seemingly nowhere

Behold, I go forward, but he is not there,
and backward, but I do not perceive him;
on the left hand when he is working, I do not behold him;
he turns to the right hand, but I do not see him.
But he knows the way that I take;
when he has tried me, I shall come out as gold.
Job 23:8-10

Job is perplexed that He cannot seem to find God and hear anything definitive from God about his sufferings. But there are two clear convictions that Job's faith clings to at this time: 1) God is working despite His frustrating silence. 2) Job will be made better at the end of all this because of God's work. Job is trusting God even as he is perplexed at what God is doing. This is a faith that can only show its resolve in trial.

What Job is doing here is very, very hard. But it is a human response. I believe it is still a holy response. Job resolves to trust God without all the answers coming to him in the moment. He is willing to endure the continued pain and tears by faith, knowing that God is still working to do something wonderful in Job.

Even Jesus suffered in His trials. And Jesus was sinless. He faced Calvary with an agonizing prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane during which He asked His Father to keep the cup of suffering away. Yet He resigned Himself to God's will knowing what would occur would be greater than the season of suffering.

Lord,
I know that there are seasons when I cannot find You. I get perplexed by it. I struggle with doubt as a result. Yet, You are not gone, but are instead asking me to trust by faith and not by sight. And so I will let You lead even in those foggy dark journeys where You don't seem to be anywhere yet are in fact everywhere around me.
Amen.

God looks down

The LORD looks down from heaven;
he sees all the children of man;
from where he sits enthroned he looks out
on all the inhabitants of the earth,
he who fashions the hearts of them all
and observes all their deeds.
Psalm 33:13-15

God is not a distant, impersonal creator. He is still "fashioning the hearts" of people. There are over seven billion of us on this globe, and still God looks down on each and every life, well aware of each human heart's musings and all the actions of every person. He knows my thoughts, my motivations, my desires, and every deed that I have done. He intimately knows the thoughts I just wrote and where each finger would hit the keys as I typed out this paragraph.

God is personally aware of my every thought. He knows when I really love Him and other people, and when I am just in it for personal reward and acclaim of others. Yes... He knows when my motives have been purely selfish and sinful. When I sin, I want to forget about that, but He does not forget! He guides me with His Word and leads me in my life circumstances, graciously receiving my repentance. He knows my wounds and heals my pains. He calms my fears and also shakes my soul when I have become too complacent or selfishly lazy. He does not just watch me. He loves me and guides me through His Word and His Holy Spirit.

Lord,
You watch this world with the loving gaze of a Father over His children. Yet You rule this world. You know when the deeds of men need judgment or correction. You also offer salvation for us to find in Christ. You care for this world. You know my heart and my deeds and yet You still love me, save me, and direct me. Thank You for Your sovereign love and grace!
Amen

be careful what you ask for

Now Samuel called the people together to the Lord at Mizpah. And he said to the people of Israel, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘I brought up Israel out of Egypt, and I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of all the kingdoms that were oppressing you.’ But today you have rejected your God, who saves you from all your calamities and your distresses, and you have said to him, ‘Set a king over us.’ Now therefore present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes and by your thousands.”
1 Samuel 10:17-19

God let Israel have a king out of their own selfish, sinful demands. He knew they were asking with wrong reasons. He knew they were rejecting His rulership by such a request. Yet Saul came to rule Israel because of this demand. And the nation would get what they wanted. They would have a king like all the nations around them. Saul would be just what their selfish hearts craved and demanded.

It always amazes me that God gave in to Israel's demand for a human king. He was the true sovereign of the nation. But they could not accept that worship of God alone could lead the nation. And so God gave them a king and they became servants in a kingdom. And Saul, reluctantly at first, would represent Israel to the world, build defenses, and lead the people. And he was a flawed leader who clearly contrasted with the flawless, infinite wisdom of a holy God.

The lesson is simple: God may give us over to the things we want when we reject Him. And those things may please us for a short season. Yet brutal tyranny may overtake us when we reject God's rule. And the results of that can be tragic. Ultimately that will be the story of Saul. He started out a reluctant prince. He ended an insane, out of control, sad tyrant.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

how God makes a nation

And the sons of Joseph, who were born to him in Egypt, were two. All the persons of the house of Jacob who came into Egypt were seventy.
Genesis 46:27

This little commentary about the number of descendants in Jacob's household is an important reminder about God's promise. God had told Abraham, who was childless at the time, that He would make of him a great nation. And so the promise made then has grown. Form Abraham came one promised heir, Isaac. And Isaac doubled the promise with twin sons, Esau and Jacob. From Jacob came 12 sons and multiple grand kids. By the time they all resettle to Egypt, there are 70 members of the household who directly descend from Abraham. God is keeping His promise a generation at a time.

What I see as the generations spring forth from the Genesis text is a story of the faithfulness of God. When Abraham is first introduced, we have no way of seeing how a nation could come to the old nomad. Yet by bringing one son, the story progresses as God blesses. And the blessing comes despite the character of the people God is blessing. Abraham lies. So does Isaac. Esau has his selfish faults, but we see even more in Jacob. Yet God gives Jacob 12 sons. Those sons become a nation, but not without difficulty, beginning as refugees and then slaves in Egypt. Yet God is faithful to His promise despite human sinful choices and less than ideal circumstances for nation-building.

When God wants to make a nation, He chooses a childless elderly couple to start the process. God uses jealous twin brothers to further the development of His promises. He sends seventy hungry refugees to Egypt to endure generations of slavery. Then He will call up a nation. The means that God uses to fulfill His promise will clearly bring all the praise to Himself. From our point of view, God does it the hard way. From His sovereign purpose, He does it so that He might clearly show His power and be praised.

thoughts on discipleship

And he went up on the mountain and called to him those whom he desired, and they came to him. And he appointed twelve (whom he also named apostles) so that they might be with him and he might send them out to preach and have authority to cast out demons.
Mark 3:13-15

Jesus made disciples. He chose twelve of His closest followers in whom He invested His most intense time and teaching. And He eventually left them, asking them to make disciples as He did. This is a life's task no matter what each Christian's individual vocation may be.

Discipleship involves teaching (doctrinal, practical, scriptural, and personal). It necessitates personal mentoring that models for the disciple the life that is expected of the disciple. It means coaching, encouraging followers when they get it right and improving their spiritual and personal skills. It calls us to admonish and correct when a disciple may be struggling or even sinning against another person and the Master. It is a multi-faceted personal commitment that is a big investment of our time and energy.

To make disciples we must be ready to spend time. Jesus devoted three full years of day and night intensive constant contact with His disciples. We should expect that only intensive commitment truly makes disciples today. Discipleship is also repetitive. His men kept making the same mistakes and needed constant reminders. He often taught the same concepts so the truth could sink in and change them. It is very demanding to do ministry at this level. And it is also very personal. Jesus taught and trained twelve and seemed to spend even more time with Peter, James, and John, developing particular leadership skills in particular followers.

Sadly, the history of the church has been to replace personal discipleship with programs. Systems are built to gather a crowd. Numbers become the measure of success and not necessarily personal spiritual growth. Jesus ended His ministry with a church of eleven... hardly any seminarian's dream.

We need to recapture Jesus' model of personal growth and discipleship. We certainly have challenges in the 21st century... little time for authentic relationship as it is replaced with electronically managed personal "images". There is little time for involvement in "programs", causing churches to falter or even become involved in a pseudo-discipleship as they build their systems around programs. There is little commitment to personal growth as people expect "one minute bibles" and twitter devotionals to sustain them.

It is time to make church gatherings about the people and not the programs. It is time to make disciples like Jesus did. It is always the right time to follow Jesus by investing life with each other as His followers.

Stay in the world

I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world.
1 Corinthians 5:9-10

Stay in the world
and make friends here
so the gospel can advance
and relationships can bear
the truth and conviction
faith brings

Love the world
as God loves all
and sent His Son
into this world, a small
child, then a man,
then Savior

Redeem the world
be salt and light
so that the good news
message can burn bright
for others we love and know
to see Jesus

Changing me AND the world

Is not this the fast that I choose:

to loose the bonds of wickedness,

to undo the straps of the yoke,

to let the oppressed go free,

and to break every yoke?

Is it not to share your bread with the hungry

and bring the homeless poor into your house;

when you see the naked, to cover him,

and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?

Isaiah 58:6-7

Why do I discipline myself to "do" certain tasks as a Christian? There are special practices that I do to personally express my spiritual life and to grow in my knowledge and love of the Lord. I rise early to open the scriptures, to devote my thoughts to prayer, and to journal as I am doing right now. I seek solitude and silence to do these things knowing that outside distractions are far too many in my lifestyle. I give of my time and resources for the advance of the gospel in the local church and other Christian ministries. And yet somehow even though it is good for me, it cannot only benefit me. This passage warns that no spiritual discipline stops at me. It fails if it does not move me to care for others as God does.

The subject of Isaiah 58 is fasting. And Israel was great at social fasts for outward appearances. But the fasts and other spiritual disciplines that the law asked of the nation had failed to give them a heart like God had because they did not apply themselves to truly seek God in their disciplines. Fasts failed because they missed the greater call of God in the practice: to hate injustice, to break the yoke of slavery, to feed the hungry, to house the homeless, to clothe the cold, and to care for the needs of the poorest among them. Had they truly grown close to the heart of the Lord in their fasts, they would have done these sorts of things.

Lord,

Too long I have deceived myself thinking spiritual disciplines were all about me. They benefit me ONLY as they draw me to You AND to the world that You love. You want my time, my talents, my resources, and my heart so that others may be helped through me by You. Forgive my short-sighted spirituality. Draw me to the need of others so that I can only care for people as You care for them. I want the love of God and the mercy of the cross and the new life of Christ's resurrection to make this world a better place now as I love and follow You.

Amen