Month: March 2021

Pacesetter

On By Bp. Justin ElwellIn InspirationLeave a comment

Cross-country was not my sport of choice. Just days before the start of my junior high career, a friend and I showed up for tryouts to join the team. Neither of us were runners, so we expected to be quickly sent packing.

We made the team. Well, cross-country is one of those sports in most schools where, if you show up with a functioning heart, you’re in.

Running became a passion. Largely due to the influence of the senior team members, the older kids, the high school guys. One in particular made a lasting impression.

Coach would use him, and others, to take groups of us out for long training runs around town – two of those loops took me past the Messiah Congregation building.

On these runs, Dave – not his actual name – who was a natural athlete, would set the pace for us. Explaining, based on specific body type and experience, how to approach the terrain, and adjust our pace and posture.

He would effortlessly go out ahead of us, causing us to pursue, let us pass, get well ahead of him, only to catch us, and ease in at that quicker pace to help us breathe, maintain, endure, and ultimately finish the race.

He was our pacesetter.

The author of Hebrews writes, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us” (Heb. 12:1).

This “cloud of witnesses” has been greatly misunderstood; often imagined as people sitting in the gallery watching a play. This is not the case at all, as Hebrews 11 confirms, they were people pursuing God in faith, running the race. They are not on the course now, but they know it well, and have pointed the way.

They are pacesetters in faith. Those who came before us, as examples of how to run the race set before us. Not perfect in themselves, or their lives, they looked for the finish line, that city built by the Lord. They had their struggles, faults, missteps and stumbles, but they kept the Lord always before them.

This cloud of witnesses are not only historic, a relic of antiquity; we have pacesetters with us even now. Those who have been running in faith a little longer, have had more time in the texts, prayer, and worship. They have made it over more hills and through more valleys.

They are there, around us, helping us to see what is ahead, helping us to adjust our stride, our breath, and our posture. They are not perfect, but they are in the race, helping us all to mature in Messiah (Eph. 4:12-14).

Remember, the coach, the Holy Spirit, may send them out on the run to help us learn the subtleties of faith to endure to the end. They are not there as a rebuke, but as brethren training for and running the race.

Be well. Shalom.

Chiseling Stones

On By Bp. Justin ElwellIn InspirationLeave a comment

Labor can be tedious. Trying to find meaning in mundane, repetitive tasks, exhausting. Walking in the Spirit while in the workforce, or tending to the home front, tiresome.

Paul, recognizing the challenge of finding the Spirit in the midst of the worldly, wrote, “And whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men” (Col. 3:23).

I often meditate on the construction of the second Holy Temple. The enormity of the project. The years of constriction. Then the response to seeing the foundation of the second Temple by those who had seen the first? They wept; because it did not measure up (Ezra 3:12).

Imagine if your only task was to chisel stones. Day after day: hammer to chisel. Not tasked with the finishing work, you labor in the dust and heat. Yet, your labor apparently pales in comparison to what had come before. Devastating.

Still, the Lord said, “The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former,’ says the LORD of hosts. ‘And in this place I will give peace,’ says the LORD of hosts” (Hag. 2:9).

How could the glory of the second surpass that of the first?

It would be personally visited by the Lord Himself, not in presence, but in person (Mal. 3:1).

The stones mindlessly chiseled. The dust filling the air. The scorching heat. It all served a purpose, more grand than could be imagined: Emmanuel walking on those very stones.

Today, as Paul tells us, we are a habitation of God personally visited, and in dwelt by His Son (I Cor. 3:16), chiseled by the Holy Spirit. Yet, the labor isn’t to building up and out, but to be present as Yeshua reaches through us to the next living stone to be chiseled out of this world for His advancing Kingdom.

When you recognize how He has reformed you into a living stone, a living presence in His dwelling, those hours with the chisel seem to fade away as one more appears before Him, and is ushered into His Kingdom.

Be well. Shalom.

Passover Meditation #2

On By Bp. Justin ElwellIn InspirationLeave a comment

In the hours of a Passover Seder, the subtly of its message can get lost in the ache of sitting, mental boredom, or translation itself.

Yet, during the Passover Seder you will note a series of fours: children, questions, cups, and stages of redemption. Why?

While all of these elements are intertwined as one story, one lesson stands out, that of redemption. In the Hebrew text of Exodus 6:6-7, a prominent Passover text, we find four verbs to describe redemption. As we read:

“Therefore say to the children of Israel: ‘I am the Lord; I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, I will rescue you from their bondage, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. I will take you as My people, and I will be your God. Then you shall know that I am the Lord your God who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.”

He will, 1) “bring you out … 2) save you … 3) redeem you … 4) take you …”

We note from this that deliverance is in stages; or we can understand it as a process. Yes, in messianic faith we understand the fullness of salvation to be a now, but not yet. Still, there is something more at work that gives encouragement.

First, the Lord delivers His people from oppressive bondage to sin and shame. Second, He releases us from subjection to the kingdom of darkness. Third, He redeems from the midst of destruction. Fourth, He takes us to Himself.

What do we learn from this?

Paul encourages us, “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:12-13).

Wrongly applied, “fear and trembling” seems to imply that salvation can be lost, especially if we do not work at it. Not very encouraging, and this is not at all what Paul has in mind.

Fear and trembling describes the reverent humility of one saved, not by their own effort or moral goodness, but by the unmerited action (Eph. 2:8-9) of God in fulfilling His promises to Abraham (Gen. 12:1-3; 15:13-14) by the promised lamb (Gen. 22:8).

Not in our own strength do we reach the goal (Ro. 10:4), but in the working of God’s will as it works in us according to His pleasure.

Recognize that we, as His people, are growing, not all at once, as that would be unhealthy, but gradually. While our souls are safely renewed in Yeshua/Jesus, we continue to mature in faith as He leads us out of our personal and corporate Egypt.

Let’s recognize the stages, given by the Lord, submit to His leading along the way, and rejoice in both the great and small victories in Him that manifest in our lives.

That is the message of these four verbs, and how we can deepen our understanding of them for today.

Be well. Shalom.