SETTLE DOWN

Settle Down

On April 15, 1947, Jackie Robinson became pro baseball's first black player when he debuted with the Brooklyn Dodgers.  He would face bigotry in ballparks all over the nation, but especially in the segregated South.  Robinson’s courage and calm in the face of that hatred deserves to be remembered for years and years to come.

Hiring Robinson didn’t require the same degree of bravery, but it did call for some boldness on the part of Branch Rickey, the Dodger’s baseball executive who made the call.  That’s what makes the following account from a recent CNN story so interesting:

Rickey's pastor was Wendell Fifield, from the Plymouth Church of the Pilgrims in Brooklyn…While Rickey was trying to decide if he should sign Jackie Robinson, he paid a visit to Rev. Fifield. He barged into the pastor's study and told Fifield, "Don't let me interrupt. I just want to be here. Do you mind?"

According to an eyewitness report written by Fifield's wife June, the two men passed the time without words. The pastor continued his work and Rickey energetically paced the floor, stopping occasionally to look at the pastor's window. For forty-five minutes he continued pacing, pausing, pacing, and then pausing. Finally, Rickey broke the silence by pounding his fist on the pastor's desk as he shouted, "I've got it!"

"Got what, Branch?" the minister asked.

June Fifield said that Rickey finally relaxed on a chair and told his pastor, "This was so complex, fraught with so many pitfalls but filled with so much good, if it was right, that I just had to work it out in this room with you. I had to talk to God about it and be sure what he wanted me to do. I hope you don't mind."

"Wendell," he said, "I've decided to sign Jackie Robinson." Then Rickey straightened his bow tie, donned his hat, and left the room as he said, "Bless you, Wendell."

Not many of us will be called on to make a decision of such magnitude.  But our lives are nonetheless filled with difficult challenges.  How many of us think to stop and listen for God in the same way that Rickey did before making his big decision?

This Sunday we’re going to hear about what happens in the life of Elijah when, in the midst of his panic, he is able to stop and listen for God.  I hope you can listen for God, too.

SAY WHAT?

In her recent book, Another Day in the Frontal Lobe, Dr. Katrine Firlik describes how, in the last year of her residency, she had an encounter with a patient that taught her all over again how important it is to see each patient with new eyes:

I walked into yet another examining room … a brand-new consult from out of town: 18-years-old, cerebral palsy, spasticity. Okay, okay, I've seen this before, I just need to get a good history before my attending walks in. Efficiency is key…It was clear I wasn't going to get the story from him, so I turned to the parents, my back toward the patient, and started to take down the history. …

[When my mentor walked in], I cringed…He sat down on the examining table, the only seat left in the cramped room. After introducing himself, he surveyed the compact scene—the patient, the parents—and then focused his gaze back on the patient. After what seemed like several, almost uncomfortably quiet seconds, he looked the patient in the eye and asked, "So, when did you graduate from high school?" The young man's face lit up like I had no idea it could.

My mentor had noticed something I had missed. The patient was wearing a large high-school ring, so large that it looked a little silly on his bony finger. His body, far more than his mind, had borne the brunt of his cerebral palsy. He was a proud, beaming high-school graduate, who used a specialized computer to help him communicate. For the remainder of the visit I sat in the corner, duncelike, humbled by the enormity of this ring now staring me in the face…

I’m no neurosurgeon [Perish the thought! I can’t even cut my kids’ PB&J’s in a straight line.], but I’ve had more of these types of encounters than I care to admit.  Despite prayers to the contrary, there’s a better than average chance that I’ll do it this Sunday.  I will not pay close attention.  I will look right past someone.  I will see them and not see them.

As we continue our tour around the Bible, looking at passages that speak about listening for God, this Sunday we come across a passage where Jesus reminds us that it’s possible to look without seeing and hear without hearing.

I pray that you’ll see and hear God today.

²³ Then he turned to his disciples and said privately, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. ²⁴ For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.” (Luke 10:23-24)

WALK HUMBLY

WALK HUMBLY

³ For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you. (Romans 12)

There’s a story about a woman who went for her first visit to a new dentist’s office, and as she was sitting in the waiting room, she absent-mindedly examined the dentist’s diplomas. As she took a moment to think about her new dentist’s name, a rush of memories came flooding back.  She recalled that a tall, handsome, dark-haired boy with that very name had been in her class at high school.  She couldn’t help but wonder if this could be the same guy.  But once she’d been let into the back and placed in a chair, and once her teeth had been cleaned and the dentist was summoned, she found herself face to face with a balding, gray-haired man whose face was lined with wrinkles.  The woman thought to herself, “This couldn’t be him.”  Still, the feeling that she knew him never left her, and toward the end of her appointment she finally asked, “Did you by any chance go to Morgan Park High School?”  At this the man’s face brightened up and he exclaimed, “I sure did!  Home of the Mustangs!  Class of ’78!”

“I thought so,” replied the woman, “You were in my class!”

To which the dentist replied, “Really? What subject did you teach?”

Sometimes we seek to be humble.  But often we have humility thrust upon us.  That’s because most of us tend to do the opposite of what Paul instructs above. That sober judgment that he’s talking about is much more sobering when it comes from someone else.

But it’s not always a bad thing to be “put in our place.”  It’s usually painful to one degree or another, but it does have its benefits.  Whether we seek it or not, when humility comes, it helps us regain some perspective of ourselves.

This Sunday, we’ll be reminded that God wants us to maintain a certain perspective.  He wants us to walk with Him in a way that helps us remember who we are and who He is.  He wants us to walk humbly with him.  It’s not always easy, but it brings a certain freedom and peace—the peace of remembering that God is God and we don’t have to be.    

AT MY GATE SUNDAY

    I’d like to share this powerful story from author and pastor,

Gordon MacDonald:

I grew up a pastor's son. My father's church, located next to our home, was often used for meetings of pastors belonging to a certain denomination that was passing through considerable theological controversy. Often I would sneak into the church and listen to these pastors vent their frustrations and plot their strategies for upcoming denominational conferences.

The name of one denominational leader was frequently mentioned, and when his name was spoken, it seemed to me, a small boy, as if the Devil himself was being described. Over time that name became associated with all forms of ecclesiastical evil.

Years passed, and the boy who overheard those passionate, often hateful, exchanges became a man and a pastor. Occasionally memories of those pastoral meetings and the name of the man who was so often vilified would pop up on the screen of my memory. One thing was sure: I had been taught not to like him.

Then one day when I was in my mid-thirties, I was given a powerful lesson…My assistant came to my office door and said, "Gordon, there is a man out here who would like to meet you. His name is _____." I was startled. It was the name I'd heard so often in those meetings when I played the eavesdropper.

"Mr. MacDonald," he said, "I'm from the West Coast, but I'm in Lexington today visiting relatives. For the last few years I've been reading your articles and now your books. I determined that if I ever got back here, I'd try to meet you and tell you how much your writing means to me."

How did this man know that, on that very day, I was going through a mini-crisis of confidence? How could he have intuited that I was an inch away from dropping the writing component out of my life completely?… How odd of God … to send someone I'd been taught not to like to offer this word of courage.

It’s so easy to look on people whom we don’t know as somehow less than a person.  The more unlike us they are, the less likely we are to view them with sympathy and kindness.  We see them in a one-dimensional way and forget that they are people just like we are.

                                               — — Robert

DO JUSTICE

Do Justice

She calls out to the man on the street
sir, can you help me?
It’s cold and I’ve nowhere to sleep,
Is there somewhere you can tell me?

He walks on, doesn’t look back,
He pretends he can’t hear her,
Starts to whistle as he crosses the street,
Seems embarrassed to be there.

Oh, think twice, cuz it’s another day for
You and me in paradise.
Oh, think twice, it’s just another day for you,
You and me in paradise.

            --Phil Collins, “Another Day in Paradise”

It really is, you know.  You and I are living in paradise.   It may not always feel that way.  Financial stressors can be intense; debt can be hard to avoid; there always seems to be another unforeseen expense around the corner.  In spite of all that we have, we still worry about how much will be left at the end of the month.  This congregation has always had members who struggle financially.  Its median income certainly isn’t at the top of any of the churches I’ve been a part of.  And yet, globally speaking, most of us are doing very, very well.  As tough as things may seem for you, you are one of the richest people in the world.

Wanna find out just how rich you are? When you get a chance, go to globalrichlist.com and enter your annual income in US dollars.  If you make $50K or more, you are wealthier than 99% of the population.  If you make $25K or more, you’re wealthier than 90% of the world’s population.  There might be some margin of error there, but whatever it is, well, marginal.  It might be hard for us to see, because most of us are surrounded by people of similar means.  But the fact is, not many of us will ever have to worry about basics like food, water or shelter.

This Sunday, we’re going to look at a passage that wants us to keep all of this in mind.  God has communicated his expectations to us: we are to “act justly.”  What we’ll find is that it means more than just giving money; it’s more about an attitude that we have toward all people regardless of whatever numbers might appear in their bank accounts.

NUFF SAID

’Nuff Said

This is an excerpt from an article in Leadership magazine written by John Ortberg:

Conforming to boundary markers too often substitutes for authentic transformation.

The church I grew up in had its boundary markers. A prideful or resentful pastor could have kept his job, but if ever the pastor was caught smoking a cigarette, he would've been fired. Not because anyone in the church actually thought smoking a worse sin than pride or resentment, but because smoking defined who was in our subculture and who wasn't—it was a boundary marker.

As I was growing up, having a "quiet time" became a boundary marker, a measure of spiritual growth. If someone had asked me about my spiritual life, I would immediately think, Have I been having regular and lengthy quiet time? My initial thought was not, Am I growing more loving toward God and toward people?

Boundary markers change from culture to culture, but the dynamic remains the same. If people do not experience authentic transformation, then their faith will deteriorate into a search for the boundary markers that masquerade as evidence of a changed life.

To be clear, there’s nothing wrong with boundary markers.  Every culture, every family and every individual needs boundary markers.  We need to be able to say when a line has been crossed, whether we were crossed or the one doing the crossing.  We need to be able to say, “These are things we will not do to ourselves or to God or to one another.”

The problem comes when there’s nothing in a relationship besides boundary markers.  If the only way we relate to God is by finding out what we can and can’t get away with, it turns God into nothing more than “The Great Warden in the Sky” with all of us as His inmates.  Or it leads to us following a shell of the rules.  We will keep ourselves presentable on the outside and ignore the condition of our hearts.  That’s how you become what Jesus calls a “white-washed tomb.”

God has greater hopes for you and me.  And He’s stated them very clearly in a number of places.  They are surprisingly simple to understand and attempt.  We’re going to start talking about them this Sunday.

This year especially, we want God to speak to us, to call us into His presence and give us a purpose.   But in one way of thinking about it, He has already done so in language that is crystal clear.  God has already spoken.  We’re going to take a look at this very simple message.

RISK AVERSE

Risk Averse

This is an excerpt from a sermon on courage by Mark Buchanan:

A few years ago at a Willow Creek Summit, Jack Groppel, who works with leaders to hone optimum performance, showed two video clips. The first video was of a group of NFL linebackers. When they showed up for some training at Groppel's center in the swamplands of Florida, Groppel had an assignment for them: all the linebackers were to run to the perimeter fence of the center, either fetch a ribbon from a post or tie a ribbon to a post (I can't recall which), and then run back to base camp. Groppel then added one final, important detail: a wild boar had been spotted in the forest that morning. He explained how dangerous wild boars can be and how they all needed to be on high alert.

Off they went. Now, in preparation for the activity, a cameraman had been planted along the forest trail, hiding behind the bushes. When you watch the video of what took place that day, these massive linemen come around the bend looking panicky. At that point the cameraman begins to snort and rustle the bushes. The football players each turn tail and run, squealing like schoolgirls.

Then Groppel showed us another video clip. It was of the same training scenario, only this time it's with CIA operatives. At the point where those operatives come around the bend and the alleged wild boar starts snorting and rustling, each operative gets into combat position and holds his ground.

Now you tell me—whose organization was most exalted by the courage of its members?

There’s another thing worth noting here.  My guess is that all the men, whether NFL or CIA, felt afraid when they heard the noise in the bushes.  That is to say I would bet their bodies involuntarily reacted in similar ways.  Everyone’s heart rate and breathing probably picked up.  The centers of their brains responsible for fear all became active.

The difference is not who was afraid and who wasn’t.  The difference was what action they took in light of the fear they felt.  One group prepared for flight, the other for fight.  This Sunday we’re going to look at how fear can interfere with our ability to listen for God.  I’m convinced that the trick is not to banish fear (at least not at first).  Instead, I think the trick is to know how to respond to our fears.  Then again, if you haven’t been trained in hand-to-tusk combat, who’s to say the NFL players weren’t the smart ones.

SOMEBODY SAVE ME

For those of us who believe that idolatry is a relic of pre-enlightenment eras or isolated 3^rd world countries, consider this excerpt from Timothy Keller’s The Reason for God.  I think you’ll see that idolatry is still alive and kicking.  This Sunday, I’ll be talking about the way that it interferes with our ability to hear God.  Interesting how even good things are a sad substitute for hearing from God:

“If you center your life and identity on your spouse or partner, you will be emotionally dependent, jealous, and controlling. The other person's problems will be overwhelming to you.

If you center your life and identity on your family and children, you will try to live your life through your children until they resent you or have no self of their own. At worst, you may abuse them when they displease you.

If you center your life and identity on your work and career, you will be a driven workaholic and a boring, shallow person. At worst you will lose family and friends and, if your career goes poorly, develop deep depression.

If you center your life and identity on money and possessions, you'll be eaten up by worry or jealousy about money. You'll be willing to do unethical things to maintain your lifestyle, which will eventually blow up your life.

If you center your life and identity on pleasure, gratification, and comfort, you will find yourself getting addicted to something. You will become chained to the "escape strategies" by which you avoid the hardness of life.

If you center your life and identity on relationships and approval, you will be constantly overly hurt by criticism and thus always losing friends. You will fear confronting others and therefore will be a useless friend.

If you center your life and identity on a "noble cause," you will divide the world into "good" and "bad" and demonize your opponents. Ironically, you will be controlled by your enemies. Without them, you have no purpose.

If you center your life and identity on religion and morality, you will, if you are living up to your moral standards, be proud, self-righteous, and cruel. If you don't live up to your moral standards, your guilt will be utterly devastating.” 

--Tim Keller, The Reason for God (Dutton, 2008), pp. 275-276

THE "S" WORD

The “S” Word

This Wednesday I heard commentator Frank Deford on NPR talking about our ongoing fascination with Tiger Woods.  The television ratings for PGA tournaments go down when he drops out of contention or is not playing at all.  I don’t follow golf, but it sounds like Woods is little more than an average player, and yet everyone seems to be waiting around for him to become the greatest again.  They’re sure that the collapse of his marriage and the revelation of multiple affairs were the only problem in his game.  Deford was wondering if that’s the case.  Perhaps he’s just not that good anymore.

I haven’t followed the Woods saga very closely.  I quickly lost interest.  (And I have absolutely no interest in whatever’s happening with Charlie Sheen right now.)  But while I don’t know what has happened with Woods recently, I do remember being impressed with a piece he wrote for Newsweek last fall.  Here’s an excerpt:

Last November everything I thought I knew about myself changed abruptly, and what others perceived about me shifted too…My life was out of balance, and my priorities were out of order. I made terrible choices and repeated mistakes. I hurt people whom I loved the most. And even beyond accepting the consequences and responsibility, there is the ongoing struggle to learn from my failings.

At first, I didn't want to look inward. Frankly, I was scared of what I would find—what I had become…Golf is a self-centered game, in ways good and bad. So much depends on one's own abilities. But for me, that self-reliance made me think I could tackle the world by myself. It made me think that if I was successful at golf, then I was invincible. Now I know that, no matter how tough or strong we are, we need to rely on others.

I can’t speak to anything else regarding Tiger, but I appreciate what he has to say here.  This is a pretty good confession.  It acknowledges responsibility; it displays an awareness of the internal nature of his problems; and it recognizes how long he avoided dealing with all them.

But that’s what sin does, isn’t it?  This week we’re going to be talking about the “S” word and how it creates interference when we want to hear God.  It doesn’t have to be that way, though.  In fact, our brokenness is actually one of the best places to start hearing God speak, if we’ll just allow ourselves to listen.



DRIVEN TO DISTRACTION

Driven to Distraction

The following is from an article in Leadership Journal.  It’s by author and preacher John Ortberg.  Pay special attention to the last line, because it’s the one we need hear, especially if we’re feeling overwhelmed and ineffective.  Perhaps it will help us hear God this morning:

Several weeks ago my wife pulled me into the bedroom, closed the door, and said there were a few things she wanted to talk about. She said she was kind of afraid to bring them up. She had a list.

I was not happy that she had a list.

She began: "When our marriage is at its best, we are sharing it together. We share division of labor stuff. We partner together around the house—our kids see this. We each know and care about details in each other's life and work. To be honest: it feels like that's been slipping. It feels like you have been becoming so preoccupied by all the things you have to do, by all the demands you think are on your shoulders, I'm kind of missing the you I most want." …

She said: "When you are fully present…light, breezy, spontaneous, fun, ready to listen, alive to joy—I love that man. I need that man. I haven't seen that man around much lately."

It took me a couple days to process this talk, because pouting is more or less my spiritual gift, and I had to get that out of my system first.

But I thought about the kind of life she was describing. I know that life.

I started praying. God, I need some help. Ideas started to come. I need some wisdom, some accountability—and I watched God start to bring some of that into my life. I knew I needed either a therapist, a spiritual director, or an executive coach. And I finally landed on the best choice and started moving forward. …

And then, this thought: I can do this. I can set aside the weight of unfinished tasks and unsolved problems when I come home. I can be fully present and alive even though everything around me is not settled down. Each moment I can choose this; I can ask God's help with it.

And it's been like a mini-revival. I find myself thinking, when problems arise, Bring it on. Each problem is, among other things, an opportunity to exercise this muscle, to make it stronger. And if I forget in one moment, I can begin again with God the next.

I've been struck by how this can be done by anyone, anywhere. …

RIGHT PLACE, RIGHT TIME

"I'm of the opinion that busyness is a deeper threat to the soul than pornography ever was."

–Gordon MacDonald

Now that I have your attention…You may not agree with the guy, but at least hear him out on the busyness thing.  Besides, he’s not saying it’s not a problem; he’s just trying to draw our attention to something else that competes for our attention.

And think about it: What’s your number one excuse for not creating space for God?  For me, it’s busyness.  (Later I’ll point out why I think “busyness” isn’t the real problem.  But, for now, it does seem to be the defense of choice.)  I read that scripture from Deuteronomy and I see the command to make a place for God when I “lie down” and when I “get up.”  But, by the time we lie down at night, after scouts or gymnastics or homework and getting the kids in bed and their clothes and lunches ready for the next day, I just want to watch a little TV and then go to sleep.  And when I rise in the morning, it takes all of my energy not to hit the snooze button just so we can get one kid on the bus and ourselves ready for the day’s work.  It’s hard to think about making space for God there, too.  I can see why MacDonald says busyness (or our perceived busyness) is a problem.

Add to that the irony that Sunday, our “Sabbath/Day of rest,” isn’t any better than any other day of the week.  I rush out the door to get here early in the morning, because I work here.  Most of the rest of you are scrambling just to get here on time.  (As would I, were it not my job to be here on time.)

And in the midst of this reality, we have gone and made it our mission to listen for God this year.  We are dedicating ourselves to hearing God speak in our lives in spite of however hectic and hurried our lives have become.

As we’ll see in this Sunday, sometimes God speaks spontaneously, but sometimes he speaks because he is invited.  Sometimes he speaks because a space is created for him.  I don’t know what your morning has been like, but you have an opportunity to invite him to speak to you today.  I hope you’ll make a space.

⁴ Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. ⁵ Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. ⁶ These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. ⁷ Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. ⁸ Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. ⁹ Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates. (Deuteronomy 6)

Right Place, Right Time

Right Place, Right Time

The following statistics come from a recent Pew study:

• ·         Gen Xers (born between 1965-80) who prayed daily in the late 1990s: 42 percent
• ·         Gen Xers who pray daily now: 54 percent
• ·         Boomers (born between 1946-64) who prayed daily in the early 1980s: 47 percent
• ·         Boomers who pray daily now: 62 percent
• ·         Time average American spends per day in religious and spiritual activities: 9 minutes (Average includes those who spend no time at all)

If you didn’t notice it before, go back and take a look at those stats again.  They seem to indicate that the number of people from both age groups who prayed regularly grew over the passage of time.  Is it because age does that?  Is it because of the tumult (political and economic) of the last decade or so?  I don’t know.  Whatever the reason, more people want to pray now than they did in previous years.

Steve Farrar tells the following story in his book Standing Tall:

“A number of years ago, Dr. Robert Schuller was on a whirlwind book promotion tour, visiting eight cities in four days. It was an exhausting schedule in addition to the normal duties Dr. Schuller had on his shoulders as pastor of a large church. As he was going over his schedule with his secretary for his return home, she reminded him that he was scheduled to have lunch with the winner of a charity raffle. Schuller was suddenly sobered when he found out the winner of the raffle, for he happened to know that the $500 the person bid to have lunch with him represented that person's entire life savings. How did he know that? The person was his own teenage daughter.”

What do the two have in common?  We find a way to do the things that we really want to do.  If it’s important enough, if it there’s enough motivation, you and I will take the necessary measures to make something happen.

The same thing can be said for those who want to hear from God.  Those of us who want God to speak into our lives will create opportunities for that to happen.  God can speak anytime, anywhere.  But we aren’t always able to hear Him, because we haven’t placed ourselves in a position to hear.  As you’ll see this Sunday, Samuel hears God, because he’s in the right place at the right time.

CHOSEN

There is hardly ever a complete silence in our soul. God is whispering to us well-nigh incessantly… --Frederick Faber (You’ve already heard this quote once. I’m sure you’ll see it again.)

In the following anecdote from Today’s Christian Woman, a healthcare worker from Kirbyville, Texas relates what happened one day when a young patient pressed the “call nurse” button in his hospital room:

I neglected to tell my new patient, a little boy, how his hospital room intercom worked. Soon his light flashed. I called his name and asked what he wanted. There was complete silence. I repeated myself. After a long pause he said, "Jesus, I hear you but I don't see you. Where are you?" I couldn't wait to get to his room and give him a hug.

How could I read this and not think about the boy Samuel in the temple, asleep by the Ark of the Covenant and hearing the call of God?  And it’s a funny story, because we know, of course, that it wasn’t Jesus.  There is a perfectly reasonable explanation for a voice that we suddenly hear.  There must be someone—another person—speaking on a microphone.

And while it’s probably best that we don’t automatically assume that the voice we’re hearing is coming from God.  I wonder how far in the opposite direction I’ve swung.  I wonder if it would ever occur to me that God is speaking to me right now.  If the boy is displaying appropriately childlike faith, how often do I fail to show any kind of faith at all?

This Sunday, we’re going to continue our look at the encounter with God that Samuel has in the temple at Shiloh, starting with the God’s call to Samuel.  It’s wonderful that Eli instructs Samuel to respond the way he does.  It’s wonderful that Samuel has the faith and courage to listen to the old priest.  But most wonderful of all is the fact that God calls out to us.  It doesn’t begin with us, it always begins with God.  I hope we’ll be able to look at our own lives and see how God has faithfully called out to us.

DEAD AIR

“In those days the word of the LORD was rare; there were not many visions.”                          --1 Sam. 3:1

The following is from Marshall Shelley, the editor of Leadership Journal:

My wife's father is a Kansas farmer. He's spent a lifetime raising wheat, corn, milo, beef, and along the way some sheep and chickens. One morning while I followed him around the farm, we talked about the differences between city living and a rural lifestyle.

"Most city folks I know expect each year to be better than the last," he said. "They think it's normal to get an annual raise, to earn more this year than you did last year. As a farmer, I have good years and bad years. It all depends on rain at the right time, dry days for harvest, and no damaging storms. Some years we have more; some years we have less."

It was one of those indelible moments of stunning clarity. And that "law of the harvest"—some years being fat and others being lean—applies to much more than agriculture. Growing in spiritual maturity requires gratefully accepting the "seasons of more" and the "seasons of less" that God weaves into specific areas of our lives—our friendships, marriage, career, finances, ministry, and spiritual growth.

I wonder how you would describe the “season” that you’re in right now.  For my part, I’d have to say that 2010 was not a season of dramatic spiritual growth.  So what Shelley has to say about “gratefully accepting” all of the seasons that we experience is pretty helpful.  It’s easy to think that we’re always supposed to be in a phase of dramatic spiritual growth.  But are we?

Perhaps there are times when things need to sit still for a while.  Of course sometimes they’re sitting still because we’ve grown complacent.  So it’s important to be able to tell the difference.  It’s important to ask the question: How am I relating to God and why?

As you prepare for Sunday worship I, hope you’ll stop and look at your own relationship to God.  Is it true that the word of the LORD is rare in your life?  Is it true that there has not been much vision from God?  If so, the really important question to ask is why.  Hopefully that question will bring you a step closer to being able to say to God: “Speak LORD, your servant is listening.”

                                                                                          --Robert

CHALLENGA SUNDAY 2011

Challenge Sunday 2011

Welcome to Challenge Sunday—the day where our elders share with you their hopes and plans for the coming year.  I thought I’d start by sharing a story with you from a book by Gary Preston called Character Forged from Conflict:

Back when the telegraph was the fastest means of long-distance communication, there was a story, perhaps apocryphal, about a young man who applied for a job as a Morse code operator. Answering an ad in the newspaper, he went to the address that was listed. When he arrived, he entered a large, noisy office. In the background a telegraph clacked away. A sign on the receptionist's counter instructed job applicants to fill out a form and wait until they were summoned to enter the inner office.

The young man completed his form and sat down with seven other waiting applicants. After a few minutes, the young man stood up, crossed the room to the door of the inner office, and walked right in. Naturally the other applicants perked up, wondering what was going on. Why had this man been so bold? They muttered among themselves that they hadn't heard any summons yet. They took more than a little satisfaction in assuming the young man who went into the office would be reprimanded for his presumption and summarily disqualified for the job.

Within a few minutes the young man emerged from the inner office escorted by the interviewer, who announced to the other applicants, "Gentlemen, thank you very much for coming, but the job has been filled by this young man."

The other applicants began grumbling to each other, and then one spoke up saying, "Wait a minute--I don't understand something. He was the last one to come in, and we never even got a chance to be interviewed. Yet he got the job. That's not fair."

The employer responded, "I'm sorry, but all the time you've been sitting here, the telegraph has been ticking out the following message in Morse code: `If you understand this message, then come right in. The job is yours.' None of you heard it or understood it. This young man did. So the job is his."

This year we’re going to invite you to listen for God’s voice in your own life, to make an effort throughout 2011 to hear and understand God above the noise of our lives.  But you don’t have to wait for an invitation to do that.  You can start right now even as you’re reading this.  I pray that, this year, God will speak and that we will be able to hear.