“With the Lord a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years are like a day.” –2 Peter 3:8.

 Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.  –Psalm 90:2

 The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time out of the serpent’s reach.-Revelation 12:14

Would I Recognize the Lord?

Last night I saw a stranger on my street.
It was cold, and he had no winter clothes.
The rain was pouring down upon him
As the temperature was dropping low.

I had no way to know his intention;
So, I was afraid to reach out to him.
But God stopped me in my tracks and said,
“You know, to walk away would be a sin.”

This just might be someone’s father.
Or maybe he’s a grieving mother’s son.
You can know nothing of his journey
But as Christians, we show grace to everyone.

There was no question of what I should do.
For, after all, was I not a Christian?
My Savior said what we offer to a stranger
At that moment we  also give to Him.

I wondered what I would do if this was Jesus?
Would I recognize him as my Lord?
Or, would I stand still paralyzed
As fear made my vision blur?

That was a question I could not answer,
So, I chose to give this stranger grace.
And in the gratitude, he gave back,
I saw my Savior’s smiling face.

This good deed cost me nothing.
And I gave much less than I got.
For, maybe this stranger wasn’t Jesus,
But still, he was a son of God!
Linda Troxell © 12/08/2020

Would We Recognize the Lord?

Among Christians, it seems there is a question we all love to ask. Will we recognize Jesus when He returns? We don’t know when He will return so we can’t be prepared to recognize Him. For example, if we knew He was returning next Saturday, we could be on the lookout that day for a bearded man with multitudes following Him.

But seriously, the Bible tells us nothing concrete about when Jesus will return to earth.  However, even if there was a time of His return stated in the Bible, chances are we wouldn’t understand it anyway. You might have noticed that God’s orientation to time is nothing like ours.  According to Peter, “With the Lord a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years are like a day.”                    2 Peter 3:8.

 The Bible refers to time in many ways for which the modern reader has no comparison. Sometimes the language is clear enough that we can make a good guess as to its meaning; others are too strange to even guess.

Take everlasting to everlasting, it is used in a context that makes it clear enough to guess that it means forever or outside of time: Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. –Psalm 90:2

However, others are not so easy to figure out. Perhaps the most confusing reference to time comes in a Book that is famous for being confusing.

In Revelations 12:14 it says that a woman would be taken care of for “a time, times and half a time.” I can’t even guess what that might mean. The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time out of the serpent’s reach. Revelation 12:14

Some Christian theologians say that God lives outside of time. Others say, although He doesn’t live outside of time, neither is He bound by time.  Personally, that seems to be a distinction without a difference.

In reality, I think we know nothing about how God experiences time, or even if He experiences it at all. But the symbolic way He talks about time in the Bible convinces me that if the Bible told us when Jesus will return, we probably wouldn’t understand it.

Despite all of that, according to the Bible itself, when Jesus returns there will be no mistaking that it’s Him. For, it will be noisy and confusing and it will draw everyone’s attention.

He will come on the clouds in glory with angels at His side blowing loud trumpets. And He will be visible to everyone. For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven. And then all the peoples of the earth will mourn when they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.-Matthew 24:27 and 30-31

While questions about the return of Jesus are interesting, I’ve always had a different question. I’ve always wondered how those living with and walking with Jesus did not recognize Him as the Son of God.

Why did the Pharisees and the Sadducees refuse to believe in Him after seeing Him perform, or hearing credible reports about, the miracles He performed?

He raised people from the dead, after all. And thinking about that has led me to an even larger question. I would be more interested to learn if we would recognize Jesus if He came to us in modern times?

Not returned, but if He came for the first time as He did to the ancient world, would we recognize Him as the Son of God?

I know of a young couple who were members of a certain Christian church and they were adored by the congregation. It is hard not to adore young people who are in love and devoted to one another.

It was taken for granted that when it was time, these two would definitely marry one another. The church ladies doted on them and fussed over them every week.

One Sunday the couple were not in their usual seats. And then they missed 3 or 4 Sundays after that. Everyone wondered what had happened.

The church ladies were worried. “I wonder what’s wrong?” “Should we call them? “Just to make sure everything is all right, of course.” “I hope they haven’t broken up.” They began to talk among themselves as worried church ladies often do.

They wanted to pray for the couple. But they wondered what could possibly be wrong. How could they pray when they didn’t know what to pray for? Of course, this led them to speculate more about what the problem might be.

The ladies assured the rest of us that they were not gossiping, as some might think. They were only trying to decide how to best pray for the couple. They only wanted to help.

After about a month, the young couple came back. They announced that they had been married in the time they were away. Some of the church ladies asked many intrusive questions about the wedding. At the same time, they expressed their disappointment that they had not been able to plan or attend their wedding.

The young, and newly married, couple did their best to guard their privacy by fending off the most intrusive questions. While at the same time explaining that they were married with only their parents present.

Of course, the gossip started at that moment. You know the kind. The ladies asking one another, ”I wonder what happened?”  Making suggestions to pray, “I think we should pray for them, something must have happened”.

Of course, this time there was no question that the ladies were engaged in the kind of gossip we dress up as suggestions or requests for prayer.

A few months went by and the couple didn’t miss a Sunday. Then, one Sunday they came to church and it was clear that the young wife was pregnant.

No one was truly surprised, it had all been talked about in the gossip. But the church ladies feigned surprise as right away they began to count.

No one was really shocked when they came to the conclusion that she had been pregnant before the wedding. But these good Christian ladies were scandalized.

Suddenly, this young couple whom the ladies had adored, was sinful and bad influences. The ladies were disgusted to know the couple had not remained sexually pure. Now, the gossip turned, undisguised, to what should be done about this immoral behavior.

They suggested perhaps they shouldn’t be allowed to stay in the church. After all, did we want influences like that around our children and grandchildren? The story got around the whole church within a week or two.

It wasn’t very much longer until the congregation realized the question was moot. The young couple was no longer coming to church on Sundays. I guess the discussion had gotten around to them as well.

Would we know Jesus if he came among us now? Or would we shame his mother so much that she would leave the church before he was born?

 [G]od 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.” -Luke 1:26-29

 [T]he 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.– Luke 1:30-31

“How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?” The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.            Luke 1:34-35

 This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus because he will save his people from their sins. –Matthew 1:18-21

A friend of mine once told me a story about when she attended a small and very conservative church for a time. She said that she didn’t really enjoy going to services because she didn’t feel free to be herself.

It seems the congregation had clear expectations for what one should wear, how long or short one’s hair should be at what age, and who one should have as friends. It was a small and stagnant congregation, she said

She told me that the elders and the members of the church were concerned because they could not seem to build up their youth ministry. The elders were taking turns leading the youth group each Sunday. 

Not surprisingly, the only young people who attended were those too young to have a say in the matter and those forced to by their parents.

Just as soon as these kids felt like they could say no to their parents they did. So, the youth ministry was shrinking rather than growing.

It wasn’t that these kids were just rebelling against church. Many of them had found other churches with youth ministries in which they were comfortable and went to church on their own.

Finally, the elders decided they needed to hire a youth pastor who had experience working with kids and knew what they liked. They felt confident this would build up the church’s youth ministry.

My friend said that they hired someone whose experience with kids was long and solid. He had worked as a middle school teacher before he changed careers.

He had gone into youth ministry because he had seen such a need for an adolescent ministry while he was still teaching.

So, he quit teaching and went to seminary. This was the perfect youth pastor, someone who really liked kids, and someone young enough for the kids to like.

He was given a budget and was pretty much set free to do whatever it took to draw kids to the church.

After about 6 months the attendance of young people had more than doubled. He was attracting kids in the very difficult age group of 12-18.

This is prime time for kids to hate church. But he was having success in that age group and even some of the kids who had defected to other churches had come back.

The elders were thrilled with the turnaround and they often sang the praises of their young pastor.

Then one Sunday the elders announced that they were going to be observing the youth ministry the following week. They extended an invitation to anyone in the congregation who was interested to go along. My friend went.

The elders explained that they would be observing both the Sunday group and the Wednesday mid-week because they wanted to see the kids in their element.

Everyone was very excited to see what magic the pastor had done to create such a robust youth ministry.

The elders assured the young pastor that they understood that the kids would not be authentic or at their best knowing that the Elders were watching.

It turned out that the authenticity of the youth was not the issue.  If anything the kids were too authentic.

It seemed that the elders had not seen the youth meeting room since they had turned the new youth minister loose with his budget.

What they saw now nearly brought them to their knees. My friend told me that the looks on the faces of the elders were priceless.

The walls of the room had all been painted black. The kids had decorated every square inch with graffiti art using neon paint.

There was rap music playing at loud decibels and many of the kids themselves looked to the elders, as they said, “like characters, I wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley.”

The kids were in small groups, all of them had Bibles and they were taking turns reading verses and sharing what they thought about each verse. And each group had a note-taker.

The pastor was milling around between the groups listening, encouraging, answering questions, and joking with the kids as everyone participated.

The pastor brought the groups back together in a large group before they dismissed. The note-takers read what each group member had shared in the small groups.

Then they discussrd the similarities and differences in the way that they each thought about a verse. Thereby, learning from one another.

He knew kids listened to their peers more than to any adult. So, he wanted them all to hear what their peers had to say.

I think that anyone familiar with youth would think, as I did, that someone who can get a room full of 12-18 years old to read the Bible and talk about it, is magic. Unfortunately, the elders disagreed.

They were so focused on the way the room looked, “Like some drug-crazed crack den”, on what the kids looked like, “Like inmates that had been bussed in from juvenile hall”, and the music, “That’s not music it is just drums and filthy lyrics.” (All of the rap was the G rated versions), that they missed, or perhaps ignored, that the kids were reading and studying the Bible.

But what they could not have missed is the number of kids present in that room. For, it was almost three times as many as had ever attended before this youth pastor had taken over the program.

The elders called an emergency board meeting for the very next day. My friend didn’t know exactly what they told the board.

But whatever it was, they decided not to check it out for themselves. Despite the magic he had done with the youth of the church, the youth pastor was fired.

He was told that his program did not reflect the values of the church. They told him that the congregation did not want that element (sinners?) brought into the church to corrupt their youth. And he was told that the music he allowed was terribly inappropriate for church.

So, after 6 months of attracting enough kids to grow the program to more than twice what it had been, without consulting the congregation, and without giving the pastor a chance to revamp the program, they fired him, essentially for bringing sinners into the church.

Isn’t that akin to firing a doctor for paying too much attention to sick people?

Would we know Him if Jesus came among us now? Or would we throw Him out of church for ministering to sinners?

Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” Luke 5:27-32

 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” [W]hen they kept on questioning him He straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her. –John 8:3-5 and 7

 Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For, in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.-Matthew 7:1-2

 

** Although I never experienced the situations I wrote about above, don’t make the mistake of thinking that means they are not true.

 

Let’s Pray

Father we are all broken and our natures are sinful. It seems the enemy has fertile ground in all of us for he knows that, to one degree or another, we are all judgmental and we all gossip. I believe, Lord, that we start out with good intentions. But if we aren’t careful we will cross that fine line between caring and gossiping. And we know that the enemy is right there ready to pounce and encourage us to talk about parts of people’s lives that are none of our business. Lord. We need you to help us to recognize when we have crossed a line and convict us right away. And Lord we all need the courage to call one another on our sinfulness. But Lord, we need your help in learning how to do so lovingly and not in judgment.  Because we cannot forget that in James 5:19-20 the Bible tells us that anyone who sees a brother or sister wander from the truth they should gently bring them back. Because turning a sinner from his or her sins saves their lives. We ask Lord that you help us to save one another from death by following the example of Jesus in turning each other back to His ways. We exalt you Lord and we want to serve you well, please help us to do so. I pray this in the holy name of Jesus Christ Amen.

Points for Pondering or Prayer
Or
Perhaps to Put Pen to Paper.

Have you ever been in a situation like the ones described above where you felt you were being judged and you felt uncomfortable?  Write a paragraph or so about what happened and how you felt.

 Have you ever been the one doing the judging or the gossiping?  Did you realize this sin on your own or did someone help you? Write a bit about how it happened and how you repented.

What do you think drives people to be judgmental and to gossip about others? After all, we are all Christians seeking to be remade in the image of the Lord. Write a paragraph about what you think is the driving force behind judgment and gossip.