Thursday, July 26, 2012

A Severe Ministry Opportunity

The strength of a Christian may be best determined by what kind of circumstance they see as an opportunity for ministry.  It would be hard to see surviving the Colorado theater shooting as an opportunity for ministry, instead of seeing it as a need to be ministered too.  One brave woman has seen the opportunity and God has brought her blog about it before thousands.  If you have not seen it, you need to.  Please click this link and read her words and let her minister to you.


for the journey...

Tim

Friday, July 20, 2012

A New Journey

This morning I began a journey with millions of Muslims.  Though I will be walking through Ramadan with them, I will not be walking the same way.   I began a 30 day prayer journey for Muslims during their holy month of Ramadan.

When I think of Muslims, I think of them differently than I did just a year ago; God now brings specific people to mind - my Muslim neighbor who no longer practices Islam but still counts himself as a Muslim.  I think of a young man who grew up in our church and converted to Islam.  And I think of Ata.

Ata was the bus driver we had when we toured Israel.  I trusted Ata with my life and I would do it again.  I watched him drive that big tour bus down narrow streets, through incredible traffic and down one if the steepest, most winding and no doubt dangerous roads in Galilee (you could see the wrecked vehicles that did not make it down below on this breath taking road).  He did it all incredibly.

Ata is not just any Muslim, he once was the one of the men who voiced the "calls to prayer" from the towers of mosques in Jerusalem.  I was told, his rich deep voice is still heard in recordings as he read the Koran - for those recordings he is somewhat of a celebrity.  Ata drove me and our group to the most important sites for Christians in Israel.  He heard our stories, he understood the guide's explanation, he heard the Bible read as we moved from one place to another.  I pray that it all sinks in somehow and he can see Jesus not just as a prophet recognized by Islam but as the savior of all mankind and specifically his savior.  I know that Ata will be praying and fasting during Ramadan and I will be praying for him - that all this exposure to Christians and to the Bible would not harden him to the gospel but soften him to it.

I will remember his impeccably pressed dress shirts that he wore each day, I' ll remember how he made sure there was always bottled water for us and I will remember that he called me (and all the other men) "Brother."  He seemed to have a genuine concern for us beyond his job.  So it is easy now for me to pray for Muslims because I will think of Ata, who is a true servant, and I will pray that he becomes a servant of Christ.

This Sunday, I will ask you to join me in praying through Ramadan.  Maybe you don't have someone specific to pray for, the prayer guide we have available will help with that.  Or maybe you can join me in praying for Ata.

for the journey...

Tim

Friday, July 13, 2012

Being Carried

While I was mowing my front yard last week, I watched my neighbor across the street pull into her driveway, park and then with some effort carry her young son from his car seat and into the house.  You could tell they were both tired and this was a task for both of them.  That is how it is with small children.  Tasks like that will be repeated multiple times.  This little one will be carried for many more miles and several more years.

The thought occurred to me as I kept mowing, "Do I remember being carried?"  I have many memories of childhood, some from very young.  I can remember several early memories of sitting in my mother's lap and of riding my father's knee but I have no memory of ever being carried.  That's funny, because I know without a doubt that I was.  Those moments of being carried were probably like my neighbor's moment, a routine task in a routine day, quickly forgotten but none the less real.

God's presence can be a lot like that.  There are times that without a doubt He was there and carried us though we may not have realized what was happening in the moment and we will not remember after that moment is gone.  But we know that He did, that He does.  We can know that He will.

Jesus said that He would be with us "always, even to the very end of the age."  The fact that we are where we are today is evidence of the fact that He at some point carried us.  It is also assurance that when we need to be carried, He will do it again.

We will look Sunday at the power of His presence to carry out His mission.  I hope you will allow Him to carry you there.

For the journey...

Tim

Friday, July 6, 2012

Feedback

I rarely get responses to my blog.  Sometimes I wonder if people feel like it is a sermon and they are just supposed to pray at the end and go home.   But when I do get a response, especially a very important one, I feel like sharing it with everyone.  Here's one I got from last week's blog about when to honk when someone is not moving at a green light.  Bob Tate emailed me this after that blog.

My Dad was in the hospital just days before we found he had a stage 4 brain tumor. I had been up visiting him and really didn't realize how bad the news would soon be. As I left the hospital parking lot I was following another car who had also been in the hospital lot. When we reached the first signal light it was red....when it turned green the person driving the car in front of me didn't move.....I gave them the Christian 15 seconds before I honked. The driver seemed to come out of their cloud and moved forward.
Weeks and months had passed and Dad had passed away holding my hand in the same hospital. It was just him and me until I left and went to my car to go home and be with my family.  I don't remember much about the short drive home.....but at the first traffic light someone honked at me just like I had done nine months before......the light was green but I didn't react......I was still thinking about my Dad and my Mom and how we were going to handle things now that Dad was gone.  I don't honk much anymore, because when I do that memory flashes back and I am reminded how impatient we are.  We really don't know what is on a person's mind at a red light do we?

Bob said it well.  We never know what that unmoving person at the green light is thinking or experiencing.  It is always better to err on the side of patience.  It is no wonder to me that the first thing that 1 Corinthians 13 says that love is, is patient.

For the journey...

Tim