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Pray This Prayer…

21 Aug

2 Thessalonians chapter 1 has a prayer that I have been praying off and on for over 2 decades:

To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power, so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Thessalonians 1:11-12 (ESV)

It’s a prayer for four big things:

  1. Though we are saved by His grace and that salvation is guaranteed by His Spirit, the idea that we will live lives that honor Him…is not guaranteed. So Paul prays that we would live lives worthy of our salvation. In other words, either way, we are children of our heavenly Father, but we want to live as if we are His offspring; we don’t want to dishonor Him. We are ambassadors for Him – we pray to represent Him well. MAY I LIVE WORTHY OF YOU, LORD!
  2. All the things you are hoping to do for Him – whatever you are dreaming that He would use you for – pray that He by His incredible power would bring these things about. FULFILL MY DESIRE TO DO SOMETHING GREAT FOR YOU, FATHER!
  3. And all this is for His glory. In other words, the reason we pray that He would fulfill our desires is so that Jesus would be glorified. GLORIFY JESUS THROUGH ME!
  4. And the end result is wonderful too – that we would be glorified in Him – and all this is by His grace. AND I LOOK FORWARD TO THE DAY IN WHICH I TOO WILL BE GLORIFIED…IN HIM, BECAUSE OF YOUR GRACE!
It’s one of many prayers of the Apostle Paul, and also one of the best ways to learn to pray for what really matters in life.

For Monday, August 24th: 2 Thessalonians 2

 

 
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Posted by on August 21, 2015 in Uncategorized

 

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Why I Love a Good Cemetery

04 Aug

cemetery tombstoneI’ve been a fan of cemeteries for a long time; they keep you grounded.

But seriously, Ladies and Gentlemen, they do. After all, unless our Master returns (Come, Lord Jesus), we are all headed to a cemetery for long term storage. So they do have a way of keeping you…if not grounded, then humble. You see, when pride sneaks in, cemeteries remind me that in 100+ years, no one will remember me. I can imagine my genealogy-oriented descendent: “Oh, yeah, I had a great, great grandpa, Roger Knowlton, who was in the helping professions, I think. Maybe he was a social worker?”

(By the way, tell me the name of your great, great grandpa…yeah, I thought so.)

And one more thing about cemeteries – I love to walk amidst them and read the tombstones. I like to try to discern if the dearly departed was a believer and therefore, I trust, a future friend. Of course, with the limited data of a grave marker, such discernment is admittedly a tricky proposition, but some folks have made it easier than others. Take one of my favorites: many years ago, I was walking through the cemetery in Champaign, Illinois (where I received my Business degree at the University of Illinois) and I discovered my life verse:

“Christus ist mein leben, sterben ist mein gewinn.” Philippians 1:21 (Martin Luther’s translation), translated, of course, “For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” (ESV)

I like the starkness of the German translated literally into English: CHRIST IS MY LIFE. DEATH IS MY PROFIT.

The logic behind this verse is impeccable. First, Christ is my life, and hearing this beautiful prose, every part of me wants to scream out – “Yes, yes, by God’s grace, yes He is!” And then, in the second half of verse 21, Paul uses financial terms: Gain and forfeit, Profit and loss.

You see, the majority of people around us consider death to be a loss, and they are absolutely right. For those who do not live for Christ, dying will mean the loss of everything, the loss of family, the loss of friends, the loss of peace and pleasure and all joy. Like a car crashing headlong full-speed into a semi, life itself will be a TOTAL LOSS.

But Christians also sometimes think of death as a loss, and that’s a mistake. Of course, in a very real sense, we don’t want to die. No one wants to say goodbye to dear loved ones. No one wants to go through the pain of disease or the wasting away of the body during aging. But the lesson of Philippians 1:21 is that beyond these very hard things, death for the believer…will be gain. Not debit, but credit. Not loss, but profit, and gain…great, great gain.

It’s enough to make you want to wander around cemeteries.

 

For tomorrow, Wednesday, August 5th: Philippians 2

 
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Posted by on August 4, 2015 in Uncategorized

 

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A Pastor and a Rabbi Preach a Sermon…

25 Jun

Imagine you were traveling across the country, and found yourself scanning radio stations. Now suppose you heard an engaging preacher and stopped to listen – here’s my question: how would you be able to tell if it was a Christian preacher or a Jewish Rabbi? (To make this more interesting, let’s just say that in this scenario, Jewish folks are a bigger presence in our country than they actually are, and that as many Rabbis are on the radio as Pastors. So you’ve got a 50-50 shot here.)

The message from this mystery expositor, of course, is from the Old Testament. The New Testament would be a dead giveaway. So…would you be able to tell?

And by the way, no fair listening till the end when the Christian closes in prayer, and says, “In Jesus’ name, Amen.” I’m talking about actual content here.

The truth is that in such a situation, whether listening to a sermon from Exodus or Ezekiel, a lot of times, most of us (myself included) wouldn’t be able to tell, and that’s a bad thing – not for us, mind you – but for the engaging Christian Pastor who’s preaching and who sounds just like the engaging Rabbi. So a message on murder or adultery from the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20 would sound the same from either communicator: “It’s bad. Very bad. Be sure you don’t do it.” Only from a good communicator, much more clever.

As a pastor, I’ve made the “sounds just like a Rabbi” mistake too many times. It’s moralism, and it’s pretty easy to do.  But consider this – whenever the Apostle Paul preached, he always had the same message, and that message…was Christ:

To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. Ephesians 3:8 (ESV)

Here was a man with only the Old Testament to work with and yet, when he preached, he always proclaimed Christ. Always.

  • Did they hand him the scroll of Exodus in the Synagogue? Jesus was the Passover lamb.
  • The scroll of Isaiah? That’s an easy one – Christ was the Suffering Servant.
  • 1 Samuel and David and Goliath? The message from Paul would not have been “Try to trust God more like David did, and you’ll slay your giants too,” but, “Isn’t it great that we too have a Champion who slayed the giants of sin and death for us, so we can rush forward in victory?”

I don’t know about you, but I’ve heard those messages on David and Goliath, and I’ve tried that “Trust God and try harder plan” against the giants in my life, and yet I’ve still got one or two (or more) giants greeting me every day. So you see, the first message on “being a better trust-er” only puts me under the condemnation pile, but the second one…fills me with hope. The real giants have fallen because HE was perfect in HIS trust.

So, whether Paul’s text was from the Prophets or Proverbs – the Apostle talked about Jesus. Because ultimately, if the message is not about Christ, it is only a warmed up version of “try harder.” And to be sure, the “try harder” message is often preached very cleverly and sometimes with great insight and humor, but it’s still the law, and such messages usually produce about as much change as a New Year’s resolution.

Paul, however, had a better plan, the only plan for the Christian preacher:

For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. 1 Corinthians 2:2 (ESV)

 

For tomorrow, Friday, June 26th: Ephesians 4

 
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Posted by on June 25, 2015 in Uncategorized

 

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What if the Apostle Paul Had Gotten Proud?

11 Jun

It would have been bad, that’s what.

Proud people are pretty unusable by God, and so Paul would have been put on the shelf. And maybe we would have missed half of the New Testament, you know the part that Paul wrote (Just imagine the Bible without Romans). And maybe the gospel wouldn’t have gone to Asia. And maybe Peter wouldn’t have gotten that rebuke from Paul that kept The Rock on the right path (Galatians 2:11).

So God kept Paul from pride, and therefore kept him usable, and take note of how the Lord did it…

So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited.  2 Corinthians 12:7 (ESV)

Do you see what the Lord needed to do to keep His apostle humble and therefore usable? He had to give him pain.

Now, we don’t know what the pain was – most commentators think it was something physical (because of the word “flesh” – like an eye problem or blindness, for instance), but in the end it doesn’t matter. We just know there was pain…pain enough to make him cry out to the Lord to remove it. But God, in His goodness, refused.

It’s a good reminder, because I know what I do every time pain enters my life – I do what every other believer in all the world does – I ask my Heavenly Father to remove it…and fast.  And sometimes, praise His name, He does.

And sometimes, praise Him again…He doesn’t….because thankfully, He wants to use me too.

For Friday, June 12th: 2 Corinthians 13

 

 
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Posted by on June 11, 2015 in Uncategorized

 

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Where are the Commands for Personal Evangelism?

02 Jun

Some people are under the impression that the Bible does not tell us to do personal evangelism. Have you ever considered it? It’s interesting – try to think of a biblical command that says something like this: “Be sure to tell your family and your co-workers and your neighbors about Christ,” and you’ll get the idea. You don’t see as much urging in this area as you might otherwise think.

Of course, there’s Peter’s command to be ready to give an answer for the hope that is in you (1 Peter 3:15). And more importantly, there is the Great Commission in Matthew 28. Actually, I think those few verses that close out the end of the first book in the New Testament are enough. Go make disciples and teach others to do the same. From these verses (not to mention the counterparts in the other gospels and Acts), we have enough direction to start talking until Jesus returns.

But generally the idea of talking to your co-workers and friends is simply assumed in the New Testament. But, that said, it is assumed powerfully.

Powerfully.

Take Paul’s word to the Corinthians in chapter 5 of his second letter. He begins by telling us that he doesn’t see people like he used to see them:

From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. 2 Corinthians 5:16 (ESV)

When Paul was still Saul and only a Jewish religious leader, he thought of people as very ordinary, just as he considered that rabble-rouser from Nazareth: Jesus was just a guy; nothing more. But now, just as Paul had come to know the Carpenter as God in the flesh, so the Apostle came to realize that there was more to all people than met the eye. Men and women, boys and girls, he now knew, were truly spiritual beings…and eternal.

And therefore, since God had made a way of reconciliation through Jesus, Paul took the task of evangelism with dead earnestness:

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 2 Corinthians 5:20 (ESV)

Paul said, “Eternity is forever. Hell is real. And God has made a way, so we implore. We beg. Be reconciled to God.”

And although the Apostle does not explicitly say that all Christians should take such an approach, surely we should. He had already urged his followers in Corinth to follow him as he followed Christ (1 Corinthians 11:1), and evangelism was Paul’s life.  And we know why – for there are no ordinary people, as C.S. Lewis once said so wonderfully:

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all of our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations – these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit – immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.”

-C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

For Wednesday, June 3rd: 2 Corinthians 6

 
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Posted by on June 2, 2015 in Uncategorized

 

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How We Are Outwitted By Satan

28 May

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We are often confused about the main way the enemy of our souls attacks us.

Now I’m sure that he comes against us in many different ways, all of which I myself do not know; but I think we too often imagine Exorcist-like warfare with crosses held high and twisting heads as in the movie. And while I’ve never seen “The Exorcist” and thus don’t know the music, I think we imagine our warfare with Satan to be set to music like the “Psycho” soundtrack, the now well-known shrieking sound of mainstream slasher movies.

However…in reality, his efforts against us need no such melodramatic tones. Instead, apparently, he just quietly whispers unforgiving thoughts in our ears, and therefore keeps us from reconciling with one another. How subtle and simple and…incredibly destructive.

Paul knew his plans, and so he wrote to the church at Corinth, apparently about the man who had led a revolt against the Apostle himself:

So you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. So I beg you to reaffirm your love for him. For this is why I wrote, that I might test you and know whether you are obedient in everything. Anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. Indeed, what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence of Christ, so that we would not be outwitted by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his designs. 2 Corinthians 2:7-11 (ESV)

Do you understand what God is saying through the Apostle? It’s this: Be sure to forgive, so you will not be outwitted by Satan.

You see, our enemy needs no loud pulsing music, no twisting heads or bloody knives, no Ouija boards or tarot cards. All he needs is a thought…or two: “She’s acting so nice to you now, but think about how she hurt you.” “Don’t forget what he said.” “I know it happened 10 years ago, but you should never forget the wrongs committed against you.”

And if you buy it, if you listen to him, the enemy will have a foothold in your life to plant a root of bitterness by which you yourself and many others will be defiled (Hebrews 12:15).

I know that some reading this will have encountered horrible injustices in their lives, wrongs committed against them that I can really not imagine. So I do not say forgiveness will be easy. In fact, it is one of the hardest things we ever do, because the only way we can truly grant mercy to someone who has hurt us is to in a sense, pay for their wrongs on our own. If you borrow my car and wreck it, either I make you pay for repairs or I pay myself, but true forgiveness always comes at a cost. Anyone looking at the cross knows that.

Thus, Calvary becomes the source of our forgiveness and the source of our strength to fight against the enemy’s designs. For the One Who said of His crucifiers, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34), also forgave the likes of us sinners who have trusted in Him.

He only asks of us that we extend the same costly forgiveness to others, and when we do…we crush the plans of the enemy.

For Friday, May 29th: 2 Corinthians 3

 
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Posted by on May 28, 2015 in Uncategorized

 

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