Core Value #5 in our company is Winning. The theme Bible passage for that core value comes from Jeremiah 29:11 where God said to his people “I know the plans I have for you. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future.” I taught this core value in our team training last week, waxing eloquently about why winning was important, about why God’s design for us to win, and about attitudes and attributes of winners. My team bought it hook, line & sinker.

Unbeknownst to me, the day before friends of mine had lost their son-in-law to a car accident. He died leaving a young wife, and two primary school aged children. Today the mother-in-law posted to Facebook that the last two days (which included the funeral) had been the hardest of her life.

Plans to prosper you………not to harm………hope…….a future.

So where is the prosperity, the hope, the future in this? Where’s the God who wants us to win that I taught about last week? I’ve been struggling with that thought. My guess is that its hard to offer praise to God in a household that has experienced such loss, I get that. How can we maintain our faith and reconcile the death of this Daddy with a God who says he wants to prosper us, give us a hope and a future. This is hard math. I just can’t make it add up.

I remember Job had everything taken from him, and he said “Yet if God slays me, I will still trust him.” Nice poetry. But none of us want to have to do it.

Understanding why this young man died is beyond my grasp. But I do remember hearing Babbie Mason sing once at our church in Columbia that “God is too wise to be mistaken. God is too good to be unkind. So when you don’t understand, when you don’t see His plan, when you can’t trace His hand, trust His heart.” His heart is pointed toward us, toward that young widow, her children and even the young man that was taken from them.

I believe that.

We who trust Him do so because we know Him. We know His character. We know His voice. We know His deeds. We know what He says about His desire and intent for us. That’s enough to allow us to continue trusting Him when nothing makes sense. We’ve read the end of the story. And it allows us to say with Job “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”

A friend wrote his daughters a letter entitled “Could be rough being a girl?” Its a worthy effort from a Dad to his daughters. That’s why I’m reprinting it just as he wrote it here.

Most teenage girls I believe are unhappy with who they are. They define their happiness by how they look, how many friends they have, whether or not they have a boyfriend, what kind of grades they are making, or if they made the softball team or choir/play. There are so many reasons to decide why you may not like yourself  if you are focused on exterior things or people to make you happy. True happiness comes from the inside. God wants you to enjoy your life and celebrate YOU! How do you celebrate YOU in a world that is so focused on material things? You keep your focus on the things of God. Don’t compare yourself to other girls, don’t qllow what boys might say about you to affect the way you feel about yourself. Who does God say you are? God says you are the apply of His eye, and that He loves you (He loves you)! God’s word tells you that you are more than a conqueror and that you can do ALL things through Christ who strengthens you (sing, play softball, or whatever your passion is). God loves you and has a perfect plan for your life, start today by looking in the mirror and telling yourself how SPECIAL you are! Don’t forget Jesus died on the cross because HE loved you. God wants you to be happy, and happiness is a decision that you make! Decide today to be happy about who you are! Celebrate who you are and others will begin to notice that there is something different about you! God bless you and have a happy day today.

I spent some time writing this girls. I love you very much and want the best for you as God does (you are SPECIAL). Be comfortable in your skin. You shall achieve what you beleive. Always believe great things. Please don’t forget these words. Believing in you tells God that you believe in him.

Daddy

Today I toured the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. I know it happened, yet it seems unreal. It is incomprehensible that humans created in God’s image could unleash such unspeakable horror on fellow human beings. Yet it goes on today.

For me the most moving part of the Museum was the small section about the murder of children who were mentally retarded or handicapped in someway; killed all in the name of “reducing suffering.” But they weren’t suffering. They just couldn’t do algebra. They were ordered killed because they were considered less.

I took my girls aside for a talk. We talked about how God made people in His image, about how they aren’t less because they are different, or even because they ARE mentally or physically less. We talked about how it is our responsibility to take care of them, to watch out for them.

There are two significant things happening in the culture today that seemed to come from the Nazi playbook.

First, the healthcare bill being debated in Congress has a provision for a death panel of some sort—-a team of people who reportedly would have authority to decide who was worthy of additional health care and who was too old, or too sick, or in some way…….less. I don’t pretend to understand all that goes into the healthcare debate, and I certainly believe we need to pay attention to this issue as a country. The system is broken. But I blanche at the thought that a “committee of the enlightened” would be given authority to decide who is worthy of more care, or less care because they are deemed more or less worthy. That is just inherently wrong.

Second, as I stood looking at pictures of naked children moments before they were killed, and at one physician posing over the surgical table holding the dead body of a sacrificed child he was preparing to cut open and explore in the name of science, I couldn’t help but have a gut reaction about the decisions we allow in America today for innocents to be killed. Abortion is simply wrong. Politicians say it should be rare but legal. I think that is doublespeak designed to placate both sides from men and women who either don’t know the truth or are afraid to speak it. It is our responsibility to protect the innocents, including those who haven’t yet drawn a breath. The Bible says that God knows them in their mother’s womb and there He knits them together. John, the cousin of Jesus is reported to have leapt in the womb of his mother at the announcement that Mary was pregnant with the Savior.

I don’t know everything about this issue. There are complexities. There are women who should have never gotten pregnant. There are babies destined to be born into adverse circumstances. But the notion that women can kill their babies because it’s not a convenient time in their life to have a child is just inherently wrong. I know some will say its about a woman’s right to her body,  and I agree that a woman has a right to her body, to keep her knees closed. But her rights end where exercising them deprives that baby of its right to life. God is knitting him in his mother’s womb, and what God has knit together let no man rend asunder.

I know that many of the people lauded so grandly for donating to the Holocaust Museum are also supportive of abortion rights. And, I just don’t get it. It’s wrong. How can an advanced nation like ours memorialize the horror of the Holocaust while simultaneously allowing it in our midst? I just don’t get it. It’s wrong. And I’m clear on that. If you think otherwise, you simple need to change your mind.

Thinking tonight about Sunday morning and pondering what goes on……

Does it seem reasonable that at our myriad iterations of Friendly Bible Church that our focus should center on the Bible? It is, after all, the central word in the name; and the central WORD in our faith.  

Seems like there are alot of things central to church services today…..hip music, cool graphics, sexy sermon topics, activities for every perceived segmentation of the potential church-going market.  I just wonder if central to what we do when we do church shouldn’t be cracking the Bible open and explaining what it means in an unadorned way. Doesn’t that have merit? 

The purpose when we gather is to Make Much of Jesus. Simply put: to worship God. History records that teaching of scripture has always been central to worship; teaching that ostensibly is to produce a response from the learner—a life-changing conversation between God and man.

So I go off to church tomorrow wondering whether there will be  Bible teaching, or will we be entertained with another drama, a cool slide show, or maybe an amateur rendition of the latest pop song? 

If you are headed out the door Sunday morning to go to a Baptist Church, may you witness baptisms; at the Bible Church, may it be central; and may Christ be central at the Christian Church.

It’s imperfect, but it’s a start.

Perry Noble’s website  contains the following items he wished he’d learned earlier in life. They resonnated with me so I reprinted them here.

#1 – Everyone Will Not Understand You…SO Stop Trying To Explain Yourself. Cast Vision…And MOVE Forward!

#2 – Everyone Will Not Like You…So STOP Trying To Be Popular.

#3 – You Don’t Have To Be The Person Who Actually Solves Every Problem….Admit You Are Not The Smartest Person and Let Your Experts Be Your Experts.

#4 – Spend WAY More Time Talking About Who You Are Rather Than Who You Are Not.

#5 – A Leader Is Always An Easy Target Because They Are…A Leader. So, Get Over Yourself And Get On With What God Called You To Do!

#6 – When The Holy Spirit Presses Something Into Your Heart…Don’t Ignore Him.

#7 – Do NOT Expect God’s Next Step To Make Sense.

#8 – You Can’t Plan A Move Of God…But You Must Be Prepared For One!

#9 – Do Not Resist Something Just Because You Do Not Understand It!

#10 – People Who Claim You “Are Not Deep Enough” Are Obsessed With Information But Have No Desire To Live Out Transformation.

#11 – You Don’t Need To Listen To Everybody…But You Had Better Be Listening To Somebody Because God Didn’t Ask You To Take This Journey Alone.

#12 – Never Apologize For Asking People To Commit To Something…Jesus Didn’t!

#13 – The Church Has Been Underachieving For Way Too Long…So Dream BIG And Don’t Apologize For It.

#14 – There Will Be Days When You Want To Quit…Don’t…Jesus Didn’t! (Remember…DON’T GIVE UP…if you are discouraged, take a second and read this!)

#15 – The Gospel Changes Lives…PREACH Every Sermon Like It’s Your Last!!!