Render Your Heart

“Even now’ declares the Lord. ‘Return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning.” Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and relents from sending calamity.”
Joel 2:12-13

It is the time of year when the Church begins one of its most important seasons. The Lenten season begins with Ash Wednesday. Lent is a time of introspective, looking into our hearts and seeking what parts of our lives we are keeping from God. It is also a time when we try to relate to everything that Jesus experienced – from his 40 days in the wilderness being tempted to His death and resurrection. I will be honest and say that trying to find a fresh perspective on something that occurs year after year can be difficult. So as I was thinking about what to write about Ash Wednesday, I was looking through all sorts of passages. I looked at passages that had been earmarked for our church’s Lenten series and nothing was really standing out to me. Then I looked at the scripture passages that would be used for our Ash Wednesday service. I was surprised to find the prophet Joel. I have read Joel a number of times but had never thought of his words as speaking into this season.

As I read it this time the solemnness, the anguish - of Ash Wednesday, of Good Friday and yes even in the celebratory tone of the Triumphant entry - came screaming into my mind and heart. The passage above follows eleven verses of doom and gloom – of a plague of locust, that look like horses and leave desolation in their path, God’s judgement on a wicked and stiff necked people. But Joel doesn’t leave the people with this dreadful image in their heads – no God has more for him to share, a message that says perhaps all is not lost, perhaps the Lord God will reconsider and have mercy on the people.

In Biblical time is was a common practice when people were mourning or angry to tear their clothes – it was a way of expressing extreme and painful feelings. Joel tells the people that they needed to “rend their hearts.” The dictionary has this to say of the word “rend” – to separate into parts with force or violence, to tear apart, to tear ones’ garment or hair in grief or rage. Joel is telling the people that tearing their clothes will not be enough to show God that they are truly sorry for their sin and stiff necked behavior – no this time they must break open their hard hearts, to prove that indeed their hearts are broken over how they have behaved. Once they have rended their hearts Joel calls them back to God, assuring them that God is still filled with grace and compassion and love.

In a few short weeks we remember another solemn day, that today we call good. We will remember that Jesus rended His heart to restore our relationship with the father. The curtain that separated the most Holy place from everything and everyone will be violently torn from top to bottom as the Father grieves for His Son.

We are not so different from those of ancient times – we are all sinners doing things that separate us from a God who loves us. We can be stiff necked, not wanting to change – because that change might be uncomfortable, might make us more different from the world than we want to be. Joel is speaking to us though, as he did all those generations ago – encouraging us to rend out hearts and return to God, that we might receive grace and compassion, that we would feel His love restoring our torn hearts.

If we’ll rend our hearts out of sincere grief, He will make them whole again with His love.

A Prayer
Father – what powerful words your servant Joel spoke to the people. May his word echo though our spirits giving us the courage to rend our own hearts, that the work of your Son make restore them, making us whole and bringing us back to a right and loving relationship with the One who made us and calls us His child. May we have the courage to be who You want us to be, to be so different that others will see Jesus through the torn curtain. In the name of Jesus, who rended His heart so that we would be healed from our sin sickness – Amen.

Give to God What Is God's

“…The he said to them. “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”
Matthew 22:21

It’s tax season here in the U.S. for some it will be a time of rejoicing, as the prospect of a refund for having paid the government too much becomes reality. For others however, rejoicing is not what comes to mind as they see the amount owed go up and then discover there may also be a penalty because you didn’t pay enough up front so to speak. This is where my husband and I find ourselves at the moment. The realization that we had not planned well enough in the first place and that the amount was way bigger than we had even imagined. After the initial shock wore off, we came to the conclusion that we should be grateful for the progress we made in the past year. Gratefulness in the midst of trial is the inspiration behind this week’s devotion.

This week’s passage from Matthew Gospel is the conclusion of an encounter Jesus had with the minions of the religious leaders of His day. They were trying to trap Him by getting Him to speak against the government, which would have made Him guilty of subversion and that could be punished by death according to the Romans. Instead Jesus turns the tables on them asking to see the coin used to pay taxes and then asking in essence who does this coin really belong to? He told them to return the coin to its rightful owner – Caesar and then He takes it a step further and tells them they also need to God what belongs to God. Did this group really know and understand what that meant? Do we?

What is it that we need to be giving God back, what does HE really want from us? He wants our hearts, our minds, our gratitude, our praise, our awe inspired respect, our love, our brokenness, our doubts, our fears, our struggles, our sin. He wants us to let the world have what belongs to it – all the stuff that draws us away Him and He wants us to give Him our whole selves – not just the good bits but every bit of ourselves – because we belong to Him.

I don’t know how taxes work in other parts of the world, if there is tax season or not – I do know that most of us no matter where we are, give to Caesar what is his or hers in some shape or form. If you find yourself challenged at times by this remember Jesus instructed those who would trap him to pay their taxes and give God what is His. Which is more difficult? Which has the greater return?

I’m happy to give to God what is His, for a future in His presence.

A Prayer
Father – Thank you for making the challenge out of paying taxes – since all the worlds money bears the image of a human leaders – lighter. Grant us the courage and strength to give the harder thing – ourselves to a Sovereign God, who loves us and wants the best for us. May our daily acts of giving to God what is His attract others who have been swayed by the world and bring them to a place where they too will connect with Jesus and find hope. In the name of Jesus, who gave to God what was demanded of Him and in the process brought grace, mercy and forgiveness to all who believe – Amen.

Hopelessly & Totally Devoted

“They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.”
Acts 2:42

The Lord has been stretching me and is expanding my calling step by step. That expansion is scary sometimes. You see I have always seen my calling as a behind the scenes sort of thing – caring for the business of church so that lead pastor can concentrate on studying and prayer. But the Lord is putting me on the platform, to speak what He speaks to me through His Word. It is a task I feel the weight of. If I weren’t hopelessly and totally devoted to serving the Lord in whatever way He leads, I can say with some certainty the I would be fighting the transforming work that is going on in me personally.

Recently, I was called upon to take the platform, fill the pulpit whatever you want call it. This week’s passage is a portion of the Scripture I was given to speak about. The first thing that came to mind once I knew the passage was Olivia Newton-John’s song from Grease Hopelessly Devoted To You. If you have been reading Something Special for a while you know strange things inspire me. That song was the jumping off point for the message. As the words of the song and the message wandered around in my head together the idea of devotion bring about transformation came to the for front. Then another song, this one Love Broke Thru by Toby Mac entered the picture and it also has a line about be hopelessly devoted. Both the movie Grease and the music video for Toby Mac’s song end with transformation.

I’ll ask you the same things I asked our congregation – What are you hopelessly & totally devoted to? What is it transforming you into? See the things the believers in this week’s passage are devoted to are transforming them daily into the image of Jesus and that transformation is getting the attention of those on the outside and drawing them in so that they might be connected to Jesus and transformed as well. That kind of devotion, if we let it will transform us from sinners to servants, from outsiders to insiders, from being last to being first and it will make us attractive to the people around us who need Jesus.

From the beginning of time God has been hopelessly & totally devoted to you, me and all of mankind that His love broke through time and space to reach us. The question is… will we be so hopelessly & totally devoted to Him that we be transformed daily into the likeness of Jesus? So devoted that we will lay aside our selfishness, out personal preferences, out comfort, our bias’s and anything else that stands in in the way of our being Jesus to one another and to those around us who need to meet and make a connection with Jesus.

I challenge you to take some time to look at the things you are devoted to and how those things are transforming you. Me I am going to be hopelessly & totally devoted to Jesus.

A Prayer
Father – Thank you for being hopelessly & totally devoted to us and for wanting to transform us daily into the image of your Son. Help us to be hopelessly & devoted to you so that we can indeed be transformed into the image of Jesus. We pray that the transformation will be so striking that it will attract others to us so they can find and make a connection with Him. In the name of Jesus, who shows what hopelessly & totally devoted looks like – Amen.