I received a text question on Sunday after the benediction. The texter was asking me to clear up some verbiage I used that could easily be misunderstood (or misconstrued).
You mentioned “transfer your faith” when referring to our children. Can you clarify what you mean?
This is a simple, yet loaded question.
Firstly, there is no way to transfer your faith that does not involve your child’s receiving it (John 1:12). Yes, Paul seems to understand that a parent “covers” the child in the home (1 Cor 7:14), but faith otherwise is personal.
Secondly, the family prepares the soil. Mistakes will be made, but love covers a multitude of sin and pray like mad, because ultimately it’s in His hands.
Thirdly, the word “faith” has a number of implications and I likely meant ALL of them:
Theologically, saving faith is a one-time action. The moment we believe in Jesus we have everlasting life. We are justified. We are forgiven. We are sealed. We are born again. And yes, we are babies.
“Faith” in this context could be thought of as by faith day-to-day following Jesus and His Word by which we grow into mature believers.
And of course the epistles often refer to the whole of Christian teaching as “the faith”.
As I recall, I had a slide up with the words from Deuteronomy 6:6-8 discussing the parents’ role of continuous teaching. While that slide was up, I also mentioned that we need to be faithfully modeling. It is through those two means that we “transfer our faith” to our children. Our saving faith, our living faith, and our body of knowledge (Ephesians 6:4).
“If God can do everything, then can He do nothing?” Was a forwarded text message I received on Sunday night. I don’t know who asked the question and, while I appreciate that there is “protection” in anonymity, it also requires that I make some guesses. So here goes.
I initially read this as a paradox question: “Can God make a rock he can’t lift?” or “Can God make a square circle?” The “everything” contrasting with the “nothing.” Christians have been wrestling with those questions for two millennia. The conclusions have ranged from “He’s God and can do whatever He wills” to “That question is in itself absurd and God is a God of logic and reason.”
Then I thought, perhaps he meant “is God ever inactive?” This ties directly to Genesis 2:2-3 wherein God says that he “rested on the 7th day.” A closer examination shows us that God specifically rested from creating. We know that He keeps the galaxies and even very atoms in our bodies spinning (Colossians 1:17) and that He doesn’t ever sleep (Psalm 121:4). And we have countless verses that mention His watching presence (e.g.For the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His – 2 Chronicles 16:9)! And His accompanying presence (Be strong and courageous, do not be afraid or tremble at them, for the Lord your God is the one who goes with you. He will not fail you or forsake you.” Deuteronomy 31:6, cf. Matthew 28:20; Hebrews 13:5). So my read of the Bible is that the answer is no, YHWH is never inactive. He rested from the work of creating after 6 days, but He is an active, engaged, Sovereign!
It’s also possible that the text sender meant “nothing” in the sense of “in my life” or “in answer to my prayers.” My answer there would mostly be from the various Old Testament stories that teach us that God’s timing is often measured in years, decades, or even generations, while ours is measured in hours or days. Also God is working with a massive 4-D chess board, and sometimes it’s not about me. In 2000, I preached through the book of Genesis. I will never forget how I was hit by Chapter 8 verse 1: But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the cattle that were with him in the ark; and God caused a wind to pass over the earth, and the water subsided (Genesis 8:1, emphasis added). God hadn’t really forgotten His main character, the only humans left alive, it was the author’s way of saying that God’s attention had been elsewhere. God had been busy bringing up the waters from the depth and releasing the waters from the firmament. He was destroying His first creation. He was dealing with something OTHER than Noah and His family. Not every crisis, nor every storm, nor every disagreement, nor every ”unsettling situation” is about me. Sometimes, God is doing something else! But He never removes His hand (John 10:28)! And sometimes His answer to our prayer is simply, “No, my child.”
Imagine what Adam and Eve learned about God’s generosity from their first impression of him on their first day. Their first knowledge of God and the world God had made was that rest was not an afterthought — rest was of first importance….
Adam and Eve had accomplished nothing to earn this gratuitous day of rest. Sabbath is, in my estimation, the first image of the Gospel in the biblical story. God’s nature always gives rest first; work comes later. This is reflected in all of our lives. Before our lives in this world began, we got nine months of rest in the womb.
Before taking up a vocation, we get a few years to just play as children. And before our six days of labor, we receive the day of rest. Karl Barth famously pointed out that the only thing Adam and Eve had to celebrate on that first Sabbath was God and His creation:
I stumbled across this “clipping” while in pursuit of another line of inquiry, but I thought it was worth publishing here because we don’t really have a “sabbath” anymore. We fully acknowledge that out of the 10 commandments it’s the only one not repeated in the New Testament and we, along with the vast majority of Christian churches, gather on Resurrection Sunday rather than Sabbath Saturday for our day of Worship. We don’t keep ceremonial laws, including those that count steps taken on Saturdays (shabbat) nor work done or fires lit. And we don’t, universally, treat our own day of worship as a day of rest either. I am adamantly NOT trying to introduce a new legalism, but I think every once in a while I need to be reminded that the sabbath wasn’t just part of the decalogue. It was part of creation. We function better if we rest. Amen?
A man hiking out of the Chugach mountains of Alaska hoped to make it to camp before a deadly blizzard hit. He was too late. The blizzard struck with such a fury that he was unable to see even two feet in front of his face. The windblown snow and ice knocked him off his feet as he struggled to find his way. Although he knew he was only a short distance from camp, he lost his sense of direction and couldn’t determine which way to go. Finally, in the dark of night, he slumped down into a snowbank — cold, wet, and totally exhausted. He could go no further. He resigned himself to die.
As he lay there in the snow, he thought he heard something – a faint cry, like the whimpering of a puppy. He called out to it and tried to crawl toward the sound. Sure enough, it was a dog lost in the storm. The puppy had somehow become separated from its mother and was freezing to death. The man quickly began rubbing the dog’s fur, trying to keep the dog’s blood circulating so that the dog would survive. He warmed the dog with his breath, continuing through the night to try to keep the puppy alive.
The next day scouts from the village found both the man and the dog alive. They discovered that the man, by working to keep the little dog alive during the night, had kept himself alive as well.
A quick Google search just told me that the “self-care” industry has grown 47% in the last 5 years. And yet, the Bible tells us to “Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.” Not only will this make us more like Christ, but it may also rescue our hearts or even save our lives!
I’m reposting this both for its apologetic value and its devotional value. BOTH serve as good reminders, PLEASE take the time to read this C.S. Lewis piece. ~ Pastor Scott
In February 1963, C.S. Lewis published an essay exploring a number of topics related to space-travel, including the idea of finding God in space (A response to Nikita Khrushchev’s proclamation in 1961, that cosmonauts never saw God in space) He wrote:
The Russians, I am told, report that they have not found God in outer space… Looking for God—or Heaven—by exploring space is like reading or seeing all Shakespeare’s plays in the hope that you will find Shakespeare as one of the characters or Stratford as one of the places. Shakespeare is in one sense present at every moment in every play. But he is never present in the same way as Falstaff or Lady Macbeth. Nor is he diffused through the play like a gas…
Now of course this is only an analogy. I am not suggesting at all that the existence of God is as easily established as the existence of Shakespeare. My point is that, if God does exist, He is related to the universe more as an author is related to a play than as one object in the universe is related to another.
If God created the universe, He created space-time, which is to the universe as the metre is to a poem or the key is to music. To look for Him as one item within the framework which He Himself invented is nonsensical…
How, then, it may be asked, can we either reach or avoid Him?…in our own time and place, [avoiding God] is extremely easy. Avoid silence, avoid solitude, avoid any train of thought that leads off the beaten track. Concentrate on money, sex, status, health and (above all) on your own grievances. Keep the radio on. Live in a crowd. Use plenty of sedation. If you must read books, select them very carefully. But you’d be safer to stick to the papers. You’ll find the advertisements helpful; especially those with a sexy or a snobbish appeal.
About the reaching, I am a far less reliable guide. This is because I never had the experience of looking for God. It was the other way round; He was the hunter (or so it seemed to me) and I was the deer…
Space-travel really has nothing to do with the matter. To some, God is discoverable everywhere; to others, nowhere. Those who do not find Him on earth are unlikely to find Him in space. (Hang it all, we’re in space already; every year we do a huge circular tour in space.) But send a saint up in a spaceship and he’ll find God in space as he found God on earth. Much depends on the seeing eye.1
If we are Christians, we know and are known by the God who created the universe and have many reasons to give Him thanks. On a cautionary note, however, Lewis’s insight into how easy it is to avoid God has applicability to Christians as well as non-believers. Christians can avoid God by living their lives concentrating on money, sex, status and the like, and consequently remain spiritually immature and experience little of the transforming power of Christ. Let us keep our focus on Jesus as Lord and Savior, and pursue a life of holiness and righteousness.
“The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.”
PSALM 19:1 (ESV)
1 C.S. Lewis, The Seeing Eye, from Christian Reflections, edited by Walter Hooper, Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1995, pp. 167-169, 171.
Because all four Gospels tell the story of Jesus’s death and resurrection we get a number of vignettes, not all of which are covered from the pulpit each Easter weekend. One of my favorites is the story of Peter cutting off Malchus’ ear. It’s my favorite because in my flesh I admire Peter’s desire to do “something”! Even more than that I admire Jesus’ cool head. Despite the burden He was bearing He took no joy in vengeance; He stayed on mission. He also, according to John’s gospel, took a moment to heal Malchus’ ear. The other three Gospels protect both Peter’s and the guard’s identity but John, writing at a later date, names names and he is also the only one who mentions the restoration of the ear. I won’t read into the text, but I believe it’s safe to observe that Jesus’ act of kindness to the guard, Malchus, also wiped away all evidence of Peter’s offense. Had the authorities ever wanted to pursue Peter for striking a temple guard, they would have had to declare him righteous because there was nothing there to accuse him of. It was as if he had never acted. Hours before Jesus went to the cross to exchange our sin for His righteousness, He essentially did that for Peter, He wiped away Peter’s transgression.
So imagine Malchus trying to get “justice.”
Malchus: “Sir, one of those disciples cut off my ear.”
Judge: “Looks to me like you have two ears.”
In Revelation 12:10 Satan is called the accuser of the brethren. So imagine Satan bringing your name before the judge!
Satan: “Scott is weak in his faith, he forgets to pray first, he loses his temper, he loses his focus, he fails to complete his tasks…..”
God: “Looks to Me that he has been washed by the blood of My Son, I see no sin on him, he is absolutely clean!”
“He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” ~2 Corinthians 5:21
John 4 records the interaction between Jesus and the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well. In the first verses she is clearlyidentified as a “Samaritan” – someone of a mixed race with whom Jews had little to do. A “woman” – someone a Jewish man ought to steer clear of. And, a “serial adulterer” that a righteous person should shun. But Jesus, after using the I.D. to prove Who He is, blows right past that to her need for eternal life: “but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life” (John 4:14).
Today, despite prison reform for thieves and swindlers, despite Weight Watchers and workout routines for sedentary over eaters, we live in a day where certain sinful behaviors, certain consistent temptations, are labeled as” identities;” unchangeable aspects of someone’s very nature. When viewed with a little detachment, one can clearly see:
a) Satan’s hand – you must accept what I do as who I am – imagine saying that to your PE teacher back in the day as he smacks the candy bar right out of your hand!
b) God’s wrath – Romans 1 says that as we suppress that worship of God and turn to the worship of creatures, He will give us over to unnatural lusts.
That said, if you are told from the very beginning this is WHO you are, it’s no wonder that we have folks who identify themselves accordingly.
Jesus didn’t make an issue of this person’s race, gender, or sin proclivities when He offered her the Water of Life. His concern was for her salvation. Brothers and sisters that’s where our concern needs to be, too. We aren’t going to beat Satan at his game in the media or by flying anti-rainbow flags. Jesus is coming back on a white horse and He will deal with all that nonsense once and for all!
We need to love individuals and share the gospel with individuals. If those individuals are believers struggling with this sin, then they need to be reassured that it’s just “a” sin not “the” sin. Holiness is the goal for all of us. We all struggle with being honest, with being faithful, with being just, with being loyal, with being pure of thought. Their proclivity is a leaf on the tree, the root of which needs to be made holy by the blood of Jesus.
Pastor Scott
P.S. The genesis of this blog was a rainbow flag flying in front of a church that previously seemed to have shown no such sign. As I drove past I realized that their intention was to be loving, not to condone evil, their unseen error was believing the “identity deception.”
I took an extra day off this week to get some painting done in our home. The bending over to cut in along the baseboard and stretching up to cut in along the ceiling hurt my back more than I remember. I blamed my rather sedentary occupation and was consoled by a family member who reminded me that I was also a grandfather of 8…
So I have a LOT of empathy with Randy, and those to whom this article was aimed (yes, it’s a bit of an advertisement for his book), but that just means he’s a more gifted blogger than am I. 🙂 Enjoy! Pastor Scott
200+Randy Alcorn’s Blog by Randy Alcorn / Mar 4, 2024 at 4:07 AM//keep unread//hide
Our society holds on to youthfulness with a white-knuckled grip. We worship youth and consider the elderly at best, useless; and at worst, disposable. God’s perspective is very different: “Gray hair is a glorious crown; it is found in the ways of righteousness” (Proverbs 16:31). Titus 2 encourages both older men and women to be examples to those who are younger, and to teach them God’s ways.
I love to be around older people—that is, older people who have sweetened with age, not those who have soured. Choose which you’d rather be. (And since I’m turning 70 this year, I guess I’m an “older person” too, though I feel no need or desire to retire. I’m as excited about ministry as I’ve ever been, so I’ll trust God to make it clear when I need to start cutting back.)
As you grow older, you can be one of those godly older saints people love to be around. The more you’ve walked with the Lord, the more you’ll have to offer your children, grandchildren, great grandchildren, friends, neighbors, and church family. Remember, if God didn’t have a purpose for you here, you wouldn’t be here. (As I’ve written previously, those who’ve retired from jobs still have great opportunity to serve God in the next season of life. Even if you’re unable to physically serve, your prayers, giving, and influence can have eternal impact.)
Last December, a reader named Sharon ordered copies of my book Seeing the Unseen to hand out to teens. She’s almost 70 and works with the youth at her church and its associated school. Sharon gave a talk to high school girls on her wedding anniversary (which has previously been a very difficult day, since her husband died five years ago). She wrote us:
I am so excited! I am having lunch with the 40 girls who received Seeing the Unseen. I am going to have pizza delivered to the school, and I want to hear from them. I should tell you the school is located at our church, so I see so many of the girls on Sunday. Tell Randy several of the girls have told me their family is using his devotional as a family devotional. Is that awesome or what!
And because our Father has me with the teens every Thursday night, I already have a connection with them. …To be able to pour into their lives more of Jesus AND TO GET EXCITED ABOUT HEAVEN AND ALL THAT IS TO COME helps this daughter of the King know why she is still here. …My talk on December 13th was such a gift to me.
I am a big word picture person. So here’s my word picture! Our Father invited me to go to work with Him. He sat me in the front row, and I got to see Him touch the lives of those sweet teens. Just watching our Father be God, here and now, makes me soooooo excited for Heaven and the New Earth.
She also wrote:
As far as ministry after 70: well, let me tell you! It gets bigger and better! I am 69 years old. I have been with teen ministry for 30 years. I pray every summer, “Father, please place me where You want me; if I am no longer effective, move me.” I think I might add this to my prayer this year: “Father please keep me from breaking anything while I am playing dodgeball and baseball with the teens!”
We NEVER retire from God. We just let Him move us where He wants us.
Whatever your age, how might God be calling you to make an eternal impact for His kingdom?
Grace Notes 