The Meyer Minute

The Meyer Minute for June 8, 2017

The ancient prayer for Pentecost asks God to give us His Holy Spirit and cause us “evermore to rejoice in His holy consolation.” Think those words through.

First, you need to be consoled. Something, anything has taken your mood down. Second comes the Spirit, but how? “The counteraction of comfort against affliction is by words.” Isn’t that how you’ve experienced it? Your face is down, tears welling up, your hope gone. Fellow followers of Jesus offer consolation. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4). That makes it the “holy consolation” we pray for, different from the comfort the world gives. This holy consolation is powered by the hope of heaven. “God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away” (Revelation 21:3-5).

You need consolation. Fellow believers offer it. Heaven is coming. Your tears begin to glisten. The Pentecost prayer is being granted,“evermore to rejoice in His holy consolation.” This is “divine aid which is already lavishly granted to the members of the suffering community of Jesus by present exhortation and encouraging events, and which will reach its goal when the New Testament people of God is delivered out of all its tribulations” (Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, V, 798-799). Another reason why we church people need each other!

The Meyer Minute for June 7, 2017

“What king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace” (Luke 14:31-32).

Jesus illustration is apt on this 75^th anniversary of the Battle of Midway. December 7, 1941, the attack on Pearl Harbor cripples the American navy. April, 1942, the Doolittle raid on Tokyo stuns the enemy but is militarily indecisive. Now Japan intends to finish off American power in the Pacific with a surprise attack on “AF.” But what did the Japanese code “AF” designate? Hawaii? San Diego? Australia? Our intelligence concludes AF is Midway, a small atoll halfway between Asia and North America. June 4-7, 1942: Outmanned 2 to 1 (the same proportion Jesus used), Americans ambush the Japanese, sink four carriers, losing only one, the Yorktown. “Japan’s six-month blitzkrieg had been stunningly halted, never to be resumed.”

“Book titles proclaim it the Miracle at Midway and an incredible Victory. Perhaps. But providence and chance work mysteriously, judgment and daring more plainly” (Robert Garnett, Wall Street Journal, June 3-4, A13)

In hindsight we thank You, our God, for the judgment and daring of our military and thank You for the victory. Keep our armed forces today vigilant, ready, and humbly dependent upon You. “If it had not been the Lord who was on our side when people rose up against us, then they would have swallowed us up alive…then over us would have gone the raging waters. Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth” (Psalm 124:2, 5, 8).

 

The Meyer Minute for June 6, 2017

Whoops! Yesterday’s Minute started with our power outage and moved to Pentecost power. Without electricity, I used battery power for my draft of the Minute, but then the battery ran down and I had to leave for work. Now my mistake. I forgot to tell Diane the Minute wasn’t finished. When power came back on, she sent it out…unfinished. And when I found out… Well, our mutual forbearance and long-suffering had opportunity to grow!

Some citations were missing: the story of Pentecost in Acts 2:1-13. 1 Corinthians 12:3, “No one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except in the Holy Spirit.” Martin Luther, “I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel.” Those passages teach, and it bears repeating today, that we dare never take the work of the Holy Spirit for granted. This is especially true for us who are longtime church members. Instead our prayer should be that of Psalm 51:11-12, “Take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation; and uphold me with a willing spirit.”

I thought of other editing whoops. A 1631 printing of the King James Bible said, “Thou shalt commit adultery.” In 1716 Jeremiah 31:34 was supposed to say, “Sin no more,” but the proof-reader didn’t catch what was finally published, “Sin on more.” And, Deuteronomy 24:3 should say, “If the latter husband hate her,” but a 1682 typo says, “If the latter husband ate her.”

I tease saying, “Diane has had seven happy years of marriage.” With our anniversary coming up, I had hoped to move it up to eight. Now I have doubts, but I’ve been blessed by her for 44 years.

The Meyer Minute for June 5, 2017

I started waking up this morning, wondering what time it was. A clock that projects the time onto the ceiling wasn’t working, the room totally dark. I didn’t think much about it until I finally did get up, walked down the hall, and discovered the power was out. 4:30 am, not much I could do in the dark without electricity except to think about today’s Minute.

“You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you” (Acts 1:8). Pentecost power. Not to turn on lights or brew the coffee (no coffee, that was the real bummer!), but to have the Light of the world and His fervent love in our hearts. Yesterday churches remembered Jesus’ promise of power was fulfilled on Pentecost. “x” (Acts). In our own time, the Spirit works faith in those who hear and take to heart the Good News of Jesus. “x” Martin Luther wrote, “I believe”

Yesterday’s observance of Pentecost could easily slip away from us as we get on with the work week unless we take to heart its necessity and grace. He says “I cannot” because our beings are totally corrupted by original sin, the sin all humanity has inherited ever since the fall of Adam and Eve. Hence the working of God’s Holy Spirit is absolutely necessary for your salvation. And it’s a matter of grace because God doesn’t owe you or me. “Take not your Holy Spirit from me.”

The lack of electricity was a reminder how fragile our life can be. Pentecost power prompts us to say, “Thank God!”

The Meyer Minute for June 2, 2017

Will your weekend be with God?

Let’s start here: How often on Monday do you go back to work tired? Maybe you’re planning to catch up on office work, work around the house or in the yard. Maybe you’re going to be going, going with the kids, going to a gathering. Yes, an hour in church… It’s the American way, but do your plans line up with God’s will?

God’s wise guidance invites us to sometimes leave things undone. “Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work” (Exodus 20:9-10). The divine pattern for people is to alternate, not confuse, work and rest. Jesus followed the pattern rigorously, not just observing Saturday as Sabbath but taking time away from His ministry every day to be alone with His Father. Or did He take His briefcase, cell phone and ear buds with Him when the “office” was closed? “A servant is not greater than his master” (John 13:16). Do we servants by our weekend habits disregard the Master who invites us, “Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while”? (Mark 6:31). God demands more than an hour or so in church. “With all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” means rest and renewal of body, mind and spirit in Him (Deuteronomy 6:5).

Come Monday, you will figuratively have had your “feet washed” by your Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier, your whole being bathed in His greatness and love for you. “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength” (Isaiah 30:15). “Learn from me” (Matthew 11:29).

The Meyer Minute for June 1, 2017

“Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves” (Philippians 2:3).

Corrie ten Boom was a Dutch woman who help many Jews escape the Nazis, heroism that earned her fame. A pastor shared the following story with me, though I don’t know the original source. “Corrie ten Boom was once asked if it was difficult for her to remain humble. Her reply was simple. ‘When Jesus rode into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday on the back of a donkey, and everyone was waving palm branches and throwing garments on the road, and singing praises, do you think that for one moment it ever entered the head of that donkey that any of that was for him?’ She continued, ‘If I can be the donkey on which Jesus Christ rides in His glory, I give him all the praise and all the honor.’”

“Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant….” (Philippians 2:5-7).