A bruised reed, he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not quench until he brings justice to victory.
As long as you have life, you have value. Jesus will pursue you, longing for you to pursue him, until you breathe your last.
Tag Archives: Repent
The Road Less Travelled
We’ve reached a dangerous point in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is about to bring up subjects like murder, adultery, making promises, revenge, and loving your enemies….prepare your toes for a good stomping.
Matthew 5:21-48 (paraphrased using my words)
Jesus starts off agreeably enough with his thoughts on murder. He says it something like this, “You know the old law, do not murder because whomever commits murder will face judgement”; I can hear an “Amen” echoing in unison. But…..”I say, if you’re so much as angry with your brother, you’re just as guilty.” (and the crowd goes silent)
As if that wasn’t enough to silence even the most honorable person, Jesus continues……
“Don’t bother leaving God any offerings when you are angry, settle your drama first.”
“You’ve been told to remain faithful to your spouse and not to commit adultery. In God’s eyes, if you even look on another with lustful fantasies, you’re guilty. (this is where the men start to turn and leave) What can you do about it, you ask? If your eye causes you to sin, leading you to salivate over another person, real or virtual (1.e. porn), take a sharp object and gouge it out! If your hands cause you to sin…….let your imagination run wild there………cut it off! It’d be better to lose an appendage than to lose your soul!”
Now many are thinking, “Dude, lighten up!” HA! Jesus continues…..
“You’ve heard about divorce. Just issue the proper paperwork, sign the dotted line and you’re in the clear. (Shaking his head) Anyone who divorces for any reason other than sexual unfaithfulness makes her an adulterer, and anyone who re-marries after a divorce is committing adultery!”
“You’ve been taught not to swear falsely. I say don’t swear at all! Just keep your word and no oaths are needed!”
“You live by the principle ‘an eye for an eye’, this is wrong. If someone steals from you, give them more. If someone slanders you, don’t get defensive. Let you silence inspire you to an even higher level of integrity so the offending party proves themselves the fool.”
“You’ve heard to love your friends and hate your enemies?! Love your enemies and pray for your persecutors. Even the bottom-feeders in your culture know how to love their friends.”
Jesus caps off this portion of the sermon with a little tongue-in-cheek statement directed toward the most self-righteous in the audience and, as I imagine, spoken with a slight chuckle, “Do you want to please God? Be perfect, just like he is perfect.”
I expect the sheer volume of the tension in the air drowned out any lingering noise still resonating from the crowd.
It would be a mistake to read these words and return to your routing thinking God expects nothing less than absolute perfection from you. Does he demand it? Yes. But He knows you better than that. Perfection is not the finish line of this race we’re running, it is the bar we can never reach on our own. The sermon on the mount was spoken to highlight our inadequacy and draw out that tension from trying to be “god enough” for God.
I pulled inspiration from several sources for today’s drawing. First, I’ve been on a fantasy kick from reading the Chronicles of Narnia with my boys and The Lord of the Rings on my own, today’s setting is like a crossroads where Frodo may choose to enter the dark forest or take a rocky, mountainous path. Mt second influence is Robert Frost’s poem, The Road Not Taken. A more obvious inspiration, I depict the yellow wood (in black and white) with a path that divides in two, one route obviously more traversed than the other. The path to the left leads into a circle, marked with a sign “Purgatory Mountain”. Some friends of mine recently hiked a mountain named Purgatory and took photos of a sign at the summit of their hike which notified hikers they had reached then end of the trail and to return the same way they came. I jokingly asked them if moving forward would lead in to a perpetual “figure 8″ trail from which hikers cannot escape? That is the trail I am showing on the right, a perpetual cycle of try hard – do good – fail in an attempt to please God. One path leads out of this cycle, but leads to the impassable jagged rocks. Taking this route means admitting your inadequacy and submitting a cry for help. As the light reaches through the cracks of the rocks, help will come.
I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.
Zombie Faith
Our third week of the City on a Hill series continues dissecting the Sermon on the Mount, tackling some increasingly touchy subjects as we keep digging deeper. Our main topic of discussion today was ‘Fulfillment of the Law’ with all the connotations and insinuations it entails. Matthew 5:17-20, I have not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it.
In this segment of his message, Jesus is speaking directly to the outwardly religious in the crowd. This is the leading issue that caused such violent back-lash by the religious elite in Jerusalem. Jesus is publicly calling them out for their hypocrisy. Our chosen manner of reception as we read the Bible brings us to a crossroads where we can choose the path of the righteous elite or the path of Jesus. Dean laid this out to us in a way I had not heard before, contrasting prescriptive reading with descriptive reading. A prescription provides a black and white solution to a problem; to get ‘A’ one must do ‘B’. Reading the Bible as a prescription for salvation interprets Jesus’s words as a set of minimum guidelines every individual must stay within. As a result of living life between these lines, you are in right standing with God on your day of judgement. Prescriptive reading leads to a self-righteous world-view. Donald Miller communicated a most excellent description of self-righteousness in a Storyline blog post last week; “When people are self-righteous, they are not getting their sense of righteousness from themselves. They’re getting it from you.” Self-righteous, prescriptively religious people evaluate their self-worth by comparing themselves to everyone else. “At least I’m not living like Bob over there, God must really be happy with me.” or “I’m not as good as Chuck, I need to spend more time at church.” Neither attitudes are spiritually productive, much less attractive to those still searching for their faith.
Descriptive reading converts the external interpretation of Jesus’s teaching as a checklist into an introspective evaluation to better oneself into becoming the person Jesus describes. The clearer the image Jesus paints for us becomes, the more we realize it is a life no human can ever attain. The righteousness God requires is an ultimate impossibility for the created human, at least unobtainable on our own.
Righteousness is not a status determined by what we do, we must also take into account our motives for doing. Your attempts at being kind to strangers is good, but is not righteous without a genuine concern for the person that outweighs your ego-boost from being kind. As we’ll read in the coming weeks; hate (on any level and toward any person), jealousy (again, of anyone or anything), lust (that buzz you get around that guy or girl this culture mis-defines as ‘love’. Put a ring on it or get away), entertaining any of these attitudes is a blemish on our righteousness. God is perfect, requiring everything in his presence to be also perfect. The smallest blemish puts you on the black-list…….unless. Jesus. Jesus is our mediator, standing in our place before God. He accepts all of our bruises and blemishes so that we are accepted into God’s kingdom as sons and daughters. Jesus is the wall of righteous we pass through, coming out clean on the other side.
My inspiration for today’s drawing is actually a painting concept I tossed around more than a year ago. Self-righteous people, like the Pharisee leaders Jesus’s word convicted, look normal (at the least) on the outside, but are rotting at their core. They work to hide their sin by preaching (hollering) against the very things they do behind closed doors. Tying that person in with the Tinkerbell salvation experience from last week’s post and the resulting image is of a spiritual zombie. Where a “real” zombie walks the earth with an insatiable appetite for brains, spiritual zombies hunger for minds, yours and mine. The more minds they can add to their conversion record, the more righteous they become. Their goal is strictly numbers, once they take a bite of your mind, you are counted as their spiritual property and the responsibility to live up to their standards is yours to fail.
Spiritual zombies are ingrained with a dogma that they must prove their own righteousness by disproving yours. They are quick to point out faults, boisterously preach the “right” ways to live and worship, then quickly disappear when their true state of equal broken-ness appears. The first appendage to decay on these zombies are their ears. They recoil and strike at the first hint of questioning or disagreement, refusing to hear any argument that does not echo their own position. Real zombies act on hunger instinct alone, travelling in herds to the next source of brains. Spiritual zombies lack the ability to think for themselves as long as their zombie-ism persists. As time progresses, lack of communication and stunted growth leads to cannibalism. When no “unrighteous” people are within striking distance, the self-righteous minds must turn to consuming each other, competing for the title of most-righteous.
But there is hope. Jesus, through his life and sacrifice, changed the barrier of the law from a wall in which we face-plant into a membrane we can freely permeate and come through cured. Recognizing the righteous person Jesus describes as our baseline model is himself, a level we can never obtain without his covering, righteousness becomes an lifestyle to live because of, not one to live for. When we live because of the righteous status Jesus has already raised us to, our hands are ready to serve, our eyes look for opportunities, and our ears are open to listen.
A figure has collapsed on the right of the drawing, as zombie that has been cured by Jesus’s righteous membrane. He lays out his hands, submitting to his inadequacy and the guidance of the gospel; his ears having grown back into operable place.
He who has an ear, let ‘em hear. – best recited by Bob Clyde during a Revelation study in the BSU at ECU
I’ve Been Working on the Railroad
What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I mention work? Do you think of sweat and strenuous exercise? Pride may be the inspired emotion in some, pride in their position and their productivity. Others react the opposite, feeling abhorrent toward their place of employment; discouraged by the thought of another business day. God did not intend work to be something we dread, much less avoid. As we saw last week, God created work when he created man. God placed Adam and Eve in Eden and told them to cultivate the rest of the earth by the garden’s example; he created work as an avenue to worship. The fall changed our perception of working from being a voluntary way to worship God to an inescapable form of punishment.
Men, in particular, walk a fine line between being defined by their work and defining themselves through their work. If you compare the average hours a man spends at work versus quality time spent at home with his family (taking into account time to sleep) in a single work day, his priorities seem vastly disproportionate. For most, however, quitting to devote all your time to being at home with the family is not an option. Even if you left the day job, own your home out-right, and grow or hunt your own food, there’s still work required to survive. Having to work is not where men get in trouble, the problem is being defined by your work. Our identity, as men and women, is not defined by our position, but rather in a person. Once we begin to define ourselves by what we do or how well we produce, we hand over the reigns of our emotional well-being to the one we’re producing for. This only brings disappointment and frustration when the boss who is impressed by your productivity responds by raising the bar a little higher. Happiness at one’s job is determined by a combination of the work environment and apparent value in the job. When intrinsic value is extrinsically dependent, happiness is a volatile subject because it depends on the day. Belonging to Jesus frees the supervisor from self-importance and the supervised from self-pity. Finding intrinsic value by realizing the One who made you is pleased even when your best efforts fall short attains the freedom to work hard and work well without the yoke of insurmountable expectations. When our work becomes part of our worship, our job becomes a joy. We tend to divide things that are secular from things that are sacred. We forget we are created beings working to please our Creator; everything is sacred!
Ephesians 6:5-9 teaches us the attitude we should adopt to find joy, but keep our priorities straight, in our jobs. The first word in verse 5 is most accurately translated as ‘bondservants’. In the first century, a bondservant was a person who worked for another and was compensated as a result. Sound familiar? Paul goes on to encourage bondservants to work not to be seen or as people-pleasers, but as if their work was directly for Christ. He then changes his focus to the masters, imploring them to lead fairly, knowing their employees are working for Christ, not for them.
In my life since college, I had to learn a lesson about work that specifically relates to what Christians label their “calling”. God calls people to do certain things and have certain attitudes. Many young Christians believe determining their specific calling in life is a prerequisite to selecting a career, as I was. Believing this way leads to a lot frustration, a constant search for greener pastures, and extended college careers. So much effort goes toward finding our elusive “calling”, we procrastinate ourselves into what we fear most, insignificance. Paul encourages us in Colossians 3:23 to do what we do well, as if it is for God, no matter what it is we’re doing. Our “calling” is to a life of excellence, consistently serving our God through loving people, our way of making a living is of less significance to Him than our efforts toward doing the job well. Calling does not equate to career.
Today’s drawing has several levels. The background is a black and white swirl. The description of the relationship between master and bondservant inspired this swirl, the colors never mixing but pushing each other in the circular motion instead. I initially thought of drawing a long, flat road that disappeared into the center of the swirling background. I was not happy with this imagery because most roads carry traffic in both directions. The sign along the road reads, ‘The Way – Keep Following’, encouraging travellers to stay the course despite the road getting rough. That’s when a song from my childhood came to mind, I’ve Been Working on the Railroad. Eureka! I left the road sign, but changed the asphalt road to a railway; unquestionably a one-way path and much more demanding on the workers who construct it! The railroad track disappears into a shining light that blends the master and bondservant together, the light at the end of the tunnel.
Work well, fearing God more than man.
Gospel Stockholm Syndrome
Stockholm syndrome – a paradoxical psychological phenomenon in which hostages express empathy and positive feelings toward their captors, sometimes to the point of defending them.
For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. Galatians 5:1
Our study of Paul’s letter to Galatia has shown he wrote to plainly lay out the Gospel of Christ and clear up the muddy theology that had corrupted this church. In chapter 5, Paul is warning these followers that they have let themselves become enslaved by religious legalism and turned to embrace their captor. We must be careful not to fall into the same trap. We can easily allow ourselves to embrace a gospel that takes small tastes of Jesus and twists them into a strict set of rules instead of simply loving others. Like a victim who falls in love with their kidnapper, we can experience a Gospel Stockholm Syndrome, vehemently defending the twisted theology we’ve been taught to accept as truth when faced with the real truth of Jesus’s desire for our hearts.
Today’s drawing visualizes Stockholm Syndrome. A figure falls to one knee to embrace the standing figure made of chains. Chain-linked tentacles slither from the standing figure to wrap around the kneeling figure, entrapping him in his embrace, turning his offer of affection into submission into slavery.
If you have fallen victim to this captivity of your mind, know you can break those chains. Let go of your captor by loving people, starting with yourself. Embrace the freedom offered to you through the Gospel and you will be free.
Those who’ve avoided being tangled in a web of insatiable legalism, it is your responsibility to lead others to freedom by loving them out.
Justified & Adopted
Over the last three weeks we’ve learned how we are justified through our faith in Christ alone. One would think justification is the pinnacle of the Christian faith. Today’s focus tops it.
I have several friends who have either adopted a child or are in the process of adopting. In his book “Outlive Your Life”, Max Lucado quotes the number of the world’s orphans is less than the number of families in America that call themselves Christian. He then poses the question, “Why are there still orphans?” Our culture takes a cynical approach adoption, which then affects our perception of the Gospel.
Do you have any children of your own?
You already have ___ children, why adopt?
These kinds of questions are extremely offensive to adoptive parents and degrading to the child.
Or the family introductions that go something like this: meet my adopted child so-and-so. Teaching the young mind they are lesser than a “real” child because they don’t have your DNA.
One thing I have learned through my friends who’ve adopted is this, biology doesn’t dictate parenthood. When it comes right down to it, we’re all adopted. God entrusts experienced souls (parents) with rookie earth-dwelling souls (children). The transaction occurring through copulation doesn’t make someone more of a parent and an adoption agent won’t make someone any less of a son or daughter. We are all adopted.
The same is true in spiritual anthropology. We are justified through our faith in Christ, but that faith also makes us adopted children of God. For in Christ, you are all sons of God, through faith (Galatians 3:26). We have an open invitation to approach God intimately. We do not have to communicate through a priest, Jesus is our mediator. It does not matter how we look or how we’ve failed, there are no rituals to navigate through to reach God. We are simply free to cry “Abba, Father” and embrace our heavenly dad.
Originally a slave to sin, Jesus justified us through his death and Resurrection. By faith, our Judge passes an innocent verdict despite our failures being sufficient evidence to convict us. He then steps down from the judge’s bench, walks toward the defense table with His eyes affixed on ours, then passionately embraces us as He whispers in our ear “Child. You’re home.”
So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. Galatians 4:7
