DayBreaks for the Week of 4/25/22 – The Day the World Grew Dangerous

Christianity is unlike any other religion for many reasons.  First, it’s not a religion – it’s about an intimate relationship with God, but we’ll not go into all the other differences, except to note that unlike other religions, Christianity can trace its origin to one particular event in one moment on a single day in history: the resurrection. 

When Jesus appears to the women at the tomb, he is very nonchalant in the Greek when he said, “Greetings!”  It’s as close as you could come to saying something so ordinary, like: “Hi!  How are you doing?  Nice day, isn’t it?”  Almost as if Jesus were saying, “You were expecting this, right?  I told you I’d do this!”

John Ortberg wrote about it in Who Is This Man?: Sunday changed everything, but not in the way many people think.  From our point of view 2000 years later, many people think of Easter as a comforting story that says, ‘Spring is coming.  Flowers are blooming.  Life is eternal.  Everything is going to work out.’  But the response to the resurrection on the first Easter in the Gospels consistently includes fear.  In fact, people were more afraid after the resurrection than they were before.  And none of the gospel accounts have Jesus or the angels saying, ‘Now you don’t have to worry about dying anymore.

“What Jesus does say to his followers is that there is work to be done.  In effect, ‘The cross didn’t stick.  Their plan to stop my movement didn’t work.  It’s going to go on.  Matter of fact, my plan to love even  your enemies, to be willing to sacrifice, suffer, and even die for the sake of love has been vindicated by my Father.”

“They’re really going to be ticked off now.  Pilate and the chief priests have already plotted to squelch this news.  They are furious.  They are desperate.  I’ve leaving now.  So you go, you women, you disciples.  Tell them all that the cross failed, Caesar failed, Pilate failed, the chief priests failed.  Now they have you to contend with.”

Ortberg continues: “On Sunday their lives didn’t get safer; their lives got a lot more dangerous.  What got released on Sunday was not comfort.  Also, what got released on Sunday was not assurance about life after death.” 

“What got released on Sunday was hope.  Not hope that life would turn out well.  Not even hope that there will be life after death.  Hope that called people to die: die to selfishness and sin and fear and greed, die to the lesser life of a lesser self so that a greater self might be born.  And many people did.”

What did you celebrate a couple weeks ago?  It isn’t wrong to celebrate the resurrection.  But did you also consider what it means – what the implications are for the rest of your temporal life?  I doubt few of us gave that much thought, but we should.  It was the day the world became dangerous if you wear the name “Christian.” 

PRAYER: Sometimes in our celebrations we forget the seriousness of our calling, Lord.  Let us not fear what man can do to us, but boldly proclaim the resurrection!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2022 by Galen C. Dalrymple.

DayBreaks for the week of 2/28/22 – Deserts, Words and the Holy of Holies

NOTE TO READERS: Instead of stopping DayBreaks entirely, I’ll post an single entry on Sundays for the following week.

Recent weeks have seen and heard the sounds of war shatter our illusions of peace, and we might well ask “Why”? If God is sovereign over the affairs of men as we believe him to be, what is he doing? Why is he allowing the suffering? And even if the war hadn’t come, the suffering is ever present in this broken and shattered world. I’m not smart enough to know all the answers but let me share something I learned the day after the Ukrainian invasion.

The bombs fall and we fall to our knees. People get a diagnosis of either chronic suffering or terminal illness…and we fall to our knees. A child – any loved one dies – and we fall to our knees. Pain carries us to prayer and our years of collective loss howl from our throats in a long lament. At these times we often feel alone in a scorching desert. Lost, uncertain of which way to head, doubting in the coming of a new and better day.

Ann Voskamp recently noted that there is a fascinating connection in the Hebrew between three words, the first being desert. Deserts are not typically places people choose to live. The Sahara is parched, with places receiving only 2/100ths of an inch of water a year. Life in the desert is hard and the heat assails us. But something else happens in the desert. In 2016 on a trip to Israel, our tour group was bused out into the wilderness, the desert, of Judah and we were dropped off to wander in the desert as Jesus did. The most amazing thing to me was how quiet things were in the desert, yet how well you could hear. You could hear the sounds of shepherds and their flocks from far distant hills and valleys even though you couldn’t see them. And I came to understand why Jesus would withdraw to the desert – so he could hear the voice of God without the clamor of the world interfering.

And that brings us to the second word, which is the word for word. It comes from the same root word as desert. What’s the point? It is perhaps as simple as the connection between the desert and the ability to hear and specifically to hear from God. When the bombs and bullets and missiles fly, we are drawn from the marketplace into the desert where we can once again turn our thoughts and ears heavenward to hear the message God wants to communicate to us, to set our priorities back on track again, to stir our hearts to pray with the apostle John, “Even so, come Lord Jesus!” and to ask what God wants us to do in the midst of the chaos of this world’s war.

This brings us to the third word, or phrase, which comes from the same Hebrew root. In the temple was the court of the Gentiles, the holy place and the holy of holies – the inner sanctum where God made his dwelling on earth among the Israelites. What is translated “holy of holies” comes from the same Hebrew word as desert and word. It was in the holy of holies that the high priest would pour out special sacrifices and it was where Zachariah heard the promise of the coming of the forerunner of Christ, the one who would prepare the way for the Messiah.

What does this imply? That the deserts of our lives are the places where we can hear the word of God and be in the very presence of the one who made the holy of holies what it was. In the silence of the desert, we can be still and know that He is God. We can hear his voice whispering to us even as it did to Elijah after fleeing from Jezebel after the contest with the prophets of Baal. It says that God wasn’t in the earthquake or the fire, but in a still small voice – the word used for the sound of falling snow. One cannot hear the sound of falling snow unless you are very quiet and very, very focused.

The events of our lives that we consider tragic, that take us to the barren places in our hearts and minds, are the very events that focus us and drive us to our knees in the holy of holies – the presence of God – so that we can hear, and then choose to respond, to his words.

In his tender love and respect for us as his image bearers, he gives us the choice to stop and listen or not. He gives us the choice to withdraw from him or draw closer to him. The trials are intended to nudge us to his holy presence, to let us hear him speak to us. They are part of the plan he has for us – a good plan, not to destroy but for good and to prosper us.

As we struggle with decisions and relationships, with all the warring in our hearts and souls, let’s not miss the God-given desert and the blessings we can find there.

PRAYER: Lead us to the desert when we need to hear you and be in your presence, o Holy One! In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2022 by Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 2/23/22 – The Seeds of Resurrection

Trevor Beeson stood at the high altar of Westminster Abbey to celebrate the marriage of his daughter, Catharine, to Anthony, aged twenty-three. Nine months later he stood before the same altar for Anthony’s funeral, who was killed when his car ran into a wall in East London. Four months later, Trevor he returned once more to the altar beside the coffin of his friend and hero Earl Mountbatten, who died when his fishing boat was blown to pieces by Irish terrorists.

 Reflecting on the experience, he said he could not blame God for these senseless tragedies. He wrote: “I should find it impossible to believe in, and worship, a God who arranged for the great servants of the community to be blown up on their holidays and who deliberately turned a young man’s car into a brick wall…This is not the God of love whose ways are revealed in the Bible and supremely in the life of Jesus Christ.”

Beeson found two insights that helped him to cope with his tragedies and to look beyond them: “The first is that, although God is not responsible for causing tragedy, he is not a detached observer of our suffering. On the contrary, he is immersed in it with us, sharing to the full our particular grief and pain. This is the fundamental significance of the cross.”

Second, although our natural inclination is to ask, “Why did it happen?” Beeson discovered a far more important question: “What are we going to make of it?  Every tragedy contains within it the seeds of resurrection.”

Are those who experience innocent suffering worse than anyone else?  Of course not.  Jesus was quite clear about that – suffering can happen to anyone – anytime.   

But is there a connection between innocent suffering and human action?  Of course, there is, and if we fail to change harmful ways in which we may be living, we may fall victim to certain types of suffering as a result. 

What does Jesus offer us when we experience this kind of suffering? The power of God to hold us firm, to give us strength, and to see us through.  And he holds out the hope for the “third day” resurrection!

PRAYER: Help us to learn from the tragedies and suffering that befalls us, Lord, and to see the seeds of resurrection in each situation!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2022 by Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 2/4/22 – The Ministry of Reconciliation

Romans 5:11 – Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

Reconciliation is a big topic in scripture.  In fact, it’s what the entire story of God’s interaction with mankind is all about.  Reconciliation is about the restoration of relationship.  We like the idea of reconciliation, whether it is with God or with our human acquaintances.  But perhaps we take reconciliation too lightly – we cheapen the cost of reconciliation.

Consider these words from a pastor by the name of Allan Boesak: “True reconciliation cannot take place without confrontation.  Reconciliation is not feeling good; it’s coming to grips with evil.  In order to reconcile, Christ had to die.  We must not deceive ourselves.  Reconciliation does not mean holding hands and singing ‘black and white together.’  It means, rather, death and suffering, giving up one’s life for the sake of the other.  If white and black Christians fail to understand this, we shall not be truly reconciled.” 

“So it is with peace.  One is not at peace with God and one’s neighbor because one has succeeded in closing one’s eyes to the realities of evil.  Neither is peace a situation where terrorism of the defenseless is acceptable because it is being done under the guise of the law…Peace is not simply the absence of war or an uneasy quiet in the townships.  Peace is the active presence of justice.  It is shalom, the well-being of all.”

Reconciliation to God was extremely costly.  We hope for an easy and cheap reconciliation in our relationships.  Chances are if it is easy, it isn’t truly a reconciliation.   God has given us the ministry of reconciliation.  Just like our Lord, we may have to bleed for it.

2 Cor. 5:18-20 – All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.”

PRAYER: Lord, I don’t like confrontation and I don’t like to bleed!  Help us to value reconciliation more than we value our own comfort and ease!  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2022 by Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>

DayBreaks for 12/10/21 – Thinking About Adam and Eve

Romans 5:18-19 (NLT) – Yes, Adam’s one sin brings condemnation for everyone, but Christ’s one act of righteousness brings a right relationship with God and new life for everyone. Because one person disobeyed God, many became sinners. But because one other person obeyed God, many will be made righteous.

As I was driving yesterday, I pondered the early days of Adam and Eve. I wondered what a delight it must have been like to live in a perfect world – a world where there wasn’t any death. A world before the Fall. It must have been spectacularly glorious.

But then, the rebellion. I wonder what was the first sign to them that the entire cosmos had suffered because of their rebellion? I wonder what first caught their attention. Was it a cat pouncing on a mouse and biting it until it died? Was it a bird falling dead out of a tree? Did an ill wind literally start to blow that took their breath in a gasp as they realized that something dreadful had happened?

And how did they then feel? What would it have been like to have been Adam and Eve and know because of what YOU did, the entire cosmos entered disarray and things started dying and animals (and people) started killing one another? What would it be like to realize that you were the cause of all that?

I feel badly enough when I fall into sin. But I’ve never experienced a perfect world. As a result, I suppose that I don’t feel the weight of my sin as heavily as Adam and Eve felt theirs. Perhaps I should feel it just as heavily (or even more so as we know the price it cost God to “fix” it) as they did, but my guess is that we don’t begin to approximate the understanding or comprehension of the effect of our sin.

I’m glad I wasn’t Adam. I wish I wasn’t a sinner. How grateful I am for the second Adam who will one day restore that perfect world and we will all know what it was like for Adam and Eve in the beginning before sin ruined everything. I long to see and experience that world. I’m willing to bet you do, too!

PRAYER:  Lord, we long to see what the perfected heavens and earth will be like, to see Your creation in its perfected splendor. For what we have done to deface Your creation in our day and age, we repent in dust and ashes! In Your name, Amen.

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

DayBreaks for 11/18/21 – Though He Slay Me

From Lee Eclov, Preaching Today (edited):

Once, lumberjacks learned to break up logjams by walking out on floating, rolling logs with long pikes. Then logrolling became a two-person sport with the goal of dumping one’s opponent in the water through fancy footwork. It seems like an apt metaphor for the precarious work of keeping our balance in ministry; indeed in all of life. The unsettling news is that, sooner or later, the person on the other end of your log is God.

When I was young, we’d sing, “Anywhere with Jesus I can safely go.” Well, yes and no. Sometimes God’s assignment for us is defeat. Just ask Jacob, limping off into the sunrise. Or Paul with that stubborn thorn. Or Jesus drinking the bitter dregs of crucifixion.

Years ago, my wife was stricken with panic attacks. She’d suddenly freeze in fear without knowing what frightened her. Mild anxiety could burst into terrifying alarm. She’d awaken at night too petrified to alert me. She wouldn’t drive more than a couple of miles lest she be unable to get home. Of course, we did everything we could to figure out the cause. We prayed and had others pray. She searched her heart and history. We stood against Satan. But nothing helped. The paralyzing ambushes continued for months.

Then one day I asked her, “What if these attacks aren’t because something is wrong? What if this is like Job’s experience: ‘Have you considered my servant Susan?’” So, we changed our prayers: “Lord, we are going to assume that there is nothing wrong on our side. We’re going to assume that rather than some weakness or failure on Susan’s part you have chosen her to display her faithfulness to you, just as you did with Job.” After that, she bore the attacks with the resolve of a soldier on the front lines rather than someone with undiagnosed suffering or undiscovered sin. Eventually, the attacks ended.

Part of following Christ…is God-given defeat. There you are, running madly on that spinning log, when God puts his foot down in a hard stop and next thing you know, you’re underwater. African American preachers had a great admonition for prodigals, “Son, your arm’s too short to box with God.” It’s also fitting for faithful servants.

When God throws us into deep water we are being watched. Apparently, our faithfulness under fire bears witness to unseen enemies and friends, in heaven as it is on earth. Proving that we are not God’s fair-weather friends matters.

Over the years I have seen many friends suffer dreadful blows and long ordeals. Their flocks have watched, too. So have those unseen witnesses in heavenly realms. Our congregations don’t necessarily need to see us triumph, riding through trouble with a high hand. It is enough to see their bowed and bleeding brother or sister still whisper, “Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him.”

Martyrs do not all die suddenly with a gunshot or slashing sword. Most dying for Jesus happens slowly, witnessing as we go. Then, like the sign of Jonah, we emerge from the watery depths resurrected. In the upside-down way of God’s kingdom, he defeats us in order to accomplish the very thing we signed on for—to glorify Christ and to shepherd the flock of God safely home.

And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. (1 Pet. 5:10)

PRAYER: Lord, may we always find our hope in you. May we glorify you in all circumstances. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

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

DayBreaks for 11/02/21 – A Journey to the Kingdom of Shame

From the DayBreaks archive, 2012:

Today I’m going to do something I’ve seldom done before in DayBreaks.  I share a devotion very recently about Maxmillian Kolb, a priest who swapped places in the Nazi death-camps with a man who was a husband/father.  In response to that devotion, I received a response from a man in Finland who visited Auschwitz. He said that it was a very moving experience and provided me with a link to a slide show/musical composition he’d made about Auschwitz and what he saw. 

Today I want to share that link with you and share some thoughts.  To watch the video, go here: A Trip to the Kingdom of Shame.

As I watched the slide show, I was moved, as I always am, by scenes of suffering.  I never cease to be dismayed at the depths to which we humans can fall.  I don’t understand how people could look little children in the face as they march them into the gas chambers or watch them starve.  Is there no bottom to the darkness of the human heart?

I think it must be due to our failure to obey the greatest two commands.  If we love God, we will love what is made in His image.  If we love others as we love ourselves, we will not march them off to exterminate them just like so many bugs. 

Jesus would have cried out against such atrocities…and I’m sure he did during the Holocaust.  He would not have stood silently by and watched.  He will one day intervene with all the power that created the universe.  In this lies hope.  There will be justice.

But what of us?  It is far too easy to switch the channel when commercials asking for support come on the TV showing us faces of starving children.  It is as if we have constructed switches in our hearts that can be thrown as easily as a light switch: out-of-sight, out-of-mind.  Shame.  Shame on us. 

God have mercy on our souls if we turn our faces away like the Nazi guards did. 

Jesus replied, “‘You must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments. – Matthew 22:37-40 (NLT)

PRAYER: God, I know that I am not always charitable to those who attack me.  I often want to see pain inflicted on them, but I know that I shouldn’t.  Help me to pray with genuine heart and clean motives for Your love to reach them.  We invite You to turn our world, and hearts, upside down and inside out.  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

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

DayBreaks for 10/28/21 – When You Thought the Worst was Over

“When you’ve walked through the valley of the shadow of death

When you thought the worst was over

And the worst is what was left

Some things he can’t explain now,

But by and by he will.

Look up through the pain now, and you will find him

Deeper still.

Deeper still you will find him, deeper still than before

Deeper still goes the anchor, deeper still the ocean floor.

Deeper still he has taught you, deeper still there is to go

Deeper still is the Savior, deeper still than we know.”  – from Deeper Still: For Those Who Grieve, copyright 1997 IBS Publishing

There is something inside of us that leads us to hope that our troubles are about at an end.  But what happens when you discover that what you thought the worst was only the beginning, or only a mid-point in the trouble?  I wish I had a silver-bullet answer that worked in every situation for everyone.  But the following I do know:

FIRST: God is still in His heaven and is still on His throne.

SECOND: God still loves you – regardless of the cause of the difficulty (sometimes it is brought about as a result of our sinful, selfish decisions).

THIRD: God still sees you (Psalm 10:14): But you, O God, do see trouble and grief; you consider it to take it in hand. The victim commits himself to you; you are the helper of the fatherless.

FINALLY: Whether your mind and heart can grasp it or not, you will still win – because your Father God will have His way when all is said and done.

We ask questions when we are in distress. CS Lewis pondered the questions we asked when going through his own dark night after the death of his wife when he asked: “Is it possible to ask God a question that he can’t answer?” (paraphrased)  He concludes it is very possible if we ask nonsense questions such as “What color is a pound?” or “How many ounces does a circle weigh?” He came to the conclusion that even God cannot answer nonsense questions.

When we are in the shadows with pain and anguish, we may be asking God nonsense questions. Lewis concluded that God’s only response at such a time may be (again paraphrasing): “Hush, child, you don’t understand.”

In our pain we want to know and so may ask questions he cannot answer. But he’ll never chide us for asking. Someday, when we can see our lives from the other side, I feel confident it will all make sense.

PRAYER: Father, it is tough not knowing if we have seen the worst and things will get better or not.  We try, Lord, to hold on to your certainties, but it is not easy.  Give us the courage and the strength for each day to face whatever it brings, and help us to know that you truly are in it with us! In Jesus’ name, Amen.

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

DayBreaks for 6/14/21 – Lessons in Human Nature #2

NOTE: Galen is out of the office until 6/28 so we’re featuring DayBreaks from the past.

Mt. 27:55 – And many women who had come from Galilee with Jesus to care for him were watching from a distance.

The various descriptions of human behavior around, or at the time of the crucifixion, are fascinating.  Here, we learn that there were many women who were followers of Jesus (after all, they’d followed him all the way from Galilee to Jerusalem) were witnesses to the crucifixion.  This is not surprising, I suppose.  Just as in modern times, it seems that women are often the first to follow Jesus, and a visit to a local church will find more women than men in attendance.  So, first of all, let’s give women their due.  There is a great deal that we men can, and should, learn from them!

But here, we find the women “watching from a distance” – what a description!  Why were they at a distance?  It wasn’t apparently because women weren’t allowed to be close to the actual site, for Mary, Jesus’ mother, was at the foot of the cross.  I suspect it was a combination of fear and revulsion.

The revulsion part comes in to play at any gruesome scene.  Consider cars passing by a fatal accident on the road.  There is a fascination with what is going on, but does anyone really want to stick their head inside the car and witness the carnage if you don’t have to?  No. 

The fear part is obvious.  Death and crucifixions were afoot. 

The lesson here is this: we want to be involved with Jesus, to see him and his story and hear his words, but only from a distance.  When we get too close to Him, the temperature rises and the water gets hot, just as Peter learned in the courtyard of Pilate.  These women were most likely very interested and concerned about what was happening, but also terrified – Romans didn’t care if they crucified men, women or children – and these women may well have been terrified for their lives so it is hard to blame them. 

That makes me ask: what would you and I have done?  Would we have been there at all?

PRAYER: Lord, I know you don’t want followers who follow at arm’s distance, but disciples who are covered in your dust, disciples who have your blood fall on them from the cross, not who stand at a distance.  Forgive us our quaking fears for our own safety over the advance of Your Kingdom.  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Copyright 2021, Galen C. Dalrymple, all rights reserved.

DayBreaks for 4/02/21 – How the Centurion Knew

Mark 15:37-39 (CSBBible) – Jesus let out a loud cry and breathed his last. Then the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. When the centurion, who was standing opposite him, saw the way he breathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”

The centurion in this story had an ugly job. I don’t know if it was his daily routine – go out and crucify a few more people – or not. But it couldn’t have been pleasant even to a hardened killing machine like a Roman centurion.

For hours after he gave the command to pound the nails he watched as the three men who were dying that day writhed, suffered and struggled to get even a single breath into their screaming lungs. He could hear what they said. He could see their faces. He watched while they struggled to push down with their feet to be able to get a lungful of air, only to whimper and cry with the pain of it all.

So, he either sat or stood and watched. It wasn’t like he could leave his post before the job was done. So, he attended to the victims of this most sadistic type of execution.

Then, something caught his eye. The one on the center cross took one last shuddering breath, cried out to commit his soul to the father and died. He’d watched him as the nails were driven, heard the taunts from the jeering crowd. He’s observed this man’s suffering and how he died. And it moved his stone-cold killer’s heart.

You see, it was only in beholding Jesus’ suffering and how he died that the centurion recognized Jesus for what and who he really was. He wasn’t just a carpenter lunatic from Nazareth that had managed to delude some folks into believing he was God’s son. He was God’s son and how he suffered proved it.

I don’t think I could have stood there and watched and heard it. But I’m glad this centurion did.

I’m grateful that it can be something horrendous as the suffering of the Son of God that convinces people of the love of God.

Look at him. Look at him on the cross. Listen to his words. See his face. Hear his tender pleas for you to be forgiven for your ignorance of how your actions put him there. And then, acknowledge him as the Son of God, the King of Kings, the Alpha and Omega who now holds the keys of death and who is dying to give you eternal life.

This is Easter. This is the Son of God.

PRAYER: Thank you for suffering for me, Jesus. Thank you that in your suffering we can see your real identity and your heart toward us! In Jesus’ name, Amen.Copyright 2021, Galen C. Dalrymple. ><}}}”>