Are we having supper for lunch?
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Thursday, July 03, 2008
The Feeding of the 5000
Following on from my earlier post about "Loaves, fish, pride and burnout", here's a poem based on the feeding of the 5000 recorded in John 6:1-13...
I looked round about and saw lots of mouths
That needed all to be fed.
"It's lucky for me," (I thought to myself)
"That I brought my own fish and bread!
I think if I too was one of those folk
(And was waiting too to be fed)
It would take such a time to bring in supplies
That I think that by then I'd be dead!"
So I pulled out my food (five loaves and two fish)
And was about to dig into my tucker,
When I heard Jesus say (to someone nearby)
"Now - What are we planning for supper?"
The someone He spoke to seemed rather surprised
And nervously looked up and down:
"I'm not really sure we'll have enough cash...
And besides - it's a long way to town"
I looked round again at the mingling crowd
And looked down again at my bread
And thought to myself, "Well, it's not very much,
But... well - let it never be said
That there in the midst of that ravenous crowd
'Twas only me that was fed!
"I must surely do something - um - I'll give them some fish.
... No - in fact, I'll give them it all
It's not very much; it is hardly a drop
But ... it's better than nothing at all."
So I gave them my bread and I gave them my fish
(And it really looked rather small)
But Jesus just smiled and gave me a look
That made me feel seven feet tall!
He said a short prayer and called His disciples
Who handed the food round about.
And my five little loaves and my two little fish
Just never seemed to run out!!
Everyone there, in that whole crowd of people,
I can confidently say without doubt
Ate as much as they needed (and some even more):
An amazing - awesome - result!
I'd have never imagined; I'd have never believed
That such a small little thing
Could make such a difference - when it looked at first sight
That the little that I had to bring
Was tiny compared to a problem so large
That no-one knew where to begin.
But what I now know, what I've learned here today
Is there really is no such thing
As a gift that's too small to be used for great things
When placed in the hands of The King.
- Mark H (DelightInLight.com)
Note: This is one of a number of poems for Christian children that I have posted on this blog. If you want to see more of them, please have a look at this post: "Fun Poems for Kids"
You can also email a link to this post by clicking the mail icon below...
Sunday, June 22, 2008
No I'm Not!
While I'm online, I must tell you about what Lucia (aged 2) keeps saying these days. When ever anyone says "you're cute" or "you're a funny-bunny" or "you're ..." (just about anything else) - she always says "No I'm not I'm Lucia!"
No amount of attempted persuasion will convince her to accept that she's anything other than her name!
No amount of attempted persuasion will convince her to accept that she's anything other than her name!
The Mission
I can't believe that it's over a month since I last posted to this blog! Sorry about that!
Over the past few weeks I have been reading a book called "The Purpose Driven Church" by Rick Warren, and, whilst I don't necessarily agree with everything he says or recommends, I think that his fundamental point is a good one: if you want to have a healthy church, you need to understand what the Biblical purpose of the church is, and then make sure that you are doing that.
Rick Warren's starting point is a combination of the "Great Commission" (Matt 28:18-20) and the "Greatest Commands" (Matt 22:37-40).
This seems like a great starting point to me. According to the "Great Commission" we are supposed to go into the world and make disciples, baptise them, and teach them to obey Jesus' commands. Of all the commands that Jesus gave, the greatest are to "love God" and "love your neighbour".
In other words, the church's purpose (or mission) is to help people to move from wherever they are towards being more "obedient" to the great commands of loving God and loving others.
How that is actually put into effect depends on where the person is. This ranges from someone who is a "stranger" to the church to someone who is already a mature Christian. All of these people still need to move in the direction of greater love for God and each other. However, the things that the church can (should?) do to help changes depending on where the person is in that spectrum. Also, the extent to which it is the church's input (as opposed to the individual's own input) that brings about the change also varies.
Here's a sheet with couple of diagrams that I used to illustrate some of these points when I was speaking to our congregation about all this a few Sundays ago: Church Mission PDF. It shows some thoughts on how some of the different "stages" progress, some of the key things that are likely to be needed if the person is to move forward, how the input of the church and the individual varies over the different stages, and some examples of things that can "go wrong" at various points along the way.
We have just (today) introduced an additional study for those people in the congregation who are interested in pursuing some issues at more depth. We are currently finishing off a study on salvation, and then intend to move on to study this question of the purpose of the church and how we, in our congregation, can fulfil our mission more effectively.
Please pray for God's guidance for us on this so we can serve God as effectively as possible.
Over the past few weeks I have been reading a book called "The Purpose Driven Church" by Rick Warren, and, whilst I don't necessarily agree with everything he says or recommends, I think that his fundamental point is a good one: if you want to have a healthy church, you need to understand what the Biblical purpose of the church is, and then make sure that you are doing that.
Rick Warren's starting point is a combination of the "Great Commission" (Matt 28:18-20) and the "Greatest Commands" (Matt 22:37-40).
This seems like a great starting point to me. According to the "Great Commission" we are supposed to go into the world and make disciples, baptise them, and teach them to obey Jesus' commands. Of all the commands that Jesus gave, the greatest are to "love God" and "love your neighbour".
In other words, the church's purpose (or mission) is to help people to move from wherever they are towards being more "obedient" to the great commands of loving God and loving others.
How that is actually put into effect depends on where the person is. This ranges from someone who is a "stranger" to the church to someone who is already a mature Christian. All of these people still need to move in the direction of greater love for God and each other. However, the things that the church can (should?) do to help changes depending on where the person is in that spectrum. Also, the extent to which it is the church's input (as opposed to the individual's own input) that brings about the change also varies.
Here's a sheet with couple of diagrams that I used to illustrate some of these points when I was speaking to our congregation about all this a few Sundays ago: Church Mission PDF. It shows some thoughts on how some of the different "stages" progress, some of the key things that are likely to be needed if the person is to move forward, how the input of the church and the individual varies over the different stages, and some examples of things that can "go wrong" at various points along the way.
We have just (today) introduced an additional study for those people in the congregation who are interested in pursuing some issues at more depth. We are currently finishing off a study on salvation, and then intend to move on to study this question of the purpose of the church and how we, in our congregation, can fulfil our mission more effectively.
Please pray for God's guidance for us on this so we can serve God as effectively as possible.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Loaves, Fish, Pride and Burnout
It was my turn to speak at Church this past Sunday, and I spoke about the story in John 6:1-13 of the feeding of the 5000.
This story caught my interest because it includes the information that it was a "young lad" who gave the 5 loaves and 2 fish that Jesus used to feed that huge crowd of people.
There isn't very much recorded about that lad beyond that simple fact, but it seems to me that reading between the lines a bit draws out some interesting lessons that I need to keep reminding myself about. Of course, since these details aren't actually recorded in this situation, there is no way of knowing whether my assumptions were in fact true in that case. However, I think that they are general principles that are held up by other scriptures.
[1] - The first point that I noticed was that although there were so many people there, it seems that this lad was the only one who actually did something constructive to help to deal with the situation.
I don't know if it was just that he was the only one who happened to have food with him, but I suspect not. Either way, I think that it illustrates the point that God wants us to do something. Of course, He could achieve everything He wanted to through His own strength and action, but it seems that He has chosen to rather work through His servants (i.e. us). So we shouldn't just sit around wondering when God is going to get His act into gear and "feed the 5000" - rather we need to get up and do something to help.
In Isaiah 6:8, Isaiah illustrates this attitude when he says "here I am - send me". He was willing to get up and do something. Similarly, in Matt 9:37-38, Jesus calls for workers for the harvest - in other words, He wants people who are willing to actually get on and do something.
[2] - The second point was that it appears that this lad gave all that he had. It doesn't appear, from what is said in the passage that he kept any of his food for himself.
Again, whether or not this was actually the case in that situation, it is certainly true that God wants us to give everything. In Romans 12:1, for example, that we should give ourselves as a "living and holy sacrifice". I think that God wants us to see ourselves and everything we have as completely His. And, when we are thinking about how to use those resources, we should, as it says in Philippians 2, think about other people's needs and interests ahead of our own.
This seems to be the attitude that the lad in John 6 had - he put the needs of those other people ahead of his own need for that food. Unfortunately, far too often I am more like the rich ruler who wasn't prepared to accept Jesus instruction for him to sell all that he had and follow Jesus (see Luke 18:18-27) - I am happy, maybe, to entrust Jesus with 10%, but not 100%.
Maybe the problem is that I don't have the necessary faith in Jesus' promise in Matt 6:33 that if God's interests are what I "seek first" then those other needs will be met. It is interesting, isn't it, that that lad, in spite of giving away all his food, still ate his fill - the only difference was that everyone else also got to eat their fill as well.
[3] - The third interesting point was that the thing that the lad did was relevant to the situation.
I think that sometimes we have that attitude that since God can use whatever we do there's no need for us to worry about whether or not we're doing the right, or most appropriate, thing. Of course, it is true that God could use anything we do for His ends. If the lad had handed Jesus some stones, then Jesus could have turned those into food and fed everyone. However, the lad gave food - the best thing to give when the issue at had is that of feeding people.
Our abilities to think, reason and plan are just as much gifts from God any anything else, so it seems to me that we should be using those for His ends just as we should be using our other gifts. In Matthew 10:16-20, Jesus told His disciples to be as "shrewd as serpents". In other words, He wanted them to use their heads. However, along with that instruction, He promised that they would be given the words that they needed when brought before the authorities.
It seems that God wants us to use our intelligence in an attempt to serve Him in the best way, but not rely on that intelligence. We do our best - then He takes that and makes it good enough. That lad did his best: he gave food in a situation where food was needed - then Jesus took over and made it good enough to deal with the needs of the situation.
[4] - The fourth (and final!) point was one that I found particularly relevant to myself: that lad doesn't appear to have attempted to give more that he had to give. He gave what he had, yes, but he didn't then try to do anything more than that. Because he couldn't. He had no more food to give, and, as far as one can tell, he didn't then go off in a desperate attempt to find more food so that he could provide enough for all those 5000+ people.
In my society we are generally more interested in results that in effort. We are more interested in "what did you achieve" or "did you meet your objectives" than in "did you do all you can" or even "did you work hard". But that doesn't seem to be God's approach. In 1 Cor 3:4-9, Paul points out that God expects us to "plant" and "water" but He is the one who "causes the growth". I believe that we need to avoid the mind-set of trying to achieve things that only God can achieve.
That mind-set leads to two common problems: pride and burnout.
If we do something, and God achieves something through it, then we need to recognise that, as Paul says in 1 Cor 4:7, all we did was give back what God has given us. We didn't achieve it - God did. The lad didn't achieve the goal of feeding 5000+ people - Jesus did. The lad could hardly go have and boast about the fact that he had managed to feed 5000 people!
On the other hand, understanding this fact helps us to avoid stress and burn-out. Imagine if that lad had been given the task of sorting out the food for those 5000 people in that situation - he wouldn't have had a hope. If he had thought that he could then the stress of trying would probably have done him in! Similarly, we often look at things that need to be achieved in the world and try to take the burden of solving them on our own shoulders. And then we wonder why we cave in under the stress of it all. The problems around us are far too large to be fixed by us. There are many things that need to be achieved that are far too difficult for us to achieve - only God can achieve them. So we should give up trying. Rather we should give our "5 loaves and 2 fish" and then allow God to use them in whatever way He sees fit.
What God does with what we give may be in line with what we expect. Or it may not. He may do something large and impressive or He may do something small and (in our eyes) insignificant. Whatever it is, however, you can be sure that it will be right.
So those were the four points that I gleaned from reading between the lines of that story. Maybe I'm reading more into that particular story than actually happened, but I think the points are still valid. When we look around us and see things that need doing, we need to:
I hope that this encourages you to go ahead and give God your "5 loaves and 2 fish" - whatever they may be in your particular case. This website is part of my giving God my "5 loaves and 2 fish". What God will do with it I don't know. It may be something large or it may be something small - that's God's choice. My part is to use my skills to do things that I think will be useful to Him in a way that I think is most likely to be of use to Him. My part is to think about how I can use this site to serve others rather than to serve myself. My job is to be a tool. God's job is to use His tools to build things.
I hope that one day, when I am on my death-bed, I will be able to look back over my life and say that I gave God my loaves and fish.
This story caught my interest because it includes the information that it was a "young lad" who gave the 5 loaves and 2 fish that Jesus used to feed that huge crowd of people.
There isn't very much recorded about that lad beyond that simple fact, but it seems to me that reading between the lines a bit draws out some interesting lessons that I need to keep reminding myself about. Of course, since these details aren't actually recorded in this situation, there is no way of knowing whether my assumptions were in fact true in that case. However, I think that they are general principles that are held up by other scriptures.
[1] - The first point that I noticed was that although there were so many people there, it seems that this lad was the only one who actually did something constructive to help to deal with the situation.
I don't know if it was just that he was the only one who happened to have food with him, but I suspect not. Either way, I think that it illustrates the point that God wants us to do something. Of course, He could achieve everything He wanted to through His own strength and action, but it seems that He has chosen to rather work through His servants (i.e. us). So we shouldn't just sit around wondering when God is going to get His act into gear and "feed the 5000" - rather we need to get up and do something to help.
In Isaiah 6:8, Isaiah illustrates this attitude when he says "here I am - send me". He was willing to get up and do something. Similarly, in Matt 9:37-38, Jesus calls for workers for the harvest - in other words, He wants people who are willing to actually get on and do something.
[2] - The second point was that it appears that this lad gave all that he had. It doesn't appear, from what is said in the passage that he kept any of his food for himself.
Again, whether or not this was actually the case in that situation, it is certainly true that God wants us to give everything. In Romans 12:1, for example, that we should give ourselves as a "living and holy sacrifice". I think that God wants us to see ourselves and everything we have as completely His. And, when we are thinking about how to use those resources, we should, as it says in Philippians 2, think about other people's needs and interests ahead of our own.
This seems to be the attitude that the lad in John 6 had - he put the needs of those other people ahead of his own need for that food. Unfortunately, far too often I am more like the rich ruler who wasn't prepared to accept Jesus instruction for him to sell all that he had and follow Jesus (see Luke 18:18-27) - I am happy, maybe, to entrust Jesus with 10%, but not 100%.
Maybe the problem is that I don't have the necessary faith in Jesus' promise in Matt 6:33 that if God's interests are what I "seek first" then those other needs will be met. It is interesting, isn't it, that that lad, in spite of giving away all his food, still ate his fill - the only difference was that everyone else also got to eat their fill as well.
[3] - The third interesting point was that the thing that the lad did was relevant to the situation.
I think that sometimes we have that attitude that since God can use whatever we do there's no need for us to worry about whether or not we're doing the right, or most appropriate, thing. Of course, it is true that God could use anything we do for His ends. If the lad had handed Jesus some stones, then Jesus could have turned those into food and fed everyone. However, the lad gave food - the best thing to give when the issue at had is that of feeding people.
Our abilities to think, reason and plan are just as much gifts from God any anything else, so it seems to me that we should be using those for His ends just as we should be using our other gifts. In Matthew 10:16-20, Jesus told His disciples to be as "shrewd as serpents". In other words, He wanted them to use their heads. However, along with that instruction, He promised that they would be given the words that they needed when brought before the authorities.
It seems that God wants us to use our intelligence in an attempt to serve Him in the best way, but not rely on that intelligence. We do our best - then He takes that and makes it good enough. That lad did his best: he gave food in a situation where food was needed - then Jesus took over and made it good enough to deal with the needs of the situation.
[4] - The fourth (and final!) point was one that I found particularly relevant to myself: that lad doesn't appear to have attempted to give more that he had to give. He gave what he had, yes, but he didn't then try to do anything more than that. Because he couldn't. He had no more food to give, and, as far as one can tell, he didn't then go off in a desperate attempt to find more food so that he could provide enough for all those 5000+ people.
In my society we are generally more interested in results that in effort. We are more interested in "what did you achieve" or "did you meet your objectives" than in "did you do all you can" or even "did you work hard". But that doesn't seem to be God's approach. In 1 Cor 3:4-9, Paul points out that God expects us to "plant" and "water" but He is the one who "causes the growth". I believe that we need to avoid the mind-set of trying to achieve things that only God can achieve.
That mind-set leads to two common problems: pride and burnout.
If we do something, and God achieves something through it, then we need to recognise that, as Paul says in 1 Cor 4:7, all we did was give back what God has given us. We didn't achieve it - God did. The lad didn't achieve the goal of feeding 5000+ people - Jesus did. The lad could hardly go have and boast about the fact that he had managed to feed 5000 people!
On the other hand, understanding this fact helps us to avoid stress and burn-out. Imagine if that lad had been given the task of sorting out the food for those 5000 people in that situation - he wouldn't have had a hope. If he had thought that he could then the stress of trying would probably have done him in! Similarly, we often look at things that need to be achieved in the world and try to take the burden of solving them on our own shoulders. And then we wonder why we cave in under the stress of it all. The problems around us are far too large to be fixed by us. There are many things that need to be achieved that are far too difficult for us to achieve - only God can achieve them. So we should give up trying. Rather we should give our "5 loaves and 2 fish" and then allow God to use them in whatever way He sees fit.
What God does with what we give may be in line with what we expect. Or it may not. He may do something large and impressive or He may do something small and (in our eyes) insignificant. Whatever it is, however, you can be sure that it will be right.
So those were the four points that I gleaned from reading between the lines of that story. Maybe I'm reading more into that particular story than actually happened, but I think the points are still valid. When we look around us and see things that need doing, we need to:
- Do something - it may be small, but we should at least do something!
- Give our all - remember that everything we are and have belongs to God - put other people's interests ahead of our own.
- Act sensibly - God has given us brains: we should use them.
- Don't try to do what only God can do - if we try to feed 5000 people with only 5 loaves and 2 fish we will fail. Only God can do that. We are responsible for doing what we can do - God is responsible for achieving the results.
I hope that this encourages you to go ahead and give God your "5 loaves and 2 fish" - whatever they may be in your particular case. This website is part of my giving God my "5 loaves and 2 fish". What God will do with it I don't know. It may be something large or it may be something small - that's God's choice. My part is to use my skills to do things that I think will be useful to Him in a way that I think is most likely to be of use to Him. My part is to think about how I can use this site to serve others rather than to serve myself. My job is to be a tool. God's job is to use His tools to build things.
I hope that one day, when I am on my death-bed, I will be able to look back over my life and say that I gave God my loaves and fish.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Copyright Stuff
All content on this site is copyright (C) by Mark Henning (the author).
However, while it may be presumptuous of me to think that this is a possibility, it occurred to me that you may be interested in using the content on this site in some way other than just reading it here.
So, for that reason, permission is granted for you to use the material here for non-commercial purposes (unless it is content that is from another source, in which case the relevant copyright owner's terms will apply). If you do reproduce anything from this site, please, if at all possible, indicate where it come from ("Mark H : blog.DelightInLight.com" or something like that would be great). If it is on a website, then it would be even better if the attribution was also a link to this site.
Some examples of things you can do (should you want to) include (for example):
However, please don't republish any of my content (e.g. copying it and putting it on another site or publishing something from here in a book/magazine) without checking with me first to see if it's ok. If in doubt add a comment to this post asking for a clarification and I'll let you know it what you are intending is permissible.
However, while it may be presumptuous of me to think that this is a possibility, it occurred to me that you may be interested in using the content on this site in some way other than just reading it here.
So, for that reason, permission is granted for you to use the material here for non-commercial purposes (unless it is content that is from another source, in which case the relevant copyright owner's terms will apply). If you do reproduce anything from this site, please, if at all possible, indicate where it come from ("Mark H : blog.DelightInLight.com" or something like that would be great). If it is on a website, then it would be even better if the attribution was also a link to this site.
Some examples of things you can do (should you want to) include (for example):
- Print out a copy of something (e.g. one of the poems).
- Print out multiple copies of something for a Sunday School class or similar.
- Watch a video / view some pictures / read out a poem, etc. with/to a group of people (for example during a church meeting) - as long as you are not charging people for it, of course!
However, please don't republish any of my content (e.g. copying it and putting it on another site or publishing something from here in a book/magazine) without checking with me first to see if it's ok. If in doubt add a comment to this post asking for a clarification and I'll let you know it what you are intending is permissible.
Note that there permissions are not perpetual and I reserve the right to revoke or change them at any time either in general or for specific cases.
Thanks :)
Friday, May 16, 2008
Welcome to Visitors From Google :)
I recently received a Google AdWords voucher in a magazine, so I decided to try setting up an account and using it to advertise this site a little.
Up to now, this blog has mainly been read by my family and friends, so if you are a new visitor who has come via Google: WELCOME!
I know that it's easy to convince people like my mother, wife and kids that this blog is really really interesting, but I suspect that you are somewhat less biased, so I hope you find something of interest too. If you do, I hope that you will come back in the future and that there will be something new that will continue to interest you.
May I also request, if you are willing, that you go ahead and use the "email this post" option (the little mail envelope icon at the end of each post) to send a link to someone else who you may know who you think would be interested in a particular poem or post. Since this site doesn't actually earn me any income, my advertising budget is pretty much limited to the value of the voucher I got, so if you could help me along I would greatly appreciate it! Don't go too overboard though - I don't want to end by being the source of piles of the dreaded spam - please only send the link to people you know well enough to be sure that they won't mind.
Thanks for stopping by and I pray that I have, in some small way, helped to brighten your day today :)
ps. If you came here via Google (or even if you didn't, for that matter), why not add a comment to this post to say "Hi" and let me know what you thought? I'd love to hear from you.
Up to now, this blog has mainly been read by my family and friends, so if you are a new visitor who has come via Google: WELCOME!
I know that it's easy to convince people like my mother, wife and kids that this blog is really really interesting, but I suspect that you are somewhat less biased, so I hope you find something of interest too. If you do, I hope that you will come back in the future and that there will be something new that will continue to interest you.
May I also request, if you are willing, that you go ahead and use the "email this post" option (the little mail envelope icon at the end of each post) to send a link to someone else who you may know who you think would be interested in a particular poem or post. Since this site doesn't actually earn me any income, my advertising budget is pretty much limited to the value of the voucher I got, so if you could help me along I would greatly appreciate it! Don't go too overboard though - I don't want to end by being the source of piles of the dreaded spam - please only send the link to people you know well enough to be sure that they won't mind.
Thanks for stopping by and I pray that I have, in some small way, helped to brighten your day today :)
ps. If you came here via Google (or even if you didn't, for that matter), why not add a comment to this post to say "Hi" and let me know what you thought? I'd love to hear from you.
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