July 26, 2012
“The LORD our God has secrets known to no one. We are not accountable for them, but we and our children are accountable forever for all that He has revealed to us that we may obey…” (Deuteronomy 29:29 NLT)
According to Moses, there are secrets God has determined to keep secret. (Perhaps these secrets are on a need to know basis.) However, the things God wants us to do, He has made very plain through His Word, especially the Living Word, His beloved Son. But, if God has willed to remain silent about His secrets, it would be pompous arrogance for us to say we can answer all the “why” questions regarding our suffering.
Where did we ever get the idea that we should expect to understand everything that happens to us? Where did we ever get the absurd notion that God owes us an explanation for everything He has done and is doing in our world and in our lives? If God gave us an explanation for everything and the answers to all of our “why” questions, the very essence of faith and the need for faith would be eliminated.
Almighty God has willed that without faith we cannot please Him, or come to Him (Hebrews 11:6). God is pleased when we echo these words of Job: “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him” (Job 13:15 NKJV). In my own words, God is pleased when we come to Him in our crucibles of suffering and cry, “If you heal me, that’s all right. But, if you don’t heal me, that’s all right, too, because You are all right!”
Can you say you are all right because He is all right? Can you leave the secret things with Him?
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Posted by Dick Woodward
July 20, 2012
“… that He might make you know that man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord.” (Deuteronomy 8:3)
These words are taken from one of the great sermons Moses preached after the children of Israel were delivered from Egypt just before they invaded the land of Canaan. They had wandered in a terrible wilderness for 40 years in which they suffered every imaginable hardship. In this sermon God tells them through Moses that He was using all that suffering to make them know every word that He has ever spoken.
By devotional and personal application we can realize that this is one of the ways we learn the Word of God today. God is our Mentor and He does His most effective mentoring when we are in difficult places. While facing crises and challenges that overwhelm us God makes us know His Word. Every adversity God permits or directs into our lives is redemptive and is an opportunity for us to let God make us know His Word.
God is fiercely committed to the proposition that we are going to grow spiritually into perfection or completeness and maturity. The first chapter of the letter of James informs us that God’s trials should not be treated like intruders but welcomed as friends because they are sent from God. He does this because He wants us to be perfect or complete and lacking nothing. Jesus told us to be perfect even as our Heavenly Father is perfect (Matthew 5:48).
So when those tough times come sit up and pay attention. God has come to the front of the classroom and He is about to teach us His Word.
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: Deuteronomy 8:12, facing crises, faith, God's Word, Moses, religion, Scriptures, spirituality, Studying the Scriptures, The Bible, Word of God | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
July 12, 2012
“We have spoken freely to you, Corinthians, and opened wide our hearts to you…As a fair exchange – I speak as to my children – open wide your hearts also.” (2 Corinthians 6:11-13 NIV)
To paraphrase this passage, Paul is suggesting that each of us has a communication “flap” on our heart. We should be face-to-face and heart-to-heart with our communication flaps open. But, the hard reality is that we are often back-to-back with our communication flaps down and tightly closed. The solution Paul prescribes here is that someone must say, “I am heart-to-heart with you, and my communication flap is open. Be heart-to-heart with me and open your communication flap.”
We face communication challenges every day in our family, work life, and in our interactions with people. When there is a communication problem it is so very important to realize that someone has to initiate a solution by saying, in spirit and in principle, to the person with whom they are having a communication conflict, “I am heart-to-heart with you, and my communication flap is open. Be heart to heart with me and open your communication flap.”
You may be totally amazed at how taking that stance can melt the obstacles between you and that person with whom you are having a difficult and challenging relationship. This can be a communication “circuit breaker” that restores communication in a relationship.
Bacteria multiply in the dark but cannot live in the light. If we do not have good communication in a relationship misunderstandings multiply like bacteria, but when communication is restored it is as if we have turned the light on our relationship. Most of the bacteria will die and we can address that which doesn’t die with the light of our restored communication.
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: 2 corinthians 6, communication challenges, faith, faith-based communication, healthy relationships, heart to heart, heart to heart communication, open communication, open hearts, Saint Paul, spirituality | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
July 6, 2012
“Every valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill brought low; the crooked places shall be made straight and the rough ways smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” (Isaiah 40: 4-5)
The essence of Isaiah’s great sermon is that when you build a highway you do four things: you level mountains, you fill valleys, you straighten crooked places, and you smooth out rough places.
Isaiah preached that God was coming into our world and when He did He was going to travel on the highway of the life of His Son. In that life the mountains of pride would be leveled, the empty spaces would be one hundred percent filled with the Holy Spirit, the crooked ways of sin would be perfectly straight and His rough places would be made smooth by the way He responded to them.
Just before Jesus parted with His apostles He told them that in the same way the Father sent Him into the world He was sending them into the world. If His life was to be a highway on which God traveled into this world, our life is also to be a highway for God. I challenge you to ask God to make your life into a highway for Him to travel into this world.
If you pray that prayer when God’s bulldozers start leveling your mountains of pride, His Holy Spirit fills your empty spaces and straightens out your crooked ways of sin and then gives you the grace to smooth out the rough challenges that come into your life.
While all that is happening you can write “Caution: God at work” across your life.
I dare you to have the courage to pray this prayer.
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Posted by Dick Woodward
July 1, 2012
“Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, ‘Where are you?… And He said, ‘Who told you?’” (Genesis 3: 9, 11)
A police officer on a motorcycle noticed a large enclosed truck driven down Sixth Street, in Los Angeles, California. The driver stopped every few blocks, got out of the truck, and beat around the sides of the truck with a large baseball bat. After observing this for some time, the officer turned on his siren, flashed his lights and with strong hand signals ordered the driver to pull over. The policeman asked the driver, “Mister, as far as I can tell, you’re not breaking the law. But I just gotta know, what are you doing?”
The truck driver explained, “Officer, this truck here has a capacity of five thousand pounds. But, you see, I got six thousand pounds of canaries in this truck. So, I gotta keep a thousand pounds of canaries up in the air all the time!”
When you begin reading the Bible it may surprise you to discover that the first four things God says to us are questions. Why would the creator God ask questions of the man He has created? I’m convinced God does this because He knows His creature is up in the air about life. God loves us too much to leave us without a definition of life and some direction. He wants to dialogue with us so He can bring what he calls salvation into our life.
Are you up in the air about your life? Because He loves you God would like to greet you with that question “Where are you?” and follow it with the question “Who told you?” when you respond to Him.
2 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: faith, Genesis 3, God the Creator, spiritual dialogue, Spiritual Discernment, spiritual questions, spirituality, the Creation, where are you? | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
June 20, 2012
“Now it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful.” (1 Corinthians 4:2)
Paul declared that the greatest virtue of a servant of the Lord is faithfulness.
The story is told of a man who was told by God to push against a huge rock as his primary work for a lifetime. The man did that and exhausted, burned out and discouraged told the Lord that rock had not moved a centimeter. The Lord responded that He had not told the man to move the rock, but to push against it. He made the observation that pushing against the rock had given him a strong healthy and muscular body. God knew all along that only He could move that rock.
This leads to an acrostic based on the word push. It goes like this:
P- Pray
U– Until
S– Something
H– Happens
I am now living in by 82nd year of life. One of the observations I have made in my long life is that God is our Mentor. He is always teaching us and He is fiercely committed to the proposition that we are going to grow spiritually and in every other way. He deliberately assigns us tasks that are not only difficult but impossible knowing that those tasks will grow and mature us into a faithful servant He can use to do through us what only He can do in this world.
Another observation without which I could not function as a human being or especially as a pastor is what I call four spiritual secrets. They are that I’m not, I can’t, I don’t even want to but He is He can He wants to and He does.
So push and pray until He does work through you.
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: 1 corinthians 4, faith, Faithfulness, Four Spiritual Secrets, God's faithfulness, Jesus, moving rocks, P.U.S.H., prayer, religion, Trusting God | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
June 7, 2012
“As evening came, Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Let’s cross to the other side of the lake.’ So they took Jesus in the boat and started out, leaving the crowds behind (although other boats followed). But soon a fierce storm came up. High waves were breaking into the boat, and it began to fill with water. Jesus was sleeping at the back of the boat with his head on a cushion. The disciples woke him up, shouting, ‘Teacher, don’t you care that we’re going to drown?’ When Jesus woke up, he rebuked the wind and said to the water, ‘Silence! Be still!’ Suddenly the wind stopped, and there was a great calm. Then he asked them, ‘Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?’” (Mark 4: 35-40 LB)
I have not posted a blog for quite some time because I had a medical crisis that put me in the hospital followed by a limited ability to work for about eight weeks. This experience has reminded me of the story above of a fierce storm that was turned into a great calm by a profound question asked by Jesus.
The disciples clearly believed they were all going to drown including Jesus. The question of Jesus was essentially “When are you going to get some faith?” In other words, “Do you think that all I have told you about My kingdom and your part in it is going to drown at the bottom of the Sea of Galilee?”
Jesus promises to take us to the other side. When fierce storms break into our lives they will not invalidate what Jesus is doing in and through us if we will let this profound question turn our fierce storms into a great calm.
2 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: facing storms of life, faith, Jesus Christ, Questions of Jesus, Sea of Galilee, spiritual questions, spirituality | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
May 22, 2012
“And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.” (Matthew 6:13)
An attractive young lady was returning from a church meeting at a late hour. When she stopped at a traffic light, a large “eighteen-wheeler” truck was in the next lane. As the light changed and she pulled away, the large truck “tailgated” her car while blinking its lights and blowing its loud air horn.
She was very frightened and increased her speed as she drove out of the city limits toward the farmhouse where she lived with her parents. The huge truck followed her all the way, blinking its lights and blowing its horn. She turned into a long dirt road that led to her home. The truck followed her as she drove right up to the porch of the house. When she frantically popped open her door to run for the house, the back door of her car suddenly opened and a man with a large knife bolted for the woods.
When she stopped for that light, the truck driver saw the man crouching behind her front seat with a knife in his hand. Realizing that she was going to be attacked as soon as she drove into the country, the truck driver was determined to save her from that tragedy.
Sometimes, our suffering and limitations seem like that eighteen-wheeler bearing down on us. Actually, however, that suffering can be a vehicle of our loving God, purging out of our lives the evil one who is determined to ruin us. This is what our Lord was profiling when He instructed us in the disciple’s prayer to pray that we might be delivered from the evil one.
Can you meet yourself in this story?
Editor’s Note: Dick Woodward (my Papa) recently returned from a hospitalization & has recovered nicely (thanks be to God!!) He is now getting back into his normal schedule (blog writing inclusive.) We appreciate your continued prayers as we give thanks – Life is a Gift!!
3 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: deliver us from evil, faith, faith & suffering, God's faithfulness, Matthew 5, Our Father, The Disciples' Prayer | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
May 4, 2012
“… your fellowship in the Gospel…” (Philippians 1:5)
When you read the first words of Paul’s letter to his favorite church they show you the passion of Paul and the heart of this church he loved. The bonds that made them so remarkably one in heart are expressed in the repetition of one word: “Gospel.” Paul writes that the things he has experienced have fallen out to the furtherance of the Gospel. And that he has them in his heart because in the defense and confirmation of the Gospel they all are partakers of God’s grace.
As Paul continues to repeat the word “Gospel” he expresses his heart’s passion when he describes what he calls “the faith of the Gospel.” He precedes that with the concept of behavior that becomes the Gospel. Paul is describing the purpose and function of a church when he calls their church “a fellowship of the Gospel.” The context in which the Gospel is to be believed is that fellowship of the Gospel.
Paul is in prison when he writes these words and he doesn’t know if he will be released. In verse 27 he writes his ideal for his ideal church. His great Gospel prescription is: “I want to hear that every member of your church is a Christian; every Christian is Christian and Christians are Christian together in a way that results in other people believing the Gospel!”
Paul’s plan for filling this prescription for his ideal spiritual community is to “Stand fast in one Spirit with one mind, striving together for the faith of the Gospel!” (1:27) That Church in Philippi is to act as if they have one mind among them because in fact because they do.
It is the mind of Christ.
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Posted by Dick Woodward
April 22, 2012
“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. He restores my soul; He leads me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.” (Psalm 23: 1-3)
These are some of the most familiar words in the Bible loved by Protestants, Catholics and Jews. They describe our relationship with God. They tell us that when God is our Shepherd we have green pastures, still waters and a full cup that never empties. This is because our great Shepherd makes us lie down. He may use problems we cannot solve to make us lie down. However, since we are creatures of choice we can choose to get up again. When we do our green pastures turn brown and our cup empties again. He then restores our soul by driving us into the paths of righteousness that restore us.
Many devout souls also love this psalm because they see in it a description of a believer’s death. To them death is the great Shepherd coming into a life for the last time making a devout person lie down so He can give them the green pastures that never turn brown and the full cup that never empties in the eternal state. The only way He can give us these eternal blessings is to make us lie down in death.
The key to these eternal blessings is found in the opening words of the psalm: “The Lord is my Shepherd.” Meditate on these words one word at a time. They are the key to living here and in the hereafter. Can you say that He is your Shepherd today and always?
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: christianity, death, eternal blessings, faith, god, Heaven, Jesus, King David, Peace of God, Psalm 23, Relationship with God, Trust in God | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
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