Memo From the Mann

The Good Shepherd

He will stand and shepherd his flock ~ Micah 5:4
 
There are countless stories where love lies bleeding. Where the love for another is the driving force for sacrifice that sometimes leads to death. Have you witnessed this kind of love in your life time?
 
Seven hundred years before the gospel, in Micah 5, we read about a deliverer that is foreseen. The character of the deliverer will be that of a shepherd. He’ll be wanting to feed and nourish his people. This is in direct contrast to others who’ll be oppressive dictators. This deliverer will bring peace. He’ll be the source of peace. The prince of Peace.
 
Skip’s Heitzig said, “One of the most beautiful descriptions of Jesus is when he said,
‘ I am the good shepherd.’”
 
But between the first coming and the second coming, is a cross where the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. His unmatched love will lead to him sacrificing his life ...for all mankind.
 
He will stand and shepherd his flock ~ Micah 5:4
 
O’ that we’d recognize and embrace the great sacrifice of the good shepherd.
Today ...and everyday.
 
Pray on...
Song: Through His Life

In the Flow

and peoples will flow to it ~ Micah 4:1
 
Have you ever been caught up in a moment when time didn’t exist? A moment when your mind was so occupied that the passing of time was oblivious to you. That’s to say at some point you stopped to realized a large portion of it had passed without your recognition. That’s being in the flow.
 
As a musician I get to experience (flow) it in those special improvisational instances, the ones that we can’t really explain, but that inspire us and make us want to return again and again.
 
Here in Micah 4 we read that the people will flow to it, it being Mt Zion; to the house of the Lord, to worship ...and here let me share that I’ve also experience the flow in worship. What a glorious experience to get lost so in worship that time doesn’t exist; that seconds, minutes, and hours can pass without notice.
 
Both Isaiah and Micah echo this piece of scripture. I’d like to believe that the Holy Spirit thought it was that important, that it needed to be mentioned twice. As they use it, it means spontaneous movement; you’re not compelled to do it, but you want to do it.
 
Skip Heitzig shares that, “There’s coming a day when the nations of the world will want to go to flow to Jerusalem. Because the Messiah will reign and rule from there for a thousand years, and the world will be at peace.”
 
What a prayer for our world, that all nations would flow to the house of the Lord ...to worship him.
 
Pray on...
Song: In the House of the Lord

Make the Call

Let everyone call urgently on God ~ Jonah 3:8
 
When is a time where you have urgently called on God? Urgently meaning you required immediate action or attention. It certainly would’ve been a serious, and probably even a life threatening moment. I mean we’re not gonna urgently call on God to shine on tomorrow’s day at the beach.
 
In Jonah 3 we find the king of Nineveh, the most powerful man in the city, an arrogant villain, putting on sackcloth, and sitting in the dust because he’s heard a message from God (through Jonah).
 
He leaves his seat of authority and  power, and takes off his royal clothes of pride... and he sits down in the dust where we all came from, and will return someday.
 
The king who allowed and  commanded violence and oppression for so many years has humbled himself and commanded a fast, telling everyone to urgently call on God.
 
Why? Because this non-believer heard from God.
The heart of the answer lies right here...  change begins when a person believes God!
Not just believing in God, but believing God!
 
O’ Lord, that you hear our urgent prayer for the world...
That all nations!
That all peoples!
would know and embrace You!
 
Pray on...
Song: Where Heaven Touches Earth

Fleeing, The Opposite of Following

But Jonah ran away... ~ Jonah 1:3
Have you ever run away from something? I’m sure you have ...we all have, and hindsight usually reveals just how foolish and wasteful the behavior was.
 
But imagine running from God ...as if that’s even a possibility. What foolishness to think that the omnipresent God would not be able to track us down, that he’d somehow lose us in the world’s mass of humanity. Silly, I know!
 
The book of Jonah reveals that Jonah’s not running from the danger of Nineveh, the city he’s been sent to preach in, but that’s he’s running from God. He knows God’s compassion,  and he doesn’t want to see God forgive the Ninevites.
 
What we’re asked to consider is this -
What if God’s word reveals something about God that we don’t like?
What if he calls us to people we don’t like?
 
We can talk about the fish at another time, but for today, let’s consider the idea that we can’t turn and run away from God’s work and expect not to be exposed.
Lord, help us to remember that following is our calling, and that fleeing is the opposite of following.
 
Pray on...
Song: Sittin’ in a Belly

His Word is Good

A library is a house of  hope (we could stop there) ...
It’s a place where we all, whatever our situation,
can feed our ideas and developed our dreams.
 
A cartoon showed (a father handing a child a book to his teen-age son):
“It’s a book you say, ..uh, what do I plug it into?” You mind!
 
Apart from the word of God, human life knows only chaos. It is the word that speaks order into creation and that sustains all the processes of nature. It is the word that motivates all history and brings it to fulfillment. It is the word alone that gives guidance, and forgiveness, and blessing, and fruitful life. It is in the word that God draws near to his chosen people and abides with them.
 
I share this because just as in (the Minor Prophet), Amos’ time...
(a famine of hearing the words of the Lord. ~ Amos 8:11)
There are many today who are tragically ignorant of their Bible.
...and some are weekly church goers!
They don’t’t know scripture, they don’t read it, or study it.
...I heard it said that those that do dabble with commentaries
are guilty of not creating their own.
The Biblical illiteracy among Christians is epidemic.
 
Father, our land is ripe for the hearing of your word
Let each and everyone of us begin a disciplined approach to your word
Reading it, studying it, digging deeper into it,
questioning what it means, praying on its application...
and then sharing with those around us the riches of doing so
sharing it in a way that excites others to join us
In your Son’s name we pray...
 
Pray on...
Song: His Word is Good

Tilling For Love

...break up your unplowed ground ~ Hosea 10:12
One of my daughters was a stubborn child. She knew what she wanted, and wasn’t going to have it any other way. Her will was strong, her heart could turn hard during such an exercise, her upsetment occurred because she wasn’t getting what she wanted ...much like many adults, like many unhappy souls in the world ...dare I say much like our politicians ...their stubbornness, their inability to see past their hard hearts, is the cause for much turmoil in their world and ours.
In Hosea 10:12, God uses metaphors from agriculture to set forth his requirements. Sandy Adams shares, We need to prepare the ground before we plant a garden. The strongest plants grow in the worked, and softened soil. The barren spots were the ones that were unworked.
Repentance does to our spirit, what a tiller does to the hard ground. A repentant heart sees its sin’s true ugliness. True repentance turns my life over and over breaking up my hardness. It allows the seeds of God to take root and create spiritual growth. But if the heart is not prepared the seed won’t take root. This why we need to turn up the soil of our heart. We need to work over that soil with a thorough repentance.
Tilling ground is laborious, hard, backbreaking, agonizing work ...and so  is real repentance ...the results though are worth the effort. The strongest stands of spiritual fruit, will grow where you have worked the ground.
Pray on...
Song: Once Again Lord

Complacency

Woe to you who are complacent ~ Amos 6:1
Don’t you just love people who are full of themselves? They have an arrogant way about them, one that seems to allow them the belief that we commoners, we sheep,  just grazed around them as they carry on the important aspects of their day. 
Smugness wears ugly ...don’t you think. I mean we don’t wear it as a compliment. We don’t greet a great man or woman with ...my, you really look smug today ...I love that jacket, you look really smug in it ...or maybe, you know, you wear smugness well!
The self-important quality rests on an innate security that they have, even when based on a faulty premise. In Amos 6, God tells Israel that their security is false. 
It’s truly amazing just how many examples over so many years, that we’ve seen or read, about the same arrogance revealing itself. Human kind just can’t get over itself. 
The ideal of physical power has always been at the forefront of disagreement, battle, and death. 
The Israelites saw judgement as very far away, much like children and young adults. There’s always a false comfort in putting off what we don’t want to face until tomorrow or some time in the distant future.
Let’s agree to rest on these on two things -1. God is universally in control ...not us, ...ever!2. Today, tomorrow and everyday after, are judgement days for someone, somewhere
Pray on...Song: I Don’t Know (Album: Stars Under My Feet)

No Exceptions

 Do two walk together unless they have agreed to do so? ~ Amos 3:3
I’d like to share some common agreed upon thoughts about this statement.
Persons do not walk together unless they have agreed to meet; lions do not roar unless they have captured some prey; birds do not fall to the ground for no reason; alarms don’t sound without causing fear. (Indeed, our natural disasters come not from happenstance, but from God’s governance of the world,)
Now for you and I, and anyone else, to walk together - We need to have a strong mutual agreement (a healthy understanding) We need a shared vision, a common purpose (common ground) We need to have compatible goals, and a mutual respect (a realistic path) Does this sound like you and God?
 Amos’s question is for us to consider... Can two walk together unless they’re agreed?
 (*Keep this in mind when you go to choose a spouse,  a friend, a business partner, or even a church.)
So ignore God’s warnings if you like,  think the rules don’t apply to you if you’re foolish enough, but (Amos 3 makes it quite clear that) in the end  you’re going to find out the hard way, that God makes no exceptions.
Pray on...Song: It’s A Cold War (Album: Trio)

A Country Boy, Called By God

Amos 7:14 (NIV): 14 Amos answered Amaziah, “I was neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore-fig trees.
Has the Spirit ever got you attention in an uncomfortable way? You know, you feel like you should say something, or do something that’s outside of your comfort zone?
We should take care to listen, and to trust, and to respond to such callings. The Bible is full of ordinary folks who did extraordinary things.
In the Old Testament book of Amos (A Minor Prophet) we’re introduced to someone who didn’t hang out with the religious leaders in Jerusalem, but with the sheep breeders in Tekoa (like a small borough outside of the city).
He was vocationally and culturally from a different neck of the woods (actually the back woods).  *Amos was a non-prophet organization ~ S.A.
Ministry to Amos wasn’t a career, it was a calling. It was a profession, it was a passion. It wasn’t just a job, it was his joy.Amos wasn’t a pro pastor, he was an amateur. *Amateur means - for the love of it. Amos served God because he loved God.
Amos was both a rancher and farmer... as we read in chapter seven...Amos answered Amaziah, “I was neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore-fig trees. ~ Amos 7:14
Amos was a country boy who wore jeans and drove a pick-up truck.Amos was a country boy who was called by God  to serve the urban jungles of the northern kingdom.
Could that be you? Are you ready and willing to respond? Are you ready to serve God because you love him?
Are you a country boy ... being called by God? 
Pray on...Song: We Are the Body of Christ (Album: Re:Prize)

Kiss the Son

They kiss calf-idols! ~ Hosea 14:2
To whom are you expressing your loyalty, your devotion, and your love?Now you can answer in any number of ways, but ultimately it’s your life that will express
the truth when it comes to your loyalty, your devotion, and your love.
Here in Hosea 14 we read that Instead of seeking life from God, Ephraim sought it from the fertility rites of baal worship, which was probably a small molten image, modeled after the bull of Bethel, which was made of bronze and overlaid with silver. Kissing the idol was part of the ritual of such worship.
What does your lifestyle say?
What do your purchases say about you?
Has your life revealed a side of compassion? ...a giving nature?
What does your history say?
How have you reacted to problems when they’ve occurred?
...to disappointments when they’ve appeared?
...to darkness when it unexpectedly dropped in?
What does your prayer life say?
Have your prayers been centered on wants or needs?
Have your prayers been centered on you or others?
Have your prayers been centered on expectations or doubts?
Have your prayers been centered on dependency?
Psalm 2:12 warns us -
”Kiss his son, or he will be angry and your way will lead to your destruction,
Take the time to reflect on your life, to step back and see a clear picture ...get a glimpse of the whole story that you’re telling the world, and then ask yourself...
To whom are you expressing your loyalty, your devotion, and your love?
Pray on,
Song: Kiss the Son (Album: IHS)