John Ortberg writes, “To be loved means to be chosen. The sense of being chosen is one of the very best gifts love bestows on the beloved... On the other hand, there is no pain quite like the pain of not being chosen.” I understand that last part – I have the emotional scars to show for it. I still remember the fourth grade experience of a bunch of kids playing a game. Two boys claimed the right to choose teams, and they went back and forth, “I want Jim.” “I want Doug.” “I want Mike.” On and on the choosing went.
The dread of that moment is still with me, etched in my psyche. I have to be honest, I was never very good at sports of any kind. Too clumsy, awkward, two left feet, not the right genes – I don’t know, I just know that when God gave out talents in the athletic arena, He gave me zero talents. You can guess what happened that day – down to the last two, and then one – the team leader griped, “Oh, I’ll take Johnston if I have to.”
A childhood experience, of course. Builds character. Makes you search for what you are good at. Creates strength. You’ll be good at something. I heard all of those things and said them and more to myself. But it took a long time for me to find out what I was good at, and those many experiences of being picked last created a good bit of self-doubt.
I projected much of this on God. I didn’t blame Him for my lack of athletic prowess, but I was quite sure that if He began dividing folks up that I would be at the tail end, not completely worthless but not much better – “Oh, I’ll take Johnston if I have to.” I tried to believe God loved me, but frankly, I had a hard time believing that.
I was in college when the message got through my dense skull. I still remember Bill and Ruth Martin encouraging me to change John 3:16 from “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son” to “For God so loved Bob.” I struggled to believe that – and then began to read the New Testament with new eyes, recognizing that God truly did love me, not because I was valuable to His team or exceptional in skills, but because I was valued by Him. He loved me because He loved me – amazing! I experienced this overwhelming sense of being chosen – of being wanted by God. I looked at what Jesus did with new eyes – it was as if God said, “Bob, I did all of this for you.”
Chosen – it really is a wonderful thing. Marriage at its best conveys much of that, a person picking us out, knowing us warts and all, and they say, “I choose you.” It truly is a tremendous gift – but no one outdoes God. I love the way Paul begins Colossians 3:12, “Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved...” The holy part is what God does, not what I do. And the chosen part, the loved part, that is God’s as well.
Colossians 3:12 and the verses that follow tell us the kind of spiritual clothes our Lord wants us to wear – things like compassion and kindness and humility and patience – it is a fairly complete list, I hope you will look at it. But this isn’t a list of necessary characteristics to earn God’s love – these are things we strive to do simply because we are loved. Because we are chosen. Because one day God said, “Oh, I’d love to take Johnston!” Thank You Lord!
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Sunday, November 22, 2009
God's Heartbeat
Have you ever heard your own heartbeat? Chances are you have. You exert yourself and you can hear your heart beating as you try to catch your breath. Or maybe you lay in just a certain way and you can hear your pulse beat in your head, the gentle throbbing just at the edge of your awareness.
What does your heartbeat say? Sounds like a stupid question, I know. My heartbeat isn’t very eloquent – the best I can translate it, it says something like “Thump-thump, thump-thump.” Our hearts don’t say much except to a doctor who knows what an irregular or unruly beat means – for us, it is just a steady beating of a drum that means we are alive.
We celebrate Thanksgiving this week, and I will spend time thanking God for a good number of things. Included will be gratitude for my family and friends, for good health, and for the privilege of serving such a great and gracious God. I will let you in on a little secret – I will also spend time listening to God’s heartbeat and thanking Him for that as well.
God’s heartbeat – I am speaking in images now, but I think you can get the point pretty easily. You hear God’s heartbeat in an amazing Scriptural passage known as Psalm 136. The Psalm starts out with a triple plea to give thanks to God, and then there are statements that direct our attention to God as the One who created us, redeemed us, and sustains us. Pretty standard stuff for the Bible. What sets this Psalm off from all the rest is the refrain, the steady, recurring, ever beating, never stopping, always pulsing “thump-thump” of God’s heart. Only, God is more eloquent – twenty-six times the refrain sounds in Psalm 136, “His love endures forever.”
Writer Peter Wallace says this refrain continually and repeatedly reminds us that God loves us. Despite our weaknesses and failures, our circumstances and struggles, even our doubts and fears, God’s love for us is unswerving. “His love endures forever.”
The Apostle John reminds us of God’s tremendous love for us as manifested in Jesus’ determination to go to the cross for our sins. John 13:1 says, “Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the full extent of his love.” What was the “full extent” of His love? He let His heartbeat stop on the cross so that when our heartbeats stopped in death, we would awaken in eternity with Him. Now, that is a love that endures forever.
Take some time this week and try to listen to your own heartbeat – and then listen to God’s heartbeat as reflected in Psalm 136 and in all the experiences of life as you follow Jesus. Sing a song of gratitude for the God who made us, saved us through Christ, walks with us through life.
Thump-thump, thump-thump – “His love endures forever.”
What does your heartbeat say? Sounds like a stupid question, I know. My heartbeat isn’t very eloquent – the best I can translate it, it says something like “Thump-thump, thump-thump.” Our hearts don’t say much except to a doctor who knows what an irregular or unruly beat means – for us, it is just a steady beating of a drum that means we are alive.
We celebrate Thanksgiving this week, and I will spend time thanking God for a good number of things. Included will be gratitude for my family and friends, for good health, and for the privilege of serving such a great and gracious God. I will let you in on a little secret – I will also spend time listening to God’s heartbeat and thanking Him for that as well.
God’s heartbeat – I am speaking in images now, but I think you can get the point pretty easily. You hear God’s heartbeat in an amazing Scriptural passage known as Psalm 136. The Psalm starts out with a triple plea to give thanks to God, and then there are statements that direct our attention to God as the One who created us, redeemed us, and sustains us. Pretty standard stuff for the Bible. What sets this Psalm off from all the rest is the refrain, the steady, recurring, ever beating, never stopping, always pulsing “thump-thump” of God’s heart. Only, God is more eloquent – twenty-six times the refrain sounds in Psalm 136, “His love endures forever.”
Writer Peter Wallace says this refrain continually and repeatedly reminds us that God loves us. Despite our weaknesses and failures, our circumstances and struggles, even our doubts and fears, God’s love for us is unswerving. “His love endures forever.”
The Apostle John reminds us of God’s tremendous love for us as manifested in Jesus’ determination to go to the cross for our sins. John 13:1 says, “Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the full extent of his love.” What was the “full extent” of His love? He let His heartbeat stop on the cross so that when our heartbeats stopped in death, we would awaken in eternity with Him. Now, that is a love that endures forever.
Take some time this week and try to listen to your own heartbeat – and then listen to God’s heartbeat as reflected in Psalm 136 and in all the experiences of life as you follow Jesus. Sing a song of gratitude for the God who made us, saved us through Christ, walks with us through life.
Thump-thump, thump-thump – “His love endures forever.”
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Falling From Grace
Periodically I spend time praying and planning for future sermons. This has been a week for doing that, and I am spending time with the theme of grace. I recognize why grace is so important to me – before I came to Christ I felt I was completely unacceptable. I had this mental image of God as stern, unloving, and lacking compassion. Becoming acceptable was something I had to achieve, and it didn’t take me long to recognize that wasn’t going to happen. Imagine my surprise when I was blindsided by the tremendous grace of God found in Jesus (sounds like a good sermon title, “Blindsided By Grace”). Jesus did for me what I could not possibly do for myself, and I love Him for it.
I love Him for it, I say – and I imagine many Christ-followers would say the same. But something often happens, and I am trying to get a handle on it. Those who are touched by grace and immersed in the love of God often become ungracious and unlovely – in short, unChrist-like. There are many relationships this affects, but it especially affects our relationship with those who are watching us. Sheldon Van Auken wrote, “The best argument for Christianity is Christians: their joy, their certainty, their completeness.” And what is the best argument against Christianity? Van Auken continues, “When Christians are somber, joyless, self-righteous, smug, narrow, repressive – Christianity dies a thousand deaths.”
What’s up? How can those who enter the kingdom of God through the gracefulness of God come to the place where they do not reflect that gracefulness in their day-to-day living? To put it in Luke 15 terms, how can young prodigals greeted by the tremendous love of the Father become elder brothers who look in judgment at those around? How can we fall so far from grace? How does the drift occur – and what can we do about it?
I love Him for it, I say – and I imagine many Christ-followers would say the same. But something often happens, and I am trying to get a handle on it. Those who are touched by grace and immersed in the love of God often become ungracious and unlovely – in short, unChrist-like. There are many relationships this affects, but it especially affects our relationship with those who are watching us. Sheldon Van Auken wrote, “The best argument for Christianity is Christians: their joy, their certainty, their completeness.” And what is the best argument against Christianity? Van Auken continues, “When Christians are somber, joyless, self-righteous, smug, narrow, repressive – Christianity dies a thousand deaths.”
What’s up? How can those who enter the kingdom of God through the gracefulness of God come to the place where they do not reflect that gracefulness in their day-to-day living? To put it in Luke 15 terms, how can young prodigals greeted by the tremendous love of the Father become elder brothers who look in judgment at those around? How can we fall so far from grace? How does the drift occur – and what can we do about it?
Monday, November 9, 2009
Slightly Imperfect
Not long ago my wife and I stopped by a candy store. I have to be honest, we weren’t going to buy any candy – we were there for the freebies. You know the ones I'm talking about, the samples they promised in big letters, the “slightly imperfect” pieces they could not sell but which would taste just as good as the unblemished variety. I would like to say that we had a great time, but to our dismay, the only pieces of candy were the kind no one wanted – and they looked like it. Mold wasn’t exactly growing on the candy, but – what was that white, fuzzy, stuff?
Slightly imperfect - I guess that describes a lot of things. My wife married me almost thirty-five years ago – I wonder when she discovered that I was “slightly imperfect?”
I have two great children whom I love, and my wife and I probably counted their fingers and toes when they were born and declared them perfect. Of course, then we brought them home from the hospital and, well, you can guess the rest. At least we love them – imperfectly, of course.
I like the way The Message translation gets at God’s choice of us in 1 Corinthians 1:26f: “Take a good look, friends, at who you were when you got called into this life. I don’t see many of ‘the brightest and the best’ among you, not many influential, not many from high-society families. Isn’t it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses, chose these ‘nobodies’ to expose the hollow pretensions of the ‘somebodies’?... Everything that we have – right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start – comes from God by way of Jesus Christ. That’s why we have the saying, ‘If you’re going to blow a horn, blow a trumpet for God.’”
You get the point – everyone of us is more than a bit “slightly imperfect.” You want something to thank God about? Here it is – knowing you and me as we are, He chose to love us, come to us through His Son, and offer us life. He came to us nobodies and made us somebody because of Jesus. Slightly imperfect, yes, of course. A bit moldy, tossed aside and neglected by others, perhaps. But God wasn’t looking for the unblemished variety that wouldn’t see their need for Jesus in the first place – He is content with the less than perfect that He might do His perfect work of grace in our lives. He knew what He was getting and chose us anyway. So go blow a trumpet for God and celebrate His tremendous grace.
Slightly imperfect - I guess that describes a lot of things. My wife married me almost thirty-five years ago – I wonder when she discovered that I was “slightly imperfect?”
I have two great children whom I love, and my wife and I probably counted their fingers and toes when they were born and declared them perfect. Of course, then we brought them home from the hospital and, well, you can guess the rest. At least we love them – imperfectly, of course.
I like the way The Message translation gets at God’s choice of us in 1 Corinthians 1:26f: “Take a good look, friends, at who you were when you got called into this life. I don’t see many of ‘the brightest and the best’ among you, not many influential, not many from high-society families. Isn’t it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses, chose these ‘nobodies’ to expose the hollow pretensions of the ‘somebodies’?... Everything that we have – right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start – comes from God by way of Jesus Christ. That’s why we have the saying, ‘If you’re going to blow a horn, blow a trumpet for God.’”
You get the point – everyone of us is more than a bit “slightly imperfect.” You want something to thank God about? Here it is – knowing you and me as we are, He chose to love us, come to us through His Son, and offer us life. He came to us nobodies and made us somebody because of Jesus. Slightly imperfect, yes, of course. A bit moldy, tossed aside and neglected by others, perhaps. But God wasn’t looking for the unblemished variety that wouldn’t see their need for Jesus in the first place – He is content with the less than perfect that He might do His perfect work of grace in our lives. He knew what He was getting and chose us anyway. So go blow a trumpet for God and celebrate His tremendous grace.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Time Change
This was the weekend the time changed for those of us in Missouri. We “gained” an hour, meaning that when our clocks said 10:00 PM, it was really only 9:00 PM. You go to bed by the old time, and you get to sleep an extra hour. We like the time change in the Fall; the one in the Spring where we “lose” an hour is not so loved.
I’m not sure my children, and especially my daughter, has ever forgiven me for the time change. When they were young, we never told them about the time change in the Fall – we just put them to bed at the normal time, let them fall asleep, and then went around the house and changed the clocks. My wife and I enjoyed another hour of solitude and our kids knew nothing about it. However, come Spring, we told them for a week before that they would have to go to bed early. On Saturday we would start changing the clocks so they could get accustomed to the idea that bedtime at 7:30 PM was really bedtime at 8:30 PM.
My daughter never got it. Since she was never told about the Fall change, she didn’t realize the Spring change just completed the cycle. It didn't make sense to her as she got older. It seemed like we were always losing time but never getting it back. She went through a long phase in her life where she lived in her own time zone, refusing to change her watch and even refusing to wear one.
She now lives in Arizona where the time doesn’t change.
The writer of Ecclesiastes 3 says, “There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven.” All the things you would expect are listed – a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to harvest, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh. There is something of a balance to life, a rhythm, and we are called to make the most of what life throws at us. Ephesians 5:16 even tells us to make the most of time because the days are evil. We don’t know what the day may bring, but we know every day brings opportunities to live life well under the Lordship of Christ. We can love God with all we are and love our neighbor as ourselves, a good response to the evil that may come our way.
My daughter would point out that Ecclesiastes 3 says nothing about a time to change our clocks. She’s right, of course. It also doesn’t say there is a time to forgive her father for not telling her about the time change, but maybe she will do it anyway.
I’m not sure my children, and especially my daughter, has ever forgiven me for the time change. When they were young, we never told them about the time change in the Fall – we just put them to bed at the normal time, let them fall asleep, and then went around the house and changed the clocks. My wife and I enjoyed another hour of solitude and our kids knew nothing about it. However, come Spring, we told them for a week before that they would have to go to bed early. On Saturday we would start changing the clocks so they could get accustomed to the idea that bedtime at 7:30 PM was really bedtime at 8:30 PM.
My daughter never got it. Since she was never told about the Fall change, she didn’t realize the Spring change just completed the cycle. It didn't make sense to her as she got older. It seemed like we were always losing time but never getting it back. She went through a long phase in her life where she lived in her own time zone, refusing to change her watch and even refusing to wear one.
She now lives in Arizona where the time doesn’t change.
The writer of Ecclesiastes 3 says, “There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven.” All the things you would expect are listed – a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to harvest, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh. There is something of a balance to life, a rhythm, and we are called to make the most of what life throws at us. Ephesians 5:16 even tells us to make the most of time because the days are evil. We don’t know what the day may bring, but we know every day brings opportunities to live life well under the Lordship of Christ. We can love God with all we are and love our neighbor as ourselves, a good response to the evil that may come our way.
My daughter would point out that Ecclesiastes 3 says nothing about a time to change our clocks. She’s right, of course. It also doesn’t say there is a time to forgive her father for not telling her about the time change, but maybe she will do it anyway.
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