Happy Rosh Hashanah

This is an exciting day.  This morning I started writing my morning devotionals again.  They have been kind of hit and miss for the last two months after I got sick and then recovered and then went on a two-week vacation.  But today was worth writing about and I want to expand on my thoughts here.  It is Rosh Hashanah today and tomorrow.  It is the Feast of Trumpets.  This is a celebration that Jesus Christ is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.  Call Him Yeshua HaMessiah.  Call Him Savior and Lord.  Whatever you call Him, today is a day that belongs to Him.  It is a day to give Him honor and glory and praise.  There is so much that God has revealed about Himself and His plan through this day.  When Paul says that we will be changed at the last trump, he was talking about this day.  Awake and celebrate, you who love the Lord of Hosts.  I was reading a question and answer at Torah.org and saw this interesting bit of information.  In question number six it says this:

Question: Why do we blow the shofar?

Answer: Since Rosh Hashanah is the anniversary of the creation of the world, it follows that it is also the anniversary of God being sovereign over the world. Rosh Hashanah is a coronation of sorts, and thus we trumpet the shofar just like at a coronation ceremony.

Insight: In truth, Rosh Hashanah marks the creation of Man, not the world. The actual creation of the world took place five days before the first human beings were created. In Judaism, the creation of the entire universe is marked by celebrating the creation of the purpose of the world: the free-willed human being.

The word shofar is related to the Hebrew word, l’shaper. The word l’shaper means “to beautify.” The call of the shofar reminds us each of our own calling, the calling to live beautiful lives. Why does our King decree the celebration of holidays and the performance of mitzvot, commandments? Only as a way to guide us in the process of beautifying ourselves and the world we live in.

Now hold that answer in your mind and read this passage from 1 Corinthians 15 with fresh eyes:

35But someone may ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?” 36How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. 37When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. 38But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body. 39All flesh is not the same: Men have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. 40There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendor of the heavenly bodies is one kind, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another. 41The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another and the stars another; and star differs from star in splendor.

42 So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; 43 it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; 44 it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.
If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. 45 So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. 46 The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. 47 The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. 48 As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the man from heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. 49 And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven.

50 I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. 54 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
55 “Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?” 56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

58 Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

Rosh Hashanah has been for the Jews a celebration of the creation of man in the garden.  When Jesus Christ comes at the last trump, it will be a celebration of the creation of the new man.  I am certain that Paul had this in mind when he wrote this passage.  Remember that Paul was a Pharisee and certainly understood the Jewish feasts and what was taught about them.  He says that he is unlocking a mystery or a secret that God has held until this time.  He talks here about the creation of Adam in verse 45 and uses the progression to explain how God will make us anew in verse 49.  This day celebrates what God has done and will do.  Is this the year He will come again to His own and take us to the place He has prepared for us?  I can’t answer that.  But I am watching and waiting this Rosh Hashanah as the trumpet call goes out.  I am awake and alert for His coming.  Are you ready?

The Prosperity Mirage

I absolutely love reading the Internet Monk site.  He often provokes and challenges me on things and/or says something that I have thought for years but never considered verbalizing or writing down.  He has a post now called The “Real” Prosperity Gospel that absolutely nails something that has bothered me.  It is something I tried to get at rather clumsily a while back with a post about speaking the whole truth.  Here is the part that had me nodding my head and shouting “AMEN”:

The real prosperity gospel isn’t the overt appeal to wealth. It is the more subtle appeal to God guaranteeing that we are going to be happy, and the accompanying pressure to be happy in ways that are acceptable and recognizable to the community of Christians we belong to.

The real prosperity gospel is the belief that God will- must?- keep things at a level where it’s still possible for us to follow Jesus without overt appeal to rewards in this life. The real prosperity gospel is revealed not in the promises of a yacht or a large home, but in the unspoken approval of a level of prosperity that allows us to live the Christian life on our own terms. It is the ratification of our private, sometimes entirely secret, arrangements with God of what his “goodness” means.

For years, one of my favorite Bible verses has been Jesus’ promise to his disciples in John 16:33: “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” 

This promise is completely crazy in the minds of most Western Christians.  I heard Ken Davis talk about this verse in a message called Super Sheep and he made me laugh so hard I cried.  I have told people for years; God didn’t promise you an easy life, or a cushy anything this side of heaven.  If we believe Jesus, we should expect the opposite.  I can’t fathom why we have it so good to tell you the truth.  Western Christianity has somehow fallen victim to the myth that God is working all things together for our good.  That is not what the verse says.  The verse says that He is working all things together for good, but He isn’t consulting us for our opinions of what that good is or should be.  He certainly didn’t consult Joseph in Genesis for his idea of “good”, because I am fairly certain that being sold as a slave, being falsely accused and thrown in prison and such wouldn’t have been a part of his plan or list of “good things”.  But we find Joseph telling his brothers in Genesis 45:7-8:  “7 God sent me ahead of you to establish you as a remnant within the land and to keep you alive by a great deliverance.  8 Therefore it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household, and ruler over all the land of Egypt.”

Again, iMonk puts this very well:

Ask yourself this question: Why is it that so many western Christians find the greatest challenges to their faith are experiences that do not even qualify as persecution or serious suffering? Why will the loss of a a job or the moral failure of a pastor lead to the end of faith? Why do interpersonal conflicts in a church cause so many to abandon Christianity altogether?

Is there something about these experiences that are inherently discouraging to a particular kind of faith experience? Perhaps a faith experience that says things should be turning out right most of the time?

In much of Western Christianity, a gospel has been promoted that teaches that God is about the business of giving you your “best life now”.  It just looks more blatant coming from the mouth of a Joel Osteen than it does coming from the mouth of a well-meaning pastor trying to comfort someone with the idea that God has something better planned for them down the road. 

When I was a child, I wanted to be an astronaut.  It was my life’s dream.  I thought about it all the time and even at a fairly young age started to formulate ways to make it happen.  The people I looked up to as heroes were Ed White, the first American to walk in space.  I think you get the idea.  Then, when I was 13, I was throwing rocks in the yard at some friends and they were throwing them back at me.  Suddenly, I learned why parents weren’t too keen on this activity as a rock unexpectedly hit me in the eye at the exact moment that I turned around.  The rock cut my eye open and in an instant ruined all the plans I had made.  This was not a “good” thing for me.  At the time, I was a nominal follower of Christ.  I had made a public confession and been baptized a few years earlier, but I lived my life the way I wanted to with enough “religious knowledge” to put on a good show if need be.  After the accident, a family from our church gave me a get well card that I still have to this day.  I am not at home so I can’t see it at the moment, but it says on the inside, “God always has a Plan B”.  At the time, the card held some measure of comfort, but in reality I had not felt the weight of the door slamming on my dream either.  I mean, God could still heal me or something else to make the plans I had work out “good” the way I had always known they would. 

It is safe to say that I am not an astronaut, now or ever.  Of all the things I thought I might do with my life that day, being a pastor of a small church in North Dakota would have never made the list.  But it has been amazing to behold what can happen in a life that is yielded completely to God.  Going wherever He leads and doing whatever He says.  I am not perfect even in my pursuit of Him and His ways, but I am determined to belong to Jesus Christ and to follow Him the best way I know how.  I discovered that God never had a plan B.  Just like Joseph, I learned that what looked like the worst of all disasters can be used by God in ways I couldn’t have imagined.  The only plan B around at all was mine, and I had to let it go to pursue the only plan A worth having.  I can’t promise anything to anyone.  God isn’t someone we can bargain with or control.  He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords and asks for nothing less than our complete obedience and submission to His authority as such. 

When we preach a gospel that tells people otherwise.  When we lead people to believe that God is there to give them the best things in life or that He only wants to help them have a better life or even the innocuous sounding “has a ‘great’ plan for your life”, are we leading them into disappointment and disallusionment?  Just this evening I read a story about a satanic group that slaughtered four teenagers in Russia.  In the news article one of them was quoted as saying:

Another suspect, Alexander Voronovic, said it was not the group’s first foray into cannibalism; he reported gang members previously dug up a grave and consumed the deceased’s heart, the newspaper said.

The newspaper reported another gang member said, “I tried to turn to God, but it didn’t bring me any money. I prayed to Satan, and things improved.”

We need to be honest with people as believers called to make disciples.  Life doesn’t become easy or “magically better” just because we have decided to follow Jesus.  In fact, outside of Western Christianity, the opposite is usually true.  For those brothers and sisters in Christ, life is usually much more difficult because of their decision and the persecution it brings.  I am still a person who struggles daily.  I am not immune to life as a minister.  Those faith healers on TV get sick too you know.  They have family members who get sick.  Jesus promised that if you live in this world, you will have trouble.  He didn’t say might have trouble.  He didn’t say you will have trouble until you become a Christian and then it will end.  To quote a truly classic movie, “Life is pain, highness!  Anyone who says differently is selling something.”  I don’t know about you, but I don’t feel like “selling” Christianity.

Watching for Signs in the Stars

In a continuation of a running theme here on the blog, I have a new and interesting observation to pass along.  I owe much thanks to my good friend Eric for pointing me in the direction of this little tidbit.  It turns out that a couple of years ago, the Hubble telescope spotted a strange object in the sky.  The scientists observed it for about 100 days, but could never figure out what the object was or where it came from and then it disappeared and left them with a bigger mystery.  We are just getting the news now because it was published in a scientific journal.  You can see the news story about by clicking on the link above.  Now, what does this have to do with signs in the stars you say?  Well, it turns out that the mystery object appeared in the sky in the constellation Bootes.  I have been intrigued for years with the notion that God placed His Gospel in the sky as a witness to all.  It fits with Paul’s statements of Romans 1 that all men are without excuse, because interestingly, the zodiac and collateral constellations seem to be much the same throughout most people groups.  It shows that they have a common beginning and history and could be traced to an early message of God and His plan for us.  Indeed some people have made a case for this.  An excellent book on this subject is The Witness of the Stars by E.W. Bollinger.  It can be read for free online is available at philologos.com.  The section having to do with Bootes can be found in chapter 1, but I will give a quick rundown here.  Bootes is referred to as “the coming one”.  He is described like this:

Inoculated Christianity

A few years ago, I preached a sermon with this title.  Lately, I have been thinking more about this.  I have been reading a lot of blogs discussing what is wrong with the modern church and what we can do to fix it, and I think one of the problems that is the most troubling is the phenomena of inoculated Christians.  Let me explain what I mean by the term so we have something to work with.  The type of inoculation I am speaking of is a reference to the process of “immunizing” against a more serious threat.  The dictionary definition is something like this:  to introduce immunologically active material (as an antibody or antigen) into especially in order to treat or prevent a disease <inoculate children against diphtheria>.  I can hear people already asking if I think Christianity is a disease, and I am not suggesting that it is, but the analogy is very appropriate.  In many churches today, a weakened form of Christianity is being taught and preached and lived.  It is a Christian message and life that is devoid of power and effectiveness.  Those exposed to the message become more resistant to the full blown message of Christ, and in most cases feel that they have already “done that” so to speak.  Many of them will never develop a “life-threatening” case of Christianity.  They will never feel that they actually have to do all of those things that Jesus said.  Jesus said that we must deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow Him.  This is a radical message and if we truly believe it, there is no way that most of us would have lives that are as normal as they are.  What does this have to do with the problems in churches?  It is very simple.  If most of our church congregations are inoculated Christians, then they are not Christians at all.  They have a form of Christianity, but not the power.  Actually, I think that I read that in the Bible somewhere, perhaps 2 Timothy 3:1-5

Seek and Save the Found???

Lately, I have run into a few examples of a Christian behavior that must surely puzzle the vast majority of people who are not followers of Jesus Christ.  It is the tendency of some Christians to fervently seek to convert other Christians to their beliefs about ______________(fill in the blank).  Can we find any Biblical justification for doing this?  Even as I write that sentence, I have to cringe because one of the recent examples of this behavior came from a post I wrote about sticking to the Bible itself.  From what I can gather, mostly by guessing since the person never answered most of my direct questions, I attracted the attention of an online personality who is intent on proving to the world that John didn’t write the fourth gospel and that believing that he did is tantamount to heresy? or false doctrine? or maybe endangers your eternal salvation or something.  Even when I told him that I agreed with him, he continued to badger me because I suppose I didn’t agree enough.  What this was supposed to accomplish is beyond me and I tried to find out what the author of those comments wanted to accomplish, but it went as one of those unanswered questions.

Playing the Numbers Game in Bible Prophecy

I have now read two articles at WND about this new blockbuster book about Bible prophecy.  It promises amazing discoveries and breakthroughs.  But there are a couple of “common sense” problems that I can see just from reading the synopsis articles about the book.  The book is called Temple at the Center of Time: Newton’s Bible Codex Deciphered and the Year 2012 and you can see articles about it here and here.  But here are the specifics that have set off questions that call the premise into doubt.

Sir Isaac Newton was not only a great thinker in physics, the book explains, but had extensive knowledge of the Scriptures with a special interest in prophecy. Newton believed there was a hidden code, a type of time-encrypted language. He believed the key to deciphering this code was the Temple of Solomon. He wrote extensively on the length measurements of the Temple and suggested it intersected time and dimension, serving as a prophetic and supernatural structure.

Basically this sets up the premise of the book.  According to what I have read in these articles, the book indicates that the distance from the Temple location in Jerusalem to key points on the globe corresponds with important dates in Israel’s history and therefore its future as well.  Let me take a longer quote from the article to show you what I mean:

The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing But the Truth

There were a lot of things that happened in my life during the last few weeks, but one that keeps after me day to day is a nagging issue that really hit me during my illness.  I have plenty of issues with the “prosperity gospel” or the “health and wealth gospel”, but the one that bugs me most is the fact that those who preach it either haven’t read all of their Bible or are willfully ignoring parts of it.  I don’t truthfully know which is the case from one person to the next, but it troubles me greatly.  I know it is a serious charge to make, but I intend to back it up.  If there is anyone who reads this that would like to “set me straight”, you are certainly welcome to make your case.  I just ask that you do so from Scripture and not from personal experience or personal testimony.  I will make my case from Scripture as well as give you some of my story to illustrate.

This really hit me hard a few weeks ago.  As I have mentioned here, I was quite sick and really not doing anything productive for a while.  I was running high fever and had chills, bodyaches, ect.  Recently the doctor has told me that I likely had parvovirus B19, which certainly fits.  The reason I bring this up, is that I watched a lot of TV in my downtime.  I was sleeping in a recliner, because I couldn’t be comfortable laying down and the recliner is conveniently in front of the TV.  During this time, I elected to sample some of the religious programming on TV that I don’t normally sit and watch.  Based on my sampling of some of these programs, I learned some fascinating things about Christianity that I never knew before.  One preacher told me that if I were a Christian, I couldn’t be sick.  If I just had faith and did what God said, He wouldn’t let me be sick.  This was news to me as I lay there in the chair running a fever of 103 or so.  I mean; I have acknowledged Jesus as my Savior and Lord.  One of us must have missed something in the Bible, but who?  Let me see if I can clear it up a little bit.  How about John 11:1-6?

Learning from the Todd Bentley Disaster

While I was sick and recuperating, there was a lot going on.  One of the saddest, if somewhat expected, was the thundering crash of the Lakeland revival led by Todd Bentley.  It was always a building built on the sand of unsound doctrine and bad theology instead of the firm foundation of Jesus Christ, so it isn’t a great surprise that the crash came, but it is still a saddening day for Christianity as this is the face that some took for the real deal.  There is a lot of disecting going on in the blogosphere as the fallout hits.  Much of it is very good.  There are voices from within the charismatic movement that are calling for discernment and wisdom and a returned focus on Jesus Christ in handling the fallout and preparing for future pretenders.  The news coming out keeps getting worse as the days go on and there are many who are wondering how so many could be deceived so completely.  The Fresh Fire board has issued an apology (I found it quoted at Northwest Musings but you can see it on their site) to those who have been affected and wounded by this betrayal.  Many have written critiques better than what I would put forward and I have tried to link to some of those here, but I want to echo the most important theme that I have seen in these posts.  The most important thing in Christianity is Jesus.  It is all about Jesus.  If we lose that perspective or focus, we lose our reason for living, ministering, serving, or doing anything at all.  The Jesus Paradigm makes this point much better and with great cautions about the things that can take us off the rails.

I am also finding that I really like Jared Wilson more and more.  I wrote about him and his church’s radical giving program a while back, but his take on this fits my feelings exactly so I wanted to quote him here:

This is not about piling on Bentley. This is about rebuking his staff, his friends, his fans, and his defenders. You got the hero you deserved. You traded the truth for a lie, you cashed in the all-surpassing worth of Jesus for an unrepentant lying adulterer and his lame magic show, and you didn’t flinch when the evangelical world warned you it was gonna be a disaster.

I’m saying “I told you so” as a plea to you to stop — for the love of God! — idolizing these charlatans and their witchcraft. I say that as a continuationist. This isn’t about the charismatic gifts.

It’s about truth. It’s about The Truth. And Jesus is The Truth.

What we need is a radical re-commitment to zeal for the Christian’s sole satisfaction in Christ and His work. Nothing else.
Those who drift into Jesus + ____________ have their reward.

Amen brother.  It’s all about Jesus and Him alone.  The next time some guy comes along talking about promoting angels because “everyone already believes in Jesus” or tries to elevate anything over knowing Jesus Christ crucified, run the other way with all speed.

Unplanned absence and God’s Grace

I haven’t been able to do much for over two weeks.  I got very sick, very quick and was unable to function coherently for a while.  I am starting to recover to the point that I can get stuff done, but I have some school work to catch up on and many things going on at present.  We have a mission team at our church and home working on projects this week and we have many exciting things going on.  I have several things to write about and will get them posted in the near future.  God can really show you a thing or two when all the distractions get removed from the picture.

Whose Kingdom Come?

As American Christians we are very familiar with the “culture war”.  We have been told that we have to confront evil in our culture and change our culture back to a “godly” one.  We need to work to make America honor God and make American culture honor God.  If someone would kindly point out the Biblical mandate for this call, I would appreciate it.  Many outspoken Christians in the public square have spent much time and effort in attempting to reshape America into the grand vision of an earthly kingdom that God would be proud to call His own.  I hate to tell them this, but God isn’t interested in making America into His new chosen people or His new chosen land.  It isn’t a new Washington D.C. that will be coming down in Revelation 21.  We don’t expand God’s Kingdom by making a Christian culture or nation.  We expand God’s Kingdom by telling more people His Gospel and thereby finding more people who choose to acknowledge Him as Lord and King.