Tag Archives: Holy Spirit

Online Worship

July 30, 2023 – Newton UMC – Sunday Worship Livestream

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JOY Fellowship Worship Service in Holland Hall: 9:00 a.m.

Worship Service in Main Sancutary: 10:30 a.m.

Worship service streams live at 10:30 a.m. EST (-500 GMT)

Welcome to our live-streamed Sunday Worship Services for July 23, 2023. Today we learn that we care called to be and build the church where we are and with what we have.

Please support us by giving online: https://tithe.ly/give?c=1377216 or https://paypal.me/newtonumc Or you can make and mail a check out to First UMC of Newton, 111 Ryerson Ave., Newton, NJ O7860

God bless you all for your generosity which is vital to our mission and ministry.

Devotional

Advocated

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Read Psalm 7

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous. He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world” (1 John 2:1–2 NLT).

A band I really like is one that is electronic in nature, meaning that it is composed mostly of synthesizers, electric drum beats, electric bass, and a persistant bass drum beat that will make you think the warring “deathbringers” are on their way. All jokes aside, it is basically a band that has very dancy beats, but the lyrics are absolutely deep and thought provoking. What’s more, though this is a secular band from London, well the lead singer/founder is from Ireland, there is a certain spiritual side to them that comes through in virtually every song they release.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am not saying they are a “Christian” band. I have no clue what Ronan Harris or his bandmates’ religious views are. With that said, humans are intrinsically spiritual. Even atheists find ways of fulfilling the spiritual side of their nature, whether they recognize it or not. So, there is a commonality between all human beings in that regard and that leads to humans of all creeds as well as “no creed” writing music that can move us spiritually.

One of VNV Nations songs that moves me is a song called Nemesis. The word nemesis is actually never used once in the song so, prior to talking about the song, let’s look at what the title word means. According to Oxford Dictionary, Nemesis comes from classical Greek Mythology; “she was the goddess of retribution, vengeance, who reverses excessive good fortune…”.

That is the “Nemesis” that the song is invoking: the Greek goddess of retribution. Retribution, of course, is vengeful punishment for a wrong or criminal act. In the song, Ronan laments:

“Everybody wants to live in a lie, but why should we delude ourselves? It’s not as if we can’t see something’s wrong, where’s the duty to what’s right? Intentions end with empty words and chaos replaces order. Those who shout the loudest impose their will upholding laws that serve the few, declaring peace while the sirens sing in the name of progress, the name of madness; drum beats faster, crowd shouts louder and chaos replaces order.”

The lyrics are plain and simple. He is calling out the reality that most of us see happening around us every day. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer, and the middle-class that is an anomaly to Western Civilization (aka made up of the average person in society), is shrinking. What does that mean? That means that there are less and less people with the means to live in society. And that is just dealing with Western Civilization, not to mention all of the other non-Western peoples in the world that suffer as a result of the West’s complete and abhorrently excessive lifestyle. It’s enough to make anyone with a conscience scream. Hence the chorus of Ronan’s song:

“I want justice for the voice that can’t be heard, vindication for every suffering and hurt. Let retribution hold dominion over earth because Judgement Day’s not coming…judgement day’s not coming…soon enough.”

This song very much rings and sings of the Psalms. Psalm 7 is a song of David that he wrote when he was being attacked by, enigmatically, by Cush who was a Benjaminite. The reason this is enigmatic or mysterious is because there are no references to Cush in the Biblical accounts of David. This is the only mention of him. So, we really have no clue what David was being attacked for; however, he was being attacked by an Israelite from the tribe of Benjamin, presumably in some sort of Temple trial.

The Psalmist is declaring himself righteous and even states that God should allow him to be overtaken by his enemies if he proves to be untrue. Following this, he calls for God to rise up in anger, seeking retribution against his enemies. He calls for a justice that not only vindicates him, but punishes the wicked for their wrong doing. He calls for a day where there will be an end of the violence of the wicked and where the righteous will remain secure.

Like David, that is what Ronan Harris is calling for; however, he’s not calling it just for himself, but for all of those who suffer in the world. He’s angry at the suffering he sees, at the injustice, and he is expressing his feeling that “judgement day is not coming soon enough.” I, too, have often felt this sense of urgency and anger at what I see taking place in the world around me. With that said, I also have a healthy dose of humility too. Sometimes it is my voice that is heard over others. Sometimes I have been a source of suffering and hurt as much as I have been a recipient.

While it can feel like judgement day is too delayed or may never come, we have to remember that judgment is UNIVERSAL. It is not just going to come for those we dislike or disagree with. It will come to us too! How will we stand before the judgment throne? How will we fare in front of a just God who seeks to right the wrongs of sin, evil and death in the world?

I have one answer and one answer alone: JESUS CHRIST. That is how we will stand before God and that is who we will stand with. Jesus Christ is our advocate and will stand next to us and vouch us as one of his. That is why, my friends, we need to humble ourselves before God, repent of our sins, and accept the One who has died for us…the ones who deserve a meeting with Nemesis.

Let us thank the Lord Jesus Christ that we have been invited into such a family where sin is forgiven and destroyed, where ALL are included because they are loved (as opposed to being loved because they are included), and where justice, mercy and unending LOVE reign supreme! Let us, like the Psalmist, draw closer to the one who is our advocate and redeemer.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.” – Jesus of Nazareth

PRAYER
Lord, help me to put my trust in you, to seek justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with you throughout my life. Amen.

Online Worship

July 23, 2023 – Newton UMC – Sunday Worship Livestream

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JOY Fellowship Worship Service in Holland Hall: 9:00 a.m.

Worship Service in Main Sancutary: 10:30 a.m.

Worship service streams live at 10:30 a.m. EST (-500 GMT)

Welcome to our live-streamed Sunday Worship Services for July 23, 2023. Today we learn that sometimes we are to be bold to fulfill God’s purpose despite our challenges and circumstances.

Please support us by giving online: https://tithe.ly/give?c=1377216 or https://paypal.me/newtonumc Or you can make and mail a check out to First UMC of Newton, 111 Ryerson Ave., Newton, NJ O7860

God bless you all for your generosity which is vital to our mission and ministry.

Devotional, Previous Post

REVISITED: Fleeing the Mob

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Read Mark 15:1-20

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“Then some Jews arrived from Antioch and Iconium and won the crowds to their side. They stoned Paul and dragged him out of town, thinking he was dead.” (Acts 14:19 NLT)

Perhaps you have seen the old Universal film, “Frankenstein”, starring Boris Karloff. If so, you will certainly remember the scene of the townspeople forming a mob  and chasing after the monster accidentally killed the little girl while playing with her on the dock. The girl had stumbled upon the monster, well, the monster actually stumbled upon her. All the same, the girl was trying to teach the monster a game of throwing flowers into the water of a pond.

She threw one and it floated. The monster imitated and his floated too; however, when all of the flowers were floating in the water and there were none left to throw, the monster decided to try the same thing with the little girl. It was, in all honesty, an innocent mistake. Unfortunately, the little girl could not swim and ended up drowning. Add that to the fact that this creature, this “monster”, was pieced together with the body parts of dead corpses by a crazed and mad scientist, and the people in the girl’s village were riddled with fear and rage.

Of course, fear and rage make for a deadly combination and, so, an angry and vengeful mob was the result. For those who remember this film, you will remember that this mob chased after the monster and trapped him in a windmill. In their rage, they torched the windmill and the monster inevitably burned alive after the windmill caved in on him. Following the film’s conclusion, one is seriously left wondering who was truly the monster: the creature, or the neglectful mad scientist and the raging mob.

Another film comes to mind when I think of mob mentality. In the Walt Disney film “Beauty and the Beast”, Gaston riles a mob when Belle tries to save her father from being committed in a mental institution. In order to show that her father isn’t crazy in his ramblings about a “beast” living up in the castle, she shows Gaston and the crowd the beast through magic mirror the beast gave to her as a gift.

Using fear to persuade them, Gaston is able to easily persuade the  crowd into believing that this beast is ferocious and will come in the night to steal away their children and sink his sharp fangs into their flesh. Belle tries to counteract Gaston by telling the villagers that the beast is actually friendly and means them no harm; however, they’ve already mobbed together with pitchforks and guns and there was no way that reason was ever going to break through to them.

The mob ignored her completely, locked her up with her father, and ran off into the night to go kill the beast. In the end, they did so to their own detriment and at their own peril. Gaston, himself, ends dead as a result of his fear mongering. Thus, both “Frankenstein” and “Beauty and the Beast” can be seen, among other things, as a sharp and potent warning against mobs and the mob mentality.

We are so prone, as human beings, to run to the mill with what “could happen” that we often throw caution and reason to the wind in order to attack what we fear most. I see this happening right now in this country during this election cycle, and it is most certainly happening in our world as well. The more we are attacked by terrorists, and the more people’s perceptions of our stability and security become cynical and/or negative, the more people use that fear to drum up support for action that may or may not be reasonable, let alone practical or warranted.

The challenge for us is to flee the mob, to stay clear of it, to separate ourselves from the ferver, the fear mongering, the hype, the rhetoric, and the polarization that goes on in our communities and in our worlds. We need to put ourselves in an open space where we have room to take a deep breath, think, pray and allow God to guide us. It’s not that we shouldn’t heed warnings and/or look at all fear-inducing warnings as false or bad. They very well could be true; however, it is how we react to them that makes or breaks us. When we react like the common mob caught up in a rageful ferver, we fail to use our heads, our hearts, and our faith. God is calling us to flee the mob and seek God’s guidance and wisdom out in all that we do.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“The mob is the mother of tyrants.” – Diogones

PRAYER
Lord, help us to not to get caught up in the mob mentality and to seek only your ways and your guidance. Amen.

Devotional

Moving Towards Better

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Read James 4:5-10

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“Pride leads to disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom” (Proverbs 11:2 NLT).

Ted Lasso (screen grab) Season 2, Episode 5 “Rainbow” Brett Goldstein as Roy Kent in “Ted Lasso” season two, now streaming on Apple TV+. CR: Apple TV+

Asking for help can be such a hard thing to do. I mean, there’s pride, right? We all want to look our best, to put our best foot forward so-to-speak, and to act like we have some sort of concrete knowledge in our “area of expertise”. Thus, to ask for help, just on that level alone, can be so very hard because it often feels like we are betray a weakness to others, exposing our own doubts and lack of competency. In fact, pride may be the largest reason why people do not ask for help; though, there are other reasons for sure.

Let it be said that every good leader knows that leadership requires other people. One cannot be adequately called a leader if they are merely leading themselves. No, a leader must be someone who leads others for a common cause and toward a common goal. A leader must be willing to engage with and challenge others to move toward what is good for the whole. In order to do this, the leader must also envision what the future could be and what pitfalls to possibly avoid to reach said future.

This reminds me of a character named Roy Kent on the Apple TV+ series Ted Lasso. Roy, since retired from playing football (aka soccer), has become an assistant manager on the AFC Richmond team, alongside his former coach Ted Lasso. Roy is a great football player, one of the greatest strikers of all time, and he has such potential as a manager. The guys, despite his gruff persona, love and look up to him. They respect him and they know he knows what he is talking about.

Yet, Roy often times proverbially shoots himself in the foot because of his propensity toward perfectionism. He not only holds himself to that incredibly high standard and often finds himself disgruntled at failing, but he also has those high expectations of others, making it hard for him to relate to and get along with some of the people on the show, such as the somewhat arrogant but totally talented striker Jamie Tartt, which whom he has a major personality conflict. Still, Roy needed to learn the importance of relying on and seeking help from others, regardless of personality differences.

At one point, the Director of Operations, Leslie Higgins, is in a conversation with Roy about the importance of seeking help from others. In the midst of great change and uncertainty, he told him this tidbit of very wise advice, “Human beings are never going to be perfect…The best we can do is keep asking for help and accepting it when you can. If you keep doing that, you will always be moving towards better.”

What truth that is! HUMAN BEINGS ARE NEVER GOING TO BE PERFECT! AMEN! #truth We are all destined to botch things up, get stuff wrong, do things that disappoint others, and generally to just not always get the big picture. Yet, being truly human is NOT about being perfect on our own, but relying on God who can PEFECT US in LOVE! The best we can do, as humans and as Christians, is to turn our trust over to Christ who has saved us! To do that, we also need to trust those Christ has put in our lives, collectively known as the Church! We need the help of others to be moving towards better.

We need the help of others to make a difference in this world. We need the help of others to truly represent JESUS CHRIST and HIS KINGDOM. Let us, rather than sticking it out on our own, turn to Christ and to Christians for support in helping us move towards better.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real.” – Thomas Merton

PRAYER
Lord, give me the humility to recognize my need of help from others and, most importantly, my dependency on you. Amen.

Online Worship

July 16, 2023 – Newton UMC – Sunday Worship Livestream

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JOY Fellowship Worship Service in Holland Hall: 9:00 a.m.

Worship Service in Main Sancutary: 10:30 a.m.

Worship service streams live at 10:30 a.m. EST (-500 GMT)

Welcome to our live-streamed Sunday Worship Services for July 16, 2023. Today we sing a song of praise, for God is at work and calling us into partnership!

Please support us by giving online: https://tithe.ly/give?c=1377216 or https://paypal.me/newtonumc Or you can make and mail a check out to First UMC of Newton, 111 Ryerson Ave., Newton, NJ O7860

God bless you all for your generosity which is vital to our mission and ministry.

Devotional, Previous Post

REVISITED: Human Again

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Read Daniel 4:8-33

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we will also bear the image of the man of heaven.” (1 Corinthians 15:49 NRSV)

One of my favorite Walt Disney films of all times is an animated film called, “Beauty and the Beast.” It is one of those rare stories that transcends its medium (e.g. animation) and reflects a truth and/or reality within its viewers. On the surface, the story is about a beautiful french peasant girl named Belle (whose name means beauty in French) who wants nothing more than to escape her present reality and live more than “this provincial life.”

Of course, based on the classic fairytale, we all know that Belle gets more than she bargained for. She finds herself locked up in a castle by a ferocious, hideous beast. Overtime, though, the Beast finds himself falling in love with Belle and, in turn, Belle finds herself falling in love with the Beast. It is, of course, that mutual love between them that will lift the curse on the beast and his castle, and will transform him from a beast into who he was created to be, a charming prince.

What I love about this tale is not so much the “happily ever after” end of it, but in the dark reality that leads up to the need for a “happily ever after.” In the Walt Disney version, each of the characters are shown to have inherent flaws. The prince, at the outset of the film, was cold-hearted and self-centered. When a beggar woman came to him to seek shelter from the cold, he rejected her because of her haggard appearance. Of course, that woman was really an enchantress and she cursed the prince, making his external appearnce match his internal self: a cold-hearted, fercious beast.

His court ended up cursed with him. While they had nothing directly to do with prince’s wicked actions, they were cursed as well. Perhaps some were undeserving of the curse but, as is often the case, they suffered the consquences of the sins and evil of someone else. Some of them were cursed to be transormed into the objects that represented their daily duties. For instnace, the maid became a feather duster, the head master the staff and spokesman for the prince, became a clock. The womanizing servant Lumiere became a candelabra. In essence, the very castle that objectified its subjects, and saw people as a means to an end, became doomed to be objects as well.

Moving beyond the prince, the other characters are imprisoned by their flaws too. Gaston is imrisoned by his own vanity and pride. LeFou, Gaston’s sidekick, is imprisoned by his desire to have status by virtue of his association with Gaston. The townspeople are imprisoned by their fears and ignorance. Maurice, Belle’s father, is imprisoned by is preoccupation with his inventions, allowing them to take precedence over his time with his daughter. Finally, Belle is imprisoned by her desire to have more than what she currently has. She doesn’t want to be stuck living the simple life, with simple people, settled down in a family that keeps her from exploring the world.

In the Broadway play, as the Beast and Belle start to fall in love, there is a musical number that the enchanted objects (e.g. Lumiere, Mrs. Potts, Chip, Cogsworth, etc.) begin to sing entitled, “Human Again.” Seeing that the Beast and Belle have begun to understand what actually means to selflessly love, there is hope that the kingdom can be restored back to being “human again.” The heart of this song has an important message for us all. If we are to be truly human again, if we are to be as we were created to be, we will be consumed by selfless, unconditional love. In the meantime, we are only shadows (some of us even beastly shadows) of our true selves.

While not everyone will learn what it means to be love, those who do will be restored to their true humanity. Jesus Christ showed us what it means to be truly human, and what we need to do in order to be truly human again. Our challenge is for us to study Jesus teachings and examples one what it means to be love, and to begin to allow Christ, through the Holy Spirit, to perfect us in being truly human again. Let’s not  just admire Christ, but begin to live and love like him.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“Like a real human does, I’ll be all that I was on that glorious morn when we’re fin’lly reborn, and we’re all of us human again!” – Alan Menken and Tim Rice, “Human Again”, Beauty and the Beast

PRAYER
Lord, free me from everything that is keeping me from being truly human. Amen.

Devotional

Christian Living Translated

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Read Philippians 2:12-18

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“Be careful to live properly among your unbelieving neighbors. Then even if they accuse you of doing wrong, they will see your honorable behavior, and they will give honor to God when he judges the world” (1 Peter 2:12 NLT).

Christian living can be such a wonderful experience, one that helps one to learn, to grow, and to become transformative in the world around them; however, it can also seem near impossible to live as a Christian in today’s world, given all of the different things vying for our worship, let alone where to begin. Of course, this has always been the case and is not exclusive to our time; however, our time does present a number of unique challenges that other times and periods did not present.

I remember that, as a kid, I used to truly aspire to live a Biblically-based life. By kid, I mean when I was in my formative years leading up to my mid teens. Once I hit, 16 years old or so, I began to seek out my own religious identity apart from that of my parents; still, leading up until that point, I always aspired to please Jesus even though I realize I was far from perfect at that. Truthfully, even as a wayward teen, I never sought to displease Jesus or God, it’s just that I began to seek Ultimate Reality out for myself.

As a kid, I would try to read the Bible from front to back because that is how I was taught books were read. I didn’t realize that method didn’t work in all regards and the Bible was one of those books that a front-to-back reading wasn’t necessarily the most efficacious. I wasn’t taught in Sunday School, or church for that matter (to my recollection), that I could read the Bible in any order I wanted to and that the Bible doesn’t read chronologically from front to back. 

For instance, the first five books of the Bible tell of Creation and the first peoples to inhabit the earth. It shares of the founding of the faith in Yaweh and how Yahweh planned to bring redemption into the world through that faith. Laws and ways of living were established in those early books; however, then the Bible goes off into history, then legen, then poetry, then prose, then prophecy, with other earlier accounts such as Job dispersed in between.

I wasn’t taught that praying DID NOT require bowing one’s head and dropping to one’s knees at specific times, but that prayer can be an ongoing, sometimes outloud, dialogue with Jesus in the shower or driving down the road. I wasn’t taught that failure is a required ingredient to success and that perfection didn’t happen overnight, but was an ongoing process.

My mom, God bless her, taught me some of those things. For instance, one of the ways she used to read the Bible was to pray for guidance and then to open the page to a random place and start reading. What a powerful and trusting way to approach Scripture. One can also read it by following the Chronology of the stories being told. There are a plethora of ways to approach Scripture in meaningful and meditative ways.

The same is true with every aspect of Christian living, not just reading Scripture and prayer. Evangelism, for instance, need not be handing out awkward tracts to people and telling them to “turn or burn”. In fact, that is the LEAST effective way of evangelism and one that has been the least employed in the church’s most successful moments. Evangelism, rather, is the sharing of Jesus Christ in ways that are relevant to whom one is sharing Him. This can be done with words, with actions, with silent presence, and most certainly by example. 

If one knows you are a Christian, trust me when I say that they are most definitely watching how you live and act. This is not necessarily true as to determine whether you sin or not, but whether or not you LIVE UP to the values you preach. If you are graceful, loving, compassionate, present, and a peacemaker among those you know, they will begin to associate those things with your faith; however, if you are the opposite of what you preach, you will be seen as a fake or, worse yet, your faith will become associated with those things.

The fact is that it important to daily engage in Christian living. The disciplines of studying Scripture, praying, partaking in the life of the Church, fellowshipping and being in accountability groups, observing the ordinances of God (Holy Communion, worship, etc.), sharing one’s faith and more are all vital to cultivating the true Christian life. Let us, as Christians, not shy away from doing so but actually double down in doing so. We can do so that both honors Christ and respects the people and culture to whom we are sharing. Let us take our faith seriously so as to not waste the grace God has given us to be transformed and participate in making more disciples of Jesus Christ for the tranformation of the world!

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“The Christian faith never exists except as ‘translated’ into a culture.” – David Bosch

PRAYER
Lord help me translate the Christian life into my context so that I may be transformed and, as such, be transformative for your glory in the lives of others. Amen.

Devotional, Previous Post

REVISITED: Born to Follow Revisited (An Alternate Perspective)

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Read Galatians 3:23-29

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE

“So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other.” (John 13:34)

Along with being a pastor and a chaplain, I am also the co-coordinator of the district youth team in the district that I am serving. As the District Youth Co-coordinator, I am act as a bridge between the youth in each of the local congregations within the district. This past weekend I co-led a district wide Open-Mic Night which turned out to be a wonderful evening of listening to all of the many talents that came out and shared their gifts. I also performed and, being that I just recently wrote about it, I chose to perform Bon Jovi’s “We Weren’t Born to Follow”, among others.  It really is an awesome song and it is a lot of fun to sing to. So, I gave that song my all and enjoyed rocking out to it.

Prior to singing the song, I explained to the people present that I had just written a devotion about the song, and how we ARE actually BORN TO FOLLOW. We are born to follow the ONE who created us. We are born to follow LOVE and to be LOVE wherever we may go. I basically succinctly summed up what I had written in that devotion, because I feel that it is important to take the stigma off of following. There is NOTHING wrong with being a follower…depending on who or what it is that one is following.

But I didn’t end it there, as I had in the last devotion. It is absolutely true that WE ARE BORN TO FOLLOW, that we were made in our Creator’s image, and were born to follow the example and the path that our Creator laid before us. That being said, Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora weren’t talking about that when they both wrote the song; rather, they were talking about following what others tell us about ourselves…about following in line with who and what world tells us we are. I am not sure where Jon and Richie stand spiritually, especially regarding this song; however, there is definitely some wisdom to be found in their words.

This world often tells us that we ought define ourselves based off of what we do for a living, based off of our status in life, based off of what community we live in, based off of our income, and based off of other such things. The world tells us how thin to be, how pretty to be, what clothes to wear, what foods to eat, and how to continue to hollow ourselves out into shallow, empty shells with no purpose or meaning to fill our lives. If we turn to the world we learn about might makes right, strength (aka force/violence) equals peace, and that there is a pecking order that we need to submit ourselves to.

But WE ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY WERE NOT BORN TO FOLLOW THE WORLD!!!! We were born to follow God, in whom there is no longer Jew or Greek or French or Iraqi or Russian or American. We were born to to follow God, in whom there is no longer slave or free, male or female or transgendered or whatever other label the world wants to impose on each of us. That is not to say that we should ignore the unique value of each individual, or that we should pretend we don’t have differences, but that we should stop limiting our sights to the “labels” that we use to define each individual!

In the end, we are all CHILDREN OF GOD! That’s what matters! Each one of us was born a child of God, which makes each one of us related to each other in and by the Spirit of God. We weren’t born to follow the World’s labels or definitions. We weren’t born to follow the things of this world but, rather, were were born and are called to follow our Creator who had deemed us to be one, to be united as kin! Let us stop getting hung up on what the world tells us to think and/or to do, and let us preoccupy ourselves with following the ONE who created us with a purpose and a plan in mind: TO LOVE ONE ANOTHER AS GOD HAS LOVED US!

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead.” – Oscar Wilde

PRAYER
Lord, help me to tear down the walls of division in my heart. Heal me and teach me to love others as you love me. Amen.

Devotional, Previous Post

REVISITED: Born to Follow

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Read John 21:15-22

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps.” (1 Peter 2:21)

It is no big secret that my favorite band in the world is Bon Jovi and that I have been listening to them faithfully for almost as long as I can remember. As a boy, I heard their songs on the radio and loved it every time they came on. My parents, who wouldn’t just buy me anything I wanted, allowed me to listen to them (and even bought me some of their albums) because, for the most part, their lyrics were clean and often inspirational…especially to a young boy from Jersey.

This band, which is also from New Jersey, have written and recorded 12 studio albums, have sold more than 100 million records worldwide, and have performed more than 2,700 concerts in over 50 countries for more than 34 million fans. Over the years, their music has spoken to me in many ways. With all of the ups and downs that comes with life, there is literally a Bon Jovi song for each of them. That is powerful stuff, and that is why they have been so successful. People can relate!

With that said, in 2009 Bon Jovi released the single, “We Weren’t Born to Follow” from their album “The Circle.” The song itself delivers everything a Bon Jovi fan has come to expect from the band. The lyrics are calling for people to become leaders, for people to pick themselves up off the ground and live life to it’s fullest no matter what comes their way. The chorus of the song is as follows: “We weren’t born to follow, come on and get up off your knees. When life is a bitter pill to swallow, you gotta hold on to what you believe. Believe that the sun will shine tomorrow and that your saints and sinners bleed. We weren’t born to follow, you gotta stand up for what you believe.”

At first glance, one might be questioning what is wrong with those lyrics. They seem to have a positive message and seem to be pushing people to be independent and to persevere; however, it is in that message that lies the problem. The lyrics are very heavily self-reliant. “We weren’t born to follow” implies that being a “follower” is bad and being a “leader” is good. Yet, I find these lyrics to be inherently backwards.

WE ARE BORN TO FOLLOW. God created us in God’s image and has been calling us to follow God’s way of living…of loving. It is is when we think we are INDEPENDENT…it is when we think that we can DO IT ON OUR OWN, that we run into trouble. It is our thinking that WE are the answer to our problems and self-reliance is the key to surviving life that leads us down a road that not only hurts others, but also brings us to the brink of self-destruction.

God has called us to lead in being followers. With God as OUR leader, we are called to lead others in following God…in following LOVE. That is the key to not just surviving life…but living it abundantly. So long as we are following the ultimate source of LOVE we will never be led astray and that LOVE will pick us up and carry us when we fall. God is not calling us to a life of INDEPENDENCE, but rather to a life DEPENDENT on GOD.

Like any parent, God wants us to live abundant and fruitful lives and wants us to recognize the source of our lives. If we fail to do that we will never see the great hope that lies within us, nor will we see the great hope that lies within others. Today’s challenge is to recognize that God is with you, that you are dependent on God, and that God is calling you to follow in order that you might lead others, by example, to a life of following!

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“One cannot lead without first having followed.” – Rev. Todd R. Lattig

PRAYER
Lord, I submit myself to you and follow your lead. Lead me toward following your example and leading others to do the same. Amen.