Dirke’s blog – Thanksgiving reveals our proximity to Jesus!

You’re visiting at Auntie’s home. She gives your child a treat. What do you say? Every parent knows the routine. “What do you tell Auntie, honey?” We work hard at trying to get our children to understand the importance of saying, “Thank You.” We all too often know the feeling of doing something for someone and never hearing those special two words in return.

How many times have we prayed for God to come through in a given situation and, after He did, we fail to offer up a single word of thanks? We need to put as much emphasis into thanking God for what He has done as we put into pleading with God when we are in need.

Several years ago our family devotional time at Thanksgiving focused on the parable of the ten lepers that were healed in Luke 17:11-19.  After Jesus healed the ten, only one came back to Christ and fell at his feet to give thanks.  Our Lord then said, “Where are the other nine?”

 11  On the way to Jerusalem he was passing along between Samaria and Galilee. 12 And as he entered a village, he was met by ten lepers, who stood at a distance 13 and lifted up their voices, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” 14 When he saw them he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went they were cleansed. 15 Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice;16 and he fell on his face at Jesus’ feet, giving him thanks. Now he was a Samaritan. 17 Then Jesus answered, “Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine? 18 Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” 19 And he said to him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.”

We discussed as a family how often we pray and ask God for things but seldom demonstrate a spirit of gratitude and thanks with the same intensity that we come before the Lord with our original request. A lack of thanksgiving exposes our hidden thoughts that God is somehow obligated to meet our wants. He’s our own personal bellboy in the sky.

Luke states that the ten lepers asked Christ from a distance.  Once healed, they received no more blessing!  The one who returned thanks was the only one to experience the closeness of Christ. Jesus announced, “Your faith has made you well.”  The “wellness” Jesus spoke of was beyond the original request.  Jesus addresses the deeper inner need that this former leper didn’t even realize he had. The other nine missed out. The one that returned experienced internal cleansing and a spiritual closeness to the Savior.

An attitude of thanksgiving is not just a perfunctory “thank you.” They are words from a heart that falls at the feet of Jesus and draws one into a spiritual inner awareness of their dependence upon Him. My prayer for us this Thanksgiving is that we express a real thanksgiving that draws us close to the One who has blessed us beyond whatever we could dream of or hope for.

 “In everything give thanks for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” – I Thessalonians 5:18

Dirke has his doctorate in Church Leadership and is a professor for the Ministry Degree program at Palm Beach Atlantic University. He also teaches at Cru’s Institute of Biblical Studies. He specializes in Leader Development,  creating high performing teams and has years of experience at ministering in urban cross-cultural and international contexts.

Dirke’s Blog – An Amazing Divine Encounter

Have you ever had those seemingly random encounters with a stranger where God opens up an unexpected conversation and uses you to minister and encourage someone in the Lord? I sure have. Whether it’s entering into a discussion with someone sitting next to me in an airplane, or at a coffee shop, you never know what God has in-store.

Recently I was handling routine business with our bank manager when one comment led to another and before you knew it, I was doing marriage counseling and praying with the branch  manager. Two days later I received a letter thanking me for my timely words and prayer. Last night I received a phone call from a landlord who was inquiring about renting to someone who had stayed in our home. The conversation moved to sharing her fears and past hurts. God led me to share from the Bible and to pray with her. The next day I received a follow up e-mail thanking me for my prayer & words of comfort. I wish I could say I experience these moments more often, but it made me think of a divine appointment I had in 2010 that tops my list.

An Amazing Divine ENCOUNTER

Luis worked for a Restoration company and because we had water damage, he had been working in our home for nearly two weeks. On the last day, he cautiously approached me and said, “I see from the pictures on your wall that you have a beautiful family and I know that you are a minister, is it okay if I ask you a question?” I put down what I was doing and said, “Sure.” With a pained but inquisitive expression Luis asked, “Is it normal to have second thoughts before getting married?

One discussion led to another. His fiancé from Boston came down the next month and Lorna and I counseled them. It became apparent that marriage wasn’t wise. I helped Luis through the break-up and soon after he asked if I would disciple him. We began to meet regularly for a year walking through the Scriptures and reading a book on practicing spiritual disciplines for spiritual growth. During this time, Luis shared his story . . .

Luis’ amazing spiritual journey began in prison where he was given a 10 year sentence for dealing drugs. Shortly after arriving he found a Bible with the front cover torn off and a few pages missing. He began reading and attending the prison chapel. He met several men who began to help him better understand what he was reading and told him when he was ready, to pray the prayer of salvation. In June 2006, Luis became a Christian. His sentence was reduced to two years. Luis now wanted to please God, not only from his heart but with his body. Shortly before going into prison he weighed 281 lbs. When he was released, he had become a buff 195 lbs. His old neighborhood didn’t recognize him. Luis decided to come to Orlando, FL to work in his brother’s Restoration Company which led to our encounter.

But the story becomes even more amazing. After a year of our meeting, Luis sensed the Lord wanted him to attend a Bible college in Oklahoma. During his first year he meets Latoya, and they become engaged. As Luis is sharing with LaToya he happens to mention my name. To Luis’ surprise, LaToya says, “Dirke? Dirke & Lorna?  I know them.” Latoya had been a student with the Impact Movement at Ohio University. While attending a conference in 2002 that Lorna & I spoke at, she rededicated her life to Christ and credits her Impact experience as being a major factor in her decision to go to Bible College & enter the ministry.

Luis is finishing his last year in Bible college and they just had their first child. Only God arranges these encounters. So be ready, God has divine appointments planned for you!

 

Dirke has his doctorate in Church Leadership and is a professor for the Ministry Degree program at Palm Beach Atlantic University. He also teaches at Cru’s Institute of Biblical Studies. He specializes in Leader Development,  creating high performing teams and has years of experience at ministering in urban cross-cultural and international contexts.

Dirke’s Blog – Catching the Music!

dancing

One of my most enjoyable privileges in teaching is to help our ministry and missionary students fall in love with God’s Word and ultimately Himself. In Interpreting the Bible class I emphasize more than good interpreting principles. I help students see the Scriptures as one story by one author, the Holy Spirit. It’s an adventure and love story unmatched by any cinema effort. God pursues and woos our hearts to Him.

I want them to read and study the Scriptures from a redemptive context and not from a moralistic approach. For example, the David & Goliath story is more than killing giants in our life (i.e., be like David). It is telling us about the character of God and the coming redeemer. Story after story both in the Old and New Testament point to the Savior. When Jesus speaks to the disciples in Luke 24 on the road to Emmaus, he explains that the entire Old Testament, from Genesis to Malachi points to Him.

When someone catches the music of the Gospel, how they study, how they teach and how they live out their faith changes. The music is God’s grace & acceptance. The dance steps (“to do & not to do’s” of the Bible) are in response to the music and not the other way around. Because, there is no life in the dance steps, only in the music!

What is your focus? The music of the Gospel or the dance steps? Jesus says in 2 Corinthians 5:14-15, “For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.“

For the longest time I used to read verse 14 thinking that the Apostle Paul was saying that the key action was showing MY LOVE for Christ, but that is not what Paul says. The focus is not on MY love, but rather, the LOVE of CHRIST. What will control, motivate and focus me is not what I do, but it is focusing on what He has done and is doing. It is His love, His grace, His mercy that is poured out on me, undeserved. And as I think on Him and worship Him which is listening to the music there is only one response and that is to live for Him, not because I have to, but because I want to. Its a natural response to what God has done. It is as natural as dancing to the music.

What are you dancing to? Can you imagine dancing without music? Life is only found in God’s grace. And its that grace (the Music of the Gospel) that we dance to. The dance steps are important, but only when they are lived out in harmony with the music. Are you catching the Music?

– Dirke Johnson

Dirke has his doctorate in Church Leadership and is a professor for the Ministry Degree program at Palm Beach Atlantic University. He also teaches at Cru’s Institute of Biblical Studies. He specializes in Leader Development,  creating high performing teams and has years of experience at ministering in urban cross-cultural and international contexts.

Dashed Expectations

On Palm Sunday Jesus rides into Jerusalem with palms waving and hundreds of cheering fans certain that he was the Messiah who would set Israel free from Roman rule. They were ready to crown him King because they were convinced he was about to make what was all wrong, all right! But on that original Easter morning when the sun rose, disappointment and not jubilation ruled. Jesus’ followers were dejected and their expectations had been dashed. Even when the women returned with the news that Jesus was not in the tomb, Luke records that “these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them.”

Jesus joins two of His followers that morning on the road to Emmaus, neither recognized Him. Why not? I wonder if it is the same reason that I fail to recognize Him when He is right next to me whenever I try on my own to make sense out of extreme disappointments. When my career doesn’t go the direction I had hoped, when my children don’t become what I had dreamed, when my goals cease to be realistic and those I trusted in and counted on don’t come through. Why God? I was so sure, and now I’m not. Have you been there? I have!

That Easter morning began in disappointment but it ended in jubilation! Christ had risen, He had risen indeed! But how God did it wasn’t how they expected. And it’s the same for you and for me. What God wants to do in our lives won’t be what we expect but it will be what we need. I’m learning to let go of my expectations, release my grip on how I think it should be. And with open palms facing upwards, the quicker I surrender to whatever God brings down my path the quicker that I will recognize the Lord’s abiding presence has been there all the time.

by Dirke Johnson

Dirke has his doctorate in Church Leadership and is a professor in the Ministry Degree program at Palm Beach Atlantic University. He also teaches at Cru’s Institute of Biblical Studies. He specializes in Leader Development,  creating high performing teams and has years of experience at ministering in urban cross-cultural and international contexts.