The Good King

Just ONE good King,
is all we ask.

To rule o’er us,
carry the banner,
and take the heat.
Protect us in trial,
not knowing defeat.
Give us today our daily bread.

But,
look now alas,
WE have us OUR king,
Look in the mirror,
beholding your king!
Who does not serve,
and of trifling power.
Injustice and weakness,
How quickly his feet,
run to do evil.

Crack the mirror!
Break the glass!
Kill the king!
Seek His justice!
Cry for mercy!

Is Christ now your KING?

Sickening

I realized recently that I can be very motivated by pain, but absent the pain, my discipline can often go by the wayside.

Recently I suffered through a head and chest cold, not as severe as some people I know were going through, but sick nonetheless. The day my symptoms started I was driving back from a glorious visit to the promised land of Sherman Oaks and Orange County. In Sherman Oaks live my wife's son and his beautiful two-year-old daughter "Faith" who we stayed with while we were there, and in "The OC" another daughter and the church we were from before we came to Sacramento.

Cute little Faith was recovering from a cold, but apparently not recovered enough not to pass it on to me. Germs are funny creatures silently working at our wellbeing, and stealthily entering in to invade our peace, comfort and safety. As I was driving back to Sacramento from a beautiful trip, the symptoms began to manifest. You know the feeling, the little scratch in the back of your throat and that tightening feeling behind your eyes, and perhaps just a little irritability. Well, being the wimp that I am for colds, I made a stop at Rite-Aid for the Zicam, a supposed cold preventer. It's amazing what we will pay for a chance to be rid of discomfort.

I bought the generic Zicam and some herbal throat drops, not worrying about spraying some chemical all over the inside of my mouth if it will keep the cold and flu wolf at bay. But, I better get the all-natural throat drops lest I suck on some kind of chemical and grow a green horn out the top of my head when I'm 60. Funny and even sicker is the inconvenience we will go through so we can feel better. We will often compromise our principles and give away the farm if we would just feel better. This same thinking is what keeps drug addicts addicted and alcoholics drinking, I know, I was both.

After a few days of "religiously" applying the Zicam to the insides of my mouth every four hours, and sucking down a bag of "herbal" throat drops, and again, religiously taking my Mucinex every four hours, I began to get better. Amazingly, as I was getting better, my "religious" Zicaming, throat dropping and Mucinex taking severely dropped off. The thought came to me when I realized this morning that I had not dosed myself in at least the last 18 hours. Who needs medicine when you're getting well?

You are either laughing at me, and or questioning my severe lack of character and intestinal fortitude at this point, or you are nodding your head in agreement. It wouldn't be so funny if it wasn't so true. It goes way past colds, flus and broken legs. It goes also for problems on our jobs, in our marriages and with our finances, proving the truth that we are broken people inside, sinful and depraved, beyond helping ourselves out of the mess we are in.

If we have trouble on our job, get written up say, we straighten up, hurry up or whatever else was the right thing to do in the first place. If we have trouble with our marriage and our wife is becoming increasingly hostile, we start bringing flowers, asking her to dinner and shaving more often. If we suddenly realize we are in a mountain of debt with no way out, we start cutting up credit cards and eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and beans. And the minute the boss tells us what a good job we are doing, the wife starts loving us again and we start climbing out of debt, "you know what" happens.

Same is true for spiritual things, and if we think about it, are not all things spiritual, including jobs, marriages and finances? We get in trouble whether internal or external and back to church we go, into our bibles we start looking and our prayer lives get a big shot in the arm.

Perhaps this is exactly why the God who loves us more than we can imagine, more than even life and comfort itself, allows these things to plague our life.

Keep Jesus close through worship, prayer and study of the word, and stay in touch with your friends in the Lord that can help hold you up. If we let these things down we are sure to get a "cold or flu" that will drive us to the medicine.

The Preacher

The Preacher stood and proclaimed God’s Word,
On lonely street corner where none else would.
God’s fire thundered and echoed ‘pon walls.
But upon no deaf ear, the Word e‘er falls.

The hearers are varied, some cold and some hot,
As the Preacher thundered, “Don’t let your soul rot!”
His bible held high and Words surely aimed,
His blood coursing hot and passion proclaimed.
“None can be saved without Jesus named “

Hopes and Prayers

All Hopes and Prayers for our loved ones,
Can't outrun from heaven's guns.
The Spirit prays and heaven knows,
What's inside our deepest woes.


High hopes and prayers for many things,
All fly away on fragile wings.
But He who searches all the land,
Catches these in His right hand.


The hand that spread the universe,
Opened up and took the nail adverse.
Hopes and prayers nailed to the tree,
Knowing all would safely be.

1965

We humans are capable of great discoveries, feats, inventions and acts of nobility. But, if we could look into the future and see any of those things ahead of time, we would probably try and help them along, or we would run and hide in fear. If we knew God's plans for our lives ahead of time we would probably screw them up before we got there. I am a preacher today, and if I knew 30 years ago God's plan, I would have ran and hid as sure as Adam in the garden and Saul in the baggage. I would have done everything in my power to make it not happen and probably ended up with something akin to Frankenstein's monster. I would have been insanely mad, dead or locked up. But today I am in my right mind, happy and at peace with God's future plans for my life, some are yet to come and some are in the past.
    So, I am glad we don't know God's plans. We should be encouraged that God does have a plan, and it's good ^{Jer 29:11}. How many of the great events of history would never have happened if the actors knew ahead of time what was going to take place? And, if they did know, would they have turned out so well?
    1965 in America, Martin Luther King, Jr. begins a drive to register black voters, the New York Jets signed Joe Namath, Lyndon Johnson made his "Great Society" State of the Union Address, the "Beatles' '65" album goes #1 and stays #1 for 9 weeks, the Rock group Who releases 1st album "I Can't Explain", the Beatles appear on Shindig (ABC-TV), the Who make their 1st appearance on British TV, Martin Luther King, Jr. and 700 demonstrators arrested in Selma, Alabama, Peggy Fleming, 16, wins ladies senior figure skating title, Martin Luther King, Jr. begins march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, Martin Luther King, Jr. leads 25,000 to state capitol in Montgomery, Alabama, the Beatles "Ticket to Ride" is released in U.K., Willie Mays 512th home run breaks Mel Ott's 511th NL record, May 5 1st large-scale U.S. Army ground units arrive in South Vietnam, and the Byrd's song Turn Turn Turn becomes an international hit in late 1965, (the lyrics directly from the bible in Ecclesiastes 3:2). The words probably every person in America for at least the next thirty years would recognize in a heartbeat.

To Everything (Turn, Turn, Turn)
There is a season (Turn, Turn, Turn)
And a time to every purpose, under Heaven

Quite a significant year in the history of America, and we should take heart that our story is not done yet. We should stay our course and give God the reins, and everything will turn out according to the Master's plan. It will not be problem free, and it may not turn out how we want, but it will be beautiful, as God says….further on in that chapter….

He hath made everything beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end. (Ecclesiastes 3:11)
Hebrews 11 speaks of Abraham centuries ago and says that "he went out, not knowing where he was going" and in the end here we are a product of his faith.
I am glad today I don't know exactly what God is doing. My prayer is that I willingly follow along.

I am still learning that this is the best plan.

If I Bow

If my heart does take a bow,

All Heaven stands saying Wow!

If I bow my head alone,

I so offend heaven’s ONE,

Without my heart, to bow the knee,

forsakes the share that I so need,

So, surely great the injury,

heaven’s power  does surely flee.

I bend my weakened knee to thee,

My will upon thy altar burn,

My desperate cry is death to me.

Heart, take your bow, to Him I turn.

God's Poem

(Ephesians 2:10) For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

For means "because", this is the reason the previous thought happened, so looking backwards at what was just said in the second most famous scripture in all Christendom.

(Ephesians 2:8) For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

I love this verse so much because it says that even though I am screwed up and have a myriad of issues and problems, I have God's undeserved blessing and favor, and that is the biggest understatement that was ever made in all of history. It had nothing to do with my strength, smarts or good looks.
　

Because we are His workmanship,

He showered and continues to shower us with Grace.

God the creator of heaven and earth not only provided the spark and the plan, He has you on His workbench in the garage, banging and clanging, poking and prodding until He gets you just right. Jeremiah18:6 says Look, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are you in My hand,".

He's working with us till He gets us just right.

This is incredible, my only real responsibility is not resisting His Hand, letting myself be molded and giving in to His glorious blueprint for my life. Real grace is that I don't have to spin myself into an adequate vessel for His work. I don't have to worry and wear my fingers to the bone trying to toe some religiously rigid and invisible line. All I have to do is allow myself to be molded by His grace.

BECAUSE we are His workmanship.He showers us with Grace.

The Greek word for workmanship is poiemi. Looks familiar, doesn't it? The word poem easily comes to mind. Poiema means ""that which is made".

Made for what?

That query has haunted man since the garden. Mostly people that won't give in to His Hand are the ones that have the most trouble seeing it.

It's a problem of the will.

(John 7:17) If anyone wills to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority.

If anyone wills to do His will...If we will give ourselves to this process and yield in His Hand, we will not have to continually fight against the process of being broken and remade. We will not be relieved completely of the process of being broken and remade this side of heaven.

…..created in Christ Jesus unto good works.

We do not have to work out a plan for our lives, but only accept the plan which He has drawn up for us. This delivers us from fret and frenzy, and insures that our lives will be of maximum glory to Him, of most blessing to others, and of greatest reward to ourselves.

-From the Believers Bible Commentary

Today Is The Day

One of the best things about today is that we now have a better point of reference, and maybe just maybe, we have a bit more understanding of what the heck was really going on yesterday, last week, last month or last year; if we are really fortunate and blessed, we will also get a better understanding of why!

(Isaiah 52:12) ….. For the LORD will go before you, And the God of Israel will be your rear guard.

Wow! God will cover His peoples back, and He will go into my tomorrow and lay out the way.

My Rear Guard, yesterday is not just passed, it is removed by God, and going before me He lays out a new day. The failures and sins of yesterday are often dragged into today poisoning the well of today as sure as that stinking dead rat inside the wall in my house, reminds me every day it is there. I can learn from the past, next time I will trap the rat instead of poison him. That's wisdom for today. Yesterday has a purpose in my life to teach me what I need to know today.

I wake up some mornings and today looks like crap, my attitude sucks and I don't feel good. No matter how good or bad yesterday was, God has removed it. As Chad and Jeremy sang "yesterday's gone". That's a very nice platitude to tell myself as I look at my ragged face in the mirror, but that alone won't cut it. I need to know about today, I need hope for today.

For the LORD will go before you.....

 Now we're talking, if God is ordering my today, how can I go wrong? Now I can look back and see a bit of what God was doing then. Like the stories we read our bibles, about the stubborn, stiff-necked and rebellious people that God used for His Grand Design. Even though we repeat the same things in our lives, we have the advantage of those 2,000 years to see all their mistakes and we are now far enough away to see what God was doing. So I can look back in my life and see what God was doing in my ten years ago past “today”.

The great thing about today is, it is all I truly have. I do not know for sure if I will walk out of this Starbucks alive. I don't know if I will make it home from here or to church tonight.

I also don't know if I won't meet someone that I can add value to their life or they to mine.

I do not know what divine plan God has in store for me. But then again, if I make it to tomorrow I can look back on today and see God's hand that I couldn't see in yesterday's today.

Hebrews 3:7

...TODAY, IF YOU WILL HEAR HIS VOICE

(what are the possibilities?)

Keeping The Kingdom

Man! I sure enjoyed the holidays. I loved getting together with family and tossing the football with my grandson, in a game we made up called Footbase. It was great having Nichole up here to stay with us in what has become a Christmas tradition. I enjoyed seeing my kids and grand-kids on Skype. I enjoyed going to the museum with my Sis Mo and Richad, eating at Brandy Ho’s in San Francisco, twice! Once with them and once with Nichole and Michelle on another trip to the city. So many things to “celebrate” the holidays, but, I really think the best part was the excuse to eat what I want, spend what I want, sleep late and not shave.

But now it’s back to reality. I was made shockingly aware of that when I got on the scale this morning and I had gained a “few” pounds. See, I could handle one or two, but when it creeped up over five I was suddenly made aware that I had lost touch with the discipline that had changed my life.

Over the past year I had lost forty, count ‘em forty pounds. I am proud of that fact, I am healthier and I went from XXL clothes to L, no more X’s. People commented everywhere I went how skinny I was getting and that really stroked my ego. But just like anyone else who has lost weight, I have this nagging fear hanging over my head, I don’t want to go back to the way it was and lose everything I had gained.

This is a great season for excuses.

Now it is the New Year, and the party’s over.

There isn’t another holiday to use for an excuse to do want you want until Memorial day in May

The beginning of the New Year is when resolutions are made.

What would the statistic be on kept resolutions?

This month marks 21 years since the day I got saved and determined to follow Christ. It is ten and one half years I have been Pastoring the church in Sacramento, CA. In all those years I have seen lot’s of imperfection and failure in my life, but I have pursued the faith.

I have seen people come and go, people better and more successful than me that no longer are serving God. I have seen people gloriously succeed and miserably fail to

“Keep the Kingdom”.

The only sure way not to fail is to not try.

The best way to not break a resolution is not to make any.

Luke 14

Jesus happened to be at a dinner with one of the Pharisees on the Sabbath, and maybe you know if you mix Pharisees, the Sabbath and Jesus you are going to get some fun kind of trouble.

It says they watched him closely.

If you are a follower of Christ people are watching you closely too. They are either waiting for you to screw up so they will feel better about themselves, or farther down in their soul they want you to succeed so they can have some shred of hope that it is true.

Knowing they were watching Him closely, He put them in a spot. One of those in attendance had an edema, a swelling of the limbs. He asked them if it was lawful to heal someone on the Sabbath, which they did not believe it was, so He healed him just to get the party started and threw out a question that would uncover their hypocrisy. I imagine that it got pretty quiet at that table.

Then He told them a parable that illustrated just how self centered and power mad these guys were. His conclusion was that they should lower themselves to serve and invite the powerless and people that can’t possibly invite them back or do any favors for them.

We get a front row seat to this glorious show, but if we were there we would probably be squirming in our seats just like these guys were.

^{Luke 14:15} Meanwhile, back at the ranch, one of these self important people needs to break the ice so he lifts his goblet and offers a toast hoping to look like an eloquent *** or “donkey.”

"How fortunate the one who gets to eat dinner in God's kingdom!"

Of course, Jesus takes His opportunity to dig down in their soul with a story of another great supper just like the one He was at.

All the invitations had been sent out to all the proper people that “should” be there. All the R.S.V.P.s had already been returned. They had all promised to be there.

So, when the time came, He sent His “servants” out to tell all the “invited ones”.

It’s time to eat! Come, everything’s ready!

BUT……….

they all began to make excuses.

It isn’t the right time I have things to do. I wasn’t expecting you to come now.

One of those invited and called said “I have bought a piece of land and I need to go see it”.

His land was more important than not insulting the host to whom he had already sent his promise to attend.

Please excuse me!

"Another said, 'I just bought five teams of oxen, and I really need to check them out. Send my regrets.'

Another said, ‘I now have a wife, so I can’t come.’

This is the only one with a half an excuse. The Old Testament gives him a year with his wife to do no business or go to war ^{Deuteronomy 20:7, 24:5}. This was a wedding party.

Remember they were invited to a dinner party, they weren’t invited to work, church or help their friends move. It sounded like a good idea at the time of the invitation, but when something else got their attention, dinner got upstaged by property, cows and wives.

I just can’t imagine anything upstaging the dinner in the kingdom. But it does, doesn’t it?

Today we have all received our invitation, Many of us have responded, and when we gave lives to Christ we said we would be at the party. We are now waiting for that announcement that says “It's time to eat”.

If we will live for the purpose and path of the kingdom we will “keep the kingdom”.