Reminders of Paul’s Visit

Posted on March 3, 2021 by Don Merritt

1Thessalonians 2:1-16

At first glance, this is an odd section; is this part of the introduction or has Paul been challenged somehow? Has someone called him a fraud since he left them? When he wrote to the Galatians and Corinthians that was the case… but not here, for as far as we know, Paul’s authority and motives had not been challenged in Thessalonica. Thus, if that is the case, why would he write like this?

In this section, Paul reminds the Thessalonians how he behaved in their midst. He had been badly treated in Philippi and had come to their city. In Thessalonica, his message was quickly opposed, but Paul preached the gospel anyway, because it was pleasing to God. He didn’t concern himself with the approval of people, for God’s approval was enough. He wasn’t looking for money; indeed, he supported himself by working while he was there.

Many received the gospel message, and these he cared for as though he was their father, with encouragement and loving concern, yet now he feels it necessary to remind them of this. Has he suddenly felt a need to hear their praise?

I think the answer to this riddle will provide us with some fascinating insight into both the psyche of Paul and into what is expected of all Christians- as well as helping to achieve the purpose for which Paul is writing. You will no doubt recall that Paul is writing them to encourage everyone in Thessalonica to remain in their faith while under persecution, and so this part of the letter should encourage them, but how?

Look carefully at the passage and you will see that Paul has linked together the message of the gospel with the way he is living his life. Notice in particular that he is trying to show that his motives are in harmony with his message, and that he acted it out. The message of the gospel is a message of love on God’s part, but delivering the gospel message was an act of love on Paul’s part, even more so after his treatment in Philippi and with the opposition in Thessalonica; he did it anyway to please God and so that they might be saved because Paul loved God and because Paul loved the Thessalonians: This was Paul’s love in action. There is no greater act of love than to share the gospel message.

What should the church at Thessalonica do to hold firm to the faith while being persecuted? Live their faith in love every day. What should we as Christians be doing every day? We should be living our faith in love in all that we do.

By taking this approach, Paul is also setting up the emphasis of the remainder of the letter.; again, his message to them (and to us) is that we must put the message we preach into practice in our lives.

Posted in Bible | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Confident in the Lord

Posted on March 3, 2021 by Don Merritt

But he knows the way that I take;
    when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold.
 My feet have closely followed his steps;
    I have kept to his way without turning aside.
 I have not departed from the commands of his lips;
    I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.

Job 23:10-12 (Larger context: Job 12)

I’m sure pretty much everyone knows the story of old Job, who was a good and righteous man, but whom God allowed Satan to test. Old Satan thought he could break Job away from God, but after terrible trials and hardships, with the exception of one slip, Job held fast and received a great reward from God.

In the preceding verses, Job laments that he cannot find God to make his appeal for relief directly. In expressing this desire, Job used to idea of finding God’s house somewhere, but where?

Yes sir, Job wanted an audience with God…

Unlike Job, we can have an audience with God any time we want because God’s Son, through His action on the cross has taken away the separation that had stood between God and Man from the time of humanity’s rebellion against God described in Genesis chapter 3.

Yet even though Job couldn’t get a direct conference with God to make his case, he remained confident that he had lived according to God’s ways, that he had been faithful to God for his entire life, and thus, he knew that in the end, God would stand with him.

And Job was right, for in the end, God gave him great reward and made him whole again.

Just think about this for a moment…

Even though Job did not have the advantages that we have in Christ, he exhibited great faith, in spite of his slip up at one point, and I have to wonder if I could have been as steadfast as he was. Yet throughout my life, and I have had my share of challenges, God has always been there, He has always been steadfast, even when I might fall flat on my face. In those times, He offered me His hand to get up again.

You know, as I typed these words, I realized I did so with a long face, feeling a bit sad, if I’m honest. What am I thinking? How could I be so silly? A long face? Sad? Yes, sometimes I fall flat on my face…

And He offers His hand to help me up!!!

Yes, I regret that I mess up my fair share of the time, but when I do, He helps me get up again. I think I’ll go find a rooftop to shout from: This is a wonderful thing, don’t you think?

Posted in Christian living | Tagged , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Greetings and Thanksgiving

Posted on March 2, 2021 by Don Merritt

Paul begins the letter with the customary greeting, identifying himself along with Silas and Timothy as its source. I highly doubt that the three of them co-wrote the letter; however, Silas and Timothy had actually spent more time in Thessalonica than Paul had, and by mentioning them here, he probably intended to convey that they all stood as one in the things he was writing about.

Verses 2-10 contain the balance of Paul’s greeting in the form of thanksgiving to God for the Thessalonians themselves. This is not quite as perfunctory as it might seem at first, for in these few verses, Paul tells the brief history of the church, and begins to reveal why he has written this letter to them.

Very quickly Paul mentions that they, apparently more than many other churches, jumped right into the work of the gospel, as a response to the love of Christ. Notice verse 5 in which Paul says the gospel came to them with more than words, but with power and the Spirit since they immediately became imitators of Paul, and thus of Christ. Wouldn’t it be something if our churches today were more prone to this! They knew how Paul lived among them, and they copied Paul’s way of living, right off the bat. As they did this, they encountered opposition in the community in the form of persecution, but they kept at it, and in so doing the church in Thessalonica became the model for all of the churches in the region; quite a success story.

It would seem that they had so completely turned from Pagan worship to being followers of Jesus Christ that news of this spread far and wide, beyond their own provinces, so Paul makes it clear that he is not writing to correct the way they have responded to the gospel; there is something else on his mind. Paul will have more to say about the Thessalonians as he continues into the next chapter, and we will pick up his narrative in the next installment…

Posted in Bible | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

What you look for you will find

Posted on March 2, 2021 by Don Merritt

If you are thinking about buying a green car, you will suddenly notice that there are many green cars on the road; if you are thinking about buying a new green Toyota, you’ll start to see them everywhere. If you go out on a Saturday night looking for trouble, you’ll be calling a friend to bail you out of jail on Sunday morning.

We always find what we are looking for.

I see a lot of posts that have the word “sin” in their titles, I hear a lot of people talking about sin in others, sometimes I hear people talking about the sin in their lives. Why are so many focused on sin?

We always find what we are looking for.

Do we look for the sin in TV shows or movies or books? It isn’t hard to find. Are we looking for sin in culture; that isn’t hard to find. Are we looking for sin in other people; that’s pretty easy to spot as well, and to be sure, they can see our sin just as easily.

We always find what we are looking for.

The Pharisees were the most righteous of all men, and it would appear from the record of Scripture that they were on the lookout for sin, and they found it everywhere in their midst, and they were very quick to point it out, but when the Son of God was in their midst, they missed Him entirely, preferring instead to find sin; that unending search for the sin in their midst was their downfall.

We always find what we are looking for.

Nice going guys…

Paul didn’t tell us we should be obsessed with sin:

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.

Colossians 3:1

We always find what we are looking for.

Maybe I’m wrong; maybe I’m crazy.

 You might say I’ve gone soft on sin; you might say I’m a sinner.

It could be I’m old and feeble; It could be I’m out of touch.

But if we find what we are looking for, wouldn’t it be a bad idea to be looking for sin?

If we find what we are looking for, wouldn’t it be a better idea to be looking for the things that are from above? If we find what we are looking for, wouldn’t it be a great idea to be looking for His presence?

Posted in Christian living | Tagged , , , , | 9 Comments

Paul Writes to Thessalonica

Posted on March 1, 2021 by Don Merritt

The letters that Paul wrote to that church are much discussed today, if for all of the wrong reasons. His first letter, written about 50 – 51 AD is very likely Paul’s first pastoral letter. This was done during the time of Paul’s second missionary journey, after he had visited Thessalonica, and while he was staying in Corinth. We can easily see what occasioned his writing: The Thessalonian church was a very young church, having been in existence for only a short time. It was located in a challenging environment, where it was finding itself under serious persecution right from the start. Paul wrote to this church to urge them to remain in the faith- to urge them to continue down the road of discipleship as followers of Christ. As we read this letter, it is vital that we keep this in mind, lest we make the mistake of reading it in light of current day theories about things that Paul is not discussing in the letter.

The letter follows the typical Pauline pattern, one common in his day of letter writing. It begins with a greeting in which the writer identifies himself, and then moves on into a thanksgiving passage. Next comes the body of the letter, and it ends with a final greeting. Paul varies from this format only once in chapter 2 where he includes a second thanksgiving and we’ll cover it when we arrive at that point.

This is a letter that all of us should concern ourselves with for it has much to teach us. Of course, you can say that about any book of Scripture, but the letters to the Thessalonians have more than most that applies directly to our circumstances in the modern world. Most of us don’t live under anything that can be called persecution, but I would imagine that most of us experience temptations similar to those of Thessalonica, namely to avoid standing out in our communities as being “different” so as to avoid embarrassment or the wagging tongues of those who are not followers of our Lord. Obviously, the Thessalonians had far more serious repercussions to deal with than most of us do, and as I see it that should make the silliness of our fears all the more starkly obvious.

Well dear reader, there is the “preview”: We’ll begin in earnest tomorrow as we charge ahead into chapter one of a most amazing new adventure into Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonian church; see you then!

Posted in Bible | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

Love in Action

Posted on March 1, 2021 by Don Merritt

Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.

1John 3:18

It’s all well and good for us to talk about love, after all everybody feels better when the conversation is over. Please forgive me if I’m too blunt here but, talk can be a bit too cheap: Love, real true Godly love, requires action.

To be completely clear, I’m not talking about romance.

The example John used in this passage is found in verse 16:

This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.

It’s unlikely we’ll be called upon to die on a cross or anything like that, but if our brother or sister is hurting in some way, we should set our own wants aside and give them a hand, don’t you think? If someone is hungry, we give them food, if they are hurting emotionally, we stand beside them, if they need a shoulder to lean on we stand fast with them, and if they need a hand to pull them up, we pull them up.

In short, we put their interests and needs ahead of our own: That is Godly love.

Remember, Jesus didn’t go to the cross because He wanted to get His name in the news, He did it so that we might have life eternal; I’m sure He could have found something more pleasant to do that day, but no, He put us first instead.

I wonder: How can I put love into action today- how can I let His love in me work in someone else’s life today?

Posted in Christian living | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Sunday Sermon Notes: February 28, 2021

Posted on February 28, 2021 by Don Merritt

Title: This is Love

Text:  John 4:7-12

Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

1 John 4:7-10

This is where John begins the central core of this letter, and this core runs from verse 7 to the end of this chapter.  It is not only the central core of the letter, but it is also the central core of Christian theology.  All of those comparisons at the beginning of the letter, and all of the discussion of evil, antichrists and the testing of spirits comes back to this theme, for without it, the rest of the theology of our faith is rendered meaningless.  In short, what is written in this section is the one thing that gives Christianity its power and authority, and against which the gates of Hell itself cannot, and will not stand.

The last sentence in this text is the key: God loved us. In fact, he loved us while we were lost, and not loving Him at all.  Yet God loved us anyway− He loved us so much that He sent Jesus to die for us.  Yes, you’re right, this has already been pointed out in this letter, but here it is again, as the core of everything else: that is how important it is that we grasp this simple concept.

How could God love us so much and in spite of everything?  Because God is love.

That being the case, we are to love one another, just as God loved us.  Nobody can do this unless God is in that person, which is to say that person is in Christ.  Loving one another as God loved us runs counter to every teaching of this world, as it also runs against our natural human inclinations.  Therefore, if a person does not love, it is because God is not in him or her.

Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

1 John 4:11-12

Simply stated, this love core flows like this:

  1. God loved us while we were still sinners.
  2. God sent His Son to die for our sins.
  3. We loved God and responded to the Gospel.
  4. God loved our brothers and sisters in Christ.

Therefore, so do we.

We see this pattern at work once again in verse 11.  God loved us, so we should love each other. Then John, as was his custom, takes one more step.  Since no one has ever seen God, and since God loves all of us and we love Him, if we also love each other, God’s love will be complete in us and visibly expressed within His Body, the Church.  This is as far as John has gone so far…

At this point, we can infer that there is another step.  The other step is implied in John’s mentioning that “no one has seen God.”  OK, why did he choose to write that?  Think…

No one has seen God, but if we love one another as God loved us, then His love will live amongst us, and though us all will see it.

I have seen a number of debates about Evolution and Creation.  These kinds of discussions usually have at their core, an assumption that if we cannot observe some “evidence” that God exists, then we can determine that He does not exist.  I’m no scientist, but this seems to be a natural inclination on the part of people who are educated with regard to the Scientific Method.  Remember that one from your school days?  It was the one about observations, and testing theories with observable evidence.

Back to John.  Have you ever thought that it would be nice if you could find the positive “proof” of God’s existence? Yes, something that can be observed and studied?

Are you sitting down?

John just gave it to you− The proof is God’s love at work in our lives and within the Body of Christ; at least it should be.  Maybe if we started taking these verses to heart and putting them into our everyday manner of living, like we are commanded by God to do, more people would notice that the greatest “proof” of God, the observable evidence is right there in front of us all: Love for one another as Jesus has loved us, and gave His life for us.

Let’s wrap up for today with a question to think about: Do you ever wonder if it is a coincidence that the whole concept of Godly love has been corrupted and demeaned in our culture? After all, doesn’t society use the word “love” to mean just about anything other than Godly love?

Posted in Bible | 2 Comments

Walking in the morning stillness

Posted on February 27, 2021 by Don Merritt

I have always enjoyed going for a walk, especially early in the morning when the air is still and the land is relatively quiet and calm. Now that I finally live in the country, this is even more true for me.

These days my morning walks serve a dual purpose for this is a workout. I begin in the woods where footing isn’t always great, there are big tree roots in the path and some holes that are often obscured by fallen leaves. In the woods I am warming up, stepping carefully and enjoying myself in a time where it’s just me and God. Eventually, the pathway leads to normal roads where I kick it up several notches and get my heart rate up into a cardio workout that I keep up until I get back home where I see what Mr. Fitbit has to say about my efforts.

Without a doubt, that first part is the part that keeps me doing this most every day.

From my front door, it takes me roughly 90 seconds to reach this spot where I can leave everyone behind for a while. I took these photos on the one day I brought my iphone along with me, December 16, 2020. It was a tad chilly on that morning, just after sunup; I’d say probably upper 40’s F. As I began walking down this path into the woods all I could hear was the slight rustling of leaves overhead, the birds singing in the trees and cattle mooing in the distance. Then the crowing of a rooster in a nearby farm… and far off a train sounding it’s warning as it approached a grade crossing.

Suddenly in the brush, the sound of an animal which doesn’t want to meet me. It could be a squirrel or a rabbit; maybe a mouse. One thing I know, on this December morning, the reptiles aren’t moving very fast, if they’re even awake.

Now the quiet returns and it’s just me and God; how lucky I am to be in the midst of His marvelous Creation early this morning.

Off to one side as I move along, I approach a meadow; it could be almost anywhere, but if you notice the little palm in the bottom corner, I guess that narrows the choices down a bit. As I continue past the meadow, I notice a chill little breeze that is moving across the open ground where the vegetation thins out on that side.

I keep walking with God, side-by-side…

Eventually, I’m near the little lake where the alligators live; they won’t be coming out to play this morning. If this were summertime, I wouldn’t be strolling by here at feeding time.

I’ve been told that the ones in this water aren’t very big and will run away from a human, and that normally alligators are a bit on the lazy side. Frankly, I don’t really want to find out for myself. I’ve seen them in a Zoo, and if I’m honest, they creep me out… Yuk!

Funny, I always seem to pick up my pace in this stretch, strictly for enhanced cardio purposes, you understand.

A few minutes later I come to this stand of bamboo; this stuff must be 25 or 30 feet high. A slight breeze comes along as I walk through here and causes the bamboo to rustle and make a curious song as the poles tap each other almost like those bamboo wind chimes at the exotic import shops…

Back I go into the woods, where photos are hard to take; the sun isn’t high enough to get much light in here yet.. and then there’s a little break in the trees.

What a great sight as the early morning sun catches those leaves. Maybe I should have brought my real camera instead of my phone, for this photo doesn’t come close to doing the view justice.

I have to be honest with you: On these morning walks, I’m reminded each day how very lucky I am to be able to do this, to stroll though a bit of God’s glorious Creation, just me and God, alone together in His Creation talking things over, getting ready for a new day. Thank you, Lord.

Shortly before I made it back to was passes for civilization around here, I accidentally made a discovery. I always wondered how people take selfies, and on this morning, I hit the wrong button on my phone and found out, so it’s only appropriate that I sign off now with my first, and obviously, last ever selfie…

Believe me when I tell you that I’ve made it a point to forget which little button does this, and I can assure you, this won’t happen again! 😊

Posted in Bible | 20 Comments

While I was Away… part 3

Posted on February 26, 2021 by Don Merritt

I’ve asked myself a number of times why it is that people move from the city to the country, after all, in spite of the noise and congestion of a city, there are quite a few amenities and conveniences that can’t really be found anywhere else. Here’s one that’s important to me… The Los Angeles Dodgers never play their games out in the countryside near a town you’ve never heard of.

Out in the country, there isn’t even a Trader Joe’s: How can you live without that?

It’s becoming clear to me that there are a great many reasons people have moved to our little community in the middle of nowhere. One thing we don’t have around here is church, that is, unless you want to drive a long way to get there. That’s really not such a problem, but from long distance, it isn’t so easy to be involved in the church community from 30 or 40 miles away.

A lot of people miss that.

Not everyone moves out this far just because they’ve always wanted to be in the country, like I have. A fair percentage have left town because they have been hurt in some way and don’t want to be around a lot of people, at least for a time. Some have even been hurt by a church.

I wasn’t here too long before I came to realize that there were people here who had been hoping and even praying for a church right here in the neighborhood. At Christmas, the lady who lives behind us, over that famous hedge, hosted a time for reflection, reading of the Christmas story from the Gospels, a few songs and prayer in the clubhouse. Having been invited for Christmas Eve, we went…

Afterward there was mingling and conversation, and for no particular reason other than I knew I should do this, I asked if anyone might be interested if there was a Bible study. The response was immediate: that would be an answer to prayer, so losing all common sense, I asked what about a regular service on Sundays.

Same response; the only problem was that there wasn’t anyone who could lead the study or service.

Then I lost all control and told them that I could do it.

We began the study group, really a small group study, right after the holidays were over, and our first Sunday service began last week. I’ve been quite amazed thus far at how receptive people have been to this, and how universal the notion is that we don’t need formality, traditions or human restraints, just relationship with our Lord. Mind you our group is quite diverse doctrinally in terms of backgrounds…

As I reflect on the whole thing, we have an amazing opportunity to share Christ with our neighbors here, after all, nobody is a stranger for very long in a small community in a remote location, and it seems that we are all clear that what people need from us is not a great sales pitch or a good speech, but simply for them to see God at work in our lives. As a result, in each of our 2 studies a week, since the first week in January, save one, and in our first service last week, we have had at least one new person in the group.

What an amazing God we have!

Posted in Christian living | Tagged , , , , , , , | 16 Comments

Jesus Gives an Answer That Changes Everything

Posted on February 26, 2021 by Don Merritt

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Matthew 22:37-40

One of the great challenges to our understanding of life is found in how we view God’s commands, or to put it another way, “rules”.

Is following Jesus, the same thing as following rules? Is that all there is- checking off rules you’ve followed?

Yet another way of stating the same essential question is this: Should we view the God as being transactional or relational?

In the text above, the Pharisees were setting a trap for Jesus to see if they could entice Him into making the mistake of suggesting that we could neglect one command to favor another. If they could get Jesus to put one over another, then they could say something like, “Oh yeah? What about this, what about that, you heretic?!”

In His answer, Jesus covers all of the bases: Love God is the greatest, but the second is love your neighbor. Just in case they might think they could pounce, Jesus went one small step further, and when He did, He set their world on its ear:

All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments. (22:40)

Our God is not a god of checklists, rulebooks and “gotcha!” He isn’t following us around trying to find a way to exclude us from relationship with Him: He loves you. If you think about it, this is the very definition of relational, not of transaction consisting or ordinances and violations followed by punishment and banishment.

God so loved you and me that He sent Jesus to die for us so that we might live eternally in relationship with Him, because He had no desire to punish anybody. This way, the choice is entirely ours of whether or not to live with Him.

Friends, that is some serious love!

Of course, we all misstep from time-to-time; we all mess up and fall short of Christ’s example, but take heart in this: God has gone to extreme measures to take care of this problem, for He knows that we are mere mortals living in a corrupted world and that we are not perfect.

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

1John 1:9

We have nothing to fear.

Posted in Bible | Tagged , , , | 10 Comments