Coming January 1, 2010...

Daily devotions from the Bible. 

Right here!

If one of your New Year's Resolutions is to begin having a daily quiet time, you've come to the right place. Starting January 1, 2010, I'll be posting a short meditation each morning right here.

Based on the daily Bible Reading Guide from the Canadian Bible Society each devotion will have:

- Today's Special: the Bible Reading Guide passage, linked through Bible Gateway (you don't even need to own a Bible).

- To Chew On: a focus verse (from the day's reading) and some thoughts on how you can apply the ideas from this verse to your life.

- Prayer: a short prayer.

- More: quotes, links, songs - generally more stuff to help you take what you learned from the Bible into your everyday life.

I'm so excited to start these daily devotions! Won't you join me January 1st?

Spiritual drifting

Last Sunday our pastor preached a great sermon.  He called it "Spiritual Drifting," and listed fourteen things that can cause us to drift away from God. Here's his list:

1. Busyness.

2. Illness, isolation, discouragement - all can cause a loss of perspective.

3. Trouble - financial pressure, business trouble.

4. Conflict - in marriage or conflict with friends.

5. Prosperity - more option;  the tendency is often toward idleness.

6. Picking up someone else's offense. (The original people resolve their problem, but I, an outsider, still hold bitterness toward the person who has offended my friend.)

7. Controversy - theological controversy and debate, with no normal accountability structure.

8. Loneliness - Especially for singles - God has a best for you in a relationship. Don't accept 'good enough.'

9. Return of old habits - resuming something that was representative of your life before Christ (e.g. drinking, clubbing, etc.).

10. Worldly saturation - TV, movies, internet - becoming infatuated with the personalities and world views of our society's stars.

11. Compromise - a pattern of downward spiral.

12. Disobedience - self-willed knowing "I know that I should but..." soon becomes comfortable with disobedience.

13. Sarcasm, arrogance, negative, critical, humor at the expense of someone, judgmental.

14. Carelessness - priorities get rearranged; reading the Bible and prayer get left out.

Those are the points in brief as I wrote them in my notes. Of course he expanded on each one. If you'd like to hear his whole talk, it's here.

Can you relate to any of these? (I know I can - even to most of them to some extent.) What additional items could be on the list?

Joseph the optimist

I think Joseph was an optimist. And that's no surprise. Because he'd had an optimal childhood as the loved and coddled favorite of his father.

Once that caravan of Ishmaelites got to Egypt and Joseph was installed in wealthy Potiphar's home, life continued along pretty much as it had up till the well incident -- his way. He was a good worker and soon had as much responsibility as he wanted. The golden touch -- that was his due. Until someone else noticed this natural-born prince.

I can only imagine the shivers of revulsion that ran up and down his spine once it came home to him how truly determined Potiphar's wife was to have him. The day she made her move, all he could think of was getting away. No matter that he ended up in prison! I don't imagine him having one second of regret that he didn't give in to her demands.

Maybe that first day he woke up in jail, he thought, I really am finished now. But of course he wasn't - just like we aren't when we emerge from a tight spot where we had no choice but to make the decision we made, but now we're in more trouble than we were at first.

Joseph found that with God, even that was a good spot to be - and so will we. His presence with us gives us reason to be an optimist any time and in any situation.

(If you want to read this story, it's in Genesis 39.)

Joseph Classes

Genesis 37 is the beginning of the very interesting story of Joseph. His brothers hate him - and we can understand why. He is an irritating, spoiled kid,obsessed with his own greatness (which has come to him in dreams) and a tattle tale to boot.

However, God will sort all that out. He will arrange schooling for Joseph, the like of which he has never imagined. The prison years will grind off all that superiority.

I wonder how God uses Joseph techniques with us. Our hidden times -- the quiet places we inhabit when we're on display to no one but God -- could be some of our Joseph classes. Have we learned our lessons? Or do we need continuing courses, refreshers and review? Pity but I fear this old student still needs some of these Joseph lessons in her ripe old age.

Book Review: Chasing the Dragon by Jackie Pullinger with Andrew Quicke

Title: Chasing the Dragon
Author: Jackie Pullinger with Andrew Quicke
Publisher: Hodder & Soughton, London, England, 1980, 2001.
Genre: Autobiography - Missions

At the age of 22 Jackie Pullinger, British subject and graduate of Royal College of Music specializing in the oboe, felt she was to be a missionary. But when all the missionary societies turned her down, she followed the advice of a pastor who told her, “go out and buy and ticket for a boat gong on the longest journey you can find and pray to know where to get off.” She bought a ticket from France to Japan. When she got to Hong Kong she knew this was the place.

Soon she had job teaching music and English conversation in Mrs. Donnithorne’s Primary School located in the “Walled City”, the old walled village of Kowloon. Through historic concessions it had become a haven for gold and drug smuggling, illegal gambling and every kind of vice. In 1966 this part of Hong Kong was six acres of stinking alleyways, prostitution, gambling and opium dens where Triad gangs reigned.

Soon Miss Poon (as Pullinger was called) became aware of the drug addicts and prostitutes that haunted the walled city’s streets, alleys and dens. But mostly her heart ached for the teen boys – mostly gang members – who were trapped in this lifestyle of violence and addiction.

Pullinger was nothing if not idealistic. “My mission was to help the Walled City people to understand who Christ was. If they could not understand the words about Jesus then we Christians should show them what He was like by the way we lived. I remember He had said, “If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.’ So this was the beginning of what I called ‘walking the extra mile’. There seemed to be a lot of Christians who did not mind walking one, not many who could be bothered to walk two, and no one who wanted to walk three. This in need that I met seemed to need a marathon.”

Chasing the Dragon tells the story how between 1966 and 1976 Jackie’s mission of fleshing out Jesus to the people of Kowloon became reality. The 2006 edition I read also contains two chapters added to the original 1980 edition by Jackie in 2001. They tell a few stories of what has happened and continues to happen through the St. Stephen’s Society since then.



Some of the things that impressed me about Jackie and her life:

1. She operates in the power of the Holy Spirit. After living in Hong Kong for about a year, she became increasingly aware of how difficult the work in the Walled City really was, and how fruitless. Other missionaries didn’t help. “They did not expect people to be converted and explained this by saying that there was a spiritual cloud hanging over China which covered Hong Kong too.

Yet as she read the Bible she saw that Jesus operated in power. “Some Christians claimed that these things still happened, and I certainly needed to find them.”

One day she met a couple who seemed to have “it” whatever “it” was. She sought them out and understood them to say that the difference was the Holy Spirit. Insulted, she insisted she did have the Holy Spirit. How else could she have been converted? However, they invited her over to their house for a prayer meeting – a meeting she describes quite hilariously in the book. The long and short of it is that that night she encountered the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues.

Not much changed after that, for a while at least. Until she met the Willans – an American couple new to Hong Kong. They impressed on her the importance of praying on tongues as a part of her regular devotional practice.

When Jackie demurred, saying that she had never found tongues that helpful, Jean Willans replied, “The Bible says he who prays in tongues will be built up spiritually, so never mind what you feel. Do it!”

Jackie began praying in tongues part of her regular devotional practice (set the timer and prayed for 15 minutes a day). Here, in her own words, is what happened:

“After about six weeks I noticed something remarkable. Those I talked to about Christ believed….This time I was talking about Jesus to people who wanted to hear. I had let God have a hand in my prayers and it produced a direct result. Instead of my deciding what I wanted to do for God and asking His blessing, I was asking Him to do His will through me as I prayed in the language He gave me.”

This was only the beginning of remarkable things. One of the most incredible miracles that came out of Jackie’s ministry was drug addicts coming off drugs – detoxing – without pain and illness. This happened to addict after addict for whom she and others prayed. She encouraged them to pray for themselves and each other as well. Probably hundreds, maybe thousands, accepted Christ and then received the Holy Spirit in this tangible signs-following way with this remarkable ability to leave drugs without suffering the usual excruciating pain and sickness that coming off heroin or opium usually entails.

2. She was bold about sharing the gospel. She took every opportunity to talk to a drug addict or gang leader about Jesus. The Triads in Hong Kong were organized hierarchically with each “little brother” responsible to a “big brother.” Whenever a little brother accepted Jesus, she asked him to introduce her to his big brother. Many times the new convert would say, “He won’t want to meet with you.” Yet when she insisted and the junior gang member called up his senior the man would agree. Whoever Jackie met with, her message was always “Jesus” not getting off drugs or cleaning up one’s life.

3. Jackie stayed and lived with the people. She didn’t leave after a few years, go home on furloughs, etc. (not that she would say that’s wrong – it’s just something she never did; she lived there after all, and was not there under the auspices of any mission board anyway). Instead she took these people to her heart and showed it by loving them in tangible ways – seeking them out, visiting them in their opium dens, hovels and in prison, finding them jobs, legal counsel, places to stay.

Altogether this is a book of gripping stories could be called The Acts of a Modern Apostle. Jackie Pullinger, with her compassion and readiness to extend physical help and comfort reminds me of Mother Theresa. After finishing it last weekend I wrote in my journal: “I continue to live with a tinge of regret. How can someone not live with a tinge of regret after reading a book like Jackie Pullinger’s and reflecting on one’s own unremarkable life."

Related:

• A list of mp3 messages by Jackie are linked here.
• Jackie Pullinger mentions at Ottawa Inner City Ministries.

Memory verse - week 6

Come to Me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.

- Matthew 11:28-30 NIV

(With apologies to the NIV translators for changing the personal pronouns for Jesus to begin with upper, vs. lower case.)

At the end of last week I wrote in my journal: Striving. That is the word that comes to me at the moment as a description of my writing life... striving to be read, striving to do well, striving to get established.

I'm tired of striving, Lord. I want to labor under Your light burden and easy yoke. Teach me how to get out from under this burden of striving.

striving: to make earnest effort; to engage in strife, contend, fight, vie, emulate.

emulate: to try to equal or surpass, to rival or vie with successfully.

vie: to strive for superiority, contend, compete as in a race.

I figured this would be a good verse to fill my mind with this week - a constant reminder that life in/with Christ is one of light burdens, peace, the opposite of striving.

Memory verse - week 5

Your ears shall hear a word behind you saying, "This is the way, walk in it," whenever you turn to the right hand or whenever you turn to the left.

- Isaiah 30:21 NKJV

I'm always wanting guidance - wanting to know what the next step is before I take it. This verse is interesting in that it implies God guides from behind: "Your ears will hear a word behind you..." How does that work?

There are forks in the road. Do we go right or left? This verse seems to say we simply make a decision, take the steps and listen for the 'word behind us.' Seems like a good description of the life of faith.

I've experienced this. Sometimes I've taken on writing assignments for the simple fact that I've finished the last project and this one came along at just that time. There were no prophetic words, voices or holy thrills - not even a scripture verse to hang my hat on. Not uncommonly I'll question whether I've made the right decision, especially when the writing gets tough or the piece gets rejected. Later, much later sometimes, I'll get confirmation in some way that the project was a 'God thing' (it gets accepted, I get an email or note from someone saying it blessed them, it wins a prize, gets republished).

As far as I can see, this is the way we live the Christian life most of the time.

Verse for week four

For as the rain comes down and the snow from heaven
And do not return there but water the earth
And make it bring forth and bud
That it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth;
It shall not return to me void
But it shall accomplish what I please
And prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

Isaiah 55:10-11 NKJV

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Love this verse! It's the reason I have the nerve to put up something so audacious as a blog that looks at the Bible with kids. Who would think that such an old book would have something to say to kids in the 21st century.

But it does. It speaks today like it has for thousands of years because it is a supernatural book with the wind of the Spirit in it. Through it we find living water, the bread of life, the way the truth and the life, the door, the resurrection and life and so much more. It speaks of our Creator God, our Savior, Redeemer and Rescuer Jesus and our counselor the Holy Spirit. I love the Bible and I'm so happy that I have the opportunity through technology to spread its good news on the internet.

Thank you Lord!

Verse for week 3

Enlarge the place of your tent
And let them stretch out the curtains of your dwellings;
Do not spare;
Lengthen your cords
And strengthen your stakes.
For you shall expand to the right and to the left
And your descendants will inherit the nations,
and make the desolate cities inhabited.

- Isaiah 54:2,3

***********

Thoughts and questions:
Line 1 - "Enlarge the place of your tent"
This is what I do. Act in obedience to what I know and feel to be God's directions to me.

Line 2 - "And let them stretch out the curtains of your dwellings;"
Who is "them"? Who will be a partner in this enlargement of ministry and sphere of influence?

Line 3 - "Do not spare"
Love this! It speaks to me of living life large, with abandon, nothing kept in reserve. It reminds me of this bit from Annie Dillard: "One of the few things I know about writing is this: Spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book or for another book, give it, give it all, give it now...Some more will arise for later, something better. These things fill from behind, frm beneath like well water.

"Similarly, the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful, it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe and find ashes."

Lines 4 & 5 - "Lengthen your cords
And strengthen your stakes."
Speaks to me of making sure that the supports (the cords) and foundation (stakes) are in place and secure. I take this personally as a reminder to stay close to God - in both attitude and action. Let Him lengthen those cords and strengthen those stakes with the input of His word through the Holy Spirit.

Line 6 - "For you shall expand to the right and to the left."
Opportunity? From every direction?

Lines 7 & 8 "And your descendants will inherit the nations,
and make the desolate cities inhabited."
I claim this as a specific promise for my Bible Drive-Thru devotional. My descendants will be those who are introduced through God and Jesus through the blog and the Bible passages they read on thee. They will inherit nations - in other words, they will come from all over the world; possible because it's on the internet. They will make desolate cities inhabited in that their knowledge of God will bless cities of the world with little knowledge of Him and make those cities His dwelling too.

What great verses! Praise the Lord!!

Verse for week 2

The verse I'm memorizing this week is the verse I've chosen as my life verse for the year. I've been working on it all week, so let's see if I can type it from memory:

Let Your work (the signs of Your power) be revealed to Your servants and Your glorious majesty to their children.

And let the beauty and delightfulness and favor of the Lord our God be upon us: confirm and establish the work of our hands, yes the work of our hands confirm and establish it.

Psalm 90:16,17 (Amplified)

Yes, I quoted it perfectly!

One day this week I looked up some parallel passages.

Psalm 44:1 "We have heard with our ears, O God; our fathers have told us what you did in their days long ago."

- One of the ways God's deeds are revealed to us and our children is by having them passed on. We do that ourselves when we tell these stories - from the Bible and personal experience - to our children.

Psalm 77:12 "I will meditate on all Your works and consider all Your mighty deeds."

- Meditating on the stories we've heard helps us make application to our own lives.

Psalm 90:4,5 "For you make me glad by Your deeds, O Lord: I sing for joy at the works of Your hands. How great are Your works, O Lord, how profound your thoughts."

Verse of the week - 1

I have made a resolution this year to memorize one verse a week. I have also resolved to work on this verse as part of my quiet time every morning.

Here is the verse I chose for this first week of January:

Proverbs 16:3

Commit your works to the Lord and your plans will be established. (NIV)

Commit your works to the Lord and your thoughts will be established. (NKJV)

And here it is in the translation in which I'm memorizing it:

Roll your works on the Lord -- commit and trust them wholly to Him; [He will cause your thoughts to become agreeable to His will and] so shall your plans be established and succeed. (AMP)

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Here are some word study notes that enhance its meaning and make it even more powerful:

commit - galal, Strong's #1556: to roll, to roll down, roll away, remove. In this text the reader is encouraged to roll his works into God's care. The picture is of a camel, burdened with a heavy load; when the load is to be removed, the camel kneels down, tilts far to one side and the load rolls off. (From "Word Wealth" - New Spirit Life Bible)

establish (established):
1] To make secure, stable or permanent; fix firmly in a particular place or condition.
2] To set up, found or institute on a firm or lasting basis: to establish a government, colony or business.
3] To cause to be securely or permanently settled in a particular place, position, occupation, etc. : to establish oneself in a new home.
4] To introduce (a law, custom, practice, etc.)and gain lasting acceptance for; initiate and cause to last: to establish a precedent.
5] To cause to be widely or unquestioningly recognized and accepted: to establish oneself as a writer.
6] To clear from doubt; demonstrate convincingly, prove: to establish one's innocence.
7] To find out, figure out or make clear from available evidence. They were unable to establish where she had been.
8] To cause to be the official church or religion of a state or nation.
9] In card games to get control of (a particular suit) so that all subsequent tricks can be won.


Thus on the basis of our complete and utter entrusting of our 'works' - what we plan and carry out - to God, giving Him full responsibility for them, He works in us, in our minds, to give us the thoughts that will lead to our eventual success. Our work and reputation will be fixed, secure, recognized, permanent, stable. What a way to face a new year - with a promise like that in my pocket, head and heart!

No second-guessing allowed

It's easy to second-guess what we've said about Jesus to our unbelieving family, friends, acquaintances and strangers, especially if the response is negative or there's no response at all. Jesus told the disciples specifically not to do this. In Matthew 10 He said: "You will be brought before governors and kings for My sake as a testimony to them and the Gentiles. But when they deliver you up do not worry about how or what you should speak."

Paul is a good example of someone who was a good spur-of-the-moment witness. When he talked to the people of Athens, he brought up the "Unknown God" inscription he had seen when strolling through the city to segue into the subject of Jesus (Acts 17). When he talked to Felix he spoke of "sin, righteousness and judgement" (Acts 24). Before Agrippa and Bernice he told his story (Acts 26).

If he mulled over these encounters later with thoughts of "Why did I say that and not this?" and "What was I thinking of when I brought that up?" he shouldn't have. For I believe he was a fulfillment of what Jesus said would happen. God gave him ideas and words for each occasion. All he had to do was be obedient, open his mouth and let those words come out, then leave the results with God.

I want to be more tuned to that kind of witnessing -- the kind that refuses to fret and stew over what to say but trusts that God will supply the ideas and the words. Then, instead of over-thinking myself into silence, I want to actually open my mouth and express those ideas, say those words.

Live in light

I eschew any sneakiness in you. Don't adapt yourself to the climate of the age, which seeks to put one past the rules or laws of the land. Resist falsehood so there is no chink for Satan to get a foothold in you.

Be light yourself in a childlike, transparent way.

God is light; in Him is no darkness at all - 1 John 1:5

Feeling confused

On browsing the blogs of some children’s book editors yesterday, I began feeling overwhelmed, somewhat directionless, down on myself for not being more focused, and even – confused? Yes a little. This morning I felt this check in my spirit:

Did I tell you to go there? Are you getting direction from Me or from common sense and the industry? Stay close to Me. Stick on the path right on My heels – and I will surely lead you to the next thing, and the next, and the next…

"A man's heart plans his way,
But the Lord directs his steps."
- Proverbs 16:9

Practice

Practice My presence. Review what I am to you. Remind yourself that I am with you … as you read emails, blog, consider your day, plan your day, water your flowers, care for your home, talk with your family.

"O Lord, You have searched me and known me.
You know my sitting down and my rising up;
You understand my thought afar off.
You comprehend my path and my lying down,
And are acquainted with all my ways."
Psalm 139:2,3

God Calling -- me?

For my birthday recently, my sis gave me a copy of the devotional God Calling, by Two Listeners, edited by A.J. Russell. Each day’s devotion consists of a short message –
from God. As Russell explains in the ‘Introduction’:

Not one woman, but two have written this book; and they seek no praise. They have elected to remain anonymous and to be called “Two Listeners.” But the claim which they make is an astonishing one, that their message has been given to them, today, here in England, by the Living Christ Himself.

Having read their book I believe them.

I do not of course believe that He whispered to them all that He intends to say to this generation. But I am confident that He opened their eyes to many things which they and this generation greatly need to know.

I do not believe in the verbal inspiration of this or any book. But I do believe that these two women have been led and that much of what is written is very clear leading indeed.

I too am amazed at how ‘right on’ this book feels with the tone of the Bible and the personality of Jesus. And these writings have challenged me to listen for myself. So in the next while, I am going to record here, what God says to me. I have decided to cast these messages in first-person, just as the Two Listeners did. Forgive me if that sounds presumptuous or like some extra-biblical stuff. It isn’t meant to be. Rather I choose to do it that way to give the sense of immediacy and the personal that addressing one in first-person gives. (In fact if anything I say here doesn’t line up with Scripture, I’d be happy to be put straight.)

God Calling me – May 31, 2007

Don’t try to organize what I’ve taught and am teaching you in these morning times. Just soak them in, one lesson at a time. Each day’s teaching is for that day. As you marinade your mind in My truths, you are slowly being changed. Your outlook is changed. Whom you seek to please is changed. Don’t feel you have to systematize it; I will do that in My own way.

"Whom will He teach knowledge?
And whom will he make to understand the message?
Those just weaned from milk?
Those just drawn from the breasts?
For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept,
Line upon line, line upon line,
Here a little, there a little."
- Isaiah 28:9,10

Which weather are you watching?

If you haven’t noticed all the “sky is falling” rhetoric about global warming, which has risen from a low rumble to an ear-splitting din in the past few months, you’re probably from another planet. People have observed signs – a thinning of the ozone layer, a gradual but noticeable rise in temperature, the increase of erratic weather events – and have come up with all kinds of postulations.

The fallout from this is even beginning to affect me. I’m routinely paying fees to dispose of the stuff I buy, from juice boxes to bug spray. The object that lights my world through more hours than I care to admit – the incandescent light bulb – is on the way out, apparently illegal in Canada by 2012. I’m even starting to feel guilty when we drive the car somewhere just for fun (not too, though; we still do it).

I’m certainly not a scientist or a student of these things. I watched the “Great Global Warming Swindle” and couldn’t help but think that yes, the theory of sun activity affecting climate change made more sense than the theory of greenhouse gas emissions. Even so, my opinion counts for nothing and since I’m a citizen of a society which is on board with the latter, I must comply with its demands.

I was reminded of all this, this morning when I read about Jesus commenting on weather forecasters (Luke 12:54-56). He acknowledged how good the people were at watching for signs in the sky back then too, and making accurate predictions about the weather ahead. Then he called them “Hypocrites!”

Why hypocrites, I wonder. Could it be because they thought their astuteness with weather made them wise and able to prepare to for whatever the future held? But instead, Jesus told them they were ignoring the signs in a whole realm of reality – spiritual reality – and their wisdom was fake.

We aren’t so different. We take ourselves so seriously and are ever so earnest about saving the physical planet, all the while ignoring signs in the spiritual sky. Look at Matthew 24:4-14 for example.

4Jesus answered them, Be careful that no one misleads you [deceiving you and leading you into error].

5For many will come in (on the strength of) My name [appropriating the name which belongs to Me], saying, I am the Christ (the Messiah), and they will lead many astray.

6And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not frightened or troubled, for this must take place, but the end is not yet.

7For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in place after place;

8All this is but the beginning [the early pains] of the birth pangs [of the intolerable anguish].

9Then they will hand you over to suffer affliction and tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.

10And then many will be offended and repelled and will begin to distrust and desert [Him Whom they ought to trust and obey] and will stumble and fall away and betray one another and pursue one another with hatred.

11And many false prophets will rise up and deceive and lead many into error.

12And the love of the great body of people will grow cold because of the multiplied lawlessness and iniquity,

13But he who endures to the end will be saved.

14And this good news of the kingdom (the Gospel) will be preached throughout the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then will come the end.

- Amplified

Are you seeing some of these signs? I am. Looks like the beginning of spiritual ‘global warming’ to me!

Everybody is I

"The journey only took twelve minutes, but on this occasion that was long enough for a startling new truth to penetrate my ten-year-old consciousness so profoundly that it has affected almost everything I have done since that day.

As I sat on the front seat of the big green Maidstone and District bus, a sixpenny bit and a penny clutched in my hand ready for the conductor, a phrase I had read earlier repeated itself over and over in my mind.

“Everybody is I.”

For some reason I sensed an important inner core of meaning in the words. But I was unable to dig it out.

Everybody is I... Everybody is I ...

Suddenly I stiffened. Body erect, hands flat on the ledge of the window, I pressed my forehead against the glass and stared in amazement at the crowds on the pavement below. The true meaning of those three simple, but puzzling words had exploded into my mind, destroying the illusion that I was the center of the universe, and leaving me to cope, for the rest of my life, with a burden of knowledge. Every one of those people down there in the street, walking the pavements, driving cars, waiting for buses – every single one, whatever they were, whatever they looked like, whatever I thought of them, were as important to themselves as I was to myself!

I shook my head trying to clear it of this incredible notion. Everybody is I ... That funny, bent old lady with the mouth drooping on one side – she mattered, she was vital – central. The bus conductor who had interrupted my mental churning earlier; he wasn’t just a bit player in my world. He was the star in his own. He had a head full of thoughts and feelings; a life inside him; he was the reason that the earth went on turning. My own father and mother, my brothers, aunts, uncles, all my friends – all were “I”. Everybody was I, and at that moment I was somehow aware that I would probably never learn a more important lesson."

– Adrian Plass, from Growing Up Pains

I thought of this bit from Adrian Plass this morning when I read the words of Jesus in Luke 6:41,42. It’s where He exposes people who find fault with others for doing the same things they’re doing themselves, as hypocrites.

I wonder if part of our problem with specks and planks – things like complaining how people in church are unfriendly, but being standoffish ourselves, whining about bad drivers but bending the rules ourselves, all that hypocritical stuff – doesn’t have its roots here. Perhaps we’ve never learned the lesson that 10-year-old Adrian learned that day. We still think and act like we’re the center of the universe, and behave with great indulgence toward our egostically centered selves to boot.

I know I’ve been guilty. I need to grow up. Otherwise, how will I ever be able to obey that most unhypocritical command of Jesus just a few verses earlier: “And just as you want men to do to you, you do to them likewise” (Luke 6:31)?

Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over

"Give and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom. For with the same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you." - Jesus, Luke 6:38

Who doesn’t salivate at Jesus' word picture of abundance? Yes, bring it on!


But I wonder how often I don’t recognize the abundance I already have.

We have an abundance of food in our freezer and a well-stocked pantry


We have an abundance of books (this bookshelf x about 5).

I have an abundance of clothes.

We have an abundance of good memories in shelf-fulls of photo albums and many more photos in boxes and on computer disks.


We have an abundance of CDs (these are just the ones in my office).

I have an abundance of pens, pencils and paper.




I have an abundance of Bibles (many more than this!)



You get the picture?



I think this "good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over" has already hit me in many areas of my life. I’d better have an abundance of thanks!

Woe!

Saturday afternoon driving into Vancouver, we again passed the site, in front of the Chinese Consulate, where for five years Falun Gong members demonstrated against the Chinese Government. They were protesting the persecution of their brothers and sisters China.

The city tried to shut down the protest last summer. Thus people no longer sit and stand there 24/7 as they used to. But there are still posters and banners. As we sped by, I caught sight of a woman’s face on a poster, emaciated and bruised, hair a mess, eyes filled with pain. And I thought of how much she looked like pictures of persecuted Christians I have seen.

This morning when reading Jesus’ woes in Luke 6: “Woe to you who are rich....Woe to you who are full....Woe to you who laugh now....Woe to you when all men speak well of you....” I thought of my rich, full, accepted life, and what a contrast is the life of Christians in places where persecution is the norm. And I also thought of that Falun Gong protest site.

It was not my choice to be born in Canada – a land of tolerance and plenty. But I do have other choices. One of them concerns what to do about my persecuted brothers and sisters in India and Uzbekistan and Pakistan and China and Myanmar and Thailand etc. etc. Like the Falun Gong, should I consider making myself a little uncomfortable and unpopular by protesting against governments that deal oppressively with Christians and which my country supports with respect and trade? That monument of their dedication on Granville Street is a rebuke to me.

At the very least, I know I should pray regularly for my persecuted brothers and sisters. For if I don’t take some of their present woe on myself in this least (and perhaps most) thing I can do – intercession – I can consider myself warned. Jesus said someday the tables would be turned:

“Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you shall be filled. Blessed are you who weep now. Blessed are you when men hate you, and when they exclude you and revile you and cast out your name as evil....For your reward is great in heaven (Luke 6:20-23).

Don’t know what’s happening to Christians around the world? Check out:

WorldServe Ministries

Voice of the Martyrs

Persecution blog