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Originally published here: https://www.thesheridanpress.com/faith/column-the-world-jesus-came-to-didnt-look-like-a-movie/article_9c06d148-1a2e-48c4-82dd-8f73740619d2.html

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The Christmas Stroll has become one of my favorite times of the year. If I am in town for Thanksgiving weekend, I’m there. This year was no exception. I enjoyed chatting with friends. The kids were having a blast laughing and playing together. Stores were filled. Live music was playing everywhere. And my cup of hot chocolate was never so satisfying.

We’ve had such a beautiful fall season that I’ve been having trouble comprehending that Christmas is so close. But the snow came at just the right time – right on queue for the Christmas Stroll! It was so good to walk up and down Main Street in the snow, even if I wasn’t acclimated to the cool breeze. It made for a wonderful and picturesque evening. Someone commented, “it’s like a Hallmark movie!” So true!

While that evening looked like a movie scene, I know that for many this is a very difficult time of year. Some are grieving a loss. Some are in a challenging financial situation. Some are dealing with issues at work or at home. I get it. Sometimes life is really, really hard.

If I’m honest about my own life, this season has been a mixed bag. At times I’m celebrating God’s goodness with friends and then a moment later I’m grieving the loss of a loved one with other friends. Some days I’ve got the “feel good vibes” and the next I’m wondering if anything else can fall apart. I’m guessing you can relate to this. I’m keenly aware that there is a season for everything. And this season seems to be filled with all the things.

There is a verse that I keep coming back to that says, “When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners” (Romans 5:6 NLT). I like to think I have enough Wyoming grit to muscle my way through any circumstance, but I don’t. I’m going to give it my best shot and yet at some point I run out of strength. This passage is referencing sin specifically – I definitely fall short and I’m utterly helpless. Yet God knew this about me and he sent Jesus for me anyway. And not just for me – for you too. That’s what we celebrate at Christmas. At just the right time, Jesus came. Immanuel, God with us.

Much like our everyday reality, the world Jesus came to didn’t look like a movie. Quite the opposite actually. He came to a world that didn’t welcome him. He came to a humble place, an animal-filled barn. In a sense he came to you right where you are. And at just the right time.

Whatever this season is like for you, the appearance of everything going perfectly isn’t the goal. Likewise, we don’t celebrate how things feel. Instead, we celebrate that Jesus came. We have hope because of what Christ has done for us and because Christ is with us now. In him there is newness of life, hope and peace. I encourage you to stay connected during this season. Go to church. Call your family. Visit with friends. And remember 1 John 4:9 (NLT), “God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him.”

“How are you doing?”  “I’m great! Thanks! And you?” 

That sounds like the start of almost every conversation everywhere. Whether or not we are actually “great” might be another matter. Our reality is that some people are doing amazingly well and some people are hurting. Really hurting. If we are honest, everyone of us is somewhere on that spectrum between blessed and struggling. We all know too, that our situations are very fluid and can change rapidly.

I have been pleasantly surprised recently to see folks step up to help others in the best possible ways. The kindness is tangible and real. I love seeing people come alongside one another to help out as needed. Sometimes these are small acts of service that could go unnoticed and sometimes these are acts of sacrificial giving coming at great cost to the giver. 

As I gain experience as a pastor, I’m learning that everyone is wrestling with something. We are sometimes tempted to compare ourselves to others. Don’t do it. It is useless to compare our struggles because for each one of us struggles are very real. My battle is different than yours and yours is very different than mine. And that’s probably okay. 

I’m also learning that we handle battles differently. We tend to have default behavior and default tools that guide us. Some responses are innate and some are learned. Some people seem to have great tools in the toolbox and others seem to have room to grow. All of us could stand to sharpen the tools we have. Perhaps we even need to acquire some new tools with the help of counselors or spiritual leaders. 

One of the best tools we have access to is other people. We are not very good at carrying burdens alone. Of course no one wants to see anyone go through a crisis, but there is value in walking through a crisis with others. 

Whatever it is that you are going through, find some people that you can walk with. I understand that some issues are difficult to admit, but it is worth the effort to journey with others. I might even go so far as to say that God created us to walk in community. 

Churches can be great places to find our much needed community. My encouragement to you is to find a place to plug in. Of course I’d love to have you at my church, but if we aren’t a great fit then I will help you find another place to plug in. We have some amazing pastors and churches in our community. 

One great value in walking together is that we can encourage each other. When I’m having a down day I need to hear from my brothers and sisters. When I have something to celebrate, that celebration is so much sweeter with friends.

Whatever the circumstances, I often think of Psalms 126:3 (NIV) which says, “The LORD has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.” When I’m stuck thinking about my difficulties, I remember that the Lord has been so good to me. And then I remember that the Lord has been so good to us. So let’s encourage one another and build each other up. Let’s cheer each other on and support one another. 

“Glorify the LORD with me; let us exalt his name together.” Psalms 34:3 NIV

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I’m a little slow in posting this. I wrote this piece for our local newspaper on January 17. Here is the original link: https://www.thesheridanpress.com/opinion/columnists/column-how-are-you-doing/article_0f70861a-d393-11ef-aa55-eb795fc06386.html

With all of our schools kicking off a new year in the past week or two, I can’t help but to think of how important education is for our young people. We are blessed to live in a community with some of the best schools in the nation. I might be a bit biased yet all the Blue Ribbons seem to back me up on this statement. And we have some great alternative schools as well! Thank you, teachers, administrators, and support staff for caring for our young people! We pray that this year will be the best yet, that you will have all the appropriate resources you need, and that you will have a renewed passion and energy for this upcoming year.

For all of us that are out of school I have a two part challenge. First, I want to challenge you to always be a learner. It is far too easy to think that we are done with that phase of our lives. Now we have expectations to produce at the workplace. Whatever the product is in our industry, there is pressure to perform. There’s nothing wrong with that. We should strive to be productive in the literal sense of the word. Write articles, sell houses, build systems, serve a meal. Put in an honest day’s work in whatever you do. And yet in that, always be a learner.

I am constantly striving to grow and learn. I’ve taken on countless projects that I didn’t know how to do at the time knowing that I could learn how to do it. I’m not advocating for being deceptive or for taking on too much. Instead I’m saying that we should be open to stretching ourselves by learning new skills, by applying what we already know in new ways, and by acquiring new tools to do new jobs. Don’t stop learning.

Second, I want to challenge you to apply the learned knowledge and skills in real life.

I’m really looking forward to getting back to watching Sunday afternoon football. It doesn’t matter who is playing – I just enjoy watching a good game. And I can definitely be a bit of an armchair quarterback. “Why did you throw that?! How come you didn’t run the ball?! Didn’t you see the open man?! What even was that?!” To be clear, I’m not a football player, unless you count the rare backyard game. Here’s my point. I can sound like an expert and even tell people what they ought to do, but too often I’m unwilling to do it myself. Can anyone else relate to that? I think all of us do this to some extent. Leo Tolstoy, author of War & Peace, said, “Everybody thinks of changing humanity and nobody thinks of changing himself.” We need to actually do the things we know to do.

The Apostle Paul was a role model in this regard. First, he credited the Lord for everything he learned and practiced. Second, he modeled the behavior that he taught others to do. And he was bold enough to say not only, “do what I say,” but also, “do what I do.” He said, “Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.” (Philippians 4:9 NLT) Strive to be a “do what I do” sort of person.

And I have one more challenge for those that know the Lord. I encourage you to keep fixing your eyes on Christ and to stay in the Word. Paul offered an instruction and a promise in this verse: “Let your roots grow down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness.” (Colossians 2:7 NLT)

Be a student for life and let your life be a blessing to everyone you meet.

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This will appear in The Sheridan Press on August 30, 2024.

This article will appeared in The Sheridan Press as a part of a series on health in 2021.

https://www.thesheridanpress.com/special/page-health-and-fitness-2021-7/page_47a70f7b-fc69-5804-b2c3-cb29e1f7c50b.html

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What comes to mind when you think of spiritual health?  As with physical health, we tend to think of inward activities – prayer, meditation, devotion, and the like. We would do well to prioritize these inward-focused disciplines. However, spiritual health also involves being outward focused.

As a Christian, I can’t ignore all that Jesus and the Bible said about being outward focused. The Bible instructs believers to consider others above oneself.  Here are a few examples: “Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other” (Romans 12:10).  “Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others” (Colossians 3:13).  “Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions” (1 John 3:18).  And a final example from Jesus, who so plainly and directly said, “This is my command: Love each other” (John 15:17).

The reason we should develop inward-focused health is so we can have an outward-focused impact on the world around us.  What good is it to know all of Scripture if those around you have never heard it before?  What good is it to amass great wealth if it perishes at the end of your life?  What good is salt if it has lost its flavor?  You were created to be in relationship with the Father and to love others.

Not long before the crucifixion of Jesus, some religious leaders tried to trap Jesus with a question, “What is the most important commandment?”  Jesus replied with two commands that are intricately woven together and inseparable.  Quoting the Old Testament, he said, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:37-40)

Spiritual health in the first century – and now in the twenty-first century – must center on these two commands.  Love the Lord and love others.  

With these principles in mind, here are three simple steps to improve your spiritual health:

1. Be disciplined in your personal habits.  Prayer. Mediation. Study.  Take care of yourself and cultivate your faith.  You won’t have much to share if you don’t have much.  And yet, whether you have little or much, you can still be a blessing to others.
2. Take small steps.  In most cases, the smallest actions have the biggest impact. Be alert to opportunities to serve others.  Help a neighbor with a chore.  Pick up the tab for someone’s lunch.  Collect the trash left behind or blown by the wind. The sum of these small actions will literally change the world.
3. Focus on people.  If the best of actions are completed in a vacuum, there is no point.  I’m all for anonymous kindness, but that kindness should be directed to real-life people.  Use whatever resources, talents, and abilities you have to minister (a word that means “to serve”) others. If you are having trouble identifying who to help, extend a hand to those closest to you.

In conclusion and in the words of the Apostle Paul, “Let the message about Christ, in all its richness, fill your lives. Teach and counsel each other with all the wisdom he gives. Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to God with thankful hearts. And whatever you do or say, do it as a representative of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through him to God the Father.”  (Colossians 3:16-17)

I certainly have opinions about everything that is going on these days.  I’ve shared a few of my thoughts privately with close friends.  I’ve refrained from going public with all these thoughts for a variety of reasons but mostly because I’m not totally convinced of my own opinions.

Today that changes.  I would like to share a few thoughts and opinions.  However, I want to do so in a different way than I’ve been seeing recently.  Yesterday morning I woke up and couldn’t shake the question, “what are you thankful for?”  So I’m starting a list.  In light of everything going on I would encourage you to do something similar.

1. Friends and family.  I’m grateful for friends and family that have the same opinions as me and I’m grateful for friends and family with different opinions.  While I sometimes struggle to see the opposing viewpoint, I know that it is good for me to hear their side more than it is good for me to shout my own viewpoint.  I smile when I think of the diversity of my friends.  It makes me think that I’ve done a good job being a civil human being.  (In full disclosure, I’ve hidden a few friends in my social media news feeds, not because I disagree, but because I cannot tolerate their tone.  Friends aren’t abusive.  I have no room for abuse.)
2. Technology.  Just a few years ago we wouldn’t have been able to carry on like we have during a crisis.  Churches like ours are still meeting – and growing – even though we had a season of not meeting in person.  (I’m convinced that those who say all this is persecution against the church are really just dealing with their own insecurities.)  Schools are still operating, thanks to creative teachers and parents and the use of technology.  
3. Medical professionals.  There has never been a better time for a health crisis.  We’ve never been better equipped for something like this.  We have incredible technology, incredible knowledge, and incredible people all working together to solve this problem. Wealthy individuals are pitching in.  Governments are contributing.  I don’t agree with or understand every decision they make, but I also know that they are putting everything they’ve got into this and eventually it will no longer be a “crisis.”
4. Men and women in uniform.  Some of the friends and family I mentioned in the first category serve and I’m grateful for their service.  I did a ride-along this past winter with a friend in our local PD.  I was super impressed with the quality of his work and with the ethics in which he operates.  Honestly, I already knew he was a great guy and yet he exceeded my expectations.  I see him and so many others serving with the same diligence and excellence every day.  They are doing their jobs and doing them well.
5. Conspiracy theorists.  They rarely see themselves as such and the name I just gave them might be worded too strongly.  However, I am grateful that they are digging for truth and trying to hold people accountable.  More than that, I’m grateful we live in such a place as this that respects (generally) the right to say what we want, whether or not it makes any sense whatsoever. Additionally, we can freely and openly agree or disagree with that outrageous statement.  The thing we need to remember is that other people don’t have to support our sentiment.  If they choose to “take it down,” well, they have just as much right to do so as we have a right to speak it to begin with.  Find another way to communicate your beliefs.  Be careful of what you demand of others.
6. Balance of power.  The timing of balance tends to mess with people.  It takes time for everything to level out.  In a storm with waves crashing all around, it takes even longer.  I have quite a bit of faith in this system.  It has a long track record of working.  Also, there’s not a better alternative to what we have.  So flaws and all, I’ll take it.
7. Jesus.  I want to make sure I communicate this clearly and simply.  This category exceeds all the others.  In fact, none of the other things I’m thankful for matter in comparison to Christ and his work in me and around me.

“Yes, we know that ‘we all have knowledge’ about this issue. But while knowledge makes us feel important, it is love that strengthens the church. Anyone who claims to know all the answers doesn’t really know very much.”

1 Corinthians 8:1b-2 NLT

We live in a generous community.  I’ve always known this and yet this year I saw generosity redefined.  While the month of December is always filled with the usual flurry of activities, programs, and fundraisers, there is the usual emphasis on giving.  It is the season of giving, after all. In the midst of all the commotion, one example of generosity really stood out to me. With his permission, I’ll tell you part of his story.

A friend of mine works full-time yet the pay is barely sufficient to meet his basic needs.  I will tell you that he is a responsible man, but circumstances largely out of his control mean that he is living month-to-month, paycheck to paycheck.  There are many in our community that can identify with that. Yet the financial limitation did not hold him back from being generous this year. He found ways to serve others by volunteering his time with different organizations.  I thought that was very commendable. Then one afternoon I got a text from him saying, “Let me know if there is a family in need. I’d like to help them have some gifts.” As God’s timing would have it, a very short time later I was able to match him with a family.  He blessed them with gifts given not out his abundance, but out of his poverty. And I believe he received the bigger blessing.  

I know there are so many stories like this.  I could fill today’s paper with them. There are lots of great organizations and individuals blessing others, sharing everything they have.  For the Christians, we do this as an expression of the generosity Christ showed us when he lived, died, and rose again on the third day for our salvation.  This is a response to the hope, love, joy, and peace that is now ours through Christ the King.

Let me share another illustration of generosity.  Many churches have a Christmas Eve candlelight service.  At some point during the service, the lights are dimmed down and the congregation takes a moment to reflect on the Christ candle, the white candle lit at the end of the Advent season.  A team will then light candles they are holding from that Christ candle and turn to light more candles that the congregation members are holding. Pretty quickly the room goes from dimly lit to surprisingly bright.  Many of you witnessed this just a couple of days ago.

This is a beautiful picture of the church being the light of Christ in a broken world.  Jesus talked about light and generosity in Matthew 5:14-16: “No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket. Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house. ‘You are the light of the world—like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden. In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father.’”

This is the generosity that I saw so much of this year – a generosity with the purpose of glorifying Christ.  What I described was not generosity because of Christmas, but rather generosity because of Christ. 

So here is my challenge to the church and to this community (and to myself).  Let’s make generosity a habit. Let’s always be aware of the needs around us. Let’s not wait until next December.  If you are looking for a New Year’s resolution for 2020, let it be, “I will make generosity a habit.”

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This appeared in The Sheridan Press on December 27, 2019.  (https://thesheridanpress.com/117546/make-generosity-a-habit-for-2020/)

In sharing about God’s justice, I made a statement that many Christians share a hesitancy in talking about how God expresses justice.  Following the service a friend came to me and said, “God isn’t timid about it; we shouldn’t be either.” My friend is absolutely correct.  God’s justice is expressed throughout Scripture, literally from beginning to end. The world has every reason to be fearful of this all-consuming justice, and yet this justice is the very thing that leads us to the cross.

In a word, we can define justice as “Jesus.” God the Father has appointed him to be judge of all the earth (John 5).  This King descended from his throne in heaven and took the seat of Judge in the courtroom. Hearing and seeing the evidence he pronounced me guilty and sentenced me to death and eternal separation from the One who breathed life into me.  

That could have been the end of the story.

This King and Judge descended again from his rightful seat of authority.  He walked up to me, face and face, and then pushed me aside to take my place on the cross.  All the things I did, all the guilty verdicts, all the times I was an enemy of God became his cross to bear.  Not only that, I was there to nail his hands and feet to the cross, my cross. Justice was served, and the wrong criminal took the fall.  He died on that cross for me.  

That could have been the end of the story. 

How is that fair?  Why should my King die in my place?  Who am I that God would be mindful of me?  What is a criminal worth to the Lord of all creation?  Apparently everything. That’s not fair. Sometimes I still hang on to my “stuff.”  Sometimes I try to take ownership of everything he took. I try to make things “fair” in my eyes.  Don’t you?  

The story continues.

This King and Judge and Sacrifice rebuilt the temple in three days.  He is taking back everything that is his. His Kingdom is expanding and he is asking us to join him in his good work.  The world needs to hear this message about justice, his justice. This message is that yes, you are guilty, and yes, this King and Judge took the punishment so that we might have new life.  

This message of justice changes everything.  All the revenge that we think we are entitled to take, we hand back to the King, for it is his to take.  All chains that were rightfully ours are now broken as we walk in the freedom that comes in and from Christ.  We praise our Father for the hope that is now ours. We are the evidence that God changes everything.  

For I am not ashamed of this Good News about Christ. It is the power of God at work, saving everyone who believes—the Jew first and also the Gentile.  This Good News tells us how God makes us right in his sight. This is accomplished from start to finish by faith. As the Scriptures say, “It is through faith that a righteous person has life.”  (Romans 1:16‭-‬17 NLT)

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This is a reflection on a message I shared at Cornerstone Church on October 13, 2019.

Video: https://youtu.be/hA1_e7hnbHc

Podcast: The Real God // The Justice of God