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Happy Mother’s Day

May 6, 2011 / / 0 Comments

“God could not be everywhere, so he created mothers.”  ~Old Jewish Proverb

On a literal level, we certainly disagree with the proverb. God is most definitely everywhere. But in a symbolic sense, I dearly love what the proverb proclaims. For we do see our God in our mothers.

When our mothers cook for us our favorite meals, sew the patch in the knee of our blue jeans, and slip us the cash for the movie, they are reflecting the provision of our God who always meets the needs of his children.

When our mothers hold us closely through the thunderstorm, watch us as we cross the street, and insist on meeting all our friends, they are mimicking the protection we’re promised by our Father.

When they wipe away the tears and apply the band aids and force the cough medicine down our throats, they are shadowing our God, the Comforter and Healer.

Our mothers love us unconditionally, despite the messes we make and the trouble we cause. Even when we don’t listen and we don’t behave, mom’s love never wanes. She disciplines us when we stray from the path. She forgives us when we wreck her carpet or her drapes. And she encourages us to be everything our God has created us to be.

Our mothers teach us right from wrong. They listen inexhaustibly. They rejoice in our success. And our setbacks cause their hearts to break. They know what we’re going to say before we say it. Our mothers brag about us to their friends and they defend us to our peers. They believe in us even when we don’t believe in ourselves. They lead us from in front and they push us from behind.

And there’s nothing that could ever separate us from their love. Ever.

Yes, our God is everywhere. But so too, it seems, are our mothers.

There’s another old proverb out there that says an ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy. I’m not touching that one.

Happy Mother’s Day!

Beat LA!

Allan

Baptism Sirens

May 5, 2011 / / 0 Comments

I’ve got an idea. No, no, this is a good idea. Really. This isn’t like pre-wallpapered sheetrock or cell phones. This is really a good idea.

What about baptism sirens?

Yes, baptism sirens. Why don’t we install baptism sirens throughout our church building? I think we should do this immediately.

A sweet young lady from our community, a junior at Richland High School who’s been coming to Legacy with her friends for a few months now and studying with Jason and a couple of others, confessed Jesus as Lord last night and put on our Savior in baptism. Sarah was added to God’s eternal Kingdom. Sarah was saved last night, forgiven of all her sins. God’s Spirit began living in Sarah immediately. She was transformed right before our eyes!

And while there were many of us who made it to the worship center to participate in Sarah’s baptism and congratulate her and pray with her and meet her parents, there were many more people out in the hallways. There were dozens of us in the gym and in the parking lots, hanging out in the atrium and in the kitchen. Not everybody knows when a baptism is happening. Not everybody gets the news every time.

Baptism sirens would change that. Can you imagine? The sirens go off throughout the building, inside and outside. A loud voice booms over the church intercom, “Attention, please! God Almighty is delivering another person from sin and death! God is acting on his Word and being faithful to his promises! That thing we teach and preach and dedicate our lives to and rest our hopes in is actually happening right now! Would all confessing Christians please make their way to the worship center. Thank you.”

The world needs to stop when someone is being baptized. When a person is baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus, we need to drop everything and give it the complete and undivided attention it deserves. A baptism is the sure sign of God’s grace. It’s proof of his forgiveness. It stands for his mercy and love. It testifies to his present and continuing action among his people in the world. It’s God right there in front of us, saving somebody, defeating Satan, stealing another soul from hell, giving another person eternal life, fulfilling his promises for all time. Right there in front of us!

Why would we miss it? Why would we pass up an opportunity to personally participate in a sin-forgiving, life-bestowing, history-altering, cosmic event? Why would we eschew the chance the hug these new babes in Christ, to cheer them, to pat them on the back, to show them by our presence and our actions that what they’re doing — No! What God is doing! — is just as important as we claim it is?

It must be because not everybody hears the announcement. There can be no other reason. We don’t get the information to all the people.

Baptism sirens would fix that.

Peace,

Allan

Take Heart!

May 4, 2011 / / 1 Comment

“In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” ~John 16:33

Jesus tells us plainly — from the mountain, around the table, along the way — that this world is openly hostile to the things of God. For disciples to live in the world means we have to experience struggle and conflict and even battles. The world’s values and vision and morals and ethics are opposed to ours in Christ. And living here isn’t easy.

Not for Christians.

Living right here right now is hard.

I spent an hour with Quincy this morning in our prayer room, lifting up dozens of requests to our Father in Jesus’ name. The things my brothers and sisters have written on those requests tell me that we have struggles and battles. I’ve spent more than a few cumulative hours over the past four or five days in my study counseling with people, praying with people, crying and agonizing with people. There’s nothing easy about this.

Jesus never pretended that it would be. He knows it’s tough. He lived it, remember? And he reminds us that while we’re having this trouble, we can also be filled with courage and strength and hope because he has overcome all of it.

Jesus tells us, “I have faced your enemy and I have conquered him. I have fought your battles on the same fields of human experience where you fight, and I’ve won. I’ve already done it for you. And I’m doing it right now in you and for you.”

If we abide in him, if we stay connected to him, his eternal victory belongs to us.

Wow. That’s really good news.

Peace,

Allan

Christian Response

May 3, 2011 / / 7 Comments

If you’re still interested in reading about and weighing in on the Christian response to the death of Osama bin Laden, allow me to link you up.

Corey Mullins, our Legacy missionary to Wollongong, Australia writes his reflections in his Mentalcourse blog here. In an email exchange yesterday, this faithful man of God considered the oxymoron, “Christian hatred.” Corey wonders why Christians look and act so much like the world and concludes it’s all about spiritual formation: “One hour on Sunday just isn’t enough to conform our thought patterns to Scripture. But, sadly, that’s all most of our people are getting.” Corey goes on to tell me about a friend of his in Korea whose church is open every morning from 7:00-8:00am for Bible reading and prayer. Many people — actually, Corey says “most” of the church’s members — come in on their ways to work to pray and meditate on the words of God. I wonder about us here at Legacy where, for almost two-and-a-half-years now, our elders and ministers open our prayer rooms every weekday morning from 7:00-8:00am. Quincy comes. And usually nobody else. Corey says most of these churches in Korea “are full of first generation Christians which may explain the difference. Maybe we’ve become lazy with our spirituality.”

David Smith, the preaching minister at the Missouri Street Church of Christ in Baytown, Texas, has compiled a list of 18 other preachers and ministers and theologians, mostly CofC, who have written articles about bin Laden’s death. The posts run the gamut of almost anything you can imagine as a Christian reaction to the death of this terrorist. The page with all the links is here. While you’re at it, go ahead and read Smith’s own personal angle here. Scroll down to his second post, Osama bin Laden Talks with God. Wow! How does he keep his job at Missouri Street writing like that?

Finally, my great friend Jim Gardner pointed me to a blog post by Kurt Willems, a former classmate of his at the Fresno Pacific Biblical Seminary. Kurt explores the things that “grieve the heart of God.” Click here.

This Sunday I am preaching from my favorite Bible verse, John 16:33. These are Jesus’ last words to his disciples before he gives himself up, before he dies on the cross as a sacrifice for every sinner in the history of our planet: “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

Peace,

Allan

The Death of the Wicked

May 2, 2011 / / 6 Comments

“As surely as I live,” declares the Sovereign Lord, “I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live.” ~Ezekiel 33:11

I knew it the moment I watched the first images late last night of the crowds in front of the White House and in Times Square boisterously celebrating the death of Osama bin Laden. I knew it this morning when the news programs showed us image after image of young men and women waving flags and singing songs on their city streets and campus squares. I knew it when I drove my girls to school and listened to the talk show hosts discussing what they would have done to bin Laden’s body had they been in charge. And I realized it when I started seeing the forwarded emails. From Christians.

I’ve known all day today that this is not how Christians behave. We do not celebrate the death of a human being made in the image of God and loved by our Father. No matter how ruthless and vile Bin Laden may be, we love our enemies. We pray for our enemies and their families. We do good things for our enemies.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven.” ~Matthew 5:43-45

God’s children do not dance and rejoice in the death of anyone. It’s decidedly un-Christ-like. To join in the worldly celebration of the death of a man who did not know our God is to deny our Christ and his Gospel. After all, our Lord died for us (you and me) while we (you and me) were his enemies. That’s the part I’ve not been able to understand today: doesn’t whooping and hollering and taking great joy and pleasure in the death of another human being deny just about everything Scripture teaches us about the nature and the will of our Father? Does it not oppose the clear commands from our Lord?

“Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” ~Luke 6:27-28

It is good today to grieve anew with the families of those who lost dear friends and relatives in the violent attacks orchestrated by this man. It is proper to mourn the loss of soldiers and civilians who’ve been trapped in the middle of the on-going conflict. It’s OK to acknowledge God’s sovereign use of nations and armies to enact his justice. It is right today to join the faithful lament of the prophets and the groaning of the martyred souls under the altar and cry out to our God, “How long?!? How much longer are you going to allow this to continue?!? When will you finally put all things to right?!?” Today is a day for prayer. Reflection. Meditation. Thanksgiving. Mixed feelings. It’s not a day for dancing in the streets.

I’ve known all along  that if I were to blog today about the way I’m feeling, I would be criticized. I’ve known that if I preach this Sunday on what the Scriptures say about the death of this terrorist, I might be fired. So, instead, I chose this morning to blog about God expecting more out of the people he’s blessed with his good gifts and matchless grace; about God requiring more out of his children; about God demanding more from the people he’s saved; about how that verse in Luke 12:48 is the very thing that pushed me over the top and compelled me to ditch sports radio and start preaching the Good News.

Please forgive me. I, too, have denied my Lord today.

Peace (not as the world gives peace),

Allan

Much Will Be Demanded

May 2, 2011 / / 0 Comments

“From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded.” ~Luke 12:48

Jesus fed the five thousand with some rolls and a couple of fish. Scripture tells us he gave the food to his disciples and they, in turn, passed it on to the crowds. But what if the disciples had just held on to the food?

“Hey, thanks for the lunch, Jesus.”

Then Jesus hands them more. “Oh! OK. Thanks for the dinner, too, Jesus.”

Then Jesus gives them more. “Wow! Allright! Thank you, Jesus.” What if the disciples started looking around for some to-go boxes? What if they began trying to figure out how to get all this food home? What if Jesus’ followers had just held onto the food for themselves when their Lord was giving them more than enough to share with everyone in the crowds who had need?

Along with God’s great gifts comes great responsibility.

I never could shake those words of Jesus at the end of Luke 12. They didn’t really give me a guilt trip; they didn’t knock me down every time I read them or thought about them. It was more like a heavy burden that followed me everywhere I went. Because I’ve been given much. Materially, financially, physically, I am blessed. I’m rich. More than that, God has completely forgiven me of every one of the horrible sins I’ve ever committed in my life. He’s totally restored me to a perfectly righteous relationship with him. By the death and resurrection of Christ Jesus, I am eternally wealthy. I’m Bill Gates and Donald Trump combined. With a great haircut and 50 lawyers! And because of his great gifts and his matchless grace, it is demanded of me that I use the abilities and talents and opportunities he gives me, not to talk about the Cowboys and Rangers and Mavs, but to boldly proclaim salvation from God in Christ! It’s required of me to declare his love and mercy that are available to all mankind and his will and his plan to redeem and restore all of creation forever.

After many years of dealing with Luke 12:48 — alternately ignoring it, wrestling with it, praying about it, trying to shake it — I finally got up the faith or the guts (or both) to act on what God was demanding of me. And I will never look back.

The truth is that when my crucified and risen Lord returns, I couldn’t bear the thought of explaining to him the way I used his gifts and grace for all of my adult life: camped out in press boxes and locked up in studios talking about and obsessing about things that don’t matter.

He is coming back. Right? Yes, you know that.

Peace,

Allan

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