Summer Showers

Summer is supposed to be about sunshine and swimming, baseball and hot dogs, vacations and ice cream. Instead, this morning I awoke to the sound of rain down pouring. The news said traffic was a mess and little league games rained out. Rain is not a curse but a blessing. I know you're thinking "but my plans got rained out." Rain is God's way of watering the earth. It's a cycle of rain with water runoff into creeks and rivers that flow to the lakes and oceans, which evaporate to start the cycle all over again. Rain keeps the plants and flowers watered. We need a spiritual rain cycle in our lives. God pouring His truth and grace upon us, which overflows from us to others, from person to person until it returns to God in the form of praise. John Piper once said that "missions exist because worship doesn't." As we experience God's blessing, we are in turn to bless others. The church today is over saturated. It has been blessed beyond measure. We hold onto the blessing as if it is a commodity in short supply. God's economy is far different from ours. For the more we give away, the more we receive. The only way a sponge fully saturated with water can receive more water is by wringing it dry, then it is ready to receive more. Believers are blessed in order to be a blessing. This past week the Exodus ministry closed its doors. It's director said that "Christians had lost the culture war." Here's the problem: The church was never called to wage a culture war. We are, however, in a spiritual war and our culture is a by-product. As citizens of our country, we have the right to voice our values and vote the way we think is right. But politics cannot change a human heart nor transform a life for eternity. But God can and does. God chooses to use us in His cycle of reaching people. Have you been blessed by God? Has God touched your life? Has God transformed you? If so, then wring God's blessings out of your life and into someone else. Let the showers of God's blessings flow from your life to another. Do not be afraid to declare what God has done for you, for when we declare this, we are fulfilling God's plan and opening the eyes of those who know us to the reality of a God who blesses. One by one, person by person, we bring people to Christ. As each receives a blessing, they in turn go out to bless another. May you be a blessing to someone today. Pastor Pete

The Door

This past week the 86th annual National Spelling Bee was held. The winner was Arvind Mahankali, a 13 year old from the state of New York. Twice in previous years he lost to words derived from the German language. Twice this year he overcame German derived words to become the champion of this year's spelling bee. The last word was "knaidel." I'm sure that most of us in Occidental would not know that it is a word used for a small mass of leavened dough. OK, maybe the Blanz's know. The participants study hard in order to know all the variations of words from multiple languages that somehow blend together into words on the spelling list. Leavened dough is used daily, sometimes multiple times each day to make our bread. In the Bible, leaven became associated with sin. Just a little bit of leaven affects the whole batch of dough. So it is with our lives that just a little bit of sin affects our entire life. To rid the dough of leaven is impossible. Once infected, it does it job. The evidence that sin has infected the human race is all around us. From fragmented lives and broken relationships to greed that often results in war and killing. Sin is all around us. In the time of Noah, God said that he was grieved that He had made mankind, for every inkling of their heart and mind was intent on evil. God did judge the human race then and wiped all but one family off the face of the earth. Noah found favor in God's sight. God promised to never destroy the earth by flood again. Jesus said that in the end times it would be like as in the days of Noah. It seems that every inkling of man's heart is full of sin again. It is in the last days that God will judge man again for his sin. The question then is how to survive God's judgment. Noah survived because he found favor with God. The Bible says that he was a righteous man. He did that which was right before God and his fellow man. The only way to please God is through faith in God. So we can conclude that faith plus doing that which is right is the key to surviving God's judgment. Noah expressed his faith by doing what God said to do. So he built an ark according to the specifications God gave. He installed one door on the side to enter in. When God said load up, he did so, along with all the animals that God brought to the ark. After everyone was in, God closed the door. Only those who went through the door were saved. For us today, Jesus is the door. Jesus said "I am the way, the truth and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me." We enter the door through faith in God's provision for sin expressed by the sacrifice of His son on the cross. As with Noah, there is only one door. As with Noah, there is only one way to find God's favor, and that is through faith expressed in our actions. So many today say they believe in God and are Christians, but that is the extent of their profession. But if a person does not ever act upon that "faith" is it really faith? Genuine faith in God will change hearts and transform minds and result in life transformation. God brings about change from the inside out. It is when we live out our faith that we discover the wonderful purpose and will of God for our lives and find God's favor. Jesus, the bread from heaven, offers Himself to us, that we may take, eat and live. May we who profess Christ with our mouths also profess it in how we live our lives. May we bring the bread of heaven to the hungry hearts of a lost world. Blessings, Pastor Pete