THIRTY YEARS - A REFLECTION

  

              A lot has changed over the past 30 years.  When I graduated from Christ Theological Seminary in Urbana, Illinois and entered the full-time ministry as an Assistant Pastor for my Father, I was a single guy, with no wonderful wife and precious daughter.

There was no internet or e-mail, nor were there PC/Laptop computers, Game Boys, Sony Wii’s, Smart Phones, Mobile Phones, MRI’s, Fiber Optics, Office Software, CDs, MP3s, LEDs, LCDs, GPS, E-Bay, Digital Photography, Video Cameras, Bio Fuels, Genetically altered plants, Human Genome Mapping, ATMs, or Stents.  We still typed on electric typewriters and made copies by offset printing or ditto machines. 

               While technological and scientific advances have progressed at a dizzying pace, we have witnessed a jaw-dropping decline in moral virtue and Christian spirituality. Nearly every cultural indicator—out of wedlock births, unmarried couples living together, divorce rates, availability of pornography, STD’s, sodomy, juvenile delinquency, drug dependency, financial irresponsibility, dishonesty, cheating, educational deficiency, and declining church participation (particularly among the young) and lax Church standards—confirms that the very fabric of our civilization is unraveling before our very eyes.

               As we march into this Brave New World convinced that traditional mores are outdated and irrelevant to our times:

1. Western governments are spending themselves into bankruptcy trying to meet the needs of their citizens—needs that have historically been met by traditional families,
2. Psychological duress is debilitating and destabilizing large portions of the population while the wages of sin are wreaking havoc with public health, social welfare, and family stability &
3. Children are undervalued, undisciplined, insecure, and woefully unprepared for the challenges of adulthood.

I’m starting to wonder if I’ve enlisted in a losing cause!  Actually I have.  Martin Luther was right when he penned the words to this classic hymn:

Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing;
Were not the right Man on our side, the Man of God’s own choosing:
Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is He;
Lord Sabaoth, His Name, from age to age the same,
And He must win the battle.

And though this world, with devils filled, should threaten to undo us,
We will not fear, for God hath willed His truth to triumph through us:
The Prince of Darkness grim, we tremble not for him;
His rage we can endure, for lo, his doom is sure,
One little word shall fell him.

That word above all earthly powers, no thanks to them, abideth;
The Spirit and the gifts are ours through Him Who with us sideth:
Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also;
The body they may kill: God’s truth abideth still,
His kingdom is forever.

IT WOULD BE A LOSING CAUSE, BUT CHRIST JESUS WILL NOT FAIL—HE MUST, AND HE WILL WIN THE BATTLE! Praise the Lord! Hallelujah! Glory to God in the Highest!  I am not worthy—But HE is!  I am not able—But HE is!  I am not wise enough—But HE is! 

FOR MY 30^TH ANNIVERSARY IN THE MINISTRY it would be thrilling to…

+Sing 30 verses of Gospel Music this Sunday!

+Have 30 riders on each bus route!

+Have 30 men, 30 women, and 30 teens in the morning service!

+Hear a 30 voice choir singing Sunday Morning!

+Have $3,000 pledged and given to “Fresh Start” Building Fund Campaign

+Have 30 minute sermons (yeah right!)

+Have everyone over after Church Sunday evening for fellowship.