Presby-Musings

When I was six years old, after my parents and I had come home from church one Sunday night, I came to them and told them I wanted to "get saved," and "invite Jesus to come into my heart."   I was repeating what I had been taught, of course, and I wanted to belong to the family of faith more than anything at that moment.   I then prayed the "Sinner's Prayer"--a prayer that I'd been coached to pray for most of my short life by pastors, Sunday school teachers and the like.   Bill Graham's version of the Sinner's Prayer went something like this:   "Dear Lord Jesus, I know that I am a sinner, and I ask for Your forgiveness. I believe You died for my sins and rose from the dead. I turn from my sins and invite You to come into my heart and life. I want to trust and follow You as my Lord and Savior. In Your Name." After that moment, and for many years later, that last line of that prayer was what defined my understanding of what...

This week the inspiration for our Daily Devotions will be drawn from the sermon that I preached this past Sunday for All Saints' Day--a sermon on grief, loss, hope, life, heaven, Heaven and resurrection. If you would like to read the transcript of that sermon, you can click HERE .  The Scripture that we used as our guide was John chapter 11--the story of Jesus raising of Lazarus from the dead.   There is an old joke that I rather like.  A prominent politician and a pastor both die and arrive at the Pearly Gates at the same time.  As the politician approaches, St. Peter gestures and a huge red carpet is rolled out in front of him, angels suddenly appear and begin blowing trumpets.  Jesus comes to the gates and personally welcomes the politician with a warm embrace while hosts of angels cheer.  The whole retinue goes inside shouting and singing.   After the noise dies down, the pastor approaches and St. Peter simply says, "Welcome my son, come...

This week we are continuing the sermon series that will take us through the month of October--a series entitled, "Haunted."  The idea behind this series is something that we all share to some extent. No matter who you are, or what your background might be you have something in common with every other person who is sitting in here today:  At some point in time you have had something happen in your past that caused you pain.   Maybe you did something you regret.  Maybe you had doubts about your faith. Maybe you learned to be afraid.  Maybe you were hurt, wounded by someone.   And for many of us those experiences feel like they happened yesterday.  We've been haunted by them, and because we've been haunted by these experiences in our past, they are affecting how we handle our present, and perhaps are ruining our vision of the future.   Throughout this series we're going to be focusing on this simple, but life-changing truth: You ...

I have been in his brightest shining heaven and seen such things that no man, once returned from there, has wit or skill to tell about.           - Dante from  Paradiso "Peter," said Lucy, "where is this, do you suppose?" "I don't know," said the High King.  "It reminds me of somewhere, but I can't give it a name.  Could it be somewhere we once stayed for a holiday when we were very, very small?"          - C.S. Lewis from The Last Battle What is Heaven like?  What can we learn from visions of Heaven that will give us a renewed sense of purpose here on earth?  How can we defy that old saying, Christians are so heavenly minded, "they are no earthly good?" A Spirit-filled vision of Heaven should give us hope for the future, and a purpose for the present.  When we go to the Bible we find some interesting visions of Heaven... In Isaiah 2:2-4 we have this description of Heaven from the prop...

As part of my research on Heaven these past couple of weeks, I have had the chance to read more than my fair share of books on the subject. Here is a short list of the more "popular" books about Heaven with brief reviews of each: Heaven Is For Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story Of His Trip to Heaven and Back by Todd Burpo with Lynn Vincent. [Thomas Nelson, 2010] This New York Times Bestseller became a phenomenon, selling millions of copies and garnering a great deal of attention.  The book recounts the experiences of young Colton Burpo, who "died" and went to heaven during a severe illness.  Later, he began to relate his memories of the event to his parents, who were astounded by what they believed to be unexplainable details in his stories.  This is an easy read that could be finished in an afternoon.  I have to admit, I was slightly underwhelmed by this book.  I expected a great deal more out of it than I received, to be honest.  I can definit...

Some months ago I purchased The Sword of the Lord:  The Roots of Fundamentalism in an American Family  by Andrew Himes.  It was one of those impulse Kindle purchases that I made because of some recommendation or another  of the book that I read in a magazine. Then I promptly put it on the virtual shelf in my iPad.  I had other books to read at the time, and wasn't sure when I would get around to it. To my surprise when I picked up The Sword of the Lord  recently, I couldn't put it down.  It was an amazing read about an amazing family---perhaps the "first" family of Christian fundamentalists in America:  The Rice's. Full disclosure:  I was born and raised a fundamentalist Baptist.  My dad graduated from Bob Jones University, and I only attended fundamentalist Baptist churches, and went to fundamentalist Baptist schools.  I have baggage.  In fact, I have only recently begun to deal with my baggage in a productive way. ...

The other day my wife went to our local Books A Million bookstore.  She was looking for something that she couldn't buy on her Kindle for half of the price of a regular book.  While she was standing at the counter talking with the clerk a man in his early 60's stormed into the store and up the counter.  He was angry and rude.  "Where is THAT BOOK ON HELL?" He demanded in a loud voice.  The clerk was taken aback, but began to explain that they had tens of thousands of books and that he was going to have to narrow it down a bit.  The angry man revealed that he went to one of the local large Southern Baptist Churches in the area and that his pastor wanted the entire congregation to read this particular book which had been written by a young pastor who was a "heretic."  My wife who had just finished reading the book in question-- Love Wins by Rob Bell --told the clerk which book the man was looking for.  The store did not have it in stock and th...