Something to think about While taking the Lord's Supper

 I gave these thoughts during Communion Time, January 29, 2023 at Legacy Christian Church. We take the Lord's supper every week, together.

Devoting Yourself

My second favorite book of the Bible is the Book of Acts. I love reading the history of the early church, seeing how they struggled with some of the same issues we have in church, and hopefully, learning the lessons they are trying to teach today. Even from the Church’s earliest days, we learn some important lessons. Read with me in Acts Chapter 2 beginning with verse 42:

Act 2:42-47  And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.  (43)  And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles.  (44)  And all who believed were together and had all things in common.  (45)  And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need.  (46)  And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts,  (47)  praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

Very quickly, I want us to look at four things the early church did as it was being established.

1.      1. They devoted themselves to learning from the right place. They witnessed the miraculous power of God demonstrated by the Apostles, and then listened to them teach about Jesus. This gave them the information they needed for the new life they embraced.

2.      2. Fellowship: It’s so important to get together. They needed it especially because many of them were far from home. They celebrated Pentecost and in the process, found out about Jesus. Eager to learn, they needed physical support as well as spiritual while they were learning about the Way

3.      3. They broke bread together like we’re doing now! Jesus gave us a meal to eat together and remember Him. They did it every day, but we do it every week.

4.      4. They prayed. Prayer changes the one praying, and it can change outcomes. It aligns us with God especially when we pray as we study the Apostles’ teaching, or fellowship together, or when we break bread!

When we do these things, we are transformed, made ready to do the good things that God has prepared in advance for us to do. Will you join me in prayer, to thank Him for His wonderful mercy, His eternal Son, and the Hope we have for resurrection.

Hey, That's Me, in the Cracks....

I confess,

Sometimes it feels like I get a little lost in all that happens. I'm left alone when I want to be talked to. I say "I'm OK", but mean "Something's wrong, but I don't know how to explain it". Some days I just wish to speak and be understood, to be taken plainly. I'm in the cracks, stuck, and I'm not sure I'll get out. When I think about it, I guess the feeling I have comes from being marginalized. I've been "Nothing Buttered"* into an identity separate from how I see myself, and what I've been told I am by God.

In this post I'm stretching to describe the strange Malaise I feel toward existing in the here and now and the Malice expressed toward me by this world. These M&Ms are poison pills that taint my effectiveness at holiness in ways both subtle and obvious. It's hard to try when you show people just a little of who you are and they scoff and deride you. It should be expected that the world would hate me (hate us), but when it happens, it happens in so many strange little ways. I feel like I could fight the world if the rules were the same for both groups, but ultimately they're not.

Consider this: Culturally, Christians are called to bear our Cross with Jesus. I understand in my mind what this means. I must lose constantly. I'm a condemned man. I must be reviled. The State is against me. That's not optional. ultimately all human government is against God because all government seeks to perpetuate itself over and against the governed. In America we attempt to insulate ourselves from this fact through democracy, law, and something called "Checks and Balances" but ultimately our government seeks the same domination of the governed either through regulation, taxation, or compartmentalization. Regulation and taxation are obvious, because Christian or not, we all feel some burden from regulation and taxation. Compartmentalization is something different. I believe Government (big G intentional) attempts to shuffle people into a category that they can label and then they can sell their customized reality of "the best life". Society and Government needs us in a box to produce for them, make them tax dollars! They do their best to try and convince us to be "quiet and content" while making sure we are their definition of quiet and content.That's the rules that change. This world will try to tell us what it means to "...lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. " (1 Timothy 2:2, ESV) but we can't let them. We have to go to the Bible and get the Word on Godliness, peace, quietness, dignity. Get out of THEIR box!

I'm trying to breakout of my box all the time. Today it's tiresome. It's always tiresome, mainly because I desperately want to take the easy way out. I want to flow on the path of water. Sometimes that is a feature, today it's a flaw. There's no quick "Grace!" and it's over. Holiness is a long slog toward something we can't fully comprehend, and yet is always happening. There's no room on the cross you're carrying for all the things we do and partake of to make this life easier. All creation groans after what we perceive, that this world is passing. It will burn. It must burn. It isn't holy, loving, selfless, or warm. "Heat death" is it's ultimate end, a state of changelessness where even the fabric of the universe melts away, becoming nothing, going back to nothing, "ashes to ashes, earth to earth, dust to dust". Good riddance. Better to lose now, while we can still live forever. Better to embrace the all present presence of God, His lamb making us righteous.

To that end, I've got something in the works, Something Big. Something that I hope will be helpful and worth reading about what God calls "Salvation." I've been working on it for a while, and I'm close to a release. I've written the first post, run it by others, and the words are ready. I need to format it in Blogger, link it up to a few websites, and I need to finish one more post's worth of content. Then I'll begin releasing it weekly, Here, or on my regular blog, skattagun.blogspot.com. Maybe i'll do both...

....Keep a Weather Eye....

Psalms 131 -Revisited as a Communion Meditation

 I've talked about this Psalm before in a devotional thought. Here, I've turned it into a communion meditation. Check this out:

Psalms 131

Psa 131:1-3  A Song of Ascents. Of David. O LORD, my heart is not lifted up; my eyes are not raised too high; I do not occupy myself with things too great and too marvelous for me.  (2)  But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me.  (3)  O Israel, hope in the LORD from this time forth and forevermore.

 

I’ve seen what happens when kids go from milk to solid food. It’s not an altogether pleasant occasion. There’s fussing, tears, pawing, calling out. And then, there’s quiet, and clinging.

When we try to lift our hearts up to understand, raise our eyes to perceive, we’re trying, many times to grasp at things we can’t comprehend. At least not right now. Once you’ve become an adult, and have kids of your own, you know why they stop taking milk. They’re growing. Even if they’re not aware of the process, it’s occurring, and they are changing. In the three years Jesus spent with His disciples on earth, He was changing them. He was feeding them milk, and getting them ready to be without Him. On the night He was betrayed, He took the Passover meal given by God through Moses to celebrate and remember the transition of the people of God from slavery into freedom. He told them what it really meant. It was something too great and marvelous to comprehend. When He announced to them on that night that someone would betray Him, they couldn’t believe it. When He announced that He had to go away, they didn’t understand. He gave them a deeper meaning to that meal though. It was a type of what was to come, what those disciples were witnessing in the moment. He simply told them to take the bread which is His body, and that the wine in the cup was a new covenant written in His blood. Take it, eat it, and remember. Find your comfort there.

After the weaning’s over the child finds new comfort in the presence of his mother. We do the same thing when we take the Lord’s supper. We find the presence of Christ here together in remembrance of what’s He’s done for us. Let us pray and remember and participate in the presence of Christ together.

"The Prayers of a Righteous Person"

Pre-Covid, I had the distinct privilege of being able to speak with the Homeless of Orlando.  Here's the message I shared with them, generated from an outline I've created. It won't be word for word verbatim what I said, but it should be similar enough to call the same.

Text: Luke 18:9-14

Introduction: If I were to give this message to you today a title, it would not come from the main text I want to look at today, but from a supporting text I want us to look at right now. One of the principles we should use when we study the Bible is to let one text interpret another. If we have trouble with one text, another can help us understand the meaning of it. In this case, both texts I believe, are straight forward, and pretty easy to understand. One though, does give us a practical example of the other. The first passage I want us to look at is in the book of James chapter 5:13-18:

Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.

I've always wanted to pray powerfully. My understanding of what it means to pray powerfully has changed a little over time. I want us to look at an example of prayer given to us by Jesus, so that we can understand what it means to pray "The Prayers of a Righteous Person." The example is found in the book of Luke 18:9-14:

He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

In this parable, Jesus teaches us what it means to be a righteous man praying by showing us an example of a man whose prayers were answered. In studying this man, we will come to see that our prayers are made effective when we first appeal to God for mercy because of who we are. We also see an example of how we shouldn't be. Let's take a look at the people to whom Jesus told this parable.


I. A Parable with a Purpose
 When Jesus gave this parable, he had a specific target audience in mind. These people have two characteristics that we need to look at as a warning. I would even contend that it's very easy to be a person who displays one or both of these traits. In America today, I would say that we even teach people to have one of these traits, and we glorify those who display the other. The text says that Jesus told this parable to people who trusted their own righteousness, and treated others with contempt. Those two ideas kind of go hand in hand. If you trust your own righteousness, you will treat others with contempt. I think that most people will at some point in their life trust their own righteousness. It's what our society teaches people to do. People say things like Find your own path to God. Trust your heart. Go with your feelings. One of the highest virtues our society has is to find our own way, and trust it to lead to our God. Once someone else finds a different way, we will treat them with contempt.
  A. The Parable had a target audience
      1. Trust in Self
      2. Hold others in contempt
  B. Familiar Image: Matthew 6:5,6
  C. Similar message: Matthew 6:7-13

II. The People involved
  A. A Pharisee
      1. Knows his place
      2. Says his prayer
      3. Gets what is coming to him.
  B. A Tax Collector
      1. Knows his place
      2. Says his prayer
      3. Gets what is coming to him.

III. How will you pray today?
  A. Will you humble yourself?
  B. Will you Confess your sins?
  C. Will you call out to God for a clean conscience? 1 Peter 3:21


Conclusion:
Everybody here agrees that prayer is important, and that praying correctly is something we all should strive to do. We want to pray powerful deep prayers that accomplish good. Today we've seen an example of a prayer that gets work done. It's also incredibly simple. It acknowledges sin, and asks for forgiveness. If you want to be a righteous person, I want you to know you can pray this prayer too. You can call out to God for a clean conscience in baptism. It's God's way! Will you do it today?

Here's the sermon video:

Turn the Light On!

 James "The Gravy" McCrickard and I have created a podcast we call "Turn the Light On"

You should check it out:

Anchor:

https://anchor.fm/turn-the-light-on

Spotify:

https://open.spotify.com/show/5AY2cGtLcTRpwuT3MRrCh6

Stitcher:

https://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=559368&refid=stpr

Google Podcasts:

https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy8yZDU2MTU2Yy9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw

Apple iTunes:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/turn-the-light-on/id1525392943

#lightwins

John 1:5

 

So far we have 3 episodes.

Eventually we'll have our own blog for it.

for now, there's here!

Episodes in order of appearance:

"The Light Shines in the Darkness" https://anchor.fm/turn-the-light-on/episodes/The-Light-Shines-in-the-Darkness-eh4dmm

"Blind Man Sees the Light" https://anchor.fm/turn-the-light-on/episodes/Blind-Man-Sees-the-Light-ehe1lr 

we're encouraging everyone to use the hashtag #lightwins to promote this endevour.

Enjoy! Share! Comment! Like!

what if....

Update:

This may be happening. I've been praying for it to happen, and I caught the tail end of a conversation about a small group forming just for this! 

 Update 2:

This may get folded into something coming up called Project VOLTAGE: Volunteers Of Love Taking Action for God Everywhere.

OG Text:

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Calling all worship leaders dedicated to an ecclesiology that teaches that Christians should be unified. I have the following proposal for a worship service:

i figure it would be about 30 minutes of singing together. 

I'm taping this paper to the front of my prayer journal. Here's what the paper says:

----

What if...

- we constructed a worship service around teaching each other using Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs.

    - Songs about belief

    - Songs about confessing Jesus as Lord

    - Songs about repentance. 

    - Songs about baptism for the forgiveness of sins. 

    - songs about sanctification. 

----

Please pray with me so that this will happen! We have to learn to teach and encourage each other in the name of the Lord. If we're solely dependent on the preacher, or some other man, for the source of our doctrine, teaching, encouragement, we'll be let down! Taking the time to build each other up makes us stronger and more resilient as a church.

I am Chosen

Recently,  I've been reading The Collected Writings of Jack Cottrell.  I'm on volume 4, "The Bible Versus Calvinism" and it's greatly edifying my faith. It is reminding me who I am (and who has me as well.) I've got a serious post in the works right now partly because of this series of books, but until it's done,  I want to share something I read in it this morning.

Dr Jack Cottrell Telling the truth

We, as Christians are called to proclaim something. We are specifically elected to do this job, it is why we are saved, and it's why we continue in the truth. Israel had their part, get the world ready for the Messiah. Now it's time for us to do our job!

Annoyed, Mildly Disturbed

I'm annoyed a little bit.

I seriously consider arguing to the point of losing friends/damaging relationships every time some says something to the effect of "It doesn't matter if I go to church or not, as long as I have a relationship with God."
There's so much wrong with that, I can't even.
First off, there's the idea of what the church IS.
IT IS:

• The Body of Christ
• The Bride of Christ
• The "Called out" of God
• a Body of Believers

Then we have the idea of what the church is TO DO:

• Proclaim the death and ressurection of Jesus through Communion
• Encourage one another to do good works
• Stand firm against the world.

Why on earth would you not want to be a part of this?!?

Maybe it's because of what else the church IS:

• A group of Sinners with problems
• An exclusive group
• People who don't live up to their expectations

And sometimes we DO these things:

• Keep people out
• "Forgive" without accountability
• Insist on keeping rules

First, let's realize something about The End¹:
I've heard some people compare the search for God/Purpose/Meaning to life to a journey, and on this journey it is said: "There's more than one path up Mt Fuji."
or "All Dogs Go to Heaven"
some variation on the idea that All-Loving-Powerful-Knowledgeful, etc God will accept Your Best as Good Enough to get by, and this is how we can all make it to heaven.
Simply put that's not something I can believe, given the truth of scripture, and what it's got to say. Scripture says God is one, and He is Holy. This means that I'm not going to the top of Mt Fuji. Mt Fuji is on earth, it's end is the same as the rest of the planet. I'm going somewhere fundamentally different than this earth. This earth is not The End. It will be remade into something it's not right now, but that Coming Thing is so vastly different than what's here right now, I can only barely glimpse at it. I know there's no crying or death there, but I don't know what that means. I know that I will see God, and that the Tree of Life is there, but I don't know what that means.
You say you don't go to church because your way is good enough, that there's more than one way up mt Fuji.
I'm not going there, and I don't want to. Mt Fuji is here, I want to go Over There.
To get over there I need help, and so do you.
That's why the Church is here.

As a body of believers, we're ready to do what God's called us to do, and it doesn't matter what happens to us. God makes it a point to make sure that what is happening to us now works together for our Good.
We're blessed with the fellowship of other believers. Not everyone in the congregation where we worship is at the same level of spiritual maturity. Some people in church need milk, others can handle meatier doctrine. We all still have need for the blood of Christ to continually cleanse us. We remind each other where we're going and who we are.
That is what Church is FOR. We're on a journey, not to a place that is here, on this plane of existence, but rather we are going to the Throne room of the King, where our voices will join in the chorus: "HOLY HOLY HOLY is the Lord God Almighty!" Here we see in part, and know in part. Then we will be complete. You don't get there without being in the Church!
Joining the Church is the same as being saved from your sins. You can't have them washed away without God adding you to the Church.
It's a deluxe package deal.
Please stop climbing Mt Fuji, and start reaching out to God. You don't have to go far.
Repent of your sins, and confess that "Jesus is Lord". Join the church through the Grace² of God by your Faith³ during your baptism⁴. Please, if something is hard to understand, reach out to me here on the blog, or send me a message in email. We can help.
The important thing is to take the right step next.

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¹ The End is the idea of Telos, or "purpose" not just "the end of the world", although that is part of it (briefly explored in a Sermon titled "Do You Really Want it All to Stop?") The idea is also a part of what's going on in your life to accomplish an end, it's not just God's End for the world, but His End for you as well. ²Grace: God's favor given to you by His Love. you don't earn it. ³Faith: Faith in the death of Jesus because of and in atonement for your sins. ⁴baptism: Immersion in water done in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to wash away your sins and raise you to new life.