Hope for Life Blog

I have to confess: I like looking at extravagant Christmas gifts. Not out of any desire to give or receive them. I just like to marvel at what’s available.

Some of them are amazingly expensive. Like the Ferrari FF listed at Neiman Marcus; it can be yours for only $390,000. You may want to hurry. They only have 10 available.

For mom, Amazon lists a black pearl necklace for a mere $76,500 dollars. Don’t worry… the item ships for free.

Another option is a gift card from Halcyon jets. A $5 million gift card! Actually, it’s called a Dream Card, and it gives you full access to their complete fleet of jets, as well as a private aviation specialist and a personal concierge.

For the truly discriminating, might I suggest you consider purchasing an island? You can get a lovely 20-acre island off the coast of Rio de Janeiro for a mere $8 million. Sorry… only one per customer.

Most of us won’t be spending quite as much on Christmas gifts, though many will spend more than they should. There’s something about the Christmas season that makes us want to give gifts in a big way.

However, we know that the greatest gift has already been given. No one can match the extravagance of our Heavenly Father, who gave us what the apostle Paul calls an “indescribable gift.” (2 Corinthians 9:15) God gave us His own Son, not as a Christmas gift, but as the gift that never stops giving. God’s Son, Jesus, came and died, to give us all the right to claim the gift of eternal life.

The apostle John famously wrote, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16–17)

In this season of giving and receiving, let’s take time to remember the greatest gift of all: God’s Son. And let’s make sure that we’ve claimed the gift He offers each of us: the gift of eternal life.

In the United States, we’re celebrating Thanksgiving this week. For most, it’s a pleasant time shared with family and friends. There are sporting events and parades. Lots of stores use this time to kick off the holiday shopping season. And there’s usually plenty to eat!

And once in a while, we even remember to be thankful.

There’s lots of reasons to give thanks. It doesn’t always seem that way, but if we put our mind to it, we can usually think of more reasons for being thankful than for complaining.

In the Bible, there’s a beautiful piece of Hebrew poetry that expresses one man’s thankfulness to God. The author talks about blessings like health, rescue from enemies and material goods. He also talks about spiritual blessings, like God’s justice in this world.

In my favorite section of this poem, the author talks about the greatest blessing of all:

The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. (Psalm 103:8-12)

I love that imagery. “As far as the east is from the west.” All of my mistakes, all of my failings, all of my sin… God has taken it all away. So far away that it can never be connected with me again. “As far as the east is from the west.”

I don’t know what you’re thankful for this year. I’m thankful that God is slow to anger and quick to forgive. I’m thankful that He treats me with mercy, not harsh justice. I’m thankful that He forgives all of my sins, giving me a fresh start every day.

Be thankful for that as well. God’s forgiveness is available to you, just as it is to me, just as it was to that Hebrew poet so many years ago. Receive His forgiveness and be thankful. I’d love to tell you how.

How many people actually listen to the safety demonstration on an airplane? Nobody thinks that their plane is actually going to be involved in a crash. Besides, if you fly very often, you’ve heard the same spiel dozens of times. It almost seems like a waste of time.

Everybody knows how to fasten and unfasten their seatbelt, right? That seems like a pointless part of the demonstration. Maybe not; a study by the British Civil Aviation Authority revealed that an average of 6% of passengers get delayed by seatbelt problems during an evacuation.

Every safety demonstration discusses what to do if the plane has to make a water landing, but in the 2009 U.S. Airways landing on the Hudson River, only about half took a seat cushion for floatation and only 10 of 150 passengers thought to grab a life jacket. They’d heard the briefing, but hadn’t really listened.

Experts say that even a half-second delay in an emergency can mean the difference between life and death, yet few of us pay attention to the very information that can save our lives. We don’t value the information until we really need it.

I can’t help but feel that we treat God the same way. We’re vaguely aware that He’s there, we know that we really ought to learn more about Him, but we don’t take the trouble to do so.

Until we find ourselves in an emergency.

Then we wish we knew Him better. We wish we knew more about how to pray. We wish we were more confident about knowing what He expects of us and how we should behave towards Him.

My suggestion is not to wait until that crisis hits. Take the time to learn about God. Connect with people who know Him and can guide you. Learn the basics about Bible study, then make reading the Bible a part of your daily routine. Start talking to God on a regular basis… there’s no better way to learn about prayer than by doing it.

Connecting with God is easier than inflating a life vest or opening an emergency exit on a plane. And the rescue He offers lasts forever.

It’s said that the opening of a book is extremely important. The writer needs to engage his readers from the outset, filling them with a desire to read more.

When the apostle Matthew sat down to write the story of Jesus, I’m not sure that he was thinking about that. The first 14 verses of his book are a genealogy. This man was the father of that man, who was the father of some other guy. It’s not the most exciting reading for most of us.

As we read through this list of fathers and sons, there are four names that ought to catch our attention. Four women made this list: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth and Bath-Sheba. Over forty men are listed and only four women.

So these women must be especially righteous, especially virtuous women, right? They are included in the genealogy of Jesus, showing the people God used to bring His Son into the world. We would expect these women to be the examples of what women should be.

But that’s not the case. One of them dressed up as a prostitute and seduced her own father-in-law. One of them WAS a prostitute. Another committed adultery, got pregnant, and married the father of that child after her own husband was murdered. The other was fairly righteous, but she was also a foreigner. The Jews weren’t supposed to marry foreigners, so she shouldn’t even be on this list.

But these names are here. These women are remembered, while other women have been long forgotten. Matthew had his reasons, and I won’t pretend to know exactly what they were.

But I know that there is a lesson here: God can use anybody. Even when they’ve made mistakes. Even when they’ve been taken advantage of. Even when they don’t come from the right family. God can use anybody.

That message is fitting for the story of Jesus. Jesus came and made it possible for everyone to be acceptable to God. He broke down barriers, creating a new nation made up of people from every nation of this world. The story of Jesus is a story of inclusion.

I can be a part. You can be a part. Everyone who is willing to truly put their faith in Jesus can be a part.

People love stories. They love to hear them. They love to tell them.

It seems to be natural. Have you ever met a child that didn’t like stories? That didn’t want to be read to at night?

It’s not surprising that so much of the Bible is made up of stories. Well, maybe it is surprising. When we think of what we’ll find in a religious book, we often expect some sort of rule book or owner’s manual, telling people exactly how to live. And some of the Bible could be described that way.

But it’s mostly stories. Stories of grand adventures. Stories of everyday life. Stories of miracles and stories of tragedies. Stories that make you want to stand up and cheer, as well as stories that make you want to boo the villain.

Reading these stories can be a bit like reading any other history book. Until we get to that special part where God invites us to be a part of the story. To add our story to the stories that we find written in the Bible. To jump into the flow of God’s story and ride it all the way to the end.

I love looking at the videos on this website. People tell their story in those videos, their story about how God made them part of His story. Like the stories in the Bible, these stories involve tragedy and victory, great happiness and deep pain. And the stories have happy endings, because God can take every story and make it end well.

You’ve got a story. It’s a unique story that’s being written every day. But your story needs an ending, a happy ending. And I know that the only way your story can end happily is if you make your story part of God’s story.

There’s an amazing story about Jesus and a man named Jairus. Jairus was a religious leader, one of the rulers of the Jewish synagogue. At that time, that would have made him unlikely to go see someone like Jesus. But Jairus went.

He went because his daughter was very sick. He went because he was desperate. He went because he considered Jesus to be his only hope.

Jairus was able to convince Jesus to come to his house. But while they were on the way, someone came with terrible news: Jairus’ daughter was dead. All hope was now gone. Or so Jairus must have thought.

But Jesus thought otherwise. He said to the grieving father: “Don’t be afraid; just believe, and she will be healed.” (Luke 8:50)

When they arrived at Jairus’ house, people were standing outside, crying. Jesus told them: “She is not dead but asleep.” They laughed at him, because everyone knew she was dead.

Except Jesus. That is, he knew she was dead. But he also knew that she wouldn’t stay that way. Jesus went to the girl, took her by the hand, and told her to get up. And the young girl did!

It’s a beautiful story. As a father, I guess I hear it differently than I once did. I can imagine if my daughter were desperately ill, how hopeless I would feel. And I don’t even want to try and imagine how I would feel if she passed away.

But I know that Jesus’ words would ring in my ears: “Don’t be afraid; just believe.”

More than 80 times in the Bible, people are told “Don’t be afraid.” Fear is a common element of our human condition. And there’s probably no greater fear than the fear of death. One New Testament writer wrote that Jesus came to “free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” (Hebrews 2:15)

As we find ourselves facing the imminent death of someone we love or even our own death, that’s the time we need to hear Jesus’ words: “Don’t be afraid; just believe.” Because even when the worst happens, Jesus can say, “They’re not dead but asleep.” He is able to take even the dead by the hand and wake them up. If we only believe.

Don’t be afraid. Just believe.

On a recent trip to Florida, I heard someone commenting on the traffic problems in Orlando. This person cited a study which indicated that the congestion was caused by the number of people who aren’t sure where they’re going.

This is an apt description of the world in general. I would say that many problems arise because people don’t know where they are going. Everyone seems to be in a hurry to get somewhere, but few seem to know where they are headed.

In a story about Jesus, recorded by one of his apostles named John, we read this: “Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him.” (John 13:3-5)

In Jesus’ day, people traveled largely by foot on dusty roads and dirty city streets. They wore open-toed footwear. When they ate, they often reclined around low tables, with one person’s feet near another person’s head. Foot washing wasn’t a luxury; it was part of basic hygiene.

It was also a task that was performed by the lowest of the low, the slaves who did the dirtiest deeds. How could Jesus bring himself to perform such a filthy, humiliating task?

He knew where he was going. He knew who he was, where he had come from and where he was going. He wasn’t defined by that task nor any of the tasks that he performed while on this earth. He was going somewhere.

We can be like Jesus in that regard. We can know who we are. We can know where we are going. And that knowledge can free us to do whatever needs doing in this world.

Let me tell you more. Write to me at tarcher@heraldoftruth.org. Or check out the four numbered steps on the www.hopeforlife.org website. Life is so much better when we know where we are going.

It was a sunny August morning. For me, it was THE sunny morning. I couldn’t remember when everything had seemed so bright. The whole world around me felt clean. I felt clean.

The day before, I hadn’t felt that way. I was wrestling with a decision, a decision that would change my life forever.

I was a teenage boy at a church camp. I had heard a man from a church, a judge, describe things he had seen in his line of work, particularly cases of troubled young people. I came from a good home, but those stories made me take a hard look at myself. And I knew that I wanted a change.

I wanted to be clean. I knew that there were things in my life that weren’t right. I knew that I had done things I shouldn’t have. Above all, I knew that I was living a life focused on me. That way of living had left me stained and dirty.

If someone were to look at me from the outside, they would have seen a good kid. But I knew there was more to the story. I wanted to be right with God, and I knew that I wasn’t good enough to be right with God. I needed His help to be clean again, to get rid of the stains my past had left.

So on a dark August night, I stepped forward and said that I wanted to be born again. I wanted to be baptized into Christ. I was lead into the Central Texas waters of Lake LBJ, cold water that made me shiver. I remember being lowered into the water, seeing it close above my head. Then I came out of the water, a changed person, a new creation as the Bible says. I had been born again into the family of God.

That dark August night led to the bright August morning. Where I had felt stained, I now felt clean. Where I had felt weighed down, I now felt nothing but freedom.

The night was gone. The sun was shining. And I was right with God.

If you haven’t experienced the wonder of new birth, merely reading about it isn’t enough. You need to live it for yourself. Go to the front page of this site, read the four steps there, then let us help you get right with God.

Billy the Kid is still waiting for his pardon. The notorious teenage outlaw was promised amnesty by New Mexico Territorial Governor Lew Wallace back in 1879 in exchange for testimony against three men in a murder trial. Apparently, Wallace never kept his word.

In recent years, Governor Bill Richardson announced his intention to pardon Billy (whose real name was Henry McCarty; “Billy” came from his alias, William Bonney). However, Richardson decided against doing so on his last day in office, and Billy continues to wait for his pardon.

None of this matters to Billy, of course. He’s long past caring about whether the State of New Mexico considers him a fugitive or not. Politicians can say what they want, but young Billy’s fate was decided long ago. As the writer of the biblical book of Hebrews says “man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment.” (Hebrews 9:27)

What about my pardon? I never killed anyone, as Billy the Kid is said to have done. I’ve done no time in prison nor ever been in trouble with the law. But I need a pardon, just as badly as Billy does.

The Bible says that everyone has sinned and needs God’s mercy. (Romans 3:23) Without God’s pardon, I’m no better off than Billy the Kid or any other villain who has lived on this earth. Fortunately, God doesn’t make me wait. The same passage that says that we’ve all sinned also says that Jesus paid the price for that sin, so that I don’t have to. (Romans 3:24)

If you don’t know how to receive the pardon God offers, read through the four steps you’ll find on the home page of this site, and you’ll learn that you don’t need a governor to declare you not guilty. God can do that for you today. No waiting involved.

I’ll confess it now: I don’t like to read poetry. When we had to read poetry in school, it was the rare poet who appealed to me. One that did, however, was Robert Burns. One of his poems that stands out in my mind is one called “To A Louse,” with the subtitle “On Seeing One on a Lady’s Bonnet at Church.” The poem addresses a louse which is crawling around on the head of a young lady.

The real point of the poem, however, is the vanity of the young lady. She, noticing the looks and pointing directed her way, vainly thinks they are admiring her and begins to toss her hair. The last stanza, in modern English (Burns wrote in Scottish), says:

O would some Power the gift to give us
To see ourselves as others see us!
It would from many a blunder free us,
And foolish notion:
What airs in dress and gait would leave us,
And even devotion!

It’s a brilliant thought, and I could certainly do worse than write on this idea. Yet my thoughts are turned a different direction. I can’t help but think how many people are like this poet. They go to a church service and spend their time focused on the people around them. How many times do you hear people say, “I’m not interested in being part of a church… they’re all a bunch of hypocrites”?

I think we need to raise our vision. We need to accept that churches are made up of humans, with all their flaws. When we become part of a group of believers, we are seeking more than human interaction; we are admitting to a belief in something above and beyond those people. Attending a church service should be more than seeing and being seen; our focus should be on the One who is unseen.

If you think that church is full of vain and shallow people, like the young lady in this poem, let me invite you to look again. Look beyond the people. Church isn’t mainly about us; it’s about the God that calls us together.

If you haven’t found a church home, I’d like to help you do so. I’m in contact with Christians around the world; I’d love to connect you with some of them. Just fill out the form under the Contact tab at the top of the page. Hope to hear from you!