In All Your Ways, Acknowledge Him.....

It'd be a little hard to ignore His showing up yesterday. He did just that, big time, in something as mundane as concert tickets.

One of my friends from church is Isaiah Smith, of the Smith family previously written about here. He's a bass player and he knows I'm a Bela Fleck fan. And Fleck's bass player in the Flecktones is Victor Wooten, arguably the best bass player in the world.

Ever.

Isaiah approached me in church about a month ago and said the Flecktones would be here the 9th of December, which was yesterday (as I write this). I asked if he'd like to go and he said "YES!!", so I got on the phone and ordered a couple seats. They were in the Loge, stage left, top row. Best unsold seats they still had.

I asked about getting VIP passes, so Isaiah could meet Victor, but there weren't any, and the Orchestra Center seats .. the best in the house .. were all gone. But they said keep checking in, to see if any got turned back in.

The 8th, I called and they said they had two Orchestra Center tickets, so I upgraded. They said stop by the Box Office when we got there and swap them out.

Parking had been a worry, as the Alys Stephens Center is right in the UAB campus and parking can be scarce. But there were some lots not too far away, and I figured I could suffer the walk OK despite my arthritis.

WELL. Yesterday, I picked up Isaiah at 4pm, we went to Dreamland BBQ at 4:30 (3 blocks from the venue) and we ate a slab of ribs, and eventually got to the venue about 5:30.

There was a parking spot on the street, 30' from the Box Office. Hmmm .. praise GOD!

We went to the box office and the nice lady took my tickets and went to get my new ones and I asked for a seating chart. A young man brought it, and pointed out where our seats were, theater left aisle, 4 rows from the stage! He'd heard we were Wooten fans and he said "He usually sets up on that side, so those will be great seats." But then he said "You might rather have B114 and B115 " .. and pointed out the two FRONT-ROW seats in front of the others.

WOW. You betcha, and thanks!!!

So help me. We were on the front row, immediately in front of Victor Wooten!!! When he played a rather long solo medley, he was standing literally 6 feet from my nose! Directly in front of Isaiah's seat.

His performance, and the performances of ALL the musicians, were simply beyond description.

After, the band went to the lobby and stood in the area where all the band stuff was on sale. They called it their "Meet & Greet". Now, I'm not into standing in line, so I just sat to the side on a nice comfy padded bench, and Isaiah went through the line.

About an hour later, we left .. Isaiah had the autographs of everybody in the band, Victor Wooten had signed his ticket and the pick guard from Isaiah's bass (he brought it just in case...), and Isaiah had his picture taken with Victor.

The entire concert was so wonderful .. so outstanding .. that I wrote a thank-you note to Victor Wooten, and asked him to express my gratitude to the rest of the band. But if I want to REALLY thank our benefactor, I need to send another thank-you note. So here it is:

Thanks, God. Your performance was the best of all.

It's OK, Because He Knows About It

Peggy and I visited with our family doctor today, for some routine 6-month followup for some bloodwork. And not just bloodwork, but fasting bloodwork.

Cleveland interpretation: fasting bloodwork is the test that give you an excuse to go eat Cheese Blintzes at IHOP, afterwards.

Everything was fine, and I took the opportunity to ask the doctor about a couple other problems that have cropped up recently. One of those was sleeping; he took care of that. Another was stuffy nose, which he addressed via a prescription.

The last problem, which arose in the past week, is best left undescribed (in case men, women, children, boys, or girls happen to read this). But it was of some concern. So, Doctor Tom and I talked it over, he examined the shall we say affected area, and said it wasn't a problem.

Peg asked me about it as we drove in the direction of the Cheese Blintzes, and I recounted the story. Then I said I felt OK with it, and said "It's OK, because he knows about it".

Hmmm ... hmmm ... it's OK, because he knows about it.

That got me to thinking .. shouldn't things be OK with me, because my Heavenly Father knows about it? I've got arthritis in my right knee and ankle, I've had prostate cancer that got out into a lymph node, we're living on Social Security and have a decent retirement nest egg but who knows what's going to happen to the economy or health care or oil prices, Peg's had breast cancer several times, and the list goes on. And on.

Do I think God doesn't know about any of these things? No. Do I think He intends harm for me? No. If that's the case, should I worry about any of those things? No.

And that flash of thought brought me to all that's going on in the SBC. Does He know what the GCRTF is up to? Yes. Does He know what their decisions are going to be? Yes. Does He know what we of the SBC, assembled in Orlando, are going to vote on, and how we're going to vote? Yes.

God, in more than one place, tells us that He orders the steps and even the thoughts of those whose works are committed fully to Him. Hence, all we need to do, as believers, and as members of the SBC, is to walk in the light He gives us, and in faithfulness to Him.

Which brings up a question in my mind. Since none of us lives in a vacuum, we're going to have to interact with people around us. Including some who don't agree with us. When that happens, do we think God doesn't know about it? I doubt we think that, and if God knows about those things, then what cause do I have to be upset?

None, that's what.

So why would there ever be vitriol, name-calling, sarcasm, and the like, stuff I see so much of in Blogdom? Maybe it's because, when someone disagrees with us, we think there's a chance they're right and we're wrong. So, we get all defensive. And loud. But if we're in tune with God, and He knows, what's to be upset about? What's to fear?

Said all that to say that God instructed us to be united. To be one, even as He and His Father are One. And He didn't say that we were just supposed to pick out somebody to be in unity with ... we're to strive for unity with all believers. Yet, as Nathan Finn pointed out some days ago on his blog, there are folks on the "sprinkling" side debating with the folks on the "immersion" side over whether the other is really a church at all!

I can't help but think that kind of thing sickens God.

In my personal case, I sure don't have a problem with either side of that debate, as I've been a Presbyterian and a Baptist. And also a Methodist, and I never left any denomination over what they believed.

For the record, I am now a Baptist by conviction, and do not intend to change. But if God tells us to go labor in some other vineyard, we'll sure do that!

The photograph above is that of the procession of the hearse carrying the remains of Pelham Police Officer Philip Davis ... killed in the line of duty last week ... from the funeral home, to the Church at Brook Hills, for his viewing 12/7/2009, and his subsequent funeral 12/8/2009. En route, they detoured past the Pelham Police Headquarters ... just off camera to the left ... which also took them past the Pelham Fire Department Headquarters. The men seen saluting in the photograph are the on-duty members of the Pelham Fire Department, paying their respects. Despite the differences, in may ways, between Policemen and Firefighters, the differences were all lost in the moment of respect caught in the picture from the Birmingham News.

As an aside, I wonder ... is there some reason we don't owe our fellow Christians at least as much respect?

Additionally, mid-day today, there weren't any Pelham Police units visible in the city; they were all at the funeral, which was some miles distant. But, in their place, were at least five cars from Hoover, the city immediately adjoining Pelham to the north. They were filling in for the Pelham Police, who were at the funeral. This was despite the fact that Pelham and Hoover may handle their duties differently. Pelham and Hoover may have different standards for speed limits, stop signs, standards for when to be lenient and when to be strict.

But none of that mattered, today.

Edit Note: We ran into our son, Brian, at lunch today, Thursday the 10th. He told me that Hoover Police Personnel began covering Pelham at 6:00 p.m. Monday, the day of the viewing of Officer Davis, and covered the entire City until 6:00 a.m. Wednesday, the day after the funeral. The entire Pelham Police force was free to attend the viewing, the funeral, and tend to the family until the morning following. We also learned that there were over 500 cars in the procession, including Police from as far away as Dallas, Texas and Phoenix, Arizona. My, my, how much we can learn from them....

I'd hope that the SBC might demonstrate such a cooperative spirit and willingness to work for the benefit of others. I'd hope that differences, in matters which are seemingly minor, might be set aside as easily as was shown over the past few days, right in our back yard.

The really strange thing is that I don't think the law requires such a spirit among public entities. Nothing forced the Fire Department or the City of Hoover to do what was done. But they did it, regardless.

As opposed to that, the Bible commands believers to have ... to cultivate ... to strive for ... a Spirit of unity. And to love one another as Christ loves us. Sadly, I see less of that within the SBC, than I believe God had in mind.

Some people in our midst are Calvinists. More, aren't. Some people favor closed communion, some don't. Some people speak in unknown tongues, some don't. Some people (fill in the blank...), and others don't. Yet, despite the fact that God knows about all those things, and despite the fact that our imperfect, sin-blurred knowledge of all things Holy dooms us to miss the mark here or there, too many folks act as if they're right about everything they believe, and anybody who disagrees with them, is wrong. And that causes goodness-knows-how-much division. And disunity.

The Bible tells me nobody, but nobody, names Jesus as Savior and Lord, but by the Holy Spirit. If you do that, you're my brother (or sister).

Do we have differences? Sure. But it's OK that we do.

It's OK because He knows about it. I'm all for letting Him handle it, and just being about His work down here.

The Absolutely Stunning Love of God

We had our small group study last evening. We were there about an hour and a quarter, and had a great discussion. We started this thing a year ago, with 4 guys studying Ken Hemphill's Serving God course, which took eight weeks; we went from there into a study of the BF&M .. 2000 vs 1962 vs 1925. That lasted until June.

We then jumped into Romans; one of the guys had asked if we could go through it. In the last 6 or 7 weeks, God has grown the group to a dozen or more. Our format is that we chase all rabbits and answer all questions, and nobody prepares. I just read some verses, and then lead a discussion. Last night, we spent the time on one verse. This one:

"May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus ... (Romans 15:5; NIV)

Man, did we have fun with that! Some of the things that struck me, that I'd frankly never paid attention to, before:

• "...gives endurance..." We talked about why he said that. Only reason we could see is that God knows how trying life can be .. He did tell us that .. and He wants to sustain us when we get tired of it all. That tells me that nothing's wrong when that happens to me, and God does want us to get through times when we want to give up. And He wants to strengthen us to do that.
• "...gives encouragement..." Here again, God knows we're going to get discouraged, and He wants to encourage us when we do.

I think He does that because He loves us. And He wants us to have an abundant life. Since He designed us, engineered us, manufactured us, and maintains us, He knows what an abundant life consists of. And He left us instructions.

Oh .. He also, via His Son, invented the concept of "abundant life", so He defines it.

His giving of encouragement and endurance is part and parcel of the abundant life, and He goes on here to described another factor of that sort of life: Unity.

• "...give you a Spirit of unity among yourselves...". Well. I have to say I see a lot of some other spirit besides unity in the SBC today. Not that folks aren't clinging to bible passages in all they do .. I mean, the Calvinists can justify every point of their system of faith, with particular scripture, just as well as BF&M justifies its positions. I figure God knew that sort of thing would arise, and it must be true that we can have unity ... real unity in our diversity. But since I'm guessing it's natural for us to divide over things, unity is going to take a particular Spirit, and it'll be a gift of God when we reach unity. Maybe we're not asking God to give us that Spirit .. maybe we're really asking God to give others a spirit of unity with us. I doubt that's the idea.
• "...as you follow Jesus Christ ...". Wow. Could it be that, when we demonstrate a lack of unity (I don't mean uniformity), that we're not really following Jesus? I don't know, but if that's how we're supposed to do it, then we're sure wrong when we don't.
  

I talked about how I'd worshiped in many places; different countries, different denominations, different languages. And how there'd always been a wonderful sense of unity. That has to be a supernatural thing, as there's nothing about me that would prepare me to pray with folks (whose language I neither spoke nor understood),in a pentecostal church in Latvia, and feel as much a part of the body as I do at home.

After 75 minutes, I finally read verse 6:

"... so that with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ". (Romans 15:6, NIV)

There's the bottom line. If we are encouraged, if we endure, if we do have .. and show .. real unity, then our hearts and mouths can glorify God. Think of that ... mortal, sinful, frail man can actually do something that glorifies God, Who, it seems to me, has no need of anything we can do.

To top it all off, God says that the reason Jesus' name is above all names, and the reason why every knee shall bow and every tongue confess, is that He was obedient to die for you and me. When He'd rather the Father had offered Him another plan.

The magnitude of God's love leaves me speechless. I hope it always does.

In Light of Impending Obamacare:

(Photo stolen here).

It might be wise to listen to this.

The Best Part Of The Meal Was......

Peg and I went to the Catfish Landing for lunch, today. I was hungry for catfish, and Peg likes Chopped Steak .. their Friday Plate Lunch Special .. so off we went.



Annie was our server. We'd been there before, but I don't think she'd ever served us. But when she said she'd keep bringing Hush Puppies and Slaw until we told her to quit, I knew she was my kind of server. Here she is...



When we said we were done, she brought the check. Here 'tis....




When I saw what she'd written, I asked if she meant that. She said she did, and I told her:

"That's the best part of the meal."

And it was. I asked her where she went to church, and she mentioned a Church of God of Prophecy, about 20 miles away. She said she lived in Chelsea, but it was worth the drive to go to her church. I told her I understood that, and we'd driven 20 miles for the catfish!

I don't know much about the C.O.G.O.P., don't know much about their doctrine, membership vs attendance, views on Sunday School, or anything else. But I know this was a lady, working for a living, not ashamed to just be a believer, and act like it. Since I told my SS class for years and years that we need to live our lives as believers, as open and happy about that as our career, our marital status, or anything else about us, Annie really resonated with me.

Thanks, Annie. You made my day. And despite how good the catfish was, the check really was the best part of the meal!

Of Baptisms and Discipleship .... or ... At Least One Editor "Gets It" ... Again

In last week's Alabama Baptist, Dr. Bob Terry posted an excellent editorial. You might want to read it here. His point (or one of them): maybe we're hot to trot for Baptisms, but not so hot about the command, in the Great Commission, which follows immediately: the teaching.

Check the average SBC church attendance; then check Sunday School attendance, subtracting the number of little children too young to be included as members. Then compare again to total membership.

That is how many folks you're actually teaching. Well, if you don't count the fact that a church's laxity in requiring, expecting, or mandating church attendance and involvement, of our members, does in fact teach the non-attenders a lot about the church. I don't think that sort of teaching is what Jesus had in mind when He spoke the first part of the Great Commission, the part about making disciples.

It's also good to remember that every one of that "total membership" number walked down our aisles, presented themselves for membership on our terms, and then placed themselves under the oversight of our churches' leadership.

Someone said our church has about 2,800 members now, and attendance of just under 1,000. At that, the attendance figure includes something on the order of 250 preschoolers, and I'm pretty sure that very, very few of them are included on the membership roll.

Do the math. Then consider what church silence (and inaction), over non-attendance, teaches the non-attenders.

What's that? Non-resident membership? I wonder who said it was OK to join a church, move away, and then just leave your membership at "Back Home Baptist Church". We seldom speak highly about folks who have their "membership" there, but our own church has (apparently) hundreds of members for whom FBC Pelham is "Back Home Baptist".

I'm not throwing rocks at FBC Pelham, by the way. We have a real heart to do all the right stuff, but I think examining the numbers reveals just how easy it is to slip into the pattern that seems to beset the SBC as a whole.

As to the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force, I have a question. Isn't making disciples the primary instruction of the GC, and isn't that responsibility squarely on the shoulders of the local body?

I guess if you look at the whole thing, you might conclude that, if the local churches .. collectively .. don't carry it out, then God is going to move someone else into the gap, and get the job done. Maybe the GCRTF is just that .. a reflection of God's opinion of the current condition of the local SBC churches.

And, of course, I am aware that all generalizations are false, including this one, so any one church may be getting it right. But look at the SBC numbers, and it'll be plain that more people .. souls .. seem to have fallen through the cracks, than have stuck with it and have become disciples. And it might only be our collective pride that keeps us from admitting that.

Owner's Manuals, Blueprints, and the Like.

I was having a conversation with Wes Kenney, on Facebook, a couple of days ago, and mentioned a post I was contemplating. He made an observation (about auto Owner's Manuals), that sealed the deal and prompted me to write some stuff.

My Toyota Prius has an impressive Owner's Manual. It has 508 pages, all oriented at making sure I know how to enjoy the car, and get the highest and best possible use out of it. And there are a number of pages printed for the seemingly express purpose of warning me against dangerous activities with the car, so that I'll be without excuse if I get it all wrong and hurt myself.

508 pages.

But wait .. there's MORE! There's a 24 page booklet called the "Scheduled Maintenance Guide", I'm guessing so I can take care of it to assure long life.

And even that's not all .. there's this 148 page book specifically on how to use the Navigation System, which will happily tell me how to navigate to my final destination. IF I learn how to use it.

There are some other things, too: there's a 29 page pamphlet called the "Quick Reference Guide" (I guess so I can skip the meat of the big book and just hit enough highlights to get me going...), a "2008 Navigation Quick Reference Guide" ... presumably for the same purpose, and then there's this 52 page booklet that tells me what my rights are, under the warranty.

All in all, the books are quite thorough, and came with the car. From the people who invented, designed, engineered, manufactured, delivered, and maintain my Toyota. The ones who want it to be a good example, so others will be attracted to Toyota.

Hmmm .. Designer .. Engineer .. Manufacturer .. Deliverer .. Maintainer .. Provider of Guidance .. sorta sounds like someone else I know.

Make that Some One!

From what I know, God Himself designed us, engineered us, manufactured us, delivered us, and maintains us. And guides us, in the process.

In fact, He seems to have used the entirety of His Person ... Father, Son, and Holy Spirit .. to do that!

The word of the LORD came to me, saying, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart ...(Jeremiah 1:4-5, NIV)

Unless that was a one-time-only deal, He did the same for me. Design. Engineer. Manufacture.

He is my loving God and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield, in whom I take refuge, who subdues peoples under me.(Psalms 144:2, NIV)

Deliverer, indeed.

Even to your old age and gray hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you. (Isaiah 46:4, NIV)

Sounds like my Maintenance Department, to me. Even providing Emergency Road service, apparently.

The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. (Hebrews 1:3, NIV)

Hey, not just me, either. The whole world!

Listen, my son, accept what I say, and the years of your life will be many. I guide you in the way of wisdom and lead you along straight paths. (Proverbs 4:10-11, NIV)

Sounds like some great Guidance System, to me.

SO. The point that Wes made, in the chat, was that we're even one step more, like this, than I'd been thinking. His point was: Most people seem to leave the owner's manual in the glove compartment until something goes wrong, and then we drag it out but can't figure out how to use it.

So there we sit, broken car, too late to learn how to use the manual. Isn't that just like us?

In our own family .. Peg and I .. we've seen the results of studying up before something goes "boom". We've both had cancer, and as I told my Sunday School Class for about 8 years, the relationship .. the dependence .. we have to fall back on, in those times, is what we built up when we didn't "need it". Plain truth is, we always need to depend on the Lord, because we always do depend on Him, whether we know it or not. If we don't get familiar with Him in the good times, we're going to suffer for it in the bad ones.

Besides all the other things He did, and does, for us, Jesus also invented the term "abundant life". I'd imagine He knows what goes into one of them. And that He'd have left us instructions on how to have one.

He does. And He did. So get to know the Manual. You'll get to know Him in the process, far better than I'll ever get to know Toyota.