Pastoral
Thy Will Be Done
Thy Will Be Done – Devotions for 3/10/21
Matthew 26:39 “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me, yet not as I will, but as You will.”
Thy will be done. What a statement made from a man who was about to be executed. Jesus knew that His mission to this world, His calling to save mankind from their sins, depended on His going to the cross to die a horrible death.
He was afraid. Jesus could not have been afraid of the end result; He had come from heaven and He was going to heaven. He knew the wonder and beauty of that place so He could not have been hesitant about going back. And, unlike all people in this world who have not been to heaven before, He had no doubts about the existence of Heaven. He had seen it. He had lived there before. He knew that He knew. There was simply no doubt!
So, why pray, “If it is possible, let this cup pass from me.” Because it would hurt. A lot! Jesus knew that death by the cross was a miserable and painful death. Who would not fear it? But, Jesus also knew it would pass in a matter of a day. So, there must have been an even greater fear represented in His prayer not to go through with the cross experience. And what was that? It was that He and the Father and the Spirit would be separated. They who had never been separated in all eternity would be separated.
This was the ultimate punishment for sin, separation from God. And since Jesus would take on Himself, the sins of us all, He needed to be separated from God, from the Father and the Spirit. Here lay his fear. Here was the root behind that prayer. Here was the pain, the pain of separation. Jesus prayed that if there was any other way to accomplish what He came to earth to do, that the Father find that and do it that way.
This is our prayer too when we are facing hard times. If there is any way around our pain and suffering, that God would lead us around it instead of through it.
This week for Deb and me, we are struggling with the death of several friends, all way too soon and all filled with heartache and loss. “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me, and from the families in such great pain.”
It is easy to stop there in our prayer. God, make the pain stop! God, rescue me!
It takes a whole different level of intimacy with God to be able to pray the last part, “Yet not as I will, but as You will.” Or to pray as Jesus taught us in the Lord’s Prayer, “Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
It is easier to ask for release from any and all difficulties than to let God decide what is best for us and for all those around us. It is a lot easier just to stop our prayer with, not me! But Jesus is our example in going deeper and trusting in God.
Some people say that praying “Thy will be done” is a cop-out. But it sure wasn’t for Jesus. It was His way of saying, “I’ll do that hard part if it is for the good of others.”
When we are facing difficult times, we should pray, “Let this cup pass from me.” We need to ask for God’s help. And often we will see answers to those prayers and trouble and pain will be avoided. But we also need to take the deeper step and pray, “Yet, not as I will, but as You will.” We need to trust in God for help in times of trouble, and for help going through the trials and troubles we need to go through for whatever reason only God knows.
Pastor Gary
Jesus Prays
Jesus Prays – Devotions for 3/3/21
Mark 14:32 “And they went to a place called Gethsemane. And He said to His disciples, “Sit here while I pray.”
Do you pray? My guess is that since you are reading this devotional, you do. Christians pray. Christians need to pray. And we have an example of praying in Jesus who on many occasions, took time to pray. Jesus prayed when He began His ministry. Jesus prayed all through His earthly ministry. He prayed on the tops of mountains, beside campfires, in places filled with evil, and in every sort of situation. Jesus prayed often. Jesus even gave His followers a lesson on how to pray and in so doing gave to us what we call “The Lord’s Prayer.”
So, it should not seem strange that on the night after He and the disciples met for dinner, the dinner we call “The Last Supper,” that Jesus would stop in the friendly confines of an olive grove and pray. As they were returning to where they were staying near Jerusalem after the Last Supper, Jesus and His group of followers stopped in the Garden of Gethsemane because Jesus wanted to pray there.
I don’t know what the disciples thought, but their thoughts about His stopping to pray likely included some wondering why they needed to stop then and pray. After all, it was late, they had been together all day and had a very full day. They would have liked to get where they were staying, maybe at the home of Lazarus, Martha and Mary and settle in for the night. Couldn’t Jesus pray there? It wasn’t very far away; couldn’t He wait and pray when they got there so those who were tired could go to bed? Why did Jesus need to keep them up at that late hour?
The fact that it was late, and they were tired is shown in that they all fall asleep, three times! Jesus asked that they watch, but they slept. Jesus asked that they pray, but they slept. Jesus even told them that He was greatly disturbed. He was troubled. Jesus makes a special appeal for them to keep watch over Him and pray, but they still fell asleep. The disciples did not understand the inner turmoil that Jesus was going through.
Often, I do not notice when others are feeling troubled. I can sleep soundly while they toss and turn and worry. I often do not even notice when it is my wife Debbie who is having a difficult time. She gets up and frets and I sleep. I guess I am like the disciples, not being aware when others are hurting.
So, Jesus prays. Jesus prays while the disciples sleep. Jesus talks to His Father while His friends and followers rest. Jesus wrestles in prayer and His friends doze.
It is good to be with a group of believers to pray. We have several opportunities for people in this church to gather together to pray during the week. But that is not always possible and it doesn’t end the need for individual prayer. Jesus prayed with His followers and He prayed alone. Whether He had company or not, Jesus would pray. So, pray. Pray with others. Pray alone. Pray when your heart is aching, pray when it is rejoicing. Pray with your friends and pray when your friends sleep.
Pray. Talk with God. Rest in Him. Trust in Him. Pray.
Pastor Gary
Seeking Jesus
Seeking Jesus – Devotions for 2/24/21
John 18:4 “Then Jesus, knowing all that would happen to him, came forward and said to them, ‘Whom do you seek?’”
When Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, after praying with His disciples, Judas led a group of soldiers to Jesus to arrest Him. Seeing them come, and likely wanting to avert a mob scene and protect His followers, Jesus steps up to Judas and the soldiers and asks, “Whom do you seek?”
They sought Jesus. They came for Jesus. They came to arrest Jesus and bring Him to trial before the Jewish and Roman authorities. This was the first step that would lead to his death on the cross. He was arrested almost immediately after first quelling a potential revolt led by Peter who took up the sword to try and defend Jesus.
Jesus went willingly with those who came seeking Him. He still does.
I love His question to Judas and the soldiers. “Whom do you seek?” They sought after Jesus. They were seeking Jesus for all the wrong reasons, but they were still seeking after Jesus. They wanted to arrest Jesus. They wanted to kill Jesus. They wanted to stop Jesus from accomplishing what He came to earth to do, die for the sins of all mankind. They were in fact, trying to thwart the will of God, but were actually used to help accomplish it.
We need to seek after Jesus too. We should not do it like they did, to try and hurt Him, but rather we should seek after Jesus to come to Him for our salvation. We need Jesus. We need His work on the cross. We need the forgiveness of sins only He can give. We need the door to heaven opened for us through His resurrection from the grave. We need Jesus. We need to seek after Jesus.
When I was younger, I ran from Jesus. I didn’t want to believe. I tried to run away from Jesus. Maybe you have too. Maybe you are still trying to hide from the Son of God. Maybe you are simply trying to avoid God all together. But, you should be seeking after God. You should be seeking after Jesus. Pursue Him. Run toward Him. Be like the Prodigal Son who after realizing that His only chance for any sort of a good life was to return to his father, turns around, repents, and comes back home. Come back home to God the Father. Come back home to Jesus. Turn around, repent, and seek Jesus with all you heart, soul, mind and strength.
This would be the right way to answer Jesus when He asks, “Whom do you seek?” When He asks you that, answer, “You, the Son of God who takes away the sins of the world.” Seek Jesus.
To everyone who comes seeking Jesus, Jesus comes to them. He comes willingly. He comes with open arms. He comes to you because He has been seeking you ever since you were born. He came to this earth to seek out every person who has or will ever live. He came seeking you. If you will seek after Him, He will come to you.
Whom do you seek?
Pastor Gary
Clean
Clean! – Devotions for 2/10/21
Luke 5:2 “And when he saw Jesus, he fell on his face and begged him, ‘Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.’”
Clean! The leper in this story wanted to be clean. He wanted an end to living as an “unclean” person who could not participate in the regular and normal events of society. He was an outcast and was likely lonely and hungry and hurting. Most people who are outcasts are that, lonely, hungry and hurting. And like many other outcasts, this man had done nothing wrong, he just happened to contract an illness that there was no help for at that time. His disease made him unclean and there was no real way for him to be made clean again. He was doomed to a life as an outcast who was looked down upon as unclean for the rest of his life.
So, he comes to Jesus with hope. He had heard about this miracle working man, a man who did the impossible. He made the lame walk, the blind see and the unclean clean. So, when this man heard that Jesus was nearby, he went to him and asked if Jesus would make him clean.
This leper went to the right person. This leper went to the only one who could truly make him clean. So, after he asked Jesus to make him clean, Jesus touched him and cleansed him of his leprosy. Jesus made him clean.
We may not have leprosy, and even if we did, today it is very curable, but we are all unclean. We are unclean in a very different way. We are filled with the filth of sin. Unlike the leper, we are guilty of making ourselves unclean. While that man did nothing to deserve his unclean status, we did. We sinned. We made ourselves unclean. We sin in thought, word and deed all the time. We are unclean sinners who need someone to make us clean.
We need Jesus! He is the one who makes unclean sinners clean. He forgives sin. He is the only one who can forgive sin and he does forgive sin.
The leper in Luke 5 calls out to Jesus and says, “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.” He did several things right, things we can learn from. First, he recognized that Jesus was Lord. He knew man could not do what Jesus did and we need someone greater than ourselves to clean us from our sin too. Our sin can only be cleansed by God, by the Lord Jesus. Call out to him and recognize that He is your Lord and God.
Part of that recognition of Jesus as God was that he fell on his face before Jesus. We need to fall on our faces and recognize that Jesus is God and that we do not deserve what He can give. The leper did not deserve to be healed by Jesus, and we don’t deserve to receive any good thing from Him either. So we come as beggars, not as deserving of anything at all.
He also knew that Jesus could help him. He wouldn’t have come to Jesus if he didn’t think Jesus could help him, so he calls out to Jesus to make him clean. We need to call out to Jesus and ask Him to make us clean too. He does forgive sins. He died on the cross to make that possible. Our sin is what made Jesus die on the cross and it is His death on the cross that can pay the payment necessary to purchase the forgiveness of our sins. Call on Jesus and He can and He will forgive your sins. He wants to make you clean.
Clean! Jesus is waiting for you to come to Him like the unclean man in this story did and when you do, He will make you clean!
Pastor Gary
Variety
VARIETY – Devotions for 2/3/21
1 Corinthians 12:4 “Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit...”
1 Corinthians 12 is a section of Paul’s letter to the church in Corinth that addresses something we need help with today. We tend to think all people should be like us. In many churches the people are very much alike, not much variety. One church has people wearing dresses and ties while in another they wear jeans, and in another they wear cowboy boots.
My point is that we downplay and often dislike the variety that God blessed this world with. And the problem with trying to have things be the same, or mostly the same, is that God created all sorts of variety in this world, including among the people He created.
From a missionary point-of-view that is easy to see. We send missionaries to reach people who are very different from ourselves. But then we go to a church where everyone is much the same as us. We need to value the variety more than we do. We need to let people be themselves, be the people God created them to be.
Paul saw that and he addressed it here in his letter to the Church in Corinth. And what does he tell them? That there is great variety in people and so there needs to be great variety in ministry to people, but that in all that variety there is One God and so all our work should be done to bring people to Him.
My guess is that the people in the church in Corinth had favored some people over others. Maybe they favored the singers and the people who stood up front every Sunday. Maybe it was those who preached. Maybe they favored the big givers who could fund the church ministries and pay for nice buildings. Maybe they favored the people who could cook nice meals to feed everyone after church on Sunday, or maybe they favored the merchants who would give discounts to Christians. But in some way, they were putting one group of people above another.
Unfortunately, we all do that. In Acts 6, this took place in the church in Jerusalem where the widows who spoke Hebrew and lived as conservative Jews were being favored above the widows who spoke Greek and lived a more secular lifestyle.
So, what does Paul write? He writes that there are many gifts in the church and that those varieties of gifts are good, just as there are different people in the church and all the people are good. So, the person who preaches is needed. The people who can lead in music are needed. The people who can cook are needed. The people who can serve are necessary. The people who can give, the ones who can build, the ones who can clean up, the ones who can tend to those who are sick, the people who like to hold babies so their parents can worship, are all needed. All people are needed, and all gifts are needed. We need a variety of people and a variety of gifts in the church for it to be all that God created it to be. No person and no gift is more important than another. Which means, you are needed, and your neighbor who is different than you is needed.
What is your part in your church? What gifts do you bring to your church? Use your gifts in service in your church no matter what that gift is. God knows that we need all sorts of people and all sorts of gifts and abilities in our churches so that our churches can reach the wide variety of people God placed into this world and into our lives.
There are no small people, and no small gifts or abilities, just a wonderful variety of each.
Pastor Gary
Reaching Out
Reaching Out – Devotions for 1/19/21
2 Thessalonians 3:1-2 “Finally, brothers, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored, as happened among you, and that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men. For not all have faith.”
What should be our stand in 2021? What shall we be involved in for 2021? What makes the difference no matter what is going on around us in the world? Reaching others for Christ.
In this text the Apostle Paul is writing to a church in the middle of a persecution, which is likely what prompted the end of verse 2 with the part about wicked men who had no faith. If you read the whole book you will see that he also talks about the end of time, so the people then were certainly thinking they were living through the end times.
The reason I was thinking of this text and the people Paul was writing to in this letter is because in many ways this is us. We are a people living in difficult times. We may not be under the threat of violence, at least to the extent they were experiencing in Thessalonica, but I think there is still much we can learn from this for our lives today. And many people today are thinking that we are in the end times, that we will see the return of Christ in our lifetime. We have much in common with the people Paul wrote this letter to.
So, what concerns the Apostle Paul in a situation like that? What concerns the Lord Jesus Christ to have Paul write this letter to the people of that time, and preserve it for our time? What is the Lord concerned that we be involved in today as we see many things happening that we do not like and that remind us of the end times?
To me the big item we need to take away from this is the importance of reaching out to people with the message of Christ. Paul writes to the people in this letter and asks them to pray for him that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored by those who would hear it.
What is Paul asking? In the middle of a time of pain and persecution, Paul is asking that he could be effective in bringing the Gospel of Jesus to still more people. Paul is writing to the church that they too would be involved in the work of bringing the Gospel to still more people. Paul’s big concern was not for the decay of the nation. It was not for the sinfulness of the people of that time, who were living very decadent lives. No doubt these were all on his mind, but they are not what he was led by the Holy Spirit to say here. He wrote about reaching still more people with the message of salvation. Paul was concerned that the Word of God go forward, even in difficult times.
It is interesting that another item Paul bring up in this chapter is that of being idle.
When times are hard, some people pull into themselves and hide away. This is not what Paul wanted the people in the church to do. He wanted them to be out among the people, even the people who were persecuting them. Paul wanted them working and reaching out to people. That was not a time to hide away, it was a time to be bold and be in the community and talking with people about Jesus. (However, they did not have a pandemic to deal with at the same time.)
My take-away here is that we can do that too. As we are able, we need to be out in the community reaching out to people, even people who may disagree with us on many things, and sharing the message of salvation with them.
Outreach through the Word of the Lord needs to “speed ahead” and we are the only ones who can make that happen. Lets make 2021 a year of outreach for our church and us personally.
Pastor Gary
Walk by the Spirit
Walking by the Spirit – Devotions for 1/13/21
Galatians 5:16 “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desires of the flesh.”
Walking by the Spirit. You might think I am a Pentecostal for choosing this text to write my devotional for today. But I’m not. As a Christian, you accept all verses in the bible, everything it says. And the bible is clear that the Holy Spirit is real and that the Holy Spirit helps us in this life. I need that help. You need that help. Every believer in the world needs the help of the Holy Spirit to walk in this life.
I need the help of the Holy Spirit to avoid sin in my life. My natural tendency is to sin. Adam and Eve proved that sin was real, and sin was not easy to avoid. They lived in paradise and still sinned. They had no real wants, no real gripes or complaints. Yet they sinned. All people sin and so all Christians need the Holy Spirit to help us not give in to temptation and sin. This is what the full portion of this verse speaks to. We will not carry out the desires of the flesh as we walk in the Spirit. So, we will not give in to sin as we walk by the Holy Spirit.
But, walking by the Spirit goes way beyond help to not sin. That is huge, that help is needed in a big way, but that is not the only help the Holy Spirit gives.
He gives help to walk in love, joy, peace and the rest that is stated in verses 22 and 23. And He gives help for us to walk in the good works that God has ordained for us to do. We need the Holy Spirit to not sin, to do good works and to live as a Christian in a non-Christian world.
We need the Holy Spirit in all of life in this crazy, mixed up and broken world.
So, how do we walk by the Spirit? We do that as we draw closer to God. The closer we are to God, the more we will walk in the Spirit. That is because we will know more what God wants of us and what He doesn’t want us involved in. We will see opportunities that only the Holy Spirit can reveal to us as well and the Holy Spirit will give us power to do what the Lord is calling us to do.
For example. My wife and I prayed that the Holy Spirit would show us people around us who need the Lord. We prayed that the Holy Spirit would enable us in some way to affect the people that we would come into contact with in a positive spiritual way.
So, I went and donated plasma. How boring is that. You sit in a chair as the blood is taken from your arm and the plasma separated out and the blood itself put back into your arm. In doing that I am basically alone as everyone usually sits quietly watching their cell phones. But, one nurse kept coming back to look at the machine I was hooked up to. Why? I don’t know. No one has done that before and it wasn’t malfunctioning. So, I asked her how she was doing. That opened the door to a conversation that included the Lord. I don’t know if she was a Christian or not, but I opened my mouth and let her know that I was a Christian and that I would pray for her and that God was so good to me.
I believe the Holy Spirit opened that door, and who knows what the rest of today will include? How about tomorrow? I plan to say that prayer a lot because I know it is important for me to reach out to people all around me, even those I do not know.
Will you pray that prayer with me? Lord, send your Holy Spirit to open the door for me to see the opportunities around me to reach out to others for you, and give me the ability to impact them in a positive way for you. Amen.
Pastor Gary
Calming the Storm
Calming the Storm – Devotions for 1/6/21
Luke 8:24 “And they went and woke Him saying, ‘Master, Master, we are perishing!’ And He awoke and rebuked the wind and the raging waves, and they ceased and there was a calm.”
For the most part, it seems that we are living through a time of nearly continual storms. The storm of the nation’s politics has combined with the storm of the pandemic, which has been joined with the storm of race relations and protests turning into riots. This has been going on for many months now and it seems at times like there is one storm after another. And into those storms that the whole country is walking through we have our own storms. The storms of job struggles, family issues, health or whatever it is that is going on in your personal life. We all have storms in our lives.
What are the storms of your life? What is stealing your peace and calm? What is causing you to miss out on the blessings of life and to hurt the people around you as you lose your calm and cause waves to crash into the lives of those closest to you? We all have storms that we are dealing with, what are yours?
Or are you in a calm place? Some people are able to sleep in peace through the storms. I envy them.
As we walk through these various storms, we need to remember that there is One who can calm the storm and that is Jesus. He calmed the storm that arose on the Sea of Galilee when he was in a boat with His disciples. They were afraid of the wind and the waves and the wild waters threatening the safety of their boat and their lives. He had been calmly sleeping as the storm arose and threatened the lives of all in the boat. In the midst of the storm, Jesus slept securely. I marvel at His inner peace. Then when the worried disciples woke Jesus up, He simply rebuked the storm and it suddenly became calm.
Jesus has the power to calm whatever storm you are in. Wake Him up, or rather, pray to Jesus and He will help. He isn’t sleeping, He does know what you are going through. He is hoping you will turn to Him and seek His help through prayer. So, pray to Jesus in the middle of your storm. He has the ability to change the situation.
Sometimes Jesus speaks and the storm is suddenly gone, as with His disciples in the boat. Sometimes, he gives you a life-ring and enables you to hang on through the storm. Sometimes Jesus walks on the water above the storm and bids you, like He did Peter, to walk above it with Him. But always, He is there, and He has a way for you to get through the storms of this life.
Call out to Jesus and He will calm the storms of your life.
Jesus ends this story in Luke 8 with a question to His disciples. When the storm was over, when the crisis was averted, Jesus asks them, “Where is your faith?”
I do not believe that the greater our faith the more God has to respond and rescue us the way we demand God to. No, what I believe Jesus was saying was this, the stronger our faith, the less we will worry. Let us turn to our faith instead of to worrying about the struggles of life. Let us lean more on Jesus because He has the power to get us through any and all the problems of this life.
Oh Lord, increase my faith and my calm.
Pastor Gary
Thanking God for You
Thanking God for You – Devotions for 12/31/20
Philippians 1:3-4 “I thank my god in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy…”
Here is it the end of 2020 and the beginning of 2021. It is likely that most people are thankful that 2020 is ending and a new year is beginning. Hopefully, all the struggle and turmoil of this past year can now, or soon, be put behind us. I am one of those. I am glad time has marched on and is leaving 2020 behind. But I am also glad for many things of this past year, mostly and most importantly, I am thankful for you.
2020 had some difficult things in it for all people. For my wife and I we both had Covid 19 and for Debra it ended her teaching career earlier than she had planned on. We also had to deal with what everyone else has had to deal with in masks, closures of stores, restaurants and vacation places. We have all had to deal with those things this year making this year a difficult one.
But, when I read what the Apostle Paul wrote to the people in the church in Philippi, I am reminded of the main thing I am thankful for. You. Paul wrote this letter from jail. He had much he could have complained about. He was unable to travel and tell people about Jesus. He was unable to start new churches. He was unable to be free and visit people and go where He wanted to go. But the first thing he writes in his letter from jail is that he is thankful for the people who stood behind him and supported him. He wrote to the people of the church in Philippi and gave thanks to God for them. They were what Paul was thankful for, and you are what I am thankful for.
While governments have let us down, while things have been shut down, while life itself has been feeling down, you have been what has lifted me up. You have stood behind this church. You have encouraged me and each other. You have prayed for Debra and I. You have attended church through the strange times we are living through and/or have faithfully watched from your phone or computer or TV screens. You have supported this church and me as your pastor through this difficult year.
Thank you. I thank God for you, and I do that with joy. Joy in the midst of struggle. Joy in the midst of sickness. Joy in the midst of distance. Joy in the midst of difficult times. Like the Apostle Paul to the Philippians, I give God thanks for you and I do it with great joy. Joy because you have been my joy through this difficult year. You have reminded me that God is still good. That God is still with us. That God is faithful. You have done that by being there for Debra and I and by being there for one another. Thank you for being a church, a church that does what a church is supposed to do, support one another, especially in hard times.
The church in Philippi supported the Apostle Paul in his time in jail in Rome and Paul was grateful to God for them. They did what a church is supposed to do, they supported one of their own in his time of struggle. You did that too, you did it to Debra and I and you did it to one another. Thank you and may the Lord bless you for being the church God has called you to be.
I thank my God in my every remembrance of you because you are the church of God and when you act like the church of God, you bless everyone you touch.
Be the church!
Pastor Gary
He Is Coming!
He’s Coming! – Devotions for 12/16/20
Revelation 22:20 “He who testifies to these things says, ‘Yes, I am coming quickly.’ Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.”
For years the world awaited the promised savior. Isaiah had said that the savior was coming. His coming was foretold in the Psalms, in Genesis, in many places in the Old Testament. Even the Magi or Wise Men had somehow heard of His coming, maybe from the Jews who had lived there since the time of Daniel. But the world waited. The Jewish priests and Rabbis and others waited. He was coming, but still the world waited.
From the beginning of time God had said that He was going to send His Messiah, His Christ, His Son. But all through the various periods of time, the world still waited while God continued to say, “He is coming!” And no doubt in heaven Jesus echoed, “Yes, I am coming quickly!”
We read this verse from the end of the bible where Jesus is talking about His second coming. Up until the time of the first Christmas, the world had waited for His first coming. Ever since His ascension into heaven, mankind has awaited His second coming. And still, two thousand years later, we still wait, and Jesus still says from heaven, “Yes, I am coming quickly.”
How long shall we wait? No one knows, no one but the Father for Jesus said that only the Father knows the time of His coming again.
We are an impatient people. That is shown anytime we have to wait for something that we didn’t expect to wait for. Maybe it is waiting in line at the grocery store. Maybe it is waiting for something to arrive in the mail. Maybe it is waiting in the waiting room at the doctor’s office. Wherever it is, when we find ourselves having to wait, especially when we didn’t expect to, we show our impatience.
But God is patient. Jesus is patient.
Remember that Jesus said He was coming quickly. No doubt the people who heard or read any of the prophecies that Jesus was coming the first time, thought it would happen soon, in their day. But many generations of people were born and died waiting for His first coming and many generations have been born and died waiting for His second coming. We may find it hard to see that as coming quickly, but not God. Jesus is still saying, through Revelation 22:20 that He is coming quickly. And no doubt, Jesus still means it. He knows He is coming, and He also knows that when He comes, many will not be ready. For them He will come too soon.
While we may think His coming has been slow, for those who are not ready, it will always be too soon, too quick.
Are you ready? That is really the question we all need to ask ourselves at Christmas when we remember His first coming. He didn’t come quickly by human terms, but He came quickly by eternal standards. And when He comes again, impatient people will not think He came back quickly, but by the standards of eternity, it will be quick. And for those who are not ready when He comes again, or when He comes for them, it will be too quickly.
Let Christmas, when we remember His first coming, His birth, remind us that we need to be ready for His return, or for us to go home when our time on earth ends. Let us be ready.
Pastor Gary
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Shepherds
Shepherds? - Devotions for 12/10/20
Luke 2:8 “And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.”
Shepherds are a big part of the Christmas story because of Luke 2 where the angel goes to the shepherds at night and tells them about the birth of Jesus in the little village of Bethlehem that they were just outside of. The Shepherds were watching their sheep in the night.
Why Shepherds? Why not someone higher up the social status ladder? Why not a group of passing Priests? Why not some theologically trained Pharisees? Why not someone from within the government? Why not a shop keeper, or farmer, or even the owners of the sheep. Why the shepherds? Why did the angels come to the shepherds?
My guess is that we will never know the full reason until we are in heaven. But I wonder about things like that sometimes. Why did God do things the way He did? Questions to save up for heaven.
But here is what we can know. Shepherds were some of the lowest people on the social scale of Israel. Most of the shepherds were young boys or teenagers, like King David when he was a boy. They had no social status, yet, outside of their parents. If they were older, they were likely the rejects from society, people who couldn’t hold another job, a better job. They were likely more like the Prodigal Son than the faithful son who worked His father’s farm. The prodigal rejected his family and ran off to enjoy a sinful life. I would guess that the older shepherds in Israel were like that, people who were on the downside of life.
So, why would God send His angels to announce the birth of His Son to shepherds? To kids and social rejects? Because God loves all of us. God involved a common couple in His plan to bring Jesus. Joseph and Mary were common people from the working class. God also involved people higher up in Zechariah the priest. God involved foreigners in the Wise Men from Persia. God involved royalty in King Herod when the Wise Men went to him seeking where the child was born. God involved a couple of older folks in Simeon and Anna who saw, and blessed, Jesus in the temple when His parents brought Him there for His dedication to the Lord.
God involved people from all walks of life in the birth of His Son, Jesus. Why? Because God welcomes every one of us into the work of His Son, Jesus. Jesus came to earth for all people, the rich and poor; the young and the old; the spiritual and the unspiritual; the social elite and the social outcast. Jesus came to all of us and for all of us. Jesus came to earth for you, whoever you are.
This is the message we need to hear and know, that God sent His only Son to all of us, to you and to me. Jesus came that first Christmas for you and for me. Jesus died on the cross for every person who has ever lived, no exceptions, no limitations. Jesus loves all people.
He proved that by involving all sorts of people in His birth, including a group of kids and social outcasts called shepherds.
So, come to the manger like the shepherds and “see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made knows to us.” Be like the shepherds and come find the Christ child, the savior of the world. Come find your savior.
Things too Great for Me
Things too great for me. - Devotions for 12/2/20
Psalm 131:1 “O Lord, my heart is not lifted up; my eyes are not raised too high; I do not occupy myself with things too great and too marvelous for me.”
We live in a world that has changed drastically from when I was young, or when I was like verse three says, “a weaned child.” The internet has totally changed the world, and it has changed the way people get involved in so many things, things most people could not have been involved in very well in the past. Specifically, I’m thinking about how we can know what goes on all over the world, instantly. We can watch news happen live, almost anywhere in the world. And we can, and some do, share their opinions on those issues, instantly.
It is easy to see this in our recent elections and the chaos that occurred before it and after it. Everything happened in real time, live in front of the eyes of anyone who wanted to watch it. It still is happening.
This all comes with a problem for most people and that problem is lack of inner peace. Many people are dealing with anger issues. Others are dealing with stress. Others think that these things are of such great importance that they take to the streets and demand one thing, one way, or another. People are all tied up. Emotions are running high. And in some cases, people have been hurt because of emotions running wild.
So, what does this Psalm say? It says that instead of living like that, we can, and we should, live in peace. “Like a weaned child with its mother.” Vs. 2. A child at peace. Imagine that during Advent, a child with His mother at peace. (Think – Silent Night).
Do you remember such peace? Do you remember being at peace as a child in your home? Do you remember your children being at peace in your arms, if you have children?
Now that all our children are grown and our grandchildren are past the weaned child age, Debra and I miss that. We miss seeing the face of a little child in total peace, trusting in mom or dad. There is something so sweet and peaceful about the face of a child at rest in the arms of mom or dad. It is beautiful.
We can have that peace too. We can rest in the arms of our Heavenly Father and have peace. We cannot do it by troubling or occupying ourselves “with things too great and too marvelous for me.”
This is the Christmas season; a time many in the Christian Church have set aside to look at the baby in the manger. The shepherds saw that baby in His mother’s arms, and I believe they left filled with peace. Looking at Jesus this Christmas will lead to peace, the peace of a child, you and me, resting in our Heavenly Father’s hands.
And His hands are capable of handling whatever it is we are finding so hard to let go of. Leave them in His hands and find peace.
This three verse Psalm then ends with these words; “O Israel, hope in the Lord from this time forth and forevermore.” We will find peace as we put our hope in the Lord, not in the things of this world.
Pastor Gary
Come and See
Come and See - Devotions for 11/18/20
Psalm 66:5 “Come and see the works of God, who is awesome in His deeds toward the sons of men.”
Come and see. That is something Jesus once said to those who would end up being His disciples. John and Andrew were following John the Baptist when Jesus was baptized and after that they asked Jesus where he was staying. Jesus said to them, “Come and see.” Shortly after that Philip said to Nathaniel who was not sure about who Jesus was, “Come and see.”
In Psalm 66:5 the Bible tells us to “Come and see the works of God.”
I think it is especially important to stop what we are doing sometimes and reflect on the things that God has done for us, or for others, in the past. I think it is important for us to get out of our normal day-to-day work and activities to see something different, something we have not seen before or for a long time. When these things happen, we see or remember that God is real.
Why is this important? Because in our weary world, in the busyness of our daily life, it is easy not to see what God is doing. It is easy not to see the Lord at all. We get so focused on what we are doing, or what others around us are doing, that we neglect to see what God is doing.
So, we need to shift our eyes upward. We need to stop and get off the merry-go-round of life. We need to step out of our closed routine, the routine we could do every day with our mental eyes closed. And we need to get a fresh look at the world around us.
Instead of only seeing what we always see, the work of our hands, or the struggles of our life, we need to see beyond ourselves. So, this Psalm tells us to “Come and see the works of God.”
Perhaps that is a visit to the Grand Canyon. It is easy to see God’s awesome work there. Perhaps it would be to a mountain vista in Rocky Mountain National Park, just over an hour from here. Maybe it is to see the breakers on some rocky shore of the ocean. But whatever it is, get out and see the works of God. Get away from the normal grind and see God at work.
Or, look back. This verse says God is “awesome in His deeds toward the sons of men.” I believe this is saying that we can be reminded of God’s place in our lives by looking back and remembering the things God has done for us, or for others we know, or read about.
When I am struggling in my faith, both of these things help me. Getting out and seeing God’s amazing creation reminds me of God’s power and presence. And remembering the works of God toward people does that too. When I remember answered prayer, or some miracle in my life, or read about them in the lives of others, I am reminded of God’s power and presence.
I need these reminders, we all do. It is all too easy to go along in live, especially cooped up from this whole Covid 19 pandemic, and not see the hand of the Lord. It is easy to only see our struggles, our problems. So, if that is happening to you. If you are starting to only see the problems and struggles of life, stop and get off the merry-go-round and look around you at something new, something God has done. And take some time to reflect on the miracles and answers to prayer you have seen and heard. God is alive. He is at work. He is not dead. You can see Him in His works of creation and be reminded of Him in a look back on His great works in your life or in the lives of other people.
He is alive and He cares about you.
Pastor Gary
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