City of Refuge Fellowship

My son Noah was part of a saxophone quartet in his school’s Christmas concert two weeks ago. Noah has been playing the saxophone for a little over a year but has taken to it quite quickly. I am very proud of him, he works pretty hard at it but most of all he really enjoys it. With that said, I have to admit that I was a bit concerned during the week that led up to the concert. I was listening to him practice and while I could definitely hear improvement from when he first started with that particular music a few weeks earlier I just was not sure if he was ready. I asked him several times how confident he was and each time he assured me that he was going to do just fine. The day of his last practice before the concert I grilled him, “How was rehearsal? Did your instructor seem happy about your performance? Did he seem to think that you guys are ready?” With each question came the same answer, “Yes Dad, we are ready.”

As we sat in the concert waiting for Noah’s quartet to come on I was a little nervous. Again, I had heard him practice his part for a month, but I just was not sure how they would do together, on stage, in front of a big crowd. The quartet came on the stage and Noah began the first song, it was beautiful. They did a wonderful job, played with such confidence, such cohesion, I was so impressed and incredibly proud. The second song started and was even better than the first, you could see and hear each one of them grow in confidence with each note. I realize that I am completely biased but the saxophone quartet stole the show.

As Noah glowed from being proud of himself and received great compliments from his friends I realized that I was not just impressed with how good the quartet had played, I was surprised. You see, I had judged what I believed the performance would sound like while it was still in it’s planning stages. I had decided that the end product would sound the same as the first attempt, I had not given room for growth and change, and I had given even less thought to how well each person would work together in unity and how each part would come together and form something good.

I share all of this today because I believe that many of us walk through life judging the things, people and situations around us just like I had judged Noah’s saxophone quartet. Many times we see something that is less than we want or think it should be and we choose to believe that this is the end, this is the way it will always be. The Apostle Paul wrote these words to the Philippians, “He who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.” Have you stopped to realize that you and all those around you are not complete yet? Thank God that we are not as we used to be, but even more, thank God that we are not yet as we will be. When impatience strikes, remember that the person that just fell short is not as they will be yet, they are still being formed, still being changed, still being made into what will one day, in eternity, be the finished work of God’s grace and love. When you fall down and fall short, don’t give in to the temptation to believe that you will never overcome, but rather remind yourself that God is still working and Paul’s promise is that your outcome is not dependent upon you and your ability, but rather God and His ability. The promise is for the Philippians to believe for themselves but it is also for them to believe about each other. As far as we have come we have much farther to go, don’t let that weary you, let it be the motivation that drives you to continue being led.

Every promise, every path, every person comes to a place in which the outcome is questioned. Israel stood at the Red Sea and wondered if there would ever be a Promised Land. Abraham looked at his elderly wife and wondered if he would ever have a son. David looked at his bandit army and wondered if he would ever be king and even the disciples heard the news of a dying Jesus and wondered if Israel would ever be saved. In your life right now you may be at the point of questioning if God’s promises will ever come to pass, you may have walked by faith, trusted with great hope and even told many others that God was going to do a good work; but right now, at this moment it just does not look like it will ever come to pass. I want to encourage you to not believe that the finished product will look like the current condition you see. Just as I could not possibly know how a quartet would sound by listening to the practices of one part you can not know the fullness of God’s plan by looking at the temporary condition of one day. In his autobiography, tennis star Andre Agassi wrote about his own experiences that people often treat each other as “finished products when in fact they’re in process.” Right now, everything is in process. You are and I am. Your life and my life and the lives of all those around us. I believe that a great place for us to ask for greater faith is to begin believing that God is as in control of the process as He is of the outcome. Do not believe that because you can not see how it is going to come to pass that it won’t and do not allow yourself to judge others as complete when they are in fact still in process. The God who started the work, who spoke the promise, who gave salvation is much more than able, He is responsible to finish, to fulfill and to accomplish all that He has started. The best news of all is that we are not asked to trust the process, we are told that we can trust the One that starts and finishes, that never falls short and only does what is good.

We have set aside every Tuesday as a day of prayer for our National leaders: President Obama, the Senate and the Congress. Each week we present a specific focus, birthed from Scripture, that we can agree and pray together. This week we pray that:

all of the decisions made by our National Leaders will be in agreement with the Word of God. We pray that they will seek to please God and obey His commandments that God will be their only counsel and that He alone will lead our country in paths of righteousness.

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules the people groan. Proverbs 29:2

Therefore, I will exhort that first of all supplication, prayers, intercessions, and giving thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may live quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior.  I Timothy 2:1-3

Due to the snow storm our Sunday December 20th 10:00 AM service has been cancelled.  Please see the website tomorrow for updates for the week’s schedule.

We have set aside every Tuesday as a day of prayer for our National leaders: President Obama, the Senate and the Congress. Each week we present a specific focus, birthed from Scripture, that we can agree and pray together. This week we pray that:

Our National Leaders will be renewed in the spirit of their minds, and they will put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness. Ephesians 4:23-25

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules the people groan. Proverbs 29:2

Therefore, I will exhort that first of all supplication, prayers, intercessions, and giving thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may live quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior.  I Timothy 2:1-3

In Matthew 16 we have a record of Peter’s great confession, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” Shortly after this confession of faith and revelation we find Peter being rebuked by Jesus. After Peter made his confession and Jesus’ identity as the Messiah was revealed, Jesus began teaching the disciples about the fullness of His calling, His suffering, death and resurrection. Peter pulled Jesus aside and rebuked Him, saying that He would not suffer these things. It was at this time that Jesus famously and sternly rebuked Peter, “Get behind me Satan!” Jesus went on to reveal what the true issue was, “you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.” Peter quickly went from blessing to rebuke, from the great confession to one of the most difficult rebukes found in Scripture. How and why did this all happen? I believe that what happened with Peter is something that happens with most if not all of us. We receive revelation from God, we have an experience that is life altering and invigorating but there is still something left that must be done, our minds need to be changed.

Romans 12 tells us to be “transformed by the renewing of our minds.” This is a work that is done by the Holy Spirit but it is done through our yielding, through our trusting and through our realizing the need to be changed. I believe that the greatest adjustment that we all have to made is to have our minds renewed. To “no longer be conformed to this world” means to think differently. Before we can ever act differently from the world we must think differently, believe differently, trust differently and surrender differently. Peter’s issue was not that he did not hear from God, we already know that he did, it was that his mind had not been changed. He still saw things from the same old point of view, he still judged and dreamed according to his understanding rather than according to God’s will. I pray today that we will all give God control of our minds, that we will choose to be transformed and that when we find ourselves put in familiar positions that we will have new reactions, new beliefs, new hope and new trust. The greatest adjustment of our lives will be when we give God our minds, when we ask for His mind in return and when we begin to believe what He says much more than what we understand.

The last few weeks I have been constantly taken back to the thought of being chosen. We go through many experiences in our lives in which the choice of someone else seems to determine our next steps. As children we wait to be chosen for teams, for awards, for opportunities and for friendships. As we grow older we wait to be chosen for dates, for jobs, for friendships, for enrollment and for responsibilities. As adults we wait to be chosen for marriage, for careers, for service and for even more responsibilities. We have all experienced the joy of being chosen as well as the sting of being passed over. I can vividly remember the joy of being selected for a little league all star team, it meant that I was wanted, that I was valued and just as much it meant that I was better than a certain number of others. It was not just that I was chosen, it was that I was chosen over so many others. Probably even more vivid is the memory of not being chosen as a starter on that same team. As I sat on the bench I was no longer overjoyed to have been chosen for the team, I was stung by the perceived rejection of not being good enough to be a main cog on the team. I was overjoyed for several weeks at the thought of being chosen over, now I was crushed by the reality of being passed over. Thank God that He does not choose like we do. He does not choose one at the expense of another, it does not come down to me or you, He chose to make a way in which we could all be chosen.

In Ephesians 1 Paul writes, “He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world”. When God chose to create us He also chose to provide for us, to make a way in which we could not only be established but so that we could be redeemed. In His omniscience God knew we would sin and in His omnipotence He made a way for us to be redeemed. We often use the phrase that someone was “chosen for greatness”. God knows the plans that He has for us and just as He told Jeremiah I believe that He has known each of us long before we were ever formed in our mother’s wombs, but I believe there is a better perspective for us to live in. Rather than considering if we have been “chosen for greatness”, what if we lived in the belief that greatness is in being chosen? Rather than spending our lives trying to see if there is a great thing we can do for God or that He created us to accomplish, what if we did nothing more than live our lives with the overflowing joy of being chosen by God? I wonder how many more great things would be accomplished if we were daily overwhelmed at being known, being loved, being chosen by God.

David Livingstone, the famous missionary to Africa in the 1800’s once said, “Forbid that we should ever consider the holding of a commission from the King of Kings a sacrifice, so long as other men esteem the service of an earthly government as an honor.” I believe his point was that being chosen by God could never be a sacrifice, it is forever an honor. Being loved by God could never be a limitation, it is a freedom. Being saved by grace is not merely the beginning, it is an all-encompassing gift that will eternally increase in measure, in reality and in revelation. I am not trying to get God’s attention or win His affection, I have had His attention before time began and I believe it was His affection for each one of us that caused Him to create us in the first place. “God is love”, everything He has ever done has not just been loving, it has been the definition, the reality the embodiment of love. You and I were chosen not because we were the best available or even because we had the ability to accomplish a great task, we were chosen because God loved us, not just loved us, but that He loved to choose us.

I believe that the concept of being chosen is a difficult one for most of us. Again, our experience is with each other. In humanity with being chosen also comes the possibility and reality of rejection. With God there is no rejection. God does not reject man, He has made a way in which, “whosoever believes in Him shall be saved.” Last night as I was sitting in a quiet time of worship with our prayer group I had this thought: God did not come into the orphanage of sinners and choose one, two or even many. He entered the orphanage and made a way in which we could all be adopted. In TV and movies we have seen the dramatization of this process. A couple comes to an orphanage to adopt a child. The children clean themselves up, they are on best behavior, they show their talents and best traits, the reasons that they should be chosen over the others. This is not how God has adopted us, “He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world”, all of us. Yes, some will reject Him, many will not believe, will reject His offer of love and refuse His adoption, but remember this He has not rejected us.

Over the last couple of weeks I have been trying to make a fundamental change in my thinking. I am attempting to live in the greatness of being chosen. Each day I want to overflow with the joy of knowing that God made a way for me, that He picked me not for a great accomplishment or task, He chose me with His great love. I am not chosen as someone else is rejected, we all stand equally loved, equally cherished and equally chosen. Others may seem to have more responsibility, more visibility, more tangible authority but no one has more love than I do. No one has been chosen over me and I have not been chosen over any others. We all stand shoulder to shoulder, orphans to sin and adopted by God. I believe that when we shed the burden of being chosen for a task we will embrace the liberty of being chosen as children, dearly loved children, set apart as the sons and the daughters of God. We were all chosen first, there was no second choice and even better no last choice, as many as will come will be chosen, and to me, that is greatness, not what we accomplish but bearing the name, the love and the Spirit of Him who is great and greatly to be praised.

We have set aside every Tuesday as a day of prayer for our National leaders: President Obama, the Senate and the Congress. Each week we present a specific focus, birthed from Scripture, that we can agree and pray together. This week we pray that:

Our National Leaders will seek after what is righteous and just. They will lead our Nation by seeking after God’s counsel and wisdom. They will not please man, but seek to please God and to bring Him glory.

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules the people groan. Proverbs 29:2

Therefore, I will exhort that first of all supplication, prayers, intercessions, and giving thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may live quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior.  I Timothy 2:1-3

Henry Blackaby writes, “A crisis of belief is not a calamity in your life but a turning point where you must make a decision. You must decide what you truly believe about God.” We all face opportunities to increase in faith. The problem is that often those moments don’t feel like opportunities at all. They are times when we must grow, when we must believe, when we must step out and trust that God will go before us, that He will step with us and that He will carry us every moment of the journey. These moments can be scary at first simply because they are new. They often take us completely out of our comfort zone and even test our belief system.

In II Kings 5, Naaman was given the opportunity to be healed of his leprosy. The problem was that the way that Elisha told him to be healed was not at all what he had prepared himself for or expected. When Naaman arrived at Elisha’s house the prophet did not even come out to see him, he sent a servant with simple instructions, “Go wash yourself seven times in the Jordan River and you will be healed.” Naaman was angry, more than that he was irate. He had prepared himself for Elisha to come and meet him, for the great prophet to wave his hands and pray a prayer of faith that wold produce healing. He was willing to believe for his healing in that way, but to go and wash in the Jordan River, that he was not prepared for.

How do we respond when God’s plans are different than ours? When God’s methods or commands don’t match our preparation? This is when the crisis of belief comes into play, will we obey, will we trust, even when we feel insecure, inferior or unsure of the method? Our true faith is told by our obedience, if I can obey God, even when I’m unsure, even when I’m scared, even when I am  sure that I am not capable, then I know that my faith is not merely found in my words but it is secure in my heart. I pray today that we would all face these crisis’ of belief head on, that we would challenge ourselves to believe and that we would trust God to be as faithful as He has promised to be. He is good and His ways are perfect, trust Him to lead you in paths of righteousness, for His name’s sake.