Stock Show Time

I have many memories of this time of year - stock show time.  For most of my growing up years, ages nine through eighteen, I was a member of the Hope 4-H Club.  Most of those years I was raising a steer to show in the annual stock show.  Well, there was that one year that I had a failed attempt to raise a hog but we won't go into that.

Not all my memories are pleasant, I still blame one particularly unruly steer for some of the back problems I experience today.  He knocked me to the ground with such a hard blow I really think it did some damage.  I have a suspicion that he felt I was responsible for him going from a bull to a steer.  In the end, I really had no regrets about selling him in the stock show auction to a man who ran a grocery with a fine meat market in it.

Most of the other animals and I got along well.  Through much of the school year, I would spend time every day feeding, walking, grooming or somehow tending to my show steer.  I learned after my first stock show that all my time and all my preparations were leading up to one moment before a judge - months would lead up to a few minutes.  Before him, every thing would be evaluated, graded, rated and judged.  What he said determined how much or how little, I would make in the auction.  One year, I won Grand Champion.  It was the biggest accomplishment of my life to that point.

God has now called me to a position where it is my job to tell people that one day they will stand before a judge.  There may have been some hardships, some knock downs, some injuries and much hard work before that day but we will come to it nonetheless. But unlike a stock show, God will not be looking for one to award as Grand Champion nor will He be determining how much we are worth in an auction, He will be looking for that which is His own. 

Too many people face that day before God like they would face a stock show judge.  They think, 'If I have worked hard enough, suffered enough, gotten my life in good enough condition maybe the judge will look favorably upon me and give me some sort of award.'  The Bible says it will not be like that at all.  It will not be about the condition of my work.  It will be about the condition of my relationship with the judge.  That moment before God is either your greatest anticipation or your greatest anxiety.  Which is it for you?  Let's talk about it Sunday.

For the journey...

Tim

You, then, why do you judge your brother? Or why do you look down on your brother? For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat.  Romans 14:10

Baptist Lent?

I was in high school before I was ever aware of the idea or the practice of Lent.  Going to high school in a town with a large Catholic population, I was really puzzled by those black marks on people's fore heads on the Ash Wednesday of my freshman year, but I did not ask what that meant until I got home and asked my parents.  Some how in my mind what stuck with me about Lent was that it was just about suffering.  'Jesus suffered so we are to suffer and we make ourselves miserable during Lent.'  That is not a correct view but that was my freshman in high school understanding.  It made be glad I was a Baptist, I was miserable enough in high school without taking on any additional home work. 

That view stayed with me until I got to seminary.  There I learned more about Lent but not too much, it was a Baptist seminary.  Now I understand a little more about Lent, about many people's desire and practice of trying to connect with Christ in the 40 days leading up to Easter.  It sounds like it is not about being miserable but understanding Christ and His sacrifice.  I am not ready to be a full fledged Lent practitioner but I can appreciate a desire to connect with Christ.  Why can't this time of year be a time for us non-Catholics to connect with Christ too?

Let me give you a challenge in this special early (Ash Wednesday) post to my weekly blog.  Take some time over the next few days to read Northside's own devotional, "Alive."  I think you will be blessed, as I already have been, in seeing how other members of my church connect with Christ.  You will find something as you do this - you do have to give up something for this "Baptist Lent" - time.  All our days are full.  No day presents itself with a carved out time to connect with Jesus.  We have to give it up.  But when we give him our time, we find more and more of what he has to give for us.

You can read the devotional by going to www.nbcvictoria.org/alive

For the journey....

Tim

Carrying a Load

In my recent travels of going to and from Houston to help my in-laws after their house fire and then a recent trip to Garland to move my oldest daughter, I have been hauling a lot of things in my pickup.  I made a realization, my truck rides better when I am carrying a load.  Pickups were made that way and designed to haul something.

In the last week, listening to Andrew Heard's testimony and seeing how he is bearing up under the load of advanced stage cancer I made another realization.  It was confirmed on another day last week when I had back to back meetings with two different members with two very different hardships in their lives, yet each were taking their trial and turning into a ministry.  My realization is this - Christians are made to carry a load.  God has designed us to "run" better when we are trusting Him to help us in the trials of life.

When we depend on God to turn our hardships into opportunities to minister to others, it is amazing how strong we become.  Of course, it is not our strength but His "power made perfect in [our] weakness" as Paul said in speaking of his "thorn in the flesh" in 2 Corinthians 12:9.

I have a lot to learn from these people about following God through hardships and how to  know His strength in my weakness, but I am glad I have seen what God can do in them.  Where is someone around you bearing up under a load and making it into a ministry opportunity?  I think there probably is someone in your life you can learn from - even if you don't drive a pickup.

For the journey...

Tim

The Super Bowl and the Unchurched

I read the essay from Dr. Jim Denison that I have a link to below and I want to encourage you to read it as well before Sunday and the Super Bowl.  It says a lot about our culture, the church and what people are really looking to find from the church.  Read and be challenged.

http://www.denisonforum.org/cultural-commentary/622-unprecedented-super-bowl-advertising-strategy

For the journey...
Tim

Wood, Hay and Straw

For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ.

  his work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each man’s work.  1 Corinthians 3:11-13

It is interesting what things survived my in-laws house fire.  It is remarkable the things that did not.  A small glass Christmas ornament made it through surprisingly well; an expensive flat screen HDTV did not.    Things honored with places high on walls - pictures and portraits - did not do as well as things relegated to the floor.  The dining room with the door open had considerable damage through out.  The laundry room with the door closed seems totally intact.

Paul wrote the verses above to remind us to build our lives on something sturdy - Jesus -  and not to put much stock in things that will not last.  Fire does reveal the nature of things.  Fire will reveal the value of what we have poured our lives into and if it was worth it.

This Sunday we will hear from a young man who just got some pretty bad news about his cancer.  That kind of test by fire shows what is valuable and what will last.  Maybe it is time that we take a deeper look and re-evaluated what are the things in life that last.

For the journey...

Tim

The Cost of Redemption

Most of you know that my in-laws home burned in Houston.  I say "burned" and not "burned down" purposely.  Though the house is a total loss, most of the structure of the house stands, it stands completely smoke damaged.  Some of the contents can and are being saved.  I say "some" purposely too.

Everything above four feet high in the house is covered with soot and in varying shades of black, most of which is ruined, but some things can be saved.  In that "some" is the overwhelming task.  Everything has to be cleaned to be determined if it can be saved; well everything that is glass or metal.  So dishes must be washed, pots must be cleaned then it can be determined if it can be saved.

The task of cleaning is daunting.  The task of washing seems unending. The task of deciding is wearying.  All of it is overwhelming.  It is a messy, ugly job where the soot gets on you and you breathe it in and it remains in the cracks of your hands. But things are coming along, progress has been made.  Inventories were turned into insurance on Friday of things that were lost.  Decisions still need to be made about the things that were saved.

In my time of helping last weekend, it hit me what a huge task it is of redeeming a fallen world where everything has been covered black with sin.  Were every single thing (mankind and creation) is damaged but some things (us) can be saved.  It is a messy, ugly job.  It cannot be done without it sticking to the one who cleans and redeems. Yet Jesus took it upon himself to clean the whole world of sin.  It takes a lot of love to do that.  It is such a big job it is still being done, even now.

I have a new gratitude for the cleaning Jesus did for us and the love that moved him to move piece by piece, person by person through the universe to redeem what could have been lost.

I am grateful for so many prayers and so much help from the people on this journey with us at Northside.  I am even more grateful for a savior who loved us enough to take on the overwhelming task of redemption and who overcame its overwhelmingness.

For the journey...

Tim

An Assignment

Let me ask you to take some time to view another blog - that of Andrew Heard.  Take the time you would have taken here to go there and read about his struggle with cancer and faith....

http://andrewbheard.com/

Andrew will be speaking at Northside on January 27.  As you read a post or two and pray for him as he gets ready to speak to us.

For the journey...
Tim