Day of Praise

Th, 08/15/13, "Day of Praise"

"Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ." - Ephesians 5:21

Fourth grade. White pants. Playground mud hole. Tug-a-war. Competitive boy.

Not a good combo.

Result. Huge mud splotch on white pants. Let's just say they were now brown pants with a white section.

Not much changes with grown-ups, as Paul McCartney used to sing (http://m.metrolyrics.com/tug-of-war-lyrics-paul-mccartney.html).

Adults have their own ways of trying to "outdo" and "outscore" each other. Let's be honest. We all know the driving force. We preached about it yesterday in worship. Luke 12:13-34 - all sorts of adult tug-of-wars because people want power and, in the world, power usually equals money.

The result is lots of mud splotches on white pants.

Nowadays, we call it slinging mud.

I'm not trying to be poetic today at all. Poetry is beautiful. Even when the topic is not.

There's nothing beautiful about adult tug-a-wars in a sinful, fallen, broken world.

That's why God says, "Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ." (Ephesians 5:21)

One of the people who reads this devotion everyday says God's way works. Submitting instead of tugging-of-warring works. They say they can now just smile at the person or the situation after letting go and putting the tug-a-war rope in God's hands.

They say God always wins.

Always.

Maybe it doesn't look that way at first. Like when Jesus was crucified. But God always works it out. Like when Jesus is raised from the mud hole, er, I mean, the dead.

And everyone who trusts in Jesus gets to share in the victory. (That's called champion-to-champion fighting, which we'll save for another day.)

So for today, may God help us to believe again that God's Way and God's ways work. So, let's "submit to one another out of reverence for Christ." (Ephesians 5:21)

And everyone's pants will stay white.

Praise God!

(For an archive of "Day of Praise", please visit my daughter Calley's website at  http://dayofpraisepc.blogspot.com/?m=1)
Pastor Chris
"The gospel is the story of Jesus [what God's only Son has done for us that we can't do for ourselves], spoken as a promise." - Robert Jenson