Happy Friday
Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life. Psalm 143:8
Trust: In Psalm 31, David cries, “I am cut off from your sight!” He later acknowledges this was not true, but it felt that way. And it does. When everything is going wrong, it can feel as though the Lord has pulled back. Conversely, when everything is going “well”, it can feel as though God is cheering us on. The first is wrong, the second may be. Like pilots who must learn to trust their instruments, we must learn to trust what God has revealed in Scripture. BTW, if we do not trust the Bible when it tells us what we do not want to hear, we are unlikely to trust it when it tells us things we do want to hear – e.g., the depth of his love, grace and forgiveness.
Anger Check: I got yelled at this week, and it was unsettling. The person yelling was an older person who has had a hard life and is overwhelmed by the changes happening around her. Her anger didn’t frighten me. So what was unsettling? Three things: 1) how little she has been transformed/comforted by the grace of God; 2) my inability to help her put things in perspective; and most of all; 3) the awareness that I might be just as blind to my prejudices and selfish thinking as she is of hers.
Speaking of Anger: According to a Pew Research study, the gap between the Left and Right has doubled since 1994 – i.e., the red has gotten redder and the blue a lot bluer. Can you imagine what 2020 is going to be like?
Tech Execs Saying No to Tech: In this recent New York Times article, the writer notes how many tech titans refuse to allow their kids to use their products. Why? Because they suspect too much tech has a deleterious effects on the hearts, minds and souls of those who use them.
Quotes Worth Requoting:
- This country prides itself on being the land of the free, but there is no country in the western world where there are more people in recovery groups suffering from various addictions. America is not as free as she thinks. Os Guinness
- Happiness does not lead to gratitude. Gratitude leads to happiness. David Steindl-Rast
Gratitude: As we head towards THANKSgiving, REACH has handed me several things to be thankful for: 1) Christ Church’s church plant in Sogakope, Ghana – which is being done in partnership with International Needs Ghana – is off to a fast start; 2) back in Illinois, we baptized 13 people last weekend; 3) we just secured this year’s sixth Matthew Home (in North Chicago).
Keller Take Three: Three weeks ago I commented on Tim Keller’s lectures on the post-Christian trajectory of North America. Given how much interest that generated, a week later I included links to my notes from the lectures, and videos of the lectures themselves. (You can click here to get my notes or click here (and go to minute 56) and here (and go to minute 55) to listen/watch). Last week I got some more feedback, most notably a recommendation to avoid drinking the Keller Kool-aid! A young Latino scholar wrote to say that “a lot of the chicken little, sky-is-falling thinking is connected to the reality that White Americans are disaffiliating from organized religion at alarming rates…, but this misses the rapid church growth among non-majority churches in the U.S.” For more on this you can see the first chapter in Jared Alcantra’s book, Crossover Preaching.
Closing Prayer: Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit, that my thoughts may all be holy. Act in me, O Holy Spirit, that my work, too, may be holy. Draw my heart, O Holy Spirit, that I love but what is holy. Strengthen me, O Holy Spirit, to defend all that is holy. Guard me, then, O Holy Spirit, that I always may be holy. Saint Augustine (354-430)