Take it from me, driving through Chicago can be dangerous to your health.
I am not talking about the road construction that will never end, or even the plague of a traffic jam that ALWAYS clogs up the Dan Ryan Expressway (I believe if the Egyptians had driven cars instead of chariots, then one of God's plagues during the time of Moses would have been a traffic jam of Chicago proportion!).
Actually, when I saw someone in a car ahead of me stick a gun out of his rolled-down window, aimed at the car beside him in the next lane, I would gladly have faced road construction or a traffic jam instead (or even a plague!).
This is a true story.
It happened during a recent trip to Chicago. At first, I did not want to believe what I thought I saw. A gun. Held by a hand that was sticking out of one car window and pointed at another car window. And it was all happening only a very short distance ahead of me.
What was happening? Was it road rage? Gang violence? Would I be an eyewitness to a murder? Would I testify in court? And how safe was I, after all?
These and a hundred other thoughts all raced through my mind in a matter of seconds.
Before I could arrive at any answers, the car being threatened suddenly pulled over to the shoulder and stopped. Immediately, the guy with the gun stopped his car in the middle of the interstate, not bothering with the shoulder...and everyone behind him stopped too, including me.
At that point, I could hear a siren, but I could not tell where it was coming from. Someone must have called 911. I looked in my rearview mirror. No sign of a police car. No flashing lights anywhere.
As I glanced back at the scene in front of me, a man was getting out of the car in the center lane and was running towards the other car on the shoulder, gun in hand. At this, the car on the shoulder took off, 60-miles an hour, backwards.
The man with the gun ran to his car and hopped in. He made a u-turn in the middle of the three-lane freeway and started driving the wrong way, and headed straight towards me.
The thought crossed my mind then that maybe I would get shot. Or, maybe my rental car would get rammed by either the "good guy" who was driving way too fast to be going backwards...or by the "bad guy" with the gun chasing him.
But as the "bad guy" got closer, I saw something that made me feel much better.
His car was not a normal "bad guy" car. I could see flashing red and blue lights tucked away behind the grill on the front of his car and, as he passed me, I heard the sound of the siren pass too.
It was an unmarked police car. The guy with the gun was not a "bad guy" after all. He was an undercover policeman. He was really a "good guy."
The problem was that I could not tell the "good guy" from the "bad guy" by looking at them. What I saw with my own two eyes deceived me.
As I thought about it later, I was reminded of Samuel in the Old Testament. He had the same problem. His eyes had deceived him when he judged by outer appearances only.
God had called Samuel to anoint the next king of Israel from among the sons of Jesse. As soon as Samuel laid eyes on Eliab, he was sure that this was God's man. There must have been something very royal about Eliab's physical appearance.
God, however, had other ideas. Here is the passage from 1 Samuel 16...
"But the Lord said to Samuel, 'Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.'"
Have you ever made that same mistake yourself?
It is easy to do. It is sort of hard-wired into our human nature.
Sometimes, I wonder if some people see Walnut Hills Baptist Church like that.
They look at our outward appearance and they are not impressed. Ours is an old building. We have no parking lot to call our own. No air conditioning. We have a small congregation. We are classified as an "urban" church rather than as a "suburban" church.
But I would like to think that God would say to them, "Do not look at the outward appearance, but look at their heart."
Because, at heart, we are a wonderful fellowship of believers. We love the Lord and we love each other. We treat each other as brothers and sisters regardless of race or age. When we come to church on Sunday, we hear a remarkable choir, lots of prayer, and a "Word from God's Word."
Some might call it "old-fashioned." Some might call it "traditional." I call it "beautiful."
I also call it ministry.
It is easy to do ministry where ministry is easy.
As a member of this church, you choose to do ministry in a more difficult place...all the while giving and receiving so many blessings in the process.
Just like Jesus did. And Paul. And Peter. And John. And so many others who looked not only at what was on the outside, but at what was on the inside.
Pastor Greg
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Going Home
It was a cold and stormy night.
A Wednesday night, to be exact...the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, in 1980.
It was my first BIG HOLIDAY away from home after graduating from college and I had BIG PLANS. Secret plans.
I would drive all the way to West Virginia from Indianapolis after I finished working at the Indiana Pacers game that night. I had rented a car because I didn't trust my 1976 Vega station wagon to make the trip without breaking down.
I would drive all night, overnight, so I could be home for Thanksgiving.
No one knew I was coming. It would be a surprise for everyone, especially for my Mom.
You see, I had never missed a Thanksgiving with her. Not once. In all of my 22 years, Mom and I had always been together for Thanksgiving.
At first, I had told myself how silly it was to make the trip at all. I was, after all, a grown man. I had a fulltime job. It was just Thanksgiving. What difference would it make if I didn't get home that year? So what if I wouldn't see my Mom, just this once.
There would be other holidays. There would be other Thanksgivings.
It was too far to drive so late at night anyway. I would be too tired. It might even be dangerous...only crazy people, or drunk people (or crazy, drunk people) were out on the roads at that time of night, on the night before Thanksgiving.
I would be fine staying at my apartment, by myself.
But, the more I thought about it, the more homesick I got. Not that my Mom was a great cook, exactly. I mean, she could cook a good meal, don't get me wrong. But, for my Mom, cooking was more of a "hit and miss" proposition.
There were times when the Thanksgiving turkey just melted in your mouth. But there were other times when the bottoms of the rolls were burned, or the mashed potatoes were a little stiff, or the pumpkin pie was still a bit frozen because she hadn't take the box out of the freezer early enough to thaw. You never knew, from one year to the next, which food would hit the table.
Of course, it didn't matter. I wasn't going home for the food. I was going home to be with my family. I was going home to be with my Mom.
So, sometime around midnight on that Wednesday night in 1980, I headed home. It really was a cold and stormy night.
I was fine for an hour or two. But eventually, there was no way I could keep my eyes open. I had to pull over and take a nap.
I slept as well possible while sitting up behind the steering wheel. That is, until the car got too cold. Freezing, I started the car, turned on the heat and let it run until the air warmed up again. Then, I turned off the engine and fell back to sleep.
That pattern repeated itself more than once that night. Drive. Stop. Sleep. Freeze. Run the car. Sleep. Repeat.
Finally, sometime around the middle of the morning on Thanksgiving day, I pulled into the driveway at Mom's house.
She was in the kitchen when I got there.
She saw me drive up. It was then that the most unusual thing happened. Something that I had not expected.
For some reason, she did not seem surprised to see me. She was happy that I made it home, of course, but she did not seem surprised at all.
It was almost as if she had expected me to be there.
As I look back on it now, I think I know why. This was my home. This was my family. This was where I belonged. This was the only place in the whole world where I could find a special kind of love...the love of my Mom. Unconditional love.
The kind of love that says, "I love you just because you are my child."
I think Mom knew that I could not stay away, because that kind of love is too precious to miss.
Someday, there is going to be a great Thanksgiving meal in the presence of Jesus. Actually, in the Bible, it is called a "wedding supper," but it is basically the same thing.
"Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder shouting: 'Hallelujah! For our Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come and his bride has made herself ready. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear'...Then the angel said to me, 'Write: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb.'" (Revelation 19:6-9)
Do you want to be invited? You have been already. You were invited the very day that Jesus died on the cross for you.
If you want to be there, you do not have to drive for hours and hours on a cold and stormy night. All you have to do is accept Jesus as your personal Savior.
What waits for you is a wonderful time of precious, unconditional love, because you have "come home" through faith in Jesus Christ. What waits for you is a love from God that says, "I love you just because you are my child."
Where else would you rather be?
Pastor Greg
A Wednesday night, to be exact...the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, in 1980.
It was my first BIG HOLIDAY away from home after graduating from college and I had BIG PLANS. Secret plans.
I would drive all the way to West Virginia from Indianapolis after I finished working at the Indiana Pacers game that night. I had rented a car because I didn't trust my 1976 Vega station wagon to make the trip without breaking down.
I would drive all night, overnight, so I could be home for Thanksgiving.
No one knew I was coming. It would be a surprise for everyone, especially for my Mom.
You see, I had never missed a Thanksgiving with her. Not once. In all of my 22 years, Mom and I had always been together for Thanksgiving.
At first, I had told myself how silly it was to make the trip at all. I was, after all, a grown man. I had a fulltime job. It was just Thanksgiving. What difference would it make if I didn't get home that year? So what if I wouldn't see my Mom, just this once.
There would be other holidays. There would be other Thanksgivings.
It was too far to drive so late at night anyway. I would be too tired. It might even be dangerous...only crazy people, or drunk people (or crazy, drunk people) were out on the roads at that time of night, on the night before Thanksgiving.
I would be fine staying at my apartment, by myself.
But, the more I thought about it, the more homesick I got. Not that my Mom was a great cook, exactly. I mean, she could cook a good meal, don't get me wrong. But, for my Mom, cooking was more of a "hit and miss" proposition.
There were times when the Thanksgiving turkey just melted in your mouth. But there were other times when the bottoms of the rolls were burned, or the mashed potatoes were a little stiff, or the pumpkin pie was still a bit frozen because she hadn't take the box out of the freezer early enough to thaw. You never knew, from one year to the next, which food would hit the table.
Of course, it didn't matter. I wasn't going home for the food. I was going home to be with my family. I was going home to be with my Mom.
So, sometime around midnight on that Wednesday night in 1980, I headed home. It really was a cold and stormy night.
I was fine for an hour or two. But eventually, there was no way I could keep my eyes open. I had to pull over and take a nap.
I slept as well possible while sitting up behind the steering wheel. That is, until the car got too cold. Freezing, I started the car, turned on the heat and let it run until the air warmed up again. Then, I turned off the engine and fell back to sleep.
That pattern repeated itself more than once that night. Drive. Stop. Sleep. Freeze. Run the car. Sleep. Repeat.
Finally, sometime around the middle of the morning on Thanksgiving day, I pulled into the driveway at Mom's house.
She was in the kitchen when I got there.
She saw me drive up. It was then that the most unusual thing happened. Something that I had not expected.
For some reason, she did not seem surprised to see me. She was happy that I made it home, of course, but she did not seem surprised at all.
It was almost as if she had expected me to be there.
As I look back on it now, I think I know why. This was my home. This was my family. This was where I belonged. This was the only place in the whole world where I could find a special kind of love...the love of my Mom. Unconditional love.
The kind of love that says, "I love you just because you are my child."
I think Mom knew that I could not stay away, because that kind of love is too precious to miss.
Someday, there is going to be a great Thanksgiving meal in the presence of Jesus. Actually, in the Bible, it is called a "wedding supper," but it is basically the same thing.
"Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder shouting: 'Hallelujah! For our Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come and his bride has made herself ready. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear'...Then the angel said to me, 'Write: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb.'" (Revelation 19:6-9)
Do you want to be invited? You have been already. You were invited the very day that Jesus died on the cross for you.
If you want to be there, you do not have to drive for hours and hours on a cold and stormy night. All you have to do is accept Jesus as your personal Savior.
What waits for you is a wonderful time of precious, unconditional love, because you have "come home" through faith in Jesus Christ. What waits for you is a love from God that says, "I love you just because you are my child."
Where else would you rather be?
Pastor Greg
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