Posted tagged ‘the angel Gabriel’

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Hope

November 30, 2015

 

“Zechariah asked the angel, ‘How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.’” (Luke 1:18)

It is much easier to doubt than it is to hope. Doubt takes little effort. It comes like the incoming tide of an ocean shore…wave after wave inching its way up the sand…changing the configuration of our thoughts. Hope takes invested commitment.

Doubt pushes its way into our visions of the future. What will God do during this time? Doubt detours around God and muddies our journey. What new directions will God take us in? Doubt stubbornly roots itself in the stiffness of the present. What better things does God have for us as we journey through our life with him? Doubt sees no good, no possible renewal.

When we allow hope to rise we step into the certainty of God’s promise. We step out of our Zechariah moment and into the delight of Elizabeth’s new hope.

Some folk in our churches have to be nurtured out of doubt. There may need to be some people who walk alongside them and usher them towards hope. “Zechariahs” take a little longer to arrive at hope. Sometimes it takes a little more persuasion…a tied tongue for a while…for someone to discover the assuredness of God’s promise.

Let hope arise! Let hope arise! Let us be able to see the hope and excitement of Elizabeth’s words: “The Lord has done this for me!” (Luke 1:25a)

Categories: Bible, Christianity, Christmas, Community, Faith, Jesus, Pastor, Prayer, Story, The Church, Uncategorized
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Recognizing Angels

December 8, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                                 December 8, 2014

                                               

Angels are well-liked. Many people see them as cuddly little bald-headed boys who fly around and sprinkle glitter. They’ve been portrayed by attractive Hollywood actresses who talk in sweet tones and sing with…okay, I’ll say it…angelic voices.

But in everyday life how do we know it’s an angel that we’re seeing or talking to. In the Bible there were very clear angelic conversations between the angel Gabriel and Zechariah (Luke 1) and also with Mary. Zechariah becomes speechless as a result of the encounter, and his faithless questions. After Jesus’ resurrection there is an angelic encounter at the tomb.

The other side of the situation, however, is Hebrews 13:2- “Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it.”

Angels could be bald-headed or have a full head of red hair. They could be thought to be Pakistani or Irish, young or old, dressed well or shabby in appearance. The disturbing thing about the verse in Hebrews is that we may have shown hospitality to dozens of angels and not be aware of it until some time in the future or next life…or we may have refused angels and not thought a thing about it.

Perhaps the point of that verse in Hebrews 13 is to say that our attitude towards people, and behavior towards people, should have a consistency to it. The recent situations across our nation have shown that we have certain biases towards those who are not like us. Years ago a church growth consultant advocated for churches to be homogenous. In other words attract more people that are cookie-cutter images of the people who are already there. Diversity was discouraged. I wonder how many angelic visitations were met with cold shoulders and closed lips?

Angelic appointments are not like my annual physical with my doctor that I can schedule a couple of months ahead of time. When I make that appointment it usually includes a couple of “No, that time doesn’t work” answers before finding a suitable time that works. Angelic visits are according to God’s planning, and, hard as it is for me to believe, God doesn’t compare calendars with me before sending one of his messengers.

So how do we recognize angels? With great difficulty! Oddly enough, that may be the point, for God does not want us to treat anyone less than we would treat Gabriel. What a concept to live life by! To see each person we meet and relate to as quite possibly being one of the angelic beings!

Categories: Bible, children, Christianity, Christmas, Jesus, Pastor, Story, The Church, Uncategorized
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Humbled and Blessed

December 8, 2014

 

“The angel went to her and said, ‘Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.” (Luke 1:28)

It seems that so many of the people that we encounter in the Bible that are blessed by God in some significant way are men and women of humble circumstances. Think about it! Peter was crucified upside down because he didn’t consider himself worthy enough to be nailed to the cross the same way Jesus had been crucified.

Ruth was spotted by Boaz as she was gleaning in the field. Gleaning was a way that people who was poor- people trying to survive- could gather grain to feed themselves.

Paul was supported by the generosity of the first churches. He was the one who wrote Philippians 2:3 “Do nothing our of self ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider other better than yourselves.” And then in describing Jesus he wrote, “And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient to death- even death on a cross!” (Philippians 2:8) Paul had been humbled by the appearance of Jesus on the road to Damascus, an event that blinded him for a while.

Humbleness is not a quality that gets much print these days. Recently a college football player was thinking too much about his celebration antics for scoring a touchdown and dropped the football prematurely before he crossed the goal line. The defending team picked up the football that was bouncing around on the one yard line and returned it 99 yards for a jaw-dropping score. If the player who had been intent on being in the spotlight had put his selfish ambition to the side and simply crossed the goal line his team would have been ahead 14-0. Instead it was suddenly 7-7 and the momentum changed for the rest of the game.

Mary was called by the angel Gabriel to be the mother of the Christ-child. Her spirit of humility showed in her response to the angel in Luke 1:38.

“I am the Lord’s servant. May it be to me as you have said.”

Two millennia later we celebrate the humble woman who was blessed by God. In terms of the blessings of God, he often goes against the grain and chooses the insignificant, the poor, the stutterer, the elderly, the common folk to carry out his greatest plans and purposes.

Categories: Bible, children, Christianity, Christmas, Jesus, love, Parenting, Story, The Church, Uncategorized
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The Beginning of a Story

December 2, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                                  December 2, 2014

                                            

Each of us live in the midst of beginnings and endings. Our days are punctuated by both. We begin by ending the torturous sound of our alarm going off. We end the day by beginning another night of sleep. Seldom, however, do we consider that one event or one conversation could be the beginning of something God-inspired and ordained.

The gospel of Luke begins with the story of Zechariah and Elizabeth. When Zechariah went into the Court of the Priests to burn incense and offer prayers for the people he never would have considered that it was the beginning of a life-altering event. The honor of performing the priestly duties was incredible by itself, but who would have thought that an angel named Gabriel would be joining him in that inner place?

That encounter changed things! And it began things!

Zechariah receives the angelic message that he’s going to be a dad. His wife, Elizabeth, though she had not been able to have children before this and was well along in years, would get pregnant. His name would be John, though it was not a family name.

The end of Zechariah’s priestly duties was the beginning of a new story that would be echoed down through the centuries. Little did he know that the words of Gabriel carried hope and a new direction for mankind.

I was recently delighted to hear about a story that came out of La Salle Street Church in Chicago. The church had received $1.6 million dollars in a real estate transaction and decided to use $160,000 of it for the cause of good. Five hundred dollars was given to each of the 320 regular attenders to do good. The stories of what people decided to use their money for were incredible. One lady used her gift to gift other children at her daughter’s grade school with winter coats and clothing. One young man, who was from Jordan and a student at Moody Bible Institute, used his funds to contribute to the building a new skate park in Jordan.

Each gift was seed money for new beginnings. People were able to help others. It was a ripple effect of goodness filtering through a city and even into other countries.

We never quite know how our words, actions, and decisions will begin new stories in other lives, but God does!

 

Categories: Bible, children, Christianity, Christmas, Jesus, Pastor, Story, The Church, Uncategorized, Youth
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