A Follower's Thoughts - God's Creation

Job 12:7-10 says, "But ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, they will tell you; or the bushes of the Earth, and they will teach you, and the fish of the sea will declare to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind." Have you ever looked into the night sky, looking at all the stars or the moon shining so bright that it illuminated the ground around you? Have you ever watched a sunrise or sunset as the light kissed the clouds and turned them into red, yellow, purple, and other colors that even the greatest artistic painters cannot create? My most intimate moments with God are when I'm outside, taking in the wonders of God.

I've had the privilege of traveling to other parts of the country and Canada to go on hunting and fishing excursions. I've sat in a boat on a lake, 100 miles from civilization, listening to a loon make its haunting call, echoing down the lake. I watched the northern lights dance across the sky. I lay in my sleeping bag and listened to wolves howl in the distance. I walked through an Aspen tree forest as the sun shone through the leaves, engulfed in yellow. And yes, I have had the privilege of trekking through knee-deep snow, snowing so hard I could barely see 10 ft in front of me. That right there was not a pleasant memory! Of all my favorite memories of being in God's Creation, my favorite would be trekking up a mountain on a beautiful clear morning, at around 11,000 ft elevation, trying to breathe in oxygen like you would not believe. Sounds like fun, doesn't it? Anyway, I found this huge rock ledge overlooking this vast range of mountains in Colorado. It was breathtaking! I took my Bible out of my pack, sat there on that ledge, and started reading God's Word. The closeness I had to God in those moments was overwhelming! There is an unspeakable peace and joy when you experience things as I have mentioned. Whether you realize it or not, we are all, in some way, connected to our Earth. This has been given to us as our temporary home to enjoy. Sometimes I think society, as a whole, has gotten away from the connection we need with God's Creation. We spend too much time on our phones and TVs and not enough time watching a sunrise or sunset, hiking a trail, fishing or hunting, walking outside looking at the spring flowers blooming, listening to the birds sing, getting our hands dirty planting flowers or a garden. All these outdoor experiences teach us that God is with us. God speaks to us through everything he has made. We need to take the time to look and listen. It's one of the best ways to find God. So, as we approach Holy Week, may we all take the time to experience God's Creation in some way. Never forget to thank God every day for breathing life into you, and most of all, thank his Son and our Savior Jesus Christ for dying on a cross so that we can have eternal life with our Creator.

God Bless!

Correll

"We the imperfect seeking the perfect" - Brother Mike Densmore

A Follower's Thought

1 Kings 19: 11-13 says, "The Lord said, 'Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.' Then a great wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind, there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. Then a voice said to him, 'What are you doing here, Elijah?'"
When I read this scripture in 1 Kings, I imagine myself in Elijah's shoes. God had called him out to be in his presence. Does God call you out to be in his presence? He calls me out daily to read his word. He calls me out to take walks with him, whether it be in the woods, on a hiking trail, in my own yard, or walking around doing my daily work. The point is that God calls. We must hear that call and respond. I will admit, there are times when I don't respond. I've come to know that usually, when I don't respond is when the noises of life drown out the quiet whisper of God, saying, "come be in my presence." Just like the scripture is describing. Elijah could not hear God in the wind, in the earthquake, nor in the fire. He heard him in the whisper. I find myself more and more seeking God's gentle whisper, especially when life's winds, earthquakes, and fires are drowning out God's voice. I hope each one of you will find the time this Holy Week to come into God's presence and hear His gentle whisper. Read your Bible, take that walk, find a quiet place to be in God's presence. You will be glad you did. God Bless.

Correll

Practicing the Presence All Day, Everyday

"You have your heads in your Bibles constantly because you think you'll find eternal life there. But you miss the forest for the trees. These Scriptures are all about me! And here I am, standing right before you, and you aren't willing to receive from me the life you say you want." John 39-40 (MSG)

Carrying the Presence of God With You

Just Call Me Peter

Just Call Me Peter
Matthew 26

We arrived in Georgia in the suffocating summer of 1980, begrudgingly accepting our new normal. Mere months prior, my dad had taken up employment with my uncle and uprooted our family from all we knew and loved in North Carolina. For a young, pre-teen girl entering 7th grade, I was less than excited or supportive about this ridiculous relocation of our family.

School started soon after we arrived, and I quickly found my place and my people in the junior high school band. Coming from a musical family, I had started playing the clarinet in 4th grade and was at least at ease in this environment. On my very first day of band class, I met a young girl. She was my friend. Oh, how I needed a friend in this strange new world I was trying to navigate. Every day…every, single day she met me in that old stinky band-room with a smile and warm greeting. Over the course of the year, we did all the typical pre-teen girlie things from sleep-overs, shopping, tanning by the pool, manicures, 4-wheeler rides, and I was certain we were quite inseparable for life. Thankful as I was for her, as it goes, I continued to make new friends and spent less and less time with my “other” friend. She was as steadfast as the first day I met her. While she wasn’t the flashy, princess popular type, and didn’t hang with “the in-crowd,” she was true. She was true to herself, and she was true to me, even when I didn’t deserve it. How often I turned my back on her when more exciting opportunities and people crossed my path, I can’t count. Yet, through the junior high and high school years, she continued to stand in the background, propping me up. 

As Holy Week unfolds, I continue to find myself along the path Jesus walked. How often am I the cheerleader on the side of the road welcoming Jesus into my day, into my life only to put him aside and deny him in my choices? What decisions and failures have me as one of the faces in the crowd yelling, “Crucify him!” then running to the cross on Sunday morning looking for my Savior? As Jesus sat at the table with the disciples for their last meal together, he looked directly at Peter and acknowledged the upcoming denials, and loved him anyway. While Peter couldn’t imagine turning his back on the Lord, he did again and again. In the time that followed the denials, Peter, utterly sorrowful, wept bitterly at his betrayal. From that time until the end of his own life, Peter was a devoted follower and came to be “the Rock of the Church.” 

Thankfully, my denials of my childhood friend have been forgiven, and she remains today, my best friend, for life. Even when I turned away from her and all the love and acceptance she offered me, she never wavered and continues to walk with me even now. We’ve meandered through adult life, sharing joys and sorrows, mostly by telephone conversations. Like my relationship with the Lord, when I reach out to her, she will answer, and I’m so very thankful for the forever friendship and forgiveness. Just call me Peter. 

Tammy Wendling

The Cross and Corona Virus

“From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests, and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.” Matthew 16:21

Loved ones, I can say with great certainty that I have never merged the two words “Cross” and “Corona” until today. I will avoid the obvious thought that Corona is another word for “crown.” I have used cross and crown in a sentence.

Today, I want you to do what Christians have been asked to do for two Millennia, reflect on the meaning of that Roman cross. It hangs around our neck. It adorns our altars of worship. It sits on our mantles. Why? It is the single most recognizable sign of a covenant sacrifice between God and human beings. I affirm today that no “virus” could ever change that reality. The cross changes our very existence FOREVER.  

So, during Holy Week, notice that protestants cherish an empty cross and not a crucifix. The reason is to emphasize the cross as a completed event. It leads to resurrection, but don’t pass over it too quickly.  

The cross is the will of the heavenly Father for Jesus. Matthew declares Jesus was to become a sin offering for all people. A divine sacrificial covenant redeeming the sons and daughters of Adam and Eve. A concept that takes us way back to a time in Abraham’s life when God puts him in a dream to swear a redemptive covenant with Him (Gen 15: 12-21). A covenant ratified with God himself in the form of a smoking pot and a flaming torch passes between a sacrifice prepared by the man, Abraham. An unprecedented picture of God walking between an animal sacrifice to say, I swear by Myself to keep the promise that I make to you. It is an incredibly gracious condescension. Why? He loves His creation so much that He is efforting to be with us through Abraham. Well, a greater one than Abraham or David or any servant is present in Jesus. He is unlike anyone. A perfectly obedient, unique Son who accomplishes God’s will in establishing His Kingdom on earth. God is finally incredibly “with us.” This redemptive effort brings Jesus to us as Son and King. His work is teaching the true God honoring life and a cross. He is king of a different kind; a servant King who loves and gathers His children into God’s presence (or salvation) by dying for them on a cross and then overwhelming the greatest efforts of an evil, terrible death. He will conquer evil’s best and final weapon, but before He does, He redemptively suffers for you and me. Think on these things redeemed children of God.

Brother Barry Dunn

Holy Monday

Matthew 21:12-46 (Focusing on Matthew 21:12-14)

Sometimes the word “shocking” is the only way to describe an action or event that changes the course of human history.  When these verses took place in real-time, the city of Jerusalem was in turmoil.  Even though the Palm Sunday parade was met with “Hosanna, hosanna, to the Son of David” by a cheering crowd of supporters, those in power were threatened and planning their next move.  The Sabbath morning arrived, with the normal hubbub of vendors gathered to sell animals for temple sacrifices and money changers.  Those who desired entrance to worship were able to buy their way inside, but those who were poor, blind or lame had to keep their distance.  Jesus, with the strength of a superhuman wrecking ball, blasts onto the scene “overturning the tables of the money changers, and the seats of those who sold doves.” He  said to them,  “It is written,  ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you are making it a house of robbers.”

     In the midst of the hysteria, the blind, lame (and probably others who felt unwanted) seized their opportunity, came to him in the temple and he cured them.  Our Holy Week is hopefully one that will change the course of our history for the better.  We have been shocked that something as horrifying as a virus could threaten our way of life and our sacred practices of worship during this time.  Right now we are all forced to be on the outside and it doesn’t feel right. Perhaps this unparalleled time in our lives is when our human family can come together in heart, mind, and spirit to celebrate Christ’s resurrection from the dead in our ordinary places of life at home and realize that He is surely with us. He makes us feel loved, accepted and wanted as His children with no strings attached. As our Lord cleansed the temple in Jerusalem, may we invite Him to cleanse and make us new people for the day we can rejoice and be together again.  Thanks be to God!

Patsy-Coe Densmore

Jesus Enters Jerusalem and Clears the Temple

Matthew 21:12-13

And Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.”

It’s Monday after a beautiful and exciting Palm Sunday. Jesus is now in Jerusalem and events begin to unfold that are walking us closer to the cross. When Jesus entered the temple area after his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, he began driving out everyone who was buying and selling there.

What had stoked the fires of his divine wrath and anger? We know from Scripture that the “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil” (1 Timothy 6:10). Jesus knew that too. Jesus became angry because religious schemers were using God to make extra money. You see, people traveling into Jerusalem for the Passover needed to buy animals for the sacrifices they would offer to God during this festival. Most of those people also needed to exchange their money for temple currency in order to buy the animals. The trouble, though, was that the money changers and sellers were often dishonest and took advantage of those travelers.

We’ve all met people who were turned off by the church. My father was one of these people. He often said he had quit gathering for worship because the church didn’t care for him—they just wanted his money. I don’t know if that was true or just an excuse. But I do know that many people have been turned off because they’ve been fleeced by some unscrupulous person who claimed to be a Christian. When that happens, Jesus gets angry.

Prayer

Lord, what needs to be cleansed in my life? Is it a love for money? Is it a desire to exploit people for our own purposes? Help me to look deeply into my life to identify what needs to be cleansed. I know, Lord, you are not happy with these areas and I need help turning away from any and all things that distance me from you. Lord, cleanse what is offensive in me. In your name, Amen.

Palm Sunday, 2020

Palm Sunday

Matthew 21:1-11

The Sunday before Easter is Palm Sunday, when the crowds welcomed Jesus waving branches and shouting “Hosanna.” The “Palm” in “Palm Sunday” refers to the tree branches that the crowds used to make a path for Jesus. His arrival—often called the Triumphal Entry—fulfilled a prophecy by the Old Testament prophet Zechariah about the Messiah’s appearance in Jerusalem. While this is a triumphal entry, it is Jesus’ first step toward His death.

Matthew 21:4 tells us: 'This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet, saying, 'Say to the daughter of Zion, 'Behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.' *The prophecy is cited from Zechariah 9:9 and Isaiah 62:11.

Jesus had become somewhat of a celebrity among people who had heard of the miraculous raising of Lazarus from the dead, and they wanted to see Him and treat Him like a king. But Jesus wasn’t arriving to be their king on account of Lazarus; the story of Lazarus would have had the religious leaders in even more of an uproar and determined to put an end to His life, which He knew . . .  Jesus’ glory would be greater than that of a local king." -Excerpted from When Is Palm Sunday?