Dulles Family Life Church

     Though it may not have been so for all of us, I think most can remember when, as children, we looked forward to Christmas with joyful excitement and anticipation.  It was, as the song says, “The most wonderful time of the year.”  For so many though, it has now become a time we just try to get through.  The reasons for this are many.  Losses, whether through divorce, death, a wayward child, a job, a home.  Or, merely the passing of the years, and the disappearance of our youth and vitality.  The coming of Christmas can be something we dread, even hate.  Maybe you find yourself somewhere in that spectrum today.  If so, I want to share something with you from my heart, and most of all, I think, from His.
     This will be my 30th Christmas in Him.  I have spent them in some very diverse places.  Physically, emotionally, and yes, spiritually.  I have been alone, and with others.  I have found myself in places where His joy and presence was so real and  full I didn’t think I could stand any more.  I have also been in places where my life seemed so bleak and grey that the very words joy and hope seemed to mock and laugh at me.  I have known what it is to be surrounded by family you love, children you adore, to truly feel as if you have everything.  I have also known what it is like to have it all gone in a seeming instant, to feel as if you have lost everything, and in the material sense, to actually have done so.  My emotions and spirit have been just as varied, from mountaintops of joy to valleys of deep sorrow and pain.  There have been times where I have been very strong, feeling like nothing could stop me, and times when I was so very weak, feeling I couldn’t take one more step.  Didn’t want to take one more step.
     I don’t write all this because I want to focus on me, but so I can focus on Him.  What I have found in all those places, no matter how I felt, what I had or didn’t have, no matter where I was, or wanted to be, was that He was with me.  The same Jesus who was with me when my life seemed like it couldn’t get any better, was so beautifully with me when it seemed it couldn’t get any worse.  He was with me in the laughter, and with me in the tears.  He was with me when I had all things, and when I had nothing.  He was with me when my heart felt so full, and when it felt completely empty.  He was with me……always,
     In Luke 2, the angel appears to shepherds outside the village of Bethlehem.  Shepherds were despised and forgotten people in Jewish society.  Yet it was to them that the Father first sent His Good News of the gift of His Son.  The Father’s message to them, is still His message to us.  “Don’t be afraid…I bring good news of great joy for everyone!  The Savior….
Yes the Messiah, has been born tonight in Bethlehem.”  Wherever you are, in whatever condition or circumstance, the Lord seeks to appear, will appear to you, bringing you anew, His Good News.  You, we, are not alone.  He has come.  He is here.  No, the circumstances, even the emotions and feelings may not magically change, but He announces to you the good news that neither can they destroy you.  No matter where the journey yet goes, He goes with us, and not just as our companion, but as Savior, Messiah, Lord of all…..and all along the way.  You may be facing this week with dread.  He speaks to your heart, our hearts, “Do not fear.”  The Savior has come…for you, for me, for us.

     For all of you who read this, no matter where your life journey finds you today, I wish and pray for you not only a blessed Christmas, but all the fullness of His joy, peace, and life that you and yours can possibly have.

Tags: Heart Thoughts by oshell
No Comments »

     I was with friend and prayer partner Bob Yarbrough the other day, getting together as we do each week to pray.  He mentioned his appreciation of my last HT’s, where I wrote of the pastor being much like the shepherd’s sheepdog.  He felt however, that I’d left out a very important part of what the pastor’s role is, and that is to speak the words of the Father to the people He has given him to care for.  I didn’t need to reflect on that to know he was right.  What I spoke of concerning going after wandering people, bringing them back into the flock, confronting bullheaded behavior, these are all vital aspects of a pastor’s ministry.  However, there is no greater responsibility, indeed, blessed privilige and calling, then to speak the words that come from the heart of God to the people He sent His Son to die for.  I wrote the other day of the sheepdog, the pastor, needing to be in complete harmony with the heart and will of the shepherd, of Jesus.  That’s true, but he must not only carry out the actions of His heart, but proclaim the words of and from His heart.  Somehow, I think we have moved away from this.  Somehow, we have given priority to “other things,” at least in part.
     Bob went on to speak of Peter and John in Acts, where the crippled man asked them for silver and gold, but the apostles declared to him that they had none, but what they did have, they gave to Him, and called him to rise and walk.  Bob talked of how often in his ministry he had been tempted to want to give the people silver and gold, to give them what they, in their flesh, wanted, which of course would make him very popular and esteemed by all.  I thought on that for a bit, and the question that came to me, that always comes to me over such things is this.  Why do we so consistently think and believe that offering nothing more than Jesus, His words, His heart, His life, is ever enough?  Why do we somehow feel that the things that matter most, have the most effect, are to be found in the silver and gold of the world?
     Why do we feel that to draw people to our fellowships, we must have a top of the line worship team, a 5 star youth and childrens ministry, a large and active singles group?  Could it be because that’s what people tell us they want, and we feel we must provide it, and if we can’t, and most of us can’t, we feel we have failed, that we have nothing to offer at all?  Over the years, I have had so many calls from so many people who are looking for a church.  Always, they want to know what we offer in way of ministry for they and their family.  They ask for silver and gold.  No one, and I mean no one, has ever called and asked me how present the Spirit of the Lord was in the fellowship.  How real He was in the day to day lives of the people, and was the transforming work of the Holy Spirit going on in the midst of the congregation?  The cripple was not looking to or expecting to rise and walk in response to Christ moving through Peter and John.  We was looking for silver and gold, and had he received it, He would never have stood up.  For him, for us, Christ is more than enough.
     What would happen in our fellowships if we began to truly live and believe that wherever we are, whatever we have in way of visible resources, our hope and future is not found in them, but in the vastness of the resource we cannot see or touch, but Who is there, and Who longs to be shown mighty in the midst of His people, of His church?  Many years ago, as a young pastor, I remember hearing Dr. Charles Strickland say in a message that you could build a church in the midst of a garbage dump, and if the power, presence, and love of God were being freely manifested in its midst, people would come from everywhere.  I knew then that he was right.  I know it now, and more than ever…..if we’ll only believe that.
     It’s not wrong to seek to have the kinds of ministries that I mention above.  The wrongness is found in thinking that in themselves, they are the answer.  Oh, I know we tell ourselves that He is working through them, but must they first exist in order for Him to work His wonders and miracles?  Can He not do them now, right where we are, when we have no other resource except Him?  With a complete absence of all the silver and gold of the world, can’t He still not cause men to rise and walk?  Isn’t He still, always, more than sufficient, more than enough, in all things?  In everything?

Blessings,
Pastor O

Tags: Uncategorized by oshell
No Comments »

     Years ago, when I was serving in Cape May, New Jersey, a crusty old evangelist named Cliff Chew shared with me an illustration of just what a pastor is.  Most of us would consider a pastor to be a shepherd, but Cliff didn’t.  Cliff compared a pastor to a shepherd’s sheepdog.  He said that the sheepdog was so tuned to the heart and will of the shepherd, that he would instantly respond to the desires and commands of the shepherd.  He never did what the sheep wanted, but only what the shepherd wanted.  He would go about, nipping at the heels of the sheep, bringing the stragglers back to the flock, chasing down the wanderer’s, and all the time, following after the leading of the shepherd, going where he led, and in turn, bringing the sheep along with him.  It was the shepherd who led to the good grass and water, the shepherd who saw to the health and well being of the sheep, the shepherd who saw to it that the sheep had the level of life the shepherd knew was best for them.
     I have thought upon brother Cliff’s words often in the years since then.  As a pastor, I long to see the people He has given me charge of spiritually, enter into the fullness of life that each of them, each of us, has been created for.  I want them to become what the Father created them to be.  I want them to know the joys of the “best grass and water.”  In short, I want them to be transformed from lost, scrawny, and disoriented sheep that are always on the verge of death, into the well fed, cared for, and protected sheep that only He can make them to be, and that’s the key.  Only He, and not me, can effect that transformation.  Like the sheepdog, I may nip at their heels, go after the stragglers, and chase down the wanderer’s, but only He can transform them from sheep, who, by their nature, are dertermined to do those things, into sheep who, as Jesus said in John 10, hear His voice and come to Him.  “He calls His own sheep by name and leads them out.”  As He says, “My purpose is to give life in all it’s fullness.”  But to have this life means we have to know both Him and His voice, so that we can distinguish between His voice and that of the thief who comes to “kill and destroy,” and to be able to know the voice, we must first be transformed.
     So, how do we become such sheep?  (It’s just occurred to me that you may not like being called a sheep.  If so, it might be that the transformation may have not yet taken place in you.)  As John Eldredge puts it in his book Walking With God, “I am accepting transformation.”  For Eldredge this also means a restoration.  A restoration to what it was that the Father intended manking to be.  What He created you and I to be.  It means yielding to the process, surrendering to the hand and heart of the Master Potter.  As Romans 8:29 puts it, “He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love Him along the same lines as the life of His Son.”  We will either surrender to this, or we’ll continue to lag behind, or wander away, or just plain run off.  The end result will always be the same.  We’re lost.  As Eldredge writes, “….all the joy we long for, it all depends on our restoration.  You can’t find or keep good friends while you’re still an irritating person to be around.  There’s no way love can flourish while you’re still controlling.  You can’t find your real purpose in life while you’re slavishly serving other people’s expectations of you.  You can’t find peace while you’re ruled by fear.  You can’t enjoy what you have while you’re envying what the other guy has.  On and on it goes.”
     The world is dying to have such transformed lives shining their light in the deep darkness that is all around them.  Are you dying for the lack of such a life?  Has some “sheepdog” been nipping at your heels, pushing you to catch up to the flock, confronting and cutting you off as you seek to wander, even run off?  Are you living the life that accepts His transformation, and therefore finds the best of the grass and water, His “life in all its fullness?”  Or, are you moving, ever steadily, into the hands and jaws, of the thief who steals, and the wolf who kills?

Blessings,
Pastor O

Tags: Uncategorized by oshell
No Comments »

     Have you ever watched some of the old Hollywood musicals, particularly those that featured dancing teams?  Oftentimes these teams would move as if they were one, with the back of the leader pressed tightly to the front of the follower.  They didn’t seem to be two people.  This always puts me in mind of David’s words in Psalm 63, verse 8, “My soul follows hard after Thee.”  Other translations render “hard” as “right behind,” or something similar, but I have always preferred the word “hard” because in truth, if we will really follow Him as David did, as he calls us, commands us to, there will most certainly be times, many times, when it is decidedly hard.
     I was watching Francis Chan on You Tube yesterday, and as always, he said so many challenging things.  One of them was this: He spoke of the verse in the old hymn that went, “Though none go with me, still I will follow.”  He asked, “Would we (you, me) really?”  It’s a question we have to allow to probe the depths of our hearts.  When He leads us into the hard places, the impossible places, the places where the threat of danger, even death are very real, will we follow……hard after Him?  In John 6, Jesus has called His followers to a total commitment, and verse 66 reads, “From that time many of His disciples went back, and walked no more with Him.”
     Chan said that not long ago, one of the people in his church had come to him and chastened him over not only the messages he was preaching, but the lifestyle he was seeking to live out before them.  He said the man told him he was far too radical in his message and lifestyle, that there was a “middle road,” as well.  Chan answered that he had read much in His Word of the narrow and wide roads that stretch out before us as lifechoices, but he’d not seen mention of a middle one.  Yet, isn’t that the road so many of us try to walk on?  It’s safe….comfortable, and while we may not be very close to Him, somehow, we can still see Him ahead, in the distance…..at least we think that’s Him we see.
     I’m continuing to find, more and more each day, that the journey of faith means coming to a place, again and again,  of having to live out, sometimes moment by moment, what I have been saying I believe.  Last week I wrote of the beauty of living lives that danced with Him, but we have to know that sometimes, oftentimes, the dance will take us out into the desert places, the dry places, the hard places….with Him.
     I leave you with one more provoking thought/image from Chan.  He asked what you and I would expect to see if we walked into a 1st centeury postpentecost church?  “Everyone facing forward, listening to one person speak, then getting up, going to their cars, and driving home?”  This is not the life written of by David in Psalm 63.  It’s not the life Jesus calls us to in John 6.  Is it though, more indicative of the life you and I have truly been living?  Are we trying, as Chan’s churchmember did, to walk upon the middle road, a road He has never given as an option?  A road that will never lead us home?  A road that will never bring us to Him?  A road that He Himself can never be found on?  We will not find much encouragement from others to walk His road.  It’s very possible none may go with us.  Will we still follow…..hard……after Him?

Blessings,
Pastor O

Tags: Uncategorized by oshell
No Comments »

     I’ve started getting together for prayer with friend and fellow pastor, Bob Yarbrough.  In last week’s time, as we talked of our mutual yearnings for more of Him for both ourselves and the church, Bob shared an insight into the Book of Revelations I’d not seen before.  He spoke of the apostle John, and his captivity on the isle of Patmos.  He said that he’d always felt that John, who wrote that he was “worshiping in the Spirit on the Lord’s day,” was also looking towards Jerusalem, yearning to be there.  As he was doing that, John writes, “Suddenly, I heard a voice behind me…”  This meant that John had been ,as Bob said, “looking the wrong way.”  The voice of course was that of Christ, and He began to give John a message for the 7 churches.  At the conclusion of that message, John writes in 4:1, “Then as I looked I saw a door standing open in heaven,” and the Lord began to share with him His plan and destiny for the church and the world.  What Bob said then really spoke to my heart.  He said, “John never got to see the old Jerusalem he so longed for, but he was shown the New Jerusalem by the Father.”
     I’ve thought on that quite a bit in the week that’s followed.  We seem to spend so much time in our prayerlife, in whatever ministry we may find ourselves engaged in, in our very day to day living, “looking the wrong way.”  We yearn for things, people, opportunities, situations, that are gone, or never have been.  We feel somehow that we are missing everything, when “everything” may well be standing right behind us, calling our name, calling us to Himself, calling us to our true destiny.
     I oftentimes come across people who live in deep frustration, even depression, because they feel they’ve never found their “true calling,” never entered into the fullness of what they believe has been promised.  I have been among them.  Very likely you have too. Could it be for each of us, all of us, that we’ve been looking the wrong way, staring in the wrong direction?  If so, it doesn’t have to remain that way.  The Father had a “suddenly” for John, and He has one for you and I as well, and the great beauty of it is, John’s circumstances didn’t need to change for Him to enter into it.  Neither do yours or mine.  John did not leave his prison island, yet he was never the same again, and I doubt that after he was allowed to see the beauty and wonder of the New Jerusalem, that he ever again longed for an earthly Jerusalem that was only a deeply flawed shadow of the heavenly one.
     Every day is truly the Lord’s Day, so where does this one find you?  Gazing towards people, or things, or even a life where you thought all the best times could be found?  You’re looking in the wrong direction, for your freedom, your fullness, His promise, won’t be found there, but here, right where you are.  Very likely, John felt Patmos was the end.  Maybe you feel your Patmos is as well.  For each of us who are truly His, there is yet to come, a suddenly.  There remains for us, to be seen by us, no matter where we are, “a door standing open in heaven.”  He bids us to walk through it, to enter in, to Him, and behold what He yet has in store.  All, if we’ll only start to look in the right direction.

Blessings,
Pastor O

Tags: Uncategorized by oshell
No Comments »

     You may be familiar with the passage of scripture in 2 Samuel, chapter 6, where King David is bringing the Ark of the Covenant into the city of Jerusalem.  As all this was happening, verse 16 says that David was “leaping and dancing before the Lord.”  I think we have usually focused on the rest of the passage which tells of David’s wife, Michal, despising him for his open show of worship, which she thought made him appear foolish and undignified.  Certainly that’s part of what is happening, but there is something more I think, that we can too easily miss.  We’re told David danced before the Lord.  I think he was also dancing WITH the Lord.  I think the Lord invites us to not only dance before Him, but He invites us to an even deeper intimacy.  He asks us to dance with Him.
     I heard a lady named Lisa Harper say something recently, and I pass it on to you.  She said, “God calls us to come and learn to dance with Him, and as we do so, He says to us, ‘Don’t look at your feet.  Look at My face.’ “  I think in our walk with Him, indeed, our dance with Him, we are spending most of our time looking at our feet.  We wonder, are we getting this thing right?  How do we look to those who are watching?  Do we seem to know what we’re doing?  Do we look foolish?  Is the Lord impressed with our skill?  We’re selfconscious, which is a polite way of saying we’re selfabsorbed about it all.  Our focus is not on Him, but us.  We’re watching our feet, He calls us to gaze on His face.  It’s impossible to notice anything or anyone else when we’re looking into the eyes of the One who is the lover of our souls. 
     This same Lisa Harper said, “We often feel God grimaces when He sees us coming.  Do we really feel He delights in us?”  David was a man who failed the Lord greatly, and more than once, yet his songs of love to the Father found in the Psalms speak of his experience of the Lord’s steadfast deleight in him, and in you and I as well.  What would happen if the power of this lie that Harper speaks of, and which so many of us have believed, were broken in our lives?  What if we began to approach Him with the sure knowledge that we come before a God who takes infinite delight in just being with us?  Yes, there may be issues to be dealt with, sin to be confessed and cleansed of, healing and restoration to be given us, but in all of it, He delights in us.  He is in no hurry to end it, and He calls us to dance with Him, to no longer watch our feet, but to look into His face, the face of unconditional love.
     He stands before each of us right now, arms wide open, waiting to embrace us, love us, delight in us.  Will you have this dance…..with Him?

Blessings,
Pastor O

Tags: Uncategorized by oshell
No Comments »