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Not everyone understands that mathematics can be beautiful. Sometimes we get too mired down in the nuts and bolts to get to the beauty. But here’s a problem from Brilliant.org that is pretty to look at, and the solution is beautiful, as well as astonishing, I think.

The ability to be astonished is something I’m working on this year–to appreciate the beauty in God’s creation or in a well-functioning organization or in the kindness of people. I don’t want to take life for granted. I’ll write more about that later.

So here’s a beautiful problem, just in its appearance.

The question is, what is the total area in orange? There is a formula for the area when circles overlap. It’s medium complicated, and in this case, even with all seven circles of radius 1, pi is involved, as well as the square root of 3. But the answer, surprisingly (astonishingly!), is 2 pi. So the picture is aesthetically pleasing, and the answer is too.

There is beauty everywhere, and we are encouraged to find it:

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.

(Philippians 4.8, NIV)

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I was talking with a pastor friend the other day, and he was very pleased with the progress his small church had made in 2018. Attendance had doubled, and he attributed that to the “missionary family” that he had prayed for. “God, please send us a ‘missionary family,’ someone who will commit themselves to reach out to people at our local military base and invite them to church.” And God did! 

After sharing his joy, I asked a simple question: “What are you doing to make ALL of your families missionary families?” 

The job of the leaders of the local church is laid out clearly in Ephesians 4.11 – 13. I like the way The Passion Translation captures part of it: 

And their [the leaders’] calling is to nurture and prepare ALL the holy believers to do their own works of ministry, and as they do this they will enlarge and build up the body of Christ. These grace ministries will function until we ALL attain oneness in the faith, until we ALL experience the fullness of what it means to know the Son of God,… [emphasis mine]

The key word is ALL serving, ALL enlarging and building up the body, not just a select few. Another pastor wrote recently, bemoaning the fact that bad weather was keeping people from Sunday morning attendance:  “Nothing can replace being here in person. The purpose of the church is to gather in worship and glorify the Lord together.” 

This sounds to me as if he believes the church leaders’ job is put together a Sunday morning worship service and the parishioners’ job is to be there. 

There’s way more to following Jesus than that! Join the Adventure! If you’re a pastor, help people join the adventure of being “missionary families.” And when God sends you a “missionary family,” see them as part of the leadership team training others. (When you click the link above, you’ll go to the Adventure tab on this blog’s website. There are links to my books and other resources that proclaim this message. One of the best is Imagine Church by Neil Hudson.)

I’ve written on this before and will continue to do so from time to time: it’s part of my ministry emphasis of “Equipping ordinary believers to make a difference where they are…helping willing pastors do the same!”

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It’s been a good week (January 7 – 12, 2019, after Clemson won the National Championship on Monday). I wore my Clemson colors all day Monday through Wednesday, and on Tuesday and Wednesday, I was amazed at how many greetings I got! “Good job!” “Your guys were great!” “Congratulations!” Most of these were from total strangers. No question, it feels good to win!

But I can’t take the personal accolades seriously—I didn’t do anything! While I tell myself that wearing orange way out here in Colorado helps the team, the fact is my total contribution to this season’s success is zero. I’m reminded of Galatians 6.3, 4:

For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor.

I knew of a church where it was common to hear, “I’m glad to be part of a church that…” has a prison ministry or helps the poor or sends out relief teams to disaster areas… It’s great to be part of such a church, to be sure, but I am accountable for what I do, not for what people around me do. 

I’m proud to be part of The Navigators, but the question isn’t, “What are The Navigators doing?” Instead, it’s, “Bob, who are you investing in?” Or as my Navigator hero Skip Gray used to say, “Where’s your fruit?”

So then each of us will give an account of himself to God. (Romans 14.12)

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It’s trivial, but I just solved a geometry problem! The problem wasn’t trivial, it was medium difficult, but my solving it or not solving it is certainly trivial. I do math for fun, and to keep my brain sharp, I subscribe to Brilliant and try to solve one problem each day. This particular problem has been hanging around since before Christmas, and I just solved it. I had been all around it, but I hadn’t put the pieces together just right until today.

What are the lessons? 

• Persistence is certainly one. I persist until I succeed (sometimes!). We are called to persistence in prayer; see, for example, Luke 18.1. We ought also to persist in tasks that need to be done. Nehemiah persisted through difficulties and finished the wall. 
• Flexibility is another lesson. When one approach doesn’t work, try another. Old-time Navigator Leroy Eims wrote a book called “No Magic Formula,” in which he observed that every Old Testament battle was different. They only marched around the walls to defeat one city – Jericho. Gideon took 300 men and used surprise. Joshua in defeating Ai took a lot of men and used a ruse. Flexibility. Churches are sometimes guilty of running the same program year after year because it worked once. 
• That leads us to creativity. God gave us the gift of creativity. Adam’s’ first task was to name the animals. Joseph was creative in how he reconciled to his brothers while giving them a chance to redeem themselves.

Persistence, flexibility, and creativity: not a bad set of lessons from a geometry problem!

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I’m trying to get into the habit of blogging every day. (Those who do say the first 1,000 days are the hardest!) To do that, I have to write whether or not I feel inspired. I started today with nothing in mind to write so I’m talking with God, and I’m on the lookout for a word.

I started my day by writing three thank-you notes. The idea was that I would get those written and mail them while I was out for a breakfast appointment. So I wrote the notes upstairs and took them downstairs to put stamps on them in preparation for leaving. Then the notes disappeared! The pen that I had written them with was downstairs on my desk (brought down from upstairs), but no notes. I looked “everywhere.” Finally I went to breakfast with no notes to mail.

Then it hit me, “Without me, you can do nothing.” (John 15.5) I can’t even mail a note! I’ve been urging us the past few days to do the next right thing. And that’s good counsel. But it presumes that we’ll do the next right thing in God’s strength and under his guidance. 

I finally found the notes about three hours later…mixed in with note cards that I haven’t used yet. When I put those away, I accidentally included the ones I had already written. 

But I hope I’ve learned something: do the next right thing with God’s help because “Without me, you can do nothing.”

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I am a proud graduate of Clemson University (B.S. in mathematics, class of ’68), and I’m very pleased, of course, with Clemson’s victory Monday night over Alabama.

There’s a lesson in Head Coach Dabo Swinney’s comment at the end of the first half when Clemson was leading 31 – 16: “Ain’t nothin’ less important than the halftime score.” He was saying what I wrote in this blog on January 6, quoting another head football coach Fisher DeBerry: “You’re only as good as your last play.” Dabo urged his team to come out in the second half with the same intensity as the first half and play like the score was 0 – 0. 

Many of us want to rest on our laurels OR let our past poor behavior cloud our future. But Paul wrote, “Forgetting those things which are behind…” (Philippians 3.13). 

Just go out and do the next right thing!

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The Christmas stories in Matthew and Luke tell of two different events in two different places. Luke speaks of the angel’s appearance to the shepherds and their visiting the newborn Jesus in the manger. Matthew tells of the wise men visiting the “young child” in a house some time later.

I just read that the early church has always loved the wise men, but it largely ignored Luke’s shepherds. Drawings of the wise men appeared in the catacombs 200 years before drawings of the shepherds for example. (E.A. Carmean Jr, art historian). The shepherds were low status men, poor, and did not seek out the Messiah until the angels called them. The wise men, on the other hand, were high status, wealthy, and had to work really hard and travel a long way. 

God used them both. The shepherds’ appearance was a confirming sign to Mary and Joseph, and the shepherds started telling about him right away (Luke 2.17). The wise men came later and didn’t tell anyone. However, their gifts would have funded the family for a long time. 

Here are a few simple lessons:

• The Messiah is for all people, rich and poor. 
• God works through ordinary people.
• God often calls people through their work. The shepherds were working when the angel appeared to them. The wise men would have discovered the star as part of their work. For that matter, Jesus called the first disciples while they were at work fishing!

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I wrote on January 6 that some folks try to excuse themselves from doing anything significant for or with God because “my spiritual life isn’t what it should be,” but that’s no excuse since what we do today is what matters: just do the next right thing. 

Here’s another reason why the alleged quality (or lack) of our spiritual life is irrelevant. Peter captures it in the aftermath of the healing of the lame man in Acts 3.

Acts 3.12 (ESV), “Why do you wonder at this, and why do you stare at us as though by our own power and piety we have made him walk?”

When we say, “I can’t do great things for God because my spiritual life isn’t what it should be,” we are saying that we do great things by our own power and piety! If only I spent an hour every day with the Lord! If only I spent 2 hours in prayer like Martin Luther did! If only…

Peter recognized and explained that the healing of the lame man was by the name of Jesus, not by Peter’s power and piety:

Acts 3:16 (ESV) And his name—by faith in his name—has made this man strong whom you see and know, and the faith that is through Jesus has given the man this perfect health in the presence of you all.

So go and do the next right thing…in the name and power of Jesus!

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“My spiritual life isn’t what it should be.” My friend had just written to ask if he might have a special gift for prayer, but then he quickly undermined it with the old standard, “I can’t be called to great things…my spiritual life isn’t what it should be.” And the answer to that is:

So what? Do the next right thing.

Paul said in Philippians 3, “Forgetting those things which are behind…”

I was just reading about Simeon in Luke 2, and his spiritual life was what it should be! The text says he was:

– A good man
– A lover of God
– Pure
– In touch with the Holy Spirit
– A believer in the imminent appearing of “The Refreshing of Israel”

A wonderful list. HOWEVER, if he doesn’t respond to the Spirit THAT DAY and go to the temple, he misses Jesus. What if he had been in the middle of doing something important? Or unimportant for that matter. What if he thought, “I’ve been a good guy for a really long time, isn’t it OK if I take a day off?”

Simeon’s responsibility, my friend’s responsibility, your and my responsibility is to do the next right thing: pray, spend time in the Word, meet a neighbor’s need, encourage someone, write the blog(!), serve your spouse,…. My friend Fisher DeBerry, former coach of the Air Force Academy Football team, had a sign in his office: “You’re only as good as your last play.”

Do the next right thing. The alleged quality of your past spiritual life, good or bad, is irrelevant.

Have a blessed 2019!

Now go up into the hills, bring down timber, and rebuild my house. I will take pleasure in it and will be honored, says the Lord. Haggai 1.8

This verse is in the middle of the chapter on priorities where Haggai challenged the Jews returning from captivity that they had built their own houses while neglecting to rebuild the temple. I’ve been using it as a challenge to folks not to make excuses for not having their daily quiet time, for example. And the verse implies effort: “Now go up into the hills and bring down timber” sounds hard! But it’s commanded nonetheless.

But I’m learning a new application for this text as I find myself, at age 71, with my warranty running out! I’ve just had shoulder surgery on May 10, three weeks before I’m writing this. The shoulder surgery was scheduled quickly so that I’ll be able to have knee replacement surgery in August. And this “simple, out-patient” shoulder surgery wasn’t, AND I came home on oxygen, a complication caused by anesthesia and living at altitude.

Haggai 1.8 came to me as I’m getting back to the stationary bike for aerobic exercise and using the little breathing exerciser they sent me home with. I don’t want to do the work! But the word is clear: my body is God’s temple, too (I Corinthians 3.16), and God wants it rebuilt! And the rebuilding will be difficult.

But there’s a promise, also. The older Jews thought the new temple was puny compared with the previous one (Haggai 2.3). But God responds: “‘The glory of this present house will be greater than the glory of the former house,’ says the LORD Almighty.” (Haggai 2.9) My orthopedist says I will be better than I was before! And God seems to be saying that, too!

So I need to do the work! If you find that your warranty is running out at whatever age, let’s encourage each other to keep both our spiritual AND our physical houses in order.