Author: Jon Gauger

The holiday we call Christmas is now in the rear view mirror.  Said another way, it’s a mere 362 days away.  Better get shopping!  Or not…

 

Our daughter and son-in-law do a terrific job of underscoring the Advent season.  Every night, they pull out a gorgeous rendition of the Christmas drama titled The Advent Book, which features fold out “doors” on every thick page each revealing a key scene in the biblical account of Christ’s birth. 

 

The book is passed around to their kids (who have now mostly memorized the whole story).  They delight in opening up the doors on every page revealing artwork and Scripture that propel the narrative along.  

 

We were privileged to be with the kids for several readings and observed five-year old Caleb’s interpretation of the visiting magi.  Like the rest of the kids opening the rest of the pages, he was anxious to demonstrate his mastery of the story.  With grinning certainty he catalogued the gifts given to the holy family: “gold, mercy and franklin.” 

 

We chuckled quietly, then observed at least two other occasions that Caleb insisted on mercy being one of the three gifts (“franklin” was later correctly modified to “frankincense”).  Intriguing that he swapped the gift order around, placing mercy right next to gold.  

 

Gold is an obvious gift. I’m not sure where the “Franklin” fits in.  But I do know we could all do with a little more mercy. And not just at Christmas. 

 

What if this year you were known as the most merciful person in your entire family? What if you were the most merciful person at your office?  What if this year your town initiated a Medal of Honor for displays of uncommon mercy—and you were the nominee?

 

Wouldn’t that be something?  It would.  It would also be expensive.   It might cost you a kind word to someone whose politics you despise.  It might cost you your quest for revenge over an injury decades old that still stings.  It might cost you an outrageous gift to someone you secretly feel is undeserving. 

 

Mercy is always expensive.  Ask Jesus.  “He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of His mercy.  He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.”

   —Titus 3:5

 

Christmas is over.  The New Year is upon us. 

Let mercy begin.  

How would you feel about leaving your family for six weeks?  There’s probably no cell phone coverage where you’d be going.  No internet either.  Those things require electricity, and there’s precious little of that where you’re headed.  That’s why you’ll be traveling with generators.

What if I told you your destination would be oppressively hot—more than 100 degrees—every day?  Travel will not just be rugged, but ridiculous.  Paved roads—not likely.  Cruising through shallow rivers and muddy creeks—a near certainty.   Did I mention that the danger doesn’t end once you arrive?  Often, that’s when it really begins.

This is the mission that workers sign up for when they join Theovision, the Ghana-based ministry whose aim is that everyone be able to hear the Bible in their own language. 

Theovision has so far recorded audio Scriptures in more than 370 languages spoken by over 75% of people in 36 African nations, reaching approximately 700 million people across Africa. But this progress comes at a price.

Many of these translations are done in hostile areas.  The recordings must sometimes be done at night and in secret.

As the Theovision team goes out with their audio equipment, they eat what the local people eat, speak as they speak, sleep as they sleep—even dress the way they dress.  All of this with the goal of making the gospel message available to people who have never heard the ultimate Good News.

To visit Theovision is to be amazed, caught up in a remarkable story-in-the-making.   But how very much like Christ Himself.

Did He not eat as we eat, live as we live and sleep as we sleep?  Did He not go to our weddings, weep at our funerals and taste the salt of our tears? All of this, so we might understand the ultimate Good news.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us…” 

                   –John 1:14

Merry Christmas!

It may be the world’s most unlikely worship band. 

Can I tell you about it?

I’d showed up for a regular appointment at a local senior retirement center.  For several years, they’ve let me serve them as a speaker at their Christian worship service, held Wednesdays at 11:00am sharp. Except this time, the start time wasn’t as sharp.

The fact is, we were late. Our piano player and sound technician (a husband and wife couple) were delayed.  A lot.  Fortunately, there’s a guy who owns a nice Bose radio, and he played a CD of reverent piano solos while we waited. And waited.

The canned music was calming, but not the voice of the lady who coordinates the service.  She was on the phone desperately trying to track down the missing keyboard lady and her husband.  Me, I was going over my notes, as I always do when getting ready to speak, scanning my iPad—lost to the world. That’s when it happened.

The Bose radio began playing the strains of the iconic hymn, Amazing Grace.  At first I thought I heard humming.  I glanced up from my notes and then heard one voice singing.  Then another.  

Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me.  Soon the whole room was alive with spontaneous singing.

I once was lost but now am found, ‘'twas blind but now I see.  This singing crowd, filled with wheelchairs and walkers, could not have been more sincere.  Or worshipful. They sang because they were gripped.  They sang because they’d connected. They sang because they couldn’t not sing.

Honestly, I was caught off guard by the lump in my throat. 

In a world of Chris Tomlin and Joel Houston and Hillsong United, these people reminded me that true worship doesn’t require projectors and screens and lights and guitars. 

True worship is a thing of the heart—with or without the official keyboard player.

 

 

 

 

At first it didn’t really sink in that Monday night. 

It was the last meal, the last time Diana and I would be with my parents in the home I grew up in.  They’d lived there since the sixties.  That's a whole lot of memories.  I stole away for a moment and took one last walk around.

The Sumac bush was still there, all sprawled out by the front porch. There in the front yard, we kids played sixteen-inch softball, learned the basics of football, and tossed lawn Jarts.   Seemed as big as Wrigley Field back then.

Turning toward the east corner, I came to the tall skinny evergreen behind which I shared my first kiss.

The peonies on the side of the house were gone. I remember the summer Mom and I were weeding around them.  I seized the moment to fake a concern for snakes in the grass (hardly likely in northern Illinois).  Having ratcheted up Mom’s pulse rate, at an opportune moment, I tickled her feet with a long stick—a chuckle neither of us have gotten over.

I ambled through the backyard garden space where one summer I followed up on a resolution to grow a watermelon.  Faithfully, I watered the sprawling vine and harvested exactly one small excessively seedy watermelon.  Yet it was remarkably sweet.

Meandering around the property I came to the collapsible picnic table Dad made, still latched to the wall.  To this day, I’m not quite sure how he designed and built it.  How many summer suppers did we eat out there?  Eight of us. Together.  Meal after meal.

I’m happy that Mom and Dad have a new home.  But leaving the old place is sort of strange. Nostalgia aside, it’s a great reminder that ultimately, our home can never be here on earth. 

Jesus said to His followers—then and now—“I’m going to prepare a place for you.  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me, that you also may be where I am.”

That’s where our real home is, and always has been. With Jesus.  Forever.    

Do you have a code of personal conduct?  George Washington did.  The father of our country wrote down his ideas in a collection known as “110 Rules of Civility.”  Among my favorites:

• Sleep not when others speak.

• Be no flatterer.

• Use no reproachful language against anyone; neither curse nor revile.

• Cleanse not your teeth with the table cloth napkin, fork, or knife; but if others do it, let it be done without a peep to them.

• Before and after drinking, wipe your lips.  Breathe not then with too great a noise for it is an evil.

• Bedew no man’s face with your spittle.

• Labor to keep alive in your breast that little spark of celestial fire called conscience.

Fascinated with George Washington, nine-year-old Joslynn decided to craft her own Rules for Civility during a recent sleepover at our house.  She spoke.  I typed.  Here are some Josie gems:

• Tell other people about Jesus at dinner.  Also…everywhere.

• If you are grounded, see if you can get out of it. Say, “I lost control of myself…I wasn’t thinking….or I forgot the calendar at the store.”

• If you’re at your grandfather’s house, eat cookies and milk on his lap if he wants you to.

• Don’t worry about your belly button.  It won’t pop off.

• Don’t be on your phone all the time.

• Read the Bible every day, like George Washington did.

• Don’t let your imagination make a mess.  Keep it in your room.  

It’s fun looking at civility through the eyes of a nine-year-old, though sad that it has nearly become a cultural fossil.  But civility matters. To God.  To us. It’s the life blood of any society.  Is it any wonder, then, that our culture is suffering from issues of the heart?   For true civility, the Bible is the ultimate resource.

"This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it; for then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have success.” 

 –Joshua 1:8

It’s the best part of traveling in West Africa: the signs on the local shops. Please note that the term, “shop,” may be a bit generous for much of what we’ve seen in Ghana.  Some of them are little more than rickety wooden roadside stalls.  But nearly all of them sport a creative (if not pretentious) name of some kind.  And a surprising number offer a Christian witness.

Just for our Thursday Thought readers, I jotted down a collection of some of the best. For example, there’s the “Power of Prayer Fast Food Shop.”  I wondered who’s the prayer for—the customers eating the food—or the workers serving it? 

If the soles on your shoes are worn out, you might consider a visit to the “God is Great Shoemaker Repair” store. 

We passed by a number of noteworthy electrical businesses:

• Great King’s Electrical
• Jesus I Know Electrical
• Thank God Electrical Works.

Another memorable sign grouping was observed in the beauty and clothing sector.  We drove past:

• The Lord is One Beauty Salon
• Clap for Jesus Barbering Salon
• Finger of God Fashions

But other skilled workers also showed up in shop signs like:

• Hand of God Metal Works
• Joyful Aluminum Works
• To God Be The Glory Brakes, Bands and Clutches

Some of the shop names puzzled me, such as “By God’s Grace Bar and Catering Service” (how does God’s grace intersect with a serving of whiskey?).  And I wondered what exactly is sold in the “Amazing Grace Cold Store.”   Also, what is the merchandise selection like at “The Yes of Jesus Mini Mart?”  And if they happen to run out of a particular item, do they offer a “no” at the “Yes of Jesus Mini Mart?”

The taxis in Ghana are also typically plastered with names as well.  Among some of our favorites:

• The Lord Provides
• God’s Way
• Take Side with Jehovah
• That All May Be One
• Man No Work—Man No Eat
• No Food for Lazy Man
• Heaven or Hell
• Decent (as in, “How was your ride?”  Answer: “Decent”)
• God is King

But the award for the best sign I saw in all of Ghana has to be this:

“Please give your life to Jesus.  For He is.”

If you’ve been looking for a sign from God—this is it!

From Ghana, with love,

– Jon

Her name is Sandra. She has no mother.

Looking at her, you would not know this about Sandra.  She smiles easily.    Generously.  I met Sandra in West Africa at a Moody Radio Global Partners Training event.  She was one of the students attending courses in the Radio Production track that I help teach in Ghana.

One of the best features of a Global Partners Training event is the daily “One on One” time we build into the schedule. Anyone attending can sign up for a timeslot with any of the presenters to talk about anything they like (typically job or ministry related).

One afternoon, Sandra showed up.  Now, in our seminars, we give practical assignments that are worked on in class, attempting to apply specific principals from the lecture.

Earlier in the day, students were asked to write copy for a radio advertisement of their choosing.  The class was over and we were moving on to other things.  Not Sandra.

She wanted to read to me the radio commercial she had written.  Curiously, it was about a business she would like to launch that sells locally grown honey.  In Sandra’s commercial, she spoke eloquently about the effectiveness of honey to help regulate blood sugar. She told how honey is extremely helpful for anyone facing the challenges of diabetes.

Then Sandra dropped the bomb.  Her mother was dead.  From diabetes.   Sandra was just seventeen when it happened.  She has never gotten over it.  Given an opportunity to write about any product or service in the world, Sandra chose to focus on the one thing that might have helped her mother.  How telling. How touching. 

Honestly, I was crushed. Here is a young girl who needs her mom.  All of her life is ahead of her. Boys surround her (I noticed this at the conference).  She needs the input only a mother can give.  So I gave her the only thing a Dad could give: a word of encouragement and a prayer.

I told Sandra that she was going to go far in life, that she had a great smile.  I also told her that God had chosen a boy for her who loved Jesus and who would treat her well—and she should settle for nothing less.  Then we prayed.

I wished I could have done more.  Said more.  Prayed more. I wanted to fix the unfixable. It is times like that I am reminded—ministry sometimes hurts.  Badly.

Her name is Sandra.  She has no mother. 

No one would ever mistake it for a mega church.

Not by today’s standards. 

If it were a mega church, you’d cruise along a winding, tree-lined asphalt road and be greeted by attendants waving orange batons directing you to a parking slot half a mile from the church doors.  Not here in Petersburg.

Take exit 11 off of Kentucky’s I-275 and the cloverleaf turn practically dumps you into the humble parking lot of Bullittsburg Baptist Church.   Organized in June, 1794 by Elders John Taylor, Joseph Redding and William Cave, it’s the oldest church in northern Kentucky. By 1797, the young congregation constructed their first meeting place. 

If you should ever be in the area, do stop by.  And don’t miss the church’s rambling cemetery adjacent to the parking lot. Unable to resist a walk through the old gravestones, I grabbed my camera and ambled across the grass. 

Snapping pictures of the granite markers, I tried to imagine just who these people were.  Tried to hear them swapping stories of revolutionary war battles like the Siege of Bryan Station or the Battle of Blue Licks. 

I tried to envision church services across the centuries.  Ponder the ministry they would have had to families devastated by the Civil War.  Or World War 1.  Or World War 2.  What a span!

There’s no gleam to the white brick structure known as Bulliltsburg Baptist Church.  Should you attend a Sunday morning service, don’t expect massive video screens or fog machines. 

But what you will find, is a long trail of faithful obedience to God and His Word.  You will see evidence of 223 years of faithful teaching and preaching and praying….223 years of caring for the neighborhood, praying for the sick, visiting the shut-ins…223 years of being a light in Petersburg, Kentucky.

And if faithfulness in ministry is the measuring stick, maybe—just maybe—Bullitsburg Baptist Church is more mega than most mega churches we know. 

“Only fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart. For consider what great things he has done for you.”      –1 Samuel 12:24

 

 

 

Rainy days are nobody’s favorite.

Who plans a wedding and hopes for a rainy day?  No parade has ever been improved by a downpour.  Same for picnics.  Few love songs connect rainy days with nostalgia or romance.  No one but a farmer enduring a parched summer welcomes a “100% chance of rain” in the forecast.

Who could possibly find glory in a puddle, or majesty in mud?  Exactly what is there, beyond the banal acknowledgement of a watered lawn or garden, to commend a rainy day?  A hint of an answer presented itself recently in an unlikely place on an unlikely day.  

Knobby fingers of darksome clouds stretched their grip across the horizon.  From those fingers trickled a steady drip of rain.  Hardly ideal weather for a vacation, but there we were.  And there it was—rain—lots of it. 

Opening the car door, I happened to glance down.  I am guessing that a parking lot has never before framed a canvas of priceless art.  Yet it seemed to right then.

A perfectly shaped maple leaf blazed an almost surreal red against the coal black asphalt.  The leaf was bordered by soggy tan wet wispiness—seeds, perhaps.  By contrast, they were boring and colorless.  All the better to spotlight that leaf!  The sheen of water over the electric red leaf gave it the appearance of those plastic coated wood tables you sometimes see in restaurants. 

Would I have noticed the leaf had it not been a rainy day?  Perhaps.  But would it have appeared as stunningly beautiful (enough to take a picture of it) without the rain?   Likely not.  The rain brought a peculiar grandeur, a glisten.

Which brings me to a question or two.  Is life a steady drip of disappointment for you lately?  Had your umbrella up for longer than you can remember?  We’re not the first!

It was in the storm that Paul offered a beautiful word of comfort to an unbelieving crew about the protective hand of God.  It was in the storm that Jesus handed His disciples the priceless jewel of belief that “even the wind and waves obey Him.”

Maybe it’s time for us to look down and find the beauty right where we are.    Right in the storm.   Beauty, after all, has been known to show up in the most unexpected places. 

 

 

The invitation to “vent” and “uncage the rage” is one that never really delivers. But with the enormous platform offered by the web, rants are everywhere (“flame trolling” is nearly an art form).

But there’s a dark side—a very dark side—to ranting before God to which I’ve previously given insufficient thought.  I make this statement reacting to a recent journey into the book of Malachi.

In chapter three God says to the nation of Israel, “You have said harsh things against me.”   What?  Sounds like God was offended—and He was. But what kind of “harsh things” had they said?  For starters, they claimed:

— “It is futile to serve God.”

— “What did we gain by carrying out His requirements and going about like mourners before the Lord Almighty?”

— “Certainly the evil doers prosper.”

— “Even those who challenge God escape.”

In other words, they demanded of the Lord, “What’s the point of trying to be godly? What’s the point of trying to obey?  Everybody else seems to be doing better than we are.  So what’s the big deal here?”

The big deal is they were whining in the face of Almighty God, humanity judging Deity. No appropriate “fear of the Lord.”  No honor reserved for His name.

While it is true we are free to be open and honest with God (David certainly was in the Psalms), let us ever remember God is still God.

• He is still “a consuming fire” (Heb. 13:29).
• He is still “robed in majesty” and “armed with strength” (Ps 93).
• He still “dwells in unapproachable light” (1 Tim 6:16).

As for our feelings of unfairness, God has warned us in advance, “My ways are not your ways.”  Nor has He made a secret of His perspective: “Man looks on the outward appearance but God looks on the heart.” 

Back to Malachi chapter three.  This God, this all-consuming, all-knowing, all powerful King of Kings was offended—and said so.   Hurt the Almighty?  That’s exactly what they had done: “You have said harsh things against me.”  But what about us?

If a recording of my every thought about God, my every conversation with God were to be broadcast on Facebook, I promise you I would be devastated.  God would likewise be forced to conclude, “You have said harsh things against me.”

Time to watch our words.

Time to watch our thoughts.

Time to honor our God—even when life disappoints.