Celebrating Easter on the green side of the grass

The other morning I asked a co-worker how he was doing. His response was, "Great, I woke up on the green side of the grass." To which I replied, "Yes, but it could have been a lot better."

I think my response confused him and perhaps to you also, because I was thinking it would be better to go to sleep here and wake up in Heaven!

Do you remember what the apostle Paul said in Philippians 1:21-25? Let me remind you here: "For to me, living means living for Christ, and dying is even better But if I live, I can do more fruitful work for Christ. So I really don't know which is better.  I'm torn between two desires: I long to go and be with Christ, which would be far better for me.  But for your sakes, it is better that I continue to live.  Knowing this, I am convinced that I will remain alive so I can continue to help all of you grow and experience the joy of your faith."

Here we are at the time our world celebrates Easter. In general what is this all about? It is about a renewal, it is about hope; it is about the promise of life after death, proven by a resurrected savior.

For many people this is the only time of the year they think about this great message that demonstrates the power of God even over death. Death is not the end for those who have chosen to be called Christians, Children of God, it is only the beginning.

Paul also gives us these wonderful words on hope in 1 Corinthians 15:20-23: "But in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead. He is the first of a great harvest of all who have died.  So you see, just as death came into the world through a man, now the resurrection from the dead has begun through another Man. Just as everyone dies because we all belong to Adam, everyone who belongs to Christ will be given new life.  But there is an order to this resurrection: Christ was raised as the first of the harvest; then all who belong to Christ will be raised when He comes back. "

I would suggest to you that this once a year holiday of Easter, brought about by the imagination of man, is not a just something to be remembered once a year. We are told in the scripture to remember the death, burial and resurrection of Christ each and every first day of the week when we assemble as God's children.

Celebrating Easter on the green side of the grass may be a good thing to do, but how much better when we celebrate continually in the presence of our God in Heaven!

Promises

Our Sunday morning Bible class is studying the topic of Promises to us as Christians. We are looking at the positive side of what our Christian life is all about. I don't know about you, but I need that reinforcement. Far too often I seem to concentrate on the "thou shalt not's" and not nearly enough on the positive aspect of our relationship to God. What is it that you concentrate upon? Where are your prayers centered? Do we pray that the bumps in the road be smoothed, or that we can endure the bumps as they come? Truth be told, a lot of what we are willing to endure depends upon what the rewards at the end of the journey. Often it is all about the promise....

We have a member of our family a little 7 pound dog named Chewy. She listens to our promises and remembers. We tell her, "Go potty and we'll give you a treat". She remembers... We tell her, "We're going to church and when we get back we'll give you a treat". She remembers (and if you forget she reminds you). At times, just the mention of the treat has her wagging from the tip of her tail to the tip of her nose.

What promises from God are special to you? What is it that you remember no matter what happens in your life? Which ones make you tingle with excitement? There are so many verses that deal with promises. One of my favorites is Romans 8:28, where Paul reminds us that no matter what is going on in our lives, in the end it will work out to good if we love and trust God. Or perhaps in 1 John 1:7-10, where John reminds us, that if we are God's child, his blood continually cleanses us from all sin. Also, no matter how we mess up, if we will truly repent and ask for forgiveness, he will forgive us. And of course his promise that someday we will be with him in heaven, no more vision problems, no more hearing problems, no more body aches or failure of body parts to respond (1 Corinthians 15:51-53). Everything is going to be brand new and as Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 4:17, "and so shall we ever be with the Lord."

How about spending some time thinking about the promises, it will do you an eternity of good!

INGNORING WARNING GATES

This past week at my work place they were doing some work with a forklift, loading material about 16 feet high on racks. Company policy is that you block the aisles on both sides of the place you are working. This way if there is an accident and something is knocked down, no one is in danger. I was a spotter (someone assigned to watch and make sure no customers came into those areas). I had just put up the aisle blocking gates when two men walked up, pushed the gate aside (with large yellow warning signs on them, which said: "Warning! Do not enter!" and walked down the aisle. I called them back and they were somewhat indignant as I tried to explain, but they protested that they could not see anyone working in the aisle and didn't see any danger.

It seems we are compelled to test limits, but not necessarily by "human nature". In the book of Genesis we read of Adam and Eve being given one "Don't" by God: "Don't eat of that particular fruit!" With what appears to be only a small whispered suggestion by Satan they chose to eat the fruit anyway.

In the New Testament we are given moral and ethical directives, yet people proclaim, "You can't tell me what to do!"; "I'll live however I want;" "I can choose my life style".  Listen to what the Apostle Paul proclaims: "Don't you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Don't fool yourselves. Those who indulge in sexual sin, or who worship idols, or commit adultery, or are male prostitutes, or practice homosexuality, or are thieves, or greedy people, or drunkards, or are abusive, or cheat people; none of these will inherit the Kingdom of God. Some of you were once like that. But you were cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (1 Corinthians 6:9-11)

I know that there are some who will read this and say that I am "Homophobic", "A hater", that my beliefs are not "Politically Correct". But please notice; it's not what I believe that is important, but what God's Word says. When you remove the warning gates put up by God, you "exchange the truth about God for a lie, and worship and serve created things rather than the Creator", (Romans 1:25).You may not be able to see the danger, but that doesn't mean it isn't there. You might be tempted to believe those who say, "The bible is old and outdated and doesn't apply to us anymore." But ask yourself, "Does God's word have an expiration date"? James tells us in James 1:17-18, "Whatever is good and perfect comes down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow. He chose to give birth to us by giving us His true word. And we, out of all creation, became His prized possession."

Maybe you don’t see the danger, but could it be that we or our world is listening to the whispers of Satan to just ignore the warning gates put in place by God for our care and safety? I would suggest that perhaps we and it does.

100 Pound Chicken

Did you hear about the 100 Pound Chicken researchers have developed? They crossed it genes with a pig. Not only is it much larger, but its eggs taste like bacon.

If you believed that little story, you are probably gullible, because I just made it up. I have sometimes heard folks described as being Gullible and at other times someone described as Jaded. Just so we are "On the same page" as they say, here are the meanings of the words. Gullible is defined as: "quick to believe something, possibly something that is not true". Jaded is defined as: "made dull, apathetic, or cynical by experience".

I got to thinking about this the other day when in good nature banter I heard someone say, "She's gullible, she'll believe anything you tell her." I heard that and thought, "Wow, what a complement… though they probably don't understand it that way". My wife is that way too, she tends to believe anything thing someone tells her and I love that about her. Why, because I'm not as open to that way of thinking as is she, I may be a little "Jaded", yet, being gullible is a biblical principle.

One of the passages we often hear at weddings comes from 1 Corinthians 13:7, the apostle Paul talking about what love means in our life says, "(Love) Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things." A more modern translation of that verse reads this way, "Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance." (NLT)

Just so we can be reminded of the importance of these things, take a look at the whole context of this verse. 1 Corinthians 13:1-7:

"If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn't love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.

If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God's secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn't love others, I would be nothing.

If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn't love others, I would have gained nothing.

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud

or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged.

It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out.

Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance". (NLT)

I don't know about you, but I think I need to work on that principle in my life. I need to be a little more gullible. I need to not give up on people, not lose faith in people, always hope for the best and because of love, endure when circumstances don't work out as I would like. How about you?

GOD'S PROVEDENTIAL SIGHT (GPS)

Have you ever thought about God's providence and how it works in your life? A few synonymous for provenience would be: opportune, advantageous, favorable, auspicious, propitious, heaven-sent, fortunate, timely, well timed and expedient.

I personally believe that God's providence works in the lives of Christians. How, I'm really not sure, but I have seen it happen too often, what Paul declares in Romans 8:28. That is that “all things work together for good for those who love God”.

By way of example: This past week our oldest son had to go somewhere to make application for membership to a shooting club. He had been there before, but on a whim turned on his GPS and followed its directions. On a back road he saw a car in a field, so he stopped to see if he could be of assistance. It turned out that the man had gotten a phone call and didn't have bluetooth, so stopped to take the call. The man thanked him several times for stopping to check on him.

As my son proceeded he noticed the car following him, turn for turn, right up to the club building where he was going. When they got out of their cars the man asked what my son was doing there. It turned out that the man was a club officer and took care of the enrollment process himself, cutting any red tape that might have slowed things down. Could it have been God's Providential Sight (GPS)?

Perhaps it was; when God proclaimed through Paul that all things would work out to the good, he didn't specify that they had to be “spiritual” things. Could it have been “just a coincidence”? Perhaps, but I prefer to think that God watches over his people. That's what faith is about, isn't it? Believing that God is in control of our world, trusting in him to make things work out, even when we don't understand the how, when or why? I'm not a big fan of "The Message" (a paraphrase of the Bible), but I like what it says of Hebrews 11:1. It reads, "The fundamental fact of existence is that this trust in God, this faith, is the firm foundation under everything that makes life worth living. It's our handle on what we can't see."

I realize that not everything in our lives may feel like it is being touched or guided by God. There are a lot of bad things that happen, simply because there is evil in the world. Sometimes we choose poorly or make bad decisions, sometimes in our mind we do nothing wrong at all, but bad things happen. That doesn't change the fact that God is in control of our world.

Maybe each of us should trust a little more in the real GPS, not necessarily that little box on our dash or in our phone. Maybe we should walk with a little more trust in God, or by Faith? What do you think?

Genesis or Genesis

The company I work for uses a computer program called Genesis. It operates the cash registers, inventory searches, customer data bases and much more. The problem I've had in learning this program is there doesn't appear to be any manual or even basic instruction forms. If you learn something on the program it is because someone has shown you how to use it. I've asked everyone from my manager on down and no one knows anything about any instruction manual.

I have been taking notes and writing codes and keystrokes down in a small note pad I carry with me with intension of putting it into a better form sometime. So, this afternoon things were a little slow and I started compiling my few notes into a written basic instruction file. I titled the page, "Notes on Genesis".

Here's what surprised me at the end of the day. I have a coworker who has been there a few months longer than I and we have talked about this problem. So at the end of the day I shared my notes with him and his reaction surprised me (a good surprise). He said, "I saw that title when I walked by and thought you must be working on a lesson for your church."

Isn't it a great thing when people see you doing something and assume it must be a spiritual or Godly thing! Far too often it seems that people assume the worst, they really don't think of us in terms of spirituality.

What do folks around you think about you? Do they recognize the priorities in your life? But then, maybe that's the problem, they do recognize the priorities in your life and they aren’t what you thought they were. Maybe you wouldn't be proud of what people recognize as your priorities if you knew what they thought.

That may fall into the instructions of Jesus in Matthew 5:16 where he says: "In the same way, let your light shine in front of others. Then they will see the good things you do. And they will praise your Father who is in heaven."

So what are we putting forth in our lives, Genesis or Genesis, God's priorities or your own? 

Some times you make tents…

It seems that the older you get, the more you think about the meaning of life and what is really important. Of course you don't have to be very old to start thinking about those things. I remember as a young man wondering about when I would figure things out, when would I really know what I wanted to do or be. I still wonder about that from time to time. I don't think we should ever stop stretching or growing, reaching for new challenges in our lives.

I've led an amazing life, sometimes people have trouble believing me when I tell them about all of the things God has allowed me to do in my life. Raised in the country, apprentice to my father a general contractor who taught me every aspect of the building trades. Spending some time involved with Uncle Sam and his Navy. Moving from there to an assembly line in a Chrysler factory. Then making a complete change by moving to Texas and going to school to being a preacher. Working in mission points in the U.S. and 6 years in missions in Kenya East Africa.  Seeing things and doing things that many will only see on Television.

We have lived and worked in 7 different states and have friends all over the world (literally). I have work experience and degrees that would allow me to continue in my ministry. But after 44 years in the full time ministry we moved back to Ohio and now I work at Lowe's. My co-workers recently asked me why I would do that, why I would choose to give that up to work in Lowe's.

I've thought about that question and of course it is a matter of choice. We are back here because we feel we can serve God better here right now. Are we right, did we make the right choice to “make tents” as Paul did to support his avocation? I don't know. My wife and I are trying to keep an open mind and watch for signs from God. We try our best to let Him lead us and open or close doors in our path. It all, ultimately boils down to the question, “What do you love most” or “How can you be of the best service to God at any given time as you perceive needs”? We think that right now we can be of service to the kingdom here in Ohio, doing what we are doing, making tents.

I read that Theologian Tim Keller said: “If you love anything more than God, even though you believe in God, if there is anything in your life that is more important to your own identity or significance than God, then that is a false god and it is a power in your life”. (reference unknown)

I really don't know what God plans for us in the future, but we will continue to look for open doors. Maybe he has something in mind for us that we have no idea, but then life is full of surprises isn't it.

It may be that God has some plans for you, but he can't use you until you put certain things out of your life or determine what is really and truly important to you. You see God doesn't compete for your attention; it has to be your choice. But be warned, when the door does open for you and God does speak to your heart, it usually costs you something. It takes a change on the inside and the outside. Our old self has to die and we have to be born as a new person putting God first. Paul wrote in Romans 6:3, “all we who were baptized in to Christ Jesus were baptized in to his death.” Verse 4 says we then begin “to walk in a new life”. Are you ready to do that?