Monday, September 11, 2023

ZOPHAR, JOB and METEOROLOGISTS

 

OH-AND-BY-THE-WAY THOUGHTS

September 11, 2023 

ZOPHAR SPEAKS (Job 11)

·        Thought: The doctrine of total depravity is probably not the best platform from which to counsel people who are grieving.

 JOB’S REPLY (Job 12)

·        Thought: God’s response to the would be “God-slayers” of Psalm Two

God makes nations great, and destroys them.

he enlarges nations, and disperses them.

He deprives the leaders of the earth of their reason;

he makes them wander in a trackless waste.

They grope in darkness with no light;

he makes them stagger like drunkards.

[Sound familiar?]

METEOROLOGISTS (Just sayin’)

·        Thought: (It’s hurricane season)

Meteorologists are like veteran sports casters. They can give a reasonable forecast of what the next play will look like (including spaghetti lines); but it all depends on where the atmospheric players are in place when the tropical depression makes its move.

Friday, May 26, 2023

OPEN AIR SONGS

 

I have been working at memorizing / re-memorizing some favorite hymns. Among my interests are open air, songs, which, like many of the psalms, open the curtains and let in the sunshine of creation in our worship. “I Sing the Mighty Power of God,” is one of those hymns with its rising mountains, flowing seas, and lofty skies. Indeed, “Lord, how Your wonders are displayed, where’er I turn my eye, if I survey the ground I tread, or gaze upon the sky.” 

Then, of course, there is “Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee,” as “hearts unfold” before God like flowers rising to sunlight. In this hymn we ask God to melt “clouds of sin and sadness” and to “drive the dark of doubt away,” so as to “fill us with the light of day.” I have often felt a thrill in the North Carolina mountains, as memory whispered:

“Field and forest, vale and mountain,

Flowery meadow, flashing sea,

Chanting bird and flowing fountain

Bid me to rejoice in (God).”

Amid all this, the writer exclaims the greatness of God’s grace in terms of a wellspring of living joy and then takes us to the beach to ponder God's “ocean depth of happy rest. And, mind you, all of this is not just for a solitary stroll. With a call to love one another the writer bids us to use this particular walk to take a deep breath of grace in terms of God as our Father and Jesus as our Brother.  
 

Sometime in when you have the opportunity, leaf through a hymnal in search of stanzas which surround us with the fresh air of God’s creation. Then, learn to pray the songs of our Creator. 

Friday, April 7, 2023

TWO WORDS

 

TWO WORDS

In the early weeks of an engagement with some anonymous guys on-line, the discussion with the primary questioner had returned to the point of rehearsing the gospel. In a pause, the young man typed two words:

“For me.”

From that point on, for the next few minutes, I simply sat and watched as his thoughts rolled onto my computer screen. In sentence after sentence, he reviewed the basic statements of grace and their ramifications on his life if he claimed those words.

Did he repent and trust Christ? Well, he credibly professed faith in Him; but our exchanges came too soon to an end. I don’t know where life has taken him and the others. Nevertheless, how he laid claim to those two words has lingered with me. In fact, I’m writing this post because they impressed themselves on my mind afresh in my “Good Friday” musings this morning.

“For me.” What a broad landscape surrounds those words:

It can be the, For-me of doubt.

It can also be the, For-me of awe, of realization, of ownership, and of joy.

As we ponder Gethsemane today – what role does, For-me, play in our thinking? Can we embrace For-me, as we study the cross? Can For-me work its way among our Easter traditions and make us look up and take in a deep breath of personal satisfaction with Jesus?

Here’s a little challenge: how many of our hymns or spiritual songs contain those words? For example:

“For me He died,

For me He lives,

And everlasting life and light He freely gives.”

(My Hope Is In the Lord, by Norman J. Clayton)


Yesterday He died for me…

Today He lives for me…

Tomorrow He comes for me…

(Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow by Jack and Don Wyrtzen)

Tuesday, March 7, 2023

Walking Thoughts

 

Walking Thoughts

I just returned from a solitary walk encompassing several neighborhood blocks. It was not as pretty as the photo to the left; but it was none-the-less an exercise in gentle imagination. Whenever I take an alone-walk, I work at refurbishing my memory of hymns and Bible texts which, at one time or another, had been a part of my mental worship library. Consider challenging yourself to do the same. I wager you’ll discover that many songs and scriptures you think you remember… you don’t.

Poetic worship resonates deeply with me when it takes me into God’s creation. Today’s review focused God’s majesty in the things He made.

I sing the mighty power of God

That made the mountains rise

(except in Florida)

That spread the flowing seas abroad,

And built the lofty skies.[1]

There are two more stanzas. Why not take some time today to look them up.  Here’s a line from another favorite.

All Thy works with joy surround Thee,

Earth and heaven reflect Thy ways.

Stars and angels sing around Thee,

Center of unbroken praise.

Field and forest, vale and mountain,

Flowery meadow, flashing sea,

Chanting bird and flowing fountain,

Call us to rejoice in thee.[2]


POST SCRIPT: Actually, as I get ready to post these thoughts, in was no longer a case of "just returned." Actually, about three hours have passed as I slogged through jumbled memories of how to activate this long-unused blog. The final accomplishment (I hope) has been the reestablishing of the "subscription" option. I have taken the liberty of re-entering a few folks I know, but I don't have a list of previous subscribers. That means, if you were one or if you weren't but would like to become one, please feel free to fill in the subscription option on the main page of the post.  


[1] I Sing the Mighty Power of God. Watts.

[2] Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee. Vandyke and Beethoven.

Tuesday, August 30, 2022

FINISHING STRONG

 


For this post, I asked my grandson, David Comings, Jr. to comment on an event that, in my personal notebook of life lessons, demonstrates a mindset for which he has become, for me, a role model. The event he describes took place in the fall of 2021 – his Senior year in High School and his final, dreamed-of opportunity, to give his tennis team a first boys-state-qualifier in more than years at the conference tennis tournament. With great pleasure, may I present:

FINISHING STRONG

David H. Comings, Jr.

Picture yourself in this situation: you're in a tennis match you've worked years to get to, and, out of nowhere, your entire body starts to cramp. You’re faced with a tough decision. Do you keep going, and fight through this pain, or do you stop and retire from the match because of the cramps? With a quick look at this situation, there's no right answer to that question. If you choose to stop, everybody will understand because of the obvious pain you're in, but if you choose to keep going and fight through the pain, you may be able to hold your head higher when you look back on this spot in your life a couple of years down the road. You will have shown a characteristic that is sometimes hard to detect.

That characteristic is your ability to finish strong no matter the circumstances. Obviously, if you're in any kind of pain or discomfort you aren't going to be able to perform at your best as you would when you're healthy. So, finishing strong in this case would be by giving it whatever you have left to finish the match, no matter if you win or lose.

A tennis match is just that--in the long run--a tennis match; But the way you treat the smaller things in life will affect how you treat the bigger things. If you can finish strong in the little things, like the tennis match I described, or doing something productive the last 10 minutes of your work shift--instead of wandering around mindlessly just to waste the time and get out of there--it will better prepare you to finish strong in bigger more important situations.

Just like, in sports, where you do countless repetitions to get better, your mind and body also run-on repetitions. If you continually take the easy way out of stuff, or do something half-heartedly, you are training your mind and body to do that in all things. If you do the opposite of that approach, and train yourself to always give the extra effort and go the extra mile in every area of your life, it will make it so much easier to put that same effort all the time.

Things like that can't be done on your own though. You need God's help to be able do those things. Philippians 4:13 says, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me". If you go to God when you encounter situations where you find it hard to "finish strong," He will help you find that extra effort or motivation to keep going.

*   *   *

Editor's Note: This fall semester David has entered his Freshman year at Crown College in St. Bonifacius MN. There he will continue to play tennis as he pursues the possibility of a career in sports management with a focus on coaching. 


Saturday, August 6, 2022

CONTENTMENT

 

Having food and clothing, with these we shall be content.

For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.

1 Timothy 6:8

 

Ah, contentment.

Latin: con/with plus tenere/hold – to hold with, to be satisfied.

 The follower of Jesus the Christ is familiar with the word contentment – if not always with the experience of it. The New Testament word (arkeo) occurs five times[i], and is linked with “satisfaction” (John 6:7). Its opposite is “covetousness.” Over the last several days I have been more and more intrigued with the implications of this word; and I have camped on the role contentment should play in my self-analysis before worship. Since I am writing this on a Saturday evening, I thought it would be worthwhile to jot some thoughts about what I’m discovering. Basically, there are two, and the second one surprised me.

Thought # 1 Contentment, Covetousness, Complacency.

Somewhere I have read that Spurgeon confronted one of the most covetous men he knew and asked, “Why do you suppose so few messages are preached on covetousness?” The reply, so the story goes, was, “Well, perhaps because it’s so rare.”

When I have had opportunities to preach on contentment and covetousness, I have almost always been asked if contentment does not lead to complacency. In other words, had Thomas Edison been content with candles we might never have had light bulbs. Over time I have realized a difference between wanting to find a way to improve a situation and wanting to have the most brightly lighted house on the street.

I believe the most vivid description of a contented life is described in 1 Thessalonians 4:11-12. Paul tells the church to, “aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands…that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and that you may lack nothing.”

 

Thought # 2 Contentment and Independence

I am indebted to Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones for the discovery of a second word for “contentment” in the New Testament. It is the word for content coupled with the prefix for self (autararkes) – self-contentment. In the very last section of his book, Spiritual Depression: It’s Causes and Cure, Lloyd-Jones tackles Paul’s assertion in Philippians 4:11 – “I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content.”

The expression has to do with a sense of personal, God-given independence from whatever circumstances may be unfolding (good or bad) at any time. It can speak to having financial security sufficient to give a kind of disinterest in finances (2 Corinthians 9:8).  In First Thessalonians 6:6, Paul links this self-satisfied state as a companion to godliness. This enables simple contentment to exist in times of need or abundance (verse 8).

And what is this self-satisfied state? It has to do with our relationship to God in Christ. No matter what events are whirling around us at any given time, none of those touch who we are in Him (Romans 8).  Self-contentment silences Job’s comforters and confronts our obsessive tendency to equate circumstances with acceptance, or lack thereof. This is fleshed out in Paul’s own confrontations with distress (2 Corinthians 7:5-6).

Self-contentment is not self-TRUST. It has to do with confidence in God to maintain my grace-given status as a justified sinner, redeemed, and sanctified in Jesus. He is the Author of my new “self” (2 Corinthians 5:17)

 

Why this appears in a book about depression should be obvious. Many of us are plagued with an obsession for interpreting bad times as testimonies of rejection. Paul’s answer to such thoughts is clear and it gives us a healthy (indeed a holy) boldness: “Who is he who condemns? … Who shall separate us?” (Romans 8:31-36) Because it is all of redeeming grace, we are independent of the temptation to boast. Because it is it is of God, we are independent of the temptation to despair.

 Before I go to church this Sunday, I’m going to do a contentment check. Will you join me? Are we content with what we have while but not becoming complacent about needs in our lives and the lives of others? Are we growing in contentment with the truth of who we are in Christ regardless of the circumstances of our pilgrimage on planet earth?

 



[i] Luke 3:14; John 6:7; 14:8; 2 Corinthians 12:9; 1 Timothy 6:8;  Hebrews 13:5;


Wednesday, August 3, 2022

FOIBLE

 

At Christmas I was given one of those daily-word calendars. So far it is one of those gifts which is still being used two-hundred-twenty-one days later. Some of the words are familiar – others, not so much. Each one (familiar or not) has an interesting story behind it. Take, for example, the one which drives me to my keyboard today. 

FOIBLE 

Both Judy and I come from backgrounds where this word was familiar. However, I’m not so sure that’s the case with folks from the last couple generations. In general use, foible was snatched from French, and it is used to describe a minor weakness or eccentricity in someone’s character.

He has most of the foibles you find in someone who fishes for compliments.

What captured our attention, however, was the discovery that this word comes from the French as the name of the weakest part of a sword – that part from the middle of the blade to the point.

In order to understand this better, I went to YouTube and picked up this information from the "Blood and Iron" site.

1.     The part of the blade closest to the hilt (handle) is rigid and sturdy.

2.     The farther you go from the hilt toward the point of the sword, the weaker the blade becomes.

3.     Close to the sword's point an opponent can more easily bend the blade away and slide his own weapon into a position of strength.  

4.     This feature creates a wide array of offensive and defensive strategies but it becomes an awkward weapon when the contestants are close to each other.

 

And… So…

 

    It is, of course, reasonably predictable that the Christian ear hears the word, “sword,” and thinks of the “sword of the Spirit…the Word of God” (Ephesians 6:17). In that reference the “sword,”refers to a short sword or dagger. It is the word-of-choice for most references to swords in the New Testament.

    The obvious implication of this information is that the Word of God corresponds to the rest of the “Christian’s armor.” It is designed for close up, hand-to-hand combat with the strongest part of our weapon at our command. It is important here to remember that the Ephesian passage is not speaking primarily of evangelism. It is counseling us with regard to our resistance to the not-flesh-and-blood foes of our lives (Ephesians 6:12). Foes which attack our minds, hearts, and souls. For the purpose of these brief thoughts, I recommend that closeness to the hilt is comparable to using the precise statements of Scripture as the basis for our counter-attacks against the strategies of the enemy. The farther we venture out onto the “foible” of it-seems-to-me, the more opportunity we give our foes to draw blood.

    I am posting this thought on a Wednesday. This is the traditional “prayer meeting” day for many of us. Let’s take a moment tonight to remind ourselves of our battle, to ask God to expose our foibles, and to commit ourselves to help each of us strengthen our grip on the hilt of our Dagger.