How do you know there is a watchmaker?

Because there is a watch!

If you take a moment to look at the timepiece strapped to your wrist, or located in your pocket, or if you’re one of those who has no watch, the cell phone you use to check the time, you can tell it is an amazingly complex piece of micro-machinery. Whether your watch has the old fashioned mainspring-driven gear mechanism or the latest digital microchip technology, upon examination it is pretty obvious that the pieces didn’t just randomly fall together and start tracking time.

And while the old style mechanical watches with their tiny gears, tightly wound mainsprings, delicately weighted balance wheels, and precision escapements have been around for centuries, we instinctively know they contain ingenious amounts of meticulous engineering. And then there is the latest marvel of silicon technology, the Smart Watch. Would it be presumptuous of me to guess that there are exactly zero human beings on Earth who believe these marvels of technogeekdom just randomly fell together as the result of random chance?

I didn’t think so.

So now that you have examined and thought about your watch for a few minutes, take a look at the world around you. Not just a cursory look, but a long, detailed look. Notice the trees, the grass, the insects, the birds, the sky and the clouds floating across it. Feel the temperature and humidity against your skin. Think about why you can feel that in the first place, and why it feels either just right, or a bit too warm or a bit too cool. Take some deep breaths and consider the oxygen you inhaled that your lungs used to revitalize your blood. Drink a cold glass of water and consider the complex processes by which your body uses that cold drink to nourish and rejuvenate you.

Look at your own hand and consider the complexity of this biomechanism and all the intricate tasks you can use it to perform. Perhaps you play the piano, or the guitar, or you’re an artist or a writer like me. Go into your kitchen and pick up an egg or a marshmallow and consider just how it is that you can manipulate your fingers just right to grasp the object, apply the precise amount of force required to hold the object without dropping it, yet hold it delicately enough to keep from crushing it. Do you really believe all this complexity you see around you, indeed even your own body, just randomly fell together, the product of aimless natural forces?

You are being disingenuous if you say you do. Just as we know there is a watchmaker because there is a watch, we also know there is a creator because there is a creation. The world around us – indeed our very own bodies – are all the evidence we need to know there is a God who created us, the world around us, and the universe within which we exist. Yes, we know the truth about God because He has made the truth obvious to us – Romans 1:20 states, “For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God.”

So regardless of what you are willing to publicly admit, you do, in fact, know that God exists. You know this beyond a shadow of a doubt and we can let all pretenses fall away right here and now. And in this moment, as you read this, I want you to shut out all the other people in your life. Tune out your friends, coworkers, family, and anyone else that might come to mind. For this is just between you and God. And right here and right now I want you to speak to God. Admit to Him that you know He is there, that He created all that there is. If you have been publicly denying this (as I once did many years ago) then apologize to Him and ask for forgiveness. Ask Him to help you come to know Him better. For it is God’s good pleasure to draw near to those who draw near to Him. (read James 4:8)

I will leave you with this truth from Romans 3:23-25a:

²³ For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. ²⁴ Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. ²⁵ For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood.

May the God you know exists bless you and keep you!

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One year ago my wife and I started ReignDrops.org in the most modest way. We simply penned “583 Words” and posted them on the Internet. We wanted to share the Gospel with the world and this was our starting point. Only 66 people read that first post in the week we published it, and we were thrilled for each and every one of them.  It was all downhill from there. Over the next 4 or 5 months it seemed we were to be lucky to get anyone to read our blog.

And then a strange thing began to happen. Readership started to increase. Slowly. But a trend is a trend and the data was pointing upwards. And as we reviewed the statistics something else caught our attention: we were being read in other countries. I can honestly say we did not anticipate that. We were slowly becoming an international ministry!

Today, one year from our starting point, we can hardly claim astronomical readership numbers, but it none-the-less seems clear God is using our words in big ways. We have been read in 72 countries around the world; our global reach has touched Europe, Asia, Africa, North and South America, Australia, New Zealand and more. We have our own business cards and t-shirts. We have been movie & TV critics, news reporters, Christian apologists, historians, and fictional writers. All in the hopes of sharing God’s truth.

So now with our first year behind us, we start turning our attention to the future. Donna and I pray nightly and our prayers regularly seek God’s guidance and direction for our fledgling little ministry. We publish our writing in the hopes of spreading the knowledge of the Lord to all who care to read. And we pray that those who read us will share the news within their spheres of influence.

In Matthew 28: 18-20, Jesus gave his disciples these words, that have come to be known as the Great Commission: “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

These words and this mission are as meaningful today for Donna and I, and all Christians everywhere, as they were to the original disciples. It is on this basis that we started our blog, and it is on this basis that we pen these words. Especially in these trying times where we see controversy seemingly around every corner and the horror of terrorism strikes ever closer to home.

Indeed, it seems wherever we turn these days, there are hurting people who need Jesus. And Jesus instructed us in Matthew 11:28: “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.”

So in these troublesome times, it is the mission of Reign Drops to bring hope to the world by speaking the truth about Jesus Christ. And these, on our one-year anniversary, are our 583 more words for 2016. May God bless you!

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“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life.” (1 John 1:1, NIV) I was flying to Chicago for business and figured I would use the idle time on the airplane to get a little Bible study in. Since our team was flying in a smaller plane, I was afforded more study time than one might normally expect in route from Minneapolis to the Windy City. Perfect!

So I opened to 1 John and began my reading. In case you have not read it lately (or ever) 1 John is an unabashed eyewitness account of John’s time with Jesus. His claims are unmistakable – he has seen, he has heard, and he has touched Jesus. And not just the pre-crucifixion Jesus; in verse two John proclaims the eternal life because he has seen, he has heard, and he has touched the resurrected Jesus. And in his eyewitness claims, he uses the word “we” because he is, presumably, speaking for the other twelve disciples as well.

I could dig a whole lot deeper into this eyewitness account, and the claims John was making, exploring their unmistakable authenticity and implications, but what struck me most in my personal, airborne Bible study was a point John makes in 1 John 2:6: that if we claim to live in God we must live our lives “as Jesus did.”  And that got me wondering, if I am to live as Jesus did, I should understand just a little about how he lived. In other words, just what example did he set for us? Below is the list I came up with as we soared through the sky:

Jesus was sinless, he had compassion, His actions showed love in tangible ways. Jesus did not condemn sinners but encouraged them to repent; He called out hypocrisy among the religious leaders wherever he encountered it. Jesus walked in perfect trust and fellowship with God, He pursued God’s will above His own. Jesus was a teacher and He always spoke the truth whether it was popular or not; there was no deceit within Him. He did not fear the disapproval of his fellow man (in fact He often expected it). Jesus walked and talked in authority. He did not pursue worldly possessions or pleasures but strove for the fullness of living for God. Jesus cast out demons and healed illness. Jesus prayed regularly and fervently. And He spent lots of time with sinners and those who were not popular.

I paused from my study right there. While my list was hardly exhaustive, it most certainly paints a vivid picture of how Jesus lived, of the things He did, the habits He developed, the way He interacted with others, His relationship with the Father, and the way he loved. Indeed, then, my list, however incomplete it may be, seems like a good yardstick by which I can measure how well I am living “as Jesus did.” And, perhaps, a roadmap for improvement. And now I am sharing it with you for your consideration. Are you living as Jesus lived? Walking as He walked?

“Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other.” (1 John 4:7-11)

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    In today’s world, technology is everywhere. Whether it’s the personal computers we use at home, the tablets we use on the go, our mobile phones, or even our automobiles we find technology and connectivity to be a part of our daily lives. Many of our homes have satellite or cable TV capable of being programmed remotely from anywhere in the world. Forget to program your favorite show to record and you’re on a business trip in Japan? Just login from your mobile device and you can setup the recording from there. Even our homes can have alarm systems, light switches, and door locks that can be activated remotely from most anywhere on Earth. Technology has changed the way we live and it is everywhere.

I must confess to being old enough to have grown up before the computer age. Never once in my twelve years of public schooling did I ever touch a computer. I think the school actually may have had a computer during my senior high years, I remember some talk of punch cards and something about a bunch of ones and zeroes, but I never actually saw such a device so I can neither confirm nor deny its existence. And during most of my youth my family was relegated to a single 19” black and white TV which received exactly 4 channels, unless you stood with your hand on the antenna in just the right spot so that channel 2 came in. I think I was 15 or 16 before I realized the Minnesota Vikings wore purple.

I grew up thinking Captain Kirk wore a slightly lighter shade of gray uniform than Scottie or Mr. Spock. Imagine my surprise when I saw Star Trek in living color for the first time. A whole new world was upon me! But even the creators of Star Trek couldn’t anticipate the technology we already have in our world today. The original Enterprise being operated by toggle switches and sliders instead of the touch screens and capacitive switches we are already familiar with. And Kirk’s communicator looks like a vintage flip phone from the 1990’s.

Being as old as I am, I remember in my first professional job using a Smith-Corona typewriter and feeling lucky we had the electric version that could go backwards and correct my copious typos. Of course, it could only do that if you had not yet moved on to the next line. And when I wanted to produce a form that had more than one size font, I was introduced to the art of hand keylining, where we blew the original up in size and pasted the hand-typed text we wanted in the smaller font, then shrunk the whole thing back down. A form I could create and print in about 15 minutes using today’s technology might’ve taken 2-3 days to make back then.

But technology slowly crept up on me. First it was video games in local arcades, then home gaming systems offering such technological triumphs as Pong and Asteroids. Sony’s Walkman let me listen to my music on the go and it wasn’t long before my children were asking for Gameboys for Christmas. VCR’s became affordable and nearly every home had one. Cassette tapes replaced the 8 tracks I grew up with and then along came the compact disc. Somewhere around 1993 I made my first car drive with mobile phone technology, a large bag phone that took up the entire passenger seat of my car. But I was able to stay in touch with the office while I drove to our other facility. It was amazing and it made me feel important.

Not long after that I bought my first home computer. I remember showing my two daughters how to use it; and I have fond memories of the familiar AOL voice telling the three of us: “You’ve got mail!” Five and a quarter floppies gave way to three and a half floppies and kilobytes grew to megabytes and then gigabytes and now terabytes (or maybe more for all I know!). Dial up connections became DSL connections and today we can download faster than our original computer could even process the data. And the pace of technology has become so fast we buy our mobile phones on plans that allow us to exchange them every six months.

We even have wrist watches that perform the tasks of our mobile phones and every time we get in our automobile our phone synchronizes to the car and we can access our phone books and text messages through our car’s Bluetooth connection. While this is fine technology for our passengers, the temptation of staying connected while we drive has led to the unintended consequence of distracted driving, a problem thought to be every bit as dangerous and deadly as drinking and driving.  And while having the Google maps app in our mobile phone give us turn by turn directions through our car’s audio system sure is convenient, when we’re connected like this all the time when do we get time to rest? When do we have time for family and friends and our Creator?

“Be still and know I am God,” declares the Psalmist in Psalm 46:10.  And isn’t this the challenge many of us face today in our connected, technological world?

I recently made a change in my life that I feel is a change for the better. I sold my technologically current, Bluetooth-equipped, mobile hotspot on wheels and have chosen instead to drive my low tech, early 90’s Mazda Miata on a daily basis. The Miata has a stereo, but the CD player doesn’t work and there’s no Bluetooth. It has air conditioning but it has long since stopped working. There are no remote control buttons on the steering wheel and when the top is down you can’t really hear the stereo too well anyway so I tend to leave it off. Just man and machine. The only connectivity is the connection to the road I feel through the steering wheel and the wind that is blowing in my hair (well…I used to have hair).

  When I put the top down and hit the road in my Miata, I see, taste, and smell nature in a very experiential way. Just me and my machine and God’s creation. My phone may be ringing but I won’t answer because I can’t hear anyway with all this wind in my face. But I am taking in reality in a way that maybe is lost in today’s technological world and I am feeling God’s presence because there’s nothing else to distract me. I motor on giving praise to the One who created and sustains all that is around me as I unwind from my busy workday.

Maybe a sports car isn’t your way of disconnecting from today’s technological age, but taking the time to disconnect from the world and to connect with Him is vital for each of us. Jesus said, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28)  So what is your way of turning off the connected world and plugging in to your Lord and Savior?

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