The GODfather

An old, white haired man sits in a metal chair in the front yard of a Sicilian villa. It appears to be about midday and he just sits there quietly. Suddenly he grabs at his chest in apparent pain, wrenches forward, and falls out of the chair onto the dirt. No one rushes to his assistance. No one cries over his demise. As the lights slowly dim, the familiar strains of a haunting theme song are heard in the background.

Almost everyone will recognize that as a description of the final scene in Godfather III. Michael Corleone, once the most powerful Mafia Don in New York, dies as a recluse, alone and forgotten, self-exiled in Sicily. For decades he ruled: the Corleone family as its violent, ruthless Godfather. He took brutal revenge on anyone he perceived as his enemy, including family members, and disowned people he felt crossed him, even his own wife.

The Corleone family is a dog eat dog system filled with anger, pride, betrayal, and focused on greed, wealth and the acquisition of power at all cost. It's a place where everyone keeps watch over their shoulder, and no one is safe, not even children. There is no room for individuality, creativity, or differences of opinion. The Godfather’s will is all-pervasive and governs everyone's life.

Contrast the Corleone family with this family. A father has 2 sons and his younger son, who is quite full of himself, decides he wants to go “do his own thing.” He is so self-centered and brash that he goes to his father, demanding him to finance the venture by giving him his inheritance in advance. Although the father can predict the outcome, he calmly grants his son the request. He respects his young son enough to allow him to make his own decisions, and doesn't force his will upon him.

The younger son moves to a major city and immediately begins living “the high life.” He has a luxurious penthouse apartment, wears designer clothes, is chauffeured in a limo, and always has a beautiful woman draped on his arm. Things couldn't be better and life couldn't be sweeter! He never thinks about his father, thanks him or even returns his phone calls.

Eventually the son runs out of money, friends, clothes, and wheels. He is homeless, and eats his meals at a local rescue mission. The only job he can get is night janitor at seedy nightclub. He spends his time sweeping broken glass, mopping up spilled beer, and cleaning vomit out of the latrines. He has lots of time to think about home, and to realize how good he had it when he was living there.

He decides to return home, determined to be grateful for the most menial job in the family business. Can you imagine how this son would be welcomed by the Corleone family? He’d probably be shot at first sight! But this father has a different idea of what being a father is all about. In fact he is been looking and eagerly waiting for his younger son to return every day. When he sees his son walking up the driveway, he runs to him and embraces him, kissing him repeatedly. Without reservation, this father immediately reinstates his son to his former place in the family and throws a big party to welcome him home.

Many of you have heard this story before. It's referred to as the Prodigal Son, and was told by Jesus to help us understand how Father God, the true GODfather loves each one of us, and welcomes us to His family. (Luke 15:11–32)

Let me ask you a question. Which Godfather would you prefer to have?

Come join us this Sunday at 9:00 AM or 11:00 AM. We will continue our discussion on “The Christlike Family,” and discover the type of family created by the true GODfather.

All in the Family?

Just what is a family? It sounds like a simple enough question, but these days the answer may not be so straightforward. Back in the 1950s and 1960s when Leave It to Beaver and Father Knows Best were popular TV shows, it was easy to identify the family. There was a father, who was a breadwinner, and a mother, who was a homemaker, and usually several children, all living under one roof. While the ghost of that family constellation may still linger with us, today less than 15% of American families fit that model.

Our current divorce rate is twice as high as it was in 1966, and 3 times as high as it was in 1950. The number of single mothers and their dependent children is 3 times more than it was in 1960, and 1 in 3 children is born out of wedlock. Today married couples make up barely 50% of the households in the United States, down 25% since 1970, and over half those married couples do not have children. A quarter of all American adults are single and live alone.

The family used to be viewed as a safe haven where members could experience some degree of security and protection from outside forces. Parents were generally considered wise and capable enough to resolve the minor conflicts that arose within the family. On today's TV reality shows it’s sometimes difficult to determine who are the children and who are the parents, at least by their behavior. Minor family conflicts have now escalated into adultery, incest rape, alcoholism and drug addiction.

The family experience of some children is anything but what might be considered typical. Many children, 1.5 million to be exact, have one or both parents incarcerated in prison. The average age of these children is 8 years old, and quarter of them are under the age of 5 years. Currently half a million children are placed in foster care and only 25% of those are living with a relative. One half of these children are never reunited with their parents, and 53% of them spend more than one year in foster care.

These statistics hardly represent the image God had in mind when He instituted the family. Scripture makes it clear that God's design for the family involved marital fidelity, mutually loving and respectful relationships between husband-and-wife, and a protective, encouraging environment for children. (Genesis 2:22–24; Ephesians 5:22–6:4; 1 Peter 3:1–7) in fact, God originally intended that the family would provide an accurate representation of His relationship with us as a loving Heavenly Father and His children.

What are all the situations that are included in your family? No matter what condition your family is in, God wants to heal your relationships, and restore them wherever that is possible. He wants to give you a hope about your future relationships as well. He is the God of all comfort and desires to restore peace and joy to you and all your family members.

Please join us this Sunday at 9:00 AM or 11:00 AM, as we look at all that is contained in the family as God designed it. This is our second installment in our current series, “The Christlike Family.”

The Mother Nexus

With Mother's Day approaching, the conversation at our last church staff meeting just naturally turned to mothers. Everyone had memories to share. Many of them focused on the wonderful foods their mother cooked or how she kept alive various family traditions. One staffer remembered how his mother always included a special treat in his school lunch along with a note signed with a heart and the word “Mom.” Another shared that his mom never missed a soccer game, and was always yelling encouragement from the sidelines. A third staffer recalled their annual family camping trip to Yosemite, and how her mom managed to pack food, supplies and clothing for a family of 5 children, and never seemed to forget anything.

I smiled as I thought of my own mother, and how she always made my favorite Korean dishes for my birthday. I have a shoebox full of birthday cards that I received from her after I was an adult and left home. She never forgot one of my birthdays her entire life. As we listened to each other's stories, we all agreed that mothers are the nexus, the center and heart of the family. They keep everyone connected to each other and to the traditions of the family. They remember all the little details that mean so much, and they are the glue that holds everything together.

Interestingly, this image of binding together like glue is depicted in the Hebrew word for mother which is EM or IMA. It is composed of two Hebrew letters, “alef” and “mem.” The Hebrew letter “alef” is represented by an ox head, and represents strength or leader. The Hebrew letter “mem” is represented by the symbol for water. So the symbolic meaning of the Hebrew word for mother is “strong water.” The ancient Hebrews made a substance they called “strong water” by boiling animal skins down to a paste-like consistency that they used to attach things together. The Hebrew mother was like this “strong water” paste, as she created the bonds that united the family.

Proverbs 31 gives a beautiful description of this “strong water” mother:

She gets up while it is still night; she provides food for her family.

She considers a field and buys it; out of her earnings she plants a vineyard.

She sets about her work vigorously; her arms are strong for the tasks.

She opens her arms to the poor; she extends her hands to the needy.

She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is upon her tongue.

She watches over the affairs of her household.

She does not eat the bread of idleness.

Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also praises her.

(v. 15-17, 20, 26-28)

This is a picture of a strong, confident woman, who is equally competent at home and in the business setting. Her family is first, but she also has a heart for the poor and needy. She is full of wise counsel for her husband and her children, and they truly appreciate her. Although written several thousand years ago, this is a description of a completely modern mother.

Mothers are nothing short of amazing! Take time to show your mother just how much you appreciate her this Mothers Day. And if you are a mother, please remember just how very special you are!

Please join us this Mother's Day Sunday at 9:00 AM or 11:00 AM. We are beginning a new series on “Christlike Family,” and our topic this Sunday is “A Christlike Mother.”

Joy Unspeakable

A first grade teacher gave her class the beginning of some well-known proverbs and let them supply the endings. Here are a few of the results:

Strike while the……… bug is close.

Don't bite the hand……… that looks dirty.

A bird in the hand……… will poop on you.

A penny saved……… is not much.

If it first you don't succeed……… time to get new batteries.  

I hope that brought a smile to your face. We've been through so much bad news and hard times in the last few years, that we need to remember that life still is full of joy. Too often in the church we get focused on the problems and forget that we have a joyful, loving Father God watching over us.

Have you ever thought of God as joyful or having a sense of humor? He does you know. Let me give you a few examples. Take creation for instance. You have to have a sense of humor to create animals like a giraffe, an ostrich, a platypus or an aardvark. Think of the penguin, a bird that looks like a bowling pin in a tuxedo! And how about designing the bumblebee that defies all the laws of aerodynamics, and yet flies? Someone's getting a good laugh out of that!

Over and over again in the creation story, it says that God saw what He created and it was good. This is not a moral statement, but a pronouncement of pleasure. Did you ever make something that gave you great satisfaction and made you smile? That's exactly what God was feeling when He looked at what He had created. He was happy.

Think of the irony in the life of Christ. The God Who created the universe comes to earth incognito as a baby and is born in a stable. On top of that He spends 30 years anonymously in an obscure country village growing up and working as a carpenter. He has a completely ordinary life during that time, doing nothing that would suggest that He is God. Think of His next-door neighbors. How would you feel if you found out the guy living next door was God! Now that's one of the biggest “gotchas” of all time!

I know God is joyful. He's the one that first told us to smile. He tells us in Proverbs 15:13, “A happy heart makes the face cheerful;” and in Proverbs 15:30, “A cheerful look brings joy to the heart.” He knew the impact of joy and happiness on our health thousands of years before we did. He tells us in Proverbs 17:22, “A merry heart does one good like a medicine.”

We are repeatedly told in Scripture that where God is, there is joy and happiness. His joy is our strength (Nehemiah 8:10). When we are in His presence there is fullness of joy (Psalms 16:11). That means there is hilarity and laughter. Before He left, Jesus prayed that His joy would be in as and that our joy would be complete or overflowing (John 15:11).

God is joyful and happy, not scowling and angry. He wants us to know what makes Him the most joyful. It's when we trust Him and receive His gift of love, becoming His adopted child. Luke 15:10 says, “I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” Put a smile on God's face today by turning to Him and accepting His love.

Come join us this Sunday at 9:00 AM or 11:00 AM. We are very excited to have our special guest speaker, James Goll, a prophet and a seer.

Nothing Is Impossible

It was a day for the history books at Kitty Hawk in 1903. Orville and Wilbur Wright had just completed the first manned flight, covering 120 feet at 6.8 mph. Their triumphant accomplishment followed years of diligent work. If you had gone up to the Wright brothers that day and announced to them that in less than 70 years man would set foot on the moon, how would they have responded? I don't know for sure, but I think they might have looked incredulous and said, “Impossible!”
It was one of the first computers, designed for the military and state-of-the-art for its day in 1946. It weighed in at 30 tons and had 18,000 vacuum tubes, and when first turned on, it consumed so much power that it dimmed the lights in Philadelphia where it was located. How would those proud technicians have responded if you told them that in 60 years the average person would be carrying far more powerful computers the size of writing tablets in their briefcases? Again, I don't know, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear, “Impossible!”

We can grasp the possibility of things we can conceive or even imagine in our biggest dreams, but how do we gauge the possibility of something beyond our imagination? Today we are technologically savvy, but do we really have any idea what might exist in 10 or 15 years? If someone were to tell us now, what will be then, would we look at them and say, “Impossible”?

Today, as Christians, we face just that kind of situation. It's not about technology, it's about a promise that Jesus made to us before He left. After demonstrating in His ministry the will of Father God by healing all the sick who came to Him, Jesus told us in John 14:12, “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in Me will do the works that I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.”

What did Jesus mean? I think He meant exactly what He said. Jesus always made it clear that He never did anything on His own, He always received His power from Father God. I think He was telling us that the same actions were possible for us to do through the power of God's Holy Spirit given to us. Only one thing was required, that we believe the promise. Jesus said in Mark 9:23, “All things are possible for the person who believes.”

This is not the power of positive thinking. It is absolute trust in the living God who is all-powerful and willing to do good for us. As the apostle Paul reminds us, “nothing is impossible with God.” (2 Corinthians 3:18)

Physical healing at God's hand is controversial in the church. Despite the promise of Jesus, some Christians cannot conceive of God placing so great a gift in our hands. Besides, there are plenty of people who are prayed for who don't get healed, so how do you explain that? I can't provide a specific answer for a particular situation, but I can give a general answer that I think is accurate. We are on a learning curve. We are not learning how to heal because that is what God does. Rather, we are learning how to more deeply trust and believe His promises to us so that we may become conduits of His power to others. As we see God heal more people, our imagination expands and we grasp more of the possibility that formerly seemed impossible.

I invite you to join us this Sunday at 9:00 AM or 11:00 AM. We are discussing God's healing power for today in “No Longer Sick,” the latest in our series on, “The Great Exchange.” We will be having a healing service and are expecting God to do the impossible in our midst.

The Living Dead

Are you fascinated by "the living dead?" Currently they are very popular as seen in the success of the "Twilight" book and movie series. Reportedly, fans are attracted by the blend of romance and horror contained in the stories, as well as the idea that someone can keep living forever.

"Good vampires" like Edward Cullen, are a recent addition to a long tradition of folklore about "the living dead." Tales of vampire-like creatures have been around as long as human history. Literal belief in vampires was so strong in medieval Europe that fear amounting to mass hysteria took over the population for a period of time. Corpses were exhumed from their graves and stakes driven through their hearts in an effort to destroy the vampires that people believed existed.

While these creatures live on perpetually, their lifestyle is hardly one that most of us would envy. They must constantly feed their desire for blood in order to continue living, so their relationship with others is that of predator. They're constantly being hunted either by human beings or other creatures, so they are never at rest. They are usually portrayed as wandering, driven, basically unhappy creatures who are doomed to an eternal existence of hunt and be hunted that will never change.

While most people would agree that vampires are mythology and not reality, "the living dead" do actually exist. Outwardly they pass for normal, but inwardly they are driven, restless and often unhappy. Who are they? The Bible describes them accurately in 1st Timothy 5:6, "The person who lives only for themselves and their pleasure is dead even while they live." They seek wealth, power and the ability to do things their own way. But Proverbs 14:21 tells us: "There is a way that seems right to a person, but in the end it leads only to death." Their plans appear to give them what they want, but they end up feeling empty and futile again.

Are their desires wrong? You might be surprised to find out, not really. We were created by God to enjoy abundance and never be in want, to have dominion over everything on the earth and to control dangers and things that could harm us. So these desires are a natural God-given part of us. It is the way we try to fulfill these desires that is the problem.

God designed us to find the fulfillment of all our desires in an ongoing relationship with Him. He originally gave us the choice of partnering with Him or going our own way, and we chose to do it our way. But that choice is a living death because we can never find satisfaction in it. We are physically alive, but not really living.

This Sunday will be Easter, a time when we remember the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is the most important event in Christianity. Do you know why? John 5:24 explains it. "Jesus said, ‘I tell you the truth, those who listen to my message and believe in God who sent me have eternal life. They will never be condemned for their sins, but they have already passed from death to life’." Eternal life is full, abundant life now, and after our physical death, life continuing forever.

Are you among the living dead? This Easter Jesus Christ is inviting you to find abundant life in Him. Choose to leave the living dead. Choose Christ and start really living!

Come join us this Easter Sunday at 9:00 AM or 11:00 AM when we will be discussing, "No Longer Dead," another in our series on "The Great Exchange."

Who's in Control?

Very superstitious, writings on the wall

Very superstitious, ladder ‘bout to fall

Thirteen month-old baby, broke the lookin’ glass

Seven years of bad luck, the good things in your past

When you believe in things you don't understand

Then you suffer

Superstition ain't the way

("Superstition" by Stevie Wonder)

Are you superstitious? Before you immediately say, "Of course not!" stop for a moment and think about your behavior. Do you have a lucky number? Do you carry an object like a rabbit's foot, or charm, or hang a medallion or a crucifix from the rearview mirror in your car? Do you feel a little uncomfortable if you walk under a ladder, break a mirror, or a black cat crosses your path? Would you rather not fly on Friday the 13th? When you play sports, do you want to wear your "lucky shirt?" Do you check your horoscope every day?

Superstitions are beliefs that are not based on human reason or scientific knowledge. Primitive man often linked one event with another without understanding the process in the physical world that connected them. He would trust in magical thinking to protect him from things that he could not explain. For example a lightning bolt was thrown by an angry god and fertility was caused by a goddess. These gods and goddesses could be appeased or pleased by performing certain types of rituals or magic incantations.

As scientific explanations began to provide us with a more accurate understanding of how events occur in the natural world, superstitious behavior began to decrease in influence. With our current cultural emphasis on science and technology, we would expect that in modern society superstitions behaviors would disappear altogether, but they haven't. Superstitions continue to flourish.

Consider the fact that even today it is impossible to locate the 13th floor in a building. You can't pass by a fountain or a well that doesn't have a bunch of coins in it. We still cross our fingers for good luck and tell each other, "break a leg," before going on stage. Tourists visiting Ireland kiss the Blarney Stone and every baseball game we see the good luck ritual of each batter who comes to the plate. Many people believe they can get information about their future from tarot cards, palm reading or crystal balls, and carrying crystals to promote or avoid certain events has become popular.

Even though we have natural explanations for most things, we still have the desire to exert extra control to ensure that we avoid bad things and bring good things into our lives. I don't think this desire is based only on wishful thinking or superstition. We were originally created in God’s image for the purpose of having dominion in the earth. We were supposed to exert a positive influence over what happens here. We forfeited that power when we rebelled against God and chose our own way, but God did not give up on us.

When Jesus Christ came to earth, died on the cross and rose again from the dead, He actually paid the ransom to restore our dominion to us. Whether we realize it or not, God has placed the control of blessing and cursing back into our hands. He tells us, "See this day, I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Choose life that you and your descendents may live." (Deuteronomy 30:19) You're in control, what do you choose? Choose Jesus and live!

Come and join us this Sunday at 9:00 AM or 11:00 AM. Our current series is "The Great Exchange," and the topic will be, "No Longer Cursed."