Monthly Archives: April 2014

"And the Lord said, 'If you had faith as a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this sycamine tree, 'be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you.'" Luke 17:6

We find this saying in two places in the Gospels, and in Luke it comes in response to a request from the disciples: "increase our faith." We must look carefully at how this familiar teaching applies directly to this request.

Who among us would not ask God to increase our faith? We treat faith like a vitamin. A little faith, the grain of a mustard seed faith, is good. More must be better! Give me more! That is the disciples' logic, and it's ours. Thus many of the inspiring testimonies we hear revolve around what so and so did and what great faith it took to accomplish this or that. We love to hear about more faith, and we long for more faith.

Notice, however, that Jesus did not say "You have asked for more faith, and that is a good thing. God will surely give it!" No. Instead He underscored the incredible effectiveness of even the smallest amount of faith. Why?

Jesus' point here, and the point we often miss, is not the amount of faith you have, but what you do with the faith God has given you. Indisputably God has given the gift of faith to every person. We all have a will to believe. Something pulls us higher and leads us to believe in God. You have faith. Now I say this gently, instead of whining for more faith why not act on the faith you have? You think it is too paltry? Jesus did not give you an excuse for having a tiny amount of faith. He taught you the possibilities of using that tiny amount of faith.

We see these possibilities in Jesus' life. In both Matthew and Mark we find this teaching after His entry into the Jerusalem, a week prior to His death. In fact, reading this past Sunday the story of His triumphal entry is what drew me to this passage. His imminent death was a tremendous challenge for Him, one that He even prayed to avoid. Yet after those prayers in the Garden, He rose with a resolve to go the cross and lay down His life for you and me. Think about it. The Son, in His full humanity, relied on His faith to act. The cross was faith in action.

Goethe said that thought without action is a disease. I say faith without action is a fantasy. If you do not act on your faith, you will feel helpless and only plead for more faith. Your request is completely irrelevant. God's answer is that He has given you what you need. Now act. Use the faith He has given you. What is the task before you? By faith, take care of it! What is the burden you have borne alone? By faith, cast it upon God and leave it there. What impulse to serve have you too long ignored? By faith, get to it!

You believe you have only little faith? You probably do. We all do. But it is enough! Act on your little faith.

Grace,

Dr. Terry Ellis

April 27, 2014

"Simon Peter said to them, 'I am going fishing.' They said to him, 'We will go with you.'" John 21:3

A very absent-minded professor's wife came to him and said, "Lloyd, dear, we're moving today. When you come home this afternoon remember to go to the new address two blocks down." The professor nodded in agreement and went to work. At the end of the day he went home, but sure enough, he went to his former address. He saw the empty house, and that stirred something of a distant memory, but he couldn't quite recall it. A little boy was in the front yard, and the professor approached him and said, "Excuse me, but where is the family that used to live here?" The little boy sighed, shook his head and said, "Mom said you'd forget."

I wonder if forgetting was Peter's main problem on that day he decided to go fishing. If you read all of John 21 you get the impression that the purpose of this resurrection appearance was specifically to help Peter move on in life. He had seen Jesus alive, but lived as if He weren't.

I'm writing this on Easter afternoon. The service this morning was wonderful. The early service around the cross was inspiring, the music in the regular service was thrilling, even the preaching was passable. Easter Sunday is a time when we remember the greatest of truths. The resurrection proves that God solved our sin problem, our death problem, and our fear problem.

Now you are likely reading this on Monday morning. Has the thrill worn off? Or do you remember and rejoice as you move into a new week? Easter is the high-point of the Christian year, but the Monday after Easter may be the most important day. Monday is when faith is put to the test. Monday is when convictions must be transformed into experience. On the Monday after Easter you will either forget or remember the resurrection.

You can remember the resurrection is you pause, even briefly, and thank Jesus for His presence in your life. He said He would be with you always. Think about what that implies. The Creator of the Universe, the King Himself promised to be with you always. Find a good devotional book, read the daily meditations, and say a prayer. That will remind you that you are not alone. You will remember.

You can remember the resurrection if, when you are troubled during this day, you pause and simply tell God that you are afraid, or angry, or resentful, or doubtful, or whatever darkens your mind and your soul. These brief prayers invite God into your thinking. Usually we neglect our faith when we're agitated. That is the very time you need to remember.

You can remember the resurrection by rejoicing in the countless moments when God reveals His grace. From the moment you finish reading GraceWaves start to look for grace moments. Do you see them in the children you are getting ready for school? Don't focus only on the aggravation they bring. Remember what a miracle they are. What about your pets? I'm writing autobiographically here. My dogs are sources of unconditional love. I saw them, played with them, and took care of them the previous night yet every morning they greet me like a long lost friend. I think God rejoices to see Schnauzer-joy. I can too, and thereby remember the resurrection. How about your spouse? Coworkers? Clerks? It takes some focus and intention, but you will be surprised by the grace moments surrounding you as you move through the day.

Christianity is a religion of life, abundant and eternal. Life itself is both the proof and the testing ground of faith. We have once again trumpeted the call that Jesus is alive, yet, if we forget, we live as if He weren't. Remember today and every day that Jesus is alive and walks with you. Now enjoy this day and the rest of your week.

Grace,

Dr. Terry Ellis

April 20, 2014

"And He is the expiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world." 1 John 2:2

Holy Week is all about an answer. The problem concerns our sins and what we are to do about them. John wrote that Jesus is the expiation for our sins. Other translations have propitiation. You likely have not used either of those words in your lifetime. Suffice it to say that on the cross Jesus secured our forgiveness. That is the answer to the most basic problem you face this week.

What will we do with that answer? Mostly, we try to sidestep the question. Sins are uncomfortable, and we are endlessly creative at avoiding the discussion.

Historically, various groups have tried to blame the Jews for Jesus' death. That's a convenient way of avoiding culpability. Blame another ethnic group. But actually it's not even accurate on the surface. The Romans executed Jesus, so I suppose we should all be mad at the Italians.

Personally, we dodge the question by either redefining sin out of existence, or trying to numb it by entertaining ourselves to death, or skipping the Jesus answer and going straight to self-forgiveness. The last option is a clean way of avoiding that messy cross.

Theologically, people often decide that God is simply too nice to worry about sin. The crucifixion, if it really happened, was just a big, unnecessary misunderstanding.

Whatever you make of the Bible, you cannot ignore the fact that human sin is described or assumed on every page. The major theme of the Bible is how God makes right that which has gone so wrong in us. Clearly God's answer is the cross. By ignoring the answer we multiply and magnify the problem.

Holy Week is about culpability. John's words indicate Jesus died for every race, nationality, group, and sub-group; anyone who has drawn a breath. That means that Jesus died for my sins, Terry Ellis' sins. I cannot begin to celebrate the resurrection until I admit, without reservation, my sins and my role in Jesus' death.

Everything else about the Christian life involves continual effort, and frankly we are entitled to accept progress. I am still a work in progress. God is refining me and bringing me to completion. I live in God's grace by accepting the fact that I am imperfect but growing. That is fine.

But on this initial decision, we cannot accept progress. Until you accept the fact that you are dead in your sins and powerless to make your life right, then you really cannot move on to the grace and glory of forgiveness and resurrection. Hold anything in reserve, allow any evasion from a full confession and you impose a limit on yourself.

A Dennis the Menace cartoon depicts Dennis kneeling in prayer beside his bed. His words: "I'm here to turn myself in."

The glory of the gospel is that surrendering to God brings not defeat, but victory. Clinging to sin, justifying bad behavior, ignoring consequences is soul-sapping, life-stealing, and joy-crushing. Holy Week is a time to turn yourself in. Go ahead. Bow and confess. God has the answer.

Grace,

Dr. Terry Ellis

April 13, 2014

"Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out." Luke 8:2

On my left knee I have a two-inch scar courtesy of a circular saw back in 1981. When I first cut myself, it was not a scar at all, of course. It was a bleeding open wound that soaked my sock. At Barbourville General Hospital a nurse cleaned it out, stopped the bleeding, and a doctor stitched it closed. The scab formed and eventually fell off leaving a white scar on my sun-starved white leg.

You probably have scars too and stories to share of how you got them. Scars are physical markers of hurt, anxiety, and probably fear. The scars on your body are reminders of the pain you felt.

The scars on your soul hurt more.

Mary Magdalene had her share of those scars. Seven of them. They were called demons, and in that day any malady could be attributed to a demon. So in addition to some real demons, she probably also suffered from some physical ailments and possibly some mental illness. We don't know much about her (the woman in Luke 7:37ff is never identified as Mary in the scripture), but we can well imagine that she had a very difficult life, suffered a lot of pain, and probably inflicted her share of it on other people.

When she met Jesus she was full of wounds, and the psychic ones were the worst. The pain of the mind and soul is deepest and is the source of the pain we bring to others. Many of Mary's wounds were fresh, some had scabbed over, but none had truly healed. Then Jesus healed her, and she began to follow Him all the way to the cross and become the first preacher of the gospel of the resurrection. The scabs had turned into scars, but how beautiful those scars were!

Now take a look at your soul wounds. We all have them. Are they scabs? Or are they scars? What role do we have in moving from one to the other?

The key is to stop picking at the scab. Each wound is real, but rehearsing the cause, and especially remembering the person responsible for the wound, just prolongs the bleeding and the pain.

Your wound may be fresh, and it will take some time for the healing to begin, but I've noticed that most of us keep picking at old wounds so that the healing never progresses. We feel resentment at the person who hurt us or we feel guilt and shame for how we hurt others. We endless rehearse how we got the wound and ensure insure the scab never becomes a scar.

The past can only hurt you today to the extent you allow it. Mary carried the scars of her past for the rest of her life, but she was not bound by her wounds, self-inflicted or otherwise. God offers you grace to move on. It can be grace to forgive or grace to feel forgiven. Either way, grace is what you need to begin turning the scab into a scar.

You also need to understand clearly God's role in your healing. God is simply not in the business of bringing pain into your life. Jesus never hurt anyone, never brought a disease on anyone, and certainly never killed anyone. He said, "if you have seen Me you have seen the Father" (John 14:9). Watching Jesus shows us what God is like. God is not interested in hurting you. He longs to heal you.

Our tendency when hurt is to ask why, and the chief "why" question is "Why did God do this?" Here's the answer: He didn't. We live in a broken world. It affects us all through disease, accidents, and death. Sometimes the pain comes through our own terrible choices. Either way we are better off to deal with life as life is. God doesn't mind the questions, but think about it. If you knew the answer to any "why" question, would that really relieve the pain? Probably not.

The truth is God's blessings often come to us in mysterious ways, and sometimes the blessing is cloaked initially in pain and trouble. Give God some time and trust. Mary came to Jesus. In the same way you can bring Him your wound. Stop arguing about it. Let Him start the healing. He can transform the scab into a glorious scar. Countless people now speak of the most difficult times in their lives as occasions when God demonstrated His power through their weakness. They're just showing off their scars!

So look again at the pain you're feeling today. You have a right to hurt, but you also have a need to heal. Are you picking at the wound? Or has the healing started? The Great Physician waits patiently.

Grace,

Dr. Terry Ellis

April 6, 2014