FreeTruth

One of my teachers used to say "our heredity begins in Christ." It is a powerful suggestion, and an effective counseling tool. Sadly, there are people who struggle for years, even decades, because of an unsavory heritage. I'm no psychologist, and clearly counselors and therapists play their part in bringing emotional healing to folks with troubled pasts. But there is a truth in this assertion that can overcome a host of evil. If we are "in Christ" we are members of God's family-- God is our father and Jesus is our brother! We have a brand new heritage!

I am always blessed when Pastor Tim speaks about his own father, as he did in yesterday's sermon. It seems to me that Tim's dad is an example of this idea that, in a true sense, our heredity begins with Christ. Mr. Shorey did not come from a Christian home, but the fruit of his salvation was passed on to Timothy M., and now the third and fourth generations are reaping the blessings of a wonderful inheritance in Christ.

I have a niece who lives in Minnesota. She recently changed her Facebook status to "in a relationship with..." She met a friend of her brother, who attended the same law school, and they are now taking a pre-marriage class at Bethlehem Baptist Church, where John Piper preaches. My niece is the dearest young lady! At 26 years old, she has her degrees, and has done a good deal of missions work overseas. She speaks of her Lord, and writes of her relationship with Him in wonderful ways. I know her love for God runs deeper than most her age.

But there is some concern on the part of some in her family. Why? Because the young man has only recently come to know the Lord, and isn't yet able to carefully articulate his theological positions. (At least, that seems to be the reason for concern). But he is an eager learner; very bright, and he's learning from the best there at Bethlehem Baptist.

And so, I do not share the concern that others have expressed. This young man is a part of God's family-- God is his Father, Christ, his brother! What more background do we need! And who knows... he may just turn out to be another Mr. Shorey!

Labels: Christian Heritage, Guest Post

While it is still December, I want to take this moment to express my love and honor for my dad and mom.

Dad died on Christmas Day, 2005. Mom died on December 1, 2006. Thus, I lost both parents in less than a year, and both at this time of the year. I sit here and look at my last two most cherished pictures of dad and mom and feel afresh the depths of love and gratitude I have for them and for their legacy.

One picture is of them together, both beaming with the contageous joy that marked their lives particularly in the last few years of their lives. The other is of mom and me, from when mom visited us and our church last, about 40 days before she went home to her Savior and saw the One for Whom she had so long lived.

It speaks of the kind of lives they lived that when they died, I felt orphaned, even though I was 48 years old and the father of six. I was father- and mother-less, and I felt it.

Reflecting on this has led me to two thoughts. First, I have regretted all the times I have failed to express adequately my grief in others grief when a parent has died. Until I lost my parents, I did not know how hard it is to lose a parent. People lose parents in different ways: some through death, some through their parents' divorce, some through abandonment, some through massive neglect. At some point or another we all feel orphaned, and I grieve that in the past I did not enter the grief of others enough, and I ask forgiveness again for it.

Second, I am affected by the deep mystical bond that human relationships involve. One of the reasons I believe in God is that only a mysterious, deep, mystical, transcendant Being can account for the mystical, deep, transcendant experiences of the human soul--including human relationships.

Love is profound. Marriage, parenthood, and deep friendship--even when far less than ideally expressed, are mystical bonds that cannot be explained by evolutionary theory or philosphical materialism; the idea that matter and the physical are all that exist.

There exists between humans--and I think we all have tasted this at least for a few moments here and there in life--a connection that transcends what can be explained by the chemical actions and reactions of our biological make-up.

These are matters of the spirit, of the soul, of transcendant reality. They are mystical and mysterious sign-posts calling our hearts to look above the world to the Transcendant One from Whom all such wonders derive.

Friends, if in these past few holiday weeks spent in family-love, friendship, or fellowship, you have had at least a moment or two when you've been lost in joy over a relationship, allow that to lift your soul above the here and now into the realms of glory, where God the Mysterious and the Profound dwells.

If you have loved and been loved, it is because the One who is love exists.

Labels: Apologetics, Christian Heritage, Family, Parents