ID Cards

ID Cards

            In recent months Tennessee has faced a lot of criticism for its new voter identification law.  In order to vote in Tennessee you must now present a state-issued photo ID.  There have been many objections, most claiming that the goal of the law was to restrict the voting rights of a particular segment of our population.  An elderly woman from Chattanooga hit the national news when the agency commissioned to issue those IDs said that because her birth certificate and her marriage certificate used different names, there was no proof that she was who she said she was.  They refused to issue her an identity card.  That decision made no sense to me, but it makes sense that there should be a way to prove that we are who we say we are.

            How are Christians supposed to be identified?  We are supposed to be recognizable, aren’t we?  Is it the fish symbol displayed on the back of my car?  Is it the message on my t-shirt?  Is it the way I dress or fix my hair?  Is it the fact that my car backs out of the driveway at the same time every Sunday and everyone can tell by the way I dress that I am on my way to church?

            It’s none of these.  I don’t have to guess about what my ID should be.  Jesus told me.  John 13:34-35.  “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.  By this shall all men know that you are my disciples if you have love one for another.”  People won’t know that we are Christians because we love everybody, though I think that would be a very good thing.  They will know us by the love we have for other Christians.

            What should that love look like?  I Corinthians 13 says love is patient, kind, not jealous, not boastful or arrogant, not selfish, not defensive, not overly sensitive, rejoicing in the truth, and so on.  But look at Ephesians 4.  Paul here is talking about the body. 

            Beginning at verse 1 he says we are to “walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

            Moving to verse 12, Paul mentions some of the types of service and says these are “for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God.”

            Verse 15 says, “But speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.”

            So the body is composed of different members all working together to build the body is love.  My job is to love as a member of the body.  I don’t have to be working constantly to figure out how to let people know I am a Christian.  I should be recognizable.

            Charlie Peacock in “A New Way to Be Human” says, “My hope is that others will name me as an honest-to-God student follower of Jesus, someone with a heart full of His brightness, following in the new way. It’s not wise to name yourself as a Christian unless you are actually embodying the way of Messiah Jesus. If you are embodying the way, it will be as obvious as Jesus was obvious. If it is obvious, the necessity of naming yourself will fade. Others will do it for you. Questions may arise, and if so, you answer them. If people want to know why you head in one direction and not another, tell them who you’re following.”

            Let your ID card be the way you love the other members of Christ’s body.

                                                                                    ~~Faith Himes Lamb

           

JUST WAIT!

I have two subjects with which I am well acquainted at this time in my life...Krispy Kreme donuts and Grief.  And since there are no words to adequately describe the almost spiritual experience of eating a hot Krispy Kreme, I'm left with the latter.

If you haven't met grief, you will...in some form.  After my husband's death four months ago and even before, I was drop-kicked into a thick, heavy cloud of pain and fear.  It hurts!  It hurts a lot!  Along with the unbelievable emotional pain, there are so many unexpected physical symptoms...tight chest, headaches, panic attacks, sleeplessness, fear, frizzy hair and forgetfulness. (I just threw the frizzy hair in there for sympathy). I forgot where I was on more than one occasion and it wasn't an "I've lost my car at the mall" forgetfulness.  There are some days that I am afraid to look down for fear that I am not fully dressed.  However, before you run out to Walgreens to stock up on Valium just to get through this blog,  my point is to tell you that through this shroud of horror, through the darkness of Dan's illness and death, God was drawing me closer to Him and teaching me things that I just didn't want to learn.  I'm still not a great fan of learning hard things but that's what He does whether we like it or not. 

One of those lessons is “to wait”.  Just wait!  I don’t like it...never have.  From big things to little, it didn’t matter, probably a flaw in my personality but I have never had patience. I wanted things fixed so that my mind could be clear and I could sleep at night.    And when Dan first became a victim of this horrendous disease, I was not going to become a victim of other people’s timetable.  And It worked, at first.  I was able to tactfully barge my way into offices and kindly demand what I needed to know, and developed a “professional” way of nagging through letters and phone calls.  For months I read books and articles on cancer and recovery, I talked to nurses and other hospitals and finally, when I realized that there was no other way out of this sad and desperate situation other than God, I sat back and listened. 

And God said, “Wait”.  And we did.  We waited through surgery, and for the doctor, we waited for bad news and waited for good, we waited for morning during long nights, and for the sun to go down on hard days, we waited for phone calls, for pain to subside, we waited through chemo, and we waited for God to heal Dan.  But He didn't!  And finally, we waited for the Lord to take him Home. 

And now, on my own and without my husband God still tells me to wait.  Through my grief and His Word, He tells me to lean on Him because He is preparing me for something great. So, I wait!  I wait for the morning that I don't feel pain,  I wait for God to heal my heart, to show me what’s next in my life, to light my path and to give me direction.   I wait because He has promised joy again, he has promised to restore me and to pull me up from the pit. And I wait on Him with a calm heart because I know it’s best for me and that by doing so He will give me His peace.  And He has.

I’m not so impatient any more. I probably wouldn't even get angry if you took my pew at church..but don't!  I even find myself driving the speed limit and standing in long lines doesn't phase me.  But I must warn you..if  the “hot donut” sign is flashing and you are in front of me, I make no promises.

Joy Dilts

Higher Ground

When the Voices of Praise started singing “Higher Ground” on Sunday morning, I was transported back to Spruce Grove Baptist Church in West Virginia.  I was a little girl of six or seven standing next to my mom, with the songbook balanced on the back of the dark wooden pew, following along as the big folks sang and I learned the words.  I still remember the picture the song made in my head of a dusty path winding up and up a mountain.  I couldn’t figure out what a “table land” was—and I’m still not entirely sure—but it seemed to me to be a sunny, happy place since everyone wanted to be there.  Hearing the song again after so many years, I sensed again the urging to be better and strive upward to a place of service and blessing.

Another old thing that I saw in a new light this week was the fourth chapter of John.  We are studying the book in Sunday School, and we’ve been watching dramatizations of it as we go.  It has been eye opening to see the old stories in a new way—to see, really see, Jacob’s well and the woman standing there talking to Jesus. I always knew she was a real person, but to see an actual woman and to watch the expression on her face as she realized she was talking to the Messiah was a new and moving experience.

Dr. Euler talked on Sunday morning about looking at Genesis in a new way. This book about the very oldest of humans is coming alive with fresh ideas to me. I’m so glad that we deal with eternal truths that never really get old.  And yet, they seem new and interesting time after time.  Ecclesiastes reminds us that “there is no new thing under the sun” (1:9).  However, at the end of his search for meaning in life, the writer concludes that the only meaningful life is one in which we “fear God and keep his commandments (12:13).  This kind of life keeps being renewed and refreshed.

Lamentations 3:22-24 speaks of newness alongside stability: “It is of the LORD’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.  They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness. ‘The LORD is my portion,’ says my soul; ‘therefore will I hope in him.’”

My prayer for all of you—and for myself—this week is to find fresh energy and new ideas in the old, the tried, and the true. May each of us press on to “higher ground” with God and “catch a gleam of glory bright” that we have never seen before.

--Sherry Poff

Would You Jump Without a Parachute?

I know you won't believe this about me, but I am not much of a risk-taker. If you're going skydiving, rock climbing, deep sea fishing, or riding the Ferris wheel...I'm not your girl! I'm saving those activities for Heaven!
But in my spiritual life, I haven't always been so careful. In fact, I've jumped from the plane of truth without a parachute, climbed mountains of decisions without a harness, gone to the sea of choices without a life jacket, and boarded the Ferris wheel of purity with people I knew would find it funny to rock the seat!
Sparing you the details of a life filled with unnecessary sin and self-centered choices, I write today to praise the Lord for His protection! I am in awe that He has preserved my reputation, my paths, my purity and my life.
In Proverbs 2, the writer urges his son to call out to the Lord for wisdom. Notice how the Lord grants more than just wisdom, and included in the list...a whole lot of protection!

Proverbs 2 
¹ My son, if you accept my words
   and store up my commands within you,
² turning your ear to wisdom
   and applying your heart to understanding—
³ indeed, if you call out for insight
   and cry aloud for understanding,
⁴ and if you look for it as for silver
   and search for it as for hidden treasure,
⁵ then you will understand the fear of the LORD
   and find the knowledge of God.
⁶ For the LORD gives wisdom;
   from his mouth come knowledge and understanding.
⁷ He holds success in store for the upright,
   he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless,
⁸ for he guards the course of the just
   and protects the way of his faithful ones.
 ⁹ Then you will understand what is right and just
   and fair—every good path.
¹⁰ For wisdom will enter your heart,
   and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul.
¹¹ Discretion will protect you,
   and understanding will guard you.
 ¹² Wisdom will save you from the ways of wicked men,
   from men whose words are perverse,
¹³ who have left the straight paths
   to walk in dark ways,
¹⁴ who delight in doing wrong
   and rejoice in the perverseness of evil,
¹⁵ whose paths are crooked
   and who are devious in their ways.
 ¹⁶ Wisdom will save you also from the adulterous woman,
   from the wayward woman with her seductive words,
¹⁷ who has left the partner of her youth
   and ignored the covenant she made before God.
¹⁸ Surely her house leads down to death
   and her paths to the spirits of the dead.
¹⁹ None who go to her return
   or attain the paths of life.
 ²⁰ Thus you will walk in the ways of the good
   and keep to the paths of the righteous.
²¹ For the upright will live in the land,
   and the blameless will remain in it;
²² but the wicked will be cut off from the land,
   and the unfaithful will be torn from it.

Praying God's wisdom for each of you, for with it comes protection!

~Rebecca Phillips