Monday Morning Music Ministry

10-23-23

Two weeks in a row, a “life story” with a practical message and a spiritual meaning. This one obviously is personal, so I should get it right, despite being barely conscious during some of it.

Some of you know that I write more than a weekly blog. Other blogs; roughly one magazine article a month; newspaper columns and op-eds; and books. It was my seventy-fifth published book that took me to New York last week. I have been doing interviews, recently the Charlie Kirk and Rita Cosby national radio shows / podcasts. The semi-official Book Launch of The Most Interesting American, Post Hill Press, my third book on Theodore Roosevelt, was scheduled on the campus of Long Island University / C W Post College. Close to Sagamore Hill, the Oyster Bay home of TR.

In addition to LIU, the events – press conference, reception, book signing, speech, public Q&A – was to be covered by C-SPAN for broadcast on its Presidential Books series. The events were co-sponsored by Theodore’s Books, the terrific Oyster Bay shop run by former congressman Steve Israel. For all the resourceful people involved, the real angel was Bernadette Castro, one of the nation’s great natural resources – furniture heiress; onetime New York candidate for the US Senate; 12 years the New York State Parks Commissioner in charge of historic preservation; and an amazing role-model of civic virtue and activism.

In short: I woke up woozy the morning of the events (forgive the technical and medical terms), but I had not eaten much in several days except for a grand dinner the previous evening; I had flown a hurried trip the week before; deadlines plagued me… who knows. It could not have been “stress” about my speech, because I have always said that I could talk about Theodore Roosevelt in my sleep. Inadvertently, here was to be my chance.

At the event, I stumbled in late; I half-realized I was signing my name one and a half times, or just scribbling; I needed help getting to the dining room. It was all a strange sensation, but more so for those who beheld this, ahem, esteemed author. I am sure that the guests (many and distinguished) thought I was drunk or having a stroke. Bernadette assured them that I was quite sober, and if I were sentient I could have assured them… well, in fact, I was not sentient. Medics arrived; then an ambulance; and I blinked back to consciousness in the loving arms of St Francis (the wonderful hospital bearing his name in Port Washington, NY).

When the dust had settled, so to speak, the consensus was not demon rum (I scarcely drink) nor a stroke but a “simple” case of hypoglycemia. My blood-sugar level had dropped to 37. I am on two meds as a pre-diabetic (“pre”? I am never early for anything) and maybe the disruptions of the previous days put those meds into overdrive.

(I only had problems with hypoglycemia once before, but that was in a spelling bee in sixth grade. Seriously, my late wife had diabetes since age 13, so I should be aware of some of the collateral issues. I am more aware, again. I am dropping jokes here as often as nurses who wake you up to ask if you are asleep… but for the first time in my life I thought I was going to die.)

Several days in the hospital; canceled appointments to see old friends and hoped-for business partners; and, having been rushed from my events, no books or papers or laptop or even a phone-charger. But the word had gotten out, and almost 700 well-wishers reached out, between phone calls and texts and e-mails I eventually received. In my case, “well-wisher” usually means people who wish I would fall down a well; but this was very special, really touching.

Among all the outreach, my daughter Emily called from Ireland, once for 45 minutes. And my son Ted drove up from Washington DC, where he is a TV news producer, to “hang with Pop,” and drive me to the airport after a day in Manhattan, just like old times.

To the impatient reader who wonders where is the “practical message, the spiritual meaning,” it is here, thicker than a dose of glucose syrup. Jesus was real to me through this. Not only my faith and grounding, nor that I was in a Catholic hospital. He truly was present in myriad ways.

I had a friend who was a professional skeptic (a.k.a. wiseguy) who once challenged me after some troubles I had. He said, “You keep giving Jesus the credit for the help you got. That wasn’t Him… it was all your friends! Wake up!”

OK. Chapter 2: For all of our conversations about politics and TR, and common work on causes like fighting the attack on historic statues… my greatest bond with Bernadette Castro is when we share personal stories, frequently centering on faith. She showed her character again this week.

This week could have been National Anti-Cliché week, because many of those messages and e-mails were from people who left fervent prayers and shared encouraging verses… as we all are to do, sincerely; not throw off Hallmark-like “Feel Betters” in circumstances like these.

A new friend in Michigan had volunteered to drive me to and from the airport (of course not knowing these things would transpire), saving me parking fees for a week and – surely – a shaky solo drive home, otherwise. A blessing. A friend from another state, who had sent a “love offering” to help with expenses… could not have known how useful that card would be. A blessing.

The hospital staff… well, ‘nuff said. I had interaction with so many people those days who showed Jesus, it was a reinforcement about the Healer, our Ever-Present Help in times of trouble. The Holy Spirit, you see, is the means and the motivator when we share the Jesus who lives within us.

So, Chapter 3. To skeptics like my old friend who said it was not Jesus but merely nice friends who show themselves in such crises (and as he, sadly, must have learned by now) –

It is Jesus who “works” in these situations. The Savior often chooses to work through His people. What better way? – win-win for everyone who is touched. I was ministered to; friends yielded themselves to share Christ’s love; and – I pray – others who hear this Gospel message may be blessed.

Yes. Let’s “wake up!” indeed.

+ + +

Click: Where No One Stands Alone

9-4-23

The unofficial end of Summer: This weekend there will be the sounds of parades, the colors of flags, the sights of smiling friends and family, and if nothing else… the aromas of barbecues. Particularly dear to me as, these very weeks, my daughter Emily, who lives in Northern Ireland, is amping up her American-barbecue business in Ireland and the UK; the BBQueen of Derry. Appropriate Cultural Appropriation you can taste!

I have told this story before about summer get-togethers. When I skip it, I get letters asking “Where was that great song you post every summer?” On this Labor Day weekend, I remember a simple barbecue, but one of the most profound days of my life. A holiday far away from my home… but very close to my heart. It happened on a summer holiday almost 30 years ago.

And it always makes me wonder, Is an America we once knew disappearing?

I lived in East Texas back then for a few months, conducting interviews and research for a book I was writing. Once settled, I took out the Yellow Pages (remember them?) to chart the location of nearby Assembly of God churches, intent on visiting as many as I could through the summer. East Texas was in every way new to me, and I wanted to experience everything I could.

Well, the first one I visited was in Cut and Shoot. That’s a town’s name; you can look it up. A small white frame AG church was my first stop that summer… and I never visited another. In that tiny congregation, it was, um, obvious in three minutes that I was not from East Texas. I was born in New York City. Yet I was treated like family as if the folks had known me for decades. A fellow named Dave Gilbert asked me if I’d like to go to his farm for a barbecue where a bunch of people were just going to get together and “do some visitin’.”

I brought the biggest watermelon I could find as my contribution to the pot-luck. There were dozens and dozens of folks. I couldn’t tell which was family and who were friends, because everybody acted like kinfolk. When folks from East Texas ask, “How are you?” they really mean it. There were several monstrous barrel barbecue smokers with chimneys, all slow-cooking beef brisket. (Every region brags about its barbecue traditions, but I’ll fight anyone who doesn’t agree that low-heat, slow-smoked, no sauce, East-Texas barbecue is the best.) There was visitin’, surely; there were delicious side dishes; there was softball and volleyball and kids dirt-biking; and breaks for sweet tea and spontaneous singing of patriotic songs.

I sat back in a folding chair, and I thought, “This is America.”

As the sun set, the same food came out again – smoked brisket galore; all the side dishes; and desserts of all sorts. Better than the first time. Then the Gilberts cleared their house’s porch. People brought instruments out of their cars and trucks. Folks tuned their guitars; some microphones and amps were set up; chairs and blankets dotted the lawn. Dave Gilbert and his brothers, I learned, sang gospel music semi-professionally in the area. Pastor Charles Wigley of that local church, during the summer had opened for Gold City Quartet at a local concert, playing gospel music on the saxophone.

In some churches, in some parts of America, you sing solo every once in a while. You’re not only expected to – you want to. So into the evening, as the sun went down and the moon came up over those farms and fields, everyone at that picnic naturally sang, together or solo or in duets or quartets. Spontaneously, mostly. Far into the night, exuberantly with smiles, or heartfelt with tears, singing unto the Lord.

I sat back in the folding chair, and I thought, “This is Heaven.”

I have grown sad for people who have not experienced the type of worship where singers, and people who pray, do so spontaneously. From the congregation. Moving to the front. Sharing their hearts. Crying tears of joy or conviction. Loving the Lord, and each other, freely. If you have not… then visit a church where this is commonplace. Even witnessing it is an uplifting balm to the soul, where there is freedom and joy in singing spontaneously.

I attach a video that very closely captures the music, and the feeling – the fellowship – of that evening. A wooden ranch house, a barbecue picnic just ended, a campfire, and singers spontaneously worshiping, joining in, clapping, and “taking choruses.” Smiling, hugging. There were cameras at this particular get-together, but it took this city boy back to that holiday weekend, finding himself among a brand-new family, the greatest barbecue I ever tasted before or since… and the sweetest songs I know.

And I think to myself, nervously shedding a tear… “THIS is the America we are losing.”

+ + +

Click: The Sweetest Song I Know

1-24-22

I shared this message on Facebook this week, and now will here, with you. It has been nine years since my wife Nancy died. Heart and kidney transplants were supposed to give her another three to five years… but she lived 16 more years, mostly healthy till the very end.

She inspired people and devoted herself to a ministry serving transplant recipients, donors, and those on life’s edge, including families.

This week was Sanctity of Life Week also, capped by the March For Life in Washington DC. President Trump, like many of us, once was pro-abortion, or at least neutral; then became the only president personally to address the March. President Biden, like many Catholic friends, claims adherence to the church teachings but rejects them in practice.

Life – living, protecting, honoring life – ought be the concern of all. This should be axiomatic… but in this world it is not even automatic. The devil wants to destroy our lives; governments want to control our lives; but God gave us life and Jesus sacrificed His life that we might have life and life more abundant.

Some years ago I edited the magazine Rare Jewel. We published a Sanctity of Life theme issue, and I asked Nancy to write about her experience and perspective, facing death and cherishing life. Edited, I offer it here. She also endured, besides the heart and kidney transplants, diabetes, strokes, cancer, celiac disease, amputations, and other challenges. Her story in part follows:

I was diagnosed with heart disease two months after my 41st birthday. My three children were 15, 14, and 11 at the time.

I also learned that I had had a silent heart attack sometime the previous summer, and that I had coronary artery disease and congestive heart failure (CHF), meaning that the arteries supplying blood to my heart were narrowed. There was no blockage that surgery could correct by bypass.

In the first diagnoses, the doctors thought that with medicines my heart disease could be kept under control and in 10 years or so I would have to consider the prospect of a heart transplant.

But after two more heart attacks in 10 months—and not so “silent” these times—the doctors told me that I would not survive a fourth heart attack. This news came on my 42nd birthday. Within the month I was transferred from our local hospital to Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia and put on the transplant list for a heart and kidney.

Events moved quickly, and I really didn’t have much time to think about what was ahead. As a diabetic, I had assumed that at some time I might need a kidney transplant—I had never thought about needing a new heart! I also assumed that the whole process was like changing a battery: take out the old and put in the new.

Not quite. Because my doctors could not guarantee my survival at home for longer than two weeks, I had to stay in the hospital, with heart monitors attached to my chest, and an IV tube continuously feeding me medicines that kept my heart working at its maximum possible efficiency.

In the beginning of this process, I think most patients in my “group” of potential organ recipients were, like me, a bit naive. We didn’t know about some of the complications associated with the surgery. Strokes, blood clots causing the loss of limbs, and blindness were just some of the problems. Our group of approximately 16 patients was relatively healthy or at least stable, but every now and then reality would strike.

Without warning, people “coded” (heart stopping); sometimes they could not be revived. Other times those who had received transplanted organs would return to the hospital with rejection (the body trying to destroy the new organ).

We all know there are no guarantees in life, but no matter how young or old, we tend to take some things for granted. However, when hospitalized in a heart-failure unit, never knowing what the next minutes might bring, I developed a deeper sense of what was important to me.

I prayed for more time—time to be a mother to my children, for us to be together as a family. I cried out to God, How much longer? He answered in the words of I Peter 5:6,7: Humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him; for He cares for you.

And I learned to trust Him. Just as He was taking care of me, He would take care of my family. And each time I asked “How much longer?” He would remind me of a promise I made to Him that I would stay for as long as He wanted me to. And God gave me His total peace.

In all ways my hospital stay—18 weeks before organs became available; then three weeks after the operation, until I could go home—was a good experience. I came to know God in a more intimate way, to learn to trust Him and His ways, and to appreciate all that He has given me. I began praying for the other patients on the floor; first for those on their way to the ER, then weekly Bible studies, then prayer support groups. We started a family ministry that lasted more than seven years.

I have seen all three of my children grow up. Heather is a youth minister in Michigan; Ted is a television news producer [now in Washington DC] and Emily moved to Ireland after doing missions work [and has started her own business of American-style foods.] And, I have four beautiful grandchildren. I am very proud of them all.

At one time I did not have real hope, leaning on my own view of life. But as Psalm 119:50 says:

My comfort in my suffering was this: “Your promise preserves my life!”

+ + +

Click: I’ll Have a New Life / Everybody Will Be Happy Over There

3-22-21

Last week’s message on addiction excited a greater number of responses than I usually receive. I hoped that it would present a somewhat different perspective on this topic than we routinely hear; and perhaps that struck a chord.

I had not thought of this until I wondered at the feedback, but in a society where “victimhood” virtually has become a religion, it is refreshing to assert that we often are responsible, ourselves, for “challenges” we face. And, as should follow, that we can take responsibility as well for their solutions. Such resolutions represent more than coping, but rather liberation… second chances… new starts… a fresh excitement about life.

Several readers, and friends I have made in recent years, surprised me (and were glad to do so) with stories of their own redemption, of kicking addictions. My way of putting it with friends: moving from Alcoholics Unanimous to Alcoholics Anonymous; and, of course, other things than alcohol, which was the larger point of my essay.

There is another story about my unnamed friend from years ago whose situation inspired that message, and I will share the follow-up again, in a way of closing the circle.

It is a little more personal, to me that is. There was a tough period some years ago for my family – toughest most of all for my late wife Nancy. She had faced health challenges (what euphemisms we use) most of her life. She was an early diabetic, and that was the source of many ills, but not solely. When we met she monitored blood-sugar levels with test strips, and she (or I) would administer insulin shots by needle.

Eventually pumps and remote monitors were developed. During that technical evolution, her physical problems, some caused by the diabetes, raged. She virtually lost her sight twice; a miracle restored it once (unquote, incredulous doctors) and another by laser treatments. She had several heart attacks; and several TIAs, or minor strokes. She developed celiac disease, and had to avoid wheat, oats, rye, and barley; besides sugar, of course. The diabetes attacked more places than her eyes, and she had toes amputated. Cancer was discovered in her thyroid gland, and although one lobe was removed, it was devoid of cancer cells (another miracle, doctors could only call it). There were more medical problems too, like broken bones – all these before and after a heart transplant and a kidney transplant.

Nancy worried, more than about herself, for our three children. But they took strength from her faith and strength. We started a hospital ministry that lasted almost seven years… and might have have blessed us as much as the patients and their families.

We were without insurance, with me as a freelancer and she having (duh) pre-existing conditions. Things were tight, and emotionally stretched. At this time (while Nancy was in hospital, listed for compatible organs) my mother was dying, in hospice, in Florida, and I made the difficult decision to be there in her last hours. Driving to the train station in Philadelphia, my car was T-boned at an intersection and totaled. I was OK, and two days later I took that train. My mother lingered longer than expected; I returned home for Christmas, and got the message that she died while I wended north.

The transplants went well – in fact, she was almost like a poster child; no rejections, and living 16 years instead of the projected extra five. Until I could get a new car, our pastor lent us his van. Friends helped with watching the kids, and with meals. Neighbors helped with housework and chores. Our ministry continued, and my freelance schedule enabled me to take Nancy to the many follow-ups and lab visits.

We return here to my friend who starred in last week’s message, and was mentioned above. I related this litany to him with the appropriate “thank Gods” and gratitude to friends and neighbors. The whole “before and after” tale.

Ever the skeptic, he took the opportunity to teach me a lesson, to shake me back to reality. “You’re always thanking God for this and that,” he said. “But listen to yourself. It wasn’t Jesus who took your kids in when you had to go to Florida. It wasn’t Jesus who lent you that van. It wasn’t Jesus who brought you meals and cleaned your house… They were just friends and neighbors!”

My response came immediately, inspired by Someone else, because I wasn’t that clever myself: “You’re wrong. It WAS Jesus… working THROUGH our friends and neighbors.”

This truth is a way that God works, and a way that He often chooses to work. Not a fallback, but His intention. It is the reason Jesus came to earth… and, more, the reason He left.

But I tell you I am going to do what is best for you. This is why I am going away. The Holy Spirit cannot come to help you until I leave. But after I am gone, I will send the Spirit to you (John 16:7). And we yield to the Spirit.

We should be reminded here of bumper-strip theology that can have impact as it distills the Truth:

~~ You might be the only Jesus people ever know.
~~ Always share the Gospel – sometimes even use words.
~~ Be doers of the Word, not hearers only.
~~ Love one another, even as I have loved you,.
~~ Be imitators of Christ.

Of all the experiences, trials, and acts I have mentioned here, none is too big for us to assume it need not be done. And none is too small to have a life-changing, eternal impact. It’s funny how God works that way.

Especially when it’s through us.

+ + +

An example of “how small” an act can be is in this song by Ray Boltz. It reminds be of a visit by a missionary family to our little church, and their slide-show about their work overseas. My little girl Emily was so affected that she decided then and there to go into missions work. Which she did.

Click: Thank You

This message, and this song, would seem like orphans if I didn’t invite you to visit the site of Grand Staff Ministries Grand Staff Ministries – Becky and Tracy Spencer’s remarkable missions program to the people of eSwatini (formerly Swaziland) in Africa.

6-15-20

These messages here, especially in the past three weeks, have evoked letters from readers who asked virtually the same questions.

How did you know I needed those words at this time in my life?

The Holy Spirit must have guided your hand. You answered questions that were eating at me lately!

I found your site by accident… but it was no accident. Your message brought tears to my eyes.

When I receive messages like this, I am reminded that this is all worthwhile. Sometimes (I hope all the time) I write by inspiration. But who reads; who is impressed of a Godly message… that is out of my hands.

Christians sometimes obsess over what impact we have. We think we have to close every deal when we share the Good News. To borrow from recent messages, that is the Holy Spirit’s job. Our job is to bear witness to the Truth. The Holy Spirit will work on peoples’ hearts.

We plant seeds. The Holy Spirit cultivates and harvests.

When I speak at Christian writers conferences I make a point of pointing to random spots in the audience, or sometimes making eye contact here and there, and encouraging the discouraged as well as the hopeful – that is, reminding every writer and aspiring writer of the consequential opportunities they have; and the responsibilities.

“Something you wrote last week might seem like it died without being noticed. But perhaps one person read it and was touched and saved the clipping. And next year might share it with a distant relative. And that relative might pass the thought along to a stranger who needs those words at that very moment. And that person might change his or her life because of that thought, which can then spread to family members and neighbors. Hundreds, or thousands, of people can find truth and beauty and salvation, all because of something you wrote, and maybe thought a failure or a waste of time.”

Or I share variations of that very plausible scenario. Or that this pertains not only to things we write, but things we might say. Or a way we acted when challenged a certain manner. Or how we reacted, maybe when we thought nobody was looking.

Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us (Hebrews 12:1).

Many times I have thought of the time a small family of missionaries visited our little church when my daughter Emily was a young schoolkid. Their testimonies and stories and slideshow impressed her so much that she broke out in spontaneous prayer, and told my wife later that day that she wanted to be a missionary – that God told her she would serve in the missions field. She did. She went to Bible college; joined missions trips to Russia and Mexico and Ireland. She went to Ireland a second time to do street ministry, more training at a Bible college, and did church work.

I often think what might have happened in her life, or not happened, if she had skipped church that day, or was not open to that message from that family.

But we should all think about the pictures from life’s other side. What if that family had not been open, themselves, to the Holy Spirit’s leading? What if they had grown weary, and not visited that church that morning? What if they had checked their passion at the door, and shared a mere travelogue instead of the powerful stories of lives changed in a faraway land of hurting and needy people?…

The Bible chapter preceding the one cited above – Hebrews 11 – sometimes is called “The Hall Of Fame of Faith.” It contains a long list of the Bible’s heroes who believed, and stepped out, and persisted, and fought the good fight for God’s truths, or “ran the race” well. By the way, they did not all achieve their “goals.” But they are honored in God’s eyes, and in history, for being faithful… as witnessed by uncountable angels, the heavenly host, the “great cloud of witnesses,” and by us today.

You see, God does not require success; only obedience. The Holy Spirit takes the baton to finish our race for us.

For that reason (and as the attached music video powerfully illustrates) we need to be aware of those who watch us. Not to be paranoid, but to be encouraged! Be aware of who watch you – God; the heavenly “great cloud of witnesses”; angels; your spouse or children; your neighbors.

And, sometimes, people you will never meet.

+ + +

Click: Thank You For Giving To the Lord

5-11-20

Sometimes, life’s circumstances can be like viruses. Appearing suddenly… not foreseeable… hard to pinpoint, harder to fight, often impossible to overcome – an invisible enemy.

My daughter Emily (yes, in whom I am well pleased!) in Ireland, with her family, has been a victim of life’s circumstances. Except that she has never fully seen the situation that way.

Onslaught? Oh, no question. She was a missionary, went to the “troubled” streets of Derry / Londonderry on the border of Ireland and Northern Ireland… lost her missions support… fell in love with a local lad in church, Norman McCorkell… married… went to Bible School together… jobs in church and running a retreat center near Dublin… setbacks… Norman’s epilepsy… with two great children, helpless but not hopeless for a spell, virtually homeless but for friends… returned to the Derry area.

Mr and Mrs Job, eh?

Don’t shed tears. Emily merely has pivoted, and pivoted again, starting an American-style food business (BBQ!) that has been well accepted in the city, her jars and bottles selling to stores and homes; her smoked meats selling via food truck to fans and to groups via catering. Emily has been on radio, in newspapers, magazine covers, billboards. She and Norman, a great team in the prep, production, and deliveries, were about to open a storefront… and then, you guessed it, the pandemic hit like a storm. The city is closed down.

What to do, especially with the insane PP rules? One thing not to do was retreat or moan or wait for things to resolve themselves. While making small batches of BBQ specialties to loyal (and hungry) customers, for non-contact pickups, she pivoted again. With sympathy for healthcare workers in hospitals and clinics, thinking the patients and the doctors should have other “angels,” she inaugurated a program for people to donate food – mostly packaged and easy-to-prepare – for the kitchen spaces in hospitals and clinics. For the workers and the over-worked on shifts, tired when they get home, to make their meals faster and special, and their days easier.

The response was immediate and enormous, after a little publicity and word-of-mouth. Individuals, cafes, stores, opened their cupboards; her garage was filled each day with donations. (As I write this, Emily reported that a man she doesn’t know heard about her “Pantry” campaign and ordered 87 Pounds, about $100, of foods from a shop to be delivered straight to her center.) She and Norman, and little Elsie and Lewis, pivoted to encouragement, thanks, deliveries. People were blessed – both givers and recipients. In interviews, again, Emily explained it all: “It’s what Jesus would do.”

All of these activities, pivoting to new activities, is what businesses call Entrepreneurship. It is what Jesus called “Doing unto the least of these.” The least? Taking care of one’s family is proper, prioritized. Then serving others. Good value and good taste and good service when times are good; good discernment of people’s needs and good organization and good charity – many untold stories, the time spent, the generosity of so many – when times are tight.

All in the space of a couple months. Emily will continue to serve the sometimes-forgotten workers. She is taking orders for no-touch BBQ orders for fans of her meats every Friday. She and Norman are looking again at a food truck with which – lockdown or no – they can deliver foods and be alongside events. Lo+Slo, her little operation, is not little, really, and cannot be suppressed!

How, in the face of health and job and housing and now pandemic opposition, does she thrive? She has a saying – maybe not original? Too good to think others have not used it too. It has become her slogan during lockdowns and isolation:

I Can’t; We Can.

Brilliant, really. An inspirational rallying-cry. As I thought of my daughter, admiring her from afar but talking daily on the phone, I thought of Jesus too – but not only of His admonition that we be charitable; He fed the hungry and said that we should exercise love to the needy.

No, let us think of the larger Christian meaning, a lesson, really, inherent in that phrase I Can’t; We Can.

God has reached down through history via the inspired Word and prophets and given us guidance and wisdom. Jesus came that we might have life and life more abundant; He taught, and offered salvation. The Holy Spirit was sent that we can have spiritual encouragement, gifts, power.

With all this spiritual help, we are blessed. Surely we cannot fail to be good servants – serving God, serving each other…

Yet. Consider I Can’t; We Can. Not only in the context of the fellowship of the saints and the priesthood of all believers, as important as are those truths. No, the “We” I think God would have us remember – and too many Christians tend to forget – is the We of the Godhead. God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

How many of us have faced a challenge or gone through a severe crisis, and we pray to God, with confidence (and I hope not pride) – “OK, God, I’ve got it from here.”

That is wrong. The more we know of Him and His ways, the more we need Him, and know that we need Him. The more mature our faith becomes, the more we realize how dependent we are on the Lord. In every aspect of our lives.

Our livelihoods, our families, our homes, our businesses, our health, our budgets. Our patience, our sanity, our resourcefulness. Our future.

I Can’t; We Can. I can’t do these things on my own. We – family, friends, fellowships – are important; thanks. But the We who will see us through is waiting for us to lean on the Everlasting Arms.

I can do all things through Christ Who strengthens me (Philippians 4:13).

+ + +

Click: I Believe; Help Thou My Unbelief

3-30-20

Three events this week seemed connected in a way I think God would have us see. The unifying factors are these: that God has plans for us that occasionally look anything but good at first glance; we seldom can predict these life-adjustments, or even recognize them at first; and, number 3, God wants to use us. Yes, you and me. He gives us assignments for His work.

* In no particular order. I first will address the Coronavirus pandemic. Of course we have enormous sympathy for the deaths and dislocations – businesses closed and savings gone – that are resulting. But last week I listed some of the new priorities and redundant traditions that are good to be cleared away in a single season, instead of over a generation.

This social (not medical) craziness is bringing out the best in people, and I pray it lasts through and beyond the lockdowns. Acts of charity; innovative ways to care; new initiatives. My daughter Emily, in Ireland, was close to opening a restaurant and making other arrangements for her new food business, just a few weeks ago. She could have been locked into a horrible arrangement, as shops are hard-hit there as in the US. Instead of stewing (ha), she came up the idea of operating a “food pantry” to deliver food to doctors’ offices and hospitals, for those weary workers on extra shifts and unable to enjoy home-cooked food. The community is responding, in her city and elsewhere. Pallets of packaged foods; restaurant surpluses; volunteers; contributions.

Her inspiration was Jesus feeding the 5000. It’s not about her; she calls the initiative the National Health Service Pantry. For “Front Line” workers – what we would call medical first-responders and staffers.

Good will come from this plague. In myriad ways. That’s what Christians should make happen. God does not want people to catch and die from a virus. But in the midst, He has plans for us all while it is here. There’s at least one plan for you – just find it!

* Then I was reminded that the Feast of the Annunciation was this week. Forty weeks before Jesus’ birth. Mary woke up one day a lowly handmaiden; was visited by an angel; and went to sleep knowing she would give birth to the Savior of the human race. Quite a day!

Which means we cannot, usually, predict or expect or recognize events. We think such things are rare, but plagues and storms and wars often surprise us; and things are “never the same”… yet life goes on, doesn’t it? And for the good things too – blessings, gifts, visits from angels. Like Mary, as recorded in her prayer called the Magnificat, our souls magnify the Lord. We are humbled. We need to understand His lovingkindness. Those are acts to undertake. Just find one!

* Finally, did you notice in the news this week that Roger Stone, the perennial political dirty-trickster who was swept up in the “Russian Collusion” hoax, and sentenced to prison, attended a Franklin Graham crusade and gave his heart to Jesus? A little like Chuck Colson, the Nixon operative who was born again and founded the Prison Fellowship ministry.

Is it a legitimate conversion? I have a view of the matter. Many years ago I worked with two partners of his, just before the three founded a Washington lobbying group. More to share in a future column, but this born-again story – and a viral 25-minute video interview on CBN – caught my attention. And it ties in to my third “coincidental” inspiration for this week. Just think —

God has plans for us that are not always clear to us at first. His messages and callings usually are things we could never have expected. But… God wants to use us.

Use us. He doesn’t have to. He could use your neighbor. Or a stranger. Or nobody, and wave His hand over situations; He is God. But He issued a challenge to Emily’s faith… He blessed Mary with an unspeakable privilege… He broke Roger’s heart of Stone. He challenges, we respond. That’s how God works.

These things came together this week, amid good and bad health and financial news. The same message is delivered to us all – be open to God; welcome His surprises; and be willing to be used.

Just listen. Just see. Just act.

+ + +

Click: The Unseen Hand

9-30-19

Do many people confess this – ‘I Don’t Know How To Pray!’ – or would, if pressed? You would be surprised how many Christians, even, are uncomfortable when called upon to pray audibly, or front of others.

My late wife Nancy’s birthday was last week; and she died almost seven years ago. I have written how she suffered almost uncountable numbers of ailments and afflictions, including cancer, strokes, and heart and kidney transplants. She never stopped attending church all her life through, but her natural shyness plus an upbringing in church and home that did not encourage spontaneous and public praying, brought her seldom to pray in front of others. Even before our family, at mealtimes.

But when she was listed for transplantation, she began a ministry on the Heart Failure floor of the hospital. She saw a need, particularly as – believe it or not – clergy seldom visited and prayed with patients there.

A Catholic priest scurried through once a week, sharing the Host and the Sign of the Cross to Catholic patients on his list, and then moved on; scarcely chatting. Protestant clergy, sometimes from patients’ home churches, occasionally made calls and had conversations more than prayers. In those times, almost 25 years ago, transplant recipients were wired to monitors and telemetry units, so the machinery and poles prevented them from even venturing to the chapel on the hospital’s ground floor.

It seemed curious and, frankly, cruel to Nancy that patients were receiving medical care but not spiritual care.

She started a hospital ministry. She visited rooms. She had us bring Bibles that she could distribute. It became a family ministry, even as our children Heather, Ted, and Emily would pray, sometimes with children of patients. We began holding services on Sunday mornings in rooms, or the lounges, or atrium, depending on attendance.

And attendance grew. Patients were wheeled in; nurses joined as they could; family members timed their visits to the services. We dealt with crises of faith. We saw miracles. We played recorded music, always surprised that rural men fell in love with Black spirituals; faithful Jewish couples lost themselves in the joy of Southern gospel songs; Hispanics sang the traditional hymns in Spanish as we sang in English.

And before we knew it, people prayed with us… and prayed, themselves. Enthusiastically, and spontaneously. People opened up to request a specific prayer, as, they said, they never had done in their lives. Patients shared thanks for things that happened during the week, or for a breakthrough they experienced. Very often, patients or family members were bold enough to ask God questions, in front of all us. (You don’t know how liberating, and Biblical, it is to answer “I don’t know! I don’t know, either! Let’s pray about it!”).

Sometimes widows or widowers, or children of patients who died after transplantation, or during procedures, or while waiting, came to thank us all. And to share peace with their “new” families. Local TV stations, and the Philadelphia Inquirer, did multiple stories on Nancy and this ministry. We continued it as a family for almost seven years after she received her heart and kidney, until we moved to San Diego.

Nancy received more than a heart and a kidney; she had a personality transplant. This woman who was so shy that she seldom audibly prayed over dinner… became a prayer warrior.

“Out of the abundance of the heart, so the mouth speaketh.” Once, a patient’s wife said that she believed her husband was “listed” at that time and in that place, in order that he learn about Jesus from us. He accepted Christ – over which she had prayed for years – but I don’t believe God sends sickness. The lesson, however, is that our job is to turn circumstances around on the devil.

There were many times patients prayed, in front of others as well as the Lord, for the first time in their lives. I still can almost hear the accelerating thump, thump, thump heartbeats on the monitors at those times. Spiritual emotion. Once, on New Years Eve, a sweet hulk of man from the Philly suburbs requested that we all gather in his room. “I don’t know how to pray!” he confessed… but declared that he wanted to do so, for the first time in his life. He did, through tears – his and ours – and his “Amen!” was followed by the biggest smile you could imagine.

Is it possible, dear reader, that you don’t know how to pray? Is it awkward? Either before others, or privately to God?

If so, that grieves God more than you can know. He wants to communicate with us; the Bible says we should share the burdens of our hearts. He knows them… but he wants to hear from you. Is there a guilt that impedes you? Confess it! He knows that already too! Are you so joyful that you think prayer is not necessary? Shame on you! You have extra reason!

All of us live a little south of Heaven and a little north of Hell. We are in a common (even crowded) place from which to approach the Throne of God. You don’t know how to pray, or what to pray?

If your slate is that empty, start by simply praising Him. Thank Him for Who He is, and what He has done. Can’t think of anything? You will. It will start as a “sacrifice of praise” and then start to roll. He will speak to your spirit. Are you getting through? The Bible says that the Holy Spirit will speak, even groan when we are troubled, to God on our behalf. Pray. I pray of you.

You don’t need to be confined to a hospital’s Heart Failure floor, but, believe me… we all need heart transplants.
+ + +
Click: Prayer

8-5-19

I am writing this in the first week of August, a time that once, and elsewhere, carries more significance than a new calendar page. In the 19th century, a lot of magazines published “Mid-Summer Numbers,” observing some sort of moment in the earth’s cycle, like taking a breath. In Europe – France especially – the entire month of August is devoted to vacations; trips far away from home. Some streets in Paris are virtually empty except for unlucky waiters and gendarmes.

For me, August reminds me of summers growing up outside New York City, in New Jersey. The Jersey Shore? Palisades Park? No, as an eternal foodie, my memories are of the best corn and the best tomatoes on earth. It is futile to seek such quality elsewhere, but these weeks beat Spring flowers and Fall harvests in many ways. De gustibus and all that…

It requires no stretch to see a spiritual aspect to the unique time between planting and harvest. We make plans, we live in hope, we anticipate; we pray. Planting seeds is a metaphor for being intentional about life, and commitments, our directions. Harvest? We anticipate the results of our work and plans. And prayers.

This week my son Ted, my daughter Emily, and I coincidentally went through separate but similar experiences, all related to the work we do. We praise God (always) for His leading, and His hand, the calling on our lives. But sometimes – without stopping to acknowledge God as the Master Farmer – it seems like we plant soybeans and we harvest alfalfa (or whatever those two plants look like; have mercy on this City boy; this is still a metaphor).

That growth period is just as important as Planting and Harvesting.

When Emily was very young, missionaries from Central America visited our little church and made a presentation about their work. Somehow their stories, their passion, affected her. As young as she was, she was overtaken with emotion and tears and… a conviction that she would serve in the missions field when she grew up. She eventually went to Bible College, joined missions trips to Mexico, Russia, and Ireland. And Ireland again. Her heart was joined there – in two ways; as she fell in love with Norman, attending a Bible college in Dublin, marrying, and being fruitful and multiplying. Still serving the Lod, of course.

Would all this have happened without that impactful visit of a missionary family decades ago? Maybe, or maybe not in the same way… but as a father I am awestruck at the growth (and nurture) of certain seeds that are planted in lives.

My friend Becky Spencer (writer, missionary, singer, songwriter) and her husband Tracy run a B+B and a Thrift Boutique in Kansas, to help finance their longtime work in Swaziland, now eSwatini in Africa. (I’m sorry, but the country’s new name sounds more like a video game to me…) It is a land with many challenges of health, poverty, disease, and education. And more. These past weeks has seen her crew from GrandStaffMinistries (.com, you know) experienced some family crises among relatives before they left America; financial challenges of course; a stolen passport at a stopover airport; stolen credit cards and money at another airport, followed by crazy rules and balky “facilitators” when help was needed; a ton-of-bricks debilitating infection to Becky herself… and so forth.

[And just as I write this, I received an emergency message from Becky in eSwatini that their facilities have caught fire that is spreading. Please pray, friends!]

Hard truth: when the devil attacks, it often means that you are doing something right. But when missions work – schools, clinics, worship centers, food sharing, teaching – is savagely attacked… is this God’s harvest for work well planned?

Well, yes, it is. For the overall accomplishments and victories of Grand Staff Ministries; for the work Emily has done and the blessings she receives; for the results of yieldedness that unfolds for Ted and me (and multiplied other testimonies), God does not bless our agendas. It’s about His plan, not our ideas of what His plan should be. He knows where we are headed. (Pssst – I can share a secret about how to know it: It is where He wants us.) And, almost always, He does not ordain where, and in what form, that harvest will be manifested.

Excuse me: He does ordain it. He just seldom shares it with us. And if we do work as unto the Lord, there are no “good” results or “bad” results; only God-results.

In fact I believe there is an aspect to spiritual planting-and-harvesting that we seldom think about. We offer ourselves as living sacrifices to serve Him, by serving others; we understand that, and we obey (not often enough, most us, but that’s another message). But our Sovereign God can use other people and other methods. But… the fact that He chooses us is a reminder that He cares about us as much as the people we serve.

It is truly the case that God wants to do a good work in us, not only in third-world kids or starving villages or abused women. By sharing Christ, sharing resources, and sharing ourselves we do not only do favors for the “lost”… but for ourselves.

And that is good theology. God will not take our lives, or our souls, for granted, as we do good. He cares about us as much as the people we serve.

Mary did not merely honor and bless Jesus by anointing His feet. She was blessed, and received honor and blessing from the Savior, for the choice she made. “The poor ye shall always have with you.” St Augustine saw that not as an admission of futility. He recognized that God wants to encourage in us, not only our loving targets, the reality of His love.

Not something only to deliver, but something to live, ourselves. Harvest time approacheth.

+ + +

Click: Thank You For Giving To the Lord

5-14-18

I never have had the privilege of being a mother. As closely bound as I was to fathering, being present at the births of our children, then nurturing and rearing them; fatherhood in all senses… I am aware it all is a far-distant second. The special relationship of mother and child – among all species – is a unique and precious blessing.

A birthright, in fact.

For all the good feelings engendered by Mother’s Day, I reserve a portion of contempt for those creatures who denigrate the institution of Motherhood. Not loutish men alone, but women themselves who, ultimately, are self-loathing. Those who deny the privilege – to others, not only for themselves – of sanctifying the foundation of the family; for hating what we love; for hating what is love.

I reserve a portion of pity, too. I must. What I often call in this space the Culture of Death extends beyond the trashing of motherhood and women’s traditional roles. Biologically, homosexuals cannot naturally procreate (pro-create). Abortion fanatics crusade for death – disguising their “advocacy” as concern for “convenience” for the mothers; as birth-control-after-the-fact. And so on. They are to be pitied, and prayed for.

In the meantime, my Mother’s Day is filled with memories of the Mom I knew. I loved her, and love her. She was an example whose nurture appears stronger through the years: seeds, planted, and growing in my life. A servant’s heart, making silent and willing sacrifices. Was she perfect? Smoking and drinking were regrettable but did not affect her salvation. Big deal. My sisters and I prayed for Jesus to turn the wine back into water.

Of vital importance is that she knew Jesus, was active in churches, and related almost every question I ever had to the gospel.

A preacher in aprons. A saint in curlers. An invariable forgiver.

And that example was no less special because it is the frequent role of mothers – not stereotyped, not clichéd, not pressed upon her as a dirty, leftover job – the role of imparting life lessons, of teaching values; sharing love.

Fathers can do such things before mothers do, with their children. Life’s circumstances dictate such things, and some fathers might be the more tender of a set of parents – but we all know that in the vast majority of cases in the Human Family, it is the mother who holds, hugs, shares tears, teaches, and smiles, a little more than the father, or at least a little earlier. And we children remember.

Fathers discipline; mothers forgive. Fathers prod the way forward; mothers welcome us home. Fathers mold us; mothers know us.

I believe God created Woman not only as a helpmeet to Adam, but as an Assistant to Himself. As Mothers, to show unconditional love; to bond in unique ways with their children; to bear the essence of comfort, understanding, acceptance.

Think back to the first song you learned, maybe a lullaby. The first prayers you heard, or memorized. The first gentle nursery rhyme or fairy tale. Chances are that was your mother’s voice, mother’s smiles, mother’s tears. And if not… probably Grandmother’s. This is our DNA, emotions as strong as genetics.

I admired my Dad, oh yes; I still finish every project wondering if he would approve; to be a good professional. But Mom? If I can be as good a man as she was a mother, I will die grateful and content.

There are some women who, by circumstance or infirmity, sadly cannot become mothers. Most women whom I have met from those groups have hearts even more tender for families and for children.

However, sorry to tell all of you radical harridans who hate, you have disinvited yourselves from family reunions – not at ballparks on summer afternoons, or Grandma’s house on Winter evenings – but from that mystical, privileged, and sacred Family that truly is a gift of God.

+ + +

Does this essay seem to dwell on old-fashioned things? I plead guilty! There are too many old fashions that we are losing. Here is one: a tender lullaby, a mother’s song, written by Stephen Foster 150 years ago. Recently we shared another tender song by this great American poet and composer. This, sung by Alison Kraus, is equally impressive. And some crazed radicals are tearing down his statue in the town of his birth…

Click: Slumber, My Darling

3-19-18

In some ways, St Patrick is more of an American saint than an Irish saint. He was born in Britain and enslaved, while young, in Ireland. While tending flocks in the lonely hills, the unschooled boy sought God in his musings and humble prayers. Eventually he came to faith, followed God’s voice to dare returning to Britain. He did… he learned more of the Bible and Christian doctrine… returned to Ireland and mightily evangelized a special race of people, leading to their empowerment to great things, temporal and spiritual.

Why do I say he is, in a way, more of an American saint? Because in America, not Ireland, cities hold massive parades, dye entire rivers green, and festoon homes and schoolrooms, even those of Blacks and Jews, in green. I once was in Dublin on St Patrick’s Day, and in the Temple Bar section of the city there were uncountable drunks in funny green hats, green vests, and “Kiss Me, I’m Irish” buttons.

To a person, they were all American tourists. The Irish, north and south (and the Anglican Communion too) revere St Patrick in a more proper and reasonable manner. My son-in-law Norman McCorkell, of Derry, Northern Ireland, is our guest blogger this week. He is a BA (Hons) graduate of the Irish Bible Institute in Dublin, and is passionate about discipleship and mission. He serves on the teaching team of Foyle Vineyard Church in Derry; and visits the local prisons as a volunteer through Prison Fellowship Northern Ireland.

During the “Patrick celebrations” the more theologically minded among us will find it difficult not to marvel at the prolific missionary work in Ireland led by Saint Patrick. After returning to the land of his enslavement as a teenager from western Britain, some 400 years after Christ gave the command to go and make disciples, Patrick inaugurated a disciple-making movement in Ireland that would change civilization. His burden to see the pagan “barbarians” transformed through the Gospel stood in stark contrast to the church of the Roman Empire, which for many years constrained the Gospel to within its borders. A lack, frankly, of missionary zeal.

Patrick passionately embraced the best of Irish culture, redeeming it for the Gospel by firmly standing against elements that were incompatible – ending the slave trade; reducing tribal warfare and murder. His life was an example of a new and different kind of courage – one that lived fearlessly and peaceably through God’s promises in an atmosphere containing daily threats of those horrors: murder, betrayal, and enslavement.

Despite the violent, and even magical, opposition from locals (druids and chieftains), and criticism from church leaders (conventional bishops in Britain), Patrick used his lack of formal church training to work creatively within his context. Instead of employing church structures used by the civilized Roman Empire – based in cities, where bishops were supreme – Patrick formed an ecclesiastical model more like the Irish, who were rural and tribal. The inhabitants of Ireland had no settled towns, roads, currency, written law, government bureaucracy, or taxation. Society was decentralized, and organized around tribes led by local “kings.”

With Patrick’s influence, monasteries were established and developed as places of spiritual devotion and learning. Young men who had once given their lives to clan feuds were now transformed by the good news of Jesus Christ. Monasteries became “sending centers,” noted church scholar Steve Addison: “the Irish church took on the character of a missionary movement.” And thus Ireland became a glowing spiritual base for sending out monks into western and northern Europe to “be pilgrims for Christ.” This made Celtic monasticism “highly flexible, adaptable, and able to be transplanted – everything that the Roman Empire was not.”

“Sending Monasteries” grew rapidly throughout Ireland and Europe bringing with them unprecedented prosperity, art, and learning. These population centers on the continent would eventually develop and become cities.

Norman tells us several enormously significant things here:

Saint Patrick was a real saint, not a manufactured icon – a real man who overcame ignorance and slavery; sought God’s leading… and followed it.

His work, and his powerful, persuasive witness, transformed the social manners and repressive tendencies of countless tribes and warrior-kings in ancient Ireland. The Irish indeed saved Western civilization.

St Patrick overcame his challenges by love, and the Gospel of love. He was brave, all by God’s grace.

Four hundred years after Christ, it is notable that even when the mighty Roman Empire adopted Christianity as the state religion, it kept it within its borders, as large as the Empire was. It was Patrick who first preached to alien and hostile tribes and barbarians… the first missionary since Saint Paul.

— These are lessons for today: what we can do, too, even by ourselves and against great odds, to bring the revolutionary message of Christ’s Good News to others.

I thank Norman for these words from “the ould sod” itself. My daughter worked for awhile for the St Patrick Foundation, which works to bring healing, knowledge, and reconciliation to the two Irelands.

For Patrick is not an American saint, no. But he was not a Catholic saint alone, nor Protestant nor Church of England nor Church of Ireland.

He was a saint for all, and is a Saint for today.

+ + +

A thousand-year-old Irish hymn, “Be Thou My Vision,” has an extra meaning, sung here by Ginny Owens, who is blind.

Click: Be Thou My Vision

7-17-17

Sent from Ireland this week, revived while visiting my daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren.

Unlike some saints of trinkets and wall-hangings, Ireland’s Saint Patrick was real, and is real.

St Patrick knew persecution. There understandably is some obscurity about a man who lived in the late 400s, but two letters he wrote survive; there are records of his deeds; tremendous influences surely attributable to him are still felt; and he did die on March 17. These things, and more, we do know.

He was born in western England and kidnapped by Irish marauders when he was a teenager. As a slave he worked as a shepherd, during which time his faith in God grew, where others might have turned despondent. He escaped to Britain, became learned in the Christian faith, and felt called to return to Ireland. On that soil he converted thousands, he encouraged men and women to serve in the clergy, he worked against slavery, and quashed paganism and heresies. Among his surviving colorful lessons is using the shamrock to explain the mystery of the Trinity, the Triune God, to converts.

He was an on-the-ground evangelist – possibly the church’s first great evangelist/missionary since St Paul, planting churches as far away as Germany – and he preceded much of history: living more than a hundred years prior to Mohammed; 500 years before Christianity split into Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy; and a thousand years before the Reformation.

I am not Irish; I am American. And my background is not at all Irish; it is German. But propelled, I am eager to admit, by a remarkable book, How the Irish Saved Civilization, by Thomas Cahill, I have learned about a gifted people. Not unlike other ethnic groups, the Irish endured persecution through generations, but in many ways in special ways. I have learned about a land that was repository of many tribes, not least the Celts, until its craggy Atlantic coast became the last European stand against pagan barbarism. Those tribes became a people, and their land virtually became, for quite a while, the defiant yet secret refuge of literacy and faith, in lonely monasteries and libraries. You know, the “Dark” Ages. Which were not all that dark. Plumbing was neglected, perhaps; but faith thrived.

As Lori Erickson recently wrote in a series on St Patrick for Patheos, “In the eighth century, Celtic Christians created a masterpiece of religious art called the The Book of Kells, whose vividness, color, and artistic mastery reflected Christian traditions laced with Celtic enchantment. The Book of Kells is an illuminated Latin manuscript of the four Gospels. While scholars don’t know for certain, it was likely created on the remote island of Iona off the coast of Scotland, and later brought to the monastery at Kells, Ireland. Made from the finest vellum and painted with inks and pigments from around the world (including lapis lazuli from Afghanistan), the book is almost indescribable in its loveliness, with designs that are convoluted, ornate, sinuous, and dreamlike in their complexity. Some scholars have called it the most beautiful book in the world,” she wrote. I can add that it can be seen as an early graphic novel.

It is on display at the magnificent Trinity College Library in Dublin – whose famous, cavernous, multi-balconied library room is akin to heaven for bibliomaniacs like me – surrounded by back-lit photos and displays of enlargements. It sits in an environment-controlled case, one page at a time turned every few months. To behold that book, so magnificent in its reproductions, in its reality, was one of the great experiences of my life.

The Book of Kells is awesome for what it is, surely one of the greatest artistic achievements of the human hand, head, and heart. A majestic monument to faith, all the more remarkable for being anonymously produced, unlikely by one person; possibly by a virtual army of creative souls. The Book of Kells is significant, too, for what it represents:

The tenacity of faith; the triumph of trust; the assumption of lonely devotion in the face of worldly temptations and the world-system’s persecutions; the joy of creativity; and obedience to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Knowing Him; making Him known. Not incidentally investing artistic beauty along the way… and having obvious, visceral, evident fun in the process.

Back to Saint Patrick. When the ancient masterpiece we behold as The Book of Kells was created, the man Patrick who bravely and no less tenaciously fought for the Gospel on that beautiful soil was already, himself, 500 years in the past. Our faith has been blessed with famous noted saints like Paul and Augustine; and those who touched souls for Christ but never were designated saints subsequently, like Martin Luther and J S Bach; and many, many saints who mightily served Christ in obscurity, like the monks who made The Book of Kells, and uncountable missionaries and martyrs.

Saint Patrick, born a pagan, made a slave, once a fugitive, was transformed by a knowledge of Christ. He taught us how to overcome challenges, listen to the Holy Spirit, formulate a vision, and change the world. Not just his world; but the world ever after.

+ + +

For more than a millennium a hymn, set to the haunting Irish tune “Slane,” and using St Patrick’s teaching in the words of the 6th-century Irish poet Saint Dallan, has spoken to the hearts of believers and non-believers: God is our All-In-All: Be Thou My Vision. It is performed here – with obvious and profound extra layers of meaning – by the blind gospel singer Ginny Owens.

+ + +

Click: Be Thou My Vision

3-13-17

There are rhythms to all things in life, and in life itself. Cycles. In Ecclesiastes chapter 3, they are called “seasons.”

“To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven: A time to be born, And a time to die”… Later, “A time to break down, And a time to build up; A time to weep, And a time to laugh; A time to mourn, And a time to dance”… Condensing the chapter’s long list of dichotomies, Byrd-like, “A time to tear, And a time to sew; A time to keep silence, And a time to speak; A time to love, And a time to hate; A time of war, And a time of peace.”

To everything there is a season, indeed; we all know this by intuition and experience. But most of us do not notice a huge qualification to this wisdom and poetry… later in the same chapter:

“I know that whatever God does, it shall be forever. Nothing can be added to it, and nothing taken from it. God does it, that men should fear before Him.”

In other words, one thing does not change. Truth is immutable. Truth does not depend upon cycles, nor rely on “times” or seasons, nor wait upon our opinions. God’s Word is unchanging; God Himself is eternal. Jesus came once, for all.

There have been cycles of reform in the church of Jesus Christ. As inspired by the Holy Spirit, faithful servants of the Word have seen the need for renewed fidelity to scripture, and acted – often at the peril of scorn, rejection, ostracism, persecution, and sometimes death at the hands of fellow… Christians.

2017 marks the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther nailing his 95 Theses – complaints – to the church door in Wittenberg, Germany. It is a convenient numerical commemoration, but no less worthy of recognition for it.

Change is not needed in the body of Christ every 500 years. Sometimes it urgently is needed more often, and has been throughout history. Councils and creeds were plentiful in the battles against errancy and heresy. The Truth of God does not need defense in the realm of ideas; but it does need protection “under this inverted bowl we call the sky, whereunder crawling, cooped, we live and die.” Hence, apologetics and evangelism. And reform.

Every 500 years? Every generation? No, every day.

Some of the greatest persecution of believers has come, and is coming, from fellow “Christians.” Yes, we face opposition from Muslims, the secular culture, governments, the world, the flesh, and the devil; but we also have Error and counterfeit Christianity as foes of our own household. In the Last Days, even the saints will be decieved. And we now are at a crisis point in spiritual history.

God has never needed the dilution, or perversion, of His Word in order to “attract the lost.” Just the opposite. Steel sharpens steel, as Proverbs reminds us! Today, the church in America, in the West, is conforming itself to the world instead of being transformed, instead of having others be transformed by the Holy Spirit to the renewing of minds. It is doomed to failure. Not of God, it is hellish.

In the many stresses of daily life in the 21st century, our paths to spiritual comfort ought to be clearer, not more complicated, than they have become… easier to embrace, not inaccessible. The church, itself in its blind flailing of good intentions, is a prime offender.

Relativism – substituting our logic for God’s Truth – is rife. The contemporary gospel would create God in mankind’s own image.

Religious imperialism – missions outreach that imposes our sort of Christianity on the third world – is offensive. And counterproductive: as the spread of the gospel explodes south of the Equator, even outpacing Islam, missionaries from Africa and South America now see Europe and North America as mission fields.

The deadly “works doctrine” – holding that we can earn our way to Heaven, or buy God’s favor – sparked Luther’s outrage but unfortunately did not die with him. Indulgences have new names, and they are not all Romish. Pentecostalism has been perverted by the Prosperity Gospel. “Seed faith” and “faith offerings,” paired with assurances of God’s material payback, are a stain on the church.

Mega-churches; uncountable “versions” of the Bible; Christian 12-Step programs; retreats and seminars; encyclicals; media ministries… do you notice a pattern? They all tend to be about selves, about each other. Abstractly, not horrible in such a hurting world. But. How many of them are about God? About meeting, knowing, loving Jesus? This should be the “first step” in any “12 Step” program that addresses our challenges.

Our problem – a sin, really – in the contemporary church is this: Too many programs, and Not enough Jesus.

The church has become fluent in identifying needs and creating programs to help alleviate stressors. But the Church itself should be discipled in such a way that these programs need not exist!

We are to bear with one another, not reflexively direct each other to a local church’s ministry program. We ought to shoulder each other’s burdens, umbrella each other when we can, in order to protect and love them. We are not only God’s children, but His witnesses as well. What more could we witness to others than the love, care, and protection that a Father offers? 

In the first century, when the Church was new and exciting and vital, before cathedrals and media ministries, believers met in small circles. Families and extended families. Neighbors. People who knew each other, and wanted to. Brothers and sisters who cared, and served. No microphones and rock bands and back-screen projections or gold-encrusted crowns and robes, or bingo games or mega-anythings…

“Yes, but…” missions? Youth trips? Building programs? Let the dead bury the dead. When Jesus looked down from the cross, he looked into our eyes, each of us, mysteriously, separately. He did not say that He came for programs and ministries. He certainly did not die for Denominationalism that parsed His word into irrelevancy.

He came for you, and your soul. You can take it from there… or, actually, the Holy Spirit can: it is the reason the Paraclete was sent to us.

God sent Jesus to save our souls, and the Spirit to be our Umbrella, our inspiration to overcome the vicissitudes of an evil and false generation. “For me and my household…”

We have been blessed to visit sites of the First-century church. In Roman catacombs (whose primary functions were as places of worship, not hiding) and Irish fields. The goal of Christian pioneers was to withdraw to intimate fellowships; not to expand so as to boast of unmanageable numbers and programs.

Do you yearn for the spiritual comfort and true fellowship of the first-century church?

Rick Marschall and Emily Joy McCorkell

+ + +

Click: Faith of Our Fathers

3-6-17

A possible Sign of the Times. But this sign says “Going out of business.” Not Sears nor Macy’s nor Outback Steakhouse nor JCPenney nor Kmart nor Office Depot nor Aeropostale. Not American automakers, either; nor air-conditioning plants; not other businesses being yanked back to our shores.

No, this week it was announced that Family Christian Stores, the self-proclaimed “World’s largest retailer of Christian-themed merchandise,” is giving up the ghost. For several years, the chain’s financial woes widely have been discussed, inside and outside the camp.

There were bankruptcies, reorganizations, proposals, takeovers, conversions from for-“profit” status to non-profit; promises to earmark income to charity; inventories that disappeared; unpaid invoices; at least one publisher and one distributor who were forced to go out of business because of Family Christian’s actions; and, of course, approximately 3000 employees in 240 stores across 36 states.

Beyond this recitation of facts, no more will be said, even as employees in the home office in Michigan are not being told much more than their final dates to report. Many good people tried to make Family Christian Stores work, and the causes perhaps will be fully revealed someday.

The chain began 85 years ago when brothers Pat and Bernie Zondervan (yes, those Zondervans) opened stores. Their bookstores were re-christened Family Christian Bookstores when HarperCollins bought the Zondervan publishing arm. This was about the time, in the interest of disclosure, that books I edited were distributed by Zondervan, and books I wrote were sold in FCB shops. So Zondervan begat Family Bookstores begat Family Christian Bookstores begat Family Christian Stores…

When I noticed that the logo changed – removing “Books” from the name – it told me more than did gossip on business pages and in Christianity Today. Two years ago, in a court-sanctioned bankruptcy move, the chain “shed” $127-million of its obligations; and soon thereafter was sold for $55-million. Customers were little affected, but publishers, authors, manufacturers, and distributors were, negatively.

Excuse me for already breaking my Commandment to recite no more facts. We have the sad reality of this major go-to source for everyday Christians… no longer is a reality. In any form of reorganization.

Time and chance, however, happeneth to all. “The business of America is business,” Calvin Coolidge famously said (and, little appreciated by many, not as a valedictory to capitalism but as a spiritual rebuke to shallow materialism) – and there is a macro-narrative about companies that outlive their usefulness. Manufacturers of buggy-whips were mightily depressed when Henry Ford coldly threatened their existence.

Similarly, as many American manufacturing jobs are moving overseas, history might record that it was the “turn” of emerging economies as the United States moved on to other technologies. To the extent this is true, despite the discomfort and dislocation of middle-aged factory workers, a lot of Economic Nationalism might be retrograde.

Lucky for me, digressions are still in vogue, and I shall return from mine. My point is that times are a-changin’ in retail publishing, as elsewhere. Another Michigan-headquartered chain, Borders, was a recent casualty. Barnes & Noble retains a measure of viability because, and to the extent that, it has become a bookish theme-park in each store, with coffee bars, easy-chair oases, gifts, toys, music, puzzles, and kids’ zones. Smart.

Family Christian did the same thing, accelerated in the past few years. Unlike Barnes & Noble or Starbucks’ pastry and CD counters, the move was doomed to fail, however. Family Christian was in a different line of work, and when it forgot that fact, its days were numbered.

Ken Dalto is “retail expert.” These days, despite the Trump Bump, I fear, his line of work – that is, performing autopsies – will be a growth industry. But his post-mortem of Family Christian’s demise is: “I don’t think it has anything to do with religion – I see it as pure business.”

Indeed, that was the problem: the stores had less and less to do with religion; the Christian religion, specifically.

Which was the chicken; which was the egg? Did the customer-base of believers hanker for more jewelry, pictures frames, wall hangings, travel mugs, driftwood with Bible verses, and baseball caps? Or did Family Christian’s strategic planners cast bigger nets to capture larger numbers of fish? The question is not rhetorical, nor is the answer dispositive: both trends must be true. However, it would have been difficult to hew close to the bedrock commitment to offer of solidly Christian material; and to remain a retailer of books and music.

Being “all things to all people” failed St Paul’s injunction when, say, FCS refused to carry Chick tracts but ballyhooed the latest Osteen books or Christian-lite DVDs. No, Family Christian had tried to become some thing for some people according to the dogmas of marketers and focus groups. In so doing it fell between the pier and the boat.

A Christian literary agent, Steve Laube, was quoted, I think about the consequent failure of Send the Light Distributors: “One less [sic] major distributor to feed the Christian store market.” Beyond the cold analysis, which is unavoidable at any temperature, we arrive at a snapshot of Christian publishing, 2017. Literary agents using bad grammar; Christian book stores that scarcely carry books (during this morning’s visit to my local Family Christian store, a large outlet, I counted only four short aisles of books); and many of the “Christian” books are relativist, celebrity-oriented, motivational, sometimes heretical.

“The Shack” and “Silence” are touted, and consumed, as contemporary substitutes for the Gospel itself. So many new translations of the Bible appear these days that I wonder if God sees this, ultimately, as a churchy Tower of Babel redux.

But times does march on, and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there?

I love my 14 commentaries, most of them the size and weight of car batteries. I am proud of my 40-volume set of Luther’s works. Yet I will admit that I haven’t cracked them in several years, not the commentaries anyways. After almost everything I write, I literally thank God and Google. And Wikipedia, sure. Change.

As a Christian author I lament the death, and perhaps dearth, of Christian stores.
But the internet allows us all to sell, and to buy. Smartphones and iPads allow us conveniently to follow scripture passages in our pews. Bibles have not yet been outlawed; and they have margins to accommodate home study.

Up to the minute, the great site FaithHappenings is a one-stop shop for ordering books, reading reviews, following debates, learning about concerts and speakers – more than “old-fashioned” (ouch) retail outlets ever could.

Roughly concurrent to the Family Christian announcement, Tim Keller of Manhattan’s Redeemer Presbyterian shared the news that he would retire from his pulpit… however to shepherd his megachurch into three smaller congregations; each in turn to plant three “daughter” churches of their own. Thus (through the City to City program) has Tim encouraged the establishment of almost 400 churches in 54 cities around the world.

It’s hard to keep a good Gospel down. But my daughter Emily made a prescient point about the trend, perhaps death-spiral, of Family Christian’s product-line decisions. Christian jewelry and decorations and toys were not co-opting Target and WalMart – who will, after all, pick up Jesus products in new corners of their stores, complete with the superficiality.

No, it might all be illustrating the stark fact that contemporary Christianity in America has become jewelry and decoration and toys.

If belly-up Family Christian Stores across the landscape is what we need to demonstrate that sad fact, then may the chain Rest in Pieces.
+ + +
Click: Lachrimosa

2-29-16

Just for a moment, stop. Savor the good; calculate the not-so-good. We must live our lives, even as the culture tells us to put on costumes and spout lines, letting our selves go past our eyes as if we were spectators, not the players. We, all of us, go around and around and around in our worlds, always meaning to start, or finish, something or other.

Parents know: running kids from here to there and back again. Activities. They’ve got to enjoy themselves, right? But how often do they enjoy talking to their parents… talking with their parents? How many times have you returned from a vacation, feeling that now you REALLY need a rest; whew!?! Even leisure has become an industry.

A while ago I wrote an essay based on Psalm 46:10, “Be still and know that I am God,” in which I suggested that great wisdom comes from a deliberate parsing: “Be.” “Be still.” “Be still and know.” “Be still, and know that I am.” “Be still, and know that I am God.”

Profound wisdom in each portion, each inviting deep contemplation – maybe a lifetime’s! Yet the essence that we of the 21st century take away is the admonition to be still. It is hard to hear God above the noise. It also is difficult to hear ourselves above the noise.

And when that happens, we stop even trying to listen to ourselves. In the next step – a downward step on a spiral staircase, I’m afraid – we finally stop talking to ourselves. Not talking to ourselves like mad people do, but conversations with the “inner selves” God has placed in our make-ups. Our creative selves. To stop that, I believe, is a sin.

When God created mankind, He made them in the likeness of God. (Genesis 5:1)

The question of listening to ourselves, to responding to the “creative spark,” is something that long interested me. My father, a polymath and omnivorous reader, encouraged me to draw and paint and write; to love music and art and history. But I came to realize that our earthly fathers and mothers only can cultivate such interests. It is our Heavenly Father who plants the seeds.

For a while, as a baby Christian, I was persuaded by some people that we are rebellious if we claim to create anything – that Only God can create, and that nothing can be created that is not of Him already. Pretty soon I realized that this is only a word game; and, when that game is played, it would rob the Lord of one of His great joys. He is Creator-God, yes; but when creating us in His image, He puts creativity within us!

If we are to be “imitators of Christ” in our standards and actions, so we can be imitators of God, and seek to create in His spirit; to dream and imagine, and dare. Attempting the likeness of God’s very creativity, we can seek perfection, look for beauty, and bless others.

We are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do (Ephesians 2:10).

I humbly suggest that in God’s eyes, “good works” are more than sharing Christ and being charitable. It is good work indeed to be all that God intended you to be, to fulfill the creativity wherewith He graced you. To me, it comes close to insulting God to dismiss the talent and imagination you have – and Yes, you have gifts; we all do.

If you doubt, this is when you should stop and be especially quiet, and listen for the Holy Spirit, and to the voice of your creative self. My daughter Emily is tenfold more talented than I, and she draws and paints and writes, beautifully. She has proposed collaborating on a children’s book with her Pop – can anything honor a father more? She has dreamed, lately, of opening a restaurant. When life intrudes, as it will, creativity just sprouts elsewhere, like the pretty shoots and buds and reeds appear every spring, sometimes in the most surprising places. Emily now is designing a website about cooking and baking and serving others through kitchen-fun.

Another Hero of Creativity, and a poster child for quietly listening, obeying, and sharing God’s spark in her life, is Eva Cassidy. I only learned of her from friends in Ireland, where her acclaim commenced after her death. A singer born in the Washington DC area, she played in local clubs and made only a few recordings, partly because she loved so many genres she was hard to categorize; partly because she was intensely shy. But… she was warmed by that creative spark.

Her performances were astonishing. Just past 30 years of age she died, suddenly, of melanoma cancer. After a few years her tapes made it to England, where, played on the BBC, her songs suddenly topped the charts. Eventually her music sold millions, in the UK, Ireland, throughout Europe, and back in the USA.

I cannot listen to her without getting teary. Not just her voice and interpretations. But her example. She stopped and savored life, with the stereotypical obsession to be a superstar; but she sang to please others, where she was, with what she had. She listened; she loved God; she dared to step out. She sang because she loved to. She mastered her craft and surrendered to her heart – when, today, most of us try our hardest to do the opposite, often failing at both.

“How lucky am I,” she once said, “to just do what I love: play the guitar and sing songs.” How many of us can savor the satisfaction of doing what we really love… and really loving what we do?

There’s the pursuit, and often the attainment, of happiness. That is one way to please God. It is not selfish: it is doing what He has prepared you to do. Go thou and create!

+ + +

Eva Cassidy died in 1996. The Georgian/Northern Irish/British singer Katie Melua is about as old now as Eva when she died; they never met. However through the creative use of technology, they have performed duets, sensitive and powerful in their beauty. Eva’s “half” is from a serendipitous video-cam capture of a performance 20 years ago. Stop and watch and listen.

Click: What a Wonderful World

8-26-13

It is a familiar scene this time of year. Children go off to school, some walking up the steps of the yellow school bus, some into the front doors of the school where you drop them off, some into the car, off to college. Familiar scenes; also familiar feelings, at least for parents.

Separation anxiety, of sorts. Landmarks. Turning points. All very emotional. For me, as a father, these scenes were especially emotional, because my children appeared to seldom notice anything special at all about them. Tra la la, they couldn’t wait to board the buses or run for the schoolyard. The most sentiment ever displayed was my son Ted’s annoyance at my insistence to photograph him on the porch, each first day of school year after year (because, um, I KNEW that some day he would cherish the memories) (that day might yet arrive).

It all threatened to get really slobbery when they went off to college. At those points I was ready to grab each of my three kids around their ankles, unwilling to let them go. They reflected no such emotion. I have chalked this all up, by the way, to their active sense of curiosity and adventure, nothing to do with me being the Weirdest Dad On the Street, proven by such episodes.

OK, I exaggerate a little (I tend to exaggerate at least a million times a day). But we need to remember – which means, when I write it, that I often forget – that the “saddest” things in life really are sometimes the sweetest.

When we sign up to be parents, part of the contract is to let go some day. Actually day by day. It is not a mixed blessing, even if we get, in the immortal words of Maynard G. Krebs, misty in those moments. In a recent essay I quoted Theodore Roosevelt, when he said that both life and death are parts of the same Great Adventure. Likewise, no less, are dirty diapers, silly tantrums, going off to school, asking for help with homework, the first date, the second broken heart, going off to college or the military, and watching them get married.

“Time and Chance happeneth to all,” we are reminded – and we do need reminders – in Ecclesiastes. If God sees sparrows falling to the ground, He also sees them when they leave the nest… and fly. If Mama Sparrow is not sad about that (which is my guess), neither should we regard our tears as anything but droplets of joy.

Our first born, Heather, I assumed to be exceptional from her first breath, so when she was three months old or so, I festooned the house with large signs labeling everything, just to help her to read a day or two sooner than otherwise. My son Ted entered a more sensible world. Our youngest, Emily, we knew would be our last child. My subliminal response to this, I now realize, was to keep her a baby forever, to preserve her like amber in childhood (hers, not mine). I tried to hide from her the knowledge of things like bicycles and solid food.

I kid again, a little, but rearing children, after all, is more about your values at the time than their “molded” personalities afterward. It is unavoidable, and not to be regretted but rather celebrated. Savor it all, parents, even the separation of day care, summer camp, or college in some state you cannot locate on a map.

Part of God’s sweet plan of life is that when you have children, and nurture them, and train them, and endure (and share) all the dramas of childhood, the hours drag by slowly.

… but when the kids have left home, for whatever the myriad reasons, the years then go by quickly. Remember that, while you still have the gift of remembering.

One of Emily’s friends is Amy Duke Sanchez, whom we would not know except for having “let go” of Emily when she left for a faraway college right about this time of year. Recently AmyDuke forwarded to me a very wise saying – “Don’t ask God for anything until you’ve thanked Him for everything.” That is not merely a template for constructing your prayers.

It is a reminder to stop and think about the implications of “everything.” We know that all things can work for good, and we need to see that our momentary regrets, especially in this, the Season of Empty Nests, can really be puzzle-pieces in God’s eternal and joyful plan.

+ + +

Even after mxplf years (gee, how strange: a typo) since my youngest went off to college, I still get as misty as Maynard G. Krebs when I listen to Suzy Bogguss’s bittersweet classic about a child’s Rite of Passage, “Letting Go.” The lyrics about the empty nest, and turning the page on memories, are wonderfully captured in the video with the song. Please treat yourself.

Click: Letting Go

11-19-12

I had planned to write today a version of my annual Thanksgiving message – subsection B, the rant about how “Thank You” and “You’re Welcome” have become abused, misused, and confused terms these days. So, you will have a year to notice how people might still utter “thank yous” but how the responses are, these days, almost always “Thank YOU,” or “You bet,” “Sure thing,” or “No prob.” All of which invite us to think about the value of sincere thanks and heartfelt responses, social habits, and the meaning of it all. If there is a meaning.

There is a meaning, but it is worthwhile to think about social graces that expire, and why.

Instead, today, I was knocked off course by an e-mail I received from a friend; in fact, several recent e-mails. They have touched me, especially as I make the obvious link to the essence of Thanksgiving: giving thanks.

I have been rocked recently by professional and personal events, the personal matters mostly due to (and not to be mentioned in the same breath as) health crises of my wife. She has been in the hospital for almost three weeks, and this is, I think, her seventh hospitalization this year. We have had blessings and travels during the “good” periods lately, but this year has been visited by several mini-strokes, pneumonia, kidney failure, and grim diagnoses about her 17-year-out transplanted heart.

Nancy’s faith is strong, but I think she is getting sick and tired of being sick and tired. Through it all, the support of family and friends has been a comfort. And a hundred little things that are not little: the concern and indulgence of my agent and publisher; prayers from unknown and surprising places; and so forth. People who do not just say, “I’ll keep you in prayer,” but, having the face-to-face opportunity, pray right in the moment. Friends who, when they say they are willing to drop everything and help, mean it; and we know they mean it.

And the e-mail I received this morning, from a friend who did not even know of Nancy’s recent crises:

Dear Rick, I’ve been praying every day for you and for your family. I know I didn’t write to you after your grandbaby died, and I feel bad about that, but I don’t want you to think that means I don’t love you, because I do. It’s easy to pray for you. I would find it hard to forget!

But something about the season of Advent changes all that. Words start to flow like milk and honey! … If you have some time, I’d love it if I could call you and have a good talk. If not, don’t worry, I get that! But consider this message a hug and an expression of genuine friendship and great regard. My brother in Christ! It’s just so great that God loves us, and love is just such a cool thing!

Well. Is there better medicine that that? And I don’t mean to disparage the precious notes and calls from other friends, from brief “I’m thinking about you,” to long letters, all precious. A friend in Arizona with whom (I regret) I don’t speak to as often as we used to, reminds me that Thursday of every week he prays for me and my family. Another friend is bursting with news she knows I want to hear, but gives me space and a prayer that the space is occupied with blessing. Reaching out in such ways is what friends, especially Christian friends, DO.

In the family of God, NOTHING is more precious than the fact of family: we are brothers and sisters in Christ, children of a loving God who has graced us with salvation and a promise of eternal life, with Him in glory.

And part of that blessed truth is that we have a promise… but we don’t have to wait for the promise to fulfill itself in Heaven. We can know it now, and in the midst of trials, share the love of Christ in a way that the world can hear about but never FEEL, Hallelujah.

This is something we don’t often enough gives thanks for in and of itself; at least I don’t. It is a wonderful gift of God, and truly a gracious thing, because we hardly deserve it. While we were yet sinners, God visited humankind and sent His Son to assume the guilt for our sins. On this Thanksgiving week, I picture it like this: our natural selves rebel and insult God in many ways, uncountable times, and God’s response is almost like “Thank you.” Huh? “I am sending my only-begotten Son as a sacrifice for your transgressions. Believe on Him.”

That is not exactly a “Thank you,” of course, But as His “You’re welcome,” before we even repent, it is a form of advance-“Thank you”… and it merits from us a lifetime of continual “Thank YOUs” and “You’re welcomes,” and praises and gratitudes. And thanks. Of the most profound sort.

What my friend this morning showed is the proof that Christ lives in us. That is to say, such expressions as she made is evidence of the Spirit-filled heart, for we are told that in such things it is not us, but the Christ who lives within us who enables us to do such things.

I am reminded of the mirror-image, an insight Nancy had during our hospital ministry after her transplants. When Satan attacks us, it is not us whom he hates – for, clearly, he has little regard for us – but he hates the Christ within us. The more Jesus in our hearts, the more he attacks.

Abraham Lincoln set aside the third Thursday of November for the nation to gives thanks to God. He summed up sentiments of previous leaders, and anticipated powerful proclamations from some of his successors in the office. Indeed we should give thanks to God for our bounties and harvests, our material blessings. But Lincoln also admonished, and people like my dear friends remind me, that we must remember, and cannot help be thankful for, the Author of those blessings. How He works in our lives; how He lives in fellow believers; how He can, and should, inhabit our works.

Thank God.

+ + +

The moving hymn “Now Thank We All Our God,” appropriate this week and every week of our lives, has an interesting story behind it. The best hymns do. It was written by Pastor Martin Rinckart during the Thirty Years’ War. In the Saxon town of Eilenburg, the site of battles and pillage and plagues, he was the only clergyman who survived to minister to the ravaged populace. At one point he performed 50 funerals a day, and the year he wrote this hymn, 1637, he performed more than 4000 funerals. Nevertheless, in the midst of it all, he wrote “Now Thank We All Our God” for his family. Was there any way to summon peace and praise in such circumstances, except by the Holy Spirit? “Nun Danke alle Gott” was used as a theme several times by Bach, and was – and should be – a vital component of church worship ever since. It was translated into English by Catherine Winkworth in 1856.

Click: Now Thank We All Our God