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for June, 2009.
By pastorbillwalden
This will be a short post, but needs to be written for a few of you who need to know.
I was awakened this morning and informed that Roby Duke died this last Wednesday, apparently of a massive heart attack. He was discovered by his friend and manager Anne Baldwin and her son, I believe today.
To many of you to whom I write, you were at least familiar with Roby, or had become a friend. To some of us, Roby had become a very good friend.
I first met Roby back in 1990, and over the next 17 years we became close. We weren’t close because we saw each other frequently, but because there was a certain sameness that we enjoyed. This is a great loss for me, and for many. I spent the day on the phone with many of Roby’s friends. If you were Roby’s friend, you were friends with his friends. When you meet them, there is a bond.
Our church was scheduled to have Roby come and share with us on this Dec. 31. He invited his friends Erick Hailstone and Heather Powers to join him. Our church worship team was even going to play a few songs with him. That will have to wait for now. Heather and Erick will join us, and we will celebrate Roby’s life, and play some of his music.
If you never had the chance to meet Roby, visit his web page at robyduke.com. There is a “news” link that will take you to his MySpace page. Spend some time listening to his music, and if you can purchase some, I urge you to do it.
One of Roby’s signature songs was, “I Shall See God”. The song ends with 7 notes and 7 words. “I shall see Him, touch His face”. 7 is the number of completion, and Roby has kept the faith, fought the good fight, and run the race.
He has gone on ahead of us, having completed what God had for him here.
Funeral arrangements are pending. I’ll keep you posted.
By pastorbillwalden
“It’s sittin’ on 17’s.” So says my youngest son Jonathan, approvingly. “So that’s where I put my roller skate”, comments another.
After a string of less than reliable cars, I took the plunge and decided to buy this 2006 Scion Xa, made by Toyota. It is a salvaged title vehicle, but repaired perfectly. Only 8500 miles, and and 100,000,000 more to go.
It has 17″ racing tires on custom rims. So? It has a great stereo system with extra speakers added and stereo controls in the steering wheel. You gotta problem with that? So yeah, it’s lowered and can take a corner at 60 m.p.h. It’s just for aerodynamics and fuel efficiency. It’s not my fault that it’s fun. And then there is the carbon fiber hood. I never knew such things existed.
I can’t help it that I bought this car. God forced me to. You see, my ‘92 Toyota 4Runner only gets 12mpg city/16mpg highway. As I prayed, I had a vision of a simple, fuel efficient car. Gas prices are continuing to rise, and I want to be a good steward of our family finances. It just made sense to be thinking about a simple fuel efficient vehicle.
Something plain, nondescript, hardly noticeable, just blending in to the wash of plain and simple cars. A nobody car amongst a sea of nobody cars. Yes, that was what I envisioned. This would be all about simple living, and saving money.
But God’s ways are not our ways.
I searched online for that “nothing” of a car that I would buy, and then I saw the Xa. It looked good, and the price was, well, way less than even a Corolla. Could God be leading me to buy this car? Would He force me to purchase a vehicle that would make teenage boys jealous, and soccer moms shake their heads? Please Lord, no. I pleaded with Him.
I prayed. “Lord, don’t force me to buy this car that has a great stereo, corners like a race car, and looks good according to people who have never seen a black and white T.V. Lord, don’t plunge me into this test of having to be envied, mocked, and misunderstood.”
And yet, like Isaiah, I must say, “Here I am Lord, send me”. And so the car was purchased, and I suffer alone.
I have been plunged by God into a spiritual battle, the flesh and the spirit are at war as I weave in and out of traffic, quickly passing those that I pray for. High speed U-turns are executed, as I realize people I just passed need a drive-by prayer. The 1.5 liter engine strains like a stallion taking a soldier into battle.
Yes, perhaps that is God’s plan, having me cover more ground, praying as I go. Yes, that must be it. Drive and pray, pray and drive, corner and pray, crank up the stereo, and pray. The mission is crystallizing.
The unenlightened public doesn’t understand. “Hey, it matches your hair”, they say mockingly. Or, “Are you gonna start dying your hair black”? This is not a mid life crisis folks. This is a costly ministry, and I alone have been chosen.
And so I will set my face like flint. The streets of Napa and beyond are my Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and uttermost parts of the world. I will drive and pray. I will corner and intercede. I will ignore the jealous glares, and instead, return good for evil. The thumping of the stereo will be the harbinger’s call for all to repent.
I will suffer quietly as I serve the Lord, knowing that I am envied and misunderstood. And if you see me, pray for me. Don’t let the grin fool you, this is serious work.
By pastorbillwalden
Genesis 3:8-11 8And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. 9Then the LORD God called to Adam and said to him, “Where are you?” 10So he said, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.” 11And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat?”
God walked with Adam and Eve in the Garden. Emmanuel. God was “with” them. When they sinned, that fellowship was broken, and they were put out of the Garden. Though God is always there, the aspect of walking with Him was broken. The “Emmanuel” experience ceased.
Matthew 1:21-23 21And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.”
22So all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying: 23“Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, which is translated, “God with us.”
Jesus entered our world and walked among us. God in the flesh, come to reveal the Father, and to die for our sins. Emmanuel once again.
For every Christian, the Emmanuel experience is one of God’s great gifts to us. What an awesome thing to be able to experience God.
Revelation 21:1-3 1Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. 2Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God.
God’s ultimate goal for His children is to once again walk among them and dwell with them. It will be in a fuller sense than what we have now.
What do we see? We see that God’s desire is to “walk” with His people. The Biblical account of God’s interaction with man shows us that He has always wanted to have relationship with man. It started that way. It will end that way. God desires relationship, friendship, and communion with us.
What could be more satisfying, more stabilizing, and more healing than a living, vital relationship with God? What could be more exciting? What could inspire and instill more hope or anticipation for the future? What could better “lift us up”, and make us to be the people that God created us to be?
Dear Christian: May you enjoy friendship with God. It is God’s eternal desire to “be” with you. Don’t allow anything to hinder that. Don’t allow sin to hinder that. Don’t treat relationship with God as a small thing, or a light thing, or as an optional thing. It is a great privilege to “walk with God”. It cost Jesus His life.
Dear friend who might not know Jesus. He wants to forgive you, and fill you with Himself. The Bible tells us our sins separate us from God. The Bible also declares that Jesus offered Himself as a substitute, receiving in Himself the punishment that we deserve. He did that in order to do away with the separating aspect of sin.
One of God’s names is Emmanuel. God with us. That’s why he came. That’s what we celebrate at Christmas. Ask Him to be with you.
Merry Christmas.
By pastorbillwalden
Water seeks its own level. That is a law of physics and of nature. It is the law of gravity, and a law of God. Water will always find a way to return back to sea level, and its fluidity can discover pathways that no one would have suspected even existed. It may take a long time, but water is patient. Someone rightly said, “Nature bats last”.
That downward flow of water can be beautiful, as when one views Niagara Falls, or some other great waterfall, but the downhill flow of water always has an eroding aspect to it. When studies on erosion of the Horseshoe Falls (part of the Niagara Falls) first started, it was estimated that the erosion rate Horseshoe Falls was about 3.8 feet per year. Over the years, that has been artificially reduced, due to conservation efforts, but if left alone, the Horseshoe Falls would have continued at that rate of erosion.
Water going downhill can be beautiful, but there is always erosion.
The “natural” flow of things for people seems to be the same. It is easy for us to take the path of least resistance, and “go with the flow”. It is easy to live as responders to our nature. Most people seem to live that way.
Some people do rise above their natural abilities by hard work and determination. They are the ones of whom inspirational movies are made. These determined people rise above the adversities and downward inclinations of life, and make great changes for themselves. They quit bad habits, form good habits, and make progress that no one would have expected. That is to be admired.
Let’s take the concept “up” another level, from behavior to nature. The Bible tells us “we are by nature, children of wrath”. (Ephesians 2:3) That means our nature is such that we do stuff to deserve God’s judgment. We sin. My very nature always wants to go in the opposite direction from what God would want for me and expect from me. That is erosion of the soul.
Conservation efforts to reduce the erosion of Horseshoe Falls have helped some, but as long as water flows there, there will be erosion. It’s just the nature of the Falls. As long as man continues on his natural path, there is erosion, regardless of what efforts he makes to reduce that erosion. It’s just the nature of the Fall. (Genesis 3). Man violates his own conscience and moral value system. He then either has to deny that a failure occurred, reconfigure his value system, or self medicate to dull the guilt.
Jesus stepped into our eroding world, and has made a way for us to not just reduce the eroding aspect of “soul life”, but to actually begin to make a way for Him to infuse His “upward” life into our lives.
When a person surrenders to God, God begins a new work in their soul. Whereas man can change his behavior and even attitude, only God can change a man’s nature, and introduce His nature into an eroding life.
There are certain forces in nature that will cause water to rise upward against gravity. A geyser has unseen power that causes water to go against its nature, and actually move upward. A wave travels miles across the ocean until it meets the shoreline, where the unseen, rising ocean bottom causes that horizontal energy to move water vertically, even to the point of it folding over on itself. It is a principal of nature that a force stronger than water’s natural flow actually causes the water to go against its own natural inclination.
God moves this way in the heart of the Christian. His greater force can cause the Christian to rise above his own nature. But there is a difference. A wave or a geyser is formed without any moral decision being made. The same is not true for the Christian. While the water in geyser rises without making a moral decision to surrender to a greater force, the Christian can only be changed by way of surrender. The great force of God will never overpower a child of God unless there is surrender.
A great blessing of the Christian life is knowing that God’s intention for His children is to take them “higher” than their natural inclinations. God’s intention is to take the Christian higher than the Christian’s own best efforts and intentions. There will never be a time in our lives when God can’t take us higher, conforming us more closely into the image of Christ.
The surrendered life can experience that which the “natural man” can never know: the experience of flowing uphill.
By pastorbillwalden
God never said that it would be easy. He said it would be worth it.
Damien Kyle, 10-2-2004
Techniques draw a crowd, but they don’t produce a church.
David Rosales, 6-7-2005
God buries His workmen, but His work lives.
Charles Spurgeon
What good is Jesus’ cross if it doesn’t bring a man to his own cross?
Don McCLure, 9-12-2005
Your gifting will get you into the ministry, your character will keep you there.
Mark Walsh, Vajta, Hungary
And my new favorite…
Ministry is a contact sport.
Sandy Adams, 9-10-2007
By pastorbillwalden
Over the years, I have had my Bible re-covered twice. Not recovered as in it was lost, but re-covered as in it was falling apart. I bought it in 1989, while on staff at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa. It is a wide margin, New King James Thomas Nelson Bible, with no editor’s notes. I love the wide margins, because I have been able to use this Bible almost like a journal, a commentary, and a handy guide to “preach a sermon right now”. It has comments, word definitions, and sermon outlines written throughout the wide side margins. They don’t make this Bible any more. It is a treasure to me.
Inside the front cover, I have my “One Liners Hall Of Fame”. It is a collection of great one liners that have blessed me for the last 18 years. The “dated” quotes are attributed to the names given, but the speakers may have been quoting someone else.
I wanted to share a few of these “one liners” with you all. Some of the quotes are longer than one line, but that would have messed up the title of this post. (grin) There will be future installments posted.
“We choose and hope. God chooses and waits”.
Chuck Smith, 6-28-1990
“The process is as wonderful as the product”.
Don McCLure, 9-10-96
“Read yourself full, think yourself clear, pray yourself hot, let yourself go”.
Alan Redpath
“Conscious repentance brings unconscious holiness”.
Oswald Chambers
“It takes a steady hand to hold a full cup”.
Greg Laurie. 6-4-2002
I think all those quotes are worthy of some meditation.
Be blessed as we head into the blessed Christmas season.
By pastorbillwalden
O.K., this post will rate somewhere between almost useless to hmmm…but it’s my blog, so…
Some thoughts on public prayer. Since public prayer is heard by others, and can and does affect them, here are a few thoughts.
Pastor Prayer No-No’s
Pastor, when you are done preaching and start to pray, don’t keep preaching. You aren’t talking to the congregation any longer. You are talking to the Lord. There ought to be some kind of noticeable change between your preaching and your praying. You don’t get an extra three minutes to preach by calling it a closing prayer. And don’t pray while you are closing up your Bible, shuffling your notes, etc. You wouldn’t talk to people that way…hopefully.
D.L. Moody visited England to hear Spurgeon preach. Upon his return to the States, people asked him, “Did you hear the great Mr. Spurgeon preach”? Moody’s response was, “Preach? I heard the man pray!”
Pastor: public prayer can and ought to be an awesome thing, not just a few extra preaching minutes.
Christian Prayer No-No’s
Please don’t be angry with me folks. I heard this said as a slightly sarcastic joke 25 years ago, but I bring it up now with the best intentions.
We often pray to Father Wejust or Father Ijust. Somehow, in our public prayer lives, we have incorporated the word “just” into our public prayers. It has become a part of our California Christianese.
I am sure that it is said because of a sense of humility and an understanding of God’s grace by those who speak it. That we can even come to God in prayer is wonderful, and humbling.
That being said, might I make a suggestion? Drop the word “just”. It’s like public speakers that use the word “umm”. It’s not needed, and becomes a distraction to others who are picky and critical like me. (insert grin here)
It also sounds a bit underpowered for an approach to God, who has told us, “therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4:16)
If I told my wife, “I ‘just’ love you”, or, “I ‘just’ appreciate you”, well…you get the picture.
I guess I am hoping for all the believers I know, that we don’t “just” thank the Lord, but that we “THANK THE LORD”, etc. “Just” thanking Him, “just” asking Him doesn’t sound bold to me. Maybe it’s just something we grow into, like everything else in the Christian life. Oops, I said it. The dreaded “j” word.
O.K., admittedly, this whole post sounds picky, it’s not very Christmasy, and probably paints me as a real prayer critic. That’s not the intention here, so don’t get uptight praying around me and just…umm… feel free to…umm…pray.
