Jesus Archives - Page 13 of 28 - call me pasturescott

christmas is for shepherds and moabites

Looking back on this blog, I can spot times where I’ve written angsty at the church or when I’ve made the gospel seem as though it was only for the elite. I’ve written from places of hurt and sadness. There are some lighthearted posts here and there and a whole lot of essays of encouragement. On balance, I’d much rather write about a gospel that is true and gracious. And accessible.

If you drew a line from previous posts that sounded more preachy to where I’ve been ruminating in recent years you’d discover that line marks precisely when Graham passed too soon from this world. He’s my reason for this “new season” of softening.

His story has taken the edge off. How God handled Graham has taught my fingers to dance across the keyboard. I’m not spending as much time these days wringing my hands over the condition of the church, and overly obsessed with matters of who’s in who’s out. I’m still savoring the awe that my boy is with Jesus…and waking up to a gospel of attraction rather than subtraction.

As Christmas approaches I find myself thinking about the key players in the nativity story once again. I suppose it’s because our son was taken eight Decembers ago I’ve been more drawn to the people who shouldn’t be in the cast of Advent but are. People like those shepherds abiding. Imagine these guys making up the first worship team!

These were not a romanticized version of herdsman but a rough-and-tumble group of guys. Today, they would be more suited for a biker’s bar than a synagogue. Gamey and course, their arms would sport a collision of tattoos and hard lines from hard lives would crease their faces.

And yet, and yet.

Heaven sang like a choir to this audience of irregulars. Religious folk labeled them unclean. They were unwelcome in their churches because their line of work with sacrificial lambs connected them to manure and flies and death. They had one job: tend the temple sheep until they were needed to spill blood for the people’s sin. This bunch were tough.

And yet…the Light of Christmas Glory built a tabernacle around them.

A friend and I shared breakfast last week and conversation turned to, as it always does, the gospel. I mentioned I was in Isaiah in my daily reading and referenced the prophet’s hard words about an ancient people, the Moabites. But then I discovered something.

A very cool gospel something.

Virtually nowhere in scripture are the Moabites mentioned with any degree of favor. They are the sworn enemies of God’s people from the beginning. So repugnant are they, God makes them pariah in his own sanctuary.

No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the LORD. Even to the tenth generation, none of them may enter the assembly of the LORD forever,
Deuteronomy 23:3

You’d be hard-pressed to find anything anywhere in the Bible remotely nice about Moabites. Even Isaiah, the “Christmas” prophet (Isa 7:14, 9:2, 9:6, 11:1) piled on with a plethora of judgments regarding Moab, not mincing words.

And yet. And yet.
[Here’s the very cool gospel part]

I found a lone verse where Moab is given a good ending, just like my boy. Plugging the word “Moab” into my Bible app’s search engine, this text bubbled up:

“Yet I will restore the fortunes of Moab
in days to come,”
declares the Lord.
Here ends the judgment on Moab.
Jeremiah 48:47

Don’t miss that last sentence. “Here ends…judgment.” Precisely because Jesus died for Moabites too is why that promise holds. What was announced to baseborn shepherds on the night of Advent — “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.” — applied to a congregation of misfits.

Oh, don’t you remember? Ruth….the Moabite? Right there in Jesus’s genealogy? Jesus Messiah came into this cold earth with some Moabite blood!

Jesus is heir of a line in which flows the blood of the harlot Rahab, and of the rustic Ruth; he is akin to the fallen and to the lowly, and he will show his love even to the poorest and most obscure. I, too, may have a part and lot in him.
Charles Spurgeon, The Gospel of the Kingdom

Shepherds and Moabites, prodigals and lost causes. Christmas is good news for people without a country. The only ones left in the dark are those who ignore the Main Character. He, who was born in a feeding trough, lived homeless, and was buried in a donated grave, came not for the tidied-up but for the beat-down.

I’m weak
fragile
gone in a strong gust
or wave
my bones and soul
break
like dry twigs.

It is possible to lose all

except

the love of God.

The gospel is for the unheard, the counted-out, the ones from whom friends hide their face, the shamed, the losers.

It’s “good news to the poor…liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind”

the disadvantaged
the incarcerated
the disabled

Jesus draws near.

–Quina Aragon, Spoken Word Artist

This post is for anyone out there who has a “Moabite” in their life. Some unlikely candidate for gospel change. You hope, you actually hurt, for their salvation. This could be their last shot and that pains you.

Don’t give up, beloved. Pray that some heavenly visitor, or a choir of singing angels, finds them in some forgotten field on a night they least suspect and draws them in to “join the triumph of the skies.”

God can meet them in their isolated bulwarks of hardened flesh. He came all the way from Glory to raid the devil’s domain after all.

Selah, and Merry Christmas to you and yours!

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153 reasons

It’s the month of thanks, or, if you’re born anew, a continuation of the theme.

Here I’ll raise mine Ebenezer and join the family sing-a-long. You might want to settle in, mine’s got 153 verses.

It starts with a story. Once upon a Galilee morn, seven disciples crowd into a boat with hopes set high for a good catch. Stop me if you’ve heard this before. All night long and not a single bite. Mind you, these are experienced fishermen and they get nada. Zero. Squat.

Their leader is the most confused. Peter grouses, “What in tarnation is happening here?” He’s known how to do this since a paidíon. This was second nature to him. Must he fail at this too?

The early April morning is suddenly cleaved by a voice from the shore.

“‘Mornin’ lads! Any luck?”

There’s a cute moment embedded in the story: Jesus asks them if they’d had any success through the night. He wants to know if they’ve caught any prosphágion. Don’t anyone tell me Jesus didn’t have a sense of humor. The word he used means a side dish, not the main course. He was trolling them!

“Hey fellas, you got anything to nibble on?”

Groan.

Peter squints through the mist and sees the shape of a man. A hundred yards off, it’s difficult to tell who yon figure is. And yet the Voice sounds familiar…

There’s fish, and then there’s fish

“Try your nets on the right side,” the Man on the shore suggests.

“You’ve got to be kid—”

You pretty much know the next bit if you’ve been to Sunday school or raised up in the Word.

The seven knackered disciples throw the nets starboard and look on in amazement as the sea comes alive. The fish practically school themselves right into the nets! The startled men never saw such a haul!

Our narrator, John (aka, “the other disciple”) describes the moment the catch comes in. He chooses the word ichthúos to supplant their fruitless all-nighter. Now, we’re talking game fish, big fish, what you’d serve at a banquet!

Count ‘em. 153. (you best believe fishermen wouldn’t lie about something like that) That’s almost 22 family-sized fish per disciple. And the net didn’t break. Not a single ichthúos was lost!

Tell me, if you were in the boat that morning, what would you do? What other response could there be but to recognize Jesus in the moment and hurdle every obstacle to get to the feet of the Lord? That’s what Peter was thinking too. Casting off restraint, Peter jumps out of the boat.

While Peter doesn’t exactly walk on water, he throws on his tunic over his bare bottom and swims to shore, leaving the great catch behind. Just Jesus, only Jesus, always Jesus.

Charcoal fires

What does he find when he gets to shore? Jesus sitting beside a fire of coals and a ready-made breakfast. Pardon the quick side trail, but do you remember when we last saw a charcoal fire? That’s right. Simon Peter stood by one at night, warming his hands, denying he knew the Man Jesus.

Quite niftily, John adds this bit of trivia into the gospel record. Mind you, it’s there for more than just atmosphere. His deft narrator’s eye catches the detail of fire burned down to the coals, owing to the fact the Savior’s been there a long while.

The seaside breakfast tells us Jesus is waiting for us to simply “Come.” Whether we’ve failed, lied, or trampled on his name, the sizzle tells the story. The aroma doesn’t lie.

Hear this, beloved: that the fire’s been set in the morning reminds Peter — and us — it’s a brand new day. The veil of that awful night of scandal has been lifted and the mercies of Christ are fresh as the dew.

There’s dying, and there’s living

Conversation ensues. There’s a fascinating back-and-forth between Jesus and Peter regarding agapáō and philéō and something about Peter’s not-so-flattering future. But then Jesus looks at the reeling disciple and says, “Walk with me.”

It’s not a metaphorical invitation. Jesus quite literally stands up from the group and motions for Peter to follow. The two start a stroll along the beach, away from the others. We can skip for now the bit about John getting up to follow after and Simon Peter’s protest.

Here’s where I wanted to take you today: I’d wager Jesus wanted to speak life into Peter, privately teaching him about agapáō and feeding sheep and lambs and why charcoal fires and the significance of 153 fish. And a whole lot of other stuff too, perhaps. Cool to think about.

Someone counted all of the encounters Jesus had with individuals in the gospels and came up with the number 153. I haven’t proven that, but I’ll take it on face value. It wouldn’t surprise me if that number were accurate. That’s 153 Jesus stories in the gospels.

Those seven Galileans in that gospel johnboat had 153 gospel stories that day, enough to spend the rest of their lives talking about them and writing about them. Peter, soon-to-be leader of the global spread of the gospel, surely did his share.

How many Jesus stories might you have? I bet you could come up with at least 153. That’s a lot of fish tales!

An infinite God can give all of Himself to each of His children. He does not distribute Himself that each may have a part, but to each one He gives all of Himself as fully as if there were no others.
A.W. Tozer

Dear reader, I pray you have some breakfast conversations with Jesus in the coming days. I’m going to ask him to lovingly explain some deep stuff to you, marvelous things that equip you for your next assignment. I hope you hear the sizzle and smell the aroma of the fish on the fire. He’s waiting for you now.

I finished John’s gospel in my daily reading yesterday and wrapped up my welling emotions over this final text with a thanksgiving prayer from my journal. Here’s what I wrote, in part:

I’m actually sitting with you this morning … You are the Risen Christ and I’m sitting with you. And you’re listening. You’re reading along with me. I love you, Jesus.

Thank you for my disability. May I use it for your glory today.

Thank you for all my close calls with death and for your Resurrection Life in me. Thank you for all my sicknesses and hospitalizations. You have been faithful and kind to me. You are my shepherd and I follow you in my wheelchair, wherever you lead me. I trust you.

Thank you for the “153” great fish you’ve given me, Father. I seem to always pine for only a handful, a bucketful, of “snack-sized” fish and have never been successful. Thank you for the “haul”, the supernatural “catch”…through my weakness, my inadequacy, my need. Thank you for the charcoal fires and for the already-cooked breakfast I didn’t labor for.

Thank you for inviting me to sit with you and serving (!) me. Bless you, in Your endearingly gracious name. Amen.

Selah and amen.

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gospel sanity in insane times

Crazy times, huh?

Back in the 80s Billy Joel had a hit song, “We Didn’t Start the Fire,” in which he lyricized his life from 1949 to 1989 through the headlines, some good, mostly bad. His song cited 118 key moments he’d lived through. Again, over a lifetime.

If you’re alive in these strange days, you could add 118 of those kind of moments….in just the last 18 months!

We brave souls who have already weathered 9/11 and the war on terror, have been conscripted to face the bungled Afghanistan pull-out, COVID-19, shelter-in-place, George Floyd, Critical Race Theory, Capitol riots, and cancel culture.

Mix in the perfect storm of $28 trillion national debt, full-term abortion, impeachment, social injustice, racism, human trafficking, police brutality, nationalism, BLM, white supremacy, #MeToo, pronouns, and gender identity.

Talk about piling on.

Of course the disciples of the early 1st century didn’t have the pandora’s box of issues we face in the 21st century but they lived in worrisome times too. They were a conquered people living under the imperial thumb of Rome, and right along with their countrymen they longed for a Savior-Messiah to break into their story.

Over three years, based on the information they had, the disciples believed their hoped-for hero was now standing in their midst. Trouble was, he didn’t quite fit their idea of how such a king should accede to the throne. Here’s how he put it to them:

For as the lightning flashes and lights up the sky from one side to the other, so will the Son of Man be in his day. BUT FIRST HE MUST SUFFER MANY THINGS AND BE REJECTED BY THIS GENERATION.
Luke 17:24-25, ESV

Say what, Jesus?

Talk of lightning and thunder and glory are themes we can get behind. Swooping in and saving the elect and wiping out the wicked? Yes, Lord, more of that, please. Inject it into our veins! But suffering and rejection? AYKM?!?

Jesus wasn’t finished. He went on to paint an even more dire picture of future days saying it wasn’t going to be all roses and rainbows for his followers either. Times would “wax” worse and worse with unimaginable terrors unleashed on an ill-equipped world. It would be thus right up to the end. Matthew’s gospel adds the gut-checking news that only those who “endure to the end will be saved.” Even Jesus wondered aloud, “When the Son of Man returns will he find faith on the earth?”

If you’re bothered by the trajectory of things (“just how bad is it gonna get?”) take heart. Jesus’s band of brothers wondered too.

And you know what Jesus did to settle them? He told them a little story.

A widow, it seems, was the victim of a pyramid scheme and lost her life savings. She heard the circuit judge was coming to town so she went out to have her case adjudicated. To her dismay, the corrupt judge wouldn’t give her the time of day.

Next morning, she got herself dressed and went out the door to where the judge was holding court. Same answer. No, lady, go home.

Next day, same.

And the next.

But she never stopped going as long as Mr. Justice was in town. She was determined to get a hearing. He was going to take her case or, by golly, she was going to die trying.

Unfortunately the pitiful woman was penniless and had nothing to offer the shady judge by way of bribe. Still, she ventured out to the “justice tent” all the same.

This was likely her last chance. The judge could be packed up and gone the next day. This was it. Please, Universe, Higher Being, Whoever, be on my side, she prayed. (We don’t know if the fictional widow was saved.)

That morning, the judge asked who was out there beyond the folds of his tent and his assistant told him the same old lady who’s been coming every day. He shook his head disgustedly.

“Her again?”

He thought about it, then thought about it some more, and then he broke character.

“Send her in,” he said with a sigh.

And they all lived happily ever after.

Well, not without Jesus they didn’t! Which is the point. Try and do life without Jesus, and you’ll end up a pillar of salt or vulture lunch.

So what does the story have to do with being ready for what’s coming? Simply put, readiness requires faith (God is good), faith requires a “just” Jesus (God is wise), and it’s all fueled with the aromatic incense of prayer (God is able).

The people of God “ought always” to pray, Jesus said.

Was this the answer the disciples were hoping for? Probably not, and it’s not usually what we’re inclined to accept. Pray? Come on God, isn’t there something more concrete?

Yeah, he says, there is something more. Pray….and don’t give up!

[Smiley face emoji]

I’m pretty sure Jesus added that enjoinder because he knows the last days will be hard. We’re taking hard, hard, hardhardhard, so much so the elect (the people of God) will shrink and fail and cower and wonder if it’s all worth it. What if he isn’t coming? What if it’s been a trick the whole time?

Jesus hasn’t changed the formula. Methods and styles come and go, the times they get worse then better and ever worse again, but it’s always been a praying people abiding in the shelter of the Almighty who overcome through the worst of times.

I hear some of you saying, “That sounds like works, Scott.” I totally get that. Problem is, you consider prayer a task to be done — a human work — rather than a lifelong conversation with God. The praying Jesus is speaking of in verse one can be linked to his question in verse eight.

A “praying people” are a “faithing people.”

So if I stand let me stand on the promise
That you will pull me through
And if I can’t let me fall on the grace
That first brought me to You
And if I sing let me sing for the joy
That has born in me these songs
And if I weep let it be as a man
Who is longing for his home
— Rich Mullins, If I Stand

The praying Jesus is referencing is not suppertime thanks or bedtime rhymes. He’s telling us that our assurance of enduring to the end is our clinging to the Savior (“not give up”) through thick and thin, hard times and lean times, rest and unrest. It is a lifestyle and testimony of trusting Christ to carry us all the way home.

Does the little story really answer the questions and fears of the disciples? On the surface, it seems almost a redirect. On closer inspection, we see it’s exactly what we need to hear.

The widow shows us “praying” is “coming” to our One True Authority. Like her, we are to come faithfully, enduringly, single-mindedly, hopefully, and trustingly. Day after day, all our days, until Jesus comes. This is how we endure to the end.

Unlike the widow, we don’t have an unjust judge in the heavenlies who demands a bribe before coming to our rescue. He doesn’t expect us to “shape up” before he will act in mercy. He doesn’t require us to ‘perform’ some empty ritual of contrition so as to move him to respond. The only prerequisites are neediness and faith.

Each and every morning you wake up, as soon as you say the word “Father…” you can rest assured his eyes are already on you and he’s inviting you into his tent. Beloved, you are on his docket for the day, all day. Go to him. Ask him. Have faith he will hear you and be good to you.

[I was blessed to be able to share these thoughts with the generous and loving congregation at West Huntsville Baptist Church recently. If you’d like to view the full video service, simply click here.]

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