Do you know people that are poor? Have you ever been poor yourself? Probably the closest some of us have come was when we were in college or first married. Some of you may even be poor now.

We’ve known lots of people that were poor… they’ve lived in our home.

And our family has been at various times of our life part of the working poor. Employed or underemployed, but still struggling to make ends meet.

It is hard to think of the poor as blessed as we are going to read that Jesus said of them. I don’t know if we have felt blessed when we were struggling.

While picking up provisions for a weekend trip, author Donald Miller describes what happened as he stood in line at the grocery store.

He writes: “At the checkout counter, the lady in front of me pulled out food stamps to pay for her groceries. I had never seen food stamps before. They were more colorful than I imagined and looked more like money than stamps. It was obvious as she unfolded the currency that she, I, and the checkout girl were quite uncomfortable with the interaction. I wished there was something I could do. I wished I could pay for her groceries myself, but to do so would have been to cause a greater scene. The checkout girl quickly performed her job, signing and verifying a few documents, then filed the lady through the line. The woman never lifted her head as she organized her bags of groceries and set them into her cart. She walked away from the checkout stand in the sort of stiff movements a person uses when they know they are being watched.

On the drive over the mountain that afternoon, I realized that it was not the woman who should be pitied; it was me. Somehow I had come to believe that because a person is in need, they are candidates for sympathy, not just charity. It was not that I wanted to buy her groceries; the government was already doing that. I wanted to buy her dignity. And yet, by judging her, I was the one taking her dignity away.

Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz (Thomas Nelson, 2003) p.84; submitted by Jennifer Scott, Carol Stream, Illinois

This tends to be how we feel about the poor. We either feel sympathy for them, or we believe that it is their fault that they are in their situation.

So, what does Jesus have to say about poverty and riches.

Let’s Read Luke 6:17-26

Luke 6:17 He came down with them, and stood on a level place, with a crowd of his disciples, and a great number of the people from all Judea and Jerusalem, and the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear him and to be healed of their diseases; 18 as well as those who were troubled by unclean spirits, and they were being healed. 19 All the multitude sought to touch him, for power came out from him and healed them all.

20 He lifted up his eyes to his disciples, and said,

“Blessed are you who are poor,

For yours is the Kingdom of God.

21 Blessed are you who hunger now,

For you will be filled.

Blessed are you who weep now,

For you will laugh.

22 Blessed are you when men shall hate you, and when they shall exclude and mock you, and throw out your name as evil, for the Son of Man’s sake.

23 Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven, for their fathers did the same thing to the prophets.

24 “But woe to you who are rich!

For you have received your consolation.

25 Woe to you, you who are full now!

For you will be hungry.

Woe to you who laugh now!

For you will mourn and weep.

26 Woe, when men speak well of you!

For their fathers did the same thing to the false prophets.

First, before we talk about the poor, let’s begin with the rich. These woes are rather off-putting, because in most cases they describe us. When compared to local poverty and world poverty, we are all rich. we are full, we laugh, and men speak well of us.

So why does this seem to provoke woe from God while He simultaneously blesses the poor?

It is because we have our needs met and thus don’t need Jesus.

24 “But woe to you who are rich!

For you have received your consolation.

We have what we need. We have received our consolation. So why should we look to Jesus for anything more.

Luke records many instances in which Jesus warned the rich that they were going to have a more difficult time then the poor entering the kingdom of heaven.

Luke 16:20 20 A certain beggar, named Lazarus, was laid at his gate, full of sores, 21 and desiring to be fed with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table. Yes, even the dogs came and licked his sores. 22 It happened that the beggar died, and that he was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s bosom. The rich man also died, and was buried. 23 In Hades, he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and saw Abraham far off, and Lazarus at his bosom. 24 He cried and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue! For I am in anguish in this flame.’

25 “But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that you, in your lifetime, received your good things, and Lazarus, in like manner, bad things. But now here he is comforted and you are in anguish.

Then in Luke Luke 18:18

18 A certain ruler asked him, saying, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”

19 Jesus asked him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good, except one—God. 20 You know the commandments: ‘Don’t commit adultery,’ ‘Don’t murder,’ ‘Don’t steal,’ ‘Don’t give false testimony,’ ‘Honor your father and your mother.’”

21 He said, “I have observed all these things from my youth up.”

22 When Jesus heard these things, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell all that you have, and distribute it to the poor. You will have treasure in heaven. Come, follow me.”

23 But when he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was very rich.

24 Jesus, seeing that he became very sad, said, “How hard it is for those who have riches to enter into the Kingdom of God! 25 For it is easier for a camel to enter in through a needle’s eye, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God.”

So, what can we do?

We need to learn from the poor.

While we cannot be the blessed because we are poor, Matthew says that we can be blessed by being like the poor. [Repeat]

Matthew 5:3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit”

Normally we think of it as having poverty of spirit. That our spirit is needy. That is different from the poor who are also physically needy.

I don’t have a commentary to back me up on this.

But another way to read “the poor in spirit” is to be like the poor

To take on those attributes of the poor that make them more susceptible to the Kingdom of God.

it is learning to think and act like you are poor.

To be dependant.  The poor depend on God to provide for their needs. Because we have our needs taken care of, all we have left is our wants, which God isn’t concerned about. When you are poor and don’t have enough rent this month, what do you do?  you pray and depend on God. When you are poor and don’t have enough to buy food to eat, what do you do?  you pray that god with provide and stretch the food.

Let’s look at why the poor are blessed and how we can be like them.

First, the poor were blessed because they were like Jesus who became poor on our behalf.

9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that you through his poverty might become rich. 2corinthians 8:9

Jesus gave up all the riches of being king of the universe to become poor so that through his poverty we might become rich. So, the poor are blessed because they are like Jesus.

Second. He was compassionate for the needy.

Luke 4:18

18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,

Because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.

He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted,

To proclaim release to the captives,

Recovering of sight to the blind,

To deliver those who are crushed,

19 And to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”

Luke 5:31 “Those who are healthy have no need for a physician, but those who are sick do.

As I said in my previous sermon, Jesus meets us in our point of need. not our want. The rich and the powerful wanted Jesus to be the Messiah in their image. But the poor _needed_ Jesus to be whatever He was because He ministered to their need. Jesus never ministers to our wants. We need to be desperate for Him. The poor are often more desparate for him then the rich.

The third reason that the poor were blessed. It was comparatively easy for a poor man to become a Christian; for he could lose little in this world, and would gain much in the world to come. The poor can respond to the call of the gospel with a certain abandonment and uncomplicated totality because they have so little to lose and are ready for anything.

A rich man would not be inclined to make those sacrifices, and to expose himself to those sufferings to which all Christians, during the first ages, were liable. (J. Thomson, D. D.)

So, How can we be like the poor.

Monika Hellwig, lists the following “advantages” to being poor that I think we would do well to imitate.

1. The poor know they are in urgent need of redemption. We need to be like the poor in our desperation for God’s help.

2. The poor know not only their dependence on God and on powerful people but also their interdependence with one another. The poor rest their security not on things but on people. The poor need other people. Intimacy is created when we are met by others in our time of need. We need to be like the poor in this respect. Relying on each other.

4. The poor have no exaggerated sense of their own importance. We know a woman from back home who used to live a very humble life. Then she decided to run for state congresswoman.

6. The poor can distinguish between necessities and luxuries. I have a very difficult time with this. One of the reasons my generation can have a difficult time living inside their means

7. The poor can wait, because they have acquired a kind of dogged patience. We need to…

9. When the poor have the gospel preached to them, it sounds like good news and not like a threat or scolding. We need to…

Philip Yancey, The Jesus I Never Knew (Zondervan, 2001, p. 115); submitted by David Bartlett, Rochester, Minnesota

Read Psalm 130

1 Out of the depths I have cried to You, O LORD;

2 Lord, hear my voice!

Let Your ears be attentive

To the voice of my supplications.

3 If You, LORD, should mark iniquities,

O Lord, who could stand?

4 But there is forgiveness with You,

That You may be feared.

5 I wait for the LORD, my soul waits,

And in His word I do hope.

6 My soul waits for the Lord

More than those who watch for the morning—

Yes, more than those who watch for the morning.

7 O Israel, hope in the LORD;

For with the LORD there is mercy,

And with Him is abundant redemption.

8 And He shall redeem Israel

From all his iniquities.

Introduction.

Wants vs. needs.

We do it with God, we do it with people, and we do it with our lives.

I am so focused on what I want, that I don’t realize how good it is that my needs have been met.

I need a relationship with God. I want Him to give me my desires.

I need food. I want cajun.

I need water. I want Mt. Dew

I need shelter. I want my dream home.

I need meaningful relationships. I want them to be on my terms.

Our relationship with God must begin at the point of need.

I often wonder why it is that I strain to see God’s hand in my everyday life.

I am beginning to realize that when my focus is on God providing for my desires, I will fail to see the abundant ways that he has supplied my needs.

Psalm 130 is written from a man who needs God.

verse 1 says “ 1 Out of the depths I have cried to you, Lord”

A reminder of Jonah, in the belly of the whale. In the depths crying out to God.

These are men who need God. They aren’t coming to him to have their wants met. They are desperate for God. Are we desperate for God? When was the last time you cried out to God. Take a moment, and examine yourself and ask “Am I desperate for God?”

Let’s dive in.

4 points

read verse 1 and 2

Lord hear me

1 Out of the depths I have cried to you, Yahweh.

2 Lord, hear my voice.

Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my petitions.

I want God to talk to me.

I need Him to hear my voice.

I like to describe myself as a frustrated pentecostal. I believe that all the spirit filled supernatural gifts are for today, and yet I don’t see them manifest in the world around me. I want desperately to see God’s work.

But David here, instead of being frustrated that God isn’t speaking, prays to God that He would listen

What a transforming prayer.

Have you ever had a conversation with someone and said in desperation “You aren’t listening!”

David is praying to God: “Listen to me!” “Lord hear my voice.”

When I am focused on my wants, I will desire to see God act to meet my wants.

But when I am focused on my need for God, I will simply cry out to Him “Lord hear my voice,” and be satisfied that He heard me.

Read verses 3 and 4

If God kept a record of sins

3 If you, Lord, kept a record of sins,

Lord, who could stand?

4 But there is forgiveness with you,

Therefore you are feared.

What a revelation this is

What if God kept a record of sins.

Romans 1:18 says 18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,

If God were to keep a record of our sins, His wrath would be visited upon us. His wrath



But instead David writes in verse 4

4 But there is forgiveness with you,

Therefore you are feared.

Then later in Psalm 103:11, 12

11 For as the heavens are high above the earth,

So great is his loving kindness toward those who fear him.

12 As far as the east is from the west,

So far has he removed our transgressions from us.

This should change our whole perspective of life.

Humility that God has forgiven us.

But also desperation that sinners would come to follow Jesus as Lord so that He can save them from His wrath.

Thank God He does not keep a record of our sins.

I wait for the Lord

5 I wait for Yahweh.

My soul waits.

I hope in his word.

6 My soul longs for the Lord more than watchmen long for the morning;

More than watchmen for the morning.

“more than the morning watchers, that watch for or until the morning” {h}; than watchmen of cities, or the keepers of the wails, as Aben Ezra; those who are upon the last morning watch, and are looking out for the morning light; that they may go off from duty, and lie down and sleep: or than those that sit up with sick persons; who, being solitary and melancholy, as well as want sleep, long for the morning, that they may have some refreshment: or rather than the priests and Levites that watched in the temple, that waited for the morning, that they might be relieved by others;

When we learn to focus first on asking God to hear us, our next step is to wait on Him. I believe that He will answer. But He does so in His time, and so we must learn to patiently wait.

verse 6 says that we wait for Him like watchmen long for the morning.

I remember when I was teaching music that sometimes we would have to get up at what to me is mega early… 5am to get on a bus at 6am. While sleeping, I would be so afraid that I would oversleep my alarm clock that I would wake up every little bit and look at the time. I was a watchman waiting for the morning.

Another group of watchmen were those who would sit on the walls and watch for enemies. This was a round the clock job, and so some would work the graveyard shift and be up all not. These people were watchmen waiting for the morning.

In both cases, they were anxious for morning. waiting expectantly for the sun to rise.

In the same way, we need to be expectant for God, waiting patiently for Him to act or to speak, attentive so that when He does, we will recognize His voice or His actions.

A couple points:

First, as we wait, verse 5 says “i hope in His word.” Where we can expect to hear Him speak is in His Word. I hear God’s voice most often when I hear the word of God spoken and suddenly, gold letters are around a certain phrase.

Second, as we wait, we are waiting for the things of the Lord, not for the things that we want. God has his own agenda. Sometimes it lines up with ours, but often it doesn’t. When we wait on Him we need to learn to discern His voice from ours.

Finally, verse 7 and 8 speak hope for the people of God.

7 Israel, hope in Yahweh,

For with Yahweh there is loving kindness.

With him is abundant redemption.

8 He will redeem Israel from all their sins.

Out of our need for God comes hope for the church.

Repeat

The church needs to be filled with needy people. Needy for the things of God. Desperate for God. Dissatisfied with the amount of God we have. Desiring to be filled to overflowing with the Holy Spirit.

When this is the condition of the people of God, then in verse 7 David says “Israel, hope in Yahweh. With Him is loving kindness. With Him is abundant redeption.”

He will redeem His church from all her sins.

Prayer

Lord, you are our Lord.

Teach us to put aside our wants, and to need you. Desperately.

We wait for you.

Redeem your people from all her sins.

Let our lives so shine by our desperation for you that people would be drawn to make you Lord of their lives.

Ten Commandments: Neglected. Very important to us as Christians.

Useful for holiness

Conviction of sins. Romans

Used to judge people. As we will see.

One of them is important to us today as we continue with our study of Luke.

Exodus 20:8 Lists the Fourth commandment: 8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 You shall labor six days, and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to Yahweh your God.

Sabbath means to rest. But we don’t just rest as an end in itself. We rest to give our attention to God.

Fairly basic instruction.

However, what has constantly gotten the practice in trouble has been the phrase “keep it holy.”

This inspired 1,521 different laws that the Jewish people had to obey,

for example, you had to remove your false teeth. Eventually, to not profane the name of God, they ceased saying it at all.

But the Jewish people were not the only ones who got hung up on how exactly keep the sabbath day holy. Possibly as early as 1781 so-called “blue laws” were enacted in various United States colonies that restricted certain activities on Sunday.

For example the Blue laws of Conneticut read

CONCERNING THE SABBATH:

The Sabbath Day shall begin at sunset Saturday.

No one shall cross a river on the Sabbath but authorized clergymen.

No one shall travel, cook victuals, make beds, sweep houses, cut hair, or shave on the Sabbath Day.

No one shall kiss his or her children on the Sabbath or feasting days.

Winona Lake’s Blue laws read:

No manufacture, sale, consumption, or possession of alcohol

No swearing or spitting in public

No boating, carriage rides, or swimming on Sundays

No dancing with members of the opposite sex

No conducting of business (except food service) on Sundays

No card playing or wagering of any kind

In Texas a blue law was in effect until 1985 prohibiting selling housewares such as pots, pans, and washing machines on Sunday

Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Minnesota car dealerships continue to operate under blue-law prohibitions in which an automobile may not be purchased or traded on a Sunday.

It’s important that we find a balance in how we approach sabbath keeping. We’ve seen examples of how it has been overly legislated. But in our day the danger is probably more in not giving it enough attention.

Today we’ll learn from Luke how Jesus approached the sabbath and also learn some ways that we can make Sabbath keeping more meaningful.

Read Luke 6:1-5

1 Now it happened on the second Sabbath after the first, that he was going through the grain fields. His disciples plucked the heads of grain, and ate, rubbing them in their hands. 2 But some of the Pharisees said to them, “Why do you do that which is not lawful to do on the Sabbath day?”

3 Jesus, answering them, said, “Haven’t you read what David did when he was hungry, he, and those who were with him; 4 how he entered into the house of God, and took and ate the show bread, and gave also to those who were with him, which is not lawful to eat except for the priests alone?” 5 He said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.”

Read 6:1 and 2 again.

1 Now it happened on the second Sabbath after the first, that he was going through the grain fields. His disciples plucked the heads of grain, and ate, rubbing them in their hands. 2 But some of the Pharisees said to them, “Why do you do that which is not lawful to do on the Sabbath day?”

Let’s look first at what it was that the disciples did that got the Pharisees all rankled.

What was it exactly that they had done on the sabbath?

Was it the fact that they were walking on the sabbath?

No. You were allowed to walk, so long as it didn’t exceed two thousand cubits, about a 1/4 of a mile, which was called, appropriately a sabbath day’s journey.

Another possibility was that they were in a grain field on the sabbath. One of the sabbath laws said “it is not lawful for a man to visit his gardens or his fields to check on their progress.” In other words: it is work if you are checking how things are going. But the disciples weren’t checking up on the crop because it wasn’t theirs. They just happened to be passing through.

Perhaps we wonder if the trouble was that they were taking food that didn’t belong to them. Were they stealing? No. Even taking food from a field was allowed in Deuteronomy 23:25 “When you come into your neighbor’s standing grain, then you may pluck the ears with your hand; but you shall not move a sickle to your neighbor’s standing grain.” It is ok to snack at a man’s field but it is not ok to harvest. I wonder if the same applies to eating an apple off of someone’s tree.

The problem wasn’t walking on the sabbath, or being in a grain field on the sabbath, or taking food that didn’t belong to them. The problem was that they plucked the grain and rubbed it in their hands on the sabbath. They were harvesting and threshing. The Jewish rule was “he that reaps (on the sabbath day) ever so little, is guilty of stoning, and “plucking of ears of corn is a derivative of reaping”;” and is punishable with the same kind of death. Philo the Jew said that the rest of the sabbath not only reached to men, bond and free, and to beasts, but even to trees, and plants. He wrote “it was not lawful to cut a plant, or branch, or so much as a leaf”, on a sabbath day:

So the Pharisees were astonished at such a blatant disregard for the law and said to Jesus “Why do you do that which is not lawful to do on the Sabbath day?”

Jesus answered in verse 3 “Haven’t you read what David did when he was hungry, he, and those who were with him; 4 how he entered into the house of God, and took and ate the show bread, and gave also to those who were with him, which is not lawful to eat except for the priests alone?”

It was allowed of David because of necessity. 1Samuel 21:6 So the priest gave him holy bread; for there was no bread there but the show bread.

So Jesus is hear saying to the Pharisees that in the same case there was a necessity of the disciples to eat and so while they were breaking the ceremonial laws that had been added to the original fourth commandment, they were not in fact breaking the commandment.

But then He completely scandalized them by adding in verse 5: “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.”

John Gill writes: The Jews so far agree to this, that he that commanded the law of the sabbath, could dispense with it; For example: the day on which Jericho was taken was the sabbath day; and that though they slew and burnt on the sabbath day, the God that commanded the observation of the sabbath, commanded the profaning of it”.”

And since Christ is equal to the Father in power and glory so as he is Lord of all other things, he is of the sabbath, and has a power of dispensing with it, and even of abolishing it.

This helps to explain how the Gentile church changed the observance of the sabbath into observing The Lord’s Day.

The church began meeting on Sunday instead of saturday because it was the day that Jesus rose from the dead.

One of the early church fathers, Ignatius, wrote “We No longer keep the Sabbath but living according to the Lord’s day, on which also our Light arose”

Barnabus called it the eight day, the day after the Sabbath. As the first day of the week was the beginning of the first creation, they called the day after the sabbath the day of the beginning of the new creation. “We keep the eighth day with gladness, on which Jesus arose from the dead.”

Let’s look at some reasons why the Gentile church moved away from ceremonial observance of the seventh day as the sabbath.

When the Jewish Christians learned that the Gentiles had come into a saving knowledge of Jesus they were called upon to decide if the Gentile Christians needed to follow the Jewish laws. They convened a council to discuss it and made a lits of what they called “the necessary things”

Acts 15:28, 29 28 For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay no greater burden on you than these necessary things: 29 that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality, from which if you keep yourselves, it will be well with you. Farewell.”

No mention of keeping the seventh day as a sabbath. And so the gentile Christians were under no obligation to keep the seventh day as a sabbath.

In Colossians, Paul warned against those who would judge based on whether or not people kept the sabbath day.

Colossians 2:16 16 Let no man therefore judge you in eating, or in drinking, or with respect to a feast day or a new moon or a Sabbath day, 17 which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is Christ’s.

As a matter of individual devotion a man might do as he pleased (Ro 14:5, 6, ), but no general rule as necessary for salvation could be compatible with the liberty wherein Christ has made us free.

In fact, even though the Christian’s worship was held on Sunday it did not even sanctify Sunday any more than a regular Wednesday service among us sanctifies Wednesday. John Calvin even proposed to adopt Thursday in place of Sunday. In fact the first church services were held in the evening, not in the morning. Should we then only meet on Sunday evening?

For many Christians meeting on Sunday morning is a simple impossibility. One member of our young adult small group works at Target at 3:00am making Sunday morning worship impossible for him. So Wednesday night _is_ his church. He is just as much a part of this church as anyone who attends on sunday.

So if Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath and observance of the seventh day as the sabbath is no longer a command, then how should we observe the 4th commandment?

The puritans have some instruction to us. Their position generally was that the commandment teaches the principle that one day in seven is to be given to God, without in fact naming the day of the week. It says “Remember the sabbath day..the day of rest,” not “Remember the seventh day of the week…”. This is what distinguishes the ceremonial from the moral – the commandment reminded them that by ceremony, the seventh day had been marked out as the weekly Sabbath. But the identification of the specific day was not the essence of the commandment. The moral substance of the commandment was the principle to keep one day out of seven to the Lord.

So what we need to do is practice the principles that go with the sabbath, which are rest from work and worship to God.

Let’s look at each of these.

First rest from work.

According to a raft of recent studies, Americans are working more and enjoying it less. Between 1995 and 1999, the number of people calling in sick because of stress more than tripled. “I’ve got a lot of clients coming to me from Silicon Valley,” says Pam Ammondson…who runs a Santa Rosa…workshop to counsel…burnout [sufferers]. “It’s a dream to make a million dollars overnight. But these people are not happy, their relationships are miserable, and they’re taking a step back to ask what it’s all about”…. http://www.timesizing.com/1vacatns.htm

Sherman James, a researcher of epidemic diseases at the University of Michigan, describes a personality type named John Henryism. The name refers to the American folk hero who, hammering a six-foot-long steel drill, tried to out-race a steam drill tunneling through a mountain. John Henry beat the machine, only to fall dead from the superhuman effort.

Robert M. Sapolsky, Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers, (W.H. Freman and Co., 1998), p. 332–333; submitted by James Lindberg, Cha

We need to be exceptionally cautious as Americans that we not fall victim to John Henryism: working so hard that we lose our life under the mistaken notion that with enough effort and determination we can control our world.

It is exactly to this tendency that the sabbath rest speaks to us. We need rest.

Our farmer friends at Menno Mennonite Church said that if they work on Sunday, the machinery will break on Monday. While this is a little superstitious it is a reminder that God wants us to rest.

We need rest. We need a break from our work during our work day. We need sleep to regenerate from our work. And we need a sabbath day of rest to break from our work. It is a reminder that we are not little gods over our worlds.

What about our worship. How does keeping the sabbath holy affect our worship?

Leland Rycken says “Earlier in this century, someone claimed that we work at our play and play at our work. Today the confusion has deepened: we worship our work, work at our play, and play at our worship.” Leland Ryken, quoted in Critique (1997, No. 7), p. 9; submitted by Aaron Goerner, New Hartford, New York

Rafael Antonio Lozano is a man with a mission, albeit a strange one. The 33-year-old computer programmer from Plano, Texas, is on a quest to visit every company-owned Starbucks on the planet.

Lozano, who calls himself Winter, began his mission in 1997, when there were 1,304 such stores worldwide. Today, there are over 6,000 in 37 countries. As of October 31st, 2005, Winter had visited 4,918 Starbucks in North America, in addition to 213 others around the globe.

Despite his impressive pace, Winter is realistic about the nature of his quest, saying, “As long as they keep building Starbucks, I’ll never be finished.” He is also realistic about the importance of his mission. “Every time I reach a Starbucks, I feel like I’ve accomplished something,” he said, “when actually I’ve accomplished nothing.”

Jayne Clark, “Sooner or Latte, He’ll Get There,” USAToday.com (10-13-05); submitted by Sam O’Neal, St. Charles, Illino

One of the great concerns for how we treat the Lord’s day is that while we go as often as Lozano visits Starbucks, we may not actually be accomplishing anything.

As Annie Dillard says “Christians aren’t sensible of the conditions. The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets.”

In Isaiah 58:13, 14 God says “If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words, then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord.”

The temptation for us is the same as it was for the Pharisees. To make keeping the sabbath all about rest from work and to them minimize the focus on our devotion to god.

Richard Baxter, Puritan pastor and author says “It is a day for heart work, [not merely rest]. your principal business is with heaven; follow your hearts therefore all the day and see that they be not idle while your bodies are exercised: nothing is done if the heart do nothing. Follow your hearts therefore all the day and see that they be not idle while your bodies are exercised: nothing is done if the heart do nothing.”

Here are some ideas that he gives to prepare for the Lord’s day.

1. Do your work during the 6 days. Dispatch all your business

2. Shake off the thoughts of worldly things and clear your minds of worldly delights and cares

3. Call to mind the sermon you heard the last Lord’s day so that you may be prepared to receive the next.

4. Go seasonably to bed that you may not be sleepy on the Lord’s day. Acts 20:9 A certain young man named Eutychus sat in the window, weighed down with deep sleep. As Paul spoke still longer, being weighed down by his sleep, he fell down from the third story, and was taken up dead.

5. Repent of the sins of the week past as particularly and seriously as you can; and seek pardon and peace through Christ that you come not with guilt or trouble upon your consciences before the Lord.

Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath. We need to not be worried with keeping the law ceremonially. But we need to follow it as a rest from our work and focus of our attention on God and our heart.

8 Core Convictions

I believe in a sovereign, loving, holy God. I believe it is more true to the scripture and healthier to live with God as He is and has described Himself in the Bible then to attempt to craft a theology that safely answers the paradoxes His omnipotence creates. He is in charge of life.

The best source of knowledge, wisdom and understanding is the Gospels, the Bible and the Spirit of Christ in me.

I believe that we are called to live abundant lives. The entrance of Jesus into the world 2000 years ago established the Kingdom of God on Earth and provided history and our personal lives with hopeful meaning in the midst of tribulation and trials as opposed to historicial and personal pessimism. Deuteronomy 30:19 to choose life, that you may live. I choose life!

Learning is a life-long pursuit with varied focuses that depend on the physical, emotional and spiritual stage of life we are in.

God has given each of us complete solidarity. The ethic that Jesus taught was for the influence of the Holy Spirit to transform the will of each individual so that they would be free to choose the Kingdom and to then take initiative to accomplish Kingdom good. This contrasts measuring spirituality on outward appearance and rewarding organizational service. It instead elevates initiative on individuals and gifts.

God has made us mutual branches of one vine, and reconcilers of people separated from God and others. Our relationships are to be characterized by love, acceptance and forgiveness. It is important that we gather as the Church, the Body of Christ, seek team solutions to social and spiritual needs, to reach out to people in need, and to reconcile and strengthen relationships both in the church and outside the church.

The seed and nest of abundant life is the family. It should be prioritized so that we are providing for the full needs of our families without sacrificing their well being to pursue material wealth, organizational recognition, religious obligations, or personal passions.

I believe that we are called to change people’s lives by inviting them to follow Jesus. I believe that we are called to change the world. By leveraging the previous seven points, the individual, family and church can “salt the earth,” providing healing and adding flavor. This is the mission of the Kingdom, that God’s will would be done here as it is in heaven, that the blind see, that we be the father to the orphan, and friend to the stranger.

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