April 5

LEVITICUS 8
I enjoyed reading J.Vernon McGee’s commentary on this chapter today. I particularly appreciated his interpretation of the significance of Fellowship offerings and the placement of the blood upon the ear, thumb and big toe of the priest:
Actually, fellowship in the New Testament means to share the things of Christ. Only those who are the blood-bought believers can share the things of Christ. The priests had to go inside the holy place to see the beauties of that place. The outside was not very pretty. Just so, the unbelieving world does not see the beauty of Christ and rejects Him, but the child of God is finding new beauties and glories in Him every day.
The blood-tipped ear symbolizes the ear that will hear the voice of God. Without that, friend, you are not going to hear Him. The natural man does not receive the things of Christ. The blood-tipped hand was essential for service. It is impossible to serve the Lord before one is saved. The blood-tipped foot was essential for the walk before God. All of this is symbolic of the fact that the total personality must be presented to God. (J. Vernon McGee, Thru the Bible Commentary).
Jesus, our High Priest, presented Himself totally to the Father. Let us do the same through the blood of His sacrifice. Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

PSALM 95
What causes you to sing? Do you ever just break forth into singing? What motivates it? I have several motivations when I break into singing. Occasionally, I just enjoy it. Sometimes I am kind of melancholy, and it just seems fitting to sing a sad song. Sometimes I am depressed, and I need to combat depression with joyful expression. But usually it comes as an outburst of something I am joyful about. I have written a few songs, not many but a few. They all came to me when I was thinking about the Lord when He had just brought Laura into my life. It set me in a joyful mood because of His wonderful grace. The songs just came.
The Psalmist, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, commands us to sing joyfully to the Lord. It is not enough for him to give us a command, but He also tells us how great He is. He is in the deep places of the earth. I have visited a few caverns. I have been to Marvel Cavern, Lurray Caverns, Alabaster Caverns and some caverns in Chiapas, Mexico. I am always amazed at the beauty under the earth that God has created. Who knows what beauties lie under the earth that only God knows what is there. He alone appreciates their great beauty. He created if for His own pleasure. Yet man from the very beginning has been digging in the earth trying to mine its treasures and explore its beauties.
I am equally amazed at the beauty of the sea. I saw the ocean for the first time when I was 19 years old. For almost three years I lived only three blocks from the beach. Another ten years I lived just a fifteen minute drive from the beach. The sea is incredibly vast in its majesty and beauty. It has been said that we know more about outer space than we know about our oceans. I don’t know if that statement is true, but I do know the ocean is an incredible ecosystem which also is full of the beauty of the Lord. Its storms are terrible indeed. Its life is teeming with complexity and diversity. Its color is breath taking. I remember one night walking on the beach. We had some kind of anomaly in the ocean that caused thousands maybe millions of little jellyfish to wash up on the beach. As Laura and I walked along, the breakers would dash the little jellyfish against the sand. When their tentacles hit, they would light up light like mini-lightning bolts. The beach literally sparkled with the jellyfish raging against the breakers and sand. It was a sight of outrageous beauty. He created it for His own pleasure. Even if we had not been there, it would have happened, and He would have enjoyed it! What was it like for those firs explorers to build boats and rafts and set out for other continents across the vast sea?
I have also lived near mountains. Their beauties to me are the most staggering of all. To stand on the edge of an outcropping of rock near the pinnacle of a mountain causes a swelling of awe to rise up in me that takes my breath away. Because of the panoramic scene which spreads out before me, it causes me to see how little I am in a vast array of beauty. Yet I am only able to enjoy its beauty because others have built roads and cut pathways for me to get to the top safely and then return home. Yet God created and sees this beauty and more that we cannot ever see. He does it all for His pleasure.
This God, who does this, takes even greater delight in His creation of us. He sees possible beauty in us that no one else can see, and He rejoices! With all this possibility, He chooses take us into His flock, and he cares for us as a shepherd for his sheep. He yearns to draw that beauty out of us, but it means that we must listen to His voice. It is going to take a lot of work. Work makes me tired, but if we listen to his voice, He leads us into a work that is restful. That is His desire. He leads us into a work of beauty that is restful. Why wouldn’t that knowledge cause a song of joy to well up in me? I have to let it out! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor John

ISAIAH 2
I briefly had a part-time job selling baseball tickets for the Portland Beavers over the phone M-F 6:00-8:00. It was an interesting job. I only made minimum wage plus $1.00 for every package that I sold. It lasted for about 4-6 weeks. As you can imagine, I did not make much money. What made the job interesting was the people with whom I worked. One of them was a local bank vice president. He made a comfortable living. I was a little perplexed as to why he bothered. He said that he did it because he was bored at home, and he thought this might be interesting temporary outlet. One night I was out of gas and money, so I rode my bicycle into town. When he found out that I had rode my bicycle 11 miles to show up for a 2-hour minimum wage job, I guess that he felt sorry for me. He asked if he could give me a ride home. I wasn’t hard to persuade. He volunteered to take me home the rest of the nights until I was paid and could put a little gas in my car. During the next week or two, I got to know a little bit about his values. And we talked about spiritual things. He even taught me a song that he learned as a kid:

I don’t care if it rains or freezes
Just as long as I’ve got my plastic Jesus
Sittin on the dashboard of my car. . .

Hmmm. . . I don’t remember his name, but I remember the silly song he taught me. . . .
Yet the song represented his spiritual thought so well. He had invented his own god whom he worshipped. In truth he worshipped a god that was the work of his own hands. To people such as they, who never repent from the work of their own hands, Isaiah says three times that they will hide away from “the glory of His majesty.” (v. 10, 19,21)
Most people spend their lives worshipping the work of their own hands. My friend did. He had risen to vice-president of data control for a bank. He wasn’t extremely wealthy, but he was comfortable. He didn’t need (so he thought) the real Jesus. He was comfortable with his plastic Jesus, one made with his own hands. Why would he trade the glory of His majesty for a Jesus made with his own hands? Could it be because he never stopped long enough to seek Him in His word to see His majesty? Could it be that he had never seen the majesty of the real Jesus? Isaiah tells us that the day is coming when Jesus will dwell among us visibly. His majesty will be available for viewing. Then nations will say, “Come and let us go unto the mountain of the Lord.” They will do this in order to experience Him. However we view the glory of His majesty now, it is certain then the glory of his majesty is something that will motivate people to lay aside all for which they had warred in order to cease warring and take up farming. His glory, when fully experienced, is worth laying aside all for which we previously fought and died for in order that we might know Him. Do we have that kind of knowledge of Him now? If not, why not? What is it about Him that would make one want to give up the god of their own making to trade it in for farm implements? Maybe we have a faulty view of the glory of His majesty. Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

LUKE 8:26-56
In August of '04 I had the privilege of being one of the adults to take our youth to our national youth conference, Life, in Phoenix, AZ. We took an extra day to take some of them up to the Grand Canyon. It was the first and only time that I have ever seen it. Even the best photographs just do not do it justice. I've seen these panoramic pictures that are extra wide of the Grand Canyon and nothing does it justice. For me it was breath taking. It is interesting, now that I have been there, to go to picture books and look at the little photographs of certain localized spots of the canyon. But now I know that those photographs cannot even begin to communicate the greatness of the glory of the Grand Canyon. And yet there are even larger canyons. The Copper Canyon in Chihuahua, Mexico is reported to be 4 times larger consisting of 6 major canyons that make up the system and over 10,000 miles of winding river passages. It is hard to see the glory of such canyons through just photographs.
The greatness of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ is even greater than the creation, for He made it all and holds it all together by the word of His power. Yet we can get little photographic shots of little niches of His glory. In one sweeping panoramic view Luke reveals Jesus setting one man free from the bondage of sin, cleansing a woman from the stain of sin, and raising a girl temporarily from the penalty of sin. It speaks volumes to what He can and will do in our lives.
The picture of His victory over the demons with the demoniac demonstrates that there is no habit, no bondage to sin, no behavior from which He cannot set us free and give us victory! No drink is too controlling that He cannot bring self-control. No drug is too strong that he cannot bring freedom. No emotion is so overpowering that He is cannot bring relief. No drive is so great that He cannot apply the brakes.
The picture of His healing of the woman with the issue of blood reveals His great power to cleanse us from our sin. In Jesus' culture the woman's physical problem rendered here ceremonially unclean so that she would have been forbidden to participate in acts of worship and even in some social interaction. If she followed the regulations, she would have felt not only physical weakness but also a great deal of isolation because of her ceremonial impurity. Certainly she had to deal with many issues of guilt feelings. Many ills that people endure today stem from guilt feelings resulting from unresolved sin issues or improper thinking concerning their sin. Because of their guilt they feel isolated from others. But Jesus forgives sin. He washes away the guilt associated with our past behavior. We are clean in His sight. No stain is too deep that He cannot remove it. No past is too wrong that He cannot right it.
The picture of His raising Jairus' daughter reveals that one day we too will be raised finally and completely from the dead. Death is an unwanted intruder. It was never part of the original creation. It is the result of sin. The last enemy that will be laid aside by Jesus is death. In His resurrection He has already secured its defeat. But one day He will apply it to all who are in Him. Death has no victory and no sting. The raising of Jairus' daughter reveals that.
Jesus does all of these. He sets us free. He cleanses us. He raises us from the dead. Right now they are little still photographs of a glory that cannot be comprehended in a photo. By the way I read somewhere once that if you reduced the earth to the size of a ball bearing that we cannot make ball bearings that are as smooth as the earth would be. And yet, I am impressed with the Grand Canyon. That presents His glory from a different perspective. Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john