For Lord’s Day, February 17, 2013

Dear Saints,

The heat hasn’t worked all week at the manse, so we had someone stop by Friday afternoon to take a look.  It’s now fixed, although thankfully God has made the weather warm again, so we don’t presently need the heater (this is really February, right!?).

It was an exciting visit for us, actually.  And not only for the heater working again through a simple reset.  The man who visited turned out to be a Christian, and we had a lovely talk (and later we all prayed together).  Turns out he wrote a book about the Cedar Fire of 2003 in California, and how his friend’s property in the Cuyumaca Mountains was spared by the fire that consumed everything all around it — and right along the property’s border lines.  And this was in answer to the prayers of his wife and daughter.  You can read about it in a book he wrote, called God Inside the Fire, here: http://www.amazon.com/God-Inside-The-Fire-Amazing/dp/1477499911

Turns out his working in a field he never planned on for ten years had him particularly trained to write a book about the physics of fire.  Turns out the lady assigned by his company to visit the manse that day with him also was a Christian, although they had never met until then.  Turns out our recent changes that have me working at the manse most days had me home to meet them and chat — normally I would have been in the office on a Friday afternoon.  Turned out God sent them to help us when it could have been any number of other employees.

Turns out as he explained his story, I remembered that I had heard it a few months ago on KOGO radio when he called in and did a great job of getting a testimony of God’s protection of that property in the midst of California’s largest fire ever (the radio host was taking calls remembering the fire on its anniversary).  I only catch that particular program once in a while (and only for a few minutes when I do).

This gregarious man, named Greg, said I was one of the first pastors to get excited about this story and believe that God was behind it (of course, I also recognize God was behind the fire as well as the special protection within it).  I told him God, in His sovereignty, could have chosen not to answer that prayer (and we obviously believe there is no further Revelation outside His Word, properly speaking), but as good Presbyterians we know that God is providentially involved in and behind everything, even each drop of rain as I have noted in a quote by Calvin in an earlier post.  This discussion reminded me of how blessed we at our church are to know to exalt God in all His doings in our world (including the asteroid that penetrated Eastern Russia that same morning of the visit); I was reminded of of how our Statement of Faith explains such things nicely in the chapter, “Of Providence”:

• “God the great Creator of all things doth uphold, direct, dispose, and govern all creatures, actions, and things, from the greatest even to the least, by His most wise and holy providence, according to His infallible foreknowledge, and the free and immutable counsel of His own will, to the praise of the glory of His wisdom, power, justice, goodness, and mercy.” (Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 5, section 1)
• “God, in His ordinary providence, maketh use of means, yet is free to work without, above, and against them, at His pleasure.” (Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 5, section 3)

Let us thus approach God in worship with this attitude:

• “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.” (Revelation 4:11)
• “For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.” (Romans 11:36)

Semper Reformanda,

Pastor Grant