Monday Morning Music Ministry

7-9-18

I recently delivered the message at a friend’s memorial service. I was asked by her mother, who had only three months ago lost her husband too. Life and death are not supposed to run that way, mothers burying daughters. But I have learned of other sicknesses and deaths in my circle. And people who came to me after the service also shared many stories of recent sad news, deaths, and afflictions.

Life happens.

What should not happen is that we, God’s children, take comfort in fantasies of our own imaginings. Not that these things happened at the service, but we often hear and perhaps say – and I pray not believe – that so-and-so is now dancing with angels. Or reunited with his or her favorite pets. Or watching over us.

Such fables perhaps are well intentioned. But to describe Heaven, or to contemplate our own eternal lives, in such ways, reveal that we do not know the Bible. Or, if know the Bible, we thereby presume to know more than it says. Are we wiser than the revealed Lord? Will He turn the universe of His creation upside-down because we hope to act in a fictional play of our own desires?

Whatever we do NOT know of death and eternity – indeed, all of life’s mysteries – puts us in the position of wanting to create God in our own image. Let it not be so! The riches of His glory are so great, so literally indescribable, that we cannot begin to choreograph what He has in store.

Remember that truth, that whatever we cannot imagine is so much greater than that which we know. Trust God: there is a reason we do not know all. Trust Jesus: “In My house there are many mansions [prepared for you], if it were not so, I would not have told you.” Trust the Holy Spirit, who has been sent to lead us to all Truth.

Coping, as we must, however, with life’s challenges and griefs, and with all the mysteries of life, not to mention death, it is natural that many of us turn to books and tracts that collect Bible verses of comfort. They are sometimes arranged by category of concerns; otherwise a Bible concordance can serve the same purposes. They contain “God’s Promises.” Yes, from God’s word.

In all respect, literally, to God and to all of you, I say that we must remember that another “Promise Book” can be compiled from many proverbs, warnings, commandments, epistles, sermons, and exhortations in the Bible. These “other” promises are also God’s words, after all.

God, by His inspiration of writers and prophets and judges and apostles and disciples and missionaries, spoke of many things.

You might lose jobs; your family and neighbors might think you crazy; you will be a lone, and very lonely, voice defending the truth.

These are not threats or warnings, strictly. Coldly, these are promises of God. The way of a Christian is not easy… never has been… never will be. In God’s providence, He did not mean it to be easy. Jesus took up His cross, and we were told – yes, promised – that we must do the same to be worthy of Him, worthy of Eternity.

A downer? No! Even more Bible promises assure us that it is a privilege to die with Christ. We are His ambassadors here on earth. He lives within us, and His Holy Spirit empowers us… that we will be more than conquerors.

And those trials of life? Challenges, disappointments, rejections, fear? I ask you to look at the promise that He would never leave us nor forsake us, and remember some incidents.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego could have been spared the fiery furnace if God chose to destroy it. Yet they displayed faith, and were protected through the fire. God could close up the Valley of the Shadow of Death… yet when we walk through it, we are protected by His rod and His staff; they comfort us. By faith, Abraham was even willing to sacrifice his son Isaac, yet the Lord stayed his hand, blessed Abraham and his descendants, and gave us a picture of Jesus’s sacrifice when God was willing. And so on – the list of God’s promises, and their fulfillment or puzzling postponement, that Mystery of His ways.

“God had planned something better… so that only together with us would they be made perfect.” We are parts of that “scarlet thread of redemption.” The powerful truths of His promises do not depend on our understanding of them! He asks only faithful obedience.

If you ignore the least commandment and teach others to do the same, you will be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven. But anyone who obeys God’s laws and teaches them will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven (Matt. 5:19).

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Click: Come Harvest Time

11-3-14

We believe Jesus in many ways and about many things; or we like to believe we do. But often, when He speaks most directly, His humble servants – you and me – tend to either miss the significance of His words, or sometimes over-think them. Does that happen in your life?

In either of those cases His words lose their effect! Unplugging Jesus? That’s not just foolish; it could be dangerous.

I am speaking specifically of His promises to us, and when we don’t act on them. Why would the Son of God “go out on a limb” and promise us peace and healing and forgiveness and wisdom and strength and power, unless He can fulfill those promises; and wants us to take Him at His word; and have us try to exercise spiritual gifts? And if we don’t – if we hear them, but are timid, or weak in faith, or exercise excuses – are we not, in effect, calling Him a liar?

In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus said: “Come to me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke on you and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and my load is not hard to carry” (11:28-39, NET).

Could there be a sweeter promise? We don’t have to be farmers or ploughmen to understand the analogy. All we have to be is human beings – with our usual problems and fears and disappointments; and, sometimes, doubts – to FEEL the unspeakable joy that such an invitation holds. But yet, we do not always avail ourselves of the promise.

How often do we feel unworthy to bring all our problems for the Lord to deal with, especially if they are of our own making? How often do we feel that our spirituality should not admit to needing any help – “we can take it from here, Lord”? How often do we over-intellectualize, searching scripture, seeking counsel, even praying, praying, praying? Those all might represent good “B” answers… when the “A” answer is the promise of Jesus!

How often do we do these things (or not do these things)? The answer is – often. Too often.

“Take your burden to the Lord leave it there.” You know, there is a lot of room at the foot of the cross. More than we can imagine. One burden. Many of our burdens. Huge burdens. The burdens of many. And in the meantime – on our way to the cross to leave them, so to speak – Jesus will be our yoke, lifting the load, carrying our burdens for us.

There is a hymn, “Leave It There,” describing this very practice, taking our burdens to the Lord. It has special significance to me and my family. After the heart and kidney transplants of my wife Nancy at Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia, we conducted a hospital ministry to heart-failure and transplant patients. For six years we (that is, Nancy and me and our three children Heather, Ted, and Emily) would conduct services and visit patients’ rooms once or twice every week.

In our services, “Leave It There” became a favorite hymn, often requested by patients, some of whom heard it for the first time in those services, and by patients who came and went through the years. Among its comforting, and strengthening, lines: “If your body suffers pain and your health you can’t regain, And your soul is almost sinking in despair, Jesus knows the pain you feel, He can save and He can heal; Take your burden to the Lord and leave it there. ~~ Leave it there, leave it there, Take your burden to the Lord and leave it there; If you trust and never doubt, He will surely bring you out! Take your burden to the Lord and leave it there.”

It was written by Charles Albert Tindley, born in 1851, the son of a slave. By age five he was orphaned, but at 17, after the Civil War, he had taught himself to read and write. He moved from Maryland to Philadelphia, working for no pay as a church custodian but, aspiring to the ministry, he learned Greek and Hebrew. The African Methodist Episcopal Church accredited him on the basis of outstanding test scores and preaching skills. For several years he was placed in different churches in different cities, impressing his congregations and winning converts.

Pastor, Deacon, Elder… eventually Tindley received a call to a congregation in Philadelphia. Thus did this servant of God become pastor of the church where he once worked as an unpaid janitor. When he preached his first sermon there, 130 members sat in the pews. Eventually under him the church had more than 10,000 worshipers. He preached, he championed civic causes, and he wrote astonishing hymns and gospel songs. One became the basis of the Civil Rights anthem, “We Shall Overcome.”

Another was “Take Your Burden To the Lord, and Leave It There.”

Doing research during the course of our hospital ministry, I was surprised to learn that the author of our makeshift congregations’ favorite hymn lived and preached in Tindley Temple, just down North Broad Street from where we met every Sunday morning. We had a connection with Dr. Tindley, who died in 1933, that seemed more than coincidental. Did he, with all the challenges he faced and, yes, burdens he bore, always “trust and never doubt”? That likely is not the case… but he was, as an overcomer, an example of someone who took those burdens to the Lord and left them there.

Those very acts, trusting and fighting the temptation to doubt, will be honored by God. He will surely bring you out.

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The great Jessy Dixon sings the anthem of faith, “Leave It There,” as only he could.
Click: Leave It There

8-6-12

Recently I heard a world-famous preacher talk about God’s promises. Actually, it was the wife of a world-famous preacher, who had developed quite a thriving business with her own ministry. These days it seems that evangelists and big-name ministers are not just called to preach the Gospel, but called to be the wife, or son, of a big-name preacher. Prosperity often follows.

Actually, that was the topic – prosperity – of this evangelista, who shall remain nameless. But Victoria Osteen is not the only prophet of the Prosperity Gospel these days. Many of my brothers and sisters in the Pentecostal churches, and in other corners of Christianity, frequently preach about prosperity, “seed offerings,” the blessings that await the faithful – under the general, spiritual umbrella of “receiving God’s promises.”

Content warning: I do not intend to join the debate, here, on the theology of what should be a more active discussion in today’s American church. I want to address our response to the promises of God, not whether people are wasting chances for nice homes and cars, or whether people are wickedly twisting the words of the Bible, or whether naiveté or agendas have driven new translations and understandings.

For my own part, the plausibility of God’s intention to shower me with material things was shaken years ago when the magazine of a favorite evangelist printed a chart that explained the “hundredfold return” that Jesus promised. It explained by simple arithmetic how dollars given as offering would return in dollars that were, well, one hundred times greater. A sure bet.

Mark 10:28-31: Then Peter began to say to Him, “See, we have left all and followed You.” So Jesus answered and said, “Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands, for My sake and the gospel’s, who shall not receive a hundredfold now in this time – houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions – and in the age to come, eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”

Hmmm. Christ’s fine print included sacrifices that do not mention money; results in this life and the next; persecutions might be numbered among the “dividends”; and a warning against expecting anything by formula. It IS called the Hundredfold “Return,” not “Reward.”

So much for not joining the debate, but I do urge us all to think about God’s promises for a moment. God had made many promises to us, His children. Many more than we realize. More than most of us ever… take advantage of? … receive? With terms like that we stray close to presumption, a sin. Not petitioning God to do something, not expecting, but presuming He will do something; and as it turns out in the circumstances of believers, it translates to Him do doing something we want. Not usually the mode of the Almighty.

Bookstores are full of biblical “Promise Books”… and should be. Indeed, God has made many promises. In fact, besides the history and commandments, we can say that the entire Bible is “God’s Promise Book”! Some of God’s promises are conditional, of course. But His greatest promise – eternal life bought by the substitutionary death of His Son – is unconditional. Jesus died while we were yet sinners, and we are free to accept or reject this unspeakable gift according to His grace.

How often do the evangelists talk about OUR promises, in between “calling in” those of God? Every one of us, maybe in different ways, have made the same promises to God – when we received Christ into our hearts; when we have been hurting; when we have sought forgiveness; after we have sinned; at times of confusion; when crises have hit; during challenges in the areas of health, finances, career, loved ones; and so forth in an endless list. When we recite the Lord’s Prayer or the Creeds, we exchange promises with God. The mere act of repentance – a frequent thing for Christians – is tantamount to making a promise.

… and how often do we break our promises to God? How many times do we sin? The thoughts, words, and deeds, even of “saints,” are not perfect. We break our word to the Creator of the Universe, the master of our souls. Often. And we have the audacity to call God out about what we perceive to be His promises to us? God cannot lie, no… but let us be a little humble about this Promise thing. As Micah wrote, He has showed you, oh man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?

Does God want us to prosper? I say that it is not inconsistent with His will. But I have a friend who once said to me, with tears in his eyes, “I KNOW if I were rich, I would lose control of myself in a lot of ways, afford the sins I used to lust over… probably kill myself in the process.” If this man was correct about himself, it would be a merciful God who would prosper him in radically different ways.

Farther along, we will understand the finer points of theology. But we can receive the spiritual blessings of justice, mercy, and humility, right now. That is a solid promise we can take to the REAL bank.

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Part of a Christian’s humility is accepting that we will never know some things… or know them “farther along.” Here that great old hymn of faith is sung in a living-room setting – complete with flubbed lines! – by three of the most beautiful singers, and beautiful voices, in music today: Suzy Bogguss, who opens and sings the verses; Matraca Berg; and Gretchen Peters on the mandolin. A prosperity of talent! (With the line, “And still we wonder why others prosper…”)

Click: Farther Along

3-12-12

Sixteen years ago, when my wife Nancy was waiting for her heart transplant, our family was led to start a ministry on the Heart Failure floor of Temple University Hospital. Many stories, many salvation decisions, many laughs and tears, many healings, and many mysteries — the sweet God-mysteries — came from the six years we wound up serving patients and their families.

One guy, a rough-cut, white-haired old Italian laborer from New Jersey, was gruff or friendly, depending on his whim. It was usually gruff when we invited him to makeshift services. Vinnie could often be found on the treadmill — I began to suspect that he didn’t need a heart transplant, but was on the floor in some witness-protection program. Some weeks the treadmill was in the solarium, where we held our services, so he occasionally hung around the back door or sat by the window, looking out over Philadelphia, waiting for us all to leave.

Vinnie finally did get his heart. The donor program found a perfect match… on paper. As sometimes happened with heart transplants we witnessed and lived through, “everything” was right, yet Vinnie suffered a stroke on the operating table. He made the usual return to the floor for recuperation, but burly Vinnie started wasting away. He couldn’t move most of his body; he could barely speak; he couldn’t get out of bed, much less hop on the old treadmill.

One Sunday I stopped in Vinnie’s room before our service in the solarium. I small-talked and finally said I had to leave. “Are you going to have the music?” he managed to ask — that’s what he called our services. And I took a cue from the look in his eye. I kidded him: “Hey, buddy, don’t you go anywhere. Church is coming to you this morning.” Everyone who had gathered in the solarium, Nancy and her sermon notes, my kids, even strangers and staff that morning, crowded into Vinnie’s room, spilling out into the hallway. Music and monitors somehow fit in, too, all around his bed.

We opened with prayer, and, in the quiet room, I asked Vinnie if he had a special request. He managed to whisper a gravelly: “Yeah. Can you sing that sparrow song you always sing?”

“His Eye Is On the Sparrow” is based on the sweet promise of Matthew 10:29-31. We often worry about our circumstances – but are we not worth more than sparrows? Even those small birds cannot fall to earth without Father God noticing… and caring. How much more does our Heavenly father love us?

Do YOU always sing this song, or the joy behind its meanings? Do you always remember the promise? Old Vinnie didn’t make it long after that bedside music that he reached out for. But the tears on his face showed that he was at peace with the One who, ultimately and in His loving way, watched over him.

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If big problems or “little things” loom up this week… remember the words of Jesus and, here, the voices of Selah: blessings that will bring you through.

Click: “His Eye Is On the Sparrow”

I’m not sure I’ve ever known a time when so many people — so many Christian friends — are distressed, hurting, facing challenges, as right now.

Of course it’s the economy. Of course there are political crises. Of course when a culture loses its moorings, the ship is going to be tossed around. And the people in it will be buffeted.

The Bible not only warns about such travail… it assures us its part of the package: raining on the just and unjust; but also that the faithful will experience persecution.

Yet we are not without a Friend, and surely not without hope. A new precious friend, Becky Spencer, has a CD out with a wonderful song of hers, “The Coldest Winter (Always Turns to Spring),” and it got me thinking… spring always follows winter; life replaces death, the sun always shines after the storm. And isn’t the most beautiful Spring the one that follows the hardest Winter? and the most amazing sunny day the kind right after an awful storm has swept through?

There is hope, and even in hard times (not SPARED from hard times, but THROUGH hard times) God’s promises are true. This song sung by Cynthia Clawson reminds us, even further, that even when the storm is at its worst, behind the clouds the Sun is still shining!

Click:  It Won’t Rain Always