In His Image

In His Image

2 Corinthians 3:18

But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.

   Since 1998, Herbert Chavez who lives in the Philippines has endured seventeen plastic surgery procedures.  Was he involved in some horrific accident?  No.  Born disfigured?  No.  He is transforming himself to look like his boyhood hero, Superman.  Chavez has a house filled with Superman memorabilia and wanted to look more like Superman, so he is having his body changed to achieve his goal.  One big problem is that he is only five foot six inches tall, and Superman was written as a six foot three inch hero.  But Chavez is looking into procedures to increase his height. 

   If you’re like me, you read this thinking something like, “why would anyone do this to themselves?”  The answer is that Herbert Chavez really sincerely wanted to look like his hero.  I have a confession to make – so do I.  Not Superman, although that would be great to look like him, but I want to look more like my hero, Jesus.  Since I allowed Jesus into my life, He has been changing me a little at a time. 

   If you know Jesus as your Savior, there is a change going on in your life.  Herbert Chavez is changing himself to look more and more like what he thinks Superman should look like.  God is changing us to be more and more like Jesus.  We are not doing the changing, God is at work in our lives through the Holy Spirit, and we “are being transformed.”

   I am far from being perfect, but God has been at work in my life changing all the things that do not conform to the image of His Son.  My mouth got me into trouble many times, but God is working at changing my speech and it is getting more like Jesus’ speech.  My fondness for arguing used to get me in many arguments, but God is changing my way of thinking.  I have more love for others and would rather help people than argue endlessly with them.  Worldly lusts are being removed piece by piece.  Sometimes this renovation project that God has going on in my life is easy, and sometimes it is bitter medicine to swallow.  In fact, it can be downright painful.  Looking in the Word of God I can see a portrait of Jesus.  There is still a long, long way to go before this former sinner is transformed into someone who looks like Jesus, but God has begun the work in me and will bring this work to completion.

   How can God ever change the stony heart in me?  I really do not know how, but I am confident that God will never give up on what He has begun in my heart and life.  He will bring it to completion.  God is not going to give up on what He has begun in your life either.  He will see it through to completion.  We have the promise of God that someday in some way we will somehow be like Jesus.  

We are told this in 1 John 3:2 (Complete Jewish Bible)

Dear friends, we are God’s children now; and it has not yet been made clear what we will become. We do know that when He appears, we will be like Him; because we will see Him as he really is.

  Hold onto this promise of God and look forward to this work being complete in you!  One day, “we shall be like Him.”

Stephen Cram                                                                   August 24, 2013                      

Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, following the tradition of men according to the rudiments of the world, and not in accordance with Christ.  Colossians 2:8

Visit my pastor’s blog at http://pastorjonrhinehart.blogspot.com/.

Living Among the Dead

Living Among the Dead

Romans 8:10-11 American Standard Version

10 And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the spirit is life because of righteousness.

11 But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwelleth in you, he that raised up Christ Jesus from the dead shall give life also to your mortal bodies through his Spirit that dwelleth in you.

   In an article about the Philippines, there was mention of the over-population problem.  In Manila, the capitol, there are an estimated twelve million people living in an area of 14.88 square miles.  By comparison, the population of Ohio is only 11.54 million in an area of 44,825 square miles.  So picture everybody in Ohio visiting Columbus on the same day. 

   Manila also faces severe poverty for an overwhelming majority of this population.  They live anywhere there is room to build a shack or lean-to.  Many live in the city dumps and many also live in the city’s cemeteries.  Dr. Eduardo Serrano, head of the Manila Health Department's preventable diseases division said about the situation, "They already know that they should not make homes out of cemeteries. It's dangerous to their health. The problem is they are being asked to leave but they keep on coming back."

   We, as Christians, are alive in our spirits.  Christ’s death paid the penalty of sin and redeemed our lives from spiritual death.  Yet we live, so to speak, in a very large cemetery we call, “The World.”  The World is full of dead people; dead in their sins.  We live among them and walk with them, work with them, associate with them, but we are not like them. 

   We must always keep in mind that the hopes and dreams of the unsaved are the hopes and dreams of dead people.  We should not dream their dreams or hope their hopes because we should be living the life of a redeemed person.  Our Lord became death and then God resurrected Him to life and in doing so made it possible for us to have this life in us.  We live because He lives.  Our lives should reflect the living Lord Who dwells in us not the dead people of the world around us.

   Did you ever stop to consider that when you envy the life of an unsaved person you are envying a dead person?  For me it really strikes home when I watch news on TV.  (A habit I really have to break.)  To hear the speeches of the rich and powerful is sad, to me, because they are lost and without direction in their lives and they stagger through life blindly stumbling over crisis after crisis.  They are trying to sway others to their point of view in a hopeless attempt to make the world a better place.  But our world is broken far beyond repair by the dead leading the dead.

   For those who are physically dead and buried in a cemetery there is nothing that the living can do for them. We cannot bring them back to life. However, there is something that we can do for the living dead - those who are alive physically but do not know Jesus as their personal Savior.  We can walk in the light of our Lord and shine the Gospel light of the Lord on the darkness around us exposing the world for the dark place it is.  The living dead, through the light of the Gospel, can begin to awaken from their sleep of death and see their need for Jesus to come into their lives and bring them the life we have.

   So, whenever you walk in the world and have contact with these living dead always let the light of Jesus shine through you.  It is not too late for some of these to come to Jesus and receive eternal life.

Stephen Cram                                                        August 18, 2013                    

Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, following the tradition of men according to the rudiments of the world, and not in accordance with Christ.  Colossians 2:8

Visit my pastor’s blog at http://pastorjonrhinehart.blogspot.com/.

Why Did God Fail?

Why Did God Fail?

1 Kings 18:36-40

36 And it came to pass, at the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that Elijah the prophet came near and said, “Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that You are God in Israel and I am Your servant, and that I have done all these things at Your word. 

37 Hear me, O Lord, hear me, that this people may know that You are the LordGod, and that You have turned their hearts back to You again.”

38 Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood and the stones and the dust, and it licked up the water that was in the trench. 

39 Now when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces; and they said, “The Lord, He is God! The Lord, He is God!”

40 And Elijah said to them, “Seize the prophets of Baal! Do not let one of them escape!” So they seized them; and Elijah brought them down to the Brook Kishon and executed them there.

   Why did God fail?  You would think the whole incident would have won the hearts of the Israelites.  Elijah had commanded the rain to stop three years before and the people were suffering from the worse famine in their history.  Then Elijah shows up and arranges a contest to see if Baal-Melkart or Ashtoreth were more powerful gods than Yahweh was.  He built a simple alter and placed the sacrifice on it and drowned it with water.  Neither false god had been able to send fire down on their dry sacrifice, but Yahweh sent fire from a cloudless sky and burned the sacrifice of Elijah, along with the wood, the water and even the stones were cracked by the intensity of the fire.  It made an impression on the people; the Bible tells us it did.  But they did not turn their hearts to God.  The test was a success – spectacularly so.  But it did not turn the people away from Baal worship; they just decided to share their worship between the Baals and Yahweh.  King Ahab was not convinced nor did Queen Jezebel begin to worship God.  In the long view, the incident was a failure.

   So Elijah fled from the Queen’s anger and went to the wilderness to a mountain.  There God taught him an essential truth.  God sent a strong wind that broke rocks.  An earthquake shook the mountain and then a fire burned the trees and shrubs, but He did not speak to Elijah.  Then when Elijah was quiet, he heard a quiet voice.  God spoke from the quiet not from the violence of the storm, the earthquake or the fire.  And He asked Elijah, “Why are you here?”  Well, Elijah was hiding from Jezebel, of course.  But God had already protected Elijah for three years.  He hid him, fed him, and then answered his prayer at Mt Carmel in a dramatic way.  He sent the rain after Elijah called for it.  So why had Elijah fled the country and climbed this mountain?  And why was he whining to God about being the only Prophet left in Israel? 

   Because he had never learned that God must be in our hearts.  He is not at home in our emotions nor is He at home in our heads.  His home must be in our hearts if we are to be His people.  The people saw the fire and the then the rain and were impressed, but their hearts were still inclined towards the Baals.  Genesis 6:5 Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. 

   The real problem is that when we are born, we are born tainted by Adam’s sin.  Our hearts are sinful and are naturally opposed to God.  We are not born wanting God and His righteousness: we are born sinful and wanting to fulfill our own lusts.  This is why that most church programs to draw the unsaved into church fail.  The world is not sitting at home waiting for a reason to go to church; they’re enjoying their sin and might never feel like going to church in their whole lives.

   If a person is going to turn to God, the Holy Spirit must – must – must first have softened their hearts.  If their hearts are not softened, they will not turn to God.  You can make up signs and hang them around town and hire a big-name worship leader and a famous evangelist and he can pray and call down fire from Heaven and no one’s heart will be turned to God unless the Holy Spirit does the work.

   God still speaks in a quiet voice and He is not shouting over the noise and hubbub of the world.  He still works in people’s hearts and does not try to win people’s minds.  He draws people to Himself and does not try to “persuade” them to change their ways.  Because when He lives in our hearts, He has us completely.  If He wins our hearts, He will get all of us over time.  Our lives will change from the heart out and will never change from the head down. 

Stephen Cram                                                                                                            2013                     

Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, following the tradition of men according to the rudiments of the world, and not in accordance with Christ.  Colossians 2:8

Visit my pastor’s blog at http://pastorjonrhinehart.blogspot.com/.

But Did You Bring Your Umbrella?

But Did You Bring Your Umbrella?

Acts 12:13-15

13 And as Peter knocked at the door of the gate, a girl named Rhoda came to answer. 

14 When she recognized Peter’s voice, because of her gladness she did not open the gate, but ran in and announced that Peter stood before the gate. 

15 But they said to her, “You are beside yourself!” Yet she kept insisting that it was so. So they said, “It is his angel.”

   Picture this scene.  Close your eyes and let it play out in your head.  Your pastor has been arrested and put in prison guarded by sixteen soldiers.  He is chained to at least two of them.  He is asleep and behind at least two locked, iron gates.  Your church meets to pray for his safety.  There is a knock on the door and a young girl goes to answer it and comes back and says, “the pastor is at the door!”  Do you believe God answered your prayers and run to the door and greet him or tell the girl she’s crazy? 

   This reminds me of a story I heard once - supposedly a true story.  A rural church in the middle of a farming community had a special service to pray for rain.  A drought had hit the area hard and the farmers and community were suffering financially.  Many people came to the service to pray and as the pastor looked out over the crowd he was encouraged.  However, he noticed that of all the people who came to the prayer meeting, only one had brought an umbrella.  A little girl sitting in the front pew was holding a bright, red umbrella in her lap.  They were praying for rain but didn’t have enough faith to bring an umbrella.

   I can’t speak for you, but I’ve prayed like this.  I’ve asked God for an answer to some need and then tried to work out for myself how to fix it.  I pray, really pray, and really mean it, then get up off my knees, and don’t reach for an umbrella. 

   The problem is that many Christians don’t take prayer seriously.  I’m not saying that we don’t pray and I’m not saying that we don’t have some prayer warriors among us, but the vast majority of Christians don’t seem to take prayer seriously.  Churches with prayer meetings regularly are, by one poll I read, in a minority in this country.  And of those few churches who do have prayer meetings that meeting is the least attended meeting on the weekly schedule.  One church I attended was a church with more than five hundred in attendance every Sunday morning.  The prayer meeting had about ten. 

   Our churches need prayer.  We need growth and protection and wisdom and a whole lot of other things and we need God’s help with them all.  What we need is to live by Matthew 7:7&8

7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 

8 For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. 

There must be preparation for prayer: prayer is an act of worship.  Just as you prepare to worship on Sunday morning you should prepare to encounter God in prayer. How do we prepare for serious prayer?  

Plan to take time to pray, not just “wing it” for a couple of minutes but plan some real time. 

Find a good place to pray where we won’t be interrupted for the time we’re planning to spend in prayer. 

Turn off your phone, computer, pad, whatever – turn ‘em off! 

Recognize that you’re planning to enter the Presence of God Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth.  Don’t come flippantly or take it lightly, He’s really God, show some respect! 

Be humble.  God is not in need of your wisdom or help.  You are the servant – He is the God.

Tell Him what you want.  He’s willing to listen to one of His children, so talk to Him. 

Expect to hear from God.  Probably not spoken words, but you’ll know He speaks if you listen with your whole being. 

Expect to get an answer.  In other words, bring your umbrella. 

   One last thought - prayer empowers you.
Ephesians 3:20

Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, 

Stephen Cram                                                                                        August 4, 2013                     

Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, following the tradition of men according to the rudiments of the world, and not in accordance with Christ.  Colossians 2:8

Visit my pastor’s blog at http://pastorjonrhinehart.blogspot.com/.