teacher Devotions: Losing My Religion

Romans 8:15 For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, "Abba, Father."

I’m starting a new Sunday School series this week at our church. It’s called “Losing My Religion.” It’s all about the cultural influences, emergent movements, and inter-faith dialogues that are diminishing the Christian faith of our children. Not since the fourth and fifteenth centuries have our people faced such a disabling theosophy that threatens to lead them astray. They believe that one worldism and interfaith worship holds the key to a peaceful planet. They are being led like lambs to the slaughter and taken down a path which will steal them away from God. The choice that I have is this: do let them follow the pied pipers of superficial spirituality and poseur popularity, or do I use my own gifts and faith knowledge to counter it?

I keep thinking back to Mary Slessor, the great Scottish missionary to Africa and the choices that she had to make. She confronted witch doctors and popular superstitions in order to bring Christ into the communities where she served. She opposed slavery and witchcraft, and stopped the horrendous killing of twin babies, who were crushed into large jars and buried alive because they brought bad luck to a village. Did Mary Slessor sit down and share courteous dialogue about the different religious philosophies and practices? Did she break bread with those who used fear and violence, superstition and magic to maliciously control the people?

Mary Slessor preached and practiced the Gospel, letting Christ’s words and ways liberate the heart, minds, and souls of people who were physically, mentally, and spiritually enslaved. She confronted evil with Christ’s good. She faced down wicked with His Holiness.

I fear that our kids have got no earthly idea about who Christ really is and what He came to change. They talk about God as if He is just another application that they can conveniently add on to their iphones. They are enslaved to their culture and sliding down a path that will lead to persecution and perdition. The planet has become their god and globalism is their religion.

I cannot let it go and leave it be. I cannot watch souls being tricked and a whole generation being swallowed up and led into a maelstrom that will eventually crush their faith and bury their beliefs. It’s time to win them back for Christ…

Prayer:                        Lord Jesus, the world would diminish Your divinity and eliminate Your influence over the people of this planet. Our kids are being cleverly misled and are getting caught up in a cultural wave that will one day crash and wreck their souls. Help the Church to re-seek Your ways and re-own Your words, so that a stronger generation may grow in true Christian faith, and not just a faith of their own creating and choosing. In Your Holy Name, we adamantly pray. Amen.

John Stuart is the pastor of Erin Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. If you would like to comment on today’s message, please send him an email to pastor@erinpresbyterian.org. (I'm also going to do an online version of the series. If you would like to participate, please send me an email and I'll get you signed up).

Teacher Devotions: 2010 - A New Year, a New Journey

Psalm 147:5    Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit.

I like to think about each New Year as a journey of faith, where my understanding about God and my beliefs in Jesus will grow deeper and stronger. I’ve tried to be a Christian for almost 33 years and throughout each year, I’ve learned more about God’s words and Christ’s ways. It doesn’t make me anymore holy or saintly, but rather as each year passes I am in awe of God’s patience, love, and grace.

Perhaps you are also wondering about this New Year and new decade that we’re about to enter. Maybe you have hopes and dreams for your life, or perhaps there are fears and worries on the horizon. Whatever is ahead, know this: God is still mighty and powerful, and His understanding of our lives and circumstances are limitless.

We all tend to make resolutions at this time of year, but perhaps this is the perfect time to ask God what He would wish to resolve in us. If we will let Christ guide us throughout this new journey of 2010, then I think that there will be all sorts of new opportunities and possibilities about growing in faith, getting nearer to God, and finding our purpose.

So may 2010 be a Happy and Prosperous New Year for all of us, but also a more meaningful and faithful journey in Christ.

Prayer:                        Lord Jesus, as we stand on the threshold of another new year, we pray that You will come to meet us and lead us onward in this amazing journey that we call life. Take us to where You would have us effectively do Your work, and empower us to minister to those who travel with us. In Your Holy Name, we expectantly pray. Amen.

John Stuart is the pastor of Erin Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. If you would like to comment on today’s message, please send him an email to pastor@presbyterian.org.

Teacher Devotions: Blue Christmas Candle & Poem

Christmas can be a painful and lonely time for some people. At our candlelight service, we light a Blue Christmas candle for those who are grieving, hurting, or ill during the festive season. This prayer poem is recited as the blue candle is lit. It's a very meaningful and emotional time for some members in the congregation.

Blue Christmas Prayer

There’s no room at Christmas for sadness,
There’s no place for hearts that are blue.
All the world wants to hear
Is a word full of cheer,
Not a sigh, not a tear, not from you.

There’s no room at Christmas for loneliness,
There’s no place for your emptiness and grief.
All the world wants is peace,
Mistletoe and Christmas trees,
Not a heartache that mars its beliefs.

There’s no room at Christmas for sickness,
There’s no place or time to be ill.
All the world wants is health,
Prosperity and wealth,
Not a pain that can spoil its goodwill.

There’s no room at Christmas for Jesus,
There’s no place for His family, too,
All the world would not share,
No one seems to really care,
A stable will just have to do.

Silence……..

Yes, there’s room at Christmas for sadness,
There’s a place in God’s heart for you.
For He knows pain and loss,
Which He felt on the Cross,
So this candle is lit here for you…
*For Christ knows what it’s like to be blue.

* light a blue candle

Teacher Devotions: Christian Contenders - Philippians 1 v 27,28

Philippians 1:27b-28a                       I will know that you stand firm in one spirit, contending as one man for the faith of the gospel without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you.

Like most kids, I was bullied at school by several people who loved to intimidate me on a daily basis. They would bump into me on the soccer field and trip me up deliberately, or they would gang up on me in a quiet corner and seek to terrify me.

It got so bad that I didn’t want to go to school. My grades plummeted and instead of being in the top ten group in my class, I sank almost to the bottom. My mom wanted to go and face my daily oppressors, but that would have shamed me even more. She wasn’t mentally fit anyway, so I didn’t think that she could make any difference.

And then one morning during recess, just as the bullies were coming to get their usual sadistic pleasure out of intimating me, my mom appeared out of the blue. She verbally tore into them and publicly humiliated them. As I watched their faces get redder with embarrassment I realized that they were just children like me. My mom gave them a dressing down and the other kids in the school playground cheered her on. I guess that some of the other kids had been bullied by them too.

After that incident, things got better. I wasn’t afraid any more and got back into the top ten students in my class. The bullies’ reign of terror was ended and my mom became the heroine of my heart. Sadly, insanity and schizophrenia would expunge the incident from her mind, but even although it has been more than forty years since the event occurred, I still admire her what she did for me that day.

These days, Christians are contending for the Gospel in the face of persecution and harassment, imprisonment and even death in many lands. Their undaunted faith is a living testimony to the truth of the Gospel and work of Jesus Christ in the world. Society sometimes seeks to diminish Christianity and make it irrelevant. But the more that we are philosophically and socially opposed, the more true Christians appear to contend for the faith of the Gospel and stand up for Christ’s holy words. We will not be bullied, berated, or beaten down.

Prayer:                        Lord Jesus, faith is a precious gift and one that world desperately needs. All over the earth, Your Church and Your people are being made to feel insignificant and irrelevant. We are told that we are intolerant by intolerant people. We are viewed as being reactionary by those who violently react to Your teaching. We are humiliated and harassed all over the world by brazen bullies and godless governments. Help and empower us to contend for the Gospel, just as our brothers and sisters in our faith did so long ago. In Your Sacred and Holy Name, we pray. Amen.

John Stuart is the pastor of Erin Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. If you would like to comment on today’s message, please send him an email to pastor@erinpresbyterian.org.

Teacher Devotions: Hopes and Fears - Advent 3 - Job 23 v 16

Job 23: 16 God has made my heart faint; the Almighty has terrified me.

I feel sorry for Job. He was living at a time when people believed that personal pain and suffering occurred because God was angry with them. This meant that any tragedy was clouded with a terrifying fear that God was punishing the people. Any illness or sickness, any setback or obstacle was seen a sign of God’s wrath. Only repentance and sacrifice would suffice to appease God. Only humility and contrition would placate the Almighty.

Thank God then that we are New Testament people! We are no longer bound by those primeval fears. Christ has come into the world to tell us not to be afraid. Christ has given the ultimate sacrifice for all of our mistakes and sins. The threat of divine punishment is no longer to be dreaded. Instead of being terrified of God, we are attracted to Him through the love and grace of Jesus Christ.

Out of the 6.5 billion people on this planet, about 5 billion live under the religious fear of God’s wrath. They are terrified of plagues and famines, wars and earthquakes, floods and disasters. They are anxious about offending God and worry over the smallest of mistakes. They constantly spend their resources on appeasing false gods and try to buy divine blessings. Christianity, however, has a real message of hope for all of these people who are plagued by superstition: Do not be afraid and be of good cheer.

In this pre-season of Christmas that we call Advent, we should constantly pray for the world to be open to Christ’s message of goodwill, forgiveness, and peace. It has the potential to save the entire world from its fears and to lovingly restore everyone to God’s favor and blessings. If only Job knew way back then what we know now, he would never have been driven to despair through his fear of God. He could have been comforted, embraced, and encouraged by God through the presence of Jesus Christ in his life.

Prayer:                        Lord Jesus, we all carry hopes and fears in our hearts and minds. We pray that You will diminish our anxieties by graciously responding to our concerns. Guard us and guide us. Embrace us and bless us. In Your Holy Name, we confidently pray. Amen.

John Stuart is the pastor of Erin Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. If you would like to comment on today’s message, please send him an email to pastor@erinpresbyterian.org. He enjoys reading your reflections.

Buying a Kindle: Top Ten reasons for Buying a Kindle this Christmas!

10:       You can carry many books at once without hurting your arm or bursting a bag.

9:         You can subscribe to your favorite magazine, newspaper, or blogger.

8:         You don’t have to make any more room in your house for used books.

7:         You don’t need a garage sale to get rid of your used books.

6:         You can send important pdf documents to your Kindle and impress your boss.

5:         Everybody at the local coffee house now thinks that you’re cool.

4:         You can turn pages at the flick of a button.

3:         You can highlight and store favorite quotations.

2:         You get best sellers downloaded immediately at unbeatable prices.

1:         You don’t have to wait in line at the bookstore anymore!

Go on, you know you want one!

Teachers Devotions: Arguing Against God - Job 23 v 4

Job 23:4          I would state my case before him and fill my mouth with arguments.

I feel sorry for the whole Christian Church right now. We seem to be stumbling over our own feet and are constantly struggling with issues of homosexuality, poverty, and abortion. There doesn’t seem to be any clear consensus about what we should believe, and no matter what biblical verses or principles are used to prop up one side of a theological debate, the other side trumps it with a different interpretation. We are so tainted with this urge to state and enforce our views upon the Church that we have lost the capacity to convince the world that what we believe in is the truth. In our desperate need to make everyone feel accepted and for us to be liked, we’ve thrown out Christ with the waters of baptism and allowed the waters of chaos to overwhelm us.

I personally feel as though I’ve taken the wrong path and allowed myself to justify my beliefs. I’ve confused and fused my culture with my Christianity. I’ve stuck my head in the sand instead of drawing a line in the sand. Instead of letting the scriptures be my guide, I’ve relied upon my conscience. Instead of following the words of Christ, I’ve followed the maddening crowd. I’ve permitted modernism to mangle my relationship with Christ and have let post-modernists diminish my preaching. I feel like a prodigal pastor and a theological prostitute. I need to repent, refocus, and return to the Kingly Christ of the Scriptures and not the jolly Jesus that society has created.

In the Old Testament, Job fiercely expressed his right to contend with God and be acquitted through the power of his arguments. In the New Testament, Christ freely sacrificed Himself because we cannot contend with God and be acquitted. We may be able to defend our thoughts and justify our beliefs to other people, but we cannot do the same with God. Only Christ can advocate on our behalf. And only He can do this for us if we repent of our pride, our arrogant mistakes, and false misconceptions.

Prayer:                        Lord Jesus, we foolishly believe that our society has it all right and that Your words are outdated, outmoded, and outflanked. You clearly laid out the godly ways to live our lives, but we sinfully pick and choose whatever is convenient for us. Pardon our arrogance and stupidity for believing that our generation is right and that all previous Christian generations were totally wrong. Redirect our paths and reclaim our churches as Your own. In Your Heavenly Name, we pray. Amen.

John Stuart is currently the pastor of Erin Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. If you would like to comment on today’s message, please send him an email to pastor@erinpresbyterian.org.