In 2 Chronicles 15, only about 50 years after Solomon dedicated the Temple to Yahweh, Judah was in a mess.  You can read about the situation in 2 Chronicles 15:1-7. In verse 6, the Chronicler attributed the hardship that had fallen on them as coming from God.

They were broken in pieces. Nation was crushed by nation and city by city, for God troubled them with every sort of distress.  (Emphasis added)

God troubled them.  He didn’t just allow it, He ordained it.  Sent it.  Purposed it for His glory.  

The last 13 months have been some of the most difficult times many of us have experienced in our lives.  I am convinced more than ever, however, the difficulty has come our way at the hand of God.  And sadly, we seem to have failed to learn the lessons He intended.  

The year 2020 has added a new dynamic to Thanksgiving Day. Some will not be able to gather with family and celebrate the occasion in the usual manner.  Moreover, COVID, politics, and social unrest have presented difficult challenges for most of us.

While some give thanks for health and healing, still others will deal with the anxiety of an unresolved or incurable diagnosis. Some will give thanks for material possessions while others will spend the day wondering how they will avoid losing what little they have. Yes, Thanksgiving Day can be a challenge.

Thanksgiving “In”

In Monday’s blog, I challenged you to be thankful TO while being thankful for. Today, I want to encourage you to be thankful IN in addition to being thankful for. What a difference a preposition can make. Consider the words of Paul:

Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
– 1 Thessalonians 5:18

Let me offer a few “whys.”

1. We can be thankful even in difficult circumstances because God has a plan and He is in control. Nothing happens to us that He has not permitted and plans to use for His glory and our good. (Romans 8:28)

2. We can be thankful even in difficult circumstances because in them we have the opportunity to let others see Jesus living in us. How we respond to adversity says a lot about what is in out heart. Keep your focus on Jesus and let Him live through you. (Philippians 2:12-14)

3. We can be thankful even in bad circumstances because God will us them FOR us to make us better and more like Jesus. Circumstances are like sandpaper and grit that buff out our rough edges and make us smoother. The finest pearls are fashioned in the grittiest oysters. (1 Peter 1:6-7)

This year, take time to give God thanks for your circumstances no matter how rosy or rough they may be. God is at work in your life. He is for you, nothing can be against you, and you will come through shining like gold.

This Sunday, November 29th, we would love for you to join us for worship at Bellevue Baptist Church, 5925 Price Road, Macon, GA.  We will  begin our Advent Seasonal Celebration as we focus on the HOPE Jesus brings to the World.  We would love to see YOU at The VUE.  The service starts at 11:00am.

Dr. Johnston was one of my favorite professors when I was in college.  

I grew up in a Christian home with my family attending a Bible teaching church.  I graduated from a Christian school where I was faithfully taught Scriptural truth from the 4^th – 12^th grades.  College was my first personal encounter with people who did not believe the same things I did.

I saw liberalism in every facet of college life – socially, politically, and even theologically.  I was so thankful for the foundation others had laid in my life.  Unfortunately, not being very mature at that point, I constantly stayed on the defensive.  Every class discussion I had, every paper I wrote, every opportunity I could find, I stood for conservatism.  I even spent one week as the “religion editor” for the campus paper.  After one article, they told me they would no longer need my articles.  They admitted that they did not want my conservative approach.

Dr. Johnston taught my very first class in New Testament studies.  I found him to be a fellow conservative, seemingly the only one on the religion faculty.  Over the years I took every class He taught that I possible could.  He was such a man of truth.  In fact, here’s a true and funny anecdote.  We noticed that in his weekly true/false tests, most of the answers were true.  One week, a fellow student did not have time to study, so he planned to just mark every answer TRUE.  He received an 88 grade on the paper!  14 out of 16 answers were TRUE!

Hostile Sources

Comments Dr. Johnston made on several papers I wrote challenged my use of what he called “hostile sources.”  He challenged me to read and deal with views that may not agree with my thesis or personal views.  He taught me the value of listening to all sides and synthesizing information into the best possible result.

Dr. Johnston showed me that allowing other viewpoints to challenge my own only strengthened my stand. Either I learned things I might not have otherwise seen or I became more convinced of my original position.

Intellectual Incest

I see a growing movement in our culture of rejecting other viewpoints and cocooning with like-minded people.  What we call “cancel culture” has trained us to delegitimize anyone with whom we disagree.  We want to only hear the voice of those with whom we agree, whether it be socially, politically, or even theologically.

I call this tragedy intellectual incest.  Science teaches us the genetic dangers of in-breeding.  Such a practice multiplies the genetic faults in a family line and leads to dangerous and unhealthy mutations. 

In like manner, if all we ever do is listen to the voices with whom we agree, we run the risk of growing stale in our thinking.  I am not suggesting that our principles should ever change.  I AM suggesting that we can better articulate and defend our positions by knowing how others think and believe.

A Biblical Example

In Acts 17, we read about Paul’s time in Athens, a culture not much unlike our own today.  Paul interacted with a variety of people while in Athens. He reasoned with the religious in the synagogue, engaged the busy-ness in the marketplace, and conversed with the philosophers.  And the Bible says he did this EVERY DAY.

His willingness to engage all kinds of people earned him the opportunity to address the most influential public forum in Athens.  Mars Hill was the place where the intellectuals discussed philosophy.  The religious discussed religion.  And the politicians discussed politics.  You can read his most effective Gospel presentation in Acts 17:22-31.  

Because he engaged others who thought and believed differently that he did, he had the intellectual foundation to present the Gospel in terms they could understand.  As you might imagine, he received mixed results (Acts 17:32-34).  Many mocked.  Others showed an interest to hear more.  And most importantly believed.

Moving Forward

I guess the point of my article today is to encourage you not to huddle into an intellectual cocoon of people with whom you agree.  Don’t run the risk of intellectual incest. Listen to others, learn how they think and why they think that way.  Engage them kindly and respectfully.  Share what you believe and why, but make sure you listen to them.

Droves of people are abandoning both social media and traditional media sites that display a bias against what they believe.  Please stick around.  The people on those sites need to hear your voice.  But more importantly, you need to hear theirs.

Recently the president of the largest Evangelical university in the USA resigned amid controvery. The response of many saddened me.

What has grieved me most is the response of the Faith Community to all of this.  Most of what I have read in the comments sections of social media (mostly Twitter) has been full of self-righteous finger pointing.  

When Kingdom citizens respond with an “I told you so” attitude or a “well he ought to be (you fill in the blank)” attitude, we sound a lot like the Pharisee in Jesus’ story about the Tax Collector and Pharisee in Luke 18:9-14.  Suffice it to say, Jesus sided with the Tax Collector.

Sometimes it seems that we take great delight in celebrating the downfall of others’ brought on by their sin.  Maybe it’s because the louder we speak about someone else’s public sin, we can’t hear the guilt of our own private sin.

A Proper Response

How should we then respond to failures of a public nature?  Here are some suggestions.

This Memorial Day, I want to honor Kenneth Wiley Walker. Kenneth was born December 2, 1922, the 6^th child and second son to my great grandparents Joe Carlie and Mary Elizabeth Walker.  That would make him my great uncle. 

The Man

He joined the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1939 and served in Oregon until 1941.  Then in October of 1942 he volunteered to serve in the United States Navy.  The ship on which he served, the USS Thuban, deployed in the Pacific during WWII.

The Mission

In order to take Midway Island, the US Navy needed to take out a Japanese stronghold in The Gilbert Islands.  The specific Island was Betio, located in what was known as the Tarawa Atoll.  The goal was to destroy the stronghold there, establish a base in the Marianna Islands, then take Midway.  From there, the USN could launch offensives into the Philippines and eventually Japan.  The US deemed this mission vital to the success of our effort in WWII.

As I write this, we are still the uncertain days of the COVID-19 pandemic.  I also write as we anticipate, for the second Sunday in a row, severe storms to move through our area.  Suffice it to say, many people understandably are feeling a great bit of anxiety. 

Recently, my friend Bobby Simpson, wrote in his “Thought for Tuesday” about a concept he calls “our reaction to our reaction.”  Anxiety is a natural reaction a pandemic threatens our life’s normalcy or a storm threatens our safety. But the key is not to act on our first reaction. We do better to consider a positive reaction to our reaction.

Thermometer or Thermostat

I’ve written before about our feelings and our thoughts being like a thermometer and thermostat. (Here and more recently here). A thermometer measures the environment that surrounds it.  Anxiety is a feeling that hints to us that our circumstances may be less than optimal.  We cannot keep from feeling anxiety at times any more than we can keep from feeling a chill when cold. 

In  my last blog, I wrote about the one thing I most pray will remain the same post-COVID.  I pray that this apparent renewed interest in trusting God will stick.  However, today, I want to share the one thing that I most pray that COVID make different about.

I pray that we will have a new, improved attitude about church.

Let me suggest two ways this new attitude should manifest itself.

These COVID days are difficult times indeed.  However, we have endured difficult days before and these will soon pass as well.  But what will we learn?  How will COVID-19 change the way we live. What will remain the same?

The Old Testament recounts numerous times God allowed His people to suffer in order to turn their hearts to Him.  I believe God has allowed the Coronavirus and has an ultimate purpose for it. I wrote previously that my greatest coronavirus fear is that we will go back to the way we were before.

Today, I want to share with you the thing I most pray will stay the same in post-COVID times.

I pray that this apparent renewed sense of dependence on God is real and lasting, not superficial, superstitious, and fleeting.

Below are three things I pray stay the same and give evidence we individually have heard from God.

I am Barabbas in a lot of ways. Remember him? He’s the guy that Pilate, at the request of the Jewish crowd, released instead of Jesus.

At the festival Pilate used to release for the people a prisoner whom they requested. There was one named Barabbas, who was in prison with rebels who had committed murder during the rebellion. The crowd came up and began to ask Pilate to do for them as was his custom. Pilate answered them, “Do you want me to release the King of the Jews for you?” For he knew it was because of envy that the chief priests had handed him over. But the chief priests stirred up the crowd so that he would release Barabbas to them instead. Pilate asked them again, “Then what do you want me to do with the one you call the King of the Jews?”

 

Again they shouted, “Crucify him!”

 

Pilate said to them, “Why? What has he done wrong?”

 

But they shouted all the more, “Crucify him!”

 

Wanting to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas to them; and after having Jesus flogged, he handed him over to be crucified. – Mark 15:6-15

What Do We Know About Barabbas?

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