What do I do?!!

A friend of mine was sharing the pain and fear he is experiencing as a result of the slow economy.  He is a single parent and told of how he tries to stay strong for his eight-year old son, but cries when he is alone almost daily.  Losing his house is only a couple of months away.  The vehicle has to go.  And it broke his heart to tell his son that they could no longer afford the cable bill. He so wants to be a good dad and faithful provider for his son.

Hurricanes.  Gas shortages. An economy on the brink of collapse.  Fear of terroristic attacks.  It is a very humbling time.  We are a people who are being reminded that we need God.  What are we to do in response to the crises we are facing personally and as a nation?

When Jesus was asked what He believed was the greatest commandment, He responded, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind and will all your strength.  And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself."  He then said, "All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments."  I believe he gave us the answer to every, "What do I do?" question.  "What do I do with my life?"  Love God and love others.  "What do I do if I get cancer?"  Love God and love others.  "What do I if it looks like I'm going to lose everything?"  Yes, love God and love others.

It raises the question, "Ok, how do I love God?  What does that look like?"  Think of how you love anyone.  You delight in them.  You give your heart over to them.  You devote yourself to them and their desires become your priority.  It is your joy to serve them and bless them, and you constantly want to let them know their worth in your eyes.

Communicating to God His worth to us is what we do when we worship.  Worship is more than just singing songs to God.  We are "worshiping" whenever we give our hearts and lives to something in hopes of a return of life.  Sadly, we don't always worship God, the source of life.  We erect idols in our hearts that we believe will bring us security, comfort, or pleasure.  Anything we look to for life and for our needs to be met outside of God or that which God provides is an idol.

If we want to love God with all our hearts, we have to take an honest look at our lives and identify the idols we, even as Christians, are worshiping over God.  The present crisis in our nation is exposing our idols in a powerful way.

The prophet Ezekiel brought the word of God to his children, the Israelites, when they had given themselves over to idols, and the result was to be the destruction of their nation, including the temple of God in Jerusalem.  In chapter 14, he gives the reason why. God says to Ezekiel, "Son of man, these men have set up idols in their hearts and put wicked stumbling blocks before their faces.  Should I let them inquire of me at all?  Therefore speak to them and tell them, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says:  When any Israelite sets up idols in his heart and puts a wicked stumbling block before his face and goes to a prophet, I the LORD will answer him myself in keeping with his great idolatry.  I will do this to recapture the hearts of the people of Israel, who have all deserted me for their idols. Therefore say to the house of Israel, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Repent!  Turn from your idols and renounce all your detestable practices!" (vs. 3-5)

God, who is always, always, always, motivated by love "answers" his children's idolatry in order to recapture their hearts.  In verse 13, he speaks of his response to a nation's idolatry: "Son of man, if a country sins against me by being unfaithful and I stretch out my hand against it to cut off its food supply and send famine upon it and kill its men and their animals, even if these three men - Noah, Daniel, and Job - were in it, they could save only themselves by their righteousness, declares the Sovereign LORD.

It is a tragic reality that when a nation's unfaithfulness brings God's loving judgment, even the children of the most righteous in the land will not escape its effect.  Would anyone argue that our country has sinned by being unfaithful?  We've legalized the killing of unborn children. We're beginning to legally affirm same-sex marriages that only helps to keep God's children from experiencing the healing and restoration from the Fall that He longs to provide.  Our greed is ranked among the highest in the world and we are the greatest producer of immoral entertainment. And it's quite obvious that we, as a nation, have a trusted plastic cards and the banks they represent, to give us the life we think we need rather than trusting God who is life.  Ultimately though, the problem is not that the nation has been unfaithful.  What is bringing God's judgment is that we, God's children, the Christians, have been unfaithful.  We have stood silent, we have set up idols in our hearts over God, and we taken on lifestyles of sin.  We have done what anyone will do when they do not know, experientially, the love of God demonstrated on the Cross of Christ, that fills every need.

Loving God with all our hearts requires we acknowledge the idols to which we have given our hearts, and that we renounce them and every detestable practice.  "Repent" is a beautiful word as it admonishes us to reorient ourselves to God who always loves us, who is always for us, and who always is ready to give us true, abundant life.  He is perfectly faithful and committed to providing for our needs, spiritually, physically, and emotionally.  The present crises is not a time for panic.  It is a time to be grateful to God for doing whatever is necessary to turn our hearts back to Him.  He knows how good He is and He wants us to experience just how good He is.  He wants to show us again what life is all about.

My friend told me how his son responded to the news about the cable bill.  Smiling lovingly, he said, "Dad, don't worry about it.  We don't need that TV.  That just means we'll have more time to play together."  Isn't that beautiful? The desire of his heart was to be a good dad and provide for his son.  In losing the trappings of this world, he hears his son communicate what he really wants and needs from him: Time together. It's the kind of thing God knows will be experienced all over our nation as he reminds His people what life is all about.  Yes, loving God and loving others.

God Loves a "Pest"

Several years ago, some friends of ours gave my sons a trampoline for Christmas.  They loved it, and they loved for their daddy to jump on it with them.  I admit, I enjoyed it too, but it was exhausting, especially with my, then four-year old  sonwho always wanted me to hold him while we jumped.  One weekend, I had already been talked into a trampoline session by my two youngest sons, had spent all my energy and had flopped into a lawn chair to recuperate when my oldest son appeared.  

"Dad, let's go jump on the trampoline."  

"Sorry,  son. Already did that and I'm all worn out.  Sorry you missed it."  

C'mon, Dad.  Please!"  

"Son,  I'm sorry.  You could have jumped with us, but you were inside watching tv."  

"But I didn't know.  Nobody told me." 

"Son, I'm just too tired. You snooze, you lose."  

"Dad, P-L-E-A-S-E!"

Somewhere in the midst of that conversation, it dawned on me: This is really important to him.

 

Because I love my son, I let him help me out of the lawn chair and returned to the trampoline, jumped with him, wrestled with him, and had a great time.  Of course, because I love my son, if he had asked for something that I knew wasn't good for him, he could have asked an infinite number of times, and I wouldn't have budged.  But, either way his persistent pestering would have communicated something to me about him and his heart.

When Jesus teaches on prayer, a consistent theme is persistence.  In Luke 11, He tells a story about a friend who comes at midnight to ask for bread for another friend.  "Don't bother me.  The door is already locked, and my children are with me in bed. I can't get up and give you anything."  Sounds familiar.  Then Jesus adds, "I tell you, though he will not get up and give him the bread because he is his friend,  yet because of the man's boldness he will get up and give him as much as he needs."

Then again in Luke 18, Jesus told his disciples a parable to "show them that they should always pray and not give up."  He describes a godless judge who didn't care about people, but who was being approached with a plea for justice, over and over again, by a persistent widow. "For some time he refused.  But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!'" (vs. 4,5)  

Have you ever thought about how much faith it takes to "pester" God, or for a child to beg a parent to do something?  If my son had no hope that I would grant his request to jump on the trampoline, he might ask once for the heck of it, but there's no way he would plead and plead if he didn't really believe his pleading would rouse me to move.   We typically spend our energy on what we believe makes a difference.

What if God is willing to help, to heal, to give guidance, to restore, to bless, but is waiting to see if our hearts are fully engaged, and watching to see if what we are asking is really important to us. What if He's waiting to see if we really believe?  No, waiting to see is what I did with my son.  It took me "realizing" that jumping on the trampoline was important to my son to get me out of the reclined position. God already knows what's important to us .  He knows we won't ask and ask and ask if we don't believe we'll receive.  He knows we won't knock and knock and knock if we don't believe the door will be opened.  He knows we won't seek and seek and seek if we have no hope of finding Him.  We can sometimes fool the people in our lives, or even ourselves, with half-hearted efforts, but we can never fool God. Since He already knows, I guess our persistence in prayer give us an indicator of our faith, because if I really believe and something is truly important to me , I will persist.  I will plead.  I will pester. 

The weird thing is, the more I plead, the more I believe. 

Stinging Questions

    Last week I enjoyed the fruits of a revived hobby of mine.  I had taken a season or two off from beekeeping after a not-so-glorious first attempt several years back.  It wasn't a great year for honey since the summer's first heavy rain came just as the long-awaited sourwood blooms appeared.  However, I was blessed with more honey than some, and I remembered the lessons I had learned the last time I robbed the hives.  Some of you may remember my story about taking the honey and putting it in my garage, not realizing how good bees were at finding what they had worked so hard to produce.  I'll never forget the sight of that swarm and having to walk right into the middle of it to get the bee suit I needed to start the whole process over again.  I didn't make that mistake again, and there were new lessons to be learned this year.  Thanks to Tony and Dana Southern who sold me the hives, I learned how to spot the queen, how check to see how she was laying, even how to raise a new queen and start a new colony.  And, as the summer wore on, I learned what would be a no-brainer to most of us: you don't mess with the hives unless you're wearing your bee-suit, especially when you're young in the hobby and the bees can detect your nerves.  It actually took a couple of times of getting stung during what I thought would be simple, non-disturbing procedures, before I vowed to alway work fully clothed with protection.

     It might not take too many bee stings before making such a vow, but what would it take for us to vow to face each day's challenges of life fully clothed with the armor of God?  Do we wake up each day with the awareness that "our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" as Paul explains in Ephesians 6?  I mean, really?  Is that our conscious reality?  Do our lives reflect that we have taken Peter's warning seriously when he said, "Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour"?  Satan's mind is not set on tempting us.  He wants to kill us! To "steal, kill and destroy" is the way Jesus put it in John 10.  Paul tells us to put on the full armor of God so that we may take our stand against the devil's schemes.  I'm pretty sure if we were fully aware of what he is scheming to do we would be much more motivated to suit up.

     Here's my take on the pieces of the armor Paul mentions.  The "belt of truth" that holds the pieces together and on which the weapons hang is remembering the truth of our new identity in Christ.  By faith in Christ's death and resurrection for us, we become, not slaves, but sons and daughters of God and blood-brothers with Jesus Christ.  We are no longer just sinners saved by grace, but now are saints being formed in the image of Christ.  We are no longer slaves to sin, but are free.  We are co-heirs with Christ and we have access to all that He earned on our behalf. He is our life (at least He wants to be) and in him is the abundant life.

     The "breastplate of righteousness" that we put on was earned by Jesus' perfect performance.  Because of it, the enemy has no power to condemn us any more with those foul words, "Look at you!  You're nothing but a ________!  You might as well give up and give in to who you "really are" because you'll never be good enough!"  By putting on the breastplate of Christ's righteousness, we protect our hearts from the attacks on our true identity in Christ that come from Satan and often through the one's in our lives that we love the most.  He was and is "good enough" in our place.  And, when we act in obedience and our lives are consistent with this righteousness, we don't give the devil "a foothold."  If we realized how much power we give the enemy over us when we sin, we would be much more motivated to fight and not give in to temptation.

      The "shoes of the gospel of peace" that we are encouraged to wear each day remind us of our new purpose and calling.  A Christian's life is not his own any more, but he now shares Christ's mission of reconciling people with God through the good news of the peace Jesus made available to us.  By focusing on what we are now about, we are not as vulnerable to the enemy's efforts to distract and derail us into making life about us and our own comfort again.

     The "shield of faith" combats the original lies of Satan:  You can't trust God and you're on your own to make sure your needs are met.  If you think about it, every temptation to sin is just an attempt to entice us to look to something besides God to meet our needs and desires.  In a time of great economic challenges, the world needs to see us putting our faith in God and not allowing Satan to rob us of our peace and our purpose of living to bring God glory.

      The "helmet of Salvation" protects our minds and the control center of our bodies as we remember what Jesus has done and what it cost him.  It took one sin to corrupt the entire human race and to require Jesus' death on the cross.  Would we give in to Satan's lie that sin is no big deal, that it's inevitable, that "it's covered anyway so enjoy it" if we were aware of what our salvation cost Jesus or how our sin breaks the heart of God?  We are saved, and the truth is we have His Spirit in us that is willing and able to resist every effort of the enemy to lead us into life-sucking, glory of God diminishing sin.  And the helmet of salvation reminds us that WE ARE LOVED!

       The "Sword of the Spirit, the word of God" is the weapon in hand that Paul tells us to wield against the enemy.  Satan, the father of lies, flees whenever truth is swung at him.  He knows his power is in his deception.  He constantly throws out, "You're alone and on your own."  "You're not lovable."  "You'll never be good enough." Or, "You could be good enough if you would just try harder."  "You need this or that to feel complete."  The truth is we are not alone and never forsaken.  God has proven how much he loves us, that "while we were still sinners Christ died for us."  We will never be good enough, but Christ is good enough for us.  And we are complete in Christ, and all we need is what He supplies!  You and I need to know scripture so we can "remind" Satan of the the truth and that he has been defeated.

     And last, Paul tells us to "pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests."  If you and I ever want to know that our prayers are powerful and effective, we will need to grasp what Paul is talking about when he says to "pray in the Spirit." (That phrase would be something great to study or even "google"!) When we agree with what the Spirit that lives in us is already praying, and allow our voices to speak it out, something powerful happens in the effort to bring the kingdom of God to earth. Satan's schemes will again be thwarted.

     So may you and I live in reality as God's word describes, with an awareness of what we are facing as we go about each day.  And may we vow to suit up each day so that we take our stand against the devil's schemes.

 (Men, if you would like to grow in understanding the reality of the story you were born into, who you are in Christ, and how to fight against what the enemy is up to as he schemes against you, your wife and your children, you may want to read "Wild at Heart" and "Waking the Dead" by John Eldredge and check out a retreat opportunity at the end of October at www.bandofbrothersweekend.org.)