Archive June 2008
House of Prayer
Sunday morning this was my text. I spoke about “reasonable prayer.”
And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves, And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves. And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple; and he healed them. And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying in the temple, and saying, Hosanna to the Son of David; they were sore displeased, And said unto him, Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise? Matthew 21:12-16
I really want our church to be a house of prayer. For the past couple of years I have been at out combined prayer ministry at the Midtown church every Tuesday evening I am in town. But, for some time now, Pastor Sam and I have prayed about starting a prayer ministry at KCBT on the main campus. I wanted very much to help establish the family connection with the Midtown church, and that is why I have been personally involved. I have loved every minute. Pastor Sam has done an incredible job of communicating the vision of one church, two campuses.
A few months ago a small group of our students began meeting on Tuesday nights at The Point (our student facility). After some prayer and discussion, we came to the conclusion that is is time to launch the prayer ministry on the big campus, knowing this would demand my presence. Sunday I made the announcement that our students would lead us in this effort.
Tonight was the first time all of us joined in. I am very thankful for what happened tonight. I had expected only a handful of adults to join with the 15-20 students who have already been meeting. Over 60 of us showed up. Wow! What a blessed time! What encouraged me most was to see older adults praying together with students. What a fabulous sight! We saw prayer answered on the spot tonight. There was so much happening and so many answered prayers I wouldn’t know where bo begin to tell you about it. Suffice it to say that I am very encouraged by this first effort. I am asking God to make our church a house of prayer.
Join us in the Upper Room at The Point every Tuesday evening at 7:00pm. We’ll be getting together with the Midtown church a few times a year for a combined time of prayer. I’ll let you know when and where.
What’s a Nüvi and Why Would I Want One?
A little metallic box about the size of a deck of cards sits beside my laptop connected to it by a USB umbilical cord. Streams of electronic data flow freely through the cord loading detailed maps of the entire North American continent into the little box. I am loading the latest version of maps into my nifty Garmin Nüvi 350, a very fine Global Positioning System (GPS). I’ve had it for a year now and suppose I could live without it, but I don’t want to.
Gadgets are a guy thing, or so they say. I like gadgets as much as the next guy, but I viewed this as purely a luxury item that I really didn’t need. Driving rental cars on the east coast began to tempt me to buy a GPS. In our part of the country spaces are usually wide open and you can see for a long way off. East coast driving is often through tight spaces, rolling hills, forests, tall buildings, and other obstacles that impede vision. I have a decent sense of direction, but I was getting frustrated sometimes by overshooting turns or exits and having to get turned around. Finally, last year I bought a GPS as a birthday present to myself.
It was love at first sight. It talks to me — in several voices and accents. I decide. It warns me of turns coming up, tells me which way to turn and lets me know very accurately how long it will take me to get where I am going. It tells me the direction in which I am headed. All this and more.
Garmin and Tom Tom are the industry leaders. Garmin is located right here in Olathe and is a great success story. I like to buy local, and I have not been disappointed in Garmin. They have a dizzying array of devices, but you can get one like mine for under $200 if you check around for a deal. Here are my top three reasons you might want to drop that kind of cash for a gadget.
- Reduce your own road rage. When looking for an unfamiliar address I love to just enter the address and let the box talk me in. Very neat.
- Save money. Yes, that’s right. With the price of gasoline today, who wants to drive around endlessly looking for an address? I’ve done it and you probably have to. You can’t ask for directions, you know. That’s also a guy thing. But in guy world, a cool gadget cancels out the shame of asking for directions when you are lost. Really. So, with your GPS you don’t have to wander and waste. Just for fun I have often entered familiar destinations in my own city and discovered some great shortcuts and more direct routes. More savings! If this continues I can convince myself I am paying for the cost of my gadget!
- Find stuff. Let’s say you are traveling in a strange city, or even your own. You suddenly want, say, a Wal-Mart. I don’t know why you would, but let’s just say that. I can ask my friendly little box to show me all the Wal-Marts in the area and I then pick out the closest or the one in the right direction and it then guides me to the door. More than once I have dropped Cheryl off somewhere and asked my box to lead me to the nearest coffee shop. Life doesn’t get much better than this. Looking for a certain type of food or restaurant? Not a problem. It has them listed.
Maybe you have some benefits you’d like to add to the list. How about it?
When Heaven and Earth Converge
What a weather year we have been having! Even as I am writing these words a strong line of storms is approaching from the west. It is passing through Lawrence now and should be arriving here in Kansas City between 10:00pm and midnight. Tuesday night produced some spectacular storms.
Cheryl and I had taken our Argentine guests, Edgar and Sonia Surenian, to prayer ministry in Midtown. The storms were hitting just as we arrived in a pouring, driving rain. During the entire meeting the storm pelted the building with rain and hail. Afterward, we were headed toward downtown when Cheryl mentioned a large glow in the sky. I looked and saw brilliant yellow flames reaching up from the horizon just to the west of downtown.
We later learned that lightning had struck a fuel storage tank and produced this fire. The next day I found this amazing picture. It reminds me of what I am going to be speaking on Sunday – our reasonable prayer. This is a graphic illustration of the powerful convergence of heaven and earth, and what I desire as we ask God to make our church a house of prayer — not the destruction, of course, but the power.
La Tarea Sigue Siendo la Misma (English? Scroll Down)
Esta mañana estaba yo leyendo en Deuteronomio y me encontré con este pasaje tan famoso y conocido. Los dos primeros versículos se llaman shema, la profesión definitiva de la identidad hebrea hasta el día de hoy.
Oye, Israel: Jehová nuestro Dios, Jehová uno es. Y amarás a Jehová tu Dios de todo tu corazón, y de toda tu alma, y con todas tus fuerzas. Y estas palabras que yo te mando hoy, estarán sobre tu corazón; y las repetirás a tus hijos, y hablarás de ellas estando en tu casa, y andando por el camino, y al acostarte, y cuando te levantes. Y las atarás como una señal en tu mano, y estarán como frontales entre tus ojos; y las escribirás en los postes de tu casa, y en tus puertas. Deuteronomio 6:4-9
Recientemente he estado leyendo en los salmos acerca de la importancia de pasar la fe y la tradición de una generación a otra. Este pasaje proporciona algunas técnicas de cómo hacerlo. Lo que también vi en este pasaje es la similitud a lo que es hacer discípulos. Esto no ha de sorprender, porque el criar niños es muy parecido a lo que es hacer discípulos.
En la sociedad hebrea bajo la ley, no es solamente la fe, sino la tradición, la vocación y toda la vida que son trasferidas de una generación a otra. Desde temprano los niños trabajan con los padres en la vocación familiar. En esa cultura las familias tienen la ventaja de pasar mucho tiempo junto, adultos con niños, trabajando hombro a hombro. Esta cultura provee mucha oportunidad cada día para enseñar, repetir, hablar, analizar y vivir las palabras de Dios. Además, Moisés sigue diciendo (Deuteronomio 6:10-19) que los padres han de vivir vidas que sean modelos de obediencia. Entonces, al final del capítulo (Deuteronomio 6:20-25) se les advierte a los padres que tienen que estar listos para contestar las preguntas de la generación emergente.
Con los horarios que llevamos en la vida contemporánea y las muchas actividades de los niños y los estudiantes, no es tan fácil encontrar tiempo para la familia. Claro que la cultura de hoy es otra, y ni Dios mismo espera que volvamos a como fue en la antigüedad. El mundo siempre está pasando por cambios y transiciones. Esto quiere decir que tenemos que ser creativos, flexibles y dedicados a buscar y crear esos momentos oportunos para pasar buen tiempo con los chicos.
Aunque el mundo ha cambiado muchísimo desde entonces, los otros principios que vemos en Deuteronomio 6 no cambian. Más que nunca hemos de vivir vidas ejemplares. Los jóvenes detectan la hipocresía con facilidad y la detestan. Tenemos que estar listos para responder a sus preguntas. Adoctrinar no da resultado con esta generación presente, y nunca ha sido el modelo bíblico. Hay una diferencia enorme entre lo que es adoctrinar y lo que es enseñarles a pensar de una forma bíblica. A veces estar preparado para responder a sus preguntas es simplemente decir, “Yo tampoco sé.”
Sacando aplicaciones para hacer discípulos, podemos concluir que el hacer discípulos es un proceso de toda la vida. Tiene que ver con mucho más que el conocimiento bíblico. Tiene que ver con toda la vida. No podemos hacer discípulos si enseñamos una cosa y vivimos otra. También tenemos que responder a las preguntas con honestidad y humildad.
Jesús usaba el mismo sistema con sus discípulos. Aprovechaba de todo y cada oportunidad para discipular a los suyos, empleando ejemplo, ilustración, parábola, similitud, predicación, discurso, o enseñanza. Hay partes del discipulado que se pueden estructurar y mucho que no se puede. Lo fácil es armar un currículum, escribir un libro o enseñar sobre los fundamentos de la fe en algún sistema de discipulado. Más difícil es aquella parte del discipulado que tiene que ver con el carácter, la vida y esas cosas intangibles de la fe. Esa parte es la que tenemos que enseñar por ejemplo y no palabra. Me es fascinante observar que no importa si se trata de criar niños en Israel de la Biblia, en la sociedad contemporánea o si es el hacer discípulos en la iglesia local, la tarea sigue siendo la misma.
The Task is Still the Same
This morning I was reading in Deuteronomy and came to this very famous and well-known passage. The first couple of verses are called the shema, the definitive profession of Jewish identity to this day.
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes. And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates. Deuteronomy 6:4-9
I have been reading recently in the Psalms about the need for one generation to pass down the faith to the next generation. This passage offers some good technique on how to do just that. What I also see in this passage is the similarity with what it means to make disciples. This should not be surprising, because raising kids is very similar to making disciples.
In Hebrew society under the Law, not just faith, but tradition, vocation and all of life is passed down from generation to generation. From very early age children work with their parents in the family vocation. This culture allows families the advantage of spending much time together, adults with children, working shoulder to shoulder. This culture provides much opportunity each day to teach, repeat, speak, analyze and live the words of God. Furthermore, Moses continues (Deuteronomy 6:10-19) saying that parents should live lives that are examples of obedience. Then, at the end of the chapter (Deuteronomy 6:20-25) parents are advised to be ready to answer the questions of the emerging generation.
With the schedules we keep in contemporary life and the many activities of both children and students, it’s not easy to find time for the family. Clearly today’s culture is totally different from that of biblical times and not even God Himself expects us to return to the way things were in antiquity. The world is constantly changing and going through transition. This means that we must be creative, flexible and dedicated to seek and create those opportune moments to spend good time with the kids.
Even though the world has changed a great deal since then, the other principles that we see in Deuteronomy 6 don’t change. More than ever we must live exemplary lives. Students detect hypocrisy easily, and they detest it. We must be ready to respond to their questions. To simply indoctrinate doesn’t work with this generation, and that has never been the biblical model. There is a great difference between indoctrination and teaching them to think in a biblical manner. Sometimes, to be prepared to respond to their questions is simply to say, “I don’t know either.”
Making application to making disciples, we can conclude that making disciples is a lifelong process. It has to do with much more than Bible knowledge. It has to do with all of life. We can’t make disciples if we teach one thing and live another. We also much respond to questions with humility and honesty.
Jesus used the same system with his disciples. He took advantage of everything and every opportunity to disciple his followers, using example, illustration, parable, similitude, preaching, discourse or teaching. There are parts of discipleship that can be structured and much that cannot. It’s easy to put together a curriculum, write a book or teach on the fundamentals of faith in some discipleship system. More difficult is that part of discipleship that has to do with character, life and those intangibles aspects of faith. This is the part that we must teach by example and not just by words. I find it fascinating that whether it is raising kids in biblical Israel, in contemporary society or making disciples in a local church, the task remains the same.
Bottom Line Questions
I don’t want to weird you out, but regular visitors to this blog are accustomed to my sometimes bizarre way to see wild things in odd passages of scripture. Slugging my way through Deuteronomy recently, has provoked some reactions and I’ve been trying to share some of them. Here’s the passage for today.
All the commandments which I command thee this day shall ye observe to do, that ye may live, and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers. And thou shalt remember all the way which the LORD thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no. And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live. Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell, these forty years. Thou shalt also consider in thine heart, that, as a man chasteneth his son, so the LORD thy God chasteneth thee. Deuteronomy 8:1-5
Moses is delivering a stern warning to a new generation of Israelites about their need to trust and obey God. Their fathers had been severely lacking in character and faith. As a result, they have spent 40 years in the desert in less than ideal conditions. Moses clearly establishes that trials and suffering are permitted by God and used to mature us, prove us and reveal the reality of our hearts. Yet even with all their suffering, Moses reminds them that they never really lacked for anything. The real purpose of trials is to learn that daily needs are more than physical and more than daily bread could ever satisfy. They need to learn that true life, provision and protection is found by thoroughly digesting the truth of God’s words.
Following times of trial and tribulation, if it pleases God to bless us abundantly, Moses wants his people to remember that God is the one who gives us the power and strength to get wealth and not the result of our own hard work and effort (Deuteronomy 8:17-18). Despite Israel’s frequent sin and rebellion, God never abandoned them, the manna continued to appear, they had clothes on the backs and shoes on their feet.
Now, taking this into account, I was wondering how we might apply this truth today. We share the same
tendency to focus more on the gifts than on the Giver. We tend to chew on the bread and spit out God’s words. Here are some “bottom line” questions to provoke us to thought. Maybe you can think of others.