The Key

I have a key ring with several keys from which to choose.  They are of different shapes and sizes.  I can choose to use any of them at any time but only one fits the door of my house, only one fits the door to the church building, only one fits the door to my shed and so on.  Many keys and many choices but my choice is limited to one when it comes down to actually using it to open a particular door.

On more than one occasion I have tried to use the wrong key to open the church building door with my office key and my office with the church building key as they both look so much alike.  But, while they have some common features, they are neither one a substitute for the other - regardless of how much I giggle the keys.  Each lock can be opened by only one key pattern.  When I want to enter a particular door, I must use a particular key.

I used this principle to begin writing this blog.  In order to open up this iPad, I had to use a pattern of key strokes.  There are many keys to use and in infinite number of patterns from which to choose.  I am free to choose any that I wish but only one particular set of key strokes will unlock the device, allowing me to share these thoughts with you as I am at this moment.

In my case next to the chair I am sitting in as I am writing, there is laptop computer from my office.  If I were to open it and use the key strokes I have used for this computer, I would get a warning that I have made an error and then denied access.  No matter how many times I try, I will not gain access with these key strokes.  Actually, in that computer, if I try the wrong strokes three times, I will be given instructions to contact my program administrator as access is denied altogether.

So why am I telling you all this?  Why am I bothering to talk about the singularity of keys?  Because only Jesus is the Key to eternal life - he alone is "the Way, the Truth, and the Life; and no man comes to the Father except through [him]" (Jn 14:6).

He alone open the door to our Father's home and the glory awaiting us.  There are many choices when it comes to religious paths: Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindu, Bhuddist, and thousands more.  But Jesus alone is the correct choice for "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12).

My saying that is not narrow minded or bigoted or exclusive - it is simply true.  To say there are many paths to heaven sounds very tolerant and inclusive but it is not true and helps no one come to the Father.  While I can tolerate and even defend anyone's right to choose whatever path they will, I cannot support or agree unless it is Jesus. Jus' Say'n.

Seasons

The mornings are getting cooler.  The sun sleepily rises later in the morning.  The heat of the day comes on later, doesn't rise as high and retreats with the cool of the early evening.  The season is changing, summer is past, fall is upon us and winter will not be very far behind.  You make like the change, you may pine for summer days but the season will pass nonetheless and another season will take its place.

King Solomon put it this way: "There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace" (Eccl 3:1-8).

Everything in its time and a time for everything.  We talk about seasonal jobs, seasonal clothes, seasonal activities, seasonal opportunities, etc.  The truth, however, is that everything is seasonal.  Every job is seasonal.  That season may last 40 years or four months, but it's season will come and go.  All your clothes are seasonal.  What you wore in your teens is not likely what you are wearing or would choose to wear now.  Your health is seasonal.  You use to run like the wind.  Now you run out of wind.  Everything, even your very life, is seasonal.

The thing about seasons is that each has its own pluses and minuses.  This season has one thing and the next has another.  There is something to enjoy and something to endure in each.  It's great being young and starting a family but the struggles of raising children is a little like being pecked to death by a duck.  On the other hand, being older and being able to enjoy grandchildren is a wonderful thing that isn't packed with the stress of parenting.  However, it also isn't packed with energy and the need to take those precious grand kids back home so you can rest replaces the stamina of youth.

When people say they would love to be young again, is to say that they would love to turn this season back in for the other.  But would you really?  Would you give up the wisdom you've acquired?  Would you give up the memories you cherish?  Would you give up your grandchildren?  Would you so easily give up the you that has developed over the years to become that person you once were.  I personally like my senior wrinkles better than my teenage acne.

Seasons are meant to enjoy and to cause growth through trials.  But then, thankfully, they pass on to the next with its new joys and new trials.  You've heard mothers say about their babies, "I wish you could stay like this forever."  Not really.  Not if it actually happened as it did for a next door neighbor I once had whose 50 year old son was still in diapers, could not talk or walk.  He never experienced the changes of growth beyond infancy.  She never experienced the joy and sorrows of raising a boy into manhood.  And her temporary joy of having a baby became the deep sorrow of never having a son, a grandson or relief from the never ending challenge of being totally responsible for another.

Yes, there is a sadness of changes in seasons.  There is even a condition called Seasonal Affect that causes someone to experience deep sadness moving from sunny days of summer to increasing darkness of winter.  However, to never experience seasons or change is not how we are wired.  We need the changes, we even long for them.  And the last season, when we have to leave this world behind gives us pause but it also gives us promise of that Day when the seasons of earth are traded in for the  eternal season of heaven, which contains all the blessings but none of the sorrows of our time on earth.  Jus' Say'n.

Unseen Certainity

I'm originally from Missouri, the "Show Me State."  It is also called the "Mule State," which lends itself to a combined meaning of stubbornly refusing to believe anything until seen.  Jerry McGuire's famous "Show Me The Money!" would be restated as "show me the whatever it is you're trying to tell me is so.

I can't begin to tell you how many times I've heard "I won't believe it until I see it."  Further, in a tongue and cheek sort of way, I can remember hearing, "Don't believe what you hear and only half of what you see."  If it wasn't seen, it wasn't certain - that was for certain!

As culturally posited as the notion of unseen equals uncertain, that is unequivocally not in step with my Christian upbringing.  Contrary to Hillary's statement about the need of churches to get in step with democracy, which is to adopt the cultural mores of the day, Christianity rather is to be counter cultural just as Jesus proved to be.

Jesus was so counter cultural that the cultural leaders of the day put him to death on a cross.  He warned his disciples, "If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you" (Jn 15:18-19).  Yeah, no the church is not to get in step with the culture.

And, to the point of this message, Christians, perhaps in no more important way, are not to accept the cultural insistence of "seeing is believing."  Instead, the foundation of our life in Christ is embracing the truths taught in Scripture and imprinted in our hearts, not affirming what we can see, hear, touch, smell and taste: "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see" (Heb 11:1).

Biblical faith is the "unseen certainty" provided by the Holy Spirit.  It is not blind trust as the Spirit gives evidence to our own spirits and provides truth in Holy Writ and displays God's glory in creation.  Seeing God, far from a physical sighting, is accomplished by the eye of faith which allows for an "unseen certainty" provided by the Spirit of Christ: "No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known" (Jn 1:18).

Have I physically seen God?  No, no more than I've physically seen love or hope or oxygen or peace or so many other things that are not seen but are unseen certainty.  I don't need to see a thing to know it exists, I accept many things on evidence.  In legal terms is is called "circumstantial evidence," which connects an inference to a conclusion of fact.  The Holy Spirit, the Bible and design in creation  are the inferences that connect me to the conclusion of the fact of God.  Jus' Say'n.

Getting Prayer

"This, then, is how you should pray: "`Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us today our daily bread.  Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.  And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one'" (Matt 6:9-13).

Jesus' model for prayer is less about getting what you want in prayer and more about getting prayer.  While prayer is a means of making petition to God in regards to our needs: "daily bread," it is more about His will and about His way.

Establishing His kingdom on earth as it is in heaven is the foundation of the prayer.  When God's Kingdom reign is established, our need will be met, forgiveness will be the order of the day, His name will be praised and we will be delivered from the evil one.

Getting prayer is to understand its purpose is to get God, to get His vision, to get his heart, to get his purposes of a redeemed world and to get oneself in line with the Master rather than the servant getting the Master to provide all the things his heart desires.

Getting what we want without getting what God wants would be selfish and self-defeating.  God did not intend prayer to be a way in which man manipulates the will of God but rather where man is molded by the will of God.

Getting prayer is to understand that it is a dialogue not a monologue.  It is an asking, sharing and listening with the emphasis on listening as what God says is infinitely more important than what we ask or share.

God wants to hear from us, to hear our wants, our fears, our needs and our goals; but moreover God wants us to listen to His will, His purpose, His plan, His desire for us.  For God's will is always good and right.  What we ask of God may help us in this life, what God has to say actually brings life.  Jus' Say'n.

Just Ask

Have you ever found yourself coming up short on something only to have someone you know say, "Next time just ask.  I'd be more than happy to help."  Its an experience that's pretty common to mankind in general.  So often we do without because we just didn't ask for help.

This is not just a common problem, it is a universal problem for the God of the universe stands by willing to bless us if we will just ask.  "You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God" (Js 4:2).

Rather than ask God, man often tries to get what he needs on his own and often by any means necessary.  However, in the end, we so often fail to get what we really want, even though we pull out all the stops.  We even resort to trying to simply take what we want, which doesn't insure we will get anything more than compounded loss.

All the while, God is saying to us, "Hey, just ask me.  I want to bless you!"  The key to what we really want and need is just ask.  And yet, we fail to do so time and again.  And, then when we do get around to asking God, we still do not receive because we don't "just" ask.  I'm making a little play on words here. I'm not using the word "just" to to mean simply but rather as a moral qualifier.

Listen to the next verse in the Book of James,  "When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures" (v. 3).  God stands ready to give what we ask if we "just" ask - simply ask in a just manner.

To be selfish is not just, it is seeking to subvert justice and direct the common good to self.  Selfish people don't want what is good for everyone or just, they simply want what is best for self, regardless and even in spite of the needs of others.

God is telling us that when we are consider of the needs of others in our asking, He is predisposed to give whatever we ask because it serves the common good and therefore just in the asking.

Don't wrangle and wrest with others over what you want, don't do without what you need.  Instead, turn to God in humble, selfless petition and He will provide.  Jus' Say'n.

Friendly Pain

In the United States, torture, the intentional infliction of pain to uncover truth, is outlawed.  Even in Guantanamo, where we are dealing with Islamic terrorists bent on the destruction of the West, torture is forbidden.

But this morning, I'm going to be tortured.  I will be poked, prodded, stuck and scraped, all in the pursuit of uncovering truth from the tooth.   That's right, I'm going to the dentist for my bi-annual teeth cleaning and exam.  I'm going to be tortured and I'm going willingly, even paying for the experience though not particularly looking forward to the experience.

Why would I do that?  Why would I pay to have someone inflict pain on me?  Because I am certain that the pain is valuable to me.  It is the price I pay to keep my teeth in this progressively aging head. As much as I dislike the discomfort, I appreciate the discovery of plaque, tartar and tooth decay that allows my dentist to do what is necessary and good for my dental health.

Pain, as much as we dislike it, can have the purpose of preventing decay and destruction and demise. Pain can be our friend, it can be the one thing a friend alone would inflict on us.  For instance the pain of being brutally honest that a best friend my bring.  We don't want to hear it and they don't want to bring it but your best interest depends on this kind of honesty.

The pain of deprivation or delayed gratification may well be inflicted by a parent who loves a child very deeply because he/she knows that the child is not ready for the thing they ask or that what they are asking is now and will forever be harmful to them.  A parent take pleasure in providing and experiences pain in denying a child but often will choose the answer that causes pain in both them and the child for the present but brings about good in the long run.

This is precisely what God will often do.  He will allow or inflict pain in the present to prevent worse in the future.  Listen to his words in Hebrews 12:10-11, "Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it."

No, I don't expect to ever like the feeling of pain but there are times when it is welcomed because it brings life in the end.  There is such a thing as friendly pain, pain that is inflicted for our good - pain often described as discipline.  Jus' Say'n.

Wisdom

If you could ask for an abundance of just one thing, what would it be?  Would you ask for money, power, health, food, clothing -- what would be the one thing you would want to insure you had over everything else?

God's revelation of what that should be may surprise you: Wisdom.  Specifically the Lord says, "Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding" (Prov 4:7).  Wisdom over everything - over food, over money, over health, over everything else.  Why?

Wouldn't having a large amount of money insure we could have everything else we needed?  We could buy food, get health care, afford housing, etc.  Except that a fool and his money is soon parted or as the Bible puts it, "In the house of the wise are stores of choice food and oil, but a foolish man devours all he has" (Prov 21:20).

And the truth is that money can't buy love or happiness or even good health.  And money, if not accompanied by wisdom is a very fluid thing indeed - it soon runs out.  Whatever else you may have is equally at risk in the hands of a fool.  How many have ruined their health doing foolish things?  How many have had power and lost it by acting the fool?  How many have lost their jobs, their houses, their families due to foolish behavior?

A foolish person wastes, risks, loses, wrecks or otherwise dispatches all that he has.  But a wise person takes care of his family, his home, his business, his life.  A wise man will find a way to make money, to secure housing, to promote his health, to provide for his family.

You can take away everything a wise man or woman has and he/she will rebuild.  But you can give a fool everything he/she needs and that person will dismantle and destroy or simply lose it.  Wisdom is the key to everything, especially the most important thing: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding" (Prov 9:10).

And one more thing about wisdom - it can be had for the asking: "If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him" (Js 1:5).  God gives us wisdom, with which we can receive eternal life and riches, even though we do not deserve it.  He offers it freely to all who will seek after it.  Don't settle for less.  Jus' Say'n.