Every Day - devotional for June 1

There are a lot of people who can work hard for a while, care for a while, love for a while, give of themselves for a while. They leave behind them a legacy of inconsistency and frayed or broken relationships with people and with God. 

In their jobs, they can’t be counted on. 

As parents, they raise kids who never know what the boundaries are. 

As husbands or wives, they tend to make everything about them – the “me” trumps the “we” that makes marriage work.

What’s the answer?

24 Then Jesus went to work on his disciples. "Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat; I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. 

25 Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self.  Matt 16 (MSG)

The secret to a life that leaves a lasting legacy is in those verses. 

Let Jesus lead.

Embrace life’s hardships. 

Follow Jesus every day. 

EVERY DAY. 

Do it and find peace.

Read This

Do just the opposite of what the world calls you to do. Dive deep into a community of people who call themselves a church. Expose your best and worst sides to them. Experience their worst and their best. Love them anyway as they love you. Don't go looking for the "best" this or that. Don't go seeking to have your "needs" met. Find an imperfect place filled with imperfect people and spend the rest of your life trying to meet their needs and the needs of the souls God puts into your path.

And if you're in one of those places right now...

treasure it.

Thank God for it.

You may very well find a place that requires far less of you and presents you with that just right music, just right messages, and just right people to share it with.

But in doing so you are walking away from the HEART of what it means to be a Christian. All those passages like "the last will be first" or "take up your cross daily."

It shouldn't be easy.

It should cost you something of your comfortable life.

Resist.

Dive deep.

----------------------

This post is dedicated to the most real, most raw experience of "church" I have ever known, my beloved New Hope Baptist Church in Valparaiso. You guys are heroes to me and an inspiration every moment you come to mind.

Sharing Jesus As A Grace Driven Church

We're walking through a series of messages that examine the purposes of the Church through the lens of grace. Today, we looked at evangelism. When I laid out the series,I felt that this would be the hardest to deal with. Now after I have delivered it, I still think that's the case.

We need to live out our love for Jesus in such a way that even those who oppose our worldview admire the way we live it. It means holding those beliefs tightly, but opening our hands and hearts to be good neighbors, regardless of whether those neighbors agree with us on a number of areas.

It means seeking the common ground that the apostle Paul wrote about.

My prayer is that we at New Hope would be people of grace, always ready to give an answer to the question of why we love God, love each other, and love others. And that we give that answer gently, gracefully, with respect for the person who asks.

Here's the You Tube link.

Wearing Him Well

“Putting on Christ'...is not one among many jobs a Christian has to do; and it is not a sort of special exercise for the top class. It is the whole of Christianity. Christianity offers nothing else at all.” 
― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

So we know how to act.

To do the right thing, to say the right words, or not say them.

Well, most of us do.

We know that we need to "put on Christ."

Most of the time we do okay. But if we're honest, that "clothing" wears thin when the wind of criticism, the tiny cuts of aggravating people, and just the stress of living snatches us away from the place we want to live.

But some people... it just FITS them.

One of the folks God's graced Bunny and me with makes me want to be more like Christ every time I watch him bless people with his genuine goodness, his heart for others and his devotion to his Lord. While others walk around the most menial tasks thinking someone will get that, he quietly heads that way. When a most demanding person causes others to cringe, he quiets that storm with his grace expressed - placing himself in service to him in such a humble way it's shocking to watch.

Shocking in a most convicting way.

He'll never preach a sermon.

But he lives one every day.

Thanks, Ray.

You wear Him well.

Christmas - Weakly

While rereading the accounts of Christmas again, it occurred to me - God's powerful act of Incarnation couldn't have come to a more unlikely group of people. His mighty actions and revealed plans to change everything elicited a very weak response from those who received the news.

Zachariah doubted God and couldn't even believe when an angel showed up.

Joseph searched for another way to explain what Mary had told him.

Even Mary, a model of faith, asked "How can this be...?"

Each and every one of them had a moment or moments when the situation they were presented with was just too much to believe.

Have you ever been there?

I sure have.

There have been times where, despite years of trying to live a live of faith and devotion to Jesus, something will happen and I'll silently ask the question "How can this be...?" Or really, how in the world am I going to make it through this?

To that question, God answers - "wait."

Uh, not really helpful - see we have this situation here and I need to get it fixed. And to that you say - "wait?"

I realized when I typed it that "wait" is not a word we would ever associate with Christmas, unless we add the obligatory "I can't.." as a prefix.

And yet, waiting is exactly what God required of each of the people involved in Christmas.

Zachariah and Elizabeth had prayed for a son all their married lives.

Joseph and Mary agreed in their betrothal to wait a year before consummating their marriage.

Even after the angel's announcements to them, there was the usual nine month wait for the babies that were promised to appear.

How long have you been waiting for your Christmas miracle to come? I'm not talking about that long promised pony or motorcycle.

I'm thinking of that moment when the faith you have...

...expands to fill your whole life.  When this verse becomes reality... to you.

What is faith? It is the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It is the evidence of things we cannot yet see. Heb 11:1 (NLT)

You know what?

I'm encouraged that Zachariah wouldn't take an angel's word for it. And in a way I'm grateful for Joseph's worries and Mary's concerns.

Because I am no weaker than they were, when they failed to grasp Christmas.

But then it's not about us, in our weakness.

It's about God, and His unfailing love. Remember what Gabriel said? "For nothing is impossible with God."

We can have the faith they had when we, like Mary, say to God, "let it be to me exactly as you wish. I trust you."

May we all be given the grace to do just that.

Grace and peace,

David

"So how big did this place get?"

It's funny how an offhand comment or question can sometimes drive me into periods of really deep thought and reflection. That's really not a neighborhood I frequent much anymore, simply because the pressure of getting this done NOW is so much a part of my life. Between church and school there's just not much down time.

The question came from a friend while we were preparing meals to be delivered to people who live in the neighborhoods around the church. I could be there because it was a "snow day" for us at school, so I could help Bunny get the cooking done and then be able to show up at church hours earlier than normal. His job on base let him be there too. The roads were icy, and most people had hunkered down at home, but that didn't mean they didn't need a hot meal. So some of the folks at New Hope turned out including this young man.

He and his family had simply showed up one Sunday and quickly became a part of our church. Their heart for Christ and willingness to serve have just endeared them to everyone at New Hope. And their precious daughter is a sense of endless fascination and joy while we watch her scamper around. It's been a great blessing to have them within our church family.

So his question was delivered while he and I were filling clam shell containers with black-eyed peas and rice. Not a probe, just a curious question. But it's made me think.

I answered him like most pastors would do - with numbers and relating them to the size of our sanctuary and number of seats. It's possible I mentioned some of the factors that have caused those numbers to shrink - but I don't think so.

At any rate we kept filling the containers with food, and another New Hope family member came in with some rolls to add to the meal. Then in a little while another brother came in to help finish up "plating" the meal and help deliver them. And once we got them all filled, we left and delivered them all - 99 meals to people who needed them, and maybe reminding of the fact that God loves them and so do we.

Today as I was taking a look at Sunday's Bible study, the conversation came back to my memory. You have to understand - I've spent over 14 years at New Hope, preaching and teaching the Word, loving and praying for the people, and doing whatever it took at the time to see us love people and reach them with the love of God. There have been times I wanted to leave out of frustration with what was happening, and a couple times I could have left, but I knew absolutely it was God's will for me to move here and though it has been tough at times, He has never released me from this call. So here I am.

Look - we've had more people. Twice as many plus some. We've had some really great folks come and serve with us, and then move away or move on for one reason or another. God bless them all. I'll be forever grateful for what they meant to God's work at New Hope, and what they meant to me personally.

You don't serve with someone, spend time in each other's homes, do funerals for their fathers, mothers, and pets; you don't stand up with their children as they pledge their lives to God and each other; you don't laugh and cry with them - without a feeling of loss when they leave. Not sure many people understand that when you have prayed for a person as their pastor - calling out to God for them by name everyday for years, you grow kind of attached. So yeah...

But you have to understand this too. A pastor does not live in the past, he runs to the future, because that's where his prayers to the timeless God he prays to - lead him. I'm always praying for another chance to see God capture the heart of a child, of a teen, of an adult. I'm always hoping to be there when God mends a broken heart or when He sets one on FIRE for souls. That's what drives me - what keeps me excited about being a pastor.

And right now I'm seeing a rekindling of that fire in the people of New Hope. We may have less people, but we have a group who love, who serve, who give, who want to see the Kingdom come and His will be done right here in a small church in a small town.

"So how big did this place get is?" a question I hope to ask the Father one day. In person.

I really expect to be blown away.

Because Scripture tells me that God can do more than we can ask or even imagine. And I believe it with all my heart.

The Cost

Well, it's almost Christmas. The traffic is thicker and our patience is thinner. We're beginning to put one eye on the calendar and the other on the checkbook make sure that one doesn't get ahead of the other. That fear can begin to start - what if we don't have enough? Don't you miss those days as children when you never gave a thought to Christmas' cost? 

My family was not wealthy by any means, but neither were we poor. Like many, we lived from week to week, knew our banker or loan officer well, and while we never lacked, we never prospered. Yet every Christmas that I can remember came and went leaving me filled with the belief that I had been blessed. If I wanted a "Johnny 7 One Man Army Gun" badly enough, it seemed to find its way to the tree. If a "Model Motoring by Aurora" racetrack caught my fancy, well, apparently Santa knew that too. 

Even though I knew from my trips to the stores that such things had prices, I never concerned myself with the cost. 

Yet there was a cost - a sacrifice for my parents - every year. As I grew older, I'd catch snippets of conversations about the bills, and their struggle to pay them. "What are we going to do?", I'd hear my Mother say with worry and fear coloring her voice. "I don't know, but they are going to have Christmas," replied my Father, somewhat more hopefully, but still unsure. And off they'd go to the Western Auto, or to Sears, or to somewhere else they could buy toys and pay on time. 

Gradually I realized that my Christmas gifts cost them dearly. In time, in energy, in stress. My mother would cut corners - patch jeans, save pennies. My father would work overtime even after his regular swing shift. So somehow, every year there'd come Christmas. It came with a cost. 

It always has. 

That's why we have communion on Christmas Eve. To remember the cost.

My prayer is that as we celebrate the birth of Christ tomorrow, we remember that He came to pay the price for our sins.

Merry Christmas!

Whenever You Hold A Child

Christmas time always causes me to rummage around in my closet of memories. If you're like me, you've got stuff in there.

For me, back there past the 3rd grade report card I'm still grousing over from one December past, or the memory of the time the heat pump went out when I was 2200 miles away from a freezing Macon, GA, are memories upon memories of Christmases.

Some examples?

One Christmas when I was a child, I received a toy helicopter with a broken windshield. A note affixed read "sorry, dropped off the sleigh. - Santa". I come by my sense of humor genetically, obviously.

Another found Bunny and me walking away from a guitar store, not buying, but selling my guitar to pay for Christmas for the boys. We had smiles on our faces, thinking about how they were going to enjoy the toys. No regrets, only memories of their joy.

Really, most of my memories of Christmas revolve around children. I get excited every year to see the little ones as they begin to anticipate the day's coming. When I read the Christmas story, I remember what it's like to hold a newborn son. Joy floods your soul as you cradle this new life - full of promise, bathed in love, fresh from the arms of God. This time last year we were joyously but anxiously awaiting the birth of Aiden Brann Wilson, our grandson.

So when I read Zachariah's "song" and see this, it touches me.

And you, my child, "Prophet of the Highest,"
will go ahead of the Master to prepare his ways,
77Present the offer of salvation to his people,
the forgiveness of their sins.
78Through the heartfelt mercies of our God,
God's Sunrise will break in upon us,
79Shining on those in the darkness,
those sitting in the shadow of death,
Then showing us the way, one foot at a time,
down the path of peace. Luke 1:77-79

When I visualize this scene, I see a man holding his son. Maybe John was sleeping - you like them to get in that routine early. Or maybe he was looking up at his daddy, fist in his mouth, or with arms outstretched. I can see those dimples on the backs of his hands, and his little bitty toes. A baby, held tight in the arms of love.

Zachariah, unlike most anyone else, had a clear understanding from God directly about what the result of his son's life would be. That passage is God's announcement of just what the life of John the Baptist would mean.

But remember, Zach and Liz couldn't just kick back and not do the work of being John's parents - just the opposite. God's plan for John's life required Zachariah and Elizabeth to do what they only could do, and that is to "train up a child in the way he should go..." Before John could show anyone else the "path of peace", he had to be taught the "way".

Friends, when you hold a child, you are holding God's investment into the future of this world. You are holding one of His masterpieces of creation. Snug within your arms lies the continuation of God's purpose and plan.

That child you hold may be someone like John, who will show many people the way.
That child you hold may be someone like Mary, whose life will be used to change the world forever.

Your part in that isn't just to hold them, but to mold them into people who grow up to live for Jesus. Whenever you do, you are touching generations yet to come with His love.

So this Christmas, why not take time each night to read the Christmas Scriptures? Talk with your kids about God's love for the world expressed through Jesus. Let them pretend they are shepherds, wise men, Joseph and Mary. Let them enter into the wonder and experiences that surround Christ's birth.

Make their memories of Christmas include Jesus.

And give them a hug for Bunny and me.

Adam and Shonda, bring us Aiden please. :)

29,999 hits +1

There was a time, back in the days I was writing more, I used to check my blog's statistics often. I'd write a post and then check to see how many people read it and even where they came from. No, I can't tell exactly WHO reads it, just the general geographic area. Remember, I'm SBC, not NSA. My goal was to try to help people see the love of God reaching out to them in the everyday. So I'd check to see if it was reaching anyone at all.

Last week's sermon, though I suspect everyone else has forgotten it, is still pinging around in my brain. I guess you could say it reached - me. I've having trouble getting past the idea that we have no idea, really, of just how much God loves us. The trigger for that was pretty simple, really. Thinking about all the ways God has shown His love to me, I focused on the beauty of nature around me. My Mother invested in me a love of flowers in general and I've always loved wildflowers for their simple beauty. So as I thought - prayed, really - prayers of thanks to God for His gifts, it came to me.

God created gazillions of wildflowers, most of which few humans will never see. And yet, there they are and as the Bible says "Solomon in all his glory

I'm writing this on Black Friday, where this year's reports rolling in indicate that people are many times willing to suspend the love for neighbor in favor of fighting to get that just right gift for themselves or someone they love. They'll punch, craw, snatch, and grab just so they can prove their love.

In sharp contrast, God IS love.

Everything He does comes directly from His deep, deep love for humanity. 

I wish I could help everyone to see that. This week has been full of moments when His love was so real. Like this one. 

So dear reader, thank you. I'll try to do better at this writing thing which sits in the middle of a crazy busy life.

When It's All Said and Done

Bunny and I spent a few minutes today looking at pictures of the most fascinating person in the world - Aiden Brann Wilson - our grandson. Perhaps I'm getting a bit easy to move emotionally as I age, but looking at those pictures, I remembered those days when I held Aiden's father in my arms, and many of those moments that mark a life forever. I remember how my heart would swell with joy as he slept on my shoulder and I felt his heart beat and heard those little coos as he breathed.

Meeting the woman of my dreams, our first kiss, beginning life together - it's all still there. Bunny being pregnant with Adam, enjoying him immeasurably, and then being blessed with Sean to boot. Then came so many years of joy as we raised two incredible boys, surrounded by our families in the community we grew up in. Our church families at Bethesda and Mt Zion Baptist both provided us with strong support and deep understanding of what it means to be a church family. The conversations we had and the times we shared still warm my heart decades after the fact.

And here I am tonight finishing a sermon as I have done so many times... I'm wondering.

Have I done what God wanted me to with my life?

When I accepted God's call - when I said "yes" to God, it also meant I was saying "no" to a lot of what made our life so rich for so long. I left a great job with a future, a great church with awesome friends, left family and familiar surroundings for the great unknown - at least unknown to us. Just as I've always told people who are getting married that no one can really explain what it's like, serving God as a pastor comes with precious little in the way of a road map. There have been others who entered the ministry after me who have left it already, good men who I respect for their faith and character but who ended their service in leadership to return to a normal life. It always causes me to wonder what happened. Was the pressure too great? Were the strains of "herding cats" while keeping a church's focus on Christ instead of preferences too telling? Did the toll on their family prove so much they just decided "enough - I've done enough."

There have certainly been some detours and road closed signs during the time I have served at New Hope. Many times discouragement and doubt have caused me to want to hang it up or leave. Yet the Lord has always given me the grace to make it another day. These last three years, as I've worked as a teacher along with trying my best to care for the people God gave me to love have been a roller coaster ride of feeling great about our impact one day and not so great the next. Still, grace has always been enough.

So tonight as I'm preparing to preach in Acts Chapter 20 tomorrow, where Paul is following God's call into an uncertain future, I get a chance to hear a clear message directly from his heart to mine. From one man who left it all behind to follow Jesus to another.

And you know what?

When it's all said and done - His grace is enough.

I can look back and see God's guiding hand again and again. I can feel His presence even now as I write this, letting me know He is with me and that no matter how feeble and unworthy I might feel at times, His Spirit will supply what I need to fulfill His purpose for me until the day He calls me home. I'll try to be faithful everyday, and rely on Him to live out this verse.

David did God’s will during his lifetime.  Acts 13:36 (NCV)

First-hand faith example

Before I could finish praying, God had answered. I had come to the church to check our food pantry to see what we could cook for our food ministry this Wednesday. Every week we cook and deliver a 100 or so meals to our neighbors, and another couple of dozen or so for anyone who comes to eat with us at the church. It's something we've done for a couple of years now.

Supplying the needs for it, out of a small congregation like ours, is always a faith-building exercise. But we see people giving and God blessing the work. So I was a little shocked today when I was greeted with a pantry and freezers where there was not enough food to make it happen. I took the picture and headed over to check the mail and open my office for a meeting I had.

I hadn't gone 20 paces. 

I hadn't done more than a "Lord, you know our needs. We're doing this because your Word calls us to reach out in love to "the least of these"... 

I got to the mailbox, and thanked God there were no bills. :) But there was a card from someone in Texas. The name wasn't familiar. I opened the card and read a message from a person Bunny had met online. Bunny had shared about how our smaller church was cooking and delivering meals to our neighbors. She wrote "God moved me to help" and in the envelope was a check for $100.

Friends, before I asked - before I even knew we had a need - God had answered.

This is the God we love and serve at New Hope. 

If church is easy -  If your faith is never tested - If your faith is never validated like that...

You need to come experience faith first-hand at New Hope.

Come and see how GOOD God is.

The Message IS the Messenger

The message of Christ is not Christianity. The message of Christ is Christ. --Gary Amirault

I soon will celebrate some milestone anniversaries in my life. On August 6th, I'll remember a nervous young man who was riding down a dirt road with his beloved in a 1973 Vega notchback ( no pictures of such a car still exist because it was so... Vega) and asked what to that time were the most important words I had ever spoken. "Will you marry me?"

The impact of those words and the answer I received has given my life such a richness of love I can hardly keep from crying. My love, my wife, and through her, my family - my sons and grandson - joy!

Just one month later I will remember the most important words I ever spoke. I walked down an aisle at Bethesda Baptist church, leaving my fiance standing at the pew I had just left, and grabbed the hand of the pastor and told him I wanted to become a Christian. 

I loved that church, that pastor, and those people.

But I wasn't coming to get my name on a roll, or get a vote at the business meetings. I came that day because Jesus Christ had overwhelmed me with His love, convinced me of His standing as Lord and Christ, and convicted me of my sin and need of His forgiveness.

It was His love as expressed through His words. Like these from Eugene Peterson's paraphrase - The Message. 

^28-30 “Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

Jesus. I am a follower of Jesus.  Because He first loved me.

Hope in the afternoon

There are a lot of stories about Easter. So many ways to look at what happened that day. The one story that jumped out at me this year was one where two people went home after hearing about the events of the morning - still depressed and discouraged. They had heard that others had seen the risen Christ, but they hadn't themselves. It took a visit from Christ to change their hearts.

One of the key takeaways from this passage is that we all have a story we see ourselves in. Everything we've experienced as well as our hopes, dreams, failures, and regrets make up those stories. We see what we can see. But God sees so much more. He can take our story and place it in the context of His Big Story and show us just how He can overcome evil with good. He can explain the Bible in a way that we connect and understand it and are able to see how to live in light of it.

I used this story this morning to illustrate how we can think we know a story, but at times we only know part of it.

A man and a woman had been married for more than 60 years. They had shared everything. They had kept no secrets from each other except that the little old woman had a shoe box in the top of her closet that she had cautioned her husband never to open or ask her about. For all of these years, he had never thought about the box, but one day the little old woman got very sick and the doctor said she would not recover. In trying to sort out their affairs, the little old man took down the shoe box and took it to his wife's bedside. She agreed that it was time that he should know what was in the box. When he opened it, he found two crocheted dolls and a stack of money totaling $95,000. He asked her about the contents. "When we were to be married," she said, "my grandmother told me the secret of a happy marriage was to never argue. She told me that if I ever got angry with you, I should just keep quiet and crochet a doll."

The little old man was so moved; he had to fight back tears. Only two precious dolls were in the box. She had only been angry with him two times in all those years of living and loving. He almost burst with happiness. "Honey," he said "that explains the doll, but what about all of this money? Where did it come from?" "Oh, that?" she said.  "That's the money I made from selling the dolls." - from Lion Brand Yarn's website

He didn't really know, did he?

The people on the Emmaus road didn't know all the story either. All they know was that their hopes were crushed and their future looked dark. They just wanted to go home.

Then Jesus showed up and it all made sense.

We cannot let the world write our story.
We cannot assume that our view of our story is correct.
We have to seek God and enter into a deep and abiding relationship with Him where we can see our lives from His perspective.

Christ changed everything when He paid the price for our sins and provided hope beyond the grave through His resurrection.

So failure is NEVER final.

And we can have our stories rewritten by a loving God.

Let Him.

Whatever You Do

A traveling preacher out one night and upon entering a town stops at the door of a little home. Coming to the door was a woman with apron on and paring knife in hand. She had been peeling apples for a pie, and greeted the pastor with a smile.

Hat in hand, the man asked her. "Does Jesus live here?"

Puzzled, she thought at first she didn't understand his question. Seeing her face revealed to the preacher her heart, so he asked again, "Does Jesus live here?" This time she heard well, and was considering the thought that the man was not quite well.

She said nothing, not knowing what to say. "Does Jesus live here?" was the question again, and it produced even more unease in the woman. Before she could stammer any answer, the man said, "I am so sorry. I had hoped Jesus lived here."

With that, he put his hat back on and walked on into the night.

The young woman went back to her work, but couldn't help wondering about the man and his question. Soon her husband came in, and she told him of her strange encounter.

The husband told her, "Well, why didn't you tell him that we are members of the church on the hill, that we give regularly to the work of it, and attend Sunday School once in a while?" But the young woman had caught a grasp of the old man's meaning.

"He didn't ask that, John. He asked whether Jesus lived here or not."

It made me think this morning of these verses.

6 And you must commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these commands I am giving you today.
7 Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are away on a journey, when you are lying down and when you are getting up again.
8 Tie them to your hands as a reminder, and wear them on your forehead. 9 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
Deut 6:6-9 (NLT)

The Hebrews were very successful in keeping their religion a part of every day life. How did they do it? They integrated what they believed into how they lived. They used their lives, their homes, and their vocations to honor God, and taught their children to do the same. It's one of the reasons why, despite the best efforts of evil people down through the years, the Jews still exist as a people, even in cultures that abhor everything they are.

I'm a student of culture, a history buff. And I would tell you that we live in an America that is very much post-Christian. If we are to bring our faith forward and deliver it to generations to follow, we have to be much more like the Jews in the way we approach our family responsibilities.

But far more important than that, we need to be far more passionate about wanting more of Jesus in our lives. We need to hunger and thirst for more of Jesus.

We have to find ways to intentionally model Jesus no matter where we physically might be - at home, at work, out in the public.

I don't want my faith to be an afterthought, like "David is a teacher and he's a Christian." I want people to put Christian before teacher when they think of who I am. I don't mean dropping a bunch of "God talk" on everyone - I mean God actions - like Jesus did.

We can do this. Through the power of the Holy Spirit - the Jesus in us.

All I Want For Christmas

I was there in my office at New Hope on a rare day off from school and spending some time getting reacquainted with the place. For years I spent hours a day in here, arriving at 9 and leaving at 5 or thereabouts. Then we realized how much it was costing to heat and cool a building for one person and I started to work at home, coming here when Bunny came up to teach piano. She'd be here two or three hours most days. It still felt secure, safe - a place that I had filled with prayers, labored over words and the Word, and met with people to counsel or just talk.

I loved my office. My study. And to a large extent, it was my sanctuary.

But now?

I feel like a visitor. The books who were loyal and true friends seem distant, like people from my home town that I used to know well. The collections - of unit mugs from different military units, things New Hope people have given me over the years that I treasure, toys I kept on hand for the kids who would drop by, all just seem like stuff. I don't spend enough time here for it to feel the way it did. My bivocational status as a teacher means I am making a difference in the lives of the students at Eglin and still reach out and care for people through New Hope. It is a big help financially for the church, and an opportunity to show that the preacher is practicing what he preaches. But it is a different type of ministry and I'm still adjusting to it.

For thirteen years I have preferred New Hope Baptist Church - the people that have made it up and the mission God has given us - over everything else in my life save my wife and family. I came here because I believed that God was sending me here to work with Him and His people to make a difference. And we have - we are. Just last week while Bunny and I were gone, the people of New Hope worked together to produce and deliver a Thanksgiving meal for everyone they could find in our community that needed one.

And I believe that Bunny and I are doing everything we can do to see God's church move forward and reach more people in years to come. But the last couple of years have been tough and tougher. I sit here on a Sunday night praying that God will draw near and let me know how I can see His name glorified again in a growing church. The people I dearly love need that. I need that.

I know what I want for Christmas. I'm praying that Jesus will come alongside each of us and give us what we need to reach others in our circles of influence with His love. I'm praying people who have cooled off, tuned out, or been turned off to religion come to New Hope this Christmas season and see what a church family that's directed by God's will and sold out to making a difference looks like.

If you're reading this and that fits you, then come. Come worship with us. Come serve God and your neighbor with us. Come and experience the grace that is New Hope.

Under the Shade Tree

Don't know whether I was running on fumes Sunday or what, but I came home after and went straight to sleep. I was awakened about 2:30 by a call from Willie Jackson, the man who lives at the blockhouse with his wife that we helped with some of the money he needed to purchase a used engine for his car. Willie came to New Hope today and worshiped with us. He's looking for odd jobs to get that engine in so he can have better transportation than his bike and take a job. What he needed to get it done was the fluids to fill the engine and transmission with and a special tool that's used with the fuel system. He got the tool but still needed the fluids.

So a while later I got up and went to Autozone and explained what I was looking for and why. One of the employees helped me find the oil, filer, and transmission fluid - which was on sale at a very low price as a kit with a pan, funnel, rags, and hand cleaner for less than the oil alone! He apologized for not being able to offer me a case discount on the transmission fluid.

Then he gave me a 10% discount, because "people need to help people." And God uses people to do just that.

When I got to the blockhouse, Willie was pulling the old engine in true shade tree mechanic fashion - under a shade tree with the hoist over a limb.

I explained to Willie how God made sure he got more than what he needed.

It was a moment of grace. It was one of those times when I remembered what I had just preached - God often works in ways we would not have anticipated, using people who we wouldn't have chosen.

Pray for Willie as he completes the engine swap and thank God for reminding us once again just how great His grace truly is.

Works In Progress

Every week when we go out to deliver food in our little town, we greet people we have known for a while and we meet new people. Every one of them has a story. Sometimes they'll share. Here's one from last week.

"We met Jimmy Varner and Edwina Pittman at the blockhouse tonight.  Jimmy is disabled after suffering a stroke and being paralyzed on his left side.  He does have some movement now in his leftarm which he demonstrated for me tonight.  He also has high blood pressure and gout. 

Edwina used to be his girlfriend, but he moved another girl into their house, so now she's not.  Now she's his caregiver.  I got their whole story while I was there.  I believe she is probably a person of faith and she said God is still working on her.  I told her I am still a work in progress, too.  Edwina asked to put Jimmy on our prayer list."

 Don't you know there were smiles in heaven when two of God's children shared this moment of grace. This pastor's heart was sure warmed by reading what one of our New Hope folks had said.


That my friends, is grace in action. Well done, brother.

Friends, we are ALL works in progress. We're being "conformed into the image of Christ." Sometimes you meet people who don't want to admit that, but I'm blessed to be a part of a church that's a work in progress too.

Come and walk with us at New Hope as we experience The Story - a 31 week walk through the Big Story of God's love for mankind. You'll find yourself understanding the Bible in a deeper way as you make connections to the bits and pieces of what you already know and place them together and let the Holy Spirit show you the depth of God's love.


New Hope - a great place to know, to grow, and to go and share God's love.

Hunger Doesn't Take Holidays

Things have changed. Things are changing.

It's a challenging time to be alive, and to be called into ministering in Jesus' name.

Everyone knows Jesus. But not many KNOW Jesus in a way that would result in a changed life. And years of most churches as "holy huddles" has left folks on the outside not looking in -
or really even looking in that direction.

But we're called to love our neighbors whether or not it's easy, whether or not anyone even notices we are doing it.  To do that as if the person we were caring for was Jesus himself. Regardless of who is physically before us.

Wednesday we delivered food to people in our little town. It was July 4th. The town and most people in it were enjoying a day off and the events of the day with a big annual fireworks show at the end of it. When I was looking at that day on the calendar a few weeks ago, I wondered whether we should just take the evening off. I had a list of reasons including both truth and suspicions. It was true that the folks at New Hope could have enjoyed a break. We don't have many people, but we have people who work hard and give of themselves every week. It might have been true that lots of the people we regularly deliver to were not going to be there. Might have been. 

When we packaged the meals, we cut the number by 15 because we really thought some people wouldn't be home. We'd never delivered on a holiday before. 

As we delivered, we had people tell us "we didn't realize you guys would be here today." Walking away from the house of an elderly woman who received the 6 meals as she does every week, I shook my head wondering if we were wrong. Maybe people would be home after all.

It happened again and again. "Oh you are here!" "Don't you know it's a holiday?" or some variation. When we met up with Frank and Diane Weech at the low priced rentals we call "the Blockhouse", we only had 8 meals left. We wound up leaving what meals we had with them, then going back to church and getting more meals twice to meet the needs. We learned something - Hunger Doesn't Take Holidays

On Mother's Day

On July 15th, 1920, on the wrong side of the tracks down on Roff Avenue near "Mr Willingham's Textile Mill", a little girl was born to Henry and Bertie Bowden. Her parents were millworkers who had moved from the farm to the city in search of a better life. Each had lost a spouse to death before they met each other, and the family was a blend of Fosters and Bowdens.

The little girl grew to adulthood in that shotgun house, becoming the first of her family to get a high school diploma. During those years, she saw a sister die in a fire, a brother killed when his car stalled on the railroad tracks that ran parallel to the road. When she was 12, her father was hit by a car and died the next day. Hurt came often to Roff Avenue. The family grew tight - they had to. Somehow the widow "Bertie" raised all their kids and another couple of girls besides. Lodie was the big sister now, and she went to school and worked in the mill too. Whatever it took to help, she did.

She met a young man who lived in the same mill village, and just as World War Two began, they married. He was sent away, and in a year or so, she enlisted herself. They saw each other once during the War, in Manila.

After the war, they had both changed. Everything had.

They divorced, and then love found them again, and they remarried.

One day they got the news she was pregnant with twins. Nine months later they got the news the babies wouldn't survive. Delivered, they lived less than a week. But a couple who had seen so much pain and held so much heartache, just wouldn't give up hope. One year later, I was born - the young woman was my Mother - Lodie Marie Bowden Wilson.

She passed away in 1991 - much too soon. No other person had more influence on who I became than she.  Not one day in the years we shared on this earth did I not awake knowing that my Mother loved me deeply. We had some amazingly stubborn battles of will, but I always knew she loved me.

When you are the recipient of love, like a Mother's love, most of the time you are blind to it. Days come and go, sacrifices are made for you. Some you might realize but poorly comprehend. Others you miss completely. When your children come along, understanding does too, and then when the giver passes away, the gifts are made visible in the loss of the one who gave them. I think someone wrote "Now we see through a glass darkly..." and that is so so true.

I cannot give her anything now. All I can do is give to others as I have been given to. When I was reading Philippians one day, I came across this. Those of you who read it,  think about your life, and what someone years after you are gone will write about it in review. Will it be God-honoring? Will it be praiseworthy? What will be your legacy? Will you have pointed your family to Jesus? Can you write as Paul does here?

Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you. Philippians 4:9 NIV

Remember, we love, because He first loved us.

It's called...

Grace!

Davi

Truth In Advertising

I used to work for the world's biggest advertiser. We spent more money in more ways that anyone on the planet to get our products in front of people. When you combined that with the fact that in most cases our products were the best in their particular market segment, it made for some good selling for folks like me who called on stores and warehouses. If you couldn't sell Crest toothpaste, Pepto-Bismol, Folgers coffee, Crisco, Charmin etc. with all that going for you, well... there were people waiting in line to get your job who would.

Going to a supermarket or drugstore chain headquarters I could truthfully say we had the best product with the most support for them to sell it to the consumer. There were times when I convinced the retailer to sell my product to the consumer for LESS than the retailer paid for it. Why would they do that? Because people would make a special trip to buy my product, and once they were there they would buy other items too.

Those were the days.

Now as the pastor of a church I am working on an advertisement for our local newspaper. It's been a while since we advertised at all. We preferred spending the money on orphanages, wells, water purification, or HIV meds. But we need a greater presence in the area, and we have a couple who wants to see us get that so much they have paid for the ads. So now the dilemma arises - what do we say in the ads?

Unlike in my previous advertising experience, I can not confidently say that we have the best "product with the best support." That'd be wrong in a couple of ways. I really don't want to think of what we do as a "product." And when I think of what support we have here, I think of God. We have amazingly generous people who give of their time and money sacrificially - but it's all God's time and God's money - so it doesn't feel right to brag about that. And when I look at what we have to offer, lots of churches have more.

So now what?

I think we make our case by what we do.
We admit that we are imperfect.
Incomplete.

And that we can do anything through Jesus Christ if it is His will.

I'm deeply in love with the people God has placed at New Hope and with the community God has given us to serve. I expect we'll never be everything everyone wants. I accept that I will, that we will - disappoint people.

But I will follow Jesus and encourage people in my care to do the same. We will not hoard. We will not fear or worry about the future. We will love, we will give sacrificially, we will serve the least of these.

So if you see an ad for an "Imperfect Church", come see what it looks like in person. :)