Shaped by the Word – Psalm 1

How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked,

Nor stand in the path of sinners,

Nor sit in the seat of scoffers! 

But his delight is in the law of the Lord, 

And in His law he meditates day and night. 

He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water,

Which yields its fruit in its season

And its leaf does not wither;

And in whatever he does, he prospers. 

 

The wicked are not so, 

But they are like chaff which the wind drives away. 

Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,

Nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. 

For the Lord knows the way of the righteous,

But the way of the wicked will perish. Psalm 1

To be blessed, according to the Amplified translation is to be fortunate, prosperous, and favored by God. However, this Psalm 1 blessing is a conditional one, dependent on who we associate with and our orientation to the law of the Lord.

How is a born again Christian, living out of a new covenant and a new life in Christ supposed to relate to conditional promises from the Old Testament? Let’s be honest: we cannot help but be attracted because of the richness of the promises, but do we really want blessing as our motive and obedience as our means? Do we really want to enter into a relationship with God that is dependent on us delivering the goods? What if one only meditated in the day and not the night or happened to keep company with the unregenerate? I believe I know the answer to these questions, but I tell you the truth, I believe every child of God is going to have to work the answers out for themselves.

I have friends who relate passionately to the Old Testament because of their attraction to prosperity. They are devout and seemingly beyond my appeal that there is a better way. Because I bought into it as a younger believer, I am sensitive to quid pro quo religion, where, if I do this or do that, I will position myself to receive God’s blessing.

It may sound arrogant, but I am a blessed man, before I ever pick up my Bible, because I have a new life in Christ. I am a child of God before I even read or quote the scriptures. By trusting in Christ, I was grafted into him—the Vine. The fruit I bear is directly related to this reality, not my adherence to the law of the Lord or my proclamation of it. The laws of the Lord originated out the Lord’s own being and you and I now live in that being and he lives in us. In Christ, we have the ultimate blessing. In him we are heir to everything he is and has. In Christ, we truly have an unfathomably rich inheritance. It is a huge step backwards to try and receive promises by virtue of our initiatives, compliance, or recitations.

If I just trashed your doctrine, you’re welcome. If I did, you are probably also thinking that Rob does not hold the scriptures or obedience in high regard. I promise I do, but I don’t think about them as a means to anything. My love of the scriptures and any inclination I have to live in harmony with them is a byproduct of the eternal life that is in me, which is compatible with the scriptures. I love his word because his word first loved me. When I obey his word, it is because his word already lives in me and beckons me, for the good of my heart, to agree and comply.

I am very familiar with the schools of Christian thought that have us confessing and declaring his word so that particular outcomes will be produced. I gave this theology a thorough test drive and found it incompatible with the new life that was in me. The very practicing of it placed God in a box that was much too small. Is God, our good, good Father, withholding his blessing until we incant his words as if they were some magical or mechanical trigger to release a blessing? If we proclaim his word, it should be because our soul exults in those words, not because we want something from God we cannot have otherwise. In him we have it all. He, the person of God, is our all in all.

God is a better parent than us. Did we withhold our children’s provision until they ask us with just the right words? The childlike, trusting heart I believe God wants to produce in us is one that simply trusts that he knows our needs and delights in meeting them. I think he likes us to ask, but, oh, the things we do beyond the childlike asking.

I am saying this as one who is feeling pretty desperate for some relief. Pain showed up on my doorstep 17 years ago in the region of my lower back and never left. It has just kept moving in on me a little at a time to the point where I’m not sure how to tolerate it any longer. That will sound like a pretty shabby confession to part of my faith family, but not to my Father. At this writing, he did not just recoil at my negative confession. I can’t explain why pain has been woven into my story but I am unwilling to credit my lack of faith or positive confession with its presence. If pain continued to encroach on my earthly comfort, would it diminish his goodness? Discredit his affection for me? Reflect poorly on his fatherhood? I echo a sentiment with Paul: “I speak as if insane” (from 2 Corinthians 11:23).

Until we are set free from these earthly bodies, which are so prone to decay and degeneration, what response does God want from us? What is he looking for in our hearts? All I know is that even sons sometime ask their Father why he has forsaken them only to discover that resurrection life is just around the corner.

Father, I pray that you would heal my body, specifically the degenerated, arthritic components of my spine. Please mend the nerves and the inflamed tissues that surround these areas. You are the healer of every facet of my being. And by the way, thank you for every minute of the previous 17 years. While I would not trade them for anything, please note that I am currently negotiable. Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

The Heart—Psalm 73

I am writing from a Hilton Hotel patio appointed with the finest in outdoor furniture. It overlooks an enormous pool with its own lazy river. Beyond that there is a golf course appearing in the early morning light. The scripture for today?

But as for me, my feet came close to stumbling, 

My steps had almost slipped.

For I was envious of the arrogant

As I saw the prosperity of the wicked. 

For there are no pains in their death,

And their body is fat. 

They are not in trouble as other men, 

Nor are they plagued like mankind. 

Therefore pride is their necklace; 

The garment of violence covers them. 

Their eye bulges from fatness; 

The imaginations of their heart run riot. 

They mock and wickedly speak of oppression; 

They speak from on high. 

They have set their mouth against the heavens, 

And their tongue parades through the earth. 

 

Therefore his people return to this place, 

And waters of abundance are drunk by them. 

They say, “How does God know? 

And is there knowledge with the Most High?” 

Behold, these are the wicked; 

And always at ease, they have increased in wealth. Psalm 73:2-12

I owe some thanks as well to another friend who faithfully sends me wake-up-from-your-materialistic-dream articles. Today’s just happened to reference Neil Postman’s prophetic “Amusing Ourselves to Death.” And what do I see just beyond the golf course? Disneyland and the Magic Kingdom, of course. God’s timing is impeccable.

I am at the National Asphalt Paving Association’s (NAPA’s) annual conference in Orlando, which is the ultimate reminder that we are a nation governed by interest groups—not just people. This association and a thousand others are encamped at the D.C. gates of our nation to incentivize our leaders to create policy that is favorable toward their industry. I wonder where the National Association of Arms Dealers is having their annual conference?

By being here in Orlando—the Mecca of amusement parks—have my feet come close to stumbling? I could go down this road of self-reproach and condemnation; I know it pretty well, but I believe I will avoid stumbling better by entering into the sanctuary of God and casting my troubled thoughts upon him. From this place I gain perspective by simply reminding myself of things I know to be true about God. He does not discriminate against race, religion, gender, or even trade associations. This might be entirely self-serving, but I don’t believe God has written off every person or family here who has attained a degree of prosperity, as some schools of religious thought (and even this psalm) might propose. I know there are exceptions. I’m sure the imaginations of some in this crowd are running riot with ambition and pride, but there is something else going on here as well.

One gentleman received a Lifetime Achievement Award for his contribution to the asphalt paving industry. In his humble and gracious acceptance remarks, he expressed heart-felt gratitude for God’s agape love—the indestructible and unmerited love that God had shown him in Jesus Christ. Then, as if it were an extension of the same, he acknowledged the people of this industry who had shown him a lifetime of phileo love—fraternal good will in the context of his chosen vocation.

This is not just a convention of prosperous people who are asking, “How does God know? And is there knowledge with the Most High?” This group (if their applause for this man’s words means anything) seems to be keenly aware that God does in fact know and is due thanks for his blessings. I don’t believe these road builders can be classed in a wholesale fashion as “wicked people, always at ease, insulated from pain or death by their increasing wealth, setting their mouths against the heavens, with their tongues parading their glory through the earth.

What is going on here then? I suppose the same thing that is going on all over the earth. God is endeavoring to grow his kingdom, one heart at a time. His kingdom and the affairs of earth strategically overlap where he deems fit and often where his children are leaning into this reality. I’m trying to lean in.

But as for me, the nearness of God is my good; 

I have made the Lord God my refuge, 

That I may tell of all Your works. Psalm 73:28

I had the opportunity to speak to an associate about Islam—the primary religion of his native country. From his childhood, he recalled coups regularly taking place and not-so peaceful transitions of government occurring overnight. While he doffs his cap to religion (as if there might be something going on with a higher power), he sees a grand conspiracy being underway with the religious (from whatever faith) as pawns in a huge game that is driven exclusively by man’s lust for power. We were interrupted by the event’s MC, who was calling us to attention for the Awards Assembly. Power… Is power the end game on earth?

The first wave of awards were given to those people and organizations who funded NAPA’s political action committee, which exists unapologetically to incentivize our nation’s leaders to share our vision of a well funded black (as in asphalt) infrastructure versus a white (as in concrete) one, or worse yet—an underfunded one altogether. One award recipient after another was paraded across the stage, receiving applause and plaques of proportional size for their level of contribution. Plaques and applause as incentives? I don’t sense that heaven is overlapping the earth too much here. In fact I think someone’s imagination may have run at least mildly riot in planning this part of the ceremony. Ugh… that was gross. Due to my flesh, which seems to regularly flirt with stumbling and failure, rarely does an hour pass that I must fall back onto my primary reality:

Nevertheless I am continually with You;

You have taken hold of my right hand. 

With Your counsel You will guide me, 

And afterward receive me to glory. 

Whom have I in heaven but You? 

And besides You, I desire nothing on earth. 

My flesh and my heart may fail, 

But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalm 73:23-26

Father, I pray that neither my flesh, nor the flesh of any man, might prosper too long without your loving correction, lest we all run riot, more than we already have, in our imaginations. Before we are utterly swept away in some moment of terror like senseless and arrogant beasts, awaken us from our dream that you might become our end as well as our beginning. Amen.

 

Home (Sunday)—Revelation 2:17

He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, to him I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone which no one knows but he who receives it. (Revelation 2:17)

Our verse is laden with mystery: a new name and secret nourishment are promised to him who overcomes. And it seems, from this verse, to overcome one must first hear. Much is said in scripture about ears that hear or ears that do not. Why is this? What is it that opens ears? What keeps them closed? Jesus tell us: “If anyone is willing to do His will, he will know of the teaching, whether it is of God or whether I speak from Myself” (John 7:17). C.S. Lewis put it like this:

There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, “Thy will be done,” and those to whom God says, in the end, “Thy will be done.” …Those who seek find. For those who knock it is opened. (The Great Divorce)

The first step in overcoming is to hear, and to hear we must present ourselves to God as those willing to do his will. Once a man has given himself to God, saying, “As far as it concerns me, Lord, Thy will be done,” the ears are opened. God now has someone on whom his words will not be wasted. Someone may still protest, saying, “But… I cannot do God’s will; it is beyond me.” This is both a true and a false statement. Let’s allow Lewis to continue.

             To have faith in Christ, means, of course, trying to do all that He says. There would be no sense in saying you trusted a person if you would not take his advice. Thus if you have really handed yourself over to Him, it must follow that you are trying to obey Him. But trying in a new way, a less worried way. Not doing these things in order to be saved, but because He has begun to save you already. Not hoping to get to Heaven as a reward for your actions, but inevitably wanting to act in a certain way because a first faint gleam of Heaven is already inside you.

Now we cannot discover our failure to keep God’s law except by trying our very hardest (and then failing). Unless we really try, whatever we say, there will always be at the back of our minds the idea that if we try harder next time, we shall succeed in being completely good. Thus, in one sense, the road back to God is a road of moral effort, of trying harder and harder. But in another sense it is not trying that is ever going to bring us home. All this trying leads up to the vital moment at which you turn to God and say, “You must do this. I can’t.”

The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become—because He made us. He invented us. He invented the person that you and I were intended to be… It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own. (from Mere Christianity)

I pray that we have ears to hear what Jesus is saying to the church in our day. Our overcoming depends on it. Becoming the light of the world depends on it. The Bride of Christ, having her lamp full of oil, is dependent on it. Since hearing is pivotal to overcoming, surrendering to God is foundational.

In the abandonment both Jesus and Lewis preach, there is a process of discovery in which we encounter the cross—that place where we die to ourselves and can say with clear conscience, it is no longer I who live, but Christ who now lives in me. This is why C.S. Lewis also said, “Die before you die, there is no chance after.”

The life of God is hidden from us, in large part, until we die – but not completely. When Christ’s life becomes our life, we know it because it is accompanied by a new identity. We know we are God’s and God is ours. In this place, slaves who were laboring to please the Master, become sons and friends to God. They have, in essence, been renamed and their labors to please God cease. And yet they bear fruit and overcome out of the new nature within them.

To find our way home, we must first give ourselves to God who is both our origin and our destiny. We must hand the title back to him. Then, our hearing will be opened; then we will begin to learn the many lessons he has for us in his school of obedience, where we will learn that (as Lewis has aptly put it) “It is not trying that is ever going to bring us home.”

Father, truly you are our hidden manna. And, you are the Good Shepherd who is guiding us home. May our hearts grasp that you alone are our Way, our Truth, and our Life. Amen.

 

 

Home (Saturday)—I Corinthians 15:50-58

As I consider Paul’s words I feel a tension, and I know why. He is talking about life after death, and I want him to talk about life before death. More accurately, I want him to talk about Life while living. Our passage seems to say we really don’t start living until the worms start eating. I don’t believe this is what Paul is saying. This will be a good place to employ our Bible Study 101 skills and ask, “Who is speaking and why?” A complete reading of 1st and 2nd Corinthians reveals that Corinth not only had theological problems: they also had morality problems.

Lies from pagan culture still had traction in the young church. Between bad theology and bad morality, there wasn’t much left to distinguish the Corinthian saints from the Corinthian pagans. This was deeply troubling to Paul—their spiritual father. His plan was to wade right into the middle of it, “determined to know nothing among them except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.” Fully committed to winning them, the great apostle starts with a question:

 Now, let me ask you something profound yet troubling. If you became believers because you trusted the proclamation that Christ is alive, risen from the dead, how can you let people say that there is no such thing as a resurrection? (I Corinthians 15:12 The Message)

They were letting people say there was no such thing as a resurrection because various lies remained operative within their community. As Paul preached “nothing but Christ and Him crucified,” he was facing off with the principalities of Corinthian culture, which had reigned unchallenged for hundreds of years.

Paul was no stranger to these demons. At Mars Hill, most of the philosophers mocked him when he spoke of Christ’s resurrection from the dead. Due to their philosophical strongholds, it was inconceivable to them a person’s earthly body could come back to life after it had died. The Epicurean philosophers were materialists, believing there was no existence beyond death. The Stoic philosophers taught that, at death, the soul was merged with Deity, precluding the need of a body. The Platonist philosophers taught the soul was immortal, but they denied the idea of a bodily resurrection.

The Greek word for resurrection is anastasis, which literally means, “to stand up again.” Resurrection means that a person will “stand up again” after he dies—that he will come back to life in a new body. This was the sword Paul drew. Sound doctrine was his primary weapon in combating the doctrines of demons. While he was correcting the specific errors of the Corinthians, he did not see the need to share the things about the resurrection, which he had shared with the Romans.

 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. (Romans 6:4)

While he did not teach this to the Corinthians directly in our passage, he had certainly implied it when he told them they were new creatures in Christ (II Corinthians 5:17). In God’s kingdom, which has come and is coming, Life is not just reserved as a post trumpet blast, when-the-dead-shall-rise experience. We have been raised up already. Christ is now our Life!

While it will not be the ultimate expression of resurrection life, Paul is keen that Jesus’ life be manifest in the lives of believers while still in their mortal bodies. He envisions the inner man standing up and expressing something eternal while still residing in the temporal. This happens as God is permitted to become the King of our hearts. As God succeeds as Lord in our innermost being, his kingdom expands.

 Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.

If Paul were preaching his straightforward Christ-and-Him-crucified message to the western evangelical church, he would get push back from another set of principalities who hold that the real, substantive resurrection life begins only after we die. Due to this philosophical stronghold it is inconceivable to many Christians that Jesus will make much of a stand in his Church: “How much resurrection life is realistic, restricted as it is by fallen human nature?” Overlooking the new nature, in Christ, this church-based stronghold breeds passivity and a tread-water-until-then outlook. Where this doctrine persists, the troops remain in the barracks, awaiting reveille, praying they will not be left behind.

Right now, in Christ, we are raised from the dead (in our spirits) and we will be raised from the dead (in our bodies) at the appointed time. Resurrection life is planted like a seed in our hearts. By God’s grace, it takes root. That seed is Christ himself. There is no life other than his. This must be why Paul is so determined to preach exclusively about the resurrection. This message is the one that sets the stage for the believer to personally discover that Jesus Christ is literally all they have and all they need. He is, himself, our sufficiency. For our good and the Kingdom’s, he intends to become our all-in-all.

Father, thank you that in Christ our toil is not in vain. Manifest your resurrection life within us. Give this unbelieving world something fresh to chew on. Let them see newness of life in your family. Transform us, as you have always intended, not just in that ultimate twinkling of an eye, rather, over time, as we walk with you in the Spirit. Let this world see the perishable putting on some imperishable, and mortality putting on some immortality. Let them puzzle as they see our liberty in the Spirit, asking themselves, “Where is the sting of death in these people?” Take your stand, Lord. Amen.

Home (Friday)- Revelation 21:9-27

Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and spoke with me, saying, “Come here, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb. And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. Her brilliance was like a very costly stone, as a stone of crystal-clear jasper. (Revelation 21:9-11)

How are we to respond to this? An angel, armed to the hilt, has invited John to see the Bride but then shows him a 1500 cubic mile structure. Its scale is overwhelming! The construction is jaw dropping! The universe must have been mined to acquire the building materials! But how is this the Bride? Weren’t we hoping to see a composite of persons (perhaps with a glimpse of ourselves included)? How is Revelation 21 supposed to motivate us? What should be our take away?

Her brilliance was like a very costly stone, as a stone of crystal-clear jasper.

The phrase  “was like” tells us John is using his limited and fragile vocabulary to depict something for which he has no words. Clearly, he has been swept up into the mystery. Symbolism is the best he can do. Unfortunately, mystery often leaves the western mind underwhelmed and perhaps even offended.

In the west, we love a concrete principle that fits neatly into our belief structure! Oh how desirable we believe another post-tensioning truth will be to our foundation! Yet John does not offer us a single stick of moralistic rebar. The logical religious mind may ask, “Then what is the point here?” Our pining for principles reveals our discomfort with mystery and I suspect, with God.

We think about God as if he lives up two or three flights of stairs from us when in reality the particulars of his realm are light years beyond our comprehension in every conceivable direction. Our minds, as it turns out, at least for now, are merciful buffers between us and God. We could not endure his glory for a moment.  John’s words have been spoken that we may grapple with them. They are to have an instructive impact upon us. As we wrestle with God’s glory in this passage we find we are graciously pinned in the first round. Our loss then becomes our gain – and our glory.

Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heardand  which  have not entered the heart of man. (1 Corinthians 2:9)

God saying, “My ways are higher than your ways” will no doubt be the understatement of all eternity. So much about God is a glorious mystery held in trust for his Bride. By merciful design we do not have exhaustive knowledge. Knowing all mysteries would undermine the need for faith – the only way we may please him while in these earthly bodies. Until that day (when we will know as we have been known) we have sufficient truth to live in. Even now, we have Jesus, the Light of the world – the exact representation of the Father, to illumine our path. We also have the Holy Spirit in us to teach and to guide.

Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselorOr who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to him againFor from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen. (Romans 11:33-36)

Sometimes God’s word is spoken to simply drive us to our knees that, from there, we may discover we live and move and have our being in Christ. We can then rest our exhausted heads upon his lap and hear him say …

Peace my child. Be still and know that I am God.

Father, even if we were to understand all mysteries, Jesus, not our knowledge, would be our foundation. Oh Lord, that you might convey to us your sufficiency and your presence independent of our substantial data base about you. Amen.