World View - Open or Closed?

What matters about our world view -- how we see the world -- is whether we base our view on either an open or a closed universe.

When we look around us at the visible universe -- the basic question we must deal with is: is this all there is?

If it is, we believe in a closed universe.

This is the dominating view of our culture today.

What we see is all there is.

On the other hand, when we look at the universe of things and ideas, and acknowledge that there is something more -- a driving creative force beyond what we can see and know -- then we have an open world view of the universe.

That is the Bible's view.

Apart from the Christian community, our culture is increasingly moving toward a closed-universe view.

In practical daily living, that means everything is material and explainable.

For Trekkies, for example, that is the meaning of Star Trek: the Motion Picture.

A power is coming toward the earth and beings from earth are going out to intercept it.

The "thing" expresses its mission as a quest "for its creator."

We expect its creator to be God.

But when the adventurers get down to finding out what it really is, they find that it is a machine that has been made by human beings.

So, in this case, the people themselves become creators. They become gods.

Christianity says something radically different.

If we do not understand that, we do not understand Christianity at all.

Since we live in a world that is increasingly materialistic (closed universe) we often miss the main point.

Christianity says that there is something beyond the material.

That something is God, and God is the Creator of the material.

Furthermore, He is the One who has revealed Himself to us in Jesus of Nazareth.

And that is the point of the Christmas story.

God invaded history.

This invasion is unlike anything that had ever happened before or since.

If the story is true, it means there is a God, that He is beyond our human system, and furthermore, He is concerned about us and has demonstrated that concern through the Incarnation.

That's our open world view - there is a God and He has spoken to us and continues to speak to us.

There is more to life than what we can see or hear or understand or explain.

It's what we yearn for - just as in the movie, we journey far to discover who we are and who made us and for what reason.

But the Christian's answer is full of hope and  purpose. We were made, not by a machine devoid of all hope and planning, made by other uncertain and empty human beings, but by a loving God who wants to bring us back into His family.

For God so loved the world He sent His only Son,

that whosoever believes in Him

should not perish, but have everlasting life.

For God sent not His Son into the world to

condemn the world,

but to save the world (John 3:16-17).

US: Letter to Babylon

Here is a real jewel.....Jeremiah's letter he sent from Jerusalem to the Hebrew exiles who had been taken captive to Babylon...

This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried in exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will
prosper.

I treasure this portion of Scripture and it brings to mind again God's sovereignty over all kingdoms and over all cultures and over all world events.

Look at that sentence: Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.

Throughout centuries of world history, Jews have obeyed this command. They have sought the peace and prosperity of the lands where they have lived. When they fled from Russia to Germany and Poland, they supported those governments. When they fled from Turkey and were scattered again throughout Europe they became law-abiding citizens, living in their own "ghettos" and "beyond the pale" often, but they did not seek to destroy the governments, even when oppressed. And in spite of it all, they grew and prospered, so much that most of the world envied and began to hate them.

When Haym Salomon fled Poland in the 1770's and came to New York, he rose to a position of financial prosperity and used his money and influence to help finance the American Revolution. George Washington depended on a number of Jewish Americans to help him clothe and arm his men.

And maybe there is another lesson here for us: aren't we, too, aliens in this world? Pilgrims journeying on to our heavenly home? Living in the Kingdom of God, and extending it, while still living in our earthly kingdom, even when the kingdom of Satan is trying to advance.

We, too, are strangers, foreigners, aliens.

I don't want to sound cynical, but I sort of feel that if we don't realize how "alien" we really are in this 2020 culture, then we aren't paying attention. Maybe not getting out much!

Maybe this advice to the Hebrews in Babylon is good advice for us, too, reminding us to pray for our land. For its peace and prosperity.

Jeremiah's letter goes on to say:

This is what the LORD says: When seventy years are completed in Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

How wonderful of our loving God! He reminds His people right at the beginning that they will be there 70 years. Don't try to escape; don't sit down and wait for Me to come to you. Just go on about your work. Take care of your families. Don't listen to false prophets. Don't waste time trying to figure it all out. Just keep living your lives and wait for Me. I will come. But it's not going to be right away.

God is good all the time. All the time God is good.

Then there's this amazing promise:

Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me with all your heart. I will be found by you.

(I just love that part of the promise--they will seek Him and He will be found by them! He allows Himself to be found! He is not the God who hides Himself -- He is the God who reveals Himself!! WOW!)

God is good all the time. All the time God is good!

P.S. Something sort of interesting about our Great Seal of the United States.
Just above the head of the eagle is a circular disc with 13 stars. George Washington worked on the design. Originally the stars were scattered, but he (at least some early Americans said) designed the stars to be in the configuration they are now -- look closely -- they are in a hexagram -- 2 equilateral triangles with two tips touching -- the two triangles pointing toward each other -- the hexagram is the Mogan (Star of) David -- some people said Washington placed them this way to let Haym Salomon and the other Jews realize how much he valued their help and respected their influence here in the new nation. But it had to be subtle, almost secret, because, as usual, Jews were still hated by some.

God's Blotter - Jerry Bridges

I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.   Isaiah 43:25

Here God uses two absolute terms to assure us of the complete removal of our sins: blots out and remembers no more.

To blot out something is to remove it from the record. He has done more than wipe the slate clean--
He has thrown away the slate!

There is no chance the offense will ever arise to haunt us in the future.

Not only has God blotted out our sins. He further says He remembers them no more.

Someone has helpfully pointed out the difference between forgetting and not remembering.

Forgetting is something we do because of our fallible minds.

We forget to pick up something at the store, or we forget where we laid our car keys. Obviously, God does not forget as we do.

On the other hand, to not remember is to choose not to bring something to one's mind over and over again.

And God has promised never to remember our sins, never to bring them to his mind again.

Think of some of your more recent sins--sins of which you are now ashamed. It may have been an unkind word, a resentful attitude, or a lustful thought.

Whatever it might be, God says He has put it out of His mind. He remembers it no more.

What an overwhelming thought! What joy this should bring to our hearts!

     -- From The Gospel for Real Life by Jerry Bridges



There is no room for guilt in the Christian life!

Why should we dwell on our past sins?

And why should we dwell on the sins of others?

Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God has forgiven you. Ephesians 4:32



.

Becoming Like Him

And we all, with unveiled faces, beholding the glory of the Lord are being changed into His likeness from one degree of glory to another.
                  -- 2 Corinthians 3:18


We may spend time amid the wonders of Creation, admiring and searching the natural world and have an exact knowledge of Genesis, but unless all this makes us more like Jesus, it matters little.

We may know the words of the prophets by heart and have a clear vision of the Revelation to John, but unless this knowledge makes us gentle and patient like Jesus, we are wasting our time.

We may serve our brethren faithfully and entertain them regularly, but unless they begin to see the Hands  and Feet of Jesus at work in us, it will all be forgotten.

We may think we have clear insight into the Scriptures and understand the intricacies of the covenants, but unless they make us love others as Jesus loved, then our knowledge is but a tinkling bell.

We may be able to recite the words of Jesus perfectly, but unless He lives in us every moment of every day, those words stored in our memories are not doing their work.

We may move among God's people and enjoy their company, but unless we are prepared to wash the feet of everyone who knows the Lord, we are not loving as He did.

We may give a helping had to a weary traveler, but unless we can love the unlovable and touch the untouchable, we have not become fully like Jesus.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

1 Corinthians 13

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.

If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.

If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

     Love is patient
     Love is kind
     It does not envy
     It does not boast
     It is not proud
     It is not rude
     It is not self-seeking
     It is not easily angered
     It keeps no record of wrongs
     Love does not delight in evil,
          but rejoices with the truth
     It always protects, always trusts,
           always hopes, always perseveres.
     Love never fails.
                       

But what happens in the end?

A horrible and shocking thing has happened in the land;
The prophets prophesy lies, the priests rule by their own authority, and the people love it this way.

But what will you do in the end? (Jeremiah 5:30-31)




I keep re-reading these provocative verses....
Jeremiah's message was preached during the last years of the nation of Judah.

The fatal Babylonian siege of Jerusalem had not yet begun.



Somehow it reminds me of our own nation today.

Just a few lines before Jeremiah had said, "Your sins have deprived you of good" (5:23).


Have our sins deprived us of some of God's good?

I notice the religious leaders were lying and ruling by their own authority, not God's...and the people love
it this way, Jeremiah says.


Back when I was a child there was a common saying,
"It doesn't matter what you believe as long as you are sincere."


A few years later we dropped the "sincere" part and just said, "It doesn't matter what you believe."


Still a lie, of course.





Then a few years later we revised it again This time to, "It doesn't matter if you believe."


Still a lie, of course.


Now we seem to say, "No, it doesn't matter if you believe, but you are cooler if you don't believe."


Same lie.





The more things change, the more they remain the same.





But what will you do in the end?





It all reduces down to whether we need a Savior or not.





I think, without a doubt, that when (or if, if you prefer) I stand before God, I will need a Savior.





And in Jesus Christ I have that Savior.





If you don't really think you will need a Savior, then it doesn't matter, does it?

What will you do in the end?





"For Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners" (1 Timothy 1:15).

Ths is the day - TODAY - by Sarah Young

Come to Me with a thankful heart so that you can enjoy My Presence.

This is the day that I have made. I want you to rejoice today, refusing to worry about tomorrow.

Search for all I have prepared for you, anticipating abundant blessings and accepting difficulties as they come.

I can weave miracles into the most mundane day if you keep your focus on Me.

Come to Me with all your needs, knowing that My glorious riches are a more-than-adequate supply.

Stay in communication with Me so that you can live above your circumstances even while you are in the midst of them.

Present your requests to Me with thanksgiving, and My Peace, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your heart and mind.

     -- From Jesus Calling, by Sarah Young



This is the day the LORD has made! Let us rejoice and be glad in it!  Psalm 118:24

And my God will meet all your needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus.  Philippians 4:19

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your heart sad your minds in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:6-7

The New Commandment - Deeper and Wider

It has been a while since Easter -- almost a year actually...I am anxious to celebrate it again this year - I would like to have another Maundy Thursday service. Another time to focus on the most important event in world history - it's just not possible that anything in the past, present or future has ever or will ever come close to the cross in its importance--except maybe Judgment Day -- but that's about the cross, too.

Anyway, Maundy Thursday services celebrate the Lord's Supper (and our Savior's last meal with His disciples before His crucifixion) and Christ giving His most important commandment (Maundy comes from mandate, or commandment).

     Little children, I shall be with you a little while longer. You will seek Me; and as I said to the Jews, 'Where I am going, you cannot come,' so now I say to you:

"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all shall know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."  -- John 13

I used to worry over this passage a little. Because the commandment to love each other was not new.
It was clearly commanded way back in Leviticus well over a thousand years before the Incarnation.

You shall not hate your brother in your heart...you shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Leviticus 19:18 

So how could Christ call His commandment new?

As I get older I can begin to see it. (Not that age has anything to do with it!)  It is one of those things that is so profoundly simple!

 Christ's new law was wider and deeper:

1. It was wider because it included all mankind. When the Leviticus law was given to the Jews they knew they would be living in Jewish communities (as soon as they could get out of that wilderness!) Their neighbors were Jews. They were 'the children of your people' as the Leviticus verse said.. But Christ changed completely the notion of who our neighbors are. The lawyer asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?"

We all know the answer  -- the story of the Good Samaritan. Jesus, when finished, asked, "So which of these three do you think was neighbor to him who fell among the thieves?"

The answer: "He who showed mercy on him"

Jesus said, "Go and do likewise."

So the notion of "neighbor" was expanded to include everyone who at anytime showed mercy or was in need of mercy.

This was the original "Good Neighbor Policy."

2. Christ's new commandment was also deeper. The ancient Jews were told to love their neighbors as they loved themselves.  So Christ raised the bar to an unheard of level -- they were to love each other as Christ Himself loved them -- which was more than He loved Himself - they were to love each other
more than they loved themselves....like...that must mean...I am to love my neighbor more than I love myself...even if I don't know him, or like him....You must love each other as I have loved you, He said.

He Himself was the standard -  the template.

In the Garden, Christ payed that if possible, "take this cup away from me. Nevertheless not My will, but Yours be done." (Luke 22) and then later He said to Peter, "Shall I not drink the cup which My Father has given me?" (John 18).

He drank the cup. He loved us more than He loved Himself.

That made it the new commandment.

Go and do likewise.

Looking Back at Genesis - Back to the Garden

Let's Go Back To Where We Started.....


Sometimes it seems we have lost everything - authentic marriage and family life, our schools, our cities, our future, even our churches are often a disappointment.

The society - science and technology, the law and politics, business and the arts - all are conspiring to promote their godless, self-asserting agenda and send us into a downward spiral.

This seems one of those times to me - like all is lost, or on the verge of collapse.

We have a deep and persistent longing to return to paradise - to live in a society like God intended, where family love nurtures the children, where politics and government seek to serve the people, where the poor and powerless are lifted up.

"Happiness is not only our hope," wrote G. K. Chesterton, "but also in some strange manner it is our memory; we are all kings in exile."

Joni Mitchell once sang:

     We are stardust
     We are golden
     And we've got to get ourselves
     Back to the garden.

But how do we get back to the garden?

The answer is not within us, or we would have already gone back to the garden.

The problem is obvious. We live for ourselves and our own glory, rather than to love God and seek His glory.

"Salvation belong to the LORD," we are told in Scripture.

We need God to come and save us. And so He did.
And as He saves us He is bringing us back to the garden, into intimate fellowship with Him.

Genesis in General - First words and Last words

Getting a Handle on Genesis.....

First Words and Last Words

Want to work your way through the first book of the Bible?

It's easy.....

Just think of the first five words of the first verse:  

  In the beginning God created....(Genesis 1:1)

Then think of the last five words of the last verse:

In a coffin in Egypt....(Genesis 50:26)

Who's in that coffin? Joseph.

  

   So Joseph died at the age of a hundred and ten.   

And after they embalmed him,

he was placed in a coffin in Egypt.

Genesis 50:26

So those two phrases: the first five words and the last five words, are bookends that support the entire

book of Genesis.

Every thing that happened between those two phrases begin the story of mankind which is then extended throughout the Old Testament, and, for that matter, the New Testament and into the times yet to come.

• Creation
• Adam and Eve
• Sin enters the world
• Noah and the Flood
• Tower of Babel and the origin of nations
• Abraham
• Isaac
• Jacob
• Joseph
• 
  

Here's another way to get a handle on Genesis:

think of the word GOOD....

It's used 7 times in chapter 1, as God pondered His

acts of creation, concluding with verse 31:

God saw all that He had made, and it was very good....

Then look at the  words of chapter 50, spoken by Joseph to his brothers, who were tormented by their guilt and fearful of their lives:

Don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God?

You intended to  harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives....

verses 19-20

So God, His Voice piercing the dark chaos and emptiness of all space, created an earth of ever-mysterious radiant beauty. And He declared it good.

So Joseph could look at the chaos of his own troubled life and see God's hand at work, and saw that it, too,

was good.

And we can do that, too. Look back through our own lives, through all the missteps, all the bad judgments, all the disobedient acts of willful sin.....

and yet we can see it redeemed by the grace of God

through our Lord Jesus Christ.

And we know that in all things God works for the good

of those who love Him, who have been called

according to His purpose...

(Romans 8:28)

Two handles to get hold of the Book of Genesis:

• (1) The first and last phrases, In the beginning God created, and in a coffin in Egypt....all the rest of the events of the book falls between creation and Joseph,

        and

• (2) the word good: out of cosmic chaos God created good (the first chapter), and out of Joseph's life (last chapter),  and ours, He created, and still creates, good.

Ancient words, ever true, changing me, changing you.

We have come with open hearts,

Oh, let the ancient words impart.

Holy words, long preserved for our walk in this world

They resound with God's own heart,

Oh, let the ancient words impart!

Genesis in General - The Biggest Miracle of All?

For me, the best way to study Genesis - really get a handle on it -- is to think of it like making a sandwich.

Start with two slices of bread, slather them with mayo-mustard, and then fill in the middle and put it all together - and enjoy!

One slice of bread is the first five words of the book - In the beginning God created. And the other slice of bread is the last five words of the book- in a coffin in Egypt.

Now we start piling on all the tasty items between the slices of bread.

Starting with: What did God create? The heavens and the earth.

We often gaze with wonder at the astonishing night skies above us. It's easy to proclaim My God, how great thou art!

I suppose even pagans and non-believers can sing those words when they stand enraptured by the dizzying display of stars and planets.

But for us, the greatest miracle is not up there in the sky, but right here beneath our feet - the Earth itself!

It did not always appear to be such a miracle.

When I was a child we didn't understand what parameters were necessary for a planet to support life.

Carl Sagan and others declared that there were only
2 conditions needed for a planet to support life -
we knew certain kinds of stars were necessary and a planet had to be just the right distance from these stars.

So pondering the vast landscape of space, the scientists estimated there were a high number of planets that could support life.

And so we set out to try to find those other beings that crowded the cosmic galaxies.

So far we haven't.

Now we realize that there are many more conditions needed to support life. As that number has soared,
the possibility of life "out there" has diminished.

Eric Metaxas' book, Miracles, explores these requirements and shows how truly remarkable our planet is!

In fact,

     The number of variables necessary for life on a planet
     in the universe has exploded, while the number of possible
     planets that could conceivably support life has withered.

     The number shrank down to zero years ago, and as the
     number of variables necessary for life on a planet have
     continued to grow, the number of planets that could support
     life has sunk further and further below zero.

     The odds against a planet supporting life have grown and
     grown, to unfathomable and dizzying heights of impossibility. 

          -- From Miracles, by Eric Metaxas, Chapter 4.







Yet, here we are - living on this planet earth and even wondering about how we got here - and why!

Here are some of his examples:






1. The size of the earth is critical. If the earth were slightly larger, it would have more gravity, not just affecting our bodily weight,  but also forcing gases like methane and ammonia to remain close to our surface. We can't breathe those gases.

If the earth were slightly smaller, and had less gravity, water vapor would not stay close to the surface, but would dissipate into the atmosphere, and we couldn't exist without water.

2. The speed at which our planet rotates is critical.
Any slower rate and temperature ranges between day and night would be deadly. Any faster would
produce impossibly high winds.

3. Another requirement for life on earth is the existence of an extremely large planet in our solar system.

Jupiter, because of its size and lack of density,
keeps us from being bombarded by comets.

It is 318 times the mass of earth and so 318 times the gravity, pulling comets toward it and deflecting them from the earth.





Comets and comet debris would strike us probably one thousand times more frequently, if Jupiter were not exactly where it is, whirling through the universe, shielding us from catastrophe.
Who would have thought that the presence of our giant neighbor would contribute so much to the presence of life on Earth?



4. Even more important than Jupiter is the miracle of our moon.

It's size - if any larger our tides would be more extreme. If any smaller the tides would be insufficient to cleanse coastal seawater and replenish its nutrients.

If the moon were any size other that the size it is, life as we know it would not exist.



There are many more considerations about the improbability (actually, impossibility) of life on our planet, including its exact tilt, and the bizarre property of water and dozens more. 


So from scientific evidence of Carl Sagan's day, when scientists calculated that one in every ten thousand planets should support life, because there were only two known requirements, to today - that list has grown from 2 to almost 200 - and the existence of life anywhere in the universe is a miracle!



If we do the math, that means the odds of a planet supporting life are less than one in two to the seventy-third power - that's one followed by seventy-three zeroes!

Life on Earth is unique in the universe.

God saw all that He had made, and it was very good.

Genesis 1:31

God's creation of the heavens and the Earth pleased Him.

I recommend Eric Metaxas' book, Miracles. Read it and no longer take our beautiful planet for granted!

And there was light!

Lately I find myself thinking more and more about the temple at Jerusalem and Christ's familiarity of it -- He worshiped there regularly (we could never know how many times) before the crucifixion.

What would He be thinking as He entered the temple courts? He would know exactly what lay behind those heavily embroidered curtains. And He would know why each object was there and why it was placed exactly where it was placed.

I have a copy of The Stone Edition of the Chumash, a Jewish copy of the Pentateuch (Chumash is a Hebrew word for Pentateuch) with commentary notes. Sometimes it is fun to sit and read parts of it.

Right now I am reading about the Menorah, the seven-branched lampstand designed for use in the Tabernacle and then later for the Temple. The lampstand and its accessories were to be made of solid gold.

The accessories were implements used to clean and prepare the lamps. With the tongs the priests would grip the wicks to place them in the oil. The spoons were used to remove the previous day's ash and other residue so that the lamps could be prepared for the new day's lighting.

The lampstand and accessories were to be made of 1 talent of pure gold, which according to this commentary would be 2400 ounces. At today's prices that would be over 3 million dollars!

Some people say that in Israel today the Jews are preparing for their new temple (the 3rd) and that they have already crafted much of the furniture needed for the new temple, including the main menorah. These new items are secreted away in a safe place to be brought out when the new temple is built.

They are waiting for the reclaiming of Temple Mount so they can build the new temple. We wait for the triumphal coming of our Lord and His coronation as King of Kings.

Anyway, what I found captivating in this Jewish commentary was this paragraph:

The symbolic and esoteric interpretations attached to the Menorah are virtually endless. In its simple sense, the ornate gold Menorah served to demonstrate the majesty of the tabernacle. It was placed in the outer chamber so that it would be visible--and inspirational-- to everyone, and not inside the Holy of Holies [the most holy area that housed the Ark and where only the High Priest could go, and only once a year on Day of Atonement]. The lampstand was not in the room with the Ark--because the Ark and all it contained and represented (God's Word inscribed on the stone tablets) did not require light: the Torah is its own light.

I LOVE that paragraph! The Ark with its contents of God's Word did not require any light, because God's Word is, in itself, its own light!


Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path, the poet sang in Psalm 119:105

C S Lewis - Nature is Mortal

Nature is mortal; we shall outlive her.

When all the suns and nebulae have passed away, each of you will still be alive.

Nature is only the image, the symbol; but it is the symbol Scripture invites me to use. We are summoned to pass through Nature, beyond her, into that splendor which she fitfully reflects.

And in there, in beyond Nature, we shall eat of the tree of life.

At present, if we are reborn in Christ, the spirit in us lives directly on God; but the mind and, still more, the body receives life from Him at a thousand removes --  through our ancestors, through our food, through the elements.

The faint, far-off results of these energies which God's creative rapture implanted in matter when He made the worlds are what we now call physical pleasures; and even thus filtered, they are too much for our present management.

What would it be to taste at the fountainhead that stream of which even these lower reaches prove so intoxicating?

Yet that, I believe, is what lies before us.

The whole man is to drink joy from the fountain of joy.

As St. Augustine said, the rapture of the soul will "flow over" into the glorified body.

   -- From The Weight of Glory, by C S Lewis

The Cost - Packer

"Anyone of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be My disciple."

If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life [i.e., put them all decisively second in his esteem], he cannot be My disciple.  And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it...or what king, going to war against another king, does not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand. Or else, while the other is still a great way off, he send a delegation and asks conditions of peace.  Luke 14:26-32

The repentance that Christ requires of His people consists in a settled refusal to set any limit to the claims which He may make on their lives.

Our Lord knew--who better?--how costly it is to retain this refusal, and let Him have His way with them all the time, and therefore He wished them to face out and think through the implications of discipleship before committing themselves.

He did not desire to make disciples under false pretenses. He had no interest in gathering vast crowds of professed adherents who would melt away as soon as they found out what following Him actually demanded of them.

In our own presentation of Christ's gospel, therefore, we need to lay a similar stress on the cost of following Christ, and make the sinners face it soberly before we urge them to respond to the message of free forgiveness.

In common  honesty, we must not conceal the fact that free forgiveness, in one sense, will cost everything, or else our evangelizing becomes a sort of confidence trick.

And where there is no clear knowledge, and hence no realistic recognition of the real claims that Christ makes, there can be no repentance, and therefore no salvation. Such is the evangelistic message that we are sent to make known.

 -- J. I. Packer,  Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God


P.S. When God calls a man, He calls him to die.....
Dietrich Bonhoffer


...A condition of complete simplicity (Costing not less than everything...)
T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets

Our Burden Bearer

Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior,

Who daily bears our burdens.

Our God is a God who saves.

Psalm 68:19-20

Cast all your cares upon Him for He cares for you.

1 Peter 5:7

Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened

and I will give you rest.

Matthew 11:30

And as He loves us, so are we to love one another.

Carry each other's burdens,

and in this way you will fulfill the  law of Christ.

Galatians 6:2

The Poorer We Are Becoming - Brennan Manning

The deeper we grow in the Spirit of Jesus Christ, the poorer we become -- the more we realize that everything in life is a gift.

The tenor of our lives becomes one of humble and joyful thanksgiving.

Awareness of our poverty and ineptitude causes us to rejoice in the gift of being called out of darkness into wondrous light and translated into the kingdom of God's beloved Son.

In conversation, the disciple who is truly poor in spirit always leaves the other person feeling, My life has been enriched by talking with you.

This is neither false modesty nor phony humility.

His or her life has been enriched and graced.

He is not all exhaust and no intake. She does not impose herself on others.

He listens well because he knows he has so much to learn from others. Her spiritual poverty enables her to enter the world of the other, even when she cannot identify with that world -- e.g., the drug culture, the gay world.

The poor in spirit are the most nonjudgmental of peoples; they get along well with sinners.

      -- From The Ragamuffin Gospel, Chapter 4,
                 by Brennan Manning

Blessed are the poor in spirit,

for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 5:3

Martin Luther - Thoughts on Prayer

From Martin Luther...

Praying in Faith

Prayer is a special exercise of faith. Faith makes the prayer acceptable because it believes that either the prayer will be answered, or that something better will be given instead.

This is why James says, "Let him who asks of God not waver in faith, for if he wavers, let him not think that he shall receive anything from the Lord."


This is a clear statement which says directly: he who does not trust will receive nothing, neither that which he asks nor anything better.

From this it follows that the one who prays correctly never doubts that the prayer will be answered, even if the very thing for which one prays is not given. For we are to lay our need before God in prayer but not prescribe to God a measure, manner, time, or place.

We must leave that to God, for He may wish to give it to us in another, perhaps better, way then we think best.

It is amazing that a poor human creature is able to speak with God's High Majesty in heaven and not be afraid.

When we pray the heart and conscience must not pull away from God because of our sins and our unworthiness, or stand in doubt, or be scared away.

When we pray we must hold fast and believe that God has heard our prayer. It was for this reason that the ancients defined prayer as an Ascensus mentis ad Deum, "a climbing up of the heart unto God."

                  

Severe Grace - Richard John Neuhaus

There is a story told me when I was very young, by a veteran who said he was there.

     Allied troops were on a ship crossing the English Channel.
For some reason I forgot--perhaps it was torpedoed--the ship was sinking, and fifty or more men were caught in the hold, from which there was no escape.

     A chaplain who was on deck with the other soldiers went down through the one-way funnel to his certain death in order to give Last Rites or otherwise console those who were still alive.

     I have over the years been haunted by that story of what it means to be a minister, a servant, of the One who said, "I have come not to be served, but to serve."

     The veteran who told it to me emphasized that none of the soldiers would have blamed the chaplain had he stayed on the safety of the deck, but neither did they try to dissuade him from his determination to temper fate with grace.

     I have thought about what I would have done were I am his place, and I do not know.

---From As I Lay Dying, by Richard John Neuhaus

.'''whoever wants to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be a slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."             Mark 10:44-45.

Basic Faith 101 - C. S. Lewis

Now Faith, in the sense in which I am here using the word, is the art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods. For moods will change, whatever view your reason takes.

Now that I am a Christian I do have moods in which the whole thing looks very improbable; but when I was an atheist I had moods in which Christianity looked terribly probable.

This rebellion of your moods against your real self is going to come anyway. That is why Faith is such a necessary virtue: unless you teach your moods 'where they get off', you can never be either a sound Christian or even a sound atheist, but just a creature dithering to and fro, with its beliefs really dependent on the weather and the state of its digestion. Consequently one must train the habit of Faith.

The first step is to recognize the fact that your moods change. The next is to make sure that, if you have once accepted Christianity, then some of its main doctrines shall be deliberately held before your mind for some time every day.

That is why daily prayers and religious readings and churchgoing are necessary parts of the Christian life. We have to be continually reminded of what we believe. Neither this belief nor any other will automatically remain alive in the mind. It must be fed.

And as a matter of fact, if you examined a hundred people who had lost their faith in Christianity, I wonder how many of them would turn out to have been reasoned out of it by honest argument? Do not most people simply drift away?

From Mere Christianity, by C. S. Lewis