Never Stop Trusting God: James 1:1-8 and the Purpose of Life’s Trials

Posted on October 28, 2026 by salooper57

(We have been having difficulties with our streaming service, so in place of the video of this sermon, I am posting the text of the sermon.)

In October of 1941, the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who had attended Harrow School as a teen, was there for an afternoon concert. He had been at Harrow ten months earlier, during the Blitz, when the Nazis bombed London for 57 consecutive nights. Now, he was back with a message for both students and faculty. He spoke for only two or three minutes, yet one line of that speech is still remembered today.

Churchill told Harrow’s faculty and students: “…surely from this period of ten months this is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never – in nothing, great or small, large or petty – never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”

If, in the Spring of 1941, England had given in, what might the world look like today? If today you or I give in – to temptation or despair, or to the promise of ease at the cost of integrity – what will our lives look like tomorrow?

The early church didn’t give in. They understood the critical importance of perseverance. Jesus displayed it and required it of his followers. In his letters, Paul used the word in its noun and verb forms 21 times. James highlights it. The Revelation features it. There is no success in the Christian life apart from perseverance.

The early church prized perseverance, but that is not the case today. Our age prizes the entrepreneurial spirit more than it does fortitude. We celebrate success, not endurance. We dream of prosperity without adversity, and happiness without holiness. We value self-actualization and forget character. We applaud creativity and overlook constancy. We live in a shortcut society.

But there are no shortcuts in the Christian life. It takes time to produce godly men and women. It also takes adversity and endurance. You don’t become godly by listening to a podcast. Life is a crucible for producing saints, and saint-making takes a lifetime.

If you give in when marriage gets hard, when money gets tight, when people get mean, when you get tired and sad and hurt, you will miss out on what God has for you. And what he has for you – it is critical that you understand this – is not a thing or an experience; it’s a person. It’s you—the person he is making you to be in the crucible of life. The reward is not some extraneous thing like a mansion just over the hilltop. The reward is getting the chance to be you – the you that you were meant to be.

When you have become that joyful, grateful person, you will appreciate other people for who they are, and you will no longer feel the need to compare yourselves to them. But how do you become that person? By perseverance. There’s no other way.

Perseverance is a major theme in the Book of James or, more precisely, it is the binding that holds the major themes in the Book of James together. The three major themes in James are all introduced in the first chapter, beginning with the believer’s relationship to testing—testing that brings joy and produces blessedness. The second theme is wisdom, especially as it is revealed in a believer’s speech. The third theme is the Christ-follower’s relationship to wealth (or the lack thereof). The three themes move to a summary in chapter 5 that pulls them all together. In verse 11, James concludes: “…we consider blessed those who have persevered.” That idea holds the Book of James together.

Let’s read our text, which is found in James 1:1-8: “James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes scattered among the nations: Greetings. Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.”

After the traditional greeting in verse 1, James issues what might be the most mystifying command in the Bible: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds.” This is not comfort Christianity. This is radical stuff. Try telling someone who has just lost a spouse, lost a limb, been diagnosed with a serious illness, or is going through marriage problems or money troubles to count it pure joy. They’ll call you heartless or think you’re crazy.

So, maybe you shouldn’t try telling someone that; tell it to yourself. But understand what it means and why there’s value in it, otherwise you will never be able to do it. James knew from experience that this is possible, and if we can learn what he knew, we will be able to do this too.

The Greek word translated as “consider” is important. It has two basic and interrelated meanings. The first is “to lead” or “guide.” The second is “to think” or “to regard.” James wants us to regard (the word’s second meaning) our trials as an occasion for joy because he wants us to be guided (the first meaning) by that idea.

Whenever we face trials (or fall into them, as the Greek has it, since trials frequently take us by surprise), James want us to consider it pure joy. Notice that he does not tell us to feel pure joy. Feelings cannot be commanded like that. Feelings follow thoughts, and so we must begin by considering our trials joy.

You should know that this verse could be translated, “Consider it pure joy…whenever you face temptations of many kinds.” In Greek, the same word means both “trials” and “temptations.” There is a reason for that. Every temptation is a trial: our trust in God goes on trial when we are being tempted. And every trial is a temptation – a temptation to give up on God and trust something or someone else in his place.

The trial of a difficult marriage may become a temptation to unfaithfulness or to bitterness. The trial of chronic illness may be a temptation to envy or despair. The trial of poverty may be a temptation to complain or to steal. Every trial comes preloaded with a host of possible temptations.

Likewise, temptations become trials. Unrelenting temptations not only wear us down and crush our spirits; they put our faith on trial. They bring to light what it is lacking.

To describe these trials, James uses an adjective (this is the word NIV renders “various”) that is composed of two roots: “many” and “colored.” Trials come in various colors and hues. Some are blue – full of sadness and pity. Some are red – full of heat and emotion. Some are gray and threaten us with despair.

But for every color of trial, there is a matching shade of grace. We see that in Peter’s first letter, where he used the same adjective to convey a different idea. He wrote: “Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms” (1 Peter 4:10). Let me reword that last phrase: “faithfully administering God’s many-colored grace.” For every color of trial, God has a corresponding color of grace to give his needy child, often through someone in the church. The grace he has given me to administer might be heaven-made to match someone in a “blue” trial. The grace God has given you might perfectly serve a person in a gray trial, or a fiery red one. In his wisdom, God has given us “everything we need for life and godliness” (2 Peter 1:3), and that “everything” includes our church family.

But how can God expect me to consider the trial I am suffering through right now pure joy—the sickness, the relationship trouble, the job loss? I hate the sickness. How can I consider it pure joy? The job loss cost me my house. Why should I consider it pure joy?

Because the trial itself does something for me that neither health nor house can do. If I will persevere, the trial will carry me closer than I have ever been to becoming the amazing person God intends me to be—and that is a great joy.

Now, don’t miss this: you simply won’t be able to consider the trial you are experiencing pure joy unless you know that God is using it to bring about great good in your life. In other words, the “consider” of verse 2 is dependent upon the “know” of verse 3. Unless you know what James knew, unless you are guided by the truth he understood, you will never consider your trials pure joy. Apart from that knowledge, considering them pure joy would be a sign of mental impairment. But what if you knew something about those trials other people did not know? What if you had inside information?

There was a great story a few years ago about a Dairy Queen employee in Minnesota who saw a customer filch a $20 bill that belonged to a blind person. When that customer came to the counter, he told her he wouldn’t serve her unless she gave the $20 back. She denied stealing the money, swore at him, and then stormed out of the store, taking the money with her. So, he took a $20 out of his own pocket and gave it the blind man, who didn’t know he’s been robbed. The story only came out because an anonymous customer saw what happened and wrote a wrote a letter to Dairy Queen in praise of the 19-year-old.

For the sake of illustration, try to picture a situation in which you would consider it pure joy for someone to snatch $20 from a blind person. What if the person taking the money knew something no one else did: the blind man was the leader of a three-person ring of thieves who filched cash and phones, which they passed on to him, knowing he would not be suspected. The woman who discovered what was happening only took the money so she could return it to its rightful owner. Once you knew the inside story, you would consider it pure joy that the blind man got his comeuppance, but if you didn’t know the true story, you would be outraged. It would all depend on what you knew.

That is the case here. Considering trials pure joy is crazy, unless you know the truth about what is happening in the trial, which is what James lets us in on. We can consider a faith-testing trial pure joy because we know it is producing perseverance, which is what catalyst for metamorphosis into Christlikeness.

Before we go any further, we need to answer an important question: Perseverance in what? Unless we know the answer that question, we might persevere in the wrong things. We can keep hitting our heads against a wall and call it perseverance. We can stay in a situation God wants us to leave and call it perseverance. We can refuse to back down from a stand we never should have taken and call it perseverance, when it’s really just pigheadedness.

James is not saying we need to persevere in everything we undertake. He wants us to persevere in trusting God; this, don’t forget, is the “testing of your faith.” To persevere in trusting God means to continue doing things his way, even when it is hard. We don’t take shortcuts. We don’t ignore God’s word or abandon his ways to make things easier for ourselves.

When we persevere in trusting God through a trial, remarkable things happen within us. But they don’t happen just because we persevere; they happen because we persevere in trusting God. When we do that, we become mature and complete, where “mature” means we have reached the end for which we were made, and “complete” means we aren’t missing any important components. James is not talking about developing certain virtues – say patience or kindness or generosity. He’s talking about putting all the virtues together as a package. He’s talking about becoming the person God had in mind when he designed you. And there is no way to become that person – to become yourself – that doesn’t involve perseverance in trusting God through trials.

People who persevere in trusting God through trials do not (verse 4) lack anything that they need to be everything God calls them to be. That includes the wisdom they need (verse 5) to endure trials in good and God-honoring ways. People who continue to trust God in a difficult marriage can ask God for wisdom about how to proceed in that marriage and receive it. People who persevere in trusting God through a debilitating illness can ask God for wisdom about to how to serve him and find joy and purpose even when they feel lousy. People who persevere in trusting God through a relational conflict can ask for wisdom about how to approach the person with whom they are having trouble, and God will give it. You get the point. The wisdom in verse 5 is not for everyone. It is for the persevering person of verses 2-4.

I stress this point because we can easily miss it. We start out on some quest or project and believe we need to persevere because that’s what the Bible teaches. But perseverance in certain endeavors may have the opposite effect God intends. It may make us stubborn and bitter, whereas perseverance in trusting God makes us hopeful and better.

Now let’s go back to the phrase, “the testing of your faith.” Notice what is, and what is not, being tested here. It is “your faith,” your trust in God, that is tested, not your intelligence. Not your moral superiority, or integrity, or Bible knowledge. It’s your faith. What is being tested here – whether in the trial of poverty or the temptation to adultery; whether in the ordeal of illness or the impulse to lie – is your faith in God. Will you trust God and do things his way? If you will, perseverance will catalyze your spiritual formation and accelerate your development into the person you long to be.

So, understand: the trial you are suffering through right now is a test of your faith. The difficult marriage is a test of your faith. Will you trust God and dare to relate to your spouse as he has instructed? The illness you are going through is a test of your faith. Will you trust God to bring good out of it? Will you obey him without excuse and serve him in the midst of your pain? If you will, God will do remarkable things through you. The financial trial your family is going through is a test of your faith – not of your worth or your smarts or your success. Trust God, use the money he has given you as he instructed, and see what he does!

In most tests, an easier way becomes apparent. It’s easier to throw yourself into work or into fantasy than to approach your spouse with honesty. It’s easier to use deceit than to confess your sin or your failure. There’s always a way that seems easier than trusting God, a fork in the road you can follow that doesn’t require you to trust and obey.

But remember what is being tested: it’s not your ability to generate a certain outcome. Not your finesse in managing a situation. What is being tested is your faith. Pass that test, and it will open new doors for you; opportunities you have not imagined will present themselves. Pass that test and your will find it easier to pass the next one. And the one after that. Persevere in trusting God, and you will be on your way to becoming the person God intends you to be and that you will love being. That will not happen if you take the shortcut. The shortcut may help you sidestep what you’re eager to avoid, but it won’t lead you where you want to go.

The author of Hebrews gives us this word about trusting God in the test you are now facing: “… do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.” (Hebrews 10:35-36).  Let me put that another way: When it comes to trusting God: “Never give in. Never give in, never, never, never – in nothing, great or small, large or petty” – never stop trusting God.

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When Worlds Go Out of Phase: Physics, Faith, and the Fall

Posted on October 24, 2026 by salooper57

You are on the bridge of a starship. Red lights are flashing around you, and an alarm is sounding every three seconds. The captain is addressing the chief engineer in a tone of utmost urgency.

“Chen, what are we looking at?”

“It’s a cascading resonance loop, Captain. The incoming spatial wave generated by the alien ship has created an enormous phase difference that is collapsing our warp field.”

“If we increase the energy output of the deflector dish, will it rectify the phase variance?”

“Captain, the phase differential is increasing by 3 percent every second! The deflector dish cannot adjust that quickly, no matter how much power we send it.”

And so on. The dialogue sounds like something I have heard in a dozen different Star Trek shows. It does not need to make sense as long as it alerts viewers to the crew’s possible demise. But phase differences exist outside television studios and make a difference on earth in real life.

The terminology, “phase difference,” “phase variance,” and “phase differential” all come out of the physics of wave phenomena, sometimes referred to as “wave mechanics.” Wave function plays a role in the cosmological models of theoretical physics, but also in down-to-earth applications in optic and auditory sciences.

Phase differences in auditory applications may be most familiar. The noise cancelling headphones that so many of us own employ phase differences to “cancel” noise by generating a sound wave that is 180° out of phase with the incoming wave. The two waves effectively cancel each other out, and the result is silence. The company ZeroSound is trying to develop a large-scale application using this technology: electronic sound walls that reduce industrial noise in urban areas.

The Air Force’s stealth bomber is “invisible” to traditional radar because its design exploits phase differences to cancel out the radio microwaves that radar systems emit. Closer to home, the anti-reflective coating on your glasses makes use of a phase difference between the top and bottom surfaces of your lenses to eliminate reflected light.

I have been thinking that theology also knows something about phase differences. In this case, the difference does not lie in the light spectrum but in the spiritual spectrum. What theologians refer to as “The Fall” – the rebellion of the first humans against their creator – seems to have caused something like a phase shift between the Creator and his creatures. They are no longer in phase, and the result has been catastrophic.

When describing a natural world state in which waves (for example, radio waves) are out of phase, physicists use the term, “decoherence.” In reference to optical systems, decoherence can cause distortions in the visual field that degrade image quality. In auditory systems (for example, a PA system in a concert hall), decoherence causes the music the audience hears to sound “muddy” and unclear.

When phase difference occurs in the spiritual world, humans fail to perceive God’s image clearly, and for some it may be horribly distorted. A phase difference could be the reason “No one has seen God at any time” (John 1:18). It may also explain how people could look at the Messiah Jesus and fail to perceive the heavenly Father (John 14:9).

A spiritual phase difference may explain why humans can “be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding” (Mark 4:12, citing Isaiah 6:9). It helps us understand why Jesus, when debating with Jerusalem Jews at the Feast of Tabernacles, asked them, “Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say!” (John 8:43). His words and their ears/minds were out of phase, which left them “unable to hear.” A spiritual phase shift had effectively cancelled Jesus’s voice.

Of course, I am using the “phase” terminology metaphorically, but that does not mean it is merely an illustration. Something similar to phase differences in the natural order has occurred in the spiritual order. Its effects have been deleterious, inhibiting humans from hearing God and seeing him even when he came among them in the person of Jesus Christ.

I wrote above that the effects were deleterious, but the more appropriate word would be disastrous. The “phase shift” between humans and God, set in motion by Adam and continuing (perhaps even escalating) throughout history, has left humanity “separated from the life of God” (Ephesians 4:17). The result is a humanity that has “fallen short of the glory of God” – the glory of his living, loving images – and is searching (usually in the wrong places) for purpose and satisfaction.

There is more to this story than the threat that a spiritual phase shift represents to humanity. The Captain is on the bridge, and he knows how to respond to the threat, restore coherence, and set right everything that has gone wrong.

(More on “phase difference” and “phase coherence” next time.)

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The Fruitful Disciple (John 5:1-8)

Posted on October 20, 2026 by salooper57

This 27-minute sermon from John 15 is audio only (or almost only). It helps us understand that a fruitless disciple is a contradiction in terms. That is the challenging part. But this text is also deeply encouraging, for the Father’s commitment to the Son assures the joyful fruitfulness of his disciples!

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“Help My Unbelief”: How Great Figures in Faith Navigated Doubt

Posted on October 17, 2026 by salooper57

“The only thing that casts doubt on the miracles of Jesus,” a Wisconsin fishing guide once quipped, “is that they were all witnessed by fishermen.” I chuckled over that, knowing fisherman the way I do. But for many people, the subject of doubt is no laughing matter.

If being a Christian is all about faith, “from first to last” as Paul puts it, isn’t doubt about the worst thing that could happen to a person? Doesn’t the presence of doubt cast doubt on the genuineness of a person’s salvation?

To get to the bottom of this, one must first distinguish between doubt and unbelief. Doubt resides in the mind; unbelief in the heart. Doubt is intellectual; unbelief is spiritual. Doubt motivates a person to seek answers while unbelief deadens a person and leaves him unconcerned. Paradoxically, it is generally the believer who has doubts, while the unbeliever does not.

It is important (and helpful) to understand that most believers will struggle with doubt at some point in their lives. Because the idea, “I am the only one who has doubts,” is so terrifying, many people don’t admit their doubts and end up living in misery. They hide their doubts for fear of being thought a fraud, but this inevitably leads to more doubt. It’s a vicious cycle.

But most people have to deal with doubt from time to time. We are like the man in the gospel story who says to Jesus, “I believe!” only to cry out in the next breath, “Help my unbelief!”

A good example comes from John Wesley, the founder of Methodism. After a mission trip to the American colonies that seemed to him to be less than successful, Wesley concluded that he was not only not a minister, but that he was himself a lost soul. Then, at a meeting in Aldersgate Street in central London, Wesley encountered God in a life-changing way. He wrote that his heart had been “strangely warmed.”

It was the beginning of an extraordinary life of faith that had worldwide impact. Wesley established the great Methodist movement. He was a principal figure in a spiritual awakening that some historians believe spared England a revolution like the one that splintered France. The revival spread across the ocean and had a powerful effect on people living in America. What most people don’t know is that a year after his Aldersgate experience, Wesley wrote in his journal, “I know that I am not a Christian. I know it because I do not feel that I love God and his Son Jesus Christ as my Savior.”

Even great men have doubts. It is what one does with those doubts that determines whether they will strengthen faith or weaken it.

When doubts arise, there are certain steps a person can take. First, even before examining the doubt, the believer should examine himself. The Christian who is living a hypocritical life is certain to suffer doubts: doubts that are intellectually unassailable until that person has faced his or her sins and dealt with them in an appropriate manner.

Then it is useful to discover where doubts come from. When the twentieth century’s most influential Christian apologist, C. S. Lewis, struggled with doubt, he discovered that his doubts were not based on rational grounds at all but on “the irrational deadweight of my old skeptical habits, and the spirit of the age, and the cares of the day.” He came to realize that he didn’t “think” these things; he “felt” them. And, of course, it is nearly impossible to reason oneself out of a feeling.

Sometimes doubts about God stem from doubts about other people. The man whose alcoholic father repeatedly failed to love him, the woman whose husband was unfaithful, the parishioner whose need was overlooked by the church may all suffer doubts by extension. These may not be legitimate, but they are real and must be faced.

Perhaps the best advice for a person suffering from doubt is this: confront the doubt, share it with a wise Christian friend, work through it, and then move on. Doubt can only defeat a person if it keeps him from doing the things that he has no doubt he should be doing.

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Was Paul Really “Compelled by the Spirit”? Questions for Acts 20–21

Posted on October 10, 2026 by salooper57

I always have thought of Saul of Tarsus, later Paul the Apostle, as a hero. He has been the MVP for Team Jesus nearly every year for two millennia. I realize that St. Paul’s knowledge, courage, experience, virtue, and influence so far exceeds mine that my admiration means very little. A child praises his dad as the strongest person in the world when he sees him lifting the forty-pound bag he could not budge. The dad is grateful for the high value the child puts on him, but he also knows what it is worth.

I realize that my praise of the great saint means little, for it is the “praise of the praiseworthy that is above all rewards,” and I am not among their number. But if my praise means little, my questioning of the same saint must mean even less, for how could I understand his reasons and motivations? Even so, I do question something St. Paul once did.

I say, “I question something” he once did, not that I criticize it. I entirely lack the right, the wit, and the desire to criticize my hero. But I admit that I don’t understand why he did what he did.

The text is Acts 20-21. Paul is returning to Jerusalem following his third missionary journey, carrying a generous offering from the Gentile churches to help support their Jewish brothers and sisters in Judea. It was the fulfillment of years of planning and working, and Paul must have viewed it as a highlight of his ministry.

However, for some time before he arrived in Jerusalem, he was aware that he would suffer hardships and be thrown into prison if he insisted on going to the holy city. In Acts 20:23, which records part of Paul’s final meeting with the elders of the church in Ephesus, the apostle admits that “…in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me.”

In the previous verse (Acts 20:22, NIV), Paul says to the elders: “…compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there.” Consider the phrase, “compelled by the Spirit.” If the “Spirit” – the Holy Spirit – was compelling Paul to go to Jerusalem despite the danger, that only reinforces the idea of Paul’s commendable courage. But was it the Holy Spirit who compelled him?

That is how this passage has often been read, especially since the Holy Spirit is mentioned in the next verse. However, it is not clear that it is the Holy Spirit who compels Paul. (Greek does not “capitalize” words, so whether this refers to the Holy Spirit or Paul’s own spirit must be determined from its context.) Additionally, the word the NIV translates as “compelled” is not rendered that way in any of its 43 appearances in the New Testament. When Paul uses the same word in the next chapter (21:33), he clearly means “bound” (its normal meaning) rather than “compelled” or “driven.” Furthermore, even if one chooses to translate the word as “compelled,” Paul never uses it with the Holy Spirit as its subject, nor does any other New Testament text.

In the previous chapter, Paul was determined in his own Spirit, not the Holy Spirit, to travel to Jerusalem via Macedonia and Achaia. And when Paul later relates the story to the Roman prefect Felix, he tells him that he was in Jerusalem to deliver his years-in-the making gift from the Gentiles to “my people” – the gift Paul hoped would help unite believing Jews and Gentiles.

When, in chapter 21: 4, Paul stops in Tyre on his way to Jerusalem, the Christ-followers told him “through the Spirit” not to go to Jerusalem. It is worth noting that the New Testament never records someone speaking a message “through the Spirit” that is wrong or contrary to God’s intent. Did the same Spirit who supposedly “compelled” Paul to go to Jerusalem tell him not to go to Jerusalem a short time later?

While Paul was in Caesarea, on his way to deliver the Gentile’s gift to the church in Jerusalem, a Christian from Judea prophesied that Paul would be bound by the Jews and handed over to the Romans if he went to Jerusalem. Upon hearing this, the church “pleaded with Paul not to go up to Jerusalem,” but Paul “would not be dissuaded,” and they finally “gave up and said, ‘The Lord’s will be done.’”

But was it the Lord’s will … or was it Paul’s? That is the question that runs through my mind. Paul’s courage and his willingness to suffer for the sake of Christ cannot be doubted. But if it was really “through the Spirit” that the church in Tyre told Paul not to go to Jerusalem, if it was by his own spirit that Paul was bound to go and not by God’s Spirit, might he not have been better to have let Timothy, Tychicus, Trophimus, Aristarchus, Secundus and Gaius finish the mission and present the Gentile’s gift to the church?

As I have already written, I am not criticizing the great apostle, but I am questioning whether the NIV is right to translate “compelled by the Spirit,” implying it was God’s will that Paul be beaten, arrested, and imprisoned. You may say, “Look at the great good that came out of it! Paul proclaimed Christ before two prefects, a king, and an emperor because of his arrest.” This is true, but God is capable of bringing good – even great good – out of the decisions his saints make even when they differ from the good he planned for them.

That last sentence, I guess, is as good a lesson to pull from this as any. But it may also be helpful to practice examining our assumptions in light of what the Scriptures actually say and to refuse to be dogmatic when the biblical text is not. It won’t hurt to remind ourselves that we – and possibly even our heroes – are not always right. God alone can claim that.

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Peeling the Onion of Fear: How Christ Reclaims the Human Heart

Posted on October 3, 2026 by salooper57

Humans have been defined as “Beings that call themselves rational while being governed entirely by appetites, anxieties, and the opinions of strangers.” While there is truth in that definition, it is not true that humans are entirely governed by these things. We are more complex than that, though, it is true that appetites, anxieties, and the opinions of strangers often govern our behavior. The life-long work of the Christian is to transfer governing power to the new administration: to Jesus.

That is easier done in theory than in practice because humans (to misappropriate Churchill’s famous description of Russia) are a “riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma”—an enigma even to themselves. Too often, our actions and decisions are not governed by Christ but by fears wrapped in anger and posturing as justice. Fear has resided near the center of the human being ever since Adam’s rebellion in the garden. It is significant that his first words after his treachery was exposed were: “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid…”)

Fear lies within us, but fear of what? It is a difficult question to answer because fear itself is layered, and the fear we are aware of usually occupies the outermost layer. Underneath it are older, deeper fears.

In my fifties, I became claustrophobic. I had no trace of claustrophobia (as far as I know) until then. Where did this fear come from? What precipitated it? I do not know, except to say that it came from within me. I had to live more than fifty years before reaching that layer, and I know there are other layers beneath it.

The word “fear” or one of its cognates (“afraid,” “dread,” “terror,” “anxious,” etc.) appear over 700 times in the Bible, which pales compared to the number of times it appears in our lives. Nevertheless, the Bible takes seriously the fear that haunts all our lives. Among the many fears it acknowledges are the fear of peers, of adversaries, natural phenomena (storms, earthquakes), the future, the lack of necessities, and others as well.

I sometimes think that a significant part of the role we play in God’s salvation is to overcome fear whenever and however it manifests in our lives. The child who believes in Jesus needs to conquer the fear of closet monsters. The young adult needs to surmount the fear of looking stupid. As life progresses, we uncover new fears – the fear of rejection, of failure, of loss, of being alone, of accomplishing nothing. Fear is layered like an onion and its layers seem endless—overcoming it will take a lifetime.

Precisely. It will take a lifetime, and perhaps a little longer than that. In the end, we will face the fear that lies beneath the others and masquerades itself in a thousand ways: the fear of death. We are born with this fear, or born into it, as a baby born into a petrochemical industry zone inherits its PAHs, benzene, and cadmium, and experiences the consequences. We needn’t be taught the fear of death; it’s just there.

And we are just there too, born into the fear of death, which has seeped into the soil (and soul) of human life, and pervades the cultural air we breathe. But we are not alone in this place. Through Christ, God has come to join us “who, in the midst of life are in death.”[1] And he, who in the midst of death was life, has changed the calculus.

The author of Hebrews wrote, “Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death – that is, the devil – and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.”

God’s love in Christ can free us from our fear of death—and of everything else. “Love,” the Apostle John claims, is what “casts out fear.” Certainly, this is God’s love for us expressed through Christ’s devil-defeating, fear-releasing, slavery-ending death. But it is also, I think, our love, sourced in God and expressed through worship and service.

I am still peeling the onion of my fears. I’ve been at it for a lifetime, and I expect it will take a little longer than that. Currently, I am trying to peel away the layer called claustrophobia. (I had a small victory: I got into an MRI machine, which is something I swore I would never do!) However, I know that under the claustrophobia lies another layer of fear. I will not conquer fear through courage—that is not how courage works. I will not conquer it through reason; claustrophobia taught me that. But I will be conquer it through love, God’s love and mine, which reverberates to his. It is the love that casts out fear.

[1] Thomas Cranmer, Book of Common Prayer, 1549

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I Am the True Vine (John 15:1-8)

Posted on September 30, 2026 by salooper57

We usually come to this passage – and most passages – trying to discover what it says about us and what we should do about it. This passage certainly has something to say about us and to us (we’ll look at that next week), but what is most important is what it says about Jesus. What does it mean that Jesus is the “true vine”? Probably more than we’ve realized.

Until we understand what this passage means about Jesus, will never understand what it means for us!

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The God Who Isn’t Finished: Hope for Those Who Think It’s Too Late

Posted on September 26, 2026 by salooper57

Yesterday, I found myself thinking about various encounters I have had with people who – how can I put it? – did not find my company appealing, but with whom I later enjoyed welcome, good conversation, and even shared faith. I can remember my reservations in meeting them (I am an introvert by nature and upbringing), and how my first interactions with them seemed disastrous.

There was K. I only met K because his good friend asked me if I would visit him in the hospital. “K is really bad,” he told me, “and might not make it. And he isn’t saved. Would you go and talk to him?” I went to the hospital, but when I arrived outside K’s third floor room, I could hear him laughing and conversing with a visitor. I decided to wait outside rather than interrupting this meeting of friends.

When his friend left, I entered the room, smiled, and introduced myself. “Hi,” I said. “I am Shayne Looper. I am the pastor at L’s church, and L asked me to stop and see how you are doing.”

The result was immediate—and unsettling. K turned over on his side, his face turned away from me, and would not even acknowledge my presence. I think he took me – the pastor – as the harbinger of death. I spoke to him for another thirty seconds, but he acted like he could not hear me. So, I said it was nice to meet him (though this was not strictly true) and said goodbye.

A few months later, L asked me to go with him to K’s home and talk to him about the Lord. I was not, as you can imagine, eager to repeat the debacle of the hospital room, but I agreed to go. When we arrived, K’s wife opened the door and invited us in. He said hello and, without reference to our previous introduction, we chatted about nothing for a few minutes.

When I got up my courage, I asked K what he thought about God and if he knew anything about Jesus. I was surprised to find that both K and his wife wanted to come to God and trust in Christ—and did so right then! Together, they attended our church until his death, and she continued after that.

Even before K, there was W. He was an over-the-road, rough-around-the-edges (and maybe rough all the way to the center) retired truck driver. His wife attended our church. Whenever I went to their home to visit, W. would see me coming and would leave the room. Once, after I had made a few visits, he remained in the room and even joined in the conversation. But when he thought it was getting time for me to leave (that is, when he thought I was about to pray), he would quietly disappear. This went on for at least a year. I knew I was making progress when W started staying in the room through my brief prayers.

After four or five years, when W and I had a comfortable (if not good) relationship, I went to a conference in a city about 150 miles away. As soon as the clerk at the hotel heard my name, even before I checked in, I was told that there was a message for me. It stated that W had experienced a sudden health crisis and was not expected to live. I asked the clerk to cancel my reservation, and I drove back to my city and to the hospital.

W was about to be taken to surgery and was already prepped. I asked if I could have a moment to pray with him before they took him, and that moment was granted. I asked W if he was ready to change and become God’s person, but he was unable to speak. I said to him, “W, if you want to put your trust in Jesus Christ, blink your eyes.” He convincingly blinked both eyes, so I gave him some instructions, urged him to talk to God, and prayed with him.

I never saw W again. He did not survive the surgery. I hope to see him one day.

Then there was B. As a hospice chaplain, I went to meet and pray for her mother. B answered the door, acting as if I and the friend who was with me might be ax murderers (or something still less desirable). She left us with her mother and went into the kitchen, where she made a crazy amount of noise. It was clear that she did not want her mother listening to us.

I visited many times and, each time that B was there, she acted like she hated me. That, of course, could have been my imagination, but one day I met her younger sister who told me straight out: “B hates you.” I couldn’t imagine why. We had never met before I went to visit her terminally ill mother.

I saw B in a Walmart a few months after her mother died. I turned down an aisle and caught a glimpse of her at the other end. I thought that I should go and speak to her, but I chickened out and slinked into a different aisle. I didn’t see her again for several years. Then, one Sunday morning, she showed up at our church! To my amazement, she kept coming. The day came when I was visiting and praying with her. Whenever I got ready to hang up the phone or leave her apartment in the senior living complex, B would say, “I love you, pastor!”

I share these stories because some of us think that it must be too late for our family members and other loved ones to come to God. Others of us might be thinking, “It’s too late for me. Even if I wanted to, why would God want me?” In both cases, we would be wrong. It is never too late for the God who can move through time as we move through space, “the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not.”

I have seen him do some remarkable things. You can too.

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Way. Truth. Life. (John 14:1-6)

Posted on September 23, 2026 by salooper57

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Restoring Our Center of Gravity

Posted on September 19, 2026 by salooper57

Driving around Chicago felt like a cinch after the crazy drivers and screaming racing bikes on the 405 in L.A. It felt like a cinch, that is, until the SUV immediately in front of us swerved one way, then the other, and then rolled over repeatedly.

Had I performed the same maneuver in our sedan, our car would have kept its wheels. That’s because we have a much lower center of gravity. The SUV’s high center of gravity caused the weight load on the side wheels to shift dramatically, hence the rollover.

The term “center of gravity” refers to the point at which the entire weight of a body can be equally balanced. In racing, the center of gravity is enormously important. Two cars with equal power will perform very differently, depending on the location of their center of gravity. Establishing the center of gravity is consequential for mechanical engineering, athletics, dance and a whole host of disciplines.

Imagine a car that has been involved in a collision. It is still drivable, but the center of gravity has shifted from a spot under the firewall and midway between the doors to a place directly under the passenger seat. Now when the car turns right, weight is unevenly distributed to that side while the left tires lose traction. Because the center of gravity has been moved toward the rear of the car, acceleration is sluggish. Mileage drops precipitously. Braking is slow and uneven. The car has lost its center. It is an accident waiting to happen.

This can serve as a metaphor for understanding the human race, which always seems to be an accident waiting to happen. (Just in my lifetime, humanity has faced nuclear obliteration, a global network of terror, and the epistemic crisis and transhuman nightmares associated with the rise of AI—not to mention that we somehow survived disco and 80s music.) Thinkers in the Judeo-Christian tradition believe that humanity has been in a kind of collision. They refer to it as “the fall,” and believe that it has effectively moved our center of gravity. Humanity has lost its center.

This explains our sluggishness to respond to injustice. It explains why, when tempted to unethical or immoral behavior, humans find it hard to stop themselves. By the time we know it’s wrong, it’s too late to stop. It explains why we experience emotional roll-overs.

Before the fall, God was the gravitational center that kept humanity balanced. The collision (the fall) has moved that point away from God and toward the passenger side, where self-interest is located. Our lives are still drivable, but they handle so poorly that we can’t keep out of accidents: divorce, abuse, negligence, racism, unjust treatment of the poor, war, and the misuse of the earth, to name a few.

It takes major repair work to get the center of gravity back where it belongs. Politics cannot do it. Neither can education or social activism. Medical and psychological treatment are not equipped for it. These things are all good and helpful – even necessary – but they cannot, in and of themselves, provide a solution. That takes a power from outside us. The car that has been in a collision cannot fix itself. Neither can a person.

Only God has the know-how to fully restore a person damaged by “the fall.” He understands the intricacies of mind and soul, the interrelationships between them and between them and others. As the original designer, he knows how people are supposed to function. And as an experienced restorer, he knows what it takes to renovate damaged people.

It is conversion, renewal, and restoration that is needed. Conversion is a theological term for the change that takes place in a person when he or she trusts God and submits to his leadership over life. Conversion begins with an act of faith, but it doesn’t end there. It ends when one’s center of gravity has been restored to its rightful place, and that requires ongoing work.            

Worship has a role in that work. Worship changes us precisely because it brings us back to our true center. In worship we both act and are acted upon; we give and receive. The push and pull of worship re-positions us, brings us into alignment with God, and works to restore us to our true center. Worship obliges us to “Acknowledge that the Lord is God! He made us and we belong to him; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture” (Ps. 100:3 CSB) To sincerely make that acknowledgment is to move toward our true center and our eventual restoration.

(This article has been revised from a 2015 article and was first published by Gatehouse Media, Inc.)

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