It all begins with an all-church brunch beginning at 9:00 a.m. in the west Education Building. A “Special Heritage Family Christmas” presentation by the Adult Choir and Orchestra will follow the brunch along with a message by Pastor Marty. This is a great opportunity to invite family and friends to our church body’s Christmas celebration. We are asking our people to bring Christmas breads or muffins on Saturday, December 14th to the Commons between 10 a.m. and noon; you may place them on the designated cart.
desiringgod.org» by David Mathis on November 4, 2013
This is a plea from the younger generation to the older. We desperately need you.
Please don’t phone it in just when the King’s about to call. Don’t retire on the world’s terms and abandon your long-time local church.
As the tsunami of the Baby Boom begins to flood the shores of retirement, please don’t leave us Millennials to fend for ourselves and make the same mistakes all over again. Join John Piper in rethinking retirement, and complete the course, all the way to the finish line, proclaiming Jesus’s might to another generation (Psalm 71:18).
Your Wisdom
For your joy, and for our good, we need you in this family called “the church.” You are our fathers (1 Timothy 5:1). The apostle wrote not only to young men, but to you — not just to the younger generation, but to the “fathers” (1 John 2:12–14). Don’t leave us as orphans.
We need your wisdom. We need your experience. You have made the long journey, watched fads comes and go, rejoiced with those who have rejoiced, wept with those who have wept, endured the dark night of the soul. As the young men see visions, we need you to dream dreams (Acts 2:17) and lean in, not out. Help us be courageous when we should be brave, and gently direct us to a different course when we should back off.
What will we hobbits do without our Gandalfs?
Your Example
We need your example. The young bucks need your discipling and your encouragement to be self-controlled (Titus 2:6), to “flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace” (2 Timothy 2:22). We need you to model for us how “not to be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil” (2 Timothy 2:24).
We need you to be “sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness” (Titus 2:2), to temper the energy of our youth with your patience, to complement the young man’s ambition with the perspective of the happy, old man who’s already been around the block a few times.
Your Grace
We need your forgiveness. In our fervor to create the future, we often have seen things out of focus. At times, we have been so naïve as to think things would be better if your generation would get out of the way. It might be easier, but it emphatically would not be better. How deadly it is when spiritual ardor ferments into arrogance. We have been foolish. We have sinned against you. We need your mercy.
We need your patience. We need your grace. Young leaders are not always easy to deal with. We ask you to remember what it was like to be younger, even as we try to keep in mind that one day soon we will be older. We ask you to listen, truly listen, and give those of us who manifestly love Jesus the benefit of the doubt. We’re not trying to ruin your church, but prepare the way for greater things still yet to come. We’re not trying to kill your gospel legacy, but keep it alive.
And we need you to do all this, not in your own strength, but in the strength that God supplies, so that in everything he gets the glory through Jesus (1 Peter 4:11). He has promised explicitly not to forsake you (Psalm 71:18), but to carry you, even to old age and gray hairs (Isaiah 43:4). He will empower you, and preserve you to hear his voice, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21, 23).
More Than Ever
For decades, you have walked as “strangers and exiles on the earth” (Hebrews 11:13). And now, as you slow down and grow weaker, and so acutely feel yourself closer than ever to heaven, more than ever “seeking a homeland” (Hebrews 11:14) — as you “desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one,” a city prepared for you by God himself (Hebrews 11:15) — please don’t settle for a little Sabbath evening of rest on this side.
We need you — ordinary, average, imperfect you. Not only do we long for the likes of Raymond Lull (martyred among Muslims at age 80), and Polycarp (bishop of Smyrna, burned alive in 155 at age 86), and J. Oswald Sanders (who wrote a book a year beginning at age 70 and died a week after he turned 100). But we also earnestly need the unknown senior sages, laboring without renown in out-of-the-way local churches, participating without occupying the positions of privilege, engaged without making the final calls, on the bus without having to be in the driver’s seat.
“Most men don’t die of old age,” said Ralph Winter, “they die of retirement.”
Please don’t retire from the local church. We need you more than ever.
desiringgod.org» by David Mathis on November 4, 2013 •
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How to Pray from the Bible
Here are 5 examples from Ephesians:
Please pray persecuted believers would know the hope God gives (Ephesians 1:8).
Pray the Holy Spirit would strengthen them (Ephesians 3:16).
Please pray persecuted believers would know how much God loves them (Ephesians 3:17)
Pray they would know how to share the gospel (Ephesians 6:19).
Please pray persecuted believers would fearlessly tell others about Jesus (Ephesians 6:20).
How to Pray for Practical Needs
Along with the example prayers in the Bible, there are some practical needs persecuted believers would love your prayers for:
Please pray persecuted believers would have access to a Bible.
Pray they have the courage to remain in their homeland.
Please pray for believers who have been rejected by family and friends.
Pray that God would surround them with a new Christian “family” who loves them and supports them emotionally and physically.
Pray for God to be an advocate for women who are socially vulnerable or have lost the custody of their children because of their faith.
Please pray that God would provide persecuted believers with jobs and safe places to live.
Learn more ways to pray for the persecuted church and read news alerts on current crises by visiting the Web site for the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church.
www.persecution.com
www.opendoors.org
Heritage once again has the privilege to assist local families through a food drive. This will help provide much needed groceries and household supplies for families in our local body as well as several families of Will Rogers and Windsor Hills Elementary School. To participate in this effort, pick up donation boxes in the Commons beginning next Sunday, November 10. Each box will have a list of items needed to fill that particular box. In order to help with distribution, please purchase items that will fit in the box provided. Families will receive more than one so there is no need to stuff the box to overflowing; it would be better to fill multiple boxes. Please return filled boxes to collection stations located in the Commons and Café on Sunday,
Nov. 17th or 24th. If you or anyone you know could benefit from this ministry, please contact Ron Miller at 773-3333 x 113.
With the loss of your loved one and the holidays upon us, you are probably thinking that there are not many people who understand the deep hurt you are feeling and/or how you will make it through the holidays. Perhaps you may be finding that it is difficult to feel optimistic about the future right now. Please know we hurt for you and want to offer you comfort and support. This is the reason we are beginning a new semester of GriefShare, a special support group for people walking the path of grief.
GriefShare begins Wednesday, November 6 at 6:00-7:30 p.m. in Room 422 located in the West Education Building on campus. (If you have never been to Heritage Baptist Church you can drive in on the south drive to the west end of the campus entrance, there will be someone at the door to welcome you and direct you to where we meet. All GriefShare attendees can join us for a free dinner which begins at 5:00pm in the same location, please come and join us)
Family members and friends are welcome to attend with you for support. You may contact Pastor Jimmy Jackson at 720-1449 or jim@delightinGod.org for more information.
More information on what the groups look like and material covered can be found on the GriefShare website found here.
You and your family are invited to come have fun with us at HBC’s Fall Festival on Wednesday, October 30, 6:30-8:30 p.m.
Free . . .
Food—Hotdogs, Popcorn, Candy
Games—Duck Pond, Football Throw, Fishing
Inflatables—Bungee Run, Obstacle Course, Moon Walk
We are located at 14317 North Council Road, OKC 73142 – 720-1449
Life in this fallen world is hard. Preparation is hard. Change is hard. It’s easy to get discouraged. It‘s easy to feel overwhelmed. It’s easy to remain or revert to being self-absorbed. It’s easy to feel alone. It’s easy to think that no one understands what you are going through.
It’s tempting to think like Moses that God must have gotten the wrong address, that this trial couldn’t have been intended for your doorstep. It’s easy to give in to wondering if the hardships of the Christian life are worth the trouble. It’s easy to look over the fence and yield to debilitating envy. It‘s easy to let go of good and godly personal spiritual habits. It’s easy, at the end of a long day, to try to numb or distract yourself by whatever temporary pleasure lies within reach.
It’s easy to deceive yourself about the need to change, to grow in godliness. It’s easy to lose your way and give up. But it’s important for you to remember that life and ministry in the fallen world are hard, not only for you, but also for everyone in your care.
That’s why God has designed us to live with others in a community of love. When I read 1 Peter 1, I’m always struck by how God has placed a call to love at the end of a discussion of hardship. As Peter summarizes what God is doing here and now, he uses three words: “suffer, grief, and trial.” None of us wants these things! But Peter reminds us that they’re tools of refinement in the hands of a loving Redeemer intent on completing in us what he’s begun. Then Peter begins to lay out how to live productively in the middle of these hardships.
Listen to his final directive: “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart” (1 Peter 1:22). Peter is saying something very powerful here. God hasn’t simply called us to endure the refining fires of sanctification. He’s ordained us to incarnate his love through the community he’s placed around us. This community of love gives us hope and strength. But it also encourages us with the reminder that the One who tests and trains is the One who loves.
This community of love is meant to comfort the person who’s discouraged, to strengthen the person who’s weak, to encourage the person who has no hope, to come alongside the person who’s alone, to guide the person who’s lost his way, to give wisdom to the person lost in foolishness, to warn the person who’s beginning to wander, to correct the person turning the wrong way, to give eyes to the person blind to God’s presence, and to physically represent God’s presence and love. No one, including pastors, is wired to live outside this community.
So as you’re living and ministering in this broken world, what does God call you to do? There’s one sure and reliable answer to the question: he calls you to seize every opportunity to be an instrument of his love.
An an ambassador of Christ, you’ve been called to participate in a community of love that is the church:
- That teenager attracted to the world needs God’s love.
- That single person facing the death of personal dreams needs God’s love
- That immigrant brother or sister who feels so out of place and so misunderstood needs God’s love.
- That mom overwhelmed with her parenting responsibilities needs God’s love.
- That man tempted to walk out of his troubled marriage needs God’s love.
- That little boy who lost his father to divorce needs God’s love.
- That woman living through the ravages of cancer needs God’s love.
- That couple facing debts they can’t pay needs God’s love.
- The woman who now faces life without the man who’s been her companion for decades needs God’s love.
- That pastor carrying a heavy weight of spiritual responsibility needs God’s love.
- That university student facing spiritual warfare needs God’s love.
We could multiply example after example. There is no location, situation, or relationship this side of heaven where this love is extraneous. This love isn’t about liking people. It isn’t about romantic affection. It’s something more than cultural niceness. It’s deeper than being respectful or mannerly.
This love finds its motivation, hope, and direction at the cross of Jesus Christ. It’s active, persevering, tender, understanding, forgiving, compassionate, and self-sacrificing love. The people in your care need this cross-shaped love, and so do you. You can love others because the One you represent never fails to love you perfectly this way in both your best and worst moments.
by Paul Tripp
When someone begins a sentence with “God told me . . .” I have to admit a silent alarm goes off somewhere inside me—unless the phrase is followed by a verse of Scripture. I know that many see this as the way the Christian life is supposed to work—that if we are really in fellowship with God we will be able to sense him speaking to us through an inner voice. But I’m not so sure. And it’s not because I think God is incapable of or uninterested in speaking to his people today. In fact I resist this language precisely because God is speaking to his people today. He speaks to us through the Scriptures.
When we read the Scriptures we are not just reading a record of what God has said in the past. God actively speaks to us in the here and now through the words of this amazing book. The writer of Hebrews makes this point clear when he quotes Old Testament passages and presents them not as something God said to his people sometime in the past, but as something God is currently saying to his people (Hebrews 1:6,7,8, 2:12, 3:7, 4:7). He writes that “the word of God is living and active” (4:12). It is exposing our shallow beliefs and hidden motives. This word is personal. You and I hear the voice of God speaking to us—unmistakably, authoritatively, and personally—when we read, hear, study, and meditate on the Scriptures.
Something More, Something Different
But many of us want something more, something different. We read the Scriptures and witness God speaking to individuals in amazing ways throughout the history of redemption. Job heard God speaking from the whirlwind. Moses heard him calling from the fiery bush. Samuel heard him calling in the dark. David heard him speak through the prophet Nathan. Isaiah felt the burning coal and heard assurance that his guilt was taken away and sin atoned for. Saul and those traveling with him on the road to Damascus heard Jesus asking why Saul was persecuting him. Prophets and teachers at Antioch heard the Holy Spirit tell them to set apart Barnabas and to send out Saul. John felt the glorified Jesus touch him and heard his assurance that he didn’t have to be afraid.
Many of us read these accounts and assume that the Bible is presenting the normal experience of all who follow God. But is it? Graeme Goldsworthy speaks to this question in his book Gospel and Wisdom. He writes, “Every case of special guidance given to individuals in the Bible has to do with that person’s place in the outworking of God’s saving purposes.” He adds, “There are no instances in the Bible in which God gives special and specific guidance to the ordinary believing Israelite or Christian in the details of their personal existence.”
Are there instances in the Scriptures in which people describe a sense of God speaking to them through an inner voice? We read accounts of God speaking in an audible voice, through a supernatural dream or vision, a human hand writing on a wall, a blinding light, or a thunderous voice from heaven. This is quite different from the way most people who say that God has told them something describe hearing his voice—as a thought that came into their mind that they “know” was God speaking. One prominent teacher who trains people on how to hear the voice of God writes, “God’s voice in your heart often sounds like a flow of spontaneous thoughts.” But where in the Bible are we instructed to seek after or expect to hear God speak to us in this way?
Some who suggest that a conversational relationship with God is not only possible but even normative point to John 10 in which Jesus describes himself as the good shepherd, saying, “My sheep hear my voice.” However, in this passage Jesus is not prescribing a method of ongoing divine communication. He is speaking to the Jews of his day using a metaphor they understand—a shepherd and his sheep. His point is that the elect among the Jews will recognize him as the shepherd the prophets wrote about and will respond to his call to repent and believe, as will the elect among the Gentiles so that they will become one flock, one church, with him at the head.
Longing for God’s Guidance
So why do we speak about hearing God in this way? We grew up being told that we must have a “personal relationship with God,” and what is more personal than hearing him speak to us about our individual issues and needs? Sometimes if we dig deep we realize we speak this way because we want to impresses others with our close connection to God and make sure they know we’ve consulted with him on the matter at hand. Another reason may be that to say, “God told me . . .” can prove useful to us. If you’ve asked me to teach children’s Sunday school this fall, it sounds far more spiritual and makes it far more difficult for you to challenge me if I say that God told me I need to sit in adult Sunday school with my husband than if I simply say that I don’t want to or have decided not to teach.
But I think there is something more at work here than simply our desire to sound spiritual or to make it difficult for someone to challenge our preferences or decisions. We genuinely long for God to guide us. We genuinely long for a personal word from God, a supernatural experience with God. Yet we fail to grasp that as we read and study and hear the Word of God taught and preached, it is a personal word from God. Because the Scriptures are “living and active,” God’s speaking to us through them is a personal, supernatural experience.
God has spoken and is, in fact, still speaking to us through the Scriptures. We don’t need any more special revelation. What we need is illumination, and this is exactly what Jesus has promised the Holy Spirit will give to us as his word abides in us. The Holy Spirit of God works through the Word of God to counsel and comfort and convict (John 16:7-15). Through the Scriptures we hear God teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training us in righteousness (2 Tim. 3:16-17). The Word of God transforms us by renewing our minds so that we think more like him and less like the world. Instead of needing God to dictate to us what to do, we become increasingly able to “discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:2).
I appreciate the way John Piper described his experience in hearing God speak through the Scriptures in his message “How Important is the Bible?” given at Lausanne 2010:
God talks to me no other way, but don’t get this wrong, he talks to me very personally. I open my Bible in the morning to meet my friend, my Savior, my Creator, my Sustainer. I meet him and he talks to me. . . . I’m not denying providence, not denying circumstances, not denying people, I’m just saying that the only authoritative communion I have with God with any certainty comes through the words of this book.
And if we want to go back a little further, Jonathan Edwards warned:
I . . . know by experience that impressions being made with great power, and upon the minds of true saints, yea, eminent saints; and presently after, yea, in the midst of, extraordinary exercises of grace and sweet communion with God, and attended with texts of Scripture strongly impressed on the mind, are no sure signs of their being revelations from heaven: for I have known such impressions [to] fail, and prove vain.
What Difference Does It Really Make?
Does it really make a difference when we expect God to speak to us through the Scriptures rather than waiting to hear a divine voice in our heads? I think it does.
When we know that God speaks personally and powerfully through his Word, we don’t have to feel that our relationship to Christ is sub-par, or that we are experiencing a less-than Christian life if we don’t sense God giving us extra-biblical words of instruction or promise. When we know God speaks through his Word we are not obligated to accept—indeed, we can be appropriately skeptical toward—claims by any book, teacher, preacher, or even friend when they write or say, “God told me . . .” We don’t have to wait until we hear God give us the go-ahead before we say “yes” or “no” to a request or make a decision. We can consult the Scriptures and rest in the wisdom and insight the Holy Spirit is developing in us and feel free to make a decision.
As we delight ourselves in the law of the Lord day and night, we can expect his Word to be living and active in our inmost parts. As that Word transforms us by the renewal of our minds, we will find that our thoughts and feelings, dreams and desires, are being shaped more by his Word than by our flesh. We will find that we are more drawn to obey his commands than to follow the culture. We will ask him for wisdom and receive it out of his generosity.
Nancy Guthrie and her husband, David, and son, Matt, make their home in Nashville, Tennessee. She and David are the co-hosts of the GriefShare video series used in more than 8,500 churches around the country and host Respite Retreats for couples who have experienced the death of a child. Nancy is the author of numerous books, including Holding on to Hope and Hearing Jesus Speak into Your Sorrowand is currently working on the five-book Seeing Jesus in the Old Testament Bible study series.
Fighting for perspective in times of suffering…
“How long, O Lord?” is a familiar cry to those who experience suffering and despair. In my own experience this question can be asked in both steadfast faith-filled hope and in faithless unbelief. I’ve asked it in both ways in the same hour or minute.
Trials teach hard lessons, as Charles Spurgeon said: “I have learned to kiss the wave that throws me against the Rock of Ages.”
And sometimes you get seasick when you’re learning to “kiss the wave.”
Kissing the Wave?
But what can Spurgeon mean, to learn to kiss the wave?
One thing he cannot mean is to call evil good. God’s word forbids us to do such a thing: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil” (Isaiah 5:20). After he revealed his true identity to his brothers who had sold him into slavery, Joseph said, “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20). Despite all of his hardship, Joseph was encouraged because he knew God was sovereign over his past, and he saw some of the good work God had already done through his trials.
Hindsight is 20/20, though, right? Where do we find comfort when we’re in the thick of trials in which we can’t see any good (at least not yet)? I think the answer to this question is also in Joseph’s story.
Joseph’s Story
There’s a common thread that runs through each account of Joseph’s ordeals from his being sold into Egypt as a slave to being wrongly incarcerated.
- “And the patriarchs, jealous of Joseph, sold him into Egypt; but God was with him” (Acts 7:9).
- “The Lᴏʀᴅ was with Joseph, and he became a successful man, and he was in the house of his Egyptian master” (Genesis 39:2).
- “His master saw that the Lᴏʀᴅ was with him and that the Lᴏʀᴅ caused all that he did to succeed in his hands” (Genesis 39:3).
- “But the Lᴏʀᴅ was with Joseph and showed him steadfast love and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison” (Genesis 39:21).
- “The keeper of the prison paid no attention to anything that was in Joseph’s charge, because the Lᴏʀᴅ was with him. And whatever he did, the Lord made it succeed” (Genesis 39:23).
There’s no doubt about it — the Lᴏʀᴅ was with Joseph. He was with Joseph in the pit. He was with Joseph in the house where he worked as a slave. He was with Joseph in jail. He was with Joseph in the court of Pharaoh. He was with Joseph in the most dramatic confrontation of his entire life. The waves kept throwing Joseph against the Rock of Ages.
God’s Nearness
I don’t think Spurgeon’s comment came from a sarcastic “Pucker up, Waves!” perspective, but one of humble sobriety and childlike faith in God who works all things for our good. Whenever we encourage one another in our home with “kiss the wave,” the words are often spoken into a tearful conversation as a lump rises in our throats and our hearts feels like they are being squeezed in a vice.
The nearness of God is our good. And the trials we endure in this fallen world, perhaps more than most other things, have a tendency to awaken us to this truth. We remember Jesus, who is called Immanuel (“God with us”), and the cross he bore for our sake. Can the waves of trials then drown us if we have a Substitute who endured the greatest trial in our place?
We can “learn to kiss the wave” because Christ is near to us and supreme over all things. He died and rose again to vanquish evil forever. Christ is to us wisdom from God, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption (1 Corinthians 1:30). You can’t get much nearer than that.
When there’s nothing in heaven or on earth or under the earth that can separate you from Christ’s love, waves of trials can only throw you onto the Rock of Ages. Resting on that Rock is where I’d like to be and stay forever, and may the Lord bless the means he uses to remind me of that.
This article was originally posted on www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/kissing-the-wave
This was originally posted here and is worth your time.
50 Rules for Dads of Daughters
1. Love her mom. Treat her mother with respect, honor, and a big heaping spoonful of public displays of affection. When she grows up, the odds are good she’ll fall in love with and marry someone who treats her much like you treated her mother. Good or bad, that’s just the way it is. I’d prefer good.
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2. Always be there. Quality time doesn’t happen without quantity time. Hang out together for no other reason than just to be in each other’s presence. Be genuinely interested in the things that interest her. She needs her dad to be involved in her life at every stage. Don’t just sit idly by while she adds years to her life… add life to her years.
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3. Save the day. She’ll grow up looking for a hero. It might as well be you. She’ll need you to come through for her over and over again throughout her life. Rise to the occasion. Red cape and blue tights optional.
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4. Savor every moment you have together. Today she’s crawling around the house in diapers, tomorrow you’re handing her the keys to the car, and before you know it, you’re walking her down the aisle. Some day soon, hanging out with her old man won’t be the bees knees anymore. Life happens pretty fast. You better cherish it while you can.
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5. Pray for her. Regularly. Passionately. Continually.
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6. Buy her a glove and teach her to throw a baseball. Make her proud to throw like a girl… a girl with a wicked slider.
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7. She will fight with her mother. Choose sides wisely.
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8. Go ahead. Buy her those pearls.
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9. Of course you look silly playing peek-a-boo. You should play anyway.
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10. Enjoy the wonder of bath time.
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11. There will come a day when she asks for a puppy. Don’t over think it. At least one time in her life, just say, “Yes.”
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12. It’s never too early to start teaching her about money. She will still probably suck you dry as a teenager… and on her wedding day.
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13. Make pancakes in the shape of her age for breakfast on her birthday. In a pinch, donuts with pink sprinkles and a candle will suffice.
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14. Buy her a pair of Chucks as soon as she starts walking. She won’t always want to wear matching shoes with her old man.
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15. Dance with her. Start when she’s a little girl or even when she’s a baby. Don’t wait until her wedding day.
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16. Take her fishing. She will probably squirm more than the worm on your hook. That’s OK.
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17. Learn to say no. She may pitch a fit today, but someday you’ll both be glad you stuck to your guns.
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18. Tell her she’s beautiful. Say it over and over again. Someday an animated movie or “beauty” magazine will try to convince her otherwise.
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19. Teach her to change a flat. A tire without air need not be a major panic inducing event in her life. She’ll still call you crying the first time it happens.
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20. Take her camping. Immerse her in the great outdoors. Watch her eyes fill with wonder the first time she sees the beauty of wide open spaces. Leave the iPod at home.
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21. Let her hold the wheel. She will always remember when daddy let her drive.
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22. She’s as smart as any boy. Make sure she knows that.
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23. When she learns to give kisses, she will want to plant them all over your face. Encourage this practice.
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24. Knowing how to eat sunflower seeds correctly will not help her get into a good college. Teach her anyway.
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25. Letting her ride on your shoulders is pure magic. Do it now while you have a strong back and she’s still tiny.
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26. It is in her nature to make music. It’s up to you to introduce her to the joy of socks on a wooden floor.
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27. If there’s a splash park near your home, take her there often. She will be drawn to the water like a duck to a puddle.
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28. She will eagerly await your return home from work in the evenings. Don’t be late.
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29. If her mom enrolls her in swim lessons, make sure you get in the pool too. Don’t be intimidated if there are no other dads there. It’s their loss.
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30. Never miss her birthday. In ten years she won’t remember the presentyou gave her. She will remember if you weren’t there.
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31. Teach her to roller skate. Watch her confidence soar.
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32. Let her roll around in the grass. It’s good for her soul. It’s not bad for yours either.
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33. Take her swimsuit shopping. Don’t be afraid to veto some of her choices, but resist the urge to buy her full-body beach pajamas.
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34. Somewhere between the time she turns three and her sixth birthday, the odds are good that she will ask you to marry her. Let her down gently.
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35. She’ll probably want to crawl in bed with you after a nightmare. This is a good thing.
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36. Few things in life are more comforting to a crying little girl than her father’s hand. Never forget this.
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37. Introduce her to the swings at your local park. She’ll squeal for you to push her higher and faster. Her definition of “higher and faster” is probably not the same as yours. Keep that in mind.
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38. When she’s a bit older, your definition of higher and faster will be a lot closer to hers. When that day comes, go ahead… give it all you’ve got.
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39. Holding her upside down by the legs while she giggles and screams uncontrollably is great for your biceps. WARNING: She has no concept of muscle fatigue.
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40. She might ask you to buy her a pony on her birthday. Unless you live on a farm, do not buy her a pony on her birthday. It’s OK to rent one though.
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41. Take it easy on the presents for her birthday and Christmas. Instead, give her the gift of experiences you can share together.
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42. Let her know she can always come home. No matter what.
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43. Remember, just like a butterfly, she too will spread her wings and fly some day. Enjoy her caterpillar years.
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44. Write her a handwritten letter every year on her birthday. Give them to her when she goes off to college, becomes a mother herself, or when you think she needs them most.
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45. Learn to trust her. Gradually give her more freedom as she gets older. She will rise to the expectations you set for her.
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46. When in doubt, trust your heart. She already does.
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47. When your teenage daughter is upset, learning when to engage and when to back off will add years to YOUR life. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.
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48. Ice cream covers over a multitude of sins. Know her favorite flavor.
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49. This day is coming soon. There’s nothing you can do to be ready for it. The sooner you accept this fact, the easier it will be.
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50. Today she’s walking down the driveway to get on the school bus. Tomorrow she’s going off to college. Don’t blink.
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Photo Credits
I was unable to find the original source for #’s 1, 3, 7, 16, 20, 42, and 47. If you know the source for any of these, please tell me so I can give the photographers credit. Here are the rest:
15. Danielle Toews
26. Dear Baby Blog
28. Baby Love Blog
43. Sandy Honig
50. Lil Miss Bossy
And #’s 8, 10, 13, 27, 29, and 36 were taken by yours truly.
If a number is not listed above, the image came from Life Magazine’s online database of pictures hosted by Google Images.
As I write this, it is Saturday March 30. Tomorrow is Easter for those denominations who use the Easter dates established by the Gregorian calendar.
Easter. What a joyous word for Christians, recalling as it does the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead after His crucifixion. During the early church, Easter was the most important celebration of the year, bar none. Christmas celebrations were not evident until sometime in the 300s, but the events of Easter, being as they were the foundation of Christianity, resonated within the church from its earliest days.
Yet I am always mindful that Easter, with all its joy, is a culmination. It is Act 2, if you will, of a play written and directed by God the Father, in which God the Son was the sole star. And I cannot think of Act 2, without thinking of Act 1. Without the Crucifixion, there would be no Easter.
So walk with me as I muse on some aspects of the Crucifixion that don’t always receive a lot of attention.
The Roman legions were the finest military on the face of the Earth at that time. Their soldiers were very hard, very tough men, who served a 25 year enlistment. And unlike modern American military practice, they were not usually transferred from station to station. They tended to stay in one location for years. The legion assigned to the area including Judea was the Legio VI Ferrata, or the Legion VI Ironclad. It was primarily based in Syria, near Damascus, but there were detachments of troops in various places, including Jerusalem.
Why do we care about Roman soldiers? Because they are laced throughout the Crucifixion accounts, beginning with the arrest of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane.
Judas then, having received the Roman cohort, and officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, came there with lanterns and torches and weapons….So the Roman cohort and the commander, and the officers of the Jews, arrested Jesus and bound Him, and led Him to Annas first; for he was father-in-law of Caiaphas, who was high priest that year. John 18:3, 12-14 NASB
The Passion begins with a Roman cohort being part of the people sent to arrest Jesus. It may have been the cohort of legion auxiliaries (think of them as non-Roman citizens serving in the Roman army) that was the normal garrison in Jerusalem, or it may have been a cohort of regular legionaries brought down from Damascus by Pilate when he came to Jerusalem at this time. It doesn’t matter which. They were there when Christ was arrested, and they delivered him to the priests who had ordered the arrest of Jesus.
After the farce of a trial that Jesus endured, Matthew, Mark, and John all record that Jesus was severely beaten and whipped by the Roman soldiers. Matthew and Mark record that the entire Roman cohort was gathered to participate in this. If the cohort was at full strength, this would have been close to five hundred men.
So as many as five hundred men participated in systematically beating and abusing Jesus, and according to scripture they laughed and jeered as they did it.
Once they had had their fun, Jesus was taken to be crucified. That was also done by Roman soldiers. We know this for two reasons: first, the Jewish courts did not have the authority to exact capital punishment. The Romans had reserved that right to themselves when they took over Judea, Samaria, Galilee, and the surrounding regions after the death of Herod the Great. So the Crucifixion was ordered by Pilate and would have had to have been carried out by Roman soldiers. Second, we know the Roman soldiers did it because all four of the gospels record them as being involved.
Mark records that Jesus was crucified about the third hour of the day (Mark 15:25), and that He died about the ninth hour (Mark 15:33-37). The atoning work of Jesus, necessary for the salvation of all believers of all lands of all history, was compressed into six hours.
And the thing that I want to end with, the thing that I want you to see, occurred at the end of that six hours.
Now when the centurion saw what had happened, he began praising God, saying, “Certainly this man was innocent.” Luke 23:47-48 NASB
And when the centurion, who was standing right in front of Him, saw the way He breathed His last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!” Mark 15:39 NASB
What I want you to consider was what kind of man this centurion was. His rank is roughly analogous to a captain in the modern U.S. Army. He probably had around 80 men under his command. And to maintain order and discipline in this group of hard, tough men—men who had just beaten and punched out and flogged Jesus—he had to be harder and tougher than they were. He probably started at the bottom and rose through the ranks. This was a man who led from the front on the battlefield, who had run his sword into enemies and watched them die. This was a man who flogged troops guilty of serious infractions of army rules. This was a man to whom crucifixions were a common occurrence. This was a hard, hard, hard man, who had no reason to consider Jesus as anything other than foreign trash from a province that had given them trouble in the past. This was a man who carried out Pilate’s orders to crucify Jesus as a matter of course, handling it in a routine business-like manner, who would ordinarily go back to his room that night and sleep well.
He had crucified men before, maybe dozens of them. What kind of impact did this crucifixion have—this execution of a wandering itinerant holy man from some scruffy village in Galilee—that it caused this man to take note of it? This hard man—this hard as nails, hard as a hammer officer to whom blood and death was all part of a day’s work—this man stood looking up at the cross as Jesus died, and said, “Truly this man was the Son of God.”
A testimony from a Roman.
Even in the moment of His death, Jesus touched a man and changed him.
He would change a world on the third day.
Soli Deo Gloria.
David
Today is Thursday. Generally a ho-hum day. There is really nothing special about a Thursday. For most it is just another step towards the weekend, another grind to get through. And that is exactly why we need to pay close attention.
This is Maundy Thursday or Holy Thursday or Covenant Thursday. Maundy refers to foot washing and specifically to Jesus washing the feet of His disciples. Now there, in this account of Jesus serving these boys, is the colliding of the mundane and the magnificent, the ho-hum and the jaw-dropping.
Foot washing – The ugly step-brother to taking out the trash. The lowest of chores. The thing that had to be done, but no one ever wanted to do it. The job you paper/rock/scissor to get out of. The no praise, no glamour, no fun task that no one signed up for and everyone dropped their heads hoping not to get assigned.
Jesus – THE Firstborn of all creation. THE Author and Perfecter of our faith. THE only child of THE Most High God. THE spotless Lamb. THE Way. THE Truth. THE Life. THE And…
Foot washing and Jesus are a strange combination and yet we all know about it. Let’s be honest we only know about foot washing because of what Jesus has done. The only reason people have painted pictures of it, written songs, and carved statues is because we are humbled and amazed by what Jesus has done.
Last year we studied the book of Revelation with the college students. When studying Revelation there is no avoiding the wrath of God. Maundy Thursday is a great reminder that One has taken our place, has paid our debt, has become a curse, and suffered the wrath of God so we would not.
Revelation 16 speaks of blood as part of the judgment the world will face. The waters will be turned to blood and there will be nothing else to drink. It even goes on to say “They deserve it“. Ironically, on that same Thursday where Jesus washes His disciples feet He calls them to drink His blood (Matt 26:27-28, “ And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you; 28 for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.”). He leaves for the garden and sweats blood (Luke 22:44, “And being in agony He was praying very fervently; and His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground.”)
Jesus was crushed for our sins. He took our shame, our curse, our punishment which we deserved. He took the very form of a servant and modeled for us how to follow.
Colossians 2:13-15 says,
“When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, 14 having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. 15 When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.“
Let us not miss the beauty of what God has done by moping through another Thursday.
It is not mundane. It’s Maundy Thursday.
His foot washing was not just another thing. It was the Lamb/King humbly serving those who deserved punishment. We deserve punishment, but in His grace we find rescue. It’s not ho-hum, but rather humbling and truly awe-inspiring.
Binary Solution Set
Have you ever heard that phrase? If you hang around mathematicians, or computer programmers, or some types of engineers, you may have encountered it. It’s a phrase that describes a problem with two—and only two—answers. Typically those answers are expressed as either “Yes/No” or “On/Off.” A binary solution set problem, whatever it is, is very clear cut, and the response is very black and white, so to speak.
What does that have to do with church, you ask? Well, Pastor Marty’s sermons on evangelism bring up a true binary solution set problem.
Response to the gospel message is a binary solution set. You either say “Yes” to the invitation to know Christ as Savior, or you say “No.”
To be perfectly clear and perfectly blunt, any answer that is not “Yes” to Jesus is “No.”
“I’m not sure,” is really “No.”
“I’m not ready,” is really “No.”
“I need to think about it,” is really “No.”
“I need clean up my life first,” is really “No.”
“Not right now,” is really “No.”
Our culture doesn’t like that. Our culture has grown so inclusive and so pantheistic that we want to believe that “All roads lead to Rome” works for religion, too. At the same time, our culture wants to believe that salvation is at least to some extent a meritocracy, that we will enter heaven because we in some manner deserve it.
Unfortunately, the Bible tells us that is not the case.
“For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.”
Luke 9:26
I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead…
2 Timothy 4:1a
Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds… And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
Revelation 20:11-12, 15
So our eternal destiny is actually determined by our response to the binary solution set question of “Do you have a saving relationship with Jesus Christ?
An answer of “Yes” enrolls our names in the Lamb’s Book of Life, which in turn places us in God’s Presence for eternity.
Any other answer, no matter how rational or reasonable to our human ears and minds, is “No,” and means our names are not present in that Book. And if we die in that state, they will never be in that Book, which will mean we will spend eternity separated from God.
To all those who believe in Purgatory or reincarnation, I’m sorry, you’re wrong. The Bible does not allow for either of those. There are no reruns, retries, do overs, or second chances. Our final answer to the question when we die is our final answer for all eternity.
The best thing we can do for our families, friends, and neighbors is present them with this binary solution set question, make it clear to them what their choices really are, and make it clear to them what the true results of those choices will be.
To do less is disobedience to God and Christ. To do less is to fail our families, friends, and neighbors.
It’s Sunday afternoon, March 10, 2013. Pastor Marty preached an excellent sermon this morning in his series addressing what evangelism is and is not, and what evangelism should mean to the church. This morning, he had occasion to refer to the following passage of scripture:
And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. Luke 9:23-24 (NASB)
I’m a writer—from time to time I’ll even go so far as to call myself a wordsmith—so it’s very easy for me to get focused on a word and mull it over and chase it down odd paths of thought. That happened to me this morning with the word ‘cross’. While Pastor Marty had me engaged with the sermon, the back of my mind kept teasing this word ‘cross’ and its context in this verse. And in a few minutes I arrived at the following thoughts.
One of the things we have to be very careful about in reading scripture today is to not read context into a verse that isn’t there. This verse is a place where it’s very easy to do that, and it all deals with that word ‘cross.’
You see, for almost 2000 years ‘cross’ has been associated with the central truth of the Christian faith and gospel. It was a cross upon which Jesus Christ, Messiah of God, was executed in the beginning of the only act of redemption by which people can receive salvation and eternal life. There have been almost 2000 years of respect and awe and at times veneration visited upon the cross because of this.
As a consequence, it’s very difficult for us as believers and members of our culture to read the word ‘cross’ in scripture and not burden it with 2000 years of awe and glory and reverence. Sometimes that’s okay; there are some verses where it is appropriate for that to be part of our reading and interpretation of the word ‘cross.’
In other verses, not so much. And this is one of the times where we shouldn’t do it.
Jesus is speaking here to people who had gathered around him. Remember that at this point in time the Crucifixion of Jesus has not occurred. That event is in the future when this account happens. Therefore, the whole weight of glory and reverence that we today associate to and with the cross of Jesus did not exist in the minds of His hearers. It’s important to know that. That was not part of their social or religious culture. It was not part of the context of this conversation, and if we really want to understand what Jesus was saying, it should not be part of our interpretation of this verse.
Crucifixion at that time was (and for that matter still is) a particularly barbaric form of execution comprised of equal parts of death by torture and death by exposure. It was part of Roman law that a Roman citizen could not be crucified. It was reserved for the worst sorts of criminals and enemies. It is a matter of history that when the slave rebellion led by Spartacus was eventually crushed, the Romans crucified thousands of the captured rebels along the highways of Italy.
There was nothing elegant or glorious or awesome about crucifixion in the minds of those who heard this statement when Jesus said it. It was strictly associated with cruelty and sordid deaths. Jesus was not giving His hearers something to aspire to; He was giving them a very graphic warning about what life could hold for those who followed Him.
If Jesus were speaking today to a crowd in America, He might have worded the statement this way:
- Take up his electric chair daily and follow me
Or maybe this way:
- Take up his gas chamber daily and follow me
Or this way:
- Take up his gallows daily and follow me
Maybe this way:
- Take up his executioner’s drug syringe daily and follow me
Or even this way:
- Take up his lynch mob’s noose daily and follow me
Do you get the point? There is no promise of an easy comfortable life if we follow Jesus. In fact, in another place Jesus said this:
“If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you…” John 15:18-20a (NASB)
So if we are truly being the church—if we are truly being disciples of Christ and not just professing that we are—it should not surprise us if we face (sometimes violent) personal opposition.
Soli Deo Gloria.
David
“When He went ashore, He saw a large crowd, and felt compassion for them...” Matt 14:14
When Jesus looked at people, He saw them in their neediness and felt compassion for them. LORD, help us to see the individuals around us and fill us with Your compassion for them.
“For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline.” 2 Tim 1:7
Pray that fear would not keep us from sharing the Gospel with others regularly, but that we would eagerly share because of His power and love in us.
“Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation.” Romans 10:1
LORD, fill us with the desire to see others come to salvation. May we not live insulated in our own little world, but aware and connecting with the lost around us.
“And as you go, preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand‘” Matt 10:7
Father, fill us with boldness to clearly and simply share the Gospel with those around us.
“Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.” Matt 9:38
Father, we ask you to send workers from Heritage into Your harvest.
