Dear Friends,

In the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle, David sent Joab with his officers and all Israel with him; they ravaged the Ammonites, and besieged Rabbah, but David remained at Jerusalem (2 Sam 11:1).

We greet each other in friendly terms. He is the CEO of my client. I am the attorney for the corporate board. We haven’t always agreed, but we have worked together for a long time. I have been requested by the board to make this appointment to deliver some news.

“What’s on your mind?” he asks me.

“I’m here to talk about what’s in the file,” I say. “I think you should read it first.” I lean forward and push the file across his desk. He picks it up, opens it and begins to read as I watch him in silence.

He is a star at the zenith of his career — charismatic, successful, distinguished family, astute business strategist, husband and father, respected church and community leader.  The business has become dominant in its market since he took over its management.

But there were reports that he was “coasting,” taking “shortcuts” with expense reports, customers, contracts, and female employees. An audit has revealed discrepancies that cannot be overlooked.

He begins to argue, “It’s not what it looks like . . . the auditor is mistaken . . . do you have any idea what I’ve sacrificed for this company?!?” Read more »

Dear Friends,

And, besides other things, I am under daily pressure because of my anxiety for all the churches (2 Cor 11:28).

Paul is the apostle who famously wrote, “Do not worry about anything” (Phil 4:5). Yet, here he is confessing to anxiety, something that Scripture is adamant against. The most frequent command uttered by Jesus Christ on this earth was “Don’t be afraid.” David wrote, “I sought the Lord, and he answered me, and delivered me from all my fears” (Ps 34:4).

There are obviously a lot of things on Paul’s mind. The “other things” he references in our text are his experiences of imprisonment, flogging, stoning, shipwrecks, floods, bandits, persecution by Jews, persecution by Gentiles, urban crime, wilderness survival, betrayal by associates, sleep-deprivation, hunger, thirst, and destitution (2 Cor 11:23-27). Paul would score over the top on any stress test, but that’s not what has him worried.

He’s concerned about the churches that he’s established in cities around the Mediterranean. That doesn’t mean buildings. Architecture can express praise and evoke reverence, but it never led a soul to the Lord despite the fortunes spent on it.

Paul is concerned about the Body of Christ composed of the men, women, boys, and girls in homes and store fronts who have listened to Paul and his companions in ministry and have been persuaded to commit their lives and fortunes to Christ. Their congregations are assemblages of Jews and Gentiles, males and females, slave and free, barbarian, Scythian, circumcised and uncircumcised, for whom devotion to Christ has become the focus of their lives united them despite their differences (Gal 3:28; Col 3:11). Read more »

Dear Friends,

The Lord’s Prayer is a hearty and helpful companion in my experience. I have no idea when I first learned it, unlike Psalm 23 which I learned from my Mom when I was four and recited in our little church. Both Scripture passages have personalized, enriched and illuminated my understanding of our heavenly Father and his Son, Jesus Christ, who he sent to redeem us from sin and death.

We would each pray in turn in our family worships. My Dad would always pray last and he would frequently conclude by praying, “May we see Thee returning soon in the clouds of heaven so that we can go home and live with the One who taught us to pray, ‘Our Father who art in heaven . . . .” We would all join in saying the Lord’s Prayer together at that point. That’s where I must have learned the prayer in the King James’ English that my Dad repeated with a tender reverence that will always be the tone and pitch in which Jesus’ words sing to my heart.

I came to think of the prayer as a blanket covering our family with the love and protection of our heavenly Father. Fifty years later, I pray with modern language, but I still like to pull that prayer-blanket close around me as I lie in bed at night after a difficult day, driving to work or while hiking up a steep trail in the mountains. It is a profound blessing to know that I have a Father in heaven holding my loved ones, friends, and even enemies in the encircling embrace of “Our Father.”

Reading C.S. Lewis taught me about “festooning” which means to add your own thoughts and concerns at each phrase of the prayer to make it personal. This is something like, ” ‘Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” including that difficult conversation that I will have today, and in my relationships in the law firm and at the University, especially _____ who is having such a hard time right now. ‘Give her today, the daily bread and sustenance that she needs to make it through . . . .” and so on. You get the point. Read more »