Angels All Around

Do you believe in angels? According to the surveys, you probably do. And according to the surveys, you probably do even if you don’t go to church and even if you aren’t sure God exists.

Those of us who read the Bible are more likely to believe in angels, but we don’t talk about it much. Many of us might believe in angels because we’re supposed to while also a little embarrassed about modern angel stories. I think Tish Harrison Warren speaks for a lot of us when she wrote this:

In Scripture, angels are all over the place…. Yet, until recently, I basically ignored angels. Believing in the supernatural can frankly be a little embarrassing in my urban circles. Then, to my surprise, I noticed that I had developed a habit sometime in the first years of my daughter’s life of asking God to send angels to protect her…. I realized slowly that I was increasingly thinking about angels and that I found them amazing and fierce and faithful. I found great comfort in the belief that there were created beings, like me but not like me, who spent their time worshipping and serving God.

This Easter Sunday, we’re going to begin a series on what the Bible says about angels.

Why should we take the time to study about angels?

For one, it’s a point of connection to our secular world. Even people who aren’t religious find the subject of angels intriguing. Maybe that’s you. If so, I hope you’ll join us each Sunday this April as we discuss this topic.

And if you’re a believer, there’s a greater reason to study about angels. We’re told in 2 Timothy 3:16 that all scripture is inspired of God and profitable. And if Scripture gives us picture after picture after picture of angel encounters, there’s something profitable there. Let’s find out what that is.

If you’re coming to Hillcrest this Easter Sunday, help us prepare for a great attendance in four ways: (1) Bring someone with you, (2) park away from the building, (3) move forward and to the left before you find your seat, and (4) greet those seated around you!

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

What Happens When Jesus Shows Up

What happens to a life or a church when Jesus shows up?

Don’t get me wrong. Jesus is always with us, but when we speak of certain circumstances or events in life, we tend to say, “Wow, God showed up!” That’s the way we speak about a powerful worship service at church or a youth retreat when a record number of students commit to Christ. That’s even the way Forrest Gump described a hurricane that made him the most successful shrimp boat captain on the Gulf coast: “God showed up!”

Almost 275 years ago, the early American pastor and scholar Jonathan Edwards wrote a book called A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God. It was a template for judging when genuine revival had come to a life or a community. He was trying to answer the question, “What does life look like when Jesus shows up?”

That’s what I think we can learn from Matthew 21. There we read of three dramatic acts: Jesus rides into Jerusalem on a donkey, he casts merchants out of the Temple, and he curses a fig tree. The first story is about our loyalty, the second story is about our worship, and the third story is about our productivity.

Those are the evidences of revival.

A revived believer has a fresh loyalty to Christ’s authority, a renewed commitment to worship, and a visible increase in fruitfulness. That, praise God, can happen anytime!

Maybe even this Sunday.

Join us this Palm Sunday at 10am for a study of Matthew 21. We’re not calling it a “revival service,” exactly. But we pray for revival to fall. Be pleased, Lord, to grant it.

Tom

P.S., thanks for participating in last week’s Winning Ways survey. I’m working on a series of short books called “Treasured Bible Passages.” I asked you which treasured selection of scripture you most wanted me to write about. Twenty-eight percent said they wanted a book on the Armor of God, 19% asked for a book on Romans 8, and 17% wanted to see a book on the Beatitudes. I’ll keep you updated!

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Bearing Witness on Saint Patrick’s Day

How are you celebrating Saint Patrick’s Day today? Wearing green? Pinching someone who doesn’t? Hoisting a mug of green beer?

Maybe the best way to celebrate the day is by sharing your faith.

Truly.

The man we celebrate today wasn’t Irish; he was raised in a well-to-do home in Roman Britain. His father was a church deacon and his grandfather was an elder, but Patrick had never been very serious about the Christian faith himself. Then pirates kidnapped him in his teen years and sold him to a farmer in Ireland. There, as a slave tending livestock, Patrick encountered the living God.

When he saw a chance to escape his slavery, he took it. Back in Britain, he settled into a comfortable life as a priest surrounded by Christians. But one night in a dream he heard an Irish voice calling out, “Holy boy, we are asking you to come home and walk among us again.”

At first, he was reluctant to return to the land of his enslavement. But he was finally “struck to the heart” with compassion for the Irish, he later wrote. He saw his former slavers as enslaved themselves, in bondage to pagan superstition and Druid worship. And so, he brought the gospel to Ireland. Traveling throughout the land, he witnessed to kings in their courts and peasants in their fields. He preached, established churches, trained leaders, and baptized thousands of converts. When he died in 461, his gospel movement had transformed the Emerald Isle.

At Hillcrest, we’re engaged in “Thirty Days of Prayer for our One.” Each of us is praying for one person who needs Jesus and who needs a church home. Sometime in these thirty days, I’m convinced you’ll have a chance to invite your One to our Easter worship service on April 9.

It would make Patrick proud.

(For more information on Patrick of Ireland, I recommend Stephen Lawhead’s historical novel, Patrick: Son of Ireland or Philip Freeman’s St. Patrick of Ireland: A Biography. Or, for lighter fare, maybe just start with the VeggieTales cartoon of Patrick’s life.)

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

How to Confront

Silence isn’t always golden; sometimes it’s yellow.

If your silence is too often motivated by cowardice, then look at Matthew 18:15-17. Jesus gave us instructions on how to confront someone who has let us down.

First: Talk in private. Jesus said, “Go privately and point out the fault.” This is where a lot of us fail right away. We talk about the person, but we don’t talk to the person. We involve a lot of other people in the problem long before we get into it with the person we feel has sinned against us.

Second: Involve others. If we have to take it to the next level, Jesus expects us to know how to count. Now’s not the time to rally a bunch of people to your cause. How many people did he say to involve in verse 16? “Take one or two others with you and go back again.”

Third: Tell the church. If private conversation doesn’t solve it and if mediators can’t help, in verse 17 Jesus said, “Take your case to the church.” This is a much more formal level: It’s now a case that has to be solved, not just an issue to be settled. Through multiple meetings across several months you’ve tried to get this solved one-on-one, and then with mediators. The person who’s hurt you still refuses to deal with it. So, you and your mediators bring it to the church.

Fourth: Cut off the person. If a private conversation doesn’t resolve things, if a small group of mediators couldn’t get anywhere, if a formal church intervention didn’t move the heart of the offender, what other choice do you have?

Sadly, we often go first to the step that Christ said should be last. Let’s get this right.

As we continue our Sunday morning series called “Getting Along,” we'll look closely at Christ's instructions this week. Join us at 10am on campus or online!

Tom

 If you want to review the first three installments in the “Getting Along” series, go to our “Sermons” page, or our YouTube channel or our podcast.

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Hearing Aids and Megaphones

Imagine you’re driving down the road and pass a sign with this warning: “Don’t Go Into the Box Unless the Wayout is Clear.” Would you know what it meant?

An English driver would know that means she shouldn’t block the intersection.

Or say you stopped for directions, and an Englishman replied: “Take the dual carriageway to the first roundabout, keeping a sharp eye for the left-coming signs. Take the wayout just beyond the first flyover after you pass the car park next to the petrol station. Beware of the loose chippings and the crown strollers. Follow the road diversion and make sure you by-pass the road-up. If your motor car breaks down, you can use the lay-by or any of the verges to look under your bonnet.”

You would probably leave that conversation mumbling something to your wife about why you never stop for directions!

Again, the conversation makes perfect sense in Great Britain. A dual carriageway is a divided highway; a roundabout is a traffic circle; a wayout is an exit; a flyover is an overpass; a car park is a parking lot; a petrol station is a gas station; loose chippings are fallen rocks, and crown strollers are slow-moving road hogs; a road diversion is a detour, and road-up is a road under repair; a lay-by is a place to pull off the road, verges are road shoulders, and a bonnet is the hood of your car.

Got it?

Sometimes we think we’re communicating just because words are being spoken. Real communication involves more.

In Joshua 22, a war was about to break out between Israel’s western tribes and eastern tribes. It was all because the eastern tribes failed to communicate their intentions adequately, and the western tribes jumped to false conclusions about the matter without inquiring and listening.

This Sunday, I’m going to talk about five “hearing aids” and five “megaphones” that will help in our relationships. Join us on campus or online at 10am!

Tom

If you want to review the first three installments in the “Getting Along” series, go to our “Sermons” page, or our YouTube channel or our podcast.

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

To Forbear is Divine

At the banquet celebrating a couple’s 50th wedding anniversary, the husband was asked to tell the crowd what he had learned from his many years of married life. “Well,” he began. “Marriage teaches you loyalty, meekness, forbearance, self-restraint, forgiveness—and a great many other qualities you wouldn't need if you stayed single.”

In our marriage, at work, at church, and in all our relationships, we need to learn how to get along. Paul said that we should always be “forbearing one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other” (Colossians 3:13). Paul calls for two actions there, but while forgiveness is the difficult one, forbearance is the daily one.

How can we forbear others? Pay attention to four things about them.

Their Personality. Some are introverts, others are extroverts. In making decisions, some are rational, and others are spontaneous. We shouldn’t expect everyone to think like us, react like us, or communicate like us.

Their Perspective. As the old saying goes, “Don’t judge a man until you’ve walked a mile in his shoes.” The old proverb advises us to see things as others see them. In that way, we become more understanding of others.

Their Progress. If we’ll keep in mind that people are at different stages than we are physically, emotionally, and spiritually, it will help us bear irritations in relationships.

Their Problems. Someone else’s behavior may spring from the stuff they’re dealing with: their wife’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis, their adult child’s poor choices, their shame, their fears, their regrets. The more sensitive we are to what others are going through, the more we can bear with the things that annoy us.

As we consider another person’s personality, perspective, progress, and problems, the better we’ll be at dealing with them the way God wants us to.

Let’s dig deeper into these things on Sunday! It’s the fifth week in our sermon series called “Getting Along: Eight Biblical Solutions to Conflict.” If you want to review the first four installments in the series, go to our “Sermons” page, or our YouTube channel or our podcast. I hope to see you Sunday at 10am!

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

The Ministry of Mediation

A few years ago, the New York Times ran an article about how to deal with difficult people. They reported on the cottage industry of seminars, workbooks, and multimedia tools to help people “co-exist with those they wish did not exist.”

There’s a ready audience for any resource that helps people resolve conflicts they’re in. But what about conflicts they see? In other words, when people we care about are at odds with each other, do we have any responsibility to intervene? We tend to just shake our head in dismay and otherwise ignore the problem. Instead, we should look for ways to bring peace between people we care about.

Paul once addressed two battling believers by name: “I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord” (Philippians 4:2). But Paul didn’t stop with his plea to the two women. He then turned to a third person whom he simply called “my true companion” and asked him or her to “help these women” make peace (Philippians 4:3).

Sometimes we’re like Euodia and Syntyche: we need to solve a conflict we’re in. But sometimes God expects us to be like Paul’s unnamed “true companion”: we need to solve a conflict we see.

Two thousand years later, the only thing we know of these two women is their feud. Wouldn’t it be sad if the only memory people had of you was some unsolved spat? Our wintertime sermon series can keep that from happening. It’s called “Getting Along.” Most of the topics we’re covering can help you settle some issue you have with another person at work or school or church or the neighborhood.

But the ministry of mediation is part of conflict resolution, too. Getting into the thick of disputes and helping people solve them is hard work. It’s also rewarding work. Come learn more about it this Sunday at 10am on campus or online.

Tom

If you want to review the first three installments in the “Getting Along” series, go to our “Sermons” page, or our YouTube channel or our podcast.

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Dueling Leaf-Blowers and You

Did you read about the infamous leaf-blower incident in South Carolina? It’s a cautionary tale about getting along with others.

It seems that a man saw his neighbor blowing leaves onto his property one Sunday morning. In response, he got his leaf blower out of the garage and blew the leaves back into his neighbor’s yard. A duel of leaf-blowers ensued, with the two men standing at their property line blowing leaves back and forth.

Then it turned ugly. Yep, they started blowing air in each other’s faces.

By the time the police intervened, one man had head-butted the other three or four times, and one man had taken a hammer to the other man’s leaf-blower.

Pride goeth before a fall, says the book of Proverbs. Apparently, it also goeth before a fit.

This Sunday, we continue our sermon series called “Getting Along.” We’re looking at eight biblical solutions to conflict. If you want to catch up with the series or review the messages, go to our “Sermons” page, or to our YouTube channel or to our podcast.

We’ve already looked at how to tame anger and how to think “win-win.” This Sunday we’ll learn the fine art of the apology. Scripture guides us on this tough but necessary work. Then, as the series continues, we’ll learn...

how to mediate a conflict between others

the difference between “forgiving” offenses and “forbearing” annoyances

how to sharpen your communication skills

how to confront appropriately

how a greater trust in God contributes to peaceful living

True, not all our conflicts are as comical as the leaf-blower fight. Some differences are far more series and far more consequential. The good news is that God’s Word can guide us to resolve conflicts no matter how profound the issues, and no matter how much damage has already been done. Join us as we continue this important study! We meet every Sunday at 10am on campus or online.

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

In Your Disagreements, Think Win-Win

Collisions can be beautiful.

That’s how Mount Everest came into existence. The Indian and Eurasian continents press into each other at the rate of about four inches a year, and all that earth and rock have to go somewhere, so it goes upward. As India keeps moving inward, compressing and lifting southern Eurasia, a spectacular natural treasure continues to be created.

Think of that: no collision, no Everest. The world would be a poorer place.

The collisions between people have the potential of creating the same majesty and wonder. The compression of two lives against each other is almost always uncomfortable, distressing, and frustrating. But out of that compression a solution can be reached that is as towering and beautiful as Mount Everest.

Do you look for ways to turn the collision of interests into something beautiful? Philippians 2:4 (CSV) says, “Everyone should look not to his own interests, but rather to the interests of others.” This effort to address the interests of all sides can result in a thing of stunning beauty.

About 30 years ago, Roger Fisher and William Ury wrote a book called Getting to Yes. It’s been translated into 25 different languages and millions of people have read it. The book offers “a proven, step-by-step strategy for coming to mutually acceptable agreements in every sort of conflict.” Their four principles are:

• Separate the people from the problem.

• Focus on the interests, not the positions.

• Brainstorm creative options for solving the problem.

• Agree on the standards you will use to solve the problem.

The amazing thing is that the principles from this Harvard Business School classic were already laid out two thousand years ago in God’s Word. The Bible really is the world’s most practical book.

This Sunday, let’s see what God’s word has to say about negotiating with others. It’s the second part of our morning series called “Getting Along: Eight Biblical Solutions to Conflict.” In this week’s study, we’ll learn how to think “win-win.”

Tom

(The connection between conflict and Everest was made in Gary Thomas’ remarkable book, Sacred Marriage.)

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

The Bible is Your Anger Management Manual

I read about a woman whose neighbor played his music way too loud in the apartment below her. Finally, she had enough and yelled at him to turn it down. He just taunted her by banging a broom handle on his ceiling. This infuriated her so much that she jumped up in the air and slammed both feet on the floor.

Here’s why the altercation made the newspaper: The force of her landing broke both her legs about 4 inches below the kneecap.

The moral of the story? When you lose your temper in a disagreement, it will leave you without a leg to stand on.

David needed help with his out-of-control rage at one point. Does that surprise you? I mean, David loved to write psalms about nimble deer and quiet waters and night skies. He was “a man after God’s own heart” who “served God’s purpose in his own generation” (1 Samuel 13:14 and Acts 13:36). And yet in 1 Samuel 25, we have an account of how he let anger get the best of him. Had Abigail not intervened, his rage would have led to disastrous consequences.

The story convicts me. No matter how much we love God, no matter how gentle we think we are, no matter how much we've grown spiritually, anger can get the best of us.

Thankfully, the Bible is a wonderful Anger Management Manual. Starting this Sunday, we’ll see what it has to say about conflict resolution. Our new series is called “Getting Along.” Across eight weeks we’ll look at these biblical solutions to conflict:

• Tame your anger

• Think “win-win”

• Confess your part in the problem

• How to mediate a conflict between others

• The difference between “forgiving” offenses and “forbearing” annoyances

• How to sharpen your communication skills

• How to confront appropriately

• How a greater trust in God contributes to peaceful living

God’s Word can guide us to resolve conflicts. Let’s open our Anger Management Manual across the next eight weeks to see what it has to say about getting along!

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

The Quest and the Battle

Any good story involves a fight as well as a dream, a battle as well as a quest.

Braveheart.

Rocky.

Gladiator.

The stories we love involve a hope of what life should be. But in every one of those stories the heroes must fight valiantly against forces that would keep the dream from being a reality.

In Colossians 3:1-11, we discover that life with the Lord is very much like that. It includes both a quest that compels us forward and a battle against forces that hold us back.

In verses 1-4, we’re given our quest. Paul said, “Keep seeking the things above. Set your mind on the values of the kingdom, the priorities of the kingdom, and the rewards that wait for you in that kingdom.”

But we don’t have to meditate too long on the things above before we quickly identify things in our lives that don’t match that kingdom life. There are things we struggle against that simply do not match the quality of that life above. So, verses 5-11 tell us to battle against the things that warp desires within us and against the things that ruin relationships around us.

But note something about this Quest and this Battle. It’s not a solo project. When Paul says you need to seek the things above and you need to put to death what is earthly, the “you” is plural.

(By the way, this comes out in the Y’all Version Bible. If you haven’t heard about this online resource, check out Colossians 3 at this link!)

The point is, don’t go it alone. We need to challenge each other, pray for each other, confront each other, and build up each other. You can’t get far without connecting with other believers. That’s one reason we gather in Life Groups after the morning service. If you need to connect or reconnect with a Life Group, do it this Sunday!

How are you doing in the Worthy Quest and the Daring Battle? Read Colossians 3:1-11 and come study it with us this Sunday at 10am!

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

So, I Wrote a Novel

Two days before Christmas 1927, Santa Claus entered a Texas bank.

No one expected him to pull a gun.

The fake white beard hid his identity from his neighbors while he and three others took everything. But outside, armed citizens assembled, motivated by a new reward for dead bank robbers. By the time it all played out, one bandit died in the gunfight, one was executed in the electric chair, one swung from a rope in a mob lynching—and one survived to find unexpected hope beyond all his wrong turns.

The press dubbed it “The Santa Claus Bank Robbery.” I first heard about it when I served as pastor in the county where all this took place. Most accounts of the crime end at the lynching of the Santa Claus robber himself. But I’ve always been fascinated by the last survivor. He was released in 1943, and granted a full pardon by Governor John Connally in 1964. By the time he died in the 1990s, he had been a married churchgoing man for decades. In his honor, my novel is called The Last Man.

Back in 2018, my opening chapter was awarded in the Foundations competition for new novelists at the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers Conference. I returned home to complete the novel, and it should finally be published this September.

Do you want updates on the countdown to publication? I’ve created a separate newsletter for that. Here's a link to the first edition. If you want to sign up for the newsletter, there's a “Subscribe” button on the top left of that page.

I’ll send updates to subscribers about once a month. I’ll reveal the cover design in February and the launch of the website in March. I’ll post photos of the real characters and places behind the novel. When pre-publication reviews come out and promotional events get scheduled, you’ll be the first to know. I’d love to have you as a subscriber.

I did this on my own time. A pastor is never off the clock, but I decided it counted as “personal time” if I wrote every day from 6:00am until the office opened at 8:30am. The Personnel Committee agreed. Any appearances to promote the book will be scheduled on the time off granted by Personnel Manual.

It’s a story of grace ignored and grace received. I can’t wait for you to read it.

Tom

(The photo is of the alley beside the First National Bank of Cisco. The alley became a shooting gallery as the gang tried to leave the bank by a side door to their getaway car.)

Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Find Your One Square Inch of Silence

Gordon Hempton is on a mission he calls “One Square Inch of Silence.” In 2005 he began a search for somewhere he could stand for fifteen minutes and not hear a human sound.

No truck. No camper generator. No jet high overhead.

By that definition, no quiet places are left in Europe. In America, there are none east of the Mississippi River. But Hempton followed leads and criss-crossed the country until he found what he was looking for. Deep in the Olympic National Forest in Washington State, he found a spot where no manmade noises intruded. Gordon marked the site with a small red stone and made a promise to himself to defend it.

He now wants Congress to designate a square inch of silence in ten other national parks as well. Park officials are charged with protecting its natural resources and the natural soundscape is a part of those resources. So, he wonders why no park has a plan to protect its stillness. Hempton is on a campaign to make them do so.

It’s hard to find a place in nature where human noise does not break in. It’s also hard to find a place in your soul where human noise does not break in.

Fears. Worries. Demands. Expectations. Unruly ambitions.

You need a place inside yourself where this noise can’t reach. Philippians 4:6-9 shows us how to launch our own campaign to defend one square inch of soul silence. Click here for last Sunday’s lesson from these verses.

(I first read about Hempton in a 2008 article Kathleen Dean Moore wrote for Orion magazine. He has been featured in more recent media, including On Being. You can find a list of his appearances here.)

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

O Leave, Let Us Adore Him!

We tend to separate worship from daily life. In the thinking of many, on Sunday mornings we leave home and go to worship.

But in the Christmas story, after the shepherds found Christ, they returned home worshipping.

That’s what Luke wrote: “The shepherds returned home, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen” (2:20). Did you catch it? Yes, they knelt before the Christ child in the manger, but then worship continued as they returned to daily life.

In light of this little verse, maybe some of our Christmas carols need updating:

O leave, all ye faithful!

Joyful and triumphant!

O leave ye, O leave ye from Bethlehem.

O leave, let us adore him

O leave, let us adore him

O leave, let us adore him

Christ the Lord!

There’s a serious point here. While you should come to worship, you should leave worshipping, too.

This is hard, I know.

In a worship service we sing all these glorious statements about God’s power and care. But then maybe we leave the service and return home to not-so-glorious living. It’s not easy to return home worshipping when your marriage is strained, or your kids disappoint you, or there’s tension in your workplace, or you’re fighting cancer, or there’s financial anxiety.

But what you experience from worship music and from Bible study should rearrange your priorities, attitudes, and choices in daily life. Declaring gospel truth in a worship service is scrimmage; living out the implications of gospel truth throughout the week is where the real game is won.

Let’s go deeper into this truth on the Lord’s Day. Join us at Hillcrest at 10am!

One more thing: When you bring people to Hillcrest this December, they can pick up their own free copy of the book John Parker and I wrote. It’s called Repeat the Sounding Joy: The Four Christmas Carols of Luke’s Gospel. Or you can buy copies for them as “stocking stuffers.” The books cost $3.99 at Amazon (https://amzn.to/3ijkZQm), or purchase them in the church office during the week and save shipping.

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Chreasters Welcome

I first ran across the term  “Chreasters” a few years ago. It was in reference to persons who only seem to show up for church services at the seasons of Christmas and Easter -- thus “Chreasters.”

Here’s one pastor hoping to start a friendship with a few Chreasters this Advent season.

Now, is it sufficient to worship with God’s Family only once or twice a year? Of course not. Christ expects us to connect with a congregation and invest ourselves in the fellowship and ministry offered there. A local church isn’t like a restaurant that you occasionally patronize when you’re in the mood for its cuisine.

So, why do I have room in my heart for Chreasters -- and why should you? In an article for World magazine, Tony Woodlief said:

Chreasters come though it doesn’t fit their routine. They come, in spite of the discomfort in not belonging. They come because something draws them -- a faint sense of holiness evoked by the season, or because we are more inviting, or for the music, or maybe because the baby Christ [at Christmas] and the murdered Christ [at Easter] are images they can relate to best in their fear and need. They come, with their doubts and their poor attendance records, and somewhere, most importantly, the hope that it isn’t all just a myth, that the baby was and is Immanuel, God with us.

This holiday season I hope you’ll invite your Chreaster friends to Hillcrest. Invite them to our worship services on December 18 and 25 at 10am. Or invite them to our candlelight Christmas Eve service at 4 pm. There’s more information about our schedule at www.hillcrest.church.

Just like the Wise Men of old, Chreasters seek him. We’re here to help.

One more thing: When you bring people to Hillcrest this December, they can pick up their own free copy of the book John Parker and I wrote. It’s called Repeat the Sounding Joy: The Four Christmas Carols of Luke’s Gospel. Or you can buy copies for them as “stocking stuffers.” The books cost $3.99 at Amazon (https://amzn.to/3ijkZQm), or purchase them in the church office during the week and save shipping.

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

There’s Something About Joseph

In most manger scenes Joseph is just a guy in the background behind Mary and the shepherds and the wise men. But we men need to pay attention to that guy in the background of our manger scenes. In Matthew 1:18-25, men find three qualities from Joseph’s life to imitate.

First: Be a righteous man. Though Joseph didn’t have the whole story when he first discovered Mary was pregnant, he knew he wasn’t the father. The only conclusion he could draw at this point was that his fiancé had been unfaithful to him. So, he decided to break off the engagement. His walk with God mattered to him—and her walk with God mattered to him, too. Like Joseph, we men need to develop our own spiritual self-discipline in all areas, and then let those around us feel the weight of our influence.

Second: Be a merciful man. Matthew 1:19 says, “Joseph, being a righteous man, and not wanting to disgrace her publicly, decided to divorce her secretly.” His plan to break the engagement was evidence of his righteousness; his plan to break the engagement privately was evidence of his mercy. It’s a rare thing to see both character and compassion in the same life today. Joseph was both righteous and merciful, and it’s a characteristic for Christian men to imitate.

Third: Be an obedient man. When Joseph was told to proceed with his planned marriage to Mary, he “did as the Lord’s angel had commanded him” (Matthew 1:24). It’s notable that the angel said, “Don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife.” Joseph knew that obeying God on this matter would deeply complicate his life, but he said yes. It’s still true that God calls on us men to do hard things. It’s in those times we must decide what God’s leadership really means to us.

Pray that the men who are important to you rise to the honorable example of Joseph!

One more thing: When you bring people to Hillcrest this December, they can pick up their own free copy of the book John Parker and I wrote. It’s called Repeat the Sounding Joy: The Four Christmas Carols of Luke’s Gospel. Or you can buy copies for them as “stocking stuffers.” The books cost $3.99 at Amazon (https://amzn.to/3ijkZQm), or purchase them in the church office during the week and save shipping.

 Tom

Image Credit

Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Repeat the Sounding Joy!

A friend emailed me this week. She said, “Looking for something to read, I went to my bookshelf and there was your book. I’m sorry to say I had not read it. It was on my ‘to-read’ shelf last year, but after Christmas, I just didn’t get around to it. I took it down and finally got around to it. It is a wonderful little book, and I enjoyed every minute of the read. Thank you and thank Jesus for drawing it to my attention.”

She was talking about Repeat the Sounding Joy! John Parker and I released the book last Christmas and gave it away to everyone who attended Hillcrest.

The little book explores the four “Christmas carols” in Luke’s Gospel. Music is one of our favorite traditions of the Christmas season. When we sing songs about the birth of Jesus, we unite with the musical testimony of Christians through two thousand years of church history. But Luke’s nativity stories contain the very first Christmas carols, so to speak. Your holiday will more meaningful if you study these Biblical songs with the help of our book.

Maybe you’re like my friend. Maybe you got a free copy last year and had every intention of reading the book, but you didn't. You let the Christmas season come and go without cracking the spine. Why not take some time with it this weekend?

And if you don’t have a book, get one when you attend this Sunday!

If you want friends and family to have copies, don’t raid the book racks in the auditorium. We want you to bring people to church where they can pick up one for themselves. If that’s not possible, buy copies for them. The books cost $3.99 at Amazon (https://amzn.to/3ijkZQm). Or purchase them in the church office during the week and save shipping.

Your own Christmas celebration will be richer when you understand what made the characters in Luke’s Gospel burst into song in response to the birth of Jesus. This book will give you reasons to sing this season!

Tom

Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Thanks Giving

Thanksgiving Day provides a chance for us to remember all the ways God has blessed us. But some of us would have to admit that gratitude doesn’t spring up spontaneously from our heart. Disappointment has darkened our heart this year.

If 2022 has been a year of heartache and frustration, I have a three-step process for developing a grateful heart in the midst of disappointment:

First, begin by thanking God for the obvious blessings that immediately come to mind. We take for granted so many things, assuming them as rights instead of as gifts from the King. As a country preacher once said, we’re a lot like hogs in an apple orchard: enjoying the good things around us but never looking up to see where they came from. To thank God for his gifts is to grasp the first rung on the ladder out of bitterness.

Second, ask God to show you how he has been at work this past year, and thank him for it. Too often heartache blinds us to all the ways God has been at work, but gratitude can restore our sight.

Finally, claim Romans 8:28 even over your disappointments: “We know that in everything God works for the good of those who love him” (NCV). While Step Two helps you see God’s work despite life’s frustrations, Step Three helps you see God at work within those very things! Here we find the highest proof of faith: to believe that even things that break our heart (and God’s) can be used of God to advance his purposes in our lives.

That’s at three-step process for how to give thanks. But why should we give thanks? This Sunday, we’ll study Psalm 33 to find four reasons. After the service, you’ll meet with your Life Group as usual, and then you can join us for our Churchwide Thanksgiving Dinner. The cost is $12 a plate. Find out more about it and secure your reservation by clicking here.

We won’t be sending out an edition of Winning Ways next week because of the Thanksgiving break. So let me go ahead and wish you an early blessing on your Thanksgiving Day 

Tom

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Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

Honorable Mention

When we gather on Sunday, we worship God in song. Then we open the Bible and worship God in study. And then we worship God in stewardship. We don’t pass offering plates after the worship service ends, but as a part of it.

Even though most of us give electronically these days, passing offering plates in the weekly service is a reminder that our giving is as much a part of worship as the songs and preaching.

Before I began pastoral ministry, Diane and I attended a church in Fort Worth that had an interesting way of collecting the offering. The offering plates were passed while instrumental music played, and then, when the offering plates had made it to the back of the building, the choir director would lead us in singing a song called the Doxology:

Praise God from whom all blessings flow,

Praise him all creatures here below,

Praise him above ye heavenly host;

Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

As the congregation sang, the offering bearers would make a procession down the aisles toward the stage with the offering plates held before them. And as they passed each row, each row stood. It looked like a human wave sweeping across that large building from the back to the front. The procession and the music were timed so that everyone was standing by the last majestic line—Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Then, with everyone standing and the plates stacked on the front table, someone would pray for the offering that had been collected. It was a powerful weekly reminder to regard our giving as sacred time.

Even though we don’t follow that habit and routine in our church, the offering time should be regarded as sacred time in our church, too. It’s not something we do after the worship ends, but something we do as a part of it. Worship is a time to honor God, and Proverbs 3:9 tells one way we do that: “Honor the Lord by giving him the first part of all your income” (LB).

Tom

Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.

In Your Own Personal Dunkirk

In the summer of 1940, the Germans were poised to overwhelm more than 350,000 mostly British soldiers trapped in the French seaside town of Dunkirk. When a British naval officer reported their plight to London, he cabled just three words.

“But if not.”

The words came from a story in the book of Daniel. Three Jewish men were threatened with death in a fiery furnace for refusing to bow to a Babylonian idol. They replied (as the King James Version puts it), “Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up” (Daniel 3:17-18).

“But if not.”

In an era when people were accustomed to hearing and reading the Bible, people only needed these three words to recall the biblical story and to understand what the cabled message meant. Their boys urgently needed help, but even if it didn’t come, the troops were determined not to give in.

Soon, a makeshift armada of merchant marine boats, pleasure cruisers, and small fishing boats started across the English Channel. Miraculously, they evacuated more than 338,000 soldiers before the Germans could complete their conquest of Dunkirk.

Like the soldiers, the three Hebrew men in Daniel 3 believed God could miraculously rescue them, but they also knew that you can’t order a rescue like ordering a meal from a waiter. God can do anything we ask, but he may choose to say no.

One day you’ll be backed up against the sea in your own personal Dunkirk. It may be some heartbreak with your kids, or a betrayal by a marriage partner, or a pink slip at work, or a doctor’s report that changes your entire world. When that happens, ask for God’s help. Then, give him the glory if the rescue comes, but refuse to abandon your faith if the rescue doesn’t come.

Let’s study more about this on Sunday. Join us at 10am on campus or online!

Tom

Image Credit

Tom Goodman serves as pastor at Hillcrest Church in Austin, Texas. His sermons are available on YouTube and the HillcrestToGo Podcast and you can find him on Facebook and Twitter. If someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, sign up here to receive Tom’s weekly devotional in your email inbox.