Notes of Faith March 26, 2021

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! — 2 Corinthians 5:17 

Heaven is both present and future. As you walk along your life-path holding My hand, you are already in touch with the essence of Heaven: nearness to Me. You can also find many hints of Heaven along your pathway because the earth is radiantly alive with My Presence. Shimmering sunshine awakens your heart, gently reminding you of My brilliant Light. Birds and flowers, trees and skies evoke praises to My holy Name. Keep your eyes and ears fully open as you journey with Me.  

At the end of your life-path is an entrance to Heaven. Only I know when you will reach that destination, but I am preparing you for it each step of the way. The absolute certainty of your heavenly home gives you Peace and Joy to help you along your journey. You know that you will reach your home in My perfect timing: not one moment too soon or too late. Let the hope of Heaven encourage you as you walk along the path of Life with Me.  

But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ, the first fruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to Him. — 1  Corinthians 15:20–23 

We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain. — Hebrews 6:19 

* 

Your longing for Heaven is good because it is an extension of your yearning for Me. The hope of Heaven is meant to strengthen and encourage you, filling you with wondrous Joy. Many Christians have misunderstood this word hope, believing that it denotes wishful thinking. Nothing could be further from the truth! As soon as I became your Savior, Heaven became your ultimate destination. The phrase hope of Heaven highlights the benefits you can enjoy even while remaining on earth. This hope keeps you spiritually alive during dark times of adversity; it brightens your path and heightens your awareness of My Presence.  

My desire is that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.  

Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. 

— Romans 8:23-25 

God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain. 
— Hebrews 6:18-19 

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may  
overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. 
— Romans 15:13 

Excerpted from Jesus Calling for Easter by Sarah Young, copyright Sarah Young. 

Hope is a powerful word, not a maybe it will happen kind of thing. It is a promise from God. Our hope in Jesus is a guarantee! He is our anchor! Firm and secure!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 25, 2021

Be Still and Know that I Am God

Our union with Jesus and His love transcends words. Our words are insufficient. Jesus used words and action in everyday life, of course, but in times of prayer He withdrew into solitude. Jesus is the Word. God doesn’t disapprove of our busy and active lives. He never says in Scripture to stop what we’re doing and forget all about work. In fact, the Word of God tells us just the opposite:  

For even when we were with you, we commanded you this: If anyone will not work, neither shall he eat. 

— 2 Thessalonians 3:10 

It’s our anxiety He addressed:  

Let not your heart be troubled… Peace I give you, not as the world gives. — John 14:1, John 14:27, paraphrased 

In the familiar account of Jesus and His disciples having dinner at the home of His friend Lazarus and Lazarus’s two sisters, Mary and Martha, a conflict arose. Mary forgot all about dinner and sat mesmerized by what Jesus was talking about. She sat enraptured, listening to His every word while Martha anxiously labored preparing food. Finally she burst into the room where Jesus was teaching and spouted out what amounted to, “Jesus, tell my sister to come help me. Here I am stuck with all the work while she does nothing.”  

Jesus, in His sweet way, responded with, “Martha, Martha, you’re worried and upset about many things.” He told her that Mary had made a good decision when she chose to be still and sit at His feet to learn about God. He told Martha that few things in this life are actually necessary, but there was really only one thing that mattered and what Mary learned could never be taken away from her.  

The practical side of me can’t help wonder if they ate at all that night. Did Martha take off her apron and sit down to listen too? Did her brother Lazarus get up and stir the soup?

Did the bread burn in the oven? Maybe Jesus Himself set the table. Maybe they stayed up all night nibbling on burnt bread and cold soup while Jesus taught.  

The words that remain with us like fire are His words to Martha: “Martha, Martha . . .”  

It was not her busy activity Jesus addressed, but her anxiety. She was nervous and upset, and Jesus discerned that she was anxious about more than just the dinner.

“Many things,”  He said.  

The early believers learned that sitting in silence and stillness was “the better part” that brought them inner peace and a deeper awareness of the mystery of God. Mary may have been familiar with Psalm 46,  

Be still, and know that I am God. 

Martha wanted to make sure they had a nice meal. After all, more than likely this was a special event.  

Martha anxiously worked to get a meal together to feed the Lord.  

Mary was sitting silently, being fed by the Lord. Jesus said that what she gained by sitting silently and listening calmly could not be taken away from her.  

If we can sit still in the Lord’s presence like Mary did, then something that can never be taken away from us happens to us too.  

Stress is stolen property. Stress doesn’t belong to you. 
If stress were a gift from God, it would bring you joy. 
Does stress bring you joy? 

Everywhere we turn, people harp about the stress in their lives. Stress crushes what’s lovely in us. We lose who we are and why we’re on earth for such a time as this. Try increasing your daily sessions of Quiet Prayer to give the Lord Jesus the freedom to touch you deeply. He will show by His Spirit the one thing that’s necessary, the thing that can never be taken from you.  

Excerpted from Quiet Prayer by Marie Chapian, copyright Marie Chapian. 

Can you sit still in the Lord’s presence? Stress can be crushing.  But, the Lord is ready for us to sit at His feet, being still, knowing Him in loving intimacy.  The world cannot compete!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 24, 2021

Missing Jesus

Picture yourself at church, engaged in a spirited discussion about Jesus' life. Where did that discussion happen? If you are like most of us, you probably pictured yourself pulling up a tiny chair at a tiny table. Why? Because in most churches, lower elementary Sunday school is the only place where Jesus is systematically studied.

Of course, the church loves and worships Jesus and studies the Gospels. Jesus is the glowing center of our faith. But in her ongoing quest to plumb the depths of justification, the church has, inadvertently, become more enamored with what Jesus has done than who he is. Yet the two truths are inseparable!

What I mean is there is virtually no systematic study and analysis of the person of Jesus. Hundreds of thousands of scholarly articles and books have been written on the work of Christ, but virtually nothing systematic and comprehensive on his person.1

We’ve studied how to fix the bad (redemption and salvation), but we’ve not studied this beautiful thing we are supposed to all become: Jesus.

I’m describing a hole in our systematic theology. Our doctrine of the person is almost vacant. A typical seminary class on the person of Christ studies the early creeds, which help us understand the relationship between his divinity and his humanity, but little study is focused on him as a person. We’ve studied how to fix the bad (redemption and salvation), but we’ve not studied this beautiful thing we are supposed to all become: Jesus. So we don’t have a clear sense of what it is to be human.

This leaves us with a weak doctrine of humanity and no framework for understanding love. We don’t know the answer to basic questions like, what does good sadness look like? How does Jesus handle grief? When does he say no? When does he say yes? Or what makes him angry? We don’t know Jesus’ compassion, his honesty, his dependence, or his faith. We aren’t gripped by the beauty and wonder of Christ. But we will be when we see him.

Secular-liberalism is crushing Christianity with a vision of what it is to be human. In the popular mind, Secular-liberalism feels inclusive, compassionate and relevant, while Christianity feels judgmental, narrow, and old fashioned.

Our design for “church” has been focused on what we do, sometimes what we say, but rarely who we are and what we are made to become.  Doing things for Christ takes the place of knowing Christ.  Being busy as a Christian replaces intimate relationship with Christ.  All of our worship, praise, sacrifice, offerings, work, love, etc., should flow out of a relationship with Jesus that is ever deepening and growing.  As we become more like Jesus, all of the things that we do in the church will fall into proper perspective and priority. 

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 23, 2021

The Christian life is marked by notable milestones, and you’ll find joy in every one of them. Remember, just because something is important and serious doesn’t mean it can’t also be filled with joy and the beauty of deep, abiding contentment.

Salvation

The moment of salvation is inexpressibly joyous. This is our eternal, spiritual delivery from separation from God and our entry into the kingdom of God. Jesus came so that we might be saved, and the New Testament testifies that this experience is an occasion for joy — for those converted and for those involved in the process. Many tears of joy have been shed when someone estranged from God, or who has been an enemy of God, has become His adopted son or daughter.

In Luke 15, Jesus told three stories of precious things that are lost and then found, and each is an occasion for joy: the shepherd who left ninety-nine sheep to search for and find one lost lamb; the woman who lost a valuable coin and found it; and the prodigal son, who was lost but finds his way home. In each story Jesus spoke of the rejoicing that surrounds the saving of one soul, and He described the joy that results:

I say to you that likewise there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine just persons who need no repentance. — Luke 15:7

After the Ethiopian eunuch was saved, he went on his way rejoicing (Acts 8:39). Luke recorded the conversion of the Gentiles “caused great joy to all the brethren” (Acts 15:3).

The Philippian jailer and his family were filled with joy when they became believers in God (Acts 16:34). Never doubt that salvation, the most profound of new beginnings, is also
infused with joy beyond description.

Baptism

Ask most Christians which is the most joyful event in a church service, and many will say baptism. Joy surrounds baptism.

Years ago, when I was a pastor in Indiana, I became friends with another pastor who told me amazing stories of God’s work in his congregation. One Sunday, as he was preaching, a homeless man came into his church and sat down in the front. He listened to the gospel message intently, and at the end of the service, he gave his heart to the Lord.

This church practiced immediate baptism. If you became a Christian, they baptized you that same day at the close of the service. According to my friend, this man was so joyful about his conversion and baptism that he came up out of the water, threw both hands in the air, and shouted, “Hot dog! Hot dog!” He hadn’t learned to say, “Amen,” “Praise the Lord,” or “Hallelujah.” All he knew was “Hot dog! Hot dog!” My friend said that was one of the most joyous days he could remember as a pastor.

Trial and Discouragement

Christian joy shows up not only in the happy times but also in times of trial and discouragement. Jesus’ joy survived troubles and even flourished in the midst of them. He told His followers:

Blessed are you when men hate you, and when they exclude you, and revile you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of Man’s sake. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy!” — Luke 6:22-23

The writers of the epistles followed Jesus’ lead:

You received the message with joy from the Holy Spirit in spite of the severe suffering it brought you. — 1 Thessalonians 1:6 NLT

My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials. — James 1:2

One of my favorite Bible stories is the story of Paul and Silas in the Philippian jail. They were beaten; they were imprisoned; and who knew what would happen to them the next day?

But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. — Acts 16:25

The kind of joy that gets you singing in jail at midnight with your back bleeding and your life hanging by a thread — that’s joy worth cultivating!

In our culture of instant gratification and constant amusement, it’s hard to understand the suffering the apostles endured for the sake of the gospel. We’ll do anything to avoid trials and tribulations. But often, in an attempt to keep anything uncomfortable from touching us, we miss the very thing God wants to use to lead us to the joy in Him. We can’t avoid difficulties, but in the midst of all our troubles — there is God and His effervescent love.

This doesn’t mean we deny or disguise our feelings. It doesn’t mean we can or should shrug off pain or disappointment, or try not to feel sorrow when we have good cause. It means we place our trust in God, and He opens the door to a joy beyond anything we can know on our own: the joy of knowing we are in His hands forever.

Commenting on the New Testament’s command that we’re to rejoice and be glad when undergoing trials, Philip Yancey said:

By using words like “Rejoice!” the apostles were not advocating a spirit of grin-and-bear-it or act-tough-like-nothing-happened. No trace of those attitudes can be found in Christ’s response to suffering, or in Paul’s…

Nor is there any masochistic hint of enjoying pain.

“Rejoicing in suffering” does not mean that Christians should act happy about tragedy and pain when they feel like crying. Rather, the Bible aims the spotlight on the end result, the productive use God can make of suffering in our lives. To achieve that result, however, He first needs our commitment of trust, and the process of giving Him that commitment can be described as rejoicing.1

Death

Christian joy is so complete and lasting that it stays with us even when we are dying.

Tony Snow was one of America’s most successful and respected newsmen and commentators. He rose from an op-ed writer and editor for a small newspaper to become a voice on ABC’s Good Morning America and other network shows. His career took off when he moved to Fox News as host of his own show and was a frequent commentator on others. In 2006, President George W. Bush appointed Snow to be his White House press secretary. Though popular, knowledgeable, and highly articulate, he was forced to resign less than two years later when he was diagnosed with terminal colon cancer. He died the following year at fifty-three.

Tony Snow could have died a bitter man, angry at how his brilliant career was cut short at its peak and how cancer deprived him of life with his wife and three children. But Tony was a devout Christian. Far from being angry at God, he found joy in the unexpected blessing his illness brought him. He communicated this joy eloquently in an article published a few months before his death.

God relishes surprise. We want lives of simple, predictable ease — smooth, even trails as far as the eye can see — but God likes to go off-road. He provokes us with twists and turns. He places us in predicaments that seem to defy our endurance and comprehension — and yet don’t. By His love and grace, we persevere. The challenges that make our hearts leap and stomachs churn invariably strengthen our faith and grant measures of wisdom and joy we would not experience otherwise…

The mere thought of death somehow makes every blessing vivid, every happiness more luminous and intense. We may not know how our contest with sickness will end, but we have felt the ineluctable touch of God.2

As Paul contemplated the conclusion of his life and ministry, he anticipated the joy that would be his at the end:

But none of these things move me; nor do I count my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy.  — Acts 20:24

According to the apostle Peter, this joy is “inexpressible” (1 Peter 1:8). From his captivity on the Isle of Patmos, John the apostle affirmed this dying joy:

Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord. 
— Revelation 14:13

G.K. Chesterton believed this joy is “the gigantic secret of the Christian.”3 And I believe he’s right. Joy that thrives from the moment of our salvation to the moment of our death cannot be found outside of Christ! And what God desires for us, He also provides for us.

1. Philip Yancey, Where Is God When It Hurts? (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990), Kindle locations 1697–1702.

2. Tony Snow, “Cancer’s Unexpected Blessings,” Christianity Today, July 20, 2007, http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/july/25.30.html.

3. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy (New York: John Lane, 1909), 298.

Excerpted from A Life Beyond Amazing by David Jeremiah, copyright David P. Jeremiah.

I love studying biblical joy.  I love learning to experience the joy of God in the life and even death that He gives us.  It is His joy that brings us true joy.  We must know what that is before we can experience it.  Press on toward the call of God in Christ Jesus each day and be filled with the joy of God!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 22, 2021

Moses was eighty years old when God strengthened him to lead the children of Israel out of Egypt. God gave Moses a new strength to perform a divine mission and calling at eighty years old. But why did Moses initially resist God's call? Strangely, it had to do with his character. Moses' humility endeared him and made him a great man and leader. This one trait also explains why Moses resisted the Lord's call to become Israel's redeemer, even though it was a tremendous honor. One of the things that endeared Moses to the Lord was that Moses, according to the book of Numbers (Numbers 12:3, Numbers 12:6–8), was the humblest man in all of the earth. 

What does all this mean for you and me? Moses had a unique relationship with God. He performed these extraordinary miracles in front of Pharaoh. He had this calling upon his life, but calling and character always go together. 

This idea of character and calling is vital because you might have a great calling on your life. But to be called is one thing; to have the character humble enough to listen to God's direction, keep His will, and persevere despite people's adverse reactions. 

We find Moses' characteristic humility in a very unique way. Leviticus 1:1 says,  

And God called to Moses. 

Moses was so humble that he didn't want to write what the directly Lord gave him. The last letter of the word Vayyiqra, "and God called." Moses wrote this word with a very small letter, aleph. Aleph is the first letter and therefore the "lead" or "chief" letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Aleph represents the Lord (Abba, Adonai begin with the letter aleph). It is also the letter that represents leadership. This small letter aleph expressed Moses' humility. 

Why is that so important? Because that is the essence and definition of what humanity is. Humility is making yourself small in the sight of God, smaller in the sight of others, and smaller in your sight. Another way to understand it is humility is about occupying the right amount of space. When you occupy too much space, more than what God has allotted to you, that is pride. 

Philippians 2 tells us about Yeshua's humility. Out of His great love for us, He did His Father's will and died a painful death on the Cross. While pride is essentially selfish, humility is occupying the right space regardless of how it makes us look. Jesus died a horrible death but rose in victory. Like Moses, His humility led to freedom and salvation. 

Friends, humility is the way to greatness in the Kingdom. It's the foundation of spiritual service. It's about making yourself small so that God can be great because you can't be full of yourself and have room for the Lord in your life.  

And you can't be full of yourself and have room for relationships and the service to others. Suppose you want to be a great leader. In that case, if you're going to be like Messiah and like Moses, who embodied humility, you have to humble yourself in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up. Even as the scripture said,  

Blessed are the humble, for they will inherit the earth. 

Written for Devotionals Daily by Rabbi Jason Sobel, author of Mysteries of the Messiah. 

It is hard to be humble when you are perfect.  Well, since no one is perfect but Jesus, I would assume that we have lots of room to be humble!  Let us yield in humility to the Lord and serve Him and our earthly brethren giving God all the praise and glory for His work through us!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 21, 2021

Who Is God? By John Piper

1.God is spirit.

Here’s the first thing I believe I see in those revelations from God of who he is. First, Jesus says that God is spirit. John 4:24, “God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” In other words, he’s not physical. He’s not material. He does not have a body. He is invisible. He’s spirit.

2. God is personal.

Second, God is personal. This is amazing when you think that absolute reality could have been anything — I mean, there was nothing before absolute reality to make it what it is. And to think it’s personal, that’s just mind-blowing! He has revealed himself as one who thinks and reasons and plans and loves and rejoices and experiences anger and compassion.

Isaiah 55:8: “My thoughts are not your thoughts.”

Jeremiah 29:11: “I know the plans I have for you.”

Isaiah 1:18: “Come now, let us reason together.”

Hosea 11:8: “My compassion grows warm and tender.”

Zephaniah 3:17: The Lord “will rejoice over you with gladness.”

Numbers 11:10: “The anger of the Lord blazed hotly.”

“God is constant. He cannot be improved.”

Amazing! God is not impersonal. He’s not a substance. He’s not a mere force. He’s not material, like an element or a gas. He’s not just an influence. God is a person, personal. From him comes personhood. This is why human beings are so unique in the world of God’s creatures: he made us in his image; we are persons.

3. God is.

Third, he revealed himself as absolute, self-existent, independent of all other reality. I think one of the most important verses in the Bible is Exodus 3:14: “God said to Moses, ‘I Am Who I Am.’ And he said, ‘Say this to the people of Israel: “I Am has sent me to you.”’” The phrase “I Am Who I Am” is a declaration of absolute freedom from being created or formed or guided or swayed or determined by anything outside himself. Whatever God is or whatever God does, he himself is the ultimate source and cause of that.

Here are some implications of what that revelation means for who God is, that revelation of his “I Am Who I Am.”

1. It means he never had a beginning. Nobody made God. God simply is, always was, with no beginning.

2. God will never end. He is absolute being. If you are being from forever, there’s no place to go outside being. You can’t not be.

3. There is no reality before him. There’s no reality outside him unless he wills it to be and makes it.

4. God is utterly independent. He depends on nothing to bring him into being or support him or counsel him or make him what he is.

5. Everything that is not God depends totally on God. All that is not God is secondary and dependent. The entire universe — vast, vast, vast billions of galaxies — is utterly secondary to God.

6. He is constant. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He cannot be improved. He is not becoming anything. There is no development in God, no progress. Absolute perfection cannot be improved.

7. He is the absolute standard of truth and goodness and beauty. There is no lawbook to which he looks to know what is right. There’s no almanac to establish facts for God, no guild to determine what is excellent or beautiful. He himself is the standard of what is right and true and beautiful.

8. All that God does is always right, always just, always beautiful, and always in accord with truth — that is, himself. It fits. In that sense, it is right and good and beautiful, all things considered.

9. Therefore, God is the most important and most valuable reality in the universe. He is more worthy of interest and attention and admiration and enjoyment than all other realities, including the entire universe.

Now, all of that, all nine of those implications of “I Am Who I Am” — all of that — is implied in God’s word to Moses, “Tell them, ‘I Am has sent me to you.’” You can see the same implications in many other places in the Bible — for example, in the letter to the Romans. This is one of my favorite passages: Romans 11:33–36.

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!

“For who has known the mind of the Lord,

     or who has been his counselor?”

“Or who has given a gift to him

     that he might be repaid?”

For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

“The Son of God has always been God, and now he is also man — the God-man, Jesus.”

In other words, God can’t be counseled because his knowledge and wisdom are infinite. God can’t be negotiated with or bartered with or bribed because he owns everything. He can never be put in anybody’s debt. Everything originates with him. He sustains all that is. And the display of his glory, his beauty, his greatness, his value, is the goal of everything: “From him and through him and to him are all things.” Therefore, “to him be glory forever.”

4. God is Trinity.

And in his fullness and perfection, the Bible makes plain that, from all eternity, God has had a perfect image of himself, the radiance of his glory. The Bible calls it “the exact imprint of his nature” (Hebrews 1:3). And this image is so complete with all that God is that the Bible speaks of this image as the second person in God and uses the language of Son of God, not because there’s any biological way that he’s a son — like he had sex with Mary and had a baby; that’s not what the Bible teaches. He’s a son, the second person that has always existed in and as the perfect image of God.

This Son is a son to indicate that they have the same nature. They’re both personal, and love reigns between them. The Bible speaks of God the Father loving God the Son, and God the Son loving God the Father, and the Bible points to the reality that this Spirit between them — this love between the Father and Son — carries, as it were, such a fullness of all that they both are that a third person exists, stands forth, has always stood forth in God.

So, the biblical picture is that there’s one God — not three gods — and that this one God mysteriously exists as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. This is one reason that it makes sense to say, as 1 John 4:8 says, “God is love.” Love has been surging from all eternity in the fellowship of the three persons of the one God.

5. God became man.

Now, if that were not amazing enough — we’re over our head, I know; I’m just pointing. If that weren’t amazing enough, here comes the most amazing thing of all about who God is in his perfection and independence and fullness. He is not only completely righteous and just and holy, but overflowing — he is overflowing with his own beauty and goodness and joy, so that his creatures can know him, love him, enjoy him, be with him forever. In other words, the love that God has always enjoyed (and enjoyed is the right word) in the fellowship of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, God aims to share with his creatures.

“In God’s justice and mercy, he devised a way, from all eternity, for sinners like us to be forgiven and to be adopted into his eternal family.”

To do this, God the Father sends God the Son into his creation to be born as the God-man, Jesus Christ. This is what the Gospel of John means when it says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). “And the Word became flesh [that is, became a human being] and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). And you see the switch in categories from Word to Son, just to make clear that that’s who we’re talking about — the eternal Son, that other, second person in God. The Son of God has always been God, and now he is also man — the God-man, Jesus Christ.

6. God rescues undeserving people.

Why? Why this so-called incarnation of God? Because all of God’s human creatures had failed to worship and love God and obey God as we ought. We deserve to be punished. God would be perfectly just to punish us all in hell because of our failure and our rebellion. But in the fullness of his God-like love, he planned way before the foundation of the world — he is not only just, but he is merciful — to intrude himself into the world to rescue his own creatures, who deserve punishment, from his punishment. He rescues us from his own wrath by his own mercy. The Son of God becomes human and is punished in our place. Here’s how the prophet Isaiah in the Old Testament Scriptures, the Jewish Scriptures, put it:

He was pierced for our transgressions;

     he was crushed for our iniquities. . . .

All we like sheep have gone astray;

     we have turned — every one — to his own way;

and the Lord has laid on him

     the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:5–6)

The New Testament puts it like this: “God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). Whoever believes, whoever trusts, whoever receives, whoever treasures Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, Jesus becomes his substitute, bears God’s punishment, provides God’s righteousness, secures eternal joy in fellowship with God.

All That God Is for You

So, who is God? He’s the Creator, Sustainer, Governor, and Judge of the universe. And in his justice and mercy, he devised a way, from all eternity, for sinners like us to be forgiven and to be adopted into his eternal family as the children of God and as a kind of bride for his Son, Jesus Christ, so that by sharing the joy God has in himself, our joy in him would show the fullness of his own glory.

I invite you, I urge you, to embrace Jesus and all that God is. Jesus is who God is.  Respond to the Spirit’s prompting to your heart.  Yield to the love that wants to guide you through the narrow path of righteousness and truth. Know God . . . by coming to Him in humble faith, worshipping, praising, giving thanks, asking for help to make it through each day.  Then you will know peace that passes all understanding and have hope in the unseen glory of God!

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 20, 2021

Hostage Situation

Figure out what’s holding you back.  

It was September 1973 in Stockholm, Sweden. A convicted felon left prison after serving a portion of his sentence.

Think of it like probation. He was getting a second chance at life, a chance to prove he could reenter society and do it right this time. It didn’t work. Soon after he was released, he headed to a bank to rob it and took four hostages when it went wrong. There was a five-day standoff before the Swedish authorities filled the bank with tear gas to flush him out.  

When the robber was brought to trial, the four hostages were obviously the key witnesses. Surprisingly, following the trauma of the experience, the four hostages refused to say anything negative about the person who had held them captive for almost a week. This led to what we now call “Stockholm syndrome.” Maybe you’ve heard of it. It’s a name given to the inexplicable psychological phenomenon where a person develops affection for the person causing their affliction. Simply put, they developed a weirdly codependent relationship with their captor.  

It doesn’t just happen in bank robberies, though. Think about it. Who do you know who can’t break the cycle of bad relationships? Do you know someone who goes through predictable cycles of addiction and can’t seem to break free? What about the person obsessively checking their phone for work emails while they are supposed to be on vacation? That last one is seemingly more benign than the others, but it’s not.  

Many of us are clinging with affection to the very things that are holding us hostage. You know I’m talking about you right now, right?  

It could be anything. A routine, a relationship, a job, a deeply held belief caused by a childhood wound. It might even be fair to say that we’re all being held hostage by something to some degree. Some of the most important work you will do is to identify who or what has been keeping you captive and to break free. We can’t fix what we don’t understand.  

You can’t move forward with your new ambitions without sloughing off some of your old hang-ups, and we can’t simply walk away from these hang-ups without understanding them first.

Here’s something to consider: our current failures are often an echo of our past ones.  

As we come to understand these cycling behaviors, we get the clues we need to figure out what’s underneath the surface and holding us back.  

Here’s the good news: you can turn whatever has been holding you hostage into a path toward freedom by understanding what that is and then breaking your relationship with it.  

If you want to accomplish your ambitions, you’re going to have to learn some Houdini-level escape tricks. To do this you will have to clear the path of anything standing in the way.  

We need to figure out what limiting beliefs we have developed that have us convinced that our ambitions are not available to us. These limiting beliefs come in all shapes and sizes for us. But they have one unifying characteristic — they hold us back. I have them and you have them. They are the invisible ghosts whispering that we’ll never make it, that we can’t accomplish our ambitions, that we missed our chance. I bet you’ve heard that voice in your head saying, You’re not smart enough or You’re not attractive enough or You don’t have the right gifts and talents to accomplish that or You missed your only chance. These ugly, untrue messages will flood our minds if we’re not on guard.  

Where do these voices come from? My bet is that they didn’t originate with you. If you drill down on them, you’ll probably find they originated with a parent or a coach, a sibling or a pastor, a teacher or a bully, an old boyfriend or girlfriend. Or maybe the voice in your head is a mashup of some or all of these.  

We have a drawer at our house where we keep a box full of keys. I don’t know what most of them unlock or where they came from. Like you, I didn’t want to lose the ability to possibly unlock something I had, so I kept them all, not understanding which locks the keys went with. I’ve wondered if there were little elves in the attic hiding more of them each night. I was going to set some traps that looked like locks and see if I could catch a couple. These keys are of zero use to us, yet still we keep them because we think we might need them someday.  

That box of keys is like the hang-ups in our lives. They are habits and beliefs and patterns that may have served us at one point, but don’t any longer. Yet still we hang on to them thinking they might be useful later. This is how limiting beliefs operate. We don’t even remember how we got them.

They are of no use to us, and they don’t unlock anything, but we’ve given them full access to our most deeply held beliefs.  

We’ve all given more than a couple of keys away too. We’ve done a key exchange with people we don’t even know but listen to because they are loud or authoritative or convincing. We have allowed them in and treated them like guests when they are actually trespassers in our lives.

We’ve given keys to some of our life choices too. There’s a swap happening with our careers and cars and bank accounts and retirement plans. The hard work comes when we start understanding our keys — the ones we’ve got, the ones we’ve given away, and the ones we don’t need anymore.  

If you want to do some detective work on your life, look at your behaviors.  

Are you bad at relationships? Maybe your parents got divorced so you started to believe your path would be the same. Did your parents stay up at night over a dimly lit kitchen table wondering how they could afford the electricity bill? Perhaps this is the origin of your worldview that the resources you need will be scarce. Do you remember playing musical chairs and you’re afraid you’ll be the one without a seat when the music stops? Maybe this is where your fear of rejection came from. Did you get made fun of for your freckles or get dumped by a prom date? These could be the return address of some of your insecurities. 

Limiting beliefs can be anything, really, and they’re unique to each of us. If you want to clear the path to your ambitions, you’re going to have to stare down some monsters that have made their way into your closet or under your bed or into your life.

You have to silence these old voices telling you lies about yesterday so the truth of today becomes a little bit more audible.  

I guess what I’m saying is that none of us, literally not a single person, pursues their ambitions without having to face the moments in their past that have influenced their beliefs and deciding what they’ll do about them. The only question is whether you’ll stop, recognize that a limiting belief has grabbed the microphone in your life, understand what is happening, and tune out what isn’t true. If you don’t, there’s a chance you’ll let the lies you’ve believed in the past repeat themselves until the day you die.  

*

Our limiting beliefs usually take the shape of fear. This can manifest as procrastination, rationalizing, busyness, and a host of other subconscious tactics we employ to keep from chasing our ambitions. Whether the fear is rational or not, it feels real.  

Fear boxes us in and will always try to talk us into settling for lesser things. If we let fear push us around, it won’t be long before we’re all fences and no horses.  

If you want to clear the path toward your ambitions, you need to figure out what you’re afraid of and why you’re afraid of it.  

Here’s a hard truth you need to understand as you pinpoint your fears: they will not go away by themselves. They’re more likely to multiply like rabbits in the dark. Listen up.

Fears don’t really get fully conquered; they’re just understood and given less power. Be strong and courageous. Understand what fears are driving you. Are you willing to slay the dragon to move toward your ambition? Figure out your fears, kick them in the teeth, and get back to work. You’re not a hostage anymore.  

Excerpted from Dream Big by Bob Goff, copyright Bob Goff.

What’s holding you back from victory in Jesus and living a life pleasing to God and storing up treasure in heaven?  Sin holds us hostage!  Fight the good fight, you cannot lose with Jesus on your side.  Draw near to Him in times of trouble and He will guard and protect your path.

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 19, 2021

Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you. 

— Matthew 17:20, NIV

In Equatorial Africa, far from pharmacies and hospitals, a woman died in childbirth, leaving behind a grieving two-year-old daughter and a premature baby in danger of succumbing to the chill of the night. With no incubator, no electricity, and few supplies, the newborn’s life was in jeopardy.

A helper filled a hot water bottle to maintain the warmth desperately needed by the infant, but suddenly the rubber burst — and it was the last hot water bottle in the village.

A visiting missionary physician from Northern Ireland, Dr. Helen Roseveare, asked the orphans to pray for the situation — but a faith-filled ten-year-old named Ruth seemed to go too far.

“Please, God, send us a water bottle,” she implored. “It’ll be no good tomorrow, God, the baby’ll be dead; so please send it this afternoon.” As if that request was not sufficiently audacious, she added, “And while You are about it, would You please send a dolly for the little girl so she’ll know You really love her?”

Recalled Roseveare, “I was put on the spot. Could I honestly say, ‘Amen’? I just did not believe that God could do this. Oh, yes, I know that He can do everything. The Bible says so, but there are limits, aren’t there?”

The only hope of getting a water bottle would be from a parcel sent from the homeland, but she had never received one during the almost four years she had lived there.

“Anyway,” she mused, “if anyone did send a parcel, who would put in a hot water bottle? I live on the equator!”

A couple of hours later, a car dropped off a twenty-two-pound package. The orphans helped open it and sort through the contents: some clothing for them, bandages for the leprosy patients, and a bit of food.

Oh, and this: “As I put my hand in again, I felt the… could it really be? I grasped it, and pulled it out. Yes. A brand-new rubber, hot water bottle!” said Roseveare. “I cried. I had not asked God to send it; I had not truly believed that He could.”

With that, little Ruth rushed forward. “If God has sent the bottle, He must have sent the dolly too!” she exclaimed.

She dug through the packaging and found it at the bottom of the parcel: a beautifully dressed doll. Asked Ruth, “Can I go over with you, Mummy, and give this dolly to that little girl, so she’ll know that Jesus really loves her?”

That parcel had been packed five months earlier by Roseveare’s former Sunday school class. The leader, feeling prompted by God, included the hot water bottle; a girl contributed the doll.

And this package, the only one ever to arrive, was delivered the same day Ruth prayed for it with the faith of a child.

A mere twist of fate? An embellished yarn? Or perhaps a miracle?

According to a 2004 survey, 55 percent of US physicians have seen results in their patients that they would consider miraculous. Furthermore, three-quarters of the 1,100 doctors surveyed are convinced that miracles can occur today — a percentage that’s actually higher than that of the US population in general. So maybe it’s not surprising that six out of ten physicians said they pray for their patients individually.

The big issue, however, is whether belief in supernatural occurrences is based on mistake, misunderstanding, fraud, legend, rumor, wishful thinking, confirmation bias, the placebo effect — or reality.

In other words, does a miracle-performing God actually exist, and has He left His fingerprints all over supernatural events throughout history down to the present age? Is He even available to intervene in your life today?

Excerpted from The Case for Miracles by Lee Strobel, copyright Lee Strobel.

Do you believe in miraculous events straight from the hand of Jesus? Put more personally, do you believe that God will work miracles in your own life today?

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 18, 2021

When was the last time you heard God speak to you in your spirit? 

I believe God desires to communicate with each of us on a daily basis — in fact, as often as we need to hear from Him, which may be several times in a day. He always has a message for us that is more timely than the daily news and more important than the message that any person on earth can give. 

A woman once told me that her mother-in-law had died a few weeks earlier after a very painful experience with stomach cancer. I began to offer my sympathy when the woman interrupted me and said, “I’m glad this happened.”  

I was a bit taken aback. “You are?” I asked.  

“Oh, yes,” she said. “This wasn’t a negative thing at all. It was the most positive experience in her life and certainly one of the most positive experiences in mine.”  

Most people would consider stomach cancer to be anything but positive. I was interested in hearing more of her story, which she was happy to tell.  

“My mother-in-law was one of the most bitter, spiteful, difficult women I have ever met. I knew from the first minute she laid eyes on me that she was determined to be my enemy,” she began. “In fact, my husband and I eloped so we wouldn’t have to deal with her at our wedding ceremony.

During the fifteen years that I knew her before her diagnosis with cancer, I never heard a kind word from her lips — except to our daughter. She had a soft spot in her heart for our daughter, but not for anyone else. She wasn’t mean only to me, but to my husband, to her other two sons, and to everyone she encountered. Repairmen told me that they dreaded a call from her home, and even the kindest clergyman we know had a difficult time with her rebukes and sarcasm.”  

“She must have been a woman with a great deal of inner pain,” I said.  

“Yes,” she replied. “I didn’t realize how much inner pain she had, however, until after her diagnosis. Up to that time, I just figured she was a hateful, mean woman. I didn’t take the time or make the effort to see beyond her façade.”  

“She may not have let you see inside her,” I said.  

“I believe that’s right,” she agreed. “She had a stone wall around her heart. And she kept this stone wall in place for several weeks after her doctor told her she had cancer.

Initially, she was given only a few weeks to live. It was amazing to everyone who knew her and knew her condition that she lived nearly five months.”  

“And you believe that was the grace of God?” I asked.  

“Yes,” she said. “What happened was this. She refused all offers of help except those from my husband and me. We were the only ones she would allow to enter her home to fix meals for her and to change her bed and do her laundry.

When the pain was intense, she’d ask us to read to her or to stay and converse with her to help take her mind off the pain. As the days went by and she saw that I was caring for her with love and concern — not with criticism or hate — she began to tell me her story. I began to understand why she was filled with such anger.”  

“Was it something from her childhood?” I guessed.  

“Actually from her teen years,” she said. “A woman in her church accused her of stealing funds that the youth group had collected for a ski trip. The accusations were made in a very hurtful and public way, and my mother-in-law was given little chance to defend herself or to reply to the charges.

She hadn’t taken the money, but ironically, about the same time she had found twenty dollars in a small coin purse in the gutter of a street near her home. She had spent the money, figuring that she was the beneficiary of finders, keepers. When she offered this explanation as the reason she had had more spending money of late, the woman refused to believe her story and not only called her a thief but a liar.  

“My mother-in-law became so angry that she dropped out of church and turned her back on God. For years she had told me she was an atheist. After her diagnosis she modified that to say she didn’t believe in God because if there was a God, He should be just and righteous, and there had been no justice on her behalf in this unfortunate situation.”  

“So she had been angry and bitter for decades,” I said.  

“Yes, for forty-nine years. The more she suffered with her disease, the more she concluded that there was no God of mercy or kindness. She couldn’t explain away, however, the peace that my husband, daughter, and I felt in our hearts — or the kindness and love that we showered upon her. Bit by bit, she began to soften. She even started asking us to read some of the Psalms to her when she was in pain. We had a couple of conversations about Heaven too.”  

“Did she accept the Lord as her Savior before she died?” I asked.  

“Yes, but it happened in a way that I would never have anticipated,” she said as tears welled up in her eyes.  

“One day when I went over to fix dinner for her, our daughter went along. She said, ‘Granny Lou, I love you. And Jesus told me to tell you that He loves you too.’ I froze in my tracks. I steeled myself for what I felt sure would be my mother-in-law’s reply, probably something like, ‘That’s nice for you to believe.’ Instead, she said, ‘I know He does, dear. He told me so Himself last night.’  

“She looked up and I’m sure she read my face, which no doubt expressed great surprise and pleasure. She said, ‘I saw Jesus last night. He came to the foot of my bed in a pool of bright light and said, ‘Lou, I’m here to tell you that I love you. I want you to come live with Me.’”  

“Wonderful!” I said.  

She continued, “I was so stunned, all I could stammer was, ‘That’s great, Mother Lou.’ She said, ‘I know you probably think it’s strange He would come calling on me like that, and I was pretty surprised myself. I asked Him, “How could You love an old hag like me?” He said, “You won’t be an old hag when you are living with Me.” And then He was gone.’  

“Not long after that, she asked my husband to pray the sinner’s prayer with her. And about a week later, she died.

Just before she died, she said, ‘I wasted a lot of years railing against God. Instead of my doing all the talking against Him, I should have done a little more listening to Him.’”  

“What a tremendous testimony!” I said.  

“My mother-in-law isn’t the only one with a testimony,” she said. “The Lord did a great thing in my own heart through this. I discovered in caring for my mother-in-law that I had failed to love as Christ loved. I repented of the hatred I had held toward my mother-in-law and asked God to forgive me and to help me love her as He loved her. He softened my heart and gave me compassion and tenderness toward her that I would never have believed were possible. I find myself looking at difficult people with new eyes. In fact, I’m considering taking a volunteer position with the hospice program. I believe the Lord still has things to teach me and ways to use me.”  

“I feel certain that He does,” I said.  

“One thing I know with certainty,” she said as our conversation drew to a close, “God can cross any barriers we might put up. I’m grateful that He still had something to say to my mother-in-law. I have a new faith that He still has something to say to me too.”  

Yes, a thousand times yes! God does still have something to say to each one of us. He never reaches the place where He doesn’t have a message that is precisely for us.  

Excerpted from Can You Still Trust God? By Dr. Charles F. Stanley, copyright Charles F. Stanley. 

Romans 5:8 says that God demonstrates His love for us in the Cross. Jesus is the display of His love!  And He keeps coming after us with His love until death.

Pastor Dale

Notes of Faith March 17, 2021

“St. Patrick’s Breastplate,” a powerful prayer attributed to Saint Patrick of Ireland, begins in this way:

I arise today

Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,

Through belief in the Threeness,

Through confession of the Oneness

of the Creator of creation.1

“I arise today through a mighty strength.” Oh, wouldn’t that be nice to say every morning? I want that to be true of me, but what is true for so many of us on too many mornings is “I arise today through a fog of forgetfulness.” We have to claw our way out of the cloying depths of unbelief back into the dawning light of truth and breath.

Different mornings provide alternative options of discouragement. Thoughts that frequently take our hearts captive upon arising include:

It’s going to be a bad day.

I don’t want to get up.

You are a failure as a mother, father, friend…

You do not love well.

You are alone.

You are on the outside.

You are a selfish person.

This is all too hard.

And repeat.

Do you know what yours are?

This morning, I arose through a veil of guilt and accusation. Today’s litany coming against me was a shorter version. The accuser was battering my heart with Failure. Failure. Failure.

The crushing weight of shame was reinforced by memories (cruelly twisted but seemingly real interpretations) of my failings, evidence parading across my mind that I was not being a good friend, wife, or mother.

But the prayer continues:

I arise today

Through the strength of Christ’s birth with His baptism,

Through the strength of His crucifixion with His burial,

Through the strength of His resurrection with His ascension,

Through the strength of His descent for the judgment of doom.2

Wow. Well, okay then. We don’t arise through our strength to figure it out or to pull it off or to change or to become an amazing person who loves everyone at all times perfectly. We certainly don’t arise today by arguing ourselves and the oppressor of our souls out of accusation.

We arise today and every day by turning our gaze onto Jesus and what He has accomplished for us — because we needed Him to accomplish it.

We don’t arise today by our strength but by His.

We simply don’t have the capacity to get out of bed in the morning when we’re buried under a landslide of accusation and shame, the evidence of our faults piled high, ready to convict us and send us into a prison of self-loathing.

No.

While still feeling the weight of failure this morning, I turned my gaze onto my Jesus and His finished work on my behalf. I began to ask Jesus for the truth and to tell it to myself: I am not a perfect friend, but I am a good one. I fail as a wife and mother, but I am not a failure.

I took my gaze off my performance and turned it onto the King and His character: His faithfulness. His goodness. His mercy. His strength. His might.

I arise today, through

God’s strength to pilot me,

God’s might to uphold me,

God’s wisdom to guide me,

God’s eye to look before me,

God’s ear to hear me,

God’s word to speak for me,

God’s hand to guard me,

God’s shield to protect me,

God’s host to save me

From snares of devils,

From temptation of vices,

From everyone who shall wish me ill, afar and near.3

I hide myself in Him, and in Him I find my strength to rise. For He does not accuse us; He blesses us. He invites us all further up and further in to be changed into His likeness, and not to gaze at our weaknesses or fears but to gaze at Him. Perfection. Might. Our Victor. Our Savior.

Christ with me,

Christ before me,

Christ behind me,

Christ in me,

Christ beneath me,

Christ above me,

Christ on my right,

Christ on my left,

Christ when I lie down,

Christ when I sit down,

Christ when I arise,

Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me,

Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me,

Christ in every eye that sees me,

Christ in every ear that hears me.4

This morning, like so many days in my clay-footed life, I need mercy. My Father offers it to me. Jesus has won it for me. The Holy Spirit beckons me to receive it. I need mercy, and I know it. In that knowing comes a great gift. I turn my heart again to my kind and understanding God and confess to Him that I need mercy. His answer swamps my heart with a too-good-to-be-true reality that leads to a crumbling of hopelessness and shame. My self-loathing collapses into His love. My self-condemnation melts into His arms that welcome and soothe. I have blown it. The blowing now has become the wind of the Holy Spirit. Ruah is here. His breath shepherds my heart into my Father’s, and there mercy triumphs over judgment. I may stay in bed a bit longer, but now it is not out of despair. Now I cozily snuggle into His forgiveness, His love, His heartbeat of hope.

The turning of my heart from lies to truth can happen as quickly as whiplash. It is the good kind, the kind that brings life. Sometimes I am not strong enough to orchestrate it, but our God is stronger. Always. And for that I am defiantly joyful. He invites us all to make the turn, and when we look to Him, He gives us the power to do it. We can have hope, no matter if we wake to accusation or to celebration, because our God is with us.

1. “St. Patrick’s Breastplate,” Our Catholic Prayers, last modified 2018, http://www.ourcatholicprayers.com/st-patricks -breastplate.html.

2. “St. Patrick’s Breastplate.”

3. “St. Patrick’s Breastplate.”

4. “St. Patrick’s Breastplate.”

Excerpted from Defiant Joy by Stasi Eldredge, copyright Stasi Eldredge.

Let’s take the discouragement that wakes with us and taunts us and take an abrupt turn away from it! Like St. Patrick we can pray Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ in me.

Pastor Dale