𝐘𝐀𝐇 𝐎𝐍𝐋𝐘 𝐓𝐕 100 𝐋𝐈𝐕𝐄 𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌

https://youtube.com/live/3-k_cXECsR4?si=-p7DS9VGqWecAEz6

He gives good gifts, ask with faith. 🙌

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It’s Here! — Issue #11

Welcome to our 11th ISSUE of Pure in Heart!

Cover art: At the Fish Ladder by Heather Dickinson, Issue #11.

(Download | Buy Print Issue)

Well, Resurrection Day has come and gone (though it remains in our hearts), spring is in the air, summer is just around the corner, the sun is shining, baby birds are singing — which means … (drumroll) … it’s time for the newest issue of Pure in Heart!

Our little magazine has been growing in the number of readers and writers who want to glorify God, and it shows. In our 11th issue, we have a smorgasbord of creative work by kids, teenagers, students, teachers, parents, and writers and artists of all ages and backgrounds. We have a new, two-part saga of our favorite red-headed heroine (Beatrix), a recipe that will change the way you make scrambled eggs forever, poems that will touch your heart, make you smile, and urge you to be a blessing to others, stories that will make you laugh, maybe make you tear-up, and some that will kindle joyful warmth in your heart … and there’s so much more! There’s even a fun drawing game that will get the whole family laughing around the table (we know from experience).

READ MORE >

READ ISSUE #11!
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🗣️ Malcolm J. Duncan: ”The New Wine of the Kingdom”.

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Struck Blind, Led By Grace

A Sermon of Encounter on the Damascus Road (Acts 9:1–19a)

(Note: Sermons can be heard in audio format at https://millersburgmennonite.org/worship/sermon-audio/)

Introduction

Last Sunday Rachelle talked about the disciples trembling in fear behind locked doors, only to have a surprise encounter with the risen Christ. As you may remember, last week I shared during the children’s story about a fearful encounter with a tornado from my childhood. Since I left you hanging at the end, and since there have been some inquiries about how things turned out, I wanted to finish the story.

I left the story with the windows of the school wide open, the skies dark and roiling with clouds, and we students and teachers sitting with our heads between our knees in the hallway, as I heard a teacher running from the office and the squawking Bearcat weather radio announcing that a tornado was heading right for us.

Well, unless I have somehow been replaced by a clone, you of course know I survived.

I did some research, and it seems the tornado in question was an F4—one step below the worst rating—that occurred on March 29, 1976. It started in central Mississippi and traveled 127 miles to Meridian. I was in third grade. I was scared.

If my memory serves me correctly, the tornado jumped over the school and tore the roof off a car dealership down the road. I learned that the tornado did kill three people. But it could have been much, much worse if the twister had landed on top of a bunch of scared children in Mt. Barton Elementary School that warm afternoon in March.

If we live on this earth very long, most of us will encounter forces greater than ourselves. Moments of terror. Moments of mystery. Moments when we are left trying to understand why we encountered what we encountered, why we lived while others died, why we had to face the experience at all. There are things that overtake us in this life—storms in the sky, storms in history, storms in the soul—and in those moments we feel very small indeed.

That is part of what makes Acts 9 such a powerful text.

Because Acts 9 is not just about a road.
It is about a man under orders.
It is about a collision with a force far greater than himself.

Scripture portrays Saul as overwhelmed by the terrifying nearness of the risen Christ—fallen to the earth, blinded by glory, and reduced from a man of force to one who must be led by the hand.

Let us pray,

 Que las palabras de mi boca y las meditaciones de nuestros corazones sean agradables a tus ojos, oh Dios, roca nuestra y redentor nuestro. Amén.

Homily

Saul begins the story as a man of certainty, a man of momentum, a man of religious fervor. He is not hesitant. He is not conflicted. He is “still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord.” Violence is in his lungs. Zeal is in his bones. He believes he knows exactly what he is doing.

And yet in one terrible and merciful moment, all of that certainty collapses.

Sometimes Christ meets us that way, by interrupting the life we thought we controlled. Sometimes grace arrives as disruption. Sometimes truth comes as collapse. A veces, Cristo resucitado nos encuentra no en nuestra fuerza, sino en nuestra debilidad. Sometimes the risen Christ meets us not in our strength, but in our weakness.

And so as we come to this story, we do not come merely to admire Saul’s conversion from a safe distance. We come as people who know what it is to be brought low, to have our certainties shaken, to ask what on earth just happened, and what do we do now.

Acts 9 is not only the story of Saul’s conversion. It is also the story of how Jesus interrupts violence, how blindness can become the beginning of true sight, and how the church is called to receive even the one it most fears.

“Meanwhile Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest…”

That is how the story opens. Saul is not merely irritated. He is not simply mistaken.  He is a man so certain of his cause, so convinced of his righteousness, that he believes persecution is holy work.

That is one of the most unsettling truths in all of scripture: it is possible to be zealous for God and yet resistant to God. It is possible to be religious and wrong. It is possible to think we are defending truth while we are actually wounding Christ.

Saul is fervent. Focused. Devoted. He has official backing. He has a mission. He is going to Damascus to bind disciples and drag them away.

And then, on the road, everything changes.

A light from heaven flashes around him. He falls to the ground. And he hears a voice saying, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”

That sentence is at the heart of the whole passage.

Jesus does not say, “Why do you persecute my people?”
He says, “Why do you persecute me?”

Christ so identifies with the church, with the suffering, hunted, trembling body of believers, that to strike them is to strike him. To wound them is to wound him. To terrorize them is to terrorize him.

This means the church is never merely a voluntary association or a club of like-minded people. The church is bound to Christ. The body belongs to the head. Jesús resucitado se toma como algo personal lo que se le hace a su pueblo. The risen Jesus takes personally what is done to his people.

And this also means something else. When anyone is trampled, degraded, humiliated, or brutalized, Christ is not distant from that suffering. The crucified and risen Jesus is the one who still says, in every age, “Why are you persecuting me?”

The voice of Christ echoes across history—across jail cells, lynching trees, prison camps, ghettos, slave ships, detention centers, ruined villages, and frightened homes. Christ is not neutral where human beings are crushed.

But notice: Jesus confronts Saul yet does not destroy him.

The first word Saul receives is judgment, yes—but judgment in the form of revelation. Saul is forced to see that the one he opposes is the Lord. The one he thought he was defending God against is, in fact, God’s Anointed One. The risen Christ unmasks Saul’s righteousness as rebellion.

But Jesus does not kill Saul on the road. He stops him.

The grace of God is often like that. It interrupts before it rebuilds. It knocks us down before it raises us up. It unmasks the disease before it heals.

And then comes the strange mercy of blindness.

Saul opens his eyes, but he can see nothing.

The man who thought he could see clearly turns out to be blind. The man who believed he had clarity, certainty, and theological precision is suddenly dependent on others to lead him by the hand.

He came to Damascus to take captives.
Instead, he enters Damascus a prisoner of his blindness.

He came with authority.
He arrives helpless.

He came breathing threats.
He arrives in silence.

For three days he neither eats nor drinks. Three days. A familiar length of time in the Christian story. It sounds like death, burial, waiting, undoing. Saul is in a kind of tomb. The old Saul—the self-assured, violent, self-justifying Saul—is being dismantled in darkness.

Sometimes we speak of conversion too lightly. As if it were merely changing one’s opinion or adjusting one’s beliefs. But in Acts, conversion is more like death and resurrection. It is not a tweak. It is a collapse of the old order. Saul’s world caves in on the Damascus road. As Paul later wrote to the church of Corinth, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: ¡Lo viejo se ha ido, lo nuevo ha llegado! The old has gone, the new is here!”

Some of us know what it is to have a world we trusted come apart. We know what it is to discover that our certainties were too certain, our judgments too sharp, our righteousness too self-protective, our religion too aligned with our fear.

Some of us know what it is to be brought low enough that we must be led by the hand.

But that is not the end of the story. Acts 9 is not only about Saul. It is also about Ananias.

The Lord comes to a disciple in Damascus and says, “Go.”

And Ananias rsponds with the facts: “Lord, I have heard from many about this man…”

In other words:
Lord, do you know who this is?
Lord, do you know what he has done?
Lord, do you know what he came here for?

Ananias is not faithless. He is honest. He knows the danger. He knows the stories. He knows the trauma Saul has caused. He knows that “welcome” is not cheap for people who have been hunted.

Pero el Señor dice: «Ve, porque él es un instrumento que yo he escogido…»

Yet the Lord says, “Go, for he is an instrument whom I have chosen…”

This is astonishing. God chooses the persecutor. Not because the persecution did not matter. Not because the harm was unreal. Not because God waves away the suffering Saul caused. No—God chooses Saul because grace is stronger than Saul’s past. La gracia es más fuerte que el pasado.

That does not minimize sin. It magnifies mercy.

Ananias goes.

This may be the hardest part of the text, honestly. Saul’s conversion is dramatic and memorable, but Ananias’s obedience is perhaps even more difficult.

Ananias must walk into the house where his enemy is staying. He must cross the threshold of fear. He must trust that Christ is already at work in someone he would never have trusted on his own.

And when he enters, his first words are breathtaking:

“Brother Saul.”

Brother.

Not “former enemy,”
not “dangerous man,”
not “suspect,”
not “problem,”
not even “convert.”

Brother.

Before the scales fall, Ananias speaks kinship. Before Saul has preached a sermon, planted a church, or written a letter, Ananias names him as family.

That is what the church is called to do—not cheaply, not foolishly, not without truth—but with the deep, trembling courage that believes Christ can make a new creation where we may only see a threat.

Ananias lays hands on Saul. Saul’s sight is restored. He is filled with the Holy Spirit. He rises and is baptized.

Maybe today some of us need the Saul word.
We have been too certain.
Too quick to call our own fear “conviction.”
Too ready to wound in the name of righteousness.
And the risen Christ is merciful enough to stop us.

Some need the Ananias word.
We are being asked to go where we do not want to go.
To cross a threshold we did not choose.
To trust that Christ may already be at work in the person we fear, avoid, or resent.
And obedience feels dangerous.

Some need the church word.
We are not merely individuals with private spiritual lives. We belong to one another in Christ. What is done to one member is done to all of us. The wounds of others are not somebody else’s problem. Christ says, “Why do you persecute me?”

And some need the resurrection word.
Our blindness is not the end.
Our darkness is not the end.
Our undone place is not the end.
God knows how to use even the tomb-like places that fill our souls.

Again and again in Scripture, God meets fearful, overwhelmed, disoriented people and makes a way where there seemed to be none. Paul himself will later admit that he came “in weakness and in fear and in much trembling.” La Biblia no oculta el miedo humano. Revela a un Dios que se encuentra con las personas en medio de él. The Bible does not hide human fear. It reveals a God who keeps meeting people in the middle of it.

We often think faith should remove fear entirely. But scripture is more honest than that. Faith is not always the absence of trembling. Often it is what happens when trembling people keep going because God has met them where they shiver and shake.

This means grace is not merely about making nice people a little nicer. Grace is about new creation. Grace does not simply smooth over rough edges. It raises the dead and rips off the grave clothes. It takes enemies and makes them kin. It takes what is curved inward on itself and bends it toward love.

The church, then, is called to be the place where this strange and difficult miracle keeps happening. Not that we become naive about harm. Not that we forget wounds. Not that accountability disappears. But that we refuse to believe anyone lies outside the reach of the risen Christ. Nos negamos a creer que alguien esté fuera del alcance de Cristo resucitado.

So perhaps part of the sermon today is this: someone else’s healing may depend on your willingness to go.

Your willingness to knock on the door.
Your willingness to enter the room.
Your willingness to pray.
Your willingness to trust that Christ has gone ahead of you.

And perhaps part of the sermon is this too: your own healing may depend on letting someone come to you.

Letting yourself be seen in your blindness.
Letting yourself be led.
Letting yourself receive touch, prayer, kindness, and naming.
Letting the community do for you what you cannot do for yourself.

So this morning, wherever you find yourself in the story, hear the good news.

If you are frightened, Christ speaks peace to frightened people.
If you are blind, Christ can open your eyes.
If you are ashamed of what you have done, Christ can heal you.
If you are reluctant like Ananias, Christ can still send you.
If you are wounded by what others have done, Christ sees that wound as his own.

The voice that spoke on the Damascus road still speaks today.

Still interrupts. Still confronts. Still blinds false vision. Still opens true eyes. Still joins himself to the wounded. Still sends disciples into difficult places. Still makes apostles out of enemies and saints out of the shattered.

So may the Lord who met Saul meet us. May the Lord who sent Ananias send us. May the Lord who restored sight restore our own. And may the scales fall from our eyes—whatever they are, however long they have clung—so that we may finally see Christ, and in seeing Christ, also rise with him in power, witness, and glory.

Amen

"Peter replied, 'Repent and be baptised, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.'"

Acts 2:38 #Bible #repentance #HolySpirit

‘From Addicted to Redeemed’ by Dawn Sanchez

This is my testimony — which, by definition, means to tell the story of how one came to Christ. But, more than that, this is my journey from death to life, from ashes to beauty, from a sinner to a saint! This is my story of redemption through Jesus Christ!

I grew up in Taylor, TX, and attended church since I was a baby. My parents ensured that I was raised in the church and that I was familiar with God. I didn’t know it at the time, but this would be vital in helping me find my way to Jesus. They laid that foundation for me. The Bible says, “Train up a child in the way he should go, and even when he is old, he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6). For me, that would prove to be true. 

I accepted Christ as my Savior when I was 9 years old, in Sunday school. I thought I knew what it meant, and part of me did comprehend some things, but I didn’t really know what being a believer was all about, and wouldn’t for a long time. The older I got, the more rebellious I became. Not only in the way I lived, but also in the way I treated my parents and others who were close to me. When I was 16, I ended up getting pregnant, which was a consequence that I couldn’t just pretend didn’t happen and sweep under the rug; however, it did turn out to be a blessing in disguise. It was not ideal, being a teen mother, but I was immensely blessed with a beautiful baby boy. Shortly after I had my son, I was diagnosed with severe clinical depression, which led to self-medicating with drugs and alcohol; it led to a multitude of destructive behaviors. Although my focus was on my new son, the depression still produced thoughts of suicide, but I couldn’t leave my baby without a mother. Looking back, I do believe that God sent my son to me as a way to reveal to me that life was (in fact) precious, and because I loved him so much, I turned away from my own selfish desires to focus on nurturing and loving him. God knew what He was doing. Even in my struggle, I remembered the scripture which says, “And we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28).   

Somewhere along the way, I lost my ability to cope with life on life’s terms. So, I began using and drinking as my coping mechanism. During my drinking and drugging career, I became the kind of person that I didn’t want to be. I remember one time when I was drinking, I got so drunk that I rolled down a hill, threw up in a taxi — which cost me $100 — tripped on concrete stairs, and hit my face so hard that I had a black eye for about three weeks … and I don’t remember any of it. I was in a blackout. That didn’t stop me. I continued drinking heavily. That’s how firm the grip of alcoholism had on me. I also remember a time when I was drugging, that I went out of town with some friends, and right before I left, my pills got stolen. I had put a stash away so that I had enough to last me the whole weekend. I had to spend the entire trip withdrawing, and I was so sick I could not participate in anything that my friends were doing. So, one of the girls there mentioned that she had some pain pills, and I offered to pay her for some. She told my friend, we got into a massive argument, and I spent the entire night in tears. I couldn’t wait to get home so I could get my fix. The experience traumatized me. 

I have many, many stories like the ones I just shared.  It became a way of life for me. I also lost a lot of friends along the way. I wore them out. They couldn’t keep taking responsibility for me while I was consumed by a selfish, relentless need to shut down my emotions. There were many times I probably should have ended up in jail or dead, but God had other plans for my life. After approximately 10 years of trying multiple substances and getting addicted to them all, switching back and forth between drugs and alcohol for years, 30 days in rehab, and one relapse, I got to the point where I was ready to give up the pursuit of trying to do this thing on my own and turned to Jesus, the only one who can enact lasting change and freedom from addiction. My journey to this point was definitely not an overnight process; however, I had finally hit my rock bottom and decided that enough was enough. I was sick and tired of being sick and tired.

My husband was instrumental in helping bring me to my knees before the cross. He threatened to leave me, and he had every right to do so. I was not the girl he married. I know that God used him to get through to me because nothing else was working. I got sober one year before he got home from the Army. He was stationed in Germany for three years. We were both completely different people by the time he got home, but I think I needed that time without him to get myself together. We were strangers when he came home, but through hard work, the decision to choose each other daily, and loving each other through the hardest parts, we fell in love all over again. We had to get to know each other again, and it was very difficult, but it’s a part of our story that I wouldn’t change. It made us the couple we are today.

The thing about taking what this world has to offer to cope with life is that it’s only temporarily satisfying. The feel-good feeling always passed, and not only did it leave me wanting more, but it also left me with suffocating feelings of guilt and shame. On November 16, 2011, I hit my knees and pleaded with God to completely remove the desire for drugs and alcohol. I needed Jesus, NOT the things of this world. It was in that moment that I let go of trying to control the direction of my life and began trusting Jesus, so He could lead and guide me to the right path, because I was running down a road of eventual total self-destruction. The Bible says, “Don’t love this evil world or the things in it. If you love the world, you do not have the love of the father in you” (1 John 2:15). I had sought solace in the things of this world and finally understood why God said not to. After I hit my knees and literally cried out to my heavenly Father, my tears immediately stopped, and a peace like nothing I had ever felt before washed over me and covered me like a warm blanket. 

To this day, I remain sober, ONLY by the grace of God. I know that he can use the experiences that I’ve been through to help others. He gave me the spiritual gift of Mercy, and I intend to utilize that gift to the best of my ability — to help others who are suffering, just like I suffered.

When I accepted Christ as a young girl, I didn’t really understand much about what that meant, but today I do. God transformed my heart, exchanging my inclination for worldly things for a deep longing for Him. Jesus made a way where there seemed to be no way, and He continues to do so. I have a passion in my heart for the things of Christ. I yearn to learn and grow in my knowledge of the truth of the Word of God. I seek to build lasting relationships with like-minded believers, and have done so since I began faithfully attending my home church — Foundation Christian Ministries in Bastrop, TX. I have met so many brothers and sisters in Christ who not only counsel me but encourage and pray for me in my time of need.  

It’s almost like the Lord “activated” my heart to want to go deeper in relationship with Him. That’s the only way I know how to describe the change I felt. Now, I want to read God’s Word, I want to attend church and be involved in discipleship, I want to serve! I don’t have to, I get to! The old me is gone, and the new me rejoices for what Christ has done in my heart and life. He has given me everything I need for living a godly life! He brought me out of darkness, out of the pit of my own personal hell, into a new freedom I’ve never known. As a Christian, is my performance perfect? Absolutely not!  But the righteousness of Christ now lives in me!Hebrews 10:10 says, “And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” My new desire is to submit to Christ daily and trust Him fully in all things.

I used to struggle with my identity, but now I know that my identity is IN Christ. I am loved by the Creator of the universe! The Bible says that I’m a member of Christ’s body (1 Cor. 12:27), I have been chosen by God and adopted as His child (Eph. 1:3-8), I have been redeemed and forgiven of all of my sins (past, present, and future) (Col. 1:13-14), I am complete in Christ (Col. 2:9-10)!

Complete. That word holds a lot of meaning to me. When I was in the world, I was trying to fill a void that only Jesus can fill. Now, I’m complete. I’m whole. There is a God-shaped void in each of us, and Jesus is the only one who can fill it. The world offers many things, but none of them are adequate. Christ is sufficient. He is enough. 

I used to be lost in the identity I got from what the world had to say about me, but in Christ, I am a NEW creation (2 Cor. 5:17)! If you want what I have, it’s as simple as believing in the one who can change your heart and your life; Jesus! He came so that we might have freedom from this world and from the ensnaring traps of the enemy. The Bible plainly says that we are saved by grace alone through faith alone (Eph. 2:8-9). It’s not through our own efforts that we are saved. It’s through the finished work on the cross — it’s a free gift that we are given, received by faith. Salvation is obtained by simply believing in Jesus (who came as God in the flesh, lived a perfect and sinless life, sacrificed Himself in our place on the cross, and resurrected on the third day, defeating death), along with repentance from sin, (which is having a sincere change of heart, mind, and action; turning away from wrongdoing to follow Christ) resulting in a guaranteed permanent place in His presence.

You can KNOW that you are saved! It says in Romans 8:38-39, “I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow — not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below — indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Thank the Lord that we can be completely forgiven of all sin and can be made whole in Christ! What a gift! Ezekiel 36:26 says, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”

As for me, I know that Jesus is alive and living through me, putting on display the fruits of the spirit that He has given me: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal. 5:22-23). He has a plan and a purpose for my life. My favorite verse in the Bible states, “I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future” (Jer. 29:11). I used to believe that I had no purpose, but I now know that it was a lie from the enemy. I have freedom in Christ – freedom from the grip of addiction and freedom from the grip of the world. I am forgiven for my past, and therefore do not need to dwell on who I used to be because that’s not who I am today. 

Today, I am a child of God! I am a wife, a mother, a Nana, and my heart is filled with gratitude and thanksgiving for the chains that have been broken in my life. Looking back, I can see where God protected me from harm. He used my husband to get to the heart of the matter with me and to bring me to my knees.  I didn’t want to lose my family, my husband, my children. I thank God for restoring my marriage and continuing to work in me to make me a better wife and mother. My hope is to live in such a way that my life reflects the character of Jesus and points others to Him.

The Lord is my strength and salvation! He is my protector, provider, and healer! All glory to the most-high God, my King and redeemer of my soul!  I praise the Lord for all He has done in my life, and I look forward to all that He has in store for me.

Abiding in Him

A prayer by Dawn Sanchez: Jesus, help us to surrender our will and control of our lives over to you. I pray that you bless all who read my testimony, that it might touch the hearts of many still suffering. Thank you for your grace that we do not deserve, but which You give so freely. Amen!

Are you searching for God?