Hearing the Music

Free to Love

While the celebrations will be a bit different this year, many of us will spend time this weekend celebrating with friends and family the independence of our country. We will spend time thanking God for the freedoms that we enjoy, especially the opportunity to worship our Creator without fear of persecution. It is a wonderful thing to live in a country that supports such freedoms, especially as we see so many other places in the world where the picture is much different. Thank You Lord for our Freedoms.

But with these freedoms comes great responsibility. Paul put it this way in his letter to the Galatians, “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Galatians 5:13-14). Here the Lord, through Paul, rightly reminds us that freedom is not the absence of constraint whereby we can do whatever we want, whenever we want. But rather freedom is the opportunity to be the people that God has created us to be, and called us to be in Christ, operating within the parameters that He has laid within us. Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it like this:

In the language of the Bible, freedom is not something man has for himself, but something he has for others… it is not a possession, a presence, an object… but a relationship and nothing else. In truth, freedom is a relationship between two persons. Being free means “ being free for the other,” because the other has bound me to him. Only in relationship with the other am I free. (Creation and Fall, Temptation p.37)

I am sure that you see how this Biblical notion of freedom challenges both the right (free to acquire all the wealth I can) and the left (free to use my body any way I want) of our present cultural moment. Rather than a freedom from restraints, our freedom has bound us to Christ (Romans 6:18). It is in following His path that brings life, peace and a heart free from condemnation (Romans 8:1-6). As we lean into this truth, every day becomes Independence Day!

I look forward to seeing many of you Sunday or to being seen by you through video. We will be looking at a relatively little known passage in 2 Kings 3 in which Israel’s kings go to war against Moab. And while we see the mixed hearts of the human actors in the story, God once again shows up to remind us that only as we seek Him will we experience true blessing!

_{Photo by frank mckenna on Unsplash}

Happy Anniversary

Whose anniversary are we celebrating? Why, ours, of course! That’s right, 6 years ago this coming Sunday I was installed as minister of Christ Church. It is hard to believe that 6 yrs have elapsed. Since we have been here we have had 4 kids graduate from high school. We have fostered about a dozen kids and the Lord has added Moses to our family. We have been in your homes, you have been in ours. We have seen God work in our church community; in exciting ways and in ways that have stretched us. We have met each other on mountaintops and in valleys. We have been the source of one another’s delight and we have been the occasion of each other’s discouragement. These are the realities of life together. By God’s grace we will have many more years to search out the scriptures for the deep things of grace and have the opportunity to practice them together in our community.

While these occasions do not always call for outward celebration or even recognition, I do try to use them as an opportunity for reflection. Right now the thing I feel the most weight of is the calling to serve God’s people. I have been an ordained minister for over 20 years now and I can honestly say I have never experienced a season like this one. The disruption and uncertainty brought about by the pandemic and the various responses to it, the divisions that exists politically in our country AND in our churches over proper response to cultural issues, the pain being expressed as these divided groups hurt one another, the frailty and fallenness on display amongst my fellow brothers in the ministry; each of these points to a desperate need for divine intervention. With Isaiah I say “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips” (Is. 6:5). With Paul I cry out, “Who is sufficient for these things?” (2 Cor. 2:16)

But here is the hope, “thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere” (2 Cor. 2:14). We look at our selves and we see feet of clay and hearts of wax. But, when we keep our eyes on Jesus, our covenant making and covenant keeping Lord, there is always hope. Remember, the light has shone in the darkness and the darkness shall not overcome it (John 1:5)! It is this Light that guides us. It is this Light that sustains and shines through us. So let us together keep seeking the Light. Let us keep short accounts with one another that we may be long on grace. And may it be that God would spread through us the fragrance of the Gospel.

Holding the Center

And he (Christ) is before all things, and in him all things hold together.          Colossians 1:17

Fragmentation. Isolation. These are words used to describe our present cultural moment. Some of this has been brought on by the pandemic, while other aspects are more a culmination of trends in our culture over the last several decades. What we experience culturally, we also experience in smaller units: families, churches, businesses, etc…. What will hold us together? Political ideology? Economic stability? From the beginning humanity has discovered the secret to unity is right relationship to our Creator. As the verse from Colossians at the top of today's letter states, Christ is the center. In him all things hold together. When we lose our grasp on him, disintegration is the result. This week Pastor Bryant will be opening Psalm 133 with us, a Psalm extolling the beauty of unity held together by people surrendered to the Gospel message.  

As part of our experience of this surrender and belonging to Christ, the elders have encouraged us to celebrate the Lord’s Supper this Sunday. As much as the Lord’s Supper speaks to our individual relationship with the Lord, it also is a powerful picture of the unity that we have with one another. So both in the parking lot and in the home worship guide, whether you are with your family or with a small group together in person or via zoom, we encourage you to prepare your hearts to express your faith in Christ. We recognize that this celebration will be different from other celebrations that we have had. Some will note the insufficiencies, perhaps even inconsistencies of celebrating the Supper at this time. But the importance of confessing our faith and unity in Christ seems especially important at this time. Christ is our center. Only as we hold on to him do all things hold together. It is our joy to confess our faith in him, even imperfectly. It is our desperation to wait on the strength promised for all those who feed on him with faith.  

_{Photo by Joshua Hoehne on Unsplash}