Yesterday we saw how Solomon’s wealth (including wives) turned his heart from the Lord. Here’s the antidote:

Teach me how to make good decisions, and give me revelation-light, for I believe in your commands…The words you speak to me are worth more than all the riches and wealth in the whole world! (Psalm 119.66, 72, TPT)

If Solomon had stuck with God’s word instead of going astray, that would have been worth more than his wealth. Truly, the Word is greater than Wealth. (That’s what the > symbol in the title means: “greater than.”)

And when [the king] sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law, approved by the Levitical priests. And it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes, and doing them, that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right hand or to the left, so that he may continue long in his kingdom, he and his children, in Israel. (Deuteronomy 17.18 – 20, ESV)

Following my reading program, I’m in 1 Kings now, and chapter 10 ends with a long section (14 – 29) about Solomon’s wealth. Here’s part of it:

Thus King Solomon excelled all the kings of the earth in riches and in wisdom. And the whole earth sought the presence of Solomon to hear his wisdom, which God had put into his mind. Every one of them brought his present, articles of silver and gold, garments, myrrh, spices, horses, and mules, so much year by year. And Solomon gathered together chariots and horsemen. He had 1,400 chariots and 12,000 horsemen, whom he stationed in the chariot cities and with the king in Jerusalem. And the king made silver as common in Jerusalem as stone, and he made cedar as plentiful as the sycamore of the Shephelah. And Solomon’s import of horses was from Egypt and Kue, and the king’s traders received them from Kue at a price. (1 Kings 10.23 – 28, ESV)

There follows one of the sad verses in the Bible. One sad verse is Judges 2.10: “There arose a generation that knew not the Lord…” That verse speaks of the failure of the older generation to teach the younger generation. This sad verse is the opposite: Solomon chooses not to follow the example of his father:

For when Solomon was old his wives turned away his heart after other gods, and his heart was not wholly true to the LORD his God, as was the heart of David his father. (1 Kings 11.4, ESV)

What good is wealth and having everything you want if your heart turns away from the Lord?

When you come to the land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you possess it and dwell in it and then say, “I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,” you may indeed set a king over you whom the LORD your God will choose. One from among your brothers you shall set as king over you. You may not put a foreigner over you, who is not your brother. Only he must not acquire many horses for himself or cause the people to return to Egypt in order to acquire many horses, since the LORD has said to you, “You shall never return that way again.” And he shall not acquire many wives for himself, lest his heart turn away, nor shall he acquire for himself excessive silver and gold. (Deuteronomy 17.14 – 17, ESV)

Take care lest you forget the LORD your God by not keeping his commandments and his rules and his statutes, which I command you today, lest, when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them, and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery… (Deuteronomy 8.11 – 14, ESV)

I was reading the narrative of Jesus’ birth in Luke 2.8 – 38. It’s interesting whom Luke records as witnessing the coming of the Messiah:

• Shepherds, ordinary working men
• Simeon, a resident of Jerusalem is all we know. We don’t even know that he is old.
• Anna, a widow

None of these people had any status. All shared publicly what they knew. The message is clear.

Compared with Paul’s message in Ephesians 3, what these people knew was limited. They thought Jesus was the Messiah for the Jewish people. It didn’t occur to them that the whole world would be included.

There has never been a generation that has been given the detailed understanding of this glorious and divine mystery until now. He kept it a secret until this generation. God is revealing it only now to his sacred apostles and prophets by the Holy Spirit. Here’s the secret: The gospel of grace has made you, non-Jewish believers, into coheirs of his promise through your union with him. And you have now become members of his body—one with the Anointed One! I have been made a messenger of this wonderful news by the gift of grace that works through me. Even though I am the least significant of all his holy believers, this grace-gift was imparted when the manifestation of his power came upon me. Grace alone empowers me so that I can boldly preach this wonderful message to non-Jewish people, sharing with them the unfading, inexhaustible riches of Christ, which are beyond comprehension. (Ephesians 3.5 – 8, TPT)

Apollos also shared what he knew, even though his knowledge was incomplete also. But Paul to the rescue again. Paul trained Priscilla and Aquilla, ordinary tentmakers (see Acts 18.1 – 3), and they shared with Apollos what they knew!

Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was an eloquent man, competent in the Scriptures. He had been instructed in the way of the Lord. And being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John. He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, but when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately. (Acts 18.24 – 26, ESV)

My son Mark alerted me to this post from Atheists in Kenya Society, which, as nearly as I can tell, is a legit organization promoting atheism and humanism in Kenya. I offer this press release, dated May 30, 2021, with little comment:

This evening, regretfully, the Secretary of the Atheists In Kenya Society Mr. Seth Mahiga informed me that he has made the decision to resign from his position as Secretary of the society.

Seth’s reason for resigning is that he has found Jesus Christ and is no longer interested in promoting atheism in Kenya.

We wish Seth all the best in his new found relationship with Jesus Christ. We thank him for having served the society with dedication over the last one and half years.

The position of Secretary of the Society has been rendered vacant. We are calling upon Kenyan atheists who would wish to join our Executive Committee to send their CVs to info@atheistsinkenya.org.

I’ll be praying for Seth and for whatever influence he has with his former associates in the Atheists in Kenya Society. (FYI, I think Seth’s position has already been filled.)

For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers. – Apostle Paul (Galatians 1.13, 14, ESV)

I myself was convinced that I ought to do many things in opposing the name of Jesus of Nazareth. And I did so in Jerusalem. I not only locked up many of the saints in prison after receiving authority from the chief priests, but when they were put to death I cast my vote against them. And I punished them often in all the synagogues and tried to make them blaspheme, and in raging fury against them I persecuted them even to foreign cities. In this connection I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. At midday, O king, I saw on the way a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, that shone around me and those who journeyed with me. And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.” And I said, “Who are you, Lord?” And the Lord said, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.” – Apostle Paul (Acts 26.9 – 15, ESV)

Every now and then someone captures nicely some of what we’re trying to do in our ministry. Diana Gruver (https://www.dianagruver.com/) wrote a piece called “How Many Hours of Your Week Are Dedicated to God” when she was working with Vere Institute, now closed. You can see her whole article here.

She opens with a memory from her high school days when the leader put everyone on a guilt trip by having them add up the number of hours “dedicated to God” as opposed to sleeping, work/school, etc. For her, less than 5 hours per week in church and personal devotions. Today she understands…

…this exercise, and the guilt it sparked in me, reflected a faulty understanding of life as a disciple of Jesus.

She goes on to say:

But I also find this memory to be sobering because I know there are still faithful Jesus-followers, sitting in church pews each week who are laden with guilt that they aren’t doing more “church things.” They feel guilty for not feeling the call to drop everything and move to a foreign country. They feel less-than for not being able to wake up at 4 a.m. to devote extra hours to prayer. They, to be frank, feel like a second-class Christian for not devoting more time to explicitly “spiritual” endeavors.

These brothers and sisters have no vision for how day-to-day life can be fully dedicated to the Lord. How spending time in conversation with a coworker might be just as God-honoring as time in a Bible study. How doing good work as a health care worker or teacher or parent might be just as valued in the Kingdom of God as attending that extra prayer meeting. They have no imagination to see how God wants to permeate, fill, and transform every part, place, and relationship within their everyday life. – Diana Gruver

I couldn’t agree more. Several years ago I hosted a seminar with Neil Hudson of the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity (LICC). When Diana wrote this piece, Vere Institute was the U.S. affiliate of the LICC. One of Neil’s key concepts matches Diana’s article. Neil asks church leaders: “How are you using the (at most) 10 weekly hours that your members spend in organized church activities to prepare them for the 110 waking hours weekly that they are living their lives in the world?” (Neil’s book, Imagine Church, is available on Amazon. I strongly recommend.)

And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ,… (Ephesians 4.11, 12, NKJV)

A fellow Navigator staff member shared this diagram the other day, reminding us all what we’re about.

Moving around the circle clockwise from the 12:00 position, we are

• In the world, evangelizing with a goal of producing a convert – someone who begins to follow Jesus.
• We establish the convert in the basics as shown in the wheel illustration (Christ the center, obedience, the Word, prayer, fellowship, and witnessing) so that the convert is a disciple. I wrote about one way to define a disciple back in January 2020.
• We then equip the disciples so that they become laborers who can be sent into the world to repeat the process.

You don’t have to be Navigator staff to be involved in this process! The mission is for everyone.

But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd. Then He said to His disciples, “The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.” (Matthew 9.36 – 38, NKJV)

And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen. (Matthew 28.18 – 20, NKJV)

Sometimes one has to wonder where some church traditions come from. For example, when I was growing up in South Carolina, there were “white” churches and “black” churches, no member of one would visit another. Some were adamant that things were supposed to be like that. That the scriptures don’t support such a view is obvious from just a few observations, beginning with Jesus’ crucifixion:

As they came out of the city, they stopped an African man named Simon, a native of Libya. He was passing by, just coming in from the countryside with his two sons, Alexander and Rufus, and the soldiers forced him to carry the heavy crossbeam for Jesus. (Mark 15.21, TPT)

Rufus is mentioned in Romans 16.13, and if it’s the same guy, we’re talking about a black man in the church. Of course, one of the first targets of extra-Jewish evangelism was a black man from Ethiopia (Acts 8). And there was a black leader in the church at Antioch in Acts 13:

In the church at Antioch there were a number of prophets and teachers of the Word, including Barnabas, Simeon from Niger, Lucius the Libyan, Manean (the childhood companion of King Herod Antipas), and Saul. (Acts 13.1, TPT)

Actually two: Simeon from Niger and Lucius from Libya. So where did white supremacists get off all these years keeping the church segregated? The early church certainly wasn’t. It started with people from all over the world:

And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language? Parthians and Medes and Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians—we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.” (Acts 2.8 – 10, ESV)

For in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3.26 – 28, ESV)

Here’s one more quick observation from Mark’s gospel. You may have noticed in some translations that verses 9 – 20 of chapter 16 “don’t appear in the oldest manuscripts.” There’s considerable scholarly debate on the subject (and the fact that there’s debate, in my opinion, means that no one really knows whether it should be included or not).

One issue is the promise of miracle signs in verses 17 and 18:

And these miracle signs will accompany those who believe: They will drive out demons in the power of my name. They will speak in tongues. They will be supernaturally protected from snakes and from drinking anything poisonous. And they will lay hands on the sick and heal them.” (Mark 16.17, 18, TPT)

I like that one charismatic preacher who believes not only that the apostles and their followers exercised these powers but that people today could also do so said something like

It says, “The signs follow the believers,” NOT, “The believers follow the signs.” There are too many people who go from one meeting to another to watch someone else heal people. That’s believers following the signs! Why not trust God to work through you too? – I forgot who I heard say that!

But these verses on signs shouldn’t be a problem since every one of them was documented fulfilled in the book of Acts!

• They will drive out demons (See Acts 16.16 – 18)
• They will speak in tongues (See Acts 2.1 – 12)
• They will be supernaturally protected from snakes (See Acts 28.1 – 6)
• They will lay hands on the sick and heal them (See Acts 28:7 – 10 for one of many)

Do we believe in the power Paul prayed for in Ephesians 1 or not?

[That you may know…] what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead… (Ephesians 1.19, 20, ESV)

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us,… (Ephesians 3.20, ESV)

We’re always challenged to pray, and if you’re like me, you sometimes wonder what we should be praying for. The Apostle Paul gives us some sterling examples, two in Ephesians. I offer the first one here without further comment except to format the text so we can clearly see what Paul is asking for in Ephesians 1.15 – 23:

For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers,

• that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him,
• having the eyes of your hearts enlightened,
• that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you,
• what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints,
• and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

I was finishing the Gospel of Mark the other day (still on my reading program!) and I noticed the obvious: Jesus set the pace for his new movement by dying.

They went on from there and passed through Galilee. And he did not want anyone to know, for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him. And when he is killed, after three days he will rise.” But they did not understand the saying, and were afraid to ask him. (Mark 9.30 – 32, ESV)

Maybe I saw this obvious fact because I’ve been reading Rod Dreher’s book Live Not by Lies, in which he shows how selfless behavior by believers eventually overcame many totalitarian governments in Eastern Europe. Lenin, Mao, etc., all advanced their movements through violence. Not Jesus. He died (and rose again, of course) and left his followers to spread the movement…

And he said to them, “As you go into all the world, preach openly the wonderful news of the gospel to the entire human race! (Mark 16.15, TPT)

Our people must also learn to engage in good deeds to meet pressing needs, so that they will not be unfruitful. (Titus 3.14, NASB)