The Goodness of God

  This weekend Pastor Fred preached on Mark 10:17-27 and the goodness of God. The essence of the story is where the rich young ruler who came up to Jesus and asked Him what he needed to do to be saved and I love Jesus response to the rich young ruler. His response when the ruler called Him good was that the only person who is good is God. With this definition of good, do we need to change our definition of what good means. We often throw this word around when we are talking about what we just ate, to the style of music we prefer to how we view people. In essence our view and definition of good can be very subjective and it almost has a different meaning to when we are either talking about food or people. Gods definition of good is essential to His character and Who He is. His goodness comes out because God is holy and righteous. His goodness comes out because He is not only love, but His love is perfect. If Gods love came out of anger, it would make Him scary and a thug. As people we often call things that are a holy good bad and things that aren’t holy, but somehow serve our self interest good. So here is my question, do we redefine what or who we call good and do we need to use Gods standard of what good is? The only way we can do this is if we are transformed by Gods goodness and His grace.

  The other thing that caught my eye is the ruler asked what he needed to do to be saved. Jesus question was that of, have you kept the law? The rulers response was an overwhelming yes and Jesus answer back to the rulers response was piercing because He told him to go and sell off everything he owned and to follow Him. The rulers response walked away depressed because he held those valuables higher than his relationship with God. A couple of things struck me in this passage and the first one is how as people we like list. This pertains more to guys, because we like to know what is expected and just give us that list so we can cross things off. I know when I do this I get a sense of accomplishment, but here is the thing, when we do this, we often care more about doing and not the relationship. Also, often we do it on our own strength and not Gods. This plays into my second thought which is that we think we can earn our salvation. If we do the right tor say the right things and not do certain things and speak a certain way, God will have to love us and let us into heaven. In essence we embrace the worldly philosophy of karma of doing more good than bad and we don’t rely on the grace of God. According do the church reformer Martin Luther, we can only be saved by grace and faith alone. Our actions do matter, bit without faith in God and His grace they are pointless. In Matthew 7 people come to God promoting all of their good works, but God turns them away because they did those things on their terms and we’re trying to earn salvation in hopes of pleasing God.

   My final thought is this. Are we more concerned with doing or being? Doing is more about earning our salvation and what I can do for God. When we do this, we tend to spin our wheels and are never completely satisfied. When we are more concerned about being, we live in Gods grace and our faith leads us to what to do. When we know we are in God and live in Gods grace, we tend to live in peace. What we do is based on who we are in God and that we don’t need to earn our salvation and we know what our mission is. When we live this way, we are not defined by our possessions or what we do, because we are defined by God and His Goodness. God doesn’t say that possessions are bad, but are we are we letting those things have more importance in our life than they should. In essence, are we worshipping the created instead of the Creator? So here is my question, are we like the rich young ruler who is defined by what he does and have? Also, how do we make the transition of going from doing to being?  My final question is this. How does the goodness of God and His grace transform our lives to the point of what we do and how we interact with others?

  

To Be Known

   

  This week Pastor Ben preached out of the book of Exodus and he started in chapter three when Moses encountered God at the burning bush. As God and Moses were talking, one of the questions that got kicked around is both parties asking the question of Who Are You? The song who Are You by the rock group The Guess Who came to mind as Ben was preaching, especially the line from the song “cause I really got to know” comes to mind. This got me thinking, as people, we want to know others and be known by others. God created us to be relational people, not only with Him but with others also. God has several names as Ben discussed such as Adonai, El Shaddi, and the ultimate name of I Am. Each of these names convey something about Gods character and who He is. We are the same, we are all called something different, depending on the group we are with. For me in high school I was known as Tommy, or in college Big Tom because of my size and my roommate was also named Tom. Finally, my family nickname is Shep. Often our names says something about us or comes from an important event in our lives. So here is my question for us, what prevents us from being known and knowing God? How often do we pull an Adam and Eve, and we put on fig leaves and hide from Him or others? This is often done by hiding behind screens or not completely being honest with ourselves, others, and God. 

  I think the other part of being known and knowing others is defining the relationship. Every couple, especially those who are married often have the “DTR” or defining the relationship conversation to find out where their relationship is not only going, but what they are to each other. Jesus has this conversation with the disciples when He asked them Who Do You Say That I Am?” Moses and God had the exact conversation Moses was wondering what he should tell the Israelites who sent him. Moses has been oh in the desert herding sheep for forty years as he was letting things cool down in Egypt after killing the Egyptian. Moses had to come to realty of who God was not only in all the universe but who God was to him. He also had to come to terms with how God saw him and how he wanted to use Moses to make His name great and bring the nation of Israel back into relationship with Himself. So here are some thoughts to ponder, the first one is, who do we say that God is? To paraphrase a C.S. Lewis put it, is God a liar, lunatic or is He really who He says He is and what does that mean for us. Something else to ponder, why do we have such a difficult time seeing how God sees us. We tend to live on one extreme of we are better than we really are or that we are worthless garbage and we can swing from side to side quite frequently. Remember, we are created in the image of God. 

  My final observation is that Jesus came and lived a life that we couldn’t live and took our punishment that He didn’t deserve so that we can be made whole again. Jesus did this so that we can know God and be in right relationship with Him. If we want to know who God is and what His character is, we can look at Jesus. I will close with this, with God making the statement of I Am, it means that He is all that and a bag of chips. God is eternal and hasn’t changed nor will He ever change and we can take this to the bank. God wants us to know Him intimately and vice versa, nor only so we can spend eternity with Him, but so He can be praised and that His will would be done on earth as it is in heaven 

Grace and Peace

Tom Boustead

Worship

 

  This weekend, Pastor Fred preached on worship and for me, when I think about worship, I tend to gravitate to John 4:24 where we are commanded to worship God in spirit and in truth. We could spend several weeks talking about worship and what it looks like, but here are some observations. The first one is that God doesn’t need our worship and if He did, it would mean that He is a narcissist. God doesn’t need are approval or worship. Does He desire it, yes, but He doesn’t need it. Worship means that we are in a relationship with Him and that is what He desires and what we are created for. 

  My second observation is that worship is a response to something or someone. God did not create us to be robots who are programed to worship Him because that is the only thing we know. God gave us a free will which means that we have a choice to worship Him. Every day we have countless choices to either put God first and worship Him or worship something else. Worship is more than prayer, Bible readings and singing. Worship is how we perform at our place of employment, how we parent, to how we interact with each other, especially those who get under our skin. So here is my question, do we worship the Creator of all the world, or the created things in the world? Remember, worshipping the created is bowing down to idols that either we have or others have created to be more important than God.

  My third observation is that true worship will take us out of our comfort zone. It means more than singing songs that are not our favorites and in the style we can’t get behind. True worship maybe is switching jobs three years before retirement that has a pay cut. Or how abut adopting a teenager because they don’t have a family? In all honesty, true worship not only will take us out of our comfort zone, but it will often cost us something great. Are we willing to be obedient and have eternity in mind or do we care more about our comfort and safety? Worship doesn’t call up to be stupid, but maybe to live on the edge a ltlle more and be obedient in faith. What is that thing that God is calling you that’s way out of your control and comfort zone?

  My final observation is that worship is about who or what we love. Jesus tells us that we are to love God with everything we have and to love our neighbor as ourselves. Godly worship demands everything we have and yes sometimes it is hard work. Pastor Haven has a quote that he shares with the youth frequently of “when it’s the hardest to worship, that’s when you worship the hardest.” I have also heard that when it’s the hardest to be at church, that’s when you need the church and God the most. When we worship with all we have, it will be difficult at times but are we making it a priority? Also, what are the things that prevent you from worshipping with all you have? 

  This weekend was a great time of worship as a community of believers. We got to witness baptisms in each of the services and the awesome part was witnessing the eight youth who made that proclamation of faith through baptism. Baptism is our response or worship to what God is doing in and through us. We also got to worship by gathering together to eat great food and to raise money to help the Gilboy’s be obedient to Gods calling their life. I will close with this, we can not or should not only worship God in a vacuum or by ourselves. Worship is to be done on an individual basis and also with other people. Remember that God tells us to make a joyful noise, with everything we have and that it doesn’t have to be in the right key. 

Grace and Peace 

Tom Boustead  

What’s Your Story?

   

  This week we had the privilege of hearing from Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge and for those who don’t know, Teen Challenge is a Christian treatment program for men who have struggled with drug or alcohol addiction. They minister through song and personal testimony. As I was talking with one of the guys after the Saturday night service a couple of things hit me when hearing his story. The first one is that when we get that nagging gut feeling it’s often God nudging us to do something. How often do we know we should do something but we find every excuse to not do it, but God keeps bringing it up. When we finally do it, God provides a way for it to happen and something usually wonderful happens. 

  The second thing I realized is that we can either run and hide from our issues or deal with them. A lot of the guys who go to Teen Challenge, it’s either a choice between prison or the treatment program at Teen Challenge. It’s a choice either to prison and yes serve time, but the issues don’t have to be dealt with. By going to Teen Challenge, the guys are taking responsibility for their choices and are looking to deal and beat their addiction. The work is long and hard, but they get to know and be transformed by Gods grace while developing healthy community.

  We may not have an addiction to drugs or alcohol, but all of us have things we struggle with. My question is, are we willing to admit our struggles and put in the hard work to deal with them or do we brush them off or even try and hide them. Eventually those struggles and sin will come to light and be known by the world. They usually come out at the wrong time and wrong place.

  So here is my question. What is your story? What are the things you have struggled with and overcome, are you willing to be like the guys from Teen Challenge? They are vulnerable enough to share their stories and struggles with complete strangers and we have a hard time doing it with people we know. What would it take for you to either share your struggles with someone or hear theirs?

  My story is this, I have stifled with my weight for most of my life and it has lead to some issues like being diabetic, skin infections and other issues. About sixteen months ago I spent a week in the hospital because I was retaining fluid and I was a hurtin. Through some lifestyle adjustments and medication changes, I have dropped about 125 lbs and my diabetes is under control and I’m seeing my dr less, which is a good thing. I now can breath  and move better. One of the things I enjoy doing is going to local state parks to take pictures. The two pictures above is of me at Grand Portage State Park a couple of weeks ago and I don’t know if I could have done that sixteen months ago. So what is your story of how Gods grace has changed you and are you sharing it to encourage others?