What kind of good works?

June 23, 2025

Maria Good works, John 6, Spiritual Growth, Titus 2 , , , 2 Comments

[Jesus] gave himself for us . . . to purify for Himself a people for His own possession who are zealous for good works.

Titus 2:14 ESV

My colleague who volunteers with me on Tuesday mornings overflows with love, desiring “to do good works.” Her large and soft heart embraces those unacquainted with Jesus’ good news. But her husband doesn’t yet share this passionate zeal. She mourns this reality. Seeing other couples aligned and serving God together pains her.

Paul wrote to Titus about  these “good works” prepared by God for us to do. But just what did he have in mind? Looking to the Gospel of John, we read:

What must we do, to be doing the works of God? . . . This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent. John 6:28–29 ESV

My friend who is drawn to helping others would likely respond, “I already DO believe in Him!” True, but the Greek word for believe means to trust, to “en-trust all things to Jesus as Lord.” What Jesus is calling for is a handing over of all that concerns us. For my friend, this includes her husband’s spiritual journey. 

It could be, and this is just a conjecture, that until she actually believes that Jesus has got this, the situation might not change. Jesus might just think it best FIRST to grow HER unequivocal confidence in Him. And then grow her husband.

Act as if…..

May 23, 2024

Maria Colossians 3, Covenants, Faith, Holy Spirit, Kingdom of God, Psalm 23, Spiritual Growth, Spiritual Practice, Truth , , , , , , 1 Comment

“Assume a virtue, if you have it not.”  Hamlet to his mother

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Colossians 3:12 NIV

Cousin Terry recommended a book written by Malcolm Smith entitled, The Power of the Blood Covenant. Yesterday morning I read from the chapter about walking in the Spirit.  The author’s premise (which tracks with the Bible) is that if we have the Spirit of Christ in us, then we are entitled to and have free access to ALL the covenant promises, rights and responsibilities that Jesus won for us.

How does that work?  I’m so thankful for the Gospel of John. In so many places, Jesus mentions that he himself is IN us and that we live IN him. Furthermore, he explains that he and the Father are one. The problem is that we don’t feel as though any of this is true.

I don’t sense the Spirit of God in me. I don’t see God’s wisdom, strength, power, peace, love, joy in me. But the Bible asserts that these are indeed mine to use since the Holy Spirit, the helper, lives in me.

As I was pondering our position vis-à-vis God and all the benefits that we are not to forget, I pictured a medieval walled city.  Imagine with me the lord or king of this city-state going out alone to make a peace treaty with a stronger and good monarch.  Our leader, our representative meets all the treaty stipulations. He accomplishes all the seemingly impossible feats of courage and self-control that are necessary to accomplish this ruler’s unheard-of standards. He does what none of us, his people, would dare or could do. 

Why not one of us?  The truth is, no one is worthy, nor are we equipped. Neither are we in a representative role to do our fellow citizens any good. But he is.

After signing the treaty agreement with his blood, he rides back victoriously with the good news.  We now belong to the most kind and powerful ruler in all creation and have been granted the privileges of his kingdom. Our life, our status has changed forever. It is a done deal. And we didn’t have to do anything. We just have to believe and stay in the Kingdom.

Immediately we notice a new flag has been hoisted and we are issued new clothes in different colors from the drab rags we wore.  With gratitude we dress ourselves in the same clothes as our new Over-Lord. As we are taught about all the changes to our status and the freedom from fear we have been given, we also learn a curious fact about our own city-state king. Even though officially co-equal with the Over-King, he submits to him.

Next we receive instruction and homework about how to act, how to treat others. We are to watch our own king and learn from him how citizens in this new government are expected to conduct themselves. Love, kindness, charity, forgiveness, humility are the new attributes we are to live into.

As we dress ourselves in our new clothes, we see different kinds of provisions being stockpiled for each individual citizen. We no longer have to worry about being defenseless against the many foes who come up against us. We are free to use new weapons to resist the enemy.

But we don’t feel different than we had the previous day, before our status changed.

This is a faint but inadequate picture of our position as those who belong to Christ.  We have been given ALL the gifts of the Kingdom of Heaven. Right now.  Along with the expectations of how to operate.

But if we don’t dress ourselves with the clothes of the Kingdom, we are in effect living as though we were mere mortals.

How do I see Mike and me working this out in our daily lives?  Mike has often commented to me, “Maria, what if we lived as if we really believed Jesus, if we really took him at his word?”

We often exchange a few ideas, yet end there with a sigh and : “Wouldn’t that be nice!”

Yesterday and today, I’ve been talking to myself, reminding myself: “Maria, you DO have Jesus’ peace, love, power, joy, wisdom, righteousness, self-control, and mind IN you. Don’t forget!  And you have all the gifts and resources that Jesus procured for you!  You don’t have to work for them, just enjoy them.”

Yes, life is hard and scary.  But I’ve gotten so good at ‘practicing the presence of being alone and dependent on myself’, that when I use my imagination poorly to contemplate a situation, I always reason without God and all his benefits. This time, I want to really live out ‘practicing the presence of God’.

The last paragraph I read this morning from Malcolm Smith’s book quoted Psalm 23:4: ….I will fear no evil, for you are with me. That’s a good place to start. For fear is Satan’s favorite and effective tool.

I’m reminding myself, that even though I will fail and forget today’s resove, this is a daily, an hourly decision that I can come back to at any time.

Does that sound doable to you? If you have the Spirit of Christ in you, then FOR SURE all his covenant-won promises and privileges are yours.  God doesn’t lie. How about trying again, with me, acting as if all were true, taking God at his word, trusting him! That is called authentic faith.  

And if we slip back into old habits, acting as if we have to face evil times and hard circumstances alone? Then we repent.

We shift our thoughts back to what is objectively true, whether we subjectively feel like it’s for real or not.  

Has how you pray changed over the years?

May 4, 2023

Maria John 17, Luke 11, Prayer, Spiritual Growth, Spiritual Practice, Spiritual Warfare, The Lord's Prayer , , 2 Comments

“Lord, teach us to pray….” Luke 11:1 ESV

Today, 4 May 2023, is our country’s National Day of Prayer, a time to renew our practice of prayer and perhaps adjust it.

I can sense changes in how I now talk to God, especially in how I intercede for others.

Have you ever noticed how children pray?  They blurt out exactly what they want. “Jesus, give us a good day.” And rightly so. We must enter the kingdom with that same simple but cheery, trusting and care-free approach. Our Lord wants us to hand over every material and immaterial situation to him. But our Father also expects us to grow in our understanding and practice of praying.

For a while my care for God’s honor, for his name has increased. His expansive goals and perspective are slowly replacing my limited ones, or maybe amplifying them.

Remember how God planned to liberate Israel from Pharaoh as well as cause Egypt to know experientially that HE is Yahweh, the LORD? He had dual purposes.  And so can we.

This morning, I asked Jesus that the four men in my immediate family would honor God in how they pray for their wives. That he would give them the spirit of wisdom and revelation in their work. As well as draw them deeper into intimacy with our Father. Then reading Oswald Chamber’s meditation for today, I felt resolve to pray more like this expand.

With razor-sharpness, Chambers diagnoses the limited ways we intercede for others. (May 4 meditation from My Utmost for His Highest)  “We do not identify ourselves with God’s interests and concerns for others…..we are always ready with our own ideas, and our intercession becomes only the glorification of our own natural sympathies…..Vicarious intercession means that we deliberately substitute God’s interests in others for our natural sympathy with them.”

So, where do you start if you want to mature in how you pray for others? You can’t go wrong by allowing ‘the Lord’s Prayer’ to shape and change your approach.  Think of it as a framework, a springboard for a personal and God-honoring way to intercede.

Focus first on God’s goals and purposes. If we are believers, then our primary goals, our ‘first concerns’ should be the Lord’s, such as the honoring of his name, kingdom expansion, and all his purposes to become reality.  Then we are invited to hand over what we need this day, personally as well as for others.  This is where we can mention the immediate situations and needs, such as Jim’s surgery or travel safety for Sally, or a peace-filled resolution to the war in Ukraine.

But, don’t you want to talk to practice talking with the Father like Jesus?  For inspiration and guidance, we can sink our teeth deep into John 17 and study how Jesus prayed and for what.  We can select one of his petitions for the day and model our prayers for others on that.

For sure all and any sincere conversation with the Lord is a GOOD and RIGHT thing. This is not a suggestion to leave one way behind and replace it with something new. It’s a both/and.

Who knows, maybe Jesus is calling you into a grand adventure.  Maybe this shift will cause you to look forward to praying for others with a greater sense of expectancy.

Beware, though, Satan will not be pleased. So, armor up each morning with all the spiritual defenses and the one offensive arm we are to use, God’s Word.  

Are you growing more holy, more like Jesus? How can you tell?

March 13, 2023

Maria Ephesians 4, Holiness, Philippians 4, Spiritual Growth , , , , , , 1 Comment

Let your gentleness be apparent to all. The Lord is near. Philippians 4:5 BSB

A friend of mine has a daughter who drives herself. She is a very hard worker, skilled and competent. But she is too busy. Her mom can see that, as can I. Maybe that’s why an image of an earlier Maria popped into my mind this morning: ‘Grim Maria’.

This is a well-rehearsed character from maybe 15 years ago. Pretty much on a regular basis, I would set myself up with a list of ‘stuff that has to get done’.  Where did all these tasks come from?  I don’t remember. What I do recall is the belief: ‘If it’s gonna be, it’s gotta be up to me!’  My MO (modus operandi) never changed: work past fatigue and then feel resentful.  Mike called that persona, “Grim Bean” (Bean being my pet name).

How refreshing this morning to realize I haven’t seen that Maria in some years.  But thinking about my friend’s daughter, a busy mom and medical professional, I CAN recall being in her shoes. She probably truly believes she has no other choice, that there is no alternative to all she drives herself to get done.  That’s how irrational my thinking was.

Did I set out to quit playing ‘Grim Bean’?  No, that’s the marvel of it all. Since Mike and I as well as our adult sons have moved toward a more reformed theology, we’ve all come to appreciate the fact of God’s sovereignty, his total control over everything that happens in the universe.

Does that sound frightening, that an all-powerful God actually directs every molecule that exists?  Not at all.   This God is not a cold, impersonal force, directing events, nature and people, but a personal, loving and good Father who kindly offers his supernatural help to all his children who depend on him.

As this truth of who God is has sunk into my heart, I have relaxed more and off-loaded much of my life to him. For example, I don’t rush anymore, trying to cram more stuff into my day. I accept with ease what doesn’t get done.  I actually feel at peace with Jesus’ leadership and his setting of the pace of what we do together. I’m learning that none of what I do is truly ‘up to me’.

Our pastor’s sermon yesterday reenforced this posture of yielding control to God. Jim focused on the practice of forgiveness as laid out in Ephesians 4:32. He emphasized that the actions preceding Paul’s exhortation to offer forgiveness along with kindness uses the verb form of ‘Let….. (this action) take place in.’ It’s passive. It follows then that this behavioral change is something the Holy Spirit affects in us. We don’t work at it. We allow God to change us as we meditate on how gracious his initial forgiveness was and the fact that daily he welcomes us to confess and receive his cleansing. His compassions and mercies are as regular and welcome as the dawn’s early light.

I think often about the wonder and gift of having a heavenly Father and God who is in charge of both the universe and me. This is how I can relax throughout my day.  I believe that my inward state is transforming how I present to the world around me.  A gentle Maria is more the norm.

Can you see why I felt so encouraged this morning when the the Holy Spirit prompted the memory of a grim version of me? “Maria, this is evidence of spiritual growth!” 

Nevertheless, God is still about the business of growing my humility, letting me know that plenty of change is built into his holiness curriculum. One of my sins that occasionally reoccurs reminds me of the former Maria.  It’s the desire for someone to feel sorry for me and to offer me praise mixed with pity.  Namely, Mike.  Here’s how that looks. 

Yesterday after having some friends over for an early Sunday lunch, I set out to do some food prep. Two tasks morphed into several so that by the time I finished cleaning up in the kitchen it was almost 3 in the afternoon. Mike was coming down the stairs and I felt the urge to say with a staged self-deprecating sound, “I just finished doing food prep!” But by grace, the Holy Spirit poked me gently and I resisted that temptation. 

Yes, that indicates more growth. But it still shows me that I need to be mindful of how I self-assign tasks. No one is expecting me to spend that kind of time in the kitchen, not even Jesus. In fact, I didn’t even check with him first.  Now that I’m writing this, I see I should have asked, “Jesus, how do you want me to spend this Sabbath afternoon?”

Definitely God is transforming me. But with each step forward, the Holy Spirit gently shows me what the next assignment is. Glad it’s not all up to me!