Friday Five...11/16/12

Here's this week's five favorite things for you:

1. Favorite Tweet (via Jon Acuff) - "Know what makes me feel like a bad parent? The Subaru ad where kids wash the inside of a car with hoses & their dad is happy. #NotMyReaction"

2. Favorite Taxidermy Photo...(random, I know)

3. Favorite Baby Fighting Video

4. Favorite Thanksgiving Video that wont make the Thanksgiving Service:

5. Finally, my favorite joke of this week:

 - Jokes about German sausage are the wurst.

Thursday's thing...(I know I'm being redundant)

I'm thinking about making some changes to the blog for 2013 (if the world still exists after December 20th). I would like you thoughts if you haven't already responded:

Wednesday's Word...TEN: Do Nothing (Part 4 of 5)

This is part 4 of 5. Find part 1 here and part 2 here and part 3 here.

So we are 4 weeks into the 10 Commandments and we're only going to hit one more of them today. So far, we have discovered that the 10 Commandments were not given as a condition for a relationship, but they were given as a confirmation of a relationship with God. Did you catch that? Relationship always precedes rules with God. He calls us His first, then gives us the rules. 

Let’s look at Exodus 20:8-9: “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work” (NIV). Okay, let’s back up a little here. The word “Sabbath” is actually a noun that came from a verb meaning rest, or don't work. Now, at this point you may hear that and think that this idea of rest and not working might have been great for Israel thousands of years ago, but that isn't going to fly with your schedule in the 21^st century.

as long ago as this was, their culture was not all that different from ours now. This was a group of people who had come out of slavery where they spent all of their time, I mean literally all of their time, serving Egyptians. This was a group of people who had a very strong work ethic, and they lived in a world where if you didn't work all the time, your family may not eat. People’s lives depended on working hard and working often. So for God to tell them to take an entire 24-hour period off and do no work—in other words, provide nothing for yourself—probably came across not only as unrealistic, but insensitive too. Didn’t God care that they get food in their stomachs? But fortunately for this group of people, they had just had an experience with God that put this commandment in context.

When the Israelites left Egypt, they numbered about one or two million. The whole nation left Egypt, and while they took some food with them, there was only so much they could pack and it would only last for so long. They were literally an entire culture moving through the desert, and it didn’t take long at all before they ran out of food. So they began to complain and take their complaints to Moses, their leader, saying they were going to starve to death. But then one morning something strange happens. They woke up and looked outside their tents, and scattered all over the ground were these little, crusty pieces of something they had never seen before. Well, somebody was just hungry enough to put this crusty piece of something in his mouth and eat it, and when he did he realized it was food! When they needed it the most, God actually provided food for them by having it rain down from heaven. They called this food manna.

So from then on out, every single morning of the week except for one—the Sabbath—the Israelites woke up and found fresh manna on the ground. Essentially God told Moses, “Look, I want you to tell the people that I'm going to provide for them what they need to eat every single day. They need to trust me on this. Tell them not to try to store up food from one day for the next. I only want them to get just enough manna for the day.” It sounded simple enough, but some people didn't believe it. They thought God might cut off the supply, that maybe He wouldn’t be good to His word, so just in case, they got two days' worth of food. But the next morning when they woke up, the manna they saved was rotten and full of worms. They may have thought they were being smart, but what they were doing was choosing not to trust God. 

God created a situation where Israel was forced to be dependent on Him—daily. For 40 years their daily bread was waiting for them every morning outside their tent. And the night before the Sabbath, they gathered twice as much so they would have enough for two days—the one time a week when two days’ worth of provision is allowed. They learned to take the Sabbath off. They learned that God could be trusted when they chose to rest—and when they rested, they acknowledged all God had done to allow them the time to stop. Listen to how extreme God’s instructions were in Exodus 20:10: "On [the Sabbath] you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates" (NIV).

                                                                                                   

Obviously, this mattered to God. He’s saying, “I don't want you to do this halfway. I don’t even want your animals doing work. I don't want anybody doing any work—not even those you expect to work. I want there to be 24 hours where you realize more than any other time My provision for you. I want you to realize that I am looking out for you, I notice your needs and I have you under my care. The Sabbath is to be a day that you commemorate and remember all I have already done to get you where you are.” And Israel taking the time to look back and see what God had already done gave them a confidence to look forward in confidence of what God would do in the future.

The day of rest is a day of remembrance. The day of rest is a period of time when the nation of Israel had to remember as important as progress was, as important as prosperity was, and as important as eating and living indoors was, there was something else that was more important. It was having a constant physical trust in God our Provider. It was taking the time to remember that when they stopped working, when they paused long enough to acknowledge God they just might find that far fewer things depended on them than they realized. In fact, their stillness would instead serve as a reminder that God had things under far greater control than they ever could. And taking the time to be still confirmed that God was bigger—bigger than their need, bigger than their progress, and bigger than their drive.

Ultimately the issue comes down to this—can you trust God? That is the point of the Sabbath. And that is why we are so reluctant to take it—because we are afraid. We truly think that if we stopped, if we rested, everything would fall apart. We trust more in our own ability than we do God’s provision. But the Sabbath is a tangible way to choose trust when everything inside of us may want to fight it. It’s learning to count on God with that very, very practical part of life. It’s learning that it’s not all up to you. That it’s not all in your hands. It’s stopping from the frantic pace of life, and remembering not only how God provided, but about who He is.

So here is my challenge to you—would you be willing to institute the principle of the Sabbath in your life? Would you try for just one month, to make time every week where you force yourself to remember what God has done and is doing in your life—and in the lives of those around you?

                                                                 

You’re going to feel like you’re missing out, or maybe falling behind. You’re going to feel like you need that little bit extra to keep up, or stay ahead. But what if, for one day, you let God consume your time instead of everything and everyone else?

This isn't an excuse to get out of work. No. It’s about getting your work done before the Sabbath hits. It’s about prioritizing your schedule and your time to make room for the Sabbath. It doesn't even have to be the same time period each week. There are no rules about this part of it. God just cares that the rest and the focus happens. Period.

Boldness and Prayer...and what it has to do with becoming rooted.

I had the opportunity to preach this past week. The message could be summed up fairly simply: Boldness today paves the way for God to work. We are called to be bold, to stand up for what's right, but to do it with humility and respect. 

Whenever I teach or preach I try to point to an area in which we should be rooted. When we began the "rooted in God's love" initiative, we laid out 6 expressions of love and gave people bookmarks with spiritual goals using those six expressions (the goals can be found here): Study, Prayer, Stewardship, Discipleship, Community, and Service.

This got me to thinking about boldness and where it fits. I failed to make that connection on Sunday, but I am convinced that it falls into the Prayer expression. Our goal in prayer is to have a constant awareness of God's presence in our lives. We often try to sensationalize God's presence, but in reality is it simply to recognize that God is at work in the world around us and to adjust our eyes to be able to see where He is and to join Him in His work.

I believe that to have boldness that God honors is to recognize that my actions today will alter, even if it's just slightly, the course of my life; but not just my life, potentially the lives of all those around me. 

We have a huge weight of responsibility for what we do and say today. 

Anyway, that's what I've been wrestling with today. Thoughts?

Monday's Mention...11/12/12

Yesterday was Veterans Day. Thank you to the service men and women of the past and those who stand up today, fighting for the freedoms that we love so much and take for granted.

Yesterday, we showed this video as part of our service. I wanted to share it again with you today:

Friday Five...11/9/12

Here's this week's list:

1. Favorite Photo (and here's how it was taken): 

Cover of New York Magazine after Hurricane Sandy

2. Favorite Joke (that is completely appropriate, but I could never use as a sermon illustration):

-- A dyslexic man walks into a bra... --

3. Favorite Thoughts on Halloween Candy from Tim Hawkins

4. Favorite "Oh! I Get It!" Bumper Sticker: From Stuff Christians Like

5. Finally, my Favorite "Christmas just got better!" Picture

Guess who's going to be at the Disney Christmas Day parade?

Have a great weekend!

Wednesday's Word...TEN: That's Not My Name (Part 3 of 5)

This is part 3 of 5. Find part 1 here and part 2 here.

So, we're three weeks into talking about the 10 Commandments, the rules that God gave Moses and the Hebrew slaves after inviting them into relationship with Him, rescuing them from slavery in Egypt, and doing some pretty amazing miracles along the way.

Today I want to focus in on the 3rd Commandment. If I had to guess, I would bet a lot of you are familiar with this one. But the reason I want to talk about it is because it is so incredibly misunderstood.

If you've been around church for a while, you were probably taught this one. I know I was, and this commandment had a very specific application that went along with it. Unfortunately, it may have been the wrong application. But I can remember this commandment being drilled in my head: “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God" (Exodus 20:7 NIV).

I was taught, and maybe you were too, that according to this commandment, when you lose your temper, when you get upset, angry or stub your toe, you’re not supposed to yell out God's name or His Son's name. Oh, and while you’re at it, you aren't supposed to ask God if He would curse or damn something with His name attached either. Are you with me?

Now I want to stop and think about this for a minute because if we really spend some time on this, we will realize how silly this application sounds next to the other commandments we have already covered. I mean, God has given the big Ten here, the top 10 things He wants to make sure Israel gets right. And He gets to number three and says, “Thou shall not call out My name when you lose your temper”? Could that really be what that means? Before He tells us not to murder or steal, God says, “Hey, don’t yell out My name!”? But what if it doesn't mean that? Now, I’ll be honest, I still think it's a bad thing to yell out God's name or to yell out Jesus' name when you lose your temper. But my feelings on that have nothing to do with this commandment. I think it’s just disrespectful. 

“You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses His name.” (Exodus 20:7, NIV)

Reading that, don’t you think there could be more to this commandment than saying God’s name in a fit of rage? The NIV has the word “misuse”; in other words, don’t abuse, mishandle or, and this one is really important, exploit the name of God. More comes to mind than just cursing when I hear this. This means we are not to associate God’s name with something God is not associated with. Let’s take it one step farther. It also means don't leverage the name of God in order to accomplish something God has nothing to do with. That is abusing His name. That is mishandling His name. That is exploiting His name. Don't use God to accomplish your means; don't use the name of God to get your way. That is misusing the name of God. 

He wants us to be careful about what we say about Him and what we attribute to Him. What we say and what we attribute reflect on His character, so we better be sure we reflect His character accurately. 

Want to know something interesting? The maddest Jesus ever gets in the New Testament is when He walks into the temple and finds men in the outer courts changing money and selling sacrificial animals to poor people for a huge profit. The animals being sold aren't even the animals God said could be sacrificed. He clearly stated in the Old Testament which animals would be a suitable sacrifice and how the sacrifices should be prepared.

                                              

Basically, these religious leaders allowed other people to come into the temple and abuse the system to enrich themselves. So when Jesus walks into the temple, He is furious. He saw the religious leaders leveraging the name of God and leveraging the Law. In other words, they were exploiting it. Luke 19 describes it this way: Then he entered the temple area and began driving out those who were selling (v. 45 NIV). Then Jesus says to the religious leaders, “It is written . . . 'My house will be a house of prayer'; but you have made it a 'den of robbers'” (Luke 19:46 NIV).

In other words, Jesus is saying, “You have managed to break the eighth commandment, which says, “Thou shall not steal”; you've bypassed My Father's desire to have this temple be a holy place; you've violated the clear teachings of My Father by coming up with a system that allows you to steal from the people. And you are doing it all in My name!” See, when people showed up at the temple they assumed it was all legitimate business. They trusted what the religious leaders were asking of them. But the religious leaders were exploiting the name, intent and character of God, and Jesus was furious.

If you stay in the habit or if you get in the habit of dodging the Law of God in the name of God, ultimately you will miss God.

So here's my question—in your own little world, in your own little way, do you try to leverage God against Himself? In your own little way, in your own little world, are there things you know God doesn't want you to do, places He doesn't want you to go? But you justify it, twist it, to make it okay? You may not be thinking about it at the time, but you’re violating the third commandment. And I don’t know what all of the ramifications for this look like, but I do know as long as you are dodging the will of God in the name of God, as long as you are dodging the morality of God, as long as you're dodging the Law of God, as long as you are dodging the commands of God, you won't know Him.

If you don’t put a stop to the cycle, you’ll go on hearing people talk about this personal relationship with God and you’ll always wonder, “Why can't I experience that?” The only way to do that is to be honest and say, “God, I want to do that sin, but I'm not going to pretend like it's okay with you anymore. God, I want to be in that relationship, and I'm going to be honest and say You probably don't want me to be in that relationship. I'm just telling you I'm not going to pretend like somehow You want me to be happy regardless of the cost. I’m not going to play that game anymore.”

And if you make that decision, I have a feeling that the God who loves you will penetrate your stubborn heart and get control of your life. 

Monday's Mention...11/5/12

Worth a mention:

- We've had over 60 people involved in our Married People classes! It's been a great opportunity to better understand our spouses and strengthen our marriages. Look for more opportunities to come!

- Shaun and Paige Hord have poured themselves into these two groups. They are a great example of a couple who are using their gifts to serve Christ!

I am excited about some things coming up in the next couple months as we approach the holiday season...be on the lookout for ways that you can grow on your journey to become "rooted in God's love."

See you Wednesday. Don't forget to take a brief survey about the blog here. 

Friday Five...11/2/12

This week is dominated by videos. Enjoy!

1. Favorite Thing I Learned - I'm tying my show wrong:

2. Favorite Advertisement - Coke Zero and Skyfall

3. Favorite Thanksgiving Themed Video: Stuff People Say:

(And this one: don't watch it if you can't laugh at yourself a little, and it's not really a Thanksgiving video, but it's a "Christian" response to the "Things People Say" YouTube meme)

4. Favorite "non-video" of the week: "Different Paths" - excellent article on drawing out your child's strengths.

5. Favorite Johnny and Chachi Video...this week. "The Don't Song:"

Have a great weekend!

Thursday's Third Degree...(trying to keep the alliteration going!?!?)

I've been blogging again for about a month and a half. Would you do me a favor? I'd like your feedback. I have created the simple form below. If you could take a minute and give me your thoughts and press the submit button when you are finished, I would greatly appreciate it. It's completely anonymous, so I won't hunt you don't if you hate it. :-)

If, for some reason, the form is not appearing below, you can click this link.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dHRBQXp2Y2Q0TEFiT0QyakhrWkVwY3c6MQ