Balaam’s Blessings – The Third Oracle

March 11th, 2010

Now Balak is really upset.  “Neither curse them at all, nor bless them at all!”

Balaam says what we’re all thinking: “Did I not tell you, saying, ‘All the Lord speaks, that I must do’?”  I tried to tell you …

But Balak really doesn’t get it.  He keeps doing the same thing by the same principle and hoping that he’ll get a different result … one of the definitions of insanity, as I remember.  “Please come, I will take you to another place; perhaps it will please God that you may curse them for me from there.”

Before Balaam speaks this time, however, the Bible says “he did not go at other times, to seek to use sorcery …”  Meaning other times he did.

This time the perspective and place was from “the top of Peor, that overlooks the wasteland.”  Balak wanted Balaam to see Israel from the midst of the wasteland.

As Balaam’s “eyes are opened” he declares:

“How lovely are your tents, O Jacob!  Your dwellings, O Israel!  Like valleys that stretch out, like gardens by the riverside, like aloes planted by the Lord, like cedars beside the waters.  He shall pour water from his buckets, and his seed shall be in many waters.”

In other words, Balaam didn’t see a wasteland.  His eyes were opened by God and he saw that, despite the wasteland they currently inhabited, Israel was wealthy and abundant, lying in valleys and gardens amidst trees with flowing waters.

I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling at times like the Lord has placed me in the middle of a wasteland.  But God doesn’t see you defined by your situation.  He sees you defined by what He has decided to bless you with.  As Paul said, “having nothing yet possessing everything.”

There is a place where you might seem like you have nothing.  But in God’s eyes, if you have Him in your midst, you have no lack.  In fact, you possess everything in abundance and will have everything as you need it.  This is true faith to see this.

Balaam ends with: “‘He (Israel) bows down, he lies down as a lion; and as a lion, who will rouse him?’  Blessed is he who curses you (Israel), and cursed is he who curses you.”

Again with the poking of the sleeping lion.  We’ll see how it goes for Balak in the next and last oracle Balaam provides us.

Peace.

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Balaam’s Blessings – The Second Oracle

March 10th, 2010

So now Balak, the king, is upset.  “I took you to curse my enemies, and look, you have blessed them bountifully!”

What seems obvious to Balak was that it was the wrong place and perspective:  “Please come with me to another place from which you may see them; you shall see only the outer part of them, and shall not see them at all; curse them for me from there.”

Again with the “from there.”

The new perspective is to see the “outer part of them”.

Balaam’s prophecy begins by reiterating that that God “has blessed, and I cannot reverse it.”

Then Balaam continues: “God has not observed iniquity in Jacob, nor has He seen wickedness in Israel.  The Lord God is with him, and the shout of a King is among them.”

In other words, as Balaam is given a surface perspective, he declares that God sees no iniquity in Israel but God Himself is among them as a King.

But wait a minute … doesn’t God continually have to deal with rebellion and sin in the midst of the camp of Israel?  Yes, and will again in the very next chapter in Numbers as Israel embraces idolatry.

From an outside perspective, however, to those on the outside, those that would seek to curse His people, the word is different.  When God sees His people, and when He testifies of His people to others,  He testifies by love and as a good father and husband.  He speaks good things over those He has set out to bless, despite their failings.

As a husband and father, I know my wife and children have their issues.  And I might even deal with those issues in my personal relationship and responsibilities with them.  But when I speak of my family with others, I honor and lift them up.  They are the greatest thing in the world to me, the greatest blessing, and something I am abundantly thankful for despite the fact that my wife and I might have had a tense discussion the night before or I might have had to discipline one of my children that morning.

Too often we are concerned with how the world views the Church, with the outside perspective.  We need to be concerned with our testimony and integrity, to be sure, but our standard should never be how others react but what God says about us.  He is our Husband and Father and wants good things for us, to bless us.  So we listen to Him to see what He would have us do or say or change or repent of.  Too often we give a worldly culture the right to define what kind of Christians we ought to be.  If we follow God as we should, they may hate or love us, but that isn’t the goal.  Obedience is.

Be encouraged.  God may deal with your frailty and even seem harsh sometimes, but as a Father, He has a different message for your enemies: the world, the flesh, the Devil.  “They are pure and good and I am among them.”

There are consequences for messing with God’s people.  Balaam’s second oracle ends with, “Look, a people rises like a lioness, and lifts itself up like a lion; it shall not lie down until it devours the prey, and drinks the blood of the slain.”

In other words, Balak, you’re poking a sleeping lion.  Probably not a good idea.

Third oracle next.

Peace.

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Balaam’s Blessings – The First Oracle

March 9th, 2010

As we get into the oracles/burdens/prophecies/blessings of Balaam, King Balak continually seeks to curse Israel based on place.  As we will see with the first three oracles, Balak thinks the problem is the place or perspective from whence Balaam is prophesying.  Of course it isn’t about place, it is about the Lord’s heart for His people.

So Balak takes Balaam up to the “high places of Baal” (a pagan god and idol) that “from there he might observe the extent of the people.”

“From there” is an important phrase for these first three oracles.

So at this high place, Balaam has Balak build altars and stuff and begins the first oracle.

First, Balaam states that he cannot curse “whom God has not cursed” or “denounce whom the Lord has not denounced.”  The New Covenant promises to overcome the curse of sin and the Law in Christ should encourage us.  If God is for us, who can be against us?  He will not curse nor denounce, nor truly allow a curse upon, what He has chosen to bless.

And interestingly enough, Balaam also deals with the perspective given by Balak to “observe the extent of the people.”  Balaam sees Israel and says, “Who can count the dust of Jacob or number one fourth of Israel?”

In other words, Balak thought to show Balaam the extent, the limits, of Israel, and Balaam’s blessing was that there is no end to them.

As we’ll see with the next two, God’s view of His people is different than the worldly view of them.  He sees as a father to a son or a husband to his bride.  He looks on in love and will not bear that others seek to curse them.  It is a good way to piss Him off.

Balaam’s second oracle up next.

Peace.

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Balaam’s Blessings – Introduction

March 5th, 2010

Starting a new series this week on Balaam’s prophecies.  I think they are interesting and enlightening to explore.

Most of us know the story of the donkey who talked to Balaam.  It makes for a great Sunday School story when you’re a kid, but most people never really teach past that one illustration.

The basic setup here is that the nation of Israel is fighting her way through other nations to get to the Promised Land after forty years in the wilderness.  They’ve completely wiped out a people or two, and a king, Balak, decides he needs to do something about this.  Namely, he wants to spiritually curse them.

So he sends for Balaam, a known sorcerer/prophet whom you could hire for such things.  Balaam tells Balak’s envoys that he cannot go with them after God forbids it.  Balak sends for Balaam again and promises great honor.

Balaam’s response is interesting.  He says, “Though Balak were to give me his house full of silver and gold, I could not go beyond the word of the Lord my God, to do less  or more.”

This brings up a little confusion.  Throughout the whole of the scripture, Balaam is seen as a villain.  He is labeled a diviner by Joshua, and Peter describes him as someone who “loved the wages of wickedness.”

But here we have Balaam calling the Lord his God and having some understanding of where the power of curses and blessings come from.  He almost seems a hero more than a villain.

God allows him to go this time, and yet an angel meets them on the road to kill Balaam.  This is where we get the famous story of how the donkey saw the angel and stopped.  Balaam ultimately beats the poor animal, and God gives the donkey the power of speech (which Balaam doesn’t seem that shocked by because he argues with the animal instead of messing his pants since a donkey just started talking – oh, and thanks to Shrek the donkey now sounds like Eddie Murphy in my head … even though it was a female).

After God opened Balaam’s eyes to see the angel, God again allows Balaam to proceed to meet up with Balak to “curse” Israel.

This is one of the things I love about the Old Testament.  It just tells things how they happened, and yet our modernist need to put things in black and white end up confusing us instead of helping us make sense of things.

It helps to understand that the area the Israelites were returning to had been the home of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  Esau and Ishmael and Lot’s line also had whole nations come from their progeny.  The idea of the God of Abraham would be very familiar to them.  But obviously, over time, a mixture of idolatry and sorcery had been intermixed within them as well.

I’ll give a scriptural example.  Jacob goes to Laban, his mother’s close relative, and marries Rachel and Leah and all that.  When they finally leave after twenty years or so, Rachel steals Laban’s idol and cleverly hides it.  Even years later, after Jacob’s sons killed a whole town for what was done to their sister Dinah, Jacob was going to make an altar at Bethel and had to tell his family “Put away the foreign gods that are among you, purify yourselves, and change your garments.”

Even the nation of Israel, since Moses was taking too long to come down off the mountain, their first thought was to make an idol and call it “the god that brought us out of Egypt”, all this after Moses specifically gave them a commandment from God NOT to make any idols before he went UP the mountain.

I’m saying all of this to point out that many could obviously see no disconnect between their “devotion” to the one God and notions of idolatry or witchcraft.  Balaam was obviously such a man.

But just because you give lip service to God while also dabbling in idolatry and witchcraft doesn’t make it any less abominable to God.  You’re still an enemy of the truth if and when you do.

I remember telling a group of pastors in India that I was somewhat jealous of the fact that they lived in a country where people actually did worship idols, so the line between worshipping God and a physical image was clear.  In America, I told them, few people worship physical images, but idolatry is just as common but more deceptive because it is subtle.

Did you know the New Testament calls covetousness and greed idolatry?  Just because you don’t put up a statue in your house and bow down to it doesn’t mean you’re not guilty of idolatry.

Idolatry is the worship of the “work of your own hands” in any sense.  It is still possible to give lip service to God and yet be mixed up in idolatry.

The purpose here for me is not to judge or condemn you or anyone, but to encourage us all to dedicate ourselves to the House of God (Bethel) as Jacob did, and “put away the foreign gods” among you.  You can’t have them both.

First “oracle of Balaam” coming up.

Peace.

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Overcoming Evil with Good

February 26th, 2010

Was meditating last night after a great conversation with a brother, and in the midst of it I said something and later had to ponder the truth behind it.

We were discussing the ability by grace to live a righteous life and the seemingly contradictory experience of not being able to.  While I won’t tackle all of this here, I did want to hit upon an important aspect of “overcoming” that is very important.

My comment late last night after having caffeine was, “Sometimes the problem is we are too concerned about the ‘no’ and we should instead be about the ‘yes’.”

As I meditated about this later, I realized how godly this idea is.  Most of us know the label “Christian” means “little Christ.”  So to be a Christian is to live a life so in line with the Spirit of Jesus that our testimony reminds others of Christ, the Anointed One.

So if we are to “be holy as I am holy”, as Peter quotes for us, what does that mean?  Does it mean being so focused on what I can’t do that the “do not” aspect of holiness consumes me?  It seems to me that God does not sit around thinking about all the evil stuff that He’s not supposed to do.  Rather, I would say His thoughts are about the good He is able to do.

Therefore, to “be holy as I am holy” entails a different type of focus, at least in part.  To be focused on the evil you’re not allowed to do, or not supposed to do, is spiritually counter-intuitive.  It doesn’t work.  But being about the things of the Kingdom will, by extension, help us to overcome in other areas of our lives.

This doesn’t mean you deny the wrong you’ve done or are capable of doing.  When conviction comes, you acknowledge it, repent and move on.  But “moving on” should be about what God has called us TO and not what He’s called us away from.

Romans states: “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse … repay no one evil for evil … if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him a drink; for in doing so you will heap coals of fire on his head … do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good.”

Now in context, Paul is speaking of the evil of others and our reaction to it.  But what about the sin in our own lives?  Can the same principle apply?

I believe it can.  Part of overcoming the evil or sin in our own lives is to focus on the good that we have been called to do.  To obey in the “yes” instead of wallowing in the “no”.  Because if you can overcome in the “yes”, your spiritual enemy will be thwarted because the Devil’s ultimate goal is to steal, kill and destroy, and in so doing usurp God’s will and plan.

You cannot overcome evil by focusing on the evil.  You can only overcome evil with GOOD.

In other words, don’t allow your periodic struggles with sin distract you or discourage you from doing what God has called you to do.  I do not mean to excuse sin in any way (there is no excuse for it anymore), but don’t let your enemy have a double victory by also making you so focused on yourself and your own weakness that God’s desire to minister through you doesn’t happen.

What you will find is that when you are “about your Father’s business” and focused there as much as you are able, that obedience to God’s plan of spreading the Kingdom will by extension give you more grace and power and true perspective to overcome when struggling with sin.  “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness” is as absolute and practical a principle as you will find.

I kinda rambled this out, so any additional comments or questions are always welcome.

Peace.

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The Foundation of the Kingdom of God

January 19th, 2010

The Apostle John records for us a key exchange between a member of the educated religious elite and authority … and some poor carpenter from the armpit of the world who had never gone to one of their schools.

Realizing that Jesus was indeed someone of spiritual authority, Nicodemus came to him in the middle of the night.  Jesus’ message was one of source and end.

Jesus realized, because of where he actually came from (not Nazareth), that source was important.  Source determines end.

So he begins to teach Nicodemus this by basically saying, “In order see the Kingdom of God, you must change your source.”

Of course the recorded words are: “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

Nicodemus reacts with an understandable amazement.  What do you mean?  So Jesus further explains.

“That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”

Jesus is clearly stating, and not even implying: there was something eternally inadequate in the first birth.  So what must change is the source of things, not just to adjust the things themselves.

Nicodemus’ lack of understanding, despite his immense education and social position, serves to be an example of Jesus’ teaching.  Jesus points this out.

“Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things?”

Many Christians and Christian teaching proves how much we misunderstand this, as well.  We use the term “born again” and the resulting testimony in the lives of those who claim it is so far from a “born again” life that the term is a byword and a mockery.

Let’s first understand exactly what Jesus is saying.  Because without this understanding, we can’t really have revelation about the Kingdom of God at all.  We are blind men who claim to see, which is a dangerous thing.  Everything else rests in this one concept:

That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

This understanding will change how you read the whole of the New Testament, and then in that reality, help you to properly appreciate the Old Testament as well.

Jesus is essentially telling Nicodemus that all that he is about is worthless.  It is all by the flesh.  He is, by flesh and blood, a Jew, but that does not enable someone to see the Kingdom of God.  Nicodemus is highly educated in the scriptures and theology.  But that won’t help him see the Kingdom.  Nicodemus is a person of some authority and position, and assuming he is also a person of wealth and stature, but these things don’t give you a better position to see the Kingdom.

The only solution is to count all such things as what they are, rubbish, and plead with God to be born a second time, to be given a life that so transcends such things as to make them worth nothing.  Because without the ability to see the Kingdom of God, they have no worth in and of themselves.

The solution is to change the source from one of flesh to one of spirit.  Then one can see spiritual things.

In the next chapter Jesus makes it clear that “God is spirit and must be worshiped in spirit-truth.”  That the place of worship will not matter, this mountain or another one, but the source of the worship matters.

Why?  Because of its end.  Paul tells us that “flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.”  The things of the flesh, the things that are by nature temporary, will not inherit the Kingdom of God: nationality, personality, talents, personal achievements, all things that are temporary will end.  The end of the flesh is destruction.

Paul further exemplifies this in Philippians by listing how many things could give him confidence “in the flesh”: his Jewish heritage, his circumcision, his religious education, his legalistic following of the Law.  Paul of all people realized that those things meant nothing.  He had them and was violently opposed to the Kingdom.

So he counted all those things as rubbish, as crap, as nothing, so that he could have Christ and Him alone and a life of true righteous living by faith in God.

The promise given to us is the Spirit.  God did the necessary thing, the promised thing in a New Covenant, where he made available not just repentance and forgiveness, but an opportunity to be born from a different source, a spiritual one.

Jesus’ good confession before Pilate?  “My Kingdom is not of this world.”  It is made of different stuff.

Without understanding the difference between spiritual and fleshly foundations, there can be no revelation or participation in the Kingdom of God.  A life of the Spirit will look drastically different and beyond the understanding of the world.  “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes.  So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

That’s an absolutely all-inclusive statement.  A truly “born again” life will be led and motivated and empowered by the One unseen.  That will be the testimony of a truly “born again” person.

This is the foundation of the revelation of the Kingdom of God.  No wonder so many misunderstand and misrepresent it.

Peace.

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Seeking First the Kingdom — One Aspect

January 11th, 2010

For those  of us who claim to love and follow Jesus with all our hearts, one statement bears repeated meditation:  Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.

In the context of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is speaking of two different perspectives.  The first perspective is the worldly one where your focus is worrying about your own provision (what you will eat, what you will wear, etc.).  The true and right perspective, in contrast, is a focus on the Kingdom of God and the righteousness that results from that focus.

You prove the focus on the Kingdom or your own worldly needs by the choices you make.  The choices you make prove where your priorities lie, not your words or pieces of paper you may have signed.  Proverbs lets us know that even a child is known for what he does.

One of the many aspects of seeking first the Kingdom of God is making your local fellowship a priority.  Jesus spent the bulk of His time with a select few people.  Sure He ministered and called the multitudes, but there was a special relationship with those that, although they also annoyed Him, ministered to Him as He intimately discipled them.  Jesus even testifies in Luke how they “have continued with Me in my trials.”

Every believer needs a local fellowship that they are intimate with and live life with as a family.  This by nature goes beyond your natural family.  Jesus said, “Who are my mother and my brothers?  Those who do the will of my Father.”  Do we really believe this?  Do we really believe that our true family is our spiritual one, not the one of blood?  Hebrews tells the Church to encourage one another daily to keep from unbelief.  The first church in Acts spent all day every day with one another.

The fact that we live differently than the testimony of those that turned the world upside down should not cause us to seek to justify our own lifestyle but to seek the higher way.

This isn’t about a mental belief but a true conviction that determines our perspective and, by extension, how we make choices.

For many Christians, worldly concerns take precedence over treating their local fellowship like a family.  But Jesus tells us that the Kingdom of God is within us.  The greatest expression of the Kingdom of God is in His people, and if your investment and focus and priority is there, these other worldly concerns will be taken care of.

A couple more scriptures before we get a little practical.  Jesus says that those that give up these worldly things (houses, lands, family) for Him will receive a hundred fold in THIS LIFE and in THE LIFE TO COME.  So often we hold onto these worldly concerns under a pseudo Christian idea of being a “good steward” and miss the greatest return investment we could imagine.  Ask any investor how much you should invest in an opportunity that truly guarantees a hundredfold profit … they would say everything.

In the parable of the soils, one of the plants was choked out by “the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches”.  This creates an unfruitful plant.  And it can be scary what Jesus does with unfruitful plants.

In the search for the things of this world, many allow themselves to be drawn away from the spiritual family God has for them.  This happens with new jobs that make more more money and take more time.  This happens with new houses that are just a little too far now from the fellowship you felt so intimate with.  All because worldly concerns took precedence.

I wish I could find it now, but I heard a sermon once that I still remember vividly.  This pastor said that his church lost more people to their front yards than to sin.  He explained the process.  A man buys a house, usually claiming God’s blessing in his life.  This house is big and nice.  In order to pay for this house, this man has to work a good amount of time during the week, so he doesn’t have time available for the Body and barely enough time for his own family.  Then he’s got the house itself to take care of.  The only time he has to work on the house is on the weekends, so he doesn’t have time to come to Sunday worship times, either.

In some search to have “better things” in life for himself and his family, this man has essentially hid his talent in the ground instead of investing in the most sure way of acquiring true, spiritual and eternal wealth.  You never lose the eternal investments.

Sometimes the new house of the new job takes people physically away from where they fellowship.  The drive, the traffic, becomes too far and people become slowly less involved and have to start “looking for a new church home” … all because they chose to buy a new house.

I’m going to say something that many people won’t agree with and/or won’t like, but it is true.  You shouldn’t choose where to live based on your job or where your physical family lives or the area of town you like or where you found a great deal on the perfect house.  You should choose where you live based on where God has called you to fellowship with other believers as an intimate spiritual family.  This is one very important and overlooked aspect of seeking first the Kingdom.  You must then have faith that other things will “be added to you”.  Instead we seek the worldly things first and think the Kingdom of God and fellowship will be added to us.   Doesn’t work that way.

On to some random thoughts before I close.

So much of our Christian subculture defines us by our flesh and temporal things, and it is tragic.  Many ministries have separate programs based on worldly designations.  Young marrieds.  Singles.  Divorced.  Widows.  Youth.  The elders.  Children.  Personalities.  Political ideas.  Even most churches are racially homogenus.  The larger Christian culture is so segregated that some people actually feel uncomfortable with others not like them.  And they are even encouraged to seek such segregation out by spiritual leaders I can only assume think they are doing something good.

We prove nothing spiritual by being attracted to others who are like us in the flesh. What speaks of Heaven is a people who no longer know one another after the flesh but by the Spirit.  This should be our testimony, but sadly for many, it isn’t.  In fact, giving validity to these concerns keeps us from being spiritually fruitful.  You want to see God teach you and see real discipleship happen in the Body?  Embrace relationships with people who are not like you in the world but are fully committed to Christ and living out the Kingdom and Heaven on earth.  I guarantee it will be uncomfortable, but you’ll end up having a spiritual family based on spiritual things and not because you both like football.

I’ve known people that once they find their spouse, the Body sees less of them, if they see them at all.  Once they have children and a family, the Body must then get squeezed in here and there.  Often in search of being a good father or mother or husband or wife, the Body of Christ gets the raw end of the deal.  Should never happen.

Believe it or not, but this principle works here, too.  You want to be a good husband and father, wife or mother?  Raise your children and love your wife  in context of the Body of Christ as your intimate family.  Include them in your search of the Kingdom above all else.  I speak from experience when I say that the spiritual reward in your family is worth it.

What does it mean to have a hundredfold return on your investment?  This doesn’t mean that if you give money to a ministry God will make you monetarily wealthy.  God might make you monetarily wealthy as you obey Him and seek Him, but that’s not the main principle here.  If you choose the Body over your own career advancement or upward mobility in housing or some other idea of American suburban success, you get more than you gave up.

It is one of the principles of the Kingdom that you cannot give more than you get.  Becca and I have spiritual family around the world, people we feel just as close to, if not closer, than our own family.  We have a fellowship now that fills homes and, more importantly, our hearts with love and support and challenge and encouragement and even rebuke at times.  There are homes around the world that are as open to us as our own physical family might be, if not more.

I’ve lost my job and my family has not wanted for a thing.  The Body has been more of a support to us than the government ever could be.

I can tell you with all honesty that I will probably not die materially wealthy, but I am the richest man I know.

As a final aside, I know many of my military friends might be frustrated with some of this teaching because much of their choices are made for them, especially where they are stationed.  But for many of you, I know you well enough, that those choices you do have prove that you understand this more than you think.  And when the time comes that even that choice is open for you to make, remember the things I’ve said if they ring true to you.

Congrats if you made it to the end of this post!  It was a long one.  Love God and His people above all else.

Peace.

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Some Thoughts on Christmas

December 22nd, 2009

santa-claus-kids-cryingFunny how things change.

I vividly remember being one of the few I knew who adopted “house” or “organic” church ideas back in the day, way before it became more popular and buzz worthy.  I remember being more anti-tradition and people getting all upset at me for questioning the status quo.  Funny how some of the same have seen what I’ve seen and become even more dogmatic than I was then.

In regards to Christmas, it is true that most of our traditions around Christmas are non-Christian in origin.  The tree, the presents, and even the date itself are borrowed from pre-Christian Roman sun worship (equinox and all that).

More problematic to me than any of it is the whole myth of Santa Claus.  Let’s look at what some people tell children about Santa as if it is actually true.  He is an immortal man, can do supernatural things, is omniscient, and rewards those who are good based on his omniscient knowledge.  Not only that, but how we’ve taken the gift giving superfatman and connected him to a capitalistic consumer driven season.  He sits on a throne.  In malls and department stores.  And people line their kids up just to tell him what they want for Christmas.

None of this is true, and yet we tell kids that it is.  Multimillion dollar movies are made almost every year based on this myth.  We have a secular media that rarely acknowledges the truth and the foundation for what Christmas is supposed to be about, and yet they highly value and contribute to a myth.

So my kids don’t know that much about Santa.  We don’t make a big deal out of it, but my children know that friends and relatives give them gifts, not some imaginary person.  And we try to be sensitive to those children who believe in Santa Claus by telling Micah that he probably shouldn’t tell them … but for me it is halfhearted because I’m rebel enough to not care if some kids get upset when you tell them the truth.

I remember a wise woman, one of my mothers in the faith.  Her name is Rose Palmer, and she was an older woman from Jamaica, about five feet tall, but I was totally humbled by her on a regular basis.  I remember many of the things she said to me, usually in some sort of loving and stern rebuke, but I will always remember this one thing she said to me when I was a teenager.

She talked about how she never told her children fairy tales.  She told them stories from the Bible.  And those stories are amazing enough, but they are true.

While Micah loves all types of entertainment, he is also in awe of stories about David and Goliath or Daniel in the lion’s den, or the three young men in a fiery furnace.  And he loves to watch movies about Jesus, to hear stories about what He did, who He healed and that He died and rose again.

And I make sure to continually point out to Micah that cartoon characters and superheroes are not real.  Micah told me one time how strong the Hulk was.  I said, “You’re stronger.”  He looked confused.  I explained.  “You’re stronger because you are real.  The Hulk is imaginary and can’t pick anything up.  He can’t do anything.  You are stronger than the Hulk and Superman and all the other superheroes put together because they are pretend and you are real.”  He understood.

Then Micah said, “But God is the strongest of all.”  Why?  “Because He is real.”

I don’t boycott Christmas.  If I boycotted Christmas because of its non-Christian origins and traditions, then I’d also have to skip Thanksgiving, the 4th of July, Memorial Day, Valentines Day, and a host of others.  Non-Christian origins or traditions mean nothing to me; they have no power in and of themselves, only what we in our ignorance believe about them or give power to.

And honestly, I think that a time to meditate on the birth of Christ is fine and completely healthy, no matter when you do it.  All four gospels have some version of His birth for a reason, and the testimony of how the Word became flesh is obviously essential.

While I don’t boycott the holiday, I do think it is important to focus on what is the truth and the message of the whole deal, and whether our secular society wants to value it or not, it is all about Jesus and Him alone, and by extension, the people in whom He dwells.  By necessity, that means that other things that are completely unnecessary distractions and substitutions, like Santa, have to get way less focus or are ignored completely.  It is opportunity cost, to use an economic term.  In other words, all that time I could spend getting my kids to believe in Santa, I could use to teach them about something real and much deeper.

And I won’t have to admit it was all a myth at some point in the future.

Those are my thoughts, for what they are worth.  I hope that we all use the time our culture gives us not to save an economy or uphold empty traditions but to invest our time to the things that have eternal weight.

Give to those in need.  Feed the hungry.  Clothe the naked.  Spend time with those you love.  Try to be the gift instead of getting them.  The world needs that a whole lot more than another dumb movie about Santa Claus.

Peace.

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The Lord Surrounds His People

December 17th, 2009

I’ve been reading through Psalms lately.  Just feeling like I need to concentrate there for a while …

Of course, being the Bible, there’s a ton of good stuff.  But I thought I would share just a bit from Psalm 125.

Particularly, the verse “As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds His people from this time forth and forever.”

This verse has many implications, but I’ll just share a few.

First of all, Jerusalem in the Old Testament is the Holy City of God, where David set up the capital and Solomon the Temple.  In the New Testament, Jerusalem has become a type and a symbol for the true City of God, His people not by the flesh but by the Spirit, those who are born of (and led by) the Spirit of God.

The writer of this psalm uses the mountains around Jerusalem, a natural boundary against enemies, as a simile for the Lord’s protection of His people.  Actually, the psalm contends that the Lord Himself is the protection and the barrier.

First of all, let’s look at the barrier concept.  This teaches us that Jesus is the only way in.  This way is difficult and natural.  Notice the writer didn’t use man made walls, he used a natural boundary.  Or we could use the buzz-word organic.  Essentially, the way is difficult because we must deny ourselves, seek to lose our lives for His sake before we find true life.

We don’t like to think of Jesus as a difficult person, but in order to truly help us, He must be.  It is his “kindness that leads us to repentance.”  His kindness draws us to see we are wrong and need change at the very core of our being, not just a little adjustment here and there because we’re basically okay.  Even though multitudes flocked to Him at times, He was ultimately very offensive to most people, to the point where Jesus said, “Blessed are those who are not offended by me.”  Which means it is highly likely we will be.

The way is narrow not because it is difficult to understand, but because it requires so much of us.  Unfortunately, we have a Christianity better at marginalizing the extreme call of Jesus in His ministry than actually responding to it.

But there’s no other way in.  Anyone who gets in any other way than through the Person of Christ (and His call which cannot be separated from Him)  is a “thief and a robber”.

To those outside of the true City of God (His people), Jesus is a stumbling block of offense.  To those on the inside, God is a refuge and a source of endless protection.

Back in the day, smart people used to build cities situated where natural barriers protected them: bodies of water, mountains, deserts, etc.  Any attack would naturally be by land or sea, so therefore these things protected a city from invaders and enemies.

So secondly, Jesus is also our the protection against the three main enemies, the world, the flesh, and the devil.  So once you’ve begun to traverse the narrow way, as difficult as it may seem, you are actually safer in the long run … like, the way long run … you know, eternally.

But there’s also no other protection.  We try to manufacture other things that make us feel safe like programs, paradigms, structures, organizations, political ambitions, and sacraments, but ultimately it is only the Son of God who protects and acts as the boundary and defines the Body of Christ.

Our lives are “hidden in Christ” at the right hand of God.  Therefore Paul tells us in Colossians to look there, in the heavens, where our lives truly exist.

Another important scripture to note in relation to this is when Jesus promises the Holy Spirit in the Gospel of John.  To the world, the Holy Spirit will reveal, “sin, righteousness, and the judgment of God.”  To believers, the Spirit “will lead you into all truth.”  To the world, the Spirit leads to repentance.  But once you’ve repented, relinquished your right to live your own life, to instead dedicate everything you are to the furthering of His Kingdom, the Spirit takes a different role.  He then “leads you into all truth.”

There are many things I could discuss, but those were the two main points I thought needed sharing.

But one note as I close.  The picture we are given of the people of God is a city.  In Psalm 122 it’s “built as a city that is compact together.”  You are not alone in a city, and the more “compact” the city, the more you have to do to be alone and isolated.  In other words, you weren’t designed to do this alone.  You need a fellowship of people to walk this out with on a day to day basis, to live closely with, those who also do all they can to “seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness”, who make the Kingdom the foremost thought in their brains.  It’s really not designed to work any other way, no matter how clever we think we are.

Peace.

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The Rise of Hate Crimes During Recession

November 24th, 2009

Interesting article today in the USA Today detailing how hate crimes, which are somewhat problematic too define, have risen over the last year, more than likely as a result of the economic recession.

The article spent time talking about how hate crimes against blacks and gays and lesbians have risen, according to FBI reports, 8% and 13% respectively.

But the most interesting part of the article was that hate crimes against Catholics have risen 23%, more than any other group.  The reason given?  The targeted Catholics have conservative viewpoints, they are pro-life and anti gay marriage rights.

All hate crimes are wrong, but it is compelling to me that the sharpest rise of victimization are those with conservative religious moral viewpoints, and that total religious victims (which I’m sure included hate crimes against Muslims, Hindus, evangelical Christians, etc) were second only to those due to race (all racial groups).

Peace.

Posted in misc messages, sounding off | No Comments »

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