It’s Memorial Day

A special friend in the faith died yesterday. He knew me longer than I knew him. He was from my father’s generation. He was a relative in the flesh, but he was also my brother in God’s family. This latter relationship better describes our relationship. He was one of the hardest working men in the Lord’s work that I have ever known and led many to know Christ as Savior. Indeed, I never knew him to miss church except for illness. His name was Vint Rice…unknown to most of my readers but, rest assured, known to God as you are also known to God.

Vint gave it his all. So do many of you. Question: What makes such Christians? It is the pursuit of knowing Christ!

Today’s Verse for a Better Ministry demonstrates such a Christian’s heart for Christ. The Magi (wise men) of the first Christmas had an incredible thirst, even a need to be in the presence of the One who was the Christ, the King of the Jews. Their journey was long (in excess of one year) and difficult, but the hunger was much greater than the problems of the journey. They arrived with a large checkbook, too. They presented rich gifts to the King because in their eyes He was more than just the King of the Jews. He was also their King. They were not obsessed with things, but with Him. They “fell down and worshiped Him” because they had been doing that activity every day in their heart since they began their journey. In brief, their goal was KNOWING THE KING.

This goal of KNOWING HIM is what separates people, even Christians. Those Christians that rise to the top are obsessed with KNOWING HIM. He is their focus, not merely religious, even church matters. They do whatever they do for Him and that drives them to a higher degree of excellence. They live out the old song, “Were the whole realm of nature mine, that were a present far too small. Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.” If you know those words in daily experience, happy are ye. You know of what I write.

John Piper asked, “Why did the Magi bring gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh? When you give a gift to Christ it’s a way of saying, ‘The joy that I pursue is not the hope of getting rich with things from you.  I have not come to you for your things but for yourself. And this desire I now intensify and demonstrate by giving up things in the hope of enjoying you more, not the things. By giving to you what you do not need and what I might enjoy, I am saying more earnestly and more authentically, ‘You are my treasure, not these things.’”  Amen!

Tom Swartzwelder was born again at the age of nine in an old-fashioned revival meeting. Tom received his B.A. from Tennessee Temple University and his M. Div from Luther Rice Seminary. He has pastored for nearly forty years in both bi-vocational and full-time roles. He provides practical how-to-do-ministry resources for the disciples of Jesus Christ at http://www.godsgreenhouse.net. Tom’s latest book is “God Speaks–Today!”