If you’ve been waiting for a sign to visit church, this is it! Whether it would be your first time visiting a church or whether you already have lots of past experience with church, I want you to know that you are always welcome to join us for Bible class and Worship! I know that people have lots of different feelings and thoughts when they hear the word church. To some, it is a reminder of how people have failed them in the past. For others, it might bring to mind images of dusty cathedrals with stained-glass windows. Still others might be unsure of what church is even all about. I’d like to briefly share a few reflections on what makes the church so unique and why I think you should consider taking the time to learn more about the church and the message of Christianity.

First, in a world full of bad news, the church has good news. The good news is that because of Jesus Christ, our relationship with God can be restored and we can have hope. Second, in an age of isolation, the church has a place for you to belong. God created us for relationships—it’s part of what it means to be human! Although we are by no means perfect, the church becomes something like an extended family to belong to. Third, in contrast to the emptiness of the current secular worldview, the church has the solution to humanity’s greatest problem. Our greatest problem is that we have all committed moral crimes against a perfect and holy God. But Jesus is the answer!

I want to emphasize that the church has these things—good news, a place for you to belong, and the solution to humanity’s greatest problem—not because the people who go to church are better than other people but because God freely gives these things to those who believe in him and obey him. For all of these reasons and many more, I want to invite you to consider learning more about the message of Christianity. I invite you to do this not merely because I think it will benefit your life (although it will do that too, in many ways) but because I am convinced that Christianity is true, and that it is the key to our greatest need as humans and to making sense of the world we live in. I encourage you to approach Christianity with an open mind, to look at the evidence carefully, and to see for yourself whether the church does in fact have something that the whole world desperately needs.

Once again, I want to invite you to come join our church for Worship this coming Sunday at 11:00 am. I hope that you will see that the church is a special place, not because we are better than anyone else, but because God has given us hope and purpose in life, and we want you to have that, too. I hope that if you have any questions you will not hesitate to ask. We’d be glad to find a time to talk about any questions you have or to study the Bible more.

This year, Father’s Day has a new dimension for me. For the first time ever, in addition to celebrating my father on Father’s Day, I myself am now an expecting father. For me, it’s a season of reflection as I look back over my own childhood and look forward to raising a child of my own. As I grow older, I have come to appreciate more and more just what a blessing it is to have a godly father. I’m thankful for my father and the many, many things he has modeled well for me when it comes to being a godly father. So, although I have no personal experience of being a father yet, I want to offer three biblical reflections on fatherhood this Father’s Day. They may sound familiar to you, because we made three similar observations about motherhood a number of weeks ago on Mother’s Day.

First, fatherhood is God’s design. When he created the world, God designed humans to exist as two complimentary yet distinct counterparts: male and female. Men and women are both equal in value, and both are created in the image of God. Fatherhood and motherhood are corresponding realities that arise from the foundational reality of male and female. So while there is much overlap between motherhood and fatherhood, they are not identical in every respect. Fatherhood is part of God’s design for the home and the family. 

Second, fatherhood is good. God’s design and plan for our lives is always best. No doubt it is hard (as I’m sure I will soon find out!) but fatherhood is a good thing because it is part of God’s plan. And good things in life are seldom easy. So, fathers, do not grow weary in doing good, but remember that fatherhood is good because it is part of God’s design for the family. Nevertheless, good things that are corrupted by sin become terrible perversions of what God intended those good things to be, and this is also true of fatherhood. Therefore, although God’s design for fatherhood is good, we must not fail to see the next and final point.

Third, fatherhood is for the glory of God. We are to do everything that we do for the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31), but if you are a father, then God’s calling on your life is inseparable from the calling to fulfill that role in a way that brings glory to the Lord. Never think that your role as a father is unconnected from your growth in Christlikeness. The way you strive to be a godly father to your children is one key avenue for you to glorify and serve the Lord and it has incredible potential to bring glory to the Lord. So to all the fathers in our church, lean on God for strength and wisdom to fulfill this good put challenging part of his plan for your life in a way that honors and glorifies him.

If I were the director of a film telling the story of the life of Abraham, there is one scene that I would really want to get just right. The scene I have in mind is the time in Genesis when Abraham faced the greatest test of his life. This scene would be the high point of the movie, for it is the high point of Abraham’s life. To really understand the weight of this moment in Abraham’s life, though, we have to recall three prior events in his life that shaped him into the man we meet in chapter 22. Think of these three events as flashbacks that we see as Abram is walking up the mountain in chapter 22.

In the first of these flashbacks, we see Abram (before his name was changed) encountering God for the first time. The Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country… to the land I will show you” (Gen. 12:1). “So Abram went…” (Gen. 12:3). Abram was a man of obedience. God said “Go!” and Abram went. In the second we see Abram receiving an incredible promise from the Lord—that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars in the sky (Gen. 15:5). Abram didn’t even have one child at this point, much less a multitude of descendants. Despite the promise seeming unbelievable, “Abram believed the Lord…” (Gen 15:6). Abram was a man of faith. The Lord gave his word, and Abram believed him. Finally, in the third, we see the Lord appearing to Abram to make a covenant with him, reaffirming his promises to Abram. In response, he “fell on his face,” showing his honor for the Lord (Gen. 17:3). Clearly, Abram was a man of reverence. The Lord appeared, and Abram worshipped.

God’s command to Abraham in Genesis 22 was to go and sacrifice his promised son Isaac on Mt. Moriah. God did this to test Abraham. We’ve seen that up to this point in Abraham’s life, he was a man of obedience, faith, and reverence. But will Abraham be obedient, faithful, and reverent even when everything is on the line? Astonishingly, he was! God commanded “Go!” (22:2) and Abraham went (22:3); God commanded him to sacrifice Isaac (through whom Abraham’s descendants were promised to come) and Abraham believed that God could raise Isaac from the dead (Heb. 11:19); God tested Abraham’s devotion and it became evident that Abraham revered the Lord more highly than anything or anyone else (Gen. 24:12). The test proved that Abraham was still a man of obedience, faith, and reverence, even when everything was on the line. Like Abraham, we have formative moments in life, and then we have tests. Will we be ready for the test when it comes? Will we be obedient, faithful, and reverent even in moments of testing? God is worthy of our obedience, faith, and reverence, so let us give him our lives and our all.

One of the things high-caliber leaders do is that they select and train their own replacements. Good leaders know that they cannot lead forever or even be around forever, so they do something proactive about it. If senior leadership is deeply invested in the long-term health of the organization and want it to outlive them, they invest thought and energy into training up individuals from within their company so that one day the operations and management of the corporation can be handed over to the next generation. The leadership in churches is supposed to do something very similar. Elders and ministers cannot be around forever or lead the church forever. Instead of being bothered by this, church leaders do something proactive about it. Because church leaders are invested in the long-term health and stability of their congregation and want it to outline them, they invest time and energy into training up the next generation of men to be leaders. Paul laid out this very concept to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:2. “…and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also.” Notice two things about this verse:

First, we can count four ‘generations’ of disciples represented in this verse. In the first place we have Paul. Then we have Timothy, who was trained by Paul. Timothy is supposed to train faithful men—the third ‘generation.’ Finally, those faithful men will teach ‘others’—the fourth ‘generation’—and from there the cycle just keeps repeating itself. Just as disciples are called to make more disciples (Matthew 28:18-20) so teachers in the church train others to become teachers as well. This is how the gospel gets passed on from generation to generation: disciples who make disciples who make disciples who make disciples… until Jesus comes back.

Second, notice what Paul says to Timothy about training disciples to become teachers and future leaders in the church. Paul mentions two characteristics these future teachers must possess (faithfulness and ability) but he puts the priority on faithfulness. He told Timothy to entrust these things to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. Timothy is not to seek out gifted men to be teachers who might become faithful one day. No, he is to seek faithful men who will also be able to teach. Faithfulness is more foundation than ability or gifting.

So to men in the church, I offer this two-part challenge. First, are you prioritizing growing in faithfulness? If you want to be a leader in the church, faithfulness is the primary qualification. Second, are you doing your part in passing on the faith to the next generation? Someone taught you everything you know. Will you take the time to teach and train the next generation so that they too can one day train others? 

After years of exposure to the Bible, we sometimes lose our sense of wonder at the amazing things we read about in the pages of Scripture. Every once in a while it is good to take a step back, pause, and marvel at the miracles that we read about in the Bible, and to praise God who has shown his power through these miracles.

One fascinating miracle in the Old Testament was performed by the prophet Elisha in 2 Kings 6. He was felling trees with some other men when an accident happened: “But as one was felling a log, his axe head fell into the water, and he cried out, ‘Alas, my master! It was borrowed.’ Then the man of God said, ‘Where did it fall?’ When he showed him the place, he cut off a stick and threw it in there and made the iron float” (2 Kings 6:5-6).

Another miracle in the Old Testament that always stops me in my tracks is found in 2 Kings 13:20-21. “So Elisha died, and they buried him. Now bands of Moabites used to invade the land in the spring of the year. And as a man was being buried, behold, a marauding band was seen and the man was thrown into the grave of Elisha, and as soon as the man touched the bones of Elisha, he revived and stood on his feet.” (2 Kings 13:20-21). What an amazing event! If you had seen this, wouldn’t you have told everyone you know about what you just witnessed? By this event, God showed his power through Elisha, even after Elisha was dead. This is one of those miracles that reminds me to pause and marvel at the power of God.

A third lesser-known miracle is found in Acts 19. While we are not told all the details, Luke emphasizes the incredible nature of these miracles. “And God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them” (Acts 19:11-12). It is nothing short of incredible that pieces of fabric that Paul touched could then be taken to sick and demon possessed people who were healed with the touch of the cloth.

Everyone knows that ordinarily iron doesn’t float, dead men’s bones don’t make other dead men come alive, and fabric doesn’t heal people of diseases. These are three spectacular miracles that put God’s greatness and power on full display. Nothing is too hard for our God! But all too often, instead of trusting in the God who can make iron float, dead people come alive, and heal people with a handkerchief, I worry about situations in life that seem out of my control. When something feels out of our control, it’s a good time to pause and remember that nothing is too hard for our God!