God's Love Inspired Grace

I have recently been thinking much about the love of God and the grace of God. And it seems to me that God wants to prove His love for us by demonstrating His grace toward us. Throughout Scripture it is as if He is saying, "You know that I love you when you see that I have shown you grace."

That truth is seen in Romans 5:8 where the Apsotle Paul writes, "But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." There are many ways that God could have inspired Paul to write that verse. He could have simply said, "God demonstrates His love for us in that Christ died for us." If that would have been how Romans 5:8 was written then it would have still been amazingly true and would have been infinitely worthy of our praising God for all eternity.

But Paul adds a phrase that magnifies God’s grace. He says that God shows His love toward us in that "while we were still sinners" Jesus died for us. That phrase magnifies God's grace toward us in that it shows us love inspired grace. Jesus did not just die, He died while we were rebels, while we did not love God, while we had nothing good in us, while we were deserving of nothing but hell and punishment, while we were going our own way, while we could care less about God, while we were committing sin after sin against the God of the universe, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Jesus did the dying and the saving while we still did not deserve it.

That is grace. And that is how you know that God loves you: you know that God loves you when He shows you grace like that. It is one thing to see love; it is a more amazing thing to see grace-filled love!

Without Words Wednesday (or maybe just a few words...)

This Wednesday we will have a few words with our picture because we would ask that you be praying for our family.  Early Saturday morning we will be leaving Florida bound for the Center for Intercultural Training in Union Mills, North Carolina where we will be spending nearly three months in preparation for our move to Senegal. Pray that we will all make the transition well, learn things that will equip our family to live cross-culturally in Senegal, and that we will walk close with Jesus and each other during our months at CIT.

Stand Firm in the Faith

A few weeks ago I got the opportunity to preach at the Strong Man men's conference in Twin Falls, Idaho. Below is a link to the video of the sermon from Psalm 78 dealing with a father's role to stand firm in the faith for the sake of the next generation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FSF1cdpmyE&feature=player_embedded

Without Words Wednesday

Without Words Wednesday

Without Words Wednesday

Happy Birthday Ezra

Early in our marriage Gayle and I battled with infertility. We tried for over three-and-a-half years to become pregnant before being told by one of the country's leading infertility specialists that the chances of us having children on our own were nearly nonexistent.

God used this long event in our lives as very new Christians to teach us about what it meant to treasure Jesus over and above everything. Even over wonderful things like children.

But God, in His infinite grace, did indeed bless us with a child. And I can remember how we and our family and our church family and friends rejoiced to find out that after all of this time Gayle was finally pregnant. 

When the big day for Ezra to be born finally came there was great excitement. Over 25 people were at the hospital as Gayle went into labor. The child that the doctors had said was nearly impossible, that we had all been praying for for years, was getting ready to make his arrival. It was a time of great anticipation and joy.

But Ezra's arrival did not go exactly the way that we had planned it. When he arrived there were some unanswered questions about our little boy that the doctors had to look into. And less than 12 hours after Ezra's birth Gayle and I sat alone in the hospital room as Ezra was carted off to have some x-rays done of his skull and to see a neurosurgeon. Our half-day-old little boy was taken away to see what his future, and ours, would hold. This was not the picture that we had imagined for over four years.

As Gayle and I sat in that room we were exhausted, confused, and more than a little bit overwhelmed. And it was in that moment that the Lord laid a verse of Scripture on my heart that we had memorized together years earlier. It was Psalm 20:7 which reads, "Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will remember the name of the LORD our God." And there in that hospital room in our time of need we were reminded of our great God. We were reminded of His sovereignty and His love and His care. We were assured that He was there and that no matter what this looked like or how this turned out that He was in control and that He was always good. He reminded us that He is a trustworthy God and when you cannot trace His hand you must learn to trust His heart.

Today Ezra turns ten years old. And Ezra is in perfect health. As I type this my eyes are filled with tears at the abundant blessing he has been to his father. We named him Ezra because of what was said about Ezra the scribe in Ezra 7:10: "For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the Law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach statutes and ordinances in Israel." By God's grace we are getting a front row seat to see God make him into that kind of young man.

Our times of trusting God for Ezra are far from over. I am sure that there are many more bumps and bruises, both physically and emotionally, that we will endure as we move into the future. And when they come I pray that we, along with Ezra, will be able to say, "Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will remember the name of the LORD our God." Happy birthday Ez! Thank you for blessing your father for the last ten years.