The End is Coming ...Again

In 1987, I received an unsolicited book in the mail entitled "88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988" by an unknown preacher named Edgar Whisenart. A year later, I received a second book from Whisenart telling me Jesus would appear in 1989. Between 1989 and the present, we've all endured the Hale-Bopp comet, the Branch Davidians, and a host of other crackpots. Even venerable Jack Van Impe has gotten into the act with the suggestion that the world may end on December 21, 2012 (according to Baptist Bulletin magazine). Maybe he's read one too many Mayan calendars. The latest fool to trot out a date is an until-now unknown named Harold Camping who says the world ends tomorrow. So if you're a little late reading this, you may or may not be in trouble.

The very real problem I have with all these charlatans is that they make the serious message of the Bible trivial and the butt of every joke. You hear them everywhere: "I'm not paying my bills until Sunday." Charles Krauthhammer said "There's an upside to everything. You can eat red meat."

The truth is that the world is going to end some time sooner than later. Christians know it. God certainly know it. The world should know it, but they won't.

Someone has made a joke of it.

Time For a Course Correction

I lose my focus at times, and when I do, God is faithful to remind me and bring me back into line. Frankly, I've been off course for a while and it's time for correction. I've spent way too much time concerned about how the church is growing and what to do about it. I've concentrated too much on how my wife and I are going to afford life when she finally retires. I've spent way too much time thinking about how things are going to work out.

Doesn't everybody? Perhaps none of the items I've just described surprise anyone. Perhaps others will read these words with the thought "That's what I've been doing. What's wrong with planning for the future?"

Nothing is wrong with planning for the future. The question is whose plans we are following.

The thing I've known, forgotten, and needed to be reminded again is that God is in charge of all plans. It's not my place to be concerned with how things work out. It's my place to follow the Lord first and let Him tell me how He is going to work it out.

But God is not going to tell me everything at once. He will tell me enough for today, and I must take care of today. The most important matter before me is not how life will work out. The most important matter is my relationship with God. "The Lord knows you have need of these things."

May God help me to trust Him first, seek Him first, and let Him tell me where I can follow Him. It's not my plans that matter. It's His.

A Hard Expensive Lesson

Our epic adventure with the "new people" is over. After an extensive investigation, we learned the recent "converts" had more to be concerned about than "baggage." They are professional thieves.

People of this kind make a living off the generosity of churches. We had taken them in with the intent of truly helping them and seeing their lives turned around. For their part, they intended to take the church for every penny they could get, and frankly, they succeeded fairly well. The combined total in cash, food and merchandise exceeded $1000.00 within one month.

The scam operates the same all over. A couple arrives in town and either shows up at church or calls. Either way, a plea is made for money for a variety of excuses: The car broke down. We're trying to get home to see our dying mother/father/sister/brother. We are out of gas. We are out of food. We need a motel room. We had a fire. etc., etc.

If the couple is successful, they may convince enough churches to have a different church making contributions each week. Once the couple is found out, they simply move to another town and start over.

In the case of the particular couple in our church, they simply became too greedy too quickly and that raised enough suspicion to begin an investigation. Greed is always their undoing. They never know when enough is enough.

This has been a touch and expensive experience for our church, but we simply have to learn when to say "no." This is a fair warning to all churches. Be very careful about how you help people. Have a plan in place for those times when people come calling for a handout. Trust me, they will. Have a plan and follow it faithfully. Don't jeopardize your church by unwise sympathy and careless procedures. Don't give money to strangers no matter how real they may seem to be. Confine your help to your own people, those who belong to your church those who faithfully attend, and those you know personally. In the long run, you'll be glad you did.

Salvation is Messy, Part Deux

I'm exhausted. I've been dragged from pillar to post while trying to help some new converts in our church. Life would have been lots easier if they had been customized into the Christian subculture already. Nope, these people are as green as they come - no church background whatever.

And baggage? Can you say "fly the friendly skies?"Every day is a new revelation, a continual soap opera of recurring problems from a seedy past. Earlier this month, I wrote "Salvation is messy," and the Lord added His exclamation point.

The intriguing and unknown factor is when "enough" is going to be enough. That is, when are these people going to be capable of standing on their own feet without the pastor (or another church member) coming to rescue them from yet another unforeseen predicament? The answer may only be known in hindsight. Like the experience of rearing our own children, we may not come to an exact point where we can say our job is done - ever.

But as a government official reminded me just a week ago, this experience, and the responsibility that comes with it, is all part of the job. When we ask the Lord for new people in church and souls being saved, He is under no obligation to provide them all shiny and new. New converts are new on the inside but the exterior can remain quite rough.

So what's the preacher to do in cases like this? Do a lot of praying, and then do the best you can. Remember the Lord is keeping watch, and your labor is not in vain.

It only looks that way.

Salvation is Messy

Two people were saved today following our services. I say that with the understanding that only God really knows their hearts and I am making a statement by faith. Their professions seemed genuine enough and quite emphatic. We'll see. After thirty-five years in the ministry, I've been fooled more often than not. There's not a preacher under the sun that doesn't want every profession of faith in Christ to bear real and lasting fruit. I've come to the point that I almost hold my breath to see what will be the outcome of each profession.

But there is another element with these people in particular. They come will baggage. Tons of it. I find myself always having to undo some emergency, some unforeseen problem their past has dumped on us.

Why is it we always seem to find the really messy sinners? Why can't we convert all the nice "clean" sinners? Why do people always seem to come with baggage? The truth is, we all come with baggage. No one is really clean.

Salvation is messy. Sometimes it's more messy than usual because that's the kind of public we are dealing with these days. We who inhabit the pulpit have to be prepared and committed to getting our hands dirty with the kind of people who need salvation most - the profoundly lost.

Sure, it's a messy proposition. But then again, only the profoundly lost are likely to become the profoundly saved. And when you get right down to it, it is the really bad cases who are our greatest trophies of grace, the ones we really wouldn't regret if we could because they represent our greatest victories.

We really don't need "neat" conversions. We need God's people who are willing to get a little messy. Winning the lost is hard work. Changing lives and habits from a sordid past to a life of grace requires hefty amounts of time, patience and money. And the only way to do it is to jump in.

It's time to get our hands a little dirty.

America Turns

I've read tonight about a children's play performed in Missoula, Montana in which the children sang about beheading Sarah Palin, and noting "no one would miss her."
There are turning points in a nation: historical moments when you know life can never go back to being the same. The assassination of Abraham Lincoln was such a moment. So too was Pearl Harbor and the dropping of the atomic bomb. Without question, so was the attack on the World Trade Center. Events of this kind are so large they cannot be ignored. Everyone agrees that life changed on those days.
But other events are not so obvious. It's hard to miss something the size of the atomic bomb, but other events are quite small - and yet their effect is every bit as large.
I suppose hardly anyone will notice a children's play in Montana. I hear Missoula is a lovely place and the mountains are breathtaking. But Missoula is so remote, it could go on forever and most of America would never notice. That's unfortunate because America needs to notice.
The play I read about, thanks to a post from Greta Van Susteren, is something we all should take note of. America has taken another turn and it's not for the better.
In the long and not terribly proud history of American politics, there are lots of examples of politicians saying and doing all sorts of sordid things about their opponents. But I can't recall any time when American children were taught and cheered to sing about beheading a former governor. The real problem is that the people doing the teaching and singing are not politicians who are used to saying and doing just about anything during a campaign and then forgetting all about it the day after. This is the general public.
When the general public begins to teach its children to kill Christians, we have turned a new corner. And let's not fool ourselves. The most irritating thing about Sarah Palin to her enemies is not that she is a Republican, or that she is a conservative. She is a Christian.
That's why this new low in America's relentless march toward the depths of depravity is so significant. The public's attitude toward one prominent Christian is sure to work its way toward the rest of us. "The servant is not greater than his Master." The principle still holds.
Can anyone doubt that we are rapidly coming to the end of life as we know it? Can anyone doubt that the Lord's appearing is right around the bend?

Reflections...

As I sit here on the verge of another year, I cannot help but think of all those we've left behind. At least a couple of times this season, I've had opportunity to remember the notables from American life and culture who passed away in 2010. The thing that really struck was how familiar their faces were to me. They were not players from some another era. They were people I grew up with, people whose names and faces I've known all my life.
And now they are gone.
I've lost a lifetime this past year.
It's times like this that really hit home; times that make a person stop cheering with the clock moves past midnight, and begin to wonder who we will lose in the coming year.
Although none of us wants to admit it - we're too busy celebrating - the thing New Year's really demonstrates is our own mortality. One more new year. One less new year we will live to see.
Yet at the same time, it's also one more year nearer heaven, one more year nearer Christ, one more year nearer His kingdom.
The souls who've gone before us, who surround the rainbow throne of God's immaculate glory, do not have calenders as do we, but they do have events. And the next big one for them, the thing they have to anticipate is the rapture and all that follows. The passing years here mean something altogether different to them than to us. They know life doesn't have to end the way it does here.
Some day there will be no more looking back. It can't come quick enough.