Grundy's Blog

"But if not, be it know to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up." (Daniel 3:16-18) Most Sunday-schoolers know the story. Shadrach, Meschach, and Abnego are commanded by King Nebuchadnezzar to fall down and worship the golden image, and if they choose not fall down and worship, they will be cast into a burning furnace. The three men presumably had led normal lives, loyal to their livelihood. But now they are faced with a test of loyalty. "On one side of the equation was position family, wealth, security, life itself; and on the other side there was God."  This was the hardest test of loyalty to God that they had ever faced. The men must have gone through mental gymnastics in deciding which to choose. Do I choose to obey Yahweh, or do I choose security and family? What will it matter if I choose to bow to the golden image? Is loyalty to God more important than my own life? In John Lennox's commentary on...

"Be still, and know I am God." —Psalm 46:10 We live anxiety-ridden lives. I look at the world and wonder,  how can I live a life of peace in a world permeated with fear, hate, arrogance, divisiveness, greed, racism, famine, and licentiousness? How can I be someone who exudes God's peace? How can I "calm and quiet my soul?" (Psalm 131). The answer begins with humility, "...the acceptance of our limited lives,. When we move low, back toward the soil from which we from which we can learn the lessons of our true humility, [then] we are able to enter a kind of peace." (Sutterfield, Wendell Berry and the Given Life ). There is as St. Augustine writes in The City of God , "the peace of all things is the tranquility of order" (Book XIX, Ch. 13). We are at peace when the "creature lives as a creature, the human as a human, God as God, and all are in proper relationship with one another" (Sutterfield 20-21).  In other words, peace is the r...

"What does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?" —Micah 6:8 The plastic tree is stored, the plastic candles are shelved, the entangled Christmas lights are crammed into illegal paper bags.  The Christmas season is sadly over, but as much as I enjoy December's bacchanalian  festivities, there is a part of me that finds the traditional final day of the Christmas season—New Year's Day—nearly as exciting. Closure brings forth newness : new friendships, new joy, new goals, new surprises, new growth, new liturgies.   Some of my friends contend that my personality reminds them of Alan Milne's old, depressed, grey donkey Eeyore (would you be happy if your tail was detachable and had a pink bow wrapped around it?)  But on New Year's Day, I feel more like the beloved, bouncing Tigger. New Years is throwing away that old stretched-out, tattered, fuzzy sweater and putting on a new, no fuzz, day-after sale ...

Haggai 2:6-9 (ESV) For thus says the Lord of hosts: “Yet once more, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land. And I will shake all nations, so that the treasures of all nations shall come in, and I will fill this house with glory,” says the Lord of hosts. “The silver is mine, and the gold is mine,” declares the Lord of hosts. “The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former,” says the Lord of hosts. “And in this place I will give peace,” declares the Lord of hosts. The book of Haggai was written to those who had returned from Babylonian to rebuild the destroyed temple of God. It was an encouragement and a call to rebuild amidst rubble, hope despite desolation, and believe even during times of hardship and disappointment. In verses 6 to 9, Haggai spoke of a time to come when the world would be shaken up as it had never been shaken before. Ironically, this was intended to be a co...

Longing It is right for me to feel this way about you, since I have you in my heart, for whether I am in chains, or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God’s grace with me, God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Jesus Christ. Longing for something is much more than just wanting something.   Longing is primal, a craving, a hungering.   Longing is not being able to live without whatever the object of my longing is.   In a the documentary, Nothing Left Unsaid , a nostalgic Gloria Vanderbilt shares with her son (CNN’s Anderson Cooper) that for all of her ninety-five years, she has achingly longed for a home. She was raised by nannies away from her divorced mother who resided in Paris.   After a few years of living in a mansion on the east coast, she was sent to live with her aunt.   Then back to the nanny. Then back to her mother. Then back to the nanny. Her life was a never-ending transition.   Vanderbil...

Loving My Enemies You have heard that it was said, "You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy." But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you in order that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax-gatherers do the same? And if you greet your brothers only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. Matthew 5:43-48 Man oh man, Lord, how can I ever love my enemies? You are asking the impossible. It’s much easier to love those who believe and live as I do.   It’s much easier to hate my enemies, not love them.   Like Linus in the Peanuts cartoon strip says, “I love mankind, it’s people I can’t stand.” In other words, I love everyone, except for th...

When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought, ‘Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it…. This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.’”(Genesis 28:16,17, NIV). “When Jacob awoke from his sleep…” There is more than one form of sleep. I sleep when a valuable friendship disintegrates, I sleep while a brother or sister in Christ battles sickness, I sleep while my next door neighbor fights for his marriage, I sleep when Jesus prompts me to pray, I sleep while my missionary friends are overcome with loneliness. I sleep too often. And if you are anything like me, when I sleep, I become spiritually draggy.   This can go on for weeks, even months.   But our loving God will not allow me to stay in this place: “He awakens me from my sleep.” I am struck by the phrase…”and I was not aware of it.” How often am I not aware that the Lord in “this place.” He is here, with me. Better yet, He is in me.   When I sleep, He is in me; when I wee...