November 10, 2008

“Make Room in Your Heart”
by Pastor George Van Alstine

In his letter to the believers of the Corinthian church, Paul writes in very personal terms about his ministry. He gave 110%, but often felt unappreciated and disrespected. You will get a feel for this by reading 2 Corinthians 6:3-10.

After expressing himself so openly, Paul summarizes:
“We have spoken frankly to you Corinthians; our heart is wide open to you.”  (2 Corinthians 6:11)
He realizes how vulnerable he has become in sharing his feelings with them.

Then he turns the tables:
“There is no restriction in our affections, but only in yours.” (verse 13)

Paul expands on this exhortation a few verses later:
“Make room in your hearts for us; we have wronged no one, we have corrupted no one, we have taken advantage of no one.”   (7:12)
He seems to be reminding them that he has not attacked them in any way; yet, they seem to be defensively protecting themselves.

To me, the words that stand out are “Make room in your hearts for us.” This comes as a challenge to each of us whose hearts have been “enlarged” by the Holy Spirit’s presence. We are capable of more love, more caring, more outreach, more giving, than we ever have allowed ourselves to express. We remain “restricted,” as we were before the grace of God entered our experience. Instead of passing his love on to others, we tend to hoard it for ourselves and our loved ones. When we could be gushing God’s grace all over spiritually thirsty persons around us, we ration out little drips, as we feel we can afford them.

With the holiday season before us, this is an ideal time to make more of yourself available to others. Is there someone in your circle of nearness who seems to be saying, “Make room in your heart for me?” Are you brushing this person off, pretending you don’t hear?

Maybe you’ve been “restricting” yourself. Maybe you’ve underestimated the love you have to give. Maybe there’s a whole new ministry of caring ahead of you.

Open your heart to others.  God has fully opened his heart to you, as the Christmas story vividly reminds us.

November 3, 2008

“The Red-White-And-Blue Church”
by Pastor George Van Alstine

I’m writing this on Election Day.  This is the perfect time to express these thoughts, because (1) no one can think I’m trying to influence the election; and (2) I don’t know who our next president will be as I write.

There has been much discussion throughout US history about the relationship between Church and State, as envisioned by our Nation’s Founding Fathers.  There has been relatively little talk about the intention of the Church’s Founding Father.  Most recent controversy revolves around what influence the Church should have on the State.  My focus in this article will be the opposite: How are we allowing the Church to be shaped by the State and its secular interests?

I’ve entitled this “The Red-White-and-Blue Church” based on a clear picture in my mind.  It was the week after the Fourth of July when I attended a meeting at another church.  That church had celebrated America’s Independence Day with great vigor and enthusiasm, since the Fourth fell on a Sunday that year.  The decorations were still up.  Theirs was literally a Red-White-and-Blue Church, festooned with banners, flags and bunting.  For a moment I wasn’t sure I was in a church, but I knew I was in America.

The Church Jesus established was prepared for a hostile world.  “I am sending you out like sheep in the midst of wolves… They will hand you over to councils and flog you… You will be dragged before governments and kings because of Me.” (Matthew 10:16-18) The letters of Peter, Paul and John are stories of a Church suffering a great deal for being the Church.  I envision this as the Black-and-Blue Church.  This church was definitely not comfortable with the State and civil society surrounding it.

A few centuries later, the Church did become comfortable.  In fact, when the Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity, the Church suddenly became the “in” religion.  The interests of the State and the interests of the Church were merged into one agenda.  I envision this as the Purple-and-Gold Church, since those are the colors of royal privilege.  Most Christians at that time thought they had entered into the glory days.  However, history has demonstrated that the Purple-and-Gold Church helped usher in a period of greed, ambition and warfare, which led to the Dark Ages eclipse of both spiritual vitality in the Church and rational enlightenment in the State.

We are Christians.  We are Americans.  We should proudly affirm both, but they are not the same thing.  As Christians we are part of a world spiritual community.  An increasingly shrinking number of our brothers and sisters worship as part of a Purple-and-Gold Church, in countries with a tradition of  close Church/State identities, such as European and South American Catholic nations.  Far more of our brothers and sisters worldwide worship in struggling fellowships of Black-and-Blue churches, ministering to the poor and hopeless under harsh political regimes.

Frankly, the Red-White-and-Blue Church makes no sense to them.  They see no justification for it in the New Testament, and they believe it separates American Christians from the day-to-day struggles they face.  Worst of all, American Christians, under their Red-White-and-Blue banner, support policies that oppress or endanger them and make their situations worse.  Ironically, we end up supporting missions to believers in Third-World countries and governmental policies that actually hurt them.

I hope the Church in America will rethink its role vis-a-vis the State. I would like to see the Red-White-and-Blue Church disappear and be replaced by a new American Church – where the flag that is waved is a flag of many colors, representing the varied people and nations Jesus had in mind when he said,

“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations…” Matthew 28:20

October 27, 2008

    “Living A Bite-Size Life”
by Pastor George Van Alstine

We try to swallow life whole.  Through experience, we learn (or we’re supposed to learn) that we can’t digest that much.  Wisdom is learning how to take life in small bites.

Think about happiness, for instance.  It tastes good, so we want it continually, and we want all we can get.  Of course, we’re not equipped to handle so much sweet stuff, and we become nauseated from over-indulgence.  True happiness can only be savored in small bites, thoroughly chewed and swallowed slowly.  One of life’s most important lessons is to experience happiness in bite-size chunks.

And then there is sadness, happiness’ alter-ego.  Sadness can be seen as the absence of happiness, and happiness as the absence of sadness.  Sadness, too, can be nourishing, but only when we take it in small bites.  Too much all at once can make us gravely ill.  Wisdom teaches us that if we discipline ourselves to enjoy happiness in small bites, this tends to break up large blocks of sadness into bite size pieces.

Then look at Paul’s famous big three of 1 Corinthians 13– faith, hope and charity (love). We think of faith as a big leap we may some day be called on to take giant-killer faith,  or mountain-moving faith. But faith in small bites is what makes God’s work go forward, and it’s also what makes your life a journey upward toward his purposes for you. It’s the faith you often don’t even see as faith - the little decisions for good, the small steps into unknown territory, the tiny risks of trusting God - that fuel the engine of our spiritual life. Bite-size faith.

Hope also is best experienced in bite-size pieces. It’s fine to have an ultimate goal, a picture of what we can be and do, a high standard. But sometimes the distance between here and there seems immense, and we become discouraged. Discouragement is the opposite of hope, and it can kick the wind out of us. But spiritual wisdom will teach us to feel hope in small pieces, rather than in its most grandiose form. Yes, eye has not seen, nor ear heard what God has prepared for his people. That’s our glorious destiny. Be we also need some mini-destinies near at hand - looking forward to a time with the family, anticipating Gospel Choir rehearsal, waiting for the answer to our prayer for a friend who is under the weather. These are examples of the bite-size hope that can keep us going from day to day.

Of course, love is also best experienced in bite-size pieces. I know we all have fantasies (and maybe a few memories) of great lavish feasts of love, as we share our deep mutual affection, with the one-and-only love-of-our-lives. But this is much more common in Harlequin romances than in real life. And if we do experience this kind of love, the next morning often brings other feelings. What’s more, the intensity of erotic love is just about impossible to maintain over time. So let’s  hear it for bite-size love - the smile of a baby, a special meal made by a wife for her husband, the offer of a stranger to give your car a jump-start, the sharing of a friend’s painful parenting problems, seeing a child you’ve taught in Sunday School go forward at the pastor’s invitation after the sermon.

Some people experience a dramatic conversion that radically changes their lives over night. Others grow spiritually, but in fits and starts, sometimes feeling high, then falling into a pit, with other mountains and valleys making up the pattern of their lives. I’ve noticed that the people who grow most consistently and surely into the image of Jesus are those who have learned the lesson of experiencing all of the Christian life in bite-size, digestible, nourishing pieces.

“Lois and Eunice and You”
by Pastor George Van Alstine

 Our homecoming emphasis this year will be on the critical role women have played in the origin and emergence of Altadena Baptist Church. We came to this idea by the realization that some older women of faith have graduated to eternity during recent months, such as Jeanne Marsh, Dorothy Olson and Lois Shotlow and Betty Stickles. People who have been part of the fellowship in recent years probably don’t realize the important roles such women have played in the church’s ministry over the years.

 We are entitling our theme, “Lois, Eunice and You,” based on the words of Paul to his young assistant Timothy:

“I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith
that lived first in your grandmother Lois and
your mother Eunice and now, I am sure,
lives in you.”    II Timothy: 1:5

It would make the picture complete if Timothy’s name were “Timothia,” and “she” carried on the faith heritage of “her” mother and grandmother. That’s the sense of our title “Lois and Eunice and You,” that women of faith who play important roles in today’s ABC are following in the footsteps of some very impressive women of the past.

 But let’s allow Timothy to remain a male. In the first century, women did not have many opportunities to be up-front leaders, but they could invest in the training of a promising young man who, like Timothy, was destined to be one of the Early Church’s key leaders. Eunice’s mother Lois gave her a name that meant “Good Victory.” She chose to see this little female baby as a courageous conqueror. Was that an ironic joke, or did Lois have the spiritual insight to foresee that the shy, reticent Timothy would need the example of a courageous mother to bring out the best in him?

Until 1979, women at ABC were not allowed to serve on its main governing body, the Board of Deacons. But many of these women found a way to be powerful leaders in spite of such limitations. I discovered an example of this while rummaging through historical records in the church’s vault room. Bethel Baptist Church, originally the Swedish Baptist Church of Pasadena, is one of the congregations that merged to form ABC. Their original building was constructed in the middle of the Depression. There are records showing that much of the financial support came from women, who kept their jobs working as domestics for large Pasadena estates, while their menfolk couldn’t find jobs.

 It doesn’t take much insight to see that the lifeblood of churches like ABC has more often than not been based on the faithfulness of women who were de facto leaders long before they were allowed to be official church leaders. This is the spiritual heritage we want to recognize and celebrate this Homecoming Sunday, through the theme “Lois and Eunice and You.”

 Please do your best to be at our annual Homecoming celebration on November 2. 

October 20, 2008

“Everlasting Dust”
by Pastor George Van Alstine

When we’re kids, life seems to have no limits.  Even if the death of a pet makes us feel bad, and the death of a grandparent makes us feel even worse, we don’t apply the lesson of mortality to ourselves.  We think we personally, will never die.

Sometime during middle age our thinking changes.  We realize there will come a moment when death will become a personal challenge to us.  By the time we reach retirement age, we begin to read the Obituary section of the newspaper to make sure our name is not there.

Psalm 90 expresses the sense of helplessness  we have when we face these truths.
“For all our days pass away under your wrath;
our years come to an end like a sigh.
The days of our life are seventy years,
Or perhaps eighty, if we are strong;
even then their span is only toil and trouble;
They are soon gone, and we fly away” (Psalm 90:9-10)

A few verses earlier our dilemma is graphically expressed in this way:
“You turn us back to dust, And say, “Turn back, you Mortals.’” (Psalm 90:3)

Think about this.  We look into our future, past our remaining days of physical struggle with disease and weakness, past our experience of death, past our funeral.  And what do we see?  Dust!  We look backward over our years of working and family building, to our childhood, even to our earliest infant memories.  Beyond that, we can look through our genealogy into the shadows of the beginnings of the human race (Gen. 2:7).  And what do we see?  Dust!  So, our lives are bracketed by dust.  As the Scripture puts it,
“Dust you are, and to dust you shall return.” (Genesis 3:19)

But let’s read the part of Psalm 90 just before the depressing dust-to-dust words:
“Lord, you have been our
dwelling place in all generations.
Before the mountains were brought forth,
Or ever you had formed the earth and the world,
from everlasting to everlasting
You are God.” (Psalm 90:1-2)

A strong contrast is established.  We are dust-to-dust; God is everlasting-to-everlasting!

This phrase, “from everlasting to everlasting,” is found in several  psalms: 41:3, 103:17, 106:48.  It is a powerful statement of the radical superiority of the God who revealed himself to the biblical people over the shabby temporary gods represented by idols.

The word translated “everlasting” has a root meaning of “concealed” or “hidden.”  Scholars believe that in biblical times it indicated that reality which lay beyond the reach of human sight, learning, and understanding, the “vanishing point” a human mind would experience in thinking about the past or future.

As awesome as this idea was to the psalm-writer, it is even more profound to us today.  Modern science has demonstrated the immensity of the universe and the mind-bending relationship between time and space.  So “everlasting” means much more to us than to a person who lived just a few generations ago.  And as challenging as it is to conceive of everlasting-future, it’s even more difficult to think about everlasting-past, before the Big Bang, before Creation, to the “In-the-Beginning” where God alone existed.  But this lofty phrase proclaims the idea that at any point, from everlasting-past to everlasting-future, God is the central fact  of reality.

Dust seems even smaller now — just a speck.  How can our lives find any significance at all, when the contrast between God and us is so radical?  Actually the answer is obvious: by getting closer to the One Who is “from everlasting to everlasting.”  And this psalm reassures us that faith makes this possible.

“Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.” (Psalm 90:1)

When dust finds a dwelling place in the everlasting, dust itself can have everlasting significance.

So this psalm ends with a faith-affirmation of dust that has found refuge in the everlasting:
“Let your work be manifest to your servants,
And your glorious power to their children.
Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us,
And prosper for us the work of our hands-
O prosper the work of our hands!” Psalm 90: 16-17)