A Right Question When We’re Hurting

August 3, 2012

“… what does He receive from your hand?”      (Job 35:7)

Not many devout people are disillusioned when they see wicked people suffer; however, the people of God are often faith-challenged when the godly suffer.  For thousands of years devout souls have been asking God, “Why do the righteous suffer?”

The book of Job is the longest, most profound and comprehensive answer to that question in the Bible.  If this is the oldest book in the Bible, then the very first truth God wanted to teach us is His answer to this primary ‘why question’ of His hurting people.

The way this ancient “Saga of Suffering” answers that question turns on a question Job asked his wife.  God had given Satan permission to take every possession he had, including his ten children (Job 2:3).  Then God permitted Satan to take Job’s health.  When he lost his health and was suffering from a dreadful disease, his wife told him he should curse God and die.  He responded to her cheerful counsel by asking, “Shall we accept good from the hand of God, and not trouble?” (Job 2:10 NIV)

The essence of Job’s question was, “What should a righteous man expect God to put in his hand because he is living a righteous life?”  The answer to Job’s question is found in a discourse of a young man named, Elihu.  He told Job he was asking the wrong question.  He should be asking, “What is He receiving from your hand?” (Job 35: 7 NIV)

If you are hurting, or when you do, ask God the right question.  What have you done for Him lately?  What are you putting in His hand?

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Posted by Dick Woodward

Let the Redeemed of the Lord Say So

June 27, 2012

“Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good! For His mercy endures forever. Let the redeemed of the LORD say so, whom He has redeemed from the hand of the enemy…” (Psalm 107: 1, 2)

Redemption means to get something back that has been lost.  It is similar in meaning to the word “rehabilitation” which essentially means “to invest again with dignity.”  I have quoted the first words of a marvelous hymn of redemption.  A thought that is repeated at the end of each of the five stanzas in this psalm is that those who have been redeemed by the Lord should step up and say so – gratefully giving thanks for the various ways in which they have been redeemed.

Levels or dimensions of redemption are profiled and each description ends with the charge that we thank the Lord for His goodness in redeeming us in this way.  God redeems us from our chaos when He finds us.  He then redeems us from our chains when He sets us free from our sins.

This is followed by the way He redeems us from our foolish and sinful choices.  He emphasizes our responsibility for bringing on the consequences of our sins.

He then describes the way God redeems us from our complacency by meeting us in our crises from which He redeems us when we are at our wits end and don’t know what to do.   He agrees with Isaiah that God creates these crises (Isaiah 45:7).

Meditate on all these levels of redemption.  Ask God to continuously redeem you in all these ways.  As you reflect on each individual dimension of redemption step up and join the redeemed of the Lord in grateful worship. 

And say so…

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Posted by Dick Woodward

A Fellowship in the Gospel

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

Oneness

April 25, 2012

“Is Christ divided?”   (1 Corinthians 1:13)

 In the great prayer our Lord prayed for His Church (John 17), Jesus asked His Father, not once but five times, that we all might be one.  In light of that great prayer priority of our Lord, is it not an evidence of the work of the evil one when we consider all the “sects and insects and isms and spasms” that say they are His true Church today?

The risen, living Christ can be known by His followers today.  One of the favorite ways the authors of the New Testament identify the authentic followers of Jesus is when they refer to them as being “in Christ.”  When His Church in Corinth was hopelessly divided the Apostle Paul asked that church a very appropriate question: “Is Christ divided?”

If thinking people really track with the authors of the New Testament would they not think it strange if people profess to be in Christ and then cannot agree on anything?  There is, however, a supernatural oneness or agreement among people who are truly in Christ today.

Many decades ago when African American believers were petitioning white churches in the southern part of our country to integrate I discovered that it didn’t matter whether the people in my church were born in northern or southern United States.  What mattered in my congregation was whether or not they were born again.  Christ does not feel more than one way about civil rights.  Neither will we if we are born again and in Christ.

Paul concludes the second chapter of his first letter to the Corinthians by claiming that we have the mind of Christ.  If we in fact do have the mind of Christ we will agree.

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Posted by Dick Woodward

The New Commandment

April 5, 2012

“Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the full extent of his love.”   (John 13:1)

Jesus was celebrating the Passover with His apostles.  Luke writes that on the way to the upper room where they were to celebrate the Passover with Jesus the apostles argued about which of them would be the greatest in the kingdom Jesus promised.  What a shock it must have been when Jesus assumed the attire of a slave and washed their feet!

Having washed their feet He asked the question “Do you know what I have done to you?” His question is answered in the words quoted above.  The most dynamic characteristic of the personality of Jesus was love.  He had loved these men for three years in ways they had never been loved before in their entire lives.

He also answered His question by telling them that He had given them an example.  If He as their Lord and Teacher had washed their feet they should wash each other’s feet.  Then He made the connection between feet washing and love by giving them the New Commandment.  They were to love one another in the same ways He had loved them.  This would be the absolute credential that they were His disciples.

A New Commandment directed them to a New Commitment.  Each of them had made a commitment to Jesus but now they were to make a commitment to each other.  This new commitment established a New Community.  We call it the church.  The secular people said of the early church, “Behold how they love one another!”  If they made that charge today about your church or mine would there be enough evidence to convict us?

Oh Lord make it so!

 

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Posted by Dick Woodward

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