I was in Chengdu, China meeting with a group of bright, talented university students. Only the top students are considered for this university, and I recognized from the start that those who were in the little apartment with me were part of that elite group.

My host for the evening was a professor and his wife - Christians who had to keep their Christianity under cover. I was told the apartment would be "bugged" and that I should speak in code. I thought that would be easy, but I discovered just how difficult it is to refrain from mentioning the name of Jesus or to quote Scripture.

The professor introduced the group to me and allowed each of them to speak. I was surprised - given my instructions to be careful what I said - at how bold and honest they were. They talked about the hopelessness of the Communist philosophy, how it reduced people to cogs in a machine or spokes in a wheel. They had been taught that there is no ultimate value or meaning, that there is no God or future life, that life was to be lived to perpetuate and elevate the state and the people of China. The state, they said, was godless, materialistic, and ruthless in pursuing its goals.

One bright young man told me how he had become restless after his years of study. He asked himself why he should work so hard to help China to prosper by becoming an intellectual when, in a few years, he would die and cease to exist. He said he thought about the value of the Chinese folk religions and their veneration of ancestors - but he said it wasn't satisfying to think that the only thing left of him in 50 years might be the memory in the hearts and minds of his children and grandchildren.

I heard similar stories from the mouths of one student after another. Communism and materialism teach us to be producing machines who have no purpose other than to prosper the nation and who have no hope for life after death.

Each of the students in that apartment had come to faith in Christ. Their faith was not convenient. In fact, it was dangerous and could have cost them their positions in the university. Their faith was not simple-minded; they were intellectuals whose grasp of science, history, and philosophy was informed and keen.

But they refused to be cogs in a machine. They rejected the foolish notion that we are the products of mindless, godless evolution. They hungered for meaning and purpose bigger than a Communist state. They all had found that meaning and purpose in Jesus Christ.

God is spirit. You and I are spirit-inhabited bodies. We hunger for truth and spiritual reality. We cannot be satisfied just with a college degree, a good job, a nice house and a loving family. As important as these are, none of them is ultimate.

We meet and worship the God who is spirit and truth when we come to faith in Jesus Christ. In fact, He is actively seeking worshipers, pursuing them in love.

Has He found you yet?

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

The philosopher Rousseau or Voltaire or someone is reported to have said, "In the beginning God created man in His own image; then man returned the favor." How true. If mankind is good at anything, it is in creating gods to his own liking. This is especially true in the postmodern world. Postmoderns pick and choose their deities as passionately as they choose their wardrobes or music preferences. After all, since according to postmodern thinking there is no "truth," only "your truth" and "my truth," the kind of god I worship is just a matter of personal preference.

So in the twenty-first century, we have become skilled idolaters, crafting gods in our own likeness as surely as those ancient silversmiths in Ephesus and Corinth or any other Greco-Roman city. The Bible is no longer the authority for what we believe; we are much too sophisticated to settle for an outdated and time-bound view of God such as is found in the Bible. Our "god" must be tolerant, chummy, easy-going, and not too demanding. We like our jeans cut in a relaxed fit; and we like our "god" to be comfortable and relaxed enough to allow for our own self-expression.

Don't misunderstand. I'm not saying that postmoderns give their "god" a different name. No, indeed. They still call him "Jesus" or "Our Father" or "God." But they don't mean what Paul or John or Matthew or Peter meant when they spoke of Jesus the Christ. They have a reinvented god, a god made in their own image and to their own liking.

It's a dangerous thing to bring our intellects and wills to the New Testament. The Bible is iconoclastic. It smashes our idolatrous, self-preferred images of God and reveals the only true and living God there is. It takes captive every thought that exalts itself against the knowledge of God  (2 Corinthians 10:4-5).

But when we do that, when we come to Scripture and, in advance, lay aside our preconceived and prejudiced images, we discover the God who has revealed Himself, not the God we create by our own imaginations and preferences. The result is humbling, but it is also gratifying and exhilarating.

God is. He is what He says He is. He is not what I want Him to be or what I make Him to be. He is Who He has revealed Himself to be. Anything else is an idol.

"Little children, guard yourselves from idols" (1 John 5:21).

Alan Day, Senior Pastor
Edmond's First Baptist Church

GOD IS! Those two words are a complete sentence in themselves. They mean that He exists. He is not the creation of our own minds or the projection of our own longings and unmet psychological cravings. He is; always has been; and always will be.

But what IS He? How do we answer the question, "If there is a God, what is He like?" It seems there are a number of different ways to answer that question.

The first is to look within our own minds and attempt to reason our way to an idea about the nature of God. For instance, we might think, "By definition God must be eternal since anything not eternal had a beginning and God did not have a beginning." And we might think, "By definition God must be all powerful since anything with limited power could not be God." Furthermore, we could reason, "By definition God must have all knowledge since He alone is eternal and created all things." This is how philosophy has worked for centuries, attempting to find a description of God by the use of reason alone. The "God" who emerges from this approach is not very warm and inviting to me personally. I can live without him, in fact.

Another approach to the question, "What is God like," is to study nature and, from the observations of our study, come to conclusions about God's character. From geology and physics and astronomy and chemistry we could conclude that God is a powerful God, an intelligent God, even a God who likes order and harmony even while He tolerates disorder and chaos. We can look at the Grand Canyon or the constellations on a cloudless night and think, "What a powerful God to create all of this!" We can look at light diffused through a prism or at microscopic organisms through a microscope and think, "What great wisdom to have created such a world." But, again, the "God" of power, intelligence, and wisdom whom I deduce from a study of nature still leaves me cold and emotionally unaffected.

Then I can study the world's great religions to find an answer to our question. Here I find a dismaying cacophony of voices - a virtual smorgasbord of proposals. For some there is not one God but many. For others God is identified with creation; He is the "world-soul" or the spirit inherent in the universe. Still for others God is a menacing and austere and frightful being who demands that we give to Him all that He requires without question and without reservation or be damned without remedy. I am not happy with religion. Religion is another form of philosophy - man attempting to think his way to God. The God or gods in religion are unappealing and unsatisfactory to me. I'm running from all that.

Two thousand years ago there was a teacher who did not merely tell us what God is like; He showed us what God is like. He was the embodiment of God, the personal revelation of God. His name was (and is) Jesus the Christ. As a result of Jesus' beautiful life and His sacrificial death, a statement was made by one of His followers that had never been uttered before. John the Beloved Apostle wrote, "God is love." That statement has revolutionized the world.

Many today consider the statement "God is love" to be a self-evident truism that everyone accepts. But that is simply not the case. Until Jesus came, no one had ever said it. Philosophers had never thought it. Religions had never advocated it.

Because of Jesus, we now know what God is like. "God is love." (1 John 4:8) I hope you understand that. Better yet, I want you to experience it. Let God love you - then love Him back - in Jesus' name!

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

WARNING: READ WITH CAUTION

Why does the church exist? At EFBC, we say that we have five purposes which guide us: Worship, Fellowship; Discipleship; Ministry / Service; and Missions / evangelism.

Worship focuses upon God; fellowship focuses upon relating to other believers; discipleship means the process of growing into the likeness of Christ through disciplined prayer, Bible study, and understanding the truths of Christ; service focuses upon the needy and the ministries of the church; missions focuses upon the unreached and unsaved.

A healthy diet is a balanced diet. Too many carbs or fats or sweets can be disastrous to health. A healthy church has learned to balance the five aspects of its purpose. A healthy believer has the proper balance of contagious worship, cooperating fellowship, consistent discipleship, caring service, and compassionate evangelism and missions.

For the past several weeks, we have been focusing on the fifth purpose - missions. It would revolutionize most of us to realize that the church doesn't DO missions, it IS missions. Missions is not merely what we do in Africa or inner-city Los Angeles; it is what we do when we go to a home or apartment or trailer park and share the gospel. It is the motivating force for a student activity on campus. It is the impetus for Vacation Bible School or Summer Youth Camp.

Missions is also the motivating force for our newest attempt to impact our city called 1105. This is going to be a missional worship service designed to reach those we are not now reaching. 1105 is not an effort to accommodate people who like a certain musical style. It is a tool to reach those we are commissioned by our Lord to reach.

When we do missions in Brazil, we use Portuguese; and in Mexico we use Spanish. In Edmond we will use a variety of musical "languages" to present the unchanging message of Jesus Christ.

• 1105 will be a culturally-specific and culturally-sensitive missions worship time designed to reach and disciple those in Edmond whose heart language requires a different sound.
• 1105 will be a time of WORSHIP - with music that resonates with our target audience.
• 1105 will be a time of FELLOWSHIP - with friendships and camaraderie rooted in Jesus.
• 1105 will be a time of DISCIPLESHIP - with life-changing Bible study the center of all we do.
• 1105 will be a time of SERVICE - for ushers, greeters, camera operators, sound technicians, connecting place (inquiry room) workers, Praise Team participants, and others.
• Finally, 1105 will be a time of MISSIONS. It will be a tool to reach those who can be attracted to Christ by a certain sound and style. The message will not change - Jesus is real and He is relevant.

1105 is another hook in the water; it is another silver trumpet blasting the good news of the gospel; it is a bold banner announcing the changeless news about a changeless Christ who can change our lives.

People will come if you ASK THEM and especially if you BRING THEM. 1105 begins next Sunday. Whom are you bringing with you?

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

For years I have had the belief that the Bride of Christ would be purified (= revival) before Christ returns. My conviction was more the result of my heart desire and analogical reasoning than of textual evidence.

Yesterday I meditated upon the following verses.

6 Then I heard something like the voice of a vast multitude, like the sound of cascading waters, and like the rumbling of loud thunder, saying:
    Hallelujah - because our Lord God, the Almighty,
    has begun to reign!
     7 Let us be glad, rejoice, and give Him glory,
    because the marriage of the Lamb has come,
    and His wife has prepared herself.
    8 She was permitted to wear fine linen, bright and pure.
    For the fine linen represents the righteous acts of the saints.

    Revelation 19:6-8 (HCSB)

The passage has to do with the Lord's return. Note that the bride prepares herself. This is not a sudden and gracious transformation that takes place at the Parousia (1 John 3:2); it is the activity of the Bride herself. She dresses herself in fine linen, which represents her righteous acts, in anticipation of her Beloved's appearance.

Here is the picture of a church that is prepared for the Lord's return. She has forsaken all competing lovers; she has made herself ready for the wedding feast and the wedding night; she is pure, clean, and glowing with anticipation.

I don't want to delay the Lord's return. But it seems to me His glorious coming will be preceded by His Bride's getting herself ready to receive Him. I don't see much evidence of that right now - unless, of course, the Bride is not anything like the churches which claim to be His people.

I remember Miss Bertha Smith teaching on sanctification with the two dolls - one in a dirty wedding dress and the other in a clean, white dress. She said that Christ is coming for a pure bride, not a soiled bride. I agree with her that the Lord Jesus is going to return for a holy Bride, washed and clean and eager for union with the Groom. This passage seems to teach that truth.

The truth of this passage can be used or misused. To misuse it would be to suggest that, since the church is so worldly today, the Lord's coming could not be soon. To use it properly, the preacher will hold before his people the wonderful truth that Christ is coming for a pure Bride and that those who make up the Bride will be ready for His coming. The New Testament never uses the Lord's coming as a tool of fear to motivate believers; it is the "blessed hope." All who love Jesus, even those who are now in the grips of some carnal habit, will resonate with the idea that Jesus' coming is desirable and that "he that has this hope in himself purifies himself even as He is pure."

We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself just as He is pure.

1 John 3:2-3 (HCSB)

Hope is purifying. The need for the church today is to hope for the right things - the coming of Christ, a new heaven and a new earth, the reign of righteousness as Jesus assumes His millennial throne, the subjugation of sin and Satan and the exaltation of God's people. Prosperity preaching focuses on this world and this life. Gospel preaching anticipates a New World.

Some call this the "Second Coming Cop-out." Well, I call it the only hope for the church. We will not reform this world by electing the right people to congress. Our only hope is the Blessed Hope. If that's defeatism, I don't apologize. I'm looking for His coming.

Perhaps we should preach on the Lord's coming more than we do.

I'm ready for Deep Cleaning.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

I believe in something that doesn’t exist! I’m not talking about God, in spite of the claims of the atheist that there is no God and that my belief in God is belief in something that does not exist.

I’m talking about the future. The future does not exist - but I believe in it because I am experiencing it. When I opened my computer to write this article, the time was 8:50 AM. At that time, 8:57 was in the future. It did not exist; it had never existed; it was only an idea that could be assumed and anticipated.

But now the time on my computer reads 8:57 AM. I am now living in the future. The present, after all, is just the future realized. Anticipation has become actualization. Faith has become sight. Expectation has morphed into experience.

Now my computer says the time is 9:00 AM. What happened to 8:00 AM and 8:57 AM? Do they exist somewhere? Did they ever exist or am I just imagining it? How can I tell the difference between past, present, and future?

About 350 days ago we experienced a day that we labeled “January 1, 2010.” We ate our black eye peas and cabbage, watched bowl games, and took a nap to deal with the fuzziness resulting from a late night on New Year’s Eve. What happened to those 350 days? Are they gone forever? Do they exist somewhere besides our photo albums and memories?

The past does exist. Don’t believe me? Then stand outside (if there are no clouds) and take a look at the sky. What will you see? You will see the sun, right? Wrong! You will see the sun as it looked eight minutes ago. You’ve never seen the sun in real time. It took the light from the sun eight minutes traveling at 186,000 miles per second to travel the 93 million miles and arrive at your eyes. Then go outside tonight and look up. The closest star outside our solar system is 5.9 trillion miles away, so it took the light from that star approximately 4.2 years to reach the earth. If you “see” Proxima Centauri you are seeing it as it looked over four years ago.

Time is confusing, right? But here’s what I know: my future is secure because of what happened in the past. Jesus died and rose again 2000 years ago. That “fact” powerfully and irreversibly and presently affects my behavior, my values, my hopes and my dreams.

The Second Coming is future, right? Well, kind of. But I read about it in 1 Thessalonians and Revelation and other places in Scripture. In the eyes of God the future is history. God sees our tomorrows more clearly than we remember our yesterdays.

I live my life in the present time conditioned by a past event (the cross and resurrection) and a future event (the Second Coming) which define and determine my present experience.

The year 2011 is future. Or is it? Maybe from God’s perspective it’s already history. History is His-story - the story of His grace, mercy, and extravagant love.

It’s 9:30 a.m. now. Where was that when I opened my computer 40 minutes ago? It was in the mind of God. And what God knows will be is the same as what is and what was - since He is “the Alpha and the Omega the One who is, who was, and who is coming, the Almighty.” (Revelation 1:8 HCSB)

Happy New Year!

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

The secularists as well as the advocates of competing religions have been partly successful in our country at either stripping the Christmas season of its religious dimension or diluting it with other celebrations and demanding status for their convictions. We could be sidetracked at this time of year into blasting these sentiments or lamenting the loss of the unique place Christmas has been historically afforded in American life.

Of course, we ourselves have helped in the process of either secularization or ideological confusion. We have often given lip service to Jesus without yielding our lives totally to Him and living out the implications of the Christmas story. What do I mean?

Think about it.

• Christmas means that GOD LOVES US and gave His Son.
• Christmas means that GOD CAME TO US and lived among us.
• Christmas means that GOD CAME FOR US to do what we could never do for ourselves.
• Christmas means that GOD IS HERE - ACCESSIBLE, AVAILABLE, APPROACHABLE.

What's not to like about that story! Should we not spend the lion's share of our energies wildly celebrating this truth rather than arguing with those who do not believe it?

If you just got married recently and are living in the mindless bliss of early matrimony, so what if somebody says to you, "You know, I don't believe in marriage. I think marriage was an invention of the church to control the behavior of people. Marriage does not exist!"

Are you going to go to your room and cry and scream, "I thought I was happily married but I was just told there is no such thing! Boo, Hoo, Hoo, Hoo!"

I think not. You're probably going to tell that person, "If you had experienced what I'm experiencing, you wouldn't knock it. You would have a smile on your face and a spring in your step. Pardon me, but I'm going home to my sweetheart. We're married, you see!"

I'm not saying that we should not be concerned about cultural deterioration. I am saying that we must not miss the wonder and joy of the season because we focus on Christ's detractors rather than focusing on Christ Himself.

Jesus is the source of life, hope, and joy! "O come, let us adore Him, Christ the Lord."

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

When they had prayed, the place where they were assembled was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak God’s message with boldness. Acts 4:31 (HCSB)

If you check out the website of the US Geological Survey, you will find a FAQ button, and then you will find a button indicating COMMON MYTHS ABOUT EARTHQUAKES. The myths are interesting, and I have heard many of them myself, especially recently.

For instance, some people claim that they can predict earthquakes - but there is no scientific evidence for this. Then there is the myth that California is one day going to fall into the ocean. I know some people who think that would be a good thing - but it’s not going to happen.

The most popular myth that I hear today is that the number and severity of earthquakes are increasing. This is only a perception because we have better information now than previously.

“In 1931, there were about 350 stations operating in the world; today, there are more that 4,000 stations and the data now comes in rapidly from these stations by telex, computer and satellite. This increase in the number of stations and the more timely receipt of data has allowed us and other seismological centers to locate many small earthquakes which were undetected in earlier years, and we are able to locate earthquakes more rapidly.” Earthquake.usgs.gov

About 15 years ago, I personally experienced a small earthquake. From that experience I can say without fear of contradiction that if you are ever in an earthquake, you’ll never forget it.

Even more unforgettable than a physical earthquake is when God shakes his people. He shook the church house in Acts 4 - a sign of answered prayer and a sign of the awesome presence of God upon their lives and ministries.

If you are ever in a churchquake, you’ll never forget it. God’s presence is palpable. God’s blessings are abundant. God’s people are bold. Those outside of Christ are attracted to the preaching of the gospel. Carnal Christians give up their sin. Casual Christians get plugged in to the mission of the church.

The believers In Acts 4 were described as having “boldness.” That word is synonymous with “assurance” or “conviction.” It is not arrogant presumption. Boldness is Spirit-energized confidence that comes from personal experience.

We need more positive Christians.

A young boy said to his dad, “I think I flunked my history exam today.”

The dad said, “Son, that’s negative thinking. You should be more positive.”

The boy answered, “OK, Dad, I’m positive I flunked my history exam today!”

Boldness comes from the Spirit of Christ. Twice in this passage we are told they were filled with the Holy Spirit.

It is interesting to me that the focus of the Spirit’s ministry in the Book of Acts is not to make Christians feel good but to empower us for ministry and evangelism. Christians sometimes try to turn spiritual gifts into play toys and pacifiers to make them feel better. It seems to me that the dynamite of the gospel requires the dynamic of Spirit-filled believers who share lives worth living and then live lives worth sharing. The Holy Spirit’s presence in our lives authenticates our witness.

God-rocked churches are composed of men and women who have what the country preacher described as a “case of the ‘can’t help its.’” We see that in Simon Peter and John’s words after they were commanded by the authorities to cease sharing the gospel. “But Peter and John answered them, ‘Whether it’s right in the sight of God [for us] to listen to you rather than to God, you decide; for we are unable to stop speaking about what we have seen and heard.’” [Acts 4:19-20]

One wag described some churches when he said that they were led by "mild-manner preachers who preach mild-manner sermons to mild-mannered people about how to be more mild-mannered.” These God-rocked believers in Acts were anything but mild-mannered. They were not ill-mannered; they were persuasive and bold.

The text says that “when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled was shaken.” “Whey they had prayed.” Not “when they had complained to the authorities about the mistreatment they were receiving.” Not “when they had a protest rally to call for civil disobedience and political action.” God rocked this little band of believers after they had prayed.

They didn’t say prayers - they prayed. They didn’t read prayers - they prayed. They didn’t quote prayers - they prayed. They stood before the Supreme Court of the universe and told the judge of all creation that they needed His help to do His work in His way. A sympathetic Savior heard such selfless praying and answered with a churchquake resulting in supernaturally empowered testimony and the conversion of multitudes.

Many Christians have never experienced a churchquake - a spiritual shaking that transforms the church from top to bottom. Perhaps if we had a few more “knee parties” rather than “Tea parties,” we might just find what we’re searching for.

E. M. Bounds said, “You can do more than pray after you have prayed, but you cannot do more than pray until you have prayed.”

Let us pray until God rocks our lives, our families, our churches, and our society. Societal and cultural transformation is not a consequence of an election; it is the direct result of God-rocked churches motivating God-rocked Christians to live Spirit-driven lives.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

In his epoch-making treatise, On the Origin of Species (1859), Charles Darwin spoke in chapter one of the variations and adaptations among animals resulting from the influence of man. For example, he wrote, “Not a single domestic animal can be named which has not in some country drooping ears; and the view suggested by some authors, that the drooping is due to the disuse of the muscles of the ear, from the animals not being much alarmed by danger, seems probable” (p. 11).

In this article I am not going to argue for or against the reliability of Darwin’s speculations; but the idea of animals whose ears droop because they no longer sense any danger and are being continually looked after is very suggestive to me. If you will pardon the analogy, I would like to ask a question: Do your ears droop?

Drooping ears - in domesticated animals at least - suggests heedlessness and carelessness due to the absence of danger and the presence of protection and provision. But what about drooping ears among believers? How do you explain our failure to listen to God, to heed His warnings and to care for the things He tells us to care about?

In the Scriptures, we are frequently pictured as sheep. I know very little about sheep from personal experience; but those who do know them have written entire volumes to explain the comparison of believers to sheep. Sheep are dumb animals (doesn’t that make you feel good?). Sheep stink (feeling better now?). Sheep are weak, unable to defend themselves, and they are slow (bet you’re sticking your chest out now!). And sheep don’t have a keen sense of direction. They can get lost easily if not watched over by a shepherd. (Got the “big head” now, don’t you?)

Jesus, calling Himself the “Good Shepherd,” said that His “sheep follow him because they recognize his voice. They will never follow a stranger; instead they will run away from him, because they don’t recognize the voice of strangers.” (John 10:4-5 HCSB) In ancient Palestine, sheep were most often raised for wool and not for food. Consequently, shepherds and sheep developed a special relationship over time. The shepherd would often name his sheep; he knew each sheep individually, and the sheep knew the shepherd’s voice and distinguished it from that of anyone else. Shepherds often developed a language in which they communicated with his sheep.

After a visit to Palestine decades ago, author H. V. Morton penned this description of shepherds: "He talks to [his sheep] in a sing-song voice, using a language unlike anything I have heard in my life. The words were animal sounds arranged in a kind of order . . . a language the great god Pan might have spoken on the mountains of Greece." Several flocks of sheep might be watering at the same watering hole when one of the shepherds would begin his sing-song chant. All the sheep would raise their ears, but only those belonging to that shepherd would leave the water and follow that voice. The rest - not recognizing that voice - would continue watering until their own shepherd began his familiar chant; then they would follow him. The flocks were mingled and indistinguishable; but they were never lost, confused, or forgotten.

A Christian with drooping ears is one who feels so secure he has stopped listening to the Shepherd’s voice. It is one thing to know we have a Good Shepherd; it is another thing to take Him for granted and to cease listening to His call.

Jesus said emphatically, “My sheep hear My voice, I know them, and they follow Me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish - ever! No one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one” (John 10:27-30 HCSB).

Many Evangelicals say that this passage teaches the “security of believers,” i.e., the truth that those who really belong to Christ can never be lost again. I believe that as much as any doctrine in Scripture. Christ saves and He keeps us; therefore, I am secure in Him.

However, that doctrine can be easily prostituted into a cheap idea equivalent to “now I don’t have to worry about anything since I can never lose my relationship to Christ.” The deleterious effects of that kind of thinking are heedlessness and carelessness. In short, we can develop drooping ears. Convinced of our Shepherd’s protection and oblivious to any potential danger, we stop listening to His voice.

Now for the punch line - and the conclusion. One reason God allows problems, crises, adversity, and danger to come into our lives is to make us raise our ears, listen for His voice, and run to His side. When problems come - and they are inevitable - we must perk up our ears and listen for guidance. A Christian who is continually facing challenges (and which of us is not) should have perky ears since the spiritual muscles that control our spiritual ears are toned and taut.

Call it a paradox if you want to, but healthy Christian sheep are both secure and they are constantly listening to the Shepherd’s voice for guidance and warning. He speaks because He loves us. He speaks because we are weak, wayward, wandering, and wanton. We listen because we have learned by painful experience the trouble we can get into when our ears droop.

Yolanda Adams wrote these lyrics:

Because He knows just what we need, we should listen to His voice. Perky ears are certain evidence of a careful, watchful, listening believer.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

The agnostic Greek philosopher Protagoras is credited with the phrase, “Man is the measure of all things.” Since the context of the statement is not available to us, we can only guess what he meant. I won’t even attempt to speculate right now - but the statement is full of bluster and conceit, it seems to me. Yet let me add this caveat - it is bluster only if there is a God. Otherwise, the statement is as true as any other one might craft about the meaning and value of life.

As a pastor and theologian, I have often tried to put myself in the position of the unbeliever, feeling and thinking as he does about the questions of God, good and evil, the meaning of life, values and the destiny of the universe and mankind. It’s a tough assignment, but it is not without profit.

Here is one insight I received during one of my agnostic/atheist sessions: I might not believe in God if it were not for Jesus Christ. I know that sounds almost blasphemous from the perspective of a person of faith; but I’m trying to think as one who doesn’t have faith - or as one for whom faith is problematic.

Put on your agnostic thinking cap for a moment and join me in a little exercise.

1) Let’s think about the kind of God revealed in nature alone. Natural theology seeks God by studying nature without any appeal to supernatural revelation. In nature we discover matter and energy, predictable and universal laws, amazing complexity and diversity along with symmetry and beauty. Yet in nature there are also those “dysteleological” elements, the things that don’t make sense and that frighten us - such as tornado, hurricane, disease, and death. The God of natural theology is powerful and smart; but he is not always attractive. He is big enough to create a world, if my reasoning is correct; but I’m still going to die - and then what? There’s barely a hint to the answer to that question.

The poet Tennyson wrestled with the contradictions between faith and Nature and wrote In Memoriam:

Tennyson held onto his belief in “god” even though his musings on science and nature provided him with no solutions and no comfort. I’m afraid I would be as pessimistic and melancholy as Tennyson if all I had was nature to tell me who God is. I might infer the existence of a god, but I would have no clue to his identity or character.

2) Now let’s think about religion. The gods of the world religions are also not attractive to me personally. Even the god of reason found in Unitarianism or Deism is unappealing. When I read of “that Beneficent Spirit who guides the universe and provides us all of our needs,” I can’t help but wonder, “Where on earth did you learn of such a being? Did you just get in a room one day and start imagining what kind of god you would like and then, abracadabra, you invented him on the spot?” It appears to me that this god is either a dumbed-down version of the biblical deity or he is merely an intellectual fabrication—with no authority outside my own mind to support the idea. The god of reason is not for me.

3) So we move from religion in general to the God of the Hebrew faith. If I am an agnostic seeking to know if God exists, even the God revealed in the Old Testament leaves me wanting more—and sometimes less. Yahweh has many wonderful attributes—but there are some inexplicable mysteries in the character of Yahweh as revealed in the Old Testament.

Theologian Rudolf Otto spoke of the “mysterium tremendum et fascinans,” the fearful and attractive mystery of God. I have to admit that the Old Testament picture of God by itself, i.e., without the completion of the portrait found in the New Testament, is at times more fear-evoking than attractive. There are many exceptions, of course; but when I have on my agnostic thinking cap, it’s easy to focus on the “tremendum” more than the “fascinans.”

4) I’m still trying to think like an agnostic. In my quest I pick up a New Testament. At once I make an amazing discovery—in the New Testament, God has a human face. The powerful, holy and transcendent God revealed as the Creator and the covenant God of Israel has come down to where we are, assumed our likeness, and invited us to fellowship with Him.
He is still powerful because He quiets the storms and turns water into wine and heals the infirm. But He holds little children in His arms, tousles a young lad’s hair, converses with and shows affection to women and social outcasts, and weeps at the tomb of a friend.
Through Jesus I learn that God is the seeker, never the one who is sought. He initiates relationships and enables response.

In Jesus I learn that God is the lover more than the beloved. I can love Him because He first loved me.

Here is a God I can believe in—indeed, I want to believe in. The phrase, “God is nowhere” has been transformed to read, “God is now here.” How can one be an agnostic when he faces the reality that is Jesus Christ?

5) The agnostic hat is off now. It’s just me, Alan—the guy who has found In Jesus Christ the measure of all things, the meaning of life, and the perfect portrait of God. Now when I pick up the Old Testament, it makes sense to me--but only in retrospect.

Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann said that we should interpret the Old Testament without any precommitments based upon the New Testament. But I disagree—with all of my being. Only from a Christological perspective does the Old Testament make any sense to me. Only in the light of the New Covenant does it become clear what God was doing in calling Abraham and Moses, creating the nation of Israel, and preserving the history and interpretation of those events in the Old Testament. Only when I understand that Yahweh and Jesus are one do I hungrily approach the Psalms or the Prophets or the Historical books and expect to meet a friend.

6) The reason I know that Jesus is Yahweh is because He rose from the dead. Paul said that those who believe in Christ’s resurrection and who confess Him as Yahweh (Lord—Greek “kurios” = “Yahweh”) will be saved (Romans 10:9-13). I have made that confession and it has become the very foundation of my existence. Jesus is Yahweh. Jesus is Lord. Jesus is God. Therefore Jesus saves.

Jesus is the clue to unraveling the mystery of deity. Jesus is the key to the treasure chest of God’s wisdom containing the explanation for life and all existence. He is the very principle that holds together the universe and causes it to “cohere” both intellectually and physically (Col. 1:17).

It is not a big deal to say, “I believe in God.” The question is, “What kind of God do you believe in?” I believe in the God who finalized His message to mankind with a manger and a cross and a big rock. A virgin-born babe, supernaturally conceived, who was both God and man and who was named Jesus—that’s the God I believe in. A perfect man—who never sinned but who loved sinners and went to a cross to redeem guilty sinners like me—that’s the God I believe in. A victorious man—who died and rose again and whose resurrection is symbolized by the stone that was removed from a tomb that is empty—that’s the God I believe in. A man who was so much man as if He were not God, but so much God as if He where not man—that’s the God I believe in.

Jesus is God. “For in Him the entire fullness of God’s nature dwells bodily” (Col 2:9 HCSB). He is creator, sustainer, completer, consummator. He is wise enough to conceive of a universe, powerful enough to speak the worlds into existence and then sustain these worlds, loving enough to redeem humanity from destruction, and persistent enough to hold onto those who put their trust in Him.

Protagoras was almost right. What He should have said is: “The God-man is the measure of all things.”

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

As I write these words, I am (as they say where I come from) “smack dab in the middle” of a couple of anniversaries. July 6 marked the 62nd anniversary of my birth. I don’t remember the event, but I suppose it was significant—to my mother, at least. She had a very difficult labor and delivery and I was born by caesarian section. Although she died when I was only six years old, I can feel her love today. As a little boy I sensed she was crazy about me. The little boy in me today is still conscious of her warm affection.

The other anniversary is one of those “milestones” that necessitates a little extra celebration. This month Edmond’s First Baptist Church will recognize Alice and me for 25 years of service with them. I started preaching the gospel over 45 years ago as a teenager. I was licensed to preach at age 17. I began to pastor 40 years ago. Twenty-five years ago we moved to Edmond. The rest is, as they say, “history.”

I don’t know how to evaluate the past 25 years. Consequently, I prefer to simply assume the same frame of mind as the Apostle Paul:

“A person should consider us in this way: as servants of Christ and managers of God’s mysteries. In this regard, it is expected of managers that each one be found faithful. It is of little importance that I should be evaluated by you or by a human court. In fact, I don’t even evaluate myself. For I am not conscious of anything against myself, but I am not justified by this. The One who evaluates me is the Lord. Therefore don’t judge anything prematurely, before the Lord comes, who will both bring to light what is hidden in darkness and reveal the intentions of the hearts. And then praise will come to each one from God.” (1 Cor 4:1-5 HCSB)

Paul referred to himself as a “servant” and a “manager.” As a servant he had no rights and as a manager he owned no property. Neither his time nor his relationships nor even his ministry were his; he owned nothing and he controlled nothing. He was a manager who oversaw someone else’s property.

How was he doing at the time he wrote this first epistle to the Corinthians? Was he successful? Was he “getting the job done”? Paul himself would not hazard an opinion on that question. He was aware that there would be a future day when he and all of God’s servants would render an account before the Lord and would be properly honored for their faithfulness. “I don’t evaluate myself,” he wrote. He was willing to wait until he stood before the Lord to learn the true value of his service to Christ.

That is a good way for a minister—or any believer—to live.

I have had more than my share of accolades and honors. I do not despise the tributes that people have given to me. I treasure every expression of appreciation that has flowed to me from the precious people whom I have served as pastor for these past decades. There have been countless letters, gifts, plaques, cards, and warm fuzzies through these years. I have been blessed by them all—especially by the drawings that little children have given me (usually a picture of me in the pulpit!).

Although these commendations and accolades are not without meaning—they are not what really matters. Paul said that “The One who evaluates me is the Lord.” He commented that he was going to wait until he stood before the Lord to learn whether he was successful or not.

Paul had the humility and wisdom to refuse indulging in speculation about what was the true value of his service to Christ. Of course he maintained a clear conscience—“For I am not conscious of anything against myself.” But he understood that his thoughts were not God’s thoughts. Self-justification is only for the arrogant, Paul reasoned. He refused to play that game. He would wait until “the Lord comes.” Only then will the quality of Paul’s—or my—ministry be made known.

Another similar sentiment is found in the writings of the Apostle Peter.

“Therefore, as a fellow elder and witness to the sufferings of the Messiah, and also a participant in the glory about to be revealed, I exhort the elders among you: shepherd God’s flock among you, not overseeing out of compulsion but freely, according to God’s [will] ; not for the money but eagerly; not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.” (1 Peter 5:1-4 HCSB)

“Elder” is another term for the office we usually refer to as “pastor.” The position I have held in Edmond for the past 25 years has been that of pastor-teacher, elder, and overseer. As a pastor-teacher, I have tried to feed and tend the sheep. As an elder, I have attempted to model maturity and wisdom. As an overseer, my goal has been to lead, guide, and motivate the congregation to serve the Lord Jesus with total devotion.

Peter’s words remind me that my service should have been motivated by no other compulsion but the will of God, by no other incentive but spiritual passion, and by no other spirit but that of exemplary humility. He concludes, like Paul, by informing those who serve as elders, pastors, and overseers to wait until “the chief Shepherd appears” when He will honor those who have served faithfully.

I suppose it’s a good thing to remember birthdays and to recognize anniversaries as long as we keep in mind what the Lord said through Isaiah: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not My ways.” (Isaiah 55:8 HCSB) In other words, it’s alright to take a glance backward now and then to see where we’ve been and what we’ve done. That’s OK. But we dare not compare ourselves to anyone else or speculate about how much good we’ve actually accomplished. Only the Lord knows that. Only the Lord has wisdom enough to evaluate the quality of our ministries. Only He knows why we did what we did? Only He knows whether we gave everything to Him or whether we kept part of ourselves from the Lord’s control.

I appreciate the esteem, love, and honors given to me by the people of Edmond’s First Baptist. In all honesty and sincerity, however, the only opinion that really matters is the one I won’t fully know until the day I stand before Jesus and lay it all down at His blessed feet. I look forward to that day.

Pastor Alan Day

Imagine for a moment that you have lost the power of memory. You awaken in the morning and go into the kitchen where you find other people gathering for breakfast. You think, "Who are all these people? I don't know them."

You walk into your den. Photographs and portraits are all around. You stare in bewilderment at pictures of people whose names you do not know and whose faces you cannot recognize.

In a special room in your house are memorabilia from trips and awards and plaques from business and social clubs; yet you have no idea what they all mean. You have lost your memory.

Our lives are, in many ways, defined by our memories and our hopes. Add to those two realities our convictions and beliefs and you have the essence of the human experience.

Tyrants know that people have short memories. They understand that history can be rewritten. They thrive on the reticence of people to diligently preserve their institutions and inculcate their values by memorializing the important moments of their past. They appeal to the human willingness to trade their freedoms for the promises of provisions, security, and even happiness.

On this Memorial Day 2010, we need to dust off our memories and recollect why the voluntary sacrifice of so many through the years of our history is appropriately honored and remembered.

If there are no lasting values and no absolute truths, then those who died for this nation were fools. If there are no morally superior forms of government and no morally superior cultures--if, in fact, communism or socialism or fascism or Islamic sharia law are the moral equals of constitutional republicanism--then, to misquote Lincoln, "these dead shall have died in vain."

But they didn't die in vain. They died for the belief that God is the Author of our liberties; that the Constitution both empowers and limits our government; and that freedom, although a gift from God, is never free. They died because they believed that, while all men are created equal, all governments are not equal. They believed that there are evil empires, immoral governments, and degenerate regimes.

While we remember our honored dead this week, we must remind ourselves why they died. We must refresh our collective and corporate memories and educate our children.

Finally, we must resolve that we, too, will be willing to pay the ultimate price so that freedom can be perpetuated in our land and extended throughout the world. We must pray for our leaders, hold them accountable, vote for those who understand and honor our Constitution, and remove from office every person whose vision of America is not consistent with the truths enshrined in our founding documents.

We are always only one generation away from the extinction of our freedoms. We cannot afford to forget either what our heroes believed they had to die for or what we have to live for.

Remember!

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

No, I’m not talking about the eternal pain of hell; I’m referring to the enduring flames of married love. The fire in the marital fireplace transcends this life.

In my final message in the HOMEFIRES series, I talked about four stages of married love - Young Love, the Middle Years, the Empty Nest, and the Golden Years. But there is another stage that some of us will experience. I was reminded of that fact by a letter I received from Dr. Calvin Turpin, whose wife Eudell passed away three years ago. Here’s the letter which is as good a description of the final stage of HOMEFIRES as I could possibly imagine. I use it with Dr. Turpin’s permission.

	Dear Pastor, I write to thank you for your beautiful and thought provoking sermon last Sunday. I proudly validate the Biblical truths I heard in “Keep the Homefires Burning.” I wish that message could be heard all across America because I think many marriages could be either strengthened or saved. I would like to share a couple of things I have learned since the passing of my beloved Eudell. We were married 63 years before God elevated her to higher glories than this world can ever know. First, I have found that love does not die with death. I can never remember a time that I did not love Eudell. Perhaps you will remember that I moved next door to her when I was six years old. She has been in my life and heart since I first saw her almost 80 years ago. In just a few months it will be three years since you brought her beautiful memorial message. Since her death my love for her has continued to grow. I love her more than at any other time in our relationship. I say again love does not die with death. I have discovered an additional truth: a sense of nearness need not diminish with distance. Her ashes rest in the family plot in the Romance Arkansas Cemetery. However, a sense of her presence lingers near. I sense her presence much like I sense the presence of God in the church and in my daily living. To me it is real! Her marker may be far away, but she is near. For that I am grateful. Again, I thank you for your loving and supportive ministry. Your contributions to my life are beyond measure. You and the church will continue to remain in my daily prayers. I remain, Your colleague in ministry, Calvin C. Turpin

I heard the poem below by A. K. Rowswell in 1966. These melancholy words made a deep impression on a college freshman.

Should You Go First

Should you go first and I remain
To walk the road alone,
I'll live in memory's garden, dear,
With happy days we've known.

In Spring I'll wait for roses red,
When fades the lilac blue,
In early Fall, when brown leaves call
I'll catch a glimpse of you.

Should you go first and I remain
For battles to be fought,
Each thing you've touched along the way
Will be a hallowed spot.

I'll hear your voice, I'll see your smile,
Though blindly I may grope,
The memory of your helping hand
Will buoy me on with hope.

Should you go first and I remain
To finish with the scroll,
No lenght'ning shadows shall creep in
To make this life seem droll,

We've known so much of happiness,
We've had our cup of joy,
And memory is one gift of God
That death cannot destroy.

Should you go first and I remain,
One thing I'd have you do:
Walk slowly down that long, long path,
For soon I'll follow you.

I'll want to know each step you take
That I may walk the same,
For some day down that long, long road
You'll hear me call your name.

- A.K. Rowswell

The fact that love for a mate transcends their death has been discussed frequently. In his autobiography, the great19th century preacher Lyman Beecher spoke of his love for his first wife: "I am still blessed in a beloved wife. But I rejoice that affection for the living does not obliterate the memory, the precious memory of the dead, or supersede a love stronger than death for the companion of my early years, and that this tenderness is one also that practices no fraud upon the rights of the living whom God has most mercifully given me" (The Autobiography of Lyman Beecher, v. 1, p. 287).

Jesus taught us that there is no marriage in heaven. But as long as we are alive we will love our mates - even if they have already graduated to the honors of heaven. The Bible does not tell us what our relationships will be like in heaven; but we will know each other even though we will not be married. I suppose we can conclude that there is something better than marriage. We’ll have to wait to get to heaven to know what that is!

Next time I bring a message on the phases of marriage, I will include Dr. Turpin’s reminder that there is a final phase of love even after our mate passes. Thank you for the powerful reminder, Dr. Turpin.

Pastor Alan Day, Senior Pastor

Forty years ago when the feminist movement was beginning to blossom, Germaine Greer wrote a book titled The Female Eunuch. She said that pregnancy is an illness and urged women to be “deliberately promiscuous” and be careful not to conceive. She said that women can change our society, but they must refuse to marry and have children.

Another feminist, Betty Friedan, wrote The Feminine Mystique around the same time. She said that homemakers are “parasites” in society and that traditional family is “burying millions of American women alive.”

For decades we have been told by feminists, Hollywood and television personalities, and even political figures, that the brightest and best women don’t choose to be mothers or they will defer becoming mothers until after they have secured their places in history through their careers.

Without realizing it, our culture has dishonored the role of mothers by suggesting that women should seek their significance outside of marriage and family. Helen Gurley Brown’s book, You Can Have It All, is simply wrong. Life is not about having it all; it is about establishing priorities and making sure the most important things get done first and get done well.

America sets aside a day to honor mothers and motherhood, but our actions the rest of the year tell another story. We really do not value mothers as God does. We do not understand how important - how critical - a mother’s role is in shaping the consciences and values and characters of children. Our culture respects woman as a producer and a consumer, not as a bearer and nurturer of children.

Ken Magid and Carole McKelvey wrote a disturbing book titled High Risk: Children Without a Conscience. They spoke about the growing problem of what they called “Maternal Deprivation.”

“What Happens, right or wrong, in the critical first two years of a baby’s life will imprint that child as an adult. A complex set of events must occur in infancy to assure a future of trust and love. If the proper bonding and subsequent attachment does not occur - usually between the child and the mother - the child will develop mistrust and a deep-seated rage. He becomes a child without a conscience” (p. 3).

A little boy was watching the evening news with his mother when a film clip showed the police accosting some criminals. The boy asked what was going on and his mother explained that they were bad men who had robbed a bank and had to be put in jail. The little boy said, “Gee, don’t they got a mama?”

The poet, Ann Taylor, was pointing out the value of mothers when she wrote:

Who ran to help me when I fell,

And would some pretty story tell,

Or kiss the place to make it well?

My mother.

First Lady Barbara Bush was never known for her fashion statements. Goggle-eyed reporters never commented on her trim body or her exercise routine. But, in my opinion, she made one of the finest statements ever made to women in her address to the graduating class at Wellesley College in 1990.

“For several years, you’ve had impressed upon you the importance to your career of dedication and hard work. This is true, but as important as your obligations as a doctor, lawyer, or business leader will be, you are a human being first and those human connections - with spouses, with children, with friends - are the most important investments you will ever make.

“At the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, not winning one more verdict or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a friend, a child or a parent.”

We honor mothers this Mother’s Day. God doesn’t honor mothers one day a year. He honors them every day. In God’s book, motherhood is a worthy vocation and is to be honored. Let’s join our God today and every day in honoring what He says is honorable.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

In his excellent book, THE DRIFTING MARRIAGE, Donald Harvey put his finger on the greatest threat to marital happiness today: “We marry for intimacy. Marriages, in general, fail because of the inability to attain intimacy. They lack internal bonding or connectedness.”

The analogy of drifting is appropriate, it seems to me. Couples don’t jump from the blazing fire of romance to the frigid waters of marital isolation in one single bound. They slowly, surely, predictably drift apart. They consciously or unconsciously fail to do the things that create and sustain marital intimacy.

That famous poet and author, Anonymous, outdid himself/herself with the following lines:

The Wall

Their wedding picture mocked them from the table
These two whose lives no longer touched each other.
They loved with such a heavy barricade between them
That neither battering rams of words
Nor artilleries of touch could break it down.
Somewhere between the oldest child’s first tooth
And youngest daughter’s graduation
They lost each other.
Throughout the years each slowly unraveled
That tangled ball of string called self
And as they tugged at stubborn knots
Each hid their searching from the other.
Sometimes she cried at night and begged
The whispering darkness to tell her who she was
While he lay beside her snoring like a
Hibernating bear unaware of her winter.
Once after they had made love he wanted to tell her
How afraid he was of dying
But fearing to show his naked soul he spoke instead
About the beauty of her breasts.
She took a course in modern art trying to find herself.
In colors splashed upon a canvas
And complaining to other women about men
Who were insensitive.
He climbed into a tomb called the office
Wrapped his mind in a shroud of paper figures
And buried himself in customers.
Slowly the wall between them rose cemented
By the mortar of indifference.
One day reaching out to touch each other
They found a barrier they could not penetrate
And recoiling from the coldness of the stone
Each retreated from the stranger on the other side.
For when love dies it is not in a moment of angry battle
Nor when fiery bodies lose their heat.
It lies panting exhausted expiring
At the bottom of a wall it could not scale.

That piece is tragic and sad—but the picture it paints is so common . . . and unnecessary. In my opinion, marital intimacy can last a lifetime.

Marriage therapist Ed Wheat has developed an approach to restoring intimacy in marriage. I have heard the testimonies of men and women who were on the brink of divorce when they consulted Dr. Wheat, used his techniques, and regained the intimacy they had lost. One such couple I have met is Pat and Jill Williams. Pat was general manager of the Chicago Bulls, the Philadelphia 76’ers and then the Orlando Magic. His book, REKINDLED, is the story of how he almost lost his marriage to Jill, and how with Dr. Wheat’s counsel they not only saved their marriage but rekindled the flames of romance.

Dr. Wheat’s program is called by the acronym, BEST, and is found in his book STAYING IN LOVE FOR A LIFETIME.

• Bless
  Speak kindly, lovingly to your mate - words of affection, words of appreciation, words of approval.
• Edify
  Build up your mate’s sense of personal value and worth. Encourage them.
• Share
  We are to share our dreams, or fears, our hopes, our cares, our hurts, our joys. There must be transparency in order for there to be intimacy.
• Touch
  God created us with hundreds of thousands of microscopic nerve endings in our skin designed to sense and benefit from a loving touch. A tender, non-sexual touch tells us that we are cared for. It can calm our fears, soothe pain, comfort, and give emotional security.

Psychiatrist Scott Peck, in his breakthrough book, THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED, said that falling in love is not love at all since it is not a conscious choice and requires no real effort. He defines the insanity of falling in love in strictly biological terms: “It is a genetically determined instinctual component of mating behavior . . . which serves to increase the probability of sexual pairing and bonding so as to enhance the survival of the species.” (THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED, p. 90)

Now, isn’t that romantic? Well, it’s not supposed to be. And I agree with the general tenor of Dr. Peck’s opinion. You see, “falling in love” or “being in love” is not the same thing as “loving.” Love is a choice, not something you fall into or fall out of.

There once was a group of GI’s who had a cook that they enjoyed playing practical jokes on. They would nail his shoes to the floor, grease the knobs on the stove, or put a bucket of water over the door that would fall on his head when he entered. One day they decided they were too tough on the cook and told him they would no longer be doing those practical jokes.

The cook said, “You no more nail shoes to floor?” They said “No.”

“You no more grease knobs on stove?” “No.”

“No more put water bucket over door?” “No.”

“Good. Cookie no more spit in soup!”

I remember the tumultuous ‘60’s antiwar protests. One of the best-known slogans during those days was,” MAKE LOVE, NOT WAR.” That’s pretty good advice for married couples. You’re on the same team. The enemies are selfishness, creeping separatism, and emotional opacity. Fight the enemies of marital intimacy. You can have a “BEST” marriage.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

At lunch time one day, a little boy opened his brown bag, unwrapped his sandwich, pulled the two pieces of bread apart and stared at the peanut butter inside. He then uttered a sound of disgust and ate the sandwich.

The next day he went through the same routine. He took the sandwich out of his brown bag, unwrapped the sandwich, and then pulled the two pieces of bread apart. Once again, he said with disgust, "My goodness! Peanut butter again!"

The friend who ate with him every day said, "Why don't you tell your mother you don't like peanut butter?"

The little boy answered angrily, "You keep my mother out of this! I make my own sandwiches."

*****

Much of modern psychology has focused our attention on the damage done to us by our parents. As Anna Russell said in the "Psychiatric Folksong" a few years ago:

I went to my psychiatrist to be psychoanalyzed
To find out why I killed the cat and blacked my husband's eye.
He laid me on a downy couch to see what he could find,
And here's what he dredged up, from my subconscious mind.
When I was one, my mummy hid my dolly in a trunk
And so it follows, naturally, that I am always drunk.
When I was two, I saw my father kiss the maid one day,
and that is why I suffer from kleptomania.
At three I had a feeling of ambivalence towards my brothers
and so it follows naturally I poisoned all my lovers.
but I am happy now I have learned the lessons this has taught:
Everything I do that's wrong, is someone else's fault!

There is no doubt in my mind that we parents do leave our marks and sometimes scars on our children. Our parents did the same thing to us.

But God created us with the capacity to rise above our personal histories. If we had a painful childhood, we do not have to continue repeating the mistakes of our parents or to remain chained to the past. Human personality is not cast in concrete. The human spirit is flexible, transformable, and fixable (to coin a word).

People can learn how to love. Couples can learn how to meet each other's needs. Parents can learn how to give strong, godly, loving leadership to their children. God's grace is the guaranty that there are no hopeless situations.

All of us need two things in our lives: models and mentors. We need someone to show us what it looks like to have a successful marriage and to be good parents and to live a consistent Christian life. That's the MODEL. Then we need the MENTOR - someone who will walk with us, hold us accountable, and encourage us to keep on.

The best place to find models and mentors is in the church. To be sure, not everyone in the church qualifies for these two roles. Many have not figured it out yet. But there are some who have traveled far enough down the road of life, marriage, and parenting to be qualified to give counsel and hold us accountable.

Some people play at church membership and then wonder why they get little out of it. Others invest their lives in God's church, invest their resources to bless others and extend the kingdom, and then invest their influence in other people. These people are always growing; and they always seem so happy and fulfilled.

You can become the person you want to be. The best place to start is by accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and then becoming part of Christ's body, which is His church.

If you don't like peanut butter sandwiches, then stop making them. God will help you do it.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

Jonathan Edwards was a busy pastor, brilliant philosopher, and leader of the Great Awakening that began in the 1730's in New England. He routinely spent 13 hours a day in his study. He also oversaw his household, farm, children, and church. Yet his marriage to Sarah was a beautiful and romantic thing.

When the itinerant evangelist, George Whitefield, stayed for a while in the Edwards' home, he was captivated by the warm and affectionate relationship between Jonathan and Sarah. Even with a house filled with children, Jonathan and Sarah had a romantic bond that could not be broken. Whitefield called the Edwards home a "household of peace" and determined that he would find a wife and marry as soon as possible--and he did.

The marriage between Jonathan and Sarah became the model for their children, their children's children, and on and on for generations. In fact, Edward's lasting legacy may not be his theological and philosophical writings--as important as they are. His real legacy may be the home he and Sarah established, the warm and romantic marriage they enjoyed, and the children they raised. Their marriage became the pattern for their children and children's children. (See THE GOD-CENTERED LIFE: INSIGHTS FROM JONATHAN EDWARDS FOR TODAY, by Josh Moody.)

Do strong marriages and loving families make a difference in society? Consider studies done of the Edwards family contrasted with a contemporary, Max Juke. Juke was a freethinker, possibly an atheist, who believed in free sex and liberation from laws. Juke had numerous children, some of them illegitimate.

Of 1026 descendants of Max Juke, 300 were convicts, 27 were murderers, 190 were prostitutes, and 509 were either alcoholics or drug addicts. One researcher was able to estimate that the Jukes had cost the State of New York almost $1.4 million dollars to house, institutionalize and treat the family of deviants. By contrast, the 929 descendents of Jonathan Edwards included 13 college presidents, 86 college professors, 430 ministers, 314 war veterans, 75 authors, 100 lawyers, 30 judges, 66 physicians, and 80 holders of public office, including three U.S. Senators, seven congressman, mayors of three large cities, governors of three states, a Vice-President of the United States, and a controller of the United States Treasury.

In her book, WHAT CHILDREN LEARN FROM THEIR PARENTS' MARRIAGE, author Judith P. Siegel writes that there "is a certain atmosphere and culture that is created in each family. The ways in which parents speak to each other, touch each other, talk about each other; the tone that accompanies the minutiae of everyday interactions . . . all lead to the beliefs, values, and expectations that family members share. It is the atmosphere and way of conducting everyday living that is imprinted on the child's schema of a couple. When parents value each other, are happy to see each other, and keep each other's needs in focus, their children learn the importance of marital closeness" [pp. 19-20]. Siegel says that "belief in the goodness of marriage is established in childhood and adolescence, and is already formed by young adulthood" [p. 16]. They learn this by watching their parents.

Strong marriages are essential for strong families. Strong families are essential for rearing children of character. People of character are essential for the welfare of a community or nation.

We must train people in the art of building a homefire that burns long and hot and creates a warm and desirable atmosphere in the home.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

Last night was one of those few nights that I got to bed early to catch up on some needed rest after battling a stomach virus for a few days.  But even though my body said I needed sleep, my mind would not cooperate.  So I got up and went to my study and surveyed the stacks of books I have yet to read.  On top of one stack was John Piper’s A Sweet and Bitter Providence:  Sex, Race, and the Sovereignty of God—a theological and homiletical exposition of the Book of Ruth.  Since the book was only 160 pages in length, I decided to take care of it as quickly as possible in the anticipation that sleep would come with the assistance of Piper’s theological ruminations.

Neither Piper nor my brain would cooperate with my intentions.  The book was stimulating and provocative.  The characters in the inspired story, Piper contends, were not in the hands of blind fate or sorry circumstances—they were in the hands of a sovereign God who works all things together for the good of those who love Him.  I was not surprised to find penetrating theology in a book by Piper.  After all, he is one of the premier pastor-theologians in America today.

Having finished Piper, the time was approaching 11:00 p.m.—and my brain was still not ready for sleep.    I looked over at the stacks of unread books and saw a book I had been given only one day earlier—Overcoming Evil by Cindy Shell, an Edmond resident whose mother was killed by an intruder in 2007.  I counted the pages—127—and calculated that I could polish it off in time to get to bed at a decent hour.

I already knew the story of course, and I was also aware of Cindy’s faith in Christ that so powerfully sustained her after her mother’s tragic death.  But the first few pages were hard reading for me.  I thought—“This is just going to be a sentimental sob story, a therapeutic exercise that will appeal to the emotions and help Cindy feel better after the story is told.”  I was in for a surprise.

It took nearly 60 pages; but then it happened.  Cindy expressed the kind of confidence in God’s providence and sovereignty that one seldom encounters in the shallow self-help books and sermons that the public seems so hungry for.  I had just read Piper’s book on God’s providence, and it was good.  In all due respect to the pastor-theologian, nothing in his book gripped me with the forcefulness that I experienced when I read Cindy’s confession of her confidence in the goodness, wisdom, and power of a God who had allowed her mother to be brutally and senselessly murdered.  She did not try to appear theologically sophisticated; not at all.  But she articulated as clear a presentation of God’s providence as I have ever read.

What Cindy has to teach us is that confidence in God’s providence is not an intellectual exercise; it is a matter of faith.  Here are several excerpts from the book:

• Through it all, I had an unwavering confidence in the providence of God.  I have no doubt it started the moment I unconsciously screamed out “Oh my God” upon seeing Mom.  I sincerely believe Jesus saw my breaking heart and immediately stepped in to start comforting me and carrying me.

• In the darkest moment of my life, I made the decision to run to God and trust in him and trust everything I was ever told about him.  (p. 58)

• The fact that I never doubted God or his love for me and instead was overwhelmed with the feeling of how he was still in complete control was a miracle to me even while it was happening.  God kept overwhelming me with his providence at every turn, and I grabbed on to it with complete faith and confidence.  If you honestly believe that God is in control and commit to that, does any “why” ever really matter? (p. 62)

• The problem for those who do invest everything in the “why” when bad things happen is that no answer to “why” is really ever mentally or emotionally sufficient.
   
  Knowing why doesn’t bring peace, and it doesn’t take the loss away.  Is there any answer that we, in our limited understanding as human beings, would be satisfied with?  I am so thankful because early on, the need to know why was taken away and replaced with the only understanding that does lead to peace and healing, the understanding that God is in control no matter what happens.  This is the peace that passes all understanding.  (p. 63)

• It would have been easy to be angry with God for ruining all the plans I had and taking my mom and best friend away. . . .I never thought to be angry with God, and I can only attribute it to God himself sparing me from thinking that and showing himself to be so comforting and welcoming of my brokenness.  So instead of running from him in anger and doubt, I knew from the first moment that He was in control of this, so I ran to him. (p. 65)

Cindy tells how God’s grace allowed her and her family to forgive her mother’s murderer and pray for his salvation.  God honored her faith and she had the experience of hearing the slayer ask for her and God’s forgiveness.  She freely forgave him, and she experienced that freedom that only forgiven forgivers understand.

Near the end of the book Cindy repeats a phrase which summarizes the book:  “I know without a doubt that the only way I have overcome the evil in my life, both my own sin and the pain of losing my mother, is by running to Jesus, the author of mercy. . . .The freedom you receive from seeking Jesus far outweighs anything that this world could offer.  Your temporary selfish desires and understandings quickly fade, and you see the possibility of an eternity surrounded by love and joy and peace.”   (p. 125)

Well-done, Cindy.  I’m recommending the book, especially to those who are hurting and questioning God about their afflictions.  You found the answer.  The answer is Jesus.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

Palm Sunday gets its name from the royal reception the residents of Jerusalem gave to Jesus.  John puts it this way:  12 The next day, when the large crowd that had come to the festival heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, 13 they took palm branches and went out to meet Him. They kept shouting: “ Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord - the King of Israel!” John 12:12-13 (HCSB).

They worshiped Him--but their worship was in vain because done in willful ignorance.  They wanted a King to deliver them from high taxes, squalid conditions and oppressive political powers.  They expected--and demanded--that Jesus would fulfill their nationalistic and economic dreams.  They craved a here-and-now deliverer who would right all the wrongs and correct all of the injustices they had suffered.  They wanted miracles and bread.

But that's not why Jesus came.  He came to die in order to rescue them and all the world from the greatest tyranny--the tyranny of sin and death and hell.  His mission was "to seek and to save that which was lost," and in order to do that He would have to go to the cross.

By the end of that week, the same crowd who cried, "Hosanna!  Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord" was shouting, "Crucify Him, Crucify Him."  Jesus did not fulfill their expectations, so they would rather He be dead than to be Lord and Master of their lives.

Many today still want a "miracles and bread" Messiah.  They want a God that will protect them from cancer or job loss or personal tragedy, and they will fall down and worship such a God.

Our Savior died on a cross.  On Good Friday the representatives of the Roman government nailed his hands and his feet to that tree fixed atop Golgotha.  His mission was not then and not now to eliminate poverty and disease.  His purpose for His life was to die so that His children could be saved.

Jesus will not build a hedge around your life to keep away all the germs and diseases that might attack you.  He will not fix it so you won't take a wrong turn or trip and fall or go through excruciating pain.

So why love and serve Him?  Let me tell you why!!!!  Because He loves you.  He died for you.  He rose for you.  He lives for you.  And He's coming for you.  He promised to be with you and to never leave  you or forsake you.  He promised you that you would have pressure and trials, but He also said that He will be with you through it all.

Today we worship the King and Lord over sin and death.  We reject the idea of a miracles and bread Messiah.  Our Savior has nail prints in His hands and feet.  Our Lord has a scar in his side where a spear pierced Him.   We love Him because He tasted death for everyone of us--not because he spares us from sickness and death.

We take the bread and wine in communion to symbolize our union with Him and our faith that His broken body and shed blood have redeemed us.

Majestic simplicity--bread and wine become tokens of the greatest love the world has ever known.  Don't miss the awesome presence of our Savior as we take the Lord's Supper together.  He joins us at His table.  Bless His Name!

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

In the seventh chapter of Romans, Paul speaks of his own experience in this way:  “For I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh. For the desire to do what is good is with me, but there is no ability to do it.  For I do not do the good that I want to do, but I practice the evil that I do not want to do.  Now if I do what I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but it is the sin that lives in me.   So I discover this principle: when I want to do good, evil is with me.  For in my inner self I joyfully agree with God’s law.  But I see a different law in the parts of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and taking me prisoner to the law of sin in the parts of my body.   What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:18-24 HCSB)

A question that Bible scholars have wrangled over for centuries is:  “When Paul referred to himself as a ‘wretched man,’ was he speaking of himself before or after his conversion?”  There are four primary options considered by evangelicals.

Some see this autobiographical section as describing Paul before he met Christ.  Others see this as Paul’s experience while he was under conviction of sin and   still controlled by his self-righteousness apart from Christ.  Others see the passage as descriptive of Paul after conversion but before he learned the truths of the victorious Christian life made possible by the indwelling Holy Spirit, which he explores in Romans 8.

But a very large section of the evangelical church sees Romans 7 as the continuing experience of the believer—even the Spirit-filled believer.  The Christian life, they argue, is a continual battlefield.  The flesh—which is fallen human nature—is never obliterated or improved.  We have a new nature by the presence of the Spirit, but the old nature is still very real.  Consequently, we are in for a struggle every day of our lives until we die or until the rapture.

What is the true meaning of Paul’s words in Romans 7?  Is this the pre-conversion Paul, the almost-converted Paul, the newly-converted Paul, or the mature Paul who honestly admitted a continuing conflict?  Let’s examine Paul’s statement.

First, the phrase “nothing good lives in me” is consistent with Paul’s emphasis on the total inability of a person to respond to God apart from grace.  In Ephesians, for instance, he describes the unsaved person as “dead in trespasses and sins” (2:1).  To be dead is to be pretty bad off, you’ll have to admit.

Second, the statement “there is no ability to do [good]” is also consistent with what Paul writes about the unregenerate:   “And you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you previously walked according to this worldly age, according to the ruler of the atmospheric domain, the spirit now working in the disobedient.   We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and by nature we were children under wrath, as the others were also.”(Eph 2:1-3 HCSB)

Paul speaks of the unregenerate as “disobedient” and as “children of wrath” who “walked according to this worldly age,” i.e., they lived just like the rest of those who don’t know God in Christ.

So, you can make the argument that this autobiographical passage portrays Paul before his new birth experience on the Damascus road.

But there are weighty arguments in favor of this being Paul’s admission of weakness after his conversion and throughout his Christian experience.

• First, Paul writes in the present tense.  In his flesh he admits that “there is no ability to do” God’s will.  He confesses that “I practice the evil that I do not want to do” and that “sin . . . lives in me.”  These are present tense verbs.

• Second, his confession, “What a wretched man I am” is also in the present tense.  He could easily have written, “What a wretched man I used to be; but then I met Christ and now I have perpetual victory.  The battle with the flesh is over.  I am more than a conqueror.”

Theologically, I would have preferred Paul to have written it that way—to have said, “I no longer have to dilly-dally with sin.  The issue was settled long ago.  I’m not perfect, but I’m no longer a captive to sin.  Thanks be to God.”

I say, that would be my preference.  It makes more sense to me theologically.  But that’s not what he said.  The straightforward and simple meaning of his words is that the great Apostle to the Gentiles still struggled with indwelling sin.  He admitted that there was a conflict between the old, fallen nature—the remnant of his pre-conversion life—and his new nature, which was the creation of the indwelling Holy Spirit.

Third, the following words could never be said by a lost person:  “22 For in my inner self I joyfully agree with God’s law.”  Only someone who had been regenerated by the Holy Spirit would claim that he delighted in the moral law of God and gave hearty agreement with its demands and penalties.  The tendency of the unregenerate is to chafe under the law and to accuse God of being arbitrary and unreasonable to require people to live by such a strict code of morality.

How, then, do we decide the true interpretation?

First, there is the analogy of scripture.  What does the rest of the New Testament teach?  Is there an ongoing conflict within the heart of the child of God; or does the presence of the Holy Spirit end all battles with sin?  In my opinion, there is no teaching in scripture that the sin principle is eradicated at conversion.  In Galatians 5, Paul clearly states that the “works of the flesh” are evident, and he implies that the believer can produce these works when he is not filled with the Spirit.  The character of Christlikeness is the “fruit” of the Spirit’s presence in our lives (see Gal. 5:19-25).  A choice to live in the flesh or live by the Spirit is plainly indicated.

Second, there is the value of personal experience.  Those of us who have received God’s grace in Christ have our own spiritual autobiographies.  We cannot claim that they are Spirit-inspired like Paul’s epistles; however, we can and should claim that our experience with Christ is genuine and is a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit.

So, what about your experience?  Have you ever noticed a battle raging in your own heart?  Have you ever been tempted to do what you knew was wrong, and did you feel that your entire being would burst under the strain?  Have you ever lost one of these battles and become the prisoner of the flesh, at least for a time?

Most of us would honestly confess “Yes” to all three of the above questions.  We know the battle from personal experience.  Our “old man” is still very much with us.  The “flesh” has to be mortified on a daily basis.  If we do not choose regularly to be Spirit-filled, we will walk in the flesh and produce the works of the flesh. As a consequence God will be dishonored while our own lives become spiritual shambles.  It is easy for most of us to see how Paul could be describing himself after his conversion.

Third, there is the weight of Christian scholarship.  To be sure, we can cite scholars who support each of the positions we have mentioned.  Yet all of us have our favorites, and when push comes to shove, we tend to agree with them on issues that we are not clear about.  That is not a bad practice, by the way.  I have learned to trust the judgment of some of my favorite scholars who seem to have an uncanny gift to unravel the mysteries of the Word of God.  I don’t always agree with any one scholar; but certain of them are my “go to guys” when crunch time comes.

With apologies to Martyn Lloyd-Jones, one of my favorite commentators on the book of Romans, I must reject his view that Paul was describing his experience when he was under conviction by the Spirit and before he was born again.  I also reject the view that this was descriptive of Paul while he was a self-righteous Pharisee and before the regenerating work of the Spirit.  My view is a combination of the third and fourth options listed above.  Paul is both confessing a present struggle as the “wretched man,” and he is sharing the secret of victory that comes by living in the Spirit.

Paul is describing every Christian.  We are all in a battle.  We must daily choose life in the Spirit.  We are, in one sense, perpetually the “wretched man” who can never please God and who struggles with the tendency to live in the flesh.

The wonderful thing is:  now we can make the choice to live by the Spirit.  Before we were born again, there was no choice to make.  We could never live the Spirit life until the Spirit came into our lives.  The presence of the Spirit in our lives makes possible the choice to honor Christ, deny the flesh, and live in faith and obedience.

The struggle is real; but so is the choice to respond to the Holy Spirit.  We can never honestly say, “I couldn’t help myself,” meaning we were in the clutches of an irresistible force that compelled us to sin.   One battle at a time we can say “Yes” to the Spirit and experience life.  We are the “wretched man” who will never find the exit from the arena of spiritual conflict until Jesus snatches us up or calls us home.  But at the same time we are “more than victorious through Him that loved us” (Romans 8:37).

Paul’s reference to victory is obviously eschatological (related to the end-time); but the Spirit-filled believer has the privilege of experiencing right now the presence of the Kingdom which will not be fully revealed until the King comes again.  Through the Holy Spirit we can know, in the words of G. Eldon Ladd, the “presence of the future.”  Or as the late Princeton theologian Gerhardus Vos put it so graphically, the Kingdom is “already, but not yet.”

We will live in this “already, but not yet” tension all of our lives.  But keep your eyes on the eastern sky.  Dawn is breaking.  The sun is about to peak over the horizon.  The King is coming.  The victory we know now proleptically and hopefully will be fully realized.  Faith will become sight, and hope will dissolve into the glory of the Son of God as we are instantly transformed into His blessed likeness (I John 3:2-3).

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

Someone asked me recently, "Why don't people bring their Bibles to church anymore?"  I had to think about it; here's what I came up with.

First, many of our people--most in fact--do bring a Bible to church.  When we lift our Bibles and say, "God said it; I believe it; that settles it" I see Bibles lifted all over the house.

Second, some younger folks have never been trained to bring their Bibles.  There are churches where the pastor encourages people NOT to bring their Bibles.  One pastor of a mega-church said that it might turn some "seekers" off if they see Bible-toting people in the church; he asks church members to come without Bibles.

Third, in my opinion our use of Sunday School quarterlies has given the unintended message that Sunday school is about teaching a "lesson" and studying a "lesson" rather than teaching and studying the Bible.   For a century Baptists have trained people to be dependent on a quarterly rather than the Bible.  Some read the quarterly and think they have read the Bible.

Fourth, I believe we need to emphasize the importance of the Bible in our daily lives and in our worship.  I preach from the Bible.  I do expository sermons which treat the very words and ideas of the Bible.  There is no way a person can understand what I as a pastor believe and stand for without reference to the Bible.  I value the Bible and want our people to love the Bible.

Fifth, we cannot be serious about listening to the pastor's message if we do not consult the Bible.  I am not inclined merely to preach my opinions; nor should our people be interested just in my opinions.  I want our church to be anchored in Scripture, knowledgeable of Scripture, and obedient to Scripture.

Sixth, I read recently that 60% of church members have never read the entire New Testament.  We simply have failed to disciple our people

Finally, I am committed to leading our church to love the Bible, to value the Bible in worship, and to read the Bible in personal devotions.  Our staff will announce an emphasis soon which will help us to read the Bible personally, devotionally, and as families.

Please, please, please!  Bring your Bible to church.  Open the Bible when the pastor or pulpit guest is preaching.  We put the scriptures on the IMAG screen to help those who do not have Bibles and to help move the message along without waiting for people to locate a scripture.  But you don't have to depend solely on the IMAG.  You can bring your Bible and open it to the text and follow along when the pastor teaches.  Then you can check the passage after the message and apply the Scripture to your own life.

HOLY BIBLE, BOOK DIVINE
by John Burton
(original lyrics)

Holy Bible, book Divine,
Precious treasure, thou art mine;
Mine to tell me whence I came;
Mine to teach me what I am.

Mine to chide me when I rove;
Mine to shew a Saviour’s love;
Mine art thou to guide my feet;
Mine to judge, condemn, acquit.

Mine to comfort in distress;
If the Holy Spirit bless;
Mine to shew, by living faith,
Man can triumph over death.

Mine to tell of joys to come,
And the rebel sinner’s doom;
Holy Bible, book Divine,
Precious treasure, thou art mine.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

James McDonald, view blog post, has written about the “Five Distortions of the Gospel in Our Day.”  He describes the shallow substitutes for genuine New Testament proclamation and evangelization as the “cake mix gospel” in which key ingredients (e.g. repentance) are left out; the “cultural gospel” in which the main focus is to appear to be relevant; the “cool gospel” which attempts to be fashionable; the “carnal gospel” which emphasizes what Christ can do for you (health, wealth, happiness); and the “careful gospel” which masters the art of “almost saying something” but doesn’t say anything to offend anybody.

I like Brother McDonald.  He has the spirit of the prophets and writes and preaches in a no-nonsense, no-holds-barred, no-fear-of-man style.  With all due respect, I want to agree with his analysis while adding one more to his list.  I at first called it the “privatized gospel,” but then when I reread McDonald’s analysis, I decided to fit in with his “c’s” just to continue the alliteration.  (You don’t need to preach to me about preachers who sacrifice “illumination” for “alliteration”; I understand the danger but believe I’ve avoided it here.)  Let’s call it the “cloister gospel.”

I was working out at the gym and listening to 1 Kings on my mp3 player.  When the narrator reached the following verses, a beeper went off in my mind.  See if you can determine why.  Here’s the text:

41 Jehoshaphat son of Asa became king over Judah in the fourth year of Israel’s King Ahab. 42 Jehoshaphat was 35 years old when he became king; he reigned 25 years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Azubah daughter of Shilhi. 43 He walked in all the ways of his father Asa; he did not turn away from them but did what was right in the Lord’s sight. However, the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places. 44 Jehoshaphat also made peace with the king of Israel. 1 Kings 22:41-44 (HCSB)

According to dictionary.com, a cloister is “a place of religious seclusion, as a monastery or convent.”  Zealous believers go to cloisters in order to escape the world and practice their religion without the interference of those who don’t think or act like they do.  The theology of the cloister emphasizes personal and privatized spirituality without regard to the big, mean, ugly world around.  The songs of the cloister ring out about “Jesus loves ME, this I know” and “MY soul has found a resting place.”  Cloister Christianity retreats from the world and practices its devotions in seclusion without any attempt to influence the world for good and for God.  For all its pretensions of piety, the cloister gospel may be one of the most prominent denials of the gospel in the church today.  It professes to believe in the dynamic power of the gospel to transform lives, but denies the power of the gospel to transform culture.  It retreats to the inner sanctum of the cloister and prays in the closet--out of sight and out of mind of the world.

Back to 1 Kings, it is impossible to miss the sacred historian’s emphasis on the positive character and commitment of Jehoshaphat.  “He walked in all the ways of his father Asa; he did not turn away from them but did what was right in the Lord’s sight.”  He was a good and godly King.  Amen.  Hallelujah.  End of song.

Not quite.  The next few words are just as important as the ones just listed.  The inspired writer has carefully chosen his phrases to describe a huge area of neglect of this godly king.  “However, the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places.”

As king, Jehoshaphat had the political authority and the spiritual responsibility to remove the practice of idolatry from his kingdom.  With the issuance of a decree and a word to his commanders, he could have destroyed all the shrines and images dedicated to pagan deities and he could have enforced a decision to cleanse the nation of the immorality and superstition associated with Baalism.

But he did not do it.  We don’t know why he did not do it.  Let me speculate.

Jehoshaphat somehow believed the lie that religion is a purely private matter and that he should not attempt to influence the public morals or spiritual appetites of his subjects.  Had he been a better historian, or had he merely read the historical accounts of Israel’s oscillating devotion to and consequent discipline by Yahweh, he would have known that the security and prosperity of the nation depended upon their breaking free from the chains of idolatry.  He should have realized that, under the monarchy, he had both the responsibility and the authority to enforce sacred law.  But he did not do it.  He was a good and godly man who kept his religion to himself.

My point is not that we should use the force of law to impose our religious convictions on our nation.  We are a democracy (actually, we are a republic).  We believe in religious liberty.  I would not lift a finger to coerce someone to commit to Jesus Christ.

But we do have both authority and responsibility that transcends our own personal devotion to Christ.  Unlike Jehoshaphat, we cannot issue decrees and order commanders to impose our sovereign will upon society.  We can, however, realize that privatized religion is not what Jesus came to establish.  We can understand that we have not done our duty when we have entered the closet and prayed or entered the chapel and worshiped.

We have been commanded to be salt and light in the world (Matt. 5:13-14).  Like meat which tends to putrefaction, our culture is spoiling into moral rottenness.  Our culture needs the salt of transformed believers penetrating every aspect of society.  Our culture needs the light of biblical truth and the Christian worldview to contrast and contradict the hopelessness and meaningless of the secular and humanistic worldview that tends to pessimism, emptiness, and godlessness.

Cloister Christians are content to go to church on Sundays and forget about the world.  They are neither burdened for the world nor bothered by the thought that the world is in rebellion against God and is on a collision course with the Almighty.

These six false gospels are much too prevalent in our world, even in the Bible belt.  There are some, however, who still believe that the Word of God is sufficient and the Spirit of God is adequate to change lives and to transform culture.  I’m one of them.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

There are only two kinds of Christians:  those who are filled with themselves and those who are filled with the Holy Spirit. Many of us spent time at the altar during HEARTLAND dealing with issues that have prevented the Spirit from controlling our lives.  God has spoken.  Many critical decisions--about sin and lack of discipline and failure to surrender--have been made.  Many of us have crowned Christ the Lord of our lives once again.  That is revival!  Are you experiencing revival?

There are no un-contested victories in the Christian life.  Every time we retake territory that has been occupied by the enemy, we are going to have a battle.  The devil never gives up any area he has controlled without a huge fight.  Our decision to surrender to Christ is only the beginning.   Let me say two things about what we can expect over the next few weeks and months.

First, those of us who responded to the Holy Spirit in repentance and surrender can expect unusual outbreaks of spiritual opposition in our lives.  Be prepared for it.  Don't think the battle is over.  For some of us, the battle has just begun.  Be prepared for attacks upon yourself or your family during the days immediately following a touch of God.  It ALWAYS happens.

Second, our church can expect some unusual and unexpected testing from the most unlikely sources.  Whenever a church determines to walk in victory and in the blessings of God and whenever a significant "critical mass" of its people decides to live in the "new normal," the devil will change his game plan and bring pressures and problems into the congregation to distract them from the main issue--the continual surrender of our lives to Jesus.

I spoke to all of our staff recently about what we can expect in the days ahead.  We can expect God to continue to move in the hearts of our people.  We can expect many to make the changes God has told them to make.  We can expect more responsiveness and sensitivity at invitation time as people move to the altar in prayer and commitment.  And . . . we can expect opposition to anything that would change the status quo and would set the bar any higher in our church.

Cold, carnal, casual church members don’t care about revival; they don’t care about a lost world; they don’t care about the glory of God.  They just want their church to be comfortable, cozy, and convenient.  Here’s the doxology according to carnal Christians:

“Praise God for the status quo,
Praise Him all creatures here below,
Praise Him for standards that are low,
Praise Benny and Joel and Brother Creflo."

The sad fact is—the 15% of surrendered church members are often held back by the 85% who want church on their own terms.  Tragically, many staff leaders have to invest most of their energies in the people who cannot positively influence the kingdom and the church for good or help the church move forward.

We've had a touch of revival.  Let's press on to the summit.  Let's go for the gold.  Let's not stop praying and surrendering and loving until the church and all of its ministries are controlled by the Spirit of Jesus.

We best heed the inspired wisdom that the Apostle Peter gave to the scatter believers in the first century:

8 Be sober! Be on the alert! Your adversary the Devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour. 9 Resist him, firm in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are being experienced by your brothers in the world. 10 Now the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ Jesus, will personally restore, establish, strengthen, and support you after you have suffered a little. 11 To Him be the dominion forever.
1 Peter 5:8-11 (HCSB)

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

I’m old enough to remember when theaters forced African Americans to sit in the balconies, public transportation authorities required them to sit in the back of the buses or train cars, and restaurants served them only if they came to the back door.  The motto of most businesses in the 50’s and 60’s in my neck of the woods could very well have been, “If you’re black, go to the back.”

The belief in white supremacy was seldom questioned in my home town.  It was everywhere—in the schools (separate but equal—an astonishing logical fallacy), in the social and fraternal organizations, and, sadly, in the churches.   The undeniable truth that turns my cheeks crimson to this day is that I never saw a person of color in my home church.  The fact is that the most segregated hour of the week was 11:00 a.m. on Sunday mornings.  Incredibly, that statement is still true despite the discernible improvements in race relations over the past five decades.

I remember the racial tensions of the 1960’s as if it were yesterday.  I recall warnings that “freedom riders” from the North were coming to town to picket local businesses.  It happened.  There was a rumor that representatives of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference intended to integrate the churches.  They were going to march through the streets and join the pickets in front of businesses that practiced discrimination.  Unannounced they were going to enter white churches on Sunday and ask to be seated.

What I am writing now grieves me as much as anything I have ever written.  It involves people that I loved and admired--people who taught me to love Jesus and love a lost world.  But those same people were so blinded by their prejudice they could not see the incongruity between their faith in Jesus and their lovelessness toward people of color.

Here’s the story.  When the deacons of our Louisiana church heard the rumor that African Americans were going to enter white churches and demand to be seated, some of the leading men of the church said—and I heard them say it—that they would have their revolvers with them as they served as ushers on Sunday morning and that no “n_____” was going to get into our church.

How can one explain such an attitude?  How can one process the historical fact that, according to DeYoung, Emerson, Yancey, and Kim (UNITED BY FAITH, Oxford University Press, 2003), throughout the United States in the early 20th century “[a]pproximately forty thousand ministers were members of the Ku Klux Klan with Protestant ministers serving as Grand Dragons in Pennsylvania, Texas, North Dakota, and Colorado”?  How do you reconcile the logic of sending missionaries to Africa with the policy of excluding Africans from your home church?

I’m ashamed.  I have grieved for years over the enormity of our collective sins against African Americans, Native Americans, and anybody who doesn’t look like “us.”  My grief and shame are not merely my personal identification with the flaws of my forefathers and contemporaries; they are the result of my passion for the honor of Jesus Christ, whose people—the ones who claim Him as Lord—have failed Him so miserably in this regard.  The word “Christian” means “little Christ.”  I suppose in an ironic way that title is descriptive of those of us who were in complicity with this xenophobia—we were very “little” like Christ.

Jesus Christ was the archetypal anti-racist.   It was no mere coincidence that the Father sent His Son to be born and live for 33 years in the very middle of the geographic center of the known world; that his earthly skin would not have been black or white, but the Middle Eastern blend of the two; that He could never legitimately be called “the white man’s god.”  True Christianity teaches that there is only one world created by the one, true God.  It teaches that there is only one race—the human race (Acts 17:26). There is no white race and black race and yellow race and red race or brown race.  There is the human race—all descendents of an original set of parents.

Immediately the educated reader might say that “modern science” has proven that the idea of an original pair is an outdated myth and that enlightened people cannot accept such nonsense.

Alright, let’s turn to a scientist and to scientific “theories” of the “origin of the species” to see if we can find help with the issue of race.

Charles Darwin taught that natural selection and the evolutionary process favored certain races because of inherent biological advantages.  The full title of his 1859 work was On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Darwin’s writings were used by  communists and Nazis to support their own perverted forms of racism, economics and politics.  The greatest bloodbaths in history happened in the 20th century as a result of this bad science wedded to economic and social and political theories and speculative philosophy.  Even in the United States, racism informed by the pseudo-science of “natural selection” became the fuel for the advocacy of forced sterilization, birth control, and abortion—under the guise of helping women and the poor, but driven by the philosophy that certain races and classes were inherently inferior.  The vestiges of this bad science and social policy are alive today in the organizations that promote and provide abortions.  The original goal, according to the founders of the abortion industry, was to purify the gene pool and eliminate those peoples destined to be a drain on society.

Christians have used the Bible to defend racism. Communists and Nazis and other atheists have used scientific theories to justify racism.  To paraphrase an aphorism from another context, “Racism has many defenders, but no defense.”

Racism blights humanity.  It is a scandal in the church.  It dehumanizes people and dishonors Jesus Christ.

Can a racist go to heaven?  I’m not God, so I don’t get a vote on that question.  I do believe that only those who have received Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord are true Christians.  So the question could be phrased, “Can a person believe in Jesus and still embrace racial prejudice?”

You will have to answer that for yourself.  If I were God, I might let persons with prejudice in their hearts go to heaven.  I suppose they could ride the Glory-bound Transportation System to Beulah Land.  But they would have to sit in the back of the bus!

Pastor Alan Day

In churches that desperately need revival, one can often hear the prayer being offered, “Lord, send revival to our church.  You know how much we need it.”

But revival doesn’t come . . . because that is not revival praying.  The words may be spoken passionately; the prayer may be uttered fervently and loudly; but revival doesn’t come just because we pray for revival.  Praying for revival is not revival praying.

Revival praying is praying that addresses the conditions that have necessitated revival.  Revival preaching is the preaching of repentance.  Revival preaching calls upon the church to change - and it names the specific areas that need to be changed.  Revival praying is the prayer of repentance.  It is the aligning of the heart with the will and purpose and desire of God.  Revival praying calls sins by their first names.

Nehemiah was engaged in revival praying when he said:

“Lord God of heaven, the great and awe-inspiring God who keeps His gracious covenant with those who love Him and keep His commands,   let Your eyes be open and Your ears be attentive to hear Your servant’s prayer that I now pray to You day and night for Your servants, the Israelites. I confess the sins we have committed against You. Both I and my father’s house have sinned.   We have acted corruptly toward You and have not kept the commands, statutes, and ordinances You gave Your servant Moses” (Neh 1:5-7 HCSB).

In his book, IF GOD WERE REAL, John Avant says that the “essence of a genuine prayer for revival is this:  God, change everything about me that you need to change.  Change everything about our church too.  Do in me - and in your people - whatever it takes to bring you honor and glory.  Help us to be willing to do whatever it takes to fulfill your Great Commission.   Even if it means I never like another song I sing or sermon I hear in this church, may we do things that will bring this community to you.  May I never get my way on a committee or like the kind of people who come here or the times of the services or anything else if, instead, we can reach people who aren’t yet here.  Bring this kind of revival to our church, Lord.  In Jesus’ name, amen.”

Revival praying is not prayer for revival; it is prayer that precipitates revival.  It is prayer that responds to the conviction of the Spirit which has exposed coldness, callousness, and carelessness.  It is prayer that “owns up” to the indictment that the Spirit has leveled against the people.  It is both personal praying - personal confession and repentance - and corporate praying - confessing the sins of the church as a whole.

Many of us are good at confessing other people’s sins.  Revival praying is confessing our own sins and the sins of our church.  Revival is on its way when we hear and respond to the voice of the Spirit which says, “Remember then how far you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first” (Rev 2:5 HCSB).

This warning was spoken to the Church at Ephesus, where the Beloved Apostle John himself had been a leader and where Mary, the revered mother of Jesus had been a member.  She may still have been living and attending the church.  Yet they needed revival.

The church that confesses its need for revival and aligns itself with the New Testament picture of what the church ought to be has nothing to lose - but its chains.  It has the favor and power of God to gain.  

Let’s do revival praying.    

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

I tried unsuccessfully to determine who was the first to use the term "the new normal."  It's not important anyway, except I hate to want to know something and not be able to track it down.

Whatever!  We know what the term means.  "The New Normal" means that events have so changed the cultural or economic or social or religious landscape (depending on the subject being discussed) that what was "normal" is no longer the norm; there is a "new normal," a new environment of actualities and expectations and opportunities and threats and possibilities.  

Revival is the arrival of a "new normal," when subnormal Christians become normal.  Vance Havner said, "When subnormal Christians become normal, people will think them to be abnormal."

Subnormal Christians live materialistic and self-centered lives.  Subnormal Christians know little of the presence and leadership of the Holy Spirit.  Subnormal Christians can barely be distinguished from good, moral pagans.  There is little of the supernatural about their lives; little that would indicate they are twice-born and Spirit-filled.  

Normal Christianity is living by the power and leadership of the Holy Spirit.  Normal Christianity is pictured in the Book of Acts and in the epistles of Paul.  Normal means consecrated to Christ; submitted to His will; in love with His people and in love with a lost world.  Normal Christianity is hot-hearted and evangelistic; it is missional and missionary; it is benevolent and charitable.

Unfortunately, most Christians are not normal; they are subnormal.  Living beneath their privileges, they experience little of Christ's anointing and guidance.

Revival is when subnormal Christians become normal.  People will think them to be abnormal; but it's just the "new normal."

That's what we're praying for.  Welcome to the "new normal" for EFBC!

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

I got on my Harley the other day to go get the cobwebs out of my mind.  It’s amazing how clear my mind can be when I feel the rush of wind in my face and there’s nothing between me and the clouds but God’s clean air and a bird now and then.  As it so often has happened in my experience, when I get my mind cleansed of clutter, God speaks with a clarity that is stunning.  

I had been struggling with the questions concerning Misty’s health and future--questions about the children, questions about my son and his ministry.  I wasn’t worrying and I wasn’t panicking.  I just needed a word from God.  

God spoke.  Over the roar of that 96 cubic inch engine with the Screamin’ Eagle exhausts, I could hear God.

And you know what?  God speaks in Greek!  Some have argued that the language of heaven is going to be Hebrew since that was the language of the Old Testament people of God.  But, now, I know better.

Yep, on that day God spoke one word to me—“sunantilambanomai.”  That’s Greek, of course; and you can find it in Romans 8:26 as “helpeth” (KJV) and “joins to help” (HSB).  “In the same way the Spirit also joins to help in our weakness, because we do not know what to pray for as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with unspoken groanings” (Romans 8:26 HCSB).

The Greek word is a word picture.  It is made up of two prefixes and a verb.  “Sun” means “with,” and “anti” means “over against” or “opposite” or “instead of.”  “Lambano” means “to take hold.”  Here’s the picture—the Holy Spirit comes “alongside” us in our service, especially our praying, and “with us” or “over against us” He “takes hold of” the burden of ministry and prayer and concern.  He doesn’t replace us; he joins us and helps us.  

What I heard God saying when I heard “sunantilambanaomai” is this:  “I’m not going to remove the burden.  I’m not going to let you escape the struggle of carrying the load of prayer and trust.  But the Holy Spirit is going to join you to help in your weakness.  He will lift it enough so that, even though the load will seem unbearable at times, you will make it.  Your prayers will be effective.  Your faith will not fail.  You have a companion in the struggle.  You will not be alone.”

The old song says, “Take your burden to the Lord and leave it there.”  That may not be exactly biblical.  Consider, for instance, the New Testament concept of patience.  The word “hupomone” is translated “patience” or “endurance.”  It, too, is a word picture.  It literally means “to stay under” a burden or a load.  It doesn’t mean the load gets lighter; it means you don’t quit.  You keep on praying and working and preaching and sharing and giving.  You’re not a quitter, even though the road is tough and the load is heavy.  

Every time I come across hupomone in my Greek New Testament, a picture enters my mind.  I see the old image of the Greek god Atlas, remember?  In the ancient Greek mythology, the world is borne up by the god Atlas, who holds the world on his shoulders.  He “stays under” the load.  That’s “hupomone” or patient endurance.

Rather than taking our burdens to the Lord and leaving them there, the Bible tells us to bear them patiently.  We refuse to quit.  When it hurts, we don’t stop.  When we don’t think we can take another step, we trudge on.  Patiently.  With endurance.  We don’t give up.

Sunantilambanomai tells me that I won’t bear the burden alone.  I won’t pray alone.  I won’t suffer alone.  I won’t give alone.  I won’t love perseveringly alone.  The Holy Spirit takes hold of the load, and with me, over against me, opposite me He helps carry the load.  He prays with and through me.  We works with and through me.  He endures with and through me.

Because He won’t quit, therefore I won’t quit.  Because He won’t fail, I won’t fail.  

I didn’t know that Alice was aware of the reason for my going on the ride that day.  When I returned, however, she asked me, “Did you get it all worked out?”

I smiled and said, “I really did.”  I later explained to her what I’m telling you now.  As usual she said, “You know, that’s how I’ve always felt about it.  The Lord is with us, helping us, even when we don’t realize it and when we would rather have a different outcome.  He’s always there.”

She doesn’t need a Harley to get her mind cleared.  I haven’t figured out how she does it.  She doesn’t play golf and she doesn’t ride a Harley.  I could save a lot of money if I knew her secret.  But she won’t tell me.  She says, “You wouldn’t understand.”  It’s a gender thing, I’m thinking.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

As a young preacher I often listened to Southern Gospel music on Sunday mornings while preparing to go to church.  I listened to the Florida Boys, the Inspirations, the Happy Goodmans, and many others.  I didn’t have many options back then—I think we got three channels on our black and white television.

One song I remember well is “Come and Dine.”  My, how those quartets loved to sing that one.  

Jesus has a table spread where the saints of God are fed
He invites his chosen people come and dine
With his manna he doth feed and supplies our every need
Oh tis sweet to sup with Jesus all the time.

 Come and dine the Master calleth come and dine
You may feast at Jesus table all the time
He who fed the multitude turned the water into wine
To the hungry calleth now come and dine.

Looking back on that period of my life and taking a more objective view of the genre of music that song represents, I can now afford to be a little more critical (critical” means “involving skillful judgment as to truth, merit, etc.”).  What I discover when I do a critical evaluation of much of the music and theology I was raised on is that much if not most of it has to do with “my” feelings and “my” comfort and “my” benefits in following Christ.  The faith expressed in much popular theology and music in those days was very individualistic and even self-centered.  The focus was on how the individual feels about Jesus or how Jesus makes the individual feel.

Now I wouldn’t begin to argue against the blessings of knowing Christ.  Nor would I want anyone to think I don’t believe there is “joy in serving Jesus,” to quote one of the songs of my youth.  Not on your life!  And there is peace in knowing Jesus.  Peace like a river; joy and love like an ocean; these are real and they are available for every believer in Christ.

But it is interesting to me that when Jesus called for people to follow him, He never tied a carrot on a stick and promised them wonderful joy and unspeakable blessings.  He called them to a relationship that would result in a purpose:  “Follow me and I will make you fishers of people” (Mark 1:17).

He called them to count the cost: “Summoning the crowd along with His disciples, He said to them, ‘If anyone wants to be My follower, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me’” (Mark 8:34 HCSB).

You know that by “taking up your cross” Jesus wasn’t commanding his disciples and “seekers” that they needed to go down to the jewelry store and buy a cross necklace and begin wearing it.  And He was also not instructing them to get a bumper sticker with the words “Honk if you love Jesus” and put it on the back of their wagons.  He was especially not recommending that they get a tee shirt with a cross logo on it and the words, “I’m serious about Jesus.” He was telling them that they must die—to their sin, their plans, their purposes, and their self-directed lives.  He was soon to carry His cross to Golgotha and die there.  They must have a similar experience.  No one—not father, mother, sister or brother, or friends—can be more important than Jesus.  Nothing—not career, religion, social connections, or precommitments—can stand ahead of Jesus.

Jesus did invite his disciples to “come and dine” (John 21:12 KJV), but that was later, after his resurrection.  It seems to me that the call to “come and die” precedes the call to “come and dine.”  Fellowship at the table with the resurrected Christ does not happen until we fellowship with the crucified Christ.

Maybe that’s what Paul meant when he wrote:  

“But everything that was a gain to me, I have considered to be a loss because of Christ.  More than that, I also consider everything to be a loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Because of Him I have suffered the loss of all things and consider them filth, so that I may gain Christ  and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own from the law, but one that is through faith in Christ —the righteousness from God based on faith.  [My goal] is to know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, assuming that I will somehow reach the resurrection from among the dead.” Phil 3:7-11 (HCSB)

Death precedes resurrection; suffering precedes glory; the “fellowship of His sufferings” precedes the “power of His resurrection.”

I do agree with Martyn Lloyd-Jones that joyless Christians are bad advertisements for Jesus Christ.  I’m just saying that joy is a by-product of a crucified life, not the immediate result of a shallow commitment.

The call to “come and die” precedes the invitation to “come and dine.”  

I’m not hearing much about this from popular pulpits today.  Most of what I hear is the “stick and carrot” approach.  

What we get when we treat lost people like religious consumers and treat prospective church members like bidders for the lowest-priced membership is a market-driven Christianity that is captive to culture and consumer demands.  

We might ought to prefer to be “captive to the word of God,” as Luther said about his conscience.

I’m just sayin’ . . . .

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

I met Avery Willis in the early 1980’s at a conference where he was teaching his discipleship program, MASTERLIFE.  I was impressed by his deep spirituality, warm spirit, and unpretentious intelligence.  I was also gripped by his message.

Avery had been a career missionary who had developed his discipleship methods on the mission field.  What he discovered was that new believers were hungry to discover principles and procedures that would help them experience the life-transforming power of Christ even after the conversion experience.  MASTERLIFE was born to accelerate the growth of new believers at the time when they are most open to spiritual truth—immediately following their conversion to Christ.

Somebody found out what Avery was teaching and recognized that churches and believers in America desperately needed this same emphasis.  Avery allowed his materials to be published and promoted by Southern Baptists and he and MASTERLIFE soon became almost household names.

Avery became a Vice President at the International Mission Board and continued promoting the life of prayer, Bible memorization, and spiritual formation that are inculcated in MASTERLIFE.  Anybody who spent more than five minutes with Avery learned that these principles were not just sermons he put in print—they are the stuff of his life.  Avery lives and breathes communion with God and a passion to reach the world with the gospel.

Now Avery is fighting the battle with leukemia.  He has been in Houston receiving treatment for a few weeks; but every day he cranks out a journal entry and posts it for anyone to read at caringbridge.org (you can go online and read his journal entries and the story behind his illness at the CaringBridge website.

A recent entry is typical of the kind of thinking that has characterized this godly man for all of his life.  The theology and spiritual perception in these words cannot help but strengthen some of you who are facing a similar struggle right now.  Even if you are not in this crisis now, you soon will be.  You’ll need to remind yourself of insights like this.

Here are his comments from Friday, February 5, 2010, written from Houston, Texas:

“Some have said, ‘Why don't you ask for a certain number of years.’ I believe that every one of my days is already ordained-Psa. 139:16.  (God knows already how many of you and how much you are praying in faith and will act accordingly.)  I would love to be active until 80 and Caleb is my hero asking for ‘his mountain’ at 85. But I don't want to be a Hezekiah who prayed for and got 15 years only to lay the ground work for the Exile by showing off his treasures.   

God knows my days and it has been my prayer for more than 55 years for Him to help me to number my days and apply ‘my heart unto wisdom’.  In my early 30s I had a premonition that I would die at 37. So I have always lived with the urgency to use every day for the Lord.  Obviously I didn't die then but I have continued to work as if I don't know I have another day (and we never do).  Some would dub me a workaholic but I am just living with a passion to reach the world and glorify God.  That is not work. I do have hobbies but I don't let them take more time than I think I should give.  At best, our days are few on the earth and I still believe in getting ready to serve forever in heaven. Every day is a precious gift from our Loving Father.”

I am praying for Avery and Shirley right now.  I would like for God to heal him or let his illness go into remission so that he can have more years to stir up Southern Baptists to live passionately for Christ.  I am praying that EFBC will catch the infection of revival praying and urgent evangelization that have characterized Avery for all the years I’ve known him.  

I am praying for my own heart.  I don’t want to fire blanks when I preach and pray.  I want to be hot-hearted, Spirit-intoxicated and purpose-focused.  I want to live a “mastered” life—under the sovereign and gracious sway of the Master—the Lord Jesus.

Alan Day, Senior Pastor

While Baptists have significant areas of disagreement with the Vatican, we share many of the same creedal and moral convictions.  Furthermore, we are prudent to identify those areas of consensus and to collaborate with those who share our moral and ethical perspectives whenever we can do so without compromise.

Just this week (February 1, 2010), Pope Benedict XVI criticized British laws which offer special protection for homosexual behavior as a “violation of natural law.”  Those who are knowledgeable of recent political battles for Supreme Court appointments are familiar with the hotly-contested debate about the issue of natural law.  While our nation’s Founders were of one mind about the existence and authority of natural law and based their convictions about human rights and political authority upon the doctrine of natural law, many today reject the notion of any transcendent law, since that implies a Lawgiver and, consequently, would place mankind under the authority of that Divine Being.  In the least case, natural law implies that “man is not the measure of all things,” that morality transcends cultural contexts, and that morals are not democratic.  Our votes or opinion polls don’t turn error into truth or immorality into righteousness.

The Pope adroitly said to his British listeners, "Your country is well-known for its firm commitment to equality of opportunity for all members of society. Yet, as you have rightly pointed out, the effect of some of the legislation designed to achieve this goal has been to impose unjust limitations on the freedom of religious communities to act in accordance with their beliefs."

There is no doubting that what the Pope said is true.  Already in this country we in the church are feeling the pressure to soften our moral judgments about aberrant sexual behavior.  Not only can one be penalized for making statements critical of homosexual activity in the public forum, we are told that there are movements afoot to restrict criticism of the homosexual lifestyle on the public airwaves via television and radio or even in the social media.  In the name of “tolerance” or in the name of a supposed right of people to flaunt their sexual preferences, or under the rubric of “hate crimes” and “hate speech,” a special class and special privileges have been created for homosexuals for which there is no legal or constitutional precedent and, despite media disinformation, no scientific basis.

The Pope is not being uncharitable.  Nor is he blind to the real world.  He is aware that the Catholic priesthood itself has historically attracted men who struggled with issues of sexual deviancy.  Those of us outside the Catholic Church have been critical of the Church’s slow response at times to claims of sexual abuses among the clergy.  The official statements issued by the Vatican on these issues have been comforting, however, to those who expect nothing less than moral purity to be advocated by the man who speaks for the Church.

To those who question why the Pope bases his moral opinion upon “natural law” and not the Bible, the answer is really very simple.  The Bible is the Scriptures for Christians (the Jews share much of our same Scriptures - or, I should say, we share much of their Scriptures).  The Bible is our ultimate authority for doctrine and morals.  “God said it; I believe it; and that settles it.”  The Bible is truth; and when God speaks, the argument is over.

Yet much of our world does not accept the authority of Scripture.  They are devoted to other religions, and a growing number of intellectuals and young students are committed to agnosticism or atheism.  For them, there is no higher authority than the mind of man.  Some would argue that the authority for morals or values is found in the consensus of the community or in the body politic.

Historically, however, many thinkers have understood that there are principles guiding human behavior that are self-evident.  These moral and social principles have been recognized by pre-Christian philosophers as well as by Christian theologians, and they have been given the name “natural law.”  Just as there are inviolable and universal physical laws governing our universe, and, as far as we can judge, there is no place in the universe where these laws are not in effect, likewise there are universal, culturally and historically transcendent moral laws that cannot be ignored or suspended without causing harm to the human race.

To repeat, our nation’s Founders accepted this doctrine of natural law and our Declaration of Independence is rooted in this philosophy.

To put it simply, just as philosophers and scientists don’t make the laws governing our universe, they simply discover them; likewise, we do not make the laws governing human behavior, we simply discover these laws as they were designed by the Lawgiver.

This article is not advocating natural law (although we could do it).  I am simply applauding the Pope for speaking the truth about a hotly-contested issue.  The Vatican is still right on the issue of abortion rights and we give three cheers for that stand.  The Pope is also correct in saying that homosexual behavior is not moral behavior and that recent attempts in Britain and elsewhere to criminalize speech critical of homosexuals is a denial of the rights of free speech and the free exercise of religion.

Here, here!  

Alan Day, Senior Pastor