The Last Few Days

I do not speak because I have need, for I have learned in whatever state I am to be content.

Philippians 4:11

So I sat here at my computer for quite a while asking the Lord to show me what He wants me to write about - reading through some verses, chapters and posts from others. Over the past few weeks I knew I was going to write soon, so I thought about what I could possibly write about. Things would happen and I would immediately see God’s fingerprints are all over whatever happened and thought maybe I could write about that. Then the memory does what it’s very good at: forgets things. This age thing I’m going through is not really a welcomed journey. To feel like I’m 20 and have trouble getting out of the car. How can I be ok with that?

So where I’m going with this is that I’m going to share a few things I heard over the past few days and share the importance of how those little things I picked up on affected me.

The first one was from Saturday night at worship rehearsal when we played a song just to loosen up: “Rock of Ages.” Wow, did that do it. But I was singing along on this one, “There is no rock, There is no god like our God.” AMEN! Purely a reminder that pursuing God and getting to know him better should be our top goal each day. I’ll be humming that song all week.

The second one was when I heard someone say, “Sounds like Peter when he sunk in the water.” Well, that discussion was all about feeling distant from God. It’s so true, when one’s heart drifts from following Christ and goes after things the heart desires, sinking starts to occur. Remember, Peter cried out to Jesus, but it was Jesus who reached out to Peter.

The third was when I was driving to work and listening to a Vlog where the commentator was discussing the prosperity theology with a pastor and how it is exactly opposite of what Paul says in Philippians, “I have learned in whatever state I am to be content.” Content. The dictionary says it’s the state of being satisfied. I went to a thesaurus and was really surprised that the opposite of content is a whole bunch of negativities. Not one semi-positive word was given.

As I sat here thinking about something to write, the experiences of the past few days that came to mind shed light on something pretty powerful. I’m confident that if I wasn’t following the Lord that I would not have had these reminders of Biblical truths. In other words, If I was living in my own power, I would have missed everything above. There’s an importance to being around our church family and others who are following Christ, around family who loves us and guides us.

Press in to see those God-moments. He really wants us to see them.

And I’m content with 30 minute drive to work - that’s two Vlogs or better yet, 3-4 chapters of the Bible.

I hope you have a great day!

—Brian Rainey

*Please be advised that this blog represents the views, opinions and beliefs of the writer and does not necessarily reflect those of our church leadership or denominational affiliation.

Sweet Dreams

As a little girl, I lived in a magical world of imagination and make-believe. What glorious days I spent with my dolls in the attic, creating sweet stories of maidens in distress and knights in shining armor, of beautiful and forgotten Cinderellas and rescuing, handsome Prince Charmings.

But nighttime was a different story. That overblown imagination of mine wreaked havoc in the dark. I suffered from terrible nightmares almost every night.

My very resourceful and creative mom came to my rescue….not one of my imaginary cavaliers dashing in on his noble, white steed. She would sit with me on my bed and gently caress my arm and my forehead until I was awake. Soothing me with her quiet words and kisses, she would whisper softy, “I brought the Sweet Dream Drops.” She then would unscrew a little glass bottle and, with her fingertip, place a droplet of the potion on my pillow. Eagerly, I would roll over on my side so I could get my nose nearer the spot. The delightful aroma filled my head and I would sigh with relief. Before too long, I would slip into a peaceful sleep.

Don’t you wish there really was a secret formula that would make all the scary things in life disappear like that? I sure do. But as an adult living in this fallen world, I have sadly come to realize that many of us truly are living, not sleeping, in the middle of many different kinds of very real nightmares. And there isn’t a bottle of anything big enough to bring us the peace and rest and comfort we desperately long for.

Recently, we hosted a marriage retreat featuring Dr. Paul Tripp and a series called The Marriage of Your Dreams. Nearly forty couples, couples of all ages and stages, gathered to listen and learn from this pastor, speaker, writer, and counselor. As I looked around the room, I couldn’t help but wonder if some of the couples, once expectant and smiling brides and grooms, were in fact living out their marriages with fear and trembling, caught up in a painful bad dream. I prayed Dr. Tripp would have words to help them, to help all of us.

For those who attended, here is a mini reminder of what we all heard, God’s words, I think, for navigating our marriages. For those of you who did not attend, here is my big take away.

I thought one of the most astonishing things Dr. Tripp said during the course of the weekend was that it is a miracle that any marriage survives. Not what I was expecting to hear. But he reminded us that marriage is basically the union of two broken, sinful people living in a very broken, sinful world trying to live together in the most intimate and intense of all human relationships—and somehow making it work. At the very least, marriage is difficult. For every couple. Not the stuff of our childhood dreams for sure. And not at all what we expected standing at the altar. 

But, Paul Tripp reminded us, God knows that. The fact that we struggle for harmony in our marriages didn’t catch Him off guard. In fact, He uses our difficult marriages for something great and glorious and good. Isn’t that just like Him?

And besides that, Dr. Tripp wanted us all to remember we are not alone. What we have is so much better than a magic potion.

We have God, the Designer of Marriage, the Comforter, the Healer, the Rescuer, the King.

If we’re God’s children, He wants so much more for our marriages than we can imagine, so much so that He in His loving kindness has “unzipped” us and placed the Holy Spirit inside us to live. We are not left to our own frail and faltering resources. The Warrior Spirit has the power to defeat what we cannot and to achieve what we cannot.

Galatians 6 seems to say there are two ways we can live in our marriages. We can walk in the flesh, held hostage to the evil that still lurks in us and trust our own will power, OR we can wisely walk in the Spirit, choosing to move in alignment with the Father’s character and plans, and He will gift us with love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, kindness, self-control—the stuff of the marriages of our dreams. Don’t we all want marriages and relationships overflowing with these graces? Seems like a no brainer.

Jesus died to make this our potential. He died not just to secure forgiveness for our sins but also to deliver us from them here and now. Jesus died so that we as His children would be transformed. He doesn’t want us to just settle for the mess we have created in our homes by choosing our own selfish ways or by simply learning to negotiate each other’s bad days. We can do better. Our Savior is exercising His powerful grace through the Spirit inside us to change us. That’s His plan for us. When we walk in the Spirit, we must understand that is His goal.  

And how does He do this? He uses our marriages! Do you see the interconnectedness of this, the beauty of His plan? God wants the best for us—His definition of that, not ours. The “best” we would choose for us would be selfish comfort. But God wants more for us, so He wisely puts us in the comprehensive relationship of marriage and uses the struggles in it to transform us. The conflict and poor communication we experience bring to the surface our flaws and weaknesses, blind spots that need attention. When we choose to walk with Him in this process, to walk in the Spirit, we make our purposes His purposes. We say we want to go in the same direction as our Redeemer. We learn to desire to be changed and cooperate with Him, recognizing that even the painful circumstances, the nightmares of this life, are not wasted. God is all about turning even these into something good and useful, tools in His hands as He molds us into the likeness of His dear Son. The Spirit He has given us, living in us, provides everything we need to let Him do His work.

For example, I am incapable of loving Kenny like I should, so I pray each day that God will help me love him. I know that is God’s plan. He wants to show Kenny His love through me. So I look for ways to do it. My job to love Kenny must be more valuable to me than being right or having peace. As I do this daily, especially when he is not so lovable and I am not so willing, God invades our mess by His grace and grows us to a brand new way of living. He gives me what I lack. He promises me He is near. We are growing and changing and He graces us with His gifts of love, joy, peace, gentleness, and patience…all His precious graces, all things we long for in our home.

To have the marriage of our dreams, we must let our marriages with their inevitable struggles and nightmares continue to refine and rescue us and make us more like Jesus, cooperating with the purposes of God and leaning on the indwelling power and presence of the Holy Spirit for help each day. Who knew the way to have the marriage God desires for us, the marriage I really want too, is to let the sometimes hurtful issues of that very marriage change us into the persons He wants us to be? Seems counter-intuitive…

Please don’t be discouraged if you are in the beginning or middle of His work in your marriage. Trust His good plan even when it hurts or seems impossible. He desires to accomplish something beautiful and is committed to defeating selfishness and transforming you. He gives grace. He gives strength. He gives hope.

Your God is big. He is faithful to complete the work He started in you.

The marriage of your dreams may be on the horizon.

You don’t need Sweet Dream Drops.    

 —Eileen Hill

Seven Pounds of Guilt

Seven Pounds (Columbia Pictures, 2008), starring Will Smith and Rosario Dawson, is summarized by the Internet Movie Database like this (here): “A man with a fateful secret embarks on an extraordinary journey of redemption by forever changing the lives of seven strangers.”

IMDB.com gets this mostly right. An anguished man with a secret—huge spoiler alert coming!—has, with the help of a friend, hatched a plan to identify seven individuals whom he finds worthy of benefiting from his body parts, after he commits suicide.

This is the strange impetus that drives the plot of Seven Pounds. It’s what makes the film both loved and hated, depending on your demographic. Meaning, if you get paid to rate films, you generally hated it; if you don’t, you generally loved it.

Specifically, by a roughly three-to-one margin, the professional critics panned it. On the other hand, everyday audience members loved it. That is, Rotten Tomatoes, here, shows that 195 critics gave it an overall score of 27 percent, while over six-hundred thousand non-paid viewers gave it a score of 75 percent. Hundreds of thousands more people freely offered their generally positive opinion than the relative handful who were paid to review the film.

* * *

Regardless of who you are, I believe one thing about film and film-making: to understand the medium, one has to understand what’s beneath the visuals of the story and maybe even the story, itself. The result of that may have nothing to do with what you’re watching, yet everything to do with it.

For example, Steven Spielberg’s E.T: The Extraterrestrial (Universal, 1982) appears to be about an alien boy stranded on Earth and befriended by a non-alien boy named Elliot. However, as Spielberg told Roger Ebert, in 1997, “From the very beginning, 'E.T.' was a movie about my childhood—about my parents' divorce” (for more on that, see Ebert’s page, here).

So, on the surface, the narrative gives us E.T., a boy who must phone home. But just below the surface is separation from the family unit and the grief and anxiety that the separation generated. These are the aspects of life that the Apostle Paul might call common to man (I Corinthians 10:13, NASB); they are universal experiences illustrated by the story-teller. The narrative is just the placeholder for those common-to-man experiences.

With this in mind, the jury may be out on the film Seven Pounds. This is because the film doesn’t touch on something universal, as Spielberg’s E.T. had done. It instead considers something philosophical. It conveys two interdependent ideas that three quarters of its unpaid critics appear to agree with. It first says that for one to die for another individual is a good and noble thing; it then says that the laying down of one’s life ought to only benefit those who are worthy of the ultimate sacrifice.

Seven Pounds tries to be Spielbergian. It tries to tap into a universal truth—namely, that to lay down one’s life is beautiful. And the film wonderfully illustrates how such a selfless act can forever impact the life of another—or, seven others, as in this film.

The film delivers a corollary to this truth. Namely, that to make the sacrifice worth it, it ought to only be made on behalf of those who are good; it should only benefit the truly deserving.

The film’s screenwriter, Grant Nieporte, must have believed that, in this, he was simply relating another universally held belief. His story’s protagonist—Ben Thomas, played by Will Smith—believes that only a good man (or woman) ought to receive the gift of life being offered to them. We see this in a portion of dialogue that Ben has with a man named George, to whom he would donate a kidney:

George: You know, Ben, I keep asking you this but why me?
Ben: Because you are a good man.
George: No, really.
Ben: Even when you don't know that people are watching you.

This same thought is seen again, as Ben talks with Emily, to whom he would donate his heart: 

Emily: Why do I get the feeling you're doing me a really big favor?
Ben: Because I get the feeling that you really deserve it.

Nieporte and Thomas—and, I assume, Will Smith—seem to believe that the beneficiaries of an ultimate sacrifice must be worthy of that sacrifice. I believe that they also thought they were conveying something which the majority of the public had also thought, along these same lines, if the film’s approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes is any indicator.

But God has another opinion. As Paul writes to the Romans, Christ didn’t die for those who had lived good lives and were therefore worthy of his sacrifice. No; instead, he died for the sinners (5:8), as every one of us are such (3:23), and for the ungodly (5:6).

While the film Seven Pounds attempts to confirm the supposed universal idea that ultimate sacrifice requires worthiness, the maker of the universe had another idea. Instead, he flipped that thought on its head and changed the economy of that contract from one of worthiness to that of worthlessness.

The economy of God says that none are worthy of benefitting from his Son’s ultimate sacrifice, yet all are invited to participate, anyway. Worthiness has actually been taken out of the equation, altogether. As Matthew Henry puts it (here), Christ didn’t die for the “good” (as Ben told George) or the deserving (as Ben told Emily), but for the ungodly among us; He died for the:

helpless creatures, and therefore likely to perish, but guilty sinful creatures, and therefore deserving to perish; not only mean and worthless, but vile and obnoxious, unworthy of such favour with the holy God.

Moreover, Henry says that we are “enemies,” “traitors and rebels, in arms against the government.” We were of “carnal mind.” He says that we were “not only an enemy to God, but enmity itself.” We were not only unworthy of the sacrifice of Christ, we were totally and completely worthless.

Yet, we were—and are—those for whom Christ died. He died for us vile and obnoxious ones.

C.S. Lewis seems to have anticipated Seven Pounds and its viewpoint on sacrifice and worthiness. He must have understood the idea’s pervasiveness when he mentioned the valiant nature of the sort of thing that the film’s Ben Thomas had done. Lewis says that, “As St. Paul writes, to have died for valuable men would have been not divine but merely heroic; but God died for sinners”(1).

* * *

Ben Thomas, dying for the lives of seven others was merely heroic. He died for valuable men and women, donating his heart, eyes, kidneys, and lungs, so that others might see and live.

Our Lord’s death, on the other hand, was beyond heroic. It was divine. It was such because it refused to consider the worthiness, godliness, or guilt of those for whom the sacrifice was made. Whereas, in the film Seven Pounds, it was Ben Thomas’s guilt that had motivated him to go through with the sacrificing of his life in the first place (he had accidentally killed seven people, as he texted while driving).

Christ laid down His life not because of any degree of worthiness on our part. Instead, He knew how unworthy we were and laid down His life, anyway. In this case, the guilt belonged to the beneficiary of the sacrifice and not the one who had become the sacrifice.

Jesus’ motivation was not guilt, but love—His love for a people who had gone astray: namely, all of us (Isaiah 53:6). He was so motivated by love that He, “for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising and ignoring the shame” (Hebrews 12:2) in order to bring us into His presence.

* * *

My philosophy of life is that everything in life is a lesson. And I see two lessons here.

The first is the lesson of Seven Pounds, that sacrifice like Ben Thomas’s is merely heroic; the second is that of the New Testament: we need to consider how we might be more like Jesus. With those two thoughts in mind, then our directive for this day is that, as we lay down our lives for the King, we ought to think about how we can be more than heroic.

We are not and we cannot be divine, but we have the divine God living in us. As we follow Him, with His Spirit within us, He will direct us to the ungodly, to the unworthy, and speak to us about how to sacrifice ourselves, to lay ourselves down, so that we might love them into the Kingdom.

This is our mission. This is why we’re still here: so we can love the obnoxious into the Kingdom. You and I were worth the blood of Jesus. Likewise, those around us are worth loving—not because of who they are, in themselves, but because they, too, are those for whom Christ died.

In the film Seven Pounds, Ben Thomas literally gives the woman he loves his heart, that she might survive a soon-to-be-fatal cardiac condition. This is, for us, but a weak metaphor for what God has done for us through His Son: He has given us His heart, so that we might do the same—that we might, in turn, give our hearts to Him.

This is the message of the Gospel. It’s a message worth dying for. At the very least, it’s the message that we can sacrifice a part of ourselves to every day, as we’re directed by God. There are plenty of unworthy ones around us, in days like this. Even during a pandemic.

* * *

1. C.S. Lewis. “Membership.” The Weight of His Glory and other addresses. 1946. Harper Collins. Hat Tip: Pastor Greg Hill.

—Kevin Hutchins

*Please be advised that this blog represents the views, opinions and beliefs of the writer and does not necessarily reflect those of our church leadership or denominational affiliation.

Everlasting Peace

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.  I do not give to you as the world gives.  Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. - John 14:27 

The peace Jesus gives is not of this world. I pray the Spirit of God will help us define, pursue, and take hold of the peace that God gives while avoiding the entrapments of the peace offered by the world.  

In reading John 16:33 we see that Jesus and the world offer different types of peace. Before we go any further, it is imperative to recognize that the world does offer peace. Jesus does not deny this. Instead, He clearly states, “I do not give to you as the world gives.” It is crucial to understand that there is a peace that comes from the world that does not come from God. Lacking this understanding, I fear many wrongly attribute their current peace to God in vain. The roots of their folly will be exposed by the storms of life. May His Spirit reveal the type of peace we are seeking. 

The world’s peace is skillfully marketed and promoted by the prince and the power of the air, a.k.a. the devil.  He markets this peace to men, knowing the sinful, worldly desires of our flesh. He offers us a peace that can be earned; therefore, our flesh craves it. The one who earns this peace will definitely make a good name for himself. For some, signs of this peace may include large mansions, beachfront vacations, and hyperbolic chambers. However, many more pursue this counterfeit peace without ever catching it. It is crucial to recognize the incredible internal and external influencers selling this type of peace so we may be careful to avoid its enticing bait and snare. May we take a closer look at this peace that the world gives. 

The peace the world gives is based on circumstances. A circumstance is a situation or condition.  Furthermore, circumstance is defined as one’s state of financial or material welfare. This worldly peace is the one you will find most people working and praying for. It is the one God is often praised for though this peace is not from Him. This peace is ushered in with familiarity, predictability, and independence. It is the peace of a settler, one who establishes one’s own kingdom on earth. In Genesis chapter 11 we find an example of people searching for this kind of peace. 

“And it came about, as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar and  settled there. Then they said to one another, “Come, let’s make bricks and fire them thoroughly.” And they used brick for stone, and they used tar for mortar.  And they said, “Come, let’s build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let’s make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered abroad over the face of all the earth.” 

Here we see people who, after the chaos of the flood, seek peace. They want to settle down and make a home for themselves of the world. They don’t want to travel anymore. They see no need for further movement. Their goal is to get their circumstances just right so that they are satisfied and protected by the work of their hands. They endeavor to build themselves a dwelling that will be heaven on earth. This is the peace the world gives. This peace, at its best, is temporary and ends in everlasting torment. May God never give us our desires for this worldly peace that seeks self-exaltation. 

In contrast, in the next chapter of Genesis, we see God offering a different peace, His peace, to a man named Abram. God calls Abram to leave His settled life and follow Him, trusting that God himself will be his shield and great reward. In Genesis 15:6 we read that Abraham “believed in the LORD, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.” This is the difference between the peace of God and the peace of the world: 

The peace the world gives changes with circumstances. The everlasting peace of God comes from knowing you have been made right with God in Christ. 

In the fourth chapter of Romans it is written, 

No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.” But the words “it was counted to him” were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. - Romans 4:20-25  

I can imagine Jesus saying to Abram, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.  But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Abraham stored his treasure in Christ by trusting in God’s promises. In Hebrews 11 it is written of Abraham, 

“By faith he dwelt in the promised land as a stranger in a foreign country. He lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.” 

Like Abraham, God offers us a peace that grows when we trust in His promises. Unlike the world’s peace, this peace cannot be forfeited with the change of a circumstance. The Scriptures reveal to us that unshakable peace comes from beholding the glory of God in the person of Jesus.   

This peace comes not from peaceful circumstances, but from being made right with God.   

Mercy and truth have met together; Righteousness and peace have kissed. Truth  shall  spring out of the earth, And righteousness shall look down from heaven. Yes, the Lord will give what is good; And our land will yield its increase. Righteousness will go before Him, And shall make His footsteps our pathway. - Psalm 85: 10-13 

The peace Jesus gives is the peace that remains when comfortable circumstances turn uncomfortable. It is the peace that testifies that He who is in us is greater than he who is in the world. This is the peace that comes from knowing Jesus, our Savior, is Lord of all.   

Are you seeking peace by taking hold of the world, by settling down, by storing up treasures on earth or do you find peace by journeying with your Shepherd through this world into the very presence of God? You must put down the world’s peace to take hold of His. Now may the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you.  

In Christ, 

—Roger Garrison 

 Further verses for encouragement: Isaiah 26:3; Numbers 6:24-26, John 14:24, John 16:33 

*Please be advised that this blog represents the views, opinions and beliefs of the writer and does not necessarily reflect those of our church leadership or denominational affiliation.