Weekly Seed of Faith 12/3/2021

Seed of Faith – Advent Hope  By Pastor Dave  

“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14

“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.” Isaiah 9:6-7

Dear Faithful and Fearless Seed Sowers,

It’s here: the first week of Advent. It is time to get all our Christmas tree, our Christmas decorations and set up our home.  Guess what pastors love about the 4-week Advent season? It is time for us to prepare our hearts for Christ!

Wait!
 
Waiting!

What comes to your mind when you hear these two words?

Who or what is it that you are waiting on?

I remember when I had a mysterious, intriguing, and strange rash of oozing blisters on my legs and shoulders and chest. The year was 2013! I waited for 33 months as I saw fourteen different doctors. Each doctor told me they had no idea what was wrong with me. The Infectious Disease Doctor called in two other disease specialists into my room. Their diagnosis: no clue but you are intriguing. Listen, I didn’t want to be intriguing.  I was waiting to get rid of my 33-month-old rash!

How about you? What are you waiting for?

We have all been struggling with a world-wide pandemic that has caused many to quarantine, lock-down and even shutdown. It has been almost 2 years — 20 months of waiting, watching, worrying, and wondering — How Long, Lord?! How long do we have to wait?

“Wait” is a verb! Did you know that? I will say it again, “WAIT” is a verb. Waiting is an action that we do. Isn’t that kind of funny? Waiting is an action that we do…we wait. How exactly do we wait? One of my Bible Dictionaries defined “wait” this way: “to remain in readiness or expectation.” [i] In Scripture, the word “wait” normally suggests the anxious, yet confident, expectation by God’s people that the Lord will intervene on their behalf. Waiting, therefore, is the working out of hope. Did you hear that? When we wait—we are to remain in readiness and expectation. Think about what it is (or who it is) that you are waiting for. Now—remain confident that God will intervene. What we are doing when we wait? We are working out HOPE.

I love that thought, “Waiting is the working out of hope.”  “The expectation that the Lord will intervene on my behalf.”

We have been waiting for 20 months to hear some good news concerning Covid. As we wait, we hear that there is a new variant.(I find it interesting that they are using the Greek alphabet to name the variants.)

As I have work on this message, I have been reflecting on some of the people who had to wait in the Bible:

Abraham was given a promise that he would be the father of many nations yet it was not until he was 100 years old that his wife Sarah gave birth to Isaac. Can you imagine waiting until you are almost one hundred to see the birth of your son!? WAIT ... Remain in readiness. Remain in Expectation!

Then there is Jacob. Jacob worked for 7 years to marry Rachel only to find out that his father-in-law switched daughters on him, and he ended up marrying Leah. When Jacob found out what Laban had done, he then promised to work another 7 years for him in order to marry Rachel. Can you imagine waiting and working for 14 years for the right to marry the one you love? WAIT: Remain in readiness. Remain in expectation.

How about Moses? Moses is orphaned as a 3-month-old baby and grows up in Pharaoh’s palace for the next 40 years, then the following 40 years he lives in the wilderness taking care of his father-in-law’s sheep. After that, Moses spends 40 years wandering in the wilderness caring for the people of Israel. That is a lifetime of waiting. Can you imagine waiting 40 years to enter the Promised Land? Can you imagine seeing it from across the river but not ever being able to enter it? WAIT: Remain in readiness. Remain in expectation.

What about David? David grows up taking care of his father’s sheep. He writes psalms (songs) and plays the harp. David is anointed king by Samuel, and slays a giant named Goliath. Did you know it took 15 years after he was anointed king to actually become the king of Judah? Can you imagine waiting 15 years for the promise of a promotion or a raise? WAIT: Remain in readiness. Remain in expectation.

When you turn to the New Testament, we read about an old priest by the name of Zechariah.

Zechariah, an old high priest, waited to have the opportunity to bring the incense into the Holy of Holy’s. It was finally his turn and in he went into the Holy of Holies—by himself, with a rope tied to his foot—in case of emergency—they could drag him out.

Hope. Zechariah had prayed and prayed for years and years for his wife Elizabeth to have a child. Now he was an old man and his wife was beyond childbearing age. Scholars believe that Zechariah and Elizabeth had been married for about 50 years. We do not know how old Zechariah is but that we do know that he had been waiting for a long time to hear from God. The Jewish people had been waiting four hundred years to hear from God. They were waiting for a Messiah. My guess is that Zechariah had been waiting and hoping for a child for 80 years. Zechariah was going through the motions, putting in his time, punching his high priest’s “to do” list: “Fill the candles, clean the pulpit, mop the entry, dust the altar…” And then, lightning struck: Zechariah’s name was drawn from the hat! More like his straw was picked, his lot was chosen; and Zechariah was chosen to enter the holy of holies and offer the yearly sacrifice! Zechariah’s been at this for an exceptionally long time. Five times every year Zechariah made the five-mile hike to Jerusalem to go serve in the temple for the feasts. Now from the lot of the 18,000 priests, Zechariah’s name is chosen. Look at those odds … 1 in 18,0000. Is now the time for God to speak? WAIT WITH CONFIDENCE, and EXPECTATION…work out HOPE as you wait.

Zechariah means — “The Lord Remembers.”

I wonder if there were times when Zechariah thought that the Lord did not remember him. I bet there were times when Zechariah was willing to give up, give in and stop believing. “I’m too old. Elizabeth is too old. I have been praying this same prayer for way too long. Maybe God has forgotten me.”

SO WHAT?
How many times do you and I want to give up, give in and not believe?

What are the odds that some of us reading this today are ready to give up, give in and throw in the towel?
Don’t do it. Be like Abraham. Be like Jacob. Be like Moses. Be like David. Be like Zechariah. WAIT IN HOPE!

In our Scripture reading from Isaiah 7, we hear the Prophet Isaiah challenge King Ahaz to ask God for a sign. Ahaz says that he will not put God to the test of a sign because he has secretly made an alliance with the Assyrians to protect him. In essence, King Ahaz was not waiting on God to help him. King Ahaz had taken matters into his own human hands. Instead of waiting on God, he forced a deal with the enemy.

How often do we act like King Ahaz?

How often do we take matters into our own hands?

How hard is it to WAIT on God?

I can tell you that it is pretty darn hard to wait.

Even though King Ahaz would not ask for a sign, God gave him, and the people of Israel, a sign. That sign is proclaimed in Isaiah 7:14 — Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.

Do you remember what “Immanuel” means? “Immanuel” means “God is with us.” Here in Isaiah, the promise of the sign given by God is that of IMMANUEL–God is with us. God is with us! God is working on our behalf even when we cannot see or feel Him working! God is working in our lives while we wait.

Write that down on the table of your heart: God is working while you wait!

Dr. Arthur Pierson once told of being alone in the study of the great man of faith and achievement, George Mueller. Thinking it would be a good time to look at the great man’s Bible, he opened it and was thumbing through its pages when he came to a verse in Psalms where it reads, “The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord” (Ps. 37:23).

Opposite it, on the margin, Mueller had made this notation: “And the stops, too.”

THE STEPS AND THE STOPS OF A GOOD MAN OR WOMAN ARE ORDERED BY THE LORD.

Has God put some stops in your life?

Then WAIT.

What if we turned WAIT into an acronym?

WALKING
ALWAYS
INTO
TRUST

WAIT!

Remember:

  1.  While we are waiting, God is working.
  2.  We can wait with hope. We can remain in readiness. Remain in expectation. We can wait and trust that God will intervene.

I still have two times the lethal limit of lead in my body, I am down from 5 times! I have been waiting to detox this lead since September of 2017, 4 years. The pandemic has but a halt on my chelation, so I’m waiting. But NOW I wait with confidence that God is with me.

IMMANUEL. I wait knowing that the day is coming when I will be lead free. Like Abraham, Moses, Zechariah—and all of us who wait…it is my prayer that we will learn to wait in hope … “remain in readiness or expectation…having the anxious, yet confident, expectation that the Lord will intervene on our behalf.”

As you may know, my wife is very creative. The other day she walked into my study area and announced she’s changing my acronym for the Advent season. My trustworthy and true acronym for HOPE is HOPE…. Heaven’s One Promise: Emmanuel. God with us.
Jac wanted something new for this Advent season. She loved that Advent means PREPARATION! We really are to prepare our hearts for the Christ Child this Advent. Here is her acronym: HOPE…Holy One Prepares EVERYONE! “Get it,” she said. “This way while I wait, I can trust that God is busy preparing everyone for Christmas!”

Let’s wait with readiness and expectation that GOD IS WITH US. God is with us as we get our decorations out. God is with us as we prepare our homes. God is with us as we make our lists but most importantly, GOD IS WITH US AS WE WAIT.

What are you waiting for? Who are you waiting for? Your homework is to go ahead and start preparing your home for Christmas. But…when you get a momentary setback of time, just remember–God is with you while you wait so wait in readiness for God to intervene. I’m waiting to be free of lead poisoning; 33 months is nothing for God. I’m praying for you, too, as you wait in hope and prepare your heart for the reason for the season.

Let’s prepare our hearts for Christmas.

See You SUNDAY!

God loves you and so do I,
Pastor Dave
www.theseedchristianfellowship.com

Copyright © 2018 THE SEED CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP, All rights reserved. May you be blessed by God’s grace and love. You are receiving this email because you signed up for our weekly devotionals.   Our mailing address is: 6450 Emerald Street Alta Loma, California 91701   Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.

Weekly Seed of Faith 11/15/21

Seed of Faith – RESURRECTION VICTORY By Pastor Dave  

“Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked. For the LORD God is a sun and shield; the LORD bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.” Psalm 84:10-11

“For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.” I Corinthians 15:53

Dear Faithful Friends, Family and Fruitful Seed-Sowers,

As I sit down to write a Seed of Faith, I realize it has been a long time since I’ve sat at my computer. My last Seed of Faith was written on October 2nd, 35 days ago. My last Seed of Faith was entitled, “Resurrection Revelations”.  I had been writing a series on I Corinthians 15. I think this SEED OF FAITH will be a witness and a testimony to the love and grace of Jesus.

I encourage you to take a few minutes and read Paul’s writings in chapter 15 of 1 Corinthians.

By now, I am sure that you heard that our family came down with Covid-19 in the month of October. All seven of us in the house had Covid-19. The three grandchildren, our daughter and and son-of love and my wife and myself. We fell like dominoes–all 7 of us in 7 days. What is fascinating to me is that we all had different symptoms.  My daughter and myself had it the worst. But, the truth be told, Covid hit the adults all pretty hard, we were in bed for a week! And the 3 teenagers recovered in days.

I want to thank all of you who loved us through this time. We received text messages, emails, cards, phone calls, food, food and more food. I also want to thank our doctors who got us the right treatments and medications. My wife and I both qualified for the monoclonal infusion; that certainly helped. Without your love, support, prayers and encouragement I do not know how we would have made it through.  Thank you!

I have several devotionals that I read each morning along with my regular Bible reading.  When I got knocked down with Covid-19, I did not do much but sleep and lay in bed for days. Jac tells everyone I slept 22 of the 24 hours a day for the first week.

Today I picked up my devotional, “Voices From The Past — Puritan Devotional Readings” edited by Richard Rushing and I noticed my book marker. I opened to the last day I had read: October 10th. The opening Scripture was the Psalm above, Psalm 84:10-11.

Today’s reading begins with Paul’s words found in 1 Corinthians 15:53.

On top of struggling through Covid-19–the entire house moaning and groaning–we received the sad news that “Dad” had contracted Covid in the memory care home. They have been battling Covid on and off for the past year. Dad had been isolated for the last half of September. Then we got Covid. Then Dad got Covid. With all of Dad’s medical conditions, he passed away on October 27th. The golden thread in all of this is that because we had had Covid, the nurse and the director allowed us to stay and visit dad once we hit our day 11. We were able to spend the last week of Dad’s life with him. That was a blessing–for him and for us. Hospice had isolated Dad and he was alone in his room for the first two days. I was then able to go and care for him, and a few days later Jac was able to join me. Dad was doing really well until the morning of Day 9. He really only suffered for a few minutes until Hospice gave him a dose of morphine–he was gone two hours later. Great peace filled his room those last two hours.

About 650 days ago, Jac’s mom fell and we found out she had stage IV lung cancer with metastases to her brain. We brought her home on hospice. Within 5 weeks, Mom passed to heaven. By now, we were noticing that Dad was not able to care for himself alone.  Covid had hit America very strongly in early 2020, so we stayed 3 months and tried to figure out a plan. In mid-May we implemented our plan: rented a motorhome. packed up all Dad’s belongings that we could and moved dad from Florida to California. What a kind, gentle and loving man dad was. My wife said through her tears, the other day as we were cleaning up up his room, “Dad sure is miss-able.” 

Boy, I thought about that statement!  When I die, I want to be miss-able!

We know that Paul wanted to pass along to the church what was the most important thing he had — the resurrection. Listen again to the opening words of 1 Corinthians 15.  “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve.”  I Corinthians 15:3-5

A good so what thought, or question is, “What is the most important thing you have?  What is the most important thing you want to pass on to your children and your children’s children? What do you want your friends and family to remember about you?”

We all have questions about heaven and the resurrection.  As I mentioned, my wife and I have been caring for Dad since her mom died in February of 2020.  Dad lived with us for a year, and then his dementia got worse. We moved him into a memory care home.  He loved it. He loved having his own room, little kitchenette, and private shower/bath. Every day he’d say, “I really love this place. It’s all I need.” Every day I would go and visit him—I used the excuse of bringing him the newspaper but it was really to check on him and to see how he was doing and if he needed anything.  We’d go 2-3 times a day. The morning was to refresh his room, and the late afternoons were to play cards, and watch golf and baseball. During all of these visits, he has really become my dad; I call him dad. I’ve known him for 49 years now.

Almost every day as we would sit and talk, Dad would say, “I just cannot believe that Jo Ann (his wife of seventy years)  is gone. I never thought this is how life would turn out. I always thought I’d go first.”

Every day I would talk with dad about the resurrection and heaven. I got to tell him heaven is a joyous place and that he will be given a new body.  His old body that was dying and not working very well would be replaced with a new body that will never perish or get weak again. He said he liked that idea, “I hope you are right, David.” I would tell him about these passage in 1 Corinthians 15 and Revelation 21 that teaches about a new heaven and a new earth–where there will be no more tears, pain, or suffering. I would tell him that we are all going to die, but we will have life eternal given to us through Jesus Christ.

Friends, this is exactly what Paul is teaching the church in Corinth.

When dad passed away my wife, Jac and I were sitting by his bedside reading and praying with him. Right before he passed, Jac asked me to read the passage that we read to her mom when she passed. I got my Bible out and turned to 1 Corinthians 15 and starting reading at verse 53

“For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. 54 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” 55 Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” 56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” I Corinthians 15:53-57

When I started to read verse 57, dad took a deep breath and puffed up his chest and breathed out slowly and walked into the arms of Jesus. Dad was not afraid of death and he bravely faced it with his chest out as he embraced eternal life.

What is so fascinating to me is that when mom died almost two years ago dad sat with us as I read the same passages.  He looked at Jac and I and said, “I have never seen anyone die before.”  Over the past two years, dad has come to know the power, the hope and the resurrection victory.

So What?
Do you want the people who love you to say of you after you are gone, “Boy, are they ever miss-able” ?

When Jac walked into Dad’s room, Dad got the biggest smile on his face. He’d wave and say, “Hi, Jac! That’s my daughter!” Wherever he was, he’d tell everyone, “This is my daughter! She’s terrific!”

I’ve watched this relationship for 49 years now. I can’t recall a time when Dad wasn’t happy to see us. He’d stop whatever he was doing and see how we were. He’d offer a sodie, and food. Like Jac often says, “It was like we were movie stars or something!” Jac’s dad had a million dollar smile and a laugh to match.

Here’s your “SO WHAT?” homework: Do you believe it’s too late to change? It’s not. Do you want to be deeply missed when you move on to heaven? What do you need to change about yourself in order for that to happen? Jac’s dad would always say, “I don’t want to be any trouble. I want to be nice. I want to be kind.”
Dad, you are really miss-able around here.

See you Sunday!
God loves you and so do I,
Pastor Dave
www.theseedchristianfellowship.com

Copyright © 2018 THE SEED CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP, All rights reserved. May you be blessed by God’s grace and love. You are receiving this email because you signed up for our weekly devotionals.   Our mailing address is: 6450 Emerald Street Alta Loma, California 91701   Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.