The Armor of God

13th Sunday of Pentecost
Scripture: Ephesians 6:10-20

As Paul takes leave of his people, he is sees a giant struggle that lies ahead of him: house arrest with a Roman guard chained to his wrist. 24/7.

Now, life in the ancient world was different from our lives today. They widely believed in demons, devils and evil spirits. The air was full of these elements just waiting to pounce upon us as God’s people, seeking to derail us from our walk with our true God.

Looking at his guard and the armor he wore, Paul makes a great spiritual comparison to how the guards’ armor reflects our armor in the battle against evil forces.

1. The belt around his waist is the belt of truth. As Christians we can move freely and quickly because in any of our life’s situation He knows the truth. Our God walks daily in all our lives’ actions and situations.
2. The breastplate of righteousness covers the chest. Words are no defense against accusations that are hurled against us, but a good life displays a true person.
3. There were the sandals of preparation. One’s sandals are a sign that one is equipped and ready to go out and spread the good news. This means all persons, male or female, lay or clergy have a few sermons just itching to be shared.
4. There is the shield of faith. Paul is not thinking about a small round shield, but a full body shield to protect one as the fiery darts of evil are thrown at us. The dart is a long stick, a point dipped in oil, lit with fire that seeks to destroy the words of God.
5. There is the helmet of salvation. We must always remember that it is not something that looks back to our sins, but something that means God’s forgiveness of our past and strength for the present and the future.
6. There is the sword of the Holy Spirit, “which is the word of God.” The sword is not a 2-edge sharp weapon that may cause death, but the presence and words of God that can pierce the darkest sin and evil that seeks to destroy us as Christians.
7. Paul’s final weapon is prayer. Paul states 3 types of prayer:

• Constant Prayer
• Intense Prayer
• Concentration Prayer

As they say, “a limp prayer never got us anywhere.”

The Jews had this saying. “Let a man unite himself with the community in his prayers. Always pray for others before praying for oneself.”

Finally, Paul, after praying for others, prays for himself. He does not ask for comfort, or for peace. He allows God to move in his life as God sees fit, not as he desires. We would do well to remember that.

No Christian leader and no Christian pastor can go on unless their people are ever upholding them in prayer. Thank you all for your support, and please keep the prayer for the ministry here. Amen!

His Body and His Blood

12th Sunday of Pentecost
Scripture: St. John 6:51-59

We may take it in a quite general sense that Jesus spoke about eating His flesh and drinking His blood. The flesh of Jesus was His full humanity. If Jesus had come only in His flesh and not of God, where would we be today? Certainly not attending a worship service in His heavenly house.

The spirit that denies that Jesus came only in the flesh is the antichrist. Jesus insists that we must cluster, grasp, and never let go of the full humanity of Christ.

“Jesus was bone of our bones and flesh of our flesh.” What does that mean? Jesus, as we have encountered Him, was – is – the Mind of God, who fully became human. In other words, God was in the flesh, living among us here on earth.

He took all the failures of our human life. He endured all our human situations, struggled with our human problems, and endured our human temptations, working out our human relation with Him

It is as if Jesus said, “Feed your heart, mind, and grace out of my manhood.” Jesus took all the pitfalls of our human life upon Himself. Suddenly, life and flesh are shod with the glory of God where they had been touched with God’s living presence.

It was and is the great belief of the Greek Orthodox Christology that Jesus defined our flesh by taking it on Himself. To eat Jesus Christ’s body is to feed on the thought of Jesus Christ’s manhood until our manhood is strengthened and cleaned and purified by Him. But John meant more than what he was thinking at the Lord’s Supper. He was saying:

“If you want life, you must come and eat at the table and drink of the cup of wine, which somehow is the grace of God, bringing you into a redeemed, loved, relationship with Christ Jesus, the Son of the Living God.”

We cannot draw on the fullest of the Christian life in words unless we sit at the table of love. It is here that the sacrament is a special appointment with our God. He felt in His heart that at every meal in the humblest home or the greatest mansion beneath the canopy of the sky with only the grass we celebrate the Lord’s sacrament. John refused to limit the presence of God to an ecclesiastical environment and a collective liturgy. He believed that we can find Christ anywhere in a Christ-filled world.

Lord, God, help us as we have slipped away way too far in our society. Take from us all activities that stand in the way of a redeeming fellowship with You. Amen!

Be Ye Angry and Sin Not

11th Sunday of Pentecost

Scripture: Ephesians 4:25 – 5:2

John Wesley echoed Ephesians 4:26 in cautioning us to take heed to not sin when we are angry.

Anger is not evil, but we should feel only pity for the sinner. If we are angry with a person, don’t permit or allow it to turn into a sin by your action against that person. It is difficult to not allow our anger to turn into sin. We must not permit our anger to produce falsehoods, and we must be mindful there is more than one type of anger.

One such anger is said deliberately and almost unconsciously, causing great hurt and wronging to someone. It can and often does show flaw in one’s character. That will be difficult to make right if even possible.

In our Christian life, we must have the RIGHT kind of anger. There are flaws in our thought process which at sometime causes all of us to lose our cool when selfish anger blows up.  

Crossness and bad temper are without defense!

There is an anger that without it would make a worse place to live and the world would lose much without that type of anger. Case in point:

The slave trade caused much anger between people. It caused a civil war and allowed people to be free people. Slavery divided the nation. It was used as an excuse for free labor, and it tore what family life the slaves might have had.

Case in point:

When someone has been in prisoned, having served his time, they may have vowed to change his lifestyle often employment is hard to find.  And if they find employment, it seems like most co-workers know their history, and many make it extremely hard for them to make the adjustment to being a law-abiding citizen.

Case in point:

The anger between my father and my twin brother completely tore up our family life at my age 16. It was over my father’s lady friend and harsh and terrible words were uttered by my brother. He was ordered out of the house, not to be there when my father returned from work. Then my father looked at me and said “either me or him. You can’t have us both.” My father and brother never spoke to one another again. My father and the lady married several years later and she would not permit a good relationship between my father and me. That continued for over 20 years.  We were reunited when one of my sons took his marriage invitation to his grandpa. Edith came in, sat next to our daughter in law to be as if nothing had ever happened, and the past 20+ years evaporated in emotions and feelings instantly.

I know personally of how words spoken before putting one’s thought pattern in the right mode can take years before it can be buried in history in one’s life. These 3 cases mentioned, have changed the lives of countless people. When people act in anger for the right purpose in God’s will. With what’s going on in the world today, the pains of our history and lives could cause us to deal with the same type of deadly anger. 

I pray that we as a nation and the world would never have to endure another Holocast. But with some of the factions in the world today, if good God fearing people fail to get angry at what’s going on in the world and do not band together in unity and prayer asking God to help us, who knows where we are headed!

Be mindful that not all anger is evil!

Let us pray…

Grace to Grace

Tenth Sunday of Pentecost
Scripture: Ephesians 4:1-16

The purpose of the church is to make new disciples for the kingdom of God on earth, to build up the living, active body of Christ until all of us have a unity of faith, acknowledging Jesus as the Son of the Living God.

Christ knows us and calls us.  He knows the potential within our lives and believes we can aid in transforming the world that God has created. With ordinary people like each of us, we can lead others in making this world a more caring, loving world than it is today.

Today this world operates on discourse, disharmony and disunity.

• In many family units
• In the communities we live in
• The world as a whole 
• And even within the church

We are called and equipped to create a sacred oneness as agents of Jesus Christ. The church is the one source that has the ability, but for the church to create that unity we need to dispel all discourse and our personal agendas. We need to take those differences to the Lord asking him to enable us to transcend our differences. We must love one another as He loves us.

The grace to ask ourselves is at our fingertips; it is within our grasp. That is one of the basic factors of the Christian church. Love one another as the Lord loves us!

Christ knows that we have an instant struggle, a daily battle loving one another as he loves us. It is possible for us to love one another by seeing that we are not perfect persons. We are only God’s children in process. We need when we have wronged one another wrongly

• to stop that action instantly!
• to see deep down the goodness that is in each one of us and see what the Lord sees in us.

That is a goal that we must seek to attain. When we hold on to our ill feelings about one another, we are hurting not only ourselves but the image of the Lord who lives within us. Likewise we limit the fullness of God’s grace and we are one missing the goal of unity with one another and our Lord.

It’s wonderful that our Lord has the ability not only to forgive us, but He forgets our sin and it will never be brought up against us again. It would have been wonderful and a blessing if we had the ability to forgive and forget our transgressions against one another.

It is here that Satan attacks us full force to destroy the love of God within our hearts! When we yield to our human frailties we sacrifice the grace of God within us.

Lord God, help us for we all are guilty of this sin causing us to lose faith and Your divine grace. Help us forgive the way You have forgiven us. Amen.

Father God

9th Sunday of Pentecost
Scripture: Ephesians  3:14-21

When I say "father," what image do you feel and see in your heart and mind?                                        
Paul is making a huge step of faith when he speaks of the Holy God as Father. Fatherhood comes with a large responsibility. While a man can be a sperm donor, he may never care for the child as a father. In the Old Testament, God was not spoken in terms of as a Father.  In the Old Testament, God was seen as an impossible entity to approach. To see God face to face meant instant death. It was only on the Day of Atonement that the High Priest could go into the Holy of Holies, where the Ark of the Covenant was, to offer prayer for the sins of the people.

Recall when Moses came down from Mt. Sinai. His face shown like the sun and the people believed that he had been with God.

It’s only in the New Testament, that the writers speak of God as a Father. Recall when Jesus was baptized by John in the Jordan river.  When He came up out of the water, the voice of God was heard saying “This is my beloved Son."

Paul said in Ephesians 3, where he talked about sharing with the Ephesians, that God is our Heavenly Father.  He also said that He transcends all aspects of our earthly father.

It is through Jesus Christ’s blood we can approach God personally, yet today every church family has members who question the basic fact that our faith response makes God approachable. That is simply not the case.

Do not be swayed from the truth by the last person you have spoken to. Stand firm in the faith and in scripture. Paul speaks of a clever trickery and many that offer their opinion.

Like James Jones' followers in Guyana, they were deceived. These people are excellent actors.
In seducing and causing many to fall from grace. There are some that follow the preacher and not the Lord he preaches about.

Who was the first one to call God The Father? It was Jesus!

God the Father is not an entity out in outer space, nor just in Heaven.
He is right here, right now in this sanctuary.
He hears each word that is spoken.
He senses each thought in our hearts and minds.
He sees each of our reactions to what is going on.
He knows us better than we know ourselves.

Paul is making us aware that if we water down our understanding of a loving, caring Heavenly Father, we are shortchanging ourselves to the fullness of the Father Grace. Paul makes aware that it is ever so easy to abandon our faith by often following mortal man and not the Father in Heaven.

If we don’t hold onto the Faith, it causes spiritual stagnation and narrow mindedness. That leads to limited understanding of the fullness of God's presence.

Praise God the Father who loves us and knows us. In spite of ourselves His love is so great that He sacrificed His only Son as a ransom for our sins.

Let us pray… Thank you Heavenly Father. We can comprehend your love for us for forgiving our sins through the blood of Your Son Jesus Christ. Amen!

A Holy Seal

Seventh Sunday of Pentecost
Scripture: Ephesians 1:3-14

We are all sealed with a holy seal when we confess our faith. God placed that Holy Seal upon us by the sacrificed blood of Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son.

Paul begins the letter of Ephesians claiming 2 things:
1.) He is an apostle of Christ.
2.) His approval came only through the will of God.

Paul’s apostleship means that his action is through his commissioning as a gift from God. He likewise is amazed that God could use him, with such a dark and sinful background. As Christians, we must never be filled with pride. We must only be filled with wonderment and amazement that the Lord sees our worth in spreading the Gospel.

When we confess our faith and love for Jesus in our hearts, we are sealed with the Holy Spirit for the tasks that lay ahead of us. That seal is for God’s grace and peace.

The grace and peace from God is always a precious gift. It is impossible for us to obtain by our own efforts. We can never earn it. It is always a gift from the Loving Lord. God’s peace is something that is independent of our own outward circumstances.

One might live a life of ease and luxury in the world. One might have the finest things in life...

• a huge fine mansion
• a large bank account
• a host of friends

…while having no real sense of peace within their heart and life.

Take some of the 3rd world nations. They might make a couple dollars for a whole day’s work, yet they can have a smile on their face and a real sense of peace in their heart.

The explanation of that peace can be seen in the one set of footprints in the sand, the awareness that God is carrying them through this ordeal.

I sense that Paul thought a person who has the love of God in his heart and nothing more could have the peace of God. He reminds us that many of the choices we make can rob us of God’s peace. For we were created to be God’s chosen ones, but by our own default we reject the will of God!

The choices we make in our own lives may draw us away from God’s love or draw us closer to His love because he created us with free will.

There is a story of a rich man and beggar (the 16th chapter of Luke). The rich man never saw the beggar at his doorstep, but the beggar asked the rich man to send Lazerus to warn his 5 brothers that they should not follow in his footsteps.

19 “There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day.
20 At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores
21 and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.
22 “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried.

23 In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side.
24 So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’

25 “But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony.
26 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place,
so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’

27 “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family,
28 for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’”

The choices we make now, may seem inconsequential and yet if the rich man would have given the beggar a drink of water, the Lord would have seen it and blessed him.

We always have 2 choices in life.

1. We can go the way of the world
2. We can go above and beyond the world… 

laying treasures in heaven, laying great treasures in Heaven.

Who are we going to follow? The way of the world or the way of God?

Rejoice in His holy seal that God seeks to put upon our lives. Amen!

Thorns or Grace?

Sixth Sunday of Pentecost

Scripture: 2nd Corinthians 12:1-10

Our scripture starts out with Paul speaking about a man in Christ giving of himself to the Lord. Paul knew this man for 14 years. In this passage, he spoke about being "caught up in the 3rd Heaven."  He likewise states that he did not know if this was with his body or without his body being in the Spirit.

About this man I will boast. About myself, I will not boast. I will not be a fool, for I will speak only the truth.

Paul speaks about a thorn in his flesh. Some believe that it was a form of Malaria Fever that haunted the coastal area he traveled in. Others thought it might have been a Spiritual temptation or "constant doubt" that he was doing the will of the Lord.

Others thought it was fear from shirking his duty.

Yet others thought it was carnal temptation. Monks and hermits shut themselves in monasteries to tame the instinct of sex.

Yet none of these solutions can be right for 3 reasons:
1.) The text states that it was severe pain.
2.) Others thought it was physical suffering of a deformity.
3.) The pain was intermittent.

It states in 2nd Corinthians that Paul might have had a weakened body. Sometimes he could hardly share his love for the Lord.

Paul does not tell us nor does the scripture identify the thorn in Paul’s side. Paul asked the Lord several times to remove the thorn. The Lord said no. His grace is sufficient.

Paul would not let the thorn in his side stop him from serving the Lord.

What is the thorn in your side? We all have at least one that limits us from our ability to faithfully serve the Lord our God. Are you limited in sharing your faith with others? Fearful of not saying the right things?

We are not to worry about what we might say, for the Lord said He would give us His words. Just tell your story. Tell them your love of the Lord and how He has been with you every step of the way. Remember the footsteps poem I shared a few week ago?

Some won’t try to increase their limited abilities because of the lack of education or even comfort level.  

I cannot sing on tune or read music, yet I enjoy making a joyful noise unto the Lord. That’s all that is required of us. With all the thorns in my life, the Lord had not made me useless in speaking the Word of God for 45 years.

We need to stop holding back our gifts and talents the Lord has given us. I knew a lay pastor who had a speech impediment, not unlike Moses. He stuttered constantly when speaking, yet when he started to preach his speech was clear and without any evidence that he had a stuttering problem.

We need to not be limited by the thorns in our lives that seek to hinder us of our true capabilities to share the Love of Christ. As we seek to serve the Lord, may He not remove the thorns in our lives, but use them to spur us on and do his will as He desires rather than settling for our unwillingness to step out in faith.

May we praise the Lord with the amazing grace that He has given each and everyone of us who is willing to be used by Him to tell His story.

Amen!