STAND AMAZED

We live in an age when there is a religious philosophy on every corner.  The true and false mingle together sometimes, and the journey gets very foggy.  This is the age of spirituality.  Religious ideologies abound.  Palm readers and Fortunetellers have set up shop in about every city. The religion of Self-help abounds and the religion of materialism, which calls people to more and more possessions and greater and greater success, permeates the horizon. 

When Jesus comes along and says that he is “the Way and the Truth and the Life” (John 14:6), He pushes the envelop a little too far for some.  That's why people will take Jesus to a certain point, and no further.  When He starts talking about sin and brokenness and about Him dying and being raised from the dead that, pretty much, ends the conversation for a lot of folks.

We human types don't want to talk about sin and brokenness.  We don't want to talk about the pain we carry and the emptiness, which haunts us so much, that we live out our lives medicated with some "pain-killer" of choice. We drive our cars and talk on our cell phones and watch our TV's and embrace our entertainment and sip our drink of choice, caught up in a world of busyness and activity and distraction, knowing that things are not working in our lives but ignoring the reality of it.

Then, Jesus shows up, and by His simply being here, we see the truth about ourselves, we see the dead ends, and we see the possibilities of new beginnings.  Suddenly, something new is on the horizon, and we know, we know, love is covering our lives, and that the future can be different than the past.  Amazing Grace fills us up and we stand amazed at how good God is. 

LOOK AND LIVE

While strolling through Athens, Greece, Paul came across an altar with an inscription on it that read,  "TO AN UNKNOWN GOD" (Acts 17:23).  He was already “distressed to see that the city was full of idols” (vs. 16), and this inscription added to the distress but also gave him an opportunity to share Jesus with the philosophers who had gathered. 

           

They called on him to share the faith that he had been claiming, something that was new to them.  They asked, “May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting? You are bringing some strange ideas to our ears, and we would like to know what they mean” (vs. 19-20). 

           

Paul used the inscription “To an unknown God,” as his point of entry to share with them the good news of Jesus.  He shared that the “unknown God” of the altar was in fact known, that He was present in the person of Jesus, and that Jesus’ credential were established when He was raised from the dead.  He told them that in Jesus God was inviting people to “seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him” (vs. 27).   Then Paul said this very powerful thing about God.  He said that God “is not far from any one of us” (vs. 27).

           

Paul takes us from an unknown God to the God who is not far from any one of us.  We believe God is here, that our lives are being encountered by His amazing grace.  God is not absent.  He is present.   God is not unknown.  If you want to know what God looks like, take a long, long, look at Jesus. Tear down any altars or idols that distracts from Jesus, and come into His resurrection. 

Look and live.

DON'T WASTE THE GRACE

The disciples felt the day of their death had come and that there on the sea, in the midst of a violent storm, they were going to perish.  In an act of panic they turned to Jesus to save them.  He did, but not before asking them “Why are you afraid, you men of little faith?” (Matt. 8:26).

           

Odd question, don’t you think?  Everything in your training says it’s over.  The storm is ragging, the wind is blowing, everything is getting soaking wet, and there is no help in sight.  What do you mean, “Why are you afraid?” 

           

When life is coming apart we can turn to fear and panic or Jesus and peace.  Panic probably comes easier than peace, but panic is a wrong decision for one who trusts in the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

After Jesus had calmed the storm at sea and in the hearts of the disciples they asked, “What kind of a man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?” (vs. 27).  What kind of man is He? The God-Man, in fact.  God with us.  Immanuel.  God’s loving response to the deepest needs of the human heart.

Jesus, Lord of lords and King of kings, is present today still stunning us with His power and His love.  Come what may, Jesus is who He says He is. In Him our lives are covered by grace, and mercy is the very air we breathe. As the seventeenth century hymns says, "Be Still, My Soul; the Lord is on thy side."[1]  Don’t waste the grace.           

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[1] “Be Still, My Soul,” Catharina von Schlegel, 1697-? Translated by Jane Borthwick, 1813-1897

HOW AWESOME IS THIS PLACE

Augustine said that the “signs of the Trinity” were all throughout the world.  If he is right, and I think he is, it occurs to me that I ought to seek to be a bit more attentive to the presence of God in my world.

           

Too often I meander through my days, caught up in whatever it is that has caught me up, and I live unaware of the ever-present and astonishing reality of God.  I have discovered that the routine can become the normal and that the normal can lull me to sleep so that I missed the awe and wonder of God.

           

Do you remember the story of Jacob and the dream he had one night in which there was a ladder rising up to heaven and on the ladder, coming and going, were angels?  When he awoke he said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it…. How awesome is this place!  This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven” (Genesis 28:16-17).

           

What a confession! “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it.” Too often, this has been my story.  Life and stuff and schedules and people and the clock and, did I mention stuff, distract me from the greatest of all realities, that God is here, in this place, right now, here, really. 

           

Yet, this is too big to miss.  If I miss this, I have missed too much.  God is here, really; and, He is at work in amazing grace and marvelous love and awesome forgiveness.  Wherever I am “is none other than the house of God, the gate of heaven.” 

HOW AWESOME IS THIS PLACE.

Be Thou My Vision

 The eight century Irish hymn says,

Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise.

Thou mine in inheritance, now and always.

Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,

High King of Heaven, My Treasure Thou art.[1]

This song has gotten under my skin in the most positive of ways recently, as I have seen God work His works in my life and in the church.

Standing firm in Christ against the assault of cancer has drawn me close to the Father’s heart and there I have seen in fresh new ways that there is no better way to live in this world than to live here in the life of Jesus.

As to the church, when it seemed that the story was over and that there would be no future, God’s Amazing Grace swallowed us up in the possibilities of God, and now we aren’t thinking about closing but about thriving into a new future.  The God who raised Jesus from the dead has spoken His life transforming Word.

I stand amazed again today watching God work and calling us into His work.  My prayer is borrowed, but it is mine,

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;


I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;


Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;


Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.[2]

Another prayer is borrow, too.  “Your kingdom come.  Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10). 

                                   

The wind is blowing.

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[1] Verse 4, “Be Thou My Vision,” Irish hymn from 8^th century; translated from ancient Irish into English by Mary E. Byrne, 1905

[2] Verse 2, “Be Thou My Vision”

NEVER UNDER-ESTIMATE THE POWER OF GOD

Sometimes life comes fast and furious at us and it is difficult to see God in the midst of things.  The apostle Paul says that in our lives today “we see in a mirror dimly” (I Cor. 13:12).  Everything isn’t crystal clear.  We walk by faith and not by sight, and some times it gets pretty dark out there. 

           

In the “unclearness,” however, there is a God who is at work in our lives and in our world.  What we see about God in the Scripture is that we ought never underestimate His power.  He is the God with whom nothing is impossible and He is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think (See Luke 1:37 and Eph. 3:20).   

           

Live faithfully in the provision of the One who is the Maker of heaven and earth, who opens and no one shuts, who shuts and no one opens.  I John 4:4 tells us “greater is He who is in [us] than he who is in the world.”  We may be living in a world where “we see in a mirror dimly,” but we live there indwelled by the God of the universe who has called us to Himself and made us alive in Jesus.

           

Whatever you are facing, face it with God.  Don’t under-estimate His power to work His works.  God is God and no situation you or I might come up against can undo this fact.  He has redeemed us in Jesus and by the power of His resurrection He can hold us steady each step along the way. 

           

Never underestimate the power of God.