The Heart of the Abortion Debate

Generally I try to be pretty neutral on election year issues.  I have my positions and those that know me know where I stand.  However, in the last two months I and other Pro-Life supporters have been called everything under the sun and I feel that somethings must be said.  The final straw was found this week in an editorial I read on CNN.com that attempted to convince me that if I wanted abortions to decline, then I needed to support the expansion of the social safety net.  Obviously the discussion has gotten of the track.

The heart of the abortion debate is not a "war on women" or the "insensitivty of men to women's needs."  The heart of the debate is not "are you gonna pay to support these children that are born to mother's who don't want them."  The heart of the debate isn't even about being a Republican or a Democrat.  The heart of the debate is personal responsiblity.

In the last fifty years of American society abortion is the leading cause of death.  Not cancer, heart disease, or drunk driving but abortion.  There is no scientific argument that is available to claim that life begins at any point other than conception.  Whether you believe that a fetus is human or not is a matter of worldview, but the argument about whether or not it is alive has been settled by science from the beginning.

Thus, by choosing to engage in sexual activity, a woman and a man have chosen to create a life.  Now the matter of personal responsiblity comes into play.  Abortion offers people the opportunity to erase the consequence of their previous choice.  Rather than have to live with, handle, and face the results of their actions, abortion allows one to simply take a mulligan and eliminate the consequence. 

This mentality has demonstrated itself in all areas of American society.  Men, who refuse to support the child they helped to create, often run from their responsiblities to their children.  Children often exhibit bad behavior without facing the consequence of that action.  No fault divorces often dissolve families not because of abuse or neglect but because of preference and desire.  Celebrities often engage in public destructive behavior without ever facing the negative results of those activities.  By eliminating the consequences of our choices we also eliminate personal responsiblity from the equation.  Instead the mantra of the day becomes "Don't I deserve to be happy?"

Abortion is a symptom of the unwillingness to accept the consequences of our choices.  We would rather kill the life of the unborn rather than accept the consequences of the choices we have made. 

"What about rape, incest, and the life of the mother?"  Rape and incest are terrible crimes.  No rapist should ever have parental rights.  Incest that is the result of abuse is rape and should be classified the same way.  In these cases, the women who are victims of crimes should be given medical care by the state and offered the option of keeping the child as many of them do, or placing the child up for a fast track adoption. 

The Bible often offers the use of deadly force as a means of defending ones on life.  In the case of a medical emergency the termination of the unborn is reasonable in order to save the life of the mother.  This should never be a first option nor an easy one, but is a necessary exemption.

Choices have consequences.  We, as a people, seem to have forgotten that.  As a result, we have lost personal responsibility.  Many believe that the government should be responsible for our well being.  Others believe that the churches and society should be responsible for our well being.  However, the only person who is responsible for your well being is you. 

Let us stop trying to eliminate the consequences of our choices and let us begin to rebuild the personal responsiblity that we called to carry.  Only then will the choices we make become better choices with  better consequences. 

God Bless

Preparation for the Coming Election

Greetings,

As we all know the elections are just over forty days away.  In the last few weeks I have seen a renewed emphasis on the need to pray for the elections.  With this sentiment I whole-heartedly agree.  However, I wanted to take a few moments and make sure that we focus our prayers on the right target.

Many people will go to their knees in prayer for their particular candidate to win or for their particular party to obtain power.  However, I am quite certain that this is the wrong emphasis for our prayers.  Over the last sixty years, a steep moral and spiritual decline has overcome our society.  Sin has become acceptable and righteousness has been labeled "hate" and "intolerant."  This decline has come on the watch of both conservatives and liberals.  This decline has come while having Southern Baptist, Methodist, Catholics, and Episcopalians in the office of the presidency. 

The reality is that we have a spiritual problem in our country that cannot be solved by political activity.  Rather, political activity has in many ways distracted the church from its mission.  2 Timothy 2 speaks directly to this point for us today.  Paul, while imprisoned by the Roman authorities, does not call for civil disobedience or political action.  Rather he encourages Timothy to be a good soldier and remain faithful to the call of the Gospel. 

The only hope our society has today is the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  This has been its only hope from the beginning.  When the church forgets that, then the church has lost her ability to truly affect change.  There is no lasting political solution, there is no lasting economic solution, and there is no lasting social solution to the issues we face in America today.  The only true sustaining solution that exists is the Gospel of Jesus Christ taking hold of hearts and changing lives through the power of the Holy Spirit.

When we pray leading up to this election, let us not entagle ourselves in civilian matters.  Rather let us pray for the release of the Gospel upon the hearts and lives of those who are running for office and voting for those officers.  The Gospel is the power of God to bring about salvation.  Let us not forget that as we talk about abortion, gay marriage, or terrorism.  Let us be as faithful in sharing the Gospel message with those we meet as we are in sharing our political views. 

Pray that God will expand his kingdom in the hearts and lives of those who know him and pray that he will expand his kingdom into the hearts and lives of those who do not.  Pray that his will be accomplished in the coming days.  Pray for a move of his presence that will draw men closer to him.  Pray that he would draw you closer to his side.

Then take time to vote.  Every believer has the civic responsiblity to vote according to the leading of the Holy Spirit in your life.  Vote with confidence and with pride.  Vote, but do not forget that the hope of our nation does not lie in your vote, it rest soley in your willingness to share the Gospel.

God Bless

Getting Back in the Saddle

Well this was my second full week back at work from our migration to Denver. I nearly forgot how good it feels to work. I also nearly forgot how awesome spending time with our church family is as opposed to just seeing them on Sundays. The summer missionaries are working hard and they are both being used by God to do great things. Last week they helped Hillcrest Baptist Church with Vacation Bible School and were able to see two children come to Jesus Christ as their Savior. They also led worship with our praise band Sunday. They did an excellent job. People were singing and worshipping in ways that I had not seen in our church. We also had a number of visitors in church with us this past week. Please pray that God will continue to draw his flock together for worship and cooperation here in Riverton. This week we are making final preparation for Vacation Bible School. We will be leading a prayer walk and an invitation distribution for familes to come and participate in VBS with us next week. Pray that God will use us to spread his Gospel in our community. Finally, I was reading Revelation 1 yesterday morning and the reality of God's revelation of himself in Jesus Christ came breaking through on me again. When we see Jesus Christ revealed we see the nature and character of God on display. Jesus who lived and breathed and walked with humanity displays to us the fullness of God. When we face hardships and difficulties. When we struggle with sin and with self. When we encounter discouragement and fear. We can take couraged because just as Jesus led his disciples through the most trying and difficult steps of their lives, God is leading us in ours. God bless you all in the coming week.

I Am Back

Well it has been a couple of months since I last updated my blog.  We have been quite busy.  In the last couple of months we brought home our babies, received out two summer missionaries, and have planned quite a bit of activity for the summer.  I am hoping to take time each Monday to update this blog and to keep everyone aware of what we are doing and how God is working.

First of all the babies are doing great.  They are growing and they are happy, even if they are not sleeping all the time.  Sharon and I are learning to be parents and we both have developed a new appreciatation for the love of God.  That God would offer his son for us takes on a whole new meaning when we look into the faces of our precious children.

Secondly, we have our new summer missionaries.  They are Quinn and Lora.  I cannot tell you how much I like both of them.  Their love for God and others shines through in everything that they do.  Quinn led worship for us for the first time yesterday.  He did an excellent job, even if I did hang him out to dry.  Lora worked with our children's church and learned some valuable tips for ministry outdoors.  Lora is also designing our new church brochure and I cannot wait until it is completed.  This week they will be helping with Vacation Bible School at Hillcrest Baptist Church here in Riverton.  I pray that God will use them greatly in this work.  Pray for them and Hillcrest also.

When I look at these two wonderful young people I am greatly humbled.  God has entrusted me with helping them prepare for ministry for this summer.  That is not a charge that I take lightly.  However, it also brings back into focus my calling as a pastor of this church.  The effort that I put into helping Quinn and Lora push on towards maturity is the same efforts that I must put into helping all of our church press on towards maturity as well.  We are all to be transformed by the renewing of our minds and to seek to be mature and complete in Christ.  I pray that Quinn and Lora will learn a great deal with Summer and they will be faithful ambassadors of the Kingdom but I also thank God that they are teaching and growing me everyday.

Until next time God bless.

Making the Most of Easter

This year our church is combining our Easter services with an outreach effort to families. By hosting a breakfast and an Easter Egg hunt between our sunrise service and our Sunday School we are providing an opportunity for families to celebrate Easter with us. We did this with a degree of success while I was in Florida and managed to reach out to several families we would not have reached otherwise. The fact that we are doing this has brought raised some concerns though within my thinking process. Most of our churches are engaged in sign evangelism. Mainly we hang out the open sign and hope that the people will come into our churches. The problem is that we do this poorly. We do not follow up on the visitors that do stumble into our churches and we often fail to make them feel welcome. We have committed the sin of partiality as described in James 2. While James points this at those who would honor the wealthy and despise the poor, we tend to honor the familiar and ignore the new. Rather than displaying the love of Christ to those who come into our times of worship we tend to ignore them. I am not talking about a false smile and a fake handshake, but a genuine delight in their presence that they might hear the word of God and be changed by their encounter with him during our times of worship. This week as visitors enter our churches for their annual Easter visit, let us show them something different. Let's show them the love of Christ and the joy of the Lord in our actions, activities, and expressions. Let's make them feel welcome and appreciated. Finally, let's get some contact information so that we can follow up with them. God's blessiings

Understanding the Mercy of God

One of the truly great attributes of God is his mercy.  To grasp the mercy of God we must understand the absolute holiness of God.  Consistently, the Bible testifies to the holiness of God as an essential element of his nature.  When Isaiah saw the Lord in his heavenly vision, the angels surrounding the throne did not declare the love of God but rather declared his holiness.  Holiness reflects a purity that has never been stained.  Holiness is complete and total righteousness.  Holiness is God.

The holiness of the creator creates a barrier between himself and his creation.  Creation is unholy.  All of creation is stained with sin and unrighteousness.  While I may not be as bad a person as someone else, in comparison to God I am unholy.  When placed against the standard of God's holiness Romans 3:23 becomes all the more accurate.  When it states that all have sinned and fallen short of God's glory it gives testimony from the Holy Spirit of God against all of humanity. 

In Genesis, God begins a pattern of judgment upon sin.  We witness his judgment in expelling Adam and Eve from the Garden.  We see his judgment upon Cain for the murder of Abel.  His judgment is revealed in the flood.  We see God's judgment against sin throughout the Old Testament and we see his judgment on display in the New Testament as well.  We are promised that God will ultimately judge all of humanity for their sins because he is holy and he cannot and will not allow sin to go unpunished.

Now, here is the mercy of God on display.  God first displays his mercy by offering general grace to his creation.  God could wipe us all out with disasters, drought, and famine as a means of punishing us for our temporal sins.  At times God has done this in a local sense, but he could rightfully do this in a global sense as well.  Why?  No one is innocent of sin and thus deserve God's judgment.  However, he refrains from this judgment because of his mercy.

Secondly, God displays his mercy to us through Jesus Christ.  Since man was enslaved to sin and could not save himself from this slavery, God came forth in Jesus Christ to pay the price for our sin through his death.  Only the blood of a spotless and sinless sacrifice could atone for our sins and that is what God gave us in Jesus Christ.  2 Corinthians 5:21 testifies that it is through Jesus Christ we may become the righteousness of God.

God's mercy for us is best described as God not giving us what we deserve.  However, not only does He not give us what we deserve in his mercy.  He also provided what we needed in his mercy.  This week I want to challenge you to think about the penalty you have earned because of your sin and then offer thanks to God for the price he paid that your penalty might be covered by him.

God Bless

The Promise of God

I often hear people talk about the promise of God in the church today. They talk about claiming the promises, taking assurity from the promises, and celebrating the promises. However, I am not sure that we have not become like the Israelites of old. We often seek to claim the positive promises of God without condition and we seek to ignore the negative promises of God that we are much more likely to receive. One of the promises of God that I rarely hear anyone talk about is God's promise in Revelation 3:15-16. God promises the church in Laodicea that because they were neither cold nor hot he would vomit them from his mouth. The lukewarm church was an abomination to God and as a consequence he promised to spit them out. Does this not strike a holy fear into our hearts? As we look at the church in America today, can we not see the lukewarm nature of Laodicea within our fellowships? Can we not see this nature within ourselves? In this day when over a million souls enter eternity without Christ each time the sun sets, can we expect God to overlook our lukewarmness? With the unbridled access to the word of God that this country has afforded can we not expect God to hold us accountable for our unwillingness to know his word and believe it? I would beg you to allow God to search your heart and ask what we must do to be warmed by the fires of God to a rolling boil for him. Revelation 3 records God's promise to the church as well that if we will repent, return to holiness, and open the door of our hearts to the Lordship of Jesus Christ then he will come in and have fellowship with us. Brothers and sisters, how long has it been since we have had true fellowship with him? How long has it been since he has been invited into our hearts and our lives to be Lord once again? Today, I would invite you to believe the promise of God and to draw near to his heart that your life may be changed and that our churches may be revived. Claim this promise of God that if we will open the door of our hearts he will come in and we will never be the same.

The Absence of Prayer

The more I read and study about men who were gripped by God throughout histrory, the more I witness their undeniable reliance upon prayer.  Whether that man was Mueller, Taylor, Finney, Whitfield, or Wesley, the greatest characterisitic of their lives and their ministry was their prayers.  We have many who would lead today that can many things said about them, they are men of vision, men of accomplishment, and men of determination but can we call them men of prayer?  Prayer has been replaced in many of our pastorates by leadership books, strategies, and advertising.  While none of those things are bad, they are no substitute for prayer. 
Our lack of prayer today directly corresponds to our lack of power in our churches.  All the powers of the flesh and the forces of Hell are working to keep the souls of men enslaved to sin.  As a result, God has made his unlimited power available to us for the battle.  Yet we march forth defeated and dejected.  We make excuses and we soothe our conscience by changing the goals.  All in an effort to cover the fact that we have failed to pray.
Leonard Ravenhill stated "This generation of the church needs to pray more than any previous generation, but we probably pray less."  There is more truth in that one sentence than I have time to address, but the absence of prayer cannot be ignored.  We cannot achieve a spiritual result through planning and hard work.  Those are essential elements to the church for certain, but they are only effective once they have been empowered through prayer. 
The faithful Bible teacher John Fletcher would teach his students about the great doctrines of God and after lecturing for one hour would end his class with this statement: "That is the theory, now will the ones who want the practice come along to my room?"  The subsequent session would be spent in prayer for hours until every man had the full assurance of what he had been praying for.  When was the last time any of us spent three hours in prayer about anything?  Wesley prayed for a minimum of three hours a day for he understood that the work he undertook was too great to bear without the time in prayer.  When Wesley died he left behind six five pound notes, a set of silver spoons, and thousands of souls that had entered the kingdom through his ministry.  D.L. Moody prayed and then he worked.  The greatest testimony of Moody is made by one of his harshest critics who stated "The population of Hell has been decreased by at least a million souls because of D.L. Moody."
One may say that those things are fine but God does not move like that today.  I would counter that the Word of God declares that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  God's arm has not shortened nor has his strength weaked.  I would say that God is moving just like this all around the world where his people come to him and pray with a passion for his work, his will, and his way. 
Revival is burning across the plains of the Sudan, across the snows of the old Soviet Union, and among the mountains of South Korea.  Will you join them in prayer?  Will you seek the power that has been promised for salvation of souls?  Will you crave the filling of the Holy Spirit in your life?  Will you plead for the annointing of God upon your preaching and teaching?  Will you pray and not let go of God in prayer until he has let go of you?

Willing for Revival

I have been struggling with the matter of revival now for several months. I have prayed about it and I have studied it. I believe that our greatest need today is for the burning of revival fires. However, I am confronted time and again with whether or not I am truly willing to pay the price to experience revival. Charles Finney believed that revival was not a miracle of God. Rather revival was the result of meeting God according to the conditions he has defined and trusting in his providence to bring the revival he has promised. The more I look at the the Scriptures I find this to be true. When the people of God met the conditions for revival, then revival always came. When they determined that no matter what the cost they would walk in righteounsess with God and others, seek God in prayer and repentance, and surrender themselves absolutely and completely to his will and his way, then revival came. This was the promise God made to Solomon in 2 Chronicles 7:14, this was the promise that was claimed by Jehosaphat in 2 Chronicles 20, and this was the promise displayed in the reign of Josiah in 2 Chronicles 34. Each time, as the people of God met the conditions of revival a mighty move of God came upon the people. I believe that if we were willing to meet these requirements today we would experience revival as well. However, I am not sure that we are willing to pay the price for revival. To experience revival today we must determine to live in a righteous way. That means we must be willing to mend our relationship with God and with one another. We must forgive and even more devestatingly, we must acknowlege our own failings, apologize, and ask for forgiveness of those we have offended. We must put aside gossip, backbiting, and slander. If we are unwilling to pay this price, then we are unwilling to experience revival. Secondly, we must be willing to seek the leadership of God in every area of our lives and we must repent of our sins. This means that we must turn aside from anything that we think, say, or do that displeases God. We must allow the Spirit of God to search our hearts and our lives to find any sins that we have hidden. We must confess those sins and put them aside. Not only must we turn from our sins, but we must allow God to lead us in our activity. We not only must avoid doing wrong things, but we must do right things as well as the Lord leads. Third, we must surrender completely. This is a great demand. To surrender requires us to give up control. This is to allow God to move as he sees fit and to work as he sees best without our obstruction. Without this surrender revival can never truly be unleashed in our lives. Stephen Olford defined revival as "Times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord." Revival must begin in the hearts of God's people. Revival is an encounter with God first and foremost that results in a lasting change. When we are brought back from the place of carnality and sin that so easily sets upon us, then true revival is taking place. When the world sees the presence of God on display, then the lost are drawn by the Spirit of God as he calls, convicts, and converts the lost in this time of refreshing. The question that we must ask ourselves is "Are we willing to pay the price for revival?" Is this what we are willing to do in order to see a move of God. If we are not, then we can be certain that revival will remain absent from our churches and our lives, but if we are then we can prepare to see God honor his word and unleash himself like we have never imagined. Are you willing?

What Is Missing Here?

I was reading Leonard Ravenhill's Revival Praying this morning when I was stopped by this quotation, "It is not God's plan that the world be merely evangelized ultimately.  It should be evangelized in every generation."  That quote by T.A. Hegre highlights the absolute absence of something within the church today.  The first century church carried the gospel to the entire known world within less than a century.  The Gospel went into the heart of Africa, Asia, and Europe.  From Ethiopia to Spain to India, the gospel covered the world.  Without mission boards, strategic planning, and financial resources the world was evangelized in a way that has never been duplicated.

Today we have all those other things.  We have resources, media, plans, and technology that the apostles could never have fathomed.  But we lack something.  What is missing in our efforts that have resulted more and more in a failing to reach the world in our subsequent generations?  I offer some basic but, I believe, profound answers to that question.

First we lack the power of the Holy Spirit.  I am not talking about a Pentecostal experience.  I was raised a Pentecostal and I have seen the shouting and the tongues.  I have been in services where men and women ran pews and fainted to the floor.  However, the result within their lives testified to the fact that while there was a mighty wind the Lord was not in it.  The New Testament reveals time and time again that the power of the Spirit affords two results.  The first is a changed life and the second is an empowered ministry in the life of the believer and the church.  Whether it is Peter on the Day of Pentecost or Paul in the city of Damascus, when the power of God was present lives where changed and the church was set ablaze.  We need men and women of God who are filled with the Spirit today.  The Bible commands that we are to be continually filled with the Spirit and that does not happen by accident.  We are to seek this filling of the Spirit in our lives everyday.

Secondly, we lack the proper priorities.  I am ashamed that environmentalist will give more for their misguided beliefs than we will give for our risen savior.  For the environmentalist, there is nothing in this life more important than preserving the environment.  This year we have witnessed the environmentalist work to kill an oil pipeline that could changed the entire economic state of our country, yet we continue to see those who claim to be followers of Christ unable to evanglize our neighborhoods.  Either the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the most important aspect of our living or it is not.  If it is not, then it is time to make a change.  We must live our lives as though the world is lost and that Hell is real.  We must live our lives as though our love for the savior is our greatest love.  We must live like the Gospel is the only hope for humanity because the truth of the matter is that it is.

Finally, we lack a lifestyle of prayer.  Samuel Chadwick stated "Brethern, the crying sin of the church is her laziness after God."  I cannot disagree.  We have placed our focus on organizational change, missional strategies, construction of buildings, and policitcal power rather than on a relationship with God.  The early church had no power, political influence, or financial security but they had much prayer resulting in relationship.  We have much of the former and little of the latter.  Consequently, they reached the world in less than a century and we are no closer to reaching the world with the Gospel today than we were in 1980.  Truthfully, we haven't even reached the United States yet with the Gospel.  I live in a state that has 64 communities without an evangelical gospel witness.  We must return to prayer that seeks after God for his will and his way for his glory.

I am twenty-nine years old.  I have been in vocational ministry since I was fifteen.  I have seen fads, strategies, and organizational alterations.  But I have not seen our world evangelized and I have not seen true revival.  I look at my newborn children and I pray that by the time they are my age, they will not share that same testimony with me.  I invite you to join me in seeking the filling of the Spirit for your life, getting our priorities in order, and returning to prayer as we seek God.

God's Blessings

Moving the Goalpost

This week Congress held hearings on the Obama administration's contraception requirement. As I have looked at the coverage, I am wondering "Who moved the goalpost?" People are upset because there were no women on the witness list to discuss women's health. I thought the hearing was about religious liberty and this administration's policies. I absolutely believe that women should be on a panel about women's health, but that was not this panel. This is a discussion on religious liberty. Let us not blur the lines. The Constitution restricts the government from making laws that prohibit the free exercise of religion. That is the matter of this discussion. Women's health is an important matter, but so is religious liberty. Freedom requires people to make choices. If a woman wishes to have coverage for contraception, then she can choose an employer that offers that coverage. The solution is not to require religious groups to violate their consciences. Let's keep the focus on the main thing. I do not pretend to have all the answers, but to reach a meaningful solution we must allow a full discussion of all the issues to take place. Pray for our leaders that they may have the Lord's wisdom in this and all their discussions.

Ministry From a Distance

As I sit in my wife's hospital room, I am struggling with the many different circumstances of ministry from a distance. I am seven hours away from my flock and I miss them greatly. I struggle with questions about how to encourage and help them in this time of personal struggle. I wrestle with how I can demonstrate to them the love and affection I feel for them from the other side of the moon.
I believe that many ministers struggle with these questions. How do we fulfill our calling when the circumstances of life have driven us away. Here are a few of my suggestions.
1. The telephone still works and people do like to hear from their pastor.
2. Notes and cards to thank and encourage others are always a way to express your care, concern, and thanks.
3. Pray for your people by name often and let them know that you are praying for them.
Nothing beats the personal contact that comes from ministry on the field, but my people have taught me quite a bit about ministry from a distance. As they have reached out to me, I have discovered how I can reach out and minister to them.