Tag: holiness

Sunday, Sept. 4

~ Chuck Griffin ~ Leave a comment

Welcome to the daily prayer guide for the month of September! Today is Sunday, Sept. 4.

Today being Sunday, we will deviate from our pattern. Focus today on worshiping with others! If you engage earnestly in worship, you will experience all the elements of prayer we have explored so far.

By the way, engage with worship early. Start preparing yourself to encounter God in worship as you leave the house. Approach the place of worship prayerfully and joyfully, rejoicing in the sight of your fellow believers. And as you worship, remember throughout who your audience is:

God.

Saturday, Sept. 3

~ Chuck Griffin ~ Leave a comment

Welcome to the daily prayer guide for the month of September! Today is Saturday, Sept. 3. If you need an explanation about how to use this guide, see the first post.

Morning

For people with traditional work schedules, Saturday’s schedule can be gobbled up by recreation as quickly as the weekdays can be consumed with work. But we still want to begin our day centered! This morning, ask yourself how you can recognize God’s presence in the midst of all you do, be it work or play. See if you’re comfortable praying words along these lines:

“Lord, I invite you to keep me aware of you all day, wherever I may be. I know you are everywhere. Help me to sense this truth. Amen.” Let’s also remember to praise God for who He is. He made us. He saves us from sin. He dwells among us now as the Holy Spirit.

Take a moment to lift up the names of all around you who are tired, anxious, sick or lonely. Ask God to be with them; listen intently whether God is telling you to adjust your schedule to spend some time with them.

Take time to read the following Scriptures in your preferred translation: Deuteronomy 29:2-20; Matthew 10:34-42. Slow down enough to meditate on each one. Read what comes before and after if more context is necessary.

Pray these words out loud: “Lord, I surrender this day to you. Let my plans be your plans, let my encounters with others be holy, and may your kingdom grow just a little today because I am in this world. Amen.”

Give yourself a few minutes of silence before resuming your day.

Noon

Pray the Lord’s Prayer (See if someone might join you):

“Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom, and the power and the glory forever. Amen.”

Again, give yourself a few minutes of silence before resuming your day.

Night

As you review your day, pay attention to how closely you came to praying without ceasing (1 Thessalonians 5:17). By this, Paul meant being aware of God’s presence throughout the day.

I hope the meditative prayer time in the evening is becoming comfortable and rewarding. It’s a little like exercise; stick with it, and you will experience surprising growth. If the visualization aspect is proving difficult, simply focus on breathing and listening for the ever-present God.

And again, if you have questions or comments about the experience, it’s also okay to use the comments section of this page to start a conversation with others. May your dreams include visions of the kingdom to come.

Friday, Sept. 2

~ Chuck Griffin ~ Leave a comment

Welcome to the daily prayer guide for the month of September! Today is Friday, Sept. 2. If you need an explanation about how to use this guide, see yesterday’s post.

Morning

Let your early thoughts in the day connect you to God. This morning, think about how God first delivered to you the message of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. As you give thanks for the gift of salvation, consider how your experience might be beneficial to others.

Like yesterday, think about the people you know who may face a challenging day, and pray that God’s Spirit surrounds and supports them. You can continue to lift up this prayer throughout the day as other people continue to come to mind.

Take time to read the following Scriptures in your preferred translation: Psalm 1; Deuteronomy 7:12-26. Slow down enough to meditate on each one. Read what comes before and after if more context is necessary.

Pray these words out loud: “Lord, I surrender this day to you. Let my plans be your plans, let my encounters with others be holy, and may your kingdom grow just a little today because I am in this world. Amen.”

Give yourself a few minutes of silence before resuming your day.

Noon

Pray the Lord’s Prayer:

“Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom, and the power and the glory forever. Amen.”

Again, give yourself a few minutes of silence before resuming your day.

Night

Begin by making a brief mental review of your day. When were you walking with God? When were you walking on your own? This isn’t a time to beat yourself up. It’s simply spiritually healthy to assess how you’re doing in relation to what God wants from you.

If you started this prayer series yesterday, you may have found the meditative prayer time challenging. That’s okay; this is an important time of spiritual growth. If this is your first attempt, take some time to read “Life and Breath” and “Under Water.”

If you have questions or comments about the experience, it’s also okay to use the comments section of this page to start a conversation with others. And again, sleep well.

Thursday, Sept. 1

~ Chuck Griffin ~ 5 Comments

Welcome to the daily prayer guide for the month of September! Today is Thursday, Sept. 1.

As this is the first posting, a quick explanation is in order. This guide is designed to lead you through three prayer opportunities during the day. Ideally, at each opportunity you will find a quiet place to spend some time with God. Some of the prayer activities will appear repeatedly throughout the month so you can grow in your understanding. The pattern is Morning, Noon and Night. It’s up to you to find the time that works best for you in each of these parts of the day. Even “Noon” doesn’t have to be precisely at noon, but simply somewhere in the middle part of the day.

Those of you who use computer calendars might want to set reminders on them for each prayer moment. That would be diligent planning, but at the same time, if a crisis or some other event interferes with your prayer time, simply get back on track at the next opportunity. God is always there for you.

Morning

Let your early thoughts in the day connect you to God. Give thanks for how God is revealed to us as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Consider the people you know who may face a challenging day, and pray that God’s Spirit surrounds and supports them. (You can continue to lift up this prayer throughout the day as other people continue to come to mind.)

Take time to read the following Scriptures in your preferred translation: Psalm 139; Philippians 2:25-30. Slow down enough to meditate on each one. Read what comes before and after if more context is necessary.

Pray these words out loud: “Lord, I surrender this day to you. Let my plans be your plans, let my encounters with others be holy, and may your kingdom grow just a little today because I am in this world. Amen.”

Give yourself a few minutes of silence before resuming your day.

Noon

Pray the Lord’s Prayer:

“Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom, and the power and the glory forever. Amen.”

Again, give yourself a few minutes of silence before resuming your day.

Night

Begin by making a brief mental review of your day. When were you walking with God? When were you walking on your own? This isn’t a time to beat yourself up. It’s simply spiritually healthy to assess how you’re doing in relation to what God wants from you.

The remainder of the evening prayer time is more of a meditative experience. To better understand what is being recommended, take some time to read “Life and Breath” and “Under Water.” Perhaps you will be seeking peace, forgiveness or healing of some sort. Know that God meets you in these moments, and that grace is always available to you.

Sleep well.

For Such a Time as This, Pt. 2

~ Chuck Griffin ~ 1 Comment

2 Corinthians 13:5-10

By Chuck Griffin

Tuesday, I began moving toward Sunday’s sermon with an exhortation: Theologically conservative Methodists positioned by God to lead should do just that in our current environment, employing a little creativity and a lot of grace in the process.

I am not naïve. Once people become entrenched in institutional power and lucrative privilege, they very often will place their own interests above scriptural principles. (Another exhortation in Philippians 2:4-5 comes to mind.) So I exhort with only faint hope of a real response from anyone already positioned to make a difference.

That failure at the top continues to reverberate throughout the United Methodist Church, as it has done for decades now. Basic biblical concepts long preached and taught by Methodists have fallen by the wayside as the people once most able to encourage them grew silent in the face of secular pressure.

You can test how heavily your particular church has been affected by all of this. Look at today’s text from 2 Corinthians and ask yourself if it sounds like something anyone has taught or preached there.

The church at Corinth had very modern problems, the people immersed in “impurity, sexual immorality, and eagerness for lustful pleasure.” Paul expected that when he arrived, he would find quarreling, jealousy, anger, selfishness, slander, gossip, arrogance and disorderly behavior among them, too. (Read chapter 12 for the context I am citing here.)

Paul did not dance around those problems. He did not accommodate the social trends of the day. Instead, he relied on his humble subservience to God, letting God speak through him, employing the Scripture of his day and his direct encounters with the Holy Spirit to define right and wrong.

“Examine yourselves to see if your faith is genuine. Test yourselves. Surely you know that Jesus Christ is among you; if not, you have failed the test of genuine faith.”

If you’re unfamiliar with such language in church, you are in a congregation that has lost sight of what once was a basic Methodist concept, the pursuit of holiness. In church, this is a group effort to create an environment where people can, with the help of God, find their actions more closely aligned with God’s will each passing day.

Missing that in your church? Well, here’s the good news. Unworthy leaders can be ignored and even replaced. Paul ultimately aimed his message at all the Christians in the Corinthian church, giving everyone an opportunity to respond, and we can consider his words a message to us, too.

Know God’s word. Seek the presence of God’s Spirit through prayer, fasting and worship. As more of us do so, we will begin to recover what was once a bright, vibrant form of Methodism, a kind of Christianity that changed lives for the better.

Lord, we give thanks for the leaders who will arise among us, and we pray that they be graced with a double portion of your Spirit. Amen.

Taking Sides

~ John Grimm ~ 1 Comment

Psalm 124 (NRSV)

By John Grimm

How can we get the Lord on our side?  Is it through rigorous campaigning? Is it through generous giving?  Or could we get God on our side by belittling the other side?  These questions seem to be missing the mark.

It would be better for us to consider if we are on the Lord’s side!  Then, we would know that God is on our side.  For when we are trusting Jesus, obeying God, and following the lead of the Holy Spirit, then we are on the Lord’s side. 

Being on the Lord’s side is not always easy.  We many times will escape our enemies like a bird from the snare of the fowlers.

Enemies will attack us.  Our pasts will be brought up.  Our inconsistencies will be brought to light.  Our stumbling in the faith will be used as a weapon against us.  Thankfully, we do not need to depend upon ourselves to escape from our enemies.

The Lord’s name is our help.  The one who made heaven and earth is with us when we are attacked.  Our responsibility is to be on the Lord’s side before, during and after any attack we face.  Will we be found on the side of the Lord?

Lord, thank you for delivering us from past attacks.  It was not because of our merit that you did such work.  We have trusted you.  You have delivered us.  Thank you for being with us as we escaped.  In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray.  Amen.

An Unpopular Notion

~ Chuck Griffin ~ Leave a comment

Ephesians 5:15-20 (NLT)

So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. Don’t act thoughtlessly, but understand what the Lord wants you to do. Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life. Instead, be filled with the Holy Spirit, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, and making music to the Lord in your hearts. And give thanks for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

By Chuck Griffin

How we respond to verses like these says a lot about where we are in our walk with God.

Boring! Killjoys. Squares. Only the good die young! People caught up in the glittery side of life find it easy to roll their eyes at such sober Christian advice.

A lot of us who call ourselves Christian are all too familiar with this worldly stage of life, having passed through it in our younger days. I’ve known a few Christians who will tell you how they stayed in their “younger days” well into their sixties and beyond, discovering a better way only late in life.

We need to remember that it’s not always the wine that makes people drunk. The anxiety-inducing desires of this world—do I have enough, am I successful enough—can stun us into a spiritual stupor as powerfully as a big bottle of the finest red. 

To those who have yet to absorb Paul’s message, the part about being filled with the Holy Spirit, singing psalms and hymns, sounds intolerably boring. It’s because they have yet to taste the peace, the joy and the overwhelming sense of love that comes from stopping for a moment, taking a real accounting of our lives, and then stepping fully into a life with Christ.

Here’s the challenge for us who have already stumbled into that better way. How do we communicate what we are experiencing so others might be open to it, too? We all need to dwell on that question for a while and see if we can answer it creatively.

It helps me that I spend time with very old Christians who happily discuss what their walk with Christ means to them.  They see death as an ever-present possibility, but their joy and peace remain.

When with them, I often realize it would do me good to slow down and engage with the Holy Spirit even more. In that relationship, there is nothing to lose and glimpses of eternity to gain. Surely, if I engage enough, people will see the joy in me.

Sweet Spirit of God, continue to whisper to our souls, showing us the better way. As a people, may we once again grasp these truths at an early age. Amen.

“I Am the Lord Your God”

~ John Grimm ~ 1 Comment

Leviticus 19:9-18 (NRSV)

By John Grimm

When God says something directly to his people, he is quite emphatic.  In our relationships with one another, we do what is right for those relationships because the Lord is our God.  Righteousness happens between people because that is the way that the Lord our God is.  Whether we are harvesting, or speaking with one another, or interacting with the deaf, or working with all classes of neighbors, or when we attempt to bear a grudge, we are to be righteous.  Why?

God says it emphatically, clearly, and purposefully: “I am the Lord your God.”

Is this truth working in our lives?  Is this truth working in our local churches?  Is this truth working in our Annual Conference?  Is this truth working in our current denomination, the United Methodist Church?

These questions are for the people of God.  These questions are not for the unchurched. 

Are there happenings in our lives that attempt to refute God’s position in creation?  We are to care for the poor.  We are to honorably carry God’s name with our lives.  We can fear God, even when others do not frighten us.  We can honor our neighbors of all classes.  We can love our neighbors as ourselves.

We seek justice—the kind that honors God and recognizes our neighbors.  We deliver the truth—the kind that honors God and recognizes our neighbors.  We love—the kind that honors God and recognizes our neighbors.

Are the many sides in the United Methodist Church recognizing that the Lord is our God?  Are we doing such by refraining from bending the truth?  Are we loving our enemies?

Lord, you are God.  There is no other god for us.  As we interact and go through the present turmoil in the United Methodist Church, forgive us for not loving our neighbors, especially those who do not believe as we do.  We are to honor you and recognize the dignity of our neighbors.  Guide us to be righteous as you are righteous while we live in these days.  In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray.  Amen.

Holy, Holy, Holy

~ John Grimm ~ 1 Comment

Revelation 4:1-11 (NRSV)

By John Grimm

There is much in Revelation that people find confusing.  There are how many sevens?  There are how many cities?  When does this thing called “tribulation” begin?  Yet, one central part of Revelation does not cause confusion.

We are to worship God!

The living creatures that are attending to God are worshiping God.  We also see a refrain from the twenty-four elders.  The point and counterpoint help us to recognize that heaven and earth can (and do) worship God.  This worship happens together.

The living creatures are spelling out who they see and what they understand about the Lord:

1.)  Holy – repeated three times to show how perfectly true and gracious God is.

2.)  The Lord God the Almighty – an Old Testament name which describes all that God is – sovereign, divine, and having all strength.

3.)  Who was, and is, and is to come – God is before us, is with us, and will come to live within a renewed creation.

The refrain has people from earth repeating these themes from their perspective:

1.)  Worthy – for there is no other creature or any part of creation who can receive glory, honor, and praise.

2.)  Our Lord and God created all – he was before all created things, and he made all created things to be created.

Yes, these accolades for God in Revelation 4 are all true!  Though we see John’s apocalyptic vision as happening in the future, what is stopping us from worshiping God now?  Can we worship God for the reasons the living creatures and the twenty-four elders do?  Will we worship God and speak with our own voices how worthy the Lord is?

Lord God the Almighty, what a vision of worship as it can be.  Even today we realize we can give you all glory, honor, and praise.  Help our generation to know you through our worship of you.  In the name of Jesus Christ, we thank you for the time to worship you now, even though we do not understand everything going on around us, or in the Revelation of John.  Holy Spirit, thank you for John’s vision.  Amen.

Psalm 118, Meditation 4

~ John Grimm ~ 1 Comment

Psalm 118 (NRSV)

By John Grimm

There is nothing more timeless than salvation.  As Chuck pointed out yesterday, the psalms have a timelessness to them.  The timelessness of salvation is what we all want to know.  This desire is ingrained in our lives.  We want to be secure in our living now and our hope for the future.

This salvation comes only from the Lord.  We see verses 21-25 pointing out how God becomes our salvation.

I thank you that you have answered me and have become my salvation.
The stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.
This is the Lord's doing; it is marvelous in our eyes.
This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.
Save us, we beseech you, O LORD! O LORD, we beseech you, give us success!

Jesus was rejected by those who were attempting to build Israel into a great nation.  It is by knowing Jesus as the chief cornerstone of life that we have salvation.  We can sing about Jesus delivering us from our sins and ourselves.  Jesus will give us success over the sins we have committed and the nature of sin in us.

Salvation is not merely being delivered from sin. Salvation involves us discovering how we can be made new creatures (2 Corinthians 5:17ff.).  Salvation is lived in our lives during this day and all the following days.  We marvel because, like God’s mercies being new each day, he continues to renew us in the image of Christ.  This is salvation, being made to bear the image of Christ fully and completely in our lives.

Lord God, thank you for Jesus Christ.  We are looking for success in bearing the image of Christ in our lives.  As we seek you, we can rejoice in how you are working in us so that we live like Jesus, even today.  In the name of Jesus Christ, we ask that we may be found to be like him more each day.  Amen.