Christmas 2007

My brother Harold Motte and I exchanged gifts a few days before Christmas. Here he is relaxing beside their tree.

I spent Christmas Eve and Christmas morning at my daughter Shelby’s home in Mullins.

She bought special jingle bell collars for the three dogs, Scooter, Buster and Molly. They seemed to enjoy the collars!

Terry’s family came over for an hour or so of sharing delicious holiday food and catching up on news, followed by gift exchanges.

This year I didn’t drive to Murrells Inlet to spend Christmas Day with Tim’s brother Bryan and family, since Ora Lee wasn’t able to attend.

Early Christmas day Dale moved her from Bethea back to the Third Loop condominium that she and Theron had lived in and where Dale and his son Jon now live. I visited her after lunch on Christmas Day and she was trying to get settled in and adjusted, which will take a while.

All in all the holidays weren’t the best or the worst, and when we remember what – and Who – it’s supposed to be about in the first place, that helps a lot.

The beginning of the Gospel…

“The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the son of God.”  That’s the way the Gospel of Mark begins.  As I read that the other day, I stopped right there and thought — where does it say, The middle of the gospel?  Or The end of the gospel?

“It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service…” says Ephesians 4:11-12.  Hmmm.

Now, apostles seem natural gifts for God’s people, don’t they.  Those are the people sent out to establish the church, after all.  And prophets — they are God’s spokespersons on earth, so the church is a natural recipient for that gift.  And of course every church needs pastors and teachers.

But evangelists? Evangelists tell the gospel.  Gospel means good news.  Haven’t churches already gotten that good news?  Why do they need evangelists?  Shouldn’t they be sending OUT evangelists?

Ah, but good news is still being created by God, that’s why.  Good news hasn’t been limited to one event (Christmas) or another (Easter), there’s still lots of other good news that churches need to hear.

Grace is massive.  So is mercy.  Healing.  Deliverance.  Guidance.  Inspiration.  Empowerment.  Lots of God’s good news hasn’t completely sunk in yet for many believers, so there’s still a need for evangelists in the churches.  Until we all grow up completely, we’ll still need all of those gifts, evangelists included.

The more I learn about Father God and his ideas, his gifts, the more I realize how much I still need to learn.

Mercy, wow, what a concept…

Mercy, wow, what a concept. It means even if I’m guilty, I don’t get punished. That is such a great gift – and that’s what Christmas really means.

The most precious word in the Bible is mercy, and the most precious verse in the Bible is Hebrews 4:16, “Let us, therefore, come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.”

Whenever you see a “therefore,” you need to find out what it’s there for — so said a preacher one day, and he was right. Therefore refers to the fact that we have a “high priest” who can sympathize with us because he lived as a human being, faced the same kinds of stress and temptations and problems we do, and came through it a winner.

When we’re experiencing lack of character, lack of courage, lack of gumption – or the more practical stuff like food, or shelter, or money, or health, we can come to God and get help for free. We don’t have to crawl, or beg, or whimper, or grovel — we don’t have to be afraid that God will hurl thunderbolts at us losers or weaklings, or burn us to a crisp for our shortcomings. No, he created us. He loves us, with a kind of love that always wants to help, not hurt. God is love, he can’t help it.

Through the centuries, authentic love has been watered down, contaminated or mutated into an ungodly form. Lavish gifts distributed without affection, without spending time, parent to child. Big house, no time. Fancy car, no time. Excellent school, no time. Or perhaps plenty of time, all spent in berating, criticizing, controlling, not praising, appreciating, encouraging.

God’s love is expressed in and through grace, that is, freely without payment. When we take a birthday present to someone, we don’t expect them to pay us for it. And when God gives us a birthday (new birth, that is, ours) present, he doesn’t expect us to pay Him for it. What do we have valuable enough to pay him with, after all? But we do have to accept the gift. He won’t force it on us against our will.

Grace means it’s free, no payment expected, and mercy is the free gift that we get from God, when we accept it. This present comes wrapped up in the person of Jesus. He’s why I can take advantage of Hebrews 4:16. He’s the “therefore.”

He took my guiltiness, my cowardice, my wrongdoing, took my punishment for it, then offered me the free gift of mercy, just for the taking. What better present can you get than that?

What’s it like?

In January I will be attending a conference at the OM office in Germany, then visiting the new ship Logos Hope for a few days before returning home. An OM ship is a busy place!

People often ask me what it would be like to live and work onboard an OM ship — here’s a glimpse of life on the Doulos in 2007.