The Burden Of Drebb

David said to him, “If you go on with me, then you will become a burden to me. 2 Samuel 15:33

The Story
The building where I was to start my new job turned out to be one of those multiple office buildings with a common receptionist. With only a time and place to present myself, I stopped at the front desk.

"Morning, I'm Drebb."

"I'm so sorry for you," she stated with practiced concern, "the therapist has an appointment slot available in 20 minutes."

"Uh, no, I'm here to start my new job," I told her, "I need the office of the comptroller, I think."

She proceeded to tell me what the comptroller did and that no assistance with my condition could be had there, in fact her concern was that the functions of that office might even cause a decline in my mental health. Fortunately, I saw the building directory cunningly placed far off to the side where most folks would not think to look. On the third floor, just off the elevator, I found the main entrance to the Office of the Comptroller stated in understated gold lettering. I approached the receptionist for the office, a fine sharp looking young man, or so I thought until,

"Good morning, I'm Drebb."

"I'm so sorry, the receptionist at the main entrance can set up an appointment to get you help with that, sir."

Ach! Here we go again, I thought, wondering for the hundredth time what it might take to change my name to John, Jack, or something common like that.

The Message
We all have burdens to bear in this life. David told some guy who came to him that he would be the burden if he went on with him. Being a burden to our leader is not generally something we set out to do in life. Whether you have a burden or are the burden, Jesus gave to all a wonderful invitation: Come to Me!

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Matthew 11:28

Bucky

Come To The Shepherd

My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. John 10:27

So, you went to the city council saying, "Please let me represent the city in the Big Contest next week!" And they unanimously responded, "Please don't!" Come to the Shepherd, He needs sheep just like you to represent Him.

So, your skills in the company are held in such high regard that when you showed up to the Big Company Project saying, "Let me help you!", the entire project team suddenly found religion and prayed, "Lord help us!" Come to the Shepherd, He allows His sheep to help on all His projects.

So, you volunteered to lead the big thing at church, because you are such a great leader that you... turned around to find the entire congregation running the other way with surprising vigor. Come to the Shepherd and learn to follow Him. You and I may not be the great leader, or contest winner, or even any help at all to some, but we have a Good Shepherd who calls His sheep to lead us home.

To paraphrase the great president: The world will little note, nor long remember, how many times it rejected us, but it must never forget the Good Shepherd who died to save His sheep.

Bucky

A Thoughts Problem

Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Genesis 6:5

But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, “Why do you think evil in your hearts? Matthew 9:4

Just before the waters came down on a certain ark, the Lord noted a problem with the thoughts of His humans. A couple thousand or so years later, the Son of God noted a similar problem with some thoughts. While I can only speak for myself this morning, I can say that this thing remains a problem another couple thousand years down the road of time. There has been tons of religious effort expended over that span of time, and yet the problem persists. It would seem that we have gotten nowhere in all that time. Therefore it would appear to me that human effort does not hold the answer we need. Please, enter the New Testament of the Bible and meet God's answer to this conundrum of evil thoughts. The book of John is a great place to begin your seeking.

Peace and love to you in Christ our Savior,

Bucky

Remeberoializing Day

And when he observed him, he was afraid, and said, “What is it, lord?” So he said to him, “Your prayers and your alms have come up for a memorial before God.

Now you can see why they didn't let me make up the title for the holiday coming on Monday. I mean, other than the fact that on the first observance on May 30, 1868, my birth was still about 95 years away. Memorials in the Bible were established with the Law of Moses beginning in Exodus and continuing throughout the laws. In the Acts, a man named Cornelius had been praying, and it seems rather appropriate this weekend that this was an officer serving his country when word came to him that his prayers and alms had come up for a memorial before the Lord. While a person may not be able to afford alms, any of us could be among the poor who receive them instead, all of us can pray, and the word from the Lord says that those prayers are remembered. Another memorial that we can pray over is that greatest of loves, laying down ones life for friends. Out on the front lines, it can be difficult to see a sacrifice for such big things as nations and peoples, especially those far away. Much easier coming to mind are buddies, mates, and friends who are right there; and the possibility of the great sacrifice being called for. Mine was not called for in those days of my service, but for those who did pay that price we have Memorial Day. 

In case I am still without home Internet on Monday: Have a wonderful Memorial Day as you remember the sacrifice of those who died serving our great nation!

Bucky

Taking Up The Sword

And the rest were killed with the sword which proceeded from the mouth of Him who sat on the horse. And all the birds were filled with their flesh. Revelation 19:21

Welcome to the next Internet outage for Spring 2024! This time we will take some steps to confront this shameful state of service. By the verse I selected for today, you might be thinking of a call to the authorities to report impending violence. While I am a bit miffed to wake up to my Internet service being out once again, whacking them with a sword is not my intention. Taking up the sword of the word for us means to bring the good news of Jesus. Or, to defend ourselves from the attacks of those powers and principalities of this present darkness who are not flesh and blood, as Paul told us in Ephesians. You and I have quoted the word to others in our time, and I have never yet seen anyone bleed from it. Which makes that verse in the Revelation all the more interesting. The sword comes from His mouth, which sounds to us like that same sword of the word, and yet in that case armies are slain and carrion birds come to gorge. So, take up the sword of the word carefully with love and mercy. If slaying must come, let us leave it to Him who sat on the horse! 

So, from another place which thankfully has Internet service, glory to God our Father!

Bucky

Faith: Our Happy Cheerleader

When Jesus heard it, he marvelled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel.  Matthew 8:10

Good morning in the Lord Jesus Christ! There lives with us a certain happy cheerleader we must not take for granted. This cheerleader may appear small, but she can be held up to deflect the flaming darts of the evil one. Afraid you may drop her? No worries, this little cheerleader bounces back up for she is indestructible. Feel depressed and anxious, down on life in this world? Look with Faith to the Lord, for she is irrepressible. Based in our Lord Jesus, she will never leave you. Do not be fooled by her size though, for were she a seed she would grow to be the largest of trees. Feel sick of life this morning? Faith can make you whole in the Lord. Wherever you may go in this life, take your Faith with you. For we all could use Faith's happy cheer on any given day!

Faith in the Lord Jesus!

Bucky

Seasonal Times, Seasonal Purposes

To everything there is a season,
A time for every purpose under heaven.
  -- Ecclesiastes 3:1

The season of planting may be finished for southern farms or getting close to finished for those way up north. At that time of the year, farmers set up highly specialized machines costing several hundred thousand dollars, use them for a couple of weeks, and then put them up until the winter maintenance cycle arrives. However, for all that expense, the planter cannot do its work without a tractor that could cost upwards of a cool million dollars itself. And then there are the inputs: chemicals, seed, labor, fuel, and others. None of this gets the farmer a paycheck, that comes in a different season. If all of this sounds like an expensive gamble to you, there certainly is that element of farming since no one knows but God what the world will look like in a few months when the harvest season comes. Oh, and that expensive planter we started with... will be completely useless in the harvest season.

Solomon, the writer of Ecclesiastes lived thousands of years ago, but those seasons he saw still have their times and purposes. Praise God for the season!

Bucky

Of His Sheep

Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father’s name, they bear witness of Me. But you do not believe, because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you  John 10:25-26

The response in our verse for today came from a question rooted in unbelief. The Jews had asked Him, "How long do you keep us in doubt?" For those who believed in Jesus as the Messiah there could be no doubt: they were all ready for Him to conquer Israel and take up the kingship. So, yes, even those of the Jews who believed were not quite getting His message. We have the advantage of collected scriptures bearing the witness of those who saw Him and believed, and then understood later as He died on the cross and then rose again to new life. This incident recorded in John 10 might give us a pause as we consider what we might have wrong in our expectations of His second coming. As one of His sheep though, we get to let the Good Shepherd take care of all things pertaining to His return. 

The Lord's command to His sheep is to be ready. Perfect understanding of end times prophecy might elude us. Be of His sheep and be ready!

Bucky

Know The Good Shepherd

The hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the sheep. I am the good shepherd; and I know My sheep, and am known by My own. John 10:13-14

In our two verses for this morning we have a contrast between a keeper hired for the task and the shepherd who owns the sheep. In this lifetime, each of us has experienced the care of a shepherd or two who didn't really care all that much for the flock except for what they could do by way of working. You may even have worked in one of those places where the CEO-shepherd earned 400 times your rate of pay. Or you may enjoy following politics and know that to any of the President-shepherds you are but a vote on a tally or a number on a poll. Compare that to the Good Shepherd who is known by His sheep and knows each one of them personally. A President of our nation, exalted (or hated) though he may be, cannot possibly know each of the 330 million or so residents scattered about the place. But the Good Shepherd knows all of those and many more, and whether they belong to His flock or not.

Know the Good Shepherd, because He certainly knows you!

Bucky

A Chastening

And when He had said these things, one of the officers who stood by struck Jesus with the palm of his hand, saying, “Do You answer the high priest like that?”

Jesus answered him, “If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil; but if well, why do you strike Me?” John 18:22-23

We know this story: Jesus has been arrested, and the party arrives in front of the high priest where Jesus is questioned and in this case He gives an answer. And our Lord Jesus is slapped for it by an officer of the court. We may draw back in shock at someone striking our Lord, but did the man feel the presence of those 12 legions of angels standing by for our Lord's call? But no, the man lives and receives a chastening from the Lord Jesus. In other places and courts, Jesus gave no answer. What an honor of love for this officer to receive a chastening from our Lord! How do we know this to be His love in action? We have this: As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent. (Revelation 3:19).

Great and ever present was the love of our Lord Jesus in His trial,

Bucky

Hope Can't See It

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.  Romans 15:13

Hope has few instances in the gospel, only one in the NKJV and it isn't about the coming of Jesus. Of course it isn't! He was there. For thousands of years the hope had been for the arrival of the Messiah, but in the gospel accounts the hope of the ages had arrived. As Paul explains in another place in his letter to the Romans, one does not hope for what can be seen. Hope took a holiday while our Lord Jesus was here walking in the flesh. Now that He has ascended to sit beside the Father, we have hope once more in His return. Yes, as you can well see, hope means ya can't see or hold it yet. 

As Jesus told Thomas, blessed are those who have not seen, and yet have believed. Our hope grows by faith in Him!

Bucky

In Blame, Follow Him

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love.  Ephesians 1:3-4

In the New King James Version of the Bible it can be difficult to pull a shorter sentence out of one of Paul's mega-sentences. Now, was it the apostle or the translators who are to blame for this? Ah yes, blame, that giving of credit to the one who hurt us in hopes of inspiring guilt or shame. How well does that go with forgiveness? It seems that in blame we ought to follow our Lord Jesus, just as we do with forgiveness. If we would rather not be dumped into the vat of shame and guilt by way of blame, then perhaps we should not seek to apply the blame to others. And if we do not  have to worry about who to blame, then we can do as Paul wrote in another place and rejoice in the Lord always.

Rejoicing in the Lord today!

Bucky

We Believe That He Is!

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live.  John 11:25

We have met a few boasters in this life. There are those who boast of themselves, "I'm the greatest grasshopper slapper there ever was!" And those who boast of their family members, "My daddy invented sliced bread!" We may politely keep quiet, but we also know that those who said such things are not likely the greatest or that inventor who gave us convenient loaves of toast. However, there came to a Roman-occupied land in the 1st century a man who made such extraordinary statements about himself that few would even attempt to match them. This man made his statements, one of which is in our verse for today, in a land where any statement like that caused a whole bunch of people to reach for throwing rocks to stone the blasphemer to death. 

And so, we have to decide. Believe Him, and His extraordinary boasts become real to us. Reject him as a megalomaniac crackpot, and his statements are just ravings. Or, grab some throwing stones to silence the liar as many tried to do in his time. According to this Jesus, all we have to gain for that belief is eternal life. 

Love to you in Christ our Lord!

Bucky

How Quickly They Forgot

Is it a small thing that you have brought us up out of a land flowing with milk and honey, to kill us in the wilderness, that you should keep acting like a prince over us? Numbers 16:13

Brought us up out of?! How quickly they forgot that they were the ones who refused to enter that promised land! Moses runs into a bit of ingratitude here in our verse for today, and it would appear some willful memory lapsing. This incident may bring to mind something we have forgotten, someone to give thanks to perhaps. Or, we may be in the other position where someone refused advice or a gift, and then later blamed us for not having what was freely offered! That would hurt and we would know something of what God must have felt in this moment of ingratitude from the Israelites.

If the Lord promises, keep on believin'!

Bucky

How Was Your Weekend?

Therefore comfort and encourage one another with these words [concerning our reunion with believers who have died].  1 Thessalonians 4:18  Amplified Bible

This morning I will be asked more than once about my weekend. As I am one who tends to spend the weekend alone, it may be that people want to fill in the gap of those two days in their knowledge. Or, perhaps they are sociable people who await my changing to something more normal in their experience. Okay, they think I'm crazy and want to be the first to know when that final straw breaks the ol' camel for good. Whatever the reason, this little reunion each Monday morning is as nothing when compared to that reunion with the dearly departed we look for in Christ Jesus. One of the most comforting and encouraging of word sets to read comes in the verses preceding this one for today where Paul writes of that snatching away we know as the Rapture. 

Comfort for our reunion in Christ!

Bucky

He Came Anyway

Now at vintage-time he sent a servant to the vinedressers, that he might receive some of the fruit of the vineyard from the vinedressers. And they took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. Again he sent them another servant, and at him they threw stones, wounded him in the head, and sent him away shamefully treated. And again he sent another, and him they killed; and many others, beating some and killing some.  Mark 12:2-5

By the time we get to the verse with the many others, we have seen the pattern and might find it easy to fault this absent vineyard owner for not taking action other than doing the same thing repeatedly. Of course with a bit of consideration, we can see that those servants killed would not be able to send word back and so the owner might think they had run off or gotten lost. The empty-handed one may have been too embarrassed to return to his master, and the one wounded in the head unable to make sense even if he was able to return. But all of that useless fault-finding would be to our shame since the actual fault lies with those vinedressers no matter how many servants the landlord sends. If we as the readers of this story try to find fault with anyone other than the tenants committing those heinous acts, then we are like the boss who wrote up his murdered employee for dereliction of duty! 

Praise God that His Son, knowing well what had happened to the prophets He had sent, volunteered to come and save us anyway. 

Bucky

Happy...National Day Of Prayer!

Nevertheless we made our prayer to our God, and because of them we set a watch against them day and night.  Nehemiah 4:9

As my birthday comes in the early days of May, and the National Day of Prayer comes on the first Thursday of that month, every few years I enjoy the privilege of those coming together for a special day of prayer. On those days, I like to ask for a birthday present of prayer. Pray for someone who has hurt you. Pray for our nation and its many disagreements. Pray for one another and pray for your beloved ones. Get with God and pray. 

This verse fits us well today, or maybe it doesn't? For example, one of the times each day I make my prayers to God comes in the late evening and then I fall asleep. In the trying time Nehemiah faced rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, they made their prayer and then set a watch, day and night. Circumstances may not allow for praying and then relaxing in sleep, but call for praying and then taking action. 

Praise God for all the times that bring us to prayer!

Bucky

Holding An Expectation?

Now his father and mother did not know this was from the LORD, who wanted the Philistines to provide an opportunity for a confrontation. At that time, the Philistines were ruling Israel.  Judges 14:4

A lot to unpack in this verse today. We can easily see the parallel with a Philistine occupied Israel then and a Roman controlled Judea later. We read of a couple of people who did not know the Lord had something going on behind the scenes. And then we find out this is from the story of Samson, a man who had strength that even professional athletes do not have in this age. And when it came to combat, Samson was a killer without peer. And that is where our parallel goes off the rails, you might say. For to Judea came the Lord's Savior, but He acted quite differently than Samson, a savior of Israel in that earlier time. And, steeped in the stories of Samson, Gideon, David, and other warrior-type saviors of the past, Judea (Israel) failed to recognize Jesus as their Savior. Jesus didn't do what they expected of Him. 

So...what are you and I looking for this day from Jesus? Are we holding an expectation when He has a better way? It may be, let Him do His thing!

Bucky