Lots of babies being born lately. In the past year or so alone we’ve probably had at least a dozen or more newborn’s welcomed into this world in the English congregation alone. Our children are truly gifts and joyful blessings from God. But with parenting comes a great responsibility of raising them. There is a verse in today’s sermon passage about how we as Christians are storing up our inheritance in Christ by enduring the challenges in this lifetime. It got me thinking about inheritance and the “spiritual” inheritance we as parents are imparting upon our children in this life.
In our society inheritance is a firmly established custom and practice. Complex Wills & Estate laws exist to ensure and promote one’s ability to leave behind whatever material wealth one has amassed in life to one’s children and loved ones. It’s natural for a parent to want to provide a better future for their children than they had growing up. But as Christians there is the challenge of what we are bestowing upon our children in terms of our Christian Faith.
It’s fairly straightforward to assess whatever money and assets that remain after one’s death. Those materials things are carefully accounted for as the inheritance children receive. But in terms of spiritual inheritance, our individual Christian faith is not something that we can simply bottle up as an asset to be presented to our children after we pass on. The spiritual inheritance our children receive from us is a lifetime’s work of our love for the Lord expressed in our love for our children.
We receive unconditional love and forgiveness as children of God and yet condition our approval and acceptance of our children as we live vicariously through their successes and failures. God never required us to “earn” his love and acceptance. He just wants to have a relationship with us. We spend a lifetime killing ourselves amassing material things for the sake of providing for our children’s future security when what they needed most was to be loved. What they needed most was for us to stop for a moment and spend time with them as a witness of our love and faith in the Lord to provide all things.
One of my favorite passages is Psalm 127:1-7. Unless the Lord is present our labor is in vain. For

"It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
For he gives to his beloved sleep.”

From Pastor Mark’s Heart
May 18, 2014

The NFL draft is coming up this Thursday, and it is definitely one of the things that I look forward to each year. Not only because I am curious as to who the Cowboys will be drafting, but maybe more importantly, it means we’re just that much closer to the start of the NFL season. It’s a part of my personal countdown to September that starts with free agency and the draft followed by OTAs, rookie minicamp, training camp, and the preseason. This year’s draft is particularly more exciting for me because the Cowboys have a huge hole to fill at running back. I’m still hoping that AP will get traded to the Cowboys, but in the event that that doesn’t happen, I want to know who they will be drafting.
Every year before the draft, all the NFL teams go through a process of evaluating the college players. They come up with a board that ranks all the players at each position. They even have an overall board, where they rank who they think the best players are regardless of position. I believe this year, the best player overall is supposed to be quarterback Jameis Winston from Florida State. In order for each team to come up with these boards, they go watch players at the NFL combine and even invite certain players for something called a Pro Day. They watch the players run through drills which vary depending on the position that they play. They interview the players, and they watch their college game films. You can just imagine how much work they put in to evaluate hundreds and hundreds of players, and I’m sure each board will have similarities and differences among the different teams. Then on draft day, they use that board to decide who to pick based on what players are taken and what players are remaining. I can imagine it’s a lot of headache and pressure trying to pick players who they think will be successful in the NFL. If they miss on a pick that means time and money is wasted, and they’ll have to deal with a lot of angry fans.
Which really got me thinking, why would these coaches and scouts put in all this effort to make sure that they picked the “right” players? I conclude that it’s because we are imperfect human beings. Since we are imperfect, we need to find the best in order to succeed. For NFL teams to win the Super Bowl, they need a team filled with as many good players as possible. I don’t think there ever was a team that won the Super Bowl with a bunch of no-name scrubs. There was never a team that won with a lot of “Mr. Irrelevants” on their team. Mr. Irrelevant is the nick name given to the last player chosen in the draft.
On the flip side, we see in the Bible that God didn’t have to put in a lot of effort and research to find the best servants for Him to use. He didn’t have a servant board that ranked everyone from best to worst. He was able to use anyone even the most unqualified. God doesn’t have to stress because He is perfect. He can take a team of imperfect people and make them successful. Jesus had the first football team, the 11 disciples (Judas doesn’t count). They were a bunch of no-name scrubs. They all ran away when Jesus died on the cross, and yet God used them to build the church. God used them to spread the good news. God used them to really change the world!
When it comes to serving, it’s not about our worth. It’s not about our skills or talents. It’s about God’s perfection. It’s about Him. God can use Mr. Irrelevants like you and me to do great things.

From Pastor Eugene’s Heart
April 26, 2015