Serve Elyria

Wow, what a day today was! It was one of those days where I was so proud to be the Pastor of Church of the Open Door. Over 500 volunteers demonstrated the love of God to the people of Elyria at Serve Elyria completing over 360 projects throughout the city. 260 of those were gardens using the organic and super creative gardensoxx from Filtrexx (check them out here). Our Pastor of Life Groups, Dan Samms, led the project this year and he and his team did a great job organizing and leading. He reported that in addition to the gardensoxx projects, we completed over 100 other projects throughout the city! Is that incredible or what?

My goal was to serve at the most projects and encourage the most people throughout the city. So as Pastor Jamie, my wife Andrea, and I traveled from site to site and encouraged, we helped out and loaded and unloaded gardensoxx, worked on landscaping projects, raked leaves, helped insulate and rebrick the foundation of a mobile home, cleaned up trash, and heard one person after another talk about what a great day it was.

One lady who I’ll call Judy, because that’s what her name is, cried when we helped her with some yard work and fixed her roof and said, “I can’t do any of these things anymore and I didn’t have anyone who could help me. I can’t believe what you all are doing today. Thank you so much.” (more tears.) I told her we just wanted to show her the love of God in tangible ways. She said, “well you did. Thank you.” (more tears.) Then I found out that one of the couples in our church who was up on her roof also left her a check to help out with expenses!

Another guy, I’ll call Ryan, because that’s what his name is, has only been coming to our church for about a month. He was out serving today and said to me: “this is what we’ve been looking for, a church that serves.” What a statement.

You know what? I think God is looking for a church like that and so are people in the community. Let’s continue to be that church!

Marriage Grace

This past Sunday, I finished preaching a sermon series called “Resurrecting Marriage: Learning Marriage CPR.” My dual goals when preaching are: to be faithful to what the Scripture text actually says, and, communicate relevantly with love and clarity. Some Scripture texts are very difficult to either accept or preach. Mark 10:2-12 is both hard to accept and hard to preach, especially vv. 10-12. My desire was to bring a word of grace to the strong words of vv. 10-12 without watering down what Jesus said. You can watch or listen to the messages here.

Some feel I wasn’t clear enough as to what do you do if you’re divorced (regardless of the reason) and remarried, in other words, “now what?” The way forward for those who are remarried is the same for those who are still in their current marriage: practice Marriage CPR.
Commit (in this new marriage) to God’s Vision for that marriage,
Pay Attention to Your Heart and
Relate with Christlike Love

Keep doing those three steps (as explained in each of the 3 sermons). Especially the last letter/point, “R,” Relate with Christlike love, is how you relate in order to move forward: Love with Christ’s love, which is Compassionate, Forgiving, Initiating, and Sacrificial. But keep doing “C” and “P” too (paying attention to your heart and stay committed to God’s vision for your [new] marriage.)

Some may ask, “If you’re remarried, and are faithful to your spouse, are you therefore “living” in adultery? No. There’s a difference between “living in adultery” and “committing adultery.” If you’re legally divorced, or your spouse is deceased, and then you remarry and are faithful to that spouse, you are not “living in adultery.” Living in adultery is either:
a. living in an ongoing pattern of marriage-divorce-remarriage-divorce-remarriage-divorce-remarriage, etc. or
b. living with/having sex with another person who is not your spouse.

So, if you’re remarried, the past is past, receive God’s grace and move on; you have made a new covenant before God (your new marriage vows), now go back to the “CPR” and
Commit (in this new marriage) to God’s Vision for that marriage,
Pay Attention to Your Heart and
Relate with Christlike Love.

You don’t undo one wrong with another one. It is not God’s will for you to divorce your current spouse to remarry your first (or former) one. Remember, we’ve got to stop treating this area of our lives different from other areas: every single one of us needs God’s grace whether we’ve been divorced or not and God’s grace is available for each of us regardless of our past. Thank God! Grace is the only way to move forward.
Some may ask: if our souls are “glued” together, and we get divorced, can we ever”be free” of that person in our new marriage; will we always be carrying around part of that person in our soul, even into our next relationship?

The answer is to look at divorce for what it is: a death. Divorce isn’t like a death, it is a death. The same question asked in the previous paragraph is asked of people grieving the loss of their spouse through that spouse dying. Can you totally forget the person? Probably not. Can you get past that death and get remarried and have a healthy relationship? Absolutely. Is it easy? No. The longer you were married, truthfully, the harder it will be to “get past” the former marriage. But by God’s grace, it is most definitely possible; and not only possible, again, because God is God of grace, it is what God desires for you.

This is why it is so absolutely critical that we grieve well the death (and/or divorce) of the first marriage; the grieving/healing process is critical for the viability of the new marriage. You need to take at the very least a full year to process/heal the death of that marriage and, depending on the situation, you may need 5 or more years. To the degree that you process well, grieve well and get healed up, your new marriage can be better than the first one, even if the first one was great.

With God’s grace, incredible vistas of fulfillment and joy are waiting to be experienced and explored. God’s grace is not a hack patch job. He is the God who heals the brokenhearted (Psalm 147:3). His grace is healing, restorative, re-creating, and unbelievably satisfying. But we must learn to receive and assimilate that grace into our lives - again, the exact same thing, everyone else must learn to do - regardless of our pasts.
For all of us, an incredible future of joy and fulfillment is available because of God’s grace. Let me give you 2 great verses to meditate on:
2 Corinthians 9:8: And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.
2 Peter 3:18: Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

An area of confusion that some have mentioned to me is reconciling the Bible’s strong stance against divorce with the “exception passages” that seem to “allow” divorce. There is a tension there, but it’s the same tension present in the verses that call us to holiness while recognizing that sin happens and providing grace when it does.

God’s original plan never included divorce, but he recognizes that it happens. The key word is “recognize.” That doesn’t mean he “approves” it or “endorses” it. When we talk about the Bible “allowing” divorce or when we talk about “valid” biblical divorces, (e.g. Matt. 5:32, 1 Cor. 7, etc.) we are using language that recognizes that divorce does happen, but its not as if God is saying “I approve of/endorse divorce.” That puts words in God’s mouth he never intends to say. We must live with the tension that “recognize” and “allow” do not mean “approve” and “endorse.”

We must also recognize that the Bible never intends to answer the question “what are all the circumstances in which a divorce is allowed?” The Bible declares God’s original desire and then in different places recognizes circumstances where divorce might happen. Taking these exception occurrences and recognizing that the Bible doesn’t intend to speak comprehensively or exhaustively on the issue of each of the individual circumstances that lead to divorce, wise counsel calls us to examine each situation in the light of the Scriptures and seek the best path forward for that relationship. Combing the Bible to look for exceptions and loopholes is a distortion of the purpose of the Bible. Seeking wise counsel in light of Biblical truth honors God’s Word and the purpose for which it was given.

Because this is an area that is fraught with so many questions and issues, our Church Life Board (of which I am a part) has written a brief position paper on Marriage, Divorce and Remarriage that I believe will be helpful. I urge you to read it carefully.

May God’s great grace be upon you and your family as you seek to live your life in a way that honors Him.

Fearing Jesus

I don’t usually get afraid when reading the Bible, though it has happened on more than one occasion. This morning I read in Luke 8:26-39 a story that made me afraid. The story includes things that have been known to scare other people as well: talk of torture, tombs, demons, high cliffs, deep water, and a pig stampede; but they aren’t related like you might think. You have to read the story to find out where the fear shows up, and when you do maybe you’ll be stunned by the same phrases that got me.

Read Luke 8:26-39

Did you read it? Two reactions to the story are juxtaposed with each other and I wonder which one best describes you and me. Both reactions are associated with fear. The first one is in v. 37: “the people asked Jesus to leave them.” The second one is in v. 39 where Jesus says, “Return home and tell how much God has done for you.” Three things about these verses make me afraid:

1. It is possible to get so comfortable with the way I have arranged my life that when Jesus upsets it, I might find myself wishing he would leave. In this story when it’s clear that Jesus isn’t welcome, he leaves. That scares me.
2. It is possible to care more about my comfort level than about someone getting their life miraculously changed. A man is liberated from bondage and death, his life is forever changed, he is saved, rescued, miraculously delivered, and all people can think about is themselves. That scares me.
3. Jesus has instructed all of us who have had our lives changed to “Tell how much God has done for you.” But we don’t. Or at least few of us do. What did this man do? Verse 39 continues: “So the man went away and told all over town how much Jesus had done for him.” Why don’t we? One word: fear. Fear of what people may think; fear of what to say, fear of how people will respond, etc.

I fear the fear that keeps us silent and preoccupied with lesser things while people all around us live in bondage and death. Do we keep Jesus at arms length out of fear? Are we more concerned with our comfort level than changed lives? Do we share the good news of Jesus or are we silenced by fear?

“Lord, I praise you for all that you have done for me. Help me recognize opportunities where I can tell others of all you’ve done. You’ve healed me, forgiven me, saved me, adopted me. You’ve cleansed me from my sin and filled me with your Holy Spirit. You’ve given me a purpose and hope and a reason for living. You’ve given me a calling and spiritual gifts to serve you and others. You have surrounded me with blessings, with family, with friends, and placed me in a church that is inspired by a clear mission from you. I am blessed beyond measure and its all because of you! Forgive me of my fear, I surrender it to you. You have not given me a spirit of fear and timidity, but of love and power and self-discipline. Fill me with your Holy Spirit and give me boldness me to tell others of what you’ve done for me. Amen.”

Fire of God

I've had enough people ask me to post the words to my song that we did this past week to cause me to assent. The song is called Fire of God.

I actually started the song years ago, but it just sat dormant and felt unfinished. I picked it up again 3 or 4 weeks ago when I began studying Mark 9:49 and meditating on what it might mean. I was really wrestling with the whole idea of the purifying fires of God and how the Holy Spirit uses this part of the sanctification process to to purify our love.

I thought I had finished the song again but as I was singing it for Chad, our worship pastor, it just didn't feel right. He said he liked it, and we were going to do it a couple of Sundays ago and then again the 28th, but something just didn't feel right about it, so I yanked it. The next week, I wrote a completely new melody and changed some of the words to how we did it this past Sunday.

I thought Chad and the band did a great job with it in the Auditorium services and I heard Terry Adkins and the band who were leading worship in our video venue in the RNC, did a great job with it too. (Thanks guys!)

I wanted simple words and a simple melody so the song could be learned quickly and sung as an expression of a heart crying out to God.

Fill me Lord, with Your holy love;
Come Wind of God, blow through my life.
Fire of God, ignite my heart to love.
Spirit come.
I want to love like You.
I want to be more like You.

So, fill me Lord, with Your holy love;
Come Wind of God, blow through my life.
Fire of God, ignite my heart to love.
Spirit come.

Let the Fire fall!
I give You my life, I give You my all.
I dare to draw near to Your Holy Flame
Fire of God, purify my love
Fire of God, purify my love
I surrender all.

“Fire of God”/Words and music by Jim Mindling/© 2010 CrossWinds Music