In The Midnight Hour

Have you ever been in bed and the phone goes off? Maybe it is a text, and you think, “What time is it? Who in their right mind is texting at this hour of the night?” Then another text comes in, and then the phone rings. You finally answer, and they say, “Were you asleep?” “No, I was detailing my car at 1:00 in the morning. Yes, I was asleep!” The voice asks, “Can you help me?” You do not think the request is that important for the time of the call, and you decline. The phone rings again. Your spouse asks who it is, and you hear your children move around. You do not answer, and it rings again. You finally get up and help just so the phone will stop ringing. You might have an idea of what was going on in Luke 11:5-8.

Your friend has a friend that shows up, and he want to be hospitable but has no bread. Your friend comes to you at midnight to ask for some bread. You and your family are in bed. You do not want to get up and disturb everyone, but he keeps asking. You cave because he keeps asking. What a persistent friend! I want a persistent friend if he is trying to help me but not one who is waking me up at midnight.

Why would Jesus tell this? Before our lesson, in verses one through four, Jesus is teaching His disciples to pray. After our lesson, in verses 9-13, we have more instructions about prayer. So, in context, the lesson is about prayer. What about prayer? Persistence in it. Do you only “pray” when a prayer is led in Sunday morning worship? Do you only pray in emergencies? We are called to devote ourselves to prayer (Colossians 4:2). This is not a magic formula that will give you what you want. It is a lifestyle that is trusting in God. We tell Him our wants and trust that He knows best. Ultimately our desire is God’s will and His glorification. How is your prayer life?

A Reminder

It is that time of year again where soon we will gather with family that we may have not seen in a while. Some will gather together to perhaps eat turkey, or stuffing, or vegetables, or that nasty red jello cranberry stuff (You folks need special prayers lol). Some might watch some football or, if the weather is right, go out and throw the old pig skin around. Some might get the newspaper and prepare to go out Friday and fill the Christmas lists they have been given. Some might go hunting or just sit around and reminisce of days gone by. Though none of those things are necessarily wrong, what is the holiday called? Thanksgiving.

As Christians, we should be thankful daily and not just in one season of the year. This season can serve as a good reminder to be thankful. It can be easy to focus on the things that are wrong in my life and lose perspective on how truly blessed I am. Maybe a simple example of this is a Thanksgiving meal. It is loaded with everything you love, but it has that cranberry stuff. You do not like that stuff, and you complain about why anyone would have it. Nobody likes it. It is just ruining this feast. Are you missing the feast because you cannot get past the cranberry stuff? Not only are you missing the feast, but how many meals have you eaten before that have gotten you to this point? If we truly counted our blessings, we would see we have so many in our lives. No one has a perfect life, but do not miss the blessings (we all have) because of that fact.

Who in your life should you express gratitude to? Spouse, parents, children, family, friends, co-workers, bosses, employees, neighbors, those who provide a service for you (mail person, waitress, cashier, etc). The list could truly go on and on. The most gratitude we should show is to God. He has blessed us more than we could ever imagine (Colossians 3:17).

Disguised as a Stick

Last week I shared some lessons from cleaning up the brush pile behind my shed. This week I would like to share another. One of the reasons I wanted to clean the pile up was that I was concerned it might house snakes or fire ants. Well, my suspicions came true as I was raking up a pile of sticks. One of the sticks bent funny and then came by my leg. I hollered at Noah, “Snake!”, and we proceeded to take a break from clean up. I had not seen a snake until that point, and I was close to the end of the pile and was ready to be done. Maybe I had let my guard down, but I put it back up when the “stick” moved. That is all I thought it was until it came by my leg. Guard back up.

As Noah and I were talking about it later on, we were trying to figure out a spiritual application for this incident. When you have to write an article for the bulletin every week, you are always looking for an idea for an article. I remembered 2 Corinthians 11:14 which says, “Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.” What I thought was just a stick, like all the other sticks, was not, in fact, a stick. Have you ever been there, when what you thought you saw, heard, or believed in reality was not. Have you had that happen spiritually?

Maybe it is a movie, show, or song, and everybody is raving about it. So you watch or listen, and they take the Lord’s name in vain or there is an inappropriate sexual situation or they are glamorizing some sin. What do you do? Everybody says it is a great show, and you were really excited about it. Maybe it is a relationship that starts out as just some common interests, but the friendship grows until you really like the other person. Then you find out they are not a very Godly influence on you. What do you do? Be careful! Something that looks good may be a snake hiding in a bunch of sticks.