pastorjohnb

Thoughts and musings on faith and our mighty God!

Tag Archives: faith


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The Journey On

Reading: Colossians 1: 15-20

Jesus, Paul declares, is the “firstborn of all creation”.  Since the beginning of time, Jesus has been the creator and the purpose for all that has been created.  He is therefore supreme over all.  Yet counter to all of this, Jesus is also the one who humbled Himself to death on a cross, becoming the “firstborn from among the dead”.  In doing so, Jesus became the way to true and eternal life.  Only through His blood can we be made righteous.

Jesus rule and example were so countercultural.  Jesus loved instead of conquered.  Jesus healed instead of killed.  Jesus forgave instead of holding grudges.  Jesus sacrificed instead of taking advantage.  Jesus offered compassion instead of judgment.  In all these ways, Jesus gave us an example we can each follow.  Love, compassion, mercy, forgiveness, understanding, servant.  Jesus’ power comes from His heart, not from His brain or His brawn.  We are each born with the spark of the divine in our hearts.  We can thus all live a life that follows the ways of Jesus.  We were created in His image, intended to follow after Jesus as His disciples.

Next Sunday begins a new year in the church calendar as Advent begins.  Like the end of the calendar year, may it be a time when we pause and take stock of our journey of faith.  John Wesley called this life of faith a “journey towards perfection”.  It is a place we never reach, yet one we should always be arriving towards.  Jesus was the perfect example of God’s love lived out.  This week may we look at our journeys of faith – at both our times moving forward and at our times of failure.  May we each commit to a year of growth in our faith, seeking to ever become more and more like Jesus Christ, the one true King, the one and only Way.  May it be so.


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Trust

Reading: Luke 21: 10-19

Today’s passage really lays out what is ahead one day and makes it clear that God will be present through it all.  The reading opens with a view of a grim future that evokes connections to Revelation.  We do not know when, but we do know that the world will be in rough shape with all the earthquakes, famine, violence, and so forth.

Then Jesus steps back and makes it personal.  Jesus speaks of a time of persecution and trial for the believers.  Believers will be persecuted and arrested and put on trial.  Why?  So we can witness to our faith.  It is interesting that we will not be rescued from the trial by our carefully thought-out arguments.  Jesus even says not to prepare any.  He says, “Trust”.  Do not worry – “I will give you words and wisdom”.  Do not rely on your own skills and knowledge and rhetoric, but only rely on your faith.  Just like the Holy Spirit filled Peter and John when they were on trial before the Sanhedrin, so too will the Holy Spirit fill each who trusts fully in Jesus.

This message of trusting in God holds true for all believers in all times.  We need to remember this because we know that in this life we will face times of trial.  There will be difficulties.  There simply will be.  Jesus encourages us in how we approach and walk through these times.  The first thing we must do is trust in God and not in ourselves.  Once we acknowledge our absolute need for God, then we fully open ourselves up to God’s presence to work in our lives.  In this way we will bear witness to our faith in a world that doubts and questions.  By trusting fully in God we demonstrate that God is absolutely in control.  By living out a peace that passes understanding we bear witness to God.

God is faithful and God is loving.  When we trust fully in God, we experience these things.  There will be pain and hurt in this life, but when we hold fast to our faith in God, we retain a hope greater than anything in life can defeat.  May we trust fully in God, knowing our eternity rests securely in God’s loving hands.


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Living, Not Just Knowing

Reading: Luke 21: 5-9

The disciples are looking at the beauty and wealth of the temple.  People go to the great cathedrals of the world and marvel at the stone work and stained glass.  Visitors to museums stand in amazement before the painting of the Last Supper or some other religious portrait.  We go to our churches and think, “What a great place this is”!

Jesus says to just hold on a minute.  He says that one day the temple will be no more.  One day those cathedrals will be gone too.  One day that artwork will fade.  One day…  Jesus goes on to warn them that one day false prophets will come, trying to charm us into believing other stories.  Jesus warns us not to be deceived.  If all our faith is is in the things – the buildings, the artwork, the campus – then we will be lost when our faith is shaken or tested.  Instead, our faith must be in Jesus.

There can be danger here too.  If we read all the stories of Jesus and appreciate all He said and are amazed at what He did, but do not go any deeper than knowing the stories, then we have simply created another empty building.  The words must travel the short distance from our heads to our hearts.  The words must take on understanding and application.  It is at this level the they begin to transform our lives.  When we allow Jesus to come alive in our hearts, we begin to be transformed and to live out our faith instead of simply knowing our faith.

If our faith is built upon a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, then we do not need a building to visit Jesus in.  Jesus is not a building.  He lives in us.  If Jesus lives in us, we will not be deceived by false prophets or drawn in by the lies of the world.  He will guide us from within our hearts.  Lord Jesus, reign in me today!  Jesus, be alive in my heart!


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Questions

Reading: Luke 20: 27-38

Sometimes we ask questions because we seek information.  Sometimes we think we have the information and we ask questions to test or trap or embarrass someone.  The second scenario is the case with our Sadducees today.  They think up a whopper of a question to test and embarrass this man who seems to have all the the answers.  Even to this difficult question, Jesus has an answer.  It is such a good answer, in fact, that our gospel goes on to tell us that they dared not ask Him any more questions.

The intent of the Sadducees was not good.  We have all been in or witnessed such a scenario ourselves.  A person in authority asks a question their inferior likely cannot answer as a means to reinforce their own position or status.  A child asks another a question about something they just learned in hopes of appearing smarter than the other.  A colleague asks an apparently innocent “how was your weekend?” question, already knowing about the embarrassing thing that happened.  All of these questions are questions asked to knock down another while falsely building ourselves up.  This is not how we are called to live as followers of Jesus Christ.

Jesus is all about positive relationships and about helping others to grow in their faith.  It is true that at times Jesus asked tough questions.  He never sought to do this and only asked them as a way to prompt someone, not to force out an embarrassing revelation or confession.  At times we too will have teachable moment that call for us to ask a tough question in order to allow another to grow.  For the most part, we are called to ask questions that build others up, to ask questions that prompt growth and learning and thinking.  Our line of questioning should allow others to consider and contemplate their faith without condemning or judging them.  May we be careful with our words, always seeking to build up and teach and encourage growth in others so that they may grow in their relationship with Jesus Christ. 


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Praise

Reading: Psalm 145

“Great is the Lord and most worthy of praise; his greatness no one can fathom”.  God is indeed worthy of our praises.  All the blessings in our life come from God alone.  For this simple fact we should offer our praise to God all the time.  From the larger view, we sense God’s greatness, but we cannot see the bounds of it.  It is like looking out upon the ocean or up into the night sky – we can sense the immensity of it but we cannot really fathom or understand just how big or great it is.  Such is the case with God.

“I will meditate on your wonderful works”.  Even though we cannot fully understand, we can meditate on and wrestle with the things of God.  God’s hand and Spirit are at work in so many ways all the time.  It is good for our soul and good for our faith to take time often, to slow down, and to see God in our world and in our lives.  When we meditate on this, we gain a better sense of what we cannot fully understand.

“The Lord is good to all; he has compassion on all he has made”.  God desires to bless you and me.  God desires to bless all of creation.  This has been God’s intent since the beginning of the world.  But we are fallen and broken.  We sin.  This does not diminish God’s love for us.  Seeing our human state, God sent his only Son to die for us.  God is compassionate.  His love for us is so passionate that God gave his only Son for our sins.  This is an essential truth if our faith.  Consider this well today.  Meditate on God’s love and compassion for us all.  God is worthy of our praise.


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For I am with You

Reading: Haggai 1:15b to 2:9

Remember when America was great?  A TV in every living room and a car in every driveway…  This was the ‘land of opportunity’, the place where hundreds of thousands came to make a better life for themselves.  Every parent’s dream was for their children to be better off than they themselves were.  It was a significant event when that first child from a family went off to college.  Remember the good old days?!

Haggai speaks to the people in a time just after the Babylonian exile has ended.  The people returning to Jerusalem and other communities remembered their homes and the temple in an idealized way.  All was beautiful and perfect in their mind’s eye.  But they return to a temple in ruins, to homes that show decades of neglect.  There is such a disconnect between what they envisioned and their reality that it is depressing and causes them to question all that matters, especially their faith.

We too can experience this remembering of a glorified past.  It can be physical – like when one returns to the old family home and thinks, “My this bedroom is small, I remember it being bigger”.  This can also happen in our faith.  Like those returning to Jerusalem, we too can return to our faith after a time of exile.  After we have been away from God for a while, we come to return and expect God’s magnificent presence to be there all the time.  We recall our ‘mountaintop’ faith moment and want to reclaim that feeling.  But our reality is that often times our faith must be rebuilt, just like the homes and temple that the people of Haggis’s had to rebuild.

The Lord speaks to Haggai as this large task has deflated the people.  “Be strong all you people of the land and work.  For I am with you…  I will fill this house with glory”.  These are our promises too.  Be strong, stay true to our faith, work at it.  God is with us.  God loves us.  God will fill each of us, all of us, with God’s glory.  God is faithful.  May we be too.


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Prayer Encourager

Reading: 2 Thessalonians 1: 11-12

Paul played many roles for his churches and those he shared the faith with.  He was most often a teacher.  The main goal of Paul’s life was to bring people to Jesus Christ.  He traveled all over the place preaching and teaching.  Paul would often offer remedial lessons, found in the form of his letters we find in the New Testament, that would refine his teaching, would fix errors in both thinking and practice, and would seek to resolve disputes within the churches and between individuals.

We see another of Paul’s roles today: prayer.  He is one who prays.  Paul prayed all the time for the churches he established, for churches already in existence, and for those he knew and was mentoring in the faith.  Through prayer, Paul often sought to encourage those who would read his letters.  Through prayer, Paul encouraged the good things about a church or person and sought to remind them if God’s hand at work among them.  In these ways Paul’s prayers were like compliments.  Not only were they positive and uplifting, but they also would spur the readers on to continue in the faith and to build up their faith.  Reminding them of what they did well led them to do it all the more.

We can also read Paul’s prayer today as an encouragement to our faith.  We can also pray this prayer for those in our lives who need encouragement.  To pray that we are “worthy of his calling” implies that we are indeed called.  Born a child of God, we have been called since birth.  To pray that we act “by his power” reminds us that we need to rely fully on God, not on ourselves.  To pray that God is present in fulfilling “every good purpose and every act prompted by our faith” implies an active and responsive faith, a faith lived out.  All of this leads to Paul’s conclusion: all of this done so that Jesus Christ may be glorified.  May it be so in our lives this day.


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Faith and Trust

Reading: Habakkuk 2: 1-4

Habakkuk has cried out to God.  Now he takes his place on the wall and awaits God’s response.  He has said his piece and waits.  Habakkuk demonstrates great faith.  He will wait upon God.  He is also showing us how to be hopeful in the face of injustice or persecution.  This can be very hard on our own but very possible with God.  Lastly, Habakkuk expects a response from God.  It is as if he is saying, “I’m going to stand over here God.  Come answer me when you are ready”.

God’s answer is not really an answer to Habakkuk’s question.  In essence, God’s answer to “How long?” is: “until I am ready”.  In God’s answer we sense a definite awareness of what Habakkuk was praying about – the injustice and the violence.  But God also says to be patient.  God speaks of an appointed time that will not prove false.  God indicates that Habakkuk is to wait as the answer lingers.  Our passage ends by God stating, “the righteous will live by his faith”.  It echoes what was revealed to Paul, “my grace is sufficient for you”.  God is saying, “be patient, be obedient, be steadfast – I have this”.

In our lives, we too may often ask “How long”?  God’s response is the same to us: trust me, be patient, have faith, be obedient, live righteously, be steadfast.  We know that God is sovereign.  We know that God is omnipotent and omnipresent.  God has it all in the ‘palm of his hand’.  May we, like Habakkuk, faithfully live into God’s plan, even when it requires patience and, above all, faith and trust.


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Simple Servant

Reading: 2 Timothy 4: 6-8

As Paul looks back over a lifetime, he is pleased with how he finished.  He knows he had his moments.  We all do.  Paul grew up like all other Jewish boys – learning the Torah and practicing the family trade.  He worked hard at learning the Law and rose to become a Pharisee.  Then this Jesus fellow came along and started to cause a stir.  Paul stuck to his traditional faith and soon Jesus was crucified and buried.  But the newfound “Way”, as it was known, continued to grow and spread.  Paul, known then as Saul, took up the mantel and led the charge to stamp out this fledgling religion.  But then one day, on his way to Damascus to round up some followers of the Way, Paul himself met Jesus.  Paul encountered the risen Christ and Paul became a new creation.  From then on he worked tirelessly to teach the good news of Jesus Christ to any and all who would listen.

Paul has “fought the fight, finished the race, kept the faith”.  Paul is pleased with how he has spent the last years of his life.  There is no regret, no second thoughts.  Paul has been a great champion of sharing Jesus with others.  He has done all he could do for a Savior that changed his life forever.  Paul now sees his life as being poured out like a thank offering, a gift made to God for the change that Jesus Christ has wrought in his life.  Having given fully of himself, Paul is content with his life of service offered to the Christ he loves.

Paul exemplifies the simple servant that Jesus calls us all to be.  It is the life that Jesus first modeled as well.  When we offer ourselves out of a love for God and a love for neighbor, we too are fighting the good fight.  When we step into the opportunities that God gives us, we too are keeping the faith.  Each day, as we strive to fall more in love with God and to grow deeper in our faith, we too are finishing the race as faithful disciples.  May we bring glory and honor to God in all we do.


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Teach and Share. Repeat.

Reading: 2Timothy 3:14 to 4:5

Timothy has been richly blessed in his life.  His family has encouraged and taught him on his early faith journey.  They planted and nurtured the seeds of faith that God watered and made grow.  Paul steps into Timothy’s life to continue to teach and correct and encourage him as he grows in his faith.  Timothy is now at a point where he is ready to preach the Word, to use his faith to help others on their journey of faith.  Timothy’s faith has grown to the point that he feels God’s call upon his life.

We too have walked (or are walking) a similar path.  Our faith is meant to be lived out in community.  It began that we with Jesus and a small group of followers.  Jesus taught them the faith so that they too could one day share the good news with others.  After they had been with Jesus for a sufficient time, He sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal.  The disciples went out and shared their growing faith with others.  Their own faith grew and they returned to Jesus to learn some more.

After Jesus’ death and resurrection, the disciples continued to learn and grow from each other and by the power of the Holy Spirit.  We, as current disciples, are called to the same life.  Be in the community, be in small groups to encourage, support, and learn together.  Go out into the world to teach and Share our faith.  Return for more encouraging, supporting, and learning.  Head back out into the world to teach and Share.  Repeat often.  May we learn to follow Jesus’ example, modeled by Paul as well.