DayBreaks for the Week of 11/20/22 – The Miracle of the Cross

There’s a true story that illustrates the power of the cross: the Archbishop of Paris once stood in the pulpit of Notre Dame Cathedral. He was there to preach a sermon, a sermon built around a story. Thirty years earlier, he said, three young tourists had come into that very cathedral. All three young men were rough, rude, and cynical, thinking all religion was nothing more or less than a racket. Two dared the third young man to go into the confessional box and give a made-up confession. The two bet him that he didn’t have the nerve to do as they dared.

The third young man did go into the confessional and tried to fool the priest. But somehow, the priest knew that what the young man was saying was a lie. There was a tone of arrogance in the young man’s voice that the priest noticed. After hearing the confession, the priest told the young man his penance. The priest said, “Very well, my son. Every confession requires a penance, and this is yours. I ask you to go into the chapel, stand before the crucifix, look into the face of the crucified Christ and say, ‘All this you did for me, and I don’t give a damn!’

The young man staggered out of the confessional to his friends, bragging that he had done as they dared. The other young men insisted he finish the performance by doing the penance, so the third man made his way back into the chapel, stood before the crucifix, looked up into the face of Christ and began, “All this you did for me and I … I … I don’t … I don’t give a ….” At this point in the story, the archbishop leaned over the pulpit and said, “That young man was this man who stands before you to preach.”

That’s the miracle of the cross. It changes things.  It changes us.  No honest person can look into the face of Christ on the cross and come away unchanged.  Once we begin to understand the love that brought the cross to take place, we want to change our relationship with God. We cannot remain the same anymore.  How much difference is the cross making in your life?

PRAYER: For the pain, for the shame, for the anguish and for the death on the cross we thank You, Lord Jesus!  Thank you for making a change in this world – and in all who come to you! In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2022, Galen C. Dalrymple.

DayBreaks for 11/03/21 – No Room for a Chip

Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. – Matthew 16:24 (ESV)

Carrying crosses is not an easy thing – especially when you know you are to be crucified on it. I suspect that it was easier for Simon the Cyrene to carry Jesus’ cross than it was for Jesus to carry it, even if Jesus hadn’t been scourged to within an inch of his life prior to the journey. Our own burdens always seem heavier than someone else’s.

And, when we are carrying a heavy burden, we often are quick to let others know about it.

“Lord, You said if I want to follow you, I will need to carry my cross every day. I want to follow, Lord.

“But there are days when I’m dragging my cross, making a trail for everyone to see. There are days when I’m pushing my cross, making my own path miserable and dusty. There are days when I’m sitting on my cross, trying to get comfortable and going nowhere. There are days when I’m giving my cross to somebody else, who already has one of his own.

“Help me, Lord, to carry my cross on my shoulder. When it’s up there, it leaves no room for a chip!” – A Treasury of Bible Illustrations 

I don’t know about you, but there are plenty of days when I drag my cross and hope that everyone will see how deep of a furrow I leave behind because of the weight of my struggle. Then, there are days when I’m not dragging it, but I’m pushing it – and that’s even harder because it takes even more strength. 

Sitting down for comfort on the way? Oh, yeah. It sure beats dragging or pushing the cross, doesn’t it? It is far easier than pushing or pulling and it is far more common to us American Christians. Not necessarily so common for other Christians, though, around the world.

How about you? Are you dragging your cross, pushing it, sitting on it or trying to give your cross away?  

PRAYER: Jesus, for all the times I have complained about my cross, I’m sorry. I nearly always forget how blessed I am! Help me to not carry a chip on my shoulder, but rather to shoulder the crosses you send my way. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2021 by Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 5/28/21 – Meeting Jesus at the Door

Matthew 7:14 (NIV) – But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

As a pastor, one of the things that one traditionally does is to stand at the doorway and greet members of the congregation as they enter and leave.  It is something that I always loved to do because I loved the people and delighted in seeing them and being with them again each Sunday.  Most of the time the conversation was light and pleasant – but there were moments when it was deep and touched on areas of pain in their lives.  What a privilege to be entrusted with the details of the lives of others!

Of course, part of the welcoming conversation was to encourage people, especially guests, to come back again.  I would welcome them, and after services as they left, I’d ask if they had any questions about what we believed and practiced.  Nothing challenging – that much is for sure.

Episcopal priest and author Barbara Brown Taylor wrote, “If Jesus were in charge of an average congregation I figure there would be about four people left there on Sunday mornings, and chances are those four would be fooling themselves. Jesus would greet newcomers by saying, “Are you absolutely sure you want to follow this way of life? It will take everything you have. It has to come before everything else that matters to you. Plenty of people have launched out on it without counting the cost, and as you can see they are not here anymore. The other thing is, if you succeed, if you really follow me, it will probably get you killed. Why don’t you go home and think it over? I would hate for you to get in over your head.'” – Barbara Brown Taylor, Bread of Angels, p. 47

Many Christians and many churches have “dumbed down” the demands of Christ.  Christ never did.  Christ never will.  He will challenge us with his words to live in different ways than the world around us, and to suffer, carrying our cross daily.  I don’t know what that will mean for me (let alone for you), but of one thing I am certain: Christ will issue us a challenge that will blow us away.

PRAYER: Father, forgive me for the times I’ve not put your bold challenges in front of others and for the times I’ve failed to live up to them myself!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2021, Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 3/23/21: Jesus – A Crown or a Cross?

John 6:14-15 (CSBBible) – When the people saw the sign he had done, they said, “This truly is the Prophet who is to come into the world.” Therefore, when Jesus realized that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountain by himself.

The context for this passage is the feeding of the 5000. The masses of humanity had just received a free meal and were excited about what they’d heard and witnessed. They were ready to make Jesus their king – presumably because they felt that he’d continue to feed them (doesn’t sound that much different than why people like particular politicians today).

Jesus, however, would have none of it. Knowing their hearts, he slipped away from the crowd and went into voluntary solitary confinement on the mountain.

Now, try to put yourself in Jesus’ place. The crowd adores you (maybe not for the right reasons always). They want to make you their king! The crown would have been tempting – certainly more tempting than the thorny one he was to wear later. Who wouldn’t want to be king?!?!

Jesus wouldn’t – at least not a king of the kind they were seeking. Jesus had something far more important to do. His mission wasn’t to be a king, but a Savior and a dying one at that.

In some ways this might have been a far greater temptation than that which Jesus faced in the wilderness. But his love for us – even those that wanted to make him king but totally misunderstood his mission – kept him walking the slow, agonizing trail to the top of Calvary’s mount rather than to an earthly throne.

Not everyone would trade a crown for a cross. Jesus did. And it was love for us that made him do it.

PRAYER: Jesus, we give you praise and glory for your dedication to your mission and the love that bound you to the path to Calvary! In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2021, Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 11/30/20 – All This You Did for Me

From the DayBreaks archive, November 2010:

The Archbishop of Paris once stood in the pulpit of Notre Dame Cathedral to preach a sermon.  His sermon was built around a single story – an illustration from real life if you please.  Thirty years earlier, he began, there were three young tourists who had come into this very cathedral. All the young men were rough, rude, and cynical, who thought that all religion was a racket. Two of these men dared a third to go into the confessional box and make a made-up confession to the priest. The two bet that the third young man did not have the nerve to do as they suggested.

That was all that was necessary to motivate the third young man who went into the confessional box and tried to fool the priest. But the priest knew that what the young man was saying was a lie. There was a tone of arrogance in the young man’s voice – which could not go without notice. After hearing the confession, the priest told the young man his penance. The priest said, “Very well, my son. Every confession requires a penance, and this is yours. I ask you to go into the chapel, stand before the crucifix, look into the face of the crucified Christ and say, ‘All this you did for me, and I don’t give a damn!’ “

The young man staggered out of the confessional to his friends, bragging that he had done as they dared. The other two young men insisted that he finish the performance by doing the penance. This young man made his way into the chapel, stood before the crucifix, looked up into the face of Christ and began, “All this you did for me and I … I … I don’t … I don’t give a ….” At this point in the story, the archbishop leaned over the pulpit and said, “That young man was this man who stands before you to preach.”

That’s the miracle of the cross. When we begin to understand the love on the cross, we want to change our relationship with God. We cannot remain the same, anymore. We want God at the center of our lives, again.

How has the love of God changed your life?  Are you aware of what Christ has done for you – and do you still dare stand and look into his eyes and say to him that you don’t care about it? 

PRAYER: I know that by my actions, words and thoughts it must often appear to you, Lord, that I don’t care about what You did for me.  Please see my heart – and know that I am weak, but that I do truly love You, and that I do care about what it cost You to save my soul!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2020, Galen C. Dalrymple.

DayBreaks for 7/27/20 – The Tale of the Crucified Crook

Luke 23:42 (NLT2) – Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.”

Have you ever thought about how outlandish this request was? Here was a violent man who by his own admission was receiving his just reward of crucifixion. He didn’t deny his guilt. Perhaps the only thing that is more shocking than his request was the fact that his “death bed” request was granted. But why? What are we to learn from this?

Some time ago someone broke into a department store. What was interesting was that they didn’t steal a single thing. All they did was spend their time inside switching price tags. An outboard motor was marked at $5 while stationary was priced at hundreds. And then they escaped.

The next morning it took four hours before anyone noticed there was a problem. In the meantime, some folks got great deals! But the pricing had nothing to do with the value of the item itself.

You see, we are living in a day and age when the value system is totally bonkers. We’ve raised the value of cheap thrills and degraded the value of human beings to nothing more than a pile of cells composed of a few minerals and water.

Jesus’ incredible granting of the thief’s request shows us that even the greatest of losers are valuable. Jesus was showing us by his response (Luke 23:43 – I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise) reveals what Jesus thinks of the value of the human race.

And get this: what could the thief do for Jesus? Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Nada. He would never be able to do a single thing for the cause of Jesus. But he didn’t have to in order for his value to be recognized. The love of the Lord doesn’t depend on what we do for him or could do if given the chance. You have value just because you exist!

Try to hold onto that thought the next time someone shames you, attacks you, or steamrolls you into the dirt. When someone tries to mark down your value, just smile because you know the truth about yourself. If you’d been the thief on the cross and made that request of Jesus you would have heard the same words spoken back to you that the thief heard.

I love what Max Lucado said in No Wonder They Call Him the Savior said: “…it makes me smile to think that there is a grinning ex-con walking the golden streets who knows more about grace than a thousand theologians. No one else would have given him a pray. But in the end, that is all that he had. And in the end, that is all it took.”   

PRAYER: Lord Jesus, have mercy on us sinners and remember us when your Kingdom comes in its fullness!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright by 2020 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 7/20/20 – Just a Piece of Wood?

Imagine yourself sitting across a table from someone who is perplexed and puzzled by life and the Bible. Perhaps they’d thought that becoming a Christian would solve all their problems and doubts. But it didn’t. Maybe they’re an unbeliever who is trying to find something to make life worth living. And so, they ask, “What is it that is truly important, that really, really matters?” And then they sit quietly staring at you expecting words of wisdom to fall from your lips. What would you say?

Some might mumble something about the two greatest commandments – surely that must be the answer, right? After all, how can love ever be the wrong answer? The point is that those are the two greatest commandments, but they mean diddly-squat if the main gist of the book is missed.

Fortunately, we don’t have to guess as to the answer. Paul answered it for us in 1 Corinthians 15 when he penned these words: For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures. That he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.

There you have it. That’s it. Too simple? It wasn’t simple from God or Jesus’ standpoint. The truth is this: what matters is the cross and the events following.

How can a couple pieces of wood be what counts? As Max Lucado put it in No Wonder They Call Him the Savior, “History has idolized it and despised it, gold-plated it and burned it, worn and trashed it. History has done everything to it but ignore it. That’s the one option that the cross does not offer…Its bottom line is sobering: if the account is true, it is history’s hinge. Period. If not, it is history’s hoax.”

Of course, it wasn’t the pieces of wood that made it special. It was the transaction that took place there: the transference of my sin onto his lashed shoulders, him taking my sin into his pierced hands…and paying the price for it that I should have to pay.

What matters? THAT is what matters.

PRAYER: Jesus, when I begin to doubt your love, to think that my sin is too great a burden even for you, when life crushes in and suffocates me, remind me what matters and turn my heart to contemplate what happened there. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright by 2020 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 4/10/20 – The Hallway Through the Sea #16: On the Cross and the Kingdom

From Christianity Today and Tim Dalrymple, 4/09/20:

The following is the latest in a series of daily meditations amid the pandemic. For today’s musical pairing, as we enter Good Friday, consider this unhurried version of the Lacrimosa from Mozart’s Requiem. 

“He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”
Isaiah 53:3–6

Meditation 16. 1,536,979 confirmed cases, 93,425 deaths globally.
There are four passages in Isaiah often called the Songs of the Suffering Servant. The longest and most renowned is Isaiah 52:13–53:12. Jews read these passages and hear the story of Israel itself, as God redeemed the sufferings of his chosen people to bring blessing to the world. Christians, of course, hear the story of Jesus and his suffering on behalf of humankind.

Both can be true. As Holy Week makes excruciatingly clear, Jesus was “a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.” He was “pierced for our transgressions,” “led like a lamb to the slaughter,” and “cut off from the land of the living,” an “offering for sin.” “After he has suffered,” says verse 11, “he will see the light of life” and “will justify many.”

As we discussed in a recent meditation, Jesus seeks not only admirers but imitators. Time and again he defines following him as dying to ourselves and taking up our cross. Even as he is a Suffering Servant, he calls his church to be a fellowship of suffering servants.

In the words of Henri Nouwen, we are all called to be wounded healers. “The great illusion of leadership,” he writes in The Wounded Healer, “is to think that man can be led out of the desert by someone who has never been there.” Or, better, “The beginning and the end of all Christian leadership is to give your life for others.”

The Cross is our key to the kingdom. It shows us all the truths we would rather forget. That the kingdom of God is not about power and triumph, because all the might of the world cannot heal the hearts of men… (Click this link to read the rest of the meditation.)

Link to Christianity Today’s Facebook page

The Hallway Through the Sea is a series of daily meditations from the president and CEO of Christianity Today, written specifically for those struggling through the coronavirus pandemic. It will address our sense of fear and isolation and also the ways we find beauty and truth and hope—and Christ himself—in the midst of suffering. The title of the column alludes to the passage of the Israelites through the Red Sea. We are a people redeemed from our enslavement to sin, yet we find ourselves living between where we were and where we are meant to be. Danger looms on both sides, but our hope and our faith is that God will deliver us through the sea and into the land of promise. If you wish, you can follow Timothy Dalrymple on Twitter @TimDalrymple_

PREVIOUS THE HALLWAY THROUGH THE SEA COLUMNS:

Out of the Depths

Chosen in the Furnace

The First Word and the Last

More . . .

Link to video with facts, symptoms and prevention tips about coronavirus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AITtaAAAdYc

Copyright by 2020 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>

 

DayBreaks for 5/24/19 – Taking Hold of the Cross

If you refuse to take up your cross and follow me, you are not worthy of being mine. If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give it up for me, you will find it. – Matthew 10:38-39 (NLT)

In a world full of challenges to accomplish much and achieve great things, Jesus’ invitation to lose our life stands in stark contrast to what the world invites us to do.  To accept one’s cross seems counter-intuitive at best, and outright crazy according to human thought. 

There are several things about Jesus’ invitation that we must consider:

FIRST: in taking up our cross, we are following Him.  He invites us to do what He has done before us – accepting that cross that awaits.  Because he took up the cross first, if we fail to imitate him, we are not worthy of being his.

SECOND: Jesus only invites us to do the things that he’s already been willing to do.  He never asks us to go farther than he was willing to go. 

THIRD: Jesus doesn’t invite us to just get tough and pull ourselves up to heaven by our bootstraps.  He knows that isn’t possible.  He is fully aware, as Mike Mason put it in The Gospel According to Job, that “the only bootstrap in the Christian life is the cross.  Sometimes laying hold of the cross can be comforting; but other times it is like picking up a snake.  Christ Himself found this out when He cried, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

The cross is the only pathway to heaven.  Dying is the only pathway to life.

Prayer: Lord, we need your courage to be able to follow in your footsteps to our own cross.  As we embrace not only your cross, but ours, may we find life and life to the fullest.  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright by 2019 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 4/05/19 – The Shape of Christian Victory

From the DayBreaks archive, April 2009:

Wars are fought over silly things: oil, power, insults, a beautiful woman (remember Helen of Troy?), perceived slights – for these things and many others like them, blood has been spilled and lives sacrificed.  It is a sad, strange business this thing called war.

Wars in ancient days were fought with crude weapons such as stones, axes, spears, bows and arrows.  In all modern man’s “wisdom”, we’ve managed to create ever more deadly and accurate weapons.  While once upon a time a man had to stand in front of the other man and look him in the eye as he tried to kill him, we now can launch a missile and destroy millions of people on the far side of the world – never being confronted with their faces and the look in their eyes as they realize they are about to die.  War has become impersonal.  Indeed, remote control aircraft are being used in Iraq and Afghanistan to fire missiles at cars, gatherings of suspected terrorists, etc., and they are piloted by “pilots” sitting in front a computer monitor in the United States…how like a video game we have made war!!!

At the end of World War II, the shape of victory was the mushroom clouds that rose over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  Thankfully, due to the horrible nature of those weapons, to date the world has never seen a repeat of their use.  There is no guarantee that this will always be the case, however. 

Of all the battles ever fought, the greatest victory of all time was won on a God-forsaken hillside outside of Jerusalem on a spring day as a carpenter from Nazareth was stripped and nailed to a tree.  His blood, like that of so many before him, watered the earth, turning dust into a red, muddy paste.  How strange that to the Romans and religious leaders that the shape of victory that day was a cross.  Even more bizarre is that the very same cross was also the shape of victory for the God who hung on it and for all who would believe on Him.

As Christians, the shape of our victory is not a mushroom cloud or a sword or a spear or a howitzer or the Gatling gun strapped on the side of an attack helicopter.  No, the shape of our victory is cruciform: What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all–how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died–more than that, who was raised to life–is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written: “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. – Romans 8:31-37 (NIV)

Prayer: For the victory of the cross we honor You!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright by 2019 by Galen C. Dalrymple.  ><}}}”>