A Deceitful and Sinful Lack of Prayer

I have a confession to make.

I have been fooling you all along.

If you go to College Park Church, you know me. I am the one in choir who stands pretty much front and center (I was put there I promise! I did not choose it!) and…moves…a lot…all the time… Its an exuberance I can’t really hold back. The Gospel is so freeing and so amazing and God’s love so inconceivable that I personally can’t help but be excited about it, enthusiastic about it, smile about it, sing about it.

But that joy has been a selfish joy. I am happy God has saved ME. I am joyful he has taken me from MY sin and claimed ME as his own so that I can claim MY inheritance. The joy is genuine, but it is incomplete, it is insufficient. It is not completely founded in God’s heart.

Why?

I have no heart for the nations.

Pastor Nate preached on Sunday and made a thrust with the sword of the spirit when he said that God is a glowing hot ember of love for the nations and if we are near enough we WILL catch fire.

If I’m not on fire, what does that say about me? What does that say about what I do on Sunday mornings Sunday in and Sunday out in front of you all, claiming that I love God with all of my heart, soul, mind and strength?

For four REACH  months (CPC's annual focus on global missions), I have listened to the sermons, had meals with missionaries, done the prayer nights and breakfasts absorbed all of the amazing content that College Park offered. I would agree with every bit of it and say, “Yes! God I want to do your work! If you want to send me, send me! Open an opportunity!”

Then I would…wait. 

I’m not sure what I expected really. I expected at some point listening to a missionary talk about what they were doing that my heart would leap and say “I NEED to do that,” or that my heart would break for a specific people group or need. I waited. I would look over the Vision Trips and the schedules and my available PTO time and see that…well…none of them fit. So I would wait. And a year would go by and the next REACH would come and the same thing would happen. I wait…and nothing happens.

“Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.” Matthew 7:7-8

Both Pastor Willson and Pastor Nate have told us that the most important first step is to ask God for the nations. What did Jesus say himself when he looked and saw all of the wayward people of Israel harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd? He didn’t tell his disciples to “Go now and help them,” or “appoint some amongst yourselves to go.” No he said, “pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” (Matthew 9:38 emphasis mine)

Of course nothing was happening! Of course my heart didn't leap or break! Of course PTO was a problem or schedules didn't align or the money wasn't there! How could it be?! I NEVER ASKED. How can I claim that I don’t go because I don’t feel God moving me if I never ask him to do it? How can I justify my inaction and disguise it in spiritual sounding “lack of calling” if my own lack of prayer shows where my desire really is?

I have a sung of a selfish Gospel. I have exuded selfish joy. I have proclaimed selfish freedom. I am truly, deeply, sorry.

Maybe, as Pastor Nate said, the dampness is drying out from the paper that is my heart. Maybe the anti-inflammatory sealant that I like to paint over my soul is finally being taken over. After four REACH months, its finally time to start praying. I don’t know what that means for my future. I don’t know where it will take me, if anywhere. Maybe I am a sender, an enabler, a Barnabas. But how can I be sure if I don’t ask?

What I do know is the rest of the promise in Matthew 7.

“Which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heave given good things to those who ask him?” Matthew 7:9-11

I may have to do something hard or uncomfortable. It may cost me a lot. But God promises that it will be GOOD. It will be a GIFT. And more people will join me when Jesus returns to sing of a global Gospel, a Gospel not just for me but for all people and all tribes and all languages from all of time.

Amen.    

Out of His Presence

One day last week, I woke up and experienced the scariest moment I have ever experienced.

Ever since my heart has began to be regenerated, which was about four years ago, scripture has never failed to speak to me. I would open the Word of God and feel it living, feel it speaking, feel it teaching and feel it convicting. Every time I open the Word, I have had something to write, whether it be for bible study, for teaching, for leading, for planning, for blogging or for journaling. It has been an amazing time of discovery and worship and love and adoration.

On this day, I had nothing.

I was not panicked yet though. This had happened before. I would open a passage and just not know where to start. I would blankly stare at a text and my mind would spin, having no order or no coherence or no direction. I would stop and ask God to reveal himself to me. I would tell God that I need him and that I wanted to see him. I would ask him to remember his promise from his word, his covenant love and kindness. I would open the text again and his words would be there, living and active, speaking to my soul, giving me something to write.

On this day, I had nothing.

And I was terrified.

You see, the night before, my heart, my thoughts and my actions were far from God. I had bought into the promise of immediacy, the allure of the here and now, the burning desire deep in my gut that needed to be dealt with. I chose to forget God's promise, God's character, God's satisfaction, God's hope. This was not the first time, and it won't be the last but it was the first time I had ever heard God tell me...

ENOUGH

"When you come to appear before me, who has required of you this trampling of my courts? Bring no more vain offerings; incense is an abomination to me. New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations— I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates; they have become a burden to me; I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you; even though you make many prayers, I will not listen; your hands are full of blood." Isaiah 1:12-15

As much as God has shown his love for us and as much as he has proven it, God has also shown his holiness. God has proven that he despises sin. He does not and cannot abide it in his presence. He grows weary of our words of loyalty when they are tainted by acts of betrayal. He tires of our fruitless devotion when it is infected by poisonous treason. 

And after a while, he will hide from you. 

He will refuse to be found. 

He will ignore your prayers.

I have prayed Psalm 51 before but never with such fervency, such desperation. "Cast me not out of your presence and take not your Holy Spirit from me! Restore to me the joy of your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit!" I feverishly prayed this as inscribed these words in my journal. I sat back...

...and closed my journal. 

I was done. I had nothing left to say. I simply had to wait for God's answer. I surrounded myself with the Word that day, through music and sermons and people and prayers. I did not open the word again, but infused my mind and my soul with Christ and his people. Holiness was pursued vigorously, sin was avoided mercilessly, God was worship fervently and desperately. I NEEDED to taste the goodness of God again. 

I opened the word again, to the same passage I had opened before...

...and God was there. It wasn't profound or life changing or theology altering that morning. But the Word was speaking. Words were in my mind and coming through my hands on to the paper. Thoughts were clear and God was present. He had returned and revealed himself again.

I am desperately thirsty and over the past four years God has begun to refine my taste. He has promised and he has delivered and I have tasted and seen his goodness. I had, however, began to take it for granted. I had read these words before, prayed David's prayer, but never had I identified with the feeling and never had I felt like God had left me. Never had I felt like I needed God's presence in me. I had been drinking things in for 4 years, whether God or sin. I had quenched my thirst with one or the other because both were available. Never had I reached out for God and not found him there to drink from.

And that was terrifying. 

I am desperately thirsty, and now by God's grace, he is using that thirst to save my soul. 

Reciprocity

Have you ever heard or used this phrase in your life?

"I don't like you but I love you."

or perhaps

"Its a good thing I love you because sometimes I really don't like you."

I feel like it is most often used in the context of family. There are these people that we are "required" to love because of some social construct that our society defines that facilitates the continuation of our race so we have to "love" them even though they are people we would never choose to hang out with otherwise. It is fraught with a sense of obligation, robbing the relationship of any sense of intimacy and enjoyment. We benefit from the relationship sure but it seems more like a symbiotic partnership than an intimate relationship.

Do you ever think that God feels the same way about us?

We know that God loves us. He sent his Son to die for us to redeem us to himself. We hear about God's love all of the time. We love the love of God. We talk about it, we sing about it, we preach it, we pray it, we base everything on it.

But does God like us?

You will be a crown of splendor in the Lord’s hand,
    a royal diadem in the hand of your God.
⁴ No longer will they call you Deserted, 
    or name your land Desolate. 
But you will be called Hephzibah,
    and your land Beulah;
for the Lord will take delight in you,
    and your land will be married. 
⁵ As a young man marries a young woman,
    so will your Builder marry you;
as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride,
    so will your God rejoice over you.

Isaiah 62:3-5

Psychologists say that the single largest determining factor in human attraction is reciprocity. That means we are attracted most to people who are attracted to us back. 

So we love God because he first loved us. 

But we enjoy God because he rejoices over us. He delights in us. He promises this. This relationship is what we have to look forward to. If ever you wonder if heaven is going to be a place really worth fighting for, really worth suffering for, really worth sacrificing for, really worth dying for just think of this.

You know how good you feel when you walk in to a gathering and people's faces light up when you enter because they are glad to see you?

Imagine how you will feel when the God of the universe infinitely delights to have you in his presence and rejoices over you. 

I don't care how desperately thirsty I am, that will quench it. And knowing that that is coming will hold me over enough to get me there. 

Doubts and Decisions

Humans are masters at subtext. We will say something and everybody who hears it understands what was not said. I think this is especially true when we are tearing another person down. Beneath nearly all gossip is the understood subtext "I would never do that/say that/be that way. Aren't I a better person than them?"

These words are rarely used but they are in fact a big reason why gossip is so tempting. We want to make ourselves look better, even at the expense of other people. The gossip is the pretext to communicate the subtext within the context of another life.

We don't just do that with the people around us. We do it to people in the Bible as well. We make fun of Peter's foot-in-mouth syndrome and neglect that fact that our prayers communicate to God ideas that are just as naive or foolhardy. We call James and John the "Sons of Thunder" when we are just as quick to cast judgement upon the people around us, casting our own condemnation of hell upon them by not sharing the Gospel because "they wouldn't listen anyway". We bash the Pharisees and rightfully so. But how often do we look at the staples of our Christian life in the same way that they looked at their Jewish traditions? Do I need to bring up all the arguments about worship styles, Bible translations, length and content of quiet times, the way we pray and so on and so on? Oh yeah, we are Pharisees just as much as they were.

There is another person of the Bible that gets a bad rap because we want to feel better about ourselves. However, when we understand that this character stands not as an example of human frailty but as an example of the immense grace of God, our hearts will be filled in an entirely different way.

That man is Thomas.

We call him "Doubting Thomas" because he was the last disciple to believe that God had raised Jesus from the dead. We hear Jesus' words to him after he believes "blessed are those who have not seen yet still believe" and we think, "Yeah! I haven't seen and I believe! I'm more blessed than he was!" We feel good and don't really want to dive deeper into this story and walk in Thomas' shoes. We do ourselves and God a major disservice when we move on from this passage with scarcely a thought.

So a few observations...

First, why don't we call Peter "Doubting Peter"? When Mary and Martha told him that Jesus had risen, he didn't believe then and ran to the tomb to see himself. Didn't he, by his actions, declare the same thing that Thomas declared? "Until I see with my own eyes..." 

Second, its not as if the other 10 disciples believed without seeing. Jesus appeared to them. They saw. They needed to see just as much as Thomas did. Jesus told them  And he said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate before them." Luke 24:38-43. The other disciples were not quoted as saying such things but they felt and needed and received everything for which Thomas asked. All Thomas was saying was "Give me the same thing!"

Third and most important, Jesus gives Thomas exactly what he asked for. Jesus gives him everything he needs to believe. Don't miss the grace in this. Don't miss the love in this. Jesus says "I heard you and I want you to believe in me. Look, here is the proof that you wanted." God doesn't have to do anything for anybody. He could have come to Thomas in a vision. He could have appeared and done other miracles. He could have allowed the testimony of the other disciples time to do its work. Instead, Jesus comes himself, holds Thomas by the hand and says "Look at what I have done for you. Look at what I continue to do for you. Believe in me, Trust me." 

There is another story, back in the old testament. Gideon was given a task. He heard a word from the Lord to go and attack the Midianites. However, he wasn't sure if he had really heard God or not. He wanted to make certain. So he conducts a test. Twice actually, just to make absolute certain. What does God do? Without a hint of anger or rebuke, he answers. God gives Gideon everything he needs to believe and to act. What grace!! What an amazing portrait of just what God will do to show himself to us! What does that say about him? The God of the universe in whose very creation that we live bothers to create and bolster in us faith by revealing to us himself in exactly the way we need. He doesn't leave it to creation or miracles or past actions. He acts now and for us specifically. 


I am desperately thirsty, and like most thirsty people, I want assurance that water is nearby. When something new is on the horizon, some unknown journey or trial, I want to see my assurance. I want proof that I will be provided for and that I am not mindlessly and groundlessly stepping forward. In other words, I have my doubts. The promise of these two accounts is that if I ask, God will show me exactly what I need. God is so rich in mercy and loves us so thoroughly that he will reach down and give us the assurance that we ask for. 


Thomas was confronted with a crazy proposition. He was being asked to believe that this man who had died was the Messiah. He knew that if he ascribed to this, his life would be changed forever. He wanted to believe, but he needed the same proof that the others had. God gave it to him. Thomas was then filled with faith that would empower him for the rest of his life to do amazing things and die for the proclamation of the Gospel.

So what does Jesus mean when he says "blessed are those who have not seen and still believe"? I think he means that the same faith that the apostles had, that same world changing, death defying, passion fueling faith that they received by looking at Jesus will be received by us, even though we have not seen him for ourselves.

That power, that assurance is available to us. All we have to do is ask him, and he will give us what we need. It won't be Christ standing before us, but it will be enough. He promises us that.

Eager Expectation

Expectations are powerful things.

Super Bowl ad revenue is driven almost exclusively by expectations. Some time in the not so distant past, a few companies decided to spend a little extra time and creativity on ads run during the Super Bowl. It worked. People loved the ads. This began to create an expectation about the future ads. People started actually watching the commercials and paying attention to them during the pauses. NFL and network executives caught on to this and started charging exorbitant amounts of money for spots, fueling our expectations of the ads worth this kind of money to show. Something that we most often skip through or leave the room for on any other day becomes something where people "shush" others and critique harder than the game itself. And we joyfully wade through more than an hour of crap commercials to find two or three that are genuinely enjoyable. And companies endure the hit on their accounts because they know people will watch and even a bad commercial gets talked about, a lot.

Actually the entire premise of commercial ad revenue is based on expectation. If the show is worth watching, we will endure the breaks and ads just so we can watch what we want to. Ad execs and network revenue execs know this so they pay and charge more for spots in more popular shows.

We endure a lot if we expect much. It is ingrained into the deepest core of our being. Our culture knows it and feeds off of it. We are so thirsty as to be insatiable. If we think we can be satisfied, we will endure anything. Therefore, things are offered to quench our thirst and people constantly evaluate just how much punishment we will take as commercial breaks become longer, more frequent and more obtrusive (just look at the evolution of ads in internet video over the past couple of years to know this). As expectations grow, tolerance increases.


"For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God...And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience." Romans 8:18-19, 23-25


You may have noticed a recurring theme in the content of this blog. Not only the theme of thirst but also the theme of looking forward to something greater as it pertains to various desires that we want fulfilled. You may want me to talk about something else. I would submit to you that there really is nothing else. The problem is we forget to remind ourselves what exactly we are waiting for and our anticipation wanes. Our expectations lose prominence. The eagerness is gone, hope fades and our affections return to the temporal, the mundane and the empty. I know this because I am an "out of sight, out of mind" person. I will only be thirsty for something if it is constantly in front of me. 


Over and over, the means by which we strive for holiness and for endurance is directly connected to resurrection bodies or glorification in heaven. We have the goal and purpose of glorifying God and enjoying him forever. Our dedication to that end is directly connected to the way in which we engage our minds in this eager expectation and hope. What we MUST do is to constantly raise our eyes and put into our sight the future vision that God has given us and live like that future vision is a present reality. This is the only way we can patiently wait for anything, enduring everything, lacking nothing. It is the only way we can look at all of the ways the world promises to quench our thirst and know that all that it offers is vanity. We can only do that if we have the promised fulfillment in our sight.


A while ago, I adopted the well known poem in "V for Vendetta" to fit this theme. The character V used this poem as a mantra to motivate his painful and arduous existence, his long term plan and the hard choices he had to make to achieve his ends. There are many verses of scripture that do that for us, as you have seen but I have still found the poetry easier to remember and the message compelling.

Remember remember, our blessed Redeemer
The upcoming season he bought
I know of no reason this upcoming season
Should ever be forgot

If I can remember this, if my expectations are set properly, the Bible says and practical experience with human nature has proven, I can endure anything.

And Scripture promises it will be worth it.

The Neverending Question or the Neverending Answer?

Curiosity, as they say, kills the cat. However, I would say that little kills the patience of a parent quicker than the question "why?"

Obviously, I am not a parent. However, I have a younger brother who is eleven years younger than I am. I remember very well, in fact I was a know it all high schooler when my brother was in his inquisitive phase. I would take it upon myself to answer all of his questions. I was in high school. Surely I could out-smart this little 5 year old. Surely I could impress his young mind with a volume of knowledge he had just accumulated in 3 minutes and satisfy him. Surely his mind really didn't care that much, he just wanted somebody to answer him.

Surely...

So now I know that when I become a parent, I will NOT be doing that. I will not provide endless answers to the endless questions, at least not with continual reasons. The answer to a why question only prompts more questions, usually another why. While inquisitive minds should be rewarded and answers must be given, they should be the right answers to the right questions. Sometimes, you just don't need to know why. Sometimes there is a far better question that can be asked and a far more satisfying answer to be given.

But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. "The Lord is my portion, " says my soul, "therefore I will hope in him." Lamentations 3:21-23.

This is a familiar verse, often sung and quoted in prayers. How often do you remember the reference though? This passage is in Jeremiah's lament over the fall of Judah, the exile of his people, the judgment of God upon the nations. Listen to what he says as he laments to the Lord.

"I am the man who has seen affliction under the rod of his wrath; he has driven and brought me into darkness without any light; surely against me he turns his hand again and again the whole day long. He has made my flesh and my skin waste away; he has broken my bones; he has besieged and enveloped me with bitterness and tribulation' he has made me dwell in darkness like the dead of long ago..." Lamentations 3:1-6

Here is a man at an end of himself. He has nothing left. No home, no family, no health, no wealth, no security. All he has is pain, physical, emotional and spiritual. And yet he never asks God why. In fact, there is only one time the word "why" appears in the entire chapter.

"Who has spoken and it came to pass, unless the Lord has commanded it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come? Why should a living man complain, a man, about the punishment of his sins?" Lamentations 3:37-39

This man has plenty of reason to question. He has plenty of reason to wonder at the character of God. All he needs to do is look around and see God's wrath and anger. This man has nothing...

except a memory of who God is,

and this memory give him hope.

The moment we give ourselves to asking why, we are asking God to open the windows of eternity and to show us his plan that spans throughout millenia, countless ages past, present and future. We give ourselves to circumstance, to change, to the ebb and flow of time itself. When we ask "who?", God gives us his word and tells us who he is. We can rest in his unchanging and proven nature, the assurance of his promise and the faithfulness of his provision. "The Lord is my portion" says this broken and suffering man crying out to God.

The answer to the who question is far more satisfying and life giving than the answer to the why question, as Mark Vroegop, lead pastor of College Park Church said in his sermon "The Reverence and Relevance of Job." We need to learn how to ask it. All we really want to know is "Is everything ok?" "Am I going to be all right?" "What am I to do?" We really just want assurance, confidence and purpose. We think that the answer to "why" will give us the security that we desire. God knows better. He simply gives us himself. We get assurance because we know he is faithful. We get confidence because we know he is powerful and we get purpose because we see he is wonderful and all we can do is glorify him.

"Therefore, I will hope in him."

The God of ? Chances

We live in a world full of penalties. And if we are honest to ourselves, we love it.

Play any game out there. You only get a certain number of chances to fail before you are out. Baseball is an easy one. You get 3 strikes per at bat, 3 outs an inning, 27 outs per game. Football gives you 4 downs. Basketball gives you 5 (or 6) fouls. All of these games gives you a certain amount of time. We thrive in these environments because these penalties or clear roads of failure gives us a marker for our performance. We can easily measure how we are doing. We like to know where we are. We feel a sense of accomplishment when we achieve, pushed on by these boundaries of failure that are well defined and regulated constantly.

There is a sense where we have that in the Christian life but there is another sense in that we don't. We have clear instructions and commands, things that mark a failure to follow Christ. The thing is there is something else that we know.

Everybody fails.

There is no success when it comes to following the law, when obeying every command of Christ all the time for the rest of our lives. This is MADDENING at times. How do we know how we are doing? How many times can we fail before God says "I'm through!"? Then we can know, "well I still have 5287 failures left in my life before I am disqualified. I am doing pretty good!" In a world of rules and penalties, of goals and failures, we thirst for yardsticks. We search for measurement. God, instead put in place and only two things.

His immeasurable perfection.

His immeasurable mercy.

In Jeremiah 42, Judeans who were left after the Babylonian takeover are afraid. The governor that the Babylonians placed over them has been assassinated and they await the wrath of their overlords. They cry out to Jeremiah for a word from God. To show just how far they had departed from God, they ask Jeremiah to "pray to the Lord your God." These people had disobeyed so many times and had endured the wrath of God for their disobedience to the point where they say that God is not even their God anymore. And yet, how does God respond to them?"

"If you will remain in this land, then I will build you up and not pull you down...do not fear (the king of Babylon), declares the Lord, for I am with you, to save you and to deliver you from his hand. I will grant you mercy, that he may have mercy on you and let you remain in your own land." Jeremiah 42:10-12"

To a people seemingly hell-bent on disobedience, God offers mercy again. He has no reason to. They have not lived up to his law. Not only have they not lived up but they have betrayed him utterly. How alike are we? We live in complete view of his mercy and goodness and we still fail. We still choose the fleeting pleasures of this life to the eternal satisfaction of our God. Yet no matter how many times we fail, God shows mercy. He welcomes us back into fellowship, into his arms, into his love, into his blessing. We can have a lifetime of failure and God will still offer his hand of mercy to us. It is, as I said earlier, completely immeasurable, thoroughly incomprehensible, and never depleteable.

God frees us from having to measure ourselves, letting us live without comparison to anybody or anything. All we can stand by are his perfection and mercy, both immeasurable. His mercy is the only thing that is capable of filling the void left by his perfection and he gives it to us for this very purpose; so that we will know that in him, we cannot fail, we cannot lose, because he does not fail and he does not lose.

I must caveat this though. The very next verses show what happens when men sin too much. The Judeans reject God's mercy. The refuse to listen and they run. They are then killed and taken away by the Babylonian army. So God's mercy is never ending. It will always be enough. However, if we make a habit of rejecting God, we will do so again when it matters most. His mercy is sufficient but you MUST accept it.

"Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts..." Hebrews 4:7

Happy Valentine's Day?

Most singles hate Valentine's day.

We call it a Hallmark holiday or Singles Awareness Day. We bemoan its entirely commercial nature, call it completely unnecessary, become conscientious objectors to the whole idea of Valentine's Day.

Not that singles are alone in this. Men in relationships who do not have the romantic bent will hate it because their partner will have an idea of Valentine's Day they can never live up to. Its a day of the year full of unmet expectation that often ends in quiet disappointment.

I have never had a problem with Valentine's Day. I think it is because I have never been in a relationship, I don't know what Valentine's Day is "supposed" to be. In some sense, I don't know what I'm "missing". I've played along, joked with friends, hated on the commercialized nature of it, agreed with exasperated men having to live up to expectations, nodded sagely with those who say, "We don't do Valentine's Day," and generally just floated along while never really having any sort of feeling to it.

It hit me more this year. As I listened and read and talked to people, I wondered, "Why don't I hate it?". I know myself. I am desperately thirsty. If there is any day in the year that I should be reminded of what I do not have, it is this one. And yet...

The name, Saint Valentine first appeared in a Catholic book of martyrs in the 1400's though a "feast of Saint Valentine" was said to be instituted even earlier in the 400's. The importance is not really who he is or what he did but the fact that he was found and remembered as a martyr. 

John 15:13 "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends."

1 John 3:16 "By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers."

You know it seems like every other day, we realize what love we have. However, this one day out of the year, we buy into the lie that culture has given us. We let stores and cards and people's stories ascribe to us our worth and define our identity like we never do around Christmas. Why have we let culture redefine this day? Because we want what the culture has for us. We want this redefined image of love and we forget what real love is.

Real love is what brought the Gospel to your ear. Someone loved you enough to face rejection and ridicule to give you the truth of Christ. Real love is what gave you the Bible in your language. Someone faced punishment and death to write and translate the Word and even more loved enough to distribute it. Real love is what is spread the Gospel to the far corners of the earth. Real love is what brought the Gospel out of the first century. Real love is what fueled the Gospel outside of Jerusalem. Real love is what kept Jesus on the cross, making sure that there even is a Gospel.

Love is the vehicle by which the Gospel has spread throughout time and space and into our hearts today. God gave of himself, all of himself for us. Men and women gave of themselves, all they had including their lives, for us. Unlike the culture that connects worth to chocolates and diamonds and dinners and teddy bears, countless people have told you that you are treasured by giving you their life so that you can hear the glorious truth of the one who loves you most. Don't buy into the lies because you are beautiful, you are treasured and you are worth every bit of that sacrifice because of the grace and the love of God himself.

So, honestly, have a Happy Valentine's day. It is worth celebrating.

The Danger of Denial

I have a weird form of impulse buying.

Lets take, as an example, my saga of buying a PS3. Ever since it came out, I mulled over the prospect of buying one. It has some great games, great features, is region free (a big thing for me as I import stuff from Japan) and has killer computing power. The thing was, for a long time, there were other things that I needed to spend $300 on, like, say food and tuition and rent. I would reason my way out of the desire, pressing it down into the lower reaches of my conciousness and go about taking care of the necessities of life. I would see trailers for games and hear conversations by friends that would raise the specter of desire and I would brutally shove it down again.

Fast forward to some 3 years later. I am meandering through Fry's Electronics (always a dangerous thing when you have unsatified technical fantasies) and I notice that they are selling refurbished PS3's in the wake of the newer slimmer model that had just released. It was just too good of a deal to ignore. A game that I really wanted to play had just released from my favorite studio and now this sale hits me at a weak moment, a time where I had already decided to spend some money (I was pot committed if you will). So I walk over and grab a box. Then I look up the row and see the brand new model sitting there at full price. I look at the box and wonder at the stories that this pre-owned console may have, what conditions it had been in before, how some uncaring tech may have poorly re-soldered some components and a catastrophic failure that could happen and the extra money I would end up paying. The potential was too great for my mind. I put the box down and grabbed the new model and walked out with a much much lighter wallet. This is a pattern. Anything over a couple hundred dollars goes through this process for me.

Now I don't regret this purchase. Not really. But what is illustrated here? A repressed desire will grow until one day some catalyst will transform it into an uncontrollable urge with consequences larger than it ever would have been had the desire been fulfilled initially.

I am desperately thirsty. I want a lot of things, a lot of which can be attained easily through sin. Self-righteous culture tells me to deny these impulses, that desires are unholy and should be suppressed. Post-modern culture tells me to satify every desire and constantly bombards me with messages about how to do so and shows me a myriad of people who are doing so and enjoying it. As Christians we are caught between denial and indulgence, between holiness and debauchery with many strategies to win mental battles but with few motivations to win heart battles.

"I will feast the soul of the priests with abundnce, and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness, declares the Lord." Jeremiah 31:14

Two things. He says he will feast the soul. This is not a promise of material blessing, something to satisfy our minds and senses. This is a promise that he satisfies the root, the innermost part of our being. He goes beyond what we think will fulfill our desires and fills the very essence of the desire itself, a longing and emptiness in our souls. He then says that they will be satisfied with his goodness, not his gifts. He makes certain that our satisfaction is rooted in something that will never change and will never depart and that is himself.

Remember, this is written to his people who are in exile. They are in a pagan culture where they are being told every day that their way is not the best way, their God is a farce and that they can have everything they have ever wanted if they will simply live like everyone else. They are in Babylon, which is used in Revelation as a metaphor for the most sin drenched depth that mankind can reach.

God knows that simply giving them a list of "do nots" will do nothing to combat the enticement of the culture around them. Instead he tells them, "Don't trust them, trust me. I will do far more for you than they can. I will satisfy you so much more deeply than they can ever know. Don't deny your desires, they will keep coming back. Come to me and have them filled."

"Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me" is not a call to not satisfy the desires of our heart. It is a call to give up our own control and our own ideas of how to satisfy them. It is God saying, "Look, you can do what everybody else is doing to work at satisfying yourself or you can do it my way. My way looks like the cruelest, most agonizing thing you can ever choose because to all the world, it will look like you are giving up something great. They will ridicule you and call you foolish. But the weight of my cross on your back is the weight of my love for you, a reminder of my goodness to you, a taste of what I have done for you. You have me and I am good."

So don't bury your desires, trying to pretend they don't exist, trying to hide them from God in some silly notion that we can fool God into thinking we are holier than we are. Open them before him. Tell him what your mind is telling you that you need. Then ask him to fill you. Ask him to remind you of his promise. Ask him to give you a vision and a faith to make the future vision a present reality. Ask him and ask him often. Every day, every moment if you have to. Whatever it takes to attain the attitude that Paul had "Whatever gain I had, I count as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord."

"Ask and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened...If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father (who is good!) who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!"

I Want You to Want Me

You know that 1977 song by Cheap Trick.

"I want you to want me
I need you to need me
I'd love you to love me
I'm beggin you to beg me"

I am an attention whore. I like it and I crave it. I love being the center of attention and not only that but the center of affection. I want to approval of everybody in the room. My public life, my words, my actions often center on this desire. Every person is the object of my desire.

Except God.

At least at the beginning.

See we are all like this. As sinful man we run far and fast from God. We don't want him, we want ourselves. We don't want his plan, we want ours. We want pleasure NOW, not pleasure later. We never really seek God's attention. We don't try to claw our way up to heaven begging for God to take notice of us. We beg and claw and fight and strive for the attention of those who are around us.

"Why have I found favor in your eyes, that you should take notice of me, since I am a foreigner?” Ruth 2:10

Ruth asks Boaz this question after he pledges his protection over her in his fields and offers her provision of drink if she is thirsty. She does this while on her knees, face to the ground, recognizing that no Israelite in his right mind should offer this blessing to a former oppressor, a foreigner and a stranger.

I was struck by this question. In context, Ruth had done plenty worth noting, namely her loyatly to her mother in law, and her good reputation preceded her. However, I read those words and I can't help but think,

"Why have I found favor in your eyes, that you should take notice of me, since I am a sinner?"

When God called me out of darkness, I was not seeking him. I was rebelling against everything I had learned about him, making my own path, choosing what to please myself with. Yet he was the one not content to let me finish my hell bound race. He was the one who poured his spirit into my life. He was the one who drew me back to himself so that I could have eternal life instead of eternal death. He was the one who sent his son to die so that I could be saved.

"God, why do you bother?" I often ask that question in my struggle with sin. "Why do you convict me? Why do you work to bring me back? Why do you exert your will? Why do you never give up? Why do you want me?"

His answer is actually a little bit like that song.

"I want you to want me
but I don't need you to need me
I'd just love you to love me
but I won't beg you to beg me.

Didn't I, didn't I didn't I see you crying?
Feelin all alone without a friend, I know you felt like dyin
Didn't I didn't I didn't I see you crying?"

He did indeed. And he came, not because I begged him, but because he saw me, before the beginning of time, and he loved me, not because of me, but because of who he is.

We find favor because he is favorable, not because we are. So we don't need to vie for God's attention. We don't need to impress him or claw over each other and compete to get his time or his blessing. We are free to experience his love and blessing and care knowing its not dependant upon us. We can rest in assurance. And the more we realize this, the more we drink of this water, the less thirsty we become for anything but God until what Jesus said to the woman at the well becomes absolutely true.

"whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never thirst again." John 4:14

A Taste of Something Greater

We all have our lists. What list is that? Its the "Heaven would not be heaven without _____" list. This is the list that every Christian has as we look around the world and then think, "You know, having God around will be pretty cool and all but I don't think I can be eternally joyful without this thing that I have right now". I've heard some pretty amusing ones in my time and I have some of my own. Heaven would not be heaven without...

1. McDonalds fries. And there, they will always be perfectly salted, not left to the whim of the store manager.

2. The ability to get around the world in minutes, presumably by flying. How can we enjoy the beauty of a new heaven and a new earth without being able to get around on a whim? I imagine grabbing somebody's hand, saying "Hey, lets go see a sunset on a canyon", jumping up into the air and landing after a pleasant jaunt through the skies just on time to see it.

3. Which reminds me, sunsets. Or something in the sky kind of like it. If there is no night, and no light apart from God, there is no sunset. But God can put colors in the sky if he wants. And thats what I want.

4. Healing powers like Wolverine from the X-Men. I mean we will have immortal bodies. Its gotta be something like that.

5. Lightsabers. With man's wisdom, many things are impossible. With God's wisdom, nothing is impossible. Besides, Genesis 3:24 said a cherubim had a flaming sword. The Hebrew word there means to burn, blaze, scorch, kindle, blaze up, flame (not kidding, look it up). Since they did not have Star Wars then, they didn't know how else to describe it. If they had known, the Bible would say lightsaber. Guaranteed.

The truth is, we don't really know what to expect of heaven. We get these images of wings and harps and clouds and golden streets from culture and think..."thats kinda boring..." and we desperately search for what will fulfill our desires for an eternal home. The thing is, what we think about where we are going can be either incredibly motivating or awfully deflating. We desperately want to have an idea of where we are going so that we know we are making the right choice by choosing God now. We want to know if giving up the pleasures of this world is worth it and our hearts need constant convincing.

"'But if you listen to me, declares the LORD, and bring in no burden by the gates of this city on the Sabbath day, but keep the Sabbath day holy and do no work on it, then there shall enter by the gates of this city kings and princes who sit on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their officials, the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And this city shall be inhabited forever." Jeremiah 17:24-25

Jeremiah is a book that is mostly full of God's judgement on Israel. He lists their offenses often in the book and the judgment God sends is clearly deserved. Here is the interesting thing. This language that Jeremiah uses is parralell language to the descriptions of heaven in Isaiah 60 and Revelation 21 ("the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it"). We know that heaven is a guarantee. We know that Jerusalem will become what is promised in Jeremiah whether the nation obeys at this time or not. God will not break his covenant. And yet he makes this conditional statement, "if you listen to me...".

What I think God is trying to say here is that if we listen and obey him, he will give us a taste of heaven while we are here on earth. Like so many of his other promises, these blessings are promises of double fulfillment, partial fulfillment now and complete fulfillment later.

I am desperately thirsty. Though the promise of heaven is alluring and the reward there tantalizing, it sometimes is not enough to keep me from temptation. This life may be short in view of eternity but our journies are long. We constantly must fight temptations and worldly promises and it so often saps our strength. We need something more than a future blessing and future grace. The amazing thing is, God gives that to us. He doesn't have to but he knows us, he knows our hearts. He knows that we are creatures of desire; he made us that way. He is gracious and wants us near him so he gives, as it is in his nature to give. He does make it conditional though, knowing that the one who obeys him will glorify him as he deserves for his grace, and the one who does not obey will not testify to his goodness.

What does this taste of heaven look like? Well what I know of heaven is this. We will have no need. We will have no want. God will be with us. We will be filled with joy and glorify him for eternity. Whatever that looks like on this earth, I want that. I want to be at peace about putting food on my table because God has provided. I want to get to the point where I want nothing, not because I have bought everything I want but because I am utterly content with what God has graciously given. This thirst, God has promised to fulfill if I obey, so I will obey, knowing that I will experience something amazing here, and knowing that that amazement will be magified infinitely on the other side of eternity.

And what could be more amazing than holding a lightsaber in my hand some day? Or at least walking by some cherubim holding one. Yup, going to stick by that. Its in the Bible.

"Oh taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him! Oh fear the Lord, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack." Psalm 34:8-9

Into the Light

Most of us have things we would rather keep in the dark, little idiocycracies that we fear may change the way people look at us. I had a roomate in college, for example who kept secret for a long time his guilty pleasure TV show, one inherited from an old girlfriend of his. Incidentally, it kind of became a guilty pleasure show for all of us, so I definately identify with the reason he kept it a secret for as long as he could. What show was it? Well, let just say its about some girls that go by the name of Gilmore.

Those of you reading this that did not know that, your perception of me changed a bit didn't it?

And yet, you get a more complete picture of who I am. My words and opinions can now be evaluated as those coming from one who appreciates snarky dialog, complex relationships and societal expectations. What is exposed gives meaning and nuance and significance to the object in question.

I have many more guilty pleasures, pleasures that aren't nearly as innocent as television shows about young, rich, witty women. I am, as I have said, desperately thirsty. These pleasures are ones that I would much rather keep in the dark and never expose to the light of day, to the light of public opinion and to the light of truth. These are all encompassing. Do I really want people to know how much I enjoy tearing people down with smart sarcasm? How I revel in the rush of power I feel when expressing anger? How I love the sense of accomplishment when I successfully tell a lie? How I long for the giddiness and carelessness that comes with being drunk? How I relish the false intimacy of a relationship that begins and ends at a club or even a screen? What happens when this is exposed?

"for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light." Ephesians 5:8-14a

Right at the end of this passage is this amazing truth buried in a metaphor of the physcial world. What we don't often think about is that everything we "see" in this world is really just rays of light from our sun. These rays come from millions of miles away, reflect off of objects, losing some of its characteristics but retaining its essence, and enter into our eyes for our brains to process. What we actually see is the light of the source reflected off of exposed surfaces.

The beauty of what Christ does is that whatever we expose to him becomes a surface that reflects his glory. I think this is what it means when Paul says "for anything that becomes visible is light." Anything, whether it be our gifts, our good works, our obedience and even our sin, when it comes into the light of Christ becomes something that reflects the glory of who he is.

Now exposure in this sense is not simply letting everybody know what this thing is, whether good or evil. It is exposure to men AND exposure to the sanctification of God through the Holy Spirit. I am by no means advocating the continuation of sin because God is glorified by it. However, as children of grace being sanctified by his Spirit, I am saying that even the darkest moments of our depravity, when exposed to God and to men, is a testimony of the overwhelming beauty and glory of God and his Christ. It shows the depth of grace that God wields to save us and the depth of goodness that God has to fill us and the depth of love that God feels for him to even want to do either.

"Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed..." James 5:16

God, you are in fact light. You are the source of the universe which all things reflect. Thank you that this light cannot be overcome by any darkness, even the darkness of our depravity. Help us to bring what was once done in darkness into light so that we can show just how beautiful you are, just how fulfilling you are, and just how gracious you are to a world that is settling for the very things that we used to settle for. Show in us and through us just what it is that you have to offer a dieing and depraved world. Help us reflect your glory.

Greater Blessings

I mentioned this before and if you know me, I have never been otherwise.

I am single. I like long walks on the beach, sunsets, poetry, moonlit walks in the woods in the snow...oh wait...that was for my E-Hamony profile, not here...sorry. Though all of these things are true ; )

I have noticed something and it gets stronger every year I remain single. People around me want me to get married. This is all well and good. They want me to be happy. They want what they have for me.

The problem is, I start to want it.

I am desperately thirsty. There is much beauty and much grace and much growth in marriage. It is God's illustration to us of Christ and his church. There is much that marriage makes real to us: our sinful nature, a practical realization of how much God loves us, a close look into the design that God has for us as humans that function in one body. I get thirsty for that and at times will fix my mind on it.

The problem is, if its not God's time, this want leads me down the wrong path, a path of false intimacy, of depression, of utter distraction and bad stewardship of the gifts and skills God has given me. No amount of "God has a plan," or "The perfect person is waiting for you just around the corner," will satisfy my thirst.

Thank God that he is a generous and giving God. He does not expect me to give up everything for nothing in return. He faithfully gives everything to those who will give up anything.

"Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord say, “The Lord will surely separate me from his people”; and let not the eunuch say, “Behold, I am a dry tree.” For thus says the Lord: “To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, who choose the things that please me and hold fast my covenant, I will give in my house and within my walls a monument and a name better than sons and daughters; I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off." Isaiah 56:3-5

"Sing, O barren one, who did not bear; break forth into singing and cry aloud, you who have not been in labor! For the children of the desolate one will be more than the children of her who is married,’ says the Lord” Isaiah 54:1

John Piper says this in his exegisis of this passage.

"Take heed here lest you minimize what I am saying and do not hear how radical it really is. I am not sentimentalizing singleness to make the unmarried feel good. I am declaring the temporary and secondary nature of marriage and family over against the eternal and primary nature of the church. Marriage and family are temporary for this age; the church is forever. I am declaring the radical biblical truth that being in a human family is no sign of eternal blessing, but being in God’s family means being eternally blessed. Relationships based on family are temporary. Relationships based on union with Christ are eternal."

In prophesying the coming of Christ and the New Covenant, Isaiah is pointing to a radical shift in culture, that the offspring that God cares about are not phyiscal offspring, but spiritual offspring. This is emphasized in his prophesy of Christ in Isaiah 53, “It was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.” (quoted and emphasized by Piper in the same sermon).

Now I am not trying to make an unfair judgement on married couples. The reward for spiritual offspring is for all of God's faithful. What the text says is that the blessings of spiritual offspring is better than the blessings of physical offpring, and that one who is barren physically but faithful spiritually can have more spiritual offspring in eternity than one who is married. The math is simple. Marraige takes a ton of time and raising children even more. Parents have to do both, raising phyiscal and spiritual offspring, a full time ministry if there ever was one, one that will have unique heavenly rewards. After all, there must be a next generation of parents and singles to carry on after we are gone right? Singles can take all that time and energy and pour it forth fully to the birthing and discipling of spiritual offspring and God promises to reward us handsomly for doing so.

So what does God do? He takes my thirst for something now and gives me a taste of something greater. In this wilderness, he tells me that singleness is not a space between times, a transition into "real life". He tells me "Come! See what I have for you! I will give you over and abundantly more than you can imagine. Now do my work." I taste and see that the Lord is good and it quenches my thirst.

So to all of those around me who inadvertantly and well-meaningly make me thirsty for something that God does not have for me now, ask me what I am doing, not who I am dating. Pray that I will win souls in my workplace, my ministries, my friendships, not that I will win the heart of a woman. Don't be disappointed when I am not seeing someone, be disappointed when I see a chance to share the Gospel and forgoe it. Whet my appetitie for heaven, not my appetite for intimacy. Make me thirsty for what God wants me to be thristy for and help me run to the fountain of living waters to be filled. I will be happier there than any other place, I promise.

And when the day and opportunity comes when I need the help of another in order to accomplish this call of God, there will be someone there, probably joining me on a beach watching a sunset. I hear the sand at Eagle Creek Resevoir is pretty nice.

Here is the link to John Piper's full sermon. http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/sermons/single-in-christ-a-name-better-than-sons-and-daughters

Success and Failure

I am a performer, not just in the sense of I get in front of people and sing, but also in the sense that I judge myself by my performance all the time. I've been an athlete, an entertainer, a worship leader and much more. I've had a lot of great moments of success.

Side note, I think this is why I like video games. I don't want to just passively watch another world. I want to do something in it. I want to win. And I'm not a really firey, in-your-face competitor. I just quietly and calmly destroy you. Play Mario Kart with me some time. I don't care if its your first time, I will lap you. There is no going easy. I will use the power slide boost on every curve I can (don't know what that is? yeah. I know all the moves).

The flip side of this is I despise failure. I judge myself harshly when I lose. I go over every mistake and analyze the performance and make myself better. Heck, if I don't win by enough, I still do that.

I tend to do this in the Christian life too. I am desperately thirsty. I want to succeed. I want to accomplish. I want to be perfect. I want God to be near me because I am so awesome. But guess what? (News flash to me) I am not awesome (Most of you probably knew this already). I am pretty awful at being Christ like, and I fall into this spiraling pit of despair and hopelessness because I can't seem to succeed. Since I want God to be near me because I am awesome, I also think that there is no way God will want me near when I am not. I ask the question of God often, "God why do you bother with me? I am such a failure! You have to work so hard on me! Why do you try?"

"We acknowledge our wickedness, O LORD, and the iniquity of our fathers, for we have sinned against you. Do not spurn us, for your name's sake; do not dishonor your glorious throne; remember and do not break your covenant with us." Jeremiah 14:20-21.

God entered into a covenant relationship with the nation of Israel. He calls them to obey and he promises to be near them and to make them his holy people. The problem is they fail. Repeatedly. Horribly. But this was not a contract. God did not say if you obey me, I will make you my people. He said obey AND I will make you my people. And this verse tells us why. Its for His name's sake, for his glory. God's nearness to us and his salvation have nothing to do with our performance and has everything to do with his character. David says the same thing in Psalm 51.

Have mercy on me, O God,
   according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy    blot out my transgressions.
Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
   and cleanse me from my sin!

We have a God who judges us not based on our work but based on his grace. All we have to do is believe in it. This is such a balm for my soul when my mind is wracked with failure. His grace is not dependent upon me. He remains near to me because he is awesome.

If we are honest with ourselves, its not really the success that drives us or failure that depresses us. It is the results of these things. We want the noteriety, the money, the respect, the power, the adulation and we despise the humiliation and the lack of reward. God enters into our world and says "Don't worry about that. Here is your result. You can have it. Its yours. Now LIVE WITHOUT FEAR. Live with EAGER EXPECTATION. LIVE FOR ME."

"With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation." Isaiah 12:3.

What about you? How often do you find yourself falling into a performance mentality?

Shame and Approval

How much of what we do and feel on a day to day basis is based on what the people around us think? Think about how we dress. The phrase "I wouldn't be caught dead wearing that..." should be finished with the phrase "because people will think I am _____" nearly every time. Side note, I definately have something that most people would not be caught dead in. Its on Facebook. Lets just say its orange, and they are somewhere between shorts and pants. Oh yes. Find it. I'm not ashamed : p

Here is what still gets me. When I am with people at work or in social situations outside of church and the topic of sex comes up, why do I have that moment of embarrasment that I am still a virgin? Why do I have the urge to look down and away and admit it quietly? I'm 26, have been saying this for years, and STILL I can't get over that first gut reaction.

On the other side, whenever the subject of partying comes up, I feel an irresitable urge to tell of my college exploits, the crazy drinks I have had, the crazy things I have done, whatever. I strive to identify with them. I can't bring myself not to mention it.

WHY?

Its shame. I wonder if people will approve. I wonder what they will think. How I will look in their eyes. How I will be dismissed in their mind.

I am desperately thirsty. I am an attention whore. My greatest social fear, more than embarrassment (because that gives you attention), is to be dismissed. Irrelevent. Looked down upon. I want to command respect and attention, whatever the cost.

"Yes I will rejoice, because I know that through your prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ this will turn out for my deliverance as it it my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage, now as always, Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." Phil 1: 18-21

Many things are wrapped up in this passage. What it is saying to me today is that there will be no shame at the revelation of Jesus Christ for the things that I did in his name, even from those that seek to shame me now. I believe that part of what it means when "every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father" is that those who chose Christ will be looked upon on that day and everyone will think, "yeah, they made a good choice". Our decisions to be pure, to be sober, to be poor, to be giving, to be disciplined will be looked upon by all as right and good. What choice will everyone have when God himself gives his approval and gives us his reward?

As always, I settle for a shadow. I settle for the approval of a few now instead of the approval by ALL later. As with any desire, approval is not wrong itself. The desire is designed to drive us to God and his purpose. Paul says that this moment is his eager expectation and hope. He longs for that moment when his actions, choices and sacrifices will be vindicated by God in the sight of all men.

So I drink deeply of this water, this promise that even this desire will be fulfilled on that day. I pray that God will  imbed into my heart that this future fulfillment is enough to quench my thrist now and that will "press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus," because one day, I will be caught dead doing something. Will I be ashamed then? Only by the grace of God will I not.

But I would  still be careful about what you wear in public. Especially if they are orange capris. That may never be vindicated, by anybody. But hey, at least they matched my shoes...wait what?

Oh yes.

What about you? How does shame play a part in your day to day life? Is it time to overcome them?

Escapism

I am an escapist. I run to stories, to other worlds, to lives created by others in situations created by others in order to live a life more interesting than mine. Allow me to spell it out a bit for you. If ever you were unsure of how big of a dork I am, I am putting that argument to rest, once and for all.

I own over 70 Star Wars novels and have read them all multiple times.
I have invested over 350 hours into Tales RPG's over the last 2 years.
In the last two months alone, I have put in 71 hours into the DotA 2 beta.
I don't even want to know how many hours have gone into DotA. I know that I have something around 1000 matches, lasting an average of 30 min.
I have a full terrabyte of anime on my hard drive. Honestly, I don't feel like calculating how many hours of TV that is.

A quick note for those who say "That's why you are still single." The other friends that I play DotA with are all married and they actually play more than I do. So I have many other problems when it comes to that. Just sayin : p

I said it before, I am desperately thirsty. There is a desire deep down in my soul for a better life, a better self, a better country

What does God give me in order to satify this desire for more? For something better?

Hebrews 11:9-10 "By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God."

Hebrews 11:26 "(Moses) considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward."

Heb 12:22-23 "But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God..."

Phil 3:19-20 "Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body by the power than enables him even to subject all things to himself."

And so much more. All of Revelation 21 and 22. References in Psalms and the prophets to the coming Kingdom of God. God puts in us an insatiable desire for perfections, something that is far better than what we see and experience here. He gives us a vision in his Word to quench that desire, to motivate us to do everything we can to reach that land, that place, that life, that body. But like everything else, we settle for what the world tells us is a good land, a good place, a good life, a good body (think superpowers, not supermodels. This is not a treatise on sexual exploitation.)

Now, I not going to swear off any of these things, nor would I ever encourage anyone to. However, what I will do and what I will pray is as follows.

"God, thank you for your grace that you offer us such an eternity. Help me to meditate on it more and more. Help the vision of what you have for me and how it is that you want me to get there begin to eclipse all other desires. Let everything else begin to feel empty and insufficient compared to your gift of this amazing reward."

"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 inquire in his temple.

Introduction

Writing has been an odd constant in my life. I wouldn't say I journal or write diaries. I don't write manuscripts or short stories or songs or novels. What I do is take meticulous notes.

"Notes? Really? That's not writing!!"

Normally, you would be right. Notes tend to be shorthand thoughts to be perused later in preparation for something greater. There is little thought or effort that goes into notes. But those aren't my notes. My notes are written in complete sentences. With punctuation. My notes have paragraph breaks. My notes have summary statements where summary statements should be, with introductions and conclusions. My notes aren't revisited and complied into a greater work. They often are my work. I don't know what goes on in my brain as I process information, whether its different or faster or slower than other people, but my thoughts come out naturally in grammatically correct, organized sentences, paragraphs and papers.

When I started talking about writing a blog, many of my friends said, "I'm surprised you don't have one already." I don't really know what kept me. I guess it was my dislike for following trends for the sake of being trendy. I didn't want to do it because everybody else was doing it. I wanted to do it for a reason. 

 I believe that reason has finally made itself clear.

"Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. And there I will giver her her vineyards and make the Valley of Trouble a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt." Hosea 2:14-15.

"When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue is parched with thirst, I the Lord will answer them; I the God of Israel will not forsake them. I will open rivers on the bare heights, and fountains in the midst of the valleys, I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water. I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive. I will set in the desert the cypress, the plane and the pine together, that they may see and know, may consider and understand together, that the hand of the Lord has done this, the Holy One of Israel has created it." Isaiah 41:17-20

I am a desperately thirsty person. I am constantly digging for myself new wells, building new cisterns, finding new sources, and God regularly pulls me into the wilderness where I have no hope of quenching any thirst and makes the desert spring with life and water like he shows in these verses, filling me in a way that I was never able to with my own efforts. That is what I want to chronicle, scriptures and theology that God has provided for me in the past, that are filling me now in the present, and that I will drink deeply of and be satisfied with in the future. I trust that you too are thirsty because you too are human. I pray that verses and truth here can help turn you to this fountain of living waters, to drink deeply and with joy from the well of salvation. And if nothing else, it will remind me that the only times in my life where I have ever had my thirst quenched is when I have drunk deeply of the water that he gives. So I hope you come with me and drink deeply of this water that God provides so faithfully here in our wilderness, the wilderness that God himself allures is into.