This week’s post is a little earlier than usual. I will be away on Saturday when I normally post this.

Proper 18
September 9, 2007

Jeremiah 18:1-11
Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18
Philemon 1-21
Luke 14:25-33

I can only guess that Jeremiah’s passage about the Lord being the potter, was the inspiration for the song Potter’s Hand. I enjoy doing this song when I lead worship at FLAME. My favorite was a few years ago, when I was playing electric. That song should be the prayer of all of our hearts — that we would be clay in the hands of the Master potter. That we would let Him use us as He wills to build His Kingdom.

David reminds us in Psalm 139 of how much God cares about us. Pam reminded us on Sunday that God knit us together and that He knew us in our mother’s womb. God knows all about us and that we are wonderfully made — keeping that theme of God being the master potter.

Which brings us to Philemon. It’s not a book that we turn to often, but this week, we read it in its entirety. Here Paul asks a fellow believer to accept back a slave that has run away. It appears, at least as I read it, that perhaps the slave has become a fellow believer during his time with Paul and Paul believes that it is right for the slave to go back to his master. I know this all seems a little strange in our modern day culture. But I believe that Paul implies that the master needs to take care of his servant…that he should not exploit him simply because he can. Paul tells him to treat him like a brother in the Lord, because he is. This is good stuff for us to remember. We have many sisters and brothers in the Lord and we need to treat them right because they are our family in Christ.

There are two important points in Jesus’ words today. One is that to be a disciple of Christ we must leave everything that we own, but first Jesus reminds us that we need to count the cost. Are we willing to go through with it once we’ve made the decision to follow Christ? There is a high cost in following Christ. Could Pam and I served Christ as laypeople? Yes and we were doing that, but Christ called us to even more and it has cost us. I’ve said it before in church, that even thought it has cost us, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I believe that we are right where God wants us. As we were setting up for Mosaic yesterday, I said to Pam that who knows if we weren’t called to Martinsville to give leadership to Mosaic. Since we have been here, there have been several events that have come and gone that God has called us here for those specific times. God is doing a work — is it costly? You bet! But I’d rather be following Jesus, like we sang on Sunday morning, I’d rather have Jesus than any other thing. Is that your prayer today?