Tag: christian hope

Faith, Hope, and Love (Acts 27:13-38)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment

When a gentle south wind began to blow, they saw their opportunity; so they weighed anchor and sailed along the shore of Crete. Before very long, a wind of hurricane force, called the Northeaster, swept down from the island. The ship was caught by the storm and could not head into the wind; so we gave way to it and were driven along. 

As we passed to the lee of a small island called Cauda, we were hardly able to make the lifeboat secure, so the men hoisted it aboard. Then they passed ropes under the ship itself to hold it together. Because they were afraid they would run aground on the sandbars of Syrtis, they lowered the sea anchor and let the ship be driven along. 

We took such a violent battering from the storm that the next day they began to throw the cargo overboard. On the third day, they threw the ship’s tackle overboard with their own hands. When neither sun nor stars appeared for many days and the storm continued raging, we finally gave up all hope of being saved.

After they had gone a long time without food, Paul stood up before them and said: “Men, you should have taken my advice not to sail from Crete; then you would have spared yourselves this damage and loss. But now I urge you to keep up your courage, because not one of you will be lost; only the ship will be destroyed. Last night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve stood beside me and said, ‘Do not be afraid, Paul. You must stand trial before Caesar; and God has graciously given you the lives of all who sail with you.’ So keep up your courage, men, for I have faith in God that it will happen just as he told me. Nevertheless, we must run aground on some island.”

On the fourteenth night we were still being driven across the Adriatic Sea, when about midnight the sailors sensed they were approaching land. They took soundings and found that the water was a hundred and twenty feet deep. A short time later they took soundings again and found it was ninety feet deep. 

Fearing that we would be dashed against the rocks, they dropped four anchors from the stern and prayed for daylight. In an attempt to escape from the ship, the sailors let the lifeboat down into the sea, pretending they were going to lower some anchors from the bow. Then Paul said to the centurion and the soldiers, “Unless these men stay with the ship, you cannot be saved.” So the soldiers cut the ropes that held the lifeboat and let it drift away.

Just before dawn Paul urged them all to eat. “For the last fourteen days,” he said, “you have been in constant suspense and have gone without food—you haven’t eaten anything. Now I urge you to take some food. You need it to survive. Not one of you will lose a single hair from his head.” After he said this, he took some bread and gave thanks to God in front of them all. Then he broke it and began to eat. They were all encouraged and ate some food themselves. Altogether there were 276 of us on board. When they had eaten as much as they wanted, they lightened the ship by throwing the grain into the sea. (New International Version)

An engraving of the Roman prison ship, by Henry Adlard (1799-1893)

Keeping your courage in the face of an intense stressor is more than challenging. Yet, the Apostle Paul did it. Not only that, but he also had the wherewithal to help keep up the spirits of the people around him – even though he was on a prison ship in the middle of storm.

How did Paul do it? How did he remain encouraged himself, while also encouraging others? What’s the answer? Three words which are essential to the Christian life: faith, hope, and love.

Every believer knows from experience how difficult it is to practice these in daily life, especially the crucible of multiple stressors. One reason it’s so doggone hard, even when we want to please the Lord, is due to the confusion between our inner feelings and our outer actions. Yet once we understand the incongruence, and how to evaluate our inner experience, then it’s a whole lot easier to make daily decisions of faith, hope, and love.

In the beginning God created humans in the divine image. Humanity’s relationship to God was central to daily life (Genesis 1:26; 2:16-25). And God created people with the capacity to interact with the divine through our ability to think and reason. (Ephesians 4:24; Colossians 3:10)

Before there were broken relationships between Creator and creature, our original ancestors had complete self-control, along with unity and harmony between one another and God. (Genesis 1:31; 2:7, 16-25). 

It’s vital for us to recognize the distinction between human being and human doing; there’s a difference in who we are and what we do. (Romans 1:21-32; 6:16-22; 1 Corinthians 9:27; Ephesians 4:21-32)

And if we fail to grasp this distinction, we’re going to have some big stress in living as Christians.

In Adam and Eve’s disobedience toward God, humanity took on its own authority, and started making decisions independent of God. In other words, the source of authority switched, and we began relying upon ourselves.

The problem with this is that our brokenness has left us in disparate parts, badly in need of integration. The fall of humanity compromised our integrity, and so, we have a messed up sense of what to do, how to feel, and how and what to think.

This is why rational people do irrational things, and why fear, stress, and anxiety rule so much of our lives. Many a church pastor, not understanding this dynamic, is forever frustrated and flabbergasted that parishioners do not simply take what has been taught them, and go do it. (If it were that simple there would be no place for the Holy Spirit!)

There’s more. In our fallen state, we lost control of our capacity to function well – and are now vulnerable to manipulation from others, and from Satan. (Ephesians 2:2-3; Galatians 5:16-21)

As a result, our inner conscience has become confused. We are not always certain of right and wrong, or what needs to happen whenever we’re distressed. We end up misunderstanding what life is really supposed to be about. We’re disconnected from our original source of faith, hope, and love.

However, the good news of Christianity is that through the redeeming work of Jesus, and a new birth, the bondage of shame and disconnection is reinstated. God once again becomes central to daily life. The Lord’s gracious authority is restored.

In this renewed relationship, we can again receive truth through the Holy Spirit and the Holy Scriptures. Our daily practical experience of this relationship brings freedom, joy, assurance, peace, and self-control. Yet, even though one is redeemed by Jesus Christ and believes in him, it is still possible to regress into conflict, doubt, fear, anxiety, frustration, disappointment, and confusion. (Romans 7:14-25; 1 Corinthians 3:1-4)

We must, therefore, make daily decisions of faith, hope, and love based in our identity as God’s image-bearers:

  • Recognize you have the ability to function in faith, hope, and love as God’s beloved child.(2 Corinthians 7:1; Romans 8:14-17)
  • Understand the difference between your being and doing. Evil thoughts and emotions do not make you evil. What you do with your feelings and thoughts is what’s vital. (See how Jesus handled this in Matthew 4:1-11).
  • Know that you can take charge of your thoughts, feelings, and actions. (Galatians 5:22-23)
  • Know also that you can reject whatever is harmful and out of sync with your basic identity. (Ephesians 4:22; Colossians 3:5-9; Titus 2:11-12)
  • Respond to God and God’s Word by daily obedience. Learn to think and act on the basis of truth. (Acts 27:25)
  • Discern that practicing the truth will result in freedom, and a re-patterning of thinking and functioning. (John 8:32; Titus 2:11-14; Philippians 2:12-16)

Supportive communities help one another live into shared values and commitments. Faith, hope, and love exists and grows in the context of community.

Paul had faith by believing what he heard; hope by looking ahead to the end of God’s promise; and love by reaching out to his fellow prisoners and the ship’s crew. Whereas stress moved to distress for most on the ship, Paul found strength, within that same stress, by practicing faith, hope, and love.

Almighty God, give us true faith, and make that faith grow in us day by day. Also give us hope and love, so that we may serve our neighbors according to your will; through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Jesus of Nazareth (Matthew 2:13-23)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
Nazareth Village, Israel

When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”

So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:

“A voice is heard in Ramah,
    weeping and great mourning,
Rachel weeping for her children
    and refusing to be comforted,
    because they are no more.”

After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead.”

So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets, that he would be called a Nazarene. (New International Version)

Jesus is the New Exodus

Joseph was told to take Jesus to Egypt. He obeyed the Lord and assumed the role of protecting the child Jesus, unlike King Herod’s demented attempt to murder Jesus. Whereas Herod sought only his own personal agenda, Jesus identified with the people of God and sought their best interests.

Just as God brought the Israelites out of Egypt through a great deliverance, so God brought up Jesus, the Great Deliverer, out of Egypt as the unique Son of God. Jesus is God’s divine Son, and so is the rightful Ruler in God’s kingdom.

In Christianity, Jesus is the special God Man who secures salvation for us. God preserved Israel from Pharaoh’s wrath; God protected Jesus from Herod’s wrath.

Flight to Egypt by He Qi

God’s kindness and loyalty preserves us from the wrath of the devil who seeks to keep as many people as possible in the realm of darkness. 

Our hope is in the Lord, specifically, in Jesus who has conquered the devil; and he did it by first establishing a beachhead on this earth through his incarnation as the Son of God.

Just as Hosea’s prophecy was an appeal to turn from other gods to the true and living God of mercy and grace, so Matthew calls us to turn from idolatry, from anything that would displace Jesus as the rightful Ruler of our lives.

Jesus brought us out of exile

King Herod massacred innocent toddlers in order to ensure the destruction of Jesus. Behind his atrocity was the devil himself who knew that Jesus was the coming King who would one day bring salvation, and the satanic agenda was set in place.

However, nothing can thwart the fulfillment of God’s promises – including Satan, whose most powerful weapon, death, has now lost its sting because of Jesus.

Just as the prophet Jeremiah spoke hope to the people that exile will not be forever, so Matthew speaks the fulfillment of that hope. The incarnation is here. Jesus has arrived. Salvation has come in the form of a child. He is the Deliverer, the Savior. Christ brings us from captivity into the promises of God.

Jesus came to save the littlest, the lowly, the least, the lost, the lonely, and the last. God demonstrated the commitment to deliver such persons through a humble existence in a backwater town called Nazareth.

Jesus is the new Moses

Joseph is, again, unexpectedly visited by an angel with instructions concerning Jesus. Herod, after all his sinister shenanigans, finally dies. The ancient Jewish historian, Josephus, described Herod’s death: 

He had a terrible craving to scratch himself, his bowels were ulcerated, and his privates were full of gangrene and worms. At Jericho he assembled the men of distinction from all parts of the nation and ordered them shut inside the hippodrome. He told his sister, Salome, that as soon as he died, all these men were to be killed, so that there would be grief throughout the country at his death rather than joy. (Paul Maier, Josephus: The Essential Works, 252)

The contrast between King Herod and King Jesus could not be any more pronounced; Jesus said in a clear demonstration of his humility and grace at his death:

“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:24, NIV)

With Herod dead, it was safe to return to Israel. Matthew links Jesus to the exodus and deliverance of the Israelites as the new Moses. Just as Moses was by God to go back to Egypt because all the men who wanted to kill him were dead (Exodus 4:19) so Jesus is also told to return from Egypt because he will save the people from their sins.

Everything in Holy Scripture points to Jesus, in one way or another, on purpose, as the center from which all things hinge and revolve. 

Christ the Deliverer, Rio De Janeiro, Brazil

At the beginning of this New Year, in the middle of Christmastide, it is good to remember the incarnation of Jesus to help set the tone for the entire year.

Christ came to us so that he might set apart a holy people, dedicated to doing his will, and living according to the ethics of God’s kingdom. 

God doesn’t determine who is a good follow through the metrics of perfect attendance to church services, but in how we interact with people while we are there, and how we live our lives when we are outside the four walls of a church building. 

God has found us, and the purpose of our existence is to know God and enjoy the Lord forever.

Jesus of Nazareth

Nazareth was an obscure village, not a likely place for a king to settle down and live. Yet, this is in line with what the prophet said would occur:

Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress. In the past he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the future he will honor Galilee of the nations, by the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan—

The people walking in darkness
    have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of deep darkness
    a light has dawned. (Isaiah 9:1-2, NIV)

The choice of settling in Nazareth underlines that the gospel is not only for particular people, not just for Jews, the wealthy, or the influential; the gospel is for everyone, especially for the lost, the least, and the lowly. 

Describing Christ as “Jesus of Nazareth” means we are expressing an important theological truth that God is with us, that the Lord identifies with us, that the universal Sovereign of all is concerned for the common person, the poor, needy, and powerless among humanity.

The settling in Nazareth also underscores that Jesus is a different kind of king – he rules over God’s kingdom as a servant leader, using his power to dispense grace. Christ shares that power by giving it away, and together with the Father, gives the Holy Spirit. 

Unlike earthly political kings who demanded outward allegiance, Jesus gains followers through touching the heart by means of grace and love. Christ doesn’t coerce and cajole but serves others. He is patient, not wanting any to perish but all to come to eternal life.

Jesus is the culmination and climax of history. Hope is not found in electing the right politicians or having the right boss at a workplace; hope is not in attending church services and doing all the acceptable Christian activities.

Rather, hope resides in the child Jesus who was born to die so that we might live. We aren’t saved by the right people in the right positions, or in doing the right things, or having the right ideas – because Jesus is the Savior; he is our hope.

Almighty Lord God, give us true faith, and make that faith grow in us day by day. Also give us hope and love, so that we may serve our neighbors according to your will; through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Hope for the Grieving (Jeremiah 31:15-22)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
Orthodox icon of Rachel weeping for the children

This is what the Lord says:

“A voice is heard in Ramah,
    mourning and great weeping,
Rachel weeping for her children
    and refusing to be comforted,
    because they are no more.”

This is what the Lord says:

“Restrain your voice from weeping
    and your eyes from tears,
for your work will be rewarded,”
declares the Lord.
    “They will return from the land of the enemy.
So there is hope for your descendants,”
declares the Lord.
    “Your children will return to their own land.

“I have surely heard Ephraim’s moaning:
    ‘You disciplined me like an unruly calf,
    and I have been disciplined.
Restore me, and I will return,
    because you are the Lord my God.
After I strayed,
    I repented;
after I came to understand,
    I beat my breast.
I was ashamed and humiliated
    because I bore the disgrace of my youth.’
Is not Ephraim my dear son,
    the child in whom I delight?
Though I often speak against him,
    I still remember him.
Therefore my heart yearns for him;
    I have great compassion for him,”
declares the Lord.

“Set up road signs;
    put up guideposts.
Take note of the highway,
    the road that you take.
Return, Virgin Israel,
    return to your towns.
How long will you wander,
    unfaithful Daughter Israel?
The Lord will create a new thing on earth—
    the woman will return to the man.” (New International Version)

The bereavement of losing someone you care about is awful. A parent experiencing the death of a child is next level grief. There is no bereavement like it.

As a hospital chaplain, I occasionally attend to a grieving mother who just lost her baby. I have shown up for premature and stillborn deaths, full term births, then death, sudden infant death, and more. The grief is indescribable.

On some level, there is no comfort – and never will be. I know that, for me, providing grief support to mothers who are enduring the death of a baby or young child has profoundly changed me and forever impacted my soul. So, I can only imagine what it’s like for a mother.

Many Christians will recognize the verse of Rachel weeping for her children as part of the early story surrounding Jesus:

An angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”

So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt,where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:

“A voice is heard in Ramah,
    weeping and great mourning,
Rachel weeping for her children
    and refusing to be comforted,
    because they are no more.”(Matthew 2:13-18, NIV)

It’s really hard to have hope when you’re in the throes of lamenting the death of children. We need hope. It’s necessary to life. We cannot survive, let alone thrive, without it.

It is possible to simultaneously experience hopelessness and hope. At the same time, we hold both despair and desire, anguish and anticipation, in our hearts. While we may never forget who we have lost, we make it through our days believing that another child can change the world for the better. We place our faith in the Christ child, in Jesus.

Wily old King Herod massacred innocent toddlers in order to ensure the destruction of Jesus. Behind his atrocity was the devil himself who knew that Jesus was the coming King who would one day bring salvation. But the old King’s sinister plan didn’t work. 

Reflecting on a vision of Christ’s birth, the Apostle John stated:

The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who “will rule all the nations with an iron scepter.” And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. (Revelation 12:4-5, NIV)

Satan wars against God’s Son and God’s people, whose roots go all the way back to the first prophecy of Christ:

And I will put enmity
    between you and the woman,
    and between your offspring and hers;
he will crush your head,
    and you will strike his heel.” (Genesis 3:15, NIV)

There has been bad blood, ever since the Fall of humanity, between the serpent and the seed of the woman. The Old Testament Israelites were continually being threatened with extermination; they were constantly tempted to conform to pagan ways for handling their suffering and grief. 

Herod was just another in a long line of demonically animated men trying to perpetuate the kingdom of darkness. The devil knows that his time is short; and he uses twisted persons like Herod for his insidious schemes.

Many people experience hell on earth because Satan is on a rampage; mothers and their children are often the collateral damage.

The holiday season is a hard time of year for many people, filled with depression instead of joy, grieving over lost loved ones for whom you will not spend another Christmas with. And yet, there is a reunion coming, the hope of a bodily resurrection in which we will be with Jesus and God’s people forever.

Satan’s most powerful weapon, death, has lost its sting because of Jesus. Death does not have the last word; resurrection does. And this hope for the future helps us in the present to keep going and not give up.

The prophet Jeremiah was dealing with children lost in war to the invading Babylonians. His words are a lament in the context of the hope that captivity and exile will not be forever. 

Matthew wants us to see that the exile is over for us; Jesus has arrived, and the tears that were shed will shortly dry up. There may be a time of suffering that we must endure, but there is glory ahead.

Jesus is the Great Deliverer who brings us out of the grip of death, grief, and lament and into the promises of God. Christ is our hope. Amen, and amen.

The Time Is Ripe (Galatians 4:1-7)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment

What I am saying is that as long as an heir is underage, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. The heir is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father. So also, when we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world. 

But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir. (New International Version)

The three greatest persons in biblical history – Abraham, Moses, and Jesus – are connected. God entered into a covenant with Abraham and promised to bless everyone on the earth through his progeny. God gave Moses the Law as a sort of school teacher and guide, alongside Abraham’s covenant. God fulfilled the covenant promise in Jesus. Thus, everyone who is led and tutored toward Christ, inherits all of God’s promises.

Under the Law

The Apostle Paul, speaking to a group of new believers who were confused about the relation between the Law and Christ, helped them understand with a metaphor. It’s like a boy who is the heir to a great estate. Someday, it will all be his. But now, he’s too young to possess it. So, during his childhood, he’s subject to trustees who oversee the estate, and teachers who instruct him in how to actually use the wealth once he actually inherits it.

While the boy is in the middle of the guidance, he’s not in control of much, just like the servants on the estate. The child will remain in this state until his time comes, until the date in which his father says he can take possession of the inheritance.

Before Christ, people were under the Law. They were heirs to God’s great kingdom promises. Yet, they needed the Law to guide and instruct them until it was time for them to receive the inheritance. Much like a present day kid in school, they see themselves in a sort of bondage, even though it’s a necessary part of their lives.

It’s bondage in the sense that the Law, the schoolmaster, has no power or ability to give the inheritance nor to save them from their current condition. In other words, the Law is good, yet lacks the potency to actually deliver one from sin, death, and hell.

What’s more, the elemental spirits of the age, namely Satan and his wicked spirits, wormed their way into the process of guidance and twisted the Law for their own advantage, to keep people in bondage. Just as the guardian of the boy may mistreat him in ways his father never intended, so the devil has exploited the Law in order to have it be a tyrannical presence over people.

Whereas God intended the Law to reveal humanity’s sin and drive them to a Savior, evil uses the Law to shame people and drive them to despair. The Law was meant for good, to be a gracious leading of people to the Messiah; yet Satan co-opted the Law to bring condemnation to folks and keep them under his insidious thumb.

In Christ

But when the time was ripe, God sent the Son so that people would be done with their guardians and inherit divine promises. To use yet another metaphor, when the scaffolding on a building has served it’s intended purpose in construction, it’s taken down; it’s no longer needed. It would be weird if the shiny new building were erected, and the owner decided to keep the scaffolding beside the structure.

The Law of Moses had done its work of preparing people for Christ. So, God sent Jesus, the Son, to redeem humanity, to transform slaves into sons and daughters. The Lord adopted us and granted us full rights as children of the King.

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law by becoming a curse for us—because it is written, Everyone who is hung on a tree is cursed.

Galatians 3:13, CEB

Jesus is uniquely qualified to be such a Redeemer of humanity. He is God’s Son, born of a human mother. Therefore, as both divine and human – the God Man – Jesus is the person for whom all the covenant promises of God have their fulfillment.

In the past God spoke to our ancestors many times and in many ways through the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us through his Son. He is the one through whom God created the universe, the one whom God has chosen to possess all things at the end. He reflects the brightness of God’s glory and is the exact likeness of God’s own being, sustaining the universe with his powerful word. After achieving forgiveness for the sins of all human beings, he sat down in heaven at the right side of God, the Supreme Power. (Hebrews 1:1-3, GNT)

In Christian trinitarian theology, God is Three in One, the Holy Trinity. God sent the Son into the world, of which believers celebrate the incarnation of Christ each year at Christmas. God sent the Spirit into our hearts; and from that place we cry “Abba! Father!” The Spirit testifies with our own spirit that we are truly adopted children of God. (Romans 8:15-16)

The Spirit is like the seal on a document, proving that our inheritance papers are all in order. And, much more than that, the Spirit also does this sealing work with affection. Christianity is not merely a legal transaction; it’s an experience of grace and love in which we enter into a new life, free from bondage, and alive to all the possibilities that humanity was originally meant for.

Both our status and our sensibilities are changed. It happens because of God’s good grace and purpose, fulfilled in Christ and impressed on us by the Spirit.

Conclusion

The French philosopher and writer, Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), once said that there is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of each person which needs to be filled:

“There was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace. This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God himself.” Blaise Pascal, Pensées

If we want to find happiness, satisfaction, and goodwill, then the empty void within us creatures and within the systems and the cultures we create, needs to be filled with our Creator.

The Christian season of Advent is an appropriate time to reconnect with the infinite and the immutable. The time is ripe to be filled not only with love and goodness, but with the very source of Love itself.

May it be so, to the glory of God.