Word of Encouragement

I have always wondered why God came as an infant, subject to the rules and laws of this world, an innocent at the mercy of the guilty. Why not come in power and might? Why humbly? A baby in a manger? Only when we begin to understand the true nature of love can we begin to understand this. Power is the opposite of love. Power does not care about you or me. Power simply wants results. Power demands. It consumes, pushes, controls. Love, not so much. Love thinks of the other first, seeks the best for others before self. Love is not jealous or angry or shouting or demanding. Love just wants to walk quietly with us in the cool of the garden, and listen and smile, and bring us purpose and peace, meaning and life. Christmas is Love; Love is Christmas. This is why God came as an infant. Merry Christmas Wesley!

~Grace & Peace~
Pastor Ernie

“Unto us a child is born.” the magnitude of those words often gets overlooked in our lives and the craziness Christmas has become. So for just a minute or two think of this: Almighty God, creator of the heavens and earth, thought enough of us, you and me, that he would send His Son. He sent his Son, not an ambassador or an angel or a messenger, His Son, His only Son. And He sent him for the purpose of becoming a perfect sacrifice, He sent Him to die on the cross. Now that is really quite astounding, humbling, inspiring. Is there anyone else in your life who puts that sort of value on you? We would all hope so.

We know this is love, no that we loved God but that He first loved us and gave himself up for us. Remember that this Christmas season. God has an amazing love for each one of us. Set time aside to worship. Do not take a single day for granted or think you will have time to do it tomorrow. Thank God Today.

~Grace & Peace~
Pastor Ernie

“For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on Him but also to suffer for Him” Philippians 1:29 Such an odd joining of thoughts: granted, as in a favor toward me, and the favor is that I am privileged to suffer like Paul for the sake of Christ. Odd. Paul says this sort of thing often, “Consider it all joy when you experience trials of any kind.” In all my years as a pastor I have learned that the holiday season is the best of times and the worst of times. We love to be with our families and laugh and eat and share love, and at the same time we miss those who are no longer with us. It is like crying and laughing at the same time. What we have as believers is the knowledge that we are living our lives “in Christ.” And that makes all the difference. For in Christ we find our hope and our assurance that there is more to us than flesh and blood. In Christ we share the reality that what others see as an end we see as a beginning of a grand new life. In Christ we can feel the wind blow and see the sun rise and are reminded that God is not yet finished with this old world or this old life. In Christ we can rise the next morning and not only believe it will be a good day but actually live out a good day.

That good day starts with believing in Christ. Trust the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. Acknowledge Him in all your ways and He will keep your path straight. Good advice for the holiday season.

~Grace & Peace~
Pastor Ernie

Already we see the hustle of the holiday season. My car was hit in the Publix parking lot because there was just too much action for everyone to know where to look. It was just a small fender bender and will serve as a reminder to always be thankful during the holidays that God provides. That is the approach I decided to take.

I could have decided to allow the dent to be a reminder of a negative experience between two Floridians. I actually did not even have to decide this time. I automatically went to forgiveness and set the other driver free before I even looked at the dent. Looking back, it seems quite freeing. I guess I could have sat there and waited two hours for the police to file a report so his insurance would have to pay for a repair. But in the end, it was a so what? And I really liked it that way.

So your word of encouragement today. Even if it is someone else’s fault, pull a so what. Set yourself free.

~Grace & Peace~
Pastor Ernie

What should we do when we get discouraged?  DIscouragement often stems from a limited perspective.  We see things with short sighted vision and limited or no peripheral vision.  So here are two suggestions to help us when we start getting the blues.

~Grace & Peace~

Pastor Ernie

Another mass shooting, this one in a church on a Sunday morning. Oh my. God we need some help here. Hear our cry as your people. We repent of our evil ways. We confess that we have thought we know better ways to live than to follow your precepts. We are sorry that we have become so arrogant as to think we have better answers than the ones You gave us. Do not leave us to ourselves. Hear our cry for mercy, hear our voice again. Leave us not to ourselves. Leave us not…

“If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” 2 Chronicles 7:14

Israel did not repent, they did not pray and they were cast from their land, swallowed up by their enemies. The land did not receive the healing God desired to give it. We should pray church. We should pray for God to hear our voice again. We should pray for repentance and humility to rule the land and guide the minds of our leaders and our citizens. We should pray for Godly leadership to rise and corruption and greed be brought to an end. Humble us God. Humble them! Bring us all to our knees.

~Grace & Peace~
Pastor Ernie

This past Sunday I shared a critical thinking for the church that is too important to our future simply to assume we all understood.  Here is a brief summary:  we are moving into the letters of Paul and Paul loves lists.  He presents us with many of them.  Romans 1 has a list, a long one.  The purpose of the list is twofold.  First, for the believer, the list exists to be inclusive not exclusive.  Paul does not present behavioral lists to exclude people from the kingdom.  Rather he presents them so that we (believers) are reminded that we are sinners in need of a savior.  So Romans 2:1 follows the list and Paul says believers are not to judge others.  The second reason Paul presents the lists is to remind us that what we do matters to God.  We are not free to just do whatever we wish.

As important as it is that believers not be judgmental, the more important teaching of Romans 1 is that everyone is responsible for responding to the truth of God.  Paul says creation itself should have been sufficient evidence for us to humble ourselves and worship a good and loving Creator.  When someone (or a church or a nation) chooses to reject God and create idols, God’s response is simply to turn us over to ourselves.  Simply put, we get to make up what we think is true based on our own opinions.  In our society, this means that those we elected to office will determine what is true and the truth will be handed down to us.  We will not vote on it.  And if we are being handed over to ourselves, we would vote in favor of godlessness.

The evidence that we are being handed over to ourselves is seen in the lists Paul gives us throughout his letters and in the call to become Holy Jesus offers his disciples.  So what are we to do?

We are to seek holiness and accept the reality that God’s people have always been called to be different and set apart.  We are to remain steadfast and cling to the truth.  We are to understand that eventually others will be drawn to the truth.  Light in the darkness always gets attention.  In short, we are not to conform to the pattern of the world but to be transformed by the Spirit of God. Romans 12:1-2

In the end, I realize I am just a single person with little ability to influence anyone in the direction of what is true. Without God empowering what I am learning, there is no hope it can really change me or anyone else. We are entering the letters of Paul in our 27/90 readings and this will be a most challenging month of reading and thinking. I had considered saving the more difficult readings for small groups but have decided that would not be beneficial for the whole church. Over the next few weeks I plan to be as bold as Paul. Rather than lead us to truth in subtlety, I will be running full force into it.

This week I plan to lay a foundation for the rest of the writings of Paul and I hope for our lives. Please read Romans 1:1-2:4 before church. Next week, November 5, will be PG 13 as I talk about marriage, human sexuality and the call to holiness in our world. Please read 1 Corinthians 3:16, 1 Corinthians 6:12-7:40. Small children should go to Promiseland. Teens and maybe even preteens should be in church with you. Be prepared to converse with your family about the teaching. Parents, use your discretion. Husbands bring your wives and wives your husbands.

~Grace & Peace~

I have been reading about how the church got started in the book of Acts and I have to tell you I am not so sure I would have wanted to be a church starter back then. It did have its highs and lows, like almost everything in life.

On the high side, Peter gave one sermon and the church had 3,000 people. Not quite working like that today. On the low side, they argued over who was going to get their way. Who would get the food offering and who would be left out. On the low side, if the towns people did not like what you were saying they would stone you, not a bad option today some might say. On the high side, if the leader knew you were lying, he could call you into the office and you would die, and so would your wife.

On the high side, you got to live a lot of places because you were always being scattered throughout the region. On the low side, your enemies always seem to know where you went and they would follow you.

So there were lots of ups and downs when starting a church in Acts. There still are today and it is so much fun.

~Grace & Peace~

One of the gifts I was given as a young Christian was being taught to put important scripture verses in my mind and then my heart. I put my first verse in my memory the very first night I was a Christian, Hebrews 11:1 “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen.” This verse has visited my mind many times since 1976, most of those times when it came, it was right on cue. It always came when I was struggling with something about life, really cannot even remember all of the details now. What I do remember though is how that verse came to me and what it felt like.

When life is confusing because of circumstances, events, relationships, and each morning carries more pain and hurt, there is something powerful about a verse washing over you, bathing you in hope. You can stay there for hours and it seem like a second. This still happens today. At any moment in time, God can send me a message of hope through a scripture I memorized. It even happens when I am standing on front of the congregation preaching. God sends me a word, something for me, something for you. And that word is always so sweet, so comforting, right on time.

~Grace & Peace~
Pastor Ernie