Dare to Imagine a Life of Harmony
Thursday, February 10, 2011 at 10:05AM
Like a guy who shows up at a party in 1980’s MC Hammer pants, obedience is hopelessly out of fashion. The very word obey carries with it ridiculous notions of ancient kingdoms, stupid henchmen, or marital imbalance. Disobedience has always existed, but the idea that our actions should be determined by someone else, is passé among North Americans of all kinds: believers and unbelievers alike.
Isaiah dwelt among a “people of unclean lips.” We dwell among a people of independence. Our heroes are those who will not bow. Our hearts rise to the closing lines of Henley’s poem,
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
I suspect our distrust of obedience flows from our fear of the other--the one whom we are to obey. Why should a woman pledge obedience to a husband who is filled with selfishness and pride? Why should a soldier vow obedience to a government pursuing injustice and oppression? Why would anyone put themselves in the hands of another? We are afraid of the other. What agenda does the other person have? To what purpose does someone else demand we do things his way? To follow someone else’s will is to expose ourselves to exploitation and open ourselves to abuse. No one else could possibly have our good as the highest goal. And even if by some crazy chance someone else did have our best interests at heart, how could we be sure they had the wisdom or strength to bring it about?
We refuse to obey because we see the call to obedience as something foreign and alien to our souls. We hear the voice of the Other and put up our defenses because we think something from the outside is trying to invade our lives, our very being. Our life experience has taught us no one possesses the combination of good intentions, perfect wisdom, and effective power to win our trust. We have become convinced we must protect ourselves.
I believe this lies at the heart of our reticence to obey the Heavenly Father. We resist the commands of God because we are not convinced he is good, or his intentions toward us are safe, or he has the wisdom or power to act on our behalf. It is an issue of trust. Church people tell us of his goodness, but our experience and fear tell us otherwise. Like a panicked, drowning man fighting against the very lifeguard who is trying to pull us to shore the only answer is submission and harmony with the rescue effort, but these are the very things our panic and fear tell us to resist. “Work together with me,” says the lifeguard, “and we will get to the shore.”
What if the Person who loved us most was also the one capable of showing us how to live? What if the Person who has the wisdom to see life as it really is the very one whispering instructions to our heart? “This is the way,” he says, and we feel his breath on our face. “Walk in it.” What if the one who has infinite power and authority wants to use his strength for our good? Our struggle flows from the fact that the news is too good to believe: the most powerful Being in the universe is also the one who loves us most. We are afraid of power because we have seen its abuse. We distrust good intentions because we are sure no one has the wisdom to navigate the maze of life.
It requires a daring imagination: what if we were created to sing in harmony with the One who writes the perfect song? To resist him would be to resist our own good. To harmonize with him would be to sing the song of life. What if obedience is not the requirement of an alien invasion but an invitation to our highest good? What if a life of submission is actually walking in concert with perfect love? All fear would be gone. Our stumblings would be met with our own desire to get back in step.
There is more good news to believe, even for those of us who call ourselves people of faith. We must dare to believe that the One loves us most is the truest guide, the surest hand, and fully capable of showing us the way. His way really is the best thing for us. We must see obedience as harmony with the Source of life, not rules and laws and regulations and requirements and chains and bondage. We must discover again that He is the way, the truth, and the life.
Monday's Meditation: The Cosmic SitCom
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 11:44AM 
It’s the stuff of sitcoms: the authority figure leaves the scene with one final instruction: “Don’t push that button,” or “Don’t drink the wine.” Halfway through the comedy, the rule is broken, the cover-up begins, hilarity ensues. It’s inevitable, right?
I suspect many people have the same view of their relationship with the Heavenly Father. From the very beginning, God is the one who is absent, the one who leaves behind some kind of warning: “Don’t eat from the fruit from this one tree,” or, “Don’t engage is this (or that) activity.” We are the screw-ups in a mad-cap cosmic comedy: eating, drinking, messing up and covering up. It’s inevitable, right?
Except we give such a viewpoint more respectable, religious, language. We are simply “miserable sinners,” constantly in need of grace and forgiveness, provided without measure by Jesus Christ. It’s inevitable, right?
It’s true--his mercy and grace flow unending, constantly meeting our need. Yet many followers of Jesus find themselves trapped in what Dallas Willard calls Miserable Sinner Theology: our destiny is constant failure; his ministry is unending forgiveness. When we limit the work of Jesus to nothing but forgiveness, we lose sight of the possibilities of experiencing a new kind life with him here and now.
This week’s meditation finds it’s source in two passages and two questions:
Passage One: “Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, ‘Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?’ Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, ‘Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?’ No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.” (Deuteronomy 30: 11 - 14)
Passage Two: “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.” (Matthew 28: 18-19)
Question One: Is obedience possible?
Question Two: Is Jesus the kind of person who would demand of us something we can never give?
Body, Soul, and Flu: Why Our Choices Matter
Thursday, February 3, 2011 at 11:59AM 
The peaceful hills of Kentucky have been disturbed by flu season. Around my house and the homes of many of my friends we sit coughing, sneezing, running fevers, and--grumbling. You know the feeling: your body is sick and nothing else seems right with the world. Food tastes like cardboard, the best sitcoms can barely raise a laugh, and life seems pretty sucky in general.
But why? True, we’re sick. But we’ve been sick before and we’ll get better after a while. It’s not a big deal. Even in our sickness, the circumstances of our life are unchanged: we have a job, we have food, clothing, money, and shelter in abundance; our dreams and aspirations remain intact. The sun will rise again and in a few days the memory of the illness fades. But in the moment, while we a are sick, our mood is sour and the pleasures of life are lost to us.
Likewise, the beauty of a spring day coupled with the blessing of good health can cause us to embrace the world with hope: we may still have bills to pay and relationships to settle, but sometimes shear goodness forces its way through our pores and into our souls. Try this sometime: give an extravagant and unexpected gift to someone in need, and watch your own personal joy burst through the happiness meter.
Our momentary sickness brings to the surface a lesson about our nature. In these moments we can discover reality of how the Creator designed human life: we are not people who have a body, we are people comprised of body, soul, and spirit, inseparable and united, each part exerting its influence on the whole of our lives.
In Monday’s Meditation I sang a hymn in praise of mindless obedience. Today, with the able assistance of cold and flu season, I would like to suggest that transformation into the likeness of Jesus does not flow solely from the inside out, but we can also participate in his destiny for us by squeezing ourselves into an outward mold, even if it means our hearts are not fully on board with the process. I would like to suggest that while transformation of the heart is paramount, the outward actions of body can promote our inward health.
Our bodies are important, and how we choose to use them--even if it sometimes means “mindless obedience”-- can determine the condition of our souls.
Like the foolish teenager from Monday’s post we might think that the only obedience that “counts” for anything is the free-flow of heart obedience. We think that to obey God against our inner will is somehow inauthentic. But what if obedience can effect change from the outside in, as well as our heart’s ability to effect obedience from the inside out?
For example, when humanity first contemplated jealousy and murder, God came near with important revelation about the interplay of body and spirit. Yahweh expressed a preference for the sacrifice of Abel instead of the one brought by Cain. Cain became angry with God, his brother, and the whole world. Then Yahweh approached him:
Then the LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will not your countenance be lifted up? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.” (Genesis 4: 6-7 NASB)
In this passage (the first in which the word “sin” is used in the scripture) God reveals the power of doing right, even in the face of our own anger or disappointment. That is, obedience has the power to lift us out of anger and rejection. It’s not a formula: it’s a revelation of how we are made: external choices, even through the struggle of an untoward heart, can lead us out of the pit. Obedience brings the reward of a lifted heart.
The news is even better--to a degree, we can rule over sin. Even when our hearts are angry or hurting, we have the capacity to choose well. The strength comes from Him (after all, the presence of God certainly came near to Cain) but we make the final choice of whether to obey or go our own way. He provides the strength, but we must choose to act in his presence.
All types of obedience, including worship, require the cooperation of his empowerment and our choice. King David looked toward his own heart and commanded himself to praise: “Praise the LORD, my soul . . .” (Psalm 104:1)
The prophet Habakkuk determined to praise God (a response of obedience) simply because it was the right thing to do, regardless of the circumstances. Crop failures, foreign invasion and despair as deep as his bowels do not block his choice:
yet I will rejoice in the LORD,
I will be joyful in God my Savior (Habakkuk 3: 18)
It is God who responds with divine empowerment toward those who have turned his way:
The Sovereign LORD is my strength;
he makes my feet like the feet of a deer,
he enables me to tread on the heights. (verse 19)
What we know intuitively through everyday sickness and health in our bodies can also be true for our developing the life of a disciple. Outward choices can shape inner realities just as much as inner motivations can generate outward responses. Choosing well is within our grasp, and when our grasp fails he is there to help us do what we cannot. Our will, in partnership with his grace, can lead us toward the image of Christ.
Monday's Meditation: In Praise of "Mindless Obedience"
Monday, January 31, 2011 at 10:27AM
“I won’t be a hypocrite. The Bible says partying and getting drunk is a bad thing, but I really like it. Why should I hold back from doing something if that’s what my heart really wants? I don’t think God would appreciate that. Obeying God only counts when we mean it from the heart.”
These are the words of a teenager I once tried to turn back from the edge of reckless behavior. This young person was intelligent, sincere, and determined not to put up a false front. His highest value was “be true to your heart.” He had seen plenty of high-school classmates profess one set of values at some church youth group, yet party themselves into a stupor on Friday nights.
True obedience to the will of God must spring from the heart, right? When Jesus said “if a man looks on a woman lustfully he has already committed adultery,” he was trying to point to the soil of the heart from which all action flows. “Mindless obedience” is the stuff of Pharisees, right?
In our day--perhaps more than any other--we are urged to be be real: “Follow your dreams . . . don’t settle for less . . . be true to your self.” Yes, well, what if I’m a jerk? Should I be true to that self? What if my dreams involve a level of selfishness that puts my family at risk for poverty or loss? Should I be true to those dreams? What if in refusing to settle for less I end up achieving nothing, and must rely on the charity of others? What if following my heart leads me to a god who looks exactly like . . . me?
Monday’s Meditation is a caution: It’s true that the highest obedience flows from a heart conformed to his image: are there lower forms of obedience capable of effecting change from the outside in? How does my heart experience such a transformation, and what is my role in the metamorphosis?
Calming Our Fears
Thursday, January 27, 2011 at 01:41PM 
Just when we are tempted to think these times are unique, the Gospels remind us that people of every generation, every race, and every society have had to cope with fear and uncertainty. The answer is always the same: there is a King in Heaven who will return to earth, and we can participate in His Kingdom right now, even before he returns.
One of the most amazing things about the gospels is how up-to-date they are. No matter how many centuries have passed or how many continents removed, the story of Jesus still speaks to our time and place. Today we find ourselves in a time of political change, in a time economic uncertainty, and in a time of armed conflict. We all share a common concern for safety and security, but find ourselves filled with worry and uncertainty. But we are reading the wrong newspapers and checking the wrong websites: it turns out God’s early edition is still up do date.
In the Luke’s gospel, we get a picture of a society eager to find a solution to their worries. The beginning of Luke chapter 12 tells us that so many people gathered to hear the teachings of Jesus that the crowds grew to many thousands, sometimes in danger of trampling upon one another (Luke 12:1). In that setting Jesus reminded his followers of how to order their priorities and manage their fears.
He taught that our first priority was to be sure that our fears are rightly placed--in reverence to God Himself, the ultimate Judge. Jesus boldly indicated that the only judgment that mattered was the final judgment when the Son of God would return. In the first paragraphs of this chapter (Luke 12: 4-21) we can receive a powerful revelation from the Scriptures, namely that riches in this life are not as important as being “rich toward God.” (v. 21)
After establishing the one ultimate truth about Judgment Day, Jesus then began to address the cares and worries if this world and the here-and-now. He taught that the reality of the Kingdom of God is not simply about the afterlife, but rather that the Kingdom of God should impact the way we think and act now.
Here is how Jesus gives us comfort. He assures us that God cares about our everyday needs. He promises us that we can settle our fears by learning how to trust Him for practical things. In this new relationship with God He will provide for our everyday needs:
And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well. Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. (Luke 12: 29 - 32NIV)
Jesus assures us that the same Father who provides for our eternal life also provides for our needs right now. That is, the benefits of the Kingdom of God can begin right here and now for those who walk in a trusting relationship with him.
Do we really believe that our Heavenly Father is pleased to “give us the Kingdom?” Perhaps we trust him for our assurance of eternity with him, but Jesus is also instructing us that when the Father gives his Kingdom, he is committing himself to look after our needs day-to-day: our needs for food, and shelter, and clothing.
True, in the remaining portion of the chapter He also instructs us to look forward to his return. We should be ready for that day! (verses 35 - 59) How can we depend on God for our eternal destination, without also learning to trust Him for the journey along the way?
These verses about the Kingdom of God in the middle of the chapter are heart of his message. Luke 12 opens and closes with images from the end of the age, but by proclaiming the Kingdom of God in the middle of the chapter, Jesus is reminding us that if our heavenly priorities are correct, his Kingdom can begin to impact our everyday needs, and calm our fears.