I don’t know what it looked like in the heavenlies…but it must have been awesome.  The prayers, ascending like smoke before the throne of God.  A Mighty King hears, and smiles…and answers.

Aslan roars.

Sabet found a ride, and left a little earlier than he anticipated.  When he was finally able to reach Suzy, he was in Nairobi and will make his flights easily. 

What has you down?  What problems can stand before the Hero King?  Is He not strong, is He not loving?

Have faith, rejoice….and thank you for your prayers.

I really don’t know her that well, but for the first time in my experience I watched her normally staid, British countenance shudder.  Suzy Kuj was telling me about the difficulties Sabet has faced since going back to check on their clinic/mission in the Sudan.  His car had broken down on the way into Tonj, their village.  Without parts, it isn’t fixable, and parts take a long time to ship into Africa.  If  the parts don’t come in time, Sabet will have to beg a ride from Tonj to Rumbek on Wednesday (Dec 12th), which is not an easy prospect in a country ravaged by poverty and civil war.  Few have cars, fewer still have gasoline to fuel them.  He has to find a ride, or he won’t make it home for Christmas with his family.

“It’s just been hard, but I needed to hear what you said this morning.”  She was talking about Sunday’s teaching out of Mark 6, where we were reminded that doing God’s will doesn’t guarantee smooth sailing.  I looked at her in awe.  Her two children were playing on the chairs beside us, oblivious to the strain I saw evident on their mother’s face.  As I watched them play, I realized how close to Christmas it is right now.

I stand here at this computer portal, and I’m calling all you Saints to PRAY!  Pray to the Hero, ask that He be the Hero in this circumstance. 

Pray for a miracle, that every obstacle be removed from Sabet’s pathway to his family.  Pray for a ride, pray for fuel, pray for a timely arrival at the airfield that will launch his trip to the states. 

“Oh mighty King, we call on you today for mercies in abundance tomorrow.  Tomorrow let a way be made for Sabet Kuj, our brother, to return to his family for Christmas.  All things are possible with You.  Tear down every barrier to his travel, build up every road.  Grant him wings of an eagle, and set him on his way.  All for your glory.  All for your purposes.  All for your Kingdom.  Let Your Kingdom come, let Your will be done, on this earth like it’s done in Your heaven.  Because Jesus said we could ask, we pray in His name.    Amen.”

If you’re interested in issues dealing with the Sudan, I would like to recommend a movie to you.  It’s called “God Grew Tired of Us“, and it’s really an excellent film.  Go fire up your Netflix account and slam that thing into your que…you won’t be disappointed.

Ok…so I’m going to abandon the Sketchcast answers to questions I didn’t get to for technical reasons.  Sorry.

So here’s a question from the pile:

“Why would God allow the Holocaust, earthquakes, etc to happen in the first place?”

I read a newspaper article about my dad who, years ago, said when he got to heaven that would be the first question he asked God.  That statement in itself is filled with a lot of irony, but I like it.  I don’t know if that’s really what he asked.  Maybe my first question will be “what did my dad ask you when he got here?”  But I digress.

That is the age old question dealing with the problem of sin and pain.  There really is no good answer for it.  Notice I said “good” answer.  There are many attempted answers which come off almost flippantly about sin not being God’s fault, and so on.  But those are hard to sell to the hurting. I think, instead of trying to answer that question, I’ll pose another.

I was watching one of those survival shows that have been on constantly, and the host was clawing his way through the jungle, when he pointed out a spiny vine which was hanging down from the canopy, oozing a sticky, viscous liquid.  He smiled and gave it a wide berth, explaining that the vine was extremely toxic, the liquid of which if it were to get under the skin would cause the skin to literally rot off your bones.  My inner 15 year old said “coooool!”…but my rational side said “Why is that there?  What possible use could there be for such a horrifying plant?  Why would God allow that plant to sit in the jungle waiting to rot the skin of some poor, unsuspecting survival show host?”

One of the reasons I’ve never been big on going camping is that very thing…nature is out to kill you! has always been my motto.

On the other hand, the survival host went just a few more steps and smiled at an obnoxious looking weed and said “But not everything here is dangerous!”, and he went on to explain that the weed in question had powerful anti-toxins in it’s sap which were very useful for cleaning wounds and creating compresses.  And as I marveled at the placement of such a wonderful plant near the flesh rotting vine, I had to ask another question: “Where did THAT come from?”  For everything that is so wrong in this fallen world, there is still a lot that is RIGHT.  Where does the good stuff come from?

I have a doctor friend who was telling me one day that the amount of things that can go wrong during pregnancy is staggering.  He smiled and confessed that he is still amazed that so many children are born without a hitch.  Where does that come from?  I was reading an article about the second law of Thermodynamics, the concept of entropy…that everything is wearing down and moving toward a chaotic state, order to disorder, and so on.  The article posed a question that has many physicists stumped and that is “why does ANYTHING work?”  If the normal path is toward disorder, why is there any order at all?  What keeps your alarm clock from just falling apart or your food processor from exploding every day?

The question of why evil and pain and suffering still exist in this world when we believe there is a good God in control is a hard question, one I don’t feel qualified to answer.  But there is another question that must be logged right beside it, and that is, “what do we make of all the good in this world?”  For as much as there is that seeps flesh eating poison, there are almost as many healing weeds nearby.  As hostile as this world still remains, the evidence of a Friend is there at every intersection.

Evil is here, we can’t deny it.  But so is good.  Let’s at least try to keep our questions balanced and factor in both sides.

What do you think?

Hey everyone!  As I mentioned Sunday, I’m posting the YouTube video of the Washington Post experiement with Joshua Bell.  I’ve watched it several times, I find it fascinating.

And, in case you’d like to read the whole article that goes with the video, you can read it HERE

 Oh….and one more thing.  I’ve had a couple people tell me that the Sketchcast videos get chopy at the end of them.  Have you had that experience?  Just wondering.

 Did Constantine cause everyone to think they were Christians (by establishing a state religion)?

Who are the “shepherds” of Jeremiah 23:1-2?  Are there pastors who fall into this catagory?

 “Woe to the shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep of my pasture!” declares the LORD. 2 Therefore this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says to the shepherds who tend my people: “Because you have scattered my flock and driven them away and have not bestowed care on them, I will bestow punishment on you for the evil you have done,” declares the LORD.” 

 If the Biblical age of creation is approximatly 6,000 years old, how can it be explained that, given the speed of light, the Hubble deep field images of stars are looking back in time at universes that are over one billion years old?

What is our duty as a “body” in regards to something going on in the “body” that is not good and we don’t want to be gossiping?  What is the proper thing to do?

The instructions of Matthew 18 are applicable here.  Jesus said “If a fellow believer hurts you, go and tell him—work it out between the two of you. If he listens, you’ve made a friend. If he won’t listen, take one or two others along so that the presence of witnesses will keep things honest, and try again. If he still won’t listen, tell the church. If he won’t listen to the church, you’ll have to start over from scratch, confront him with the need for repentance, and offer again God’s forgiving love.”

Even before that…pray.  Pray for God’s view of the situation.  Is the “not good” thing not good because it isn’t in harmony with Scripture…or is it not good because it violates something specific to your own conscience?  If it’s the latter, then continue to pray.  If it’s the former, and you have a place in the person’s life to speak into it, then go and talk to them about it (and only him or her).

If you don’t have that place in their life, gain it.  Get to know them, find out what’s going on with them and how you can serve them.  Don’t go off on a crusade to clean a person up or fix them…that will only add new problems to the mix.  Pray about how you can love and serve the people involved, and ask God to lead and convict and guide them.  The Holy Spirit is well able to lead His own people, He doesn’t need us to show Him how to do it.

The bottom line answer is love.  Love the person/people.  If you have a place in their life to speak, speak in love.  If you don’t, through love-find that place.

First, before I get to the question, be sure to visit the Prayer Wall page, we have a lot of needs to be keeping before God for the people of our church community!

 Ok, here goes…

Why Doesn’t Jesus let the demons He throws out identify Him as the Son of God?  Wouldn’t that make people believe, and wouldn’t that be kind of ironic?

Also: Why did Jesus warn folks not to make it known that He was the Son of God?

Ok…obviously, the reason this is asked is because the Scriptures don’t give a definitive reason why Jesus did what seems almost counterproductive to gaining a following.  I mean, if Jesus let supernatural beings identify Him as the Messiah, wouldn’t that just help to further His cause?  The most common  answer to that, and the one I tend to lean toward has to do with timing.

Everything happening in it’s right time.  The amazing thing about God is that He is sovereign, meaning, He is in complete control of all things.  The even MORE amazing thing about His sovereignty is that He seems to be able to exercises it through the midst of man’s appearant free will.  Jesus had to go to the cross…it was mandatory.  If He didn’t, we would still be lost.  There had to be a right time and a right place for people to know that Jesus is the Son of God…and the majority of that belief came after Jesus was killed and then rose again.  Had He let everyone identify Him as the Messiah, the groundswell of His popularity may have prevented His death.  Maybe that’s even why the demons were so quick to want to identify Him…to throw off the timing, make the cross a less sure thing? 

That seems like the most reasonable explanation for His behavior to me.

What do you think?