Letter to a son – what we failed to teach you

September 28, 2010

Maria Faith, Gospel, Peace, Sanctification, Thinking , , , , , , Leave a comment

Dear Son –

Dad and I were so blessed by your phone call last night. Your transparent accounting of what you struggle with at age 22, both as a newly married man and a recently commissioned Infantry lieutenant, convey trust and love for us and a longing to grow.  These two changes in your life are major, in and of themselves.  Together they provide a lot of stress; even if they are circumstances you have chosen and for which you have mentally prepared.    You’ve faced difficult challenges before, since you’ve been a Christian for 6 or so years and have experienced pruning and growth. But new developments have peeled away a comfort layer and revealed more sin for your Father to address.  Your attitude and reaction to some of these feelings raised have caught you by surprise.

The way you described what God has been teaching you was well articulated.  It’s not a first-time lesson nor is it unique to you.  The choice before all Christians is to walk/abide in our human flesh or to walk/abide in Christ.  The first choice is more comfortable because we have developed personal coping mechanisms to deal with daily unpleasantness.  The second option works far better, but either doesn’t always occur to us and/or doesn’t appeal.  Our pride/stubbornness leads us to default to the shortcut, even if we can accurately predict the outcome. We are used to failure, self-condemnation, our own excuses and concomitant spewing over onto those we love.

Here are some observations from your parents who are 31 years older than you.  However, we have really only been growing as Christians for the past 10 years.  So you, your brother, Dad and I are really about the same age as God’s Kids.

Dad and I DID NOT teach you the following: (we have been learning these realities ourselves in recent years, since you left for college)

  • The reason we were born is to glorify God.
  • The nature of life on earth is brokenness and  warfare
  • Because of Christ in us, we can have purpose and joy beyond measure, but they have NOTHING to do with comfort or circumstances.  They have to do with the Cross.

First – the purpose of life is to glorify God.  Relentlessly, the world tells us that life is all about us.  Hear the constant litany – “our comfort, our desires, our bodies, our accomplishments, our purposes, our stuff, and our rights.”   We have to intentionally choose to live moment by moment, breath by breath for what magnifies and makes most of God, not what exalts us.  John Piper exhorts us not to waste our lives on ourselves, no matter how much we beguile ourselves with our own self-worth.  Self, self, self!

Second – because of the Fall, life is hard.  Because of Satan, we are in a war.   John Piper calls us to adopt a warfare mentality.  That’s not bad.  You were mentioning that a good soldier always has a plan and is prepared to fight.  Our enemy is not just terrorists from another land, fellow humans.  All they can do is kill us.  Our real enemy is far worse. He can deceive us into believing that God doesn’t exist, or in inventing our own version of God, made in our image.

So even though we Christians know how the story ends, we have to be alert and on guard.  The American dream in both the active working years and in retirement is a major ploy of Satan’s.  He has lulled us into thinking that this life is all there is and we had better enjoy it.  Meanwhile, he is behind our lines as a 5th column, beguiling the ‘innocent’.   Be mad!  Get righteously angry, but not at fellow humans, but at the Father of Lies.

My 3rd point is worth more discussion than I have time right now.  But I don’t think you need convincing of the possibility of lasting joy and purpose in Christ.  We are comforted and assured by God’s Word that, even now on Earth, we have eternal life.  Furthermore, God be praised, we are blessed with brief glimpses of joy even while wearing these perishable bodies.

Yet, as your chronologically older sister and brother in Christ, KNOW that this painful lesson of choosing to abide in Christ, rather than working out of your flesh/ your dominant side is a lesson you will have to RELEARN, time and time again.  I’m sorry to tell you that.  Were it otherwise!  But that’s reality here on Earth.  I still struggle with complaining and a poor attitude. I have to be pulled up short, daily.  I’m even doing what I love, teaching French.  Still I grumble, because of lack of perceived comfort, time, and choice circumstances, all the ME- desires.  Your father is blessed to sing with a quality chorus as a hobby.  He still struggles with the insidious temptation to work alone out of his own strength, thus experiencing frustration or to be yoked with Christ and enjoy rest.  How simple the choice seems with distance.  How blind we are.

So be prepared to fall again and again. We thank God for your wife, a godly woman who loves you and will hold you accountable.  And you will do the same for her, when she fails to remember the way life is.   Repentance is a blessing and the Father’s arms are never shut.  Fly to him frequently.

Love,

Mom & Dad

Crazy Love – thoughts from Francis Chan

September 8, 2010

Maria Disciplines, Reflections, Thinking, Wisdom , Leave a comment

Francis Chan shares a vision of what being crazy about God looks like.  Lloyd C. Douglas wrote a book in 1929 called Magnificent Obsession, loosely based on the Gospel of Matthew.  That title describes what Chan is trying to portray as the ideal Christian response to God.  Here are some kernels of thought that spoke to me.

  1. Quoting A. W. Tozer:  “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us”
  2. Regarding God’s command to ‘rejoice in the Lord always’, Chan says:  “When I am consumed by my problems, stressed out about my life, my family, my job, I actually convey the belief that I think the circumstances are more important than God’s command to always rejoice.”
  3. Regarding control in the face of the uncertainties of life:  turning inward is one   way to respond.  Acknowledging our lack of control and reaching out for God’s help is another
  4. If we indulge in worry and stress, we are displaying arrogance.  We are declaring our tendency to forget 4 things:  -we have been forgiven/ -our lives are brief/ -we’re headed to heaven/ -in the context of God’s strength, that our problems are small indeed.
  5. The greatest good on this earth is God
  6. A piercing question:  Has your relationship with God actually changed the way you live?
  7. How God measures our lives (and what matters to Him most) – how we love
  8. If life is a river, then pursuing Christ requires swimming upstream.  If we stop swimming (i.e. stop pursuing Christ), we get pushed downstream.  We are letting our relationship with Christ deteriorate.
  9. Nothing should concern me more than my relationship with God (not my weight, not my time)

10. When I look at my relationship with God as a duty, a chore, a sacrifice, then I am getting the glory, not God.

11. We have a choice.  Either we just let life happen or we actively run toward Christ.

12. Radical concept – how about aspiring to the Median – when people commit to live at or below the median US income and give the rest for missions.

13. ******What are you doing right now that requires faith?

14. ******We are consumed by safety.  Most of our prayers are for traveling mercies.  What about praying, “God, bring me closer to you during this trip, whatever it takes.”

15. ******Battling pride – we have to seek to make our self less known and Christ more known.

16. Joy doesn’t depend on circumstances (my job, my weight, my time) or environment.  It is a gift that must be chosen and cultivated, a gift that ultimately comes from God.  (which means that God must REALLY care about providing me with a way to cultivate joy, i.e. TRIALS)

17. A person who literally has to depend on God for his daily bread and all that includes stays in prayer, close to God.

18. Chan says he wrote the book because much of our talk doesn’t match our lives.  We ‘quote’:  “I can do all things through Christ…../ Trust in the Lord always….” But we try to set our lives up so everything will be fine, even if God doesn’t come through.

19. You don’t have to wait for a special calling from God to be obedient to what He commands in His word.  Jesus didn’t say, “If you love me, you will obey me when you feel called…..”

20. Chan quotes Daniel Webster:  ‘The greatest thought that has ever entered my mind is that one day I will have to stand before a holy God and give an account of my life.’(And we thought he just loved words!)

21. About churchgoers who are lukewarm – they will not be heaven.  He recalls God spitting them out of his mouth in Revelation 3.  If someone DOES have the HS, there will be fruit evident in his or her life.  His or hers will not be a lukewarm life.

22. His summary – most of us live CRAZY LIVES.  A crazy life is to live a safe life and to store up things while trying to enjoy our time on earth, yet knowing that any second God could take your life.  Better to have Crazy Love of God and let that guide you.  We should

–      Keep pursuing Christ

–      Keep the thought that we are not alone – the spiritual realm is watching us, both God’s force’s and the Enemy’s

–      Try for a whole day to be conscious of heaven

–      Remember that we have life and power in us through the Holy Spirit

–      Recall what Annie Dillard wrote – ‘the way we live out each day is the way we will live out our lives’

–      **The American Dream (i.e. build a bigger barn story from Luke 12) fuels a lukewarm life.  We should not conform to that pattern.

Chew well, fellow travelers, and may we burn brighter for Christ. May it never be said that we were lukewarm.

Functional Idols – what/who I love more than God

August 30, 2010

Maria Thinking , , Leave a comment

Okay, God.  I get it.  You give me insight and you expect me to act on it.  If I don’t, then you arrange my circumstances to reinforce your point.

I have struggled with food and body issues since I was 16.  I finally reached close to the weight I feel best at (more or less –don’t we always want to be thinner?)  I bought a scale to weigh myself every day.  If the scale showed close to my ideal, it was a good day.  In fact, my first thoughts of the day would come from what the scale showed.  And God made it very clear that this was wrong.  He gently, but persistently would ask me (the thoughts would come into my head): “Is that what is most important to you?  Your body which is temporary and is going to get old and wrinkled and break down – is that what determines how you feel about life?   What about the fact that I died for you, that I have given you eternal life, you who didn’t deserve it, you who deserve condemnation?  Do you really value your body more than what I have given you?”

And I would say, “I know you’re right – I’m to love you and worship you above all else.  But this scale has the power to determine what kind of day I’ll have.  And even though if I don’t like the number, I’ll be depressed, there’s a chance the number is on the thin side and I’ll feel REALLY good!”

But, recently, the scales have been going up and up and I seem to have no control over the number it shows or over my body.  I haven’t changed my exercise or my eating habits.  For the days when I’ve eaten more, I’ve compensated.  But now I am perplexed and have been depressed.

Yet I understand what has happened.  When I wasn’t obedient to the soft God-voice, He had to get my attention in a stronger fashion.  Repenting, I put away the scales today and asked God to give me a different way of thinking.  And He did.  I was in Zechariah this morning.  Chapter 4, verse 6 says:  Not by might, not by strength but by my spirit alone, says the Lord. And then in an email Christian quote of the day, was Paul’s reminder to Timothy (and to us) that God has not given us a spirit of fear (or condemnation) but a spirit of love, of power and of a sound mind (the Holy Spirit).

So, dear Lord, forgive me for looking to something other than You as my lodestar.  Guide me this day in how to think (and how to eat). I can’t be trusted to think correctly on my own.   I’m fallen.  And thinking right thoughts IS our chief moral duty (per Michael Novak, a Catholic theologian).  For unless we think correctly and truthfully about God, we will not act properly.

Either/ or – what we feed on

August 23, 2010

Maria Ephesians, Matthew, Philippians, Prayer , , Leave a comment

The Gospel of John: 53Jesus said to them, “I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood; you have no life in you. 54Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and I will raise him up at the last day. 55For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. 56Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. 57Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.

Are you walking dead?  You are, if you are feeding your mind with thoughts about your circumstances.  I’ve been thinking of the choice we have every moment about what to think about.  I realize that if I am dwelling on (i.e.  Worrying about, fretting over) anything, then I am not growing, but dying.  Life comes from feeding on, pondering about, marveling at the many FACTS of my life in Christ.  Here’s the catch.  It takes effort to remind myself of my riches.

What are all those spiritual blessings stored up for me in heaven?   Paul talks about them a lot. In Ephesians 1: 3 he assures us that we who are chosen by God before the foundation of the world have been blessed with EVERY spiritual blessing in Christ.   All that Christ our redeemer intended to accomplish awaits us.  That would include:

-my sins being removed and laid on Him

-perfect righteousness being credited to me because of what Jesus did

-everlasting life in a place that will be fascinating

-forever fellowship with those whom I love who are also believers

-living and working on a new earth where real peace reigns.

Why is it SO much easier to think about the stuff I have to do, or the difficult decisions that face me, or friends and family who are suffering?  Thoughts about those things come naturally.  And they drain away life.

Jesus says in John that we have life to the extent that we feed on him.  I take that to mean thinking thoughtfully and deeply and with appreciation and wonder about the facts of our faith.  Look above at verse 54 again.  The verbs are in the present tense.  As we feed, we have life.  So the life is not for later, but for right now.

Jesus gives us this very same advice in another format.  Remember what Matthew records in chapter 6, verses 31, 33?  My paraphrase is: Don’t worry/ dwell on/ fret about all the normal things of life, but SEEK first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and you’ll get the other necessities thrown in.  But look at the strength of the verb SEEK.  The Greek word is ZETEO (# 2212) and it means require, worship, will, go after, endeavor.  Those are very active words.  Compare them with how easy it is to fall into worry.  We don’t have to be taught or motivated to fret.  (Come on kids, let’s practice anxiety.  Susie – look at how much better your sister is than you.  Make an effort…)

Along with seeking God’s kingdom, we are to strive for His righteousness.  I take that to mean God’s way of living rightly.  And throughout the Bible, God calls us to believe and to rejoice.   Living God’s way, walking according to His Word has to do with right or correct thinking.  We’re talking about the arena of the mind.  We are far too casual with our thought life.  In fact, we feel entitled to think what we want.  “Who are you to tell me how and what to think?” Well, maybe I don’t have any authority of my own as a fellow human, but God does.  He is our creator.  And He commands us to rejoice.  But we cannot rejoice unless we have content.  This is why believing God and feeding on Jesus takes effort.

Don’t get me wrong, God doesn’t dismiss as unimportant our circumstances, our loved ones’ suffering.  In fact He commands us to pray about them and to cast our cares about everything on Him.  But nowhere does He call us to worry.   We are to BELIEVE, PRAY, TRUST, REJOICE, OFFER THANKS, REPENT, WAIT, REST, BE STILL.  Do you see anything at all akin to worry?

In closing, I commend a book to you by Francis Chan called Crazy Love.  What got me thinking about this was author’s realization on page 41: “When I am consumed by my problems – stressed out about my life, my family, and my job – I actually convey the belief that I think the circumstances are more important than God’s command to always rejoice.  In other words, that I have a ‘right’ to disobey God because of the magnitude of my responsibilities.”

Amen!

What women alone are designed to do

July 19, 2010

Maria Genesis, Women , , 1 Comment

Genesis 2:18 The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

A new thought on an old text came to me after spending a few days with my good friend Sue.  We both are blessed with God-fearing, kind husbands who love us very much.  But as women are wont to do, we were ‘sharing’ our thoughts (not complaining J) about our husbands.  Sue was recounting how it surprised her early in her marriage (now 50 years strong, praise God) that her husband would never THINK to offer his help in the kitchen after a big dinner party.  But, to his credit, if she asked him to do something specific, he would be happy to do so.  Sue’s assessment was that he didn’t look around unprompted and see what needed to be done and then offer to do it.

This is an old complaint we women surface to point out the surprising differences between husbands and wives.  But as I was driving home after my visit and listening to a podcast sermon, I was taken by the thought that women, and not men are wired to be helpers.  Men have a different bent.  So how fair is it for us to criticize them?

Being a helper – an ‘ezer’ as the Hebrew puts it, is a holy and exalted profession.  None other than God himself is our role model.  Here are a few other places in Scripture where ‘ezer’ is used – and they all describe God.

Ex 18:4 – and the other was named Eliezer, for he said, “My father’s God was my helper; he saved me from the sword of Pharaoh.”

Deut 33:26 – “There is no one like the God of Jeshurun, who rides on the heavens to help you and on the clouds in his majesty.

Ps 121: 1-2 – A song of ascents. I lift up my eyes to the hills– where does my help come from?  My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.

Moving on in the Hebrew, we find the word ‘neged’ meaning suitable.  It also has the sense of being in front of.  We are not meant to help from behind, but in sight of our men, facing life together with them.  Just like we keep our eyes on God, (“I have set the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken” -Psalm 16:8), so our husbands should be able to keep their eyes on us, for help, wisdom and encouragement.

So then, if our husband is not created with an instinctual desire to help us, how is he created to function?  God says he was designed to do 3 things:

a)   to ‘radah’  and to ‘kabash’ the earth, that is to rule and have dominion

b)   to ‘abad’ it, that is to work it

c)    to ‘shamar’ it, that is to preserve, protect it and celebrate it

That is a pretty awesome responsibility and is way more than he can handle on his own.  Matt Chandler points out that man does not come to this conclusion on his own.  It is God who says that it is not good for man to be alone.  So God creates a (i.e. one) woman, out of man’s own flesh to be his perfect helper in this mission.

One final thought: We mustn’t get our noses out of joint, by not having what we think of as the primary role.  We don’t get to choose.  God is the designer, it’s His world.  We can criticize the creator, but what’s the point?  Why not embrace our God-given role, for which we are equipped.  Besides, we have the best role-model, God himself.  If He is not ashamed to be considered man’s helper, why should we?

An Experience in Sharing the Gospel

June 14, 2010

Maria Gospel, Reflections, Uncategorized, Wisdom , , , , Leave a comment

Colossians 4:5-6 Be wise in the way you act with outsiders, make the most of every opportunity.  Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt so that you may know how to answer everyone.

I clobbered my mother-in-law with doctrine.  I wrote her a letter outlining my concerns about her spiritual life.  I shared some basics about sin, repentance, the Good News of what Jesus has done for us and how to grow in the love & knowledge of God.  But I overwhelmed her with my intensity. And I have irrevocably moved our relationship into a new territory where neither of us knows how to maneuver.  All of this – 2 weeks before our youngest son’s wedding when family will gather.

My mother-in-law is 81.  She grew up in the Catholic Church, switched to the Episcopal Church in college, met & married a seminarian and shared the life of an Episcopal priest & bishop for almost 59 years.   Thus has the Episcopal Church been the center of her life.

My concerns for the state of her soul were cumulative over many years as my husband and I were graciously drawn out of the kingdom of darkness and transferred into the kingdom of light.  Looking back on our past, Mike & I recall how we truly THOUGHT we were Christians all the years we were faithful church-goers and served in different ministries.  Indignation and denial most likely would have been our reaction had someone confronted us with the state of our souls.  So I understand how it must seem puzzling to someone living a ‘religious’ life, that it might be possible not even to belong to Christ.  “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.”  Matt 7:21

As we discovered truth and life, we wanted to share this joy and the assurance of salvation with those closest to us.  My mother was a believer, yet died before I was regenerated.  I failed to share the Gospel with my father.  I tried, but was not equipped and backed off many times when he didn’t want to talk.  Out of that experience, my husband and I approached his parents.  Our concerns for their spiritual well-being intensified over the past months as my father-in-law was dying.  We prayed for opportunities to have authentic discussions about the reality of Christian hope.  But we could do no more than skirt the periphery of religiosity.

I don’t understand people’s boundaries.  To my discredit, it is very difficult to imagine or empathize, and therefore yield to limits and walls friends and family erect to protect emotions or comfortable routines of looking at life.  (Why wouldn’t you want to talk about the most important topic in life? – your future after you die?  Don’t you want to know if what you have staked your life on is valid?  Don’t you want to even know WHAT it is you believe?) My grown children and husband consider me intense.  But I can’t see that:  I am what I am.  Is a fish aware that he breathes in through gills?

So returning from my father-in-law’s funeral I wrote my mother-in-law THE letter and launched her on a roller-coaster of emotions of anger, shame, indignation and horror.

Here is what I have learned from this experience:

(1)   – Patience is not something I practice naturally, so just as a pilot must intentionally crab into a wind to keep her flight path straight, so must I wait longer than I think is necessary.  I composed THE letter on a Friday and sent it to two people whose opinion I value.  I received a green light from one, but did not wait long enough to hear back from the other person before mailing it off.  She replied 3 ½ days later and suggested restraint.  But I had already mailed off the letter. To my ‘partial credit’ I had slept on it and prayerfully revised it over a 3-day period.  Yet I should have waited for this second person’s wisdom, since I had explicitly asked for it.

(2)   Offhand remarks I wrote that were not even my main point were received poorly.  This really surprised me.  I should have considered every sentence.  When I closed the letter to my dear mother-in-law with the reassurance that her grandsons would be praying along with me for her, I thought that would encourage her.  Instead she was horrified that I had shared something ‘negative’ and had ‘misrepresented her’ to the boys.  I never would have anticipated that reaction.

(3)   Less is more.  I dumped TOO much on her (14 pagesL).  The quantity had two negative effects: a) she missed some important parts because it was too much to take in all at once and b) she felt bludgeoned by the sheer amount of what I wrote.

I failed to SEASON my written conversation with her; I just dumped out the whole blue container of Morton’s iodized salt.

So, I am trusting God now to work my blundering efforts for her good and for mine.  I am praying that we can sort out a way of relating that is safe and comfortable for her when she arrives next week for the wedding.  I am sorry that she will feel self-conscious around her grandsons and us.  That was not my intention.  But I don’t regret that I initiated the discussion.  I could never have said some of what I wrote face to face.  I will continue to share the Gospel with others when appropriate and will trust the Holy Spirit to let me know His timing and the proper words.

Sola Fide – how to be prepared to share

May 3, 2010

Maria Ephesians, Gospel, Hope, Uncategorized , Leave a comment

I read something that Ken Boa wrote recently – it was a very succinct summary of the essence Gospel.  I realize that if I am to be obedient to the Great Commission to share the hope that I have, then I have to be ready and prepped with, at a minimum,  a 30-second blurb.  But I want this good news to roll off my tongue, in order to feel confident.  It’s stressful, if I am not prepped, when someone asks, “What does your license mean – ‘sola fid’?” I purposefully chose those 7 letters just SO someone would ask.

I have taken what Ken Boa says and massaged it a bit to strip it of ‘Christianese’, to make it more accessible to those with no knowledge of the Bible.

“Sola Fide” means – by faith alone. That refers to being right with God, having a right relation with him.  We are right with God only through God’s GIFT of this right standing with him, and that through faith.  Furthermore, this right relationship or ‘righteousness’ is found in the good news or gospel.  The Gospel teaches that Christ died for sin as a sacrifice.  We have to let go of our own efforts of justifying ourselves:  this giving up that is an action called repenting.  Only then, with empty hands and no agenda can we receive as a gift his sacrifice, thereby making us right with God.  Amazingly, this right standing with God brings a boat-load of benefits that defy imagination.

Our record, with the listing of all our innumerable misdeeds since we were infants, is taken away and Christ’s righteousness is credited to our account.  Together, these 2 actions guarantee our admittance into the presence of Holy God for eternity.  But that is not all!  We also get the assurance that we are LOVED, we get a PURPOSE for life that will satisfy us (to live for the praise of the glory of this grace) and we get a NEW FAMILY – we are brought into relationship with other believers both for our comfort and our growth. Last, but not least, we get POWER for daily living – the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.  He is a guarantee of our future place in Heaven, kind of like an engagement ring.   After all, the Church IS the bride of Christ. (arrabon meaning a deposit/security in biblical Greek and in modern Greek, it means engagement ring). The Holy Spirit is also the ultimate power source – Paul reminds us that the same power that raised Jesus from the dead is living in us.  So we don’t have to despair of being incapable of obeying God and relying on him.  The HS gives us the power. We just have to trust and step out to do what He calls & empowers us to do, no matter our fleshly feelings of weakness!

The good news of the Gospel is amazing – but I need to be amazed and astonished daily or I slip into fear, worry and complaining.  So prepping to share the kernel or essence of the Gospel actually helps me as I rehearse continuously.  It keeps my mind focusing on this good news and it prepares me to give a reason for the hope that I have.

What does it mean to ‘abide in Christ’?

February 24, 2010

Maria John, Peace , Leave a comment

So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”  John 8:31-32

Definition of Abide or “Meno” in the Greek – to stay, remain, watch, continue, hang out.

Don’t you want to be free?  From worry, circumstances holding you down, anxiety hovering overhead, heaviness?  Here is Jesus’ solution.  All we have to do is remain in the Logos, the Word, a synonym for Jesus himself.  What does that mean, to remain or stay in Him?  Do we,  as a matter of course, hang out somewhere?  Where would that be?   What are our choices?

Try worry, circumstances, and problems.  In essence, since God made man a RATIONAL being, unlike the animals, that means we are THINKING animals.  We live in our thoughts.  Do we ever turn off our minds?  No…we are always thinking about something.  Do we have control over our thoughts?  As a teacher, I would say we do.  I tap a pencil on the table of a day-dreaming student.  He startles and returns to the classroom discussion.  I catch myself wandering in my thoughts when I’m listening to a pod-cast sermon.  Quickly, I bring my thoughts back to what I’m listening to. I would argue that we have absolute power to choose and think thoughts.  That’s not a difficult premise to accept.  What is perhaps more serious is the fact that our thoughts matter.  They color EVERYTHING about us.  Our thoughts determine our moods, our feelings, our spoken words and our actions.  To a large degree, we create our future reactions to circumstances by our thoughts.

When Jesus counsels His listeners to abide in Him, so that they will be free, He is talking to men who are physically  free.  He’s not lecturing in a prison.  So He must be speaking symbolically about freedom.  And we certainly can grasp that.  Don’t we often  feel trapped by our habits of negativity or of particular earthly indulgences?

Jesus is promising a true liberation – the kind where you feel like a kid again, on a beautiful summer day, with no worries at all.  What we have to do is discipline our mind, gently, to think about Him:  His character, His promises, His past actions, His story, our inheritance in Him, our treasures stored up in Heaven, our blessings.  To summarize, we are to think about those things that Paul describes as true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy.  What we think about, then,  is where we MENO or dwell.  We can either MENO or abide in circumstances or in Christ.   Not only will we be free, but we will be noticeable as His disciples.

What would make us stand out as His followers?  I think it’s that we would exhibit an unusual peace.  People around us are frustrated and preoccupied, rushing around, unaware that they have control over their thoughts.  If we exhibited a calm, restful demeanor, that would give someone pause and perhaps cause them to ask us about our source of peace.

The power of an idea – two thoughts that have changed my life recently

February 18, 2010

Maria Peace, Prayer , 1 Comment

A friend and I were discussing prayer, both having read Paul Miller’s book, A Praying Life.  She mentioned that she had started a prayer journal where each day she writes down the things over which she has no control.  That ‘title’ for one’s worries all of a sudden opened up a way to articulate so many MORE concerns in my life.  I hadn’t realized what resided in the bottom of the muck pool of my mind.  New topics to pray about and actually hand over to God started to leave this familiar, fetid place and venture into new territory.  I grew excited about the possibilities!

As soon as I got home, I found a diary with a few blank pages left and wrote the date and the title:  Today I Have No Control Over…..  As soon as I had written down 5-6 things, I said to God, “Here, YOU take and handle them today.”   It was easy and left me feeling lighter.

The next morning, I could hardly wait to get up and write down the new day’s concerns over which it was apparent I have no control.  Of course, one could get carried away with all sorts of situations..but I confined myself to concerns in my life that day: younger son’s projects at college, older son’s fears about supporting his family, husband’s discomfort stemming from a controlling & dysfunctional boss, in-laws’ declining health and their fears about making it to the wedding in June, a scheduling problem to be sorted out with a Travelocity rep located on the other side of the world, French classes’ scheduled for the day and their energy level and response to my input.

Several days create a habit.  What has surprised me is the spread of my new consciousness over items I really don’t control.  Apparently the very act of writing them down has trained my mind to respond ‘properly’ during other parts of my day.  I heard some bad news this afternoon and immediately thought – “I have no control over that, Lord, that’s YOUR department”.  No time in my in-box of worry.  So I have freedom to keep a mental diary handy, with its column already set up, ready to receive MORE items.  This is fun!

I did run into my friend and shared with her how much her brief 20 second explanation had changed me.  I wanted her to be encouraged about the positive influence we can have on those around us and maybe not even know it!

The other mind-altering thought came from a blog post by Ray Ortlund.  He mentioned in ONE sentence that ‘our okay-ness’ is located outside of us. I took that to mean that if there is anything worthy or beautiful about me, it’s because of Christ’s righteousness imputed to me.  There is nothing noteworthy about me beyond the fact that I am made in the image of God.  As Paul says several places and actually quotes (is that a retweet?) the Old Testament prophet – “, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord'” (from Jer 9:23; I Cor. 1:31)

The application for me was that I have no reason to defend myself – EVER.  The truth is, at it dawned on me; no one can hurt me with criticisms or put- downs.  If I already know that ‘no good thing resides in me’ – Rom 7:18 – then I am FREE.  I can give a logical response to a personal attack. “Yes, you’re correct that I………And your point is?”

All in one week, I have been given two gifts.  First, I can stop doing God’s work for Him – by worrying about things only He has sovereign control over and second, I can stop defending myself, since there is really nothing to defend.  What amazing power resides in ideas!

What is your major premise about God?

February 11, 2010

Maria Colossians, Doctrine, Job 2 Comments

Job 23:10   (God) He knows what he is doing with me…and when he has tested me, I will come forth as pure gold.

This verse contains both Job’s basic theology about God, what I call his major premise, and Job’s conclusion.  What did Job know about God?   Despite personal pain, Job could essentially assert in advance, ‘God has a plan for me and knows what He is doing – He’s actually in control of my miserable circumstances.’   With that theology in place, when the unthinkable happened, he safely concluded, ‘I will actually be a better person when all this is over’.

Because Job was certain about God, he bore with some grace the nightmarish circumstances of loss of family and property and did not dissolve into suicidal depression.  What we believe about God influences our conclusions about God.  These fundamental beliefs frame our context when we have to make sense of life’s painful & disappointing circumstances.

What was the major premise of the disciples upon encountering the man born blind?   They asked Jesus, ‘Lord, tell us who sinned – this man or his parents?’  Their theology at the time was that health and prosperity were a result of being obedient and enjoying favor with God.  So when they met the handicapped man, their conclusion was that SOMEONE sinned.  This reaction is similar to how Hindus view the caste system.  Those privileged members at the top won’t give aid and assistance to those at the bottom for fear of interfering with the cycle of Karma.  The well-to-do believe that the dregs are paying for sins committed in a previous life and that one should not interfere.

Today, most people’s major premises go unspoken.  You only hear them when tragedy strikes and they conclude that a) there must not be a God or b) God must not be loving or powerful. Their major premise is that if there is a God, then he would not permit evil if he loves mankind and is in control of the universe.

Job’s knowledge of God kept him grounded and he was able to draw a healthy conclusion in the absence of any explanation from an imminent, supernatural and caring deity.

Without the correct presuppositions, Job could have concluded, “God is mean/ God doesn’t love me/God is punishing me/ God doesn’t exist.”

Paul reminds us in Colossians 3 that since we have put on the new self we are being RENEWED in KNOWLEDGE in the image of our creator.  The correct knowledge about God does make a difference.  We dishonor God when we draw an incorrect, sinful conclusion about Him.

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