Possession and Joy

One of the most amazing passages, to me, is Isaiah chapter 61. Unpacking everything in this chapter would take too long for this blog so I'll only mention a couple of things. Throughout the first half of the book of Isaiah, there has been great judgment pronounced by the Lord to the nation of Israel. Historically speaking, “rebuilding the ancient ruins” was a great comfort to Israel since their city (nation) laid in ruin. Although the physically restoration comes in the form of Israel becoming a nation again, the spiritual promise to all of God’s people of becoming “oak(s) of righteousness” and “priest” and “ministers of our God” (v. 6) is of eternal value.

The imagery of restoration is that of wealth, possession, and affluence in verse 6b-7 also points to signs of not only prosperity in this present life but also for the one to come. If the pre-fall world and 2nd coming of Christ world show the same types of imagery of affluence for God’s people then it stands to reason that God wants to bless us in some capacity in order to catch glimpses of the eternal. This also further displays God's grace in kindness towards His people. Although sin ran rampant throughout the nation of Israel, it did not reign in God's deep desire to bless His people.

Another point in the opening chapter the Lord says, “For you will be like an oak whose leaf fades away or as a garden that has no water” (Is. 1:30) because of the unrighteousness and injustice practiced among them (1:21). But now we arrive to chapter 61, one of the most amazing passages of restoration and transformation from “an oak whose leaf fades away” to becoming “oaks of righteousness” (61:3). How is this possible? It’s possible because it is the Lord that does “the planting, . . . that He may be glorified.”

If you were to ask some of my close friends how to describe me they probably wouldn’t use the phrase, “oak of righteousness.” I’m fully aware of my shortcomings daily and, at times, it could get extremely frustrating. But remember, it’s the Lord’s work and He’s not done and He promises to finish and give us garments of “salvation” and “righteousness” (61:10) and the judgment due to us will be lifted. This of course is looking to the future work of Christ in the New Testament. But the fact that it is being mentioned here in the Old Testament, I find amazing.

In affirming that the Lord does the work in us in no way frees us from our personal responsibilities. In trusting divine sovereignty we do not neglect human responsibly. Oswalk puts it this way:

Most of us want God’s power for holy living while retaining a firm grip on the steering wheel of our lives. We would like to be “better” Christians but are unwilling to become bond-slaves. God’s awesome power to be loving when we are not loved, to be kind in the midst of cruelty, to be clean in the midst of filth, to be self-forgetful when everything around us says to “take care of yourself at all costs” is not available to those who would use it for their own ends.

Passages in the New Testament also confirm the tension between our acts and God’s power:

Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good. (Titus 2:13-14)

What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? (James 2:14)

May our conduct and works reflect the power of God that works within us.

A 2nd Job Part II of II

For Part I Click Here

Interestingly, people still come up to me and give me their condolences regarding my mom. They also tell stories about how wonderful she was for the community. She was an icon in East Los Angeles. Yes, I miss her very much. My sister has a picture of her in the office. The first couple of weeks it was difficult to see the picture because it was a reminder that she’s no longer here. But it’s also a reminder that her kids are keeping up the family business and are working together to do they best they can without her. I think she would be proud.

An unexpected opportunity to share the gospel has also come from going back to the store. I still have friends in the old neighborhood that come by. It’s been great to be able to share the gospel the way my mom did her last few years. Speaking of the gospel, isn’t it at the heart of the gospel to love the unlovable? Isn’t that what the Lord did with us, . . . though we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

The apostle Paul says, “I am a debtor both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to wise and to unwise” (Romans 1:14 – NKJV). To be in debt means to owe someone something (e.g., mortgage, student loans, etc.), usually to a creditor. The Lord gave Paul grace so why, in this passage, would he call himself a “debtor” to Greeks and Barbarians? A clue in answering this question is in the first verse of chapter one where it says, “Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God” (1:1 – NIV – emphasis added). Paul didn’t call himself nor did he set apart himself. It was God doing the work in Paul’s heart. Paul didn’t qualify for the grace of God nor did he do anything to be disqualified from the grace of God, “it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.”

The beauty of receiving God’s grace is not that we owe God anything but that it wipes out what we did owe by virtue of our sins. So then, the “debt” we now owe is to offer this amazing grace to other unqualified people, to the Greeks and Barbarians and selfish customers of our day. Understanding this grace we have received will show in how we greet and interact with people. If we understand grace we won’t cut our eyes towards people for their differences or selfishness, feeling like we “qualified” for God’s grace while they didn’t.

Now, putting hands and feet to this wonderful concept of receiving God’s grace while working at a 7-11 store in the middle of East Los Angeles means I will show patience and compassion for everyone, knowing that I didn’t qualify for the grace of God. No matter how moronically a customer behaves, I need to extend grace because I am a “debtor” to them. It’s not because they gave me anything but because “His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue.”

A 2nd Job Part I of II

If you’ve been following this blog for any amount of time you’ll know that I’m terrified at the prospect of parenthood. So my defense mechanism is to make fun of parenthood. But this isn’t about parenthood (sort of). One of the prospects that I find frightening is the loss of one income (the wife’s – who actually makes more than I do) and the addition of an expense (Junior Jr.). Yes, I just referred to my future child as “an expense.” And I will certainly remind him of this when I’m bailing him out of jail.

Instead of waiting to end up in the negative, I decided to get a second job and start saving for the bail bond now. The easiest way to a second job is to work for my sister, Vicky (only I can refer to her as “Vicky” and everyone else has to call her “Victoria.”), who took over our beloved mother’s 7-11 store. I don’t need to be trained because I worked there as a teenager. I also remember absolutely hating working there and having to convince my mom NOT to leave the store to me by threatening her that I would sell it for pennies on the dollar when she passed away.

Vicky was always better at managing the store anyway. I never had the stomach for all the nonsense that goes on with running a store. Actually, that was one of the reasons why I went to college, to get out of that hellhole. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciated how the Lord provided everything for us through that 7-11 but I just hated working there. At this point, you might be asking, “If you hate working there so much, why are you going back?” Good question. The first reason I mentioned- it is the easiest job to get without any additional training involved. Secondly, I can spend more time with my sister. Although she’s consistently going 100 mph and worrying about 45 different things all at once, it’s still nice to see her. Finally, I felt that it’s been years since I last worked there and had hoped my maturity (if any) would help reign in my pure hatred for working there.

If you’re wondering why I hated it so much, it was because I was a lazy teenager who didn’t like to work at all. In addition to that mindset come along annoying and evil customers. Now, not all customers are annoying and evil. Actually the vast majority of customers are just average-hard-working-Americans-with-decency. But it’s those few that make my skin crawl. For example, there’s always that 70-year-old lady who holds up the line by wanting 57 different types of lottery scratchers because she has nothing better to do with her time. I love the fact they only come in when it’s really busy, too. Or, how about individuals who want to have their Lotto tickets checked but their tickets looks like they’ve been through the washer so the machine can’t read them? Here’s the thing that bothers me, if you truly believe that playing the Lotto might win you millions of dollars, wouldn’t you guard that ticket accordingly instead of allowing it to become so damaged the machine can’t even read it? Now if you don’t believe you’re going to win, then why play it at all? Most people who play the Lotto play it regularly. What they don’t realize is that if they simply invested that same money they would probably be wealthy.

Lotto sheets can print out 10 draws on one sheet. But there’s always THAT GUY who wants to have them printed out in single sheets. The dialogue usually goes like this:

Me: “Hello, how can I help you?”

Customer: “Yes, I would like a $5 Lotto ticket but instead of printing it on one sheet, saving time and paper, I would like you to print them on 5 single sheets thus holding up the line and annoying everyone around me.”

Me: “No problem, sir. Would you like a punch in the face with that?”

Not everything bad is Lotto related. Consider, for example, the customer who gets caught stealing and begins to become defensive and says, “I don’t know how that got into my pocket.” Or the homeless person laying in the parking lot that you kindly ask to leave and tells you to “Eff off, this is a free country!” Okay, technically the homeless dude isn’t a customer but still.

Or the person that insists that the coffee must be fresh, which apparently means made at the time of his arrival instead of 20 seconds ago. We definitely have different ideas of what “fresh” means.

I remember the time when we used to have to serve the Big Gulps and Slurpees behind the counter. Now the customers serve themselves. You would think pouring soda into a cup or turning a lever to fill a slurpee cup would be easy. Apparently for some customers it’s very difficult. The slurpee, when overworked, needs time to recharge and has a light indicating it. It’s a big flashing red light that says, “DO NOT USE IDIOT!!!” But do they see it? Of course not, so the slurpee isn’t quite as “slurpeey” as usual and they leave the half-filled cup there without saying a word. The station is always a mess even though we have trash dispensers all over that area. I haven’t even mentioned the hostile customers like gang members, beer runners, and robbers but that goes without saying. Those are some of the reasons why I hated working there. But since I’ve been back, it’s been great to see my sister and an opportunity to meet some of the new workers at the store my mom helped build.

For Part II Click Here.

John's Lament

My buddy John Rinehart, whom I co-lead a Grace Group with, wrote a contemporary lament for today. It was read in last Sunday's worship service at our church. I wrote a lament when the Lakers lost in the 2008 Finals to the Celtics but I think John's lament over the state of our soul is slightly more elegant. I felt that it would be good to post it here and share it with all of you. So I share with you John's Lament:

Oh Lord, have mercy on us,
Not according to our righteousness, but your steadfast love
For we have sinned,
And all our evil ways are before you.

We are a people who love violence:
We entertain ourselves like men of old,
We’re amused by fighters, who act more like animals than like men.
We too would have rushed to the Coliseum in Rome to support the bloodshed,
Praising the strong for their victories and dismissing the weak without a second thought.
We don’t hate violence, in fact, in doesn’t even faze us anymore.
We watch movies filled with murder and bloodshed,
Our men think manhood is physical strength or sexual conquest, not holiness.
We find more men in the gym working on their bodies,
Than in church working on their souls,
Or in their homes working on their families.

Your wrath, O Lord is due on us, for we reject you at every turn.
You hate divorce and yet our hearts are so hard that over half of marriages end this way.
We treat it as normal and have whole professions and industries that accommodate it,
Some of us even get divorced again and again.
We twist your word when we don’t like it, excusing our sin and disregarding your truth.

“Not even a hint of sexual immorality” your Word says,
And yet it seems that there is not even a hint of sexual purity left.
It seems that everything that can be done, will be done,
And we are lost and blind without you.
Our promiscuity and sensuality is hatred toward our neighbors, not love.

We use and manipulate others for our gain, rather than serve and protect others for their pleasure.
We do not guard our hearts, but instead turn our ways to the right and the left,
Straying from your path,
Wandering from your way,
Going our own way,
Never giving thought to our end,
Never thinking that we’re sheep headed for the slaughter.
We distort your image, thinking it impossible that you might be a God of wrath,
Denying that we deserve judgment and that you, Lord, are sure to bring it.

O Lord, how we need repentance, reformation and revival.
Your people are dragged away by the currents of this world,
And the further we stray, the less we can hear or even remember your voice,
For you once called to us,
You once spoke to us,
You once convicted us,
And now our silence is full of noise, not full of your voice.

O Lord, your people flee from the cities of influence,
We run to the suburbs where land and homes entice us,
We want freedom and space, not truth and grace.
Your mission becomes our occasional hobby,
Instead of a lamp to our feet and a light to our path,
The light of your word is like a candle almost gone out.
We run after other counselors, not you, the Wonderful Counselor,
We take the advice of magazine editors, newspaper columnists and TV personalities,
While your Word collects dust.

We read little and think even less.
We avoid your calling and delegate ministry to professionals,
As if the priesthood of all believers was a bad theological idea.
We, like the Israelites, would ask you for a King of a Pastor who is omni-competent,
Or at least funny and mildly passionate about something.
We ignore our omnipotent King of Kings,
Not because we couldn’t correctly identify this title for Jesus on a Bible exam,
But because we fail to submit to you as you demand.
We resist the truth that you are King and we are not.
We lie in saying that we are Christians, when we won’t let Christ be King,
We won’t bend the knee to anyone, and so this ugly pride is everyone,
Which leads to our abundance of anger, complaining and strife.
We are a broken people wandering around in the dark,
Like sheep without a shepherd,
Made in the image of God,
And yet so repetitively scratching the itch in our souls with anything but truth,
The splinter cannot be removed without our Master Surgeon,
But instead we think our idols can heal,
Only to be left by them more wounded.

O God, have mercy on us, according to your steadfast love,
For the sake of your name, forgive our transgressions,

Forgive us for playing at our worship, worshipping our work, and working at our play,
We don’t keep your Sabbath,
We treat it like it was a good idea for people who didn’t have the internet,
But for us, we need to keep going.
We don’t trust you.
We don’t believe you.
We don’t know you.
We think your yoke is heavy, not light,
To follow you is a list of rules to keep, not a new life to lead.
The promise of your Holy Spirit was also for days gone by,
Not for our strength in the fight,
Nor for water when we’ve run dry.

We love to drink,
And are impressed to think,
Of what we carry in our hands
With no concern for the drunkenness of our land.
We love mirrors,
Because in them we see our gods,
The love of self,
Self-image and Self-help
Not self-discipline or self-control,
Self-esteem, not Christ esteem,
On whom do we lean?

For the one who walked the dusty streets,
And saw what had become of what was made,
Was not received, but instead was beat,
For speaking the truth and calling out spades.
So Lord, come quickly and save us from,
Your judgment and wrath which are to come.

Lord, without you we will be,
Punished for all eternity,
So please have mercy on our offense,
And lead our land to repentance.

Iron Sharpens Iron – Review

I started teaching public school before I received my teaching credential. When my district told me to go back and get my credential so they could rehire me, I complied and enrolled at National University. Most of the classes were/are completely useless but there were a couple of classes in which I said, “This would’ve been useful a couple of years ago.” After getting thrown into the fire of teaching, you learn as you go. Most young teachers I’ve met said they actually learned the useful things while on the job.

To some degree, that’s how I felt reading Iron Sharpens Iron: Leading Bible-Oriented Small Groups that Thrive by Orlando Saer. In no way is the book useless like my credential classes at National, but after co-leading a small group for a couple of years I had the same, “This would’ve been useful a couple of years ago.” But for those of you who never have lead a small group Bible study, this book will be extremely useful to you. I’ll just point out some key points that I found helpful.

Why have a small group?

At Grace EV Free La Mirada, we encourage our members to join a “Grace Group” (small home Bible study). The reasons are (also stated in Saer’s book):

• We are built for community and smaller groups help nurture and foster that community.
• Accountability: We all play a role in each other’s sanctification.
• Small groups give an opportunity to care for one another (i.e., prayer, accountability, personal needs, etc.).
• A good place from which to reach the lost: members can work together to advance the gospel.

Being a leader of a small group Bible study is big responsibility far beyond simply leading a discussion of Sunday morning’s sermon. It takes work to avoid the group becoming stagnant. There was a time in our small group when the group grew stagnant and sluggish. I couldn’t tell you what was the cause at the time because of my lack of experience leading a small group but in retrospect I can see several factors that could’ve caused it. Saer gives categories to these pitfalls and tells you how to avoid them.

Having good social events beyond your regular meeting time in order to cultivate friendship and community is a helpful part of maintaining a healthy group. This makes accountability and sanctification become more natural. Saer also gives ideas for group outings and fun events but he also warns of the group simply becoming a “social club.”

Managing the Group

There are issues to consider when starting a new group.

1. Focus: What kind of group will it be? - Is its primary purpose to help enquirers, to train believers, or to study the Bible together and support each other?

2. Life Expectancy: Is it open-ended or fixed-life? – To stop groups getting stodgy, many small group ministries build in a ‘shelf life’ of maybe 1 or 2 years, after which groups are mixed up.

3. Study Programme: Who is responsible for setting it? - Usually the church leaders set this up but it’s important to keep a balance of “sticking with the program” and meeting the needs of the group.

4. Personnel: Who is involved in organizing the group? Who is the leader or co-leaders and what are their roles? Clear roles are important in that the members of the group clearly need to know who to look to for leadership.

5. Time and Place: Where and when do we meet? I prefer any time when the Lakers are not on but that hasn't worked out well. Praise the Lord for DVR.

6. Size: How big should the group be? - This could depend on the size of the room/house you meet at. This could also depend on how well connected everyone is to each other. Are you meeting the needs of your current members? If not, then add more people might not be a good idea for the time being. But if you guys are rock solid, then meeting another person's needs might just be what your group needs to continue to grow.

7. Make-up: How diverse is the group going to be? Do you want a good mix to avoid it simply being another sub-group (e.g., college group)? I say yes. It's important to be diverse not simply for diversity sake but to truly represent the body of Christ well.

These are all valid questions that Saer has pointed out. Wrestling through much of these issues myself has actually been enriching instead of burdensome. I can confidently say that co-leading a small group with my friends John Rinehart and Mark Joseph has been one of the must enriching experiences in my Christian life. I didn’t really want the responsibility of co-leading anything because of the work involved. What I didn’t anticipate was the transformation it would cause in my life. I find myself more caring towards the members of the group, and I have a deep seeded desire to see the group continue to grow as it has been through these couple of years.

In short, Saer has some great points. Remember to always keep God at the center of everything and that this time is to honor and glorify Him. Saer goes on and gives several practical steps in leading a discussion, preparing for leadership, and managing a group but the overall theme of the purpose of small groups is what I wanted to point out here. No doubt the Lord has used Grace Groups at our church to help people connect better with other members of the church. They act as the “frontlines” of ministry. When there is a crisis regarding a member of the church the first question asked is, “Is this person in a Grace Group?” If so, then it is followed by a second question, “Who are the leaders?” It’s been an amazing an honor to serve others in this capacity.

Champs and Chumps

Gery Woelfel of the Journal Times tells the story of Kim Hughes, former Clippers assistant and interim head coach who was diagnosed with prostate cancer while he worked for the Clippers.

Hughes' new doctor, Stuart Holden, at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, was receptive to doing the surgery the following week.

But then Hughes encountered yet another major obstacle.

"I contacted the Clippers about medical coverage and they said the surgery wouldn't be covered," Hughes said. "I said, ‘Are you kidding me?' And they said if they did it for one person, they'd have to do for everybody else."

When Dunleavy learned the Clippers wouldn't cover the cost of Hughes' surgery, he mentioned it to his players.

Several of them, including now Milwaukee Bucks forward Corey Maggette, Chris Kaman, Elton Brand and Marko Jaric, were taken aback by the news and decided to offer their assistance.

"Kim was one of our coaches and he's a really good friend of mine, too," Maggette said. "He was in a situation where the Clippers' medical coverage wouldn't cover his surgery. I thought it was a great opportunity to help someone in need, to do something that Christ would do.

"It shows your humanity, that you care for other people and not just yourself. Kim was in a life-and-death situation."

It was indeed a dicey time for Hughes. After a biopsy was taken, he learned his prostate cancer was much worse than he believed.

The cancer had quickly spread and was on the brink of moving to other areas of his body.

There are a lot of different reactions one might have to that.

One of the most obvious is to add yet another well deserved log to the bonfire of owner Donald Sterling's reputation.

Henry Abbott posted this story on ESPN.com early today. But I wanted to point out two things here. First, it was noble for the players to step up and help their assistant coach when they had the means to do so. And secondly, the contrast between how the Clipper organization handled this situation and how the Lakers handled the Ronny Turiaf situation back in 2005.

Recently, Ronny Turiaf shared his experience when asked about Wes Leonard, the basketball player from Fennville (Mich.) High School who died last week.

On July 16, 2005, with no prior symptoms or related family medical history, Turiaf was diagnosed with an enlarged aortic root. The discovery came during a routine checkup while he was playing on the Los Angeles Lakers' summer league team. Alongside Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak and assistant GM Ronnie Lester, Turiaf met with doctors, who gave him two options.
"They said, 'Ronny, you are lucky to be here today; you could have died at any point,'" Turiaf recalled. "[They said,] 'We have two choices for you: Choice A, either you stop playing basketball and can't do any contact sports, and you have to take medicine for the rest of your life. Or you have the surgery done.'

Turiaf choose to go with the surgery. Even though the Lakers voided his newly signed contract for health issues, they paid for the heart surgery and the treatment to get him back on the court. If you follow the Lakers for any amount of time you know that Turiaf returned to the court and was able to play basketball again. He played well enough that in the summer of 2008, the Golden State Warriors signed him to a four-year, $17 million contract.

Is it a wonder why one organization is Champs and the other Chumps? The Clippers are not cursed, they just have a cheap owner who lacks compassion. I hope Blake Griffin remembers this when he’s a free agent in the summer of 2014.

Tsunami, Sovereignty, and Mercy

In light of the tragedy in Japan, I thought it would be good to reflect the Sovereignty and Mercy of the Lord. John Piper wrote an article titled: Tsunami, Sovereignty, and Mercy back in December 29, 2004 touching on the topic of natural disasters.

“The waves of death encompassed me, the torrents of destruction assailed me. . . This God—his way is perfect” (2 Samuel 22:5, 31).

After the loss of his ten children owing to a “natural disaster” (Job 1:19), Job said, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21). At the end of the book, the inspired writer confirms Job’s understanding of what happened. He says Job’s brothers and sisters “comforted him for all the evil that the Lord had brought upon him” (Job 42:11). This has several crucial implications for us as we think about the calamity in the Indian Ocean.

1) Satan is not ultimate, God is.

Satan had a hand in Job’s misery, but not the decisive hand. God gave Satan permission to afflict Job (Job 1:12; 2:10). But Job and the writer of this book treat God as the ultimate and decisive cause. When Satan afflicts Job with sores, Job says to his wife, “Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?” (Job 2:10), and the writer calls these satanic sores “the evil that the Lord had brought upon him” (Job 42:11). So Satan is real. Satan brings misery. But Satan is not ultimate or decisive. He is on a leash. He goes no farther than God decisively permits.

Click here for the entire article: Tsunami, Sovereignty, and Mercy