God’s Word Daily

Boston, Our Broken World, and the Kingdom of God

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Whether its Boston, Beijing, or Azerbaijan, global events have seared

themselves into my conscience and make me wonder about

the world we live in.

This week its Boston.

I have grief from a distance; then the wondering sets in.

Someone did this with malice and aforethought.

It was not an accident.

Lord help us.

Still within our broken world love remains a choice.

The impulse toward life resists terror and speculation

about our next race, our next celebration, our next gathering.

We lift up the heroes who rushed in.

And those of us who pray, seek God

for the comfort and healing of those who remain.

Jesus said, “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God

to the other towns as well, for I was sent for this purpose.”  Luke 4:43

We believe the good news of the God’s kingdom

breaks into our conscience and our broken world

with the message of God’s redeeming work —

He will gather the nations before Him.

He will set all things right.

He will wipe away every tear.

He will make all things new.

He will cause the joy of our faith to abound in His love.

He will.

Ticked off, frustrated and trying to get something done…

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Ticked off, frustrated and trying to get something done..

its not my kid’s fault…

but she has needs and

I am the one that must accommodate.

Arriving at the decision to adjust and temporarily

suspend my needs, wants, and preferences required thinking.

Acting badly and full of impatience was just natural.

Serving with a happy heart

required grace and consideration of how good God has been to us.

Obviously that’s God’s will.

I’m thankful for these verses:

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.  Romans 12:2

Here’s the disciple life:

Under the influence of God’s Spirit and His Word,

we are commissioned to sort out (test & approve) what God’s will is.

In this process of making decisions we begin to

discern the will of God for each of us and for our community.

Sorting (testing, thinking and considering) is messier than most of us desire.

In some decisions God’s way seems obvious.

In some decisions God’s way seems obscure.

In all we have this grace: we may discern what

is good, acceptable, and perfect.

Head-On Collision with Truth

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Its constant.

Since the day we were born forces opposed to

the glory of God have been working to mold us

into something contrary to God’s vision of us.

Conform.

But the Gospel ushers us into a head on collision with Truth.

And this collision with Jesus, full of grace and truth,

changes us.

Transform.

His grace forgives us of sin, makes us alive, and morphs us

into someone recognizable to Him.

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.  Romans 12:2

After conversion, you might expect that the world’s pressure diminishes.

Not my experience.  The pressure increases.

Left to my own devices my vision of God’s grace dims.

I need renewal.

Informed by the Word of God and empowered by the Spirit of God

my mind needs to be renewed continually.

Oh Heavenly Father,

take away this veil, this fog, this dullness

and awaken me again to your grace and truth;

let me rejoice in your goodness;

give me the mind of Christ.

Our Worship, The Google Curse & My Wandering Soul

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Our brains are changing.  I don’t memorize phone numbers and a slew of facts anymore.  They are stored on my phone or I can search for them easily.

And my guess is, you are not memorizing Scripture either.

The Google curse.

We don’t have to memorize so we don’t.  Just google it!

I’m not sure we want to merrily accept this pattern of life.

I remember Ms. Lily White standing up in our Sunday worship gathering for several years to share the Scripture with us.  With a voice astonishingly clear for her 80 plus years, she would reach into the depths of her mind and quote Scripture; her favorite was Psalm 1.  Even when her mind lost track of other details, the Scripture remained.  Those were high and holy moments.  Our worship of God was enriched.

In conversation she attributed her long life and her joy in it to God’s grace.  And she always extolled the virtue of memorizing Scripture.

Readers, did you memorize last week’s verses?

1I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.  Romans 12:1-2

My soul is prone to wander.   I know I need the signs that point me back to God’s grace.  David the Psalmist said, “Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against thee.”

Did you see that?  Thy and Thee?  Its because I memorized Psalm 119:11 in the King James Version over thirty years ago!

If our daily life is the major fabric of our worship of God, then we need a lot of signs.

Memorizing Scripture is like loading the hard-drive of your mind.  When you need it, the Holy Spirit can remind you of it and redirect your soul into His grace, wisdom, and love.

PS:  Here’s link to an article to that will help you get started.

Non-Conformist

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Industry standards require conformity.

I learned this morning that Robert Zildjian the founder of Sabian Cymbals died this week.  He was 89 years old.  Zildjian and Sabian cymbals have been used by bands and orchestras for years.  The process used by the family business was a closely guarded secret discovered by Avedis, an Armenian alchemist of the 17th century.  Seeking to turn bronze into gold, Avedis found a way to combine copper, silver and tin into ingots that could be beaten into a thin disc of metal.  We’ve been enjoying their cymbals ever since!  Last year over 900,000 Sabian Cymbals were shipped around the world.

You can be sure each cymbal conformed to a standard!  And that’s a good thing.

Conform.

In God’s view of us He sees that we are under pressure to conform to the world.  And that is not a good thing.

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.  Romans 12:2

Conformed.  Pushed into the world’s pattern, mold, shape.  This is especially problematic when held up to the pattern of Jesus Christ.  We are to conform to Jesus.

By God’s grace, culture and societal standards can benefit us with much that is good and leans toward the values of the Kingdom of God.  However, culture and society do not completely embody God’s vision for us in relationship to Him, each other, ourselves, and the stuff of earth.  When we are animated by the Gospel we will discover that the Word of God creates resistance in us toward the shaping pressure of the world.  Then we become

non-conformists.