Using God for Gain

Our church is currently in the middle of a series in the book of Malachi entitled "What People are Saying." Constantly throughout the book, God tells His people that He knows what they are saying - and why they are saying it. In chapter 2, God deals directly with the priests who are failing to give glory to His name. They are misrepresenting God to the people. And yet, at the solemn feasts, these same priests still take the choice parts of the animals sacrificed for their own livelihood. One of those choice parts is the maw (or stomach). It doesn't sound very appetizing to me, but then again, I pour hot sauce on everything I eat - so I'm probably not a very good judge. Apparently, before you can eat the stomach, you must clean it out thoroughly because it has refuse in it. In Malachi 2:3, God tells the priests that He will spread the refuse (from the sacrifices) on their faces. It's as if God is saying, "This is how you are causing people to think of me." The priests used their status and position to get what they wanted, and did not care how the people viewed God. It reminds me that as a pastor, I must always present God for who He really is. When Moses struck the rock (Numbers 20), instead of speaking to it as God commanded, he misrepresented God before the people and paid a terrible price. We are all called to give glory to God's name and the best way to do that is to show the unchurched who God really is. When people come to us with real problems, they need us to introduce them to a real God.

CAP

Little Like Me

I know I blog an awful lot about my kids, but isn't it amazing how God refreshes our thinking vicariously through the experiences of our children? A few days ago, my son (excited about his Christmas toys) asked, "Daddy, do you want to play with me?" I told him I did and the next words he spoke were profound - "Daddy, you'll have to become little like me." In his mind, I couldn't truly have fun with him unless I was little like he was. What does that remind you of? Matthew 18:2-3 says, "Then Jesus called a little child to Him, set him in the midst of them, and said, “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven." True faith is childlike in its simplicity and that is what the world cannot comprehend. My brother-in-law is a gamer and asked me to get on YouTube and do a search for XBox 360 - Project Natal. I was intrigued by what I saw because in the near future, gamers will no longer need controllers to play games. The game system will be able to recognize body movements - making controllers obsolete. How is it that R&D scientists can invent technology that will allow us to move our hands and feet to control a video game, but we have a hard time believing that an omniscient intelligent designer (God) can create the universe and order everything in it? Evolutionists will not allow themselves to think like children, even though science mimics the creation process. How big is our God? The bigger He is, the littler we all must become.

CAP