LOSING JESUS

Have you ever lost something that you didn’t realize you’d lost until you were far away from the place you’d lost it?  You know, like leaving something in a hotel room and not realizing it until you get home and start unpacking. 

Now imagine that the something you lost is someone, and imagine that the someone you lost is your child.

Now imagine that the child you lost ------------ is Jesus.
LOSING JESUS.

Listen well.

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Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is the pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church

Call/ fax: 334-288-0577
Email us at hallmemorialcme1@aol.com  
Friend Pastor Graves at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves
If you want to be a blessing to this ministry, contributions may be made by check or money order.

Mail all contributions to:

Hall Memorial CME Church
541 Seibles Road
Montgomery, AL 36116

 

HAPPY NEW YEAR ------- RIGHT NOW!

It won’t be 2012 much longer.  In a couple of days 2012 will end and the year 2013 will begin.  In every time zone  people will gather in homes, and clubs, and churches, and public spaces to countdown to midnight.  And then they will shout and sing and celebrate the moment of transition out of one year and into another.

Why is that?

Our modern Western calendar marks 365 days in a year.  This is about how long it takes planet Earth to complete a single orbit around the sun, but even the 365 isn’t exactly right. So, we have leap year to try to make up the miscalculation. 

The billions of people who follow the Chinese, Hindu, Muslim, or Eastern Orthodox calendars mark New Year at an entirely different time. 

To us it’ll be a new month and a new year.  But to a whole lot of people,  it’ll just be Tuesday. 

Even the Bible makes it clear that the date we choose for New Year’s Day has no real significance in itself.  In fact the Bible has 2 different dates for New Years’ Day.

The ancient Hebrews counted years by the  movement of the moon, not by the movements of the Earth and sun.  So the Biblical calendar was not 365 days.

But even then, New Year’s Day was marked and remembered.

We know that because Noah marked the New Year.

Genesis 8:13 And it came to pass in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, that the waters were dried up from the earth; and Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked, and indeed the surface of the ground was dry.

But that was New Year’s Day on the old Hebrew calendar.

In Exodus chapter 12, when God sent the 10^th plague on Egypt, killing the firstborn and freeing the Jews from slavery, the Lord also changed the calendar.

The 1^st Passover took place in the Hebrew month of Nisan (Abib in Caananite), the  8^th month of the Hebrew year.  On the day of the 1^st Passover, God said in   Exodus 12:2 “This month shall be your beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year to you. 

So, from then what had been the 8^th month became the 1^st month. The freed Jews had a new New Year’s Day.  

Like the Christian church today, the Jews have 2 calendars, a religious or “liturgical” calendar and the original secular calendar. 

I have a friend in Camden, Alabama who greets everyone with “Happy New Year.” Doesn’t matter what day or what time.  Whether you see him in a store, or call him on the phone, he says, “Well, Happy New Year.”

Why is that?

“Because,” he says, “Every day, every moment is a chance to start fresh.  Every moment is the beginning of the rest of your life.  Everyday is the start of the next year of your life.  So---- Happy New Year.”

Nothing is wrong with joining with friends and family in the celebration of the coming New Year, but you have to understand that there is nothing magical about this date. That 10 second countdown between what we call December 31^st and what we refer to as January 1^st is not in and of itself anything special.

What makes the New Year new and hopeful is you. 

You determine that this moment is the moment at which you begin to do the things you have not done. 

You determine that this is the date from which you will calculate the deadlines for completing the projects that will change the trajectory of your life.

You determine that this is where you start counting down through the milestones and obstacles you must pass to fulfill your purpose.

The newness of the New Year is not a function of our shifting and arbitrary calendar markings. 

The newness of the New Year comes from you.

Therefore, you don’t have to wait for the December 31^st countdown to reach your local time zone.  You can begin your New Year right now.

In fact, what you really should be asking yourself is: Why you are waiting for Monday night to become Tuesday morning? 

Are you going to be any different Tuesday at 12: 01 A.M. than you are right now?

Is the champagne and music of that New Year’s party going to give you any power that you don’t now possess to choose the path you have been called to?

Are you holding out for a Word in “Watch Night” worship to confirm the calling and anointing that the Holy Spirit has already confirmed a thousand times?

No, you’re not.  Not really.

You know that the real change from old to new year doesn’t come from flipping a page on a calendar; it comes from shifting the mentality  that has held back your spirit.

Right now is the first moment of the next year of your life.

Resolve to be different from this moment forward.

Resolve to be better starting now.

Resolve to do what you should have been doing and seal your resolve by doing, not by drinking. 

Do some push-ups---- now.

Read your Bible ---- now.

Pray---- now.

Call, text, email, write, get up and go into the next room and tell the people you love how much you love them------ right now.

Throughout history and across cultures we’ve made New Year’s Day to be whatever day we wanted it to be.

Make NOW your New Year.

Happy New Year.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a pastor, writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Call me at 334-288-0577
Email me at atgravestwo2@aol.com
Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To hear sermons, read devotions, and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme@blogspotcom.

A WORD TO THE WISE. Proverbs 29: 13

Proverbs 29: 13     The poor man and the oppressor have this in common: The Lord gives light to the eyes of both.

Proverbs 29: 13.  This scripture highlights a contrast and a connection between two socioeconomic classes.  The classes here are the poor and the people who keep them poor in order to profit from their poverty. 

Now, immediately something rises up in some  of you that says, “Wait a minute now.  Poverty isn’t somebody else’s fault.  Some people are poor because they are lazy or because they make bad decisions.” 

Granted.  And the Bible speaks to those situations, but the Bible also speaks to the very real situations in which poverty is the product of oppression, not laziness, not stupidity, not sin. 

The whole counsel of God demands that we see the poor in a more nuanced light.  They aren’t all simply the lazy dregs of the far-right or the innocent invalids of the far-left.  The Bible points out poverty is a bit of both.

The poor and their oppressors are contrasted in Proverbs 29: 13 as the robbed are contrasted to the robbers.  But they are also connected by the common work of God. 

God’s light shines on the poor and oppressed just as brightly as it shines upon the rich and corrupt. And, vice versa.

God’s mercy, God’s grace, God’s longsuffering offer of another chance to do things right are always available to the bottom rungs of society.  That same mercy, grace, and another chance are equally available (and needed) at the top of ladder.

When the opposing classes meet in the course of business they assume positions of spiritual superiority.  The tenant thinks, “God will definitely let me into Heaven because I’ve suffered so much , and He will definitely send my landlord to Hell because he’s made me suffer.”

The slumlord thinks, “God doesn’t care about these people or why would they suffer?  Surely God loves me more because He’s kept me from being like them.”

Both are wrong.

God shows the same light and Truth to slumlord and to tenant, to disenfranchised citizen and to corrupt politician, to middle-classed drug dealer and to homeless addict.  The light of God’s Word shines on the Truth that: ALL are sinners.  ALL  have come short of God’s standard (Romans 3: 23).  ALL need to repent and be saved in through Jesus Christ because God loves ALL of us (2 Peter 3: 9).

---Anderson T. Graves II

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is the pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church

Call/ fax: 334-288-0577
Email us at hallmemorialcme1@aol.com
Friend Pastor Graves at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

If you want to be a blessing to this ministry, contributions may be made by check or money order.

Mail all contributions to :

Hall Memorial CME Church
541 Seibles Road
Montgomery, AL 36116

A WORD TO THE WISE: Proverbs 29: 12

Proverbs 29: 12     If a ruler pays attention to lies, all his servants become wicked.

Proverbs 29: 12.  You are going to get lied to.  And, if you are in any position of leadership, influence, or perceived influence, you are going to get lied to ------- a lot.

Sometimes, while the liar is lying to you, everyone else will know that the liar is lying----- but they won’t tell you.  They’ll  wait to see how you respond. 

If you discern the lie and act on the truth---- you can develop a culture in which honesty is the preferred policy.  If you act on the lie, you’ll create an atmosphere in which lies are rewarded and (consequently) honest people are unwelcome.

But if you think about it, when leaders act on a lie it isn’t usually because the leaders were tricked, but it’s because the leaders were scared.   Afraid to question the story.  Afraid of checking the facts and facing their own assumptions/ insecurities.    Scared of hearing more than one side of the story because the other sides might reveal inconvenient truths.  Most of the time leaders accept lies at face value it’s because the leaders are afraid that by checking into the story they  heard, they’ll look uncertain, out of control, or weak.  That’s pride.  That’s fear.

Pride and fear make leaders susceptible to lies.   Leaders who function from pride and fear have subordinates who function through pride and fear.  Thus, corruption.

The only people who are afraid of looking like they aren’t in control are people who aren’t in control.  The only time someone’s scared that asking a necessary question will make them look stupid is when they’ve been too stupid to ask the question when it first became necessary.  If you are a leader who can’t handle the truth about your organization then the truth is---- you can’t handle leading that organization.

People are waiting to see how you handle liars because that’s how they’ll decide whether or not to be liars. No, it shouldn’t be that way, but that’s the way it is.

But truthfully, even at your best sometimes you will be deceived.  Sometimes, you will get tricked. So here’s what you do to immunize yourself against the effects of deception:  Always, no matter what you hear, no matter what you think the facts are---do right and do right by people.

Always.

Maybe So-and-so is out to get your job.  Maybe not.   Treat So-and-so fairly regardless.  Don’t withhold rewards when due.  Don’t look the other way when reprimand or correction is proper.

Maybe Such-and-such doesn’t like you.  Maybe he/she does.  Treat Such-and-such right regardless.  Listen to Such-and-such as attentively as you listen to any of the others.  Weigh the merits of the ideas not what you think you might know about Such-and-such’s feelings.

Humble yourself  and you take care of pride.

Seek the truth even when it makes you uncomfortable and you nullify fear.  Consistently do right and consistently do right by folks and you cancel any benefits the liar hopes to gain.

That’s how you keep from lies from controlling you and your team.

Or, don’t.

Just keep on believing the first thing you hear.  Just keep on shrinking your circle to a small crew of people who know just how to tickle your ears.  Just keep on believing whatever lies let you stay out of situations in which you feel uncomfortable or less powerful.  Keep on and one day you’ll look up to find that all the honest folks have left you and you’re surrounded by a pack of liars.

Just imagine how much safer you’ll be surrounded by a pack of liars?

---Anderson T. Graves II

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is the pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church

Call/ fax: 334-288-0577
Email us at hallmemorialcme1@aol.com
Friend Pastor Graves at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

If you want to be a blessing to this ministry, contributions may be made by check or money order.

Mail all contributions to :

Hall Memorial CME Church
541 Seibles Road
Montgomery, AL 36116

A QUOTE WORTH READING A NOVEL TO FIND

From the last page-and-a-half of the noel Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell:

Belief is both prize & battlefield, within the mind & in the mind's mirror, the world. If we believe humanity is a ladder of tribes, a colosseum of confrontation, exploitation & bestiality, such a humanity is surely brought into being, & history's Horroxes, Boerhaaves & Gooses shall prevail. You & I, the moneyed, the privileged, the ...fortunate, shall not fare so badly in this world, provided our luck holds. What of it if our consciences itch? Why undermine the dominance of our race, our gunships, our heritage & our legacy Why fight the "natural" (oh, weaselly word!) order of things?

Why? Because of this: — one fine day, a purely predatory world shall consume itself. Yes, the devil shall take the hindmost until the foremost is the hindmost. In an individual, sefishness uglifies the soul; for the human species, selfishness is extinction.

Is this the doom written within our nature?

If we believe that humanity may transcend tooth and claw, if we believe divers races & creeds can share this world as peaceably as the orphans share their candlenut tree, if we believe leaders must be just, violence muzzled, power accountable & the riches of the Earth & its Oceans shared equitably, such a world will come to pass.

If we believe that humanity may transcend tooth & claw, if we believe divers races & creeds can share this world as peaceably as the orphans share their candlenut tree, if we believe leaders must be just, violence muzzled, power accountable & the riches of the Earth & its Oceans shared equitably, such a world will come to pass. I am not deceived. It is the hardest of worlds to make real. Tortuous advances won over generations can be lost by a single stroke of a myopic president's pen or a vainglorious general's sword.

A life spent shaping a world I want [my son] to inherit, not one I fear [my son] shall inherit, this strikes me as a life worth living.

...He who would do battle with the many-headed hydra of human nature must pay a world of pain & his family must pay it along with him! & only as you gasp your dying breath shall you understand, your life amounted to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean!"

Yet what is any ocean but a multitude of drops?
---David Mitchell

 I'm not sure whether the book is a brilliant novel or a haphazard collection of short stories trying to look like a brilliant novel, but this quote alone was worth reading all 509 pages.

 

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a pastor, writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Call me at 334-288-0577
Email me at atgravestwo2@aol.com
Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To hear sermons, read devotions, and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme@blogspotcom.

 

 

THE PERFECT GIFT

Every shopping-hating husband wants to know, what is the perfect gift for my wife cause then he can get it and quit shopping.

Interestingly enough, the Bible actually has an answer for that. 

Oh, yeah.  From our continuing series of 4^thSunday sermons on relationships, here a timely message called THE PERFECT GIFT.

Listen well.

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---Anderson T. Graves II

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is the pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church

Call/ fax: 334-288-0577
Email us at hallmemorialcme1@aol.com  
Friend Pastor Graves at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves
If you want to be a blessing to this ministry, contributions may be made by check or money order.

Mail all contributions to:

Hall Memorial CME Church
541 Seibles Road
Montgomery, AL 36116

 

A WORD TO THE WISE: Proverbs 29: 11, "Venting"

Proverbs 29: 11     A fool vents all his feelings, but a wise manholds them back.

Proverbs 29: 11.  Sometimes you just need to vent.

Sometimes you don’t need advice or a solution.  Sometimes there’s no solution to advise.  You’re just hurting and you need to vent some of the pain and pressure before you implode.

That’s O.K. 

When Jesus faced the grave of His friend Lazarus, He wept and groaned (John 11).  Eventually, Jesus prayed and changed the situation, but initially Jesus just needed to vent.

It’s O.K. to vent sometimes.

Sometimes, but not all the time.  And not to everybody.

Job vented his anguish to 4 friends and they spent the next 30 something chapters making him feel worse.

Eleven disciples went with Jesus to the Garden of Gethsemane, but when the time came for Jesus to pour out His heart about His passion, Jesus only took 3 disciples with Him, and He kept those 3 a stone’s throw away while He vented to His father (Matt. 26:36-39; Mark 14:32-36; Luke 22: 41).

Mary carefully observed young Jesus, how people responded to Him and how He answered people; but Mary didn’t tell everybody everything she saw or was told.  A lot of things she kept to herself and pondered them in her heart.   (Luke 2:19; Luke 2: 51)

Practice thinking before you vent.  Consider whom you’re about to tell and what you’re about to tell them.  Are they likely to help or to make matters worse?  Can you trust everybody in the room with your pain or do you need to pull a few people aside and vent alone?  

Think before you vent the most intimate details of the ongoing argument between you and your husband/ wife/ boss/ parent/ child/ whomever.  Will telling the entire planet by posting your business online help or harm the ultimate goal of solving the problem and healing the relationship?

Emotion can compel you to react immediately, but remember that the root of the word emotion is motion, which refers to movement.  In other words, feeling come and feeling go.   Emotion is temporary, but venting emotion has permanent consequences.

Once you’ve spoken, you can apologize; you can explain.  But, you cannot un-speak what you’ve said.  And your audience cannot un-hear what you’ve told them.

Once that rant or that pic is posted, one share, one copy/paste later and it’s out there---- forever, for the entire planet to relive and repost at will.

It’s O.K., to vent sometimes; but sometimes, probably most of the time, you need to hold back and be thoughtful about how you share your emotions.

Now, don’t share false emotions.  Don’t say you’re happy when you’re really broken-hearted.  Don’t say that you don’t care if they leave when you really want them to stay.  Speak truth or be silent.

Wisdom  means knowing when to do which.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a pastor, writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Call me at 334-288-0577
Email me at atgravestwo2@aol.com
Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To hear sermons, read devotions, and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme@blogspotcom.

BETTER WITH TIME?

From our seat in the modern world, we look back at the past and think about those poor people who weren't as "advanced" as we are. 

But, who’s really smarter:

The guy in the SUV using GPS to find a McDonald’s, or the scientist in the 60’s who put men on the moon twice using a computer that was the size of a room but slower than a kid’s Iphone, or the Vikings who without maps or a written language managed to row across the Atlantic ocean and back.

The homeowner who running into Lowe’s for a paint color that’ll last a year longer than the last one or the cave man who’s handprint made in a mixture of berry juices is still there after tens of thousands of years.

The armies of designers and contractors who spend billions of dollars constructing skyscrapers with steel and concrete or the ancient Egyptians who without bulldozers, welding torches, or mortar to hold the blocks together built pyramids that are still standing today in one of the harshest climates on earth.

Who’s really more clever, the modern chef who comes up with a new chocolate sauce for his duck confit or the prehistoric man walking through a field who looks at the seeds on top of a stand of weeds and says, “Ugg!  Me think that if me pick these, grind them under stone, add liquid, and apply heat evenly around mixture, then me make new food.  Me call it 'bread.' ”

Who’s really more “advanced,” our contemporary philosophers and pundits who with all their theories of evolution and alien intervention can’t accurately predict next year’s interest rates or this afternoon’s weather, or the ancient Mayans who’ve got them freaking out cause one of them ran out of space while writing on a rock.

We come to a place in which we have animals (pets) that die if they eat regular food that isn’t processed and people that die from eating food processed especially for human consumption.

Evolution maintains that human beings are getting better and smarter.

Ya’ sure about that?

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a pastor, writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Call me at 334-288-0577
Email me at atgravestwo2@aol.com
Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To hear sermons, read devotions, and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme@blogspotcom.