The LORD of hosts is with us!
Dear Parents and Friends of CCS,
May this issue of Parent News find you experiencing the grace and goodness of God!
I want to start with some shoutouts to our Chaplain Jeff Collier, the CCS Worship Team and Hannah Osterbye for their help in putting together our recent Community Prayer Furnace.
God was clearly present, and much prayer was lifted up for our families and for a gospel centered awakening in the culture at large.
We hope to schedule 2-3 Community Prayer Furnaces for next year, and thereby continue to establish a rhythm of prayer in support of the growth and maturing of God’s work here at CCS.
We are being obedient to our Father in heaven by scheduling and preparing for these, and He has allowed us to see Him at work in powerful ways at these events over the years:
I believe that God is doing a new thing in our midst in many areas of school life. There are three exciting new programs that will likely launch in Fall 2024, and hopefully I will be able share more details very soon.
In preparation for that, this week I’d like to comment briefly on Psalm 46, one of my favorite Psalms.
The whole Psalm is beautiful, but in particular I’d like to focus on verses 10 and 11:
“[Cease striving (let go, relax, stop fighting) and know (fully recognize, understand) that I
am God; I will be exalted among the nations (lit. Gentiles: people who are not Hebrews),
I will be exalted (lifted high, made much of, given the glory due him) in the earth. The
The LORD of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
The latter part of Psalm 46 has a distinct martial, war-like feel to it. This is reflective of the violent context of Israel’s history as they struggled to establish themselves in their God-given inheritance, the Promised Land.
In essence these two verses relay the idea that you might as well lay down your arms, stop fighting, and stop striving to gain the victory.
There are probably a number of applications for this concept, but as I reflect on this in the context of the rest of God’s word and my own life in this season, I think it’s fair to apply this as a powerful reminder that my hard work will not win the day, will not ultimately cause the overthrow of my enemies, and will not better my position relative to those things I struggle against.
All of that striving forward will not fill the deficits in my life, the hole that can only be filled adequately and sustainably by God. Work is good, but only if we’re doing it as a result of our Jesus-bought standing before God, and not a subtle (or not-so-subtle) attempt to gain the favor of God or others.
Trying to earn favor in this way is antithetical to the Gospel of the Kingdom. As God-followers, we are to increasingly understand that we serve God out of a position of sonship & daughter-ship i.e. we are family with the most High God. As such we cannot flourish as Kingdom citizens if we work to fill the hole in our heart with anything but God.
This realization, set in the context of the amazing kinship of Trinity, should be a mind-blowing fact. If it doesn't strike us that way, perhaps we need to ask ourselves why.
It’s interesting to note that God’s exaltation is not up for debate, and it’s not conditional. It’s a settled fact: God will be seen for who He really is, as His word, the Holy Bible, describes Him, the one true God existing in three loving and just persons. And He will be glorified.
The Psalm closes with this incredibly powerful statement, one that when taken seriously is a game-changer in our lives: The LORD (YaHWeH, the self-existent One, who needs nothing yet created us humans for love) of hosts (angel-armies) is with us.
We are not alone! And not only is He with us, He has taken us into His family, and provides us with protection on every side. Sometimes that means bad things are prevented from getting to us.
But other times it means that hard things will continue to happen, yet God is offering to be our “strong tower” in the midst of the suffering. The enemy cannot breach the inner sanctum - all hell may break loose in our lives, yet our interior person can be at rest.
This amazing offer is more than we can take in. Yet it resonates throughout the Scriptures.
God is in the business of rescuing His family, whether it be out of pain or in the midst of it. And all this is based on the settled fact of Jesus’ sacrifice of Himself on our behalf to pay the debt that we could not pay to a perfectly holy God.
And this, my friends, is very good news.
May God the Father, His Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit who proceeds from them, receive all of the glory as we continue to move step by step toward becoming a truly extraordinary school, for the greater glory of God.
For CCS and the Kingdom,
Tom