Getting Your Taxes Right – Giving to God What Is God’s

I’ve decided to begin this pastor’s note on a cheerful note by reminding you that this coming Monday is April 15. I am sure you have been looking forward to this year’s tax deadline. When it comes to income tax, I am always reminded of my former supervisor at the Don Pedro Recreation Agency whose April 15^th comment was, “I wish I had to pay a million dollars in taxes!” Of course, he was also hoping to have the kind of income that would generate that size of a tax bill.

Now that you are in a good mood let me enhance it with some words of Jesus after he was asked a malicious question about paying taxes to the imperial Roman government, “Show me a Roman coin. Whose picture and title are stamped on it?” “Caesar’s,” they replied. “Well then,” he said, “give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and give to God what belongs to God” Luke 20:24-25 (NLT2).

Since you are now feeling thoroughly upbeat, let me focus you on the most overlooked part of Jesus’ answer to his greedy, money-loving questioners (Luke 16:14), “give to God what belongs to God.” Be honest, is that the part you focused on, contemplated? Or, did you join the choir of the tax gripers?

If you and I are going to live in a relationship with God, be followers of Jesus, and adopt God’s word (the Bible) as our guide, we will have to learn to have a different relationship with money, possessions, wealth, and stuff. Those religious leaders, who were trying to squeeze Jesus into saying something that would make the majority of people unhappy with him, were all about themselves, about hoarding as much as they could, they had God on their lips but wanting to be rich and the love of money in their hearts (Mark 7:6-13). God got the leftovers, certainly not the first and the best.

So, what belongs to God? That’s the right starting question.

• The earth is the LORD’S, and all it contains, The world, and those who dwell in it Psalm 24:1 (NASB). This truth, this fact, has some serious implications. The laptop I am composing this p-note on – God’s. The cars sitting outside my window, with Susie’s and my names on the registration – God’s. The house we hold title to – God’s. The current balance in our bank accounts – God’s. My body, skills, and know-how – God’s. Today, tomorrow, and hopefully the rest of this and many more years – God’s. This reality of God being the owner makes you and me a steward, a manager, accountable to God, which means what pleases Him, and what He wants is vastly more important than our desires and plans. Have you surrendered all that you have to God?

• Whatever you do, do all to the glory of God 1 Corinthians 10:31 (NASB). Let every detail in your lives—words, actions, whatever—be done in the name of the Master, Jesus, thanking God the Father every step of the way Colossians 3:17 (MSG). This requires a differently ordered heart because where your treasure is, there your heart will be also Matthew 6:21 (NASB). This is a heart that is focused on God, exalting God, continually and in everything praising and thanking God, a heart that wants to involve everything in our lives in our relationship and worship of God. This is a heart that lives out a full-time, all-of-the-time, everywhere and anywhere relationship with God. Have you surrendered all of yourself?

• If we have food and covering, with these we shall be content 1 Timothy 6:8 (NASB).  But you, … pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness 1 Timothy 6:11 (NIV). In my experience, most tax conversations reek of discontent, which is why they put the tax question to Jesus, but if you and I are going to focus on rendering the things that are God’s to God there are much more important things to pursue than tax issues, For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it 1 Timothy 6:7 (NIV). Imagine what your life would be like if you’d spend as much energy, time, and effort on pursuing righteousness, godliness, faith, love, … than you are on discussing and paying less taxes? Are you pursuing what will transform you into Christlikeness?

To God be all glory. Happy April 15^th, Pastor Hans

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Jesus Christ, King of kings. – Who Is Your King?

Facts are facts. Our problems with facts develop when we don’t like the facts, when the facts don’t support our point of view, when they challenge our lifestyle, politics, and beliefs.

She said, “Well, he’s not my president!” Obviously, she neither liked the incumbent president nor voted for him. The stubborn fact, however, is that the duly elected and sworn-in president of the United States is the president of all Americans regardless of whether a person likes him or not.

Before I get you all sidetracked by politics, let me turn your attention to Jesus Christ and Palm Sunday and the facts regarding Jesus. Palm Sunday commemorates Jesus riding into Jerusalem at the beginning of the week that ended with His crucifixion and resurrection. Mark records the moment, “Many spread their cloaks on the road, and others spread leafy branches that they had cut from the fields. And those who went before and those who followed were shouting, ‘Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David! Hosanna in the highest!’” Mark 11:8-10 (ESV).

They welcomed Jesus as King and then rejected Him when He didn’t meet their expectations and politics, they saw themselves as the king-makers. But what about the facts? Jesus Christ isn’t King because you and I decide to vote for Him or acknowledge Him as such. He is the eternal King, He has never not been the King of kings and Lord of lords (Revelation 19:11-16). He holds authority over all things: heaven, earth, the entire cosmos, all of humanity, history, every nation, all peoples, life, death, and hell (Matthew 28:18, Colossians 1:15-18, 2 Timothy 4:1).

Before Pilate, the Roman Governor, gave the order to crucify Jesus, he had the following conversation with him: “’Are you the King of the Jews?’
 Jesus answered, ‘Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?’
 Pilate answered, ‘Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?’
 Jesus answered, ‘My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.’
 Then Pilate said to him, ‘So you are a king?’                                                             Jesus answered, ‘You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.’  
 Pilate said to him, ‘What is truth?’” John 18:33-38 (ESV). Doesn’t sound like Pilate bought into Jesus being a King, does it? He certainly didn’t think that Jesus had more power than the emperor Pilate was serving. If Jesus was some sort of king, He was the kind of king you could safely ignore, which is what Pilate eventually did. He ended up yielding to the power of politics and the desire to forge his own success and destiny.

I wonder what Pilate will think when he, along with you and me, sees Jesus on the throne of heaven judging all of mankind, when “at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” Philippians 2:8-11. He met the King of kings and chose to serve a lesser king. He got an invitation to be part of God’s eternal kingdom and rejected it for what will never last.

How do you know who’s your king? You know by looking at who or what rules you, who you bow down to, whose standards and laws you follow and submit to. Maybe you’re like Pilate, who under no illusion that he was the big fish, but he made sure he ruled over as much as he could. Maybe you are like many in the Palm Sunday crowd, you know that you won’t be the king, so you settle for being part of the king-makers to make sure things will go in your direction, fit your opinion, establish your values, affirm your lifestyle.

My chances, like those of most folks, of running into a real king are minimal, but each one of us will stand and bow before Jesus’ throne and acknowledge Him as the King of kings. The only question is whether you and I will stand there because we accepted His invitation to be part of His eternal kingdom, or because we rejected His invitation and authority and had to be summoned.

Who’s your king? Who rules over and in your life? Don’t pull a Pilate and settle those most important questions according to what you declare to be true, instead listen to and submit yourself to the only King whose rule extends beyond the grave and over all of eternity, Jesus Christ. Don’t be foolish or defiant and say, “Well he’s not my king!” I … implore each one of you to walk worthy of God, who calls you into His own kingdom and glory” 1 Thessalonians 2:12.

            With Palm Sunday love and truth, Pastor Hans

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Tough Love – part 2

“If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and, though they discipline him, will not listen to them, then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives, and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear, and fear. Deuteronomy 21:18-21 (ESV)

I am wondering just when did Jewish parents introduce their children to this? Did baby cribs come with Deuteronomy 21:18-21 carved into them? Did they sell school lunch boxes that had this on the inside of the lid? Did kids sing this in synagogue school along with the hand motions? Did parents ever have a conversation like, “And just when are going to sit down with this boy and read him Deuteronomy 21:18-21, because if you won’t, by Moses, I will?!”

  “But Miriam, he’s only three months old.”

  “Are you going to back me up on this, or what? We are not going to make the same mistake your parents made with you.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Don’t try to change the subject with me. I am telling you, if you won’t, I’m calling the Rabbi!”

As extreme as Deuteronomy 21:18-21 sounds to us today, it does remind us that every parent, no matter how much they love their child/ren, has to make tough love decisions. But that isn’t just true of parents, there are times for everyone when love will have to do tough things.

The Apostle Paul, who was fully aware of Christ’s command to “love one another as I have loved you” (John 13:34-35), publicly rebuked the Apostle Peter when he caught him acting like a hypocrite and bigot (Galatians 2:11-14). I wonder if he had Proverbs 27:4-5 in the back of his mind when he did so, “Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy” Proverbs 27:5-6 (ESV).

Jesus, who unquestionably loved Peter, gave him a swift verbal kick in the pants right after Peter publicly and accurately confessed Jesus as the Christ/Messiah, and then thought he could rebuke Jesus for predicting His death, burial, and resurrection. “Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man” Mark 8:33 (ESV), Jesus told him turning around – ouch.

The Old Testament ends with sixteen books written and named after prophets and every one of them illustrates the tough love of God. God’s tough love seeks to correct us, lead us to repentance, forsake sin, give up foolishness, turn us into blessers, establish godly habits, develop righteous character, sow goodness, promote harmony and unity, and cause us to love Him and others more, “For the LORD corrects those he loves, just as a father corrects a child in whom he delights” Proverbs 3:12 (NLT2).

Tough loving is still loving, so it has to know when to ease up. The Corinthian Church had to collectively exercise some tough love on a man who was causing grief and hurt. It seems he responded well to that tough love by repenting, changing his ways, and setting things right. Paul reminded them, “Now, however, it is time to forgive and comfort him. Otherwise he may be overcome by discouragement. So I urge you now to reaffirm your love for him” 2 Corinthians 2:7-8 (NLT2).

May God help you and me to be very good at love, just as He commanded us, and be even better and careful when it comes to exercising tough love.

            To God be all glory. Love you, Pastor Hans

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Unleashing Our Capacity to Love – To More and Better Loving

Each of my children knows that I love him or her the most and that all the others are just ugly ducks, runts, and trolls. After we had our first little guy, I questioned having any more kids because how in the world could I divide my love for him? Silly me, I found out I didn’t have to divide my love at all, it multiplied with each addition.

We have a tremendous God-given capacity to love. According to Jesus, it makes both a present and eternal difference what we do with that capacity, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also… No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” Matthew 6:19-21, 24 (ESV). The only way to be heaven-eternally rich is for our love to be focused on God and the things of God.

We can do different things with our love capacity. We can use it sparingly or not at all. We can misuse or abuse it. We can shrink or grow it. We can be selective or liberal with it. We can misdirect it or use it as God has intended it. But all of us are prone to love the wrong things, thus the Apostle John warned, “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever” 1 John 2:15-17 (ESV).

So, what are some things you and I can learn from these two scriptures that will help us with both keeping the proper focus and growing our capacity to love?

• Focus on eternal values.

Eternal values are all connected to God, the Eternal One. Every person has eternal value by virtue of having been made in God’s image. Every person is of greater value than the sum of all of your and my possessions, actually, the net worth of our entire planet (Matthew 16:26). Love in itself is an eternal value, “Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love” 1 Corinthians 13:13 (NLT2).

• Love and serve the right master.

Without exception, each of us is ruled by something or someone. So, the question is not a matter of if but of who or what. The right and best choice is to be submitted to God who occupies the eternal throne, whose every decision and edict is intrinsically good and wise. And, Jesus specifically warns us about adopting a two-master solution, serving God and money, or any other master, including ourselves.

• Know what is of the Father.

The greatest expression of God the Father’s love is His Son Jesus Christ (John 3:16-17). The Holy Spirit, who indwells everyone who has trusted in and committed themselves to Jesus as their Savior, is from the Father (John 15:26). God’s written word, the Bible, is a gift from God. All three are meant to save us, transform us, and help us to know God and navigate this life.

• Knowing and doing God’s will

“Whoever does the will of God abides forever,” that makes knowing God’s will critically important. When it comes to God’s will we often start backwards, “Should I marry him?” “Should I take this job?” “…?” Before seeking those answers, and we both can and should, we need to ask ourselves if we are already doing what God has clearly revealed about His will, “Am I loving God above all?” “Am I loving my neighbor as myself?” “Are the fruits of the Holy Spirit (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control -Galatians 5:22-23) evident in my actions and interactions?” “…?” It is God’s will for you and me to love Him, to love Jesus, to love our neighbor, to love to serve Him and people, to love Jesus’s church, to love God’s wisdom, to love generosity, to love seeing sinners being saved, to love peace-making, to love righteousness, to love doing good, to love God’s word, to love being led by the Holy Spirit, to love …, to love everything that please and glorifies God.

To God be all glory, and to more and better loving. Pastor Hans

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Loving Your Neighbor as Yourself – Where to Start and How

“Love your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27)

 When it comes to literal neighbors, people living next door, or around the corner, we have had some awesome, some average, and some awful neighbors. I love the awesome kind, but I struggle with awful ones, and yet I am commanded to love them both. Of course, the commandment of loving your neighbor includes more people than those who share my street and ZIP code. Jesus, answering the question, “Who is my neighbor?” asked by someone with a narrow definition of the term, told him to ask a better question, one that will help anyone serious about this most important commandment, “Are you a loving neighbor?”

 Once we settle the “Who is my neighbor?” according to Jesus, questions like “How much?” “What does that look like?” and, “Where do I start?” will pop up. The commandment (which means it isn’t optional in God’s mind) is just one short sentence, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” but covers the what – love, the who – your neighbor, and the how – as yourself. It is a beautiful commandment, imagine if everyone on your street would live by it, what kind of neighborhood would it be? If everyone at your work kept it, what would that be like? If your entire family was guided by it every day, how good would that be?

 Maybe your reaction is, “Sounds nice preacher, but that’s not my reality.” It isn’t mine either, yet the commandment to love my neighbor isn’t qualified by “love them when they love you,” but by “as yourself.” It isn’t a commandment that applies when everything falls into place, when everybody else is doing the right thing. We are called to practice and obey it now, regardless of what anyone else does or doesn’t do.

 The guy asking, “Who is my neighbor?” tried to find justification for twisting the ‘who’ in the commandment, to create wiggle room for his hate, and to legitimize being unloving to some. If we are not careful, we will also twist the second part of the commandment “… as yourself.” It works like this, “I first have to love myself before I can love my neighbor.” Amazing, how quickly we can turn around a commandment that focuses us on how to treat our neighbor, back to ourselves. Nowhere does God command us to love ourselves, we already know how; “as yourself” is the practical starting point of actually loving your neighbor. In Matthew 7:12 Jesus puts it this way, “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (NIV). The Apostle Paul, expounding on the commandment to love our neighbor wrote, “Owe nothing to anyone—except for your obligation to love one another. If you love your neighbor, you will fulfill the requirements of God’s law. For the commandments say, ‘You must not commit adultery. You must not murder. You must not steal. You must not covet.’ These—and other such commandments—are summed up in this one commandment: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no wrong to others, so love fulfills the requirements of God’s law” Romans 13:8-10 (NLT2). Loving your neighbor isn’t some psychological self-help text, it is a commandment that centers us on others. More self-centeredness, more me-focused love, doesn’t make us healthier or better. But, ironically, when we focus less on ourselves and more on others we don’t become less but more.

Jesus looked at his disciples, who knew the commandment “Love your neighbor as yourself,” and expanded the qualifier, “So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples” John 13:34-35 (NLT2). It’s one thing to love my neighbor as myself, it is quite another to love him or her like Jesus. Jesus obviously thought that both are possible. God’s commandments are never setups for failure, they have His full support, with His help we can love our neighbor as ourselves, like Jesus.

I do know when the command to love my neighbor is challenging, hard to flesh out, even overwhelming, we are free and welcome to, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; those who seek find; and to those who knock, the door will be opened. Which of you, if your child asks for bread, will give him or her a stone? Or if your child asks for a fish, will give him or her a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” Matthew 7:7-12.

            To God be all glory. Love you, Pastor Hans

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Passing the Loving Your Neighbor Test

He knew the answer, but he didn’t like the answer. Any chance that ever happened to you? It wasn’t about anything trivial either, eternal life and the most important commandment were the subject matter. In the middle of a conversation between Jesus and his disciples, an expert in the law stood up to test Him, saying, “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
 “What is written in the law?” He asked him. “How do you read it?”
 He answered: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.
 “You’ve answered correctly,” He told him. “Do this and you will live.”
 But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” Luke 10:25-29 (HCSB).

Jesus knew that this Old Testament lawyer knew the answer down to chapter and verse, specifically Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18. He let the lawyer, who was trying to trip Him up, answer his own question. Amazing how quickly Jesus reversed the roles; the hubris of trying to outsmart God will trip us up.

Even though the lawyer’s motives were lousy, and his attitude was adversarial, Jesus acknowledged that his answer was spot on. He should’ve left good enough alone, but somehow, he felt the need to justify himself regarding loving your neighbor. Did he feel an immediate pinch of guilt for failing to keep this commandment? Did the stares of the bystanders, who were all too aware of the rampant hypocrisy of their leaders, birth the need for this self-justification?

He tried to get back on his home turf, to make it a theoretical, categorizing the law kind of discussion. You guessed it, Jesus didn’t let him. Instead, he told him what may be the most widely known story of the Bible, the story of the Good Samaritan, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him, beat him up, and fled, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down that road. When he saw him, he passed by on the other side. In the same way, a Levite, when he arrived at the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan on his journey came up to him, and when he saw the man, he had compassion. He went over to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on olive oil and wine. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, ‘Take care of him. When I come back I’ll reimburse you for whatever extra you spend.’  “Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?”
 “The one who showed mercy to him,” he said. Then Jesus told him, “Go and do the same” Luke 10:30-37 (HCSB).

Loving, whether it is God or your neighbor, is never just theoretical. Knowing the command to love and keeping it are two different things. By wanting to know who he could pass by, who he was free not love, he placed himself in the camp of the priest and Levite, which, ironically, was the group he belonged to in real life. Highlighting the goodness, neighborliness, and law-keeping of the Samaritan, Jesus expanded the loving your neighbor scripture found in Leviticus which focuses on loving your fellow countrymen, “your people,” to including “those people,” all people.

According to Jesus, if this lawyer wanted to really keep the commandment of loving your neighbor he shouldn’t have asked who he could bypass and instead answered the very personal question of, “Am I being a loving neighbor?” Not just to “my people,” but to anyone God puts in my path. If we ask the lawyer’s question, we will have no problem keeping our distance even while we quote chapter and verse of the command to love our neighbor. But, if we learn to continually ask ourselves what Jesus wants us to ask, “Am I being a loving neighbor?” then we might actually put our heart, hands, feet, and resources into what is most important to God, to our neighbor, and in life.

To God be all glory. Love you, Pastor Hans

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Absolutely Essential – Checking Your Love Motor

Some things are essential, crucial, and some are not. Your car will still drive with a broken window or windshield wipers that have a mind of their own. It will still get you from point A to point B without a heater or a working air conditioner, but if your motor seizes you are not going anywhere. The same is true of our bodies, we can manage without some parts, but if you’re your heart stops – sayonara.

When it comes to living life to its fullest, the way God designed us and wants us to live, the most essential, crucial, and indispensable part is love. It is so essential that God commands it, and Jesus affirms its foremost importance, “One of the teachers of religious law was standing there listening to the debate. He realized that Jesus had answered well, so he asked, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”
 Jesus replied, “The most important commandment is this: ‘Listen, O Israel! The LORD our God is the one and only LORD.  And you must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.’ The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these” Mark 12:28-31 (NLT2).

The Apostle Paul trying to correct numerous problems among the Christians in Corinth (Non-Christian thinking, personality cults, suing each other, doctrinal heresies, etc.) pinpoints the lack of, or complete absence of genuine Christlike love as their number one problem, and tells them that Christians without love are bankrupt and destitute, no matter how spiritual they claim to be. “If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing” 1 Corinthians 13:1-3 (NLT2). – Ouch!

God’s word, the Bible, identifies sin as the core problem plaguing mankind (Romans 3:23), and sin invariably corrupts love, perverts love, twists love, kills love, and diminishes our capacity to love. Sin turns love into something manipulative, self-centered, selective, optional, and commercial. Sin misdirects our God-given ability to love from its two most important objects, God and others, to things that are of incomparable lesser and temporal value. Misplaced and lack of love devalues both God and people, it inflames our desires/lusts, and it inflates our pride, “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever” 1 John 2:15-17 (ESV).

How much wrong went down in the world in the time you’ve been reading this pastors-note? Too much! May God help you and me to continually remember that, “Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of God’s law” Romans 13:10 (ESV, italics mine).

No one knows more about love than God, than Jesus Christ, “God is love” 1 John 4:8. So, if I want to learn how to love that is the very best starting point. In the school of God’s love, two things are essential: 1. Embracing Jesus Christ, “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins… Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God” 1 John 4:10, 15 (ESV); 2. Living by God’s commandments, “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome” 1 John 5:2-3 (ESV).

Whenever I point out the absolute essential of loving like Jesus, that loving God and loving people are the two highest values in God’s kingdom, the “Yes but …” raise their hands, even in my own mind. Too often that is the sinner in me afraid of going radical, trying to tone it down. Too often it is the stranglehold of my opinions and politics unwilling to surrender. Too often I retreat into reducing this love thing to a mental exercise. But, I am always glad when I let God’s love captivate me, move my legs, extend my hands, disperse my belongings, and stretch my wired-for-love soul.

            To God be all Glory. Love you, Pastor Hans

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No Chance Encounters When It Comes to Jesus – To Being Saved

How many chance encounters do you remember? And in how many of those encounters did you have a clear sense that God was orchestrating the whole thing? George comes to my mind. We had finished another two weeks of intense ministry with our Tanzanian brothers and sisters, and on the redeye flight from Arusha to Amsterdam I sank into my window seat dead tired. All I wanted to do was sleep, and, glory to God, I had an empty seat next to me – stretch out and sleep, “Thank you, Lord!” Forty-five minutes later the plane made its customary stop in Dar es Salaam, and that’s when George Mpeli Kilindu woke me up and kindly asked me to get my stuff out of his seat. I was tempted to give him the stare, for which I am told I have a reputation, but he was just too nice.

We got to talking, and before long, and after he found out that I was a preacher, our conversation turned to marriage and spiritual things. For some reason, I mentioned the song, “It’s Sad to Belong to Someone Else, When the Right One Comes Along.” His eyes opened wide, and he said, “That’s my parent’s favorite song, but no one knows this song. What are the chances!” He was right, God orchestrated this, it wasn’t a chance thing. And in the years since we have kept in contact, I invade his life every now and then, pray with him, and get to count him among my friends.

Paul and Silas were spending a rotten night in jail at Philippi. They certainly hadn’t volunteered to be there, nor had they asked to get a flogging. I might have contemplated which lawyer I would call once released, or how to post this injustice on social media. Paul and Silas, however, decided to have a prayer and praise worship service and seemingly let everyone who could hear them know about Jesus and their need to be saved. We know this because a little while later all hell broke loose when an earthquake struck. The jailor thought all of his prisoners had escaped had was ready to kill himself (Roman jailors were responsible for their prisoners with their lives). Paul stopped him and let him know that none of his charges had run off. The jailor’s response was not what you’d expect. He ran up to Paul and Silas, fell down before them, and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” (Acts 16:30, NASB). Clearly, he had put two and two together and realized that nothing that happened that night was by chance, that God was at work and was giving him an opportunity to be saved. Paul and Silas told him, “Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, along with everyone in your household” (Acts 16:31 NLT2).

I venture to say that at the beginning of that day, this jailor gave no thought to “being saved” or anticipated that this might be the most spiritually and eternally significant day of his life. He probably didn’t have the slightest idea what “being saved” meant or that he needed saving. Most likely he thought whatever he believed was good enough, sufficient. And yet, it wasn’t. He, like you and me, needed Jesus to save him because there is no other way to be right with God, be forgiven of our sins, and be granted eternal life, “There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12, NLT2). “Anyone who believes in God’s Son, Jesus Christ, has eternal life. Anyone who doesn’t obey the Son will never experience eternal life but remains under God’s angry judgment.” (John 3:36, NLT2, italics mine).

No one hears the Gospel, the truth of Jesus, by chance. No one is given an opportunity to be saved by chance. It might appear so on the surface, but behind the scenes the Spirit of God is orchestrating it all. So, if you have been hearing about Jesus and your need to be saved don’t dismiss it, God is calling you. If you somehow end up sitting next to a devoted Christian or, heaven forbid, a preacher, connect the dots like the Philippian jailor. Or, if you have read this pastor’s note, written by some obscure preacher in Don Pedro California, to the very end, don’t dismiss it, God is at work.

Are you saved?

Here is how the rest of the jailor’s story, “Paul and Silas went on to spell out in detail the story of the Master, Jesus—the entire family got in on this part. They never did get to bed that night. The jailer made them feel at home, dressed their wounds, and then—he couldn’t wait till morning!—was baptized, he and everyone in his family. There in his home, he had food set out for a festive meal. It was a night to remember: He and his entire family had put their trust in God; everyone in the house was in on the celebration” (Acts 16:32-34, MSG, italics mine).

Be saved.

            To God be all glory. Love you, Pastor Hans

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Saved, Baptized, and Added to the Church – Loving Jesus’ Church

I am continually amazed, puzzled, and disappointed by how many people I run into who claim to be followers of Jesus, Christians, but have no regard, use, or love for the church, and think that belonging to and being faithfully involved in the church is entirely optional or unnecessary.

I partially understand. Church can be messy, ugly, and even hurtful. I can show you the scars I acquired my almost forty years of pastoring, or spend a full afternoon with stories of dumb, hurtful, and wicked things people have said and done at the Lake Don Pedro Baptist Church, including myself.

All of the New Testament letters concern themselves with the church and church people, Christians, being good, growing, holy, righteous, wholesome, loving, and Christlike. They don’t gloss over and condone any ugly, sinful, and dysfunctional behavior, but instead expose and confront it, call for repentance, and always redirect us towards holiness and Christlikeness. But they also never give up on the church, never give a single okay for dismissing the church or making being part of the church optional. Paul in stressing how being a Christian should affect the behavior of wives and husbands, says the following about Christ and His church, “… Christ loved the church. He gave up his life for her to make her holy and clean, washed by the cleansing of God’s word. He did this to present her to himself as a glorious church without a spot or wrinkle or any other blemish. Instead, she will be holy and without fault” Ephesians 5:25-27 (NLT2). I haven’t figured out how anyone read this and dismiss church; loving Jesus includes loving what Jesus loves.

After Jesus’ ascension, what was left of His followers, about 120 or so, stayed in Jerusalem and waited for the Holy Spirit promised by Jesus. They were in essence the first church in Jerusalem. On the Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descended on those believers and filled and empowered them. This caused them to run out into the busy streets of Jerusalem and share the Gospel of Jesus. Soon a big crowd gathered and Peter preached to them and had a Q&A, which led to the following, “With many other words Peter warned them; and he pleaded with them, ‘Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.’ Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer” Acts 2:40-42 (NIV, italics mine). Did you notice what happened?

• 3,000 people got saved. They heard and understood the Gospel, repented, and called on the name of Jesus to save them – a serious “Hallelujah!” moment.
• Those 3,000 who got saved were baptized. They publicly identified themselves with and confessed their belief in the crucified, buried, and risen Christ, and in doing so renounced their old beliefs and ways of life.
• Then those 3,000 were added to the community of believers, the body of Christ, the church. They began to participate in and became devoted to the life and practices of the church. They were not just known for going to church but for being the church day in and day out, “Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved” Acts 2:43-47 (NIV).

Everyone needs to be saved. Everyone who is saved needs to be baptized. Everyone who is saved and baptized needs to belong and be committed to a local, where-you-live church that exalts Jesus, preaches the Gospel, teaches the Bible, and excels in encouraging and loving one another.

Take the next step.

To God be all glory. Love you, Pastor Hans

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You Must Be Saved – By Jesus

 “And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name (Jesus) under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.” Acts 4:12 (NASB, parenthesis mine)

That’s not what they wanted to hear, the Jewish ruling council who had Peter and John arrested the previous day. In their minds, the best thing that could happen was for the whole Jesus thing to away. If anyone needed saving it surely wasn’t them, they had their act together, contributed to society, stood for public morality, believed in God, prayed, and taught their children about God. No, if anyone needed saving it was these two uneducated and deluded followers of Jesus and their kind. If anyone needed saving it was the toothless tweaking drug addict down by the liquor store, or those damn Samaritans and heathens up north, those foreigners who shouldn’t be here in the first place, and those corrupt, Rome-sympathizing tax collectors. “The audacity! How dare they suggest that we are wrong, corrupt, and in need of saving.”

In the end, they tried to intimidate Peter and John and released them but not without threatening them and officially banning them from preaching Jesus’ name and the message that goes with it. Obviously, it didn’t work because, thankfully, Jesus’ name and the truth that we can only be saved by believing in His name is still being proclaimed two thousand years later. Not for lack of trying, however, in short order, they arrested them again and this time had them beaten before releasing them, and not long after executed Stephen for nothing more than preaching Jesus. They were far more corrupt, sinful, and lost than they would ever admit. Oh, how they needed saving.

They totally missed it, the good news that through Jesus they could be saved from God’s deserved judgment, death, and eternal damnation as well as the opportunity God gave them to repent, believe in, and call on Jesus’ name when Peter told them both the truth and pointed out their need.

Their rejection of Jesus and self-righteousness hardened both their minds and hearts, salvation was so near and yet so far away. It wasn’t that they didn’t think people needed saving, it just wasn’t them who needed saving. “There is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name (Jesus) under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved,” is just so narrow, so all-inclusive. No first-class cabins in the salvation ark of Jesus, the upright productive citizen is seated next to the tattooed gangbanger convict, the philanthropist has to share a cabin with the toothless drug addict in front of the liquor store we met earlier, the Never-Trumper next to MAGA-hat wearer, the illegal alien welcomed the same as the natural-born citizen, even our enemies get a sunny deck chair next to us instead of the brig.

The most humbling place in all the world is at the foot of the cross of Jesus, and realize that the sinless Son of God died there because of and for you, that without Him you have no hope of forgiveness and will forever remain in the clutches of sin and death, that the sum-total of all of your very best and noble efforts cannot save you, that you are unable to save yourself, that you need saving, “You must be saved” by Jesus!

So, are you saved? Are you going to respond to this opportunity God is granting you through a simple pastor’s note, or are you going to pass it up? If you have never been saved, read the following, then kneel and pray out loud your belief in the crucified and resurrected Jesus, acknowledge your sinfulness, and call on His name to save you.

“If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved…
 For ‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’” Romans 10:9-10, 13 (ESV).  

            To God be all glory. Love you, Pastor Hans

P.S. If you knelt and asked Jesus to save you, take these next steps. Tell everyone, including me (dergermanshepherd@gmail.com). Find a Jesus-preaching, Bible-teaching church. Get Baptized. Start serving Jesus every day.

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