Marys and Marthas

Here we are again at the Lord’s Table. I hope the joy and wonder of this moment of our service never escapes you. You can easily take the Lord’s goodness for granted but you should not do so. Work hard to cultivate joy and thanksgiving at this place.

         As you look around, think about all the different sorts of people that the Lord has gathered here. No doubt, some of them are worker bees like Martha. You may be one. Others are content to sit and contemplate the goodness of the Lord, like Mary. That might be you. If you are a Martha, don’t make the mistake of thinking Mary is lazy and spacey. If you are a Mary, don’t make the mistake of thinking Martha is just full of anxiety and missing out on Jesus. Appreciate each other. Seek to exalt one another. Give of your own talents to your sisters and brothers, to some extent making them more like you and you becoming more like them. If you do this, perhaps you will both see each other better and what is the better part, by far, see Jesus more clearly and be in the presence of Jesus more devotedly.

We Know How to Behave

God is kind to us. We should see that in this series on the Family. We have looked at so many different family relationships and maybe learned something about how to behave as fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, sons, daughters or sisters.

         The reality, though, is that most of us already know how to behave. We are to behave as Christians. Don’t think of yourself more highly than you ought. Think of your brothers and sisters of more value than yourself. We know these things. But God gives us a wealth of information in the Scriptures so that we can see these truths from a hundred different angles. That is His kindness and as a result, we are left utterly without excuse if we fail to heed Him.

He desires that we do see these truths, that we hear Him, that we humble ourselves in obedience, that we receive the tremendous blessings of that obedience and that we reject every way that seeks to put self ahead of everybody else.

         And He knows that the only way that we can do this is to confess our own failings, turn away from them in repentance and embrace the enabling grace of His Holy Spirit, so that we can be a good brother, sister, mother or father.

Providential Timing

About 30 years ago, I was playing football as a running back in Twin Falls, Idaho. My senior year we had a really good team and played in the Idaho State Football Championship on our home field. Unfortunately, the other team, Couer d'Alene, was much better and we took a drubbing in front of the home crowd. The final score was 55-13.

One of the backup quarterbacks on their team was John Friesz, who went on to legedary status at Universtiy of Idaho and played in the NFL for ten years or so. From Wikepedia, "Friesz grew up in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, and attended Coeur d'Alene High School, graduating in 1985. He was a year behind Scott Wellman, a two-time all-state quarterback who led the Vikings to the A-1 state finals in 1982 and 1983, winning the first. Friesz spent those seasons as a back-up and became the starter in his senior season in the fall of 1984." Okay, so these guys were so good that a future NFL quarterback did not start on their team as a sophomore. Scott Wellman did.

Ya, that Scott Wellman. He smoked us. Between him and number 44, Mike Cox, they really gave it to us. I remember 44 in that championship game. He ran for a touchdown, threw for a touchdown, kicked a field goal and kicked off a lot, considering how many touchdowns they scored. In addition to that, he was their main force at middle linebacker but also lined up as a down lineman and met me, regularly, at or behind the line of scrimmage. The backs of both of my hands were black and blue for weeks from being smashed by 44 and landing on the frozen and by that late in the year, the week before Thanksgiving, mostly grassless field.  Cox also went on to be a force at linebacker at University of Idaho and is to this day one of the All-time tackles leaders at U of I. It was a long day.

Those are all just reminisces brought back to me in a providential way today. This morning I took my 10 year old son, Calvin, our youngest, to soccer practice. After practice, we had a talk about hustle, paying attention and taking initiative. It is his first year playing and he is one of the younger players on the middle school team. I reminded him that he may not be one of the better players this year but that he can still have a huge positive effect on the team through hustle, directed desire and being a team player.

I told him about an award that I won my senior year of football. It was the Paul Austin award and was given to the athlete with 'the greatest hustle and most desire to win.' I have probably only spoken of this award a few times in the last 30 years. Obviously, the import of the award has stuck with me and so has that same tenacity, the desire to work hard, the need to be a team player, hustle and teaching the importance of hustle. I would much rather see a kid hustle at every level than watch a hugely talented kid lazily outperform him. I'll take the hustle kid every time.

When I arrived home from soccer practice today, I had an email in my inbox from one of my old high school friends and fellow football players with an interesting request. He is assisting the football team and the current coach of Twin Falls High is interested in bringing former winners of the Paul Austin award to serve as honorary captains of the team and give a pep talk to the players before a game.

Very odd, providential, a God thing, as my friend Bruce would say. So, I guess I'll talk to the coach and maybe make a trip out to Bruin Stadium and, if they'll let me, give the kids a rousing pep talk. At the least, I've had a good memory and reminded myself of things to reiterate to my own kids and the various kids that I have the privilege to coach and mentor.

Wonderful Disbelief

Why do we look around at church during communion? Because we are pleased to be in the presence of God with our family. We have brothers and sisters in Christ who are also favored to sit in the presence of the Lord. We are rejoicing in their bounty as well as ours. In fact, if we think of this rightly, we are shaking our heads in happy disbelief. We look at our brothers and sisters and we can hardly believe we are here to rejoice with them because we cannot believe that we are here.

         We might believe that God’s blessing could rest on them but we know ourselves and are surprised that God’s blessing is resting on us. As we look from side to side, it is almost like we are shaking our heads with a smile, like the humble 10K, Olympian, Mo Farah, who simply cannot believe he just pulled off what he had hoped for, victory, the gold medal, the acclaim of his countrymen, the favor of Prince William and Lady Kate.

         We are like that here, blessed, but also greatly rejoicing that our countrymen, our brothers and sisters, are all here to witness this goodness and receive the blessing of God.

Overroasted Bitterness

Bitterness is a root that grows wide. It will grow deep as well, if it can but it does not need a lot of soil. Any little reason will let bitterness take root. You can grow bitter because you were truly treated poorly by your parents, or your brother was a better athlete, or your sister has a better voice, or a fellow employee got the promotion, or someone younger than you tried to teach you something, or a sister in the church who looked at you with a funny look on her face that you took to be a haughty glance at you. It turns out she was squinting at the clock wondering if she had remembered to set the automatic timer for the Sunday roast.

         She did, in fact, remember to set the timer, and the roast cooked for several hours and grew juicy and tender and was consumed by all with great joy for a Sunday feast.

And you nursed that little squint for five years and your heart grew hard and sinewy at her blessings and you were consumed with envy culminating in misery and sorrow and Sundays were never a feast.

Maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration but it can and does happen. Envy and bitterness do not need much room to grow. So, don’t let them. Think of others more highly than you think of yourself. Rejoice in the bounty of your brothers and sisters in your own family and in the family of God.

Let the Little Children Come Unto Me

Jesus said, “Let the little children come unto me.”  He said this not only when little ones came to Jesus of their own accord but even when the little ones, the infants in arms, were brought to Jesus. It is striking that in the Scriptures some of the sharpest rebukes from Jesus to His disciples were about this very thing, keeping the children from the Lord.

         I thank God that He has revealed this to us and we emphatically do not keep the little ones from Jesus. We bring them to Him and He blesses them, for of such is the kingdom of heaven.

         Dear saints, we are all little children in God’s sight, babes in arms. It is imperative that we approach our Father with that kind of humility, trusting Him as a little nursing daughter fully trusts her doting mother.

         We have a new saint among us, a sister, Louisa Marie, saved by grace, blessed by Jesus and received as our fellow heir of the kingdom. Let us rejoice in God’s goodness to us as His children and also rejoice in our growing family.

                   

The Grace of Holiness

We will once again speak about daughters and the Holy Daughter of Zion. The Lord requires holiness and purity. Today, we will also baptize a young daughter, placing the name of Christ upon her.

         As we do this and as we speak about the need for our daughters to be holy and pure, we do not want to get the wrong idea. No daughter is totally pure, not even the smallest one among us, little Louisa, who will soon be named Christian.

         Even Louisa is tainted by sin. If that were not true, she would not be in need of the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ. But Louisa is fallen from grace with her father, Adam. She sinned in him and fell with him in his first transgression. And the only One that can fix the fact that she is by nature an object of God’s wrath is the righteous Lamb of God, the Lord Jesus Christ.

         So, when I speak of purity, I do not mean that our daughters, even our baby daughters are pure and sinless. They are not. I do mean that there are certain sins that should not even be named among God’s people. They should be put aside and we should enable ourselves of the grace of God to walk in holiness.

And where there is remaining sin and the struggles with particular sins, we seek the grace of God to bring us to repentance and to empower us to live holy lives. But it is all by grace through faith, not of our selves, lest any man, woman, son or daughter should boast.

Pure Hearts at Communion

Some of what has been said today is disconcerting. God requires that we be pure and chaste and yet we find in ourselves defilement and the wanton pangs of remaining sin. What are we to do? How can we be as pure as God desires us to be? The answer, of course, is Jesus. He takes us in our mess and cleanses us from all unrighteousness.  He presents us to His Father as those who have been purified by His forgiveness.

         He then gives us His Holy Spirit so that we are enabled to die to those things that unlawfully attract us and to live towards those things that are true and lovely in God’s eyes.

         All of us have sinned and sinful thoughts still assail us, some, no doubt, more than others. But God has cleansed us. God has called us to life. God has given us His Holy Spirit. God has called us friends. God has called us sons and daughters, children in whom He is well pleased.

         At this place, let us believe God. Through Jesus He has made us pure and we come to Him with pure hearts full of thanksgiving.

Holy Daughters

One of the defining attributes of a godly daughter is her purity. God desires daughters to be unstained by the world. This requires that they have hearts that are pure so that what flows from their hearts; their words, glances, the clothes they wear, their hairstyle, the respect they give, all reveal a deep inner purity.

As we think about our daughters, it is easy for us to grasp the truth that God requires chastity. We can all understand that God desires our daughters to be virgins and to have carnal knowledge of only one man, their own husband. We fathers particularly understand this as we seek to protect the honor and purity of our daughters, saving them for that one man.

But we need to understand that this is not only true of our daughters. God requires our sons, our wives and ourselves to possess this deep inner purity and beauty. He desires that we have chaste hearts and minds and therefore live faithful chaste lives.

We got a restart when we came to saving faith in Jesus Christ. God forgave us, making us pure and blameless. Like the woman at the well who had five husbands or the woman caught in adultery, Jesus forgave us and told us to go and sin no more. 

We should grasp these two things. One, Jesus forgives us so that we can be pure in heart and body once again. And two, we must put aside those sins which so easily entangle us, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes.

Whose Your Daddy?

Today, at the Table, I want you to think about who your daddy is. For some of you, that is a good thought or memory. For others, not so much, especially at this Table. Because of your family resemblance to your father, you may feel unworthy to be here at God’s Table. The reality is that all of us by nature, are, sons of Adam the First. He was a failure and got us kicked out of our homeland in disgrace. But by grace, we are all now sons of Adam the Second, Jesus Christ the Savior, who has brought us back from exile and established us in the garden of God, having cleansed us from our former sins, even our former bad name in Adam the First.

         This is a great truth. You were bad sons in Adam. But you are sons brought home in Jesus. He is your Father as well as Jesus’s Father. Thus, this is your Table as well as the Table of God, the Father. Jesus calls him Father and He encourages us to see the family resemblance so that we have the courage to also call God, Father, Abba, Daddy. Be at peace at this Table. You are home.

Derecho-Breath of God

The power of God is revealed to us in many ways. We recently saw what He can do with a simple breath. He conjured a super Derecho and it knocked down thousands of trees and revealed our weakness in the presence of God’s great power. Our seeming strength is an illusion and if we are not careful we get caught up in the illusion thinking we are safe and protected from calamity. We may think this because we have fine homes, good jobs, a decent bank account or a good retirement fund. But the fact of the matter is that we are dependent upon God at every little turn of our lives. Were He to remove His blessing and protection for even a moment, we would find ourselves utterly helpless.

         I, for one, am thankful that He has graciously revealed this to us and that He has protected us Providence saints in the midst of this storm. Let us confess our tendency for self-reliance and once again cast ourselves into the caring hands of God, our Savior.

Communion with a pleased Father

Sons and daughters are known for striving to please their parents. There are many middle-aged men and women still struggling to please their parents. Sometimes the parents are dead and gone and the opportunity to please them has completely vanished and yet the living child is still unsatisfied, a gnawing lack of assurance that they were pleasing to their father.

         This is an all too common and sad state of affairs in families at every level. Some of the blame goes on the fathers, no doubt, who simply refuse to be pleased with their children.  Men, we need to learn to take pleasure in those God has put in our charge. The first step to getting there is for you to rest, knowing that your Father is pleased with you.

         If you are here at this Table, invited by and seated with Jesus, then rest assured, the Father is pleased. 

But my sin, but my failures, but my own earthly father’s displeasure! 

Stop all that. Now is rest, now is assurance, now is peace, now we are God’s children, in whom He is well pleased. Can you rest in this? Can your receive it? Can you be at peace? God, our Father is pleased with Jesus and His choice of friends. Don’t argue with Him. Thus, you are friends of God and have even become His children through Jesus. You are His beloved sons and daughters in whom He is well pleased.

Exhortation- True Sons

Jesus is the Son of God. The Father is pleased with Him. The Father is particularly pleased because Jesus laid down His life for those the Father loved and desired to draw to Himself. Thus, Jesus did exactly what the Father would have Him do, that is, deny Himself and reveal the Father’s will on the Earth among men.

         In that little paragraph is a lot of room for our own condemnation. We know that we have not always been faithful sons and daughters. We have sought to establish our own wills and ways, sometimes even in opposition to our own earthly fathers, or even in opposition to our Heavenly Father. We are not surprised that God is pleased with Jesus and the comparison of ourselves to Jesus only makes our guilt and shame increase. What are we to do?

         First, be honest. It is true that you are not the perfect son, like Jesus. But God has looked upon you in your condition, taken pity upon you and brought you to Himself through Jesus, adopted you and called you son. You were by nature the very object of wrath that causes you to shrink from His presence. But God, the Father, by grace, has picked you out, named you Christian, a friend and brother of Jesus, and written you into His own divine will.

         Second, forsake those things that make you an odious son. And Third, come up out of the slop and your squandered inheritance. Return home to your Father and be received back into the family as a full joint heir of all the promises of God. All such sons will put on the royal robe and feast on the fatted calf.

Communion Meditation- Quiet Souls

Are you quiet? Are you meek? That is, are you subdued to God, the Father, His will, His ways, His Savior, His Providence? And having humbled yourself to Him, has this produced a quietness of soul in you? This quietness of soul is what we call the peace that passes understanding. Why does it pass understanding? Because on the outside, there remains no reason for peace. There is trouble in the world, trouble in your own life, trouble in the lives of the ones you love. Like Peter on the water, we look at the waves and are tossed about with all manner of doubt. But Jesus bids us come, look at Him, walk, even in the waves of the storm, without fear.

         We can only do this, with peace, with a quietness of spirit, if we have our eyes on Jesus.  This meal is all about that. We focus on Jesus, what He did on the cross, how He rose from the dead, the fact He sent His Spirit to dwell with us forever and that He calls us to this table to dine with Him in perfect peace. Jesus said, These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you. But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. 

Meek and Quiet

Our sermon today is on living with a meek and quiet spirit. That sounds easy, especially if the husbands are asking their wives to do this while they themselves thrash around like a bull moose, neither meek nor quiet. But the great Moses, the man who stood up to Pharoah, is described as the meekest man on the Earth.

         At the core, I believe a meek and quiet spirit is learning to submit to God in all things and relinquish control to God’s will and providence of those things that you really cannot control anyway. This amounts to a host of things, your husband’s behavior, your children’s affection, your wife’s respect or lack thereof, the hard providences of God in our lives, the government leaders that you live under, your boss and his demands, your teachers and their peculiar ways.

         God gives us many opportunities to display a meek and quiet spirit. When we do so, it reveals to ourselves and others that we truly believe that God is ultimately in control of all things. Phil. 4:6 Be careful (full of care, worry, anxiety) for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.

         So, to the extent that you are unwilling for God to be in control, you need to, as the old saying goes, let go and let God. This letting go is confession and repentance, the letting God, is to be meek and quiet, concerned for nothing, resting in the Lord.

Happy Anniversary

Today is my 25th Anniversary. I guess you might think that is a long time. Perhaps, but the years have rolled by, troubles and all, filled with God's grace and great joy.

My dear bride is still the love of my life. We have now been married for 25 wonderful years but we got started as sweethearts long before that. I put a green sucker in her desk in Mrs. Hellewell's class in fifth grade. Seems she went for the sweet bribe. That was about 35 years ago and she has held my heart ever since.

We look forward to another 25 years!

I love you, my sweet Kate. Happy Anniversary!

Communion- Humble Compliance

Our sermon today talked about submission but it was not an admonition to submit with our arms crossed in a huff and our faced creased with steely resolve. That really is not submission at all. The place where we learn godly submission is right here at this Table.

First of all, Jesus submitted to the will of the Father. He did so with blood-sweat and tears. But He also did it for the joy that was set before Him.  Herein is that joy realized. He did it to bring us to the Table of Fellowship.

At this place, you must take your guard down. Uncross your arms, remove the creased brow, lay down your burdens, come in humble compliance to Jesus, and for this joy, this realized joy of fellowship, come and eat with Jesus. You see, the fruit of honorable submission is what we are doing now, peaceful fellowship.

Exhortation- Tap Out

Today, we look at a couple of passages of Scripture that speak of the relationship of wives to their own husbands. Keep in mind that this is also the relationship of the Church to Christ. And, as such, is the relationship of all under authority to all those in authority. This means that these passages speak to everyone of us and not simply to our women or to our wives.

         This mean that we all have to learn to respond properly to authority. It also means that we are going to see that we have all failed in our responses to authority and in doing so have caused harm both to ourselves and to the authorities that we have resisted.

         The purpose of saying this is not to beat you up. This is not done simply to make you feel bad. But to some extent the beating is necessary.  An honorable fight always gives room for the weaker opponent to submit. He can call uncle, tap out, admit he is beat, that is, he can submit. Or, he can resist, unimpressed by the beating and thus declare that he is willing to take more.

         When the opponent is the Word and Spirit of God, there is no chance of victory, so the only thing that remains to be seen is how strong is your resistance and thus, how much of a beating is necessary in order to get you to tap out? I would exhort you to always tap out early as soon as you realize that you are fighting the Word of God.

The Lord Understands Us

We have continued our bible study of how husbands are to love their wives, as Christ loves the church, and live with them in an understanding way. When a husband lives this way, his wife feels loved. 

         Here at the Table of the Lord, we see this in action. The Lord understands us, His Church. He gave Himself for us and we remember what He has done. He gives us tokens of His commitment to us, bread and wine, symbols of His perfect sacrifice and undying devotion to us.

         He knows our frame, that we grow weak and unsure, even insecure about His love.  So, He gathers us weekly to review what He has done and renew His love towards us.  In short, the Lord lives with us in an understanding way. We should have no doubt about His love for us.

Understand

I believe it was St. Augustine who first said the goal of godliness is not to seek to be understood but to seek to understand. That is a helpful admonition for today’s sermon. As husband and wife, we often get stuck trying to get our spouse to understand us.  But if we turn this around and first seek to understand them as our primary focus, then whether they understand us or not fades into the background.

         The reality is that seeking to understand is simply love. For some of us, this kind of love is more difficult. We may not be good at asking questions. We may not be as naturally curious. We may not have a strong desire to know. But as the Lord brings people into your life, it is important for you to get to know them, to seek to understand who they are and what makes them tick. You cannot do this without keen skills of observation and you cannot do this without asking some personal questions.

         We can all do a better job at this, that is sanctification. But there may be a need for repentance as well if your main goal has always been to get others to understand you. If you have been self-absorbed and self-centered in this way, repentance is in order as we ask God to change you and enable you to seek to understand others and so become a humble learner.