Today's daily lesson comes from Matthew chapter 7 verses 15 through 19:
15 “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. 16 You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17 So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. 18 A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
On Saturday a group of us from church went out to the orchard east of town to pick apples. My kids spent about half an hour in scorching heat picking apples from the bottoms of the trees where they could reach and then putting them into buckets. Before I went to weigh and pay for the apples I sorted through the bucket and separated the apples good from bad. It was about half and half.
Discernment is a grown ups' job. There is judgment involved. I know Jesus said not to judge, but he also said to "Judge with right judgment," and to "the measure you give will be the measure you get".
Spiritually mature persons have learned to stop expecting grapes to come from thorn bushes and to stop trying to gather figs out amongst thorns. And in doing so they've spared themselves a lot of pain also.
We must learn to judge a tree by its fruit and come to the realization that just because a piece of fruit is low hanging and available doesn't mean it's good. In fact, if we aren't careful, it may be the one bad apple that could spoil our whole bunch.
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
Tuesday, September 29, 2015
Daily Leason for September 29, 2015
Today's daily lesson comes from Matthew 7 verse 6:
"Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you."
One thing we must learn to do in life is to guard our own hearts. Our value and worth as human beings is not subject to a referendum by the blood-thirsty and vicious. Our dignity as human beings is not determined by what others of hostility and malice think and say.
When we were children we wore our hearts on our sleeves and submitted ourselves to whatever insult any other mean-spirited child or adult hurled at us. We had not yet learned to protect ourselves. And unfortunately some of us later learned to protect ourselves in a negative way -- by becoming ourselves hard-hearted and mean.
But there is a more excellent way. The task of a spiritually mature person is to stay tender-hearted, but to also learn to protect their heart from the careless, mean, and abusive.
"Do not give what is holy to dogs," Jesus said. That doesn't mean don't feed or pet or be kind to them. It just means not to feed them with our sacred bread -- or our sacred worth.
"Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you."
One thing we must learn to do in life is to guard our own hearts. Our value and worth as human beings is not subject to a referendum by the blood-thirsty and vicious. Our dignity as human beings is not determined by what others of hostility and malice think and say.
When we were children we wore our hearts on our sleeves and submitted ourselves to whatever insult any other mean-spirited child or adult hurled at us. We had not yet learned to protect ourselves. And unfortunately some of us later learned to protect ourselves in a negative way -- by becoming ourselves hard-hearted and mean.
But there is a more excellent way. The task of a spiritually mature person is to stay tender-hearted, but to also learn to protect their heart from the careless, mean, and abusive.
"Do not give what is holy to dogs," Jesus said. That doesn't mean don't feed or pet or be kind to them. It just means not to feed them with our sacred bread -- or our sacred worth.
Monday, September 28, 2015
Daily Lesson for September 28, 2015
Today's daily lesson comes from Matthew 6 verse 34:
"Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble."
In our present age of anxiety we are told to worry about everything under both today's sun and also tomorrow's. When I was a kid an alert message scrolling across the bottom of the TV screen meant something extraordinarily serious was happening. Now, there are alerts 24/7. Powerful interests pour millions of dollars into keeping us hyper-vigilant and hyper-anxious and hyper-tuned-in.
The antidote for all this is not to not worry. We do worry; and not to worry would not be human. Rather, Jesus teaches not to worry about things we have no control over. If we can't reach out and touch and tend to it, then we really ought not to fixate ourselves on it.
There is no need to borrow tomorrow's worries because it turns out today's worries are plenty enough. I can pretty much spend today up tending to stuff within my reach without wasting it worrying about what isn't. Whether it's gonna rain or shine tomorrow really ought not to interfere with an honest day's work today and a good night's sleep this evening.
Today I'm going to do something radical; I'm only going to worry about today and the troubles it brings me. That doesn't mean I'm not going to buy insurance; but it does mean I'm going to go ahead and take the peace of mind that comes with it.
I have plenty to worry about and take care of today; there is no need to borrow any more from tomorrow.
Besides, as the old farmer said, "Most of the things that people worry about are never gonna happen no-how."
"Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble."
In our present age of anxiety we are told to worry about everything under both today's sun and also tomorrow's. When I was a kid an alert message scrolling across the bottom of the TV screen meant something extraordinarily serious was happening. Now, there are alerts 24/7. Powerful interests pour millions of dollars into keeping us hyper-vigilant and hyper-anxious and hyper-tuned-in.
The antidote for all this is not to not worry. We do worry; and not to worry would not be human. Rather, Jesus teaches not to worry about things we have no control over. If we can't reach out and touch and tend to it, then we really ought not to fixate ourselves on it.
There is no need to borrow tomorrow's worries because it turns out today's worries are plenty enough. I can pretty much spend today up tending to stuff within my reach without wasting it worrying about what isn't. Whether it's gonna rain or shine tomorrow really ought not to interfere with an honest day's work today and a good night's sleep this evening.
Today I'm going to do something radical; I'm only going to worry about today and the troubles it brings me. That doesn't mean I'm not going to buy insurance; but it does mean I'm going to go ahead and take the peace of mind that comes with it.
I have plenty to worry about and take care of today; there is no need to borrow any more from tomorrow.
Besides, as the old farmer said, "Most of the things that people worry about are never gonna happen no-how."
Friday, September 25, 2015
Daily Lesson for September 25, 2015
Today's daily lesson comes from Matthew chapter 6 verses 7 through 13:
7 “And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. 8 Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. 9 Pray then like this:
“Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
10 Your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
11 Give us this day our daily bread,
12 and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
Prayers are not at all like college essays; there is no assignment of nor does one get credit for length and word count. In fact, when Jesus talked of long and wordy prayers he used a term "battologeo" which derived from the poet Battus, who was known for long and wordy poems. "Do not "battologeo" Jesus said. Or as some translations have it: "Do not pile up words."
And I know something else that can be piled up too.
Jesus teaches his disciples how to pray. The prayer is simple and sparse. There is only one adjective in the prayer and it refers to God's name: "hallowed". Everything else is minimalistic; the requests are modest. A prayer for daily provision, for the forgiveness of transgression (as we've ourselves forgiven) and a plea to be led out of temptation and the clutches of evil. And before all this a prayer of surrender: "thy will be done".
How does it work? Therein lies the mystery hidden in God. Nobody can really say; nobody has the knowledge or the words.
Nobody except Battus, that is. If he were around he could probably tell us.
7 “And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. 8 Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. 9 Pray then like this:
“Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
10 Your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
11 Give us this day our daily bread,
12 and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
Prayers are not at all like college essays; there is no assignment of nor does one get credit for length and word count. In fact, when Jesus talked of long and wordy prayers he used a term "battologeo" which derived from the poet Battus, who was known for long and wordy poems. "Do not "battologeo" Jesus said. Or as some translations have it: "Do not pile up words."
And I know something else that can be piled up too.
Jesus teaches his disciples how to pray. The prayer is simple and sparse. There is only one adjective in the prayer and it refers to God's name: "hallowed". Everything else is minimalistic; the requests are modest. A prayer for daily provision, for the forgiveness of transgression (as we've ourselves forgiven) and a plea to be led out of temptation and the clutches of evil. And before all this a prayer of surrender: "thy will be done".
How does it work? Therein lies the mystery hidden in God. Nobody can really say; nobody has the knowledge or the words.
Nobody except Battus, that is. If he were around he could probably tell us.
Thursday, September 24, 2015
Daily Lesson for September 24, 2015
Today's daily lesson comes from Matthew chapter 6 verses 1 through 4:
“Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. 2 Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you."
I am thinking now of one of those giant checks we see in photographs when some business is making a donation to some charitable organization or school. You can see those checks from the moon; and I always wonder how large the drive through teller machine must be where you can deposit it.
Those giant checks everybody can see are just fine for businesses trying to let the community know they are investing in the community; but Jesus was not at all impressed with those walking around with them in their back pockets and trying to drop them into the plate at the house of God. It's not that the house of God won't accept it -- I guarantee that the church will take it. But the deal, Jesus says, is that's the reward -- the satisfaction of having everyone know you gave it.
And what's wrong with that? Well, first of all in the end it ain't very much. It evaporates like cotton candy. As soon as it's tasted it's gone. Our picture with that big check in tote shows up for one day in the printed news and even less on social media. Then what? It's gone. Cotton candy in the mouth.
But there's another, deeper thing too; and that is that in choosing others' perceptions of us our reward we end up choosing to put all our self worth into the eyes of people who are neither capable nor fit to behold and judge such a thing rightly. The word we have for that is idolatry -- that is, the bowing down before something or someone made in the image of God but without the eyes of wisdom which allows God to see into the heart and know where there is pride, manipulation, and phonyism.
So what is the reward our Father who sees in secret will reward us with? Not outer adulation, which can be spun and manipulated by our personal P.R. professional known as the ego, but instead something much more intrinsic, lasting, unalloyed, and true. Just this, a thing we call: character.
“Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. 2 Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you."
I am thinking now of one of those giant checks we see in photographs when some business is making a donation to some charitable organization or school. You can see those checks from the moon; and I always wonder how large the drive through teller machine must be where you can deposit it.
Those giant checks everybody can see are just fine for businesses trying to let the community know they are investing in the community; but Jesus was not at all impressed with those walking around with them in their back pockets and trying to drop them into the plate at the house of God. It's not that the house of God won't accept it -- I guarantee that the church will take it. But the deal, Jesus says, is that's the reward -- the satisfaction of having everyone know you gave it.
And what's wrong with that? Well, first of all in the end it ain't very much. It evaporates like cotton candy. As soon as it's tasted it's gone. Our picture with that big check in tote shows up for one day in the printed news and even less on social media. Then what? It's gone. Cotton candy in the mouth.
But there's another, deeper thing too; and that is that in choosing others' perceptions of us our reward we end up choosing to put all our self worth into the eyes of people who are neither capable nor fit to behold and judge such a thing rightly. The word we have for that is idolatry -- that is, the bowing down before something or someone made in the image of God but without the eyes of wisdom which allows God to see into the heart and know where there is pride, manipulation, and phonyism.
So what is the reward our Father who sees in secret will reward us with? Not outer adulation, which can be spun and manipulated by our personal P.R. professional known as the ego, but instead something much more intrinsic, lasting, unalloyed, and true. Just this, a thing we call: character.
Wednesday, September 23, 2015
Daily Lesson for September 23, 2015
Today's daily lesson comes from John chapter 11 verse 4:
"And having heard, Jesus said, 'This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified by it.'"
The daughter of a reader of these daily devotionals just underwent transplant surgery. I told her today's lesson would be especially for them.
On Friday night Texas Tech University hosted the world premier of the opera "Breath of Life", which is about the spiritual mystery of heart transplant surgery. The opera was written by a man named Todd Frazier, whose father Dr. O.H. Frazier is chief of cardiopulmonary transplantation at the Texas Heart Institute in Houston and has performed over 2,000 heart transplant surgeries.
I attended the premier and was especially captivated by one in line in the drama spoken by the surgeon in the operating room just after having attached the donor heart to the recipient's body. It is an intensely agonizing moment, as the work is done and now everyone must wait and wonder and trust that life will indeed come back into the recipient. At the moment of highest drama, the surgeon speaks these profound words: "The heart must remember to beat again."
When I heard that line I thought of my own work in the care of the soul, symbolized by the metaphor of the heart. When I have said and done all that I know to say and do in the care of the soul, there is then the moment of faith: I must have faith that life is still present; and the heart must be trusted to live again.
After the show I had the privilege of meeting Dr. Frazier and I asked him about that line. He said Todd took that line from an interview Todd heard his father give for a PBS special on heart transplant surgery. "I've done 2,000 of these surgeries," he told me, "and though we know a lot about the science, it's still a mystery how it works. The heart has to remember to live and the doctor has to trust that it will remember."
We cannot under our own power make another's heart beat again. If a heart is to beat again it must beat of its own. After all is said and done, at some point we have to step back, take our hands off and trust that the heart can indeed beat of its own and will remember how.
And as the good doctor said, how exactly that works is a mystery -- the mystery of life hidden with God in the very heart itself.
"And having heard, Jesus said, 'This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified by it.'"
The daughter of a reader of these daily devotionals just underwent transplant surgery. I told her today's lesson would be especially for them.
On Friday night Texas Tech University hosted the world premier of the opera "Breath of Life", which is about the spiritual mystery of heart transplant surgery. The opera was written by a man named Todd Frazier, whose father Dr. O.H. Frazier is chief of cardiopulmonary transplantation at the Texas Heart Institute in Houston and has performed over 2,000 heart transplant surgeries.
I attended the premier and was especially captivated by one in line in the drama spoken by the surgeon in the operating room just after having attached the donor heart to the recipient's body. It is an intensely agonizing moment, as the work is done and now everyone must wait and wonder and trust that life will indeed come back into the recipient. At the moment of highest drama, the surgeon speaks these profound words: "The heart must remember to beat again."
When I heard that line I thought of my own work in the care of the soul, symbolized by the metaphor of the heart. When I have said and done all that I know to say and do in the care of the soul, there is then the moment of faith: I must have faith that life is still present; and the heart must be trusted to live again.
After the show I had the privilege of meeting Dr. Frazier and I asked him about that line. He said Todd took that line from an interview Todd heard his father give for a PBS special on heart transplant surgery. "I've done 2,000 of these surgeries," he told me, "and though we know a lot about the science, it's still a mystery how it works. The heart has to remember to live and the doctor has to trust that it will remember."
We cannot under our own power make another's heart beat again. If a heart is to beat again it must beat of its own. After all is said and done, at some point we have to step back, take our hands off and trust that the heart can indeed beat of its own and will remember how.
And as the good doctor said, how exactly that works is a mystery -- the mystery of life hidden with God in the very heart itself.
Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Daily Lesson for September 22, 2015
Today's daily lesson comes from Matthew chapter 5 verses 33 through 37:
33 "Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’34 But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God,35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King.36 And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil."
"Do you so solemnly swear that you will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?"
Well, do you?
Oaths are necessary in a court of law because a courtroom is a place where everybody knows somebody will be either lying or telling a half truth -- which, according to an old Yiddish proverb, is a whole lie.
There are other places where oaths are not supposed to be necessary because everybody is assumed to be telling the truth. Among these places include: our church, our place of business, and our home. When people resort to swearing they're telling the truth in any one of these then the whole culture of truth has already been lost. You might as well go ahead and hire a lawyer and tell it to the judge.
"Let your yes be yes and your no be no," Jesus said.
And my grandfather added, "And let your handshake speak for itself."
33 "Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’34 But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God,35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King.36 And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil."
"Do you so solemnly swear that you will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?"
Well, do you?
Oaths are necessary in a court of law because a courtroom is a place where everybody knows somebody will be either lying or telling a half truth -- which, according to an old Yiddish proverb, is a whole lie.
There are other places where oaths are not supposed to be necessary because everybody is assumed to be telling the truth. Among these places include: our church, our place of business, and our home. When people resort to swearing they're telling the truth in any one of these then the whole culture of truth has already been lost. You might as well go ahead and hire a lawyer and tell it to the judge.
"Let your yes be yes and your no be no," Jesus said.
And my grandfather added, "And let your handshake speak for itself."
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