Preacher

A few weeks ago the priest at Mom’s church asked me if I ever preach. Without thinking or hesitating, I said yes. In truth, I’ve only ever preached in cyberspace (AKA, my blog), but this was an amazing opportunity, and I wasn’t going to turn it down.
So yesterday was the day, and what a perfect Sunday for me to preach: Presentation Sunday. The Gospel passage for Presentation Sunday is Luke 2:22-40:

When the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, the parents of Jesus brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the law of the Lord, “Every firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord”), and they offered a sacrifice according to what is stated in the law of the Lord, “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.”
Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon; this man was righteous and devout, looking forward to the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit rested on him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Messiah. Guided by the Spirit, Simeon came into the temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him what was customary under the law, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying, “Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.”
And the child’s father and mother were amazed at what was being said about him. Then Simeon blessed them and said to his mother Mary, “This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed—and a sword will pierce your own soul too.”
There was also a prophet, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was of a great age, having lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped there with fasting and prayer night and day. At that moment she came, and began to praise God and to speak about the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.
When they had finished everything required by the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him.

So here is my sermon for Presentation Sunday:

Living in Breathless Anticipation

I am a missionary, based in Milan, Italy and called for all of Europe. What I do is encourage missionaries because Europe is a very difficult and discouraging mission field. I work with missionaries and pastors of all Christian denominations. When I started ministry in 2010, the problem was how to find missionaries. The answer was simple: go where missionaries hang out—churches. So it became my habit to attend at least two church services each Sunday.
I love going to church. I know that some people come to church, and once a week is about all that they can stand, but I love church. I attend services from the whole range of Christianity: Catholic high masses to chandelier-swinging Pentecostal services, and everything in between. Of course, I have my own preference, which lies somewhere in the middle, but no matter what kind of expression of worship, I love going to church. I love going to church because no matter where I go or what the worship is like, God always shows up. Sometimes it’s my favorite song or my favorite passage from the Bible. Sometimes it’s a nugget in the sermon and every once in a while, it’s a whole sermon that feels like it was a personal message to me from God. So I love going to church because God always shows up for me.
So I can relate to Simeon and Anna. They were at the temple every day. They each had a promise from God that they would see His Messiah, the Christ. So they did what I do: they came to the Temple every day with the breathless anticipation of seeing God’s Messiah. And because of their expectation of meeting God, I believe that God showed up each day for them, like He does for me. So every day for years, for decades, they came to the temple in breathless anticipation, meeting God in the little things until that day finally came when they saw Him in the face to face.
But my story is not over. We are living in the time when Jesus could return. According to Bible prophecy, His return is likely to be in our lifetime. So we should not only come to church, expecting to meet God, but we should wake up each day with breathless anticipation: is today the day? It could be!

So yesterday, on a sunny Super Bowl Sunday, I gave the sermon at both morning services in the sweet little Episcopal Church around the corner from home. It was wonderful, getting the opportunity to preach. My sermon was well-received. God is good!

The Not-So-Funhouse Image

This morning during contemplative prayer, I had an epiphany—and what interesting timing, since this is the time of Epiphany on the Christian calendar. I’ve been harassed by spirits of rejection and fear for many years now. And I realized this morning that the image they have made me believe about myself is a distorted one. Recently that fear/rejection image caused me particular problems in my relationships—all because I didn’t understand that the people involved love me. How could they love me when I was having such trouble loving myself?

In a recent post, He Loves Me, I wrote about basking in God’s Niagara Falls of love, feeling the physical sensation of His love falling, falling, falling on me. Even though the physical sensation passed, His love never stopped falling. But I need to keep reminding myself of His love until it becomes integrated into my thinking. And although I’ve read it many, many times, 1 John 4:18 became a rhema word for me today:

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.

I always remember “perfect love casts out fear,” but I had somehow forgotten all the rest of that verse. Fear and rejection had for so long poisoned my thinking that I had come to have a self-image as distorted as a funhouse mirror.

Today I am taking a hammer to that not-so-funhouse mirror. Today I chose to embrace God’s love and a new (true!) image of myself: loved, accepted, forgiven, and precious. God is good!

Cross-Culture

I used to dream of being the next Billy Graham, filling Heaven with new believers. But evangelism is not my gifting. In fact, my testimony (shared in detail in my latest book, Graceful Flight) is one that most unbelievers simply cannot relate to at all. So I share my faith whenever prompted by the Holy Spirit, but otherwise I stick to the ministry that God has given me: to encourage His people.
A couple of weeks ago, Paul, an acquaintance here at the retirement residence, started sharing his passion for mythical creatures with me. It’s a passion that I not only don’t share, but can’t even relate to. I have to admit that most mythical creatures are hideous, disgusting, and evoke a demonic association. Paul is loud because of severe hearing loss, fiercely competitive, and hyperactive. It would be very easy to dismiss him as an insensitive creep, and I was prepared to do so. But then the Lord showed me that in reality Paul is very sweet.
Paul buys shirts on e-bay with pictures his mythical creatures. Paul loves to find bargains on e-bay. He is constantly finding beautiful, unique costume jewelry for our neighbors at incredibly cheap prices. This has made him very popular among the women here. They tell him what they are looking for and he finds it for them. With prices starting at 99 cents, Paul is obviously not making any money. One day I remembered the Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman, and realized that Paul’s love language is receiving gifts. He does it all as an act of love for the people of our community.
Paul’s girlfriend, Beverly, recently had a death in the family that hit her very hard. He has been very supportive, trying to help her through all this. His kind of support has been both good (going to chapel services with her) and bad (buying and consuming large amounts of wine with her).
Paul and I usually cross paths in the computer room before breakfast. I didn’t know him well, but we had played team trivia together. After realizing about his love language, I started to like Paul, despite the obsession with mythical creatures. Then one day he came into the computer room and told me about hearing from his college roommate. He was really excited and happy about reconnecting with an old friend. But then he proceeded to tell me a dirty story about his friend’s girlfriend. He wasn’t looking at me, so he couldn’t see my expression, and I knew that it was pointless to try and interrupt, so I just tried to ignore what he was saying and continue with my computer work instead.
This morning while I was thinking about the encounter, I realized that when dealing with non-Christians, we are crossing cultures. Just as I had to learn Italian culture and customs, and adapt accordingly, so in dealing with Paul, I’ve had to learn his culture and customs. Paul came by our apartment recently asking if we had a portable CD player that he and Beverly could borrow. Much to my surprise, Mom had one that I hadn’t even known about. We loaned it to him until his is repaired. The next day, Beverly came up to me all smiles and said, “You made a little boy (meaning Paul) very happy!” A few minutes later, Paul came to me and gave me a perfume bottle with dragons all over it. He was so happy, and this was his way of thanking me. Although I think the thing is ugly, I graciously accepted it.
The next time I saw Paul and Beverly was when the church choir from My Misfit Church came and sang for the residents. The choirmaster passed out hymnals, and we sang along with the choir, including Paul and Beverly. One song we sang was When the Saints go Marching In. In a moment of insane inspiration I hopped to my feet and started marching in time with the music. I felt like a complete fool, but at the same time, it was fun. Afterwards several people came up to tell me what fun and an inspiration I was, marching around like an idiot. Beverly was one of them. She had tears in her eyes because they had also sang Amazing Grace, which had been sung at the funeral. But she also couldn’t keep a smile from her lips as she talked about my nutty march.
The thing about dealing cross-culturally with people is that you have to be flexible and willing to step out of your comfort zone. These days, the gap between us and the rest of the world is as wide as the ocean. Cross-cultural ministry can happen in your own town, and even in your own neighborhood. God is good!

Dancing in the Piazza!

We have been rehearsing the last few days to do a flash mob in the Parliament Square.  This was my 3^rd flash mob.  The first was in Milan’s ritzy department store, La Rinascinte, singing Amazing Grace on Christmas Eve to shoppers there.

My 2^nd was a flash mob of values on the steps of the Duomo Cathedral of Milan, in which at a signal we held signs naming various moral values.  Mine said coraggio (courage).  The press had been invited to that one!

This time we were all over the big central piazza and after an introduction we ran to the middle of the piazza and danced to Resurrection (link there—I’m in the back on the right, all in gray).  You can see a guy in green at the front who briefly dances with us.  We had good audience participation.  The wind was something I, personally, had prayed for because without wind, it would have been blistering hot—so thank You, Lord, for the wind to keep us cool!

Afterwards the dance team and others went to the main street, set up there, and danced some more.  It was a moment when I would like to have been able to be in 2 places at once.  But I stayed in the piazza with the evangelization team.  We hadn’t seen them very much at all since Rome, so I wanted to spend some time with them.  But that desire was really just a set up for a divine appointment.  In Rome Guy, the host and head of the evangelization team, had told us about prayer walking in Parliament Square at 3AM.  He had gone up to the door and knocked on it.  The guard who answered had tears in his eyes, and Guy asked if he could pray for him.  The guard had just a month earlier lost his daughter in a car accident and had been in that moment struggling to cope.  Guy prayed for him and shared the Good News of Jesus Christ with the guard.  The guard has remained Guy’s friend.

After the dancers left, Guy went to the same door and knocked.  He asked the guard inside to please tell Paul hello for him.  The guard said, “If you wait 10 minutes, Paul will be here, and you can tell him yourself.”  So we all got to meet Paul, and he invited us into the courtyard of the Parliament Building.  Paul told us that we can’t go inside, though.  Then after a few minutes, he took us into another courtyard that was even prettier.  Again he told us that we couldn’t go inside.  I got a chance there in the second courtyard to talk with Paul.  He is a very nice man, and his affection for Guy was obvious.

Then after telling us twice that we couldn’t go inside, Paul took us inside, where we saw lots of suits of armor and paintings of leaders going back to the 1500’s.  Before exiting, we all prayed for Paul.  He thanked us, wiping tears from his eyes.  It was a sweet and touching visit, and probably prophetic for whenever Operation Capitals of Europe comes to Malta—that we will be gratefully welcomed.

Then Guy treated us all to ice cream, and we said our good-byes (some of them are leaving today, and I’m leaving tomorrow).  God is good!

Gracious Grace!

Day Eighteen

This morning I read yet another rant against grace, and now I just can’t keep silent any longer.

Grace is the power of God to save.  Power.  To save.  People who want to reduce grace only to a salvation event fail to understand the power behind grace.

On the other hand, people who want to use grace as a license to sin fail to understand the true liberty of grace, and also the necessity of repentance (read Romans chapter 6).

Grace has been granted once and for all to cover our every sin past, present, and future.  That should be obvious, since this all happened long before any of us alive today were born (or our parents, our grandparents, our great-grandparents, etc.).

Grace is also the power to walk in the newness of life, once we’ve repented.  Without repentance, we are not allowed access to grace.  Grace is granted only on the condition that we have repented.  Repentance is literally turning around and going the opposite direction.  If my life didn’t produce fruit that shows my repentance (Matthew 3:8), then I also wouldn’t truly have grace.  Therefore, grace is not a license to sin.

Grace gives us power to live this new life through the same thing that brought us to the cross: love—our response to Jesus’ love.  “We love Him because He first loved us,” (1 John 4:19, NKJV).  Love and grace are inseparable.  Grace was granted to us because of Jesus’ love for us.  If He hadn’t died for us, then we couldn’t say that He ever loved us, and grace would be an unknown and unknowable concept.  So since love and grace are inseparable, if we love Him, we also have the power (through grace) to live a life that is pleasing to Him.

The problem is us, not grace.  Our love is imperfect.  We tend to think of love as an emotion.  Love is a decision—a sacrificial decision.  Love made Jesus lay down His life for us (John 15:13).  If we waver and struggle with sin, it’s because we love the world more than we love Jesus.  And in that case, we need to go back to step one: repentance.  If we don’t do repentance right, then our whole Christian walk is worthless—worse than worthless because it casts a negative light on the Gospel.

But to go too far the other way risks falling back into legalism.  Legalism is a rejection of grace.  It says to Jesus, “No thanks, I can do it for myself.”  For more about how I feel about legalism, look at my recent post: Stop Complicating the Simple Things.

Also check out an article that I found in my inbox today from Charisma News: What’s Wrong with Grace?  Grace gets under the legalists’ skin, but it’s also abused by some.

Thank God for grace—it is Amazing!  God is good!

God’s Standard

Grace is amazing!  I’m so thankful for grace that saved me through no effort of my own.  After all, I could never live up to God’s standard without the work of salvation by grace in the death of Jesus on the cross.  All our good works are like filthy rags to God (Isaiah 64:6—some translations actually say “like menstrual rags”).

But even if grace is free, it doesn’t mean that we are excused forever from doing good works.  Good works are not how we get into Heaven, but they do have value.  Here are some of my thoughts about good works and the fruit (results) of those works:

• Good works are something that we were created to do (Ephesians 2:10)
• God’s work of salvation in us will come out as good fruit (Matthew 12:33)
• Our work will bear fruit, either good fruit or bad (Matthew 7:16-19)
• We are expected to bear fruit for the Kingdom of God (Matthew 3:8)
• If we don’t bear fruit, the Father will cut us off (John 15:2)
• We will bear fruit if we stay close to Jesus (John 15:5)
• Our work will be tested (1 Corinthians 3:12-14)
• It’s important to keep doing good works because we will reap a harvest if we do not give up (Galatians 6:9)

We could never save ourselves by good works, so that’s not the point of doing good works.  When we do “good works” in our flesh, we produce filthy rags.  Yes, even those things that seem good are nothing without the Holy Spirit’s guidance.  So you can spend your whole life working alongside Mother Teresa, but if God didn’t call you there, it’s all wasted effort.  And even if you are called there, but don’t spend daily time in prayer, seeking God’s face, it’s wasted effort.

Good works should produce good fruit (results) for the Kingdom—fruit that lasts.  So to produce good fruit, we’ve got to stay close to Jesus through the Holy Spirit.

Now examine yourself.  Think about how you spend your time each day.  How much time do you spend praying and reading God’s Word and then doing good works that He’s called you to do?  Now compare that to how much time you waste in front of the TV, at the computer, or playing with electronic gadgets.  (I’m not perfect, either, just in case you’re wondering.)  The world has lots of ways of seducing us away from our first love (God), so it takes some effort to resist those temptations.  Even things that are not sins, strictly speaking, can be sins if they take us away from those things that we should be doing.

So thanks to Jesus, we’ve gotten a boost that gets us entry into Heaven.  But now it’s up to us to do the good works that will bear lasting fruit for the Kingdom.  And these things we do not just because it’s required of us, but out of a grateful heart.

Once you do surrender your will completely to Him, you’ll find that His yoke really is easy and His burden is light.

God is good.

The Bells

One thing that you hear all over Europe is bells.  Just about every church in every town has bells.  Some ring daily, some ring hourly, but bells are a very familiar sound throughout Europe.  This morning, here in Hungary, I heard a church bell ringing and ringing, and it reminded me to write about the bells in London from my recent visit there.

In London we went to visit John Newton’s church, St. Mary Woolnoth.  In the entryway there was a bell rope in red, white, and blue, the three colors of the British flag.  I had such a strong urge to pull the bell rope that it was literally all I could do to keep from reaching out and giving it a tug.  Those who know me, know that whenever I pass a bell, I’ve got to ring it—a character trait that’s often gotten me scolded.  But, honestly, what are bells for, if not for ringing?

Safely inside, we heard the story of John Newton’s life.  John Newton is the writer of the most famous and beloved hymn in the world:  “Amazing Grace.”  Newton’s life is actually reflected in those lyrics (http://www.constitution.org/col/amazing_grace.htm).  Then we prayed and sang.

Someone in the group shared a prophecy in which it was predicted that the bells will ring all over the country.  That’s when I realized that I had been in London for four days and had not heard one single bell.  What I had heard was a lot of cars honking, and it seemed that honking had replaced bells in London.  Someone else, having also noticed the bell rope, said, “Let’s ring the bells!”  So we went to the entryway and one of the men unhooked the bell rope and began to pull it.  Nothing.  He pulled harder.  Still nothing.  He pulled even harder, getting a rhythm going.  Silence.  Somebody had either removed or silenced the bells.  I was so disappointed and saddened that tears came to my eyes.  A member of the group had noted that bells are rung to call people to worship and also to proclaim freedom.  I had felt disappointed at the lack of worship and saddened by the lack of freedom.

So we left the church, and I was still feeling very sad.  Then suddenly we were surrounded by bicycles, and all the bicycles were ringing their bells—we were surrounded by ringing bells!  It was like God was reassuring us that even efforts to silence the bells will not succeed.  We were all rejoicing like crazy people there in the streets of London.

God is good!