What a glorious morning, the thunder and the lightening showing forth His glory. What a difference is all of creation when we see His mighty loving hands behind the way things are, even if those things are broken. Blessing and Glory and Honor be unto the One Who Sits on the Throne, and to the Lamb, and to the fullness of the Mighty Spirit who so evidently does as He pleases.
Isaiah says:
23 Sing, O heavens, for the Lord has done it;
shout, O depths of the earth;
break forth into singing, O mountains,
O forest, and every tree in it!
For the Lord has redeemed Jacob, and will be glorified in Israel.
24 Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, who formed you from the womb:
“I am the Lord, who made all things,
who alone stretched out the heavens,
who spread out the earth by myself,
This song of Glory is all around us at all times. We have to listen to hear it and look to see it with ears and eyes opened by the Spirit of God. Yet this speaks some of what C. S. Lewis refers to as the “Deeper Magic.” That order of things which are at the root and ground of all Creation and the basis for Redemption. The heavens sing of his mighty acts, what he has done. All these things are founded, not on some random chance, nor do these things make themselves. The LORD makes all things. He stretched the canvas of the Earth and he painted on it what he liked. He redeemed us from sin that had an infinite penalty because it was sin against an infinitely holy God. He is still drawing our story and we get to color in the picture. He is worth singing about.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
September 13 Sermon
What follows is the essence of Sunday's Sermon. Our recording equipment failed so here are my notes.
Today we remember. Today we follow a long standing biblical practice of remembering how the Lord has accomplished deliverance for us. This remembering is not always pleasant or easy. It is not necessary to only remember the good stuff. Yet we are to see the salvation of the Lord in the thing we remember. Why did God send us Ike? I am not sure we can have all the answers yet there are clues if we look at the time leading up to Ike and the time since Ike. We will examine some of them in light of this scripture from Isaiah in which the Lord first points out the futility of idols and then points us to a place where He can be found.
Isaiah 57 (ESV) 13 When you cry out, let your collection of idols deliver you! The wind will carry them off, a breath will take them away. But he who takes refuge in me shall possess the land and shall inherit my holy mountain. 14 And it shall be said, “Build up, build up, prepare the way, remove every obstruction from my people’s way.” 15 For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.
On the road to Ike we saw the hand of God moving preparing us for what was to come. We were praying for revival. I in particular had been led to pray God would shake those things that could be shaken so that only those unshakable things would remain. I believe we desired that God would do a work in us and in our city and, while I do not now believe that Ike was the complete answer to that prayer, I do believe it was part of the answer. What I deeply believe is that God desires communion with His people. The one who Isaiah describes as living in a high and holy place desires to dine with you. The obstacles to that are both His holiness and our distraction.
The distraction is idolatry. We expect fulfillment in the wrong place. We look for it in things that do not satisfy. Our idols are multitude. We seek approval. We seek security. We seek popularity. We seek prosperity. We seek to have our wants and desires met, regardless of the cost to us or others. We seek power over others with wealth, sex, intelligence, manipulation, fear, etc. We seek to cure our aloneness, insecurity, need to be loved, need to be admired, need to feel beautiful, by bowing down to things that cannot finally meet and satisfy those needs. We choose those far away idols like security or prosperity to meet global needs. We choose those nearby idols like money or pornography to have something we can control. Whatever your idols may be, when the storm hits they are impotent. God tells the people of Isaiah’s day: When you cry out, let your collection of idols deliver you! The wind will carry them off, a breath will take them away.
The real test of an idol is whether it can deliver what it promises in a lasting way.
Most of what we choose to trust in cannot save us in the storms of life. God goes on to say: But he who takes refuge in me shall possess the land and shall inherit my holy mountain. 14 And it shall be said, “Build up, build up, prepare the way, remove every obstruction from my people’s way.”
The irony is that when we actually trust in God we find that those things we were pursuing may just be part of His plan for us. The difference is in what we really worship, what we really trust in. I can usually tell what I am depending on when it is absent or access to it is deferred. What kind of reaction does it cause? Do we have the same reaction when we miss time with God? Usually that will tell us something.
We are afraid to try to get to the place God dwells and we often allow other things the place only God can have. So what does God do since He loves us and desires to restore us? He reminds us in this passage that there is another place He can be found.
and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.
God lives in the place of a contrite heart.
דָּכָא
crush, harm, i.e., apply pressure to an object, which if alive, will hurt, bruise, or kill (Job 4:19; 6:9; Ps 72:4; 89:11[EB 10]; 94:5; 143:3; Isa 3:15; 53:10; La 3:34+), see also LN 19.43–19.54; (pual) bruised, formally, crushed, i.e., have a wound on the body due to a violent pressing motion (Isa 53:5+); 2. LN 88.51-88.58 (nif) contrite, formally, crushed, i.e., pertaining to being humble and unpretentious, as a figurative extension of an object in a low position due to pressure placed on it[1]
There is real glory here. The LORD, the King of Glory, dwells in the place of a heart that is crushed. But not only does he dwell there. He lives there for a purpose, to revive that heart. חָיָה the simple Hebrew root for live, to give life, to revive, to nurture. God moves in to a bruised heart to make it truly live.
My heart is more alive to the truth of God now than it has ever been. I know that I have not tasted the real depths of despair but I know now that the things that needed shaking were mostly in me. What God desires for us is that we see His glory and that we admit our need is for Him. Look at these words from Isaiah:
Isaiah 6 (ESV)1 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” 4 And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. 5 And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” 6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7 And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” 8 And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.”
Communion with God will include cleansing by God and mission from God. We must be ready for the mission
Clay Thomas
For the love of the Father
Made by the Son to be ours
Applied by the Comforter’s power
Is the Love that we share
As the body and bride
For Him and for all of his own
And this Love, our reflection
Of Trinity Love
Is Love that makes us all one
Revelation 4:8 (ESV)
8 And the four living creatures,
each of them with six wings,
are full of eyes all around and within,
and day and night
they never cease to say,
“Holy, holy, holy,
Today we remember. Today we follow a long standing biblical practice of remembering how the Lord has accomplished deliverance for us. This remembering is not always pleasant or easy. It is not necessary to only remember the good stuff. Yet we are to see the salvation of the Lord in the thing we remember. Why did God send us Ike? I am not sure we can have all the answers yet there are clues if we look at the time leading up to Ike and the time since Ike. We will examine some of them in light of this scripture from Isaiah in which the Lord first points out the futility of idols and then points us to a place where He can be found.
Isaiah 57 (ESV) 13 When you cry out, let your collection of idols deliver you! The wind will carry them off, a breath will take them away. But he who takes refuge in me shall possess the land and shall inherit my holy mountain. 14 And it shall be said, “Build up, build up, prepare the way, remove every obstruction from my people’s way.” 15 For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.
On the road to Ike we saw the hand of God moving preparing us for what was to come. We were praying for revival. I in particular had been led to pray God would shake those things that could be shaken so that only those unshakable things would remain. I believe we desired that God would do a work in us and in our city and, while I do not now believe that Ike was the complete answer to that prayer, I do believe it was part of the answer. What I deeply believe is that God desires communion with His people. The one who Isaiah describes as living in a high and holy place desires to dine with you. The obstacles to that are both His holiness and our distraction.
The distraction is idolatry. We expect fulfillment in the wrong place. We look for it in things that do not satisfy. Our idols are multitude. We seek approval. We seek security. We seek popularity. We seek prosperity. We seek to have our wants and desires met, regardless of the cost to us or others. We seek power over others with wealth, sex, intelligence, manipulation, fear, etc. We seek to cure our aloneness, insecurity, need to be loved, need to be admired, need to feel beautiful, by bowing down to things that cannot finally meet and satisfy those needs. We choose those far away idols like security or prosperity to meet global needs. We choose those nearby idols like money or pornography to have something we can control. Whatever your idols may be, when the storm hits they are impotent. God tells the people of Isaiah’s day: When you cry out, let your collection of idols deliver you! The wind will carry them off, a breath will take them away.
The real test of an idol is whether it can deliver what it promises in a lasting way.
Most of what we choose to trust in cannot save us in the storms of life. God goes on to say: But he who takes refuge in me shall possess the land and shall inherit my holy mountain. 14 And it shall be said, “Build up, build up, prepare the way, remove every obstruction from my people’s way.”
The irony is that when we actually trust in God we find that those things we were pursuing may just be part of His plan for us. The difference is in what we really worship, what we really trust in. I can usually tell what I am depending on when it is absent or access to it is deferred. What kind of reaction does it cause? Do we have the same reaction when we miss time with God? Usually that will tell us something.
We are afraid to try to get to the place God dwells and we often allow other things the place only God can have. So what does God do since He loves us and desires to restore us? He reminds us in this passage that there is another place He can be found.
and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.
God lives in the place of a contrite heart.
דָּכָא
crush, harm, i.e., apply pressure to an object, which if alive, will hurt, bruise, or kill (Job 4:19; 6:9; Ps 72:4; 89:11[EB 10]; 94:5; 143:3; Isa 3:15; 53:10; La 3:34+), see also LN 19.43–19.54; (pual) bruised, formally, crushed, i.e., have a wound on the body due to a violent pressing motion (Isa 53:5+); 2. LN 88.51-88.58 (nif) contrite, formally, crushed, i.e., pertaining to being humble and unpretentious, as a figurative extension of an object in a low position due to pressure placed on it[1]
There is real glory here. The LORD, the King of Glory, dwells in the place of a heart that is crushed. But not only does he dwell there. He lives there for a purpose, to revive that heart. חָיָה the simple Hebrew root for live, to give life, to revive, to nurture. God moves in to a bruised heart to make it truly live.
My heart is more alive to the truth of God now than it has ever been. I know that I have not tasted the real depths of despair but I know now that the things that needed shaking were mostly in me. What God desires for us is that we see His glory and that we admit our need is for Him. Look at these words from Isaiah:
Isaiah 6 (ESV)1 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” 4 And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. 5 And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” 6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7 And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” 8 And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.”
Communion with God will include cleansing by God and mission from God. We must be ready for the mission
Clay Thomas
For the love of the Father
Made by the Son to be ours
Applied by the Comforter’s power
Is the Love that we share
As the body and bride
For Him and for all of his own
And this Love, our reflection
Of Trinity Love
Is Love that makes us all one
Revelation 4:8 (ESV)
8 And the four living creatures,
each of them with six wings,
are full of eyes all around and within,
and day and night
they never cease to say,
“Holy, holy, holy,
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