Pause: with Pastor Aaron

When I was a teenager I watched Wayne's World. I'll quickly admit it wasn't the best use of my time, yet here I am almost 25+ years later remembering a line they would use as they encountered a 'rock god' or something that inspired them. They would fall to their knees and shout out, "We're Not Worthy! We're Not Worthy!  I laughed a bit because of how it was done.  It was funny, but it was also in some ways strangely tragic.  I wonder what Wayne or Garth will do before the God of Heaven. 11 For the Scriptures say, “‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord ‘every knee will bend to me and every tongue will declare allegiance to God.’ 12 Yes, each of us will give a personal account to God." Romans 14:11-12 (NLT) In the presence of eternal God we are not worthy ourselves, yet the blood of Christ makes us worthy because it has paid for Creator's purpose to be restored.  The blood of Christ restored fellowship to God, took away the curse of sin and dea...

Perhaps the hardest time to trust God is when we are being attacked by those who we think do not have the truth on their side.   Our human instinct is to rise up in defense of ourselves, to try to 'set straight' the people who argue as if they are right and you are wrong.   There are many tactics that we often employ in defensiveness, but what if they are all wrong save one.   What if defensiveness was as great of a sin as the wrong being committed against the person at that time? Consider todays verse that gave me pause:   Mark 15:32, "Let this Messiah, this king of Israel, come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe.   Those crucified with Him also heaped insults on Him." The context of the verse is Jesus at Golgotha.   He has been already been falsely charged, assaulted, sleep deprived, man handled, taken to illegitimate courts, handed over to Rome as a common criminal, rejected by those who a week ago 'loved' him, scourged, humiliate...

As the pastor in several churches in my career, and a pastor's son in many others,  I have spent a lifetime learning the culture of church.   My conclusion is that you can have a variety of denominations, but in most cases human nature is human nature.  We may believe differently, but in many ways we act the same regardless of what church we worship in. An example is in our giving.  What my experience has been is that we often neglect the simple truths of giving, out and out reject them, or we complicate them with rules and extra Biblical thinking.  We neglect to remember that we are stewards of His greater resources.  We are managers of His money, His time and His giftedness within us.  He asks so little of His own resources, yet we rationalize from a mixed bag of priorities what we think we need to do, spend money on and invest in. Make no mistake, God will judge us on this.  It's that big of a deal. My quest lately has been to read the gosp...

Pause: With Pastor  Aaron So the question is asked, "What is the greatest thing you can ever do for God?" There are a multitude of common replies. Feed the hungry. House the homeless. Watch out for the orphan. Support the widow. Give to the church of your time, talent and treasure.  All these replies are excellent, yet could all of these replies also be wrong? Could these responses be done and yet we still miss the greatest thing we can ever do for God. Today's text that gave me pause... Mark 12:28-31 ”28 One of the teachers of the law ... asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” 29 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” Note Jesus response to the...