Now that we’ve entered the month of November, I’m thinking about Thanksgiving and the holidays. It seems fitting for the season to take several posts over the next two weeks to consider gratitude and thanks-giving.
When we think about Thanksgiving, it’s often in the context of giving God thanks for all of the blessings He has showered upon us. We know that every good and perfect gift comes from above. We can look around us and see many ways He has blessed us—our life and the breath in our lungs, family and friends, homes and food, the beauty of creation, good work for our hands and minds—and we must never forget all that He has done for us through the life and death of Jesus Christ. This is fitting and right and our constant duty—to give Him thanks.
But this thanksgiving to God should overflow into our interactions with other people. As Christians, we should be a thankful people, and those we constantly interact with should see the mark of gratitude on us. While we are giving thanks to the Lord, we should also turn to those beside us and express our thanksgiving for the role they play in our story.
Read moreFriends, if we call ourselves Christians, we have the high calling of being ambassadors and harbingers of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ. We are to welcome and work for this Kingdom to come to earth, as it is in Heaven. We are to represent all that He is to the world. We should look like Him.
When emotions run high, we look for the way of Jesus, the way of His Kingdom. Look at your neighbors, your co-workers, other parents at your children’s school, fellow church members, and yes, even those on your Facebook feed. How can you best represent Jesus Christ to them? How can you lay down your life for them? How can you offer compassion and understanding? How can you extend generosity and grace? How can you speak for love and peace, healing and reconciliation? How can you be an ambassador of His Kingdom?
Read moreFear appears to be a universal part of the human experience. Our fears stretch from the mundane to the profound. Fear of spiders and thunderstorms grows up into fears of failure and rejection. We’re afraid of people who are different from us. We’re afraid of things we don’t understand. We’re afraid of an uncertain future.
Some fears are understandable. Groups like ISIS in the Middle East and Boko Haram in Nigeria spread brutal violence and unsettle villages and local governments. Economic uncertainty plagues some, as they wonder what will come of their jobs and their families. Elections—in the United States and elsewhere—have been fraught with fear over who will come to power and what havoc they may wreck once they’re there. Some Christians profess fear over losing religious liberties or watching a secular culture encroach on their lives.
In scary and uncertain times, it is easy to make decisions or shape our attitudes based on fear (even if we would like to call it by another name). When these fear-based decisions and attitudes encroach on opportunities to live out faith, hope, and love, we have lost sight of something very important. Because at this point, our fear has taken us to a place beyond the realm of a reasonable sense of caution or the desire to make wise decisions. Fear has made us lose sight of the God we worship and the Savior we follow, as we begin to compromise on living as faithful disciples of Jesus for the sake of assuaging our fear. When fear compromises our discipleship, we are succumbing to a faulty view of reality. This sort of fear, which we so often see expressed, should not have a place in the Christian.
In the Bible we read hundreds of times the command “Fear not.” Always, God’s people are told “Do not be afraid.” Do not be afraid of political forces that are swirling out of control. Do not be afraid of your adversaries. Do not be afraid of that which you do not understand. Do not be afraid when people speak ill of you or when injustice prevails. In fact, I cannot think of a single instance we’re instructed to fear anything—besides God himself.
Read moreDon’t the Israelites continually provide a vivid picture of human nature? They’re in the wilderness. In spite of their grumbling and doubting, the Lord provides manna for them for each day. There is always enough—they should learn to rely on its consistency. Each morning, when they wake and step from their tents into the light of a new day, a thick coating of the Lord’s grace and care waits for them to gather—manna for another day. But still they try to make a storehouse of the manna, gathering extra, “just in case,” they might say. Let’s save up a little extra…just in case God doesn’t come through like He always does?
Of course we know from the story that their attempt to keep extra manna doesn’t work, and it spoils over night. They once again must walk into the Lord’s new day with new provision—always enough but never early.
It would seem it’s a universal part of human nature to want some control over our lives. Isn’t that part of the reason behind the Israelites’ desire to hoard God’s provided manna?—Just have a little set back, so we have a back-up plan, so we don’t feel helpless, so we don’t have to enter each day supported only by faith that God will provide. We don’t like to be utterly dependent on Him. Dependence is a word and a feeling that easily frightens us. It strips us down so that faith in God’s continued provision and sustenance is what holds us up.
Read moreThis post is a part of an ongoing series on spiritual disciplines, which are tools that bring us into contact with the Lord so that His presence can shape our lives. Learn more here.
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For hundreds of years, monks in monastic orders across the world have paused throughout the day to pray. These structured prayer times are typically called the Daily (or Divine) Office or the Liturgy of the Hours. Since the 5th-century, there have been seven set times of prayer for monastic communities (though in the 6th-century, Benedict added an 8th prayer time).
It’s easy to see how your day would become shaped around and centered on prayer if about every three hours—including the middle of the night—you stopped what you were doing to pray. It would change your focus. God could not be an afterthought.
This wasn’t a practice that was made up in the early middle ages, though. Regular times of prayer throughout the day was a Jewish practice, it would seem, since the time of the Old Testament. It was also a part of the early Christian church.
Consider any mother at home with young children—it’s impossible for them to be forgotten because they keep breaking into her world. They need fed. Diapers need changed. Conflicts need resolving. She cannot lose sight of her children—they wouldn’t let her because they continue to break into her day.
The reality of God’s presence and rule over the day was just as apparent for these Christians. He could not be avoided or crowded out. The day was structured so that He continuously broke in and interrupted their daily activities.
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