truth

November 12, 2020

And the Winner Is . . .

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Odds favor that on January 20, 2021, the United States of America will inaugurate Joe Biden as our 46th president. Presidential Election Day falls on the first Tuesday of November every four years and, approximately 10 weeks later, the first day of the presidential term begins. Our republic has an organized system of governance and election protocols. While I won’t dig deeply into detail, here are a few key dates to be aware of:

November 3: Election Day
December 14: Electoral college voting
January 6: Congressional counting of electoral college ballots
January 20: Presidential Inauguration Day

Currently, we have a contested election. This means for most of us in the general public, a period of waiting. Waiting for legal issues to be resolved, waiting for state ballot counts to be certified, waiting for the electoral college to meet, waiting for those ballots to be tabulated in Congress, waiting for Inauguration Day.

At Elim, we know waiting, and we know there can be some discomfort in the process. We await God’s revealing of a permanent lead pastor. In this time of not knowing, we do well to rest in the trust of God’s continuing provision and, therefore, His preparation of the man who will serve Jesus, in our midst, into the future.

In this world, there will be legal battles. There will be wars of words. There will be tumult and tempests. This is certainly true when it comes to our political environment. And to put it lightly, God has some knowledge and experience in this area.

Jesus, facing the greatest “political” battle of his life, stood before Pilate, Governor of Judaea. He spoke these words:

My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not of this realm. (John 18:36, my emphasis)

Did you catch that? Jesus’s fight is not a political one and neither is that of His followers. The kingdom of Jesus, of which every born-again Christian is a part, neither rises nor falls with the fortunes of any political party. Though there are significant differences between party platforms and candidates, the will of God is sovereign over all, and we can have peace in the midst of the storm because our King is the King of Peace.

We don’t fight like men fight, with destruction and division, but we are to wage war. We war in ways which sinful man cannot understand, nor can he comprehend. Our weapons are truth and faith and prayer and submission and trust—not to human outcomes, but to our God and Creator who rules over all, and that, forevermore. And the result? Peace. A peace that none can take away.

So I urge you to draw near, in this time of waiting, not to television sets or iPhones for the latest political update, but draw near to God, and love one another as He has loved you.

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December 27, 2018December 27, 2018

Remember!

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By Dan Amos

This year, our family exchanged gifts and had our family meal on December 23. It’s our newest phase of life, in which Fran and I no longer set the agenda but coordinate getting together with our sons’ three families and their families. But when we did, as we’ve done for dozens of years before, we read of Christ’s birth from Luke’s account. It’s difficult not to think of Linus from A Charlie Brown Christmas, but I read from the NIV instead of King James. Even this set off an amusing discussion of translations among the now four families being created out of our one.

The following evening, we participated in the Christmas Eve service in which Brian and the team led us through the story of Christ from Old Testament prophecies to His birth, death, and resurrection. Brian repeated throughout Israel’s history how families recounted the prophecies pointing to the Savior that was to come. In reading the story of Jesus’s birth, we continued the tradition of retelling His birth from a virgin in the town of David and all to God’s glory.

Martin and Brian led us through December to the annual celebration by recounting essential doctrines: the Trinity, how we are created for God’s glory, and how we shattered that glory with sin. God provided the solution for our sin in the form of Jesus—our one and only way to redemption.

These are fundamental doctrines of our faith. Yet throughout the Christmas season, I was bombarded not with truth but with Santa, excessive consumption, and annoyingly odd commercial images intended to make me think of a smell. There was no mention outside of church of Jesus.

Israel was given festivals and commemorations precisely to help them remember. The Christian church was given Communion to remember Christ’s death and resurrection. Christmas will cease to be a remembrance if we let it.

So when we study doctrine, we keep it firm in our understanding and the core of our faith. As Martin pointed out, even within the churches of America, too many fail to understand the divinity of Christ and what he has done for us. The power of the Gospel is rooted in the truth of God’s revelation of himself.

Charles Schulz got pushback from his producer about including New Testament Scripture in the Peanuts special. But he countered with, “Bill, if we don’t, who will?” That remains our question today. If we don’t hold to the truth, if we don’t speak it and remember it, who will?

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October 4, 2018October 18, 2018

Pray without Ceasing

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By Jeff Foerster

Pray without ceasing. What? This instruction blows my mind, my one-track mind. I don’t multitask. I don’t multitask because if I attempt it, something gets broken or someone gets hurt. For me, to “pray without ceasing” means becoming a monk and giving up driving a car, washing laundry, or even cooking a meal. I have about as much chance at successfully obeying this command as I do with “Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

Prayer is relational conversation.

Praying without ceasing makes a lot more sense when I consider that God is with me. He is with me as sure as a friend sitting across from me at a café or sharing a good meal at a restaurant. What do you talk about with others? You talk about how you’ve been spending your time, what happened while at work, what made you upset, that you couldn’t believe that guy in that car who did that thing or that woman in that place who said what she said—imagine her nerve! You sit around recalling that time that thing happened and you laugh ‘til tears stream down your face and your gut cries out for mercy. You share what makes you sad and what brings fear to your heart. You listen to what the other person thinks is important, and you wrestle with ideas and plans and hopes and dreams. You are in relationship.

What do you believe?

What do you believe about prayer? Not what you think—what you would tell me you believe. What do you actually believe? Do you know? To know, you must look to your actions, your “fruit.”

Here’s another way to say the same thing: How is your relationship with Jesus? I didn’t ask for your theology—what you think about Him, or what you believe about His sacrifice, as important as these are. I’m not asking you if you have prayed to receive His forgiveness, though without it there is no relationship. I am asking if you are close to Him, or if “distant” would be a more apt description. Is He called when you need something, when other avenues fail? Or do you talk to Him about everything? Do you share the triumphs and failings of the day as well as listen for His response, His questions, His leading? What would happen if you stopped talking with your spouse or your best friend for a day? A week? A month? Distance would grow, and your relationship would wither.

God is much more than any person you are connected to. He cares for you with greater passion and greater wisdom, and He knows you better than even you do. He is more than a resource for you to employ. He is heaven itself, in a person. To pray without ceasing means to lean into relationship with Jesus, with the Spirit, with the Father. Brian Sharpe spoke of A.C.T.S. in the Sunday sermon as a tool to help engagement in prayer, conversation starters. These concepts are found in the Scriptures—sometimes referred to as God’s love letters to humanity. In these, God woos us with His undying love with which He died for us. Time and again His message is one of control—He’s got it and I can let it go. The plan was formed long ago before the first of us were formed from earth. We are His beloved creations to whom He has endowed the right to become His children. God has engaged us; He made the first move, but an intimate relationship requires 100% from both—what will you do?

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May 3, 2018May 10, 2018

If Loving You Was Easy . . .

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by Jeff Foerster

Jesus said, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

There it is: Love God. Love your neighbor. And implied in the second commandment, love yourself. Yeah. Okay. Wait. What?

If you were at the Men’s retreat a few weeks ago, you heard these three pieces of counsel. The first two commands are citations of Deuteronomy and Leviticus that Jesus spoke to the Pharisees. The third, love yourself, may sound weird and even liable to be abused, given our sinful condition, but it is necessary to be healthy. So how exactly does one love oneself well?

True love embraces truth. The truth is that each of us is a dirty, rotten sinner. If you like theological terms, think total depravity. If not, understand that each aspect of our being, our heart, our soul, and our mind has been corrupted by sin. As they say, I am not as bad as I could be, and I may not be the worst rascal out there, but there is no part of me that is untainted or untouched by sin.

I don’t sound very lovable as the truth sheds light on my condition. And I don’t feel much like loving others, or God for that matter, when I just want to run and hide—Adam and Eve, anyone? But for God. God comes near, and because He loved me first, I can love Him and my neighbor. My standing has been changed; I have been redeemed and remade—no longer a sinner, now a saint.

From this position I can love myself well. From this perspective and by the power of the Holy Spirit living through me, I can love myself well.

Nuts and bolts. Brass tacks. What’s it all about, man?! I am not about to create a picture of chowing down on bonbons, leisure days at the spa, or week long retreats to hot springs near Icelandic villas frequented by hipsters trying to “find themselves” or “lose themselves” or find their “lost selves.” Instead, if I am to love myself well, I will take the long view of things, the eternal view. Instead of indulgence, I will choose sacrifice, and I will like it. “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain which he cannot lose.” Jim Elliot, a Christian missionary, gave us that quote to consider. He speaks of salvation, but also for consideration are the eternal rewards for faithful and faith-filled living here and now.

Three pragmatic points to ponder:

Self-Control

The Scriptures lay out that acting in harmony (love) with the Spirit will produce self-control. In practical terms, it means not getting drunk or high, spending or eating excessively, or engaging in any number of other sins. Loving oneself is not indulgence—it’s sacrifice, for our own good (not to mention the positive effects which others around us experience).

Temple

All who are born-again Christians are dwelling places of God. Care for our bodies and minds is important. Our temples are to be well kept, prepared for purpose, but not as an end in themselves. We are not to run ourselves ragged out of a misguided sense of “sacrifice.” Not caring for my body’s need for rest, healthy food, or mental downtime is abuse, not a measure of my efficiency or a cause for admiration from others.

Focus

Loving myself means having life’s priorities clear. Jesus comes first. First in time, first in hope, first in authority, etc. This helps me weather life’s storms and simply helps me experience life in the way I was created to live it. It means setting aside the remote, the keypad, the phone and spending time with the God I say I love.

So, I invite you: love yourself, but love yourself well. Give yourself the very best. Your relationship with God will blossom, and as you sacrifice those second-rate indulgences, those around you will be blessed.

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July 27, 2017August 3, 2017

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By Dan Amos

About the time we started the series on James at Elim, Fran and I visited Washington, DC. One evening we visited the Jefferson Memorial and I was struck by the inscription chosen for the southeast portico wall. I could not help comparing those words to those Pastor Martin led us through from the first chapter of James.

The memorial’s quote was from a letter Jefferson wrote extolling man’s growing wisdom, but instead, I see it as an illustration of our arrogance.

It is this thinking that leads to calling good things evil and evil things good. It leads to questioning who God is and what role He plays in our lives. It leads to changing the teachings of Scripture and replacing the words of life with pretty but empty words that suit our modern sensibilities. Ultimately, it leads away from salvation and instead to death.

While Jefferson advocated that the things our ancestors believed become outdated and practices need to change with the times, James tells us the very opposite about God in 1:16-18.

Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first-fruits of all he created.

James is using words that inflame contemporary wisdom, such as “Father” and “does not change” and “truth.” In his own life, Jefferson did not want to accept the deity of Christ and the teachings of the Apostles. We reject the wisdom of man and proclaim the following in our statement of faith:

We believe that God has spoken in the Scriptures, both Old and New Testaments, through the words of human authors. As the verbally inspired Word of God, the Bible is without error in the original writings, the complete revelation of His will for salvation, and the ultimate authority by which every realm of human knowledge and endeavor should be judged. Therefore, it is to be believed in all that it teaches, obeyed in all that it requires, and trusted in all that it promises.

That the Word of God is under attack is nothing new. It has been happening since the serpent spoke to Eve (and Adam passively listened). Great councils used to be called together to debate heretical teachings. Now the attacks are less dramatic, but they are everywhere, coming from every media, impossible to avoid. But the truth remains, and our access to it is as unprecedented as the lie is prevalent. All we have to do is open it.

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June 2, 2016June 20, 2016

Are You Healthily Sick?

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By Nate Champneys

Are you healthily sick?

“What do you mean?,” you might ask. “How can you be sick in a healthy way?” As human beings who live in a world that is soaking in the depravity of sin, the effect of the Fall is all around us and within us. I used to think that eventually I would “arrive” and I would be completely healthy at some point. I would look at certain people in my life, where everything looked good in their lives and I would think, “Maybe someday I will be able to be like them.”

However, the longer I live, the more I realize that even the people who came from “good” childhoods and seem like they have it all together are broken. Every single one of us has fractures in our heart as a result of own sin and being sinned against by others. So every one of us is “sick.”

The good news is that we have a God who can and does bring healing to our broken hearts, but, until we get to Heaven, we will always have fractures in our hearts that need God’s healing. Is there a healthy way to deal with our brokenness? What does it look like to be healthy in the midst of our sickness? I would like to share four principles of being healthily sick.

Let me be clear. These four characteristics are not “Nathan Champneys’s four steps to spiritual success.” They really aren’t steps, but they are all simultaneously part of the healing process. In my own life, I feel like I am constantly going deeper into all of these. None of us ever “arrives.” So life becomes a process of working through these items. Don’t read these steps and try to place yourself into one or another. You will focus on these in different measures as you go deeper and deeper into allowing God to heal your heart. As we embrace these four principles, even though we are still “sick” because of our sin nature, we are living in a healthy way as Jesus continually brings healing to our hearts.

Embrace the truth that you are accepted and loved exactly the way you are. God is not surprised by the fractures in your heart. He loves you right now, even with all your problems. There is nothing you can do to change that fact. This is such a hard truth to internalize, and it’s one that we have to keep relearning. I find it helpful to verbalize the truth to myself in prayer. I pray, “God, I thank You for being a good Father and completely accepting me. I thank You for loving me in my brokenness.”
Own your brokenness. It has been said that the first step toward recovery is admitting that you have a problem. This really isn’t the first step; it’s the second. Until we understand how loved we are by God, we tend to feel insecure about our weaknesses and thus feel a need to live in denial about them. You are broken. You are a piece of work. But you are okay! You are loved!
Intentionally discover your brokenness. The next part of being healthy in your brokenness is intentionally seeking out the areas that need healing. Psalm 139:23-24 says, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends You.” David asks God to point out the offensive areas of his heart. David is not afraid to acknowledge his faults. Instead, he is actively working with God to discover the broken areas.
Ask God to heal you. David ends Psalm 139 with this line, “Lead me along the path of everlasting life.” David was asking God to help him thrive in his relationship. The reality about our God is that He is a really, really good Father. The only way that real relationship can truly happen is for there to be freedom for both people in the relationship to have free will to participate. Therefore, God will never violate our free will. To do so would make us robots and make any relationship with us fake. If we don’t invite God into the process of healing our hearts, He doesn’t force it on us. But he has promised that as we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us and “cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” As we choose to bring our sickness to Him, He is more than willing to bring healing to us.

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