Teach Me To Do... Psalm 143

I’ve always had this nagging suspicion that God, being the Good Father that He is, isn’t entertained by a cruel school-yard game of keep away from Brian and thus hasn’t encrypted His will for my life with complicated mind-games and nearly impossible challenges. I tend to believe that my struggle to know the will of God has been more of a seeing the trees for the forest kind of issue. That is, that the Creator who breathed into existence all the vast complexities of this universe, has bestowed upon each us such a simple purpose, which in our rigorous efforts to discover, we often dismiss like a candy wrapper for the candy within. Though we deeply desire it, and once held it in our very own hands, it now lies waiting patiently in a rubbish bin while we obliviously search near and far for something much more fantastic. It’s not vanity or selfishness on our part, which determines that God’s will for our lives must be somehow glorious. It’s more like a young baseball player convinced he’s ready for the fast-balls of the major league. We’re engaging the wrong struggle. Discovering the will of God shouldn’t be an epic challenge like finding some hidden ancient treasure. So don’t focus on the search for so much as the fulfilling of God purpose as this is where you should feel stretched the most and subsequently where you’ll experience the growth. I think that’s why the Psalmist uses language like “Make me know…” and “Teach me to do your will…” rather than “Let me know and I will do your will.” God’s good and perfect plan isn’t elusive. Although we often need him to tune our focus to see it in it’s simplicity, it’s more the doing, which requires discipline and perseverance, that we’ll need some help with. So pray this day, like the Psalmist, Lord, make me know and teach me to do your will. Amen 

Vibrant & Overflowing - Mark 4

I have mixed emotions as I look at the beds of Vinca we planted earlier this year. The one bed, vibrant and overflowing with colorful blossoms is within the flow of our everyday lives and, as such, has been weeded faithfully while the other bed some fifty feet away, is lush with weeds and boasts no more than a puny blossom or two. I can imagine if Jesus we're walking by, he might gather up a crowd and give His Mark 4 talk, motioning to each of my flower beds as he describes the four soils, charging each of us to maintain good soil and produce fruit thirty, sixty and a hundredfold. Pretty clear cut, but the problem is that we often apply the parable to the planting alone rather than to the constant gardening required to yield this sort of outcome. So let's weed the soil of our hearts regularly, tearing from it, roots and all, the "cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and desires" so that our lives may be vibrant and overflowing. 

Stop Fighting The Current – Proverbs 3

So there’s this sign posted at like every public beach access. If you’re caught in a rip current, knowing this simple plan can save your life and get you back to the beach. I love how so many patterns and principals in nature present Gods way with such clear perspective. But of course, He designed it that way. Doesn’t it sometimes feel like you’re swimming against a strong current and making no headway. While on the surface, the waves appear to be lapping the shoreline like normal and up and down the beach you see folks paddling in with ease, but paddle as you may, you’re no closer to dry sand, increasingly exhausted and barely keeping your head above the water as the, once beautiful surf, now gnarls it’s teeth at you’re bobbing head. If you’ve ever been trapped in a nasty current in life or at sea, you know this dramatic description is an understatement. But, if in the water, you’ve every tried the straightforward strategy described on this sign, you’ve likely become confident  enough not to panic in a common rip current situation. Chances are you even paddle back out for more waves, experiencing several effortless rip current escapes in a single day. This is not because you’ve become some super swimmer, but instead because you’ve tapped in to the power of employing the right strategy. We try so hard to wrap our minds around a winning strategy for life, a worthy endeavor. Proverbs 3 is like the rip current sign for life. It exhorts us not to trust our own understanding too much but instead to always look to God and He’ll provide the straight way to where we need to be going. So good news! We can stop depleting ourselves  physically, mentally and emotionally battling the rip currents of our lives and just trust it all to the one who founded the earth and established the heavens, who broke open the deep and dropped down dew from the clouds. In Him we can find life for our souls, security in our walk and  freedom from fear and confidently inherit the favor and honor that comes with trusting Him.

Freedom In Surrender - Matthew 19

I find, in the paradoxical teachings and actions of Christ, a sort of intellectual hook. Teachings like the first shall be last, losing your life to save it and so forth hit me much like the edgy questions brilliant professors will often pose in order to challenge students to think beyond their current understanding. So it makes sense that Jesus would use some of this seemingly self contradictory rhetoric in answering this rich young ruler with his moral swagger and rabbinical intellect. He'd lived well by the law, a ruler of religion and was extremely wealthy to boot, yet he himself sensed there was still something missing if he was to obtain eternal life. Jesus gave him a quick look in the mirror by suggesting the impossible. Keep all the commandments. Jesus acknowledged in the same breath that only He is good enough to do that. Still the young man couldn't or wouldn't look deep enough within to see his own folly so Jesus, welling up with love for the young man and the sincerity of his quest, give's it to him as an action step. Surrender your possessions. That's clear enough but turns out to be the one thing the young man could not bring himself to do. While it's great to own many things, it's to your destruction if those many things own you. And so it was with this rich young ruler who had wealth of possessions and so much going for him, yet would not fully surrender. He could have walked away that day richer than ever, full of joy, free and heaven bound but instead he left destitute, with a dark sadness, captive to his countless possessions and still not possessing eternal life.  Let that be a lesson to us, that in Christ, the answer to all of life's problems, the discovery of the missing pieces, the power to overcome the most daunting obstacles and the freedom to live the life we were created to live will always be found in surrender. Remember always that when we surrender our will, we discover how infinitely better His will is and how perfect His plans and his timing. When we surrender our pride and our superficial shortcomings, we experience His power and ultimately the assurance of who we are in Him, so far superior to our meager ideals. And when we surrender whatever dominates our time, our attention and treasures, we find true freedom to live!

Diet & Exercise - Psalm 119

Drilling down on Psalm 119:11, I have to ask the question, “How can ‘hiding God’s word in our heart’ keep us from sinning?” I threw this one out for discussion last night at the dinner table and my 9 year old quickly guided the conversation through the three temptations of Christ in the wilderness and his scriptural response to each. First was the temptation, in his immense hunger, to turn a stone into bread, to which he quoted Deuteronomy 8:3 “…man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord.” Then, [mis]quoting scripture himself, Satan  tempted Jesus to throw Himself down from the pinnacle of the temple and command His angels to rescue Him. Jesus retorted, again from Deuteronomy, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” The final of the recorded temptation here was to fall down and worship Satan with the promise that all the kingdoms of the world would be His. “They already were His!” my kid points out. Again, responding with God breathed words straight out the Deuteronomy, “Worship the Lord your God and serve only Him.” And Satan took his worthless toys and went home crying. Now we have the same arsenal of scripture and same powerful Spirit within us to battle just the same. John 14:26 tells us that the Holy Spirit, the Advocate, the Helper will remind us of what we’ve been taught. If we’re faithful to a diet of God’s word, which He promises will never return void but will always do what He meant for it to do, then right when we need it, and every time we need it, the Spirit of God within us will reference what we’ve hidden in our hearts and use it to keep us from sinning, to rebuke, teach and edify. And like exercise, the more we listen to these spiritual nudges of scripture from within, the more readily available they’ll become and the better we’ll hear them.

Consider His Love - Psalm 107

Just take a second today to consider His love. No matter how far we've gone or for how long, God's steadfast love transcends our capacity for sin and suffering. Whether we're wandering through wastelands, sitting in darkness or, just because of pure foolishness, have found ourselves staggering at wits end, we ARE the redeemed! And His redemptive power in our lives knows no bounds! We just need to speak up: "Let the redeemed of the Lord say so..." And sure enough, He's faithful to hear our cry, lead us who are wandering,  deliver us from darkness and heal us from the affliction of sin. Let's choose to be wiser than wicked and consider His love so resolute.

Who are we to stand in God's way? - Acts 10 & 11

It's found in the Hutu and Tutsi peoples of Rwanda divided over the shape of their noses, the Sunni and Shia sects of Islam in India with their varying religious heritage and the light vs dark skinned people of the island nation of Haiti. Whether, rich or poor, educated or uneducated and despite your political parties or religious views no-one is exempt from the dire impact of prejudice. As I consider the existence, both historically and presently, of racism and discrimination in every region of the world, I'm drawn back to the reality that Christianity itself was once thought to be for only one people. I love this passage that describes the passionate Simon Peter caught completely unaware as God made forgiveness of sin and new life in Christ available for Jews and Gentiles (non-Jews) alike. In Chapter 10, the usually over-zealous Peter took great caution in responding to God's prompt to take the story of Jesus' life, death and resurrection to the home of a prominent Gentile. And although the message could certainly have fallen on deaf ears in this context, here comes the Holy Spirit and the whole lot believes, are saved and even baptized on the scene. It's comical that this came as such a surprise to Peter, who had had the exact same thing happen on multiple occasions with predominately Jewish gatherings, where thousands upon thousands had believed and repented on the spot. It's even more fun, in chapter 11, watching the dumbfounded Peter reporting back to the church in defense of this unbefitting social encounter and presenting the new realization that Jesus' sacrifice is THE sacrifice for the sins of the WHOLE world. A refreshing reality in this world full of bigotry and hate. We must do our part to see every person as one of the very individuals that Jesus gave His life for because they are! And we must affirm with our thoughts, words and actions that every person, with their vast array of distinct differences, are created in the image of God because they are! After all, God has a unique plan for each of us and, like Peter, "Who are we to stand in God's way?"