Vol. 19 No. 18 | April 30, 2017

Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. (Romans 15:7, NIV)

Accept one another. This is what Jesus said. This is what Jesus did. He accepted us and bid that we follow His example by accepting one another.

What He did not say was this:

Jesus did not say to judge one another.
He did not say to criticize one another.
He did not say to disapprove of or censure or condemn one another.

Jesus did not say to discourage one another.
He did not say to frustrate one another.
He did not say to oppose or irritate or combat one another.

Jesus did not say to question one another.
He did not say to disagree with one another.
He did not say to debate or protest or rebuff one another.

Jesus did not say to condescend one another.
He did not say to belittle one another.
He did not say to discredit or ridicule or humiliate one another.

Jesus did not say to dismiss one another.
He did not say to ignore one another.
He did not say to exclude or reject or abandon one another.

Jesus did not say to antagonize one another.
He did not say to curse one another.
He did not say slander or berate or scorn one another.

Jesus did not say to argue with one another.
He did not say to defy one another.
He did not say to conquer or betray or harm one another.

Jesus did not say to fear one another.
He did not say to dislike one another.
He did not say to defy or condemn or hate one another.

What Jesus said was to love one another, to accept one another.

So, let us hear what He said. Let us do what He said. Let us love one another, and let us accept one another.

Tom

A Norvell Note © Copyright 2017. Tom Norvell All Rights Reserved.

Vol. 19 No. 17 | April 23, 2017

Some of us are more aware of them than others. The voices, they are always there. I am not talking about strange psychotic or disturbing ‘people would be worried’ voices. I am talking about the voices inside of our heads and heart that overpower us and create confusion and anxiety, but at other times calm our spirits and bring us peace and harmony.

Jesus heard the voices.

“You cannot be the Son of God. You are a carpenter’s son.”

“Jesus, You should demonstrate Your power in such a dramatic way to show people who You really are.”

“Jesus, put my sons in positions of leadership in Your kingdom!”

“Jesus change these stones to bread. Jesus worship me and I will give You all these kingdoms. Jesus throw yourself off this high place and prove to me Your loyalty and dedication.”

“Jesus, who do You think you are?”

Jesus heard the voices, yet He stayed true to His nature and to His calling.

Thinking about the voices led me to pray this prayer and similar ones many times.

Father, I hear the voices. They come from all directions. They come from friends who want me to succeed. They come from those who may want to see me fail. Father, help me discern between the voices so that I know when to listen to my head and when to listen to my heart.

Father, silence the voices that tell me that what I do is insignificant. Silence the voices that tell me I am too good to do this, or that I am not good enough. Silence the voices who speak negativity to my heart.

Father, increase the volume of the voices that say this is a good thing, you are a good person, you are doing great things, you are touching lives, you are helping people find peace and hope. Increase the volume of the voices that say this is where God wants you and you are doing what He wants you to do.

Father, silence the voices that invoke fear. Increase the volume of the voices that instill confidence and trust in You.

Father, silence the voices that try to tear me down by drawing me away from You. Increase the voices that lift me up and draw me closer to You.

Father, silence the voices that tell me to be suspicious, skeptical, cynical and judge those who are different from me. Increase the voices that tell me to be open, to be trusting, and to love all people.

Father, silence the voices that remind me of my sins and failures. Increase the volume of those voices that remind me of Your forgiveness and the victories that You and I have enjoyed through Your strength.

The voices are real, Father. Some are good and some are bad. Father, help me discern between the voices and know which ones need to be silenced and which ones need to be heard.

Father, help me hear Your voice above all others.

Tom

A Norvell Note © Copyright 2017. Tom Norvell All Rights Reserved.

What I Want You To Know About Jesus, #5

Vol. 19 No. 16 | April 15, 2017

My most vivid childhood memory of Easter involves polishing my shoes. Yes, you read that correctly. Polishing shoes was our Easter ritual that I now realize was a clever way to implement tradition. To me, there was no rhyme or reason to it, but it did serve as an effective way for our parents to get us to shine our shoes on Easter morning. 

The understanding in our house was that if you wanted Easter candy on Easter morning, your shoes had to be cleaned, polished, shined and placed outside your bedroom door. With shoes cleaned and shined, we would go to bed, then on Easter morning we would find our shined shoes miraculously filled with Easter candy, along with a basket full of eggs and more candy. I eventually discovered that the Easter Bunny was just as much of a night owl as Santa was. But none of this mattered, as long as I had an adequate supply of those white, cream-covered eggs with pink, yellow, blue, and green sugar. Such a healthy snack to start off our Sunday morning!

The second most vivid memory of my childhood Easters was dying the Easter eggs. Usually on the Saturday before, the eggs would be boiled and tablets of dye would be dropped into heated vinegar. Next, the boiled eggs would be placed on a copper wire with a circle designed specifically to hold one egg at a time. The egg would be dipped into the dye and an amazing transformation would take place. Those plain white eggs became various shades of red, blue, green, yellow, and pink. Some of them came out of the dye with unique designs that we would create with a wax crayon. After the color transformation, the eggs, still wet with warm vinegar, would be placed on newspaper spread out on the kitchen table to dry. I can still here my mom’s warnings: “Don’t touch them! You’ll mess them up! You have to let them dry!”

And so, adequately jacked up on sugar, off we would go to church- dressed in our best (and only) pair of black pants, white shirts, black ties, and beautifully polished shoes- soon to join all the ladies and little girls dressed in their Sunday best, wearing their pretty hats and new fancy dresses.

I suppose the preacher spoke about the Resurrection, but I most likely missed it, falling asleep right about the time he started. But I assure you I woke up in time for the Easter Egg hunt that followed. That I would not miss. 

Eventually I outgrew those traditions. Well, most of them. I still try to make sure my shoes are in pretty good shape, and I now prefer the Reece’s Peanut Butter bunnies instead of the colorful sugar-coated eggs. I also eventually came to understand that the miracle of Easter was not about candy mysteriously showing up in my shoes, or eggs changing color right before my eyes.  Easter was about a Savior who had died and been buried, and then rose again from His grave.

The miracle is about the followers of Jesus who watched him suffer pain and humiliation, who witnessed the afflictions of his wounds and declaration of his death, who saw him conquer death and rise again. Hope restored.

I now understand that an Easter Sunrise means more than hunting eggs and wearing my best clothes. It means that the time of darkness has passed and the Light has returned. It means that the hope that had been lost has now returned. It means that although we go through times of waiting and confusion, even despair, because of that empty tomb, hope is restored. 

He is risen! He is risen indeed!

Tom

A Norvell Note © Copyright 2017. Tom Norvell All Rights Reserved.

What I Want You To Know About Jesus, #4

Vol. 19 No. 15 | April 10, 2017

Jesus is not safe because following Him means carrying a cross.

Your cross may involve suffering for your faith. Your cross may involve leaving the creature comforts of your local community or staying there longer than you desire. Your cross may involve losing friends and family or being stretched to the limits of your faith. Your cross may involve physical limitations or being forced to face your fears. 

Jesus is not safe because following Him leads to death.

Following Jesus means abandoning yourself and embracing Him as your truth. Following Jesus may mean letting your dreams die so that He can create new ones within you. Following Jesus may mean abandoning your career goals so you can pursue the vocation He has designed for you. Following Jesus may mean surrendering your pride and even experiencing physical death that will unite you with and bring glory to Him.

Jesus is not safe because loving people is not easy.

Following Jesus means loving people. Loving people is not easy and it is not optional. Loving people is the identifying factor of a follower of Jesus. Some people are easier to love than others. You have to love the difficult ones too. Following Jesus means loving people like He loves you, and this also entails forgiving them as He has forgiven you.

Following Jesus will present known challenges and some that will not be revealed until you are in the thick of it. If you choose to follow Jesus, there may be times when you wonder if you made the right decision and times when you are convinced you made the wrong one.

Following Jesus is not safe because you must carry your cross, you must let the person you were before die so that He may now live through you. And, you must love people. If you just start with those two things, your journey will be much easier than it would have been otherwise. 

If you choose to follow Jesus, stay focused on the fact that He carried His cross and died for your sins. He chose to die so that you could be victorious over death. He chose to love people because He knew we needed to be loved.

Following Jesus is both challenging and rewarding. But the reward, in the end, will be worth the challenges.

As you consider following Jesus think about this story

Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side. After he had dismissed them, he went up to a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there alone. The boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the wind and the waves.

Shortly before dawn, Jesus went out to them, walking on water to reach them. When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified and cried out in fear, “It’s a ghost!”

But Jesus immediately said to them: “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

“Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.”

“Come,” he said.

Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water, and came toward Jesus. (Matthew 14:22-29, NIV)

As scary as it was, Peter came forth and walked on water. None of the other disciples could make that claim. He loved and trusted Jesus enough to follow Him when he said, “Come”.

The question of whether or not you will follow Jesus can only be answered by you. He does not demand it. He will not force you. He invites you to follow Him. If you choose to follow Him, your life will be filled with adventure that is beyond anything you can imagine. Maybe He is saying, “Come” to you. Will you?

Tom

A Norvell Note © Copyright 2017. Tom Norvell All Rights Reserved.

What I Want You To Know About Jesus, #3

Vol. 19 No. 14 | April 3, 2017

Three weeks ago, I wrote that I was beginning a series of articles, based on John’s gospel, where I would share things that I want you to know about Jesus. I started with the fact that, ‘He is’. Jesus is who he says He is. Last week I wrote about the fact that He is the ‘True Light’, and we need the light of Jesus to see our way through the world.

My plan this week was to focus on this thought John 1:15, The Message:

The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. We saw the glory with our own eyes, the one-of-a-kind glory, like Father, like Son, Generous inside and out, true from start to finish.

I’ve imagine this scene as follows: You come home from work and see a van parked in the driveway of the house next to yours. You walk over to meet the new neighbor and discover it is Jesus. Jesus has moved into the house next to yours. Not to keep an eye on you. Not to spoil your fun. He moved in next to you because He wants to be close to you. Wow, what a thought! Jesus wants to be close to me.

My plan was to go through the gospel of John pointing out other characteristics of Jesus, other facts about Jesus, and other interesting ideas about Jesus that I wanted everyone else to know. This would be a long series of articles that would provide a vast repertoire of topics to pull from for the months to come.

Then I got bored.

That’s right, I got bored with my own stuff. I realized that you probably already know most of my thoughts about Jesus and most of the traits of Jesus that I wanted to share. Yes, I think it is important for you to know that, “Jesus Is” that He offers us “True Light” and that He wants to be near you. I think we all need to know those things as well as all the others I would eventually share.

But, through a series of God moments, conversations, and opportunities to listen and reflect on life – the gospel, our culture, and where I am in my own life – I realized most of the thoughts I wanted to share with you would fill you with thoughts, ideas, and concepts that might not be what you really need. They might help you live a nice, comfortable life in your church and in your community. But my concern is that this might prompt you to live through my thoughts without ever really experiencing the real Jesus and how an honest relationship with Him might transform your world.

So, the third thing (technically the fourth) I want you to know about Jesus is that He Is Not Safe. By that I do not mean that He will not care for us, that He will not give us peace, or that He will not provide us with rest when we are weary. He always does and He always will.

But when we make a commitment to follow Jesus, we need to know that we are choosing a life that is not all fun and games. A life with Jesus is not always easy, or smooth, or comfortable. In fact, this understanding of a life following Jesus may be one of the most destructive views of God that pervades our culture. ‘Just trust in Jesus and the blessings will start falling from the heavens.’

This is what Jesus said:

Do you finally believe? In fact, you’re about to make a run for it—saving your own skins and abandoning me. But I’m not abandoned. The Father is with me. I’ve told you all this so that trusting me, you will be unshakable and assured, deeply at peace. In this godless world you will continue to experience difficulties. But take heart! I’ve conquered the world. (John 16:32-33, The Message)

Did you catch that? “In this godless world you will continue to experience difficulties.” But, are the frustrations, disappointments, trials, hurts, and sorrows that you are experiencing because you are following Jesus? No. They are part of life and will continue. You simply must be ready, be patient, and be strong.

This is the best decision you will ever make. Yes, He has overcome all that. Yes, eventually you will too. But for right now, in this world, do not be shocked, surprised, or caught off guard when things do not go how you want them to. “Following Me” Jesus says, “will be difficult at times.”

But, the good news is that He will be with us through every frustration, every disappointment, every trial, every hurt, and every sorrow. At times when we think we cannot bear any more, He will lift our burden or help us carry it.

No, Jesus is not safe. But, He is. He provides the light for our way. He is with us at all times.

Now, you have a crucial decision to make. Will you follow Jesus?

Tom

A Norvell Note © Copyright 2017. Tom Norvell All Rights Reserved.