An Investment Strategy

An Investment Strategy

“But store up for yourselves treasure in heaven…. for

  where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

                                         Matthew 6:20-21

As we begin again this year to raise money to provide bible school graduates in the Philippines with study bibles that they could not otherwise afford, I can’t help but think about the importance of making sound investments and about realizing what the best investments of all really are. And the matter is not just about money because we invest our time, our energy, and even our lives in causes, in pursuits, and, hopefully, in other people’s lives. Some of those investments are in this life only while others are eternal, a true storing up for ourselves “treasure in heaven”.

My parents did some investing in their lifetime, some incredibly profitable and some not so much. Not all that many years ago, for example, they bought stock in a very notable telecommunications company for $116 a share, investing a good portion of their retirement savings in the hopes of adding to that reserve. According to the New York Stock Exchange, those shares are now worth slightly less than $10 a share, a pretty significant loss for any investor. On the other hand, the investments my parents made in our children, supporting them in everything from help with school books to going on missions trips, are paying far greater dividends than they ever could have imagined as their grandchildren are being used by the Lord in so many ways. And the amazing thing is that those dividends are only going to increase and increase as those and others my mom and dad invested in continue to be used by God to build His kingdom.

The time we spend encouraging a struggling friend or family member is a wise investment in the life of another. And the return comes as they are strengthened and live fruitful lives for the Lord.  The money we donate to help the poor and less fortunate is an investment in a life that has a natural need but an eternal purpose. And the dividend comes as they testify of God’s faithfulness in providing for them in their time of greatest need. The Bibles we send to the Philippines that are used Sunday after Sunday to minister God’s Word bear incredible fruit, affecting an untold number of lives as they help these young men and women prepare anointed messages filled with faith and hope in God.

Wall Street might not agree with my investment strategy but the best investments have always been, and will always be, those made in the lives of people. Invest your time, your energy, and your finances in other people, in their hopes, dreams, and visions, to meet their needs and to heal their hurts, and you will certainly end up a very wealthy person!

God Bless,
Pastor Joe

Gateway Church

Pie Night

Pie Night

“For by the standard you judge you will be judged, and
 the measure you use will be the measure you receive.”
                                                          Matthew 7:2

Of all the family traditions, making pies on the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving just might be our favorite. It’s a night when everyone has their role, from making crusts to peeling apples to mixing the myriad of ingredients needed for the apple, pumpkin and chocolate pies that will be consumed the next day. My contribution is usually doing the dishes that pile up from the night and I can tell you from experience that every measuring device in the kitchen, from the yellow one-eighth of a teaspoon plastic spoon to the 4 cup glass jar, along with every conceivable size and shape in between, is used on pie making night. From spices to pumpkin filling, those measuring devices help insure that just the right amount of each ingredient is used in preparing the pies without which Thanksgiving Day just wouldn’t be complete.

But did you know that God does some measuring of His own? Jesus told His disciples that “the measure you use will be the measure you receive”. So for example, if you show a quarter cup of mercy to others, you can expect to receive a quarter cup of mercy from the Lord. And that will work well unless you find yourself needing a full cup of mercy; then you might have a problem. The same principle is true of forgiving others, of being compassionate and of finding fault with others. In fact, I’d like to make a recommendation: when forgiving others, use the largest measuring cup you can possibly find. You’ll be thankful you did when you find yourself needing forgiveness, as we all do from time to time.  And as far as finding fault with others, I’d get the smallest cup around, the one-eighth teaspoon variety and use it as sparingly as possible. Just remember, God’s going to use the same size when dealing with the shortcomings in your life.

And as God stretches us through difficulties of every kind, let’s realize that like the different measuring cups, He is so often painfully stretching us to meet the needs of others, increasing our capacity to show compassion to those who are struggling, deepening the level of comfort we are able to give to those who are really hurting, and expanding our ability to minister life to each person around us. The truth that God measures to us as we measure to others has one more point; in measuring to us the Lord so often includes those closest to us so that not only are our actions going to come back to us but they will affect our sons, daughters, and spouses as well. So let’s be liberal in pouring out where God would be so pleased, and, at other times, frugal in our measure. You can be sure that you’ll never regret it!

God Bless
Pastor Joe
Gateway Church

Gentleman Soldiers

Gentleman Soldiers

“Stand firm in one spirit, contending as
one man for the faith of the gospel.”
                                      Philippians 1:27

Being familiar with such terms as boot camp, enlistment, orders and deployment, terms associated with our current military forces, the men who fought in America’s war for independence might be hard to recognize as soldiers. Corn, cotton, wheat and tobacco farmers, bankers, builders and businessmen, traders, servants and statesmen, they came from all walks of life to fight for the freedoms  that had first drawn them across the ocean to this new land. And fight they did, defeating a far better trained and equipped British army.

Those loyal British troops were following orders; they were dedicated and loyal to the nation that had commissioned them to this battle, and they certainly did their best on the battlefield. But the poorly equipped and barely trained army they were facing had a distinct advantage. And lest we be fooled, it wasn’t their superior knowledge of the terrain they were fighting on, or their being more accustomed to the harsh weather conditions found in America. Their advantage was that they had a cause worth fighting for and worth dying for. They said goodbye to wives and children, family and friends to go off to fight for freedoms that had been obtained at great cost. They knew that the risk of not returning was all too real but they saw the risk of losing their freedoms, including the freedom to worship as they chose, as far greater.

In much the same way, God is looking for men and women, ordinary men and women from all walks of life, who will take up their swords and begin to fight for the cause of Christ, to contend as one for the faith of the gospel. When I think of the farmer who left his fields to take up arms against the British troops, I think of the factory worker, the housewife, the businessman, the teacher, the nurse and many more in similar positions who realize that we are in a battle and that the faith that has been delivered to us is desperate for those who will fight for its truth. Generations to come depend on our response to the challenge set before us. Complacency will not get the job done; leaving the job to the professionals is not enough. The Christian faith our nation was founded on faces a different enemy but with the same goal, to rob us of our passion and our freedom to worship as we choose. May we have the same willingness to fight, to lay our lives down, and to take up our crosses to see God glorified and honored in our nation.

God Bless,
Pastor Joe
Gateway Church

The Turning Point

The Turning Point

“… to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning,

and the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.”
                                                                                Isaiah 61:3

A treatment center and a recovery program, a citizens group, conferences, academies, and even a donkey rescue organization – the name “turning point” has been adopted by many to try and describe the mission and work they are trying to accomplish in peoples’ lives. Because it’s so appropriate, history likes to use the phrase too, especially in relation to battles and wars. The Battle of Gettysburg had a turning point when Little Round Top was secured by the Union forces. World War II was big enough to have several turning points, with the Normandy Invasion on D-Day being among the most notable. A turning point is that point in time, often during a time of crisis, when a clear breakthrough in the direction of our lives occurs.

A blind man named Bartimaeus had a turning point in his life when, hearing that Jesus was passing by, he began to shout and cry out with all that was within him. Jesus heard his cry for mercy, called him forth, and healed his blindness. And he was never the same! For Jacob, his turning point came when he wrestled with God all night long in prayer, refusing to let go of God until he touched him, changed him, and blessed him. And that’s exactly what happened to Jacob at the end of a long night with the Lord. Moses turned aside to see a bush that was on fire, and the encounter with the Lord that followed changed the course and direction of his life forever. From Ruth and Rahab in the Old Testament to Peter and Paul in the New, God’s people have often experienced a turning point, a specific time in their lives when they broke through into a place of deeper relationship, greater blessing, and divine purpose previously unknown.

If one common piece to the puzzle of experiencing a turning point can be found, it’s in having a fresh encounter with God and receiving a personal revelation from Him for our lives. Isaiah saw the Lord and experienced His presence; Paul saw a light shining all around him and heard the voice of the Lord. You may be reading this feeling like Moses must have after 40 years in the wilderness, wondering if there would ever even be a turning point, wondering if there was anything more ahead. Can I encourage you today that just like General Motors is in the business of making cars, God is in the business of giving new beginnings, and of causing turning points to occur in the lives of His people. Live expectantly, seek Him passionately, and when your turning point occurs, give Him all the glory!!

God Bless,
Pastor Joe

Gateway Church

A Party Line

A Party Line

“Call to me and I will answer you and show you
 great and mighty things which you do not know.”

                                       Jeremiah 33:3

To really put the changes in communication that have taken place over the years into perspective, you only have to go back to the party line phone system. My earliest memory of having phones in the house was the party line that we shared with our neighbors, the DiPiazzas on one side and the Tetts on the other. Having a party line meant that you might pick up the phone to find no dial tone and the neighbor’s daughter Kathy talking to one of her friends. You would keep trying, to the point of being annoying when you were in a hurry, until the line was free and then it was your turn to make a call. And in case you were wondering, opportunities to listen in to neighbors’ conversations were never (well, almost never) taken advantage of.

Finally getting a private line years later was a big deal because it meant you could make a phone call whenever you wanted. That worked tremendously except for the holidays when everyone tried to make a call at once and you would dial the phone only to receive the standard “all circuits are busy, please try your call again later” message. And sometimes we would try for hours before being able to complete a call to one of our family members living in another city or state. Looking back over time, the jump in technology from those party lines of the 50’s to now being able to talk over the internet to people thousands of miles away in other nations has been incredible.

And maybe that what makes God being “the same yesterday, today and forever” even more awesome than we often realize. Think of the fact that the peasant farmer in Medieval France would call on the Lord in prayer and expect an answer exactly the same way that you and I do today. God hasn’t changed a single prerequisite for receiving an answer to prayer; He hasn’t deviated one degree from the plans and purposes He laid out before the worlds were formed. And that is why God says so emphatically in Malachi 3:6 “For I am the Lord, I do not change!!!!”

Methods of communication may change but God remains a constant in our lives, a Rock that we can rely on. And that goes for His Word too! The Word of God is so dynamic and alive that it crosses every generational line without losing one spec of its power.  The Word that George Washington meditated on in the 1700’s has the same application, the same importance, and the same relevance, never goes out of date, and is undiminished in every way, to the web-cam, video chat, iPad generation of today. In an ever changing world, having God as the one constant that we can rely on is a treasure beyond compare.

God Bless
Pastor Joe

Gateway Church

Running on Empty

Running on Empty

“The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
Therefore the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath.”
                                                                         Mark 2:27-28

In this age of cell phones, laptop computers and other electronic devices, we are constantly reminded that batteries go dead and have to be recharged or replaced. With my laptop, it can only go so long on a full charge before the warning light flashes telling me that, unless I take immediate action, it’s about to be unusable. On a trip to New York, the Buick can go about six hours, give or take, until it runs out of gas, and the lawn mower can make it through one full mowing before it does the same. Using up energy in the process of use, no matter what the situation, and the need to replenish it, is one of the easiest concepts to understand.

Maybe I should have said that it is one of the easier concepts to understand when it comes to everything but our physical bodies, emotional health, and spiritual strength. Plugging in and filling up are absolutes when the item being considered is made of nuts and bolts but for some reason we struggle with doing the same when it’s about us as individuals. We get too busy or tired to eat properly and replenish the nutrients our body needs to function properly (and yes family, I’m addressing this to myself too). We push ourselves to accomplish more and more, multi-tasking as if our life depended on it, without stopping to take a deep breath and recharge the internal, invisible batteries of our hearts.

Both spiritually and emotionally, we run our wells dry and try to function properly on a dead battery and an empty gas tank. That is why Jesus separating himself from his disciples to spend time in prayer and fellowship with the Father is such a great and necessary example for us today. No matter what needs He faced, and no matter how great the demands on Him were, He realized that more than anything He needed the strength and replenishing that came from His time spent with the Father. And despite the masses who needed the supernatural touch that only He could provide, Jesus was regularly found in the temple or synagogue spending time in God’s presence and in the Word.

His example reminds us that we have to move from where going to church is one more duty for us to perform to that place where we delight in the refreshing it provides. Our perspective has to include what Jesus said above that “the Sabbath was made for man”, a time set aside for man to refill – and that includes a healthy dose of God’s presence, a Texas sized portion of His Word, and several helpings of fellowship with those walking the same road that we are on.

God Bless
Pastor Joe
Gateway Church

Connect the Dots

Connect the Dots

“For God is working in you, giving you the desire to
obey Him and the power to do what pleases Him.”
                                                              Philippians 2:13

The picture represented by the dots scattered across the page is not always easily recognizable until you begin to connect the dots, as the name of the simple game indicates, drawing lines from one dot to another until the picture begins to take definition and become clear. And the games range in difficulty from those made for children to adult versions in easy, medium, and hard formats. The principle of connecting the dots, with all its variations, can also be applied to our walk with the Lord and can provide each of us with a valuable lesson.

When we face situations, for example, that really try our patience, we can look at them as isolated incidents to be reacted to, and totally miss the point of what God is trying to accomplish in our lives through them. So often those situations happen over and over again because we are failing to “connect the dots” between our current struggles and God’s desire to build character in our lives and to prepare us for our future. Our failure to connect the dots in our walk with the Lord can be fatal to our attitudes, to our spiritual priorities, and to the needed breakthroughs we are longing for.

The principle has to make us step back and look at the circumstances of our lives: the delays and the waiting, the conflicts and the struggles in relationships, the stretching and the call to walk in faith, the challenge to be faithful and to go the second mile, and the pain and sorrows we too often encounter. In a vacuum, we would certainly react to each of these life situations with a kind of disdain for the difficulties they present. But looking at the bigger picture, where we are cognizant of the need to connect the dots, should cause us to respond with acceptance and a cry for grace to help us through.

The lesson has hit home with me; the need to start to connect the dots before frustration sets in and mistakes are made is very clear. Just as connecting the dots results in a picture being revealed, connecting the dots in a game where God has a plan and a purpose for each of our lives is crucial to the endurance we need, to the determination required, and to the acceptance of where God has each of us at this time in our lives.

God Bless,

Pastor Joe

Gateway Church