What the Heck?

That is what I ask myself when I notice I haven't posted anything here since October! No excuse! So I am sitting at the Panera Bread Company in Cleveland Tennessee with my brother-in-law, Bill, drinking coffee and using the free wifi. I seem to be in this end of the year mode. For me end of the year mode means evaluating the past year and excitement about the coming year and a renewed commitment to the things I need to be much better about doing. Of course posting regularly here in this blog is one of those things I feel I need to do better with.

So my birthday is in 9 days, I turn 41. For the first time in my life I feel kinda old as my birthday approaches. I blame in on teenage children, bad knees, and nose hair.

Service or Serve Us

I usually don't "need" to blog. I like blogging, it is one way to communicate to different groups of people, but I don't have this self expression need that drives me to blog, usually. This is a post I "needed" to write.

I am in Atlanta, GA. at this







One of the speaker this week is Andy Stanley








He was sharing from John 13 about Jesus and a principle of leadership that he displayed.

Joh 13:1-15 Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. (2) During supper, when the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him, (3) Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, (4) rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. (5) Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him. (6) He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, "Lord, do you wash my feet?" (7) Jesus answered him, "What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand." (8) Peter said to him, "You shall never wash my feet." Jesus answered him, "If I do not wash you, you have no share with me." (9) Simon Peter said to him, "Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!" (10) Jesus said to him, "The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean, but not every one of you." (11) For he knew who was to betray him; that was why he said, "Not all of you are clean." (12) When he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, "Do you understand what I have done to you? (13) You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. (14) If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. (15) For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you.

Andy pointed out a good principle of leadership, but something else really spoke to me out of this passage and it has to do with verses 3-5 and 14-15. It says that Jesus knew his own exalted position, "that the Father had given all things into his hands." Yet the next verses tell how the exalted Christ who has all things put in subjection to him, laid aside the symbol of his authority, his garment, and humbled himself and washed the disciples feet. The Creator of the universe stripped off his clothing and wore a towel. The very expression of the Glory of God, pure and holy, dipped his hands into increasingly dirty water and scrubbed the filthy feet of twelve men.
Jesus, who had the praise of angels and the worship of heavenly creatures became a servant. the very light and Lord of heaven condescended (in a good way) to service in order to show the full extent of his love.

I just have to say, that blows my mind. Wow! What a mighty, loving, and unsearchable God!!
Then in verses 14-15 Jesus makes it clear that he is calling his followers to a life of service following his example of service. I am afraid I all to often have an attitude of serve us instead of service. Jesus said no servant is greater than his master. When I want to be served instead of serve others am I saying I am greater than my master, he who said, "the son of man came not to be served but to serve and give his life as a ransom for many.

God forgive me

Perspective

I have been thinking much lately about putting things in perspective. Again, a theme that God has been working in my life. I think it started with several videos, blogs, and articles about the lack of clean water in the third world, especially Africa. Here are some statistics to put into perspective. Americans spend more on makeup than it would cost to provide good wells with clean water for the third world. My dog drinks better water than most of the third world. Americans flush more clean water than most of the third world has to drink.

Then I read this blog about persecution of Christians in India. Here is a quote from Pastor Sudhakar about the persecution he and his congregation have suffered.

"On 9th( Sunday) of this month a group of 20 young people came while we were worshipping and beaten me and some women of our church and in return they have lodged a counter complaint on me putting allegation on me by saying i am converting lot of Hindus into Christianity. Kindly pray for me as the case is in the court."

It's not just limited to this pastor and his congregation. Four anti- communal groups called RSS, VHP, Bajarangdal and Hindu Vahini have been and continue to be responsible for attacks upon Christian churches in India. Hindu Vahini seems to be the worst among these groups. They killed two pastors brutally three years ago. They poured acid, cut the pastors into peaces and put them in a gunny bag and threw their bodies in the outskirts of the city.

Finally, this morning my wife and I were taking a walk and we were talking about how last year so much corn was used for the production of ethanol that other corn products and corn fed products went up in price because there was a "shortage" of corn. Now this year more corn was grown to meet the demand, but less wheat was grown so now there is a "shortage" of wheat so wheat products have increased in price. Then my wife said, "But it's not a shortage like so many other places in the world."

Perspective: here I sit fifty pounds overweight, with a cup of parasite free coffee in one hand and an unpoisioned diet coke in the other typing away on my laptop with a wireless high speed Internet connection confident that no one will grab me, pour acid down my throat, cut me into pieces and throw my body on the edge of town because of my faith.

Worthy is the Lamb!

I recently was studying in Hebrews chapters one and two. Chapter one gives a wonderful verbal picture of the exalted Son of God. I mean the description of Jesus in Hebrews one is intense. Read this out loud and listen to it....

Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
(Heb 1:1-3)

I simply think that it beautiful! Jesus is the Son of God, the very agent of creation, Everything owes its existence to Christ both its creation and continuation. Christ is the radiance of the glory of God, that aspect, or part of God's glory we get to see, we see it in Christ. He is the exact imprint of God's nature. Jesus is God!

And then Hebrews chapter two begins like this..

Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. (Heb 2:1)

I hear in this verse an admonition to meditate on the exalted nature of Christ, to dwell upon the reality of Jesus being God, to embrace all of the glory of God in Christ Jesus. So I decided I needed to write at least once a week in a journal (or a blog) about the exalted nature of Christ, make a written record of paying much closer attention to what I have heard.

Repentance

God often works thematically in my life. In His infinite wisdom and with extreme patience, He teaches me from His Word over and over on a particular theme, while at the same time uses books that I am reading and sermons to which I am listening to speak to that same theme. I love the way God does that work in my life. I think that is how I learn best, total immersion. Well, the present theme in my life is repentance. I am not exactly sure when my Heavenly Father raised this theme in my life. I originally thought it was in August, but the more I ponder, I think it was earlier, like maybe late May or early June. I was reading in the book of Judges and the following passage really opened my eyes to God's feeling toward sin.

And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals. And they abandoned the LORD, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt. They went after other gods, from among the gods of the peoples who were around them, and bowed down to them. And they provoked the LORD to anger. They abandoned the LORD and served the Baals and the Ashtaroth. So the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and he gave them over to plunderers, who plundered them. And he sold them into the hand of their surrounding enemies, so that they could no longer withstand their enemies. Whenever they marched out, the hand of the LORD was against them for harm, as the LORD had warned, and as the LORD had sworn to them. And they were in terrible distress.
(Judges 2:11-15)

I think this is when God began to teach me about repentance. So here is some of the stuff God has taught me about repentance.
1. Repentance is a turn/return to God which involves mind, heart, will, body, and spirit.
2. Repentance and faith are two aspects of one event/action called conversion.
3. Jesus called people to repent.
4. Repentance is what God commands all men everywhere to do.
5. The first sermon preached after Pentecost called for repentance.
6. Initial faith/repentance are necessary for salvation, continued faith/repentance are a
characteristic of conversion.
7. Repentance produces fruit.
8. Repentance is glossed over way to often.
The last two are the gleanings about repentance that I have most impacted me. Repentance produces fruit, in other words, others can see the change and are impacted by the attitude of humility and submission to God's purposes in words and actions. Repentance is glossed over way to often (especially in my own life) I will confess to my accountability partners that I ignored prayer, didn't do anything to share the Gospel with someone, or let my mind dwell on lustful thoughts and then say, I need to do better next week. No! what I need to do is repent!

So, Thursday night I am teaching at BASIC, I am pretty sure we will be looking at what the Bible has to say about repentance.

My New Blog

So I started this new blog. I decided I needed a fresh start at blogging. I read other people's blogs a lot and find them very helpful, insightful, intriguing, or entertaining. I found that I couldn't produce anything like that at my old blog. I thought a change of venue might give me some new inspiration and vigor to produce something worth reading. It's not that I want my blog to be read so I can have some kind of blog fame, but I want to encourage thought and discussion through the medium of blog. Maybe my aspirations are unrealistic, but we will see.

I was at a conference back in July and I was in this breakout session about using the internet for church planting and the guy Drew Goodmanson talked about the different kinds of blogs. He says there's three kinds of blogs; The virus blog-that spreads and infects other blogs, The Boss blog-a leader who has a readership and kind of teaches through the blog, The Cat Blog-Me and my cat went for a walk today that kind of stuff. My favorite kind of blogs are the virus and the boss blog, the cat blog is good when it is funny. What do you think?