LOVE REVEALED IN US

It is often said that Jesus puts a face on God.  Catherine Baird (1895-1984), captures this in her lovely hymn, O Love, Revealed In Christ -

O Love, revealed on earth in Christ,

In blindness once I sacrificed
Thy gifts for dross; I could not see

         But Jesus brings me sight of Thee.

O Love, invisible before,

I see Thee now, desire Thee more;

              When Jesus speaks Thy word is clear;

I search his face and find Thee near.

  

O Love, forever claim my eyes!

       Thy beauty be my chosen prize;

I cast my load on timeless grace

              That my free soul may run the race.

I come to Thee with quiet mind,

         Thyself to know, Thy will to find;

In Jesus’ steps my steps must be,

I follow him to follow Thee.

A child asks “What does God look like?”  The parent replies with stories of Jesus so the child grows to understand that God is love and looks like Jesus.  Through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, God brings clarity about his nature and his holy love for us. 

Speaking of Jesus, the Apostle Paul writes to the Colossians (1:15 & 19), He is the image of the invisible God . . . for God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him,”  and in writing to the Ephesians (3:19) Paul explains why, that you may be filled to the measure of the fullness of God.  In other words, the child wondering what God looks like gets a good idea just by seeing the fullness of God in us. 

Thanks be to God! 

The Company We Keep

We become the company we keep.  This is a truism because it is powerfully true.  We become like those with whom we spend time.  We pick up their expressions, quirks, habits, and characteristics.  With  time their influence goes deeper than acquiring their characteristics. We may also internalize their  character.

 We don’t always have a choice with whom we spend large swaths of time.  The person next door, or in the work place, or community may not be our first or even twenty-fifth choice.  However, we do have choices in what we do with much of our time.   Given the limitations on our time, prudence dictates choosing wisely knowing there are eternal consequences from how we spend our time and with whom. 

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Here’s what I aspire to in keeping the company of others.  I want to spend everyday in the presence of Christ knowing him more and more completely.  In becoming increasingly acquainted with him, I hope to grow in intimacy with my Lord and Savior, my Creator, the one who restores me to his likeness and holiness, the one who fills my heart and life with himself and his pure love.  Time in the Word, in prayer, in fellowship with living saints, and exposures to all the means of grace possible, are the ways and means of keeping company with my Lord.

I aspire as well to keep company with others who keep company with Jesus.  They include the poor in spirit,  the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful,  and the pure in heart.  In short, they are those who obediently walk in holiness because of the sacred company they keep.  Some of them are alive and are my dear friends.  Others I’ve not met yet, but I remain excited about those to whom Christ is yet to introduce me.   Some of the saints with whom I keep company are long gone to their eternal reward and yet I keep company with them through their writings and music:  John Wesley, Charles Wesley, John Gowans,  Albert Orsborn, Sidney Cox, Catherine Baird and so many others.  The challenge comes in also keeping company with those in whom we see Christ:  the poor, the marginalized and dispossessed, the down and out, the unlovely.  Albert Orsborn's beautiful song pens our response:  Unless I am moved with compassion, how dwellest thy Spirit in me.

So, with whom are you keeping company? Knowing that we become like those  with whom we hang out, like those whose company we keep. Who’s company do you cherish?Whose  company do you need to give up?  It’s all a matter of managing the limited time we have and making the best choices.  Best blessings as you sort it out!

WHAT COULD BE BETTER THAN LIFE?

EN GEDI - DAVID'S DESERT SANCTUARY

What could be better than life?  David in the wilderness of Judah provides an answer:  “Because your loving kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise you (Psalm 63:3).  David was anointed as King of Israel and Judah by the prophet, Samuel, but he was on the run hiding from Saul, the fallen King who fell out or favor with God.  Living on the run in many ways was no life at all.  Nevertheless, David experienced the loving kindness of God in the midst of dire circumstances and travail.

THE CAVE AT EN GEDI

Psalm 63 is a remarkable expression of God’s reciprocal, synergistic intimacy with David.   David acknowledges God as his God:  “O God, You are my God.”  David responds to God’s goodness and grace by stating his priority for God in his life even in the hardship of life in the desert as he is pursued by Saul who seeks to end his life: “Early will I seek You; My soul thirsts for you; My flesh longs for You in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water.”  David’s seeks to worship the Lord in the desert sanctuary that nature provides:  “So I have looked for You in the sanctuary, to see Your power and your glory.”  All of this is a response to his growing understanding of God’s loving kindness in his life.

David’s worship is bold and unconstrained in response to God’s kindness and love.  He recognizes and readily acknowledges with praise God’s grace: “Because Your loving kindness is better than life, My lips shall praise You.  Thus will I bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name.  My soul shall be satisfies as with marrow and fatness (read: choice delicacies), and my mouth shall praise you with joyful lips.”  You might ask, “What does he have to be joyful about?”  The answer is that in this life threatening, high-risk time of his life filled with danger and harassment and on the cusp of death, David’s relationship with God is increasingly intimate as he recognizes and acknowledges God’s grace. 

In short, David’s intimacy with God and faith in Him is growing each day in the context of his hardships.  We see it even through the night.  David states, “When I remember you on my bed, I meditate on You in the night watches.”  What does he conclude?  He says, “Because You have been my help, therefore in the shadow of Your wings I will rejoice.”  In response to knowing who God is in his life and experiencing directly God’s loving kindness, goodness, and grace, David proclaims, “My soul follows close behind You; Your right hand upholds me."

Psalm 63 is a compelling example of synergistic holiness.  There is synergism in the intimacy of God and David.  Notice the reciprocity. God blesses.  David recognizes God’s grace and responds.  God blesses again and again.  David’s faith grows.  His love for God and appreciation of God’s loving kindness are  expressed in thanks, praise, and worship.  In the ongoing exchanges, God is shaping David into his holy likeness preparing him further to be a leader after the likeness of God’s own heart.  What could be better in our lives than that?  Thanks be to God!

RETURNING THANKS! NOT WAITING FOR THANKSGIVING!

Learning to pray at meal time at an early age (14 mo.) Aaaamen!

One of the joys of living close to our daughter with her husband and 14-month-old baby boy is having them over often for dinner.  We always begin the meal with a prayer, sometimes in one or all of three languages (English, Spanish, and Korean – I’ll explain another time).  From time to time we remind ourselves that a meal can be a sacrament.  It is a sign and example of God’s providence.  The individual foods of the meal represent all the various ways God’s grace came into our lives that day to bless us.  The dinner is a reminder of God’s provision and love.  The dinner together begins with a prayer of thanks followed by the blessing of the nutritious meal and then we return thanks again.  The sequence is thanks to God, His provision (the meal), and our response of more thanks.  The prayer of returning thanks is often preceded by scripture that encourages thanksgiving.  We can’t thank God enough.

Responding to God’s grace by returning thanks helps us set our hearts and minds on things above (Colossians 3:1&2).  We are reminded that in whatever we do, whether in word or deed, to do it in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him (Col. 3:17).  The Apostle Paul encourages us to “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus" (1 Thess. 5:16).  We are not waiting for Thanksgiving (the holiday) to give thanks! Thanks be to God!

Train up a child in the way he should go,
And when he is old he will not depart from it.

Proverbs 22:6New King James Version (NKJV)

THE OLD SONGS? WHAT HAPPENED?

When something works, don’t try to fix it or replace it.  Keep at it, and look for ways to fine tune it, improve it, and rise to new heights.  This is a truism for many things, but I want to focus on the hymns and songs that resonate with hearts of the faithful, or used to anyway.

As Christians we’ve been singing our theology for two millenia as God’s grace invites our response.  His lavish love inspires our obedient faith.  God’s call to holiness invites us into intimacy with him.  Ours is a full salvation from the uttermost of our sin to the uttermost of Christ’s perfecting work shaping us into his likeness, holiness.  We sing about God's initiatives and provisions.  Song is a celebration of our personal journeys in our alienation from God through redemption and reconciliation to our restoration, purity of heart and life, and ever increasing intimacy with God.  Our songs and hymns carry the good news of the Gospel.  The Good News does not end with our Lord’s crucifixion and resurrection, but goes forward with God’s remarkable gift of himself, the Holy Spirit, who is by faith available to us today.

The contributors to our hymns and songs of faith are many over the years, but  

no one helps us sing our theology more than Charles Wesley.  He wrote over 6,000 hymns in his lifetime.  Among them are such well-known classics as And Can It Be, Christ the Lord Is Risen Today, Come Thou Long Expected Jesus, Hark! The Herald Angels Sing, Love Divine All Love Excelling, O for a Heart to Praise My God, O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing, and Soldiers of Christ, Arise.

What happened to the old songs and hymns?  They’ve all but disappeared. The challenge we face today is that we rarely sing the old hymns.  We’ve begun to forget the words.  We lose a key means of learning our classic Christianity while  the new songs rarely communicate the theology very well.  Believers under 40, perhaps and some under 50, don’t know the old hymns and songs and are especially at a disadvantage.  While hymns are no substitute for knowing Scripture, the classic old hymns help interpret the Word in ways that move our hearts and mind like no other.  My hope and prayer is that we will rediscover the hymns of our heritage and pass them on to the next generation.  I also pray that God will raise up some new Charles Wesleys whose grasp of the Word make possible new songs and hymns for our sake and God’s glory!

OPTIMISM AND GRACE

I’ve been thinking how refreshing it is to hear “Thank you!” from someone when you’re not expecting it.  When someone recognizes something we’ve done and they acknowledge it, we feel good.   Feeling good is a blessing.  The flip side of receiving thanks is anticipating thanks and having it happen.  Too often it doesn’t.  Recently, I sent a check to friends who were struggling financially.  It helped them make an important transition.  We’ve had dear ones do the same for us when we were younger.  We felt recently that it was the right thing to do and frankly I was optimistic about a response.  We were not disappointed.  The financial help came at the right time.  It occasioned surprise and relief.  It also occasioned a lovely response of thanks and touched our hearts.

I suppose this is what happens with God.  He pours his grace into our lives every day and waits for our response. The appropriate response is thanks and praise.  We thank him for all the blessings he piles on us from morning to night, and through the night.  We praise him for he is a loving, gracious, awesome God. 

Not everyone and sometimes not anyone remembers to thank God for all the gifts and grace he gives.  Sometimes days, weeks, and months go by before God’s grace is even recognized and then acknowledged.   Often it just doesn't happen.  Why is that?  It doesn’t seem right?  How do we change it?  The Psalmist has an answer.  It is the disposition and habit of thanksgiving.  He writes in Psalm 100, “Come unto the gates with thanksgiving.  Enter his courts with praise.”  This is a picture of pilgrims singing their thank s and praise as they journey up to Jerusalem and enter the temple.  They were expressing their faith that God is ready and willing to bless his people.  Like the people to whom the Psalmist writes, for us to “come unto” is to anticipate, to look for, to be ready to receive.  It is acknowledging that God is faithful.  He blessed us in the past.  He blesses us now.  By faith we anticipated that he would continue his blessings on our behalf.

 Approaching gates with thanksgiving is a great way to live.  It reflects an optimism about God’s grace.  Our thanks for what God has done, is doing, and will do naturally spills over into praise to God for being that kind of God, one who loves us with an everlasting love.  Thanks is always a prelude to songs of praise, and the Bible says that God inhabits the praises of his people.  So, when we give thanks and praise to God, he draws near and we find ourselves in an even more intimate place with him.  What a great way to live!  Thanks and Glory be to God!

Be joyful always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances 

for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.  1 Thessalonians 5:16-18