Romans 12 April 27, 2008
One Step At a Time, Part 2
What Does a Christian Do?
Rev. Meagan M. Boozer
Today, in this “One Step at a Time” sermon series, we are asking the question, “What Does a Christian Do?” A couple of weeks ago, we asked, “What is a Christian?” If you weren’t here, or didn’t receive a copy of that sermon in the mail, you can look at it on our website, or you can look in the racks where we keep the newsletters on your way out the door. We’re going “step by step,” and each step is important.
To answer the questions we’re asking, we go to God’s Word. Everything we need to know is in His holy Word. “What Does a Christian Do?” Listen to the apostle Paul’s words from Romans 12:
“I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.
For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness.
Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers.
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are. Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” No, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
I’m tempted to just say ‘Amen.’ If you’re a Christian, trusting Jesus as LORD, and believing he is exactly who he says he is, and if you do all the stuff Paul tells us to do in that chapter, then ‘Amen,’ to you. The reality though is that we don’t do it – maybe because we forget – or maybe because we don’t want to – or maybe because we didn’t know how important this or that was to do.
Let me try to condense it a bit. Here’s what Christians are supposed to do:
present your body as a living sacrifice to God,
be transformed by the renewing of your minds,
do not think of yourself more highly than you ought to think,
think with sober judgment,
have genuine love,
hate what is evil,
hold fast to what is good,
love one another with mutual affection,
outdo one another in showing honor,
do not lag in zeal,
be ardent in spirit,
serve the Lord,
rejoice in hope,
be patient in suffering,
persevere in prayer,
contribute to the needs of the saints,
extend hospitality to strangers,
bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them,
rejoice with those who rejoice,
weep with those who weep,
live in harmony with one another,
do not be haughty,
associate with the lowly,
do not claim to be wiser than you are,
do not repay anyone evil for evil,
so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all,
don’t take revenge (trust God’s judgment),
if your enemies are hungry, feed them,
if they are thirsty, give them something to drink,
overcome evil with good.
There, that’s better. Little shorter, little easier, right? Not at all. It’s not easy to live as God calls us to live. If it would be easy, we wouldn’t need God, would we?
It’s hard to love our enemies,
it’s hard not to speak out revengeful words, or act out revengeful actions.
It’s hard to live at peace with everyone all the time.
It’s hard not to become prideful that “we have it all together.”
It’s hard to be patient in times of suffering: we want relief, we want answers, and we want them now!
It’s hard to be constantly focused on trying to outdo one another in showing honor to others.
It’s hard to rejoice with those who are rejoicing when your own life isn’t going so well.
God, who knows everything about us, who sent Jesus to earth to walk in our shoes to understand our troubles in life, God says, “I know you can’t do this.” So, let Me do this through you.
This passage begins, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God . . .” Let’s stop there for right now, because before we get into this list of do’s and don’ts, Paul is telling us that any way that we can live that reflects Jesus to the world, is only by the mercy of God. He knows we can’t do it – we’re sinners – we’re limited in our thinking, we’re limited in our understanding, we’re limited in our ability to overcome evil with good. We are limited. But God is NOT limited in any way. He wants to pour his mercy into our lives, and enable us to do what we can not do on our own. That’s why the next words after “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God,” the next words are: “to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy & acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship.”
I want to try to give a visual demonstration of this. (To the reader: I’m asking a small child to come and let me hold them in my arms. I want them to really hold on to me around my neck in a big bear hug.) Now, to present our bodies to God as a living sacrifice can’t really look like this, because what are our arms busy doing? Holding on. What are our feet doing? Holding on. Where are we looking? In the opposite direction that God is looking. Clinging to God like this isn’t really presenting our body as a living sacrifice. We have too much control in this picture.
(To the reader: Next, I’m going to ask this child to let me pick them up – but I want them to be stiff, as if they were lying on an invisible firm board in my hands.) What do you think about this? Does this look like “presenting your body to God as a living sacrifice?” Personally, I don’t think so, because there isn’t any freedom of movement if you’re all stiff like this. It’s sort of like the person who says, “Okay God. I’ll do it your way…” – but then that person is not at all pliable in the hands of God. God asks in Jeremiah 18:6, “Can I not do with you just as the potter has done?” Putting ourselves in God’s hands like this, isn’t really presenting our body as a living sacrifice. We still have way too much control in this picture.
(To the reader: Next, I’m going to ask this child to lay back in my arms, relaxed & loose.) How about this? “Present your body to God as a living sacrifice.” To the child: Can you move your hands? Yes. Can you move your feet? Yes. Can you look around? Yes. But are you able to go wherever you want to go? Do you want to go over there? Okay. But I want to take you over here. We can have a conversation about it – but ultimately if we’re truly offering ourselves to God, we’re not going to jump out of His arms and do our own thing. Every day, every moment of every day, we’re going to make a conscious decision to trust God, and remain relaxed and ready to do whatever God wants to do through us.
I read in Sports Illustrated about Dale Webster. Has anyone heard about Dale Webster? (Probably not, unless you also read Sports Illustrated this past week.)
Allow me to read part of an article by Chris Ballard about Mr. Webster entitled, “Dale Webster’s Endless Summer.”
What does it mean to give your life to your sport? Ask Dale Webster. Every day for the last 32 years, every single day, he has surfed. He heads out each morning in Bodega Bay, a blustery town on the northern California coast, and paddles into the 50° water, a worn-out 59-year-old in a worn-out wet suit. He's caught waves during howling storms, while wracked by kidney stones and, once, within snapping distance of a Volvo-sized great white shark ("never paddled so hard in my life," he says). He's gone through 35-plus wet suits and as many surfboards. All that cold water has narrowed his ear canals, and his eyes are bloodshot and glassy, in need of surgery.
On Sept. 3, 1975, Webster began surfing daily. In 1976, a leap year, it occurred to him: Why not keep going until Feb. 29 of another leap year, 2004? In a world in which diets are successful if they last six months, it was a preposterously ambitious goal. "People thought I was crazy," says Webster, and they were probably right. But he just kept going, living his own waterlogged version of Groundhog Day. Eventually the world noticed. There was an item in Surfer magazine, a nickname (the Daily Wavester), newspaper stories and, sweetest of all, a four-minute cameo in the 2003 Dana Brown surf movie Step into Liquid. The following year Webster finally reached his goal [of breaking the Guinness World Record for consecutive days surfing]. On the big day there was practically a parade to the beach. His wife, Kaye was there, of course, as was their teenage daughter, Margo, who so idolized her dad that she'd started her own streak, becoming the first kid in her district to go from elementary school through high school with perfect attendance. Guinness had verified Webster's record (10,000 consecutive days), and the media were on hand to report that the Daily Wavester had finally hung it up. And, really, that was his intention. Funny thing, though. That next morning Webster woke up, and all he could think about was the ocean. So he packed up his '93 Ford Escort and headed back to Doran Beach. Only this time he was alone. No reporters, no friends, no cameras, just a steady rain. He lugged his board into the water, and the tears started to fall. First in relief, then in loss. It was over, but then again, it was over. Twenty-eight years working toward something, and now he had to move on. Just me and the ocean, he thought, one more day. That was four years ago. Last Sunday, Webster clocked his 11,919th consecutive day. In June he'll hit 12,000, but for what? Cal Ripken Jr. played every game for a paycheck, but there are no rewards for what Webster does, at least not the kind that would get you out of a sagging two-room rented house. Because of the streak, he's never visited his in-laws' home in Utah or taken a vacation inland, and he's held a succession of part-time jobs. "I have no retirement plan, no house, no four-oh-ten-K or whatever those numbers mean," he says. "My attitude was always, If I can just get to the beach, the rest of the day will take care of itself."
A couple of years ago something happened that made him question whether even the Endless Summer eventually turns to fall. Kaye began feeling a dull pain in her ribs. When she finally got X-rays, they showed her bones were pitted, like old driftwood. She had multiple myeloma, a severe form of blood cancer. Chemo didn't help. Now, as Dale puts it, "she's reaching the end of her wave," and doctors think she might not make Christmas. So each morning he kisses her goodbye as she sleeps, slips in his three waves at the beach and returns to be with her before leaving for work at 2:30. It's caused him to reevaluate his life, and his ritual. "It started out as a string, then a streak, then a quest," he says. "Now it's almost like it's become a toll -- how much it's taken of my life." Yet he doesn't stop. It is his burden and his salvation. Tomorrow, as always, dawn will come, the waves will break and Dale Webster will surf. "For me it comes down to this," he says. "We have this short time on earth -- what are we going to do with it?"
I think Dale has presented his body to surfing as a living sacrifice. What do you think? Every single day for 12,000 days (that’s 32 years), he has fulfilled a commitment to ride the waves. It’s the first thing he thinks about when he wakes up.
Now, I feel sad for him – but I do think we can learn from his example. Presenting our bodies to God, as living sacrifices, is like riding the waves. We’re not in control of the waves, but we learn, through continual practice, how to stay on them for the great rides. I know, (not from experience), that in order to stay on the board, you have to be loose. You have to be intentionally relaxed in order to move with the power of the wave. Are you getting the picture?
In order for us to do all the things God wants us to do (and did you notice that all that stuff in Romans 12 has to do with how we treat people?) . . . In order for us live out our Christian lives like Jesus modeled for us, we have to be committed every day to placing our lives in his capable hands. We have to trust him enough to relax. We have to be loose enough to allow his power to move in and through us. After a time, every morning, when we wake up, the first thing we think about is God – and how we can get with him, and stay with him throughout the day.
I want to pray for Dale and Kaye and Margo Webster. I want to pray that God will use what he has learned through his commitment to surfing, to be transferred into a commitment to choosing God’s will for his life. Will you pray with me?
Heavenly Father, we know you know and see the Webster family. Maybe Dale is even on a wave right now as we pray for him. We pray you would draw this family to yourself. We pray for Kaye in her time of suffering. Touch her spirit, and call her to drink of your living water so that she can know your peace. Touch Dale and Margo. Help them be where they need to be, and we ask that you would make your presence and power known in their lives. Bring to them the gift of salvation – and grant them all your peace. We pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.
Folks, you need to know that on my own, I cannot be merciful to others when they are making choices that go against the will of God, and then they come to me and wonder “what’s wrong with my life?” Basically, in my flesh, I just want to strangle them (not literally ). This is the honest truth. But thanks be to God – that by his mercies, I can, you can, be Jesus in this world today.
When John and I went away for our anniversary, we stayed at a Bed and Breakfast that had 24 rooms. Twenty-four rooms. We were the ONLY people staying there that night. Around 6:45 a.m. (on one morning that we can sleep in a little), we were awakened by men talking and laughing right outside our room. They were putting up scaffolding and beating on the roof right above us. We paid extra to have a room with a balcony so that we could relax in the evening and in the morning outside, overlooking beautiful garden. As it was, we had to keep our blinds pulled down. Now, if the people who run this B & B were Christians, when John gently mentioned to them that it was disappointing to have this happen, I would expect an apology, and an offer to refund the extra amount we paid to have a room with a balcony. That’s what Christians should do – working to outdo one another in showing honor. Unfortunately, if these people were Christians, they weren’t showing it that day. I don’t know, maybe because we were the only ones there, they were more concerned about income than they were about service, but if they were Christians, that would have been an opportunity to practice putting their trust in God & his promises. That would have been an opportunity to say to God, “You know what we need to keep this place running, but I believe that you put us here to care for and honor other people – and so we’re going to trust you and give this couple their balcony money back.”
Listen, either we are going to get beat around by the waves that come at us in life because we’re trying to do it all on our own power in our own way, or we are going to place ourselves in the arms of God, follow the flow of His Spirit, and let him deliver his mercy to us and through us. That’s what a Christian is supposed to do. Amen.
One Step At a Time, Part 2
What Does a Christian Do?
Rev. Meagan M. Boozer
Today, in this “One Step at a Time” sermon series, we are asking the question, “What Does a Christian Do?” A couple of weeks ago, we asked, “What is a Christian?” If you weren’t here, or didn’t receive a copy of that sermon in the mail, you can look at it on our website, or you can look in the racks where we keep the newsletters on your way out the door. We’re going “step by step,” and each step is important.
To answer the questions we’re asking, we go to God’s Word. Everything we need to know is in His holy Word. “What Does a Christian Do?” Listen to the apostle Paul’s words from Romans 12:
“I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.
For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness.
Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers.
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are. Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” No, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
I’m tempted to just say ‘Amen.’ If you’re a Christian, trusting Jesus as LORD, and believing he is exactly who he says he is, and if you do all the stuff Paul tells us to do in that chapter, then ‘Amen,’ to you. The reality though is that we don’t do it – maybe because we forget – or maybe because we don’t want to – or maybe because we didn’t know how important this or that was to do.
Let me try to condense it a bit. Here’s what Christians are supposed to do:
present your body as a living sacrifice to God,
be transformed by the renewing of your minds,
do not think of yourself more highly than you ought to think,
think with sober judgment,
have genuine love,
hate what is evil,
hold fast to what is good,
love one another with mutual affection,
outdo one another in showing honor,
do not lag in zeal,
be ardent in spirit,
serve the Lord,
rejoice in hope,
be patient in suffering,
persevere in prayer,
contribute to the needs of the saints,
extend hospitality to strangers,
bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them,
rejoice with those who rejoice,
weep with those who weep,
live in harmony with one another,
do not be haughty,
associate with the lowly,
do not claim to be wiser than you are,
do not repay anyone evil for evil,
so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all,
don’t take revenge (trust God’s judgment),
if your enemies are hungry, feed them,
if they are thirsty, give them something to drink,
overcome evil with good.
There, that’s better. Little shorter, little easier, right? Not at all. It’s not easy to live as God calls us to live. If it would be easy, we wouldn’t need God, would we?
It’s hard to love our enemies,
it’s hard not to speak out revengeful words, or act out revengeful actions.
It’s hard to live at peace with everyone all the time.
It’s hard not to become prideful that “we have it all together.”
It’s hard to be patient in times of suffering: we want relief, we want answers, and we want them now!
It’s hard to be constantly focused on trying to outdo one another in showing honor to others.
It’s hard to rejoice with those who are rejoicing when your own life isn’t going so well.
God, who knows everything about us, who sent Jesus to earth to walk in our shoes to understand our troubles in life, God says, “I know you can’t do this.” So, let Me do this through you.
This passage begins, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God . . .” Let’s stop there for right now, because before we get into this list of do’s and don’ts, Paul is telling us that any way that we can live that reflects Jesus to the world, is only by the mercy of God. He knows we can’t do it – we’re sinners – we’re limited in our thinking, we’re limited in our understanding, we’re limited in our ability to overcome evil with good. We are limited. But God is NOT limited in any way. He wants to pour his mercy into our lives, and enable us to do what we can not do on our own. That’s why the next words after “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God,” the next words are: “to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy & acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship.”
I want to try to give a visual demonstration of this. (To the reader: I’m asking a small child to come and let me hold them in my arms. I want them to really hold on to me around my neck in a big bear hug.) Now, to present our bodies to God as a living sacrifice can’t really look like this, because what are our arms busy doing? Holding on. What are our feet doing? Holding on. Where are we looking? In the opposite direction that God is looking. Clinging to God like this isn’t really presenting our body as a living sacrifice. We have too much control in this picture.
(To the reader: Next, I’m going to ask this child to let me pick them up – but I want them to be stiff, as if they were lying on an invisible firm board in my hands.) What do you think about this? Does this look like “presenting your body to God as a living sacrifice?” Personally, I don’t think so, because there isn’t any freedom of movement if you’re all stiff like this. It’s sort of like the person who says, “Okay God. I’ll do it your way…” – but then that person is not at all pliable in the hands of God. God asks in Jeremiah 18:6, “Can I not do with you just as the potter has done?” Putting ourselves in God’s hands like this, isn’t really presenting our body as a living sacrifice. We still have way too much control in this picture.
(To the reader: Next, I’m going to ask this child to lay back in my arms, relaxed & loose.) How about this? “Present your body to God as a living sacrifice.” To the child: Can you move your hands? Yes. Can you move your feet? Yes. Can you look around? Yes. But are you able to go wherever you want to go? Do you want to go over there? Okay. But I want to take you over here. We can have a conversation about it – but ultimately if we’re truly offering ourselves to God, we’re not going to jump out of His arms and do our own thing. Every day, every moment of every day, we’re going to make a conscious decision to trust God, and remain relaxed and ready to do whatever God wants to do through us.
I read in Sports Illustrated about Dale Webster. Has anyone heard about Dale Webster? (Probably not, unless you also read Sports Illustrated this past week.)
Allow me to read part of an article by Chris Ballard about Mr. Webster entitled, “Dale Webster’s Endless Summer.”
What does it mean to give your life to your sport? Ask Dale Webster. Every day for the last 32 years, every single day, he has surfed. He heads out each morning in Bodega Bay, a blustery town on the northern California coast, and paddles into the 50° water, a worn-out 59-year-old in a worn-out wet suit. He's caught waves during howling storms, while wracked by kidney stones and, once, within snapping distance of a Volvo-sized great white shark ("never paddled so hard in my life," he says). He's gone through 35-plus wet suits and as many surfboards. All that cold water has narrowed his ear canals, and his eyes are bloodshot and glassy, in need of surgery.
On Sept. 3, 1975, Webster began surfing daily. In 1976, a leap year, it occurred to him: Why not keep going until Feb. 29 of another leap year, 2004? In a world in which diets are successful if they last six months, it was a preposterously ambitious goal. "People thought I was crazy," says Webster, and they were probably right. But he just kept going, living his own waterlogged version of Groundhog Day. Eventually the world noticed. There was an item in Surfer magazine, a nickname (the Daily Wavester), newspaper stories and, sweetest of all, a four-minute cameo in the 2003 Dana Brown surf movie Step into Liquid. The following year Webster finally reached his goal [of breaking the Guinness World Record for consecutive days surfing]. On the big day there was practically a parade to the beach. His wife, Kaye was there, of course, as was their teenage daughter, Margo, who so idolized her dad that she'd started her own streak, becoming the first kid in her district to go from elementary school through high school with perfect attendance. Guinness had verified Webster's record (10,000 consecutive days), and the media were on hand to report that the Daily Wavester had finally hung it up. And, really, that was his intention. Funny thing, though. That next morning Webster woke up, and all he could think about was the ocean. So he packed up his '93 Ford Escort and headed back to Doran Beach. Only this time he was alone. No reporters, no friends, no cameras, just a steady rain. He lugged his board into the water, and the tears started to fall. First in relief, then in loss. It was over, but then again, it was over. Twenty-eight years working toward something, and now he had to move on. Just me and the ocean, he thought, one more day. That was four years ago. Last Sunday, Webster clocked his 11,919th consecutive day. In June he'll hit 12,000, but for what? Cal Ripken Jr. played every game for a paycheck, but there are no rewards for what Webster does, at least not the kind that would get you out of a sagging two-room rented house. Because of the streak, he's never visited his in-laws' home in Utah or taken a vacation inland, and he's held a succession of part-time jobs. "I have no retirement plan, no house, no four-oh-ten-K or whatever those numbers mean," he says. "My attitude was always, If I can just get to the beach, the rest of the day will take care of itself."
A couple of years ago something happened that made him question whether even the Endless Summer eventually turns to fall. Kaye began feeling a dull pain in her ribs. When she finally got X-rays, they showed her bones were pitted, like old driftwood. She had multiple myeloma, a severe form of blood cancer. Chemo didn't help. Now, as Dale puts it, "she's reaching the end of her wave," and doctors think she might not make Christmas. So each morning he kisses her goodbye as she sleeps, slips in his three waves at the beach and returns to be with her before leaving for work at 2:30. It's caused him to reevaluate his life, and his ritual. "It started out as a string, then a streak, then a quest," he says. "Now it's almost like it's become a toll -- how much it's taken of my life." Yet he doesn't stop. It is his burden and his salvation. Tomorrow, as always, dawn will come, the waves will break and Dale Webster will surf. "For me it comes down to this," he says. "We have this short time on earth -- what are we going to do with it?"
I think Dale has presented his body to surfing as a living sacrifice. What do you think? Every single day for 12,000 days (that’s 32 years), he has fulfilled a commitment to ride the waves. It’s the first thing he thinks about when he wakes up.
Now, I feel sad for him – but I do think we can learn from his example. Presenting our bodies to God, as living sacrifices, is like riding the waves. We’re not in control of the waves, but we learn, through continual practice, how to stay on them for the great rides. I know, (not from experience), that in order to stay on the board, you have to be loose. You have to be intentionally relaxed in order to move with the power of the wave. Are you getting the picture?
In order for us to do all the things God wants us to do (and did you notice that all that stuff in Romans 12 has to do with how we treat people?) . . . In order for us live out our Christian lives like Jesus modeled for us, we have to be committed every day to placing our lives in his capable hands. We have to trust him enough to relax. We have to be loose enough to allow his power to move in and through us. After a time, every morning, when we wake up, the first thing we think about is God – and how we can get with him, and stay with him throughout the day.
I want to pray for Dale and Kaye and Margo Webster. I want to pray that God will use what he has learned through his commitment to surfing, to be transferred into a commitment to choosing God’s will for his life. Will you pray with me?
Heavenly Father, we know you know and see the Webster family. Maybe Dale is even on a wave right now as we pray for him. We pray you would draw this family to yourself. We pray for Kaye in her time of suffering. Touch her spirit, and call her to drink of your living water so that she can know your peace. Touch Dale and Margo. Help them be where they need to be, and we ask that you would make your presence and power known in their lives. Bring to them the gift of salvation – and grant them all your peace. We pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.
Folks, you need to know that on my own, I cannot be merciful to others when they are making choices that go against the will of God, and then they come to me and wonder “what’s wrong with my life?” Basically, in my flesh, I just want to strangle them (not literally ). This is the honest truth. But thanks be to God – that by his mercies, I can, you can, be Jesus in this world today.
When John and I went away for our anniversary, we stayed at a Bed and Breakfast that had 24 rooms. Twenty-four rooms. We were the ONLY people staying there that night. Around 6:45 a.m. (on one morning that we can sleep in a little), we were awakened by men talking and laughing right outside our room. They were putting up scaffolding and beating on the roof right above us. We paid extra to have a room with a balcony so that we could relax in the evening and in the morning outside, overlooking beautiful garden. As it was, we had to keep our blinds pulled down. Now, if the people who run this B & B were Christians, when John gently mentioned to them that it was disappointing to have this happen, I would expect an apology, and an offer to refund the extra amount we paid to have a room with a balcony. That’s what Christians should do – working to outdo one another in showing honor. Unfortunately, if these people were Christians, they weren’t showing it that day. I don’t know, maybe because we were the only ones there, they were more concerned about income than they were about service, but if they were Christians, that would have been an opportunity to practice putting their trust in God & his promises. That would have been an opportunity to say to God, “You know what we need to keep this place running, but I believe that you put us here to care for and honor other people – and so we’re going to trust you and give this couple their balcony money back.”
Listen, either we are going to get beat around by the waves that come at us in life because we’re trying to do it all on our own power in our own way, or we are going to place ourselves in the arms of God, follow the flow of His Spirit, and let him deliver his mercy to us and through us. That’s what a Christian is supposed to do. Amen.
