Memorials

Acts 2:42

Do you do anything to help you remember important information?  I bet you do.  I usually keep a small notebook in my pocket or close at hand so that I write down important dates, and facts or anything that I don’t want to forget.  I also have a bunch of pictures on my computer, and framed photos on the wall.  The pictures that make the wall are the ones that I want to see and be reminded of every day.

In the Old Testament when something important happened, the people would pile up stones in a pillar.  Then when people were walking along and their children asked, “Why is there a big pile of rocks over there?  Did something important happen here?”  The parents could tell them the history of the place and how it shaped their people.  We make memorials like this all over place today.  Just look around Washington D.C.

Right before Jesus is arrested and crucified, he has one last dinner with his closest friends and followers.  We call this the Last Supper.  In that upper room Jesus sets up a memorial.  He takes some ordinary food of the day, bread and wine, and tells his disciples that when they eat and drink to remember him and what is about to happen to on the cross.

The early Church devotes themselves to the breaking of bread.  They devoted themselves to the memory of Jesus and the work on the cross.  The early Christians set their lives in a rhythm that constantly reminded them of Jesus and the Cross.  Today our challenge is how do we set our lives up in such a way that we are constantly reminding ourselves of our Lord and Savior.

What’s your position?

One of the strongest values of Americans is individualism.  While we do not have the dramatic mythology of the Greeks or the Romans, we do have the Old West.  The characters that are celebrated in story are lone cowboys, lone lawmen, and lone settlers.  All of the heroes are celebrated for their rugged individualism and survival.

I have constantly striven to be a self-sufficient individual who takes care of himself and relies only on himself.  In my school days I even competed in individual sports.  I ran cross-country and track for the school, and competed in karate tournaments as well.  In track and cross-country both my performance could help the team but only by what I did as an individual.  In karate my training partners helped along the way but I competed alone. 

This is not how we are meant to run the race of faith.

For me this is one of the harder teachings of the Bible.  We are saved as individuals but as soon as we are, we join the team of the Kingdom of Heaven.  We call this team the body of Christ, or simply the Church.  Acts 2:42 calls it the fellowship.

The apostle Paul explains this a little more in his first letter to the Corinthians.  In the twelfth chapter he explains that different people have different roles on God’s team.  Jesus is the head or the coach and the rest of us have other roles to fill.  Some are teachers, some are healers, and some are leaders.  Paul does not give a complete list of gifts here but begins to give us an idea of the ways that God equips his team.

Being on the team requires participation and there are no individual events.  Everyone on the team everywhere in the world is to be working together toward the team’s goal of victory.  Victory is the sharing of the gospel’s redeeming message and meeting the needs of everyone we can.  The question is: What position do you play?

Following Up

Day one: Read what is said about Spiritual gifts and the body in 1 Corinthians 12

Day 2:  What are your gifts?

Day 3 How can I use my gift to further the message of Jesus Christ?

Day 4 How can I use my gifts to help those in need?

Day 5 Read Ephesians 4:1-16 How does this passage further your understanding of the body and fellowship?

Break Time

I don’t know how many sermons, teachings and lessons on reading the Bible regularly I have sat through.  Very rarely do they do anything but make me feel guilty for an hour or two.  I can only think of a couple of times where a teaching of any kind has inspired me to spend more time reading my Bible; usually the teaching wasn’t about Bible reading.

In the summer of 2006 I experienced God in a way that I thought was impossible.  Up until then my time studying the Bible alone wasn’t much more than a joke.  I was hit and miss at best.  That summer I worked in outside Grand Rapids, Michigan at camp for at risk children and adolescents.  The pace of every day was crazy.  I spent every day from about 7:30 A.M. till around 10:30 P.M. with misbehaving, wild children trying to show them the way to Jesus and everlasting life.

I spent the entire day with these kids except for an hour break.  Most days I longed for my break.  Breaks were a time of quiet alone time.  At first I tried to sleep on break but I could never fall asleep.  After a couple of sleepless breaks I started reading my Bible.  I was inspired by my co-counselor Sam who was already on his second read through of the Bible that year.  Not to mention the fact he had spent the last few months memorizing the entire book of Galatians.

I started reading at the beginning in Genesis and worked my way through the historical book by the end of the summer.  The hour a day I spent reading changed me in ways that I can’t fully describe.  When I think about it all I can think is the words of Joshua 1:8 “Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.

The Duke and the Man with No Name

Recently, I have found myself watching the same old spaghetti westerns and cowboy movies that I thought were boring when my dad watched them as I grew up.  I have come to love many of John Wayne’s movies but most of all I love the Man with No Name movies with Clint Eastwood.  There is something about those characters who are strong, sleep under the stars, and fight for right that makes my heart beat.

For a long time I thought of the Middle Eastern, first century shepherd as kind of a sissy.  I thought of them as soft, lamb carrying wimps who played the harp.  It turns out they were much more like the American cowboys who drove cattle in the west.  They were tough and hard.  The major differences between them and the American cowboy are they had sheep following them, and they did not carry rifles or revolvers.

The first century shepherds were responsible for their sheep anytime they were out of the fold or pen.  Without the shepherds the sheep would be easy pray for thieves, wolves, lions, and bears.  But the shepherds stood between everything that would harm the sheep and led the sheep to places where they could eat their fill and drink slow, cool, calm water. 

Jesus says he is the Good Shepherd.  Unlike many of our leaders today, Jesus wants to stand between us and darker things of this world that will hurt us.  Not only is he standing there, he is willing to protect us with his life.  So that we would not feel the eternal consequences of our own bad choices and our own actions, Jesus laid down his life instead.  He then picked his life back up and promised us that he will fix what is broken in us and will repair the damage we have done to the world by creating new bodies for us and a new Earth for us to live on.  All we have to do is recognize his voice and believe.

John 10:1-21