Dr. Kirk Lewis Books

Dip Your Toe in the Jordan

Author’s Note: I wrote this article 10 years ago in the months after my retirement as superintendent in Pasadena ISD. As our church shared its baccalaureate ceremony last Sunday, I was reminded again of what it felt like long ago to have all my life ahead of me as today’s graduates now have. It seemed again a good message to share with them. Feel free to send it to the graduates in your life. KL

Focal Passage: Joshua 1:1-9

I walked on stage this year again as a part of yet another high school graduation. After a 30-year career in public education, I’ve participated in one form or another in more than 120 commencement exercises and watched roughly 65,000 young people end their high school careers. That means I’ve seen my share of beach balls. Heard my share of air horns. Watched my share of impromptu dances across the stage.

The faces of these graduates as they received that cherished piece of parchment paper reflected a mixture of joy and excitement, tinged with an underlying sense of dread. Each of them undoubtedly realized in the hours after they walked the stage that they faced a future that remained largely unknown despite all their plans and dreams.

As I watched the evenings unfold each year, the ceremony always reminded me of my own graduation from high school. The scope and venue were certainly different–NRG Stadium in Houston compared to my high school auditorium in Ropesville, Texas. Standing among classes ranging in size from 450 to 1,000 students compared to my class of 33.

The graduation ceremonies, regardless of time, place and size, meant the same today as they did in our yesterday. Each graduate ends that which is familiar to begin a future that will unfold before them in unexpected ways, taking them down paths beyond anything they can truly imagine. It will be confusing and chaotic. Exciting and exhilarating. Filled with joy and pain. Some will thrive amid the challenges of life. Others will wither under its pressure.

So, we watch these young people graduate from high school with a prayer on our lips and hope in our hearts that God will lead, guide and protect them through each day of their lives. I am certain, whether they know it or not, they will need his presence every step of the way.

Our culture calls it commencement. A beginning. I like to think of it as a commissioning. A challenge set before them to be all God needs them to be in whatever call of life he sets before them.

He faithfully served his God under the leadership of Moses. Chosen among the leaders of his tribe to sit among Moses’ council of advisors, Joshua played a significant role in leading the Hebrew people into the promised land. As a spy, Joshua refused to see the land of Canaan as a place of unconquerable giants and impenetrable fortress cities as others did. Rather, Joshua saw the land God promised as a land of milk and honey.

Because of his trust and faith in God, Joshua was given the task originally assigned to Moses. I picture him dipping is toe in the slow current of the River Jordan, staring across the value in the direction of Jericho. It is three days before he would give the command to his people to cross the river and enter the land of promise.

If he was anything like most of us, and I suspect he was, he fought an internal battle with his doubts and fears, voicing a prayer for strength and wisdom he felt he lacked. Joshua surely understood his future would be at times confusing and chaotic. Exciting and exhilarating. Filled with joy and pain. A future in which he could thrive amid the challenges and stumble under the pressure. Like our graduates today, I suspect the butterflies in Joshua’s stomach seem as large as eagles.

God chose that moment as his commencement. His commissioning. The Old Testament tells us that God gave his charge to the leader of his people as he stood with his toes in the Jordan. As a commission to those he calls to serve, it can encourage our graduates equally well as they prepare to encounter life after high school. And, it is good news indeed.

God said to Joshua…

“Be strong and very courageous. Obey the laws Moses gave you. Do not turn away from them and you will be successful in everything you do. Study this book of the Law continually. Meditate on it day and night so you may be sure to obey all that is written in it. Only then will you succeed. I command you…be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the Lord you God is with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:7-9)

To those graduating from high school or college, know that God has a purpose for your life, just as he did when he told Joshua, “You will lead me people to possess all the land I promised to give their ancestors.” His plan is unique to you. To the heart he has given you. The skill sets you have learned and the talents you acquired along the way. I can almost guarantee you the plan will take you places you never thought you’d go. Watch for the doors that open and don’t hesitate to walk through them.

Following God’s path will not always be easy. Life will hit with cold reality that will lead to disappointment and discouragement. Yet it will also bless in glorious ways. God encouraged Joshua to “be strong and very courageous.” The door he opens may not be a threshold you wanted to cross. Step across it anyway with courage, conviction and confidence in the Father. A door may appear at times to be blocked. Overcome. Persevere. Rest on the promises of God.

God reminds us in this passage that success is contingent on our understanding of and obedience to the word of God. We leave high school and home desiring to exert our personal independence, to make our own choices and chart our own course in life. That’s the whole point of growing up.

Free of someone who wakes you on Sunday morning for church, it will be easy to sleep in…to set aside your faith. A word of caution. Now is not the time to express your independence from God. As you enter college or head into the work force to establish a home of your own, you will choose whether to abandon the relationship you have with Christ or to draw more deeply upon it. You have that choice.

God reminded Joshua not to stray from the teachings of God. To hold the word of God close to his heart. To mediate upon it. To study it. To draw from scripture the wisdom of God that enables us to deal with both the good and difficult times of life. This is the key to success.

Be careful also to recognize success through the eyes of God and not the eyes of the world. Success hinges upon your ability to stay focused and obedient to the plan God has for you. When we walk in his steps we walk on firm ground, able to experience joy and contentment in a life of service to the Father and to others.

As you can imagine and as the scripture tells us, Joshua and his people had to fight for all that God promised. The path God chose for Joshua as not easy. The hardships and heartaches were real. The difficulties must have seemed insurmountable at times where Joshua struggled with which way to turn and what he should do. He must have felt terribly alone at times.

You will almost certainly face hardships and heartaches throughout your life, hopefully in the measured grace of God’s blessings. You will face some of life’s hardest decisions, uncertain about which way to turn and what you should do.

Know this. God promised his presence. “…the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” It is a promise as true today as it was when Joshua stood with his toes in the Jordan River. Trust the promise. Trust in the one who made it. God will be with you wherever you go.

So the message of Joshua speaks these four things as clearly to me today as it should to you as a high school graduate.

God has a plan and purpose for each of us…in every phase of life.

He calls us to walk with strength and courage in obedience to his plan and purpose regardless of where it leads us.

We find that strength and courage and discover his will and wisdom only when seek him and immerse ourselves in his word.

Despite the difficulties that will most assuredly come, we can rest each day knowing that he will be with us wherever we go.

Here’s the thing I’ve learned and the one of which I am reminded with every graduation I attend. The challenge of graduation isn’t a one-time event. After you’ve tossed the cap and hung the tassel from the mirror of your car, you will take the next step in the life God has planned for you. You will dip your toes in the Jordan and step into the land his has promised. From that day forward, you will find another Jordan to cross. And another. And another. And another.

To every graduate out there, whether with the Class of 2026 or any class back through time, celebrate this special day. When it is over, dip your toes in the Jordan. You can’t imagine what God has planned for you!

Thinking Points

The following reflections are applicable to graduates as well as those of us who crossed that stage long ago. God is still asking all of us to dip our toes in the next Jordan.

Where do I sense God opening a door in front of me, and what step of courage is He asking me to take as I cross my own “Jordan?”

How will I stay rooted in God’s Word as I step into independence, so that my success is shaped by His wisdom rather than the world’s expectations?

What current season of transition in my life feels like standing at the riverbank, and how is God calling me to be strong and courageous in it?

In what ways have I seen God’s faithfulness in past crossings, and how might remembering those moments strengthen my trust for the next one?

Choose Life

Focal Passage: Deuteronomy 30:19-20 and Romans 12:1-2

Baseball entered my bloodstream during the 1961 World Series when the New York Yankees defeated the Cincinnati Reds in five games. The New York dynasty bothered my Dad. He detested the Yankees, and, quite naturally, so did I.

While we grudgingly accepted the greatness of Mickey Mantle and Whitey Ford, both of us had a soft spot for Yogi Berra. Catchers in the Major Leagues are generally among the more intelligent players on the team. Berra sounded like the exception.

“You can observe a lot just by watching.”

“It’s like deja vu all over again.”

Smart in practical, real-world ways, especially about baseball, teamwork, and reading situations quickly, Berra built a reputation for goofy sayings that made him a media darling.

I thought of one of my favorite Yogi quotes this week as I was doing my Bible study. He once said, “When you come to the fork in the road, take it.”

Psychologists say that people make as many as 35,000 decisions or choices of one kind or another every, single day. Rice Krispies or Cheerios? Sensodyne or Crest? Paper clips or staples?

Out of the millions of choices made over our lifetimes, those same psychologists say we make only a few hundred life-altering decisions. Buy or Rent? This job or that one? “I do” or I don’t?

Back in my college days, I asked a friend to tell me whom I should ask out on a date. He suggested one of two girls we knew who happened to be roommates. When I asked him which one, he said, “Just call. Ask the one who answers the phone.” The girl who answered the phone on that February night in 1973 has been my wife for over 50 years now.

Thankfully, sometimes God guides those all-important choices for us.

I might be wrong, but on most days, I’m not sure God cares if I go with the paper clips or staples. In the grand scheme of his plan for my life he’s probably less concerned about whether I use a brand recommended by dentists for sensitive teeth or a brand where I can cheerfully report, “Look, Ma! No cavities.”

There are, however, many choices we face that do matter in God’s will for our lives. Those are the ones to which we must pay attention. There is one choice more important than any other.

The Hebrew people didn’t always make the right choice. No one knew this better than Moses. He has seen Israel long for captivity in Egypt again after God had set them free. He had heard them grumble when they wanted something other than the manna God provided to sustain them in the desert. He stared in disbelief at a golden calf they created when they grew tired of waiting on God.

Moses watched them stand at the point of deliverance in Kadesh Barnea ready to enter the promised land only to back away in fear. Moses witnessed the death of an entire generation in the wilderness because of the choices they made.

This godly leader felt the consequences of poor decisions as he stood a second time on the precipice of the promised land, knowing he would not be allowed to enter because of his own disobedience.

Moses understood that life is full of consequential choices. After all of that history—after rebellion, regret, judgment, and mercy—Moses gathered this new generation of Israelites on the banks of the Jordan telling them they had a choice to make.

Read what he said.

This day I call on heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now, choose life… (Deuteronomy 30:19)

When Moses urges them to “choose life,” it is not a poetic flourish. He pleads with a people who have repeatedly chosen a path of destruction, even when another more blessed option was clearly offered.

At first glance it seems a simple choice. Who among us, even today, would not choose life and blessing over death and curses? Most scholars say that’s not really the choice we’re called to make. Life and blessing or death and curses are the results of what we choose.

Moses goes on to explain to the Hebrew people and to us what it looks like to choose life. Read further in the passage.

Choose life…that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life… (Deuteronomy 30:20)

Notice that God does not force the outcome. He invites a response.

Choose life.

The Hebrew word for choose used in this passage means “to select or decide after careful consideration. It is not a casual choice, nor is it an emotional one. It is intentional, suggesting loyal commitment. It is the same word used in covenant language when God “chooses” Israel.

Moses tells the people essentially, “Choose God the way God has chosen you.”

Interestingly, according to one commentary, the Hebrew word translated “life” in this passage is plural. It conveys the idea of life to its fullest; life in every dimension. Spiritual. Relational. Emotional. It mirrors the language of Jesus’ desire when he calls us to experience “abundant life.” Life as it was meant to be in God’s creation.

The people of Israel hear Moses tell them to carefully and deliberately commit to a path that leads to a true, full, God-centered life.

Moses doesn’t stop there. He tells them how to do it. It’s less about 10 commandments etched in stone and more about their relationship to God. Did you see it?

To love him.

To listen to his voice.

To hold fast to him.

There is a passage in Genesis where God declares, “Jacob I loved; Esau I hated.” The Hebrew words for love and hate are not about emotion. They are about choice. God chose Jacob as the one who would receive God’s promises. He did not choose Esau.

We are to choose God. To give him our devotion. Our adoration. Our loyalty. Our worship. Our trust. That’s what it means to love God.

We are to go past hearing God’s voice and deeply listening to his words. God stands ready to teach and guide those who chose him. His word is true and never fails. It is, as the Psalmist says, a “light unto my feet,” intended to guide our daily walk, even when we are surrounded by darkness. We are to listen to his voice.

As we live in relationship with God, we are to hold fast to him. The verb tense of the word suggests that holding on to God is not something done only once or only in difficult times. It means literally to keep on clinging to God. Hold on tightly. Don’t ever let go.

Think about that. Moses said, choose life by loving God, listening to his voice and clinging to him. The reason, he added, is simple. God is life. See it? Choose life. God is life. Therefore, choose God.

For a people about to enter a land where God was neither known nor worshipped, the choice Moses laid out was the only choice that would bring them the life God promised.

Every day, in a thousand small and large ways, you and I stand at Yogi’s fork in the road. Now, we have a choice between good or bad. Good or better. Better or best. Life or death. Blessing or curses.

When you get right down to it, we face the same choice the Hebrew people made long ago.

Will I love and trust God or will I depend on myself?

Will I listen to the voice of God and the whispers of his Holy Spirit or will I ignore what I hear?

Will I cling to Christ despite the circumstances or will I let myself drift away?

The good news is that God not only gives the command to choose—He gives the desire behind it. “Choose life” is not harsh; it is deeply compassionate and reveals the heart of God. Choose life is not an ultimatum, it is his expressed desire for all of us. It is as if God is saying, “This is the path that leads to joy, peace, and purpose. Walk in it, please! Come to me!”

It’s not just an Old Testament concept. Paul urged the Christian believers in Rome to choose life by offering themselves to God.

Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer yourselves as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. (Romans 12:1-2)

In other words, give yourself to God in every way. Choose life.

Today, life will be set before you and I again and again. Not in one dramatic moment, but in a hundred quiet decisions…a hundred forks in the road.

Choose to love Him.

Choose to listen.

Choose to hold fast.

Because He is life.

Thinking Points

What choices have I made recently that indicate what I truly value and trust?

Where am I tempted to choose comfort, familiarity, or self reliance instead of choosing God?

What would it look like today for me to love God intentionally — with loyalty, devotion, and commitment?

How well am I listening for God’s voice rather than merely hearing His words?

In what circumstances do I need to cling to God more tightly instead of drifting or loosening my grip?

Love Matters

Focal Passages: Psalm 19:1-2, Psalm 8:1-4 and Mark 12:30

Theology is not always deep, but it is always rich in memory and meaning. Memory and meaning combined over the last few weeks to take me back over five decades.

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth…” (Genesis 1:1)

As a 15-year-old high school student, with the ambition, but probably not the aptitude, to be an astronaut, I sat on the floor of my aunt and uncle’s house in McGregor, Texas, watching a grainy telecast from the tiny Apollo 8 capsule as it orbited the moon on Christmas Eve.

Three men, Frank Borman, James Lovell and Bill Anders, were doing what no one had done before. They were orbiting the moon.

On the fourth orbit, just as they emerged from the far side of moon, Borman began reading the Genesis creation story. I’ll admit now what I tried to hide then. I blinked back tears welling up in my eyes.

There was certainly a sense of awe and pride as a young American watching the impossible unfold before my eyes. However, hearing those words reflecting on God’s handiwork and the awe-inspiring scene unfolding out the windows of that spacecraft affected me in ways I had not imagined possible.

As I watched the moon slide by with our earth so small in the background, I thought about God setting all of the universe in motion. It was as if God was saying, “See, I made all of this for mankind to gaze at and explore. Be good stewards of what I created for you. Live in it and enjoy the works my hands have made.”

God saw all that he had made and it was very good. (Genesis 1:31)

Very good, indeed.

Those Genesis verses came alive and real on that December day in 1968. It matters so little how God created all the beauty and wonder of the universe. That he created it all…that’s enough for me. It was enough on that Christmas Eve long ago. It was enough just days ago.

Today, I have a new memory, filled with meaning that has been refreshed and renewed.

I sat in my own living room last week inspired and in awe again of manned spaceflight. I watched another mind-boggling mission around the moon unfold…this time on an Easter Sunday.

Even one with little interest in the space program must appreciate the courage and professionalism of astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen. I can only imagine the technical skills of all those engineers and scientists behind the effort. Their God-given talents combined to enable an almost flawless mission.

The videos and photographic images sent to earth from crew aboard Artemis II were stunning in detail, context and stark beauty. I found myself studying the images again, with the same sense of wonder I did in 1968. I listened to the conversations between the astronauts and mission-control as they let their enthusiasm get the better of their professionalism. You could hear the joy and amazement in their voices.

I could not look on the scenes unfolding on television without the words from Apollo 8 echoing in my heart.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth…

Victor Glover, pilot of the Artemis II mission, is a man unashamed of his faith. He is a U. S. Navy Captain and NASA astronaut who integrates his faith seamlessly into his work while doing things I only dreamed of doing.

In a recent interview, Glover said, “My career is fed by my faith. Anytime I do something that’s pretty risky, I pray. Before I fly, every time I fly. Definitely when I go sit on top of a rocket ship.”

Glover said that working at NASA has opened doors to talk about creation and faith. Certainly, flying around the moon gave him an unique perspective of God’s creation. In a broadcast from Artemis II as they approached the moon, Glover used that moment to reflect on what it meant to look at both the moon and earth suspended in the blackness of space.

“When I read the Bible, I think of this amazing place that we have—this ‘spaceship called Earth’—that was created to give us a place to live.” He added, “In all of this emptiness, you have this oasis, this beautiful place that we get to exist together.”

Like I did back in 1968, I listened to those heartfelt words, this time with more mature tears in my eyes. I could not help but think of words written by the Psalmist so very long ago.

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day, they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. (Psalm 19:1-2)

The writer seems to be telling us the more we study God’s universe, the more we see his hand in it. The more we see up close all he created, the more we will learn about him. It’s a thought echoed by the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Christians in Rome.

For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. (Romans 1:20)

God’s fingerprints are present in all creation, teaching us about his handiwork. That truth is readily seen by those with a heart open to his presence.

The psalmist sensed a richer purpose for creation. It’s not just about the glory of creation. There is purpose behind it.

Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory in the heavens…When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them? (Psalm 8:1, 3-4)

That’s a heady thought, isn’t it?

God, the creator, is mindful of all humanity.

The phrase in Hebrew suggests more than just thinking about us occasionally. It carries a sense of active remembrance. Paying attention with intent. Caring enough to intervene. In other words, the creator of the universe intentionally keeps you and me in his thoughts in ways that actively demonstrate his love and care for us.

I should celebrate and stand in awe of the beauty and wonder of creation, but that’s not really the point. God pulled creation together to give us a place to live together in relationship to him and to each other because God cares. God loves us.

Glover spoke more about that when he returned to earth. Reflecting on the success of the mission and all he and this crew had seen, Glover said. “As we continue to unlock the mystery of the cosmos, I’d like to remind everyone that love matters.”

He’s so right. As serene as our world seems from space, it is a chaotic place, filled with too much division and hate. It is a world that often fails to see the God who created all this; the God who loves us so much that he sent his son as the atoning sacrifice for your sins and mine.

Loving God and loving one another does matter.

In response to a challenge from an inquisitive Pharisee, Jesus affirmed God’s greatest commandments.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself. There are not greater commandments than these. (Mark 12:30)

I think that’s one of the things I took away as the wonders of the universe on display during the Artemis mission. I see that sliver of “blue marble” hanging in space and realize, as Glover said, “Love matters.”

As I said from the start. It’s not the deepest theology, but it may indeed be the richest

Now, it’s just up to you and me to live like love matters.

If we can do that, then I think we can hear God say, “It’s very good!”

Thinking Points

When have I last paused long enough to let creation stir awe in me, and what did that moment reveal about God’s character?

In what ways am I living as a steward of God’s creation — not just the physical world, but the people He has placed around me?

How does knowing that the Creator of the universe is mindful of me reshape the way I see my worth, my worries, and my daily life?

If Jesus says that loving God and loving others are the greatest commandments, what would it look like for me to live this week as if “love matters”?

Resurrection Faith

Focal Passage: John 11:1-44

Just as the sun was setting, a breathless messenger found Jesus sitting among his disciples after another day of teaching and ministering to people on the east side of the Jordan River. The messenger, most likely a man Jesus had met previously while visiting in the home of Lazarus and his two sisters, Martha and Mary.

The message was simple. “The one you love is sick.”

What sounds a little cryptic to us was clear to Jesus. His good friend Lazarus was seriously ill. Martha and Mary just knew when Jesus heard those words, he would stop what he was doing and hurry to Bethany to heal their brother, a man Jesus loved like his own brother.

Jesus spoke to he man and the disciples offering a quick word of reassurance that the sickness would not end in death, but that God, and Jesus himself, would be glorified through it.

Then, in a move that may have surprised the messenger, Jesus stayed where he was for two more days, continuing to minister to all who came to him.

After that second day, Jesus began the day’s walk to Bethany.

As he neared the village, Martha ran to meet Jesus. Through scripture we hear an emotional conversation that becomes one of the greatest Easter messages of all time. Listen to the words between Martha and Jesus.

“Lord,” Martha said, “If only you had been here, my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.”

Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:21-26)

There is incredible truth in these few words of scripture than drill into the core of Christianity.

Across most of the Christian world, we just observed Easter, the day we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. According to some estimates, church attendance across America on Easter increases between 50-75 percent. However, a 2022 survey conducted by Lifeway Research and Ligonier Ministries revealed that slightly over one-third (34 percent) of all professing Christians question whether the physical, bodily resurrection of Jesus actually occurred.

This exchange between Martha and Jesus foreshadows Jesus’ own victory over death and underscores the power of living in resurrection faith.

This passage offers three aspects of the story that really speak to why the resurrection matters today.

Mary and Martha get word that Jesus is near, so Mary, the reflective one, remains behind while Martha, the one that always has to be doing something, runs to meet Jesus. She expresses sorrow and perhaps a little frustration that Jesus didn’t arrive in time to heal her brother.

Look at verses 23-26…

Martha’s words seem less a challenge to Jesus’ late arrival as an expression of sorrow over what might have been. Jesus doesn’t explain. He just offers reassurance.

“Your brother will rise again.”

Mary responds with the only resurrection she knows. The prominent Jewish belief among the religious Jewish priests and people was in a corporate resurrection of God’s people at the end times. She states what she has been taught and what she fervently believes. “I know he’ll rise again in the last day.”

It is here that Jesus speaks words that auger not only his own death and resurrection, but a truth so embedded in the gospel that it resonates 2,000 years later.

“I am the resurrection and the life…”

Hear that carefully because it is an astounding promise that is the heart of the gospel.

The resurrection changed lives. The disciples when from timid and fearful to tenacious and fearless in their proclamation of the good news. It wasn’t that they just decided to go on the offensive. What they saw and what they experienced when they saw the risen Christ, changed them.

The resurrection is not an abstract belief or just another fact of history. Dr. Jeremiah Johnson, author of Body of Proof, reminds us that the resurrection is A PERSON. Jesus IS the Resurrection and Life.

I don’t know if I ever thought of the resurrection in that exact way.

All the other “I am” statements Jesus makes in the Gospel of John are clear metaphors:

I am the good shepherd.

I am the bread.

I am the light.

I am the gate.

I am the way.

I am the true vine.

Metaphors that share essential truth about Jesus, his nature and his role.

When Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25), it feels different. He’s not just using a metaphor—He’s making a powerful claim that he is the source of resurrection and life, both here and now and after we die. He is the agent of resurrection. Resurrection is not just something He provides, it is something found in Him and only in him. Resurrection is who he is.

It’s as if he is telling Martha, “Resurrection/Life is standing right in front of you. In me, there is no death.”

Because Jesus is the resurrection, it ought to change our outlook on life.

Go back to the initial words of Martha, and for that matter, the first words of Mary when she greets Jesus.

Vs. 21–If only you had been here, my brother would not have died (Martha)

Vs. 32–If only you had been here, my brother would not have died. (Mary)

This was something they talked about in the dark hours after Lazarus died…a feeling they shared. Jesus has demonstrated healing in the past. They had undoubtedly heard of those miracles. They may have even seen his healing power demonstrated in person with others they knew.

The sisters certainly knew he was capable of taking the sickness away. That’s why they asked him to come in the first place. They knew, based on where Jesus was at the time, that he could get to Bethany in two days. Jesus waited under the guidance of the Holy Spirit to reveal something far greater than his healing power. Both Martha and Mary said, “If only…”

Why didn’t you come when you first heard? Why did you wait? You could have done something? He died because you weren’t here to heal him? These are emotional words spoken in loss, uttered by sisters who are hurting.

“If only…” How many times have you and I said the same thing after experiencing a loss of someone we love?

In his book, Johnson urges his readers to turn our regret-filled “if onlys” to a faith-filled “if Jesus.”

If only says it’s too late. It looks backward at what didn’t happen rather than looking forward to what Christ can still do—even in situations that seems final.

“If Jesus” anticipates what can happen today because Jesus is who he is. “If Jesus” tells us that nothing and no one is ever too gone. If Jesus is in our lives, things can still happen. It may not be everything we were hoping, but if Jesus is present, he will bring good from it. Martha understood it to some limited degree…”but even now…”

Seeing Jesus as the source of life, gives us a resurrection outlook that moves from regret to expectation. From a past-perspective to a future trust. From finality to possibility and hope. From spiritual and physical death to abundant life now and for all eternity.

If Jesus is at work in my life, he can still restore, redeem and lead me forward. That’s resurrection outlook.

Experiencing that resurrection outlook matters because it is not dependent on:

timing (Jesus arrived after Lazarus died)
circumstances (The tomb was already sealed)
human conclusions (Everyone else thought it was over)

There is one final thought that we must overlook. Resurrection is personal.

Listen to the next few phrases in vs. 25-26.

“He who believes in me will live, even though he dies”; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.”

At first glance these statements seem to say the same thing. Commentaries suggest these phrases subtly complement each other.

The first phrase…he who believes in me will live even though he dies…refers to physical death of a believer followed by resurrection. There is a real, future resurrection life. Physical death is temporary. We may die physically, but we will live again. We move from physical death to spiritual life.

The second phrase…whoever lives (in me) and believes in me will never die…refers to never experiencing eternal death or separation from God. Literally, in the Greek, (emphatic and forcefully stated) “he will absolutely never die at all.” This phrase explains what death ultimately cannot do to a believer. It cannot separate a believer from the presence of God. Death is powerless.

Jesus is purposeful in stating these phrases in this order. Jesus acknowledges that death is a reality then he emphatically redefines that reality for believers…death isn’t really death. It’s a gateway to life eternal for the believer. Because we believe in him, we will never, ever be separated again from God who loves us. So, what he says is not repetition, it’s revelation.

These words should be a source of immense comfort to us. This promise is not reserved for a select few but is extended to all who put their faith in Jesus Christ.

When you look back at the scripture, Jesus made his declaration. He explained its meaning. Then, looking straight into Martha’s eyes, he posed the only question that really mattered. In is in this question that resurrection becomes personal.

Look at the end of Vs. 26. “Do you believe this”?

By asking this question, Jesus made it personal for Martha. Martha believes in the Jewish doctrine of resurrection; She knows the dead will one day rise. That’s been taught to her all her life.

Jesus called her personally to take the next step and believe in him as the resurrection in order to:

To deepen her faith before the miracle. He did not want her faith to rest solely on seeing Lazarus raised—He wanted it grounded in who He is.
To reveal His identity clearly. This was one of His strongest claims, I AM THE RESURRECTION AND LIFE. Now that you know who I am, what will you do with that knowledge?
To invite a confession of faith. Martha responded with one of the clearest statements of faith in all of John: “Yes, Lord…I believe you are the Christ, the Son of God.” She believed in him for who he was, not what he might do for her brother.

When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead he demonstrated and validated his claim about being the resurrection and life. It is guaranteed by his empty tomb on that first Easter Sunday. Jesus’ resurrection is the seal for our salvation and our assurance of eternal life.

Paul reminds of that truth in several ways.

If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. (Romans 10:9)

He (Jesus) was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.” (Romans 4:25)

If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ is raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith…your faith is futile and you are still in your sin…But Christ has indeed been raised…(I Corinthians 15:13-14, 17, 20)

A Christian lives and dies with that truth and hope expressed by Paul.

That, my friends, is an act of resurrection faith.

The question is, do you believe it?

Thinking Points

How does seeing Jesus not just as the giver of resurrection but as the Resurrection Himself reshape my view of life and death?

Where am I still living with an “if only” mindset instead of an “if Jesus” faith?

How personally do I take Jesus’ question, ‘Do you believe this,’ and what does my life say about my answer?

Follow the Trail

Focal Passages: Jeremiah 31:31-34; Luke 22:20

Daniel Boone is probably my pioneer hero thanks to Fess Parker and the glory days of NBC. While the television show that aired from 1964 to 1970 was more fiction than fact, Boone did play a significant role in the western expansion of the United States in the late-1700s.

In 1775, Daniel Boone and a team of about 30 axmen hacked their way from Tennessee through the Cumberland Gap into Kentucky and the Ohio River Valley, cutting the Wilderness Road. Along the way, they widened and connected a series of existing Native America paths, opening the door for American settlement on the western side of the Appalachian Mountains.

As he carved this new road, Boone “blazed a trail.” While we use that phrase today as an idiom to mean pioneering a movement or innovating in some new field, to Daniel Boone, “blazing a trail” meant to cut notches (blazes) into trees to point travelers in the right direction.

Historians estimate that roughly 200,000-300,000 people used the Wilderness Road, following Boone’s blaze marks, to reach Kentucky and beyond.

I’ve been reading the gospels in the last week as we approach Easter and found a new way to look at God’s redemptive work, following a trail God blazed long ago. Follow it with me.

This trail began before creation. Paul tells us this much in 2 Timothy 1:9.

He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time.

There’s our first blaze. We can follow the trail to the Old Testament. The prophet Jeremiah came at a time when the people of God had again fallen away from God. They broke again the old covenant with God and faced a future in captivity and exile. Hopelessly lost in their sin.

What Jeremiah proclaimed was the high point of his prophecies. A deep blaze in the trail of God’s salvation, pointing us toward Jesus and the cross.

The time is coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant though I was a husband to them. (Jeremiah 31:31-32)

Jeremiah declares that a new covenant is coming. This new covenant will be different by recognizing that God’s people would never on their own be able to keep the old covenant. God would provide a new way to restore his bride to himself.

Listen to the words of God that Jeremiah proclaims.

This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be my people. No longer will a man teach his neighbor or a man his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” because they will all know me from the least of them to the greatest. For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more. (Jeremiah 31:33-34)

Can you see the promise of Easter in his words?

This new covenant, sealed with the blood of Christ, says that rather than laws written in stone, God will write his law in their hearts and in their minds. Faithfulness will become less an outward demonstration, but an inward transformation…a change of heart.

When God declares that he will be their God and they will be his people he is encouraging intimacy and belonging. They will have a restored relationship that is not based on compliance, but on connection and grace.

God promised that they will no longer be dependent on priests or intermediaries to know him. The relationship with him in the new covenant will be personal and direct. He will speak to them and they will speak to him. The new covenant will be available to anyone…from the least to the greatest.

The promise of something new has been made. Put a notch on this tree and let it lead us further down the trail.

The thought of this new covenant crossed my mind during a sermon my pastor preached several weeks ago in his series from the Gospel of Mark. Follow me on this path of discovery.

Jesus, confronted by some folks who were upset that Jesus’ disciples didn’t always fast like the really holy people of the day (Mark 2:22), broke into a parable about wineskins. It’s a story that would have left all who heard nodding in agreement. “You don’t pour new wine into old wineskins.”

You see Jesus had come to do, as the prophet said in Isaiah 43:19, “a new thing.” One simply could not pour Jesus’ teachings into a tired, old religious system that led to ruin. Jesus was doing a new thing. Once restricted to the Jewish people, God was prepared to do a new thing. His “new wine” would not only break out of the rigid trap of the Law that limited salvation to a select few, it would be available to all people, both Jew and Gentile. God is doing a new thing.

Cut a notch into that tree and keep blazing the trail.

Later, in Luke 22, Jesus gathered his closest disciples in a non-descript upper room in the heart of Jerusalem to share the Passover meal, hours before his betrayal, arrest and crucifixion. Thick with emotion and meaning, it was unlike any other Passover they had ever experienced.

Jesus shared the bread with those around him, urging them to take and always remember what he had done and what he was about to do.

This is my body given for you. Do this in remembrance of me. (Luke 22:19)

Then, Jesus shared the cup. Listen closely to what he said and watch him cut another notch in the trail.

This cup is the new covenant in my blood which is poured out for you. (Luke 22:20)

The wineskin story ultimately led me to Isaiah’s promise that God is doing a new thing, which in turn led to Jesus’ promise of a new covenant. It is a statement so rich in meaning.

In a biblical sense, a covenant is a promise between God and humanity. The old covenant, set out in Exodus 24, was that God would take Israel as his people. Israel promised to obey the laws God set before them. God upheld his end of the bargain. Israel could not consistently obey the law, thereby breaching the covenant time and time again with their sinfulness. All of the Jewish sacrificial system was established to atone for that sin through blood sacrifice.

Before we get too high on the horse with Israel, we would do no better than they in keeping the law. We would get just as lost in our attempt to follow the old covenant.

So in this teachable moment, Jesus tells his disciples that his death, his blood, will create a new relationship between God and humanity. His sacrifice on the cross replaced the old covenant system based on obedience to the Mosaic law with a new covenant based on forgiveness and grace.

Jesus and his work on the cross lies at the end of the trail this trail. Jeremiah’s beautiful description of what that new covenant would mean to you and me is another blaze along the path. Let’s follow it toward Easter as we look again at the prophecy of Jeremiah through New Testament eyes.

I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be my people. No longer will a man teach his neighbor or a man his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” because they will all know me from the least of them to the greatest. For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more. (Jeremiah 31:33-34)

The old covenant with its laws, sacrifices and temple system required repeated offerings. The new covenant in Jesus is sufficient, final and personal…offered to you and me through his sacrifice on the cross and sealed by his resurrection.

The new covenant offered through Christ will not be some externally driven creed or code. It is a a life lived by the teachings of Christ, written on our hearts and burned in to our minds. It is our turning point. It isn’t an attempt to modify our behavior, but a way of transforming out hearts to be like the heart of Christ. In this new covenant, we don’t conform to the law, we are changed inside to be like Christ.

As a result, we know God in a different more intensely personal way. He is our God and we are uniquely and securely his. No dependence on intermediaries. No barriers beyond those we create through our waywardness. He is not someone we cannot reach. We have this direct relationship with God through Jesus.

Because of Christ’s death for our sins and his resurrection that promises new life, our sins are forgiven and forgotten. God chooses not to remember. Jesus paid the price of atonement on the cross, so we don’t have to suffer the penalty.

That’s the promise of the new covenant and the hope and joy of Easter, isn’t it? Easter is Jesus saying, “By my life and my death, I have opened the door to a new relationship between you and God. I am the forever sacrifice that atones or covers every sin. The trail has been blazed. All you have to do is follow it.”

The Jeremiah passage may be the clearest Old Testament prophecy of what Christians understand as the new covenant fulfilled in Christ.

It shifts the focus from external law to internal change; from a national covenant to a personal relationship; from repeated sacrifice to complete forgiveness.

God planned his redemptive work and set it in motion long before time began, blazing a trail through human history, to bring us to that first Easter morning and the resurrection of the one who died to mark the pathway for us. Jesus is our trailblazer.

I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. (John 14:6)

These are the questions we all must answer. Have you seen the blaze marks he cut for you? Have you followed the trail that leads to this new covenant and to the eternal life he promised you?

I hope you have, but if not, it’s never too late to start walking.

If the trail has already led you to Jesus, have you honored the new covenant he made with you? Are you living your life following Christ as your example?

I hope you have, but if not, that next blaze mark could bring you back to the path he needs you to walk.

Thinking Points

How does this new covenant change the way I view my relationship with God?

How is my faith different when it comes from inner transformation rather than external rules or traditions?

What does it mean for me personally that Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross is sufficient and final?

How can I live out the hope and freedom of the new covenant starting this Easter?

How can I share the reality of God’s personal relationship with others in my life?

Wrestling With God

Focal Passage: Genesis 32:24-32

When a Bible passage becomes a mirror into your own life, it’s time to sit up and pay attention. I read the story of Jacob in Genesis 32 this week, finding that I identified all too well with him.

How often have I tried to cling to control or run away when facing some hard truth? How often have I simply trusted in my own cleverness more than I trusted in God’s providential care?

Jacob’s story tells me there comes a time when God no longer lets us keep doing things our way. There comes a time when we find ourselves wrestling with a loving God who refuses to let us stay the same.

I wonder if, like me, you can see yourself mirrored in Jacob’s life. Think about it.

*****

Jacob stood alone on the bank of the Jabbok River on a night that probably felt darker than any he had known.

Over the course of the day, he had sent out three separate caravans loaded with lavish gifts, sending them across the river on a march toward his estranged twin brother Esau. Jacob hoped to placate Esau’s anger for his callous and selfish acts of betrayal some 20 years earlier.

Then, just before sunset, Jacob sent his two wives, his children and the remainder of his possessions to set up camp across the river in expectation of Esau’s arrival the next day.

As his family faded into the night Jacob stayed behind in the darkness trying to devise some novel scheme to get out of the mess he created of his life. One good scheme deserved another in Jacob’s eyes.

As a young man, Jacob tricked a desperately hungry Esau into giving away his birthright as the first-born son in exchange for a bowl of stew. With his financial future secure and with the help of their mother Rebecca, Jacob later duped his blind father Isaac into extending to Jacob the family blessing, which again, rightfully belonged to Esau.

Cheated twice out of his heritage, Esau pledged to kill Jacob as soon as their father died. Rebecca, afraid for Jacob’s life, sent him back to Haran to stay with her brother Laban until things in Canaan cooled down a bit. Rather than deal with the consequences of his actions, Jacob ran.

This escape to Haran began a long, difficult 20-year journey of love, labor and deceit. Laban manipulated Jacob’s love for his daughter Rachel, turning it into 20 years of indentured servanthood. Every time Jacob wanted to return home, Laban found another way of keeping him there.

When it finally appeared that Laban might never let him go, Jacob gathered together his family, his servants and his livestock. In the dead of night, he ran.

Jacob spent his whole life manipulating the circumstances of his life in his favor. Trying to take advantage of every situation to gain the upper hand.

So, that night he stood on the bank of the river…con artist who had been conned, a manipulator who had been manipulated…calculating outcomes that might happen if Esau rejected his gifts. I suspect running away rose to the top of the list. It had been his go-to solution every other time circumstances got the better of him.

Jacob was still scheming with one eye looking toward Esau and the other looking for the best escape route. God had other plans. Before Jacob could face Esau, he had to face God. Before he could run away again, he had a run in with God.

You’ll find the passage in Genesis 32.

So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man.

Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”

But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

The man said, “What is your name?”

“Jacob,” he answered.

Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.”

Jacob said, “Please tell me your name.”

But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he blessed him there. (Genesis 32:24-29)

I don’t want to make it sound like Jacob was a horrible individual. He wasn’t. While he crossed more than one ethical line, there was something inside him that longed for God.

Go back a few chapters in Genesis. Jacob is running as fast as he can to Laban at his mother’s insistence. He’s tired and worn out. The man with a stolen estate has no home in which to sleep. He pulls a flat rock for a pillow and dreams of a stairway to heaven. It’s as if God is saying, “Home may be out of reach right now, but heaven is not. I am here.”

Through his dream God renews with Jacob the covenant he made with his father Isaac and his grandfather Abraham. The land upon which his head rests will be his land and the land for all his descendants. Through his lineage, scripture says, “the people of the world shall be blessed.” Jacob holds on to that promise for two decades.

As Jacob’s wealth increases during his time with Laban, Jacob gives God the glory for every success.

Jacob recognized God’s presence in his life, he just didn’t always trust him. Jacob always felt that if anything good was going to happen, he had to make it happen. He lived up to his name every step of the way… “the heel grabber,” “the grasper,” “the striver.”

God commands Jacob to “return to the land of your fathers” (Genesis 31:3), telling him, “I will be with you.” The closer Jacob gets to the border of Esau’s land, he grows more anxious, worrying about Esau’s retribution.

Jacob didn’t think God was capable on his own of working things out, so he rolled out the gifts. He divided his family and his flock, hoping that one group might escape if Esau attacked the other. He searched through the night for any other advantage that might give him the upper hand.

Jacob left God no other choice. In one of the most understated verses in scripture, a “man wrestled with him until daybreak.”

It’s almost as if Jacob turned to run away again only to be tackled by a man ready to rumble. Theologians debate whether this man was an angel, the pre-incarnate Christ or God himself. As far as Jacob was concerned, “I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.” (Gensis 32:30)

It’s almost laughable when you think about it: God wrestling a man. Yet, God and I have gone more than a few rounds over the years. I suspect you have, too. Each of us at one time or another has wrestled with what we know God is calling us to do.

In addition to his more manipulative traits, Jacob was also clever, resourceful, determined and strong-willed. He was all those things, but he was not yet surrendered. God knew it was time for Jacob to stop conniving, to stop running, so they fought it out in a match that lasted all night.

I don’t know about you, but some of my wrestling matches with God last a lot longer. I can put up a quite the fight when I don’t want to do what God wants me to do. I can find excuses or what I think are pretty valid reasons why I’m right and God is wrong. My ideas always seem better.

Notice this, however. Jacob’s bout with God didn’t last until daybreak because he and God were evenly matched. The prolonged struggle lasted as long as it did because God was exposing Jacob’s stubborn independence.

When we are wrestling God for control of our lives, that fight goes on until we recognize our own stubbornness. It will last until we surrender and call him Lord.

The scripture declares clearly the moment Jacob gave in. As the morning approached, I think he still wanted to run away…to do things his way. At that point, with a touch intended to put an end to Jacob’s resistance, God dislocated his hip. Running was no longer an option. Pastor Adrian Rogers put it this way, “God crippled him to conquer him.”

When Jacob realized he had no choice, he surrendered, wrapping his arms around the ankles of the only one who could make things right.

Here’s the interesting thing to me. One moment Jacob is wrestling against God; the next moment he is clinging to God. Jacob, the man who had stolen the blessing of his father, was now begging for the blessing of the Father God.

When Jacob said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me,” it is not defiance, it’s desperation. Jacob quit fighting to win and started depending. Wrestling became an embrace.

In a culture that prizes self-sufficiency and self-reliance, surrender seems a coward’s option. It may well be one’s greatest act of courage. God’s work in us flows best through surrender.

Jacob’s story reflects our own tendency to run from God’s call, conviction or presence. Like Jacob, we are met by God, through circumstances, reflection or divine confrontation. Sometimes, he stops us in our tracks so we can no longer run from him.

Surrender brings transformation.

Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome. (Genesis 32:28)

It’s not saying he outwrestled God. Jacob overcame his own stubbornness, his own self-reliance.

Theologian Frederick Buechner called Jacob’s divine encounter at the Jabbok River the “magnificent defeat of the human soul at the hands of God.” In Jacob’s story we can easily see our own struggles with our desire to take control of our lives. Our failed efforts to find escape from our own fears and vulnerabilities.

Out of these experiences God offers blessing.

In the end, God did what he had to do. He confronted Esau. He grappled all night for what was truly important. When Jacob could wrestle no longer, he surrendered. He clung to God with greater strength than he resisted, realizing that he could not go on without him.

Jacob’s story invites us to ask simple but searching questions: Why am I still wrestling? Where am I still wrestling with God? The blessing came only when Jacob stopped resisting and held on in surrender. The same is true for us.

God meets us in the places we fear most, not to destroy us, but to reshape us. And though surrender may leave us limping, it also leaves us blessed.

Next time you see me, I hope you see me limping.

Thinking Points

Where in my life am I still trying to manage outcomes instead of trusting God?

What fear or unresolved situation keeps me looking for an escape route?

What would it look like for me to stop wrestling with God and start clinging to him?

What new identity or new way of walking might God want me to embrace when I surrender control to him?

Build an Altar

Focal Passage: Genesis 12:7

I have some friends who are serious hikers. For several years, they head east to hike another leg of the Appalachian Trail. One hopes to complete the last 150 miles of his journey this year. The other still has 750 miles to go.

Robin and I are recreational hikers. Tackling such an ambitious goal is not in the cards or our legs, though we did hike about 15 feet of the Appalachian Trail when we visited the Great Smokey Mountains a couple of years ago. We have just short of 2,190 miles to go!

These hiker buddies tell me getting lost on the trail is a very real danger. To avoid losing the trail on rocky ground, they watch for cairns. A cairn is a pile of stones stacked carefully on top of one another, placed by rangers to guide hikers along the correct path.

We see something similar with altars. God’s people would gather stones to build an altar, not because the stones had significance, but because together they became a marker of an encounter with God—a memorial of faith, obedience or answered prayer. So, in one sense, these altars built of stone would keep them on the righteous path.

Altars are a common theme in the Old Testament, particularly in the story of Abraham’s life. God called him from a distant land, telling him to leave his country, his people and his family and go to a land that God would eventually show him and carrying a promise of blessing.

Eventually, Abraham reached a place called Shechem in Canaanite territory. When he arrived, God affirmed that this was the land he had promised to Abraham and his descendants. In Genesis 12:7 you find a small phrase showing Abraham’s response.

“…so he built an altar there…”

If you keep reading Abraham’s story, the phrase becomes a theme.

Time and time again in Genesis, Abraham builds an altar. Nothing dramatic (with one notable exception). No elaborate ritual. Just ordinary stones stacked in quiet response of God’s faithfulness. Those altars stand as markers along the trail of Abraham’s spiritual journey. In many ways, they show us how a believer grows through promise, identity, restoration, trust and obedience.

Promise

Go back to that passage in Genesis 12:7. Abraham entered Canaan, the land God promised him. Everything he owned he brought with him. The land belonged to others. God told him, “To your offspring I will give this land.”
Notice what Abraham doesn’t do. He doesn’t survey the land. He doesn’t secure its borders. He doesn’t call his men together to talk about conquest.

Instead, he worships in occupied territory. Bows before God in a place that does not yet reflect God’s reign. He stakes the ground spiritually before he ever possesses it physically. The altar at Shechem is built on promise alone. Abram has no deed. No visible guarantee. All he has is God’s word.

This is where faith begins, isn’t it? Before we see fulfillment, before we possess anything tangible, before circumstances shift in our favor, we build an altar on God’s promise alone.

Abraham’s altar is his way of saying, “God has spoken and that’s enough.”

There are seasons of life when God gives a promise, but not possession. In those moments, the question is simply this:

Will we build an altar anyway?

Identity

Afterward worshipping God in Shechem, Abraham moves his herd to a new place between Bethel and Ai. No new promise is given. No dramatic revelation follows. He is doing what a sheep herder does. He moves his flock to new grass. There, he pitches his tent and builds another altar. At this altar, scripture tells us he…

“called upon the name of the Lord.” (Genesis 12:8)

He is not worshiping this time in reaction to something new God has done. It establishes a pattern of worship for Abraham. It marks his identity. Among a people who worship pagan gods and a culture filled with competing loyalties, Abraham builds another altar establishing who he is and to whom he belongs.

You see, before faith is truly tested in the crucible of real life, it must be established, rooted in the fertile soil of God’s presence. The Bethel altar is Abraham declaring, “I belong to the Lord, not just in moments of revelation, but in daily life. It shifts the emphasis from event-driven faith to identity-driven faith.

Shechem is about what God said. Bethel is about who Abram is. There are seasons of life when we must firmly identify ourselves with God. When was the last time you built such an altar as a witness and testimony of the one to whom you belong?

Restoration

After these early steps of faith, Abraham falters. Famine sends him to Egypt where opposition feels formidable. Fear takes over. He misrepresents his relationship with Sarah. Now, the promise seems threatened by Abraham’s compromise.

When he finally returns to Canaan, he goes back to Bethel, the place where he declared his identity. I imagine the altar had fallen into disrepair during his time away. You can almost see Abraham rebuild the altar from fallen stones even as he rebuilt his identity with God. and he again…

“called upon the name of the Lord.” (Genesis 13:4)

This rebuilt altar is not about promises or identity. It is about restoration. Abraham returned to the place where faith burned brightest to rekindle what he had lost.

There is something profoundly hopeful here. The life of faith is not a straight upward climb, is it? The Father of Faith, as the writer of Hebrews describes him, stumbled just like we do. When he did, he repented. He didn’t hide in shame or construct a new path. He went back to first things. First love. First trust. First dependence. Picked up the stones and rebuilt the altar.

Abraham didn’t outgrow the altar. He returned to it. In that moment of worship Abraham found himself restored into fellowship with the God of the promise.

I don’t know about you. I’ve spent my time in Egypt—a time of fear-driven decisions or some other spiritual drift. The altar of restoration is a repentant desire to return. A desire to come back to the Lord.

The beauty of this part of Abraham’s story is there is no rebuke from God. No ending punishment. God simply receives his worship and opens his arms again to Abraham. If you need to reconnect with God today, if you need his restoration, pick up the stones. Rebuild the altar of your identity as a child of God.

Surrender

Just a few verses later, Abraham found himself at a crossroad with his nephew Lot. The land cannot sustain both families. As the elder, Abraham had the right of first choice. Instead, he let Lot decide where he wanted to settle his family and his herds.

Lot chose the lush Jordan Valley, leaving Abraham with the leftovers, land which appeared less desirable. After Lot departed, God reaffirmed his promise to Abraham and his children. Abraham then settled near Hebron and…

“…built an altar to the Lord…” (Genesis 13:18)

Maybe this altar represents surrender. Abraham had every right and reason to grasp what was his. Rather than claim his own, he yielded. He trusted that God’s promise didn’t depend on Abraham’s maneuvering or manipulation.

There is a deep spiritual maturity here. Early faith built an altar after hearing promise. Growing faith built an altar after losing its advantage.

Trust is not tested when everything aligns in our favor, but when we voluntarily relinquish control. The altar at Hebron said, “God’s blessing does not depend on my securing the best position.”

Surrendering means letting go of what looks better. Letting go of my assumed advantage to go where God has placed me. Faith means believing that what God assigns is better than what we could have chosen.

This altar was quieter than the first, but perhaps stronger. Abraham no longer needed visible superiority. He just needed to let go. Could you and I also need to let go of something we think we need in order to receive God’s fullest blessing? If so, let’s build an altar to God.

Obedience

The final altar was the most severe.

God commands Abraham to offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice—the very child through whom that original promise was to be fulfilled. This was no longer about land. It was about the promise itself.

When he arrived at Mt. Moriah, Abraham…

“…built an altar there…” (Gensis 22:9)

On Mt. Moriah, Abraham built another altar, one that would cost him everything. Earlier altars celebrated promise. This altar appeared to contradict it. Yet, Abraham obeyed. With each stone growing heavier in his hands and heart heaving in despair, Abraham’s faith grew deeper, even when he didn’t fully understand.

He didn’t argue. He didn’t delay. He built.

At the final critical moment, God provided a substitute. The altar became a place of revelation: “The Lord will provide.” Obedience revealed provision. Earlier altars revealed trust in God’s word. This one required trust in God’s character.

Faith ultimately laid everything on the altar before God, even everything that God himself had given.

When we step back and watch Abraham, we see a progression of faith.

Promise leads to worship.

Worship leads to identity.

Failure leads to restoration.

Restoration leads to surrender.

Surrender leads to obedience.

Altars mark the decisive moments in Abraham’s spiritual foundation. They are not monuments to achievement. Not even guideposts along the trail, at least not in the most important sense. They are testimonies to dependence on and connection with God.

The quiet message running beneath these passages is that faith is not defined by what we do, but by whom we worship. Abraham’s life was not secured by cleverness or control. It was shaped by repeated acts of worship. A lifestyle of worship.

We may no longer build literal altars of stone, but we need to erect our spiritual altars.

Build them in the place of promise before fulfillment.

Build them in the place where we chose to identify ourselves as children of God.

Build them where we return from wandering to a place of restoration.

Build them where we let go of our desires, surrendering to God’s control.

Build them where we obey without full understanding.

Perhaps the question for us is this simple: Where do you need to build your next altar?

Walk and Be Blameless

Focal Passage: Genesis 17:1

It was one of those Facebook posts you see all the time. Boldface words on a solid yellow background. The post was a single passage of scripture from Genesis. I don’t remember who posted it originally. I only saw the post that one time, but for some reason, the passage kept skipping through my mind like a smooth stone flung across a calm lake.

When Abram was 99 years old, God appeared to him and said, “I am God Almighty; walk before me and be blameless.” (Genesis 17:1)

It is a verse that gets lost in the personal, covenant language that follows as God promises a new relationship with Abram and his people. Like any covenant or promise, it lays out the responsibilities of both parties. God explains in the following verses what he will do. Yet this first verse captures in a nutshell what God expects of Abram.

I heard it all week every time the stone skipped over that water. I am God Almighty. (Skip) Walk before me. (Skip) Be blameless. (Skip)

The words pushed me to slow down and look more carefully at the language itself. The more I looked at the verse the deeper and richer it became. Let me show you what I mean.

The Hebrew word for walk used in the passage is halakh. It’s not like God is telling Abram, “March! Get moving!” Rather, halakh, in one sense, speaks of wandering. Not walking in a straight line. Roaming back and forth.

If that sounds like the aimless meandering of someone who doesn’t know where they’re going, it’s not. It suggests the idea of consistent, purposeful movement. In other words, make a habit of… Develop a pattern of life…

When God tells Abram to walk, he’s saying, “As you go about your life…” or “Wherever life takes you…” “In everything you do, no matter where you are…” For one whose life took more than one unexpected turn, that resonates with me. “In the daily routine of life…”

This idea of walking doesn’t end with Abram. The New Testament picks it up and deepens it. Our walk becomes one of the primary ways Paul and John describe our life in Christ.

Paul writes in Ephesians:

I urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling you have received. (Ephesians 4:1)

Our walk, according to Paul, is our daily conduct. Our moral direction. It is all about aligning our relationship with Christ with everything we do. Paul encouraged the followers of Christ in the Ephesian church to make sure their life reflected the life and love of Jesus everywhere they went and in all they did.

John also used walk to describe authentic faith.

If we say we have fellowship with him and yet walk in darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth…but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another… (I John 1:6-7)

What does that walk look like? Genesis 17 offers another word to guide us. Be Blameless. It’s another skip of that rock we’ve tossed across the pond.

The Hebrew word of blameless is tamim. We can relax a bit because it doesn’t mean sinless or morally perfect. Thank goodness!

Tamim means complete. Whole. Undivided. Think faithful, not flawless. David was called a “man after God’s own heart,” yet he sinned. Even so, he was tamim. A man with undivided loyalty to God.

God tells Abram so we can also hear him. “Live your life consistently with an undivided heart, whole and complete. Don’t withhold any part of your life from me. Give me your all. Live it all before me.”

Pause with me here.

Have you ever studied a passage of scripture, thinking you had it nailed down tightly only to have the nagging sense that you were missing something important? That was me last night. Walk. Be blameless. What was I missing?

Here’s what I noticed. God tells Abram to walk or live out his life, but he says walk before me. The phrase before me expresses a nuance I had not considered. The most literal translation from Hebrew translates before me as before my face.

Before whose face?

I am God Almighty. Walk before me…

At first glance in feels like a foreboding call to obedience because God always has his eye on us, just waiting for us to trip up so he can punish us.

I was a good kid, I think. If I’m honest, I was probably better when I knew my parents were watching. That’s human nature, I suppose, but I just don’t think that’s what God is saying here. It makes obedience a fear response. I’ll walk the straight and narrow because I don’t want to get in trouble.

When you look deeper, God Almighty is calling Abram into a covenant relationship with him. A call to personal relationship. God tells Abram wherever you go in life, whatever you do, do it in my presence. “Be with me. Let me be with you.”

There it is. That’s the amazing thing I missed at first glance. God Almighty wants a personal relationship with me. He wants to walk with me wherever I go. I find that far more comforting than uncomfortable.

Jesus made a similar connection in his last intimate message to his disciples before his arrest and crucifixion

Remain in me and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit. Apart from me, you can do nothing. (John 15:4-5)

Can you see how this ties so well to Genesis 17? God tells Abram to walk before him. Jesus tells us to remain or abide in him. To dwell in his presence. To live in him. It’s relational. It’s mutual. It’s Jesus’ way of saying live your life continuously and consistently in the presence of God.

Doing so, allows me to not only be in fellowship with God and others, but to bear fruit…to reflect the life of Christ so others can catch a glimpse of who he is and what he promises.

I am God Almighty.

Walk.

Before me.

Be Blameless.

It is a call to live a Christ-like life in every area of life wherever that life takes us. And always in the strength of our God Almighty.

Not perfect. Just present.

Not flawless. Just faithful.

Not alone. Just alongside.

Maybe that’s where this new covenant takes root. Not in the grand spiritual moments, but in our daily walks with undivided hearts in relationship with an almighty God who delights in walking with us.

Maybe that’s why I still keep hearing it, like a stone skipping across the water again and again and again.

Thinking Points

When you hear God’s words, “Walk before me,” do you experience them more as an invitation to a relationship or as a call to performance? Why?

What areas of your life you tend to keep compartmentalized—places where your heart may not feel completely “undivided” before God?

How does understanding blameless as “whole” or “complete” change the way you think about faithfulness?

What might it look like for you this week to live more consciously before God’s face—reveling in His presence rather than fearful of His scrutiny?

Life After Birth

Focal Passage: John 3:1-17

Every time I pull into my drive way and look at the roof above my garage, I see the flashing that has come loose. The glue and nails that once held it in place have weakened and broken free. The sealant intended to keep water from leaking into the frame of the house has visible gaps.

It wouldn’t be hard to fix if it were within easier reach of my 12-foot ladder and my 72-year-old body. Just when I think I can make that repair, I look again at the pitch of that roof and decide that discretion is the better part of valor. Back goes the ladder on its hooks.

I drove into the driveway this week, the flashing laughing again at my cowardice. I had enough. I picked up my phone and called Willie. Willie has done a fair amount of restoration work in my neighborhood. My neighbors tell me his competency comes at a reasonable price.

Every home, regardless of how well it was originally built, will need restoration after a time. This week, weather permitting, Willie will come out and restore the broken pieces of my house. I’ll be grateful.

Restoration.

It sort of became the theme of my thoughts this week. I read a snippet from a book I have in my library called Dancing at My Funeral, written by Maxie Dunnam back in 1973. I bought the book during my sophomore year at Texas Tech University with the discount I got for working part-time as a clerk at the Baptist Bookstore in Lubbock.

The book is Dunnam’s reflection upon the choices that shaped his life…some for the good and some, well, no so much. Dunnam looked back at his life with the freedom of grace that God gave him, finding he could “dance at the funeral of the past that haunted him.”

He comes out of that life reflection able to rejoice because he understands that the Bible is all about restoration. It is a theme that courses through the heart of all scripture. Cover to cover. From “In the beginning” to John’s last “Amen,..” and everything in between.

Dunnam wrote, “All the years since my youth I had been demanding a chance to start over. But, that’s impossible! And unimportant. The fact that you can’t start over is only part of the essential truth. The encouraging and redeeming part is that you don’t need to start over. The need is to start today…right now…living the new life God offers.

“The past,” said Dunnam, “can’t be blotted out, but we don’t have to be shackled by it. And, that is the essence of the gospel.”

Restoration.

You may remember our friend Nicodemus. He’s the Pharisee who first got to hear Jesus say, “For God so loved the world…” Nicodemus heard Jesus teach and preach. His colleagues in the priesthood felt threatened by Jesus’ surprising teachings and his rising popularity. Nicodemus, on the other hand, felt his carefully constructed faith begin to unravel at the seams every time he hear Jesus speak.

The faith Jesus spoke about seemed firmly anchored in concepts of love and grace that transforms ritual into righteousness. Everything Jesus said burrowed in the emptiness of Nicodemus’ religion, cutting away the last remaining strings that held it together.

When he could not rid himself of the drabness of his faith, Nicodemus tiptoed into Jesus’ campsite in the dead of night for a private conversation that would probe his heart at its deepest.

“Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him.” (John 3:2)

Far more than a polite conversation starter, these opening lines were a veiled plea of a man for whom life and faith had grown stale. To borrow the words of Dunnam’s own experience, the past haunted him.

In reply, Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth; no one can know the kingdom of God unless he is born again.” (John 3:3)

Jesus’ cryptic statement only served to deepen Nicodemus’ despair and increase his anguish. Nicodemus argued the point by incredulously stating that being born again is a physical impossibility. A red-herring of an argument that Nicodemus hoped would buy him time to think.

Maybe it buys us some time as well. Think about it.

Yes, new life comes at birth, but after you’ve made of mess of life, when nothing about your past makes sense, when we can’t break the chains of the past, life just gets hard. It’s not easy climbing out of the ruts cut by our deliberate decision to live life on our terms.

I think deep down Nicodemus wanted this new life Jesus talked about, but didn’t know where or how to find it. This desire to find life after birth brought him to Jesus when every fiber of his being told him to stay away.

Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh but the spirit gives birth to spirit…for God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3:5-6, 16-17)

Nicodemus wasn’t questioning the desire for restoration. That he wanted more than anything. He was questioning the possibility of restoration.

I understand where Nicodemus is coming from. Like me staring at that ladder, he knew something needed repair, but the risk felt too high and the outcome too uncertain. Yet, he came anyway—quietly and cautiously—because he knew he needed someone else to do the restoration. Jesus was his Willie, the one who could make it new again.

Restoration often begins right there. Where fear and hope meet and hope takes that one small step forward.

Jesus laid it all out there for Nicodemus as he does for us. God loves enough to offer restoration through Christ. He didn’t come to condemn us for our failures to live up to God’s standard, he just wants us to open our hearts to the possibilities that life can be more…that restoration to new life is not only possible, it is powerful.

Paul practically shouts it out in his letter to the Colossian church.

When you were dead in your sins…God made you alive in Christ. He forgave all our sins…he took it away, nailing it to the cross. (Col 2:13-14)

With sins forgiven and nailed to the cross with Christ, we find ourselves restored to new life. We see that message clearly written in 2 Corinthians.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation, the old has gone. The new has come. (2 Corinthians 5:17)

I could finish this up with my own thoughts, but I doubt they would be as profound as those penned by Dunnam himself. So, with respect to copyright laws, allow me to quote him.

“I’ve discovered there is a beginning which is common to every experience, no matter what has gone before. This beginning is the point of decisiveness where we turn to God with a new attentiveness, a new openness to his possibilities…To say “yes” to God is the ultimate act of will. To say “yes” is to surrender. Surrender is the pivotal point for becoming a whole person.”

Restoration.

Surrender leads to restoration and restoration is built into ever fiber of God’s word. It found its deepest expression in the death of Jesus on the cross in sacrifice for the mistakes of our past, present and future. For those open to the possibility of restoration…life after birth…it is all the answer we need.

The past need not define or haunt us. The present need not overwhelm us. The future need not frighten us. Every bit of flashing can be resealed. Every nail re-driven. I can…you can…be restored to new life in Christ. All it takes is the courage to tiptoe into Jesus’ campsite…even in the middle of the night when nothing else makes sense.

When we surrender to his will, there is always life after new birth and it is always more.

I have come that they might have life and have it to the full. (John 10:10)

Jesus offers me abundant life beginning now. Regardless of my past mistakes. Regardless of my stubborn desire to live life on my terms. He stands by offering a life overflowing with joy, purpose, peace, and communion with God and others.

Here’s my chance and yours today. Find restoration in God’s grace. Bury the guilt of the past. Toss a flower on its grave. Dance at its funeral.

Let’s express our gratitude to Christ for restoration even as we discover that there is indeed life after birth.

Create in me a pure heart, O God and renew a steadfast spirit within me…Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me. (Psalm 51:10,12)

Thinking Points

What “loose flashing” in my life have I noticed but avoided addressing because the climb feels risky or uncomfortable?

In what ways might my faith—like Nicodemus’s—be carefully constructed but quietly unraveling at the seams?

Do I believe restoration is something God desires for me, but struggle to believe it is truly possible? Why?

What parts of my past still feel like they haunt me rather than instruct me—and what would it mean to “dance at their funeral?”

What would it look like for me to say a decisive “yes” to God today—not starting over (because I can’t), but starting now?

Man in the Mirror

Focal Passage: James 1:22-25

Like many World War II veterans, Dwight Eisenhower was one of my Dad’s heroes, both as a general and a president. The more I read about Eisenhower’s leadership during the war and his time as president and his compassion for people, the more I admire the man.

Eisenhower was not a man of impulse, but rather a man who gathered information, listened to the advice of others and then acted decisively. He knew there was a time to plan and a time to do.

In his book, An Army at Dawn, Rick Atkinson related this story about Eisenhower. American troops had landed in North Africa in 1942 in an effort to liberate Europe from Hitler’s Nazi Germany. In the earliest days of that invasion, the U. S. Army struggled to gain ground. Eisenhower grew frustrated with what many of his commanders were doing…or more accurately…not doing in the field.

In his notes, Eisenhower wrote, “There is a lot of big talk and desk hammering around this place, but very few doers.”

Don’t you wonder sometimes if God feels the same way when he watches his people today. Surely, he hears a lot of “big talk and desk hammering” from those who profess a love for him, but how many of us are “doers.”

God actually warned us of that tendency when he inspired James to write a letter to the persecution-scattered Christians of the first century. Look at what he says after encouraging his fellow Christians to humbly accept the word planted in you.

Do not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in the mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does. (James 1:22-25)

James warns us against lulling ourselves into a false sense of complacency by thinking we’re getting this faith thing right for the Lord when we aren’t really doing the things he teaches us to do.

I love the illustration James uses to drive home his point when he talks about the man who, in his daily routine, sees himself in the mirror, but forgets what he looks like when he walks way. James compares the physical man with the spiritual man who “looks intently” into the “perfect law,” and not forgetting what it reveals, but rather doing what it commands.

James sees God’s word as a perfect mirror, one into which we can look to see the truth as God reveals it to us. The godly man, James says, remembers what God’s law or word says and then does what it commands him to do.

The first man observes, goes away and forgets. The second man studies, perseveres and acts. The first man goes through the motions without meaning and the second man looks with intent at the word of God, continually concentrating on its meaning.

What he learns changes his behavior and compels him to act upon it. Both men listen…which is a good place to start…only the latter ultimately acts.

In Matthew’s account of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus makes the same point.

Therefore, anyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like the wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against the house; yet it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house upon the sand. The rain came down, the streams rose and the winds blew and beat upon the house, and it fell with a great crash. (Matthew 7: 24-27)

The difference between hearing and doing is huge!

Jesus’ illustration is borne out of his life experiences as a carpenter and craftsman. It is believable that he spent a portion of his life building homes, knowing the critical importance of a good foundation.

Theologian William Barclay wrote, “Only a house whose foundations are firm can withstand the storm; and only a life whose foundations are sure can stand the tests.”

Jesus tells us how to build that foundation…on hearing and on doing.

Jesus places value in the hearing. We cannot act upon what we do not know. Therefore, we must listen to God’s word. It is looking into the mirror of his word and seeing it for what it is. Again, it’s a great first step. Listening with intent takes us deeper than just hearing. The latter acknowledges God’s teaching. The former internalizes it.

Listening with intent to the word of God prepares for Jesus’ next command. Jesus wants us to be doers of his word. Knowledge only becomes relevant when we put it into action. Theory must be applied. Again, as Barclay writes, “Theology must become life.”

My cardiologist today told me to exercise more and lose weight. It does little good to go to the doctor in the first place if I’m not going to at least try to do what she instructs me to do. The same holds with my faith. It does little good to study God’s word if I don’t allow it to change my lifestyle and compel me to act.

It boils down to obedience, doesn’t it? For both my physical and spiritual health.

I have been guilty too many times of not hearing with intent. I suspect you have as well. Many people hear the word of God, but they don’t do anything with it. There are a lot of people who just enjoy listening to good preaching and teaching. That’s as far as it goes. They never really do anything with it. Call them “hearers of the word.” They listen, and listen, and listen — but it never leads them to DO what they’ve heard.

Again, hearing God’s word is a good thing, but it is not the end that God desires for us. James tells us that the one who hears with intent, never forgetting God’s word, the one will be blessed in what he does. This means the obedient person who does what God commands will find favor through a changed life. Will find blessings in the doing itself. Blessings in a life aligned with God’s will.

The blessing received by hearing and doing carries the biblical idea of shalom—being right with God and others. It is relational and spiritual. It also hints at blessings derived from an active and obedient faith that bears fruit in the life of the one who does and the lives of those he or she touches.

There’s the challenge James presents us. If all you and I are doing is hearing or reading or even studying God’s word, we might think we’re being a good follower of Christ, but we’re only deceiving ourselves, looking at ourselves in a mirror and walking away (vs. 22). Maybe it’s time we took the next step to become doers of the word!

Like Michael Jackson sang back in 1987 when he recorded Man in the Mirror:

I’m starting with the man in the mirror.
I’m asking him to change his ways.
And no message could have been any clearer.
If you want to make the world a better place
Just look at yourself then make a change.

May my life and yours be a reflection of Jesus and not a lot of “big talk and desk hammering.”

Thinking Points

When I read or hear God’s word, where do I most often stop short of actually doing what it calls me to do?

In what ways might I be mistaking familiarity with scripture for obedience to scripture?

How does Jesus’ picture of building on rock versus sand challenge the foundation upon which I’m currently building my life?

What is one concrete step I can take this week to move from “hearing” to “doing?”