What is a miracle?  A miracle is more than an action.  If it were simply a surprising outcome in a military confrontation, you could say Hitler’s blitzkriegs were miraculous.  I believe there are three intermingling factors involved in a miracle.  There is the purpose of the motivation, the action, and the effect of the miracle.  The purpose must be grounded in the hope that the first will be last and the servant of all and the effect must be to make the principle a reality.  By these two realities, the action gains its content.  In this way, the person who is healed of cancer may thank God for his mercy and the person who dies of cancer can thank God for the strength to endure the treatments for the purpose of a search for healing and the ability to sacrifice that doctors learn more in the quest to find a cure.  They both are benefactors of God's mercy.   The second has  received the power to lay down a life for another, and the first h...

The story of Moses and the burning bush is one of the widest known stories in the Bible.  Most of the time people approach this story, focusing one what appears as his hesitancy to follow God’s call to set the people free.  As a person who has lived the majority of his life based on God’s call I understand his interchange with God a different way.  The most important thing Moses says is, “Who am I?”  I believe everyone experiences a calling.  The context of the calling is challenging.  When you receive a calling it means you have to journey down a path that excludes the experience found on other paths.  You are confronted not only by what you might gain, but what you will sacrifice.  That reality spurs a conversation.  The struggle Moses experiences is no different than the one everyone experiences, and the struggle is necessary. As I write this devotion to God, I am surrounded by the new birth of Spring.  I am inspired by new leaves...

I had the privilege of coaching my first son’s five and six year old soccer team.  There was a small park in the neighborhood where the boys, their mothers, and myself would gather for practice.  There is something perfect and idyllic about a dozen five year olds chasing a soccer ball on a green field.  Suddenly, paradise was interrupted by a woman’s screams.  I looked up and there was a man without a shirt beating a terrified woman with a coiled rope.  Instinctively, I put myself between the boys and the horror and yelled, “Hey!  Stop that!”  The man hesitated and turned his attention toward me.  During that lapse of attention, the woman broke free and started running toward me.  She ran across the road, into the park, and ran to my outstretched arms with such force that she knocked me over and we both tumbled to the ground.  From my new vantage point, I focused my attention no the whereabouts of the man.  I now realized that he ha...

Moses witnessed an Egyptian beating a Hebrew.  He decided he was going to put an end to this injustice so he looked around, and when he saw no one looking, killed the Egyptian and buried him in the sand.  The next day he saw two Hebrews fighting and  asked them why they were doing harm to a fellow Hebrew.  One responds instinctively saying, “Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you intend to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?”   Moses is faced with the reality that his deeds are known to a large number of people and most likely Pharaoh will know soon enough. I believe the most important messages are rarely discussed.  “Who knew Moses killed the Egyptian?”  The most logical witness was the man who was beaten.  Why didn’t Moses consider this possibility after he killed the Egyptian?  He never considered that the one being persecuted would endanger his rescuer.  Moses discovered that those he felt a need to free from oppression,...

Of all the features of the wild, the river is the one that most often impacts civilization.  While people find it important to control the effects of the wilderness, the river is invited to mingle with civilization, because rivers bring water of life.  People try to contain it, control it, but we are reminded constantly that the river has the power to bring unintended consequences, exercising unwelcome power over civilizations and altering their future.   The power of God’s Word supersedes the norms of culture.  I have always been surprised that the idea that Moses, “Born of Water,” grew up as the adopted son of Pharaoh’s Daughter, is given so little attention.  Pharaoh was schooled and immersed in the Egyptian religion.  Moses also was schooled by teachers groomed to inspire future kings.  The Egyptian religion was the means of internalizing the norms and aspirations of the civilization, and Egypt was the most prosperous of its time.  Yet for a...

How do empires come to an end?  In a way that is a misnomer.  Most often the people continue, but the people who ruled them change, and with the change culture is altered significantly.  We simplify history by focusing on a major battle or other theatric climatic event.  I believe the end and new beginning is more subtle.  I heard of an oil company that was taken over through a dispute between a brother and sister.  That dispute started with an act of cruelty.  When the children were young little sister was given a peacock for her birthday.  She loved that peacock, spending lots of time training her pet.  People were amazed at how the peacock responded to her love.  Little sister received lots of praise from her parents because of the responsiveness of her pet.  Older brother became jealous.    He would tease the peacock, throw pebbles at the bird, and torment little sister to tears. One day older brother reached across th...

But when she could no longer hide him, she took an ark of bulrushes for him, daubed it with asphalt and pitch, put the child in it, and laid it in the reeds by the river’s bank.   Exodus 2: 3 The word ark does not mean ship.  It actually means box or a chest.  Ark is defined by what it carries.  It could be the chest that carried Noah, the chest that carried Moses, or the chest that carried the Word of God.  In every case the importance of the Ark is not the container but what it carries.  In every instance it is also not the physical substance the Ark carries, but the message of the contents that is important.  It is the same with every life and everything.  Our importance is not confined to our physical substance, but is eternal in the message of our life.  In the three references above, that message is defined by words like Faith, Hope, and Love.  We should ask, “What is the message of my life, and how does it measure up to the p...

So Pharaoh commanded all his people, saying, “Every son who is born you shall cast into the river, and every daughter you shall save alive.”  Genesis 1:22 Here we see the apex of Pharaoh’s power.  After failing to get midwives to kill babies at birth, he put out a proclamation to the population as a whole to kill all Hebrew new born sons.  What a demonstration of the length people will go to remain first.  The midwives circumvented Pharaoh’s order because they were asked to destroy the joy of their life, helping bring new life into the world.  Pharaoh gives his second order to the entire population, knowing that the majority of the people will silently not heed his orders, being repulsed by the idea.  Pharaoh knowingly caters to a small but significant minority of the most evil people in his society, who will cherish the idea of drowning the life of a new born Hebrew child.   We began this discussion of Exodus with a warning about cultural forgetfu...

When something is pressed down it naturally moves toward the boundaries of societal life, looking for relief.  The wilderness provides this relief.  Power is concentrated in the civilizations  humans create, therefore it is natural for the oppressed to seek the periphery of society.  When healthy physical things are withheld people begin to seek spiritual things.  This is why oppressors go mad and become self destructive.  Oppression is like a dead end slough.  You exit the main stream of the river of life, thinking it will be an attractive diversion, only to find it abruptly ends against a dry bank without the necessities needed to sustain life. The Hebrew responded to oppression by becoming better human beings.  When deprived of physical luxuries, they explored spiritual luxuries, becoming more sensitive to the foundation of relationships.  When Pharaoh realized they became stronger under his oppression he decided to undermine their ...

 Exodus 1: 11-14 "Therefore they set taskmasters over them to afflict them with their burdens. And they built for Pharaoh supply cities, Pithom and Raamses.  But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew. And they were in dread of the children of Israel.  So the Egyptians made the children of Israel serve with rigor.  And they made their lives bitter with hard bondage—in mortar, in brick, and in all manner of service in the field. All their service in which they made them serve was with rigor." Oppression is the evil counter point to God’s principle, “The First Shall Be Last and the Servant of All.”  The definition of oppression accurately describes the methodology of those who seek to undermine God’s principle.  Oppression is the violent pressing down of another.  Jesus gave a revealing indictment and definition of those who oppress others:  “ Woe to you lawyers also! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, an...

The Bible teaches us that God is a promise maker and a promise keeper.  Sunday night was a time to thank God for the fulfillment of His promise.  I enjoyed the first fruits of the Canoe and Outdoor Ministry   Twenty-two representatives of the youth ministry came for burgers, fun, and fellowship in the name of Jesus Christ.  When I looked at them playing and praying, my heart was inspired by the courage of those who choose the Way of Jesus Christ.  I thank God for Alain, Natalie, and their counselors, who inspired my faith with their example and their teachings.  I thank God for a Christian wife who finds joy in Christian hospitality.  I thank God for mud up to the waistline and quiet reflections upon prayer lanterns floating down the Trinity River.  This morning I pray for their endurance, and thank God for their ultimate victory.  For God is a promise maker and a promise keeper. My brethren, count it all joy when you fall in...

Most of us have been raised remembering the holocaust during and surrounding World War II.  A parishioner of my church was on location when Allied troops liberated a German concentration camp.  As an information officer, he had his own personal collection of horrific survivor photographs.  The images of  starving prisoners still affects my memory. Life is good in the United States and the communication industry provides more information than most people care to disseminate.  It is easy to be lulled into the attitude that the holocaust is part of the dust bin of history, never to raise its ugly head again.  When we hear words that dehumanize groups of people, we might say, “That is bad but it could never be a threat to the existence of those who are demeaned.”  Did you know? Today the following are experiencing ethnic cleansing:  - Muslim Rohingya from Myanmar t by the Buddhist majority - The Nuer in south Sudan  by  the Dinka major...

Most people confuse the wilderness as an uninhabitable place, a place of danger and death.  During the formative years of the Hebrew nation, the years upon which God’s Word was established, the Hebrew people were nomads, living in tents and tending their flocks.  They lived in the wilderness.  The biblical term most often used to convey wilderness is pasture.  Ancient Israel enjoyed temperatures that ranged from 40-85 degrees.  It was located in the fertile crescent and enjoyed two seasons; dry season and a rainy season.  This wilderness is “midbar.”  The relatively uninhabited wilderness or the desert is  “arabah.”  This is a sterile land, yet even the desert is a wonderful mouthpiece for the Word of God.   Today urbanization has resulted in 95% of the world’s population living on 10% of the earth’s surface.  The herd’s corral is becoming more crowded.  I believe this is one of the reasons so few people reflect in awe on the...

Words have many meanings.  Words are a pioneer's tools of exploration.  They explore tributaries, which no matter how far from the source are connected to the River of Life.  The word wilderness explores one very special tributary in the Song of Solomon.  Solomon is a preacher and teacher, as well as a king.  In his former roles, he seeks to convey the wisdom of God's Word.  In Song of Solomon 4:3 he uses the word wilderness to describe the mouth of his beloved. Your lips are like a strand of scarlet, And your "MOUTH" is lovely. Your temples behind your veil Are like a piece of pomegranate. NKJV The translation of wilderness as mouth is also translated speech.  Mouth is understood as the "organ of speech."  Wilderness is not a stagnant panorama, it is dynamic, moving, revealing.  The wilderness is an organ of speech, which God utilizes to communicate His truth into the lives of those who have ears to hear.  Jesus c...

“If” is a powerful word.  What does it mean?  If is a meeting place like when planets align and create a special moment during night time meditation.  In 2016, Jupiter, Mars, Saturn, Venus, and Mercury could all be seen through the same lens and I once saw a planetarium presentation that claimed the Bethlehem star was really the once in several millennia alignment of three planets, which caused the appearance of a brilliant star over Bethlehem at the time of Christ’s birth.  If is a meeting place that presents a gift of wonder that seizes consciousness and says, “Wait here a while and fill your life with possibility.” Possibility joyfully injects doubt into ones life.  People are so focused on building a track to run on that they may become railroaded into believing that yesterday is all there is.  Have you ever had someone come to you with a problem?  You invest time listening to their story and results that have led to chronic suffering.  As t...

Returned last night from another wilderness experience.  This wilderness experience was confined to the St. Luke’s Hospital in Lufkin.  The hospital is a wilderness that provides an encampment on the river of life.  The single focus of life is gathering the gifts necessary to sustain life and make it better.  It is a pure place, a place of gifting and a place of gathering gifts.  It is a place most suitable for a pioneer; accentuating the senses is essential.  Listening is the birthplace of understanding and new direction.  Scents stimulate the memory and provide havens of peace.  Vision is widened, prompting awareness of many healing avenues and the vast community who rest under  healing arms.  Touch opens the soul to the close proximity of suffering and hope.  Hearing opens the possibility of melodies that vibrate ear drums and melodies that vibrate the soul.  The hospital wilderness is a place where the traveler may experien...