What comes to mind when you think about God?

Greetings!

     Let me start with a question: What comes to mind when you think about God?
     One particular man has said that your answer to that question, "is the most important thing about [you]."   So think about it again: "What comes into your mind when you think about God?"   This week's "thought" explains why he makes the above assertion.  It is taken from the book, "The Knowledge of the Holy" by A. W. Tozer, and I pass it along to you because I want to challenge you to think more deeply about what you believe about God.

     As with most of the "thoughts" I pass along, I believe Tozer is right in the things he says.  What we believe about God does have a tremendous effect upon who we are, what we do, and who we will become.  I pray that his words might cause you to earnestly consider, and if necessary make some adjustments, in relation to your view of God. In fact, if you desire a very thoughtful and readable consideration of what Scripture tells us God is like, this book is well-worth the cost and time it takes to read it (or listen to it) The following entry tells you why he wrote the book.  Enjoy.

     "What comes to mind when we think about God is the most important thing about us. The history of mankind will probably show that no people has ever risen above its religion, and man's spiritual history will positively demonstrate that no religion has ever been greater than its idea of God.  Worship is either pure or base as the worshiper entertains high or low thoughts of God. For this reason the gravest question before the Church is always God Himself, and the most portentous fact about any man is not what he at any given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like.  We tend by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental image of God. This is true not only of the individual Christian, but the company of Christians that composes the Church.  Always the most revealing thing about the Church is her idea of God, just as her most significant message is what she says about Him or leaves unsaid, for her silence is often more eloquent than her speech. She can never escape the self-disclosure of her witness concerning God.

     Were we able to extract from any person a complete answer to the question, "What comes to mind when you think about God?" we might predict with certainty the spiritual future of that person.  Were we able to know exactly what our most influential religious leaders think of God today, we might be able with some precision to foretell where the Church will stand tomorrow. Without doubt, the mightiest thought the mind can entertain is the thought of God, and the weightiest word in any language is its word for God.  Thought and speech are God's gifts to creatures made in His image; these are intimately associated with Him and impossible apart from Him...  We may speak because God spoke.  In Him word and idea are indivisible.

That our idea of God correspond as nearly as possible to the true being of God is of immense importance to us.  Compared with our actual thoughts of Him, our creedal statements are of little consequence. Our real idea of God may lie buried under the rubbish of conventional religious notions and may require an intelligent and vigorous search before it is finally unearthed and exposed for what it is. Only after an ordeal of painful self-probing are we likely to discover what we actually believe about God.  A right conception of God is basic not only to systematic theology but to practical Christian living as well.  It is to worship what the foundation is to the Temple. Where it is inadequate or out of plumb, the whole structure must sooner or later collapse.  I believe there is scarcely an error in doctrine or a failure in applying Christian ethics that cannot be traced finally to imperfect and ignoble thoughts about God...

     The church has surrendered her once lofty concept of God and has substituted for it one so low, so ignoble, as to be utterly unworthy of thinking, worshiping people. This she has done not deliberately, but little by little and without her knowledge; and her very unawareness only makes her situation all the more tragic.  This low view of God... is the cause of a hundred lesser evils everywhere among us. A whole new philosophy of the Christian life has resulted from this one basic error in our religious thinking.  With our loss of the sense of [God's] majesty has come the further loss of religious awe and consciousness of the divine Presence. We have lost our spirit of worship and our ability to withdraw inwardly to meet God in adoring silence. Modern Christianity is simply not producing the kind of Christian who can appreciate or experience the life in the Spirit. The words, "Be still and know that I am God," mean next to nothing to the self-confident bustling worshiper [of our day]...  The decline of the knowledge of the Holy has brought on our troubles...  A rediscovery of the majesty of God will go a long way toward curing those troubles. It is impossible to keep our moral practices sound and our inward attitudes right while our idea of God is erroneous or inadequate.  If we would bring back spiritual power to our lives, we must begin to think of God more nearly as He is." 

     I have seen the truth of what he says play itself out in my own life, as well as in society.  You too (if you are the introspective type) may be able to see traces of that progression (in a positive or negative direction) in your own life.  We inevitably (subconsciously) take on the characteristics of the God that we worship.  In fact, speaking of idols and those who make them the psalmist says: "Those who make them will be like them, and so will all who trust in them" (Psalm 115:8).  This is why it makes such a difference what we believe about God.  "We tend by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental image of God," as Tozer put it.

     Do you believe God is permissive? You believe God is a heartless taskmaster?  You believe God is gracious and kind?  You believe God is a heartless rule-enforcer?  You believe God is Santa Claus in the sky?  Do you believe ______________?   The answer to these questions is extremely important, for you will gravitate toward exhibiting the characteristics of the God you envision.  As many have realized (and used for both good and bad purposes -- like the empathetic counselor who wants to free from guilt with the Gospel, or the terrorist who wants to enlist people to do unspeakable acts of cruelty): All you need to do to bring about change in a person is to change their view of God. 

     Which leads me to ask you one last time: "What comes to mind when you think about God?"   And to close, let me ask you to imagine how different you, and this world could be, if the answer to that question was, "Jesus." (Hebrews 1:3).

Just some food for thought, Pastor Jeff

He Touched Me - My Pilgrimage of Prayer

Greetings All,

     After sending out my "thought"  last week from John Powell's book, "He Touched Me - My Pilgrimage of Prayer,"  and receiving the positive response I got back as a result, I thought I would send out one more from the same book.  This selection has to do with honest "self-disclosure" with God in our times of prayer.  I have found what he says to be true to my own experience and have recommended it to others. Therefore, I also commend it to you.  Enjoy. 

     "I hear Jesus say, "Without me you can do nothing. You can bear no fruit. I am the Vine and you are the branches. Cut off from me you are dead."  I hear St. John say that only he who knows God can know the meaning of love.  I hear St. Paul describe love as the highest and greatest gift of the Spirit.  Wherever I have found love I have felt the presence of God; God at work in the minds and hearts and muscles of people.

     My experience of God has been working this transformation in me, too. Oh, I am still a very selfish person. God is not finished with me yet. Others may not think of me as a very effective lover, but they do not know the before and after; they cannot read the motives of the heart. The process of divinization, in which God makes us more and more into his image and likeness, is a slow and gradual process.  I am still a pilgrim.  But I have been touched and I am partially transformed. This is the basis of my hope. The God who has touched me in the past will act again and again in my life. Over and over again I will feel his finger and find him.

     Where has all this led me? Where has God, through all this, been leading me? I now understand and approach prayer as communication in a relationship of love, a speaking and listening in truth and in trust. Speaking to God honestly is the beginning of prayer.  It locates a person before God.  I believe that the primary "giving" of love is the giving of one's self through self-disclosure. Without such self-disclosure there is not real giving, for it is only in that moment when we are willing to put our true selves on the line, to be taken for better or for worse, to be accepted or rejected, that true interpersonal encounter begins.  We do not begin to offer ourselves to others until we offer ourselves in this way, for love demands presence, not presents. All my "gifts" (presents) are a mere motion until I have given my true self (presence) in honest self-revelation.

     As in all interpersonal relationships, so in the relationship with God. I do not put myself into his hands or confront his freedom of choice to accept or reject me, to love or loathe me, until I have told him who I really am. Only then can I ask him: Will you have me?  Will you let me be yours? Will you be mine? Martin Luther's first law of success in prayer was: "Don't lie to God!"  In speaking to God in the dialogue of prayer, we must reveal our true and naked selves. We must tell him the truth of our thoughts, desires, and feelings, whatever they may be.  They may not be what I would like them to be, but they are not right or wrong, true or false. They are me.

     I am sure that this has benefited me in many other ways, but certainly it has enabled to speak more honestly to my God. It has freed me from the lie of those prefabricated pious cliches that are death to true conversational prayer.  I have told him where I really live -- in belief and unbelief. I have told him of my weariness in answering his call.  Of the emotional resentment I feel at being a public utility, a servant to be used and taken for granted. I have ventilated all my neurotic, throbbing emotions... I have been like Job of the Old Testament, cursing the day he made me, and like the prophet Jeremiah, accusing God of making not a prophet, but a fool of me. I have been a King David singing of his mercy and forgiveness, which I have always needed along the way of my pilgrimage.

     There is something so healing about "letting it all out" with God. The psychiatrist Karl Jung defined neurosis in terms of an inner cleavage, a war within, the existence of fraction-hood or inward division. With Paul we all know that there is, "another law warring in my members."  The real problem is confronted when we come to the question of our willingness to accept ourselves in this human condition of weakness. Will we be comfortable as a fraction, a creature of ambiguity whose evil is always mixed somehow with good and whose good is always somehow tainted with evil?

     I am sure that my comfort in this human condition depends for me on whether God will accept me this way or not.  I am worth only what I am worth in his eyes.  All the rest is charade. So, I have to put myself on the line the way I am. Charades with God is wasted time. I have to place myself in the posture of trusting his greatness and understanding. This is the essential beginning of prayer."

     Self-disclosure with God requires two things:

     1st) It requires the assurance we will not be rejected for what we share. That is, we need to be assured of the Gospel doctrine of justification; that our acceptance is secured through another on our behalf. That God accepts us fully for Jesus sake, through faith in Him.  Or to put it in theological terms, we must believe the message of the Gospel -- that our justification is not dependent upon our sanctification or performance, but just the opposite!  If we do not believe this, then complete honesty with God and others is nearly impossible.

     2nd) To be searingly honest with God I must believe the biblical declaration that the God  who loves and accepts me in Jesus is all-knowing (Psalm 139:1-4). We must believe that there is nothing hidden from Him, not even the secret things we alone know about ourselves (Ecclesiastes 12:14).  If we think we can hide something from God, we will.  It's not until we know He knows all that we are, that we are  freed to share what we truly feel and struggle with - that mishmash of conflicting desires and compulsions Paul speaks of in Romans 7.  In fact, believing that God knows all, even the secret things, makes anything but complete openness and honesty and transparency and truthfulness with God seem so utterly childish and foolish -- like the child who naively thinks he's not fully exposed to the sight of others simply because he covers his own eyes with his hands! 

     God's omniscience actually beckons me to be completely truthful with him, because it assures me he already knows everything I'm thinking, feeling, and even repressing.  It helps me realize that in prayer he simply wants to hear me tell him what he already knows about me!  It's part of healing that neurotic cleavage and fraction-hood and bringing me (and you) to wholeness. And Powell is right, it does open the door to become the true beginning of real prayer.  Then honest communication replaces the pious cliches we often use to mask the truth of who we are and experience God loving even the darkest parts of us.

In the Bonds of the Transforming Truth of the Gospel,  Pastor Jeff

Attitude Adjustment

Greetings All!

     This week's "thought," which comes to you from F. Congreve, has to do with a commonly needed "attitude adjustment" in the believers heart and mind.  For as believers in Jesus we can sometimes we fall into the trap of thinking (because of the sinful things we did in our past) that we should not be joyful. That joy would be wrong.  That being joyful would somehow imply we didn't take our past sins seriously enough. But often just the opposite it true.  The sense that we must remain sullen comes not from the fact that we haven't taken our past sin seriously enough, but that we haven't taken divine forgiveness seriously enough!  For if we are forgiven - truly forgiven by God - how can we not experience joy, even despite the sinful things we may have done.

     Hopefully today's thought will reinforce that truth.  If God has forgiven your sins there are only two reasonable responses: 1.) Tears of joy and gratitude (Luke 7:38) and 2.) smiles of joy and gratitude.  But never should the knowledge of our gracious forgiveness lead to a conscious attempt on our part to repress the sense of joy that should follow!  For as Paul says, "Blessed is the person whose sins are forgiven; whose transgressions are covered. Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will never count against him" (Rom. 4:7-8).  Enjoy.

     "The feast which Levi gave to our Lord Jesus on the occasion of his conversion (Luke 5:27-35) is such a cheerful metaphor of the Christian life.  It is a festival of joy and gratitude for a conversion.  We are sinners forgiven - abundant reason for perpetual praise.  A feast represents a forgiven sinner's whole course; he is embraced, welcomed home, and has brought more joy to heaven than there was before.  His sorrow for sin is not a mortified, humiliated, angry disgust with himself.  It is a humble, hopeful sorrow always 'turning into joy'.  So, if his very sorrows become the material for his joy, his life may be represented by the feast Levi gave to the Lord, who had forgiven and called him. 

     "But I am unworthy of joy," says the forgiven sinner.  "I am willing to work and suffer if need be. I don't deserve joy."  That is the sentiment true of a pagan, but it contradicts the whole Creed of the Church - "I believe in...the forgiveness of sins."  So, our life ought to be full of the joy of grateful love; the remembrance of sin means the remembrance of the love that called us out of our sins and forgave us our whole sin-debt.

     And notice that Levi did not just make Jesus a feast, he made Jesus a great feast.  It is not that we are to be cheerful for our own gratification.  Our life is to be full of praise and thanksgiving, singing and making melody in our hearts to the Lord - for the honor of Jesus.  Levi made the great feast for Him.  Our habitual joy is due God, and honors God, and our joy means not simply a reflection of the joy of God, but is the joy of God... If we are sinners forgiven, we ought to behave as forgiven, welcomed-home sinners. People crowned with wonderful love in Christ. We should cheer and encourage everyone around us, who often go about so heavily because we have reflected our gloom upon them instead of our grateful love, hope and confidence."

     It's a thought worthy of prayerful consideration!

Living in the Grace of Jesus, Pastor Jeff

The Moment The "Light Goes On"

Greetings All!

     This week's "thought" is the story of one man who met Jesus. It tells of the moment in that man's life when the "light went on," it all made sense, and by the Holy Spirit working through the Gospel he was made new.  The man's name is Max Lucado, the well-known and best-selling author of many Christian books.  As with many other believers, his conversion came at the most unexpected of times, in the most unexpected way, in a rather ordinary place, through a man of little or no renown.  It's yet another confirmation that when God calls people to Himself, he often uses the most ordinary and unexpected of people to do so. And He does it that way to assure us that our salvation comes through the powerful message of the Gospel, applied to the heart and mind by the Spirit, and not as the result of the abilities, charisma, or persuasiveness of any earthly messenger.  Enjoy. 

     Many believers can distinctly recall the events surrounding their conversion experience...  "Do you remember yours? Where were you the night the door was opened? Do you remember the touch of the Father?  Who walked with you the day you were set free? Can you still see the scene?  Can you feel the road beneath your feet?  I hope so. I hope that permanently planted in your soul is the moment the Father stirred you in the darkness and led you down the path.  It's a memory like no other.  For when he sets you free, you are free indeed.

     Ex-slaves describe well their hour of deliverance. Can I tell you mine?  It was a Bible class in a small West Texas town. I didn't know what was more remarkable, that a teacher was trying to teach the book of Romans to a group of ten-year-olds, or that I remember what he said.  The classroom was mid-sized, one of a dozen or so in a small church.  My desk had carvings on it and gum under it. Twenty or so others were in the room, though only four or five were taken by the message.  We all sat back, too sophisticated to appear interested. Starched jeans. High top tennis shoes.  It was summer.  The slow-setting sun cast the window in gold. 

     The teacher is an earnest man.  I can still see his flattop, his belly bulging from beneath his coat that he didn't even try to button. His tie stops midway down his chest. He has a black mole on his forehead, a soft voice, and a kind smile. Though he is hopelessly out of touch with the kids of 1965, he doesn't know it. His notes are stacked on a podium underneath a heavy black Bible. His back is turned to us and his jacket goes up and down his belt-line as he writes on the board. He speaks with genuine passion. He is not a dramatic man, but tonight he is fervent.

     God only knows why I heard him that night. His text was Romans six. The blackboard was littered with long words and diagrams. Somewhere in the process of describing how Jesus went into the tomb and came back out, it happened. The jewel of grace was lifted and turned and I could see it from a new angle... and it stole my breath. I didn't see a moral code. I didn't see a church. I didn't see ten commandments or hellish demons. I saw what one other ten-year-old in that class -- Mary Barbour -- saw.  I saw my Father enter my dark night, awaken me from my slumber, and gently guide me -- no carry me -- to freedom."

     So, I ask the same question Max Lucado started with: Do you remember your conversion?  Do you remember the time you were "awakened from your slumber" (or more in keeping with Scripture, do you remember when God "raised you to life when you were dead in trespasses and sins" - Ephesians 2:1 / Ephesians 2:4-5 / Colossians 2:13)?  Have you since come to reflect and realize it was not the doing of any person (including yourself), but the miraculous and supernatural work of a gracious God softening a heart of stone and making it a heart of flesh and tender toward Christ?  A gift to one who could NEVER be good enough, or worthy enough, to deserve it?  Do you remember that event in your life?  Does the memory of it still stir your soul?  Have you every truly come to Christ and received new birth through the Spirit?  Jesus came, lived, died, rose, and is coming again, says Scripture.  Do you believe it?  Has the Father entered into the darkness of your soul to raise you to life and carry you to freedom?  Oh, what a day that was!  Or for some others, oh what a day that will be...

In the Bonds of Gospel Grace, Pastor Jeff

The Mind, the Spirit, and Power

Greetings All,

     This "thought" comes to you from the humble, devout, and godly British minister, statesman and scholar, John R. W. Stott, PhD.  I had the privilege of hearing him speak in person three times before he passed away in 2011. He was so well-respected at home and abroad that in 2005 Time Magazine listed him (at 86 years old) as "one of the 100 most influential people on the planet."  I have many of his books sitting on my shelves and can say without reservation that anything written by him is worth the read (I count his commentary on the New Testament book of Acts as among the best available).
     This excerpt is taken from the book, "Faith and Culture - The Guide to a Culture Shaped by Faith." by Kelly Monroe Kullberg and Lael Arrington.  Enjoy.

The Mind, the Spirit, and Power

     "I believe that anti-intellectualism and fullness of the Holy Spirit are mutually incompatible. And I dare say it because the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth.  Jesus our Lord himself referred to the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of Truth, and therefore, it is only logical to say that wherever the Holy Spirit has given his freedom, truth is bound to matter.  So I have argued, and argue still, that a proper and conscientious use of our minds is an inevitable part and parcel our Christian life.

     FIRST, a proper use of our minds glorifies our Creator. We believe that God is a rational Being who has made us in his own image and likeness, as rational men and women. And has given us a rational revelation of himself. 

     SECOND, a proper use of our mind enriches our Christian discipleship. There is no aspect of our discipleship which can be developed without the use of our mind. Whatever part of discipleship your are reflecting on -- worship, faith, guidance -- the mind has an indispensable part to play.

     THIRD, a proper use of the mind strengthens our witness in the world. I am convinced that one of the major reasons people reject the gospel in the West today is not because they perceive it to be false, but because they perceive it to be trivial.  They think it is inadequate for the complexities and challenges of the world today.  We know, of course, that in evangelism, in conversion, and in regeneration (or the new birth), the Holy Spirit has an indispensable part to play. Only the Spirit can lead a sinner to Christ. But when he leads us to Christ, he does not do it in spite of the evidence, but because of the evidence, when he opens our minds to attend to it.

     To sum up, anti-intellectualism insults God, impoverishes us, and weakens our testimony in the world. A proper use of the mind glorifies God, enriches us, and strengthens our witness in the world."

     It is interesting to me (though I do not have the full manuscript of what he shared in this address presented to The London Institute of Contemporary Christianity in 2001) that Stott does not even allude to the primary biblical imperatives that call us to use all the powers of our God-given intellect in our worship and service to Him and others -- the Two Greatest Commandments.  As commands which most all Christian people have memorized at one time or another, it would seem that anti-intellectualism would be forever banished from the Church of God.  For in those commands we are told (as part of our love and adoration of Him) to use every part of every human faculty given to us in loving Him and our neighbor.  All our will and emotions and all the powers of our intellect, strength, energy or actions are to be used in sacred service to the one who gave them to us for the sake of His glory.

     It is beyond dispute that we are to, "love the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul, with all our MIND (emphasis mine), and with all our strength," (Mark 12:30).  Or as Jesus affirms and summarizes it two verses later, "You are right in saying.that... To love Him with all your heart, with all your UNDERSTANDING (emphasis again is mine) and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."

     Therefore, it is an unbiblical and unsustainable assertion to suggest that one should avoid using their mind, reason or intellect in the defense and furtherance of the faith (as long as the mind is used in the service of God and not to oppose the purposes of God). Gordon Fee, my professor of N.T. at Gordon-Conwell was raised in a Pentecostal environment where it was not unusual to hear people exalt the place of the heart and soul, but put down the place of the mind. He said that growing up he would hear people in that environment say, "I'd rather be a heart on fire than a mind on ice."  But as he studied the Scriptures, and the place it gives to the mind, he realized that such an assertion resulted from an anti-intellectual, false and unbiblical dichotomy.  He came to see that what the Bible actually encourages is, "not only a heart on fire for the Lord, but a mind that is also on fire for the Lord."  The one does not negate the other. They actually compliment each other.

     Simple faith in the Lord Jesus is a gift.  But so also is a mind that uses all it's intellectual powers to love and serve God, as we see in such people as Blaise Pascal, Jonathan Edwards, C. S. Lewis, Ravi Zacharias, Deithrich Bonhoeffer, John Piper, Nancy Pearcy, Lee Stobel, Dallas Willard, Tim Keller, Os Guiness, and slews of other brilliant, God-loving and devout defenders of the faith. Such people have been blessings beyond description in being used of God to lead unbelievers to Christ, and encouraging believers to go deeper and deeper in the faith.

     He died. He rose. He is coming again.  Pastor Jeff

Simple Church

Greetings to All and Prayers for a Happy New Year!

     As we begin the new year, I thought I would start us off with a call to return to simple.  Simple and uncomplicated ministry.  Ministry as Jesus did it.  Ministry stripped off all the ways we try and make it more complex than it really is. Spirituality that's focused on the important.  Being the Church Jesus wants us to be.

 

This was driven home to me in a book recommended by a close friend: Simple Church, by Thom Rainer and Eric Geiger.  It is a straightforward and down to earth appraisal of how ministry should look. How Jesus intended it to look. If you happen to be struggling with the church as it often is, and want to consider it from a refreshing perspective, I would encourage you to pick up this easy to read book. As you go through it I am sure you will likely find yourself saying on many occasions, "Yes, that IS how it should be."   I offer this excerpt as a mere taste of what is in the book. Enjoy.

     "Simple churches have chosen to align themselves with the way God works. They have chosen to partner with the discipleship process revealed in Scripture. They have chosen to structure their churches around a simple process...  We are not claiming a simple church design is easy. There is a big difference between simple and easy.  Simple is basic, uncomplicated, and fundamental. Easy is effortless...  Leading a local church is neither simple nor easy, but the church strategy does not need to be complicated. The ministry design can and should be simple.

     If anyone knows simple it is Jesus. If anyone is a revolutionary, it is Jesus. He is the simple revolutionary. He stepped into a complicated and polluted religious scene. It was cluttered with Sadducees, Pharisees, Herodians, Zealots, and Essenes. He did not play by their rules.  He could not stand their hypocrisy.  He preferred spending time with tax collectors and sinners.  The religious leaders had developed a religious system with 613 laws. They chose that number because that was how many separate letters were in the text containing the 10 Commandments. Then they found 613 commandments in the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament). They divided the list into affirmative commands (do this) and negative commands (don't do this).  There were 248 affirmative commands, one for every part of the human body as they understood it. There were 365 negative commands, one for each day of the year. They further divided the list into binding commands and nonbinding commands. Then they spent their days debating whether the divisions were accurate and ranking the commands within each division.

     Enter Jesus. Jesus has the ability to take the complex and make it simple. The prime example is Matthew 22:37-40, where Jesus gives what has become known as the Great Commandment. Here is the scene. Jesus has just stumped the Sadducees. Literally. He silenced them by His wisdom (Matt. 22:34). Next up are the Pharisees. Maybe they can do a better job knocking this revolutionary down. The Pharisees gather for a meeting. They devise a debate strategy. The goal is to humiliate Jesus in front of the crowd. They choose their smartest guy, a lawyer, to take on Jesus. He asks Jesus which is the greatest commandment in the law. Of all the 613 commandments, he is asking Jesus for the greatest. Jesus replied: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind. This is the greatest and most important commandment. The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets depend (are summed up in) these two commandments." Think about the significance of that moment. He said all the Law (and He added the Prophets) is summed up in this simple and perfect phrase. He was not lowering the standard of the Law.  He was not abolishing it.  He was capturing all its spirit, all of its essence, in one statement.  He said all of it hangs on this.  He summed up 613 commands in two.  Jesus took the complexity and the advancement of the Law and made it very simple.

     Jesus was a rabbi, a teacher. In the Jewish culture, each rabbi had a "yoke" of teaching. His yoke was his instructions, his content and his message. Many rabbis put yokes of teaching on the people that were impossible and legalistic. These yokes pushed people away from the grace of God and not toward it.  These yokes burned people out and turned people off.  Jesus stepped onto the scene and said to the crowd one day: "Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble of heart and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light" (Matt. 11:28-30). Jesus said HIS yoke was easy. His teaching was in stark contrast to the religious rabbis of the day. He was not offering a complicated and long set of rules, rituals, and regulations. He was offering grace. He was offering a simple relationship with God. As a simple revolutionary, Jesus was bothered by meaningless and distracting clutter.

     On at least one occasion, Jesus cleansed the temple. Many biblical scholars believe he did this twice during His earthly ministry. Mark 11 gives the account of one of His cleaning projects.  Jesus was enraged by what he observed at the temple. The temple had the appearance of being a place where people would seek God, but this was not the reality. People had lost their focus. Mark describes three areas of clutter that infuriated Jesus.  FIRST, people are buying and selling in the temple... The leaders allowed vendors to set up shop in the temple.  Historians reveal vendors were typically set up outside the temple, but (in Jesus day) the makeshift marketplace is inside the temple. Jesus responded by driving out those who were selling doves.  SECOND, money changers were exchanging foreign currency for the Gentiles. The Gentiles needed Jewish money to buy sacrifices and they were being exploited with a fee for the exchange. Instead of the temple being a house of prayer for all nations (including Gentiles) it was cluttered with people robbing them financially. Jesus reacts by throwing over the tables of the money changers.  THIRD, the temple had become a shortcut for people to pass through the city...  Jesus stopped them.

     His behavior in the temple gives us amazing insight into the heart of God. Jesus is adamantly opposed to anything that gets in the way of people encountering Him. He quoted from Isaiah that day saying, "Is it not written. 'My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations?' But you have made it a den of thieves!"  (Mark 11:17).  Many of our churches have become cluttered. So cluttered that people have a difficult time encountering the simple and powerful message of Christ. So cluttered that many people are busy doing church instead of being the church. What about your church?"

     Just some food for thought as we enter the New Year and hopefully "clean out" and "simplify" our approach to God.  For Jesus wants us to know, "[His] yoke is easy and [His] burden is light."  He designed it that way.  He fought to keep it that way.  May He win the fight to do so in your life and in your church.

     With Prayers for a Year Where We Can Learn to Enjoy the Simplicity and Light Load of Being In Christ, Pastor Jeff

Holy Sonnet XIV - John Donne (1572-1631)

Greetings All!

Today's "thought" comes from a rather thick book (I'm estimating it has over 1000 pages since it's almost 3 inches thick and the only recent book I have where the pages are not numbered)!  It's called "A Poem a Day -- 365 Devotional Readings Based on Classic Christian Verse" by Philip Comfort and Daniel Partner.  Though I'm no poet, I have found it quite intriguing.

     Today's selection includes a poem by John Donne (1572-1631) followed by a meditation on who he was and why he wrote it. The poem (which is autobiographical) deals with Donne's yearning yet rebellious heart which he knew well enough to know that God must either possess him completely, or he could never be chaste or satisfied -- something which may sound odd to some.
     Even if you're not a poet either, I encourage you to read on.  Consider not just the poem, but the devotional thought that follows -- a thought which reveals the heart of a man who could not settle for complacency or meager handouts in his relationship with God. Enjoy.

Holy Sonnet XIV

"Batter my heart, three-personed God; for you as yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend; that I may rise and stand.

  Overthrow me, and bend your force to break, blow, burn and make me new.

  I, like a usurped town, to another due, labor to admit you, but O, to no end.

Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend, but is captived, and proves weak or untrue. 

 Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain, but am betrothed unto your enemy.

Divorce me!  Untie or break that knot again.

 Take me to you and imprison me, for I, except you enthrall me, never shall be free,

 Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me."

     John Donne was one of the greatest English poets and preachers of the 1600's. His deep intellect and fiery emotions are evident in both his poetry and sermons. A descendant of Saint Thomas More, Donne was raised a Roman Catholic, but in the 1590's became a member of the Church of England. In 1597 he became secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton and fell in love with Egerton's niece, Ann More. They eloped in 1601. Ann's father disapproved of the marriage and caused Egerton to dismiss Donne from his job.  Thereafter, Donne accepted the king's invitation to become an Anglican priest.

     These experiences of poverty and failure caused Donne to rely on God and cherish His love. This poem expresses the poet's desire for God -- the entire Triune God -- to take over his being. Donne compares himself to a captive town that can never be free unless God captures the capturer (the enemy) and sets Donne free. And with pungent, dramatic irony, Donne declares that he can never be "chaste" -- or a spiritual virgin -- unless God ravishes him. Wooing had not worked.  Donne needed God to take violent action and batter down his heart and take it over completely.

     Sometimes we need to ask God to take over our heart and mind in a radical way. In doing so, He will not enslave us or seize us without right, but rather, He will free us. Until God completely occupies us, we will be occupied with everything but God.

     As the prophet says: "I will make you my wife forever, says the Lord. I will show you righteousness and justice, unfailing love and compassion. I will be faithful to you and make you mine, and you will finally know me as Lord." (Hosea 2:19-20)."

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     I would have loved to sit under the preaching of a man so passionate to know and experience the love, presence, and grace of God. It reminds me of another person who also spoke of God in such terms. It brings to mind another person, Annie Dillard, who was also discontent with the common and somewhat apathetic views of God held in the church. For after surveying the contemporary church scene in the 1980's she wrote in her book, "Teaching a Stone to Talk":

     "On the whole, I do not find Christians, outside the catacombs, sufficiently sensible of the conditions.  Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of Power we so blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? The churches are like children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies' straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake some day and take offense, or the waking god may draw us out to where we can never return."

     Isaiah would have preferred her understanding of God to that which is sometimes put forth in the church.  For very much like her, Isaiah conceived that if God were to, "rend the heavens and come down," then the mountains would tremble before Him, the waters would boil as when a fire is lit beneath them, and the nations would quake in fear before His presence (Isaiah 64:1-5). 

     What a difference it would make to us as individuals, and Christ's Church as a whole, if we captured even the smallest glimpse of God's true greatness and grandeur and majesty.  Even the smallest glimpse of the God we worship would make us, like Donne, passionate to know and be possessed completely by Him.

In His Service, Pastor Jeff