Thursday Meditation - It's About Us

It’s About Us

Galatians 6:1-10

 This letter was written to the church in Galatia by Paul. The Gentile-Christian church he founded received a backlash of criticism from the Jewish-Christians.  The Jewish-Christians told them that Paul was not a real Apostle of Christ which made them illegitimate believers in Christ.  According to them, to be real followers of Christ they had to be circumcised and follow the laws of Moses as well.  The more pressure the Gentile-Christian received they found themselves in an intra-conflict.  The intra-conflict caused many of them to go back to their old pagan religious practice. 

As the conflict continued Paul received word, but was not able to defend himself or the church in person so he wrote a letter outlining their responsibility as a church of believers.  The conflict was with those who were believers in Christ but had a different view of Faith in Christ.  This intra-conflict reminds me of the response letter Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote to the eight clergymen from the Birmingham Jail in April 1963.  Although, they believed in Christ they said, “The demonstrations were unwise, untimely that hatred and violence had no sanctions in their religious and political traditions.”  A quote from Dr. King’s response said, “I have heard numerous southern religious leaders admonish their worship service to comply with the desegregation because it is the law, but I long to hear a white minister to declare: Follow this decree because integration is morally right and the Negro is our brother.” 

As Dr. King and Paul was trying to say in their letter was it’s about us.  We are brothers and sisters in Christ connected through our faith.  We are to carry each others burden and help those who have strayed away from the faith to be reconnected with God.   When we approach a brother or sister who strayed away from God we must make sure we do not fall into temptation.  The members of this church were trying to live in Christ and in their pagan practices.  Paul had to remind them it was their faith that brought them this far.  He kept reminding them it was about them as a whole.  Today many of us continue to struggle between what we ought to do and what we really do.  Let us stop saying God knows our heart just as long we are sincere.  Let us say God help us to be sincere as we work on transformation our hearts to be a better servant and minister of the Gospel.

Prayer:  God we seek to unite ourselves as one. Help us to dismantle the intra-conflict as Christians so we can do the work ministry outside the walls of the church. Amen.

Thursday Meditation - Living Spiritually

Living Spiritually

Hebrews 2:10-18

The world teaches us to live physically, but our relationship with God teaches us to live spiritually and physically.  This has been the challenge for many of us and the challenge to the writer of this 2^nd chapter of Hebrews to an early Christian church confronted by struggle and test of faith.  The unknown author of this book uses the birth of Christ and Israel’s disobedience to God to show that Christ is the only way to God’s kingdom of perfection.  Although, this letter was written to Jewish and Gentile Christians who became followers of Christ because of scripture or what they’ve seen and heard, but how do we know that Christ is the only way to perfection in God’s Kingdom?

Christ leads us to God’s glory.  The glory of God is intended for all of God’s Children.      Since we all have the same Father, v11 says that Jesus is not ashamed to call us his family.  When you are family you are able to come together and support one another and love one another.  As a family we can share what our parents have done for us before even before we were born.  In a family we are able to trust each other without reservation, hesitation or doubt.  In a family we focus on what will strengthen us rather than divide us.  We will listen to wisdom and not what the world thinks is right for us.  For us we are apart of God’s family with an elder brother who is not ashamed to call us sisters and brothers.  It is this type of family perfection we seek.  A family that will communicate with each other, a family that will praise God together, and a family that will not use the world’s point of view to define what God’s perfection will look like.  God’s glory is eternal and everlasting life.  A life with all believers devoted to God, worshiping God in spirit and truth. 

Prayer:  God we want our perfection in worship to be in spirit and truth.  It is your glory we seek daily for eternal life.  Amen.

Thursday Meditation - Cry from the Depths

Cry from the Depths 

Psalm 130

The Psalmist stood before the Israelites crying a soul wrenching cry.  The Israelites have turned their back on God.  They have allowed the worship of other god’s to go before the true and living God.  The people no longer fear the Lord God and have taken matters in their own hands.  Many of us have gotten to this point in life, our spouse decided to leave us, our children decided that robbing and stealing is better than working things out, our jobs have been outsourced or sent overseas for cheaper labor, the credit card company have increased our rates, our decision to invest our money has caused us to lose our investment and threaten our livelihood.  The foreclosure rate, unemployment and the recession continue to rise. 

And if that’s not enough, we received news from the doctor that our love one will not make it through the night or the diagnosis from the tests taken were positive and there is no cure.  Whatever the situation is some of us still have not cried out from the depths of our soul but those who have cried out have gotten God’s attention.  When life beats us down a shallow cry does not get God’s attention.  Shallow cries are from the throat, it’s hollow with no substance, but when a person is depressed and have no place to go like the psalmist, the cry to God will start from the gut.  This is the kind of cry that makes us take deep breaths deep and bellow out from our diaphragm to say “O Lord, hear my voice! Listen to me!"  I need your help.  I have tried it on my own but I can’t do it anymore.  I have sinned and fallen short of your glory.  I have acknowledged and recognized the sin, the unforgiveness, and the apathy in my life, but now it’s time for me to open my mouth and break the silence not only for me but for the community and its problems.  This is what God is waiting for us to do.  God wants us to break our individual silence and speak up and cry those deep well cries that will draw God’s attention and cause others to join in.

Prayer:  God we have not found our voice to cry from the depths of our souls.  We ask that you teach us by showing us where we can join the lament of others so we can cry from our souls.

Thursday Meditation - We are Living Bones

We are Living Bones
Ezekiel 37:1-14

We all may have heard about the story of Ezekiel and the valley of dry bones.  God used Ezekiel to prophesy to the bones and they were restored to a multitude of people in the valley.  This text fascinated me because I enjoy watching the show Bones.  Although it is a forensic crime solving show but I can't help to be intrigued by the reconstruction and resurrection of bones to tell a story.  Our bones can tell a lot about us in life and  after death. While we are living, our bones are wet with blood vessels and nerves run through them and in the center of our bones is bone marrow.  However in death our bones become dry and brittle because there is no life in them. When we want to know more about the bones of people we call upon the anthropologist and archeologist to tell us about the condition surrounding the bones and age, but it takes an osteologist to detail the true condition of bones due to disease, deficiency and demographics.

Ezekiel saw the condition of the bones and said they were very dry and in a valley.  These bones were not buried in the earth, they laid on top of the earth with direct sunlight.  The sunlight continue to make the bones drier and more brittle.  This is the image God showed to Ezekiel about the house of Israel. They have lost all hope and are cut off from God.  God showed Ezekiel restoration is possible by collecting and resurrecting the bones. 

This is the condition that many of us are in.  We are living bones, but living as dry and brittle bones.  We've lost our hope to live, no longer vibrant and wet bones with blood vessels and nerves running through our bodies.  When we encounter nothing but suffering, disappointment and rejection our living spirit starts to become like dry bones. We start to harden our hearts, our minds and spirits to the point that we refuse to hear from God nor want to speak with God.  The image God is showing in Ezekiel is the possibility of new life when all hope is gone.  We can be restored to a vibrant life if we are willing to believe in hope for a future, turn from self-righteousness and open ourselves to embrace unity without limitations.  If God can restore a valley of dry bones then what more can God do for our dried and broken spirit?

Prayer: God we seek restoration on this day.  Life have sucked us dry to the point that we have no hope or positive outlook on life.  We ask that you will shine a ray of hope our way so we can be recollected and filled with the spirit of your love. Amen.

Thursday Meditation - Time to Move On

Time to Move On

1 Samuel 16:1

Often in life we find ourselves stuck in neutral.  We get to a point in life where we think we can just coast and ignore the changes in life while everything around us is in an uproar.  This is where we find the prophet Samuel. He is still in denial and grieving that God has rejected Saul as the King of Israel. Samuel is experiencing tremendous grief because he was the one who anointed Saul as King (1 Samuel 10:1) and then he was the one to tell Saul he was rejected by God as King of Israel (1 Samuel 15:35). As we can see, Samuel is hurting as well.  He was there at the beginning of Saul's leadership and now he is at the end of his leadership.  Samuel was probably going through the second stage of grief process, pain and guilt.  Why? Israel wanted a king over them and Samuel felt they rejected him, but actually they were rejecting God.  

Samuel finds it hard to move on and accept that God has rejected Saul.  We all know how hard it is to move on after the death of a love one.  We can't help but to grieve, remain in denial and disbelief until we get to a point of acceptance.  We know Saul did not die physically yet, but his leadership suffered death because he rejected the word of God.  Because of this leadership death, Samuel wasn't able to let go and move forward, but God was ready. 

Why do we keep holding on to situations, positions and people when it is time to move on?  

We hold on because we really don't want to start over again or believe this will be the best we will ever get.  Imagine what life would be like if we really looked at all that God has rejected in our life as a change for the better.  Too many of us are walking around as stained cups because of the things that has happened in our past. We refuse to move forward because our cups will not be as beaming white as others.  We  must stop looking at the cups of other people and move when God says move.  The longer we hold on to situations, positions and people that reject us, the harder it will be for us to function properly and we will keep grieving.  Let us not drag our feet when God says move or we'll end up like Lot's wife a pillar of salt (Genesis 19) to remind us that we started to move on but we kept looking back to see what were leaving.  In order to prepare for our future we must be willing to let loose of the baggage, junk in the trunk, skeletons in the closets or what ever we call it, we must let it go.  God let Saul go when he told Samuel to fill his horn with oil and sent him to a place and a people where new leadership.  God has told us provision has been made and trying to move us into new territories of life, leadership, relationship and positions but first we got to let the rejected mess go.

Prayer: God, we pray when we are no longer useful in what we are doing, we ask you to give us the ability to move on and stop lingering around. Amen.