anything in the universe. Saving faith says, "I receive you as my Savior, my Lord, my supreme Treasure; and "I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ" (Philippians 3:8).
There are profound and important reasons why Jesus said, "Therefore, any one who does not hate renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:33). Or "Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me" (Matthew 10:37). And, "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field" (Matthew 13:44).
We need to see Jesus as compellingly beautiful so that we present Him as compellingly beautiful to others. We want others to receive Him in a way that He like the treasure in the field and has become so compellingly beautiful, valuable, and infinitely satisfying to them.
Jesus is infinitely valuable and infinitely satisfying. Saving faith receives this Christ.
"Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.My flesh and my heart may fail,but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever"(Psalm 73:25)
Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, 9obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.(1 Peter 1:8)
Treasuring Christ above all things,
Pastor Bill
Recently I was discussing with a dear friend about the gospel and communicating it to others. So I asked my friend to share with me her understanding of the gospel. As she began sharing she threw out biblical terms such as glory, fellowship, sin, wrath, judgement, redemption,God's righteousness, holy, grace,believe, receive, and repent. When I pretended I was a non-Christian and asked her what these terms meant, she had a great difficulty defining those terms for me. Now this is a seasoned, on fire, and godly woman. it came to me, if she had such difficulty defining her terms, what about the rest of the Christian community?
When sharing the gospel or anything pertaining to our faith, it is imperative that we know what we are talking about. Ignorance is not bliss and having wrong ideas of what the bible teaches can lead ourselves and others to false conclusions and convictions.
I was especially thinking about the term we use of "receiving Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior". I have had so many tell me about so and so receiving Jesus into their heart or someone who was led to make a decision for Jesus Christ. Now the bible speaks of receiving Jesus, but what does that mean and what does it not mean? There are so many people who say they have received Christ and believed Christ who give little or no evidence that they are spiritually alive. We will often times say that because Fred once received Christ, even though his life demonstrates little or no evidence of change, that because he received Christ, he is in no matter what.
Last week I wrote about what it means to love God. The bible defines loving God in terms of treasuring Christ, savoring Christ, cherishing Christ, or supremely valuing Christ.
But what of those who are unresponsive to the spiritual beauty of Jesus? Who are unmoved by the glories of Christ. Who don't have the spirit of the apostle Paul when he said, "I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ" (Philippians 3:8)? This is not their spirit, yet they say they have received Christ. So to me it looks as though it is possible to "receive Christ" and yet to not " receive Him" for who and what He really is. Thus, we demean His worth and do not really "receive" Christ at all.
This is why I so strongly believe we need to add a new term in defining what it means for someone to become a Christian and receive Christ: Make Jesus Christ Your Supreme Treasure. I think it is much more helpful and forthright in clearly telling others what it means to love, follow, and receive Jesus. Treasuring God is the essence of loving God.
Let me describe why I think this is so important. One way to describe this problem is to say that when these people "receive Christ," they do not receive him as supremely valuable. They receive him simply as sin-forgiver (because they love being guilt-free), and as rescuer-from-hell (because they love being pain-free), and as healer (because they love being disease-free), and as protector (because they love being safe), and as prosperity-giver (because they love being wealthy). They don't receive him the way Paul did when he spoke of "the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord." They don't receive him as he really is—more glorious, more beautiful, more wonderful, more satisfying, than everything else in this world, this life, and the whole universe. They don't prize him or treasure him or cherish him or delight in him.
Such a "receiving" of Christ is the kind of receiving that anyone can do. Any unregenerate, "natural" person can do this. This is very doable. This is a "receiving" of Christ that requires no change in human nature. You don't have to be born again to love being guilt-free and pain-free and disease-free and safe and wealthy. All natural men without any spiritual life love these things. But to embrace Jesus as your supreme treasure requires a new nature. No one does this naturally. You must be born again (John 3:3). You must be a new creation in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17; Galatians 6:15). You must be made spiritually alive (Ephesians 2:1-4). "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord' [and mean it!] except in the Holy Spirit" (1 Corinthians 12:3).
True saving faith is a receiving of Christ for who He really is and what He really is, namely, more glorious, more wonderful, more satisfying, and, therefore, more valuable than anything in the universe. Saving faith says, "I receive you as my Savior, my Lord, my supreme Treasure; and "I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ" (Philippians 3:8).
There are profound and important reasons why Jesus said, "Therefore, any one who does not hate renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:33). Or "Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me" (Matthew 10:37). And, "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field" (Matthew 13:44).
We need to see Jesus as compellingly beautiful so that we present Him as compellingly beautiful to others. We want others to receive Him in a way that He like the treasure in the field and has become so compellingly beautiful, valuable, and infinitely satisfying to them.
Jesus is infinitely valuable and infinitely satisfying. Saving faith receives this Christ.
"Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.My flesh and my heart may fail,but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever"(Psalm 73:25)
Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, 9obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.(1 Peter 1:8)
Treasuring Christ above all things,
Pastor Bill
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
WHAT IT MEANS TO LOVE GOD
“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” He answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:36–39).
If you really want to know the will of God for your life and find out what is of supreme importance to Him, the best way to do that is listen to what Jesus, the Son of God has to say. He tells us that the greatest commandment is to love God. And Jesus says to do this with all of our heart, soul, and mind. What does this mean to love God this way?
I am very excited to try to help you really learn and understand what this means. When Jesus says, “Love God will all your heart, soul, and mind,” He means that our thinking and feeling and desiring should be wholly engaged to do all they can to awaken and express the heartfelt fullness of treasuring God above all things.
There are two key things that will help us to understand this sweet demand from Jesus. First, “loving God” means more than anything else to treasure God. The other is that thinking (the mind), feeling (the heart), and inclining our desires (our souls) are the means to that end. In other words, loving God is an experience of cherishing, delighting, admiring, enjoying, and valuing Him. It’s not a thought, feeling, or desire about God or a work for God. It’s the sort of thing Paul meant when he said, “I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Philippians 3:8). It’s about treasuring the supreme worth of God. So, love for God is an affair of the affections. Ideas, feelings, desires, thoughts and thinking are crucial but they are not what love is. Thinking, feeling, and desiring is for the sake of loving God but it is not in itself loving God. It’s a means to loving. It’s not what love is.
Now what this means is that love is not a mere decision any more than your enjoying the beauty of a sunset is a mere decision. Could you imagine looking at a sunset feeling nothing than telling yourself to decide to enjoy it even though you don't. That is why I have said that where feelings for God are dead, worship is dead. You don’t decide to find beauty compelling to you. It happens to you. Decision based love breeds performance and hypocrisy and a duty based way of looking at love. Loving God means that God is of supreme value and worth to you; your supreme treasure and pleasure. We prefer above everything else to know Him and see Him and be with Him and be like Him.
Perhaps for some of you, you have never thought of loving God in these terms. May I suggest that because many don't understand what loving God means they end up focusing on means and ends and not love itself. So much I have read and been taught over the years focuses on means and ends and not on the love itself. Some focus little on the means and wonder why they struggle loving God. Others focus on the ends and struggle with loving people and obedience to God. So what I mean is how we come to love Him and the beautiful things that come out of our lives from this love for Him.
Loving God in the Great Commandment means most essentially treasuring God—valuing him, cherishing him, admiring him, desiring him. Therefore, loving him with all our heart, soul, and mind means that our thinking, our feeling, and our desires are not what does the loving, but what fuels the loving. Loving God with the heart, desires, and mind do all they can to awaken and express our treasuring God above all things.
Paul says in 1 Timothy 1:7 that "the object and purpose of our instruction and charge is love".(Amplified bible). Jonathan Edwards has charged me as a pastor to "raise the affections of my hearers as much as i can" when I preach the word. I wish every pastor would make that their goal when they speak, otherwise they have failed.
If we equate loving God with thinking and feeling rightly about God, we jeopardize the very reality of love. Let me use the analogy of fire. in order to have fire you need wood and kindling. but you would never call the kindling fire. When the fire burns you are not thinking about the kindling anymore, you enjoy the fire. So God has given us His word and the Christ exalting illumination of the Holy Spirit to be kindling picked up and engaged by our mind, heart, and desires in order to light a fire of love. I have often times said that the most important thing in our lives is to see Jesus for all that He is(that is the kindling) and to savor Him for all He is worth (that's loving and treasuring Him).
In the same light, fire produces two effects, light and heat. But we know that light and heat will not happen without the fire. When Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15), He emphatically did not say that keeping His commandments is what love is. He distinguished the two and made commandment-keeping the evidence of loving Him, not the definition of loving Him.
And when Jesus says the second commandment (keeping God’s commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves), He emphatically did not say that the second commandment was interchangeable with the first one. It is like it. It is not it. Loving God is not defined by loving neighbor. It is demonstrated by loving neighbor. “He who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen” (1 John 4:20).
Or consider the way Jesus talks about the heart worshiping Him. “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me’” (Mark 7:6–7). In other words, external actions—even religious ones directed toward God—are not the essence of worship. They are not the essence of love. What happens in the heart is essential. The external behaviors will be pleasing to God when they flow from a heart that freely treasures God above all things.
In other words, just as a fire produces light and heat, love for God, will produce love in our lives. The fire of the Father's love will burn within our hearts producing love. Is it no wonder that John says, "This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome" (1 John 5:3). There is a kind of commandment keeping that is exceedingly burdensome (without love for God out of duty or self effort) and there is a kind of commandment keeping that is easy (produced and released out of love). there is such a joyful freedom when love produces your behavior. No more decision, no more duty, and no more performance just a natural/supernatural outflow of what is in your heart.
So we cannot truly love God without knowing God; and the way we know God is by the Spirit-enabled use of our minds and hearts. So to “love God with all your mind and heart and soul” means engaging all your powers to know God as fully as possible in order to treasure him for all He is worth.
May you be free to know Him and enjoy Him forever. "Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy" (2 Peter 1:8)
THIS IS LOVE!
Pastor Bill
If you really want to know the will of God for your life and find out what is of supreme importance to Him, the best way to do that is listen to what Jesus, the Son of God has to say. He tells us that the greatest commandment is to love God. And Jesus says to do this with all of our heart, soul, and mind. What does this mean to love God this way?
I am very excited to try to help you really learn and understand what this means. When Jesus says, “Love God will all your heart, soul, and mind,” He means that our thinking and feeling and desiring should be wholly engaged to do all they can to awaken and express the heartfelt fullness of treasuring God above all things.
There are two key things that will help us to understand this sweet demand from Jesus. First, “loving God” means more than anything else to treasure God. The other is that thinking (the mind), feeling (the heart), and inclining our desires (our souls) are the means to that end. In other words, loving God is an experience of cherishing, delighting, admiring, enjoying, and valuing Him. It’s not a thought, feeling, or desire about God or a work for God. It’s the sort of thing Paul meant when he said, “I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Philippians 3:8). It’s about treasuring the supreme worth of God. So, love for God is an affair of the affections. Ideas, feelings, desires, thoughts and thinking are crucial but they are not what love is. Thinking, feeling, and desiring is for the sake of loving God but it is not in itself loving God. It’s a means to loving. It’s not what love is.
Now what this means is that love is not a mere decision any more than your enjoying the beauty of a sunset is a mere decision. Could you imagine looking at a sunset feeling nothing than telling yourself to decide to enjoy it even though you don't. That is why I have said that where feelings for God are dead, worship is dead. You don’t decide to find beauty compelling to you. It happens to you. Decision based love breeds performance and hypocrisy and a duty based way of looking at love. Loving God means that God is of supreme value and worth to you; your supreme treasure and pleasure. We prefer above everything else to know Him and see Him and be with Him and be like Him.
Perhaps for some of you, you have never thought of loving God in these terms. May I suggest that because many don't understand what loving God means they end up focusing on means and ends and not love itself. So much I have read and been taught over the years focuses on means and ends and not on the love itself. Some focus little on the means and wonder why they struggle loving God. Others focus on the ends and struggle with loving people and obedience to God. So what I mean is how we come to love Him and the beautiful things that come out of our lives from this love for Him.
Loving God in the Great Commandment means most essentially treasuring God—valuing him, cherishing him, admiring him, desiring him. Therefore, loving him with all our heart, soul, and mind means that our thinking, our feeling, and our desires are not what does the loving, but what fuels the loving. Loving God with the heart, desires, and mind do all they can to awaken and express our treasuring God above all things.
Paul says in 1 Timothy 1:7 that "the object and purpose of our instruction and charge is love".(Amplified bible). Jonathan Edwards has charged me as a pastor to "raise the affections of my hearers as much as i can" when I preach the word. I wish every pastor would make that their goal when they speak, otherwise they have failed.
If we equate loving God with thinking and feeling rightly about God, we jeopardize the very reality of love. Let me use the analogy of fire. in order to have fire you need wood and kindling. but you would never call the kindling fire. When the fire burns you are not thinking about the kindling anymore, you enjoy the fire. So God has given us His word and the Christ exalting illumination of the Holy Spirit to be kindling picked up and engaged by our mind, heart, and desires in order to light a fire of love. I have often times said that the most important thing in our lives is to see Jesus for all that He is(that is the kindling) and to savor Him for all He is worth (that's loving and treasuring Him).
In the same light, fire produces two effects, light and heat. But we know that light and heat will not happen without the fire. When Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15), He emphatically did not say that keeping His commandments is what love is. He distinguished the two and made commandment-keeping the evidence of loving Him, not the definition of loving Him.
And when Jesus says the second commandment (keeping God’s commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves), He emphatically did not say that the second commandment was interchangeable with the first one. It is like it. It is not it. Loving God is not defined by loving neighbor. It is demonstrated by loving neighbor. “He who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen” (1 John 4:20).
Or consider the way Jesus talks about the heart worshiping Him. “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me’” (Mark 7:6–7). In other words, external actions—even religious ones directed toward God—are not the essence of worship. They are not the essence of love. What happens in the heart is essential. The external behaviors will be pleasing to God when they flow from a heart that freely treasures God above all things.
In other words, just as a fire produces light and heat, love for God, will produce love in our lives. The fire of the Father's love will burn within our hearts producing love. Is it no wonder that John says, "This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome" (1 John 5:3). There is a kind of commandment keeping that is exceedingly burdensome (without love for God out of duty or self effort) and there is a kind of commandment keeping that is easy (produced and released out of love). there is such a joyful freedom when love produces your behavior. No more decision, no more duty, and no more performance just a natural/supernatural outflow of what is in your heart.
So we cannot truly love God without knowing God; and the way we know God is by the Spirit-enabled use of our minds and hearts. So to “love God with all your mind and heart and soul” means engaging all your powers to know God as fully as possible in order to treasure him for all He is worth.
May you be free to know Him and enjoy Him forever. "Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy" (2 Peter 1:8)
THIS IS LOVE!
Pastor Bill
Monday, October 11, 2010
HOW GOD HAS BEEN CHANGING MY LIFE
Five months ago my life changed. After Pastoring for thirty three years, and twenty three years at my beloved church, I stepped down and have taken a pause in my life. I can truly say that it has saved my life. I had worked six days a week for all of this time and worked often even on my day off. I felt overloaded, overwhelmed, overworked. I was regularly depressed, grumpy, and lonely. Deep inside I felt that God did not love me, I was worried all the time, frequently discouraged, most of the time I felt like a complete failure, I was utterly disappointed with my self and my life, I was completely out of touch with my inner life and emotions, had constant feelings of impending doom, felt like I needed to perform in order to be loved by God and others, feared rejection, had developed a way of relating to Christ that was devoted, structured, disciplined, but not close and intimate with Him. I needed a "pause" in my own life in order to get on with the rest of my life and know the satisfaction, the sweetness, and the freedom of living in a deeply centered and reflective way before the presence of God. I needed to rediscover the Father's love in order to be freed to live a life of love and in love.
Now after five months I am happy to say that my old life is over, dead, and gone. There is no turning back. I am feeling closer to God than I have ever been. I am happier, calmer, and experiencing freedom from the tyranny of performance and others expectations. I will never live that way again or be that person again. I want to live in love, peace, freedom, and joy for now on. I want to live to magnify the Lord in my body whether i live or die (Philippians 1:21). I want to truly love God and others. I want to be free to BE who God made me to be as Bill Robison. I want to live a quiet, reflective, centered life. I want to do what the Father is doing and not my own agenda or for my own self enhancement.
That is why I wrote awhile back about taking "pauses' in your daily life in order to commune and fellowship with God. This is what has helped to change my life and to save my life. To "pause is to stop or cease from some activity in order to "start' spending some time with the Lord.
I was not calling all of you to quite your jobs and hang out in the forest all day or become monks; but I was challenging us all to take serious inventory in our lives. I was calling you to be courageous and honest enough to determine how much time we spend being busy and how much time we spend in communion with the Lord. I wanted to create in you like God did in me a "holy dissatisfaction" with anything less than a deep, rich, growing relationship with Jesus Christ. What does your life look like? Is Christ truly the treasure, joy, and satisfaction of your life? Does Jesus move you or are you bored with Him? Do you find yourself growing deeper and deeper in your love for Him and others? Do you have an insatiable hunger and thirst for god and the things of God? Do you love to read and pray the Bible? Do you care for others? Do you hate sin and love holiness? Does pleasing God matter to you?
My experience as a pastor has been that most Christians spend little time alone, little time in silence, little time in the Word of God, and as a result, little time with God. In short, we spend a disproportionate amount of time in the things of little or no value instead of the things of eternal value, the nurture and care of our souls. Think about this, that is the person we afflict upon our work, our spouses, our children, our church, and others around us!
The fruit of over busy lives is sin, stress, fear, anxiety, little inner peace and tranquility, distance from God, anger, bitterness, relational conflict, loneliness, emptiness, shallowness, selfishness, depression, sorrow, reacting instead of being proactive, lack of intentionality in what we do, thoughtlessness, foolishness, compulsiveness, wasted time and wasted lives.
The whole goal of taking a pause in your life is that you would love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and that you would love your neighbor as yourself. As my friend Ed Piorick says, "the end game is love." For love to come out of your life, the Father's love has to come into your life. Love has to master you inside in order to minister through you outside. The only way love is going to come into your life is when you drink from the well, the river, the source of love and get around the fire of love that produces heat and light.
So I challenged you to bring some balance into your lives and balance activity by embracing and integrating into your life silence, solitude, and contemplation or meditation. We are a doing people but I have learned that "being" is what produces "doing". We are called human beings not human doings. Doing does not produce being; instead, being produces doing.
I mentioned that the Muslims have five "pauses' in their day in order to worship and remember their God. Allah. The Jews regularly set aside times of the day in order to worship Jehovah. Jesus would take "pauses" from His busy and demanding life in order to be with the Father. After His resurrection, Jesus disciples continued to pray at certain hours of the day. The Roman Catholic Benedictine monastic tradition has many "pauses' in their day(Eight) called "the Daily Office". So, taking pauses in the day has been a regular practice throughout history. Pauses like silence, solitude, and meditation are means of grace that we can use in order to draw close to God and become lovers whether for five minutes or five hours.
So, for the next three weeks I would like to share how you can practically integrate silence, solitude, and meditation into your life. I pray that it would become a welcome "pause" in your day and that like me, it would begin changing and transforming you into a more loving person than ever before. Would you join me on this wonderful journey?
Enjoying the new journey,
Pastor Bill
Now after five months I am happy to say that my old life is over, dead, and gone. There is no turning back. I am feeling closer to God than I have ever been. I am happier, calmer, and experiencing freedom from the tyranny of performance and others expectations. I will never live that way again or be that person again. I want to live in love, peace, freedom, and joy for now on. I want to live to magnify the Lord in my body whether i live or die (Philippians 1:21). I want to truly love God and others. I want to be free to BE who God made me to be as Bill Robison. I want to live a quiet, reflective, centered life. I want to do what the Father is doing and not my own agenda or for my own self enhancement.
That is why I wrote awhile back about taking "pauses' in your daily life in order to commune and fellowship with God. This is what has helped to change my life and to save my life. To "pause is to stop or cease from some activity in order to "start' spending some time with the Lord.
I was not calling all of you to quite your jobs and hang out in the forest all day or become monks; but I was challenging us all to take serious inventory in our lives. I was calling you to be courageous and honest enough to determine how much time we spend being busy and how much time we spend in communion with the Lord. I wanted to create in you like God did in me a "holy dissatisfaction" with anything less than a deep, rich, growing relationship with Jesus Christ. What does your life look like? Is Christ truly the treasure, joy, and satisfaction of your life? Does Jesus move you or are you bored with Him? Do you find yourself growing deeper and deeper in your love for Him and others? Do you have an insatiable hunger and thirst for god and the things of God? Do you love to read and pray the Bible? Do you care for others? Do you hate sin and love holiness? Does pleasing God matter to you?
My experience as a pastor has been that most Christians spend little time alone, little time in silence, little time in the Word of God, and as a result, little time with God. In short, we spend a disproportionate amount of time in the things of little or no value instead of the things of eternal value, the nurture and care of our souls. Think about this, that is the person we afflict upon our work, our spouses, our children, our church, and others around us!
The fruit of over busy lives is sin, stress, fear, anxiety, little inner peace and tranquility, distance from God, anger, bitterness, relational conflict, loneliness, emptiness, shallowness, selfishness, depression, sorrow, reacting instead of being proactive, lack of intentionality in what we do, thoughtlessness, foolishness, compulsiveness, wasted time and wasted lives.
The whole goal of taking a pause in your life is that you would love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and that you would love your neighbor as yourself. As my friend Ed Piorick says, "the end game is love." For love to come out of your life, the Father's love has to come into your life. Love has to master you inside in order to minister through you outside. The only way love is going to come into your life is when you drink from the well, the river, the source of love and get around the fire of love that produces heat and light.
So I challenged you to bring some balance into your lives and balance activity by embracing and integrating into your life silence, solitude, and contemplation or meditation. We are a doing people but I have learned that "being" is what produces "doing". We are called human beings not human doings. Doing does not produce being; instead, being produces doing.
I mentioned that the Muslims have five "pauses' in their day in order to worship and remember their God. Allah. The Jews regularly set aside times of the day in order to worship Jehovah. Jesus would take "pauses" from His busy and demanding life in order to be with the Father. After His resurrection, Jesus disciples continued to pray at certain hours of the day. The Roman Catholic Benedictine monastic tradition has many "pauses' in their day(Eight) called "the Daily Office". So, taking pauses in the day has been a regular practice throughout history. Pauses like silence, solitude, and meditation are means of grace that we can use in order to draw close to God and become lovers whether for five minutes or five hours.
So, for the next three weeks I would like to share how you can practically integrate silence, solitude, and meditation into your life. I pray that it would become a welcome "pause" in your day and that like me, it would begin changing and transforming you into a more loving person than ever before. Would you join me on this wonderful journey?
Enjoying the new journey,
Pastor Bill
Monday, October 4, 2010
WHAT NAOMI DID NOT SEE Part 2
One of the scriptures that I tether my life to, especially when I do not understand what is going on in my life, is Deuteronomy 29:29, "The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever". God has been kind enough to reveal to us many things in regards to His will, purposes, and doings but He has also chosen to conceal millions of micro reasons for the why and what He is doing. This is where most of us have great difficulty when we are in the midst of prolonged suffering or when we face sudden, devastating catastrophe. Naomi sure did.
Naomi suffered relentless and devastating loss. First a severe famine, then a move to pagan Moab, then the death of her husband, next the marriage of her sons to foreign wives, then ten years of apparent childlessness for both of her daughters-in-law, and finally the death of her sons. Only those who have suffered severe loss in their own lives can begin to relate to She says in response to all of this pain, "Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the Lord has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me?" (Ruth 1:20–21)
What Naomi does not see is that God is working even the most bitter providences for His good and glory (Romans 8:28; Genesis 50:20). She needed to open her eyes—the eyes of her heart—to the signs of his merciful purposes. Oh that when we see only bitter providence's in our lives like Naomi, that we would ask God to give us sight, light that would rise us to see beyond the darkness a wonderful, loving, kind, merciful, purposeful, sovereign God who works 24/7 (Psalm 121).
God’s providence is sometimes very very hard. You lose your job; your spouse or child dies; you are diagnosed with cancer; a friend betrays you; your spouse leaves you; a promise has been broken; a child leaves the faith that you raised him with. Most of us have experienced loss and all of us eventually will. It’s true, God had dealt bitterly with Naomi—at least in the short run, it could only feel like bitterness. It could only seem like utter darkness.
Perhaps someone will say, “It was all owing to the sin of going to Moab and marrying foreign wives.” Maybe so. But not necessarily, the text does not say so.
Psalm 34:19 says, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.” Neither the Old Testament nor the New Testament promises that believers will escape affliction in this life. “Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22). "For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him"( Philippians 1:29)“Therefore let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator” (1 Peter 4:19). The one who suffered most deserved it least: Jesus Christ. There is no sure connection between our suffering and our behavior. Never forget that dear reader. It is not at all certain, therefore, that Naomi’s affliction was owing to God’s displeasure with her.
But for the sake of argument and practical application, let us suppose that Naomi’s calamity was owing to her disobedience. There certainly are times where we reap what we sow (Galatians 6:7-8) and whom the Lord loves He chastens (Hebrews 12:7-11). Then this makes the story of Naomi doubly encouraging because it shows that God is willing and able even to turn His judgments into mercies and to turn our sorrows into joys. If Ruth was brought into the family by sin, it is doubly astonishing that she is made the grandmother of David and ancestor of Jesus Christ. Don’t ever think that the sin of your past means there is no hope for your future.
Not only does God reign in all the affairs of men, and not only is His providence sometimes hard, but in all His works His purposes are for the good and the greater happiness of His people. Who would have imagined that in the worst of all times—God was quietly moving in the tragedies of a single family to prepare the way for the greatest king of Israel?
But not only that, He was working to fill Naomi and Ruth and Boaz and their friends with great joy. If anything painful has fallen on you to make your future look hopeless, learn from Ruth that God is at work for you right now to give you a future and a hope. Trust him. Wait patiently. The ominous clouds are big with mercy and will break with blessing on your head.
When you believe in the sovereignty of God and that He loves to work mightily for those who trust Him, it gives a freedom, boldness, joy, and courage that isn’t abandoned and cannot be shaken in hard times. Hope for the future gives us an amazing power in the present. Lose hope and you lose life; gain hope and even if you are surrounded by death, life and power comes to take you through whatever you are going through triumphantly.
“As a Christian is never out of the reach of God’s hand, so he is never out of the view of God’s eye.” Thomas Watson
Pastor Bill
Naomi suffered relentless and devastating loss. First a severe famine, then a move to pagan Moab, then the death of her husband, next the marriage of her sons to foreign wives, then ten years of apparent childlessness for both of her daughters-in-law, and finally the death of her sons. Only those who have suffered severe loss in their own lives can begin to relate to She says in response to all of this pain, "Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the Lord has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me?" (Ruth 1:20–21)
What Naomi does not see is that God is working even the most bitter providences for His good and glory (Romans 8:28; Genesis 50:20). She needed to open her eyes—the eyes of her heart—to the signs of his merciful purposes. Oh that when we see only bitter providence's in our lives like Naomi, that we would ask God to give us sight, light that would rise us to see beyond the darkness a wonderful, loving, kind, merciful, purposeful, sovereign God who works 24/7 (Psalm 121).
God’s providence is sometimes very very hard. You lose your job; your spouse or child dies; you are diagnosed with cancer; a friend betrays you; your spouse leaves you; a promise has been broken; a child leaves the faith that you raised him with. Most of us have experienced loss and all of us eventually will. It’s true, God had dealt bitterly with Naomi—at least in the short run, it could only feel like bitterness. It could only seem like utter darkness.
Perhaps someone will say, “It was all owing to the sin of going to Moab and marrying foreign wives.” Maybe so. But not necessarily, the text does not say so.
Psalm 34:19 says, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.” Neither the Old Testament nor the New Testament promises that believers will escape affliction in this life. “Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22). "For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him"( Philippians 1:29)“Therefore let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator” (1 Peter 4:19). The one who suffered most deserved it least: Jesus Christ. There is no sure connection between our suffering and our behavior. Never forget that dear reader. It is not at all certain, therefore, that Naomi’s affliction was owing to God’s displeasure with her.
But for the sake of argument and practical application, let us suppose that Naomi’s calamity was owing to her disobedience. There certainly are times where we reap what we sow (Galatians 6:7-8) and whom the Lord loves He chastens (Hebrews 12:7-11). Then this makes the story of Naomi doubly encouraging because it shows that God is willing and able even to turn His judgments into mercies and to turn our sorrows into joys. If Ruth was brought into the family by sin, it is doubly astonishing that she is made the grandmother of David and ancestor of Jesus Christ. Don’t ever think that the sin of your past means there is no hope for your future.
Not only does God reign in all the affairs of men, and not only is His providence sometimes hard, but in all His works His purposes are for the good and the greater happiness of His people. Who would have imagined that in the worst of all times—God was quietly moving in the tragedies of a single family to prepare the way for the greatest king of Israel?
But not only that, He was working to fill Naomi and Ruth and Boaz and their friends with great joy. If anything painful has fallen on you to make your future look hopeless, learn from Ruth that God is at work for you right now to give you a future and a hope. Trust him. Wait patiently. The ominous clouds are big with mercy and will break with blessing on your head.
When you believe in the sovereignty of God and that He loves to work mightily for those who trust Him, it gives a freedom, boldness, joy, and courage that isn’t abandoned and cannot be shaken in hard times. Hope for the future gives us an amazing power in the present. Lose hope and you lose life; gain hope and even if you are surrounded by death, life and power comes to take you through whatever you are going through triumphantly.
“As a Christian is never out of the reach of God’s hand, so he is never out of the view of God’s eye.” Thomas Watson
Pastor Bill
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
WHAT NAOMI DID NOT SEE
“Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the Lord has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me?” Ruth 1:20-21
I have seen many going through great suffering the past few months including myself. The Book of Ruth is a book that can bring great comfort, perspective, and faith when prolonged suffering or sudden calamity sets upon us. I have found great comfort here as I have silently contemplated this story. What especially has been helpful for me, is reading stories in the Bible that so resonate with my own experience.
Naomi lived during the time of the Judges in Israel and suffered greatly. First, a severe famine came over the land. Naomi knew that God was the one who sent the famine. She said, “The Almighty has brought calamity upon me” (1:21).
The her husband dies after the family moves to Moab. So when Naomi’s husband dies (Ruth 1:3), what could she feel but that the judgment of God had followed her and added grief to famine? “The hand of the Lord has gone out against me” (1:13).
Then her two sons take Moabite wives, one named Orpah, the other named Ruth (1:4). And again the hand of God falls. Verse 5 sums up Naomi’s tragedy after ten years of childless marriages: “Both Mahlon and Chilion died, so that the woman was left without her two sons and her husband.” A famine, a move to pagan Moab, the death of her husband, the marriage of her sons to foreign wives, ten years of apparent childlessness for both of her daughters-in-law, and the death of her sons—the pain, suffering, and trials are relentless.
In verse 6, Naomi gets word that “the Lord had visited his people and given them food.” So she decides to return. to Judah. Her two daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpah, go with her, partway it seems, but then in verses 8–13 she tries to persuade them to go back home. In verse 11 Naomi says, ‘Turn back, my daughters; why will you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may become your husbands?’” In other words, Naomi has nothing to offer them. Her condition is worse than theirs. If they try to be faithful to her and to the name of their husbands, they will find nothing but pain. So she concludes at the end of verse 13, “No, my daughters, for it is exceedingly bitter to me for your sake that the hand of the Lord has gone out against me.” In other words, Don’t come with me because God is against me. Your life may become as bitter as mine.
But little does Naomi know what God has in store for her beyond all of this pain and suffering. It was God who broke the famine and opened the way home (1:6). It will be God who preserved a kinsman named Boaz to continue Naomi’s line (2:20). And it will be God who will constrain Ruth to stay with Naomi. But Naomi is so broken, devastated, and grief stricken by God’s hard providence that she does not see His mercy at work in her life.
So Ruth and Naomi return together to Bethlehem in Judah. “And when they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them. And the women said, ‘Is this Naomi?’” (1:19). That is a painful question not only because they see that she is older and with no husband and no sons, but also because the name Naomi means “pleasant” or “sweet.” So she responds,
Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the Lord has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me? (Ruth 1:20–21)
Naomi is unshaken and sure about three things: God exists, God is sovereign, and God has afflicted her. What Naomi does not see is that God is working even the most bitter providences for His good and glory (Romans 8:28; Genesis 50:20). She needed to open her eyes—the eyes of her heart—to the signs of his merciful purposes.
Day by day, and with each passing moment,Strength I find, to meet my trials here;
Trusting in my Father’s wise bestowment, I’ve no cause for worry or for fear.He whose heart is kind beyond all measure,Gives unto each day what He deems best—Lovingly,its part of pain and pleasure,Mingling toil with peace and rest. Karolina W. Sandell-Berg, “Day by Day”
Naomi saw a glimmer of light that it was God who took away the famine and opened a way home. Naomi “had heard in the fields of Moab that the Lord had visited his people and given them food” (1:6). Just as surely as God brought the famine, God took it away. Naomi could see that. But she could not see all that God was doing. Later she will be able to look back, in the same way we can often look back in God's workings in our own lives and see the pointers of hope for our present.
I look back in my own life back in April and thought I might be homeless by June. I was frightened, depressed, stressed, anxious and saw nothing but darkness ahead for my future. Now here I am writing at the end of September and God,through incredible acts of providence, has wonderfully taken care of me, comforted and sustained me, and graced me to be on a Sabbatical after 33 years of ministry! Who knew?
I have written before that there are millions of micro-reasons for God doing what He does that He has chosen not to reveal to us (Deuteronomy 29:29). Most of the time we have not a clue. That is why we must ground ourselves with an iron hold onto the things He has revealed to us in His Word, His macro-reasons.
Oh that when we see only bitter providence's in our lives like Naomi, that we would ask God to give us sight, light that would rise us to see beyond the darkness a wonderful, loving, kind, merciful, purposeful, sovereign God who works 24/7 (Psalm 121).
Naomi says in verse 21, “The Lord has brought me back empty.” She may have emotionally felt that but this is not true! What would Naomi say if she could see only a fraction of the thousands of things God was doing in the bitter providence's of her life? What would we say? Listen to what a poet well acquainted with emotional pain, despair, and suffering named William Cowper wrote:
God moves in a mysterious way,
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.
Deep in unfathomable mines
Of never failing skill,
He treasures up his bright designs,
And works his sovereign will.
Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread
are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence,
He hides a smiling face.
His purposes will ripen fast,
Unfolding every hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flower.
Blind unbelief is sure to err,
And scan his work in vain;
God is his own interpreter,
And he will make it plain.
William Cowper
Do we believe that God "moves in mysterious ways"? What if I knew back in April what God would do over the next five months in my life? What if Naomi knew that God was choosing an “unclean” outsider, a Moabitess—just like he chose Rahab the prostitute (Matthew 1:5; Joshua 2:1) and Tamar who played the prostitute (Matthew 1:3; Genesis 38:15)—as the kind of person he wanted in the bloodline of his Son? What if she knew that part of what God was doing was shaping a genealogy for the Messiah that would humble the world?
What if Naomi could see that in Ruth she would gain a man-child, and that this man-child would be the grandfather of the greatest king of Israel, and that this king of Israel would be the ancestor of the King of kings, Jesus Christ, the Lord of the universe? If she had trusted God that such things were in the offing, she may have said like the poet William Cowper wrote,
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face
I have seen many going through great suffering the past few months including myself. The Book of Ruth is a book that can bring great comfort, perspective, and faith when prolonged suffering or sudden calamity sets upon us. I have found great comfort here as I have silently contemplated this story. What especially has been helpful for me, is reading stories in the Bible that so resonate with my own experience.
Naomi lived during the time of the Judges in Israel and suffered greatly. First, a severe famine came over the land. Naomi knew that God was the one who sent the famine. She said, “The Almighty has brought calamity upon me” (1:21).
The her husband dies after the family moves to Moab. So when Naomi’s husband dies (Ruth 1:3), what could she feel but that the judgment of God had followed her and added grief to famine? “The hand of the Lord has gone out against me” (1:13).
Then her two sons take Moabite wives, one named Orpah, the other named Ruth (1:4). And again the hand of God falls. Verse 5 sums up Naomi’s tragedy after ten years of childless marriages: “Both Mahlon and Chilion died, so that the woman was left without her two sons and her husband.” A famine, a move to pagan Moab, the death of her husband, the marriage of her sons to foreign wives, ten years of apparent childlessness for both of her daughters-in-law, and the death of her sons—the pain, suffering, and trials are relentless.
In verse 6, Naomi gets word that “the Lord had visited his people and given them food.” So she decides to return. to Judah. Her two daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpah, go with her, partway it seems, but then in verses 8–13 she tries to persuade them to go back home. In verse 11 Naomi says, ‘Turn back, my daughters; why will you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may become your husbands?’” In other words, Naomi has nothing to offer them. Her condition is worse than theirs. If they try to be faithful to her and to the name of their husbands, they will find nothing but pain. So she concludes at the end of verse 13, “No, my daughters, for it is exceedingly bitter to me for your sake that the hand of the Lord has gone out against me.” In other words, Don’t come with me because God is against me. Your life may become as bitter as mine.
But little does Naomi know what God has in store for her beyond all of this pain and suffering. It was God who broke the famine and opened the way home (1:6). It will be God who preserved a kinsman named Boaz to continue Naomi’s line (2:20). And it will be God who will constrain Ruth to stay with Naomi. But Naomi is so broken, devastated, and grief stricken by God’s hard providence that she does not see His mercy at work in her life.
So Ruth and Naomi return together to Bethlehem in Judah. “And when they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them. And the women said, ‘Is this Naomi?’” (1:19). That is a painful question not only because they see that she is older and with no husband and no sons, but also because the name Naomi means “pleasant” or “sweet.” So she responds,
Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the Lord has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me? (Ruth 1:20–21)
Naomi is unshaken and sure about three things: God exists, God is sovereign, and God has afflicted her. What Naomi does not see is that God is working even the most bitter providences for His good and glory (Romans 8:28; Genesis 50:20). She needed to open her eyes—the eyes of her heart—to the signs of his merciful purposes.
Day by day, and with each passing moment,Strength I find, to meet my trials here;
Trusting in my Father’s wise bestowment, I’ve no cause for worry or for fear.He whose heart is kind beyond all measure,Gives unto each day what He deems best—Lovingly,its part of pain and pleasure,Mingling toil with peace and rest. Karolina W. Sandell-Berg, “Day by Day”
Naomi saw a glimmer of light that it was God who took away the famine and opened a way home. Naomi “had heard in the fields of Moab that the Lord had visited his people and given them food” (1:6). Just as surely as God brought the famine, God took it away. Naomi could see that. But she could not see all that God was doing. Later she will be able to look back, in the same way we can often look back in God's workings in our own lives and see the pointers of hope for our present.
I look back in my own life back in April and thought I might be homeless by June. I was frightened, depressed, stressed, anxious and saw nothing but darkness ahead for my future. Now here I am writing at the end of September and God,through incredible acts of providence, has wonderfully taken care of me, comforted and sustained me, and graced me to be on a Sabbatical after 33 years of ministry! Who knew?
I have written before that there are millions of micro-reasons for God doing what He does that He has chosen not to reveal to us (Deuteronomy 29:29). Most of the time we have not a clue. That is why we must ground ourselves with an iron hold onto the things He has revealed to us in His Word, His macro-reasons.
Oh that when we see only bitter providence's in our lives like Naomi, that we would ask God to give us sight, light that would rise us to see beyond the darkness a wonderful, loving, kind, merciful, purposeful, sovereign God who works 24/7 (Psalm 121).
Naomi says in verse 21, “The Lord has brought me back empty.” She may have emotionally felt that but this is not true! What would Naomi say if she could see only a fraction of the thousands of things God was doing in the bitter providence's of her life? What would we say? Listen to what a poet well acquainted with emotional pain, despair, and suffering named William Cowper wrote:
God moves in a mysterious way,
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.
Deep in unfathomable mines
Of never failing skill,
He treasures up his bright designs,
And works his sovereign will.
Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread
are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence,
He hides a smiling face.
His purposes will ripen fast,
Unfolding every hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flower.
Blind unbelief is sure to err,
And scan his work in vain;
God is his own interpreter,
And he will make it plain.
William Cowper
Do we believe that God "moves in mysterious ways"? What if I knew back in April what God would do over the next five months in my life? What if Naomi knew that God was choosing an “unclean” outsider, a Moabitess—just like he chose Rahab the prostitute (Matthew 1:5; Joshua 2:1) and Tamar who played the prostitute (Matthew 1:3; Genesis 38:15)—as the kind of person he wanted in the bloodline of his Son? What if she knew that part of what God was doing was shaping a genealogy for the Messiah that would humble the world?
What if Naomi could see that in Ruth she would gain a man-child, and that this man-child would be the grandfather of the greatest king of Israel, and that this king of Israel would be the ancestor of the King of kings, Jesus Christ, the Lord of the universe? If she had trusted God that such things were in the offing, she may have said like the poet William Cowper wrote,
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face
Looking at that smiling face beyond my gloom,
Pastor Bill
Thursday, September 23, 2010
ENJOYING THE CREATOR AND HIS CREATION
"Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good,for his steadfast love endures forever.
Give thanks to the God of gods,for his steadfast love endures forever.Give thanks to the Lord of lords,for his steadfast love endures forever;to him who alone does great wonders,for his steadfast love endures forever;to him who by understanding made the heavens,for his steadfast love endures forever;to him who spread out the earth above the waters,for his steadfast love endures forever;to him who made the great lights, for his steadfast love endures forever; the sun to rule over the day,for his steadfast love endures forever; the moon and stars to rule over the night,for his steadfast love endures forever" Psalm 136:1-4
"It is he who made the earth by his power,who established the world by his wisdom,and by his understanding stretched out the heavens." Jeremiah 10:12
I have just returned from a few weeks of hiking in the Sierra's, Yosemite National Park, Lassen Volcanic National Park, and the Redwoods National Park. I climbed in the Sierra's to over 10,500 feet at Mammoth Crest and saw myself rising above the tree lines and entering into alpine tundra. There I was able to see all the lakes of Mammoth Lakes from my viewpoint as well as the Minarets of the Sierra's across the way. In Tuolomne Meadows in Yosemite I hiked to the Cathedral Pass and from one vantage point I could see Half Dome and the Yosemite Valley while looking back and able to see Cathedral Mountain and Lake. I also climbed the Lambert Dome and from there could see all of Tuolomne Meadows and Yosemite in its glorious splendor. At Lassen I climbed Mount Lassen and could see the entire panorama of the park from all sides. Down below I hiked to see the boiling pools, fissures of steam, and sulfur streams at Bumpass Hell. Then I hiked to the Chaos Jumbles to sit at the belly of a volcanic crater and look up at the majestic walls of the crater towering above me. What a contrast it was for me to leave the moonscape of Chaos Jumbles and walk leisurely along the pastoral tranquility of Manzanita Lake. Then there was the Redwoods. When I entered into the towering Redwood forests I felt I had entered a world of enchantment. The height of the trees seeming to reach toward heaven and the lushness of the green forest was captivating to the eyes.
In all of these places there came to my soul a sense of the glory and majesty of God that was inexpressible to me. I found myself unable to bridge the gap between the beauty that I saw and my ability to express all the feeling and emotion that was inside of me. All I could say most of the time were expressions like "wow!","awesome!", "amazing", "praise God!", "incredible", and "it is so beautiful!" Most of the time I just looked around with inexpressible wonder, amazement, and joy in beholding the immense beauty I was observing.
I thought often on how God made things for His own pleasure and glory and for our enjoyment. When He made all things He said, "It is good." Oh, how He delights in His handiwork! I mused about how many places there are that no one sees or rarely sees that are full of incomparable beauty that God delights in each and every moment.They are always there radiating beauty and God delights in each and every place He created even if no one is privileged to ever see them. Sometimes I would be all alone in one of those places and I would think as I was enjoying it how much the Father delighted in my enjoyment of His creating work. I thought about His infinite perfection, brilliance,genius, excellency, creativity, purity, love, and wisdom in all that He has made. What kind of mind could create a mountain, a forest, a lake, ferns, streams, lakes, igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks, glaciers, valleys, colors,shapes,such diversity, yet such order.
God has made all things as a physical display of His beauty and the greatness of his works for all to see. God, the most beautiful being in the universe created a world where His beautiful perfections could shine. Jonathan Edwards say of God's creating beauty,
"The Lord is an infinite fountain of holiness, moral excellence, and beauty, and the earth is the basin by which his beauty is poured."
Paul writes,
"For of Him and through him, and to Him are all things" (Romans 11:36).
"For by him all things were created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible, and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions, principalities or powers, all things were created by Him and for Him"(Colossians 1:16)
When God made creation, His ultimate end was for us to see His glory. That is why it is both sad and blasphemous when I meet people who appreciate nature but do not believe, love, nor honor the maker of the beauty of the nature they so cherish. The beauty of the Sierra's, Yosemite, Lassen, and the Redwoods pale compared to the beauty of the one whose glory is displayed in all of His creation. As a matter of fact, his creation is like a towering neon sign displayed for all to see and enjoy, planted by God to display His infinite beauty and glory. All beauty is a pale reflection, an echo, a pointer, to the one who made and designed it and "made all things for Himself".
Creation is a love song from its creator to us! Walk in the Redwoods and you will hear the sweet chords of divine music. Hike in the Sierra's and God's sweet song of love will ring in your ears. Are you listening to the music or have your ears become so accustomed to the discordant cacophonies of technology, media, and entertainment that you have lost the ability to appreciate the beautiful things of life in their simplest forms. Oh how many of us have become so spiritually thin that we have lost our connection with nature. I would encourage you my dear readers to make a return to nature and enjoy it. Go for a walk on the beach; go to the park, enjoy your yards,go to the woods, go to the mountains, go to the desert and sing praises, laugh, contemplate the delights of all the little and big things that God has made, and commune with Him in the very realm that was made by Him to testify of Him.
But never forget that the ultimate enjoyment is not in creation but in the beautiful creator himself.
"The enjoyment of [God] is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied…. Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of earthly friends are but shadows, but enjoyment of God is the substance. These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun. These are but streams, but God is the fountain. These are but drops, but God is the ocean. " Jonathan Edwards
Loving the creator of His creation which I so enjoy,
Pastor Bill
Give thanks to the God of gods,for his steadfast love endures forever.Give thanks to the Lord of lords,for his steadfast love endures forever;to him who alone does great wonders,for his steadfast love endures forever;to him who by understanding made the heavens,for his steadfast love endures forever;to him who spread out the earth above the waters,for his steadfast love endures forever;to him who made the great lights, for his steadfast love endures forever; the sun to rule over the day,for his steadfast love endures forever; the moon and stars to rule over the night,for his steadfast love endures forever" Psalm 136:1-4
"It is he who made the earth by his power,who established the world by his wisdom,and by his understanding stretched out the heavens." Jeremiah 10:12
I have just returned from a few weeks of hiking in the Sierra's, Yosemite National Park, Lassen Volcanic National Park, and the Redwoods National Park. I climbed in the Sierra's to over 10,500 feet at Mammoth Crest and saw myself rising above the tree lines and entering into alpine tundra. There I was able to see all the lakes of Mammoth Lakes from my viewpoint as well as the Minarets of the Sierra's across the way. In Tuolomne Meadows in Yosemite I hiked to the Cathedral Pass and from one vantage point I could see Half Dome and the Yosemite Valley while looking back and able to see Cathedral Mountain and Lake. I also climbed the Lambert Dome and from there could see all of Tuolomne Meadows and Yosemite in its glorious splendor. At Lassen I climbed Mount Lassen and could see the entire panorama of the park from all sides. Down below I hiked to see the boiling pools, fissures of steam, and sulfur streams at Bumpass Hell. Then I hiked to the Chaos Jumbles to sit at the belly of a volcanic crater and look up at the majestic walls of the crater towering above me. What a contrast it was for me to leave the moonscape of Chaos Jumbles and walk leisurely along the pastoral tranquility of Manzanita Lake. Then there was the Redwoods. When I entered into the towering Redwood forests I felt I had entered a world of enchantment. The height of the trees seeming to reach toward heaven and the lushness of the green forest was captivating to the eyes.
In all of these places there came to my soul a sense of the glory and majesty of God that was inexpressible to me. I found myself unable to bridge the gap between the beauty that I saw and my ability to express all the feeling and emotion that was inside of me. All I could say most of the time were expressions like "wow!","awesome!", "amazing", "praise God!", "incredible", and "it is so beautiful!" Most of the time I just looked around with inexpressible wonder, amazement, and joy in beholding the immense beauty I was observing.
I thought often on how God made things for His own pleasure and glory and for our enjoyment. When He made all things He said, "It is good." Oh, how He delights in His handiwork! I mused about how many places there are that no one sees or rarely sees that are full of incomparable beauty that God delights in each and every moment.They are always there radiating beauty and God delights in each and every place He created even if no one is privileged to ever see them. Sometimes I would be all alone in one of those places and I would think as I was enjoying it how much the Father delighted in my enjoyment of His creating work. I thought about His infinite perfection, brilliance,genius, excellency, creativity, purity, love, and wisdom in all that He has made. What kind of mind could create a mountain, a forest, a lake, ferns, streams, lakes, igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks, glaciers, valleys, colors,shapes,such diversity, yet such order.
God has made all things as a physical display of His beauty and the greatness of his works for all to see. God, the most beautiful being in the universe created a world where His beautiful perfections could shine. Jonathan Edwards say of God's creating beauty,
"The Lord is an infinite fountain of holiness, moral excellence, and beauty, and the earth is the basin by which his beauty is poured."
Paul writes,
"For of Him and through him, and to Him are all things" (Romans 11:36).
"For by him all things were created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible, and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions, principalities or powers, all things were created by Him and for Him"(Colossians 1:16)
When God made creation, His ultimate end was for us to see His glory. That is why it is both sad and blasphemous when I meet people who appreciate nature but do not believe, love, nor honor the maker of the beauty of the nature they so cherish. The beauty of the Sierra's, Yosemite, Lassen, and the Redwoods pale compared to the beauty of the one whose glory is displayed in all of His creation. As a matter of fact, his creation is like a towering neon sign displayed for all to see and enjoy, planted by God to display His infinite beauty and glory. All beauty is a pale reflection, an echo, a pointer, to the one who made and designed it and "made all things for Himself".
Creation is a love song from its creator to us! Walk in the Redwoods and you will hear the sweet chords of divine music. Hike in the Sierra's and God's sweet song of love will ring in your ears. Are you listening to the music or have your ears become so accustomed to the discordant cacophonies of technology, media, and entertainment that you have lost the ability to appreciate the beautiful things of life in their simplest forms. Oh how many of us have become so spiritually thin that we have lost our connection with nature. I would encourage you my dear readers to make a return to nature and enjoy it. Go for a walk on the beach; go to the park, enjoy your yards,go to the woods, go to the mountains, go to the desert and sing praises, laugh, contemplate the delights of all the little and big things that God has made, and commune with Him in the very realm that was made by Him to testify of Him.
But never forget that the ultimate enjoyment is not in creation but in the beautiful creator himself.
"The enjoyment of [God] is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied…. Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of earthly friends are but shadows, but enjoyment of God is the substance. These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun. These are but streams, but God is the fountain. These are but drops, but God is the ocean. " Jonathan Edwards
Loving the creator of His creation which I so enjoy,
Pastor Bill
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)