"Did God Really Say …?” - Key Questions in the Bible

 "Did God Really Say …?” - Key Questions in the Bible

Sunday, January 2, 2022

In a new, fast read-through of the Bible, I’m noting the key questions. I will do a series here on some of those.

The first “Key Question of the Bible” is not asked by God. It is not asked by man seeking for God. The first question in the Bible is asked by the devil (the serpent in the garden, identified clearly in Revelation 12:8 - “that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world.” It is a question that has been repeated over and over since that disastrous day in the Garden. It is still being asked today: “Did God Really Say … ?”

It would be convenient for us, wouldn’t it, if we could re-frame the words of God in ways that would fit well with our ways of thinking, shaped as they are by our sinful and selfish desires? We would like things to be a certain way, even though, in most cases, if we had it our way, we would actually function as a god, and the God of the Bible would be our servant. So we have a great need to go back to the Book over and over and see what it is that God has actually said.

Did God actually say, “You shall surely die?” Yes, He did. No question. We find it in Genesis 2. We find it in Romans 6:23 - “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Did God actually say that Jesus is the only way to heaven? Yes, He did. John 14:6 says “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’”

Did God actually say that marriage is between a man and a woman, and that sexual relations belong only within the marriage context? Yes, He did. Genesis 2:24 says, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” And Hebrews 13:4 says: “Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.”

Some people say, “That doesn’t seem right to me.” It doesn’t matter. God said it. Some people say, “I like to think of God in this way.” Your own thinking doesn’t make it so. God, who cannot lie, has given us His Word, and we need to know what God has said. And, that’s why you are going to spend time reading it this year!

Moody Church

Moody Church

Sunday, December 19, 2021

It was our privilege to worship with the congregation at The Moody Church last Sunday in Chicago. It was named after D.L. Moody. From their website:

“Our story began with a man who wanted to share the joy of the gospel with the needy and humble. D.L. Moody started his ministry in Chicago in 1856. A shoe salesman by trade, he found the call of the God to be deafening in comparison to the riches of the world. Leaving behind a life of luxury, Moody established a Sunday school for poor children in an area of Chicago known as “Little Hell.” Filling the small space with more than 500 people each Sunday, his ministry quickly outgrew its facilities as more and more children and their families flocked to hear Moody’s powerful preaching. In 1864, Moody and his congregation opened the Illinois Street Church.”

That church building burned down during the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. Moody then involved himself in international and local evangelism, and the expansion of city ministry. He died in 1899.

It was when I attended a conference in this sanctuary many years ago, early in my time here in Milford, that I sensed the presence of God more clearly than any other time in my life. I don’t know the speaker, nor the message. But I clearly remember the experience. I don’t speak easily of such things, knowing that subjective experiences can be variously interpreted. But have you ever felt the weight of the hand of God pressing down upon you? Yes, a sense of His presence. But more than that. God’s hand, or maybe even God’s thumb, pressing so hard that you think it might leave God’s fingerprint. And that’s what I think God was doing, impressing, with something of the fear of the Lord, and something of my helplessness to argue with Him.

And so, this past Sunday, looking down from the balcony at the seat I had occupied all those years ago, I remembered, and felt again, something of the heavy hand of God. We sing, “O Love that will not Let me Go,” but there is also something else there - that God will not let us go - He’s got us; He owns us. We are His, and there is no where to run or hide. He’s got us, for our good, and for His glory.

Time, Times, and Half a Time

Time, Times, and Half a Time 

Sunday, December 12, 2021

Time is a funny thing. As I set the old church clock each Sunday morning, the time on my phone has already changed during those moments it takes me to move around the minute hand, time and again. That clock, donated to the church many years ago by the youth (hoping, no doubt, that it might have an affect on length of services) has ticked and tocked through many worships. Some of those youth have now doubtless passed on. 

The clock doesn’t control the time. It simply attempts to mark it (and not all that successfully - it’s forever slow). And one thing I notice about the old clock - it always moves forward, never back. Because once time has passed, it’s gone. There is no reclaiming lost time. Forever gone.

You can’t really “save” time. You can’t hoard it. You can’t “save it up.” I understand that there are all kinds of time-savers out there, but they merely attempt to speed up projects and processes so that you can use time for something else. You are not the master of time. In some senses, it masters you.

Paul speaks of “redeeming the time.” That is, we are to make good use of the time that God gives us. And time is just that: a gift. And that time that is given, we can spend, on ourselves, or on others; in the service of me, or in the service of God. “Redeeming the time” means that we use this gift in ways that matter; in ways that may have lasting benefits; even eternal benefits.

But “redeeming the time” does not mean that you can reclaim past time. It’s lost. It’s gone. You can only start now, as we see time as the playing field of Christ’s mission, not ours.

And then, time’s up. Our earthly lives will be over. We don’t know when, or how long. There is no way to bargain for more. God’s got it set in stone. And He hasn’t told us. We are not in charge of this, just like a whole lot of others things we’re not in charge of.

But the Lord who directed Paul to write “redeem the time” has done something else, something better. He has come to redeem people, to redeem you, so that, having believed in Him; having followed Him and served Him - when your time is up, He gives again. He doesn’t give you more time. He gives you eternity, a space where we are forever in His presence, and a kind of life where we are forever where we are supposed to be, never again late; never again lost.

December

 December

Sunday, December 5, 2021

What is December? Why, it’s the last month of the year. Yes, that, and so much more.

As the last month of the year, it is a time of reflection. These past months have a particular character to them. One magazine has titled 2021 the year of “endurance.” But your experience might use a different word, a harder one. 

I thought the year 2020 was a tough year. It was tough for businesses and families. It was tough for churches. And it has remained tough. December, 2020 did not bring about an end to the year’s difficulties and divisions. It continued this year, along with other things, dragging cancers from 2020 into 2021. 

December is the beginning of our winter. It signals that, after this month, there will be more winter, only more so. It will get colder; more snow. And we’ve got a long way to go. December may signal the end of the calendar year, but it does not signal the end of a season. And we find ourselves in seasons of unknown duration.

But December is also the month of Christmas. The whole of the month seems to be given over to celebration of this holi-day, now turned into something of a secular-day - not now quite so holy. But it is the month of preparation and gatherings and celebrations, if pestilence allows. There are gifts to buy and then to wrap. Invites and reservations are hard to come by.

And the music! December has its own music. Caroles and cantatas. Boy choirs and brass choirs. We gather to listen; to sing.

And December has its birthday - the birthday of the King. Yes, as alluded above, we’ve shoved aside the birthday boy for the sake of the party. But Jesus’ birth story is still repeated, and read, and dramatized, both in still life and in childhood plays. And yes, we pay nearly as much attention to the other characters of Christmas as we do to Jesus - Mary and Joseph; shepherds and wise men. But it is December, and it’s Jesus’ month. It belongs to Him, as does every other month of the year, though we may not be so aware. 

The magic of Christmas; the mystery of Christmas - is this little baby who is packed full of divinity, wrapped all around with humanity. This joyful month is met with a sobriety as we realize that He is sent to this world as a baby for the particular purpose that He might die for us. December! What a wonderful, perturbing month!