Sun, 05 May 2024 23:13:13 -0400WeeblyWed, 25 Jul 2018 00:22:05 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/gazing-upon-the-water“On the road that runs around Mackinac Island the view is all lush forest on one side and all water on the other.  I’m stopping on that road in the quiet early morning.  It occurred to me that, while there is much more to see on the forest side of the road, my gaze is almost always on the water.  These Straits of Mackinac have long been a passageway of commerce.  Fortunes have been made, cities have been built, and wars have been won because these Straits allowed all the things needed for those accomplishments to get from where they were to where they were needed.  On this quiet morning I am remembering that my baptism was like that, too.  In that water connected to the Words and Promises of God, grace and mercy and forgiveness and sonship and life and salvation flowed from their Source to this one who needed them.  And how I needed them and need them still!  As I sit here in the quiet dawn and watch wave after wave wash up on the shoreline, I know that’s what God is doing for me every second of every minute of every day of my life - ever since that day he re-birthed me in the waters of baptism.  That makes this a very nice ride.”]]>Tue, 26 Jun 2018 00:41:37 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/are-you-feeling-swamped (35) “On that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s go over to the other side.” (36) After leaving the crowd behind, the disciples took him along in the boat, just as he was. Other small boats also followed him. (37) A great windstorm arose, and the waves were splashing into the boat, so that the boat was quickly filling up. (38) Jesus himself was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. They woke him and said, ‘Teacher, don’t you care that we are about to drown?’
(39) Then he got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ The wind stopped, and there was a great calm. (40) He said to them, ‘Why are you so afraid? Do you still lack faith?’
(41) They were filled with awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!’” (Mark 4:35-41)
 
I bet you remember most of the words to this song…
 
Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale,
A tale of a fateful trip
That started from this tropic port
Aboard this tiny ship.

The mate was a mighty sailing man,
The skipper brave and sure.
Five passengers set sail that day
For a three hour tour, a three hour tour.

The weather started getting rough,
The tiny ship was tossed,
If not for the courage of the fearless crew
The Minnow would be lost, the Minnow would be lost.

The ship set ground on the shore of this uncharted desert isle
With Gilligan
The Skipper too,
A millionaire and his wife,
A movie star
The Professor and Mary Ann,*
Here on Gilligan's Isle.
 
Did you find yourself singing it to yourself?  You may recognize that as the opening theme of Gilligan’s Island, a very popular sit-com that had a 3-season run in the mid 1960’s.  It was a comedy about a shipwreck.  It was funny because everyone knew it had never happened.  And no matter what happened, you knew that every one of the seven regulars on the show were going to survive.  You can still watch every episode on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and probably dozens of other places.  Shipwrecks can be funny if it’s fiction and written as a comedy.
 
But the really scary ones are when it’s our boat and the storm is real.  You know what I’m talking about – those storms in life that seem overwhelming:  swamped with bills we did not expect, illness that’s threatening life – ours or some loved one’s, or maybe it’s a combination of things - we’ve hardly come up for air on one problem and another wave crashes over us.  How do we survive?  How do find a sense of peace even in the midst of those howling storms?  How can we be ready when the next storm comes?  Today, let’s get into a boat with Jesus and head out onto the Sea of Galilee, Things are going to get rough, but by the time we make shore we will have learned a very important truth about what it means to be a Christian:  It doesn’t matter what rocks the boat as long as Jesus is in it with you!
 
A lack of faith lets fear flood in.
 
(35) “On that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s go over to the other side.” (36) After leaving the crowd behind, the disciples took him along in the boat, just as he was. Other small boats also followed him. (37) A great windstorm arose, and the waves were splashing into the boat, so that the boat was quickly filling up. (38) Jesus himself was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. They woke him and said, ‘Teacher, don’t you care that we are about to drown?’
 
If you want a quick little timeline so far in Mark’s gospel, it would go something like this:  Chapter 1 – Jesus was baptized by John and began his public ministry.  Chapters 1 and 2 – Jesus got to work:  preaching, casting out demons, healing the sick.  Chapters 2 and 3 he called the Twelve to follow him.  At that point they began their adult instruction class about the kingdom of God.  Chapter 4 – the first two-thirds of the chapter Jesus taught about faith.  In this chapter (4) he taught that faith grows where the Word is planted.  He taught that when Satan or the sinful nature of people take that Word away, faith doesn’t last long.  He taught that growing faith in the human heart is God’s work.  He taught that faith’s power lies not in the size of the faith but in the power and grace of the one we trust.
 
Jesus had done lots of teaching about faith, and here at the end of chapter 4 the Master Teacher took his disciples on an extraordinary “field trip” for some practical experience to understand better what he’d been saying.  “On that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s go over to the other side.”  Now, apart from putting the disciples in a situation where they could get a powerful understanding about faith and the absence of it, Jesus had an agenda here.  On the next day, on the other side of the Sea of Galilee, he would drive many demons out of a man who was so tormented and possessed by them that he took to living in a cemetery.  Jesus would cast all those demons out of him with a single command.  That man would go from possessed by demons to powerfully professing to anyone who would listen what Jesus had done for him.  Then Jesus would cross back over the Sea of Galilee in order to raise the daughter of a synagogue ruler, from the dead.
 
The Twelve were going to see lots of things in the days to come, and that would include opposition and unbelief by many of the people who would see and hear what the Twelve did.  By the time their ministry with Jesus came to an end three years later on a hilltop as he ascended into heaven, they would know that the good news about Jesus would be opposed and rejected, and it would be believed and confessed.  Their faith would be encouraged by lots of people whose hearts were changed by the gospel, and their faith would be attacked by those who did not believe it.  By that time, the disciples would have grown in their understanding of faith, the blessings that God imparts through it, and the disaster that comes when faith is lacking.  This incident was one of the very first times that they were going to get a powerful lesson about that.
 
So there they were, somewhere out on the Sea of Galilee.  And out there, in the dark, at the worst possible time, with a number of boats in the entourage, 37 “A great windstorm arose, and the waves were splashing into the boat, so that the boat was quickly filling up.”  This was serious.  Boats were getting swamped.  If they went down, lives would be lost.  In the dark there was no way to know how close they were to safety on the other side. But the darkness wasn’t just outside; it was inside, too.  The disciples were afraid.  They were afraid for themselves and they were afraid for the people in the other boats.  They were afraid of the storm, to be sure, but they also expressed another fear: “Teacher, don’t you care that we are about to drown?”  They were afraid that Jesus did not care that they were about to drown.  Let me say that again, and let it sink in:  they were afraid that Jesus did not care.  At that moment, out on the sea of Galilee, it suddenly didn’t seem to matter that Jesus had cast out demons and healed diseases.  It’s as if the wind tearing at their clothes drown out those powerful words and deeds of Jesus.  It’s as if the waves swamping into the boat washed away the memory of those powerful displays of Jesus’ power and love.  They did not ask Jesus to help.  They did not pray.  They accused, and make no mistake, that question was an accusation.  Just change two English words around and you have it:  “Teacher, you don’t care that we are about to drown.”  Later in this story Jesus, the Great Physician of Souls,  diagnosed the problem:  “Why are you so afraid? Do you still lack faith?”  Fear flooded in because they lacked trust in Jesus.  They had yet to really learn that Jesus was more than a Teacher; he was and always had been and would always be the Son of God himself.
 
“Jesus, don’t you care that I…” – complete that sentence with whatever is swamping your boat right now.  Complete that sentence with whatever has made you feel swamped in the past.  Let me help: “Jesus, don’t you care that my loved one is so sick?”  “Jesus, don’t you care that I’m drowning in these bills?”  “Jesus, don’t you care that I am struggling against this sin?”  “Jesus, don’t you care that I am so sick and tired of being sick?”  “Jesus, don’t you care?” 
 
Jesus doesn’t care – that is a really scary thought, isn’t it?  That’s scary because those things that rock and swamp our boat are bigger than we are.  If Jesus doesn’t care, then we are in serious trouble.  If Jesus doesn’t care, then he is not reliable.  If Jesus doesn’t care, then who needs him?  And if Jesus doesn’t care but wants me to believe in him, well, that’s when we get angry at him.  And the accusation that spilled from the lips of the disciples spills out of our hearts, too.
 
So what’s to be done?  By you and me? – nothing.  What we need is to be quiet, close our mouths, open our ears and our eyes and watch and listen to Jesus.  Only then will our faith – and the peace that comes with it – be strengthened. 
 
Knowing God’s power and grace produces peace.
 
(39) Then he got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ The wind stopped, and there was a great calm. (40) He said to them, ‘Why are you so afraid? Do you still lack faith?’ (41) They were filled with awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!’”
(38) Jesus himself was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion…”. How could Jesus sleep through that storm?  Why wasn’t he afraid?  Jesus was not afraid because he knew who he was.  He was the One who created water and wind.  He was the One who spoke to Job in our first reading.  Do you remember what he said? “I laid the foundation of the earth … I clothed the sea with clouds … I wrapped it with thick darkness as its swaddling clothes … I broke its power with my decree … I locked it up behind barred, double doors … I said, ‘You may come this far, but no farther.  Here is the barrier for your proud waves.’”  Whether he was awake or asleep, he was that Son of God.  He knew that he could still command both water and wind and it would have to obey him.  The disciples did not yet fully understand that, but he did.  And so he slept. 
 
But Jesus knew more.  He knew that his Father’s plan was for him to die on a cross for the sins of the world, not to die in a storm on the Sea of Galilee.  He knew that plan perfectly well.  He had always known it.  In time, he would explain it over and over and over again to the disciples so that they would know it, too.  At the other end of this three-year ministry, as they were going to Jerusalem for the last time, Jesus would say, “Look, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and the experts in the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles. (34) They will mock him, spit on him, flog him, and kill him. On the third day he will rise again.”  Does that sound like he didn’t know God’s plan for him?  Of course, not.  Jesus was sound asleep on the cushion because he knew perfectly well that God’s plan did not involve his death by drowning.  That boat was not going to sink.  No one in those boats was going to die – not that night, and not that way.  The disciples did not yet fully understand that yet either, but Jesus did.  And so he slept.
 
And then, in loving response to the fear that had overwhelmed the hearts of his disciples, Jesus who created wind and wave – Jesus, who knew his Father’s plan to act in power and grace for sinners on a rocky hill called Calvary, acted: “Then he got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’”
 
The effect of his command on wild and unruly nature was immediate and complete:  “The wind stopped, and there was a great calm.”  Of course it became calm!  This, after all, is the Son of God, the second person of the Holy Trinity!  This is the One through whom all things were made!  This is the One who can make any promise and fulfill it!  This is the One who exercised power over demons and diseases!  Of course the wind stopped and there was great calm!
 
But not only in nature.  It became calm and still in the hearts of those disciples, too.  Look at the effect of all of this on them:  “They were filled with awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!’”  Hearts that were filled with fear, were now filled with awe.  Teeth had been clenched as they strained at ropes because they thought only human effort could hold that boat together, but no mouths hung open in awe at what they had just heard and seen.  These guys were never going to be the same again.  Now they were beginning to see it – their Teacher was not just a teacher!  Wind and waves obeyed him!  The next day they were going to see demons obey him, and death obey him.  And one day, just three years later, they were doing to see him die on the cross and forever quiet the accusation of the law against sinners.  They were going to see him rise from the dead and provide peace to all those who travel through the valley of the shadow of death.  They were going to see Jesus ascend into heaven, where he would forever rule over all things for the benefit of his people.  Power and grace – that’s what was at work in Jesus’ command in that storm.  Power and grace – that’s what led him to the cross for sinners.  Our Savior’s power and grace – knowing them gives us peace even when – especially when – our boat is really rocking and the waves are pouring over the sides of life.
 
So, here’s our take-home:  Jesus cares.  Of course, he cares!  Let’s stand at the cross and remember what he did there and why he did it.  John, who was in that boat that night, said it this way: “This is how God’s love for us was revealed: God has sent his only-begotten Son into the world so that we may live through him. (10) This is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.” (1 John 4:9-10)   Jesus has power.  Of course, he has power!  Let’s stand at the empty tomb, and remember what that means for us, even in the face of death itself.  Jesus, who was in the boat that night, said, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even if he dies. (26) And whoever lives and believes in me will never perish.” (John 11:25-26).  Our Savior Jesus is the same Son of God who spoke to Job in our first reading.  And he is the same Savior who says to us when the wind is howling and the waves are crashing, “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine. (2) When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. (3) For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.”   That’s who’s in the boat with us every day and every night of our lives.  In that truth there is peace and stillness in the storms of life!  Amen.]]>Tue, 08 May 2018 00:00:08 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/who-sets-immigration-policyA caravan of people reaches the border, claims asylum, and expects to be allowed entry.  No doubt you’ve seen the images and heard the reports.  It’s pretty dramatic stuff.  And no matter your political stripe, it does raise some important questions – about what borders mean, who has right of entry, and under what circumstances should people be allowed entry.  Among the answers offered are, on the one hand, anyone should be allowed entry into the country with no conditions at all.  On the other hand, there are those who argue for entry based on merit.  Ask ten people, you’re likely to get ten different opinions.  It’s all part of our political discourse these days.
 
I wonder if people think those same ideas apply to heaven. 
 
It’s a very popular belief that anyone and everyone who dies finds the “pearly gates” wide open. Everybody goes to heaven.  Creeds don’t count because, in this theory, no matter whom you worship it’s all the same God anyway.  Oh, there may be some folks who won’t be allowed in, but being barred from heaven is only for particularly bad people…people certainly worse than me, anyway.  That’s a popular idea, but is it so?
 
Another idea is that entrance into heaven is merit-based.   If you are a good person or try hard to be a good person, God will let you in.  Nobody’s perfect, of course, so as long as you’re as good as most and better than the worst, you have a reasonably good chance of getting in.  In this idea, too, creeds don’t mean much.  It’s all about deeds.  There’s something about this that appeals to us.  Everyone admires the self-made person who, through effort and grit and determination, carves out a place in world for herself or himself.  That, too, is a popular idea, but is it so?
 
There’s a little verse in Proverbs in the Bible (14:12) that says, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.”  Not all ideas that people have – especially religious and spiritual ones – have validity.  Some can be downright deadly.  We’d be wise to not be too quick to make assumptions until we check with the person who actually sets the policy.
 
Of course, the kinds of ideas about heaven mentioned above are based on the assumption that those who want to immigrate have something to say about the admittance policy.  And that is where those ideas all fall apart.  Heaven is God’s creation.  He and he alone has the prerogative to set policy about who may enter and on what basis he or she may enter.  And the truth of it is that he has said very explicit things about those two ideas mentioned above, clearly rejecting both of them.
 
That merit-based thing falls apart when we look at what God says about the merit standard he has set:  “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”  That doesn’t say “try hard.”  It doesn’t say, “Be good” or even “be better than most.”  It says “be perfect.”  The apostle Paul realized this merit-based thing cannot work for that very reason.  Here’s how he put it, “no one will be declared righteous in [God’s] sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.”  (Romans 3:20).  So much for merit-based admittance.
 
And what about the “all roads lead to heaven” theory?  Give some thought to God’s statement through the prophet Isaiah (45:21-22):  “…there is no God apart from me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is none but me.  Turn to me and be saved, all you ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other.”  The corollary to that verse is in Acts 4: 12 in the New Testament – “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men which we must be saved.”  That’s quite specific, isn’t it?  The God who reveals himself in the Bible says that he is the only one to whom people can turn for admittance.  Jesus said it as clearly as it can be said, “I am the way and the truth and life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.”  Apparently and obviously, creeds do matter – not the creeds you hold in your hand, but rather the one you hold in your heart.
 
“No one comes to the Father except through me.”  To some ears that might sound really exclusive.  If it does, then we really don’t understand the heart of the one who said that.  Jesus atoned for the sins of the whole world.  That’s not my opinion; that’s what the Word of God says:  “He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the world.”  (1 John 2:2) The atoning death of Jesus was inclusive of the entire human race.  His plan to tell people about this?  That was totally inclusive, too: “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation.”  (Mark 16:15). Nobody is to be excluded – all are to be told the good news!  And God’s invitation to have heaven through Jesus is inclusive, too.  How else do we understand this arms-thrown-wide-open statement? – “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”  Entrance is by Jesus’ finished work.  Entrance is available and open to all who enter by him who is The Way.   
 
Get it?  Those who “show up at the border” and insist on being let in on their own terms are in for a monumental and eternal disappointment.  “Show up at the border” seeking admittance on the basis for Jesus’ merit and on the basis of the price of admission that he paid at the cross, and the gates are wide open.  Jesus put it this way (Mark 16:16):  “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved but whoever does not believe will be condemned.”  I like that policy both because it gives sure hope for heaven, and because I know it is not just wishful thinking on my part.  It’s God’s own promise!
 

]]>Tue, 13 Mar 2018 00:08:25 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/how-do-you-fair-in-the-universal-background-check
 
4But God, because he is rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved! 6He also raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. 7He did this so that, in the coming ages, he might demonstrate the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8Indeed, it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast.
10For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared in advance so that we would walk in them.  (Ephesians 2:4-10)
 
Background checks are a fact of life, aren’t they?  Before you can have a Concealed Pistol License in the state of Michigan, you have to pass a background check.  A search is made to see if you have any kind of a police record or other issues that would prohibit you from carrying a concealed weapon.  Employers regularly require background checks, too.  Some may be official searches of police and FBI databases.  Some may be more unofficial, looking at a person’s social media activity and interviewing references.  The point of it is that before an employer entrusts things of value to a worker, he or she wants to be sure that the worker is worthy of the job and the responsibility that goes along with it.  After all, it’s the employer’s possessions that are at stake!
 
In the opening two verses of Ephesians chapter 2, our background check results are published.  It isn’t a pretty picture.  Listen to this:  “You were dead in your trespasses and sins, 2 in which you formerly walked when you followed the ways of this present world. You were following the ruler of the domain of the air, the spirit now at work in the people who disobey.”  Just look at what Paul says is in our background check! –

• dead in your trespasses and sins
• you followed the ways of this present world
• you were following the ruler of the domain of the air
• people who disobey

Again here in our text Paul lays out the truth about us:  we were dead in trespasses.  Those are direct quotes from God himself. 
 
Let’s take a moment to understand fully what God means by those statements.  Twice, God says we were dead in our trespasses and sins.  He’s not talking about physical death there, although that happens because of sin.  He’s talking about spiritual death – being born into this world physically alive, but spiritually dead.  Not in a coma.  Not unconscious.  Dead.  Now, let’s remember that God the Holy Spirit breathed into the Bible writers not only the truths he wanted them to write about, but also the very words he wanted them to us in writing about them.  Do you recall Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 2:13:  “We also speak about these things, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual truths with spiritual words.”  The Holy Spirit meant to say “dead” here.  That means just what you and I know it means:  spiritually lifeless, unable to act in things spiritual, unable to make decisions about spiritual things.
 
“you followed the ways of this present world ...” Paul reminds us that because we were born into this world spiritually lifeless, we were and would always have been like spiritual driftwood carried along by the currents of the unbelieving world into which we were born.  Those currents run along these lines:  God is whoever you want him to be.  Right and wrong are whatever the situation requires for your benefit.  What matters – what’s real – is what you can understand, hold in your hand, spend, drive, or call home.  The most important relationships are the ones that bring you emotional satisfaction in the moment.  It’s your body and your life to do with as you please.  And all of that seems so right because as we look around us, we see lots of other pieces of driftwood heading in the same direction.  If everyone is going that way, if everyone thinks that way, if everyone believes something like that, then we must be going in the right direction?  Right?
 
But then Paul reminds us that that current is not just an impersonal force.  He reveals the dark hand that helps to push and pull the driftwood along:   “You were following the ruler of the domain of the air...”  That’s the Devil, Satan, the Destroyer, the Accuser, the Tempter, the Father of Lies.  As invisible as the air around us, always on the move like the air around us, he pushed at our back and pulled us along.  He did that with the very same power he has always used since he fell:  lies.  His lies are really no different than what he used in Eden on Adam and Eve: planting doubts about what God really says, offering “alternative truths” (that is, lies) in place of God’s truth, convincing us that God does not always act in our best interest, planting seeds of suspicion and doubt about God in our hearts, and finally convincing us that our way is just as good as God’s way – better than God’s way. 
 
The result?  Paul says that we failed the background check.  Across our name, God’s Law wrote the reality of it:  “people who disobey.”  That’s God’s assessment.  It’s what got Adam and Eve expelled from the Garden.  It’s what brought death into the world.  It’s what disqualifies us for eternal life. Do you see? – failing this background check doesn’t just bar us from certain earthly freedoms, nor is it a matter of not being hired for certain jobs.  This is about much more serious consequences than that.  Speaking of heaven itself, the apostle John wrote in Revelation:  “Nothing that is unclean and no one who does what is detestable or who tells lies will ever enter it, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.” (Revelation 21:27)
 
Where is the hope for that in the Word of God?  It is in some wonderful past tense verbs in those very same first two verses of this second chapter of Ephesians.  Listen to those verses again: “You were dead in your trespasses and sins, 2 in which you formerly walked when you followed the ways of this present world. You were following the ruler of the domain of the air, the spirit now at work in the people who disobey.”  Did you hear the way Paul talked about you and me there?  That horribly failed background check status before God used to be so.  But it is no more!  What happened?  Now I want you to look with me to the verses of our text today.  As I read it, watch and listen for who the active agent is in changing our condition.  I want you to listen to the reason that is given for that active agent changing our condition.  And I want you to listen for how the change in our condition is described:  4”But God, because he is rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved! 6He also raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. 7He did this so that, in the coming ages, he might demonstrate the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8Indeed, it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast.”
 
Who is the doer in those verses?  Do you see that it is consistently God himself?  And did you hear how his work in us and for us is described in such miraculous terms? – 5”made us alive,”  “you have been saved,” “raised us up,” “seated us in the heavenly places.”  That means just what it says.  God did a raising-Lazarus-from-the-dead-like miracle in you and me in making what was once spiritually dead live.  How did that happen?  Peter tells us in his first letter (1:23) – “you have been born again, not from perishable seed but from imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.”  That life-giving Word empowered the water of baptism to give that rebirth.  Is that not what Paul is clearly saying in Titus 3:  “he saved us—not by righteous works that we did ourselves, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and the renewal by the Holy Spirit,” Paul tells us in this text that when God raised Jesus to his right hand in heaven, it can be said that he placed us there, too.  Yes, we still live here on earth, for now – but because of what God did for us in Christ our place in heaven is prepared and reserved and waiting.  It is already ours!  Do you see?  You don’t need some person who claims to have had a near-death experience write a book to tell you that heaven is real and that it is really yours – God himself tells you that right here in his Word and in this very text today!
 
Why would God do such a thing for people who have so completely and miserably failed the background check?  Only a few words in our text explain that, but what words they are!  Listen again:  4”But God, because he is rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved!”  Did you catch them? – “mercy,” “love,” “grace.”  Every one of those words describes an attribute of God.  It is those attributes of God that alone explain why he did what he did.  He had mercy on our lost condition.  He loved us even though there was nothing in us that merited that love.  He acted in grace, giving us the very opposite of what we deserved.  How else can you explain how we who are under the curse of “the wages of sin is death” would nevertheless receive “the undeserved gift of God...eternal life”? (Romans 6:23)
 
That’s the why of these priceless blessings.  What is the how of them?  Listen again, “7He did this so that, in the coming ages, he might demonstrate the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8Indeed, it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast.”  Faith is the connection through which all those priceless blessings flowed and flow to you and me.  And they only flow because of the One who as at the active end of our faith:  Jesus.  How can we read and hear these words without seeing and hearing that all these blessings flow to us from Christ and come to us with Christ and are ours in Christ?  Listen again, 4”But God, because he is rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved! 6He also raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”  Priceless blessings are yours NOW in Christ!
 
But there are also priceless blessings that WILL be ours in the ages to come:  “7He did this so that, in the coming ages, he might demonstrate the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”  I don’t know if the phrase “coming ages” means our future in this life or if they refer to our future in eternity.  In the end, it doesn’t matter which we understand it here because both are absolutely correct.  Because of Jesus’ finished work and through faith in him, you already live in God’s surpassing grace.  And because of Jesus’ finished work and through faith in him you will enjoy the riches of that grace in eternity.
 
And then our text closes with a return to the present tense - to you and me in this life we live now.  But what a remarkable description of that life we find in the last verse of our text!: “...we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared in advance so that we would walk in them.”  Think of how the first two verses of Ephesians 2 described what we were, and then consider what God has made of us!  We are God’s own handiwork, created spiritually anew for a completely different purpose than following the ways of this world and ruler of the kingdom of the air, and disobeying.  Now, in Christ Jesus, we for good works God prepared for us to do and we are doing them!  Even that is not our doing, it is God’s doing in us!
 
Faith.  All that word means is trust.  It is a relationship word, isn’t it?  If there is no object of faith, we can’t really even say that faith exists.  And if the object of our faith is weak or evil or non-existent, then that faith is pointless – like a lifeline thrown to a drowning person but with no one on the other end who can or will effect the rescue.  But what certainty and joy and priceless blessings are yours and mine – because at the active end of our faith is non other than Jesus Christ!  Rejoice in the priceless blessings you have in Christ!  Amen.]]>Tue, 27 Feb 2018 00:16:03 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/you-are-not-alone-god-is-with-you10 Jacob set out from Beersheba and traveled toward Haran. 11 He came to a certain place and decided to spend the night there, because the sun had set. He took one of the stones from that place, put it under his head, and lay down to sleep in that place. 12 He had a dream in which he saw a stairway set up on the earth with its top reaching to heaven. There were angels of God ascending and descending on it. 13 There at the top stood the Lord, who said, “I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. The land on which you are lying, I give to you and to your descendants. 14 Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south. In you and in your seed all the families of the earth will be blessed. 15 Now, I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back again into this land. Indeed, I will not leave you, until I have done what I have promised to you.” 16 Jacob woke up from his sleep, and he said, “Certainly the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it.” 17 He was afraid and he said, “How awe-inspiring is this place! This is nothing other than the house of God, and this is the gate to heaven.”
To Jacob, the place where he stopped for the night may have seemed just a random spot to camp for the night.  But the LORD had chosen this spot very carefully.  You see, this was the same spot at which his grandpa Abraham, many years earlier, had built an altar to the LORD when God had given him the promise that from one of his descendants all the world would be blessed.  Jacob found a rock against which he could lean and sleep for the night.  Perhaps it might even have been one of the very stones that Abraham had used to build his altar to the Lord on that spot so many years earlier. 
 
During that night the LORD gave Jacob a promise in the form of a dream. The LORD promised Jacob, alone and afraid and on the run,, that he was not alone.  His God was there with him.  The vision could not have brought him more cheer, could it?  God showed him a wide stairway that led to the throne room of heaven itself.  Up and down that stairway angels were traveling to God with the prayers and the needs of Jacob and God’s people, and then returning to carry out God’s instructions.
 
What do you think it said to Jacob - guilty, alone, afraid Jacob – that God appeared to him and promised him that he would have a great family and that God had not changed his mind, neither about sending a Savior nor that that Savior would come from Jacob’s own descendants?  It said: grace! - God was giving Jacob the opposite of what he deserved!  This dream announced faithful grace! – God would keep his promise to send a Savior even though Jacob had acted in ways that should have disqualified him for such an honor.  And Jacob was NOT alone!  The angels of God were involved in his journey, protecting him along the way.  And though he had neither wife nor children yet, he would eventually find a wife and he would have twelve sons who would become the forefathers of the twelve tribes of Israel!  But at this point in our text, it was a matter of faith for Jacob.  He did not yet see what would be, but only heard what God said would be.  But what cheerful and cheering promises God spoke to him that night!
 
What does it say about our LORD and us, that he treated Jacob this way?  It tells us that even in those moments when we may feel most alone and afraid, our LORD is with us.  Isn’t that what he promised us? “Surely I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:20).  And even if we put ourselves in hard places because of our own sins, still, when we call out to the LORD, he is near!  His very name says that he is and it explains why he can be with sinful you and sinful me just as he was with sinful Jacob:  “The LORD, the LORD, compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin.”  (Exodus 34:6-7)  God is near with grace and forgiveness that has been bought and paid for and established at the cross of Jesus.  That’s very same cross before which we gather today, to which we look for God’s forgiving and forgetting of our sins, and at which God made us God’s own redeemed people. 
 
Jacob’s vision of the stairway still stands!  It stands in the promise God also gives you and me in Psalm 91:  “he will give a command to his angels concerning you, to guard you in all your ways.”  It is there in the promise God give you and me in Hebrews 12:  “Are not all angels ministering spirits sent out to serve for the benefit of those who are going to inherit salvation?”
 
So, for all those times you and I have disrespected our earthly parents or our heavenly Father, for all those times we have cheated our brothers or sisters or neighbors out of the love we owe them, God has not turned away!  He has not abandoned us on our journey through life!   He is still the LORD, the God of free and faithful and forgiving grace!  As David teaches us in the 23rd Psalm:  “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.”  Do you remember what Paul said in our Scripture lessons today from Romans chapter 5? -The reconciling death of Jesus Christ was what healed the relationship broken by our sin and inseparably connects us to God’s love!
 
How it must have cheered Jacob to know that his God was with him on his journey!  How it must have cheered Jacob to know that God would not break his promises even though Jacob had broken God’s law!  But there is more here for Jacob and for you and me.  God was also with Jacob directing him along the way by his hand.
 
When Jacob stopped to camp for the night in that place, he still had most of the 500 mile journey ahead of him.  And he still had a brother who wanted to kill him behind him.  Danger behind and a dangerous journey ahead.  What’s was more, he had a fractured family behind him and only his father’s wish that at the end of his journey he would find a wife from among the believers in his mother Rebekah’s extended family in Haran.  But he knew no one there, either.  And even if he was able to start fresh with a family of his own, would he ever be able to see his father and mother, Isaac and Rebekah, again?  And what of his relationship with his brother Esau?  Could that ever be reconciled?
 
God was answering all those questions and concerns, wasn’t he?  Jacob would indeed find a wife.  He would be the father of a great family.  And he would come home again.  And he would see his mother and father again.  And the day would even come when he would be reunited with his brother, Esau.  Genesis 33:4 records their meeting this way, “Esau ran to meet Jacob and embraced him; he threw his arms around his neck and kissed him. And they wept.”  The specifics of all of that Jacob did not know and God did not explain.  But here’s what Jacob did know – because God promised him:  “Now, I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back again into this land. Indeed, I will not leave you, until I have done what I have promised to you.”  Between this night in our text and that day, so much lay ahead for Jacob.  He would reach Haran safely.  He would meet and fall deeply in love with a woman named Rachel.  Rachel’s father would trick him into marrying his other daughter Leah, and it would be seven more years before Jacob could fulfill his promise to Rachel.  But God would indeed watch over Jacob.  And the day would come when God would tell Jacob to settle his large and prosperous family in Bethel – the very place where I camped that night.  There God would come to him again, and say:  “Your name is Jacob, but you will no longer be called Jacob; your name will be Israel.... I am God Almighty; be fruitful and increase in number. A nation and a community of nations will come from you, and kings will be among your descendants.12 The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I also give to you, and I will give this land to your descendants after you.”
 
And, of course, every word God spoke came to be.  And the greatest king to come from Jacob’s descendants was the one who was hung on a cross with a sign over his head announcing him, “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.”  That sign was hung in mockery and ignorance, but that sign announced the fulfillment of all that God promised Jacob.  In that king, every sinner from every nation in every age and in every place has redemption, forgiveness, and reconciliation with God.
 
I don’t know what lies ahead on my journey, and certainly not on yours.  Yes, we have our plans all laid out in our heads.  But some of us have lived along enough to know that there’s a big difference between what we plan and the way things work out. Isn’t it a good thing that our God does not change? – that he still says to you and me what he said to Jacob? - 15Now, I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back again into this land. Indeed, I will not leave you, until I have done what I have promised to you.”  And so he invites us, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.”  (Proverbs 3:5-6)  I am so happy to be able to tell you this morning that whatever lies ahead for you, God will be with you.  And as long as we trust him, he will lead us through all that lies ahead and bring us safely home to heaven. 
 
Jacob did not know all that life held in store for him.  But when he woke up in the morning he knew a very important thing.  Listen:  16Jacob woke up from his sleep, and he said, “Certainly the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it. ... How awe-inspiring is this place! This is nothing other than the house of God, and this is the gate to heaven.”  You are this morning where he was that morning.  No, not at all the same place geographically.  But exactly the same place spiritually.  The same God is with us who was with Jacob there.  The same promises have been given to us as were given to Jacob.  You have forgiveness just as Jacob did.  The angels are ascending and descending between heaven where you are to serve God and you, just as they did in that place for Jacob.  God speaks to us in his Word, just as he spoke to Jacob there.  No, we are not at the journey’s end in heaven yet, but this is the perfect place from which to take our next step!  “Certainly the Lord is in this place ... How awe-inspiring is this place! This is nothing other than the house of God, and this is the gate to heaven.”  Travel on in confidence, my friends.  God’s promises and direction are yours! Amen.

]]>Mon, 18 Dec 2017 22:27:43 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/christmas-in-a-cow-barn (Reprinted at this time each year)

​When I was a farm kid growing up in Saginaw County, Michigan, Christmas was a wonderful time.  It isn’t that we had a big house festooned with lights.  It was actually a very modest farmhouse, parts of it dating back to the late 1800’s.  We didn’t have a real fireplace, but every year Dad would assemble a cardboard one made to look like bricks.  We could hardly wait until it was up so we could hang our stockings on it.  We always had a real tree, but it couldn’t be very big because our living room was pretty small.  But once it was up and decorated I loved lying on the floor with my head under the tree looking up through the branches at the decorations and lights as I listened to Christmas music.  One of my favorites was an LP by Perry Como.  One side contained a telling of the Christmas story with songs and carols along the way.  There lying on the living floor it was warm and comfortable and the sights and sounds were, well, Christmas.
 
But we did live on a farm – a working dairy farm. (emphasis on the word working).  And no matter the season and no matter how warm it was in the house and cold outside, the cattle needed to be fed, milked and tended.  It was hard work, but most of the time I didn’t really mind.  In fact, I rather enjoyed it.  Most of the time. 
 
I guess I was about 10 years old when it happened.  I had to go out and help do the evening chores.  Neither of my sisters had to go out in the cold and into the cowbarn to help, but I did.  I didn’t like it that day.  I wanted to be in the house in my Christmas position near the tree enjoying the pleasant sights and sounds of Christmas.  But here I was out on a cold starry night in a barn warmed only by the body heat of the cows.  They stood there in their stalls contentedly munching their feed, while I could have been inside watching some Christmas special on TV and eating popcorn.  All I could hear in the barn was their jostling in the straw and the occasional bleating of one of the young calves in the other end of the barn; sometimes a cow would let out a low “moo,” but that it was it.  Nothing Christmas-y about that.  No Perry Como, just that annoying “moo.”  And it sure wasn’t Christmas cookies in the oven I was smelling, but rather corn and hay after it’s been run through a cow.  And my sisters were inside and I was stuck out there.  So I just went about my work with a bit of a resentful attitude in the last place I wanted to be that night.
 
I don’t know when it hit me.  Perhaps I was humming one of those carols of Christmas.  Perhaps the words of Perry that I had memorized came to mind, “There was no room in the inn, so his mother lay baby Jesus in the soft sweet hay of a manger.”  All I recall now is that it suddenly dawned on me:  Were these very sounds that I am hearing the first ones to fall on the ears of baby Jesus?  Before the angels sang or the shepherds came adoring, was it the gentle bleating of a calf or the low reassuring moo of a cow what lulled him to sleep?  Was it this warmth produced by the closeness of cattle that warmed him on that night? Did this rich, earthy smell greet his first moments in the world?  And then I realized that on that cold night in a warm barn with no colored lights, no carols, no cookies, and no Perry Como I was in the best place I could have been to truly appreciate what Christmas is – what it really is. 
 
I still remember that night every year when Christmas comes around.  I’m glad for it.  It’s so easy to get caught up in the busyness and the sparkling festive trimmings of this season, that I could almost forget what that first Christmas was.  God himself came into the flesh to serve sinners.  He was born in a barn, a place of work, as if God were saying, “Roll up your sleeves, Son, you’ve got a world to save and it won’t get done without you.”  And that’s what Jesus did.  His whole life every day working away at keeping God’s law so that we could stand before God today righteous in his sight.  And then in the last big labor of love he went to the cross to atone for our sins and redeem us to be God’s own. 
 
So, merry Christmas!  Celebrate it in the stable in your memory, but celebrate Jesus in your heart!  I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people:  a Savior has been born to you – he is Christ the Lord]]>Wed, 08 Nov 2017 01:18:25 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/why-did-it-happen-and-what-do-we-do-in-responseLast Sunday morning a little Christian congregation was the victim of a brutal attack.  Only a small handful of worshippers escaped unharmed.  It didn’t happen in a big urban city.  Islamic Terrorism was not the cause.  It happened in a very small town and early indications are that it was a tragic turn in a domestic dispute.  This was unprecedented in terms of lives lost, but, sadly, not in terms of setting.  There have been such crimes committed in churches before, in big ones and little ones,  in city churches and in country churches.  Not to be a pessimist, but rather a realist – it will almost certainly happen again.
 
Even as more details are coming to light, voices are demanding to know why this happened.  The “Why?” question carries with it the assumption that if we can get an answer to that, then we can pass laws to prevent it from happening again.  If only it were as simple as trying to control behavior.  The behavior is a symptom.  The causative problem is in the human heart.  God has been quite consistent in pointing this out.  He had no sooner caused the waters of the Flood to recede, than he observed about mankind, “..every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood.” (Genesis 8:21b).  Jesus made the same sad point in Matthew 15:19, “...out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.”  To put it simply, these terrible things happen because sin is in the world and sin is in human hearts and sin is in the thought processes and in the behaviors of people.  People commit sins because they – we – are sinful.
 
So what do we do in response to this horrible thing that happened last Sunday?  Putting our faith in more laws to prevent murder is to put our trust in people, and people fail.  Apparently, someone did not enter into the FBI database about the church attacker’s bad conduct discharge from the military for family violence.  If they had, his application to purchase a firearm would have been flagged and denied.  That’s human failure.  There must surely have been people who knew about his history and his ineligibility to own firearms, but said nothing to authorities.  That’s human failure.  Lots of men have problems getting along with their mother-in-law, but find some way to make the relationship work, avoiding such extreme violence.  There was human failure about that in this case, too.  I suppose more laws could be written and passed, but those, too, are of human origin and would be enforced by human beings.  There would certainly be failures and breakdowns there, too.
 
The point isn’t that we throw up our hands and do nothing.  The point rather is that we do the most important things.  Permit me to suggest a few.
 

1. Pray.  Pray that God foil such plots and plans to do such unspeakable evil.  Pray that he surround his people with angels to protect them.  Pray that when human beings disobey him and do such terrible things, that he keep us from holding God responsible for it.  Pray that when bad things do happen, God would keep us close to his Word for strength and comfort to endure.
2. Proclaim.  Proclaim the good news that only in Jesus is the problem of sin solved.  He atoned for it all at the cross, and in him every sinner can find forgiveness full and free.  Proclaim that good news because, first and foremost, it imparts eternal life so that we are ready whenever and however we step into eternity.  But also proclaim it knowing that it is the only thing that changes people from the inside out, changing behavior by changing the heart from which behavior springs.

 

1. Plan.  Whether it is in your home or in your place of worship, responsible adults should sit down with law enforcement and formulate a response plan in case such a thing should ever occur.  And once the plan is formulated, make time to rehearse it regularly enough that people would know what to do.  Jesus said in Matthew 10:16-17, “I am sending you out like sheep among wolves.  Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.  But be on your guard...”  Being on guard with a smart plan to thwart an attacker is not a lack of faith in God, it’s doing what Jesus says is appropriate for our situation.

 

1. Protect.  In that small Texas church, a mother gave her life in an effort to shield her children from the attacker with her own body.  Husbands, be determined to love your wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.  Parents, be determined to protect your children, entrusted to you by a gracious God to be brought up to know him, serve him, and be a force for the gospel in their time and place.  Pastors, be determined to protect the flock over which the Holy Spirit has made you a shepherd.  It’s what shepherds do, after all.  And especially for the preacher, it’s important to remember that that protection involves praying for your people, proclaiming the whole counsel of God to your people, and urging that a response plan is formulated and rehearsed.

]]>Wed, 01 Nov 2017 00:52:16 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/dont-get-tricked-out-of-the-treatOctober 31st often reignites an ongoing conversation among Christians regarding Trick or Treating.   Whether you are in the “No way!  Not under any circumstances!” camp or the “It’s free candy! What’s the big deal?” camp or somewhere in between, the argument often overlooks a much bigger issue. 
 
October 31st is not just Halloween, it is also Reformation Day.  500 years ago this October 31st, a young monk and professor posted 95 statements for debate on the community bulletin board (the church doors) in Wittenberg, Germany.  His name was Martin Luther, of the Augustinian Order.  That event sparked the movement known as the Reformation.  What lay at the very heart of it is a simple and profoundly important question:  “What is the gospel?”  In Luther’s Day, the abuses that fired up that question were these:  Can a person, by buying an Indulgence from the Roman Catholic Church, actually purchase release from the penalties due his or her sins?  Is the righteousness that the sinner needs in order to enjoy God’s favor and get into heaven something the sinner produces? Were there certain people who were way more holy than they needed to be for their own salvation, whose overflow of good works can be credited to sinners?  Is Jesus alone the righteousness that we need to stand before God?  And what role does faith play in all of this?  Do Christ’s benefits flow to the sinner by faith alone, or must good works also be combined with faith in order to be saved?    
 
Those questions were not new in Luther’s day.  They were around in days of the apostle Paul, too.  The Christians in the Galatian churches had heard the gospel – believed it, too.  That gospel was proclaimed against the backdrop of the law which clearly said that peace and God and eternal life were impossible if based on the good works of the sinner.  God’s minimum standard is perfection which, of course, no sinner can claim.  But the gospel announced God’s favor and grace expressed, established and extended to the sinner by the finished work of Jesus.  It’s why Paul wrote this in Galatians 3:  “...those who rely on the works of the law are under a curse.  For it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who do not continue to do everything written in the book of the law.’ Clearly, no one is declared righteous before God by the law, because, ‘The righteous will live by faith.’  The law does not say ‘by faith.’ Instead it says, ‘He one who does these things will live by them.’  Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us.  As it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.’ He redeemed us in order that the blessing of Abraham would come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that we would receive the promised Spirit through faith.”  (Galatians 3:20-14)   The gospel is God’s treat, freely given, announced to the sinner because Jesus has already purchased it in full and by his life, death and resurrection put it into full effect.
 
But Christians in Galatia, like so many in Luther’s Day and in ours, were being tricked out of that treat.  The tricking came from two sources:  man’s own law-based opinion about salvation, and from false teachers who promoted that view.  This “other gospel” says that faith in Jesus is a fine thing, but if you do something to offend God (sin), then it is entirely or mostly or a little up to you to fix that.  The reason why so many in Paul’s day and Luther’s day and our day get tricked by that is because it seems like it is the way all our human relationships works. But our relationship with God is different.  God knows that we sinners will never be able to meet his minimum standard of perfection no matter what we do.  And even if we could get to a level of conduct where we stopped sinning, that would not erase all our sins committed before that point.  Jesus performed the righteousness for us which could not and God credits that to us.  Jesus became a curse for our sins in our place and God now considers those sins punished.
 
Paul opened his letter to the Galatian Christian with a sincere and urgent warning that is as valid for us today as it was for them:  “I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you in the grace of Christ, for a different gospel, which is really not another gospel at all.  There are, however, some who are trying to disturb you by perverting the gospel of Christ.  But even if we or an angel from heaven would preach any gospel other than the one we preached to you – a curse on him!”  (Galatians 1:6-8)
 
Look to Jesus and his finished work alone.  Let your good works be a willing thank you note written with your life for that gift, but don’t get tricked into thinking that your good works are the check you are writing to purchase what God has already given you in Christ.  Don’t get tricked out of the treat!]]>Thu, 12 Oct 2017 02:22:14 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/where-is-godIsaiah 55:6-9
6Seek the Lord while he allows himself to be found!
Call on him while he is near!
7Let the wicked abandon his way.
Let an evil man abandon his thoughts,
and let him turn to the Lord, and he will show him mercy,
and let him turn to our God, because he will abundantly   forgive.
 
8Certainly my plans are not your plans,
and your ways are not my ways, declares the Lord.
9Just as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so my ways are higher than your ways
and my plans are higher than your plans.
 
Doesn’t it make you wonder?  Hurricanes devastate the gulf coast and Puerto Rico. People lose their lives, cities are destroyed, and livelihoods are destroyed.  Where is God?  A gunman opens fire on a country music concert in Las Vegas and 58 innocent people are killed and hundreds more injured.  Where is God?  A visit to the doctor results in the crushing news of a life-threatening illness.  Where is God?  A family is fractured and lives are changed.  Where is God?  Thieves steal, a power outage ruins food, a terrorist kills with a suicide bomb.  Where is God?  I can’t imagine that there is even one of us here who has not wondered that in the midst of trouble, crisis or calamity.
 
Where are you, Lord?  That question, even when it comes from you and me as Christians, comes from fear, doesn’t it?  We fear that perhaps there are times in our lives when God is not near, when God does not see what we we’re going through, or when God does not hear our cry for help.  We fear that perhaps God is near, but is settling some score for some sin we have committed.  We fear that we are in a situation in which there doesn’t seem to be any good resolution to a problem that is so vast that not even God is able to help. 
 
Those fears are like waves that wash over us.  With each assault they seem to weaken our grip on God’s promises or wash away our joy.  It gets to the point that physically, emotionally and spiritually we don’t know if we can hang on any longer.  If you aren’t in a place in life like that right now, you probably have been.  And if you haven’t been, you probably will be.  I’m not being pessimistic about that.  I’m just being realistic, am I not?
 
Dear friends, Isaiah has good news to share with us today.  Our God is not now nor ever will be far away from us.  He is, after all, Immanuel:  God with us.  And so today he gives us a standing invitation for the present and the future:
 
Call On God While He Is Near!
1.  Call On God Because He Is Near With Grace That Goes Beyond Understanding!
 
It is pure grace that God is near at all!  39 chapters…for 39 chapters of this book over and over again God was confronting the people of  northern Israel with their sins.  The root cause of the spiritual decay going on in Israel was tragically simple:  they had distanced themselves from God by chasing after other idols.  God doesn’t waste any time getting to the point with them.  Listen to the very opening verses of Isaiah 1:  (2-4)  “Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth! For the LORD has spoken: ‘I reared children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against me. {3} The ox knows his master, the donkey his owner's manger, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.’ {4} Ah, sinful nation, a people loaded with guilt, a brood of evildoers, children given to corruption! They have forsaken the LORD; they have spurned the Holy One of Israel and turned their backs on him.”  God wasn’t mincing words there, was he?  And Isaiah wasn’t the only one saying these things.  Other Bible prophets who worked at the same time as Isaiah were Amos, Hosea, and Micah.  It wasn’t that God had driven these people away.  Israel’s entire history was a wonderful story of God’s faithfulness and blessing to his people.  But Israel was responding with rebellion, ignorance, evil, and corruption.  They turned their backs on him.  God had every reason to distance himself from these people.
 
But in his grace God had mercy and pardoned sin!  26 chapters – for 26 chapters of this book God approached Israel to reassure them of his love.  Listen to the opening verses of chapter 40:  (1-2)  “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. {2} Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for.”  In a wonderful proclamation of prophetic certainty, God even explained how that pardon for sin would come about:  (Isaiah 53:5)  “he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.”  God was going to come as near to his people as it is possible to get:  he would become one of them to redeem them, to pardon them, to save them.  What grace!  That God would desire so much to pardon those who had so much to pardon!
But God cautioned his people never to squander this time of grace!   Through Isaiah, God was reassuring faithless and weak and troubled Israel that he had not gone anywhere – he had not abandoned them….yet.  But that could happen.  These words contain a strong hint of that don’t they?  God’s grace in the gospel was (and is) like a life-giving rain.  Where hearts drank it deep it would give life and always be near at hand.  But where it was rejected, it would simply move on to where it could do its wonderful work in human hearts.  It was just this picture that God himself was using in the verse right after our text:  (Isaiah 55:9-11)  "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. {10} As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, {11} so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”
 
It isn’t just Old Testament Israel that was guilty of turning from God in idolatry.  I am too, and so are you.  Each time we thrust our will ahead of God’s will, each time I am more important than my God, each time I love and honor me before my God…that is idolatry.  In fact, from God’s point of view, each and every sin we commit is idolatry, isn’t it?  That’s the painful point Paul is making in (Colossians 3:5-6)  “Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. {6} Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.”  The truth is, we too often do not put those things to death, do we?  We invite them, tolerate them, and play with them in our hearts and lives.  Why on earth should God be so near to us when our hearts are so often far from him?
 
And yet he still is still lovingly serious when he extends the gospel’s invitation to us: 6Seek the Lord while he allows himself to be found! Call on him while he is near! 7Let the wicked abandon his way. Let an evil man abandon his thoughts, and let him turn to the Lord, and he will show him mercy, and let him turn to our God, because he will abundantly forgive. What comforting statements God makes in these words!  “He is near…he will show mercy…he will abundantly forgive.”  No mights, no maybes, no ifs.  Our God is near because in love that needs no reason to love, he chooses to be.  And he forgives abundantly because Jesus was pierced and crushed for our sins, too.  For all our sins!  That’s why he invites us to turn to him – every sin that would have put distance between us and God has been abundantly forgiven.  There is no reason left for him to be distant from us!  His words carry in them the power to work the change in our hearts that they urge:  “Let the wicked abandon his way…let him turn to the Lord.”   Who would expect a God we have so often abused to be so persistently near?  But then, that’s the nature of his faithful and forgiving grace! 
 
Our God invites us everyday to come to him in trust and in prayer.  He promises that we will find him each and every time we seek him.  But should I persist in turning my back on him, he will not wait around forever.  He will move on to those who yet need to hear his gentle call in the gospel to turn to him and live.  How tragic if I should end up far away from him, not because he wanted to be far away, but because I did.  How horrible to find oneself in hell where there will never ever again be an opportunity to be near the Lord and have him near! 
 
But today, right now God is near!  He is near no matter what is happening in your life right now.  He is near with his mercy and with his pardon and with his love.  He is near with a grace that goes beyond understanding!  Paul says it this way in Ephesians 3:18:  “…how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ!”  It’s so big we can’t see the end of it, it is so deep that we can’t understand the depth of it, it is so wide that it dwarfs every sin and every hardship.  It is so long that it reaches into eternity and infinitely beyond.  That’s not wishful thinking…that’s God’s own statement!
 
But what about the hurricanes, the life-threatening illness, the crime, the disappointments that knock us around in life?  Why does that happen?  What is God’s purpose?  Listen to Isaiah here!  He invites us to…
 
2.  Call On God Because He Is Near Even When Things Are Beyond Understanding!
 
Bad things happen in life for a very basic reason:  sin.   Sin affects everything about our human experience, doesn’t it?  It’s been that way since the beginning of sin.  Adam’s sin of loveless neglect in his wife’s hour of need affected her response to Satan’s temptation.  That loveless neglect was compounded by his blaming her before God.  Eve’s relationship with God was turned on its head.  Where once it was “God friend, devil enemy,”  that day became “devil friend, God enemy.”  Their relationship was affected by the hurt and anger and guilt and fear that stemmed from sin.  Crime reared its ugly head shortly thereafter when one of their sons murdered another for no other reason than jealousy and frustration.  Marriages are broken, homes are broken into, and the peace is broken by man’s sinfulness and sin.  But to make it a more personal – and honest – that brokenness is caused too often by our sinfulness and sin.  People do bad things to each other because people are sinful.  It sounds simplistic, I know, but it is the hard and simple truth.
 
But sin has not only affected people’s behavior; it has also affected the created universe.  It just doesn’t work like the perfect system God created in the beginning.  It wobbles out of control.  Whether it’s the human body or the ocean’s waves or winds or the ground under our feet…they don’t always work as originally designed.  Paul remarked about that long ago in Romans 8.  He says that creation is “subjected to frustration” and held in “its bondage to decay.”  Think of it this way:  You know what happens when a tire is out of round or when the load in the washing machine gets all lopsided?  It shakes and thumps and bangs around.  Our universe is out of round, bent out of shape with sin.  No wonder the angry seas swallow cities, the ground snaps and jerks, the clouds pour too much rain in one place and not enough in another; no wonder the winds are sometimes so calm a ship’s sails luff uselessly and other times snap trees and homes like match sticks.  Hurricanes, tornadoes, power outages, illnesses…those things happen because sin has broken our world.
 
So when the sins and the brokenness of the world touch our lives, we want answers, don’t we?  Why this Lord?!  Why now Lord?!  Why me Lord?!  Like Job we summon God and demand that he explain himself.  We want to understand.   But is it even possible to understand such things this side of heaven?  Listen to what Isaiah says in our text:  {8} "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the LORD. {9} "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
 
Let me put it this way.  We take our little children to the doctor for immunizations because we know that the momentary pain caused by th shot they will get is important to avoid more serious harm and discomfort later.  At the moment that needle pokes our little one, they are not aware of any of that good that’s being done.  All they feel is the pain.  As much as it may pain us to see they cry, we know that we are providing care for them because we love them.  All they feel is the sharp “Ow!”  But we know that measles, mumps, rubella, and who knows what else is not going to claim our child.
 
God calls us his children.  He dearly loves us for Jesus’ sake.  He sees the present perfectly, but also the future.  Only God is in a position to know what I need to experience in the present to prepare me for the challenges that will come in the future.  There are things he does and permits that I cannot understand.  I don’t know what he knows; I don’t see present dangers that he sees; I can’t know the future as clearly as he sees it.  All I can do is trust.
 
But it is not blind trust.  God gives us promises to hold on to:  ” “…in all things God works for the good of those who love him…” (Romans 8:28).  “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5)… (Romans 11:33-34)  “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! {34} "Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?"
 
So, in the end, our God does lots of things in his grace and power that I do not understand.  The Scriptures are filled with them:  he created all out of nothing in six days, he sent a worldwide flood, he parted water  neatly in two so Israel would escape Pharaoh’s deadly army, a man named Jonah was swallowed by a fish and then barfed up on a beach alive and ready to serve, a man named Joseph was sold into slavery so that he would be in the right place at the right time to save millions of lives.  I don’t understand how God could have managed to use such troubling events to work such good things, but he did and he did it in his love and grace. 
 
Dear friends, look at the cross and know that our God is near with his patient and pure love.  Look at our lives, and trust that his ways, while far above our own, are still moved by the grace that holds us in the hollow of his hand.  And then, in confidence every day, call on the Lord because he is near! ]]>Tue, 12 Sep 2017 00:31:58 GMThttp://ascensionmacomb.com/pastors-blog_old/fitting-inI was once a ninth grader. That was a long time ago, but it wasn’t so long ago that I have forgotten what being a ninth grader was like.  In some ways I was a bundle of angst.  I was at that age when probably more than ever before and since I was acutely aware of wanting to fit in.  And in so many ways I didn’t feel that I did.  I was going to a high school in which I literally did not know anyone before I arrived on campus. It was Michigan Lutheran Seminary in Saginaw, Michigan and not a single grade school classmate or friend was enrolling there with me.  I really felt alone.  I was at that awkward age of not quite being a young adult but desperately wanting to no longer be a little kid.  My prospects for fitting in did not seem very good.  I was not athletic enough to really fit in with the jocks.  I was in no danger of ever being chosen as valedictorian, so I didn’t really fit in with the brains.  I looked at myself in the mirror and my ears seemed too big, and so did my pimples.
 
The very first night that I was on campus, something happened that I still remember as being one of the most traumatic things that ever happened to me in high school. It was an unofficial custom at MLS that upper classmen could, within reason, make under classmen do just about anything they wanted.  I was down in the student union, doing my best to be invisible.  A couple of upper classmen decided it would be great fun and very entertaining to make me quite visible.  As a group of freshmen girls were sitting in a big group in one corner of the union, those upperclassmen commanded me to go over to them, stand at attention and repeat three times:  “Hello, my name is Dan Simons and I would like to join your group.”
 
I did it because I had no choice.  But I was so humiliated by the experience that I literally ran out of the student union and spent the rest of the night in my dorm room assuming that my high school life was destined for disaster.  I would be forever labeled as that geeky farm kid who made such a fool out of himself.  Fitting in was no longer my biggest concern; I just didn’t want to be laughed at for the rest of my high school career.
 
The next day was the first day of classes.  It didn’t take long before the effects of the night before started to show up…but not in the way I had feared.  It seemed that nearly all the girls in my class knew my name.  They didn’t know hardly any upperclassmen by name, but they knew me.  My social life was a whole different experience after that.  And when class elections were held just a few days later, I was elected class treasurer.
 
It seems that in a most unlikely way, I had found a way to fit in.  But it wasn’t because I had become more athletic, or smarter, or better looking, or completely zit-free. It’s just that they knew my name.
 
Our God wants nothing more than to fit into our hearts and lives.  But he wants that not because he is a bundle of adolescent insecurities who has a need to fit in.  He wants to fit into our hearts and lives because he knows that unless he does we will never be all that he wants us to be.  And once he does find a place in our hearts and lives, our lives and eternities will never be the same.  How does God find a place in our hearts?  He does that by telling us that we have a place in his heart.  He does that by telling us how he made a place for us in his family now and in his heaven in eternity.  That has everything to do with Jesus because Jesus did everything to make it so.  He lived a perfect life so that the perfection we need to be worthy of a place in his kingdom was accomplished on our behalf.  He died on the cross so that every sin that would have disqualified us for a place in his kingdom has been washed away.  In fact, everything in the Bible is part of God’s “profile” that tells us who he is and what he has done for us and what he continues to do for us.  The better we know that name, the more clearly we see how he fit us into his heart and his plan.
 
So, yes, I fit in!  You do, too!  The Savior who made that so is worthy of a place in my heart.  How about yours?  ]]>