Fall Creek Christian Church

"Then the Lord said to Moses,'Tell Aaron and his sons to bless the people of Israel with this special blessing: May the Lord bless you and protect you. May the Lord smile on you and be gracious to you. May the Lord show you his favor and give you his peace. Whenever Aaron and his sons bless the people of Israel in my name, I myself will bless them." Numbers 6:22-27 On the eve of my wedding day, my father gave me the greatest gift a son can receive. The rehearsal dinner was coming to an end and my dad stood up to speak. In just a few short minutes, he gave me what every son longs for from his father - his blessing. Publicly, he claimed me as his own. He honored my choices with his approval and spoke confidently of my ability to see them through. He gave me wings. God knew how important blessing was and is. Out of love, he wanted to give his blessing to his people. He chose to use the visible and audible blessing of the priests to be the transport for hi...

“...Saul realized his troops were rapidly slipping away. So he demanded, "Bring me the burnt offerings and the peace offerings!" And Saul sacrificed the burnt offering himself. Just as Saul was finishing with the burnt offering, Samuel arrived. Saul went out to meet him and welcomed him, but Samuel said, "What is this you have done?"..."  I Samuel 13:8-11 1-2-3, spin the ball, shoot. Turn the cap inside out. One practice swing then hit. We see it all the time in sports. Rituals. Attempts by players to get in the zone or by fans to send some magical positive energy to their team through the flatscreen. In the context of sports, it's harmless fun. However, this ritual for outcomes isn't always a harmless proposition. In our verses for today, we see King Saul in trouble. He had been told to wait for Samuel the prophet and priest, but he was overwhelmed with fear. In his panic, he made the decision to make the offerings Samuel was supposed to make. His logi...

"But because my servant Caleb has a different spirit and follows me wholeheartedly, I will bring him into the land he went to, and his descendants will inherit it."   Numbers  14:24 In the too few moments in my life where I could honestly say, "I got it right", each one would have a connection point with God's instructions.  I have never experienced regret, guilt or shame when I chose to trust and obey God.  I am unable to recall any time when I did not obey God and left feeling good about it. In Numbers 14, we find a man named Caleb who got it right.  God told Moses to send some men to explore the land which he was about to give to the Israelites.  Ten of them decided to change the mission.  They decided it was their job to determine whether or not it was a good idea to take possession of the land or not, essentially disregarding God's instructions.  They got it wrong and it cost them their lives.  Caleb, however, was firmly fixed on one que...

"What's more, the scriptures looked forward to this time when God would accept the Gentiles, too, on the basis of their faith.  God promised this good news to Abraham long ago when he said, 'All nations will be blessed through you.'  And so it is: All who put their faith in Christ share the same blessing Abraham received because of his faith."  Galatians 3:8-9 After dousing the fire out with cups of water, we all stood there looking at the van with the same question racing through our minds, "So ... now what?"  The options didn't feel like good ones as we stood on the side of the road with ten hours of driving ahead of us and our fully loaded vehicle still smoking.  After two phone calls, we found ourselves towed to a wonderfully kind family's garage with a highly trained mechanic friend of my family giving us the green light to head on home.  What an amazing blessing they all were to us! In our scripture today, Paul is extremely excited abou...