The Pen of the Wayfarer

by Derek Gitsham

Then Jesus turned and saw them following
and saith unto them, what seek ye? They
said unto him, Rabbi (which is to say being
interpreted, Master,) where dwellest thou?
He saith unto them, “Come and see.” John 1:38-39

Jesus turning around and seeing his disciples
following surprised them by asking them what
they were seeking. Impulsively they responded,
“Where do you live?” It was a strange response
but they did not know what to say, as they were
not expecting that question from Jesus.

The Lord’s response is beautiful. It is totally
uncomplicated, void of anything intellectual,
come and see. It is possibly the most simple of
responses that they could have heard from Jesus.
They were not put off, they were not rebuked for
being silly, just told to “come and see.”

So uncomplicated does the Lord intend our walk
to be with Him, that literally all the believer
has to do is come to Jesus, and “look around.”
Take it all in boys, everything you see. See
where I live in my heart, who preoccupies me,
where I go when I need help, just come and see.

Jesus is making the same response to us today,
“come and see.” Look upon Me, gaze upon Me with
the eye of your heart, seek My face, “behold in
a glass the glory of the Lord, look unto Me all
you ends of the earth and be ye saved.”

Look for Jesus in everything, see Him in all,
He is there. As the Hebrew writer beautifully
writes, but now we see not yet all things put
under him but we see Jesus who was made a
little lower than the angels.

Come and see. Two great things to do. Come, just
do it, stop procrastinating, simply come, and see
what happens when you do. Come unto me all you
that labor and see the change.

There's no doubt about it:life comes at you hard.
Failure, abysmal failure, no doubt, is somewhat
inevitable. God has to bring us to the end of
our long, hard selves in order to get us into
any shape at all that can be called holy and healthy.

Thank God that we have a Savior who knows
how to lift us up out of the miry clay and
set our feet on the Rock without unnecessary
comment. Our God leads and teaches and corrects
with the utmost humility.

There is much talk about spiritual leadership,
but what really is a godly leader like? If you
were going to be fall into your worst failure,
who would you want to gather your sadly shattered
pieces and help you put them back together?
Implicit in that answer is a lot of what it means
to lead like God leads.

Have you ever broken something that is precious
to someone else? There is nothing worse than
the feeling of horrible helplessness when you
realize that you have dropped something that
cannot be easily or at all fixed, or acted, or
been acted upon, in such a way that trust has
been broken. This can happen to us as a child
with our mom's favorite collectable or it can
happen relationally to us as adults with each
other. It can happen, and many times does happen,
between us and God. Or any mixture of all of the
above.

We are hurt often, we hurt others often:
that part we get. But how do we respond as
Jesus would? For how we respond to the
failure of another, especially if the
failure has caused us great hurt, is a test of
our ability to lead as Jesus does. In these
situations we have much more to lose than
the one who appears to have failed.

Again, when you fail, who would you like to
come and help you up? Wouldn't you
want someone to come and get you
as gently but as effectively as Jesus
got Peter when he denied Him? Jesus did
not mock Peter, or shame him, but
gently shows him the path to restoration
and, therefore, to freedom.

Peter denied Jesus at the worst
possible time. In Jesus' hour
of need, Peter not only was
not there, he turned his back
on Jesus. Peter failed--royally
failed. If we think that Jesus
did not feel the pain of that,
I think we misunderstand
completely.

Christ was hurt by his fellows,
have no doubt about that.
Betrayal is the nastiest of things.
Yet He kept on doing the will of
God to the very end. He plunged
into death so that we might be
plunged into life. He was pulling
all of humanity out of the pit
on His very back. Alone.

And yet, without fanfare, at the
first possible moment, he heads
back for the one hurting, lost
sheep: Peter.

With Christ there was no posing for
paparazzi. No grand talk of beating
the devil's butt singlehanded. No
victory swagger. Not even
any reading of "the Riot Act"
to Peter for cracking under
pressure at the most crucial moment.
Jesus is back to basics: cooking
breakfast on the beach. Serving.
Low of heart. Looking to take
Peter back in and get him back on track.

If Jesus comes in too high,
even though He certainly could,
Peter might not, probably would
not, take the extended hand up.
True leaders are not focused on
themselves, but on reaching
the last lost sheep. They do not
say, "99 is good enough, let the
last one go, they deserved it."
They do not count whether the
fallen one has money or not, or
talent, or beauty, or brains or
anything this world calls "worth"
--they go out and get them.

Jesus does not say much to Peter,
but He keeps saying the same
thing until Peter gets it.
"Peter, do you love Me? Feed
My sheep." No direct mention is made
of Peter's denial. Peter must get
that Jesus asks him three times,
"Do you love me?" because Peter
denied him three times. Kind of
a cancelling out of the denial
with love. Love is like that.

Peter says, "Lord, you know that I
love You." He understands, in a new
way, that the Lord does know--knows
everything about Peter, knows his depths,
and knows his failures and definitely
knows his weakness. Its all out there.
Jesus in not horrified, not surprised,
not out to embarrass Peter, but to give
him what he needs to get back on the path.

The setting reflects the moral of the
story. Jesus, as always, has prepared
what they need as a good leader always
does. Peter has decided to go fishing,
because that is what we do when we fail:
revert to our old life, but that old life
produces no fruit, and in this case, no fish.

Jesus already has fish cooking on the shore.
This is his third appearance to his
disciples since He has risen. He invites
them to eat of what He has, but He also
invites them to bring forth out of the
share He miraculously provides for them.
They have been fishing all night and caught
nothing. Now they have more than they could
imagine once they take His playful advice.

Jesus tells them, "put your net on the other
side of the boat." Yea, right. The truth is,
with God, the impossible, amazing answer is near
at hand, right under our noses, if we but
believe God. He brings a little miracle,
an ironic little miracle, to the beach
that morning to take the morose tone
off things. Jesus always seems to be
doing that. "Just letting you guys know
that its the same old Me."

"It's no big deal. Just get back to business."
Do you love Me? Feed my sheep. Love
them the way I love you. Love them
just like this. No fanfare. Breakfast
prepared, a little straight talk,
communion shared, life given. Off to
work. Radical acceptance and radical
forgiveness are like that.

When you experience radical acceptance
and radical forgiveness you have a
better chance of becoming the kind
of person that will go and pull
people out of their failures without
the "shoulda, coulda, woulda" lecture.
You have a better chance of being
like Jesus: the answer comes to the 'just
on the other side of the boat' kind
of person, a love God and take care
of others kind of person. And by the way,
breakfast is waiting. Don't be late.
Make the road back as easy as possible
for others.

Be like Christ. He leads best who bows
his knee to lift others up. That is
rarer than hen's teeth, and infinitely
more valuable. Happy fishing.

restoration
forgiveness
humility
godly character
dealing with failure
John 21;1-19
Peter's denial
godly leadership
mercy
lost sheep

I thank you God for this most amazing day, for
the leaping greenly spirits of trees, and for
the blue dream of sky and for everything which
is natural, which is infinite, which is yes. ~e.e. cummings

photo taken in Worcester, England

The sixth chapter of Daniel reveals to us
some similarities between the life of Daniel
and the life of Jesus. Daniel had a quiet
spirit. He, like Jesus, did not try to
make himself the center of attention. Both
men quietly went about doing good, and
obeying what God had asked of them.

Yet, envy and jealousy rose up in people's
hearts against Daniel, as it did against
Jesus. Those that plotted against Daniel
knew that they could not find anything
wrong in what he was doing "unless they
find it against him concerning the law
of his God" (vs. 5); for they knew that
he served God alone and would not compromise,
even with the king. May we strive for
such a pure place, for sadly, there can be
much that antagonizes others in us that
is not of God.

Nonetheless,envy and jealousy provoke evil
deeds more than we know. We need to guard
against the mad thrashings of envy in our
own lives. Envy provokes Daniel's contemporaries
to devise a plot to bring him down. The
same was true of Jesus. In Matthew 27:18
Pilate knew that "it was for envy that they
delivered him" [to the Roman authorities].

What is amazing about both Jesus and Daniel
is how, when continually and violently
opposed, they just remained in the place that
God called them to and "did not raise their
voice" in the streets. They did nothing to
promote their "ministry" nor defend themselves.
They were simply faithful to God.

In Daniel 6, those that were envious of Daniel
observe that he is not falling down to worship
the king but is still, blessedly, worshipping
God alone. Here is how they hope to trap him
and take him down. Daniel's response to this is to
go home, open his windows, and pray three times
a day to God AS HE HAD ALWAYS DONE! (vs. 10).

When things are arrayed against us let us
quietly but visibly continue to obey God.
Consider the life of Jesus, for in it we
see this same quiet, visible obedience
in action.

Isaiah writes about what the coming
Messiah will be like: "he shall not cry,
nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be
heard in the street. A bruised reed he
shall not break and a smoldering wick he
shall not quench." (Is. 42:2-3).

He also writes:"he was oppressed and
afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth:
he is brought as lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before her shearers is
dumb, so he openeth not his mouth" (Is. 53:7).

Jesus, and Daniel, did not fight to
defend themselves but trusted in God,
leaving their defence to God.

In Matthew 21 Jesus tells the parable
of the wicked vineyard keepers. The
parable exposes the envy and hatred
of the Pharisees toward God and His Son.
Jesus concludes that He is as the son
of the husbandman who was killed and like
the rejected cornerstone. Then He says
"whoever falls on the Stone shall be broken,
but on whomever it falls it shall grind
him to powder" (Mat 21:44). Even this coming
judgment is without words yet sure and
effective.

The chief priests and elders constantly
plot to get Jesus, yet Jesus just goes
along quietly obeying the Father. They bring
false witnesses to speak against Jesus but
"Jesus held His peace" (Mat. 26:63).

Jesus only does what He sees His Father
doing, He does nothing from Himself (John
5:19). Even then, He is persecuted, but
God is His defender, just as God is
Daniel's defender and the defender of
anyone who obeys God and does not
fight in his own strength to defend
himself for doing what God bids.

Defending ourselves becomes noisome.
We choose to lift up our voice, to
take up our weapons, to defend
our way; in doing so we lose quiet
obedience to God. Our voice is heard
in the street, we call attention to
ourselves. We lose the quiet and
meek spirit displayed by Daniel and
by Jesus. The spirit of Antichrist
is a noisy spirit that chatters
and clatters and pushes itself
to the front, gleefully breaking
bruised reeds and pompously snuffing
out smoldering wicks.

Let us seek to walk quietly and
humbly with God, not raising our
voice, putting ourselves in God's
hands, even when we are threatened
at the hands of men.

God's ways are not like ours.
We find Him in quietness and in
confident trust. We find His favor
in obedience. Let us trust ourselves
into His hands, and leave our defence
to Him. Whether we live we live unto
Lord, or whether we die, we die
unto the Lord, whether we live
or die, WE ARE THE LORD'S (Rom 14:8).

Bible study Book of Daniel
Book of Daniel
Daniel 6
Daniel and Jesus
Isaiah 42:2-3
Isaiah 53:7
envy
trusting God
quietness
humility
godly character
Christ and Antichrist

I will charge my soul to believe and
wait for Him, and will follow His
providence, and not go before it,
nor stay behind it. - Samuel Rutherford

by Pastor Derek Gitsham

"God is faithful by whom you were called
unto the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ
our Lord" (1 Corinthians 1:9)

Paul was perfectly chosen to bring our hearts
and minds to the most significant phrase in
scripture. You were called unto the fellowship
of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord. He did not
launch out and say our calling was our work
for God but our fellowship with God. A man’s
work was to be an overflow of his relationship
with God, not vice-versa.

This is probably the reason why so many in the
work of the Lord have suffered so much, by being
burned out; given to despair, depression and many
other symptoms which are all the result of putting
the cart before the horse.

Mark 3:14 Jesus ordained twelve that they should
be with him and that he might send them forth to
preach. Notice the phrase, “ordained to be with Him.”
How true this is. Far be it for us to think anything
less of this verse. It means exactly what it says,
“Ordained to be with Him.”

Everything starts with our relationship to Jesus.
All must come out of our fellowship with the Lord
else all is dead. He is the life, there is no other
life but in Him, and as we commune and partake of
Him so His life becomes our life. He that hath the
Son, goes on having the Son, has life. Everything is
Jesus. He is first, second, third, fourth, and so on.
He is Alpha and Omega, and all that is in between.

Jesus’ words to Peter were, “Do you love me, Peter,
more than these?” Spoken three times, Peter gave the
same response. Jesus’ answer was, “Feed My sheep.”
Loving Him is our relationship with Him, then we have
food for sheep. How crucial is it for God’s servants
to be in a vital relationship with Jesus, if they are
to feed the flock. “Love Me, Peter, fellowship with
Me, know Me, feed the sheep.” We can know what we
need to know by loving Him. Called into fellowship
with Jesus, make your calling and election sure.

I love to think of nature as an unlimited
broadcasting station, through which God
speaks to us every hour, if we will only
tune in. ~George Washington Carver

photo taken in Catskill, New York

God writes the gospel not in the Bible
alone, but on trees and flowers and
clouds and stars. ~Martin Luther

photo taken in Hudson, New York :)

"Dear Lord, grant me the grace of wonder.
Surprise me, amaze me, awe me in every crevice
of Your universe. Delight me to see how Your
Christ plays in ten thousand places. . .to the
Father through the features of men's faces. Each
day enrapture me with your marvelous things
without number. I do not ask to see the reason for
it all; I ask only to share the wonder of it all."

-- Joshua Abraham Heschel

photo taken in Abergavenny, Wales

Joshua Abraham Heschel
wonder