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Worship - May 2021

Over the last couple of months, I have really enjoyed getting to know more of our church family through the phone calls that myself and the other pastors have been making. I have been able to build wonderful relationships with many of you, but there are still many others whom I have not even had the chance to meet yet. Just last week we were able to have our first true Bible Study Luncheon since I joined the Oakhill staff ten months ago, and I was able to meet for the first time several folks who have not been able to attend regular church services in over a year. In an effort to allow you all to get to know me a little better, I thought I would take this opportunity to share with you what my favorite passage of Scripture is.

I don’t know if pastors are supposed to have “favorite” Bible verses or stories, but mine is found in Exodus 3. It’s the story of God speaking to Moses from the burning bush. The funny thing is that as a child I did not like this story at all. Let’s face it, God is mysterious. We can’t see Him, we can’t hear Him, we can’t touch Him. And to a child who was growing up in church but did not yet know God, He was especially mysterious. But here in Exodus 3 is the story of a guy who actually gets the chance to have a real-life conversation with God. And as part of that conversation, Moses asks the mysterious God of the universe, “Who are you?” Technically, Moses didn’t just come out and ask the question, he actually beats around the bush (pun intended) and asks the hypothetical question, “If I come to the people… and they ask me ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” (3:13). Now, keep in mind that God has already identified himself to Moses in this story as “the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” (3:6). But Moses takes advantage of this incredible opportunity and, wanting more information, essentially asks God, “Who are you?” or “What is your name?”.  This is a magnificent set of circumstances! But as a child, struggling to understand who God was, I was entirely dissatisfied with God’s answer.  I thought, “That doesn’t even make sense!”

But I am getting ahead in the story. Before I talk about God’s answer to this question, I want to briefly mention Moses’ previous question.  After being told that God is sending him to Egypt to rescue all of Israel from slavery (3:10), Moses asks God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Eqypt?” (3:11).  I absolutely love how God ignores Moses’ question.  God doesn’t address Moses’ qualifications or his abilities, God responds with “But I will be with you”. This isn’t the most exegetical interpretation of the passage, but I like to imagine God saying, “Moses, I’m well aware that you’re a nobody, but this isn’t about you. I’m going to be there every step of the way, and I’m the one that is going to make it happen, not you.”

So, after being put in his place, Moses realizes that God’s identity is infinitely more important to the situation than his own, so he asks the much more profound question, “What is [your] name?” (3:13). And God responds with “I AM WHO I AM.” (3:14).  Think about that for a second. As a child, I felt like God was teasing us. It would be sort of like walking up to someone and asking them “Who are you?” and they respond with “I’m me.” It’s just not helpful!

What I understand much better now than I did all those years ago is that God wasn’t ignoring the question this time, He was in fact revealing an awful lot about Himself. I don’t pretend to understand everything that God was saying by making this short, five-word statement. I know that I will better understand who He is one day, but for now, here is how I see it. You and I have names because someone had the authority to give us our names. Giving a name is a privilege that falls upon parents who are tasked with raising a child that they have brought into the world.  But who could name God? Jesus has a name, which literally means “The Lord [I AM] is salvation”, but who gave him that name? The Father did. And even if someone could give God a name, what name could ever capture His majesty, transcendence, glory, power, righteousness, or His love?  Instead, He tells us “I AM”, or “I AM THAT I AM”. We could try to say it in one of these ways: He will be who He is, He will be who He has been, He always has been and always will be, or perhaps simply: He exists, or He is. Whatever else God is communicating about Himself through this name, he is making a statement that He is the self-existing, self-sustaining, never-changing God who is without beginning or end. I love this passage, what little I can comprehend of it, and I can’t wait to one day know fully, even as I am fully known.

Worship - April 2021

Right around the time when you receive this newsletter, we will either be heading into or just coming out of Easter weekend. Perhaps you have even found yourself reading this article on Good Friday, the one day of the year when we celebrate death. We will of course be celebrating a lot more than just the death of Jesus on this weekend, we will celebrate his resurrection, his victory over sin! But first, we celebrate his death.

When was the last time you sat down to contemplate and meditate on the death of Jesus? It is very good for us to meditate on his death. Maybe your mind is jumping to the film that came out several years ago, The Passion of the Christ. But I’m not really talking about the physical torture he underwent, or the gruesome way in which he was murdered. As heinous as the means of his death was, that is not what makes Jesus’s death unique or important. In fact, thousands of Jews were crucified during the first century, and by comparison, most of them probably suffered for a lot longer before they finally ran out of the strength required to lift themselves up and take a breath.

I think it’s fair to say that the most important thing about Jesus’s death is not what was happening in time and space on that hill outside of Jerusalem, but what was happening between God the Son and God the Father. There is a short drama, if you could call it that, that was composed many years ago, which I think helps us understand the transaction that finally culminated in the Son of God dying on a hill just outside of Jerusalem two thousand years ago. Though not lengthy, it is powerful. In fact, I remember where I was the first time I heard it several years ago, and I’ve been returning to it ever since. It was written by John Flavel, a 17^th century pastor, and this is his thought-provoking version of how the conversation between the Father and the Son could have gone. This short story, known as “The Father’s Bargain with the Son” reads as follows:

“Here you may suppose the Father to say, when driving his bargain with Christ for you:

Father: ‘My son, here is a company of poor miserable souls, that have utterly undone themselves, and now lie open to my justice! Justice demands satisfaction for them, or will satisfy itself in the eternal ruin of them: What shall be done for these souls?’

Son: ‘O my Father, such is my love to, and pity for them, that rather than they shall perish eternally, I will be responsible for them as their Surety; bring in all thy bills, that I may see what they owe thee; Lord, bring them all in, that there may be no after-reckonings with them; at my hand shalt thou require it. I will rather choose to suffer thy wrath than they should suffer it: upon me, my Father, upon me be all their debt.’

Father: ‘But, my Son, if thou undertake for them, thou must reckon to pay the last mite, expect no abatements; if I spare them, I will not spare thee.’

Son: ‘Content, Father, let it be so; charge it all upon me, I am able to discharge it: and though it prove a kind of undoing to me, though it impoverish all my riches, empty all my treasures… yet I am content to undertake it.’”