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Written by Senior Pastor Lewis Archer
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Wednesday, 01 September 2010 15:44 |
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Psalm 139: 13-16 NIV
For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from you,when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed substance;in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them.
God knows. God knows us and made us. We are beyond our own understanding. We do not know the significance of our lives. God knows. We do not know all the intricacies of the human body, mind and soul. God knows. We do not know what the future will bring or what the past truly was. God knows. We cannot see the depth of our own purpose. God knows. We cannot understand all there is to know about the universe. God knows.
The question we must answer is whether we can trust the God who knows. If exhaustive knowledge is required in order to trust God we will never trust God. If we have to know everything God knows in order to trust God, we will never trust God. If we have to be God ourselves before we can trust God, we will never trust God.
“I don’t know.” Is a perfectly good answer to many questions. However, we have reason to believe that God is trustworthy. We can look to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. He forever revealed the trustworthiness of God by his giving of himself on the cross. He has gone before us into death and beyond that into resurrection.
If we look at the vast accumulation of information that has taken place in the past fifty years we are impressed. That is until we are faced with the reality of how little we truly know. We know about things but we don’t know things. Christ has revealed what we could never deduce. The choice is not whether we will ever learn some secret that will answer all our questions but whether we will trust the one who has proved himself trustworthy. Some day we will know as we are known. For now, trust is what we need. Trust in God and God’s word. |
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Written by Senior Pastor Lewis Archer
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Wednesday, 25 August 2010 18:39 |
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Sorry God, our way or the Highway...
Psalm 81:11-12
My people would not listen to me;
Israel would not submit to me.
So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts
to follow their own devices.
Romans 1:21-25
For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
1 Corinthians 13:5
Love doesn't force itself on others,
We often slander God. We portray God as a cosmic tyrant who imposes suffering on humanity out of vindictive spite. God is portrayed as robbing us of our dignity by imposing unreasonable demands upon us. We imagine these demands inhibit our happiness and well being.
The Bible offers a different picture. God's greatest punishment for sin it to let us have our own way. We surrender our dignity by taking our own way and debasing ourselves. God lets us. Tough love.
Even when we've had our own way, God continues to pursue a relationship of love with us. His hand is extended in friendship and his arm is not too weak to make things right and good again. The task is to come to the point that we see God's way of love, justice and trust is the way for us. May the Spirit make that way plain before us! |
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Written by Senior Pastor Lewis Archer
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Tuesday, 17 August 2010 15:17 |
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Psalm 71:3 Be my rock of refuge,
to which I can always go;
The tallest mountain in Virginia is a dormant volcano. The summit is over 5000 feet above sea level. There is open country on which wild ponies graze and the views go for many, many miles. I went to College within site of Mt. Rogers and would occasionally go there with friends to hike or camp. We went one beautiful fall evening to spend the night on the mountain. The weather was clear and crisp. After we’d arrived and settled in on the rocky crags at the southern end of the mountain we noticed a thunderstorm approaching from down the valley. We watched lightning snap and pop in the cloud as it approached us. It came quickly so we didn’t feel it would be safe to try to get back to our cars and we simply placed ourselves into a 2 foot wide grass strip with 2 foot high rock on either side of us. We put our ponchos over the gap, secured them with rocks and hoped for the best. It came. The wind road and the lightning popped but we didn’t get wet and nothing worse happened than an occasional slap in the face as the wind whipped our ponchos around. We found a refuge. We were safe in the midst of the storm.
People live in despair and hopelessness when they do not know that God is an ever present help in times of trouble. We despair over life when God says we will see his goodness in the land of the living. God loves and cares and protects and redeems and sustains and shelters those who cry out to him. Storms come in overwhelming power but God comes with even more power it we will embrace his offer of shelter in the shadow of his wing!
You can always go to God. No matter how far you have climbed fool’s hill he always is ready to give you refuge and lead you home. |
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