Doctor Luke and his Blessed Pen

Since the last time I wrote on this blog, my studies of God's Word have taken me to all sorts of places in the Bible.  I spent a few weeks in the Old Testament, reading parts of Isaiah, all of Job, Jonah, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther.  I also delved a bit in Proverbs.

While lingering in the Old Testament, I learned a lot; too much, in fact, to talk about today.  I will say that everything that I learned about the Old Testament Jews was fascinating stuff, and drove me to want to know more about Jesus and the early Christian Church.

Thanks to my younger brother Marty, I discovered the sermons of Charles Spurgeon, and began studying the book of Acts with Doctor Spurgeon as my guide.

I love the book of The Acts of the Apostles.  From a purely literary standpoint, it's a great adventure story, for one thing.  From Jesus' final days on Earth through the conversion of Paul and his Journeys through Judea, Greece, Asia and Europe, it's a story of miracles, early sermons, and perilous journeys and narrow escapes.

From the standpoint of a Christian student of the Bible, Acts is a complex work of faith that brings a mixture of awe and shame; awe, in that we see the Apostles performing great miracles of healing through the power of the Holy Spirit, and shame because so few Christians show the same faith and power these days.  It's hard to read Acts and not feel at least a little shame at my own weaknesses, anyway, when contrasted with the powerful things accomplished by the Apostles in the early years of our Faith.

This week, in the adult Bible Study class led by the pastor of my Church, we began to study Acts.  I'm quite excited, because my Pastor is a great student of the Bible, and I learn something new every time he teaches, so I'm expecting to learn a lot in the coming weeks.

Most Biblical scholars agree that Luke the Apostle is the author of Acts, with good evidence supporting the belief.  Since, in my personal, alone-time Bible study, I've been reading the Gospels, I'm going to be studying Luke's account of the life and ministry of Jesus to complement my Pastor's Wednesday night Bible Study class.  The Beloved Physician writes with great detail, and, in his Gospel, achieves in a masterful way what he states he will do in his preface:

"Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us, even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eyewitnesses, and ministers of the word; it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty of those things, wherein thou hast been instructed."  The Gospel of Luke, 1: 1-4. (KJV)

To paraphrase the Beloved Physician, Luke picked up his pen meaning to record for posterity an account of the life and ministry of the Christ from his own recollections, from written sources available to him ( Several sources record that Luke used the Apostle Mark's account as a reference.) and also by talking to other eyewitnesses who had seen and spoke to Jesus both before his death and after his resurrection.  Luke was writing to be sure that not only the people of his time, but that people for all time would have certainty that Jesus lived, died, and conquered the grave exactly as our Lord said he would.

Jesus is not a mythical figure.  We Christians understand this, because we have faith.  We should also, though, be aware that the Apostles understood that non-Christians in later ages would have their doubts, and so Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John took pains to be sure that people down through the ages would have written records from people who were there that Jesus indeed lived, died, and was resurrected.  I, for one, am grateful.  I know that those of you who are reading this little blog are also grateful.

My day was wrecked, but then something amazing happened.....

My Mother and I had the most rude awakening experience this morning.  I don't want to go into details, but we had to cope with my hospice-patient Father's digestion before coffee, before even getting the sleep out of our eyes.  It was an absolutely horrible way to begin a day; not the worst way, but definitely ranking up there with bad beginnings.

Once things were squared-away, breakfast dealt with, and I could sit down to continue my study of Romans, the Word of God revealed something to me.  Two verses from Paul's Letter to the Romans, Chapter 8, changed my whole day, and put me on a whole new level of understanding and joy in my faith.

"Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities:  for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.

And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God."  Romans 8: 26-27 KJV

Truth time:  reading that in the King James version didn't smack me in the face with it's truth.  It wasn't until I followed up this morning's reading of the Bible with Clifton J. Allen's excellent study guide, published by Convention Press in 1956 and titled, "The Gospel According to Paul:  A Study of the Letter to the Romans" that I understood what I'd just been reading.

The Holy Spirit helps us pray.  We don't have to get the words right every time, because the Holy Spirit which God sent to dwell in our hearts intercedes for us, and helps us pray even when we don't do it right.  

You may want to read that again, or maybe you've known this for a long time.  There is no telling how many times I've read Romans in the past, but I've somehow missed the powerful truth in 8: 26-27 every time.  I've known that the Holy Spirit helps us through comforting our spirits, healing our physical and spiritual wounds, and many, many other things, but Paul tells us that He even helps align our prayers with the will of God.

I don't know about y'all, but I really needed that lesson this morning, and I'm going to be in awe for the rest of the day.  Hallelujah.

The Road to Rome, From Alabama to Tekoa, to Judah, and Bethlehem, and Through Babylon

Yeah, I know.  It's a heckuva route to get to Rome.  In the title, I'm referring to my Scriptural path to Paul's letter to the Romans.

For roughly the past six weeks or so, my personal Bible study has been in the Old Testament.  I've studied Amos, the Prophet from Tekoa, and (as I'm sure you can see from my last post) Jeremiah.  I've prayed a lot for guidance from the Holy Spirit.  Honestly, y'all, when I finish a book of the Bible, I don't know where I'm going to turn next.  I'm just going along with where the Holy Spirit is leading me, and I don't understand exactly why I'm being led by this particular route, and I don't feel like I have to know.  I'm happily studying the Scriptures that the Lord is putting in front of me.

After finishing a study in Jeremiah, where I didn't actually complete the whole book, just a study of chapters 1-36, I was led to Ruth, and from there to I Samuel, II Samuel, and then to Daniel.  I finished Daniel yesterday, and today I was led to Paul's Letter to the Romans.

Understand something, y'all.  I'm not advocating that anyone else follow the same study path that I'm on.  For well over a decade, I was away from the Church, and my feet had strayed so far away from God, and this personal journey through God's word is just that:  PERSONAL.  I've got a lot of catching up to do.  Most of y'all who are reading this blog are probably far ahead of me in your personal transformation, and you should be studying in the way that the Holy Spirit leads you to do.  I'm just recording my own study course in this blog because I've got to tell SOMEBODY about what I'm experiencing.  I want to tell EVERYBODY, really, because every day's reading in Scripture is filling me with such awe and wonder that I'm going to explode if I don't share it.

Back to the Bible.  What I'm seeing, and what I'm getting from this study, are several things.  In studying the Prophets, we learn not only that God is a long-range planner, but we learn things about the Prophets as fellow humans.  Amos, Jeremiah, Daniel.....they were as real as we are, and they had very personal feelings about the events that happened in their lives, and the words and visions that God revealed to them to tell to others.  Personally, I'm learning a lot about obedience; unswerving, unquestioning obedience to the very omnipotent, omniscient God.  I'm learning that God's plan is perfect, and that His faithfulness is perfect, and unswerving.

After completing Jeremiah, I detoured from the Prophet's writings to Ruth, which led to I and II Samuel, where the lineage of David and Christ is first recorded.  I'm still processing a lot of what I read in those books, and will no doubt be going back to them again.

Daniel was mind-blowing to read as a complete book, rather than the way I read it in my youth.  When I was younger, in Sunday School, I learned the miracles in the stories of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and of Daniel in the lion's den.  Now that I'm older, and a little more learned in the history of the Middle East, the power and majesty of the visions that were revealed to Daniel hit me harder.  In those visions, Daniel saw not only the destruction and partitioning of Babylon, but the coming of Christ and the Catholic Church and the Papacy.  I didn't see or understand all that on my own.  I have at hand Halley's Bible Handbook, 23rd Edition, Copyright 1962 from Zondervan Publishing House as a reference work.

As a famous comedian once said, "I told you all of that so I could tell you this."  Today, I felt moved to open Romans.  I've been avoiding studying Romans as a complete Book for a couple of years now, and some of you reading this blog will understand why.  Romans is not only a long epistle, (16 Chapters in one letter!) but it's also one of the deepest books in the Bible, where Paul was trying to give his most complete testimony to a group of the faithful in Rome.  When Paul wrote it, he was unsure if he'd ever get out of Jerusalem alive, and was desperate to communicate a message to a budding congregation in the most famous city in the ancient world.

Of course, I've read verses from Romans in the last few years, and have studied and reflected on short passages in it, but to make a study of the book as a complete work.....well, I just wasn't ready yet.  I remember taking several months to get through it back in the 1980's in my Youth Bible Study at Eulaton First Baptist Church, but the lessons of Paul have dimmed through the years, and I think I'll understand things a little better now.

(Here's a short, funny story from my youth:  There's a lot of talk of circumcision in Romans.  I think I was probably fifteen years old or so, maybe sixteen, and I didn't know what circumcision was.  Our Bible Study class was being led by our young, female Youth Minister, a lady by the name of Rachel.  In the middle of the class one Sunday night, I finally blurted out, "what the heck is circumcision?  I don't get it!"  At which point, from the looks and blushes on everyone else' face, I realized that I was the only one in the room who didn't know.  Without speaking a word, Rachel thumbed through the dictionary in the back of her Bible and handed it to me, to read the definition silently.  Oh, my.  At that point, my neck began turning red, and the flames went all the way up until I thought my ears were going to catch fire.)

Today I read the first five chapters of Romans, and came to a passage that blew me away.  I'll provide a link here, so y'all can read it for yourselves from The Message version.

Yeah.  One man, Adam, disobeyed God, and brought Sin to all mankind.  One Man, God himself as Jesus Christ, came, and paid the price for the sins of all mankind.  Think about that One.  For some reason, that passage hit me really hard today, and both humbled me with awe, and filled me up with a joy that just can't be described to those who have no faith.  It something you just gotta experience for yourself.

Sorry it took so many words to get to this point, but my skills as a writer are somewhat lacking, and brevity isn't in me.  I hope y'all have a good day.  Thanks for reading this far.

With much fear and trembling, I recently began studying the book of Jeremiah.  I began in fear and trembling because I've tried to read Jeremiah before, and became confused about many things.

In previous years, I made a couple of mistakes that I don't make anymore.  I used to read the Bible alone.  Now, I never, ever open my Bible without praying for the guidance of the Holy Spirit, so that I have divine assistance to engrave the words on my heart and help me find the meaning that God intends for me to learn.  I also never before read Bible commentary.  Now, when I'm trying to study a particular book that has given me trouble in the past, I go to my church library, and look for a study guide to help me.  Bible scholars, men and women who have devoted years to studying ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek have written thousands and thousands of guides and commentaries to help others deepen their understanding of God's written Word.

For Jeremiah, I'm using Studies in Jeremiah, published by Convention Press (that's the Southern Baptist publisher) copyrighted in 1961 by Clyde T. Francisco.  Between Rev. Francisco and the Holy Spirit, I'm actually seeing things that I wouldn't have seen on my own.  I'm going to share a little of what I've learned here in this post.

Why did God choose Jeremiah to be his prophet?  Verse 5 of Chapter 1 says:  "Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations."  Well, God knows all of us before we're born, so it's understandable that God's answer doesn't throw much light on the situation to us.  The thing is, at the time God told Jeremiah that he was going to be His prophet, they were already in conversation.  Jeremiah, probably alone among the inhabitants of Israel, actually had a personal relationship with God.  Further reading in Jeremiah let's you know real quick that the rest of the Jews, although they went to their temple sometimes, and paid lip-service to being God's chosen people, the majority had no PERSONAL relationship to their God.

Over and over again, Jeremiah preaches to the people that God wants none of their sacrifices and is not listening to any of their songs, because they were only following the outward trappings of their religion when they went to their temple.  When they weren't in the temple of Jehovah, they were in the temples of Baal and other false gods, visiting the prostitutes that honored those false gods.  The sins of the Jews at that time were many, too many to list here,but all through this Book, the reader can't help but see that the Jews weren't really talking to their God, or listening to anything He had to say to them.

In various places in Jeremiah 10 through 20, Jeremiah wrote (actually, his scribe, Baruch wrote them down for him) several laments, or complaints to God for how the Jews were treating him.  All of Jeremiah's friends left him, and some accused him to the Jewish elders.  God wouldn't allow Jeremiah to get a wife, because He knew that destruction was coming to Israel, and didn't want Jeremiah to bring a new life into a place where invading armies were going to come, bringing death and destruction.  Jeremiah at one point was arrested, and put into stocks for everybody to spit on, and throw rotten food at him.  Jeremiah was understandably angry, frustrated, and feeling pretty defeated; so he complained to God about it.  At one point, Jeremiah even quit preaching.

I'm paraphrasing a lot here, but I want y'all to read this stuff for yourselves, and not take my word for it.  God's answer to Jeremiah was essentially, "Quit being so selfish, Jeremiah.  If you think things are rough now, just wait, because they're about to get even worse."  Oh, my, how hard that must have been for Jeremiah to hear.  Jeremiah was in danger of having the Lord decide not to use him as His prophet.  Although Jeremiah made complaints, though, and was very frustrated, he never stopped talking to God, and by Chapter 20, Jeremiah stopped complaining and got back to doing the Lord's work.

I've been angry with God before, too.  When my older brother was killed in a car accident in 2009, I was angry with God, and told Him so.  Rather than hurting my relationship with God, though, I was actually brought closer to Him. I think it's because I was honest with God and myself, and by continuing to talk to God instead of shutting Him out, I was made to see that I'm very small in all this vast universe, and my plans are also small and insignificant.  Even though I was hurt and angry, and probably no fun to talk to, God didn't stop loving me or talking to me, even if some of the things He had to say were probably not enjoyable to say.
Jeremiah struggle through some awful things, too, and even though he didn't understand all of God's plans, he got his act together, and went back to being obedient to God, and God continued to use him.  Today, we have the book of Jeremiah to study, and to learn from, which was obviously part of God's plans that Jeremiah was never aware of.

We all struggle.  The book of Jeremiah is so much more than just a piece of Jewish history.  I confess, I really like the guy, Jeremiah.  Apparently, according to Rev. Francisco, Jeremiah was an artist, and a dreamer sort of fella before God told him to prophesy.  It seems he liked people, a lot, and he struggled with being the bearer of bad news, and having all his friends leave him, and to see everybody turn away from him and with he'd just shut up.  The struggles of Jeremiah make all of my problems seem pretty small, and his sheer persistence in doing what God told him to do is touching.  Jeremiah's laments to God strike a familiar chord.  We struggle, and sometimes we have no idea why things are so hard; faithfulness and obedience seem to be out of our abilities.  The truth is, though, our struggles don't even come close to what Jeremiah had to endure, and yet Jeremiah continued to speak and to do what God commanded him to do.

We have something that Jeremiah didn't.  Jeremiah had no knowledge of Jesus.  In his day, the Holy Spirit was not available to comfort and console.  Jesus had not yet come to intercede.  Remember in the Gospel of John, Chapter 20, Verse 29, Jesus told Doubting Thomas:  "Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed."

In this day, we have our faith in Jesus Christ to give us comfort that was unavailable to Jeremiah.  If he could persevere, then we can, too.

How do YOU pray?

How do you pray?  Y'all, that ain't a rhetorical question.....I really want to know.  I'm going to try to relate how I pray, and I want to hear from the folks reading this about how you pray, and what you pray for.  I've tried to fix the settings for the comments on this blog so that anybody can comment, but I've gotten some feedback that suggests that the comments aren't working as well as they should.  If that's the case, and you have trouble commenting on this page, then leave your thoughts on the Facebook link to this post, or drop me a private message on Facegbook, or shoot me an email.  I've already heard from a few people that they have read the blog post from yesterday, but so far, almost everyone is too shy to leave a written note.  That's okay, too.

From my post yesterday, it may have seemed (because capturing accurately my interactions with God is challenging for me) that God dealt harshly with me because I didn't directly ask for his blessing upon this blog.  If I gave that impression, I'm sorry, and I'll try to correct myself here.

Imagine, if you will, that your child joined the school baseball/softball team, performed well during their first game, thanked his/her parents publicly afterwards, and NEVER INVITED YOU TO THE GAME.  You'd be very sad, and very disappointed at not being invited, right?  Yesterday, in my alone-time with the Lord, I felt like the child being confronted by a sad, disappointed parent who had not been invited to participate and encourage me.  

Another way to look at the situation is to imagine being a teenager who, on the way out of the front door, says, "Dad, I'm going over to my friend's house, byeeeeeeeee" and runs out the door without giving Dad the time to say, "Okay, Son." or "Get your butt back here, you haven't done your homework, yet."

On the internet, anybody and everybody has access to this blog.  My witness of Christ is being put out there for anybody in the world to see, and so it is important that my Lord and Savior be a full participant in this process; not to bring attention to me, but because His precious name is being used in public.  

The idea that I want to get across is this:  My Lord spoke to me yesterday, clearly, unmistakably, and in the most deeply personal and loving way.  My brothers and sisters in Christ, I think, will understand exactly what I'm saying, here.  If you are reading this post, and you are not a Christian, of if you have never experienced that kind of communication with God and doubt it's reality, I honestly don't know what to tell you, except that if you message me privately, I'll be happy to prove it to you.  

God answers prayers.  Isaiah chapter 65, verse 24 says:

Before they call I will answer; while they are yet speaking I will hear.

Prayer is not a monologue.  When you talk to God, it is a dialogue:  God talks back to you.  It doesn't always happen by the burning-bush method through which God spoke to Moses, but when God speaks to you, there is no doubt; you won't be left wondering, "Did that really happen?"  Referring back to yesterday, I didn't feel angry, vengeful wrath, or fear of punishment.   Quite the contrary.  I felt nothing but love.  The feeling of shame came from within myself, in the knowledge that I'd thoughtlessly disappointed someone who loved me and wanted to be included in my life.

There's nothing special about me.  As I said in my first post on this blog, I'm not a preacher, prophet, teacher, or apostle.  God loves ALL of his children.  In looking for Scripture to offer as proof, I found many, many verses in the Bible which demonstrates God's love for us all.  Most of us are intimately familiar with John 3:16, but another verse seemed to fit my thoughts for today, from the book of Zephaniah, Chapter 3; Verse 17:

The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.

Amen.  How do you pray?  

I had second thoughts, today, about continuing with this blog, and I'd better tell y'all why.  Before beginning it, I didn't really seek the Lord's input, at least not to the degree that I should.  Although I put some thought into the blog, and I did talk to the Lord about it, I forgot to ask for His blessing. I'm worried, really worried, about me and myself and too much of me, me, me being present.

By establishing a blog that deals with a walk with Christ, our risen Savior must be the most visible aspect.  I think in any endeavor that deals with our relationship with God, if God is not the central focus, and without His blessing, the endeavor is doomed to fail.  I had an idea in my head about something that I wanted to accomplish, and I'm afraid that's exactly what I'm going to get:  a personal accomplishment, and if that's what happens, then things will have gone seriously awry, and it will be all my fault.

If you haven't yet gotten the idea, I'm going to try to be even more clear:  The Holy Spirit brought me up short this morning, in the middle of my prayers, and showed me in no uncertain terms the error of my ways, and so this post is a confession that I messed up by not seeking God's blessing before getting started.  Some people may think "No big deal" but that is NOT the message that I received.

I asked forgiveness of God, and I must also ask the forgiveness of anybody who is reading this post, and those who saw my post yesterday on Facebook.  Y'all had every right to expect that I would have placed this endeavor in God's hands, COMPLETELY, but I did not.  It shames me more than you know to make this public confession, but it's nothing to the shame I felt when my Savior brought it to my attention.  I do not deserve a second chance to get this right, and I won't get that chance without publicly confessing that I messed it up.  I hope you believe me when I say that I have now, with all the humility that I can muster, sought the face of my God and asked that He bless not only this blog and the things that will be shared here, but also that he bless all of you, who read this and contribute your own thoughts.

I'll try to do better, y'all.

I was actually going to wait until tomorrow to create this blog and post on it, but I remembered that it takes a little time to set things up, and the first post is always problematic, so I'm posting tonight so I can get my reasons for creating this thing out of the way, and if I feel so inclined tomorrow, I can just start posting on the real reason for the creation of this space.

First:  I'm 47 years old, and I'm a caregiver to my Mom (who has Alzheimer's) and my Dad (who is a hospice patient) and I don't get out much.  If I'm not at the grocery store, the doctor's office, or at Church, I'm likely at home.  I don't own a car, I'm not employed, and I'm poor as one can be, financially.  My home life is incredibly stressful, as you can imagine, knowing my age and the age and condition of my parents.  Life is hard; harder than I've ever experienced life to be.

Now that's out of the way, I want to make it clear that I'm happier than I've ever been.  Am I crazy?  Well.....yeah, as the people who've known me for most of my life will attest, I am a little crazy, but no more so than most other people I know.  Even with the stress and difficulties of my daily life, I'm actually one of the happiest people that I know.  How is this possible?

My answer won't be a surprise to most of you reading this blog, because most of y'all go to the same church that I do, Eulaton First Baptist.  Those of you who are not Christians who mistakenly clicked this link from my Facebook page or my Twitter account will probably be navigating away from this page before you get to the end of this paragraph, and that's a shame; it really is.  Let's just get this part out of the way, then, so y'all can go about your business if you don't want to read anything about a real, personal, relationship with Jesus Christ, because He is the reason why I experience more joy on a daily basis, even in the midst of some of the worst crises that I've ever personally faced.

So why am I starting this blog?  Well, yesterday, I posted something on Facebook where I told everyone about an answered prayer.  It wasn't a big, dramatic, burning-bush sort of thing, but I was excited about it, and wanted really badly to share my excitement with other people.  I wanted to share it with people who would understand exactly why I was excited.  I realize that the majority of people on Facebook not only don't care about how we Christians feel about our personal relationship with our Redeemer, they absolutely HATE to see any kind of post that has anything to do with Christianity.  I don't have the luxury of removing all of those people from my Facebook list, because I'm in the entertainment industry.  With my brother, Marty, I do a political talk show on the internet, and I maintain my Facebook account for marketing reasons rather than purely social ones.  Facebook is where I engage more with Democrats, Atheists, Pagans, and Communists than with my fellow Christians.  I engage with those folks because God wants me to, plain and simple.  Some of those folks are actually reachable, and some of them are friends whom I love and refuse to abandon without doing everything that I possibly can to show them that, rather than existing in a guilt-filled pit of awareness of our sins, we Christians live with the joy of knowing that although we are guilty of sin, we worship a Savior who rescues us from our sinful nature and shows us a better, more joyful and abundant life.

I need a place where I can share my Christian life, and the amazing, wonderful things that I am learning from studying God's Word.  I need a place where I can tell my brothers and sisters in Christ about answered prayers, and I want y'all to share your joys, sorrows, trials, and answered prayers with me.  I'm not a preacher, pastor, prophet, teacher, Deacon, or elder of my Church.  I'm just a guy, a sinner like everybody else.  I don't really have wisdom to offer here, because when God was handing out wisdom, I overslept.  I'm starting this blog so that I can write things down without worrying about whether or not Facebook will delete the post, or lose it, or any of the other crappy things that Facebook is famous for doing.  Also, it's unlikely that any of the scantily-clad women who should know better than to put half-nekkid pictures of themselves on the internet will be sending me their friend-requests here.  (believe it or not, ugly as I am, every day I have to deny friend-requests from those type of women on Facebook.  Go figure.)

Sorry for the name of the blog.  All of the good Scripture-based web addresses were unavailable, so I went with the advice of my beard, which is getting bushy enough to have it's own personality.