Author Archives: reveds

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About reveds

Occupation: Pastor, Ebenezer Presbyterian Church, Lennox, SD Education: BS - Christian Education, Sterling College; MDiv. - Princeton Theological Seminary Family: Married, with Four children. Hobbies: Running (will someday run a marathon), Sci-Fi (especially Doctor Who and Sherlock), Theater, and anything else my kids will let me do.

Good Morning, M. Le Pew!

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“The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the LORD,
but the prayer of the upright is acceptable to him.”
(Proverbs 15:8 (ESV)

I must have missed the memo.  Did anyone else know it was Skunk Week?  Maybe the drought has made these “odor-able cats” more adventurous, or perhaps with the sunrise coming later every morning, their “up” time and my running time are overlapping.  Whatever the case, I saw three skunks in the last week while on my morning run.  So be warned, the skunks are out in force.

As a public service, then, I thought I’d share some advice on avoiding skunks that I found at the Animal Planet website.  Most of it is common sense – something that, as a runner, I may be lacking.

  1. Stay Away – Skunks only spray when they are threatened, so keep your distance and don’t threaten the skunk, and you won’t have a problem.
  2. Freeze – If you do see a skunk at a distance, stop where you are and let it pass.  It is the passive approach, but it is effective.
  3. Speak Softly and Walk with a Big Stomp – Speak in a low voice and stomp your feet. Skunks have poor vision and often spray in defense because they simply don’t know what’s going on.  (I tried this approach when I saw one at the corner of 11th and Hillside – the skunk just stood there and looked at me until I decided to turn around and run the other way – not a real effective technique).
  4. Run… or Shut Your Eyes and Hang On Tight – Right before a skunk lets loose its spray of stinkiness, it stomps its feet and turns around.  If you see a skunk doing this little dance, run away or hang on tight, because you’re about to get skunked.

If you do happen to get sprayed remember,

  1. Everything you touch will smell like skunk, so stay outside
  2. Don’t soak yourself in tomato juice, or spray on a bunch of air fresheners, unless you want to smell like “fresh morning dew skunk” or “vanilla skunk.”  Instead, you have to wash yourself in a special mixture that will neutralize the chemicals in the spray.

Now, as bad as it would be to get sprayed by a skunk, the sad reality is, apart from Christ, we reek of sin and we are an offence in the nostrils of God.  The prophet Isaiah writes, “We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garments” (Is 64:6).  The prayers of the faithful were meant to be a fragrant offering in the presence of God, but because of our wickedness, because of the pride of our hearts, our offerings, our works of righteousness, our best efforts are nothing but an abomination to God.

Unlike the blast of a pole cat, this odor isn’t something we can out run or avoid.  We carry it with us.  Like the home of a habitual smoker, everything is saturated with the reek.  Everything we touch is polluted by our sins.  We can try to cover up the offensiveness of our sins with religious showboating and showers of self-righteous, but eventually we’ll all end up smelling of rancid mild and foot.  We try to rid ourselves of the smell, but eventually you realize, it’s not the skunk, it’s you that stinks.  The odor is coming from your heart.  Then what?

Our only hope is to be washed and made clean in Christ Jesus.  Repeatedly in the NT, this idea of washing is used to signify our salvation.  Paul summarizes the gospel in Titus saying, “But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life” (Titus 3:4–7), and in 1st Corinthians when he writes, “You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor 6:11).  Hebrews encourages us to come before God through Jesus, “with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water” (Heb 10:22).

When the Leper came to Jesus for healing in Matthew 8, he cried out “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”  And of course, Jesus said in reply, “I am willing, be clean.”  Whatever the sin, whatever the offence, whatever blemish you carry, the Lord is able and He is willing to cleanse you; to wash you and make you new.  Turn to Him, fix your eyes on Jesus, let his mercy pour over you so that you may lay aside the filthy garments, every weight and sin which clings so closely… and run with endurance the race that is set before us.

Lesson from the Linden Tree

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“When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.
For all day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer.”
(Psalm 32:3-4 (ESV)

A couple of summers ago we lost one of the really nice Linden trees in our front yard as a tornado blew through town.  I kind of suspected that we’d lose the tree, ants had pretty thoroughly eaten at the base of the tree, and the leaves look sickly.  Sure enough; one strong wind put the tree down on the roof of our front porch.  One tree down, one to go.

Over the last month, I have noticed that the other Linden tree, which stands 40 to 50 feet high, was starting to lose its leaves.  Let me correct that, it wasn’t actually losing the leaves, it’s just that the leaves were all turning brown and shriveling up.  A front moved through last week with some strong winds, and the next morning I found a large, leafless branch laying in the front yard.  And then this week, while watering the yard, I realized that almost all of the leaves of the tree were brown – from all outward appearances, the tree is dead.

Because the tree is on the easement  – that space between the curb and the sidewalk – the city is responsible for removing any dead or dying trees.  When I called the city office they sent someone over to take a look at the tree for us.  Sure enough, he said it was dead as well.  But the city man was stumped (sorry for the pun), he just couldn’t understand why it had died, and why it went so quickly.  He was sure that though the summer has been hot and very, dry Linden trees were drought resistant, and this shouldn’t have happened.  After assuring me that the city would remove the tree (hopefully before it too falls on the house), he drove away, shaking his head in amazement.

Curious, I did a little research (consulted Google).  Come to find out, Linden are very resilient trees, but in extreme drought, they are susceptible to something called Verticillium Wilt.  Verticillium is a fungus that can exist in the ground for 10 years, and while a Linden tree is resistant to the fungus, extreme cases of drought can stress the tree and allow the fungus to enter the roots, spreading toxins which disease and eventually kill the tree.  Our Linden tree may not have Verticillium, but the picture on the information at the ISU Extension website looks exactly like our tree did about a month ago.

So if this is Verticillium, our tree is as good as dead.  The fungus had lived around the tree for years, waiting for the right opportunity to enter the roots – an opportunity that came when the rain stopped and the drought came.  With no rain to feed the roots, the tree began to open itself up to anything and everything it could find for nourishment.  Enter the disease.  The toxin entered the tree, dried the flowers, browned the leaves, and turned the strong and supple branches of the tree brittle and weak.  One summer of drought revealed the nature of the soil and the tree – and now the tree must go.

Have you ever found that the droughts in your life reveal the health and the strength of your faith?  Like a tree planted by the river, our faith and trust in God grows and flourishes, bringing cover and shelter to every aspect of our lives.  Because of our faith we can face the challenges this world presents us.  We know that God has delivered us in the past, that God has secured his promises for us in Christ Jesus, and so we can look on tomorrow that God will be faithful still.  When we stand by the stream, fed by the Word of God through regular study, worship, fellowship, sin is kept at bay and tremendous growth is seen.

But what about when that stream dries up.  What happens to our faith when we go through times of drought and famine in spirit?  Sometimes the drought comes from the Lord, but usually it is self-imposed.  For whatever reason we turn away from the reading of God’s Word, going to Worship and spending time with other believers takes a back-seat to “more important things,” prayer becomes a quiet, tedious, and unproductive thing.  The sin that permeates the world around us, that was repelled by the nourishment from God’s stream, creeps back into our lives.

Absence from the Word of God, from regular worship, study, and fellowship, does not make the heart grow stronger.  No, it invites the sins that would destroy us back into our lives so that our faith is choked out by the cares, worries, and passions of the world.  Spiritual drought reveals the nature of our faith, and until we return to the Lord, the only one who had feed and nourish our souls, we will wilt and wither on the branch.

Jesus said, “Abide in me, and I in you.  As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.  I am the vine; you are the branches.  Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.  If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers…” (John 15:4-6).  There is no spiritual health, no nourishment, no life apart from Christ.  Does your spirit long for the water of life?  Has the poison of sin seeped into your life?  Then come to the fountain.  Come to Christ.  “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.  Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ (John 7:37-38).

Friends, end the drought, come to Jesus.  Let him nourish your soul with the water of life.  Abide in him, drink him in, and he will become in you a “spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14).

SDG