i ain't got nothing...but GOD

Somedays you find yourself so spent up, beat down and wrung out that you ain't got nothing.  I’ve sat by a raging beast of a wood kiln for 3 days guarding my students from harm and this morning feel like that old Johnny Cash song, Bird on a Wire…

“But I swear by this song

And by all that I’ve done wrong

I’ll make it all up to thee.”

Praise God All Mighty Maker of Heaven and Earth He will never leave us like a “Bird on a Wire.”

“For the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His.”  II Chronicles 16:9

2400 degrees and Holy

The Generosity of a Wood Kiln

Luke 16:13-31

So I can wrap this up very quickly.  The theme is to help us be generous and unselfish with our money.  Here is the wrap up for me.  Make my attitude about money a reflection of my relationship with God who is always generous with me.   I am writing this as I sit by a roaring wood kiln, deep in the dark woods of night.  Like I said, He’s always generous to me.  

my students at the wood kiln, paige nichole, cassandra
megan and casey, mr. larry sanderson in background

2000 degrees and climbing

Recovering ADDICT

Luke 16:13-31

Recovering Materialists.  I once read that phrase and thought how that aptly describes most Americans who have chosen to faithfully follow the teaching of Christ.  It certainly describes me.  The rich man in this passage is described as “Habitually dressed in purple and fine linen, gaily living in splendor everyday.”  As I write this I am wrapped in an LL Bean terry cloth robe, wearing LB Evans leather slippers, drinking Gavalia Coffee sitting on a 19’/30’ screened in back porch typing on an Apple MacBook Pro laptop.  By American standards I would be categorized as middle class, by God, “habitually dressed in purple and fine linen, gaily living in splendor everyday.”

I am not fully recovered!!!

My Daddy's Love

Luke 16: 27-31

The last subtitle in our lesson encouraging us to be generous and unselfish with our money is “Do I Need to Repent?”   The passages tell of the rich man in Hades asking Abraham to send Lazarus back to earth to convince his five brothers to repent and be spared from the torment he finds himself in. 

Repentance is a funny term in that it supposes that I have offended someone.  However, I often give money to the poor and needy.  In a fit of self-righteousness this entire week I have congratulated myself on my willingness to give to the poor, but I have missed the point.  The point is not, have I given to the poor, but do I see the poor as Christ sees them…dearly loved children of God?  Giving money to a man on the street corner may alleviate my guilt toward him, but if I do not see him as a child of God my greater guilt remains.  I have offended God.  That’s why God always looks at my heart.  Giving to the poor may be an act of self-righteousness or a learning tool for my children, but unless my redeemed heart animates my life to act in love toward that man, my guilt remains.

The question then becomes, do I love the poor and needy and an expression of that love is giving?

My dad was such a good teacher in that lesson.  

Heaven Hell, Take Your Pick

Luke 16:22-26

This passage is the telling of the afterlife of the rich man and Lazarus. 

No one can read the Bible with attention and not realize that it clearly develops the theme “there’s hell to pay!”  More importantly Jesus is the one who develops the theme.  We may not like it, but there it is.  Each of us must make a clear decision based on what we believe… either Jesus is truly mad and often talks out of his head and therefore is to be dismissed, or Jesus is who He claims Himself to be and we must devote our lives and money (in this case) to Him.   Jesus allows for no middle ground. 

The truth of this passage is not that the rich man went to hell because he was rich and the poor man went to heaven because he was poor.  The truth is that they both ended up in eternity based solely on their relationship with God.  Money was just an outward sign of an inward condition. 

Although the theme of “there’s hell to pay” is true, the good news is that THERE’S HEAVEN TO BE GAINED.   The decision rests squarely on our shoulders.  

Don’t Send a Dog To Do A Christian’s Job

Luke 16:19-21

The point of our lesson on money is to help us to be generous and unselfish with our money.

The second subtitle of our lesson is “How do you use your money?”  The text is Christ’s familiar telling of Lazarus outside the rich man’s gates longing for table scraps while dogs lick his sores.  All the while, the rich man is inside living the highlife. 

I stopped and meditated on the question of how I use my money.  Most of it I spend on me and mine.  I so readily condemned the “rich man” because Lazarus was right there in his doorway. However, because of technology and media most of the poor of the world reside not outside my door, but inside my living room.  I see them, but do I respond in generosity; do I use my money to help elevate the hunger and sickness that afflict the world’s poor?

Post Script: I often see beggars on street corners with dogs.  Why waste resources feeding and watering a dog?  It was only after reading today’s passage that I realized a great truth.  The dogs were serving as the church to Lazarus.  They provided his only aid and comfort, companionship and acceptance. 

Don’t send a dog to do a Christian’s job!

1/8 th of Me

Luke 16:13-15

The title of the Sunday school lesson is “Manage Money Well.”   The first subtitle that we study is “What do you think about money?”  Money is a faith-based instrument.  Our currency hasn’t any real value other than the faith the world places in us to keep working and producing which in turn endows the currency with value.  Let’s look at it this way.  In 1974, when I started driving I could buy two gallons of gas with one dollar.  Today it takes me four dollars to buy one gallon.  If I had a dollar printed in 1974 and took it to Exxon today, they would not give me two gallons of gas for it because it has no real value.  The value is assigned to it by the world’s faith and is now worth about 1/8 of what it was worth then. 

We always need to keep this upper most in our minds when thinking of God and our money.  Here’s why.  In this passage Jesus speaks to the wealthy, “You are the ones who justify yourselves in the sight of others…” Jesus knows that humans are often susceptible to the temptations of wealth.  One of those is basing our value or “justification” on the amount of money we or someone else have.  But remember, if that is the case, I’m only 1/8^th as valuable as I was in 1974. 

Money is not very faithful!!!

Always Rooting For the Underdog

II Chronicles 10-14

Luke 16:13-15, 19-31

Once again I am teaching Sunday school this coming Sunday and I will be reading the lesson passage every morning for the next few days.  The passage comes from the Gospel of Luke.  I read both passages this morning and both develop the same theme.  In II Chronicles we read of two great wars... one an army of 400,000 faces one of 800,000 and the second an army of 1,000,000 faces one of 580,000.  In the Gospel of Luke we read Christ’s telling of the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man.  In all three stories the underdog wins and relates a great truth of faith found in Romans 8:31, “What shall we say about such wonderful things as these?  If God is for us, who can ever be against us?”  And another truth found in the Gospel of Mark 10:31, Jesus speaking, “But many who are the greatest now will be least important then, and those who seem least important now will be the greatest then.”

We should always look at the world the way God does.  He’s often looking at the end of the line.  

My sculpture "Lazarus and the Rich Man"

A Casket Is Not a Storage Unit

II Chronicles 6-9

Another powerful morning of meeting with the Lord. 

Solomon’s life reads like the greatest fairy tale of all time.  His prayer is a model for every human.  God’s advice to countries offers us the peace that passes all understanding.  Gold, silver, gems, ivory, spices and precious materials stack up like so much filler in an epic poem.  Wisdom and honor flow like time through eternity and wealth, power, luxury, influence and possessions are without equal!  Solomon was Billy Graham, Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Dubai, America, the Queen of England, President Obama, Steven Spielberg, Stephen Hawking and more, all rolled into one. 

What’s the moral of the story?  It’s found in the last verse of the reading this morning.  “And Solomon slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of his father David…” 9:31

The moral;

WHERE WE’RE GOING, YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU!!!

Golden Shirts and Silver Britches

II Chronicles 1-4

Another wonderful passage overlaid with gold and silver and bound with purple and violet.  This is a retelling of Solomon’s building of The Temple and the richness of it cannot be overstated.  But you may miss the richest part if you don’t pay close attention.  Lets walk through it.

“And the house which I (Solomon) am about to build will be great, for greater is our God than all the gods.  But who is able to build a house for Him, for the heavens and the highest heavens cannot contain Him?”  2:5-6

“Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?”  I Corinthians 3:16

“so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of God.” 5:14

Only we can contain God.  Will people see us today clothed in golden shirts and silver britches sewn up with purple and violet thread and filled with “the glory of the Lord?”

Aren't You Glad God...

1 Chronicles 26-29

Such a beautiful passage!  Full of men and women loving God.  Rich with gold, silver and precious gems tossed like fronds on Palm Sunday.  Hearts full of thanksgiving and praise; leaders, humble with the sincere understanding of power.

These passages remind us anew that God is not at all interested in religious observance, rites and ordinances or attendance and rules.  God is interested in humans.  Individuals whose hearts have at some point realized that the whole world testifies that He loves us.  And in that realization a new heart is born, a heart full of gratitude, thankfulness and praise.   Aren’t you glad God _______________.

"Sacreding It Up"

I Chronicles 22-25

The reading today tells of all the people who were responsible for taking care of the church.  I have always felt like the church building is a sacred space.   When I was growing up, all my dad’s churches seemed to possess it.  They were old creaky buildings with dark smooth benches worn smooth from decades of poor country folk sliding faithfully in each week.  The tall clear windows painted shut with thick layers of history were always pried open in the summer to cool the Spirit that always seemed to blaze inside.  I don’t have that feeling about my current church and I wondered why.  It’s a new building, "squarish", with no windows.  It is an add-on to another add-on to another add-on.  No steeple and as soft and comfortable as designers can make it.  All the churches of my youth were well-worn gems passed from one generation to another.  Lots of “blood, sweat and tears” are in generational church spaces.  I guess the “newest add-on” that I attend just hasn’t had the time to gather the blood, sweat and tears that wears the soft off and polishes what’s left into a sacred sheen. 

My last thought: will we do our part of bleeding, sweating and weeping upon this space to “sacred it up”

Haleys Grove Baptist Church, Crab Orchard Tennessee.  My dad's church many years ago.
The most sacred space I know.  Painted by Chris Ousley.

Just The Facts

I Chronicles 17-21

I caught myself pontificating this morning; so let us just stick to the facts.

1.   David is a model Christian in that he is always seeking to love God with all his heart, mind, soul      and strength.

2.   David is a model human in that he often messes up with disastrous consequences.

3.   David is a model human Christian in that when he messes up he always cries out to God for  restoration.

4.   God is the model God because HE ALWAYS OFFERS RESTORATION!!!

Facts are never boring.

Rain Drop Psalm

I Chronicles 13-16

A conundrum this morning… God’s wrath burns out at Uzza for touching the Ark and kills him.  David gets angry with God and I must confess every time I read this passage I do too.  I understand the reasons that man has come up with to explain it, but I don’t agree with the harshness of it.  Some honest and sincere questions never get answered.

Then the reading turns to a Psalm (song) of David where he praises the Lord for all His loving kindness that He continually blesses us with.  I love praise songs because there’s so much to praise Him for.  This morning it is raining during a very hot, dry spring.  Every green leaf, every green blade of grass must have regular water or it dies.  Can you imagine if man was in charge of watering all the green on earth?  Also, how wonderful it is that rain comes in drops?  Drops are the perfect size for something as heavy as water.  What if rain came in gallon size drops?  It wouldn’t be called “Showers of Blessings”, but “Bombings of Wrath.”  I love praise songs.

Thank You for the rain

You’re the most generous

         Being I know.

And thank You for the drops

         Whether in water or

In snow.

I love You!!!

The Chronicles of a Baby Calf and a Grandmother

I Chronicles 9-12

The Temple keepers are named; Saul and Jonathan die; David is crowned and the names of the 30 mighty men are recorded.  No life stories here, just recorded history.  It’s amazing how quickly our life becomes a brief recording of history.  Hard to fathom how the rich vitality of what we call life quickly turns into a concise chronicle.

Yesterday, my 97-year-old grandmother and I sat beside a fresh spring pasture in the hills of east Tennessee and watched a calf being born.  It stumbled and staggered as it tried to stand and take its first steps in its new world.  It was so unsure, frail and toppled over several times before gaining a feeble stance on its new legs.  I couldn’t help thinking about how my grandmother was in the same condition.  She is old and her body is just as unsure as she is feebly moving toward her new life in heaven.   That calf is surely prancing and dancing around that mountain pasture this morning just as surely as my grandmother will dance and prance around heaven.

We’re never a chronicle with God, but a dearly loved son or daughter who He longs to call home to Him someday.  I love you God!!!

Men Rule and Women Rule the Cradle

I Chronicles 6-8

He begat him, him begat he, he begat him.  Not much room for girls.  I imagine many a Hebrew mom read these chapters and thought, “Humph, I wonder how many hes and hims, he and him birthed!!!?”  Behind every great Chronicle stands a mighty Chroniclette. 

I hope you womened/maned up and read all these begats.  Its called “stick-to-it-ness.”  Think about it like pulling weeds in the spring so you’ll enjoy sweet tomatoes all summer. 

When the great artist Michelangelo was asked by the Pope to paint the Pope’s private chapel, he refused because he was a sculptor.  He felt painting was beneath him.  It was only when the Pope threatened to excommunicate him that he relented and painted the beautiful Sistine Chapel.  So always read Chronicles as if it were your personal Sistine Chapel.

Who's In Your Family

I Chronicles 2-5

“…and Zabad became the father of Ephlal, and Ephlal became the father of Obed, and Obed became the father of Jehu, and Jehu became the…”  Fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, children and grandchildren…a great list of family.  The list includes Jabez and his famous prayer, David and Solomon and the names of the ancient potters for the king.  “these records are from very old traditions. They were the potters who lived in Netaim and Gederah, resident potters who worked for the king.”

I love these lists…real men and women.  This isn’t history or genealogy, but humans, loved ones, living souls.  They’re walking on a new planet, under a new sky, warmed by a brand new sun and gazing at brand, sparkling, new stars.  Oh, the marvels they must have seen: clear air and clean water, virgin forests and newly minted stones.

I also love these lists because I love thinking about my own family, the new and the ancient ones.  Preachers and drunks, pastors and prisoners, builders, poets, carpenters turned painters and hillbillies and city folk, artists and teachers.  Who’s in your family?  Who are your ancients and your newest ones?  This might help you think: they are all children of The Most High God.

Take Your Mulligan

II Kings 25-I Chronicles 1

Do overs and mulligans, we all love a second chance to get it right.  This is a sobering passage of scripture.  The last chapters of II Kings record the looting of the Temple, Jerusalem burning to the ground and Babylon carrying the people of Israel into exile.  The first chapter of I Chronicles records mankind’s genealogy from Adam to the great patriarch, Jacob, who God renamed Israel.

One of the great truths of all time is that you can’t rewrite history and it stains our hearts with sorrow because we already know how Chronicles is going to turn out. 

But here’s an even greater truth: you can’t rewrite history, but you can rewrite yourself.  All humans, while alive, can be made afresh.  It’s even named that, being reborn.  Jesus said, “Truly, Truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”  John 3:3  “This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person.  The old life is gone; a new life has begun!” 

I Corinthians 5:17

You can’t rewrite history, but you can be rewritten.  Don’t you just love Jesus!!!

Pretending There's No God

II Kings 22-24

What if we pretended there was no God?  That’s today’s story.  After years of staggering along like a stoned ballerina in The Nutcracker, the children of Israel stumbled upon a Bible.  It’s read to all the people.  It’s beauty spreads like buttercups across a spring field.  But it’s too late!!!  At some point they had crossed over the line of no return.  The sobering truth is that God will not always tarry with a people. The hearts of the people have long since died, the fertile rich soil turned to salty flats.   There’s something we should all remember: it’s never to late until it’s too late and then it’s too late.

The horrors of a country that decided to pretend there was no God.   Too bad we can’t pretend the consequences!

Post Script:  A good contemporary look at this scenario is the movie, The Book of Eli starring Denzel Washington.

still from The Book of Eli

His Hands Been Offered so For Your Sake HOLD ON

II Kings 19-21

Finally a good leader comes to power; he fathers a wretch of an heir; the laws of astrophysics are suspended and a great truth is once again affirmed.  Let’s focus on the great truth.  God sees and hears us and the great truth is that God also offers us His hand in loving relationship.  In this relationship there is no power in the universe that can break it.

Here is the joyful reaffirmation of this passage.  In partnership with God nothing should surprise us; we can live longer, heal our land or suspend the laws of astrophysics.  But hear this: just because we “can do”, doesn’t mean we will do.  God is still God and we must learn to trust HIM, not what He does.  The key is believing this:  “and we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God…” Romans 8:28a

The truth of life for Hezekiah and for us is that often all we have to cling to is God.

The State of the Union

II Kings 16-18

God is angry; the nation of Israel is divided into Israel and Judah; Israel is exiled and Judah is still looking for peace.  It’s a mess and painful to read.  This once great people are being slowly destroyed by “they followed vanity and became vain.” 17:15

What’s heartrending is how they slowly dismantle the great Temple of the Lord and sell it to their enemies to ensure their safety.  Their belief in God is traded for peace and in the void slips tolerance, tolerance for every belief system that sets itself up, tolerance for every god, but the One and Only God.  It’s a sad

                                                             State of the Union.

“and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray, and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”  II Chronicles 7:14

Your Great, Great, Great Grandchildren

II Kings 13-15

Sometimes the word can be tedious.  This morning it seems to be only a recording of facts, kings, kings, and more kings and very few good ones.  What can keep us going on mornings like this?  Deciding we will be faithful.  God never promised us Moby Dick or Treasure Island, The Sum of All Fears or The Hunger Games.

A true truth - faithfulness goes a long way with God.  “But the Lord was gracious to them and had compassion on them and turned to them because of His covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob…” 13:23 - Hundreds of years later, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob’s faithfulness is still paying dividends. 

Sometimes you can be faithful for your great, great, great grandchildren who you will never know.  The True Truth?  God will know!!!

Fix-It-Job

II Kings 10-12

Finally a king whose heart is right with the Lord and chooses to follow Him.  Jehoash becomes king and the first thing he does is repair the Temple of the Lord.  Humans love “fix-it jobs”; we like to repair things that are busted, restore what’s wrecked, mend what’s broken.  One of the most rewarding acts of “fix-it” restoration is modern medicine.  I am a great recipient of the miracles that man can do with a human body that has been sorely broken up. 

Can you imagine what happened in the grave that first Easter morning?  Cells laid dead for three days slowly revive, kidneys begin to process, liver wakes up, lungs long since hard become fresh and soft and expand with that first breath of sweet air.  The heart starts up, baa bump, baa bump and blood begins to rush from head to toe. The body, purple as death, slowly turns pink and God becomes WARM.  The Holy Brain filled with warm blood knows He’s alive and opens His eyes.  He is alive.

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”  John 3:16

The greatest “fix-it-job” of all time.

Risen Christ, Isenheim Altarpiece

Will He Keep His Word

II Kings 7-9

One thing you can say about God: He keeps His word.  This is true in these passages.  I wonder if Jezebel knew Numbers 32:23.  If not, she should have.  God keeps His word!  He said, “be sure your sins will find you out” and dogs eat Jezebel.  He said, “let there be light” and by the time I finished writing this it was here.  He said,  “For He will be delivered to the Gentile, and will be mocked and mistreated and spit upon, and after they have scourged Him, they will kill Him, and the third day He will rise again.”  Luke 18:32-33

The whole earth stands quietly still and watches the grave.  Will He keep His word?

The Lamentation Over The Body of Christ

The Killing Miracle

II Kings 4-6

Miracles abound! Old women having babies, dead raised to life, floating ax heads, cured lepers and seeing the future.  I love miracles; I’m rarely skeptical and delight in these stories.  There are times, however, when doubt scratches me the wrong way.  You know what the biggest cure for doubt is?  Miracles!  Like how a spider can weave beauty, how mixing dirt, water and sun together grows bananas, or better still how a human can eat hamburgers, salads and cheerios and grow another human inside her.  How about the light from the sun traveling 93,000,000 miles through frigid space, -477 F, and strikes my face still warm, or how the love I experience for my grandbabies is exceedingly different from the love I feel for my children, or why art exists. 

Here is a truth.  When we believe in miracles and take pleasure in their existence we are given the ability to see them everywhere.  We are then miraculously filled with an ongoing sense of gratefulness and thanksgiving. 

How about this miracle, God is spit on, beaten, bloodied, whipped till His flesh is splattering on the ground, nailed heart and soul to a tree and…and with each moment I was being healed…was killed.  

The Flagellation of Christ

Carl Sagan, A Jewish Prophet?

II Kings 1-3

The great Jewish prophet, Elijah, passes on his ministry to Elisha and is taken to heaven in a chariot made of fire teamed by horses made of the same.  Two female bears maul 42 smart aleck kids and water fills a valley full of blood.  These chapters record the Divine weaving Itself into the time, light and matter of our cosmos.

Carl Sagan, the great astronomer and astrophysics now deceased, once said, “The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.” He was making a statement of faith and was, unknowingly, dancing with God.  God, Maker of heaven and earth, is the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End, always was, always is, always will be. 

I love it when God, The Divine, weaves Himself into the world creating fiery chariots.  Even now, my porch is slowly turning east at about 900 mph toward a fiery ball whose light and warmth will top the hill behind me at 186,000 miles per second and day will begin…all this while the birds in my back yard quietly hum the Hallelujah Chorus. 

Carl Sagan, a Ukrainian Jew, would have made a great Jewish Prophet.  

ATTENTION

I Kings 21-22

This is the story of Naboth, Ahab and Jezebel.  It’s easy for “us” to get lost in the Bible story.  These are three individuals in a world of millions and it seems that all God’s attention is focused on them.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  All the people in the Bible are there to tell God’s story.  They are used to develop God’s narrative and relate the truth of His word.  God’s story is simple; every human is an eternal being and is sinful; God loves every human no matter how good are bad we are; God wants us to be with Him forever and offers us the only way…Jesus, His Son.  We choose.

The Bible is like all stories ever written; it uses humans to talk to and about humans.  The only difference is God is writing the Bible.  So the next time you feel that God’s attention is focused on someone else, remember Jesus’ words in Luke 12:7: God knows you even to the number of hairs on your head.  That’s pretty attentive!

Super Bowl I

I Kings 17-20

The great Super Bowl of the Gods, the god Baal verses God Almighty.  God Almighty wins.  Severe drought, war, altar building, raising the dead and miracles abound.  The Word is rich.

Have you ever wondered why it rains?  It could stop.  Dust Bowl of 1934-1936!  Humans can’t make a single drop of rain and without it, we die.  How can something so valuable be taken so much for granted?  Rain is God’s realm along with light, fire and air to name just a few.  Worship is our business.  I bet if it stopped raining and WalMart sold rain gods there would be one on every porch.  Who do you think makes rain?  They would be worthy of worship, rain or shine.

iconic dust bowl image

"I Walk the Line"

I Kings 14-16

Evil, idol worship, murder, treason and suicide rip thorough these pages as Israel and Judah burn through crowned kings and civil war.  We end with Ahab and the infamous Jezebel ascending to the throne.  Hard reading but running throughout is a scarlet thread of truth.  Each kings life is recorded in context of how he related to God, it’s that personal relationship that is of upmost importance.  I wonder how American’s history would be recorded if instead of our leaders accomplishments, historians recorded their walk with God?  

To Answer Your Question

Luke 6:12-48

The title of our Sunday school lesson is “Live to Benefit Others.”  When we read the passage we are immediately struck with the question, “does Jesus really expect me to live this way?”  It was only this morning that I fully understood the lesson.  The key is in the first word, LIVE.  That word is critical in understanding how radical Jesus expects us to be.  I may live to make art, live to hike, live to chase my wife around the house, basically live to entertain myself.  Christ demands a radical transformation.  To live exuberantly, actively devoted to the care of others.  Whether they are our enemies or those that struggle with the abject tragedies of life.  Our lives should be characterized by actively living for their benefit.  To answer your question, live for him.