Prayer is a Full Contact Activity!

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. Epaphras, who is one of you and a servant of Christ Jesus, sends greetings. He is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured. (Col. 4:2, 12 NIV)

In our daily Bible study, last night we were reading the fourth chapter of Colossians. I was struck by the two verses I shared above. Paul knows the power of prayer and so he admonishes the believers in Colossae to be devoted to prayer, while being watchful, which I take to mean alert and aware of all that is going on in our lives, especially the spiritual; and to be thankful, which I take to mean in, and for, all things.

But the meatier part of the verses is that word "wrestling" as that man Epaphras did in his daily prayers. I took that to mean that the man not only knew about the trials, temptations and challenges of the believers, he took them on in his prayers. That means, as we pray for a dear one who is battling cancer, take on the cancer in your prayers! Wrestle that cancer in Jesus' name, asking the Lord be the victor in the struggle. If the opponent is doubt, take on the doubt on behalf of your brothers and sisters who have shared they are doubting. Is your friend needing a better job, or a job because they are unemployed? Take that on as well! Prayer is a full contact activity if we make it so! If you wrestle in prayer and your friends know, they will, as Epaphras asked, be able to stand firm in whatever comes, knowing the will of God is being done. They also can face it with maturity and the assurance that we need in our lives.

So, as we get prayer requests, join forces with God as we wrestle against some powerful opponents, but knowing that God's power is mightier, and it is God's will, not ours, that gets done.

Lord, as we pray together, we join forces with You as we take on the enemies of dear ones in our lives as they have shared with us. We wrestle against disease and illness in the bodies of family and church members. We ask that these would be defeated and deployed to outer darkness where they can harm no one else. We take on doubt and despair, asking that You remove those from loved ones, and make them mature and assured of their worth and value in Your loving eyes. We take on anything and all things that stand in the way of our loved ones and You. May You have the final word and the victory as we pray in Christ Jesus' strong name, amen!

Half-Mast

Our flag is at half-mast. Everywhere you turned today, the businesses and buildings that fly our flag have it at half-mast. I remember learning about a flag at half-mast in November of 1963. Our president had been assassinated and our teacher explained what the flag not fully raised meant. I remember seeing it, as I do the ones today, with great sorrow. It meant we were not where we should be; our country had been hit as had been our hearts, and the flag flying at half-mast meant we were in mourning, we were hurting, we were not whole any more.

The flag when fully flown represents the power and majesty of our country at its best; the images of those Marines on Iwo Jima raising the flag, even in the midst of great suffering and setback, showed the promise and the possibility of the United States of America, "one nation under God, indivisible," the "give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send those, the homeless, tempest-tost to me," country where people come because they believe in the American Dream - that which means different things to different people, but the basic underlying hope of living free; and what are we offering? Death. It has come so quickly, to so many, of different colors and diverse creeds, the same colored red blood spilled senselessly on the streets, ripping out the hearts of mothers, wives, children, neighbors and friends. Not a reason to fly Old Glory at full-mast, lower the flag as our hearts and spirits have been. We can only say, help us God, to be comforted and reassured once again that we can be "the land of the free, and the home of the brave."

It Was on a Sunday...

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. (Rev. 3:20). There was an old chorus we would sing in the Rio Grande Conference churches at events and gatherings, "It was on a Sunday, when Somebody touched me..." and the song would go on to the different days of the week and one was supposed to stand on the day that God had touched us. I always stood on Sunday because I knew it had been during a Sunday morning worship service when I was about eight years old that I heard our preacher talk about Jesus wanting to have a relationship with us. He may have used the above text as his text, but all I know was that I was paying attention and I heard that we should invite Him in to our hearts, and I did. I cannot remember who my pastor was, nor the date of that event; all I knew was that it happened - Jesus came into my heart.

I did not fly home, for wings did not sprout out my shoulders. And the family slept well that night, the house was not brightly lit with the afterglow of that experience; and my cap still fit me for there was not a halo to contend with. I was still a shy boy, and I don't remember standing on a street corner shouting out sermons calling for Kingsville to repent. I can say my attitude towards all things God changed. No longer did I fuss about going to church and it reached the point where I asked my parents why we couldn't have Sunday school five days a week and public school once a week; I figured the importance of God in my life at that point outweighed whatever they were trying to teach me at Flato Elementary. My Bible became important to me. My prayers became important too. I began to sense a purpose to my life, which made me sense a value in God's eyes that I found in very little other places.

The interesting thing as I reflect back on that day is that in 1960 or thereabouts, when this event occurred, the churches were filled with people. Texas was under Blue Laws, and that meant pretty much every thing was closed on Sunday, and those stores which were open were limited by law as to what they could sell. Wednesdays on school nights, were homework free; there were not practices of the football team nor the band, and it was expected that Wednesday was a church night. We had mid-week service, as well as a Sunday night service; but still the invitation to come to Christ was being offered pretty often. Pastors did not take it for granted that all were in a relationship with Jesus and so invitations through sermons and altar calls were being made, or at least in the Spanish language services of the Río Grande Conference. All events of the church offered that opportunity as well, and even on television Billy Graham had regularly televised crusades that called to my attention and to many. His was a straightforward message and very little was said about money, and nothing flashy was being shone to drum up contributions. Yes, Katherine Kuhlman was on during that time and I saw her as being spooky; and Oral Roberts also made an occasional appearance; but the main driving place for Jesus was the local church.

Has it been on a Sunday that you have been touched by the message heard in your church? Has it been on a Sunday that your message has touched someone in a way that invites him or her to come to Christ? I believe that now more than ever, the local church should be the arena in which disciples are made, strengthened, and deployed to go and make more disciples.

OWN YOUR SERMONS!

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Your weekly gift, as pastor, to your congregation should be a loving, touching, challenging, inspiring sermon. And as a district superintendent in the United Methodist Church, one common complaint I've heard, thank God from not too many churches, is something along the lines of "Our pastor doesn't seem to care about us." That could mean several things, including that you don't really care about them, but it could also mean that you're not having eye contact with them, or you're not "owning" your sermon; you're not making it your story or your struggle along with theirs as you share the gospel mandate. The late Zig Ziglar (Checkup from the Neck Up guy) used to say that in his presentations, he could not go 7 minutes without sharing something humorous in his talk; and the same applies to our sermons. We're not comedians, but we're having fun with the passage and we sometimes have to keep our audience's attention by trying to slip something humorous by them. Some preachers employ the "Turn to your neighbor and tell them...." just to make sure they and their neighbors are still with us (awake?). The Rev. Dr. Charles Stanley of First Baptist, Atlanta, uses the "Listen!" comment every few minutes of his sermons or right before he's to make an important point. You could also say, "If you're writing this down, this is something you should write."

Nothing works better than to put yourself in the struggle or story. When the Walk to Emmaus was in its infancy, I came to dread hearing these two things, which worked back then, but after the first two hundred uses, they got old: "And that little boy was me!" or "Webster defines __________ as..." I doubt Daniel dreamed one day he would be the most quoted theologian... But do share something about yourself, especially if you're new to the church. This Sunday's (tomorrow's) gospel is/or can be about, looking back and forgetting to move forward. I used to share how God called me out of a nice job with Ma Bell; I had thought several times, "If I was still with Ma Bell I might have made this much money or I would at least be a vice-president or CEO; but that was looking back; God called me here, and here I am, with you, to do a mightier work." Or, " can't keep thinking back to the pastorate I left behind, because God has me here, and I'm excited to be here, with you, to do this marvelous, awesome work that God has for you and me to do."

Share, on a regular basis, your gratitude to be where you are, even if you're not. Keep the innermost secret thoughts of your heart right where they are. I believe you are grateful to be there, so smile and share that from time to time; it's a good way to start worship or prayer time; and it makes your folks glad to be in worship with you that morning.

Best Man

On Thursday, June 9th, 2016, I did one of the hardest things I ever have, and that was to give the eulogy for my father, Eradio Valverde, Sr. My dad, since a boy, liked to go by Eradio Martinez Valverde, so most knew him as E.M., but like me, had only a first and last name. One of the things I regret not mentioning about my dad was that he was the best man at my wedding. When Nellie and I decided to marry as we talked about who would be what, as I thought about what "best man" meant to me, there was only one person who could be the best man, and that was my dad, for no man had ever done for me what my dad did, and continued to do until he passed away.

Education Mattered My dad dropped out of school when he was in eighth grade, if all the stories are to be believed. He was not proud of that, but he was proud that he charged us: You will go to college. One of his favorite sayings to us was, "I don't want you to have to work as hard as I do." And we knew what he meant. He struggled once his dream job closed up. The Hygeia Creamery shut down its Kingsville plant and moved to Harlingen, and he was not invited to come along. Dad tried a series of jobs including one that a local dress shop tried, having a panel van with ladies' clothing in it that would go to several towns in the area and call on its best customers and they could come out to the truck, look at dresses and then try them on in the privacy of their home, and decide if they wanted to buy them or not. Now, it seems like internet/online buying before there was an internet. I went along with him one day and I found it to be awkward; needless to say, so did Dad, and he kept looking for meaningful work. The Sunday came when he announced that he would be driving up with Mr. Meza, our across the street neighbor, who had found work in Houston. That afternoon he piled in the car with other Kingsville men who set out to Houston. Most already had jobs, my dad did not. Several of the men from our church, El Buen Pastor Methodist Church, had left for Houston, and through one of them found a job as a spray painter with Dresser Industries. It may have had an additional name, as it underwent several incarnations, but the main company was Dresser. My dad eventually became a master painter, spraying the computer cabinets that went on oil exploration trucks. Eventually, the fumes from the paint started giving my father headaches (the ones we gave him were not enough!), and so he sought other work. He became part of an assembly team that put in the electronics in the cockpits of the fighter jets made by Grumman and he did that for a while. Then, he got a job with Houston Independent School District, working in the electrical warehouse, where he retired. Still, he said, "You will go to college, so you don't have to work as hard as I do." And we did. All five of us have our bachelor degrees. I was the only one to not have a University of Houston degree, but I did do summer work there allowing me to finish my undergraduate degree in three calendar years. I sure did work hard getting my college degree so that I wouldn't have to work hard.

Manners Mattered One thing my dad disliked was for us to be rude. He believed we should greet everyone, shaking their hand or at least acknowledging them when we saw them. Yes, sir, and No, ma'am, were expected. We could not get away with just yeah, or nah. Respect for elders was important. And he expected our colleges and universities to teach that or at least he would ask, if I did not greet someone, "Did you learn that at college?" We would joke with each other that somehow that course was not in the curriculum for our colleges and universities. But, we learned the principles of good manners from him and mom. I was thankful I did not have to learn the strict Mexican ones that my cousins had to learn; they lived right next door to my maternal grandfather and he expected certain things that we never were taught nor expected to follow; holding our hands behind our backs after serving him a glass of water. We did learn, "Mande" as a way of expecting to do more for him or any of our elders. Mande literally means, "command" so we were at the command of our elders if they so expected. My daughters learned that one and to this day if we ask them something and they don't hear it, will ask, "Mande?"

God MattersWe all had a drug problem growing up. Any time the church doors opened, we were drug to church by my father. Worship and anything related to the church mattered. (Steve Harvey covered this in his portion of The Kings of Comedy). Sunday school, we were there. Sunday worship, check. Sunday night worship, check. Wednesday night worship, check. MYF meeting, check. Vacation Bible School, check. It was no wonder that God got ahold of me early on. And I'm so thankful He did! But, I always loved my church friends more than my school friends. Part of it was that here we were a minority in the country, members of a Protestant church, so we were double-minorities and that helped us bond with each other. Summer camp, check. We worked hard all year with our church MYF to raise the $20 per week charge at Mt. Wesley in Kerrville, Texas. Car washes, bake sales, spaghetti suppers, even an egg sale that to this day makes me smile that we even tried it. Two by two, our youth director sent us in the nicer neighborhoods near our church, to ring the doorbell of each house. The first house, if someone answered, and keep in mind, these were different times, we would ask if they would please donate an egg for our egg sale. Just one egg. Everyone had an egg, and off we would go to the second house and ring their doorbell. "Would you like to buy an egg to help our church youth group get to summer camp? Any amount will do!" And most would give us at least a dollar, some fifty cents, some two dollars. And after an afternoon of begging and selling, we would have amassed a significant amount of our needed money.

We were taught how to pray by our parents, and by my paternal grandmother, Petra M. Valverde, "Momo" as we called her. Prayer was our way of staying connected to God, and simple, sincere prayers were what were expected; nothing fancy, just from the heart conversations with God. Yes, we tended to ask more than we gave in our prayers, but it was part of our learning.

Singing was fun. Singing in Spanish allowed us to further learn the language. Reading responsive readings in Spanish were also great lessons of the awesome language. Singing was an important part of our worship, and to this day I miss singing in Spanish. The years of decline in the Rio Grande Conference churches in Houston, led to my parents deciding to visit an anglo church being pastored by one of my old college roommates, The Rev. Richard Laster, who was senior pastor at St. Philips UMC. They had known Richard for years and he welcomed and loved them, and made them members of St. Philips. There they also found dear sisters and brothers in the faith. It was St. Philips that buried both of them. They both wanted singing in Spanish for their funerals, but few to none of the members there knew how, so they used the hymns in English, including some that were found in the old Cokesbury Hymnal, "When Jesus Came Into My Heart," was one that a YouTube video reminded the pastor of that melody and found in the C.H. "He Lives" was my dad's favorite and we sang that, I in Spanish, in my pew, the rest in English.

Best Man IndeedI'll never forget my dad. As I shared in my words to the congregation the idea that Dad was just a phone call away blessed me. He was quick to answer and would either go rescue us or send someone to help us as need be. My maturing into a man was because I knew he was or could be there soon, should I mess up or need his help right away. He made trusting God as a father possible, because he was a good father. My daughters all loved him and loved being with him. His sense of humor tickled them. He would watch their shows and made his honest comments about them. Blues Clues was the one that really set him off. "How can he be asking such things? It's right there? Is that guy a dummy?" he would say, and just set my girls laughing and laughing. Every summer they would spend some days with my parents and were spoiled just as grandparents are supposed to do. Dad loved his great grandchildren as well, getting to know the Houston boy, Liam, a little more, as Liam loved going to see "Great-grandpa." It was he would cried the most as the coffin was lowered into the ground. But it allowed for this grandpa to talk to him about resurrection and eternal life.

Dad, you will always be my best man.

And They'll Know We Are Christians By Our _____?

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When he had gone out, Jesus said, ‘Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, “Where I am going, you cannot come.” I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’ (John 13:31-35)

God blessed me with a wonderful day yesterday.  It was a long day, but one I spent with my sweet wife, going the width of our district.  We got up early to be in worship at First UMC in Port Lavaca, where our web master and his wife asked that I baptize their daughter.  His mother is our associate pastor at FUMC there, and it was a great morning, followed by a good lunch.  Then we zoomed over to George West, Texas, where I shared my faith story with a large group of confirmands.  And as I was reading the gospel text for this coming Sunday that thinking about the day and especially the giggly confirmands sitting on the front row that I thought of that old song which I quoted in the titles of this devotional.  The refrain says, "And they'll know we are Christians by our love, by our love; yes, they'll know we are Christians by our love."  Did I mention I got attacked as soon as I walked in the sanctuary at the first church?  Yes, they'll know we are Christians by our lack of love in some cases...  It was not a personal attack but an attack against a pastor is still an attack.  Yes, they'll know we are Christians by our love...

The object of our lives is to glorify God in everything we say, think, and do.  And nothing glorifies God more than our love towards God, towards ourselves in positive, healthy ways, and our love for others.  It's the new commandment, and it's one that will never get old, especially as new people come to that understanding of its importance and centrality to our faith.  Jesus was suggesting or hinting this; He was commanding this.  "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.  Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.  By this everyone will know you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."

Yes, everyone.  No exceptions.  Not even jerks.

PRAYER:  Lord, Easter is about Your love for us, and our love for you and others.  We sometimes fear the "others" because of what we have seen or experienced from some, but nonetheless, our commandment is to love one another.  Forgive us when we find it hard or try to ignore doing that; we are called to people The People of Love.  May it be so in my heart and life right now!  In Your Name I pray, amen.

Have a great and blessed day in the Lord!

Eradio Valverde

PS  That attack did not ruin my day nor deny me my blessings!  Amen!

Ah, the Good Life!

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The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.     He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters;     he restores my soul. He leads me in right paths    for his name’s sake. 

Even though I walk through the darkest valley,    I fear no evil; for you are with me;    your rod and your staff—    they comfort me. 

You prepare a table before me    in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil;    my cup overflows.  Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me    all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord    my whole life long. - 23rd Psalm

I entered the good life at around nine years of age.  It was at that age that Jesus became my shepherd.  It was at that age I got my first paying job; and I became a tither.  And around that age that I was confirmed into the Methodist Church on this very day (it was a Sunday back then!).  I can think of no better life that I could want.  I am the richest man when it comes to blessings from the Lord; His love and care for me.  I have never wanted for anything; many have been the green pastures in which I have laid down in.  Cool has been the water I have drank.  And many have been the times the Lord has restored my soul.  He's been my G.P.S.; my Good Providing Shepherd, and has led me on the right path and what an adventure that has been.  I wish I could say that I've stayed on that path; I sometimes resemble that verse that says, "And we, like sheep, have gone astray..." but He's led me back and more importantly welcomed me back.  Yes, I've been scared and many have been the tears I have shed; but I've never feared, especially evil, for the power and might of the Lord have protected me, and yes, I've been comforted.

I've attended the finest banquets possible, sometimes even with people that didn't care for me, and some may have been my enemies; but that was okay because as far as the Lord was concerned I was the guest of honor; and so were they - for Jesus died for sinners.  To receive bread and wine in Jesus' name and presence, and power; I'm full!  And while the journey has been a great one and no one know how much more we have, we hold on to the hand of He who leads us, and you know what?  The best is yet to come!  I have reservations at the Shepherd's house.

PRAYER:  Lord, bless those who have read it; may those who know You celebrate You, and may those who seek You come to know You as Lord and Shepherd.  I pray in Thy name, amen.

Have a great and blessed day in the Lord!

Eradio Valverde

P.S.  The year was 1963 - 53 years ago.  I still have the Bible given to me on that day, and I still have the certificate of my church membership!  To God be the glory!