Leading of the Spirit - Acts 16.6-12 (Sermon)

49 days ago, we celebrated Easter. Today is the day of Pentecost. This day, about 1980 years ago, give or take, the church was born. The people who had come or stayed in Jerusalem from the Passover were now witnesses to this great and monumental event.  It started with the rushing wind, though there was no wind. Then the Holy Spirit came upon the Apostles, as tongues of flame. He then enabled them to communicate the Gospel message to everyone listening in his or her native language.

Can you imagine what that would have been like? 3,000 people came to know the Lord that day. 3,000 people repenting of their sins and being clothed into Christ Jesus. No church plant can claim such success! 3,000 that day, with the Scriptures telling us that the Lord was daily, DAILY, adding to those being saved!

I did get ahead a little bit. They heard the initial good news, the masses, after being led by God to where the Apostles were. But not all of them were amazed. They thought that this was a neat parlor trick brought about by too much wine. They scoffed. So Peter then stood up and gave account to what it all meant. He showed them how Jesus was the long awaited Savior of Israel. And that this is the same Jesus that the crowd had 50 days prior, called to be crucified. But the good news is that Jesus did die and was buried, but he conquered death to pay our sin debt to God, our Heavenly Father. He continued that in order to become right with God, they would need to do two things: Repent and be immersed into Christ for not only the forgiveness of our sins, but also to receive the Holy Spirit.

We forget that last part, too often. Oh, we know in our heads that when we are immersed, we receive the Holy Spirit, but do we allow that knowledge to affect our hearts and our actions? Or do we tend to continue on with our daily lives paying mind only when we hear or read about the Spirit?

As we continue our journey through the book of Acts, Acts 16 this morning, verses 6-12, we find that Paul is continuing on in his journey having added Timothy, and a few verses later, Luke, our book’s author. Here, we see the Holy Spirit working actively, in a way that hasn’t been seen since Acts 2. Let’s read the text: [Read]

Here we see that Paul has a plan, but the Spirit directs him differently. Then Paul adjusted his plan, only to be denied once again. Finally, the Holy Spirit gives Paul a vision to follow. There are a few lessons here that we should take to heart about the Spirit.

As we know, He is already part of our lives, if we’ve been baptized into Christ Jesus. But are we sensitive to the Holy Spirit? That is something that comes from spending time. Paul, as he is traveling, preaching Christ, has been a Christian to this point perhaps as many as 10 years now. We know that he spoke of going to Arabia for 3 years before going to Jerusalem to meet the Apostles. We also get the sense that he was in Antioch for a number of years. We can’t be sure how much time has passed, but we do know that to this point, Paul is not a new believer. He has developed a spiritual life that allows him to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit.

We can as well. Paul went into study, spending time with the Lord in prayer, meditation and the Word. I suspect that he looked at the Old Testament with new eyes in his time preparing to meet the Apostles in Jerusalem. We know that he fasted the first days waiting to be healed, he did so again before going out on the first missionary journey with Barnabas and again when he appointed elders in each of the churches they planted. And he fellowshipped with the believers. They became family to him.

Just as Paul did, do we spend time in the Word? We need to spend time in the Word so that by it, we might grow. This was one of the most common problems that Paul dealt with, immature Christians who refused to consider the Word. But looking at the word for understanding isn’t enough. We also need to be able to gather together to encourage one another with the Word. Past few weeks, it seems that through our time of fellowship on Wednesdays has refocused how I viewed passages. As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Now I am going to step on some toes here, including my own. Praying to God doesn’t seem to be a problem. I’ve adopted Paul’s advice to the Thessalonians, to have a constant attitude of prayer. But here is where I am weak: the other half is fasting. Its been said that God has never told us to fast as Christians. This is true. There are no commands about it. Paul, Peter, James and John never wrote about this exercise. But what of precedent? We after all meet on Sundays, the first day of the week, because the early church met on the first day of the week, because Christ arose on the first day of the week. If we follow that precedent, then why not the precedent of fasting, especially when we have a monumental decision to make, such as a direction for the church, or installing a elder or preacher. And this is hard to say because I know that there is lunch waiting for us when I finish the message here.

So let’s move on to the next lesson about the Holy Spirit. When He guides us, it is to help us in our mission. Remember, we were all called to be witnesses of all that Christ has done and taught. It isn’t just a select few who are to carry this out. Now how was Paul’s guidance a help to the mission? We know that from Peter’s writing, where Paul wanted to travel with the Good News, Peter would instead travel. There is that side of the coin. Another side is that Paul was uniquely qualified to take the message west unlike any of the other Apostles. Paul was a Roman citizen. There would be no way that Caesar would grant audience to any of the other Apostles. But as a citizen, Paul had that right. So the Holy Spirit helped him move towards Rome.

Now about us. By listening to the Holy Spirit, we are able to make choices that are between good and better. Next week, we will see Paul make such a choice. His choice was to stand up for his rights as a citizen, or to trust God to advance the Good News. These are the choices that we need to make. Is what I am doing advancing the Gospel message? As a parent, am I making sure that what my children are exposed to pro-Jesus? Now I have children, but you have grandkids or nieces and nephews. They are needing to be influenced as much by you as you possibly can.

Often, I’ve seen my parents do this, to allow my nieces and nephews to carry on as they would at their own homes. Do you know I get ribbed for not allowing Sponge Bob or even Dora the Explorer in my home? This is on top of my attitude about Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy. But I believe that I need to make sure that I am teaching them to follow Jesus as much as I can. When there is a show that is questionable, then we sit and talk about it. Ricky loves picking apart these evolution shows such as “Walking with the Dinosaurs” or even “Meer Cat Manor”.  My point is, make sure that we are making the choices that best helps you to further your witness to those around you. This is done when we listen, when we are sensitive to the Holy Spirit’s leading.

Now there is a final lesson here. Paul was not mandated to go the Macedonia. God may prohibit us from doing something. But God will not force us to do something. For example, Paul received a vision of a Macedonian. He was not told he had to go that direction. He was free to go another direction.

Jonah and the fish doesn’t count. The fish was God’s punishment for Jonah disobeying God in the first place. Going to Nineveh was Jonah’s acceptance of God’s will, to carry the message, to a people God wanted to reach. Jonah repented of his disobedience. Now mind you, Jonah is a bit different in that he signed up to be a prophet of the Lord. When a person accepts that responsibility there is a surrender of free will to a great extent.

Come to think of it, there is a surrender of free will when we come to Christ. The Word is always challenging us to live a higher standard. We can see how the world around us lives. People who don’t know Jesus, who are not truly clothed in Christ, live a truly selfish life. We who are in Christ are encouraged, not forced, but encouraged to live a selfless life. Even then, God, by the power of the Spirit, the same power, Paul wrote, that raised Jesus from the dead.

We have this same Spirit who gives us this same power so that we can live a life different from those around us. So let this day of Pentecost be the day that we decide that we are going to be more sensitive to the leading of the Spirit, that we will be more open to sharing God’s love with those who are hard to love, that we will be the witnesses of the message. Then perhaps once again, we can see God add to those being saved.

Reaching the Hurting - A Mother's Day Message (Sermon)

This day 99 years ago, Anna Jarvis successfully changed our society by having the 2^nd Sunday of May forever known as Mother’s Day, a day in which we celebrate the women who are important in our lives, who have raised us, guided us, mended our wounded knees and our wounded hearts. And as we are commended by Paul, we should indeed honor our mothers. This is the day that moms will receive cards and flowers and calls from children who’ve moved away. Some will arise to find their family serving breakfast in bed. Some might even be blessed enough to see their children cleaning without being told, or at least trying their best to behave and to be quieter than normal so that mom can have the illusion of rest. Some moms might even attend church with their families, or perhaps I should say that their families will attend church with their moms, though not as many will attend church for MD as they would be for Easter and Christmas. But nevertheless, they join mom in church because they will take mom out for a special lunch. 

But for those who would come out on MD, we preachers have tried to be on the ball to prepare, to honor as a body, our moms in the congregations. So we will seek the messages of motherhood from a character such as Mary, the mother of Jesus, or Sarah, or Timothy’s mom and grandma, or some other mom mentioned in the Bible. I’ve even used Mrs. Job for a Mother’s Day message. Some will not look at one mom, but look instead to Proverbs 31.

We will hold up the beacon of motherhood and praise them. Some churches will give the moms in attendance a flower of sort. I used to give a rose to each mom. Some would give a bigger gift for the mom with the most children, the oldest mom, and the newest mom. We would have all the moms in the room stand so that everyone might cheer their sacrificial work raising the children. In our honoring, we assume motherhood through rose-colored glasses, whereas on Father’s Day, we will blast the man who isn’t pulling his weight as a father. It is as if we are saying that if you are not a mom, then you are not a whole woman. We can even site Scripture such as 1 Timothy to that effect, that women are saved through having babies, lots of babies.

Now not all women are able to have kids. So when the church is showing so much love and adoration on moms, these women are hearing that message. They hear the church saying you are not a fulfilled woman unless you have children. Or you are not a whole woman. We don’t mean it, but our actions too often betray our message.  So these women, be that they don’t have children, have lost their children, or have been abandoned by their children will skip church in May, since we prepare the week before and reflect the week after. And this disenfranchised group is ever growing. Joining them are moms who feel so overwhelmed that they really see themselves as failures. They hear praise and think to themselves, “It’s a facade. You wouldn't say that if you saw these brats a couple of hours ago!”

It’s led me to look at their point of view and reconsider how we should handle MD. As you might have guessed, I am not going to have a MD message in the traditional sense. Rather, I want us to see, to be aware of the opportunities that surround us, and not just with women who fit the mentioned segment, but to expand our view to others as well, for I am ever the student of humanity.  I can sit at a mall and just watch people and not be bored. But since I've moved from the city life, I am not able to readily enjoy watching people. But we do have the internet and there are forums I do look at. And it is interesting that as I read their profiles, their user names are telling. There is one user name that is “ashleysmom” or another “dadcoach” because he has 6 boys. Some of the names are descriptive of what the person does, “gusbusdriver”. Of course my favorite name that I’ve seen is “forlorncubbie”. Now that is someone who loves the Chicago Cubs but knows they will be destined to be forever one of the worst teams in pro baseball. Marlins are the worst presently.

The lesson here is that often people find fulfillment where they can. They are really seeking purpose, meaning and belonging in a world that is otherwise cold and rejecting. Solomon said of all the things that man can pursue in life, nothing will fill that emptiness that people have. Well almost nothing he concludes. At one point, he said that life apart from the Lord is a waste, meaningless.

In this time we have the answer to speak into the lives of those around us. We have found our purpose and can therefore share it with others who need the hope. How do we do this?

1 Corinthians 5.11-13 Paul is encouraging the church in how the body deals with people. Did you know one of the biggest complaints against the church is the “hypocritical judging”? This is a valid complaint. Here’s what I mean: we tend to expect Christian behavior from non-Christians. Then we tend it ignore non-Christian behavior committed by Christians. For example the context of the passage is that Paul a man is with his father’s wife and the church is not batting an eye. Paul then tells them that this shouldn't  be so. We shouldn't put up with godlessness within the body. This doesn't apply just to the sexually impure, as this man was, but continues with the drunkards, the thieves, the abusive, and the greedy as well. Those who do these and claim to be a believer in Christ put them away. Don’t even eat lunch. But the part of the verse I want to focus on is last part of 12. Since we judge those with us, we must allow God to take care of the outsiders, or the non-believers. Why should the non-Christian come when he sees no difference between God’s children and his drinking pals? We must be sure that we do not however expect Christian behavior from non-Christians. We have radio ministries who are doing just that. Corporations that didn't claim to be Christian corporations are being bullied into complying? There we are lacking grace that allows us to speak into a person’s life.

Another passage that tells us how to speak into the life of someone hurting is Colossians 4.5-6. Paul tells us here that we need to make the most of our time that we have with the outsiders, making sure that we are gracious in our speech so that we can answer each person’s questions. I sometimes like listening to debates. Ken Ham is one. But every once in a while, he will lose his cool with his debate opponent and be a little less than gracious, unlike his radio bites. I am not criticizing him. This is where his fallible humanity shines through. He tends to lose it with “experts” who are refusing to listen.

Finally there is Titus 3.3. We must remember that when we are dealing with those seeking a sense of belonging, we were also once just like that outsider. This is why we need to be gracious in our speech and in our conduct. We must be patient as they struggle with the faith, coming to terms, accepting it on their timetable, and not ours.

This is what we are called to do as Christians. This is how we witness and carry out the Great Commission to the world around us Monday through Saturday and even some on Sunday. The world is hurting and lost. Let us therefore be God’s instruments of grace and love.

In Conflict, Grace (Sermon)

It is interesting that just a couple of days ago, a news article hit the net in a near viral moment. I saw friends reposting that New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg was holding an informal work meeting with his city comptroller at a pizzeria. When he asked for a second slice, he was denied by the owner in protest to the mayor’s law banning the sale of larger sodas. You can buy smaller fountain drinks. You can buy smaller bottles, or the 2 liters, but the 1 liter and larger than 16 ounce mugs or bottles, nope. That’s against the law which the pizzeria owner was protesting. The report says that the mayor lost his cool using even vulgarity with the owner. He finally left and went to another pizzeria. Later in the day, the pizzeria’s website had so many visits that the site crashed for a 24 hour period of time. Of course, this added more to the fuel to the fire with people claiming that the mayor was so incensed that he had the pizzeria’s website and probably even wifi turned off.

Then on Friday, it was revealed that the mainstream press that picked up on this story, along with all of us net stream users, were duped by a site called “Daily Currant”.  Of course, most news sites were all saying, “we knew it was a hoax from the start.” Talk about trying to save face.

Oh the soda law is real, just not the pizzeria visit. I don’t know that the mayor would be brave enough to enter an establishment that is being forced to reduce the amount of soda it can serve or sell. And though it was a funny article, it revealed how silly some conflicts that you or I might get caught up in can be.

I can’t imagine being told, “Sir, I must cut you off because you have had your limit.” But that is just one area in which we can find conflict. There are other areas. The latest conflict on the news feed is that of Israel and Syria. Which country should Iran fear more? Syria admitted that early Friday morning, Israel launched an air strike against a military weapons factory. I thought that was awful nice of them to admit. Some countries in the past have claimed what was believed to have been such a place was really an aspirin factory. “Yeah, Israel, you got us. We admit it.” But I digress.

Topic this morning is conflict. Not just political conflict, but conflict that is more personal, that hits home. Sometimes we are blessed that conflict happens only at work, or perhaps when one fishing line crosses another. It is a blessing when the church is without that conflict. I appreciate that even now that we don’t seem to have conflict within our family here at Central.

In fact, of my 20 years now of serving churches, this is the first time that I have had the pleasure of being part of a body free of current inner turmoil and conflict. The issues of conflict are in the past, which is a good place for them. And yet, as we are together, as we seek to be about the mission of sharing God’s news to those around us, conflicts will arise. And when we do, our true character will shine through.

So the question we must ask ourselves is what is our character as a body, as a family? In a single word, I suggest that our character we commit to is grace. It is easy to love when everything seems good or even when life is ok. But when life is not so rosy, the ability to love others, or even each other, can only happen if we are a people of grace.

Until recently, I don’t think I was as much a person of grace as I thought I was. I mean, sure, I give grace where I can, and more often than I should, so I have been told. But as we were studying this morning’s passage, I learned that I have been perhaps short of grace to the Apostle Paul.

Acts 15.36 is the start of a conflict, the first conflict within a ministry team. Paul and Barnabas are fighting over giving John Mark a second chance. Then the team, being unable to reconcile, split apart. Let’s read the passage:

The focus this morning is verse 40, that they were commended to the grace of the Lord. Most scholars say that the church sided with Paul in the conflict. But Wednesday evening, it was suggested that perhaps I have fallen into the trap of seeing verse markers as thought segments. I mean that verse 40 was its own thought and verse 39 was a different thought, or event. And he was right. I was. And because so, I have short changed the grace that I should have given Paul.

With every conflict, there are two parties, unfortunately, sometimes there are more. There are two rights, and there are two wrongs. Jesus commended us that we should appear united with our brothers of the faith, at least be reconciled with them. And here they both were, arguing. Paul did not want to rely on someone who lacked the strength, perhaps. Barnabas, being that his was his nephew, being that Mark was a young man, could see that Mark was full of potential if he had the right guiding. And so the church of Antioch didn’t take a side, but commended both to the grace of the Lord. The “them” of verse 40 refers to not only Paul and Silas, but also to Barnabas and Mark. Both men, Paul and Barnabas, needed grace.

They both needed grace because when conflict comes, it can kill a spirit. It can kill a ministry. Grace, on the other hand, heals. We see later that Paul must have reconciled with Barnabas because Paul refers to him as a partner in the ministry. He wrote this to the church of Corinth, so they somehow came together in that the church knew both men. And then John Mark is mentioned as a dear partner in the ministry in a couple of Paul’s letters.

Finally, the brethren of Antioch teach us about grace is that by grace, God is glorified. Consider what we do know about this passage. Barnabas takes one team and heads out. Unfortunately, we don’t know where he’s gone other than to perhaps the churches of the first mission trip and of course to Corinth. Paul takes another team out, for he picks up Timothy in the next chapter as well as Luke not too much farther down the road. So here are two teams spreading the news of Jesus’ love and sacrifice. More people are therefore hearing the Gospel message. More people are therefore accepting this message, which means more people being saved.

Let’s further speculate in Corinth since we know that this church knew them both. How much more powerful did Paul’s message become when Barnabas came sharing the exact same message? Or how much more receptive were the people of Corinth to Barnabas because Paul had already laid the groundwork?

Now let me bring this home. We will not always avoid conflict, be it here in the body, or especially not in our daily lives. Yet what we have seen and thought about grace with Paul and Barnabas also applies to us. How much more receptive will the defying brother, the one who knows all your buttons to push, will be when he sees you respond to him with the grace of the Lord? What about with the pesky neighbor, or the overbearing boss? In every area of life, let us commend ourselves; let us commend one another to the grace of the Lord so that we might be better Christians for the world to see. 

Play Ball (Sermon)

It was a warm April day that I walked in. I was late picking up my baseball gear for the team that I would be coaching. I was late because until the night before, this team had no coach and I seem to have a problem with the word, “no”. I don’t like to hear it, and some would swear I don’t even know how to say it. My gear for the team included 9 shirts, hats and socks, 3 balls, 3 helmets, 1 catcher’s helmet and chest pad, and 1 book titled, “US Little League handbook”. That is a misleading title if ever one was made. 

First, the size was about the same as our pew bibles. The pages were as many and the print size was a bit smaller. It is a condensed version of the NBL’s rulebook, which is the size of my concordance. One rule I remember reading was a violation of any rule could result in forfeiture of the game upon league review. The best news, opening day was in 5 days, and my team hadn’t met. We were the only ones who hadn’t, and finding a field to use was impossible. We practiced during the game. Oh the fun that was!!

Yet that does have me thinking about rules. We tend to be odd ducks that way. It seems that we love our rules. We love them because they define what we can and cannot do. They become a boundary that as long as we stay within, we will be ok.  If you will, rules become a cage that we willingly enter, closing the doors often ourselves. If we don’t see the rules immediately, we might become creative and make up the rules where none exist. Music can only be made with the voice since there is no mention of instruments in the New Testament.

For others, these same rules are not about what I can or cannot do, but in what I can have you do or not do. It becomes a source of control over another person. “You must do what I say or you will be committing the unpardonable sin: blaspheming the Holy Spirit.”  Now that sounds pretty serious. Most would bow under such a command.

But here are the problems with rules. Because they limit us, put us in the cage, our mentality changes. We cease being what God wants for us, cease striving for the blessings that God has. It affects the attitude. It affects the desire. For example, have you ever had an opportunity to see whales in the wild or at someplace like Sea World? They are beautiful creatures. My favorite isn’t really a whale, but a porpoise called an ‘orca’, or whale killer, thus killer whales. In the wild, their dorsal fin is straight, strong and tall. But at Sea World, look at the orcas there. Their dorsal fins are bent in half, curling in. There is a tremendous difference that all porpoises or dolphins tend to display. Captivity breaks the spirit. Rules, today, break ours. Because our spirits are broken then we tend to feel guilt, especially when we break a rule again, and again. Broken people tend to be easy to control, by the way.

And maybe that is why these false teachers went to Antioch. They wanted to break people. These new teachings were so contrary to what the church had been taught by Paul that they had to ask for clarity. So the elders and Apostles came to discuss this matter. Peter concluded that life in Christ is not about following a check list, but living by grace. It is grace that saves, but if one must have rules, then here are 3 simple rules. (Read the Text)

Did you catch those rules? Stay away from idolatry, or worshiping anyone or thing than God. Stay away from blood, and food with its blood still present. Stay sexually pure. Paul and the Apostles of course through their other writings have expanded on these three rules, mainly the first and last.

Where rules confine, grace in Christ liberates, frees us. Life in Christ is not about following a bunch of rules that limit, but living abundantly, freely. But unlike rules that are easy to read with clear boundaries, grace allows each to soar for Christ. How do we love our God? One of the ways that shows is by how we love our brother. Matthew 6, Jesus says another tell of our love for God is by where or what our treasures are. James would say that our love is shown through our works of faith; taking care of those needs we have the ability to meet, not to ignore genuine distress. Notice, these are not lists of must dos, but examples of what may do.

And yet, I wonder. Though we have no boundaries to worry, save three, how serious do we take these three? Some say that we keep away from blood foods. Well mostly. Some do not realize that by not consuming the blood of what is hunted, and then we are showing more respect than those who do the opposite. But let’s move further away from the obvious and look to the ramifications. Do we stay away from blood when we are as a nation ok with abortion? MMR vaccinations are incubated in human embryonic tissue. Do we respect the blood, or life, when we have such practices?

We surely do not eat at feasts dedicated to Buddha or Allah? Do we accept, however, Hanukah dinner invitations? That’s the obvious, so let’s go deeper here. When we say we believe we worship God alone, can we still claim this belief as long as we see church as something we do once in a while, rather than seeing that worships isn’t going to church but part of our lives, that church is our dearest family, that we are a faith community?

OK there’s the last one, to stay sexually pure. Sex is a wonderful event given to us by God to be enjoyed in the confines of a marriage. This seems to be the easiest to keep, maybe, maybe not. Jesus tells us that sexual purity begins with the mind. “I tell you if you if you lust after a woman, you’ve already committed [sexual impurity] with her.” Sure, it can be said that sex has been kept between a husband and his wife. But do we? 

How many Christians live with their boyfriend/girlfriend? How are we about the issue of redefining? Here is a shocker: I believe God defined marriage between one man and one woman, Adam and Eve. But even the Bible is full of examples of man redefining marriage. Abraham and Jacob each had more than one wife. David had 7 at one time and a divorce. Not to be outdone by his dad, Solomon had 700. We can see the mess this type of redefining brought. This doesn’t begin to touch the problems that come from divorce and all other issues.

Now for all of these, sure, we have kept these three rules, even to the extensions that I’ve taken them. Let me ask you though. In Corinth, the church celebrated a man who had a relationship with his hopefully step mom. Paul tells us further in that letter that we need to be aware that bad company corrupts good character. That is why we are told to be careful in how we deal with people and their sins, lest we be found guilty of them ourselves. Rather, when we are told that there are unrepentant brothers, such as Matthew 18, then we are to have nothing to do with them. I have friends like that. I have family like that. And I haven’t shunned them. Maybe that’s why they are still where they are. What about yourselves? Do you?

3 rules. The Law of Moses offered a cage. The grace of Christ gives us freedom. Just to help, we had received 3 simple rules. But here’s the good news. When we get a proper perspective of living for Christ, living a life of grace, the brothers, it records, were gladdened by the Word. They sent the delegation with a blessing of peace. This is why we come here together, to encourage one another. Yes we meet around the Lord’s Table and worship God, but that worship is secondary, since worship is a reflection of our own personal, daily worship of God. Primary is that we meet to encourage one another with the Word, with songs and spiritual hymns and psalms.

This is the message that we need to share. We have a wonderful freedom, full of grace for when we blow it, which we do more than any of us care to admit it. Let’s get out of the cage and play some ball.

The 10 Commandments and the Faith

As a student, I had a hiccup in history that I could not get past. It had to do with the whole idea that our nation is a Judeo-Christian nation. Judeo-Christian means that our roots are based upon not just Christianity but also Judaism. What confused me about the term was that none of the founders were Jewish. They were Christians or perhaps deists, though I think that perhaps is revisionists’ history. Jefferson had some pretty strong things to say about Christianity and the Bible. So given that we were founded by Christians, I wondered how we became a Judeo-Christian society. Then I learned that we are “Judeo-“ because of the shape of our government and justice system. In Isaiah, God is called our lawgiver, our judge and king. This gives us the three branches of government. Then of course the Old Testament Law, an eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth, became the bases of law for our society. But unlike most others, our justice was tempered with Christian grace.

So to say that our government is Judeo Christian is fair. To say that we are as a people? Well we started using that term more readily so that we would come across as inclusive of the Jewish immigrants fleeing Europe not too long ago. And that is where we became snagged as a Christian people. I am not talking about the government because Judeo-Christian principles worked for the structure of this republic.

In churches across the country, if you asked the average preacher if the 10 Commandments are something that should be taught and followed, most of us would say yes. Ask the average member, you would get nearly 100% saying yes. And this is nothing new.

Where the Law of Moses comes into the picture of faith has always been a hot topic. It was what was happening in Antioch with the Pharisees who went down from Judea.  But I wonder, even speculate, that there was more going on than just merely arguing the finer points of the 10 Commandments. Let’s read the passage this morning.

Now I will add a disclaimer here. Yes, I’ve added more. The argument was circumcision. But the circumcision is tied to the Law of Moses, which is often in short referred to as the Ten. When one point is argued and accepted, it becomes easy to accept other points as well. I equated the three into the term “Ten”. And since I am a big fan of advocating that we do not live by the Old Testament, since we are saved by faith alone, the Old Testament is still a useful tool of showing how Jesus was foretold as early as the Garden. It is complete with glimpses of God’s love, grace and justness. It shows glimpses of people who struggle with life no differently than you and I do today. But when we start following and adopting it, then we can run into trouble.

If the Ten is so important to follow, then may I ask who has a tattoo? All of us men here have beards that are way too short. And then there’s the clincher: who here likes pizza or catfish? Yep, both are unclean foods. All of us are wearing poly-blends. My point is that it’s all the same. If you argue circumcision, you argue the Law, you argue the Ten. That is where I am coming from in my message.

Now what is really going on here is something more than just arguing the Law. The critics could be hung up on the tradition. For as long as they knew, the Ten was part of their lives. The Ten was the first thing they learned past the names of their siblings as well as mom and dad. Now here is Paul and Barnabas out away from Jerusalem, away from Judea, teaching that the Law was no longer needed. I can see these men, themselves no longer needed back home, thinking that they could go to one of the new churches and become teachers, teaching what they knew, the Ten.

We never do well with change. But that is the nature of life. The only constant is change. Yesterday morning, an icon in the El Paso skyline fell. There was an old copper smelt that had two smoke stacks. One was as tall as the Empire State building, and the other was nearly 20 stories taller. They both came down because change happens.

So here we can see people who are having trouble letting go. Perhaps more than that, they perhaps still wanted the power that they no longer had. I am not saying that they set out to be bad people. But once one is used to being something, when he has to let it go, it is extremely difficult.

However if these men went out as enemies of the church, seeking to destroy those who are new in the Faith, then there is a lesson to mark. It teaches us that we need to be careful and on watch for those who’d want to sneak in and destroy the church. We need to cling to strong doctrine and appoint leaders over us who are as committed to the faith.

This is about the ego. Something that not only did the early church have to deal with, but we still have the ego to deal with today, be it the preacher’s ego or your own ego. Sometimes we can be well meaning, but when we allow our pride to step in, then we find ourselves creating a huge mess.

And there is another lesson for us about faith. Why circumcision mostly? I had originally intended to talk to you about the difference between baptism and circumcision, but that is not what this passage is about. This act is different from baptism in a couple of manners: women are not circumcised, and wet people dry.

So on one hand, by holding to this, we can have an outward sign that we can point to. “See? I am a Christian!” Um, yeah, I think they did that. “See? I am a Jew.” But outward signs are nothing according to Paul. What is important is the change of the heart, or the circumcision of the heart.

Like outward signs, the Ten is really about the minimal.  I am Christian because of the sign I wear, or the plastic fish icon on my bumper, or because I shared the “I love Jesus” poster on Facebook. Because I have done of the listed, then I am free to do what I want for the rest of the time.

Take for example the job description. They are a list of rules one must keep in order to maintain employment. As long as you stay within the job description, you keep your status. It is the same with the Ten. These are rules of minimums. Love God by not having any idols, by not using his name in vain, by honoring your parents, but not doing the five things to your neighbor. These are the minimums God wants you to keep in order to achieve a right standing. But there are just under 300 commands in the Law of Moses. If you live to keep the law, then you’ve violated the first, have no other gods. Why? Because God wants us to live for Him! God desires to have fellowship with you and I, AND He wants us to want that fellowship with Him as well. So Jesus grabs the only two ambiguous commands when asked of the greatest.

He said, “Love God with all your being and the second is like it, love your neighbor as you love yourself.” What does something like that look like? Instead of do not commit sexual impurity, Jesus said do not lust. Don’t even entertain such thoughts. And impurity is any relationship outside of marriage between a man and a woman. Instead of do not murder, Jesus said do not be angry with your brother. Do not hate, but show your enemy love by allowing him to compel you the extra mile, which gives us, “Going the extra mile.” Give more than what is asked. This is why Jesus tells us to rethink our self importance. If you serve your neighbor, than you are loving him. If you are loving him, the Apostle John says, then you are loving God. Well, no one can hate his neighbor and love God is more accurate. But my claim is still true.

Faith isn’t about the minimums. It is about the max. This is why living with the Ten is bad advice for Christians because we tend to confuse ourselves into believing that holding them, we have done our duty. But our Father doesn’t want our duty. He wants us to aim as high as possible for the Kingdom. Faith is taking steps that everyone says is not there, that everyone says is impossible. But for the size of a mustard seed, you can cast by faith the mountain into the vast sea.

Again, in the parable of the talents, did you notice the only failure in that parable was the one who sat on the money. He didn’t aim and fail. He just didn’t aim. That’s the ten. Faith is like the one who invested his 5,000 and had 10 to show, or the man who invested his 2,000 and had 4 to show. They doubled because they had faith.

Now we must ask ourselves, but not just today, are we living minimally for God, or do we truly have faith in the Father? When we set aside rules and traditions, when we aim high, let me tell you: that speaks volumes more than some outward appearance. People do notice when someone truly walks a life of faith. Would you like to have such a life of faith?

When the Crowd, Win the Crowd (Sermon)

See Paul sitting there in Lystra? He had just been run out of a town because some rose up against his preaching Jesus.  Now he is here in this new location. I can see him preaching to both the Jews and the Gentiles. To the Jews he’s said that Jesus came to redeem Israel and the world, that he is the long awaited messiah. To the Greeks I can see him preaching the freedom that Jesus offers, freedom from relying on others’ charities, freedom from obeying sets of rules, freedom from the guilt of the wrong doing, freedom from the fear of the end or death. Then there is a man there sitting, listening, wanting. I can imagine him wishing that he didn’t need to beg for scraps and pity. It is always been in the heart of man to want to provide for himself and perhaps even provide for those he loves. It’s a base instinct.

And Paul saw him listening, believing all that Paul had to say. To demonstrate his message, Paul then tells this man to stand up. Not only does the man stand, but he adds jumping. Mind you, he’s never been vertical. His ankles have never had weight of any sort on them. He starts walking instantly. I wonder if he was like my boys, still occasionally tripping, or was he graceful as if he’d been doing this all along? It doesn’t really matter. He was healed.

Then Paul learned something about the human nature. The human heart, which Jeremiah says can’t be trusted, is fickle, and can’t be trusted. Let’s read the people’s reaction to Paul’s good work following his good words.

(Read Verses 11-18) So here is Paul, instantly he’s Lycaonium’s pastor. Everyone likes him. He is at the top of his game, so much so, that they want to see him as a god. There is that temptation within leadership, just as there has been with being part of the “right” church. When the crowd cheers you, focus on God. It can become easy to lose focus on Jesus. After all, look back to Peter. He walked on water, further than you and I, but the moment he lost his focus, he sank.  Thankfully, Paul and Barnabas didn’t. They continued pleading with the people, barely stopping them from making the sacrifices to them. They continued stating that God is living, and continues to show His love and grace. It was a close call. But when the crowd cheers you, focus on God.

(Read verse 19a) But not everything remained up and up. The crowd turned on Paul and Barnabas. For some reason, crowds are never reliable. It is too easy to turn an audience into a mob. I am not sure how long it took the Jews to turn the masses, day or two, a week or month? Luke gives us no passage of time, other than the allusion of the passage in verses 8 and 9. The man listened to Paul speak. For how long did Paul speak before the man believed?

Here is why, though, we cannot trust and live by our emotions, live by our heart, live by our feelings. One moment, the people are in awe as they listened to God give the 10 commandments to them. Then begging in reverent fear for Moses to intercede, they turned and made a golden calf. I believe that when they heard the first 10, they were in earnest. But a few days later, perhaps a week or two, they turned away. They earnestly made a calf.

The crowd is fickle when one day; they are out clipping branches and laying blankets in the road welcoming Jesus as their rightful king. They were in earnest. They truly believed him to the long awaited king. Then just a few days later, 5 to be exact, the crowds are now saying, “crucify Jesus!” And unfortunately, they were in earnest.

Now some people come to stir up trouble because they were envious of the popularity of Paul. I can see the poisoned words, “Paul said your gods were worthless. He said that your parents who died worshipping Zeus are now dead in their sins.” It wouldn’t take much to poison a person’s mind.

I remember talking to one lady in a previous ministry. She said that to accept immersion as I teach it, instead of sprinkling, as her Lutheran priest taught, then she will not see him, or her deceased husband, or her deceased parents and siblings again. She would rather suffer with them if my teaching was correct and hers was wrong. Be it known, I never said where the fate of her loved ones rested. I said, and still say, trust in the Lord and his mercy and grace!  Yet, when the crowds jeer, focus on God.

(Read 19b & 20) The final lesson that Paul teaches us is when the crowds abandon, focus on God. That is the cycle of the crowd. They will praise us, then boo us and then leave us. They left Paul thinking he was dead. They didn’t kill him. But I do think a miracle did take place. I do think he was healed since he got up and seemed to have returned to the town before he left the next day. I imagine that he waited only because the day was already too late for traveling.  But when he did leave, he continued preaching. He continued winning people to the Lord.

For us, we are fighting a temptation. It would be easy to see us as having been abandoned by the many who’ve been part of this congregation. The world and the devil would say, “See how small you are? There’s no hope that this church has what it takes to grow!” But then we still have Paul’s promise to the church in Corinth. We have all we need to carry out the mission. We just need to focus on Jesus. We need to focus on reaching our lost loved ones with the good news that Jesus died to set us free. We reach, God adds.

Now the crowds may cheer us as we do so. The sad reality though, as we focus on God, on living righteous lives, or to live according to the grace we’ve received, the crowds will more than likely jeer us. It will give us a choice. We may think that we are to focus on ourselves, but no. That is not the solution. The solution is to focus on Christ. It’s not sitting around, hoping people will drop in through our doors. It is actually making a point to encourage people in Jesus, to talk about the Lord’s grace and ask them to consider Jesus. Time and again, God shows how when the crowds… we should win the crowds for Christ. Then the Lord added daily to their number those being saved. Are you ready to win? Do you need to know how to win? If so, come as we stand and sing.

Oh Great Day of Hope - Matthew 27.50-53 (Sermon)

This indeed is a Great Day!  And though I can easily take the time of the message to lay out why I prefer Easter as the title for our Christian holiday, I want to do something that is different today. I have elected a passage that is pre-burial in part, but not really pre-burial.

Because it goes beyond what we can fathom, I suspect many gloss over these 4 verses. There is no real simple explanation, other than the most simplistic of explanations. It finds a foretelling in Ezekiel 37, how God told Ezekiel to prophesy so that the valley of bones becomes flesh, and then again so that these bodies might regain their breath. He obeyed and a valley of dry bones became an army.

Of course, this is fascinating. Though Ezekiel is in a vision, what was happening in Jerusalem that day was no vision. It was happening, and because it happened, we have a great day, and we have a great hope! Let’s look at this passage, Matthew 27.50-53. {Read Text}

Let us see the good news of the Resurrection. The first and foremost is the reason Christ came to this earth. Back in the Garden, man was created in the image of God, the Lord Almighty. He created them male and female. He said above all creation that Man and Woman were very good. They knew no sin, felt no shame. Daily they walked with God. They enjoyed fellowship with Him. But along the way, Satan came in to corrupt this fellowship. He deceived Eve and she ate the fruit from the tree of knowledge. Adam, not wanting to lose her, shared in her sin. In their choice, they lost the garden. God had to banish them. He would not abide in sin. They were sentenced. Justice would be coming.

Then skipping a couple of ions, we see a little old woman begging of David to bring his son back to court. She prophesied that God is not content with banishing his children, but looks for a way to restore the fellowship. Let me back up now, to the choosing of Abraham and his descendents of Isaac, his son by Sarah. (This is like a country dance, two steps forward, one step back.) God chose Abraham for the plan God had for creation. He was working on restoring the fellowship with His own creation.  But even as he was choosing Abraham, through Moses, he was teaching that the salvation wasn’t just for the line of Abraham, but for all nations. That’s why there was a court of the Gentiles.

That plan was to restore our fellowship with Him, and he would do so by coming into humanity as Jesus. Justice had to be paid, so our Father decided to take on this pain. So we would not need to know what it is to be alone, He was sin for us. Because he was sin, the veil separating us from God was ripped open. We now had the freedom to approach him on our own, without a priest, without a sacrifice for our wrongs. Isn’t that great?

It doesn’t matter what is going on in our lives. He wants us to draw near to him. He opened the door for us. His apostles quote Jesus in telling us that we can now casually call him daddy, or papa, as we would our earthly father. While we were strangers, steeped in our sin and guilt, in our shame, He died for us so we can embrace him, accept His offer.  That is what the ripped veil tells us. Come!

So that we know how much God loves us, how He longs for our fellowship, He gave us a token of what is to come. He gives us hope for more life. Mind you, when Christ died, saints from all over the world were not raised, only those in Jerusalem. And even then, not all the saints from Jerusalem were raised into life. Only some of the saints were raised. These saints had a two-fold purpose. They were first to be evidences of Christ’s command over death. In life he brought three back, even after the last one had been dead for 5 days. Why would this be different?

Ah but perhaps that is where there is differences. We do not know that they lived eternally at that point, or if, like Lazarus, they died again. We don’t even know who came back. Were these recently died or were some of these bones like Ezekiel? It is not unheard of for a cemetery to be called a valley of death. They are, after all, reminders that death comes to all. So we draw this conclusion that just as some were raised as Christ died, or maybe others were right, that they came to life when/after Christ did. What is important is that they came to life! And as we have placed our hope in Jesus, so too, will we come back to life. Unlike those from the cemetery, we will receive new bodies, free from the signs of trials we’ve faced in this life.

There is another application here. It is more personal, for us as a body, Central Christian Church of Stuttgart. We are few. Experts tell us that we are dead already. Once a church’s median age reaches 63, once a church drops to a dozen or less, there is no hope. But as you know, I am not one to rely on experts. Neither are you.

We, instead, serve a living God. You know that Jesus trusted everything to a group of 12. If we count the children, we are 12, a bit more. With that aside, let’s focus on this. Jesus conquered death. And just as in the act of Friday and Sunday, I firmly believe that He can do more than we can ask or imagine! Jesus breathed new life into bones. He can breathe new life into this congregation.

Our prayers must expect it. Father, build up your body as we strive to build your kingdom. Sure, we will take a bit more effort on each of our shoulders. Yet let us not focus on our strength to do this alone. Because Jesus is fully powerful, Paul tells us that He gives us the same power that raised Christ from the dead. It’s also why we have not only been given the strength to endure, to reach out to others, to do, to be vessels of God’s glory, but we have one another for encouragement.

This morning, we are reminded that it is a great day of hope in Christ Jesus. I want to therefore encourage you that not only will you see this day as a new day full of new opportunity, but I want you to see that this great day of hope is just the first day, as tomorrow will be another.

Let us open our eyes not to what we hear in the news and see around us, a world falling apart. Let us instead see the opportunities before us, see the fields white for the harvest.

Now we have our song of commitment, song of decision. We will sing #228, “Were You There”. We will sing verses 1, 4 and 5. Verse 5 is easy, though it’s not in the book. Were you there when he rose up from the dead. Oh sometimes it causes me to praise him. For those who are not clothed in Christ, what better day for you to make a decision for Christ? I invite you to come forward. Let us stand and sing.