22 Friday Dec 2006
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This has been an amazing couple of weeks; very high highs and very low lows, but it’s all part of ministry. As the past couple of weeks have progressed, I am convinced of the Kingdom of Light vs. the Kingdom of Darkness. Here’s a short video from sermonspice.com about the two kingdoms.
20 Wednesday Dec 2006
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This past Sunday, we had our annual church Christmas banquet. My wife heard one of our students say they “were there only for the presents.” Now this was the typical southern church carry-in dinner. The food was excellent and we had plenty of it. My wife and I brought some Pennsylvania Dutch cooking. I brought Potato Filling and Pam made Shoo-fly Pie. After dinner, we hand out presents. Last year, we didn’t know that, so we handed ours to our ministry leaders early. This year Pam and I made custom, one of a kind Christmas balls for each leader. I forgot to take a picture of them to show you. It is great show of love to each other. We received many presents, plus our Christmas bonus, which helped us finish our shopping this week. Thank you to the congregation of Preston Wesleyan. We know that we are loved and we love you back. After that we all go home.
Let me get back to the title. The students had their Christmas party and got their gifts the week before, but they were looking for more. Here’s the application. How many times during this season do we go around seeking the presents? What we really need to seek is the Presence. Jesus came to earth over two thousand years ago to be Emmanuel – God with Us. John the Evangelist writes, “The Word (Jesus) became flesh and dwelt among us.” Instead of seeking presents, let me encourage you to seek the Presence, Jesus Christ, Emmanuel, God with Us.
19 Tuesday Dec 2006
Posted in Lectionary
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This coming Sunday will be the Fourth Sunday of our Advent celebration. At 5:00 on Sunday, we will meet for a Lessons and Carols service. Here are the scriptures for this Sunday.
Micah 5:2-5; Psalm 80:1-7; Hebrews 10:5-10; Luke 1:39-55
Our theme for this Sunday is: Advent: A Season of Joy. Our choir will be presenting a worship musical called, “Jesus, There’s Something About That Name.” I’m looking forward to it. I want to share the Gospel reading for Sunday with you. It’s about Mary and it’s known as “The Magnificat.”
“Oh, how my soul praises the Lord.
47 How my spirit rejoices in God my Savior!
48 For he took notice of his lowly servant girl,
and from now on all generations will call me blessed.
49 For the Mighty One is holy,
and he has done great things for me.
50 He shows mercy from generation to generation
to all who fear him.
51 His mighty arm has done tremendous things!
He has scattered the proud and haughty ones.
52 He has brought down princes from their thrones
and exalted the humble.
53 He has filled the hungry with good things
and sent the rich away with empty hands.
54 He has helped his servant Israel
and remembered to be merciful.
55 For he made this promise to our ancestors,
to Abraham and his children forever.”
I’ll post something on this later this week.
19 Tuesday Dec 2006
Posted in Blogging
Today I wanted to share with a couple of thoughts. Being that next Monday is Christmas, I’ve included a clip from youtube.com of the Indiana Wesleyan University Chorale. The song that they are singing is an African Christmas carol. I hope you enjoy it.
By now most of you are aware that Time has selected “you” as the Person of the Year. Here’s a quote from the article: “But look at 2006 through a different lens and you’ll see another story, one that isn’t about conflict or great men. It’s a story about community and collaboration on a scale never seen before. It’s about the cosmic compendium of knowledge Wikipedia and the million-channel people’s network YouTube and the online metropolis MySpace. It’s about the many wresting power from the few and helping one another for nothing and how that will not only change the world, but also change the way the world changes.”
If you would have asked me a year ago if I had any interest in blogging, I would have looked at you cross-eyed. I never thought I would enjoy doing this, but I am and have several blogs that I read and they read mine. It’s cool.
I agree with Keith Drury. I believe this will change denominations and churches. He has written two articles this semester and he says it much better than I do, so here are the links.
To quote Dr. Drury, “So what do you think?”
19 Tuesday Dec 2006
Posted in Uncategorized
Whatever corrections I made last week to bowl so well, I promptly forgot them this week. I struggled with two sub-100 games to start out. The third game started the same way. About the fourth frame of the third game, I decided to go back to the basics; correct footwork and delivery of the ball. For the next several frames, I bowled spares then had an open frame and then rolled a mark in all the remaining frames to end with a 141. I bowled a 341 for the evening. Several thoughts come from tonight’s experience.
Sometimes, you just need to go back to the basics. This could apply to many areas of our lives. Sometimes it can apply to the church. What should we concentrate on; soul-winning or discipleship? Is it an “either-or” proposition? Just so that all of us can think about this more, Here is a link for Rod Pickett’s blog. He is a Wesleyan pastor in Illinois, who is thinking about such things.
We quickly fell behind in the first two games, so we just had fun. Two men on the other team were having one of those great nights. A 157 average bowler rolled a 617 set. That’s cool. Several others were just bowling their hearts out and having great games. I am competitive. I enjoy winning, but tonight things weren’t working for us, so we just had fun. I think I had more fun encouraging all the other bowlers who were having great nights, than bowling myself. It was great. Thought #2 is if things aren’t going well for you, cheer on the others around you who are clicking on all cylinders and celebrate their victories. What if we operated in the church that way. So many times we get caught up in our little world and forget to celebrate with those who are (at the time) “having the game of their lives.”
19 Tuesday Dec 2006
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Here’s a great post from Wesleyan pastor Dean Brown. Dean is a church planter in Nova Scotia and has endured some great trials this year.
18 Monday Dec 2006
Posted in Sunday Thoughts
Today was a good day. I led worship with just my guitar. The theme today was Advent: A Season of Salvation. We sang Christmas carols that carried that theme; Joy to the World, Go – Tell It on the Mountain, and What Child is This? We had a men’s trio sing (That’s a first since I’ve been here.) I preached a sermon in line with the theme. We finished with a great new Christmas hymn from the pens of Keith Getty and Stuart Townend; Joy Has Dawned. Getty and Townend also penned “In Christ Alone.”
That however wasn’t the end of the day. Me and one of our teens were supposed to decorate for our Christmas banquet this evening, but he got sick, so I enlisted my children. We decorated the fellowship hall for our banquet. Then had a quick choir practice for next week’s service and then headed off to the banquet. I made my potato filling and everyone loved it. When we finished, our church traditionally hands out Christmas presents to everyone, including the pastor. We received some very nice gifts. Thank you to everyone for a very nice evening together. Our family really enjoyed the fellowship and the slow pace of the dinner.
17 Sunday Dec 2006
Today is the third week of our journey through Advent. We continue to prepare our hearts for the Christmas season. So far on our journey we have looked at how Christ’s coming gives us hope. His first advent (or coming) gave us hope that something can be done about our sinful condition. His second advent gives us hope for the future, no matter what this life is like. Last week we looked at how Christ’s advents can give us comfort and peace. We live in a world that needs to hear that message. This morning we are going to take a step toward the Christmas story and see how Christ’s advent brings us salvation.
If you’ve been reading along in our Year of the Bible readings, we’ve now spent the last three and a half months in the prophets of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and some of the Minor Prophets. One of the things that have become very clear is that Israel – God’s chosen people were in need of salvation. They were in need of something or someone else beyond them to save them. What is amazing is that the cycle of sinning and repenting and then following God wasn’t more than a generation long over and over again. One generation would follow God, the next would be rebellious and the cycle continued for thousand to two thousand years. God even gave his chosen people laws to follow, but that didn’t help; they continued to disobey God. What was going to be the solution? Was there anything or anyone that could help them? Yes, there is someone that could help them and Yes, there is someone who can help us. His name is Jesus and He brings salvation; not only to the Hebrews, but to everyone. Let’s go see what the prophet Zephaniah says about this salvation.
14 Sing, O daughter of Zion; shout aloud, O Israel! Be glad and rejoice with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem! 15 For the Lord will remove his hand of judgment and will disperse the armies of your enemy. And the Lord himself, the King of Israel, will live among you! At last your troubles will be over, and you will fear disaster no more.
16 On that day the announcement to Jerusalem will be, “Cheer up, Zion! Don’t be afraid! 17 For the Lord your God has arrived to live among you. He is a mighty savior. He will rejoice over you with great gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will exult over you by singing a happy song.”
18 “I will gather you who mourn for the appointed festivals; you will be disgraced no more. 19 And I will deal severely with all who have oppressed you. I will save the weak and helpless ones; I will bring together those who were chased away. I will give glory and renown to my former exiles, who have been mocked and shamed. 20 On that day I will gather you together and bring you home again. I will give you a good name, a name of distinction among all the nations of the earth. They will praise you as I restore your fortunes before their very eyes. I, the Lord, have spoken!”[1]
Zephaniah’s main theme is the coming of the day of the Lord, when God will severely punish the nations. The day of the Lord is not a time of joy, but a time of accountability and judgment, and while he does that, he also makes it clear that God will yet be merciful to his people. Thus, he ends his pronouncements of doom on a positive note that we have just read. Zephaniah lets the people know that salvation is coming. This explains why those in Israel were looking for a mighty king rather than a baby in a manger born in Bethlehem. That’s not the way a king is born. Their king would be born out of the royal line, in a grand way. Zephaniah says, “And the Lord himself, the King of Israel will live among you! At last your troubles will be over, and you will fear disaster no more.” No wonder they were awaiting this Messiah, this Anointed One. He was going to change everything. If we look down a few more verses, it goes like this, “For the Lord you God has arrived to live among you. He is a mighty savior, He will rejoice over you with great gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will exult you by singing a happy song.”
Jesus advent in Bethlehem was the fulfillment of the prophecies. Listen to the prophet Isaiah:
2 See, God has come to save me.
I will trust in him and not be afraid.
The Lord God is my strength and my song;
he has become my salvation.”
3 With joy you will drink deeply from the fountain of salvation! 4 In that wonderful day you will sing:
“Thank the Lord!
Praise his name!
Tell the world what he has done.
Oh, how mighty he is!
5 Sing to the Lord,
for he has done wonderful things.
Make known his praise around the world.
6 Let all the people of Jerusalem shout his praise with joy!
For great is the Holy One of Israel who lives among you.”[2]
So Advent is a season of salvation. At Christmas we celebrate the Son of God, Jesus – Emmanuel – God with us, coming to earth as a baby. He is our salvation.
He came from heaven to earth – to show the way
From the earth to the cross – my debt to pay
From the cross to the grave – from the grave to the sky
Lord, I lift Your name on high.
I love this song because it is the gospel in miniature. Man couldn’t do it alone. The Old Testament is proof of that. Only God is righteous. Only God can make us righteous. We can’t do it on our own. It’s interesting to note that the only date important on the calendar for the early Christians was the Resurrection Sunday or as we know it Easter. It was so important to those early Christians that every Lord’s Day was a celebration of the resurrection. It was that important to them. It’s really only in the resurrection of Jesus Christ that makes any difference. Jesus came two thousand years ago to save the human race. Gradually they began commemorating the other important events in the life of Jesus. Next week as we gather together, we will be celebrating the joy that comes from the advent of Jesus and next Sunday at 5:00 PM, we will celebrate finally that Jesus has come. “Joy to the world the Lord is come.”
One of the ways that we can prepare our hearts for the coming of the King of kings is to make sure that we have already received Jesus as our Savior. He came to save us, but the gift of salvation has to be received. This morning I want to make sure that everyone here has had the opportunity to receive him as Savior. Wouldn’t it be cool to celebrate Christmas the way it was really intended? Would it be great to celebrate the birth of Jesus and in the process know that He is your Savior? That’s why he came.
Some will say, “I can do it on my own.” We like to think that we can pull ourselves up by the bootstraps. Doesn’t the Bible say, “God helps those who help themselves?” It sure does not! Unless that phrase is in one of the Minor Prophets that we haven’t read yet or the book of Revelation, it’s not in there. I can assure you that it’s not. There is nothing we can do to earn our salvation. It is all God. He offers his Son, Jesus, as a free gift. Think about that for a moment. You can’t earn a gift. A gift by its very definition is free. There’s a word that describes that. The word is grace. We can remember it this way: God’s Riches at Christ’s Expense. Christ paid the penalty for sin; a debt that we owed because each one of us is a sinner. Each one of us falls short of God’s glorious standard. We can’t compare ourselves to other humans, because they’re sinners as well. It’s only through God’s gift of Jesus that we can be saved. God tells us in order to receive this wonderful gift we have to repent or turn in the opposite direction of our sins and receive him. Instead of living for ourselves we live for God. We place our life into His hands and He will help us. It’s only when we live in his hands that we really can live life to its fullest. It’s really a wonderful place to live. Once you place your life in his hands though, you have to leave it there. Is it easy? I wish I could say it was. There are those who will say, “Just give your life to Jesus and he will work everything out.” While in a way that is true, if we are truly honest, we know that once we give our lives to Jesus, we will struggle because there are two kingdoms; the kingdom of light and the kingdom of dark. Also remember that difficulties only refine our faith. So if we receive Jesus into our lives and let him take over, do we just live our life on autopilot? No! Here’s some great advice from Paul.
4 Always be full of joy in the Lord. I say it again—rejoice! 5 Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do. Remember, the Lord is coming soon.
6 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. 7 If you do this, you will experience God’s peace, which is far more wonderful than the human mind can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.[3]
That is some great advice and it includes a reminder of the season that we are in. Jesus came once as a baby to save the world from its sins. Jesus is coming again to take those who are his to heaven with him.
This morning the altar is open for those who would like to receive Jesus this morning. He is our salvation.
[1]Holy Bible, New Living Translation, (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.) 1996.
[2]Holy Bible, New Living Translation, (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.) 1996.
[3]Holy Bible, New Living Translation, (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.) 1996.
17 Sunday Dec 2006
Posted in Lectionary
The past few weeks, I have been working on another blog, but have found out it’s just too much writing. I’ve had some writer’s block this week. What I’ve decided to do is to pull the post from my Lectionary Notepad and put them here in my regular blog. What I will be doing is using the Revised Common Lectionary for each week. (Click here for “The Purpose.) Many liturgical churches use this. The readings walk us through the life of Christ in a year and there are three separate years. This past year was the Year of the Bible in The Wesleyan Church and I wanted to do a more meditative, reflective reading this year, so these posts are a result of that. In addition, I’ll add some things about the church year here as well. All these posts will be tagged “Lectionary.” Hope you enjoy this project.
16 Saturday Dec 2006
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I followed this link from Joy Ziegler. It’s a quiz to show you your theological leanings. Like Joy said I’m glad I came out an Evangelical Wesleyan, although not because I’m working on ordination, but because I am ordained in the Wesleyan Church. Thanks for the link.
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You scored as Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan. You are an evangelical in the Wesleyan tradition. You believe that God’s grace enables you to choose to believe in him, even though you yourself are totally depraved. The gift of the Holy Spirit gives you assurance of your salvation, and he also enables you to live the life of obedience to which God has called us. You are influenced heavly by John Wesley and the Methodists.
What’s your theological worldview? |
