What an incredibly busy last couple of days and an even busier week ahead! We spent most of the weekend with my side of the family out in East Texas where my parents live in Liberty City, using about half the day Saturday to shop in Canton on the way back here to North Richland Hills. Keith had to teach his classes at Harding yesterday, but Rhonda’s family came back with us to see the house and worship with us Sunday at Legacy. Rhonda’s middle child, Caleb, is the sports nut in their family. And she’s constantly telling him to get rid of some of his sports junk and stop accumulating more sports junk. I brought them in to see my office here at the church building Sunday afternoon and all that did was provide Caleb with more ammunition. When he saw my Dallas Cowboys lamp that I got on my 12th birthday and the Super Bowl pennant from ’72 and the collector’s glasses I purchased in 1979, he became even more convinced that it was OK to hang onto all that stuff.

Good for you, Caleb. Don’t throw any of it away! Live the dream!

Carrie-Anne is teaching one of the three-year-old classes at the Legacy church day school this year and I was honored to be the first speaker at their weekly chapel services this morning. I’m having lunch with my good friend Paul Brownlow today, breakfast with David Byrnes Thursday morning, and dinner with the Roseberrys Thursday night. Friday morning I’m speaking at chapel at Fort Worth Christian (weird) and then we’re having dinner and attending the Dallas Christian – Fort Worth Christian football game that night with Andrew and Stephanie Brownlow and their kids. Give Away Day kicked off here at Legacy Sunday. And Carley’s birthday is Monday. She wants to go to Chuck E. Cheese. I’m trying to talk her out of it.

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I’m right smack dab in the middle of book #3 in the ACU Heart of the Restoration Series, Unveiling Glory: Visions of Christ’s Transforming Presence. In a chapter on Jesus’ earthly ministry and teachings, the authors make an interesting observation. They claim that we sometimes distort or downplay Jesus’ role as an example for us to follow.

“He is the founder of the church and the doorway into eternal life, not so much a model for our current behavior. Instead, the institutional features of the church take the lead, so that discipleship is defined in terms of meeting the conditions for membership and faithfully upholding the traditions of the institution. In direct defiance of Jesus’ teaching and example, matters such as adherence to specific worship forms become more important measures of faithfulness than whether or not one is showing mercy to those in need. The church’s vast resources are pledged to support and defend its traditions in such matters. Straining out the gnat of procedural details, we fall into danger of swallowing the camel of apathy towards the sick and wounded.”

There are probably none among us who don’t feel that this is a real threat to genuine discipleship to Jesus. And most, if not all, of us want to get as far away from the sectarian mindset as we can. We want to flee the old judgmental dynamic of the church. We want to avoid at all costs the arrogance of that attitude and legalistic atmosphere. And, rightfully so, we run away from those things.

But I’m afraid a lot of us are running backwards.

We’re so bent on distancing ourselves from those harmful aspects of the church that, while we’re running, we don’t take the time or the effort to turn around and watch where we’re going. Are we thinking as seriously and reflecting as deeply about where we’re running as we do about from what we’re running? Some of us are running away from legalism and church tradition — backwards — so fast that we could be heading right for the edge of a fatal cliff and not even realize it. We’re not looking for it. And we don’t see it.

The authors of Unveiling Glory, Jeff Childers and Frederick Aquino, address this very thing that I’ve been concerned about for some time.

“Ironically, strong currents of reaction against traditional preoccupation with the institution can produce a similar distortion of Jesus’ ministry. Some among us have felt the need to reject what they see as a religion of maintaining rules and regulations about procedural matters. They refuse to carry a Pharisaical yoke of legalism that burdens people unnecessarily and distracts them from pursuing a personal relationship with the Lord and cultivating matters of the heart. They yearn to experience the liberty of the Gospel. However, at times this impulse becomes so all-engrossing that it leads us to suppose that the freedom Jesus brings is an escape from our own traditions, from obedience, and from duty. Rather than understanding the Good News to be about deliverance from sin and the opportunity to serve others as slaves of God, we see it as delivering us from the bondage of our religious ancestors and from the oppressive burden of religious obligation.

People start to judge the spiritual vitality of churches based on how non-traditional they are in certain areas and how well they avoid creating uncomfortable feelings of guilt or obligation, rather than using the rigorous standards of servant spirituality that Jesus shows us. Taking up the anthem that ‘it is for freedom that Christ has set us free,’ we run the risk of using our freedom ‘to indulge the flesh’ rather than serving one another in love.”

Let’s do everything we can to separate ourselves from an arrogant, self-assured, legalistic mindset. Let’s do everything to flee that sort of thinking and acting within our brotherhood and in our communities. But let’s turn around and watch carefully where we’re going.

Peace,

Allan

Akibah, the great first century Jewish rabbi who lived and taught in Capernaum one generation after Jesus, said “The greatest sin is to teach a student to believe in God and not teach the student that God believes in him.”

When you understand the Jewish education system during the time of Jesus — the ages of the students, the steps in the education process, the expectations — it’s clear that most, if not all, of Jesus’ disciples were the ones who hadn’t made the cut. They were the ones who either were not able to memorize the entire Torah by the age of 12 or who had not made the grade in the Beth-Midrasch by the time they were 15. Most of them were already working, fishing, collecting taxes. These were not the merit scholars. There were no valedictorians in this group. They had disappointed their families and themselves.

And then Jesus walks up to them and says, “Come. Follow me.” Jesus tells these young men, “You can be like me.” Do you understand what it means to tell a C-student that you believe in him?

We’re always shocked by the Gospel accounts of the disciples dropping their nets immediately, at once, to follow Jesus. Luke goes out of his way to tell us they dropped everything, left it all, right there on the spot. Why are we surprised? If Luke’s chronology is correct, this rabbi Jesus had already raised the dead, cast out demons, and fed the five thousand. When he shows up and tells these young men, “You can be like me. You can follow me” they probably broke the world record in the half mile running home to tell their parents, “Jesus says I can follow him!”

Do you understand what it means to tell someone you believe in him?

In John 15, Jesus tells the disciples to go change the world. “And,” he says, “remember, you didn’t choose me. I chose you.”

When Peter is trying so hard to be just like Jesus and actually steps out of the boat and begins to walk on the water, just like his rabbi, he notices the wind and the waves and he begins to sink. Jesus reaches out and saves him and then says “oligopiste,” “little of faith,” why did you doubt?

What did Peter doubt? Who had Peter doubted? What was Jesus talking about? Did Jesus think Peter had doubted him? No. Jesus was still standing there, right on top of the water. He hadn’t sunk. He wasn’t sinking. Peter didn’t doubt Jesus.

He was doubting himself.

He was unsure if he could really be like Jesus, even with Jesus standing right there beside him.

And Jesus says, “Why?” Why do you doubt yourself?

Why don’t we believe we can be just like Jesus? Why don’t we really believe it?

He believes it. Why don’t we?

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Football season is here! Today! Right now! Oh, glorious day! You can tell how great it is because of all the exclamation points! Eleven college football games today and tonight, climaxing with the SEC matchup at 7:00 on ESPN between LSU and Mississippi State in Starkville. Forget the preseason finale tonight between the Vikings and Cowboys. The real football season, with games that count and outcomes that matter, is here!

Several of you have asked me to list all of the football players in the countdown to football season. I’ve done you one better. Starting today, you can go to the “99 Numbers” page and see all the players—from 1 to 99 — who helped us pass the time this summer in anticipation of football season. You can roll your cursor across the image to see the name of the player and the college and/or pro team where he had the success that earned him a spot on the list. And if you click on the image you’ll get the full size.

I must confess, counting down the days to football season with the jersey numbers served at least a couple of different purposes. Knowing I had to keep up with the commitment forced me to write every day. It worked. Now I’m in the habit. It also provided a bit of a hook for some of you who wouldn’t otherwise pay much attention to a preacher’s blog. I hope that part worked, too. I hope you’re in the habit.

Peace,

Allan