I talk a lot about sowing seed, particularly about investing time in people so they can follow Jesus and help others do the same. Sometimes we see results and sometimes not.

We had a pleasant surprise a few days ago when Steve and Mildred McNair of Clinton, Mississippi, called us because they were in Colorado Springs and wanted to see us. We all scrambled, but within two hours of the initial contact, we were sitting down to dinner together.

Why did they and we want to get together? Because in 1971 Mildred and her twin sister Marian were high schoolers in Biloxi, MS, when we arrived there for an Air Force assignment. We (mostly June!) were privileged to spend time with them, studying the Bible together, helping them walk with God and plan for the future. Here’s what I just heard from Steve:

I just wanted you to know how much Mildred and I appreciate the time spent with you in Colorado Springs on Sept 27.  Mildred knew she wanted to make contact. We had a good time talking about her knowing you both in Biloxi back in the early ’70s.  The obvious, most important thing is that you connected with her and Marian and they profited from your instruction in the Word.  God inspired Mildred early in her life to pray for an eventual marriage to a Christian man.  God answered my prayer for a Christian wife.  We were talking in the car about Psalm 19. ‘The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul.’  I connected Jesus’ words about the great commandments in the law to that Psalm verse in the following way: ‘you shall love your neighbor as your self’ is substituted into the Psalm 19 verse (almost like algebra).  Your Christian love for Mildred, back in time and currently, revives the soul!  More simply, perhaps, the love that believers show for one another revives the soul. The Savior would have it that way.

That’s encouraging! And thought-provoking: “Love that believers show for one another revives the soul.”

But Timothy has just now come to us from you and has brought good news about your faith and love. He has told us that you always have pleasant memories of us and that you long to see us, just as we also long to see you. Therefore, brothers and sisters, in all our distress and persecution we were encouraged about you because of your faith. For now we really live, since you are standing firm in the Lord. (1 Thessalonians 3.6 – 8, NIV)

I wrote on Tuesday about the importance of warnings. By the way, the weather Wednesday was a balmy 70+ degrees all day. Today it hasn’t made it to 20 degrees, and it’s snowing…as we were warned! Just like Jesus warned us:

Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. It’s like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with their assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch. Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back—whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to everyone: “Watch!” (Mark 13.33 – 37, NIV, emphasis mine)

I quoted this on Tuesday, but I didn’t really specify what living by Mark 13’s warnings might look like. But today, my friend Ray referred me to Deuteronomy 4.9, which speaks perfectly to what keeping watch might include. Here it is in The Message, with bullet points so we don’t miss any of it:

• Just make sure you stay alert.
• Keep close watch over yourselves.
• Don’t forget anything of what you’ve seen.
• Don’t let your heart wander off.
• Stay vigilant as long as you live.
• Teach what you’ve seen and heard to your children and grandchildren.

This is enough to keep us busy, and a further warning to us is that the Israelites didn’t keep watch, and the nation suffered for it (read the rest of the Old Testament!).

And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the LORD or the work that he had done for Israel. (Judges 2.10, ESV)

Have you given thanks for mail service lately? I haven’t until now.

I’ve been corresponding with a young pastor in Cameroon to whom I wanted to send some books. When I tried to buy a Kindle book for him, a little notice popped up saying I could only give an e-book to someone in the U.S. So I asked for his mailing address. He sent me his email address. I asked again, explaining that I couldn’t send an e-book, but I was willing to mail him a paper book if he would please provide his address. Again, he sent his email address.

Thinking we had a communication problem since he is a native French speaker, I carefully explained that I was looking for a mailing address and gave him mine as an example. Then I said, “If I wanted to mail something to you, how would I address it?” Then he wrote back: 

It’s now okay for now. I don’t have any box but when I will have some money I will go and open it. Thank you for all the time you took to explain may God bless you.

He doesn’t have a post office box and can’t afford to open one!

We complain about the junk mail we get delivered to our homes for free! And if we wanted to rent a post office box, we could do so for a nominal fee that we wouldn’t think twice about. 

For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing out in the valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper. And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you. (Deuteronomy 8:7 – 10, ESV)

It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises to your name, O Most High; to declare your steadfast love in the morning, and your faithfulness by night… (Psalm 92.1, 2, ESV)

Few passages are as difficult to interpret as Jesus’ words to his disciples on the Mount of Olives right before his crucifixion (see Matthew 24 and 25, Mark 13, and Luke 21). But the primary application is clear: be on guard! Be aware! Keep watch!

Jesus answered, “At that time deception will run rampant. So beware that you’re not fooled! (Mark 13.5, Passion Translation)

Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. It’s like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with their assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch. Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back—whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to everyone: “Watch!” (Mark 13.33 – 37, NIV, emphasis mine)

It’s October 8, and the weather couldn’t be nicer. Clear skies, a gentle breeze, highs in the 70s today. But look at the forecast for Thursday (the Red Flag Warning is for high fire danger Wednesday because of dryness and high winds):

As I said, it’s in the 70s today, with the big change coming Wednesday into Thursday. Overnight low Thursday morning is 21, and Friday morning is 7! 1-3” of snow on Thursday. So what?

• Bring the flowers in!
• I’ve already put the lawnmower to bed for the winter and moved the snowblower to the ready position.
• Be sure the generator is ready in the unlikely event we lose power.

In general, a warning should cause us to act! Often we are tempted to get tied up in the complicated interpretations of prophecy, but the purpose of prophecy is always a warning to act whether or not we know all the specifics.

When my kids were still at home, and we were going out for the evening, I might say something like, “Please finish cleaning up the kitchen before we get home or there will be consequences!” What I did NOT want to hear were questions like, “When are you coming home? What are the consequences if we don’t do it?” No! I just want them to do the work.

The revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who testifies to everything he saw—that is, the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it, because the time is near. (Revelation 1.1 – 3, NIV, emphasis mine)

Friday, Sputnik Day(!), we took our granddaughter Kesley to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in honor of her recent 14th birthday. (She was out of school that day.) The plan had been to pick her up from swim team Thursday afternoon, keep her overnight, go to the zoo, and drop her at her mother’s after. While at the zoo, the plan changed, and her mother asked that Kesley be taken to her other grandmother’s (Anna) instead. No problem.

When we approached Anna’s house we saw a small Yorkshire terrier that looked like our silky terrier, Babo, only smaller. He appeared to be unattended as he walked down the sidewalk. So when we got to Anna’s we asked some neighbors if that was their dog, and they said no. After a few minutes of following him up and down the street, I picked up the dog and gave him to Anna who took him gladly since he reminded her of a dog she had that died a few years ago. Anna said she would post something on the neighborhood web site. 

The short ending is that they finally went door-to-door and found the owner who was actually visiting from out of town. That family had been distraught over the loss of their dog and was overjoyed and very grateful when our granddaughter returned him. Kesley called June with the good news.

The point is that God orchestrated our day to be there for that dog. We weren’t planning to be in that neighborhood at all, and then we arrived at the precise time to see the dog. 2 minutes earlier or later, and we would have gone straight to Anna’s, dropped Kesley, and left. 

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. (Mark 10.29, ESV)

And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left. (Isaiah 30.21, ESV)

Not accepting responsibility goes back a long way:

The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.” Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” (Genesis 3.12, 13, ESV)

And we saw it again in game 1 of the National League’s Division Series with Ronald Acuna, the Atlanta Braves center fielder, not running hard after he hit a long fly ball, reducing a double into a single. Speaking through a translator, Acuna insisted, “I mean, I was trying to give my best effort and those are those things that just kind of get away from you.”

No, they don’t “just kind of get away from you.” You didn’t hustle. (To his credit he played harder in the next game while saying things like, “That shouldn’t have happened,” rather than “I should have run harder.”) Acuna’s reaction reminds me of Todd Bertuzzi’s attack on Steve Moore back in 2004, described this way:

With Moore ignoring him, Bertuzzi grabbed Moore’s jersey from behind and punched him in the jaw, then deliberately slammed Moore’s head into the ice as the pair fell…Moore was taken to a hospital where he was treated for three fractured vertebrae in his neck, a grade-three concussion, vertebral ligament damage, stretching of the brachial plexus nerves, and facial lacerations.

Later, Bertuzzi said: “For the kids that watch this game, I’m truly sorry. I don’t play the game that way. And I’m not a mean-spirited person.”

Actually, you do play the game that way: we have the video to prove it!

Accepting responsibility for our actions is the first step toward correcting them, isn’t it? When teaching my sons to play ball, I would say, “OK, next time, let’s do it this way.” Response: “I did do it that way!” “No, if you had done it that way, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

And Aaron said, “Let not the anger of my lord burn hot. You know the people, that they are set on evil. For they said to me, ‘Make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’ So I said to them, ‘Let any who have gold take it off.’ So they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.” (Exodus 32.22 – 24, ESV, emphasis mine)

I know how bad I’ve been; my sins are staring me down. You’re the One I’ve violated, and you’ve seen it all, seen the full extent of my evil. You have all the facts before you; whatever you decide about me is fair. (Psalm 51.3, 4, MSG)

I wrote Thursday about starting Galatians with a small group from church and noticing that Galatians is not bringing us “a new way of being religious,” but a single worldwide family initiated by Jesus’ resurrection.

Today, I just want to mention another very important sentence in Galatians, so important it appears twice:

Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything.

For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. (Galatians 5.6, ESV)

For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. (Galatians 6.15, ESV)

I’m sure you’re aware that circumcision was the sign of the covenant that God instituted with Abraham, first discussed in Genesis 17:

And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. (Genesis 17.9, 10, ESV)

Now Paul, a trained Pharisee, a Jew’s Jew (see Philippians 3.4 – 6), says that it doesn’t matter whether one is circumcised or not circumcised! This is radical.

Folks, if circumcision doesn’t matter, there are A LOT of things that don’t matter! When we baptize and how much water we use comes to mind. Worship and music style? Dress code? Hair length? Speaking in tongues?

Here’s what does count from the two verses above and the third time Paul declares that circumcision doesn’t count:

• Faith working through love (Galatians 5.6)
• A new creation (Galatians 6.15)
• Keeping the commandments of God (1 Corinthians 7.19)

I think God is calling us to fewer lines drawn between us and more following Jesus.

So where does that leave you when you criticize a brother? And where does that leave you when you condescend to a sister? I’d say it leaves you looking pretty silly—or worse. Eventually, we’re all going to end up kneeling side by side in the place of judgment, facing God. Your critical and condescending ways aren’t going to improve your position there one bit…So tend to your knitting. You’ve got your hands full just taking care of your own life before God. Forget about deciding what’s right for each other. Here’s what you need to be concerned about: that you don’t get in the way of someone else, making life more difficult than it already is. (Romans 14.10 – 13, MSG)

This is being published on Sputnik Day, October 4, the 62nd anniversary of the Soviet Union’s launch of the first orbiting satellite, back in 1957. I remember it well, having just started sixth grade. Just 13 years later, I found myself tracking Sputnik’s successors from a radar site in Turkey.

Of course, Sputnik kicked off the space race, culminating in the U.S. putting men on the moon, July 20, 1969, which I wrote about five times during the 50th anniversary week.

Those were exciting times, and I’m glad that we were able to develop the technology for the Apollo moon program; technology that, by the way, laid the foundation for many of the things we enjoy today. I’m also glad that people like Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, is spending his time these days applying technology to other pressing problems.

When he and his wife, Melinda, read that huge numbers of children in the world are still dying before the age of five from diarrhea, they jumped on it. They discovered that the issue is not just lack of clean water, it’s the lack of sanitation. So the Gates challenged scientists and manufacturers to develop self-contained toilets and sewage treatment plants, devices that can run without being connected to electricity or running water. And they are succeeding!

Some people would say that the Gates are contributing to Shalom – the Hebrew word for peace – but not just the absence of conflict but human flourishing.

Shalom: peace, safety, prosperity, well-being; intactness, wholeness; peace…

Bringing sustainable sanitation to the developing world is a worthy endeavor, an astounding use of technology. It’s also an example of good things that are happening in the word that don’t make news! (That’s another whole subject!) By the way, I learned about the Gates’ sanitation work in the first episode of the Netflix 3-part series called Inside Bill’s Brain.

Seek the peace [shalom] and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.” (Jeremiah 29.7, NIV)

I recently read Andy Stanley’s new book Irresistible, and while I’m still mulling over some of the content, I’m coming into strong agreement that we tend to make the gospel too complicated. When the early church was getting started, for the first couple centuries, there was no New Testament, and for the Gentiles that Paul and others preached to, there was no “Old Testament” either! So what did they preach? Simply the resurrection.

And with great power the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. (Acts 4.33, ESV)

Paul, addressing the sophisticated Athenians said:

The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.” (Acts 17.30, 31, ESV, emphasis mine)

Our church has just started small groups to study Galatians from now until Advent, and the main message, boiled down, is quit adding stuff! Let’s focus on Jesus, his death and resurrection. 

Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead—and all the brothers who are with me, To the churches of Galatia: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen. (Galatians 1.1 – 5, ESV, emphasis mine)

Our study guide was written by N. T. Wright, and I really like this early comment:

The gospel isn’t a system of salvation or a new way of being religious. It’s the announcement that Jesus, the crucified Messiah, is exalted as Lord of the whole world; therefore he is calling into existence a single worldwide family.

It’s not “a new way of being religious.” One of our group members has been reflecting recently on her spiritual journey. She came out of one pseudo-Christian religious system based entirely on works and keeping certain ritualistic practices only to find herself moving from one church to another trying to learn, in N.T. Wright’s words, the right “new way of being religious.”

Finally, she is realizing how much God loves her and is learning to enjoy her freedom in Christ.

I could go on and on about this, but I’d better stop for now! I’ll close with this: the Apostle Paul was very clear in Galatians in a verse one of our group members thinks is the most important verse in the book. (It’s hard to choose just one, but he might be right!)

Is it not clear to you that to go back to that old rule-keeping, peer-pleasing religion would be an abandonment of everything personal and free in my relationship with God? I refuse to do that, to repudiate God’s grace. If a living relationship with God could come by rule-keeping, then Christ died unnecessarily. (Galatians 2.21, MSG)

The next day, as he left Bethany, Jesus was feeling hungry. He noticed a leafy fig tree in the distance, so he walked over to see if there was any fruit on it, but there was none—only leaves (for it wasn’t yet the season for bearing figs). Jesus spoke to the fig tree, saying, “No one will ever eat fruit from you again!” And the disciples overheard him. (Mark 11.12 – 14, Passion Translation)

Jesus “spoke to” the fig tree. Peter interpreted it as a curse in verse 21, but the text doesn’t directly say so. Nevertheless, the fig tree died:

In the morning, they passed by the fig tree that Jesus spoke to and it was completely withered from the roots up. (Mark 11.20, Passion Translation)

It’s almost as if the fig tree understood what Jesus said to it and decided that if it wasn’t going to bear fruit, there was no reason for it to stick around!

Fruit is important; that’s why Jesus had so much to say about it.

I am a true sprouting vine, and the farmer who tends the vine is my Father. He cares for the branches connected to me by lifting and propping up the fruitless branches and pruning every fruitful branch to yield a greater harvest. The words I have spoken over you have already cleansed you. So you must remain in life-union with me, for I remain in life-union with you. For as a branch severed from the vine will not bear fruit, so your life will be fruitless unless you live your life intimately joined to mine. I am the sprouting vine and you’re my branches. As you live in union with me as your source, fruitfulness will stream from within you—but when you live separated from me you are powerless. (John 15.1 – 5, Passion Translation)