Staying in Love

I give thanks every day for you! I was touched with your open arms when I came as a new pastor. You touched me with your love. You inspire me how you are growing in your faith. You share the love of Jesus Christ openly and with grace. I see you following Jesus Christ. I hear your testimony how God’s love is changing you. I see God’s blessings flowing from your wonderful testimony of God’s love.

People think the Bible is dull, dry, and boring. If that is the case, they haven’t read the Songs of Solomon. The Songs of Solomon teaches us about love. It teaches us about love between a husband and a wife. The Songs of Solomon teaches us how to write a love letter. Today’s love letter is to King Solomon from his wife. Do we write love letters to our girlfriends, boyfriends, or spouses anymore? Do we tell the people that we love them in a special and creative way? Do we just resort to finding a greeting card that almost says what we want to say to those that we love?

I confess that I don’t write Susan love letters anymore. I don’t know if I even did it when we were dating. I just assume that she knows how I feel about her. I also confess that I buy the American Greetings card to express my love for her. I haven’t found a special and creative way to tell her that I love her. I’m promising myself that I will say “I love you” to Susan in a special way right after I write this sermon.

The Song of Solomon 2:8-13 scriptures says “Listen! My lover! Look! Here he comes leaping across the mountains, bounding over the hills. My lover is like a gazelle or a young stag. Look! There he stands behind our wall, gazing through the windows, peering through the lattice. My lover spoke and said to me, “Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, and come with me. See! The winter is past; the rains are over and gone. Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing has come, the cooing of doves is heard in our land. The fig tree forms its early fruit; the blossoming vines spread their fragrance. Arise, come, my darling; my beautiful one, come with me.”

This letter is written about King Solomon by his wife when they were very old. She was graciously remembering when Solomon was a young man. She called him a young stag. Today, she would probably call him a young buck or strong lion. She remembered that he could overcome any obstacle to reach her. Solomon was like an Old Testament superman. He could leap across mountains and bound over hills to reach her. Solomon could probably have stopped a speeding bullet if bullets had been invented when this book of the Bible was written. The simple request for Solomon’s wife to arise and come with him is powerful. Do we tell the ones that we love that we want them to come with us?

Solomon tells her that all of their problems are gone like the dreary rains. He explains that all of their problems of their lives have been replaced with flowers. If winter does not come, we cannot enjoy the spring. If the cold soaking rains do not come, the ground cannot open up to allow the flower seeds to sprout and bloom. Have we appreciated the challenges in our lives? Did we realize that we are stronger because we’ve endured those challenges? Solomon’s wife is celebrating the memory of when their love was young and all they thought about doing was to sing. I’d love to be able to serenade Susan, but my voice isn’t sweet enough to serenade her by myself. I’d need music playing behind me that I could sing along. There’s a song called “Sing” that Karen Carpenter sang when I was a kid. The words went:

“Sing, sing a song. Sing out loud. Sing out strong. Sing of good things not bad. Sing of happy not sad. Sing, sing a song. Make it simple to last your whole life long. Don't worry that it's not good enough for anyone else to hear. Just sing, sing a song. Let the world sing along. Sing of love there could be. Sing for you and for me.”

Karen Carpenter’s song always gave me encouragement. The song said “don’t worry about it’s not good enough for anyone else to hear. Just sing, sing a song.” I love to sing praises to God. I enjoy singing the songs that pop into my head without worrying about my voice being good enough. I just sing songs. We need to be willing to write love letters as well.

Did you realize that most of our hymns are actually love songs? Our hymns teach us about God’s love for us and also teach us about our love for God. Everything in this life boils down to love. We learn how to love our family from the way God loves his only son, Jesus Christ. We learn about how to love our parents from the love that Jesus gave to his father in heaven.

We are able to love because we were loved first by God. We learn to love our brothers and sisters. We learn to love strangers. We will learn to love in a new way when we meet that special someone who becomes our partner for our journey through this world.

Love has a way to overlook any flaw in our voices or our personality. It is when we forget “that we are in love” that the flaws in our special someone becomes visible. Somehow, we forget to see our husband or wife through the eyes of love.

Do you ever take the hand of your loved one to walk through the woods and listen to the birds singing and the crickets chirping? Do you wait for the sunset to look at God’s beauty together? Do you wait for the lightning bugs to glow in the early evening light? Or do you sit there worrying about the mosquitoes instead? Do you look into the eyes of your special someone and remember the first time you gazed into those eyes? Or do you look at the wrinkles around the eyes or the graying hair at the temples?

The flowers have a wonderful fragrance if we stop long enough to smell them with our loved ones. The first fruits are so sweet and tasty if we stop long enough to take a bite. Are you willing take the time to pick the fruit and taste the sweet and juicy peach?

King Solomon’s wife had a gift. She remembered King Solomon through the eyes of love. He had flaws. He had a lot of flaws. Did she mention those in her love letter? No. Did she complain about leaving his socks on the bedroom floor? No. Did she complain about anything? No. Her letter celebrated his strength, kindness, and love for her without any of the memories about a fight about money or disciplining the kids. She remembered his loving words to her. She remembered that King Solomon wanted her with him. Here are the verses: “Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing has come, the cooing of doves is heard in our land. The fig tree forms its early fruit; the blossoming vines spread their fragrance. Arise, come, my darling; my beautiful one, come with me.”

He is telling her that he thinks that she is a flower that blooms in the spring after the early rains. He thinks that she bears good fruit and that she is the beautiful one. He wants her by his side.

I think we forget to tell the ones that we love that they bear good fruit. We tell them that our kids are dumb and lazy. That is a lie! We complain about the small stuff in life that doesn’t matter. Our kids are blessings from God. God has given us people in our lives to love and cherish. It is our duty to tell those people that we are thankful that God has blessed us with their presence in our lives.

Those people may be in our lives for a brief season. We can still write love letters about how they touched our lives and our hearts. We can also write love letters to our parents to tell them that we are thankful that they loved us before we knew about God’s love. We can write to the people in our lives today to tell them that they are special.

I give thanks every day for you! I was touched with your open arms when I came to you. You touched me with your love. You inspire me how you are growing in your faith. You share the love of Jesus Christ openly and with grace. The Hall Family recently experienced the tragedy of losing their home, but they did not lose love. You loved them as if they were your own family. I’ve seen you forgive and turn your pain over to God. I’ve seen you ask God for prayers. I’ve seen how you’ve reacted when you’ve been touched by God. I am in awe that you dream of God’s love and are willing to share that love with others.

I give thanks that you encourage, strengthen, and love all of God’s children. I give thanks that you raise your voices to God. I give thanks that you lift up those that are discouraged. I give thanks that I can see God in your face. I give thanks that you love with your whole heart. I give thanks that you love to get dirty to build an addition to our church. I give thanks that I have learned to love, to share, to encourage, and to sing praises to God right here with you.

I love you. I cherish your smile. I remember your faithfulness. I thank God that I have the opportunity to call you my friend. I thank God that I am learning about God’s grace through your example and your love. I remember to love God with all my heart, all my soul, all my strength, and all of my mind and to love my neighbor as myself.

I will also remember that Susan is the love of my life and that she was a gift from God to me to be my companion as I journey through this world to serve God in a special and powerful way. I will remember that our children our God’s first fruit. Our family is a gift that I will cherish today and everyday from this day forward. I promise to write praises to God for all of those that I love.

I vow to write love letters again. I vow to sing a love song and let the whole world sing along. Last week, one of the young girls asked to sing “Jesus Loves Me.” It was the faith of a little child that reminded us that Jesus loves us.

I promise that I will be the one asking to sing love songs about God in the future. I promise to remember to cherish love of all kinds and especially the love of my wife, the mother of our children, and the woman who enables me to be the man who can serve God. Without my wife, I would not be the man in front of you today. Susan taught me to give to God first. Susan taught me to find joy in every situation. Susan was the answer to my prayer to God when I told him that I was ready for my companion in this journey we call life. I thank God that I am a man blessed with Susan and my kids, our God, and our church. I thank God for men and women who are unified in their faith and abundant love. Amen!

Give God Thirty Days

I’m here today to ask a simple question. Can you give God a chance? Can you give God thirty days of your life? There are times in our lives when we just have to step out on faith. It is hard to do. The world says that we must also understand why and how everything happens to us. The logic of this world says that life must be fair.

Let us accept on faith that there is a God. We can spend all of our lives trying to use logic to explain away God or we can just believe that God exists and that God is our God. We can also believe that we are children of God. We can also choose to serve God for thirty days.

The minds of this world claim that we must have a nice and neat answer to how the universe was created. The logic of this world says that we must know the day and hour that the world was created. We can spend all of our time searching for the exact moment that the universe was created or we can just believe that God created us and the beauty that we see all around us. Mankind has been searching for the answer of how this world was created for a long time. The Bible provides an answer that God spoke it into existence and that creation was good. Let us accept creation on faith.

I was challenged with a lot of tough questions several weeks ago. I had a conversation about God with someone who asked a lot of hard questions about God. They were challenging questions. He was using those questions as justification for avoiding building a strong relationship with God. I wasn’t sure that I had all of the answers. In fact, I didn’t. God provided the answers through me. God provided the scriptures to back up the answers. God is an amazing God if we just listen.

I am inspired when people are touched by God. God surprises me a lot. I love it when God does the unexpected. I share my love of God with a lot of people. Not everyone is ready to hear about God or God’s love. I believe in planting seeds and seeing what comes up. My favorite gardening style is to let God blow the flower seeds and plant the seeds where he wants the flowers to grow. In the spring, I strain to look at the leaves of the new plants to try to guess what flower will grow from that small seed planted by God in the dead of winter.

I also strain to look into the hearts of people to see God growing stronger in their garden of life. The faith journey is different for different people. For some, the journey is short. For others, the journey takes a long time. For most of us, we will spend our entire lives on the journey to get closer to God. We will have spiritual growth spurts along the way and then we will have periods where it seems like we are making no progress at all. The journey may require a lot of prayers from our loved ones to God asking that we receive God’s anointing, favor, and blessing. In fact, someone else may have planted the seed of faith that sprouted when I watered the seed with God’s word.

There’s a story in the Bible in Matthew 13:1-23 about seeds falling on different kinds of soil. That soil is really descriptions for our hearts. [Read Matthew 13:1-23] We must prepare our hearts to be fertile ground for God’s word. If our hearts are full of stones or weeds, then we must change and build a place for God to grow within us. We need to build spiritual roots that are deep and strong so that we will stand firm when the storms come in our life. We also need to withstand the thorns and weeds in our life which try to chock our joy and our relationship with God.

My job is to know about God and to share the good news about him as your pastor. God is the one who helps me with the words and with the spiritual guidance. I’m just the guy willing to open his mouth and to let God’s words flow out. The amazing thing is that I can’t guess who has the fertile heart where God’s words will grow and flourish. I just go around planting seeds. It is so much fun. I don’t know what kind of ground that I’m sowing on when I sow God’s word. I just share God. Did you catch that? I just share God. It is that simple.

Recently, I shared God with a guy at a time when I hadn’t planned on sharing God. God just provided the situation to happen. Just sharing God provided joy for me and the guy receiving God. Two hours seemed like two minutes for both of us. We didn’t know what was happening we just talked like we were talking about a baseball game. The difference was that we were asking and answering questions about God.

Satan has placed a lot of reasons in our heart why we should not be in relationship with God. All of Satan’s reasons are lies. One of reasons may be that you lost your job because God was mad at you. One of reasons may be that you are sick because God wanted you to be sick. One of reasons may be that you aren’t happy because it pleases God. It is all a lie. Don’t listen to Satan. Listen to God.

I’m here today to ask a simple question. Can you give God a chance? Can you give God thirty days? Here’s what I’m asking you to do for God:

1. Speak with faith for thirty days. Don’t speak any negative about yourself or anyone else for thirty days.

2. See with the eyes of faith for thirty days. Look at what God wants you to see for thirty days.

3. Avoid cursing, teasing, and joking at someone else’s expense for thirty days.

4. Avoid any negative comments about yourself, your health, your friends, or anyone you love for thirty days.

5. Avoid giving anyone a hard time about anything for thirty days. Anyone means your wife, your children, and your friends.

6. Give yourself over to God completely for thirty days.

7. Tell your family and friends and even strangers that you love them for thirty days.

8. Open the Bible for thirty days. Read any scripture that you find. Imagine yourself in the Bible story or scripture.

9. Share the love of Jesus Christ for thirty days.

10. Do something unexpected for someone for thirty days.

[Go through each of the main points above in more detail.]
1. Speaking with faith for thirty days means speaking the unseen before it is visible. Speak with boldness that the impossible is possible. Stop saying “My son is lazy.” Start saying “I thank God for my son who is faithful, loving, smart, and hard working.” Stop saying that “My health is declining.” Start saying “I thank God that I’m getting better every day.” Speak only positive things about yourself or anyone else for thirty days.

2. See with the eyes of faith for thirty days. Look at what God wants you to see for thirty days. God has a plan for you. Open your eyes to the potential that is in you that God has given you. Open your eyes to see work in a new light. Open your eyes to see your spouse or children the way that God sees them. Open your eyes to see a sunset like it is the first time after you regained your sight. What would it be like to see God’s beauty for the first time? What would it be like to see your child’s face for the first time? What would it be like to see the smile on your loved one’s face for the first time? Let God guide you to see the mysteries of the gospel for the first time.

3. Avoid cursing, teasing, and joking at someone else’s expense for thirty days. We are snared by our tongue. Our spoken word has so much power over us. Scriptures warn us about the danger of the spoken word used in the wrong way. Scriptures also explain the power of the spoken word to confirm blessings in our lives. Joking at someone’s expense is really easy, but the hurt stays long after the laughing ceases. Don’t do it. Don’t tease. Don’t curse. Think about what you are about to say before it comes out of your mouth. Only let the positive and spiritual words be spoken out of your mouth. Don’t say “You are trouble.” Don’t say “You are a pain in my side.” Don’t say “You will not account to anything in this life.”

4. Avoid any negative comments about yourself, your health, your friends, or anyone you love for thirty days. This goes along with the third point. Only speak words that are loving, encouraging, and uplifting for thirty days. Don’t say that my back is getting worse. Tell your loved one how special they are to be in your life.

5. Avoid giving anyone a hard time about anything for thirty days. Anyone means your wife,
your children, and your friends. Don’t say it if you don’t mean it. Don’t say it in anger. Say your words in love. Say your words in joy.

6. Give yourself over to God completely for thirty days. Pray to God and say “God, you are my God and I am yours. Guide my steps in the way that you want me to go.”

7. Tell your family and friends and even strangers that you love them for thirty days. This is probably the hardest of all. It gets easier once we say “I love you” for the first time. It is fun to see the reaction of friends or strangers when you tell them that you love them. It is tough to see the reaction of family who haven’t heard those three words for too long. At first, a wall begins to fall that separates the two of you. A place of joy and love replaces the wall that separated the two of you.

8. Open the Bible for thirty days. Read any scripture that you find. Imagine yourself in the Bible story or scripture.

9. Share the love of Jesus Christ for thirty days.

10. Do something unexpected for someone for thirty days.

These points tie very nicely into Ephesians 4:25-5:2. The main goal is not to give the devil a foothold into your life. We were given the advice not to let the sun go down while you are still angry when we got married. It is still good advice. The scripture is asking us not to let bad language come out of our mouths. The spoken word is very powerful. The spoken word can bless our lives or it can curse our lives. Don’t voice your fears out load. Speak in faith instead.

The scripture from Ephesians 4:25-5:2 is so important. The scripture says “25Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body. 26"In your anger do not sin"[d]: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27and do not give the devil a foothold. 28He who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with his own hands, that he may have something to share with those in need. 29Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. 30And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. 1Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children 2and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”

The person who was given this challenge to give God a chance for thirty days is seeing a difference in his life. His coworkers want to know what happened to him. He is not cursing. He is not looking at other women. He feels the fullness of God in his life. He is about to burst open with God’s love inside of him. He doesn’t know what to do yet, but he knows that life has changed for him. Are you willing to give God a chance for thirty days, too? Amen.

Living A Life Worthy of God

What does it mean to live a life worthy of the calling you have received? Are we living a life worthy of God’s calling? We have so many grand ideas of God’s calling, but are we handling the small stuff? Ephesians 4:1-3 says "As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. "

I scanned a lot of pictures from our family photo albums over the last month. My parents are going to celebrate their 50th Wedding Anniversary on December 20th this year. My sister wanted to have a slide show of some of the best photographs. I quickly realized that our family has changed and also grown over the years. All of my grandparents have passed away now. There was a time when I could not have imagined life without them. I thought about their lives and how God called them. I wondered if my life would stack up to the faithful path that they had walked in their lives. I also thought about how they had touched their church and their family and their friends over the course of their lives.

Are we being a good friend? Are we being a good spouse? Are we being a good son or daughter or parent? Do we give the time when someone needs us? I spent the week at the Boy Scout Camp Ottari this week. I am the Scoutmaster for Boy Scout Troop 362. We only have a handful of boys, but it means a lot to them that I took my time to spend the week with them.

One of the boys told me that he hoped that his Dad would be with him next year. He hoped that his Dad could sleep with him in his tent next year. At that moment I realized that part of my calling from God is being a Dad. I took time this week just to be a Dad. The time that I gave was more valuable to Johnny than all of the money in the world.

I’ve had the scripture for this week’s sermon for a long time. I took the scripture and my notes to Boy Scout Camp. I would get out my Bible and my notebook to start writing with the intentions of writing my sermon. Every time, someone would start up a conversation about God or God’s calling on their life.

Scoutmaster Tom told me that he knew that God was calling him to be a pastor since he was about eighteen years old. Tom told me that he had zigged and zagged his way through life. He’s cross paths with what God was calling him to do, but he never would stay on course until about two years ago. He realized that God’s call on his life was too great to ignore any longer. He was starting on the process to be a pastor in the United Methodist Church. It was great getting to know Tom and hearing how God had touched his life.

A scout came up to be to me his belief in God and religion. He told me that he didn’t have too much faith in religion. I told him that Jesus didn’t either. I told him that Jesus upset the money changers in the temple who were part of the organized religion. He wasn’t sure about God because of his lack of faith in religion. I told him that he should look around him at the beauty of nature if he ever doubted the existence of God. God created the beauty.

Have you ever been seen someone working alone and realized that they needed help? I saw a scoutmaster cooking hot dogs on Thursday afternoon. I realized that I couldn’t just keep on walking and leave him to cook for all of those boys and their leaders alone. I cooked about nine hundred hamburgers for the outdoor festival. Afterwards, I needed to take a shower and cook off. Finally, on Thursday night I found a bench overlooking the lake to write the first few pages of this sermon. I felt God and had a sense of this sermon.

It rained almost every day that we were at camp. Our socks and clothes were wet. It was hard to get them dry so they were put into the dirty clothes bag a little damp. We loaded the truck in the rain and had to put all of the suitcases and dirty clothes in the cab. I didn’t notice the smell when we loaded the truck. I didn’t notice the smell until I had taken a bath and returned to unload the truck.

I smelled the wet and soggy truck with a new sense of smell. I tried to get the clothes washed as quickly as possible so that the rest of the family would not gag from the smell of a son and Dad who had been camping for a week.

We got back on Saturday morning from camp. I had dreams of getting home early, resting, finishing my sermon early in the afternoon, and having a peaceful birthday party for my brother-in-law. Jessica told me that she needed to shop for tennis shoes for band camp next week. We couldn’t find a pair a “Show Show” in Rocky Mount so we ended up driving to the “Rack Room” in Roanoke. I realized while I was driving Jessica that driving to Roanoke was the gift of my time to help Jessica have shoes to wear while she was marching next week. I was fulfilling my call to be a parent in a different way. I was ready to rest, but my calling was to give time to my daughter.

Susan was at Wesley Seminary last week learning about how God and the Bible is portrayed in Hollywood movies. I missed her. She didn’t make it home until Saturday afternoon. I realize that my calling as a supportive husband is being able to let go enough so that Susan can grow spiritually. Missy is also serving God at Project SPY (Summer Project Youth) in Christiansburg. I’ve missed her this summer, but she is really growing in her faith by preparing a place of middle and high school students to come to serve God. I’ve also had to let go of Missy so God could transform her spiritually.

I’m also learning that living my calling requires me to listen to God, Susan, and my children. They have very special things to tell me about how God is touching them. If I don’t slow down enough, I’ll never be able to hear their wonderful stories of inspiration and transformation. My call is to be an active listener.

My call is also being a good brother-in-law. My call is also being a good pastor by visiting David Smith in Franklin Memorial Hospital. My call is also being an encourager to people that cross my path – Whitney. Whitney remembered every word that I told her last year. She remembered my stories. She remembered my encouragement. I had forgotten the words that were spoken last year at Boy Scout Camp, but for her those words were words of hope and faith. I realized that my call from God is to encourage strangers as they cross my path. Those moments may make a bigger impact in someone’s life than we realize.

I received a call from Kofi Boakye. The windows and doors are in the Sagadugu Church. He said that missionary went by the church and was impressed with the new church. The missionary asked Kofi how the church was built. Kofi is ready to start work on the plaster job for that church. Kofi said that the people of Sagadugu are encouraged because they have a place to worship. I realized that my call is to serve God by helping people to worship God.

I received a call from a member of our church who wants to remember her baptism. She wants to rededicate her life to God. I realize that my call is to help people along their faith journey.
Living a life worthy of God’s calling is easy. We need to pay attention to the little things in our life when people need us. We need to lift them up. We need to encourage. We need to help people when they are down. We need to pray for the sick. We need to clothe the poor. We need to feed the hungry.

It is okay to think about the calling of Moses going to the burning bush or the mountain top. We may be called to part the Red Sea or we may just be called to live our life in a manner that people will say that they were touched by our love in such a special way. If someone opens the photo album fifty years from now, what will they say about our life? Will our lives inspire others to serve God and to be inspired to determine their life that is worthy of God’s call? As we go out those doors today, let us think about God’s calling on our lives and find the way that God wants us to serve.