by RobertCummins | Nov 26, 2014 | 48. Together
Romans 12:1-21
And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind, that you might prove what the will of God is, that which is good acceptable and perfect.
At the age of 25, I was a young zealous disciple who had memorized this verse and was busily memorizing others in a systematic way which, along with inductive bible study, was how I would manage my transformation. It felt good to be on the cutting edge of authentic Christianity.
I didn’t fully appreciate verse 3 where Paul instructs us “to not think more highly of yourself than you ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgement…”
A lesson I hope I can continue to learn is that God’s intentions involve bringing our minds and our hearts together. While the mind can acquire truth, its the heart that must live it. While I had enscribed the first 2 verses of Romans 12 on my mind, it was the remaining 19, having to do with relationships, that God would use to inscribe His words onto my heart. Here is a summary of those verses;
So we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of the other; be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor; bless those who persecute you; be of the same mind toward one another; do not be haughty in mind, but associate with the lowly; do not be wise in your own estimation; if possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men.
I think of truth as a seed. When I memorized it, I would like to think that it had been planted in my heart and was now a part of the renewed me. In truth though, as the seed was stored in my mind, it was really just resting on the surface with any fruit it might bare, yet to be seen. At 25 I had no idea that how I would respond to the one another, relational commands of verses 3-21 would determine if the hard shell around that seed would deteriorate germinate and grow.
One of the ways we are conformed to this world is the way we see ourselves. In Adam, in our “flesh”, we are already predisposed toward selfishness. From that place, the devil and the world conspire with our flesh to keep us in competition with each other so that comparison is second nature. This is ground zero for the transformation God has in mind. (check out 2 Cor 10:12.)
While it appears to us that some have more and some have less, in God’s sight, it has more to do with where he has placed us in His body and how He has distributed gifts among us. God is inviting us into a kingdom without class-distinctions as we know them. In His counterintuitive kingdom, if we aspire rightly, we must embrace the one anthers who are lowly, those are irritating and even our antagonists.
So that the biblical truth we have stored in our minds ends up in our hearts, rightly influencing our motives and actions, God will see to it that we will encounter the lowly, the irritating and our opponents whose views and agendas differ with ours. If we are listening and obeying in the ruff and tumble of human interaction, the hard shell of the seed will break down and truth will be birthed; the Word will become flesh; the Light of the world will be seen; love will prevail and the gospel’s claims of freedom will be validated.
By the time I was 35, I had amassed a lot of bible knowledge but I had also amassed and afflicted a ton of pain in personal and family relationships. Amazingly, in the midst of the contention, my lips were moving and I was mouthing those biblical truths with intense conviction but the true sound being transmitted was a lifeless, noisy religious gong. It was not until I responded at the heart level to Paul’s command to, “if possible, be at peace with all men“, that transformation really had much of a chance.
A very familiar part of me violently opposed this plan but I knew exactly what God was asking me to do. This story is too long to relate here but I can testify that God’s grace literally poured into my life and into my relationships when I acknowledged that it was possible and obeyed this instruction. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done but it resulted in an amazing transformation in me and consequently in my family. While I am describing a singular event in time, I believe God is calling the citizens of His kingdom to embrace this dying-living-loving process as our way of life. Relational expressions of heart-obedience, every bit as much as our charity, will serve as those good works which will glorify our Father who is in heaven. Our light shines here because in this process we are being transformed into the image of Christ.
Here is a a sad and telling mystery regarding relationship, the cross and transformation. Prior to this watershed event, I was at serious odds with people very close to me. I was dead certain that if a jury of my peers were assembled and were to hear my case I would be found innocent in heart and deed, vindicated on all counts. I was certain of this. If truth and justice were on the job (I thought) the real guilty parties would be brought into the light and held accountable. As I said, I was dead-certain.
I learned in this encounter with God that His ways are very different and much higher than my own. He was not in the least bit interested in my jury idea. Can you believe that! In fact, as far as He was concerned, my interest in seeing others brought to justice was the only offense on the books that He would hear. I knew that if I didn’t let go of this that God and I would be at odds. When I finally let go, I died to something. I think of this as having taken up my cross and followed Him. Consequently grace flooded into this impossible situation and set the stage for a new season free from the previous ten years of debilitating strife. Had I insisted on being right, I would have been walking in the flesh and I would have reaped death for myself and others. I would have had to sell myself some story about my opponent’s depravity to justify my own self righteousness. Being right is highly overrated. While thinking we are right feels good to our flesh, it is a certain pathway to death for our spirits.
Father, help us to see that all the ingredients for our transformation are at hand, that our circumstances together with Your Word and Your Spirit are sufficient. May this world see Your resurrection life demonstrated as we find ourselves in right relation to each other, individually members one of the other. In so doing, may we overcome evil with good.
Application Is the Lord bringing anyone to mind just now? If so, here is a prayer-route to higher ground;
Lord, I forgive (fill in the blank for yourself – you know the names),
I give you permission to take the judgement and the bitterness out of my life. I do not want this in my life. I surrender it to You and ask You to remove it – to heal me where I have been wounded, to forgive me where I have sinned. I choose not to blame or hold the action of others against them. I hereby surrender my right to be paid back for my loss by the one who has sinned against me, and in so doing, I declare my trust in You alone as my Righteous Judge. Father bless them in every way. In Jesus; name. Amen (This prayer is contributed by Charlie Finck of Liberty Cross Ministries, Liberty Lake, WA)
by RobertCummins | Nov 25, 2014 | 48. Together
Hebrews 10:19-25
In conversing recently with a gentleman at a hotel where I was staying, I learned that the church across the busy freeway had just gone to 5 services. This had been necessitated by their 25% annual growth rate. I asked myself if that achievement in numbers alone constituted success? Is God monitoring the same statistics we do? To Jesus, what does the expansion of His kingdom actually look like? I believe growing numbers could happen concurrently with authentic kingdom growth but in light of Jesus’ comments about broad and narrow paths, numbers should probably not be considered the sole benchmark. Neither should the size of budgets be considered true benchmarks of the Bride’s health. How tragic that the numbers of heads and dollars have become the default gold standard of church success.
What is the consequence of building something using our plumb line versus God’s? Can we really build the city whose architect is God using our standards of measurement and our tools? As you read the New Testament, how do you think God is measuring success? By their New Testament teachings, can you tell what the apostles’s were using as a plumb line?
Once upon a time there was an apprentice carpenter who was handed a board by the journeyman carpenter and instructed to use that board as his standard of measurement. He instructed him to produce 100 boards exactly like that one. Eager to please, the zealous apprentice laid the board on top of the board to be cut and struck his line. He made his cut and produced his first board. He then took the second board and used it to mark the cut for the third board. He followed this procedure for 98 subsequent cuts. When the journeyman came to see how his apprentice had done, He was not pleased. He asked where the original board was. The journeyman picked up the template and the second board. He compared them to the 100th cut and showed the apprentice the difference, how setting aside the original pattern had resulted in a slow accumulation of error in each subsequent board. The consequence was that much time and materials had been spent cutting 98 boards that would not fit the application.
As I see the masses avoiding the Church and Christians increasingly marginalized in our modern culture, I ask myself “Why?” The story we devout ones often tell ourselves is that they are not attracted to Christianity because they are by nature either hardened, depraved or unelected (probably all three). While I see an element of truth to this assessment, I don’t think this is the whole story. I believe that substituting heads and dollars for the simple transformation of human lives has resulted in the accumulated errors that we now live with and must call normal lest we delegitimize our existence. In other words, each subsequent board that has been cut over the centuries became a tradition (or wineskin) sanctified by time and practice. Institutions perpetuate themselves by comparing themselves to their own traditions not by comparing themselves to the original early church example and raising threatening questions about themselves. I believe that many who are yet-to-be-saved keep Christianity at bay because their gut tells them something is amiss.
What if, in the gut of man, there is something as ancient as Adam, some remnant of knowing related to his having been created in God’s image, that knows that if Christianity is anything at all it must be a family. What if many remain disinterested because what they see when a Christian approaches is an agenda as opposed to a kindred and caring spirit armed with nothing more than an authentic interest in them as persons?
For the purpose of searching out those ancient boundaries I am proposing to my friends, that in our precious smaller gatherings that we continue to read and meditate on the the New Testament narrative, as our plumb line, free of the biases we have inflicted upon it through our traditions. We must learn to read in a new way, not just to glean more Bible information, but in such a way that its light searches our hearts.
The current questions that are being discussed in many circles I associate with, revolve around the Church. What is the Church supposed to look like when it gathers? Does our assesment of her health mirror that of God’s?
Regardless of where we are, our passage reminds us all to not forsake our own assembling together. The passage implies that when we meet, it should also be our intention to encourage and stimulate each other to love and good deeds. Keeping in mind that where two or three are gathered in his name, He is there in our midst, will serve to export Christ’s life outside the boundaries our traditional thinking has created.
Father, I believe You desire to pour out Your new wine, Your very own abundant life upon us. I believe You desire to see us even exceed Yourself in the good works that You did while on this earth. Just as in Cana, I believe the Bride Groom has saved the best wine for the last. As we revisit the New Testament and search out the ancient markers and the original plumb line please show us how to be transformed and to transform our institutions into communities where new wine can be better received, retained and served up to the called and thirsty ones all around us. Amen.
by RobertCummins | Nov 24, 2014 | 48. Together
Ecclesiastes 4:7-12
A cord of three strands is not quickly torn apart.
I inherited a meaningful piece of my vision (which I think of as a set of values) indirectly from the Navigator’s who leaned on “one-on-one” and “small group” ministry models. Our family lived in a community of believers for 15 formative years which was focused on discipleship and community. We taught our own children. We helped each other move, remodel, babysit. We worked and played together and thought of it as worship. I did not know how intertwined with these people my life had become until we relocated to another city. Neither did I know how unique our experience was until, for the first time, I became an integrated part of a traditional local church.
When we arrived in our new city, we were shocked at how private, independent and disconnected people were compared to what we had been used to. We learned that if we wanted community, we would have to build it with those who had an appetite for it. We didn’t know it, but we had been ruined for church in the traditional institutional sense of that word. I am sure I have been a thorn in it’s side as I have kicked against the organizational goads almost from day one.
Where we had come from, a few folks had titles, but their authority did not derive from those titles. The authority to lead in our culture had been earned by simply standing alongside each other through life’s experiences and exemplifying character in the context of relationship. In our new traditional setting leaders were selected by elders or voted on by the congregation. They too had served but their service had often happened only in the context of institutional ministry models. We observed that the authority in the traditional local church was less relational and more positional – a lot like a business. While this statement may be incomprehensible to many, our engagement with the traditional local church felt as though we had moved from a family into an organization.
I served for approximately 15 years in the traditional local church, much of that time as an elder, believing naively that my community DNA could serve this local assembly. After resigning a few years ago and just living life as an untitled person, relating to others simply as a friends or a potential friend, I have been able to recover some sense of family and purpose. Note; In my experience it seems I have been a much better representative of the kingdom of God as a friend than I ever was an elder, worship leader or teacher.
I have learned the hard way that institutions don’t want reformed. They want perpetuated, and the things that achieve this tend to fashion cultures that resemble businesses with employees and programs as opposed to families with members with lives to live. All I can really do is keep seeking the things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God, acknowledge that the upward call of God in Christ offers every son and daughter a never ending opportunity to know Him more intimately. What I can do is invite others to join me so that together we can explore and discover the treasure and the mystery of Christ who has welcomed us into the eternal community He shares with the Father and the Spirit.
I believe that ultimately whether we are in an institutional church setting or in a smaller community (or both) our kingdom relevance will ultimately be born out of our relational intimacy with Him and each other. Before the final chapter of the Church is written I believe we are going to discover that we are going to need Him (in each other), far more than we may currently grasp.
So Father, as we see the day drawing near, let us draw nearer in Your holy presence with hearts that are fully assured that Christ is now our life and that He provides a living way of continual access into Your presence. May the love we encounter there give us the security to become available to each other in new and authentic ways. May we become the family that all men hunger to belong to. Amen.
by RobertCummins | Dec 3, 2013 | 48. Together
This is an account of a 2012 event but it explores values I believe are kingdom-values that I endeavor to cultivate wherever God provides favor.
John 13:31-35
I am preparing to share “my story” this morning at the 2012 Eufaula Kingdom Summit (EKS 2012). Perhaps what is coming to your mind is an auditorium, numbers of people, a PA system and a keynote speaker. The truth is that EKS 2012 is just a “big” name for a “little” gathering. We are just 8 guys (nine yesterday) who have intentionally pulled off the busy freeway of life and church business. We have downshifted into “retreat gear” and are moving at a speed that allows us to better appreciate each other as well as the beautiful scenery outside our windows. Even though the venue is small, it seems like big (maybe even “kingdom” -sized) things are happening.
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.“
In light of this verse, It is quite a wonder that the division marks on the current yard stick that we use to measure “ministry” success are in increments of numbers on one side and dollars on the the other. I know good organizations also have a “souls saved / “transformed” yardstick but if you are in leadership, eventually the following questions will arise; “How many people have you got coming out on Sundays?” “What does you budget look like (especially missions)?” These are not the questions we are asking at this gathering.
The simple premise of this retreat was to create a safe space for men to be themselves and hopefully feel comfortable enough to tell their stories. We didn’t come to fix each other up. We really just came to identify and affirm the handiwork of the master builder in each other’s lives. Amazingly, without a single prepared message from the Word; without a commercial building or a bulletin; without any titled religious professional presiding, the Spirit has been moving – drawing us toward each other and toward the Father.
What I see as people gather in this way, free of the obligations and pressures to grow financially and numerically, is that they seem to behave and relate to each other differently. In this unlikely form of gathering I have watched something going on in our midst that resembles the gatherings I read about in the new testament where each person has something to contribute; where words of encouragement are given to build each other up; where the obligation of leading and teaching is shared.
The EKS 2012 made a contribution I think to the structure God is building out of us as living stones. While, we are all different sizes and shapes and vary in degrees of hardness, the give and take of our time together has brought more clarity as to what manner of stones we individually are and how we may fit together in the larger structure that God is building.
It strikes me that in the kingdom that God is building, He is the Master-Builder and He has positioned us strategically in our relationship to those around us. I believe it will be His love that will ultimately find expression though us that will be the mortar holding us together. We will not always just be independent piles of dissimilar rocks. A Master plan will one day be completed and we will find ourselves fitted along side others, who today may seem so odd (and even offensive) to us, into a gloriously beautiful structure – the habitation of God.
The men at this retreat came from different generations, backgrounds, experience and theology. (We were very different types of stone.) However, as we intentionally drew near to each other and apart from our busy and familiar contexts, we gave love a chance to grow as we listened to each other and discovered the unique way He has transformed us from inert stones into “living” stones. Creating safe spaces in our relationships; listening to the stories of how He breathed His initial life into us and has since been endeavoring to sustain and grow that Life is proving itself a way of being together worth replicating.
Holy Spirit we give You Your rightful place in the center of our beings. We give You continual permission to fulfill Your mission through us of drawing men toward the Father and toward each other so that all men may one day see and believe. Help us to make time and space for the relationships you have given us to grow in love and bear fruit for Your kingdom. Amen.
The EKS 2012 motive;
– I love you.
I want to do you good
I have no agenda –
The EKS mandate;
Be yourself. (tell your story). Those who mind don’t matter; those who matter don’t mind.
by RobertCummins | Dec 1, 2013 | 48. Together
Hebrews 10:19-25
In conversing recently with a gentleman at a hotel where I was staying, I learned that the church across the busy freeway had just gone to 5 services. This had been necessitated by their 25% annual growth rate. I asked myself if that achievement in numbers alone constituted success? Was God monitoring the same statistics this man was tracking? How does God measure growth in His Church? I believe growing numbers could happen concurrently with authentic growth but in light of Jesus’ comments about broad and narrow paths, numbers should probably not be considered the sole benchmark. The size of budgets should not be considered a true benchmark for the Bride’s health either. How tragic that the numbers of heads and dollars have become the gold standard of church success.
What is the consequence of building something using our plumb line versus God’s? Can we really build the city whose architect is God using our standards of measurement and our tools? As you read the New Testament, how do you think God is measuring success? By their NT teachings, can you tell what the apostles’s were using as a plumb line?
Once upon a time there was an apprentice carpenter who was handed a board by the journeyman carpenter and instructed to use that board as his standard of measurement. He instructed him to produce 100 boards exactly like that one. The hard working apprentice laid the board on top of the board to be cut and struck his line. He made his cut and produced his first board. He then took the second board and used it to mark the cut for the third board. He followed this procedure for 98 subsequent cuts. When the journeyman came to see how his apprentice had done, He was not pleased. He asked where the original board was. The apprentice showed him where he had set it after the first cut. The journeman showed the apprentice how setting aside the original resulted in a slow accumulation of error in each subsequent board. The consequence was that much time and materials had been spent cutting 98 boards that would not fit the application where they were needed.
As I see churches shrinking and the masses avoiding Christianity; as I see Christians increasingly marginalized in our modern culture, I ask myself “Why?” The story we devout ones often sell to ourselves is that they are not involved in Christianity because they are by nature hardened, depraved and unelected. While I see an element of truth to this assessment, I don’t think that is the whole story. I also believe that substituting heads and dollars for the simple transformation of human lives have resulted in the accumulated errors that have contributed to impotency in the western church. Each subsequent board that has been cut over the centuries became a tradition (or wineskin) sanctified by time and practice. I think it is quite likely that many who are yet-to-be-saved keep Christianity at a distance because their gut tells them something is amiss.
Father, I believe You desire to pour out Your new wine, Your very own abundant life upon us. I believe You desire to see us exceed Yourself in the good works that You did while on this earth. Just as in Cana, I believe the Bride Groom has saved the best wine for the last. As we revisit the New Testament and search out the ancient markers and the original plumb line please show us how to be transformed and to transform our institutions into communities where new wine can be better received, retained and served up to the called and thirsty ones all around us. Amen.
For the purpose of searching out those ancient boundaries I am proposing to my friends (who have an interest) that in our precious smaller gatherings that we read the New Testament together in 2014. I am also proposing we read and study a book together that might help us better capture the narrative of the New Testament free of the biases we have inflicted upon it through our traditions. The book is called The Untold Story of the New Testament Church by Frank Viola.
The current questions that are being discussed in many circles I associate with, revolve around the Church. What is the Church supposed to look like when it gathers? Does our assesment of her health mirror that of God’s? Why is my local church shrinking?
We are reminded in our passage to not forsake our own assembling together. The passage implies that when we meet, it should also be our intention to encourage and stimulate each other to love and good deeds.
by RobertCummins | Nov 30, 2013 | 48. Together
Luke 10:25-37
When the learned man stood to test Jesus, his motive, as a lawyer, was to ply his trade and expose some contradiction in Jesus’ testimony and thereby discredit Him. I picture Jesus, totally at ease and unthreatened, standing, smiling, and saying “Thank you, I’m so glad you asked this.”
At this point the lawyer may have even thought he had lulled this country boy to sleep with a pretended deference to Him as “Teacher”.
Jesus replied with words this man had known since he was a child; “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind…” At this point the lawyer may have been disarmed himself by these familiar words and Jesus’ authentic deference and respect for Him. Then Jesus plies His trade (exposing our heart’s contradictions) and adding…, “(and by the way), you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Being perhaps caught off guard, yet still nimble of mind, the lawyer, rationalizing, managed, “(Yes, but) Who is my neighbor?”
The story is familiar to us. A man is waylaid by a band of robbers and left alone to die. Both a priest and a Levite “passed by on the other side” leaving the victim as they had encountered him – mostly dead. But a Samaritan (probably one with less in common with the victim than the first two passers-by) slowed down and observed the dying man’s condition and he felt compassion. From there it is a story of the Samaritan, taking ownership of the man’s situation and making what resources he had available to help return the half-dead man to full health.
I could picture a tribal man from some remote jungle village being brought to America and being given the opportunity to observe us for a while. When he returns home and is asked what he saw, he might say, “they are a people who pass by on the other side. He might then add. “at high speed!”
Perhaps our speed (and the pace of our lives) is handy in the sense that we never really slow down enough to observe and discover the needs of those bleeding souls in proximity to us. Perhaps our compassion remains untapped because we are really passing each other by in our technological, production oriented culture. This way we can keep our(?) resources for ourselves.
The lawyer may have attempted to test Him but Jesus turns things around and tests the lawyer (and, I think us). Who is our neighbor? According to Jesus, it is anyone we encounter who has a need or a burden we can relieve by sharing our resources. Maybe as important as sharing what we have is, is the act itself of assuming ownership of another’s well-being until they are whole.
I am thinking that our culture is not going to slow down. We will have to exit the freeway of our own accord and downshift from over drive into a more efficient gear. At this new pace, we can begin to truly discover the persons we are passing by on the other side. Instead, we will turn to them and ask, with sincere interest, “how are you doing?” Perhaps, as we do this, our compassion will be awakened. By really listening, we can create safe spaces for others to reveal who they are and discover what has been robbed or is being robbed from their souls.
Perhaps communities (safe spaces) of newly connected people can even prevent the isolation that gave the robbers opportunity in the first place. If we are to pass Jesus’ test we will discover that we are each called to be the Samaritan and each other’s keeper. As agents of His kingdom we are to take ownership of the space around us for the sake of His kingdom.
Father, may Your love triumph. May we discover the nature of our oneness. May we learn to defer to one another and consider the needs of others above our wants. Give us the courage to slow down and really look at those around us. Awaken our compassions and transform them into those many deeds which you have prepared beforehand that we might walk in them. Amen.
