As a pastor I have lots of people come to me with problems in their life that are very sad. It is one of the heaviest responsibilities of being in ministry. Seeing the problems and hearing the stories is difficult, but the worst part is not being able to fix things. I give counsel and admonish and I pray my heart out, and sometimes things get better and everything turns around, but most often nothing changes. Bad habits, low self-worth, selfishness, lack of self control, engrained dysfunctional behavior takes over and the bad choices continue. It is a mystery to me why people will continue to do things that have created their problems and they know it, but can’t seem to stop, or don’t want to stop. My resolve and commitment is to pray more than I have. To pray for myself for more wisdom to give better advice and to encourage and motivate more effectively so people will make better choices. To pray for people that God would protect and deliver them from the control and temptations of the devil and his demons. To pray that God would give strength to those struggling so they can resist and conquer bad habits. I am also resolved not to allow myself to become cynical, judgmental, or defeated but to persevere in loving, serving, praying and helping as God gives opportunity.

In 1 Corinthians 13 in the New Testament of the Bible it says that the three greatest things in life are Faith, Hope and love. I think we would agree about love being super important, and we all understand that without faith a relationship with God would be impossible, but what about hope? We tend to define hope as “wishful thinking” like ” I hope it happens” meaning maybe it will, maybe it won’t. It is hard to imagine that definition of hope would make it one of the most important words in life. The word hope as a noun in the New Testament means ” a positive expectation of a future event”. This event that is referred to is entrance into heaven. This hope when it is in us as strong as love and faith controls every aspect of our life. It is like all day long the thought “I am going to heaven, I am going to heaven, I am going to heaven! Most of us need to work at growing to be much more loving than we are because we are so naturally selfish, most of us need to grow strong in our faith and are like the disciples of Jesus when He said to them “Oh you of little faith, why did you doubt?” And very few of us are strong in hope where the thought, “I am going to heaven, I am going to heaven” just keeps going round and round in our heads. Most thoughts repeated constantly would get boring, but the thought of going to heaven is so amazing that it just keeps getting more and more exciting. People with strong hope look forward with great longing to their impending death not in a morbid way but as an amazing graduation into an incomprehensible existence. I sing all day long a song with a hundred different tunes but only four words, ” I’me going to heaven”. I am anxious to end this life and get my new body, but I have so much more I want to do and I want to become so much more than I am in character. Kind of like being between a rock and a hard place.

The warnings in the Bible about bitterness are everywhere. Simply put there probably isn’t anything we can do even just a little bit that has more consequence to it than being bitter and its coralarys. The opposite is to forgive anybody of anything quickly no matter how bad what they did to us is and no matter how many times they have done what they have done. It seems a bit overboard to say it like that but Jesus is quite clear on this. We have been forgiven of everything by Him because of His death on a cross, and He commands that we forgive quickly anybody of anything. The consequences of failing to do this is Jesus not forgiving our sins, which means He will not hear our prayers, we will not have peace or joy, we won’t be able to understand the bible, we won’t have any power, and many more equally bad deals. The way I have learned to deal with these situations where I feel hurt, offended, irritated, or just plain judgmental about their life style or performance especially as it relates to and affects my life or the life of someone close to me is to make them a major recipient of my prayers for a season. In the evening when I do most of my praying I think of anyone who I am annoyed with all the way up to hate and every feeling or attitude in between. I pray God’s blessings on them and then ask God to give me the strength to forgive them as He has forgiven me. Every time a negative thought pops into my head about this person I pray, “Father, thank You for forgiving me of all my sins, I choose to forgive this person of all that they have done because You have forgive me. Please bless them with great success in life.”

I have a spot in behind my shop where I throw the trimmings from when we prune our fruit trees as well as scraps from wood projects and Seth puts brush and lawn clippings back there from his lawn maintanence business. I usually burn the pile twice a year, but this spring the normal burn season was cut short because of our dry spring so my burn pile was close to the size of Mt Hood. I decided to burn it today and with tha fairly strong wind coming from tha South I figured that if I started it on the North side of the pile, the side closest to the shop the fire wouldn’t have worked itself up to a really big fire until it was away from the shop a bit, plus the wind wouldn’t be making it worse because it would be blowing in the direction where it had already burned. So I did manage to burn the pile without burning my shop down, but I did singe my hair, my beard and my eye lashes. With a good pair of scissors I think I fixed it so I look alright for church tonight and tomorrow. Every year when I burn the pile, as I stand there keeping an eye on it leaning on my pitchfork, I can’t help wondering what hell is like and what it will feel like to be there. The Bible’s description of it reminds me of my big rip roaring burn pile. I know many deny the existence of hell and that is nice, but I know God is a God of justice so what happens to people like those yesterday who slaughtered all those innocent people? Some would say they just cease to exist, turn into dirt when they die and that is the end of them. I think I will just believe that the Bible is true and that hell is a real place with real people going there and Heaven is a real place with real people going there. I think I will believe the Bible as well in how I can know for sure that I am going to heaven.

I have been reading on the internet news various articles and reports about the terrorist attacks and killings in Paris today. It is sad and sobering to read how evil and cruel people can be to other people. I guess it has always been this way. We went on a short term mission trip to Bosnia 20 years ago shortly after the war there was over and heard awful stories of torture, cruelty, and mass slaughter of innocent people. In 2002 we went to Sierra Leone shortly after the war there was over and heard the stories of children having their arms cut off and many other horrific descriptions of thousands being slaughtered who were woman and children and other innocent people being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Those who are good people in positions of power and influence think, write and talk about what we can do to fix our human problem of evil. The idea of fixing the world so these kinds of atrocities were a thing of the past is noble, but it seems for all the efforts things are getting worse. The Bible talks about a day that is coming when Jesus will come to the earth different than His first visit as a baby. This second coming will be as a King and He will rule the world. That will be a time when there is no war and cruelty and meanness. The devil will be bound in the pit and Christ will rule. I believe this with all my heart and in the midst of present news it is my hope, and joy, and security.

Hebrews 11:6
And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.

Fairly regularly I hear or read someone saying that we shouldn’t try to please God. That He accepts us as we are, and has forgiven us of everything so just relax. That statement assumes we are trying to please God to be accepted by Him, but I want to please God to bring Him pleasure, to give Him joy, as an expression of love for all He has done for me. The activity that will bring great pleasure to Him is when I seek Him diligently. To want to have an intimate relationship with Him that is real. My seeking God is a result of a strong faith that He exists and that He really does want us to want Him.

Jesus’s harshest critisms of His disciples was when they displayed weak faith. On several occasions even getting a bit angry at them for their lack of faith. On the other hand He got quite excited over the faith of a Roman Centerian and declared that He had not seen such great faith in all of Israel. In Romans it says that Abraham grew strong in faith. I want to have strong faith and to be growing stronger all the rest of my life. Jesus said that if I had faith even as small as a mustard seed I can move mountains and nothing will be impossible for me. That is exciting to think about, having great faith and accomplishing great things. So the question is obvious, how do I grow my weak faith into strong faith. If Jesus scolded weak faith and praised great faith I must be responsible, he would not hold people accountable for something they had no control over. So as I study the Bible it looks like growing my faith is like growing tomatoes, there are some basic disciplines that if practiced faithfully results in a growing faith soon to become great. Now that is a journey worth taking. I will be preaching on how to grow our faith this weekend. Next week I will share the principles that I believe causes our faith to grow like a weed.

Our house is about 100 feet from the railroad tracks and a train goes by at least every hour. We have lived in this house for close to 25 years so we have gotten used to the racket it makes as it goes by our house, we hardly even notice it. As the kids were growing up I got lots of teaching illustrations for the kids from the train. One of them that I repeated often was the “engine and caboose” illustration. I told them that the engine was pulling all of the cars and it was a picture of our wisdom, clear thinking, knowledge, and resolve to do what was right according to Jesus. The caboose was a picture of our feelings and emotions. In life our emotions are influenced by all the events we experience, the words people say to us, even the weather! If we act the way we feel the train is going backwards, and our feelings will become even more negative than they already are. We can’t stop what we feel, but if we act right in spite of our emotions the train is going ithe right direction with the caboose at the end, and the result is we will soon feel joy, peace, satisfaction, and a sense of self worth and security. It takes a great deal of self control to not allow our emotions to run our life. This control that keeps wisdom up front is the most fundamental definition of maturity.

Went oversize sturgeon fishing today with fishing guide, Dave Maroon below the Falls at Oregon City on the Willamette River. There were 4 of us that went and we all had a wonderful day. The weather was nice, I brought good food in my cooler, the fellowship with the other guys was refreshing and the fish were biting. We caught about 20 between us that we’re between 4 and 8 feet long. Fishing is probably the most enjoyable activity I do. It is very renewing for my emotional energy level that gets totally depleted from weekend church services, but after a day like today I am ready to hit it hard this week and preach the best sermon ever this next weekend. Running the race set before by God with endurance takes energy. Being a steward of finite energy levels to do Gods will and work is a multifaceted skill. Being faithful to pray and ask God for His strength is super important, but if we do not use what we have wisely, we will not be entrusted with more. I have found that a key ingredient in this stewarding is rest that renews. Adequate sleep is obviously a part of this resting, but periodic and systematic change of pace is also important for me and fishing is super effective as an activity that is rest.

The worst thing that I experience with my Parkinson’s disease is the pain that I have in my muscles most of the time. It is sort of like a Charlie horse or what you feel when you have worked out super hard after not doing any exercise for months. There are a couple of situations when the pain goes away. One of them is when I am peddling my stationary bike. It takes about 5 minutes of peddling before it is mostly gone. The first 5 minutes it is much worse and then goes away. I think that initial increase in the pain is what keeps many Parkinson’s people from exercising much. The second situation where I have zero pain is when I am preaching or teaching. At first I thought it was just a matter of not noticing because I was so focused on my message, but this weekend I really paid attention, and I am sure that almost immediately when I start teaching that the pain is totally gone. This morning in the first service that starts at 9 am I was in more pain than usual as I was walking around the foyer before the service welcoming people and handing out bulletins. I was smiling and cheerfully greeting people, but inwardly I was groaning. After a couple of worship songs I got up to welcome people, make some announcements, and pray and ask God’s blessing on the service. It was very difficult getting out of the chair and walking up the two steps to the pulpit, and I thought to myself, it is going to be a long morning. After a couple more songs and a “special music” I got up to preach, and by the time I finished the first point I was totally pain free. The second service was the same and I was even more attentive to if it was really gone or if I was just imagining it to the point that I lost my train of thought while speaking. Thank You Lord. I guess I will have to increase the time I spend teaching and preaching.