Month: March 2020

Read: Exodus 3:1-4:18

There exists in some Christian circles a particular idol that I (Brycen) have encountered in various places over my years following Jesus. I encountered it most strongly when attending seminary. I am speaking of the idol of finding “my fit.” I overheard many conversations about the jobs guys were willing to take like, “I’d be willing to do youth ministry if I have to until I can get a different job.” You can bet I couldn’t let that one go without asking them not to disservice those possible teens with that kind of attitude. But I really got confused when the idea of picking where God might call you to serve was quantified by taking your Myers-Briggs and the generalized Myers-Briggs of the zip code you might serve and seeing if it proved compatible. Now this is extreme and definitely not normative of the attitudes of Covenant Seminary. However, we often narrow our focus of the ministries and places God might ask us to serve in the local church or in life based on what we deem is our best fit.

The danger in this attitude is that it diminishes the empowering of God in sending you out into His work in the world. Moses tried to argue that the call to lead the people out of bondage wasn’t really a good fit for him. Jeremiah argued that he was to young. Jonah thought himself not a fit with the zip code of Nineveh. Yet the answer to all of them was not in who they were or how they fit, but in who God was and what He would do despite their qualifications.

In Colossians 1:29 Paul begins a sentence that we almost anticipate going a different way. “For this I toil, struggling with all…” You expect him to say “my strength,” but the verse concludes with “his energy that he powerfully works within me.” Paul knew and Moses is told that the Lord equips the called, rather than calls the equipped.

Take time to reflect:

Have you ever found yourself narrowing the range of places God could possibly call you down to some idealized fit?

We know that the Lord gives spiritual gifts and has specific plans for us to walk in, so when is it appropriate to factor fit into the equation?

When does fit become and idol or an excuse that limits our willingness to respond to God’s call to serve in His work? What are signs that we may be looking for excuses out of certain areas of service?

Has God tugged on your heart to step in to His work in a certain area of your church, family or community and you have been resistant? Will you pray for Him to reveal any of that to you and maybe invite a friend into that process?

Read: Luke 15:1-7

Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. ² And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.”

³ So he told them this parable: ⁴ “What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? ⁵ And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. ⁶ And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ ⁷ Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.

As I, Brycen, type this devotional while working in one of the office rooms at Salem, I can see a table that many would call “the Lost & Found.” This fine collection contains dirty coffee thermoses, sunglasses, small stuffed animals and a bag with the name Nate on it that has been here long enough, the change of clothes inside would no longer fit either young Nate in our congregation. Rick and I refer to this assortment not as the “Lost & Found”, but simply “the Lost.” These things have no consciousness of their abandoned state nor would you find their owners scouring the building to find them.

This condition of lostness reflects the condition of both the sheep and the Pharisees and scribes in our text. As many have heard, sheep are stupid. I haven’t personally fact checked this assertion, but I trust those I know who have and they would tell me that the sheep spoken of in the parable would quite possibly not even know it was lost.

The beauty of the parable lies not in the sheep but the shepherd. The shepherd tears apart the countryside in search of the sheep. Upon finding the unaware fluff ball, he brings him home and throws a party to celebrate. This of course mirrors the pursuit Christ undertakes to seek and save the lost in this world. The sinners Jesus is accused of eating with (and He did) in verse 2 are the broken in this world who are aware they aren’t in the best situation, but don’t know they are lost, as they didn’t know who they needed to be found by. Jesus finds them nonetheless and brings them to the celebration of a new home in Him!

Do you have that story of salvation in your life? Were you lost without a full awareness of how lost you were? Did Jesus come and find you and carry you home? Praise Him for that story and share it with someone this week!

The second group whose condition reflects “the Salem Lost” probably even more, are the Pharisees and scribes in verse 2. The sheep represents the broken sinners this party judged and they at least knew of their brokenness. The Pharisees and Scribes, however, sit in the presence of the one all their studies should have pointed to and yet they don’t recognize they need to be found by Him. They sit unmoved from their table of lostness, not because there is no one ready to find them and carry them home, but because they refuse to admit their condition. Their position in their minds finds security in self-righteousness, and yet placing their security in this keeps them lost, not experiencing the joy and party of finding their home in the fields of Jesus’ grace and mercy.

Take time to reflect:

Are you tempted to sit in a security of self-righteousness and mistakenly forget that you need to be found by Jesus just as much as the “sinners” of your world?

What areas do you find a judgmental attitude creep in towards the struggles of those around?

Read John 10:27-30. What areas of your life are you slow to recognize your drift from the Good Shepherd’s guiding voice? How can you get back to following Him?

As you pray to the Lord on these things, don’t forget to check “the Lost” this Sunday and turn it into a “Lost & Found.”

¹⁶ For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. ¹⁷ For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”

What embarrasses you? When have you felt ashamed about something?

Years ago, Angie and I joined the church we’d been attending. The senior pastor was introducing all of the new members to the congregation (of nearly a thousand people). He knew me and mentioned I was in seminary at the time. Wanting to say something about Angie (who was in medical school at the time), he said she was working on her “PHT degree” which he explained was “putting hubby through”. People who knew us gasped (didn’t he know Angie was in medical school? Yes, but in the moment, he forgot).

That probably would have been embarrassing for him had it not gotten worse. He went on to another young woman, Kirstin, and as he introduced her, he asked if she was “with child”. She was not! I’m not sure who was more embarrassed – that pastor or poor Kirstin!

The message of the gospel is foolishness to the world. We don’t like being told we’re spiritual failures who can’t be good enough for God. We don’t like the idea that we can’t save ourselves. That kind of message is fine for other people, but I can take care of myself.

We don’t want to be told we are wicked; that we deserve wrath; that our best actions are like filthy rags. And yet, Paul writes in Ephesians 2, we all “were dead in the trespasses and sins ² in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— ³ among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind (Ephesians 2:1-3). We didn’t have a little sin problem, we were dead!

People don’t like to be told they have a problem. They don’t like being told they aren’t good enough. When we share the message of the gospel, it sounds crazy to people. And yet, it is the wisdom of God and the power of God. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, ¹⁸ For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God (1:18). And in the passage above from Romans 1 as well.

There are many verses I love in the Bible, but my two favorite words are “But God.” We were objects of wrath; we were dead in our sin; we were lost and without hope…⁴ But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, ⁵ even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved.

We need to remind ourselves each day of the beauty of the gospel. We are greater sinners than we can possibly understand; but we are loved by a God with love that is so much more than anything we can ever imagine. John Newton, the ex-slave trader who wrote the hymn Amazing Grace, wrote, “I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I want to be, I am not what I hope to be in another world; but still I am not what I once used to be, and by the grace of God I am what I am.”

We are great sinners; Christ is a great savior! Let us rejoice in the message of salvation – foolishness to the world; but the power of God to us who believe!

Take time to reflect:

Have you ever felt ashamed or embarrassed by the gospel?

How do you understand your heart condition? When you read Paul’s words in Ephesians, do you see yourself in those words?

How has God transformed you since the first day you believed? How have you seen the power of the gospel in your life?

Take a few moments to reflect on where your heart and life still need transformation. Ask God to continue the good work he has begun in you and promises to bring to completion in the day of Christ Jesus (Philippians 1:6).