Proverbs 14:10-Each heart knows its own bitterness, and no one else can share its joy.
Over the past year of my life, I have spent countless hours processing the idea of what community is and can be, and the possibilities that exist to have a deeper experience of God through our relationships with one another. Others and myself have dialogued, prayed, look at scripture, and wrestled greatly with this reality and have asked the Lord to reveal to us what it is that true “gospel-centered, transformational community” looks like.
It is within this context that the above verse was brought to me by the Lord through meditation on the scriptures one day in the past month, and through the Holy Spirit’s revelation, I felt as though I had stumbled upon something so true and pure it terrified me. And that some things are so true you have to learn them again every day.
The gospel-centered, transformational community that I have been seeking to understand and desiring to cultivate for our church is ultimately subservient to a community with Christ himself that isn’t just beneficial to, but wholly essential to the formation of the latter. Simply put, if my community with Christ himself isn’t growing at least to the degree that my community with others within whom Christ dwells is, the community with others is destined to disappoint.
Avoiding disappointment isn’t the object of what I am stating, rather a seemingly subtle, yet massively important shift, is the nature of this revelation and consequent invitation. Namely, do you understand your need to experience the person of Christ firsthand, and the catastrophic impact of not doing so, on even the greatest most godly of relationships.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his book life together states talks about our “life together under the Word.” It is a simple statement but carries with it massive implications for it assumes that for us as Christ followers, true community is only had when both parties are “under” the Word. Another way of stating this is that the vantage point from which we view relationships and our lives together is viewed exclusively through the lens of scripture. The problem with that is that we have in modern times treated scripture as a text to be learned, rather than a relationship to be experienced. It is the difference between approaching scripture for information to take with us and go “work”, or approaching scripture relationally for formation, that the truth found within the scriptures needs to and can “work” us.
John 1:14-The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
It is hard at times to remember that when we approach scripture we aren’t coming to a text to be mastered, but to be mastered by a person who in Spirit inhabits our very selves and purposes to transform not just our minds but bodies into His very likeness. We come to scripture be taught not to self-teach. We come to receive, not to self-discover, to be revealed to, not self-enlighten. We come to experience someone rather than learn about them. And if we don’t, we will and do spend all of our lives seeking that experience though something temporal and unable to fulfill our desire. And why is because the desire inside of us is not something we conjure, but something lodged within the very fabric of our selves by God himself.
Ecclesiastes 3:11b- He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
This is why understanding Proverbs 14:10 is so essential. Without a daily experiential recognition of the fact that no one but Christ himself knows the depths of my heart, the sorrow that resides there, and the joy that it experiences, I will undoubtedly look to something or some one temporal to satisfy this eternal longing. It is only living first personally “under His Word” that we then are able to receive and cultivate healthy, gospel-centered, transformational community. It is only when through our community with Christ himself, and his transformation of us, that we can move into “life together” with one another and not make an idol of community, and consequently killing it and ourselves, trying to get from it, what it cannot give.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Mind The Gap.
Romans 7:19- For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing
Modern Translation- Why the $%!@ do I keep on doing this…#@$%?
“There has always been a gap between the ideals people espouse and the way they live, between knowledge and behavior, intellect and character. The difference today is not that the discrepancy exists but that our modern expectations do not cater to it. Ancients understood that it was only in admitting the gap between what you profess and how you perform that growth and maturity could take place.” –Rebecca Manley Pippert
Are you ever surprised by your sin? I often times find myself completely jaw-dropped at my capacity to live completely counter to what I know in my heart to be the truth. Do you know why we are surprised? Pride. I hate to make it that simple, but it is. And the fact that you are fighting right now to make it something more than that, to find some more complicated explanation, proves that very point.
Ecclesiastes 7:29 –“This only have I found: God made mankind upright, but men have gone in search of many schemes."
Psalm 10: 4-“In his pride the wicked does not seek him; in all his thoughts there is no room for God”
Our scheming hearts are relentless factories of deception, constantly pumping out false confidence in a “self,” that if we were to see through the pure lens of the gospel, would cause us without question or reservation to cast all of our hope fully on God’s grace. We simply can’t believe that we are really that fallen, that broken, that desperate, that needy, that helpless, that powerless, that depraved. But that’s exactly what we are apart from Christ.
That is what Pippert is referring to in the above quote when she states, “The difference today is not that the discrepancy exists but that our modern expectations do not cater to it.” The modern mind is fixated on the idea that although we may need some help (grace) from time to time, ultimately with a little more fine tuning we can actually get our lives and sin under control. We are immersed in a self-help society that believes with the right plan, and some good old-fashioned hard work, we can fix this. Were wrong. And the ever-undulating state of our visceral lives is often all the proof we need.
This begs the question, so what do we do? We repent and rest (in Christ himself), as opposed to self-flagellate and double the effort. And we do so often.
Isaiah 30:15 "In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.”
We can’t truly repent if we can’t acknowledge our real need and its scope. We can rest unless we know the truth.
Psalm 16:9-11 “Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.”
It is in our need of Christ, in our posture of humility, in our honesty of our utter inability to within ourselves to live out what He has led us to believe, that we find the starting line, the often “daily” repeated first steps into a deeper journey of seeing our lives in the physical world, begin to reflect what we have more fully grasped in the spiritual.
Romans 7:24-25 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
Modern Translation- Why the $%!@ do I keep on doing this…#@$%?
“There has always been a gap between the ideals people espouse and the way they live, between knowledge and behavior, intellect and character. The difference today is not that the discrepancy exists but that our modern expectations do not cater to it. Ancients understood that it was only in admitting the gap between what you profess and how you perform that growth and maturity could take place.” –Rebecca Manley Pippert
Are you ever surprised by your sin? I often times find myself completely jaw-dropped at my capacity to live completely counter to what I know in my heart to be the truth. Do you know why we are surprised? Pride. I hate to make it that simple, but it is. And the fact that you are fighting right now to make it something more than that, to find some more complicated explanation, proves that very point.
Ecclesiastes 7:29 –“This only have I found: God made mankind upright, but men have gone in search of many schemes."
Psalm 10: 4-“In his pride the wicked does not seek him; in all his thoughts there is no room for God”
Our scheming hearts are relentless factories of deception, constantly pumping out false confidence in a “self,” that if we were to see through the pure lens of the gospel, would cause us without question or reservation to cast all of our hope fully on God’s grace. We simply can’t believe that we are really that fallen, that broken, that desperate, that needy, that helpless, that powerless, that depraved. But that’s exactly what we are apart from Christ.
That is what Pippert is referring to in the above quote when she states, “The difference today is not that the discrepancy exists but that our modern expectations do not cater to it.” The modern mind is fixated on the idea that although we may need some help (grace) from time to time, ultimately with a little more fine tuning we can actually get our lives and sin under control. We are immersed in a self-help society that believes with the right plan, and some good old-fashioned hard work, we can fix this. Were wrong. And the ever-undulating state of our visceral lives is often all the proof we need.
This begs the question, so what do we do? We repent and rest (in Christ himself), as opposed to self-flagellate and double the effort. And we do so often.
Isaiah 30:15 "In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.”
We can’t truly repent if we can’t acknowledge our real need and its scope. We can rest unless we know the truth.
Psalm 16:9-11 “Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.”
It is in our need of Christ, in our posture of humility, in our honesty of our utter inability to within ourselves to live out what He has led us to believe, that we find the starting line, the often “daily” repeated first steps into a deeper journey of seeing our lives in the physical world, begin to reflect what we have more fully grasped in the spiritual.
Romans 7:24-25 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
Friday, January 2, 2009
This ain't no chicken before the egg question.
Psalm 4:5- Offer right sacrifices and trust in the Lord.
Psalm 4: 7 -8: You have filled my heart with greater joy than when their grain and new wine abound. I will lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety.
It is hard to comprehend at times the connectedness between our ability to trust the Lord and our apparent need to act “right”. For real trust to be birthed and experienced, the “right” sacrifices are necessary, but what we have often determined are the “right sacrifices”, are in fact, pride-born self-righteous acts that can never lead us to the joy and peace marked real trust in the Lord.
Psalm 51:17- the sacrifices of the Lord are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart you will not despise.
The “right sacrifices” that the Lord is after have nothing to do with our actions but more a state of heart that leads to a acting posture of trust. For real, whole-hearted trust to be present, it is marked by a complete and utter un-self righteous dependence. This is where it gets tricky in our self-sufficient society, which teaches us through self-help techniques, and positive reinforcement we can create, manifest, and “live out” with confidence the cognitive and emotional state of joy, peace and trust. When we inevitably fail to do so, and our lack of joy, peace, and trust is exposed, we become prime candidates for needless loathing in guilt and shame. Yet scripture is clear that true joy and peace is the by-product, not predecessor, of trust. And trust is preceded by grace, not effort.
It’s hard to quantify how much time I spend feeling ashamed that my feelings and emotional state don’t often reflect what I believe. I can spend endless amounts of emotional energy trying to change how I feel to reflect what I “believe”, rather than shamelessly taking my fear, anger, and doubt (unbelief and brokenness) to the Lord for him to comfort, and therefore give way to trust (belief).
The conflict is twofold. It is one of order and origin. First lets deal with order. As the psalmist states, “right sacrifices” precede trust, and that the sacrifices of the Lord are a broken and contrite heart. Therefore we can see that attempting to produce an emotional state of “joy” which reflects trust is not just unnecessary, but impossible. It also shows us that we still have a deep seeded resistance to needing God for anything, and our relentless desire to “prove” to God that although others need his grace to trust, we somehow have escaped and are above such poverty of self.
Yet scripture is clear that it is in our brokenness, in our contriteness (marked by sorrow, not joy), that is the road (“right sacrifice”) to real trust, which gives birth to joy and peace.
We have the order backwards. Joy only after sorrow. Trust only after humility and brokenness. Trust never is born on strength of self, but weakness given way to firm reliance in someone truly strong. We must understand this order, for if we don’t, needless hours, days and even years of our lives can be marked by trying to trust in God, rather than letting him lead us into trust, trying to live with joy and peace, rather than assuming a posture that allows Him to “fill our hearts with greater joy” and cause us to “sleep in peace.”
This answers our origin question. The origin of joy, or trust, of peace, for the Christ follower is never found or had without the “right sacrifices.” It is our pride and unwillingness to approach Christ broken that keeps us from experiencing Christ and consequently the peace and joy we desire. Christ himself is the author of our peace, joy and trust. It is only in his presence that we have a hope of experiencing such states of grace, which transcend our daily circumstances. All else is self-motivated, soon to let down, frail, humanistic shadows of the ruddy grace and God-given trust that we need to get through this broken life.
Psalm 5: 5 – The arrogant cannot stand in your presence.
Mark 9:24 – I do believe, help me overcome my unbelief.
Psalm 4: 7 -8: You have filled my heart with greater joy than when their grain and new wine abound. I will lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety.
It is hard to comprehend at times the connectedness between our ability to trust the Lord and our apparent need to act “right”. For real trust to be birthed and experienced, the “right” sacrifices are necessary, but what we have often determined are the “right sacrifices”, are in fact, pride-born self-righteous acts that can never lead us to the joy and peace marked real trust in the Lord.
Psalm 51:17- the sacrifices of the Lord are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart you will not despise.
The “right sacrifices” that the Lord is after have nothing to do with our actions but more a state of heart that leads to a acting posture of trust. For real, whole-hearted trust to be present, it is marked by a complete and utter un-self righteous dependence. This is where it gets tricky in our self-sufficient society, which teaches us through self-help techniques, and positive reinforcement we can create, manifest, and “live out” with confidence the cognitive and emotional state of joy, peace and trust. When we inevitably fail to do so, and our lack of joy, peace, and trust is exposed, we become prime candidates for needless loathing in guilt and shame. Yet scripture is clear that true joy and peace is the by-product, not predecessor, of trust. And trust is preceded by grace, not effort.
It’s hard to quantify how much time I spend feeling ashamed that my feelings and emotional state don’t often reflect what I believe. I can spend endless amounts of emotional energy trying to change how I feel to reflect what I “believe”, rather than shamelessly taking my fear, anger, and doubt (unbelief and brokenness) to the Lord for him to comfort, and therefore give way to trust (belief).
The conflict is twofold. It is one of order and origin. First lets deal with order. As the psalmist states, “right sacrifices” precede trust, and that the sacrifices of the Lord are a broken and contrite heart. Therefore we can see that attempting to produce an emotional state of “joy” which reflects trust is not just unnecessary, but impossible. It also shows us that we still have a deep seeded resistance to needing God for anything, and our relentless desire to “prove” to God that although others need his grace to trust, we somehow have escaped and are above such poverty of self.
Yet scripture is clear that it is in our brokenness, in our contriteness (marked by sorrow, not joy), that is the road (“right sacrifice”) to real trust, which gives birth to joy and peace.
We have the order backwards. Joy only after sorrow. Trust only after humility and brokenness. Trust never is born on strength of self, but weakness given way to firm reliance in someone truly strong. We must understand this order, for if we don’t, needless hours, days and even years of our lives can be marked by trying to trust in God, rather than letting him lead us into trust, trying to live with joy and peace, rather than assuming a posture that allows Him to “fill our hearts with greater joy” and cause us to “sleep in peace.”
This answers our origin question. The origin of joy, or trust, of peace, for the Christ follower is never found or had without the “right sacrifices.” It is our pride and unwillingness to approach Christ broken that keeps us from experiencing Christ and consequently the peace and joy we desire. Christ himself is the author of our peace, joy and trust. It is only in his presence that we have a hope of experiencing such states of grace, which transcend our daily circumstances. All else is self-motivated, soon to let down, frail, humanistic shadows of the ruddy grace and God-given trust that we need to get through this broken life.
Psalm 5: 5 – The arrogant cannot stand in your presence.
Mark 9:24 – I do believe, help me overcome my unbelief.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Call and Response
Call and Response-
This weekend I was invited to lead a panel discussion on a film titled “call and response,” a documentary film shedding light on the issue of human trafficking, and its pervasiveness in the world today. It was a sobering and convicting film to say the least, shining a glaring spotlight on this issue and it’s need to be addressed.
As my mind was inundated with the images, sounds, and truth concerning the reality that there are “more slaves in the world today than any other point in human history,” and that people, and in particular children, are daily being reduced (further de-humanization) to a commodity to be sold for labor or sexual means, I oddly found my mind being led to consider not just how I was going to necessarily “respond” to this tragedy, but how I was likely to be partially responsible for this ever occurring in the first place. That is to say that, is it possible, that through some of my seemingly “disconnected” daily decisions, that appear on the surface to not have such grave consequences, when “looked at” through a broader lens, and put in the context of the naively denied reality of the “connectedness” of all things (which is denied only because if faced, the gravity of our actions would be to great to ignore), that I may be just as much apart of the problem as the man who is pimping out kids in on the streets of Bangkok.
Cornell West suggests that the gospel affords us, in the prophetic tradition, to “humbly direct your strongest criticism at yourself, and then speak self-critically your mind to others with painful candor and genuine compassion.” With this in mind, lets take the deeper more painful journey to look into our own culpability in this issue of human trafficking.
Galatians 5: - It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.
A simple question that I can ask is this, how do I find myself, consciously, or more than likely, subconsciously, experientially “falling out” of the freedom that is afforded and secured for me in Christ, and consequently living “under the burden” once again of any yoke of slavery? That it to say, that I somehow forfeit the grace that has been given me (Jonah 2:8), though not loosing it in actuality, only neutering it in it’s pervasiveness, to be the grounds by which, and the place from which, all of my “life”, and consequently my actions flow.
How this looks on the street is that although I “appear” and claim to be free, I find that my actions, which flow from decisions that are informed and motivated by values, which are rooted undoubtedly in my beliefs (what I hold to be truth), do not reflect the freedom that I claim to “live in.” It is this disparity between belief (truth claim) and action, between “held belief” and “displayed fruit” (Matthew 12:33) that is at the root of how I see the “connectedness” of this issue, and how I can be found culpable, in some form or fashion, about an issue such a human trafficking, that only days ago I was totally unaware of.
The most practical way I see this fleshing out in my own life and in the life of others is the slavery to consumerism and materialism that is inbred and woven tightly into the mindset of most western Americans. As a result of the globalization of economies and information, and the syncretism of systems of belief, the resultant has cultivated now a pervasive “entitlement”, or at the least “desire”, in most all humanity and people groups that the “goal of life” is to gather enough materials (money) to ensure happiness and comfort, which might as well be deities of modernity. As it appears in culture today, the American dream has been reduced to a “free for all, dog eat dog” playground for hedonism, narcissism, and materialism.
But what happens when my “entitlement” or desire, for a consumable product, is being realized by someone else’s freedom being taken from them? That is to say that, when does my sense of being “entitled” to having shoes, at a price that I think is right for me to pay, (even though that “price” requires someone in the chain of supply for that product, to be forced to produce that product, against their will and without pay), breakdown, and be found exposed for what it truly is, namely “selfish ambition.” How can I say as a Christ follower I deserve anything at the expense of the freedom of anther human?
This is where I find us all to be culpable for this issue. To ignore the “connectedness“ of all humanity, and the effects of one cultures prosperity, built upon the backs of another cultures depravity (enslavement), is only possible in a culture such as America, where we satiate our minds and minutes of every day with ample distractions, keeping us from fixating long enough to feel convicted about anything. This inability to have “sustained attention”(Gary Haugen), keeps us from ever making sizable, and lasting progress in such areas as human trafficking. We simply don’t have the attention span, and often the only thing that sustains attention, in our growing global “values”, are in their root forms purely narcissist, limiting therefore the willingness that is unquestionably required in the “dying to self” that leads to liberation of others.
Philippians 2 -Imitating Christ's Humility If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross!
The mark of the gospel taking root in out lives, and beginning to bear fruit, is humility that takes on the form of sacrifice. Cornell West stated in the film, “justice is what love looks like in public.” The kingdom ethic that Jesus lived and imparted to us through the Holy Spirit is one of downward movement, of service to others, of laying down our lives. This is far beyond the “go green”, sexy semi-philanthropic displays of our secular culture, as good as they mean and are.
This call is a call to literally consider others better than yourself, to love others at least as much as you love yourself. For this to even be remotely possible, requires living in the reality of what has been done for us in Christ, which is constantly under “contest” in the attention spans of us all, but when experienced, affords us the capacity, fueled solely by grace, to suffer and lay down our lives (entitlement) for others. It requires a dying that is only possible when a hope experientially begins to be firmly fixed in our hearts and minds.
Romans 5: 3-5 Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.
This weekend I was invited to lead a panel discussion on a film titled “call and response,” a documentary film shedding light on the issue of human trafficking, and its pervasiveness in the world today. It was a sobering and convicting film to say the least, shining a glaring spotlight on this issue and it’s need to be addressed.
As my mind was inundated with the images, sounds, and truth concerning the reality that there are “more slaves in the world today than any other point in human history,” and that people, and in particular children, are daily being reduced (further de-humanization) to a commodity to be sold for labor or sexual means, I oddly found my mind being led to consider not just how I was going to necessarily “respond” to this tragedy, but how I was likely to be partially responsible for this ever occurring in the first place. That is to say that, is it possible, that through some of my seemingly “disconnected” daily decisions, that appear on the surface to not have such grave consequences, when “looked at” through a broader lens, and put in the context of the naively denied reality of the “connectedness” of all things (which is denied only because if faced, the gravity of our actions would be to great to ignore), that I may be just as much apart of the problem as the man who is pimping out kids in on the streets of Bangkok.
Cornell West suggests that the gospel affords us, in the prophetic tradition, to “humbly direct your strongest criticism at yourself, and then speak self-critically your mind to others with painful candor and genuine compassion.” With this in mind, lets take the deeper more painful journey to look into our own culpability in this issue of human trafficking.
Galatians 5: - It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.
A simple question that I can ask is this, how do I find myself, consciously, or more than likely, subconsciously, experientially “falling out” of the freedom that is afforded and secured for me in Christ, and consequently living “under the burden” once again of any yoke of slavery? That it to say, that I somehow forfeit the grace that has been given me (Jonah 2:8), though not loosing it in actuality, only neutering it in it’s pervasiveness, to be the grounds by which, and the place from which, all of my “life”, and consequently my actions flow.
How this looks on the street is that although I “appear” and claim to be free, I find that my actions, which flow from decisions that are informed and motivated by values, which are rooted undoubtedly in my beliefs (what I hold to be truth), do not reflect the freedom that I claim to “live in.” It is this disparity between belief (truth claim) and action, between “held belief” and “displayed fruit” (Matthew 12:33) that is at the root of how I see the “connectedness” of this issue, and how I can be found culpable, in some form or fashion, about an issue such a human trafficking, that only days ago I was totally unaware of.
The most practical way I see this fleshing out in my own life and in the life of others is the slavery to consumerism and materialism that is inbred and woven tightly into the mindset of most western Americans. As a result of the globalization of economies and information, and the syncretism of systems of belief, the resultant has cultivated now a pervasive “entitlement”, or at the least “desire”, in most all humanity and people groups that the “goal of life” is to gather enough materials (money) to ensure happiness and comfort, which might as well be deities of modernity. As it appears in culture today, the American dream has been reduced to a “free for all, dog eat dog” playground for hedonism, narcissism, and materialism.
But what happens when my “entitlement” or desire, for a consumable product, is being realized by someone else’s freedom being taken from them? That is to say that, when does my sense of being “entitled” to having shoes, at a price that I think is right for me to pay, (even though that “price” requires someone in the chain of supply for that product, to be forced to produce that product, against their will and without pay), breakdown, and be found exposed for what it truly is, namely “selfish ambition.” How can I say as a Christ follower I deserve anything at the expense of the freedom of anther human?
This is where I find us all to be culpable for this issue. To ignore the “connectedness“ of all humanity, and the effects of one cultures prosperity, built upon the backs of another cultures depravity (enslavement), is only possible in a culture such as America, where we satiate our minds and minutes of every day with ample distractions, keeping us from fixating long enough to feel convicted about anything. This inability to have “sustained attention”(Gary Haugen), keeps us from ever making sizable, and lasting progress in such areas as human trafficking. We simply don’t have the attention span, and often the only thing that sustains attention, in our growing global “values”, are in their root forms purely narcissist, limiting therefore the willingness that is unquestionably required in the “dying to self” that leads to liberation of others.
Philippians 2 -Imitating Christ's Humility If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross!
The mark of the gospel taking root in out lives, and beginning to bear fruit, is humility that takes on the form of sacrifice. Cornell West stated in the film, “justice is what love looks like in public.” The kingdom ethic that Jesus lived and imparted to us through the Holy Spirit is one of downward movement, of service to others, of laying down our lives. This is far beyond the “go green”, sexy semi-philanthropic displays of our secular culture, as good as they mean and are.
This call is a call to literally consider others better than yourself, to love others at least as much as you love yourself. For this to even be remotely possible, requires living in the reality of what has been done for us in Christ, which is constantly under “contest” in the attention spans of us all, but when experienced, affords us the capacity, fueled solely by grace, to suffer and lay down our lives (entitlement) for others. It requires a dying that is only possible when a hope experientially begins to be firmly fixed in our hearts and minds.
Romans 5: 3-5 Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
I can’t get no, satisfaction. – Mick Jagger, The Rolling Stones.
Hosea 13: 6- when I fed them, they were satisfied; when they were satisfied, they became proud; then they forgot me.
The paper-thin line between living in active gratitude of the reality that all of life is divine provision, and the pride swelling belief of a life committed to self-gained self-satisfaction, is one that few people walk well, if ever. We often are found to be a living contradiction of thought and action; rarely exercising in our daily lives the things that we hold to be true, in our grace-laden, gospel-sane minds.
This passage in Hosea struck me to be a beautiful example of this contradiction. It raises questions surrounding our quest for satisfaction, the realities of its lack of attainability and sustainability, and the consequent problems that result from our undeniable pursuit of it (satisfaction).
The most familiar thing to all of us in this passage is the reality of being found to be “hungry”, which is assumed from the need being stated in the passage of “being fed”. The beginning of this passage is the Lord describing what he did for Israel in brining them out of Egypt and feeding them in the dessert with manna from heaven. It is such a vivid image given to us in scripture to usher us into the reality that not only does God care about our most basic of daily needs, but he is capable of providing for those needs in the most supernatural of fashions, if it suits his will. But greater than the actual need of food for Israel in the Desert, was the need of trust and hope being experientially birthed and rooted in God as the provider of all things for His people.
To overlook this would be to miss a fundamental pattern that God has used throughout the history of the world to reveal himself to his people, namely his allowance or creation of a position of suffering for His people, to awaken them to their inability to save and provide for themselves, giving them the consequent experiential grounds to trust God more wholly. Our capacity to overlook this truth is rooted in one of two places; our societal commitment to never suffering (and the belief that if something is hard then it is wrong), and our societal commitment to self- sufficiency (pride) and the clear communication of our culture that the most “valuable” person is the one that needs nothing from anyone.
Lets look further at this issue of self-sufficiency. Most of us who are “in Christ” have been at least exposed to the idea, or have some sense of a theology, that all that we have is simply provided for us by the Lord, and is an act of his grace towards us, not a resultant of our merit, that indebts Him to us. Yet in our western American “Christiantopia” we have concocted a hybrid, compartmentalized practical theology that allows us in the recesses of our minds to cognitively believe that “all is an act of His grace” and yet live on the street as though “you reap what you sow.”
This is due to the diametrically opposed nature of the gospel to the dominant value systems of our world’s culture. The gospel is incompatible with the marketplace values that often typify most believers’ practical lives. To be in need of being “fed”, or to have your “satisfaction” being found dependant upon something outside of yourself is considered far to risky and to be avoided in today’s culture. The goal is to never need anything outside of yourself to “satisfy” your needs, to do so is far too speculative, putting yourself in the hands of another, and is considered in our conservative, self-protective climate, to simply be irresponsible. I often wonder if when we meet Christ if he will redefine our modern notion of irresponsibility with a more proper definition of perspective called “faith.”
The problem with all of this is that when I live in self-sufficiency, and even manage somehow to attain to the things that I long for that I believe will bring lasting satisfaction, they never do, and I am often off on another quest to find the next thing that I hope will fill the void. All of us can identify on some level with this cycle, but sadly few ever stop to ask this question. Is satisfaction something that is received or attained? That is to say, is the nature of satisfaction something that is fundamentally found in reception, or in achievement?
As I get older, it has become easier for me to see that all of the things that satisfy me most were things that were provided for me, ultimately as a result of factors far beyond my control, that I simply had to act to receive, rather than create for myself.
Isaiah 48: 17-18 This is what the LORD says—your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: "I am the LORD your God, who teaches you what is best for you, who directs you in the way you should go. If only you had paid attention to my commands, your peace would have been like a river, your righteousness like the waves of the sea.
What is difficult about the above passage, especially as it pertains to the issue of satisfaction, is that the Lord is clearly saying that we need Him to teach us what is best for us. This is complicated because each person “feels” as though they already have some sense of what it is that is best for them, (which often times is nothing more that a learned behavior or desire that is subconsciously formed through means of some outward stimulus). That is to say that you think what’s best for you is to have great wealth, because it is shown to you though society, media, and culture that happiness and satisfaction are inexplicably tied to money. Yet if the outward stimulus that one was primarily exposed to was the teaching and kingdom ethic of Matthew 6:25-34, your sense of what is best for you would be radically different. One leads you to satisfaction in money (temporal), the other to satisfaction in the Lord’s provision (eternal).
Matthew 6: 25-34 Do Not Worry
25"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? 28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
For lasting satisfaction to be true, it requires the object of the satisfaction to be constant, unchangeable, and eternal. Anything short of this, though good in and of itself, and made for us to enjoy not worship (Isaiah 58), is merely a temporary substitute, a reflection of an eternal longing that will ultimately only be satisfied in Christ.
Genesis 15: 1 Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.
The paper-thin line between living in active gratitude of the reality that all of life is divine provision, and the pride swelling belief of a life committed to self-gained self-satisfaction, is one that few people walk well, if ever. We often are found to be a living contradiction of thought and action; rarely exercising in our daily lives the things that we hold to be true, in our grace-laden, gospel-sane minds.
This passage in Hosea struck me to be a beautiful example of this contradiction. It raises questions surrounding our quest for satisfaction, the realities of its lack of attainability and sustainability, and the consequent problems that result from our undeniable pursuit of it (satisfaction).
The most familiar thing to all of us in this passage is the reality of being found to be “hungry”, which is assumed from the need being stated in the passage of “being fed”. The beginning of this passage is the Lord describing what he did for Israel in brining them out of Egypt and feeding them in the dessert with manna from heaven. It is such a vivid image given to us in scripture to usher us into the reality that not only does God care about our most basic of daily needs, but he is capable of providing for those needs in the most supernatural of fashions, if it suits his will. But greater than the actual need of food for Israel in the Desert, was the need of trust and hope being experientially birthed and rooted in God as the provider of all things for His people.
To overlook this would be to miss a fundamental pattern that God has used throughout the history of the world to reveal himself to his people, namely his allowance or creation of a position of suffering for His people, to awaken them to their inability to save and provide for themselves, giving them the consequent experiential grounds to trust God more wholly. Our capacity to overlook this truth is rooted in one of two places; our societal commitment to never suffering (and the belief that if something is hard then it is wrong), and our societal commitment to self- sufficiency (pride) and the clear communication of our culture that the most “valuable” person is the one that needs nothing from anyone.
Lets look further at this issue of self-sufficiency. Most of us who are “in Christ” have been at least exposed to the idea, or have some sense of a theology, that all that we have is simply provided for us by the Lord, and is an act of his grace towards us, not a resultant of our merit, that indebts Him to us. Yet in our western American “Christiantopia” we have concocted a hybrid, compartmentalized practical theology that allows us in the recesses of our minds to cognitively believe that “all is an act of His grace” and yet live on the street as though “you reap what you sow.”
This is due to the diametrically opposed nature of the gospel to the dominant value systems of our world’s culture. The gospel is incompatible with the marketplace values that often typify most believers’ practical lives. To be in need of being “fed”, or to have your “satisfaction” being found dependant upon something outside of yourself is considered far to risky and to be avoided in today’s culture. The goal is to never need anything outside of yourself to “satisfy” your needs, to do so is far too speculative, putting yourself in the hands of another, and is considered in our conservative, self-protective climate, to simply be irresponsible. I often wonder if when we meet Christ if he will redefine our modern notion of irresponsibility with a more proper definition of perspective called “faith.”
The problem with all of this is that when I live in self-sufficiency, and even manage somehow to attain to the things that I long for that I believe will bring lasting satisfaction, they never do, and I am often off on another quest to find the next thing that I hope will fill the void. All of us can identify on some level with this cycle, but sadly few ever stop to ask this question. Is satisfaction something that is received or attained? That is to say, is the nature of satisfaction something that is fundamentally found in reception, or in achievement?
As I get older, it has become easier for me to see that all of the things that satisfy me most were things that were provided for me, ultimately as a result of factors far beyond my control, that I simply had to act to receive, rather than create for myself.
Isaiah 48: 17-18 This is what the LORD says—your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: "I am the LORD your God, who teaches you what is best for you, who directs you in the way you should go. If only you had paid attention to my commands, your peace would have been like a river, your righteousness like the waves of the sea.
What is difficult about the above passage, especially as it pertains to the issue of satisfaction, is that the Lord is clearly saying that we need Him to teach us what is best for us. This is complicated because each person “feels” as though they already have some sense of what it is that is best for them, (which often times is nothing more that a learned behavior or desire that is subconsciously formed through means of some outward stimulus). That is to say that you think what’s best for you is to have great wealth, because it is shown to you though society, media, and culture that happiness and satisfaction are inexplicably tied to money. Yet if the outward stimulus that one was primarily exposed to was the teaching and kingdom ethic of Matthew 6:25-34, your sense of what is best for you would be radically different. One leads you to satisfaction in money (temporal), the other to satisfaction in the Lord’s provision (eternal).
Matthew 6: 25-34 Do Not Worry
25"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? 28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
For lasting satisfaction to be true, it requires the object of the satisfaction to be constant, unchangeable, and eternal. Anything short of this, though good in and of itself, and made for us to enjoy not worship (Isaiah 58), is merely a temporary substitute, a reflection of an eternal longing that will ultimately only be satisfied in Christ.
Genesis 15: 1 Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Desire makes everything blossom; possession makes everything wither and fade. Marcel Proust
Proverbs 19:22 -What a man desires is unfailing love; better to be poor than a liar.
Proust describes well the condition of a soul having not yet tasted of the unfailing love of God, in Christ Jesus. For in a world that promotes “personal” desire and the pursuit of it’s fulfillment as ones greatest call, the shipwrecked hearts of humanity line up in the wake of fulfilled desire, only seemingly attained, but then to be found left wanting once again.
We can all relate to Proust’s sentiment. Just simply look to your own desire for anything you have ever dreamed of having. Although for a time, once receiving the object of ones desire, we experience a sense of temporal satisfaction, most often those feelings are short lived and we are on to the next thing that we think will produce the same feeling, but potentially and hopefully, next time it will last longer. It only takes a handful of these experiences of receiving and then “groaning” (Romans 8:23) again for more, to teach our subconscious that possession (commitment) is not what we are really after, and attaches the chief value to the desire or “feeling” of wanting, not the actual reception of the desired thing; This is why most people love the “chase” of a relationship but get bored with it as soon as possession (commitment) is involved.
The problem with this thinking and consequent living is twofold. The first problem that arises is in value being attached to the desire, not the possession. This attachment insulates us from the opportunity to experience what it is we were made for, namely unfailing love. It also serves to place the focus of ones energy on the temporal nature of feelings, which can be swayed easily by something as simple as lack of sleep, and moves one away from the commitment that is had in possession, which in turn, can by grace lead to a deeper and fuller understanding of loves very nature. This inevitably continues to perpetuate a “what I want is still out there” mentality, that when attached to our desire, keeps us from experiencing a more mature love, that finds its inception in desire, but its fulfillment in sacrifice (commitment).
Secondly, it misunderstands the actual nature of our desire itself and forces us to address this question; are all my desires for various objects as real and independent of one another as they seem, or are all my desires simply a humanistic grasping at fulfilling something placed deep within me, that needs to be received and not attained? That is to say that when we experience in fullness the love and glory of Christ, the only thing that will fade, is everything else we thought we wanted instead.
C.S. Lewis would describe this misunderstanding of our desire in these terms. "We are halfhearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."
The shift occurs for us though the understanding that since the fall of man, we have lived under the “desire curse” of original sin, namely God is holding out on you, and what He has provided for you is not what you most deeply want. Eat the apple. Yet what was exposed in that deception and consequently engrained into the fabric of humanity was a pattern of “anxious grasping” for fulfillment, inevitably leaving one to be found still “wanting” even after possession. This condition was the precursor to the entire redemptive movement of God to his people through Christ. It is the redemption of the falsity of our need to possess something that will satisfy, with the truth that only in our being possessed, will our desire be fully quenched.
Deuteronomy 14:2 -for you are a people holy to the LORD your God. Out of all the peoples on the face of the earth, the LORD has chosen you to be his treasured possession.
Revelation 5:9-they sang a new song: "You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation.
We are the Lords desired possession. He purchased us by his blood, his sacrifice. It was not because we were in and of our selves something to be desired, quite to the contrary. We were helpless, sheep with out a shepherd (Matthew 9:36), even enemies of God (Romans 5:10). Yet his mind has been set on purchasing us since the foundation of the world and his unchanging and unfailing love is the force behind such action. Our souls and bodies long for an encounter with such eternal and unfading love. Anything short of this, is a temporal fix, that serves as a distraction, keeping our attentions nailed to incapable “phantom” loves than never quite do it.
“What a man desires is unfailing love, better to be poor than a liar.” What the writer of proverbs is saying is that it is better to have none of the things that you think you desire (to be poor), than to lie to yourself about what you truly want (unfailing love). For it is only in the experience of the eternal, unchanging and unfading love of God for us in Christ Jesus that in possession the object of our desire (Christ himself) does not fade, but daily thereafter grows increasingly by grace until one day, when our bodies and souls are fully redeemed, we will experience in full, what now we fully have (justification), but only experience in part (we are partially sanctified, and still await glorification– Romans 8).
Proust describes well the condition of a soul having not yet tasted of the unfailing love of God, in Christ Jesus. For in a world that promotes “personal” desire and the pursuit of it’s fulfillment as ones greatest call, the shipwrecked hearts of humanity line up in the wake of fulfilled desire, only seemingly attained, but then to be found left wanting once again.
We can all relate to Proust’s sentiment. Just simply look to your own desire for anything you have ever dreamed of having. Although for a time, once receiving the object of ones desire, we experience a sense of temporal satisfaction, most often those feelings are short lived and we are on to the next thing that we think will produce the same feeling, but potentially and hopefully, next time it will last longer. It only takes a handful of these experiences of receiving and then “groaning” (Romans 8:23) again for more, to teach our subconscious that possession (commitment) is not what we are really after, and attaches the chief value to the desire or “feeling” of wanting, not the actual reception of the desired thing; This is why most people love the “chase” of a relationship but get bored with it as soon as possession (commitment) is involved.
The problem with this thinking and consequent living is twofold. The first problem that arises is in value being attached to the desire, not the possession. This attachment insulates us from the opportunity to experience what it is we were made for, namely unfailing love. It also serves to place the focus of ones energy on the temporal nature of feelings, which can be swayed easily by something as simple as lack of sleep, and moves one away from the commitment that is had in possession, which in turn, can by grace lead to a deeper and fuller understanding of loves very nature. This inevitably continues to perpetuate a “what I want is still out there” mentality, that when attached to our desire, keeps us from experiencing a more mature love, that finds its inception in desire, but its fulfillment in sacrifice (commitment).
Secondly, it misunderstands the actual nature of our desire itself and forces us to address this question; are all my desires for various objects as real and independent of one another as they seem, or are all my desires simply a humanistic grasping at fulfilling something placed deep within me, that needs to be received and not attained? That is to say that when we experience in fullness the love and glory of Christ, the only thing that will fade, is everything else we thought we wanted instead.
C.S. Lewis would describe this misunderstanding of our desire in these terms. "We are halfhearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."
The shift occurs for us though the understanding that since the fall of man, we have lived under the “desire curse” of original sin, namely God is holding out on you, and what He has provided for you is not what you most deeply want. Eat the apple. Yet what was exposed in that deception and consequently engrained into the fabric of humanity was a pattern of “anxious grasping” for fulfillment, inevitably leaving one to be found still “wanting” even after possession. This condition was the precursor to the entire redemptive movement of God to his people through Christ. It is the redemption of the falsity of our need to possess something that will satisfy, with the truth that only in our being possessed, will our desire be fully quenched.
Deuteronomy 14:2 -for you are a people holy to the LORD your God. Out of all the peoples on the face of the earth, the LORD has chosen you to be his treasured possession.
Revelation 5:9-they sang a new song: "You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation.
We are the Lords desired possession. He purchased us by his blood, his sacrifice. It was not because we were in and of our selves something to be desired, quite to the contrary. We were helpless, sheep with out a shepherd (Matthew 9:36), even enemies of God (Romans 5:10). Yet his mind has been set on purchasing us since the foundation of the world and his unchanging and unfailing love is the force behind such action. Our souls and bodies long for an encounter with such eternal and unfading love. Anything short of this, is a temporal fix, that serves as a distraction, keeping our attentions nailed to incapable “phantom” loves than never quite do it.
“What a man desires is unfailing love, better to be poor than a liar.” What the writer of proverbs is saying is that it is better to have none of the things that you think you desire (to be poor), than to lie to yourself about what you truly want (unfailing love). For it is only in the experience of the eternal, unchanging and unfading love of God for us in Christ Jesus that in possession the object of our desire (Christ himself) does not fade, but daily thereafter grows increasingly by grace until one day, when our bodies and souls are fully redeemed, we will experience in full, what now we fully have (justification), but only experience in part (we are partially sanctified, and still await glorification– Romans 8).
Monday, June 23, 2008
The closer I’m bound in love to you the closer I am to free- indigo girls, “power of two”.
Galatians 5:1-It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.
Freedom as defined by our culture is the complete and utter independence to do whatever it is that I feel like doing, how I feel like doing it, when I feel like doing it. Anything short of this is seen as having limitations and boundaries set upon your freedom, and that is to be avoided or minimized at all costs. Most pursuit of wealth is rooted in trying to afford this scenario. If I just had more money (power), then I could afford more “freedom” (which is most likely misunderstood desire for control) in my life.
We see this often most clearly but not exclusively in relationships of the romantic nature. People struggling to commit to another, using language within themselves that is subconscious, yet purposefully confusing, that gives us spiritual words to dress up and take away the sting of our side of the situation, namely the extreme narcissistic commitment to our “self” and “freedom.” That’s not to say that to listen to real concerns in your heart (the Holy Spirit’s work- Job 38:36) about your ability to commit to a relationship with a person aren’t valid and necessary, but to place the reason for the lack of ability to commit, squarely on some personality defect in the other, or some incompatibility difference, often times is an overstatement that keeps us from looking at where we may be at the root of the problem.
The root of anything wrong is rarely ever one thing. Our reductionistic society demands that ultimate blame be placed squarely on a singular thing. Although at times this is possible (not probable), the journey to this conclusion is rarely useful, and often times allows us to overlook where our own fault lies. As long as greater or prior fault lies with another it gives us the mental “wiggle room” to not take seriously our sin or struggle in the matter. The problem lies within our misunderstanding of the freedom that we now are “in” as Christ followers, and the difference between it, and our cultural experience of “freedom.”
Dictionary.com defines freedom as philosophically “the power to exercise choice and make decisions without constraint from within or without; autonomy; self-determination: The power to determine action without restraint. So what is true biblical freedom if not in this traditional cultural expression and definition?
“Freedom to determine our own moral standards is considered a necessity for being fully human. This oversimplifies, however. Freedom cannot be defined in strictly negative terms, as the absence of confinement or restraint. In fact, in many cases, confinement and constraint is actually a means to liberation.” Tim Keller- The Reason for God (45)
The fundamental flaw lies in the fact that we are conditioned in culture to believe that we are free to begin with in this life. Scripture tells us differently in Ephesians 2:1, “we were dead in our sins and transgressions.” And that we were “slaves to sin”, before Christ redeemed us through his blood (Romans 6). This means that we start not in a position of entitled freedom, but in helpless slavery and death, from which we need to be rescued and brought to life. It is taught to us in culture that freedom is our right, something that we are entitled to, rather than an act of grace in our lives. Consequently we have very little understanding for the heart of the freedom that has been afforded for us by Christ.
Galatians 2:20- “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
The freedom that is ours to have and experience in the gospel is one that has boundaries. Culture would say that for it to have boundaries that the freedom is thus compromised and therefore not freedom at all. Yet we see it all the time in everyday life that boundaries can actually free you, rather than confine you. Look no further than Eric Clapton to see how the limitations and focus of a musician on a single instrument gave birth to a complete freedom within those bounds. The focus brought to an area allows one to develop freedom within that specific discipline to a degree that otherwise would go undeveloped had the “restriction” not been place. Therefore the conclusion that true “freedom” can only be had with no limits is to simple. In fact I would argue that the “freedom” of no limitations and its satisfaction is but a pale reflection of the satisfaction of expressing “full freedom” in a specific area.
Friends of mine joke that I made a deal, (I guess with God?) that I could be a great recreational athlete at any sport; the only catch was I could never be good enough in any of them to succeed on any platform higher than just basic recreation. I enjoy playing almost any sport, and can say with confidence (not arrogance) I’m pretty capable at most sports I apply myself to (barring golf, at which I suck, really, really suck.) Don’t get me wrong here, being able to “hang” in a variety of sports is a luxury that I don’t take for granted, but I would trade it all to be excellent in one sport, soccer. To excel, compete, and play soccer at the level I would like, would be worth trading in all other outlets and options. I realize that in one sense this would be limiting my freedom, but in another, exploding a new more “full freedom” that’s value would surpass the simple luxury of being a recreational sport chameleon.
This is not unlike the quote from the indigo girls I stated earlier and the heart of Galatians 5:1. It is in being “bound” to Christ, in loosing (dying to) our self, that we are found to be truly free, and as apart of his creation, under his redemptive movement, finally “fully human” and alive (Ephesians 2:4-5). I can see particularly in my marriage. Although I am limited now to being married to one woman, and therefore limited physically, spiritually, emotionally, and socially with the degree to which I can interact with other women, there is a depth of relationship that has been cultivated under this restriction (healthy desirous commitment) that would never be reached without it. The question that this leaves on the table and I believe is at the heart of biblical freedom is not the lessoning of the desire for a certain thing or scenario, but the willingness to be delayed in the receiving of these things, only accepting them in the timing and will of the Father, rather than living lives marked by anxious grasping for things that we “feel” we need in order to experience the freedom we desire.
Scripture tells us clearly that we are already free (Gal. 5). That there is nothing that I can gain (or loose for that matter) that can add to or lesson the freedom that is now mine in Christ Jesus. If this is true, then we must take honest assessment of our life patterns and see that the relentless pursuit of “more” is not really a pursuit of freedom, but often a deceptive slavery that sells itself to us as something better than what we already have. Often times we “buy in” and wake up down the road enslaved to something that told us if we just had this, then we would be free.
Freedom as defined by our culture is the complete and utter independence to do whatever it is that I feel like doing, how I feel like doing it, when I feel like doing it. Anything short of this is seen as having limitations and boundaries set upon your freedom, and that is to be avoided or minimized at all costs. Most pursuit of wealth is rooted in trying to afford this scenario. If I just had more money (power), then I could afford more “freedom” (which is most likely misunderstood desire for control) in my life.
We see this often most clearly but not exclusively in relationships of the romantic nature. People struggling to commit to another, using language within themselves that is subconscious, yet purposefully confusing, that gives us spiritual words to dress up and take away the sting of our side of the situation, namely the extreme narcissistic commitment to our “self” and “freedom.” That’s not to say that to listen to real concerns in your heart (the Holy Spirit’s work- Job 38:36) about your ability to commit to a relationship with a person aren’t valid and necessary, but to place the reason for the lack of ability to commit, squarely on some personality defect in the other, or some incompatibility difference, often times is an overstatement that keeps us from looking at where we may be at the root of the problem.
The root of anything wrong is rarely ever one thing. Our reductionistic society demands that ultimate blame be placed squarely on a singular thing. Although at times this is possible (not probable), the journey to this conclusion is rarely useful, and often times allows us to overlook where our own fault lies. As long as greater or prior fault lies with another it gives us the mental “wiggle room” to not take seriously our sin or struggle in the matter. The problem lies within our misunderstanding of the freedom that we now are “in” as Christ followers, and the difference between it, and our cultural experience of “freedom.”
Dictionary.com defines freedom as philosophically “the power to exercise choice and make decisions without constraint from within or without; autonomy; self-determination: The power to determine action without restraint. So what is true biblical freedom if not in this traditional cultural expression and definition?
“Freedom to determine our own moral standards is considered a necessity for being fully human. This oversimplifies, however. Freedom cannot be defined in strictly negative terms, as the absence of confinement or restraint. In fact, in many cases, confinement and constraint is actually a means to liberation.” Tim Keller- The Reason for God (45)
The fundamental flaw lies in the fact that we are conditioned in culture to believe that we are free to begin with in this life. Scripture tells us differently in Ephesians 2:1, “we were dead in our sins and transgressions.” And that we were “slaves to sin”, before Christ redeemed us through his blood (Romans 6). This means that we start not in a position of entitled freedom, but in helpless slavery and death, from which we need to be rescued and brought to life. It is taught to us in culture that freedom is our right, something that we are entitled to, rather than an act of grace in our lives. Consequently we have very little understanding for the heart of the freedom that has been afforded for us by Christ.
Galatians 2:20- “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
The freedom that is ours to have and experience in the gospel is one that has boundaries. Culture would say that for it to have boundaries that the freedom is thus compromised and therefore not freedom at all. Yet we see it all the time in everyday life that boundaries can actually free you, rather than confine you. Look no further than Eric Clapton to see how the limitations and focus of a musician on a single instrument gave birth to a complete freedom within those bounds. The focus brought to an area allows one to develop freedom within that specific discipline to a degree that otherwise would go undeveloped had the “restriction” not been place. Therefore the conclusion that true “freedom” can only be had with no limits is to simple. In fact I would argue that the “freedom” of no limitations and its satisfaction is but a pale reflection of the satisfaction of expressing “full freedom” in a specific area.
Friends of mine joke that I made a deal, (I guess with God?) that I could be a great recreational athlete at any sport; the only catch was I could never be good enough in any of them to succeed on any platform higher than just basic recreation. I enjoy playing almost any sport, and can say with confidence (not arrogance) I’m pretty capable at most sports I apply myself to (barring golf, at which I suck, really, really suck.) Don’t get me wrong here, being able to “hang” in a variety of sports is a luxury that I don’t take for granted, but I would trade it all to be excellent in one sport, soccer. To excel, compete, and play soccer at the level I would like, would be worth trading in all other outlets and options. I realize that in one sense this would be limiting my freedom, but in another, exploding a new more “full freedom” that’s value would surpass the simple luxury of being a recreational sport chameleon.
This is not unlike the quote from the indigo girls I stated earlier and the heart of Galatians 5:1. It is in being “bound” to Christ, in loosing (dying to) our self, that we are found to be truly free, and as apart of his creation, under his redemptive movement, finally “fully human” and alive (Ephesians 2:4-5). I can see particularly in my marriage. Although I am limited now to being married to one woman, and therefore limited physically, spiritually, emotionally, and socially with the degree to which I can interact with other women, there is a depth of relationship that has been cultivated under this restriction (healthy desirous commitment) that would never be reached without it. The question that this leaves on the table and I believe is at the heart of biblical freedom is not the lessoning of the desire for a certain thing or scenario, but the willingness to be delayed in the receiving of these things, only accepting them in the timing and will of the Father, rather than living lives marked by anxious grasping for things that we “feel” we need in order to experience the freedom we desire.
Scripture tells us clearly that we are already free (Gal. 5). That there is nothing that I can gain (or loose for that matter) that can add to or lesson the freedom that is now mine in Christ Jesus. If this is true, then we must take honest assessment of our life patterns and see that the relentless pursuit of “more” is not really a pursuit of freedom, but often a deceptive slavery that sells itself to us as something better than what we already have. Often times we “buy in” and wake up down the road enslaved to something that told us if we just had this, then we would be free.
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