[This is the journal entry for my quiet time with God earlier today.]
Look: “...I thank and praise you, God of my ancestors: You have given me wisdom and power, you have made known to me what we asked of you, you have made known to us the dream of the king.” (Daniel 2:23)
This is part of a prayer of praise and thanksgiving offered by Daniel, a Jew held captive in Babylon after that nation conquered God’s people.
Daniel, following a period of training, was enlisted into the ranks of the Babylonian king’s “wise men.” Also enlisted from God’s people were Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. (The three are known best today by the names given to them by the Babylonians, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, although I’m certain they would prefer to be known by their given Hebrew names.)
The king had dreamt a troubling dream. Unlike the Pharaoh during Israel’s enslavement in Egypt many centuries before, the king not only expected his wise men to interpret his dream, but also to tell him what had happened in his dream. For some reason, neither Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, nor Azariah was present when the Babylonian seers confessed that they couldn’t see the king’s dream, only interpret the dream as the king recounted it. The king was furious and ordered the execution of all the wise men, even the four Hebrews.
When Daniel and the other three Hebrews learned of the king’s death sentence, Daniel went to the king and asked for time so that he could interpret the dream. He then enlisted Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah to pray that God would show them mercy by revealing both the content of the king’s dream and its meaning. “He urged them to plead for mercy from the God of heaven concerning this mystery, so that he and his friends might not be executed with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.” (Daniel 2:18) Daniel wasn’t just interested in saving himself and his friends from the executioner, but also the Babylonian wise men.
That night, after the four had sought God’s mercy, the dream and its interpretation were revealed to Daniel. Interestingly, in the verse, Daniel thanks God not only for revealing these things to himself personally but also to “us,” to him and his three prayer partners. Our faith life is lived out in the company of, with the support of, and with accountability to other believers.
Listen: I’m struck by several things here.
I’m struck, first, by the nature of prayer offered to the God of Israel, now revealed to the whole world in Jesus Christ.
First, Daniel was concerned not just for his own life and not just for the lives of his fellow Jews, but for the lives too of the Babylonian wise men. In James 4:3, James upbraids his addressees, who are mystified at why they receive no answers to their prayers, “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.” Daniel wanted to save his own life, to be sure. But he also wanted to save others’ lives and to rely with bold faith on God. In 1 Corinthians 13, the apostle Paul says that love doesn’t seek its own way. And in Philippians 4, he exhorts believers to put the interests of others above their own. Things could have gone very badly for Daniel when he boldly came into the presence of the king to plead for time to learn from God both the content of the king’s dream and its proper interpretation. But he did so with confidence in the mercy God shows when we love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
Second, when we pray alone, God certainly hears our prayers. But when we enlist others to pray with us, there is an accountability. If Daniel had said, “Hey, guys, please pray that God will save us and nobody else,” it’s likely that he would have prayed alone...and without effect. But the four Hebrews could all agree that seeking God’s help and wisdom in order to save everyone’s life was a godly prayer. The God of Israel was ultimately revealed in Jesus, Who tells us, “I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven.” (Matthew 18:19) (Of course, even when two or three or more pray for something, as Christians, they also pray in Jesus’ name and for God’s will to be done. Prayer is submission to the will of God, even when it’s not what we want.)
I’m also struck by the fact that Daniel didn’t forget to thank God for the answered prayers. How often have I gotten into scrapes and prayed, with genuine faith and submission, only to forget to thank God after He’s taken me through them? More often than I can remember, I’m sure.
I’m also struck again by the fact that true faith in the God we now all can know only in Christ is characterized both by boldness and humility. Daniel and his friends were bold in their prayers to God and humbly submissive to God. Daniel was bold to petition the king but did so without accusation or anger, only humility. Boldness AND humility should characterize the Christian’s life, including our prayers and our interactions with others. I often seem to fall prey to my human nature and end up being neither bold nor humble!
One big takeaway for me is to pray with faith and submission to the God revealed in Jesus. This is what Jesus teaches us to do. “Your will be done,” is, for me the hardest and most important petition of the prayer that Jesus has taught us, the Lord’s Prayer.
The other big takeaway is this: pray with certainty that God hears prayers offered in Jesus’ name, that is, prayers that submit to the will of God and are filled with a knowledge of God born of our relationship with Him. James says, “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.” (James 1:5) The experience of Daniel and his friends bears the truth of that verse out.
Respond: Lord, teach me today to be both bold and humble as I seek to live my life in Your power and to Your glory alone. In Jesus’ name I ask this. Amen
[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]
Showing posts with label James 1:5. Show all posts
Showing posts with label James 1:5. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 21, 2018
Sunday, June 21, 2015
Jesus or a Comfortable Life?
[This was shared during both of today's worship services with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Springboro, Ohio.]
Job 38:1-11
2 Corinthians 6:1-13
Mark 4:35-41
In today’s Gospel lesson (and really in all our Bible lessons for today as well), Jesus confronts us with a simple question: Do we want Him or do we want to be comfortable?
Do we want the God we meet in Jesus Christ or do we want easy, trouble-free lives?
Some of the hucksters on TV sell a brand of Christianity that tells us if we believe in Jesus and stay positive, we’ll be flush with cash, healthy, and successful.
The problem, of course, is that Jesus never promises any of this to those who follow Him.
Jesus does promise wonderful things.
He promises that when we repent and believe, we will be part of the Kingdom of God.
He promises that when we trust in Him as the only Son of God and the only way to reconciliation to God, we will have everlasting life with God.
Believers in Jesus know that we have the presence and guidance of God with us in this life.
He will give weary souls rest.
He will be with His people always, even to the close of the age.
Christ’s people have the hope of the life for which we are made--a life which at present we can only see as through a mirror dimly, a resurrected life in which tears are dried, bodies restored, work is meaningful,* and joy is complete.
But not once does the God we know in Jesus Christ promise that following Him will make us comfortable in this world.
Not once does He say that decisions will be easy.
Not once does He say problems will go away.
Not once does He say that the life of discipleship--of following Him, of sacrificing ourselves and our own comfort out of love and worship for God and out of love for neighbors--those we can see and those we can’t see--will be easy.
In fact, Jesus says, "In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)
Our first lesson for today comes to us from the Old Testament book of Job. It’s thought to be the oldest book in the Bible, recounting events that took place long before Abraham. In it, a man who strives to follow God, who repents not only for his own sins, but also those of his children, is struck down by many of the horrors that the world and the devil can bring to human beings.
All his property and livestock are destroyed.
All his children are killed.
He is stricken with a horrible disease, his body covered with open sores.
Job had worshiped God and played by the rules. But in one fell swoop, his whole world was decimated.
Following God had not brought Job a comfortable life.
Through much of the book that bears his name, Job's friends try to tell their suffering friend that had he been more faithful, these bad things wouldn’t have come to him. He insists he doesn’t deserve his suffering and angrily challenges God to explain Himself.
At the end of the book, God chastises Job’s so-called friends. Faith in God isn’t a pass to easy street and Job’s distress wasn’t caused by Job being sinful.
But, as we can see from our first lesson, neither does God explain Job’s suffering.
Job suffered in spite of being a follower of God because we live in a fallen world in which bad things happen even to faithful people.
In our second lesson, written in about 55 AD, the apostle Paul recounts some of the suffering he underwent not in spite of following and proclaiming the God revealed in the crucified and risen Jesus, but because he followed and proclaimed the crucified and risen Jesus. Paul said that he and his ministry team commended themselves to people in the church at Corinth precisely because they had endured calamities for the sake of their faith in the God we know through Jesus.
He writes: “...as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses; in beatings, imprisonments and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights and hunger; in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left; through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors; known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.”
Believers in Jesus are called to keep following Jesus even when it’s inconvenient, painful, challenging, uncomfortable.
When it commands sacrifice.
When it threatens our reputations, our financial security, our lives.
Jesus calls us to choose between life with Him and being comfortable.
He does this emphatically in our Gospel lesson, Matthew 4:35-41.
The incident narrated here comes right after Jesus gives a series of parables describing what the Kingdom of God, the kingdom He is going to die and rise to bring into being. It all begins with a command, which Jesus disciples obey. “That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, ‘Let us go over to the other side.’ Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him.”
Of course, when Jesus issued His command to the disciples, they probably wouldn’t have given it a second thought. Most of them were experiences fishermen accustomed to plying the Galilean waters at night, as He was now commanding them to do at sundown.
Following Jesus may often seem a simple thing, comfortable. We don’t know what storms may lay ahead.
You know what happens next. Verse 37: “A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, ‘Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?’”
We Christians ask a version of that question every time adversity strikes, every time Jesus calls us to do hard things we’d rather not do, uncomfortable things: forgive someone who has hurt us; confront a fellow believer with a hard truth; give sacrificially. “Lord,” we wonder, “don’t you care if we drown? Don’t you care if we lose our comfort? Don't you care if what you're calling me to do could result in killing my reputation, killing my investment portfolio, kill my health, kill me?”
Jesus' answer, quite frankly, is, “No.” The God Who tells us that "whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it," the God Who went to a cross to bear our sins cares more about our character than our comfort.
He cares more about our learning to follow Him faithfully than He does about our ease. Our ease can come in eternity.
For now, our call is to follow even in the darkest, most difficult times.
Verse 39: “He [Jesus] got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, ‘Quiet! Be still!’ Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, ‘Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?’”
When storms come, we wonder how we can survive. We forget that nothing can separate those who trust in Him from the love God gives through Jesus Christ. Nothing.
A young woman, a member of our church in Cincinnati, was dying. She and her husband had two young children. She gave her testimony of faith during worship one Sunday. This was in 1999. She talked about all the things she hoped to be able to see in this world: her children grown, the new millennium. She knew that she might not see any of these earthly hopes come into being. And it saddened her. She tried to understand. Yet she also told us that she was confident that the Lord Who was leading her through her darkest valley would not only lead her to Himself, but also lead her children. She said that she knew that Christ's Church in which her children were baptized would faithfully share Christ with them, forge their characters by the power of the Holy Spirit, and help them to know the eternity of hope we have in Jesus Christ.
After Jesus had sternly spoken to the disciples, they contemplated in awe-filled fear, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey Him?” The answer can be found all through Scripture. But I mention just two places.
In Psalm 104:7, the psalmist confesses of God, “...at your rebuke the waters fled, at the sound of your thunder they took to flight…”
Genesis 1:1 tells us that God the Holy Spirit moved over the waters of primordial chaos and brought into being peace, order, and life.
The One Who calmed the storm that so frightened the experienced fishermen sailing with Jesus that night was and is God Himself.
Storms, challenges come and go in this life.
Jesus will sometimes ask us to do things, to endure things, to sacrifice things, which in our own power, we are incapable of doing.
But, listen: Whenever we can’t, God can.
And after the storm, the God we know in Jesus Christ still stands.
And so do all who put their faith in Him.
They’re the ones who were more concerned with following Jesus than with being comfortable. I pray each day that God will forge me to be one of their number.
What storms are you going through today?
What is Jesus asking you to do that you don’t believe can be done?
Is there a comfortable sin for which you need to repent?
Follow Jesus and let the One Who can still our storms see you through. Amen
*Work is not a punishment for human sin, as some suppose. Human beings, created in the image of God, are meant to share in His work. But after the fall into sin and the world's subjection to futility, work was marred, along with all human enterprises, by futility. In eternity then, God's resurrected people will be restored to our full function in the new creation and once again fulfill our calling to manifest God's image in work marked by purpose, joy, and fulfillment.
Job 38:1-11
2 Corinthians 6:1-13
Mark 4:35-41
In today’s Gospel lesson (and really in all our Bible lessons for today as well), Jesus confronts us with a simple question: Do we want Him or do we want to be comfortable?
Do we want the God we meet in Jesus Christ or do we want easy, trouble-free lives?
The problem, of course, is that Jesus never promises any of this to those who follow Him.
He promises that when we repent and believe, we will be part of the Kingdom of God.
He promises that when we trust in Him as the only Son of God and the only way to reconciliation to God, we will have everlasting life with God.
Believers in Jesus know that we have the presence and guidance of God with us in this life.
He will give weary souls rest.
He will be with His people always, even to the close of the age.
Christ’s people have the hope of the life for which we are made--a life which at present we can only see as through a mirror dimly, a resurrected life in which tears are dried, bodies restored, work is meaningful,* and joy is complete.
Not once does He say that decisions will be easy.
Not once does He say problems will go away.
Not once does He say that the life of discipleship--of following Him, of sacrificing ourselves and our own comfort out of love and worship for God and out of love for neighbors--those we can see and those we can’t see--will be easy.
In fact, Jesus says, "In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)
All his property and livestock are destroyed.
All his children are killed.
He is stricken with a horrible disease, his body covered with open sores.
Job had worshiped God and played by the rules. But in one fell swoop, his whole world was decimated.
Following God had not brought Job a comfortable life.
Through much of the book that bears his name, Job's friends try to tell their suffering friend that had he been more faithful, these bad things wouldn’t have come to him. He insists he doesn’t deserve his suffering and angrily challenges God to explain Himself.
At the end of the book, God chastises Job’s so-called friends. Faith in God isn’t a pass to easy street and Job’s distress wasn’t caused by Job being sinful.
But, as we can see from our first lesson, neither does God explain Job’s suffering.
Job suffered in spite of being a follower of God because we live in a fallen world in which bad things happen even to faithful people.
He writes: “...as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses; in beatings, imprisonments and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights and hunger; in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left; through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors; known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.”
Believers in Jesus are called to keep following Jesus even when it’s inconvenient, painful, challenging, uncomfortable.
When it commands sacrifice.
When it threatens our reputations, our financial security, our lives.
Jesus calls us to choose between life with Him and being comfortable.
The incident narrated here comes right after Jesus gives a series of parables describing what the Kingdom of God, the kingdom He is going to die and rise to bring into being. It all begins with a command, which Jesus disciples obey. “That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, ‘Let us go over to the other side.’ Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him.”
Following Jesus may often seem a simple thing, comfortable. We don’t know what storms may lay ahead.
We Christians ask a version of that question every time adversity strikes, every time Jesus calls us to do hard things we’d rather not do, uncomfortable things: forgive someone who has hurt us; confront a fellow believer with a hard truth; give sacrificially. “Lord,” we wonder, “don’t you care if we drown? Don’t you care if we lose our comfort? Don't you care if what you're calling me to do could result in killing my reputation, killing my investment portfolio, kill my health, kill me?”
He cares more about our learning to follow Him faithfully than He does about our ease. Our ease can come in eternity.
For now, our call is to follow even in the darkest, most difficult times.
When storms come, we wonder how we can survive. We forget that nothing can separate those who trust in Him from the love God gives through Jesus Christ. Nothing.
A young woman, a member of our church in Cincinnati, was dying. She and her husband had two young children. She gave her testimony of faith during worship one Sunday. This was in 1999. She talked about all the things she hoped to be able to see in this world: her children grown, the new millennium. She knew that she might not see any of these earthly hopes come into being. And it saddened her. She tried to understand. Yet she also told us that she was confident that the Lord Who was leading her through her darkest valley would not only lead her to Himself, but also lead her children. She said that she knew that Christ's Church in which her children were baptized would faithfully share Christ with them, forge their characters by the power of the Holy Spirit, and help them to know the eternity of hope we have in Jesus Christ.
In Psalm 104:7, the psalmist confesses of God, “...at your rebuke the waters fled, at the sound of your thunder they took to flight…”
Genesis 1:1 tells us that God the Holy Spirit moved over the waters of primordial chaos and brought into being peace, order, and life.
The One Who calmed the storm that so frightened the experienced fishermen sailing with Jesus that night was and is God Himself.
Storms, challenges come and go in this life.
Jesus will sometimes ask us to do things, to endure things, to sacrifice things, which in our own power, we are incapable of doing.
But, listen: Whenever we can’t, God can.
And after the storm, the God we know in Jesus Christ still stands.
And so do all who put their faith in Him.
They’re the ones who were more concerned with following Jesus than with being comfortable. I pray each day that God will forge me to be one of their number.
What storms are you going through today?
What is Jesus asking you to do that you don’t believe can be done?
Is there a comfortable sin for which you need to repent?
Follow Jesus and let the One Who can still our storms see you through. Amen
*Work is not a punishment for human sin, as some suppose. Human beings, created in the image of God, are meant to share in His work. But after the fall into sin and the world's subjection to futility, work was marred, along with all human enterprises, by futility. In eternity then, God's resurrected people will be restored to our full function in the new creation and once again fulfill our calling to manifest God's image in work marked by purpose, joy, and fulfillment.
Tuesday, July 08, 2014
True Wisdom
[This was shared during worship with the people and guests of Living Water Lutheran Church in Springboro, Ohio, this past Sunday.]
Matthew 11:25-30
Today, our topic is true wisdom.
True story: An then middle-aged white woman, a longtime follower of Christ and a devoted student of the Bible, went with women from the Methodist congregation to which she belonged to visit a group of African-American women who were members of an inner city church. They were to have a Bible study together.
The woman supposed that she and her group would do a lot of teaching during the gathering.
She and the other women of her group were amazed though, by one young black Christian whose love of Scripture and, more importantly, her depth as a follower of Jesus Christ, taught those white women more about what it means to be a disciple in a few hours than they had learned for much of the rest of their lives.
Decades later the middle aged woman, by then elderly, told a little boy who, more than twenty years later, God would, call to be a Lutheran pastor, to never confuse Bible knowledge for faithfulness, to never confuse learning about the Lord (or learning about anything else, for that matter) for wisdom from the Lord. I've never forgotten those words spoken to me by my great-grandmother.
Knowledge and worldly wisdom come from us; but true wisdom comes from God alone. And if we take our cues from the world and its ideas about what’s shrewd and smart and wise, we will end up on the wrong side of eternity.
From the wellspring of God’s wisdom given to him by God, King Solomon writes in Proverbs 14:12: “There is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death.”
Nowhere is this more true than in the usual responses of the world to Jesus Christ.
Though the human race may not like it, Jesus, both the Bible and Jesus Himself insist, is the only way to life with God.
N.T. Wright, the Anglican scholar of the New Testament, has summarized this truth by saying that Jesus is “the window onto God.”
And five hundred years ago, Martin Luther distilled it by saying that if we want to know God and Who He is, we need to look to Christ on the cross.
Jesus is explicit about His identity as God and as the way to God in verse 27 of today’s Gospel lesson: “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
Jesus is the window to God, the doorway to eternity, God come to the earth, Who is our only means to eternity.
You may have noticed that the world isn’t always keen to accept these things about Jesus.
Accepting Jesus as the ultimate self-disclosure of God and the only Savior of human souls doesn’t play well with the prevailing prejudices of the human race.
One such prejudice challenges God in Christ to prove Himself, His existence, and His power, as though His death and resurrection are insufficient proof to silence all challenges to Jesus’ lordship.
Another prejudice comes from those who prefer that God be subordinate to them and let them choose religion over faith in Christ alone.
Then there are those who simply hate the idea of surrendering to a God Who offers them salvation as a free gift, who want to prove themselves and their own worthiness, who want their will to be done and not God’s will.
Truth is, we all exhibit these prejudices, even the most committed of Christians.
Bred deep in the DNA of every human being is the desire to be like God and the suspicion that we know better than God.
And this inherited “functional atheism” will reside in every human being until the crucifixion of death comes to this earthly flesh.
In the section of Matthew’s Gospel from which this morning’s lesson comes, Jesus has been running the gauntlet of these human prejudices, through the kind of human confidence in human wisdom that often keeps human beings from trusting in Christ as God and Savior.
Take a look at Matthew 11 with me, please (page 682 in the sanctuary Bibles), and scan the incidents that give rise to the prayer of Jesus that makes up today’s lesson.
Matthew 11:3 tells us that John the Baptist, of all people, incarcerated for readying the world for the coming of the Messiah, was having his doubts about Jesus. John instructs his own disciples to ask Jesus: “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”
You see, to those of a religious bent of mind, Christianity seems too simple. They find it hard to accept that God doesn’t say, “Be good and you can earn your way into my good graces.” Instead, God says, “Repent--submit to the crucifixion of your old self and all its sins--and trust in Christ--believe that Christ erases the power of sin and death over your life, and you will have life with God for eternity.”
John, being of a religious bent of mind, was confused. He thought that the Messiah would be a conquering king. But here the One he thought was Messiah was operating as God always had stretching back to the garden and throughout the Old Testament, offering salvation by grace through faith in Him.
Later, in verses 16-18, Jesus laments the fact that “this generation,” meaning the whole human race, could never be satisfied with the ways in which God reached out to them. They said that John the Baptist, who never touched a drop of alcohol, had a demon and that Jesus, because He reached out to tax extortionists and other sinners, was “a glutton and a drunkard.” The religious know-it-alls, the good church people of Jesus’ day, were certain of their wisdom.
“But wisdom,” Jesus says in Matthew 11:19, “is proved right by her deeds.”
Despite his doubts, John the Baptist was willing to submit to death for His faith in Christ, and so was proven right.
Jesus, despite His sinlessness, was willing to take our punishment for sin on the cross, then rose from death to offer life to all who follow Him, and so was proven right.
And, the Bible teaches, if we will follow Him, we too will be proven right in trusting in Him.
1 Peter 1:6-9 tells Christians: “...though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”
This way of life is completely opposite to the way of life commended by the world’s wisdom.
The wisdom of this world says: “Do what seems right to you. Follow your heart. Look out for number one. Get it while you can.”
The wisdom of God tells us, “Surrender to Christ. Let God call the shots. Endure...even when it’s the last thing on earth you want to do. God will help you through the tough times. And He will give you an eternity of joy beyond all human imagining.”
Just before today’s lesson, then, Jesus denounces towns that refused to welcome Him as Lord. He says that because they were more confident in their own wisdom than the revealed wisdom of God, they would “go down to Hades,” to hell. (So much for Milquetoast Jesus.)
It’s then that Jesus prays, starting at Matthew 11:25: “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.”
The people who get the Gospel, who get Jesus and get life from Him are those who are willing to get Jesus, people who submit to becoming little children and who bow to the wisdom of God.
Jesus isn’t saying that those who follow Him are to be stupid or gullible. He’s saying that they are pliant, open to God.
In the end, faith in Christ and deepened faith in Christ cannot come as the result of human wisdom or rational argument.
Faith cannot come from the begrudging fulfillment of religious duties, of taking on the burden of religious do’s and don’t’s like the heavy yoke the farmers of Jesus’ day placed on the backs of their work animals.
Faith and the new life of freedom from sin, the freedom to say no to sin, the freedom to live as the people God made us to be, the freedom to live life God’s way, the way we were designed to live, is a gift to those who turn their backs on the wisdom of the world and embrace the wisdom of God.
Of course, we must learn as Christians to live in this world like foreigners and strangers. We're not in heaven yet. That's why Jesus says that His followers are to be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves.
But we are people who live under a new wisdom, unlike the wisdom of this world.
We know that grace is free.
The Gospel is true.
And rest for the soul comes to those who follow Christ.
So, Jesus says, beginning in verse 28, issues an invitation to all people to bow to this wisdom and His lordship: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
To some, heedless of Christ’s cross and empty tomb, these words will seem like nonsense. They will refuse to believe.
And the only way to reach them is the very way Jesus reached skeptics and unbelievers, through deeds of kindness and love and service rendered in the power and in the Name of God Himself.
That’s why our missions to places like India and Haiti, our service through agencies like Service Over Self, Interfaith Hospitality Network, and the Gateway Men’s Shelter of St. Vincent de Paul, and even our kindness outreaches, are so important.
Romans 2:4 tells us that the kindness of God is intended to bring people to repentance and new life in Christ.
Christians, living in the wisdom revealed by Christ and not in their own wisdom, are freed from all anxiety about their own worthiness, so that they can perpetrate many small and large acts of kindness in Christ’s Name and Christ’s power and so, recklessly help others know the God of the cross and the resurrection.
This actually should be very good news for us this morning!
I know it does for me.
Confession: The older I get, the less I can truly say I know.
My head may be filled with lots of facts. I may have lots of experiences. But as time goes by, the less qualified I feel to function myself or to offer advice to others.
My wisdom, I realize, is non-existent. My impulses, doubtful. My maturity, questionable.
But despite having nothing of what the world counts as wisdom, I live with confidence and hope. I know that God has all the wisdom I need to live from day to day. And from God, we can have the greatest wisdom of all: faith in Christ! This is what Jesus offers to those who submit to being little children who follow Him.
James 1:5 tells us: “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.”
In Matthew 11:27, Jesus says: “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
Jesus has chosen to reveal God and the way of salvation and hope to those who are willing to surrender.
You don’t have to earn it.
You don’t have to be brilliant or charming or strong or beautiful or accomplished.
You just have to be willing to let Him love you and follow where He leads.
I have to warn you that that sounds easier than it actually is.
Which is why the Christian lives in what Lutheran called “daily repentance and renewal,” daily surrender to Christ, daily downloading of God's wisdom.
This is the way of life. Amen
Matthew 11:25-30
Today, our topic is true wisdom.
True story: An then middle-aged white woman, a longtime follower of Christ and a devoted student of the Bible, went with women from the Methodist congregation to which she belonged to visit a group of African-American women who were members of an inner city church. They were to have a Bible study together.
The woman supposed that she and her group would do a lot of teaching during the gathering.
She and the other women of her group were amazed though, by one young black Christian whose love of Scripture and, more importantly, her depth as a follower of Jesus Christ, taught those white women more about what it means to be a disciple in a few hours than they had learned for much of the rest of their lives.
Decades later the middle aged woman, by then elderly, told a little boy who, more than twenty years later, God would, call to be a Lutheran pastor, to never confuse Bible knowledge for faithfulness, to never confuse learning about the Lord (or learning about anything else, for that matter) for wisdom from the Lord. I've never forgotten those words spoken to me by my great-grandmother.
Knowledge and worldly wisdom come from us; but true wisdom comes from God alone. And if we take our cues from the world and its ideas about what’s shrewd and smart and wise, we will end up on the wrong side of eternity.
From the wellspring of God’s wisdom given to him by God, King Solomon writes in Proverbs 14:12: “There is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death.”
Nowhere is this more true than in the usual responses of the world to Jesus Christ.
Though the human race may not like it, Jesus, both the Bible and Jesus Himself insist, is the only way to life with God.
N.T. Wright, the Anglican scholar of the New Testament, has summarized this truth by saying that Jesus is “the window onto God.”
And five hundred years ago, Martin Luther distilled it by saying that if we want to know God and Who He is, we need to look to Christ on the cross.
Jesus is explicit about His identity as God and as the way to God in verse 27 of today’s Gospel lesson: “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
Jesus is the window to God, the doorway to eternity, God come to the earth, Who is our only means to eternity.
You may have noticed that the world isn’t always keen to accept these things about Jesus.
Accepting Jesus as the ultimate self-disclosure of God and the only Savior of human souls doesn’t play well with the prevailing prejudices of the human race.
One such prejudice challenges God in Christ to prove Himself, His existence, and His power, as though His death and resurrection are insufficient proof to silence all challenges to Jesus’ lordship.
Another prejudice comes from those who prefer that God be subordinate to them and let them choose religion over faith in Christ alone.
Then there are those who simply hate the idea of surrendering to a God Who offers them salvation as a free gift, who want to prove themselves and their own worthiness, who want their will to be done and not God’s will.
Truth is, we all exhibit these prejudices, even the most committed of Christians.
Bred deep in the DNA of every human being is the desire to be like God and the suspicion that we know better than God.
And this inherited “functional atheism” will reside in every human being until the crucifixion of death comes to this earthly flesh.
In the section of Matthew’s Gospel from which this morning’s lesson comes, Jesus has been running the gauntlet of these human prejudices, through the kind of human confidence in human wisdom that often keeps human beings from trusting in Christ as God and Savior.
Take a look at Matthew 11 with me, please (page 682 in the sanctuary Bibles), and scan the incidents that give rise to the prayer of Jesus that makes up today’s lesson.
Matthew 11:3 tells us that John the Baptist, of all people, incarcerated for readying the world for the coming of the Messiah, was having his doubts about Jesus. John instructs his own disciples to ask Jesus: “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”
You see, to those of a religious bent of mind, Christianity seems too simple. They find it hard to accept that God doesn’t say, “Be good and you can earn your way into my good graces.” Instead, God says, “Repent--submit to the crucifixion of your old self and all its sins--and trust in Christ--believe that Christ erases the power of sin and death over your life, and you will have life with God for eternity.”
John, being of a religious bent of mind, was confused. He thought that the Messiah would be a conquering king. But here the One he thought was Messiah was operating as God always had stretching back to the garden and throughout the Old Testament, offering salvation by grace through faith in Him.
Later, in verses 16-18, Jesus laments the fact that “this generation,” meaning the whole human race, could never be satisfied with the ways in which God reached out to them. They said that John the Baptist, who never touched a drop of alcohol, had a demon and that Jesus, because He reached out to tax extortionists and other sinners, was “a glutton and a drunkard.” The religious know-it-alls, the good church people of Jesus’ day, were certain of their wisdom.
“But wisdom,” Jesus says in Matthew 11:19, “is proved right by her deeds.”
Despite his doubts, John the Baptist was willing to submit to death for His faith in Christ, and so was proven right.
Jesus, despite His sinlessness, was willing to take our punishment for sin on the cross, then rose from death to offer life to all who follow Him, and so was proven right.
And, the Bible teaches, if we will follow Him, we too will be proven right in trusting in Him.
1 Peter 1:6-9 tells Christians: “...though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”
This way of life is completely opposite to the way of life commended by the world’s wisdom.
The wisdom of this world says: “Do what seems right to you. Follow your heart. Look out for number one. Get it while you can.”
The wisdom of God tells us, “Surrender to Christ. Let God call the shots. Endure...even when it’s the last thing on earth you want to do. God will help you through the tough times. And He will give you an eternity of joy beyond all human imagining.”
Just before today’s lesson, then, Jesus denounces towns that refused to welcome Him as Lord. He says that because they were more confident in their own wisdom than the revealed wisdom of God, they would “go down to Hades,” to hell. (So much for Milquetoast Jesus.)
It’s then that Jesus prays, starting at Matthew 11:25: “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.”
The people who get the Gospel, who get Jesus and get life from Him are those who are willing to get Jesus, people who submit to becoming little children and who bow to the wisdom of God.
Jesus isn’t saying that those who follow Him are to be stupid or gullible. He’s saying that they are pliant, open to God.
In the end, faith in Christ and deepened faith in Christ cannot come as the result of human wisdom or rational argument.
Faith cannot come from the begrudging fulfillment of religious duties, of taking on the burden of religious do’s and don’t’s like the heavy yoke the farmers of Jesus’ day placed on the backs of their work animals.
Faith and the new life of freedom from sin, the freedom to say no to sin, the freedom to live as the people God made us to be, the freedom to live life God’s way, the way we were designed to live, is a gift to those who turn their backs on the wisdom of the world and embrace the wisdom of God.
Of course, we must learn as Christians to live in this world like foreigners and strangers. We're not in heaven yet. That's why Jesus says that His followers are to be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves.
But we are people who live under a new wisdom, unlike the wisdom of this world.
We know that grace is free.
The Gospel is true.
And rest for the soul comes to those who follow Christ.
So, Jesus says, beginning in verse 28, issues an invitation to all people to bow to this wisdom and His lordship: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
To some, heedless of Christ’s cross and empty tomb, these words will seem like nonsense. They will refuse to believe.
And the only way to reach them is the very way Jesus reached skeptics and unbelievers, through deeds of kindness and love and service rendered in the power and in the Name of God Himself.
That’s why our missions to places like India and Haiti, our service through agencies like Service Over Self, Interfaith Hospitality Network, and the Gateway Men’s Shelter of St. Vincent de Paul, and even our kindness outreaches, are so important.
Romans 2:4 tells us that the kindness of God is intended to bring people to repentance and new life in Christ.
Christians, living in the wisdom revealed by Christ and not in their own wisdom, are freed from all anxiety about their own worthiness, so that they can perpetrate many small and large acts of kindness in Christ’s Name and Christ’s power and so, recklessly help others know the God of the cross and the resurrection.
This actually should be very good news for us this morning!
I know it does for me.
Confession: The older I get, the less I can truly say I know.
My head may be filled with lots of facts. I may have lots of experiences. But as time goes by, the less qualified I feel to function myself or to offer advice to others.
My wisdom, I realize, is non-existent. My impulses, doubtful. My maturity, questionable.
But despite having nothing of what the world counts as wisdom, I live with confidence and hope. I know that God has all the wisdom I need to live from day to day. And from God, we can have the greatest wisdom of all: faith in Christ! This is what Jesus offers to those who submit to being little children who follow Him.
James 1:5 tells us: “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.”
In Matthew 11:27, Jesus says: “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
Jesus has chosen to reveal God and the way of salvation and hope to those who are willing to surrender.
You don’t have to earn it.
You don’t have to be brilliant or charming or strong or beautiful or accomplished.
You just have to be willing to let Him love you and follow where He leads.
I have to warn you that that sounds easier than it actually is.
Which is why the Christian lives in what Lutheran called “daily repentance and renewal,” daily surrender to Christ, daily downloading of God's wisdom.
This is the way of life. Amen
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Deciding How to Live
[This was shared during the 10:15 AM worship with the people of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio, today.]
James 3:13-4:8
Robert Frost’s famous poem, The Road Not Taken, begins:
Some decisions we make, of course, have more importance than others.
The career path we will follow.
Who we will marry.
How much effort we will choose to put into our relationships.
What to do in caring for elderly parents.
Life is filled with consequential decisions and, as we make them, we feel the need for wisdom.
In today’s second lesson, James, the earthly brother of Jesus and leader of the Christians in Jerusalem, says that there are two kinds of wisdom. And the consequences these two divergent forms of wisdom bring into our lives are dramatically different. Turn please to the lesson, James 3:13-4:8.
James begins with a question:
And if the rows of self-help books you find in most bookstores are any indication, our idea of wisdom has to do with being shrewd and bold about getting what we want when we want it, no matter who or what gets in the way.
James well describes the shrewd, plotting wisdom that the world usually recommends to us:
This sort of death-dealing wisdom even has been given place in the twenty-first century Church.
For example, some conservative denominations and Christian megachurches wrap Jesus in the American flag to justify everything about American traditions and values, to give them the sheen of holiness. In doing so, they subordinate Jesus to the United States, engaging in an idolatry that appeals to those who are certain that, even if God isn't a Republican or a Democrat, a conservative, liberal, libertarian, or socialist, God is an American. This false wisdom may help churches get along with people who would rather not be confronted with the truth about the flaws of this nation we love, but it will leave the people who accept it far from the true God of the universe we know in Jesus.
Sadly, many embrace other forms of false and worldly wisdom in the so-called "liberal" denominations, like our own Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
An official web site of our ELCA, called Living Lutheran, recently published a sermon by Pastor Delmer Chilton, an assistant to the bishop of the ELCA’s Southeastern Synod. His text was Mark 7:24-37, a passage of the Bible that we looked at a few weeks ago. It deals with Jesus’ encounter with a Syrophoenician woman, a Gentile, a non-Jew, whose daughter had a demon.
Jesus, you’ll remember, at first appears to refuse the woman her request. “Let the children [by which Jesus means the children of Israel] be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” “Dogs” was the put-down term Jews used about Gentiles, who they believed could never be saved from sin and death nor be right with God. But we know that Jesus came to die and rise for all people, giving eternal life to all who turn from sin and believe in Him alone as God and authority over their lives.
We also know that Jesus is God the Son: all-knowing, all-powerful. “The Father and I are one,” Jesus tells us [John 10:30].
So, we are momentarily mystified by Jesus’ seeming refusal of this woman’s request.
But as we pointed out a few weeks ago, the word that Jesus uses for dogs is the word for puppies. The Syrophoenician woman immediately picks up on Jesus’ playful phrasing, understanding not only that Jesus is going to grant her request, but that He is using this incident as a memorable sign that His grace can reach and change the life of any person, whatever their nationality or former religious persuasion. As Jesus will put it elsewhere in Mark’s gospel, “The one who believes in Me and is baptized will be saved; but the one who does not believe in Me will be condemned.”
In his ELCA official web site sermon, Delmer Chilton ignores all that Jesus claims about Himself throughout the rest of the gospels and says that Jesus really was going to turn the Syrophoenician woman down until she taught Jesus what it means to be God and Savior of the world. Chilton claims that after this encounter, “Jesus stands corrected...the woman has helped Jesus understand a difficult part of Scripture and a difficult part of his call.”
Folks, this is the cunning, shrewd, self-serving wisdom of the world dressed up as Christianity. It’s the same kind of sin the devil has been enticing proud people into embracing since the garden of Eden.
You see, if you whittle God down to your size, then you, not God, can call the shots. You can tell God how to be God. You can decide what truths in God’s Word you’ll accept as authoritative over your life and what ones you’ll ignore or denigrate. It allows you to remake Christian truth in ways that are more palatable to you.
Operating from the same mindset, the pastor of an ELCA congregation in Santa Fe, New Mexico told another newspaper a few weeks ago that Bible “is not a talking book” [a surprise to anyone who’s been taught that the Bible is the Word of God in which God speaks to us] and then, he asserted, the Bible “doesn’t tell me what to do.”
Turn please, to 2 Timothy 3:16. It says:
The kind of wisdom that we need isn’t the wisdom of the world, or of the devil, or even from within ourselves. James describes it in James 3:17: “But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.”
Life is too big for us to figure it out on our own.
We need the wisdom God gives to those who humbly surrender their lives to Jesus Christ. Look again at our text, at James 4:7-8:
I've gotten into trouble when I have followed my own thoughtful analysis of circumstances, instead of following Jesus. God gave us our brains. So, we are to use them. But if my brain isn't subordinated to the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ, I will inevitably make unwise choices. As Proverbs 14:12 reminds us: “There is a way that seems right to [human beings], but its end is the way of death.”
I've also gotten myself into trouble when I have followed my heart instead of following Jesus. God gave us our emotions and they can bless our lives. But if my heart isn't subordinated to Jesus Christ, I make unwise decisions. Jeremiah 17:9 says that the human heart "is devious above all else; it is perverse..."
I've also gotten myself into trouble when I've followed the crowd or some individual I respect or like, instead of following Christ. Proverbs 11:14 tells us, "Where there is no guidance, a nation falls, but in abundance of counselors there is safety." It's good to get the advice of other people. But if those other people aren't following Jesus, their advice is, at best, suspect.
I've gotten myself into trouble in life then, when I haven't followed the wisdom of God.
But, how can we operate from God’s wisdom, rather than the wisdom of the world?
For me, one passage of Scripture seems to best summarize God’s counsel and command for those who want to live in the wisdom of God every day of their lives.
Please turn to Romans 12:1-2.
It says:
Jesus says, “...wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction [that is, to hell and separation from God], and there are many who [take this route]...[But] narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life and there are few who find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14)
We all have decisions to make in life. Surrender to Jesus Christ and God will guide you to make wise choices.
Sometimes those choices will lead you through pain and growth and maturity you’d just as soon not acquire.
But when you choose to follow Jesus Christ, you will always be living wisely.
You will always be on the way that leads to life. Amen
James 3:13-4:8
Robert Frost’s famous poem, The Road Not Taken, begins:
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,Anyone who has ever had to make a decision in life can identify with those lines. We all must make decisions.
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could.
Some decisions we make, of course, have more importance than others.
The career path we will follow.
Who we will marry.
How much effort we will choose to put into our relationships.
What to do in caring for elderly parents.
Life is filled with consequential decisions and, as we make them, we feel the need for wisdom.
In today’s second lesson, James, the earthly brother of Jesus and leader of the Christians in Jerusalem, says that there are two kinds of wisdom. And the consequences these two divergent forms of wisdom bring into our lives are dramatically different. Turn please to the lesson, James 3:13-4:8.
James begins with a question:
“Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him [or her] show by good conduct that his [or her] works are done in the meekness of wisdom.”Now, truth be told, we don’t like being told to be meek. We flinch when Jesus says, in the Sermon on the Mount, “the meek will inherit the earth.” But, we don’t want to inherit the earth. We want it now! We’re not into delayed gratification.
And if the rows of self-help books you find in most bookstores are any indication, our idea of wisdom has to do with being shrewd and bold about getting what we want when we want it, no matter who or what gets in the way.
James well describes the shrewd, plotting wisdom that the world usually recommends to us:
"But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly [from the world, not from God in heaven], sensual [it gratifies the parts of us slated for death], demonic [from hell, the place of everlasting punishment and condemnation for those who turn their backs on Jesus Christ]. For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there."The problem with the wisdom generated by human beings is that it’s me-centered. Buy into the “wisdom” of this world and you may achieve things that the world considers great, but you will not be in alignment with God’s will that we love God and love others as we love ourselves. You will, as Jesus says, "gain the world and lose your life."
This sort of death-dealing wisdom even has been given place in the twenty-first century Church.
For example, some conservative denominations and Christian megachurches wrap Jesus in the American flag to justify everything about American traditions and values, to give them the sheen of holiness. In doing so, they subordinate Jesus to the United States, engaging in an idolatry that appeals to those who are certain that, even if God isn't a Republican or a Democrat, a conservative, liberal, libertarian, or socialist, God is an American. This false wisdom may help churches get along with people who would rather not be confronted with the truth about the flaws of this nation we love, but it will leave the people who accept it far from the true God of the universe we know in Jesus.
Sadly, many embrace other forms of false and worldly wisdom in the so-called "liberal" denominations, like our own Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
An official web site of our ELCA, called Living Lutheran, recently published a sermon by Pastor Delmer Chilton, an assistant to the bishop of the ELCA’s Southeastern Synod. His text was Mark 7:24-37, a passage of the Bible that we looked at a few weeks ago. It deals with Jesus’ encounter with a Syrophoenician woman, a Gentile, a non-Jew, whose daughter had a demon.
Jesus, you’ll remember, at first appears to refuse the woman her request. “Let the children [by which Jesus means the children of Israel] be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” “Dogs” was the put-down term Jews used about Gentiles, who they believed could never be saved from sin and death nor be right with God. But we know that Jesus came to die and rise for all people, giving eternal life to all who turn from sin and believe in Him alone as God and authority over their lives.
We also know that Jesus is God the Son: all-knowing, all-powerful. “The Father and I are one,” Jesus tells us [John 10:30].
So, we are momentarily mystified by Jesus’ seeming refusal of this woman’s request.
But as we pointed out a few weeks ago, the word that Jesus uses for dogs is the word for puppies. The Syrophoenician woman immediately picks up on Jesus’ playful phrasing, understanding not only that Jesus is going to grant her request, but that He is using this incident as a memorable sign that His grace can reach and change the life of any person, whatever their nationality or former religious persuasion. As Jesus will put it elsewhere in Mark’s gospel, “The one who believes in Me and is baptized will be saved; but the one who does not believe in Me will be condemned.”
In his ELCA official web site sermon, Delmer Chilton ignores all that Jesus claims about Himself throughout the rest of the gospels and says that Jesus really was going to turn the Syrophoenician woman down until she taught Jesus what it means to be God and Savior of the world. Chilton claims that after this encounter, “Jesus stands corrected...the woman has helped Jesus understand a difficult part of Scripture and a difficult part of his call.”
Folks, this is the cunning, shrewd, self-serving wisdom of the world dressed up as Christianity. It’s the same kind of sin the devil has been enticing proud people into embracing since the garden of Eden.
You see, if you whittle God down to your size, then you, not God, can call the shots. You can tell God how to be God. You can decide what truths in God’s Word you’ll accept as authoritative over your life and what ones you’ll ignore or denigrate. It allows you to remake Christian truth in ways that are more palatable to you.
Operating from the same mindset, the pastor of an ELCA congregation in Santa Fe, New Mexico told another newspaper a few weeks ago that Bible “is not a talking book” [a surprise to anyone who’s been taught that the Bible is the Word of God in which God speaks to us] and then, he asserted, the Bible “doesn’t tell me what to do.”
Turn please, to 2 Timothy 3:16. It says:
“All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof [that means censuring or rebuking for wandering away from God’s will], for correction, for instruction in righteousness...”There are things we may not understand in the Bible, but it is the living Word of God, the place we go to find hope, salvation, truth, and God's will for our lives. It records God's definitive disclosure of Himself, first to ancient Israel and ultimately to all the world, through Jesus Christ. This is the God Who will give us wisdom for every decision we may face in life, if will will only ask for it in Jesus' Name. James 1:5 reminds us: “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him [or her] ask God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given...”
The kind of wisdom that we need isn’t the wisdom of the world, or of the devil, or even from within ourselves. James describes it in James 3:17: “But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.”
Life is too big for us to figure it out on our own.
We need the wisdom God gives to those who humbly surrender their lives to Jesus Christ. Look again at our text, at James 4:7-8:
“Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”In my own life, whether before I turned from atheism to faith in Christ or in the years since I fell in love with Jesus, I have always gotten into spiritual danger, relational danger, and the danger of forgetting who God made me to be and who Christ, by His cross and resurrection, freed me to be in when I do three different things.
I've gotten into trouble when I have followed my own thoughtful analysis of circumstances, instead of following Jesus. God gave us our brains. So, we are to use them. But if my brain isn't subordinated to the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ, I will inevitably make unwise choices. As Proverbs 14:12 reminds us: “There is a way that seems right to [human beings], but its end is the way of death.”
I've also gotten myself into trouble when I have followed my heart instead of following Jesus. God gave us our emotions and they can bless our lives. But if my heart isn't subordinated to Jesus Christ, I make unwise decisions. Jeremiah 17:9 says that the human heart "is devious above all else; it is perverse..."
I've also gotten myself into trouble when I've followed the crowd or some individual I respect or like, instead of following Christ. Proverbs 11:14 tells us, "Where there is no guidance, a nation falls, but in abundance of counselors there is safety." It's good to get the advice of other people. But if those other people aren't following Jesus, their advice is, at best, suspect.
I've gotten myself into trouble in life then, when I haven't followed the wisdom of God.
But, how can we operate from God’s wisdom, rather than the wisdom of the world?
For me, one passage of Scripture seems to best summarize God’s counsel and command for those who want to live in the wisdom of God every day of their lives.
Please turn to Romans 12:1-2.
It says:
“I beseech you therefore, [brothers and sisters], by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”Wisdom--as well as life, hope, and joy--comes to those who give their all to the God Who gave His all to us in Jesus Christ. Wisdom comes to those who surrender to Christ!
Jesus says, “...wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction [that is, to hell and separation from God], and there are many who [take this route]...[But] narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life and there are few who find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14)
We all have decisions to make in life. Surrender to Jesus Christ and God will guide you to make wise choices.
Sometimes those choices will lead you through pain and growth and maturity you’d just as soon not acquire.
But when you choose to follow Jesus Christ, you will always be living wisely.
You will always be on the way that leads to life. Amen
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
From Someone Who's 'Dumber Than Dirt'
The biggest regrets of my life are all associated with those times when I have impulsively decided to do what I wanted to do, rather than taking the time to seek the wisdom of God in the Bible and through prayer in Jesus' Name.
Fifty-eight years on Planet Earth have taught me that I'm not "all that" and that the mere passage of years doesn't make a person wise. Only the God we know and follow in Jesus Christ can give us wisdom. That's why I love Proverbs 9:10 in the Old Testament:
We may not always like the guidance that God gives to us, but it will always set us on the right path. I can't say that about the "wisdom" I might derive from myself or other people.
So, seek God's wisdom. Dig into God's Word, the Bible. Lift up prayers for counsel to God through prayer in Jesus' Name. Ask God to send Christian counselors to you as you make decisions. And ask God to give you the faith to walk in the paths He marks out for you.
James writes in the New Testament:
Check out these thoughts on getting wisdom from God in today's post at Our Daily Bread. Be sure to read Proverbs 2:1-9, on which it's based, first.
Fifty-eight years on Planet Earth have taught me that I'm not "all that" and that the mere passage of years doesn't make a person wise. Only the God we know and follow in Jesus Christ can give us wisdom. That's why I love Proverbs 9:10 in the Old Testament:
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,Though my use of God's wisdom has often been limited by my own egotistical resistance to taking instruction from anyone or anything besides my intelligence, knowledge, common sense, or emotional impulses, I've learned that God is not stingy about giving us His wisdom if we're humble enough to ask for it.
and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.
We may not always like the guidance that God gives to us, but it will always set us on the right path. I can't say that about the "wisdom" I might derive from myself or other people.
So, seek God's wisdom. Dig into God's Word, the Bible. Lift up prayers for counsel to God through prayer in Jesus' Name. Ask God to send Christian counselors to you as you make decisions. And ask God to give you the faith to walk in the paths He marks out for you.
James writes in the New Testament:
If any of you is lacking in wisdom, ask God, Who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly, and it will be given you. (James 1:5)My wife and I often say that, in so many ways in life, we are "dumber than dirt." But we've found, often against our own wills or initial judgments, that God is a lot wiser than we are and that when we submit to Him, He helps us to make wise decisions.
Check out these thoughts on getting wisdom from God in today's post at Our Daily Bread. Be sure to read Proverbs 2:1-9, on which it's based, first.
Monday, November 03, 2008
What is the Christian's Responsibility When It Comes to Voting?
[The following is a piece I wrote for our congregation's November newsletter.]
While some of us may have taken advantage of early voting by now, November 4, brings election day. What is the Christian’s responsibility when it comes to voting?
For the follower of Jesus Christ living in a democracy, the command to love our neighbor, I believe, includes responsible citizenship. And responsible citizenship, in turn, can entail voting.
I say that it can entail voting because merely casting a ballot is no sign of being a good citizen.
The right to vote can be abused or misused as easily as other privileges we have in life. To cast an uninformed vote, to vote for a candidate simply because of their party affiliation, or because we like the way a candidate looks, are common ways in which we can misuse the privilege of voting.
If we’re uninformed about a particular race, we should probably not vote in that contest. We exercise good stewardship of our citizenship when we cast an informed vote. If we do feel informed though, then we should by all means, vote. One could even say that we have a Christian duty to vote.
This raises another question: What do we do if after fully informing ourselves, we feel no enthusiasm for any candidate?
Here are a few points to consider.
First: Remember that politicians are people too. Those who seek public office are, just everybody else, members of the human race of whom the Bible observes: “There is no one who is righteous, not even one...” (Romans 1:10) Perfection is not the benchmark standard for us to apply to our political leaders. I’m certainly not suggesting that you overlook what appears to be an overtly rotten character in a candidate. But I do suggest cutting candidates some slack for being human. Remember that even George Washington, as great as he undeniably was, didn’t start out with his face chiseled onto Mount Rushmore.
Second: Pray about your vote. Ask God to clarify your thinking and to give you wisdom. The Bible says, “If any of you is lacking in wisdom, ask God, who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly, and it will be given to you” (James 1:5).
Finally: “Sin boldly.” This strange bit of advice came from Martin Luther for Christians sincerely weighing decisions. Luther advised Christians to read God’s Word, talk things over with trusted Christian friends, and to pray. If, after all of that, your course remains unclear, do what you think is right. Your judgment could be wrong. But you can have a clear conscience because you know that your intent is to do God’s will.
While some of us may have taken advantage of early voting by now, November 4, brings election day. What is the Christian’s responsibility when it comes to voting?
For the follower of Jesus Christ living in a democracy, the command to love our neighbor, I believe, includes responsible citizenship. And responsible citizenship, in turn, can entail voting.
I say that it can entail voting because merely casting a ballot is no sign of being a good citizen.
The right to vote can be abused or misused as easily as other privileges we have in life. To cast an uninformed vote, to vote for a candidate simply because of their party affiliation, or because we like the way a candidate looks, are common ways in which we can misuse the privilege of voting.
If we’re uninformed about a particular race, we should probably not vote in that contest. We exercise good stewardship of our citizenship when we cast an informed vote. If we do feel informed though, then we should by all means, vote. One could even say that we have a Christian duty to vote.
This raises another question: What do we do if after fully informing ourselves, we feel no enthusiasm for any candidate?
Here are a few points to consider.
First: Remember that politicians are people too. Those who seek public office are, just everybody else, members of the human race of whom the Bible observes: “There is no one who is righteous, not even one...” (Romans 1:10) Perfection is not the benchmark standard for us to apply to our political leaders. I’m certainly not suggesting that you overlook what appears to be an overtly rotten character in a candidate. But I do suggest cutting candidates some slack for being human. Remember that even George Washington, as great as he undeniably was, didn’t start out with his face chiseled onto Mount Rushmore.
Second: Pray about your vote. Ask God to clarify your thinking and to give you wisdom. The Bible says, “If any of you is lacking in wisdom, ask God, who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly, and it will be given to you” (James 1:5).
Finally: “Sin boldly.” This strange bit of advice came from Martin Luther for Christians sincerely weighing decisions. Luther advised Christians to read God’s Word, talk things over with trusted Christian friends, and to pray. If, after all of that, your course remains unclear, do what you think is right. Your judgment could be wrong. But you can have a clear conscience because you know that your intent is to do God’s will.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)