Dare to Imagine a Life of Harmony

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

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

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"

“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? 

Monday's Meditation: Demanding the Impossible?

I’ve been going through the Sermon on the Mount with a group of university students since January.  We pray, read, talk, and try to come to terms with what Jesus meant. A few weeks ago I asked my friends, “How many of you think it’s possible to fulfill Jesus’ teaching in your everyday lives?” Only one person out of twenty raised a hand. One. Does this strike you as a problem?

Why would 19 out of 20 students invest a semester studying a sermon they had no hope of living up to? The Sermon on the Mount has been regarded as the essence of Jesus’ teaching. Matthew chapters 5, 6 & 7 have been called the constitution of the Kingdom of God. But like many famous Bible passages--like much of our worship--we honor the ideal and then return to the “real world,” leaving His words behind. Granted, these are challenging words from Jesus. Here's just a small sampling:

• Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. (5:19)
• I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. (5:22)
• Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (5:48)
• Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. (6:25)
• For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks find; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. (7:8)
• Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. (7:21)

The Sermon on the Mount brings this question into sharp focus, but it applies to all of Jesus’ actions and teaching--why would Jesus demonstrate or share the impossible with us? If he is the Master of Living, would he demand of us what we cannot give?

Here’s a Monday meditation: if we think of Jesus as the kind of person who would never say “be warm and filled” to a beggar without helping the poor man, why would we think of Jesus as commanding the impossible of his disciples? As students of Jesus, our answer makes all the difference. I invite you to share your answer in the "comments" section--I'm eager to read your opinion.

Is Obedience Possible?

Imagine this scene: a man lies naked, hungry and cold.  A stranger approaches and offers these words, “I wish you well. Be warm, and filled.”  Then the stranger walks away.  Now imagine the stranger who walks away is Jesus.

Unthinkable, right?  Too many Christians possess just such an image of Jesus when it comes to the issue obedience.  God wants us to obey his will.  It’s good.  It’s necessary.  The problem is many of us see ourselves as incapable of obedience.   We have failed too often.  We find ourselves naked and cold, in desperate need.  And into our helpless situation, we imagine that Jesus walks up to us and says, “be obedient” without offering any practical help.

Would the grace God demand from us something we cannot give?  If we were “miserable sinners” before turning to Jesus, why does Jesus expect his followers to become obedient to his will?  How do we become something other than “forgiven miserable sinners?”  Some believers find themselves trapped in a Christian existence of forgiveness, more sin, and more forgiveness.

The good news is that God’s grace does something more than say, “Be warm and filled.”  Jesus calls us obey, but he does not leave us on our own.  He demonstrated how to become the kind of follower who is not trapped in the forgive-sin again-forgive cycle.

The Jesus way of teaching believers how to obey is contained in the famous verses we call The Great Commission:

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 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. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.

The Great Commission does not command obedience, but rather discipleship--which makes obedience possible.  Discipleship is God’s plan to grow in obedience.  Jesus breaks discipleship to two functions--immersing believers in the three revealed identities of God (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) and instructing disciples in how to obey everything he commanded.  To separate obedience from teaching how to obey would be the same as merely saying “Be warm and filled” to a naked homeless person, and Jesus wouldn’t do that.

The church, however, has fallen into the “Be warm and filled” fallacy.  We attempt to “teach” obedience apart from relationship.  In fact, obedience cannot be taught apart from relationship, it can only be demanded.  Sitting in church listening to the demands of obedience usually results in guilt--a guilt incapable of producing fruit.

A better pattern is the family model.  Good parents teach their children to obey in an atmosphere of mutual love and commitment.  Fathers and mothers love their children, and children love their parents.  Relationship and obedience grow side-by-side.  The love felt by both parents and child provide the motivation for discipline from above and effort from below.  Healthy families provide examples of obedience.  Day-by-day children can witness whether true obedience lives in the household.

New life in Christ means the Father has provided a new family for each of us.  We become a part of God’s household.  If obedience resides in the house, it becomes a way of life--something for us to enter into, not something imposed from the outside.  Obedience becomes the natural response of loving hearts.  The family of God becomes the context for learning how to obey.  Our obedience helps provide a setting for others to discover the way of life.  This is one of the reasons that our obedience is not merely a personal matter.  It’s also why some Christian mystics describe God as Father and the church as the mother of our obedience.

Could you be God’s means of grace is someone else’s life?  If you respond to the Great Commission by making disciples, the answer is yes.

Monday's Meditation: Two Insignificant Verses

It’s just two weeks after Easter Sunday. We are still in that period of time when the resurrected Jesus remained on the earth, encouraging and teaching his friends about the Kingdom of God.

His final actions are recorded for us in Matthew 28: 16 - 20:
Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 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. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

These are familiar verses to Evangelicals. We have even given this passage a name, “The Great Commission.” Most people who point to these verses begin at verse 18, when Jesus begins to speak, but the proper context begins at verse 16--and what a difference those two verses make!

Here are two quick meditations:

Verse 16 - The disciples obeyed. Jesus gave them instructions to return to Galilee. Apart from carrying out those instructions, they would have missed an encounter with the resurrected Lord. It’s a simple meditation, but challenging: obedience puts us in a position to hear God. Do my actions make it easier or harder for me to hear his voice?

Verse 17 - Some of them doubted. These words first hit me like a thunderbolt--some of those who had seen the resurrected Jesus, those who had “proof” of his glory, still doubted! Imagine the scene around Jesus: his best friends giving him worship in a private setting, yet in some minds and hearts there was still doubt. Here’s the good news: their doubt did not disqualify them. He still received them, and he gave the “Great Commission” even to those who doubted.

These two are worth turning over in our hearts today: disobedience may keep me from hearing his voice, but doubt will not. Happy Monday!

What is the Rock?

Jesus offers his followers the kind of life that results in rest and peace. Yet Christians are thrown from crisis to crisis as if the storms of life are in control. Still, Jesus is very clear on this: if we will take his yoke upon ourselves, we can find the kind of life that will be characterized by rest and peace. Who doesn’t want a life like this?

My wife worked for years in a crisis pregnancy center. One day a young, unmarried Christian woman (a teenager, at that) came into the center for a free pregnancy test. The test was positive, and my wife delivered the news to the girl. “I don’t understand,” she cried as my wife held the girl in her arms. “How could God let this happen to me?” The news rocked this poor girl’s world. She received the news as if the pregnancy was something that happened to her--as if some force beyond her control had imposed its will on her and changed her life forever.

In my invitations to speak to Christian organizations, many people are familiar with the gospel stories I select as the theme for my talks. This familiarity can sometimes work against hearing the word of God in a way that can change our lives right now. We are tempted to think that because we have a heard a story before we must already understand its meaning. I believe this is especially true of the final story Jesus tells in his Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5, 6, & 7). So many people have heard the story they unwittingly think there is no need to let the word of God instruct them if they hear it again. But let’s try to hear it again:

"Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash." (Matthew 7: 24-27)

Each time, after I read these words out loud, I stop and ask the same question: “What is the rock?” In more than a decade of speaking engagements I have never once been given the correct answer immediately. The answers offered are invariably “Jesus,” “God,” or “the Bible.” These are answers are worthy sentiments, but they are wrong.

Only after reading the text a second (or third) time with special emphasis given to the key phrase does it dawn on the listeners that Jesus is requiring something of them in response to his preaching. Jesus says plainly that the difference between the two builders is putting his words into practice. One man hears and puts the words into practice, and the other does not. The old-fashioned word for this response is “obedience.” In these three chapters Jesus offers words of life. He speaks to our condition. He challenges our ideas of piety. He teaches us to pray. He points toward a loving Heavenly Father who is poised to help us in every situation Then at the end of the greatest sermon ever preached, he invites you and me into the building process.

Jesus has provided the guidance, but we must take the initiative to build on his words. We must decide if we trust his words enough to adopt them into our lives. It is one thing to hear him speak, it is quite another to order our lives around his words. His words are the words of life. But we must act on them.

Implicit in his teaching is the idea that we are all building. Each day, brick by brick we are building the houses of our lives. Everyone is building. The question is whether we are building on the rock, and the only way to do that is to put his words into practical operation in our lives.

As a pastor I have listened to people in crisis as they stare into the corner of the room and share the specific sadness that robs them of rest and peace. Their difficulties are real, their pain is not imagined. Sometimes the house of their life is crumbling around them. Seldom do I hear someone question whether they are forgiven or whether they will go to heaven. But frequently I hear them question if God cares about their suffering at that moment. From their ruin they do not doubt that God will forgive them at the end of their lives, but they openly wonder whether he cares at all about their lives right now.

Of course, God does care about our lives right now. He cares so much that he sent Jesus to model how to live in this world in a way that equips us to experience rest and peace right now, no matter what happens. But he will not build our lives without us. We must participate with him, and that participation begins with the determination to put his words into practice, to build on the rock.