Preparations for the Last Supper. But first, the palm procession.
Jesus tosses tables in the temple once he gets into Jerusalem. Why? Loan sharks, dove merchants(they sold sacrifices for the poorer folks--likely way overcharging, like inner city convenience stores and other 'hood merchants today). Children got it, others, not so much. Left town for the night, disgusted.
No fruit on the fig tree. Won't we be known by the fruit produced in our lives? He curses the tree and says no fruit ever again. Notice that this isn't an indictment on whether or not the disciples' lives produce fruit, but whether or not they, through prayer, are able to do what Jesus does--and more. That's a power we ought not disabuse--to deny someone the ability to ever produce fruit, would be an abuse of that power, I would think. "If you embrace the kingdom life and don't doubt God, you'll not only do minor feats like this, but more--huge obstacles!
Credentials. Who authorized you to teach here? Who authorized John's baptism? Answering question with question; not providing easy, soundbite answers. Think about it! And be careful not to self-incriminate!
Which son did what the father asked? "Even when you saw their changed lives, you didn't care enough to change and believe him."
"God's kingdom will be taken back from you and handed over to a people who live out the kingdom life. Whoever stumbles on this Stone gets shattered; whoever the Stone falls on gets smashed."...Many people held Jesus to be a prophet of God.
Are we rebellious tenants--stewards trying to be owners? Even if we are, God hasn't left us alone, despite our sin. God is still here in love and forgiveness, exercising his gracious rule over our lives. EP: "Warning: If you refuse to acknowledge the ownership of God and your position as a steward of life, there will be no meaning or beauty or fullness in anything you do. Even the marvelous wonders of material things-material created by God-won't give you happiness. You'll descend into a downward spiral of neurotic anxiety and unhappy pleasure seeking, as constant denial of God's central place won't get rid of God. The point of the stewardship story is this: God wants us to enjoy all that he has given us. But we can't do it unless we enjoy God at the center. Every joy radiates from that central joy, just as the rays of life-giving light radiate from the sun."
Wedding banquet. Zan Holmes story-everyone come! Extreme banquet, but folks are too busy, think they got a better offer. Invite anyone you find to the banquet-everyone they laid eyes on: good and bad, regardless. Yet one is kicked out for improper dress. Is that where we've gotten the church dress code?
Ep: "God has invited us to come to him and has prepared a feast for us to share. And we take it lightly. We make excuses. Or we're so far out of touch with reality that we actually scoff at or even destroy the messengers who deliver the invitation. God is the reality with whom we have to deal. Life is the banquet God's prepared."
"Man was not prepared for the banquet as he was dressed inappropriately. Probably not literal dress, but spiritual dress--are we internally transformed for God's banquet? "We're in the very presence of God, sharing the very acts and words of God, and yet we treat them just like any other words and acts. They're just another part of the routine of the day, neither less nor more important. We read the bible with the same detached boredom with which we skin the newspaper. We sometimes come to church with the same combination of duty and reluctance that gets us to a PTA meeting. We pray with the same casual indifference that we use when talking to the checkout clerk in the supermarket--the bare, monosyllabic minimum that will get us our daily bread. This is both the irony and the tragedy of the parable. And its both the irond and tragedy of our own lives as well." EP
"Give Caesar what's his, and give God what is his." trick answer, too, as if everything is God's...and God takes care of all, won't God take care of Caesar, too? Never thought of it that way...chewing.
"The living God defines himself not as the God of the dead but of the living."
What's the most important command in God's law: "Love the Lord your God with all your passion, prayer and intelligence. Love others as well as you love yourself; These two commands are pegs; everything in God's Law and the prophets hangs from them."
"Whose son is the Christ?"
Romans 1-3
A devoted slave of Jesus Christ on assignment...You are who you are through the gift and call of Jesus Christ! I thank God for every one of you. You have as much to give me as I do to you.
This extraordinary message of God's powerful plan to rescue everyone who trusts him, starting with the Jews and then right on to everyone else.
"People knew God perfectly well, but when they didn't treat God like God, refusing to worship God, they trivialized themselves into silliness and confusion so that there was neither sense nor direction left in their lives. They pretended to know it all but were illiterate regarding life. They traded the glory of God who holds the whole world in his hands for cheap figurines you can buy at any roadside stand." "If that's what you want, that's what you get." Do you worship the God who made you, or the god you made?
What do you think of God withholding blessing, presence, conversation, and letting us run loose, spitting in God's face?
EP: Sin isn't a skeleton in the closet that we surround with restrictions to keep it in place. It's a defective relationship with God. If we aren't convinced of the nature of that defect in our lives, it's unlikely we'll accept the remedy for the defect. The failure to treat God as God, to honor him and thank him, Paul calls Sin, with a capital S, from which all lowercase sins ultimately proceed. If we, having read Paul's gospel, were to still think that sin is sensuality or vice or crudeness or any of the bad things we do, we would have missed the point completely. Paul wants us to understand that those things are derivative. Sin, he asserts, is that original rebellion against God, that basic act of leaving God, that foundational failure to treat God as the Almighty. This disaffection from God, called Sin, is humanity's despair. But when Paul writes of it, it's anything but despair, for by tracing our sins to their source, he prepares for the solution. That solution has nothing to do with self-help and everything to do with a Savior."
God is kind but not soft. Great section headline. "Every time you criticize someone, you condemn yourself." God holds us to what we've done--can't distract God by pointing at others. "In kindness, God takes us by the hand and leads us into a radical life-cahnge."
"If you sin without knowing what you're doing, God takes that into account. But if you sin knowing full well what you're doing, that's a different story entirely. Merely hearing God's law is a waste of time if you don't do what God commands. Doing, not hearing, is what makes the difference with God."
Confirm truth by obedience, as God's law is woven into the very fabric of our lives (I thought that was cotton). There is something deep within that echoes God's yes and no, right and wrong.
Religion can't save you. Can I get an "Amen"? "It's because of you Jews (religious people) that outsiders are down on God." And we think this is a 21st century thing?! Better to keep God's law uncircumcised than to break it circumcised. You become a Jew by who you are. It's the mark of God on your heart, not a knife on your skin, that makes a Jew. Recognition comes from God.
"God keeps God's word even when the whole world is lying through its teeth." There may be hope for us yet!
"All of us, whether insiders or outsiders, start out in identical condition, as sinners." We're all in the same boat. "Our involvement with God's revelation doesn't put us right with God. What it does is force us to face our complicity in everyone else's sin."
Out of sheer generosity God put us in right standing with himself. A pure gift.
Justification: God putting us in right standing with himself. Jesus comes into the courtroom and the court and word are transformed. The court room switches from a site for cross examination to a place of creation--of becoming new creations in Christ. Sin and righteousness are bridged by God's justification. Begins with justice and ends by making us just. Justice is served. We're free.
Insider claims are canceled, too. God doesn't respond to what we do; we respond to what God does. Our lives get in step with God. God is the God of outsider non-Jews as well as insider Jews. How could it be otherwise since there is only one God? God sets right all who welcome his action and enter into it, both those who follow our religious system and those who have never heard of our religion. What God does. We put the entire way of life into practice and confirm what God does.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Day 10: Matthew 19-20; Acts 28
Matthew 19-20
Divorce. Pharisees always testing Jesus on the law. Divorce provided as a concession to your hard-heartedness, but not part of God's ideal plan. "Not everyone is mature enough to live a married life. It requires a certain aptitude and grace. Marriage isn't for everyone...if you're capable of growing into the largeness of marriage, do it."
"Let the little children alone, don't prevent them from coming to me. God's kingdom is made up of people like these."
"Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?" Do we see salvation as transactional? A give to get? That is the sort of question asked here. What must I do to get? It is a question we ask daily either explicitly or implicitly. "God is the One who is good. Do what God tells you if you want to enter eternal life. " I'm good with the big ten, at least according to the letter of the law--generally-could honor my parents more-- not OK with Jesus' "but I tell you's". If I read the list in v. 19 and remember what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, I'm not doing so hot. Surely Jesus' instruction to "Go sell your possessions" falls in the category of Jesus' reframing and tightening of the OT laws, too. Crestfallen, he walked away. Lord, help me not walk away. Instead, help me submit again, and again, and again, until you have made me what you want me to be. Gulp.
"Then who has any chance at all?" "No chance if you think you can pull it off yourself (What must I do?). Every chance in the world if you trust God to do it." "We left everything and followed you. What do we get out of it?" Lord, keep me from those thoughts. Give me patience and perseverance to trust in your timing, your ordering, your faithfulness.
The great reversal. We don't talk about that too much, do we?
Workers in the vineyard. "It's not fair." Jesus doesn't call us to an ethic of fairness, a kingdom of fair. It's reversal, and it can be a bitter taste. Jesus changes the value system. He values us because we are, not because of our salary or vocation or self-image based on the first two. We all get treated generously by God.
"Can't I do what I want with my own money?" Can't I give as I see fit? Not reward, but give. Not evaluate, but give. Not punish, but give. Not lecture, but give. Not sort out and assign places, but give. Each person can be valued as God values us. "I decided to give to the one who came last the same as you." You are needed and you are valued. God calls you; you are significant; God gives you generous gifts and you are esteemed. Treated with dignity and grace, no matter when you got in on the work. "The moment they decided to listen to what God said to them and pay attention to how God valued them-not to what others said about them or how they felt about themselves-they were on the way to getting their act together. The moment you decide that, you will, too." EP
Talks of himself in the third person: The Son of Man. Give my sons the honored seats at your table. Are you able to do what I'm going to do? You will, but I've got no say on where you sit. Can't do it. God picks those. Posturing for position. Difficult to have groups in which this does not take place.
Two blind men. "Master, have mercy on us!" "What do you want from me?" What do you want from Jesus? Do you believe that Jesus can do for you what you ask? "What do you want from me?"
Acts 28
Extreme hospitality provided to Paul and crew by the Malta people. Paul snake bit--not a punishment for his evil--poisonous snake didn't harm him. god? Paul heals Pubius' father. Others were healed, too. 3 months on Malta. Traveled on and arrived in Rome. Paul was two years in a guest house during which time he welcomed all who came to see him, preached the Kingdom of God, and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ. He turned his house into a church by doing those three things: Welcoming, preaching, and teaching. EP: Welcoming-the hospitable acceptance of one another. Preaching-the urgent announcement that this is God's world and God runs it. Teaching-the careful presentation of Jesus as the one who will do for us what we can't do for ourselves. These things took place as an overflow of Paul's heart.
Paul claims Israel's side, always and forever. A hostage for hope, not for doom. Paul invited to speak to the Jewish leaders about God's kingdom and Jesus. Some were persuaded , but others refused to believe a word of it. Christian proclamation receives a mixed reaction. Isaiah 6:9-10-God's people don't always have the capacity (or desire) to hear. "So they won't have to deal with me face-to-face and let me heal them." Non-Jewish outsiders are next on the list, and they'll receive with open arms!
"Paul's door was always open." Is yours? Is ours? That's the end of the story of the early church. "Open" is the last word. Open.
So, how do we who call ourselves the church, the body of Christ in the world, ones who desire that "Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven", continue the story? Much has been written about Acts 29, and that being the chapter of our lives. So what's our story? What's your story? How is God seeking to change either, so that we excel in welcoming, preaching, and teaching?
Divorce. Pharisees always testing Jesus on the law. Divorce provided as a concession to your hard-heartedness, but not part of God's ideal plan. "Not everyone is mature enough to live a married life. It requires a certain aptitude and grace. Marriage isn't for everyone...if you're capable of growing into the largeness of marriage, do it."
"Let the little children alone, don't prevent them from coming to me. God's kingdom is made up of people like these."
"Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?" Do we see salvation as transactional? A give to get? That is the sort of question asked here. What must I do to get? It is a question we ask daily either explicitly or implicitly. "God is the One who is good. Do what God tells you if you want to enter eternal life. " I'm good with the big ten, at least according to the letter of the law--generally-could honor my parents more-- not OK with Jesus' "but I tell you's". If I read the list in v. 19 and remember what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, I'm not doing so hot. Surely Jesus' instruction to "Go sell your possessions" falls in the category of Jesus' reframing and tightening of the OT laws, too. Crestfallen, he walked away. Lord, help me not walk away. Instead, help me submit again, and again, and again, until you have made me what you want me to be. Gulp.
"Then who has any chance at all?" "No chance if you think you can pull it off yourself (What must I do?). Every chance in the world if you trust God to do it." "We left everything and followed you. What do we get out of it?" Lord, keep me from those thoughts. Give me patience and perseverance to trust in your timing, your ordering, your faithfulness.
The great reversal. We don't talk about that too much, do we?
Workers in the vineyard. "It's not fair." Jesus doesn't call us to an ethic of fairness, a kingdom of fair. It's reversal, and it can be a bitter taste. Jesus changes the value system. He values us because we are, not because of our salary or vocation or self-image based on the first two. We all get treated generously by God.
"Can't I do what I want with my own money?" Can't I give as I see fit? Not reward, but give. Not evaluate, but give. Not punish, but give. Not lecture, but give. Not sort out and assign places, but give. Each person can be valued as God values us. "I decided to give to the one who came last the same as you." You are needed and you are valued. God calls you; you are significant; God gives you generous gifts and you are esteemed. Treated with dignity and grace, no matter when you got in on the work. "The moment they decided to listen to what God said to them and pay attention to how God valued them-not to what others said about them or how they felt about themselves-they were on the way to getting their act together. The moment you decide that, you will, too." EP
Talks of himself in the third person: The Son of Man. Give my sons the honored seats at your table. Are you able to do what I'm going to do? You will, but I've got no say on where you sit. Can't do it. God picks those. Posturing for position. Difficult to have groups in which this does not take place.
Two blind men. "Master, have mercy on us!" "What do you want from me?" What do you want from Jesus? Do you believe that Jesus can do for you what you ask? "What do you want from me?"
Acts 28
Extreme hospitality provided to Paul and crew by the Malta people. Paul snake bit--not a punishment for his evil--poisonous snake didn't harm him. god? Paul heals Pubius' father. Others were healed, too. 3 months on Malta. Traveled on and arrived in Rome. Paul was two years in a guest house during which time he welcomed all who came to see him, preached the Kingdom of God, and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ. He turned his house into a church by doing those three things: Welcoming, preaching, and teaching. EP: Welcoming-the hospitable acceptance of one another. Preaching-the urgent announcement that this is God's world and God runs it. Teaching-the careful presentation of Jesus as the one who will do for us what we can't do for ourselves. These things took place as an overflow of Paul's heart.
Paul claims Israel's side, always and forever. A hostage for hope, not for doom. Paul invited to speak to the Jewish leaders about God's kingdom and Jesus. Some were persuaded , but others refused to believe a word of it. Christian proclamation receives a mixed reaction. Isaiah 6:9-10-God's people don't always have the capacity (or desire) to hear. "So they won't have to deal with me face-to-face and let me heal them." Non-Jewish outsiders are next on the list, and they'll receive with open arms!
"Paul's door was always open." Is yours? Is ours? That's the end of the story of the early church. "Open" is the last word. Open.
So, how do we who call ourselves the church, the body of Christ in the world, ones who desire that "Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven", continue the story? Much has been written about Acts 29, and that being the chapter of our lives. So what's our story? What's your story? How is God seeking to change either, so that we excel in welcoming, preaching, and teaching?
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Day 9--Matthew 17-18; Acts 25-27
Transfiguration. Sunlight pouring from Jesus' face on the mountain with Peter, James, John, Elijah and Moses. "This is my Son, marked by my love, focus of my delight. Listen to him." "Don't be afraid." right. I'll try? "Elijah has already come, but they didn't know him when they saw him. They treated him like dirt, the same way they are about to treat the Son of Man." Jesus metamorphosized, transformed--"the reality that was inside of Jesus got outside of him so the disciples could see it." (EP) Be changed from the inside out. Same words are used to describe our transformation as describe Jesus' transfiguration on the mountain. Awesome.
Disciples couldn't do anything for man's son who goes out of his mind. "No sense of God. No focus to your lives. How long do I have to put up with this?"
Why couldn't we do it? "Because you're not taking God seriously. If you did, there is nothing you would not be able to tackle."
Taxes.
Who gets the highest rank? "Unless you return to square one and start over like children, you're not even going to get a look at the kingdom, let alone get in. Whoever becomes simple and elemental again, like this child, will rank high in God's kingdom. What's more, when you receive the childlike on my account, it's the same as receiving me...Watch that you don't treat a single one of these believers arrogantly. You realize, don't you, that their personal angels are constantly in touch with my Father in heaven?"
Work it out between you. Conflict management. Gossip stopping. Relationship building. Hard.
"If a fellow believer hurts you, go and tell him--work it out between the two of you. If he listens, you've made a friend. If he won't listen, take one or two others along so that the presence of witnesses will keep things honest, and try again. If he still won't listen, tell the church. If he won't listen to the church, you'll have to start over from scratch, confront him with the need for repentance, and offer again God's forgiving love." Too often we fail one another and we fail the community of believers when we allow gossip to go unchecked--when we fail to ask one who is talking poorly of another, "Have to talked to her/him about this?" Oh, that we might grow up and honor God with our disagreements! Unchecked gossip is a metastatic cancer in the body of Christ. Churches have to make allowances for weakness and sin. We will disappoint one another. Even tick each other off. It's how we handle those times that reflects on our understanding of and obedience to God's ways.
Forgiveness. King shows mercy. Debtor released. Released debtor turns around and imprisons one who owes him, failing at extending the same mercy that was extended to him. Released debtor "caught" by king and re-imprisoned for his lack of forgiveness and mercy.
Acts 25-27
New governor/ruler, new attempts to discredit our enemy, in this case, Paul. Festus tries to appeal to lower Jews and take trial back to Jerusalem. Paul petitions upward instead knowing the accusations are baseless, to Caesar. First Paul is brought before the visiting King Agrippa. The more Paul tells his story, the more details we get about his Pharisaic days, about his conversion, about his change in understanding.
"I'm sending you off to open the eyes of the outsiders so they can see the difference between dark and light, and choose light, see the difference between Satan and God, and choose God. I'm sending you off to present my offer of sins forgiven, and a place in the family, inviting them into the company of those who begin real living by believing in me." (Jesus to Saul/Paul) "What could I do? I became an obedient believer on the spot!" Oh, that it were that easy!
Jews are mad about this "whole world" dimension--they want to keep God for themselves. Festus tells Paul he's crazy. Agrippa is almost swayed: "Keep this up much longer and you'll make a Christian out of me." "There's nothing in this man deserving prison, let alone death...but now he's got to get his hearing before Caesar."
Paul invaded the court room with a message of the gospel--he preached, and attempted to persuade King Agrippa with the gospel.
EP: The best defense is a good offense. What the world needs is not evidence for the deity of Christ or arguments for the existence of God. What it needs, and what will bring it to its knees in adoration, is a confrontation with a man to whom Christ means everything. We don't need to defend God. God can handle that. What we do need is to live in obedience to God and enter the world with a confidence and enthusiasm that spring from having our lives centered on God."
27: 35-38--Paul has his own loaves and fishes miracle as he feeds the ship's crew after a 14 day fast filled with threats of capsize and death. Everyone made it to shore safely, despite hopelessness that had overtaken them. "Don't give up...take heart."
Disciples couldn't do anything for man's son who goes out of his mind. "No sense of God. No focus to your lives. How long do I have to put up with this?"
Why couldn't we do it? "Because you're not taking God seriously. If you did, there is nothing you would not be able to tackle."
Taxes.
Who gets the highest rank? "Unless you return to square one and start over like children, you're not even going to get a look at the kingdom, let alone get in. Whoever becomes simple and elemental again, like this child, will rank high in God's kingdom. What's more, when you receive the childlike on my account, it's the same as receiving me...Watch that you don't treat a single one of these believers arrogantly. You realize, don't you, that their personal angels are constantly in touch with my Father in heaven?"
Work it out between you. Conflict management. Gossip stopping. Relationship building. Hard.
"If a fellow believer hurts you, go and tell him--work it out between the two of you. If he listens, you've made a friend. If he won't listen, take one or two others along so that the presence of witnesses will keep things honest, and try again. If he still won't listen, tell the church. If he won't listen to the church, you'll have to start over from scratch, confront him with the need for repentance, and offer again God's forgiving love." Too often we fail one another and we fail the community of believers when we allow gossip to go unchecked--when we fail to ask one who is talking poorly of another, "Have to talked to her/him about this?" Oh, that we might grow up and honor God with our disagreements! Unchecked gossip is a metastatic cancer in the body of Christ. Churches have to make allowances for weakness and sin. We will disappoint one another. Even tick each other off. It's how we handle those times that reflects on our understanding of and obedience to God's ways.
Forgiveness. King shows mercy. Debtor released. Released debtor turns around and imprisons one who owes him, failing at extending the same mercy that was extended to him. Released debtor "caught" by king and re-imprisoned for his lack of forgiveness and mercy.
Acts 25-27
New governor/ruler, new attempts to discredit our enemy, in this case, Paul. Festus tries to appeal to lower Jews and take trial back to Jerusalem. Paul petitions upward instead knowing the accusations are baseless, to Caesar. First Paul is brought before the visiting King Agrippa. The more Paul tells his story, the more details we get about his Pharisaic days, about his conversion, about his change in understanding.
"I'm sending you off to open the eyes of the outsiders so they can see the difference between dark and light, and choose light, see the difference between Satan and God, and choose God. I'm sending you off to present my offer of sins forgiven, and a place in the family, inviting them into the company of those who begin real living by believing in me." (Jesus to Saul/Paul) "What could I do? I became an obedient believer on the spot!" Oh, that it were that easy!
Jews are mad about this "whole world" dimension--they want to keep God for themselves. Festus tells Paul he's crazy. Agrippa is almost swayed: "Keep this up much longer and you'll make a Christian out of me." "There's nothing in this man deserving prison, let alone death...but now he's got to get his hearing before Caesar."
Paul invaded the court room with a message of the gospel--he preached, and attempted to persuade King Agrippa with the gospel.
EP: The best defense is a good offense. What the world needs is not evidence for the deity of Christ or arguments for the existence of God. What it needs, and what will bring it to its knees in adoration, is a confrontation with a man to whom Christ means everything. We don't need to defend God. God can handle that. What we do need is to live in obedience to God and enter the world with a confidence and enthusiasm that spring from having our lives centered on God."
27: 35-38--Paul has his own loaves and fishes miracle as he feeds the ship's crew after a 14 day fast filled with threats of capsize and death. Everyone made it to shore safely, despite hopelessness that had overtaken them. "Don't give up...take heart."
Monday, September 27, 2010
Day 8: Matthew 15 & 16; Acts 22-24
Pharisees to Jesus: "Why do your disciples play fast and loose with the rules?"
Jesus to Pharisees: "Why do you use your rules to play fast and loose with God's commands?"
Is your heart in it? Do you mean it when you worship God? Or do you use God as a cover for "whatever suits your fancy"?
"It's not what you swallow that pollutes your life, but what you vomit up."
"You, too?" Jesus to Peter, when Peter joins the ranks of the not understanding. "It's from the heart that we vomit up evil arguments, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, lies, and cussing. That's what pollutes. Eating or not eating certain foods, washing or not washing your hands--that's neither here nor there."
Jesus and the Canaanite woman. Disturbing a bit. Why? Because Jesus casts away one who is asking for help. Jesus was rude and silent...but in the silence, was converted, if you will. Jesus didn't answer her first request. He didn't reject it, either. He was silent. And the silence was cleansing of the self-seeking part of her. In the silence, the woman got bare and simply said to Jesus, "Help me." God's silence gives us an atmosphere in which to change our prayers, our position, our petitions, to make them more simple and basic. When Jesus is silent, he is still listening. When he rebukes, he is still loving.
Feeding with 7 loaves. "How much bread do we have?" Do you answer honestly, or do you hold back? (Acts 5, Ananais and Sapphira).
Bad yeast works through a whole batch of dough and pollutes a whole people/harvest/batch. "You find it easy enough to forecast the weather, but can't read the signs of the times." Isn't this a call to prophetic witness, and publicly reading the signs of the times? Don't teach the Sadducee/Pharisee kind of teaching.
"Who do you say I am?" What is it about your relationship with Jesus Christ that others can't live without? Do you have an answer for either question? Jesus. The Christ. The one who brought me back to life, reminded me who I was, when I was lost, unsure of a future or where to turn. Jesus reclaimed me and restored me and breathed life back in me so that I could see myself in God's world picture as opposed to the so very small picture that had become my job, my vocation, and all I could see of my life. Who do you say Jesus is? Seminal question for we who follow.
"Now I'm going to tell you who you really are, Peter." That's what Jesus did for me...told me I wasn't washed up, hadn't failed, still had value and worth (even though my "stuff" said I had, interiorly I didn't think I did).
A yes on earth is a yes in heaven. A no on earth is a no in heaven.
Simon Peter is such an unlikely character upon whom God would build the church. Gives the rest of us hope. Also gives us each the inability to disqualify ourselves from playing a part. If Simon could be used, surely all of us!
"Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat; I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. What kind of deal is it to get everything you want but lose yourself? What could you ever trade your soul for?
Acts 22-24
Paul's speech in Jerusalem. He spoke in their language, so they quieted down and could understand. Claimed Rabbi Gamaliel. Passionately on God's side, as you all are. Tells story of his persecuting followers of ' the Way,' and of his conversion on the way into Damascus. Crowd got ticked. Captured by centurians, spread eagle prepared for whipping. "Do you always treat Romans this way, without a fair trial?" Paul was born a Roman citizen, didn't have to pay for it as the captain had. Paul didn't speak with anger or vengeance. He didn't defend himself from the charges. He reviewed his past--using that as material for the future. He talked about his conversion, the invasion of God into his present. Then he talked about his release for the future, to go to the Gentiles, to share his life and the life of Christ with all men, wherever they may be and whatever their racial nature. It was Paul's story.
Clear-conscience Paul, clear before God. Violent conflict in the council breaks out between the Pharisees and Sadducees. Paul sent to cell for safety, visited by Master and told, "Good job." Now do it in Rome.
Seditious sect called Nazarenes. Could we be accused of sedition because of the way we proclaim our faith?
Governor Felix. "I serve and worship the same God served and worshiped by all our ancestors and embrace everything written in all our Scriptures. And I admit to living in hopeful anticipation that God will raise the dead, both the good and the bad. If that's my crime, my accusers are just as guilty as I am.
OH MY GOSH! Paul is a universalist! Or could be a universalist. God will raise the good and the bad. What's up with that? "Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus." Could it be?! Even Paul thought that...Paul, whose letters are used to condemn and divide? Holy Schmoly!
My accusers didn't show. You see, they are cowards. "It's because I believe in the resurrection that I've been hauled into this court! Does that sound like grounds for a criminal case?"
EP: "The trials in Acts 24-26 force us, if we're to stay true to the story we're reading, to give up the notion that the Christian community can catch the admiring eye of the world if we just live rightly and obediently. We have ample documentation by now to disabuse us of such thinking. God's revelation is rejected far more often than it is accepted, is dismissed by far more people than embrace it, and has been either attacked or ignored by every major culture or civilization in which it has given its witness: magnificent Egypt, fierce Assyria, beautiful Babylon, artistic Greece, political Rome, Enlightenment France, Nazi Germany, Renaissance Italy, Marxist Russia, Maoist China, and pursuit-of-happiness America. The community of God's people has survived in all of these cultures and civilizations but always as a minority, always marginal to the mainstream, never statistically significant.
"This gives us pause. If we, as the continuing company of Jesus, have achieved an easy accommodation with our society and culture, how did we manage to pull off what Jesus and his community of followers failed to accomplish? How has it come to pass that after 20 centuries of rejections, we assume that human acclaim is tantamount to divine approval."
Jesus to Pharisees: "Why do you use your rules to play fast and loose with God's commands?"
Is your heart in it? Do you mean it when you worship God? Or do you use God as a cover for "whatever suits your fancy"?
"It's not what you swallow that pollutes your life, but what you vomit up."
"You, too?" Jesus to Peter, when Peter joins the ranks of the not understanding. "It's from the heart that we vomit up evil arguments, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, lies, and cussing. That's what pollutes. Eating or not eating certain foods, washing or not washing your hands--that's neither here nor there."
Jesus and the Canaanite woman. Disturbing a bit. Why? Because Jesus casts away one who is asking for help. Jesus was rude and silent...but in the silence, was converted, if you will. Jesus didn't answer her first request. He didn't reject it, either. He was silent. And the silence was cleansing of the self-seeking part of her. In the silence, the woman got bare and simply said to Jesus, "Help me." God's silence gives us an atmosphere in which to change our prayers, our position, our petitions, to make them more simple and basic. When Jesus is silent, he is still listening. When he rebukes, he is still loving.
Feeding with 7 loaves. "How much bread do we have?" Do you answer honestly, or do you hold back? (Acts 5, Ananais and Sapphira).
Bad yeast works through a whole batch of dough and pollutes a whole people/harvest/batch. "You find it easy enough to forecast the weather, but can't read the signs of the times." Isn't this a call to prophetic witness, and publicly reading the signs of the times? Don't teach the Sadducee/Pharisee kind of teaching.
"Who do you say I am?" What is it about your relationship with Jesus Christ that others can't live without? Do you have an answer for either question? Jesus. The Christ. The one who brought me back to life, reminded me who I was, when I was lost, unsure of a future or where to turn. Jesus reclaimed me and restored me and breathed life back in me so that I could see myself in God's world picture as opposed to the so very small picture that had become my job, my vocation, and all I could see of my life. Who do you say Jesus is? Seminal question for we who follow.
"Now I'm going to tell you who you really are, Peter." That's what Jesus did for me...told me I wasn't washed up, hadn't failed, still had value and worth (even though my "stuff" said I had, interiorly I didn't think I did).
A yes on earth is a yes in heaven. A no on earth is a no in heaven.
Simon Peter is such an unlikely character upon whom God would build the church. Gives the rest of us hope. Also gives us each the inability to disqualify ourselves from playing a part. If Simon could be used, surely all of us!
"Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat; I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. What kind of deal is it to get everything you want but lose yourself? What could you ever trade your soul for?
Acts 22-24
Paul's speech in Jerusalem. He spoke in their language, so they quieted down and could understand. Claimed Rabbi Gamaliel. Passionately on God's side, as you all are. Tells story of his persecuting followers of ' the Way,' and of his conversion on the way into Damascus. Crowd got ticked. Captured by centurians, spread eagle prepared for whipping. "Do you always treat Romans this way, without a fair trial?" Paul was born a Roman citizen, didn't have to pay for it as the captain had. Paul didn't speak with anger or vengeance. He didn't defend himself from the charges. He reviewed his past--using that as material for the future. He talked about his conversion, the invasion of God into his present. Then he talked about his release for the future, to go to the Gentiles, to share his life and the life of Christ with all men, wherever they may be and whatever their racial nature. It was Paul's story.
Clear-conscience Paul, clear before God. Violent conflict in the council breaks out between the Pharisees and Sadducees. Paul sent to cell for safety, visited by Master and told, "Good job." Now do it in Rome.
Seditious sect called Nazarenes. Could we be accused of sedition because of the way we proclaim our faith?
Governor Felix. "I serve and worship the same God served and worshiped by all our ancestors and embrace everything written in all our Scriptures. And I admit to living in hopeful anticipation that God will raise the dead, both the good and the bad. If that's my crime, my accusers are just as guilty as I am.
OH MY GOSH! Paul is a universalist! Or could be a universalist. God will raise the good and the bad. What's up with that? "Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus." Could it be?! Even Paul thought that...Paul, whose letters are used to condemn and divide? Holy Schmoly!
My accusers didn't show. You see, they are cowards. "It's because I believe in the resurrection that I've been hauled into this court! Does that sound like grounds for a criminal case?"
EP: "The trials in Acts 24-26 force us, if we're to stay true to the story we're reading, to give up the notion that the Christian community can catch the admiring eye of the world if we just live rightly and obediently. We have ample documentation by now to disabuse us of such thinking. God's revelation is rejected far more often than it is accepted, is dismissed by far more people than embrace it, and has been either attacked or ignored by every major culture or civilization in which it has given its witness: magnificent Egypt, fierce Assyria, beautiful Babylon, artistic Greece, political Rome, Enlightenment France, Nazi Germany, Renaissance Italy, Marxist Russia, Maoist China, and pursuit-of-happiness America. The community of God's people has survived in all of these cultures and civilizations but always as a minority, always marginal to the mainstream, never statistically significant.
"This gives us pause. If we, as the continuing company of Jesus, have achieved an easy accommodation with our society and culture, how did we manage to pull off what Jesus and his community of followers failed to accomplish? How has it come to pass that after 20 centuries of rejections, we assume that human acclaim is tantamount to divine approval."
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Day 7-end of week 1: Matthew 13-14; Acts 19-21
Realized I skipped over Matthew 12. Jesus is accused of black magic. Wasn't the first time; we've not seen the last time yet. "This is war, and there is no neutral ground. If you're not on my side, you're the enemy; if you're not helping, you're making things worse."
"The fruit tells you about the tree."
"It's your heart, not the dictionary that gives meaning to your words."
"Words are powerful. They can be your salvation or your damnation. Take them seriously."
"Teacher, we want to see your credentials. Give us some hard evidence that God is in this."
"When Jonah preached to them, they changed their lives. You've got one greater than Jonah and you squabble about 'proofs'."
"That's what this generation is like: You may think you have cleaned out the junk from your lives and gotten ready for God, but you weren't hospitable to my kingdom message, and now all the devils are moving back in."
Some of the accusations at the ruling elite in chapter 12 sting. Honestly, all too many of Jesus' words sting. There are moments when it "hurts so good," and moments when it just hurts.
"Obedience is thicker than blood. The person who obeys my heavenly Father's will is my brother and sister and mother."
13
Parable of the soil and seeds. Why do you tell stories? Stories create readiness. But if there's no readiness, any trace of receptivity soon disappears. Stories are to create readiness, to nudge the people toward receptive insight. I don't want to be a blockhead! I want to see, and hear. I want to be receptive, even when it hurts, even when the Word challenges my preconceived notions and worldview.
Do I take the Word into my heart, or does it lie on the surface? Or, have I been overly enthusiastic, and now the emotion is gone and I'm lifeless? Am I choked by worry and illusion, so strangled that nothing comes of It? Can I take in the Word and produce a harvest beyond my wildest dreams?
Weeds and wheat. Let them grow together until the harvest time. Small seed, big plant. Size of seed does not determine the harvest. A little yeast works through a large batch of dough.
EP: "The metaphors Jesus used for the life of ministry are frequently images of the single, the small, and the quiet, which have effects far in excess of their appearance: salt, leaven, seed. Our culture publicizes the opposite emphasis: the big, the multitudinous, the noisy. It is, then, a strategic necessity that people in ministry, especially pastors, ally themselves with the quiet, poised harpooners, and not leap, frenzied to the oars. There is far more need that we develop the skills of a harpooner than the muscles of the oarsman. It is far more biblical to learn quiet attentiveness before God than to exhaust ourselves in a flurry of activity."
"Ripe holy lives will mature and adorn the kingdom of their Father."
What is God's kingdom like to you?
"Every student well-trained in God's kingdom is like the owner of a general store who can put his hands on anything you need, old or new, exactly when you need it."
"A prophet is taken for granted in his hometown and his family." Jesus didn't do any miracles there because of their hostile indifference.
Hostile indifference. What does that look like today?
14
Herod kills John the Baptist.
Feeding 5000. "You give them supper."
Jesus by himself to pray...and sometimes it works, and sometimes he gets interrupted.
Peter walking on water. What have you thought that God could not save or rescue you from?
Healed by touching the hem of Jesus' coat.
Acts
"Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? Did you take God into your mind only, or did you also embrace God with your heart? Did God get inside you?" Well?
John's baptism of radical life change so that people would be ready to receive Jesus. Now, after the radical life change, you're ready for Jesus. Tongues. Necessary?
"Holy Spirit--church's way of talking about the life of God in humans. Wind, breath, sign of life in a person. Uncontainable. Alive in ways they'd never been. We're candidates for receiving the same Holy Spirit--and the same thing can happen to us: new life,new and overflowing life." EP
Paul had a few good months, then evil rumors began to be spread about the Christian way of life.
The touch did it--they were healed and whole.
"I know Jesus and I've heard of Paul, but who are you?"
The Word of the Master was now sovereign and prevailed in Ephesus.
Idols to Artemis. Business in jeopardy. Fear this Paul guy. Raise up the level of fear so that Paul might be stopped! "There is no excuse for what's happened today. We're putting our city in serious danger."
Gave constant encouragement, lifting their spirits and charging them with fresh hope.
Paul preached a young man to sleep. He fell out of a window and died. Paul brought him back to life. And then Paul kept talking.
..."urging Jews and Greeks alike to a radical life-change before God and an equally radical trust in our Master Jesus."
Compelled to go to Jerusalem. "What matters is to finish what God started: the job Master Jesus gave me of letting everyone I meet know all about this incredibly extravagant generosity of God....I've done my best for you, given you my all, held back nothing of God's will for you. Now it's up to you. Be on your toes--both for yourselves and your congregation of sheep. The Holy Spirit has put you in charge of these people--God's people they are--to guard and protect them. God himself thought they were worth dying for...Now I'm turning you over to God, our marvelous God whose gracious Word can make you into what God wants you to be and give you everything you could possibly need in this community of holy friends...In everything I've done, I have demonstrated to you how necessary it is to work on behalf of the weak and not exploit them. "
Apostle means one who is sent as one bears the ministry of Christ everywhere. Our nature isn't static, stationary. We ought to be apostolic--sent to reach others with the Gospel whether at distance geographically or emotionally.
Agabus prophesies that Paul will be tied up and handed over to godless unbelievers in Jerusalem. For Paul the issues isn't what they do to him, but what Jesus does through Paul's obedience. How does that kind of commitment feel? Is it attractive? Or repulsive?
Paul was beyond peer pressure. I want to live that way, with God so at my center. I don't want the good intentions of my friends to deflect me from the best intentions of God.
Paul is captured in Jerusalem, but given an opportunity to speak to the crowd...tomorrow.
"The fruit tells you about the tree."
"It's your heart, not the dictionary that gives meaning to your words."
"Words are powerful. They can be your salvation or your damnation. Take them seriously."
"Teacher, we want to see your credentials. Give us some hard evidence that God is in this."
"When Jonah preached to them, they changed their lives. You've got one greater than Jonah and you squabble about 'proofs'."
"That's what this generation is like: You may think you have cleaned out the junk from your lives and gotten ready for God, but you weren't hospitable to my kingdom message, and now all the devils are moving back in."
Some of the accusations at the ruling elite in chapter 12 sting. Honestly, all too many of Jesus' words sting. There are moments when it "hurts so good," and moments when it just hurts.
"Obedience is thicker than blood. The person who obeys my heavenly Father's will is my brother and sister and mother."
13
Parable of the soil and seeds. Why do you tell stories? Stories create readiness. But if there's no readiness, any trace of receptivity soon disappears. Stories are to create readiness, to nudge the people toward receptive insight. I don't want to be a blockhead! I want to see, and hear. I want to be receptive, even when it hurts, even when the Word challenges my preconceived notions and worldview.
Do I take the Word into my heart, or does it lie on the surface? Or, have I been overly enthusiastic, and now the emotion is gone and I'm lifeless? Am I choked by worry and illusion, so strangled that nothing comes of It? Can I take in the Word and produce a harvest beyond my wildest dreams?
Weeds and wheat. Let them grow together until the harvest time. Small seed, big plant. Size of seed does not determine the harvest. A little yeast works through a large batch of dough.
EP: "The metaphors Jesus used for the life of ministry are frequently images of the single, the small, and the quiet, which have effects far in excess of their appearance: salt, leaven, seed. Our culture publicizes the opposite emphasis: the big, the multitudinous, the noisy. It is, then, a strategic necessity that people in ministry, especially pastors, ally themselves with the quiet, poised harpooners, and not leap, frenzied to the oars. There is far more need that we develop the skills of a harpooner than the muscles of the oarsman. It is far more biblical to learn quiet attentiveness before God than to exhaust ourselves in a flurry of activity."
"Ripe holy lives will mature and adorn the kingdom of their Father."
What is God's kingdom like to you?
"Every student well-trained in God's kingdom is like the owner of a general store who can put his hands on anything you need, old or new, exactly when you need it."
"A prophet is taken for granted in his hometown and his family." Jesus didn't do any miracles there because of their hostile indifference.
Hostile indifference. What does that look like today?
14
Herod kills John the Baptist.
Feeding 5000. "You give them supper."
Jesus by himself to pray...and sometimes it works, and sometimes he gets interrupted.
Peter walking on water. What have you thought that God could not save or rescue you from?
Healed by touching the hem of Jesus' coat.
Acts
"Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? Did you take God into your mind only, or did you also embrace God with your heart? Did God get inside you?" Well?
John's baptism of radical life change so that people would be ready to receive Jesus. Now, after the radical life change, you're ready for Jesus. Tongues. Necessary?
"Holy Spirit--church's way of talking about the life of God in humans. Wind, breath, sign of life in a person. Uncontainable. Alive in ways they'd never been. We're candidates for receiving the same Holy Spirit--and the same thing can happen to us: new life,new and overflowing life." EP
Paul had a few good months, then evil rumors began to be spread about the Christian way of life.
The touch did it--they were healed and whole.
"I know Jesus and I've heard of Paul, but who are you?"
The Word of the Master was now sovereign and prevailed in Ephesus.
Idols to Artemis. Business in jeopardy. Fear this Paul guy. Raise up the level of fear so that Paul might be stopped! "There is no excuse for what's happened today. We're putting our city in serious danger."
Gave constant encouragement, lifting their spirits and charging them with fresh hope.
Paul preached a young man to sleep. He fell out of a window and died. Paul brought him back to life. And then Paul kept talking.
..."urging Jews and Greeks alike to a radical life-change before God and an equally radical trust in our Master Jesus."
Compelled to go to Jerusalem. "What matters is to finish what God started: the job Master Jesus gave me of letting everyone I meet know all about this incredibly extravagant generosity of God....I've done my best for you, given you my all, held back nothing of God's will for you. Now it's up to you. Be on your toes--both for yourselves and your congregation of sheep. The Holy Spirit has put you in charge of these people--God's people they are--to guard and protect them. God himself thought they were worth dying for...Now I'm turning you over to God, our marvelous God whose gracious Word can make you into what God wants you to be and give you everything you could possibly need in this community of holy friends...In everything I've done, I have demonstrated to you how necessary it is to work on behalf of the weak and not exploit them. "
Apostle means one who is sent as one bears the ministry of Christ everywhere. Our nature isn't static, stationary. We ought to be apostolic--sent to reach others with the Gospel whether at distance geographically or emotionally.
Agabus prophesies that Paul will be tied up and handed over to godless unbelievers in Jerusalem. For Paul the issues isn't what they do to him, but what Jesus does through Paul's obedience. How does that kind of commitment feel? Is it attractive? Or repulsive?
Paul was beyond peer pressure. I want to live that way, with God so at my center. I don't want the good intentions of my friends to deflect me from the best intentions of God.
Paul is captured in Jerusalem, but given an opportunity to speak to the crowd...tomorrow.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Day 6: Matthew 11 & 12; Acts 16-18
Jesus finished chapter 10 by telling the disciples to live the life, that the smallest act of giving or receiving makes you a true apprentice. He gives the disciples that charge then goes on to preach and teach in the villages. John the Baptist, Jesus' cousin, is locked in prison. He heard what the disciples were doing and sent a messenger to ask Jesus if he's the real deal. Jesus answers with the results, which fulfill what Jesus proclaimed when he read from the scroll of Isaiah (Luke 4:18-19): blind see, lame walk, lepers are cleansed, deaf hear, dead raised, the wretched of the earth learn that God is on their side.
I'm not sure I've ever seen that translation before: "The wretched of the earth learn that God is on their side." Where are the proclaimers of that truth when religious folks suggest otherwise today? Is there a witness? The wretched learn that God is on their side! Hallelujah! What kind of would our God be if his nature was to heap up more stuff on the already beaten down? Why does the possibility of rescuing the beaten down produce such fear? "Is this what you were expecting? Then count yourself blessed!"
"For a long time now people have tried to force themselves into God's kingdom. But if you read the books of the Prophets and God's Law closely, you will see them culminate in John (the Baptist), teaming up with him in preparing the way for the Messiah of the kingdom."
"Are you listening to me? Really listening?"
"John came fasting and they called him crazy. I came feasting and they called me a lush, a friend of the riffraff. Opinion polls don't count for much, do they? The proof of the pudding is in the eating."
Don't we still have trouble today if proverbial heads don't roll when folks are blatantly disobedient? That's why some say that Christians have been known to eat their young, or shoot their wounded.
EP: Jesus isn't passive. He's not active in the way we sometimes expect him to be. For he came not at a political savior, but as a personal savior-not bringing down the wrath of God on nations, but bringing the mercy of God to individuals.
"This Father-Son operation comes out of intimacies and knowledge.
"Are you tired? Worn out? Burnt out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me--watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly.
Acts
Timothy--Jewish mom and Greek father. They presented the simple guidelines the Jerusalem apostles and leaders had come up with. That turned out to be most helpful. Day after day the congregations became stronger in faith and larger in size.
Paul's Macedonian dream. Time to go preach to the Euopeans. EP: "God's world is always larger than our world. And God's vision to Paul shows us how large. The vision shows a person calling fo help. The most common error of the church and its leaders as they grow is to quit helping and begin exploiting. Without the vision to "Come over," the world becomes small and selfish. With this vision the world becomes large and generous. Without this vision, the church reduces itself to repetitious programs and rituals. Without this vision, the church looks at people as customers who help pay the bills and put on the programs. So we need to look long and hard at the Macedonian vision: 'Come over to Macedonia and help us!' This vision enlarges our capacity to enter the dimensions of God's world."
Prayer meeting with the women who listened, trusted, and believed. Lydia hosts Paul and Timothy and her whole household is baptized.
Slave girl who recognizes Paul and Timothy and their work for the Most High God. Paul calls out the possessing spirit, which means her money-making potential is shot. They took after Paul and Silas, had them arrested, publicly beat, and jailed with leg irons and all. Praying and singing, an earthquake occurred. Doors flew open and everyone got out. No one left. Jailer was ready to kill himself (shame). Sees they're all still there and asks Paul and Silas, "What do I have to do to be saved, to really live?" "Put your entire trust in the Master Jesus." Your entire trust? Entire. Trust. Entire? How hard is that?! Entire?!
Paul, though offered freedom, demands justice for their wrongful beating and imprisonment. Being set free isn't enough. He demands justice. They were Roman citizens and should not have been treated that way. That citizenship carried with it certain rights.
The hard-liners go after them, and they go after those who have been hosting Paul and Silas. And they do everything they possibly can to try to discredit them. "These people are out to destroy the world, and now they're here on our doorstep, attacking everything we hold dear. And Jason is hiding them, these traitors and turncoats who say that Jesus is king and Caesar is nothing." Those are fighting words...that Jesus is king, that is. And that Caesar is nothing. In that day and often in ours, Caesar is everything and Jesus is nothing...at least by the values we hold up and live.
Berean Jews are receptive, but the Thessalonians find them there. Paul to Athens, and sent for Timothy and Silas. "The city was a junkyard of idols." He presented a "new slant" on the gods with his story of Jesus and the resurrection. "Explain it at the Aeropagus so we can understand." "To the God nobody knows." I'll tell you who that is.
Paul's obvious truth: People are empty without God, and they try to eliminate the emptiness with philosophy or religion. Paul preaches Christ
Not remote; God's near. We're God created. "God overlooks as long as you don't know better, but that time is past. The unknown is now known and God's calling for a radical life change." I recently read somewhere that what if the account we are to give before God has to do with the beauty and presence of God we failed to notice, with the love we failed to share, with how we failed noticing how prevalent God's presence is on earth...it was something like that. And I appreciated it.
From Athens to Corinth. Frustrated. But changes houses and gets some results. Spirit speaks:
"Don't let anyone intimidate or silence you. No matter what happens, I'm with you and no one is going to be able to hurt you."
Governor of the province suggests this is one more Jewish squabble. Deal with it yourselves.
"Putting fresh heart into the disciples." Apollos needed a bit of theological correction, but then was a great help to those who had become believers.
The endurance and perseverance in the book of Acts never ceases to amaze me. It makes me sad at what small inconveniences can derail me, even if briefly.
I'm not sure I've ever seen that translation before: "The wretched of the earth learn that God is on their side." Where are the proclaimers of that truth when religious folks suggest otherwise today? Is there a witness? The wretched learn that God is on their side! Hallelujah! What kind of would our God be if his nature was to heap up more stuff on the already beaten down? Why does the possibility of rescuing the beaten down produce such fear? "Is this what you were expecting? Then count yourself blessed!"
"For a long time now people have tried to force themselves into God's kingdom. But if you read the books of the Prophets and God's Law closely, you will see them culminate in John (the Baptist), teaming up with him in preparing the way for the Messiah of the kingdom."
"Are you listening to me? Really listening?"
"John came fasting and they called him crazy. I came feasting and they called me a lush, a friend of the riffraff. Opinion polls don't count for much, do they? The proof of the pudding is in the eating."
Don't we still have trouble today if proverbial heads don't roll when folks are blatantly disobedient? That's why some say that Christians have been known to eat their young, or shoot their wounded.
EP: Jesus isn't passive. He's not active in the way we sometimes expect him to be. For he came not at a political savior, but as a personal savior-not bringing down the wrath of God on nations, but bringing the mercy of God to individuals.
"This Father-Son operation comes out of intimacies and knowledge.
"Are you tired? Worn out? Burnt out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me--watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly.
Acts
Timothy--Jewish mom and Greek father. They presented the simple guidelines the Jerusalem apostles and leaders had come up with. That turned out to be most helpful. Day after day the congregations became stronger in faith and larger in size.
Paul's Macedonian dream. Time to go preach to the Euopeans. EP: "God's world is always larger than our world. And God's vision to Paul shows us how large. The vision shows a person calling fo help. The most common error of the church and its leaders as they grow is to quit helping and begin exploiting. Without the vision to "Come over," the world becomes small and selfish. With this vision the world becomes large and generous. Without this vision, the church reduces itself to repetitious programs and rituals. Without this vision, the church looks at people as customers who help pay the bills and put on the programs. So we need to look long and hard at the Macedonian vision: 'Come over to Macedonia and help us!' This vision enlarges our capacity to enter the dimensions of God's world."
Prayer meeting with the women who listened, trusted, and believed. Lydia hosts Paul and Timothy and her whole household is baptized.
Slave girl who recognizes Paul and Timothy and their work for the Most High God. Paul calls out the possessing spirit, which means her money-making potential is shot. They took after Paul and Silas, had them arrested, publicly beat, and jailed with leg irons and all. Praying and singing, an earthquake occurred. Doors flew open and everyone got out. No one left. Jailer was ready to kill himself (shame). Sees they're all still there and asks Paul and Silas, "What do I have to do to be saved, to really live?" "Put your entire trust in the Master Jesus." Your entire trust? Entire. Trust. Entire? How hard is that?! Entire?!
Paul, though offered freedom, demands justice for their wrongful beating and imprisonment. Being set free isn't enough. He demands justice. They were Roman citizens and should not have been treated that way. That citizenship carried with it certain rights.
The hard-liners go after them, and they go after those who have been hosting Paul and Silas. And they do everything they possibly can to try to discredit them. "These people are out to destroy the world, and now they're here on our doorstep, attacking everything we hold dear. And Jason is hiding them, these traitors and turncoats who say that Jesus is king and Caesar is nothing." Those are fighting words...that Jesus is king, that is. And that Caesar is nothing. In that day and often in ours, Caesar is everything and Jesus is nothing...at least by the values we hold up and live.
Berean Jews are receptive, but the Thessalonians find them there. Paul to Athens, and sent for Timothy and Silas. "The city was a junkyard of idols." He presented a "new slant" on the gods with his story of Jesus and the resurrection. "Explain it at the Aeropagus so we can understand." "To the God nobody knows." I'll tell you who that is.
Paul's obvious truth: People are empty without God, and they try to eliminate the emptiness with philosophy or religion. Paul preaches Christ
Not remote; God's near. We're God created. "God overlooks as long as you don't know better, but that time is past. The unknown is now known and God's calling for a radical life change." I recently read somewhere that what if the account we are to give before God has to do with the beauty and presence of God we failed to notice, with the love we failed to share, with how we failed noticing how prevalent God's presence is on earth...it was something like that. And I appreciated it.
From Athens to Corinth. Frustrated. But changes houses and gets some results. Spirit speaks:
"Don't let anyone intimidate or silence you. No matter what happens, I'm with you and no one is going to be able to hurt you."
Governor of the province suggests this is one more Jewish squabble. Deal with it yourselves.
"Putting fresh heart into the disciples." Apollos needed a bit of theological correction, but then was a great help to those who had become believers.
The endurance and perseverance in the book of Acts never ceases to amaze me. It makes me sad at what small inconveniences can derail me, even if briefly.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Notes and things
For those who may be curious, I am doing my reading in Conversations: The Message Bible with its Translator. My custom when I journal, is to write out the verses that stick on me, which is why you are seeing so much direct text from The Message. I realize I've also not directly yet engaged the reflection questions provided to us through the challenge as I've let the text provoke me directly. I expect to use the questions on Sunday evening, and I'll take a look and see if there are any questions that are burning, and I'll share them later. If you've got one bugging you, please post it and let's discuss. You can get the questions at: http://www.warehouse839.org/docs/NTC/NTC_questions_week_1.pdf. More information about the whole series is available at www.warehouse839.org.
Matthew 9 & 10; Acts 13-15
Matthew 9 & 10
"Cheer up, son. I forgive your sins." Why this gossipy whispering?
Eating with disreputable characters, acting cozy with riffraff and crooks.
"Who needs a doctor: the healthy or the sick? Go figure out what this Scripture means: 'I'm after mercy, not religion.' I'm here to invite outsiders, not coddle insiders."
"This is Kingdom come!"
"If I can just put a finger on his robe, I'll get well."
Jesus said to her, "Courage, daughter. You took a risk of faith, and now you're well."
When Jesus had gotten rid of the crowd, he went in, took the girl's hand, and pulled her to her feet-alive.
"Do you really believe I can do this?" Jesus asked. He touched their eyes and said, "Become what you believe." Become what you believe. What an awesome charge, call, and invitation.
Jesus taught, reported kingdom news, healed bruised and hurt lives. His heart broke. "What a huge harvest! How few workers! On your knees and pray for harvest hands!" The perennial struggle for enough servant volunteers...
Jesus gave disciples the power to kick out evil spirits and to care for bruised and hurt lives.
"Don't begin by traveling to some far-off place to convert unbelievers. And don't try to be dramatic by tackling some public enemy. Go to the lost, confused people right here in the neighborhood. Tell them that the kingdom is here. Bring health to the sick. Raise the dead. Touch the untouchables. Kick out the demons. You have been treated generously, so live generously...You are the equipment, and all you need to keep that going is three meals a day. Travel light."
"Stay alert. This is hazardous work I'm assigning you. You're going to be like sheep running through a wolf pack, so don't call attention to yourselves. Be as cunning as a snake, inoffensive as a dove. Don't be naive. Some people will impugn your motives, others will smear your reputation-just because you believe in me. "
"When people realize it is the living God you are presenting and not some idol that makes them feel good, they are going to turn on you, even people in your own family. There is great irony here: proclaiming so much love, experiencing so much hate! But don't quit. Don't cave in. It is all well worth it in the end."
"Don't be bluffed into silence by threats of bullies. There's nothing they can do to your soul, your core being. Save your fear for God, who holds your entire life-body and soul-in his hands."
(EP)"Three times Jesus tells his disciples not to be afraid. We know these words are for us, too. If we're honest, we know the words demand that we grow up, that we be fully human before God, and that most folks won't be enthusiastic about it. We know we're called to be disciples, but the opposition unnerves us. Jesus still says, "Don't be afraid. We're afraid we're not up to the challenge of the love we're called to give, the suffering we're expected to endure, the opposition we're forced to face. Our fears close us in. There's so much to see, so many people to love, such a marvelous Lord to worship, and nothing to fear."
"Stand up for me against world opinion and I'll stand up for you before my Father in heaven. If you turn tail and run, do you think I'll cover for you?"
"If you don't go all the way with me, through thick and thin, you don't deserve me. If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you'll find both yourself and me."
"We are intimately linked in this harvest work. Anyone who accepts what you do, accepts me, the One who sent you. Anyone who accepts what I do accepts my Father, who sent me. Accepting a messenger of God is as good as being God's messenger. Accepting someone's help is as good as giving someone help. This is large work I've called you into, but don't be overwhelmed by it. It's best to start small. Give a cup of cool water to someone who is thirsty, for instance. The smallest act of giving or receiving makes you a true apprentice. You won't lose out on a thing."
Those last 3 verses, 10:4-42. I never noticed before the equality, if you will, of giving and receiving. We must be able to receive from others, otherwise, we put ourselves in God's place, the One who is the first giver. So my ability to both give and receive affect my following Jesus and my faithfulness. That may be stretching the context a bit as the whole passage/pericope deals with the disciples as traveling missionaries, going literally from house to house...I still wonder back to my first thought, realizing the historical context...hmmm.
Acts 13-15
"They commissioned them. In that circle of intensity and obedience of fasting and praying, they laid hands on their heads and sent them off."
Not all of the believers became missionaries. Some of them did. We must be in one group or the other: the ones who will go and be sent, or the ones who after serious prayer will lay hands on those sent and send them.
Dr. Know it all was as crooked as a corkscrew. Paul calls out the good doctor and his less than honorable deeds, and the Doc goes blind.
Paul tells the story, fulfilling the prophets through Jesus. God raised Jesus from the dead...for good, no going back to that rot and decay.
"On account of the resurrection of Jesus the forgiveness of your sins can be promised. He accomplishes, in those who believe, everything that the Law of Moses could never make good on. But everyone who believes in this raised-up Jesus is declared good and right and whole before God." Practically the whole city showed up for the next message...
"It was required that God's word be spoken first of all to you, the Jews. But seeing that you want no part of it-you've made it quite clear that you have no taste or inclination for eternal life-the door is open to all the outsiders. And we're on our way through it, following orders, doing what God commanded."
"The non-Jewish outsiders could hardly believe their good fortune. All who were marked out for real life put their trust in God-they honored God's Word by receiving that life. And this message of salvation spread like wildfire throughout the land."
"Some of the Jews convinced the most respected women and leading men of the town that their precious way of life was about to be destroyed. Alarmed, they turned on Paul and Barnabas and forced them to leave. Paul and Barnabas shrugged their shoulders and went on to the next town, Iconium, brimming with joy and the Holy Spirit, two happy disciples."
"Unbelieving Jews worked up a whispering campaign, sowing mistrust and suspicion in the minds of the people in the street."
But there was a split in public opinion--some siding with the Jews and some with the apostles.
"Ripe for God's work, ready to believe." Paul saw this in the man. Have you ever seen this in anyone? Has anyone ever seen it in you?
"We're not gods! We are men just like you, and we're here to bring you the Message, to persuade you to abandon these silly god-superstitions and embrace God himself, the living God. We don't make God; God makes us, and all of this--sky, earth, sea, and everything in them."
God is among us in healing and salvation...in knitting back together things that are torn apart. God's blessings are both routine and not routing. God isn't limited to our imagination, nor our routine, nor to the common places of our lives. God is surprising and unexpected, yet never apart from the common and expected.
"Evidence of good beyond your doing."
"You have to circumcise pagan converts. You must make them keep the law of Moses."
"God, who can't be fooled by any pretense on our part but always knows a person's thoughts, gave them the Holy Spirit exactly as he gave him to us. He treated the outsiders exactly as he treated us, beginning at the very center of who they were and working with them from that center outward, cleaning up their lives as they trusted and believed him. So why are you trying to out-god God, loading these new believers down with rules that crushed our ancestors and crushed us, too? Don't we believe that we are saved because the Master Jesus amazingly and out of sheer generosity moved to save us just as he did those from beyond our nation? So what are we arguing about?... The silence deepened. James said, "Friends, listen. Simeon has told us the story of how God at the very outset made sure that racial outsiders were included...God has always known he would do this." "We're not going to unnecessarily burden non-Jewish people who turn to the Master. We'll write them a letter and tell them not to get involved in activities connected to idols, to guard the morality of sex and marriage, to not serve food offensive to Jewish Christians...basic wisdom from Moses."
That passage is one that for me so clearly indicates that the understanding of obedience to the Law of Moses changes...that the Word of God is indeed living. That doesn't mean we notice that in a reckless fashion, rather in an intentional, deliberate, prayerful, discerning manner, and that we do anticipate that God is still speaking to us.
(EP) "Everyone in the early church was agreed on what the Word of God said: that God had come in Christ to save men, to forgive them, and to give them a new life of love. But a division arose in the church over how that was to take place. One group said salvation in Christ had to be built on the foundation of the Law of Moses. Nothing could be lost or forgotten. It must all be incorporated and retained. The second group said that adnerance to the Law wasn't necessary for salvation. Christ himself was enough. He himself fulfilled the Laaw, and to accept him with your whole heart was all that mattered. A completely new beginning was made in Christ; in him all things were made new. to insist on keeping old laws and regulations was to deny the sufficiency of Christ. Salvation wasn't by works but by grace, the free gift of God.
"Cheer up, son. I forgive your sins." Why this gossipy whispering?
Eating with disreputable characters, acting cozy with riffraff and crooks.
"Who needs a doctor: the healthy or the sick? Go figure out what this Scripture means: 'I'm after mercy, not religion.' I'm here to invite outsiders, not coddle insiders."
"This is Kingdom come!"
"If I can just put a finger on his robe, I'll get well."
Jesus said to her, "Courage, daughter. You took a risk of faith, and now you're well."
When Jesus had gotten rid of the crowd, he went in, took the girl's hand, and pulled her to her feet-alive.
"Do you really believe I can do this?" Jesus asked. He touched their eyes and said, "Become what you believe." Become what you believe. What an awesome charge, call, and invitation.
Jesus taught, reported kingdom news, healed bruised and hurt lives. His heart broke. "What a huge harvest! How few workers! On your knees and pray for harvest hands!" The perennial struggle for enough servant volunteers...
Jesus gave disciples the power to kick out evil spirits and to care for bruised and hurt lives.
"Don't begin by traveling to some far-off place to convert unbelievers. And don't try to be dramatic by tackling some public enemy. Go to the lost, confused people right here in the neighborhood. Tell them that the kingdom is here. Bring health to the sick. Raise the dead. Touch the untouchables. Kick out the demons. You have been treated generously, so live generously...You are the equipment, and all you need to keep that going is three meals a day. Travel light."
"Stay alert. This is hazardous work I'm assigning you. You're going to be like sheep running through a wolf pack, so don't call attention to yourselves. Be as cunning as a snake, inoffensive as a dove. Don't be naive. Some people will impugn your motives, others will smear your reputation-just because you believe in me. "
"When people realize it is the living God you are presenting and not some idol that makes them feel good, they are going to turn on you, even people in your own family. There is great irony here: proclaiming so much love, experiencing so much hate! But don't quit. Don't cave in. It is all well worth it in the end."
"Don't be bluffed into silence by threats of bullies. There's nothing they can do to your soul, your core being. Save your fear for God, who holds your entire life-body and soul-in his hands."
(EP)"Three times Jesus tells his disciples not to be afraid. We know these words are for us, too. If we're honest, we know the words demand that we grow up, that we be fully human before God, and that most folks won't be enthusiastic about it. We know we're called to be disciples, but the opposition unnerves us. Jesus still says, "Don't be afraid. We're afraid we're not up to the challenge of the love we're called to give, the suffering we're expected to endure, the opposition we're forced to face. Our fears close us in. There's so much to see, so many people to love, such a marvelous Lord to worship, and nothing to fear."
"Stand up for me against world opinion and I'll stand up for you before my Father in heaven. If you turn tail and run, do you think I'll cover for you?"
"If you don't go all the way with me, through thick and thin, you don't deserve me. If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you'll find both yourself and me."
"We are intimately linked in this harvest work. Anyone who accepts what you do, accepts me, the One who sent you. Anyone who accepts what I do accepts my Father, who sent me. Accepting a messenger of God is as good as being God's messenger. Accepting someone's help is as good as giving someone help. This is large work I've called you into, but don't be overwhelmed by it. It's best to start small. Give a cup of cool water to someone who is thirsty, for instance. The smallest act of giving or receiving makes you a true apprentice. You won't lose out on a thing."
Those last 3 verses, 10:4-42. I never noticed before the equality, if you will, of giving and receiving. We must be able to receive from others, otherwise, we put ourselves in God's place, the One who is the first giver. So my ability to both give and receive affect my following Jesus and my faithfulness. That may be stretching the context a bit as the whole passage/pericope deals with the disciples as traveling missionaries, going literally from house to house...I still wonder back to my first thought, realizing the historical context...hmmm.
Acts 13-15
"They commissioned them. In that circle of intensity and obedience of fasting and praying, they laid hands on their heads and sent them off."
Not all of the believers became missionaries. Some of them did. We must be in one group or the other: the ones who will go and be sent, or the ones who after serious prayer will lay hands on those sent and send them.
Dr. Know it all was as crooked as a corkscrew. Paul calls out the good doctor and his less than honorable deeds, and the Doc goes blind.
Paul tells the story, fulfilling the prophets through Jesus. God raised Jesus from the dead...for good, no going back to that rot and decay.
"On account of the resurrection of Jesus the forgiveness of your sins can be promised. He accomplishes, in those who believe, everything that the Law of Moses could never make good on. But everyone who believes in this raised-up Jesus is declared good and right and whole before God." Practically the whole city showed up for the next message...
"It was required that God's word be spoken first of all to you, the Jews. But seeing that you want no part of it-you've made it quite clear that you have no taste or inclination for eternal life-the door is open to all the outsiders. And we're on our way through it, following orders, doing what God commanded."
"The non-Jewish outsiders could hardly believe their good fortune. All who were marked out for real life put their trust in God-they honored God's Word by receiving that life. And this message of salvation spread like wildfire throughout the land."
"Some of the Jews convinced the most respected women and leading men of the town that their precious way of life was about to be destroyed. Alarmed, they turned on Paul and Barnabas and forced them to leave. Paul and Barnabas shrugged their shoulders and went on to the next town, Iconium, brimming with joy and the Holy Spirit, two happy disciples."
"Unbelieving Jews worked up a whispering campaign, sowing mistrust and suspicion in the minds of the people in the street."
But there was a split in public opinion--some siding with the Jews and some with the apostles.
"Ripe for God's work, ready to believe." Paul saw this in the man. Have you ever seen this in anyone? Has anyone ever seen it in you?
"We're not gods! We are men just like you, and we're here to bring you the Message, to persuade you to abandon these silly god-superstitions and embrace God himself, the living God. We don't make God; God makes us, and all of this--sky, earth, sea, and everything in them."
God is among us in healing and salvation...in knitting back together things that are torn apart. God's blessings are both routine and not routing. God isn't limited to our imagination, nor our routine, nor to the common places of our lives. God is surprising and unexpected, yet never apart from the common and expected.
"Evidence of good beyond your doing."
"You have to circumcise pagan converts. You must make them keep the law of Moses."
"God, who can't be fooled by any pretense on our part but always knows a person's thoughts, gave them the Holy Spirit exactly as he gave him to us. He treated the outsiders exactly as he treated us, beginning at the very center of who they were and working with them from that center outward, cleaning up their lives as they trusted and believed him. So why are you trying to out-god God, loading these new believers down with rules that crushed our ancestors and crushed us, too? Don't we believe that we are saved because the Master Jesus amazingly and out of sheer generosity moved to save us just as he did those from beyond our nation? So what are we arguing about?... The silence deepened. James said, "Friends, listen. Simeon has told us the story of how God at the very outset made sure that racial outsiders were included...God has always known he would do this." "We're not going to unnecessarily burden non-Jewish people who turn to the Master. We'll write them a letter and tell them not to get involved in activities connected to idols, to guard the morality of sex and marriage, to not serve food offensive to Jewish Christians...basic wisdom from Moses."
That passage is one that for me so clearly indicates that the understanding of obedience to the Law of Moses changes...that the Word of God is indeed living. That doesn't mean we notice that in a reckless fashion, rather in an intentional, deliberate, prayerful, discerning manner, and that we do anticipate that God is still speaking to us.
(EP) "Everyone in the early church was agreed on what the Word of God said: that God had come in Christ to save men, to forgive them, and to give them a new life of love. But a division arose in the church over how that was to take place. One group said salvation in Christ had to be built on the foundation of the Law of Moses. Nothing could be lost or forgotten. It must all be incorporated and retained. The second group said that adnerance to the Law wasn't necessary for salvation. Christ himself was enough. He himself fulfilled the Laaw, and to accept him with your whole heart was all that mattered. A completely new beginning was made in Christ; in him all things were made new. to insist on keeping old laws and regulations was to deny the sufficiency of Christ. Salvation wasn't by works but by grace, the free gift of God.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Day 4: Matthew 7 & 8; Acts10-12
"Don't pick on people, jump on their failures, criticize their faults-unless, of course, you want the same treatment. That critical spirit has a way of boomeranging."
One of my recent prayers has been for God to help me with my critical spirit--when I have it, when I want to have it, when I don't know I have it. How can I more frequently simply live my part in the story?
"Don't reduce holy mysteries to slogans. In trying to be relevant, you're only being cute and inviting sacrilege." What does this say to seeker-focused worship?
"Don't bargain with God. Be direct. Ask for what you need."
"Ask yourself what you want people to do for you, then grab the initiative and do it for them. Add up God's Law and Prophets and this is what you get."
"Don't look for shortcuts to God...The way to life-to God!-is vigorous and requires total attention."
"Be wary of false preachers who smile a lot, dripping with practiced sincerity. Chances are they are out to rip you off in one way or another. Don't be impressed with charisma; look for character. Who preachers are is the main thing, not what they say. A genuine leader will never exploit your emotions or your pocketbook."
"What is required is serious obedience--doing what my Father wills."
"These words are foundational words, words to build a life upon. Work them into your life."
"Jesus was living everything he was saying...it was the best teaching they ever heard!"
It's hard to believe that this was the "best" teaching they'd heard, as offensive and counter-cultural as it was. In some ways makes me ask Jesus' question: "Why do you call it good?"
EP: "Jesus says be poets (doers). Make something of these words I've spoken to you. Make a life, epic and poetic. And make it beautiful. Make it a work of art."
"Master, if you want to, you can heal my body." "Your cleansed and grateful life, not your work, will bear witness to what I have done."
"I've yet to come across this simple trust in Israel, the very people who are supposed to know all about God and how he works...Go. What you believed could happen has happened."
Demon-afflicted people. Who is that today? What are your demons?
"Are you ready to rough it? We're not staying in the best inns, you know."
"First things first. Your business is life, not death. Follow me. Pursue life."
"Why are you such cowards, such faint hearts?"
Jesus banishes the demon spirits into nearby pigs, who then run off a cliff...and Jesus promptly leaves that territory...
Acts
Cornelius. A thoroughly good man. Go get Peter. Peter's trance--unclean food and more food on a blanket. Voice says: "Go to it, Peter. Kill and eat." Peter: "No! I've never eaten anything unclean!" Voice: "If God says it's OK, it's OK." Happens three times for emphasis and completion. So...were all of the food purity laws man made?
Peter to Cornelius' house. "I'm sure that this is highly irregular. Jews just don't do this-visit adn relax with people of another race. But God has just shown me that no race is better than any other." Peter shares his witness, the gospel, with Cornelius and his household. "It's God's own truth, nothing could be plainer: God plays no favorites! It makes no difference who you are or where you're from-if you want God and are ready to do as God says, the door is open. The Message he sent to the children of Israel-that through Jesus Christ EVERYTHING is being put together again-well, he's doing it everywhere, among everyone."
"Our witness is that Jesus is the means to forgiveness of sins is backed up by the witness of all the prophets." No sooner were these words out of Peter's mouth than the Holy Spirit came on the listeners. The believeing Jews who had come with Peter couldn't believe it, couldn't believe that the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out on "outsider" non-Jewws, but there it was-they heard them speaking in tongues, heard them praising God. "Do I hear any objections to baptizing these friends with water? They've received the Holy Spirit exactly as we did." Spirit came first, then the sign of water baptism.
"What do you think you're doing rubbing shoulders with that crowd, eating what is prohibited and ruining our good name?" Peter replays chapter 10. Hearing it laid out like that, they quieted down. Oh, that we would claim the power of story and of sharing experience so we might see how frequently God acts beyond the borders we have prescribed!
"It's really happened! God has broken through to the other nations, opened them up to Life!"
"Barnabas was a good man that way, enthusiastic and confident in the Holy Spirit's ways."
Are you a "good" man or woman?
King Herod (ruling authorities) goes after some of the church members. First James. Now Peter, heavily under guard in the jailhouse. Powerful prayer-strenuous. Angel comes, Peter walks. Not a dream. Rescued. Mary's house, packed with praying people. Peter knocks. Rhoda doesn't even open the door--knows it's Peter's voice, but leaves him standing in the street. People inside don't believe it's Peter's voice either...she's crazy! Finally they open the door and see him.
Do we ever pray and pray and pray, and the answer stands outside the door, but we think it's impossible that the answer would be there, that the prayer would be heard and responded to?
Those poor guardsmen lost their heads for Peter's escape, which had been divinely orchestrated.
Herod's demise as his kingdom began to crumble. Exterior was all show. Interior was worm-ridden, diseased, and hollow.
Who is going to be lord of our lives? The God who reveals himself in Jesus and saves us or the Herod who pretends to be God and tyrannizes us?
One of my recent prayers has been for God to help me with my critical spirit--when I have it, when I want to have it, when I don't know I have it. How can I more frequently simply live my part in the story?
"Don't reduce holy mysteries to slogans. In trying to be relevant, you're only being cute and inviting sacrilege." What does this say to seeker-focused worship?
"Don't bargain with God. Be direct. Ask for what you need."
"Ask yourself what you want people to do for you, then grab the initiative and do it for them. Add up God's Law and Prophets and this is what you get."
"Don't look for shortcuts to God...The way to life-to God!-is vigorous and requires total attention."
"Be wary of false preachers who smile a lot, dripping with practiced sincerity. Chances are they are out to rip you off in one way or another. Don't be impressed with charisma; look for character. Who preachers are is the main thing, not what they say. A genuine leader will never exploit your emotions or your pocketbook."
"What is required is serious obedience--doing what my Father wills."
"These words are foundational words, words to build a life upon. Work them into your life."
"Jesus was living everything he was saying...it was the best teaching they ever heard!"
It's hard to believe that this was the "best" teaching they'd heard, as offensive and counter-cultural as it was. In some ways makes me ask Jesus' question: "Why do you call it good?"
EP: "Jesus says be poets (doers). Make something of these words I've spoken to you. Make a life, epic and poetic. And make it beautiful. Make it a work of art."
"Master, if you want to, you can heal my body." "Your cleansed and grateful life, not your work, will bear witness to what I have done."
"I've yet to come across this simple trust in Israel, the very people who are supposed to know all about God and how he works...Go. What you believed could happen has happened."
Demon-afflicted people. Who is that today? What are your demons?
"Are you ready to rough it? We're not staying in the best inns, you know."
"First things first. Your business is life, not death. Follow me. Pursue life."
"Why are you such cowards, such faint hearts?"
Jesus banishes the demon spirits into nearby pigs, who then run off a cliff...and Jesus promptly leaves that territory...
Acts
Cornelius. A thoroughly good man. Go get Peter. Peter's trance--unclean food and more food on a blanket. Voice says: "Go to it, Peter. Kill and eat." Peter: "No! I've never eaten anything unclean!" Voice: "If God says it's OK, it's OK." Happens three times for emphasis and completion. So...were all of the food purity laws man made?
Peter to Cornelius' house. "I'm sure that this is highly irregular. Jews just don't do this-visit adn relax with people of another race. But God has just shown me that no race is better than any other." Peter shares his witness, the gospel, with Cornelius and his household. "It's God's own truth, nothing could be plainer: God plays no favorites! It makes no difference who you are or where you're from-if you want God and are ready to do as God says, the door is open. The Message he sent to the children of Israel-that through Jesus Christ EVERYTHING is being put together again-well, he's doing it everywhere, among everyone."
"Our witness is that Jesus is the means to forgiveness of sins is backed up by the witness of all the prophets." No sooner were these words out of Peter's mouth than the Holy Spirit came on the listeners. The believeing Jews who had come with Peter couldn't believe it, couldn't believe that the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out on "outsider" non-Jewws, but there it was-they heard them speaking in tongues, heard them praising God. "Do I hear any objections to baptizing these friends with water? They've received the Holy Spirit exactly as we did." Spirit came first, then the sign of water baptism.
"What do you think you're doing rubbing shoulders with that crowd, eating what is prohibited and ruining our good name?" Peter replays chapter 10. Hearing it laid out like that, they quieted down. Oh, that we would claim the power of story and of sharing experience so we might see how frequently God acts beyond the borders we have prescribed!
"It's really happened! God has broken through to the other nations, opened them up to Life!"
"Barnabas was a good man that way, enthusiastic and confident in the Holy Spirit's ways."
Are you a "good" man or woman?
King Herod (ruling authorities) goes after some of the church members. First James. Now Peter, heavily under guard in the jailhouse. Powerful prayer-strenuous. Angel comes, Peter walks. Not a dream. Rescued. Mary's house, packed with praying people. Peter knocks. Rhoda doesn't even open the door--knows it's Peter's voice, but leaves him standing in the street. People inside don't believe it's Peter's voice either...she's crazy! Finally they open the door and see him.
Do we ever pray and pray and pray, and the answer stands outside the door, but we think it's impossible that the answer would be there, that the prayer would be heard and responded to?
Those poor guardsmen lost their heads for Peter's escape, which had been divinely orchestrated.
Herod's demise as his kingdom began to crumble. Exterior was all show. Interior was worm-ridden, diseased, and hollow.
Who is going to be lord of our lives? The God who reveals himself in Jesus and saves us or the Herod who pretends to be God and tyrannizes us?
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Day 3: Matthew 5 & 6; Acts 7-9
Matthew
"You're blessed when you're at the end of your rope. With less of you there's more of God and God's rule.
You're blessed when you feel you've lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.
You're blessed when you're content with just who you are--no more, no less. That's the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can't be bought.
You're blessed when you've worked up a good appetite for God.
You're blessed when you care.
You're blessed when you get your inside world--your mind and heart--put right. Then you can see God in the outside world.
You're blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That's when you discover who you really are, and your place in God's family.
You're blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you even deeper inot God's kingdom.
Count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit me. What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable."
Am I willing to be so poor, and so vulnerable that all I depend upon is God? We humans are generally very capable. We can get far not even giving God a nod. Have I, today, given God a nod? Have a listened? Have I said thank you?
"Salt seasoning that brings out the God flavors of the earth." Be light. Bring out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept--go public! Be a light-bearer. Be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you'll prompt people to open up with God.
"Unless you do far better than the Pharisees in the matters of right living, you' won't know the first thing about entering the kingdom."
Don't murder, or say idiot or stupid. Words kill. Don't make an offering to God while you're holding a grudge--fix it. Make things right. Then come back and work things out with God. Make broken relationships right.
Anger is legitimate emotion. It's ok to be angry, but don't let anger get away from you. It can cause you to sin. Anger is dangerous. It can consume us. As it does, we are the ones condemned. Most anger ends up being sinful. "Human anger generates a toxic and suffocating smoke." EP
Adultery doesn't have to be physical. Leering, thinking about it, still corrupts. Don't use the courts to use legal cover for moral failure.
Mean what you say. Do what you say you will. Yes or No will do.
Love your enemies. Don't retaliate or counter-sue. No tit for tat. Live generously. Let your enemies bring out the best in you, not the worst. Can you love the unlovable?
"In a word, what I'm saying is Grow up. You're kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you."
Don't be a hypocrite, or falsely holy and pious. No masks.
To pray, find a quiet, secluded place so you won't be tempted to role-play before God...simple, honest...shift the focus from you to God. Feel God's grace..."Our Father in heaven, Reveal who you are. Set the world right; Do what's best--as above, so below. Keep us alive with three square meals. Keep us forgiven with you and forgiving others. Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil. You're in charge! You can do anything you want! You're ablaze in beauty! Yes.Yes.Yes. "
Can't get forgiveness from God without also forgiving others. If you refuse to do your part, you cut yourself off from God's part.
God doesn't require attention-getting devices. God won't overlook what you're doing and will reward you well.
Don't hoard treasure down here. The place where your treasure is, is the place you will most want to be, and end up being. (Where your treasure is, there your heart will be. Your treasure, not your time and your talent. What sort of stewardship question is this?)
"If you open your eyes up with wonder and belief, you fill up with light. If you live squinty eyed in greed and distrust, your body is a dank cellar."
Can't worship two Gods---if you love one, you'll hate the other. What to do, what to do, what to do?! Can't worship both God and money.
If you choose God, food and clothes won't matter. Appearances won't matter.
"Relax. Don't be so preoccupied with getting, so that you can respond to God's giving. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don't worry about missing out. You'll find all your everyday human concerns will be met."
"Give your entire attention to what God is doing now and don't get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes."
What pinches most from this part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount?
Acts
Steven, under threat of death, does not back down from telling the salvation story beginning with Abraham and Genesis 11. He will not deny the story of God's faithfulness through Moses and Aaron, Joshua, and Jesus. He calls out the Pharisees for squandering God's law. Stephen doesn't notice the mob rush on him, as he has been empowered by the Holy Spirit and can only see Jesus. He's dragged out, stoned and killed, praying and asking Jesus to forgive the crowd--they don't know what they are doing. Was Stephen crazy?!
The church was strengthened by the intensity of Stephen's witness. Stephen's final prayer offered up to God all that he was. "Master Jesus, take my life. Master, don't blame them for this sin."
Persecution of church in Jerusalem and scattering of believers. Saul continued to devastate the followers of Jesus. They all became missionaries, scattered proclaimers of the Story. Philip outpreaches Simon the wizard, who becomes a believer and is baptized. Can't buy what God gives, as Simon soon learned. Need a new life--right now you reek with money lust.
"Simon treated the gift of God as something that could be used, traded, and purchased. He would never have committed this sin had he truly and deeply believed in God. If he had presented himself as a worshiper, giving himself in humility and service, it would never have entered his mind to try to take God's gift and make a profession of using it. For the Holy Spirit is not a Power to be manipulated but a Power to be obeyed." EP
Ethiopian Eunuch when questioned whether he understood what he was reading in the scroll of Isaiah the prophet: "How can I (know) without some help?" Philip told the eunuch about Jesus and baptized the eunuch (who would have been deemed "unclean" by the religious folks) in a stream of water.
Saul meets Jesus on the road to Damascus, on his way to do in a few more Jesus followers. This story is told here in chapter 9, and again in chapters 22 and 26. It's important. Shows that anybody, absolutely anybody, is capable of conversion.
Ananais told to "trust Paul's conversion." Can only imagine his reasonable hesitancy. Spirit said, "Do it." And Ananias does. EP: "The narrative underscores the element of surprise in its expectation of what God could do. The story of Paul's conversion comes as a sudden and surprising invasion of God's activity in a person whom I think is the enemy, the one individual I've given up on. This man from whom I expect the worst is the man about whom God said, 'I have picked him as my personal representative (v. 15).'"
So what can God do with the person whom I think is beyond God's grace? What ought I think now of the person about whom I think the worst? What if God is saying, "I have picked him/her as my personal representative?"
Saul becomes a turncoat to the persecuters and catches folks off guard as he speaks positively about Jesus. Paul is threatened with death and gets out of it, is accepted by the disciples, and then givein more teaching in Tarsus.
Peter heals Aeneas. And he brings Tabitha back to life.
"You're blessed when you're at the end of your rope. With less of you there's more of God and God's rule.
You're blessed when you feel you've lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.
You're blessed when you're content with just who you are--no more, no less. That's the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can't be bought.
You're blessed when you've worked up a good appetite for God.
You're blessed when you care.
You're blessed when you get your inside world--your mind and heart--put right. Then you can see God in the outside world.
You're blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That's when you discover who you really are, and your place in God's family.
You're blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you even deeper inot God's kingdom.
Count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit me. What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable."
Am I willing to be so poor, and so vulnerable that all I depend upon is God? We humans are generally very capable. We can get far not even giving God a nod. Have I, today, given God a nod? Have a listened? Have I said thank you?
"Salt seasoning that brings out the God flavors of the earth." Be light. Bring out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept--go public! Be a light-bearer. Be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you'll prompt people to open up with God.
"Unless you do far better than the Pharisees in the matters of right living, you' won't know the first thing about entering the kingdom."
Don't murder, or say idiot or stupid. Words kill. Don't make an offering to God while you're holding a grudge--fix it. Make things right. Then come back and work things out with God. Make broken relationships right.
Anger is legitimate emotion. It's ok to be angry, but don't let anger get away from you. It can cause you to sin. Anger is dangerous. It can consume us. As it does, we are the ones condemned. Most anger ends up being sinful. "Human anger generates a toxic and suffocating smoke." EP
Adultery doesn't have to be physical. Leering, thinking about it, still corrupts. Don't use the courts to use legal cover for moral failure.
Mean what you say. Do what you say you will. Yes or No will do.
Love your enemies. Don't retaliate or counter-sue. No tit for tat. Live generously. Let your enemies bring out the best in you, not the worst. Can you love the unlovable?
"In a word, what I'm saying is Grow up. You're kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you."
Don't be a hypocrite, or falsely holy and pious. No masks.
To pray, find a quiet, secluded place so you won't be tempted to role-play before God...simple, honest...shift the focus from you to God. Feel God's grace..."Our Father in heaven, Reveal who you are. Set the world right; Do what's best--as above, so below. Keep us alive with three square meals. Keep us forgiven with you and forgiving others. Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil. You're in charge! You can do anything you want! You're ablaze in beauty! Yes.Yes.Yes. "
Can't get forgiveness from God without also forgiving others. If you refuse to do your part, you cut yourself off from God's part.
God doesn't require attention-getting devices. God won't overlook what you're doing and will reward you well.
Don't hoard treasure down here. The place where your treasure is, is the place you will most want to be, and end up being. (Where your treasure is, there your heart will be. Your treasure, not your time and your talent. What sort of stewardship question is this?)
"If you open your eyes up with wonder and belief, you fill up with light. If you live squinty eyed in greed and distrust, your body is a dank cellar."
Can't worship two Gods---if you love one, you'll hate the other. What to do, what to do, what to do?! Can't worship both God and money.
If you choose God, food and clothes won't matter. Appearances won't matter.
"Relax. Don't be so preoccupied with getting, so that you can respond to God's giving. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don't worry about missing out. You'll find all your everyday human concerns will be met."
"Give your entire attention to what God is doing now and don't get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes."
What pinches most from this part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount?
Acts
Steven, under threat of death, does not back down from telling the salvation story beginning with Abraham and Genesis 11. He will not deny the story of God's faithfulness through Moses and Aaron, Joshua, and Jesus. He calls out the Pharisees for squandering God's law. Stephen doesn't notice the mob rush on him, as he has been empowered by the Holy Spirit and can only see Jesus. He's dragged out, stoned and killed, praying and asking Jesus to forgive the crowd--they don't know what they are doing. Was Stephen crazy?!
The church was strengthened by the intensity of Stephen's witness. Stephen's final prayer offered up to God all that he was. "Master Jesus, take my life. Master, don't blame them for this sin."
Persecution of church in Jerusalem and scattering of believers. Saul continued to devastate the followers of Jesus. They all became missionaries, scattered proclaimers of the Story. Philip outpreaches Simon the wizard, who becomes a believer and is baptized. Can't buy what God gives, as Simon soon learned. Need a new life--right now you reek with money lust.
"Simon treated the gift of God as something that could be used, traded, and purchased. He would never have committed this sin had he truly and deeply believed in God. If he had presented himself as a worshiper, giving himself in humility and service, it would never have entered his mind to try to take God's gift and make a profession of using it. For the Holy Spirit is not a Power to be manipulated but a Power to be obeyed." EP
Ethiopian Eunuch when questioned whether he understood what he was reading in the scroll of Isaiah the prophet: "How can I (know) without some help?" Philip told the eunuch about Jesus and baptized the eunuch (who would have been deemed "unclean" by the religious folks) in a stream of water.
Saul meets Jesus on the road to Damascus, on his way to do in a few more Jesus followers. This story is told here in chapter 9, and again in chapters 22 and 26. It's important. Shows that anybody, absolutely anybody, is capable of conversion.
Ananais told to "trust Paul's conversion." Can only imagine his reasonable hesitancy. Spirit said, "Do it." And Ananias does. EP: "The narrative underscores the element of surprise in its expectation of what God could do. The story of Paul's conversion comes as a sudden and surprising invasion of God's activity in a person whom I think is the enemy, the one individual I've given up on. This man from whom I expect the worst is the man about whom God said, 'I have picked him as my personal representative (v. 15).'"
So what can God do with the person whom I think is beyond God's grace? What ought I think now of the person about whom I think the worst? What if God is saying, "I have picked him/her as my personal representative?"
Saul becomes a turncoat to the persecuters and catches folks off guard as he speaks positively about Jesus. Paul is threatened with death and gets out of it, is accepted by the disciples, and then givein more teaching in Tarsus.
Peter heals Aeneas. And he brings Tabitha back to life.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Day 2--Matthew 3 & 4
Baptized into a changed life. If we could only remember our baptism moment by moment! What counts is your life--is it green and blossoming or is it deadwood--which means it goes on the fire?
John the Baptist:
Repent--God wills to love us into eternity. Are we able to allow such love? Repentance quits doing something--we quit trying to save ourselves, quit trying to be our own God.
Vipers--hypocrites. People around who have no intention of changing anything--dishonest.
Fire--changes what it touches. nothing keeps its identity in the fire-it is changed! Fire doesn't stay on the outside; it goes to the inside, too.
John warns that we can't consider God from a distance. Dare we go "all in"? God's got to be more than an idea.
Are you sure you know what you're asking for if you want to grow closer to God? Are you willing to risk the change that God will desire to bring in your life? It won't be under your control.
"Taken into the wild by the Spirit for a test."
1st temptation: put bread first and God second.
2nd temptation: test God's power--succumb to the excitement and adrenaline rush--looking at God as entertainment. excitement first and God second.
3rd temptation: you can have it all if you worship the devil. Single-heartedness toward devil or toward God? Temptation to bypass God to do something good. Don't we often give God credit in retrospect, having not included God in the forethought? Temptation is to be so obsessed with doing the right thing that we're willing to get rid of God in order to do it. Temptation to be impatient, to rush God's ways--which tend toward quiet, suffering, sacrificial, loving and patient, never violating human dignity.
Subtle temptations, like to be sensible about life and take care of our own basic needs and then after we're done that, take care of our relationship with God.
"Change your life. God's kingdom is here."
"I'll make a new kind of fisherman out of you."
Acts 4-6
Peter: "We have nothing to hide."
Bold men, uninhibited, fully exercising the freedom to speak out.
Humans never have the last word. God does. Period.
What if we were bold in admitting who we are: people who fall short of God's will and who are often active accomplices in plans to thwart God's will. Are we able to admit this, and refrain from self-righteousness, arrogance, etc?
God is Creator and Redeemer. God loves all creatures and will redeem and restore them to full relationship with Godself.
Peter: "Ananias, how did Satan get you to lie to the Holy Spirit and secretly keep back part of the price of the field? Before you sold it, it was yours. After you sold it, it was yours. So what what into you to pull a trick like this? You didn't lie to men but to God."
This event, with Ananias and Sapphira, takes place within the people of faith, within the proverbial body of Christ, the church, their community. They lied to God.
EP: "In the church it's not sin we need to fear, for God is practiced in dealing with fear. It's not wickedness and scandal, for the church has survived that. It's the lie of Ananias of which we need warning: 'appearing to have an external righteousness that we don't possess internally, which is none other than hypocrisy.'"
"Hoped to be touched by Peter's shadow as he walked by."
Gamaliel--a teacher of Paul, one at whose feet Stephen's sandals will be placed in chapter 7, one who cautions the authorities that they ought to leave the disciples alone. If what they're doing is only human, it will fall apart. But if it's of God, there is nothing they can do about it--and they ought not be found fighthing against God!"
Chose 7 men who would be responsible for care of the poor, so that the 12 could do the work of prayer, teaching and preaching the Word of God.
The plot against Stephen begins. He's arrested for a drummed up charge, and his end begins.
John the Baptist:
Repent--God wills to love us into eternity. Are we able to allow such love? Repentance quits doing something--we quit trying to save ourselves, quit trying to be our own God.
Vipers--hypocrites. People around who have no intention of changing anything--dishonest.
Fire--changes what it touches. nothing keeps its identity in the fire-it is changed! Fire doesn't stay on the outside; it goes to the inside, too.
John warns that we can't consider God from a distance. Dare we go "all in"? God's got to be more than an idea.
Are you sure you know what you're asking for if you want to grow closer to God? Are you willing to risk the change that God will desire to bring in your life? It won't be under your control.
"Taken into the wild by the Spirit for a test."
1st temptation: put bread first and God second.
2nd temptation: test God's power--succumb to the excitement and adrenaline rush--looking at God as entertainment. excitement first and God second.
3rd temptation: you can have it all if you worship the devil. Single-heartedness toward devil or toward God? Temptation to bypass God to do something good. Don't we often give God credit in retrospect, having not included God in the forethought? Temptation is to be so obsessed with doing the right thing that we're willing to get rid of God in order to do it. Temptation to be impatient, to rush God's ways--which tend toward quiet, suffering, sacrificial, loving and patient, never violating human dignity.
Subtle temptations, like to be sensible about life and take care of our own basic needs and then after we're done that, take care of our relationship with God.
"Change your life. God's kingdom is here."
"I'll make a new kind of fisherman out of you."
Acts 4-6
Peter: "We have nothing to hide."
Bold men, uninhibited, fully exercising the freedom to speak out.
Humans never have the last word. God does. Period.
What if we were bold in admitting who we are: people who fall short of God's will and who are often active accomplices in plans to thwart God's will. Are we able to admit this, and refrain from self-righteousness, arrogance, etc?
God is Creator and Redeemer. God loves all creatures and will redeem and restore them to full relationship with Godself.
Peter: "Ananias, how did Satan get you to lie to the Holy Spirit and secretly keep back part of the price of the field? Before you sold it, it was yours. After you sold it, it was yours. So what what into you to pull a trick like this? You didn't lie to men but to God."
This event, with Ananias and Sapphira, takes place within the people of faith, within the proverbial body of Christ, the church, their community. They lied to God.
EP: "In the church it's not sin we need to fear, for God is practiced in dealing with fear. It's not wickedness and scandal, for the church has survived that. It's the lie of Ananias of which we need warning: 'appearing to have an external righteousness that we don't possess internally, which is none other than hypocrisy.'"
"Hoped to be touched by Peter's shadow as he walked by."
Gamaliel--a teacher of Paul, one at whose feet Stephen's sandals will be placed in chapter 7, one who cautions the authorities that they ought to leave the disciples alone. If what they're doing is only human, it will fall apart. But if it's of God, there is nothing they can do about it--and they ought not be found fighthing against God!"
Chose 7 men who would be responsible for care of the poor, so that the 12 could do the work of prayer, teaching and preaching the Word of God.
The plot against Stephen begins. He's arrested for a drummed up charge, and his end begins.
Monday, September 20, 2010
NTC-Day 1
Matthew 1 & 2; Acts 1-3
I find great hope that within Matthew's genealogy there is a prostitute, a foreigner(Moabite Ruth), a woman who committed adultery with her father-in-law, and the mother of King Soloman who was involved in the sin that could have fallen King David. Why hope? First of all, because women were included at all. Second because even the unclean, or so declared at the time, had deeper wounds, further brokenness than met the eye. Hope that if some like these are included in Jesus' geneology, perhaps there is room for one like me, warts and all. Thanks be!
Matthew shows an interest in worship--which includes both relationship with God and relationship with others. Worship breaks down the wall between public and private lives.
We who follow ought to be in on the action of God, more than just impressed, rather participating in the mutuality of God acting in us, God living in us.
Acts 1.7-8- "Timing is the Father's business. What you'll get is the Holy Spirit. And when the Holy Spirit comes on you, you will be able to be my witnesses in Jerusalem, all over Judea and Samaria, even to the ends of the earth."
Acts 1.14--In this for good, completely together in prayer.
Are we witnesses to the resurrection? Do our lives and even our words, our testimony--not necessarily explicit I believe in Jesus testimony, but hope and the source of all hope--are trustworthy?
Feast of Pentecost--individual tongues come down on individual heads, albeit in community. To each is given a manifestation of the Spirit...to each one. Then, when we gather in community= magnification and multiplication!
"They were thunderstruck!"
"Whoever call out for help to me, God, will be saved!" Whoever!
This Jesus (whom you crucified)-God untied his death and raised him up! "Glad from the inside out." God made Jesus Master and Messiah. Change your life. Turn to God. Be baptized. Know yourself forgiven. Receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Holy Spirit blowing fresh, creative wind.
Church happens as the Holy Spirit descends. Never an institution with a history we can look back and measure. It's an experience of happening--of divine occurence.
Peter--I have no power (of my own) to do anything. Not even any money to give you. But I do have confidence in the power of God, and I give you that power. the willingness to respond with everything you are to the person who comes into focus as your brother or sister.
God doesn't ask us to do anything other than what we can do. Do that. (Scares me, especially if I think about the many times I've said no.)
Are you willing to respond to the needs around you with that which is uniquely you?
"You killed the author of life and God raised him from the dead--we're his witnesses! Faith in Jesus' name put this man on his feet--faith & nothing but faith.
Change your ways. Turn to God. Get your sins washed away.
I find great hope that within Matthew's genealogy there is a prostitute, a foreigner(Moabite Ruth), a woman who committed adultery with her father-in-law, and the mother of King Soloman who was involved in the sin that could have fallen King David. Why hope? First of all, because women were included at all. Second because even the unclean, or so declared at the time, had deeper wounds, further brokenness than met the eye. Hope that if some like these are included in Jesus' geneology, perhaps there is room for one like me, warts and all. Thanks be!
Matthew shows an interest in worship--which includes both relationship with God and relationship with others. Worship breaks down the wall between public and private lives.
We who follow ought to be in on the action of God, more than just impressed, rather participating in the mutuality of God acting in us, God living in us.
Acts 1.7-8- "Timing is the Father's business. What you'll get is the Holy Spirit. And when the Holy Spirit comes on you, you will be able to be my witnesses in Jerusalem, all over Judea and Samaria, even to the ends of the earth."
Acts 1.14--In this for good, completely together in prayer.
Are we witnesses to the resurrection? Do our lives and even our words, our testimony--not necessarily explicit I believe in Jesus testimony, but hope and the source of all hope--are trustworthy?
Feast of Pentecost--individual tongues come down on individual heads, albeit in community. To each is given a manifestation of the Spirit...to each one. Then, when we gather in community= magnification and multiplication!
"They were thunderstruck!"
"Whoever call out for help to me, God, will be saved!" Whoever!
This Jesus (whom you crucified)-God untied his death and raised him up! "Glad from the inside out." God made Jesus Master and Messiah. Change your life. Turn to God. Be baptized. Know yourself forgiven. Receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Holy Spirit blowing fresh, creative wind.
Church happens as the Holy Spirit descends. Never an institution with a history we can look back and measure. It's an experience of happening--of divine occurence.
Peter--I have no power (of my own) to do anything. Not even any money to give you. But I do have confidence in the power of God, and I give you that power. the willingness to respond with everything you are to the person who comes into focus as your brother or sister.
God doesn't ask us to do anything other than what we can do. Do that. (Scares me, especially if I think about the many times I've said no.)
Are you willing to respond to the needs around you with that which is uniquely you?
"You killed the author of life and God raised him from the dead--we're his witnesses! Faith in Jesus' name put this man on his feet--faith & nothing but faith.
Change your ways. Turn to God. Get your sins washed away.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Kick-off
Message series kicked off by talking about reading scripture, and it being a real, living word, reading us right back. That it stirs up stuff inside, sometimes immediately, and sometimes in retrospect, and sometimes getting us ready for the future. There's a richness and benefit to reading in community, as a number of our small groups will do.
We are eager to see what happens when a couple hundred folks read, pray, and listen together over 9 weeks. May our hearts and minds be ready for what God desires to do in and through us.
We are eager to see what happens when a couple hundred folks read, pray, and listen together over 9 weeks. May our hearts and minds be ready for what God desires to do in and through us.
New Testament Challenge
My lastest blog hope is to provide daily thoughts on our readings over the next 9 weeks. As a congregation, Warehouse 839 and Sanctuary of Hilliard United Methodist Church will be reading through the New Testament. Sunday messages will revolve around New Testament "big" themes. We've got a bunch of short term small groups set up to help discuss and think further about what we're reading. More information is available at www.warehouse839.org.
This week's readings, which begin tomorrow, September 20, are:
Monday--Matthew 1 & 2, Acts 1-3
Tuesday-- Matthew 3 & 4, Acts 4-6
Wednesday--Matthew 5-6, Acts 7-9
Thursday--Matthew 7-8, Acts 10-12
Friday--Matthew 9-10, Acts 13-15
Saturday--Matthew 11-12, Acts 16-18
Sunday--Matthew 13-14, Acts 19-21
Each days' readings ought to take about 15-20 minutes, and more if you can allow. Pray before you begin, asking God to show you something new. Read expectantly, and listen for God's still small voice in and beneath the text. May God add a blessing to this journey we begin together!
This week's readings, which begin tomorrow, September 20, are:
Monday--Matthew 1 & 2, Acts 1-3
Tuesday-- Matthew 3 & 4, Acts 4-6
Wednesday--Matthew 5-6, Acts 7-9
Thursday--Matthew 7-8, Acts 10-12
Friday--Matthew 9-10, Acts 13-15
Saturday--Matthew 11-12, Acts 16-18
Sunday--Matthew 13-14, Acts 19-21
Each days' readings ought to take about 15-20 minutes, and more if you can allow. Pray before you begin, asking God to show you something new. Read expectantly, and listen for God's still small voice in and beneath the text. May God add a blessing to this journey we begin together!
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