Coming to the Still Waters

It has been almost a year since we have seen Anna and Phil, Joshua and Evelyn.  It is a long way from Maine to Texas and especially from the eastern most part of Maine.  This is our connecting flight in New York and greeting for all travelers at LaGuardia.  It makes a long day but worth it to see those that we love so much. I have been trying to share some of what I have learned each week from my master's class that I am taking online.  I am thankful for the interaction with the professor through the ZOOM sessions.  I fear I would not be doing as well without this face to face contact and also being able to hear his explanations.  I take so many more notes when I listen to someone rather than just read the words on the page. When the word "gospel" was used during Jesus' time, it was a victory chant that the king had come or that a new kingdom was being put into place.  Another definition of this word is "good news."   The "good news" is th...

Today's Wednesday in the Word is John chapter 11 and verses 38 through 46. v.38 - So Jesus, again being deeply moved within, came to the tomb.  Now it was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. After Jesus had stayed put for two more days, He arrives in the vicinity of the home of Lazarus, Martha and Mary.  Jesus speaks to Martha in theological terms about the resurrection and that He was the resurrection.  Later, when Jesus is with Mary, the same response is echoed that her sister said to Jesus, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died."  This time Jesus doesn't not go into the theological answer but weeps with those who are weeping.  As noted last time, this weeping is more than just the shedding of tears but also a distressed sorrow for the lament of physical death in the light of a physical resurrection and eternal life. What is tremendous about this verse is that it describes the scene that will be played out in a few ...

Another great weekend and article that came across the websites that I frequent regularly.  This one is titled, "10 Traits of a Humble Leader" by Moses Y. Lee.  In my position as an intentional interim pastor and coaching an upcoming pastoral search team, I'm always looking for tools to help us evaluate resumes and eventually video and in person interviews.  I want to give the tools to answer the question, "What should we be looking for?"  Here is the link to the actual article:   https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/10-traits-humble-leader/ I want to give my bullet point version of Mr. Lee's 10 points pitting the humble leader versus the arrogant leader.  Humble leaders share resources.  Arrogant leaders hoard resources.  Humble leaders are bridge-builders .  Arrogant leaders are work-a-loners .  Humble leaders ignores gossip.  Arrogant leaders spread or entertain gossip.  Humble leaders are king-make...

Let's start with a picture to show that Stephanie and Buddy are doing well.   This is a beautiful old railroad bridge spanning the Machias River.  The rails are gone and the bed is now used for foot, horse, snowmobile, and atv traffic. Here is the bell of the Machias Valley Baptist Church.  The history is the maker of the bell was an apprentice to Paul Revere.  He is known for making bells with a more melodious sound.   While up in the tower I took this shot looking out over the Machias River.  I keyed in on the door which is common in this area.  There are many very colorful front doors in this area of the country.  Maybe it was for direction purposes.  "Look for the house with the yellow door." Out the front window of where we are staying, we have seen this color many evenings this summer.  We never get tired of seeing the sun light up the sky. Just a little hint of what is to...

I want to give full credit to what I write today so therefore I will even post the picture of the one I am referring to.  This is Rev. Dr. Gregory K. Beale (PhD, Cambridge) who holds the J. Gresham Machen chair of New Testament and is research professor of New Testament and biblical interpretation at Westminster Theological Seminary. Before coming to Maine, I was accepted to Belhaven University to take an online masters course of Biblical and Theological Studies.  I knew this would be pushing me with a full interim pastoring schedule but I thought the extra education would help me in the long haul.  I ordered the prescribed books and one of them as "God Dwells Among Us" co-written by the man pictured above.  The subtitle is "Expanding Eden to the Ends of the Earth." In preparations for coming to this assignment, I was combing the internet to learn as much about Machias Valley Baptist Church and the area as I could.  The church website brought up the name...

Some more film has come back from far, far away and we get to see what I captured.  The above is the inside shot from the balcony of the Congregational Church in East Machias, Maine.  The organ pipes are so ornate and originally it was played with the assistance of a man behind the curtains on the side hand pumping the billows.  The addition was built around this organ.  The sad part of the story is that the church has not been occupied for a year as the 8 to 12 people meet in the parsonage living room next door.  This is a common story with many of the churches in the small towns of Maine. This is another coastline shot from a beach further east than we reside.  The tides here range from 13 to 15 feet and therefore the large rocks in the foreground are covered at least once a day.  I wish I could picture how smooth they are just like the little ones on the beach.  The salt of the ocean works its magic to produce such precious sites. ...

What did I learn this week through my online master's class?  I'm glad you asked! I learned that the Bible is like a river.  I grew up around the Rifle River in the northern lower peninsula of Michigan.  I spend many hours paddling down this one river with its many sections.  The Bible is like a river.  It is one book but it has many sections but it is still one book like the Rifle River, with its many sections, is just one river.   Many times we would put in at the little town of Selkirk and travel down to a pickup point at the Moffat Bridge.  It was a good eight hour paddle through the many sections.  We gave them names like "the highbanks," and "the pipeline rapids" but they were just a part of the all one river, "The Rifle."   The Bible is one book with our sections designated by book names and even literary type sections but it is still one book in the end with one author (God), one subject (Jesus), and one message (God...

Our Wednesday in the Word takes us into a new chapter of John's gospel, chapter 11.  I put in the title "fashionably late" but by the picture I would say it is more accurate to convey that Jesus was "delayed on purpose."   We venture in today to one of Jesus' most spectacular miracles which would rival in my mind the feeding of the 5,000.  Along the way, Jesus will give us some salvation truths larger in eternal value than the physical raising of Lazarus from the dead. v.1-3 Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.  It was the Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped His feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick.  So the sisters sent word to Him, saying, "Lord, behold, he whom You love is sick." We are introduced to the family of two sisters and one brother, Martha, Mary, and Lazarus.  They are of the town of Bethany just about two miles out from the holy city of Jerusa...

The school buses start their routes tomorrow morning in this part of the nation.  I can identify with the children in the above picture as I was a bus rider for 13 years of my public school education.  We could hear the bus turning the corner from a quarter of a mile away and would run down the hill to the mailbox to be picked up.   I am back in school but of the online variety.  I am working on my masters, a Masters of Biblical and Theological Studies, from Belhaven University in Jackson, Mississippi.  My class started in the middle of August and I am starting to feel the weight of another responsibility to my already loaded calendar. I try to combine my worlds so that is my goal this morning with this blog post.  I want to share with you something that I have learned so far.  My first class is titled "Biblical Themes."   We are looking at the entirety of the Bible in light of the kingdom of God, the covenants, and the temple.  I...