Stars and Faith

The Stars of Abraham

And he brought him outside and said, "Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them." Then he said to him, "So shall your offspring be." And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness. (Gen. 15:5-6 ESV)

Abram didn’t just see a lot of stars.  Of course, there ARE a lot of stars.  I imagine that Abram was moved dramatically by the silent hugeness of the panoply of tiny lights.  But it wasn’t the wonder of the stars that led to Abram’s belief.

It was his choice to believe God’s attached and very practical promise.  God’s promise made no sense.  Abram had been waiting to have children with Sarai for many years.  God had said, “You will have children, a nation,” and Abram had believed.  But time after time, God’s promise had not come true.  Every day Abram probably felt a little more foolish.  A little more naïve.  His promise become every year… maybe every day… a little more unlikely.

This is why Abram tried to help God out a couple of times… using Hagar, for instance.  Because God seemed to be having trouble keeping His promise. 

Or maybe Abram was actually more faithful than that.  Maybe he wasn’t trying to help God… but instead was trying to find the right complicated, twisted, odd path that COULD cause God’s promise to be kept.  As if God had not given Abram a promise, but a puzzle… a riddle… a mystery.  And Abram was trying to find the answer.

But really the answer was simple and small.  His old wife was really just going to have a baby.  And that baby would have a baby.  And that baby would have a bunch of babies.  And those babies would have many more.  And eventually the rest of us would be grafted in, though the real miracle here… the Christ.

Believing God was hard for Abram.  He was believing the impossible… the practical, reality-filled, simple, natural impossible.

That is why it took faith.

And that faith was seen by God as righteousness… saving righteousness… relation-proving righteousness… Covenant forming and Covenant keeping righteousness.

And this makes me look at what I believe.  It is easy to ‘believe’ Big Promises concerning eternal life, or the establishment of The Kingdom, or the reality of Trinity, or God’s Ultimate Faithfulness.

But it is harder to believe like Abram, in the small, dirt touching, daily focused, senses effecting NOW kind of small promise.  Like having a baby.  Or like safety.  Or like emotional sunrise.  Or like getting the right job.  Or like enough bread in the pantry.  Or like enough money in the checkbook.  Or like the end of loneliness before heaven.  Or like… something… very… real… and… practical.

That’s what Abram believed.

Lord, I believe, help my unbelief.

Two Advertisements and a Reminder

Two Advertisements and a Reminder

Two opportunities at Jubilee for some musical niftiness.  But more than that, they are opportunities to be together.  They are opportunities to be working at being one.  They are opportunities to be doing more than ‘work’ together, but to rest together, enjoy together, and laugh together.

First, at JubiWednesday (continuing our lighter themes for the summer) we will be eating, of course… and then enjoying some Recitals from some Music Students.  Maybe you’ll know some of the children, and maybe you’ll know all of them.  Come encourage, enjoy, and be entertained.  Six for food (please come!) and 7 for Recitals.

Second, Sunday evening we will be listening to Jeremy Casella.  We’ve been advertising this for a few months.  Jeremy Casella is one of those ‘just under the surface’ musicians who really should be better known.  I hadn’t heard of him before Dana Daggett introduced us, but in listening to Jeremy’s work, I have found a man of graceful insights and skillful use of melody, harmony, and thought.  He will start his “Living Room Show” at 7, and be finished by 8:30 to mingle with us.

Third, a reminder… even though “Life… it’s not about you…”  JESUS loves you, does for you, and even though He doesn’t HAVE to be… IS about you!

A Day of Dependence

Dependence Day

“…But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD." Joshua 24:15

 As I have thought about the history of the world and the development of various nations and people groups throughout the world, it seems more and more clear to me that God knows what He is doing.  And one of the things He seems to have done is to give cultures, societies and nations certain distinctives or characteristics.  For instance, when we think of the ancient Greeks, we think of philosophy.  When we think of the ancient Celts, we think of strong passion.  When we think of the medieval Germans, we think of efficiency.

 However, along with that characteristic that God gives a people, He also seems to give a flaw.  And usually, that flaw coincides with the characteristic.  The thing that makes a nation strong, also tends to be it’s downfall.

 When I consider the USA, as is appropriate this week and as I consider our history, what might we say is America’s strong characteristic?  A quick glance at the birth of our nation tells us that our strength is our love of freedom.  Our founding document is called the “Declaration of INDEPENDENCE.”  We are the home of the free.  Our Freedoms, our independence, our self-sufficiency have made our nation great.

But they are also the source of our downfall, I fear.  Our belief in self-sufficiency has led to a lack of God-sufficiency.  Our tight two-armed grasp of freedom has made us forget that we are bond slaves of our Savior.  Our love of independence has caused us to forget that we are dependent upon God.

 Perhaps we need a Declaration of Dependence to sit alongside our Declaration of Independence.  A declaration that reminds us of our need for God… of our dependence on Him.

 William Wallace, the Scottish patriot, was tried for treason in London in the early 14th century.  His main defense was that he had never declared that Edward was his king.  The studied answer of the crown was that that made no difference.  Edward was his king whether acknowledged or not.

 That is how it is with God.  He IS sovereign.  We ARE dependent.  Not because we declare it… not because we want it… not because it makes us feel safe.  But simply because that is the underlying truth of mankind’s existence. 

 We are dependent on Him.

One Job

Then Peter came up and said to him, "Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?"  Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times. (Matt. 18:21-22 ESV)

One Job

I saw a picture of a some hamburger buns packaged in a hot dog bun bag, and some hot dog buns packaged in a hamburger bun bag.  The label for the meme was, “You had ONE job!”

I laughed… that poor factory worker who pushed the wrong button… 

Until I remembered that I am just like that factory worker.

When it comes to how God expects us to treat each other, we have one job.  While it seems like there are many commandments, many requirements, many expectations, one job rises to the top.

Our one job is to forgive each other.

Just like God’s love for us is manifested most in his forgiveness, our love for each other is most clear in how easily, eagerly, or gladly we forgive other people… particularly Christians.

But we choose not to, and call our evil, good.

We don’t forgive because that jerk hasn’t apologized yet.

We don’t forgive because we aren’t sure they MEANT, “I’m sorry.”

We don’t forgive because she repeated the offensive act.  Twice.

We don’t forgive because he doesn’t deserve it.

We don’t forgive because the hurt is too deep.

We don’t forgive because sometimes being angry feels too comfortable.

God forgives even when we haven’t apologized, or meant, “I’m sorry.”  God forgives even when we repeat our sin.  Twice.  He forgives when we don’t deserve it.  He forgives though we have hurt Him… we killed His Son.   He moves away from His righteous and comfortable and just wrath… and forgives.

We have one job.

Forgive.  Because we've been forgiven. :-)

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Jubilee Things

Wednesday 6:00 JubiWednesday!  The first of our community presentations!  DeAnne presents…

Saturday     7:00 Men’s Bible Study Breakfast at Jubilee

Sunday    10:00 Prayer Meeting

                 11:00 Worship!

July 6 Movie Night 7:00 pm

July 22  Jeremy Casella:  The Living Room Show

Landscape Plans… consider and talk to Tom or a Deacon

Hobby in the Lobby will just be Hobbying for the summer… not booking. June 21, July 19, Aug 16.  Book Club will return Sept 20.

Vacation Bible School… looks like August 15,16, and 17 in the evening.  We need you!  This will be grand!

What Do You Want to Do?

What Do You Want to Do?

When I was a child, I couldn’t wait to be a grown up and do whatever I wanted.  No more chores like mowing the lawn in the summer heat.  No more reading books that I was TOLD to read.  No more going to bed on time, or getting up on time, or eating on time, or showing up on time, or thinking about time at ALL.

And then I became legally an adult.  And got married.  And had mortgages for houses I loved.  And had children.  And learned the joy of service (sometimes.)  And learned of the danger of obeying my whims instead of God’s WHIMS. 

And one day… both gradually and suddenly… I realized that being an adult did not mean finally being able to do what I want to do.  But rather doing what the love of God and others allows me to do.

I almost wrote, “requires” me to do.  But that is not quite right.  Certainly God’s law, external to me, requires actions, words, and thoughts from me.  But that is not why I do them.

Martin Luther was the greatest of the “Bait and Switch” evangelists.  He claimed that once we become a Christian we are free to do whatever we want.  But what we want to do, changes.

We are not the masters of our fate.  We are not the deciders of what is good.  We are not the source of freedom.  We are not children finally having selfish, childish, fire-crackish giddy adventures. 

We are free, instead, to do as we were created to do, and restored to be able to do.  We are free to be Christs to each other (no one else is free to do that, because only His people can.)  We are free to do what HE wants us to do (our Creator who knows us and our limits and our potential.)  We are free to choose what is both loving and lovely (while those without Christ can only choose selfish and shallow.)  We are free to do what He has freed us to be.

And that is not what, before and without Christ, I wanted to do.

But more and more… some days better than others… some moments richer than others… some times more real than others… I want to do.

Broken

I know a car mechanic who understood job security.  We stood and looked out his front window at the nearby street and he uttered, “everyone one of those cars is broken.  No matter what it looks like.”

I think about that every time I hear about a friend who is broken.  You see, no matter what it looks like, we are all hurting.  A lot.  We put on nice strong church faces, but I expect that every person you know has grieved this week. 

If you want some poor science, but true understanding, just consider yourself.  You smile at the grocery store while inside you are thinking about your recent doctor visit, where he said the “C” word.  You talk on the phone to a cousin and laugh, but on the back burner of your brain you are remembering the threat of a layoff.  You sit at the table with your family, chewing and swallowing, but your eyes are searching your children’s in fear… or worry… or with terrible knowledge.

Every one of us is broken.

And those words are far too small and glib.

I am actually not the most sensitive of humans.  But even so, this last week I have listened to grievous stories from three close friends that blurred my vision and took away my appetite.  And those three stories reminded me of a few more. 

We are all broken.

We have been trained by media and fear of pain to assume that people with HUGE problems are off there somewhere… behind the distant clouds or international borders.  We believe the lie that we are all doing ok.

But we all are broken.

Our optimistic dreams are often forgotten instead of fulfilled.  Our checkbooks are empty.  Our backs ache.  Our jobs aren’t changing the world.  Our evenings are lonely.  Our clocks and calendars are too fast. 

… broken…

We hide it.  We deny it.  We keep it inside.  We have stiff upper lips.  We don’t admit that our pillows are stained with bitter tears.  And even if on rare occasions we express our own dark-shadowed sorrows, we seem alone in our fears, our tears, and our darkness.  We are sad islands.

My goal today is not to offer an answer to our sorrows.  Although there is a great answer.  But for now, it is my hope that we consider two things.

First, remember that every face that faces your face has sorrow, too.    Ease up on each other.  Just like you, the people all around you are losing sleep.

And second, stop hiding.  Tell your spouse.  Take the time to tell your friends, and to listen.  The light of open revelation always makes the shadows flee.  Stop hiding.

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Wednesday 6:00               Jubiwednesday!  Come ‘friend’ with us.

Saturday      7:00               Men’s Breakfast/Bible Study at Cracker Barrell

July 22  Jeremy Casella:  The Living Room Show

Hobby in the Lobby will just be Hobbying for the summer… not booking. June 21, July 19, Aug 16.  Book Club will return Sept 20.

Towards the end of summer we would like to host a Sunnydale Vacation Bible School!  But we need workers… are you willing and able to help out?

I Don't Particularly Like Chicken

We give thanks to God always for all of you, constantly mentioning you in our prayers,  remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Thess. 1:2-3 ESV)

She nudged me, and gave me one of those delighted looks.  Fairley said, “we’re going to have chicken.”  The “chicken” was not said in bold print, but more in a celebrative font.  Implying fireworks, toothy grins, and hearty cheers.

In Australia (unlike Mississippi) chicken was what you served guests that you wanted to impress.  Steak, oddly enough, was what you served guests when your budget didn’t allow for extravagance.

We were going to have chicken.  And I had to choose to be impressed.  Or perhaps, I GOT to choose to be impressed.   The fact that I am not particularly a fan of eating chickens didn’t matter.

Receiving gifts is so much better when we receive them using the eyes of the giver.  When Fairley offered me chicken, she was offering me love, hard work, financial sacrifice, and hope.  

Gifts… they are not for us.  They are from someone.

This is true on your birthday, on a random day, and even regarding the free gift of Jesus.  Consider the giver and you’ll find a lot less to complain about in life.  You’ll also find Joy.

Memories

Faulty Memories

For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, Colossians 1:19

It’s funny (sort of) how our memories change.  I remember being the absolute worst baseball player on my little league team.  But I probably wasn’t all that bad.

I remember being the most stylish dude at my Senior Prom.  But now I look at the picture of my long shaggy hair, wide lapels, loud cummerbund and goofy grin and I just laugh.  And laugh.  And laugh.

I remember being a hero when I probably wasn’t.  I remember being a failure when I probably wasn’t.  Our memories are untrustworthy, altered by time, and usually biased.

Memorial Day is a good holiday.  It is a time to remember.  At first, on Memorial Day we remembered those who had sacrificed their lives in the Armed Forces.  In more recent years, we have added those who sacrificed in any public service.  And even those who served, without loss of life.

All good things to remember.  All good reasons to have a holiday.

But don’t forget… that memory is faulty.   Whether it is over-rating a heroic family member… or ignoring the faults of those who have sacrificed… or focusing on only half of the story… our memory is faulty.

As we “remember” this weekend, let’s be grateful, nostalgic, and proud.  But let’s also be accurate.

In fact, I think that being accurate in our memories honors the one remembered more.  Glossing over faults doesn’t prove we loved Grandpa.  Being truthful and complete shows we loved HIM.  Purposefully forgetting the troubling times doesn’t make the happy times more memorable.  In fact, remembering the troubles helps us appreciate the good.

And… setting up our ‘heroes’ as faultless belittles the One who IS faultless.  Only one hero was perfect.  Only one hero has NO bad side.  Only one hero is impossible to over-rate.  The Savior, Jesus Christ.

Faith

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. (Heb. 11:1 ESV)

I am tired of faith.

Faith is not ‘extreme confidence.’  Faith is not ‘what we really, really, really, really know.’

Faith is what God gives us when we do NOT know.

Faith is what we choose, when our circumstances and senses give us fits of terror.

Faith is the result of the unpleasant realization that though we are Promised much, sometimes the fulfillment of those Promises seems distant.

Faith looks like foolish naivete.  Faith looks like simplicity.  Faith looks like giving up.  Faith looks like foolishness to those without it.

And when I have to choose faith because my world doesn’t make sense, it is a painful relief.  When I am given faith because my knowledge and experience have let me down, it is a peaceful embarrassment.  When like my namesake, I am ‘Doubting’ on my way to assurance, and Jesus lets my fingers feel the hole in His side, my knees become my resting place… in grateful wonder.

But faith is not what I need.  It is not ever really enough.  I need what our faith is IN.  I need Him.  I need Jesus.  

I am glad that God gives us faith.  We need it.  But when we don’t need it anymore:  That will be grand!

Oh Lord, haste the day when our faith shall be sight.

Daisy Questions

“Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” (Jn. 15:13 ESV)

He loves me, He loves me not…

I don’t think I ever played that daisy-game, where petals are plucked, and a mantra expressed.  “She loves me, she loves me not…”  It seemed a very random method for determining a very, very, very important fact.

But we play that game with Christ, I think.

Does He love me?  It doesn’t ‘seem’ like it sometimes.  When a storm hits.  When tragedies are center stage.  When our community becomes Godless.  When our plans fail.  When our plans fail to do what we wanted them to do.

We ask (even if only internally,) “how does THIS show that Jesus loves me?”

And that is the wrong question.

First, because we don’t know, yet, the end result of the bad thing we are experiencing.  Today’s tragedy often becomes tomorrow’s joy.  Think the disciples in the upper room.  Or, think about the job you lost that led to a BETTER job.  Or, remember that our sorrows lead to tighter God hugs.

Second, because He has told us He loves us.  In neon-lit words in Scripture.  In those many times we ARE able to see the ‘good.’  In the shouts of beauty and wonder of creation’s pictures and the music of the spheres.

And third, because He has shown us.  He declared that love is best shown not by merely giving fun presents, or looking deeply into moon-struck eyes, or listening to lovey-dovey music, or sending thoughtful cards.  But love, He says (and this is God talking, THE creator and therefor definer of ALL things) that love is shown by sacrifice.  And then Jesus sacrificed everything.

He loves you.

I need to remember that when distracted by false petals.

Skunks and Sin

There might be more than one way to skin a cat, but there is only one way to deal with Sin… and to trap a skunk.

There was a skunk in my shed.  And, beyond even the stink, the skunk reminded me of sin.  This, I thought, was a strange skunk.  I had kicked and bumped and rattled the corner where he was hiding, and he didn’t react, or reveal himself.  I only found him because I was distractedly looking in the corner for some other irrelevant things.  I wasn’t even sure he was alive.  He just… laid there. 

I ran, with panic in my step.  We weren’t done pushing the camper out of the shed, and I thought about just leaving the camper there.  Permanently.  I thought about having one of the folk helping me with the trailer take the ‘inside’ position.  And not telling them about the skunk.  I thought about just proceeding with the camper removal, and ignoring the skunk.  Until he died, got bored, or just left of his own accord.  Did I really need that shed?

But I finally just took the steps to get rid of the shed.  Animal Control was unwilling to help.  A small nuclear device placed discretely in the shed seemed like overkill.  And I don’t have a small nuclear device.  No, I had to trap it… drag the cage into the field… and dispatch the skunk.  (For environmentalists who might be reading, at present Kansas has a plethora of wild skunks.  I would have had to transport the cute little sharp-nosed beastie to central Oklahoma to find a region that is presently welcoming skunk immigrants.)

No shortcuts.  No skunk.

And getting rid of sin works the same way.  I prefer to ignore my sin if it isn’t rabid.  I am willing to let the sin survive and place others in danger.  I toy with the idea of destructive behavior that is ruinous, but at least gets rid of the sin.

But there is only one way.

Jesus.

His death pays for it, exchanging on the cross my sinfulness with Christ’s perfection.  His life fixes my life, with His righteousness being attributed to me.  His example motivates me.  His grand relationship with His wrathful Father allows me to have the same relationship with Him.

We try lots of other ways.  Exerting our will.  Convincing ourselves that our sin is someone else’s fault.  Ignoring our sin.  Hoping our sin will leave on its own.  But there is only one way.

Jesus… sin killer.

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This week

Wednesday        6:00 pm               Jubiwednesday!  Chicken! Nehemiah!  Friends!

Saturday              7:00 am                Men’s Bible Study and Breakfast

Sunday                 10:00 am             Pray with us… to our loving King.

                                11:00 am             Worship with us… before our awesome King.

Missionary Aviation Fellowship  A representative of the MAF will be attending a Jubiwednesday soon to explain their work in assisting mission transport to isolated areas.

Change for Life Baby Bottle Campaign

The mission of Embrace is to serve individuals and families with the love of Christ empowering them to:

-Choose Life

-Practice sexual integrity

-Experience physical, emotional and spiritual wholeness

We provide pregnancy tests, ultrasounds, counseling, mentorship, social service support, STD testing and treatment, along with relationship and parenting classes at no or low cost to the client.

The baby bottle campaign is easy. 

1.)    We bring empty baby bottles to your church with a table display; you set them out Mother’s Day.

2.)     Your congregation takes one bottle home, fills with spare change and returns on Father’s Day.

Charlie Brown

… but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love; (Lam. 3:32 ESV)

Good Grief

Charlie Brown often said it.

We say it as a socially acceptable curse.

And maybe, accidentally, we are profoundly correct.

Grief is never good.  We grieve when we notice loss.  We grieve when we are sympathetic to pain.  We grieve when news is more tearful than giggly. 

But Jesus is bigger than my grief. 

That doesn’t mean that Jesus WILL turn your sorrow to smiles today.  I don’t claim that the very thing that causes such anguish at two in the morning will cause joyful excitement at seven.  Jesus, as bigger than my grief, does not magically make the grief go away…

But it does mean two things.

First, Jesus knows your grief.  He experienced it in His thirty-three years of lowly life.  He lost loved ones.  He had to put aside dreams.  He was rejected, and lonely, and fearful.  And His knowledge comforts me.  It helps to be understood.  It is better to be known.

And second, Jesus did something about your grief.  He died for it.  He experienced, as God, the ultimate grief to fix our grief.  The resulting peace is long in coming, at times.  It is most definitely an ‘already, but not yet’ sort of thing.  But the cure has been added to the bloodstream.  The happy ending to the tragedy is right… over… there.  And at times, when I think on it, I can sense it.  And smile a little.

Not because the grief is gone yet.  But because it will be.

And the sugar in the bitter tea needs to be stirred.  And the dawn’s light needs time to become noon.  And the end of grief has been paid for.  It’s coming.  Sometimes He lets me taste it now.

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This Week

Wednesday        6:00 pm               The Joy of Eating, and Laughing, and Learning at

                                                         Jubiwednesday.    Let me cook for you.

Sunday                 10:00 am             He inclines His ear to us when we cry out to Him.  Pray with us.

                              11:00 am             Worship!  Because He is so very very wow!

May 4                    7:00 pm               Movie Night!  And popcorn night! 

9 June:  The First  Fund Raising Garage Sale!  Save up stuff you want to sell and/or get rid of!  We will be open on Friday and Saturday.  Can you help host? 

Quick Change

Quick Change

Last week it was so hot I perspired just thinking about going outside.  I put away my winter coat and warm Russian hat weeks ago.  I was wondering about wearing shorts.  Some of you did more than wonder.    It was summer-ish, if not actually summer.

And then, it got cold.  And last night it snowed.  We didn’t get any drifts, but in the Northwest they did.  One town reported nine inches.  School got canceled there.

And then it got hot.  And then it got cold.  And then…

Isn’t life full of surprising changes like that?  That cute little baby suddenly graduates from high school.  That seedling you planted on Arbor Day is now suddenly towering above your roof.  The price of gas has passed two dollars a gallon… when “just yesterday” it was under a dollar.

Some of changes took years… but other changes are like yesterday’s snow.  They not only seem sudden, they are sudden.  A sudden car accident that takes away mobility.  A sudden hailstorm that flattens yesterday’s blossoming crops.  A sudden argument that breaks a friendship.

It almost makes me feel insecure.  Things change.  Too fast.

But of course, everything doesn’t change.  Even though seas drain, planets shift, suns flare and atoms disintegrate, everything doesn’t change.  Even though colors fade, sounds are silenced, odors diminish and tastes grow bland, everything doesn’t change.  Even though Presidents lose elections, boundaries are moved, nations disappear and cities crumble, everything doesn’t change.

And snow in Mid-April reminds me…

That God doesn’t change.  That He still (as He has always done) saves only through grace because of Jesus’ death and life.  That He still loves what He made.  That He is still all-powerful.

God doesn’t change.

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Nothing but (Great) Advertisements

Nothing But Advertisements

I am excited about some Jubilee stuff happening…

First, this Wednesday, at JubiWednesday, come for some lighter fare!  Delicious (I hope) food, and some friendly and calm March Madness.

And next week… our most full JubiWeek of the year.

Sunday

10:00 Prayer Meeting.  Start this week with prayer.  And whether you attend Sunday morning or not… FILL your week with prayer.

11:00 Worship. It’s Palm Sunday, as we recall Christ’s last entry into Jerusalem.  As He loves His people.  Come sing and shout, “Hosanna!”

Tuesday

7:00 We focus appropriately on the death and resurrection of Christ this week… but today we will notice and rejoice that His entire LIFE was necessary for us.

Wednesday

6:30 NOTE THE DIFFERENT TIME!

We will be studying the Passover.  Why did Jesus make a big deal about the Passover celebration?  What do the symbols mean? Come eat and fellowship and experience.

Thursday

7:00 The Lord’s Supper.  The heir to Passover.  What has changed?  And why?

Friday

7:00 Good Friday Remembrance

Jesus’ death frees us, fixes us, heals us, helps us, enables us, forgives us, enlightens us, defines us, emboldens us, prepares us, and demonstrates, proves, and embodies Jesus’ love.

Sunday

7:00 am He has risen!

8:00 am Breakfast!  Cooked by the men…

Tapestries and Rubic's Cubes

Colossians 2:2-4  (MSG)

"I want you woven into a tapestry of love, in touch with everything there is to know of God. Then you will have minds confident and at rest, focused on Christ, God’s great mystery. All the richest treasures of wisdom and knowledge are embedded in that mystery and nowhere else. And we’ve been shown the mystery!"

I messed up last week.  I made some decisions and did some things that to me, were obviously right.  But they started an avalanche that left me, and some whom I love, broken and confused at the bottom of life’s hill.

Rubic’s cubes overwhelm me.  I know how to solve them.  (I bought a book, once.)  But when I see that colorful cacophony of squares, my stomach freezes.  The logic behind the puzzle exercises my neurons… but the task seems to complex, tedious, and scary. 

But I have a friend who loves to complete the puzzles.  He sees the patterns differently than I do.  And so when my Rubic’s puzzle on my desk gets messed up, I ask my friend for help.

I don’t know what to say to someone who is hurting.  I don’t know what to do when all my choices seem poised to drop unintended consequences on everyone around me.   When I do choose, the effects can be staggering.  It often appears that I chose poorly.

Overwhelming.

But I serve a King who knows how to solve every puzzle.  And He is kind as well as powerful. Understanding as well as wise.  He weaves everything I don’t understand into a tapestry that HE understands, and that He assures me is absolutely, shockingly, inspiringly, and lovingly is exactly the tapestry that I needed on my wall.

NO LOST SLEEP

We’ve reached that exciting time of year… the time of year when JUBILEE DOES NOT LOSE AN HOUR OF SLEEP… but instead lose an hour of Sunday Afternoon.

We will have our regular Sunday activities AS IF we had not put our clocks ahead.  (Because we won’t need to put our clocks ahead…)  Then, when we are done with our Second Sunday Dinner, we can put our clocks ahead and join the rest of the time zone.

This week:

Wednesday        6:00 JubiWednesday

Saturday              7:00 Men’s Breakfast/Bible Study

Sunday                 10:00 Meeting for Prayer

                                11:00 Worship

                                12:15 Congregational Meeting

                                12:30 Eating Together

                                 1:30 SET CLOCKS AHEAD

March 15 7:00 pm Hobby in the Lobby Book Club: Will discuss  “The Same Kind of Different as Me.”

March 25 through April 1

        Be with us for a week of devotion, worship, and fellowship.

        March 25 Palm Sunday

        March 26  7:00 pm    Prayer and Study

                     28 6:00  pm   Seder experienced and explained

                     29 7:00  pm   Maundy Thursday

                     30 7:00  pm   Good Friday

        April  1    7:00    am    Resurrection Celebration!

                         8:00 am     Breakfast!

9 June:  The First Fund Raising Garage Sale!  Save up stuff you want to sell and/or get rid of!  Details to follow.

Good Goodbyes

Good-bye

We shouldn’t hate saying “good-bye.”

But we do.  Good-bye usually means missing someone, losing control of someone, having less contact with someone, or not having the benefit of someone’s company.

But the origins of the phrase give us some help in finding hope and pleasure in saying “good-bye,” instead of our usual attitude.

“Good-bye” is a shortened form of “God be with ye.”

And isn’t that a grand thing to be wishing for someone?

If we really are hoping that God is with someone, we don’t need to be in control of them… God is.  If we really want God to be with someone, then we don’t need to worry if they are out of our circle of communication, because God has them in His hands.  If we really are saying that as our “good-bye-ing” person goes away, we know God is with them, then they will have GOD’S company, which is so much better than our company.

And for Christians… no matter how permanent “good-bye” might seem, it isn’t permanent at all.  Because heaven looms cheerfully in our future.  We might not have the pleasure of someone for the next few days, or months, or years… but we WILL have forever with them.

Because of God’s presence, through Christ, in their lives.

And if THAT is good-bye… it ain’t so bad, is it?

All you who flounder... come unto Me

Floundering

 28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (Matt. 11:28 ESV)

Why do I need the LS this week?

The last time I had laryngitis this bad was around ten years ago.   I was helping at a youth camp located in the forest behind Mt. Rushmore, and we were on a hike.  Somehow, I had fallen behind on the familiar path, and it had started to rain.  And it had turned cold.  And I became lost.

I had travelled the path many times, but on that afternoon every tree and every rocky outcrop seemed familiar, but dislocated.  And I began to make every mistake that a woodsman never makes.  I walked faster.  I repeatedly stopped and rotated, searching for any familiar nearby landmark.  I became afraid.

I was floundering.

And then I found my way.  Really, it was three things. First, I remembered some things.  I remembered that moss really does grow more readily on the north side of trees and rocks, and that I needed to head west.   Second, I listened.  There is always noise in the woods.  And I could hear the hints of civilization when I wasn’t wheezing and stomping.  Third, I allowed myself to feel some faith.  To trust that this path had an end, and a good one at that.  Hot chocolate, probably.

And my hope, combined with faint but clear sounds, and a deducted sense of direction saved me.  Even if I lost my voice.

And that floundering feeling is more common than I like to admit.  And that is one reason I relish the Lord’s Supper.  Because the Lord’s Supper enables me to find my way out of the rainy, cold, lonely forest.

It reminds me of something that I know.  Just like that Northern moss, remembering my Jesus can give me some clarity.  He lived, and His life gives me meaning and direction.

The Words that I hear (even when I am speaking them,) though faint in the cacophony of pains, fears, and accusations, grab and hold my attention.  Those words are what I really need to hear… He loves me, even unto and beyond death.

And that strange, irrational (but oh, so rational!) hope is present, too.  His presence warms me, fills me, enables me, holds me, upholds me, and enlivens me.

I need those things, whenever I flounder.

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Remember this week to acknowledge God’s gift of life.  And to grieve for those daily who lose their life, due to the American Abortion Tragedy.  This week we recall the Roe v Wade decision.  Have mercy, Lord… have mercy.

President Duck?

Most people remember American Presidents like Washington, Lincoln, and Roosevelt.  But we can learn things from the examples of lesser known Presidents as well.

Millard Fillmore was President from 1850 to 1853.  He became President because while he served as Vice President, President Taylor died in office.  Fillmore’s Presidency was filled with mediocrity.  He didn’t lead his nation in a new direction.  He didn’t challenge great evil.  He just was President.

He was born in a log cabin in New York.  Self educated, he eventually became a lawyer and served as a Representative for New York.  He was selected as Vice President because of his experience in the Mexican American War, and his good looks. (Queen Victoria once called him the most handsome man she had ever met.)

He inherited a Presidency of troubles.  The slavery issue was hotly debated, and Fillmore accepted a compromise offered by the main debaters in which California was admitted to the Union as a Free State, and the Fugitive Slave Act (by which slave owners were allowed to re-capture escaped slaves in a vigilante-like way) was more fully enforced.  But the end result was not contentment.  Abolitionists (those who opposed slavery most strongly) continued to ignore the Fugitive Slave Act; and the balance of power upset caused by the entrance of California became a thorn in his political side.

However, Fillmore endured to the end.  Was dropped by his Party, and after a couple of failed attempts to run as a third-party candidate, retired to obscurity.

He was the first President to have running water in the White House.  He negotiated a treaty with Peru involving bird droppings.  He turned down an honorary Doctorate from Oxford on the grounds, “that no one should have a degree that he can’t read.”  His nickname was “His Accidency.”  Political satirists made much of his first name, usually replacing it with “Mallard.”

But he was President of the United States.  And that encourages me.  Our job (as was Fillmore’s) is simply to do what is set before us.  It doesn’t always involve averting world war.  It doesn’t always involve curing the common cold.  It doesn’t always involve being amazing.

Just do your job.  The absolute best you can do.

The Millard Fillmore way.

Believing and Seeing

Believing is Seeing

“I saw Mommy Kissing Santa Clause,” sings the very excited boy.  Apparently, he had snuck downstairs on Christmas Eve and witnessed his mother kissing Santa.  Of course, we all know it was not Santa.  Although I do wonder why dad was wearing a Santa suit.  Was he on his way to an office Christmas party? 

But the boy’s optic nerves saw what he believed he might see.  Since it was Christmas Eve, a man in a red suit might indeed be Santa.  Whether he was Kissing Mommy or not.

While we often say, “Seeing is believing,” the opposite is also true.  We claim to be rational, logical, and skeptical.  But what we believe can affect what we see.  Optical illusions are the result of this.  “Seeing things” is a result of this. 

What we believe is more important than what we think.  What we believe is more important than what we see.  What we believe is more important than what we understand.  What we believe is closely tied in with who we are.

How necessary, therefore, to believe what is true.  (II Thessalonians 2:11,12)

How necessary, therefore, to be able to articulate what we believe. (1 Pet. 3:15)

How necessary, therefore, to let our senses be guided by our beliefs.

Believe and see.