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Fred Harvey was a name almost every American knew in the late 1800s and early 1900s. This son of Britain had come to America and made his mark in the food industry. Working with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, he built a chain of restaurants across the great Southwest which became legendary for their insistance on quality and their devotion to the customer.
In his book, "Appetite for America: How Visionary Businessman Fred Harvey Built a Railroad Hospitality Empire That Civilized the Wild West," Stephen Fried says Harvey originated the first national chain of restaurants, of hotels, of newsstands, and of bookstores--"in fact, the first national chain of anything--in America."
You may be familiar with the Judy Garland movie on the Harvey Girls, another innovation of Fred Harvey's. He recruited single young women in the East, then sent them to work in his restaurants from Kansas City to California. In doing so, he inadvertently provided wives for countless westerners and helped to populate a great segment of the USA.
All of this is just so we can relate one story from the book.
Once, in the short period before women took over the serving duties for his restaurants, Harvey was fielding a complaint from one of his "eating house stewards" about a particularly demanding customer.
"There's no pleasing that man," said the steward. "He's nothing but an out and out crank!"
Harvey responded, "Well, of course he's a crank! It's our business to please cranks. Anyone can please a gentleman."
Pleasing cranks.
Anyone can please a gentleman.
It's our business.
Why did that line sound familiar to me, I wondered as I read past that little story. I know. It sounds so much like the Lord Jesus.
Think of it.
The doctor's office called last week. It's time for my annual checkup. But before the visit with the physician, I was instructed to drop in on the lab in the hospital next Monday for a "blood workup."
I've done it before and know the routine.
So, tomorrow morning, I'll skip breakfast and the usual two cups of Community Coffee and head down to Ochsner's Foundation Hospital first thing. It's a short drive and a quick procedure. They'll push up my sleeve, insert a needle into a vein, and drain off a few samples of my blood in vials. The lady will slap a band-aid on the wound and send me on my way. I will have been there for a total of 10 minutes, max.
Two weeks later, Dr. Robert Miles will tell me all about myself. What my cholesterol level is, both good and bad, and whether the thyroid stuff I take needs to be adjusted in strength, and numerous other details which escape me now. (Hey, I'm a preacher, not a medical person.)
Fascinating how they can take a sip of one's blood and learn a hundred things about us.
Actually, it's not so odd. You and I live by that principle, that we can learn a lot about a subject by a small sample.
I've just spent a weekend with a group of investors.
No, not that kind. These folks are not looking for a way to pull in 10 percent or more a year on their life savings. They're not looking for tax shelters and not searching for the next Microsoft.
They're taking a longer view than that.
These are people who open their checkbooks and make fairly large gifts to educate and train the next generation of preachers and missionaries and Christian workers of all kinds.
They contribute to New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Their gifts build those new apartment buildings that are going up right now. Their gifts pay for the playground equipment and the renovated evangelism center and the new chairs in a classroom.
Their gifts help pay faculty salaries and reduce tuition costs to a bare minimum.
If ever anyone qualified for the term "person of faith," these good folk do.
In fact, I'm going to make the most stunning statement to come from me in years....
They called the other day and invited me to speak in chapel at a local Christian high school. I was delighted and told them what I usually do.
They said, "That's fine. But another time. This time, we need something else."
What I often do in high school assemblies, I told her, was to set my easel up on the gym floor and get two or three students out of the audience and caricature them. Then, for the piece de resistance, stand the principal before them and sketch him/her. After that, give them my 10 or 15 minute talk on lessons learned from a lifetime of drawing people on the subject of self-image, self-acceptance, and faith in the Lord who made us.
She said, "That sounds great. And we'd like to have you back to do that sometime. But we need something else from you this time."
"One of our students is dying," she said. "And it has shaken the entire student body. We need you to minister to us."
The next day the student went to Heaven.
Today is Friday, the chapel service is Tuesday morning.
Get that? This Sunday is Palm Sunday, the next Sunday is Easter, and in between we're going to have a service to talk about death and life.
And hope. That's what this is all about. It's certainly what Easter is all about.
"We have been born again to a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead" (I Peter 1:3).
A young pastor who feels he might be out of place in leading a church sent me a note the other day. With the constant demands upon his time and the unending situations that call for wisdom and patience, he's feeling like the fellow who was eaten alive by a school of minnows. He wonders if he's cut out to be a pastor.
He said, "I hear people talking about those who have the heart of a pastor. What exactly is that?"
Great question. I've pastored seven churches over 42 years and preached in another two hundred, but have never been asked that until now.
Perhaps a pastor's heart is like what someone said of art (and a lot of other things!): "I can't define it but I know it when I see it."
My friend Chris was grieving over the reassignment of their church's associate minister and his family to a new congregation several states away. Recently in the church hallway, she was passing one of the women on the church staff. The minister said, "Good morning, Chris. How are you today?"
Chris burst into tears.
With that, the minister pulled up a chair and gave Chris the next 30 minutes of her day. In telling me about it--and expressing her wonder at such sensitivity and kindness from the staff member--Chris said, "They must teach this in the seminary."
No. They don't. It's what a pastor's heart looks like.
It's come as a surprise to me that the 27th chapter of Proverbs has become a favorite in that vast book filled with maxims, truths, and adages. So much of that chapter is about friendship.
"Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but deceitful are the kisses of an enemy..... Do not forsake your own friend or your father's friend.... Better is a neighbor who is near than a brother far away.... He who blesses his friend with a loud voice early in the morning, it will be reckoned a curse to him.... Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another...."
As they said to George Bailey, "No man with many friends is poor." Or something to that effect.
The person who can boast many friends is rich indeed. According to Facebook, my list of friends now approaches 1,800. Even if that were true--it refers to the sum total of people I'm connected to in that vast network--there's no way anyone could have that many "good" friends.
That list--the special, "to die for," friends--is tiny, for all of us.
For reasons I cannot fathom, lately I've found myself pondering those people, those men (and for me, they're all men, mostly my contemporaries) who occupy a strategic spot in my mind, memory, and appreciation.
And I think I've identified a key element of that kind of close friendship. See what you think and consider whether it's the case in your own intimate relationships. (I use the word "intimate" in its best and highest connotation.)
As we approach the Easter event, many of us begin to reflect once again on the death of the finest, the purest One ever to walk this planet.
It's quite the indictment of humanity that earth could not tolerate Him and so put him to death.
In Robert Bolt's prize-winning play, "A Man For All Seasons," Sir Thomas More is beheaded for opposing the ungodly doings of King Henry VIII. (Or, to be more exact, for not approving them.) As the play winds to a close, a spokesman comes center stage and addresses the audience:
"I'm breathing.... Are you breathing, too?.... It's nice, isn't it? It isn't difficult to keep alive, friends--just don't make trouble--or if you must make trouble, make the sort that's expected....."
At the trial of Jesus, they said of him, "He has stirred up the people from Galilee to Jerusalem." They got that right.
Look at the world we live in. It could use another stirring up.
Following is my very brief four-point observation on the Church and Easter. You know that the whole point of Easter--the crucifixion, the burial, the resurrection--was the Church, don't you?
"Christ loved the Church and gave himself for her." (Ephesians 5:25) And then, "Shepherd the church of God which He purchased with his own blood" (Acts 20:28).
Over the last weekend, Congress passed the President's health care program and did it with three votes to spare.
This has been the most controversial piece of legislation in decades. I'm tempted to say the most in my lifetime, but that takes in all the debates of the 1940s, the Cold War of the 1950s, the Civil Rights acts of the 1960s, the Vietnamese War issues of the 1970s, and so on.
But this one has been so mean-spirited, I wonder if it's not in a class by itself.
The disturbing thing to me is how ugly some people can be even when they are occupying the high ground morally.
As congressmen and congresswomen worked their way through the crowds surrounding the Capitol building last Sunday--their safety was not the primary concern; security and police were everywhere--they had to listen to epithets being spat in their direction by these champions of the unborn. (Okay, not by all of them, but some.)
The gay congressman heard, "Fag!" yelled at him. The N-word was hurled at Congressman John Lewis, a hero of the Civil Rights movement if one ever existed. And we're told that in the House of Representative itself, a congressman yelled out, "Baby killers!" to those voting for the health-care legislation.
I was in Springfield, Illinois, watching this on television from my hotel room in between worship services at one of our Southern Baptist churches. The pastor and I were discussing the behavior of the demonstrators.
That's when he told me of the time a deacon hit him in the face and "busted my tooth."
Tommy Bowden, former football coach of Tulane and Clemson, is quoted as saying, "I don't want to follow my father at Florida State. I want to follow the coach who follows him!"
His father, the one-of-a-kind Bobby Bowden, has just retired after several decades at that university where he racked up the second most victories ever for a college football coach.
Preachers advise one another not to follow a pastor who either died or went to the mission field. You will never live up to the image left in people's minds, whether it's accurate or not.
People are funny about preachers. They give them a hard time, expect far more from them than any human can ever deliver, and are not unhappy to see them move on. But let a new pastor come in and suddenly the old one looks mighty good. Pray for the new guy. He has to listen to a constant stream of "When Brother Henry was here...." and "how Dr. Henry did things" without it seeming to bother him or slow him down. He smiles and mutters something about, "We are blessed to have had such a wonderful pastor, aren't we?"
If he is experienced in the Lord's work, he knows two things: 1) the fellow who followed him back at his former church is having to hear the same junk and 2) give it a little time, and he can outlive the memory of Brother Henry.
No offense to anyone named Henry. The name just popped into my head. (How many Pastor Henrys do I know? Jim Henry, Henry Cox, Bill Henry...)
The business of preferring one preacher over another is not a new phenomenon. In fact, that little carnal activity was not only present from the beginning, it wormed its way into the New Testament.
Paul talks about the "liking one preacher better than another" syndrome in his First Epistle to the Corinthians. In case you wonder, he was "agin" it. No wonder, since he came out on the short end of the comparisons. You and I are amazed at that. How could any preacher begin to measure up to the great Apostle Paul, much less surpass him?
No one surpassed him, I venture to say, except in popular appeal. Paul did not fare too well there. Apparently, he lacked somewhat in looks and his stage presence was not strong. The Second Epistle to the Corinthians goes into that, particularly chapters 10 and 11. Readers will want to pay especial attention to Paul's resume in chapter 11. Pressed to verify his right to be called an apostle, he does the opposite of what they might have expected. He gives them what I call a "reverse resume," listing not his awards and achievements, but the scars and suffering he has endured for Jesus. Let them try to match that!
At the moment, for our purposes in this piece, we're turning to I Corinthians 4, the first 5 verses.
"Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may on account of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation." (I Peter 2:12)
Be a fly on the wall. Sit in on religious discussions (okay, hostile debates and knock-down, drag-out arguments over doctrine) and you will come away burdened by one huge conclusion: for a large number of people who call themselves followers of Jesus, doctrine counts far more than behavior.
They didn't get it from Jesus, I'll tell you that. And they sure didn't get it from Scripture.
Start at page one of the New Testament. You're not out of the opening chapter before you see that the sexual activities of the Lord's people is a matter of major concern. It shows up in the genealogy of Jesus, with a number of people listed having been guilty or accused of inappropriate activities of a sexual nature. Still in that chapter, Joseph hears that his beloved Mary is with child and decides to call off the engagement. It took heavenly intervention for him to change his mind.
And that's just in the first chapter of Matthew.
Skip over to chapters 5-7, what we call "The Sermon on the Mount." There's doctrine there--Scripture never slights the subject--but behavior before the Gentile world by God's people is a major consideration. Oath-taking, brotherly treatment, sexual purity, relations with one's enemies--and we're still in chapter 5.
Sprinkled throughout that fifth chapter of Matthew are reminders that God's people are to live by a higher standard than the Gentiles in order to bear a faithful witness to them.
"You are the salt of the earth.... You are the light of the world.... Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in Heaven.... Except your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of Heaven.... If you greet your brothers only...do not even the Gentiles do the same?"
God expects a higher standard out of us. He gives two primary reasons:
1) We are God's children and He expects us to act like it.
2) The outside world needs to see we are different. If they see the same selfish behavior--or even worse!--in us, we can forget about having any influence with them.
Christian, behave yourself. They're watching.
Teena Myers wrote about me this week at NOLA.com:
I met Dr. Joe Neil McKeever [sic] at Kathy Frady’s Giggle Fest. At the time, he was the Director of Missions for the Baptist Association for Greater New Orleans. Joe (he insisted I call him “Joe” after I said “Dr. McKeever” one too many times) graciously consented to contribute his blog articles to NOLA’s faith blog. He is such a prolific writer; I don’t have the time to read everything he writes. A smattering of the articles that catch my attention are copied and pasted for NOLA’s readers.I made a mental note to contact Joe about writing a profile. The note hung on the cork board in my mind for months, maybe longer, before I stumbled across him on Facebook and inquired if I could write his profile for NOLA. Three months later, I found the time to buy him a hot chocolate at Café du Monde.
As a pastor leading your own congregation, you don't get out much. Every Sunday, you're tied down to your own assignment. The old saw about the pastor working only one day a week is tired, but it contains one great truth: he really works on that day.
So, when he gets a chance to sit in on the worship service of another church, it's a rarity, a blessing, and in many cases, a vacation.
The pastor is visiting his parents, he and the family are on vacation, or they are en route somewhere. On this Sunday, he leaves the tie in the closet and dresses like normal people. He is looking forward to this. Today, he gets to sit in a pew and worship without being responsible for anything.
After leaving the active pastorate nearly 6 years ago, visiting other churches has become routine for me. Most times, I've been the guest preacher, but often I was there as a friend of the pastor. Sometimes, as with other ministers, I was on vacation, visiting my mother, or traveling.
In the last three Sundays, I have worshiped in three greatly different churches: Williams Boulevard Baptist in Kenner, Louisiana, the First Baptist Church of New Orleans, and Eutaw Baptist Church of Eutaw, Alabama.
The first is just across town from where I live, the late pastor of that church was a longtime friend, and the present interim pastor, Mark Tolbert, was interim at our church (FBC Kenner). I love that great church and decided to visit.
My pastor, Mike Miller, approves this church-hopping thing of mine. We've discussed it. I send my tithe, my prayers, my family, and I'm there fairly often.
The second church--FBC, New Orleans--is likewise pastored by a dear friend, David Crosby. That Sunday, he was preaching on an event that took place in the days following Hurricane Katrina and which continues to suck the air out of the atmosphere around here. I had been praying for him and wanted to hear the sermon.
The last church, Eutaw, Alabama, my son and I were en route back to New Orleans from spending the weekend on the farm with my mom and the family. We had planned to stop for church along the way and this church, located 30 miles below Tuscaloosa on the interstate, was perfect. Rick Williams is the pastor, but we were meeting for the first time. My father-in-law grew up in Eutaw, so we figured that half the people around us were related in some way to my son.
What other pastors do irregularly--visit another church--I'm doing as a matter of routine. It occurs to me that we might make a suggestion or two as to what the visiting preacher will want to do. That's what follows:
I had been preaching for 10 years the first time I heard a Bible teacher say, "When you come to a 'therefore' in Scripture, stop and ask what it's 'there for.'" I thought, "Great. Why didn't I think of that?"
Wonder why I'd never heard it.
They say there are two parts to every sermon: what and so what?
The "what" is the doctrinal and "so what" the practical.
There's a little storefront church in Metairie, one of those "Unity" kinds, that bills itself as dealing with "practical Christianity." Like there's any other kind. If it's not practical, pertaining to normal people living their everyday lives, it's not the authentic, biblical variety.
You often find the "so what" in Scripture with the "therefore" passages. On the basis of what has gone before, here is how we are to live.
The Bible is filled with them. First, we'll take the ones in I Peter, then some of our favorites from the rest of the New Testament.
This should be fun to write.
I've saved the last item from our newspaper of a few days ago, knowing it had to furnish material for this blog but waiting for the moment. That moment has arrived. It has to do with the 3 candidates for Kenner mayor. Not a pretty thing.
The other two items are from today's Times-Picayune, one regarding a Saints football player, a free agent, who wants to stay with the team but is "not feeling love from the front office," and the other pertains to a candidate for city council in Kenner.
Let's take care of the last one first. It's the simplest.
The two candidates for this council post are compared side by side, ages, background, etc. I don't know either, but since I live in River Ridge and not Kenner, that's all right. What struck me was the company one of the candidates owns.
"Bill and Jerry Investments, Inc." That's the name of his company.
Now, I'll buy Ben and Jerry ice cream. I'll watch Tom and Jerry cartoons. But invest my hard-earned savings with Bill and Jerry Investments? I dunno. Sounds shaky to me. I'd be more comfortable if they used last names.
It reminds me of the time I flew Jet Blue airlines. I wanted the attendants to act more professional, and not spend their time playing games in the aisles with passengers. The short pants and polo shirts they wore didn't inspire my confidence, either.
I sat in a meeting Tuesday night with the board members of Global Maritime Ministries and noticed the new executive director of New Orleans Baptist Association, Dr. Duane McDaniel, sitting there in his suit and tie. Now, he's a classy guy and would look distinguished in a tank top and gym shorts. And maybe it's just me, but I like the way he presented himself. He looked professional.
The next time you see a pastor running around in ragged jeans and flip-flops, ask yourself what kind of confidence he inspires in you.
Second item. The disgrunted Saints player.
I hear you're having a tough time of it.
Good. Glad to hear it.
As I got it, a group in the church doesn't care for your leadership. They find fault with your sermons. They probably don't like the color of your tie (or worse, the fact that you don't wear one).
What makes their opposition dire is that they are the leaders of the church. Not a good thing.
Unity is always better than division.
You came close to resigning, I was told. You probably felt, "If I don't have the support of these elected leaders of the church, then I'll not be able to do anything here."
You actually wrote out a resignation, perhaps to see what it would feel like.
It felt wrong. You knew you were displeasing the wrong One, the Father who sent you there in the first place.
So, you chose to hang in there and try to give leadership to a church that is not sure it wants any.
Welcome to the ministry.
Scripture says, "It is good for a young man to bear the burden in his youth" (Lamentations 3:27). Whatever else that means, I suggest it is saying, "You might as well learn early on what you've gotten yourself into."
Sitting in front of the television the other evening as Hollywood was having its annual prom--it was Oscar night--I wondered something.
Who decides who steps to the microphone to receive an award?
When a movie's name is called as the winner of "best picture" or some other category in which a number of people have collaborated, who decides which member of that crowd stands, walks to the front, accepts the kiss from Penelope Cruz, and addresses the billion people who are tuned in?
Do they work this out in advance? Is it spontaneous? Do people get their feelings hurt when the wrong person steps up and takes credit?
Michael Curtiz directed "Casablanca," the incredible movie (my favorite) which took home several Oscars from the 1944 prom. He was named best director and the movie best picture of the year.
The other night, a Turner Classic Movie program on the three Warner Brothers was played. It's a new bio done by the granddaughter of one of the three--Albert, Harry, and Jack. Cass Warner makes no bones about it, that Jack was the rascal in the bunch. He talked the other two into selling the studio to a Boston firm, then the next day repurchased it so it would belong exclusively to himself. The rest of the family never forgave and never forgot.
An executive who worked on "Casablanca"--I failed to notice his name--told what happened when they announced the best picture award. "I was rising to my feet when I noticed Jack Warner already on his way to the front. He accepted the Oscar like he had had anything to do with this movie. It was my movie. I'm the one who made 'Casablanca' happen!"
A generation later, he still had not forgotten the offense or forgiven Jack Warner.
The line often attributed to Ronald Reagan goes like this: "There is no limit to what can be accomplished if you don't care who gets the credit." (It is also attributed to Walt Disney and others.)
That sounds great. And it's almost true. But not entirely. It matters a great deal who gets the credit.
It happens to every pastor a few times in his lifetime.
An event occurs in the community that attracts the attention of the world and shocks the members of his church. His people experience a mixture of grief, sadness, amazement, and anger. The event is front-page news for a week.
The thoughtful pastor decides there are moral dimensions in play here and spiritual lessons that need to be addressed.
The pastor decides to preach on that subject next Sunday.
Start praying for him. This is the toughest kind of sermon he will ever preach.
David Crosby did just this last weekend. He went about it so responsibly, approached it so carefully, and pulled it off so successfully, I felt other pastors would be interested in what he did.
Since June 1, 1996, David Crosby has led the historic First Baptist Church of New Orleans. Some eight years ago, he led them in a total relocation from the St. Charles Avenue site to an all new facility located at 5290 Canal Boulevard. Since Katrina (date: August 29, 2005), this church has been on the front lines of the rebuilding and renewal of New Orleans. My judgement is there is no pastor in the city more involved, more knowledgeable, and more caring than David Crosby.
Last Sunday, he titled the message: "The Danziger Bridge Conspiracy: A Confusion of Loyalties." The text was II Samuel 11:14-21,27, the account of David's adultery with Bathsheba and the participation of Joab, his general, in covering it up.
It's important for a pastor to know that David Crosby did not surprise his congregation with this sermon. He told them in advance, asked for their prayers, and involved several in internet (e-mail) discussions on how to approach the subject.
Telling the congregation in advance could also have served as a notice to anyone who chose to be absent that day for whatever reasons. Perhaps the event involved some family member or close friend and the pain was still fresh.
The front of the church bulletin Sunday introduced the sermon with background information:
"The Danziger Bridge is a vertical lift bridge which carries seven vehicular lanes of U.S.Route 90 (Chef Menteur Highway) across the Industrial Canal in New Orleans not far from the Baptist Seminary. When this bridge was completed in 1988, it was the widest lift bridge in the world. The structure itself is intriguing and unique, standing with its four great pillars towering above the highway and canal.
"Police responded to reports of gunshots on the bridge on September 4, 2005, in the chaotic aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Officers shot six civilians. Two of them died.
"Last week the lieutenant in charge of the police officers, Michael Lohman, pled guilty to the charge of conspiring to cover up the true nature of the shootings. Mr. Lohman worked the security detail for First Baptist Church for a number of years and is known to many of our members. The pastor's sermon this morning will be a response to these tragic developments in our city."
Good news is where you find it, and these days, living in New Orleans, we'll take all we can get. The New Orleans Saints won the Super Bowl exactly one month ago today. Regardless what people down here say ("I predicted this." Yeah, right. Sure you did.), we were as surprised as anyone else.
The downside of that great news is that a new season gets underway this summer and the Saints win will be ancient history. No sooner had Coach Sean Payton got back into the office on Airline Drive when sports reporters started badgering him, wanting to know, "Can you repeat?"
So much for the kind of good news we get in this life. Almost all of it has a dark side, something that takes the shine off it, that would rob it of a lasting joy. And yet, there are bits and pieces of news here and there that are light years beyond the other kind. They are pure joy and have no negatives whatever.
A few days ago, we gave the first 6 of our even dozen items of good news, the kind that never loses its luster and carries no negatives.
I promised to come back and give the last six. These are mine and the result of a lifetime of trying to live the Christian life. You'll think of more to add to it.
7. When the Lord Jesus comes into your life, you become a child of God.
Not just his servant or friend, but his child. Not his admirer or supporter or member. His child. Not just a convert, a number, a scalp to be counted, but the very own born-again child of the living God.
"As many as received him (Jesus), he gave the power (or right or authority) to become children of God, even to those who believe in his name" (John 1:12).
Now, I suspect you are aware that scripture uses many metaphors and similes to tell us all we are in Christ. There are places in the New Testament, for instance, that tell us we are adopted into God's family. And others tell us we are born again. Isn't this contradictory? Not at all. Each brings something special to the picture.
In the new birth (John 3:3), we leave behind our previous existence and begin our spiritual lives as newborn infants. In adoption (Romans 8:15 and Galatians 4:5), we enter at whatever real age we happen to be. The Roman custom of adoption sheds light on this. Instead of the way we do (adopting infants), the Romans adopted fully grown adults in order to have an heir.
So, we are children of God. The Apostle John said, "Behold, what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us that we should be called the children of God!" (I John 3:1) Indeed.
After a cold winter, everyone looks forward to the Spring. Well, today is March 5, and where I live--New Orleans, Louisiana--regardless of the calendar, it's Springtime. Later this week the temperature will reach the 70s and after that, we'll never look back.
The TV news people said today a number of economic indicators are really looking good in this country. We're ready for this kind of "springtime" also; the winter of our economic discontent has been devastating to so many.
But, there's a problem with this kind of good news. Know what it is?
After the Spring will come a blisteringly hot summer. And a few months later, winter again.
After a time of economic prosperity, sooner or later, there will come a downturn, a correction of the stock market, or whatever we choose to call it.
It's life.
So, is there good news anywhere with no shadow to it, no dark side, no "other side of the coin"?
You bet there is.
Here are an even dozen pieces of really, really great news, none of which carry harmful side effects. (Note: A second article will give the last half of this; below are the first six news items.)
"...knowing you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ."
Unless you belong to a conservative or even fundamental Christian church, you've probably not heard much about the blood of Christ lately. I'm not sure why. I do know that a quick scan of my bookshelves turned up not a single sermon on "the blood."
I heard of one Baptist church where it's actual church policy that no hymn celebrating the blood of Jesus will be used in a service. What they do with all the Scriptural texts on that subject beats me. I'm guessing that some leader has let the mania for political correctness drive his common sense from the room.
Jesus said the new covenant was "in my blood" (I Corinthians 11:25).
The writer of Hebrews said, "Without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness" (Heb. 9:22).
The Apostle John wrote, "The blood of Jesus Christ...cleanses us from all sin" (I John 1:7).
"Who are these clothed in white robes, praising the Lamb of Heaven? And where did they come from?" an elder asked. The Apostle John, in the midst of his vision, uttered, "You know who they are." The elder said, "These...have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." (Revelation 7:13-14)
Paul told the elders of Ephesus, "Shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood" (Acts 20:28).
You can preach a lot of sermons and ignore the subject of the blood of Jesus, but you'll have to pull a Thomas Jefferson to do it. (You will recall he took scissors and cut everything out of the New Testament which did not conform to his concept of God. He was more honest than many today who do the same thing, although without the shears.)
To the best of my knowledge no one has done with the doctrine of redemption through the blood of the Lamb what J. Sidlow Baxter did in "The Master Theme of the Bible." The first chapter of that book presents a broad summary of the entire message of Scripture on this subject.
I'm going to lay out the outline he uses, then add a word or two at the end which I hope readers will not skip.
Once you hear Calvin Miller, you never forget him. As creative a mind and as uncontainable an energy force as you will ever run up against. A preacher, pastor, professor, best-selling author, and accomplished author. And, I'm happy to say, a friend.
I heard him tell this story 15 years ago and have repeated my version of it ever since. Last night I found the notes taken from that message and felt that readers would enjoy it.
A traveler was making his way by foot through a strange and foreboding countryside. When a violent storm arose, he was forced to seek shelter. Coming upon a monastery, he was pleased to see a light shining through a window. He knocked. A monk came to the door.
"Come in, come in, stranger," said the monk.
The brothers fed him and let him warm by their hearth.
"Would thou care to spend the night under our roof rather than return to the storm?" said the abbott, the head monk.
"I would indeed and I'm grateful," said the traveler. "But in order to do so, I will need a few items. Could you please provide for me a rubber suit, a pound of butter, and a bass saxophone? Also, if you have it, two duck eggs and three turnips fresh from the garden."
That night, all kinds of noises came from the visitor's room. No one slept in the monastery that night.
The bad weather continued. The next night, the abbott invited the stranger to remain another night. "I thank you," he said, "And, if you would be so kind, I will once again require the use of the rubber suit and bass saxophone, and another pound of butter, two more duck eggs and three turnips."
That night was a repetition of the first, the strange noises filling the air, driving sleep from everyone. In all, as the storm lingered, the stranger stayed three nights. By now, the monks were beside themselves with fatigue.
On the morning of the fourth day, the sun came out.
As the visitor was leaving, the abbott walked out with him. "May I ask you what that was all about, this business of the rubber suit and the bass saxophone, the butter and eggs and turnips? All that noise coming from your room? We are beside ourselves with curiosity."
The stranger said, "It's an old family secret. I can tell you if you agree never to tell another living soul."
The abbott agreed never to breathe a word of it to anyone. So he told him.
My Interview with Pilgrim Radio Network (Western USA) March 3, 2010 - Subject: Church Conflict
26:41 minutes -- 11 Megabytes -- MP3
Click here to download and listen
Two things have laid the burden of adultery on my mind this morning.
This week, a friend in another state emailed that the membership of her church is being plundered and savaged by adulterous affairs. She is asking for prayer.
Yesterday, healthy "ministry marriages" was the subject of our "Interpersonal Relationship Skills" class at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Toward the end of the session, we talked about how the enemy sabotages the Lord's people through the lies of adultery.
I recommend J. Allan Petersen's 1984 book "The Myth of the Greener Grass." It should be bought and devoured and kept by every married person, particularly those in the Lord's work.
Here is my own personal list of the devil's lies concerning adultery. See if any have been dangled before your eyes.
Often, I like to use the Mississippi River as an analogy for the great torrent of offerings that flow from individuals into the church offering plates and eventually into the world.
I point out that this great body of water, which flows a couple of hundred yards below my house, is actually composed of individual drops that fell from the sky in a vast basin extending from Western New York State all the way to Eastern Montana.
In the same way, the hundreds of millions of dollars the churches of our denomination send to the fields of the world each year get their start from a child's piggy bank, a widow's pension and a young couple's tithe.
Yesterday, I had an epiphany, one of those moments when you realize there's far more to this than seemed obvious at first.
I was visiting a church not far from where I live. Although retired from being director of missions for the Baptist churches of metro New Orleans, they're still on my heart and anything I can do to encourage one, I want to do it. Mark Tolbert, seminary professor and recent interim pastor of our church, is completing one year as the interim shepherd of that congregation and I do treasure this man. I wanted to hear him preach.
So, yesterday, I worshiped at Williams Boulevard Baptist Church in Kenner, Louisiana.
They received two offerings. The first, in the middle of the service, went for the budget, that is, the full ministries of their church. The second, at the end, was being sent to our International Mission Board for recovery work in Haiti and Chile, following their devastating earthquakes.
I dropped a few dollars into the second offering and something hit me.
Just as there are numerous locks and dams along the great Mississippi River, obstacles we might say, which the waters have to negotiate before they arrive at the sea, the offerings we place in the plate have a number of hurdles to overcome before they reach their destination.
I once shared this story with Dr. Warren Wiersbe, who is a great admirer of Charles Haddon Spurgeon, considered by many to be the 19th century's greatest preacher. Even though Wiersbe had written of Spurgeon and probably knew as much about the man as anyone, he said he was unfamiliar with the story.
The source is an 1898 book, "The Unexpected Christ," by Louis Albert Banks. (My online used book source--www.alibris.com--had five copies; the cost ranged from $20 to nearly $100.)
The chapter in which the story is located is headed, "Christ Cleansing the Temple of the Soul," based from Luke 19:45-46.
"Mr. Spurgeon said that in his young ministry he received a tremendous spiritual uplift which was felt through all his later life by a strange revelation which came to him in a dream.
"He was sitting in an armchair, wearied with his work. He had fallen asleep in a very self-complacent sort of mood, as his work at the time was unusually successful. As he slept he thought a stranger entered the room, and though his face was benign, he carried suspended about his person measures and chemical agents and implements, which gave him a very strange appearance.
"The stranger came toward him, and extending his hand, said, 'How is your zeal?'