Cut to the Heart
Come, let us sing to the Lord!
….Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation.
Let us come to him with thanksgiving.
….Let us sing psalms of praise to him. Psalm 95:1-2 NLT
Acts 2:37-41 (<<click here to read the passage)
When I preach, I try to be careful. I, first of all, want to be sensitive to what the Lord wants me to communicate. And I also strive to not make my sermons too lengthy. I always format my sermons to a font of a certain type and size (I don’t have to be able to see it quite a bit above the pulpit!) Another thing that helps in my ability to see my sermon is I use 1.5 line spacing. I find that it’s easier to not lose my place. (I single space Scripture because I read it word for word.)
So, all in all, with that layout, my sermons are usually 7-8 pages long. Sometimes they’ll get up to 9 pages, but not too often.
One thing that I never worry about is if I happen to have a lot more passages of Scripture than normal. My philosophy is that directly using God’s words has a greater impact on the hearts and minds of my listeners than anything I might add!
After Peter’s sermon, which by the way was full of Old Testament Scripture and was divinely inspired by his being filled with the Holy Spirit, his words pierced his listeners’ hearts (NLT). The Amplified Bible says they were cut to the heart. v37a
Hebrews 4:12 has this to say about God’s word,
For the word of God is living and active and full of power [making it operative, energizing, and effective]. It is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating as far as the division of the soul and spirit [the completeness of a person], and of both joints and marrow [the deepest parts of our nature], exposing and judging the very thoughts and intentions of the heart. AMP
That passage is brought to life in today’s passage! It pierced them and caused them to exclaim to Peter and the other disciples, “Brothers, what should we do?” v37b NLT
I will let Peter’s response speak for itself,
“Repent [change your old way of thinking, turn from your sinful ways, accept and follow Jesus as the Messiah] and be baptized, each of you, in the name of Jesus Christ because of the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise [of the Holy Spirit] is for you and your children and for all who are far away [including the Gentiles], as many as the Lord our God calls to Himself.” v38-39
We can feel impacted by God’s word, but we can’t leave it at that. We must act! Just pulling a few words from the Amplified Bible points to action – repent – change – turn – accept – follow!
God’s word must motivate us! We can’t leave it at, “Ow! That hurt! Oof! Man, that stepped on my toes! Ugh! That cut ran deep!”
It may sound pretty silly but staying where we are doesn’t get us anywhere! We have to move! We have to go! We have to do! Those actions don’t save us – only Jesus’ actions can do that! – but those actions reflect that action on our hearts, souls, and minds!
Jesus, move us! Amen!
Jan 9th, 2022, Sun, 6:49 pm
Keep Your Damper Open
[The godly] will declare, “The Lord is just!
….He is my rock!
….There is no evil in him!” Psalm 92:15 NLT
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OK, I began this evening by jotting down some thoughts for my opening prayer. But then it became more than an opening prayer! So read on!
This has been one of the coldest days we’ve had in a while. Just as the warmth of the fire in our woodstove will only extend as far as we allow it in the house, so it can be with the warmth of Your Spirit, Father, in our lives.
There is a thing called a damper that retains the heat that would normally escape up our flue. It allows the heat to dissipate into the area being heated by the woodstove. Our wood stove sits in the corner of our living room.
When I need to start a fire, I place two or three logs in the bottom of the stove then place a quarter of a starter brick on top of those. (It’s basically a chunk of sawdust held together by a flammable waxy substance). I add another log or two on top of that, make sure by damper is fully opened, and light the starter brick. The fully opened damper allows the firebox to draw the most air, enabling the fire to start pretty quickly.
Now the fire has to be carefully managed or it can drive you out of the house because it gets so hot. (We learned that the hard way…but that’s another story for another time!) Once the metal casing of the stove gets hot, I usually shut the damper down to its lowest position. This allows only the most minimal amount of air to pass through – enough to keep things burning without letting it get out of control.
Did you know that we are the damper in our relationship with God? Spiritually I really don’t think there’s any reason to ever dampen the Holy Spirit’s work in and through our lives…but we are very good at shutting our dampers down to the lowest positions possible. Unfortunately, we can shut it down so low that the fire that once burned brightly in our lives is almost snuffed out.
On my woodstove there is a lever at the base that I can move left or right, controlling the amount of air allowed in the firebox. Spiritually things that dampen the Spirit’s ability to work in our lives are too numerous to name in their entirety. And they’re different for each of us. One the comes to mind is yielding to temptation. Anything that tempts us, puts a damper on our spirituality. The acts committed do that and more often than not, the amount of time we give to those temptations dampens our relationship with God as well. It takes time away from godly, uplifting activities we could be doing – reading our Bibles, praying, calling and encouraging the disheartened and downtrodden (We all know people who fit into those categories!)
But sometimes it’s not just doing bad things that hinder our spiritual walk. Sometimes it’s the good things that we are so hell-bent on accomplishing that take an exorbitant amount of time. We become so fixated that we quickly work God out of the process. We must be careful.
Lord Jesus, help us to keep our dampers open. May we allow the Holy Spirit to use us throughout each day to bring light and life to the world that is dying around us. Amen.
Jan 6th, 2022, Thurs, 7:12 pm
Raptors Amongst Us!
You thrill me, Lord, with all you have done for me!
….I sing for joy because of what you have done. Psalm 92:4 NLT
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This morning I saw something that I have never seen…in the wild at least! At least, I’m pretty sure it’s what I saw. On my pre-dawn journey to pick up my middle school and high school kids, a light-colored form flew not too far away in front of my bus. It wasn’t really big, but big enough to catch my attention.
It flew so that would make it a bird.
It was in the dark of night so obviously, it must be nocturnal. (Duh!)
So, the only nocturnal birds that I know of are owls! I’ve heard them on occasion but have only seen one that had died when hit by a car some years ago. (It was a little Northern Saw-whet Owl. They are only 7 to 8 inches in length with a wingspan of 16 to 19 inches.) But the owl I saw was much bigger.
Due to the light color of its underbelly, I’m pretty sure what I saw was a Barn Owl.
They are 14 to 20 inches tall with a wingspan of 40 to 45 inches – so not too big and not too small. There are several interesting facts about Barn Owls.
- They are considered medium-sized raptors, nocturnal birds of prey like other owls. Raptors have strong grasping talons for killing prey, and a hooked upper beak for tearing meat.
- They can eat more than their own weight of mice and rats in one evening.
- They often swallow their food whole – bits of fur and bone are then regurgitated (coughed up) as an owl pellet.
- They never hoot, they screech.
- They have very long legs, toes, and talons to help them to catch prey hidden under long grass.
- Their large eyes are very sensitive – they can quickly spot a mouse moving in a very gloomy barn.
But the one fact that I want to hone in on is that their ear openings are at slightly different levels on the head and set at different angles. They are covered by a flexible ruff made up of short, dense feathers, which frame the face, turning it into a dish-like amplifier for sound.
Don’t you think that would be something worth emulating? In far too many instances our mouths are more active than our ears. You would think with two ears and only one mouth that we would listen twice as much as speak, but unfortunately, that is rarely the case.
What if in our interactions with others we focused less on speaking and more on listening? I often like to interject what and who I know into conversations but if I concentrated on using my whole face to listen – really listen – to them, what would I “hear”? Of course, our ears hear. But our eyes should watch for facial expressions and posture that can communicate a great deal about a person. If we truly strove to be intentional in our interactions, what all could we pick up on? Too often we brush past obvious audible and visible signs of someone’s need.
Lord Jesus, may we take the words of James 1:19 to heart,
Understand this, my beloved brothers and sisters. Let everyone be quick to hear [be a careful, thoughtful listener], slow to speak [a speaker of carefully chosen words and], slow to anger [patient, reflective, forgiving]… AMP
Jan 5th, 2022, Wed, 8:28 pm
Death No Longer Has the Final Word!
Father, a lot is going on right now. I would pray that you would watch over us, keep us safe, bring us through exactly to the place You want us to be. Amen.
Acts 2:22-41 (<<click here to read the passage)
Death. We don’t like talking about it. We don’t like planning for it – even though we know that it is inevitable. Christians like to throw in a statement regarding Jesus’ ultimate return, hoping that we can sidestep death and stride right into God’s presence. That day will surely come but we best be prepared for what will surely come.
This past December I officiated the services of three wonderful women. The first was a dear friend that I had worked with for several years at my third “church” – Kohl’s. By just about everyone’s account, she was far too young to have succumbed to death. She was a young 57.
The other two ladies were members of one of the first congregations that I pastored in the United Methodist Church. I thought of them as old then but that was 20 years ago! One was 92 and the other missed her 100th birthday by a mere 21 days! They were quite a bit older, but did that make their passing any easier on those who loved them? No…there were tears shed at all three partings. The deaths of all three were felt deeply by many.
And they are most certainly not alone. We have all lost family and other loved ones in recent memory. And, really, just because they are recent doesn’t matter a whole lot. Those we have lost in years past can still bring tears to our eyes – mothers, fathers, grandparents, and the list goes on and on.
In my 20 years of pastoral ministry, I’ve been a part of 58 services where people have had to say their final goodbyes to those near and dear to their hearts. But I can’t hold a candle to my dad who just retired from the ministry three years ago at the “young” age of 81. The funeral and graveside services at which he officiated numbered well into the hundreds.
So why this morbid topic? After all, I did say we don’t like talking about it.
After the infilling of the Holy Spirit of those 120 gathered in the upper room, Peter stepped out to address the crowd of astonished onlookers. We find a portion of his sermon in verses 23-24. He declared,
“…this Man [Jesus], when handed over [to the Roman authorities] according to the predetermined decision and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross and put to death by the hands of lawless and godless men. But God raised Him up, releasing Him and bringing an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in death’s power.” AMP
What got my attention was that last sentence, which I emboldened.
So many of the services that have been held throughout the millennia remembering those who have gone before us have been filled with agony. Each passing individual it seems has been impossibly wrapped in death’s clutches and we’ve been powerless to overcome it.
But that is where we are wrong!
Death’s power has been defeated! The agony of death has been brought to end! Yes, we still have to deal with it. But in the scheme of time, it is but a breath. Only the shell of those who die in the Lord has been destroyed. Only their souls have left us, and we will see them again when we are united in the glorified bodies we will inhabit for all of eternity! Death no longer has the final word. God took care of that! Eternal praise to Him!
Jan 4th, 2022, Tues, 5:51 pm
Heads or Tails – Choice Not Chance
Back at the norm today, Father. I’m grateful that all of my routes went smoothly and really the whole day went without a hitch! Some might call that good luck, but I give You the credit for every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above; it comes down from the Father of lights [the Creator and Sustainer of the heavens]… James 1:7a AMP
Acts 2:14-21 (<<click here to read the passage)
Throughout biblical history, humankind has always had a choice. In a way, it’s like a coin. We either choose heads or tails. But in this instance, there is absolutely no chance involved. We have been given the free will to decide for ourselves what we want – we either choose heads or we choose tails. We cannot pin the blame on anyone else for our poor choices and no one else can take the credit for our wise choices. The end result is entirely decided by us and only us.
Thinking along those lines got me pondering about grace and mercy. These two concepts are cornerstones of our faith. If God did not extend them to us, we would be hopelessly lost with no possibility of salvation.
I poked around and found an excellent article entitled, What Is the Difference Between Grace and Mercy?, on the Christianity.com website (click the title to read it).
Here is a super easy-to-understand layout of what the concepts of grace and mercy mean. (They paraphrased it from Willmington’s Guide to the Bible).
Mercy and grace…can be differentiated as follows: mercy is the act of withholding deserved punishment, while grace is the act of endowing unmerited favor. In His mercy, God does not give us punishment we deserve, (eternal death) namely hell; while in His grace, God gives us the gift we do not deserve, (eternal life) namely heaven.
Our eternal destiny is totally, entirely, wholly, completely, up to us.
Today’s passage follows these parameters. Peter here is quoting the Old Testament Prophet Joel (Joel 2:28-32). Acts 2:17-18 ties into what happens when we choose to accept God’s grace and mercy, whereas Acts 2:19-20 ties into choosing not to accept His grace and mercy.
Completeness in Him or separation from Him. It is our choice.
You would think it would be a no-brainer, but humanity often doesn’t see it that way. Salvation or condemnation, again the choice is ours. Yet the final reward for those who choose grace and mercy is found in verse 21,
But everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. NLT
What will our choice be? Heads…or tails? And just as important in eternal impact, is the question, will you be a beacon of hope to help others make their choice, too?
Jan 3rd, 2022, Mon, 6:58 pm