Monday Morning Music Ministry

7-28-14

“When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, darkly….” (I Cor. 13: 11, NKJV) Although I came to belief in Christianity as inextricably related to Holy-Spirit Christianity as an adult, I can still put myself in this scenario.

But it has become evident to me that portions of the church have corrupted Biblical doctrines, or exaggerated them, even violated them. Can I put it this way? – some preachers, today, have actually made that glass darker, not clearer, for believers.

I have to come to see that God’s power is mightier than the misinterpreted promises shared by some preachers. His miracles are more profound than those recounted by television preachers. His mysteries are more intense AS mysteries, than theologies that explain God as a spiritual butler on hand when we have desires.

I am talking about healing, and abundance, as in the “prosperity gospel” we hear preached.

“By His stripes we are healed.” Some people preach that Christ’s suffering and death, by this verse, means that healing is ours, and we only have to claim it. That physical ailments, when not healed, indicate that our faith must be weak. Yet I have noticed that the most prominent “claim it” preachers wear glasses. Is this their choice – a fashion statement?

My wife had diabetes, heart attacks, strokes, celiac disease, amputated toes, a heart transplant, a kidney transplant, dialysis, and other health problems. Yet her faith was secure, and she was a mighty witness. She was miraculously healed of a cancerous thyroid, yet underwent a heart transplant despite prayers to be spared. She believed she received emotional and spiritual healing, and accepted God’s sovereignty. By Jesus’ stripes, not an evangelist’s, she was healed.

I believe that verse means that when we are healed, it is BECAUSE of Jesus’s “stripes,” that He ordains healing, guides the hands of doctors and nurses… and deserves the glory when healing does come. Spiritual priorities.

Likewise the verse “I can do all things through Christ, which strengthens me” (Phil. 4:13). That’s King James; other translations say “… Christ who strengthens me.” Words are important. “Claim it” preachers will say that God clearly gives us the power that Jesus had… to move mountains , for instance. Yet we do not see mountains moving. “Yes, but ALL things…”

First, we can sense metaphors more than hyperbole in this verse. Spiritual roadblocks, or spiritual mountains, we all have them. But my new understanding of that verse hinges on the emphasis of certain words. Can we not think that we possibly are being taught – return to the King James translation – that whatever we do, we should determine to do in, and through, Christ (to stay in God’s will); and that fact will strengthen us?

Yes, to answer my own question. I can touch on the prosperity gospel, and I remember how one preacher actually printed a chart – how much you would donate to his ministry, and (by the “hundredfold return” of Mark 10:31) how much money you could expect to receive, probably by miraculous surprises, in return. That, and “have life, and that more abundantly,” was answered by my wife with the realization that God can bless us in uncountable ways. If we define Him by cash we are sorry examples of Christ-followers.

Yes, God is a miracle-working God. Yes, we need miracles in our lives, often. But I would suggest that, even in our brokenness and desperation, we chase after miracles, and healing, and prosperity – even just subsistence – when we should be more passionate about chasing after and pleasing God, doing His will, and being obedient.

By the way, concerning miracles: I have seen some that people classify by that term, for instance a withered leg being made whole at a service. But, personally, the greatest miracle I have witnessed is the experience of my sinful life being forgiven, my heart turned from rebellion. I know what a miracle that was.

We will understand it all better farther on, but in the meantime the Holy Spirit can lead us, better than evangelists, in the ways of God: that is why He was sent, and why He dwells in our hearts.

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An ancient American hymn, a frontier hymn whose writer and composer are lost to history, is “It Is Better Farther On,” also known by its incipit, “As We Travel Through the Desert,” first appearing in a hymnal in 1877. (Not to be confused with the standard, “Farther Along.”) It speaks of the proper priorities of life’s journey, meeting our challenges, and trusting the Savior’s leading, as well as our destiny. “Oh my brother, are you weary Of the roughness of the way? Does your strength begin to fail you, And your vigor to decay? Jesus, Jesus will go with you, He will lead you to the throne, He who dyed His garments for you, And the winepress trod alone.” Here it is sung by the Zahasky Family, the Alaska String Band.

Click: Farther On

7-21-14

Christians ought to concede one of the arguments of scoffers. The Bible CAN BE, and sometimes IS, ambiguous. Not on matters of essential doctrine, of course. There enough unambiguous words from Jesus and the Apostles, for instance, about the way to Heaven, the path to Eternal Life: Believing in Jesus as the Son of God, and accepting His atoning sacrifice for our sins. Repentance will follow; as will confessing Him in your life.

The “ambiguous” parts come with issues that have railed or raged through the centuries, in discussions between friends, to the basis of wars between nations. Lack of biblical clarity has caused numerous councils to meet in deep debates, and has led to divisions, schisms, and uncountable splits and new denominations. And wars.

End times – when will the End of the Age come? And will the tribulation be at the beginning, middle, or end of the millennium? Is the Book of Revelation given to John literal or allegorical? Are the letters to seven churches contemporaneous or prophetical? Do they address periods of the future church’s dispensational practices? Did Jesus mean that His sharing of bread and wine was to foreordain consubstantiation or transubstantiation? Is the Body of Christ the New Israel? Can believers lose their salvation? Are the gifts of the Holy Spirit for today, or did they expire in the first century? Infant or “believer baptism”?

I believe these ambiguities of the Bible – the “confusing” parts about which, counter-intuitively, much dogmatism reigns – were purposely put there by God. Many men wrote the scriptures, inspired (literally , “breathed-in”) in every case; that is, not of their own thoughts, as coffers say, but God’s. Therefore, don’t you think that if some things might be interpreted this way or that, it is because God wants to keep His children on their toes, spiritually?

None of those “stumpers” affect our salvation, you’ll note. No, they are “side issues” to our belief in God, our acceptance of Jesus, and (or should be separate from) our service to fellow humans. For instance, “No one shall know the time or the hour” of the Second Coming. Nevertheless, Christians argue. Nevertheless, the question has nothing to do with our salvation. But the ambiguity leads to… keeping us on our spiritual toes.

One of the ambiguities has to do with prayer. The other side of ambiguity’s coin, so to speak, is “mystery.” God cannot contradict Himself, so when we are told things that seem inconsistent, we may be sure that our puny minds are at times insufficient, not that we have not caught God in an “Aha!” moment.

We have “Aha!” moments when we listen to God. We cannot catch God in an “Aha!” moment.

In my baby-Christian days I made myself a victim of what I misunderstood about God’s will, and I still fall prey, as do many believers. When conscious of my sins, or a specific transgression, I would pray. And pray. And seek God. And fall on my face before Him. Don’t we all do this, sometimes?

Yet we know that God answers prayer. “He rewards those who diligently seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6), among many similar verses throughout scripture. Yet what does “diligently” mean, precisely? Among multitudes of examples are stories of mothers who prayed daily for years for the salvation of their children. Surely this cannot contradict scripture; we are taught in Matthew 21:22, “You can pray for anything, and if you have faith, you will receive it (NLT).” Is it against God’s will to pray, and pray, and pray, for something? Does it mean we don’t trust Him to hear?

Sweet mysteries. We stay on our spiritual toes. We pray, we believe, and we seek Him.

However – back to when I was a baby-Christian – one trap into which believers should NEVER fall is this: once we have accepted Jesus, and He lives in our hearts, we must never pray prayers that approach God as “me, a lowly sinner.” Ashamed to lift our faces. How many Christians ruin their “walk” – cripple their faith – pollute their relationship with God – by adopting this attitude? MANY OF US!

Remember God throwing our sins into the Sea of Forgetfulness? This is similar. As God promises, and we cannot do, He both knows and forgets. But don’t you forget this: if Jesus is in your heart… then, when God sees you, He sees His Son. When He looks upon you, He doesn’t see the person who still fights sin and temptation. He sees that you are covered in the Blood Of the Lamb. Stand up, and claim that right standing with God.

The “defeated one,” Satan, also sees the Jesus in your heart, and cannot attack you unless you give him quarter.

Christians are too modest, or least about the wrong things, too often. Jesus lives in you! No matter what your transgressions or burdens, or how you are attacked… how can you keep from singing?

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How can we keep from singing? This is the title of a classic American hymn, its author somewhat obscure, but music by Robert Lowry, and it first appeared in printed hymnals around 1868. Here, performed in a style undoubtedly different than then, is the late Eva Cassidy.

Click: How Can I Keep from Singing?

7-14-14

“Both life and death are part of the same Great Adventure,” Theodore Roosevelt said, through tears but with pride, after he received word that his son Quentin had been shot down and killed in a World War I dogfight. This is no less true, and what I believed TR meant, not just in our lives but in all particulars of the Christian walk.

Jesus Christ was God who chose to live among us; He died to take the punishment for our sins upon Himself, that we might live. We must die to self. We can be Born Again. The cycle of life and death, life and death – with, for God’s children in Christ, eternal life as the final state.

One of the super-logical confirmations of Jesus’s existence, who He was, and what He did – against those say the Gospel accounts are legends, or are ready to believe in “Passover Plots” – is the fact that all but one of the Disciples were murdered for their faith. Believers were scattered after the Resurrection. Rome harassed Christians. Jewish leaders stoned them. The Disciples could have kept quiet, or been secretive. If they had a sliver of a suspicion that Jesus was a fraud, or that their faith was in vain… would they have endured prison, rejection, exile, torture, humiliation, poverty, stoning, and cruel martyrdom?

No. They chose death. Yes, in order to live eternally, but also because they witnessed to the truth.

“Here I stand,” said Martin Luther, threatened with excommunication and death if he did not recant his faith; “I can do no other.”

Early believers in Rome were persecuted by Nero. Murdered Christians were immolated, impaled on stakes, and set afire, lighting streets where citizens, including Christ-followers having to face choices, walked. Christians persisted. And died. Followed by others who persisted.

Stephen, an early follower in Jerusalem, refused to renounce his faith, and was stoned to death; his last words were asking God to forgive his tormenters. The future evangelist, Paul, was in that crowd. Death ironically (to us) led to life.

The story of the church’s first three centuries is the story of uncountable martyrs. The slaughter of Christians in pagan Gaul made Rome’s horrors seem tame, according to the histories of Eusebius.

The cruel sanctions, torture, and murders of reformers in Europe – so many, that their names are now dim to Christians, from Jan Hus in Prague onward for centuries – are mighty testimonies to those who were willing to die for Christ.

The Twentieth Century, withal, contained more martyrdom than the combined deaths in all previous centuries combined. Specifically: those who were persecuted AS CHRISTIANS, for BEING CHRISTIANS, for refusing to refute THEIR FAITH, who paid the price for CONFESSING CHRIST. For choosing – even when given an “out” – to die for Christ.

We remember the stories of students, in the 1999 Columbine massacre, being asked if they believed in God, answering yes or continuing to pray, before being killed.

If you have eyes to read, you know that it is now daily news, not a random story once a decade from some unknown place, not even merely once a month any more, but daily news of Christians around the world being persecuted or killed for their faith. Shahbaz Bhatti, the Pakistani Minister for Minority Affairs. Asia Bibi, in a Pakistani jail for refusing to convert to Islam. Wenxi Li, owner of a Christian book store in China. Meriam Yahia Ibrahim, a Sudanese woman sentenced to death for apostasy, for confessing Christ. Youcef Nadarkhani, a Christian pastor jailed in Iran for refusing to convert to Islam.

China. India. Pakistan. Burma. North Korea. Iraq today, where Christians, once relatively comfortable even under Saddam, have been slaughtered or exiled; and are now as a church practically an extinct species in the “country the U.S. saved.” Syria, where there had been co-existence with the Allawites, a similar situation – some of the oldest Christian communities, being slaughtered by the ISIL Sunni hordes. Egypt, where, similarly, churches founded a generation after Jesus are, today, being razed and their believers killed. Nigeria, where hundreds of girls have been kidnapped, for being vulnerable girls, but also as hated Christians. Somalia. Afghanistan. Indonesia. Columbia.

Christians are suffering horribly. Christians are dying. People are willing to die for Christ.

And then we might think about attacks on the church, restrictions on believers, prejudice against Christianity, in… the “West.” In Western Europe. In Canada. In the U.S. In our states. In our courts. In our schools. In our theaters and TV shows; in our “entertainment” and in magazines. In politics. In our towns. In our homes. Horribly, sometimes in our denominations and “churches.”

Yes, it must be a glorious burden but a hard, hard thing to die for Jesus.

But is the church in the West, as we react or don’t react, telling the world that it is, somehow, a harder thing to LIVE for Jesus? Think on this. God forbid.

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Click: I Have Decided to Follow Jesus

7-7-14

How many of us serve two gods? Even believers, not excepting born-again Christians, are not immune from the biblical injunction against serving God and Mammon. But this will not be a message about greed, avarice, and covetousness. In Western cultures we are more gaudily materialistic than in poorer societies – but the sin of serving false gods is not a matter of uncommon opportunities before us, but our common and rather dark, unfaithful hearts, the sin nature we all share and must resist.

Today, though, I invite us to think about two Gods that devout Christians unfortunately serve. That is to say, two natures – in our perception – of the same God. Not the “vengeful” Old Testament God vs the “loving” New Testament God. Not the manifestations of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But the God we know imperfectly, despite His desire that we know Him; despite His plans for us to know Him better. Worst: the God we divide in two – approaching Him one way, in one attitude of prayer; and another God of another nature (in our minds), approaching Him in contrary fashion.

Just in case this starts sounding preachy: none of us are immune to this tendency, least of all, among humanity’s members, me. So you are eavesdropping on my confession.

We all turn to the Lord in bad times, hard times, difficult times, confusing times. Disaster, sickness, crisis – it makes no difference. And we quickly note that there is nothing wrong with this! Scripture fairly drips with the overarching message that God wants to hear from His children. If you are a parent, don’t you want to hear from your children – even more so if they are undergoing trial or, simply, that they NEED you? Even if we approach God in humiliation and shame, remember that “a broken and a contrite heart God will not despise” (Psalm 51:17).

Possibly less often do we approach God when things are going swell. Human nature again. “Praise God” and “Thank you, Jesus,” after we wash out the auto-phrases, likely are lifted heavenward less often than they should be by most of us. And probably less often that those other requests and spiritual shopping lists.

I suggest that the problem – perhaps I should say the solution – is not so much that we lack constancy. I think the matter at hand is that we tend to divide God. Not literally, because He is unified, the One True God; but if we treat Him far differently at different times, we are, in the process, denying His divinity in our own lives. Insulting Him. Cheating ourselves.

The point is, despite what we know in our heads, our hearts – the exercises of our faith – too often see separate Gods whom we access. Bad.

We should pray confidently and in full faith, that is, in the same manner, whether things are “bad” or “good.” Take note of the quotation marks, because our definitions might not be God’s! Give everything to the Lord! When things are “bad,” offer the sacrifices of praise. When things are “good,” still petition Him for mercy and forgiveness.

A great poetic version of this truth is found in the lyrics of the gospel song “God Of the Mountain” written by Tracy Darrt.

“Life is easy when you’re up on the mountain, And you’ve got peace of mind like you’ve never known. But then things change and you’re down in the valley. Don’t lose faith, for you’re never alone.

“You talk of faith when you’re up on the mountain. But the talk comes easy when life’s at its best. But it’s down in the valley of trials and temptation – That’s when faith is really put to the test.

“For the God on the mountain is still God in the valley.
When things go wrong, He’ll make it right.
And the God of the good times is still God in the bad times.
The God of the day is still God in the night.”

The operative words remind us that the God ON the mountain is still God IN the valley. He cares for us the same way; we should approach Him the same way, no matter the circumstances. The God OF the good times is still God IN the bad times.

The God OF the day is still God IN the night.

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A powerful performance of this gospel is a click away. It is associated with many people (Tracy Darrt’s own family band; the McKameys; others) but no one more than Lynda Randle. She is the great contralto gospel singer, the sister of Michael Tait of the DCTalk and the Newsboys. This is a video recorded at a church concert of the Isaacs, the (mostly) Bluegrass group comprised of mother Lilly, daughters Sonya and Becky, and son Ben. You want impromptu? In this concert, they spotted Lynda in their audience, invited her onstage, prodded her to sing; they discussed keys and ranges; they backed her up on a song not in their repertoire – and we have a memorable moment of spiritual music, delivered from the heart to our hearts.

Click: God On the Mountain