Out From the Shadow Lands

Minor Adjustments in Hospital Visitation Bring Huge Results

The patient had been eating like a bird since yesterday afternoon, and didn't want to work on her bedside physical therapy.

The nursing staff decided to get the chaplain's thoughts on the matter.

“We can't seem to make any progress with her, can you help; do you have any suggestions?”

The chaplain stopped in, and he noticed right away that the room was dreary-dark. He asked permission and pulled the curtains back. Within an hour or so, the patient asked for water and ice chips.

Two or three hours later: “Ma'am, do you think you'd like to take a walk? I'd be happy to ask the staff to walk you around the nurse's station?”

“Well...You know, I think, I might like that...but I think I'd like to start with a wheelchair ride first.”

“Yes ma'am, wow...yes...what was I thinking. Let's start with the wheelchair.”

It's the little things, the simplicity of minor adjustments, that show the practical, specific measures of care. Maybe it's the location of a tray, the placement of the phone, the provision of a deck of cards or some flowers and a card.

The minor things can move mountains for these folks who appear to be without hope. The changes in the little things are like dynamite breaking up the despair and depression.

G. Mark Sumpter

Gentle, Mixed Up Mary

Note on Luke 1:26-38 Gabriel with Mary

The practice of saving faith does not hinge on my up-bringing (I was taught the truths of God well in my home, I have well-worn thoughts on how to handle trouble and sin), or my attitudinal disposition (that is, I am given toward sensitivity to spiritual issues; I’m good at catching myself when I sin), nor, last, my habitual practice of keeping up with the spiritual disciplines (good…I’ve had my daily reading time, I feel like I can walk with the King). No. These are giving focus to one’s personal history, inclinations and practices. Do these leave room for God? No. Our trust leans on God alone, His works and His ways. God has accomplished His work for me in Jesus.

One practical thing on this: God kicks out from underneath you all the self-trust stilts of your walk, and He kicks out from underneath you righteous ladder climbing. Refuse to aim for a right, faithful diagnosis of your problems, doubts and sinful habits. Also, refuse to find salvation in your right understanding of how sanctification works. How change will come about…how you can rightly recognize the ups and downs of faithfulness and failure, and how if you only knew the timing of when sound, lasting godly change will finally arrive for you. Knowing and seeing these things are not saviors.

You see, a focus on your own abilities is that just, a focus on you. Redemption has been provided in Jesus Christ. The Father has glorified His Son; the work has been done.

For Mary, she had doubts, insecurities, and fears. It’s called unbelief. She did not understand the ways of God. She did not understand God’s choice to use the anticipated shame before the eyes of the Galilean public—with her coming out-of-wedlock-pregnancy. She did not see connections of God’s ways and God’s accomplishments. But the story ends, vs. 38, “Let it be to me according to your word.”

Submission calls for the demonstration of confidence in, and coming underneath, the sovereign power of the Lord God when all evidence is contrary to our understanding and expectations. He will work His work. He is faithful to His own Word and ways. Remember JC Ryle’s quote? “Faith never rests so calmly and peacefully as when it lays its head on the pillow of God’s omnipotence.”

G. Mark Sumpter

Tony and The Tiger

First Steps of Opportunity for Coach Dungy

Men who confess transgressions need hope, truth and grace. The only way Tiger will get out of the woods is by coming under the sound of the gospel and benefiting from God's appointed means of grace. The men who are orbiting in a certain oikos, God-ordained spheres of family and household-like realms, need to step up and attempt to be vessels of His message of mercy. Dungy and Woods orbit in similar spheres: sports, the public eye and they're men.

Mr. Tony Dungy has been walking in a profession of faith in Christ Jesus, he's spoken with wisdom and compassion regarding Michael Vick; and do you remember his words after accepting the Lombardi Trophy at the Super Bowl in 2007? Beyond words, Tony has demonstrated truth in action.

Tony and Tiger need to meet, and God willing, Tony can confront Tiger with the grace and truth of Jesus Christ.

Are you praying for this oikos ministry?

John 1:38-49

They said to Him, “Rabbi” (which is to say, when translated, Teacher), “where are You staying?” He said to them, “Come and see.” They came and saw where He was staying, and remained with Him that day (now it was about the tenth hour). One of the two who heard John speak, and followed Him, was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He first found his own brother Simon, and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated, the Christ). And he brought him to Jesus.

Now when Jesus looked at him, He said, “You are Simon the son of Jonah." You shall be called Cephas” (which is translated, A Stone). The following day Jesus wanted to go to Galilee, and He found Philip and said to him, “Follow Me.” Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found Him of whom Moses in the law, and also the prophets, wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” And Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.” Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward Him, and said of him, “Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no deceit!” Nathanael said to Him, “How do You know me?” Jesus answered and said to him, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.” Nathanael answered and said to Him, “Rabbi, You are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!”

Tony to Tiger: “Come and See.”

G.Mark Sumpter

Calling

Linking Verbs and My Pastoral Work

My Tuesdays start at Dark Thirty AM. That's right, it's the Martin Luther thing. German Reformer knee-mail. Remember when Luther said that he if has a milk run of a day he gets up extra early and prays for four hours? For me, it's the pray hard stuff getting ready for Classical Conversations tutoring. Four hours of Pepto Bismol, some pacing, a few cups of coffee, and then back to more pages of samples of Simple Sentences, Verb Linking with a Predicate Noun. Then a little more Pepto Bismol.

On Tuesday afternoons, I am privileged with four classically bodied students and their parents to express more of my calling as a pastor. Recently, [that's an -ly word sentence starter!] I've been born again as an Orthodox Presbyterian Minister. Let's get a brief word of some exegesis.

Back in August, after being asked to tutor four students in English Grammar and Writing, God met me. I was doing just fine on my own Damascus Road, thank you very much. He struck me down with Subject Nouns, Intransitive Verbs and Direct Objects.

"Sumpter, Sumpter, Pick up thy Subject and Predicate, and learn to write and speak My message well."

"Who are You, Word?"

"Go, I will show thee glorious gems of parts of speech."

I got up off the ground, was baptized with some training, and so, now, every Tuesday afternoon, I delight in Grammar and Writing for about two hours with tutoring. If only Mr. Heyworth and Mr. Harrison of Mears Junior High could see the fruit of their seed-sowing! Indeed, God is good.

I am learning to pastor God's World: stories of fancy and fun, and stories of history and Gospel. I am getting more and more sanctified with my earthy and earthly work with words. I remain confident that He who began a good word for me will carry it along, Quid et Quo and all, to the very end. My students are my helping verbs.

Tuesdays are the days I love to hate. It's the pastoral calling-like thing. "Sumpter, go, I am with you!"

It's the Lord's earth with all being His: words, complete sentences, pencils, diagramming, stories, Ancient History-Based Writing and Question Confirmation.

Jesus is God, and He is King. Compound Declarative, Subject-Verb Linking-Predicate Noun.

"Therefore, go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall say."

Gulp.

G. Mark Sumpter

God’s Will, Part 2

Warnings about a Personal Will of God

In the first post, we stated that God’s will on the general level sets the stage for the daily life of serving the Lord. Let's be more accurate about this: a walk with God in general obedience IS THE STAGE for all of life. All of life is to be lived for the Lord, 24/7. There's no secondary stage for obedience.

But somehow we assume that the really big decisions are the moral ones, and the little decisions are the non-moral ones. This morning I had Cheerios; yesterday at breakfast, I ate a three-egg omlet. These little decisions are the little ones; there's not much with which to be concerned, morally, we commonly think. No. All of life is for His glory. All of life is moral. We are involved in moral decision making all the time. On the matter of making moral choices regarding breakfast, there are health issues, convenience for a hurried morning and helpful service to others, to name three.

Back to the main point thus far. Doesn’t it properly follow that if one does not obey the plain teachings of the Bible, then we’re playing a game about pursuing faithful, God-honoring decision making in what we call the larger matters of life, things like marriage, college, occupations, missionary calling, house-buying, etc.?

How are we foolish with this game? It’s in our view of God. If we think that there’s a special, secret will for each of us, then our view of God is that He has a lock and key on the door with the sign--God’s Will for Sumpter. Our God is on hand, He's involved and nearby, but He's the Concealer. He'll open the door if I will 1) rightly see the providential signs and 2) faithfully keep my heart right before Him. Who wants to serve a God who says He has a plan for each life, but it's concealed and you have to find it?

BEEP-BEEP-BEEP! Warning! On number #1, My view of God is that He’s supposedly leading me, arranging and ordering providential markers for me to follow, if only I can read His signs accurately. Maybe reading the signs includes a conversation with a school teacher, or maybe it's an email notifying me of an up-coming job interview. With this view of God, He’s the God of Providence, and I'm supposed to be the god of Reading Providence! He's become the God of magic, powers, signs, connecting dots, impressions, hunches and horoscopes, etc. I am ultimately left in charge, left to myself to properly read the signs and to be the judge. There's the door, “God’s Will for Sumpter,” and I must find the right key, at the right time and turn it to open.

BEEP-BEEP-BEEP! Warning! On number #2, My diligence to keep my heart right with God leads me into a place of introspection, which, if made a habit long enough, leads me into self-analysis and paralysis. We can underscore paralysis. Paralysis is putting obedience on hold, and we turn and look inside of self attempting to find our way. Keeping my heart right with God is religious jargon for saying, “I’m staying so close with God, I’ll just know…I’ll just know what He wants me to do with my next step for my life.” Here I give myself to personal Bible reading waiting on a passage that speaks to me, waiting for inner peace. Prayer with right feelings about something takes over. These things are more of a pagan-like divination practice of personal piety for attempting to find God's personal will.

With both uses of these tools, we’re attempting to do something that God simply does not intend for His children. On the first, it’s impossible to faithfully read and interpret signs and happenings of providence. On the second, we keep ourselves at the center of things, and we set God off to the side. Often my feelings and inner peace become indicators on how I know I'm ready to move forward.

God’s general, revealed will centers us on Him, and it gives focus to His Word. It relieves the pressure of being on a quest for the discovery of His specially planned will for me as an individual. It keeps us from thinking that God is the God who conceals His will, and I must find it. So, we must conclude: the Bible does not give to us a specially-designed, individual will of God.

G. Mark Sumpter

The Word and Sacraments

The Lord Veiled but He Confronts in Word and Sacraments

“The Word and Sacraments are the forms of abasement which Christ the Mediator to-day assumes in confronting us with His grace and challenge. They are the symbols by which He to-day accommodates Himself to our limited capacity for apprehending the divine and veils that in Himself with which we cannot bear to be directly confronted. The same self-revealing Lord who showed Himself to the people of Israel in many and varied forms, ceremonies, dreams and visions, confronts us to-day when the Word is preached and the Sacraments administered, and it is to the Word and Sacraments that we must turn if we wish to enter into communion with Him.”

Ronald Wallace in his, Calvin's Doctrine of the Word and Sacrament, p. 22

G. Mark Sumpter

Bulimia Matters.14

Seizing and Living By Truth

“Feeling sorry for yourself is one of the strongest, most addictive narcotics known to man. It feels so good to feel so bad. Self-pity arises so easily, seems so plausible, and proves so hard to shake off.”

See the Journal of Biblical Counseling, David Powlison, Vol. 25, Num 3., p. 7

G. Mark Sumpter

God's Will, Part 1

God's Will, Generally, Foundation First

I'm not able to recall where in the writings of Elisabeth Eliot I've read her on the concept of making sure the Christian puts into practice the pursuit of God's will in the plain, revealed promises and commands of the Bible. This is a signature point of hers, maybe in Discipline: A Glad Surrender.

The general will of God means the wide-sweeping, general commands of the Bible. Such matters are first-steps of our marching orders. Things like: practice hospitality, pray with thanksgiving in all things, remember to keep the Sabbath, confess the Lord Jesus before men, forgive those who come saying, "I repent," abstain from sexual immorality, give of the tithes and offerings to the Lord, do not steal, do not tell lies, admonish the unruly, comfort the fainthearted and more.

Men and women and young people seek out a counselor, an elder, pastor, teacher or a parent and they believe that a word from God about His plan will be spoken to them about specific practicalities--like, "attend the University of Washington" or "purchase the GMC truck." It's like walking into a classroom and seeing the handwriting on the white board and they say, "See, here it is; this is God's will and His plan for me." It's their attempt to get God's will in a specific order addressed specifically to them about their specific circumstances.

But right in the same stride in life, at the very same time, these same men and women and young people ignore the general will of God, the revealed commands and promises in His Word. There's an immediate warning about this. Those who are not giving attention to His general will, those who are hit and miss about it, those who are choosy and fair-weather minded about it, those who are feelings oriented with respect to it, will be the same about making decisions regarding His will in the specific steps of the nitty gritty.

What's the answer? We're to pray through and appropriate Christ's strength for daily obedience according to the plainness of what God has said. His will revealed is first order. Why first order? 1. He's glorified and loved ("Love the Lord your God"). 2. We're pursuing Him for first-order matters of His righteousness ("Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness"). 3. We're putting into practice His promises, and this especially has a bearing on guidance, ("Good and upright is the LORD; therefore He teaches sinners in the way. The humble He guides in justice, and the humble He teaches His way.")

The general will of God always carries the weight of knowing and doing God's will in the details.

G. Mark Sumpter

Fun Stuff

Christian BookSellers Convention in Time for the Holidays



Still grieving over the Lakers' loss in the NBA finals, Philip Mackenzie receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, asking him to come to an abandoned sports bar in the Oregon wilderness to talk it over. What Phil doesn't realize is that God is about to reveal Himself in a familiar earthly form that will powerfully draw him to the Divine. What transpires is a dialogue that will wrestle with the timeless question, "Where is God when your favorite sport team stinks?" The answers Phil receives will astound and transform him as he finally understands who God is for the first time in his life: a really tall black guy with a heart of gold.

WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING ABOUT "THE SHAQ":
"This book does for our generation what John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress could never do for his: Fictionalize God as an NBA center. It's that stupid." --- John Piper, pastor and author

"With cameos by David Beckham and Peyton Manning as the other Persons of the Trinity, The Shaq is a theological slam dunk!" --- ESPN

"We already idolize sports figures in America, so why not idolize God, too?" --- Redbook

"Get this book and play some one-on-one with the coolest God ever!" --- Boy's Life

HT: The Sacred Sandwich

G. Mark Sumpter

Christmas is Coming

Honey, Where Did You Say We Boxed Up the Lights?

From the section called Your Shots photos submitted to National Geographic by the magazine’s readers.

Photographer, James Snyder wrote:

This is a Cuban tree frog on a tree in my backyard in southern Florida. How and why he ate this light is a mystery. It should be noted that at the time I was taking this photo, I thought this frog was dead having cooked himself from the inside. I’m happy to say I was wrong. After a few shots he adjusted his position. So after I was finished shooting him, I pulled the light out of his mouth and he was fine. Actually, I might be crazy but I don’t think he was very happy when I took his light away.

G. Mark Sumpter

Jerusalem Conference

These three guys, Sumpter, Jensen and Wagner, have just enjoyed the fellowship around the Word at the Jerusalem Conference. Faith Church hosts the 2-day conference annually in late October. Pastor Roger Wagner of Bayview OPC was the guest teacher. This year's conference grabbed onto the shirt tails of much of Protestantism to take part in the John Calvin 500th celebration. There were about 60 in attendance.

G. Mark Sumpter

Sermon Prep 24/7

The preaching mentor and author, Zack Eswine of Covenant Seminary, reminds pastors that everyday life sunrise to sunset, most often thought as the mundane of life, finds plenty of sermon fodder. Of late, my best sermon application points come from a Nazarene pastor friend. It's simple and timely conversation, and I am so grateful for his attentive countenance and perspectives. Recently, he spoke of his own life and the place of faithful leadership among God's people. He was spot on.

Eswine writes: Listening to life and gathering sound bites and snapshots of people and places deepens our wisdom. This is our calling. Biblical preaching makes a missional turn when preachers see nothing as more essential than their personal walk with God and see all of life as their sermon preparation.

I've mentioned to several that my work at the hospital slows me down. Quite literally, you walk slower around the halls, and into the rooms; and the conversation goes to a creep-crawl. The patients on whom I call are God's agents of change for my life. I turn my ears on. They preach texts and application at me every time.

Sermons Via Surgery. Hip and Thigh Hope. The Body Chemistry of Faith. Patients in the Pulpit.

Preparing for sermons happens all the time.

G. Mark Sumpter