Jesus had some words to say to people whose religion had gone to their heads but not their hearts. Head religion is a dangerous enemy to those who long to know God. It builds false security and creates illusions of holiness, when holiness is, in fact, far, far away.

In Luke 18:9-14 Jesus tells the story of a man whose Head was filled with religion but whose heart didn't know God. In this condition the man lived out his self-righteous charade, so full of himself that he actually "viewed others with contempt." So arrogant in his religious charade was he that he actually thanked God he wasn't like those other low-life people; you know the kind, "swindlers, unjust, adulterers, and tax-collectors." Apparently he was so busy fasting and tithing and self-exalting that "other people" were a nuisance to him, folks he didn't much want to be around.

As the man prayed at the altar of God one day, a certain tax collector, also wanting to pray but not feeling worthy enough to come inside the temple, just stood "some distance away" and said, "God, be merciful to me, the sinner" (Luke 18:13).

Of the two men who prayed that day only one was heard by God and it wasn't the one who thought of himself as being so very holy. Of the man who stood at a distance Jesus said he went home justified. Of the other man Jesus said (and may I have some literary license?) "Go home. You're wasting my time and yours."

Then Jesus said, "Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted" (Luke 18:14). I think that's another way of saying, "Get real. Never forget from whence you come. Don't be religious. Instead, fall in love with God and live a life of love and forgiveness. Receive others the way God has received you."

Southern California fires

Hello, everybody,

A member of our church shared with me that her daughter and grandchildren have been evacuated from their home in San Diego County, along with thousands of others. I've watched the NEWS along with you and can't even begin to get my mind around all the devastation and suffering that is happening this week here in Southern California. In this matter, I am calling our church to prayer.

Some of you have friends who are impacted by the some 13 fires burning in Southern California today. It has been a devastating week, and for thousands of people this week is just the beginning of a long journey of recovery. I want to ask you to be available to help -- in prayer, in moral support, in financial assistance, in whatever way you can.

When the fires go out, and they will, the road to rebuilding and recovery will go on for months and months, if not years.

This is a time for persistent, tenacious, and ongoing prayer, and for persistent, tenacious and ongoing availability to serve others in whatever way we are able to do so.

Thanks for being there.

Pastor Rick Savage

It is a perplexing world in which we live – uncertain and bewildering. Life motivated one driver to put on his automobile bumper a sticker announcing to everyone behind it, ‘Life is hard and then you die.” Prophets of doom and gloom are everywhere.

Jesus, on the other hand, gathered His people around Him one day and told them a story. He told them this story “to show that at all times they ought to pray and not to lose heart” (Luke 18:1-8). Consequently we will not be putting on the church marquee the words of the bumper sticker theologian. Instead we invite everybody to gather around Jesus, listen to his story, and not become bitter, hard and cynical.

Life is hard, by the way, but Jesus calls us not to lose heart. Jesus calls us to the Father before whom we are invited to pour out our woes, or stories, and our lives. We are invited to the Father where Jesus says we will be heard and received.

Life is hard. Some things are just about unbearably hard. Some things rip at the heart and devastate the emotions. There are some things over which we simply must come before God and “cry to Him day and night.” And, the word of Jesus in these matters is that to those who do cry out to God day and night, He will bring about justice.

God does have a question, however. Jesus says, “When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth” (Luke 18:8)? Can we keep looking unto God when life keeps barreling down on us? When the times are hard and the temptation to cynicism is great what will we conclude, that Life is hard and then you die, or that life is hard but God is still God? Shall we give up or shall we give everything up to God? Jesus says, pray and don’t lose heart.

I’m with Him on this. Shall we pray together?

In a short, concise, and to the point story Luke tells us about Jesus and ten leprous men (Luke 17:11-19). The men had cried out to Jesus for mercy and it was mercy He gave them, mercy in the form of physical healing. Then He sent them off to church so that the priests could see that they were healed. If the priests were satisfied then a process could be started that would allow these ostracized men to enter again into the community and get their lives back.

One of the men put his trip to the priests on hold, turned around and came back to Jesus to thank Him for the act of mercy that had been extended to him. Luke says the man was “glorifying God with a loud voice, and he fell on his face at [Jesus] feet, giving thanks to Him” (vs. 15-16). Jesus had asked none of the ten to do this and none of the ten did, except this one man who had two issues going against him – he was a leper and he was a Samaritan.

Jewish folks and Samaritan folks didn’t get along too well and I’m not sure that just any priest would have received this Samaritan. We’ll leave that to the speculators. What we do know is that this Samaritan man came back to this Jewish man, fell on his face before Him and gave thanks.

Jesus was impressed. He knew this man was a “foreigner” (vs. 18), and He knew this man’s issues. Maybe that’s why He was impressed, that instead of an act of narcissism, this one lone Samaritan-foreigner forgot about himself for a moment and fell on his face before this One who had made such a profound impact on his life.

Putting the future on hold just to give thanks. That’s the kind of guy I would like to know. That’s the kind of guy I want to be.

“Mustard seed” talk from the lips of Jesus is intriguing to me (see Luke 17:5-10). He seems to be obsessed with the littleness of the mustard seed and yet also moved with the possibilities of power and potential within that small seed. What Jesus has to say about faith he says in the context of this very small seed, a seed so small that one might be deceived into thinking that nothing large or great could come of it. But they would be wrong.

“Faith like a mustard seed” (vs. 6) has power in it no one can fully explain. We think if we had more faith or greater faith things would be different and we could do great things for God. Jesus says that (and please forgive me for being some what simplistic) little faith operating within the reality of God so changes the dynamics of any given situation, or people, that what has been thought of as impossible is now seen in a different light so much so that it is like speaking to a great “mulberry tree” and commanding it to “be uprooted and be planted in the sea” (vs. vs. 6).

Now, I don’t want to burst anybody’s bubble but I need to tell you that you probably ought not to go out commanding mulberry trees to uproot and go into the sea. First of all they wouldn’t budge and secondly, most of them are fine right where they are, thank you very much. So, what in the world is Jesus driving at?

Maybe Jesus is telling His people to quit acting like God is dead and start living like He is very much alive. Maybe Jesus is telling us that life in the kingdom is not defined by life in this world but that life in the kingdom is defined by the life of God. In God maybe little is much. Maybe small is enough. Maybe my life in the hands of God is a life that has God-size potential and possibility.

May God is God after all. Maybe after everything is said and done there is still God. Maybe we can be what God has called us to be. Wouldn’t that be a wonderful thing?