Tag: Bible

Posted in sermons & addresses

Lights in the World (Philippians 2:12-18)

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

Note: I preached this sermon on January 4, 2026 at Beacon of Hope Community Church of the Nazarene (Moon Township, PA)

Read Philippians 2:12-18 in the New English Translation (NET)

(12) So then, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence but even more in my absence, continue working out your own salvation with awe and reverence,

(13) for the one bringing forth in you both the desire and the effort – for the sake of his good pleasure – is God.

(14) Do everything without grumbling or arguing,

(15) so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God without blemish though you live in a crooked and perverse society, in which you shine as lights in the world

(16) by holding on to the word of life so that on the day of Christ I will have a reason to boast that I did not run in vain nor labor in vain.

(17) But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service of your faith, I am glad and rejoice together with all of you.

(18) And in the same way you also should be glad and rejoice together with me.”

prayer

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INTRODUCTION

Today is the first Sunday of 2026. Many of us have faced challenges in 2025, and 2026 promises to be another year with its own share of challenges, even hardships.

When we find ourselves in that place – facing real obstacles but still hopeful – Paul’s letter to the Philippians speaks to us.

Paul didn’t pen this epistle in a comfortable palace but in a dark and chilly prison cell. Four words found in Philippians 1:13 stand out:

“I am in prison.”

It’s important, though, to read further in verse 13. There, Paul doesn’t just say “I am in prison” but he adds: “I am in prison for the sake of Christ.”

Our sovereign God is able to take the worst of our circumstances and use them to advance divine purposes in our world. Our suffering has meaning as part of a larger story, the Story of God.

Just a minute ago, we read Philippians 2:12-18. In this passage, Paul’s hardship in prison is still there in the background, but he turns now to other themes. He refuses to make his letter a “Woe is me.” Instead, good pastor that he is, his thoughts and concern – to use his words in 1:1 – turn to “all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi.”

The very fact that the early Church chose to include Paul’s letter in what we now call the New Testament is a testimony to its usefulness and timeless themes. It spoke then, and it still speaks.

Let’s look today at 3 commands that Paul gives:

  1. Work out your salvation.
  2. Be blameless and pure.
  3. Celebrate together.

WORK OUT YOUR SALVATION

Let’s not forget that Paul is writing not to an individual but to a group. He’s saying:

“Hey all y’all, work out all y’all’s salvation.”

Reuben Welch had it right when he titled his book: “We really do need each other.” John Wesley often preached on this passage, and he entitled his sermon:

“On Working Out Our Own Salvation”

Christianity is a group endeavor. No, we can’t save ourselves, but when God saves us by his grace, it is also God who enables us by his grace to continue in the walk of faith.

Look again at v. 13: “for the one bringing forth in you both the desire and the effort – for the sake of his good pleasure – is God.” The NIV is even clearer: “For it is God who works in you…”

There’s a proverb from Ghana that captures this idea of cooperation. Picture the marketplace where women are often walking with large trays of colorful goods balanced on their head. The proverb advises:

“Make up your tray then we’ll help you put it on your head.”

We do our part and God does God’s part. We work and at the same time God works inside us, by the power of the Holy Spirit.

The New English Translation captures the ongoing nature of salvation. The end of Philippians 2:12 reads: “…continue working our your salvation with awe and reverence.”

A ten year old might speak of giving her heart to Jesus at a Vacation Bible School when she was five years old, and the church says “Amen!” But if that same girl – now a grown woman of 50 – shares just that testimony and nothing new from the 45 years afterward, everyone will wonder: What has God been up to in your life since then?”

The Disney film “Finding Dory” has good advice: “Keep swimming.”

God saved me; God is saving me; God will save me.

Past, present, and future – That’s relationship. It started at some point, it’s still deepening, and one day our faith will be sight.

Work out your salvation.

BE BLAMELESS AND PURE

After talking about salvation, Paul gets really practical. Let’s read v. 14 – “Do everything without grumbling or arguing.”

Why? See verse 15: “so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God without blemish…”

Here we find the second command. Not only are we to work out our salvation, but we also are to be blameless and pure.

Don’t grumble. Don’t argue.

Some English words sound like what they are: “mur-mur” “back-biting”

Our children were pretty contented kids growing up, but occasionally like all children they would gripe about this-or-that. That’s when we’d jokingly say:

“Would you like some cheese with your WHINE?”

Or maybe if a young child falls at the playground and it’s apparent they’re not hurt but just tearfully seeking attention from their grown-ups, we ask:

“Should I call the WAM-bulance?”

We all laugh and they go back to playing with the other children, none worse for the wear.

There will be scrapes and bruises. After all, Paul never asks us to physically withdraw from this world, but he does admonish us to live clean lives despite the crooked and perverse influences around us.

In 1987, Tipper Gore entitled her book: “Raising PG kids in an X-rated society.”

Sometimes we glorify “the old days,” but that book is now almost 40 years old. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Being Christlike is a challenge in every generation. Christians are still called to be salt and light, to “change the world” as the saying would have it, but I wonder:

Instead of changing the world, has the world changed us?

Yes, the world can be dark, but Jesus, the Light of the World, turned to his listeners and said: “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14). Perhaps Paul had the Lord’s words in-mind when he reminded the Philippians in v. 15 that “you shine as lights in the world.” And how is it that we shine? How is it that we, as followers of Jesus, stand out in the moral darkness around us? There it is in verse 16: “by holding on to the word of life…”

Let’s face it: To be blameless and pure in our day-and-age is to be counter-cultural. To do that, to really shine God’s light, a passing knowledge of the Bible won’t do. What’s more, we can’t just cherry-pick the promises of God and ignore the Bible’s tougher teachings, which include what F.F. Bruce used to call “the hard sayings of Jesus.”

Dietrick Bonhoeffer ministered as a Lutheran pastor in Germany during the Second World War. After he was involved in a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler, the Nazis eventually marched the pastor to a scaffold. They hung him naked just a few days before the Allied forces liberated the prison camp where Bonhoeffer was captive. Earlier, Bonhoeffer famously wrote:

“When Jesus calls a man, he bids him come and die.”

To be blameless and pure in any generation involves sacrifice. Paul said in v. 17 that he was being “poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service of your faith.”

That’s hardly a popular message in an age when we don’t want to know what we can do for God. We want to know what God can do for me. Nonetheless, sacrifice is a message we must hear again because it lies at the heart of our Cross-based faith.

CELEBRATE TOGETHER

Paul instructs us: Work out your salvation. Secondly, he calls us to be blameless and pure, holding on to the word of life. Finally, the apostle insists: Celebrate together.

In verse 17, Paul lightens the mood. From the somber image of sacrifice upon an altar, he pivots to celebration:

“I am glad and rejoice together with all of you,” he writes. “And in the same way you also should be glad and rejoice together with me.”

As a hospital chaplain, I quickly learned that there’s a lot of pain on the various wards. It’s the man who sits in the darkness, refusing to turn on his light as week-after-week he waits for a heart transplant. It’s the young parents tearfully processing the devastating news that their 6 month old baby boy has a terminal brain tumor. The pain goes on-and-on, and as a chaplain, I quickly learned to mostly just sit in silence with people who suffered, to “bear witness” as my chaplain mentor called it.

Yet I remember the day when sitting with someone in sadness became a lesson misapplied – good practice, wrong moment.

My mentor and I visited with a man in his early 20’s who had fought cancer for many months. On that day, however, he’d received positive news. The latest test showed that his cancer was in remission! And that’s where I went wrong. Instead of pausing in that moment and rejoicing with him, I pivoted back to the overall journey, back to the hard parts, back to the sadness. Later, my mentor corrected me in private:

“Greg, make sure to celebrate what there is to celebrate.”

Yes, wrote Paul, he was being poured out like a drink offering, yet even then, Paul says: “Rejoice with me!” He would not let the sadness consume the joy.

So I ask you: Despite the tough times, what do we have to celebrate today?

We lived to see 2026. Praise the Lord!

We have a roof over our heads and enough to live on today, to meet our needs. Celebrate!

We have people who love us and care for us, including this church family. Thank you, Jesus!

To celebrate is not to deny the reality of our hardships, but it is a joyful acknowledgment – lest we forget – of what is going well.

There’s an old saying: “I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints.” Singer Billy Joel then added: “The sinners are much more fun.”

But the apostle Paul’s having none of it. He writes: “Rejoice together with me.” In 2026, let’s rediscover the joy of our salvation.

CONCLUSION

Our sermon title today is “Lights in the World.” Are you ready to shine in the new year? To shine, let’s…

  1. Work out our salvation together;
  2. Be blameless and pure, holding on to the word of life;
  3. Celebrate together.

-Transition to Holy Communion-

Posted in sermons & addresses

On Love, Fear and Hate

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

1 John 4:7-21 (Christian Standard Bible)

This sermon was first preached at Beacon of Hope Community Church (Moon Township, PA) on October 26, 2025.

INTRODUCTION

I was a little boy, maybe 6 years old. There was a bad thunderstorm one summer night, and I cowered under the bed covers. My mother heard me call out in fear; she came to my bedside to comfort me. “Don’t think of the loud thunder,” she advised. “Think of something you love, like ice cream cones.”

The “love” part was probably more the love embodied in my Mom coming to comfort me than it was in any sugary confection. Even if my mother borrowed a scene from “The Sound of Music,” the lesson endures. To drive out fear, I had to latch on to love.

TRANSITION TO SERMON

We’ve just read a passage from 1 John, the letter that John Wesley called “the deepest part of Holy Scripture” (Works 22:13, 352). Just like my mother made love tangible when she came to my bedside to console me during a storm, so Jesus made God the Father’s love tangible when he came and lived among us.

Let’s consider three truths drawn from the deep well that is 1 John:

  1.  God is the source of all love.
  2.  A loving God sent Christ to reconcile us.
  3.  Perfect love casts out fear.

GOD IS THE SOURCE OF ALL LOVE

Sometimes pop singers hit the nail on the head. Dionne Warwick made the lyrics of Burt Bacharach and Hal David memorable:

“What the world needs now
Is love, sweet love
It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of
What the world needs now
Is love, sweet love
No, not just for some, but for everyone.”

It’s an interesting song in-part because it’s actually a prayer addressed to the “Lord.” She sings: “Lord, we don’t need another mountain.” Then later, she adds: “Lord, we don’t need another meadow.” What do we need? We need love, and by saying “Lord,” Bacharach and David quietly acknowledge that God is the source of all love.

This comes across clearly in 1 John 4:7 – “Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.” John is echoing the teaching of Jesus in Matthew 7 where he talks about false prophets. How can we know whether a prophet is genuine? Look at their fruit. If there’s good fruit, you know the tree is good. If there’s bad fruit, then the tree itself is bad.

The same principle is operating when it comes to love. Wherever we see love and its positive fruit, we can be sure that God is at-work. Rick Williamson in his commentary on 1 John insists: “Love flows from God through people, whether or not that person acknowledges God. Even atheists and agnostics are part of God’s work in the world when they act in love” (1, 2, & 3 John, New Beacon Bible Commentary [2010], 152). In theological terms, this is God’s prevenient grace, the grace of God that comes before our salvation. We don’t have to call what is good bad simply because it exists outside of a profession of Christian faith. If it’s good, it’s of God. God is the source of all love.

When Charlie Kirk was murdered, his widow, Erika, stood at her husband’s funeral and tearfully told the world about the assassin: “I forgive him.” It takes nothing away from the beauty of Mrs. Kirk’s statement for us to admit: Only God’s love could allow anyone to say that. On our own, we are powerless to love completely, yet even in the most excruciating circumstances, with time, we can tap into God’s reservoir. God is the source of all love.

[click on page number below to continue]

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Posted in book reviews

In search of a new church home

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

What do you do when the church that once felt like home now feels strangely unfamiliar? When what seemed before a loving place now is hostile, petty and narrow, do you smile and bite your tongue, or – like Abraham, led by God – do you embark on a trek to an unknown land, leaving behind all you’ve ever known?

In Search for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church (Nelson, 2015), Held Evans chronicles her own personal story of disillusionment, quitting the Evangelical church tradition of her youth and setting off through a spiritual wilderness in search of a new church home. Raised in a Bible church in Dayton, Tennessee – site of the infamous “Scopes Monkey Trial” – she presents snapshots of her upbringing, the certainty of faith instilled in her and other children through Sunday School, Bible camps, and youth groups. Only grown and married does she exit the church of her youth and begin deconstructing her faith, accompanied by her husband, Dan. While gaining an online audience as a rising faith blogger and author, creating a space where questions and doubt were welcome, her connection to any church weakened. She wryly observes:

“Having failed to locate the First Post-Evangelical Church of Our Lady of Perpetual Deconstruction, we settled into something of a church-hopping rhythm wherein we visited more liturgical churches on holy days and more familiar, evangelical churches the rest of the time…and by the rest of the time, I mean maybe once a month. We weren’t exactly regulars. It occurred to me one morning as we snuck out of yet another service to avoid yet another awkward coffee hour that somehow, after all those years on fire for God, I’d become a back-row girl. I’d become the type of person for whom I’d prayed for revival. Only now I wasn’t sure I believed in revival anymore (p. 88).”

Spoiler alert: Rachel and Dan eventually rekindle their faith and join the Episcopal Church (USA), finding what in their eyes was far from a perfect church yet a better one, rich in liturgy and inclusive of the marginalized. They had found a new church home.

Chapter 15 (“Epic Fail”) especially spoke to me. As a young pastor in the Kansas City area, every pastor stood one-by-one before the annual District Assembly and summarized how things had gone the year before. Delegates followed along in a book containing all the statistics for each local church. I viscerally recall the shame I felt that year standing before the Assembly, since we had nothing impressive to show and we’d paid only a small portion of our budget for the district and missionaries. (Note: Pastors are no longer required to give a verbal report, a less shame-based way of proceeding). With that in-mind, Held Evans’ recounting of the 2011 Epic Fail Pastors Conference resonated. I felt an odd sense of comfort as I read the stories of other pastors of varied denominations or none, who – by human standards – horribly bombed. Yet God doesn’t count success in the same way we do. God only demands faithfulness. Thanks, Rachel, for reminding me of that.

Searching for Sunday is not your book if you already have it all figured out. But if you’re questioning your faith and have soured on the church, pick it up. It may just be what the Lord uses to help you find a new beginning.

Posted in sermons & addresses

Faith for Anxious Times

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

Psalm 94:16-19

Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from the New International Version (Zondervan, 2011).

This message was preached at Freedom Pine Run Church of the Nazarene (Freedom, PA) on 10/13/24.

Click on page number at bottom to advance to next page.

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INTRODUCTION

We live in fearful times. In less than a month, we’ll have an election that everyone agrees will be historic, no matter the outcome. Overseas, new wars are waging and we wonder how long before the fire spreads. Hurricanes and floods lay waste to places considered safe from such disasters. It can all seem so overwhelming; we just want to turn our head toward heaven and say: “Maranatha – come, Lord Jesus.” While we work, awaiting his return, in the middle of so much fear, how can we practice spiritual resiliency? How do we cultivate a faith for anxious times?

TRANSITION TO PSALM 94: VENGEANCE BELONGS TO GOD

Psalm 94 can help us. The psalmist certainly lived in anxious times of his own. In fact, the overall tone of the psalm is dark. It begins with a prayer for vengeance: “The LORD is a God who avenges. O God who avenges, shine forth” (v. 1).

Here we learn something about God’s character. God doesn’t wink at evil; the LORD is not morally neutral. In fact, beginning in v. 4, the psalmist paints a contrast between God and evildoers. Unlike our loving God, the wicked are arrogant, boastful, and oppressive. Rather than lifting up those who are most vulnerable, they target them with special cruelty. Who are these vulnerable individuals? Look at v.5 – it’s the widow, the foreigner, the fatherless. When shamed, it’s almost as if evildoers reply: “So what? Who cares?” In verse 7 they insist: “The LORD does not see; the God of Jacob takes no notice.” But I ask you: Is God really an ally of those who abuse others? The answer is obvious: Not at all. On the other hand, the Psalmist calls out sinister rulers. These are powerful people, but they wield their power for unjust and selfish ends. Verse 20 asks the LORD: “Can a corrupt throne be allied with you – a throne that brings on misery by its decrees?” The answer is apparent: Not at all.

In the face of such evil, there are a couple courses of action possible. First, it’s important to notice what the psalmist does NOT do. He does not himself presume to play the role of avenger. That role belongs to God alone. In Romans 12:9 we read: “Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: ‘It is mine to avenge; I will repay, says the LORD.”

Yet it’s interesting to me that Paul is quoting Deuteronomy 32:35 when he could have quoted Jesus. In fact, Jesus takes it one step further than Paul when he calls us not only to avoid avenging ourselves on others, but to pray for them. Our Lord Christ teaches in Matthew 5:43-45:

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” 

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Posted in sermons & addresses

Act justly, love mercy, walk humbly

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

This sermon was preached at Beacon of Hope Community Church (Moon Township, PA) on 8/25/24.

Coconut tree heart rot disease

All Scripture quotations are from the New International Version (Zondervan, 2011).

Read Micah 6:1-8

Prayer

INTRODUCTION

They call it “heart rot disease,” and one type is “brown rot.” You can look at a tree that appears to be perfectly healthy, yet inside, damage from fungus has already begun. The hemicellulose and cellulose begin to break down. The wood becomes dark brown and brittle, then when it dries, it makes the tree far less flexible. A strong wind can easily topple a tree suffering from brown rot. Indeed, the silent tree killer is rotting from the inside out. (Source: https://aaatrees.net)

TRANSITION TO MICAH: NATIONAL “BROWN ROT”

In the book of Micah, the fig tree is presented as a sign of prosperity and well-being. In Micah 4:4, the prophet envisions a time when “everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the LORD Almighty has spoken.” Yet that is a vision of the distant future; in the present, the prophet instead sees nations that—like a tree with brown rot – are rotting from the inside out. Again and again, the prophet speaks of moral decay that manifests itself numerous ways. What are some of the evil actions that the leaders of both Samaria and Jerusalem are trafficking in?

SINS OF THE LEADERS

 The first sin was idolatry. Micah 1:7 says that the LORD will break to pieces all her idols. Idolatry was a perennial problem for God’s people and had been from the start. God knew that when his people came into the promised land, they would discover those who worshipped other gods. Micah 5:14 mentions Asherah poles. Asherah was a Canaanite goddess often worshipped alongside Baal. It’s no accident that the first two commandments of the Decalogue – the “10 words” or commandments that God gave to Moses on Mt. Sinai – focus on gods (small “g”) and how they have no place in the worship of the people of God (capital “G”). “You shall have no gods other than me,” the LORD commanded, and “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them” (see Exodus 20:4).

A second sin is fraud. Micah 2:2 talks of those who confiscate property that doesn’t belong to them. Not just in Micah’s time but in our own, what makes for generational wealth is land and houses. To take these away without cause is to rob not only the present generation, but all generations to come. The tenth commandment forbids the people of God from coveting what doesn’t belong to us, yet they had forgotten the LORD’s directive.

A third sin – and you could add more to the list – is profiting off one’s position, corruption. Micah 3:9-12 warns: “Hear this, you leaders of Jacob, you rulers of Israel, who despise justice and all that is right; who build Zion with bloodshed, and Jerusalem with wickedness. Her leaders judge for a bribe, her priests teach for a price, and her prophets tell fortunes for money. Yet they look for the LORD’s support and say, ‘Is not the LORD among us? No disaster will come upon us.’ Therefore because of you, Zion will be plowed like a field, Jerusalem will become a heap of rubble, the temple hill a mound overgrown with thickets.”

Micah realized that the moral decay was far advanced. If these and other sins had weakened both the northern Kingdom (as represented by Samaria) and the southern Kingdom (as represented by Jerusalem), was there any hope? What solution does Micah propose to solve the problem?

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Posted in sermons & addresses

Two things: Agur’s plea (Proverbs 30:7-9)

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

INTRODUCTION

What is most important? It’s a great question. We all have to decide what we value most in life, what is the “pearl of great price,” to use the words of Jesus, the things that count the most, that really matter.

That’s the frame of mind that Agur is in, when we read Proverbs 30. His name means “gathered,” and he the son of Jakeh meaning “pious.” In his life, we can imagine that Agur gathered a lot of things, but what things are the most important? “Before I die,” he prays, “LORD, grant me just two things.” First, let me forsake fraud and lying, and secondly, give me what I need, my “daily bread.” Let’s look at Agur’s “two things.”

I. FRAUD AND LYING

In Proverbs 30:8, Agur prays: “Keep falsehood and lies far from me.” The King James translates “falsehood” as “vanity.” It stems from the Hebrew word shaw, which indicates anything that is morally worthless. The Common English Bible uses the word “fraud” – “Fraud and lies – keep far from me!” The Hebrew word for “lies” is kazab. It refers to deception and the act of lying. Underlying this moral teaching is the understanding that God does not lie. Numbers 23:19 reminds us, through the prophecy of Balaam: “God is not human, that he should lie.” The basis of holiness is that we are to emulate God; God is our pattern, so if God does not lie, then how can we?

This carries over to the New Testament. Acts 2:44 says that “all the believers were together, and had everything in common.” The early Christians at Jerusalem lived off the proceeds of land that they sold individually, donating the proceeds to the group.  One example appears in Acts 4:36-37, where it’s noted: “Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas (which means ‘son of encouragement’) sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles’ feet.”  Acts 5 tells the fearful story of Ananias and Sapphira. They sold a piece of property, but held back part of the money for themselves. When Ananias brought only part of the money to lay at the apostles’ feet, Peter immediately confronts him. “You’ve lied to the Holy Spirit.” He then revealed what Ananias had done, and concludes in verse 4: “You have not just lied to human beings but to God.” When he heard this, Ananias fell down and died. Three hours later, his wife, Sapphira came in, unaware of what had happened to her husband. Peter asked her: “Is this the price you received for the land?” When she replied “yes,” Peter said: “Listen! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also” (Acts 5:10). Saphirra falls over dead, and they buried her next to her husband. The story concludes with these words in verse 11: “Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events.”

I don’t think any of us sets out to become what the late psychiatrist M. Scott Peck called “the people of the lie.” I do think, however, we can get into some lazy habits, and sometimes unwittingly model to our children what is less than truthful. For example, your granddaughter picks up your cell phone when it rings and says “hello?” It’s a friend of yours, she says, and you reply: “Tell her I’m not home.” There may be other times when telling the truth might seem embarrassing, but is that a reason to lie?

When I was in my early teens, “Sue” and her husband, “Jeff” watched me and my brothers for several days while my parents were away at an annual conference for my father’s work. Sue had laid her purse and a few things down on the desk in our living room, and nosy boy that I was, I saw a what looked like a square plastic holder containing little pills lined up in a row. I’ve never seen anything like it, and was curious. “Mrs. so-and-so” I asked, holding up the birth control pills, “what are these”? She could have made up any kind of story at that point and I wouldn’t have known any better, but to her credit, she answered truthfully, at a level I could understand. “Greg,” she said, “those pills prevent me from having a baby until Jeff and I are ready.” I put the pills down, satisfied with her answer, and having learned something new about human biology. I went back to playing with my little brothers. In retrospect, I’ve always appreciated that Sue answered honestly, and she modeled for me how we can be honest with our children in ways that are age appropriate.

In Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, he urges: “Above all, don’t lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love.”

We live in a day and age when honesty in is short supply. Especially during an election season, all kinds of claims are made about one’s opponents. Some are true, but many are plain false, or at least have been taken out-of-context. Other times, we may see a claim come across Facebook or other social media, saying that we as Christians should be angry because in some way our rights are being infringed. An example of a false claim is that Mark Zuckerberg is going to ban the Lord’s Prayer from Facebook, so Christian, it’s your duty to post up the Lord’s Prayer! It took just 15 seconds to Google the claim, and an article from Reuters, dated January 17, 2022, debunks the rumor. Meanwhile, it has been shared more than 500,000 on Facebook! Worse, it’s a resurgence of a rumor from 2020, when it was also debunked. What does this to our witness as Christians? It certainly leaves the impression that we’re uninformed, or paranoid, or at very least, too lazy to fact check before we bear false witness. Mark Twain once said: “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.” He’s in good company. Agur prayed: “Before I die, do not refuse me two things. First, keep falsehood and lies far from me.”  

II. GIVE ME ONLY MY DAILY BREAD

Besides keeping him far away from fraud and lying, Agur asks the LORD for a second thing, in Proverbs 30:8 – “Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the LORD?’ or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God.”

I like how the Common English Bible puts it: “Give me just the food I need.” It’s a reminder to the Jewish people of how God provided manna for them on a daily basis in the wilderness. They were instructed to gather only as much as they needed, and not to stock pile it. In Exodus 16:20, some disobeyed Moses’s clear directions, and kept some overnight. In the morning, it was full of maggots and started to smell. Only on Friday were they to gather enough for Friday and Saturday, since Saturday was the Sabbath and God provided no manna on that day.

When we come over to the New Testament, Jesus affirms the daily bread principle when he teaches his disciples to pray: “Give us this day our daily bread.” He seems to be quoting the words from Agur in Proverbs 30. It’s a reminder that we are to come to the Lord on a daily basis, to bring him our needs, physical and spiritual.

Agur is aware that danger always lies in the extremes. Get your eyes on prosperity and the blessings it brings, and soon money becomes your master. It becomes an end in itself and not a tool for providing for your own necessities, then seeing who else is in need. Your 43” TV works just fine, and has for a long time, but everyone at work is talking about their 70-inch TV, and you feel left out. I’ve learned that 2-word response to every sales pitch: “I’m good.” But if the prosperity Gospel – the teaching that following Jesus means you’ll become wealthy – is false, its opposite, the poverty Gospel, is equally wrong. God is not glorified by children who go to sleep at night on an empty stomach. A worker and his family are not ennobled by keeping them at poverty wages, maintaining a minimum wage that cannot pay for rising rent and food costs. Agur fears that if he is too poor, he will be tempted to steal. In short, we need not too much, nor too little, but the right amount to live with dignity and to commend the Gospel.

As holiness people, I believe we have something to offer in this area. When we come to Jesus and begin to live like him, some old habits will fall away. Some of those habits cost money. It’s not cheap to smoke, and lottery tickets aren’t free. If we begin to live cleanly, as the Holy Spirit gently guides us, we may be like Helen, who I pastored in Missouri years ago. When she came to the Lord, I didn’t need to tell her to quit smoking. She decided to do it on her own. “Pastor,” she said, “I’m going to save the quarters I would have spent on cigarettes and keep them in my change purse.” I later heard how proud she was when the day came that she’s saved enough to take a trip she’d always wanted to take, but she’d never had the money before. Now she did.

When you say the word “thrift,” it almost has a musty, old-fashioned smell to it, yet thrift if a word right at home with Agur’s proverb. John Wesley, the co-founder with his brother, Charles, of Methodism, opposed extravagance. Toward the end of his life, he noticed a strange phenomenon. As the decades passed, Methodists were moving up the social ladder. When they started to live in ways that pleased God, they began to prosper. John Wesley was concerned that they would begin to depend – like the rich man in Agur’s proverb – upon their wealth, and forget God. And so Wesley wrote a three-point sermon: 1) Earn all you can; 2) save all you can; 3) give away all you can. His advice at the close of the 18th century is still valuable today.

CONCLUSION

Agur was thinking about what was most important in this life. He desired just two things. “Before I die,” he said, “keep me away from fraud and falsehood. Secondly, he asked the LORD to provide not too much, nor too little, but just the amount that he could live in dignity, commending the Gospel to others, honoring God’s name through his actions. May the Lord grant that our prayer is like that of Agur’s, and may the LORD help us to live it out.

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All Scripture quotations are from the New International Version of the Holy Bible (Zondervan, 2017).

Image credits

bread – CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

“lies” – Sotos, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Posted in ecclesiology & sacraments, Nazarenedom

Nazarenes and speaking in tongues

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

Is the Church of the Nazarene a Pentecostal denomination? If not, should she be?

These are not hypothetical questions. On the floor of the June 2023 Nazarene General Assembly, there was a clear division of opinion. Delegates came close to amending a Manual statement in such a way that many believed would have significantly changed our longstanding doctrine at this point. (See the extended discussion of then Manual paragraph 925, as posted to YouTube at this link, where some delegates promoted a Pentecostal understanding of speaking in tongues). If the proposed changes had been finally adopted, the Church of the Nazarene, historically and intentionally non-Pentecostal, would arguably have introduced Pentecostal doctrine into its Manual. Thankfully, that outcome was narrowly avoided.

In the YouTube video, a pastor makes passing mention of 4 families who had recently started attending his church. Why? They left their former church because of the Pentecostal understanding of tongues that was being taught. (See video, beginning at 2:04). This corresponds with my experience as a missionary in West Africa, where one of our key early leaders had grown up in a Pentecostal church, but left.

Why did he choose to become Nazarene?

He had long sought “the gift” of speaking in unknown tongues, sometimes called “glossolalia,” because he had been instructed that speaking in tongues was the evidence of being baptized by the Holy Spirit. Because he never received this baptism, he couldn’t be enrolled in that denomination’s Bible college, even though he clearly sensed God’s call to pastoral ministry. Later, while sojourning in a neighboring country, he happened upon a Nazarene congregation. In conversation with the pastor after the Sunday morning worship service, he was thrilled to learn that – while we emphasize the work of the Holy Spirit – we have a different understanding of the gift of tongues (languages). Praying over the issue, he happily found a church home with us, and over time has become an effective leader of pastors. These stories show that our historic understanding of the nature of the gift of tongues as taught in Scripture can be attractive, particularly to those who have known only a Pentecostal interpretation.

We celebrate those around the world who have come to Christ through the ministry of Pentecostal churches; after all, we hardly believe that we alone as Nazarenes are being used by God to spread the Gospel! To think as much would be sectarian and contrary to Paul’s teaching about the Body of Christ in 1 Corinthians 12. However, we are purposely not a Pentecostal denomination, and some in our ranks are glad to have found a church with a different understanding of the gift of tongues.

What is that understanding?

Note: The explanation below is reproduced from p. 51 of the course, “Christian Theology 2,” which is part of the ITN-NTI curriculum for many African pastors studying for ordination in the Church of the Nazarene. The full course can be downloaded free-of-charge at this link, hosted by the Wesleyan-Holiness Digital Library (WHDL).

In Greek, the word translated as “tongue” is glossa. It is the word that appears throughout Paul’s comparison of prophecy and tongues in 1 Cor. 12-14. Importantly, the same root word appears in Acts 2:4: “All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues (or languages – Gk. glossais) as the Spirit enabled them.” It is clear from the Acts 2 account that the glossais in question were not “heavenly languages” (or so-called “prayer languages”) but earthly languages spoken by groups of people. In amazement, they ran to see what was going on, and exclaimed: “How is it that each of us hears them in his own native language?” (Acts 2:8). Were the disciples speaking these languages they had never studied or learned, or was this a miracle of listening, the Holy Spirit interpreting simultaneously so that these unbelievers could understand the gospel message? Both positions have been advanced. In any case, it was a “miracle of communication” (W.T. Purkiser, The Gifts of the Spirit, 55) allowing evangelism to happen when it otherwise would not.

The same phenomenon appears to have happened on two other occasions in Acts: First, at the house of Cornelius (Acts 10:44) and later in Ephesus (Acts 19:1-7). In both instances, large, multi-cultural groups were present who benefited by hearing the Gospel proclaimed in their heart language through the gift of languages.

The lessons of Acts should not be forgotten when we come to 1 Cor. 12-14. Some have suggested that pagan, non-sensical babble may have been imported into the church in Corinth, perhaps from one of the temples to the various Greek gods or goddesses or even local mystery religions. However, if this was true, it is hard to see why Paul would have allowed it at all, though Purkiser suggests that Paul may have been keen to separate what was “genuine” from what were “human imitations” (Gifts of the Spirit, 62).  These “imitations” may be indicated by the use in 1 Cor. 14 of the term pneumatika (spiritual phenomena) instead of charismata (Ibid., 59). Since the Greek root word (glossa) is identical with what appears in Acts, it is possible that even in Corinth they were dealing with foreign languages, especially since Corinth was an important seaport that welcomed sailors and merchants from around the world. Such worshipers should not be forbidden from speaking, but in every case, their messages should be interpreted into a common language so that all can benefit (1 Cor. 14:26). On the other hand, when Paul says that tongues are a sign for unbelievers (14:22), he would seem to have the miraculous phenomenon of the Day of Pentecost in mind, a miracle of communication in genuine earthly languages.

Some who today practice speaking in tongues (or glossolalia, a compound word never appearing in the Greek New Testament) say they are speaking the “language of angels”(1 Cor. 13:1). Yet a fair reading of 1 Corinthians 13 does not support such a conclusion. Paul – good Pharisee that he was – is crafting a hypothetical argument, as indicated by the word “if” (v.1). Even if he could speak languages both human and angelic, if he neglected love, he would be nothing more than “a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.” In any case, Paul is not promoting a private “prayer language” or encouraging us to speak the language of angels, whatever that might be.

There is a genuine gift of languages, and the New Testament model for this gift is most clearly seen in Acts 2. Tongues are given by God at key times to further the advance of the gospel by miraculously allowing clear communication despite language barriers.

Where do we go from here?

At the close of the debate at General Assembly, it was voted to retain the Manual paragraph under question, with only slight modifications that do not change the denomination’s position on tongues. (See Manual 926, “Evidence of Baptism of the Holy Spirit”; click here to access the 2023 Manual). As one who was instrumental in teaching that historic, non-Pentecostal position to Nazarene pastors in Africa, and knowing that it is still being taught as such through widely-used ministerial curriculum, the recent episode at General Assembly raises questions, such as:

1) What confusion might have been sown if the amendment to adopt the Pentecostal position had passed?

2) How would a contradiction between a revised Manual and long-taught positions as represented above by the “Christian Theology 2″ course be received by pastors and laypeople in the local church setting?” At a meeting of the African Region when I was serving as an educational missionary, a visiting General Superintendent spoke about the Board of General Superintendent’s concern for “theological coherence” in the denomination. Is this not one important example?

3) Is it time to craft an Article of Faith that addresses our broader understanding of spiritual gifts? It does give pause to think that a single General Assembly by a vote to amend a paragraph tucked away in the Manual Appendix could have changed our trajectory on an important issue. Articles of Faith are more difficult to change, and for a reason. They speak to our theological DNA. Certainly our understanding of spiritual gifts rises to that level?

4) Do we still educate Nazarenes, longtime and new, about our view of spiritual gifts? What recent resources have been developed to assist Nazarene pastors in this vital task?

Conclusion

We live in challenging times. Pray for our Nazarene leaders as they address this crucial issue of theological coherence, a key element of our unity.

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Image credit

Flame: Patrick Hendry, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Posted in Bible

Experience and the Bible

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

For Christians, experience has always been important. As a boy, I sang the hymn “He Lives” on many Sundays, but especially on Easter. One line concludes:

“You ask me how I know he lives? He lives within my heart.”

Experience is one factor that helps the church confirm calling. My first application for a District Minister’s License included questions about my religious experience, questions like:

When were you saved? When were you sanctified wholly? Why do you think God has called you to preach?

Recounting our life-changing experience with the Lord also encourages others, inviting them to participate in the things of God. In church jargon, these are called testimonies, and there’s biblical precedent for them. When Jesus cast demons out of the demoniac in the Gerasenes (Luke 8:26-39), the man was restored to health. The Lord commanded him:

“Go back to your family, and tell them everything God has done for you” (v. 39, NLT).

In the same way, the woman at the well in Samaria was so impressed by the words of Jesus to her, she went back to the village of Sychar and proclaimed: “Come and see a man who told me everything I every did! Could he possibly be the Messiah?” (John 4:29, NLT).

Experience confirms doctrine and practice. It can help establish the validity of divine calling, and it winsomely points other to Christ.

Experience informs our thinking

Let’s focus for the rest of this essay on the first point, that experience confirms doctrine and practice. John Wesley (1703-91) understood the role of experience as related to our faith and how we live it out. In the 1760s, some Methodists were testifying to having experienced entire sanctification (see 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24). He carefully interviewed many men and women about what had happened to them. Wesley knew that if the Methodists had interpreted Scripture correctly regarding the nature of sanctification, then they should expect validation of their viewpoint through on-the-ground testimonies. In the end, he was re-assured that the doctrine of Christian perfection as taught by himself, his brother, Charles, and the other Methodist preachers was indeed valid. It was confirmed through lived experience.

Whatever the Methodist understanding of Scripture arrived at through Bible study, Wesley knew that interpretations were always open to review. Interpretations are fallible because the Bible is always interpreted by human beings, with all their foibles and propensities toward error. If an interpretation is correct, then we can expect it to be confirmed “where the rubber hits the road.” The implication is simple: When there is a disconnect between a given understanding of the Bible and what Christians experience when applying it, then we must go back to the drawing board and – like a mathematician – check our work.

A musical illustration may help. There’s an old Sunday School chorus I learned to sing as a child. The lyrics say:

“I’m inright, outright, upright, downright happy all the time. Since Jesus Christ came in, and cleansed my heart from sin, I’m inright, outright, upright, downright happy all the time.”

For my young mind, the lesson was: “If I am saved and sanctified, then I’ll always be happy. Likewise, if I’m not always happy, then I can question whether I’ve really been saved and sanctified.”

My older self realizes that these lyrics — though sung by Sunday School children over decades – are nonetheless false. Christians may be saved and sanctified, but we are also human, with all the ups-and-downs that a full range of emotions bring. How did I come to this conclusion? It was because I found that far from being happy all the time, I sometimes was sad. My experience didn’t validate the theology of that children’s chorus. So, I went back to the drawing board, and checked my work. That’s when I realized that – however catchy the tune – that song’s lyrics were just plain wrong.

It’s important to note that experience isn’t just individual; groups also experience things. On the Day of Pentecost, the 120 who had gathered in the upper room experienced the Holy Spirit together. In our Western, individualistic outlook, we too often overlook this truth.

Let’s apply to a contemporary question the Wesleyan principal that experience validates (or calls into question) given interpretations of Scripture. Many churches believe that the role of pastor is reserved for males only. To make their point, they cite 1 Corinthians 14:34 – “Women must remain silent in the church.” Also highlighted is 1 Timothy 2:12, which seems to categorically forbid women to have authority over men. The question is:

Does the church’s experience validate this interpretation or call it into question?

John Wesley did not allow women to preach, until his mother, Susanna, insisted he come and listen to a woman who was leading a Methodist Society meeting in London. He couldn’t deny that the female leader was anointed by the Holy Spirit when she expounded the Scripture. He could have refused to even go with his mother to the meeting, considering the question of male only preaching a long-settled issue. Or having gone, he could have chosen to double down on his previous understanding of Scripture, telling the brave woman to sit down. For Wesley, this would have been to view what was happening in that Methodist meeting through the lens of his existing biblical interpretation. Instead, he went and listened with an open mind and heart. He let the new light he received inform his thinking. He did not jettison the Bible, but he adjusted his former interpretation to accommodate his new observation. The Church of the Nazarene follows in this understanding, believing that both men and women are called by God to preach, and can serve in any leadership capacity in the church.

John Wesley allowing experience to inform his doctrine was nothing new; he was following a well-worn New Testament path. For Peter, the question of clean and unclean animals was settled doctrine, having been addressed in the Old Testament purity laws. By extension, he understood that the children of Israel were the sole objects of God’s saving concern, the “clean” vs. the Gentiles, who were “unclean.” God was about to shake him up. On a rooftop in Joppa (Acts 10), Peter fell into a trance and had a vision. A sheet was let down from heaven, filled with all kinds of unclean animals, including reptiles and birds. Then, a voice commanded him: “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat them” (v. 13). Peter objected that he could not eat anything that Jewish law had declared unclean. The command came three times, then the sheet went back up to heaven.

The rest of the chapter recounts the arrival of messengers from Cornelius, a God-fearing centurion, a Gentile, and therefore (in Peter’s thinking) “unclean”. The Holy Spirit commands Peter to go with them to Cornelius, where Peter preaches the gospel and the Holy Spirit falls upon them, as evidenced by them speaking in languages they had never learned (vv. 44-46). Peter is astounded, and accepts Cornelius and his household as fellow Christians. Later, in Acts 15, he tells the story again, explaining how the experience of the Holy Spirit falling on Cornelius and his household had forced him to rethink what he thought he knew about Jews, Gentiles, and salvation.

Put yourself in the place of the elders in Jerusalem. Surely, Peter’s words must have seemed strange to them at first. After all, the understanding that salvation is limited to the Jews was a centuries-old interpretation of the Old Testament on the matter, yet they listened. They were willing to discuss together respectfully, allowing God to use the experience of Cornelius’ conversion to reshape their thinking. As for me, I’m glad Peter’s argument carried the day, or we would not as Gentiles be included in the church!

Coming into the 19th century, the principle of experience forcing a re-think of cherished biblical interpretations shows up again around the issue of slavery. Slave-owners in the United States viewed slaves as property, as sub-human. They could quote plenty of Bible passages that seemed to confirm that God held nothing against owning slaves. It was interaction with slaves and their undeniable humanity that led abolitionists to take up the cause of liberation: “Chains shall He break, for the slave is my brother, and in His name all oppression shall cease” (“O Holy Night,” 1855). Experience forced them to go back to the Bible and look again at longstanding, historic interpretations that had caused so much pain. They found better interpretations more in-line with love, a central tenet of the Christian faith.

Conclusion

I’m glad that the Church of the Nazarene historically has left a large place for experience in how we understand our faith and practice. I wonder: What other issues are we facing in the 21st century that need further study of Scripture, in-light of our individual and group experience? Will our fear prevent us from praying, studying, and talking together? Will anxiety lead us to sanction prophets among us who call us to this hard but holy work? May God grant us the grace and courage to re-evaluate interpretations of the Bible that – though longstanding – can cause harm, setting up stumbling blocks for those who otherwise might follow Christ.

Posted in Bible, Christian ethics

Honey, I shrunk the Bible

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

It was one of the more memorable fun flicks from the ’80s. Wayne Szalinski (played by Rick Moranis) was the mad scientist working on an incredible shrinking ray. Sadly, he only managed to blow things up, until the day his invention worked, accidentally shrinking two of his own children and two of the neighbor’s. The rest of “Honey, I shrunk the kids” revolves around the hapless teens’ attempts to avoid dangers lurking in the lawn while their parents search frantically for their diminutive offspring.

Herein lies a cautionary tale: We can shrink things unintentionally that were never intended to be shrunk. 

Take the Bible, for instance. Sometimes I wonder whether we’ve reduced both its size and its function.

Continue reading “Honey, I shrunk the Bible” →

Posted in Bible, reflections

Scripture: Our Rule of Faith and Practice

Posted on by Gregory Crofford

Philosopher Blaise Pascal once said that “man is only a reed, but at least he is a thinking reed.” Likewise, on the great tree of Christianity, the Church of the Nazarene is only a leaf, but we are a colorful leaf. Our emphasis upon holiness of heart and life, evidence of God’s transforming grace radically at work in us, helps us bring color to the branches of the Christian tree.

Sometimes as Nazarenes we get caught up on what makes us different from other Christians, on being the colorful leaf. We can forget that leaves are part of trees. The Church of the Nazarene shares much in common with Christians of other traditions, particularly those that bear the name “Protestant.” One common element is the emphasis we put upon the Bible as the benchmark for what we  believe, how we “do church,” how we hear the Spirit’s voice and how we decide questions of ethics and morality. In theology talk, we accept the Bible as our “rule of faith and practice.” [See discussion in Randy Maddox, “The Rule of Christian Faith, Practice, and Hope,” in Richard P. Thompson and Thomas J. Oord, eds., The Bible Tells Me So: Reading the Bible as Scripture, Kindle edition (Nampa, Idaho: SacraSage Press, 2011),  location 2098].

Continue reading “Scripture: Our Rule of Faith and Practice” →