Articles

BLOOD AND GENTLENESS

Today we will serve communion at church, and I’ve been thinking of nuclear bombs. Or, at least, the father of nuclear bombs. Oppenheimer. Fairly recently, a much-acclaimed movie was released and widely received. It told the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer, head of the Los Alamos laboratory of the Manhattan Project, the story of “the father of the atomic bomb.” I just finished the book that inspired the movie. Friday, contemplating our coming Sunday communion, I was thinking of a time in Oppenheimer’s life long before he was famous. Of when he was yet a precocious but troubled student. In those days he developed few friendships, but he made a lifelong one with Isidor Rabi. Rabi was a Jew like Oppenheimer. But Rabi was raised an orthodox Jew, and Oppenheimer was raised on the opposite side of the spectrum as a rationalist, secular, non-observant one. Both were conflicted about their Jewishness. They would discuss Jewishness specifically and the topic to which that inevitably led—religion. Rabi once reflected to Oppenheimer that he found Christianity such a conundrum, such “a combination of blood and gentleness.” Oppenheimer replied that it was those very things—blood and gentleness--that attracted him to Christianity. Although I was getting drowsy reading, I came fully awake when I read that. The book offered no further context. Perhaps, Rabi in what he said, and Oppenheimer in responding to it, were not thinking of the blood of Christ. Perhaps, they meant that Christianity had produced people who were both war-aggressive and gentle. I doubt that. Or, perhaps, the blood references martyrs. I can’t tell. But what I immediately thought of was the blood of Christ. Until recently, Christianity has been known as the religion of blood. People thinking of Christianity thought of the crucifix. And the eucharist. This is what I took those two intellectuals to mean. Taking it as the blood of Christ, I thought: Here was one of the greatest geniuses of all times, one who was a master of quantum mechanics, poetry, music, and languages, one who was raised secular and humanist, and he was attracted to the Blood. Attracted, not as the charge has been falsely made of Christians, to the macabre and gore, not as the vampire-obsessed and fascinated crowd of today would think, but to the blood of the death of Christ. What an irony: This 20th-century genius thought the Blood attractive (if that is what he meant) and yet at the same time a huge segment of liberal and progressive and quickly-headed-that-direction Christianity has relegated the Blood to the primitive, provincial, and arcane. The Blood has been banished as banal. Once, protestant and evangelical churches' songs, sermons, prayers, and praises were replete with the repeated refrain of the Blood. It was not that these believers were fascinated with hemoglobic liquid. It was they realized their forgiveness, salvation, and hope of eternal life were inextricably linked to and made possible by Jesus’ sacrificial death on the Cross. Sacrifices were sacrificed by having their blood spilled. Christ was sacrificed. His blood was spilled. On the cross. For us. From the beginning Christians got this. They understood that the Cross, the Blood, was the power of God to liberate and forgive them. They were attracted to the cross, the Blood. Not all were. Even back in NT times Jews, found the Cross offensive. To them, Christ died like the worst of criminals, a death that was the curse of God. They couldn’t accept Christ as being the Messiah. Not if He’d been crucified. And what of the Greeks, the intellectuals? The Cross was just plain silly. Ludicrous. But, oh, those who have been there! Who’ve knelt at the Cross. To those who had been “washed by that blood,” the Blood was the power and wisdom of God. The Blood was wonderful, glorious, everything to them. Attractive. (“Washed in the Blood,” is a metaphor for how the penalty for their sins had been removed by Jesus’ efficacious death—when they accepted that work by faith, belief, and repentance.) Then and now, every genuine Christian understands that the Blood means something because it is what Jesus shed to die to atone for our sins, save us from hell, deliver us from death, and bring us into fellowship with God. They also understand that the Blood would be no different than any other human spilled blood, had Christ not also been God. And they understand that the Blood would be valueless had Christ not risen from the grave. But, has then been no Blood spilled, there’d be no salvation, forgiveness, or hope of eternal life. Yes, Christians are attracted to the Blood because, as Apostle Peter penned it, they have found it “precious.” (1 Peter 1:19). Precious being something esteemed, valuable, honorable, and dear. Precious because of Who spilled it, Who gave it. Precious because of the great sacrifice made in the spilling of it. Precious because of the love it’s being poured out revealed. Precious because of the reconciliation with God it brought. Precious because of its doing what nothing else could do—give forgiveness from sin and purity within. Precious because of the freedom it purchased. Precious because it was His blood, His life, and He is precious. So, forgive us if we Christians are “attracted” to the Blood. Excuse us as we sing, as we love to do, The Old Rugged Cross, and weep and wonder as we sing, … “Oh, that old rugged cross, so despised by the world, Has a wondrous attraction for me; For the dear Lamb of God left His glory above, To bear it to dark Calvary.” There is no time to speak of the other part of Rabi’s statement except to say Jesus is gentle. He is meek and lowly. And God treats us gently for Christ’s sake. For the Blood’s sake. I think I can concur. What attracts me to Christianity is “the blood and gentleness.” Of Christ. ---Pastor Clifford Hurst

WE AND THE WISENT

There is an instinctive impulse to find help on higher ground. Never do I fail to be amazed at the impulses that God has programmed into animals. Impulses that assure their survival. Let me tell you about the Wisent (pronounced, vee-zent), the European bison that’s a smaller cousin to the American Bison of our Midwest. These Wisents that roam the Caucasus Mountain range between the Black and Caspian Seas, between Europe and Asia, have a remarkable impulse. It only kicks in when things get really bad. At the height of winter in the inner valleys among the mountains where the Wisent graze, the constant accumulating snow eventually blankets the essential grasses to the point that no amount of hoof-pawing or head-sweeping can uncover them. The bison finally give up trying to dig down to their food. They just mill around or stand there. Starving. Becoming more and more emaciated. With death approaching. Then, like at the snap of invisible fingers, the whole herd is activated by the unseen impulse. They begin to move out of the valleys in a long sojourn up to mountain meadows at higher altitudes. This seems intuitively like a bad move. The snow is deeper, the wind fiercer, and the air more frigid up there. Yet, with their last remaining strength, they make what appears to be the suicidal, lemming-like trek. They arrive at their destination. They are in worse condition than they were before the climb. Now they are completely exhausted and further malnourished. They have no more reserves. They stand, heads down, as if they are conceding they’ve come to a dead end where they will end dead. Closer observing, however, brings the realization that the Wisents ARE waiting for something—and it’s not death. They do not have to wait long. Timing is everything. If they had arrived too early or too late, they would die on the mountain plateau or on the way there. But they are right on time. Shortly, a fierce, steady, hurricane-force wind from the south begins to blow. It is so powerful that in minutes it has blown the deep powdered snow off of the plateau leaving the grass below exposed. However, it is still layered with ice. But with the wind comes a low front that clears the clouds from the sky. Then, even at that height and at that temperature, the bright sun melts the ice from the steppe’s hay. The Wisents then begin to graze voraciously, mowing up the grass. They do not have long. Winter will soon return. They gorge themselves on life-saving nutrient-filled grass. Soon, the clouds and snow return reburying the field. When they do, the Wisent will have eaten enough to make the journey back to the lower pastures where they can now survive long enough for those meadows seasonally to clear as well. The impulse that drives them truly is amazing. It is more accurate than a meteorologist’s report. The developing storm is in the future and far distant from them, but the impulse activates them while the wind and front are yet miles away. They get the impulse in advance. If they didn’t, they would never make it from the lower valleys to the higher one traversing the ridges through the wind. They arrive at the exact time before the wind hits and at the exact spot where the grass will be uncovered. They are there to begin immediately to eat when the wind dies down and the grass is uncovered. And before it is reburied. The impulse indubitably saves their lives. It’s not just the Wisent to whom God’s given this impulse. It is we humans. A seeking God has put a seek in us. An impulse. And like the Wisent’s, ours generally kicks in when things get bad. When we are starved in the low fields of this world. When we are empty. When we are drained. When our environment is about to finish us off. When we are about to perish. An impulse kicks in. Making us restless where we are. Causing us to look to higher heights, upward, skyward, heavenward. We, like the Wisent, find our legs, our, rather, our hearts, moving. Climbing. Leaving behind the place of death. Reaching, calling, upward. The psalmist felt that impulse: “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth (Psa 121:1-2). The help came from the One even higher than the hills. And so does the impulse to look up, climb up. It came from Him too. To follow the impulse may be difficult. We may feel too weak to climb. We may feel the opposition of the environment. We may even at the moment of our arrival at that place of prayer feel it a wasted futile endeavor. It appears we are no better off than before. Perhaps, worst off. We have left the familiar for an even more hostile place. Then, up on the heights, the wind begins to blow, the sun begins to shine, and before us is what our soul needs. We partake. We feel the strength. The life. The newness. It has been worth the upward climb. We have been saved. Rescued. God gave the impulse to the Wisent. And to us. An impulse, activated, not by barometric pressures, but by His Spirit. Yes, unlike the Wisent, we can resist and die where we stand. Or we can turn our hearts upward and seek, reach out to, and call on Him. And enter heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Thank God for that impulse. Unbeliever, unconverted, or, believer, in trouble. Either one. Do you feel the compulsion to a higher place where your soul will be helped? This impulse, by the mercy of God, both we and the Wisent have in common. An impulse that saves our lives. How should you and I respond? “When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, LORD, will I seek.” (Psa 27:8). --Pastor Clifford Hurst

ELEVATOR OF HAUNTED HOUSE OR STAIRS TO HOLY HEIGHTS

“Sounds like a haunted house!” I wasn’t thinking as I said it. We were on the ground floor waiting for the elevator to take us to our room on the fifth. At our hotel, the wind outside was gusting ferociously. Large doors opened up to the elevator lobby. The wind was blowing the exterior doors open and was whistling, howling, and moaning through the lobby and hallways. The elevator arrived, and we with others got in and pushed the respective numbers to our rooms’ floors. When the doors shut, the vehement wind prevailed in finding its way through the small crack between the doors. The howling, whistling, and moaning increased. As the elevator began to rise, that’s when I said, “Sounds like a haunted house!” What I had forgotten was that a mother with two small girls had gotten on with us and stood behind us. When I said what I did, one of those little girls asked her mother in a quivering, fearful voice, “Mom, is this really a haunted house?” “You scared her,” Sandra whispered in her ear. I felt bad about that for just a second. Then I felt vindicated: The elevator jerked to a stop between floors. We were stuck. One passenger anxiously pushed the call button. When a voice came over the intercom speaker, she with traces of panic in her voice reported that we were trapped in the elevator. It didn’t take long for the elevator to heat up. Nervous bodies do that. It probably didn’t take long for help to show up either, but it seemed like a long time. I was looking at the elevator’s ceiling, looking for an exit. Finally, the maintenance personnel got the elevator back to the ground floor and got the doors opened. Nobody looked for another elevator. We all looked for the stairs. The mother and her daughters joined us in the stairwell. Fortunate for the girls’ small legs, their room wasn’t too far up. Ours was on the next to the last floor. As you know, there are two flights of stairs for each floor in most commercial buildings. We had eight to climb. As we labored up the stairs, I was reminded of an observation I’d made long ago: When I visited the hospitals, I used to like to park on the top floor of the parking garages and take the stairs. One day, climbing the stairs back to my vehicle, something I had subconsciously noticed many times before coalesced into words in my mind. The stairs on the bottom floor had a lot of wear--dirt from shoes and paint worn off. The higher one traveled, the stairs were less worn, less dirty, and had less paint worn off. By the time I got to the top floor, the stairs looked almost freshly painted. The observation was simple: The higher the floor, the less traveled the stairs. Few made the climb. It was too difficult. Too far. Especially with an elevator around. In Bible times, people thought of their god as residing in a temple, or in a “garden,” or on top of a mountain. That’s where gods dwelt. And if you were going to contact them, get to them that’s where you had to go. Of course, this was a distortion of the true worship of the true God, Yahweh. But take a look at the Bible's Old Testament. God’s presence was in the Temple, in the Garden, or on the Mountain. That’s where people went to meet with Yahweh. That was the Holy Place. God on top of the Mountain? That takes a climb. Comparatively few made the climb. I’ve climbed some mountains lately. The higher up, the thinner, not only the air, but also the traffic. And the less worn the trail. The sounds of the haunted house came on the lower floor stuck in an elevator. The great view of the ocean came from the height of our room after climbing the many stairs. That is true of the high places. Whatever the effort to get there the view is so much better. Clearer. Wider. Even, spectacular. The climbing the stairs to the view from our window, the scrabbling up the trail to the panoramic vista on the mountain’s summit were so worth it. Standing on the summit of one of the Superstition Mountains I said to my wife, “You never see this if you stay on the road and don’t hike up the mountain. Few see what we are seeing.” As in the hymn we used to sing describes, I am glad there is “Higher Ground.” There is a place that transcends the filth, ugliness, chaos, calamity, clamoring, and corruption, of this world in which we live. There is a heavenly place. There is God there. If we climb until the stairs look freshly painted from lack of use. If we climb the trail to where there are fewer and fewer hikers. If we persist in prayer until we leave behind the low life. We can make the climb in the privacy of our home in devotional prayer, or in the car on the way to work, or walking in the wilderness, or, in, perhaps, the most conducive place, in worship during the gathering of God’s people, in church. And we can make it because Jesus blazed the trail before us, traveled the trail, and is the Trail, to the Holy Place, to the Presence of God, to the Heights in Him. Everybody that came out of that elevator was looking for stairs. We would not have taken the stairs had the elevator not been stuck. Analogies, like the elevator, break down in a hurry--the elevator, had it worked, would have gotten us to the same height, the same level, the same floor, as did the stairs. But, two things: We wouldn’t have appreciated getting there by elevator as we did when we finally made it climbing the stairs. Second, there is no elevator to the Holy Place. Jesus blazed a trail. He didn’t install an elevator. Just, perhaps, it will take being stuck in a haunted elevator—being in some difficult, unpleasant, unbearable perplexity--to get you to climb the less traveled stairs to the higher place in God. It will be worth the climb. --Pastor Clifford Hurst

“…IT’S NOT MY TRUTH”

“You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth.” This response to me is the same one given by the multitudes of the deceived today. It is what is driving the lunacy, the vitriol, the craziness, the anti-Semitism, the reverse discrimination, the flagrant and flaunted sexual perversions, the implosion of our institutions, et al, of our society. At its roots is a vaunted arrogance. “You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth” is the epitome of self-assured arrogance. Humanity’s arrogance, I believe, has never been greater. Humanity has made itself, or, I should say, individual humans are making each himself/herself, the center of the universe. They desperately need a cosmology lesson. They make themselves the know-all. The end all. The judge in the judge’s seat, the head referee, the expert of every subject. God. “You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth” is the hallmark expression of our postmodernity age. One of the things that I find both disturbing and infuriating with those who spout this is that, by saying it, they are saying they believe in no absolute truth, no objective truth, just “my truth; But, by saying this they are, in fact, claiming an absolute truth—the absolute "truth” that there is no absolute truth. This is not semantics. This is what they have done. Their statement that there is no Truth just my truth and your truth is in itself a claim of an absolute truth. It is also absurd. “You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth” reveals, by their saying it, an even deeper arrogance: Those who spew it believe that not only it, but anything they SAY is true simply because they have said it. If they SAY Israel is the oppressor, then Israel is the oppressor. If they say the sky is characteristically yellow, the sky is yellow. If they say something that Scripture has clearly labeled sin is, not only not sin, but good, and wholesome, then, because they said it, then it’s not sin, it is good and wholesome. This we get from news reporters prattling. And from pundits pontificating. And from politicians demagoguing. And from celebrities jabberwocking. And from scientists speaking beyond their field. And from progressive preachers manipulating. And from the man on the street. And from a co-worker across from you. And from the family member that would justify his sin. “I say it, therefore it is true.” “You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth” is an attempt to say that all truth is subjective and no truth is objective. I realize that there is subjective truth. But there is a difference between objective and subjective truth. When we talk objective truth, we are talking about what corresponds to reality. The only way to deny objective truth is to deny reality. You can say it is summertime outside today in Ohio. But we have a plethora of means to ascertain whether that statement corresponds with reality. We need only consult the calendar. It’s January 14. We can take a thermometer outside. We can go for a walk without a coat. We can make and throw a snowball. And before Smarty Pants says, “Well, it is summertime in Australia,” he must know that the original statement was about the reality today, January, in Ohio. It describes a place in the northern hemisphere. And here it is winter. Smarty is not only skewing the claim, he is also proving there is objective truth. See, on January 14 it is summertime in Australia. Believe, me, it is winter here in Ohio. That is everybody here’s truth because it is true for everyone in Ohio. “You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth” is an arrogance that manifests itself, not only in “because I say it, it is true, but also in these other delusionary and illusionary statements. They may not be verbalized, but they are thought: • Because I think it is true, it is true. • Because I want it, it is right. • Because I feel it, it is good. • Because I claim it, it is unarguable. • Because I don’t like it, it is dismissible. • Because I repeat it, repeat it, repeat it, repeat it, it is undeniable. “You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth” is something said by a set of people. Scripture had both the people and the statement pegged millennia ago. “…every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” (Jdg 17:6). What one in this set of folks does is “right in his own eyes.” It’s his truth. He says it right. Therefore, it is right. Not so! What about in God’s eyes? What about what God says? “You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth” is a statement and sentiment that I reject as by any measure valid. It’s not just that I believe you are not the fountainhead or determiner of what is true. I do not believe I am either. It is that I believe God is. See, it’s not about my truth or your truth. It is about His Truth. And I want to make His truth my truth. I must. You know, there is one who can accurately claim, “You may think that is the truth, but it’s not MY truth.” And that’s God. --Pastor Clifford Hurst

WHAT’S THE TOP OF YOUR REFRIGERATOR LOOK LIKE?

Though just on the lower end of tall, 6’2”, I am still utilized in stores, like Kroger’s: “Sir, excuse me; excuse me, sir”; it took me a moment to realize that the woman I was barreling past with my cart was speaking to me. I threw on the brakes, stopped, and turned to her. “Could you reach that bread on the back of the top shelf?” I could easily see it and reach it. I pulled it off the shelf and handed it to her. She smiled and thanked me, and I went on with my amateur shopping. Thinking of refrigerators. Being tall, I can not only reach bread on the top shelf at the grocery store but also see the tops of refrigerators. Ours. Yours. Any house I visit. I don’t try to. I don’t take advantage of the hospitality of homes to which I’ve been invited to do a white-gloved inspection. It’s involuntary. I’m taller than most refrigerators. My eye level is above fridges’ top edge. I look down on them. Literally, not disparagingly. I can’t keep from noticing. It’s just my view vantage. And, here, I’m afraid I might offend some folks. I don’t mean to. But, the tops of most refrigerators are rather dusty. Many, name-writing-with-a finger-in-the-dust dusty. Once, I was just trying to be helpful—like helping the lady at the story reach her bread—and made the mistake of mentioning to my wife that the top of ours was a bit dusty. She responded with, “I can’t see up there. I can’t reach up there.” My wife is a professional house cleaner by vocation. She does an impeccable job. She also is barely north of 5’ 1”. She’s right. She can’t see up there. But, from my height, I can. If you are a parishioner, friend, or family member who has, but will now never again, invite me to your home, I must protest this is only a blog about a spiritual truth—not house cleaning. I’m not writing so you will wonder if Pastor Hurst, Dad, Cliff, or whatever you know me by, has seen the top of my refrigerator and found it covered with dust moon-dust deep. No, I’m writing to contemplate that God is taller than 6’2”. From His vantage point, He can see more than the top of my refrigerator. He can see my heart. All of it. And it’s not dust I’m worried about His seeing. Many find it an inconvenient truth, but, as the writer of Hebrews puts it, “Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.” (Heb 4:13). God sees the top the refrigerator in your heart too. Once in my devotions I was reading and musing on Psalm 139, yet again. Towards the end, I came to the psalmist’s plea, “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:” (Psa 139:23). I was wondering, “Why would the psalmist be asking God to search him to discover “any wicked way in me.” He has to know God doesn’t have to search to know. He has to know the omniscient God already knows. In fact, the Psalmist at the beginning of this outpouring has already declared that God has searched Him and known him. (139:1). It’s already been done. And then it hit me why. In a crude analogy, I answered myself, “Of course, the psalmist knew that God already knew what was in him. What he was saying was, ‘God, I know you have searched me and known me, but, God, take another tour of my heart. And this time, take me with you and point out to me and show me what You saw when You made Your search.’” Please, I am not suggesting that you invite me to do a tour of your house for me to inspect your refrigerator and tell you what I see. But, since God already has seen the top of your heart’s “refrigerator,” perhaps, it would be a good thing to, like the psalmist, invite the Lord in to do an inspection and to have Him tell you what He sees. Make no mistake. There’s comfort as well in this knowledge that God has seen the top of your refrigerator. It's not just the dust God sees. I know I don’t just see dust on refrigerators. I also see special keys. Needed medications. Breakable items. Important papers. No, God doesn’t just see the sin, the errant thoughts, the selfish motives and intents, the rebellion and disobedience. He also sees the wounds. The hurt. The pain. The struggles. The battles. Earlier, justifying my wife for our refrigerator being dusty (rarely so), I wrote: “She responded with, ‘I can’t see up there. I can’t reach up there.’” Once or twice (I’m a slow learner), she followed her response by throwing me the dust rag and saying, “If you see it’s dusty, dust it yourself.” She might have been a bit miffed at me. But her response is analogously wise. We should not only ask God how the top of our refrigerator looks from “up there,” but, when He says it is dusty, we should hand him the dust rag of repentance and contrition and, say, “God, if it is dusty, please, dust it.” As my wife also has said, “If you can see it’s dusty, you can also dust it.” What consolation. If God can see it—and He can, He can also dust it—and He will. Just ask Him. What’s the top of your refrigerator look like? None of my business, I’m sure. But have you asked God? ---Pastor Clifford Hurst

THE INAPPROPRIATE APPROPRIATION OF CHRISTMAS

A reoccurring war-drum beat today (I hope that wasn’t appropriation.) is that folks are racists because they appropriate. Appropriation, that’s the thing—not to do. One realm where righteous woke warriors (again, I hope I didn’t appropriate.) go on attack is the sports arena: They point out that sports teams’ names and mascots have been appropriated, and, thus, are racist. Some examples are Washington Redskins, Cleveland Indians, Edmonton Eskimos, and Chicago Blackhawks. One decrier proposes that any reference to humans be expunged from team names, mascots, and memorabilia. This, I find ironic since sports are all about people. Really, I’m not entering the fray of what is and isn’t cultural appropriation. But I am going to point out, that, once again, as almost always, those who decry others’ sins are committing, perhaps, greater sins themselves. If to name a team “Redskins” is appropriation, what in the world would you call the hijacking of Christmas if not appropriation? When you have taken the holiday and bleached it free from its very inception, purpose, and import and profaned it with your debauched festivities, prostituted it to make money, and repurposed it for your fairytales, what is that if not appropriation? Christmas has been inappropriately appropriated. The critical theorists who are astute include spiritual appropriation in cultural appropriation. As one explained, to wear a feather about your head is a spiritual appropriation from Native Americans. They (the Plains Indians) traditionally wore war bonnets. Also, feathers were used in Native American spiritual practices. Thus, to wear a feather on your head is appropriating culturally and spiritually. Yet, these same fastidious appropriation ferreters cannot see that Christmas has been inappropriately appropriated. I do not believe in ridiculing, maligning, or targeting any ethnic or spiritual group. Nor do I believe in being discriminatory or racist. True appropriation does exist when a group’s traditions, beliefs, customs, costumes, etc., are used for these malevolent purposes—not perceived but actual. But, contemporaneously, all such maligning things are being done with Christmas. It is being inappropriately appropriated. Before someone grabs a troll megaphone and shouts, “Don’t you know anything? It is the Christians who appropriated Christmas. December 25th is probably not even close to the day Jesus was born. But Christians appropriated the holiday of the celebration of a Roman deity to celebrate Christmas on the 25thof December.” I do know that. But I would call it re-appropriation. Polytheistic pagans had supplanted the worship of the true God with the worship of false gods. When they put the names of their contrived gods on worship and altars and feast days, they were appropriating “worship” for their own purposes. All worship belongs to God, Yahweh. Everything else is an appropriation. It’s not a pagan festival at the winter’s solstice that has been inappropriately appropriated. It’s Christmas, the celebration of Christ’s birth, the moment of the greatest wonder of all human history—God became One of us, a human. If celebrating the Word becoming flesh on December 25th, if worshiping Christ on that day is appropriation, it is an appropriate appropriation. All else being done to, with, and on that day to supplant the Christ is the inappropriate appropriation of Christmas—the holiday which bears His name, Christ. A continuously played rerun during this season is “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” That’s not the worst of it. A depraved culture has appropriated Christmas*. That’s the cultural appropriation that should concern us most. It is totally inappropriate appropriation. --Pastor Clifford Hurst *If you think this far-fetched, look how the White House this year was decorated for Christmas, and the performance there with which the First Family chose to celebrate Christmas.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH US?

“Maybe we both have COVID,” I surmised to my wife. Neither of us is subject to headaches. Both of us were experiencing awful ones. For days. My head felt simultaneously as if it were in a vice and full of slushy mush. Fatigued, for three days we complained and moped and dragged ourselves around. We wondered silently each one to ourselves and out loud to each another, “What is wrong with us?” What was wrong? It hit me when I went to fix coffee for the fourth day: Earlier in the week we had run out of our usual coffee. Deciding to wait until Saturday to purchase more from the store where we found it greatly discounted, I decided to use some specialty coffee we had purchased with graciously given gift cards. “Dark roasted” was all I saw on the package. That is what we preferred. For the next three days, I filled the filtered basket on our coffee maker with this high-end coffee. It had a nice aroma. Prepared the night before, the coffee maker goes off each morning at 5:30 am, so, by drinking coffee, we have occasion to spend time together the first part of each day.” Each morning during those three days, we both commented that this new coffee had a good flavor but seemed a little weak. “But,” I protested, “I have filled the filter as fully as possible. I can’t add more coffee.” That last evening, when I filled the basket for the next day, I took another look at the package. There in a small circle on the right of the package I read, “Decaf.” Walking to where she was sitting, I hollered to my wife, “I think I’ve figured it out! “We’ve been drinking decaf coffee! I didn’t see that label until just now.” “That has to be it,” my wife eagerly agreed. “That’s why we’ve had the headaches. I know we don’t normally drink caffeinated coffee this late, but we just might have to tonight to get our caffeine and fix these headaches.” Don’t judge us. Before you cite our headaches and low-performance functionality as evidence of our caffeine addictions and troll this post with condemnatory comments, think: Each caffeine naysayer and decrier would have the same symptoms if you didn’t eat for a day. Does that mean you have a sinful addiction to food? Well, I stumbled into that. I better leave that topic alone. But, if you protest, “Food is a necessity of life,” I must ask, “And coffee isn’t?” Satire aside, I really want to and wrote to share what I immediately thought upon my discovery of what was wrong with us: Just as not having our daily dose of caffeine had real impeding and painful effects on our daily living, so it is with one’s Christian life, with worship and prayer and with ministry when we attempt to “do it” without the empowerment and impetus of the Spirit. This is not a disconcerting, off-putting, but a wonderful truth. The NT scriptures, again and again, turn to the reality that we can—and can only—live the Christian life by the motivation, inspiration, activation, stimulation, and instigation of the Spirit of God. His effects are far more visceral to our souls and minds than caffeine is to our bodies and heads. That is the wonderful thing. We can have the Spirit daily “in our system” having this life-altering effect. The stimulate of our souls and inner lives should not be coffee. Nor wine for sure. It should be the Spirit of God (Eph. 5:18). Are you moping and groping? Are you lagging and dragging? Are you apathetic and lethargic? Is life, is serving God, a drudgery? Dull? Ineffective? What is wrong with you? Take another look at what you are “drinking,” partaking of daily. Does it have the label “de-Spirit”? The moment I realized I had once again poured decaf coffee into the coffee maker’s basket, I immediately emptied it into a Zip-lock and refilled the filter with real stuff, the good stuff, the stuff with the caffeine. Likewise, when our lives are devoid of an intake of the things of the Spirit, when we are not being filled with the Spirit, we should empty our lives of whatever we must to make room for the things of the Spirit, for the Spirit Himself. What is wrong with us? Nothing that cannot be fixed by drinking coffee…of the Spirit. --Pastor Clifford Hurst

Thankful or Unthankful

Descriptions That Say It All. Before I heard the commentator mention it, I saw it for myself. It was evident. There was a marked contrast between the two crowds. Strikingly stark: Last week, supporters of Israel rallied in Washington, D.C., in protest against anti-Semitism. The huge crowd was, though passionate, well-manner, peaceful, temperate, and restrained. Two weeks earlier, a crowd of protestors, ostensibly to support Palestinians, but in reality, against Israel and for Hamas, raged throughout Washington as they had in other cities. They were rabid in their hatred and vitriol. That crowd was incorrigible, intractable, and, anything but peaceful. It was paroxysmal. (Of course, in both crowds, there were individuals who were exceptions. But, as a whole, the above describes each crowd.) The difference in demeanor made me think of Thanksgiving this week. Of being thankful. Of gratitude. However, righteous they may believe themselves to be, a crowd that behaves by burning American flags, calling for the death of Jews, and raging about how terrible their country is, is marked by something that goes deeper than its vitriol and vituperation—ingratitude. Those that comprise it are unthankful. Likewise, a crowd that is well-mannered, peaceful, and restrained has an underlying and overarching gratitude. If you knew in advance if a crowd was thankful or unthankful, you could determine what its demeanor and behavior were going to be when it protested. Thankful or Unthankful are descriptions that say it all. It really is that simple. Americans thankful for their country, thankful for their freedoms, thankful for their opportunities, do not act violently incorrigibly. Not as a crowd. Not as individuals. (And, yes, America has had and does have flaws; but despite those, even in protest of them, folks can be grateful or ungrateful.) An attitude of gratitude or ingratitude changes everything about a person, a crowd, or a nation. In any situation, circumstance, and even crisis, how a crowd, how a person, behaves can be precisely predicted by whether it has, he has, an attitude of gratitude or ingratitude. Which attitude one has is both predictive and causal. Insightfully, the Apostle Paul revealed this when he historically described humanity’s turning from worshiping God to idolatry—a transition that led to the corruption and reprobation of humanity. He noted that those who turned from God were not thankful. Not being thankful, they rejected God. Rejecting God, they became filled with unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice, envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness, etc. Misbehavior and incorrigibility come from rejecting God, and rejecting God comes from and is accompanied by un-thankfulness. This is not just true with a crowd’s demeanor and behavior. It is true on every level. A spouse who is being unfaithful is unthankful. A teen child who is being rebellious is unthankful. A citizen who is haranguing our nation is unthankful. A believer who is maligning his church family is unthankful. And on and on the examples could go. I know, on matters of what is going on in Israel, for example, there are differences of opinion. There are nuances to the arguments. There are real wrongs done. But still, one’s demeanor and behavior in the argument, in his stance, are always consistent with whether that one is thankful or unthankful. It could be argued that the character of a person predetermines whether he will be thankful or unthankful. That may well be true. Yet, I suspect that the attitudes of gratitude and ingratitude have a power of their own. Gratitude is a kinetic force transformative of those who choose it. And ingratitude is likewise transfiguring of those who consent to its advances. Being thankful changes me. As does being unthankful. There may be much for which I cannot be thankful. But there is much more for which I can. Like the two crowds that visited D.C., my demeanor and behavior, my worship or lack of it, my love or disdain to love, will reveal which I have chosen. Whichever describes me, thankful or unthankful, well, describes me. Thankful or Unthankful are descriptions that say it all. --Pastor Clifford Hurst

HEAVEN MUST WEEP OVER EVERY BABY KILLED

“There is no other way to describe it, but that they are rejoicing over killing babies,” I remarked sadly to my wife. It was the morning after a substantial majority of Ohioans had passed Issue 1, an amendment to our state constitution that allows for abortion. Our newspaper’s special election issue led with a large photo of Issue 1’s proponents’ watch party. It featured a crowd on their feet, hands raised high in the air in victory, gleeful smiles on every face, the flush of exhilaration in their countenance, celebrating. Celebrating, ostensibly, over a victory for “women’s health.” Since the commencement of their campaign, “women’s health” was a disingenuous disguise, part of the scheming and strategy, to deceive people about what the amendment is really about. Whatever their protestations, the reality is, they were not rejoicing over women’s health. They were rejoicing over the worst thing for babies' health--being killed. How can I possibly accuse them of that? Because that is the inevitable outcome of the passage of this amendment. Babies are going to be killed. Murdered. The amendment was designingly crafted so ambiguously that eventually it can be used to allow for the abortion of anyone, for any reason, under any circumstance. The net result of the chicanery is that more babies, many more babies, exponentially more babies, will be killed than if the amendment had failed. And they were rejoicing over its passage. They were rejoicing over babies being killed. Babies will die because of this amendment. Not just the babies aborted in a true pregnancy crisis; not just the babies conceived by violent and or tragic circumstances. But babies for which there is no possibly justifiable reason their lives should be terminated. Babies that do not have to die. The revelers in the photo were rejoicing over killing babies. Plain and simple. The tragic cases that were cited by its advocates to justify the abortion amendment comprise only a minuscule fraction of the babies that will die. No! It is not just babies in those exceptional, anomalous cases that will die. Again, many, many, many, exponentially more babies will die than would have had the amendment failed. It is those babies they were rejoicing over. I tried to be kind and suppose that for many, their rejoicing was the glee of ignorance. But, really, the wrongness of killing babies is too innate to be ignorance. Although proponents have gone to great lengths to say that what is in a mother’s womb is not a baby, but just a clump of cells, people instinctually know that is not true. What’s in the womb is a baby. A clump of cells is a tumor. A tumor is removed from the body by excision. A baby is removed from the body by an abortion. Tumors are not aborted and babies are not excised. Babies, not tumors, are killed. No, there is no other way to cast it. They in the photo were rejoicing over babies being killed. Although most would have never voiced it, their jubilee, was, “We get to kill babies. We have finagled a way so any can kill their baby." It is evil to take a life. And, as Scripture would describe it, they “rejoiced to do evil.” Ours is a culture of death, and it celebrates death rather than life. Killing a life rather than giving a life. The rejoicing over the amendment said it all. In contrast, heaven rejoices over life. When one comes to and puts his faith in Christ, he is born again. He is given life. Spirit life. Abundant life. Eternal life. And, Jesus says, all of heaven rejoices over the new “baby.” Though this is a spiritual reality, it is also analogous to the physical reality. Heaven must rejoice over the birth of every baby as it did over the birth of The Baby. And, unlike those in the photo celebrating the amendment, Heaven must weep over every baby killed. --Pastor Clifford Hurst