Lamentations: "A cry from the deep, with the glimmer of hope"

What if we woke up to this headline one day:

Would you be so inclined to mourn for your country? This is a foreign concept to us as Americans since we think our military is untouchable. However, imagine the feeling you would have if this really happened. If our country was taken captive by a foreign land and all of us taken into captivity as well. Would you mourn the loss of this great nation? What if you then found out that God was personally behind it and it was our sin that caused it? That would stir up some emotions wouldn't it?

Lamentations is a book in the Old Testament that we will begin teaching through for the next 4 Sundays. The book is known for the famous passage "God's mercies are new every day", but do we know why the author would say that? Maybe because he is writing 5 laments over the loss of his great nation, Jerusalem.

The author of this book is not specifically named, however Jeremiah is said to have "uttered a lament for Josiah" (2 Chronicles 35:25) and so he is thought to be the author. Above you will find a chart of the book, podcasts will be available on Itunes and on DBSM's fan page. Later peeps.

Jude: "Contending for the faith, delivered once and for all"

Over the next 2 weeks at DBSM Sunday mornings we will be going through the book of Jude. Above is a chart of the book. To view the chart just click on the image.

Background:
Jude was the little brother of Jesus (Matt 13:55; Mark 6:3) who most likely did not believe that Jesus was the Messiah (John 7:5) until after his resurrection like his other brother James (1 Cor 15:7). This letter was written to warn against those who had gained admission into the church and they were perverting the grace of God and denying the deity of Christ. Jude also exhorts the believers to persevere as they content for their faith.

The thanksgiving of the soul

3 Reasons to “give thanks” to the Father

Colossians 1:12-14
“12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. 13He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”

1. He has qualified us by grace to be heirs

Galatians 4:7
“7So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.”

Our lives could not qualify us, our actions only condemned us. Our parents could not qualify us, their sin mirrored in us. Our religions actions and attendance could not qualify us, rather the sin of our pride found us guilty in that. As believers we are thankful because before a Holy God, we stand qualified. We are not being qualified, or one day we will be qualified, we ARE qualified. We are qualified only through the blood of on Man Jesus, who would hang on a cross for all.

2. He has delivered us from Satan’s domain

Ephesians 2:1-3
“1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.”

From the deepest of pits and the darkest of lies our King would come down to get us. He would come down to save us even when we did not want to be saved. He would take us from the deception of the enemy and deliver us to freedom. He would pick us up from our own graves and make dead men walk.

3. He transferred us to Christ’s Kingdom

Ephesians 1:7-8
“7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, 8which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight.”

The kingdom of the damned was thereby released to become to kingdom of the living. By grace, through faith the captives were set free. Sin no longer held its grasp, nor did it know God’s children by name.

November 4th…the night the arm of Lord grew short

Did you see it that night? Did you watch as the arm of the mighty King grew shorter and shorter by every vote cast? Did you watch as the sovereign Lord lost His sovereign might? Was it your country that was being shaken or was it your faith? I don’t think the King of kings was surprised by the man HE APPOINTED to win that election. I don’t think the One who would create all life would forget to stretch out his hand in a petty little election. As believers, our first allegiance is NOT to the United States, our first allegiance is to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Let me explain my purpose in writing this. I am not writing this because we should all agree with President Obama, I personally don’t agree with a lot of it, I voted for my cat Fifi. I’m not writing this to convince you to support his political agenda. I’m dang sure not writing this to engage in a political debate, nor push ANY political agenda. I’m writing this because I saw a group of Christians, a group of my own, my dearest brothers and sisters respond in a way that was and is shaming the name of Jesus Christ. Here is what we did: We voted against Barack because of our morals, our beliefs and our values and then when God’s sovereignty failed (in our minds, not literally) and He failed to pop out of the genie lamp, our faith was shattered we then forget all of those morals, values and beliefs we held to and we became the aggressor! We became the evil ones as we lashed out against what happened by saying “all hope is lost”, “black house 08”, “our country is screwed”, “God has forgotten us”, “I would move to Afghanistan, but soon our country will be just like it anyway”, “God forgive them they know not what they do”… are we SERIOUS! My most beloved brothers and sisters we are CHRISTIANS and we DO NOT LIVE THIS WAY! I hope that we, and I say we to include my own sinful self, can repent and respond in a manner that would be pleasing to the King who sits on high. I’m writing this that we might defend the honor and the glory of God.
The arm of the Lord did not grow short on election day. Rather the sovereignty of our King remains. God knew just who He wanted in office and He has sovereignly placed him there. If you have a problem with it, your problem is not with Barack, it is not with the American people, your problem is with God. I’m glad he is in office because I know God Himself placed him there for His own Name’s sake. Maybe this will be the greatest time our country has ever seen or maybe God will allow the fall of the greatest country the world has ever known. Either way God’s arm has not grown short!
As believers, especially those entrusted to us at DBSM, we are to respond to this election, not matter who our candidate was, in a way that is honoring to Him. Things that are not honoring to Him that I have seen happen this week:
• Creating groups to bash and hate the man Barack
• The use of Facebook to bash and accuse a man (make no mistake, opinions are okay, hostility and the shaming of His name is not)
• Turning this into a racial situation
• Rebelling against the government
• Assuming he is the worst president ever when he hasn’t done anything yet!
• Assuming this is the end of the world… come on!?
• Not realizing the sovereignty of God in this
• Not trusting in God
• Creating dissention amongst Christians who don’t hold the same political views
• Lashing out against non-believers who don’t hold your political or spiritual views!
• Allowing this to set back racial reconciliation by decades!
• Dividing blacks and whites
• Using Scripture out of context to “support” our dislike of the new president

The facts:
• God appointed Barack Obama into presidency (Rom 13)
• If you resist his authority, you rest God (Rom 13)
• Barack is a servant of God, whether he knows it or not (Rom 13)
• We are to pray for him (1 Tim 2)
• We are to be thankful for him (1 Tim 2)
• We are not to grumble or complain (Phil 2)
• The generation is already twisted, you are to shine in it (Phil 2)
• Daniel served a pagan King (Dan 2)
• Daniel used his gifts to bless a pagan King (Dan 2)
• Daniel would not bow to his pagan gods (Dan 3)
• God can turn the heart of Barack wherever He chooses (Prov 21)
• Our hope is not in man, but in God (Jeremiah 17)

Let this be the time we are sanctified by remembering November 4th as the night we lost our view that God is sovereign. Might we restore our view of God still being the God who sits on His throne in Heaven. The goal is NOT the glory of the U.S., the goal is the glory of the One King! It is not about us, not about our country, it’s about His name being made great and defending the honor of the Most High.

Ultimately, don’t listen to me just read the Scripture below and you search your own heart and ask yourself the question: “have I responded to this in a manner that displays my faith in the sovereign God and have I honored him by all my words and actions?”

Romans 13:1-7
1Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. 2Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. 3For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, 4for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer. 5Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God’s wrath but also for the sake of conscience. 6For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. 7 Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.

1 Timothy 2:1-3
1First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, 2 for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. 3This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior,

Philippians 2:14-15
14Do all things without grumbling or questioning, 15that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world,

Proverbs 21:1
1The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD;
he turns it wherever he will.

Jeremiah 17:5-8
5Thus says the LORD:"Cursed is the man who trusts in man
and makes flesh his strength,
whose heart turns away from the LORD.
6 He is like a shrub in the desert,
and shall not see any good come.
He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness,
in an uninhabited salt land.
7 "Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,
whose trust is the LORD.
8 He is like a tree planted by water,
that sends out its roots by the stream,
and does not fear when heat comes,
for its leaves remain green,
and is not anxious in the year of drought,
for it does not cease to bear fruit."

The prayer of an Ephesian

As we conclude teaching through Ephesians I’m somewhat saddened that we didn’t allow the time to go deeper into this phenomenal book. This book is one that is so simple, yet so profound in its entirety. It is a book that has transformed my life and is foundational to my theology. It pierces my deepest feelings and illumines my darkest corners. I was thinking through the best way to share the overview of this book and I think I’ve landed on vulnerability. Being a prayer journaler, I figured for the sake of this book we just taught, I would share with you a prayer that hopefully you could join in with me to simply pray through this book.

“Father Your grace is truly sufficient in my life. Your grace is more than enough for me. My hope is caught up fully in You. Thank You Father that my salvation was not an afterthought, but that before the foundation of the world you predestined me. To the praise of his glorious grace in Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace. That the slain Lamb would intercede for me, that in the courtroom of Heaven you would label me “not guilty”. Father I rest in the grace given through the Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. Lord thank you that nothing done in me was not done by you!
Father grant us a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of our hearts enlightened, that we might know the hope to which you have called us.
When we were enemies, You made us friends. When we were dead, You called us to walk again. When we were children of wrath, You made us children of light. When we deserved death, You showed us mercy. How, O God, can you call me a masterpiece? In what might I boast other than the cross of Christ? For by grace I have been saved through faith. I know that it is not my doing but a gift from You. Father, thank you that you made this dead man walk!
My King I do remember the time when I was alienated from you, but now in Christ Jesus I who was once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For you my King are my peace! What heights of love, what depths of peace! My comforter, my all in all… here in the love of Christ I stand! In Christ alone!
O the mystery of your grace. This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, member of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel. O that He would die for the ungodly! O that you would look down on me and loosen the grip of death! For this reason I bow my knees before you Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.
Father let me put away my falsehood, let me not sin in my anger, let the thief no longer steal, let my mouth no longer curse others… O God let me not grieve Your Spirit! Rather might I rebel! When I am in dark places might I rebel against sin and the control it had over me! The control that it no longer has! Fight for me my King! The battle before me I cannot win, help me to rebel but stand in my stead!
O Lord how can I imitate the Most High? How do I display the image of God through this sinners body? Can it be? Only by way of a cross, only as a beloved child of You my King. Lord teach me to look more like You. Thank you for placing me in a position where I can imitate the King.
Finally, let me be strong in You. Let this soldier’s strength come from his King. Allow me the shield of faith that I might extinguish the flames of the evil one by hoping in You. Allow not doubt, nor guilt, nor faithlessness, nor sin pierce me. When I can no longer hold the shield hold it for me. For you alone are my hope, my strength and my joy. I will trust in you with my whole life. I will trust in you in all circumstances. I will know you as my Savior, trust you as my Lord and worship You as my God!
Thank you that you have made me a saint, I pray that you would convict me to live a saintly life. Amen.”

After the Music Stops What Next?

As days tick off of my life I am more and more convinced and baffled by two major things. 1. The more I exist, the more I am convinced that God’s part of salvation is EVERYTHING and our part of salvation is simply bringing the sinner. 2. The more I exist in the waves of full time ministry the more I’m convinced that all we do is share the Word through the sharing of our lives (1 Thess 2:8). If you are a believer, a follower of Jesus Christ, my charge to you is to find somewhere to plug in and give away your life for His name’s sake. I hope the following displays the importance of what I mean.

I’m saying we can preach all day long, teach FCA’s at schools all over, run marriage seminars, do outreach events… we can create so many things that are fantastic! However, I believe that if it stops there we miss the most impactful part of ministering the gospel of Jesus Christ to those around us. It’s much like this song written and performed by LeCrae called “After the Music Stops”. You can listen to it here: http://www.reachrecords.com/index.php

Here is a portion of the lyrics:
"I'm out to take the bible, create disciples, who make disciples, disciple-cycles, that's why I want the beats to knock so after the music stops you can meet the rock…

After the show, after the set, after the music stops what's next?
Will there be fellowship, prayer, disciples, will you open your bibles after the music stops.
After it’s over, after it ends, after the music stops, what then?
Will you understand that Christ is King? Or will you just like the words we sing after the music stops.

Discipleship is our call but we make disciples, this is not a suggestion, create disciples. The teachin' is a process, it's not over night and it’s not a stage and a mic nah, it's life on life Christ -
Walked with twelve, ate with twelve, talked with twelve, shaped the twelve, invested in 'em well you could say that he made the twelve. Who made many more, who made plenty more, now it's on you and me if there's anymore.
1 teach, 2 teach, 3 teach, 4 teach, 5 teach, 6 teach, 7 teach more, this is what we've been commissioned, it's the reason why I write, so that you could hear the truth, not so you can say I’m tight whoa...

After the show, after the set, after the music stops what's next?
Will there be fellowship, prayer, disciples, will you open your bibles after the music stops.
After it’s over, after it ends, after the music stops, what then?
Will you understand that Christ is King? Or will you just like the words we sing after the music stops.

I don’t do this for the money, I don’t do this for fame, I don’t do this so the industry can know my name, I do this and host to glorify Yeshua the King, if you’re feelin’ me you know you should be doin’ the same let’s go…

After the show, after the set, after the music stops what's next?
Will there be fellowship, prayer, disciples, will you open your bibles after the music stops.
After it’s over, after it ends, after the music stops, what then?
Will you understand that Christ is King? Or will you just like the words we sing after the music stops.

Do you see the importance placed behind this song? Do you feel the cry for discipleship in our churches? In this case, the cry is that living for Christ goes beyond the listeners hearing this song, it goes to a depth that can only be explained by: “Discipleship is our call but we make disciples, this is not a suggestion, create disciples. The teachin' is a process, it's not over night and it’s not a stage and a mic nah, it's life on life Christ”- This is my plea to you today.

Paul said to those in Thessalonica that they were so affectionately desirous of them (the people) that they wanted to share the gospel and their lives because the people had become that precious to them. My plea is that we would do the same. We leave it up to our pastors to preach from the pulpit and that is a fantastic thing… however, is that as life changing as coffee with some peeps after the service? NO! I do not think it is. I DO acknowledge that the power of Scripture in and of itself is mighty to change hearts and lives. However, why does Paul seem to think it so important to share his life with them? Maybe it’s because that is the Gospel! Discipleship is a word we don’t always understand, but to boil it down discipleship is the sharing of the Word through the sharing of your life that His name might be magnified!
To the leaders that so graciously serve at my side: I plea for us to not forget this! We get immersed in a culture where the word “discipleship” is common tongue, but we make it so complex that we forget how to do it and we forget the power behind it! Please hear me saying now behind a limitless keyboard that a Wednesday night is not the goal, a Sunday morning is not the answer, a new or better curriculum is not the cause. The force behind the power is that of the Spirit of God at work in you. The force is you being faithful and rejoicing by watching God’s goodness. In this joy we have of loving (discipling) kids, do not forget the power displayed by your hand. Do not forget that being raised by Christ grants us the power to change the lives of these kids He entrusts to us by the work of His Spirit! Do not forget that we are to be faithful and let God be good. It’s not about Wednesday night schedules, Sunday morning topics, Powder Puff football, retreats… its about YOU sharing with THEM your very life. It’s about you taking them to the grocery store with you, having coffee with them, going to Panera for breakfast, watching Monday night football, showing up to their play- just like LeCrae said: It’ not a stage and a mic, it’s life on life!
Take every opportunity as a teachable moment for it may be the last the kid will allow you. Take every chance in challenging these students for we might end up being a challenge too late. Above all, never stop sharing your life, that they might know the Word. It’s not about a stage, it’s not about a program, it’s not about an event… it’s about life on life. View every stage, every program, every event as an opportunity for you and your students to do life together. Use EVERYTHING as a teachable moment for them. Because after the music stops, what’s next?

Our busyness is our sin

I’ve realized lately that not only is my busyness annoying to others and painful to me, it’s actually proving to be the root of my sin. Not all my sin of course, but those that are most present, those that are most detrimental. So, I’m done. I’m done letting busyness not only control my life, but hinder my walk with Christ and my ministry to people. I’m done letting my busyness hurt people. My promise to myself is this: “I’m done living off coffee and energy drinks.”

The fact is we are all busy people. Each of us find a way to busy ourselves with something, but mostly we do so with our work and the pursuit of “success”… whatever that means. For years I thought that my busyness was due to me not being a good manager of time. I remember the day I bought a palm pilot… THAT was about as effective as a one armed paper hanger! I tried to remedy my problem but no matter how much I “planned” I was still way too busy. The next logical place for me to go was to think that I was just lazy. I need to sleep 4 hours a night and then I will have enough time to do my job well, keep up with friendships, stay in touch with family, get into the lives of high school students, and have time to just do some things I love to do. I can go on 4 hours of sleep, but then I would have to take back my promise, and use coffee and energy drinks simply as a drug to keep going. We can do that, of course, until it catches up to us and leaves us physically passed out on the ground somewhere!

The fact is most of us find ourselves too busy- not due to an inability to schedule or plan, and not due to us being lazy. Simply put: 24 hours is not enough time in a day for us to completely fulfill every role that we are a part of! Rather, we are too busy because we don’t know how or when to say no. More than that, we feel a level of guilt that almost won’t allow us to say no. We find ourselves at the end of the day being guilt- free because we said yes to everybody. Or we feel guilty, because we said yes to one person but that forced us to say no to another so now we feel like we owe something to them. So who do we cheat? Who do we disappoint? The thing we fail to realize is that in the process of this guilt and juggling we are losing ourselves along the way.

The best illustration I’ve heard about this is one used by Andy Stanly. Andy has a book called “Choose to Cheat” which I haven’t read but I would love to have the opportunity soon! He addresses this issue and tells us that at some point in time we must choose to cheat somebody because of our busyness. The illustration he uses goes like this: Suppose I walked up to you with a large rock and said “can you hold this for a while?”. Mentally and physically you would have the ability to hold the rock, but after a while your physical ability would fail you. After a while you would no longer have the ability to hold it and so you would drop the rock and shatter it. At that point I might ask you “why did you drop the rock?”. My question infers that something happened at that point in time that caused you to drop the rock. However, it wasn’t that particular point in time that caused you to drop it, rather it was the process of you holding it for so long. Andy would compare this to a husband or wife walking out on their spouse one day because they had been neglected. The natural question is “what happened? Why did you leave me today?”. While the correct answer is not that something happened that day or even that week, but it was the process of our sin of busyness affecting that relationship. The point is that when we let busyness become our sin, we start to slowly hurt those people closest to us, until one day they can no longer hold this rock that we asked them to hold.

It’s funny because we seem to ask those closest to us to hold the rock for the longest amount of time. We usually ask those that are most loving and loyal to us to hold that rock. We tend to be more loyal to our bosses, our critics, our classes, our teachers and people who really aren’t that loyal to us. Those that are most loyal to us- whether it be a spouse, a best friend, a girlfriend/ boyfriend, a mom/dad- we tend to neglect and be less loyal to these people in our lives. Doesn’t that seem backwards to you? Doesn’t that seem sinful to you? Philippians 2:4 says: “Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.” Philippians 2 can be used either as a justification to neglect those closest to us, or as a conviction for us to consider the interests or the feelings of those closest and most dear to us as more than our own. Spending more time with your boss than with your wife is really you considering your own interests isn’t it? Spending more time with your friends than with your own family is the same right? We are more loyal to those less loyal to us and least loyal to those most loyal to us.

Our busyness is our sin because it hurts those closest to us.