“And when He had taken some bread and given thanks, He broke it and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is My body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’ And in the same way He took the cup after they had eaten, saying, ‘This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood’ (Luke 22:19-20).

We read in the Gospels about how the Lord took the bread and blessed it and gave thanks. The root word behind “given thanks” comes from the Greek eucharista. This is why we often call The Lord’s Supper the sacrement of the Eucharist. Our churches commonly refer to this as “Communion;” however many in the Body of Christ call it the Eucharist. This refers to the root idea in the Greek word for “giving thanks”.

We know that there is great power in the communion. It is our connection with the Lord, our memorial of His suffering and death, and the provision of salvation from our sins. But at the heart of it all is that the Lord first sat down and gave thanks to God His father. From the very outset, Jesus makes thanksgiving the priority.

Let’s follow in our Lord’s example. Come before the Father and thank Him for the provision of Jesus Christ the Son, for our adoption into God’s family. Next time we partake of Communion, begin by saying, “Thank you Father for your love and grace expressed in Jesus Christ.”

11/26/2017 Sunday AM, Shiloh in Kalona, IA

2/26/2017 Sunday AM, Shiloh in Kalona, IA

Adam openly walked with God in the garden. There was a closeness and intimacy of trust that existed between them. At some point, the adversary interjected mistrust into their relationship; accusing God saying, “has God said?” (Gen. 3:1). This mistrust played a role in Adam and Eve’s disobedience; they felt the need to take matters into their own hands and disobeyed God. One of the greatest ways that we find ourselves being separated from God is in our mistrust of Him.

In the wilderness, God humbled the Children of Israel by feeding them manna every day (Deut. 8:3). It was a test that asked, “Will you love me and trust me, or will you continue to take back control and try to provide for yourself?” God was testing the people to see if they would trust that He would take care of them. It can be a humbling experience to live in trusting dependence on another.

Mistrust is the source of many of our anxieties. What am I to do next in my life? Will God take care of me? Am I going to end up in poverty and despair? We may have volumes of personal fears that we live with all the time. These fears grow in an environment of mistrust and lead to unhealthy ways of life. We act selfishly because we don’t trust that anyone else will help us or take care of us. We think we must fend for ourselves if we are to have what we need in our lives. The patterns formed by these mistrusting attitudes, which have led to many of the humanities problems , could only be broken by a revelation of God’s faithfulness. A revelation that has come to us in Jesus Christ.

Jesus came into the world to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8). What are the works of the devil? He caused mankind to mistrust God. Christ came to destroy that mistrust. In the darkest moment of His sacrifice, He gave Himself to completely trust God; refusing to save Himself, He said “into your hands I commit my spirit” (Luke 23:35,46). This statement was the end of mistrust.

We cannot end our own mistrust, but we can draw upon the victory of Christ that has destroyed it. As we confess our mistrust to Him, we also open our hearts to let the Holy Spirit fill us with Christ’s trust. When problems arise, we no longer take matters into our own hands in an attempt to fix everything ourselves, but rather we live in the trust of the Lord that is sustained by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

Scriptures: Deut. 8:2-5, 13:1-4; Isa. 44:16-17; Matt. 6:25-32; 1 Pet. 5:7; 1 John 3:8

2/19/2017 Sunday AM, Shiloh in Kalona, IA

Have you ever been told that God cannot look upon you because of your sin? Does it strike you as odd that our loving Father who created humankind and called it very good could be so repulsed by His creation that He could not bear to be around them? This understanding of salvation tends to paint God as harsh and angry. I believe this misconception requires that we take a moment and look at things from God’s perspective.

Genesis 2 tells the story of man and woman and their life with God in the garden. In their created state, though immature and unaware, they felt no shame and had no reason to hide from God or one another. They also felt no need to be like God because they knew He was in their lives to guide them and mature them. Into this picture, a very specific misconception was introduced by the serpent. Not a direct lie, but a misstating of a truth that painted God in a bad light and exposed Adam and Eve to their own immaturity before they were ready.

Certainly, there are many ways to understand the fall of humankind, but can we stop for a moment and realize that these two children were suddenly and negatively exposed to their immaturity and told that God did not carry their needs in His heart? Their reaction was like that of any child who has been exposed to their own immaturity without love. They began to lie, blame, and hide from God and one another. This became the new state of their relationships.

The relationship that was once their freedom and joy, became painful and exposing to the extent that God needed to distance them from His holiness as He continued to work out their redemption, which He did until the fullness of time came and God Himself entered the world in the humanity of Jesus Christ (Gal 4:4). The incarnation of Christ must be understood in these personal terms.

When God entered the world, He saw Himself through our eyes. He experienced in Christ our overwhelming desire to hide, blame, and run from Him. He encountered in His own person our fear of Him as the angry punisher. If Christ was tempted in every way as we are (Heb. 4:15), then part of that temptation was to experience our misconception of God as Father. However, Christ knew no sin. He did not buy into humanity’s misconception of God, but instead ever lives to reveal God to us (John 1:14-18) and to present us to God (John 14:3).

This is now the state of our relationship with God. We are known by Him (1 Cor. 13:12) and as He brings us to know Himself we have no reason to hide or to be ashamed (1 Jn. 2:28). His love bears and covers all things (1 Cor. 13:7) and draws us to know ourselves as His beloved children (1 Jn. 3:2). In Christ, all are called to live open, exposing to the Lord all that is taking place within us (Heb. 4:13), while His loving discipline matures us to share in His holiness (Heb. 12:10). Let us come out of hiding and come confidently to the throne of grace to find help in our time of need (Heb. 4:16).

Scriptures: Gen 2:7-25, 3:1,7-11; Exo. 33:19, 34:6-7; John 1:14-18; Cor. 3:12; Heb. 4:12-16

There is a short window of time between the Day of Atonement and the Feast of Tabernacles when we have a moment to take stock of where we have been and where we are going in this next year. It is important that we count the cost and prepare ourselves for what is ahead.

Our salvation in Christ is expressed in all of the feasts, from the lamb slain at Passover to our coming to abide with the Father in the fullness of reconciliation and redemption at Tabernacles. And just before Tabernacles, the feast of abiding with the Father, there is this moment of cleansing, the Day of Atonement when God’s people are made clean. When all that hold us back from experiencing His fullness is removed from us.

We know that this picture is eternal. Within our lives we will experience time and again the sanctifying work of the Lord. We will ever be drawn closer to His fullness. In these few days between cleansing and abiding, I want to come before Him in humility. I want to ask myself, “What can I do to be more fruitful this year? How can I participate with the Lord in what He is doing?”

In Luke 14 Christ leads His disciples to ask themselves a similar question. He said, “If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:25). Though hate may be a strong word, the translator’s note explains, “by comparison of his love for Me.”  We can’t be His followers if something rivals our relationship with Him. Jesus is saying, “I have to be first. You must love me more than all these things.”

He continues, “If anyone does not carry his own cross and come after me he cannot be my disciple.” Not only must He be first in our affections, we must be the ones who follow in obedience and keep Him there. Only in our own hearts can we honestly say if He is first. This is not from our strength, but by His Spirit. We ask for His Spirit daily to give us both the desire and the enabling to walk in obedience to this commandment. We cry like the psalmist,  “Make me walk in the path of Your commandments” (Psalm 119:35).

We are anticipating a year of growth and tremendous fruitfulness. We are going to learn to abide in His presence and He will keep showing and removing from us everything that takes away from Him being the center of our lives (John 15:1-5).

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9/27/2015 Sunday AM, Shiloh, IA

Every move of God or outpouring in the history of mankind was precipitated and instigated by the prayer of men and women of God, those who reached into the Word and contended with God to see it fulfilled. Although God is subject to no one, in a manner He has limited how He interacts with mankind to be initiated by the prayers of His people. It is our asking that draws Him into history. He is ever waiting for us to engage Him in prayer.

I have been taking stock of my own prayer life. Am I walking like my fathers in the gospel?  Am I exercising the spirit I have received to stand before the Lord and contend for what He promised? Where I see things in the world and in our lives that don’t line up with the Word, am I asking God for the answer?

We should be asking for the spirit of Samuel to rest on us. It was Samuel who said, “Moreover, as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you” (1 Samuel 12:23a). It was through Samuel’s prayer life that the face of his nation was turned from idolatry and witchcraft to the things of God. The Lord is calling us to this same level of prayer now. There is nothing that cannot be changed by prayer. We give our hearts to prayer, not as an optional part of our walk with God, but as the only means by which God has said He will use to bring about the changes in this world that we are looking for.

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The Lord is constantly imparting His grace and peace to us. We see this phrase and concept repeated over and over in the scriptures. It was the prayer of Moses where he says, “The Lord bless you, and keep you; the Lord make His face shine on you, and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up His countenance on you, and give you peace” (Numbers 6:24-26). Peter uses a similar expression saying, “Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord” (2 Peter 1:2). And Paul uses this expression many times in his letters to the churches (Romans 1:7, 1 Corinthians 1:3, 2 Corinthians 1:2, Galatians 1:3, Ephesians 1:2, and more…).

As we receive the grace and peace that God is ministering to us, we should turn to minister that same grace. When we pray it should come with the same power and authority that is resident with Christ since He dwells in us. Even though we may be infants in our maturity, God has granted us all things pertaining to life and Godliness and we are partakers of that divine nature. We should pray knowing that the divine nature of the Father is working through us. Pray believing that Christ in you is imparting His grace and peace to every person and situation that you address.

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God is determined to be the center of our lives. When He created us it was not out of a need He had, but rather that we might have a relationship with Him and come to glorify Him. We were created to have God as the center of our lives and the sole focus of our worship.

Mankind’s fall into corruption might seem like a complicated topic, but it can be simply explained by realizing that Adam and Eve became the center of their own lives in place of God. As long a person views themselves as the center instead of God, everything they do will go towards corruption.

Jesus Christ has come to be our redeemer from the narrowness of self (2 Corinthians 5:15). As we receive Him, the Good News of our salvation, we are delivered from authority of darkness, reconciled to God, and we begin to bear fruit in every good work and increase in the knowledge of God (Col 1:9-20). We repent (turn away) from our centering on self and we turn back to God as our center.

We approach the communion table in the simplicity of the night He gave His life – look into His eyes as He breaks the bread and hands you the cup. Receive the deliverance He has given you through His sacrifice and come to share in the fruitfulness of the Son who ever lives with His Father as the loving center of His life.

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