Monday Morning Music Ministry

6-6-22

Prayer. It is a mysterious thing, really. A gift proffered by the Creator of the Universe to every one of His children – the invitation to have a conversation.

It can be a chat, for it is not supposed to be a one-way street. We let the burdens of our hearts be known; we lift our praise and gratitude; we sometimes cry in helpless confusion.

Other “gods” and figureheads of various religious traditions do not converse. How were they portrayed? They dispensed wisdom or rules. They demand tribute. They have no counterparts of the Holy Spirit, the aspect of God who lives in our hearts and is our Advocate before the Throne.

We are assured that God covets our prayers, and hears the prayers of the righteous; that His Word never comes back void; that the Holy Spirit – when we are unable to pray or might feel inadequate – will nevertheless “groan” on our behalf.

We often list our desires… but the Lord knows our needs. Thank God.

And that is part of the mystery, beyond the miracle that God knows even the number of hairs on our heads: He knows our needs. In fact He feels our pains and joys and burdens and petitions before we organize them in prayer. He knows, already. And He knows the answers.

So why pray? Why does He need for us to approach Him? Why does He “communicate”?

In prayerful communication, He speaks to our hearts; He sometimes speaks audibly; He brings “the peace of God, which passes understanding,” as is promised about prayer; He has assured us that fervent prayer “avails much.”

Part of the mystery should be clear – we are blessed by the act of praying, even before the answers come. Further, prayer is the most palpable form of obedience we can exercise: believing, approaching, trusting – the essence of faith. Prayer is the “key to Heaven, and faith unlocks the door,” as the Gospel song says. We are encouraged to pray for one another: such is our duty, and it pleases God that we fellowship with the saints. The Gifts of the Spirit, enumerated throughout the New Testament, include praying “in the Spirit,” surrendering our tongues and hearts to the language of angels, clearing worldly impediments to conversation with God.

Yet our natural minds still have natural questions.

Frequently asked by skeptics, and sometimes in corners of our own hearts: When we pray “fervently,” when we are “righteous” according to scriptural verses on the matter, when we “pray believing” as commanded, when we seem to be in accord with His Word, when we pray selflessly as we know how…

Why does God sometimes seem to be silent? Why does He sometimes say “no”? More – why does He sometimes seem to say “NO!!!”

An answer, as hard as it often is to accept, is that “no” is an answer. Prayer is not a magic wand. God is not an errand boy. But our response must encompass a deeper understanding than this. God is sovereign; He knows best. He knows better than our want-lists, even when our requests are sincere and righteous. As we agreed, we have our desires; He knows our needs.

Further, as obedient children of a loving God, we have to know that a “no” can really be a “not yet.” Or, “not in your way, but Mine.” Thus saith the Lord.

To reassure ourselves, let’s look at some notable things God did not do… yet, still, were answers to prayer, and examples of how He works His loving will toward us.

• Moses was leading the Hebrew children from the wrath of Pharaoh’s army. The Promised Land was far ahead, but the multitude was stopped at the Red Sea. A miracle-working God could have answered prayers by drying the waters. But God’s answer was to part the waters. There is a message for us in the way those prayers were answered: God makes a way.
• Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were condemned to death, to be cast into the dreaded “Fiery Furnace.” To honor their faith, God could have struck the King dead, or scattered the guards, or extinguished the flames. Yet prayers were answered when they survived unharmed (and in the presence of that “fourth man” appearing at their side). There is a message for us in the way those prayers were answered: God protects us.
• In the well-known Psalm of comfort, we are told to prepare for the “valley of the shadow of death.” If God chooses, He easily could set our paths on the mountaintops above such a valley. Yet we are encouraged to “fear no evil” because His rod and staff will comfort us… in the presence of our enemies. There is a message for us in the way those prayers were answered: God will be by our side.

In these examples, I think we all might have prayed urgently, probably expectantly, surely hopefully.

Naturally. But, hard as it would be to realize, those prayers would not be conversations. God’s lessons would be lost. Yet they happened, and were recorded, for reasons. We were the reasons; to learn the ways in which we can draw closer to God.

And to pray “Thy will be done” at the end, as well as the beginning, of our chats with God.

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Click: In the Night Shadows

7-12-21

We all endure trials in life; and we recently discussed that fact here. Some trials, of course, are more severe than others… some only seem so, and lesser challenges become bigger obstacles… and some trials are “blessings in disguise.”

You have heard that expression, “a blessing in disguise.” Whenever I hear it, I think of the story about Winston Churchill during the London blitz, looking out over a burning city. An aide supposedly said, “Perhaps this is a blessing disguise.” Churchill supposedly harrumphed, “Some blessing. Some disguise.”

We see through a glass darkly, and cannot always know the larger picture. That is one reason why faith, and prayer, and reliance on God, are so important.

These days, I am persuaded, our trials are worse than ever, at least unique at this point in history. I refer to our national trials and trauma – the challenges we face in society, the breakdown of morals and manners, standards and traditions; betrayal by institutions and destructiveness by groups and individuals.

And I also refer to personal trials. How can I know the trials outside my circle of friends and correspondents? Because our society’s crises are causing personal crises. Many of our trials, yours and mine, in the areas of friends, family, finances, security, and confidence flow from the dissolution of our culture. Addiction, abuse, violence, crime, broken relationships, abortion… these are trials we endure in the larger realms of our lives, and the close-up spheres of our existence.

Let us think of one of the most iconic examples of a trial, so famous that it has entered the language, “going through the fiery furnace.”

In the Book of Daniel, chapter 3, is the account of Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar, who constructed a golden idol and commanded that all bow down before it. And anyone who refused would be executed, thrown into a blazing furnace. The king was told that three officials, named Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, refused to worship the golden statue.

They were brought before the king and explained that they worshiped only the God of the Bible, and would not bow down to an idol. Nebuchadnezzar commanded that they be thrown into the fiery furnace, heated seven times hotter than normal. It was so hot that, it was written, the jailers handling them died of the heat. When the king was able look into the furnace, however, he saw the three walking around, not bent, not bowed, not burned. And he saw a fourth figure with them – he said looking “like a son of God.”

Who was the fourth man? Not an angel; not a Holy Fireman except by metaphor. Bible scholars regard the Fourth Man as the pre-incarnate Jesus, as He did appear at times through the Old Testament.

This is a lesson for us today.

Unlike some other nuanced views, this is what I take away:
* There will be trials, always; don’t kid yourself.
* Never compromise with the “world system.” We are surrounded by idols these days. Don’t be seduced; don’t compromise; do not lose faith.
* Don’t bend; don’t bow; and you will not be burnt.
* If God wanted to spare those three men, He could have extinguished the fire. He could have made the furnace crumble. He could have struck down the king and the jailers.
* God had them go through the trial, and then save them, as a lesson in Faith. For us.
* Jesus is with us in trials. He does not want us to pray that “life” never happens… but to trust Him when “life happens.”

“Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…” Notice again that God doesn’t push us toward peaceful detours. But He promises to be with us… so we can “fear no evil.”

The rotten world-system today is our King Nebuchadnezzar. Our crises – and they are real – are our personal fiery furnaces. Are you thinking of a family problem, or at the other extreme, society’s mess? Do you grieve over a friend, the school board, the White House, everything in between? Do not compromise, do not fear, do not bend, do not bow…

… and you will not burn. Look for that Fourth Man. He is with you.

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One of my favorite actors, Charles Laughton, once appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show and dramatically recited, from memory, the story of the Fourth Man. Please watch! (The only mistake was, he called it the fourth chapter of Daniel instead of the third.) By the way, can you imagine a Hollywood star, today, being invited on prime-time TV to recite a chapter from the Bible? Times HAVE changed.

Click: Charles Laughton Shares the Story of the Fiery Furnace

8-12-19

Conversation in the doctor’s waiting room. A woman next to me said, after reeling off her worries, “… but as the Bible says, God never gives us more than we can handle.”

Me: “You know, the Bible does not say that.”

“It doesn’t? I’m sure it does!”

Fortune cookies, yes. Greeting cards, yes. Even sermons, yes. But the Bible – prophets, poets, kings, disciples, Jesus? – no.

In fact, if we think about it, troubles and sickness and problems usually are attacks from the devil, or the results of our own folly… but not “sent” by God. He doesn’t “give” us more than we can handle. That is not how He works. He “gives” us hope. And strength. And faith. And wisdom. And, yes, deliverance.

But He does not visit us with bad things, even temptations. That’s in the devil’s job description, not God’s.

A proper understanding of this can change our lives. We should be free of the pagan superstition that God pushes us to the edge all the time. We are His children, and He is not a child abuser.

He did not tempt Jesus in the wilderness. That was Satan.

Let’s dig deeper into these ideas about challenges and God. I say He does not “give” junk to us. The world will ask, “If He is a loving God, then why doesn’t He prevent those problems?” A question that seems logical. He could have plucked Jesus from the cross. He could have put out the fire in the furnace before the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar ordered Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to be tossed therein. The “valley of the shadow of death”? Why didn’t God promise simply to keep us away from the cursed valley?

Well, those actions are not in God’s job description.

He never promised us a trouble-free life. Some people never quite understand that! In fact, it is guaranteed that troubles will come our way… and the more Jesus there is in our hearts, the more the devil will attack. Stone cold, that. So what does God promise? Let us re-visit the three examples:
Jesus was on the cross to fulfill God’s plan, and to demonstrate His love for us. He would not interrupt that.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego did not avoid the fire, but were saved in the midst of the fire. Brought through. And manifested the “fourth man” who appeared with them, the pre-incarnate Jesus. Lesson delivered.

Walking though the valley of the shadow of death? God promises to be with us… not to slap us down a detour. We learn (or should learn) trust and faith, because He is with us in those times.

As Andrae Crouch wrote and sang, “I thank Him for the storms He brought me through, For if I’d never had a problem, I wouldn’t know God could solve them… I’d never know what faith in God could do.”

God always “gives” us exactly what we need.

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Click: Through It All

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

1-16-17

Four years ago this week my wife lay dying. She had been sick for a long time – all her life, really – but in recent years the diabetes and heart attacks and strokes and cancers and heart and kidney transplants and amputations and much else, had taken their toll. She suffered a hemorrhage, lost most of her blood before transfusion, and was in a coma for a week. Our children flew in from far and wide – half an hour away; from across the continent; from Ireland.

It was on Monday, January 21. In the hallways of the hospital, and from other rooms, we could hear the TVs turned to news: Inauguration Day. It was pushed back from January 20, as the Constitution respects Sundays. We stood around Nancy’s bed, with monitors blinking, and we faintly could hear the pomp and circumstance, the music and announcers, from the Capitol steps, echoing in shiny hospital hallways.

At the moment, the very moment, that Obama took the oath of office, Nancy died. The monitor flat-lined. The first of us to break the silence was my son Ted: “Mom always said that if Obama actually became president a second time, she’d just die.”

Families have different ways of coping. Seeped in humor and politics for years, we evidently found ours. Lest we be thought cold, my daughter Emily will tell people that we had grieved for Nancy in many ways for many previous years.

“My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” says the Lord
(Isaiah 55:8-9). Thank God.

This anniversary of sorts has me thinking of the upcoming inauguration, also. Meditating upon God’s ways, I thought about that famous unpredictable, larger-than-life character; intemperate and over the top in uncountable ways; notable for prowess and strong actions, but also for womanizing and crazy hair. Well known to history. An unlikely person to be chosen by God to lead and perhaps redeem His people.

Donald Trump?

No, actually I was thinking of Samson.

We can find parallels, antecedents, and foreshadows wherever we look, if we look hard enough; affinities as well as exceptions to rules that tempt us to draw lessons. So I will only go so far. I mean, Samson was flawed, yet ultimately obeyed the commands of righteousness. He tore down the temple; yet to reform the system he deigned to destroy its artifice.

With Trump a new era begins – and I think this is, for once, not a quadrennial cliché. At the beginning of the campaign I opposed him, wrote against him, saying that I would not want to vote for someone whom I would not want as a neighbor. I still am not reconciled to his coarseness… but I have learned to discern between scatology and straight talk. The vocabulary of hard truths and agenda of bold solutions.

As the campaign progressed, he defined his message and platform, even to enumerating specific grievances and remedies, while his opponents in the primaries and general election actually grew less explicit about their own views. Week by week, citizens in living rooms and kitchens, churches and taverns, offices and factories, started to think that things they had complained about last week – and even since the ‘60s – were finally being articulated. And by someone who they seemed to trust would not forget them, as politicians always do.

The silent revolt of the Silent Majority is thus explained. No mystery. People with grievances; evangelicals; disillusioned working people; long-suffering victims of stagnation and rising crime rates and economic insecurity and public corruption… did not stay home this year. No mystery. People who had become too cynical to vote for president, for years, trekked to the voting booths. I know. I was one of them.

But, now what? Who knows? A man as unpredictable as Donald Trump might wind up disappointing his legions. But I don’t think so. More likely, he will disappoint nervous Republican politicians who are hoping he will revert to form in Washington DC – to be the same old, do the same old.

But the entrenched interests – those within his own party; and those who thirst for his blood, even before the inauguration, from the Disloyal Opposition – sense their possible doom, and they will fight like wounded rats. Return to this essay in a year, in four years, in a decade, if the nation and the world last that long. Let’s see: I say that myriad things will never be the same. We are at a turning point.

Civility; good will; public discourse; genuine bipartisanship; legislative compromise; political traditions… all are now virtually extinct. Those geniis will never return to those bottles. And if your first mental response to this was, “Yes, but remember what so-and-so did…” inserting the name of your favorite enemy, you have proven my point.

Samson tore down the temple, a necessary act of obedience. Daniel calmed vicious lions. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego endured the fiery furnace. David was a horrid and lustful sinner who yet was anointed of God for great works. Review the heroes of faith and history, and pray that President Trump may be found not wanting.

Get ready for a ride. Whether Donald Trump is a committed Christian I know not. But he can receive, as any of us can, and act upon, God’s call. Buckle up your prayer sandals: the new president will need our prayers, as does the nation, as do we all, every one of us.

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Click: Battle Hymn Of the Republic