Speaking of women’s ministry, there are lots of common reasons young women leave church behind, and lots of great reasons to return.  Here’s a book about it (link to Amazon book purchase site at bottom of column).  - Bob

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Spirituality Column #846

January 31, 2023

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Reason to Return

By Bob Walters

“[A church is] a holy community of imperfect saints traveling together toward the Holy City. Won’t you join us?” – author Ericka Anderson, Reason to Return

I’ve never met Ericka Anderson but she is a Christian writer and journalist who lives here in Fishers, Ind.  She has been published in Christianity Today, WORLD, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The New York Times and I’m sure, others.

So, a big-time talent with bona fides. I just read her latest book, Reason to Return, with interest and had a few thoughts to share.  Starting with: what a resource.

In retirement I drive a school bus and one of my former bus kids’ moms, who is an attorney and Facebook friend, now has her teenagers at Mission Christian Academy in Fishers where my wife Pam teaches secondary English.  The mom, Joni Sedberry, is Ericka’s good pal and church friend who recently posted about the just-released book.

Joni had fresh copies of the book and in the post offered to send a free copy to the first three people to respond.  The full title grabbed my interest immediately, Reason to Return: Why Women Need the Church and the Church Needs Women.

Ericka’s mission with the book is to encourage women, absent from a Christian congregation for whatever reason, to return to church.  It’s good for them, good for the church, and good for a whole lot of other reasons Ericka thoughtfully presents over the well-written and scripturally rich 225-page book published by Navigators’ NavPress.

Especially targeted are younger women who – in the busyness of life, kids, career, distractions of choice or past experience, and amid growing cultural apathy toward church in general – have taken church membership off their life priority list.  Funny thing is, by a large majority that Ericka notes in various ways throughout the book, spiritual growth and spiritual sanity rank high with women across the board.

The book’s title intrigued me because Pam’s daughter grew up in the church – baptized, youth groups, two involved church parents, the works – but hasn’t had a home church since she was 18.  Today Lauren is a wonderful, hard-working single mother of three with a good job, a nice home, a solid life … and … the title made me think of her.

Her three “littles” are a six-year-old boy and three-year-old boy-girl twins.  Last summer Pam, with my complete agreement and participation, decided we (well, she) would approach Lauren with the idea of us taking the grandkids to church in their town, Danville, Ind., every other weekend when they weren’t gone on visitation.  That meant we’d miss our E91 church a couple times a month or so, and the deal was that whether Lauren went was up to her.  Lauren leapt gratefully at the idea of her kids in church.

Lauren would never have the time or inclination to read a book about going to church.  But by the second Sunday we took the kids to Danville’s Northview Christian Church, Lauren joined us and now it’s on the radar every week, whether we go or not. How can you tell it’s “working”?  The kids are asking if they can go to church.  Bingo.

Reason to Return is a good and comforting read about valuable faith, not a panicked or hysterical diatribe about the “what ifs” of condemnation and hell.  Life is simply better, for everyone, with the right church family.  And girl ... is that ever true.

The God-centered book has as much sensible theology and scripture as it has practical advice and anecdotes about the quality and grace of church membership and participation in a loving, Christ-centered, scripture-believing, community congregation.

Read it for a woman you know – or love – who needs a faith-life boost. Then, share it boldly.  Don’t assume she has time to read it.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) appreciates this powerful voice for women’s ministry. 

Amazon purchase link: Reason to Return by Ericka Andersen

Stop trying to measure up to God; it’s your love He is seeking.  See the column below.  Blessings, Bob

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Spirituality Column #845

January 24, 2023

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Drastic Measures

By Bob Walters

“And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as stars in the sky and countless as the sand on the seashore.” – Hebrews 11:12 NIV

We read it throughout the Bible: God does things bigger than we can understand.

This passage from Hebrews 11 repeats God’s astonishing promise in Genesis 17 to childless, aged Abraham and barren Sarah, repeated in Genesis 32 and Hosea 1:10, that they would birth a nation – Israel – that would save the entire world.  It would save the world because from Israel would come Jesus, the Son of God.  That’s big.

We can’t measure the things God does.  We think in earthly terms of finite value, comparing this to that, measuring, weighing, or considering one thing against another. Humans tend to be stuck in a metric context, especially the folks who “have their own truth” and thereby dismiss God’s bigness, goodness, completeness … and truth.

God’s truth defies explanation.  His love surpasses human understanding.  His righteousness is absolute, unyielding, and – we too often think – awful, unforgiving and filled with condemnation.  Everything we know, He already knows infinitely better.

Our pride – pride being the original sin – makes us wonder, doubt, and dismiss.

And yet here comes Jesus our savior, Son of God, through whom God created all things and the divine embodiment on earth of God’s favorite Creation, made in His own image: humanity.  Folks often scowl at God – and humanity – and go, “Really?”

Yes, God does big things.  Scripture tells us so in many ways.  But the truth of big-beyond-compare God often flounders in our boxed-in but arrogant human minds.  We want “big” and “good” we can understand, i.e., measure, predict, verify, and manipulate.  We mis-identify as “small-minded” God’s “big” and “good” that require, like Jesus, our faith, obedience, sacrifice, and personal commitment to love God and others.

Faith, obedience, sacrifice, and love are things, as they exist in the Divine, that fallen-but-expedient humans try to measure with evidence, lists, and checked boxes of spiritual to-dos. What happens then is that God’s truth is generally lost in the unforgiving swirl of human comparison, score-keeping, score-settling, fear, and of course, pride.

The best things – God’s things – can’t be measured or counted.  Just like the stars in the sky and the shore’s grains of sand, that is the constant message of scripture … if we’ll listen to it.  Consider the parables of Jesus that all tell irrefutable truth about the Kingdom of God, the state of mankind, the errors of Israel, and the mission of Jesus.

We try to tuck Christ’s truth into the small, intellectual, non-faith pocket of “good moral teaching,” attempt to measure ourselves against an impossible standard, and then doubt God. We are prisoners, Satan’s prisoners, of measurable quantity: evidence. God’s only measure is love’s quality.  Trust, obedience, and joy are its fingerprints.

“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways are higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” That is God telling us through Isaiah (55:9) not to measure Him by our earthly thoughts, standards, or values.  Jesus proves to us – by dying on the Cross – that true Godly standards are faith, love, joy, trust, obedience, and sacrifice, not by the human measurement of “What’s in it for me?”

Jesus says in John 3:16 that He came into the world because of God’s love for the faithful.  John 3:17 says Jesus came to save the world, not to condemn the world. Romans 8:1 says, “there is now no condemnation in Christ Jesus.”  

We are not condemned in Jesus, but measured by faith and love.  That’s big.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) notes that guilt makes the forgiven controllable, not free.

Friends, Almost nothing is known about the most voluminous writer of the New Testament – Luke – Gospel author and first Church historian, but he sure helps us know Jesus.  See the column below. You are also welcome to join us 10:30 a.m. Thursdays at e91 for our Mustard Seed Bible Study through the Spring on “The People in the Gospel of Luke.” - Bob

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Spirituality Column #844

January 17, 2023

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Luke Was Different

By Bob Walters

“I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.” – Luke 1:3-4

Luke, the writer of the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts, isn’t identified by name in either book, is mentioned only three times in the New Testament, and if truly a gentile, was the only non-Jewish writer in all the Bible.  Oh, wait.  Except for Job.

And by the way, Luke, this non-Jew, in only two books wrote 28 percent of the New Testament text, more than Paul’s 24 percent in 13 books, and John’s 20 percent in five.  Luke was the first church historian (Acts) and only guesses and legends remain as to his place of birth (Antioch or Philippi?), his death (Thebes?), where he was educated (Greece?), or how he came to believe in Christ, know Paul, and join Paul’s journeys.

Famously a physician, virtually nothing concrete is known about Luke, scripture’s finest writer of Greek.  In the closing lines of “greetings” in three of the Apostle Paul’s letters, Luke is called a “doctor” in Colossians 4:14, is Paul’s lone companion in 2 Timothy 4:11 – considered to be the imprisoned Paul’s last letter shortly before his death in Rome – and appears in a brief list of Paul’s companions in Philemon 1:24.

Tellingly, in Colossians 4:11 before mentioning Luke in 4:14, Paul’s greeting identifies “Aristarchus, Onesimus, Mark…” and others saying “these are the only Jews among my fellow workers for the Kingdom of God.”  So, Luke … not a Jew.

Yet, great evidence exists that Luke was nonetheless a well-studied student of Jewish theology with a profound, obviously spirit-filled understanding of the importance, impact, purpose, position, and person of Jesus Christ.  This made him a great companion to Paul, the former Jewish Pharisee and now Christ’s apostle to the gentiles.

The Gospel of Luke is one of the three “Synoptic” Gospels with its many similarities to Matthew and Mark, while the Gospel of John is considered separate, i.e., “The Fourth Gospel.”  Some say Matthew was written heavily laden with Hebrew images for the Jews, Mark was succinct for the “to-the-point” Romans, Luke wrote elegantly for the Greeks, and John wrote in the Holy Spirit for everybody.

Each Gospel, then, had its own purpose and audience.  Luke may be famous as a doctor, but he held sufficient academic authority as a writer and historian that his testimony of Christ proved compelling even to those who did not start with belief in the Jewish God.  Luke’s polished use of eyewitness testimony, as an “outsider,” gave him the targeted purpose of preaching Christ not only to gentiles and pagans, but to the leaders and intellectuals of other cultures “to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).

Jesus, the Son of God, was a new idea for everybody.  Many Jews rebelled, but the story of Jesus traveled quickly and non-Jewish leaders and intellectuals who heard the tale of the Resurrection and the Son of God wanted to know if it were true.  That is likely the case with Theophilus (“lover of God”), assumed to be a Roman elite and likely a patron and publisher for Luke’s investigation.  Theophilus wanted to know truth.

Luke’s Gospel also had another purpose.  Written in 60 A.D. or after, heresies had already crept into the church, e.g., think of Paul’s letters to the Church at Corinth.  Luke wrote, citing eyewitnesses, to preserve truth among the believers, and wrote as an intellectual outsider so elites elsewhere couldn’t shrug him off “because he was a Jew.”

We don’t know a lot about Luke, but thanks to him, we know a lot about Jesus.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) is teaching a series on “The People in the Gospel of Luke” in e91’s Mustard Seed Bible Study, 10:30 a.m. Thursdays, free and open to all.

Friends,

An age-old New Year’s Eve song/question begs us to remember friends … and maybe even think about communion. See the column below ... 

Hope your 2023 is off to a faith-filled and encouraging start.  Blessings!

Bob

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Labels: Auld Lang Syne, communion, cup of kindness, Luke 22:19,  New Year’s Eve, perpetual Sabbath, remembrance, Robert Burns, Scotland

Spirituality Column #843

January 10, 2023

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Long Time Since

By Bob Walters

“Do this in remembrance of me.” – Jesus to his disciples at the Last Supper, Luke 22:19

On New Year’s Eve last week many folks rang in the new year, 2023, at midnight singing “Auld Lang Syne.” 

Our not-so-young gathering sang it about 9 p.m. (seemed like midnight).  But I noticed nobody knew the lyrics after the first two lines, so I later looked up the song’s words and background.  Turns out, “Auld Lang Syne’s” message fits neatly as a theme for a Sunday communion meditation at church.

“Auld Lang Syne” is a Scottish idiom meaning, literally, “long time since,” and is the title of a poem written by Scottish poet Robert Burns in the latter 1700s.  The poem soon after was put to a folk music tune and then published in 1799 – after Burns’ death – by the Scottish Musical Museum.  As Scots moved away to all parts of the world, they took “Auld Lang Syne” with them, and it’s still with us today as our New Year’s anthem.

The only part of the song almost everybody gets right are those first couple of lines, “Should old acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind ….”  I never really thought of it as a question, but more like advice to move on into the new year and forget the past, as in, “old acquaintances” should be forgot and never brought to mind. 

But “should,” in this case, isn’t negative advice, it’s a positive question, suggesting that “should we lose touch” with someone, or if we lose touch with someone, or in case we lose touch with someone … “we should remember them.” 

The song tells us not to “forget” our past, but to celebrate our future with old friends.  It is our past that gives our lives traditions and meaning.  The second verse says to do it with “a cup of kindness” – a love that expresses our present situation.

That “brought to mind” two things regarding the Last Supper and the church’s communion table of Jesus which directs us toward hope in the future.

First, don’t ever forget Jesus … ever.  We are Christians all the time.  Jesus is our perpetual Sabbath – our rest, our peace, our inspiration, all the time.  Not just on Sunday, not just during prayer, devotionals, quiet time, scripture readings, or service opportunities through the week. I am married, all the time.  I love our children, all the time.  I am with Christ, all the time.  I don’t forget.  It’s how I live and it forms my future.

Two, as we encounter the broken bread of Christ, remember the fellowship and truth of the Last Supper; remember the inviting, broken bread of ancient and abiding fellowship.  Remember to encounter the communion cup of Christ as God’s kindness to us; it is the cup of this life and Jesus’ promise of eternal life.  The cup containing the blood of the new covenant suggests a future without end in the loving Kingdom of God. 

It is freeing to see the cup of Christ as a cup of eternal joy … a cup of kindness, if you will, even a cup of cheer; but not a cup of fear.  We diminish our relationship with Christ if we see the bread as purely a symbol of his body on the Cross and the cup only as the blood of His death. Our very real communion with Jesus and each other is our fellowship in His body and our life in His blood. Our joy is to live with Jesus all the time.

Jesus is an old acquaintance we must never forget, and always bring to mind.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) used this piece as a communion message Sunday at his church (e91church.com).  He also notes that at their New Year’s Eve “Auld Lang Syne” sing-along, nobody, after the first line, was singing the same words.  The correct words, in Scottish and English, are here (link) courtesy of Encyclopaedia Britannica. Suggestion: Hang on to them for next New Year’s Eve.

I always say “Happy New Year!”, but what if life’s true adventure is something far greater than “happy”?  See the column below and have a great 2023! - Bob

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Spirituality Column #842

January 3, 2023

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Life’s Adventure

By Bob Walters

“The Lord had said to Abram, ‘Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.’” – God to Abram, Genesis 12:1

Religious or not – and I was not for most of my adult life – many folks are nonetheless familiar with the Bible’s great people and stories in the book of Genesis.

God’s Creation (Ch. 1), Adam and Eve (Ch. 2), Satan the Serpent and the Fall of Man (Ch. 3), Noah and the Flood (Ch. 6-9), the Tower of Babel (Ch. 11), Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, and the Twelve Tribes of Israel (Ch. 12-50), Sodom and Gomorrah (Ch. 18-19), and Joseph in Egypt (Ch. 37-50) to me rate as the highlights.

My own experience of reading the Bible, and specifically Genesis, for the first time at age 47 was shocking for its familiarity, given that the Bible was a book I’d never read.  Through my prior education and copious general reading habits I had heard of most of the people and places of Genesis without knowledge of their origin, understanding of their context, or belief in the truth of God or authority of the Bible.

When God allowed the Holy Spirit to turn on the faith lights in my life (or, when I allowed them in, or however that worked), Genesis especially was a cornucopia of discovery; I knew those people and events.  I began to understand them.  In time, I saw the Bible’s overarching story of a good God establishing, loving, and saving humanity.

I had a philosophy professor in college who knew seemingly everything there was to know about various religions and scripture, but believed none of it.  He knew about God but did not know God.  We all know folks who condemn God for His righteousness, thereby blinding themselves to God’s purpose and the truth of what makes a human life truly rich.  There are a lot of very bright people missing out.

Here is a tremendous take on the story of Abraham as it relates to every person’s God-given opportunity and purpose.  It’s a statement not by a believer but by a famous contemporary psychologist, professor, best-selling author, and “non-woke” cultural icon.

Jordan Peterson clear-headedly said this in a brief but rapid-fire snippet online:       

“In the story of Abraham when …Abraham is perfectly happy staying in his father’s tent eating peeled grapes and having his diapers changed even though he’s 80 years old … And God calls him out to … to adventure.  Abraham encounters tyranny and starvation and war and conspiracy to steal his wife and his own proclivity to lie cowardly … and this is all like in the … that’s his first sequence of adventures.

“And you think well what the hell’s going on here?  It’s certainly not the case that God called [Abraham] out to be happy.  And I think the right moral to draw from that story is that God, so to speak, has called us out for something far greater than mere happiness … far, so much greater than happiness that happiness pales in comparison. 

“He’s called us out for the adventure of our life that’s of sufficient moral integrity to justify the suffering.  And that’s something … and if you tell people that, if you let them know that, you know, well, that makes them stand up and cheer, ay? Because they know that is true.”

“God has called us out for the adventure of our life.”  Let that lead us into 2023.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) has no doubt Peterson would be a great Christian.