From the Pastor
| April, 2008 |
| "GOD SHOWS UP" |
| “Then people brought little children to Jesus for Him to place His hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked them. Jesus said, ‘Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.’ When He had placed His hands on them, He went on from there.” Matthew 19:13-15 |
| “At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, ‘Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?’ He called a little child, whom he placed among them. And He said: ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.’ Therefore, whoever takes a humble place - becoming a child - is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 18:1-4 |
When I was a child and adolescent growing in my folks’ churches in Kansas and South Dakota, we were taught that the essence of being a Christian was experiencing a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. To this day I believe that this is the heart of our faith.  But if your commitment to follow Jesus as Savior and Lord began to weaken or suffer from moral stumbling, spiritual laziness, or just plain indifference, then you could “rededicate your life to Jesus.” Because of some (or “all of the above”), as a teenager I rededicated my life to following and serving the Lord more than once - - - around the campfire at church camp in the Black Hills and during “the altar call” at our church in Sioux Falls. The refrain of the old hymn “Trust and Obey” tells us why Jesus had, so to speak, such faith in children as those who “own” the Kingdom of God: “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus — but to trust and obey.” I believe kids (see the scripture above) could sense that Jesus was someone they could trust, get close to, experience in a direct and loving way. The Kingdom - - - where God reigns in human hearts - - - is made up of people who have a child-like faith (trust) in Him, are humble about their place in the world and willing to change to become more and more like their Lord. The problem for a lot of us when we become grown-ups is that we tend to lose that wide-eyed trust in God. We often sacrifice genuine humility to the cultural norm that life is all about “looking out for number one.” We may grow set in our ways to the point that we no longer are willing to change, no matter how much we say we need to. We forget to “daylight,” to keep our physical, emotional, spiritual “roofs” wide open to the Son. We drift away from the promise, purity, and power of the Kingdom of God. (The old-time Christians called this “back-sliding.”) A group of us from the church meet every other Friday night at the Crossing Point to chew over and, hopefully, learn from pastor Graham Standish’s book, Becoming a Blessed Church. I want to share some of what he says about the need in mainline churches like ours to rededicate ourselves to experiencing God, to having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, to recovering the heart of being Christians. If I were to pinpoint the biggest problem in the mainline church today, it would be that the modern church has succumbed to treating God as a theological ideal, as an abstract concept, rather than as an experience, an encounter, an embrace of One with whom we can have a deep and transforming relationship. Too many churches never emphasize the encounter with God that leads to an experience of God, but instead emphasize a knowledge of God that leads to—well, where does it lead??!” “Most of the essential beliefs of Christianity—the incarnation of God in Christ, the virgin birth, Jesus’ death and resurrection, the coming of the Holy Spirit, and many more—become real only when we tangibly experience their truth through an encounter with God.” Pastor Standish has much else to say, but I want all of us to ask a simple question of ourselves: Am I coming into church on Sundays, am I living each day expecting to encounter and to be changed by God? What if we were to dedicate ourselves daily to prayerfully seeking to experience God’s purpose, Christ’s presence, and the Holy Spirit’s power? What if we were to expect, as Joe Ebertz recently said so well from the pulpit, “God to show up”?: We would be changed - - - and “The Light at Third and Vine” would shine even brighter for the Lord in Hudson and the wider world. Amen? Amen!! Yours in the love of the Risen Lord, Randy S. Fredrikson |