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Category: Worship (Page 11 of 27)

Hold to God’s Unchanging Hand

April 15, 2013 / / 0 Comments

I’ve been listening to beautiful classic Christian hymns in my office here at the church building all day long. The songs are not coming from a radio or a CD player or from the internet. These songs are coming from our chapel across the hall where Keith Lancaster and 130 men and women from all over the United States are recording two albums in the Acappella Praise and Harmony series.

Build your hopes on things eternal; hold to God’s unchanging hand…

For the past couple of hours my computer has been updating me with the horrible news out of Boston. Two explosions at the Boston Marathon. At least two people killed. Three dozen or more injured, some critically. Blood all over the sidewalks. Families separated from one another.

Because he lives, I can face tomorrow…

A most amazing blend of young voices and old, men and women, four-part harmony, Christians from here in Amarillo and from as far away as Michigan, Kentucky, New York, and, yes, Massachusetts. Praising God. Proclaiming his great love and faithfulness. Declaring trust in his promises. Giving us in the church offices a beautiful glimpse of heaven.

Resting in my Savior as my all in all, standing on the promises of God…

Chaos and turmoil near the finish line. Violence and death. Terrorism. Indescribable pain. Act of War. Panic. Screams of horror. Uncertainty. Fear. Lots of fear.

Fastened to the Rock which cannot move, grounded firm and deep in the Savior’s love…

In the middle of listening to these beautiful hymns sung by faithful Christians in an historic chapel in Amarillo, we’re reminded by the news out of Boston that Jesus has not yet returned in his glory. We’re shocked all over again at the realization that we live in a fallen world characterized by sin and death, pain and anguish, terrible tragedy and suffering. The headlines and pictures on my computer screen this afternoon have the capacity to completely take over. They can define the rest of my day. They could come to distort and shape my world view. But these songs drifting down the hall from the chapel put the day’s news in its proper perspective. Today’s news. Any day’s news. These songs remind us that our God is truly faithful, that he really is making things right, that he is doing what he always promised he would do, and that one day his Kingdom will come in all of its glory and power, destroying all sin and all death once and for all.

Lord, thank you for the gift of song and the power it possesses to encourage and inspire in dark times. Lord, please bless your children in Boston with your divine comfort and healing. And, Lord, come quickly.

Peace,

Allan

A Communion Glimpse

February 22, 2013 / / 0 Comments

“People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the Kingdom of God.” ~Luke 13:29

Jesus is talking about heaven when he says Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and all the prophets will be around the table. John’s Revelation tells us that heaven will be the ultimate gathering of “every nation, tribe, people, and language,” the ultimate feast around our Lord’s banquet table.

At communion time on Sundays, we get a small heavenly glimpse of that great eschatological feast. We come together around our Savior’s table. In the eating of the bread and the drinking of the cup, we connect not only to our Lord, but to every person in history — past, present, and future — who’s been saved by the blood of the Lamb. We’re united as one.

Different people. Different ages. Different cultures. Different languages. Different backgrounds. Different viewpoints. Different habits. Different genders. Different zip codes. Different jobs. Different haircuts. Different beliefs. Different likes and dislikes.

Same sin. Same need. Same Lord. Same baptism. Same forgiveness. Same salvation. Same commitment. Same table. Same loaf. Same cup. Same Body. Same Spirit. Same hope. Same faith. Same God and Father of us all who is over all and through all and in all.

Our communion meals point us to the heavenly meal. It gives us a peek. A holy glimpse. We spend most of our communion time in quiet introspection, reflecting on things that happened in the past. I believe our Christ intends that we spend our communion time in joyful expectation about what’s coming in the future. The way we eat and drink and share the Lord’s Supper must be shaped and practiced more and more by our great anticipation of that day when all of God’s children will be home, gathered around our Father’s table.

Peace,

Allan

Be Filled with the Spirit

February 4, 2013 / / 2 Comments

“Be filled with the Spirit. Speak to one another with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” ~Ephesians 5:18-21

We worship in the Spirit. We submit to one another and sing and speak to one another in the Spirit. The Holy Spirit of God is who gives the Christian life its energy and enthusiasm. Its endurance. And power!

Be filled with the Spirit.

This is an imperative. It’s a command. So we do take some responsibility here. This singing together and submitting to one another is either the means by which we pursue this filling of the Spirit or the result of being filled with the Spirit. Or both. Either way, Paul says when we sing together, when we pray together, when we really belong to one another, we are filled with the Spirit.

And that tells me that God is not a spectator when we gather for worship. Audience of one? No way! God is not the audience of our worship. Our God is an active participant with us — inside us — when we worship together. God is not just sitting on his throne in heaven soaking up all the hallelujahs and amens. No. Through the Spirit, the Father and Son are engaged with us. Communing with us. Eating and drinking with us. Rejoicing with us. Transforming us. Changing us. Growing us. Shaping us more into the image of our Christ.

Be filled with the Spirit.

Encountering God together — in our Sunday morning assemblies, in our Wednesday night Bible classes, in our living rooms on Sunday evenings — being in the presence of God together allows us to recognize our own sinfulness and shortcomings. And that always leads to an acute recognition of his marvelous grace. And the power of God’s grace is not just forgiveness, it’s also transformation. New creature. New creation. Christ formed in you. Being saved. It’s a communal sanctification event that we participate in and experience together when we are filled with the Spirit.

Peace,

Allan

The Second Tablet

December 4, 2012 / / 0 Comments

When God is reminding his people of the covenant promises in Deuteronomy, he vows that if they worship idols they will lose their land. If they commit idolatry/adultery with the foreign gods, if they worship these other dieties, God will send them into exile. He made those promises over and over again in Deuteronomy.

And the people worshiped idols.

Almost immediately upon entering the Promised Land, God’s people began worshiping the foreign gods. They built high places and shrines, they offered sacrifices and song, they worshiped idols. Off and on for more than 700 years, God’s people worshiped these false gods. For over seven centuries, our Lord showed tremendous patience with his people. He exhibited great restraint in not following through on his promises to strip them of their land for these atrocious acts of rebellion. They turned their backs on YHWH. They disrespected his name. They ignored him and sometimes cursed him. But our Father was long suffering with his chosen people.

In Amos, we see for the very first time in Scripture a distinction among God’s holy people between the rich and the poor. Our God speaks through the prophet and points out that the rich were getting richer at the expense of the poor. The orphan, the widow, and the stranger in the gate were not just being ignored, they were being exploited by the wealthy, for the benefit of the elite. 

“They sell the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals.
They trample on the heads of the poor as upon the dust of the ground and deny justice to the oppressed.
Father and son use the same girl and so profane my holy name.
They lie down beside every altar on garments taken in pledge.
In the house of their god they drink wine taken as fines.”
~Amos 2:6-8

“You hate the one who reproves in court and despise him who tells the truth.
You trample on the poor and force him to give you grain…
You oppress the righteous and take bribes
and you deprive the poor of justice in the courts.
~Amos 5:10-12

God points out the injustice against the poor, the systemic oppression against those most defenseless in society, the exploitation of those who are unable to help themselves, the widening gap between the rich and the poor, and he condemns it. This is completely contrary to God’s eternal plan for his people, this is exactly the opposite of what he’s wanting to do through his children for the sake of the rest of the world. So he condemns them and he takes away their land.

In less than 25 years.

It’s almost immediate. In less than one generation, God sends the Assyrians into his chosen nation and, in a divine act of punishment, demolishes them for their sins against the poor.

That’s astonishing, isn’t it?

It appears in Amos that repeated breaking of the “first tablet” of the Law — the commandments dealing with love and God and respect for his holy name — isn’t nearly as offensive to God as the breaking of the “second tablet” which deals with love of neighbor and respect for our own brothers and sisters. Jesus and all the rabbis before him taught that love of God was the most important command and love of neighbor the second. I believe that is still true. But it seems that God shows much more patience when we sin directly against him than when we sin against the poor and the weak. It looks like God’s wrath is quickly aroused when we sin against the marginalized and the defenseless. He won’t tolerate us abusing or ignoring the “least of these.”

There are at least two lessons here: One, we must pay careful attention to our attitudes and our actions regarding the weak and the poor. The comments we make, the jokes we tell, the thoughts we think, the deeds we do or don’t do, the decisions we make — so many of these things impact the defenseless people around us. We should be careful to honor them. We should be diligent to help them. And, two, in the manner of our Lord, we should be much more offended when someone treats another harshly and much less offended when we ourselves are treated harshly. We should show more patience and more understanding when we are neglected or harmed. We should be quick to speak up and act out when the least among us are similarly neglected or harmed.

Amos teaches us that God takes our behavior seriously. Our worship is meaningless to us and to our world, and an offense to our Lord, if it doesn’t compel us to serve others in his name and in his manner every day.

Peace,

Allan

 

Behind the Pine Curtain

October 15, 2012 / / 2 Comments

I’m writing this morning from the library at the Chandler Street Church of Christ in Kilgore, Texas where I’m in the middle of preaching seven times in four days at the church’s annual Gospel Meeting. I was so happy to accept the invitation almost five years ago and I’m thrilled to finally be here this week. I won’t post another article here until Friday. That 1,000th post will contain the names of the winners in our drawing for all the books. In the meantime, I’ll be checking all the comments and engaging in those on-going conversations and you’ll have these three or four days to become eligible for the prizes.

In 2005, when Carrie-Anne and I finally got up the guts or the faith (both!) to leave sports radio and enter full-time congregational ministry, the Chandler Street church way out here in East Texas said, “Yeah, we want in on that!” Chandler Street jumped in early with a commitment to help in financially supporting my family and me while we moved to Austin for a Master’s Degree in Theology. I hope it wasn’t just that my dad and my uncle are elders at this congregation. I know it helped; but I pray that wasn’t the only thing. Even if it was, our God blessed us tremendously through the people at this place. They put a trust in me, they showed some real faith in me, and they barely knew me at all. I’ve always held that trust sacred. I’ve always been grateful to this church for their belief in me. And I’ve looked forward to this week ever since to tell them “thank you” from the pulpit in their church, to let them know how much they mean to me, and to assure them that I’ll never forget.

It’s been so good.

In yesterday’s opening prayer, Archie asked God to give me a “ready recollection.” Seriously. John Kyles promised he’d do his best to stay awake. My dad led singing. Uncle Gerald gave me an introduction that was way too kind. And we dove into the words of our Lord in John 14-16. We have already laughed together and cried. We’ve sung to our God and lifted our hearts in prayer. We’ve eaten a lot of food already at two different congregational meals with at least two more to come. My uncle told me I’d gain five pounds this week and I’m well on my way. I’ve watched this church family gather around a young woman who’d just received some devastating news and was feeling so.very.alone. I’ll watch them later today bring in dozens of children from the nearby middle school to mentor and to help with homework. I was blessed last night to sing with the young people around a fire and underneath some massive oaks trees. Today, I’ll eat lunch with my good friend, Chris Vidacovich, the preaching minister here. Tonight, I’m driving to Tyler to spend the night with Jason Reeves and his family. I’m having lunch with Uncle Gerald tomorrow. My closest family and some of my dearest friends live out here. And I’m meeting so many good, good, good people. In some ways this feels almost familiar.

But it’s different.

East Texas is not a foreign country. Yes, it’s different; very different. I flew out of the flat, brown plains of Amarillo Saturday morning, above the skyscrapers and highways of Big D, and landed a couple of hours later among the hills and lakes and towering pine trees of Gregg County. Very different. The dialect is different; the accents are more pronounced. The food tastes here lean a little more toward Louisiana and Arkansas than make me comfortable. The culture is different; even the church culture is different. I know it’s not a foreign country, but it can feel like one.

It’s so good to be reminded that people in Kilgore worship God exactly like the people in Amarillo. It’s comforting. Different types of songs, yes. Different orders, different styles, different practices, even a few different beliefs and, perhaps, different theological views. But they worship God in Kilgore just like we do in Amarillo. They praise the name of Jesus in Gregg County just like they do in Dallas and Sao Paulo, Brazil. They honor our Father here just like they do in Fort Worth and Kharkov, Ukraine. You know why?

Because Jesus is Lord.

So, it’s not just good. It’s not just comforting. It’s powerful. It’s empowering. It’s everything!

It means everything to be reminded that the Kingdom of God to which we all belong is so much bigger and better than my particular congregation or my specific city or my own country. We all belong to a Kingdom, to a holy and righteous and eternal movement, that transcends all of our individual styles and traditions, cultures and viewpoints. God’s name is praised in Kilgore and it’s praised in Beijing. Our Father is worshiped all over the world, because he alone is God. It’s big. It’s bigger than we usually think. What a blessing to belong!

Peace,

Allan

A Matter of Life and Death

October 2, 2012 / / 4 Comments

(Commenting on this post automatically enters you into the drawing for all the books we’re giving away in conjunction with this blog’s upcoming 1,000th article. Scroll way down to the posts on September 20 and 21 for details.)

While studying this week for our sermon on obedience to Christ’s commands (John 15:10-14, “Obey My Commands”), I’ve come across the text of a sermon from Ephesians 5:21ff preached by William Willimon on the topic of submission. While discussing how the world has subtly attacked the Christian doctrine of submission and declared war on our lives of obedience, Willimon speaks about the importance of our Sunday morning worship gatherings. He calls our worship assemblies “a matter of life and death.”

A couple of years ago, I was invited to preach in the congregation where a friend of mine serves. The congregation is located in the heart of one of our great cities. The congregation is entirely black people who live in the tenement houses in that part of the city. I arrived at eleven o’clock, expecting to participate in about an hour of worship. But I did not rise to preach until nearly twelve-thirty. There were hymns and gospel songs, a great deal of speaking, hand-clapping, singing. We did not have the benediction until nearly one-fifteen. I was exhausted.

“Why do black people stay in church so long?” I asked my friend as we went out to lunch. “Our worship never lasts much over an hour.”

He smiled. Then he explained, “Unemployment runs nearly 50 percent here. For our youth, the unemployment rate is much higher. That means that, when our people go about during the week, everything they see, everything they hear tells them, ‘You are a failure. You are nobody. You are nothing because you do not have a good job, you do not have a fine car, you have no money.’

“So I must gather them here, once a week, and get their heads straight. I get them together, here, in the church, and through the hymns, the prayers, the preaching say, ‘That is a lie. You are somebody. You are royalty! God has bought you with a price and he loves you as his Chosen People!’

“It takes me so long to get them straight because the world perverts them so terribly.”

Paganism is the air we breathe in this current world; consumerism is the water we drink; individualism and imperialism are the oxymoronic values that shape us. These things capture us, they convert our kids, they subvert us Christians. We live in a hostile place for discipleship. That’s what makes our congregations, our communities of faith, and our appointed times of corporate worship, a matter of life and death.

We must regularly speak together about God in a world that lives as if there is no God. We must talk to one another as beloved brothers and sisters in a world which encourages us to live as strangers. We must pray to God to give us what we can’t have by our own efforts in a world that teaches us we are self-sufficient and all-powerful. What we do together on Sundays matters a great deal.

Peace,

Allan

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