Family Crosses

This last Sunday was Easter day. At the church which my son and his family attend, the families participated in a wonderful ceremony. The parents and their children built small crosses and wrapped them in burlap. Nails were placed in the cross at the points where the hands and feet of Jesus were positioned. The parents read a text explaining the meaning of the cross and the nails and said a family prayer.

Then the parents explained the Resurrection and the children and parents placed flowers and plant branches into the burlap to represent the beauty of life. The parents explained to the children that Jesus was really dead and then rose, defeating death forever.

Afterwards, the families carried the crosses home. There were as many different crosses as there were families. The crosses were all different. The crosses were all the same. The crosses were all beautiful. Just like us.

Two Fathers

Today is Father’s Day.  The holiday is observed in at least fifty countries on the third Sunday of the month of June. The day celebrates fathers and their influences on the lives of their children.

A wonderful song for Father’s Day is Beautiful Boy by John Lennon. Every father should hear it.

One of the most important biblical stories about a father is that of Abraham and Isaac.  Abraham had already had to send away his first-born son, Ishmael, the son of his wife’s servant/slave girl. Surely he had loved this son.  Now, God was asking Abraham to sacrifice his adored young son, born to Abraham’s long-barren wife.

I believe that this story tells us about two fathers: Abraham and God.

Genesis 22:1-19

22 And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham: and he said, Behold, here I am.

2 And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.

3 And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and clave the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up, and went unto the place of which God had told him.

4 Then on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off.

5 And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass; and I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you.

6 And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife; and they went both of them together.

7 And Isaac spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father: and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?

8 And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering: so they went both of them together.

9 And they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood.

10 And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son.

11 And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I.

12 And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me.

13 And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son.

14 And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovahjireh: as it is said to this day, In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen.

15 And the angel of the Lord called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time,

16 And said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, for because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son:

17 That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies;

18 And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice.

19 So Abraham returned unto his young men, and they rose up and went together to Beersheba; and Abraham dwelt at Beersheba.

The traditional understanding of this passage is that God was testing the faith of Abraham. Obviously, the omniscient omnipotent Creator knew the answer before He gave the test. I believe that there is much more there: God was also teaching Abraham at least three things:

1.          This is what I expect. You should put nothing ahead of Me.

2.          This is how much you love Me, that you would have done this thing if I had not stopped you.

3.     I will provide/have provided the only sacrifice necessary for you to be acceptable in My sight; the Blood of Jesus, the Lamb of God.

I Don't Want to Go Today

"It's time to go to church,' a mother told her son, "You know today is Sunday."


"I don't want to go," he replied.  "I don't have any friends there. The music is awful. And the sermons are boring!"


"But you have to go," the mother insisted.  "You're the pastor!"


“From The Big Book of Church Jokes, published by Barbour Publishing, Inc. Used by permission.”

The First Religious Broadcast on Radio

0n 22 January 1921 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (USA), Radio station KDKA broadcasted the regular Sunday morning worship service of the Calvary Episcopal Church .  Today, Christian broadcasting remains on radio worldwide.  About 1949, some radio evangelists began to move into the new medium of television.

Zoei Toh Religious Affilation

In response to a question by one of this blog's readers; Zoei Toh is a Seventh-day Adventist. (On the link, see the sixth bullet point.)

The largest Adventist group is the Seventh-day Adventist Church of which Zoei Toh is a member.  "Seventh-day" refers to their practice of meeting on Saturday, the Sabbath, rather than on Sunday. The Adventists are normally considered to be conservative Protestants who hold to some doctrines differing from those of other Protestants.  Two of their differing doctrines are: souls sleep after death until the Resurrection rather than immediately entering Paradise; the ultimate punishment for the wicked is annihilation rather than eternal torment.

Adventist denominations include the Seventh-day Adventist Church,  the Christadelphians, the Advent Christian Church, the Primitive Advent Christian Church, the Davidian Seventh-day Adventist Association,  the Branch Davidians, the Church of God (Seventh Day), the Church of God and Saints in Christ, the Church of God General Conference, the United Seventh-Day Brethren,  the Worldwide Church of God, the United Church of God, the True and Free Adventists, United Sabbath-Day Adventist Church, the Adventist Church of Promise, the Creation Seventh Day Adventist Church, the general Conference of the Church of God (Seventh Day), the Seventh Day Adventist reform Movement, the Church of the Great God, the Intercontinental Church of God, the Living Church of God, the Philadelphia Church of God, the True Jesus Church, the United Church of God, the United Seventh-day Brethren, the Advent Christian Church, the Church of God General Conference (Abrahamic Faith), the Church of the Blessed Hope, and Celestia.  The groups are not totally uniform in their theology, differing among themselves on certain points.

Immortality

"Millions long for immortality who do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon."

Susan Ertz (1894 -1985) British fiction writer.