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Archive for the ‘Scripture’ Category

Autumn Babies

Posted in Scripture, tagged , , , , , , on July 3, 2012 | Leave a Comment »

Yesterday, I turned 26. It was magical. Song and dance, pizza and sugar, thoughtful gifts and a Cardinals victory over Colorado. Beautiful.

Being a summer baby all but guarantees that your birthday will be sweltering and/or muggy. It’s law. We were born as sweaty chub balls to a life of perpetual birthday heat. But it’s possible that we weren’t all born as summer babies. It’s possible that we were, all of us, born as autumn babies. Humanity may have been born in the fall. To quote Don Knotts in The Ghost and Mr. Chicken, “Let me clarify”.

“5 When no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up—for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground,6 and a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground— 7 then theLord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.” – Genesis 2:5-6 (English Standard Version)

Bear with me.

Some people read this bit of Scripture and think God installed some sort of miraculous irrigation system to water the whole planet. The word translated “land” in verse 5 could also be translated “earth”. Sometimes it does mean the earth as a whole (Gen.1:1-2). Sometimes it’s just talking about dry land (1:10). Sometimes it’s even talking about a certain region (2:11-13). How is the word used in the above quoted passage? Are we really talking about the whole earth or are we talking about a certain land?

In Palestine, it doesn’t rain. We’re had +100 degree heat in St. Louis the last week or so. It hadn’t rained in weeks. Imagine our joy, then, when a small thunderstorm snuck in yesterday evening to wring itself out over our sizzling city. It was wonderful. But in Palestine, the climate is much less merciful. The rains don’t really come until the autumn. That’s when you get a burst of plant growth.

So, the above quoted passage (Genesis 2:5-7) would make a fair bit of sense if it is describing a certain time of the year, a dry Middle Eastern summer where the plants aren’t growing in the land yet. The plants are missing here, not because they hadn’t been created, but because it hadn’t rained yet and there was no one to cultivate and irrigate the land. It’s all part of the rain cycle that God set up.

And in verse six, we see the mist (or rain cloud) rising up. The fog rolls in, bearing dew and moisture for the parched land. The rainy season has begun. And it is during the rainy season of autumn that God creates man and woman.

There are certain perks to being a summer baby. I can’t think of any right now, but use your imagination. I had a real nice birthday (with an official family celebration coming this Thursday). But as I read the text of Genesis, bearing in mind the original context, I lean with a certain seasonal slant. Am I 100% sure? Nope. But I’m roughly 96% sure. Some of us are summer babies. But all of us are autumn babies. That’s when God shaped humanity, pinching us off from the same piece of clay.

Maybe that’s why I’ve always liked autumn the best. Our birthday is coming. Autumn will rise up from the ground before we know it. But until then, enjoy the sweat and eat lots of ice cream.

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Why I’d Choose Aslan’s Country Over Heaven Any Day

Posted in Jesus, Scripture, The Arts, tagged , , , , , , , , on May 24, 2012 | 6 Comments »

A few years back, Dr. Jerram Barrs, a professor at Covenant Seminary, was speaking about the Narnia books at a Borders bookstore (remember those?). The store had been gracious enough to host the event and Dr. Barrs had drawn a large crowd, speaking about the Chronicles of Narnia and what they meant. At one point in the Q & A, a little boy stood up and said, “I don’t want to go to heaven! I want to go to Aslan’s country!”

I remember that story because that little guy’s desire was so right. In my favorite book in the series, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Reepicheep the mouse has this lifelong wish to see Aslan’s country, the land where Aslan came from, where Aslan’s father reigns supreme. And at one point in the book, Reepicheep says this:

“While I can, I sail east in the Dawn Treader. When she fails me, I paddle east in my coracle. When she sinks, I shall swim east with my four paws. And when I can swim no longer, if I have not reached Aslan’s country, or shot over the edge of the world in some vast cataract, I shall sink with my nose to the sunrise.”

Christians tend to get very excited about heaven. And that’s great. I’m sure heaven will be fantastic. But it seems to me that we’re missing something. The Bible is very clear: heaven is not our final destination.

People really want to know what heaven will be like. People are so desperate to know about it that they write books about the afterlife. I completely understand this motivation. Some people even go so far as to say they’ve died, gone there, and come back to tell us what our home will be like. But heaven is not our home. Heaven is merely the threshold.

But this reigning “heaven-is-the-ending” philosophy has a few problems.

1.) It leads to an “I’ll Fly Away” escapist mentality. The rationale goes something like this: This world is not my home. God will scrap it anyway. My job on earth is to grin and bear it until I die and then the real party starts. To quote Colin Hay, “I’m waiting for my real life to begin.”

2.) If heaven is the final destination for a Christian, then the Christian has no meaningful reason to take care of the earth. Oh sure, we should be good stewards of creation and we’re commanded to care for the earth. But because our citizenship is in heaven, I don’t really have a reason to recycle or fight pollution or save the whales. Heaven will be litter-free and THAT’S where I’m going.

3.) It just ain’t biblical.

I’ve already written about how I think God is not going to scrap the world and start over with a new one. But whether you agree with me there or not, the real biblical story does not end with all the saints floating up in heaven. It ends with a new sky and a new land, renewed and cleansed from all sin and death.

And upon that new earth, the holy city, new Jerusalem, will come down out of heaven to be the dwelling place of God among humanity. That old hymn “I’ll Fly Away” should really be about leaving heaven to come back down to our true, eternal home: the earth.

This is what C.S. Lewis was trying to get at with the idea of Aslan’s country. A real place with real walls and streets and trees and running water. That’s where the saints will live out eternity. You can read all about this in the Book of Revelation, chapters 21-22.

In the end, heaven will come down to subsume the earth with “the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel” (Rev.21:10-11). We will live out eternity here, on the earth-renewed, in Aslan’s country, bathing in the glory of the Emperor-Over-the-Sea. And he will dwell among his people and they shall reign forever and ever.

That is why I will sink with my nose to the sunrise. Because that’s my real home: this earth, cleansed from evil, wrapped in the Light of the glory of God. The promise of Aslan’s country.

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Therefore

Posted in Jesus, Scripture, tagged , , , , , , on March 22, 2012 | 1 Comment »

Inspired

The Bible is God’s word. It is inspired. That means that God is the ultimate author of the Bible, making it without error and absolutely true in all that it affirms. We get the idea of “inspiration” from 2 Timothy 3:16 where Paul says that all Scripture inspired (literally, “breathed out”) by God. This is not to say that God had a Bible sitting there, written by human authors, and decided to breathe on it like Aslan, thereby making it holy and inerrant. That’s the wrong picture. Rather, the Bible is the breathed out word of God. When God exhaled, Scripture came out. He didn’t breathe into the text. He breathed the text in existence. It is his word, not a human word injected with divine DNA. God breathed it out. That’s what we mean when we say “inspired”.

I bring this up because, not only do believe that the Bible is inspired, I believe the grammar is inspired. The syntax, the flow of argument, the grammar…God breathed it out. And the more tightly I hold to that seemingly irrelevant nuance, the more joy I get. Here’s what I mean.

I Am Not My Sin

In Romans chapter 7 (specifically verses 7-25), Paul has been talking about his personal struggle with trying to obey God. He is refreshingly honest and his experience matches mine to the T. Verse 15: “For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” Verse 19: “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.” That’s my situation. That’s every believer in Christ who is struggling to make war on their sin and love Jesus and obey him every day. I try to love and obey God and when I try, it backfires and I end up sinning, doing the very thing I hate more than anything in the world.

And not only that, when I try to do good, when I try to obey God, when I resolve in my heart to be holy, sin is right there waiting for an chance to slit my throat. Verse 21: “So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.” It is always there and it never sleeps. It always wants to dominate my life.

But Paul uses the pure beauty of logic here. Paul, in his mind (in the inner man) actually doesn’t want to sin. He wants to obey God. He wants to do good. The disobedience doesn’t flow from who he is on the inside. God has redeemed his soul. It’s not his redeemed self that wants to sin. It’s the sin that lives in him that wants to sin. “So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me” (verse 17). He doesn’t want to sin. “Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me” (verse 20).

The body of death (verse 24) that wages war against the law of Paul’s mind, taking him captive to the law of sin that dwelled in his body parts, does not define him. He is not his sin. I have that written on a sticky note on the visor in my car: “I am not my sin.” Is the sin still my responsibility? Absolutely. Just read Romans 8:13 (“by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body”). But the sin does not define me, just like Paul’s sin did not define him.

Why I Need This

This is so crucial and necessary for me to grasp. When I sin, I instantly go into a depressive tailspin. I’m wracked with guilt. I wallow in my own sinfulness. I forget that, even when I disobey God, I am still in Jesus Christ (see also Romans 6:1-14- notice all the “in Christ”, “into Christ”, “with him” language). That is still my position. Jesus is my identity, not my sin. And that is true when I sin and that is true after I sin.

And here’s where the God’s inspired grammar floods me with joy.

The Beauty of Therefore

After that last chunk of Romans 7, where Paul argues that he is not his sin, that he doesn’t want to sin even if his body wants to sin, we’re faced with a shocking reality. Paul begins Romans 8 by saying, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

I’ve heard that verse so many times growing up in church that it has honestly lost its punch. I hear it and I say, “yes and amen”, but I would still be crippled by guilt and condemnation after every crash and burn. And the reason is that I never heard it in context. I never heard it as a logical extension of the argument from chapter 7.

But that’s where the joy and freedom comes from! Paul says “therefore”. It’s just a little particle. Blink and you might miss it. But as I’ve dwelt on it, I can imagine Paul standing up, his body trembling with passion, pointing wildly back to Romans 7:25, and screaming, “THEREFORE!”

Paul is saying, “So then, consequently, as a logical inference, because of the fact that you are not your sin even when you do sin, even when you curl up into a ball of guilt and shame after you sin, because of that truth, there is now no condemnation for you who are in Christ Jesus.”

All I think I deserve is condemnation after I sin. All I think I AM is condemnation after I sin. When I fail so miserably (or when my day consists of a thousand subtle sins that build up like pus on a wound), I somehow believe, in my mind, “I am my sin”. And that crushes me to the ground under a weight of condemnation.

But Paul goes right back to my identity “in Christ Jesus”. He goes right back to the fact that it is sin that does what I don’t want to do. It’s not me. That’s not who I am anymore/ “I delight in the law of God in my inner being” (7:21). And that’s true because I’m in Christ, even while I struggle and make war on my sin that doesn’t want to obey and delight in God.

And notice that Paul also says the word “now”. Because of the fact that you are not your sin, there is now no condemnation. It is an immediate and an ever-present truth. So that when I sin, when I crash and burn in a pile of depression and guilt and shame, there is always an ever-present reality and truth concerning me: no condemnation.

The condemnation that I’m feeling is a trick, a dark slight of hand from the Evil One. It is not righteous conviction. It is the feeling that I am my sin, that I will never be used by God to do great things, that I am not good enough to serve him. And that is condemnation. And condemnation does not exist for someone who is in Christ Jesus. He is my identity, not my sin.

And just to squeeze more goodness from this verse (Romans 8:1), Paul says that there is now no condemnation for us. It’s a little bit tame in the English. The word is actually an adjective in the Greek and it means something like “not at all, huh-uh, not a bit, not in a million years, impossible, never gonna happen” no. It’s the same idea as in 1 John chapter one, where John says that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. Same concept. We are not our sin. Consequently, (THEREFORE) there is no condemnation in us at all.

You are not your sin. Therefore, there is no condemnation for you. You are in Christ Jesus. So get back up. Uncurl yourself from the fetal position you’ve been moping in. Stand up. And make war on the stubborn sin robs you of your joy. Go ahead. Make war.

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Filled in the Cracks

Posted in Jesus, Scripture, tagged , , , , , on October 30, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

I spent some time with Psalm 33 this morning. Sometimes a certain verse (or even just half a verse) sings that siren lullaby and I’m utterly smitten. Today, it was the second slice of verse 5: “the earth is full of the steadfast love of the LORD” (English Standard Version).

That phrase “steadfast love” enthralled me.

The New American Standard Version translates those words as God’s “lovingkindness”. In the New International Version, it is God’s “unfailing love”. The old King James renders it simply as God’s “goodness”. I love the way Eugene Peterson’s puts it. “Earth is drenched in God’s affectionate satisfaction” (The Message).

Hesed. The “h” is pronounced like the Scottish “loch”. Just cough a couple times and you’ll get it. Then emphasize the second syllable and you’ve got it. Hesed is the English transliteration of the Hebrew word for “steadfast love”. It’s the covenant love of God’s faithfulness to His people. It’s God’s “I’m-not-going-anywhere” love. No matter what we say, what we do, how far we stray, how heinously we sin, God has hesed for us. It is His loyal love. It is a deep, profound, indomitable affection.

And Psalm 33:5 says that the earth is filled with that kind of love. What does that mean?

Open your eyes.

Take a breath.

Sit still and listen.

Every beauty around you, every good thing that benefits you, every soul that cares for you. Those are bright parables of love. Those are striking expressions of the Lord’s hesed. Earth is drenched with it. That shagbark hickory tree that is growing right now in a quiet Colorado acre that no human eye will ever see? That is God’s hesed filling the earth. He is the Creator. He is faithful to His own handiwork. And when it comes to the souls He redeems through the blood of His Son…

Hesed. Faithful, loyal love. He is faithful to us because He is faithful to the blood of His Son. He loves us and has bought us for Himself, for His own good pleasure. That is the type of God we serve. That is the God who fashioned our hearts within the womb. And the earth is filled with that love. We need only look around and be grateful to remind ourselves of His love.

Look. Listen. Breathe. Every crack, every cradle, every canyon, every cold stream: proofs of His ever-faithful love. And He is ever faithful to us in that love.

Be aware.

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Sight and Sound

Posted in Scripture, The Arts, tagged , , , , , , , , on September 30, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

Wisdom From the Spleen

The hearing ear and the seeing eye, the Lord has made them both.

Every now and then, you come across a verse in the Bible that’s a spleen verses. It probably serves some purpose, but you’re not really sure what. And, in all honesty, if we didn’t have them, we wouldn’t lose anything. Or so it seems. People throughout history have actually cut spleen verses out of the Bible. Some people have seen entire books of the Bible as spleen books (I’m looking at you, Esther). No doubt, there are some lovely people who think the Scriptures as a whole are nothing more than a religious spleen.

But what’s the point of the verse above? It’s Proverbs 20:12. “Ah,” you say. “It’s a Proverb. So it’s supposed to be vague and pointless.” Well, let’s dive in first. Judge later.

Authorial Intent

I know what this proverb is not doing. It’s not paraphrasing the creation of Adam. If it is, it’s grossly reductionistic or severely misinformed. I have that nagging suspicion (the type I get when I KNOW there’s more coffee somewhere in the pantry) that this verse is saying something far more fundamental.

This verse has the potential to create a massive shift in perspective. If God made my ears and eyes, then he owns them by right of authorship. I am a copyrighted work. Therefore, they are not my ears and eyes. They belong to God. By ownership and authorship, they are his property.

This does not mean that I should cower in fear, blindfolded with my hands over my ears so as not to soil his gifts. “Oh, be careful little ears what you hear” is not the point. That will not do and it will make you paranoid and guilty all your life, Rather, I should respect God’s authorial intent. Why did he dream up my ears and my eyes? To glorify himself. That’s the intention. And that’s what I ought to be doing with them.

Gratitude as a Sixth Sense

How? Through gratitude. Seeing and hearing are marvelous miracles. I’ve been reminded of this the past couple months. Whether I’m at the art museum or looking up at the stars, I’m using the eyes God gave me. I could be listening to Bach’s “Mass in B Minor” or the laughter of my nephew. I’m using the ears God gave me.

Sight and sound are gifts from God. Once you become mindful that you are looking through God’s custom lenses, hearing through such exquisite stethoscopes, you cannot help but be brought to a posture of gratitude. A proper perspective of stewardship makes us thankful not only for what we see and hear, but that we see and hear. Be grateful now. They only wear down with age. And when you’re blind or you’re deaf, remember. Remember those years of wonder and music, conversation and beauty. Remember and be thankful. And if you believe in Christ, dream of hearing and seeing once again, in the new earth sublime.

Awareness as a Way to Obedience

It’s hard to put any proverb in a context. Sometimes, they just seem so desultory and disjointed. But if we appreciate the big picture, Proverbs 20:12 says something else about hearing and seeing. Throughout the book of Proverbs (and really, throughout ancient Scripture) “hearing” is associated with obedience. There’s a word from God, spoken or written, and we are to obey. Seeing, in this spiritual undertone, is a call to perceive and be aware of how God would have us glorify him.

Awareness is a crucial element lacking in the Way (Acts 9:2) these days. Perhaps if we looked and listened with a bit more thought and imagination, we would be happier on a deep, satisfying level.

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The World is a Blue Jay

Posted in Jesus, Scripture, tagged , , , , , , , , , on September 22, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

Blue in Green

It’s a good day when I can trot down to our local conservation area. Missouri is really lousy with birds, thank God. I had some time to murder yesterday, so I pulled into the visitor center to spy on some wildlife. Unfortunately, when I got to my favorite birding window, I found a yellow dragon dumping dirt, rolling up and downhill, and just generally making a mess. The construction will keep the birds away from those feeders until mid-October. Building a new water fountain or some such rubbish.

Anyway.

I took comfort in walking my favorite trail. Been meaning to invest in a good walking stick. And as hoped for, within five minutes, I was standing still, watching a small herd of white-tail deer pass by. They were within throwing distance, quiet as Elves in autumn. They were descending an embankment and keeping a casual eye on me as I watched them from the trail. After crossing the dried up creek, the deer ungracefully folded their legs beneath themselves and plopped down in the shade. Very noisy ploppers.

But my main joy was seeing a blue jay in the woods. Birds are fascinating. Blue jays are fascinatinger. They’re extraordinarily intelligent creatures. They communicate more than most birds. And they’re loud. Known as “the alarm of the forest”, these are the birds that keep screaming at you even if you’ve been in the woods for ten minutes. In fact, they’ll even imitate the screech of a hawk before coming to a feeder just to freak out the other birds and make them scatter. They’re one of the few birds that actually store up food for themselves.

But blue jays aren’t blue.

It’s true. They’re feathers don’t contain any blue pigment. What you see when you look at a blue jay is actually the refracted sun in their feathers casting a blue light. Photons from a class G star travel eight minutes through a vacuum, enter earth’s atmosphere and hit the jay’s feathers, distorting at just the right speed to produce that classic shade of blue. The blue jay is a mirror.

Calvin Is For the Birds

The world is a blue jay. This blue planet reflects and refracts light. But it also twists and turns and shows off a far brighter color. John Calvin describes Earth as a grand reflection, “the elegant structure of the world serving us as a kind of mirror, in which we may behold God, though otherwise invisible.” An elegant structure in which we may behold God? Calvin goes so far as to say that “wherever you turn your eyes, there is no portion of the world, however minute, that does not exhibit at least some sparks of beauty; while it is impossible to contemplate the vast and beautiful fabric as it extends around, without being overwhelmed by the immense weight of glory.”

Calvin is suggesting that “to contemplate the vast and beautiful fabric”, to see those “sparks of beauty” therein, is to behold the invisible God. Where does he get that?

Ps.19:1-6

 1 The heavens declare the glory of God,
   and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
2Day to day pours out speech,
   and night to night reveals knowledge.
3There is no speech, nor are there words,
   whose voice is not heard.
4 Their voice goes out through all the earth,
   and their words to the end of the world.
In them he has set a tent for the sun,
 5 which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber,
   and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy.
6Its rising is from the end of the heavens,
   and its circuit to the end of them,
   and there is nothing hidden from its heat.

Speech without words. Declaration without voice. This is one of God’s revelations to humanity. This blue jay in space bends the light and shows off the aim for which it was created: to tell of God’s glory. With stunning splendor does “creation exhibit so many bright lamps lighted up to show forth the glory of its Author” (Calvin, again). Knitted by the fingers of God, this ball spins on a tilt, revolving and rotating and screaming like a blue jay: “CREATED BY GOD!”

Christ, the Color of True

But it is only a revelation to show off the Author. A revelation to save us from the cold brokenness of sin had to come in the form of Christ. The Incarnation, that marvelous footstep of bliss, was light come to earth. And the light brought a sleeping bag and stayed a while. He gave his own pigment to the earth, so that we here could actually be his color. We wouldn’t go on just refracting a distant weight of glory. Since Christ came, he made it possible to share in the color we had merely been refracting.

Through the color and substance of Christ, the image of the invisible God, the blue jay can finally become blue. And in that, we truly “show forth the glory of the Author”. I can’t prove it, but I think that’s why God made blue jays. They’re loud, beautiful, bright parables of who we are and what we were made to be. Only through Christ can we achieve our intention. Only through faith in Jesus can we partake of that lovely hue of life.

P.S.

For those who read this blog, I have to apologize. I’ve been historically neglectful in updating lately. I had a good run for a while. Not sure if I’ve announced it on this platform, but I have a children’s book that is on the virtual cusp of publication. The last word I received from the editor was “almost there”. Pins and needles, really. So, that’s why I haven’t been writing so much here. I’ve been writing, but I’ve been writing new stories and outlining new books. Still, I’ll very much try to keep this blog going. I enjoy it. And I enjoy y’all. Very much.

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The Woodchuck Parable

Posted in Scripture, tagged , , , , , , , , on September 2, 2011 | 2 Comments »

A Woodchucker’s Guide to Rewards (or The Joy of Woodchuck Watching)

One of the nice things about my city is the woods. There are so many parks, reservations, and trails to lose yourself in. There’s a quiet corner of myself that comes alive in moments of absolute stillness. Sometimes those moments find me under a blanket, reading a book by flashlight. But if I’m feeling particularly Tolkienesque, I’ll go for a walk in the woods.

Just last week, I found a new park, one that seems to have folded itself out from under the rug. I had never seen it before. And in ten minutes of being the only trail-wanderer, I saw five deer. And I instantly fell in love with it. Glorious. But my favorite spot of solitude is a parking lot in a state conservation area. I go there on Wednesday around dusk. With the sun scattering gold across the treetops, I park my car, turn off the engine and wait.

And wait.

And wait.

And then, after ten minutes of silent staring, I see it. One twitching, frightful, fidgeting nose pokes up out of the hole. It sniffs the air. Then, slowly, with fear and trembling, the woodchuck crawls out from underneath the butterfly bush and out into the field. And I have a ringside seat.

Within twenty minutes, there’re ten woodchucks lolloping around the field, tripping in and out of their holes, flopping down next to a tasty patch of whatever white flowers they munch. I don’t know if you’ve observed a lot of woodchucks in your time, but when they run, they are absolutely hysterical. Imagine your pillow covered in fur. Now imagine that pillow trying to gallop across a field. It’s like that. Graceful as a sack of peanuts.

I love these moments. I get warm by them. Do you know what I mean? Maybe this is me speaking as introvert, but I think it can be appreciated by everyone. Humans are terrified to be in a quiet room with themselves (Pascal taught me that), but the reward of all that waiting is simply marvelous. And they’re just adorable as snot, honestly. Cute, awkward little critters. Nature’s toddlers, really.

The Joy of Waiting for the Lord

But in order to see it, you have to get quiet, become still, and wait. And it’s the waiting around that kills me. I’ve recently noticed just how much the Bible talks about waiting. More specifically, waiting for the Lord. Let me tell you what this does not mean. I’m no scholar, but I’m 99.7% sure waiting for the Lord does not entail this:

“Tropical Twist Trident? Or Regular Trident? What to choose…I shall wait for the Lord before I make this decision. Let me just hunker down on my prayer rug here and be still. I shouldn’t be so hasty in passing judgment without first waiting to hear from the Lord.”

Now, to be fair, that is a big decision. But any sane person knows that Tropical Twist Trident is the only gum worth chewing. I mean, come on folks.

But that’s not what the Bible means when it talks about “waiting for the Lord”. I was looking at all the instances where this concept comes up just in the Psalms (and you can too!): Psalms 25:3, 5, 21; 27:14; 31:24; 33:20; 37:7, 9, 34; 39:7; 40:1; 52:9; 62:1,5; 69:3; 130:5, 6.

There it is. Wait for the Lord. Why? So that he can tell you what decision to make? So that you can feel more spiritual? So that you can said you did something “mystical” and freak out your fundamentalist friends? Look at it again. Wait for the Lord.

He is the Reward for Waiting

I waited to see that woodchuck clan (or whatever the appropriate family term is), and what was the reward for my waiting? I got to see woodchucks. Why does the Bible speak prescriptively and descriptively about waiting for the Lord? So that you will get the reward of the Lord. God is his own reward. He’s worth waiting for. He’s worth being still and talking with. He’s worth opening the pages of ancient Scripture and seeing the glory of his own radiance. He’s worth communing with on that deep, sweet level.

“One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to meditate in his temple.” (Ps.27:4)

Dwell. Rest. Be calmed. Wait. And from the depths of those ancient words, you will gaze upon the beauty of the Lord. So says David. And that’s what God taught me through the woodchuck parable.

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Teachable, Unteachable

Posted in Scripture, tagged , , , , , , , on August 31, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

Young, Dumb, and Unteachable

I’m a teacher by nature. I’m gifted that way. I think that way. I even majored in music education. I have this need to write and I have to pour out what I’m learning in some capacity. Otherwise, my head explodes. And it’s gross. That’s why I have a blog. That’s why I meet with younger guys. That’s why I give permission to older guys to pour wisdom into me. I love to learn.

So it’s no shock that one of the most frustrating traits I find in other people is unteachability. If a person is not teachable, I’m immediately put off by them. In fact, sometimes I’ll just write them off as idiots. Allow me to disclose the workings of my wicked mind. Grab some popcorn.

I’ll have coffee with another guy and we’ll be chatting. Let’s say I’m a few years older than him. Life’s kicked me around a bit more than it has him. Life’s been pretty easy on him so far. But I’ve got more scars and so consequently, I’ve learned more. More mistakes usually equals more lessons learned. Let’s also say that I’ve sat through a theology class or two, took some good notes, and came out the other end wiser for it. And this younger guy just isn’t there yet. And that’s fine.

And so, he asks me for some advice on a particular issue in his life. He’s been gracious enough to give me permission to speak into his life. I care about the guy and I want to see him grow. So, I open my Bible and I show him a principle that speaks clearly to his issue and I give him my advice. And he throws it all back in my face. What’s my first reaction? Anger.

Just Wanna Fight

This little situation is not hypothetical. It’s happened to me more than a few times. It happens to other guys I know. I did it a lot when I was younger, stupider and hotter under the collar. God’s still calming those fires, but for a while all I wanted was an angry gorilla to argue with…all the time. I was absolutely pugnacious and nobody was ever right except me. I’ve always had a problem with authority and even today, if I don’t think your reasons are good enough, I won’t listen to you. I have to fight that. It’s my natural bent.

I’m just naturally unteachable. I struggle with that arrogance and I fight to seek wisdom. It’s a daily thing for me. And that’s why I immediately detect it in other people. It’s probably why I’m drawn to other naturally unteachable people. I recognize myself in it and I want to help them get out of that mindset. That’s what the frustration is born out of.

Friendship With the Teacher

And so I’ve been amazed lately to see in Scripture just what kind of a teacher God is. He is the master teacher and he seeks teachable people. Psalm Twenty-Five talks about God as a teacher. It’s remarkable stuff.

Verse 4- “Make me to know your ways, O Lord; teach me your paths”. Verse 5- “Lead me in your truth and teach me”. Verse 8- “He instructs sinners in the way”. Verse 9- “He leads the humble in what is right”.

Verse 12 is the kicker for me. This is the verse that grabbed me by the throat and throttled me into submission the other night. “Who is the man who fears the Lord? Him will He instruct in the way that he should choose.“

How does God gauge teachability? By whether or not a person fears Him. The fear of the Lord creates a humble person. And “the friendship of the Lord is for those who fear him” (verse 14). David understood that if you want to be taught by God (a concept that beggars the imagination), you must learn to see Him as the massive, omnipotent, omniscient, all-satisfying, Lord of the Universe. The bigger your view of God (that is, the more your view of God matches up with the reality of the Bible), the more you will experience a reverential awe at owning a friendship with the glorious, majestic, all-wise Triune God.

That breeds teachability. That sets a person on the paths of the Lord. And “all the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness, for those who keep his covenant and his testimonies” (verse 10).

A word of encouragement to my older, wiser friends: don’t give up on those frustrating young, dumb, unteachables. Remember, you were once just like that. And God doesn’t give up on His students. You’re still being taught by Him.

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Creation Poems

Posted in Jesus, Scripture, The Arts, tagged , , , , , on August 23, 2011 | 1 Comment »

Good Poems and Bad Poems

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” - Ephesians 2:10

I’ve been enchanted with this verse ever since I first heard it explained. The word “workmanship” is the Greek word poeima (ποιημα). It simply means “that which has been made”. We get our English word “poem” from this word. We are God’s work. This refers to an act of creation, a work of God. There’s an aspect of artistry to this word.

Growing up in the youth group, whenever I heard this verse preached, I would always look around the room and wonder who the good poems were and who the bad poems were. Yeah, I was a jerk. The kid who wanted to be a missionary was probably a Shakespeare sonnet. The one on the end of the row picking his nose was like a Shel Silverstein verse.  That one in the back, making out with his girlfriend? Definitely something twisted. Like an E.E. Cummings poem or the lyrics to a Nine Inch Nails song.

New Creation Poems

But then I actually started to look at the verse. Paul’s not talking about humans as individual masterpieces, walking around like poetry on the streets. How does Paul qualify the creation? We are God’s ποιημα created in Christ. We only become new creations if we are created in Christ. We only become new works of art if we are composed within the rhyme and meter of Jesus.

2 Corinthians 5:17 puts it this way: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” It’s not that the old creation was not valuable. Scripture teaches that humanity apart from Christ does have worth by virtue of God’s authorship. God created people. Therefore, people have value.

But the old creation is dead in sin (Eph.2:1), held captive to Satan (Eph.2:2), and an object of God’s wrath (Eph.2:3). The new creation (the poeima) is in Christ Jesus, created for good works, and predestined by God for a life of good.

Christ, the Master Poet

Being in Christ makes us new creations. It is only because of our relationship to Jesus that we become God-crafted works of art (yes, that still sin and are still being worked on). So, Christianity is anything but a straight jacket.

You don’t read poetry because you have to (or at least, you shouldn’t read it for that reason). You read poetry because it is beautiful and because it wonderful and soaring and heart-wrenching and deep and glorious. That is the nature of poetry.

Likewise, when God revises you and makes you a new creation poem, you don’t find the meter and rhyme of Christ to be confining. Rather, it is only in that relationship to Him that you find true freedom and pleasure. I wish more Christians (myself included) better understand that freedom to enjoy who are in Christ. Perhaps then we could banish the myth of straight-jacket-spirituality that has attached itself to Christianity.

If you are in Christ, you are the unique craft of a Master Poet.

If you are not in Christ, you are missing out on the real poetry of existence. And I badly want you to know it.

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Oh, God of Jacob

Posted in Scripture, tagged , , , , on August 22, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

“Oh God let us be/a generation that seeks/seeks your face/Oh, God of Jacob.” That’s the chorus of one of my favorite worship songs. I remember singing that in the packed basement of the K-Life house, all sweat and devotion. I was reminded of that song this morning while reading Psalm 20. David says “may the name of the God of Jacob protect you!” (verse 1). That’s actually a particular phrase in Scripture. Often you’ll hear God referred to as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. But sometimes, the biblical writers will just call him “the God of Jacob”.

Is there any special significance to that? Well, it’s the Bible. So…yes.

Jacob has a particularly terrifying and crazy experience with the living God in Genesis 32. You can read all about it. It’s basically krav maga before krav maga was cool. Jacob and his family are on the run from his brother Esau (because Jacob’s an idiot and endangers everybody he loves) and in a moment of rare courage, Jacob sends his family ahead and waits to meet Esau. This is literally how the story reads in Genesis 32.

“And Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day.” It’s like watching a Tarantino movie. It just randomly shifts into something shocking and unexpected. It’s supposed to read that way. Long story short, it’s later revealed to him that Jacob was wrestling with God as a man. I would actually argue he wrestled with the pre-incarnate Christ. The point of the story is that Jacob would not let God go unless he blessed Jacob. And in the end, Jacob gets blessed.

Did Jacob strong-arm God into submission? That was never a possibility. God obviously could’ve annihilated Jacob just by flexing. As a display of power, God merely touches Jacob’s hip and the joint becomes dislocated. God could’ve utterly smashed Jacob to shards. But he wanted to see what Jacob would do to receive a blessing. He wanted to see if Jacob would wrestle and seek. How badly did he want an answer from God.

That’s what David meant in Psalm 20. As Jacob said, “I will not let you go until you bless me”, so David says “may the God of Jacob protect you”. It’s that association. In verse 4, he says, “May he grant you your hearts desire and fulfill all your plans!” Verse 5: “May the Lord fulfill all your petitions!” Very quickly, it must be said: these are not genie verses. These do not validate the religious equation of selfishness. Do you know what I mean?

My desire = to have object A. My prayer = a guaranteed invocation to attain object A. Therefore, my desire + my prayer = God giving me the things I want because I asked him to. That’s how a genie works. That’s not the way the God of the universe works.

The context and entirety of Psalm 20 must be observed. A heart that worships God (verse 3) will not seek to use God as a means to an end. And in the context of this psalm, the heart’s desires and the plans to be fulfilled are pleas for deliverance and blessing. They are prayer/pleas out of a worshiping heart that God would look on with favor.

So, the question I ask my heart is this: will I seek God like Jacob? Will I trust in a God who will answer (verse 6) or will I turn to other, lesser functional saviors (verse 7)? Will I wrestle and not let God go until he blesses me, until I receive an answer (even if it’s not the answer I want). This is a challenge to my decaf, cold coffee prayer life. This is a challenge to my lack of zeal, my dusty American heart.

Wrestle. Seek. Ask big things. Ask small things. He is the God of Jacob. And:

“Such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob” (Psalm 24:6).

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