TerryLema

Forgiven. Forgiven. Forgiven Again.

“If” is a little word that can have big consequences. Many people live their lives teetering on “if.”   “If I get that promotion, I’ll …. If I win the lottery, I’ll be able to …. If I have a mate, I can finally be ….”  Unfortunately, living on the world’s “if’s” is a sure highway to disappointment.

“If” can even have eternal consequences. John reminded us of those consequence in his first letter.  “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” [1 John 1:9-10 NIV]

The onus for forgiveness is ours now and it is summed up in that little word “if.” God has done His part.  He already provided all we need for forgiveness through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. He is faithful to forgive–He is willing to forgive, and with His forgiveness He will lead us in paths of righteousness.  All this is ours, “if” we come to Him repentant and confessing our sins.  “If” we don’t? That story has a different ending.

I love this song by Signature Sound about the prodigal son who decides to come home and finds the Father waiting. The Father is waiting for us also … waiting for us to come to Him.

We’re forgiven, forgiven, forgiven again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1shTv5IKQHg

A motel next to an In-N-Out Burger? That was where we stayed in Modesto. For In-N-Out burger-lovers living in a state that has no In-N-Out Burger (Idaho), this was a recipe for diet-disaster.  We did, however, restrain ourselves and only ate there twice.  It sure was tempting to eat there more often though. I felt like Pavlov’s dogs. Every time we entered and exited the hotel parking lot that bright yellow arrow on the In-N-Out Burger sign made me salivate.

Our children booked this hotel for us. I think they picked this one because they know just how much I like In-N-Out burgers. If there is one close to where I’m at, that’s where you will find me whenever I get a craving for a burger or fries.  That reminded me of part of the verse that opens Hebrews 12.  “…let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us ….”  [NKJV]

I always joke that the “sin that so easily gets us” … gets us so easily because it always knows where to find us.  We get pretty adept at locating ourselves close to temptation. It’s like staying in the hotel next to the In-N-Out.  We don’t have far to go to get there.

I would have been far less tempted to blow my diet had our motel been across town where I could not see that bright yellow arrow.  Spiritually, we need to also put some distance between our “souls” and those “places” where we are tempted to sin, where sin hardly has to make any effort to ensnare us and draw us in.

Heb 12:1: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” [NIV]

September 17

I wrote on my Facebook page last Monday … “Well, except for nearly getting killed on I95 in Oregon, it was an uneventful trip home! Some ‘fruitcake’ in a pickup decided to pass a semi and came straight for us. Bob was able to jerk our car off the roadway or it would have been head-on. Thank you, Lord, that there was a decent shoulder on that section of the road. Thank you, Lord, for Bob’s quick thinking. Thank you, Lord, for getting us home safe and sound.”

 We were almost home, just a few miles from the Oregon-Idaho border when this happened. We were traveling the speed limit, 65 MPH. We were doing everything right. Someone else, however, grew impatient behind a semi and flew into our lane of traffic heading straight for us. Bob later told me he thought he might roll the car he had to swerve so hard to get out of the way. It happened so fast I didn’t even have a chance to be frightened.

It didn’t take me too long to realize three things …1) just how fast our work on earth can be over, 2) how we are safe in God’s Hands until He determines our work is over, and 3) I had better be about my work while I have the opportunity. My time will come, it just wasn’t last Monday at 1 PM on I95 in Oregon.

The Lord gave Peter a warning of his impending death. That prompted Peter to once again remind people of the things they needed to remember after he was gone. He took the opportunity of the time he had left to continue to preach about the life, death and resurrection of His Lord and Master. We too, should use the opportunity of time to do likewise.

“I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body, because I know that I will soon put it aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me.” [2 Peter 1:12-15 NIV]

I wrote yesterday about our youngest grandson’s Junior Novice football team. These little boys in big football helmets were playing their hardest, running plays, tackling ball carriers, making touchdowns. They were excited when they scored, even though the only ones keeping score were the parents in the stands.

The parents were excited also. They cheered and shouted whenever the defense made a stop and whenever the offense ran a play. It didn’t matter that all that was being done by 7-8-year-old boys, it could have been the Super Bowl by the way they rooted for the team.

Zechariah 4:4 told us not to despise the day of small things. Small things can become great things in the hands of God. Remember Daniel chapter 2? King Nebuchadnezzar saw a great dazzling statue that was awesome in appearance. It had parts of gold and silver, bronze and clay. It represented the great kingdoms of the world to come that began with Babylon. (Read Daniel 2 today)

There was one other part of this vision. A little rock. A stone. The rock was cut out from the mountain but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet and broke it to pieces and the pieces were blown away by the wind. That little rock, that small stone, then became a huge mountain and filled the whole earth.

Jesus, the Rock, had 12 disciples, one of whom betrayed him. They, along with the Apostle Paul who was recruited by the Risen Jesus on the Road to Damascus, changed the known world in one generation. Jesus’ followers are still changing the world. Most of them are small by the world’s standards, yet we are not to despise the small … because in God’s economy, small things can do great things.

Dan 2:44-45:  “The God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed…. It will crush all those kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it will itself endure forever. This is the meaning of the vision of the rock cut out of a mountain.”  [NIV]

Last Saturday we watched our youngest grandson and his Junior Novice team play football. This was a team of boys 7-8 years old. They were precious. They looked like bobble-head dolls with helmets bigger than they were. Our son was coaching. No score was kept, except by the parents in the stands. There was no kick-off or extra points and each team had two 12-minute quarters on offense and defense. It may have looked like a free for all, but these little guys had designed plays to run and they ran them with all they had in them.

As I watched these little boys play I thought of the verse in Zechariah 4.  “Who despises the day of small things?”  

Lots of things start off small. It seems like only yesterday the grandson we watched on Friday play on his high school junior varsity team was one of these little ones with the big helmets, but he’s not so small anymore. The skills and determination that he learned as a 7-year-old benefit him now.

It is often that way with the things of God. In God’s work, the day of small things is not to be despised. Though the ones God uses might be weak and unlikely, God often chooses them to bring about great things.  Zechariah was to build a temple, but it would not equal the great temple of Solomon and the people despised its small foundation. We need to remember, however, that though beginnings are small, God can make the latter end great.

It is like Jesus said, the smallest of seeds, the mustard seed, may become a great tree where even the birds can rest on its branches.  (Luke 13:19)

Last Friday night I watched a group of young high school boys play football, the Junior Varsity at Modesto Christian School.  My grandson was part of the team.  This team has struggled this year. They’ve had a lot of adversity and they lost members. The team is small, which means that most of them play the entire game as both offense and defense. They never get a rest, and it’s been that way in each game they have played this year. They scored a touchdown in this game, the first one this year.

They had heart and determination. They never gave up. They were exhausted when it was over. Some of them were going to be mighty sore the following days, including my grandson who took a lot of hits and ended up with a bad bruise on his hip. Still, the team never gave up.

Winston Churchill gave some great speeches in his day.  He is reported as having said, “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”   

Courage. Paul closed his first letter to the Corinthian Church with an exhortation about courage, “Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be men (and women) of courage; be strong.” [1 Cor 16:13 NIV]

As I watched these young men stand strong even though exhausted and beat, I thought a lot of Christians could take a lesson from them in courage. It is the courage to continue that counts.

Our Jeep is getting a bit old and has a lot of miles, coming from years of 60-mile-round-trips between work and home and trips like this last one to California. The Jeep’s transmission has been overheating. The shop tells us “nothing to worry about. Just put it in neutral for two minutes until the warning light goes off and you can keep on going.” Really? Just put it in neutral? Well, if we don’t put it in neutral, it will put itself in neutral. It will slow down until it comes to a complete stop no matter how much gas it’s getting.

Sounds simple enough, put it in neutral.  Simple unless you are climbing up to Donner Summit, or in the middle of four lanes of traffic flying along a section of road with no shoulders. We were lucky this trip, it only happened twice on a portion of Highway 80 that had wide shoulders.  We put it in neutral and in two minutes it was cooled and ready to go again.

I’m chuckling this morning because not only did we need to put the Jeep in neutral on this trip, I needed to put me in neutral to cool down a few times. I’m usually pretty good with traffic but this trip really riled me up. I don’t know if it was the heat, the smoke from all the fires, the abundant traffic jams, the crazy drivers or if I was just tired from adjusting to a full-time work schedule. The one thing that was evident was the absence of my usual good cheer and patience!

My anger, of course, accomplished nothing except to make me miserable. No matter how I seethed inside, it remained hot and smoky, the traffic jams still delayed us, the crazy drivers still drove crazy and I was even more tired from all the energy expended with the anger. My anger sure did not reflect our God.

Multiple times in the Old Testament our God is described as slow to anger. “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.”  [Ex 34:6-7 NIV]

Father, I should have heeded the Spirit’s warning that the way I was acting was not honoring You.  Forgive me. Create in me a heart that is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.  Amen.

Travel. We drove last Thursday from Caldwell, Idaho, to Modesto, California. We have made this trip countless times since 1993. It’s always been a long trip, and in winter months it can even be hazardous with snow in the Sierra’s. Last Thursday was perhaps the most frustrating trip of all.  Maybe it is our ages, 77 and 70; or perhaps, it was the fact that it has been 15 months since the last one and we’ve “forgotten.”

We hit a traffic jam outside Reno crossing into California. That delayed us an hour as we crawled along only to find the source of the jam was someone working on the side of a hill nowhere near the road and yet they blocked off one complete lane of traffic. Then we hit stop and go traffic eight more times before we arrived. We were on the road for almost 12 hours and arrived tired and frustrated.

Frustration. Our greatest frustration was in not knowing just when all the problems would hit. We were breezing along and then Bam(!) screeching to a stop. We couldn’t see ahead of us more than a few cars, and we didn’t know why we were stopped, just that we were.

Isn’t that like life? Breezing along and then Bam(!), stopped by something. We don’t always know the source, we don’t always know why; we only know we are stopped.  I came across a question on Facebook recently, “when something gets difficult and we are stopped in our tracks, is it God’s warning?  Or is it the enemy of our soul trying to hinder us? How can you tell?”

When we can’t tell, or don’t know, we should remember those opening verses of James 1. James reminds us that there will be times of trouble. When we are unsure how to handle those times when life goes Bam(!), we should ask God for wisdom and He will provide it to us. “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.” [James 1:5 NIV]

We still may not know why life’s Bam(!) happened, but God promises us wisdom and strength to handle it. PTL.

“What you heard from me, keep as the pattern of sound teaching, with faith and love in Christ Jesus. Guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you—guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.”  [2 Timothy 1:13-14]

Every morning I go to work I enter a building and the first one I meet is the guard. He sits at a desk just inside the public entry. He’s there to make sure that all who enter that building belong there. He’s also there to protect those who do belong there.

Yesterday, we looked at the previous verse and Paul’s conviction that God was able to guard everything Paul had entrusted to Him, including his very life and death.  Now Paul turns that around.  He goes on to urge Timothy (and us) to guard what God has entrusted to him (and to us). Paul calls it that “good deposit.”

What is that “good deposit?” It’s the Good News—the Gospel. Paul refers to it as sound teaching, faith and love in Christ Jesus. It is the knowledge of God the Father as seen through the life, death and resurrection of the Son. Paul knew that the enemy of our soul is constantly on the prowl to steal that “good deposit” from us. He wants to rob us of the truth, destroy faith, and kill love.  We need to be ever on guard against his efforts.

However, we must not think we are left alone in our efforts to guard that “good deposit” because Paul also reminds Timothy that the Holy Spirit who lives in us helps us to guard it.

Father, thank you for sending Your Spirit to give us the strength and wisdom to guard that “good deposit” You have left with us. Amen.

“I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day.”  [2 Tim 1:12 NIV]

I am convinced He is able to keep what I have committed into His Hands. Paul had committed everything to God from the moment He met the Master on the Road to Damascus. He had turned over his dreams, his desires, his understanding, his health, his years. All had been placed in the hands of Christ Jesus.

Now He stood close to death’s door. He was facing martyrdom and knew it. It would be understandable to waver a little – after all Paul was not supernatural, he was human as we are. It would be reasonable if he looked back as well as looked at what was facing him in the immediate future and wondered if it was all worth it.  Would he have regrets, would he wish he had done some things differently, or even would he wonder if he had taken the correct path through life.

It is evident as he writes to Timothy that Paul was assured he had taken the correct path. He was, in his own words, convinced. He knew intimately the One in whom he had entrusted everything. And that knowledge persuaded him he had done the right thing. His Savior and Lord, His Master was able to take it all – Paul’s dreams, desires, understanding, health, years, and now even his death – and guard it against any thief or corruption. When Paul entered into the very presence of the Lord, it would all be waiting for him. Every reward, every crown, every praise from the Master would be his.

We, too, have entrusted everything into the hand of our Savior and Lord. Jesus is guarding all we have committed. Like Paul, when we enter into His Presence on the other side of the veil, rewards, crowns and praise will be waiting for us. PTL.