A Table and a Thankful Heart

The day before Thanksgiving, my wife, Carol, spent time at the Harris-Teeter grocery store in Aberdeen, N.C., and The Fresh Market in nearby Pinehurst.

She purchased three pies: pecan, pumpkin and apple. She also bought four 29-oz. cans of Margaret Holmes-brand “Greer Peaches, Southern Freestone” (distributed by McCall Farms, Effingham, S.C.) and some flour.

My late mother showed Carol how to make an easy peach cobbler. Our younger daughter, Suzanne – she and her husband, Chad, teach in elementary schools – always liked that dessert and asked Carol to bring one to their home in Raleigh, N.C., for Thanksgiving. This year, our older daughter, Janelle, observed Thanksgiving at home in Taylors, S.C., with her husband, Terry.

Carol rose early on our recent overcast Thanksgiving Thursday, poured four cans of peaches and other ingredients into a large flat pan and cooked cobbler. By 10:00, I’d loaded pies, cobbler and Daisy, our 8-year-old beagle into our Buick. In the car, I prayed for protection and a good day before Carol drove us away from Southern Pines. Just enough mist was falling to need windshield wipers, and at the first stop sign, I hopped out and took a few pine needles from under one blade. We motored 75 miles to the Chad and Suzanne's rental house in downtown Raleigh, a city with a 2010-estimated population of over 394,000.

Chad’s grandparents, Don and Lois, flew on Wednesday from Chandler, Arizona, where they retired 10 years ago. Chad met them at the Raleigh airport and had them in his home by 1:00 a.m., Thursday morning. Don, 83, and Lois, 80 slept on a “blow-up bed” near Chad’s dining room table.

As a teenager, Chad and his younger brother, Jared, lived with their mother, Barbara, who now lives in Wichita, Kansas. They often visited their father, Rod, and his wife, Kathleen, in Kansas City, Mo., and spent many summers with Don and Lois in Herington, Kansas (population 2,563 in 2000). His grandfather owned an appliance business and he let Chad work for him.

Carol and I arrived before noon, and Daisy greeted her old friend Lucy, Chad and Suzanne’s long-legged Plott Hound. Suzanne had bought our meal from Whole Foods, a “natural and organic” store. We saw turkey, dressing and gravy, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, macaroni, rolls and cranberry sauce. We added our pies and cobbler.

Don and I sat in the living room and talked before eating. Don said he was a good high school shop student, learned about electricity and worked at an appliance store that sold Maytag washing machines before he served with the U.S. Army in Korea. There, he helped service motors and helped make roads during the conflict that began in 1950 after North Korea invaded South Korea and brought on a “police action” against the aggressors.

Paul, a Christian probably in his late forties, arrived to eat. He worked at a factory in California until it closed. He lost a home and moved to N.C. when a friend offered to help him find work. He ended up in a Wilmington, N.C., homeless shelter. Somewhere along the way he had a heart attack and has applied to receive “disability.” He helps with a Raleigh house for homeless men.

We gathered around a large wooden table, and Chad prayed. After our feast, Suzanne asked that each person give thanks for something. Chad began, mentioning his grandparents and his father, who made it through brain surgery last year. Don said he was thankful for his wife, Lois, who sat across from him. She said she was glad they were able to take care of each other during their retirement.

Paul’s turn came, and he said, “Well, I’m glad to be here.” Most of us smiled, realizing his heart attack could have taken him “out of here.” He then mentioned other things he was thankful for. Sitting beside Paul, I was next in line. I thought about recent times I’d whined to God about aches, pains, difficulties and situations. Carol and I had arrived at our daughter’s house in a car – not on a motor scooter such as Paul uses to get around. I’m older than Paul and have had no heart attack or lost my job. We haven’t lost our home. Humbled by Paul’s presence and thankfulness, I, with a new sense of gratefulness, voiced my thanks to God for Jesus and my wife and family.

“I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart…” (Psalm 111:1).

The Persecuted Church Needs Our Prayers

Christians around the world will remember their brothers and sisters in Christ who suffer for their faith this Sunday, November 14, as part of a global day set aside to pray for their fellow believers, according to the Christian Broadcast Network (CBN).

“Christian pastors are often imprisoned in countries hostile to the faith,” CBN states. “This affects not only the church congregations, but also the families of these leaders.”

The global prayer day movement began in 1996 though efforts of the World Evangelical Fellowship with the help of various denominations and faith-based groups. Today, the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (IDOP) mobilizes churches on behalf of millions of persecuted Christians worldwide.

With a core of 7,000 participating churches, the IDOP has grown to become the largest prayer day event of its kind in the world. This year, churches will pray and also discuss ways to help suffering Christians.

“Why should you pray this Sunday, or perhaps daily for persecuted Christians?” asks Gary Lane, CBN News Senior International Reporter. “Why not? They need and covet your prayers. Think about it. Here are just a few of the Christian persecution headlines CBN News brought you in just the past three weeks”:

--A Pakistani Christian is sentenced to death for telling Muslim co-workers that Jesus died for their sins…

--58 Christians are killed in Iraq as Islamic militants attack their church…Less than two weeks later, grieving Christians are killed by bomb attacks targeting their Baghdad homes…

--Eight months after his release from a North Korean prison, American missionary Robert Park – for the first time – speaks about the suffering and torture he endured at the hands of his captors…

--The People's Republic of China prohibits 200 house church leaders from attending the Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelism in Cape Town South Africa. Conference organizers fear computer hackers from the PRC were responsible for shutting down their website for the first five days of the gathering….

“If anyone tells you that militant Muslims and communists are becoming more tolerant of Christians, don't believe them,” Lane says. “As I travel the world to meet with suffering believers and listen to their testimonies, I can tell you persecution is not lessening, it's intensifying. Why? I don’t know for sure. Perhaps it’s because Christians are doing a better job of sharing the gospel these days. Maybe it’s because television and the Internet are helping to bring Jesus to many societies previously closed to other beliefs and faiths.”

Lane says Christians around the world – perhaps 200 million or more – will pray for their persecuted brothers and sisters this Sunday.

“Believers in America and most Western countries know very little of the fires of persecution,” says Katherine Britton, News and Culture Editor of Crosswalk.com. “But our lack of experience doesn't have to be a lack of empathy. In Galatians 6:2, Paul tells the church to “carry each other’s burdens” to keep each other from stumbling…I think those of us who don’t endure life-threatening persecution can still partner with the persecuted church in this way. If we pray for believers we’ve never met…chances are we'll never know the impact those prayers have. And yet we can enter into their suffering in a small way when we pray for them.”

James tells us “the prayers of a righteous man are powerful and effective,” indicating that God uses prayers offered through Christ in ways we can’t imagine, Britton says. “And when we don’t know how to pray for other believers? God takes care of that hesitation as well in Romans 8:26: ‘…The Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.’”

Saint Paul asked for prayer so that “utterance may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in bonds: that therein I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak,” Ephesians 6:18-20).

Pray often for the many Christians who are being persecuted.

Grace Writers

After David Pratt, the “small groups pastor” at our church, encouraged me – and my wife, Carol, and our daughter, Suzanne, prodded me – I decided to start a church “writers group.”

I majored in art education and minored in English in college but didn’t write much until I was 50 years old and began submitting articles and letters to the editor of our local newspaper, “The Pilot” of Southern Pines, N.C. I next worked for almost four years, in the early 2000s, as a part-time religion reporter for “The Pilot.“

A few years ago, I attended a writers’ workshop led by Marlene Bagnull, a Christian author. She used this verse as a theme: “And the Lord said to me, ‘Write my answer on a billboard, large and clear, so that anyone can read it at a glance and rush to tell the others’” (Habakkuk 2:2).

In her book, “Write His Answer,” Bagnull says, “I believe God is calling us to write his answer. It’s time to boldly step out in faith and to write the words that need to be written – powerful words, winsome words, anointed words that will come only by allowing him to speak to our own hearts.”

Bagnull says she once gave the Lord excuses as to why she might not succeed in writing to honor him. She says she felt God answered her with these words: “Write out of your life experiences. Make yourself transparent and vulnerable so others can see what I have done, and am doing, in your life.” She adds, “I began to write about my life as a wife and mother…I sensed the most difficult things for me to share could be the very words someone else needed to read.”

I recently helped launch Grace Writers Group for our church, Grace Church in Southern Pines, N.C. The church holds two Sunday morning services and often sees over 1200 people attend those combined services. On two Sundays, Pastor Pratt let me host a recruiting table that stood alongside nearly 60 other small-group tables. About 11 people signed up for our group.

Six people gathered for our first meeting on September 15, 2010. (We meet on Wednesdays from 7:00-8:30 p.m.) Linda Martin, a lady in her fifties, wrote about our first class, saying, “I started the class on writing last night (Wednesday). Who would have thought I would be in a writing class – me, the person who’s been told many times to ‘write my story’ over the years and who has resisted each time…I have a hunch Steve’s gotten into more than he’s bargained for.”

I was not sure what I had “bargained for,” but I have been blessed by powerful writings produced by group members.

George Hunt, 77, is an Air Force veteran and a member of our group. He worked 30 years for Hughes Aircraft and now serves as the director of the Moore County (N.C.) Veterans Office. He touched hearts when he read to our group a writing called “A Day I Won’t Forget.” Here is his story, which is appropriate for Veterans Day (November 11):

“It was a hot July morning in 1944, and my father was in the Army somewhere in France. I was ten years old. My two younger brothers and I had decided to go swimming with our cousins in the creek near our Grandpa’s. We were having a great time splashing and playing in the water.

“Around noontime, I heard a car coming down the dirt road from the direction of Pinehurst, N.C. It was very unusual, with gas rationing, to see a car that far out in the country. Then I saw the TAXI sign on the side of the car, and my heart dropped, for a TAXI meant a death notice from the government, and there were only two houses on our road.

“I called the others and ran for home, hoping and praying that it wasn’t for our house. But when I got home, the driver had already delivered the telegram, which turned out to be about my father. All it said was he had been seriously wounded in France. That was all we knew for several months. No one knew if he was alive or dead. My mother went to the Red Cross to try and get some word, and they were unable to find out anything for us. Finally, a letter came from my father from a hospital in England. He was on his way home. What a great day that was. After months of no news, Dad was coming home.”

You will find more Grace Writers Group stories at www.gracewritersgroup.blogspot.com.

The Reformation and Grace

A young Roman Catholic priest named Martin Luther posted 95 “theses,” or statements, on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, on October 31, 1517.

Pastor Dave Tietz of St. Paul Lutheran Church in Taylor, Texas, says, “At the time, Martin Luther had no idea what drastic changes this simple act would bring upon the church, but posting those 95 Theses began a chain reaction that resulted in the events we know today as the Protestant Reformation.”

Tietz says the Arts and Entertainment Network’s choices for the most influential people of the past millennium includes these men: Guttenberg, for his invention of the movable-type printing press that made books readily available and affordable for the first time; Isaac Newton for his work in science, physics, and astronomy; and Martin Luther, who brought religion and education to the common people and is credited for laying the foundation of democracy.

Luther’s posting of the 95 Theses was the culmination of a long, personal struggle that fermented in Luther's soul and spirit for several years, Tietz says, adding, “Martin Luther grew up in a day and age when the church pictured God as an angry, vindictive God, a God of wrath and punishment who watched over us, anxiously waiting for us to make a mistake so that God could then punish us with eternal suffering in hell. The church taught people to fear God in the worst sense of the word. And the church used that fear to control the people, to get them to submit to church and obey all the teachings and rules of the church. And the church used that fear to amass tremendous wealth and power for the Pope in Rome and for the Roman Catholic Church, which was the only church in Europe at the time.” (Tietz says the Catholic Church of Luther's day, and the Catholic Church today are very different. “When I talk about the Church of Luther's day, I am in no way comparing it to the Roman Catholic Church of today,” he says.)

Tietz relates, “As a young man, Luther decided early on that he did not want to spend all of eternity in hell and suffering, so he set out to make himself right and pleasing before God. He left a promising future in law school, took on the disciplines of becoming an Augustinian monk, continued his schooling and was ordained as a priest in the Church.”

Luther earned a Ph.D. in Bible and Theology and became a professor at the University of Wittenberg in Germany, one of the then-new and upcoming schools of the Church.

“But through all of this, Luther did not find what he wanted the most...peace with God and a sense of assurance and rest for his troubled spirit,” Tietz says. “No matter how hard he strived to do everything that a Christian was supposed to do, he realized he was still a sinner. And since God punishes sinners, he was taught, he could only see himself as condemned before God…I suppose Luther was simply more honest with himself than most of us are today. We tend to belittle and minimize our sins, as if they make no difference to God…Luther saw his sin for what it really was – that which separated him from God.”

One day, as Luther prepared lectures on Paul’s letter to the Romans, he read Romans 3, a passage he had surely read many times.

“But this time as he read it, his eyes were opened, the light came on!” Tietz says. “As Luther describes it, ‘It was as though the gates of heaven were opened to me!’”

Here are excerpts from Romans 3:19-28: “Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight…(But repentant and believing sinners are) justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus...Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.”

“Can it be any clearer that that?” Tietz asks. “And yet today there are many, many Christians in Lutheran Churches and in all kinds of other churches who believe Jesus is the Son of God and that God raised him from death...but still continue to doubt, to wonder if they really are saved, who think that their salvation still depends on how good they are and how closely they obey the law and live by all the rules…God desires very deeply that we stay close to God and live lives of honesty, integrity, and obedience to God’s will. But how we live doesn’t save us. Jesus Christ saves us! That’s the Gospel…We are saved by the grace of God through faith and trust in Jesus Christ.”

Should a Christian Vote?

If Jesus walked the earth in bodily form, today, and was a U.S. citizen, would he vote in the upcoming elections?

I believe he would.

I heard recently that an estimated 65 million adult Evangelicals live in the U.S., but only 35 million of them are registered to vote. And of those Evangelicals who are registered, only half will likely turn out to vote in the November elections.

Jesus’ “real kingdom” is “not of this world,” but those who believe in him ought to help improve America by voting and participating in a government that’s still, as far as I know, “of the people, by the people and for the people.”

Jesus preached that “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people,” and he promoted (and still promotes) good stewardship, which means taking care of talents, wealth and privileges we possess. Participating in government by voting is a privilege Jesus never got to enjoy during the time between his birth in Bethlehem and his crucifixion at Calvary.

Jesus spoke powerfully about a person’s relationship to government when critics asked him about paying taxes to Rome.

“Tell us, is it right to pay taxes to the Roman government or not?” some disciples of the Pharisees asked Jesus (pardon my paraphrasing).

“You hypocrites!” Jesus said. He asked them to show him some money.

“Whose image and signature is on this coin?” Jesus asked.

“Caesar’s,” they replied.

“Then pay Caesar what is Caesar’s, and give God what belongs to God,” Jesus said (Matthew 22:21).

Some pastors say that direct-from-Jesus command indicates people desiring to follow God should also attempt to be good citizens by participating in the privileges and obligations of government. Could we be shirking part of our God-endorsed duties by staying away from voting booths?

Asked about the ethics of voting, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee said, “Part of being a citizen in a society like ours, where we have the privilege of voting, is the responsibility to exercise that privilege. To not do so is to sort of forego that part of what it means to be in a free society, and I think it would be unfortunate.”
Some religious folk may believe voting in an election is a “worldly” activity. An old gospel song contains these words: “This world is not my home; I’m just a-passing through….”

We’re all “just passing through,” but we shouldn’t neglect our temporal tasks and duties, while we pray, “Our Father, who art in heaven…Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.”

Remember the Good Samaritan? Jesus told this story: Robbers beat a traveler, stripped him and left him for dead. A priest saw the injured man but passed by on the other side of the road. Then a Levite passed by on the other side. Levites were reportedly dedicated to God. Maybe the Levite in this story had religious things to do and could spare no time to help a bloody mess-of-a-man lying on the side of a road.

“But a certain traveling Samaritan came upon the wounded man,” Jesus said, “and when he saw him, he felt compassion.”

(Samaritans were mostly despised and considered “low class” by priests and Levites.)

The Samaritan bandaged the man’s wounds, “put him on his own beast,” carried him to an inn, took care of him and left money with the innkeeper for the man’s further care.

Our American culture is being beaten and bloodied by secular humanism, atheism, socialism and “do your own thing”-ism. Proponents of such philosophies ignore God’s Word as they march toward destruction. Some say God is already judging America.

Let’s not long for the sweet-by-and-by and refuse to deal with, as someone called it, “the nasty now and now.” Let’s feel compassion for our country and help bind up its wounds.

I believe Jesus would vote in our elections if he walked among us, today, in his earthly body, and was a U.S. citizen. I believe he would vote for candidates who support Christian values. I believe we should, too.

Shoplifting at Walmart

Magalene works at the carpet manufacturing company where I work. She says her daughter, 24, is employed at Walmart and sees people try to shoplift. Magalene’s story about wickedness at Walmart goes like this:

“My daughter was checking receipts as people went out the door,” Magalene says, “and a girl she knew came up with a computer in a buggy. My daughter asked for her receipt, and the girl said the clerk didn’t give her one. My daughter said, ‘I have to see a receipt.’ Come to find out, the girl was trying to steal that computer.”

Magalene says she warned her daughter about a family who once attended the church Magalene attends, saying, “If you see any of them in your store, you watch ’em, ’cause they steal.”

Magalene says Walmart has surveillance cameras inside and outside.

“A man and a little boy came into the store and went separate ways,” she says. “The boy got liquid dishwashing detergent and began sloshing it down an aisle. The man came and slid down on that detergent. He was lying there saying he was going to sue the store. They found out on the video that him and that boy came in together.”

She says one Walmart cashier pushed a buggy holding a flat-screen TV through an employee entrance at the rear of the store. Somebody was waiting outside to run with that TV. Weeks later, Magalene’s daughter saw that cashier leave the store in police handcuffs.

“One woman faked an asthma attack, so another woman could try to get out the door with some goods,” Magalene says. “And my daughter says people try to bring things back to the store for refunds, and some of that stuff looks like it is 15 years old, and some of it didn’t even come from Walmart. One woman said she was going to sue the store if they didn’t take back the things she brought in.”

Professional shoplifters and Walmart’s own employees reportedly inflict the greatest shoplifting damage to Walmart.

We may become incensed that sticky-fingered folk ignore the commandment “Thou shalt not steal.” Their crimes are evident, but could some of us, at times, be thieves of a different sort?

“For most of us, the idea of one man stealing from another man is offensive to the point of being repulsive,” says writer Paul Meacham, Jr. “But, to steal from God, how could anyone do such a thing? Yet, that is exactly the charge God leveled against Israel through the prophet Malachi.”

“Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me” (Malachi 3:8).

“They had robbed God by not bringing the offerings and sacrifices He required,” Meacham says. “Can a man steal from God today? Certainly. When one withholds from God what is rightfully His, he is guilty of robbing God.”

Meacham says a man “robs God” when he doesn’t give God some of his income and also robs God when he gives God his sorrow but not his service. God requires more of us than just to trust Him in times of sorrow, Meacham says, adding, “Everyone can honor God with faithful, respectful service. Such is required by God and is a sign of our freedom from sin.”

Jesus said, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me” (Luke 9:23).

A person robs God when he gives God his fear but not his faithfulness, Meacham says. “If we turn to God to help us overcome our fear and fail to serve Him faithfully, we are robbing God of that which is rightfully His,” he notes.

If I try to shoplift at Walmart, I may get caught and taken away in handcuffs. If I attempt to get a “five-finger discount” on merchandise at Wally-World, my arrest may become public knowledge. Robbing God of money and of my service and faithfulness may not result in immediate consequences. He usually doesn’t set off an alarm or dispatch law enforcement officers to throw me to the ground and cuff me. No, God gives me freedom to choose blessing or cursing.

“Ye are cursed with a curse; for ye have robbed me, even this whole nation. Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it” (Malachi 3:9-10).

Judgment at New River

Summers ago when my daughters and I rafted on the New River near Beckley, West Virginia, I mentally criticized one of our guides for something he said. Days later, I realized we were sort of “in the same boat.”

My wife isn’t an outdoor person, so when our two daughters took breaks from college and high school one summer, I arranged for three-fourths of our family to try white-water rafting in West Virginia.

The three of us drove to a Beckley motel, rose early the next day and rode a bus from a ticket-buying station to the river. We donned life vests and helmets and met two other adventurers (a young man and his wife) who manned the center of our inflatable craft. Two young male guides rode the raft’s rear, and I sat behind my daughters, who planted themselves in the raft’s bow.

We paddled peacefully after entering that old and deep river at a still-water section. I admired mountain scenery and noticed railroad tracks laid along steep banks.

Numerous folksingers have crooned “I’m riding that New River train.” Those words come from “New River Train,” a song that originated, I understand, in The New River Gorge region, which produced lots of coal through the early 1900s.

Before encountering rocky, white water rapids, we enjoyed tranquil passage and listened to our main guide, a dark-haired West Virginia native, recite river facts.
During a silence, I observed a Whitetail doe pause perhaps a hundred yards ahead and to our right, enter the river and begin swimming across.

“How beautiful,” I thought. Words from one of my favorite worship choruses came to mind: “As the deer panteth for the water, so my soul longeth after Thee…” (Psalm 42:1).

I felt the doe’s entry into our idyllic scene provided icing on the cake for our near-Garden of Eden experience. Her timely appearance added flourish to an already-special display of God’s panorama. I felt thankful to be with my daughters and awed by the river and mountains.

“Look at the deer,” someone said.

From the back of the raft, our main guide, speaking in his best macho-drawl, said, “That’d sure look good in my freezer.”

“Crude!” I thought, wondering how anyone could see a lovely doe swimming a picturesque river framed by take-your-breath-away mountains and think only of appetite. How could he view such a creature and think first of his belly? His bull-in-a-China shop, caveman commentary offended me. I said nothing but judged him to be a man who mostly lived life on a physical level.

For days after our excursion, I thought about our guide’s distasteful reaction. Then, as I reveled in self-righteousness, this thought—like a heaven-born bubble ascending from the murky bottom of a deep subconscious river—floated to the surface of my mind: “How many times have you looked at person of the opposite sex and had less than spiritual thoughts?”

My puffed-up, highly inflated raft of self-righteousness struck upon the rock of that question and—swoosh!—lost all air.

This analogy hit me: a deer crosses a river, and a hunter says, “That’d look good in my freezer”; a graceful lady crosses a street, and some man muses….”

I’d fallen into the trap of thinking myself more spiritual than our deer-hunting guide, when I hadn’t shared his temptation. I hadn’t looked at that deer as dinner. I wasn’t a hunter. However, I have faced various temptations involving anger, strife, intemperance, lust and idolatry, and my initial responses to thoughts concerning “works of the flesh” haven’t always been good.

Someone said, “Temptation, unlike opportunity, doesn’t knock - it tries to kick the door in.”

No one has to search long in the trash heap of his own fallen nature to find something that puts him on a level playing field with the rest of mankind.

I believe God constantly attempts to show each of us our personal, burdensome sins - not to condemn us, but to show us we need to confess our sins and find relief by accepting his offer of forgiveness through Christ.

I believe there’s hope for the crudest of sinners. And for would-be super-sojourners, who try to think mystical thoughts while navigating life’s deep rivers, who desire to hold high “the light” and help other travelers, there is also hope - because God can even forgive self-righteousness that tends, at times, to rise in religious hearts.