Ignorance Before the Sin...
When you are tempted to sin, one of the counter measures that God uses to try and stop you from acting on the temptation is to show you all the negative consequences that will follow your committing that sin. The enemy, in contrast, doesn’t want you to have any awareness at all of any negative consequences that would follow if you give in to the temptation. If you have any thought whatsoever that there’s a possibility of a particular negative consequence to taking a certain action, that is one more barrier, one more hurdle that the tempter has to surpass. He would much rather you simply focus on some imagined good consequence that you become convinced will result from taking the action he is tempting you to take.
For example, there are many sins we are tempted to give into that would result in the people who know of us having a lower opinion of us. In short, if we do these things, and people find out (as so often happens), then our reputation will be ruined. But we often don’t think about such negative consequences when we are in the throes of being tempted. As we imagine the positive consequences that we believe, in the moment, will result from taking this or that action, it’s easy to gloss over or never even consider the possibility that there could be real negative consequences to the considered action.
Live in the Tension
I was reading Matthew 25, and was struck by how unkind and non-generous Jesus sounds here. The foolish bridesmaids get left outside of the feast. The servant who took no risks and played it safe gets thrown into outer darkness with weeping and gnashing of teeth. The goats get sent into eternal fire with the devil and his angels. This isn't Jesus Meek and Mild. This is serious talk of real judgment.
So how are we supposed to resolve the Prince of Peace with eternal judgment and punishment? To be honest, at the moment I'm not sure. But I don't buy the idea that says we can pick and choose what we want to strip from scripture, just so it smooths out our own ruffled feathers and pet explanations
With situations like this, I want to enter into the mystery offered here. I want to believe that there is some way of understanding reality that satisfies the powerful love, grace, and mercy of Jesus and, at the same time, also includes the pictures of an ultimate end, a final judgment. But instead of conveniently ignoring one side or the other of the mystery to get to the solution via shortcuts, I want to live in that tension that usually arises with such scenarios. In my opinion, we only find the truth when we can get past our discomfort and live in the tensions that arise instead of looking for "cheap" and convenient ways of resolving the tension.
Honor and Dignity
Do you care about dignity? Would you ever allow yourself to be dignified?
What role does honor play in your life? Do you ever make a priority of being honorable?
I feel like when I grew up in the 70's, I witnessed the end of generations for whom honor and dignity and duty might have meant something. There seemed to broadly be social pressure to live honorably, to be upright, honest, and hard-working, among the older people I knew growing up.
But the culture at large pushed away from all that, in favor of spontaneous expression and greater opportunity to say, wear, and do anything that anyone felt like.
I want to steer my children, and influence culture in my small corner of the world, toward honor and dignity. I hope I can someday be known as a man both honorable and dignified. I hope I don't let down anyone who already sees me that way.
The Importance of Why
If people don't have a real understanding of the deeper reasons why they should do something, they will push back against anyone who says they should do it. For a couple of examples, take traditional marriage and paying taxes. There are many people who believe that one or the other (or in some cases both) is a waste of time.
Some may believe that traditional marriage is based solely on patriarchalism and oppressive ideas about some people being worth more than others. The good things that they think marriage is supposed to bring are more easily and justly obtained through other arrangements and agreements. They are happy to see declining rates of participation in marriage among society as a whole.
Some believe that taxes are a way for established interests to steal money that rightfully belongs to individuals. They believe that money paid to the government is completely or largely wasted. They certainly see no moral obligation to paying taxes, or at least to paying all their taxes. They would be thrilled to see their taxes go down and down and down.
But in both cases, participation in these social institutions would be greatly helped by the participants or potential participants understanding the best arguments, the most powerful classic and contemporary reasons, why we should give them our participation, respect, and even defense. In their (or our) ignorance of these reasons, we may do damage to such institutions as these, and thereby to the vulnerable people that social institutions are (at their best) designed to protect.
God's Surprises
You cultivate openness to God's surprises by coming to know more deeply, emotionally, psychologically, internally as fully as possible, just who this God is. When we have a long-standing, deeply rooted understanding of who God is, then surprises should not be a terror to us.
Immigration and Abortion
We set up the boundaries. They crossed the boundaries. They now live somewhere that we don't want them to live. It is inconvenient to have their neediness impinging upon our convenience and freedom. And so we want to get rid of them.
"Building Bridges"
Anyone involved with national politics these days who says they want to build bridges with the other side is probably lying. Conventional wisdom these days says they can't build support for their own purposes by painting the most accurate possible picture of the opposition. Public figures today build their support by demeaning, dehumanizing, and demonizing their opponents. Assuming our age continues to get more polarized, no politician will be rewarded with donations or votes by painting the enemy in any light but the most unflattering one. I'm sure it's possible to go too far in dehumanizing one's opponents, with the consequence that one's supporters or potential supporters will turn away. But the threshold for that kind of thing has changed dramatically from decades past. With significantly lowered standards of decency and dignity, national politicians sadly seem to have little to lose by going really negative on their opponents.
Autonomy and the Poor
The glorification of autonomy disfavors the vulnerable, the poor, those without social, financial, or other resources to survive the negative consequences of their and others' mistakes. The bonds of community are meant to help the weak and vulnerable ride out the storms of a fallen world. But if we build and support a society where autonomy is continually celebrated, the "least of these" will be expected to make it on their own when, in many cases, they just can't.
Alone, but Connected
We stand alone, but we stand connected.
Before God's judgment we will stand alone, accountable for everything we've done. But we will also be measured by the degree to which we have lived in healthy, loving connection with others. There will be some measure of accountability for what we did, or should have done, in the lives of other people.
Jesus' Aim
Jesus' work and miracles seem to be geared not simply towards making people healthy or physically whole, but instead to put them in a right understanding (and consequent practice) and relationship towards God. He didn't set up a hospital to heal everyone in Palestine, but was at least somewhat selective, and even apparently reluctant to heal some people. If His goal was first for people to acknowledge their real relationship to God, and to live in the light of Who God really is, then if someone could do that without being physically healed, He apparently might leave such a person in that redeemed, but physically broken, state.
Trusting God
To "place your trust in God" is not merely to believe that you will go to heaven when you die. It is to believe that God is trustworthy to rely on in all the details of this life, as well. Just as we believe that, through God's grace in the blood of Jesus, we will enter paradise in spite of all of our mistakes and sinful choices, so we can trust that God can and will use our lives, with all our mistakes and sinful choices, to bless us and others and Himself. We can relax, in a sense, and take a deep breath of peace when we really accept that God is working in and through us in everything that happens.
God Is Your Protector
Do you really believe that God is your hiding place? Do you really believe that God is with you, really cares about you, and is ready to protect you from any adversity that would really damage you?
There is adversity that God wants us to go through. There are types and instances of adversity that God wants us to go through because He knows it will build us up, closer to what He wants us to be. But there are also types and instances of adversity that will truly damage us. Some adversity will draw us away from God, and away from becoming who and what He wants us to be. The path between where we are and where God wants us to be, who God wants us to become, is not always the same as the most comfortable path. And so, just because something is painful or uncomfortable, or makes us feel bad in some way or another, does not mean that it is an adversity that God is failing to protect us from. It is easy for us, and a society that highly values comfort, to assume that God's protection, if it is genuine and effective, would prevent us from experiencing anything painful, uncomfortable, or unwanted. "Progress" is virtually always equated in our society with comfort, increased comfort. If we don't have increased comfort or perceived control over a situation, we believe that it is inherently bad, broken, and to be avoided. And so, if we look for some evidence or understanding that God is our hiding Place, our protector, if our standard for the evidence of His activity in this manner is simply comfort or perceived control, then we will be repeatedly disappointed, and are likely to come to the conclusion that God is not our protector.
Ultimately, God's goal for us is not our comfort in where we are, who we are, etc. Instead, God's goal for us is reconciliation, with Him, with who He made us to be, with other people, and with all of creation.
Faith Includes Action
Luke 8:43-48; Mark 5:25-34
The woman who had been hemorrhaging for twelve years believed that touching Jesus' garment would bring her healing. And it turned out that she had been correct in that belief. But the power would not have left Him, and she would not have been healed, unless she had acted. She had to reach out. She had to risk. She had to take a chance that He would be angry at her, that He would reject her as unclean (as, under the law she most certainly was). She had to take a chance that it wasn't as simple as touching His clothes. She had to take a chance that He would withhold His healing power to this anonymous, powerless, likely-rejected woman.
Everyone has burdens they carry, struggles that define how they carry themselves, how they see themselves. And most people have at least vague ideas about the way they'd like things to be. Faith healers will remind us that God is all-powerful, and insist that all we have to do is the equivalent of this woman's reaching out to touch Jesus' clothes. The cynical among us tend to reject completely the healers' claims, reminding others and ourselves that God is not a vending machine, a mechanized slave that obeys our every request. God is not tame, and owes no one anything, we are quick to insist.
So the life of faith is not as simplistic, God is not as easily manipulated, as the faith healers insist. But neither are miracles, the chance of true, personal guidance and healing from the Almighty, impossible. To claim that miracles are impossible is to sketch a caricature of God on another end of the spectrum, that of a distant, uncaring, or impotent deity.
Instead, the life of faith is that of co-creation. We do well to remember how much God loves us, how active and involved He is, how He is always at work around us. He is all-powerful. He does love us. He does do miracles. But the tension comes as we work to hold that truth together with the truth that we can't control Him. We don't know what He has planned, can't see what He sees. As we devote ourselves to bringing Him the greatest glory (as is perfectly appropriate to us), we don't know whether our healing, our comfort, or our success will do that, or whether our failure, discomfort, or brokenness will do that.
So that's the tension. We can't guarantee miracles. But if we choose not to act, not to stretch out our hands, we can practically guarantee that God will not respond to us with miraculous power. Take the risk of action based on that unprovable thing you believe is true. When He opens the door, walk out of Egypt. Walk to the sea, to see what He will do. Reach out your hand to touch the tiniest fringe of His clothes. Because you won't find out all that He will work together with you to accomplish until you do.
And there's a bonus: your action may allow others (like Jairus to the woman with the hemorrhage) to see what God can do, and give them the extra push they need to also act, to also grow in their relationship with the One who already loves them more than anyone else.
Three Provocative Questions
- Should society honor the fluidity of identity dictated by one's own internal movements, or should one's identity have a connection to the past, and to the people around you, with an emphasis on solidity instead?
- Should the great disagreements of a society be decided upon by a great bureaucracy staffed with the best experts, telling us all what we are and aren't allowed to do, or should those disagreements be worked out in the rough and tumble of everyday life, of people sitting across the table from others and slowly working towards an agreement not imposed, but arrived at?
- Should America step back from colonialistic overlord-dom to allow the nations of the world to step into greater responsibility and self-determination, or should America accept the responsibility commensurate with its wealth and power and do the best it (in its humanly fallen way) can to create "safe spaces" for other countries to develop towards more humane governmental structures?
The River of Music
I want to write music, to write songs, that reflect, illustrate, and illuminate every passage of Scripture, every great and challenging teaching of every significant branch of the body of Christ. There is already so much good and great music and words that have been created for these purposes. And in an affluent society like ours, with such widespread education and leisure time, thousands of new works are being created all the time.
My creations are just a few drops in an enormous and powerful river. Others will dip their cups into the river and drink of others' works, and receive powerful nourishment and enlightenment from them. Maybe, if I work hard enough, create works that are good enough, and all happens by the grace of our gracious and generous Creator God, perhaps my works will go on to nourish some of those who come to the river to drink.
Cause and Effect, for Granted
We take so much cause for granted. When the pool player breaks at the beginning of the game, the cause is the forward movement of the cue. But saying that takes for granted all the existing conditions: the felt, the flat surface, the manufacture of the balls, the tightness of the racking, etc., etc.
And under it all, before it all, is the assumption of the continuity and consistency of all the known universe. The faithfulness of God, upholding the continued and consistent existence of every quark and photon, is taken almost completely for granted.
Casting Fire Upon the Earth
Here's an interesting juxtaposition that occurred to me this morning:
“"I have come to cast fire upon the earth; and how I wish it were already kindled!”
Luke 12:49 NASB
http://bible.com/100/luk.12.49.nasb
“And there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them.”
Acts 2:3 NASB
Denying Reality
To be pro-choice is to be in profound denial about the fundamental, biological reality of human reproduction and the beautiful, glorious role that women play in that process. It is to celebrate autonomy, to celebrate the division of human from human, human from creation, and human from God. It is to celebrate the fallenness of creation, the brokenness of human nature, the separation of people from each other. In this way, to be pro-choice is to celebrate the natural effects of sin. It is to deny the solidarity we all share with our fellow human beings. If you do not love the child growing within you enough to at least let her survive, how can you love the poor and oppressed whom you have no connection to?
Why Procreation Matters More
"if it feels good, do it" is particularly consequential when it comes to procreation. That's one reason why it's so devastating. It's one thing for our desires to take on a godlike force in making decisions in our lives. But when you combine that with or apply that to sexuality, which of course centrally involves the reproductive system, you end up procreating new people. And if a person is created into a situation where his or her parents are not able to wisely and appropriately raise that child, then far more problems are created then were solved by the initial sense of "if it feels good do it."
Following one's desires is risky at best, but if it is practiced in other areas of life that do not result in a brand-new person existing where they did not before, then the damage is generally more limited. Because sex is centered around the reproductive system, The consequences of actions in that area are of life and death. Generally speaking, contraception tends to mask this fact. Through the use of contraception, people tend to assume that they have control over the process, and therefore can ignore the fact that life and death are at stake, that real people can come into existence through actions involving this area of life.
The secularizing of society, which tends toward seeing people as not complete, divinely inspired souls, but merely physical bags of desire, contributes to this. It tends to suck the hope out of a life, so that all we strive for is the fulfillment of our desires, and we believe that that's all that there can be. And then, on top of emptying our own lives of meaning and value, it then makes it easier to believe that children who are procreated (and then sometimes destroyed through abortion) don't have an intrinsic, enormous value that needs to be preserved or taken care of.