jordan

(part 1 of 3 on the book of Joshua)

“Here is what I am commanding you to do. Be strong and brave. Do not be terrified. Do not lose hope. I am the Lord your God. I will be with you everywhere you go.”
— Joshua 1:9

The wandering Israelites couldn’t stop worrying about the future. God—who had already demonstrated his awesome might in freeing them from bondage in Egypt—promised that his plans were nothing short of spectacular. Yet they fretted constantly. Wasn’t the certainty of shackles and beatings better than the uncertainty of a frightening wilderness? What if God had underestimated their enemies? Would their children starve to death before they reached the land flowing with milk and honey?

Even though God faithfully met their daily needs, the Israelites had no faith that he held their future in his kind and gracious hand. So God decided that they didn’t get to taste the sweetness of the promised land after all.

The next generation of Israelites, though, got a second chance. All the grumblers were dead, and Moses, too. Joshua was leading the people now, and God told them to get ready. The future—with all its glorious promise—would at last be theirs. All they had to do was cross the Jordan River. The hugely swollen, fast moving, deep, dark, cold Jordan River.

You and I may not live in the Holy Land, but we all have experienced a Jordan River of our own, haven’t we? Our future lies before us, but the way God has provided to get there is the way of swirling currents and deep waters and nagging doubt. We can see that he has brought us to the river, but we nervously question his ability to get us across.

At these times, when we’re on the banks of our Jordan, we would be wise to remember two things that God said to Joshua and the Israelites as they prepared to cross.

First, an encouragement: “Be strong and very courageous…Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night…” (Joshua 1:8). When we remember God’s love and all that he has done in the past, we find deep wells of courage to trust his plans for us. “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear…” (1 John 4:18).

And second, a call to obey: “…When you reach the edge of the Jordan’s waters, go and stand in the river” (Joshua 3:8). It goes against our every instinct to simply wade into the depths of a flood. We should have a life jacket or some swimming lessons, right? But if we trust God and obey his commands, he will meet us in the midst of life’s raging rivers. “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you” (Isaiah 43:2a).

Father, I remember all you have done for your people and for me. Help me to meditate on your word day and night so that I can be strong and courageous when faced with the deep water of life. Help me to trust you and obey your commands. I can’t cross the Jordan by myself, but you will guide me safely to the other side if I put my hope in you. Amen

if grace is an ocean we’re all sinking...

God met with me so powerfully during this song. I don't think I’ve been the same since that encounter several months back. It was written by John Mark McMillan after his best friend was tragically killed. The song is long, no doubt, but the end will break your heart. But in a good way, because He loves us. Oh how He loves us.




How He Loves
by John Mark McMillan

He is jealous for me
Loves like a hurricane
I am a tree
Bending beneath
The weight of his wind and mercy
When all of a sudden
I am unaware of these
Afflictions eclipsed by glory
And I realize just how beautiful you are
And how great your affections are for me

Oh how he loves us so
Oh how he loves us
How he loves us so

Yea he loves us
Oh how he loves us

We are his portion
And he is our prize
Drawn to redemption by the grace in his eyes
If grace is an ocean we’re all sinking
So heaven meets earth like a sloppy wet kiss
And my heart burns violently inside of my chest
I don’t have time to maintain these regrets
When I think about the way
He loves us

Oh how he loves us so
Oh how he loves us
How he loves us so

Yea he loves us
Oh how he loves us

I thought about you
The day Stephen died
And you met me between my breaking
I know that I still love you God
Despite the agony
See people they want to tell me you’re cruel
But if Stephen could sing
He’d say its not true
Cause you’re good

rescue

(part 5 of 5 on the book of Acts)

“When Peter came to himself, he said, ‘Now I know for certain that the Lord has sent his angel and rescued me from the hand of Herod and from everything the Jewish people were expecting to happen.” — Acts 12:11

Something in us loves the idea of rescue. As children, we dream of being grown ups who protect and save others—firefighters, knights, nurses, vets. We flock to movies about superheroes who save innocent victims from evil plots to destroy the world. We hold our breath as news anchors tell of stranded hikers and sinking ships and miners trapped far underground.

It’s no wonder, really, that our hearts and minds never stray far from the notion of rescue. After all, we need rescuing. Ever since we tasted the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden, we’ve been a people in peril. We’ve been sucked into a pit of miry clay, and we can’t save ourselves from sinking.

The Apostle Peter was no stranger to that sinking feeling. He surely felt it when he denied Jesus for the third time and the Lord turned and looked right at him (Luke 22:61). And it is not hard to imagine how he must have longed for rescue after Stephen was stoned and the great persecution of the church began (Acts 8). Then, in Acts 12, Peter finds himself in jail—the same jail where the Apostle James had just been beheaded. Unless a rescuer can overcome 16 guards to stage a miraculous prison break, Peter will likely meet the same fate.

But the church—the entire church!—was “earnestly praying to God for him” (Acts 12:5). So it’s not at all surprising that rescue did come to Peter in the form of a light-shining, chain-busting angel of the Lord. Peter realized on that day that God is our great rescuer. Over and over, God does for us what we have no hope of ever doing for ourselves.

When the Israelites were suffering hopelessly in Egypt, God told Moses, “I have come down to rescue them…” (Exodus 3:8). When God delivered David from his enemies, David sang, “He rescued me from my powerful enemy, from my foes, who were too strong for me” (Psalm 18:17).

And when Jesus stepped down into our fallen and sin-burdened world to accept a punishment that should have been ours, he staged the greatest rescue of all. As Paul so passionately writes in Colossians 1:13-14, “For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”

When Peter realized that God had freed him from prison, he immediately went to tell others how the Lord had rescued him from certain death. Similarly, when a passerby pulls a child from a burning building, we praise that hero publicly for his selfless and lifesaving actions. How, then, could we as believers ever keep quiet about our own rescue from sin and death?

Thank you, Jesus, for rescuing me. Thank you for your heroic sacrifice on the cross that freed me once and for all from the bondage of sin. May I be more like Peter, who couldn’t wait to tell others the story of how you rescued him and redeemed his life from the pit. Amen.

Isobel

I never met Isobel. In fact, before yesterday, I’m not even sure I knew her name. But here’s what I do know about this beautiful lady.

I know her history. Or at least a bit of it. I know enough of Isobel’s story to know that things were not always easy for her or her family. Yet she remained a devoted mum and dearly loved granny to those who walked beside her through life. In this world that Isobel could not rightly call her true home, joy and suffering mingled together to form something greater than stolen moments of pleasure and prolonged seasons of pain. They formed wisdom. They formed contentment. And they formed the kind of rich, full life that Isobel lived.

I know her legacy. Isobel loved Jesus. She tasted his goodness, she experienced his rescue, and she lived in the shadow of his cross. Grace transformed Isobel, and she could not remain silent. As a Salvationist, she was committed to telling others about Christ’s redeeming love. As a mother, she was faithful to God’s instructions in Deuteronomy 6:6-9…“These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.” And now Isobel’s strong faith lives also in her daughter Gail, her son-in-law Keith, and her grandson Rowan. In life, we all must choose the seeds we sow. Isobel chose the Good Seed of the gospel. She chose Jesus. That is her legacy. And what a beautiful, undying legacy it is.

I know her eternity. Isobel is with Jesus. Her journey from the arms of her earthly family to the arms of her Heavenly Father is complete. She worships in his presence, face-to-face with the one who is the way, the truth and the life. She is delighting in the place he prepared for her, a place beyond her wildest imagination. And she has seen how Jesus caught all her earthly tears in the palms of his hands. Now, those tears have been tenderly wiped away. For Isobel, there is no more pain, no more sin, no more waiting. She is home at last. She is home to stay.

Isobel, I can’t wait to meet you. And Gail, I love you. How I wish I lived near enough to hold your hand and hear all your memories of your mum.

More
by Andrew Peterson



This is not the end here at this grave
This is just a hole that someone made
Every hole was made to fill
And every heart can feel it still
Our nature hates a vacuum

This is not the hardest part of all
This is just the seed that has to fall
All our lives we till the ground
Until we lay our sorrows down
And watch the sky for rain

There is more
More than all this pain
More than all the falling down
And the getting up again
There is more
More than we can see
From our tiny vantage point
In this vast eternity
There is more

A thing resounds when it rings true
Ringing all the bells inside of you
Like a golden sky on a summer eve
Your heart is tugging at your sleeve
And you cannot say why
There must be more

There is more
More than we can stand
Standing in the glory
Of a love that never ends
There is more
More than we can guess
More and more, forever more
And not a second less

There is more than what the naked eye can see
Clothing all our days with mystery
Watching over everything
Wilder than our wildest dreams
Could ever dream to be
There is more…

seeds

(part 4 of 5 on the book of Acts)

“Now on that day a great persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were forced to scatter throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria.”
— Acts 8:1b

When the first rock struck Stephen as he knelt in the center of a fierce and feral crowd, something huge was unleashed. Did those men, as they frantically hurled their cruel stones, understand that the church was gaining strength even as Stephen’s life ebbed away? I’m sure they didn’t. After all, Stephen’s death was the start of a great persecution against the church, and that must have felt like victory to the church’s foes.

As the great persecution grew, most believers ran for their lives, scattering throughout Judea and Samaria. But this wasn’t the church collapse hoped for by Stephen’s murderers. It was the church expansion planned by God from the foundations of the universe!

Almost immediately after we read of Stephen’s death in Acts 7, we witness Philip’s roadside encounter with an Ethiopian man in Acts 8:26-40. In the first century, Ethiopia was considered to be the literal edge of the world. The church had only just begun, yet the gospel of Christ was already spreading to the ends of the earth!

God orchestrated Philip’s “chance” meeting with the Ethiopian after he fled the persecution in Jerusalem. He revealed the fertile soil Philip needed to sow seeds of truth into the life of a stranger. Then God caused those seeds to grow.

What prevents us from taking the good news of Jesus and sowing it into our children, our friends, our communities, our world? Do we think that we aren’t smart enough, or eloquent enough, or brave enough? Even Moses, who considered himself a lousy public speaker, wondered how he could possibly do the work God was calling him to do. God’s response to Moses in Exodus 4:12? “Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”

Seed sowing does not require theological brilliance or compelling arguments or an advanced degree in witnessing. All it requires is a willingness to live a Christ-centered life in front of others. Then, as God reveals patches of fertile soil around us, we sow seeds of truth, and water them, and wait. Because, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3:7, “it is God who causes the growth.”

In the early 1960s, a young Islamic boy named Nouh was kidnapped from his Saharan nomadic tribe and forced by French colonizers to attend school in a city far from home. Some Christians were offering ball-point pens to children who would recite four Bible verses. Nouh got his pen, received a beating for associating with infidels, and—because the seeds of scriptural truth were planted in his heart that day—he eventually found abundant life and salvation through Jesus. Now a pastor in Mali, Nouh is responsible for the New Testament being translated into his native language. The seeds were small, but the harvest was great!

“For as the soil makes the sprout come up and a garden causes seeds to grow, so the Sovereign Lord will make righteousness and praise spring up before all nations.” (Isaiah 61:11)

Oh God, would you reveal the fertile soil all around me as I go out into the world to sow the good seed, which is the gospel of Christ? Would you help me wait with joy and anticipation to see how you will bring that seed to life? I ask this in the name of Jesus. Amen.

blaze

(Part 3 of 5 on the book of Acts)

“So the word of God spread.” — Acts 6:7

I’ve often thought that the earliest days of the church must have resembled a kind of holy, uncontrollable brushfire. Once the word of God had ignited bone-dry hearts and empty, parched lives, salvation’s fire blazed out of control. It spread quickly from person to person, from village to village, from region to region.

Do the math: Jesus discipled 12 men during his three-year earthly ministry. By Pentecost (just 50 days after the resurrection), there are 120 disciples gathered for prayer. By the end of the day of Pentecost, that number surges to 3,120. Once we get to Acts 5, there are too many disciples to count.

This is where the growing pains kick in. In Acts 6 we hear some rumblings of discontent. Specifically, the Greek Jews thought their widows were being neglected by the Hebrew Jews. The apostles were spread pretty thin by now, too—their nonstop preaching, praying, healing, and table waiting were proving quite stressful. They knew that if they were to focus on their calling—prayer and ministry of the word—they needed to train others to tend to the practical needs of the growing church.

This is nothing short of a divine formula for implementing the great commission. Anointed preaching, supported by prayer and carried out in a setting where Christ’s love is faithfully and practically revealed, will spark a spectacular and Spirit-fueled blaze.

And that’s exactly what happened. In Acts 6:7, Luke writes, “So the Word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.”

Over and over, scripture reveals the power of God’s word. In Jeremiah 23:29, the Lord asks, “Is not my word like fire?” In Hebrews 4:12 we read that His word is “living and active.” In Isaiah 55:11, God declares, “My word…will not return to Me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” Romans 10:17 tells us that faith comes from hearing the word of Christ.

As believers, we carry within us a powerful truth that is teeming with life and able to illuminate even the darkest places with its brilliant and heart-changing flame. Every day that God wakes us up to go out into a hurting and fallen world, we must choose to spread His word, or to hoard His word. In obedience and with a great sense that God was doing something truly immense, the believers of the early church boldly proclaimed Jesus—through preaching, through prayer, and through compassionate ministry. And like fire, the word spread.

Jesus, you are the Word. You are the reason that a rag-tag group of 12 disciples has grown into a church that spans the globe. Yet there are still so many who have not heard. Would you cause my life to intersect with those who need to hear the beautiful news of your salvation? Would you ignite their dry and brittle hearts with the powerful flame of your word? I ask this in your name, the only name worth proclaiming. Amen.

truth

(Part 2 of 5 on the book of Acts)

“I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.” — 3 John 1:4

How important is truth to God? From Genesis 3 (in which the lie of the serpent—“you will not surely die”—forever alters creation), through Revelation 19 (where the rider on the white horse is called “Faithful and True”), there are hundreds of references to truth and lying in scripture.

Hebrews 6:18 tells us “it is impossible for God to lie.” Conversely, Jesus states in John 8:44 that satan is “a liar and the father of lies.” The Psalmist talks repeatedly of desiring truth, walking in truth, and trusting in the word of truth. Isaiah 53:9 foretells the coming of One who has “no deceit in his mouth.” And, in fulfillment of that prophesy, Jesus over and over begins his teachings with the statement “I tell you the truth” and plainly states in John 14:6 that he is the truth.

Without a doubt, God values truth and defines it in absolute terms. The more thorny question is, do we?

According to at least one recent survey, Americans in general think that truth is relative, with a third of respondents saying that truth always depends on the circumstances and another third saying they just don’t know if truth is absolute.

In Acts 5 we can read the stark and cautionary tale of two members of the early church—Ananias and Sapphira, a married couple—who shared this belief that truth is relative and, therefore, inconsequential. But in one of scripture’s hardest teachings, we see that truth is anything but inconsequential.

Ananias and Sapphira had recently witnessed Barnabas, a fellow member of the church, sell his property and give the money to the apostles to be distributed to those in need. The couple decided to follow Barnabas’s lead, but with one key difference. They kept back part of the money for themselves. This would not have been a problem, except that Ananias and Sapphira told everyone that their contribution was the full amount they received for the land.

Maybe they thought their lie was harmless… after all, they were giving a significant amount to the church. Or perhaps they craved recognition for their generosity and thought the full truth might tarnish their image.

Regardless of the circumstances that dictated their definition of the truth, Ananias and Sapphira paid a heavy price: They both fell dead when confronted with their lie. The Apostle Peter was very clear about the nature of their sin when he said to them, “You have not lied to men but to God” and, “How could you agree to test the Spirit of the Lord?” Although we tend to rank lying fairly low on our mental inventory of “sin seriousness”—well below murder, for example, but just above exceeding the speed limit—God is a holy and truth-filled God. All sin (including lying) would separate us eternally from him, were it not for the fact that Jesus took the full weight of our sin on himself when he went to the cross. Because of his sacrifice, our earnest repentance will always lead us back to where we belong—back into the holy, loving, merciful, forgiving arms of the Lord.

In C.S. Lewis’s final Chronicles of Narnia novel—The Last Battle—one of the characters involved in the epic final struggle between Good and evil realizes something significant: “And then she understood the devilish cunning of the enemies’ plan. By mixing a little truth with it they had made their lie far stronger.”

This was where Ananias and Sapphira went so terribly wrong. Their lie may have contained an element of truth. But it was still a lie. And in God’s Kingdom, truth is not relative.

Father, would you create in me a heart that loves truth? Would you reveal to me any areas of my life where I have embraced the kind of relative truth that is not of your Kingdom, but of the world? You are truth. May I live a life that reflects that unconditional fact. I ask all this in the name of Jesus, the Way…the Truth…and the Life.