Retracing Old Steps

Sunday morning retuning: Do you remember when Jesus rescued you?  As we closed the service Sunday, did you have someone in mind who needs the same rescue you now enjoy?  Jesus invites us to join His rescue team.  Are you willing to stay one step behind Him?

Sometimes there is great value in retracing old steps…

Our choir is repeating a musical that we did a few years ago. My initial thought on this as I listened to the Lord's leading was frustration. I like to do new things. I want to keep the Easter message fresh for me personally and our musicians. But I think God had a different plan.

As I saw the choir respond favorably to repeating an old work, I was encouraged.  When I heard several of them say it would give us an opportunity to do it even better this time than we had in the last, a few new thoughts occurred to me.  I drew some inspiration from their response.

First of all, you can do it better on your second go around.  Hopefully, if you learned from that first experience, you can improve on it. Second, you can discover things you missed before.  Your eyes can be wide-open because not everything is brand-new.  That familiarity can help you see even better.  Finally, you can wade even deeper into the truth you are learning/communicating.  You're knowing can create a safe scenario for you experience more.

In short, retracing old steps can create an environment that makes hearing Jesus a little easier.  Hearing Jesus enables our creativity and profound ways, even in the simple things.  This place of rest in Hm gives you the opportunity and space to think creatively if you're willing.

Here's another way I learned this recently.  I went to an old place with old things which the Lord used to challenge me to think in a new way.  Last Tuesday, I had the opportunity to visit the Butler Museum of American Art in Youngstown with my third-grader.  We saw a variety of different mediums used to communicate some very beautiful scenes.  

There were portraits and landscapes and seascapes, there was technology and sculpture so much more.  I think the most captivating was the image below done in acrylic.  It was stunning!

In Flanders Field-Where Soldiers Sleep and Poppies Grow, 1890

ROBERT VONNOH 1858-1933

I was so inspired by the creativity of the artists that I had to consider my own contribution to the bigger picture, pun unintended.  Even going back and doing something I had done before still provided great opportunities to be creative.  We will use three different soloists, none of which I have worked with in this capacity before.  I can put our LED lights to use to enhance the message of the musical.  Mike Kelly is directing the orchestra, which allows my energies to be focused in other areas.  I'm so excited!

So I want to ask you a question again this week.  Even if you're retracing old steps, doing some of the same things you've done for awhile or at least sometime before, how can you breathe new life into them or it?

Jesus help us to go wherever You want us to go, whether old or new, knowing all the while we never walk alone.  Give us the faith to follow.  We need it!  In Jesus name.  Amen.

In Christ,

Pastor Timothy

Running Out of Gas

Sunday morning retuning: How important is your relationship to God?  Truth is, it is the most important single thing in our lives, but we do not always act like it.  We must be preoccupied with Jesus.  Then and only then, when He is at the center of not only the heavens, but also our hearts, will we have Him in his rightful place!

Well, it finally happened.  After flirting with disaster over the entire time we have owned our Chrysler van, last Thursday I ran out of gas.  I cannot tell you how many times over those years the man has showed 0 miles to empty in the computer and I just kept chugging along.  My wife had warned me any number of times not to do this, but in my pride I ignored those warnings.  That arrogance, coupled with the urgency of needing to be somewhere and not stopping to get the gas I needed even more, left me stalled going up the hill on East Market Street.

So there I was, stuck in the middle-of-the-road, wondering what I should do.  I turned on my emergency flashers and got out of the van to signal traffic to go around me.   The only problem was at 5 p.m. on East Market you need both lanes and I was blocking one.  Before I could even voice prayer for help or wisdom or deliverance, it was already on the way.

The vehicle that was immediately behind me, the first vehicle to go around me in my empty shame there in the middle of the street, was a friend from church.  He pulled into a parking lot just ahead of where I was stranded, and came to my rescue.   Literally.  

Did I mention, I was really not thinking clearly by this time?

He came directly to me and calmly encouraged me to drift off the street, this subverting sure disaster with the congestion I had created.  He lived nearby and offered to run home quickly and bring me some gas to get me on my way.  Even when a police officer stopped by a couple of minutes later as I awaited my friends return, I was able to reassure him that help was on the way and he quickly and quietly left me alone.

My friend returned with a couple gallons of gas.  A few minutes later I was headed up East Market Street again.  You must understand this was not a random act of kindness.  That my friend could've ignored my need, he did not.  I choose to call that encounter providential, believing fully God had placed him there for my good.

That got me thinking.  How often has this happened and I was not even aware?  How often has God provided a way out from a difficult, even dangerous situation before I was even aware of my need?  As I try to practice the presence of God, not always doing a very good job of it by the way, I pray he will heighten my sensitivity to such provision.

When I feel empty, I need to remember that He desires to fill me up.  He has fueled my soul with the invograting power of His Holy Spirit.  All I nned to do is ask, and I am filled.  But how often I fail to ask, drifitng along on the fumes of my flesh as it were, instead of surging ahead on the limitless energy of the Holy Spirit.

What might be the lesson in this for me, and maybe even you?  As we try to move with Jesus, how often are we out of gas and he sends some help?  It reminds me of the scripture, "The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak." Matthew 26:41b There are certainly times when I do not have the capacity to do what is right [I am empty], and yet I am able to because God provides a way [He fills me up].  May that, more and more often, be not only my story but each of ours, and all for the glory of our God.

Jesus give us eyes to see You all around us.  You are there and we need to see You.  Then give us eyes to see You as we prepare to say goodbye to all this life holds, and hello to what the next does.  Grant us peace, and open eyes.  In Jesus name.  Amen.

In Christ,

Pastor Timothy

Helper

Sunday morning retuning: So I bet it will be a while before anyone who heard Pastor Paul’s message Sunday will call shotgun?  We are called to serve others, in part by preferring them and giving them the places of honor.  We are called to value people over position.  If we claim to live in Christ, we must walk as Jesus walked.  To dig deeper click here.

The last few weeks we have been singing/praying Holy Spirit, a powerful,modern hymn that allows our souls to voice the desire to be filled and under the control or influence of the person of the Holy Spirit.  As is often the case in my walk, God is bringing several different streams together to teach me a larger principle.  I am slow, so I appreciate the force of the convergence of these multiple influences into one lesson.

Last week I challenged you to consider the words of Jesus in John 14:12 where He told us we would do even greater things than He was doing.  I have wrestled with this for some time, but I am beginning to come to terms with it.  I am empowered to do so by the next thing that Jesus taught.

After promising that He will do whatever we ask in His name, He actually says it twice in slightly different ways in 14:13-14, He reminds that if we love Him we will obey His commands.  We are only able to do that, and the greater things He has in store for us because of the next promise He makes in 14:16-17, our Helper [or Advocate or Counselor] the Spirit of Truth, the Holy Spirit.

Now that is some good news!  I mean come on, first Jesus tells us that going to do greater things than he was doing, and if that wasn't enough he lay down the gauntlet of saying if we obey him we will obey his commands.  I have walked with Jesus for several years now, and of all the things I am confident of this is certainly one of them. I cannot follow his commands in my own strength. I just cannot do it.

Living that reality helps me to sing that line from All I Have Is Christ we sang on Sunday with even greater conviction and confidence.  "Now Lord I would be yours alone and live so all might see the strength to follow your commands could never come from me."  That strength comes from the Holy Spirit, and Him alone.  He is a good Helper, for without Him we would have no hope of living in a way that testifies constantly of the grace of our God.

So what does this mean for us today? 

It means that before our feet hit the floor in the morning, we need to remind ourselves how great our need for this Helper truly is, how desperate we are for Him to fill us that we might be useful to our Father.  Then we need to keep asking Him to continue to fill us throughout the rest of our days.  Only then are we able to sing the next line, our prayer.

O Father use this ransomed life in any way You choose, and let my song forever be my only boast is You.

In Christ,

Pastor Timothy