Written Oct 20th: BREAKTHROUGHS!!

(I'm posting some missives John has sent out the past couple of months, titling them according to when they were written.)

BREAKTHROUGHS!! When Does God Really Show Up????

Greetings to all of you on the front lines of kingdom work -- whether in South Africa or here in Chicago or wherever,

Sometimes I am wondering if I am reading your mind or not. I have just come off my Monday morning walk. While in Chicago I live near the NPU campus and one of our Covenant's mother-churches, North Park Covenant. It is one of the few churches left that has no parking lot--many of its current members are living within walking distance, its immediate community is its parish, its mission field. And that represents its huge challenge!! It feels to me so limiting!!

I am walking by all the three-flats and bungalows and wonder to myself, how does one connect with these folks living behind these walls? They are all within walking distance! What are the stories hidden behind these locked doors? How many are there whom Jesus would love to touch with his transformational care? Do they really know why that church is there within a few blocks? How does the invitation to "come and see" reach them? An advertisement tugged under the windshield wipers of their cars (silly thought!!). Perhaps a regular mailer with a thoughtful invitation? A neighborly conversation? Yes, the availability of a food bank perhaps? An after school program for children on the short school days? Etc.

What if I was pastor here, what would happen to me? Would I be at risk of defining my ministry as that of the care-giver of the faithful, of resigning myself to taking care of the flock that God has entrusted to me and who show up each Sunday. In my own helplessness of what to do that would really be transformational in these blocks and blocks of city dwellers, all of whom are marching to their own drummers, would I be at risk of being apathetic??

I recall in my first ministry taking a car load of leaders to a training event. The men started to talk about "apathy in the church", of folks not stepping up to the plate and being involved! I shall never forget what one of them said to me. "Pastor", he said, "I have sat through a lot of sermons in my lifetime. You pastors are good at inspiration and throwing out the challenges. But if you never show us "how" to do it, you only frustrate us. And when we get frustrated enough, it is easy to take one more step back and say, 'let someone else worry about it'. And then you have apathy'."

What if I as a thoughtful pastor living into the 21st century honesty do not know the "how to", am I at risk of stepping back and saying to myself, 'let someone else worry about it' ????

*****

I thought about that! and more!! What about the BREAKTHROUGHS? WHEN DOES GOD REALLY SHOW UP? -- Whether this be in South Africa, the Congo, or here in the US?

And I remembered what I had just sent to David Dwight, who has been entrusted with our benevolent ministries, including Swedish Covenant Hospital and Emmanuel Hospital. It was a mediation by Wm Barclay -- He entitled the devotional, "The Light of the Cross".

"The light which shines from the Cross has always brought wonders in the dark. It shone in the dark for the sick and the suffering and the weak. Dr. A. Rendle Short wrote in The Bible and Modern Medicine: "We know from Jerome's writings that the first hospital of which we have any record...was founded by a Christian lady, Fabiola." He goes on to tell how the plague smote Carthage in AD 252. The heathen flung out their dead and fled. But Cyprian, the Christian bishop, assembled the Christian congregation to care for the sick and to bury the dead, and so saved the city from desolation. The love, the care, the tenderness that the sick and the ailing and the weakly and the deformed received was quite absent from heathen civilization; it shines from the Cross." - Wm. Barclay

Whether in the Congo, or in South Africa, or here the BREAKTHROUGHS seem to come-- and God shows up in a transformational way-- when everyone else in the society is running, but it is the Christian community that guts it out - hangs in there through the thick and thin to truly love and care in the midst of shared suffering.

HELPLESS, yes!! HOPELESS, no!! APATHETIC, never!!

Prayerfully, John N

Written Oct 12th: God's Amazing Rescue Operation

(I'm posting some missives John has sent out the past couple of months, titling them according to when they were written.)

Greetings to all of you who are there on the front lines as our Lord's "Ambassadors" --

I am watching the sun rise in Santa Barbara on this clear Sunday morning. I could not sleep any longer, mulling over in my mind the meaningfulness of those words in Ephesians 2:8-10 about "being saved by grace, not of works......".

I guess I was revisiting that empowering declaration of Paul's in the light of an essay that fell into my hands this week. It was written by a friend and colleague of mine - some of you may know him. Dr. Lloyd Ahlem taught at the Social Science Department (Psychology), Stanislaus State University in Turlock, California. He also served as the President of NPU for a season. He is a layman, but could have pastored any one of our churches.

He entitled his reflection, A CHRISTIAN MANIFESTO FOR PEOPLE ....WHO DO NOT LIKE BIG WORDS. Find your self in quiet corner sometime today with your Bible open to Ephesians 2:8-10 and then read the attachment - retelling to yourself God's amazing rescue operation in the words of Lloyd. It's all about grace!!!

Prayerfully, John N

Written Sept 6th: Being a Spirit-filled Leader

(I'm posting some missives John has sent out the past couple of months, titling them according to when they were written.)

Greetings to all of you on the front lines of kingdom work -

I woke up 3:30 in the morning, not able to sleep - praying for Gary Walter, our newly elected ECC President (and the events of Sunday/Monday) and pondering what it meant when the early church picked leaders "full of the Holy Spirit". And I thought of word-pictures that had come to my attention along the way.

Jesus (John 7:37-39) --

If any one is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him." By this Jesus meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive...

Oswald Chambers --

If we believe in Jesus, it is not what we gain, but what He pours thru us that counts. It is not that God makes us beautifully rounded grapes, but that He squeezes the sweetness out of us. Spiritually, we cannot measure our life by success, but only by what God pours through us, and we cannot measure that at all [too spontaneous!?]

Paul, writing to Philemon (Phil. 4-7) --

I always thank God when I think of you in my prayers, because I hear about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints. I pray that you may be active in sharing your faith, so that you will have a full understanding of every good thing we have in Christ. Your love has given me great joy and encouragement, because you, my brother, have refreshed the hearts of the saints.

BOTTOM LINE -- Have you notice when a Spirit-filled person leaves our presence, our own spirits have been lifted -- the visit has left "a good (sweet) taste in our mouths". What was it that Paul said will impact strangers who have witnessed true, Spirit-filled worship -- "they will fall down and worship God, exclaiming, "God is really among you". (I Corinthians 14:25)

When the early church looked for leaders (Acts 6) they picked those who were "full of faith", "full of the Spirit", and "full of wisdom". By the grace of God that is who we are--and are becoming as we are faithful, available, teachable!!!

Keep blessing others! Prayerfully, John N