April 15

(Tax day)
LEVITICUS 19
Years ago a friend of mine and his twenty-something son were helping me install the plumbing in a house which I was building. It was the end of the day, and we were grubby from crawling under the house all day installing pipes. We were ready to sweat in the copper pipes to the water heater, but we had no matches to light the torch. The man’s son and I went around the block to the nearest neighbor to beg for some matches. A young lady was home. She seemed fearful of us, but nevertheless she gave us a handful of books of matches. We returned to my house and finished the installation of the pipes.
The next day I needed to get a permit to burn a pile of construction debris that I had accumulated. While at the police station filling out the application for the permit, a woman walked up to talk to the officer. She identified herself as living at the house where my friend and I had begged the matches. She said, “Yesterday my daughter was home alone when these two unsavory characters knocked on the door and asked for some matches. I just wanted to know if there is some kind of scam going on in our neighborhood.” You should have seen the look on her face when I identified myself as one of those unsavory characters and announced that I was going to be her new neighbor—priceless.
Is it not interesting how people associate the moral character of a person with the clothes they wear? We instinctively try to determine what someone is like by association. In some ways those associations are accurate. That is why the Lord says, “You shall be holy for I am holy.” But what associations are there that indicate holiness? Is it clothing?
The Lord lays out several associations in this chapter. But there is one here that Jesus and the apostles quote in the New Testament, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Everything in this chapter would be fulfilled if we fulfilled that one commandment. It is a very demanding command. By the time Jesus arrived, 1400 years later, the rabbis had reinterpreted it to make it possible to keep. So when a lawyer asked, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied with the story of the Good Samaritan. The story is scathing in its implications. The Samaritans were enemies of the Jews. They were unsavory characters. Yet a Samaritan is the hero in this story which defines a neighbor. But is this not what the Lord has done for us? While were yet sinners, Christ died for us. While we were enemies of God, alienated from Him, He took the initiative to come down and deliver us. He is Holy. In His holiness He associates with us in His love. The “holy” people of His day associated Him with sinners. He was an unsavory character. Yet He was without sin.
I hope that when I stand before the judgment seat of Christ that He can say of me, “You associated with sinners yet remained unspotted by the world.” Why? Because then I will have reflected His glory. He will receive honor for what He has done. I want to be part of that kind of unsavory character’s club—not one of man’s associations. I want to be holy as He is holy, loving people into the presence of God, remaining unspotted by the world. When that happens, only He can truly receive glory because only He could change me in that way. Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

PSALM 105
“Keep me searchin’ for a heart of gold, and I’m growing old. . .” If you’re old like me, you probably remember that song from the early 70’s. I’m old enough to have watched a number of entertainers go through cycles of trying to find truth and meaning in life. Probably the classic is Bob Dylan. Often celebrated as one of the greatest song writers of the 60’-80’s, he ran the gambit of religions and philosophies. Of course during his “Christian” period, he wrote Gotta Serve Somebody and Man Gave Names to All the Animals. To the best of my knowledge, he currently does not claim Christianity. There is Kris Kristofferson who made a lot of noise about Jesus, especially with his song Why Me Lord? I am not sure where his public stand is right now. There was B.J.Thomas, Rain Drops Keep Fallin on My Head. He professed Christ for a while, then backed off. I think I heard that he is back with Jesus now. Of course there was Jane Fonda. What a radical! She made a few ripples a decade ago about possibly being a follower of Jesus, not sure where she stands now. People keep blindly searching for the truth. Why is it that when they find it, they back away?
Oh there are several answers to that question. The motivations are varied within the same individual and often unknown to the seeker. But I think this Psalm reveals one of the reasons people fall away. Verse 3 commands, “Glory in His holy name; Let the hearts of those rejoice who seek the LORD!” I think the reason the seeker often falls away is a failure to make this his/her motivation. Often we, as seekers, are seeking in order to advance our own glory or our own pleasure. If our own glory or pleasure is not advanced, then we fall away. What does it mean to glory in His name as opposed to my name? Why should I have to be commanded to rejoice when I seek Him? Should it not come naturally as I pursue the One who created all things?
The Psalm is replete with the history of God’s redemptive plan in Israel. Many of those acts go beyond His work with Israel. They are types of what God was going to do in Jesus the Messiah in order to deliver us out of the kingdom of darkness into His Kingdom of Light. The Psalmist recounts the many acts that God did before He made them into a great nation. They include the humbling and raising of Joseph, the plaguing of the land of Egypt before their departure, the destruction of the firstborn, the plundering of the Egyptians on the night of their deliverance, the protecting pillar and cloud of the Lord for the nation, the miraculous providing of bread and quail for the sustenance of the people. It is as though the Psalmist is saying, “Connect the dots! These times of suffering and deliverance show the glory of the Lord, not our own glory. Therefore, when suffering and deliverance occur again, connect the dots! God is about to once again reveal His glory! Therefore, led your heart be glad! Rejoice!”
Maybe a reason we have so many people fall away is because we have won them with a promise of glory, but have not helped them to connect the dots of God using the redemptive acts in their lives of suffering and struggle to bring Himself glory in our lives, by our redemption. Therefore, when we continue to suffer or struggle, rather than rejoicing in another opportunity to show His wondrous works, we give up. We thought it was solely about our comfort and redemption. Connect the dots! God used the suffering and discomfort to bring us to Himself. Because of the hardness of our hearts, He must continue to use suffering and discomfort to keep us glorifying Him. Hmmmm. . . Have I connected the dots of suffering and pain that lead me to a knowledge of him? Let my heart rejoice as I seek Him; for when those times of pain and suffering come, it is another opportunity for Him to display His wondrous works and how glorious He is! He alone can keep me searching for a heart of gold. He is that gold. He alone is our reward. Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

ISAIAH 13
Babylon is first mentioned in the Bible in 2 Kings 17:24. Relatively speaking it is rather late in the history of the world and Israel. Babylon is the nation that eventually sacked Jerusalem and took Judah into captivity. But that event would come 80-100 years following Isaiah’s ministry. Babylon would become a huge issue after Josiah’s death. It is interesting that Babylon was used by the hand of the Lord to punish Assyria and yet this passage speaks of the fall of Babylon at the hand of the Medes. Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel have volumes to speak of Babylon because they lived in the times when Babylon was the dominate world power. After the sack of Babylon by the Medes, we really don’t hear too much about it until the book of Revelation. At the time that John wrote the Revelation, Babylon was in the ruins of which Isaiah speaks in this chapter. However, Babylon appears in Revelation as it represents the world financial system. It is an idolatrous system which pursues wealth over God. It is the world financial and religious system by which men seek to support themselves, so that they do not have to seek God.
In this passage literal Babylon’s destruction is prophesied at least 80 years before it even becomes a threat to Judah. It is both a near prophecy (given at least 140 years before the beginning of its literal fulfillment) and a far prophecy given concerning the end of the world. At the height of Babylon’s power it probably seemed impossible that the city would ever fall. Listen to the KJV Bible Commentary’s description of Babylon:
The splendor of ancient Babylon was indeed spectacular, covering over 1000 acres surrounded by a double-walled system of defense that encircled the city. These walls were over 85 feet thick and 11 miles long, with the outer walls being approximately 25 feet wide and reinforced with towers every 65 feet. There were eight major city gates named after various Babylonian deities (e.g., Ishtar). The city was dominated by a seven-story ziggurat, 288 feet high, known as the Tower of Babylon. It was constructed from nearly 60 million fired bricks. On the top of it stood the temple of Marduk. The Greek historian Herodotus claimed that it contained a solid gold statue of Marduk weighing 52,000 pounds!
Can you imagine what must Jeremiah, Ezekiel or Daniel’s contemporaries must have thought of this prophecy? “It’s crazy! Babylon could never fall. Its wealth and power are too vast and great.” Yet this mighty city fell overnight to the Medes, just as Isaiah predicted. Eventually it fell into obscurity and became exactly what Isaiah predicted, “The hyenas will howl in their citadels, and jackals in their pleasant palaces.” Today it is a mass of broken down bricks. Saddam Hussein sought to restore the palace of Nebuchadnezzar as a tourist attraction. However, the gulf war brought an end to his endeavors.
Yet we cannot leave this passage just looking at the near fulfillment of Isaiah. The prophecy also looks to the far fulfillment of the final day of the Lord. This is of what John’s Revelation also speaks. One day this mighty world system of finance and economy, which seduces the people of the world to pursue it rather than the Lord, will collapse. Right now it seems impossible. Oh we all admit that there will be depressions and blips on the road, but few of us really believe that one day it will completely collapse upon itself. It is for this reason that Jesus says, “Blessed are the poor. . . Do not worry about your life. . . Seek first the kingdom of heaven and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.” Our first priority is Him. Isaiah tells us that one day it is all coming crashing down. “I will punish the world for its evil, And the wicked for their iniquity; I will halt the arrogance of the proud, And will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.”
That is the glory of our Lord. He will permit nothing but allegiance to Himself. He deserves nothing but allegiance to Himself. He graciously grants us opportunity to seek Him. But one day a day of reckoning is coming. He Himself will be exalted in that day. Should we not give all that we are for Him right now? Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

LUKE 13:1-21
Why do bad things happen to good people? Why does it seem, when you are doing your best to follow after the Lord, is when you get attacked the hardest? Why did God even allow sin anyway? Each of these questions has buried under it somewhere deep in its supporting premises that I don't deserve to be treated the way I am being treated. Let's go have a pity party. Let's rail against God for permitting it. So when those who heard about the Galileans reported it to Jesus, He gave what seems at first a very harsh and cryptic answer, "Do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners than all other Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish."
Ouch, Lord, I was just trying to get a little comfort here in what seemed to be a terrible tragedy. And you tell me that I am a terrible sinner? And He answers, "Yep."
But don't stop there. He goes on to warn that unless one's repentance begins to bear fruit that one will be cut down. Ouch! Add a little salt to the wound and rub it in! But don't stop there. He goes on to loose a woman who had been bound over with an infirmity for eighteen years. Immediately she was made straight and what? She glorified God! Somehow I think her whole life was changed from that moment on. It was not just a glorifying God for the moment, but it became a lifestyle. This was in direct opposition to the synagogue ruler who thought he was pretty good because he observed the Sabbath. Deep inside he thought he had not experienced any bad things because he was good. But he was wrong.
The glory of Jesus is that He has come to set us free from the power and bondage of sin. Ultimately, we deserve any bad thing that happens to us. We are sinners. We deserve death. We are in rebellion against the Holy God. It is only by His mercy that we continue to live. It is by His grace that we are delivered and set free! Where is the glory of Jesus? When we repent and believe in Jesus, He plants the seed of the Kingdom of God in us. Slowly it begins to grow and germinate and change us. It produces real fruit. We are changed from one bound in sin to one growing in righteousness. Now that is glory! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john