You can't let it change your life

This was the reaction of a friend to my conversion many, many years ago. “Religion is alright” he told me, “but you can't let it change your life”. I was reminded of this, this morning as I re-read the story of the Magi, who saw His star in the east and came to worship Him (Matthew 2:1- 13).

Actually, there were three reactions to the revelation of the knowledge of the coming king. There was Herod who was violently opposed, there were the religious leaders who possessed knowledge but it was “not mixed with faith” (leading to action – Hebrews 4:2), then there was the Magi who went out of their way not only to seek Him, but to worship Him. Their attitude shouted “It must change your life.” As James would have it “Faith without works is dead – works are the evidence of faith (James 2:17,18 - see also the post salvation by faith, assurance by works).

Jesus told us “He that it not for me is against me. He would rather that we be like Herod than like the “religious”. Jesus speaking to the Church at Laodicea told them “I could wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth” (Revelation 3:15,16).

Prayer: Lord forbid that I should respond to your coming with apathy. Father grant me a renewed passion and zeal for You and Your Kingdom. In Jesus' name.

How terrible never to have failed / never to have suffered loss. It's all right for you buddy!

I was recently asked if I love Christmas. I love that God sent His Son, and it is good to be reminded of the humility in which He came. I love that Jesus came to this sin filled world, and that the one behind the season the reason for the season (Jesus), is with me always. But Christmas is difficult for me and for many others. When I was recently asked how I could be prayed for I mentioned this and was told “We are not lonely when we have Jesus”. The Bible though tells us “it is not good that man should be alone.” I know that is it theologically correct to say that we do not need to be lonely, because Jesus is always with us, and while I have not suffered the losses that even many that I know have suffered, I am always more aware of my losses at this time of the year. I have still not adjusted to retirement, and sometimes the long hours that stretch ahead of me leave me with a gnawing loneliness. But I am not looking for pity here, I am just protesting the trite theological answers that get thrown up at me, and at others who are suffering far more deeply that I am.

I know that it is true that all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to His purposes (Romans 8:28), but I have had this verse thrown at me betimes, as a kick in the pants. “What is wrong with you, God is working this out for your good, get a life”. No doubt there were times when I needed such a kick in the pants, but I can't say I ever appreciate it (at least not at the time). And part of it is the way such things were given, or even that they were given in sincerity with a desire to help, but by someone who had not yet suffered significant failure or loss (and so done without any real empathy). In such cases I have wanted to say “Don't worry brother it will come to you too!”

But where does empathy come from, and why is it absent in so many? Let's start by considering the fact that theological truth, if it is indeed truth, though often hard to take, always has a practical and a redemptive side. Take Romans 8:28 (quoted above). It is certainly true that if I love God, He is working for my good within the evil that surrounds me. It is His promise. But this does not mean that I see it, or ever feel it. Sometimes things get worse before they get better. Nor does it mean that receiving/embracing this truth and living in the light of it, is easy. The point though is that the practical side of such theological truths will not even start to kick in, until we do start to receive them, and continue to receive them, with faith. God is in this for the long haul, and it goes against the grain of our modern world that demands instant solutions. But “those who endure to the end will be saved (delivered)” (Matthew 10:22). He is interested in the forging of our character, and this does not happen overnight! In the very next verse after Romans 8:28, Paul tells us that part of the good is that we are made more like Jesus, and that in submitting to it we bear much fruit!

The first part of the title of the post comes from something M. Scott Peck wrote (I don't remember where). He was telling of the reaction of a Nun to his revelation that his marriage was in trouble. “How terrible never to have failed” was her considered reply. I do not know how this was spoken, but in any case I am sure it was hard to take. Her point however was that if we cooperate with Him, God will use our suffering to refine us, and until we have suffered, we are more than likely to give unhelpful answers to those around us who are in need. We were talking the other day of the need to be real. If our Christianity consists of trying to show others how good we are, we will never be any good to them. It is the continual returning to Him in our times of trial and failure, that our Christianity is seen to be real (and hence point the way to others). Even when we are painfully aware that have let Him down over and over, He will use this for our good, if we let Him. We do need to repent and to turn, of course, but I have found that such times draw me closer to Him as I cry out for deliverance and mercy, as I thank Him for His faithfulness to forgive, and claim the cleansing that His blood affords. Paul talks about a godly sorrow that leads to repentance and zeal for the Lord (2 Corinthians 7:10,11). What an amazing God who can even use my sin and failures for ultimate good. The fact is, that it is many times the trials and the failures that draw us close to Him. And when we allow Him to work in us, in and through these things, then they advance the Kingdom.

And the way this works is that it is and through the grace that we receive from Him in our trials, that we have something to pass on to others. He is the God of all comfort, in receiving His comfort we testify to its reality, and draw others into it (2 Corinthians 1: 3,4). If we have never suffered, then we will not have experienced His comfort in our suffering, and we will have nothing to pass on. How terrible never to have failed (or to pretend that we have not)! It is when we are weak that we are strong!

That I might know Him II – The fellowship of His sufferings

Nobody wants to suffer, at least not anybody I know. Clearly some suffer more than others, but we all suffer at some level or other. It seems to be part of life. Peter admonishes us “Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you” (1 Peter 4:12). We may not have a choice as to whether we suffer, but we do have a choice as to how we respond to that suffering.

I have sometimes joked “These things are sent to try us.” I pause and then say “And they do, they certainly do try us – Oh mi nerves!” Whether they are from God or the Devil, or are consequences of our own poor choices is not always immediately clear, but as the quotation from Peter suggests “they are to try us”. I have observed that we tend to fall into two camps, either we allow our pain to refine us, or we allow it to push us the other way, into bitterness, revenge thinking, and taking it out on others. It's not that we can't switch either. God will help us move from bad to good, if we let Him. For the Christian the question is “Will we stand or will we fall?”

I hear some protesting “But it's not fair!” We don't always see things clearly, but certainly life is not always fair. Christ Jesus Crucified was not fair! What is clear is that if God is just (and He is), there has to be a heaven and a hell. There has to be a day of reckoning. We can choose justice or mercy. What I can't choose, is mercy for me and justice for him. It does not work that way. If we want to choose mercy, we must live mercy. I need His help to do that.

In an earlier post I talked about the fact that He suffers for us and with us. The quotation from Philippians 3 that we are talking about, takes it one step further and talks about “the fellowship of His sufferings” (verse 10 NKJV). The NIV translation “share in His sufferings” is weak. The Greek word is “koinonea”. It is a rich word describing the sort of intimacy and selfless living that characterized the early Church, where they were “of one heart and soul ... Nor was there anyone among them who lacked; for all who were possessors of lands or houses sold them, ......and they distributed to each as anyone had need” (Acts 4:32-35). As His followers, we need to move a lot closer to the essence of this, but that's for another day. The point though, is that it is Christ's intention that our suffering foster and cement a relationship with Him that has the depth of this koinonea type fellowship and more (because He will never let us down!).

One picture that I have of this, is that of buddies in a war. The drawing together in danger and the constant looking after each other's back, forms a bond between them that (when they survive), lasts a lifetime. For me this is something to pray into. “Lord I know that we are in a war, and that You constantly watch my back. It's not that You don't allow suffering, but You are always there. Help me to see it, and to stop resisting the people and circumstances that You allow into my life. You have promised that You will not allow me (when I embrace Your help), to be tested above my ability to endure (1 Corinthians 10:13). You have also promised that You will use every evil thing to refine me, to draw me closer to, and to make me more like You (Romans 8:28,19). You never promised that it would be easy, nor that I would not be stretched to the uttermost! Help me to cling to Your promises, and to be to You, like a buddy in the war we are most certainly in. Show me how to respond in each and every circumstance, but not only this, help me in the wherewithal of that response (Philippians 2:12,13). Help me Lord, for I am week and prone to wander. Thank You Father, that when I stumble and fall short of Your Glory, You are always ready and willing to pick me up and help me start over. Help me to draw close to You now (James 4: 8). In your precious name I pray - Amen”

That I might know Him and the power of His resurrection (and the fellowship of His suffering) I

The title of the post is from Philippians 3:10. Paul is telling us what the successful Christian life involves, what is available to us , and what is the cost of living on the cutting edge for Christ. Most of us would be happy to (experientially) know, what it is to walk in Christ's resurrection power. We might not be so keen to share in His sufferings. Why would we want to? Why, well in this passage Paul is telling us the rewards are out of this world, and not just in the there and then (afterlife), but in the here and now. Today we will be looking at some of the things that hinder our attaining to the power of His resurrection.

We used to joke in my job (researcher/teacher of Mathematics) that we were daily pushing back the frontiers of Mathematical knowledge. Most of the time it was pretty slow, and not always terribly significant. Living on the cutting edge in the Christian life however, is significant in every way. When we are living for Christ our “tiny steps for mankind” have eternal significance, even if we don't immediately see it. Elsewhere Paul tells us to “be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor in the Lord is not in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:58). Indeed it is not! Even when we have failed over and over, our willingness to repent, confess and start over, positively affects the atmosphere of world in which we live. But the fact of the matter is, that most of us live far, far below what He has called us to, and equipped us for! When we walk in the power of His resurrection, we are enabled to rise above it all, we walk in the very footprints of Jesus, do the things that He did and touch lives in a way we may never have imagined.

There are many things that hinder, and can prevent us entering into the fullness of all that Christ has provided for us. In the context in Philippians 3, Paul is dealing with a particularly insidious hindrance that affects the religious and those of us who are satisfied with where we are “at.” He introduces it by admonishing us to “have no confidence in the flesh” (verse 3). He had been there and bought the t-shirt. But now he tells us that he had “lost all things in order to gain Christ and the power ...etc”. He was not griping however, for he says (in the vernacular) that what he formerly valued, he now thought of as shit (KJV dung - any refuse, as the excrement of animals (Thayer) verse 8). Some will find my use of this word offensive, but if you can get over it (you have probably heard worse) it can help us to see just what Paul is saying here. It's not just that he no longer values the things that were formerly important to him, he sees them as something vile and unclean, negative, something to be cast off. In the same context, what was gain is now loss (verse 7), but the force of the Greek word translated loss – has to do with causing damage. In particular the things he formerly valued kept him from the “surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (verse 8 NIV). Before he encountered the Lord, these things were what was most important to him, it was where he placed his confidence. He now sees them for what they are: pride of place, pride of race, pride of position, pride of education, pride in his own goodness (righteousness), pride in his zeal, i.e. pride, period (verses 4-9), the pernicious pride that kept Him from seeing his need of Christ.

So then, these things are worse than worthless, they are something to get rid of by any and all means. Paul is telling us that these things cannot co-exist with an intimate and powerful equipping relationship with the Lord. We have been given access to the very same power that raised Christ from the dead (Ephesians 1:19,20). We do need to see it (Ephesians 1:17) pursue it, and make it our own (Philippians 3 - later). But when we need to look good, and act in such a way as to get the glory from who we are and what we do, He has to withdraw His power and presence or it would consume us. On the other hand, whatever keeps us from God, be it pride or self sufficiency or sin, it is less than useless, dung! All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6).

Prayer: Father open my eyes to see what things keep me from the fullness of knowing You and the power of Your resurrection. In Jesus name.

The price of being real, the cost of not being

If you are open and vulnerable, you will not in general fit in. Some will look down on you, others will judge you. It's why most of us are covered. But not being open and vulnerable has its own costs. In particular we will not find deep intimacy either with God or others. It is said that being covered is it a disease among Pastors, most of whom seem to feel the need (or pressure) to appear strong. But is it when we are weak that we are strong (2 Corinthians 12:10 and January 12th post 2011). When we need to appear strong, what we are left with is just our own strength, and we are acting like “mere men” (1 Corinthians 3:3). As Christians, we are not intended to be mere men (or mere women), we are intended to walk in resurrection power (Philippians 3:10). There is a price to pay to do that (see next post), but there is also a cost if we do not avail ourselves of it. No one does it perfectly, but many unnecessarily live lives of quiet desperation.

The Scripture tells us that all who live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution (2 Timothy 3:12). While the application of this verse is much wider than the application I am talking about today, it is nevertheless very real and not a little subtle. Jesus encountered it in the beginning, with the religious. It started small and subtle, but it would eventually lead to His crucifixion.

People sometimes ask me if I am religious. My impression (but not necessarily theirs) of a religious person is someone who likes to be seen as a good person (righteous), and/or who knows he or she is right about God (and possibly everything else) and everybody else is wrong. “Our Church is the best, and every other Church comes in a poor second”. With regard to wanting to be seen to be good, who would not want that? The problem though, comes when we are not willing to be real, when we wear masks, and hold people at arms length so that they will not discover who we are. So when I am asked if I am religious, my answer is “God forbid”. But the shame fear control strongholds I was talking about last day, are everywhere, and they exert a pressure on us to hide our imperfections. The price of being real is that there will be times when you will be judged, dismissed or shamed. On the other hand, the cost of not being real is that we will remain isolated and wounded. This is because it is only when we “confess our faults one to another” (within a safe community) that we will be healed (James 5:16).

There is a book entitle “Hiding from love”. The title itself speaks to me. At some level we all do it. You see God is love, but we hid form Him in our shame. It's what Adam and Eve did when they sinned. But when we cover our sin and our shame we will not grow. In Proverbs 28:13 we are told “Whoever conceals their sins does not prosper, but the one who confesses and renounces them finds mercy.” Our sin/shame guilt separates us from God (Isaiah 59:2), and in fact from each other. On the other hand, the purposes of God have to do with bringing us back into relationship with Him and each other (Ephesians 1: 9,10). Jesus died on the cross to accomplish this, but to avail ourselves of it requires confessing/admitting and turning from our sin, the very opposite of our hiding it! We cannot hide our sin and not at the same time hide from His love.

So then there is a price to pay for being hidden (loneliness, continued woundedness, separation from God and each other etc.), and there is a price to pay to become whole (there will be many places we do not fit in). As the James reference above implies healing takes place in community. It's in confessing to one another that we are healed. This cannot just be in one direction, I confess to him, but she does not confess to me. It is to “each other”. The alternative by the way, is to confess each other's faults, and this is not so healing (British understatement)! So this mutual confession can only take place in safe community, but when it is real is is unbeatable.

So then in either case there is a cost, a price to pay. You can pay the cost of remaining in your shame and isolation, or you can pay the price of openness in genuine community and find true Christian fellowship with Him and each other. Those who have tasted this testify that even though it is not without pain, it is it worth it. What will you choose? I have decided that I will either find/create a safe place, or die trying, and in the meantime, allow Him to draw me closer to Himself in the struggle. (More to come).

You would not claim to play the piano, if you could not!

One of the episodes of the Simpsons that for some reason sticks with me, is the one where Bart claims “I didn't do it”, when it was perfectly obvious that he did. He became famous for this one liner, went on TV etc. It was thought to be “cute.” It's not so cute when we do this as adults, but I suspect that at some level we all have done it, and continue to do it. Let me ask you this “Can you think of something in your past of which you are ashamed, something you do not want anyone to know?” I would be surprised if the answer was “no”. Admitting it, is another thing!

One community that I was a part of for a time, had this thing about being mature. It was a crock actually, a way of keeping people from dealing with what needed to be dealt with. It works like this, you accuse someone of being hyper sensitive when you have hurt their feelings, and then imply that if they were more mature, they would be able to overlook it. In the meantime it allows you to ride rough shot over the other persons genuine needs and desires. Its called control. Whatever else this is, it is not maturity, and it is does not foster Christian community! In fact it is one of the things that prevents it.

There is often a deep woundedness that lies behind this kind of control. More than likely it is covering a stronghold of shame, fear and control. Such strongholds start with the shame (the painful emotion caused by a strong sense of guilt, embarrassment, unworthiness, or disgrace). They continue with fear “what would people think if they knew?” And the fear progresses to control “I must prevent them from knowing about this, I must be very guarded”. Such control spills over into a way of dealing with life.

The best way to make sure that no-one finds out, is to erect walls and keep people at a distance. This way they will never find out. The problem with walls though, is that while they may at some level keep the bad out, they also keep the bad in and the good out. When a wound is not cleansed it festers, and this is what happens with our shame. It festers and increase, deepening our sense of shame. The whole cycle starts over, and becomes more and more entrenched. It leaves us lonely and isolated, and in some cases driven.

How to escape the cycle? We need to find safe places where we can be real and open and honest. Unfortunately even church can be shame based, that is driven by the need to appear whole and mature even when we are not. You would not claim you could play the piano if you could not! It would be too easy to be shown to be false. But if we did, in order to avoid being caught out, we might avoid anyone who owned a piano. We do the same sort of thing when we are trapped in a shame fear control cycle. Such strongholds cannot co-exist in the long run, with genuine Christian fellowship. If a shame based person (one described above) is part of a fellowship then one of three things will happen. Either the whole fellowship will become (or remain) shame based, or the shame based person will leave. The third option is that the fellowship will be deep enough to love the shame based person unconditionally and that person will eventually feel safe enough to open up and find healing in the process.

Unfortunately places such as I have just described are rare. The default is for us to “pretend we can play the piano when we cannot”. And this false maturity results and has resulted in multitudes of people out there, being deeply hurt by Church. Those of us who understand and are willing to be vulnerable need to create safe places. It is not easy, not the least of which is because we are likely to be shamed in the process (it is part of the control, driven by fear). But it is Christlike, He too was a wounded healer (Isaiah 53:5). It is the only way forward, and it is, and will in the end be seen to be, worth it!

She did pee-pees on the pot Grandpa, and she's only 23!

I got a call from my daughter with the good news. Isn't that great? And she's is only 23. Isn’t' that amazing? By the way, it's twenty three months, not years. Yes, I am messing with you!

Is it a coincidence that within the same 24 hour period, I was reminded of the verse from 1 Corinthians 13:11 “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things”? A friend of mine says that coincidences are little miracles that God does not get the credit for. Of course the fellow with the pitch fork can engineer coincidences too!

What is my point? It would be sad if the toilet training of our children was not accomplished until their twenties. It is also sad when we carry many of the ways we learned to cope as children, into adulthood. They say things happen in threes, and still within same 24 hour period of the above “coincidence”, it was brought to my attention just how much I still have to learn that at some level is “elementary my dear Watson”. I was sharing with a friend about a hard won life lesson, and he in all his wisdom and maturity told me “duh!” It was so obvious to him, but for me it was a lesson painfully learned, and his “duh” had shades of 'how could you have fallen for that, stupid?' attached to it. A moment of insensitivity perhaps ('don't quit your day job to go into counseling'), but as I say it brought home how often we (I don't believe it's just me), operate as adults out of the scars and ways we learned to cope, as children.

And more often than not, we don't see it. And more often than not, the Lord will bring it to our attention through relationship difficulties. Take it as a given we don't want to see it. The problem seem to be that if we admit that there is a problem, then we will (should at any rate) have to deal with it. And it's so much easier to blame the other person. And there will always be things about the other person that we can focus on, and so avoid having to deal with our own garbage!

There is a recovery saying that rings bells with me. It is this “We will not change until the pain of staying the same gets greater than the pain and fear of changing”. How many people come out of a broken marriage, for example, and because they have not dealt with their stuff, make exactly the same mistake in the second and even subsequent marriages. But we all do this at one level or another. Do you believe the Bible? It says in James 3:2 “In many things we all fail”. Yes it is one of my favourite quotes. But let me ask you this 'Do you know experientially that this verse is true of you?' We tend to fall into two categories, those who are painfully aware of it, and those who don't have a clue. But even those of us who are painfully aware of their faults, usually are thinking of but a single fault (an addiction for example). The verse says 'many things'. In particular, though addictions take on a life of their own, they usually start as symptom of things (plural) not dealt with (as for example a way of dulling our pain). They tell me that insanity is the result of not dealing properly with our pain. I am beginning to suspect that all dysfunction has its beginning in the same source.

We pick up so much of this from our environment. When we are children, we just don't have the skills to do anything else. But when we are adults, we need to learn to start dealing with our stuff. When we don't, we will try to pretend that we have, that we are mature, and we will need to hide and wear masks. We become isolated because if we let people near, they might just discover who we really are and reject us.

There is too little teaching on these things in the church, so that too many of us stay babes in Christ. It is through knowledge that the righteous are delivered (Proverbs 11:9). I have found in some ways that I have more in common with the non-Christian who is in recovery, than I have with the Christian who is not. The differences between Christians and non-Christians in recovery seem to be two. Firstly we Christians have an authoritative source (the Bible). In particular, there are many secular sources that in light from the Bible are simply wrong. The excesses of secular teaching on catharsis for example. Secondly we have the resources of heaven at our disposal. We do not need to rely on just our own abilities and strength and wisdom. For various reasons (lack of knowledge for example) Christians do not always take advantage of the help that is available. And even if we know, we may not ask and we do not have, because we do not ask (James 4:2). And we will not ask while we are still in denial.

Arrogance/False humility, two ditches along the highway of holiness.

There are two ditches along the “highway of holiness,” one on either side. The ditches vary according to the particular stretch we are currently traveling. In our discussion in the Faculty Bible study the other day, we talked about the false humility/arrogance ditches in the context of the verse “It is more necessary for you that I remain in the body” from Philippians 1:24. For Paul “to live is Christ and to die is gain” (verse 21), but as verse 25 emphasizes, Paul was convinced that the Philippians needed him in the here and now (or the there and then?). We asked if in saying this, Paul was demonstrating a lack of humility. The related question was “Is my continuing life in the here and now, significant for others?”. The questions got us talking (if not exactly agreeing). Dialogue is good!

So what comes below is a combination of what was said, and some of my own thoughts since (it's my bog, so I am allowed :) !). So would it be lack of humility for me to say “Guys, I know that you need me, so I am confident that God is not about to take me home”? I want to suggest that it would depend on how I said it, and the attitude that lies behind it. The University is not entirely lacking in arrogance! In 1 Corinthians 8:1 (AMP) we are told “mere knowledge causes people to be puffed up (to bear themselves loftily and be proud),” on the other hand love edifies! We all know of adult spoiled brats that have far too high an opinion of themselves, and God forbid that I should be one of them! But there is an equal and opposite error that many seem to fall into, and I believe that it comes from not knowing who we are in Christ.

It is said our theology should not be the same as our hymnology. I am thinking of two hymns: John Newton’s “Amazing Grace” where he tells us that God “saved a wretch like me.” Or, Isaac Watts’ hymn “Alas! and did my saviour bleed “for such a worm as I.” Let me ask would you apply these terms to your Christian brother or sister? “You do know my brother don't you, that you are a wretch and a worm”? If you would not say such things because they would be inappropriate (and I hope that is your response), then I want to suggest that to say such things about yourself is also inappropriate! And if you say such things about yourself watch out, you are speaking about someone who is the apple of God's eye! If you would not set your brother at nought (treat him as zero - Romans 14:10 JKV), why would you consider yourself as a zero or less? Does this build you up? It has the appearance of humility, but I want to suggest that it is in fact false humility.

We can certainly have too high an opinion of ourselves, but we can also have too low an opinion. I am a child of the living God. I am Royalty (Revelation 5:10). Now for sure I can be snotty Royalty, and I can act in a way that is not consistent with my standing, but that is not how I am supposed to be. When we know who we are, and do not let it go to our heads we can walk in the authority we have been given. We have been given spiritual weapons (2 Cor 10:4ff), and armour (Ephesians 6:10ff) and authority (Mtt 28:18ff), and too many of us do not walk in these things.

In my own life I always seem to battle with unbelief at some level or other. However following some reading and listening and prayer I have been telling myself “My prayers are powerful”. Well where does this come from? In James 5:16 it says “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective”. So am I righteous? Certainly I do not have a righteousness of my own, but I do have the imputed righteousness of Christ (Philippians 3:9). And as long as I am not holding onto my sin, I can claim the verse in James as a promise. So I am telling myself that my prayers are powerful, and I will say it until I really believe it, and then I will say it because I believe it! What is interesting is that since I have been doing this, I have seen many more prayers answered! I am significant if my prayers make a difference, and they do “my prayers are powerful”. We are significant, I am significant and you are significant too. We do need to stay firmly on the highway of holiness, that is not falling into the being puffed up ditch, but neither being cow toed to the lies of the enemy who will undermine our faith and confidence in God and our calling if we let him (the false humility ditch).

Do others need my believing prayer? You bet they do! “He is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or imagine”. All that comes between me and that, is my unbelief, which He tells me is sin (Hebrews 3:12). And even that is good news, because once I realize it is sin, I can confess and forsake it and be forgiven and move on to “the high calling in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14). When we learn with right humility and confidence to be who we are in Christ, we will make a difference. But on top of this, we have work to do. God ordained something specific for you, and for me. But we will not find what that is if we continue to tell ourselves that we have no significance. He “prepared beforehand (works) we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10). If He prepared these works individually for us, then they have to be significant. Our significant God would do nothing less.

He suffers with us and for us

In a previous post I told of an interview with Bethany Hamilton, who lost her arm in a shark attack, in which she says that she would not choose to have her arm back if she could. Bethany has a remarkable faith in God, and she encourages each of us to believe that God loves us , and that no matter what happens God still has a plan for our lives (Jeremiah 29:11). So Bethany has a ministry to bring hope to those who have lost hope. But Bethany is not the only person who suffered significant loss, and could later say she would not choose to reverse it. I am thinking of Joni Eareckson Tada who, as a young teenage girl, broke her neck in a freak diving accident and become permanently paralyzed from the shoulders down. Though she did not come to this easily, she is reports “If I were asked to choose between being in this chair (her wheelchair) knowing Him, and not being in the chair but not knowing Him, I would chose to be in the chair".

My description above as “not coming to this easily” is of course a huge understatement. Nevertheless she could in the end, find her way through it all to make the statement, and mean it. Her point was and is that in partnership with Him, her tragedy allowed her to find a relationship with Him that is so significant, that it more than compensated for her pain and struggles. The relationship that faith and trust in God brings can do that for each one of us. Paul suffered more than you and I are ever likely to suffer (see 2 Corinthians 11:23-29). He tells us that through patient endurance the “Love of God is shed abroad in our Hearts” (Romans 5:5). He also talks about the “fellowship of His sufferings”, that special closeness that comes when we fully invite Him into our pain. In the same passage (Philippians 3), Paul tells us that he gave up everything he held dear to be thus “found in Him”.

No matter how difficult our trial, Jesus was there before us. And He does not ask of us anything He Himself was not willing to do and more. He suffered for us, and He will suffer with us if we will let Him (surrendering all). Its hard to explain how it helps, it is in fact something of a mystery, but it does help, it really does.

Let's look a little more closely at these things. Firstly then He suffered for us. In Romans 5:7,8 Paul says “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Or as Peter puts it “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18). So it was for us that He suffered and bled and died while we were still in rebellion, and consequently at enmity with God (Romans 5:10). Mel Gibson's movie “The passion of the Christ” depicts the physical suffering of the beatings and the cross, but its not just the physical pain. In the garden He is in such emotional turmoil that his capillaries actually fracture and he literally sweats blood (Luke 22:44). And then there is the spiritual pain of separation from His Father for the first time ever, as He (again literally) becomes sin for us (2 Corinthians 5:21), and God the Father turns His face away.

And Christ suffers with us. We may have caught a gimps of what what it means to suffer with someone when we came along side someone who was suffering, even weeping with them in their pain. This is what the Lord wants to do with us. It is easy to say to someone “I know what you are going through”. It is unlikely all the same, and such phrases should be used sparingly, for though we may think we know, we may not have a clue. On the other hand Jesus really does know what we are going through, He has been there, He really has. Indeed “we do not have a high priest who cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” (Hebrews 4:15). There is no one who loves us more, and there is no one who suffered more, and He did it for us. Why? Well as we said above, He did it “to bring us to God”. “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”(Acts 4:12). It should break our hearts!

It is a remarkable thing this fellowship of His sufferings, our welcoming Him into the midst of our pain. Suffering is not something any one of us would likely choose, but for those of us who embrace Him in these times, we find something the World neither knows nor understands. Indeed, when we choose to rejoice in the midst of it all, put away our anxiety and turn to Him with prayer and petitions with thanksgiving, He brings us the “peace that passes all understanding” (Phil 4:4-7), the peace that the World cannot know (John 14:27). The one who suffered for us then, is the same one who suffers with us bringing us His peace and grace and comfort.

Prayer: Lord bring me this peace that will guard my heart and mind in You. (Phil 4:7)

To suffer or not to suffer, that is not the question!

If you expect to get through life without suffering, good luck. The Apostle Peter puts it this way “Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you” (1 Peter 4:12). We suffer because of what we have done, we suffer because of what others have done, and sometimes our suffering comes from out of the blue without apparent rhyme or reason. But whatever sooner or later, we all seem to find ourselves suffering. Indeed the “rain falls on the just and the unjust”.

What is certain (at least in my mind) is that if there is no heaven and hell then God is not just. Some will say that “well heaven and hell are here on earth”, and while I know what they mean, this cannot be right (again if God is just and He is). I say this because the wicked seem to get away with murder, sometimes quite literally. And this in fact is part of our suffering, knowing that the wicked do seem to get away with it (at least in the here and now)! The question then is not if we will suffer, but how we will deal with it.

The quotation from 1st Peter above implies that we should even expect to suffer. The same reference confirms the truth of the saying “these things are sent to try us”. My response to this is “They do, they do try us!” And this brings me back to my perhaps becoming over worn phrase “these things are crossroads”. Will we allow ourselves to become offended with God and/or the perpetrators of our pain, or will we deal with suffering the way that Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, dealt with them? He is, after all, our example.

Over the weekend I watched the awesome movie “Courageous”. The main character looses his daughter to an accident involving a drunk driver. The pastor asks him what will he choose. Will he choose to be angry that he is denied the good times he would have had with his daughter, or be thankful for the memories of the good times he did have? What would you choose? You would have to wrestle with that (at least I would), but in the end if we understood how things work, we would see that we were being offered the choice of life or death. Bitterness is like root that springs up and chokes off life, and defiles us and those we love (Hebrews 12:15). We need His help (I do) to choose His ways.

The question again then, is not if we will suffer, for this is certain. The question is how we will respond to the suffering, to the injustices that befall us, and to the consequences of our own choices.

Prayer: Father help me to respond to the things that so easily offend, by choosing life. Help me to understand that You suffered for us and with us (next day's post).

Rejoice evermore? Get real!

The Bible tells to “Rejoice in the Lord always” (Philippians 4:4), but how realistic is this? In a recent meeting we were discussing this and I suggested that I would find it hard to believe, if anyone said that they did it all the time. But it has to be possible (in Him) to live a life (substantially) filled with joy, or He would not command us to do it. At our meeting I played a You Tube clip of Nick Vujicic http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxjiEi2Eywk&feature=fvsr. Nick is an outstanding example of someone with incredible joy, who in the natural, has a lot less reason than most of us to be that way. He is, however an inspiration of what we can be in Him.

Part of the problem I think (but just a part), is that we tend to confuse joy with happiness. “I just want to be happy” we hear people say, but happiness is directly related to happen – ness. The old time musical “Oklahoma” opens with the song “Oh what a beautiful morning, oh what a beautiful day, oh what a wonderful feeling, everything's going my way”. But is the day still beautiful if things are not going my way? Happiness is so totally dependent on circumstances, but joy when we have learned to tap into it, can be the very thing that brings us through the circumstances.

The command in James 1:2 quoted last day is not a command to be happy when you find yourself caught up into the midst of various trials, it is to command to cooperate with God so He can use joy to bring you above the circumstances. Romans 8:28, also found in last days' post says “We know that God is a work in all things for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose”. I asked the group if this verse is true (just trying to weed out the heretics :-) ). We all knew the expected answer, but the real question is if we believe it, not just in our heads, but in our hearts. In other words I was asking if it is a reality in our lives.

After seeing the movie “The game” years ago, I wrote in my journal “If we knew that life was a game and that everything that happened either good or bad would, in the end, work out for our good, then we could relax and enjoy the ride” I then wrote “But we do know this” (yes I was thinking about Romans 8:28). I believe that God wants us to live in the reality of His truths, His Word is meant to change us. But how can we enter into them? It starts of course by getting them into our heads (memorize them), and then we need to meditate on them, pray over them, speak them to ourselves (and others) until we believe them, then speak them some more because we believe them.

In terms of the Romans 8:28 verse, if you have been a Christian for any length of time it is likely that God has used some difficulty in your life to bring comfort to others. And this brought you joy. There is in the end nothing that is more fulfilling than being used of God. In an interview Bethany Hamilton, the girl who lost her arm in a shark attack (the person behind the movie 'soul surfer'), tells that she would not choose to have her arm back if she could choose to reverse things. Behind this remarkable statement lies the reality of how her circumstances drew her close to God and how He used them and her, to minister to others.

I said in a previous post that the Christian has resources that the non-Christian cannot know. Most of us do not have the recourse in and of ourselves to be the sort of overcomer that we see in Nick and Bethany. But the good news is that “My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). So then when we are weak, when we do not have these resources within us, then we qualify for His enabling Grace. If we had these resources within ourselves, and using them managed to overcome, then we would get the glory. However when we do not have the resources, and we tap into His resources and then overcome, He gets the Glory and we get to be part of ushering in His Kingdom. There is, as I say, nothing that brings more fulfillment.

On top of this, when we learn to tap into this joy, then this very joy enables us to get through the difficulties of life. In other words, the joy of the Lord becomes our strength (Nehemiah 8:10). It makes no sense in the natural, but all things are possible in Him. This joy is for you and for me, it is your birthright and it is mine. We do need to set our hearts to be determined to settle for nothing less than all He has for us. If someone left you a million dollars how hard would you fight to get it? How far are you willing to go to tap into the benefits of His passion? We need to surrender all we are and have to Him, then drink of the joy and the hope and the love and the grace that He gives to those who choose to love Him (yes we are still in Romans 8:28).

Rejoice evermore? Yes. Get real? Yes, Amen! To move into this is to move into what is truly real (if unseen) where we are encompassed by His joy and love and grace. Saving grace is free, but to enter into His enabling grace will cost us everything we are and have. I particular we need to stop fighting God over the people and circumstances He allows in our lives to refine us. To paraphrase Paul “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the reality of the glory which shall be revealed in us” (Romans 8:18). Let us encourage on another to live in the certainty that this life is not all that there is, and that when we cooperate with Him, He will use the difficult things to make us more like Him, bringing us through pain into His Love and joy, and in the process bringing others into His kingdom (Romans 8:29).

I invite you to pray: Father bring me to the place I need to be in order to receive your grace and joy, no matter what the cost. Deal with everything in me that hinders this. In Jesus name

But God gives more grace. Enabling grace III

The need to forgive (see “Don't get mad, get even and poison yourself than those you love” January 2011) is perhaps exceeded only betimes, by the difficulty in doing it. The writer to the Hebrews connects the failure to forgive with our failing to obtain God's grace (enabling) to do it (Hebrews 12:15). In a relatively trivial incident just this morning, the Lord reminded me of the availability of His grace to deal with disappointment, frustration and the like.

The Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 5, that together with God's salvation, we are given “access into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God” (verse 2). We can think of this aspect of God's grace as the wherewithal to do what He commands us to do, and in particular to do the things we cannot do without Him. So then the times we need His enabling grace the most, are our times of difficulty. It is His intention that we rise above the circumstances of life, above its trials and temptations and devastating disappointments. James tells us that we are to count it all joy when we encounter trials and temptations of various kinds (James 1:2). The intention here is not simply to grit ones teeth in the face of all that happens, but to actually “Push through the pain into joy” (see last day's post). Doing this requires of us a radical trust in God. Coming to this place in the Christian life is a process, and one which Paul describes in the Romans 5 passage. He says “we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (verse 3-5).

There is a lot in this passage, but the end of it all is that we get to experience the “poured out love” in our hearts, that is as long as we do not fail to tap into this “grace in which we stand”. The Hebrews passage mentioned above admonishes us to be diligent to ensure that this does not happen. But how do we do this? Perhaps the place to start is to ask what is the opposite reaction to 'rejoicing in our trials'.

In the past I have been guilty of letting many things offend me. This manifested itself by my allowing the negative thoughts to go round and round and round in my mind. To do this is, in effect, to nurse the hurt or the resentment or the anger, and these things easily grow to consume you. When these things go on for long enough, and become full blown, it is more than a little difficult to stop them. The Christian does have the authority to “bring every thought captive unto the obedience of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor 10:5), but again learning to exercise that authority is a process. It is easier if we stop things at the beginning, but in any case, it starts with crying out to God for his help.

As part of this, we need to learn to stop fighting the people and circumstances that God allows in our lives, to refine us. He tells us in Romans 8:28 that He is at work in all things (not just some things, but all things) for good, for those of us who love Him and are called according to His purpose. We need to receive this by faith. In particular if it is by faith, we cannot demand that He show us how this trial can possible work out for our good. There will be times when our whole being will scream out that this cannot be so, as when we loose a child, or if we are seeing loved ones suffer, or if we have been abused. Please note, the verse is not saying that these things are good, what the verse is saying is that God is at actively at work even in and through the evil, for our good. It is easy to trust in the good times, but to trust in the evil day is well pleasing to Him.

Sometimes God shows us explicitly how He is working things out for our good. When we allow Him to heal us with His “love poured out”, for example He uses our tragedies to minister to others who are hurting in the same way that we were hurt. A widow who has learned to receive God's comfort, can comfort the more recently bereaved (2 Corinthians 1:4). When we are willing to admit that we have sinned or made mistakes, He can use our confession to help others (particularly those we love) to avoid the traps into which we fell. But if we can see nothing else, we can (as the verse which follows Roman's 8:28 promises), believe that our submission and trust are making us more like Jesus, and that this will always produce fruit for the Kingdom. This is the essence of the verse that immediately follows Romans 8:28 i.e verse 29!

From time to time we see outstanding examples of this fruit through pain. I am thinking people like Joni Eareckson Tada, or Anne Marie Hagan or Nick Vujicic (Google these names). But while we may not all achieve their level of freedom, we can all start the process. As it says in Romans 5 quoted above, when we stop fighting these things and choose with His help (His grace) to start to rejoice, then this produces endurance (the ability to stand up under trial) and this in turn refines our character, and the experience of this together with His out poured love in our hearts produces the hope which reinforces it all. And all this redounds to the “glory of God” (verse 2 again). With Paul we will know that His grace is sufficient (2 Corinthians 12:9). We may betimes feel overwhelmed, but when we do “God gives more grace” (James 4:6).

Prayer: Father help me to trust you in the difficult times, and give me what I need (Your Grace) to cooperate with You. Take away the blocks I have in place that prevent me from experience Your “Love poured out”, in Jesus Name.

Pushing through the pain, rising above the circumstances. Enabling Grace II

They say that if you are to going to learn to run a marathon, you have to learn to push through the pain. When you do this, they say (I have never done it), you get your second wind and can carry on. The physical is an analogy of the spiritual. There are rare individuals who in spite of severe odds, and extreme suffering, seem to find the wherewithal to rise above it all, and even to excel. And they are an inspiration to us all. I say in spite of it all, but actually I suspect it is at least partially because of it all. I keep saying it, the difficulties of life are crossroads. But where do they, where do we, find the strength and the courage, the wherewithal to take this less traveled road? It is not easy for anyone, but the Christian has resources the non Christian cannot know. In particular when we come boldly to the Throne of Grace we will find "Mercy and Grace to help in time of need" (Hebrews 4:16 quoted last day).

I have seen it over and over that suffering prods us into one of two directions. We can allow our suffering to build character, fortitude, integrity, grace, wisdom, love, hope and the like, or else we can allow it to leave us bitter, cynical abrasive and the like. To say this another way, we either allow these things to draw us closer to God, or we allow them to push us further away. We may vacillate between the two for a while, but ultimately we go in one direction or the other. And we choose. We choose to continue to see ourselves as victims, or we choose to see ourselves as over-comers. We need God's help to take the latter path. Well I at least need His help. I cannot do it without Him

The day that without doubt was the most difficult of my life, the Lord woke me up with an ancient hymn on my heart and mind:

Oh Joy that seekest me though pain,
I cannot ask to hide from thee.

I trace the rainbow through the rain,
and feel the promise is not vain,
that morn shall tearless be.

This was the day that my (now ex) wife took the four children and left. It was not the way I wanted to deal with our problems, but she had had enough. As conformation that the hymn was from Him, He next reminded me of the verse in Hebrews 12:2 “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame....” He was showing me that pain is a barrier the other side of which, is joy. But I did need to look to Jesus. He is (was) my strength and my song. He had earlier promised “Weeping may endure for the night, but joy comes in the morning” (Psalm 30:5). There were many things He did for me that day (and afterwords) in addition to speaking to me from His Word, He sent people along to pray for and comfort me, and He gave me in my spirit, what I needed to get through it.

In one of His parables (the unjust judge - Luke 18:1-6) Jesus taught that we aught always to pray and not give up (verse 1). There were times, long periods in fact, that I was not able to pray, at least not in intelligible sentences. I am grateful for the teaching from Romans 8 that at such times “the Spirit intercedes for us in groaning that cannot be uttered” and my prayers were often little more than “Aggggggg”, or “Oh God, oh God, oh God, oh God, oh God!” or “Daddy, Daddy, Daddy Daddy, Daddy, Daddy, Daddy (Abba - Father God). There were times when it all got too much for me and I fell, but He was always waiting for me to pick me up, and slowly but surely He built me up, and healed what I thought were incurable wounds. Indeed there were times I cried out with Jeremiah “Why is my pain perpetual And my wound incurable, Which refuses to be healed? Will You surely be to me like an unreliable stream, As waters that fail?”

In the days before running water on tap, an unreliable stream was one that would dry up at the time you needed it most. He did not tell us that we would never feel like we were abandoned, He did tell us that in reality He would never leave us nor abandon us. As the “footprints in the sand” poem illustrates clearly, in such times He carries us, though again we may not even be aware of it (Google "Footprints in the sand"). And the sun does come out again. It does.

The parable in Luke 18 ends with “When the Son of man comes again will He find faith on the earth?” (verse 8). Though we may stumble and fall, many times over and over and over, what is important is that we keep coming back to Him, calling out to Him from our darkness. Unless we do this, we will fail to obtain His enabling Grace (Hebrews 12:15), but if we have come to know Him, and have tasted His comfort, then like Peter we will ask ourselves and Him “Where will we go Lord, You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). As for me, I know that without Him I would quite literally be dead. Where will you go? Why don't you go there now?

Enabling Grace, the wherewithal to live the Christian life I

"You've got to do the best you can”, my friend told me. “Sometimes my best is not good enough” was my reply. The picture I have of this is, of a village suffering severely from drought as the river dries up. Way back up stream there is a dam holding back much of the water. The keeper of the dam is aware of the problem. He has a hand pump which he is working furiously to try and pump the water over the top of the dam to supply the village. “I am doing the best I can” he says. “No one could pump harder than I am, no one”. True or not, the point would be mute if there was an electric pump he could turn on to solve the problem! We may fail to tap into resources beyond ourselves because of ignorance of their existence, or because of hurt or pain or stubbornness, but we will certainly be much less than we can be, if we do not learn to tap into His power to live the live He calls us to live. The Scripture tells us “We have not because we do not ask” (James 4:2). God will not impose His enabling grace on us, we have to come to the place where we admit our best is not good enough, and then we need to turn to Him and ask for Him to fill up what we cannot do.

This bears repeating, so let me say it again. When we have tried everything, done the very best we can and failed, there are two things we need to do. We need firstly to admit that we need His help, and secondly we need to come to the foot of the cross in humility asking Him for the help to do what we know is pleasing in His sight, and which without Him is impossible. Let's make no mistake about it, His standards are so impossibly high that we really cannot live up to them without His help. “The Law is our tutor to bring us to Christ” Paul tells us in Galatians 3. We know deep down that His standards are right, but they are so out of reach at times. But when He tells us “All have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God” (Romans 3:23), it is not to condemn us, it is to help us see we need His help, His solution. If we think otherwise we are fooling ourselves and are likely to have a touch (or more) of self-righteousness.

It is said that there is no place that has more potential to generate anger, than a marriage. I believe this to be true. This being the case, there is no other relationship where sooner or later we will need His help if we are to deal with what needs to be dealt with, in a way that honours God and each other. These things are tests. Will we demonstrate that we are “mere men” (1 Corinthian 3:3), or will we with God's help (Grace), prove to ourselves and the World that there really is something to this Christianity stuff, that the Christian has something beyond him or herself?

The way it seems to work for most of us that that it is only when we come to the end of ourselves that we even start to do our part in taking hold of the resources God has made available to us through the Cross. And even then it is far from automatic. I have come to realize that these times are crossroads that we all come to sooner or later. In a marriage relationship it seems more often than not, to work this way: the things that attracted us to each other in the beginning become the very things that make us throw up our hands when the honey moon is over. I have seen it over and over, it is diabolical, and I mean that quite literally. The Evil one, the one whose agenda is to kill steel and destroy, intends it for our harm. But God intends it for our good, for our growth and the furtherance of the Kingdom. We can't do it without Him, I cannot!

They tell me that if you put an eagle chick with the turkeys they will never learn to fly. Apparently in teaching them to fly, the mother eagle will push the young ones out of the nest. When they do this, the young ones drop like a stone, well because they have not yet learned to fly. The mother will then swoop down and catch her chick on her wings, and she will do this over and over until the chick learns to spread its wings and fly.

I can't imagine that the chick enjoys this very much, well not at least until it learns to fly. I can't imagine the chick would understand what its mother was doing, at least in the beginning. What if it never learned to trust its mother, what if it never spread its wings as it fell? There are examples all over the Bible of the crossroads the trials and temptations of life bring. Some, in these examples, took the way of the World, others took the road less travelled (His way). Some grumbled against God, others poured out their complaint before him (see Numbers 11, and August posts). There is a big difference. In the Numbers passage, the children of Israel in their grumbling cut themselves off from God, choosing not to trust Him. They wanted to go back to Egypt where they had been slaves. Essentially they were saying to God “We were better off without You”. They said “This is too hard, we are going back to the old ways”. Moses reaction looks at first sight to be the same. He said “This is too hard, I cannot bear it” (11:14), but He said this to God. God was angry with the people, but He provided for Moses. He has promised to provide for us too. We are told in 1 Corinthians 10:13 that “No trial or temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tested beyond what you are able, but with the temptation (test) will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it”. In relationship with Him, He gives us the ability to do things that we cannot do without Him. It is His intention that we learn to “fly”, for “those who wait and hope and trust in the Lord will find new strength, they will rise up on wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint” (Isaiah 40:31). The trials and temptations and difficulties are, as I say, crossroads. Peter tells us “Therefore let those who suffer .... commit their souls to Him ...., as to a faithful Creator” (1 Peter 4:19). He will bring us through if we let Him. What will we do in times of trial? Will we turn to Him and find Grace to Help in time of need (Hebrews 4:16), or will we turn from Him go the way of the World? More to come.

When love and respect die

A friend of mine told me about the time his cat died. She had always been aggressive and far from affectionate, yet he went to quite extraordinary lengths to try and save her life. In the process of this she turned on him one day, quite viciously. He tells that he was very temped to give up. It was pivotal moment. Who could love a cat like that? It was decision time, and rightly or wrongly he chose to continue to love the cat, and to go to extreme lengths to save her! She died anyway, but the point of his story, was to tell me that after he had made the decision not to give up, he started to feel even more affection for his pet.

There is a principle at work here. When we choose to love in spite of the pain, the feelings of love will eventually follow (return). This is the reason we promise in the marriage ceremony to “love, honour and cherish, as long as we both shall live”. No one is saying that this is easy, but the Christian marriage councillor has the obligation to speak along the following lines to the Christian couple whose love has died “You say that you don't love her (him), but I say to you 'Love her (him)'”. I could imagine the conversation continuing. “Did you hear what I said, I told you that I don't love her”. The councillor should answer “Yes I heard you, you were stating a fact, but I was quoting a Biblical command”.

There are two immediate things I want to say. The first is that I am certainly not advocating that one simply put up with an abusive relationship. The second thing is that it is another Biblical principle, that God never gives us a command that He does not, with the command, also give us the wherewithal to carry it out.

With regard to the first point I do want to say that we far too easily give up on relationships when they become difficult, and we often fail to even begin to understand the role we each play in keeping the other stuck. I have said elsewhere that it is typical in the break up of a relationship for each part to blame the other 100% for the difficulties. At this point we are both blind, and (again as I have said before) we need to come together to the foot of the cross. It is probably the only place where we can come back into a realistic perspective on what is really happening (see “Living at the foot of the Cross” – July 2011).

The title of this post of course contains two things, love and respect. We need both of these things in our lives if we are to function well. That we need love is obvious, that we need respect is perhaps less obvious. It is interesting (to me) that the Lord specifically commands the man to love the woman, and commands the woman to respect the man (Ephesians 5:33). While we all need both love and respect, it seems to be the case that the woman is more undermined by lack of love, and the man more by lack of respect. What I know from my own life, is that when I sense lack of respect in a significant relationship, I feel undermined by it. I read somewhere that at the breakup of a relationship one or other of the parties develops a radical disrespect for his or her partner. Mother Theresa has a famous saying “Nakedness is not just for a piece of cloth”. To encounter radical disrespect from a significant other shames us, and robs us of our dignity. The resulting loss of self respect can significantly and negatively affect our behaviour, keeping us stuck in our dysfunction and reinforcing the disrespect coming down the line. So then we are commanded both to love and to respect. But there are times when this is only possible by the Grace of God.

I have said it before and no doubt will say it again, the difficulties we encounter in life are tests, they are crossroads. For the one who does not know Christ, the command to love and/or respect when he or she no longer loves or feels contempt, is a very tall order. It is this, because the one who does not know Christ does not have access to the resources the Christian has (see “Psychology without faith is lame” August 2010 and next day's post). I am not saying that it is easy even for the Christian, especially one who does not have a close relationship with the Lord. But it is at this point where we demonstrate the reality of our faith or not. If we acknowledge that it is good and right and proper to love one another and “in lowliness of mind ... esteem others better than himself” (Philippians 2:3), and we don't, then we will likely do one of two things. We will either decide that such standards are unreasonable and dismiss them as unrealistic, or we will throw ourselves on the Mercy of the Lord and allow Him to use our short comings as a vehicle to draw us to Himself, and into His Grace.

These are, as I say, difficult times. This may in fact be the time where we discover that “we have a form of godliness, but deny its power” (2 Timothy 3:5). It may be the beginning of the place where we understand how little of the Grace of God that we have manage to appropriate for ourselves. It is as I say a crossroads, one where we probably either place all the blame on the other party, or we will allow God to bring us (back) to the foot of His cross, where there is healing and power to do what He commands, and where there is restoration. More to come!

I pour out my complaint II

The context of the Psalm we are looking at (142), is of David fleeing from King Saul who was seeking his life. David is alone and hiding in a cave. Perhaps it was dark, dank and dreary, no place you would choose to be. In verse 4 David speaks of being alone and isolated “I have no refuge, no one cares for my soul.” But between verses 4 and 5 something has happened, for in verse 5 he tells the Lord “You are my refuge, You are my portion”. Things change when we come to the Lord in our desperation, giving it all to Him and waiting on Him. It did for David, and it can for us too.

Some are reluctant to bring strong feelings to the Lord, but He can handle our anger and frustration. He is not surprised by our out of control emotions. He would that we came to Him angry even with Him, rather than stay away. And we all get angry with God at times, even if is makes no sense. Many who deny that God exists are simply angry with Him (it's just a variation of the silent treatment!). One friend refuses to admit he is angry with God because “its not logical”! We need to be honest with God, and we need to be honest with ourselves. These things are at the heart of any functional relationship. David knew that God requires “truth in the inward parts” (Psalm 51:6).

There are times when the Psalmist is brutally honest, and this gives us permission to be honest too. In the Psalms, we see real responses to real injustices, and to the trials, temptations and difficulties of life. There are times when the Psalmist feels abandoned by God, but still he comes to Him. In Psalm 13 for example David cries out “How long, Oh Lord? will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and every day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?” We can paraphrase this is "God you don't love me and you don't care". Its not true of course, but that it what it felt like! Some of the Psalms express thoughts and desires that are clearly inappropriate, as they come from an honest but bitter heart. In Psalm 137:9 we read “Happy and blessed shall he be who takes and dashes your little ones against the rock!” Of course this is not something to copy for “Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord” (Romans 12:9 -see also Hebrews 12:15). The point I am making though is that we can be real with God. We know that bitterness is poison (Hebrews 12:15), but many times the pain and the injustices are so great that we need His help to get out from under it. We get that help as we come to Him, not by staying away. If we let Him, he will bring us back to the way we should go.

So then we can come to God sad, mad or bad. He is big enough to handle it. And when we come to Him, we come to one who is bigger and wiser and more powerful that we are. He has the answer we need (not necessarily the answer we want, but certainly the one we need!). He also has the ability to give us the wherewithal to do what needs to be done. When we come to God seeking His input and stay there wrestling things though with Him, then we will receive from Him what we need to get unstuck. There are two things here, we need to come, and we need to stay until faith returns and we are changed. The Psalms are a wonderful vehicle to help us in this regard.

In terms of simply coming, it is wise to stop before we even start, and ask Him both to help us and to meet us in our reading. Too often I just start reading, and I can do this without even acknowledging that He is there. It is relationship He is after and it is in intimate relationship that we will be healed.

In terms of not hurrying, like the rest of Scripture, the Palms should be thought of as concentrated Truth that needs to be “unzipped”. We should not expect to be able to speed read the Scriptures. It is far too easy to miss what is happening “between the lines”. Many of the Psalms are written as poetry, and need to be understood that way. In particular, as discussed above, the changes that took place between verses 4 and 5 (and 7) of Psalm 142 likely took some time. Neither God nor the Scriptures promise instant solutions or immediate relief. In fact it is His plan to use the trials of life to strengthen us, and put steel and integrity into our character. Peter puts it this way “Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you” (1 Peter 4:12). He also tells us that “the God of all grace...., after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast” (1 Peter 5:10 NIV).

When we “dwell in the secret place of the Most High” (Psalm 91:1) a transformation begins to take place. For one thing, we see things differently, and we receive His comfort, strength and love, and He speaks His truth into our hearts. David did not record exactly what happened in his interaction with God, or how or what He spoke to him. But we do have his response. Over and over in the beginning of this or that Psalm he comes in desperate, but he exits declaring for example “The righteous shall surround me (no longer alone and isolated), For You shall deal bountifully with me.” (Psalm 142:7 NKJV– words in brackets mine). David is expressing his faith and assurance that God will do as He has always done, and David is resting in His goodness (verse 7 NIV).

God loves us to take a hold of Him in prayer. The Scriptures show us over and over how the saints of old did this. The words of Jacob in his hour of need come to mind as in fear for his life and for those he loves, he wrestles with the Lord. He tells Him “I will not let you go until you bless me” (Genesis 32:26). This is the very opposite of the instant solutions our society has come to expect/demand. Jacob was wresting the whole night. Indeed David tells us that it is in meditating on His Word “day and night” that we become like a tree planted by the waters (Psalm 1). Jesus tells us something very similar when He says that if we continue in His Word, we will know the truth and the truth will set us free (John 8:31 ff).

Note that the emphasis is on “staying” as we read words like dwell, abide and continue. His benefits are not for those who are not willing to do anything other than rush in and out of His presence. He is after relationship, we should be too, because it is in His presence, in intimacy with Him, in the secret place, where we find grace and peace and strength. In fact this is where we find that He is everything that we need. And we are changed. As I have said before, we even get to like ourselves. It starts with me pouring out my complaint, but it ends with life and health and peace even before the circumstances change.

I pour out my complaint to the Lord

In this Psalm from which the title of the post comes (Psalm 142), David talks about being alone with nowhere to go (no refuge). He feels like nobody cares for Him (verse 4). He is persecuted and brought very low by those who are stronger than he (verse 6). He has been ensnared (verse 3) and he feels like he is in prison (verse 7). He is feeling completely overwhelmed (verse 3). Can anybody relate?

One of the things we humans seem to be very good at is getting stuck, at least it is if you are anything like me. There have been times in my life when “stuck” is an understatement, as when the bottom has fallen out of my world. Before I became a Christian my response was to be sad, mad and bad. The first thing to change when I became a Christian was that I was less bad (certainly not perfect). At lest I like to think that there was less taking out my anger and frustration on others. What took a lot longer to change was the obsessive thought patterns (sad and mad). Thoughts about injustices done, feelings of betrayal and the desire to “give them a piece of my mind” would go round and round and round with seemingly no relief. “Overwhelmed” fits the bill for sure, as do the phrases 'unable to function normally' and 'stuck in the treadmill of my thoughts'. The need to get such thoughts out is paramount, but we need to do this carefully if it is not to be destructive.

The notion of catharsis (from the Greek 'cleansing') has been adopted by modern psychotherapy to “describe the act of expressing, or more accurately, experiencing the deep emotions”. The primary thought is about anger, and the patient is told let it all out. There is a certainly a time and a place for doing this, but while “'Blowing off steam' may reduce physiological stress in the short term, but this reduction may act as a reward mechanism, reinforcing the behaviour and promoting future outbursts” (phrases in quotations from Wikipedia). In a relationship where both sides are angry, it can lead to saying and doing things that end up severing of the relationship. I am not one who advocates “no fighting” in a relationship. Conflict avoidance has its own dangers as suppressing disagreement over and over is just as likely to lead to the end of a relationship as is out of control anger. When you push things under the rug, and push things under the rug, you end up with a monster there! No, if a relationship is to be anything more than superficial, we will need to fight, but we need to learn to fight fair, and we need to know when to break off and when to resume. But going to each other when we are overwhelmed or stewing might not be the best idea. As we were saying last day there are times when we may need “time out” from our relationships. But what do we do with the stuff that goes round and round and round in our hearts and minds.

The scriptures tells us that if our brother sins against us, we need to go to him (Matthew 18:15 ff). The intent is bring reconciliation, but there are times when we are just too angry, or that for whatever reason that avenue is blocked. The tendency then (or even before) is to go to some other brother and “let it all out”. There are two potential problems here. The first is that it immediately involves others in our differences. And this can make reconciliation more difficult because your friend or relative may be offended at the person you are mad with. He or she may hold a grudge long after you have forgiven. The second (and related point) is that we will likely not choose someone who is objective, – we will likely want someone to agree with us. But a true friend will speak the truth (in love) even if we do not want to hear it. There is no better friend than the Lord.

David poured out his complaint to the Lord. It was poured out, it was not a trickle. For me there have been times when my complaint was against the Lord Himself. “How could You let such and such a thing happen?” The Lord is big enough to absorb our complaints and anger. He would rather we came to Him pouring it all out, rather than stay away mad at Him. When we come, when as in David's case it was the bad done to him by others, we find comfort and strength and peace and hope and love.

These things work best when we already have an intimate relationship with the Lord. But they can also be the very means of coming into (or deepening) relationship with Him. He has promised that when we turn to Him, He will work even through the evil for our good. Note carefully this is not in spite of the evil, He is clever enough and powerful enough to use the evil itself for our good (Romans 8:28). And part of this is our drawing closer to Him in whose presence there is life (real life). Another part is our growth as we learn to stop fighting the people and circumstances that He has allowed to come into our lives to refine us. We need to trust Him even in these things. We do need to surrender. He has promised that if we trust Him with all of our hears, acknowledging how limited is our own understanding, then He will direct and guide us and in His time straighten out the crooked paths (Proverbs 3:5,6 – various versions).

A time to embrace, And a time to refrain from embracing

There are times in life when we need to take time out. The context of the quote of the title of this post from Ecclesiastes 3:5, is that there is a time for all things. In the midst of the battles of life, we too easily finish up reacting to reacting to reacting, and when we do this escalation is the norm. Having a time out can be what councilors call an intervention. It needs to be handled carefully and Biblically.

As we will see below, part of what this means is that it is not intended to be unilateral. Unilateral withdrawals can be nothing less than a continuation of the war. We can use silences to punish, and when we do it consistently it is a form of abuse. I remember one occasion inadvertently getting in on a conversation I had no desire to be a part of. We were looking our the window at this lady's husband pottering in the garden. “He is angry with me today”, she told me, “But tomorrow he will come crawling”. It was not clear to me who had started the silences, but it was clear that this lady knew that all she had to do was to wait, and he would cave – absolute surrender. I could be wrong, but she said it a way that it felt like revenge. As I have said elsewhere, the one who loves the least, has the most power! What I am saying, is that silence can be a weapon, and this can be so hurtful to the one being punished that it can be the thing that provoked the anger in the first place.

There is a teaching of Paul in 1 Corinthians 7:5, that is relevant here. Paul is talking about the marriage relationship. He says “Do not deprive each other except perhaps by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer...” If ever there was a need for prayer, it is when we are at on going loggerheads with each other. Of course the need to devote ourselves to prayer can come when we are walking in harmony too, but this teaching is applicable to both circumstances. There are three important instructions here, that need to be followed. The first is that it needs to be by mutual consent. We need to agree together. Either party can take the initiative of course. If you know yourself well enough to know that if time out is not taken, then you will likely say something that you will later regret, then perhaps you need to take the initiative. The second thing to note is that is it “for a time”. I cannot stress this enough, you need to agree on a length of time. This should not be vague. You can of course agree to extend it (again for a mutually agreed time). If you are following the teaching (if you are fasting) it will not be for too long. So how long do you want to fast? Well how desperate is your situation? Thirdly the verse is telling us what we need to do in our time out. This is just as important as the other two points, it is for prayer and fasting, and I will say more below. This is not the time to launch into a long teaching about fasting, but I do need to say something.

One online dictionary defines fasting as “voluntarily not eating food for varying lengths of time. Fasting is used as a medical therapy for many conditions. It is also a spiritual practice.” Listen to this “Fasting can be used for nearly every chronic condition, including allergies, anxiety ..., depression .... heart disease ....., mental illness...... It is frequently prescribed as a detoxification treatment ......”

I have said elsewhere that the Lord designed the physical to be parables of the spiritual. So does the phrase “chronic condition” apply to your relationship? If it does there is going to be a need for spiritual detoxification, and the vehicle the Lord is offering is a mixture of the physical (fasting) and the spiritual (prayer).

Most people can fast for forty days without food and without danger (Luke 4:2 – remember Luke was a Physician), but this length of time should probably not be for those who are fasting for the first time. Remember it has to be by mutual agreement. How much time out do you both think you need? Will you need to do this a number of times? There is likely no quick fix for your problem! So that is the fasting part. What about prayer? We need to think of prayer in this context as much more than a grocery list of things we want to happen. In particular to prayer Biblically is to connect with God in intimacy and to allow Him into our lives and into our problems. He is the solution to every need, and He will solve our problems as we surrender to Him and His ways.

This series of posts is all about coming to the foot of the cross and staying there. In the light of this what are we talking about when we use the phrase “spiritual detoxification”? Well it is certainly going to include things like dealing with and getting rid of anger and revenge and forgiveness, self righteousness and pride and stubbornness and blame and hardness of heart. But we also need to “eat healthy”, so it also involves putting on “tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, long suffering; bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful” (Colossians 3:12-15). Remember, in many things we all fail (James 3:2). But at the foot of the cross there is “Mercy and Grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16). And here we see that “there is not difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the Glory of God” (Romans 3:23). The cross is a great leveller, and as we allow Him to fill us full of Himself (and the things mentioned above) there is healing and the desire to be reconciled. The point is as we realize how we fail Him over and over, and as we see His ongoing mercy extended to us, we want to extent that same mercy to others.

One last word for today. When we are at loggerheads with each other, we are likely to have out of control emotions. There is a Biblical way to deal with them, and this will form the content of next day's post. The gist of is however is that with David, we need to “Pour out our complaint to the Lord” (Psalm 142:2). More to come.

Living at the foot of the cross

If coming to the foot of the cross is difficult, staying there is even more so. It is however where we find fulfillment, peace, hope and joy (joy as opposed to happiness – more later). In fact this is the very reason Jesus calls us there in our quotation from last day. “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23).

This verse is an invitation in some sense to die, and who would want to do that? Being willing to do that starts with seeing something in Jesus that we can find nowhere else. Why would we “desire to follow” Him? Well Jesus is pretty cool, He is amazing. He is the only one who ever practiced what He preached. “Love your enemies, ” and as they drive cruel spikes through His hands and His feet He prays “Father forgive them ...” He has appropriate words for the hypocrites, He tells it like it is speaking the truth in love, as He pours out His love even to those who reject Him (Luke 13:34). He is smart, He is kind, He is humble, He heals the sick and the broken hearted, He accepts the rejected, gives help in time of need, and invites us to share His sufferings.

Most of us find things about Jesus that are attractive, but we are less enthusiastic about the suffering, about the dying daily bit (1 Corinthians 15:31). Most of us would love to have the kind of influence that Jesus had, for deep within us is the longing to make a deep and lasting positive impact. And as we become willing to see, we know instinctively that it is in following Him, and we understand when He tells us there is a cost that we need count before we do (take up our cross daily). The cost is the rub, but it is the only way to make a deep and lasting impact, the only way to produce fruit that will remain (John 15:16). This life is not all that there is. What we do down here in the here and now impacts not only the here and now, but all eternity. We will have to give an account even of every idle word (Matthew 12:36).

I am reminded of a missionary I knew who came out of Jamaica. He tells the story of an interview he had years ago back home with a firm that exported bananas. In the interview he was asked what his life goals were, and he told of his missionary longings. They thanked him for his honesty, and then told him “We want someone who will give his life to bananas”. He told of seeing this on his tombstone “He gave his life to bananas”! This was not the legacy he was looking for!

What do you want on your tombstone? At the end of your life will you wish you had spent more time in front of the TV, or had given yourself more fully to pornography, or to the pursuit of wealth, or had had more sexual partners (with the attending broken hearts) or had been drunk more often etc., etc., etc? The things that God values are not necessarily the things we value. He values a mother who stays home because she feels that there is no more important job than raising her children, He values honestly and integrity and a willingness to go against the tide. He values those who will stand for Him in a world that is going to hell in an hand basket, those who are ready to give an answer of the hope that is within, with meekness and fear. He values those who, to the best of their ability, speak the truth in love. He values those who take up their cross daily and follow Jesus. Such people will have an impact far beyond what can be seen, such people will see and understand on that day that is was worth it all. He or she who gives even as little as a cup of cold water in the name of Jesus, will not loose their reward (Mark 9:41).

There is a cost “let him deny himself and take up his cross”. There was a cost to Jesus. We see this supremely in the garden just hours before His crucifixion “If it be possible let this cup pass from me, nevertheless not my will but Yours” (Matthew 26:39). This kind of sacrifice only makes sense in the light (perspective) of eternity, for “if in this life only we have hope, we are to be pitied ...” (1 Corinthians 15:19).

We are told about the perspective Jesus had in Hebrews 12:2 where it says of Him “who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross despising the shame”. Part of what this is saying is that the pain and disappointments and trials and temptations of life are a barrier, the other side of which is joy. But we do need to push through the barrier, to endure, with His help to stand up under it all. The first part of the verse in the last quote tells us how to do this “looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith”. We need to keep our eyes on Him, living in intimacy with Him, embracing His perspective. We need to count the cost, then set our hearts and minds to follow no matter what. This is our part. When we do this, He will meet us and He will keep that which we have committed unto Him against that day (2 Timothy 1:12). Note the balance here we commit, He keeps. The Lord always supplies, when we seek to walk in obedience, the very wherewithal to do His will (Philippians 2:13). And when we do this we “prove that His will is good and perfect and acceptable” (Romans 12:2).

When the honeymoon is over (married or not). Positioning for restoration.

I was reminded recently by a couple I know, that I had given her away (in proxy for her father, who was on the other side of the World). “Oh”, I joked “Its all my fault!” Well this is what Adam said to God when he was confronted with his sin. Adam's opening response was “the woman You gave me … ” - in other words its the woman's fault, and its Your fault too God, for giving her to me!

I told last day of one who told me “I did not realize how selfish I am until I got married”. And I know this couple well enough to know that it really is two sided. This couple is moving in the right direction for life long fulfillment in their relationship (James 5:16).

I read somewhere that there is no place other than marriage which is guaranteed to produce more anger. We are all aware of the phrase “the honeymoon is over” and we do not need to be told what it means. When a relationship is new and exciting we have such high hopes for it, or to put it anther way, we have such high expectations. We may not say this to ourselves in words, but our hope/expectation many times is that 'this one is going to meet all my needs'. And for a while they do, until “the honeymoon is over”. Then what will we do, will we throw this relationship away too?

In the process of discovering who we are, we may need to go through the school of hard knocks in our relationship choices, in particular when they fail. Perhaps the most important thing is that we learn from these experiences. I have said elsewhere that those who go through broken relationships tend to fall into two categories, those who learn a great deal from the break up, and those who learn nothing, remaining stuck in blame and bitterness and anger!

The second group may think they have learned something (i.e. Women are %$#%%..., or men are %%#$#….). What I am talking about is learning how much we ourselves have contributed to the problem and becoming willing to do something about it. Except when one of the parties is God, there are always faults on both sides. In particular no matter who started it, we all have wrong responses to wrong responses. When there are problems, we both need to take responsibility for what has gone wrong, and to play our part in doing what needs to be done to make it work.

There is lots of advice out there about what to do. Let's look at one particular secular insight. The one I am thinking of is the idea that surrounds the buzz phrase “love deficit,” where we talk about having “empty love tanks”. If we are both demanding more that the other one is willing/able to give because of our love deficits (wounds, hurts etc.), how are we ever going to make things work? And the longer these things go the more wounding it becomes!

The solution advocated by the behavioural model, is to work at performing loving acts for each other. And who would say that this is wrong? After all we are commanded to love one another in word and deed. On the other hand, if you have been there, you will know that many times this is an uphill battle, especially when the wounds and the hurt and the sense of betrayal goes deep. What do you do when love has died, what can anyone do? Well, we need to turn to the God of resurrection.

What we need to do in this and in many other situations is to tap into the resources of heaven. In the case we are discussing, we need God to fill up our love deficits, and to resurrect love. God is after all the origin of all love, for “we love because He first loved us” (1 John4:19 NIV). What this is saying is that our ability to love at all comes from God as a response to His love for us. So the ability to have love rekindled is found in His embrace. With some situations this is the only thing that will save the relationship, in particular when it has gone on for too long, and/or there is too much hurt, too much damage and no more energy, or even desire.

We do have a part to play (our help is three pronged – Bible help, self help and God's help), but in the end when we are in relationship with God, it does not all depend on us. In Christ there is always hope. When with man it is impossible then “with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26). We can of course both be Christians and fail to tap into God's resources. It has to do with being filled with the fullness of God (which we are in fact commanded to be). There is an illustration that I find helpful.

Imagine this triangle with God at the top (you would have to know that I am a mathematician), and you and your partner at the other two corners. The sides represent our relationships. The bottom side represents your relationship with your partner the other two sides your individual relationships with God. This is not a fixed triangle, the corners can (and do) move. As we draw closer to God, moving up the “arms” of the triangle, we automatically move closer to each other. As as we draw apart from each other, we usually also move further away from God. We also move apart from each if one of the parties moves closer to God, but the other one does not. This is one of the reason we are told not to be unequally yoked with unbelievers (2 Corinthians 6:14).

The point though, is that God is Love, and as we move closer to Him, He moves closer to us and pours His love into our hearts (James 4:8, Romans 5:5). Ideally we are to let His love flow through us into each other, and into this wicked and hurting World. When we are full of His strength and love and Grace and mercy and hope and peace, we have something the World does not have, and we are enabled to live the life He calls us to live.

Sounds good, it even sounds easy right? Not! It is the solution, but its not easy. You see we cannot be full of God (or love or peace or joy or hope or anything else) and at the same time be full of self, or hate or bitterness or revenge or pride, or self righteousness or be demanding our rights at the expense of the other. The Scripture describes these things as the “flesh” or as the NIV translates that word the “sinful nature”. What I am saying is that “self” pushes all these things out. But even coming to the place where we can acknowledge that we are full of self is difficult.

This brings us full circle back to what we were talking about earlier that is to come to the knife edge between debilitating guilt and indifference (or blindness, or presumption) to our sin. In this place we know we need help and become humble enough to ask for, and hence receive, it. In this place we are positioned to receive His enabling grace to help in such times of need (Hebrews 4:16). The theological word for this is repentance. It is about coming to the end of ourselves, acknowledging and turning from our sin and receive His forgiveness and Grace and mercy, His hope and joy and peace etc. In this place, there is the awareness that in many things we all fail, and this allows us to deal more gently and empathetical with each other, knowing we are both the same, that there is no real difference between us (Romans 3:23).

And our salvation, our rescue has to do with learning to live in this place. This is the secret to walking in the Spirit, in fact to living the Christian life. It starts with our agreement with God of our predicament, and our acceptance of His solution (the good news or Gospel).

There is a lot of resistance to doing this, both in the world and in our own selves. There is a sort of catch 22 here, because we can't receive the good news if we don't know the bad news, and we can't receive the bad news because we don't know the good news that we can be rescued. So the default is to continue jus with what we have “me and only me,” and none of the resources of God.

Lets unpack this a little. It seems to work like this: we resist the good news because we don't see the need, or we may not even know about it, or it may not have not been presented it in a way we were able to hear. Or it may seem just too good to be true. It may not even make any sense to us, and we may have been hardened against it by guilt trips that have been laid on us, or by the hypocrisy of some who call themselves Christian. On the other hand many times we are in denial about the bad news, which is that without Him we are totally lost. We may be in denial about the bad news because we want all our own way, or on the other hand, because it is Pandora's box. We know at least subconsciously that the problems are so deep they are unfixable. If you doubt this ask yourself if you like yourself, and if not why not? One of the good things about walking with God is that you do get to get to like yourself.

And the bad new is indeed bad. There are a lot of inconvenient truths out there and in here (in our “self life”). And they are indeed unfixable by us, but not by God. To say it again “With God all things are possible”. Life's difficulties are crossroads, in each of them we are invited to draw close to Him and in cooperation with Him bring in the Kingdom which always brings His solution. But He will not do it without our cooperation.

The second part of the title of today's post is “Positioning for restoration. So what and where it this place. To give an analogy, it is like to come to the place where like a child in a fully functional family, we can receive correction without being crushed. Part of the problem here, is that most of us are too wounded, or too proud or too self centered to admit or even see that in many things we all need to be corrected (James 3:2). Or we are too insecure, have had too much rejection in our lives to be able to hear about our faults. And part of this is because we cannot distinguish between the other persons rejection of our behaviour and rejection of our very selves. And part of this is more often than not, the person criticizing us does not make that distinction themselves. Then there is the way it it done. We spoke earlier about speaking the truth in love. But when things get bad the truth may well have been spoken, but not in love, but rather in anger and frustration or even hate.

Nevertheless, God has given us to each other warts (besetting faults) and all. Without exception, we come to each other as raw unpolished diamonds with (often) very rough edges. There is a war going on for our souls. The Evil one, wants to use these raw edges to destroy us. The Lord wants to use them to polish us into the beautiful individual diamonds He purposed before the foundations of the World that we should be (Proverbs 27:17).

To describe this place of being positioned for restoration in Biblical terms, is to say that we need to to meet Him and each other at the foot of the cross. It is in the shadow and the perspective of the cross where we see and understand all that He has done for us. It is here where we see that there is indeed no difference between us, for indeed all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). It is here, in the light of His sacrifice, and of all the pain He was willing to suffer for you and I, that our own relationship pain is put into perspective; where we stop demanding our rights, and start to follow His example of respectful loving giving. It is here where we start to become willing to see, and take responsibility for, our own part in it all. Indeed it is probably only here, under His tender love and care and unconditional acceptance, that we receive enough from Him that we become secure enough to start to see where we have failed, where we have been selfish and self centered; where we take our eyes off “me” and where with the hymn writer we sing of being “ransomed, healed, restored forgiven” and we declare “who like me His praise should sing”.

At the foot of the cross, we start to see just how much we have needed to be forgiven, and to return over and over to Him for restoration and healing and love and joy and forgiveness and acceptance. When we come to this place and stay there, it becomes unthinkable that we should not in return forgive our partners and be willing to be fully restored to each other. It is here that we see that He has indeed “broken down the dividing walls between us” (Ephesians 2:4), and it is here where we start to cooperate with Him in His primary purpose that in the fullness of time He would unite all things in Him (Ephesians 1:10).

Jesus told us “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). When we do this we are indeed being positioned for restoration. Are you willing to follow Him in this way, am I? It is the only way to fly! We need His help. More to come.