Stushie’s Stuff

George Bush is making a speech blaming Congress for the poor economy….

Oh, for the good old days…..

I watched Jeremiah Wright’s performance at the National press Club yesterday and I thought: when is this schoolboy going to grow up? It was an immense ego trip for the guy who single handedly is destroying Obama’s attempt to become the first Black American President.

Wright tried to be his own Bill Cosby, but looked more like a fifth grader (sorry fifth graders) making a show and tell presentation. All he wanted to show was how conceited he is; all he wanted to tell the world that attacking him was an attack on the Black Church.

Who appointed him as the spokesperson for the Black church? Is he so big headed that he actually believes this stuff? How many African Americans does Wright know that have been given a $1.5 million dollar home by their workplaces? This ministerial maverick has been living in wealth for so long, that he has forgotten the pain in his community.

Any other pastor who caused a presidential candidate so much trouble would have taken a sabbatical and kept out of the headlines. Wright is bent on wrecking Obama and veils his hypocrisy in, you’ve guessed it, biblical quotations.

And as for his unpatriotic, vitriolic You-tubed sermon comments about America, he totally “nullified” the issue by saying if you haven’t heard the rest of the sermon, then sound byte viewers don’t know what they are talking about.

Perception in politics is reality, ministerial man. If you don’t understand that one, then you don’t know what the rest of America is talking about.

Bring it home, preacher man, and give Obama a fighting chance. Don’t become a millstone around his neck. This is the first time that the African American community has a real opportunity of having a Black President. Take your controversial circus act out of town until the 6^th of November. Otherwise, in years to come, the name Jeremiah Wright may become synonymous with Benedict Arnold and Judas Iscariot in both the African American community and the field of politics.

And, as for one of the biblical quotations that you paraphrased to suit yourself the other day, here’s what it actually says:

Proverbs 17:28 Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent, and discerning if he holds his tongue.

Perhaps you should reflect upon the verses that directly follow it:

Proverbs 18:1, 2          

1          An unfriendly man pursues selfish ends; he defies all sound judgment.

2          A fool finds no pleasure in understanding but delights in airing his own opinions.

Oh boy! Obama’s in trouble…

After the election, perhaps the name jeremiah Wright will become synonymous with Benedict Arnold, Quisling, and Judas Iscariot

He sits behind his golden microphone each week day and broadcasts to millions of loyal conservatives across the nation. He cajoles the tedious Democrat Campaign over the airwaves and urges his myriads of listeners to dedicate their primary votes to his own cause: Operation Chaos.

Rush believes that Republicans can screw up the Democrat nomination’s process and thus render a death blow to the Democrat hopefuls in November. He has faith in his own audience and his conception; the only thing wrong with that is this: it’s un-American.

Instead of letting the American people vote for their own candidates in these final races, Rush wants to spoil the whole process. Depending upon who is the underdog in each State, Rush urges his listeners to vote for either Hillary or Obama. He wants the race to be very close, so that the Super Delegates will have to make a semi-unpopular choice of nominee for the party. Limbaugh gleefully gloats that his operation is ruining the Democrat party and deludes his audience into thinking that they are creating havoc for their opponents. It’s just one big joke on the election process; but it’s also unpatriotic.

It’s un-American because it goes against the forces of freedom in a Republic. He’s trying to squander the votes and voices of conservatives by making them do something that goes against their will: voting for Hillary Clinton. For almost a decade, the United States became the laughing stock of the world because of the shenanigans in the Whitehouse during the Clinton administrations. Are conservatives willing to set aside their furor over those wilderness years and let Clinton win States like Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania? Is Indiana going to become rich pickings for the Clinton campaign just because of the Limbaugh Luddites?

This is a foolish philosophy and one that has the potential of backfiring on those Republicans who voted for Clinton in the primaries. In the long run, Obama was an easier target in November because of his waffling and woeful inexperience. What Limbaugh has done is re-galvanize a failing Clinton campaign, making her the comeback Queen, which has the potential of running her all the way to the Whitehouse. When she was ready to be picked off a couple of months ago, Limbaugh resuscitated her campaign. Instead of ensuring that there was one less candidate, he has allowed this to drag on, breathing life into the more formidable candidate, instead of letting superficial Obama climb to the top.

Come November, the Democrats will remember what the Limbaughtarians tried to do and will come together in a show of strength that will ruin McCain’s chances. And then what will the loyal Limbaugh listeners do? They will regret following the foolish advice of this broadcast blowhard and their idealistic icon will fall from the golden pedestal that he has created for himself.

Conservatives voting for Clinton was the death-knell to our influence in the GOP. And Limbaugh is to blame. Remember this caveat: be careful who you vote for in the primaries; she may become President in November.

Outspoken Muslim cleric Taj al-Din al-Hilali has claimed that the Bible “mandates” the wearing of the veil by Christian women.

Writing in a new book, Sheik Hilali, who lost his job as mufti of Australia after comparing scantily clad women to uncovered meat, argues that the Bible and the Koran make similar demands of a woman’s modesty.

Hilali, who remains the head of Australia’s largest mosque in the south western Sydney suburb of Lakemba, says the purpose of the book is to show the commonalities of Islam with the Jewish and Christian faiths when it comes to women’s modesty and clothing.

In the soon to be published The Legitimacy of the Veil for Women of the Scripture – Evidence of the Veil in the Bible, he points to references in the Old and New Testaments to women wearing a veil.

“Through this, I hope to raise awareness and understanding and eliminate apprehensions and misunderstandings about the veil,” news.com.au quotes him, as saying.

Read rest of the story here…

Yesterday, we held an elders’ retreat here at the church. We’re working on a few important ideas about how to strengthen our church’s commitment to Christ, His Kingdom, and His ministry in this part of Knoxville. It was an important start to a series of quarterly meetings which will help us seek God’s path for our congregation in the years to come.

It’s crucial that all our elders work together by discovering what God’s will is for our wee church. We have to keep focused on what God wants us to do for Him. Too many churches these days are being swayed by the culture around them. They want to fit in with society and use marketing ploys to bring people into their organization, but not necessarily the Kingdom of God.

15 “If you love me, you will obey what I command.

At the moment there’s a controversy stirring in West Knoxville because an independent church has sent out fliers stating that they will give all their new visitors a $20 gas coupon for coming to their church. I don’t know what their true intent is with this gimmick, but they’re desperately trying to get people to walk through their doors using greed as their marketing tool. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if the church was called The Cas Walker Memorial Church.

This is why it is important for our church elders to work on the direction that God is leading our church. If we don’t prayerfully look for God’s guidance, we’ll end up following market trends, which will lead us away from God and stop us from obeying Christ. We have to put Jesus at the center of everything we do. We don’t exist to please ourselves; Christ allows us to exist because we try to please Him.

When Jesus was speaking to His disciples in this passage from John’s Gospel, He was doing it just before He was arrested. He was trying to cram in as many lessons and as much advice as possible before He was taken, tortured and crucified. He knew that it was important to use the intensity of the situation to drive home some very important points that would become the hallmarks of the Early Christian Church. And, in this instance He said to them: if you love me, you will obey what I command.

Now, that’s normally what a mother says to an impatient child, “if you love me, you will do as I say.” Or perhaps a loving spouse may say it this way, “if you trust me, you will support me.” It’s laying down a special condition for the relationship to flourish. It’s not an ultimatum, it’s an invitation. It’s not about control, it’s about co-operation.

On this day, in the same year that our church was founded, way back in 1877, President Rutherford Hayes withdrew Federal troops from Louisiana. It was the last act of Reconstruction after the end of the Civil War. For more than twelve years after the war, the troops were in place to forcefully quell any rebellions, and to make sure that the Union did not fragment again. It took twelve years to maintain that peace and because the majority of Southerners all over the Confederate States laid down their arms, the Union remained intact.

It may not have been a perfect peace – the old prejudices wouldn’t really be removed for another 100 years, but it was a start of American people from all over the States beginning to love the Union and Constitution of the United States. The people proved that they loved America, as we still do today, by upholding the laws of this dear and precious land.

And so it was the same for Christ’s disciples, to prove that they truly loved Him, they had to keep His commands. And the same applies to our church today, which is why our elders came together to seek God’s Will and to follow Christ wherever He wants us to go.

16 And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Counselor to be with you forever-

During our conversations yesterday, our elders were asked the question: why do we want to bring people to Erin? It’s a good question because it makes us focus on what our intent, what our purpose is. Their answers were excellent: we’re here to bring people to salvation, to help them to learn more about Jesus, so that they can go out into the community and bring even more people to salvation.

Other purposes were attached to that answer: to help one another in times of trouble; to show kindness and love to each other; and to follow the guidance of the Holy Spirit. That last point raised a whole new question: what is the Holy Spirit and how do we seek its guidance?

When Jesus was talking to the disciples, He told them that God was going to give them a special Counselor, one who would be with them forever. The main role of the Holy Spirit was to give directions to the disciples throughout the rest of their lives as they went out into the entire world to preach the Gospel and teach Christ’s truth. The purpose of the Holy Spirit was to coach them day by day, situation by situation, and mission by mission so that Christ’s influence and teaching would grow in the world. And they successfully followed their coach because what started two thousand years ago with 11 disciples and dozens of others has now become a world wide church of 2 billion people.

That’s why it is very important for our church to seek the Holy Spirit’s guidance in all that we set out to do. It’s very easy to let go of God and embrace the world. It’s much harder to follow Christ and allow the Holy Spirit to set the course of where we are headed. But if we want to remain true to the Gospel and loyal to Christ, then we must be open to the presence and power of the Holy Spirit in our midst. To do other wise, is to follow a false gospel; to seek our own way is to walk away from Christ.

It’s like the baptism vows that we all took this morning. If we want to see them fulfilled in young Aaron’s life, then Steve and Tracy are going to have to keep coming to church and allowing Aaron to eventually go to Sunday School or Enrichment. But it doesn’t just depend upon them; we’ve got to do our share by maintaining this church, recruiting teachers of faith, supplying our classes, giving our resources, sharing our time and investing parts of our lives with young Aaron. If we do not do this, then how will Aaron grow up to be a Christian, a servant of the Lord, and a loyal subject in God’s Kingdom?

So we seek the counsel of the Holy Spirit in session and throughout the entire congregation to ensure that Aaron, and all other children in our midst will grow in faith and one day, perhaps as a teenager, he will confirm the promises that his parents have made here today. If we allow the Holy Spirit to coach, direct, and lead us, then these beautiful promises will be fulfilled.

17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept Him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you know Him, for He lives with you and will be in you.

Finally, after asking the disciples to show their love by following His commands and telling them that they will be gifted with the Holy Spirit, Jesus warns them that the world will not accept this experience. The world will be blind to the presence of the Spirit and will not accept the Spirit’s existence.

This is Christ’s way of telling the disciples that even with the Holy Spirit as their special Counselor, things will not be easy. Just because the Holy Sprit is with them does not mean that trouble will not come their way. In fact, in many cases in the Early Church because Christians were filled with the Spirit, they were harassed and hunted down, persecuted and imprisoned, arrested and executed.

And this should serve as a warning to our wee church. When we seek the Spirit’s counsel and do Christ’s bidding, obstacles and stumbling blocks are going to come our way. Things will not be easy if we seek to accept Christ’s truth, preach the Gospel, and share His message with the surrounding community. It will be hard to do so, because many hearts are hardened against Christ and the world does not want to be challenged by our faith.

April 27^th is a date that has seen events which has led to people standing up for their rights and fighting the world.

In 1773, the British parliament passed the Tea Act, which led to the Boston Tea party later that year, which in turn led to the War of Independence.

In 1940, the Nazi leader Himmler ordered the establishment of Auschwitz Concentration camp, which led to the Polish uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto, and the Allied Nations fighting against the fascists, which in turn led to the establishment of Israel for holocaust survivors and displaced Jews around the world.

And in 1989, almost twenty years ago, and how soon we forget, the brave students of Beijing took over Tiananmen Square in China, fearlessly walking in front of military tanks, in a noble effort to bring democracy to their nation. To this date, those same students are imprisoned in terrible conditions, which is one of the reasons that I will refuse to watch this year’s Olympic Games. How can we have an international sports gala and joyfully cheer on our athletes in a land where people of different political persuasions and religions are still being oppressed, subdued, and killed?

So, what have we learned today?

If we truly love Jesus, then we will honestly obey His commands.

When we need guidance for our lives and especially the church, we need to seek the Holy Spirit’s counsel.

And when we obey Jesus and follow the Holy Spirit, we should not expect the world to welcome us with open arms. Instead we should be prepared to stand up for what we believe in and not surrender our faith to the wiles of the world.

For as Christ says: Whoever loves me will be loved by My Father, and I also will love them and show Myself to them. And after all is said and done: is that not why we want to bring people here – to be saved from the world and loved by God? Amen.

Prayer

Late on Friday nights, during my old drinking days, you would usually find me in a pub with a whole lot of other hardened drinkers. We would swap stories and tell jokes, take the mickey out of one another, and generally have loud conversations that annoyed the rest of the people in the bar. The drunker we got, the louder we became. The more whiskies that we drank, the less our brains would operate. I think I enjoyed myself at the time, but I was usually too drunk to know.

Isaiah 8:9       Raise the war cry, you nations, and be shattered! Listen, all you distant lands. Prepare for battle, and be shattered! Prepare for battle, and be shattered!

Towards the end of the evening, a person from the Salvation Army would come in and sell their weekly newspaper, “The War Cry.” The Salvationist went from table to table, successfully selling their bundles of papers because no one wanted to offend them.

Usually, we would by a “war Cry” between us at the table and then we would read the articles. We would all laugh at these stupid Christians, in their stupid uniforms, selling their stupid newspapers. We thought that we were way too intelligent for all that Jesus stuff, but it had a weird affect upon us; we would all start to talk about God, life, and meaning.

Sometimes I would take the paper home with me and when I was sober the next day, I would glance at the articles. For a couple of minutes I would reflect upon my own life and where it was heading, but then I would start to think about which pub I would go to drink in the evening.

I cannot say for certain that the “War Cry” had any affect upon me and led me back to Christ. But perhaps seeds of faith were being planted by God for my eventual rescue from alcoholism.

That’s why I like to write these devotionals because of the seed planting that mysteriously occurs in other people’s lives. I’ve had emails from readers all around the world telling me that something I’ve written helped them through a crisis or enabled them to reconnect to God. It’s a wonderful blessing, but it all belongs to God. He’s the One who started the process on Friday nights, in Scottish bars, more than thirty years ago.

Prayer:            Lord God, Your ways are mysterious and it’s only when we look back that we can see where You were leading us. Thank You for shaping, forming, and directing our lives. Thank You for Your Holy presence throughout our days. In Jesus’ Name, we gratefully pray. Amen.

In the next couple of weeks, our church will be studying a book that has been highly recommended by Oprah Winfrey. It’s called “A New Earth” and is written by Eckhart Tolle. He writes about a new evolutionary spiritual transformation that he believes will take place this century amongst enlightened people. He draws from the teachings of Christ and Buddha, as well as the theories of Carl Jung. It’s a typical new age type of book, but his hope is that it becomes sacred scripture in the years to come.

Podcast version here

I’ve read the first chapter and already I’ve come across several areas where Tolle’s teaching misinterprets Christ. He relies upon his own feelings about Jesus as a great teacher and messenger to make his points. He does not proclaim Christ as the Son of God or Lord of all creation. Tolle also avoids calling our mistakes sinful; instead he declares them to be a form of madness which, in effect, does two things: it takes away personal accountability and it discards the need for Jesus to die for our sins.

John 16:33     “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

The book troubles me and I am sincerely sorry that Oprah has become involved and infatuated with this false teaching. It is countering Christ’s message and duping many women into believing the old heresy that salvation comes from within us.

I will be leading a ten week discussion about the book to show people where it dangerously digresses from Christian teaching, in order to help them avoid the pitfall of accepting popular superficial spirituality, as opposed to the deep meaning of Christ’s Gospel.

The discussions will take place at the church on Monday nights beginning May 5 and on Sunday mornings on May 11. I’ll also be starting a new online study class during the week of May 5 -11, so if you would like to be included, please send me an email at pastor@erinpresbyterian.org. Put “A New Earth” in the subject line of your email.

Some people may wonder why I am tackling this. It’s because in every generation, we have to defend our faith from misconceptions, mistaken beliefs, and misleading spiritual teachers. It’s properly called Apologetics, and has been in existence ever since the New Testament was written down.

Prayer:                        Lord Jesus, You are our Holy Teacher and Sacred Guide. You are the Prophet and Messenger of the Gospel. But You are also much more than these – You are the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the Living God, and the Only One with the words of eternal life. Keep us focused on Your ways and keep us away from false teachers and superficial celebrities, whose teachings are not Your own. In Your Holy Name, we pray. Amen.

After a weary, year long, God awful process, we’re getting into the Last Round. TGIT!!!

Come on, Pennsylvania, finish it tomorrow…PLEEEEEASE!!!!

I used to love “going paddling” in the Firth of Clyde before it connects with the Irish Sea. Each summer, Evelyn and I would take our kids down to the beach to build sandcastles, look for shells, and “go paddling” in the water.

Podcast version here

Only adults went paddling – usually adult men. They went down to the shore with their children, took off their shoes and socks, rolled up their trousers to above the knees, and sometimes tied a clean handkerchief like a bandana to their heads. They paddled along the shore line, knee deep in the water, looking after their swim-suited children who were swimming, playing, and laughing in the sea. The purpose of the beach paddler was to keep their children from going too far out.

I loved it and often wish each summer for those halcyon days to return. I enjoyed watching my kids play, and of being their protector from the mighty sea.

Bible Verse of the Day

Ezekiel 47:4    He measured off another thousand cubits and led me through water that was knee-deep. He measured off another thousand and led me through water that was up to the waist.

Today’s verse from Ezekiel reminds me of those days, but it’s also a picture of the depths of faith that we each have in God. I remember an old pastor giving a tremendously simple sermon on this passage, in which he challenged the whole congregation to review their relationship with God. “Have you a faith that is ankle deep, knee deep, waist high, or over your heads? Are you willing to trust God completely, or just a little bit at a time?” It was a great sermon and one that I have cherished in my heart for decades.

So, I guess the message for us all this morning is this: are we prepared to be deeply faithful to God and surrender ourselves to Jesus, or are we still inclined to just “go paddling” on the shore line of commitment?

Prayer:                        Lord Jesus, You know what we face this week, what fears we have, and what our faith commitment is to You. Help us to reach out to You completely, so that when we are confronted with hard choices and serious decisions, the depth of our faith will enable us to take the right action. Thank You for Your protection and guidance, Your counsel and presence with us each day. In Your Holy Name, we faithfully pray. Amen.