SImon

My Translation for 2017

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Those of you who have followed me and my blog posts for some time probably know that I read through the Bible every year in a different translation. Last year, I chose the Holman Christian Standard Bible. This year’s pick has been the New Jerusalem Bible. I get the joy of reading through those extra books not found in the typical Protestant Bibles.

I’m almost through the book of Genesis.

I’m reminded yet again that the people God chose in creating a nation of His own were far from perfect. All of them had character flaws and a sometimes staggering lack of good judgment. I can relate.

God still doesn’t always pick the best looking or the best dressed or the most type A personalities. Some of the choices He makes with people He works through might seem like head scratchers to a lot of us, but God knows what He’s doing.

Remember God chose you and God chose me, not because we were the most qualified to get the job done, but because God delighted in doing so. The ultimate result is that the credit for anything good that comes out of you or me goes directly to God.

It’s also a reminder that when I get aggravated with those biblical characters choosing poorly and being ignoramuses, I can remember that I occasionally am one of those, too. I imagine some of you are as well.

I love how in the Gospels, Jesus changed Simon’s name to Peter, not because of who he was but because of who Jesus saw he would become. It took a while for Peter to live up to his own name and Jesus put up with a lot of immaturity and foot-in-mouth disease from Peter and never gave up on him until he became one of the most powerful spokesmen for the early Church.

I’m thankful that God still chooses to work through nobodies and screw-ups and neurotics. I’m most thankful that there’s still nobody that’s too far gone for God to redeem and restore and repurpose.

 

Something Else from Kairos

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Tonight as usual I took home something to think about from Kairos. In almost nine years of attending and serving, I’ve rarely ever walked away without either the message or the music having affected me in some way.

Tonight I heard this: Jesus calls you by who you will become rather than who you are now.

Look at Peter, formerly known as Simon. Jesus hears his brave declaration of “You are the Christ, Son of the Living God,” and proceeds to declare that he is now Peter, the rock on whom Jesus will build His church.

Peter? Look at the guy. Immediately after making that statement, He tries to rebuke Jesus and His plans of going to Jerusalem to suffer and die. The pastor made the astute assessment that Peter folded like a cheap card table when intensely interrogated by a 13-year old servant girl.

“Weren’t you one of Jesus’ followers?” Not a loaded question. Also not one of Peter’s finest moments. Not even close.

I believe that sanctification is the process by which you and I become what Jesus has already declared us to be.

Let me say that again.

Sanctification is the process by which you and I become what Jesus has already declared us to be.

My favorite of Jesus’ declarations over me is Beloved. I may not live like that now. I may live like someone who’s ashamed of Him and who sometimes does a really good job of being an incognito Christian. But that’s not who I will be. Jesus said so.

That gives me great hope. Jesus never makes a promise or a declaration that isn’t already as good as done. It maybe a future tense promise, but it’s a present tense reality. Jesus is that good.

So maybe you and I need to believe about ourselves what Jesus has declared about us, and not what we see in the mirror every day. Maybe then others will start to see it and believe it about themselves as well.

 

Followship

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jesus_calls_disciples

“Walking along the beach of Lake Galilee, Jesus saw two brothers: Simon (later called Peter) and Andrew. They were fishing, throwing their nets into the lake. It was their regular work. Jesus said to them, ‘Come with me. I’ll make a new kind of fisherman out of you. I’ll show you how to catch men and women instead of perch and bass.’ They didn’t ask questions, but simply dropped their nets and followed” (Matthew 4:18-20).

Today at The Church at Avenue South, Aaron Bryant spoke on Matthew 4:18-22 where Jesus told Peter and Andrew, “Come follow me and I will make you fishers of men.”

I understand what they gained by following Jesus, but I don’t think I had ever really thought about all that they gave up.

Think about it. They walked away from the only livelihood they had ever known. They even walked away from their own father who was in the same fishing boat. There is no mention of any goodbyes or see you laters. They simply dropped their nets and followed Jesus, leaving everything else behind with no questions asked.

Aaron asked the question: what would you give up that might hinder you from fully following Jesus to wherever He wanted you to go?

He talked about David and Hannah, a couple who sold every bit of their furniture and moved into some friends’ apartment in view of a calling to missions in Northern Italy. They gave up good careers, extended family, and the comforts of the American middle class lifestyle because they felt Jesus calling them to go to a place where less than .1% of the population claims to be evangelical Christians.

I’ve asked myself if I could do that. I hope so. I do love my stuff. I love my family. I love where I live. Above all, I love the familiarity and comfort of where I live.

Still, I hope that I could give it all up if Jesus asked me to. Thankfully, I’m not given strength for the what-ifs and the could-bes. I believe that if the situation arose, Jesus would give me the courage and strength to lay it all down. That’s part what it means when people say that Jesus doesn’t call the equipped but equips the called. Part of that equipping means the ability to press forward and not look back to what you’re leaving behind.

In the end, though, we really never give up anything for the cause of Christ. I remember the words of one of my heroes, Jim Elliott, who said, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”