The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys

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Fulfilling the Law

August 18, 2025 / / 0 Comments

Here’s the last thing, I think, I’ll write about salvation and the law for a while. It’s a huge topic with lots of talking points, lots of opportunity to get into the weeds, and plenty of far-reaching ramifications. But I like to follow the lead of our Lord and boil it down to everything hanging on love. All the law and the prophets, everything God ever taught or ever thought, all of God’s plans for his people and his creation–it all hangs on love.

“Let no debt remain outstanding except the continuing debt to love one another, for the one who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law. The commandments, ‘Do not commit adultery,’ ‘Do not murder,’ ‘Do not steal,’ ‘Do not covet,’ and whatever other commandments there may be, are summed up in this one rule: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfillment of the law.” ~Romans 13:8-10

Here’s a bottom line deal for you. If you do not love everybody, then you have to deny all the most basic things all Christians believe. If I harshly criticize anybody, if I refuse to forgive anybody, if I discriminate in any way, if I ignore or neglect anybody, if I make any move to harm anyone for any reason, then I have to reject almost all the basic points of Christian belief.

We believe that all men and women are created by God in the image of God. All men and women. Period.

We believe our God loves all people. All people. Period.

We believe Jesus died on the cross because God wants all people to be forgiven and saved, including you and your neighbor, equally.

We believe in treating others the same way we want to be treated.

We believe our God calls us to show his divine love to all people everywhere–no exceptions.

Serving others in love keeps all the commands. Serving others in love makes all the beliefs real–not just something we know in our heads, but something we live with our lives, that changes us and fulfills the eternal will of our God.

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We were delighted to welcome Josh Ross to GCR Church this past weekend to train our adult Bible class teachers on “The Spirit Poured Out,” a twelve-week curriculum he wrote for us on the person, presence, and power of God’s Holy Spirit. Of course, it’s excellent. And I am beside myself with hope and anticipation for the conversations we’re going to have and God’s will we’re going to wrestle and the formation that’s going to happen in and through our congregation during the next three months.

I believe our church recognized in Josh what Carrie-Anne and I have known for years: his uncompromising commitment to our Lord and the ways of Christ and his unwavering love for God’s people. It’s infectious.

Carrie-Anne and I have known Josh and his family for more than 25 years. Josh’s dad, Rick, was the preacher at the Mesquite CofC when Carrie-Anne and I began worshiping and serving there in October 1999. Rick was the first preacher I really listened to, the first guy in a pulpit who connected the dots for me and, more than that, the first preacher whose life I noticed clearly reflected a commitment to Christlikeness. Josh’s mom, Beverly, became a mentor and friend for Carrie-Anne in ways that still profoundly resonate in Carrie-Anne’s walk with Jesus and in our marriage and family. Josh’s big sister Jenny and her husband David became very good friends of ours–I was driving to Houston with David to see the Astros and Giants on the morning of 9/11. Josh and his younger brother Jonathan were these two dynamic young men who had a fire for the Lord and a passion for discipleship and obvious gifts for speaking and leading in God’s Kingdom.  This was the setting–the time and place and people–God used to call me into congregational ministry.

The first time we went to the Tulsa Workshop, it was with Rick and Beverly and Jenny and David. And it was mind-blowing. Earth-shaking. Paradigm shattering. I started organizing  men’s retreats at Mesquite. I led a 24 Hours of Prayer at Mesquite. I taught that Room 201 Bible class. We sat behind Jason and Tiersa, next to Chris and Liz, in front of Brian and Terri. I led worship at Mesquite. We started that Second Saturday Servants. I rappelled out of a second-story air conditioning vent into the worship center for a VBS bit. The Four Horsemen made those vows to each other and our families and started those Wednesday night dinners and those Tuesday morning Bible studies. I started reading John Mark Hicks and C.S. Lewis. Those three years at that church were the most intensely formative times for Carrie-Anne and me in our discipleship to Jesus. That Mesquite church was a dysfunctional mess, but our gracious God used that church and those people at that time to transform me into a proclaimer of his Good News.

It’s not Josh’s fault, but in my mind and my heart he is forever connected to that time and place and people that still mean so much to me. So, I just absolutely love the guy. We had a blast hanging out together this weekend, and I know our church at GCR is going to be blessed for the next three months and beyond as we dive into his material on the Holy Spirit. As Josh told us several times, we don’t need a perfect understanding of the Holy Spirit, but we do need a working understanding.

I thank God for the gifts he’s given his servant Josh and for Josh’s eagerness to share those gifts with GCR this weekend. I thank God for the whole Ross family and the eternal impact they’ve had on me and my family. And I thank God for that Church of Christ in Mesquite.

Peace,

Allan

4-3

August 12, 2025 / / 0 Comments

“O Midland, Midland, if you had only known on this day what would bring you peace.”

I am stunned. And very, very sad. 

After the three-and-a-half hour meeting, several people asked me why I was stunned. I guess because I’m also naive. And maybe I still do not understand the depth and the power of the divisions in our city.

I am grateful to my fellow pastors and preachers in Midland who showed up to stand up for those in our community whose voices rarely get heard. And for other friends I’ve come to know and love , not just at GCR, but in this place Carrie-Anne and I now call home, who were also at the meeting tonight.

Lord, have mercy on us.

 

Continuing a Troubling Legacy

August 12, 2025 / / 4 Comments

I am troubled by the Midland School Board’s move to rename Legacy High School back to Lee. The board is meeting this evening and it feels like it’s a done deal.

The school was established in 1961 and named after Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general, as a protest against new federal laws banning segregation. In 2020, the name was finally changed to Legacy High School, in a move that many celebrated as cutting ties once and for all with the Confederate names and symbols. But now, five years later, a few new school board members are changing it back. The proposal is to name the school Midland Lee High School, instead of Robert E. Lee High School. A vote on the matter is scheduled for tonight.

I won’t respond here to this group’s claim that the name won’t be tied to the Confederate General, but only to our high school, exclusively the school’s history and nothing else. That is an insult to the intelligence of everyone who hears it.

I do want to address the other thing I’ve heard several times over the past couple of months: This move to rename the high school after Lee is not racially motivated, the African Americans in our community don’t see it as racist, Black people in Midland are not offended, they don’t really care. My question for the board is: Who would they complain to?

What if a middle-aged Black man drives past Lee High School every day on his way to and from work? Maybe his children go to this school. He sees Lee stickers on the back of every other pickup in Midland County. He sees Confederate flags flying out the back of some of those trucks and in front of some of the houses and ranches they belong to. He sees that name “Lee” and the history it represents every day. In the newspaper and on TV, on the sides of helmets and across the fronts of jerseys, on the wall of our restaurants and the sides of our buildings–every single day. If he hated that name and the symbols associated with it, if he found the name and the symbols to be an affront to his dignity and a source of deep pain, who would he complain to?

Oh, I see, you’re trying to put yourself in his shoes.
Yes. Yes, I am.

Shouldn’t we all be doing that? As a Christian speaking to mostly, I think, fellow Christians, isn’t that exactly what our Lord Jesus did? Isn’t that our calling as disciples of Christ, to empathize, to sympathize to walk alongside and understand?

Minorities–by the very definition of the word in conjunction with the broken ways of our world–African Americans, Hispanics, minorities, generally speaking, do not experience an equal status. In this country, because of past history and current structures and a thousand other complicating factors, minorities do not have the same opportunities. The playing field is not level. In our city, African Americans make up less than eight-percent of the population. They are marginalized. Who would they complain to? What could they possibly say? What power do they have? What choice do they have?

But they have complained. They have expressed their disgust with the name. They do speak often about what that name communicates to them.

My question for Christians who want to change the name back to Lee is: If you know how African Americans read that name, if you know the name and the symbols associated with it make minorities feel vulnerable and oppressed, why would you insist? Why would you fight with your words and your good name for a mascot or a logo that you know causes deep pain?

Scripture says be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. In that same Romans 12 context, the Bible says live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, it says, but be willing to associate with people of low position, people who don’t enjoy the same status or numbers or power. Christians treat others the way we want to be treated. We love our neighbors as ourselves. Christians who are seeking the attitude, or the mind, of Christ, the Bible says, consider the needs of others more important than their own.

Slippery slope arguments about erasing history and heritage are completely missing the point. The question for Christians is: Will you identify with the city that’s fading away or with the enduring city that’s coming? Will you love your neighbor more than you love a school name or a flag? Will you love your neighbor more than you love the history and heritage of the South? Will you love the African American men and women of our community more than you love the faded words on your 25-year-old diploma?

We’re known for a lot of things here in Midland. We are known as a people of great generosity. We go out of our way to sacrifice to help others, to give to others, to take care of others, to make others feel loved and like they belong. Can’t we apply those same guiding values and principles to how we name our high school? For the sake of others?

Minorities have a much different experience and viewpoint about life in our city than we do. Our Lord would try to put himself in their shoes. Actually, he did.

Peace,

Allan

Beyond the Law

August 11, 2025 / / 0 Comments

“In Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.” ~Galatians 5:6

We are not saved by obeying the law or observing the traditions or keeping the rules, we are saved by our faith in Christ alone. That’s the point of Paul’s letter to the churches in Galatia. And it’s one that bears much repeating.

Circumcision? Doesn’t count! Uncircumcision? Who cares! In Christ Jesus, those kinds of things don’t have any force. It doesn’t exercise any power.

Worship styles? Don’t count! Denominational differences? Who cares! Women’s roles, baptism methods, spiritual gifts–you name it! Small groups, Wednesday nights, lectionaries and missionaries, premillennial or amillennial, kitchens and KJVs–don’t give it any energy! Don’t waste your time. Don’t worry about it, don’t fight over it, and don’t divide over it. Why? Because it doesn’t count! The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. That’s it. Do we trust that, or not?

“There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful humans to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful humans, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us.” ~ Romans 8:1-4

God in Christ has fulfilled the entirety of the law’s purposes on our behalf. The whole point of the law and the rules has been fulfilled for us by Jesus. That’s the whole point of Jesus! Do we trust that or not?

The perfect Son of God, the one who’s never broken the law, took on your sin, he became your sin for you and took all of it to the cross. And when your sin is condemned in him, you become in God’s eyes like you’ve never sinned. Through his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus has taken care of absolutely everything to set you totally free from sin and death. Now, is your faith in that? Or is it in something else?

We spend so much energy debating worship styles and doctrinal positions and denominational differences, when there’s only one thing that matters. We argue about methods and traditions and structures and rules, when there’s only one thing that’s important. We get worked up over interpretations and translations and obligations, but only one thing counts.

You can only experience God’s freedom when you give all of yourself to the fact that your salvation has already been secured, that there’s nothing left to do, that it’s all been done. When you embrace that in faith, now you’re living in freedom. In Christ alone, you are free from your sins and anything that’s ever happened in your past. You’re free to stop worrying about yourself and your rights and your preferences and your understandings and to start loving and serving other people so that walls can be torn down and wounds can be healed. You’re not anxiously fretting about your standing with God, you’re not looking for proof of who’s in and who’s out. You are free! Free to become what God created you to be, what you always wanted to be, you just didn’t know what it was.

And whatever rules there are, whatever obligations remain, you are free to live above them and beyond them. You don’t worry about the law or the rules because your faith in Christ alone has you loving so much. Our faith expresses itself through love. And that makes the rules and laws irrelevant.

Here’s the best way to illustrate this:

There are laws in the State of Texas, and federal laws, that regulate how parents must treat their children. Child welfare laws. There are state and federally mandated requirements about food and nutrition, about not locking your kids in a closet; there are laws that prohibit physical and verbal abuse, laws regulating how much school my children get and their living conditions.

I have no idea what those laws are.

And you know what? I don’t care! I don’t. Why would I?

My deep, undying, committed, all-in love for my children has me so far beyond the letter of those laws, they don’t matter to me. I’m not under those laws. They don’t concern me. I’ve blown past all that. My love for my kids makes the law irrelevant. I’m free from those laws.

The Gospel truth is that you are saved because Jesus Christ has become for you your righteousness, holiness, and peace. You faith in him, and in that, compels you to love. It moves you so much that the law doesn’t matter. It transforms your heart and your head, it changes your principles and priorities, so the rules no longer matter. The Gospel truth and your faith in Christ alone moves you to defend the weak and stand with the accused and speak up for the oppressed. It motivates you to give and forgive with abandon. It empowers you to let go and live the way God lives, with abundant grace and giving everybody the benefit of the doubt.

That’s the only thing that counts.

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Carrie-Anne and I spent this past weekend up in Tulsa with Elliott and Samuel who turned one-month-old on Friday. We spent a little bit of time visiting with their parents, too. As always, you can click on the pictures to get the full size. You should especially click on that first one. Look at these guys!

Peace,
Allan

The Law Doesn’t Save

August 10, 2025 / / 0 Comments

“I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law or by believing what you heard? Does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you because you observe the law or because you believed what you heard?” ~ Galatians 3:2, 5

I love Whataburger. I could eat at Whataburger twice a day for three weeks and be just fine. My lunch Whataburger is on Andrews Highway here in Midland and they know me when I walk in the door. They know my order. Number One with cheese and everything on it, extra onions. Unless the Pico de Gallo burger is back for a limited time. I ease into my corner booth with that burger and those piping hot fries and spicy ketchup and the latest issue of Texas Monthly or Christianity today and I’m good for like five hours. I love Whataburger. It’s easy and it makes me happy.

But it’s not good for me. It’s killing me. I know it, my doctor knows it, my family knows it. Whataburger is bad for me.

So Carrie-Anne lays down this law: No more Whataburger. Eat at Subway. Get the six-inch Black Forest Ham on wheat. No chips. Get the apple slices. You know, that’s a really good rule. It’s a good law. That commandment is holy and righteous and good. If I eat at Subway, it’ll benefit me greatly. I’ll enjoy a greater peace with my body and the freedom to tuck in my shirts. I should not eat at Whataburger.

But in the middle of the day, when it’s time for lunch, I get in my truck and…

If I go right out of the church parking lot, Subway is just right there. But if I go left and jump on Andrews Highway, Whataburger is just right there.

“I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do, I do not do, but what I hate to do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good… For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do–this I keep on doing! When I want to do good, evil is right there with me.  ~ Romans 7:15-21

I can’t keep the law because I’m hungry. And human. That doesn’t mean the law is bad. It means I’m bad. And faulty. And weak. Carrie-Anne’s going to get a notification and she’ll see the receipt even before I can get back to the church building. I know all this, but I do it anyway. The law is not bad, the rules are not bad–it’s just that the rules can’t save me. No matter how good and holy and righteous the law is, the law can never save me.

“What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord!” ~ Romans 7:24-25

Christ Jesus is the only way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through him. The grace of God and the love of Jesus is the only way that works. So, there’s only one thing that matters.

“The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.” ~ Galatians 5:6

Peace,

Allan

Someone I Love

August 6, 2025 / / 0 Comments

From C.S. Lewis

“There is someone I love, even though I don’t approve of what he does. There is someone I accept, though some of his thoughts and actions revolt me. There is someone I forgive, though he hurts the people I love the most. That person is me.”

Peace,
Allan

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