Coming to the Still Waters

I think the key to the above picture is that there are 5 men who are working together to move the large stone.  Maybe it started out with the man in the center.  He is struggling and pushing all alone.  The man to the far left notices his struggle and starts pulling from a different direction.  The man behind the center man comes at just the right time to get the edge of the stone slightly off the ground.  The two men to the right see a way to help and run to find a couple poles to put under the stone.  The poles provide more leverage and soon the seemingly immovable object is toppled over.  This would be my layman interpretation of this artwork. Trusting God can sometimes look like the above pictured block of stone.  The task of following after Him requires great strength of faith.  Jesus, Himself, said this of those who would follow Him after stating the block of stone that was in front of Him, ...saying, "It is necessary that the Son of Man  suffering many things and

I think I have my numbers right that this is episode #137.  We started on 9/11/2016.  We look back to Easter/Resurrection Sunday and the common theme that God has always provided a sacrifice. Jesus replaced the skins of the Garden. Jesus replaced the ram caught in the thicket's thorns. Jesus replaced the household Passover lamb. Jesus replaced the national Day of Atonement goat. Jesus became the once and for all sacrifice provided by God to deliver us from His very wrath. I hope this Sunday finds you able to be with other believers hearing the Word of God and singing praises to who He is. Adam

I'm learning that you need to catch their eyes.  This is a trip to see Jason and Samantha, Libby and Taylor.  Grandma had some quality time with the girls reading them stories.  Taylor veered away from the book to see what Grandpa was doing. Here is our Libby who is now 4!  She came to spend the weekend with Grandma and Grandpa and a treat was some chocolate chip gluten free cookies.  Grandma is at home in her kitchen and she loves to include the grandchildren. A recent trip to Colorado brought some fun on a little sledding hill with these three, Evan, Andy, and Adeline.  I got two of the three looking at me before heading down the slope on the tube. Now we are at the bottom of the hill and I still have two of the three.  They sure loved their time seeing how far they could go each time.   This one was still a little too young to be out on the slopes.  Little Connor did a lot of this.  Sometimes when you are so cute that is all you have to do.  These pict

Today's Wednesday in the Word is John chapter 7 and verses 37 through 44, which read, v.37, 38 - Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying,  “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.   He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’”  It is the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles or Booths.  Jesus has come in unannounced and made His way to the temple to teach and preach.  Many are confused at His teachings and His very appearance there because the crowd knew that the religious authorities wanted Him out of the picture but here He was right out in the open. One of the rituals of the festival is a procession of the priests with a water sacrifice taken from the Pool of Siloam.  This is where Jesus healed the man previously on the Sabbath.  The priests would bring jars of water to parade around the altar once each day during the festival and this was a reme

Another Easter/Resurrection Sunday in the books and what a grand day it was.  I want to share with you about three men who were part of the congregation yesterday.  They are not Larry, Moe, & Curley but John, Eric, & Gary.  They are not a comedy act but they had something in common on this celebrated day. Being a part of a local church and leading that local church puts you in the place to observe so many different types of people at different points of their lives.  Let me take these 3 men in order of my familiarity with them from least to greatest. ********************************************* John was sitting in the back of the sanctuary ahead of the 10 o'clock start time.  He was by himself reading the bulletin and its contents from cover to cover.  My wandering around the pews put me in front of him to offer our welcome as a congregation and a "Happy Easter."   "Are you from Oglesby?" I asked.  "No," he said, "I'm an

Happy Easter/Resurrection Sunday 2019!  We take a step back to Friday on the broadcast this morning and take a brief look at the 7 last sayings of Jesus on the cross through 6 horrendous hours.   Each phrase is important and shows us His commitment to fulfill the plan of His Father.  Jesus came to fulfill the law of God by being our substitute.  He took upon the wrath of God against our sin and hung in our place.  The God of love is consistent to provide a sacrifice for His wrath against sin to be satisfied.  He is love and He is just.  God has always been providing a sacrifice. He provided the sacrifice to Adam and Eve in the garden in the form of skins to wear.  He provided the sacrifice to Abraham and Isaac of the ram in the thorns.  He provided the sacrifice to the household of Israelites in Egypt of a passover lamb.  He provided the sacrifice of a nation passover lamb on the annual Day of Atonement.  Finally, He provided the Passover Lamb, Jesus the Messiah, for the whole w

Remember that hymn from Good Friday services of the past? "Down at the cross, w here my Savior died; Down where for cleansing  from sin I cried, There to my heart  was the blood applied; Glory to His name." I have the privilege of attending two Good Friday services today.  One is at noon and another in the evening.  I am sure that they will "look" much different from each other.  The settings will be different; the make up of those gathered will be different; the order of service will be different; the song selections will be different; and even the ministers leading the services will be different.   What will be similar is the focus of our attention.  Our focus will be on the cross, an empty one, and the One who once hung there.  We will be reminded of the great agony that Jesus, our Savior and Messiah, went through.  The punishment was necessary for the substitution to be complete for the remission of sins.  The plan from the beginning needed t

Today's Wednesday in the Word is John chapter 7 and verses 32 through 36, which read, v.32 -  The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering these things about Him, and the chief priests and the Pharisees sent officers to seize Him. Jesus has quietly came into the Feast of Booths and made His way into the temple to start preaching and teaching.  What is ruffling the authorities feathers are the words that Jesus is using to explain the close relationship between Himself and His Father, Father God.  The crowd is in a state of confusion to this man named Jesus who the authorities wanted killed but He is here speaking openly in the temple.   The chief priests were mainly made up of the sect called the Sadducees who didn't believe in the bodily resurrection at the end of days.  The Pharisees did and therefore these two groups didn't usually associate with one another but now they had a common enemy.  The officers called here would have been the Temple Guard which were

We have made it to Holy Week 2019.  I find it helpful to lay out the days of this week to remember what Jesus was doing as He was heading to the cross and the resurrection from grave.   I have said this before but www.gotquestions.org is a great resource to gather information from the Bible.  Just type your question in the search bar and away you go to Bible answers from the Bible.  I assembled the summaries below from this online resource.  Sunday - yesterday - Palm Sunday - the 10th day of Nisan - the first day of the week - lamb selection day - Jesus enters Jerusalem on the foal of a donkey to fulfill the prophecy found in Zechariah 9:9 - He receives the praise of the people saying "Hosanna!" Monday - today - Holy Monday - the 11th day of Nisan - Jesus cleanses the temple - Jesus curses the fig tree Tuesday - Holy Tuesday - the 12th day of Nisan - Jesus challenges the religious authorities - Jesus commends the sacrificial gift of the widow giving her all - Je

Palm Sunday 2019 and also episode #98 of Down To The River. Today I read for us the passage dealing with Jesus' entrance into Jerusalem and set us up for a holy week that includes the testing, the Passover, the betrayal, the trial, the cross, and the grave.  Jesus will enter Jerusalem to the cheers of the people saying "Hosanna!" but he will exit to many chanting "Crucify Him!" I pray that you will have a great holy week that will include a Good Friday observance and a Resurrection Sunday celebration.  The resurrection is so important because Romans chapter 10 and verses 8b and 9 say,... This is the message of faith that we proclaim: If you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. We see a two fold response of us to what was accomplished on the cross.  We confess and we believe.  We confess that there is no other lord than the Lord Jesus Christ.  W

Waiting, don't you hate it at times? Waiting in the waiting room to see the doctor. Waiting in traffic (recent experience in Chicago). Waiting on the runway. Waiting in line (recent experience at a grocery store in downtown Chicago). Waiting for the other person to stop talking. Waiting for the results (a real experience for a cancer survivor after each CT scan). Waiting for the timer to ding. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. Waiting in line for the use of the bathroom. Maybe you could add a few more to my list. This was the topic of the devotional given at the Interim Pastor Ministries training in Chicago this week.  I had the pleasure of going through the course again, writing down a ton of notes and meeting others in the field.  The presenter was an IPM interim pastor from Colorado Springs, Colorado named Rick Foster.  His excellent website is:  www.interimpastor.org The verse drawn to was Psalms chapter 39 and verse 7, which reads, "Now, Lord,

Wednesday in the Word is John chapter 7 and verses 25 through 31, which read, v.25-27 - So some of the people of Jerusalem were saying, "Is this not the man whom they were seeking to kill?  Look, He is speaking publicly, and they are saying nothing to Him.  The rulers do not really know that this is the Christ, do they?  However, we know where this man is from; but whenever the Christ may come, no one knows where He is from." Jesus has quietly come into the Festival of Booths in the city of Jerusalem.  He has made His way to the temple not to perform some miracle but to teach openly about who He is.  The information is getting around that the religious leaders want Jesus killed.  The crowd is now confused.   "If they want Jesus killed, why aren't they doing something about it?  He is right here in the temple.  Maybe this is just all talk?  Maybe the religious leaders are not sure and this could be the Messiah and not just some crazy man talking about God

For the life of this one given the spiritual gift of pastoring to equip the saints especially in the area of pastoring/shepherding one another, sometimes I have early mornings when my sleep is done.  My mind is full and I just need to succumb to rising and starting my day.  This physical day greets me with an unseasonably warm morning after a glorious day with God's family assembled in Oglesby, Illinois. Yesterday included the preaching of a sermon that was very important to me.   I left a denominational system that I was a part of for 28 years to serve in a non-denominational church for the last 4 1/2 years.  I went from church polity set for me from a common book of Discipline spread across all the churches of the denomination to a statement in the 125 year constitution of this church that reads, "This church is independent, self-governing and is not affiliated with any denominational group." There is no one higher up that is going to figure this out for y

I am delivering a sermon this morning that will probably be about 40 minutes long.  How do I know?  Because I have poured over this message many times and I was really curious how long I was passionately talking about the topic of church leadership.  It is a sermon timely needed for our congregation but it is also a sermon that I needed to prepare for personally so I can carry it wherever I go.   The Bible gives us so much material on this topic.  Why have we strayed from what is written and created structures that look like the world rather than the family of God?  This is definitely the most intense look I have given to church leadership primarily because I came from a denomination that had it all figured out for you.  Being a part of an independent church has helped me to look deep into the Scriptures and formulate from them why we do what we do. One line from my sermon is, "Our continuing effort to understand  and implement Biblical standards." I guess my