​Last Lord's Day Pastor Daniel boldly proclaimed to us that in matters of our faith, silence is arrogance! He set the tone for his sermon to us by reading from Paul's letter to the Romans chapter 14 verse 23  “But whoever has doubts is condemned if they eat, because their eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.” Pastor Daniel then underlined the point by quoting from Romans 1:17 “the righteous shall live by faith alone.”

Sin is not just a bad action.  Everything that does not come from faith is sin. This is not just a matter of what we do but of what we don't do. All of our choices in life, even day-to-day banalities, must be done in faith, rooted in faith.  Otherwise it is sin.

Pastor Daniel reminded us that not just pastors but all of us are called to live our lives daily in faith. Living is doing. He further emphasized the point from James brother of Jesus:

James 2:17 “In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.”

James 2:26 “As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.”

Stephen, whose example we followed closely last week, is held up as a man of faith because he exemplified his faith in not just what he said but what he did to his last breath under lethal persecution.

To enter the kingdom of heaven, we will each need to demonstrate our faith by what we do in difficult circumstances. God loves and cherishes not nominal Christians but rather, those who have demonstrated their faith under pressure.

We read from Hebrews 11:6 “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.”

In this faithless world we live in, God is seeking people who are bold like Daniel, Elijah, and Stephen in proclaiming faith. Pastor Daniel noted that today many are silent because they don't have real faith in the first place. These silent people are not fully devoted. What they do is out of their own desires not from faith and obedience. Such people are always learning but not convicted in faith enough to be interested in being doers.

So we read further from James 1:22 “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”

In short, we are instructed not to merely receive the Word, but to share it!

We all know that our Bible is full of stories of John the Baptist, the prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah and many others all preaching until they were violently cut off from doing so.

Our Lord  and Savior Jesus, when he finally left his disciples forty days after the resurrection, told them to go out and boldly preach the Gospel to the ends of the earth. We read Mark 16:15 “He said to them, 'Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.'”

Pastor Daniel reminded us that so many people – uncounted millions in America and far more around the world – are ignorantly living in sin, total darkness in this world. They are commonly addicted to alcohol, drugs, video games and much else - as we all know!. Sadly, they are not   even a little inhabited by the Holy Spirit.

Well, then?

If we ARE the exception, and have received the gift of faith, have been indwelt by the Holy Spirit, is it not terribly arrogant of us – unforgivably selfish - not to share this with others?

We read from John 3:5 “Jesus answered, 'Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit.'”   

if not we don't have salvation that way, what is the worth of all the rest there is in this world?

Nothing.

Worldly imperatives are far from God's way, as we read from Luke 16:15 “He said to them, 'You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.'”

So then, our silence is arrogance and ignorance because frankly we don't really have faith. We are just like the lukewarm congregants Jesus criticized through the aged Apostle John in Revelation 3:16 “So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth.” 

Each of us will have his faith will be measured by God by his actions. Power of the Gospel in you must be shared – that is God's command.  We must each of us, not just Pastor Daniel and Pastor John, fulfill the Great Commission to go out and spread the Good News to our little brothers, to our classmates, and to folks very unlike us at the other end of the world.

Yes - each of us.

Five days ago Pastor Daniel confronted us with what the witness of the Christ and the telling of the Good News can mean, in the account of Stephen's last encounter with the orthodox religionists of his day. He died rather than swerve from the Truth.

Pastor Daniel read to us extensively from Acts to acquaint us with the whole story:
Acts 6:8-15 “Now Stephen, a man full of God’s grace and power, performed great wonders and signs among the people. Opposition arose, however, from members of the Synagogue of the Freedmen (as it was called)—Jews of Cyrene and Alexandria as well as the provinces of Cilicia and Asia—who began to argue with Stephen. But they could not stand up against the wisdom the Spirit gave him as he spoke. Then they secretly persuaded some men to say, “We have heard Stephen speak blasphemous words against Moses and against God.”  So they stirred up the people and the elders and the teachers of the law. They seized Stephen and brought him before the Sanhedrin. They produced false witnesses, who testified, 'This fellow never stops speaking against this holy place and against the law. For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and change the customs Moses handed down to us.'  All who were sitting in the Sanhedrin looked intently at Stephen, and they saw that his face was like the face of an angel.”

Acts 7: 54-60 “When the members of the Sanhedrin heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 'Look,' he said, 'I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.' At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, 'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.' Then he fell on his knees and cried out, 'Lord, do not hold this sin against them.' When he had said this, he fell asleep.”

In his last breath Stephen forgave those who were stoning him, so that not only by his words but also by his attitude of forgiveness he set an example for all of us in imitating the Christ.

So then Pastor Daniel put it to himself, and to us: “Would I be able to die like Stephen?” All who live a proper Christian life will be hated by the world. In Scripture we are warned of this repeatedly:

2 Timothy 3:12 In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted

John 15:18 “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first.”

1 John 3:13 Do not be surprised, my brothers and sisters, if the world hates you.
​
Pastor Daniel put it to us very directly: if we are not running into opposition we must be loving the world.  He bid us to consider all of the martyrs written about in the Old Testament and in the New. Remember what those who would not listen to the Truth did to the prophet Isaiah – they put him inside a hollowed-out tree trunk and then sawed it in two. We must consider many places around the world today where the profession of our faith is downright dangerous.
Matthew 10:32-33 “Whoever acknowledges me before others, I will also acknowledge before my Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before others, I will disown before my Father in heaven.”

Matthew 10:28 “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.”
Finally, Pastor Daniel commended to us the example of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste.  The Roman co-emperor Licinius by the year 320 saw Christians as people committed to his rival co-emperor Constantine, and so he ordered that they be persecuted. One of his loyal officers rounded up 40 Christians from among the soldiers in Licinius's army and ordered that they be exposed naked on a frozen pond near the town of Sebaste (in what is now Armenia) that they might freeze to death. One of the Christians fell from faith and sought the comfort of a nearby warm bath. On the other hand, one of the guards enforcing the persecution observed the supernatural light around the faithful naked Christians. This guard then threw off his clothes to join the naked, freezing Christians in their death for faith.

Pastor Daniel closed by urging that we pray for faith, that we pray for courage and boldness in our faith in the face of all kinds of adversity, even unto death.

I have here further a story of Korean people today in the witness of true faith. The story is entitled “Live like your mother!” It is told by a pastor who does much work in China's north-east, very near the border with north Korea, to minister to north Koreans. He helps train north Korean refugees in China who have accepted Christ to return to north Korea (secretly, of course) to minister the Word to faithful people in north Korea:

​“In April of (2019), one of our trained evangelists in north Korea was martyred in north Korea's JS Prison. This prison camp has been known to be notoriously harsh on Christians. It is known that camp inmates die there every day; many attempt to escape but most are caught and returned. Many of those who are caught are thrown to hungry hounds. Many are beaten or lose flesh to dogs; many recaptured prisoners die. Prison officers want camp inmates to see what happens when they try to escape. Younghee came to our training facility in China and trained with us for five months in 2008. When she returned she planted an underground church. In three years, the number of secret believers increased to twelve. As her church grew her risk of exposure grew also. Finally she was exposed and sent to a political prison camp for an indefinite term. We had lost contact.

"None of her family knew what happened to Younghee. Some children thought her mother was in China. Through one of our workers, we were able to locate Younghee's prison camp. With her two children, our worker went to try to see Younghee on July 21, 2019. Upon their arrival at the prison, officers there told the children that Younghee had died in April 2019 and her body had been cremated. Upon hearing the news of their mother's death, her children began to weep inconsolably. One prison officer walked into the room and saw the older daughter of Younghee and said, 'you must be a daughter of Younghee. You just look like your mother.' He began to tell of his experience with Younghee. He continued, 'I have never seen such a strong and honest woman as your mother. When I told your mother, ‘I don’t understand why a person like you who is smart and lacks nothing believes in a God that we cannot see. If only you had denied your God, you would not have all this suffering. Don’t you regret being a Christian?’ Then your mother answered me back, ‘I have never regretted my faith and I do not regret it even now’. Eventually I assigned light work to her because she had become physically so weak. But she was strong in her faith. She was always helping other prisoners and she showed to all of us the essential dignity of being a God-believing person. The whole prison knew that she was a Christian as she shared her food and other basic necessities with other prisoners. She had the face of someone who lives in a different world. She was always comforting those who were lonely and in distress.'

"As the prison officer finished his testimony, he stood up and said, 'Even though it is hard to live in this world, you must live like your mother!.' As he was closing the door, he murmured, 'Younghee was a genuine believer.' As her children and our worker came out of JS Prison, they were wondering whether that prison officer became a believer in Jesus after knowing Younghee.”

What about each of us? Will we be like Younghee?

​New Year Twenty Twenty-one greetings to each and to everyone at Bethel Youth Ministry!

This last Lord's Day Pastor Daniel frankly acknowledged that none of us can know what is to come in 2021 despite our misgivings from 2020. But he affirmed to us that so long as we are FAITHFUL we are covered for our number-one goal, eternal salvation, come what may. Pastor Daniel then spent time illustrating for us just why this is so.

He first read to us from Proverbs 21 verses 30 and 31 “there is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the Lord. The horse is made ready for battle.” This is by way of affirming that whatever the whiles and schemes of Satan, still our God is superior.

Then Pastor Daniel got right down to it: “Did Covid-ridden 2020 cause you to fall from faith?”
It is a good question to ask, because the common assumption among human beings is that a good God should not cause bad things to happen, or even to allow them to happen. Yes, He does not cause bad things to happen, but from Romans 8:28 (“and we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose”) that He does allow good and bad things in life to happen together to bring about His purpose, which if we are His children, must be for our ultimate good, though we may not see it.

So, do we trust our God? Many, especially adults who believe that their own estimate of the good in life must also be the way God sees it, will lose faith, if they ever had it, when life does not go according to their own script. Hopefully in BYM we each have not become so old and forgetful that we have forgotten the love of a wise and loving parent and the trust that the mom or dad, who after all is just a human being, still inspires in us.

So then, do we trust our God?

Pastor Daniel read to us from Romans 8:35-39: “ Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written: 'For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.' No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

By now we all understand that among the consequences of a fleshly body and its moral imperfection is that sin draws us to the opposite of truth. So then, how many times have we asked ourselves: “is God is really with me?” But consider that if He sacrificed is Son on the cross that we each might be redeemed from the imperfection and slavery of sin, how can He not be with us? As Pastor Daniel urged upon us: don't mix up Satan's doings with God.

Inescapably but truly, if we have doubts about God and His purposes it is because we believe in ourselves and our own intellectual and physical powers. This is something that the world all around us strongly encourages in us from our earliest consciousness. We are each to be our own little gods in the playbook of the powers that be in this world. This attitude makes us amenable to their Satanic purposes, glittering though they be.

Again from Proverbs 21:31 “The horse is made ready for the day of battle, but victory rests with the Lord.” This is another way of saying “man proposes, but God disposes”. Teacher Rand from many decades of experience will sheepishly confirm that when he has thought of himself as most discerning and clever is when Our Lord has shown him to be most mistaken!

So, Pastor Daniel asked us, the survivors of 2020: are we sick and tired of living in defeat? He urged us two-fold:

Firstly, that we pray continually. Prayer is what connects us to God.

Again: PRAYER IS WHAT CONNECTS US TO GOD. Pastor Daniel wasn't talking about some self-help meditation, but about humble, submissive prayer to our Lord and Maker.
Secondly, that we walk by the Spirit. Pastor Daniel read to us Romans 8-1 “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”. This means that we, each of us, must follow His lead, rather than “living MY life.” By way of example, Pastor Daniel brought up Israelite King David, who was a sinner like the rest of us, except that being in a position of power, he could commit bigger sins than we can, and more readily. Remember the story of Uriah the Hittite's wife Bathsheba and how King David basically murdered Uriah as well as committed adultery with his wife? (read 2 Samuel chapter 11) But what ultimately matters is that for his many large sins King David was also very painfully and humbly repentant before God. That is key. Pastor Daniel illustrated King David's true heart by reading from Psalm 51 verses 10-11: “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.” That is what our God wants to see in each of us. As victorious Chrstians we are not even remotely perfect but through the inevitable ups and downs of life in this world we are repentant and submissive – daily!

Hopefully by now we get the message, and we know that our fears from 2020 going into the new year 2021 can be mastered and overridden. We read from Romans 6:14: “For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.” and we read from 1 Corinthians 15:57 “But thanks be to God! He gives us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

If we imperfect creatures have victory through Christ over sin, then for sure the rest of it – whatever transpires in 2021 – is really just anticlimax.

In true faith we can breathe easily – the victory is already ours!

​Last greetings for the year Twenty-twenty to each and every one of our Bethel Youth!  Three days ago Pastor John looked forward to the New Year, urging that with the new year we have a “new ear” by which to hear God's voice. 

Pastor John first read to us from the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 3 verses 13 through 17: “Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John. But John tried to deter him, saying, 'I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?' Jesus replied, 'Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.' Then John consented. As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, 'This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.'”

What is baptism but publicly being cleansed of our sins and being reborn to a totally new life in Christ? So we come to the worldly custom of New Year's Day generally being a day to start something of a new life through New Year's resolutions. The idea is to form new habits and gain a sense of reset, of restarting. We have a gnawing and constant desire to change – not just the outside of ourselves but the inside. Any number of self-help books are out there, as well as innumerable social media sites, offering advice in all this. Basically they all require us to strive for something better through our own strength (and how about now with the new year?)

They are all ultimately, and most of them very quickly, inadequate. They are not the answer. Jesus is. So, let us start with the beginning of real change, of a genuine reset.

Pastor John explained to us that Jesus’ baptism that we have just read about reveals how change comes, that the Gospel changes everything! With truly taking in the Good News we have gone from death to life, from selfishness to selflessness, from pride to humility, from anger to love, from anxiety to peace....from sin to holiness!

Progressing from sin to holiness is the ENTIRE point of our temporal existence. If we each do that, our lives have been successful no matter what else in our lives or about our lives. If we fail to do that, our lives have FAILED, no matter what else.

Knowing well enough about the dark, fallen world about us and the futility of all of the advertised ways of changing ourselves within the context of that world, let us consider the genuine article, the real “new”:

Pastor John read to us from 2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” That's a big “if”, but consider the infinite consequences! It is the only “new” that ever matters!

In the last book of the Bible we read Revelation 21:5 “Behold, I am making all things new.” God doesn’t simply make new things, He makes all things new. Jesus will take what is broken and falling apart and He will make it new! The distinction is of the utmost importance, as it is each of us who instead of being swept away into the eternal incinerator will be made...new!

Through baptism. 

What Jesus demonstrated to the world, and each of us, for our benefit, that we might emulate.

Baptism is a symbol of going from death to life...from being outside God’s family to being inside...from being a stranger to being a child of God.

The story of Jesus’s baptism parallels the story of Creation. In both cases there is water and the Spirit of God hovering over the surface. Remember from Genesis  “Let us make man…” forward to baptism “Let us save man… and make him new”. Who is this “us”? The triune God! God the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit acting as One.

Baptism is a sign of being made clean - Like taking a shower when you are dirty. It is very important to remember that we are speaking in the passive voice here: in baptism we are not cleansing ourselves of sin; we are being cleansed of sin. God does for us, through our non-resistance to His invitation, what we cannot do for ourselves!

Our New Year’s resolution is usually about US trying to clean up OURSELVES and get things in order. Pastor John reminded us that by contrast true repentance and change is about saying “I can’t clean myself before God!” We go to Jesus to change us and cleanse us and carry us. 

Pastor John also taught us that Jesus’ affirmation of baptism reveals the motivation to change  – God is more concerned with who each of us is becoming than who we presently are. Again we read from Matthew 3:17 “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”  

“Listen to Him!”

That means very practically that the more we lift up Jesus – in prayer, praise, and all worship -  the more we change for the better. The key to a changed life is to KNOW we are children of God – each of us.

God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” So we are no longer slaves to sin, but God’s children; and since we are his children, God has made us also heirs. This we understood from reading from Paul's letter to the Galatians 4:6-7.
 
Beloved!  

God wants to be the LOUDEST VOICE in our lives. He says “This is my beloved child!” So, the voice we each choose to hear will determine how each of us lives his life.

Altogether different from all of those self-help books and social media gurus, right?

Child-like!

“When people ask me how they should approach performance, I always tell them the professional musician should aspire to the state of the beginner.”  Pastor John noted that this is the famed Cellist Yo-Yo Ma saying that a real musician should not be tied-up in knots with worry during a performance but instead he or she should play with the abandon of an ignorant child. We read in Matthew 18 verse 3 that Jesus told us that we had to be like children in our not being tied up in knots about worldly things, if we want to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

Finally we read in one of the last books of the Old Testament - Zephaniah 3:17 "The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."

If in the New Year we have a new ear to hear, surely come what may He will quiet us with His love.

Thank you Lord – that almighty assurance is all we need to hear!

We read from 2 Timothy 3:1-5 “But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.”

Reread the above verses. Really now: doesn't that situation look and sound too familiar to each of us from our daily experiences of the world all around us today – right now?

But Pastor Daniel cautions us that we, each of us, are called to be different...growing not in sinfulness but in godliness. Yes, it is hard to keep faith in these worldly sinful surroundings but...if we cherish Jesus Christ and His word we will be completely excluded from the coming judgment.  God will deliver us as He delivered Daniel's friends from Nebuchadnezzar's fiery furnace . Jesus came the first time 2000 years ago to save us and in so doing to demonstrate God's love. He is coming again, as we know from Scripture. In His second coming He will be as judge not as savior. He will, as it were, segregate sheep from goats, wheat from chaff.  Non-believers and fake believers out will be segregated from the small minority of mankind who are true believers. As we read in Matthew 22 verse 14 “many are called (to the “wedding feast), but few are chosen” (actually make themselves presentable to attend through their belief and matching conduct.)

What of each of us, then?

If we truly, believe, keep on believing, and continually behave as if we really do believe, then the caution we receive about the elect few of God is our confidence...not of our time in this world but from the Word. We read in Ecclesiastes 7:1 “A good name is better than fine perfume, and the day of death better than the day of birth.”  

Since we know from Scripture above that in God's good time all will be destroyed, we ought to live holy lives not fearful but confident of deliverance from whatever may come. We repose no confidence in anything of this world, a place of temporary sojourn for each true believer.    

Remember the part of the Gospel of John where Jesus has His interview with the Samaritan woman?  Let us listen again to the conversation already underway in John 4: 21-41 “'Woman,' Jesus replied, 'believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.' The woman said, 'I know that Messiah' (called Christ) 'is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.' Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.' Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?” Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people,  'Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?' They came out of the town and made their way toward him.....Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, 'He told me everything I ever did.' So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers. They said to the woman, 'We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world'”.

Wednesday mid-December warm hello to BYM!

In his efforts to have all of us well-prepared for Christmas by understanding what this “glory” that we have heard of concerning Christmas all our lives really is, Pastor John read to us from Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 10 verse 31 “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” 

All his life of ministry Paul had to fight against two tendencies that could derail Christian belief and life: one was “legalism”. This was what Jewish converts were more prone to fall into; that Christ's sacrifice on the cross was not enough; that they had yet to earn salvation through adherence to the Mosaic law that is fully detailed in the Book of Deuteronomy. The other pitfall Paul fought against tended to beset non-Jewish converts to a life in Christ. This was libertinism. This idea was that “since Christ's death on the cross saved me once and for all, I can do whatever I want during the rest of my life.” No Christians seemed more prone to this grave error than the Corinthians, since Corinth in Greece was from its early days like the stereotype of Las Vegas of the Mediterranean world: all manner of sin and vice flourished there. The Apostle Paul had repeatedly to caution the Corinthian Christians that if they truly believed, then they would sacrifice their own sinful pleasures to demonstrate their thankfulness for salvation through the Christ's sacrifice. The bottom line, as expressed in the verse above, was that they (and we) should consciously and continually use our freedom of choice to glorify God. 

Pastor John illustrated this by reminding us of his participation in a 5-kilometer run for charity when he was a high school student. The destination of the run was clear - the finish line! But there were distractions en route, chief among them the local Burger King. Our future Pastor John and his chums barely finished the race, so distracted were they. 

What about us? 

As Pastor John says, when we have a destination, we have a direction. Ultimately, our final destination and goal in life is to glorify God. That’s the bottom line. 

That goal - our purpose - is to ASCRIBE glory to the Lord. This is different from giving glory to Him, since it is He who already has it all! The difference just means that we are putting God at the front of our lives. Psalm 29 verse 2 says it really well: “Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness.” 

Pastor John reminds us that to glorify God, to ascribe glory to God, means  making God number one, the first priority, in every part of our lives, in everything we say and do. Hence the Apostle Paul's admonition: “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” 

It is not in the first place about action. It is firstly about intention. Created in God's image, we are not robots. We can and must make choices during our brief temporal journey on this earth, in this fallen world.  We are conscious beings and have the FREEDOM to choose God over everything else. 

Will we? 

Pastor John cautions us that glorifying God is not a matter of will power, it’s about a genuine RESPONSE. It begins by our encountering the glory of God. From Scripture  we have many examples of heroes and prophets of faith encountering the glory of God: 

Isaiah – “Woe is me! For I am lost!” 

Moses – “He put a veil over his face.” 

Peter – “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man!” 

John – “When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.” 

God's glory never makes us say, “Come!”; the tremendous apparition or experience of God's  glory always makes us say, “Depart!” As the above examples illustrate, it is utterly overwhelming.

​Pastor John flashed us the cute picture of Noah's Ark that you all knew from your time in preschool here at church. Then he followed with a picture of the Ark when God's wrath against sinful man is coming down as storm water. That is God's glory; scary to the Nth degree to those actually experiencing it. How could it be otherwise? He is God, and we are not. 

Pastor John then gave us this perfect gem: the glory of the cross is God's love and wrath in perfect combination. As he rephrased it, the cross is where  God’s LOVE and God's HOLINESS are in PERFECT union. How glorious! 

As Pastor John has noted before, the Sun gives off light; the Moon can only reflect light given off by the Sun. So also with us; glorifying God means REFLECTING His Love. As we are eternally grateful for the gift of salvation, so we seek to imitate the Author of our salvation, His only begotten Son. So we read Paul's admonition in Romans 8:29: “to be conformed to the image of his Son.”

God had to send Jesus to perfectly reflect God and His love because we, sinful mankind from Adam forward, had failed to do so. But fallen Adam did get the promise of the ultimate redemption of mankind and its fruit is contained in this verse John 13:34: "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another." 

This command is fundamentally new because it says “as I have loved you”.  This is a key difference between the Old Covenant and the New. We have now known our Savior in the flesh. So we should imitate and reflect to others accordingly: 1 Peter 1:16 "You shall be holy, for I am holy.” This means that we, each of us, a temple and dwelling place for God. We are again reminded of this from 1 Corinthians 6:19-20: "Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body." 

The temple in Jerusalem was as beautiful specimen of mega-architecture as the ancient world had to offer. But within the Temple the priests were always busy with the slaughter of animals as part of the duties of sacrifice prescribed in the Book of Deuteronomy. As Pastor John noted, at the end of his day's duties at the Temple a priest commonly came home with his garments heavily stained with blood. Jesus's sacrifice abolished all that, and instead we, each of us, became His temple! 

Think about that: the body, the life, that each of us has is God's temple of which we are custodians. Our bodies are for God's glory and we are charged to be mindful of that always. Doesn't that basic realization weigh powerfully on the choices we make even hourly in our lives? Wash your face, stand up straight, and infinitely much more!

​So the glory of Christmas is that Jesus, being God incarnate, perfectly reflects who God is. He is loving and He is Holy. The baby Jesus in the manger was headed for the cross – the place where God is most glorified – but His ultimate destination was not a place, but each of us!  

The glory of Christmas is the ultimate inspiration and prompt for each of us to make Jesus our destination of holiness.

Hallelujah!

​Glorious December greetings to every worshipper in our Bethel Youth Ministry! In humble faith in our Savior and constant obedience to Him, may we be primed to know true glory! Indeed, this glory is what Pastor John is carefully preparing us for this Christmas season of 2020. 

This last Lord's Day he got us underway once more by reading from the Gospel written by our fellow gentile and the Apostle Paul's traveling companion, doctor Luke, chapter 1, verses 26 through 38: “In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, 'Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.' Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be.  But the angel said to her, 'Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David,  and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.' 'How will this be,' Mary asked the angel, 'since I am a virgin?' The angel answered, 'The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.' 'I am the Lord’s servant,' Mary answered. 'May your word to me be fulfilled.' Then the angel left her.”

​Pastor John then had us consider the WAIT, a matter of time. This teenaged Jewish girl Mary was already engaged to be married to Joseph, a carpenter. She was a perfectly well-behaved young maiden fully observing all of the strict Mosaic law expected of her. And the angel had the most incredible message for her, for which nothing of her life experience could prepare her for but for which her strong inner faith in God did prepare her.

As Pastor John reminded us, Mary was thinking carefully about what she was being told. In Luke  1:29 - “But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be” and again in Luke 1:34 – “How will this be…?”  She would have to wait for the miracle to be fulfilled, the same as her elderly kinswoman Elizabeth, mother-to-be of John the Baptist. Anyway, through this humble, faithful girl God would give the fallen world the greatest gift – the gift of salvation – the Savior, the Messiah, the Christ – Jesus!

Jesus.

The name "Jesus" is the English from the Latin Iesus from the Greek Ἰησοῦς (Iésous) from the Hebrew ישוע (Yeshua) which is the shortened form for יְהוֹשֻׁעַ  (Yehoshua) a name which comes from the Hebrew verbיָשַׁע (yasha), which means to save. To get Yehoshua, the verb was combined with the Hebrew consonants for God Y-H-W-H. So in short, the name "Jesus" means “God rescues”.

(BTW the Korean 예수 [yesu] comes more directly from the original Hebrew used at the time of the Christ's earthly ministry. Just as Pastor John has said, Korean school can be worth it!)

Now, we can all recall that a short time back Pastor John soon came to realize the worth of a friend's gift of simple anti-acid medications. A worthy gift they were. But how much more desperately has all of fallen mankind needed the gift of salvation? From the time of Adam! The worth of the gift of the Christ comes in our realizing how desperately we need this gift!

Pastor John shared with us something of his family Christmas traditions: No trees, no gifts. But he had as a boy a great yearning for years for this special toy train set. One Christmas it finally came. There was great excitement because the WAIT WAS WORTH IT. 

​The pharmaceutical giant Pfizer has apparently developed a usable Covid-19 vaccine. Its worth and value is commonly held high because of the WAIT for it by billions of people.

There is the obvious featherweight of a paper $100 bill. But a father taught his child the true WEIGHT of the $100 bill through cashing in for pennies. It was a huge weight; far more pennies than can be carried. It was a graphic way for the child to understand the true weight of the $100 bill.

​​Back to the interview with the angel Gabriel: humble, very careful Mary had to consider the WEIGHT of what she was being told. Her faith must have been so great as nothing in her life up to that point could have given her worldly preparation to calculate and accept what she was being told. We read again Luke 1:38 “and Mary said, 'Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.'”So, fully comprehending what she heard, in the greatest faith Mary was TRUSTING and SUBMITTING. In worldly terms she was taking a big risk – a broken engagement and complete social ostracism at least; possibly even being stoned to death if someone wanted to make an example of her. But, she said toi the angel Gabriel  “May it be according to your word” or “May everything you said about me come true”

Such courage from the faith of this young girl!

Mary with careful attention but without hesitation chose to bear the weight of the unique divine conception. Such is the inevitable weight of obedience which is true glory. We bear the weight of obedience because Jesus took on the greatest burden of obedience for us. In the Garden of Gethsemane when facing imminent arrest, show trial and crucifixion He did say to the Father “Not my will, but yours be done”as Mary had earlier “May it be according to your word”

The story of Christmas tells us that in the person of the Son, God became breakable, fragile - someone who can get hurt. He did so because He wanted to RESCUE US (remember: Jesus means “God Rescues”). God is holy, and yet approachable through Jesus our Savior and Intercessor. As Pastor John reminded us, in Jesus, we are made righteous and we are loved and we are safe. When we could not bear the heaviness of sin and the weight of glory (God’s holiness), Jesus took on that weight for us.

​So again we read Romans 8:18: “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.” Here at Christmas!

Again, Jesus took on the greatest weight of obedience in the Garden of Gethsemane. 

More than our waiting on Jesus - Jesus is waiting on us with the weight of His sacrifice for us. 

True glory – hallelujah!

Early December greetings – brisk hellos – to each and every one of our Bethel Youth Ministry community!

Three days ago Pastor John read to us from the Gospel of John chapter 1 verse 14: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

Alright then, what is this “glory”?  Well one dictionary definition is “praise, honor, or distinction extended by common consent”. That definition is not lame but it is pretty tame; God's glory is infinitely more intense in character:

Read from the Book of Exodus chapter 3, verses 1 through 7: “Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. So Moses thought, “I will go over and see this strange sight—why the bush does not burn up.” When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!” And Moses said, “Here I am.”  “Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” Then he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.”

God's glory is so great that Moses could not come near, and he hid his face in fear of God's tremendous glory. Much later Moses is required to go up Mount Sinai alone to receive the Ten Commandments. He comes back down, and we read:

Exodus 34: 30-35  “When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, his face was radiant, and they were afraid to come near him. But Moses called to them; so Aaron and all the leaders of the community came back to him, and he spoke to them. Afterward all the Israelites came near him, and he gave them all the commands the Lord had given him on Mount Sinai. When Moses finished speaking to them, he put a veil over his face. But whenever he entered the Lord’s presence to speak with him, he removed the veil until he came out. And when he came out and told the Israelites what he had been commanded, they saw that his face was radiant. Then Moses would put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with the Lord.”

And also in the New Testament for instance the Gospel of Matthew 17:1-8 “After six days Jesus took with him Peter, James and John the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. There he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light. Just then there appeared before them Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus. Peter said to Jesus, 'Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.' While he was still speaking, a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, 'This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!'  When the disciples heard this, they fell facedown to the ground, terrified. But Jesus came and touched them. 'Get up,' he said. 'Don’t be afraid.' When they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus.”

By now we get it: God's glory is nothing like the usual human concept. It is a good, great, but fearful thing! God's glory bespeaks the essential difference between the Creator and any of His creations, including us.

Us. 

Imperfect, sinful, condemned us. But unfathomably so beloved by Him that he set in motion the most improbable, incredible rescue plan.

For us!

It was He, and He first took form as a helpless infant.

For many centuries the western world, and lately the whole world, has celebrated the birthday of Jesus of Nazareth, of the House of David, the Christ, in late December. We call it Christmas Day, in fact! The Christ, the Messiah, Our Savior, came to earth as a helpless infant on that day we say. 

Our Savior a helpless infant. Let us meditate on that incongruity for a moment. We shall seek to resolve it!

For many centuries the western world, and lately the whole world, has celebrated the birthday of Jesus of Nazareth, of the House of David, the Christ, in late December. We call it Christmas Day, in fact! The Christ, the Messiah, Our Savior, came to earth as a helpless infant on that day we say. 

Our Savior a helpless infant. Let us meditate on that incongruity for a moment. We shall seek to resolve it!​

“Became flesh” means that Jesus became TANGIBLE and real to us. He is God’s tangible expression of love to us. Now at some point in our lives (hopefully!) we each find one special person who we like (well, love) so much that we want to hold on to that person to the end of our days. So we marry, and symbolically the union between us and our special person, we slip rings on to ring fingers. As Pastor John said “If you liked it then you should have put a ring on it". That is love. How much more God's love that in baby Jesus He came not only to bring the message of good news, but He IS the Good News. God is love such that the Word became flesh.
 
In Jesus God became VULNERABLE. This right from the start. Who could be more vulnerable than a helpless infant? Thus began God's mission to us in human form, who could eat and drink and be angry and weep. Pastor John read to us from Hebrews 4:15 “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.”

God became weak and vulnerable so that we, who are weak and vulnerable, can approach him.  As we know about the glory of God, how else could He become approachable?

Onward in Hebrews 4:16 “Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

This teaches us that if Jesus became vulnerable for us, we can become vulnerable in our relationships with each other. We can learn to focus not on “having my needs met”, but on “meeting your needs.”  It allows us to see Jesus as one who died for us to meet our need as condemned by imperfection to burn for our sin. It is the only way to destroy sin without destroying us.

Many or most of us are too young to know the depths of despair.

Yet.

But keep in mind the picture of the person feeling quite beat up by recent vicissitudes in life. In the black depths of despair, this person says “I  prayed and God did not answer my prayers.”

Well, the human Jesus prayed in the garden – sweated blood in fact - but still felt abandoned on the cross. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” as He stared into the black abyss of Hell. Through Jesus our intercessor, our father God knows our travails in this life, to an acute degree. Before we even know them, in fact!

The baby Jesus was God who dwelt among us, new arrived on earth.

As Pastor John said, “dwelt among us” means at its root “pitched a tent” or “tabernacled.”  A  tabernacle was a tent where God dwelt for worship by his itinerant faithful (the Israelites wandering in the desert). Now, in the Old Testament to encounter the glory of God was fatal; it was just too much for people to handle. Remember how Moses had to go up Mount Sinai by himself to be in God's glory to receive the Ten Commandments? So, God “concealed” His glory in the Holy of Holies in the tabernacle. Recall God's very detailed instructions to the Israelites for crafting the tabernacle in Exodus chapters 25 through 31?

By contrast, in the New Testament, the Apostle John writes (John 1:14) that “...we have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son…”   Jesus became flesh and dwelt among us so that we can have full access to God. Again, just the little bit of glory that God could show Moses was like sunlight hitting the moon. And even that was too much for Israelites at the base of the mountain. All this about approachability again reminds us, as Pastor John so necessarily emphasizes, that belief in the Christ – true Christianity – is not about religion but about relationships. As we believe so through His love we are adopted into His family, as co-heirs of the portion of the Son, to enjoy forever. When 33 years later the infant Jesus died on the cross in human maturity for our sins, the Father's unapproachability was cancelled, as the veil in the temple in Jerusalem that separated the glory of God from His people was torn from top to bottom. Salvation was never anything we could possibly achieve. But through the life and sacrifice of the vulnerable Jesus, it was something that we now receive.