Archive for the ‘Spiritual’ Category
OK, so I honestly shy away from talking too much about Scripture on my blog because I’m afraid it will become too preachy. However, I am a preacher, right? And this is Holy Week. So, here you go:
I get really inspired, moved, excited, awed, and amazed every year around Easter. For much of my faith on a daily basis, I focus on the Resurrection. I believe that Christianity should be about the victory of Jesus, the life He gives, and the salvation He brings. However, there really is a time to meditate on His “passion”—the time of his suffering and death.
For some reason, Good Friday really gets to me. There is something so sacred and deep and holy about it. There is something so overwhelming about the sacrifice that He gave because of His love for us. He believed in us so much, believed in our potential, saw in us what we struggle to see ourselves—that he paid the ultimate price to secure our future.
And, as I meditate on all this, I begin to realize that I simply can not wrap my mind around what He has actually done. What he actually gave up. So tonight we read this passage at our small group, and it’s a passage I meditate on often:
Philippians 2:5-11
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name…
What amazes me about this passage is the beautiful portrayal of the humiliation of Christ. God becomes a servant; the All Powerful is humble; the Creator becomes His creation; the Eternal submits to death. It’s unfathomable. It’s indescribable.
What amazes me is the descending steps of his humiliation. As one author put it, the cross is “The bottom rung in the ladder from the Throne of God. Jesus came all the way down to the most despised death of all, a condemned criminal on the accursed cross.” (ref) Not only does God come to serve, but he becomes man. Not only does he become man, but he allows himself to die. And not only does he allow himself to die, but he allows himself to be crucified—the most ignominious way to die!
It’s kind of like Him saying, “There is literally nothing else I can do to show you my love. There is no possible way for me to lower myself any further.”
I just think it’s amazing. Words escape me. I just want to honor and stand in awe of the true sacrifice that was paid on our behalf. I think that meditating on the suffering and understanding the price that was paid, makes Resurrection Day all that more powerful!
You know, when things go wrong in life, we are often tempted to blame God. I know I have been at many times in my life, and I know that for many it is almost a knee-jerk reaction. I’ve thought some about why this is true, and I think it (in part) comes down to a sense of control. If we can blame God for bad things that happen, then, even though we are mad at God, there is still a sense of order in the universe. There is still a sense that God is in control—even if we don’t agree with what He’s doing.
I think we are uncomfortable with the fact that bad things do happen outside of God authoring them, because that feels almost random and chaotic. But that is closer to truth than the first idea. To be honest, I think that there is a sense of chaos and disorder in the universe. I think that sin, the decision to walk away from the God of order, is really the cause of this chaos.
And furthermore, I think that rather than hiding from that difficult fact, we can embrace it. I might even call that faith. You know? Trusting in spite of our inability to understand?
I feel like that’s a place that I’ve come to in my personal faith. After Hope died, I went through a long process of realizing that somewhere inside me I really believed that I deserved everything to work out well in my life. I was like a spiritual spoiled brat. I felt God asked me at some point—and please don’t hear this as harsh, it was during a long season—why I should demand everything to work out in my life the way I wanted, when so many others did not have that luxury. And I began to realize that my faith was not only centered in wanting to feel safe (falsely so), but it was also selfish. In fact, it wasn’t really faith at all in some ways because it was evidentially based. In other words, I felt good about God and my life if things were going well. But I doubted and got upset when things weren’t. Is that really faith? Faith is trust stripped of evidence and benefits. I mean SURE there will be evidence and benefits, but they cannot be the basis of faith. That’s why Jesus kept saying,”You people are just interested in signs!” They wanted the evidence, rather than trusting the person.
I guess I’m hoping to grow in understanding of this concept of faith. Of learning to trust in the character and intentions and will of God, even when things that I’m pretty sure are not in his character keep happening to me or around me.
I’m super tired right now, so I’m not sure this is even coherent. But I wanted to blog to stay consistent, so Jason and Jessica don’t get mad at me :) Hopefully this makes some sense!
I was reading a friend’s blog yesterday and they were talking about friends who help in times of need. For some reason, this immediately made me think of Simon of Cyrene from the Bible. He doesn’t get a whole lot of press, but he’s a very interesting character if you stop and think about him. He is the guy who carries Jesus’ cross for him.
Now think about that. The Bible clearly says that we will all have “crosses” to bear in this life. Now, when Jesus was talking about each of us carrying our own cross, I know he was being metaphorical. He was talking about dying to our selfishness and inwardness and ego-centrism, and learning to live with a true revelation of the lives of others around us. Love, in other words (or word as the case may be).
Isn’t it interesting, though, that even Jesus didn’t carry his own cross? Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not taking anything away from Jesus—he alone died for our sins and rose again. And truly, he could have carried the cross the whole way. So if he could have, that means he chose not to. And that’s the sticking point. Why didn’t he?
Herein lies the valuable lesson (at least for me). While on earth Jesus showed us how to live perfectly as humans. Perfect dependence on God. But also, perfect dependence on others. He was never above receiving help or blessings from other people. And I think this example is so cool. In his final moments, in his greatest anguish, on the greatest stage the world has ever known—Jesus receives the help of a no-name Jewish man. . .who carries Jesus’ cross. Jesus’ cross! Think about that!
And it makes me think—I have had so many Simon of Cyrene’s in my life, and I am so very thankful for them. Faced with a cross I never knew I’d have to carry, and a hill that was certainly too big for my legs to conquer, so many Simons (and Simonesses!) have come alongside of me and lifted my burdens onto their shoulders. They have carried my burdens.
So often people look for God in the clouds, or in science, or complain about lack of proof. When really, maybe we just need to look at each other sometimes. Do you feel abandoned by God? Maybe he’s has just shown you love through the hug of a friend. Feel discouraged by God? Maybe that kind word was actually sent by him.
So anyway, that’s what I’m thinking about tonight. And also I ‘m thinking about all the chances I have to be a Simon in other people’s lives, and what a profound blessing that is. Simon of Cyrene entered into the greatest story every told and unknowingly helped God save the world. When we let ourselves become Simon’s in other people’s lives, we too are entering into great and wonderful stories. Because often the greatest stories begin in great pain, don’t they? And when we become Simon to that person, we play a part in seeing that story go from pain to victory.
And I’m not sure there are many greater blessings on earth than that.
So go find someone who needs a Simon today . . . and pick up that cross.
As a teacher I live for these. Really. I love when a scripture or an insight or a story just comes to life for me in a new way. Like light shining on a previously darkened landscape. Lately I have especially been drawn to reading the stories of Jesus, and particularly his interactions with people. I think so often we read these stories as little kids, and then as adults, somehow we fail to lose that “kid-like fairytaleness” that we have assigned to the stories.
Two of my favorite Christian authors/preachers are Erwin McManus and Max Lucado. And both of them excel at getting real with the characters of the Bible. I really like to get down and feel the sand of the ancient middle eastern road; to smell the scent of the fishing nets when Jesus called Peter; to feel the rush of people pressing in to see Jesus as the woman touched his garment; to hear the heart-wrenching wails of Mary and Martha as they mourned the loss of their beloved brother Lazarus; to feel the utter awe-filled silence as Jesus raised Jairus’ daughter from the dead.
What were these moments like? They REALLY happened! What did it feel like? I wish I could enter in. But one thing I am convinced of—I think we better understand these stories if we read the characters as real people and not as some fairy tale versions of reality.
So tonight, I’m excited, because I had some moments of revelation for my teaching on Sunday. Hopefully others will be equally excited by the end of the sermon!
“Be not deceived, Wormwood, our cause is never more in jeopardy than when a human, no longer desiring but still intending to do our Enemy’s will, looks round upon a universe in which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.”
C. S. Lewis “Screwtape Letters”
I’ve been spending a lot of time lately with a lifelong friend of mine named Jessica. I have known her since she was 9 and I was 12, and what’s crazy is, that doesn’t seem like that long ago! She has always been a person who has seen the fullness of color in life. Lately though, the colors of her life have turned to so many shades of grey. And I’ve seen my friend go from zestfully loving life, to just walking out one day at a time.
As we have been talking, even though our situations are radically different, I’ve been reminded of the pain that Mandy and I have walked through the last several years. It’s funny—when you suffer in tragic ways, it’s almost like you join this really sad club. Weepers R Us, or Pain-a-holics Annoymous. And you all wear shirts that say, Life is HARD instead of Life is GOOD. Yeah, I’ve been to those meetings.
Anyway, I was thinking about pain, and life, and all this—and I remembered this quote from one of my favorite C.S. Lewis books. It’s about a veteran demon who is training a novice demon on how to make Christians stop believing in God. And in this one section he talks about how God (the Enemy in his language) will sometimes stand off from us so that we will learn to run to him. And then he talks about how annoyed he gets at the human, when the human, inspite of all the bad that is swirling around him, and the distance of God away from him, will still choose to follow.
I can remember in the midst of some of the darkest days after Hope passed away saying to Mandy that I didn’t want to lose my faith. I didn’t understand God, I couldn’t feel God’s presence, and I even was harboring some serious resentment and anger towards him. But at the same time I knew that I did not want to be the person who walks away when the going gets rough. So I made a choice. And so did Mandy. And so is my friend Jessica. And so can we all (too preachy?).
But really, I mean it! No matter what happens around us, we still have the power to choose. The power of choice. I choose this and not that. I choose life and not death. I choose faith and not fear. I choose love and not hate.
Now granted, these are not easy choices. They were not easy choices for me to make. And I learned that I often had to make them every day—little decisions over and over again that eventually would add up to something bigger. And as I survey the landscape of life around me, and all the hurting people I know right now, I just get this sense that those who make good choices now—choices to walk toward God and not away—will find the restoration of hope that one day will come.
As I look back into the darkest times of grief that Mandy and I shared, I realize that not only did I not lose myself, but in many ways I found myself more powerfully than ever before. And this is just true. The dark hour, the shadow of death, the valley of decision—these are all terrible times that are ripe with potential.
So my prayer for all my friends (and myself) who are struggling now is to make those small choices today that will lead to life in the tomorrows to come.
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