June 5

DEUTERONOMY 9
Believe it or not, I played football in high school. I wasn’t any good, but I was on the team. I was too light and weak to be a lineman and too slow to be a back or a receiver. For some reason I was placed on the line. As a sophomore I was 135 pounds. As a junior I was 145 pounds. As a sophomore and junior, I never suited up for a game. My senior year I soared up to weighing 165 pounds and bench pressing 240 pounds for the playing season, not very big or strong for a lineman. I actually started two games early in the season my senior year, but alas, my performance was so poor that the coach quickly pulled me out. Before the last game of the season, our nose guard had a slight injury. The coach decided to take a chance on me one last time. I was tapped to start at nose guard. I would be playing opposite guys whose average weight was around 200 pounds. We were playing the #10 ranked team in the state. Going into the game we had a win/loss record of 4/5. I wanted nothing more than to go out with a bang. All week long, I asked the Lord to allow me to play the absolute best that I could in order to bring glory to His name. The first play of the game I sacked the quarterback. They ran three plays and punted. I had two other unassisted tackles during the game and a couple of other assisted tackles. By the end of the game they had negative running yardage in the middle of the field. They did have one play where they made yardage up the middle. It was a screen pass. I tripped and fell. As I was getting up, I looked and saw their back standing next to me receiving a lobbed pass. It is difficult to tackle someone when you are getting up and have no momentum. So I wrapped my arms around his waist as I was trying to get up. He drug me along for a couple of yards. To this day when my mom relates my football experience, that is the one which she tells about. But that was the only play of the game where they made yardage up the middle. Every time I came off the field, I was greeted with, “Wow, Chaffin! You’re doing great” With each compliment I replied, “Praise the Lord!”
How is it that a crummy player like myself could outplay guys who were some of the best in the state and were 18% larger than me? There is only one answer. The Lord permitted it so that I could speak glory to His name. How is it that we can stand up to giants who are great and tall, about whom it has been said, “Who can stand before them?” The Lord wanted the Israelites to go up against the giants so that they would realize experientially that through Him we can destroy all of His enemies. What giant is there in our way that is keeping us from performing the purposes of God? The Lord permits those giants to come into our lives in order to help us learn experientially that He will empower us to overcome! As a consuming fire, He burns away every obstacle which keeps us from experiencing His kingdom! But like the children of Israel we must act in faith and obedience. When we do, His glory is seen. Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

PROVERBS 5
“John, you need to pray for me. I am going to burn in hell.” Those were the first words out of the mouth of a co-worker of mine when we came to work 35 years ago.
“I already knew that you were headed for hell, but what is it that causes you concern this evening?” In previous conversations He had made plenty of jokes about my beliefs and heaven and hell. So, I wasn’t convinced that he wasn’t still joking.
“This week end I went over to visit a friend. When I arrived, I found that he was gone for the weekend. His wife invited me in and before I knew it, I was in bed with her. I’m going to fry for that, aren’t I?” Was his reply.
“Rest assured, unless you repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you will fry, but . . .” I continued to once again to try to give him a simple explanation of the gospel. This time I think he really understood that he was a sinner in need of mercy and grace, but in the end he wasn’t ready yet to turn to Jesus. Apparently, although he was haunted by his infidelity to his friend and himself, he really enjoyed the escapade and was desirous to do it again.
What was it about this particular sin of adultery that ignited a spark to think about his sin? What is it about adultery and sexual sin that causes so much spiritual attention and at the same time so much failure? Across the board in every culture sexual infidelity is disdained and looked down upon, and yet so frequently committed. Solomon is the rule in this and not the exception. Look at him! He had seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines, and they turned his heart away from the Lord! Yet, here he is giving advice about turning away from adultery! Yet, his advice in this chapter is Holy Spirit inspired! What is it that makes this particular sin so odious in everyone’s sight, Christian or non-Christian?
Look at these two verses from this chapter:

6 Lest you ponder her path of life— Her ways are unstable; You do not know them.
21 For the ways of man are before the eyes of the LORD, And He ponders all his paths.

Notice in verse 6 that it is the man who is pondering the path of the adulterous woman. Notice also in verse 21 that it is the Lord who ponders the path of sinful man. Our sexuality is meant to be a reflection, an image, of the union between Christ and His Bride, the church. A few years ago the news made a big hullabaloo concerning the publication of a Harvard researcher who found a 4th century gnostic manuscript fragment that quotes Jesus saying, “My wife.” Of course this raised all kinds of Dan Brown DiVinci Code concepts of Jesus being married. Well, Jesus is married—to His church. It was planned from the foundation of the world. It is a Divine mystery, as the apostle Paul called it. Marriage is meant to be a reflection of that mystery! God has committed Himself to marrying the church, us! When we are adulterous in our sexual relationships, it is a repudiation, a denial, a rejection of the image for which we are created. Instinctively, we know it is wrong. We know it is horrible. But we do it anyway.
This is the where the glory of the Lord Jesus comes in. His eyes are upon us, and He ponders all our paths, and He still desires to marry us. But be careful! Unlike a man who beds an adulterous woman, He will only marry a pure, spotless and blameless bride. Only He can make us pure, spotless and blameless. He only does that for those who repent and believe in Him. But that He forgives and cleanses us is such glory! I have been unfaithful to Him so much, yet He has cleansed me of my spiritual adultery against Him. He did it with His own blood. WOW! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

ISAIAH 66
“Heaven is My throne and earth is My footstool.” I am trying to grasp that metaphorical statement by the Lord Himself. I went to this website: http://earthsky.org/space/alpha-centauri-travel-time in order to begin to understand the size of the physical universe. Here is what it said about the closest star system to us:

Alpha Centauri is the nearest star system to our sun. But, at 4.3 light-years away, getting there would be extremely difficult. The Alpha Centauri system is much farther away from us than the sun. There’s a lot of empty space between us and this nearest star. If you imagine Earth as a grain of sand, then Alpha Centauri would be over 10 kilometers – or about 6 miles – away.
Of course, in actual fact, Alpha Centauri is trillions of miles away from Earth. Its distance of 4.3 light-years equals 25.6 trillion miles away – nearly 300,000 times the distance from the Earth to the sun

Here is another web page on how far a light year is: http://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/how-far-is-a-light-year. That is just the closest star. In the metaphor God uses about heaven as His throne, that is how far it is to get to the bottom of God’s shoe. The point of the metaphor is that God is incomprehensibly larger than we can ever imagine! He has made all things that exist! How is it that since He is so great, that we can so often presume upon Him to demand that He explain His and our existence to us? Is it not the height of arrogance for us to do so? On the one hand, our being created in His image propels us to ask Him concerning our relationship to Him. On the other hand, our sin warps how we approach this fantastically great God.
How is it that as great as God is that we can bring our sacrifices before Him as though they should be acceptable to Him? Yes, God commanded the sacrificial system, but the system was only to teach concerning our inability to remove our sin from ourselves, and of God’s ability to remove it for us. It was arrogance that caused them to believe that there was something in them that made them good enough to atone for their own sin by the use of animals. God views the arrogance as if they had committed murder or animal cruelty or sought an idol. There is only one way to approach this awesomely great God; it is in utter humility saying, “Speak, Lord, for your servant listens!” Understanding His greatness should result in our own trembling at the prospect of Him speaking to us, trembling for fear, trembling for excitement, trembling at anticipation of what He will say.
God speaks if we are willing to obey His word. When He speaks, it births new life in us. When He speaks, His fire burns away our dross. When he speaks, His glory is revealed in us. When He speaks, the unrepentant and proud waste away where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched. Now that is glory! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john

John 15
"Apart from Me you can do nothing." The skeptic would scoff at that statement. But think on it just a while. What has man been able to accomplish in his 6,000 years of recorded history? We have the internet and wonders of medical science. We've traveled to the moon. Skyscrapers line the skylines of a multitude of cities. The technologies for our amusements abound. Would you call all of this, nothing?
In response consider this. Man's technologies, in spite of all its good, still display the evil machinations of man's heart. The internet continues to isolate some, as they engage in "vbloging" as a substitute for real relationships. And pornography continues to enslave many. It has been estimated that upwards to 50% of men are addicted to porn on the internet. For all its good, medical science advancements still have not prevented the misuse of medicine for the harm of others as is evidenced in abortion and euthanasia. While the space race produced technology that I love and appreciate, it has also produced technologies that allow us to kill more efficiently. We have the ability and weapons produced to kill the inhabitants of the earth many times over. Even skyscrapers have become a possible tool of mass murder.
In the midst of this evidence Jesus says, "Abide in Me. . . Apart from Me you can do nothing." Yes technology and science have improved, but the human heart and conscience have not. Jesus can take the most evil of hearts, and if he or she will abide in Him, He can replace it with His own character, or as He puts it, fruit. In spite of all our great technologies, still He remains as the only one who can change the heart. Only He can truly replace hate with love, depression with joy, inner turmoil with peace, wishes on demand with patience, curtness with kindness, evil with good, infidelity with faithfulness, roughness with gentleness, unrestrained behavior with self-control.
When He changes people, those are the changes He makes. Now that's glory! He calls us to abide in Him so that He can make those changes and glorify God! Do you want those kind of changes? He wants to glorify Himself in you! What a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john