Year Round

Year Round

"A fire shall always be burning on the altar, it shall never go out."
Leviticus 6:13

Driving down Route 14 on our annual visit to Seneca Lake, an incredibly picturesque lake in Upstate New York, we would see quite an assortment of homes and cottages along the way. They ranged from small summer cottages occupied from Memorial Day to Labor Day each year by vacationers, to year round homes where residents of nearby Geneva could enjoy the benefits of lakefront living while working in the city or at nearby Hobart and William Smith College.

I was reminded of those well-kept, year round homes as I thought about this year's Thanksgiving holiday where time spent with family giving thanks for God's many blessings on our lives is all too quickly being forgotten as people transition to the hype of Black Friday, the busiest shopping day of the entire year. The stark contrast of the two days reminded me of the importance of not just celebrating Thanksgiving Day, but of living a life of thanksgiving throughout the year.

The degree of our thankfulness is seen in so many ways. Matthew 12:34 says "for out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks". Beneath the surface of our words is the attitude of heart generating them. We can start by making sure that we are speaking thankfully with our words expressing our gratitude for the many, untold blessings in each of our lives.

We can also serve thankfully, give thankfully, and worship thankfully, all expressions of our true perspective on what we have in our lives and on the source of those blessings. A thankful person looks for opportunities to give back, instead of always wanting more and more to satisfy their desires. A thankful person serves others out of a sincere appreciation for the undeserved grace God has bestowed on them. And worship out of a thankful heart is passionate, sincere and intimate, focused on the Lord from whom all blessings flow. It is a heart that realizes that all we have we have received from the Lord.

Some of the year round homes on Seneca Lake are so beautiful; from the well manicured lawns to the porches and decks providing breathtaking views of the lake, they are homes we would all be happy to live in. And the same is true of a life lived thankfully; it's a life that is noteworthy, it's a life to be envied, it's a life worth living year round!

God Bless
Pastor Joe
Gateway Church

The Fastest Route

The Fastest Route

"There you saw how the Lord your God carried you,
as a father carries his son, all the way you went..."
Deuteronomy 1:31

With another trip to New York on the calendar for next week, the day after Thanksgiving for my 40th high school reunion, taking the most direct, fastest route will, as always, be a high priority. There are a couple options of course: one is going through Ohio, around Lake Erie and into Rochester. That route is longer but you can go over 400 miles without a single stoplight and without the inconvenience of border crossings and delays. The scenic route goes along Lake Ontario with awesome scenes of apple orchards, vineyards and beautiful shoreline, but it's not as direct and takes longer. The fastest route is going through Canada, hassling with the delays at the border, exchange rates at Tim Horton's, paying tolls on the New York State Thruway, and avoiding the many speed traps set up along the way.

One point about the story of the children of Israel going through the wilderness, journeying from Egypt to the Promised Land, has always enamored me. It's found in Deuteronomy 1:2 where it says simply:

"It takes 11 days to go from Horeb to Kadesh Barnea by the Mount Seir Road"

We know from the scriptures that they didn't take the fastest, most direct route because they hadn't learned war; they hadn't learned how to fight the battles they would face to get into the inheritance God had promised them. The fastest route wasn't an option for people who couldn't deal with enemies and battles and warfare. They came to the border of the promised land two years after leaving Egypt but they responded in unbelief to the negative reports of ten of the spies, they refused to trust the God who delivered them from the bondage of Egypt, and weren't able to enter at that time either.

38 years later they came to the border of the land God had promised them. Led by Joshua they entered into a land "flowing with mild and honey", symbolic of a life flowing with the favor and blessing of God. It is incredible to think that a journey that could have been made in 11 days ended up taking 40 years but it provides us with lessons for the journey we are on:

*If you aren't prepared in your heart to fight some battles along the way, your personal journey into the life God intended for you will take longer than planned. The Christian life includes fighting the enemy of our souls but doing it with the knowledge that "we are more than conquerors through him who loved us".

*If you are someone who doubts God and who struggles with unbelief when things don't work out as you want or hope, you will find the way blocked into the greater things of God. Trusting God and living by faith in God are essentials to entering into the incredible promises found in His Word.

*If you struggle with inconvenience and delay, with God's timing being different than ours, and with the cost of serving Him, sacrifice, denial and obedience, your journey may be a little longer than you were hoping for.

The spiritual journey we're on can either be a quick one or a long one, depending upon how we respond to the challenges we face, and the attitude and passion we seek the Lord with. Think of it: 11 days or 40 years! The choice is ours.

God Bless
Pastor Joe
Gateway Church

Lake Ontario

Lake Ontario

"Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even
though you do not see him now, you believe in him and
are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy."
I Peter 1:8

Coming across the western end of Lake Ontario last night, on my way to visit my mom, I was reminded of a scene that I had witnessed many times over the years. Looking out from one of the beaches or roads along the lake, you could see water stretching out as far as the eye could see until it disappeared into the horizon.

Growing up as a kid, there was a rumor that straight across the lake from our hometown of Rochester, New York, was a city called Toronto, with millions of people from all over the world. You could see it on a map, read about it in books, but even though it was only 50 miles or so away, you just couldn't see it. It was, as they say so often, just over the horizon.

Driving alone last night, I started to think about how that picture of Lake Ontario is a lot like the walk of faith we have been called to. We have so many promises from the Lord and there is much that lies ahead for each of us but they are not things that we can see, they are in the future and ove the horizon of our lives. I can laugh now when I think about the "rumors" of a city called Toronto, having visited it many times and enjoyed spending time there. And when I look out at Lake Ontario these days, I have a total confidence that Toronto exists even though I can't see it. And the reason is because I've stayed in beautful hotels there, enjoyed walking downtown with Nancy at night, and eaten sweet rolls from my favorite bakery in Chinatown.

There are 393 cubic miles of water separating me from Toronto where I sit in mom's den typing this out, with waves churning and cold winds blowing. In our lives, there are trials to be faced and difficulties to be overcome but the promises of God are sure and to be trusted in. You can rest in the fact that over the horizon of your life, after you've walked through some valleys and made it over some mountains, untold blessings are waiting for you. I can say that with confidence because, as I Peter 2:3 says, I "have tasted that the Lord is good".

That hope and confidence in God has to become a reality in each of our lives. David wrote in Psalm 27:13 "I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in this life." He was able to see beyond the horizon of difficulties to the shoreline of rest and victory on the other side of his Lake Ontario.

God Bless
Pastor Joe
Gateway Church

Stop And Smell The Roses

Stop And Smell The Roses

"Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing
has come the cooing of doves is heard in our land."

We talk about everyone and everything having a purpose in life. And while the extracts from many plants and flowers have been found to have medicinal purposes, what if God just created the flowers for us to look at, enjoy their beauty, and in so doing, take our eyes off ourselves and our hectic lives for a few brief moments.

The lyrics to Mac Davis's song are something we might want to keep in mind:

"You got to stop and smell the roses
You've got to count your many blessings every day
You're going to find your way to heaven is a rough and rocky road
If you don't stop and smell the roses along the way."

It might be a catchy song that has brought some notoriety to Mac Davis but it's also wise advice for each of us caught up in an increasingly materialistic world with demands on our time never seen before. We can be in such a hurry that we lose sight of reality and lose sight of God's many blessings in our lives.

Many of us have used the phrase "you need to stop and smell the roses" in speaking to someone who has lost their thankfulness for God's many blessings in their life. The loses in life are there for each of us. I've never forgotten the young Philippino man, in his early twenties, thanking the Lord for a job selling newspapers on the street earning 40 cents a day (that is not a typo in case you're wondering) for 5 hours work. He looked at that opportunity as a rose in his life. Your child, or children, is a rose that you should make sure to hug everyday. Your family, your home, your job, your health - all roses to be counted as blessings everyday. The words of the song are very true that life gets more and more difficult when we lose sight of those "roses".

The next time you go to Krogers, Meijer, or even Sam's Club, take a detour to the flower section of the store and smell the roses. Then take a moment to count the blessings in your life and thank the Lord for the roses He has sent your way.

God Bless,
Pastor Joe
Gateway Church