The Declaration of the Downcast

John Stumbo, whom Pastor Dave referred to in the opening words of Sunday’s sermon, pastored a large Alliance church in Oregon before contracting a devastating disease that nearly killed him. Partially recovered, John still cannot swallow and has numerous other limitations, but can drive and work part-time in an associate position at his church.

On his blog, John recently posted his declaration of faith, and encouraged his readers to use it to assert their own faith. “Remember,” he wrote, “this isn't a prayer, but a declaration of faith. Speak it boldly.” Maybe you’ll even want to use it for awhile in your daily devotional time, or start each day by proclaiming it to the Lord:

DECLARATION OF FAITH

In Him we live and move and have our being.

Christ is here. He is with us.
Christ is present. He is among us.

I believe we will be recipients of His grace every day we live. With David I believe that goodness and mercy will follow us all the days of our lives. With Paul I rejoice that nothing can separate us from God's love. With Mary, I accept His divine plan for our lives and say, "I am the Lord's servant. May it be to me as you have said."

Christ is here. He is with me.
Christ is present. He is surrounding me.

I believe I will be a recipient of His grace this very day. I don't know if today will bring the grace of physical healing or the grace to have the courage and strength to thrive in my brokenness. But I celebrate that both are acts of grace, both are from His good hand.

Christ is here. He is with us.
Christ is present. He is among us.

I believe that, as we have eyes to see them, we will encounter evidences of His grace today. He has no old mercies. They are ever new. He is never thwarted by evil, but can always bring good out of the worst situations if we let Him. He is the God who can redeem anything.

Christ is here. He is with me.
Christ is present. He is encompassing me.

I believe that His grace will invade my world as I walk it today. I know that as long as I live in this fallen world, I will face hardship. But I also know that I can be of good cheer--I can live with joyful courage--because the One who has overcome the world goes before me.

Christ is here. He is with me.
Christ is present. He envelopes me.

I believe that His grace will be sufficient through all of life. Even when my path takes me to the valley of death, I will have no reason to fear for He is with me. With that being settled, I can more fully embrace all he has for me this day, for I am alive. I am alive in Him.

Indeed, it is in Him that we live and move and have our being.




(For further reflection, here are the Scriptures that are directly or indirectly referenced in the above: Acts 17:28, Matthew 28:20, Hebrews 13:5-6, Psalm 23:6, Romans 8:39, Luke 1:38, Genesis 50:20, John 16:33, Psalm 23:4)

Grateful to be on this journey with you,
John

A Carrot in My Ear

When my sisters and I were young, we periodically dredged up that old joke:

“You’ve got a carrot in your ear!”

“What?”

(Louder) “You’ve got a carrot in your ear!”

“What?”

YOU’VE GOT A CARROT IN YOUR EAR!!

“I can’t hear you; I’ve got a carrot in my ear.”

If you fail to see the humor, what can I say – we loved it, which does not mean it was necessarily funny. But the joke does have something to say about our spiritual sense of hearing. We learned Sunday that hearing is the first sense to return when one is regaining consciousness, and the last to leave when one is fading out. And many of us agree that we long to be more conscious of God, but for some reason we just aren’t hearing from Him.

We lament His silence. We yearn for His voice. We remember how thrilling it was the last time He actually said something to us. We pray for Him to speak again. We listen, but hear only silence.

It’s all those carrots in our ears. Carrots like...

1. Willfulness. We want to hear some kind of guidance from the Spirit, but we’re gonna weigh what He says before committing 100%.
2. Doubt. Although we ask, we’re not sure we can count on an answer. (“That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord” James 1:7 NIV).
3. Busyness. We race around like chickens with our heads cut off, then freeze for five seconds to listen for God’s voice. Nothing yet? Then it’s off to the races again.
4. Fear. We desperately need to hear from God, but we’re petrified of what He might say. What if it’s too hard? What if it’s precisely those words we dread to hear? Might hearing be worse than this silence?
5. Noise. The voice of the Spirit is a gentle whisper. (after all, how many times do we read, “and God shouted…”?) I hope I’m not stealing from next Sunday’s sermon when I say that only after the wind, earthquake and fire had taken a back seat did Elijah hear the still, small voice of the Lord. Any commotion going on in our lives? It’s highly likely we’ll need to steal away to a quiet place where whispers can be heard.

Willfulness. Doubt. Busyness. Fear. Noise. We’d love to hear from God… but we’ve got these carrots in our ears…

Love's Perfect Present Tense

“God’s love is always in the perfect present tense.” That sentence from Sunday’s sermon deserves a resounding, Yes! It most certainly is! And just what would that mean, if you let Webster’s Dictionary, rather than an English grammar teacher, define it?

Perfect! God’s love for you and me is complete in all aspects, without defect or omission, flawless, faultless, and without reserve or qualification. It is utter, pure, sheer, and absolute perfection. It always understands you and me, always decides the right thing, always takes the right course of action. God’s love could never be improved upon and never has its ups and downs. It’s always perfect.

Present! God’s love is not just a vague, warm cosmic feeling; His love is a state that is now existing, an action that is right now in progress, an attention that is fully fixed on each of us this very second. And when the next second comes…next year… next decade… on into the eons of eternity, His love will be ever-present and attentive and active in our lives.

Tense! The root meaning of tense comes from the Latin “to stretch.” God’s love stretches from eternity past to reach into our present and continue on into our future. He planned before creation to rescue us. After man sinned, He kept reaching and reaching into our world – first through the Law and the prophets, then through His Son and His sacrifice. God continues to reach into our world through His Word and through His Holy Spirit. He’s continually stretching out to us, striving to communicate His love and capture ours. He’s wrapping His arms tightly around us. He’s pulling us close to Himself, holding us forever in His intense love.

“How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called His kids!” That we should be loved by Him… in the perfect present tense.

McWorship

“Hello and welcome to McWorship… can I take your order?”

“Ah, yes, I’d like the full meal deal. One sanctuary full of energy and enthusiasm (someone else’s), stuffed with the works – praise band, worship leader, worship team, choir… Layer on a rousing sermon, and throw in some hi-tech touches. And it’s been a hard week, so supersize the whole thing. I’ll eat that right here… And to go, I’d like a McWrap of peace with a hi-carb feeling…”

McWorship. Entering the sanctuary with one thing in mind – getting what we want, conveniently and instantly.

That’s not you? Surely we’re all guilty to some degree. God’s peace is so enjoyable, His music is so inspiring, His Word is so challenging, that it’s tempting to get our eyes off God and focus on those feelings. Soon we’re pulling into the FAC driveway, anticipating not a meeting with Him, but an infusion of good feelings. They’re what we’re hungry for, why we bite eagerly into our Sunday morning McWorship.

We’ve lowered our sights. Once we focus on the feelings, our attention turns inward. Are they serving what I need? Am I being satisfied? Will I leave here with a full spirit – gotten at a discount price?

Good grief, we would never say those things in so many words. But if our “meal” isn’t delivered as ordered, aren’t we a little disgruntled? Searching for someone to blame? Who didn’t flip the burger fast enough to fill our little order? Who withheld our inspiring word from the Lord?

We need to take a good long look at ourselves. For worship is an action verb – our action, not God’s or the pastor’s or anybody else’s. It’s the giving of our attention and intense love and admiration and adoration to God alone. Never fear, the feelings will follow in God’s plan. He is “the giving God” (James 1:5 Amp), and He will not be outgiven by His children.

Such worship is in order 24/7, not just Sunday mornings. Our body is the temple of the Lord. We are always in the sanctuary.

The question is, what are we doing in there? Ordering McWorship? Or giving ourselves to the Creator of the universe and Redeemer of our souls, who is forever to be praised….

Being a Faithful Witness

Water and meat. A hidden Elijah was privately nurtured by God from a brook running through the Kerith Ravine, and from bread and meat delivered by the raven’s talons. These were life-sustaining provisions, absolutely necessary to Elijah’s survival.

Water and meat. A public Elijah called for water, and then more and more, to be poured on the altar of God. He cut the bull into pieces and laid the meat on the altar. Then he called for fire, and those elements of water and meat were consumed by God’s answer to the challenge on Mt. Carmel. The result? Four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal lay dead, and the people of Israel lay prostrate, crying, “The Lord, He is God! The Lord, He is God!”

And us?

Water. “Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him. By this he meant the Spirit” (Jn. 7:38-39 NIV).

And meat. “Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work” (Jn. 4:34). Our water and meat: the Spirit and the will of the Father.

Do we each have a public ministry for Christ? All who belong to Him can. It may be counseling or singing or interceding in prayer or teaching or preaching or sending cards of encouragement, but He has some way that we can minister to others. “For you have been chosen by God himself – you are priests of the King… so that you may show to others how God called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Pet. 2:9 LB).

But notice… the provision begins privately. No private provision, and Elijah wouldn’t have been around when it came time for public ministry. He’d have shriveled up at the bottom of the Kerith Ravine first! Likewise in our lives, the Spirit flows from within, and the will of the Father has to be internalized, made our own. Then they will pour through us and overflow from us into public ministry. Then, instead of offering others our best human effort, through us will pour divine provision for their drought and famine.

So here’s a question to ask ourselves as we consider Sunday’s sermon: “What am I offering when I reach out to others? The fruit of my own efforts, maybe words and work given legalistically to prove my worth to God and others? Or is the Holy Spirit pouring through me, is the will of the Father simply taking on hands and feet as I reach out to others, nurturing them with the elements God has already given me?

It’s so easy to get off-balance, to give all our time and energy into our public ministries… but it starts within. If we stay open to the Source, and allow the Spirit to pour through us, and feed on the will of the Father, we may not get the dramatics that took place on Mt. Carmel. But we will surely will see the forces of evil (discouragement, doubt, despair) defeated in the lives of those we minister to, and we will hear from lips that used to worship the idols of sin and self, “The Lord, He is God! The Lord, He is God!”

Deliverance

“Deliverance.. sometimes it’s instantaneous; sometimes it’s gradual,” we heard Sunday.

Why, I wonder? Why isn’t it always instantaneous? Is it lack of faith, is it because of disobedience, is it because we didn’t pray hard enough and long enough? Why is deliverance from a besetting sin or inner stronghold frequently so long in coming? Why does it take so long to unravel the tangles in relationships and find the solutions for head-scratching dilemmas? Maybe it’s because…

 God wants us to see, through repeated failures, that there is no other Source of deliverance. We never would have pulled it off!
 God wants to build a firm foundation of faith in Him as we walk through this problem together.
 He wants to us to experience a new depth of fellowship with Him as we pour out our hearts to Him over and over for this need.
 God wants to change what we’re asking for and why we’re asking for it, so that we truly seek His will instead of our own.
 He wants to develop our patient perseverance. There is a spiritual fitness gained over the long haul that cannot come to us in the momentary miracle.
 He wants us to realize He is not a gratification machine; He is God, a Person with His own feelings and will and His own plan. Sometimes that plan is so far beyond our comprehension that He just asks us to trust the mystery.
 He wants us to involve each other in praying for our need… thus binding the body of Christ more closely together.
 He wants to involve others of His children in providing the answer as they use their gifts for edifying the church – Christian counselors, caregivers, those with the gift of helps in its various forms, etc.

Lots of reasons why deliverance from any bondage or trial can take time. It’s true not only in our personal lives, but in the life of our church. What good can come of an extended, careful search for our new pastor?

 It’s God’s safeguard against murmuring and second-guessing down the road
 It’s a time to remember that Jesus is the real Shepherd of the church, and the One we are following.
 It can bind us together more closely as we seek His will together.
 It calls us as a church to carefully consider our fears and our goals and our priorities.
 It calls us to step up to the plate and fill new roles.
 It gives God opportunity to conform us to the mystery of His will, His good and perfect will.

Deliverance is sometimes immediate; more often it’s a season. We’re in a season of deliverance right now at FAC. There’s a reason for this season - probably a lot of reasons, in fact. Let’s not miss one of them.

The Way, the Truth, the Life

Relativism. Absolutes. Whew! Those are heady philosophical terms that few of us spend much time pondering out-of-sanctuary. We’re content to leave such contemplations to those who study within book-lined walls or in classrooms far removed from the assembly-line worker, the waitress, the quality-control engineer, the harried mom with three preschoolers.

And that’s okay. We don’t need to crack a philosophy book or sit in on a university lecture to get a handle on Truth. There’s really nothing high-brow or exclusive or hard-to-grasp about Life. Nothing it takes an egghead to understand about the Way to God (in fact, they often struggle harder).

Because the Truth, as we heard Sunday, is a Person who sat thirsty and hungry beside a well, and invited a Samaritan woman to end her long search for meaning. The Life looked up at a little man perched in the branches of a sycamore tree, and invited Himself home for dinner – and that day salvation came to that house. The Way stood in the shadows with a seeking Pharisee, and invited him into the process of new birth. The Way, the Truth and the Life is a Person – Jesus Christ. Have Him, and you have assurance of what is real and right, where you’re going, and how to get there.

Pastor Phillips mentioned Sunday “the wear and tear of relativism.” Aptly put. How easy it is for Christ-followers to slip into the mindset of the world, to compromise, to rationalize Truth. We hate to appear intolerable and we worry about coming off harsh and turning people away. Besides, we aren’t smart enough to refute our neighbor’s arguments. Where is the chapter and verse to support our stand? What respected authority can we quote to convince the skeptics?

Not to worry. Our heritage as Christian & Missionary Alliance people is “Jesus Only” - the watchword of founder A. B. Simpson’s life. Still today, as the choir sang Sunday, “We preach Christ.” Not merely conservative ideals or a particular brand of theology or denominationalism, but Jesus. A Person, not a theory. Flesh-and-blood, not words on a page or rules in a book. A relationship with Him, not intellectual enlightenment.

Do the same in your life this week. Preach Christ. Jesus only. Jesus, the Way, the Truth, the Life. Walk the Way He leads; live the Truth He teaches; enjoy the Life He gives. It will be, for you, a simple and freeing thing. And it may be, for someone you meet, a woman-at-the-well experience.