The Phil Files

I love the story of Zechariah and Elizabeth (Luke 1), who are enabled to have a baby in their old age. The baby’s name is John — whom we often call John the Baptist. God uses the pregnancy of Elizabeth in her old age to be an encouragement of Mary, the mother of Jesus. The whole season of joy that goes with Jesus’ birth begins with Zechariah, Elizabeth, and the birth of their son, John.

Their story echoes with the laughter of Abraham and Sarah’s gift of a child in their old age. This child’s name was Isaac, which literally means “laughter.” Both of these stories remind us of both God’s intention to use everyday folks to do great things and also His sense of humor.

I write about all of this in my Heartlight.org post today, Season of Joy. But there are some questions that I’d love your input on related to this story and implications for us! (Just comment on this blog post!)

We find ourselves in two situations that challenge our openness to joy: the current difficult economic conditions and also the “busy-ness” of the season. How do we reconnect to the joy of God during these times?

The story of Zechariah and Elizabeth, as well as the story of Abraham and Sarah that it reflects (Genesis 18), both are told with irony and a touch of humor. Yet frequently we do not notice humor in the great stories of God. Why do think that is so?

Why are awe at the work of God and also the ability to laugh with God both important in our lives and our worship?

Zechariah’s song sounds very much like a quotation of Scripture or an ancient song, why do you think these were the first words out of his mouth?

What is the greatest disappointment you face in your life right now?

What does this story say to you about the work of God in your life?

The last two days have been cold, wet, and windy. Typical bad weather for west Texas in late November and early December. Not the kind of days that make you want to fall down on your knees and give thanks, that’s for sure. But both days had moments of stunning beauty that most never saw!

I am a bow hunter — nobody go bonkers on me on that one, it’s mostly bow-sitting and quiet time as you will see. So in the middle of the bad weather yesterday, I slipped out to a beautiful place in the country with hills and trees. About the time I got there, it started sprinkling and gave way to a gentle rain. For brief periods of time, the sky cleared and the sun broke through for a bit, but mostly it was cold, cloudy, and windy. Thankfully I had guessed perfectly on what to wear: I wasn’t too cold or too hot, I was just right!

I crawled into a little pop up blind and spent the next two hours listening — listening to the rain patter on the tent, listening to the birds signaling movement in the trees, listening to the wind, and listening to the soft footfalls of deer. Two healthy bucks showed up, both young — one a six point and the other an eight point. I passed on them both and just watched as they milled about for thirty minutes or so, then meandered on. Then a gorgeousness red fox showed right before dark. His coloring was brilliant. His movements secretive. But he found no rabbit, so he too moved on.

As I climbed out of the little blind in the darkness, I looked to the west. The last rays of sun caught the remaining clouds on the horizon and set them ablaze in purples and oranges. The moon was setting about forty-five minutes behind the sun, and it was a delicate sliver of orange hanging just below Jupiter and Saturn in a sky too wondrous for words.

As I drove in to church early this morning, I was reflecting on the beauty of the sunset yesterday. I knew most had completely missed it. It was just a raw early winter day for them. Yet in the middle of a messy day was a treasure of genuine beauty. Not only did I witness it; it refreshed my spirit. I rejoiced in God’s creative goodness. Then as if on cue, the sun slid from behind the morning clouds and the sky came alive with color. It was too early on a holiday Sunday for most to witness, but it was glorious.

Now the soft rain has set back in, the skies are a hard gray, and the wind is biting and cold. Most never saw either the glorious sunset of yesterday or sunrise of today. They were unaware of God’s gift in the middle of a lamentable weather. But I saw it and was blessed.

Makes me think about the time when Jesus came. Most never saw God’s grace dawn and His glory revealed. But for those that did, there was — and is — great joy … a joy that must be shared and beauty that must be declared.

Makes me think of Zechariah’s song at the birth of John, the cousin Jesus, who prepared the way for the coming of the Lord:

“And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High;
for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him,
to give his people the knowledge of salvation
through the forgiveness of their sins,
because of the tender mercy of our God,
by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven
to shine on those living in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the path of peace.” (Luke 1:76-79 TNIV)

Let’s not forget to share what we’ve seen!

12/14 – Angels Long to Look – CTT for planners and LIFE group leaders

Background reading for planning teams 1 Peter 1:10-12 and Luke 1 & 2 and Matthew 1 & 2.

The coming of Jesus is something long anticipated. Prophets had spoken of the Messiah. God’s people had anticipated a Savior. Even the angels of Heaven yearned to know about His coming.

The whole Christ birth event is amazing – God enters human flesh in Jesus, the Creator comes to the world as mortal. And the way he chose to do it defies human imagination. In such a world and such a story, we must not lose our sense of wonder and amazement. The fact that we hear about angels all over Luke 1 & 2 are our clue something amazing is up! We sometimes mistakenly think angels appear all over the place in the Bible story. In reality, they show up only occasionally, and often they signal that God is about to do something amazing! Luke tells the story of Jesus’ birth, a story he has researched carefully, intentionally connecting Jesus’ birth to the Old Testament story of God and the fulfillment of God’s promises through the prophets. And to make sure we catch the significance, he reminds of the presence of angels everywhere!

Many folks are amazed at the book of Revelation because of its fantastic images and its view into heaven with the angels and the elders before the thrown of God and the living creatures and the wild prophecies. Luke is making sure we see the amazing nature of Jesus’ birth – there are angels all around and we are invited to join the story and worship Jesus, now, in our time and our world and our lives. We are invited to join the angel chorus in praise of Jesus.

I know we have used “Are You Amazed Video” before, but this might be a good time to bring it back – we have a version with “Amazing Love” a cappella behind it – I have found the video.

Possible Songs:

“Surely the Presence of the Lord is in this Place” (Brush of angel wings verse) and especially “Holy Ground” (#101). Otherwise, “Amazing Love” is a song that captures some of this sense of wonder if we don’t use the video. Another song, an old one, could be “I Stand Amazed in the Presence of Jesus the Nazarene” (aka “O How Marvelous”).

Focus Ideas:

Only God could come up with such a plan – 1 Corinthians 1 & 2 emphasize the “foolishness” of God’s plan and how it confounds the people who think they are brilliant. And this plan, this person, Christ Jesus, is the center of all of God’s work and all that Scripture proclaims – Hebrews 1:1-3; 2 Timothy 3:14-17; 2 Corinthians 1:18-20.

But think of what this says to us – a poor young couple, from a dumpy forgotten place, facing the challenges of being unmarried, pregnant, having no place to stay, hated by their religious leaders in an empire so big and unfeeling to their plight they have to go to Egypt and hide to protect their child. Can there be anything much more amazing than that?

That God can bring such great things out their circumstances with such ordinary people?

Hymnic passages:

These would be used in song set. Luke 2:8-14 is the classic passage with the angelic hymn. Philippians 2:5-8 might be used to lead into communion and Philippians 2:9-11 to lead out of communion – Philippians 2:5-10 is based on an early Christian hymn probably sung at Philippi in Paul’s day.

Key Scriptures:

1 Peter 1:10-12 and Luke 2:8-14.

Kernel Overview (Heartlight article) of the possible message:

On Tiptoe

LIFE Questions:

Do the birth stories of Jesus still amaze you?

What is amazing to you about these stories?

Do you have trouble believing these stories?

Why do you think angels are mentioned so frequently in Luke’s first two chapters, the telling of the events that surround Jesus’ birth?

What all do angels do in these first two chapters?

Being witnesses of God’s glory in heaven, why do you think they were so excited with the birth of Jesus?

How can you keep from losing your amazement of what God did in sending Jesus?

John 1:1-18 talks about the coming of Jesus in a different way: what are John’s major areas of focus?

Hebrews 1:1-3 talks about the coming of Jesus as God’s greatest message. What do you think that message really is?

Last updated on 11.17.2008

For 11/16 Don’t Forget the Main Thing (4:3-6; cf. 1:13-14, 21-23, 28-29)

This message is for Daybreak on 11/16 and Refresh on 11/30.

Harvest Sunday
Because of the emphasis on Harvest Sunday this week - we will have a Harvest Sunday offering this week - I’ve switched the message for the 30th to the 16th and the previously scheduled message for this Sunday (on our center for thankful joy) to the 30th — for Daybreak, it will remain the same for Refresh. In addition, this can be a much shorter, succinct message, which will be important on a Sunday with a special focus on giving to short-term missions and other mission projects at Southern Hills.

Key Passage: Colossians 4:3-6 - I’m staying away from The Message this week because I think it misses some of the basic meaning of the text and because it uses a word or two that could be misinterpreted - the phrase “don’t miss a trick” sounds manipulative to me in the context of sharing our faith and living before people to influence them to Jesus. However, the Easy to Read Version here is pretty good:

Also pray for us. Pray that God will give us an opportunity to tell people his message. I am in prison for doing this. But pray that we can continue to tell people the secret truth that God has made known about Christ. Pray that I will say what is necessary to make this truth clear to everyone. Be wise in the way you act with those who are not believers. Use your time in the best way you can. When you talk, you should always be kind and wise. Then you will be able to answer everyone in the way you should.

Introductory Story:
Years ago, four university ladies in Abilene began to care for an older African American woman who had severe diabetes and was confined to her wheel chair because she had lost most of her lower extremities. For two years, these young women made sure she had food and friendship. Eventually, however, her body gave out and she died. As the preacher in town began to meet with these four young women and the few members of this lady’s family, it became clear that the woman had never made a commitment to Jesus. While what the four young ladies did was admirable, really in those days it was courageously kind, they never took time to visit with this dying woman and talk about her walk with Jesus, her need for grace, her opportunity for baptism and the gift of God’s forgiveness and the power of the Holy Spirit.

In today’s world, under the banner of not judging anyone, we often neglect the opportunity to talk about the most important news of all - the good news Jesus and the opportunity of the Kingdom of God into people’s lives. In the middle of doing lots of good things, we must not forget the main thing. So today, I have only one point: let’s not forget the main thing!

And what is that main thing? Bringing people into a saving relationship with Jesus. John 3:16-17; Colossians 1:13-14 & 21-22

• It’s easy for us to lose focus and neglect this - why we try to guard the Fall
• It’s easy for us to forget how blessed we are with the Hope we have
• We become like the ancient railroad signalman who forgot to light his lantern

Basically, Paul tells these new believers in Jesus to …

1. Pray for him to share the message of Christ
2. Live for opportunities to share the message of Christ (cf. 1 Peter 3:15-16)

LIFE Questions:

What makes it hard to live with “the main thing” in mind?

What is the difference between sharing our faith - our story about what Jesus has done in our lives and our reason for hope in Jesus (1 Peter 3:15-16) - and being an evangelist?

Do you have a story to share with folks about what Jesus has done in your life?

Can you share with someone what they need to do to become a true follower of Jesus?

What makes it especially hard for us to share our faith with others where we live?

Does living for “the main thing” mean we are just nice to people to get them to become followers of Jesus?

How do we genuinely engage in conversation and enter into the life of people that God brings into our lives?

What do we do if they reject our respectful efforts to share Christ with them?

1 Corinthians 14 identifies 3 different types of folks who come to our worship gatherings - brothers and sisters (brethren), unbelievers, and inquirers (mentioned several times but look especially at (vs. 24-26).

What are you doing to make friends and enter into relationship with unbelievers?

What is the difference between inquirers and unbelievers?

What are you doing to share your faith and the way to respond to Jesus with inquirers?

What do I need to do to be prepared to share “my story” and to share Jesus with others to whom God leads me?

What difference has knowing Jesus made in your life?

Using Acts 2:22-47, outline what people need to do to come into a saving relationship with Jesus.

The Gatorade commercials lately have a tag line, “Is it in you?” It goes with high profile athletes who have accomplished much in their sport shown in action in black in white. However, their sweat is the color of Gatorade — thus the tag line!

Recently, a friend shared the following video that builds off the Colossians 1:27, Christ in you, the hope of glory. I love it. You take a look and see what you think! (Links for download of the video at the bottom of this post!)

What’s so powerful to me is that I’m sure something like Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus” must be sung by Heaven’s angels when we come to Christ and are born into God’s family. So the real question for us today is pretty simple: if someone could really hear your spiritual heart, what would they be able to hear?

Is He in you?

Please Note:

Due to the crushing download volume of the video, we can’t offer the movie files for download, We are looking for a way to make this available in other ways. We apologize, but simply can’t afford the bandwidth increase for download. But the video will remain available on YouTube.

On Monday, I let folks weigh in on their take on what Jesus would do with the desperate housewife who came to a church for the first time looking for answers from God but didn’t know the unwritten rules for church “decorum” and caused a stir. You can see the post and the response through the following two links:

1. Post Link
2. Response Link

I promised that if I got some responses, I would share my own, at best tenous, response as well. So here goes.

Rather than just shoot from the hip and blow something up, I did go back this morning and read through the story of Jesus — I used a neat little harmony of the gospels (okay, I know this is hard for those of us of the rhetorical studies bunch to even hear, but I actually found it quite wonderful to read the harmony in one sitting). There are a bunch of answers I would be tempted to share. What would Jesus say to this searching and seeking mom? Hmm.

Several of the responses to the post were really on target in my opinion. Jesus stirred up trouble pretty much every time he showed up at Synagogue or Temple because He wasn’t content to let Sabbath be a day of rules that ran over people. He blasted religious leaders for weighing folks down instead of lightening people’s burdens. He clearly identified with those who were unclean — physically like the woman with the flow of blood and the leper, or spiritually like Zaccheaus, the woman at the well, and Matthew’s buddies who knew how to party big time.

So I feel like Jesus would have felt very comfortable in talking to the woman and she would have been comfortable asking him questions. In fact, I’m pretty sure the Lord would have loved the interruption of “normal church” by a seeking outsider determined to find God in the middle of her own mess — remember the sinful woman from the city in Luke 7!

So for me, Jesus’ response to her questions would have been a combination of a beginning of a real answer (the principles of Matthew 5:45; Luke 13:1-5; and John 3:17), communication of genuine concern (Luke 7:13), and an authentic invitation to find out more and learn just who HE (Jesus) really is (Matthew 11:28-30 and John 4). So here’s my bumbling set of responses from things Jesus said using the TNIV:

When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her … (Luke 7:13)

“[Because of His love, my Father] causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” (Matthew 5:45)  … Do you think that these … were worse sinners … because they suffered this way … or those who died … do you think they were more guilty than all the others … ? I tell you no!” (Luke 13:2-5) … “For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him” (John 3:17).
[But] “Come to Me, … you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your soul[s]. For My yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30).

Now here’s the same thing using the Message and melded with the story into a smoother form:

When Jesus saw Lynette in church with all her confusion and struggles, His heart broke for her. Jesus welcomed her and said, “Lynette, this is what God does. He gives his best — the sun to warm and the rain to nourish — He gives it to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty.

Let’s look at a couple of examples. Do you think those who suffer are worse sinners than others who don’t? Do you think think that those who had awful accidents were worse citizens than those who weren’t invovled? Not at all! That’s not how God works. But it is important that you have turned your heart toward Him and want to know His answers. So please know this: God loves you and even though some things are confusing, you can count on one things for certain. God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending Me, His Son — His best — merely to point an accusing finger, telling you and the world how bad you are. No He sent Me to help, to put the world right again and help you find real life.

Now you may never know completely how all tragedy and accident stuff works — prophets, philosophers, and preachers have been working on that one for a long time! But if you are tired or worn out or burned out on religion, please come to Me. Get away with Me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with Me and work with Me — watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with Me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly. You see, If you knew the generosity of God and who I am, you would be asking Me for a drink, and I would give you fresh, living water and I would give light that would light up the dark places in your life and real food that nourishes your soul.”