pastorjohnb

Thoughts and musings on faith and our mighty God!

Tag Archives: evil


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Humility and Love

Reading: 1st Kings 3:3-14

1st Kings 3:5b – “Ask whatever you wish, and I’ll give it to you.”

In our reading today God comes to Solomon in a dream. He has just become king, succeeding his father David. While David has set a great example for Solomon, all wasn’t perfect. The temple had not yet been built so people are sacrificing at local shrines. As we begin our reading we see that this is also Solomon’s practice. We also see that Solomon loved God and sought to walk according to the Law. Solomon goes to Gibeon and offers a very large sacrifice to God. Gibeon was the location of the Tabernacle. The ark of the covenant, however, was in David’s tent in Jerusalem.

That night God appears to Solomon in a dream. God says to Solomon, “Ask whatever you wish, and I’ll give it to you.” What an open-ended question! Before pressing on in our passage, we pause to ask ourselves: What would be my response to this question? Solomon’s response demonstrates both humility and his love of God. After thanking God for walking with David and for passing the kingship on to him, Solomon acknowledges his youth and inexperience. Accordingly he asks for “a discerning mind in order to govern your people” and for the ability “to discern good from evil.” Solomon also recognizes the impossibility of leading Israel without God’s help.

The Lord is pleased and grants Solomon’s requests. These requests were aligned with God’s will and plans for Solomon and for Israel. In addition, God grants Solomon wealth, fame, and the possibility of “a very long life.” This last part is contingent upon Solomon’s continued faithfulness to God.

Solomon sought to honor God with his request. His humility and Love of God drove his petition. May it be so with us as we lift our petitions to the Lord our God.

Prayer: Lord God, guide us to walk in humility, recognizing our need for your direction on our lives. Lead us to see with honest and clear eyes and hearts, recognizing our own weaknesses. Fill us with your presence, empowering us to bring you the glory in all we say, do, and think. Amen.


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Praying and Sharing

Reading: Ephesians 6:18-20

Ephesians 6:18b – “Stay alert by hanging in there and praying for all believers.”

Today’s verses follow Paul’s famous “Armor of God” passage. In this passage Paul writes about God’s protection against the “tricks of the devil.” This battle is won by holding fast to truth, justice, faith, and salvation. One holds fast by and through the power of the Holy Spirit.

As our verses for today begin, it is the same Holy Spirit that guides and empowers our prayers. Just as the Spirit is God’s constant presence in the hearts of believers, so too are our prayers to be offered “all the time.” For Paul, we are to live a life of prayer, both for ourselves and for one another. For Paul, praying should be as natural and regular as breathing. As the verse continues, Paul encourages us to “Stay alert by hanging in there and praying for all believers.” Here he is connecting back to his previous thoughts on the battle with the “spiritual powers of evil.” It is a battle that impacts all believers so we are to pray for one another. Always.

Paul models the life of prayers, asking for prayers for himself. As he sits in chains, he desires to continue spreading the good news – this “secret plan” or mystery that invites all people into a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. Even in his difficult circumstances Paul wants to make the gospel known to as many people as possible. So he asks the Ephesians to pray for him to have “the confidence to say what I have to say.” Although we cannot pray this for Paul, we certainly can pray this for all who seek to share Jesus with others today. May this be both our prayer and our action.

Prayer: Lord God, as the battle is constant, help us to lift our prayers constantly. Whisper, nudge, and otherwise remind us of the need for and of the power of prayer. Place prayer ever in our hearts and on our lips. Open our eyes to the opportunities to share our faith today. Fill us with a holy confidence to step forward in faith. Amen.


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Willing to Risk

Reading – 1st Kings 18:1-15

1st Kings 18:15 – “As surely as the Lord of heavenly forces lives, the one I serve, I will appear before Ahab today.”

Today we begin thr story of Elijah versus the prophets of Baal. It was three years ago that Elijah said to Ahab, “There will be neither dew or rain unless I say so” (1st Kings 17:1.) Elijah then fled for fear of his life. Ahab was a wicked king. He worshiped Baal and did great evil in Israel. As the drought worsened, Ahab searched and searched for Elijah. But God kept Elijah safe during this time.

At the start of chapter 18 God summons Elijah to go to Ahab. As evidence of the severity of the drought, Ahab and Obadiah are out looking for water. During this search, Obadiah and Elijah meet. Obadiah is a faithful but secret follower of God. He has hidden and cared for 100 prophets of God, keeping them safe from Jezebel, Ahab’s wife. Imagine how hard this must have been during a severe drought. And how risky!

Elijah asks Obadiah to tell Ahab that the prophet is here to meet Ahab. This thought strikes fear into Obadiah. He has two fears. First, Ahab will kill him at the mention of Elijah’s name. Second, God will once again whisk Elijah away, resulting in Obadiah’s death. But Elijah says to him, “As surely as the Lord of heavenly forces lives, the one I serve, I will appear before Ahab today.” Obadiah has Elijah’s word but still must decide what to do. More on that tomorrow.

When we are in a similar situation, asked to invite an evil and cruel person to a faith encounter, are we willing to risk their reaction? Are we will to risk self so that another might experience the power of God?

Prayer: Lord God, in our world we do not have to look far to find people who are opposed to you and to our faith in you. When your Spirit moves us to invite them to church or to an event, when your Spirit nudges us to share a word of hope or encouragement from your Word, when the Spirit invites us to love on them in your name – give us courage, fill us with strength, empower us to live out our faith boldly. Amen.


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Rescuer, Redeemer, Hope

Reading: Habakkuk 2:9-11

Habakkuk 2:11 – “A stone will cry out from a village wall, and a tree branch will respond.”

The book of Habakkuk wrestles with the question, “Why do the wicked prosper while the righteous suffer?” The prophet struggles with the idea that God could use the wicked for God’s own purposes. In the midst of our own suffering we too can wonder how any good can come from our suffering. In these moments, like the prophet, we must trust and lean into our good and loving God.

In our short passage Habakkuk pronounces doom on “the one making evil gain.” Babylon has used power, deceit, and dishonesty to add to their own wealth, at the expense of Israel. The prophet predicts that the ultimate outcome will be shame and death for evil Babylon. In many ways this is a timeless story. Greed and the hunger for power will always be sins that humanity struggles with. Today many people could utter the words of the prophet.

Hope comes in verse 11. The prophets hopes for a rescuer, for a Messiah. He trusts that God will redeem and restore God’s people. Hope will come through the cornerstone, through the root of Jesse. The longing of God’s people will be answered in Jesus Christ. He continues to be our rescuer, our redeemer, our hope. Thanks be to God.

Prayer: Lord God, this ago-old story feels true yet today. The gap between those with and those without grows. Power becomes more consolidated. May we, your children, be the stones that cry out for justice. May we, created in your image, be the branches that bring righteousness back to the land. God, restore your people, redeem the oppressed. Amen.


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Love as Well

Reading: Romans 12:17-21

Romans 12:21 – “Don’t be defeated by evil, but defeat evil with good.”

Photo credit: Kate Remmer

Our five verses from the end of Romans 12 come from a section in which Paul is arguing that love is the primary command. In and over and through and around all things, first apply love. Paul is elevating here what Jesus lived out. If we, like Jesus, allow love to lead and guide all that we say, think, and do, then we will be continuing Christ’s work of building the kingdom of God here on earth.

In verse 17 Paul warns about repaying evil with evil. That’s our natural reaction, often our first thought, isn’t it? It’s what we see in the culture all around us. Be upside-down instead. Choose love. Choose the good. In this spirit we’re encouraged to “live at peace with all people.” Paul offers some realism here: “to the best of your ability.” Some folks want nothing to do with getting along with others. Their evil intents guide all of their actions.

Paul, however, doesn’t advise us to avoid such people. Leave all the revenge and paying back to God. Paul does advise us to look for our opportunities – our chances to be love. If the one who is our “enemy” is hungry then feed them. If they are thirsty then give them a drink. In loving on such as these, we are piling upon them our love, a way of sharing faith that could one day influence them too. In this way, we will be living out Paul’s wonderful admonition: “Don’t be defeated by evil, but defeat evil with good.”

While we may think that Paul is channeling his inner Jesus with all of this “love your enemy” talk, he is quoting from Proverbs 25. Love was at the core of who and what Jesus was, yes. But love is also at the core of the Old Testament. This should be no surprise. God is love. May we be so as well.

Prayer: Lord God, empower us today and every day to be love when the world expects hate. Guide us to ever choose the good, eschewing the temptation to do harm. Through our counter-cultural and upside-down life draw others towards Jesus Christ, our earthly model of love and peace. Amen.


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The Narrow Road

Reading: Luke 10:25-37

Luke 10:36 – “What do you think? Which one of the three was a neighbor to the man?”

Photo credit: Jan Huber

Today we turn to the parable of the Good Samaritan. This is very familiar ground. The lessons Jesus taught remain as relevant today as they were the day that he told the story. The religious continue to try and limit who is acceptable and worthy. We continue to see and define others by arbitrary things like ethnicity, race, gender, religion, education…

As the passage opens, a legal expert tests Jesus. The opening question is just to set up the second question. Any 5-year-old Jew could’ve answered the opening question. It’d be like asking a 5-year-old in one of our churches, ‘Who died on the cross for our sins?’ The second question has the meat on the bone. Jesus has been preaching that God’s kingdom and the salvation that he brings is for all people. He’s been eating with tax collectors and touching lepers. Clearly Jesus’ understanding of who a good Jew’s neighbor is needs some correcting.

The story unfolds and Jesus picks a most unlikely hero. A Samaritan would be about as far from a Jew’s neighbor as anyone could be. And he does not just stop and help. Maybe the legal expert could’ve tolerated that. Like, it might’ve been okay to stop and talk to Zacchaeus, but to go to his house and to eat with him? The Good Samaritan goes way above and beyond too. He shows mercy to the one in need. He is the one who sets for us an example.

Of this story, John Wesley writes, “Let us renounce that bigotry and party zeal which could contract our hearts into an insensitivity for all the human race, but for a small number whose sentiments and practices are so much our own.” From about 31 AD to the late 1700s to today. May it be so.

Prayer: Lord God, encourage and empower us to walk the narrow road. It is narrow. Our faith is assaulted on both sides – culture on the one side, “religion” on the other. The path of Jesus, the way of love, is a narrow lane. As you held back the waters of the Jordan, hold back these evils, O Lord. Be with us each moment as we seek to build your upside-down kingdom of love in this thin space. Amen.


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Stepping Beyond Easy Love

Reading: Romans 12:9-16

Romans 12:13 – “Contribute to the needs of God’s people, and welcome the strangers into your home.”

In Romans 12:9-16 Paul calls us to love. He emphasizes loving without pretending. Other translations say “love without hypocrisy.” Paul is calling for genuine, sincere love, not fake or false love. Some of the time we can be tempted to love in ways that are superficial. We might, for example, say that we’ll pray for someone but be unwilling to take the obvious step that would be the answer to the prayer.

Paul connects this “pretend” love to cursing those who harass us and to thinking we’re better than or smarter than others. Genuine love would work against us being two-faced and against being arrogant. We are called to “hate” these evils and to “hold on to what is good.” Paul also lays out what it looks like to hold onto the good.

We are to love and honor one another. We are to be enthusiastic as we serve one another. We are to meet each other’s needs. We are to welcome in the strangers. (What a call to be the church both inside and outside the walls of the building!) We are to rejoice with the joyful, and we are to cry with those in sorrow. We are to bless others. We are to consider everyone as equals. We are to associate with those “who have no status.”

Much of what Paul writes in today’s passage parallels Jesus’ challenging words from yesterday in Luke 6. In essence both tell us to love those who are hard to love. There is also the same counter-cultural element to Paul’s words today. Love the stranger, love those without status or voice. There is risk in this call. Genuine love often involves risk.

Prayer: Lord God, as we’ve been reminded, sometimes it is easy to love. It is good and right to genuinely love our family, our friends, our church. Yet you call us to so much more. Encourage us to step beyond these familiar and safe circles of love. Guide us out into the unknown waters of the stranger. Lead us to stand on the uneven and rocky ground of the marginalized. Remind us, Lord, that in these places, we stand with you. Amen.


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Pour It Back Out

Readings: Romans 5:1-5 and 12:18-21

Romans 5:3-4 – “Trouble produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope.”

Paul begins chapter 5 by reminding the Roman church (and us) that they (we) are made righteous through Christ’s faithfulness. We are made right because of and through Christ’s work on the cross. We cannot do anything to restore ourselves to righteousness before God. But Jesus can and does. That brings us peace with God. And because we are forgiven through grace, we can and should be gracious to others. Through our own radical acts of love, others can experience and then claim the hope that we have in Christ Jesus.

Paul then rejoices because we experience hardship, trials, suffering. What?! Paul is not celebrating that we experience these things. He is celebrating how God uses them in our lives. Trouble builds endurance which builds character which builds hope. As we endure faithfully, we model Jesus and through this process take on more of Christ’s character. As we are made more Christlike our hope in God deepens. In turn we receive more of God’s love, poured into our hearts.

Shifting to chapter 12, Paul focuses in on those times when evil is the cause of hardship… He encourages an attitude of peace even then. The apostle encourages us to allow God to be the one in the punishment business. Paul then asks us to do just the opposite: give your enemy, the one doing evil to you, give them what they need. Give them food or drink or burning coals. (This last one refers to actually giving them coals so that they can rekindle the fire, bringing them warmth.) By taking the love of God that is poured into our hearts and pouring it back out into our relationships with difficult others we will “defeat evil with good.” May it be so for you and for me.

Prayer: Lord God, we thank you for the gift of Jesus Christ – he who not only became the atoning sacrifice for us but also set before us the daily example of love. In the times when it is most difficult to muster up love, grace, mercy – in moments of hardship… – remind us of your great love for all of us. In gratitude and faithfulness lead us to pour these out, blessing others. Amen.


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With Us Always

Reading: Psalm 91:9-16

Psalm 91:10 – “No evil will happen to you; no disease will come near to your tent.”

Psalm 91 is a liturgy of divine protection. The psalmist is expressing his or her belief in God as protector. They express an absolute trust in God. In verse 9 God is declared to be a place of refuge, the place of residence. The Psalm closes with God’s promise to fill them with “old age” and to “show you my salvation.” Throughout the Psalm we see the Jewish belief that living a godly life will result in being blessed by God. There will be rescue, protection, answered prayer, saving.

In verse 10 we read, “No evil will happen to you; no disease will come near to your tent.” This is backed up in verse 11, where we read that God will order the angels to protect us “wherever you go.” In verse 12 we read that we won’t even “bruise a foot” because the angels will carry us. With God’s protection we’ll be able to “march on top of lions and vipers.” These words express trust and faith in God. These words were written in a time when all things were seen as under God’s control.

As the biblical narrative unfolds, we see a shift in understanding. God created and designed the world and set it into motion. God does not, however, micromanage the world. Evil, free will, selfishness, greed… – these are part of the human condition. Nobody teaches a young child, for example, to want that toy just for themselves. They must be taught to share. Illness and death are also part of the human condition. Our bodies are amazing, complex creations of God. We are not, however, bulletproof, fireproof, illness-proof… These realities of life bring oppression, injustice, pain, grief, suffering. God desires to be with us in these hard moments. Calling upon God in faith and trust, our God of relationship will walk with us always.

Prayer: Lord God, thank you for always being with us when we call out. Lead and guide us to have a deep trust in your love and care for us. Impart upon us also an understanding of the realities of the human condition. In moments of goodness and joy, in moments when evil or illness or when poor decisions impact our lives, draw us to you, be present in our trials, walk with us in all of life. Amen.


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Come, Lord Jesus!

Reading: Revelation 21-22

Revelation 21:5 – “Then the one seated on the throne said, ‘Look! I’m making all things new.'”

As we conclude our Bible Year reading plan with Revelation 21 and 22, it is a wonderful end to this project and to the words of scripture. These two chapters give us a sneak peak into eternity. God and Jesus Christ are victorious. All evil is no more. Everything focuses on worshipping God and the Lamb.

Chapter 21 begins with the new heaven and earth becoming one as the New Jerusalem comes down from heaven. In this heavenly city, God will once again dwell with “his people.” There will be no tears, no death, no mourning, no pain. The one in the throne declares, “Look! I’m making all things new.” In his fourth spirit-led trance John gets a tour of this new city of God. It is 1,500 miles on each side. It was twelve gates, each made out of a huge pearl, each gate with the name of one of Israel’s twelve tribes on it. The city has twelve foundations, each made of a different previous stone, each bearing the name of one of the twelve apostles. There is no sun or moon. God’s glory is the light and the Lamb is the lamp. The river of life flows from the throne of God. On each bank is a tree of life. The trees bear twelve fruits and the leaves bring healing. God’s servants gather around the throne, worshipping God and the Lamb.

The epilogue begins in 22:6. An angel declares these words “trustworthy and true.” John states that he heard and saw these things. He is told not to seal the scroll because “the time is near.” Jesus, the “root and descendant of David… the bright morning star,” is coming soon. Come, Lord Jesus, come!

Prayer: Lord God, we long for the day. We long to see the new heaven and earth. We long to dwell in your presence. Today we pray, come Lord Jesus. Amen.