Years, not degrees.

*sigh*

Please don’t misunderstand, that sigh was a good one. It was the satisfied sigh of someone watching a sunrise bloom over a resplendent mountain peak or holding their baby for the first time. Or akin to the musical hum of a soul in perfect alignment.

You see, I almost did not live to see this day.

In the late spring of last year I desperately cried out to God for something I could not do for myself. When Jesus gave His blessing to those who “mourn” He used the strongest of the nine words for sorrow in the Greek New Testament. If I wasn’t in that category I was doubtlessly moving in its direction.

As the mucus seeped and tears leaked and it all seemed to catch in my throat, I pled through racking sobs for God to be my Health and Healer. The weight of my burden had so pinned me to the mat that I truly, at the risk of sounding too Pauline, “despaired of life.” Twenty-six years of undisciplined living were stealing years from my life but I always managed to swat such thoughts away with a flippant “if I die, I’ll be with Jesus, which is far better” response. But that warm afternoon I decided I did not want to die after all. Oh, that will not do! I cried up from the bellows of my heartsickness for God to add years to my life and life to my years!

And then, something shifted internally.

We’re talking seismic in scope here.

The Voice of Many Waters that thunders, quakes and flashes, shouted through an eternity of universes and struck against the bondage of years that were in me and freed me from my enslavement. The God who keeps covenant with them that fear Him—and turn to Him in their ‘cast-down-edness’—will with certainty be to them a Healer and Refuge.

“I have heard You, Scott. The life in your years that has been taken will be restored. I AM to you your Health and your Healer.”

Instantly, the mourning in me was transformed into soul-deep consolation and new, unbitter, tears began to flow.

“The means by which this Healing will be realized must be a very difficult path. Perhaps the hardest road you’ve ever traveled.”

I listened intently, but without fear.

“But I will be beside you in this journey and, in the end, you will look back with joy upon the road and praise Me for it.”

When God speaks, He acts.

When He acts, it is for keeps.

Over the next few weeks, I underwent a change in discipline of self and lost some weight. Nothing noticeable, almost imperceptible to others, but Sandy and I knew. And our hope grew. Then I had my September physical. Prostate, good. Blood pressure, good. Heart, good. Pulse rate, good.

“I’ll call you in the next 48 hours with the results of your blood test.”

I felt better. I was honoring the Lord with my day-to-day schedule, so I almost forgot about the physical until the phone rang and I saw Dr. Kiley’s name on the caller screen.

“Everything looks normal, but there’s been a new development. You’ve become a diabetic since your last physical.”

The D-word. Type 2.

He gave me the name of a personal friend of his who practiced endocrinology and told me to make an appointment as soon as possible.

“Your A1c level is almost 12,” he warned me.

A1c? I had no clue what that was but I could tell the way his voice dropped when he said ‘12’ I was very sure that the number was way too high. Or way too low. Whichever, I made haste to call my new doctor.

When Dr. Wolffe saw me, he told me we could lick this thing but I would have to follow a strict diet and regimen of exercise. No problem, doc, already begun…

My blood sugar was in the upper 300s so he pulled out a syringe and told me the liquid inside was a kind of ‘booster’ to lower my sugar dramatically over the next 24 hours. Such a calm demeanor, but I was sure it was hiding a great deal of uncertainty as to where I might end up in all of this. His southern gentlemanly drawl warned me of blindness, sores that won’t heal requiring amputation, heart disease and stroke.

And I feared not one whit.

By God’s grace I knew when I saw Dr. Wolffe again, there would be a much different scenario.

So I went home with my new glucose meter, test strips, lancets and prescription of metformin (My doctor told me the latter would also cause weight loss. Hooray!) and thus began my journey with diabetes.

When I began crying out to the Lord for His power and might to transform me a few months prior, I added that I needed a few months away from ministry and more ordered days for my lifestyle to have even a remote shot at recovery. Well, now I had it. I had preached my final sermon as pastor of my little flock in Douglasville and the calendar was ceremoniously clean and sterile. As such, I could attack this little issue free of any other expectations and tug-o-wars. God was proving faithful yet again.

The day after my ‘booster shot’ my blood sugar fell below 100 but the next day it rebounded to the mid-300s. A call to my doctor assured me this was expected. Void of alarm, his soothing tone could calm a coon dog bawling at his treed prey!

The next couple of weeks proved to be the proverbial calm before the storm. Sange and I were positively giddy about the coming holiday weeks. She had taken two vacation weeks in November around Thanksgiving and the first weekend of November we were being treated to a freebie weekend at a 5-star hotel in Huntsville, one of our favorite cities in the southeast.

Under such warm and oozy feelings, we piled into the van on October 31^st and made for a special night out, not wanting to be around the house for the evening’s inevitable trick-or-treaters. We both love Italian and while we have other more favorite Italian restaurants, the Italian Oven on the East-West Connector, a half hour from our house, isn’t bad.

We were served that night by a “witch” complete with black fingernails, lipstick and eye-dark. Gratefully, she wasn’t practicing but just dressing for the occasion. Even still, well…just, even still.

I ordered the lasagna, or as I like to say: “lazzag-na” (pretending to be a redneck; Sange just loves when I do that), and several bites in, lost my appetite. I knew that my stomach had shrunk because the Lord had given me grace to push away from the table the previous months, but this was different. I literally quit after about three bites. Sandy was not alarmed as she had been “proud” of me for aggressively competing against my hypothalamus and chalked it up to discipline.

As we climbed back into the van, my precious asked me to take her to the Hobby Lobby craft store behind the restaurant so she could see if there might be new stock for the upcoming holidays. I elected to stay in the van and listen to the Georgia Bulldog game on the radio.

“How long do I have?” Sandy asked as she jumped out of the van.

“As long as you need, baby,” I told her. She waved and smiled and I turned on the radio.

The radio did not stay on long as Florida was rolling up the points and hammering my ‘Dawgs to the ever-loving turf. ‘Nuff of that. The sky turned granite-gray and there was only a slight chill in the air. Very slight. But I suddenly got a little frigid inside the van. I started the engine and turned on the heater full-blast. It helped, but then the symptoms of a urinary tract infection began following one after another like cars on a choo-choo train.

My head began to turn ill and “sparkly” (kind of like being dizzy).

I started to dry-heave.

Feverish.

Chills.

Clammy sweat.

I reached for my cell phone and dialed Sandy. She had only been in the store for about a half hour but when I told her I was feeling very ill and we may need to head home, she left her purchases behind and was out the door. She is my angel.

We mercifully got home and I made a beeline for the bedroom. It was Saturday, so I’d have to wait 36 hours before I could get in touch with my doctor. The best thing I could do now was get in bed, take some flu medicine and sleep. Sometimes when I get hit with it, I could be better by the next morning. Other times, a few days.

When I laid my sick body (I didn’t have a clue how sick) on my low-air loss mattress, I had no inkling that I would not leave it until the next Sunday—and then in an ambulance.

I would not eat another meal for the next eight weeks.

There was no way I could have known then, but the road—the real road prescribed for me—had just gotten a whole lot harder.

And deadlier.

Eighty years ago, you were born beneath the thickening clouds of Great Depression yet the little boy with glacier-blue eyes and a mop of sandy-blonde hair atop his head smiled mischievously in the face of hard times and rose above with l’esprit de la vie beautifully marked by resilience, gusto, grit and the grace of God. The sorrows and difficulties of those early years only emblazoned the stuff of greatness deep in your being and tempered sensitivity and kindness from your heart. How blessed are we to say to the world: this man is our Dad!

You are a man of few words yet your life is a library of reference for splendid living. Not long ago, a man who was gifted with a golden tongue said “I talk and talk and talk, and I haven’t taught people in fifty years what my father taught by example in one week.” Hear, hear. We have learned much from your life, Dad. You are a living epistle of true wisdom that fits beautifully in your children’s hands. The cover is tenderly worn, the edges have gone from crisp to aged and the pages are dog-eared but only because there is so much of your life that is worth bookmarking. So much legacy to mine and plumb.

The Psalmist says, “The entrance of Thy words giveth light” (Psalm 119:130) to which your life, Dad, eloquently testifies. Each of us kids remember that same early morning liturgy rehearsed again and again across the years and how it has planted in us the hunger to know God more through the sacred scriptures.

There you sit, at the breakfast table, always before the early rays of morning gild the edges of the quiet pre-dawn, your head bowed over the Book of books; black coffee steams in a mug at your elbow but before a spoonful of cereal is raised to your mouth, God gets you first. This is how the morning greeted us! Could any other legacy be more necessary for a child? You read as though you were consuming food, for indeed you were, and your inner life glowed hotter than even the day before and not quite as much as it would the following morning. You read so the words would cleanse your soul and send you into the day with a vitality that was not your own.

Each day, every week, month after month and across the expanding bridge of decades, your life has gone up to God as a sweet savor of incense.  It might seem a strange thing to say of a grown man that he is sweet, and yet it so perfectly speaks of you. All who have ever known you, Dad, would agree when the record of your life is tallied, you come up a very sweet man. Sweet, as in, endearing. Winsome. Grace-filled. Affable. Kind.

Handsome, young and fresh out of the Air Force, it was 1953 and you made an amazing, life-changing discovery. Trapped inside a set of revolving doors at the YMCA of Harvey, Illinois, was a beautiful brunette that caught your eye. You tried to strike up a conversation with her but found her aloof and uninterested. Today, your kids are giddy with delight that you did not let this deter you. You Romancer you! You finally swept her off her feet and barely a year later, you married Mom on a glorious spring day, for richer and for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death should separate you. A long and lasting home was established, beginning with the arrival of your firstborn, eleven months later.

That home became a little slice of heaven on earth, rooted and grounded in godliness, when you were gloriously reborn! Thank God for that little mission church in Calumet City that you, Mom and your little girl began attending, and thank God for the “angel that led you to the Lord”! That angel, of course, was Pastor Wayne Angel, and he saw you in that pew, trembling there under deep conviction, and he walked back to where you were standing, asked if you were ready to surrender your life to Jesus, and you said yes. Bless you, Dad, for saying yes!

In a society of dysfunctional families, it has been our singular fortune to not only be blessed with a Dad, but a very good Dad, a doting Dad with firm hand and loving heart, a godly Dad who has lived only to see his children say yes to Jesus also and establish their homes in Christ. Thank you, Dad, for caring enough to point out the way to us. We, too, have been led to the Lord by an angel.

And when we’ve heard you sing your testimony with songs like “I’d Rather Have Jesus” or “The Love of God” and “How Great Thou Art” in that deep, rich, bass voice of yours, we’ve heard what angels must sound like when they praise the Lamb who sits on the Throne. We know our Father in glory beams when He hears you sing. We sure do.

Happy Birthday, Dad.

May You hear the heavens sing over you this day.

Passing On the Mantle...

Seventeen years ago today, I began my pastoral ministry in Douglas County. I was 31 years young, with great ambition and vision. Some thought I was foolish to end a road ministry that was quite successful and pass into obscurity in the small town of Douglasville, Georgia. But the litmus test of success in God’s economy is not position but obedience and Sandy and I both knew God was calling us to a more localized ministry where we could invest our lives in a particular group of people for a prolonged period of time. The starry twinkle in my eyes forecasted I would see a church of hundreds emerge over a span of a few years and then, after 10 years, I would resume life out on the road.

But God said, “Not so fast, big boy.”

I soon discovered I was not in Douglasville to build a church so much as I was put here so God could “build the man.”

When God wants to drill a man, and thrill a man, and skill a man
When God want to mold a man to play the noblest part
When He years with all His heart to create so great and bold a man
That all the world shall praise
Watch His methods, watch His ways
How He ruthlessly perfects whom He royally selects
How He hammers him and hurts him
And with mighty blows converts him into frail shapes of clay which only God understands
How his tortured heart is crying and he lifts beseeching hands
How he bends but never breaks when God’s good he understands
How He uses whom He chooses
And with every purpose fuses him
And by every act induces him to try His splendor out
God knows what He’s about!

Mrs. Pastor with one of her "girls"

When God wants to take a man and shake a man and wake a man…
When God wants to make a man to do the future’s will;
He tries with all His skill…
When He yearns with all His soul to create him large and whole…
With what cunning He prepares him…
How He goads and never spares him! How He whets him and He frets him and in poverty begets him…
How often He disappoints whom He sacredly anoints!
With what wisdom He will hide him;
Never minding what betide him…
Though his genius sob with slighting and his pride may not forget;
Bids him struggle harder yet!
Makes him lonely so that only God’s high messages shall reach him…
So that He may surely teach him what the hierarchy planned;
And though he may not understand…
Gives him passions to command.
How remorselessly He spurs him…
With terrific ardour stirs him
When He poignantly prefers him.

When God wants to name a man and fame a man and tame a man…
When God wants to shame a man to do His Heavenly best;
When He tries the highest test that His reckoning may bring…
When He wants a god or king;
How He reins him and restrains him so his body scarce contains him…
While He fires him and inspires him…
Keeps him yearning, ever burning for that tantalizing goal.
Lures and lacerates his soul…
Sets a challenge for his spirit;
Draws it highest then he’s near it!
Makes a jungle that he clear it;
Makes a desert that he fear it…and subdue it, if he can -
So doth God make a man!
Then to test his spirit’s wrath, Throw a mountain in his path;
Puts a bitter choice before him and relentlessly stands o’er him…
Climb or perish, so He says…
But, watch His purpose, watch His ways.
God’s plan is wondrous kind – could we understand His mind?
Fools are they who call His blind!

When his feet are torn and bleeding;
Yet his spirit mounts unheeding…
Blazing newer paths and finds;
When the Force that is Divine leaps to challenge every failure,
And His ardour still is sweet -
And love and hope are burning in the presence of defeat!
Lo the crisis, Lo the shouts that would call the leader out…
When the people need salvation doth he rise to lead the nation;
Then doth God show His plan…
And the world has found a man!

                                                             (Anonymous)

God was gracious to add seven more years to my ten to finish the work and on April 10 of this year, I heard Him say “Your work here is finished.” Somewhere along the journey we’ve managed to make ready for the Lord a core of people prepared for His coming, yes, but there has been a long and lasting work done in my wife and me. We are not the same people we were 17 years ago. Character has deepened. Faith has been strengthened. A life of more “apartness” and “otherness” is being realized compared to when we first began this journey.

For those who know us best, the past few years have been some of the hardest of our ministry lives, beginning in 2002. Pressures from within and without, destructive forces working against us, loss of hope, sleepless nights, tears seemingly without end. Perhaps the most difficult years, yes, but we stand before you with the testimony that they have been necessary and we have learned to Praise Him in the Storm.

Eleven summers ago, I was put before a congregation who wondered together: “Where do we go from here?” The lead pastor had stepped down and a shaky, uncertain man was suddenly thrust into the position and there were questions and concerns aplenty. But there was a lot of excitement too! We hammered the matter out one evening at a member family’s home and said we would focus on the things that were important to Jesus when He walked the earth. He grew UPWARDLY, INWARDLY, OUTWARDLY and DOWNWARDLY. “Jesus grew in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and with man.” This was His Life. He lived by His Father’s Rhema Word, by growing in Intimacy with His Father, by making Fishers of men, and by making Himself low before others that they would be brought nigh and high to the Father.

That seminal meeting turned into a night of deep introspection. “WHO IS ‘IN’?” was the cry of the core. It was also a time of unfettered consecration. All were humbling themselves before one another, confessing sin to one another, bearing one another’s burdens. It was the circumcision of a church intent on moving forward, away from its past, leaving those things that were behind, and reaching forward to a new day.

The same amount of people that are gathered today equals the number that confessed to “being ‘in’” on that first Sunday as we started out eleven years ago. From that, some people might say, “You haven’t gone anywhere!” “You haven’t grown at all!” and they’d be dead wrong. God has taken us places! He has stretched us and pulled us even more when we felt as though there was no elasticity left in us. The growth has been down into the ploughed-up soil of the Sower’s field and what is coming up is a richer harvest, sprouts shooting up from the Root and Stump of Jesse. We have not built new buildings, but we have been building our lives on the Rock, which Jesus defines as hearing and obeying the Gospel of the Kingdom!

Today, your lead pastor is stepping down and a shaky uncertain man is being called to lead the flock of God at New River. He doesn’t have to wonder “Where do we go from here?” and neither do you. The vision has been clearly laid out and the first steps OUTSIDE THE CAMP are marked and waiting. That doesn’t mean it will be easy. The cost has not been reduced. There are enemies encamped in “them thar hills” you have not yet encountered. There are fortresses that will rise before you that will take your breath away. But in God’s economy, great giants fall with a single stone and walls collapse without touching them. Five soldiers can rout a hundred and a hundred can put to flight ten thousand.

As long as you do it God’s way, remembering that…

      It takes OVERCOMING FAITH. (John 11)

      It takes EXTRAVAGANT SURRENDER AND SACRIFICE. (John 12)

      It takes a HIGHER LOVE. (John 13) 

Finally, my brothers and sisters, I wish to conclude with some scriptural admonition. If these are the last words I speak before this congregation, I believe they sum up the burden and blessing of my heart over you:

¹Finally, then, brothers, we ask and urge you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more. ²For you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus.
(1 Thess 4:1,2)

¹²We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, ¹³and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves. ¹⁴And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all. ¹⁵See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. ¹⁶Rejoice always, ¹⁷pray without ceasing, ¹⁸give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. ¹⁹Do not quench the Spirit. ²⁰Do not despise prophecies, ²¹but test everything; hold fast what is good. ²²Abstain from every form of evil.
 ²³Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. ²⁴He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.
 ²⁵Brothers, pray for us.
 ²⁶Greet all the brothers with a holy kiss.
 ²⁷I put you under oath before the Lord to have this letter read to all the brothers.
 ²⁸The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.
(1 Thess 5:12-28)

¹¹To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power, ¹²so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
(2 Thess 1:11,12)

¹⁵So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by our spoken word or by our letter.
(2 Thess 2:15)

¹Finally, brothers, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored, as happened among you, ²and that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men. For not all have faith. ³But the Lord is faithful. He will establish you and guard you against the evil one. ⁴And we have confidence in the Lord about you, that you are doing and will do the things that we command. ⁵May the Lord direct your hearts to the love of God and to the steadfastness of Christ.
(2 Thess 3:1-5)

As the days and months pass, perhaps even years, I will make this my constant prayer for you: 

²Beloved, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good health, as it goes well with your soul. ³For I rejoiced greatly when the brothers came and testified to your truth, as indeed you are walking in the truth. ⁴I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.
(3 John vv2-4)

Yes and Amen.

As for Sandy and me, we are not going gently into that good night. The Lord has a call on us and we are eager to meet it, whatever it is. If you ever have to step down from the pastorate, you want to do it this way, loved to the very end, not forced out or in bitter annoyance with each other, not parting because of overstayed welcome. (Sadly, wild and unkind rumors have been spread in this regard, and if they weren’t so tragic, we could all have a great laugh over them!) We’ve come to this day simply because God has revealed it is time. My ”Hebron” days have come to a close and Jerusalem awaits. And for you, Joshua waits to take you in. And I wouldn’t stand in the way of that for anything!

For seventeen years running my weekend ritual has been to use the seventh day of the week to shut myself in the house, keep the TV turned off, and stay bent over the Word of God and the notes He had given me for Sunday’s sermon, tweaking them and generally whiling away the day in the Presence of the Spirit, my Teacher. Occasionally, my van and I would venture out to our “quiet time spot” and stay parked for hours on end, allowing the Eternal Word to filibuster my mind and the Third Person spark on the tinders of my soul until the man was set afire and given the Father’s ringing endorsement as a delivery service.

But it’s Saturday and I don’t know what to do with myself.

I am now a pastor without a congregation. My stained-glass memories will have to suffice and I find them helpful reminders that I am still a man with a call on his life though I do not know what my next assignment will be. So I steal a glance at my home’s all-too-familiar work station, where my sermon paraphernalia would normally have hijacked a section of the dining room table and my heart feels a little squeeze. Sandy’s table décor is still intact, the settings and centerpiece unmoved, no sign of Sunday anywhere.

As I remain fixed here in desultory reserve, questions of “what now?” and “what’s next?” pollinate my mental stigma and everything is…abnormal. Tomorrow a new pastor mounts the platform that has been home to me for nearly two decades and I sigh, not for him but for me. As a shepherd who has loved those sheep, I feel like an unfit parent, a papa with a rolling stone complex though I know this has been in the Plan for some time and my faithfulness in the pastoral role is not in question.

But still…

I chuckle now as I recall a conversation Sandy and I shared in our kitchen that set all these past seventeen years in motion.

“I think God is telling me that I am to be a pastor,” I said, watching for any reaction it might yield.

Sandy hesitated, then made a sound like hmmmmm…

“What?”

“What what?” she blinked.

“What are you thinking?”

“About?”

“About what I just said!”

“About you being a pastor?”

If duh was in my vocabulary back then, I would have used it.

“Yes.”

There was a long space of time then she turned away from the sink and looked straight into my eyes.

“I don’t think you have a pastor’s heart,” she confessed.

I knew she was right. I could sweep into Anytown for a few days, preach and engage for the short-term, then be on to the next assignment; it was how I was programmed, what I was built to do. In the in-betweens I would hide in my cave (home) and recharge my batteries until the next church, school or camp called. Using the metaphor of theater, it is fairly easy to be “on” for the performance (don’t read into that word) then exit the stage and disassociate quickly. Pastoring is a whole ‘nother animal altogether as it requires being “on” all the time, across the span of years, overly exposed, voluntarily observed, painstakingly involved.

I chuckle again as I am afforded the luxury now of looking back. There I sat on a tiny stage on one end of a rented church library, coiffed hair (I had more to kwoff back then) and double-breasted suit, shoes shined to military code and I looked out on maybe seventy or eighty folk who gathered on that brilliant sun-shiny Sunday to celebrate the birth of a fellowship. I, the veteran of hundreds of church services the previous ten years, often preaching before thousands, found myself nervous and uncomfortable preaching before tens. But the people were beaming. They were part of something new. And in my Hybels-slash-Warren eyes-bigger-than-reality dream state, I could only see us going up and up and up.

The next Sunday, reality fell like Damacles’ sword, and I preached to a crowd of twenty.

I’ve seen God add to those twenty through the years, but nothing that would jiggle Richter’s needle much and certainly nothing that would cause Hybels-slash-Warren to turn their dual heads in our direction. But the people love me and know that I love them and would lay my life down for them. They’ve gotten close enough to see the warts and gangrenous imperfections and I’ve let them. And I’m glad I did. I’ve held their babies, buried their mothers, shared their griefs (and they mine), lovingly rebuked, liberally encouraged and earnestly taught, both with my life and the opening of scriptures each week.

Last Sunday was my last as pastor in its official capacity. The house was full; I even saw several I hadn’t seen in a long time. They came to say, you’ve been very important in our lives, Scott. We want you to see us and know we are your crown of rejoicing…I tear up, receiving no praise for myself, but thankful I did, in fact, get a Grinch-like heart transplant. A very close friend wished this upon me: “I pray that when you leave this building today and drive off the parking lot, you will hear the sound of angels standing and applauding a job well done.” I think I did. And I know Who they were standing for.  

My pastorate ended on the anniversary of my pastorate’s beginning but with seventeen wonderful years packed between. I set out in a double-breasted suit and sat down in well-worn blue jeans. Perhaps that is a commentary on those years:  God gave me a pastor’s heart after all and got me comfortable in the call.

Well, it’s Saturday. I think the van and me’ll head on over to our “quiet time” spot and get before the Lord for the next few hours. I need to get ready for Tomorrow…

Our New Testament is fifty-one percent pedagogical (teaching, training) and forty-nine percent practicum (application). Jesus spent ample time with His followers in the classroom of instruction but also sent them into the labs and out into the fields so they could discover the Life for themselves. They did, and marveled greatly.

The Book of Ephesians is a perfect balance of doctrine and exercise. The first three chapters offer fundamental instruction while chapters four, five and six deal with how such a creed looks walked out. I have heard that John Wimber, the now-deceased founder of the Vineyard Fellowship of churches, used to spend the first portion of his conferences giving a lecture then segue into what he called “clinic time” where the power of the Kingdom was manifested, the expounded word would come alive.

The Apostle Paul stressed both the “hearing of faith” (Romans 10:17) and the “obedience of faith” (Romans 1:5; 16:26). This is how the ancients learned. While our educational system is purely academia, based on information-gathering, memorizing data and dates and names of battles, the ancient people of God were educated with an interactive approach of learning and doing.  

Recently, I picked up a book that served to attack the conspiratorial presence of the religious right throughout the history of America. It was written by a New York University professor and while I admit to his secular world view, I could not help but be impressed with his comparison between the religious zealots of America and the church that was once upon a time in a place called Jerusalem. In the early centuries, the author commented, the reputation of the church was not only its theology, but its corresponding “biography.”

I love that!

These were a people who not only internalized truth, but externalized the way and the life as they spilled out onto the streets, so that what was said about them (biographical) were things like:

“See how they love one another!”
“We cannot defend their beliefs but we also cannot deny their lives”

In my twelve years as pastor at New River, I have delivered in the neighborhood of 750 sermons, devotions, talks and Bible studies, not to mention the generous dousing of articles, blogs and other written instruction. In recent years the Lord sparked in me a desire to lay down a more solid foundation through the two semesters of the LIFE Institute. I didn’t know it then, but the last couple of years have been my “Deuteronomy” to the flock, the final preparations for our moving from theology to biography, if you will.

That’s not to say that the time of teaching is over. It does mean that you are getting ready to go into the fields with Kingdom power; you have been equipped thoroughly for what is coming. A new era is dawning that marks a vital transition from the “first half of Ephesians” into the next three exciting chapters where you get to go on adventure and walk it out (Eph 4:1,17; 5:2,8,15)!

As in Romans 12:1, you are entering ‘THEREFORE’ ZONE! The first eleven chapters of Romans offer instruction and equipping and in light of all the revelation given, Paul gives what should be our only “reasonable” response:

“Therefore…present your bodies a LIVING sacrifice…which is your
reasonable SERVICE…”

As for me, I couldn’t be more thrilled. A people prepared, a Joshua waiting in the wings, and a whole host of victorious campaigns await. Beloved, a sizzling, hot biography is going to be written about you. Just be faithful to all you have learned and all will be well. Amen.

Here is an exercise for you aspirants of theology. Search out the significant differences between the sin, sin and sins in the Greek New Testament. I assure you, it has been the glory of God to hide these matters in plain sight. And it has been the glory of the sons of His Kingdom to search them out. What is found in such a search will deliver us from the incomplete gospel that would only save us from our sins…and the Gospel of the Kingdom that Jesus, His disciples and Paul preached that truly brings Life.

Paul said “the sting of the death is the sin” in 1 Corinthians 15:56 (Young’s Literal). The definite article in the original implies a particular sin, the sin of all sins. It is this sin that men embrace all the way to hell. 

When Jesus came to be baptized to fulfill all righteousness, the Baptizer exclaimed, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” He did not say, contrary to how the verse if often misquoted “who takes away the sins of the world.”

Jesus didn’t zero in on sins when He went to the cross—although they, too, were rendered powerless, praise be!—He came to do away with, once and for all, the sin that brings about the death. Sins (plural, without definite article)  are, put simply, berries on the tree of rebellion, but God made provision through Christ to go to the root of mankind’s problem.

Which is…

…the nefarious nature to rebel against the authority of God and His Kingdom which is, ultimately, His reign. THE sin is man taking the throne. It is Adam casting his vote for himself and ruling God out of office. It is the created being casting himself in the lead role and leaving the Creator God on the cutting room floor.

Say what you wish, but the sin is not just evident in an unregenerate world of hell-bound men today, it is also the Great Plague of the professing church, mostly evident in those places on the map where there is little or no persecution, where abundance is greedily scarfed down by portly epicureans, and where the Gospel has been watered down from its original, robust recipe and abridged into the costless, cross-less, insipidly banal concoction it is today.

We need to beat our breasts like the tax collector who said, ”God, be merciful to me the sinner!”  Did you catch that? THE sinner! This is far removed from the bromidic confession we so often hear through the so-called “Sinner’s Prayer”:

“Dear God, please forgive me for my sins and make me Your Child, and take me to heaven when I die. In Jesus’ Name, amen.” 

Short, sweet and not too deep. That’s the contrast to what Biblical salvation offers through the Gospel of the Kingdom. This modern, watered-down version doesn’t allow for King Jesus to mount the Throne and for man to be dethroned. It is little more than a help-me-stop-doing-the-things-that-will-send-me-to-hell-Lord, because it does not let the axe fall to the root of the tree.  It replaces the Gospel of the Reign with a Gospel of Heaven.

This is why we have such a hard time with the teachings of Jesus and even explain them away with some devilishly dispensational doctrine. We cannot accept the Sermon on the Mount as anything more than principles to be followed, rather than what the Life really looks like. We say it’s not for us but only for the Jewish audience to which it was addressed and what will only resurface in the Millennial Kingdom. And so we opt out also on “forsaking all” and “denying self” or “laying not up in store” along with “turning the other cheek” and “forgive lest you be unforgiven.”

We preach against drunkenness (and we should), against lust and sexual sins (and we should), and against witchcraft, murder and sedition—check, check, and check—but until the sin of man-as-his-own-god is dealt with, even those who call themselves disciples will become THE sons of perdition.

Church as usual, a powerless, Cross-less entity is a mass of people who have gotten some berries knocked off their bushes, but the bushes still stand. The living, breathing Gospel that is the power of God unto—unto, mind you—salvation (Romans 1:16), mightily knocks the tree over, pulverizes it and cremates it in the holy fire of God.

Those who believe UNTO salvation are not a cleaned-up bunch of Adamites, reformed from our old ways, getting by the best we can until Christ takes us to heaven, but are grafted into the Tree of Life, a heavenly race of people who only get that way by going “from faith to faith” (Romans 1:17), believing and submitting to His reign all our lives. In the roll call of faith seen in Hebrews 11, don’t scurry past one of the most important verses in the entire context of that chapter:

“These all died in faith(fulness)…” (Hebrews 11:13)

 The writer goes on to use three participles that quantified their life of faith (by the way, in Greek, the words faith and belief are the same): “having seen”, “having welcomed” and “having confessed” that they were not of this earth, but of another realm. This is the Church Christ is building. Living stones who live by persistent faith, people of THE Realm.

THE sin has met its match. It’s match is Jesus who is THE Christ. Are you submitted to Him? Is He your King? Many say with their lives, “We will not have this Man rule over us!” Even if they confess with their lips they accept Him, one sad day Jesus will confess to them,

“I never knew you, depart from Me, you who insist on governing yourselves.”
(Matthew 7:23, my paraphrase)

Can He actually say that to church members? And not just the churchy, but people who gave their lives for the work of the church? How, in God’s Name, can that be?

Because they would not “hear and do” but rather PRESUMED and BRAGGED. They followed their own initiative rather than living by faith which, in its biblical definition, is hearing God and obeying Him. These were products of THE sin, pure and simple, not those who, by faith, would inherit the kingdom.

“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man
who built his house on the rock.” 
(Matthew 7:24)

“Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you?
“Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like:
“he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built.”
(Luke 6:46-48)

Jesus said, “I will build My Church” (Matthew 16:18). His Church is on a Rock that is our confession that He is the Christ, the Messianic King, who reigns in the hearts of those who have repented of, and are constantly repenting of, THE sin.

“I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course…”
(Paul, Acts 20:24)

“…I have finished my course…”
(Paul, 2 Timothy 4:7)

Of late, I keep hearing the words “finish well.” A seminary professor once did a study on 100 Bible characters whose placement in the scriptures figures prominently. In all actuality, there are over 800 chief leaders in the Bible but only sufficient data is given for a C-note’s worth of them. What he found is quite revealing in this matter of finishing well. The study cites each of these conspicuous luminaries concluded their lives in one of five ways:

• They were “cut off” (Samson, Josiah)
• They finished poorly (Gideon, Saul, Solomon)
• They finished “so-so” (Hezekiah, Jehoshaphat)
• They finished well (Abraham, Job, Joshua)
• We’re not sure (just not enough data to determine)

The professor uncovered an alarming fact: barely 30% of all leaders in the pages of the Bible finished well. Thirty percent, beloved! More than two-thirds were sidetracked or shipwrecked by abuse of power, pride, ego, illicit sexual affairs, or improper use of finances.

The inspiration for this piece comes from something I read last evening as I was lounging in my backyard, utterly absorbed in a novel. The main characters in the book were aboard an ocean liner, not for pleasure, but to uncover a murderous plot. But that’s beside the point. One of the story’s protagonists referred to the vessel as a “cruise ship” during dinner conversation. The ship’s First Officer corrected her, pointing out they were sailing aboard an ocean liner, not a cruise ship. There is a “world of difference” between the two; the point of the cruise ship is the cruise itself. The predominant purpose of an ocean liner is to transport people to their destination.

That got me thinking.

Many—and I’m talking about those who wear the moniker “Christian” here—approach life as if merrily sailing along was their God-given right, taking in the sights, living from meal to meal and occasionally enjoying ports of call whereby they may stretch their legs and amass souvenirs of the trip. That sounds okay, except it has one fundamental flaw. That’s not living on purpose!

The ocean liner is built for speed and sea-keeping. Because its hull is more pointed than a cruise ship, it can travel upwards of 30 knots (35 mph). Its hull is also stronger, making the vessel well able to cross the open seas in all kinds of weather. While a cruise ship runs away from storms, the ocean liner draws a bead on its destination and nothing, no nothing, can deter it. The ocean liner will plow straight through a storm, never veering from its course, always with the objective of arrival. On time. In one piece. With no loss of life.

This is the life we were meant for. While some opt for the cruise, those who truly know what they are designed and destined for, will gladly forego the joyride and treasure the journey. That’s not to say we will not have seasons of refreshing—like reading a novel in the backyard. Oh, there will be opportunities for stargazing and feasting in lavish banquet halls, but we must always be vigilant to “fight the good fight” against the elements that would sink us. They’re out there, and they are relentless.

Keep your eyes to the shore, fellow oarsmen. Let’s finish the course. And let’s do it together.

May You, O God, shepherd me to Your private pastures, with cooling waters and fresh, vital springs…draw me into Your Life and introduce me to the reality of practicing Your presence. I ask for Your baptism to flow down over me and drown me in grace. I know well that there is “more” and I aim to go after it. As the deer pants for the waterbrooks, I want my soul to pant after You. Not just words, here, but heart and passion and desire. Rush to me, O God. Call me away. My spirit accepts the invitation to Rise Up and Come Away!

Lord, show me the deepest things, the deepest parts of You. Take me there and may the five sanctified senses in me experience You to the fullest. I yearn to hunger for Your Word again! To meet with You in the closet at our daily appointed time where we can embrace and linger in the air of closeness.

Take me higher! Make my feet as hinds’ feet and walk me upon the craggy heights! Take me from the congregation and draw me to the pinnacle of Your desire for me. All that You have for me is my desire. You are most glorified when I am most satisfied in You and I want and wish to glorify You. May this life hold no attraction for me; I pull from it even if its talons hold on for dear life and rip me apart. May the claim of my life become: “the world is crucified to me and I to the world!”

Put a holy dissatisfaction in me for the things of this world. I do not desire its accolades and acceptance but Yours alone. This is the cry of my spirit! My soul follows far behind at times and has for a long time, but I cannot go on in complacency and indifference. Stir me, Lord. Stir my heart for the things that matter to You and may the crevasse that I have allowed to come between us be bridged by Your gracious invitation to come along and follow hard on Your heels.

I pray for a heart of integrity, hands of skill, a voice of impact, the eyes of Elisha, the baptism of the Spirit and the tongue of the learned. For an inoffensible spirit, unconditional love and the fear of God and not man.

In Jesus’ dear Name, Amen.