More Meditations (eBook)

Building Faith & Relationships

DMin Jeffery B. Hampton (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2024 | 1. Auflage
284 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-3509-6609-1 (ISBN)

Infos

'Jeff Hampton captures the simple but profound truths of the Christian faith in Meditations in Black and White. These meditations come straight from the heart of a pastor, straight from the heart of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Open and read meditations in Black and White. Hampton will connect with your heart. His meditations will help satisfy the hunger of your soul.' -Bishop Charles N. Crutchfield, Retired, Arkansas Area, United Methodist Church

Ordained forty-eight years ago, Jeffery B. Hampton, DMin, has served in a wide variety of pulpits and staff assignments. His ministry has included coaching lay ministry teams; performing pre-marital, marital, grief, and cancer support; counseling; and visioning spiritual and maturational growth plans for congregations as small as three members and as large as four thousand. For twenty-five years, he has served Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church in Little Rock, Arkansas as Associate Pastor of Caring Ministries.

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"e;As one who has stepped across the racial boundary in the church, Dr. Hampton speaks a loving, timely, and poignant word to the Church and to those who search for faith, courage, and hope in times of challenge and celebration. His sermons grow out of a deep personal faith and significant experiences in worship, pastoral care, and service in a large, predominantly white congregation. He is a model for effective multi-cultural ministry, and his book offers encouragement to others who follow his example."e; -Rev. Victor H. Nixon, Pastor EmeritusPulaski Heights United Methodist Church, Little Rock, Arkansas

Textauszug

CHAPTER ONE

Lose Your Big Buts

Exodus 3:11-15

PRAYER

GOD OF US all, we give thanks for every opportunity to worship and praise your name. Bless us now with courage and fortitude, to never doubt your presence, and to be all you have called us to be. Amen.

Our focus today is Exodus 3:11-15. The lesson title is “Lose Your Big Buts”, as in excuses and doubts. As Moses was standing before a burning bush, he was invited to remove his sandals as he stood on Holy ground in the presence of God.

God told Moses that God would be sending him to Pharaoh to bring the Israelites out of Egypt because God heard their groaning under slavery and remembered the covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

God gave Moses a difficult mission to tell Pharaoh, “Let my people go!” So Moses questioned God, seeking a way out of his assignment. We all know the story; Moses accepted the call from God after some significant hesitation on his part. In fact, Moses hesitated several times: But Moses said, “Who am I (3:11)?” But Moses said, “What is his name (3:13)?” . . . Moses answered, “But suppose they do not believe me or listen to me (4:1).” . . . But Moses said, “I am slow of speech and slow of tongue (4:10).” . . . But Moses said, “O my Lord, please send someone else (4:13).”

Many times, we fail to answer God’s call to service because we feel the mission is too much. The workload appears to be too heavy, too time-consuming, and maybe a little above our abilities. Excuses and doubts are real, but with God’s help, we can overcome all the obstacles in our way that would prevent us or hinder us from fulfilling God’s purpose in our lives. God is constantly calling each of us to help others and to make this world a better place to live. What would happen if we dropped our excuses and doubts?

Sometimes, we are so busy that it is difficult to discern if we are having a burning bush experience. Jesus once told a parable in Luke 14:16-24: Then Jesus said to him, “Someone gave a great dinner and invited many. . . ‘Come, for everything is ready now.’ But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, ‘I have bought a piece of land’. . . Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen’. . . Another said, ‘I have just been married’. . . Then, the owner said, ‘Go out at once into the streets and lanes of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame, anyone who will come. . . For I tell you, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner.’”

If you were Moses, what would you have said to God? What are you saying to God now about the mission God wants to do? It would not have taken me very long to come up with a list of reasons why I would not have been the best person to lead that historic mission to Egypt. I can envision myself standing before God and saying, “But,” “but,” “but,” “but,” “but,” and more “buts.” So, I can totally empathize with Moses because each day, I struggle with where God is sending me. The Good News for us today is that God will answer all of our questions and doubts if we listen, as did Moses. In Exodus chapters 3 & 4, God addressed each of his concerns: But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”

Moses had a brief personal identity crisis, “Who am I?” These words indicate humility, and Moses acknowledges that he does not feel worthy or qualified. Maybe he was reluctant to take on the role God had asked of him because he was then approximately 80 years of age and had been living in exile as a rough and dirty shepherd for the last forty years. Moses was not even sure his relatives or fellow Hebrews would remember him. He was uncertain about having influence with his own people, and surely he would not have influence with the Pharaoh of Egypt. Moses said, “Who am I, that I should bring forth the Israelites out of Egypt?”

God, indeed, knows us better than we know ourselves. God knew that Moses was the person for the job because he possessed an unusual hunger and thirst for justice, and he was quick to intervene on behalf of those who were victimized or mistreated. “One day, after Moses had grown up, he went to his people and saw their forced labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his kinsfolk. He looked this way and that, and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. When he went out the next day, he saw two Hebrews fighting, and he said to the one who was in the wrong, “Why do you strike your fellow Hebrew?” . . . But Moses fled from Pharaoh. He settled in the land of Midian and sat down by a well. The priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock. But some shepherds came and drove them away. Moses got up and came to their defense and watered their flock” (Exodus 2:11-13; 15,b17).

God knew that Moses was a man of action, a man who hungered for justice, a man with a short fuse and a quick start. God said, “I will be with you; and this shall be the sign for you that it is I who sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall worship God on this mountain” (Exodus 3:12).

God responded by saying to Moses, in so many words, that it did not matter who Moses was, only who God was, and that God would be with him. “My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. God was indicating to Moses that God’s presence puts wisdom and strength into the weak and the foolish, and this should be enough for him and bring an end to all of Moses’ excuses and doubts. But Moses said to God, “If I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ What shall I say to them?” (v. 13).

After turning from the question of his own identity, Moses turns to the question of God’s identity. The Egyptians had many gods by many different names to communicate their nature and character. Moses wanted to know God’s name so the Hebrew people would know exactly who sent him and that he was not representing one of the many Egyptian gods. Moses and the Hebrew people believed in God; the question after 400 years of slavery in Egypt was whether God really cared or was even capable of caring for them. Moses was not confident that God was with him or would be with him, nor did he think the Hebrews would believe him. Moses was concerned that his people had forgotten God and God’s covenant with them. Moses said, “If they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” He said further, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘I AM has sent me to you” (Exodus 3:14).

God said, “My name is I AM WHO I AM,” a name that describes God’s actions and presence in historical affairs. This is also expressed in the term “Yahweh,” meaning “I WILL BE AS I WILL BE.” It is the most significant name for God in the Old Testament. By identifying as “I AM,” God is declaring to the Hebrews that God has always been present with them. For in God, we live, move, and have our being. God is faithful and true to all God’s promises.

Neither Moses nor the Hebrews questioned the existence of God; the question was, “Where has God been?” Yahweh’s response to Moses was, I have been present with Israel for the last 400 years in Egypt as they thrived and multiplied even while being oppressed. And I will be present with you, Moses, and Israel as you lead them out of Egypt to the Promised Land. God also said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘The LORD, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you’: This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations”(Exod. 3:15).

God wanted to have a personal relationship with God’s people, and so the Lord God gave them permission to call God by a personal name rather than by a formal name. It is like giving someone permission to call you Hamp when your name is Hampton.

God said to Moses, say to the Israelites, they may call me Lord! The Lord God has no beginning or end. The Lord God is the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last. The Lord God is eternal and unchangeable, the same yesterday, today, and forever. “I AM the ever-present helper who is always with you. The Lord God will be God’s name forever, and this is my title for all generations.”

Moses made excuses for a while. What excuses are you making that prevent you from serving your church and the world? How many times have you responded like Moses and said, “But, please send someone else? Maybe you are not called to deliver enslaved people out of bondage or climb a mountain and receive the Ten Commandments. But we are like Moses in that each of us receives a call from God to serve humanity. Like Moses, we have a choice in how we will respond.

Moses went away from the burning bush experience, confident that if it were the Lord God who called him and if the Lord God was with him, he would be faithful to the call. It was not an easy task...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 18.9.2024
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Religion / Theologie ► Christentum
• ISBN-13: 979-8-3509-6609-1 / 9798350966091