Final Frontier

 

Good afternoon, and welcome.

 Tomorrow, we at RiverWalk church will have yet another memorial service for one of our members.  Kay passed away several days ago from illness not related to COVID.  She joins several other RiverWalk members who have passed relatively recently from illness, only one of which was COVID related, as far as I know.

It is times like this that make those of us who remain alive think yet again of the reality of life and death, mortality and immortality, and the relationships we have with each other.  These times also force us to think of those things in life that are truly important compared with those things we often place in positions of great importance, but which pale in comparison to reality.

You know what I’m saying.  Those truly important things are a life well-lived; people in our lives who we love and cherish; family ties; friendships; and for people of faith, most importantly our relationship with the God of heaven and earth.  The pseudo-important things…those things we often place in positions of greatest importance in our lives…power, wealth, prestige, influence, accumulation of things…those things suddenly shrivel and essentially go away when we are facing our final frontier.

It is sad and puzzling to me why we don’t recognize the truly important things of life sooner.  Why is it that people, relationships, family, and our faith in God seem to come front and center when we are in our final weeks of battle with incurable cancer?  Why do we humans hold on to the false narrative that gives preeminence to wealth, prestige, and the accumulation of the material?  Why do we persist in holding on to idols crafted by mankind instead of holding on to the One who created us and wants us to share life, freedom, and endless joy with Him for eternity.

I can relate to those questions because I myself am guilty…as are we all…of doing that exact thing.  I have, and continue at times to hold on to that false narrative.  I find it so difficult to let go of the material…let go of the here and now…let go of the selfishness of me-first.  I am right there in it with Paul the great Apostle when he said, “Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me.  For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me.  What a wretched man I am!  Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?  Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

And Paul also provides, in the next sentence, the explanation for this deliverance through Jesus.  He writes, “there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.  For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering.  And so he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

Now, I don’t pretend to understand all there is to know about what Jesus did for me or how his death on a Roman cross somehow made me free, as Paul says, “from the law of sin and death.”  I can’t fathom how one man dying some 2,000 years ago can have any effect on me, or anyone else for that matter.  But when I look at the entire Biblical story from cover to cover, I see evidence of a God who loves me, who had (and still has) a plan for me, and who tells me that the death of Jesus did indeed have a profound effect on me and my relationship with this God.  And as Peter the apostle said once to Jesus when Jesus asked his disciples…his adult students…if they would leave him as the rest of the crowd just had, “To whom shall we go?  You have the words of eternal life.”

There is no other place, person, or thing we can go to.  We can’t take our prestige, power, or wealth with us when we die.  Jesus is the one…the only one…who has the words of eternal life, and is the only one we can take with us when we cross that final frontier.

 

Blessings,

Daily Influence

 

Good afternoon, and welcome to this edition of Thursday Thought.

 Have you ever given much thought to how wide your circle of influence extends into society and the world?  Now, I know that’s a rather deep question to start off a Thursday Thought, but the question is certainly pertinent.  Perhaps a question you might have for me before you even begin to answer my question might be, “How in the world did you come up with that thought, and why are you asking the question?”

I’m asking because as I count off the months and years, which by the way seem to be coming at me much more quickly than they did in my childhood and younger adult days, I think back to those people I’ve met and developed some kind of relationship with or events that I participated in which were somehow more important than I perhaps thought at the time.  I especially can think back on people I’ve known, many of whom I still know and have a relationship with, who are scattered far and wide on the earth.  The rise of the Internet and social media has made those kinds of widespread connections very easy and accessible.  I have to wonder just how much their knowing me has influenced them in some way, and how my knowing them has influenced me in some way.

The web of relationship is much more complicated than we might at first think.  And the fact that we have some kind of friendship or relationship with someone else pretty much naturally leads to some kind of change in that person and in us…some kind of alteration in how we think or behave…some kind of way in which we are different somehow for having that relationship.  Sometimes those changes are positive, for the good.  Other times those changes turn out to be destructive and cause damage to one’s health and well-being.

And one’s circle of influence…oh my, that is usually much, much larger than we ever have thought could be possible.  At times, we are unknowingly much more influential upon the lives of others than we ever could imagine.  And we’ll probably never know the extent of that influence or how our influence has changed not only the person we know, but people, situations, and events that they know and are part of.

We don’t exist in a vacuum.  We are not the only ones we affect when we say or do some thing or other.  Each of us looms large in the lives of others, whether we know it or not.  What we say.  What we think.  What we do.  Those actions affect others even if we do them in private…even if we make every effort to hide them…even if we take all measures to keep them out of the lives of others.  We may succeed in keeping those things private; however, they will have an effect on us and in turn we will alter in some way, large or small, how we interact with others.  Society and the world are very tangled webs of relationships.  We can only begin to understand small parts of those webs.

And the amazing thing about it all is that this influence is felt even when we are living our ordinary, routine days.  We don’t have to do or say something spectacular in order for the influence to be there.  Every day.  Every hour.  Every interaction has the potential to affect others for the better or the worse.

That doesn’t mean that you have to somehow be fearful of interaction or be overly cautious when you live your daily life.  It just means that we are indeed not islands.  We don’t live alone.  We aren’t just our own.  We’re all interrelated in some way.  We affect others in ways that we cannot fathom.  We are indeed in many ways our brother’s keeper.

Live your life.  Live it with joy, contentment, and peace.  Live it as God intended.  Love your neighbor as you love yourself.  And love God above all else.

 

Blessings.

Strength Renewal

 There’s a lot going on in the world today, both near and far away.  The war in Ukraine continues to drag on with daily reports of death and destruction.  Then there’s the news of a possible COVID variant that is spreading.  And now, at least in the Great Plains, we have out-of-control wildfires that have hit Central Kansas grasslands recently.  And those fires continue to be ignited and spread by the March winds.  You know, with all that is happening right now, it can become easy for us to hit the doldrums of life and living.  We become bogged down by all of the stuff that bombards us daily…stuff that seems to suck the spring out our step, sap our energy & drive, and cause us to want to just stay in bed and pull the covers up over our heads.  We don’t eat as we should.  We don’t exercise as we should.  We don’t interact with others as we should.  We ignore the laundry, the dishes, and the bill-paying.  You know the feeling.  You’ve been there.  You may be there right now.  You know full well what I’m describing.

Sometimes even in our gilded society of hot and cold running water, comfortable transportation, air conditioning, instant communication, and all the food we could possibly want, we become tired.  We get weary.  Life still presses in on us.

We still battle cancer, dementia, and heart disease.  We deal with sometimes untimely death.  We struggle with mental health issues and disability.  Families and relationships become estranged.  We experience divorce, societal breakdown, the gulf between liberal and conservative, and religious fanaticism.  The struggles are real.

So, where do we go?  What do we do?  Do we stay in bed all day?  Do we never get dressed our go out of our homes?  Should we seek medical or mental health care?  Maybe we could go on a sort of permanent vacation or just slip away to another city…another state…and start over.  Or we could become advocates for change, joining this group or that non-profit or some other do-good organization.  There are all sorts of ways to help mitigate the effects of human misery, none of which is perfectly satisfactory.

However, I’d like to point you to a place you may not often think of when thinking about possible cures for what ails you.  And although you might at first glance think this is a “religious” thing, in truth it isn’t so much religious (as many people think of the word) as it is practical, good advice.  I’m pointing you to the Christian Bible, the book of Isaiah in the Old Testament, chapter 40, verse 31.  Here’s what it says.  “Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.  They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”

That word “renew” when examined closely, actually means to exchange one thing for another.  In this instance, we are exchanging our feebleness for the strength of God.  We will gain new strength…strength from God himself.  That newly-imparted strength will enable us not only to soar like eagles and run without becoming weary…but the last part of that verse says we can walk…continuing to simply put one foot in front of the other in ordinary, everyday life and living…and not grow faint in so doing.

Yes, some of us will soar.  Some of us will run.  But many of us will just be walkers…going through the routine of life while we continue to encounter, battle, and deal with those things that life in this fallen creation gives us from time to time.  Our own strength will not be sufficient.  By our own strength we will fail.  We will give up.  We will lose hope.  But by the strength given us by God, we can continue to go down life’s path, not growing weary, not growing faint.

I don’t know what your situation is now.  You may be in great shape, ready to conquer the world.  You may already be soaring and running.  But I suspect that many of you who are watching this are at least at times feeling overwhelmed and out of energy and strength.  Some of you may not even know how you will finish out the day or face the day to come.  However, if you are a Christian, then “Because He Lives,” you can indeed face tomorrow, tapping into the strength provided by the unmerited favor God bestows on you.

May God bless you this day and every day.

No One But God May Know

 

My Facebook friend Jennifer Dukes Lee, in her book “Growing Slow,” talks about times when they went to the beach.  One of those times, she encountered a dad and his son building a sand castle.  As the day went on, others, many of whom were strangers, would join the two and help build the castle.  At the end of the day the castle was adorned with many towers, a moat, a stairway, and other kinds of bling.  And one thing everyone knew was that the castle at some point was going to come down, whether from humans or from the waves.

Sure enough, the next day the castle was down, having been destroyed by some kids who had jumped on it.  Dad and his son were there, building another castle.  When asked about the one that was destroyed, Dad just said, “We know these castles won’t last.  We come to this beach every year.  Our favorite part is building castles.  They never last.  But this is what we do.  It’s hard work, but mostly, it’s just a lot of fun.”

Ms. Lee then says this:  Here's what I learned on that beach:  We may build some amazing things in life that last a long time. But not everything we build will produce a measurable legacy.  Your best efforts may be washed away or trampled.  You may be forgotten.  No one but God may know about the most meaningful things you did with your life because they were done in obscurity, when no one was watching but Him.

She continues:  You might think that what you’ve built with your life so far isn’t all that grand.  But maybe that’s not the point, anyway.  It’s not what you’re building; it’s Who you are building with.

Come to the shore.  Kneel next to your Father, and get your knees dirty as the sun warms your back.  And when the day comes to a close, stand next to your Father, and take a moment to admire what you’ve done together.  Then, watch as He turns to you, squeezes your hand, and says, “Wasn’t that fun?  Let’s do it again tomorrow.”

This is Jay now.  Recently, I’ve been thinking about some of the things that I do in everyday life and work, and how futile those things I do sometimes seem to be.  And I think we all can relate to that feeling that we’re just spinning our wheels…we’re just going through the motions…we’re just doing what we are supposed to be doing as we go through our day.  Our best efforts, it seems, don’t bring about much in the way of change or recognition.  We begin to feel and believe that what we are doing is not productive at all, and more than that, no one notices what we do and no one recognizes our efforts.

The point of Ms. Lee’s post, however, is that we should place less emphasis on how much we think we accomplish and more emphasis on doing the good works that God the Father has given us to do…working alongside Him as we joyfully work with Him to renew the creation.

The fact that we may well never see the results of those good works is irrelevant.  The fruit of those good works may not be apparent ever, or may become apparent only years or even decades later.  Or we may see those good works seemingly destroyed much as the sand castle was destroyed.  That doesn’t mean we cease to do the work.  It only means that we continue those works for as long as we are given the breath to go on.

Nor does a failure to receive recognition from others for those works give us permission to cease those works.  We aren’t in the good works for the recognition and accolades from others.  We’re in the good works business because God accomplished a great work in us…forgiveness of sins, our salvation and our adoption into His family.  That’s why we do what we do.  The accolades and recognition make us feel good for a moment.  But our recognition of God’s great work in us and our thankfulness and gratitude for that great work are what should be driving us to those works.

Whether our good works consist of raising a family in the shelter of the Lord, providing good value to a customer from the business we own or work for, giving someone a ride to the doctor’s office, donating food to a food bank, being neighborly to those in our neighborhood, or whatever it may be…we do them out of our gratitude and thankfulness…not for the recognition and accolades.

May God continue to bless you with wisdom and strength as you go about the good works He has given you to do.

We Are Unique Creatures

 

Good morning!  Again today, as I did last week, I begin this thought acknowledging the current world situation with Ukraine as well as the State of the Union speech by the President and other political and ideological events and situations.  However, Thursday Thought is not a political venue.  It is, rather, a venue for me to reach out to you with what I hope and trust are words of comfort, instruction, reflection, and even information.  I don’t intend to become overly religious in these videos; however, I will not hesitate to point out certain teachings of the Christian faith when appropriate.  It is, of course, your choice whether to view these videos or not.  It is my choice to select the topics.

We are having a warm spell in Kansas this week.  Temperatures are fifteen to twenty degrees above normal.  Such spring-like temps bring out the desire to get outside, dig in the ground, clean up winter’s mess, and even go to the shops and stores that sell seeds & plants, planning the spring and summer planting seasons.

It’s all an illusion, of course.  The warmth is just a tempting ploy to get us to believe that spring maybe has arrived.  The reality is that colder weather is around the corner.  Frosts and freezes are yet to be endured.  Tender buds and shoots may well be frozen back.  And we will go back to wearing layers to keep out the cold, and endure the biting north winds that are sure to come.

The month of March is such a tease.  Days of warmth and breeze are interspersed with days of snow, ice, and gusty north winds.  Plants begin to green up and sprout in the sunny warmth only to be beaten back by several days of below average temperatures and stifling, overcast skies.  March seems to be the month when the battles between summer and winter begin in earnest.  Those battles seem to peak in late April and May with thunderstorms, hail, and even tornadoes criss crossing the plains.

Then, the battle finally having been won by the summer’s heat, June starts the calming down of the weather and July & August are just downright hot.  Late September and October begin the battles again between summer and winter with winter eventually winning out…and then the next March we do it all over again.

There are, we know, parts of this earth that don’t see these battles.  In those areas, it’s either always hot or always cold.  And there are some areas that are always, it seems, just right with very little change in temperatures from summer to winter.  Sometimes we in the temperate climates long to live in a place where the daytime temperatures are always in the upper seventies and the nights are always in the mid sixties.  A place where rainfall is abundant and plant life is rich and full.  However, people who live in those places sometimes long for more of a change.  The sameness of the weather day after day becomes a little too much.  People long for variety, even in the weather, sometimes.

I don’t know what your preference is regarding the weather.  Some like it hot.  Some like it cold. Some like it the same all the time.  Some like the variety.  We are all different.  And that’s my point.  We aren’t all the same.  We aren’t clones.  We each have our preferences and our desires, even when it comes to something we can’t control like the weather.  Those differences don’t mean that some are right and others are wrong.  Those differences don’t mean that we trash and demean those who hold to preferences that we don’t hold.  Nor do those differences mean that we are somehow superior to those who have other points of view.  All it means is that we are not cut from the same mold.  We are unique individuals created by God to fulfill a unique purpose in His creation and in His plans.

May that same God…the God of heaven and earth…the God of, as the Old Testament says, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob…the God who inhabited the earth in Jesus Christ…bless you this week as you fulfill that purpose.