Paul’s story

I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. Phil. 4:11-12

I like Paul. His story is lost on believers now because it’s so well-known, but seriously: he was at the top of his game, so zealous for his religion that he sought Christians out to have them killed. As a teacher of the law he would have had everything he needed. The man was passionate no matter what he did, but I’m sure he was also quite content in his lifestyle. And then Jesus is like, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” (Acts 9:4), and from then on he gives up everything for the gospel.

We’re talking ship wrecks, imprisonment, beatings, no money, constant travel, constant rejection, and finally death. But no matter where Paul was or who he was facing, he was always proclaiming the gospel. As Jason Curry put it at last weekend’s D-Now, Paul didn’t make Jesus “a part of his life.” Paul was a part of Jesus’ life.

And because of that life, Paul was content. He had learned contentment. In the Feb. 16 entry in Charles Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening, he writes,

Now, contentment is one of of the flowers of heaven, and if we would have it, it must be cultivated. It will not grow in us by nature. It is the new nature alone that can produce it, and even then we must be especially careful and watchful that we maintain and cultivate the grace that God has sown in us. 

I think American Christians suck at contentment — and don’t worry, I’m speaking for myself here too. We don’t understand contentment because we don’t have to be content. You want it? Go get it. You dream it? You can do it. Isn’t that our motto? Isn’t there an app for that?

So when the Lord gives us the ol’ stiff-arm and we’re stuck in the dust for what feels like forever, our first thought tends to be “why?” when it reality, it should be something a lot more like “thank you.” Thank you, Lord, for showing me my needs, which only you can provide for. Thank you for reminding me that smart phones can’t solve my problems and facebook doesn’t equal friendship. Like the Israelites, I am stiff-necked; I refuse to bow. So you show me how to bow, and I am all the better for it.

In the Lord’s mercy, he has given me the opportunity to do youth ministry again. I have been accepted to three of my four schools (in classic Oxford fashion, I won’t hear from them for another month), and by faith I believe that he will give me the opportunity to study. And if not, I think he’ll send me into some kind of leadership in the church eventually.

But even if none of that happens, I know that the Lord hasn’t abandoned me. He consistently puts other believers in my life, believers who love me and encourage me to keep going. And he lets me encourage others through my struggles as well. So even if I’m stuck in insurance for another year, the Lord’s mercy reigns — he is teaching me to be content. Praise God!

Thoughts on the Lost Sheep

In novels and movies we are taught to identify with the main character. If the main character is a victim, we feel his pain; if he is a superhero, we feel his strength; if she is confused about the direction of her life, we are constantly thinking, “Which path would I take?”

In VeggieTales, there is one refrain that Bob and Tomato and Larry the Cucumber remind their listeners of constantly: “You are special, and God loves you very much.” Our generation has taken this to heart: I am special and loved by God. Unfortunately, we have also taken it to an extreme: I am special enough to stand before God. I do enough good things to earn God’s love.

When Jesus gave the parables of the lost sheep, lost coin, and lost son, he was speaking to two groups of people: the “tax collectors and sinners,” or bottom of the religious totem pole, and the “scribes and Pharisees,” or top of the religious totem pole. Interestingly, he was able to tell stories that struck both of their hearts. As Jerram Barrs writes in his book Learning Evangelism from Jesus, the scribes and Pharisees see themselves as “the ninety-nine righteous persons who need not repent” (106), while the tax collectors and sinners “know that they are people who need to be rescued from their lost state” (107). We, however, are in an interesting conundrum: we see ourselves as the main character – that is, the lost sheep, the lost coin, or the lost son – but we feel as special as the scribes and Pharisees. We who have grown up in the church know the point which Jesus is getting at: that God has mercy on the lost. We know from Sunday School that we are lost, and we know from VeggieTales that we are special enough to receive God’s love.

Do you see the problem? When Barrs describes the tax collectors and sinners, he writes, “As they listened, many of them would be saying in their own hearts, ‘Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ They would be amazed that there will actually be a party in heaven for them, for they think that they are not worthy even to lift their eyes up to heaven” (107). When they see Jesus the Shepherd returning with the one lost sheep, they think, “This is not possible that he would be willing to save me. I’m simply not worthy.”

I was so struck by this passage because I could see my response to this story in my own heart. I promptly identify with the correct person – the lost sheep – but I skip the step of realizing my unworthiness. Deep down, I know that I am, in fact, worthy of God’s love. After all, I have been told from childhood that God loves me. Why does God love me? My childhood self isn’t really sure, but there’s no need to worry about that. I look up to heaven unafraid and say, “Come save me God! I know you want to!”

I’ll give you another example of how our culture warps this story. Barrs talks about the common 20^th century depiction of the lost sheep: a young, handsome, slightly effeminate man happily carrying a dainty, pure white sheep through rich green fields of joy. Jesus has not worked hard or sacrificed to find the lost sheep. The lost sheep has not suffered in its rebellion. It is simply a clean-cut, heart-warming story.

The reality is very different. I worked with sheep at a camp one summer and I know one thing about them: they’re stupid. They don’t like help. They don’t ever understand what’s going on and they don’t think about what they’re doing. So for instance, when some counselors attempted to sheer a sheep because of the heat of the summer, it took six counselors to hold the sheep down. They were helping him, but he refused to accept it.

So, I imagine that when the shepherd went out to find the sheep, it took forever. That stupid sheep was just fine grazing off in the fields and didn’t want to come back. He didn’t run to the shepherd; he had all the grass he needed out here, thank you very much. And when he finally got tired enough, probably very late in the evening, he simply lied down, because there was nothing else he could do.

When the shepherd finally found him, the sheep didn’t really know what was going on. He probably kicked and wiggled to avoid being hurt. He was probably large and heavy, gorged from spending all of his time eating grass. He had probably wandered far away from the other sheep, so that by the time the shepherd got him calmed down enough to pick him up and carry him home, both sheep and shepherd were exhausted. Neither of them is spotless or carefree: they are tired, they are worn out, they hurt.

And here we see the difference between the sheep and the shepherd. The sheep, in his stupidity and rebellion, wandered off and brought all this trouble on himself. He deserves to be out in the wilderness. He deserves to be tired, wounded, and weak.

But the shepherd made a conscious choice. He removed himself from the ease and comfort of the 99 well-behaved sheep and went into the wilderness. He accepted the trials of the walk, and when he found the lost sheep, he picked up the sheep, removing the pain and weariness from the sheep and placing the weight of the sheep’s rebellion on his own shoulders. And the story doesn’t end there, because Jesus says the shepherd “lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing.” The shepherd is happy to take on the pain and hurt in order to save the sheep! In his great joy he removes all vestiges of rebellion from the sheep’s heart and gives him glory and acceptance. He gives the sheep what he had never had before: love. Love in the sheep’s heart for the shepherd, because the shepherd has loved him all along.

I don’t see this in myself because I believe I am worthy from the start to receive God’s love. I am a Pharisee, a doer of good deeds, a person who walks confidently into the Lord’s throne room based on my own specialness. In reality, I am much more the lost sheep than I think I am. I walk into the throne room because the Lord has stepped off the throne, has taken on my sin, and has defeated it through his own perfection. My specialness is worth nothing. God loves me because of Christ, because of what His Son did. And what His Son did is impossible to fathom.

I was so convicted by this story because I forget my tendency to be both the self-righteous Pharisee and the spotless sheep. I forget that I believe I am good enough to enter heaven and Jesus just shows up because it looks pretty in a painting. I forget the great pain he took on. I forget how I rejected him, how my own sin sent him to the cross. I am so quick to ignore my unworthiness. I am so quick to defiantly stare God in the face and demand a spot at his right hand.

What great mercy the Father has showered on me, then, that he died to save me when I still believed I could enter heaven on my own two feet! What great pain the Shepherd accepted to save the defiant sheep! I hope I can remember my own unworthiness before the throne, so that I can glorify Christ in his astounding worthiness. I hope never to forget that my sin was first put on the righteous Lamb, and then his righteousness was given to me. How wonderful to be a tax collector and sinner! It is only in the realization of my sin that I can humbly accept Jesus’ act of grace.

The pretty picture of Jesus and the lost sheep

The reality: stooped, tired, and full of love

The tension in the chapel

So here’s the deal: I have had an excellent summer. I mean really, it’s been great. After spending some time with my family, I helped them safely move to North Carolina and then moved in with a family in Carrollton in order to stick around here. They’re so much fun, their kids are wonderful, and I just love hanging out with them. As I’ve gotten used to camp it’s become easier and more rewarding. Not that it’s less difficult — working with kids is always tiring and challenging — but, for instance, watching a little girl gleefully take in the laser show at Stone Mountain after a long day is really just beautiful. The spiritual steps we’re taking with our students are baby steps, but they’re nonetheless moving forward. And when I’m not working with camp, I’m working with the youth group. As a youth ministry team we’re exploring both the strong and weak aspects of the program and trying to figure out how we can better represent Christ to students. I get to teach this coming Wednesday, which means I’ve been able to spend a lot of really wonderful time in the Word. This summer has been not only fun but challenging and rewarding.

Now, I’m a pretty black-and-white person. Things are either good or bad. People are either kind or mean. Cereal is either crunchy or mushy and clearly you can’t have both. So when things are good, you might envision me standing in a church looking at a stained-glass window as the sun shines through it. It’s beautiful: brilliant colors which come together to form a magnificent picture. The sun is shining through so strongly that the colors are reflected across furniture in the room, making the chapel a brilliant picture of the glory of God himself.

So here’s the issue: I keep looking around and noticing shadows or even dark holes in the brilliance. Not one but two cases of long-term, committed Christians suddenly, inexplicably turning from the faith. Mourning the anniversary of one death even as I hear about more young lives taken. The faithful, tireless work of believers for the cause of Christ leading to — fruit? The hope of salvation for others? No, just darkness. Just blank stares.

On the one wrist I can see a rope tied, pulling me ever closer to the beauty and joy of the Lord. But on the other wrist the rope is pulling me in the opposite direction, towards sin and hurt and loss. This is why I’m so black and white: because the tension of both circumstances, of a loving God and a murderous demon standing in the same throne room, is too painful. Why does Job have to suffer?

I don’t have an answer and I don’t really know what to do about it. The only thing I can think of is to keep praying, because I’m certain that loving God is sovereign and that murderous demon is not. And eventually we’ll reach Canaan and, while I imagine God will not tell us why Job suffered, at the very least he won’t suffer anymore.

What I Learned at Camp

Working with kids is hard. Their sin is out there for everyone to see: if they’re angry they hit, if they don’t like what you say they mouth off, if their pride gets hurt they pout. They have either too much energy or no energy at all. They have attention spans of approximately fifteen seconds. I don’t have a ton of energy and by about noon they’ve got me completely worn out even when they’re on their best behavior. And on days like today, when they’re all fighting and crying and full of attitude, sometimes I just want to sit down, give up, and forget about them.

The hardest part, though, is not when they’re fighting with each other or mouthing off. The hardest part is when we’re sitting in front of them, desperately trying to explain the most fundamental aspect of Christianity, and they’re giving us blank stares.

“Do you understand?” we ask.

“Yeah, it all about Jesus,” they answer, trained by Southern Christian society that if they drop the J-word they’ll be good.

“Do you understand grace?”

Blank stares.

It doesn’t matter how much we explain the gospel. I can use the smallest words, the most creative examples, the clearest prose I can think of, and I’ll still get blank stares. Dark hearts don’t understand light. Even worse, dark hearts who grow up in the church think they understand light — and also think they deserve grace. If I can’t explain the cross of Christ, how will I explain anything else?

Praise the Lord for the Spirit, for true grace, and for the love that sent Christ to the cross. Praise the Lord for the gospel, because without it there is no difference between me and these kids. And without the blessed Spirit my job is pointless. Those blank stares won’t go away without the movement of the Spirit, and if you don’t believe me, come hang out with kids for a while. Praise the Lord for sovereignty, because if I could chose my own salvation I would never see Christ. My heart is too rebellious and my eyes are too blinded to do anything else.

I’m not very eloquent today because putting words to sin is just painful. I can see myself in my students: my anger, my pride, my attitude. I just hide it better than they do. I am so, so glad that Jesus has more patience with me than I do with these kids. If Christ gave up on His bride as quickly as I want to give up, let us eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die! But God is love, and love is patient. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. And it never fails. Praise the Lord for that.

I think what I learned at camp today is how important prayer is in ministry. Teaching students about Christ is, of course, commanded and absolutely necessary. But without prayer, teaching can become a self-reliant waste of time, because if I believe that my words can save then I’m damning my students to hell. We must pray that the Spirit would impact the lives of our students with grace and love: that is by far the most important part of ministry. Prayer reminds us who we’re relying on: not our eloquent words or creative illustrations, but the sovereign God who saves. I will point my students to the cross as often as possible, and when I can’t do that, Father, give me grace to remember to beg for their souls.

Please, brothers and sisters in Christ, remember prayer.

Thorns

Yeah, pain sucks.

I’m sure I’ve discussed the particular topic of pain and suffering before, but in this pre-Revelation 21 existence it pops up repeatedly, so I feel like it’s alright for me to repeat myself a little. As I’ve told many of my friends, it takes a couple times for truth to seep through my hard-headedness and I figure that’s probably the case for some of you too.

In 2 Corinthians 12 Paul says the following:

“To keep me from being conceited because of these supassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’”

I haven’t studied Paul’s thorn very much. I’m pretty sure it’s a metaphorical thorn, some kind of sin or temptation or something like that, but when I was little I thought it was a real thorn. I imagined Paul limping along with a huge rose thorn stuck in his ribs, impairing his breathing and forcing him to bend a little, one hand always clutching his nasty wound.

I didn’t understand any of what Paul was saying, so I didn’t understand why God wouldn’t take the thorn away. What does “My grace is sufficient for you” even mean? Some kind of strange, unseen feeling was supposed to take away this very real, very painful thorn? What are you talking about, God?

I like the way I used to envision Paul’s thorn, because I think it’s an excellent picture of what our suffering looks like. Often we show up in our Christian circles wearing huge black trenchcoats and happy-face masks to disguise our bloody wounds and the pain that seeps into our faces. We try so hard to stand up straight when in reality our backs are stooped from the pain of the pointy thorn stuck right between our ribs. We try to laugh but our lungs are just too pierced by that thorn. We’d much rather curl up in bed and not get out anymore.

I understand better now what God’s response to Paul meant. Paul begins his explanation with, “To keep me from being conceited…” And if that’s a good enough reason for Paul, it sounds like a pretty solid reason to me. Pain forces God’s children to forget about themselves and run to him. It makes us realize that we’re not in control, but we follow a God who is.

At a Covenant basketball game last year, our boys had been dominating up until the fourth quarter. As they got tired and perhaps a little cocky, the opposing team began catching up in points. The timer ticked down and the other team kept scoring. Nonetheless we Scots were standing in the stands, cheering for our boys and at times harassing the other team.

With three seconds on the clock, the Scots had the ball and were throwing it back into play right under the opposing team’s basket. The boy with the ball threw it across the court in an attempt to get it as far away from their basket at possible. But, misjudging the distance, he tossed the ball too high. It bounced off the bottom of the other team’s backboard and landed right in the middle of three defenders, who immediately scooped it up. They ran towards their basket and shot as we tried desperately to block them. They missed, but with less than a second left they shot again and made it. They won by one point.

The packed stands stood silent, mouths hanging open, completely shocked. We had been winning for literally four quarters and they snatched it away from us. No one moved for probably thirty seconds.

When pain comes and lops you upside the head like that, you really don’t know what to do. You stand there and wonder what happens next. You wonder if you can keep going, or if you should just give up now. When death shows up unexpectedly, how do you keep putting one foot in front of the other? When your heart aches and it won’t go away, how do you put it out of your mind and write a research paper? When you can’t fix anything, what in the world do you do?

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” There’s only one thing to do: run to Jesus. “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” Pain forces us to realize that it’s really not all about me, it’s about my Christ. When the thorn digs so deeply into my flesh, I have nothing to boast about but the Lord. I get out of bed because of Christ; I keep moving, despite my inability to fix anything, because “when I am weak,” through Christ’s great power, “then I am strong.” If suffering points a sinner to Jesus, then bring on the suffering. If, as C.S. Lewis said, “Pain is God’s megaphone to rouse a deaf world,” then pain we must accept. And if such accute hurt will draw me closer to the only God who can save me from it, then I will limp to my Savior and let Him hold me. It hurts so much, but the reward is greater than we can imagine.

Hope

We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.  … So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God — through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. Romans 7: 14-15, 19-25

Over the past few weeks I’ve had an up-close encounter with what we theologians here at Covenant call the antithesis which runs through all people. As even Paul said, every Christian is in a constant struggle between the good we’re called to and the evil we were born into. There’s no escaping this evil, at least on this side of Revelation 21. And to be perfectly honest, it completely sucks.

For instance, I love to talk to people. I love to hear their stories and share my life and hug them and feel those relational warm fuzzies. I do not, however, like to make presentations. In fact, I happen to be avoiding writing a presentation at this very moment, partly because the thought of giving a presentation in front of a class full of those juniors I always look up to is enough to give me a minor heart attack. I also like to translate Mark from Greek to English, which is what I’m doing in Greek this semester. I even like to discuss the author’s theological implications in class. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, however, I dread when 2pm comes around and I have to go to said class. I practically avoid it at all costs.

After every exam I’ve ever taken at Covenant I think to myself, “Next time it’ll be different. I’ll start studying a week beforehand, or at least three days, and I’ll feel prepared when I go into the room.” Nope. I’m always studying the night before or the morning of.

Why do I do this? I mean, I know not wanting to go to class is pretty shallow in the scope of potential problems, but my little “c” calling is to be a student right now, and I’m not doing a great job of it. I want to be a good student, but somehow facebook, C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia, and “America’s Next Top Model” are always more appealing.

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.

This quote directly follows the one I opened my post with. Paul doesn’t really give an answer to why we must struggle with this nasty antithesis — a question I’ve been asking almost constantly. But he does tell us how to deal with it: Jesus. He is the only way to be free.

I don’t know what that looks like. I think sometimes I have a hard time even believing it. But we rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disapoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. Romans 5:3-5

My biggest struggle right now is not really whether or not I’m going to class, but it’s a good enough example for what I want to say. “Hope does not disappoint us.” There is a reason to hope. Not because I can make it if I try harder, or because the sun’s going to rise tomorrow morning, or because I know I have good friends to lean on. There is a reason to hope because God loves us. As sinners he loves us, and through his Son’s righteousness he loves us. When I screw up he loves me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

Get on your knees, people.

This afternoon the House of Representatives rejected the economic bailout plan for the financial industry. By a vote of 228-205, the $700 billion plan was turned down and stocks promptly dropped, the DOW falling by more than 400 points. American stability has officially come to a halt.

I just read an interesting article from the Burnside Writers Collective entitled Why We Need To Hit Bottom, by Melanie Benedict. She opens by discussing an Ethiopian mother of six who is dying of AIDS, has been abandoned by the husband that gave it to her, is shunned by society, and lives in a room the size of a double bed. Then she discusses our own economic crisis:

“I wonder what it would take for us to understand that kind of poverty of those families in Ethiopia. They are desperate for God in every way: for their health, their food, their safety, their children’s future. They are in a position to depend on God alone that we, as Americans, can’t begin to comprehend. As strange as this may sound, I can’t help but wonder what would happen if we were to embrace the falling economy rather than fight it.”

What a ridiculous thought, right? Embrace the falling economy? Resign ourselves to such a horrific financial crisis? Lose that much money?

What about our cars, our grossly expensive schools, our huge houses, our Starbucks, our leisure life? What about weekends out? Splurging on ice cream, clothes, jewelry? What about the money we’ve spent our lives saving up, the money we rely on to get us through the week?

“What would it do for our nation if we could live for even a few days in poverty akin to the daily experience of many around the world? Would we start to look at things a little differently? Would it be as important to own houses that are bigger than we need or can afford? Or would we begin to thank God for the cool breeze of the day, for another day of life to spend with our children, for a soft blanket, or a meal shared in love?

What we seem desperate to stop could potentially be the best thing our nation could ask for. As Christians, wouldn’t the wisest thing be to get on our knees and beg God to save us, not from financial devastation, but from our love of money? If the answer is yes, the daunting question then becomes, are we willing to suffer the consequences ourselves?”

Matthew 19:20-22:

“All these I have kept,” the young man said. “What do I still lack?”

Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.

Secure in Slavery

During the course of the lesson my youth pastor taught last night, we looked at the following passage:

Jeremiah 29:11 – “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

We all know that verse. As soon as Jason said, “Turn to Jeremiah 29. This is a very popular verse,” one of the students rattled off, “For I know the plans I have for you…” And often when we think about this verse, we think, “Excellent! God’s going to take good care of me — he’ll ‘prosper’ and ‘not harm’ me, just like the verse says!” Then, when bad things happen to us, we look at God and say, “What is this all about? You promised!”

But last night, for the first time ever, I read the preceding verse, Jeremiah 29:10 – This is what the LORD says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place.”

Yep, that’s right. The Israelites were in exile, forcibly removed from their promised home by their archenemies, the Babylonians. The Israelites were smack-dab in the middle of the saddest and most difficult time in pre-Christ history. And while sitting in slavery, God says, “I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you.” What does this mean? What is God saying? It can’t get any worse than this!

God doesn’t promise a perfect life for his believers. He doesn’t promise the things the world desires — wealth, a good house, a perfect family, constant happiness, or even complete freedom. What He promises is that He will provide the Israelites with everything they really need. What did the Israelites need that God wanted to provide for them? Himself.
2 Kings 17:14 – But they would not listen and were as stiff-necked as their fathers, who did not trust in the LORD their God. Nehemiah 9:29 – You warned them to return to your law, but they became arrogant and disobeyed your commands. … Stubbornly they turned their backs on you, became stiff-necked and refused to listen. Jeremiah 7:26, 17:23, 19:15 – they were stiff-necked … they were stiff-necked … they were stiff-necked.

Do we see a pattern here? Israel constantly refused to submit to God or listen to His prophets. Israel would turn to God and fall, turn and fall, turn and fall. And God warned them over and over that if they would listen to Him, He wouldn’t hurt them. Jeremiah 41:10 – “If you stay in this land, I will build you up and not tear you down; I will plant you and not uproot you, for I am grieved over the disaster I have inflicted on you.”

But as we know, the Israelites refused to listen. Again and again, they would not submit. So God punished them as He promised, but not necessarily to hurt them. What better way to learn that we need God than having all control torn from us? While in exile, the Israelites had no way to free themselves or change their circumstances. There were only two options: run to God and trust HIs promise to protect them, or ignore Him forever and accept their fate of death.

We find the same ultimatum when we face difficult circumstances. We cannot change the death of a friend of family member. We cannot reverse the stupid decision we made that hurts our loved ones. We cannot make other people see truth and stop destroying their lives. But we can trust God. We can rest on His promise: “I know the plans I have for you … plans to give you hope and a future.” God knows what He’s doing. He knows why He has allowed death and destruction to enter our lives, and He knows that by doing this, He can break our self-righteous legs and force us to rely on Him. It is not the sadistic act of a god who wants to see us hurt. It is the relentlessly loving, passionate act of a God who loves us to death — even to His own death.

Wealth, happiness, temporal security — they’re nice, but they’re nothing compared to knowing God. Philippeans 3:7, 8 – But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him.

Just like the Israelites, we can be secure in the slavery, that lack of control, that comes from hard circumstances. In easy times we rely on ourselves; in hard times we run to our Savior. And there is nothing better than that.

Safe for the whole family!

So, Stuff Christians Like (stufffchristianslike.blogspot.com) has become my new favorite blog. Seriously, it’s really funny and relevant, and I just want to side hug everyone I meet because of it. It also has some really great, serious posts, and thus far my favorite has been this:

#77. Offering a safe approach to life.

Erwin McManus, an author and minister at Mosaic in California, has this theory that second generation Christians leave the church because they’re offered a boring faith. The life their parents offer them with God is dull and monotonous and vanilla. Whereas the world is seen as fun and wild and an adventure. I think he’s right. Somewhere along the way Christianity turned into the “safe approach” to life. What was once wild and free and raw in the Bible became kind of domesticated. Look at the biggest Christian radio station in Atlanta. Their motto is “Safe for the whole family.” They don’t focus on the quality of the music or the enjoyment you’ll get from listening to the station. They just tell you that if you listen, everything will be safe. I don’t want my faith to be that way and I don’t think God does either. Love is a dangerous idea. Grace is a dangerous idea. Forgiveness is the kind of idea that will mess your life up, for the better, but there’s nothing safe about loving your enemy. That’s what I want for my life. Let’s not be safe. Let’s be real and raw and alive.

So, go check out the blog and let me know what you think, because I really like him and I want to know how you feel and such.

My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!

So last night I was reading from Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening, as I do sporadically, and I decided to read both and Morning and the Evening devotional for July 23. While I’d like for you to just read the whole thing, the only versions I can find online are written the old way and just don’t do Spurgeon’s words justice for us, since it’s harder to understand. So I’ll do my best to summarize and put up a few quotes without the post being too long. Don’t worry, it’s well worth your time. And if you’re willing to read posts as long as mine usually are, why not a little more?

Obadiah 1:11 — You too were as one them.

The passage discusses Edom joining Israel’s enemies when they should be there to protect Israel. Instead, “On the day that strangers carried off his wealth … And cast lots for Jerusalem — You too were as one them.” Spurgeon writes, “A bad action may be all the worse because of the person who has committed it. When we, who are the chosen favorites of heaven, sin, ours is a crying offense, because we are so highly favored.” He goes on to discuss an angel convicting us of this sin, but my first thought was of my Christ.

“If [Jesus Christ] would lay his hand on us when we are doing evil, he would not need to use any other rebuke than the question, ‘What, you? What are you doing here?’” I can’t the God of the universe, who came and lived with us and willingly removed himself from perfect communion with the Father — to save sinners, even — standing in front of me, putting his hand on my shoulder, and saying, “What are you doing here?” I think about a husband standing in front of his wife, asking the same despairing question, while his wife’s other lover sits on bed behind her. What can she even say?

And yet we sin without a second thought every day. Little sins, big sins, sins that hurt others, sins that pull us away from God… “Much forgiven, much delivered, much instructed, much enriched, much blessed — will we dare to put forth our hand unto evil?” When the Bible talks about “grieving the Spirit” (Is. 63:10, Eph. 4:30), this is what it’s talking about. “Grieving the Spirit” is such a far-away phrase, though. How much more real to imagine facing the question, “What, you too? Acting like one of them, even after I’ve redeemed you and called you righteous before the Father I left for you?”

And then we move to Spurgeon’s Evening devotional for July 23: 1 John 1:7 — The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin.

“Forgiveness of sin is a present thing — a privilege for this day, a joy for this very hour. The moment a sinner trusts in Jesus, he is fully forgiven. … [This cleansing] will always be so with you, Christian, until you cross the river. You may come to this fountain every hour, for it cleanses still.”

“Our sins against God are manifold. Yet whether the debt is little or great, the same receipt can discharge one as well as the other. Blessed completeness!”

My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!
My sin, not in part but the whole,
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more,
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!