Pastoral
Silence
Silence - Devotions for 2-8-23
Psalm 62:1 “For God alone my soul waits in silence; from him comes my salvation.”
Have you ever been somewhere where you cannot hear anything, where there is total silence? It is deafening. It can be scary. People have gone mad with too much silence, too much of nothing. We need stimulation, we need noise, we need something to keep our brain thinking on.
God, in His word talks about silence as something good. We wait on God in silence our verse from Psalm 62 says. However, I do not think that this was a fun experience for King David. I do not believe he was thinking back on a good time, a fun time in his life. I think he was looking back at a dark time in his life where he waited on God but heard nothing but silence. And that kind of silence, silence from God when you need him, is very hard and lonely.
I believe King David was walking through a dark time when he turned to God and heard nothing back, silence.
Have you been there in your life? You go through something very hard and feel alone and isolated so you turn to God and find only silence from him too? That is a very dark and hard time to walk through. King David, the person the Bible calls a man after God’s own heart, walked through that kind of hard time too.
So too did Jesus. When He was in the garden of Gethsemane, He asked His disciples to watch and pray. Instead, they fell asleep. He roused them again, twice, and asked them the same thing, but each time they fell asleep. They let Him down. All the while He was praying and for Jesus it was the darkest moment of His life. He prayed that His Father would make it possible for Jesus not to go through with their plan of salvation, that of His death on a cross. He prayed and asked that three times, but all He seemed to hear from God the Father was silence. He waited in silence for God alone and heard nothing in reply.
But all the while He prayed another prayer, “yet not My will, but Your will be done.” Even in the midst of His darkness and silence from His Father, Jesus continued to put His trust in the Father. Even when King David could not hear anything from God regarding the perils of his life, he continued to place his trust in God. Even when we are in difficult times in our lives, facing challenges we cannot handle on our own, we can place our trust in God. Even if He remains silent. Even when God is silent to us, He is still there. He still hears. He still knows. He still loves us. That is what Jesus knew in the garden, that His Father was still there watching over Him. That is what King David knew when dealing with whatever difficult time he was in, that God was still there, even when He was silent.
In verse 8 David says, “Trust in Him at all times, O People: pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us.” In the silence, God is there. When you cannot hear Him, God hears you. When your heart is aching for a word or a sign from God and you find none, He is still there and you can still place your trust in Him and find refuge in His arms.
Sometimes the silence is just a time when He is waiting to hold you instead of talk. Let Him hold you in His arms in the silence. Feel His embrace and rest in His care. That kind of silent moment with God is truly good.
Pastor Gary.
Church Business
Church Business - Devotions for 2-1-23
Mark 1:38 “And He said to them, ‘Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out.”
This coming Sunday our church, like many others, will have its annual business meeting. We do this every year because the church needs to make decisions on how it will operate for the next year – or the one already begun. We vote on things like budgets, and big items that will cost money or that may change our ministry focus. The church needs a business meeting because it has to conduct business.
But the church is not a business and should never fully operate like a business. To do that is to forget that the church is a ministry and doing ministry often means doing things to make no sense to a business operator or manager. A church must never make decisions simply because it makes good business sense.
In our text Jesus says He needs to take His disciples and go into the towns and villages that they can see from the high vantage point where they were, and preach to the people in those places. That sounds good. It sounds like good business advice, to expand and go into other places.
But the situation was that down below in the town they stayed the night in and had been doing ministry, healing the sick and casting out demons, crowds of people were waiting for them. In fact, they had been inviting their friends and neighbors and a large gathering was taking place looking for Jesus to come back and heal more, preach to them and cast out more demons. Many people who needed His touch were waiting for Him. But, Jesus doesn’t go back to them. He leads His disciples to new places and new people.
From a business perspective it doesn’t make sense to leave behind a large growing group of people. Jesus could have set up shop in that town and done a lot of good ministry/business.
This would be like a pastor refusing to do what seemed to be attracting a bigger group of people in church. It would be like a church deciding not to do what it could to attract larger and larger groups of people. That would not make sense, especially not from a business perspective. From a business perspective attracting larger and larger groups of people is the most important thing a pastor or church could do. If a church were a business, then the bigger the church the better it was succeeding.
But Jesus, just when He was drawing a lot of followers in one town, decides to go to other towns and leave behind the crowds who had come to have Him heal them or their loved ones. It didn’t make any sense to the disciples and even less to those who had come all the way to have Him heal them in that town.
When you have a business meeting at your church, make sure you do not give in to the church becoming run like a business. Sometimes you need to make decisions that go against good business sense so that you can do better ministry. Jesus did. He knew He needed to go to those other towns and people so He could preach there also. After all, He did not come to be a doctor, but the savior of the world.
What is God’s call for your church? Follow that instead of strictly trying to make good business decisions for your church. Do the ministry for which God created your church. Know why God created your church and then follow His leading in doing that.
Pastor Gary.
The End of the Earth
The End of the Earth - Devotions for 1-25-23
Psalm 61:2 “From the end of the earth I call to you when my heart is faint.”
It is a cold winter day today. It reminds me of some of my growing up winters in northern Minnesota. They would actually make today in Colorado seem mild, warm even. And then I think of places that are even colder and bleaker. They are the end of the earth and I hear King David’s cry to God, from the end of the earth.
It doesn’t matter where we are in this world, it can feel like the end of the earth where no one else lives, or those who do, do not care about you. You can feel isolated and alone, as if you were at the end of the earth anywhere. Indeed, in our modern world with its huge cities numbering in the multiple millions of people, being all alone in the midst of a crowd is a very common feeling. There may be people around you, but you can still feel like you are at the end of the earth with no one around, or at least no one around who cares.
King David starts this Psalm out with this cry from the depths of his heart, “Hear my cry, O God, listen to my prayer.” Whenever David wrote this Psalm, whatever his circumstances were, and bible scholars do not agree on that, it was written when David was feeling all alone and isolated. He felt like he was at the end of the earth, alone, isolated, and in fear. So, David does what he knew to do, he called out to God in prayer.
God hears us when we pray. Wherever we are, whatever the circumstances we are in, God knows, God sees, God cares and He hears us when we pray. David knew this. I am certain that knowledge was what kept him from total despair. He knew he could turn to God in prayer and God would hear him. So, he does. He bows his head and turns to God in his mind and heart and prays. He lays out his heart before God knowing that God would be there to hear him, even if it seemed like God was absent or silent. He knew God would listen.
And God will hear you too. He hears us all. When we are in any situation in life where it seems like we are all alone, isolated, at the end of our rope, at the end of the world, God hears and God cares. Whatever you are going through in your life right now, God knows and God cares. He will listen to you as you call to Him in prayer from the depths of your heart and soul.
What good news that is. To know that even if no one else in the world cares God does. To know that even if you feel like you are all alone, you are not. God is there with you.
I have been dealing with people who have been in this place, dealing with things so deep it must seem to them like they are all alone at the end of the world and no one else cares. This happens in this world, and it makes life in this world hard and lonely. But the good news is that you are never alone, you always have God with you. So, do not despair, do not fret, God is there and He hears your prayer and He cares about you and your situation just as He cared about King David when he was feeling all alone and scared.
In this psalm King David goes on calling out to God for help, for God to comfort him and shelter him and protect him. And God does. While it may have seemed like he was isolated and all alone, God was always with David. And even when it seems like we are isolated and all alone in our situation in life, God is still there, He is with you. If you turn to Him, He will come to you and help you.
Turn to God for help. Call out to Him to help you through the hardest and darkest times in your life. He hears your cry, your prayer. Then rest in His comfort and help.
Pastor Gary.
Comfort and Joy
Comfort and Joy - Devotions for 1-12-23
Romans 12:15 “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.”
In Romans 12, where we are given suggestions on how to live out our lives as Christians toward others comes verse 15 where we are called to join in with those who are experiencing the ups and downs of life. We are called to both rejoice with people when they have some wonderful event in their life and we are called to join in crying with people when they have something very hard happen in their life. We are called to jump in with them in their joy and in their sorrow.
When Debra and I were about to get married we were meeting with the pastor who was going to do our wedding. He was a friend of the family, and it was a joyous time. He was joining us in our joy and helping us with heightening that sense of joy. We were already filled with joy over our upcoming special day and Pastor Morris Larsen was joining with us in our joy.
Then he received a call. He was on-call with the local hospital for emergencies as a chaplain. His face suddenly took on a different look, but he pulled himself together and we quickly finished our time together and then he had to leave. I asked him what happened and he said that a young boy had been killed by his own father in a farming accident. He had to go and be with the family.
Comfort and joy. Celebration and sorrow. I saw what the life of a pastor would contain that evening when I saw our pastor be with us in our joy and celebration and then have to rush off to be with others in their time of great sorrow and pain. He was rejoicing with those who rejoiced and weeping with those who were weeping, all in the span of the same hour.
Jesus is with us in those same times, in all the ups and downs of our life. We can turn to Him when we are experiencing anything in this life. He is always with us. That is our greatest comfort, He is our comforter and joy giver. And Jesus is calling us to be His hands and feet and be with others when they are having both good and hard times in their life. We are called to go and be with those who experience the great up times in their life, weddings, graduations, the birth of babies, getting a new job or promotion, whatever the good times are in someone’s life. We are to go and celebrate with them, to be Jesus in the flesh with them. We are to join them in their celebrations, eat their cake, laugh at their jokes, shake their hands. And we are to be with them in their hard times, funerals, hospital stays, loss of a job, when anything hard happens. We are to be Jesus in the flesh and hold their hands, give them a hug, and sit with them in the silence of their pain.
Comfort and joy. Jesus brings that and He is calling on us who know Him and walk with Him to be there on His behalf with those who are going through the big events of their life, both the highs and lows.
As you look at this year ahead, there will be people you know who need you to be there in their good and hard times. There will be weddings to attend, and funerals to be at. And there will be living rooms and hospital rooms to sit in with them.
In pastoral circles this is often called the ministry of presence. Just being present with someone in the ups and downs of life is important and Jesus knew it. He knew the importance of being there for people so he attended weddings and funerals, he was with people at their celebration meals and in the quiet times of pain in their homes. And He is telling us that we need to be there for others too. Come and be present with those who celebrate and who mourn.
Pastor Gary.
Prayer
Prayer
Psalm 65:2 “Oh You who hear prayer, to You all men will come.”
Prayer is a wonderful gift to all people. God gives all people, believers and unbelieves alike many gifts. His first gift to us all is the gift of life. We are given that when we are born and we have nothing to do with getting that gift. The second great gift is the gift of eternal life. He gave that gift when Jesus died on the cross and rose from the grave. These are perhaps the two greatest gifts God gives. But God gives many other gifts as well. He gives us all the blessing of this world, its beauty, its joys, its wonders. He gives to us the gifts of our family and friends. He gives us many gifts and this Psalm goes on to talk about that. It says that God answers our prayers in His awesome deeds of righteousness. Anytime God hears our prayers and answers them it is an awesome thing, a wonderful gift and work of God on our behalf.
Here is the thing; God hears the prayers of all people. In our text above it says that to God all men would come. To the God who hears prayer, all men will come. That includes believers and unbelievers alike, those who know and love God and those who have never met Him, yet. To the God who hears and answers prayers, all people will come.
The reason for that is that we all have struggles in this life. We all hit solid walls of trouble that we cannot overcome on our own. We face financial hardships, health issues, the death of loved ones, relationship struggles, losses of various kinds. We all face hard times and usually the hardest is that we look at our own death in the face as we either grow older or have some sort of life threatening illness or accident.
And when people face something they cannot handle, especially the knowledge of their own mortality, they usually pray. We know instinctively to pray. The thought of turning to a “higher power” as some might call God, the knowledge to turn to God in prayer, is a universal inborn thing every person has. And so when people face hardships in life that they cannot handle on their own, they usually turn to God in prayer. They may know God, they may not. But most people know to turn to God in prayer when they face life’s hardest challenges.
Many people have found salvation because of prayers they have thrown up to a God they didn’t know in the middle of the night when they were facing something bigger than they could handle. I think God has ordained it to be this way. We need to face hardships in life that are bigger than us so that we will turn to God for help. He is there waiting for us. Often it is those hardships, the ones we know we cannot deal with on our own, that bring us to God. We face something we cannot handle and we instinctively turn to the God we don’t know or believe in, but somehow know is there, and we pray.
But what happens after we pray and after God helps us through the struggle that led us to call out to him in the middle of the night, or whenever it was? What happens next? Do we continue to walk with Him? Do we become a believer? What happens next?
The important part of those prayers is that when God answers us, we need to continue coming to Him and believe in He who hears and answers prayer. When you reach out to God in prayer, remember to continue to come to the God who hears and answers your prayers. God doesn’t go away when the problem is resolved, He is still there. Turn to God in your times of struggle, and continue to come to Him when life is better. Believe in Him!
Pastor Gary.
Endings
Endings - Devotions for 12-28-22
Matthew 24:13 “But the one who endures to the end will be saved.”
We don’t like things to end very often, at least not good things. We may have liked it when 2020 came to an end, the year of COVOD 19. But most of the time we do not like things to end. Here we are at the end of 2022, which for most people was better than 2020 even with its ups and downs. We are also at the last devotional for this year, next week I will start a new file and it will be called something like 2023 devotionals. I will close out this file and save it for whoever may want to open it up some day in the future. And who knows, it may never be opened again. Life is like that when things come to an end, sometimes they just end.
Jesus was asked when the end of time would come, when He would come back. His disciples asked Him, “Tell us when will these things be, and what will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age?” Matthew 24:3.
It seems that everyone wants to know when the end of time will come, when Jesus will come again, and what that will look and be like. We all want to know. I would like to know.
In our Life Group, our in-home bible study last night, we studied these verses and there was a lot of lively discussion. With all that is going on in the world it is easy to guess that these are the last days, that Jesus is coming again soon. And He is. He said so. We just don’t know exactly what that “soon” looks like. It may be very soon, or it may be soon according to God’s time, not ours. We just don’t know.
But we do know that there will be an end to life as we know it, to the world and to all of creation. Jesus says that an end is coming. Everyone knows that the end is coming, we just don’t always agree what that is like or when it will be. But we all know that the end is coming and Jesus says that very thing in verse 14 where He says that the gospel will be preached to all nations and then the end will come. (It may be soon!)
I am not going to try and claim to know anything about when Jesus will come again, when the “end times” will be or even what it will look like, which end time theory is correct. What I will do is remind us all that the end is coming. Just as this year ends in a few days, and just as each one of us have an end day that we don’t want to think about, the end of all things is coming too. All things have an end day, and expiration date. We just don’t want to think about it or admit it.
In my studies of the end times I usually fall back on one thought and that is about faith. Jesus says that “The one who endures to the end will be saved.” The one who remains faithful to Jesus will be saved. He also says that the gospel will be preached to all the nations and then the end will come. Both of these things point back to faith. Our faith and others coming to faith. The end will come to all people, but to those who believe in Jesus, the end will not be a bad thing, but a good thing. Those who have faith will go to heaven, whether they live to see Him come back again or are taken home when they die.
Our calling in this life is to remain faithful and proclaim the gospel. We need to stay close to Jesus and reach out to others so they can be saved too. And as we do that, someday, the end will suddenly come and we will have been found to be faithfully doing what God wants us all to be doing. The end is coming, let us be ready, let us keep the faith.
Pastor Gary
The Light
The Light - Devotions for 12-22-22
John 1:5 “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness had not overcome it.”
We celebrate Christmas on December 25. We don’t know the actual date Jesus was born, but we celebrate it on that day every year and have been doing so since at least the year 336 AD when that date first appeared on a Roman calendar as the day of His birth. But we really don’t know on exactly what day Jesus was born.
What is interesting to me is that the church chose a date in the middle of the winter, the darkest time of the year for us who live north of the equator, to celebrate His birth. This is very appropriate. In the midst of the darkest time of the year, we celebrate the light of the world coming into that darkness. In our text, which is John’s telling about the coming of Jesus, the birth of Jesus, he says, “The light shines in the darkness.” John would go on telling a lot about the One who is the light that was born into the darkness of mankind’s sin who is the Light of the World.
John’s Gospel, and many other places in the bible, speaks of God’s light and the darkness of the world and evil. The bible paints a picture of a stark contrast between the darkness of sin and evil, and God’s light and goodness.
Into the darkness of a sin-filled world, Jesus was born. The Light of the World was born and when Jesus was born, His light, the light of God, flashed brightly into a very dark world. Jesus brought hope to a hopeless world. Jesus brought light into the darkness.
That isn’t just a world thing either. Yes, Jesus shines His light into all the world, and indeed, the world we live in has a very dark side. But, we all have our own darkness that we live in. It is in part the darkness of our own sin. It is also the darkness of the sin of others as the sin of others affects us in many ways. The truth is that we all walk in the darkness of sin in some way. We live in the world and it is a place of great sin and darkness because of the evil of mankind and Satan’s handiwork.
And into the darkness of our life, God sends His only begotten Son, Jesus, to shed His light into our darkness. Jesus in the Light of the World, and He is the light of each one of our lives.
What is the darkness you are dealing with in your life right now? Is it some sin you cannot leave behind, you cannot find the strength to overcome? Maybe it is the effects of someone else’s sin as it affects your life and brings that darkness over you. Then too there is the darkness of what is going on in the world around us. All you need to do it listen to a little bit of news and you will be overwhelmed with the reminder of how much darkness is in the world we live in.
Whatever the darkness is that you are walking through right now, know this, Jesus is the light for that darkness. Jesus coming into that situation shines the brightness of His light into whatever is causing the darkness you struggle against right now. Let Him in! Let Jesus into the dark places of your life and let Him shine His light into the darkness you live with.
And remember this, darkness does not overcome light, it cannot. Darkness is the absence of light and it does not cover up or disperse light. No, light breaks into the darkness and dispels the darkness. Light overcomes darkness, it is never the other way around. So, invite Jesus into your darkness, whatever that darkness is and wherever it comes from. Jesus is the light for that darkness. “And God said, ‘Let there be light.’” Genesis 1:3.
Pastor Gary
Peace on Earth
Peace on Earth - Devotions for 12-7-22
Luke 2:14 “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased.”
This verse and quote from God’s word in Luke 2 is what the angels said to a group of shepherds one night in a field near Bethlehem. They were coming to announce to them the birth of the Christ, the birth of Jesus. And in that birth announcement they were praising God and said to the shepherds and the whole world, “Peace on earth.”
After the angels made their appearance and announcement, the shepherds went into Bethlehem and found Joseph, Mary and the newborn Jesus, just as the angels had said they would. Jesus was wrapped in soft cloths and lying in a manger. We all know the story of the first Christmas of the birth of Jesus.
What I want to look at today is what the angels said to the shepherds. They said “Peace on earth among those with whom God is pleased.”
Where is that peace? Today the residents of Ukraine are looking for peace. So too are all those in China and Iran who are being persecuted by their governments for protesting. Then you have all those who are persecuted for their faith in places all over the world where Christians are persecuted for their faith. Where is the peace on earth?
Today is Pearl Harbor Day. There was no peace when the Japanese navy flew their bombers into Hawaii and bombed the US military bases there. There would be no peace for the next several years as the world dealt with the issues of war in Europe, war in the Pacific and concentration camps in Nazi occupied areas.
The peace that the angels announced was not that of political peace or freedom from war. No, there has been war going on in various places all over the world almost continuously from the time of Jesus’ birth until now, and there likely will be until He comes again.
The peace that the angels announced was of the peace between God and man, or more specifically between God and people who would come to receive Jesus as their savior. The peace of God that surpasses understanding and can come to each believer no matter what their outward life experiences are.
My wife watches a lot of movies that depict what happened in WWII, especially that of the concentration camp experiences. Corrie Ten Boom was one of those people who went into one such camp, she and all her family. They were imprisoned for trying to help Jews escape the death camps. In their time there, all her family members died except Corrie, she alone was released and survived the war.
Corrie Ten Boom experienced the worst of man’s inhumanity to man. In that inhumane pit of pain and death she and her sister came up with this phrase, “No pit is so deep that He is not deeper still; with Jesus even in our darkest moments, the best remains and the very best is yet to be.” Corrie and her sister had God’s peace, even in a place where peace seemed impossible.
That same peace, the peace of the Lord, the peace announced by the angels to the shepherds outside of Bethlehem so long ago, is available to everyone who calls on Jesus. Jesus is in whatever pit you are in and into that pit, He joins you and brings His peace. Call upon Jesus to bring His peace into your pit, into your pain and He will give you, His peace.
Pastor Gary
Pining Away
Pining Away - Devotions for 11-30-22
Isaiah 7:14 “Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son and you shall call his name Immanuel.”
We are in the part of the church year called advent. Last Sunday was the first Sunday in advent and we will continue preparing for Christmas all through this advent season.
As I was thinking about advent and Christmas coming, I started thinking about children and Christmas presents. Almost every child eagerly awaits Christmas morning, or for some, Christmas Eve, when they can open their presents. There are many Christmas movies that show such a scene, and you no-doubt have your own personal memories of either your children or you, eagerly looking forward to opening presents.
I remember as a child walking down the stairs of our home in Chicago and turning the corner and seeing the Christmas tree with all sorts of wrapped presents under it and spreading out into the living room. It was a magical scene for a six-year-old. My brothers and sisters faces showed that they too were as excited as I was to begin opening all those presents. I hope you have such Christmas memories to look back on too.
Some people get so excited for Christmas that they sneak in and open their presents ahead of Christmas, they cannot wait and they peak at what their presents will be. I have to admit, I actually enjoyed the suspense more than my siblings who tried to seek a peek. But either way, we all looked forward to Christmas morning when we could finally open our presents.
In a way, this is what advent is all about, the suspense and looking forward to Christ coming. In the time before Jesus was born, Jewish parents would tell stories to their children of a coming Messiah or Christ. The whole Jewish world would read the prophecies of God’s coming King and Christ and look forward to the day when the virgin would bear a son named Immanuel.
This is what the song “O Holy Night” speaks about when it says; “Long lay the world in sin and error pining, ‘til He appears and the soul felt its worth.” I think that line is a great musical line describing advent, the world waiting in sin and error, pining for the coming of Jesus. Our souls pining, longing, yearning for Christ to come and set us free from our sin and spiritual emptiness.
Today we look back to the first Christmas. We do not pine for His coming, He already came that first Christmas. We are like myself looking back to Christmas memories of coming down that staircase and seeing the first sight of a mountain of presents for our family of seven. We look back to the manger scene. We look back to the shepherds and angels. We look back to Joseph and Mary holding their new-born baby, the savior of the world. We look back to the first Christmas when Jesus, the promised Messiah, Immanuel, was born.
But we also look forward. We look forward to His coming again. Even though we do not know when that will be, we are given the promises in God’s word that He is coming again. So, while we look back to His birth, we look forward to when He will come again. And we look forward to when we will be with Him and our loved ones who have gone on before us, in heaven. In our sin and error, we pine anxiously for His second coming.
Advent is a time of anticipation for the coming Christ. Let us look back at the birth of Jesus and celebrate it joyfully, and let us look forward to His second coming and to going home to heaven if we die before He comes again.
Pastor Gary
To Dwell in Us
To Dwell in Us - Devotions for 11-16-22
Ephesians 3:17 “So that Christ may dwell in in your hearts through faith…”
Debra and I read this verse as part of our devotions this morning. Debra almost always asks when we are done reading, what spoke to me most in what we read. This morning I had to answer her that this verse spoke to me, Christ dwelling in our hearts, through faith.
The significance of this goes way back into the Old Testament with God dwelling among His people. It started with Adam and Eve. God walked with them in the garden of Eden, before they sinned and everything changed. It continued on with God living in the Tabernacle, or tent, when the people of Israel left Egypt and wandered in the wilderness and then when they set up the tabernacle in Jerusalem for many years. That was where God lived, where God dwelled.
The Hebrew term for that dwelling is shakan and it meant to inhabit, but it goes further than that to mean to settle down into or to permanently inhabit. God chose to permanently settle down with the people of Israel. The Greek word carries the same meaning, to settle down with.
God continued that idea of living with His people when Solomon built the temple. On the day of dedication God showed up in powerful ways and showed to all the people that He was moving into the temple, He was choosing to come and live with His people in the temple they built for Him.
That God would dwell with us is also a part of the Christmas story. Jesus came to earth as Emmanuel as “God with us.” In John 1 we are told that the “Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” God chose to live with us.
Heaven will be where we live with God and He will live with us forever.
The idea of God living with us goes way deeper than Him living in a building we build for him, or even that of Jesus walking on earth among people. In the text above, and in others in the New Testament, we are told that Christ, the Son of God, would come to live in each person who believes in Him. It says that “Christ may dwell in your hearts.”
This is a beautiful way of showing how close and intimate God wants to be with each one of us. He does not want us to live alone, to live isolated from Him, to live without Him. He wants to be so connected to each of us that He lives in us. Where we go, He goes. What we do, He does with us. Whatever we experience, He experiences with us. There is no closer intimacy of any kind than that of Christ living in us.
This is a beautiful picture of what it means to be a Christian, it means to have Jesus living in us. We have the God who created us, with us always, in every situation, in every circumstance and in every moment of time. That is true intimacy and we have that as believers in Jesus.
And how do we have that? How do we draw that close to Jesus? Through faith.
We do not earn that be being good. We do not gain more of that by doing Christian things like going to church or giving money to the church. We cannot do anything to gain more of Jesus in us. We have Jesus come to live in us, dwell in us, through faith. That is a gift that Jesus gives us, He gives us the gift of Himself, when we believe in Him.
If you are a believer, you have Christ in you now. Let us rest in knowing that He is with us and in us and all around us, right now. And then let us live in such a way as to glorify the One who is in us.
Pastor Gary
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Shine
Shine! - Devotions for 11-9-22
Matthew 5:16 “In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”
I am here in my office and the sun is just starting to rise. I have been in my office early for the past week and I have been blessed to watch the sunrise each morning from my office window. The sunrise from our church is nice, so is the sunset. The mountains make both beautiful as the sun lights them up in the morning and then sets behind them in the evening. It is nice to be up early and watch the sunrise out my office window.
Jesus talks about light and He says we are the light of the world and that we are to let our light shine into the world around us. We are to shine differently than the sun does, it makes all things bright. We are to shine in such a way as to make Jesus look good. We are a reflection of Him living inside us because He is the true “Light of the World.” (John 8:12) We are dim reflections of His light, but in a sin darkened world, the light we shine forth looks beautiful.
So, what is the light that shines within us that Jesus says we are to let shine into all the world so that other people can see Jesus in us and give glory to His Father in heaven? It is the good works He calls us, leads us, and helps us to do. The good works that Jesus does through us is His light in us shining into the world.
Let Him do them through you.
When someone is in need, help them. When someone is lonely, visit them. When someone is hurting, comfort them. When someone is confused, lead them. When someone is lost, show them the way to Jesus. In all their needs, pray with, and for them. Let your light shine into the hearts and lives of the people living around you, in your neighborhoods, your workplace, your family, and everywhere people are watching you.
We can be the light of the world as Jesus says we are to be, but we are only that when we let the real “light of the world” in and allow Him to shine into the world through us.
Yesterday I watched as my neighbors, a young couple, raked up their neighbor’s yard of leaves. I was just driving out our cul-de-sac when I drove by and noticed them filling the last bag of leaves. They were doing a good work. Their neighbor is an elderly widow, her husband died a couple of years ago. It did my heart good to see them reaching out to help their neighbor. Their light was shining, or rather, His light was shining through their good works. It looked as beautiful as the sunrise I am watching this morning. Both are beautiful and do my heart good.
I wonder if my neighbors see Jesus in me? Do they see my good works and glorify the Father in heaven? Sometimes I need to be the one raking my neighbor’s leaves. Sometimes I need to be the one comforting someone who hurts. Sometimes I need to be the one holding their hand and praying with them. Sometimes I need to let the Holy Spirit lead me to do the things that would shine the light of Jesus into the people around me so that they can see Jesus shining through me.
I needed that reminder, seeing my neighbors doing a good work to the widow next door to them. They shone brighter and more beautifully than the sunrise or sunset I can watch from the hill at our church. The light of God, the love of God, shone through them. May it shine forth from all of us too.
“Shine, Jesus shine, fill this land with the Father’s glory…”
Pastor Gary
Harvest Workers
Harvest Workers- Devotions for 11-2-22
Luke 10:2 “And He said to them, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore, pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.’”
You have no doubt noticed the signs all over seeking workers. You have probably also gone into a store or restaurant and ran into the shortage of workers. Some fast-food restaurants are not open to eating inside because of staff shortages and some restaurants have closed sections of their places because they don’t have enough staff either. Our labor force is hurting as there are more jobs than workers looking for them and many places expecting their workers to work longer hours and more days because they cannot hire enough people.
I don’t expect this situation to get any better anytime soon, there are just too many reasons why this is happening, too many things would need to change for it to change anytime soon. I hope I’m wrong, but it looks like this will be the way things go for some time to come.
This labor shortage brings me to another labor shortage, one that Jesus talked about. He talked about the shortage of people who were willing to work in the harvest fields of His Father. He says in a couple places that the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. Then Jesus calls on us to pray to the Father to send out workers into His harvest field.
What Jesus is talking about is that there is a worker shortage in the area of people reaching out to others with the message of salvation. The number of people doing the work of reaching out to the lost is low. So, Jesus calls us to pray the Lord of the spiritual harvest of souls to send workers out into that harvest field. Jesus is asking us to pray that God would send more people out to reach out to the lost and tell them about salvation through faith in Jesus.
Please take that call to pray for Christian workers seriously. That is a far more serious labor shortage than restaurant or store workers. We need people who will go into the world and talk with others about Jesus. We need evangelists, church planters, missionaries, pastors, worship leaders and others who will work in the harvest field of souls. And we need lay people who will join in that too. Not all laborers in the harvest field of God are full-time pastors, missionaries or other professional Christian workers. No, most are, or should be, lay people walking with Jesus and reaching out to their families, friends, neighbors and co-workers and telling them about Jesus and the salvation He offers to all.
Pray the Lord of the harvest to send all kinds of people into the field of lost souls to save as many as possible.
Deb and I just returned from the Billy Graham center, they are looking for the next Billy Graham. He preached Christ to 215 million people and millions came to faith through his ministry. But he would often say that it was only because lay people talked with their friends, relatives and neighbors about Jesus first. They prepared the ground for him to call them to faith. If it wasn’t for the people in churches all over, his crusades would have been empty.
We all have a part in the harvest of souls, we all have work to do in reaching out to others. It is not just paid professionals who Jesus is calling us to pray for, it is lay people also, and maybe, mainly lay workers, mom’s and dad’s, grandpa’s and grandma’s and all the rest too.
Pray the Lord of the harvest to send workers into His harvest field of lost souls. And then respond to that prayer by saying, “Here am I, send me!”
Pastor Gary
Faith
Faith - Devotions for 10-26-22
Romans 1:17 “For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The just shall live by faith.’”
We are a Lutheran Church, that means we have a history that dates back to the great protestant reformation that began with Martin Luther. I thought I would do a short walk through that as it is a very big thing historically and it all happened about this time in 1517.
Today we “celebrate” Halloween on October 31. We put on masks and have our kids go trick-or-treating. All that, in most cases, is pretty tame and fun. For some, it does get out-of-hand and pretty ugly, seeming to glorify evil. We should never glorify evil. But for Martin Luther, the great reformer, All Hallows Eve held a different meaning. It was the day he chose to expose some of the problems in the church at his time. On that day in 1517 he took a list of grievances against certain practices that were going on in the church and nailed them to the door of the church he was part of in Wittenberg, Germany.
Without going into the specifics of those issues, I thought I would look back at what was at the core of why he did what he did. And what was at the core of it was his understanding of Romans 1:17. Faith. What was it that allowed a person to have their sins forgiven and go to heaven when they died? Was it all the good things we did and how well we controlled our sinful inclinations and handled temptations? That is what he thought and what many taught at that time. That we needed to watch our behavior and not sin and then go and do good things. He thought that if he sought the forgiveness of his sins through confessing them and then went out and did enough good works, that then he would be able to earn his way to receiving the forgiveness of his sins and would go to heaven when he died.
But he was wrong. Salvation is not by works. The New Testament tells us that salvation is by grace and not by works so that no man could boast. We cannot have our sins forgiven and go to heaven by doing good and keeping away from sin. Why? Because we are still sinners and we need a savior. Martin Luther knew that in his heart, he knew he was a sinner and he was missing something when it came to understanding God and salvation. So, he studied the bible.
He found that the gospel teaches us that salvation is by faith, not by works. By faith in Jesus and what He did in dying for us on the cross and rising from the grave we are saved. Jesus died to break the bond of sin and rose to give us new life in heaven. If we believe in Jesus and what He did for us, we are saved. If we have faith in Jesus, we are forgiven and will go to heaven. That is what the bible teaches. That is what Martin Luther discovered in Romans 1:17 and other places when he studied the New Testament.
He never thought he would start a new Christian movement, he just wanted to make sure that people knew that salvation was not by works, but by faith in Jesus.
What are we teaching today in our churches? What are we passing on to our children and others around us in how we are living and what we are teaching them about God and salvation? We need to make sure that we are clear that salvation does not come by going to church, doing good to others, being nice people or anything else that may sound good to human ears. We need to make sure we teach that salvation comes through faith in Jesus, only.
This Halloween, let us look back to what Luther discovered and see the gospel of faith.
Pastor Gary
Mentors
Mentors - Devotions for 10-12-22
1 Corinthians 11:1 “Be imitators of me as I am of Christ.”
“Who is someone you look up to as a spiritual leader?” I was asked that question just a short while ago and it made me think. Who are the people I have had as my mentors in my Christian walk and as a pastor? It has also made me think about all of us, who are our mentors? We all need mentors in our faith walk with Jesus.
The Apostle Paul was a mentor to many and he knew it. He even encouraged it. Before mentoring was a thing, Paul was a mentor. He calls the people in the church in Corinth to look at him as their mentor in the faith and calls them to imitate him. I am sure that was a great challenge for those who knew the great Apostle Paul. How could I ever become like him! How could I have as deep a faith as he does and how could I ever reach out to others like he does?!
Of course, our goal is to become imitators of Jesus Christ, that is our ultimate goal. But sometimes we need someone we can see with our own eyes how they walk, and hear with our ears how they speak. We need flesh and blood examples of how we are to walk as believers before we can see clearly enough to more fully imitate Jesus.
Debra and I are going on a spiritual retreat, it is actually a Pastors and Wives Retreat so we will be with dozens of other pastors and wives. We are going to hear someone we have never heard speak before, he isn’t one of our mentors, but maybe he will become that after this retreat. We are going to The Cove, which is the Billy Graham training center. He was a mentor to both of us. We both looked up to him as a man of God who walked with integrity. Even though we never met him personally and didn’t know him in that way, he was still one of our mentors. I think he was that for millions of people around the world.
Who do you look up to? Who do you imitate? Who are your spiritual mentors? They can be people you know, or people you only know about from some other source.
There are others that I have looked up to that the question I was asked recently prompted me to think about and remember. There was a former president of our denomination. I looked up to him as a new pastor. He mentored me in what it meant to become a pastor. There was a fellow student I went to college with, his goal was to become a pastor. He mentored me in thinking about becoming a pastor. There are some other pastors who mentored me along the way as well. And there are others, who I never met, but whose books I read who I learned from in how to walk in a sin-filled world as a believer in Jesus Christ. I have had many mentors along the way, people I have looked up to and imitated as they followed Christ.
That is the goal. Choose mentors who are following Christ. Choose people to learn from who are ahead of you in their walk of faith. Find people you trust who are walking with Jesus, and learn from them, as they follow Christ. And make sure some of them are far enough ahead of you that they challenge you to go farther in your spiritual life. Choose mentors who will lead you into a deeper relationship with Jesus and into greater ministry for Christ.
Everyone needs Godly mentors and they need to be people who are walking with Jesus and whose walk in the lord is steady and firm. Learn from them and become imitators of them, as they imitate Jesus.
Pastor Gary
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