by NINA BROWN
Member, Third Church of Christ, Scientist

Healthcare is a subject described by multiple opinions, but it is a personal choice. Today there are many healthcare options available. I grew up in a family where spiritual healing through prayer was consistently, effectively and lovingly practiced. It had proven to be the most effective healing method in my parents’ lives before my sister and I were born. Here is one example, from among many experienced by my family, of effective spiritual healing through prayer:

My sister and I often rode our bikes through the subdivision with our friends. One Saturday morning Erika was in hurry to go on a ride with her friends and she left her shoes in the house. A few minutes after she went out, Dad and I heard a very loud scream followed by a crash.

Dad knew it was my sister, so he raced out to the street and scooped her up in his arms and moved her bike out of the street. She had gotten her foot tangled in the spokes and it looked pretty bad. Dad cleaned the wound and wrapped it with cloth as he spoke to her of God’s tender love for her. Dad prayed for her and continued to reassure her of God’s goodness and love. In less than an hour my sister was running up the stairs to head back outside and the cloth fell off, revealing her foot with no sign of injury. Dad helped her put her shoes on and she headed out to play.

This showed me the practical and immediate effectiveness of spiritual healing through prayer and is an example of why I am grateful that this system of healing was available for our family’s use. Even today I find this system of spiritual healing effective in my life.

I enjoy reading the Bible to find inspiration and examples of spiritual healing where people turned to God in prayer and found immediate help. Jesus healed many people and taught that the healings he did his followers could do also. This healing of my sister’s foot showed me this was true and agrees with another book I study, “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” where the author, Mary Baker Eddy, writes, “The Bible contains the recipe for all healing.”

What a joy to know that effective spiritual healing through prayer is available to everyone at any time and in any circumstance.

by PASTOR MARK W. LOVE
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church

As people who live with so much information and so much informed information provided by commentators and interpreters of anything and everything of our world, we are also a people left to decide whose version, interpretation and commentary of the facts are the truth. Our society today denies that there is one truth by which all things can be judged—there are only interpretations of it.

While this can be a hassle, many people like it because it allows them to pick and choose those “versions of truth” that permit them to have what they want. In short: “Getting or keeping what I want or think is right will determine what is ‘truth’ for me.” Variations of truth and the acceptance of them are both born of selfishness. We only have to go to Adam and Eve to see this one real truth. There was God’s truth and Satan’s “version of truth”—selfishness led them to accept the “version of truth,” which is NO truth at all, that gave them what they wanted.

Another important reason why we like to be able to pick and choose “versions of truth” is that the real and unyielding truth makes demands of us and it will always cost us something. Just as a person will adopt a certain “version of truth” to obtain something, this same person will also adopt the same or another “version of truth” to retain something. Consider the people who say, “It is such a big problem and I’m just one person, there is nothing I can do.” This “version of truth” allows them to obtain an excuse for their lack of participation, and it also allows them to retain their time, energy and money for their own use.

The unbeliever uses the “version of truth” that says “religion is all a matter of interpretation, there is no way to know the truth.” This “version of truth” provides the individual with a reason not to listen or study the Word of God, and it has also allowed him or her to retain his or her ungodly life.

In His high priestly prayer, Jesus asked God the Father to “sanctify them by the truth, your word is truth.” With these words, Jesus declared to all who would call themselves Christians, that God’s Word is truth for them in their lives. With this, the Christian has one real truth in God’s Word to guide and govern their lives.

Since this is the case, why is that so many Christians treat the Word of God as if it were a collection of “versions of truth” from which they can pick and choose? Answer:  For the same reason they pick and choose from the “versions of truth” in the world—it enables them to obtain or retain something they want—something the real and whole truth of God will not allow them to have. It goes back to Adam and Eve: they exchanged the real and whole truth of God for a “version of truth” that would allow them to obtain something (wisdom and food) and still retain their life.

St. Paul explains why people exchange the one real and whole truth of God for other “versions of truth” in the beginning of Romans. “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served created things rather then the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen,” Romans 1:25.

Churches do the same thing. If standing by the one truth might offend or cause us to lose a member—alter it or twist it so that you can create a new version of it that won’t offend! This is called heresy. Such churches set aside that part of the Great Commission that says “teaching them everything I have commanded you.”

In the midst of the wholesale exchanging of the one and whole truth of God for “versions” of it, we find a clear direction through this evil, in the teaching of Jesus as He spoke to the woman at the well and to us. “…a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and  truth , for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth,” John 4:23-24.

Jesus makes it clear to all who would call themselves Christian that there can be NO “versions of truth”; only the one truth of God. When Jesus was before Pilate, He told us how we can know whether we are dealing with the truth of God, “Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.” The church or individual that listens only to the whole message of Jesus, from Genesis to Revelation, will always be on the side of the one real truth.

With these words to Pilate, Jesus tells us who is on the side of God’s truth: those that listen to Him. This is the way of faith for the individual or a church body, if they “rejoice with the truth,” I Cor. 13:6. It is not an easy course but it is one that is begun each day with the prayer of the Psalmist: “Into your hands I commit my spirit; redeem me, O Lord, the God of truth,” Psalms 31:5. May God grant us to listen to Him who is “the way and the truth and the life” for ”no one comes to the Father except by him,” John 14:6.

by REV. ROBERT ECKERT
Courtland-Oakfield United Methodist Church

“…the Lord wasn’t in the wind… the Lord wasn’t in the earthquake… the Lord wasn’t in the fire… After the fire, there was a sound. Thin. Quiet,” from 1 Kings 19:11-12, Common English Version.

Hebrew scripture tells the story of a prophet named Elijah, a man who zealously advocated on behalf of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob at a time in the history of ancient Israel when its king and queen, Ahab and Jezebel, zealously advocated on behalf of the idol-god Baal. More than different perspectives on the mysteries of life, this was a struggle for the hearts and minds of the people of Israel, a conflict of ideologies that turned violent with Ahab and Jezebel killing prophets of God and Elijah killing prophets of Baal. When Elijah feared that the next clash with the king and queen would be the one that would cost him his life, he ran into the desert to hide and eventually holed up in a cave on Mt. Horeb, described in the story as “God’s mountain.”

While in the cave Elijah heard a voice that he identified as God asking, “Why are you here?” as in, “What the heck are you doing here?”

Elijah reminded God of his passionate service on God’s behalf, then summarized the current status of the campaign: “They have torn down your altars, and they have murdered your prophets with the sword. I’m the only one left, and now they want to take my life too!”

The voice told Elijah to go out of the cave and stand on the mountain, “The Lord is passing by.”

Elijah must have felt that he’d gone from the frying pan into the fire. It wasn’t enough that Ahab and Jezebel wanted him dead, now he had to answer directly to God. He was frightened, ashamed, alone, and likely expecting the worst. And he got it—a strong wind blew that tore apart rocks—God must have really been angry, but wait, “the Lord wasn’t in the wind.” Then an earthquake and then a fire, but the Lord wasn’t in either of those. Finally after all the pyrotechnics, “a sound. Thin. Quiet.” Some translations say “a still, small voice.”

In the midst of Elijah’s fear and self-recriminations the Lord passed by in stillness, offering peace, comfort and direction.

Do you ever find yourself in situations where you feel that you have failed, where you’ve boxed yourself into a corner, where events haven’t turned out as planned and you have no clue what to do next? I do. Have you ever felt isolated, detached and afraid because of it? I have. There are times when we don’t even want to show our faces because we expect, and believe we deserve, the worst.

But in those circumstances the Lord is not in the wind, earthquake or fire. God doesn’t huff and puff and blow our houses down; God doesn’t shake the foundations of what little sense of security we have left; God doesn’t respond to our shortcomings with a scorched earth policy. Rather, as parents feel compassion for their children, that’s how the Lord feels compassion for us; God knows how we are made and remembers that we are just dust, that we are fragile (Psalm 103).

I heard that thin sound, that still small voice recently in the advice of a friend who showed me how I could turn feelings of animosity for someone into an opportunity to extend grace. Whether it’s in the meditations of your own mind or heart, in sacred texts, or in fellowship with someone who loves you, may you, too, experience the tenderness of God’s love for you, even when you are struggling to love yourself.

by PASTOR MICHAEL CISLER
North Kent Bible Church

Our late winter and early spring have been very interesting this year. We had very little snowfall in February and record-breaking highs for March temperatures. Yet, April has brought its usual strong storms. Last week I picked up sticks for about 30 minutes following the strong winds that came through. Some have been awakened in the night from the thunder and lightening. Even as I write this, it is dark and rainy outside. These dark days and violent storms that come through are a lot like life itself.

We can have large periods of time, months, years, even decades when most everything is going very well. However, all of that can change so quickly. Health issues can arise in our lives, the lives of our parents, or worse yet, the lives of our children. A steady job with a steady income can be lost overnight, or over the course of a three-minute visit to somebody’s office. Life itself can be lost in an instant. These storms of life and others like them are real and they affect people in our community often.

This is the part where I include a Bible verse that ties it all up so it’s rainbows at the end. Well, the truth is, sometimes these storms last a long time and life is really hard. Please don’t get me wrong, I believe that the Bible is God’s Word and that it speaks to our lives in real ways. I believe, and have experienced, that a single verse, or even a few words from a verse, can give us hope, encouragement, strength, and can help us face these storms of life for another day (e.g. Psalm 23:4, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me).

I also believe that as Christians, there is almost always more that we can do. Offering a Scripture verse can be a great blessing to individuals as they traverse the storms of life. How much more of a blessing to offer the Scripture AND spend time with them, listening to them, sitting with them, being with them, helping physically when we can, or praying with them… with each other?

Hopefully as we encounter life’s storms we will rely on God and those people He has put in our lives. As you are that support for those who are in times of difficulty, give of the strength and hope that God has given you, not only in word but in deed and in your time with them as well.

The book “Unbroken” by Laura Hilenbrand, captures perfectly what it means to live a long, prosperous life.

Louis Zamperini was a rebellious youth who found his gift in running. He was fast! Dashing records in the mile in high school, college at USC, and became the U.S. hopeful for Olympic gold. Until WWII broke out, and Louis would put his running career on hold to serve our country as a bomber in the Air Force. A perilous military assignment, to say the least, and after surviving several close calls, his B-24 bomber was shot down over the Pacific. Most of his crew were killed at impact, but Louis and two other servicemen survived.

On a small raft adrift for over 2,000 miles with no food or water. Minimal rain and the occasional raw fish barely kept the men alive. The raft was a magnet for sharks, who constantly circled it, even lunging up onto its sides in attack.

After 47 days, death was imminent, so Louis prayed in desperation: “God if you save me, I will dedicate the rest of my life to serving you.” The immediate answer seemed cruel as he was captured by the Japanese and placed in a prison camp. His wiry athletic frame wasted away, dropping from 150 to just over 70 pounds. One prison guard, nicknamed “The Bird,” stalked him and beat him every day. For two-and-a-half years, Louis was verbally assaulted, starved and beaten, but he was never broken. Then, the war ended.

Post-War life wasn’t any easier for Louis. He had deep-seeded resentment toward the Japanese, became a raging alcoholic, struggled with his marriage, and had no money. Then, in 1949 he heard a young preacher named Billy Graham. The message was simply: “For God so loved the world that he gave his son Jesus.” Then Louis remembered that prayer on the raft. He gave his life to the Lord, and immediately felt the peace that had eluded him. He found instant relief from the addictions and went on a mission to forgive his enemies.

I think it would be more accurate to label the book “Broken,” because that’s what Louis really was. And that’s exactly the kind of life God delights in is “a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart,” (Psalm 51:17).

This week, as you think about your life, your prison camp, your raft, your “unbroken” messed-up life, think also about the love of God that reaches out, and offer God your life. He is more than ready for you!

by PASTOR DICK RILEY
Rockford United Methodist Church

The day of Easter came and went this past Sunday, but the celebration of Easter is something that can happen all year long! Easter, you see, is an historical even, but it’s even more than that. Easter is also a celebration of Christ’s victory over sin and death, but it’s even more than that! Easter is really about an attitude. In fact, it’s about four different attitudes:

1. Easter is an attitude toward life. The disciples were convinced, following the resurrection, that they could turn the world upside-down—that nothing could stop them. Why? Because they knew—they had experienced—that Jesus Christ was alive—risen from the dead—and because that was true, nothing that they proposed would be impossible. Easter is the conviction that, because Christ lives, I too, through faith in Him, shall also live! What a great attitude toward life!

2. Easter is also an attitude toward death. We all know that death is real, but the Bible teaches us—and in Easter, we celebrate—that death is not final; it is not the Last Word in our lives. Life, true and abundant life, is available to all through our faith in Him who rose from the dead on that Easter morning. What a great attitude toward death!

3. Easter is also an attitude toward the future. Christians know that Easter is a foretaste of what the world ought to be—a foretaste of the Final Victory over death and despair, over hatred and hostility, over pain and poverty, and over sin and sadness. What a great attitude toward the future!

4. Easter is, finally, an attitude toward God, being aware, as Mary was in the Garden that Easter morning, of that Unseen Presence—that Holy Presence—in our lives, and knowing that He will always be there, with us and for us! What a great attitude to have toward God!

I encourage you to worship this week in the church of your choice, and continue celebrating our Easter attitudes!

by PASTOR SCOTT SWIX
Hope Community Church

A couple of years ago there was a wonderful animated movie called “Up” in which a house is carried away by thousands of helium balloons to take the old man and the young scout on an adventure. No one balloon could do it, but put enough together… and you could fly.

The idea of each of those balloons helping lift the house is a bit similar to how the words we choose and use help lift our relationships with others and help them fly—or drag them back down to the ground. Think of each caring, loving, encouraging word as one of the balloons. It provides lift. Each negative word, each insult, each put-down, each word of anger drags the relationship back into the mud again. What’s worse, studies have shown that negative words weigh more than loving words lift up. Seems that we remember those mean words longer. It takes 10 words of encouragement to balance one harsh one; sometimes even more than that, depending on what was said. It’s hard to believe and trust the nice things someone says if we keep hearing nasty ones as well.

Well, there’s lots of wisdom in keeping our tongues in check and our words to ourselves. The Bible’s book of Proverbs is full of great advice and reminders of the damage that harsh words cause and the benefits of loving ones, such as 12:18, “Reckless words pierce like a sword but the tongue of the wise brings healing,” and 16:23, “A wise man’s heart guides his mouth,” which are just two of many.

Jesus reminds us that what comes out of our mouths really defines us. But in this electronic age it isn’t just the spoken word. One on one, live, we can have enough trouble. Texting and instant messaging appear to make us choose worse words—the person isn’t right there with us, and folks say things that they wouldn’t say in person.

Verbal bullying in online social media is another example, where blogging and website “comment” sections take it even further. Reviews of these remote and often anonymous electronic forums show them often full of extremely judgmental, disrespectful and insulting responses—all to people we don’t really even know.

Much of our current culture exhibits and almost encourages shouting-down and insults that destroy effective communication and relationships. And in so doing, we alienate others and isolate ourselves. We often don’t realize how our own words have made our own lives worse.

The alternative really is “loving words”—consciously, intentionally, shared words of encouragement, thanks, and appreciation—even for folks that disagree with us. These build others up, and in so doing also build our relationships with them. Working on the habit of sharing loving words is important in every family, between spouses and between parents and kids, and at work and school. In the end, that really is one of God’s great goals and dreams for us: to have healthy and loving relationships with each other.

by PASTOR DICK RILEY
Rockford United Methodist Church

A pastor from Atlanta once said that it always bothered him in a track meet when the runners were running the hurdles and would knock one or two of the hurdles down. He said that he felt as if they should go back and straighten up the hurdles they had knocked over. He said that if his mother were coaching the team, she would certainly make the runners go back and straighten up the knocked-over hurdles! It was important to her, you see, that the runners leave things “neat and in order” for the next runners.

“But,” said the pastor, “hurdlers who win the gold medals don’t look back. They ignore the fallen hurdles and just keep on running to the finish line.”

I don’t know if the Apostle Paul ever ran the hurdles in a race, but I do know that he understood one of the basic principles of Christian living. He wrote: “I am still not all that I should be, but I am focusing all of my energies on this one thing: forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead. I strain to reach the end of the race and receive the prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us,” (Phil. 3:13-14).

As Christians, we are called to continually grow in our personal relationship with Jesus Christ, and the only way that that is possible is for us to accept the grace of God’s holy forgiveness which He offers us through our faith in Christ our Lord. This will set us free from all of our failures of the past.

As we begin this new year of 2011, my prayer for all of us is that we will accept the grace that Christ provides so that we can quit worrying about our mistakes and failures, and, instead, focus on our growing and personal relationship with Him. You see, when grace and growth are the driving forces of our lives, we can be sure that we will truly have a happy new year!

by PASTOR SCOTT SWIX
Hope Community Church, Rockford

The year 2012 is here! The world did not end in 2011 as some predicted. Though others are convinced the Mayan calendar, Nostradamus, Biblical prophecy and other signs assure us that this year is the last year. Well, perhaps. But I’d not bet on it. That’d be a silly bet anyway, wouldn’t it? If you’re right, and you win, you can’t collect.

So how do we live in this new year of slowly improving economy, a world of great change? With European crisis, Arab Spring, global warming, Lions winning, China ascending, presidential elections, Washington gridlock (oops, sorry, that’s not new) and on and on, what are we to do?

Be faithful. Live as though Christ shall return tomorrow. And as though he won’t. Live faithfully. A faithful Christ-like life is lived the same way, either way. Love God and others, care, forgive, share the good news of the Gospel, give generously. Change a life for the better—our own, and others’. Live in the joy of the holy present moment while prudently considering the future that may come. But do not worry about it, or ignore it. Remember the past, but do not dwell upon it either. We cannot change it, nor can we recapture it.

Be faithful. That’s mostly an internal thing. Focus on becoming what God is calling us to be, and less on making others into what we think God expects them to be. Concentrate on our blessings, and less on all the things we want or think we need, and we’ll find more joy and contentment and less anxious depression.

Be faithful. Martin Luther said, “Even if I knew that the world would end tomorrow, I would still plant an apple tree today.”

Take care of what we have, and use it wisely, for one day or for many, for we may need it for a very long time.

It is a new year. Live it!

by REV. LAURIE TENHAVE-CHAPMAN
First Congregational Church, Rockford

As I walked my dog around the lake in temperatures nearing 50 degrees, I thought back to the headliner forecasts in November. “Harsh Winter Ahead” the meteorologists warned from the newspaper, broadcast studio and Internet news. I remember thinking, “How do they know?” If the 10-day prediction is a guess and the next-day forecast is seldom right, then how can they offer a broad brushstroke prediction for a whole season? “What do they know indeed?” I snorted as I walked on soft soil in early January. (But I knocked on the wood of a nearby tree to make sure!)

People like to make predictions and are heralded as true seers when they get it right. Particularly as a new year looms before us, prophets of all stripes are apt to cast their verdict for how reality will shape up the next 12 months. Most of us do not hasten to read the predictions of Jean Dixon or those who have taken over for her in recent years. We’ve learned that envisioning the future is of limited value.

What we hopefully have learned is that God alone holds the future. Our best investment of time and energy is in a spiritual life that helps us to know and trust more and more deeply the God who created this Earth in which the snow falls, the storms squall and the sun shines. What we know for sure is that we will have moments of great joy in 2012, surprising beginnings and unexpected endings. There will be losses both great and small, some emotional, some financial, others relational. Through all this we have to know what remains constant. Trust in anyone or anything other than the God who knows and loves us would be misplaced. The Bible describes God as an anchor, a rock, a redeemer, a refuge, a fortress that protects us from enemies. The Bible also says that God is love.

So take that walk around the lake as long as you can. Snap on your cross-country skis when snow blankets the ground. When the storms force you to hibernate and your kids get their long-awaited snow day, reflect on the One who provides for your every need. Whatever each day brings, invite God to walk with you, to direct your paths and you will not be rocked by the ups and downs of life. Trust God and you will know deep contentment in the new year.