Alright.. everybody in your deepest and most religious voice say with me..

“Yeaaa tho I walk thru the valley of death I will fear no evil…for thou art with me.”

Sounds kinda cool doesn’t it?  It feels good to sound religious once in a while.

Now repeat after me.. Manah Manah doot dooo do do do…

That kind of cleanses the palate…

Try to get that off your mind in the next century…

OK! Down to binness.  Did you feel all religious and righteous and everything when you were quoting one of my favorite parts of the 23rd Psalm?  What should our attitude be when we’re walking through depression, temptation, financial burdens, marital strife or a plain good ole bad day?  I say YAY!! YAY though I walk through the valley!!!

James 1:² Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters,^[a] whenever you face trials of many kinds, ³ because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. ⁴ Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 

YAY!!!  I don’t know of any other way to express pure joy knowing in the end I will lack NOTHING! NADA…NOT A THING.

Vickie and I listen to Jesse Duplantis every Sunday after church.  A couple of weeks ago he said something like this:  You can’t have shadow without light.  If theres a shadow in the valley, then that means that there’s a light that’s brighter than the darkeness. That light is Jesus.   I paraphrased that a little but I don’t think Jesse will mind.

It’s so hard to count it pure joy when we’re facing life changing issues.  If we could look just a tiny bit into the future and see our Heavenly Father there smiling..saying ”I knew my joy would pull you through that valley”… it might be a little easier.

You might just have to say YAY!! in faith cause He art with you!

Love you much.

Steve

Here’s this guy who hears from God and his whole world is crashing down around him.  His nation is crumbling, His city has been under seige for many years…no food or water and the walls have just been breached by the Babylonian army.  His colleagues threw him down into a well where his feet sunk into the slime and then they capped it over because of his ministry, his writings were torn up and burned by the king!  He was disrespected, his prophecies rejected, his needs neglected and his intentions suspected to be misdirected but he remained unaffected. ( a little Jeremiah rap for you there…)  He remained true to his calling and still he could say:

 ^{International Version (NIV)}  Lamentations 3^:22 Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. ²³ They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
²⁴ I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.” ²⁵ The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; ²⁶ it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD.

I try to put myself in his place and think how far I would last in my calling if surrounded by all the negative he had to face every day.  I realize that he had an incredible connection to his calling and he just knew and was sure of what God had called him to do.  The best part of reading about this prophet is that his faith and trust in God allowed him to end up better than most…

Jeremiah 40:¹ The word came to Jeremiah from the LORD after Nebuzaradan commander of the imperial guard had released him at Ramah. He had found Jeremiah bound in chains among all the captives from Jerusalem and Judah who were being carried into exile to Babylon. ² When the commander of the guard found Jeremiah, he said to him, “The LORD your God decreed this disaster for this place. ³ And now the LORD has brought it about; he has done just as he said he would. All this happened because you people sinned against the LORD and did not obey him. ⁴ But today I am freeing you from the chains on your wrists. Come with me to Babylon, if you like, and I will look after you; but if you do not want to, then don’t come. Look, the whole country lies before you; go wherever you please.”

You may be going through persecution, physical trials, financial difficulty or or just a bad Monday…but you can say with Jeremiah  ”Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. ²³ They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” 

Loving you much while I’m waiting quietly on the salvation of the Lord…

Steve

Recently I experienced something that had not happened to me for a long time.  Someone “permanantly borrowed” something from me.  It was an ipod that was on my desk at work with all of my Christian Music on it.  I would listen to it as I answered my email and did all of my non-recording office duties such as billing and such.  One morning I came in and it was just gone!  I blinked and looked in denial at where it was but there was only the power and audio connection cord.  The first thing I did was report it to the OSU Police.  Then I did something that I’m not proud of but I left a note on my desk stating that I had a video of the individual and if they would return my ipod I wouldn’t press charges.  There was no video of course.  Believe it or not a crudely scribbled note was on my desk the next morning confessing the crime and asking for mercy.  He had a six year old daughter with no mamma and this was his only income.  I did a little detective work and found out who it was so a connundrum lay before me.  What would you have done?  I showed mercy. 

Proverbs 6:30
People do not despise a thief if he steals to satisfy his hunger when he is starving.

Luke 12:39
But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into.

I’ve heard it said that Character is defined by what you do when no one’s watching.  I can think back to some times when my character was not what it should’ve been. It’s hard to put aside the feeling of being violated and also the sheer surprise of showing up and finding that something you were going to depend on to get you thru the day or use to connect you or others to God is gone.  That mouthful said, I tried to put myself in this thiefs shoes.  I could make excuses for him but this fact remains:  All that I have belongs to God and serves to bring about his kingdom.  I was awakened to the fact that Jesus is coming..like a thief in the night.  One moment all of the trappings of this world will be here and the next, they’ll be gone! 

I still haven’t seen my ipod yet though.

Much Love!

Steve

What about the Christ club?  Should we gather in our little groups on Sunday morning?  I’m not talking about Sunday school classes or youth groups but I am speaking to the cliquey groups in some fellowships that exclude folks because of race, color or wallet size. 

James 2:1-4  My brothers and sisters, believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ must not show favoritism. ² Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in filthy old clothes also comes in. ³ If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but say to the poor man, “You stand there” or “Sit on the floor by my feet,” ⁴ have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

One thng I can say about Mehan with confidence…We do not discriminate.  From the day I started ministering at Mehan, I’ve seen nothing but love for each one who has come thru the door…rich or poor.  Mehan is open to anyone and the love of Jesus is made available through our love for one another. I think this was the initial purpose of this fellowship that met in the old schoolhouse so many years ago; to provide an atmosphere for christians to get together and talk about Jesus. 

It’s great to see us continuing that vision.

Love you much!

Steve

So many things in our lives are affected by the fire of our quick decisions. 

 I’m building a pantry in our Old House.  This Old House is a renovated schoolhouse that served the town of Clayton around the turn of the century.  There was a bathroom and now there is a pantry.  We had to tear up the floor and start by replacing the joists. 

         I’ve tried to get Vickie to draw me up some type of blueprint but I haven’t seen one yet.  After 20 years as a carpenter, this could drive me crazy.  I trust her vision though.  This hole in the house will become the best pantry in the world and store our food in the finest fashion for years to come.        Every day she would  tell me where things were to be built…how high…how deep and how wide. She has an exact design in mind for the door…a screen door.  I know that she had all of this in her heart from the start.

Our church is going thru some amazing changes.  In the next few months we will transition from a Congregationally led Church to a Trustee and Elder led Church.  The Trustees will care for the physical needs and the Elders will care for the spiritual needs.  When I look at the photos of the construction of the first “A” frame of Mehan Union, I see a vision of Godly men and women desiring to build a place where God will be worshipped.  This drew in so many folks that the vision had to be increased to build the sanctuary we worship in now.  Larry, Barry and I were discussing things in our Tuesday staff meeting and the talk turned to the changes voted on the night before.  We weren’t sure why or how this matter needed to be changed but one thing we were sure of…God turned it into something that was in His heart.  Just like Vickie’s vision of a new pantry.  All I saw was a hole in the floor but she saw a new way for that space to serve us. 

Still waiting on that blueprint!

Love you Much!

Steve

Matthew 24:30 “At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory.

Matthew 24: 36-39 No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.

Matthew 24:42 “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come.”  http://www.gazette.com/articles/unemployed-102074-springs-funded.html

Have we gotten so busy livin’ tall at the mall that we’ve forgotten that Jesus is returning for us soon?  One test of this is to ask this question… am I living in despair, desperate for the approval of the people around me and controlled by every whim of the age?  Or am I looking ahead to that Mansion prepared for me rejoicing in the very thought of Jesus asking the Father …”today?  Is it today?

It could be!

Love you much!

Steve

Ok, What does the Holy spirit look like?  What about a dove like in Luke 3:22 New International Version? ²² and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.” Tongues of fire?  Mighty rushing wind?  I want to point something out here…These descriptions of the character of the Holy Spirit are not necessarily visual.  The spirit descended LIKE a dove,  They saw what SEEMED TO BE tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. The SOUND of a mighty rushing wind.  I wonder if it had happened today they would say “it sounded like a train” like so many descriptions I hear on the news about tornados.  So we have to use other  senses other than our eyes like the NT documentarians did.  If I told you that I had the secret to success, the number one tip that would set you up for life and here it is…

וְאָהַבְתָּ אֵת יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ

What… you don’t understand hebrew??? Then we a problem don’t we?  Without understanding they’re just marks on a page.  The Holy spirit gives us understanding. 

The Holy Spirit looks like the gentle force that directs the Monarch to it’s resting place.  The Holy Spirit looks like my GPS directing me toward my destination as I follow it’s sweet voice.  The Holy spirit looks like all of the power of God descending on us, enabling us to carry out His commands like a mighty rushing wind but with the grace of a gentle dove.  The Holy Spirit looks like the assurance and comfort we need to carry these commands out in faith.  The Holy Spirit gives us understanding as we thirst to understand The Word.

The hebrew?  It says “Love Yehovah your God”

Love you much!

Steve

Love you much!

Steve

I’ve always been the type of kid who loves to take things apart.  When I was younger, I took a clock apart.  I never got it working again but I found out how clocks work.  I saw what clocks looked like on the inside.  When a company wants to “recreate” a successful competitor’s product, the first thing they do is take it apart to see how it was made.  This is called reverse engineering.  It also gives the company insight into the mind of the creator…what where they thinking?  What if we could take Adam, man who was created in God’s image, and reverse engineer him.  We wouldn’t want to do that to you or me to see what the creator looks  like because we’re broken by the fall.  Even restored by the blood of Jesus, I don’t think I quite look as good as Adam did fresh out of the dust. 

Now before I get too preposterous and blasphemous, let me ask you, What do you think Father God looks like?  God is a spirit (John 4:24),  so his appearance is not like anything we can describe with our five senses. Exodus 33:20 tells us, “You cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.”  Two passages that powerfully describe God’s amazing appearance are Ezekiel 1:26-28 and Revelation  1:14-16. We may have to look at him thru spiritual eyes.  What does He look like thru your spiritual eyes?  You may not have had the best earthly father but we all can imagine what the perfect father would be like.  It’s Beaver’s dad, Ward Cleaver right?  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0630311/  Let me tell you how I “see” Father God.  He is the most amazing always present, always powerful guidance that lovingly shows me how much I need Him. 

I’m leaving the comments open so that you can tell me how you see Father God.

Love you much!

Steve