Hosea 2:5- She said I will go after my lovers, who gave me food and water, my wool and my linen, my oil and my drink.”
In a self-promoting, self-sustaining culture and world that teaches us to need nothing outside of ourselves for anything, the idea that all I have is a gift from the Lord, not a result of my hard work or merit, simply doesn’t compute. To not just consider, but believe and receive that all I have been given, including my suffering (Job 2:10), as a gift from the Lord, is one of the greatest challenges facing a Christ follower in today’s world. But to not consider going on the journey of growing in our willingness to receive that this is the truth, creates a myriad of complications in other areas of our walk with Jesus. Our unwillingness to look at this area is in my estimation on of the greatest crippling factors in our understanding and development of meaningful community with one another.
So where is the line? What is mine? What of mine is the Lords? How can I tell? For me this journey has been made clear through the suffering of loss, and consequently the exposure of my true belief in this area. Scripture is infinitely clear that all I have is the Lords. (Chronicles 29: 11 Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours).
It’s not just that all I have has been given to me from him, and can be taken from me at his decision, but that it actually is His possession of which I am simply entrusted. Job’s response to the absolute decimation of life as he knew it, makes clear the truth that we are all invited to live in. Job 1:20-21:At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship and said: "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised."
Only a man who understands that all he had is a gift from the Lords hand could even utter words of worship in a time of such distress and loss. It is humbling to even consider my lack of gratitude for the gifts that the Lord has given me, as well as my quick emotional flight in times of suffering, questioning even the presence of God in my life. My lifestyle of self-protection proves that down deep I don’t trust that these are truly gifts, and that I am the only one looking out for me.
Not unlike the Israelites in Hosea, I have such a broken understanding of the provision of the Lord. That it is He who provides me with the money that buys my food, my wine, my clothes, etc. Often times the Lord took Israel through seasons of suffering to teach them to depend on the Lord for even the smallest of daily details such as food (manna in the desert Exodus 16). But not unlike Israel in the desert, my propensity to gather more than I need, rooted in the fear that tomorrow God may not come through, leads often to “maggots” in my life.
Exodus 16:19-20 Then Moses said to them, "No one is to keep any of it until morning. "However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell. So Moses was angry with them.
If in any area of my life I am living as though the Lord will not provide, and consequently my heart moves in a direction of self-guided, self-protective living, I am creating a breeding ground for “maggot living”. The smell and effect of such self-protective living in one area of my life, often times is so overpowering it begins to infect all areas, and before long, it has the potential to be the only way I know to live. “Maggot living” is the heart sickness we all feel when we have put so much hope in the outcome of our efforts in any area, that even the best of results, leaves us with a sense of wanting and fear of loosing it.
I said in the beginning that the impact of this type of living is massive on our understanding and ability to live in meaningful community with one another. It attacks the truth that the root of our relationship with God is in his covenant with us, not our action towards, or for Him; the covenant that he was teaching them about in Exodus 16:12 “then you will know that I am the Lord your God.” The relationship with God and Man is a relationship of giver to receiver. If All that I have is given to me from the Lord, and not a product of my efforts, then as a result I am free to give it away in faith, believing that the Lord who provided it in the beginning, can do so again if he chooses. Living in this reality creates the equality the God speaks of in 2nd Corinthians.
2 Corinthians 8:13 “Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality.”
Equality; A “happy”, politically correct notion that has very little real value in our capitalistic, materialistic, hedonistic, narcissistic culture. It all sounds good, until out of my supposed plenty I have to meet your needs. What happens if your needs are so great that I have to suffer in order to meet them? Most giving in Christian circles is not done out of our first-fruits that could lead to our suffering, but out of such excess that often times we never have to suffer in order to give; yet this willingness to personally suffer in order to meet needs, is a mark of a gospel-centered community. For this type of community to take root, and to grow and flourish, the formative persons involved need to be ones whose lives are marked by living experientially in the truth that all I have is the Lord’s.
2 Corinthians 8: 14-15 At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. Then there will be equality, as it is written: "He who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little."
The beauty of this relationship with the Lord is that even when I have trusted in so many other things (idols) than the Lord to provide me with my needs, he is so committed, through this covenant relationship, to guide me back into the truth about His constant presence and provision for me in all things. This is his response to the idolatry of self- provision, self-protection of Israel in Hosea.
Hosea 2:14-16 "Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt. "In that day," declares the LORD, "you will call me 'my husband'; you will no longer call me 'my master.'
Monday, April 28, 2008
Monday, April 14, 2008
Hiding behind your theology, a spiritual lobotomy for “false peace”
I have been found often to be what I describe as “hiding behind” my theology. That is to say, that instead of truly dealing with Jesus in the areas of my life that are difficult, such as the recurring disappointment or emotional pain of a relationship, I claim God’s sovereignty in the situation, as to avoid dealing with Him and the obvious tension and suffering that stems from my assumption that He is somehow unable to handle the depth of emotions (anger and sorrow) that I could possibly bring to Him. And if I were to bring them to him, instead of a safe-mouthed heart of undying devotion, he would certainly only ordain more of the same suffering that I am experiencing instead of comforting me by enter into my pain.
Dan Allender in his book “To Be Told” speaks of this hiding as a sort of “spiritual lobotomy” that gives us the control to remove the immediate tension of the situation, but rarely leads to healing or any sort of lasting peace. It is often times this suffering, and even wrestling with Jesus in the midst of the pain and disappointment, which can lead to true healing.
Allendar states “remove anguish and you remove mercy. Erase anger and you erase a hunger for justice. Jesus doesn’t take away anguish and anger; he transforms heartache into passion and anger into righteous defiance. Instead of shelving these unsavory emotions Jesus transforms them.” He goes on to state, “to loose anguish is to be one step closer to robotic inhumanity, as if such a spiritual lobotomy could make a person happier.” Finally he asserts that such a spiritual lobotomy leads to using “Jesus to deflect the pain of our stories.”
The invitation from Jesus is not to use him to deflect, but to go with Him, to the very center of our pain and begin to heal. When we hide behind our theology, often times we are operating out of self-protection and distancing ourselves from the very person who can heal us. Our theology should serve as a bridge to relationally connect us with Jesus rather than a wall to protect us from dealing with Him. So why would we choose the wall?
Control. We would rather have a “false peace” that comes from our “apparent” control than deal with the fact that God is really the one who is in control and we are mad about how he is “choosing” to allow for our suffering. Allendar puts it like this; “what do we want most; God or the hollow peace of our own control?” Even my belief of God’s sovereignty can be a control issue for me if my belief in his sovereignty keeps me from having to deal with him relationally. The result is what Alledar describes as “robotic inhumanity.” Unable to handle the depth of our emotions, God is reduced from the great lover of our souls and the redeemer of all things, to a narrow-minded behavioral scorekeeper, and we in turn forfeit our image-bearing humanity and freedom to feel, for a slave like existence that keeps us from ever functionally experiencing God as anything more than a semi-benevolent, temperamental being that “endures” us.
So how do I stop from hiding behind my theology? How do I opt for not self-inflicting a spiritual lobotomy that leads to relational disconnect with God?
Hosea 2: 14- 16 "Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. 15 There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt. 16 "In that day," declares the LORD, "you will call me 'my husband'; you will no longer call me 'my master.
Anchor is translated trouble; “the valley of Anchor, a door of hope.” It is in the valley of trouble, that hope begins to burst forth. We don’t run from the desert, but receive it, as a door to hope, healing, and relationally to God himself. It is our absolute commitment to mountain top living in our culture that keeps us from experiencing the healing that is only found in the long walk through the valley, with the Lord (Psalm 23).
We stop hiding when we receive the “alluring” of the Lord in the desert, that he may speak tenderly to us, and comfort our pain. We spend so much time trying to get out of the desert, thinking that only if we are in a good place, happy and content with the Lord, that he will be tender toward us, when often times he is the one authoring, through the allowance of the desert times, to create the kind of fertile ground in our hearts, for willingness to be present enough, for us to allow him enter in and begin to heal us (psalm 42:7).
The relationship moves only from slave and master, to bride and husband, when the valley of trouble, by his grace, becomes a door of hope. If every time trouble comes, to deal with it, I must hide part of myself, lasting peace cannot be tasted, and the “hollow peace of our control” is in all it’s falsity, further perpetuated.
Dan Allender in his book “To Be Told” speaks of this hiding as a sort of “spiritual lobotomy” that gives us the control to remove the immediate tension of the situation, but rarely leads to healing or any sort of lasting peace. It is often times this suffering, and even wrestling with Jesus in the midst of the pain and disappointment, which can lead to true healing.
Allendar states “remove anguish and you remove mercy. Erase anger and you erase a hunger for justice. Jesus doesn’t take away anguish and anger; he transforms heartache into passion and anger into righteous defiance. Instead of shelving these unsavory emotions Jesus transforms them.” He goes on to state, “to loose anguish is to be one step closer to robotic inhumanity, as if such a spiritual lobotomy could make a person happier.” Finally he asserts that such a spiritual lobotomy leads to using “Jesus to deflect the pain of our stories.”
The invitation from Jesus is not to use him to deflect, but to go with Him, to the very center of our pain and begin to heal. When we hide behind our theology, often times we are operating out of self-protection and distancing ourselves from the very person who can heal us. Our theology should serve as a bridge to relationally connect us with Jesus rather than a wall to protect us from dealing with Him. So why would we choose the wall?
Control. We would rather have a “false peace” that comes from our “apparent” control than deal with the fact that God is really the one who is in control and we are mad about how he is “choosing” to allow for our suffering. Allendar puts it like this; “what do we want most; God or the hollow peace of our own control?” Even my belief of God’s sovereignty can be a control issue for me if my belief in his sovereignty keeps me from having to deal with him relationally. The result is what Alledar describes as “robotic inhumanity.” Unable to handle the depth of our emotions, God is reduced from the great lover of our souls and the redeemer of all things, to a narrow-minded behavioral scorekeeper, and we in turn forfeit our image-bearing humanity and freedom to feel, for a slave like existence that keeps us from ever functionally experiencing God as anything more than a semi-benevolent, temperamental being that “endures” us.
So how do I stop from hiding behind my theology? How do I opt for not self-inflicting a spiritual lobotomy that leads to relational disconnect with God?
Hosea 2: 14- 16 "Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. 15 There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt. 16 "In that day," declares the LORD, "you will call me 'my husband'; you will no longer call me 'my master.
Anchor is translated trouble; “the valley of Anchor, a door of hope.” It is in the valley of trouble, that hope begins to burst forth. We don’t run from the desert, but receive it, as a door to hope, healing, and relationally to God himself. It is our absolute commitment to mountain top living in our culture that keeps us from experiencing the healing that is only found in the long walk through the valley, with the Lord (Psalm 23).
We stop hiding when we receive the “alluring” of the Lord in the desert, that he may speak tenderly to us, and comfort our pain. We spend so much time trying to get out of the desert, thinking that only if we are in a good place, happy and content with the Lord, that he will be tender toward us, when often times he is the one authoring, through the allowance of the desert times, to create the kind of fertile ground in our hearts, for willingness to be present enough, for us to allow him enter in and begin to heal us (psalm 42:7).
The relationship moves only from slave and master, to bride and husband, when the valley of trouble, by his grace, becomes a door of hope. If every time trouble comes, to deal with it, I must hide part of myself, lasting peace cannot be tasted, and the “hollow peace of our control” is in all it’s falsity, further perpetuated.
Friday, April 11, 2008
I hear what your lips are saying, but how come I don’t believe you?
Do you want to get well? The question Jesus asked the man at the pool of Bethesda one afternoon. It’s a simple question, yet considering the circumstances, it’s quite perplexing. The question I would like to raise is why was that specific question that Jesus asked this man, and what question is Jesus asking me consequently?
Lets look at the story.
John 5 The Healing at the Pool- 1Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for a feast of the Jews. 2Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed.5One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, "Do you want to get well?" 7"Sir," the invalid replied, "I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me." 8Then Jesus said to him, "Get up! Pick up your mat and walk." 9At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.
38 years. It is on the heels of learning that this man had been in this condition for a long time, that Jesus decides to ask this specific question. My first reaction to the question “do you want to get well?” is annoyance with Jesus. Seems a bit odd, and obtuse. Why would this man want to stay an invalid? How could he possibly answer Jesus in any other way than yes? Did Jesus really wonder or have a sense that this man possibly would say no? Why would the invalid say no?
Lets look at the story through our own lives and our own sickness that is in need of the healing that only Christ can provide. This may lead us to the reason why “no” could have been the answer.
Think for a second of sin, or hurt, or emotional pain that exists in your life, and has for quite some time. A situation that has existed, or recurred so often that at this stage you have begun to believe that it may possibly never change. You have sat in this pain for quite some time, months and years have passed possibly, your left seeing only a couple, maybe even one possibility that could remedy the hurt, take away the pain, and stop the cycle of sin. You think, “If this one possibility could happen, then maybe the hurt would stop.” But lets be realisitic, it’s not likely. We have hoped for that before, only to have our hopes dashed against the rocks (Proverbs 13:12). Sometimes it’s just easier to live with the pain, accept the dysfunction and get on with life. Make the best of a bad situation. No use hoping now, all that ever leads to is disappointment.
I have seen in my own life and in many others this very situation played out. Sin or emotional pain, that at one point, we were so committed to dealing with, and pursuing healing for, through Jesus, is like a little dog we walk around with us everywhere we go. My friend Randy calls it our “pal” for guys, your pride, anger, and lust. We know that we are invalids when it comes to dealing with our own sin and emotional pain, and are incapable of ridding ourselves of it. But it has been with us for so long, the idea of being healed from it may be more terrifying than living with it the rest of our lives. So we keep it around, despising it and ourselves at times, but unwilling to let it go, cause then what?
This is why I said at the beginning, “I hear what your lips are saying, but how come I don’t believe you.” Often times I see a commitment to even protect my sin and my hurt because they are so familiar to me, they have become apart of my identity and to have them removed, through Christ’s healing, would leave me feeling so unsure of who I am. It is our deep commitment to control all aspects of our lives that can keep us from saying yes to Jesus question, “do you want to get well?”
Sadly my interior response is often no, even though on the surface I am acting and saying things to the contrary. No, Jesus, I don’t want to get well. I know this sucks, things being like they are, but at least it’s predictable and I can have some semblance of control. Thanks for the offer to live in total freedom (Gal 5:1) but I would rather be a slave and have some false sense of control, than let you heal me and live in the reality that my concept of control is without meaning (Job 38).
This is why I believe Jesus asked the question to the invalid. He asked because he knows the heart of a man better than the man himself (Jeremiah 17:9-10). He knows that we are in love with control more than we are in love with him. He knows that our sins and pain, although at times sickening to us, are comfortable crutches that often we are unwilling to let him deal with. We have tried our own methods to heal ourselves (control), and they have failed so many times, how could anything or anyone else help?
Isaiah 30:15 This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says: "In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.
Do you want to get well? Not such a simple question huh? It is only by his grace manifested through willingness, born from repentance, that rest and healing is experienced and we are able to let go of the control that keeps our sin and pain from being made “well”.
Lets look at the story.
John 5 The Healing at the Pool- 1Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for a feast of the Jews. 2Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed.5One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, "Do you want to get well?" 7"Sir," the invalid replied, "I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me." 8Then Jesus said to him, "Get up! Pick up your mat and walk." 9At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.
38 years. It is on the heels of learning that this man had been in this condition for a long time, that Jesus decides to ask this specific question. My first reaction to the question “do you want to get well?” is annoyance with Jesus. Seems a bit odd, and obtuse. Why would this man want to stay an invalid? How could he possibly answer Jesus in any other way than yes? Did Jesus really wonder or have a sense that this man possibly would say no? Why would the invalid say no?
Lets look at the story through our own lives and our own sickness that is in need of the healing that only Christ can provide. This may lead us to the reason why “no” could have been the answer.
Think for a second of sin, or hurt, or emotional pain that exists in your life, and has for quite some time. A situation that has existed, or recurred so often that at this stage you have begun to believe that it may possibly never change. You have sat in this pain for quite some time, months and years have passed possibly, your left seeing only a couple, maybe even one possibility that could remedy the hurt, take away the pain, and stop the cycle of sin. You think, “If this one possibility could happen, then maybe the hurt would stop.” But lets be realisitic, it’s not likely. We have hoped for that before, only to have our hopes dashed against the rocks (Proverbs 13:12). Sometimes it’s just easier to live with the pain, accept the dysfunction and get on with life. Make the best of a bad situation. No use hoping now, all that ever leads to is disappointment.
I have seen in my own life and in many others this very situation played out. Sin or emotional pain, that at one point, we were so committed to dealing with, and pursuing healing for, through Jesus, is like a little dog we walk around with us everywhere we go. My friend Randy calls it our “pal” for guys, your pride, anger, and lust. We know that we are invalids when it comes to dealing with our own sin and emotional pain, and are incapable of ridding ourselves of it. But it has been with us for so long, the idea of being healed from it may be more terrifying than living with it the rest of our lives. So we keep it around, despising it and ourselves at times, but unwilling to let it go, cause then what?
This is why I said at the beginning, “I hear what your lips are saying, but how come I don’t believe you.” Often times I see a commitment to even protect my sin and my hurt because they are so familiar to me, they have become apart of my identity and to have them removed, through Christ’s healing, would leave me feeling so unsure of who I am. It is our deep commitment to control all aspects of our lives that can keep us from saying yes to Jesus question, “do you want to get well?”
Sadly my interior response is often no, even though on the surface I am acting and saying things to the contrary. No, Jesus, I don’t want to get well. I know this sucks, things being like they are, but at least it’s predictable and I can have some semblance of control. Thanks for the offer to live in total freedom (Gal 5:1) but I would rather be a slave and have some false sense of control, than let you heal me and live in the reality that my concept of control is without meaning (Job 38).
This is why I believe Jesus asked the question to the invalid. He asked because he knows the heart of a man better than the man himself (Jeremiah 17:9-10). He knows that we are in love with control more than we are in love with him. He knows that our sins and pain, although at times sickening to us, are comfortable crutches that often we are unwilling to let him deal with. We have tried our own methods to heal ourselves (control), and they have failed so many times, how could anything or anyone else help?
Isaiah 30:15 This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says: "In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.
Do you want to get well? Not such a simple question huh? It is only by his grace manifested through willingness, born from repentance, that rest and healing is experienced and we are able to let go of the control that keeps our sin and pain from being made “well”.
Saturday, April 5, 2008
No peace without truth.
Ephesians 4:3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
In preparing to teach this weekend on the topic of “speaking the truth to one another” I have come to the conclusion in my preparation that peace and truth are inexplicably linked. That is to say, that you cannot truly have one without the other. The attempts we make to have one without the other either leads to “false peace”, which in reality is tolerance or “politically/socially correct” acceptance, or “marginalized truth”, in which a major or minor compromise to ones belief is essential to create the space to have supposed “peace”.
I have seen this played out often in my time in Northern Ireland, a place desperately seeking peace, often without pursing the truth. What occurs when you pursue one without the other is “false community” that appears on the surface to look solid, but when tested by any sort of stressor, folds quickly back into old routine and comfortable patterns that exhibit the real truth, namely that the community is established on nothing sustainable. Consequently to find “common ground” to build peace on, the truth has to be diluted to such a degree that peace is established for no other reason than we know we are supposed to have it. But just because you know something is to be, means little to nothing of our ability to actually manifest it. That’s is to say, knowledge isn’t power as we are often told. Knowledge is apart of the change that leads to peace, but only in that it is our knowledge of what has brought us into peace with God, namely His grace through Christ alone, that produces a resting in our dependence on Christ, which makes us “peacemakers” in the world in which we live (James 3:17-18-But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness).
This is why truth of the gospel is essential and the backbone to real, lasting peace. As Christ followers this then would put the truth of the gospel and our capacity to remain in it, paramount to the production of peace (“gospel of peace” in Ephesians 6:14). It is in our acknowledgement of the truth of the gospel, as it pertains to us first, and then to all others, that we find the ground that true peace is built upon. Ephesians 2:14-For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.
It is in our understanding and willingness not just to acknowledge but remain in and under the truth of the gospel and what has been done for us in Christ, that leads to the “rule” of Christ’s peace (Colossians 3:15) in our hearts and cultivates a community and environment to be able to speak the truth to one another in love.
When we fall out of step (Galatians 5:23) with the truth of the gospel, the humility necessary to speak to one another from a place of gentleness is impossible to manifest. That is to say that we ourselves must always first be saturated with the truth of our own need for Christ’s forgiveness and grace, which is at the center of the gospel, before we are to point out where in the life of another the same grace is needed. When we try to extend the grace needed to produce peace without the truth of the gospel at the center, what is exchanged are just words without power to produce any real effective change that could lead to lasting peace. Christ must be at the center; hence the truth must be at the center, if peace is to be born, cultivated, and lasting.
The “bond of peace” we share in the Spirit is what has been done for us in Christ. Without the truth of our need of Christ, and what has been accomplished for us, by his grace alone, we have no peace ourselves, and consequently no real peace to offer “one another.”
In preparing to teach this weekend on the topic of “speaking the truth to one another” I have come to the conclusion in my preparation that peace and truth are inexplicably linked. That is to say, that you cannot truly have one without the other. The attempts we make to have one without the other either leads to “false peace”, which in reality is tolerance or “politically/socially correct” acceptance, or “marginalized truth”, in which a major or minor compromise to ones belief is essential to create the space to have supposed “peace”.
I have seen this played out often in my time in Northern Ireland, a place desperately seeking peace, often without pursing the truth. What occurs when you pursue one without the other is “false community” that appears on the surface to look solid, but when tested by any sort of stressor, folds quickly back into old routine and comfortable patterns that exhibit the real truth, namely that the community is established on nothing sustainable. Consequently to find “common ground” to build peace on, the truth has to be diluted to such a degree that peace is established for no other reason than we know we are supposed to have it. But just because you know something is to be, means little to nothing of our ability to actually manifest it. That’s is to say, knowledge isn’t power as we are often told. Knowledge is apart of the change that leads to peace, but only in that it is our knowledge of what has brought us into peace with God, namely His grace through Christ alone, that produces a resting in our dependence on Christ, which makes us “peacemakers” in the world in which we live (James 3:17-18-But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness).
This is why truth of the gospel is essential and the backbone to real, lasting peace. As Christ followers this then would put the truth of the gospel and our capacity to remain in it, paramount to the production of peace (“gospel of peace” in Ephesians 6:14). It is in our acknowledgement of the truth of the gospel, as it pertains to us first, and then to all others, that we find the ground that true peace is built upon. Ephesians 2:14-For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.
It is in our understanding and willingness not just to acknowledge but remain in and under the truth of the gospel and what has been done for us in Christ, that leads to the “rule” of Christ’s peace (Colossians 3:15) in our hearts and cultivates a community and environment to be able to speak the truth to one another in love.
When we fall out of step (Galatians 5:23) with the truth of the gospel, the humility necessary to speak to one another from a place of gentleness is impossible to manifest. That is to say that we ourselves must always first be saturated with the truth of our own need for Christ’s forgiveness and grace, which is at the center of the gospel, before we are to point out where in the life of another the same grace is needed. When we try to extend the grace needed to produce peace without the truth of the gospel at the center, what is exchanged are just words without power to produce any real effective change that could lead to lasting peace. Christ must be at the center; hence the truth must be at the center, if peace is to be born, cultivated, and lasting.
The “bond of peace” we share in the Spirit is what has been done for us in Christ. Without the truth of our need of Christ, and what has been accomplished for us, by his grace alone, we have no peace ourselves, and consequently no real peace to offer “one another.”
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
