The Day God Became Poor
John R. Petrilli
In a September, 2007 edition of the television program 20/20, investigative reporter John Stossel did an expose on giving in America . He compared the giving of upper middle-class non-religious people in San Francisco , CA , to that of working poor religious people in rural South Dakota . The results were nothing short of startling. Surprisingly, the working poor of South Dakota out-gave their wealthier counterparts in San Francisco by a whopping 100%! S.U. professor Dr. Arthur Brooks concurred that his nationwide research yielded very similar results.
In short, America ’s working poor give far more to charity than do America ’s middle class. Another interesting finding revealed that even the wealthiest classes of America ’s rich give more to charity than the middle class. Media mogul Ted Turner has lost over 80% of his net worth by giving away record percentages of his wealth to charity. But such numbers pale in comparison to what God gave to bring salvation to earth. Nine months before the very first Christmas Eve the second person of the Trinity descended from Heaven to take on human flesh. Second Corinthians 8:9 contains four profound truths about Jesus’ first coming of to earth.
JESUS TRIP TO EARTH WAS AN ACT OF INFINITE GRACE!
“You know the GRACE of our Lord Jesus, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes, He became poor, that you, through His poverty, might become rich.”
I never realized just how breathtakingly beautiful our planet was until I saw NASA photos of Earth taken from outer space. Our earth most definitely stands out as the crowning jewel among the planets of our solar system.
What did Jesus see that night long ago as He peered over Heaven’s portals and looked down on our planet? Did He see a perfect race? NO. Did He see a world at peace? HARDLY. Did He see a people that would be receptive to His arrival? DON’T THINK SO. Did He see a palace that He’d live in? FAR FROM IT. He saw a race sick and crippled by sin. He saw a world that was ravaged by 4,000 years of wars and strife. He saw a people who had consistently rejected His Father, and would also reject Him. He saw a lowly manger in Bethlehem and a humble cottage in Nazareth .
What could possibly cause anyone in their right mind to willingly vacate a palatial home and to come to such a place? The answer is GRACE. Grace gives people what they don’t deserve. And believe you me, we surely didn’t deserve a visit from the Son of God! We deserved God’s wrath, but instead He surprised us with the love gift of His very own Son. We deserved God’s justice, but instead He extended His hand of mercy. Nothing in the entire universe more graphically displays God’s grace than the incarnation of Jesus Christ!
JESUS TRIP TO EARTH WAS AN ACT OF INCREDIBLE SELF-SACRIFICE!
“Though He was rich, yet for your sakes HE BECAME POOR.”
John Stossel’s research also revealed a dramatic spike in the number of millionaires and billionaires in America over the past two decades. A number of multibillionaires were interviewed about their charitable giving, with each one’s net worth being openly publicized. So just how wealthy was Jesus? What was His ‘net worth’ when He left Heaven to come down to Earth? Page one of His portfolio discloses that He owned all the stars and galaxies in space. Imagine what kind of profits you could haul in if you owned all the energy outputted by just one star like our own sun? Page two of Jesus’ portfolio indicates He owned all the livestock, all the aquatic life, and all the aviary life on the planet as well. I wonder what value the New York Stock Exchange would place on all that! But being rich involves more than vast holdings and possessions, it also involves the exercise of power and influence. Page three of Jesus’ portfolio shows that as King of Kings and Lord of Lords Jesus owned all the Nations of the Earth. Just owning the EOC would make you a gazillionaire! As God, Jesus had free and full exercise of all the power of divinity. He exercised power over the weather, power over the oceans, and power over the rulers and kingdoms of the entire world. The wealth of most sons is often determined by the net worth of their father. If that’s the way we determine wealth, then Jesus was THE WEALTHIEST PERSON of all time, case closed.
So what did Jesus DO with all that wealth and power? Believe it or not, He voluntarily surrendered His right to use it. That’s right. He set most of it aside! He temporarily relinquished most of His power, authority, and position when He became a man. By doing so, the richest and most powerful person ever to inhabit time or eternity instantly became the poorest, most powerless of men. Paul tells us in the book of Philippians that Jesus surrendered His exalted position of co-equality with the Father. Next, He surrendered His existence as pure spirit to take on a human body with all of its attending limitations. But He didn’t stop there. After that, He opted to settle for the lowest place on the social ladder, that of a common servant, trading divinity for servility! Then He stooped even lower and accepted a criminal’s death sentence He never deserved. And, to top it all off, Jesus surrendered Himself to the most shameful death known to man, death by public crucifixion. He was born in a stable of poverty, raised in the poor town of Nazareth, spent three years of His adult life as a homeless preacher, died with no clothes on his back, and was buried in a borrowed tomb. Was He poor? I’d say He was DIRT poor!
JESUS TRIP TO EARTH WAS AN ACT OF IMMEASURABLE GENEROSITY.
“Our Lord Jesus became poor, SO THAT YOU, through His poverty, might become RICH!”
When wealthy philanthropists give away or invest their money into charitable causes, the benefactors are many, and the effects are felt years and even decades down the road. Foundations are established in their names so that, even after they’re long dead and gone, their money will continue to support good causes. The same thing happened on a far grander scale when Jesus used His vast spiritual prosperity to enrich we who were so dirt poor spiritually.
All the proceeds of that act went, not to the physical or temporal benefit of a few hundred people, but to the spiritual and eternal benefit of the whole of mankind. By coming to earth, He positioned Himself to become the sacrifice for our sins. His death and resurrection opened up the storehouse of Heaven, allowing all the manifold blessings of salvation to come pouring down upon our race.
When we receive Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior, we instantly become spiritually RICH! We trade all our spiritual poverty for all of Christ’s spiritual wealth! We immediately become Jesus’ joint heirs of God’s family inheritance, and what an inheritance it IS! According to Matthew, it’s an inheritance that will never end! According to Mark our inheritance that’s indestructible by its very nature! According to Luke, it’s an inheritance that’s shared with sanctified saints, not sometimes self-centered relatives! According to John it’s an inheritance that involves co-reigning with Jesus Himself over the nations! According to Paul our inheritance is rich and glorious! And according to Peter, it’s an inheritance that’s irrevocable and incapable of being stolen away! We’re guaranteed a future body that will never again be subject to decay or death! Until that time, God promises to provide for each of our temporal needs out of the vast storehouse of wealth we now have access to in Christ Jesus. And we receive resurrection power to live today in the here and now!
JESUS TRIP TO EARTH WAS AN ACT OF INESTIMABLE LOVE.
“FOR YOUR SAKES He became poor”.
John Stossel’s research also revealed documentable evidence that giving one’s time or treasure to someone else actually improves their emotional, psychological, and physical well-being! Researchers have found that those who participated in volunteer work for the first time saw their blood pressure go down, their energy go up, and their attitude become more cheerful. While there’s nothing wrong with reaping the benefits of serving others, that wasn’t
the driving force behind Jesus’ giving up His all. So just what WAS the bottom line for Jesus doing all this? Why DID Jesus go through all the humiliation, sacrifice, and suffering of becoming man and then dying to save us?
It was LOVE, pure and simple. Love always looks out for the best interests of the object of its affection. Jesus is God, and God, by His very nature is self-sufficient. He doesn’t need anybody or anything to validate, substantiate or complete His existence. Bank on it, Jesus didn’t come to earth and go to that Cross because it made Him feel better about Himself. Absolute perfection doesn’t require any type of affirmation. He did all this because He LOVES US … it’s just that simple! He was born, lived, died, and was raised from the grave for our benefit!
There was nothing in it for Himself. The Father asked Him to go, and He went. As Ray Boltz states in his song, “What If I Give All?”, “Long ago, a Father and a Son, saw the children lost in sin, can you see the tears in the Father’s eyes, as Jesus says to Him, ‘What If I give all I have? What will that gift do?’ My Son that gift will change the world! It will free the multitudes!” The message of Christmas is the message of Christ, and that message is that God loves you! Love drew-up salvation’s plan, love sent salvation’s man, and love still holds out
salvation’s hand. Jesus wasn’t sent to us because we were such good little creatures. He came to us because without His arrival we’d be hopelessly lost in the dark for all of time and eternity. He came to us when we were groping in the fog of sin, and showed us the way out of the dark and into His marvelous light. As we celebrate His momentous coming to earth, let’s also remember that He did it all because He loved us … period. Those who know Him as Savior are looking forward to His second visit to earth, if the signs of the times are any indicator, that may be sooner than we think! Have you crowned Jesus King of your life yet? If not, I can’t think of a more appropriate way to celebrate His first coming than to do so on the observed day of His birth?
Friday, December 4, 2009
CHRISTMAS STORY, A TALE OF GOD’S GLORY!
CHRISTMAS STORY, A TALE OF GOD’S GLORY!
John R. Petrilli
Author, artist and singer Joni Eareckson Tada captures the wonder of Christmas with these words: “Can you imagine the glory and splendor displayed in the heavens on the night our Savior was born? Close your eyes … picture the sapphire-blue night sky ablaze with a million diamonds as the angelic host gave the brilliant announcement. And then, as if that wasn’t mind-bending enough, an angel choir raised up a chorus of praise that shook the heavens and earth. When I think of the majesty of that moment my heart and voice burst into adoration right along with the heavenly praise team!” Stories we’ve rehearsed over and over again can become ‘old hat’. If the Christmas story has become that for you, try witnessing Jesus’ birth from a totally different perspective … through the lens of God’s glory.
MARY GLORIFIED GOD IN HER SINGING ! Luke 1:46-47
“My soul GLORIFIES the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior!” (NIV)
Picture yourself puttering about in the kitchen or garage when, out of nowhere, a being appears, illuminating everything around you. It tries to calm your justifiable fears, then informs you that you’ve been hand-picked by God for a unique and strategic role in His redemptive plan. The being even gives you a secondary event involving a distant relative as a reference point to serve as confirmation. Having arrived at the relative’s home, something totally out of the ordinary happens which leaves no doubt in your mind that God really has chosen you. This is the scenario Mary was in as she realized she would be birthing and parenting the very Son of God. Her beautiful song, the “Magnificat”, expresses the sheer ecstasy she felt as the recipient of such a singular honor. Her profound joy spilled over into a song of praise that directed all the glory to God. To make this year’s celebration special, determine to set aside a specific time for singing glory to God for the ‘big’ as well as the ‘small’ things He’s done and continues to do in your life.
THE ANGEL OF THE LORD GLORIFIED GOD IN HIS ANNOUNCING! Luke 2:8-12
“All at once an angel came down to them from the Lord, and the brightness of the Lord’s GLORY flashed around them.” (CEV)
They were nothing to look at. Simple, everyday, blue collar, lunch pail kind of guys. The night wasn’t any different either: routine predator there, sick sheep here, a straying sheep over there … nothing out of the ordinary. Like a nightshift over-the-road truck driver, their work went unnoticed, and for the most part, unappreciated. Yet it was to these unknowns that God sent an official birth announcement! In a split second the ground they occupied lit up with the blinding brilliance of God’s ineffable glory! Struggling to regain their senses amid the flood of light, they heard a firm yet soothing voice assuring them that all was well. It was the voice of none other than an angel of the Lord. Joseph had heard it (Matt. 1:20). Zechariah had heard it (Luke 1:11). Now these lowly shepherds heard it. That angelic voice bore the good news of the Savior, a message that would resound all across the ages. A rock concert’s light show or a spotlight beam cast on a stage performer pathetically pale in comparison to the visual display of this night. The birthday of the Savior had arrived! It was time for “Lights! Camera! Action!” It took a blinding light to shake the shepherds out of their doldrum routine. May the light of God’s Word shake us out of our sometimes jaded familiarity with this holiday.
THE ANGELIC ARMY GLORIFIED GOD IN THEIR PRAISING! Luke 2:13-14
“Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, ‘GLORY to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom His favor rests.’ ” (NIV)
It may come as a surprise to some that heaven is a very musical place. Heaven’s angels sang as they watched the Master Designer at work on the morning of creation (Job 38:7). Heaven will reverberate as vast multitudes celebrate the Lamb’s victory with a resounding version of the original Hallelujah chorus (Rev. 19). Is it any surprise that we find a contingent of celestial soldiers heralding the arrival of the Prince of Glory to earth? This angelic contingent was large, enthusiastic, offering divine peace and favor! This angelic contingent declared God’s glory as they celebrated the birth of His precious Son! So what will your voice be doing this Christmas season, singing the praises of some designer label, or the praises of God?
THE SHEPHERD’S GLORIFIED GOD IN THEIR WITNESSING ! Luke 2:15-20
“The sheepherders returned and let loose, GLORIFYING and praising God for everything they had heard and seen. It turned out exactly how they’d been told!” (Message)
The spellbound shepherds confirmed the angelic report with an eyewitness exam at the Babe’s makeshift cradle. Realizing they had witnessed the real deal, they couldn’t help but broadcast the news. It’s human nature to spread the word when you’ve found a product or service that lives up to its claims. Magnify that propensity a thousand times, and you’ll have a sense of what these animal tenders experienced that night. Unlikely heralds that they were, these under classed laborers became flaming evangelists. Given their low and disreputable rung on the social ladder, it’s equally surprising that their testimony was believed by everyone who heard it! The evangelistic zeal of these first missionaries didn’t die out, but continued to burn long after they returned to their flocks. Christmas is an ideal time for getting the good news of salvation into the hands and hearts of those around us. Why not use this Christmas as a golden opportunity to share the gospel? God has so many creative ideas waiting for you. Just give it a bit of thought and prayer.
SIMEON GLORIFIED GOD IN HIS PRAYING ! Luke 2:28-32
“With my own eyes I’ve seen Your salvation; it’s now out in the open for everyone to see: A God-revealing light to the non-Jewish nations, and of GLORY for Your people Israel .” (Message)
For some folks “Seeing is believing”. It was true of Thomas, and here we see a godly man named Simeon rejoicing as God made good on a promise He’d made to the aged saint. This wonderful gentleman walked so close to God that he heard the Spirit’s whisper in his inner ear, informing him that he’d see the Savior before he passed away. That day came as he felt prompted to visit the Temple . Having taken the Babe into his weakening arms, Simeon bursts forth with a prayer of gratitude to God for allowing him such an incredible privilege. The Temple which housed the glory of God in the earliest days of Israel’s history had once again become the chosen place for a visit, this time from God’s Son Jesus, the Lord of Glory (1 Cor. 2:8). On such a memorable occasion this thankful follower of God offers a prayer that glorifies the Lord for His wisdom and grace in providing One Who would reveal the light of salvation to both Jew and non-Jew alike. In Jesus we have the full revelation of all the glory of God, a Savior for all who will put their trust in Him! As you worship this Christmas season, take advantage of the incredible opportunity you have of coming to know the Savior. Like Simeon of old, embrace Jesus with your whole heart and life. When you do, trust me, you’ll have something to really sing about!
THE WISE MEN GLORIFIED GOD IN THEIR GIFT-GIVING ! Matt. 2:1-11
“[The same star they had seen in the eastern skies] led them on until it hovered over the place of the child. They could hardly contain themselves: they were in the right place! They had arrived at the right time! They entered the house and saw the child in the arms of Mary, his mother. Overcome, they kneeled and WORSHIPPED him.” (Message)
This time around instead of debating the number of wise men, the nature of the star, or how old Jesus was, let’s zero-in on the real significance of this account. It’s all about worship. The real story is found in the “How”. Their search for God involved great distance (1), much diligence (8) and raw determination (11). After travelling thousands of miles on camelback, how would these God-seekers respond when they reached their destination and found their King? They just quietly bowed down before Him! At Christmas time we find ourselves searching. Searching for that perfect gift. Searching our mailbox for a card in from a loved one or friend. Searching for companionship. Searching. And not suspending that search until we’ve found what we’re searching for. But all that searching will be in vain if, at the end of it all, we fail to find Jesus. And having found Him, we, like those ancient seers of the past, celebrate by presenting to Him our most precious and priceless possession, our hearts.
LIKE MARY, THE SHEPHERDS, SIMEON AND THE WISE MEN, WE CAN BE TRANSFORMED BY THE GLORY OF GOD ! 2 Cor. 3:18
“But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s GLORY, are being TRANSFORMED into His likeness with ever-increasing GLORY.” (NIV)
Mary would never be the same. She’d heard from God, and became a key player in God’s unfolding plan of redemption. The Shepherds would never be the same. Once the butt of everyone’s jokes, they now held their heads up high. They’d met the Good Shepherd and joyfully became a part of His fold. Simeon would never be the same. The senior saint could now face his closing days in peace knowing he’d come face to face with the long-awaited Messiah. Each person in the Christmas narrative enters the story one person, and comes out someone completely new. That’s what happens when a man, a woman, or child encounters Jesus, the Lord of Glory! They are completely and permanently changed! Before we encounter the Lord we reflect lives that are natural, plain and undistinguished. But once we’ve met Jesus face to face we come away with a supernatural glow on our faces and a new brightness in our disposition. Because we’ve received the Lord of Glory into our hearts and lives, we now reflect that same heavenly glory. And as we yield more and more of our lives to Him, His glory will shine through our words and deeds with ever increasing brightness and clarity. May God give you and each of yours a wonderful, glory-filled Christmas!
John R. Petrilli
Author, artist and singer Joni Eareckson Tada captures the wonder of Christmas with these words: “Can you imagine the glory and splendor displayed in the heavens on the night our Savior was born? Close your eyes … picture the sapphire-blue night sky ablaze with a million diamonds as the angelic host gave the brilliant announcement. And then, as if that wasn’t mind-bending enough, an angel choir raised up a chorus of praise that shook the heavens and earth. When I think of the majesty of that moment my heart and voice burst into adoration right along with the heavenly praise team!” Stories we’ve rehearsed over and over again can become ‘old hat’. If the Christmas story has become that for you, try witnessing Jesus’ birth from a totally different perspective … through the lens of God’s glory.
MARY GLORIFIED GOD IN HER SINGING ! Luke 1:46-47
“My soul GLORIFIES the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior!” (NIV)
Picture yourself puttering about in the kitchen or garage when, out of nowhere, a being appears, illuminating everything around you. It tries to calm your justifiable fears, then informs you that you’ve been hand-picked by God for a unique and strategic role in His redemptive plan. The being even gives you a secondary event involving a distant relative as a reference point to serve as confirmation. Having arrived at the relative’s home, something totally out of the ordinary happens which leaves no doubt in your mind that God really has chosen you. This is the scenario Mary was in as she realized she would be birthing and parenting the very Son of God. Her beautiful song, the “Magnificat”, expresses the sheer ecstasy she felt as the recipient of such a singular honor. Her profound joy spilled over into a song of praise that directed all the glory to God. To make this year’s celebration special, determine to set aside a specific time for singing glory to God for the ‘big’ as well as the ‘small’ things He’s done and continues to do in your life.
THE ANGEL OF THE LORD GLORIFIED GOD IN HIS ANNOUNCING! Luke 2:8-12
“All at once an angel came down to them from the Lord, and the brightness of the Lord’s GLORY flashed around them.” (CEV)
They were nothing to look at. Simple, everyday, blue collar, lunch pail kind of guys. The night wasn’t any different either: routine predator there, sick sheep here, a straying sheep over there … nothing out of the ordinary. Like a nightshift over-the-road truck driver, their work went unnoticed, and for the most part, unappreciated. Yet it was to these unknowns that God sent an official birth announcement! In a split second the ground they occupied lit up with the blinding brilliance of God’s ineffable glory! Struggling to regain their senses amid the flood of light, they heard a firm yet soothing voice assuring them that all was well. It was the voice of none other than an angel of the Lord. Joseph had heard it (Matt. 1:20). Zechariah had heard it (Luke 1:11). Now these lowly shepherds heard it. That angelic voice bore the good news of the Savior, a message that would resound all across the ages. A rock concert’s light show or a spotlight beam cast on a stage performer pathetically pale in comparison to the visual display of this night. The birthday of the Savior had arrived! It was time for “Lights! Camera! Action!” It took a blinding light to shake the shepherds out of their doldrum routine. May the light of God’s Word shake us out of our sometimes jaded familiarity with this holiday.
THE ANGELIC ARMY GLORIFIED GOD IN THEIR PRAISING! Luke 2:13-14
“Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, ‘GLORY to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom His favor rests.’ ” (NIV)
It may come as a surprise to some that heaven is a very musical place. Heaven’s angels sang as they watched the Master Designer at work on the morning of creation (Job 38:7). Heaven will reverberate as vast multitudes celebrate the Lamb’s victory with a resounding version of the original Hallelujah chorus (Rev. 19). Is it any surprise that we find a contingent of celestial soldiers heralding the arrival of the Prince of Glory to earth? This angelic contingent was large, enthusiastic, offering divine peace and favor! This angelic contingent declared God’s glory as they celebrated the birth of His precious Son! So what will your voice be doing this Christmas season, singing the praises of some designer label, or the praises of God?
THE SHEPHERD’S GLORIFIED GOD IN THEIR WITNESSING ! Luke 2:15-20
“The sheepherders returned and let loose, GLORIFYING and praising God for everything they had heard and seen. It turned out exactly how they’d been told!” (Message)
The spellbound shepherds confirmed the angelic report with an eyewitness exam at the Babe’s makeshift cradle. Realizing they had witnessed the real deal, they couldn’t help but broadcast the news. It’s human nature to spread the word when you’ve found a product or service that lives up to its claims. Magnify that propensity a thousand times, and you’ll have a sense of what these animal tenders experienced that night. Unlikely heralds that they were, these under classed laborers became flaming evangelists. Given their low and disreputable rung on the social ladder, it’s equally surprising that their testimony was believed by everyone who heard it! The evangelistic zeal of these first missionaries didn’t die out, but continued to burn long after they returned to their flocks. Christmas is an ideal time for getting the good news of salvation into the hands and hearts of those around us. Why not use this Christmas as a golden opportunity to share the gospel? God has so many creative ideas waiting for you. Just give it a bit of thought and prayer.
SIMEON GLORIFIED GOD IN HIS PRAYING ! Luke 2:28-32
“With my own eyes I’ve seen Your salvation; it’s now out in the open for everyone to see: A God-revealing light to the non-Jewish nations, and of GLORY for Your people Israel .” (Message)
For some folks “Seeing is believing”. It was true of Thomas, and here we see a godly man named Simeon rejoicing as God made good on a promise He’d made to the aged saint. This wonderful gentleman walked so close to God that he heard the Spirit’s whisper in his inner ear, informing him that he’d see the Savior before he passed away. That day came as he felt prompted to visit the Temple . Having taken the Babe into his weakening arms, Simeon bursts forth with a prayer of gratitude to God for allowing him such an incredible privilege. The Temple which housed the glory of God in the earliest days of Israel’s history had once again become the chosen place for a visit, this time from God’s Son Jesus, the Lord of Glory (1 Cor. 2:8). On such a memorable occasion this thankful follower of God offers a prayer that glorifies the Lord for His wisdom and grace in providing One Who would reveal the light of salvation to both Jew and non-Jew alike. In Jesus we have the full revelation of all the glory of God, a Savior for all who will put their trust in Him! As you worship this Christmas season, take advantage of the incredible opportunity you have of coming to know the Savior. Like Simeon of old, embrace Jesus with your whole heart and life. When you do, trust me, you’ll have something to really sing about!
THE WISE MEN GLORIFIED GOD IN THEIR GIFT-GIVING ! Matt. 2:1-11
“[The same star they had seen in the eastern skies] led them on until it hovered over the place of the child. They could hardly contain themselves: they were in the right place! They had arrived at the right time! They entered the house and saw the child in the arms of Mary, his mother. Overcome, they kneeled and WORSHIPPED him.” (Message)
This time around instead of debating the number of wise men, the nature of the star, or how old Jesus was, let’s zero-in on the real significance of this account. It’s all about worship. The real story is found in the “How”. Their search for God involved great distance (1), much diligence (8) and raw determination (11). After travelling thousands of miles on camelback, how would these God-seekers respond when they reached their destination and found their King? They just quietly bowed down before Him! At Christmas time we find ourselves searching. Searching for that perfect gift. Searching our mailbox for a card in from a loved one or friend. Searching for companionship. Searching. And not suspending that search until we’ve found what we’re searching for. But all that searching will be in vain if, at the end of it all, we fail to find Jesus. And having found Him, we, like those ancient seers of the past, celebrate by presenting to Him our most precious and priceless possession, our hearts.
LIKE MARY, THE SHEPHERDS, SIMEON AND THE WISE MEN, WE CAN BE TRANSFORMED BY THE GLORY OF GOD ! 2 Cor. 3:18
“But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s GLORY, are being TRANSFORMED into His likeness with ever-increasing GLORY.” (NIV)
Mary would never be the same. She’d heard from God, and became a key player in God’s unfolding plan of redemption. The Shepherds would never be the same. Once the butt of everyone’s jokes, they now held their heads up high. They’d met the Good Shepherd and joyfully became a part of His fold. Simeon would never be the same. The senior saint could now face his closing days in peace knowing he’d come face to face with the long-awaited Messiah. Each person in the Christmas narrative enters the story one person, and comes out someone completely new. That’s what happens when a man, a woman, or child encounters Jesus, the Lord of Glory! They are completely and permanently changed! Before we encounter the Lord we reflect lives that are natural, plain and undistinguished. But once we’ve met Jesus face to face we come away with a supernatural glow on our faces and a new brightness in our disposition. Because we’ve received the Lord of Glory into our hearts and lives, we now reflect that same heavenly glory. And as we yield more and more of our lives to Him, His glory will shine through our words and deeds with ever increasing brightness and clarity. May God give you and each of yours a wonderful, glory-filled Christmas!
Sunday, November 22, 2009
A Recipe for Thanksgiving Joy
A Recipe for Thanksgiving Joy
John R. Petrilli
Don’t you just love the harvest season? So do I! There’s nothing quite like the foliage flurry of a thousand hues. Add to this the growing anticipation of the holidays when we revisit the annual tradition of gathering together with family and friends. A large part of that tradition is the delicious and plentiful foods that tantalize and delight our palates. Attentive household gourmets search high and low for just the right new recipe that will add a flavorful and festive tone to their celebrations. There are recipes for mouth-watering roasts, nutritious vegetable dishes, healthy salads, and, of course, we can’t leave out those scrumptious holiday pies!
While enjoying a bountiful meal with loved ones is a wonderful centuries-old holiday tradition, true and lasting joy is found at a much deeper level. The level of the spirit. Hard economic times notwithstanding, the believer in Jesus Christ doesn’t have to look far for ways to count their many blessings. The apostle Paul’s writings are chock-full of thanksgiving for the people he knew and the profound spiritual blessings he enjoyed as a follower of the Lord Jesus. Surprisingly, most of his blessings were non-material in nature. I really think it will do us a world of good to reflect on some of these oft-overlooked ingredients of life that will make every day a ‘Thanksgiving Day.’
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY INCLUDES THE INGREDIENT OF FAITHFUL FRIENDS. Phil. 1:3-5
“Every time I think of you, I THANK my God. And whenever I mention you in my prayers it makes me very happy.” (CEV)
Some people have mistakenly characterized Paul as a spiritual “Lone Ranger”. But if you look closely at his correspondence, it becomes very clear that Paul highly valued and greatly appreciated the people God brought
into his life. One church in particular stands out in this regard, the believers in the city of Philippi. Every time Paul thought of them, his heart warmed with thanksgiving for their exemplary faith and shining witness for Christ. So deep was his gratitude to God for these co-laborers that he included a personal thank you note to them at the close of his letter. He appreciated the ongoing support they gave him in prayer as well as practical assistance. They didn’t forget Paul after he left their midst, but stayed abreast and informed of his whereabouts and needs. Then, as true friends, they took steps to meet those needs in a generous and consistent manner. Who wouldn’t be thankful for such friends? Who has God brought into your life as a supporting, caring friend? Be thankful for them!
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY CALLS FOR THE INGREDIENT OF GOD’S DAILY PROVISION. 1 Tim. 4:3-4
“God created these foods to be eaten with THANKFUL hearts by His followers who know the truth. Everything God created is good. And if you give THANKS, you may eat anything. What God has said and your prayer make it fit to eat.” (CEV)
I fear that we who have little to do with the raising of crops and the milking of cows often take them for granted. It’s hard for us to see the connection between the product and the great efforts that were expended to get it to our tables. We just cruise through the grocery store aisles nearly oblivious to all that was involved in getting everything on the shelves to market. We simply buy them, bag them, and then consume them. I wonder how different our gratitude level might be if we spent a month or two investing sweat and toil into a farm. I’d venture to guess that we’d see things a whole lot differently. The grain farmer KNOWS that God sent the rain he prayed for. The dairy farmer understands that all his efforts are in vain apart from God keeping his herd healthy. We can and should be genuinely grateful for something as simple as food because, at the end of the day, it is a gift from the hand of our loving and generous Creator. Paul appreciated his daily meals, thanked God for them, and encouraged all believers to adopt an attitude of gratitude for their daily bread. In so doing he was only practicing what His Lord did as He broke bread with is disciples (1 Cor. 11:24). And somehow, in some way, such a prayer sanctifies, blesses, and makes special the meal that we partake of.
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY REQUIRES THE INGREDIENT OF SALVATION. 2 Cor. 9:15
“THANK God for His gift that is too wonderful for words!” (CEV)
A list of blessings that doesn’t include our salvation needs to be rewritten. Gratitude to God for His saving grace through the cross and blood of Jesus Christ merits a song of everlasting thanksgiving. We should be engaged in this hymn of joyful gratitude THIS side of heaven because, it’s for certain, we’ll be doing so on the OTHER side for all eternity (Rev. 7:9-12 ; 5:9,12). Here’s an ingredient of thanksgiving that knows no boundaries. If the stock market crashes, we still have our salvation. If a pink slip comes across our desk, we still have our salvation. When sickness saps our health and strength, we can still rejoice in our salvation. When death takes one of our loved ones, we still have our salvation. No degree of adversity or loss can ever rob us of this supreme joy of salvation. Habakkuk knew this secret (Habakkuk 3:17-18). Paul describes the precious gift of our salvation as “unspeakable”, “indescribable”, “and inexpressible”. Its value escapes mere words, it defies description, its inestimable treasure can never be adequately verbalized.
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY LISTS THE INGREDIENT OF USEFULNESS TO GOD. 2 Cor. 2:14
“But THANKS be to God, Who always leads us in victory through Christ. God uses us to spread His knowledge everywhere like a sweet-smelling perfume.” (Everyday Bible)
Nothing aggravates us more than when we’ve discovered that someone has used us. We feel cheated, devalued, taken for granted. But what a different result when we’ve been used by God! Instead of anger we experience supreme joy! Paul uses powerful imagery to describe what being used by God looks and feels like. He says it’s a lot like a perfumed fragrance that permeates a room with its refreshing, delightful aromatic bouquet (cf. John 12:3). Paul borrows an illustration from a Roman victory parade where incense was burned profusely to celebrate a successful military campaign against enemy armies. The smell of that incense signaled to all viewing the parade that a great victory had been won on the battlefield. Paul transfers that image to the spiritual victory over death which Christ won at the cross. He thanked God for the privilege he had to further spread the fragrance of that monster victory to the whole world. Paul was glad he was being used by God to permeate his generation and culture with the gospel. How has God used you this past year? Count the ways, and thank Him for each and every privilege He’s granted you!
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY ADDS A TOUCH OF HEAVEN-SENT TRIALS. James 1:2-4
“When all kinds of trials crowd into your lives, my brothers, don’t resent them as intruders, but WELCOME them as friends! Realize that they come to test your faith and to produce in you the quality of endurance. But let the process go on until that endurance is filly developed, and you will find you have become men of mature character with the right sort of independence.” (Phillips)
Thank God for difficulties? This must be some kind of typo, right? Not at all! Like a book, we must be careful not to judge a trial by its cover. On the cover trials appear ugly, painful, miserable, a useless waste of time, something to be avoided at all costs. But they are the very things God uses to build solid character in our lives…if we let Him. J Think for a moment. When have you experienced the greatest spurts of personal and spiritual growth? Was it when everything was rosy and calm? I’ll venture to guess that it was when your life was being turned-inside out and upside-down. It’s usually then that we recognize our complete dependence on God for wisdom and successful resolution. We can’t possibly steer our way through such times. We lack the foresight, ability and patience to pull it off on our own. Yes, we actually can and should be most thankful for the trials that invade our well-ordered lives, because they create the setting for God to move in and do for and in us what we could never do for ourselves. Our gratitude is not some “pie-in-the-sky” reaction, but a response firmly grounded in the incredible truth that God will take that trial and work it out into something that will be a blessing to us and those around us. We’ll exit the tunnel of trial stronger, wiser, and far more mature. Whatever you plunk into your Thanksgiving recipe, don’t leave out this indispensible ingredient. Happy Thanksgiving from all of us at the Good News Paper to all of you! J J
John R. Petrilli
Don’t you just love the harvest season? So do I! There’s nothing quite like the foliage flurry of a thousand hues. Add to this the growing anticipation of the holidays when we revisit the annual tradition of gathering together with family and friends. A large part of that tradition is the delicious and plentiful foods that tantalize and delight our palates. Attentive household gourmets search high and low for just the right new recipe that will add a flavorful and festive tone to their celebrations. There are recipes for mouth-watering roasts, nutritious vegetable dishes, healthy salads, and, of course, we can’t leave out those scrumptious holiday pies!
While enjoying a bountiful meal with loved ones is a wonderful centuries-old holiday tradition, true and lasting joy is found at a much deeper level. The level of the spirit. Hard economic times notwithstanding, the believer in Jesus Christ doesn’t have to look far for ways to count their many blessings. The apostle Paul’s writings are chock-full of thanksgiving for the people he knew and the profound spiritual blessings he enjoyed as a follower of the Lord Jesus. Surprisingly, most of his blessings were non-material in nature. I really think it will do us a world of good to reflect on some of these oft-overlooked ingredients of life that will make every day a ‘Thanksgiving Day.’
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY INCLUDES THE INGREDIENT OF FAITHFUL FRIENDS. Phil. 1:3-5
“Every time I think of you, I THANK my God. And whenever I mention you in my prayers it makes me very happy.” (CEV)
Some people have mistakenly characterized Paul as a spiritual “Lone Ranger”. But if you look closely at his correspondence, it becomes very clear that Paul highly valued and greatly appreciated the people God brought
into his life. One church in particular stands out in this regard, the believers in the city of Philippi. Every time Paul thought of them, his heart warmed with thanksgiving for their exemplary faith and shining witness for Christ. So deep was his gratitude to God for these co-laborers that he included a personal thank you note to them at the close of his letter. He appreciated the ongoing support they gave him in prayer as well as practical assistance. They didn’t forget Paul after he left their midst, but stayed abreast and informed of his whereabouts and needs. Then, as true friends, they took steps to meet those needs in a generous and consistent manner. Who wouldn’t be thankful for such friends? Who has God brought into your life as a supporting, caring friend? Be thankful for them!
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY CALLS FOR THE INGREDIENT OF GOD’S DAILY PROVISION. 1 Tim. 4:3-4
“God created these foods to be eaten with THANKFUL hearts by His followers who know the truth. Everything God created is good. And if you give THANKS, you may eat anything. What God has said and your prayer make it fit to eat.” (CEV)
I fear that we who have little to do with the raising of crops and the milking of cows often take them for granted. It’s hard for us to see the connection between the product and the great efforts that were expended to get it to our tables. We just cruise through the grocery store aisles nearly oblivious to all that was involved in getting everything on the shelves to market. We simply buy them, bag them, and then consume them. I wonder how different our gratitude level might be if we spent a month or two investing sweat and toil into a farm. I’d venture to guess that we’d see things a whole lot differently. The grain farmer KNOWS that God sent the rain he prayed for. The dairy farmer understands that all his efforts are in vain apart from God keeping his herd healthy. We can and should be genuinely grateful for something as simple as food because, at the end of the day, it is a gift from the hand of our loving and generous Creator. Paul appreciated his daily meals, thanked God for them, and encouraged all believers to adopt an attitude of gratitude for their daily bread. In so doing he was only practicing what His Lord did as He broke bread with is disciples (1 Cor. 11:24). And somehow, in some way, such a prayer sanctifies, blesses, and makes special the meal that we partake of.
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY REQUIRES THE INGREDIENT OF SALVATION. 2 Cor. 9:15
“THANK God for His gift that is too wonderful for words!” (CEV)
A list of blessings that doesn’t include our salvation needs to be rewritten. Gratitude to God for His saving grace through the cross and blood of Jesus Christ merits a song of everlasting thanksgiving. We should be engaged in this hymn of joyful gratitude THIS side of heaven because, it’s for certain, we’ll be doing so on the OTHER side for all eternity (Rev. 7:9-12 ; 5:9,12). Here’s an ingredient of thanksgiving that knows no boundaries. If the stock market crashes, we still have our salvation. If a pink slip comes across our desk, we still have our salvation. When sickness saps our health and strength, we can still rejoice in our salvation. When death takes one of our loved ones, we still have our salvation. No degree of adversity or loss can ever rob us of this supreme joy of salvation. Habakkuk knew this secret (Habakkuk 3:17-18). Paul describes the precious gift of our salvation as “unspeakable”, “indescribable”, “and inexpressible”. Its value escapes mere words, it defies description, its inestimable treasure can never be adequately verbalized.
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY LISTS THE INGREDIENT OF USEFULNESS TO GOD. 2 Cor. 2:14
“But THANKS be to God, Who always leads us in victory through Christ. God uses us to spread His knowledge everywhere like a sweet-smelling perfume.” (Everyday Bible)
Nothing aggravates us more than when we’ve discovered that someone has used us. We feel cheated, devalued, taken for granted. But what a different result when we’ve been used by God! Instead of anger we experience supreme joy! Paul uses powerful imagery to describe what being used by God looks and feels like. He says it’s a lot like a perfumed fragrance that permeates a room with its refreshing, delightful aromatic bouquet (cf. John 12:3). Paul borrows an illustration from a Roman victory parade where incense was burned profusely to celebrate a successful military campaign against enemy armies. The smell of that incense signaled to all viewing the parade that a great victory had been won on the battlefield. Paul transfers that image to the spiritual victory over death which Christ won at the cross. He thanked God for the privilege he had to further spread the fragrance of that monster victory to the whole world. Paul was glad he was being used by God to permeate his generation and culture with the gospel. How has God used you this past year? Count the ways, and thank Him for each and every privilege He’s granted you!
GOD’S RECIPE FOR THANKSGIVING JOY ADDS A TOUCH OF HEAVEN-SENT TRIALS. James 1:2-4
“When all kinds of trials crowd into your lives, my brothers, don’t resent them as intruders, but WELCOME them as friends! Realize that they come to test your faith and to produce in you the quality of endurance. But let the process go on until that endurance is filly developed, and you will find you have become men of mature character with the right sort of independence.” (Phillips)
Thank God for difficulties? This must be some kind of typo, right? Not at all! Like a book, we must be careful not to judge a trial by its cover. On the cover trials appear ugly, painful, miserable, a useless waste of time, something to be avoided at all costs. But they are the very things God uses to build solid character in our lives…if we let Him. J Think for a moment. When have you experienced the greatest spurts of personal and spiritual growth? Was it when everything was rosy and calm? I’ll venture to guess that it was when your life was being turned-inside out and upside-down. It’s usually then that we recognize our complete dependence on God for wisdom and successful resolution. We can’t possibly steer our way through such times. We lack the foresight, ability and patience to pull it off on our own. Yes, we actually can and should be most thankful for the trials that invade our well-ordered lives, because they create the setting for God to move in and do for and in us what we could never do for ourselves. Our gratitude is not some “pie-in-the-sky” reaction, but a response firmly grounded in the incredible truth that God will take that trial and work it out into something that will be a blessing to us and those around us. We’ll exit the tunnel of trial stronger, wiser, and far more mature. Whatever you plunk into your Thanksgiving recipe, don’t leave out this indispensible ingredient. Happy Thanksgiving from all of us at the Good News Paper to all of you! J J
Gratitude … It’s All About Attitude!
Gratitude … It’s All About Attitude!
John R. Petrilli
It was the spring of 1620. Six months earlier 101 religious refugees fleeing English persecution landed on the Massachusetts coastline. In the ensuing months one-half of the passengers on the Mayflower died, and most of the remaining travelers became sick with pneumonia, tuberculosis, and scurvy. Numbered among the dead was Dorothy May Bradford, wife of governor William Bradford, who tragically drowned in the Cape Cod Bay. Despite a three-month drought that withered the corn and cracked the ground, these hearty souls endured major losses, built houses, and succeeded in planting the first colony in the New World.
What’s even more amazing, they gathered together on November 29, 1620 to hold a colony-wide celebration of thanksgiving to God! How could they do that? They had learned the secret of cultivating an attitude of gratitude. The pilgrims knew their Bibles, and they believed it’s teaching that God desired them to “give thanks in all circumstances”. As Thanksgiving 2005 approaches, we have every reason to possess a grateful heart. To help us experience that blessing, Psalm 103 provides three tips that will help us to cultivate an attitude of gratitude.
WE CULTIVATE AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE BY ENGAGING IN SPIRITUAL MATHEMATICS. Psalm 103:3-5
The author of this Psalm, David, experienced a lifetime of God’s deliverance, blessing, protection, provision, and prosperity. David begins his poem with a self-exhortation to combat his tendency toward spiritual dementia. As if looking into a mirror, David tells himself not to forget all of God’s blessings on his life. If you’re not feeling all that thankful this season, you may want to check your “forgetfulness” file to find the reason why. Blessings continue to fall all around us, but forgetfulness can easily rob us of the joy of gratitude. While our media-driven culture sows its seeds of greed, materialism, and discontent, we can sit back and take stock of all that we DO have. That’s what is meant by the phrase “spiritual mathematics”. It’s the discipline of counting and savoring each and every blessing in our lives.
The First Calculation in Spiritual Math Involves Spiritual Blessings. As the song “Count Your Many Blessings” encourages, we engage in spiritual mathematics by itemizing one by one the ways God has blessed us. The first blessing David included on his “Thank you” list was forgiveness of sins. While David was indeed a man after God’s own heart, he was also a man with feet of clay just like us. He knew all too well the agonies of spiritual defeat, and the crushing weight of unconfessed sin. But David also knew what it meant to be forgiven by God. He knew what it was to fall, but he also knew what it was to be restored to a place of fellowship and usefulness. In Psalm 32 David describes the total recovery he experienced as he cast himself totally upon the mercy of God. So in writing Psalm 103 he places forgiveness and restoration at the top of his “thanksgiving list”. But there’s more. Also included on his list is deliverance from an eternity of spiritual loss. In verse 4 David cites God’s act of delivering his life from eternal ruin and destruction. The death-wage of sin is comprehensive, including both physical as well as spiritual death. David’s awareness of the awful and endless consequences of sin made him all the more grateful for God’s deliverance. Have you experienced forgiveness of sins and deliverance from a Christless eternity? If not, this could be your first REAL Thanksgiving! For those of us who have, not a single day should go by without pausing to thank God for the saving sacrifice of His dear Son on the Cross. Despite a life of constant trial and intense suffering, the apostle Paul remembered what he was delivered from with these words: “God rescued us from certain doom.” (2 Cor.1:10, Message). David celebrated his salvation, and so did Paul, so the question remains, “Are we celebrating OUR salvation?”
The Second Calculation in Spiritual Math Involves Temporal Blessings. “If you have your health, you have everything!” I think David would have subscribed to that maxim, for we see him thanking the Lord for his health. As David begins to ponder his earthly blessings he realizes that while many around him are sick, he enjoys good health. He also attributes the health we enjoy as a direct or indirect blessing from the Hand of God. Whether it’s through the prayer of faith, or the wisdom of a physician, God alone gets all the glory for restoring and maintaining our bodily health. It is He who “heals all our diseases”. David fell victim to sickness and disease just as we do. Sometimes he just fell ill, while other times he was under divine disciplinary action. In Psalm 32 David gave a detailed description of the latter, as God used orthopedic pain and dehydration to bring him to his spiritual senses. God’s purposes were eventually accomplished as David confessed his sins and was mercifully healed and restored by God. Whether our sickness is incidental or disciplinary, God has included healing in the benefits package we can so heartily thank Him for. But David doesn’t end there, he goes on to add material prosperity to his thank you list. In verses 4 and 5 he paints a picture of a coronation ceremony where God is placing a crown of blessing upon his head. Back in David’s day, blessing was measured in terms of agricultural yield and livestock. Psalm 65:11-13 depicts God crowning the year with goodness in the form of huge flocks and overflowing fields of grain. Proceeds from the sale of these agricultural products provided a significant source of monetary income. According to the apostle Paul, our possession of food, clothing, and a roof over our head is cause enough for thanksgiving! (1 Timothy 6:8). When was the last time you thanked God for the precious gift of your salvation? When was the last time you thanked Him for something so valuable as your health, or something so necessary as your daily provisions?
WE CULTIVATE AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE BY ACKNOWLEDGING THE MANIFOLD MERCIES OF GOD. 8, 11, 12, 17
Next time you find yourself singing the song, “I Will Sing Of The Mercies of the Lord Forever”, look up to Heaven because David may be singing right along with you. David gives us a mini-seminar on mercy in this Psalm.
First He Tells Us that God’s Mercies are LIMITLESS! In verse eight David says that the mercies of God abound. When the world dispenses benefits, it measures them out in an exacting, stingy manner. Not so with God. When He extends His mercies to us, they are poured-out in an abundant and overflowing manner, as each new day brings fresh, new mercies.
Second, David Declares God’s Mercies to be FATHOMLESS! In verse 11 we discover that the volume of God’s mercies are as great as the distance
between heaven and earth. In ancient times they didn’t have the benefit of modern scientific instruments. To them the distance between the starry heavens and the earth was incalculable, and thus quite unfathomable. Today we know from radio telescope measurements that the distance from earth to the nearest star is around 25 trillion miles. But even though we know the distance between the earth and the heavens, for all practical purposes, that distance is still unfathomable. That’s how it is with God’s mercies! They are far too vast to comprehend. Remember that the next time you come to God for forgiveness of a repeated failure.
Third, We See That God’s Mercies Are MEASURELESS! “As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.” In verse 11 we saw David draws an illustration from the field of astronomy, and here in verse 12 he uses an illustration from the field of geography. In the world of geography the terms “east” and “west” are really imaginary designations. There is no actual beginning nor end to either direction. So the distance between them is technically immeasurable. In His mercy, God moves our sins so far away from us that they’ll never have any influence on our standing with or acceptance by God.
The Fourth Quality about God’s Mercies is that They’re TIMELESS! In verse 17 David rejoices over the fact that God’s mercies last “from everlasting to everlasting”. In life we catch a “break” every once in a while. But God’s mercies just don’t stop coming, and unbelievably, they never will. David uses a clever play on words here. Having commented on the brevity of human life, he holds up the chronological length of God’s mercy, and that span works-out to FOREVER. “Everlasting” has no beginning and no end. God’s mercies have been bestowed on us in the past, are being bestowed on us in the present, and will continue being bestowed on us on into eternity! When was the last time you expressed your appreciation to God for the countless tender mercies He has favored you with?
WE CULTIVATE AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE BY DEVELOPING THE FINE ART OF PRAISE. 20-22
As David wraps up this Psalm, he closes with a crescendo of praise. He does so by describing the three languages of praise. First, in verses 20-21 he identifies praise as the language of heaven as he exhorts the courts of glory to render their praise to God. Included in this charge are angels as well as the entire heavenly host. Isn’t it interesting how whenever Scripture provides a glimpse of Heaven, we’re often ushered into a scene of thunderous praise? If you don’t enjoy praising God, perhaps you should consider canceling your reservations for Heaven?
In verse 22a we learn that praise is also meant to be the language of the entire universe! David proceeds to “cheer-on” the rest of the created universe to engage in praise. One may wonder just how inanimate objects like stars can actually engage in praise, yet in Psalm 148 we see the sun, moon, stars, fire, hail, snow, wind, mountains, hills, trees, animals, fish, birds, and even insects praising their great Creator. God created everything in the universe for His pleasure, and that pleasure is fully realized as each part honors Him with its praise.
Finally, in verse 22b we find that praise is to be the language of the human heart. “Bless the Lord, O My Soul!” shouts David. And with good cause, for we’ve been redeemed at great cost, and Ephesians 1 reveals that the end result of our salvation is to bring praise to God for His glorious grace! For practical purposes, I’d like to end this article with what I call “Four Pictures of Praise”.
In Psalm 116:12-14 David uses the picture of an offering as he takes up the cup of salvation as a tangible way of saying “thank you” to God. The point here is that our sacrifice of praise should be offered up WILLINGLY. In Hebrews 13:15 the apostle Paul uses the imagery of a harvest offering to parallel the act of giving verbal praise to God. Here we see that our sacrifice of praise is to be offered up on a continual basis. In 1 Peter 2:9 the apostle Peter chooses the sacrificial duties of the Levitical priesthood to provide a parallel to the believer’s calling to offer up the spiritual sacrifice of praise. Now there’s one duty we won’t want to be found derelict in! The concept here is that our sacrifice of praise is to be offered up publicly. And then there’s the exhortation in Psalm 103:1 bless the Lord with everything that’s within us. This implies that we’re to offer our praises wholeheartedly. Here David reached the pinnacle of praise where his entire personality was involved in the act. Wholehearted praise engages every fiber of our being. God didn’t withhold any benefits from David, so David, in turn, doesn’t withhold any part of himself from God.
The Lord pulled-out all the stops with blessings, and David pulled-out all the stops in his response of praise! I can think of no better time than Thanksgiving to pull-out the stops praise the Lord!
John R. Petrilli
It was the spring of 1620. Six months earlier 101 religious refugees fleeing English persecution landed on the Massachusetts coastline. In the ensuing months one-half of the passengers on the Mayflower died, and most of the remaining travelers became sick with pneumonia, tuberculosis, and scurvy. Numbered among the dead was Dorothy May Bradford, wife of governor William Bradford, who tragically drowned in the Cape Cod Bay. Despite a three-month drought that withered the corn and cracked the ground, these hearty souls endured major losses, built houses, and succeeded in planting the first colony in the New World.
What’s even more amazing, they gathered together on November 29, 1620 to hold a colony-wide celebration of thanksgiving to God! How could they do that? They had learned the secret of cultivating an attitude of gratitude. The pilgrims knew their Bibles, and they believed it’s teaching that God desired them to “give thanks in all circumstances”. As Thanksgiving 2005 approaches, we have every reason to possess a grateful heart. To help us experience that blessing, Psalm 103 provides three tips that will help us to cultivate an attitude of gratitude.
WE CULTIVATE AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE BY ENGAGING IN SPIRITUAL MATHEMATICS. Psalm 103:3-5
The author of this Psalm, David, experienced a lifetime of God’s deliverance, blessing, protection, provision, and prosperity. David begins his poem with a self-exhortation to combat his tendency toward spiritual dementia. As if looking into a mirror, David tells himself not to forget all of God’s blessings on his life. If you’re not feeling all that thankful this season, you may want to check your “forgetfulness” file to find the reason why. Blessings continue to fall all around us, but forgetfulness can easily rob us of the joy of gratitude. While our media-driven culture sows its seeds of greed, materialism, and discontent, we can sit back and take stock of all that we DO have. That’s what is meant by the phrase “spiritual mathematics”. It’s the discipline of counting and savoring each and every blessing in our lives.
The First Calculation in Spiritual Math Involves Spiritual Blessings. As the song “Count Your Many Blessings” encourages, we engage in spiritual mathematics by itemizing one by one the ways God has blessed us. The first blessing David included on his “Thank you” list was forgiveness of sins. While David was indeed a man after God’s own heart, he was also a man with feet of clay just like us. He knew all too well the agonies of spiritual defeat, and the crushing weight of unconfessed sin. But David also knew what it meant to be forgiven by God. He knew what it was to fall, but he also knew what it was to be restored to a place of fellowship and usefulness. In Psalm 32 David describes the total recovery he experienced as he cast himself totally upon the mercy of God. So in writing Psalm 103 he places forgiveness and restoration at the top of his “thanksgiving list”. But there’s more. Also included on his list is deliverance from an eternity of spiritual loss. In verse 4 David cites God’s act of delivering his life from eternal ruin and destruction. The death-wage of sin is comprehensive, including both physical as well as spiritual death. David’s awareness of the awful and endless consequences of sin made him all the more grateful for God’s deliverance. Have you experienced forgiveness of sins and deliverance from a Christless eternity? If not, this could be your first REAL Thanksgiving! For those of us who have, not a single day should go by without pausing to thank God for the saving sacrifice of His dear Son on the Cross. Despite a life of constant trial and intense suffering, the apostle Paul remembered what he was delivered from with these words: “God rescued us from certain doom.” (2 Cor.1:10, Message). David celebrated his salvation, and so did Paul, so the question remains, “Are we celebrating OUR salvation?”
The Second Calculation in Spiritual Math Involves Temporal Blessings. “If you have your health, you have everything!” I think David would have subscribed to that maxim, for we see him thanking the Lord for his health. As David begins to ponder his earthly blessings he realizes that while many around him are sick, he enjoys good health. He also attributes the health we enjoy as a direct or indirect blessing from the Hand of God. Whether it’s through the prayer of faith, or the wisdom of a physician, God alone gets all the glory for restoring and maintaining our bodily health. It is He who “heals all our diseases”. David fell victim to sickness and disease just as we do. Sometimes he just fell ill, while other times he was under divine disciplinary action. In Psalm 32 David gave a detailed description of the latter, as God used orthopedic pain and dehydration to bring him to his spiritual senses. God’s purposes were eventually accomplished as David confessed his sins and was mercifully healed and restored by God. Whether our sickness is incidental or disciplinary, God has included healing in the benefits package we can so heartily thank Him for. But David doesn’t end there, he goes on to add material prosperity to his thank you list. In verses 4 and 5 he paints a picture of a coronation ceremony where God is placing a crown of blessing upon his head. Back in David’s day, blessing was measured in terms of agricultural yield and livestock. Psalm 65:11-13 depicts God crowning the year with goodness in the form of huge flocks and overflowing fields of grain. Proceeds from the sale of these agricultural products provided a significant source of monetary income. According to the apostle Paul, our possession of food, clothing, and a roof over our head is cause enough for thanksgiving! (1 Timothy 6:8). When was the last time you thanked God for the precious gift of your salvation? When was the last time you thanked Him for something so valuable as your health, or something so necessary as your daily provisions?
WE CULTIVATE AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE BY ACKNOWLEDGING THE MANIFOLD MERCIES OF GOD. 8, 11, 12, 17
Next time you find yourself singing the song, “I Will Sing Of The Mercies of the Lord Forever”, look up to Heaven because David may be singing right along with you. David gives us a mini-seminar on mercy in this Psalm.
First He Tells Us that God’s Mercies are LIMITLESS! In verse eight David says that the mercies of God abound. When the world dispenses benefits, it measures them out in an exacting, stingy manner. Not so with God. When He extends His mercies to us, they are poured-out in an abundant and overflowing manner, as each new day brings fresh, new mercies.
Second, David Declares God’s Mercies to be FATHOMLESS! In verse 11 we discover that the volume of God’s mercies are as great as the distance
between heaven and earth. In ancient times they didn’t have the benefit of modern scientific instruments. To them the distance between the starry heavens and the earth was incalculable, and thus quite unfathomable. Today we know from radio telescope measurements that the distance from earth to the nearest star is around 25 trillion miles. But even though we know the distance between the earth and the heavens, for all practical purposes, that distance is still unfathomable. That’s how it is with God’s mercies! They are far too vast to comprehend. Remember that the next time you come to God for forgiveness of a repeated failure.
Third, We See That God’s Mercies Are MEASURELESS! “As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.” In verse 11 we saw David draws an illustration from the field of astronomy, and here in verse 12 he uses an illustration from the field of geography. In the world of geography the terms “east” and “west” are really imaginary designations. There is no actual beginning nor end to either direction. So the distance between them is technically immeasurable. In His mercy, God moves our sins so far away from us that they’ll never have any influence on our standing with or acceptance by God.
The Fourth Quality about God’s Mercies is that They’re TIMELESS! In verse 17 David rejoices over the fact that God’s mercies last “from everlasting to everlasting”. In life we catch a “break” every once in a while. But God’s mercies just don’t stop coming, and unbelievably, they never will. David uses a clever play on words here. Having commented on the brevity of human life, he holds up the chronological length of God’s mercy, and that span works-out to FOREVER. “Everlasting” has no beginning and no end. God’s mercies have been bestowed on us in the past, are being bestowed on us in the present, and will continue being bestowed on us on into eternity! When was the last time you expressed your appreciation to God for the countless tender mercies He has favored you with?
WE CULTIVATE AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE BY DEVELOPING THE FINE ART OF PRAISE. 20-22
As David wraps up this Psalm, he closes with a crescendo of praise. He does so by describing the three languages of praise. First, in verses 20-21 he identifies praise as the language of heaven as he exhorts the courts of glory to render their praise to God. Included in this charge are angels as well as the entire heavenly host. Isn’t it interesting how whenever Scripture provides a glimpse of Heaven, we’re often ushered into a scene of thunderous praise? If you don’t enjoy praising God, perhaps you should consider canceling your reservations for Heaven?
In verse 22a we learn that praise is also meant to be the language of the entire universe! David proceeds to “cheer-on” the rest of the created universe to engage in praise. One may wonder just how inanimate objects like stars can actually engage in praise, yet in Psalm 148 we see the sun, moon, stars, fire, hail, snow, wind, mountains, hills, trees, animals, fish, birds, and even insects praising their great Creator. God created everything in the universe for His pleasure, and that pleasure is fully realized as each part honors Him with its praise.
Finally, in verse 22b we find that praise is to be the language of the human heart. “Bless the Lord, O My Soul!” shouts David. And with good cause, for we’ve been redeemed at great cost, and Ephesians 1 reveals that the end result of our salvation is to bring praise to God for His glorious grace! For practical purposes, I’d like to end this article with what I call “Four Pictures of Praise”.
In Psalm 116:12-14 David uses the picture of an offering as he takes up the cup of salvation as a tangible way of saying “thank you” to God. The point here is that our sacrifice of praise should be offered up WILLINGLY. In Hebrews 13:15 the apostle Paul uses the imagery of a harvest offering to parallel the act of giving verbal praise to God. Here we see that our sacrifice of praise is to be offered up on a continual basis. In 1 Peter 2:9 the apostle Peter chooses the sacrificial duties of the Levitical priesthood to provide a parallel to the believer’s calling to offer up the spiritual sacrifice of praise. Now there’s one duty we won’t want to be found derelict in! The concept here is that our sacrifice of praise is to be offered up publicly. And then there’s the exhortation in Psalm 103:1 bless the Lord with everything that’s within us. This implies that we’re to offer our praises wholeheartedly. Here David reached the pinnacle of praise where his entire personality was involved in the act. Wholehearted praise engages every fiber of our being. God didn’t withhold any benefits from David, so David, in turn, doesn’t withhold any part of himself from God.
The Lord pulled-out all the stops with blessings, and David pulled-out all the stops in his response of praise! I can think of no better time than Thanksgiving to pull-out the stops praise the Lord!
A Song of Thanksgiving
A Song of Thanksgiving
John R. Petrilli
Christian hymnody is replete with songs of praise and thanksgiving. One of my fondest Thanksgiving memories is a holiday I shared with the family of a classmate from Bible School. Instead of the customary after-dinner football game, this Christian family gathered around the piano and sang a series of favorite harvest hymns. It was a very enjoyable and uplifting experience. We sang “Harvest Home”, “Now Thank We All Our God” and many other great songs of thanksgiving.
Singing songs of thanksgiving to God by no means originates with the American experience. For centuries, cultures around the world have celebrated as they hauled in the precious, life-sustaining fruits of their crops. In fact, in Psalm 65 we have the record of a harvest hymn that dates back literally thousands of years. A close look at how the people of Israel celebrated their time of harvest provides us with some keys to making our Thanksgiving an unforgettable celebration of the goodness and greatness of our God.
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR PRAYER ANSWERING GOD. 1-2
“Oh You Who hear prayer, to You all men shall come.”
Of the many things David was, he was most prominently a man of prayer. The Psalms he authored reveal a heart that diligently sought God’s face and boldly requested great things from the Lord. David’s life breathed prayer, practicing it at least three times throughout the span of a day (Psa. 55:17). This King of Israel prayed with utmost confidence in God’s ability and willingness to not only hear his request, but to grant it according to His perfect will (Psa. 5:3). That confidence proved to be well-placed as he received answer after answer from his Lord (Psalm 118:5). What instances of answered prayer can you recall this past year? Why not make a list and turn it into a song of thanksgiving to be sung around your Thanksgiving table?
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR SIN FORGIVING GOD. 3
“When we were overwhelmed by sins, You forgave our transgressions!”
Amazing at it may seem, the character quality of forgiveness is glaringly lacking in the ‘gods’ of non-Christian religions. Those ‘gods’ are vengeful, impersonal, detached, unreachable, or capricious. Only Christianity and Judaism portray a God Who knows how to forgive, and actually wants to extend this grace to His fallen creatures. When David says that God forgave him when he was overwhelmed by his sins, he knows that of which he speaks. This is the same David who stole a man’s wife in adultery, then had the audacity to eliminate the husband and marry the recently widowed adulterous partner! Just how ‘overwhelmed’ was David? At first not much. But as time went on he became increasingly troubled by his heinous actions. In Psalm 51 we see him depressed (8), guilty (14), and broken (17). In Psalm 32 David’s pitiful existence included unbearable stress, sleepless nights, loss of stamina, and drowning in a sea of personal misery. Psalm 38 shows a man totally overwhelmed by sadness, sickness, weakness, emptiness, and friendlessness. But all of that disappeared the very second he confessed and repented of his sins against the Lord (Psa. 32:5; 2 Sam. 12:13). We too can know this same blessing of forgiveness from God as we confess our sins to Him (1 John 1:9). Freedom from sin’s guilt can be ours; it’s only a prayer of repentance away! And best of all, there’s no ‘threshold’ of forgiveness, no limit to how many times God will forgive us if we deal sincerely and decisively with those things that have marred our fellowship with Him … Hallelujah!!
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR GRACIOUSLY HOSPITABLE GOD. 4
“Blessed are those You choose and bring near to live in Your courts! We are filled with the good things of Your house, of Your holy temple.”
Homelessness is approaching epidemic proportions in America. Over 3.5 million Americans live on the streets and a whopping 36 million are only one paycheck away from joining this desperate population. Tens of thousands have lost jobs, homes, and even their families, falling through the cultural cracks and landing in the streets of our cities. This is a tragedy of huge proportions. What these unfortunates would give to be welcomed into a home filled with the good things of Thanksgiving … the warmth of human kindness, the love of family and friends, the joy of fellowship. Many have been blessed by the loving outreach of the many city missions that provide a Thanksgiving meal with all the traditional trimmings, and served by the loving, friendly hands of those freely volunteering their time on a busy holiday. God bless them, every one!
While physical homelessness can and does happen, no such state exists in the spiritual realm of the family of God. The Lord is always seen extending His hand of invitation to us to enter into His presence and House. David declares that he had found life, joy and endless pleasure in the presence of God (Psa. 16:11). The Lord’s goodness and mercy became evident to David as he spent time worshipping and fellowshipping among His people in the temple (Psa. 23:6). One of God’s favorite words is “Come”. He’s constantly inviting us over to His place to share a meal, engage in conversation, and enjoy one another’s company … not unlike the hospitality of a great, lifelong friend or loving relative. Jesus picks up on this same theme, inviting all who would to “come” to God for relief from the burdens of daily life that they bear (Matt. 11:28). Even at the end of the Bible we see God reaching out to us in the third Person of the Holy Spirit, Who says, “Come” (Rev. 22:17). As we reflect on the year gone by, we surely have a lot to thank God for as we consider all the wonderful times of hospitality and fellowship we’ve had in His house with Him and His people.
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR WONDER WORKING GOD. 5-8
“You answer us with awesome deeds … Who formed the mountains by Your power … Who stilled the roaring of the seas … [Who stilled] the turmoil of the nations. Those living far away fear Your wonders.”
I recall building a volcanic mountain for my ninth grade science class, but that doesn’t even come close to a single cliff created by God! I had the opportunity to swim in a “wave pool” in Illinois, where a mechanism causes the surface to roll into high waves across the length of the pool. But compared to the waves of the sea, this isn’t even a trickle! I’ve known the peace of a reconciled friendship, but as important as that may be, it pales in comparison to ending world wars among the nations of the earth! God makes mountains, calms seas, and ends international conflicts. These are wonder-working acts that can only be achieved by a wonder-working God! The Father showed His wonderful side to His people Israel in the wilderness (Acts 7:36). Isaiah called Jesus the “Wonderful Counselor”, and rightfully so. When on earth in a human body, Jesus repeatedly left His audience awestruck with wonder (Luke 4:36-37). The Holy Spirit continued to display God’s wonder-working power through the apostles as they worked wonder after wonder in the days of the infant Church (Acts 2:43; 5:12; 14:3; 15:12).
But the greatest wonder God ever works is that of transforming the human heart. He takes a sinful, rebellious, hopeless, hell-bound lives and remakes them into something beautiful. Paul likens this transformation to the process of metamorphosis, the biological process responsible for a caterpillar becoming a butterfly and a tadpole becoming a bullfrog (2 Cor. 5:17). The change involved in spiritual regeneration likewise is dramatic, complete and permanent. If you’ve been the recipient of God’s wonder-working, saving and transforming power, why not take a moment out (right now?) and thank Him from the depths of your redeemed heart?
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR GENEROUSLY GIVING GOD. 9-13
“You enrich the land and water abundantly … [You] provide the people with grain … You crown the year with Your bounty … Your carts overflow … the grasslands overflow … the meadows are covered with flocks … the valleys are mantled with grain.”
I fear that we who have little to do with the raising of crops and the milking of cows often take our food for granted. We just cruise through the grocery store aisles oblivious to all that was involved in getting to market what we see on the shelves. It’s hard for us to make the connection between the product and the effort expended to get it to our tables. We simply buy them, bag them, and consume them. I wonder how different our gratitude level might be if we spent a month or two working on a farm. I’d venture to guess that we’d see things a whole lot differently. The grain farmer KNOWS that God sent the rain he prayed for. The dairy farmer UNDERSTANDS that all his efforts are in vain apart from God keeping his herd healthy. We should be genuinely grateful for something as simple as food because, at the end of the day, it is a gift from the hand of our loving and generous Creator.
Here David pictures a harvest landscape that graphically depicts the abundance which God showers upon His people. He carefully maintains the ecosystems that support both plant and animal life. God insures that seeds become plants, and plants become grain. As the “Master Meteorologist” He measures out just the right amount of sunshine and precipitation to guarantee an abundant harvest. Contrast this abundance with the stark poverty of many nations who have chosen to worship other gods. “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord” (Psa. 33:12). Thanks to the reverence of our forefathers, we’ve enjoyed over two centuries of economic prosperity here in America. While America’s moral drift leaves us with an uncertain future, we can still be thankful for the multitudinous blessings we’ve each received in our lifetime. Happy Thanksgiving from all of us at the Good News Paper to all of you! J J
John R. Petrilli
Christian hymnody is replete with songs of praise and thanksgiving. One of my fondest Thanksgiving memories is a holiday I shared with the family of a classmate from Bible School. Instead of the customary after-dinner football game, this Christian family gathered around the piano and sang a series of favorite harvest hymns. It was a very enjoyable and uplifting experience. We sang “Harvest Home”, “Now Thank We All Our God” and many other great songs of thanksgiving.
Singing songs of thanksgiving to God by no means originates with the American experience. For centuries, cultures around the world have celebrated as they hauled in the precious, life-sustaining fruits of their crops. In fact, in Psalm 65 we have the record of a harvest hymn that dates back literally thousands of years. A close look at how the people of Israel celebrated their time of harvest provides us with some keys to making our Thanksgiving an unforgettable celebration of the goodness and greatness of our God.
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR PRAYER ANSWERING GOD. 1-2
“Oh You Who hear prayer, to You all men shall come.”
Of the many things David was, he was most prominently a man of prayer. The Psalms he authored reveal a heart that diligently sought God’s face and boldly requested great things from the Lord. David’s life breathed prayer, practicing it at least three times throughout the span of a day (Psa. 55:17). This King of Israel prayed with utmost confidence in God’s ability and willingness to not only hear his request, but to grant it according to His perfect will (Psa. 5:3). That confidence proved to be well-placed as he received answer after answer from his Lord (Psalm 118:5). What instances of answered prayer can you recall this past year? Why not make a list and turn it into a song of thanksgiving to be sung around your Thanksgiving table?
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR SIN FORGIVING GOD. 3
“When we were overwhelmed by sins, You forgave our transgressions!”
Amazing at it may seem, the character quality of forgiveness is glaringly lacking in the ‘gods’ of non-Christian religions. Those ‘gods’ are vengeful, impersonal, detached, unreachable, or capricious. Only Christianity and Judaism portray a God Who knows how to forgive, and actually wants to extend this grace to His fallen creatures. When David says that God forgave him when he was overwhelmed by his sins, he knows that of which he speaks. This is the same David who stole a man’s wife in adultery, then had the audacity to eliminate the husband and marry the recently widowed adulterous partner! Just how ‘overwhelmed’ was David? At first not much. But as time went on he became increasingly troubled by his heinous actions. In Psalm 51 we see him depressed (8), guilty (14), and broken (17). In Psalm 32 David’s pitiful existence included unbearable stress, sleepless nights, loss of stamina, and drowning in a sea of personal misery. Psalm 38 shows a man totally overwhelmed by sadness, sickness, weakness, emptiness, and friendlessness. But all of that disappeared the very second he confessed and repented of his sins against the Lord (Psa. 32:5; 2 Sam. 12:13). We too can know this same blessing of forgiveness from God as we confess our sins to Him (1 John 1:9). Freedom from sin’s guilt can be ours; it’s only a prayer of repentance away! And best of all, there’s no ‘threshold’ of forgiveness, no limit to how many times God will forgive us if we deal sincerely and decisively with those things that have marred our fellowship with Him … Hallelujah!!
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR GRACIOUSLY HOSPITABLE GOD. 4
“Blessed are those You choose and bring near to live in Your courts! We are filled with the good things of Your house, of Your holy temple.”
Homelessness is approaching epidemic proportions in America. Over 3.5 million Americans live on the streets and a whopping 36 million are only one paycheck away from joining this desperate population. Tens of thousands have lost jobs, homes, and even their families, falling through the cultural cracks and landing in the streets of our cities. This is a tragedy of huge proportions. What these unfortunates would give to be welcomed into a home filled with the good things of Thanksgiving … the warmth of human kindness, the love of family and friends, the joy of fellowship. Many have been blessed by the loving outreach of the many city missions that provide a Thanksgiving meal with all the traditional trimmings, and served by the loving, friendly hands of those freely volunteering their time on a busy holiday. God bless them, every one!
While physical homelessness can and does happen, no such state exists in the spiritual realm of the family of God. The Lord is always seen extending His hand of invitation to us to enter into His presence and House. David declares that he had found life, joy and endless pleasure in the presence of God (Psa. 16:11). The Lord’s goodness and mercy became evident to David as he spent time worshipping and fellowshipping among His people in the temple (Psa. 23:6). One of God’s favorite words is “Come”. He’s constantly inviting us over to His place to share a meal, engage in conversation, and enjoy one another’s company … not unlike the hospitality of a great, lifelong friend or loving relative. Jesus picks up on this same theme, inviting all who would to “come” to God for relief from the burdens of daily life that they bear (Matt. 11:28). Even at the end of the Bible we see God reaching out to us in the third Person of the Holy Spirit, Who says, “Come” (Rev. 22:17). As we reflect on the year gone by, we surely have a lot to thank God for as we consider all the wonderful times of hospitality and fellowship we’ve had in His house with Him and His people.
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR WONDER WORKING GOD. 5-8
“You answer us with awesome deeds … Who formed the mountains by Your power … Who stilled the roaring of the seas … [Who stilled] the turmoil of the nations. Those living far away fear Your wonders.”
I recall building a volcanic mountain for my ninth grade science class, but that doesn’t even come close to a single cliff created by God! I had the opportunity to swim in a “wave pool” in Illinois, where a mechanism causes the surface to roll into high waves across the length of the pool. But compared to the waves of the sea, this isn’t even a trickle! I’ve known the peace of a reconciled friendship, but as important as that may be, it pales in comparison to ending world wars among the nations of the earth! God makes mountains, calms seas, and ends international conflicts. These are wonder-working acts that can only be achieved by a wonder-working God! The Father showed His wonderful side to His people Israel in the wilderness (Acts 7:36). Isaiah called Jesus the “Wonderful Counselor”, and rightfully so. When on earth in a human body, Jesus repeatedly left His audience awestruck with wonder (Luke 4:36-37). The Holy Spirit continued to display God’s wonder-working power through the apostles as they worked wonder after wonder in the days of the infant Church (Acts 2:43; 5:12; 14:3; 15:12).
But the greatest wonder God ever works is that of transforming the human heart. He takes a sinful, rebellious, hopeless, hell-bound lives and remakes them into something beautiful. Paul likens this transformation to the process of metamorphosis, the biological process responsible for a caterpillar becoming a butterfly and a tadpole becoming a bullfrog (2 Cor. 5:17). The change involved in spiritual regeneration likewise is dramatic, complete and permanent. If you’ve been the recipient of God’s wonder-working, saving and transforming power, why not take a moment out (right now?) and thank Him from the depths of your redeemed heart?
LET’S SING SONGS OF THANKSGIVING TO OUR GENEROUSLY GIVING GOD. 9-13
“You enrich the land and water abundantly … [You] provide the people with grain … You crown the year with Your bounty … Your carts overflow … the grasslands overflow … the meadows are covered with flocks … the valleys are mantled with grain.”
I fear that we who have little to do with the raising of crops and the milking of cows often take our food for granted. We just cruise through the grocery store aisles oblivious to all that was involved in getting to market what we see on the shelves. It’s hard for us to make the connection between the product and the effort expended to get it to our tables. We simply buy them, bag them, and consume them. I wonder how different our gratitude level might be if we spent a month or two working on a farm. I’d venture to guess that we’d see things a whole lot differently. The grain farmer KNOWS that God sent the rain he prayed for. The dairy farmer UNDERSTANDS that all his efforts are in vain apart from God keeping his herd healthy. We should be genuinely grateful for something as simple as food because, at the end of the day, it is a gift from the hand of our loving and generous Creator.
Here David pictures a harvest landscape that graphically depicts the abundance which God showers upon His people. He carefully maintains the ecosystems that support both plant and animal life. God insures that seeds become plants, and plants become grain. As the “Master Meteorologist” He measures out just the right amount of sunshine and precipitation to guarantee an abundant harvest. Contrast this abundance with the stark poverty of many nations who have chosen to worship other gods. “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord” (Psa. 33:12). Thanks to the reverence of our forefathers, we’ve enjoyed over two centuries of economic prosperity here in America. While America’s moral drift leaves us with an uncertain future, we can still be thankful for the multitudinous blessings we’ve each received in our lifetime. Happy Thanksgiving from all of us at the Good News Paper to all of you! J J
Friday, October 23, 2009
On the Altar of Convenience
On the Altar of Convenience
John R. Petrilli
Have America’s unborn children become an inconvenience? Chuck Colson believes so. In his latest work, “The Faith”, he makes the following observation: “We no longer see children as gifts from God; we see them more often as commodities, something that we are ‘entitled to’ simply because we exist. We decide to have children or not on the basis of whether they will enhance our lives. We evaluate pregnancies according to their potential to produce ‘good outcomes’.”
Has our next generation become a disposal thing? The wife of the late singer Keith Green thinks so. Some years ago Melody Green published a tract entitled, “Children …Things We Throw Away”.
As America approaches its fourth decade of waffling over the sanctity of unborn human life, it is instructive to delve into a passage of Scripture that recounts an earlier period in history when a country tragically adopted the pagan practice of child sacrifice. I believe the reader will find that these ancient practices strikingly parallel the modern day practice of aborting the unborn.
GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE SACRIFICED THEIR CHILDREN ON THE ALTAR OF IDOLATRY.
2 Ki. 21:3-4, 7-8
God appoints men over nations. In His sovereign plan a fifteen year-old by the name of Manasseh was appointed to rule over Judah. Undoing all the positive spiritual reforms of his immediate predecessor, King Hezekiah, Manasseh ran the table on wickedness. In addition to reintroducing witchcraft and occultist practices, ungodly Manasseh rebuilt the very altars to false deities that good king Hezekiah had torn down. He dedicated these wicked edifices to the pagan gods Baal and Asherah, having the audacity to erect one such idol right inside the Temple that had God’s Name on it! But his crowning sin was offering up the very lives of children to the Moabite god Molech (2 Ki. 3:27; 16:3; 21:6).
What was really going on here? Paul tells us that pagan worship of false gods is actually the worship of demons (1 Cor. 10:20). Each time the people of Judah worshipped at the altars of these false gods, they were worshipping none other than the devil himself and his minions. Before you conclude that ‘that was then and this is now’, consider this. Satan never ceases his assaults on God and us humans who are made in God’s image. He just changes tactics. Today he is successfully striking back at God by destroying the lives of unborn children. One look at a disposed, dismembered baby will convince you of the pure heinousness and cruelty that only a superhuman power of darkness could ever perpetrate. And the false gods we worship? Their names have changed also ... from Molech to the god of career … from Baal to the god of personal convenience … from Asherah to the mythical god of a “perfect baby”.
GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE SACRIFICED THEIR CHILDREN ON THE ALTAR OF VIOLENCE.
2 Ki. 21:6
Note the kind of death these ancient children suffered. It wasn’t quiet (like a natural death), it wasn’t private (like an execution), and it wasn’t painless (like a lethal injection). No, to appease these demonic gods, these parents forced their own flesh and blood to commit suicide by passing through a fiery death. Nothing these parents heard or saw could prompt them to stop the execution, not the wild screaming or the sight of their child’s body going up in flames. They just hardened their hearts and watched their innocent child die an excruciatingly painful death, a death that should have only been reserved for murderers. Unlike God, who through angelic intervention, stopped Abraham from going through with the sacrifice of Isaac, these parents did nothing. They stood by and watched their children die.
Until one has viewed a video of an abortion, seen a picture of an aborted baby or discovered the aftermath of an abortion in a waste basket or dumpster, they really have no grasp of the incredibly violent nature of abortion. The movie “Silent Scream” gave us a close-up look at a suction abortion as the baby’s mouth opens wide with tortured screams of outrageous pain as its members are torn limb from limb. Such cruelty against their offspring cannot be found in any other species except Homo sapiens. From whence does this violence come? From hearts deceived and hardened by sin, hearts that have suppressed an affection that is inborn, natural, and purely instinctive. The apostle Paul predicted the arrival of such a day, and we are living in that day (2 Tim 3:3 ;1 Tim. 4:1).
GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE SACRIFICED THEIR CHILDREN ON THE ALTAR OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS. 2 Ki. 21:9
When sin in a culture is present that’s bad enough, but when it escalates to the place where it receives the endorsement of a nation’s leaders, its days are certainly numbered. No civilization that’s embraced abortion has ever survived (when will we ever learn?!). Manasseh wasn’t content to set a bad example by sacrificing his son to idols, he convinced the entire nation to join in and kill their kids as well. Instead of upholding God’s prescribed penalty of capital punishment for child sacrifice (Lev.20:1-5), Manasseh gave the green light allowing everyone to practice it, elevating it to the level of official public policy. No one would be prosecuted for the murder of their offspring; in fact, they might even be praised by the wicked king for mimicking his horrific action.
Abortions have been around for a long time. It wasn’t until January 22, 1973 that the federal government of these United States of America declared it their public policy to not recognize the unborn as a human being, and therefore susceptible to slaughter. Until recently, thanks to decent past leaders, there was no federal funding of child killing, but now there are powerful forces at work to not only legalize but also fund this murderous industry. A first-century example of government sanctioned and supported abortion is found in the ancient Roman Empire. Colson writes, “… the Romans employed abortion and infanticide to produce more male workers” (The Faith, p. 179).
GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE SACRIFICED THEIR CHILDREN IN RECORD NUMBERS. 2 Ki. 21:9,16
History records that when King Charles took the throne of England, he turned the royal court into a brothel. It wasn’t long before the entire country adopted his profligate ways, plunging it into wholesale debauchery. The need for a nation to elect or appoint leaders with character can be seen in the incredible amount of influence they leverage. Manasseh’s led his people down the slippery slope of child sacrifice, and it ran rampant from that point on. Things got so bad that the Israelites’ sinful actions exceeded the exceedingly wicked practices of the very pagan nations whom they were to destroy and displace. An epidemic involves a significant portion of a population, but a pandemic occurs when an entire culture is inundated by something. Judah bought into child sacrifice hook, line, and sinker. The result was an unprecedented amount of bloodshed that literally filled the streets of Jerusalem across the five and one-half decades of Manasseh’s terrible reign.
According to “Carenet”, a reputable and reliable Evangelical prolife agency, 234,000 evangelical Christian women choose to abort their babies each year. I wonder what that figure would have been just 20 short years ago. Hmmm. America is fast approaching the infamous figure of fifty million. That’s how many living, heart-beating, brain-functioning unborn babies have been mercilessly offered up on the altar of convenience. As I sit here writing these figures I can’t believe such a terrible thing has happened in a nation founded on Judeo-Christian principles. But, tragically, it has. Who would have thought that a nation born out of a quest for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness would deteriorate to the point where it now subjects its youngest citizens to a vicious prenatal execution? God have mercy on us!
THE PRACTICE OF CHILD SACRIFICE AMONG GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE LED TO THEIR NATION’S DOWNFALL. 2 Ki. 21:12-14
When God pronounced, “Thou shalt not kill”, He meant every word. He has never taken murder lightly, and never will. There’s only so long that a nation or people can live in rank disobedience before it comes under divine judgment. God is just, and sin will always eventually be punished. The people of Judah were given a time frame in which to repent, and failed to take advantage of it. Persisting in their wicked disposal of their most precious commodity, their own children, God sent a reply in the form of upcoming cataclysmic judgment. God’s plumb line sized-up the situation, and then He rained down retribution so intense that news of it made people’s ears tingle. In today’s lingo, the story of Judah’s downfall would be “all-the-buzz”.
The Lord promised that His judgment would be complete and thorough, much like the way a housekeeper makes sure that the household dinnerware has all the food cleared off, is washed clean, and then wiped dry. Judah would witness their enemies overrunning their towns and villages, pillaging, plundering and looting everything they had called their own. They’d be left penniless paupers enslaved to a foreign power that had no concern for their welfare and wanted nothing to do with their God.
Does God ever judge by dropping His hedge of protection around a people? He most certainly does! Even the remarkable period of spiritual reform and revival under Manasseh’s successor king Josiah wasn’t enough to spare Judah from the consequences of her horrific sins. One wicked king’s influence brought the entire nation down (Jer. 15:4). She went down at the hands of world-dominating Babylon, and entered a long period of captivity in that pagan, godless land (2 Ki. 25). Once the Babylonian army laid siege to Jerusalem, the city was no longer recognizable. No more Temple, no more palace, not even a single home was left standing (2 Ki. 25:8-10). And the people? Carted-off to live as slaves in Babylon.
On 9/11/01 another foreign power attempted to lay siege to our homeland. Jihadist of terrorists planned to destroy, not only human lives, but some of America’s greatest landmark buildings of significance. The idea was to leave behind a totally devastated political and economic landscape. While America wasn’t annihilated, 3,000 of its citizens didn’t see another day, and it is taking years for our economy to rebound after that infamous day in 2001. Whether or not 9/11 was a direct judgment from God is known only to Him at this point in time. If it wasn’t, it was still an act of God’s mercy because we have the blood of those fifty million innocent lives on our hands, and an accounting will eventually be made for our monumental failure to protect life.
God in mercy gives individuals and nations a window of opportunity to turn from their wicked ways (Jer. 18:7-10 ; Rev. 2:21). To heed God’s call will bring spiritual, economic and social healing back to our land (2 Chron. 7:14). To ignore God’s invitation to repent will bring certain judgment (Psa. 9:17).
John R. Petrilli
Have America’s unborn children become an inconvenience? Chuck Colson believes so. In his latest work, “The Faith”, he makes the following observation: “We no longer see children as gifts from God; we see them more often as commodities, something that we are ‘entitled to’ simply because we exist. We decide to have children or not on the basis of whether they will enhance our lives. We evaluate pregnancies according to their potential to produce ‘good outcomes’.”
Has our next generation become a disposal thing? The wife of the late singer Keith Green thinks so. Some years ago Melody Green published a tract entitled, “Children …Things We Throw Away”.
As America approaches its fourth decade of waffling over the sanctity of unborn human life, it is instructive to delve into a passage of Scripture that recounts an earlier period in history when a country tragically adopted the pagan practice of child sacrifice. I believe the reader will find that these ancient practices strikingly parallel the modern day practice of aborting the unborn.
GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE SACRIFICED THEIR CHILDREN ON THE ALTAR OF IDOLATRY.
2 Ki. 21:3-4, 7-8
God appoints men over nations. In His sovereign plan a fifteen year-old by the name of Manasseh was appointed to rule over Judah. Undoing all the positive spiritual reforms of his immediate predecessor, King Hezekiah, Manasseh ran the table on wickedness. In addition to reintroducing witchcraft and occultist practices, ungodly Manasseh rebuilt the very altars to false deities that good king Hezekiah had torn down. He dedicated these wicked edifices to the pagan gods Baal and Asherah, having the audacity to erect one such idol right inside the Temple that had God’s Name on it! But his crowning sin was offering up the very lives of children to the Moabite god Molech (2 Ki. 3:27; 16:3; 21:6).
What was really going on here? Paul tells us that pagan worship of false gods is actually the worship of demons (1 Cor. 10:20). Each time the people of Judah worshipped at the altars of these false gods, they were worshipping none other than the devil himself and his minions. Before you conclude that ‘that was then and this is now’, consider this. Satan never ceases his assaults on God and us humans who are made in God’s image. He just changes tactics. Today he is successfully striking back at God by destroying the lives of unborn children. One look at a disposed, dismembered baby will convince you of the pure heinousness and cruelty that only a superhuman power of darkness could ever perpetrate. And the false gods we worship? Their names have changed also ... from Molech to the god of career … from Baal to the god of personal convenience … from Asherah to the mythical god of a “perfect baby”.
GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE SACRIFICED THEIR CHILDREN ON THE ALTAR OF VIOLENCE.
2 Ki. 21:6
Note the kind of death these ancient children suffered. It wasn’t quiet (like a natural death), it wasn’t private (like an execution), and it wasn’t painless (like a lethal injection). No, to appease these demonic gods, these parents forced their own flesh and blood to commit suicide by passing through a fiery death. Nothing these parents heard or saw could prompt them to stop the execution, not the wild screaming or the sight of their child’s body going up in flames. They just hardened their hearts and watched their innocent child die an excruciatingly painful death, a death that should have only been reserved for murderers. Unlike God, who through angelic intervention, stopped Abraham from going through with the sacrifice of Isaac, these parents did nothing. They stood by and watched their children die.
Until one has viewed a video of an abortion, seen a picture of an aborted baby or discovered the aftermath of an abortion in a waste basket or dumpster, they really have no grasp of the incredibly violent nature of abortion. The movie “Silent Scream” gave us a close-up look at a suction abortion as the baby’s mouth opens wide with tortured screams of outrageous pain as its members are torn limb from limb. Such cruelty against their offspring cannot be found in any other species except Homo sapiens. From whence does this violence come? From hearts deceived and hardened by sin, hearts that have suppressed an affection that is inborn, natural, and purely instinctive. The apostle Paul predicted the arrival of such a day, and we are living in that day (2 Tim 3:3 ;1 Tim. 4:1).
GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE SACRIFICED THEIR CHILDREN ON THE ALTAR OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS. 2 Ki. 21:9
When sin in a culture is present that’s bad enough, but when it escalates to the place where it receives the endorsement of a nation’s leaders, its days are certainly numbered. No civilization that’s embraced abortion has ever survived (when will we ever learn?!). Manasseh wasn’t content to set a bad example by sacrificing his son to idols, he convinced the entire nation to join in and kill their kids as well. Instead of upholding God’s prescribed penalty of capital punishment for child sacrifice (Lev.20:1-5), Manasseh gave the green light allowing everyone to practice it, elevating it to the level of official public policy. No one would be prosecuted for the murder of their offspring; in fact, they might even be praised by the wicked king for mimicking his horrific action.
Abortions have been around for a long time. It wasn’t until January 22, 1973 that the federal government of these United States of America declared it their public policy to not recognize the unborn as a human being, and therefore susceptible to slaughter. Until recently, thanks to decent past leaders, there was no federal funding of child killing, but now there are powerful forces at work to not only legalize but also fund this murderous industry. A first-century example of government sanctioned and supported abortion is found in the ancient Roman Empire. Colson writes, “… the Romans employed abortion and infanticide to produce more male workers” (The Faith, p. 179).
GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE SACRIFICED THEIR CHILDREN IN RECORD NUMBERS. 2 Ki. 21:9,16
History records that when King Charles took the throne of England, he turned the royal court into a brothel. It wasn’t long before the entire country adopted his profligate ways, plunging it into wholesale debauchery. The need for a nation to elect or appoint leaders with character can be seen in the incredible amount of influence they leverage. Manasseh’s led his people down the slippery slope of child sacrifice, and it ran rampant from that point on. Things got so bad that the Israelites’ sinful actions exceeded the exceedingly wicked practices of the very pagan nations whom they were to destroy and displace. An epidemic involves a significant portion of a population, but a pandemic occurs when an entire culture is inundated by something. Judah bought into child sacrifice hook, line, and sinker. The result was an unprecedented amount of bloodshed that literally filled the streets of Jerusalem across the five and one-half decades of Manasseh’s terrible reign.
According to “Carenet”, a reputable and reliable Evangelical prolife agency, 234,000 evangelical Christian women choose to abort their babies each year. I wonder what that figure would have been just 20 short years ago. Hmmm. America is fast approaching the infamous figure of fifty million. That’s how many living, heart-beating, brain-functioning unborn babies have been mercilessly offered up on the altar of convenience. As I sit here writing these figures I can’t believe such a terrible thing has happened in a nation founded on Judeo-Christian principles. But, tragically, it has. Who would have thought that a nation born out of a quest for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness would deteriorate to the point where it now subjects its youngest citizens to a vicious prenatal execution? God have mercy on us!
THE PRACTICE OF CHILD SACRIFICE AMONG GOD’S APOSTATE PEOPLE LED TO THEIR NATION’S DOWNFALL. 2 Ki. 21:12-14
When God pronounced, “Thou shalt not kill”, He meant every word. He has never taken murder lightly, and never will. There’s only so long that a nation or people can live in rank disobedience before it comes under divine judgment. God is just, and sin will always eventually be punished. The people of Judah were given a time frame in which to repent, and failed to take advantage of it. Persisting in their wicked disposal of their most precious commodity, their own children, God sent a reply in the form of upcoming cataclysmic judgment. God’s plumb line sized-up the situation, and then He rained down retribution so intense that news of it made people’s ears tingle. In today’s lingo, the story of Judah’s downfall would be “all-the-buzz”.
The Lord promised that His judgment would be complete and thorough, much like the way a housekeeper makes sure that the household dinnerware has all the food cleared off, is washed clean, and then wiped dry. Judah would witness their enemies overrunning their towns and villages, pillaging, plundering and looting everything they had called their own. They’d be left penniless paupers enslaved to a foreign power that had no concern for their welfare and wanted nothing to do with their God.
Does God ever judge by dropping His hedge of protection around a people? He most certainly does! Even the remarkable period of spiritual reform and revival under Manasseh’s successor king Josiah wasn’t enough to spare Judah from the consequences of her horrific sins. One wicked king’s influence brought the entire nation down (Jer. 15:4). She went down at the hands of world-dominating Babylon, and entered a long period of captivity in that pagan, godless land (2 Ki. 25). Once the Babylonian army laid siege to Jerusalem, the city was no longer recognizable. No more Temple, no more palace, not even a single home was left standing (2 Ki. 25:8-10). And the people? Carted-off to live as slaves in Babylon.
On 9/11/01 another foreign power attempted to lay siege to our homeland. Jihadist of terrorists planned to destroy, not only human lives, but some of America’s greatest landmark buildings of significance. The idea was to leave behind a totally devastated political and economic landscape. While America wasn’t annihilated, 3,000 of its citizens didn’t see another day, and it is taking years for our economy to rebound after that infamous day in 2001. Whether or not 9/11 was a direct judgment from God is known only to Him at this point in time. If it wasn’t, it was still an act of God’s mercy because we have the blood of those fifty million innocent lives on our hands, and an accounting will eventually be made for our monumental failure to protect life.
God in mercy gives individuals and nations a window of opportunity to turn from their wicked ways (Jer. 18:7-10 ; Rev. 2:21). To heed God’s call will bring spiritual, economic and social healing back to our land (2 Chron. 7:14). To ignore God’s invitation to repent will bring certain judgment (Psa. 9:17).
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Newsweek Reporter Witnesses an Abortion
Newsweek Reporter Witnesses an Abortion
by Kim Trobee, editor
Pro-abortion reporter, Sarah Kliff, is surprised by her reaction to witnessing an abortion. Sarah Kliff has covered abortion at Newsweek for two years. So she was surprised at the discomfort she felt when faced with the prospect of watching an abortion for a story she was doing on Nebraska late-term abortionist, LeRoy Carhart. Kliff spent four days at Carhart's Omaha clinic interviewing patients, hearing their stories and eventually viewing at least one first-trimester abortion. "There was a discomfort I hadn't expected," she said, "my emotional reaction to watching abortions. I had (and still have) difficulty understanding my own reaction, both relieved to have watched and distressed by the emotionality of the process. "It's something many in the pro-abortion camp are reticent to admit. Kliff faced odd reactions when she returned home. "Friends who supported legal abortion bristled slightly when I told them where I'd been and what I'd watched," she said. "Acquaintances at a party looked a bit regretful to have asked about my most recent assignment. "Carrie Gordon Earll, senior bioethics analyst at Focus on the Family Action, said the inner struggle is hard to ignore. "When you come face to face with the violence of what abortion really is," she said, "it can be a different story, as this reporter learned. Abortion kills children, and witnessing an abortion demands a response to that truth."Kliff acknowledged that abortion is not just another medical procedure. "Abortion involves weighty choices that, depending on how you view it," she said, "involve a life, or the potential for life." Earll said, "The finality of abortion is almost palpable and once it's done, someone has died and you cannot reverse it. That may be what the reporter experienced."
FOR MORE INFORMATION Abortion intersects with law and medicine. Learn more on the Issue Analysis page on CitizenLink.com.Read the Newsweek article.
by Kim Trobee, editor
Pro-abortion reporter, Sarah Kliff, is surprised by her reaction to witnessing an abortion. Sarah Kliff has covered abortion at Newsweek for two years. So she was surprised at the discomfort she felt when faced with the prospect of watching an abortion for a story she was doing on Nebraska late-term abortionist, LeRoy Carhart. Kliff spent four days at Carhart's Omaha clinic interviewing patients, hearing their stories and eventually viewing at least one first-trimester abortion. "There was a discomfort I hadn't expected," she said, "my emotional reaction to watching abortions. I had (and still have) difficulty understanding my own reaction, both relieved to have watched and distressed by the emotionality of the process. "It's something many in the pro-abortion camp are reticent to admit. Kliff faced odd reactions when she returned home. "Friends who supported legal abortion bristled slightly when I told them where I'd been and what I'd watched," she said. "Acquaintances at a party looked a bit regretful to have asked about my most recent assignment. "Carrie Gordon Earll, senior bioethics analyst at Focus on the Family Action, said the inner struggle is hard to ignore. "When you come face to face with the violence of what abortion really is," she said, "it can be a different story, as this reporter learned. Abortion kills children, and witnessing an abortion demands a response to that truth."Kliff acknowledged that abortion is not just another medical procedure. "Abortion involves weighty choices that, depending on how you view it," she said, "involve a life, or the potential for life." Earll said, "The finality of abortion is almost palpable and once it's done, someone has died and you cannot reverse it. That may be what the reporter experienced."
FOR MORE INFORMATION Abortion intersects with law and medicine. Learn more on the Issue Analysis page on CitizenLink.com.Read the Newsweek article.
NRLC Correct on Abortion in Obama Health Bill
FactCheck.org Says NRLC Correct on Abortion in Obama Health Bill
WASHINGTON (August 24, 2009) -- This is an update from the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) in Washington, D.C. (Federal Legislation Department). For further information regarding the effect of health care reform legislation on federal abortion policy, or to send messages to your representatives in Congress, visit the NRLC website at www.nrlactioncenter.com. You can also reach the Federal Legislation Department by e-mail at Legfederal@aol.com.
Please forward this e-mail to any appropriate lists. To support the work of NRLC in educating the public about the abortion-promoting components of the health care bills that are being pushed by President Obama, click here.
In recent weeks, NRLC has seen a wave of "factcheck" commentaries in various mainstream news media, denying that the health bills being advanced by President Obama and top Democratic congressional leaders would result in government funding of abortion. Some of these articles assert that government funding of abortion would be prevented by a federal law called the "Hyde Amendment," some assert that it would be prevented by an amendment adopted in a House committee called the Capps Amendment, and some assert that President Obama himself has said that he agrees with a "tradition" that the government should not fund abortions. Regrettably, all three of those assertions are demonstrably false.
On August 19, 2009, President Obama himself said that it is “not true” and a "fabrication” to say that his health plan will “mean government funding of abortion.” NRLC immediately challenged Obama's statement in a press release, in which NRLC Legislative Director Douglas Johnson said, "President Obama today brazenly misrepresented the abortion-related component of the health care legislation that his congressional allies and staff have crafted. . . . the bill backed by the White House (H.R. 3200) explicitly authorizes the government plan to cover all elective abortions."
In response to the Obama-NRLC exchange, the independent FactCheck.org, affiliated with the Annenberg Public Policy Center, examined the issue. On August 21, FactCheck.org issued its analysis, written by FactCheck.org Director Brooks Jackson, titled, "Abortion: Which Side is Fabricating?" We quote here briefly from FactCheck.org's conclusions:
“. . . it’s likely that any new federal insurance plan would cover abortion unless Congress expressly prohibits that. Low- and moderate-income persons who would choose the ‘public plan’ would qualify for federal subsidies to purchase it. Private plans that cover abortion also could be purchased with the help of federal subsidies. Therefore, we judge that the president goes too far when he calls the statements that government would be funding abortions ‘fabrications.’ . . . The NRLC’s Johnson said ‘the bill backed by the White House (H.R. 3200) explicitly authorizes the government plan to cover all elective abortions.’ And our analysis shows that Johnson’s statement is correct.”
NRLC is in general agreement with the FactCheck.org analysis, except we think that FactCheck.org is in error in the way it uses the term "public funds." The House bill backed by the White House contains language (the Capps Amendment) that explicitly authorizes the federal agency that administers the "public option" to collect an additional amount of premium funds specifically to cover the costs of elective abortions, and no one would be allowed to enroll in the "public option" without paying this abortion surcharge. NRLC asserts that once the government collects these funds, they are "public funds" (or "federal funds"), and when the government uses these funds to write payment checks to abortionists, that is government funding of abortion.
The complete FactCheck.org appears below. Copyright 2009 by FactCheck.org. Reproduced in accord with the terms of the FactCheck.org copyright policy. Original URL:
http://www.factcheck.org/2009/ 08/abortion-which-side-is- fabricating/
WASHINGTON (August 24, 2009) -- This is an update from the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) in Washington, D.C. (Federal Legislation Department). For further information regarding the effect of health care reform legislation on federal abortion policy, or to send messages to your representatives in Congress, visit the NRLC website at www.nrlactioncenter.com. You can also reach the Federal Legislation Department by e-mail at Legfederal@aol.com.
Please forward this e-mail to any appropriate lists. To support the work of NRLC in educating the public about the abortion-promoting components of the health care bills that are being pushed by President Obama, click here.
In recent weeks, NRLC has seen a wave of "factcheck" commentaries in various mainstream news media, denying that the health bills being advanced by President Obama and top Democratic congressional leaders would result in government funding of abortion. Some of these articles assert that government funding of abortion would be prevented by a federal law called the "Hyde Amendment," some assert that it would be prevented by an amendment adopted in a House committee called the Capps Amendment, and some assert that President Obama himself has said that he agrees with a "tradition" that the government should not fund abortions. Regrettably, all three of those assertions are demonstrably false.
On August 19, 2009, President Obama himself said that it is “not true” and a "fabrication” to say that his health plan will “mean government funding of abortion.” NRLC immediately challenged Obama's statement in a press release, in which NRLC Legislative Director Douglas Johnson said, "President Obama today brazenly misrepresented the abortion-related component of the health care legislation that his congressional allies and staff have crafted. . . . the bill backed by the White House (H.R. 3200) explicitly authorizes the government plan to cover all elective abortions."
In response to the Obama-NRLC exchange, the independent FactCheck.org, affiliated with the Annenberg Public Policy Center, examined the issue. On August 21, FactCheck.org issued its analysis, written by FactCheck.org Director Brooks Jackson, titled, "Abortion: Which Side is Fabricating?" We quote here briefly from FactCheck.org's conclusions:
“. . . it’s likely that any new federal insurance plan would cover abortion unless Congress expressly prohibits that. Low- and moderate-income persons who would choose the ‘public plan’ would qualify for federal subsidies to purchase it. Private plans that cover abortion also could be purchased with the help of federal subsidies. Therefore, we judge that the president goes too far when he calls the statements that government would be funding abortions ‘fabrications.’ . . . The NRLC’s Johnson said ‘the bill backed by the White House (H.R. 3200) explicitly authorizes the government plan to cover all elective abortions.’ And our analysis shows that Johnson’s statement is correct.”
NRLC is in general agreement with the FactCheck.org analysis, except we think that FactCheck.org is in error in the way it uses the term "public funds." The House bill backed by the White House contains language (the Capps Amendment) that explicitly authorizes the federal agency that administers the "public option" to collect an additional amount of premium funds specifically to cover the costs of elective abortions, and no one would be allowed to enroll in the "public option" without paying this abortion surcharge. NRLC asserts that once the government collects these funds, they are "public funds" (or "federal funds"), and when the government uses these funds to write payment checks to abortionists, that is government funding of abortion.
The complete FactCheck.org appears below. Copyright 2009 by FactCheck.org. Reproduced in accord with the terms of the FactCheck.org copyright policy. Original URL:
http://www.factcheck.org/2009/ 08/abortion-which-side-is- fabricating/
Are Christians Becoming An Endangered Species?
Are Christians Becoming An Endangered Species?
John R. Petrilli
By definition, an endangered species is a population of an organism which is at risk of becoming extinct because it is either few in numbers or it is threatened by changing environmental or predatory parameters. Currently 1,556 known species in the world have been identified as endangered, or near extinction, and are under protection by government law. The World Conservation Union (IUCN) has calculated the percentage of endangered species to be forty percent of all organisms based on samples evaluated through 2006. The IUCN Red List uses the term “endangered species” as a specific category of imperilment, and includes the following categories: Extinct, Extinct in the wild, Critically endangered, Endangered, and Vulnerable. At the international level, 190 countries have signed an accord agreeing to create Biodiversity Action Plans to protect endangered and other threatened species.
While our God-given mandate to care for creation surely includes the preservation of all species, there’s one species left off of the list of endangered species that should be cause for concern. That species would be the human species, and, more specifically, the Christian. Statistics argue this case quite convincingly, with the last century seeing more martyrs for the faith than in all previous centuries combined. Whether it’s ethnic cleansing, tribal warfare, or rank political intolerance, the church of Jesus Christ is experiencing record numbers of attrition. This situation is conveniently ignored by network news services, resulting in a state of near ignorance in the church in America.
But none of these developments need take us by surprise. Jesus assured His faithful followers that, as surely as the world hated Him, it would likewise hate them as well (John 15:18-21), and that such hatred could escalate all the way up to execution (John 16:1-4). But with that elevated level of opposition the Lord also promises special grace to overcome (John 16:33). Paul, too, warned any would be follower of Christ that persecution was part and parcel of the territory that came with being a Christian (Acts 14:22 ; Phil.1:29 ; 2 Tim. 3:12 ; 1 Thess. 3:2-4).
Paul knew what he was talking about. In a most revealing autobiographical sketch, he ticks off a long list of dangers he fell into as a Christian evangelist. In addition to death and deprivation, Paul faced the dangers of multiple imprisonments, countless beatings within an inch of his life, overexposure to the elements, drowning, traveling dangers, nautical dangers, terrestrial dangers, cosmopolitan dangers, rural dangers, and betrayals by disingenuous “brothers” in the Lord (2 Cor. 11:23-27). If anyone ever qualified for instant induction into God’s Hardship Hall Of Fame, it would have to be Paul. This guy’s life was one of constant danger and suspense. Almost a sort of Christian James Bond, Paul always seemed to be ducking death and dodging potential assassins. His life was anything thing but a “Cakewalk Christianity”. One commentator has wryly noted, “Wherever polite modern Christians meet, they throw a tea party; wherever Paul went they had a riot!” To keep this essay practical, I’ve decided to focus on the ways that we can cope with and get the most out of the days of opposition and potential danger that loom on the spiritual horizon. For help in this regard I can’t think of a better source than the apostle Peter. Writing to dispersed Christians who were really under the gun and on the run, Peter’s words gave the comfort, wisdom, perspective, and hope they needed to keep on keeping on. If you are about to toss this article because it doesn’t relate to you right now, please consider tucking it away for the rainy day that New Testament prophecy indicates is in the spiritual forecast.
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY SOBER! 1 Pet. 1:13-16
“Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy’.”
The first thing to go when under intense and prolonged persecution is one’s perspective. The first temptation isn’t to outright deny the Lord, but rather, to question whether the fight is winnable or even worth it. Prison camp officials understand the key role that right mentality plays in inmate survival, and do their best to warp the captive’s thought processes. They also attack the heart of the prisoner by demoralizing them, hoping to create emotional instability that will lead to a psychological breakdown. All this is done to wear down the detainee’s defenses, “crack” their minds and break their wills. Our spiritual enemy utilizes the same tactics, with deception and discouragement being two of his most effective tools. Aware of this, Peter urges his charges to think straight, maintain mental clarity, and pursue heart purity. Such defensive measures will shore up the soul against the darts of evil that will inevitably fly in their direction.
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY FAITHFUL! 1 Pet. 2:20
“If you suffer for doing good and endure it, this is commendable before God.”
It’s one thing to get what’s coming to us when we’ve blown it. But when we are punished for doing what’s right, this can become really confusing. It’s then that we need to realize that persecution never obeys the laws of logic. At its core, it’s a deranged mind using twisted tactics to accomplish evil outcomes. As such, we can’t expect the actions of our tormentors to make sense. In such a spiritual climate of chaotic conundrum, we need to hunker-down for the long haul, deciding at the outset to stick it out to the bitter end.
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY CHRISTLIKE! 1 Pet. 2:21-23
“To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in His steps. He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in His mouth. When they hurled their insults at Him, He did not retaliate; when he suffered, He made no threats. Instead, He entrusted Himself to Him Who judges justly.”
In the past few decades educators have discovered that different people have different learning styles. As it turns out, some learn best by actually doing the task. Employers have incorporated this methodology into their training of new hires. They place them alongside a seasoned worker to allow them to learn by example. This seems to be the approach Peter takes in helping his charges cope with persecution. He points them to Jesus Himself as their example. Jesus suffered with purity (“He committed no sin”), He suffered with honesty (“there was no deceit found in His mouth”), He suffered with forgiveness (“He did not retaliate”), and He suffered with faith (“He committed Himself to Him [the Father] Who judges righteously”). The writer to the Hebrews picks up on this same theme, citing Jesus’ incredible endurance in the face of the most intense suffering at the hands of men, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus … Who endured the Cross … Who endured such opposition from sinful men … in your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood” (Hebrews 12:2-4) .
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY EVANGELISTIC! 1 Pet. 3:13-16
“But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.”
Evangelistic? In the middle of getting our heads chopped of we’re to be evangelistic? Believe it or not, those times when we’re under the gun of persecution may be the most golden opportunities we’ll ever have to show what our faith is really made of. Peter says that our calm conduct will speak to the hearts of those hammering us, and some may wonder how we can respond in such a way. It’s then that we have a teachable moment of powerful witness. It’s then that we can explain the source of our hope and peace. It’s then that we, as objects of man’s rage and violence, can speak of the hope of our salvation with the greatest clarity and power. Who was the very last person Jesus led into the kingdom? Was it not a dying thief who saw Jesus’ composure on the cross? Who was the last person who confessed Jesus’ deity? Was it not a Roman soldier who witnessed the dignity with which the savior died? With all the clever and helpful tools we have for outreach, let’s never underestimate the tool of suffering. God uses it to win hearts like no other means.
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY JOYFUL! 1 Pet. 4:12-16
“Rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any other kind of criminal, or even as a meddler. However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name.”
Picking up on Jesus’ heads-up that His followers would be targeted for abuse just as He was, Peter states that we should not be surprised when persecution comes. Indeed, some of his readers were headed for intense “fiery” trials for their faith. But instead of retaliation or resistance, Peter recommends that they rejoice! His reasoning is that our participation in the sufferings of Christ also guarantees our share in the glories that are promised to those who endure. Peter speaks from real life experience, for according to Luke, it was he and his fellow apostles who celebrated their unjust detainment and whipping as opportunities to be counted worthy to be publicly disgraced for the Name of Jesus (Acts 5:41).
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY HOPEFUL! 1 Pet. 5:6-10
“Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.”
In our recent presidential election the entire story of John McCain’s capture, incarceration, and torture by the Viet Cong came to light. How he endured over four years of such abuse is beyond me. Ask any prisoner of war who his worst enemy was, and he’ll tell you it was himself. Survival in prisoner of war camps depend largely on one’s ability to keep his head. If they hold on to the hope of release, they can survive just about anything. Peter understood the power resident in hope. He knew that as he shifted the focus of suffering believers from the present trails to their future reward they would find superhuman strength to endure. Reminding them to remain humble (6), he encourages them to stay in touch with God in prayer (7). He urges them to remain spiritually alert (8). He tells them to stand firm in faith (9a). He explains that they’re not alone in suffering for Christ (9b), and assures them that there will come a day and time when all their nightmares will be over (10). Until then their victory would be found in their ability to focus on the hope they had in Jesus Christ and the future glory they’d share with Him.
The next time God calls you to stand up for Him and His Son, don’t sweat it. He’s in complete control, even in times of intense persecution. God promises special grace to those who find themselves in the throes of enemy opposition. We’re to stay cool, we’re to stay collected, and above all, we’re to stay focused on our victorious Savior!
John R. Petrilli
By definition, an endangered species is a population of an organism which is at risk of becoming extinct because it is either few in numbers or it is threatened by changing environmental or predatory parameters. Currently 1,556 known species in the world have been identified as endangered, or near extinction, and are under protection by government law. The World Conservation Union (IUCN) has calculated the percentage of endangered species to be forty percent of all organisms based on samples evaluated through 2006. The IUCN Red List uses the term “endangered species” as a specific category of imperilment, and includes the following categories: Extinct, Extinct in the wild, Critically endangered, Endangered, and Vulnerable. At the international level, 190 countries have signed an accord agreeing to create Biodiversity Action Plans to protect endangered and other threatened species.
While our God-given mandate to care for creation surely includes the preservation of all species, there’s one species left off of the list of endangered species that should be cause for concern. That species would be the human species, and, more specifically, the Christian. Statistics argue this case quite convincingly, with the last century seeing more martyrs for the faith than in all previous centuries combined. Whether it’s ethnic cleansing, tribal warfare, or rank political intolerance, the church of Jesus Christ is experiencing record numbers of attrition. This situation is conveniently ignored by network news services, resulting in a state of near ignorance in the church in America.
But none of these developments need take us by surprise. Jesus assured His faithful followers that, as surely as the world hated Him, it would likewise hate them as well (John 15:18-21), and that such hatred could escalate all the way up to execution (John 16:1-4). But with that elevated level of opposition the Lord also promises special grace to overcome (John 16:33). Paul, too, warned any would be follower of Christ that persecution was part and parcel of the territory that came with being a Christian (Acts 14:22 ; Phil.1:29 ; 2 Tim. 3:12 ; 1 Thess. 3:2-4).
Paul knew what he was talking about. In a most revealing autobiographical sketch, he ticks off a long list of dangers he fell into as a Christian evangelist. In addition to death and deprivation, Paul faced the dangers of multiple imprisonments, countless beatings within an inch of his life, overexposure to the elements, drowning, traveling dangers, nautical dangers, terrestrial dangers, cosmopolitan dangers, rural dangers, and betrayals by disingenuous “brothers” in the Lord (2 Cor. 11:23-27). If anyone ever qualified for instant induction into God’s Hardship Hall Of Fame, it would have to be Paul. This guy’s life was one of constant danger and suspense. Almost a sort of Christian James Bond, Paul always seemed to be ducking death and dodging potential assassins. His life was anything thing but a “Cakewalk Christianity”. One commentator has wryly noted, “Wherever polite modern Christians meet, they throw a tea party; wherever Paul went they had a riot!” To keep this essay practical, I’ve decided to focus on the ways that we can cope with and get the most out of the days of opposition and potential danger that loom on the spiritual horizon. For help in this regard I can’t think of a better source than the apostle Peter. Writing to dispersed Christians who were really under the gun and on the run, Peter’s words gave the comfort, wisdom, perspective, and hope they needed to keep on keeping on. If you are about to toss this article because it doesn’t relate to you right now, please consider tucking it away for the rainy day that New Testament prophecy indicates is in the spiritual forecast.
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY SOBER! 1 Pet. 1:13-16
“Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy’.”
The first thing to go when under intense and prolonged persecution is one’s perspective. The first temptation isn’t to outright deny the Lord, but rather, to question whether the fight is winnable or even worth it. Prison camp officials understand the key role that right mentality plays in inmate survival, and do their best to warp the captive’s thought processes. They also attack the heart of the prisoner by demoralizing them, hoping to create emotional instability that will lead to a psychological breakdown. All this is done to wear down the detainee’s defenses, “crack” their minds and break their wills. Our spiritual enemy utilizes the same tactics, with deception and discouragement being two of his most effective tools. Aware of this, Peter urges his charges to think straight, maintain mental clarity, and pursue heart purity. Such defensive measures will shore up the soul against the darts of evil that will inevitably fly in their direction.
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY FAITHFUL! 1 Pet. 2:20
“If you suffer for doing good and endure it, this is commendable before God.”
It’s one thing to get what’s coming to us when we’ve blown it. But when we are punished for doing what’s right, this can become really confusing. It’s then that we need to realize that persecution never obeys the laws of logic. At its core, it’s a deranged mind using twisted tactics to accomplish evil outcomes. As such, we can’t expect the actions of our tormentors to make sense. In such a spiritual climate of chaotic conundrum, we need to hunker-down for the long haul, deciding at the outset to stick it out to the bitter end.
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY CHRISTLIKE! 1 Pet. 2:21-23
“To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in His steps. He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in His mouth. When they hurled their insults at Him, He did not retaliate; when he suffered, He made no threats. Instead, He entrusted Himself to Him Who judges justly.”
In the past few decades educators have discovered that different people have different learning styles. As it turns out, some learn best by actually doing the task. Employers have incorporated this methodology into their training of new hires. They place them alongside a seasoned worker to allow them to learn by example. This seems to be the approach Peter takes in helping his charges cope with persecution. He points them to Jesus Himself as their example. Jesus suffered with purity (“He committed no sin”), He suffered with honesty (“there was no deceit found in His mouth”), He suffered with forgiveness (“He did not retaliate”), and He suffered with faith (“He committed Himself to Him [the Father] Who judges righteously”). The writer to the Hebrews picks up on this same theme, citing Jesus’ incredible endurance in the face of the most intense suffering at the hands of men, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus … Who endured the Cross … Who endured such opposition from sinful men … in your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood” (Hebrews 12:2-4) .
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY EVANGELISTIC! 1 Pet. 3:13-16
“But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.”
Evangelistic? In the middle of getting our heads chopped of we’re to be evangelistic? Believe it or not, those times when we’re under the gun of persecution may be the most golden opportunities we’ll ever have to show what our faith is really made of. Peter says that our calm conduct will speak to the hearts of those hammering us, and some may wonder how we can respond in such a way. It’s then that we have a teachable moment of powerful witness. It’s then that we can explain the source of our hope and peace. It’s then that we, as objects of man’s rage and violence, can speak of the hope of our salvation with the greatest clarity and power. Who was the very last person Jesus led into the kingdom? Was it not a dying thief who saw Jesus’ composure on the cross? Who was the last person who confessed Jesus’ deity? Was it not a Roman soldier who witnessed the dignity with which the savior died? With all the clever and helpful tools we have for outreach, let’s never underestimate the tool of suffering. God uses it to win hearts like no other means.
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY JOYFUL! 1 Pet. 4:12-16
“Rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any other kind of criminal, or even as a meddler. However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name.”
Picking up on Jesus’ heads-up that His followers would be targeted for abuse just as He was, Peter states that we should not be surprised when persecution comes. Indeed, some of his readers were headed for intense “fiery” trials for their faith. But instead of retaliation or resistance, Peter recommends that they rejoice! His reasoning is that our participation in the sufferings of Christ also guarantees our share in the glories that are promised to those who endure. Peter speaks from real life experience, for according to Luke, it was he and his fellow apostles who celebrated their unjust detainment and whipping as opportunities to be counted worthy to be publicly disgraced for the Name of Jesus (Acts 5:41).
PETER ENCOURAGES SUFFERING BELIEVERS TO STAY HOPEFUL! 1 Pet. 5:6-10
“Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.”
In our recent presidential election the entire story of John McCain’s capture, incarceration, and torture by the Viet Cong came to light. How he endured over four years of such abuse is beyond me. Ask any prisoner of war who his worst enemy was, and he’ll tell you it was himself. Survival in prisoner of war camps depend largely on one’s ability to keep his head. If they hold on to the hope of release, they can survive just about anything. Peter understood the power resident in hope. He knew that as he shifted the focus of suffering believers from the present trails to their future reward they would find superhuman strength to endure. Reminding them to remain humble (6), he encourages them to stay in touch with God in prayer (7). He urges them to remain spiritually alert (8). He tells them to stand firm in faith (9a). He explains that they’re not alone in suffering for Christ (9b), and assures them that there will come a day and time when all their nightmares will be over (10). Until then their victory would be found in their ability to focus on the hope they had in Jesus Christ and the future glory they’d share with Him.
The next time God calls you to stand up for Him and His Son, don’t sweat it. He’s in complete control, even in times of intense persecution. God promises special grace to those who find themselves in the throes of enemy opposition. We’re to stay cool, we’re to stay collected, and above all, we’re to stay focused on our victorious Savior!
Have It Your Way?
Have It Your Way?
John R. Petrilli
Sammy Davis Jr. enjoyed a long and stellar career as a vocalist. One of his most famous tunes was titled, “I Did It MY Way”. The song is essentially a declaration of self-made success. McDonald’s Hamburgers joined the bandwagon with their slogan, “Have it YOUR way”! So much of our culture is built upon the premise that we deserve to get what we want, when we want it, and the way we want it. While there’s nothing inherently evil about achievement, there’s a small distance between achieving a goal and allowing that goal to become an idol. Or even worse, becoming deceived into believing that you are the solution to all your problems. These are traits of what one might call man-made religion. The Scriptures are replete with examples of men and women who thought they could attain eternal life on their own terms instead of God’s. Here are just a few examples of folks who tried and continue to try to get to Heaven by doing it their way.
SOME ATTEMPT TO REACH HEAVEN THROUGH THEIR OWN WAY OF SELF-DEIFICATION. Gen. 3:1-4
“ ‘You will not surely die’ the serpent said to the woman. ‘For God knows that when you eat of it [the God-forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil] your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil’ ”.
Hear the snake snarling out his lies. “Oh Eve, you’re so beautiful, so clever, so resourceful! You don’t need any god to make it to the top. After all, YOU are god! All you need to do is open your eyes to who you really are and it’ll all be yours!” She bought the lie, persuaded Adam to join her, and they both fell from their standing of favor with God. The serpent is the all-time pro at self-deification, for that’s how he approached God in eternity past, declaring that he would “will” his way into being god (Isaiah 14:13-14). Self-deification worked in the garden and is still surprisingly effective today. It jettison’s our accountability for our sins and makes us masters of our own universe. If it were only true!
OTHERS TRY TO SECURE SAVING FAVOR WITH GOD THROUGH THEIR OWN WAY OF SELF-MADE RELIGION. Gen. 4:2-7
“Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil … the Lord did not look favorably on Cain’s offering.”
The fall led to the establishment of a sacrificial system of atonement. God had shed the blood of animals in order to clothe His fallen humans (Gen. 3:21). Knowing full well what God had prescribed as an acceptable sacrifice, Cain conveniently ignores this and boldly presents his own version of a non-blood, vegetable or grain offering. Such audacity met with God’s immediate rejection, sending the arrogant Cain into an unchecked fury that left his own brother dead in the fields. Cain did it his way, and the results were nothing short of disastrous.
This approach of manufacturing one’s own type of sacrificial system has been and continues to be repeated around the globe, none of which meets God’s approval or enjoys God’s favor.
SOME SEEK TO ATTAIN PERFECTION THROUGH THEIR OWN WAY OF SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS. Romans 9:31-32
“Israel pursued a law of righteousness but has not attained it, because they pursued it as if it were by works.”
A quick review of the basic tenets of most world religions will reveal good works as the way to heaven, nirvana, or reincarnated perfection. This approach is nothing more than a remix of Cain’s sin of substituting his way for God’s way. With self-righteousness the attraction is very strong because it appeals to human pride. By nature we buy quickly into a system that puts us in the driver’s seat, and that’s what self-righteousness does. It’s all up to us. If we do this or we do that, we can control our own spiritual destiny. If there is a god in this system, he’s laissez fare at best and absentee at worst. If our good deeds outnumber our bad ones, we’re in. The major difficulty with this system is its complete failure to address the real problem of human depravity. According to God, we have a basic nature that is unable to do anything truly good in a redemptive sense. We’re hopelessly crippled by sin, and don’t have the capacity to do a single thing to atone for our sins or save ourselves. The ancient Jews thought this was the way to God and failed (Romans 9:31-32). Likewise, the apostle Paul tried this approach and found it wanting (Philippians 3:3-9). Worst of all, if someone erroneously believes they’ve “arrived” through good works of their own, they can brag about their achievement, robbing God of all the glory He alone deserves for the salvation process (Ephesians 2:8-9). Legalism is probably responsible for sending more people to hell than any one other belief system (Colossians 2:20-22).
MILLIONS THINK THEY CAN DO IT THEIR WAY BY FOLLOWING THE POPULAR PATH OF SELF-IMPROVEMENT.
“It is not within man to understand himself” (Provrebs .
The bookstore shelves are jammed with the latest “do-it-yourself” religions, self-help titles that promise you heaven with just a little bit of personal effort. Adherents to this system believe that if they can accomplish incremental steps of self-improvement, they’ll be well on their way to attaining personal self-actualization and complete fulfillment. Such a methodology is doomed from the very start, as it expects and requires something that’s irreparably broken to fix itself. Not only can we not fix ourselves, we don’t even have the ability to diagnose our problem!
STILL OTHERS BELIEVE THEIR OWN WAY OF PHILOSOPHY WILL GET THEM BY. Colossians 2:8
“See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.”
The names are memorialized by history. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hume, Nietzsche. The list goes on and on of individuals who set forth what they believed to be the truth about life, and in some cases the afterlife.
Paul describes these systems as empty and deceptive. That’s because they are born out of human source and lack any divine authority or credibility. Sinful men cannot possibly come up with the perfect system of belief because they are flawed themselves. Only God can declare what is truth and what is error. And only God can
accurately diagnose the human condition and prescribe the proper cure. The runaway prophet shuts down all such vain pursuits by categorically stating that, “Salvation is of the Lord” (Jonah 2:9).
MANY SEEK ETERNAL LIFE THROUGH THEIR OWN WAY OF SELF-ABASEMENT. Colossians 2:23b
“Such practices have the outward appearance that popularly passes for wisdom, in promoting self-imposed rigor of devotion and delight in self-humiliation and severity of discipline of the body, but they are of no value in checking the indulgence of [humanity’s] lower nature.”
A close sister to self-righteousness is the practice of self-abasement, also known as asceticism. Here the individual tries to work off his sinful deeds by denying himself the comforts and pleasures of this life. But again, the focus is on the person’s deeds, not on the saving grace of God via the cross of Jesus Christ. Some people crawl up stairs covered with glass; others sleep on beds of pins; others have themselves severely beaten with bamboo rods. All these practices place the focus on something one can do to atone for their sins, and all fail miserably at attaining such atonement.
THE WISE PERSON UNDERSTANDS AND ACCEPTS GOD’S WAY OF SALVATION.
We’ve taken a bird’s eye view of the prevailing ideas that man holds to about the way to everlasting life. The one common thread running through each is that of self-determination. Each one features self effort of some kind to get where they want to go. Man’s way is the way of self-ism. But God says that way never has worked, never can work, and never will work. He calls man’s way of salvation a pathway to death (Proverbs 14:12). God pictures those who follow after their own ways as lost sheep (Isaiah 53:6). Jesus warned that following the crowd down their chosen road of selfishness only ends in destruction (Matthew 7:13-14). And He graciously points us to the right pathway to heaven … the cross. Jesus clearly defines that pathway as being through Him, through what HE did for us, not through anything we could ever do for ourselves (John 14:6)! In light of this, we are called upon to dump our own self-invented concepts of salvation, and got on board God’s way (Isaiah 55:7). Then and only then can we see the forest for the trees, and choose correctly.
John R. Petrilli
Sammy Davis Jr. enjoyed a long and stellar career as a vocalist. One of his most famous tunes was titled, “I Did It MY Way”. The song is essentially a declaration of self-made success. McDonald’s Hamburgers joined the bandwagon with their slogan, “Have it YOUR way”! So much of our culture is built upon the premise that we deserve to get what we want, when we want it, and the way we want it. While there’s nothing inherently evil about achievement, there’s a small distance between achieving a goal and allowing that goal to become an idol. Or even worse, becoming deceived into believing that you are the solution to all your problems. These are traits of what one might call man-made religion. The Scriptures are replete with examples of men and women who thought they could attain eternal life on their own terms instead of God’s. Here are just a few examples of folks who tried and continue to try to get to Heaven by doing it their way.
SOME ATTEMPT TO REACH HEAVEN THROUGH THEIR OWN WAY OF SELF-DEIFICATION. Gen. 3:1-4
“ ‘You will not surely die’ the serpent said to the woman. ‘For God knows that when you eat of it [the God-forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil] your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil’ ”.
Hear the snake snarling out his lies. “Oh Eve, you’re so beautiful, so clever, so resourceful! You don’t need any god to make it to the top. After all, YOU are god! All you need to do is open your eyes to who you really are and it’ll all be yours!” She bought the lie, persuaded Adam to join her, and they both fell from their standing of favor with God. The serpent is the all-time pro at self-deification, for that’s how he approached God in eternity past, declaring that he would “will” his way into being god (Isaiah 14:13-14). Self-deification worked in the garden and is still surprisingly effective today. It jettison’s our accountability for our sins and makes us masters of our own universe. If it were only true!
OTHERS TRY TO SECURE SAVING FAVOR WITH GOD THROUGH THEIR OWN WAY OF SELF-MADE RELIGION. Gen. 4:2-7
“Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil … the Lord did not look favorably on Cain’s offering.”
The fall led to the establishment of a sacrificial system of atonement. God had shed the blood of animals in order to clothe His fallen humans (Gen. 3:21). Knowing full well what God had prescribed as an acceptable sacrifice, Cain conveniently ignores this and boldly presents his own version of a non-blood, vegetable or grain offering. Such audacity met with God’s immediate rejection, sending the arrogant Cain into an unchecked fury that left his own brother dead in the fields. Cain did it his way, and the results were nothing short of disastrous.
This approach of manufacturing one’s own type of sacrificial system has been and continues to be repeated around the globe, none of which meets God’s approval or enjoys God’s favor.
SOME SEEK TO ATTAIN PERFECTION THROUGH THEIR OWN WAY OF SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS. Romans 9:31-32
“Israel pursued a law of righteousness but has not attained it, because they pursued it as if it were by works.”
A quick review of the basic tenets of most world religions will reveal good works as the way to heaven, nirvana, or reincarnated perfection. This approach is nothing more than a remix of Cain’s sin of substituting his way for God’s way. With self-righteousness the attraction is very strong because it appeals to human pride. By nature we buy quickly into a system that puts us in the driver’s seat, and that’s what self-righteousness does. It’s all up to us. If we do this or we do that, we can control our own spiritual destiny. If there is a god in this system, he’s laissez fare at best and absentee at worst. If our good deeds outnumber our bad ones, we’re in. The major difficulty with this system is its complete failure to address the real problem of human depravity. According to God, we have a basic nature that is unable to do anything truly good in a redemptive sense. We’re hopelessly crippled by sin, and don’t have the capacity to do a single thing to atone for our sins or save ourselves. The ancient Jews thought this was the way to God and failed (Romans 9:31-32). Likewise, the apostle Paul tried this approach and found it wanting (Philippians 3:3-9). Worst of all, if someone erroneously believes they’ve “arrived” through good works of their own, they can brag about their achievement, robbing God of all the glory He alone deserves for the salvation process (Ephesians 2:8-9). Legalism is probably responsible for sending more people to hell than any one other belief system (Colossians 2:20-22).
MILLIONS THINK THEY CAN DO IT THEIR WAY BY FOLLOWING THE POPULAR PATH OF SELF-IMPROVEMENT.
“It is not within man to understand himself” (Provrebs .
The bookstore shelves are jammed with the latest “do-it-yourself” religions, self-help titles that promise you heaven with just a little bit of personal effort. Adherents to this system believe that if they can accomplish incremental steps of self-improvement, they’ll be well on their way to attaining personal self-actualization and complete fulfillment. Such a methodology is doomed from the very start, as it expects and requires something that’s irreparably broken to fix itself. Not only can we not fix ourselves, we don’t even have the ability to diagnose our problem!
STILL OTHERS BELIEVE THEIR OWN WAY OF PHILOSOPHY WILL GET THEM BY. Colossians 2:8
“See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.”
The names are memorialized by history. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hume, Nietzsche. The list goes on and on of individuals who set forth what they believed to be the truth about life, and in some cases the afterlife.
Paul describes these systems as empty and deceptive. That’s because they are born out of human source and lack any divine authority or credibility. Sinful men cannot possibly come up with the perfect system of belief because they are flawed themselves. Only God can declare what is truth and what is error. And only God can
accurately diagnose the human condition and prescribe the proper cure. The runaway prophet shuts down all such vain pursuits by categorically stating that, “Salvation is of the Lord” (Jonah 2:9).
MANY SEEK ETERNAL LIFE THROUGH THEIR OWN WAY OF SELF-ABASEMENT. Colossians 2:23b
“Such practices have the outward appearance that popularly passes for wisdom, in promoting self-imposed rigor of devotion and delight in self-humiliation and severity of discipline of the body, but they are of no value in checking the indulgence of [humanity’s] lower nature.”
A close sister to self-righteousness is the practice of self-abasement, also known as asceticism. Here the individual tries to work off his sinful deeds by denying himself the comforts and pleasures of this life. But again, the focus is on the person’s deeds, not on the saving grace of God via the cross of Jesus Christ. Some people crawl up stairs covered with glass; others sleep on beds of pins; others have themselves severely beaten with bamboo rods. All these practices place the focus on something one can do to atone for their sins, and all fail miserably at attaining such atonement.
THE WISE PERSON UNDERSTANDS AND ACCEPTS GOD’S WAY OF SALVATION.
We’ve taken a bird’s eye view of the prevailing ideas that man holds to about the way to everlasting life. The one common thread running through each is that of self-determination. Each one features self effort of some kind to get where they want to go. Man’s way is the way of self-ism. But God says that way never has worked, never can work, and never will work. He calls man’s way of salvation a pathway to death (Proverbs 14:12). God pictures those who follow after their own ways as lost sheep (Isaiah 53:6). Jesus warned that following the crowd down their chosen road of selfishness only ends in destruction (Matthew 7:13-14). And He graciously points us to the right pathway to heaven … the cross. Jesus clearly defines that pathway as being through Him, through what HE did for us, not through anything we could ever do for ourselves (John 14:6)! In light of this, we are called upon to dump our own self-invented concepts of salvation, and got on board God’s way (Isaiah 55:7). Then and only then can we see the forest for the trees, and choose correctly.
God’s Love
God’s Love
GOD’S LOVE IS GLOBAL John 3:16
We live in a very well-connected world. What goes on in Africa is known instantly in America. What transpires in India gets out to Asia in a jiffy. News coming out of Europe makes international headlines overnight. Events in the Middle East find their way into the morning papers around the world.
This is a big world we live in, and it has a lot going on. Sometimes we feel overwhelmed by it all. It can become a bit too much to take in all at once. While we may get overwhelmed sometimes, the good news is that God never does. He can handle all the problems and situations no matter how big or widespread they are. This is because we serve a global God.
In the third chapter of John’s gospel we discover that God not only has a global concern, but that He also has a global love. John gives us a picture that almost looks like God is embracing the world, warts and all, into His everlasting arms. And this love He has for our world is not casual at all. It’s intense. For God “SO” loved the world. It’s also an active love, not a passive love. God’s love caused Him to take action. That action was to send His only Son into our world so that we can be saved through faith in Him.
GOD’S LOVE IS COLOR BLIND Matthew 28:19-20 ; Rev. 5:9
People and cultures the world over are rediscovering the role and contribution that disabled people can play in their societies. More and more we’re realizing the value that each and every person has, regardless of any physical, mental, emotional or social challenges they are born with or suffer from. If I were to ask you if God had a disability, what would your answer be? Believe it or not, God does have a “disability”. You see, God is color blind. When we look at each other, we take note of the racial differences as indicated by the color and tone of our skin. But when God looks at each if us, He focuses on what’s inside in our hearts, not on our outward appearance.
He doesn’t look down from heaven and say, “Oh look over there, there’s John the American”, or “Oh, I remember you, you’re Suresh the man from India”. No, God sees us from the inside out. He cares about who we are, not what we look like.
But this is not to say that God isn’t into diversity. Just look around us and see all the different colors and personality types He’s made. Someone has said, “If you want to know if God has a sense of humor, go and visit your local zoo, and look at all the comical shapes, sizes and features of the animals there”.
GOD’S LOVE IS PERSONAL Galatians 2:20 ; Romans 10:19
I happen to be a lover of astronomy. There are few things I enjoy more than to go out to the countryside at night and look up at all the stars blanketing the heavens. I’ve been doing this for over 40 years now, yet I never get over the awesome beauty and splendor of the star-studded evening sky. Yet, sometimes, when I look up and see all this vast universe, I’m prone to ponder my own importance. To be honest with you, seeing such a great creation has a way of making me feel pretty small and insignificant by comparison. But that’s not really the case at all. Even though we’re just one tiny individual in this huge universe, God still has a very personal and individual concern for each and every one of us. That’s may sound too amazing to believe, but its true!
One great ancient first-century scholar named Paul expressed this awe over God’s love and concern for him with these words, “The Son of God loved ME, and gave Himself for ME.” Centuries earlier a prolific poet named David felt this same way as he looked up at the night sky and said, “What is man that You are mindful of him, or the Son of man, that You should visit him?” To keep track of and care of every one of us on planet earth seems like a super Herculean task, but that’s only because we’re seeing it from a merely human perspective. For God, Who is ALL-present, ALL-powerful, and ALL-knowing, such a feat is actually piece of cake!
As Irish actress Roma Downey sings,
“May you understand the strength and power of God in a thunder storm in winter,
And the quiet beauty of creation in the calm of a summer sunset,
And may you come to realize that,
Insignificant as you may seem in this great universe,
You ARE an important part of God’s plan;
May He watch over you, and keep you safe from harm.”
GOD’S LOVE IS UNCONDITIONAL Romans 5:8
More and more we’re living in a performance-based world. Companies and organizations are constantly evaluating the output and efficiency of their people and programs. While there’s nothing wrong with that, it IS a mistake to allow our relationships to be controlled by a performance-based mentality. Like it or not, some people will only accept us if we successfully achieve what they set down as a prerequisite to being an associate of theirs. But God has no such system upon which He bases His relationship to us on. No, God has no such strings attached in the way He relates to us.
In fact, this verse shows that God’s greatest act of love for us came at a time when we were not at our personal best, but instead were at our personal worst! It says that He showed His deepest depth of His love for us when we hatred Him the most! Now THAT’S unconditional love!
GOD’S LOVE IS INSEPARABLE Romans 8:35-39
When two people are in love they want to spend every waking moment together. In America we have an old saying that such a couple is “inseparable”. The nature of love is that it longs to be with the object of its affection.
When a person becomes a child of God through faith in Jesus Christ, God forms an inseparable bond between them and His Son. Nothing can ever break that bond. No earthly trouble, no supernatural power, and no future unseen circumstance can possibly sever this bond of love between God and His people.
One of the greatest modern inventions along with the paper clip and duct tape is known as “super glue”. Super glue is really cool because it can permanently bond just about anything (including your finger tips!) There’s something in its chemical makeup that causes a super strong molecular bond. It may help if you think of God’s love as a kind of spiritual super glue. Once you get bonded to Christ, there’s nothing that can possibly separate you from Him.
GOD’S LOVE IS GLOBAL John 3:16
We live in a very well-connected world. What goes on in Africa is known instantly in America. What transpires in India gets out to Asia in a jiffy. News coming out of Europe makes international headlines overnight. Events in the Middle East find their way into the morning papers around the world.
This is a big world we live in, and it has a lot going on. Sometimes we feel overwhelmed by it all. It can become a bit too much to take in all at once. While we may get overwhelmed sometimes, the good news is that God never does. He can handle all the problems and situations no matter how big or widespread they are. This is because we serve a global God.
In the third chapter of John’s gospel we discover that God not only has a global concern, but that He also has a global love. John gives us a picture that almost looks like God is embracing the world, warts and all, into His everlasting arms. And this love He has for our world is not casual at all. It’s intense. For God “SO” loved the world. It’s also an active love, not a passive love. God’s love caused Him to take action. That action was to send His only Son into our world so that we can be saved through faith in Him.
GOD’S LOVE IS COLOR BLIND Matthew 28:19-20 ; Rev. 5:9
People and cultures the world over are rediscovering the role and contribution that disabled people can play in their societies. More and more we’re realizing the value that each and every person has, regardless of any physical, mental, emotional or social challenges they are born with or suffer from. If I were to ask you if God had a disability, what would your answer be? Believe it or not, God does have a “disability”. You see, God is color blind. When we look at each other, we take note of the racial differences as indicated by the color and tone of our skin. But when God looks at each if us, He focuses on what’s inside in our hearts, not on our outward appearance.
He doesn’t look down from heaven and say, “Oh look over there, there’s John the American”, or “Oh, I remember you, you’re Suresh the man from India”. No, God sees us from the inside out. He cares about who we are, not what we look like.
But this is not to say that God isn’t into diversity. Just look around us and see all the different colors and personality types He’s made. Someone has said, “If you want to know if God has a sense of humor, go and visit your local zoo, and look at all the comical shapes, sizes and features of the animals there”.
GOD’S LOVE IS PERSONAL Galatians 2:20 ; Romans 10:19
I happen to be a lover of astronomy. There are few things I enjoy more than to go out to the countryside at night and look up at all the stars blanketing the heavens. I’ve been doing this for over 40 years now, yet I never get over the awesome beauty and splendor of the star-studded evening sky. Yet, sometimes, when I look up and see all this vast universe, I’m prone to ponder my own importance. To be honest with you, seeing such a great creation has a way of making me feel pretty small and insignificant by comparison. But that’s not really the case at all. Even though we’re just one tiny individual in this huge universe, God still has a very personal and individual concern for each and every one of us. That’s may sound too amazing to believe, but its true!
One great ancient first-century scholar named Paul expressed this awe over God’s love and concern for him with these words, “The Son of God loved ME, and gave Himself for ME.” Centuries earlier a prolific poet named David felt this same way as he looked up at the night sky and said, “What is man that You are mindful of him, or the Son of man, that You should visit him?” To keep track of and care of every one of us on planet earth seems like a super Herculean task, but that’s only because we’re seeing it from a merely human perspective. For God, Who is ALL-present, ALL-powerful, and ALL-knowing, such a feat is actually piece of cake!
As Irish actress Roma Downey sings,
“May you understand the strength and power of God in a thunder storm in winter,
And the quiet beauty of creation in the calm of a summer sunset,
And may you come to realize that,
Insignificant as you may seem in this great universe,
You ARE an important part of God’s plan;
May He watch over you, and keep you safe from harm.”
GOD’S LOVE IS UNCONDITIONAL Romans 5:8
More and more we’re living in a performance-based world. Companies and organizations are constantly evaluating the output and efficiency of their people and programs. While there’s nothing wrong with that, it IS a mistake to allow our relationships to be controlled by a performance-based mentality. Like it or not, some people will only accept us if we successfully achieve what they set down as a prerequisite to being an associate of theirs. But God has no such system upon which He bases His relationship to us on. No, God has no such strings attached in the way He relates to us.
In fact, this verse shows that God’s greatest act of love for us came at a time when we were not at our personal best, but instead were at our personal worst! It says that He showed His deepest depth of His love for us when we hatred Him the most! Now THAT’S unconditional love!
GOD’S LOVE IS INSEPARABLE Romans 8:35-39
When two people are in love they want to spend every waking moment together. In America we have an old saying that such a couple is “inseparable”. The nature of love is that it longs to be with the object of its affection.
When a person becomes a child of God through faith in Jesus Christ, God forms an inseparable bond between them and His Son. Nothing can ever break that bond. No earthly trouble, no supernatural power, and no future unseen circumstance can possibly sever this bond of love between God and His people.
One of the greatest modern inventions along with the paper clip and duct tape is known as “super glue”. Super glue is really cool because it can permanently bond just about anything (including your finger tips!) There’s something in its chemical makeup that causes a super strong molecular bond. It may help if you think of God’s love as a kind of spiritual super glue. Once you get bonded to Christ, there’s nothing that can possibly separate you from Him.
God’s Favorite Song
God’s Favorite Song
John R. Petrilli
What’s your favorite song? Couples often have a favorite tune they’ve claimed as “their song”. Vocalists and instrumentalists in concert often close with their all-time favorite song to the crowd’s delight. So what’s your favorite song? For the music connoisseurs possessing a wide range of tastes, the answer will depend on which category of music we’re talking about.
We see from both Old and New Testaments that God possesses a vested interest in music and song. He incorporated it into the worship services of the temple, and commands His creation to sing to Him. It’s obvious that He definitely enjoys music. But can it be that He actually has a FAVORITE song? According to the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir’s tune, “Favorite Song of All”, God DOES have a favorite song. It’s not one particular number, but rather, a category known as praise songs. Let’s walk through the Bible and see what it has to say about this important theme.
GOD’S FAVORITE SONG OF PRAISE AFFIRMS HIS MATCHLESS WORTH AND WONDERFUL WORKS. Psalms 146-147
As we sing the praises of someone or something we’re quick to point out the admirable qualities or features of that person or item. When it comes to the Person of God, there’s no one more admirable nor worth admiring. David understood that and made a big deal out of rehearsing the greatness of God throughout his hymnody found in the Book of Psalms. While many would turn to such favorites as Psalms 23, Psalms 46, Psalms 103, or Psalms 139, I invite you to camp with me in less familiar territory at the end of the Book of Psalms. More specifically, at the final five Psalms, Psalms 146-150. Interestingly enough, each of these final five songs starts out with the imperative phrase, “PRAISE THE LORD!” That pretty much tips the reader off to the goal David has in writing these priceless lyrical works. It is to nurture and invigorate an attitude of praise to God. I guess we might see David’s role here as that of a worship leader who is longing to see God’s people engage in wholehearted, unrestrained praise.
Character is most clearly seen, not so much in what someone says, but rather, what they do. In Psalm 146 God’s matchless character can be seen in all the ways He reaches out and helps the sons of men (5). The Lord is pictured like an omnipotent social worker who attends to the pressing needs of both the poor and the prisoner alike (7). God cares ever so much about the welfare of His people, especially the disabled (8), the displaced foreigner, disregarded orphan and disenfranchised widow (9). Psalms 147 focuses on God’s provision as seen in His personal involvement in the national prosperity, emotional health and spiritual integrity of His chosen nation (2, 12-14). David sings to the God Who performs the meteorological wonder of lofting the clouds above the earth, then timely opening to release their precious cargo of rain droplets to descend upon the hungry and thirsty creatures dwelling below on terra firma (8, 9). Much as we do, the sweet singer must have watched a winter thunder storm, giving all the credit to God as the One and only author of such an awesome sight (16-18).
GOD’S FAVORITE SONG OF PRAISE IS THE DAILY OCCUPATION OF ALL CREATION. Psalms 148
Like all good worship leaders, David shoots for one-hundred percent involvement. He isn’t happy until he’s succeeded in getting every single corner of the universe involved in praising his God. He starts by prodding the angelic assemblage to give praise to their Creator (2). Recall how these heavenly vocalists sang the first Christmas cantata on a Judean hillside the morn of the Savior’s birth (Luke 2:13-14). They will continue lifting their voices to God throughout all eternity (Rev. 5:11-12 ; 7:11-12). David moves from the angelic realms of the third heaven into the astronomical realm of stars and planets in the second heaven. Someone may argue that inanimate objects are incapable of praise. To such I say, think again. According to Job, the stars of the pre-dawn skies celebrated creation day in song (Job 38:7)? Didn’t Jesus clearly imply that something as lifeless as a rock could and would sing His praises should His people fail to do so (Luke 19:40)? Didn’t the Psalmist include the panoply of galaxies and stars when he declared that “the heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim the work of His hands”, declaring God’s glory both day and night (Psalms 19:1-2)?
Next David transitions to the first heaven of the upper atmosphere (4-6). The clouds should be praising God for their inception, installation and permanency. Having extended his call to praise God top down from angelic hosts to earthly skies, the psalmist zeroes in on planet earth. Its inhabitants, both great and small, owe their Creator a debt of praise. From the tiniest bug (mosquito praise?) to the mammoth whale along with the sea they swim in, each and every one of them is engaged in offering the sacrifice of praise to their loving Creator (7-8).
Even the hills and trees join in the anthems of praise (9). Finally, the entire creation chorus adds to its membership the human family. Social, economic, chronological and marital status notwithstanding, all are to participate in the most worthy endeavor of praise to our God (11-13).
GOD’S FAVORITE SONG OF PRAISE IS THE CHURCH’S PROCLAMATION. Psalms 149-150
Having succeeded in recruiting the rest of creation into the blessed ministry of praising God, David increases the magnification of his spiritual microscope, and focuses his attention on the Church. Praise songs are the order of the day when God’s people assemble for corporate worship (149:1 ; cf., Colossians 3:16 ; Ephesians 5:19). The inclusion of the performing arts and skillful instrumentation are said to bring delight to the heart of God (3-4). When praise is accompanied by the preaching of the Word (“two-edged sword”), the spiritual impact of complete victory can be realized (6-9). In Psalms 150 David wraps up the entire book of 150 songs and poems with a resounding crescendo of praise. One can almost hear the trumpets blasting and the cymbals clashing as all the stops are pulled out in one gigantic finale of instrumental praise that deafens the ear and delights the senses (3-5). In case David miscued and left something out, he ends on a note of inclusion by urging any entity with the breath of life in its lungs to use that breath to praise God (6)!
Peter describes believers as those who’ve been assigned the holy calling of “proclaiming the PRAISES of Him Who has called you out of darkness and into His marvelous light: (1 Peter 2:5,9). Which brings us to a personal consideration. We need to prayerfully ask ourselves and the Lord the current status of our praise life. Is it healthy or lacking in some way? Do we ration our praise, only engaging in it when things are going well for us? Perhaps we need to take a closer look at just what praise is, then carefully reconsider our commitment to this most rewarding of all Christian endeavors. I hope this excursion through Psalms 146-150 has proven beneficial to you. Along the theme of music, borrowing a phrase from the great composer J.S. Bach, I close with, “Solo Deo Gloria!” (“To God alone be the glory!”)
John R. Petrilli
What’s your favorite song? Couples often have a favorite tune they’ve claimed as “their song”. Vocalists and instrumentalists in concert often close with their all-time favorite song to the crowd’s delight. So what’s your favorite song? For the music connoisseurs possessing a wide range of tastes, the answer will depend on which category of music we’re talking about.
We see from both Old and New Testaments that God possesses a vested interest in music and song. He incorporated it into the worship services of the temple, and commands His creation to sing to Him. It’s obvious that He definitely enjoys music. But can it be that He actually has a FAVORITE song? According to the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir’s tune, “Favorite Song of All”, God DOES have a favorite song. It’s not one particular number, but rather, a category known as praise songs. Let’s walk through the Bible and see what it has to say about this important theme.
GOD’S FAVORITE SONG OF PRAISE AFFIRMS HIS MATCHLESS WORTH AND WONDERFUL WORKS. Psalms 146-147
As we sing the praises of someone or something we’re quick to point out the admirable qualities or features of that person or item. When it comes to the Person of God, there’s no one more admirable nor worth admiring. David understood that and made a big deal out of rehearsing the greatness of God throughout his hymnody found in the Book of Psalms. While many would turn to such favorites as Psalms 23, Psalms 46, Psalms 103, or Psalms 139, I invite you to camp with me in less familiar territory at the end of the Book of Psalms. More specifically, at the final five Psalms, Psalms 146-150. Interestingly enough, each of these final five songs starts out with the imperative phrase, “PRAISE THE LORD!” That pretty much tips the reader off to the goal David has in writing these priceless lyrical works. It is to nurture and invigorate an attitude of praise to God. I guess we might see David’s role here as that of a worship leader who is longing to see God’s people engage in wholehearted, unrestrained praise.
Character is most clearly seen, not so much in what someone says, but rather, what they do. In Psalm 146 God’s matchless character can be seen in all the ways He reaches out and helps the sons of men (5). The Lord is pictured like an omnipotent social worker who attends to the pressing needs of both the poor and the prisoner alike (7). God cares ever so much about the welfare of His people, especially the disabled (8), the displaced foreigner, disregarded orphan and disenfranchised widow (9). Psalms 147 focuses on God’s provision as seen in His personal involvement in the national prosperity, emotional health and spiritual integrity of His chosen nation (2, 12-14). David sings to the God Who performs the meteorological wonder of lofting the clouds above the earth, then timely opening to release their precious cargo of rain droplets to descend upon the hungry and thirsty creatures dwelling below on terra firma (8, 9). Much as we do, the sweet singer must have watched a winter thunder storm, giving all the credit to God as the One and only author of such an awesome sight (16-18).
GOD’S FAVORITE SONG OF PRAISE IS THE DAILY OCCUPATION OF ALL CREATION. Psalms 148
Like all good worship leaders, David shoots for one-hundred percent involvement. He isn’t happy until he’s succeeded in getting every single corner of the universe involved in praising his God. He starts by prodding the angelic assemblage to give praise to their Creator (2). Recall how these heavenly vocalists sang the first Christmas cantata on a Judean hillside the morn of the Savior’s birth (Luke 2:13-14). They will continue lifting their voices to God throughout all eternity (Rev. 5:11-12 ; 7:11-12). David moves from the angelic realms of the third heaven into the astronomical realm of stars and planets in the second heaven. Someone may argue that inanimate objects are incapable of praise. To such I say, think again. According to Job, the stars of the pre-dawn skies celebrated creation day in song (Job 38:7)? Didn’t Jesus clearly imply that something as lifeless as a rock could and would sing His praises should His people fail to do so (Luke 19:40)? Didn’t the Psalmist include the panoply of galaxies and stars when he declared that “the heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim the work of His hands”, declaring God’s glory both day and night (Psalms 19:1-2)?
Next David transitions to the first heaven of the upper atmosphere (4-6). The clouds should be praising God for their inception, installation and permanency. Having extended his call to praise God top down from angelic hosts to earthly skies, the psalmist zeroes in on planet earth. Its inhabitants, both great and small, owe their Creator a debt of praise. From the tiniest bug (mosquito praise?) to the mammoth whale along with the sea they swim in, each and every one of them is engaged in offering the sacrifice of praise to their loving Creator (7-8).
Even the hills and trees join in the anthems of praise (9). Finally, the entire creation chorus adds to its membership the human family. Social, economic, chronological and marital status notwithstanding, all are to participate in the most worthy endeavor of praise to our God (11-13).
GOD’S FAVORITE SONG OF PRAISE IS THE CHURCH’S PROCLAMATION. Psalms 149-150
Having succeeded in recruiting the rest of creation into the blessed ministry of praising God, David increases the magnification of his spiritual microscope, and focuses his attention on the Church. Praise songs are the order of the day when God’s people assemble for corporate worship (149:1 ; cf., Colossians 3:16 ; Ephesians 5:19). The inclusion of the performing arts and skillful instrumentation are said to bring delight to the heart of God (3-4). When praise is accompanied by the preaching of the Word (“two-edged sword”), the spiritual impact of complete victory can be realized (6-9). In Psalms 150 David wraps up the entire book of 150 songs and poems with a resounding crescendo of praise. One can almost hear the trumpets blasting and the cymbals clashing as all the stops are pulled out in one gigantic finale of instrumental praise that deafens the ear and delights the senses (3-5). In case David miscued and left something out, he ends on a note of inclusion by urging any entity with the breath of life in its lungs to use that breath to praise God (6)!
Peter describes believers as those who’ve been assigned the holy calling of “proclaiming the PRAISES of Him Who has called you out of darkness and into His marvelous light: (1 Peter 2:5,9). Which brings us to a personal consideration. We need to prayerfully ask ourselves and the Lord the current status of our praise life. Is it healthy or lacking in some way? Do we ration our praise, only engaging in it when things are going well for us? Perhaps we need to take a closer look at just what praise is, then carefully reconsider our commitment to this most rewarding of all Christian endeavors. I hope this excursion through Psalms 146-150 has proven beneficial to you. Along the theme of music, borrowing a phrase from the great composer J.S. Bach, I close with, “Solo Deo Gloria!” (“To God alone be the glory!”)
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