thanksgiving weekend’s coming…

This weekend my wife and I will be spending thanksgiving in Montana, which I find comical as it is Canadian thanksgiving… A weekend inspired by the movie “Dan in Real Life,” with my wife’s entire family sequestered in a log cabin together.

I’ve been asked to share something for Sunday, a sort of thanksgiving Sunday devotional, I guess? (Seriously, at first I thought it they were kidding… but I keep getting reminded, “Aaron, I hope you’re preparing something for thanksgiving Sunday?”) It makes me laugh… why? It’s kind of like whenever we eat out with our friends or visit family everyone defers to the ‘pastor’ for the religious rite at that given time. “Pastor, will you give thanks?” “Pastor, can you bless this meal before we eat?” “Aaron, can you share a few words?” Please don’t think I’m being facetious, because I am not. It actually makes me chuckle. I sometimes want to respond… “Do I have to give thanks? I’m not very thankful you keep putting me on the spot.” “No, I can’t bless this food, God has blessed us with it already. I can ask that you don’t get sick from it?” “I can share a few words, which kind did you have in mind? My youth have taught me some hilarious ones.”

I understand that this is often the way things go, but the irony behind these traditions is that God makes Himself accessible, though the gift of His Son, at all times and anyone. You don’t have to be the Pastor figure to invite Jesus to the conversation, meal, gathering, or party – if you love and follow Him, He’s already there. May the evidence of a loving Lord and Savior always be evident in your life, wherever you are.

I had a College Professor who once told us, “always be prepared to preach, to pray, and to die.” Yeah, the third one is a little tougher to swallow, but in other words he was repeating scripture: “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.” (1 Peter 3:15-16)

Self-Centred…

I received this from a family member this morning and thought it was worth sharing…

“Self Gratification and Self Importance is Self-Worship. Self-Worship is always accompanied by fear  and anger. 1) We are afraid that people will not give appropriate time and  attention to worshiping at our shrine. 2) 
We get angry when people are too stupid to realize that we are the to be preferred above all others (always). 

This is the reason why everyone who drives slower than you is an idiot and everyone who passes you in traffic is a moron…”

How painfully true these words are – aren’t we preferred above all others? – That seems to be our default thought process. 

If you live in McKenzie Towne, you’ll know our community sits centred around a small traffic circle. Once you use it a few times you realize there are, in fact, two lanes, when there might only appear to be one; and that there is a proper usage for our circle. If you intend to use your first exit, take the outside lane; and if you intend to take any exit thereafter, take the inside lane – simple, right? It’s amazing how many people I talk to who tell me about the ’idiots’ who take the outside lane the whole way round the traffic circle. I understand their frustration; but, in truth, we have probably all misused the sacred circle at some point before learning its rules.

Prefer me above all others… scripture flips our self-worship on its head saying, “Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves.” – Romans 12:10

that is in the Bible?

Yesterday, I was sitting in the dentist’s office. I hate visiting the dentist. In the waiting room was an illustrated children’s story bible – the kind where Jesus always wore a white robe with blue sash, and everyone else had grey…

Often we look at scripture as a sort of ‘Aesops’ Fables’ collection of stories. As children were taught to pick out the moral virtue of the story, and, therefore, hopefully apply its wisdom. Unfortunately, I find that the level of biblical literacy is not much different among many of the students and adults I am grateful to have conversations with. One man, an active member of his church and one time church elder, once asked my while thumbing the pages of his bible, “where’s the verse that says ‘ cleanliness is next to Godliness?’ I want to show it to my son.” I laughed (sorry, I did), and then told him although that phrase had somehow come into come usage, it was not in the bible or implied specifically anywhere in scripture – even though hygiene is important…

The beauty of God’s word is that it is an over-arching and connected story of God’s involvement and redemptive actions within His creation, humanity. We sometimes get the Aesops’ Fables perspective when all we are interested in is the cool stories of the bible – the highlight reel of scripture. The other fact we miss out on, is that the bible is not a nice glossy children’s book either. There are some graphic and awkward stuff; genocides, plagues, wars, murders, graphic and sexual scenes which we don’t put into the highlights. That is probably for good reason too; you don’t really want to add the story of David and Bathsheba, Lot and his daughters, or how Noah got hammered going into the children’s storybook bible.

This morning I read a “that is in the Bible?” kind of story in Genesis 38 about Judah (one of Jacob’s – aka. Israel – twelve sons) and his daughter-in-law, Tamar. It’s not a flowery story. In short, you can get the specifics from Genesis itself. Judah, through a series of strange events unknowingly sleeps with his widowed daughter-in-law, Tamar. After realizing what he had done, Judah exclaims, “she is more righteous than I.” (Genesis 38:26) Honestly, this sounds like the sort of exchange that should be found on Jerry Springer, not amongst the patriarchs of the bible!? No matter who was the more righteous, it’s not easy to spot a cozy moral virtue within this story – every character simply looks awful.

Scripture, when read in its entirety – not just the highlights, demonstrates that life is not pretty, it is not now and it wasn’t then; and God has been at work in this broken mess from the very beginning – and He hasn’t given up yet: in fact, He promises that He never will.

“The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.” – Deuteronomy 31:8