It happened again!

                Just the other day I was walking into a building and an individual said to me they read my article and enjoyed it. Many of you say those kind words and encourage me. I am always struck by that. I guess because I am surprised you even read it. I was probably more overwhelmed when my wife said she reads it too (we will leave that right there). When others say that I want to shake my head and say, “you need better reading material.” It’s an image thing.

                I just don’t see myself as a writer. Writing is hard. It is hard to stare at a blank 8½ X 5½ block of screen (it used to be paper) and write words that say something let alone something with meaning. As a school student my spelling was horrible (honestly it still is) spell check has been delivered right from heaven. My grammar is just marginally better. I just don’t seem to have the skills needed to write and yet you say you read it. I am not a writer. I guess I think a writer has thoughts and ideas just gushing all the time (it doesn’t happen like that for me) and they are spelling and grammar wizards (that’s what editors are for) at least that’s what I think. I still have an image problem.

                That image thing is not just limited to writing. I still don’t think of myself as a pastor or preacher. I love to do it. But I don’t like having to get it ready. That is just work most weeks even though I have GREAT material to work from (the TRUTH of Scripture). I still don’t think of myself as worthy or capable and yet others comment as to how God spoke through those words to pick them up or convict them to be different. I do know that once I start preaching/teaching or writing and get going often times there is a “zone” or “groove” I’m in and it is life and light. It’s good to be there and stay there. But, that’s what I image for myself and honestly it really doesn’t matter what I think. The only one whose opinion matters is…well…God’s. What does God think of me and you?

                We are under attack from within and without regarding personal image. People use names to attack our identity, self-image and if we let it our very worth. We let others define us by what we do or say or act (I know if it walks like a duck…) but others don’t define us. The only one who has the right and responsibility to define us is our Creator. The potter as scripture calls him molds and shapes us into what he wants or needs and has the very right to reshape us at his whim……or does he? That is the struggle isn’t it? Does he have the right to make a new image of ourselves? He does when we want to move from sin to righteousness but that image renewal can’t end there he is making us into a new creature. A new image of his son Jesus whole and holy. It is not my impression of who I am or who others think I am but rather who The ONE is making me to be. Who HE thinks I am is what makes the difference.

                Maybe “Blessed are the poor in Spirit” means blessed are those who don’t think so much about who they are and how they do what they do because they don’t get too “puffed up” or “stuck up” with themselves. J.B. Phillips puts Jesus words this way, “How happy are the humble-minded, for the kingdom of Heaven is theirs!” Matthew 5:3 Phillips

 

Not a bad payoff for a less than perfect self-image!                     

 

In HIS Service and yours,

Bro G

Love lets go

                This past summer as we were preparing and pushing Geoffrey (our youngest and a son) to go to college. Many of our/his…well maybe more our plans hinged upon his having a driver’s license. With his health issues for those three years there seemed to be little point of getting one. But, he was going to get one and then be able to move to Statesboro living with friends he had grown up with and go to school at East Georgia. Well time continued to pass and it’s time for school to start and no license. So he catches a ride with a friend and one of us (our punishment) makes the trek to go and get him. He had packed up his stuff to move but couldn’t because of (say it all together now) No license. One week becomes two and two become a month and a month becomes a semester and still (say it together) no license.

                Between semesters I said I would not go and get him anymore. Yes, the first week of class I went three of the four days to get him. You would think I would know better than to say that. Still no appointment to take the test. That was the problem taking the test. All the while his stuff he packed in August continued to sit in his room still packed up. The plan was still possible just dependent upon a driver’s license. Low and behold two weeks ago Geoff schedules a test for his license. Go figure, after all of the pushing and prodding and inconvenience. Tuesday came and his mother took him for the exam.

                He PASSED was the text that blew up my phone. I was proud and relieved because now I didn’t have to get off the bus and into the car for another hour and a half round trip. I am selfish (in case you did not know). That afternoon he gets in the car by himself and off to school early to buy his parking pass and go to class. Very cool, a long time coming but very cool. So, Saturday morning he gets up and off to Barnes  and Nobles to buy a book. All the way in Savannah and traffic and everything, this from the kid who never wanted to drive. When he got home no scratches, dents or new dings in the car and he and we were still breathing. Wednesday it was reported to me (not official like on Facebook or anything) that he plans on moving to Statesboro this weekend like we planned before August. Very, Very KOOL Right. Well, not so fast!

                At that news I found myself wondering about his going. Now I have driven 5 hours to a school we had only seen once before hauling her belongings up three floors and 10 million steps (yes the number gets bigger every time) and left our first daughter there driving home in silence for a few miles. We have fussed and fumed about his dragging his feet to get his license and now “all of the sudden” he is moving out. But, that has been the point since he was born. The point of every child to grow up and become a healthy, happy, independent adult. If I really love him I have to let go. That’s what love does, let go.

                God has entrusted his mission to us. That rag tag group of men called disciples were left with eternity in their lap do or die. The mission was in their hands and now it is in ours. Letting go is love that is wild, radical and dangerous. It is not easy but it is like God loves us. Jesus said if you want to gain your life lose it (let go), if you want to be first be last (let go). It’s counter intuitive but so is Jesus’ dying in my place. It’s true. What is it you love? Then if you really love it let go!

In HIS Service and yours,

Bro G

Real LOVE is personal

                 I was thinking the other day of how thrilled Bro. Jeff would have been while the Atlanta Hawks were on their 19 game winning streak. He loved the Atlanta Hawks. He loved them when they were losing. He was an Atlanta Hawks fan. He loved to talk about them. I like college hoops not pro hoops. He knew that but he would still talk to me about his Hawks. I didn’t care about the Hawks but I enjoyed his telling of the game and how excited he was about their play. Those thoughts bring a smile to my face even now as I write these words.

                Max Lucado says that if you hold up a dime to the night sky at arm’s length and block your vision you are blocking out 15 million stars. With just one lone dime 15 million stars. How many dimes would it take to obscure the night sky I wonder? Consider how vast is the cosmos that God created and that’s just what we can see and imagine and there is more than that. The idea of those BIG numbers makes my head hurt. I think that is cool. It makes for me, God be huge and vast and outrageous. I need a BIG God. The cosmos is my proof.

                That vastness makes God out there. That’s the down side of a great big God, he is OUT THERE not IN HERE where I am, stuck. Ah but the manger changed all that. God said yes I’m out there but I am also right here and have moved into the neighborhood. God took the step to make his greatness personal out of his even greater love. Real love is personal. The Christmas story is personal for the characters and the readers. That’s what makes it great. God who made this vastness of time and space also existed within the same confines of time and space. I think that is the evidence of a personal approach, a real approachable love that overcomes the greatness.

                A preacher can preach the most eloquent sermon ever but if it fails to connect on an intimate, personal level with the listener of what point is it? The most powerful preacher has the listener’s ear due to a personal presence in that life. A preacher does not a pastor make nor does a pastor make a preacher. The greatest preacher has to make it personal. The greatest pastor has to be personal. We have to feel like he is speaking right to me. That is personal and powerful. That is real love.

                Bro. Jeff made me enjoy hearing about the Atlanta Hawks because he loved it and he made it personal to me through his experience. That also made him a great pastor. That same quality is what your friends and family desperately want and need to know that God is personal to you because HE is way out there for them. If you really love them you will make God personal first for you and then to them. Let them learn to love Him as you do. Oops maybe your love needs some work. He’s not personal any more.

Don’t worry He wants to be………..Call his name………………. He’ll be there.

                 

In HIS Service and yours,

Bro G

What you do after you get beat is more important?

              The 2015 Super Bowl game was great. It was the kind of ending I like in any sport. Both teams had the opportunity to win in the closing seconds of the contest. It could go either way depending on breaks and play. I may not like who wins ultimately but it is exciting.

 

              Seattle has the ball behind 4 points to the Patriots with time ticking away. A pass down the sidelines from QB Wilson to Kearse with the rookie Butler defending. Both jump for the ball. Butler tips it and Kearse falls with the ball bouncing finally into his arms for a catch. An amazing thing to watch and a disappointing thing to see for Butler as 9 times out of 10 that ball would have been incomplete. Not this time, Butler got beat on his coverage. He just lost out. So here is Seattle first and goal down by 4 with the clock ticking down. Coach calls for a slant passing play. The first year rookie who just a year ago was playing Shorter and Stillman and West Georgia and Florida Tech as a corner for the NCAA Division II West Alabama Tigers is covering after just being beat by Kearse in the Super Bowl. What does he do but step into the line of flight intercepting the pass and falling on the 1½ yard line. The Patriots now have the ball with a 4 point lead and 18 or so seconds left. The rest is history!

Peter King of the Monday Morning Quarterback writes of Butler. “Butler got the nickname “Scrap” for being a feisty player in minicamp, not backing down. The coaches liked him because when they’d quiz players about assignments, they could tell he’d been studying tape and knew how to anticipate what was coming.” That’s the thing. What to do when you just got beat, when you’re not supposed to be a part of that team, when you have only 190 snaps in 18 games this season? Malcolm Butler was an undrafted free agent in the rookie minicamp for New England. By all football logic he was not supposed to be on that team, or was he?

The apostle Paul was not supposed to be on the Jesus team either. He persecuted the Jesus followers to death and imprisonment. Following his real life encounter with Jesus Paul embarked on a more difficult task of preaching the Gospel to the Gentiles. He prepared for 14 years like Butler studying tape and anticipating what might happen on the field and like Butler Paul got beat.

 In 2 Corinthians 11:24-25 Paul writes, “²⁴ Five times I received 39 lashes from Jews. ²⁵ Three times I was beaten with rods by the Romans. Once I was stoned by my enemies. Three times I was shipwrecked. I have spent a night and a day in the open sea. (HCSB)

When we get beat what we do later is critical. Do we just stop, lick our wounds and dwell on how bad it was or how we failed or…well you know. It’s been said the too many times people quit just before the breakthrough. The Super Bowl would have a different winner if Butler had quit after being beat by Kearse. You and I might not be believers if Paul had quit after being beat. Both these men knew why they did what they did and after being beat got up and continued. Can that be said of me and you?

 

For a Jesus follower the consequences are eternal.

 

Go ahead, get up, start again, it’s worth it!

 

We WIN!        

In HIS Service and yours,

Bro G