Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam

“What is a sunbeam?” you ask.

Well, just in case it’s been too long since you sang this song, here are the words (I’ll admit I only remembered the first verse):

 “Jesus wants me for a sunbeam,
To shine for Him each day;
In every way try to please Him,
At home, at school [at work], at play.
Refrain:
A sunbeam, a sunbeam,
Jesus wants me for a sunbeam;
A sunbeam, a sunbeam,
I’ll be a sunbeam for Him.
Jesus wants me to be loving,
And kind to all I see;
Showing how pleasant and happy,
His little one can be.
I will ask Jesus to help me
To keep my heart from sin;
Ever reflecting His goodness,
And always shine for Him.
I’ll be a sunbeam for Jesus,
I can if I but try;
Serving Him moment by moment,
Then live for Him on high.”[1]

(You can thank me later for getting that song stuck in your head.)

Well, so much for my plan to show up for church every week, sit in my spot, doze through the sermon and then go home to take a nap…now I’m supposed to be a sunbeam? What does that mean, anyway?

I’m thinking that a sunbeam is a blessing or an encouragement, does that sound right to you?

“Are you, with your whole soul, might, mind, and strength, loving and serving God in blessing others around you by leading them to the Light of the world?” (E.G. White, Testimony Treasures, Volume 2, page 188)

I know what you’re thinking. “That sounds like a full time job! I don’t have time for that.” or “How can I be a blessing to others when my life is still a mess?” But I think that we let Satan tell us that stuff when being a blessing (a sunbeam) is not one big thing we do, it’s a piece of everything we do.

One author talks about the moment she figured that out. 

“For years I never felt I measured up to all I thought the Lord wanted me to be, or all I thought I should be. Satan convinced me that since I wasn't "perfect," I had no right to minister to others. Then one day, my children brought me a bouquet of flowers they had picked. I hugged each child with joy. As I tried to arrange the flowers in a vase, I discovered my children had picked no stems, just blossoms. I laughed--I had been blessed with their gift of love, however imperfect. It was then I realized we don't have to be perfect to be a blessing. We are asked only to be real, trusting in Christ's perfection to cover our imperfection”.[2]

What a relief, right? One of the drawbacks, though, is that being a blessing is something that we have to do consciously, it’s probably not going to happen on its own, or ever our own. We have to have asked for God’s help to be a blessing to the people we meet.

I just got an email today that had a list of “random acts of kindness,” that look a whole lot like people being sunbeams. There was the Subway restaurant that welcomes the homeless for a free meal every Friday; the older couple who pays for the meal of a young couple trying to eat out with a one-year-old; the dollar bill taped to the snack machine with the note saying, “Your snack is on me. Enjoy your day.” There’s a mailman who drops encouraging notes into random mailboxes as he does his mail route and the person who left the money for another person’s parking ticket on their windshield. And then there’s this:

“The Crimson Tide’s starting kicker missed three field goals during the game, then was yanked with one second remaining in favor of redshirt freshman Adam Griffith, who ended up missing the 57-yard field goal that was returned 109 yards for a Tigers game-winning touchdown.
Foster received threats and horrible, awful messages on Twitter. His teammates stuck up for him though.”

You know that it was a really tough time for that kicker…death threats? really? over a college football game? Anyway, two and a half weeks after that horrible game, Cade Foster posted a picture of a very special letter he’d received on the social website, Instagram.

The letter said, 

“Dear Cade (#43), Life has its setbacks. I know! However you will be a stronger human with time. I wish you all the best – Sincerely – another 43 George Bush.”[3]

Those things only took a second or two and made so much difference for the recipients. Just knowing that someone else noticed you and cared enough to let you know they noticed is huge! It just takes a little thought and the willingness to respond to a nudge from the Holy Spirit.

Sometimes thought, I think it’s easier to do those kinds of things for strangers than it is to encourage people we know. Have you ever noticed that? We can smile and make a joke with the person at the cash register to brighten their day, but we don’t have anything nice to say to someone in our office, at church, or in our own family. We’re quick to criticize the people closest to us. They are often the people who need our encouragement the most.

“And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” Hebrews 10:25-26

As “the Day” approaches, what can we be doing for those closest to us to encourage them as we wait for Jesus to return? How can we make sure that they know that they matter to us? that we want to see them in Heaven? that we want to help them along the way?

Instead of criticizing, let’s encourage; instead of gossiping, let’s bless; instead of tearing down, let’s build up.

“I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Ephesians 4:1-3

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[1] Nellie Talbot and Edwin O. Excell, Jesus wants me for a Sunbeam,  1851-1921

[2] Gigi Graham Tchividjian, "Heart to Heart," Today's Christian Woman.

[3] Zac Ellis, Alabama kicker Cade Foster receives handwritten note from George W. Bush, Sports Illustrated Campus Union, http://college-football.si.com/2013/12/11/cade-foster-george-w-bush-note/

Sportin a tude

“I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:” Deuteronomy 30:19

Isn’t that interesting?  Life and death mirrors blessing and cursing in that verse.  Do you think that means that if we choose a negative attitude – an attitude of cursing – that we also choose death?  That seems awfully harsh.  But a little research told me that in the Bible the word ‘rejoice’ comes up 240 times while ‘grieve ’ only got 47 hits.  I know that’s not an exhaustive study, but it tells me that the writers of the Bible spent more time telling us to be joyful than to be sad.  But doesn’t that seem a little artificial?  I mean, if I walk around acting happy all the time, aren’t folk going to think I’ve got some reality impairment? 

But have you ever noticed a person who walks around acting grumpy all the time?  Nobody thinks there’s anything wrong with him (or her).  That person might even describe himself as a ‘realist’ while I, the person acting happy, am often described as ‘having my head in the clouds’, or not facing the truth, or a nut-job.  Hm, what’s up with that?

So what do we do with verses like James 1:2   

“Reckon it nothing but joy, my brethren, whenever you find yourselves hedged in by various trials.”Weymouth New Testament; “But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy.” 1Peter 4:13; Romans 12:12, “Rejoicing in hope, persevering in tribulation, devoted to prayer…Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse”; “Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations:” 1Peter 1:6; and 2Corinthians 7:4 “Great is my boldness of speech toward you, great is my glorying of you: I am filled with comfort, I am exceeding joyful in all our tribulation.”? 

Okay, now that’s just crazy, right?  It’s one thing to choose blessings when things are going well, but being joyful when things are rotten?  How is it possible to “count it all joy” when we really feel like giving up or “bless those who curse” us when our heart is broken?   I think our mental picture of the incurable optimist who walks around smiling and whistling all the time is one of things that makes this seem hard.

But that’s not really an accurate picture is it?  I mean, look at Job.  He had huge things to deal with, not even counting his “friends”.  He didn’t deny any of the bad stuff that was going on or act like everything was okay.  He wept; he agonized; he mourned…but he never let go of God.  I’m pretty sure he didn’t feel like rejoicing or blessing during that time but look what he said: 

“The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; Blessed be the name of the LORD.” Job 1:21 

Job chose blessing; Job chose life even though he didn’t understand the whys or the wherefores what was happening to him.  Wow.

In Romans 5:3-5, Paul writes, 

“And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope. Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”  

He’s telling us two things.  One, we can “glory in tribulation” because we know that it is bringing us step by step closer to who God wants us to be.  And, two, that the Holy Spirit is right there with us, giving us the grace we need to bless the name of the Lord in even the toughest spots. 

Unfortunately, even though everyone faces trials, not everyone is drawn closer to God by going through them.  It is possible to leave God altogether and become bitter…to choose cursing and death.

My brother sent me a story this week that fits very well right here.

A young woman went to her mother started complaining about her life.  Everything in her life was so hard.  She didn’t know how she was going to make it, and she wanted to give up.  She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed like whenever she managed to solve one problem, a new one popped up.

Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water, put each one on a burner and turned it on high.  When the water in the pots came to boil she put carrots in the first pot, eggs in the second, and in the last she placed ground coffee beans. (I know, but the story doesn’t work with Postum) Then mom sat down at the kitchen table and let each pot boil. 

In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots, the eggs out and placed them in separate bowls. Then she poured the coffee into a cup. 

At that point, she turned to her daughter, she said, “'Tell me what you see.”

“Carrots, eggs, and coffee,” the young woman replied.

Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. When she did, she noticed that they were soft. Then her mom asked her to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard-boiled egg.

Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter tasted the coffee. “But, mom, what’s your point?”

Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity: boiling water. But each reacted differently. The carrot went in strong, hard, and unrelenting. After twenty minutes in the boiling water, however, it softened and became weak.

The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting in the boiling water, its inside became hard. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.

”Which are you?” mom asked. 'When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?

Think about it. Am I the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity wilt and lose my strength?  Am I more like an egg that starts with a malleable heart that changed through some trial, until it became hard and stiff? Do I look the same on the outside, but on the inside am I bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and hard heart?

Or am I like the coffee bean? Instead of being changed by the boiling water, the bean actually changed it. If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you. When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest, do you begin to sing and praise God, witness to those around you? How do you handle adversity? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?

“The Lord does not desire His people to be sad and disconsolate. He does not want His obedient followers to cover the altar with their tears, but to walk happily and cheerfully along. ‘In the world ye shall have tribulation,’ He says, ‘but in Me ye shall have peace’ ‘"Peace I leave with you; My peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth, give I unto you.’ ‘"These things have I spoken unto you that My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.’” The Signs of the Times, February 10, 1909, "Rejoice in the Lord Alway" Mrs. E. G. White

The World's Hardest Job

OK, so, which do you think would be harder, being the guy how led several million Israelites out of Egypt or the wife of the guy who led several million Israelites out of Egypt?  Yep, that’s what I thought too.

Have you ever had to stand back and watch while someone you loved and cared about had to take a risk?  Maybe it’s being in a play, playing basketball, preaching his (or her) first sermon, being elected president of the United States, or being chosen by God to go back to Egypt and chat with Pharaoh.  That’s one of the hardest things in the world, isn’t it?  You’re more nervous than he is, aren’t you?  Butterflies in your stomach, weak knees, profuse sweating, heart palpitations…you’re a nervous wreck.  He, however, looks calm, cool, and collected.  That’s so not fair.

Now, when things go well, the pressure of watching your loved one doing his thing is bearable.  But then things start going badly:  he forgets his lines, misses what would have been the winning basket, gets stuck during his sermon, his approval rating tanks or the Israelites start whining.  That’s when things begin to get uncomfortable; certainly for the person in the thick of the difficulties, but also for the person who has to stand by and take it.  Excruciating, in fact.

Think of Moses and Zipporah.  They had forty pretty easy years together-just the sheep, Zipporah’s sisters and at least one brother, Jethro, and the two boys.  They all seemed to get along pretty well.  When you think about, Moses probably had spent more of his life with these people than he had with his own family (birth or adopted).  He had worked beside these people, eaten with them, laughed and cried with them; Moses knew Zipporah’s family on a really personal basis.  They probably had inside jokes and funny old memories that his own family back in Egypt would not understand.  In many ways, I believe Moses felt more closeness with this family than with his own…to begin with anyway.

But then, God gives Moses a mission and things begin to happen pretty quickly; Moses and his wife and kids head off for Egypt.

Now to be really honest, I don’t get this whole circumcision, husband of blood thing AT ALL!  I do take comfort in finding out that almost nobody else gets it either.  Some people say that the angel was trying to kill Moses’ son, Gershom, that it was Moses who was circumcised, that Zipporah was honoring Moses by putting the blood on his feet, or that she was angry at him for making her do what he should have done.  There’s another whole theory that God was trying to kill Moses because Moses had been reluctant to take on this mission.  I think those are all things we’ll have to ask Moses and Zipporah about when we chat with them in Heaven.  All I think I understand about this episode, is that Zipporah did what she had to do to save her husband’s life, even though she probably wasn’t thrilled about doing it or understand all the why’s and wherefores of it.  She saw what had to be done and she did it.  Wow.

Zipporah doesn’t come into the story again for quite a while.  Again, there are lots of theories.  Some say that Moses divorced her at that point…but then why did she come see him again later?  Mrs. White says that Moses realized that the things he was going to have to do to get through to Pharaoh were going to be too hard on her.  He probably also knew that he couldn’t be distracted from his mission, even by his own family.  Another thing, and this is just me, Moses might have been a little reluctant for his birth family to meet Zipporah, and with good reason, as it turned out.  Whatever the logic was, Zipporah goes back to Midian and Moses heads on to Egypt.  That must have been tough.

When Zipporah and Moses meet up again, Zipporah has to realize pretty quickly that her quiet shepherdess life is completely over.  Now she is traveling the desert with the leader of several million whiney people who wanted Moses’ attention all the time.  They wanted more food, different food, water; they wanted Moses to settle their petty little arguments – all day long, everyday!  Oh for a couple hundred nice quiet sheep!!!

Do you remember how angry you were the first time one of you kids told you that somebody at school didn’t like him (or her)?  Or later, when somebody he was dating broke his heart?  He probably got over it before you did, because he’s interacting, crying, healing, meeting new people, and hopefully studying; while all you have to go on is that one bit of information, that one interaction when he was the most vulnerable.  He can move on much more easily than you can.  Imagine Moses and Zipporah in their tent ready to go to sleep and Moses is decompressing from his day.  Zipporah listens and gets pretty angry and frustrated with these people who are eating up all of her husband’s time.  Moses can get a good night’s sleep and go out and do it all again tomorrow, but Zipporah has time to stew about each slight and complaint.  Thankfully she went and vented to her dad who had some pretty great advice about how to delegate authority so Moses could stick to the important business of getting all these folks to the Promised Land.

You know what’s really great though, is that Moses took the advice.  How many of us would have just brushed Jethro’s advice off?  I mean what did he know?  He’d never led millions of people through the desert.  God hadn’t called him to free the Israelites from slavery.  He was just some small town priest from some backwoods town. Moses knew two things, though.  First, he knew his father-in-law well enough to know he was a smart guy; he’d already learned a lot from him.  And, second, he knew that God was the One who was really in charge; and if He chose to give Moses advice through his father-in-law, he’d be glad to take it.

Moses shows the advantages of having a great support system for somebody who is in a position of authority.  He didn’t ever just set out to do this on his own.  He worked with his own family – Miriam and Aaron.  He worked with his in-laws – Jethro and Hobab (Zipporah’s brother).  He worked with the Israelites by delegating authority over the people.  And probably most importantly, Moses wasn’t a control freak, an easy trap to fall into when a person holds that much authority. 

Another great thing is that Zipporah worked hard to make Moses' life easier not harder.  And isn’t that the best way we can serve each other, by making each other’s lives easier?  “Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.”  Galations 6:2 

Zipporah could have whined to Moses that he never paid any attention to her and the boys; that he’d dragged them out into the wilderness without discussing things first; that he cared more about these strangers than he did about her.  When Moses’ brother and sister got ugly about her, she could have jumped into the fight and told them what she thought about them…but as far as we know, she didn’t give into that mentality.  She supported her husband in the mission he had accepted. 

I’d be willing to bet that she didn’t always like the way her life was going, but that didn’t change her mind about her mission—to be a blessing to her family. 

“The wife can be a comfort, a blessing, standing by the side of her husband as his safe counselor, her influence keeping him to the right, to honesty and purity and godliness.”--Letter 41a, 1888, p. 5. (Written at Burrough Valley, Calif., July 7, 1888, to Brothers and Sisters at Fresno.)

“Here is the wife, the queen of the home--the blessing of God can rest upon her that she may be a sunshine, a sunbeam, in the house. Never, never, in any way, speak in a manner that would irritate. The voice is a talent; it is a talent of God. It is to be so cultivated that it will bring peace and harmony and light and love.” {2SAT 271.3}

Worshipping at the Altar of Wealth

Do you think of yourself as rich?  Do you want to be rich?  What makes a person rich?  By today’s standards (here in the US), I guess it’s whoever has the most money and things.  Have you ever seen the bumper sticker that says, “Whoever dies with the most toys wins!”?  That pretty much defines the philosophy of a lot of people when it comes to wealth, doesn’t it?  By that definition though, Solomon already won, so we might as well give up!

And besides, based on what we’ve learned by reading Ecclesiastes, we know that Solomon would disagree. In Ecclesiastes 5:15, Solomon says, “We leave this world just as we entered it—with nothing.”  So he’d figured out that having everything wasn’t the answer to anything.

Do we get caught up in the web of trying to get rich?  What does it say about our culture when we watch shows like “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” or when we camp outside of an electronics store for a week to be the first to buy the newest game system?  And, are only people who are trying to get rich caught?  Or, is trying to get rich the same as trying to make ends meet?  Where is the line between trying to get by and trying to get rich?  Do you know when you’ve crossed it?

In Counsels on Stewardship, Mrs. White says, 

“God does not condemn prudence and foresight in the use of the things of this life, but the feverish care, the undue anxiety, with respect to worldly things is not in accordance with His will.”  page 159

So, it doesn’t look like the having or not having is the issue, but the wanting.  How many of us want more than we have?  Even just a little bit?  Do you ever find yourself flipping through one of the hundreds of catalogues that comes in your mailbox or the flyers that come in the Sunday paper and wishing you could afford this or that?  Doesn’t everyone?  So is there something wrong with that? 

Well, I think that continually wanting a little bit more really opens us up to get caught by Satan.  He counts on us always wanting more.  That’s one of his easiest hooks for all of us.  Look at how early he hooks our kids!  With commercials during kids’ shows so that before we know it, we’re buying specific cereals with specific “prizes” inside or going to this particular restaurant because of the toys that restaurant puts in its kids’ meals.  Then there are these shoes, those jeans, or that type of shirt. 

Satan works on us all the time too…as soon as we pick out the coolest new cell phone and sign the contract, we see the even cooler phone that does one more thing.  Cars, computers, TV’s…we buy the newest one thinking we’ll be satisfied, but we’re not!  Remember what Paul said in Philippians 4:11-13? 

“…for I have learned to be satisfied with what I have.  I know what it is to be in need and what it is to have more than enough.  I have learned this secret, so that anywhere, at any time, I am content, whether I am full or hungry, whether I have too much or too little.  I have the strength to face all conditions by the power that Christ gives me.”  (The Good News Bible) 

So, do you think of yourself as rich or poor?  Well, let’s try for a little global perspective.  I found this on several web sites and thought it was really thought provoking and humbling:

Assume that the entire population of Earth was condensed into a village of 100 people.  Of those 100 people, 60 would be Asian, 12 European, 8 Latin American, 14 African and only 5 would be from the United States or Canada.  Eighteen would be what we consider “white”.  Thirty-three would be Christian while 67 would be of some other persuasion.  Five people would control 32% of the “village’s” wealth.  All five of those people would be US citizens.  A whopping 80 would live in substandard housing.  Twenty-four would not have any electricity at all, while out of the 76 people who did have electricity, most would only use it for lighting at night.  Sixty-seven would not be able to read.  Fifty would be malnourished, and one of those 50 would be dying of starvation.  Thirty-three would not have access to safe drinking water.  One would have AIDS, one near death, and one near birth.  Seven people in our pretend village would have access to the Internet.  And, one, just one, would have a college education.  (The Life and Times of Cornelius Root http://corneliusroot.blogspot.com)

Now do you feel rich?  We are so blessed to live with such easy wealth, but I know that sometimes I forget who makes it possible for me to live here with all the trappings of civilization.  I get lost in the trappings and miss God’s blessing.  Think of the parable of the rich man in Luke 12:13-21.  He planned to tear down all his old barns and put up newer and bigger ones so he could store all his grain and goods and then just sit back and be happy.  In Christ’s Object Lessons, pp.256-258, Ellen White comments:

“The situation of the poor, the orphan, the widow, the suffering, the afflicted, was brought to this rich man’s attention….This man’s aims were no higher than those of the beasts that perish.  He lived as if there were no God, no heaven, no future life; as if everything he possessed were his own, and he owed nothing to God or man.”

Are we like that rich man sometimes?  I know I am. 

Let’s pray this week that we don’t lose sight of the big picture.  We are where we are because God put us here.  We have what we have because God has given it to us.  He has a plan for us that involves where we are and what He has given us…have we taken the time to find out what His plan is?