Dr. Stan Parker

Today is the day it all begins! It is vacation time for Kathleen and me.  Time to unplug, unwind, and spend time with our sons, their wives, and those grandkids.  It’ll be beach, pool, water park, carriage rides, Aquarium, Boone Hall Plantation, shopping, golfing, grilling, movies, and eating in our favorite restaurants on the islands and downtown.  We’ll make homemade ice cream at home (otherwise it wouldn’t be homemade, would it?), eat snacks there, and enjoy a planned spaghetti dinner that Kathleen prepares so well.  Otherwise, it’s daily selections from a list of 16 restaurants (no fast foods).  Yes, vacation is that time each year to enjoy family and friends and a time to   change up the routine for a much needed break.

We’ll be back in the blogging world after a great week on the home front!  Hey, you take some time off too.  Shut the computer down, take the tie off, hang out with the family.  You deserve it.

Prayer:  Father, it is so easy for us to live automatically, so that little touches us or moves us unless it is a personal crisis.  Give us those opportunities to slow down and relax so we can return to the fullness of living in the now.  Help us to celebrate vacations, a day off, a weekend, but enable us so to live that we live each day in a present tense attitude.  In the name of Your Son, who loves us dearly, I pray.  Amen.

Song we’ll sing this week:  Come, Thou Fount of ev’ry blessing, tune my heart to sing Thy grace.  Streams of mercy, never ceasing, call for songs of loudest praise.  Teach me some melodious sonnet, sung by flaming tongues above.  Praise the mount, I’m fixed upon it, Mount of God’s unchanging love…. Oh, to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be!  Let that grace now, like a fetter, bind my yielded heart to Thee.  Let me know Thee in Thy fulness, guide me by Thy mighty hand till, transformed, in Thine own image in Thy presence I shall stand. –Robert Robinson

Dr. Stan Parker

The famous Holocaust survivor, Corrie ten Boom said, “Look within and be depressed. Look around and be distressed. Look to Jesus and be at rest.” Looking without, Corrie had reason to be distressed. She lived in a concentration camp. She watched many people die, including her family.  Looking within, she felt depressed as she saw clearly the darkness of her own heart. She learned to see the bright side of everything and to trust in God.  She could eventually advise multiple thousands, “Look to Jesus and be at rest.”    

We are discussing the struggle to live a victorious Christian life.  Corrie ten Boom is a wonderful example of a person learning to be obedient to God regardless of circumstances.  Early in her Christian walk, she vacillated between looking within and around.  But her obedient spirit to the Lord eventually enabled her to look up and keep looking up.

Hebrews 12:1-2 urges us to “lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.” 

Stuff does happen as we are living this life!  Friends may disappoint.  Family may frustrate.  A career may turn sour.  The neighborhood may turn in valuation and we lose our investment.  The Stock Market may not favor our choices.  The medical bills may overwhelm.  The enemy of our soul will hassle us. Death can overtake loved ones early.  So what do we do?  Let us remember why we are determined to be fully devoted disciples of the Lord Jesus.  It is because of God’s great and gracious love for us in His Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ.  He loved us while we were unlovely.  He forgave us while we were yet sinners.  He pursues us even today with an everlasting love!

So in the struggle to live a victorious Christian life,  let’s keep our eyes fixed on Jesus.  That will keep us moving forward and He will surely support our struggle.

Think about this: “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.  He will not grow tired or weary, and His understanding no one can fathom.  He gives strength to the weary, and young men stumble and fail; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.  They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”

Dr. Stan Parker 

My mother loves me dearly and I would bet she would have nothing but good things to say about me and my brother, Roger.  Sure, I was a better kid than he was.  He was always punching me and starting the arguments.  Hey, this is my blog and I can twist the story how I like.  There.  Anyway, my Mom would say great things about us not because we were kids without faults, failures, fusses, and fights; but she would say we were great (near perfect) because of her heart of love and her ability to sense that Roger and I love her dearly.  We did not always obey Mom or Dad.  We made mistakes.  Yet of us Mom will say, “Our sons are some of the best you could hope for.  They never gave us a bit of trouble.”  We blush at the very suggestion.  You see, Mom does not measure us by an absolutely legal obedience.  She measures Roger and me by our obedient spirits.  Our propensity, our desire, our determination to obey Mom and Dad — that’s what Mom measured, and she covered our defects with her gracious love and compassion.  Now that sounds like something Jesus does for us everyday!  Well, it is.

We’re discussing the struggle to live a victorious Christian life.  Victorious Christian living is more than just “let go and let God” make you victorious.  Foolish thinking.  The Scriptures are clear that we are to “work out our salvation with fear and trembling.”  We are to “present ourselves as living sacrifices, holy…”  We are to “seek you first the kingdom of God and then…”  Dozens of additional phrases from the Bible could be listed.  So, what if we try to be obedient and fail?  That’s the question of the day or this blog.

Briefly, there are two concepts to keep in mind when you consider obedience to the Lord.  One is the concept of legal obedience and the other is the concept of gracious obedience.  The first is the efforts in our fleshly nature to obey with an absolute, perfect obedience without a single failure.  It is a frustrating “works salvation” that is based on grit and grunt work to be in the Lord’s favor.  This is futile and I’ve “been there, done that!”

But there is such a thing as gracious obedience.  This is a loving and sincere spirit of obedience motivated by God’s grace to us.  It is often defective, but it is accepted by God and He covers the blemishes by the work of the Cross of His Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Through divine grace, God looks at our hearts, not at our works or human efforts.  He looks at me and says in effect, “Parker, with all your defects, you have a heart that desires to be obedient to Me.  You have a spirit that wills to submit to My Lordship, even though you frequently fail.”

The whole point of the cross of Jesus Christ is that He died, bearing the full penalty for our sins and failings, so that His shed blood can cover whatever is defective in our day-to-day obedience. 

Lest you get the wrong idea, return to my opening illustration about Mom.  That is exactly how Jesus Christ treats us everday!

Think about these words: “He who has my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me” (John 14:21).  True knowledge of Christ should result in a spirit of gracious obedience…a propensity, desire, and determination to submit to Him in word, thought and deed.  That’s what Jesus measures, and He (listen to this!) has already covered our defects with His shed blood on the cross.  Now, it just doesn’t get any better than that!

Dr. Stan Parker

I John 2:3 says: “By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments.”  The word “keep” in that verse carries the idea of watchful, observant obedience.  It is not an obedience in response to force or pressure.  It’s an obedience that responds out of pure love for God and all He has done for humanity in Jesus Christ.  The word “keep” means “to watch or guard or to keep, as some precious thing.”  The Christian that struggles to obey God in all areas of life, will demonstrate that s/he knows God by a great desire of his/her heart to obey His Word.  It isn’t easy but no one said it would be. 

Think about this:

() When we live obediently, we receive more than we would ever think possible.

() When we live obediently, our family, friends, and associates will be blessed.

() When we live obediently, the impact of our obedience to God often outlives us.

() In the day-to-day acts of obedience, you cannot imagine how your actions might impact the lives of others in the future.  Imagine what the world would be like if…

…Michelango had said, ‘I don’t do ceilings.’

…Noah had said, ‘I don’t do boats.’

…Moses had said, ‘I don’t do rivers.’

…David had said, ‘I don’t do Goliaths.’

…Mary had said, ‘I don’t do virgin births.’

…John the Baptist had said, ‘I don’t do baptisms.’

…Peter had said, ‘I don’t do Gentile discipleship.’

…Paul had said, ‘I don’t do letters.’

…Jesus had said, ‘I don’t do crosses!’

A lifestyle of struggling obedience will outlive us here on earth and in eternity.

“Now unto Him who is able to keep us from falling and to present us faultless before the throne of His grace, be glory and praise forever.”

We can love and obey Him with His promised help.

Dr. Stan Parker

The NASA space engineers tell us that most of the fuel used in a rocket launch is burned up in the first few seconds of lift-off.  It takes tremendous energy and thrust to get the rocket off the launching pad.  Once it’s moving and headed for orbit, it requires much less fuel and is easier to control and direct.  It has overcome inertia.

Jesus Christ has the power to make changes in our lives right now.  He will give us the power to get started and the power to keep going.  He will give us the power to break the chains of inertia or procrastination.  True, there is a struggle in living a dynamic Christian life.  We are discussing that in some detail.  By trusting God and allowing His love and transforming power to become a reality in our lives, we can become the person God desires for us to be.

Today, think on these simple but profound thoughts:

 <> I am nothing, but Truth is everything. -Abe Lincoln

<> We are shaped and fashioned by what we love. -Goethe

<> Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful. -Samuel Johnson

<> Always do right — this will gratify some and astonish the rest. -Mark Twain

<> How sweet it is when the strong are also gentle. -Liggie Fudim

<> Resolved: never to do anything which I should be afraid to do if it were the last hour of my life. -Jonathan Edwards

<> {God is} “able to do exceedingly above and beyond what we ask for, hope for, imagine or think, according to {His} power at work within you” -Ephesians 3:20

Dr. Stan Parker