March 5

EXODUS 16
Woops. I missed my glory blog yesterday. No excuses. I could have risen a couple hours earlier than normal and written it; however, I had to leave early to attend a morning funeral in Mustang. I just didn’t get up early enough. Maybe I felt like I could depend upon the glory that I saw yesterday. Do you ever do that?
One would think that the glory that the Children of Israel saw in their deliverance from Egypt would have lasted a lifetime. Wouldn’t you think after those ten plagues, the pillar of fire and pillar of cloud, the parting of the Red Sea and the drowning of the army, that one would be secure in the provision of the Lord? At least, wouldn’t you think that security would last more than thirty days? Well, it didn’t. Was it a problem with the glory? No, it was a problem with the people, short memories. And what was the result? Complaining. If there is one thing I cannot stand it is a complainer. Yet I frequently find myself complaining. Why? Short memory when it comes to the glory of the Lord.
How does the Lord solve this problem? He put the Israelites on a daily diet of glory. What? Does He plan doing some magnificent daily display of who He is? Well, yes and no. Moses tells them, “In the morning you shall see the glory of the LORD; for He hears your complaints against the LORD.” And what was that glory? It was literally their breakfast, lunch and dinner on the ground. All they had to do was go gather it every morning. The Israelites woke up to it and said, “What is it?” It was edible. It was sweet. It was nourishing. It did not last for more than a day, except the Sabbath. It was a daily provision for their need. It was a daily reminder of His glory. It was a daily exercise in gathering the glory of the LORD. Does His glory go bad in a day? No, but because of our bad memories and sinful hearts, we need to be daily reminded of His glory. Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

PSALM 64
My son Daniel is an illustrator. He has done a number of comical illustrations of people with unusually large tongues. The illustrations always amuse me.
“Hide me. . . from the wicked. . . who sharpen their tongues like a sword. . . But God . . . will make them stumble over their own tongue.” While not all of us have had people pursue us with swords as David did, we have all had enemies who have used sharp words to attack us. That is probably something that all of us have in common. When others attack us with their words, it can often be an emotionally paralyzing event in our lives. Particularly at those times, it is necessary to focus upon the glory of the Lord. Why? Because it is at those times that we need the realization that He will eventually bring them to an end upon their own words. Sometimes it takes a while for that to all play out, but God makes it happen. His glory makes people trip over their own tongues. Did you ever think the glory of God could be humorous? Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor John

JOB 34
What you are saying then is, “If I am guilty of breaking a law and am unable to pay the penalty, then it is morally unjust for someone else who is innocent to voluntarily take the penalty in my place.”
“That is exactly right,” he replied. The conversation was in my Problems of Philosophy class in college. My agnostic professor adamantly supported this tenant of his construction of justice. One third of our semester was devoted to investigating the basis for morality. A proper understanding of justice is imperative in any model of morality. There are some beliefs to which we reason our way, and then there are some beliefs which must just assume (a presupposition) and follow their logical results. Somewhere along the line we have to identify what our presuppositions are and ask, “Are they correct?” I understood then how he reasoned his way to agnosticism. If you begin with his understanding of justice, then you automatically rule out the Christian God. The Gospel is founded upon the tenant of substitution. My only question then was, “Do you hold this presupposition because it is logical, or because you don’t want to believe in substitution?” He insisted that it was logical, but could not give me the logic. He could only insist that it is intuitively true.
In Job 34:31–33 Elihu puts forth an interesting argument. I really like the way the New Living Translation states it:

Why don’t people say to God, ‘I have sinned, but I will sin no more’? Or ‘I don’t know what evil I have done—tell me. If I have done wrong, I will stop at once’ Must God tailor his justice to your demands? But you have rejected him! The choice is yours, not mine. Go ahead, share your wisdom with us.

Think about that! Must God tailor his justice to meet my demands? I wouldn’t want a god who had to tailor his justice to my demands. If He had to do that for me, then there would probably be others for whom he must do that. It would result in utter chaos! Elihu is completely right! The Glory of God is far greater than we could ever have the right to question its validity. I am His puppet, not He mine. Yes, we can question for the sake of greater understanding, but every question must come with an attitude of submission to His answer. To be any less would be no glory at all! I am so glad that in His scheme of justice, mercy triumphs over justice, and He permits a substitute. My God is greater than my philosophy professor’s god. In his scheme of things, once a law is broken, the one who broke it must pay for it. In my King’s scheme of things, I owed a debt which I could not pay. He paid a debt which He did not owe. He washed my sins away! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

MARK 9:30-50
A couple of years ago, I was appalled to learn that the majority of churches in America have very little ministry to children. Everything is aimed at adults. I had a seminary professor who used to say that Christianity is an adult religion. Although, what he meant is that the decision to follow Christ is one in which we need to follow lines of authority that God has designed in the family. A couple decades ago, I was listening to Larry King on the radio one night. He made the statement that children belong to the state, not the parents. A chill went down my spine when I heard that. The implication of where that will lead, if our culture buys into it, is terrifying for the church. This is particularly true as we think of where this whole separation of church and state thing has led us. Jesus clearly has a special place in His heart for children as is demonstrated in this passage.
The disciples were suffering from what I call, ‘Mohammed Ali syndrome,’ they all thought they were the greatest. Jesus took a little child, set him in the midst of them, took him in His arms and said to them, “Whoever receives one of these little children in My name receives Me. . . “ You see children don’t pay the bills. Children aren’t the ones who get things done in the senate. Children don’t catapult you into the limelight. You want to be great? Serve the least. Children are often considered to be least. Moody once reported from a campaign from which he had just returned. He said, “We have two and half conversions.”
Someone said, “You had two adults and one child saved?”
Moody replied, “No, an adult has already lived half of his life. The children still have their life ahead of them. We had two children and one adult saved.” You want to be great? Serve the ones who cannot advance your name or add to your pocket etc.
Jesus takes it a step farther when the disciples had a problem with someone not in their group. If you offend one of the little ones (children, the least), you run the risk of hell. It is not popular to think of hell. Many people want to reject the idea. A lot of people reject the idea that Jesus would send anyone to hell. Yet three times in this passage Jesus indicates that it will happen. Is that glory? You’d better believe it is. What kind of God would He be if there was no justice? He would be an unjust God. Maybe you don’t agree with His justice, but it is necessary that He be just. Your dislike of His justice does not change it one iota.
His glory is found in that He desires the least to come to Him and He is just. Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor John