On Ash Wednesday, we kicked off a new series titled One World, One King. The idea behind this series is that we’ve all at times bowed down to a king that we’ve made with our own hands. We bend our knee to our favorite political party, music artist or movie star. We worship finances, fame and even family. But the messages in this series are all about refocusing our worship on what really matters. The one true King of all is the only one deserving of our worship.
In the first message in this series we set the stage by looking into the book of Joel. This book is included in the Old Testament group of books known as the minor prophets. He wrote to the Northern Kingdom, known as Judah, about something he saw that was alarming to say the least.
An invasion of locusts was predicting an army that would soon obliterate the kingdom. But that wasn’t the end. The point of this whole book is the final moments of the world. The days we call the Day of the Lord.
Throughout this message we connect some dots to see how over every horizon of time there are gods we worship and divisions we form. But the goal and the obligation of every Christian is not to highlight the flaws in one another. Our call is to honestly, seriously and intentionally reflect on the gods we’ve formed with our own hands.
Tomorrow is a day in the church known as Ash Wednesday. It marks the beginning of the season of the church known as Lent. This season of Lent is about reflection and focus on getting ourselves ready for Easter. As followers of Jesus prepare for Easter they take time for a penitential (reflective) walk through the life of Jesus. This season is marked by confessing (admitting) sins, prayer, often fasting, and meditation.
I know that a lot of that might sound a tad too deep for many people or almost impossible for others, so we need not make this a hard and fast rule to follow. The idea behind the fasting and the prayer, the confession and the meditation is to draw us closer to Jesus. These actions serve as intentional ways in which we put off a little bit of ourselves and put on a little bit of Jesus in return.
Take for instance the fasting portion, which we’ll hit on more in a future post. The purpose of fasting in its simplest explanation is to replace a craving for one thing with a fulfillment in a relationship with Jesus. So in a sense it means we need to lose the sugar to help focus on the savior. The same can be true for the other things mentioned above. We use them as ways to more intentionally focus on who we are in this relationship with Jesus.
But what about the ashes and dust thing on Ash Wednesday? I mean that’s kind of odd if you really think about it.
What we may not realize is that Ash Wednesday and the pomp and circumstance that goes along with it didn’t really start until around the 11th century and wasn’t widely accepted among Christian traditions until the early 1970s. The Bible never talks about having ashes marked on our foreheads. There is no real rule saying that we have to do it this way. So if it’s not specifically Biblical (mandated by God) why do we do it and what does it mean?
Why ashes?
There is great symbolism in the ashes on Ash Wednesday of which many may not be aware. The ashes used to mark a cross on your forehead are made by burning the palm branches from the previous year’s Palm Sunday celebration. This means we’re taking the victorious welcome of Jesus as King and combining it with our humble approach to him as sinners.
Additionally, ashes in the Old Testament were a sign of humility and mourning. So when we receive the ashes on our heads formed in the shape of a cross, we’re essentially saying that we humble ourselves before the one is King of kings. Since Ash Wednesday marks the start of Lent, they also serve as a mark that we are mourning what this seasons brings – namely the suffering and death of Jesus.
The words spoken on Ash Wednesday are another reminder of why we do them. You are dust and to dust you shall return. This connects the ashes of victory with the dust of our beginnings. Where we have erred from God and wondered from His ways, the ashes are our humble journey back. We are reminded of our simple beginnings. Dust. Dirt clods formed in the hands of God. Breathed into with the very breath of the Father. The ashes connect us with Adam who is the symbol of our sinfulness. The cross connects us with the new man, Jesus who is the symbol of our forgiveness.
In a year that has been wrought with so much upheaval and turmoil and confusion, the normal Ash Wednesday might not be possible. So do we have to have ashes on Ash Wednesday? Simple answer is no. We don’t need ashes or fasting or any of the outward signs to connect us to the meaning and intent and purpose of this season as Christians. Whether you receive ashes or not this year, humble your heart and spirit. Remember your beginning as part of creation formed in the hands of the creator. Ponder the death and resurrection of Christ that promises bring new beginning to the old ways within us.
Whether you got ashes or you didn’t, if it wasn’t about Jesus you just got dirty.
The process of a caterpillar changing to a butterfly is pretty fantastic. We call that process a metamorphosis. It’s the undoing of one thing and the starting of a brand new thing. Well this word is actually used in the bible a few times. The most notable for many is when it is used of Jesus at the time called the transfiguration. But what we call transfiguration is really the word metamorphosis.
This metamorphosis happened at a time when his closest followers didn’t really understand who he was. They had seen him do some cool things. They were there when he was able to manipulate the physical world and walk on water. They even watched sick people completely healed. But they really didn’t get who he was or why he was there.
So he took these close followers with him up a high mountain and changed, transformed – metamorphosed in front of them. It’s like the cracking open of an egg and what’s inside that was hidden behind the shell is exposed. Behind the human exterior of Jesus’ body and clothing, buried inside him was the real and complete presence of God. At the transfiguration, it’s like Jesus’ human shell was cracked open and the Godness burst out of him for a small moment in time.
Take a listen to the following to see how this happened and better yet why it’s important to us today.
So there are certainly a few jokes we could throw around with this one but I’ll leave that up to another time and place. The point of this post is to take an unfortunate experience and see what might the learning moment be in a bad time such as imprisonment.
The audio clip below is from a message on the imprisonment of Peter in the book of Acts. While it would be great if you’d read Acts 12 and listen to the below podcast, I have the highlights below. There are three main principles we’ll cover.
The promises of the past give us peace in the present.
This first principle is a reminder that not all things that are bad in the moment really are all that bad when we step back and reevaluate. Peter is in prison after watching a friend an colleague killed in public. Kind of awful I know! But he’s in prison and the same thing is threatened of him. Instead of freaking out though, he remembers a promise Jesus gave him. Jesus told him that he would die as an old man and since he wasn’t old this moment was not going to be his end. So instead of freaking out, he slept!
God will do God’s work, but you have to do yours.
The second principle is found when Peter is told to get dressed and tie his shoes. This seems pretty unimportant at first glance, but there’s something powerful here. The angel will free Peter from the chains and from the prison but he won’t tie his shoes. Jesus will do all the work to save us and deliver us from evil and shower us with grace but he won’t believe for us. He still wants us to serve our neighbors. He still has stuff for us to do now that he’s done his work.
Pray expecting God’s answer.
This one is a pet peeve of mine but so often I hear so many prayers said as if we aren’t expecting God to answer them. I love the thy will be done section of the Lord’s Prayer to be sure! It reminds us that not all things happen the way we want. But it seems we like to hide behind this part of the prayer. We start our prayers bold and knowing exactly what we want then get to this part of the prayer and the wheels fall off. We use this phrase to erase our prayers altogether. Peter gets out of prison, exactly what his friends were praying would happen. Then he finds his friends and they didn’t even believe it was possible for Peter to be released! So why were they praying if they didn’t think God would answer?!
The long and short is we can learn from every situation in life, even the most challenging like wrongfully put in prison or insignificant like simply tying our shoes. God has a plan and that plan will happen. We just need to move forward in the faith of His past promises and in hopes of his future presence.
When you’re good at something, it’s a safe bet to just sit on that talent and do as much as you can that rests in your sweet spot. But what happens when you need to step out of that sweet spot and into a little less familiar or comfortable territory? How adaptable are you?
Learning new skills and doing new things is an important part of life and the maturity process. But often it seems the more we know the more we realize we really don’t know.
One of the challenges in life is determining how best to relate to people of different cultural, economic and traditional backgrounds effectively. We need to be willing and able to be flexible and adapt to different scenarios in life in an effort to better reach the people in our circle of influence. To do this we need to take a few key steps to ensure we’re doing this right.
First, we need to know who we are and what we believe. The better foundation you have in life, the more well informed your decisions will be. Having good intentions is one thing. But if our good intentions and adaptability aren’t built on a strong foundation of truth, then we’ll quickly go the wrong direction. So know who you are and what you believe.
The second part is to know who we’re trying to reach. I don’t mean to just know their name, although that’s important for sure! But we need to know who they are, what makes them tick, what are their passions, interests and desires. Don’t assume that just because we know their name we know what they’re thinking or what they want in life. The better we know the person and the stronger the relationship between us, the more we’ll know what they need not just what we think they want.
Finally, we need to ask ourselves what part of me needs to be put aside for the sake of this relationship growing in Christ. The idea is what personal ambition, liberty, desire do I need to sacrifice to better serve this person and help them encounter the love of Christ more fully.
I hope this short summary helps you better serve those around you. For more information on adaptability and becoming better suited to reach people effectively, check out this message.
There is a method of arguing known by its latin name ad-hominem. I know it’s not a word we say all the time but we probably use this method of arguing and don’t even know it. The idea behind an ad-hominem is that you can’t win an argument on the basis of the content of the argument so you start slandering your opponent. You move from content discussion to character attacks.
When we are backed into a corner and realize our argument really doesn’t hold water, sometimes it’s tempting to stoop to attacking someone’s character instead. Character attacks are just not cool. Actually a character attack demonstrates how weak our argument really is.
The story of Stephen in the Bible is one that starts with an argument based on content, but it’s soon realized that Stephen’s content is rock solid. Then the attack moves to his character. They make up things about him just to make others think poorly of Stephen. But again he doesn’t budge. Finally, when nothing else works they resort to murderous threats and eventually killing him.
We may not go around stoning people, at least we better not! But we often find ourselves easily backing ourselves into a character attack scenario. When we don’t get our way, we lash out at our opposition. When we don’t hear what we want to hear, we attack the person instead of arguing the merits of our position. When our personal attacks fail to get through, all too often we just drop the person from our lives, delete them from social media, block their number on our phones, act as if they no longer exist.
There must be a better way. Check out last night’s message to see what that better way might be.
Birthdays are fun aren’t they? Well, when we’re young and don’t mind another year of experience behind us they’re good. The party. The celebration. The big to do everyone makes of us. All of it is pretty fantastic! So happy birthday! Ok so maybe it’s not your birthday but maybe it’s more a celebration of your birthday than you realize? Hear me out here.
The idea of celebrating is important. If we don’t celebrate we’ll forget where we’ve been and what we’re about. Last night I spoke about the matter of celebrating the start of something massive. It was scary at first but when it really got going it meant so many people’s lives were changed for the better!
Have you ever been blocked on someone’s social media or cell phone? A while back an acquaintance and I were chatting by text message and we weren’t exactly seeing things eye to eye. He was in a different place than I was, so I tried to end that part of our conversation and change the topic. Before I could even type a message about changing the conversation, he said that’s it, “I’m blocking your number. I don’t want to talk to you anymore.”
In this day and age, it’s super easy to not only socially distance from someone but actually socially delete someone! When someone says something that doesn’t line up with our ideas, values, thoughts, or worldview – we can all too easily just remove them from our lives as if they never existed. We block their phone number, unfriend them on Facebook, hide them on other social platforms. For all intents and purposes they no longer exist.
While social media blocking someone won’t get rid of them completely it’s a form of what Saul was doing in his day. In our lesson on Sunday, we met up with Saul. He was on his way to go “block some people” in his own way. He wanted to change their worldview or eliminate them.
Take a listen to the message below as we discuss the implications of Saul’s actions and a better way to handle the challenges of different opinions.
There are times in all of our lives when we wonder Where did God go! Generally these moments are filled with anxiety, fear and worry. When things don’t go our way, we jump to blaming some higher power for disrupting the flow of our lives. When calamity strikes and panic sets in, we readily jump to the finger wagging and fist pumping toward God. So when bad things happen in our lives, where is God anyway?
This week we take a deeper look into Mark 13. This chapter of the Bible kind of address this where’s God question without actually asking the question. I’d encourage you to read the first portion of Mark 13 then take a listen. If you can’t listen now or that’s just not your thing, then keep reading the next couple of paragraphs.
So where’s God when bad stuff happens? The long and short of it is, this question comes from a misunderstanding of who God is to begin with. God is not some cosmic slot machine. He’s not some ridiculous magic genie who grants us our three wishes. He’s someone who wants to have a relationship with us. He wants to be with us in the good times and in the bad times.
If you’re only looking to blame God when bad stuff happens but not celebrate with him in the good things, then perhaps you have a misinformed view of who God is. If you want to find God in the bad things, then try to see him in the good ones first.
We’re about three weeks into a new year and many of you have kept up with your New Year’s Resolutions. Some of you will be the skinnier you. Others will be the more athletic you. Some will be a braver you or a richer you or a more intentional bible reading version of you or just about anything that enhances who you are. How’s that going?
I personally hate New Year’s Resolutions. I can’t stand them. I don’t make them because I know that sometime during the year I’ll grow so comfortable in the way things are going that I’ll forget about them. Then when I actually remember I’ll feel like a failure. But every year I do take time to become more intentional. I become more intentional in the person I am and the things I do.
When we lose our sense of intentionality we end up going through the motions. We just do what we do because it’s what we’ve always done. How terrible to go through life on autopilot!
This week I want to share with you about a man named Jonah. He pretty much was the perfect illustration of a man on autopilot. He was a prophet who’s job was to tell people about God and encourage them to change their ways. The short version of the story he got caught on autopilot and then flat rebelled against what he was supposed to do. He ended up getting swallowed by a whale then spit out on shore.
Lest you think this whole thing is a little too fishy to believe there was a man named James Bartley who was reportedly swallowed by a sperm whale back in the late 1800s. His story is pretty incredible actually.
But the moral here in the book of Jonah is that whether we get stuck on autopilot or flat out rebel against God, he will bring us back. So take some time today to think about the word intentional. Don’t let your life be a tale of sleep walking through life. Make people look at your life and think that you too lived a bit of a whale of a tale kind of life!
