Jim fields' Weblog
If I can put one touch of a rosy sunset into the life of any man or woman I shall feel that I have worked with God. Henry David Thoreau
January 28, 2023
It’s been seemingly forever since I’ve written anything…Lots on my mind but haven’t taken the time to write…maybe soon.
Jim
October 31, 2020
All Saints day.
Early in his ministry – just after the Beatitudes – Jesus told the people who followed him:
“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.
(Matthew 5:14-16)
Most if not all of us know people who are points of light, people who respond to the circumstances where they find themselves with a positive twist. They are people who smile, people who always seem to have a good word, a friendly gesture, people who lift others up or offer a helping hand. People who are points of light are kind, humble, gentle, peaceful and joyful, people who think more of others than they do themselves.
Remembering such people brings a smile to our face.
This Sunday is the celebration of All Saints Day. It is a time to reflect on those who have brought us a positive influence, those who affected our lives and helped us to be the people we have become. We honor their memory and we celebrate their lives.
Spend some time this Sunday pondering those who brought us great joy, those who taught us how to live and love, how to be kind to others, how to find peace in our otherwise difficult lives.
Be light…be an influence.
Peace
Jim
August 23, 2020
There are so many issues that pull on our heart strings and most of us can fit that reality into our own views of life…and some of those issues are the opposite of others views. How do we reconcile the idea that what some of us hold dear to our hearts others look down upon and vice versa – and all claim Christian love?
There could be as many answers as there are people.
Suffice it to say when we view all issues through the lens of the greatest commandment to love God with all heart, mind, soul, and strength and love our neighbor as ourselves (Mark 12:30-31)…we might have to give a little bit.
Something to think about…
Peace
Jim
August 7, 2020
Sitting on the deck early this morning watching the deer tiptoe through the woods. It’s interesting how the squirrels and other little critters make more noise than a bull in a china shop…but the deer just seem to float on by. If we’re not looking we don’t see them. It sort of reminds me of the beauty and goodness around us, if we’re not looking it’s as if it isn’t there at all.
As the song says,
“There was love all around but I never heard it singing…”
Beauty and goodness are all around. Stop for awhile today and look…and listen.
Peace
Jim
August 4, 2020
One last question from the post on July 29th.
“Do our blessings bring thoughts of praise, comfort, peace and calm?”
If you’ve never done it, pray through the Beatitudes in Matthew 5:3-11. Jesus talked about the blessedness of a lot of things all of which reveal a reward, a blessing. And those rewards bring thoughts of praise, comfort, peace and calm.
Pray through each beatitude, each blessing, and search our mind and heart looking for those things. Are we poor in spirit, are we poor at showing mercy and grace, poor at seeing the beauty in the words of Jesus?
Are we mournful? Do we mourn the state of our church, the misunderstanding of love and grace through the words of false prophets? Do we mourn with those who mourn without citing answers to things which we no nothing about? Do we mourn for our lack of showing and revealing Jesus, the lack of light coming from within us?
Are we humble? Do we put others before ourselves, do we always have to have the last word, do we see others as greater than ourselves?
Do we hunger and thirst for righteousness, that is goodness, integrity, morality? Do we long for our lives and the lives of others to reflect Jesus?
Do we seek mercy? Do we let go of our bent toward getting even and offer grace, or do we hope for others to get what’s coming to them for their words or actions?
Is our heart pure? Are our thoughts Jesus’ thoughts, do we look for the good and the beautiful, do we promote good and beautiful?
Are we peacemakers? Would we rather see peace or inflict our idea of justice? Do we really seek justice over revenge?
Have we ever felt persecuted for our belief in how Jesus has influenced our lives? And how do we respond to those things?
All of those are things that as we pray through the Beatitudes we search our own heart – not the heart of others – and pray for God to show us how to be more like Jesus.
There is a place for praying for others, their wants and needs, Jesus told us to be diligent in prayer, but there is also a time to seek what God has in mind for us personally. As our own bucket is filled with the goodness that Jesus advocated the more our influence becomes one of light. And we are called to be light.
If the result of our blessings only bring a smile to our face, if our blessings only show physical or monetary joy…we missed something. Praying through the beatitudes reveal where we are lacking but they also give us something to aim for as we seek the presence of Jesus to be active within us.
Pray through the Beatitudes asking God to reveal our shortcomings, recognize them but don’t dwell there. We are never intended to wallow in our mistakes or our perceived failures but to rise up and move ahead. Elijah met God on the mountain (1 Kings 14:15) and complained in his despair. And God never seemed to acknowledge Elijah’s complaints, God just told him to get up and do the next thing that God intended for him to do.
The same is for us. As we pray, we see where we failed, where we misrepresented Jesus, where we just didn’t get it right, we may even mourn those things…and God is basically saying,
“Get up, go, and do the next thing.”
And the next thing is always moving us in a direction that shows God’s love and power. And showing God’s love and power always points to Jesus…without exception. And if the next thing doesn’t point to the love of Jesus, if our thoughts, actions, if what gets our approval doesn’t point to Jesus…go back and pray through the Beatitudes again.
The Gospel was good news to the first people who heart it…and if we are seeking Jesus it is still good news today.
Peace
Jim
August 2, 2020
Going back to the post on July 29th…
“Do our thought processes reveal fear in our world or faith to believe God has good in mind for us?”
Fear has been so ingrained in us that our faith often takes a back seat to what frightens us. We sometimes allow our knowledge of Scripture to bow to fear. And that is fed daily by listening to the attempts of others who use fear as a tool to get their way.
One reason I stay away from political arguments is because it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see fear being used as a tool…and with great accomplishment even among those who claim Christ. It is sad, hurts the heart, and is reason for lament.
Fear is also rampant among Christ followers. Many people spend more time looking for the end of the story instead of living within the story. I haven’t been able to put my finger on why so many are interested in the end as opposed to new beginnings. If we’re reading and learning from the frame of mind of the first believers, if our faith is being fueled through the message of Jesus, the end is not the best news. The best news is the Good News that Jesus spoke when he claimed that the New Kingdom was at hand that the Scriptures were fulfilled with his coming.
People heard that from within their poverty both financially and spiritually, they found hope from his message.
So I’m thinking, how can we hear Jesus when we read the Scriptures and find that same hope? First, I think, we zero in on Jesus, block out the noise and static around us, understand that fear is a tool of evil, and that God through Jesus offered a better way to live. All through the Old Scripture God promised a deliverer, one who saves, one who will usher in a new way to live and think. Many of us began to follow the One who came claiming to be that hope…but often we lower our eyes as Peter walking across the water to Jesus, (Matthew 14:29-31) we begin to fear and the Good News slips away from our thinking.
We cannot follow Jesus with one eye on him and the other on false hope, the only true hope comes through Jesus. All other sources turn us a different way leading to doubt and fear. Fear is a tool of evil.
The answer to fear is Jesus. Nothing trumps Jesus, not Peter not John not Paul, not any of the Biblical writers, as Jesus said himself:
“You have heard it said…but I say to you…”
If our thinking does not settle in on Good News. If our thinking of Jesus does not see the good that God intended for us who claim him…what does that say about the light within us? Without the light within us there is only darkness, and darkness produces fear.
So…examine the way we think, what we think about. Is fear the first thing that comes to mind? Or does the Good News Jesus proclaimed stand fresh and new? The prophet Jeremiah said:
“Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.”
(Lamentations 3:22-23)
Do we believe that?
Peace
Jim
August 1, 2020
Another thing I suggested – in a previous post – that we ask ourselves is:
“Do we see Good News from our plenty…or our poverty?”
There are several ways to respond to that. But if we’re listening as were the people the Scriptures were written to, if we’re identifying ourselves with the folks who were living under the thumb of Rome and religious leadership, we must figure out how to identify with the poor financially and spiritually, how to identify with those who were feeling exile in their own country.
And it appears to me that if identifying with the poor and disadvantaged is too difficult then our problem might be entangled with our plenty. I will be the first to admit that seeing ourselves as poor is not that easy, in the back of our mind most of us don’t have to worry about where our next meal is coming from.
But the poverty part, the part about what we are lacking is a different thing. Sometimes we lack faith, we lack joy, compassion, love, grace, mercy, we look down on those who are down…we sometimes even defend wrong because we lack the vision to see that Jesus didn’t leave any wiggle room when he said that love was the greatest commandment.
Our poverty shows up in our thoughts and actions as well as our lifestyles…do we think as Jesus thought, that no one is greater than any other, that hearers of the Word must be doers of the Word? Do our thoughts and actions reveal the love, mercy and grace that Jesus advocated? For the most part our thoughts, words and actions are steeped in poverty until our roots can grow strong. Our roots grow stronger by challenging our thoughts, what we think we believe and by holding them in comparison to Jesus.
Poverty covers a lot of territory. And part of the idea Jesus had in mind comes from the very first of the Beatitudes.
“Blessed are the poor in Spirit…”
I talked about that a bit yesterday but that statement covers so much territory, everything from poor physically to poor spiritually. Unless we can see ourselves somewhere between those things we tend to take glances from our plenty. And most of the time when we do that, take glances from our plenty, we tend to find ways to justify how we live and nothing seems fresh and new. Not that we all live terribly, it’s just that unless we can come to grips with our poverty of whatever…the Good News sort of drifts out of the picture leaving something much less that does not bring hope and peace…usually fear of some sort.
But if we can level our thoughts and imagine our poverty as we read Scripture and ponder Jesus…our vision increases as we see light in the dark places, our thoughts begin to take on a softer tone, and Good News becomes more recognizable…and praise begins to come to mind instead of fear and bitterness…
What all of that says is that our poverty of whatever should make the Gospel resound with Good News. If it doesn’t then maybe discovering our poverty – whatever it is that we are lacking spiritually – can bring us down to the level where the Good News will bring praise and thanksgiving to our hearts.
As the Psalmist sang in Psalm 34:
I will bless the Lord at all times
Praise shall always be on my lips
I will glory in the Lord
let the afflicted hear and rejoice…
Taste and see that the Lord is good
blessed is the one who takes refuge in Him…
Peace
Jim
July 31, 2929
I mentioned the other day some things to think about, and one of those things was:
“Do we feel a connection with any of the Beatitudes?” (Matthew five, six, and seven)
I’ve spent a lot of time lately thinking about this because Jesus’ words in those chapters seem to be a basic beginning point from which to begin thinking about Jesus. And thinking about Jesus is very important because he had the authority to say the things he said. In fact, the people who listened to him speak the words were amazed Mat. 7:29, they were amazed “…for he taught with real authority – quite unlike their teachers of religious law.”
Knowledge and authority are not the same thing.
The teachers of the law had knowledge, they could cite Scripture and laws but they were lacking in authority, they simply repeated the same old dusty words of law and claimed knowledge based on their positions.
In contrast, Jesus had no real position of authority but his words and actions brought feelings of hope and peace. People were hungry for hope and peace and being a people of oppression this was good news. People were held in external oppression from the empire as well as religious law, and internal oppression from lack of hope and peace.
So back to the question.
Do we feel a connection with any of the Beatitudes?
Are we poor in spirit, or as some say, poor at being spiritual? Poor at seeing and feeling the hope and peace that Jesus brought? That seems to be a big deal in our day. We are often hopeless and peace-less because of the outside forces that press against us; racial injustice seems to have no end, economic concerns, political concerns, and especially today the health crisis. All of these and more steal our attention and steal our joy – and when we are trying to follow Jesus we lament and pray for a time when all are equal, all are fed and healthy, and the political situation offers hope to the poor and oppressed. When we are poor in spirit we are akin to those who listened to Jesus speak and are hungry for Good News.
Do we mourn for our family, our friends, the church, our country, the world? Do we morn when injustice is served? Do we mourn our present state where Jesus is misrepresented by those who care not for the hopeless but seek power and position over hope and peace as did those in authority in Jesus’ day?
Do we feel a connection with those who hunger and thirst for righteousness – decency, integrity, purity, morality…? Do we seek these things through prayer and a hunger for Jesus’ words?
Can we relate to the merciful, those who show grace and mercy to all people? Those who see the plight of others and act on impulse.
Do we long to be pure in heart? Do we long to be such that each thought, each motive, each action reflects the heart of God as shown through the life and teaching of Jesus?
Are we peacemakers? As opposed to gossip, slander, rudeness, hatred or discord? Do we offer ourselves as a buffer between opposing forces? Are we gentle and humble? Do we absorb the flaming arrows of the evil one and let them die within us instead of deflecting them on to yet another and another? Do we have to have our way or can we compromise or find the middle ground?
Do we ever feel persecuted for righteousness sake? Persecuted for our beliefs or our interpretation of the Scriptures? Are we afraid to say what we think and express our beliefs or ideas for fear of rebuke? But do we still pray for wisdom, direction, and the will of God and the blessings of God for us and others?
There is so much that could be said for all of these…suffice it to say that to these Jesus says in Matthew 6:14 NRSV:
“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid…let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father he heaven.”
Hopefully we find ourselves somewhere within the Beatitudes listening as did the first believers and find hope through the words of Jesus. Because if we can, and if we let our light shine we will make a difference in the seemingly hopeless and peace – less world where we live.
And when we follow Jesus the way he calls us to follow we will often be looked at with a slanted eye even persecuted. But take heart Jesus says, “Rejoice and be glad…for your reward is great in heaven.”
Jesus offered Good News to the folks he was speaking to. Find ourselves in their company and it can change our lives.
Peace and hope
Jim
July 30, 2020
I said yesterday that understanding who the Scriptures were written to combined with a faith to believe Jesus’s claims should be the beginning of our understanding of Scripture. From there we are free to read the words, ingest them, and aim our heart and mind toward the Kingdom that Jesus supposed, a Kingdom that has already begun and is awaiting our efforts at helping it become a fulfilled reality. The Sermon on the Mount in chapter five, six and seven explain much of those efforts in detail.
That pretty much takes the idea of being good and obeying the rules so we can go to Heaven when we die out of the picture. Going to Heaven when we die was never the thrust of early followers…the thrust was believing Jesus, the crucifixion, and most importantly believing the resurrection. That was the message of the Apostles, that Jesus was killed, buried, and then resurrected, was alive and well. Paul even cited that he wanted to know nothing but Jesus and Him crucified. (1 Cor. 2:2) This is the thrust of the Gospel. Everything centered around the faith to believe that Jesus was alive and was influencing his followers to live New Kingdom lives. From there would be the teaching of how to live those New Kingdom lives and influence others to do the same.
Reading Scripture with an inquisitive frame of mind has been the efforts of many who are intent on understanding the Gospel in general and Jesus in particular. If we simply say “The Bible says…” and leave it at that we find ourselves wondering what happened when we meet with contradiction within the text, and there are many contradictions.
And if we simply pass over those areas of contradiction saying, “The Bible says…” we stand the chance of either falling away or digging in deeper in our misunderstanding.
In Wesleyan Theology we believe that Scripture is paramount, it is the most important means through which we understand Jesus. But we also believe that our experiences, our traditions, and our reasoning abilities are important as well. When our ears are pricked with Jesus’ words – if we are coming at Scripture to learn and grow, maybe even be changed – it’s time to use all of our faculties to understand, all of our methods of learning, all of our efforts to grow deeper in love. We do that the best when we read from the perspective of the early believers whose only agenda was following Jesus…not trying to prove a point. Oh that we could learn from them.
Peace
Jim
July 29, 2020
So many things going through my mind and I’m not sure where to begin.
So…I’ll start at what I see as the beginning. (Not to leave out the Old Scriptures, but I’m largely speaking New Testament)
Author Brian Zahnd said something awhile back that has made a difference in my Bible reading, that the New Testament was written to a people who were anxiously looking for some Good News, and there are lots of nuances that go along with that. Suffice it to say that the first people we call Christian were a people living under the authority of the Roman Empire with only the freedoms that the Empire allowed, in a large sense an oppressed people. So when we view the Scripture as written to an oppressed people it has a different tone to it than what we are used to…we generally read Scripture as an affluent people who pretty much have anything we want. When we read it that way we’re apt to feel a bit special and anytime that happens we’re reading something into Scripture that’s not there.
So, much of the audience can be outlined in Matthew 5:3-11 (The Beatitudes)
The poor, the mournful, the humble, those who thirst for justice or righteousness, the merciful, those whose hearts are pure, the peacemakers and those persecuted because they are Christ followers. Most of those people fit into one or more of those categories.
And all of these are to base their beliefs, actions, words, even their life…on faith, faith that Jesus is who he claims to be and that his promises are true even though they seem so distant at times.
When I view the Scriptures in such a light they begin to become more real to me than ever before, even life changing.
There is a difference in feeling blessed out of our plenty than being blessed out of our poverty. Blessed out of plenty brings thoughts of gratitude…being blessed out of my poverty – especially poverty of spirit – brings thoughts of praise, comfort, peace, and calm. Big difference.
So in a nutshell the beginning of my thought processes about what the Scripture promises and how that affects us must begin through a view (as best we can fathom) from those to whom the Scriptures were written, and a faith in the One who made the promises. If we begin to feel a bit special we’re misunderstanding and we need to go back to the beginning.
So these are some things to think about:
Read Scripture with a different frame of mind.
Do we feel a connection with any of the Beatitudes?
Do we see Good News from our plenty…or our poverty?
Do our thought processes reveal fear in our world or faith to believe God has good in mind for us?
Do our blessings bring thoughts of praise, comfort, peace and calm?
More later.
Peace
Jim
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