Day 24-25: If You Build It, They Will Come

Matthew 17:14-21

When they came to the crowd, a man approached Jesus and knelt before him. “Lord, have mercy on my son,” he said. “He has seizures and is suffering greatly. He often falls into the fire or into the water. I brought him to your disciples, but they could not heal him.” “You unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied,“how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.” Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of the boy, and he was healed at that moment. Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?” He replied, “Because you have so little faith. 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.”


I'm at TITUS Camp this week. TITUS is held at HCU, and it's for teens who have a greater-than-average helping of faith, spirituality, etc. (AND it has internet!) These verses really apply to TITUS, because I have seen what the Lord can do with that mustard seed faith. Here's why. This camp involves LOTS of sitting in class/intense learning. Lots. I will be teaching Monday-Thursday from 9-12, the same kids, three hours straight. The class: Homiletics. In the afternoons they go to a series of various classes... team building, Christian service, etc. In between, they go to chapel, power hour... I could go on. In staff meeting this afternoon, the director said, "The kids are going to have lots more free time this year... tomorrow they have an hour!" :) Oh, and they have to wear dress clothes to class.


I drone on about this because when Ray came up with this idea, there were more than a few who said it would NEVER WORK. Too much for teens, they said. Too intense. Kids these days... they just don't want to work that hard. They won't spend their summer wearing ties to class.


We built it. We prayed. And they came. 


Every year we have a maxed-out crowd of amazing teens. And they LOVE it. Can't get enough. I have to believe that it's just an example of nothing being impossible. 


Do we really believe that nothing will be impossible for us? Believe it in the depths of our souls? I'm not so sure. Because if we did, if we did as a church, just imagine the things that would be happening right now. 


I am trying to change a lot of things about my life. And I mean a lot. Every day that I am studying, I see more things I need to do differently. One of those is to take bigger risks in my faith - not jump-out-of-an-airplane-type risks (although that would be cool), but diving in to things with a little bit less "sensibility" or "practicality" and a lot more faith that the Lord can do immeasurably more than all I ask or imagine. 

Day 22-23: Whiter Than White

<sup>Mark 9: 2-13


2</sup> After six days Jesus took Peter, James and John with him and led them up a high mountain, where they were all alone. There he was transfigured before them. ³ His clothes became dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could bleach them. ⁴ And there appeared before them Elijah and Moses, who were talking with Jesus.

 ⁵ Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.” ⁶ (He did not know what to say, they were so frightened.)

 ⁷ Then a cloud appeared and covered them, and a voice came from the cloud: “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!”

 ⁸ Suddenly, when they looked around, they no longer saw anyone with them except Jesus.

 ⁹ As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus gave them orders not to tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. ¹⁰ They kept the matter to themselves, discussing what “rising from the dead” meant.

 ¹¹ And they asked him, “Why do the teachers of the law say that Elijah must come first?”

 ¹² Jesus replied, “To be sure, Elijah does come first, and restores all things. Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected? ¹³ But I tell you, Elijah has come, and they have done to him everything they wished, just as it is written about him.”

I'm probably crazy, but the thoughts I had on reading this were not primarily about the majesty of the transfiguration, or the purpose, or about the meaning of the three "shelters". I stuck right onto this: "dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could make them".  It's almost like this was such an ethereal experience - so otherworldly - that there literally were no words to describe it. Instead, Mark had to try and describe heavenly clothes in human words. It makes me think about heaven... there are some pretty amazing descriptions in Revelation, but naturally they're in human words. And human words, love them as I do, could never, ever do it justice. This one little phrase, "whiter than anyone in the world could make them", really shows the futility of trying. 

The one other thing that stuck out to me was that when Jesus told them not to tell anyone, they did so, but instead talked about what rising from the dead meant. Jesus's best friends, with his death fast approaching, still did not get it. How lonely he must have felt - separated for the first time ever from his father, with a bunch of people who just didn't understand. Makes you wonder why he put up with them. For the same reason, I guess, that he puts up with us now. Against all odds, he loves us.

Day 20-21: We Will Never Die

Matt. 16:13-28

 ¹³ When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”

 ¹⁴ They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

   ¹⁵ “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”

 ¹⁶ Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

 ¹⁷ Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. ¹⁸ And I tell you that you are Peter,^[a] and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades^[b] will not overcome it. ¹⁹ I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be^[c] bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be^[d] loosed in heaven.” ²⁰ Then he ordered his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah.

Jesus Predicts His Death

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

 ²² Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!”

 ²³ Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”

 ²⁴ Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. ²⁵ For whoever wants to save their life^[e] will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. ²⁶ What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? ²⁷ For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done.

   ²⁸ “Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”

Okay... so, I know I missed writing last night. I spent a few hours at the coffee shop writing (on my novel... yep, pretty much all I do is write), and came home expecting to blog before bed. Instead I came home to a screaming baby, and we spent the rest of the night trying to lull/rock/sing/walk him back to sleep. My apologies. Life got in the way. 

That said, here we are at my most favoritest character in all the Bible... Peter! I absolutely cannot wait to talk to this guy. He's got a passion, a fire, a personality that I don't believe is rivaled anywhere else in Scripture. He's always going overboard, literally and physically. In the first section, his answer to Jesus'  question is picture perfect: what I think may be the first disciple's confession of faith. "You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God." He captures Jesus in a nutshell, and so beautifully. The Messiah. The Son. Alive. God.

But not even ten verses later, he pulls an open-mouth-insert-foot moment that would make the Son of God Himself describe him as satan, and as a stumbling block. Yeesh. His fierce devotion to Jesus makes it difficult for him to accept the plan that God has laid out. 

His comment, though, sets up one of the most thought provoking verses in all of Scripture: What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?  When the rubber meets the road, our salvation is all that can possibly matter. As Jess said in his sermon last night, it's the most important thing. It's the only thing. Why? Because we don't have a soul, as most people say. We are a soul. We have a body.

This is one reason why having children was such a daunting thought to me. When I chose to have a child, I chose to bring an eternal soul into this world. From now till all eternity, my son will never die. He will never die. The responsibility of that is enormous and I feel it, every day. Just the same, I will never die. I will never die. And that means that I must protect his soul, and mine, at all costs. Because all the baseball trophies, diplomas, accolades in the world won't matter if he doesn't win salvation. And all the clean houses, finished books, successful events in the world won't matter if I don't win it.

It's a sobering thought. But thanks to God for his great love for us, and for our salvation!

Day 18-19: All I Know Is I Was Blind, But Now I See

Mark 8:13-21

 ¹⁴ The disciples had forgotten to bring bread, except for one loaf they had with them in the boat. ¹⁵ “Be careful,” Jesus warned them. “Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod.”

 ¹⁶ They discussed this with one another and said, “It is because we have no bread.”

 ¹⁷ Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them: “Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? ¹⁸ Do you have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear? And don’t you remember? ¹⁹When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?”

   “Twelve,” they replied.

   ²⁰ “And when I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?”

   They answered, “Seven.”

 ²¹ He said to them, “Do you still not understand?”

If there ever was an example of a spiritual mindset vs. a spiritual one, this has to be it. Jesus is trying to teach the disciples a spiritual truth, and they are positively mired in the here and now. They think he's mad at them because they don't have any bread... after, mind you, not one but two miracles where he CREATED BREAD. Hello. (I'm getting the feeling that the disciples are going to have me saying that a lot.) 

Often, though, this is me. God tries to teach me a spiritual truth - through a situation, through a sermon, through a trial - and I'm so focused on the now that I miss the point altogether. It would be awesome if every day before I go to bed, I would ask myself what I have learned in that day. I think I'll try it. 

P.S. - Some of you have wondered about the theme verse thing. How's it going? Well, I'll be honest... one of the best things I ever did. I am not sure it's showing on the outside (yet), but I'm changing. Slowly and surely, I am changing. It's making it so much easier to think about my decisions and to make good ones when viewed through the lens of becoming less and allowing him to become greater. If you haven't chosen a theme verse, do it. I promise you'll be glad you did. 

Mark 8:22-26

 ²² They came to Bethsaida, and some people brought a blind man and begged Jesus to touch him. ²³ He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man’s eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?”

 ²⁴ He looked up and said, “I see people; they look like trees walking around.”

 ²⁵ Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. ²⁶ Jesus sent him home, saying, “Don’t even go into^[a] the village.”

All I can think about when I read these verses is one of my favorite songs, "All I Know" by Caedmon's Call. It doesn't even refer to this particular blind man's story, but what can I say? It's stuck in my head. It's not on youtube (I know! I thought everything in the history of things was on youtube!), but I'm putting the lyrics here. They're the best part anyway.

Spit and the clay, when washed away
Gave the blind man sight
New eyes couldn't comprehend the sun
That by light ended the night
Shackled in blindness since his birth
Whose sin, was it him, what's it all worth

Now with eyes wide open
They interrogate him
Saying "Who is he?"
"Do you believe what that man is saying?"
"Who do you say is he?"

"All I know
Is I was blind", he said,
"And now I see"
"All I know is he healed me"

I sit here today
So I say that I believe in Him
Yet I cannot fathom the wind-like way
That's made me new again
Shackled in darkness since my birth
Whose sin, was it me, what's it all worth

Now new from the womb
They interrogate me
Saying "Who is he?"
"Do you believe what that book is saying?"
"How gullible can you be?"

Darwin may tend to disagree
I don't know
Marx is writing a drug I need
Still I don't know
Freud analyzes in my head
Nietzsche's saying God is dead
But I'm saying 

"All I know
Is I was blind", he said,
"And now I see"
"All I know is he healed me"

Day 16-17: Never Forget

^{Mark 8:1-10
1} During those days another large crowd gathered. Since they had nothing to eat, Jesus called his disciples to him and said, ² “I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. ³ If I send them home hungry, they will collapse on the way, because some of them have come a long distance.”

 ⁴ His disciples answered, “But where in this remote place can anyone get enough bread to feed them?”

   ⁵ “How many loaves do you have?” Jesus asked.

   “Seven,” they replied.

 ⁶ He told the crowd to sit down on the ground. When he had taken the seven loaves and given thanks, he broke them and gave them to his disciples to distribute to the people, and they did so. ⁷ They had a few small fish as well; he gave thanks for them also and told the disciples to distribute them. ⁸ The people ate and were satisfied. Afterward the disciples picked up seven basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. ⁹ About four thousand were present. After he had sent them away, ¹⁰ he got into the boat with his disciples and went to the region of Dalmanutha.

The best (read: most telling) part of this scripture to me is the absolutely density of the disciples. They saw the feeding of the five thousand; saw it with their own eyes. And yet, when they end up in nearly the exact same situation and Jesus again questions them about what they should do, what do they say? “But where in this remote place can anyone get enough bread to feed them?” HELLO. *knocks on heads of disciples* How can you possibly ask that, people? It seems so silly. Have you forgotten so soon? 

Well, in a word... yes. Just like we do. We see God's power in full-blown action. We see the way he answers prayers and how he can truly do immeasurably more than all we ask or think. But send one little trial our way, and oh how quickly we forget. How fast we begin to rely on our own power, or doubt his ability to hear us. 

In this respect, we are all the same. "Remember Pearl Harbor" or "Never Forget 9/11"... we want them to be true, but the truth is that as we go back to our normal lives, forget we do. God help us never to forget the incredible things he has done for us.

^{Mark 8:11-13}

¹¹ The Pharisees came and began to question Jesus. To test him, they asked him for a sign from heaven. ¹² He sighed deeply and said, “Why does this generation ask for a sign? Truly I tell you, no sign will be given to it.” ¹³ Then he left them, got back into the boat and crossed to the other side. 

I love the thought of Jesus sighing deeply. I don't love the fact that he was frustrated, but I love how that sigh shows him as so very human. He's beginning to tire of this world and dealing with people that just don't get it. I wonder: does this world make us sigh? Or have we acclimated ourselves to the point where things don't affect us anymore? I'm not encouraging us all to become a whimpering bunch of negative nellies, but I do think we need to be more attuned to the evil the world throws at us. I'm afraid we're like the proverbial frog in a pot... the very fires of hell are heating this old world up until it's barely recognizable as the beautiful thing God created, and we Christians have become so used to it that we're boiling alive and don't even know it. Sad times. 

Those Pharisees could worry the horns off a billy goat, but the good news is that we know the end of this story. Hint: the Pharisees aren't around anymore. He wins in the end. ;) 

Day 14-15: Healing Touch

I'm going to do the next two passages together, because they deal with one thing: healing.

^{Mark 7:31-37
31} Then Jesus left the vicinity of Tyre and went through Sidon, down to the Sea of Galilee and into the region of the Decapolis.^[a]32 There some people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly talk, and they begged Jesus to place his hand on him.

 ³³ After he took him aside, away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into the man’s ears. Then he spit and touched the man’s tongue. ³⁴ He looked up to heaven and with a deep sigh said to him, “Ephphatha!” (which means “Be opened!”). ³⁵ At this, the man’s ears were opened, his tongue was loosened and he began to speak plainly.

 ³⁶ Jesus commanded them not to tell anyone. But the more he did so, the more they kept talking about it. ³⁷ People were overwhelmed with amazement. “He has done everything well,” they said. “He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”

^{Matthew 15:29-31}

²⁹ Jesus left there and went along the Sea of Galilee. Then he went up on a mountainside and sat down. ³⁰ Great crowds came to him, bringing the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute and many others, and laid them at his feet; and he healed them. ³¹The people were amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the crippled made well, the lame walking and the blind seeing. And they praised the God of Israel.

Jesus has always been the master Healer. I can't help but imagine what it must have been like for someone in the first century - with no hope of help or healing - to have a face-to-face encounter with him. To witness a deaf person who could suddenly hear, or a blind person who could suddenly see. Miracles in today's society are almost viewed as a sort of joke, so to see a real one... it must have been awesome.

But in another way, we have seen it, after all. I have personally seen people and situations that I thought were beyond hope healed by the spiritual touch of Jesus. When all is lost, only he has the capability to bring thing to rights. He still has the power to heal, if we only have faith that he can. And those incredible spiritual healings will doubtless lead us to say, "He has done everything well," and praise the God of Israel.

Day 12-13: I Must Become Less

So here's the plan for catching up: instead of posting a whole ton of stuff at once, I'm going to post two at a time until we're back on track. For today, the two scriptures are:

Matthew 15:12-20

Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?” He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. Leave them; they are blind guides. If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.” Peter said, “Explain the parable to us.” “Are you still so dull?” Jesus asked them. “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”

It's been a while since we studied the parable to which Peter is referring, but the point is clear: our actions come from our hearts. This is an amazingly simple concept with enormous implications: What we allow ourselves to think about/meditate on, that we will do. If we meditate on good and righteous things, our lives will be good and righteous. Sounds easy. Is hard. I studied this with my 13-year-old girls at camp last week, and I really think they grasped the concept better than most people my age. One of the amazing teachers at camp, Sonny Owens, said something that I thought about all week, and eventually decided on. He suggested choosing a "theme verse" for your life... a verse to constantly meditate on and remember as you make every decision. (His was Phil. 1:21: But for me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.) At first it seemed like a daunting task: could I really choose one verse that would apply to every situation in my life, that I could live by consistently and meditate on constantly? But I quickly realized that there was indeed one verse that would do it for me: John 3:30 "He must become greater, I must become less." Simple, but if that verse were truly in my heart every minute and every day of my life, how transformed I would be! Just a few moments (literally) after I made that decision, the morning chapel speaker did a lesson on that very verse. Point taken, Lord. So there it is. As that verse takes root in my heart, it will begin to root out all the evil that still lives there.

What is the theme verse for your life?

<sup>Matt 15: 21-28
Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly.” Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.” He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.” The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said. He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.” “Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment. 


When I was a kid, I thought that Jesus was a pretty tough bird. It seemed that a lot of what he said seemed awfully harsh. But now I realize that, often, it was a test. We can't see in words the tone in which he made his comments, and we can't hear the way it sounded. I have a suspicion that live and person, it sounded  much kinder than it comes across on paper. In any event, he wanted to know how this woman would respond. I also think he wanted his disciples to hear her response. 


But what gets me is the amazing courage and tenacity of this Gentile woman. She obviously believed that she was speaking to the Lord Himself. I likely would have given him an embarrassed nod and slunk off to mope. Instead, this woman responded with grace, dignity, and humility. I want to be more like her.</sup>