missions

An Apology From An American Christian

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 1 Comment

I am an American and I am a Christian. That being said I have a few apologies to offer on behalf of me and all my fellow believers.

I’m sorry that we’ve shown you more anger and hate than love. I’m sorry that all you ever see from us is what we’re against and what groups we hate more than what we are for and who we love.

I’m sorry that we’ve complicated something that is really very simple. God loves you and wants you to know Him through Jesus.

I’m sorry that we’ve put barriers between you and Jesus, telling you that you need to get your life strightened up or get rid of your sins or start living right before you can come to Jesus. The truth is that you can come just as you are, no matter how messed up or broken or lost you are.

I’m sorry that we’ve turned God into a political platform and a means of getting our people into office and getting our laws passed. God is beyond Democrats or Republicans, liberals or conservatives, and is more concerned with the “the weak, the vulnerable, the useless” and the least of these than those with deep pockets and political connections. God loves and blesses those who know they have nothing to offer in return.

I’m sorry that I didn’t go out of my way every day to show you Jesus and just how amazing He is and how He changed my life. I was afraid and ashamed and silent.

I’m not sorry that we profess that Jesus is the way, the only way, to heaven. I will proclaim that every other religion is about getting to God, but Christianity is how God came down to us in Jesus.

I believe that God loves and uses imperfect people. He pours out His love through broken vessels. Ultimately, it’s not about me showing you how strong I am or how great my faith is, but being a living example of how God’s strength is made perfect in my weakness and how He can move mountains with my mustard seed-sized faith.

God, we need you every day. We are hopelessly lost without you. Only You can make our lives shine and turn our brokenness into beauty. God be God in us.

God’s Family Tree

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 1 Comment

Every family has at least one person who has a checkered past. Every family has that one person whose name, when brought up in coversation, immediately reduces everyone to whsipers and furtive looks. The one everyone talks about and shakes their head and says things like, “Bless their heart.”

I bet you never thought about the fact that God has a family tree, too. He does. And His family tree has a few names that would cause some people to blush. He has a liar, a cheat, a whore, and a despised foreigner among the list.

The liar is Abraham, who twice lied about Sarah being his sister rather than his wife to save his own skin.

The cheat is Jacob who tricked his brother Esau into selling his birthright for a cup of Campbell’s chicken noodle soup.

The whore is Rahab whose redeeming act was to hide the Israelite spies and cast her lot with God’s people over her own people.

The despised foreigner is Ruth, one of the Moabites that were on Israel’s bad side ever since they didn’t let God’s people pass through their land when Israel was in the wilderness.

All these people had a part in bringing about the arrival of the Messiah. What to the world were a bunch of rejects and outcasts became a part of God’s story.

We too get to be  a part of the story God is telling. We are invited to be His children. We are the living love letters that God writes to the world to show just how strong He is to rescue and save anyone. We are the ones whose transformed lives are the best advertisement for how God’s love conquers all.

Remember that the next time your own story doesn’t seem to be going well. Your story is about more than just you. You get to be a part of something so much bigger and better than you.

And besides, I happen to have read the last page on the story and [SPOILER ALERT] WE WIN!!!

 

Help Wanted

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 1 Comment

Help wanted: people to be My Church and My witnesses to the uttermost ends of the earth.

Good looks and popularity are not necessary. People skills are optional. Talent and charisma and charm are also optional.

Looking for authentic, broken people who want Me more than anything and want My kingdom more than any political or personal agenda. Seeking those who hurt with the lost, weep with those who mourn, and reach out to the castaways.

Must be willing to sell everything and give it to the poor. Must be willing to love me so much that your love for father and mother seems like hate in comparison. Must be willing to drink My blood and eat My flesh.

Most of all, seeking those whose heart breaks for what breaks Mine. Looking for those who are surrendered and available for Me to use whenever and however I choose.

Must take up the cross and follow Me.

Must seek to worship Me in spirit and in truth.

Will take anyone who will simply say YES to me and what I did for them on the cross. Will take anyone who puts faith in me as Lord and Savior.

Wanted: people who will be vessels of my extravagant love, to be filled to overflowing so that it spills out onto everyone they meet. Need people who will realize that my love can change and transform anyone and overcome anything.

Wanted: you.

— Jesus

A Letter to Bono

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / Leave a comment

First of all, I am one of the legions of fans who discovered U2 when the Joshua Tree blew up and sold a gazillion copies in 1987. I should have found about you guys earlier, but I wasn’t nearly as musically savvy as I am now.

I remember listening to that album and having my musical horizons not just broadened, but exploded. This was music that was ahead of its time with songs of politics and faith and love all meshed together in one glorious package. This was my soundtrack for the summer of 1987 and for many years after. In some ways, it still is.

Thank you for not just being another rock star. Thank you for using the platform of fame to fight for the causes that are dear to your heart. Thank you for not being ashamed to be both a man of faith and a man of activism (true faith should automatically lead to activism and good works, but that’s not always the case in this day and age).

I look forward to your albums they way I used to look forward to Christmas. Even the re-released remastered deluxe editions of your old stuff. Even the old songs sound new. Hardly anything sounds dated or like a time capsule to a bygone era. It all sounds fresh and relevant.

I hope you will stand strong in your convictions. I pray you will keep being a voice for those who cannot speak for themselves and a champion for the outcast who cannot defend themselves. I as a believer in Jesus know that one day He will come back and set all things right and bring justice and healing to the nations, but He has called us to be His hands and feet to the hungry and hurting and lonely right here and now.

PS I hope you will come back to Nashville one day in the near future. This time I won’t be a total doofus and I will get my tickets on the day they go on sale.

What Kind of Christian Are You?

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 8 Comments

I heard a pastor say that a lot of us are waiting for God to bring His judgment. We have certain people or groups in mind. God owes them what’s coming to them and they should get no mercy, but get the hell they deserve. Yet somehow, a lot of us think that God is obligated to show us mercy.

It could be “those homosexuals” or “those liberals” or “those pacifists” or whatever other group you’re not in. It could be those who struggle with sins that don’t affect us. Our sins are forgiveable, but theirs are not. Or so we think.

But really, who are good Christians and who are bad Christians? And do such distinctions even exist?

I say not. There are no good or bad Christians. There are only lost people who have been found, dead people who are now alive, sinners who deserved condemnation but found grace and mercy. We are all, as one of my favorite writers put it, beggers trying to tell other beggars where to find bread.

In other words, there is no one good enough to earn God’s love. No one who has anything of their own they can bring to God. There is no one that’s too bad to be saved. No one who God has shut off from any possibility of redemption or grace.

I’ve had to change my thinking a lot about “those” people. I may not struggle with the “big” sins, but my sins would have earned me just as much of death and hell as anyone who has ever lived. I needed grace and forgiveness through the blood of Jesus as much as any of “those” people.

A famous newspaper once submitted a question to many leading figures of the day. The question was “What’s wrong with the world today?” A famous writer, G.K. Chesterton had the shortest (and best, I think) reply of them all. He simply replied, “I am.”

One day God will judge the world. Some people will get what they deserve. But the only reason I won’t is because of Zephaniah 1:7. “Quiet now! Reverent silence before me, God, the Master! Time’s up. My Judgment Day is near: The Holy Day is all set, the invited guests made holy.”

In other words, those guests invited to the Kingdom of God aren’t the ones who have the most to offer God or who have the most sterling resumes. They are the ones God has made holy. Because we had no gift to bring, God sent His own Son. Because we had no sacrifice, God Himself became the sacrifice so we could get in.

So instead of choosing who God should judge, maybe we should be thankful and grateful that we’re no longer the ones who will be condemned. Maybe we should love “those” people as much as God loved us and show them as much grace as He showed us. Maybe, just maybe, we could be the the ones to show them how good and great God really is.

Going to Church vs. Being the Church

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 14 Comments

As a kid, I went to church. Not much of an option there, really. My mother didn’t ask me if I felt like going, but told me we were going. After all, we’re Baptists. That’s what we do.

For most of my life, I talked about “going to church” as if church were a building or a place or an event.  In fact, until very recently. Then I noticed something in the New Testament. Nowhere in there does anyone talk about going to church or referring to church as a building or an organization. Churches in the New Testament always refer to a community of believers. A family.

If I go to church, then church is something I do once or twice a week (three or more if you’re a really good Baptist!) I will act and think differently when I’m in church than when I’m not.

But if I’m reading my Bible right and I am a part of the community called the Church, then I take the Church with me wherever I go. I am never not “in church.” That means that I act and think the same way all the time.

It amazed me that ever since I’ve picked up on this, I hear people all the time talk about Church as if it were a place or a building or a service. I hear myself talking about “going to church.” I guess it’s a part of the culture I grew up in. That many of us grew up in.

It’s not a sin to say “going to church.” But if we really believe what’s in God’s word, then maybe it’s time to shift our thinking and stop going to church and start being the church. Maybe we need to break out of the four walls of church buildings and start taking the Church, the koinonia or “the community”, everywhere we go.

A pastor I heard today said something like this: “What frustrates the world is not that we’re different, but that we’re not different enough.”  Maybe when the Church starts acting like the body of Christ, the hands and feet of Jesus, and not like brick and stone and mortar, they will start seeing the difference.

Another thing that irks me is the term “business meeting.” The church is not a business; it’s a family. But that is another topic for another blog someday.

A Prayer for My Missionary Friends

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 1 Comment

I pray for you, friends, whether you are travelling halfway around the world or stepping out your back door. I pray that as you go wherever you go, you will be God’s hands to mold new disciples and His love in you will inspire and cultivate a deep love for Jesus in those around you.

I pray God’s anointing for you as you travel into spiritually dark places. I pray that you speak the very words of God.

I pray you will speak light into the darkness, hope into the lost causes, sight to the blind, dancing to the lame, healing to the sick, wholeness to the broken, liberty to the captives, and joy to the broken-hearted.

I pray that as you advance upon the gates of hell, one little word from your mouth will cause those gates to crumble. As you whisper the name Jesus, those gates will disintegrate into dust. I pray that those held in bondage will walk in the freedom of  sons and daughters of the God and King of the Universe.

I pray that, just as Jesus promised, you would do greater things than He did because you go in the power of His resurrection. I pray that every cell of your body is filled with His presence and His power and His love.

I pray you would not think even your life’s blood too high a price to pay for the Jesus who spilled all His blood for you. I pray that your answer to whatever Jesus asks of you would be an eternal “YES!” and the cry of the depths of your heart be “Here I am! Send me!”

I pray that the love of Jesus would be so compelling and overwhelming to you that you can’t help but go, and when you go, you can’t help but speak it. I pray that because of your obedience that a generation yet unborn will rise up and proclaim the mighty works of God to the next generations.

Amen!

A Daily Prayer of Mother Teresa

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / Leave a comment

mother teresa

I found this in the booklet that came with a Natalie Grant CD I bought today.

“Dear Lord, help me to spread your fragrance wherever I go.

Flood my soul with your spirit and life. Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly that all my life may only be a radiance of yours.

Shine through me, and be so in me that every soul I come in contact with my feel your presence in my soul. Let them look up and see no longer me, but only you, O Lord!

Stay with me, then I shall begin to shine as you do; so to shine as to be light to others. The light, O Lord, will be all from you; none of it will be mine; it will be you shining on others through me. Let me thus praise you in every way you love best, by shining on those around me.

Let me preach you without preaching, not by words but by my example, by the catching force, the sympathetic influence of what I do, the evident fullness of the love my heart bears to you.

Amen.”

I would only add that while it is great to show God’s love by example, it will always be necessary at some point to use words, for how can anyone believe who has not heard? I think the point that Mother Teresa and Saint Francis of Assisi made was that you need both. Not just words without a loving example and not just a loving example without words. Lord, help me to be both today!

Amen and amen.

Bedtime thoughts

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 1 Comment

Jesus said, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments” (Matthew 22:37-40).

That’s it. Love God and love others.

But for you to love God, you have to know the reality that God already loves you. For you to love others as yourself, you have to love yourself. Ultimately, you can’t do it. Well, I will only speak for myself here and say that I can’t love God or anybody else, even me, on my own strength. I need Jesus in me, pouring out His agape love, or else I am empty and cold and love-less.

Sometimes, God calls you to love yourself as you love your neighbor. Sometimes, it’s easier to love someone else than to love that person you hang around with every minute of every day. That person who looks back at you in the mirror with accusing eyes that speak of all the impure thoughts, mixed motives, and selfish ambition.

That’s when you and I have to believe what God says about who we are over what we see and think and feel. As a friend of mine told me once, “What you think and feel will lie to you.” But God never will.

God is true. God is love. And God loves you.

And you have all the power of Christ that overcame the grave in you. You have His perfect righteousness that covers your own wretched self-righteous rags of filth.

So be free to love. Love God, love others and love you.

As always, I believe. Help my unbelief.

My two cents on spiritual warfare

/ Ragamuffingospelfan / 1 Comment

A group of guys and I have been watching a DVD series on spiritual warfare by Chip Ingram called The Invisible War (and yes, that was a shameless plug). It got me thinking about the mindset of so many American believers (including me) regarding the whole topic of spiritual warfare. Plainly put, either most of us don’t believe there is an war going on with an enemy that is constantly seeking our destruction. If we believe, we sure don’t live like it much of the time. Again, me included.

The war is real. The enemy is real. In this world, we are not tourists on vacation, or passengers on some kind of luxury cruise, but soldiers engaged in battle. Our ignorance of the battle and our enemy can only do us harm. We need to wake up to realize that we are under attack. But here’s the best part.

The battle is already won. Chip Ingram said, “As believers in Christ, we don’t fight FOR victory. We fight FROM victory.” That’s the good news (which is why it’s called the gospel!). But there is still a battle.

We fight back by putting on the armor of God as described in Ephesians 6: the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit. We should pray these on every morning and pray these for each other on a daily basis. We should pray with eyes wide open to the spiritual realm, asking God to give us eyes to see the battle around us like the Elijah prayed for his servant when they were surrounded by the Syrian army. We should pray for discernment and wisdom. Most of all, we should pray at all times to be Spirit-filled and Spirit-controlled, taking every thought captive and submitting them to the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

We must fight together. If you are fighting the enemy on your own, apart from other believers, you may succeed for a season, but you will ultimately grow weary and faint. You will stumble and fall. You need other believers praying God’s protection over you, encouraging you and keeping you honest.

We fight ultimately with one weapon– LOVE. Not as a feeling, but as a decisive act of the will. We fight by showing that Calvary’s love is stronger than hate and that love overcomes anything. Chip Ingram said, “Love is giving to another person what they need the most when they deserve it least.” Love is doing whatever you can, even to your own detriment, for the good of the beloved. It means dying to yourself and your rights and own ideas about how the world should work.

So live with eyes wide open, hands raised, side by side with your brothers and sisters in Christ. And remember that the battle is already won and that we have overcome!

As always, I believe. Help my unbelief.