Prayer in a Nutshell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For the last 4 weeks I’ve been looking at prayer…  Thinking about prayer… reading about prayer…  I’ve even prayed about prayer.

And God has changed my view on prayer.  So here’s where I am going in to this weekends message:

1)  Prayer is not about the “list”.  It’s about relationship.  If  the extent of my relationship with my wife is only the quick conversations about what I need or want that often categorizes my prayer life, then IF I have a marriage at all it won’t be a good one. We are the bride of Christ.  He wants a marriage-like relationship and that means I have to be in it for the LOVING relationship we share.

2)  Prayer can change the world!  But the primary role of prayer is not to be me changing the world through prayer, but prayer changing me through the relationship I have with Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit working inside me.  It is often the bending of my will and conforming of my character to that of Christ that takes place when I submit to HIS will and not my will.

3)  What does it mean if God does not answer?  Well, there are lots of cliches, and I’ll try to skip those for something I think was more profound in my walk this week.  If there is no response from God, it is an opportunity to develop the character traits he is building in us.  To persevere, maintain faith, patience, and most importantly (in my humble opinion) the opportunity to conform our desires to that of Christ.

So prayer in a nutshell?

Spend time with God, share your heart, ask him to change yours, pursue that relationship as he has already pursued you.  Then share what he does with everyone who will listen.  :o)

Commonplace

It’s almost Christmas…  Is this what comes to mind?  Snowy wonderlands?  Visions of sugar plums?

It’s a beautiful scene isn’t it?

All full of romantic thoughts and memories. Nostalgia…

 

But what about in January, after the shopping is done, presents are opened, many are returned and the bills start coming for the millions of people across our country who buy it all?

What about June?  Though I’ve heard of Christmas in July, is it really Christmas?

I’ve caught myself being indignant that decorations come out in October.  I mean, really? October?  Can we just skip Thanksgiving like that?

 

But then I stop and think.  What is Christmas really about.  It’s about Jesus, the Messiah, the fulfillment of prophesy, Emmanuel  – God with us.  It’s about the invitation into a relationship with a person, a living physical human being.

 

Even though it’s packaged up neatly and placed under a tree, or set out on a table, or hung on your mantel: Christmas isn’t a small story.  It’s the continuation of the most grand and intricate story ever told.  And it’s still being written.

In the beginning, He was there.  The prophets knew of His coming.  He came in a manger.  He died for my sins.  He rose again from the dead.  He IS COMING AGAIN!

 

Christmas:  I want to live more Christmas all year long.  Why?  Because it’s the greatest story ever told, and it’s not even finished yet.

 

 

 

 

DECIMATION

 

 

BEFORE IMPACT

 

 

 

 

AFTER IMPACT

 

 

 

 

Sometimes I think our lives here in the US are too tame.  As in many other developed countries, the only real risk I take i my day is driving in Houston traffic, in a closed car, with airbags and seatbelts.  Still not very risky.

I don’t race motorcycles, I don’t go skydiving.

I’ve never been attacked by a lion, or a bear, or any other really dangerous animal for that matter.

I’ve never been in a war, never been shot at, never been at risk for starvation, yellow fever, or other serious diseases.

So what risk is left to take in my life?

Ask God to decimate you. 

Am I putting myself out there, allowing God to crush my preconceptions and forcing me to choose whether or not I will love my enemies? Love those who hate me?  Love those who persecute me? Speak the truth in love?

The bible says that “even the pagans” can love their families and friends…  Ouch.

So what am I doing here?  Take a quick look at these passages:

1 Timothy 3:16
Beyond all question, the mystery …was preached among the nations…

Mat 28:19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations…

Mat 24:14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations…

Mat 12:18 ”… he will proclaim justice to the nations.

Mat 12:21 In his name the nations will put their hope.”

Why put these all together? Because a synonym for “nations” is PAGANS.  Not believing nations!  (Thank you Pastor Doyle for THAT little nugget!)

We are supposed to be out there.  Not just sitting in a nice quiet soft comfortable place with people we know and love and will always love and care for us.

And what are we preaching?  Are we constantly telling people they are wrong?  

Is that the great commission?  Convict people of their sin, right?  

You have to go to a person who is sinning, and tell them they are sinning, and tell them to repent, right???  

I’m beginning to realize I’ve had it wrong for a long time.

You are supposed to confront OTHER BELIEVERS who are living in sin about their sin.

Where in Jesus teaching does it say to convict sinners of their sin?

What is the Good News?  “He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb before the shearer is silent, so he did not open his mouth. In his humiliation he was deprived of justice. Who can speak of his descendants? For his life was taken from the earth.”  Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus.

Acts 5:42 - Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Christ.

Christ is the Messiah, the Son of God!!!

he rebukes demons, and his disciples foolishness, he argues against the religious hypocrits

He heals the sick, the blind, the lame.  He forgives the sinner, he loves and loves and loves.  He doesn’t have to condone their behavior, he loves them so much that they want to accept the truth that HE is THEIR SAVIOR.

…in the NIV I couldn’t find one instance of Jesus arguing, convincing, convicting or debating.

John 16:7-8 – But I tell you the truth: It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.  When he comes, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment:

Jesus gives the job of conviction of sin to the Holy Spirit.  He gives the jobs of Loving God and Loving your Neighbor to us.

Are you willing to let God put people in your path that do not believe what you believe?  That act the way they should not act?  Who are living in outward sin?  Are you willing to LOVE them where they are?

Are you willing to drop everything you have, like the disciples did, and FOLLOW JESUS?  DO what he DID.  BRING the KINGDOM to the Nations?

Take that risk, and I believe God will decimate everything you thought you know about reality with the enormous depth of his love.

Life Dance: A delicate balance

I am fascinated and intrigued by dancers.  The amount of time and preparation it takes to put a group of 10 dancers on a stage, choreographed months in advance, so that they can move with grace and fluidity far beyond the measure of normal man.  These dancers, they move with singular purpose, united in vision, focused on delivering a stunning visual display that ignites the strongest emotions in the audience.

We applaud.

We cheer.

We whistle.

What about when they get out of synch?  Or if one of the dancers slips and falls.  A collective gasp emitting from the whole of the audience, waiting with bated breath to see how he or she will respond.  Will they continue, or will the show cease midway and fall desperately, collapsing into failure.

 

Oh, how much more complicated are our lives!

Today is a day for questions with no answers, I think, because the answers are those that cannot be defined in generalities, the answers must be specific to each individual dancer in our production called life.

There are hundreds of dancers who pass through the stage of my daily journey, and yours too.  Some are professionally trained, some are not.  Each has their own set of expectations and beliefs, a unique and varied skill set and, often with no vision to unite us, we dance.

It can be chaos, beautiful chaos.  There are moments of unity, moments of focus and clarity, and yet they pass so quickly it seems they are only the shadow of a memory of a hope once longed for, and the dance continues.  The music continues as we pass in and out of the presence of one another.

So what is it that I wear as a burden on this day?  It is that delicate balance and how easy it is to fall.  With only the tip of a toe on the ground, or twirling leaps happening in such close proximity to one another:  What was once beautiful can become a beautiful disaster.  It is such a delicate balance.

 

And how are we doing, as a community of faith from immediate family, to the closest circle of our friends, to the church body, to the greater church, and the world beyond?

Am I handling this dance with the grace and poise of a master dancer on the floor of life.  Carried with the delicacy and care of a fragile flower?  Or do I plow forward, dancing through life like a linebacker in slippers?

I confess, some days I am graceful, others I am a linebacker in the dance of this life.

Forgive me Father where I have sinned and come so far short than your desire for my heart and the heart of those around me.

I ask for Your grace for today, your poise for today, your strength for today.

Help me to let go of those things that are yours alone to carry

…and help me up when I fall.

AT

James 4

⁷ Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸ Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹ Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰ Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

 

This Beautiful Mess We’re In

What comes to mind when you think about community?

Neighborhood?

 Friends?

Family?

Church?  

 

How close are you to the people who exist in and around your world?

Here’s the deal:  We were never meant to do this all alone.  Now, coming from a person who (though it may not seem like it) is a strongly introverted person, it’s an answer you wouldn’t normally expect.  I mean, I love people.  I love talking to people, I love hearing about their lives…  To a point.  Then I’m done.

What about the extrovert?  The party-goer who seems to be friends with everyone walking through a crowded room, bantering with every passer by like a local hero that everyone recognizes. ..

You could have 1000 friends on facebook, but not a single person to confide in.

You could know every person in your entire school or workplace by name, and have not a single real relationship in any of it.

And by real I mean REAL, as in: “Hey, this is me, this is the good stuff, this is the bad stuff.”  Is that really what we want?

Not usually.  We want to read books like “How to Win Friends and Influence People” because that’s what community is to the world.  It’s a place to get what you want.  To get ahead, to take steps forward in your career or schooling.  It’s not about what you know but who you know, and if you know the right people and they think highly enough for you, well, then you’ll go a LONG way.

So what about church?  Can we be real at church?

I would guess that most people would say absolutely not.  But why?

I think we’re scared.  oh, yeah, and there’s gossip.  We are so conditioned by the “good christian” mentality that we say it’s not like this, but we believe we have to have life “all together” to go to church.  If we were to share our struggles, then everyone else might find out that we were wrong, sinners, in need of a savior.

Wait…  Isn’t that the point?

James 5:16 says “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.”

1 Corinthians 13:9 says “we know in part and prophesy in part”  And everyone has a part!

1 Corinthians 7:7 says “… each of you has your own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that.” and we all have unique gifts!

Luke 6:38 says “Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”

If you engage with others the blessing is exponential.  If you keep it to yourself, you get 1 blessing.  Share it with 10 people and they receive the blessing and can celebrate with you.  That’s 20x the impact.

Struggling?  Share it with 5 people you trust.  They get to support and minister to you, you get to receive that blessing.  10x the blessing.

I don’t know about you.  But if getting a little messy with people puts me ina  position to get hurt, but also in a position to receive and give 10x, 20x, 100x the blessing, well, I want in!

Do you?

Big Enough

So my Facebook friend, hip hop artist  and pastor Luke Geraty (Think Theology Blog) came to me today looking for a challenge.  I love challenge so here’s what he got rolling:  Reflecting Submission that responds to the question “How do we live a life that reflects submission to an Almighty God?”

So here’s my problem:  I have to wonder if it’s even possible to do any of the stuff in Luke’s blog if god is too small.  I think we need to realign our view of God so that He is Almighty, not just a little bigger than we are.  So….

We sing songs in worship

We Raise our hands and voices

We Proclaim “Awesome God” “Everlasting God” “God of Wonders Beyond our Galaxy”…

Yet when the world presses in on us do we really live today under the GodView that He is greater than ALL of this?

So, for right now, lets give up the urge to give sunday school answers and snappy verses that sound great…  and actually look at how we live out our faith.  Lets start with an  Example: How do we pray?

Dear Lord, please do this, please do that, please do this, please fix that, help someone with this, helps someone with that…  What are we doing?

When we ask God to do something in the way we want it, we are putting limits on Him.  It’s like we’re calling our life stylist ” Hey God?  Yeah, so I’ve got this all figured out, now please do what I want. ”  As I reflect on my own prayers, it all sounds so arrogant.  Me telling God what to do…

Oh I know, we all want to say the right answer but when you really get down to brass tacks about it, I wonder if submission is even part of our vocabulary.  I mean,  why should we submit to God if what we really have is a god of our own creation?  A god who we limit and put in a little tiny man-sized box.  Something we can carry in our trunk and pull out whenever we need it?  I mean, really, how big can God be?

So I did a quick search for the phrase “God is” in the Bible.  Here’s what I got right off the bat.

Gen 21:22 ”God is with you in everything you do.”

Gen 31:50 ”God is a witness between you and me.”

Num 23:19 ”God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?”

Deu 4:24 ”For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.”

Deu 4:31 ”For the LORD your God is a merciful God; he will not abandon or destroy you or forget the covenant with your forefathers, which he confirmed to them by oath.”

Deu 7:9 ”Know therefore that the LORD your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commands.”

Whoa!   I haven’t even made it past Deuteronomy 7:9 and I’m already getting overwhelmed!  AND THAT’S THE POINT!

YAHWEH is so huge, so immense, so incredible that we can’t even begin to realize His huge-ness.    Yet I continue to ask him to do such mundane things for me?  Why?  He’s the creator, initiator, preserver, protector and provider of all things for all time…  God is in the miracle business!

Now… I’m not suggesting you stop praying.  I’m not even suggesting that you stop asking for the desires of your heart because, well, it’s in the Bible (Psa 37:4)

But it can’t end there!  The verses right afterward (Psa 37:5 and Psa 37:6) say this:

“Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.”

God’s purpose is not to do my will!  I make the decision to “commit your way to the Lord” and His purpose is to conform me to the image of Christ, the personification of righteousness.  Why?  So I can be the kingdom wherever I go.  That’s what I want!  Jesus was radical, he was way out there.  He defied social stigmas, acted on His Love for the unlovable, and communed with outcasts.  It’s not about doing a list, it’s about everything that we do being done as an expression of who God is and what he has done for, and in, us!

So our goal this week is to submit ourselves and our will daily in prayer to God.

  I think it’s time to open the flood gates:  Start praying for God to surprise you.  Pray for God to fulfill his will in and through you in ways you cannot even begin to imagine.  Then what?  Are you scared?  I am!  Because God may never do what I want him to do…

…and THAT my friends, is where submission comes in.  I am not God, I don’t see it, I don’t get it, I’m not in control.  LORD GOD, Yahweh, is in control and he desires to do (Eph 3:20) “immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us”

Then you go do what Luke is saying:  EXPRESS YOUR SUBMISSION.  Be who God is calling you to be.  Act in the ways He has called you to act.  Why?  Because real submission to an awesome God can NEVER just be words.  There’s a reason they call it the “act of submission.”

Do we intercede?  YES!  Not with our answers for God, but the act of turning a situation over to God’s wisdom and understanding.

Do we “Resist the devil, draw near to God, cleanse your hands, and purify your hearts”   (James 4:8).  YES!  But how?  Under the authority and through the work of the Holy Spirit.

Do we “Love your neighbor as yourself?”  YES!  Not as a responsibility, but as an outpouring, the natural expression and outpouring of our new understanding of how small we are compared to God!

God?  I receive the truth that you are Big Enough!  In this moment I commit my life and will, again, to your care and control.  I lift up those prayers on my heart:  Prayers of petition and intercession, all the worries of my humanity, not to my solutions, but to your miraculous power!  Surprise me, LORD, with your good purposes, your immeasurable power, and your amazing love!  Amen.

Distorted

We live in a  world of distorted perceptions.

We all know this, we all see this, we all struggle in it.

We hear stories of people doing crazy things in the name of God, killing in the name of God, hating in the name of God, responding in anger

and sin…

Not because of truth, but because of perception.

Have you ever heard a self proclaimed Christian say something, claim it’s Biblical and wonder:  Are they reading the same Bible I’m reading?

What are your expectations of God?  Do you believe that he wants you to be good, and if you’re good then he’ll make you happy?  I mean, isn’t that what the 10 commandments are about?  Giving us the rules that tell us how to be good, and if we’re good, then everything will be great, we will all be happy, right?

That all sounds really great until the floor caves in and you have to choose whether or not you will face reality or run into your coping mechanisms.  That’s where the rubber really meets the road:  When

being “good” and following the rules isn’t enough, has God changed?  Or has my perspective changed because of my position?

As we prepared for worship with the student team tonight I reflected on the lyrics of “Unchanging” by Chris Tomlin:

“You never change, You never fail O God”

I change.  Something I thought was true turns out to be a lie.  Something I               relied on to get by becomes an unhealthy habit or an emotional crutch.  Evil           seems to thrive, good seems to waver in the heat of persecution and cultural         attack.

“You never change, You never fail O God”

I fail. I sin. I fall.  I struggle. I fear. I worry. I worship earthly things…

“You never change, You never fail O God”

God’s desire is not for me to be happy.

His desire is not for me to strive to be “good” and follow the rules.

God’s desire is to mold my character to that of Christ.  He can mold me through success, but if you are like me, you remember most those things that cut the deepest.

Are you willing to submit to His will, to turn over completely to God’s perspective, to Jesus’ GodView?

Lord, help me to want your will.  Help me to submit to you when I want to grab hold of my own life and take control over my circumstance.  Help me, Lord, to seek your face, be your LOVE in this world, and to be carried by your life inside of me, your power through me, your will to direct my path.

Thank you that “You never change, You never fail O God”

 

Amen

 

GodView

 

 

 

 

 

 

What comes to mind when you think about God?

Who do you believe God is?

How do you believe God interacts with you personally and with your world?

Every one of us has a Godview whether we think about it or not.   Some people see God as the distant “Almighty” playing chess with us mere mortals.  Or maybe you hear the God of Law that condemns people with rules from heaven.  What about the God of compassion?  The God of Wisdom?  The God of Power?

There are lots of things about God I don’t understand because, well, He is SO BIG and SO FAR outside my ability to understand that all I get is static when I try.

A.W. Tozer made a pretty significant observation:  ”What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.”

Why is that the most important thing?  I think Tozer is looking at our lives, our choices, our responses…  If you believe that God is all about rules and laws, then you may spend all your time and energy trying to be good enough  (whatever that means).  Maybe you hold that God is some cosmic outsider playing a game with the fate of our lives and you spend all your time watching for the traps he sets, or the games you should win to succeed.  Maybe God is a judge waiting for your to screw up so He can punish you.  Maybe you just don’t see God at all.  not in the details, maybe in the stars a little, but a God for you personally?  Maybe not.

So where do we go from here?  Jesus asks the question in a very straight forward and difficult way “Who do you say that I am?”

If Jesus is who he says he is (He is!) and can do what he says he can do (He can!) and Jesus is the Son, an inseperable part of the Father, with the Holy Spirit his spirit  (He is!), how do our responses to life look differently?

If someone hurts us, the law you believe may say they deserve punishment,

Jesus says to forgive them.

If someone gets caught in sin, do you judge them?

Jesus says to cover them in grace instead.

If something bad happens we can blame fate or some cosmic superpower

God says He will work all things for good for those who love him.

A lot of those other GodViews leave us without hope, without peace, without LOVE…

I want t a better GodView.  I want to be in God’s will.  And his will is that I would become more like Christ.   Everything that I do, in all experiences I have, I need to remember that the purpose is to conform my character to that of Christ through submission to a loving God, a heavenly Father.

AT

In the light…

Hi…  Yes, I know it’s been a long time…  Of course I had things I thought about posting.  I just wasn’t willing.  I am struggling with willingness right now.  Can you relate?

The struggle, I think, is in the event in your life, when light goes somewhere only known to darkness.  To a place I have kept hidden, covered over, something I have used to survive in my hardest days.  When my coping mechanisms are torn back, and the wound underneath is exposed to the light it hurts.  It hurts in ways that can not even be understood until it happens.  But why?

Because the light is not a thing, it is not a creation of the sun.  It is God’s nature to be light in the darkness.  And we are to “walk in the light as He is in the light.”  Now light is something I have thought about before.  It has been the focus of my passion for photography and the visual arts.  But why?

Because the light illuminates, makes visible, those things that could be hidden in the dark.  Light unearths the mystery in the darkness and allows us to observe objectively, to ponder, to reflect, to engage in the process of being alive.    Light brings truth.  You cannot lie when you are walking in the light.  Well, you could, but everyone would know.

And there we are.  We have arrived.  It’s the “everyone” part I hold in my heart that keeps me from engaging.  I don’t really want everyone to know.  Do you?

 

I was reading Reflections of Makoto Fujimura, where this Master artist stands before a class of college artists who have been asked to show off their best work.  The students struggle to produce pieces of artwork that they believe are sufficient to show to this authority.  Fujimura responds with grace:  Show me your cast aways, your worst pieces, the pieces that failed.  He provides an opportunity to learn from the mistakes, the failures.  He asks them to bring their worst into the light, so that it does not carry the shame of failure, but the mark of learning.

 

I think it’s time that I stepped out of the shadows of my past, and step into the light so I can learn from them.

 

Lord, forgive me for hiding in the darkness of my heart.  Draw me into your ever present light, not to shame me for my failures, but to teach me and mold me by bringing your master’s hand to my weaknesses, so I may experience your mercy and forgiveness and walk in the confidence of your presence.  Amen

 

AT

Knowledge is Power

As I am studying for this weeks lesson, and working with people in various aspects of my position, God has illuminated something for me that, I think, is critical in each of our lives.

We know the phrase “knowledge is power” and yet we rarely think of why this is true.  Knowledge is the culmination of things learned through experience or education (Oxford Dictionary).  We put a lot of stock in academic knowledge and wisdom.  We spend a lot of time and money learning as much as we can, to acquire that knowledge, so it can further our purposes.

Yet I reflected on other types of knowledge: What if your experiential knowledge tells you you are worthless?  Incapable?  Destined to failure?

That knowledge has power, too.  It has the power to corrupt your mind, overtake your heart, and weigh down your spirit to the point of breaking.  It has the power to keep you from receiving blessings and from growing in your journey…  But are these things, this kind knowledge, are they true?  Many times they are deep seeded lies in our subconscious mind that impact nearly every decision we make.  So what is the goal?  To expand in knowledge of The Truth.

Since knowledge is something gained by experience, so to “be still and know that I am God” (Ps. 46:10) doesn’t mean sit and do nothing, it means to stop doing all your own activities and experience the presence of God.

and “having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might” (Eph 1:18-19) doesn’t mean just listening to a sermon, or reading a verse once in a while, Paul is saying that we can experience fullest life because we know, we experience, the hope and power and riches of God through Christ.

So that is my prayer today.  That knowledge would abound, not in earthly things, but that your knowledge of Christ would reflect the power of God in your heart and in your journey.

AT