August 17th, 2011 by Kristi Stephens

Image from visualBiblealive.com

Following God is not all about merrily skipping through meadows of flowers. God often calls us to do hard things, things that are impossible to do apart from His presence and strength.

The lives of the Old Testament prophets are clear illustrations of this fact.

Moses begged God to send someone else to confront Pharaoh and lead His people out of Egypt (Exodus 4:10-13). Jonah boarded a ship and literally tried to sail as far away from God’s call on his life as possible. I don’t blame them. Because as easy as it is to sit here in my comfortable 21st century American home and wag my condemning finger at them, I might have done the same.

A prophet’s life was difficult. Speaking truth into the lives of people who don’t want to hear it is difficult.

• Elijah was so hated for his prophetic role in Israel and his opposition to Baal worship that he became the number one target of the infamous Jezebel. He was afraid, ran for his life, and eventually prayed, “I have had enough, LORD,” he said. “Take my life…” (1 Kings 19:4) He was strengthened and comforted, but his job wasn’t done – and it wasn’t exactly a walk in the park.
• According to tradition, after almost 60 years of ministry Isaiah was sawed into two with a wooden saw during the reign of Manasseh.
• Jeremiah was known as “the weeping prophet.” He was hated for his ministry of teaching the law and calling for repentance, faced decades of persecution and eventually was stoned to death.
• Ezekiel was carried away in exile to Babylon and ministered among God’s people there, calling them to repent and return to God. According to tradition he was killed after confronting a fellow Jew regarding his idolatry.
• Daniel, likewise, was also carried into captivity in Babylon. He stood courageously for God in a hostile land, even being famously thrown into a lion’s den.

So, who wants to sign up for the job of prophet? Anyone? Anyone? Beuhler?

God calls us to do hard things. If we are followers of Jesus, we have been sent on a mission to a hostile world. We have been commanded to love people who hate us. To speak truth to those who don’t want to hear it. And He never, ever, tells us that it will be easy. Jesus tells us quite plainly what to expect:

“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. Remember the words I spoke to you: ‘No servant is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the One who sent me.”

John 15:18-21

John later teaches this again in the epistles in his own words:

“Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous. Do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you.”

1 John 3:12-13

Fellow followers of Jesus, we are modern-day descendants from a long, long line of hated people. People who lived their lives sharing a message that no one wanted to hear – and who often suffered terribly for doing so. But they understood something that we often forget: this world isn’t the end, but rather only the beginning. People who understood that to gain this whole world and yet forfeit their soul was simply not the “bargain” they were looking for. They were willing to lay down this life for the next.

Is God calling you to do hard things? To say hard things? Are you begging God, “please, send someone else!”? We need to stop being surprised when the world hates us, when people want to attack us for presenting truth to them. It’s time to adjust our perspective: this world is simply not our home – and He is worth it, no matter what it costs us along the way.

August 16th, 2011 by Kristi Stephens

Yesterday my parents and I took my children to the beach for the first time in their lives! They built castles and dug their toes into wet, squishy sand. They ran through the waves and let the rhythmic surf pull them back to shore. They fed seagulls and played on swings and simply had a marvelous time.

They certainly weren’t the only children at the beach. The shoreline was teeming with little people everywhere – but my eyes were trained on my children. I delight in them. I love them so much it hurts. It thrills my heart to see them having such fun, even as the activity of it all exhausts me. They are mine.

Just as my children were the only ones I protectively and joyfully trained my gaze upon all day at the beach, they were also the ones I disciplined. Before we ever got into the van to go to the beach, LB and I were having some “discipleship opportunities.” He did not want to obey, but what I wanted for him was what was best – what was for his ultimate good. Every day he must learn to obey, to submit, to trust that my judgment is in his best interest, even though he may not always understand why I am keeping him from what he wants at that moment.

I delight in my son. I watch him, protect him, laugh with him, play with him – and discipline him – because I love him so very dearly. I love him too much to allow him to live rebelliously and self-destruct.

God loves his people fiercely and deeply. He delights in them. They are far too important to Him to allow them to eternally self-destruct.

During the reign of Solomon’s son Rehoboam, the nation of Israel split into two distinct groups – the ten Northern tribes were still referred to as Israel, and the Southern two tribes were known as Judah. For the rest of Old Testament history these two groups were distinct, ruled by different kings. A few of the kings, largely from Judah, sought to follow and obey the Lord. They encouraged the people to get rid of the idolatry that plagued them, to turn back to the Lord wholeheartedly, to know and love His law. Many, however, were thoroughly bent on doing evil. They disregarded and abandoned God’s law, often building idolatrous places of worship and leading the people to commit despicable acts- often even sacrificing their children to false gods.

Because God loved and delighted in His people, He could not let this continue. Throughout the reigns of the kings he sent prophets time and time again to warn the kings and the people to repent, to turn away from their wickedness, to cling to God alone. The prophets had a job that none of us would want to sign up for – taking the unpopular message of repentance and impending judgment to people who, by and large, absolutely did not want to hear what they had to say. But they went, time and time again.

To summarize this period of Israel’s history, I put together this general timeline of the kings and prophets. The dates are only approximations, and due to the brevity of some of their reigns, not all of the kings are listed. But hopefully this will give you a good visual snapshot. [Note: for some reason, this chart tends to get messed up when viewing it online - if you want to look at it more closely, I'd recommend clicking on the title and downloading it in a pdf format from Scribd.]

Kings and Prophets Timeline

Unfortunately, the prophet’s warnings would often be ignored, and as the people turned away from God time and time again, eventually first Israel and then Judah were taken into foreign captivity.

Why would God allow His people to endure such suffering?

I am convinced it is because His great love is deeper than we can fathom. Just as I, a flawed, limited, very human parent want the best for my children and therefore will discipline them and teach them to obey, God loves His people too much to allow them to continue to self-destruct. He humbled them to bring them to a point of repentance.

If only we really grasped and internalized this fact, it would make a tremendous difference in how we view our lives: God loves us too deeply to focus only on our happiness and our immediate desire for comfort and stability and having our every wish granted. Just as a loving parent will discipline, God allows us to struggle, to experience pain, to be confronted with difficult circumstances and people – He wants us to be holy, conformed into the image of His Son. He loves us too much to leave us where we are.

The Scripture clearly links God’s discipline with His great love:

Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the LORD your God disciplines you.

Deuteronomy 8:5

My son, do not despise the LORD’s discipline and do not resent his rebuke,
because the LORD disciplines those he loves, as a father the son he delights in.

Proverbs 3:11-12

Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father?

Hebrews 12:7

Whatever you’re struggling through today remember this: God is not capricious. He doesn’t waste our sorrow and suffering. He is your Father, not just for the fun of playing and running in the waves – His eye is fixed on you lovingly, protectively, and He will discipline you, He will guard and keep you, He will warn you when you stray away from Him, and He will teach you to obey and trust.

How great is the love He has lavished on us! Take comfort in the security of His great love and attentive care.

Blessed is the man you discipline, O LORD,
the man you teach from your law

Psalm 94:12

August 10th, 2011 by Kristi Stephens

Image from wikipedia

I know it. I feel it. People think I’m Debbie Downer.

The one who always has to pipe up in the middle of a good time and talk about things like Haitians hunkering down under tarps as a tropical storm blows through their devastated land, the one who has to talk about thousands of people starving to death in Somalia. We’re having a good ol’ time with our nonsense on twitter and facebook and then I have to post that depressing link with pictures of starving children and guilt-ridden headlines. *wa-waaaaaah*- there goes Debbie Downer.

But you know what? I really am not a negative person. I love to laugh and sing nonsensical songs to my children and have fun. So, why? Why do I heave these depressing bricks of reality through our clean and shiny windows of denial?

Because Jesus saw people that the rest of the “religious” world tried hard to ignore. Because He made audacious statements like “whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.” (Matthew 25:45) Because if it was me carrying my starving babies through the hot African sun, I sure would hope that the Christians across the ocean who had the money to buy the meager meal that would keep us alive would forego their overpriced lattes and give generously and compassionately. I would hope that they would take the time to see us, even though it might be depressing and inconvenient.

I, too, am plagued with self-deception and denial and self-importance. But God has been working on me, chipping away. You see, when Jesus made those audacious statements in Matthew 25, when James 2 shouts out to us about favoritism, it seems that they actually mean it! They don’t seem like they would be impressed with the heavy burden of all of our American problems – having to use a two year old computer or cell phone, mechanical issues with one of our multiple cars, an amount of laundry that is impossible to keep up with due to our overabundance of clothes, hobbies and extra-curricular activities that fill our schedules so full that we have no time to see others in need.

When I ponder these things, how can I not feel sick to my stomach when I read that more than 29,000 children, under the age of five, have perished in the last 90 days in southern Somalia alone? How can I turn an indifferent eye as I read accounts of mothers being forced to leave their dying children along the road as they attempt to save their remaining little ones?

World Help is raising funds to ship lifesaving meals to those in need. “Each 40-foot container costs approximately $6,000 to ship and contains 40,000 pounds of wheat, corn, nutrition-packed soup mix, and much more that can supply 240,000 life-saving meals.” 240,000 meals for $6,000 breaks down to 40 meals for each $1 donation.

This weekend I was shopping with my family. I found a little rolling cart that I had been wanting for our trips to the library carrying a heavy book-bag bursting at the seams – it was on sale for $12! I excitedly added it to our shopping cart, along with a variety of other non-needed luxury items. They weren’t expensive – but they were luxuries – things we didn’t need but we just wanted them for whatever reason.

This weekend as I read more about Somalia, read about World Help’s work and that each $1 would feed 40 people, my cute little library book cart burned a hole in my heart. $12 for my convenience – when that $12 would feed 480 people! Almost 500 people starving to death, but at least my shoulder isn’t sore [from carrying… to my car… all of the books we have free access to!].

I don’t know what God might call your family to give, or where you might give, or what else He is leading you to do. But please bear with Debbie Downer yet again today… please take the time to read, educate yourself, see people, ask the Lord what He would have you to do.

Jesus once took a little boy’s lunch and used it to feed a multitude – give Him whatever you give, however little or much, and ask Him to use it in big ways.

The crisis is huge. Our God is bigger. He has graciously invited us to be part of His work in the lives of the desperate on this groaning planet. Open your eyes and join Him there.

August 9th, 2011 by Kristi Stephens

Image from wikipedia.org

Throughout the Old Testament there are little glimpses and pictures of Jesus, some being more specific than others. It is almost like a dot-to-dot puzzle is slowly being mapped out, and little by little we find more information about the One who was to come. In the Garden, Adam and Eve heard the first echo of what was to come. Abraham later learned more particulars – the Promised One would come through his family and would bless the whole world. In 2 Samuel 7:11-12, David has a bit more of the picture filled in.

“‘The LORD declares to you that the LORD himself will establish a house for you:
When your days are over and you rest with your fathers,
I will raise up your offspring to succeed you,
who will come from your own body,
and I will establish his kingdom.
He is the one who will build a house for my Name,
and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.’”

As the prophet Nathan speaks these words, they apply both to Solomon and the other “seeds” from David’s line who would reign from David’s household, and also to Jesus Christ, the promised Seed. While bits and pieces apply to human “seeds” in between, the full completion of God’s promises to David doesn’t occur in anyone BUT Jesus Christ.

Years later the prophet Isaiah would pen a prophecy that today we probably all can sing (at least in the shower!) thanks to Handel:

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end.
He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom,
establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever.

Isaiah 9:6-7

Looking ahead to Luke 1:32-33, notice what the angel Gabriel says to Mary:

“You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end.”

Wonder why so much emphasis is placed on Jesus’ genealogy in the book of Matthew? The fact that Jesus was a physical descendent of David was critical to these promises and prophecies. He would build a spiritual house for God’s name (1 Peter 2:5), and He will reign forever!

At this point in Biblical history, God’s people are still very much in the dark about how God’s plan will unfold. They have clues – they’ve know about the Seed since Genesis 3, and now they know He will be a king from the line of David. However, they still have no idea how grand the plan of God really would be: God the Son, in flesh, offering Himself as a sacrifice for the sin of man, reigning over the earth, and obliterating the separation between God and the people He loved enough to die for.

Feel like your own life is a dot-to-dot? Like God has begun something, moved in your life in certain ways, and now you are stuck in the waiting room? You may not see all of the future pieces, but we serve a God unbound by time and human limitations. His plans and purposes are eternal. One of the stunning things to me about seeing the bigger story in Scripture is how God’s plan is consistent from the very beginning to the very end. God does not have “Plan B” – He is always perfectly carrying out Plan A!

The God who holds eternity in His hands is big enough to trust with your life. Trust Him.