We will sin. Will we repent?

Our sins have consequences.
With every sin we crucify Jesus again and we spit on his face (Heb 6:6).

So what does repentance look like?
* Sense of one’s own guilt and sinfulness
* Hope for God’s mercy in Christ
* Hatred of sin and turning from it to God
* Persistent endeavor after a holy life—walking in the way of his commandments

In plain language, this all means:
Get closer to God.
Ask for mercy not justice!

So what does repentance do? The real, no kidding sorrow toward God on account of sin?
* Understand that sin is ugly and run from it
* Humbly surrender to God
* Make restitution

In plain language, this means:
Surrender to him—let him take over.

The Lord knows we will sin.
The question is: will we repent?

--from Wednesday's class, Oct. 24

Part VII: What's My Reaction?

So we’ve seen that David was a man who was battling Idleness, succumbing to Pride and Lust, and treating Others as Objects. It’s easy to then ask, “So how can this guy be called ‘a man after God’s own heart’?” But if that is all I take away from these events, then I am left wanting.

Are these stories just intellectual fodder to dissect? Do you realize there are myriads of “Biblical Scholars” who aren’t believers? So how are we to be different? What can we learn from this story?

Consider these other passages …

Luke 13:5
"…But unless you repent, you too will all perish."

Rev 9:20
"The rest of mankind that were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of the work of their hands…."

So what is our reaction supposed to be when we see bad things happen to others? Ask interesting academic questions to fill up an hour of Bible study? Did you see a pattern in those passages?

There’s one response that is always appropriate …
Repent!

“But that happened to David” … Repent!
“But I don’t struggle with Lust” … Repent!
“I can’t believe how he could do that” … Repent!
“That disgusts me” … Repent!

So, when Nathan says
“You are the Man”
we must read that as …
“I AM THE MAN”

And we must all … Repent!

--from Wednesday's class, Oct. 17

Part VI : I Am the Man

Text: 2 Samuel 12:1-13

Upon hearing Nathan’s story of the rich man taking the poor man’s one little ewe lamb, David was enraged at the injustice of it all. “As surely as the LORD lives, the man who did this deserves to die!”

It’s so easy to see the mistakes and sins of others. They are just SO OBVIOUS! David, as King, would have passed judgment over these kinds of matters on a daily basis. But what about when he looks in the mirror? Keep in mind that it has probably been over a year since he saw Bathsheba from the rooftop. A year of looking in the mirror …

“Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.” - James 1:23-24

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye?” - Matt 7:3-4

Then Nathan said to David, "You are the man!"

Just 4 short, 3-letter words. But with the power of a freight train. David is cut to the heart. Read excerpts from one of the Psalms he wrote:

Psalm 51:1-4

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.
Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.
For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.
Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.

~ How quick am I to see sin in OTHERS? How slow am I to recognize it in myself? ~

--from Wednesday's class, Oct. 17

Part V: Where Am I Crumbling?

How did David get to this point? Do these horrible series of events come “out of the blue” for David? Can we just chalk it up to a “moment of indiscretion” in the “heat of the moment”?

Or, perhaps, are there signs earlier in David’s life that he is ripe for a major personal disaster?

Consider what the Lord warned the people of Israel about regarding any potential, future kings hundreds of years earlier as Moses instructed them in the wilderness …

Deut 17:14-17
When you say “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,” the king must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself. He must not take many wives, or his heart will be led astray. He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold.

Did David heed the warnings in the Law that he is supposed to know so well? Or were he and Israel becoming like all the nations around them? The Fall didn’t occur all at once …

Crumbling is not an instant's Act,
A fundamental pause
Dilapidation's processes
Are organized Decays.

'Tis first a Cobweb on the Soul
A Cuticle of Dust
A Borer in the Axis
An Elemental Rust—

Ruin is formal—Devil's work,
Consecutive and slow—
Fail in an instant, no man did
Slipping—is Crash's law.
--Emily Dickinson

~ What steps am I taking today that could lead to a fall further down the road?

In what ways am I playing with fire? ~

--from Wednesday's class, Oct. 17

Part IV: How Do I Use People?

Text: 2 Samuel 11:5-13 (summarized)
The woman conceived and sent word to David, saying, “I am pregnant."

So David tries to cover his sin by bringing home her husband, Uriah, from the battle, to account for her pregnancy. But fails.

Text: 2 Samuel 11:14-27 (summarized)
David sends Uriah back to the battle, ordering Joab to put Uriah on the frontline where the fighting is fiercest. So Joab did, and reported back to David that “your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead.”

After Uriah's widow completed the time of mourning, David had her brought to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing David had done displeased the LORD.

First Bathsheba. Then Uriah. Joab, too.

People to use. To manipulate. It doesn’t stop with them, either. Other men in his army are swept up as victims in the web David is weaving. Joab has to send them with Uriah to complete the charade. Just how many families were there now who were fatherless? David didn’t account for them initially. But it doesn’t bother him. They are acceptable losses. Collateral damage.

Just people to be used.

“The best index to a person's character is how he treats people who: (a) can't do him any good, and (b) who can't fight back.” Abigail Van Buren

“The entire law is summed up in a single command: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ ” Galatians 5:14, Leviticus 19:18

“For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.” 1 John 4:20

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look to the interests of others.” Philippians 2:3-4

~ How do I treat people in my life who are of “no use” to me? How do I need to improve my relationships? ~

--from Wednesday's class, Oct. 17

Part III: Do I Pick and Choose

Text: 2 Samuel 11:4
Bathsheba came to David, and he slept with her. (She had purified herself from her uncleanness.) Then she went back home.

Well, we see they were concerned with keeping the Law … at least the part about washing properly.

But what about …“You shall not commit adultery.”
Or …
“You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife.”

It’s so easy for them to pick and choose the commands they want to follow and those that they want to ignore - giving the appearance that they are covenant people but actually just serving themselves.

“You are like whitewashed tombs, beautiful on the outside but full of dead men's bones. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.” Matthew 23:27-28

“Be on your guard against hypocrisy. There is nothing hidden that will not be made known. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs.” Luke 12:1-3

“People will be lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God - having a form of godliness but denying its power … ” 2 Timothy 3:4-5

~ Is it easy for me to pick and choose the commands I want to follow? What pieces of God’s laws am I choosing to ignore? ~

--from Wednesday's class, Oct. 17

Part II: Above It All...

Text: 2 Samuel 11:3

The woman was very beautiful, and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, "Isn't this Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?" Then David sent messengers to get her.

David sees and wants. And he doesn’t even try to hide it as he sends a servant to fetch her.

It’s almost as if he is saying …

“I’m the King, for goodness’ sake! Naturally, I get whatever I want.”

Let’s face it, he’s had great successes.
The people adore him.
He united the Kingdom of Israel for the first time. He’s confronted and defeated many foreign enemies. He has a LOT to be proud of. But …

“When pride comes, then comes disgrace…the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity.” Proverbs 11:2-3

“Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.” Proverbs 16:18

“So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!” 1 Corinthians 10:12

~ Do I think I deserve certain things because of my past successes?
Do I think that I am above sin? ~

--from Wednesday's Class, Oct. 17

Part I: What do I do with idle hands?

Text: 2 Samuel 11:1-2

In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king's men and the whole Israelite army…. But David remained in Jerusalem.
One evening David walked around on the roof of the palace and saw a woman bathing.

“At the time when kings go off to war”? But David, the KING of Israel, sends the army out under another’s command. Where is David? Back in Jerusalem in the comfort of his palace—with time on his hands …

“Idleness is the Dead Sea that swallows all virtues.” –Ben Franklin

“Idle hands are the Devil’s workshop.” –English Proverb

“A man's real worth is determined by what he does when he has nothing to do.” –From The Megiddo Message

“And we urge you, brothers, warn those who are idle.” Paul, I Thessalonians 5:14

~ What temptations come when I have “nothing to do”? What do I do with idle hands? ~

--from Wednesday's class, Oct. 17

Answered Prayers

Nathan spoke the judgment of the Lord that the child, conceived through the adulterous relationship between David and Bathsheba, would die. The child was born and became ill. David threw himself on the ground in grief and prayer. His servants pleaded with him to eat.

When the child did die, his servants were afraid. “If he is this bad off when the child was ill, what’s going to happen when we tell him the child is dead?”

David saw his servants talking among themselves and guessed that the child had died just as Nathan had told him. David got up, washed, and went in to eat. His servants were puzzled. “I don’t get it! Now that the child is dead, NOW he gets up and eats.”

David explained that while the child was alive there was hope that God might spare him, but when the child died, it wouldn’t have done any good to go on crying.

David didn’t blame God, or Nathan, or Bathsheba. He accepted the consequences of his own poor choices. He accepted what had happened, even when his prayers weren’t answered the way he would have liked. David went on with his life praising God, still strong in his faith – a man after God’s own heart.

--Anonymous

Left Holding the Bag?

Story: Tired men at the ravine, 1 Samuel 30

David and 600 of his men were in hot pursuit of the raiders who had stolen their women. They had just received word from the Lord, via the mysterious ephod, that they would succeed in the rescue.

Then it happened. When they came to the Besor Ravine, 200 of the men were too exhausted to cross. They could go no further. So they stayed behind to guard the extra supplies while 400 went forward.

Sometimes I stay behind because I’m exhausted, too. Or because my gifts don’t lie in search-and-rescue, or in war-mongering. Or because somebody has to keep the home front running, buy the groceries, take care of the kids.

Upon David’s return to the ravine, along with the 400 warriors and now the women and their goods, David merrily greeted the 200 who had stayed behind.

But the 400 fighting men had a different attitude: “Because they did not go out with us, we will not share with them the plunder we recovered” (v 22).

Yet in a merciful stroke of kindness and unpredictable justice, David instituted a new statute, to be enacted from that moment onward: “The share of the man who stayed with the supplies is to be the same as that of him who went down to the battle. All will share alike” (v 24).

I love the grace of David in this story. I love that the Lord, too, values ALL the ways his soldiers serve, whether we’re the warriors on the front line doing "big" courageous things, or whether we’re the supply-keepers who stay behind to take care of "little", but equally important, things.

We all share alike in His victory.

--Lisa B.

Let's Celebrate!

Author Excerpts:

"The decision to set the mind on the higher things of life is an act of the will. That is why celebration is a Discipline. It is not something that falls on our heads. It is the result of a consciously chosen way of thinking and living.
Of all people, we should be the most free, alive, interesting. Celebration adds a note of gaiety and festivity to our lives. "
--Richard Foster, Celebration of Discipline

"Did God tell David to behave? No. He let him dance. Scripture doesn’t portray David dancing at any other time…but when God came to town, he couldn’t sit still. Maybe God wonders how we do. Do we not enjoy what David wanted? The presence of God. ...God’s present is his presence. His greatest gift is himself. God is with us. That’s reason to celebrate."
--Max Lucado, Facing Your Giants

"To go into the presence of God is not enough. To leave impressed at what you see is not enough. Only when you are affected to the point that it makes you a different person is it enough…He took away the very sin that made us unworthy. Then he made us worthy that we may 'declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light' (1 Pet 2:9)."
--Allen Wright (yes, our very own Allen!), What Are You Worth?

A Passion for His Presence

Story: David brings home the ark, 2 Samuel 6


David lived with a passion for God’s presence.

Do I?

David began the journey with excitement. He was bringing home the ark of the covenant—the representation of the very presence of God! But the parade turned into brokenness when the Lord struck out at Uzzah for mishandling the ark. David, with fear and anger, became immobilized. So the ark went to someone else’s house.

How do I “mishandle” the presence of God? Do I take His presence for granted? How often am I even consciously aware that He is with me? Do I really believe that I would act differently if only He were physically with me, as in the form of a box? Where is my passion for His presence?

It took David 3 months to work up enough courage and motivation to try again to pursue God’s presence. After hearing how Obed-edom was blessed by his time with God’s presence (ark) in his house, David knew it would be worth it. This time he did it God’s way.

And this time the parade finished its route.

The lesson for me?

One is “don’t give up.” Another is “do it God’s way—the first time!” But the overwhelming lesson is “celebrate.” Celebrate that I don’t have to go through elaborate rituals to have the Holy Father with me…celebrate that I don’t have to live in fear that He will strike me dead when I mess up…celebrate that His dwelling place is now not only WITH me, but WITHIN me!

While I may not always keep Him in my conscious awareness, that does not negate the fact that he IS always here. He doesn’t live only in my memory or in my imagination, but He lives in my reality.

I want my life to reflect that reality…with a passion for His presence.

--notes from Wednesday's class, October 3

He Chases the Squirrels

He chases the squirrels...

This little boy with the too small chin, crooked face and wonderful grin.
And he probably thinks any day now he'll finally catch one...

So who am I to cast shadows on dreams?
To tell him what's possible - shut down his steam?
When he's already shown so many miracles to me...

And as I grow older - and younger - with him, and learn to chase squirrels, and call everyone friend, I only hope I can hold on to the joy he'll be bringing, as we run thru the park, neath the trees, where his laughter is ringing...

--by Ed G., from Wednesday's class, October 3

Insights from Art

Creation
The first thing God added to the heavens and the earth was light. All visual art is based on light and its effects. So artists acknowledge His power and wisdom through the depiction of light, whether they acknowledge Him or not.

God created something that could be perceived and judged beautiful, both by Himself (”God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.” ) and by us. Artists try to accomplish that last thing—sometimes the first as well.

God created from nothing. Artists don’t. Artists use the vehicles He created to express their thoughts: light, time, voice, movement, taste, odor, touch.

God evidently had a desire to create something that expressed His own thoughts and desires. Artists try to do that with varying degrees of success.

Communication
God tried, through creation and through language, to tell us of Himself and His vision for us. Artists try to communicate something of their own personalities and points-of-view in their work.

God explained life and how it was to be lived. Artists merely show their perceptions. It is a given in art that one man’s impression is as valid as another’s. Not so with God.

God’s communication was more than merely a feeling or impression. Artists can’t manage much more than that. For the audience to perceive what we intended is enough for us. Before God, the message must be lived as well as perceived.
God communicates to all of His creation. Artists communicate to others, but only to their fellow creatures.

--from Mike L., Wednesday's class, October 3

The Good Stuff

Lately, I've been dismantling a barn...
It's an old thing - about 80 years -
made partly even of chestnut wood,
the ancient trees that all died of blight in the 20s.
It's done it's job, and does it still,
but is no longer needed, and stands where a road must go.
Those that used, needed, and cared for it are all gone now, and the roof eves have let in the rain.
The damp has rotted the floors there, and some rafters sag.

But I get to see what is still solid,
what can be used in other ways, and in other structures.
And here is what I find:
Those who built it used the good stuff.
Cedar posts rise straight from the soil - still solid, still smelling good, still supporting the whole.
Red oak floors - layered deep with corn coverings - still solid as stone.
And the chestnut siding - gray from sun and rain - still beautiful, strong and glorious!

All this barn time has, of course, got me thinking:
have I been building with the good stuff, things like faith, hope and love?
I've got, perhaps, a few years left,
but some weaker parts already need replacing - some coverings need nailing down a little tighter.
Maybe if I can just keep the roof on, and use only good materials, my usefulness will live on, even when this structure is gone.
Yeah, I need to use the good stuff...

--by Ed G. from Wednesday's class, October 3

Am I Like Him?

How to describe Mephibosheth?
...Crippled in a fall
......Exiled and in hiding
.........Deserving of nothing

Am I like him?
...Crippled in a fall
......Exiled and in hiding
.........Deserving of nothing

Yes, I am JUST like him.

But then, he was …
Accepted, Adopted, Restored
and put in a place of honor!

And he was devoted to the King for the rest of his life.
WOW!
How much he appreciated what he was given.

What about ME?

--from Wednesday's class, September 26

CD Swap Month!

October is CD Swap Month!

Beginning Wednesday, Oct 3, bring a CD (or 2 or 3) to loan to others. Or burn a personalized disc with your favorite worship songs to share.

Pick out a “new” CD to take home for the week. Bring that one back the following week, and choose a different “new” one to take home.

Keep trading for 4 weeks.

Remember: Put your name somewhere on your CD or case to ensure its proper return!

* All CDs returned to original owners by Oct. 31.