Finding hope as the world grows dark

The world news headlines are crazy right now, aren’t they?

Israel is at war with Hamas.  Hostages have been taken.  No one knows if other countries are going to get involved or if it’s all just political posturing.  Protests are happening around the world and people are taking sides, some pro-Palestinian, some pro-Israel.  Everything around the situation is tense.

In the US, Republicans and Democrats can’t get along.  Shocking, right?  But over the last few years, party in-fighting is become just as vicious as the fights that happen between the two major parties.  There appears to be no end in sight for this kind of behavior.

AI is going to take over the planet in the next 10 years.  No one knows how, outside of jokes and memes, but the serious thinkers are quite scared of the potential disruption to nearly every industry.  And let’s not talk about what will happen when countries start using AI against their enemies.

Homelessness is reaching peak crisis levels in several major US cities.  No solution is perfect or simple, and governments who stall will only allow the situation to worsen.  Drugs, crime, mental illnesses, and a variety of other tough topics make the homeless crisis a complicated and disheartening predicament.

Those are just four topics I quickly pulled off of a news app on my phone.  There are plenty more stories to choose from.  National stories, local stories, personal stories…the more we look at the world around us, the harder it seems to find answers.  The more we read or watch the news, the darker the world becomes.  It’s difficult to think through any one of these problems, but to have all of them happening all at once?  Totally overwhelming.

The Sunday School response to all these situations would be to simply say, “Jesus is the answer!” And while many would roll their eyes, scoff at the suggestion, or question how Jesus would deal with the complex issues of our times…what if a person who lived through similarly tough times was making that claim, would it change our response?

I’d like us to consider the life of the apostle John.  He wrote 5 of the books in the New Testament – one gospel, three letters, and the book of Revelation.  John's gospel was likely one of the last books of the Bible to be written. Many scholars date John writing it in the late 1st century, even into the early 90's. Why is that significant? Because by that time, the world had changed a lot since John was following Jesus as a teenager in the early 30's. He lived through the Christian persecution primarily by the Jews in the 40's and 50's, but persecution had become common among the rest of the non-Jewish world as well.  He saw Jerusalem destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD and his people scattered among the nations.  Roman politics would make our current political issues look like playground disputes.  During John’s lifetime, the Roman emperor has changed every 10 years or so, with each one bringing significant fluctuations in personality, rulership, and attitude towards Christians.  Rome was a very pagan country and did not allow any challenge to the emperor’s rule.  On top of all of this, Rome as a country and as a governing body has only gotten stronger during John’s lifetime…and John still writes:

John 1:4-5
In [Jesus] was life, and that life was the light of men.  That light shines in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not overcome it.

That's a lot of hope and trust right there. Regardless of the growing darkness John has witnessed, he still points to the light that was not overcome.  In this light, John found life, and he shared it with anyone he could. 

Did John stop the “evil empire”?  No.  In fact, he was exiled at one point.
Did John put an end to persecution? No.  He experienced it himself.
Did John see the restoration of his home nation? No.  Israel was decimated during his life.

However, despite all this darkness, John insists that Jesus shines in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not overcome Him. 

When we check out the news and look at the problems in our world today, it’s easy to get caught up in finding a human-driven solution to try and fix everything.  It may be counter-intuitive, but following John’s example will bring us towards real resolutions.  John focused on the light, not the darkness.  This doesn’t mean he just fixated on positive, fluffy thoughts and ignored everything else.  His statement above doesn’t allow that.  Instead, John recognized that the light came from the life of Jesus.   

The life of Jesus isn’t something we can simply imitate…we can’t do that in and of ourselves.  However, Jesus will give us His eternal life when we believe in Him for it.  A little later in his gospel, John records this promise of Jesus:

John 3:16
For God loved the world in this way: He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.

No need to imitate what God freely offers for us to possess.  Believe in Jesus for eternal life, and He gives it to you – it’s as simple as that.  And when you have that eternal life, you can be the same kind of light that Jesus is in the darkness.  The darkness is still there, but we won’t be overcome by it.

Keep Pressing,
Ken

Attitudes in Stuckville

I hate feeling stuck.  I hate the feeling of being trapped in a situation with no easy or immediate escape.  Here are a few “stuck” situation examples: a job or responsibility I no longer want to perform, a gathering of people I don’t want to be around, or even a conversation I don’t want to have.  I also despise the “stuck mood” I typically develop.  I can easily become grouchy, suspicious, and generally no fun to be around.  Even if I can keep up a happy face in these kinds of situations, my “stuck mood” is swirling underneath and clouding up my thoughts. 

Perhaps you recognize these same tendencies in yourself.  Unfortunately, I don’t think we can always avoid ending up being stuck.  There are times when circumstances are out of our control, and – fair or not – we have to manage the situation in front of us the best we can.  Welcome to Stuckville, population: me.

I recently talked through these kinds of situations and feelings with the elementary school age kids at my church a couple of Sundays ago.  It was a good lesson for them and me to discuss, because it’s important for us to recognize that God is still at work when we’re feeling “stuck.”  The story we looked at was from Paul’s second missionary journey.  Paul and Silas were in the city of Philippi when this incident happened:

Acts 16:16-18
Once, as we were on our way to prayer, a slave girl met us who had a spirit by which she predicted the future.  She made a large profit for her owners by fortune-telling.  As she followed Paul and us she cried out, “These men, who are proclaiming to you a way of salvation, are the servants of the Most High God.”  She did this for many days.

It's easy to think: Well, she’s not wrong.  Paul and Silas were servants of God and they were proclaiming that if you believe in Jesus, He saves you by giving you eternal life.  The difficult part was that she followed them for many days and said this repeatedly.  When I imagine this scene, I don’t think her tone was all that helpful, either.  Perhaps she said these words with a sneer or in a mocking tone.  In any case, after several days of her pestering, Paul had had enough.

Acts 16:18
Paul was greatly annoyed.  Turning to the spirit, he said, “I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her!”  And it came out right away.

Good.  Problem solved, right?  Demon-possessed girl is no longer demon-possessed, with Paul and Silas now free to continue ministering.  Instead, a new problem was just starting:

Acts 16:19-24
When her owners realized that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to the authorities.  Bringing them before the chief magistrates, they said, “These men are seriously disturbing our city.  They are Jews and are promoting customs that are not legal for us as Romans to adopt or practice.  The crowd joined in the attack against them, and the chief magistrates stripped off their clothes and ordered them to be beaten with rods.  After they had severely flogged them, they threw them in jail, ordering the jailer to guard them carefully.  Receiving such an order, he put them into the inner prison and secured their feet in the stocks.

Here we have Paul and Silas completely stuck.  They were unfairly mobbed and physically attacked.  Even those who were supposed to be in authority were against them.  If I had been severely flogged and then thrown in jail, I’m pretty sure my emotions would be all over the place.  Angry?  Absolutely.  Scared?  Definitely.  Feeling abandoned by God?  Yeah.

And it’s possible that Paul and Silas felt all those things…but look what they did next:

Acts 16:25
About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. 

In the middle of Stuckville, where was their focus?  It wasn’t on themselves or their immediate situation.  As this midnight worship session was going on, something happened:

Acts 16:26-28
Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the jail were shaken, and immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone’s chains came loose.  When the jailer woke up and saw the doors of the prison standing open, he drew his sword and was going to kill himself, since he thought the prisoners had escaped.

But Paul called out in a loud voice, “Don’t harm yourself, because we’re all here!”

Roman law said that if you lost your prisoner, then you must compensate that loss with your life.  But Paul stopped the jailer before he could complete his suicidal act.  What happened next was probably not what Paul and Silas expected when they were dragged into the jail that night.

Acts 16:29-34
The jailer called for lights, rushed in, and fell down trembling before Paul and Silas.  He escorted them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

They said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved – you and your household.”  And they spoke the word of the Lord to him along with everyone in his house.  He took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds.  Right away he and all his family were baptized.  He brought them into his house, set a meal before them, and rejoiced because he had come to believe in God with his entire household.

This is the point that the kids and I focused in on: If Paul and Silas had not gone through their unfair ordeal, if they had not been “stuck” by circumstances outside of their control, then the Philippian jailer and his family would not have heard and believed the gospel that night.  A whole family’s eternal destiny was changed…but Paul and Silas needed to be “stuck” in order to reach them.  The kids also agreed it will be pretty cool in Heaven to meet and play with the jailer’s kids.

So when we find ourselves in Stuckville, and we can’t get out of it…if we keep our focus on God, He can give us purpose and joy when we’re tempted to be self-centered and grouchy.

Keep Pressing,
Ken

Ken’s TOP 10 (#6-10)

This month marks 10 YEARS since I took over THE WORD full time.  Crazy, I know!

In celebration of this milestone, I’m counting down the TOP 10 blog posts from the last 10 years.  To be honest, the process of choosing them was a lot harder than I expected.  It was like being forced to pick your favorite child or rank your best memories with your spouse.  There were a lot to choose from, because God’s taught me so much! 

My criteria included aspects like:

·       Biggest lessons God has taught me
·       Memorable ways I’ve had God’s truth play out in my life
·       Posts that I’ve returned to, in order to remind myself of what I’ve learned
·       Most popular posts via web search, clicks from email, or comments back from y’all

Without further ado, let’s countdown from #10 to #6:

#10
Understanding why God knows the number of hairs on our heads, posted on August 17, 2017 – This post is by far the most web searched post on my site.  I don’t know why other than maybe people have heard that God knows the number of hairs on your head, but that saying hasn’t brought a whole lot of comfort that God knows such a trivial thing about me.  What I found in my study was that the “hairs-on-your-head” phrase had a deeper meaning to the audience Jesus spoke it to.

#9
Blindsided, posted on May 22, 2015 – When you get “that call” out of the blue, what is our best response?  When grief is overwhelming and we don’t even know how to address God, what should we do?  This was a post I returned to when my step mom passed last year.  The words in the psalm are both powerful and comforting.

#8
My daddy said “STOP!”, posted on April 4, 2019 – Although this trick-or-treating incident happened nearly 20 years ago, the story has stuck with my family.  The spiritual parallels raised powerful questions for us to consider.  I still get choked up when I read the post and remember that night.

#7
He believed in me, posted on October 6, 2022 – We believe in Jesus for eternal life (John 3:16).  But what does it mean to “believe”?  Lots of people will try to add to it, but it’s not as complicated as we make it out to be.  This truth was demonstrated to me when I was on crutches and told my director I’d be ready when the performance week came.

#6
When the house tears itself apart, posted on October 28, 2021 – Who knew that an unexpected full-home remodel from my childhood would be such a great example for how we need to study the Scriptures?  Additionally, I learned what to do when I began to suspect that an interpretation I had of a passage might not be right.

I hope you take the time to read at least one of these, and I pray that resharing what I’ve learned will be helpful to you, as well.

Next week, we’ll count down the TOP 5!

Keep Pressing,
Ken

When the house tears itself apart

I grew up in the Western US, in the Nevada desert.  When I was in my teens, my family realized there was something wrong with our house.  And by “something wrong” I mean something structurally wrong with our house.  There were large-gap cracks appearing in the sidewalk and our living room floor was bowing.  Turns out, one part of the house was slowly sinking, while another section, on the opposite side, was slowly drifting away. 

How could this happen?  Well, the first thing you have to understand about desert soil is that it is very alkaline and it swells when it gets wet.  While the soil in the rest of the US will act like a sponge and soak in any rainfall, the top layer of the desert soil tends to swell shut and not allow additional water to be absorbed.  This is why “flash floods” happen in the desert – too much rainfall too quickly, the top layer of dirt swells shut, and any remaining water rapidly moves to the lowest elevation point it can find.  After the rain evaporates in the desert heat, the ground contracts back to normal.

Further investigation of the cracks and shifts revealed that the house did not have a proper foundation.  Sure, there was a concrete slab and some footers, but not much else underneath.  The house was about 25-30 years old at the time, and who knows what zoning/building laws were in place (or just flat ignored) when it was built.  In any case, we had to do something, because after a couple of decades of the ground underneath settling and the surrounding topsoil being treated like an accordion, the lack of proper foundation meant that the ground was literally tearing our house apart.

This wasn’t something we could patch with plaster or pour concrete over.  Ultimately, the best way to fix the problem was to start over with a new, properly-laid foundation.  Now, it’s one thing to place a new foundation behind an existing house…but it’s a completely different operation to move a house from its current foundation on to the new one.  We brought in and moved into a single-wide trailer on our property.  Next, our home had to be gutted.  Everything was removed, even the bottom layer of sheetrock, exposing the wooden frame.  Then, enormous metal beams were run through the gutted lower layer.  The last step was to have the house picked up by the metal beams and moved to the new foundation.  (It was quite a sight to see my entire home “floating” in the air, being supported by jacks.)  Afterward, my dad rebuilt the gutted portions before we could move back in.

By way of correlation, the same thing can happen to how we interpret the Bible.  The best way to handle Scripture begins with Observation (What do I see?), moves to Interpretation (What does it mean?), and ends with Application (How does it work?).  To use my house analogy, Observation is the foundation, Interpretation is the structure, and Application is the furnishings that make the building useful.  However…no matter how pretty we make the Application, or how much we like the Interpretation, the whole structure will fall apart if the Observation-foundation is not solid.

Perhaps you’ve lived with a particular interpretation you were taught decades ago.  But, over the years, you noticed some cracks in that line of thinking.  Maybe you’ve found that those conclusions don’t quite “fit in” with other clear statements in Scripture or your experience in life.  It’s hard to change your mind when it’s something you’ve “known” for a long time, or if it was taught by someone you respect.  When we realize that our Application is off or our Interpretation doesn’t work, it’s time to take a hard look at our Observation-foundation.  Ultimately, we need to let Scripture speak for itself.

One of the most common mis-interpretations of the Bible comes with the word “save” or “salvation”.  A regularly quoted verse about salvation is found in Paul’s letter to the believers in Philippi:

Philippians 2:12-13
Therefore, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, so now, not only in my presence but even more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.  For it is God who is working in you both to will and to work according to His good purpose.

“See?” they say.  “In order to be saved from eternal damnation, you have work to do and God has work to do.  Our obedience proves that we’re working out of our ‘saved’ state.”

But if you compare this statement with Paul’s letter to the believers in Ephesus, you find:

Ephesians 2:8-9
For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves, it is God’s gift – not from works, so that no one can boast.

So which is it, Paul?  Is eternal salvation proven by us working or is it God’s gift?  Many people try to reconcile these two verses by putting the “work” concept from Philippians into the “faith” concept found in Ephesians.  They would argue that you are saved by grace through faith [which is proven through your continued obedience and work]…the problem with this reconciliation attempt is that anything done as work automatically disqualifies the work-earnings from being called a gift (as Paul states in Romans 4:4-5). 

Notice the cracks in the interpretation structure here?  Does the house look/feel unsteady?  To really address this interpretation problem, we’re going to have to inspect our Observation-foundation.

Our problem stems from the assumption that every use of the word “save” or “salvation” in the Bible refers to being eternally saved from the consequences of our sin.  When, in fact, no Old Testament use of “save” means that, and less than half of the uses of “save” in the New Testament refer to our eternal salvation.  The other uses throughout the Bible refer to being delivered from enemies, or healed from sickness, or delivered from physical death, or other types of “rescue”…all of which can be determined by looking at the context where the word “save” is used.  Let’s be fair here…we do the same thing in English: I saved money.  I saved someone from choking.  I saved you when I gave you a ride after your car broke down.  Lots of saving here…but nothing pertaining to eternity.

If we take the same context-driven approach with our Bible reading, we find that in his letter to the believers in Philippi, Paul used the term “salvation” three times (Philippians 1:19, 1:28, 2:12).  In his chapter 1 uses, the context makes it clear that Paul is talking about an earthly rescue from earthly persecution.  In the verses surrounding 1:19, he talks about his own earthly rescue, and then in the following two uses (1:28, 2:12) Paul is using himself as a pattern for the Philippian believers to follow for their own escape from earthly persecution.

With this new, solid Observation-foundation, our interpretation changes when we read Philippians 2:12-13.  We find that this rescue-from-persecution interpretation is more consistent with the rest of the chapter.  We also realize that those verses are not in conflict with Ephesians 2:8-9, and there is no need to shoehorn one verse inside the other.  When our observations are solid, our interpretations become accurate, and our applications will be more useful.

The same thing happened when we moved our house.  Since there was a new foundation being laid…my dad took the opportunity to add a master bath and other improvements that made the home more pleasant and useful to live in.  However, these extra amenities would have been useless if we had not replaced the poorly-constructed foundation.

Whenever you find an apparent conflict between Bible passages, go back and look at the context.  Rarely does the same word mean the same thing every single time it is used.  Even if it means we need to gut and replace what we’ve been taught previously, we must let the Scriptures speak for themselves.

Keep Pressing,
Ken