spiritual

Why Go to Church?

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I stole this from a Facebook post. It’s not a perfect answer, but I think it does make a point:

A Church goer wrote a letter to the editor of a newspaper and complained that it made no sense to go to church every Sunday.

He wrote: ‘I’ve gone for 30 years now, and in that time I have heard something like 3,000 sermons, but for the life of me, I can’t remember a single one of them. So, I think I’m wasting my time, the preachers and priests are wasting theirs by giving sermons at all.’

This started a real controversy in the ‘Letters to the Editor’ column.

Much to the delight of the editor, it went on for weeks until someone wrote this clincher:

‘I’ve been married for 30 years now. In that time my wife has cooked some 32,000 meals. But, for the life of me, I cannot recall the entire menu for a single one of those meals.

But I do know this: They all nourished me and gave me the strength I needed to do my work. If my wife had not given me these meals, I would be physically dead today.

Likewise, if I had not gone to church for nourishment, I would be spiritually dead today!'”

I get the point of what the author is trying to say, but if hearing sermons at church is the equivalent of eating, then that means those who get all their spiritual knowledge on Sunday are only eating once a week. That’s not enough.

If you don’t have a consistent time of Bible reading and devotion every day, you’re just as spiritually malnourished as you would be physically if you ate one meal at the beginning of the week and didn’t eat again until the next week.

Church is for gathering together to encourage each other. The sermon is part of that. So is the worship. But that can’t be all the spiritual nourishment you get to last you for 7 days.

On the contrary, if you neglect that gathering together on Sunday, you miss out on the benefit of being around God’s people. Also, you’re disobedient to God’s command for believers to gather together. You don’t get that edification and encouragement and (sometimes) gentle reproof.

It’s not an either/or but a both/and. You need Sundays and you need to feed on God’s word every day. We all do.

Chocolate Is Salad

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It sorta makes sense if you think about it.

In my own fantasy world, I’d be able to eat all the chocolate and not get fat or turn into a diabetic. But even in that fantasy world, I’d probably get as sick of chocolate as of anything else that I ate exclusively for days and days.

Chocolate is so good because it’s a treat. It’s rare. It’s not an every day thing. That’s what makes it good.

You could take that and apply it to anything spiritual.

It’s like sex within marriage versus all the time with just anybody.

It’s like being financially responsible while allowing yourself to splurge every now and then versus impulse buying all the time and disregarding your bank account.

Discipline is a dirty word in this culture, but it can be a beautiful thing if you can learn delayed joy instead of always caving in to instant gratification. Good things do come to those who wait indeed.

Now if I could only train myself to crave salads instead of chocolate all the time.

Obedience and Trust

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Here are some words from George MacDonald on the importance of obedience and trust:

“Trust and obedience is the greatest thing that is required of any of us. The care that is filling your mind at this moment, or but waiting until you lay the book aside, to consume you, that need, which is no real need, is a demon sucking at the spring of your life. Do you object, saying, ‘But no, you do not understand. The thing I am worrying about is a reasonable anxiety, an unavoidable care.’ ?

‘Does it involve something you have to do at this very moment?’, I ask.

‘Well, no.’

‘Then you are allowing it to usurp the place of something that is required of you at this moment. The greatest thing that can ever be required of any man or woman.’

‘And what is that?’

‘To trust in the living God.’

‘What if God does not want me to have what I need at this moment?’

‘If He does not want you to have something you value, it is to give you instead something He values.’

‘And if I do not want what He has to give me?’

‘If you are not willing that God should have His way with you, then in the name of God, BE MISERABLE, until your misery drives you to the arms of the Father.’

‘Oh, but this is only about some financial concern. I do trust him with spiritual matters.’

‘Everything is an affair of the Spirit. If God has a way of dealing with you in your life, it is the only way. Everything little thing in which you would have your own way has a mission for your redemption. He will treat you as a willful child until you take your Father’s way for your own.'”

There is no area of your life that does not concern God or is outside of His purview. Every part of your story is sacred because God is using that small part to showcase His glory in a way that only you can see. What everyone else can see is your faithfulness to trust God when it doesn’t make sense or goes against what you think is best.

When you choose God’s way over your way, then people see where your allegiance really lies. They see that you are God’s and that He is yours. While it is important to speak your faith, how you live it out is just as vital to a good testimony of the goodness of God.

Happy 4th of July

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It’s officially Independence Day (or as some jokingly refer to it on social media, Treason Day by us ungrateful former British subjects).

I didn’t go see any fireworks today because 1) I’m still in recovery mode from pneumonia, 2) I’m dog sitting in Bellevue and didn’t feel like driving cross-country, and 3) it rained on and off most of the day.

I am thankful for my freedoms. You can criticize this country and its history and policies (and there’s admittedly a lot we’ve gotten way wrong over the years) but remember that one of your freedoms is the right to criticize without fear of being labeled a traitor and/or arrested by said government.

We must be doing something right for there still to be so many who want to come here (whether legally or illegally).

Yet for all that, I have to confess something. For those who profess faith in Jesus, it’s not God AND country. It’s God THEN country. We may be citizens whose pledge allegiance to a flag and a president but our ultimate allegiance is to a King and a Kingdom.

It’s helpful to keep that in mind going into yet another Presidential election. We need to be reminded yet again that our hope isn’t in the man or woman who sits in the White House. Our hope isn’t in the nine people who sit on the U. S. Supreme Court. Our hope isn’t in passing laws and statutes.

The current problems we face aren’t nearly as much political as they are spiritual, so we don’t need a political platform as much as we need a Savior.

The way of the cross still isn’t drinking the Kool Aid of one political party or the other. It isn’t more Christians in political office. The way of the cross is still this– “Whoever wants to be first must be last, and whoever wants to be the greatest must be the servant of all (Mark 9:35).

I hope you’re enjoying your extended holiday weekend. Just remember that as great as America is, it doesn’t even begin to compare to the Kingdom of God that’s already here and yet at the same time is on its way.

 

 

More Adventures From the Magical Land of McKay’s

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I went back to McKay’s Used Bookstore, or as I like to call it, The Place Where Multimedia Nerds Like Me Go When We Die.

I traded in enough movies to stock a small movie rental store and got enough credit to purchase an iPad 3 with 64 GB and a Hank Williams CD box set. It was a good day.

I still go warm and fuzzy inside when I step inside that amazing place. It’s simply ginormous. It’s huge. And it’s big, too.

I didn’t find everything I looked for, but I did come away with a few gems. And in the process, I got my happy fix for at least a month.

There’s no real spiritual segue way, other than to point out that most of us have been guilty of treating God like a giant department store.

It’s like we pray, “God, I’d like a pint of patience, two helpings of humility, a small dose of suffering (to keep me from getting too worldly), and a couple of giant crates of blessing.

What we fail to realize is that what God offers to us here and now isn’t so much gifts or blessings but Himself.

That is, God offers to transform us into the image of Jesus. We get Jesus’ righteousness, perfection, wisdom, and best of all– that power that raised Him from the dead. We get EVERYTHING we need in Jesus for life and godliness.

Sure, we get a few things thrown in that we’d like to return. But those things help more than anything to conform our character and mind into one just like that of Jesus.

So yes, I highly recommend McKays. And I recommend maybe not asking for stuff from God’s hand as much as the gift of having His heartbeat inside you and seeing with His eyes and being filled with His Spirit.

That’s all I got for now.

A Christmas Prayer

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Lord, the time approaches yet again when we celebrate your arrival in human skin to make your home among us as one of us. We celebrate that you became Immanuel, “God with us,” and took your place among us, sharing our joys and sorrows, weaknesses and pains.

We confess that we have so often lost sight of why we celebrate this day. We have made it into the giving and receiving of gifts and of excessive shopping and spending. We have forgotten that at the heart of Christmas, it is your birthday.

Help us also to remember those for whom Christmas isn’t such a happy time. So many mourn the loss of loved ones and live in the midst of family strife and turmoil. So many are facing tough days ahead as many are without jobs, some without homes and even the basic necessities.

Help us to walk along side those who are hurting in this Christmas season. May they find you, O God, to be their burden bearer, their refuge, their safe dwelling, and their peace in the midst of storms. Comfort them, bring healing to their strife, and be in the midst of them as the Prince of Peace.

Help us to remember those less fortunate than we and to be generous to those around us who have needs, both physical and spiritual. May we serve you by serving one of the least of these.

May we remember Christmas every day by being living incarnations of your presence everywhere we go, for you are not only God with us, but you are God in us, too. May we never forget that what started out in a manger ended on a cross, and that we are alive and free because of that terrible price you paid.

So as we get into the days of celebration and merriment, help us to remember that you are the reason for it all. May the best gift we give anyone be to show them your love and point them to you this holiday season.

Blessed are you when people insult you

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“Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matthew 5:11-12).

In all honesty, I don’t really like these two verses. I would much rather Jesus have said something like, “Blessed are you when people compliment you, flatter you, and tell you what great blogs you write and how spiritual you are.” I am not much for being insulted or persecuted or slandered. Probably not many people are. In fact, I would go so far as to say no one apart from the indwelling Spirit of God would count being insulted as a blessing. No one.

But if I am not ashamed of the gospel and proclaim it as the very power of God unleashed in the world, then I will face all these things. If I stand up and say that Jesus is the ONLY way, the ONLY truth and the ONLY life, I will be mocked, ridiculed, called all sorts of names, and ostracized. The sad part is that if I truly am radical about my faith, I will be insulted and persecuted and slandered by those in the Church who go by the name Christian.

I love the Message version: “Not only that—count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit me. What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable. You can be glad when that happens—give a cheer, even!—for though they don’t like it, I do! And all heaven applauds. And know that you are in good company. My prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble.”

When the truth is too close for comfort, people get uncomfortable. They react. Whether they are openly opposed to God or just those who want heaven, but not Jesus, they will lash out when someone threatens their pseudo-security. God also responds; God knows what you have done and will reward you. I’ve said this before, but the best possible reward is not anything God gives you, but God Himself. He is our great Reward, our great Inheritance. I think Francis Chan said that the great news of the Gospel is that you get God. All of God.

Lord, I don’t want to be a Christian who gets along with everyone and never causes trouble or stirs up dissention. I want to be a fork in the road, so that when people come up to me, they must choose to go one way or another to get by me– either toward or away from Christ. Hide me behind the cross, so that if there be anything offensive about me, it would be what the Greeks saw as foolishness and the Jews saw as a stumbling block– namely, Christ crucified. Jesus, get me out of the way so that You can get in the way of every single person I meet.

As always, I believe. Help my unbelief.

Confessions of a Ragamuffin (inspired by good conversation tonight at Ben & Jerrys)

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My greatest fear is that people will find out who I really am deep down inside and will leave me and want nothing else to do with me. I project my own self-condemnation onto others and believe that they are angry with me or upset with me or have written me off when it is just me that is not liking me.

Most of the time, I feel the constant need to be approved, affirmed and admired by everyone and my biggest peeve is to be ignored (or to feel that I am ignored). I try to be all spiritual and come across as so very wise and super-saint, when many times the words coming out of my mouth feel like hay and rubble that will not stand the test of the fire. I say I trust in God, but I am almost always working on a backup plan in case God fails me and does not come through for me. I am a mess.

I am also beloved by the God who knows all this about me and more. He was not willing that I should perish, but that I should come to repentence and He will not ever stop loving me. I am blessed. I have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies (so why do I still want more?). I am becoming who God has already declared me to be. I am constantly amazed just about every single day at the extreme lengths God will go to in order to prove Himself to me through friends, circumstances, reminders and (most importantly) through His Word.

Thank you to my friends who have inspired me by their honesty and willingness to be naked emotionally and spiritually. Your words and actions make me want to be more like my Jesus. You help pull me out of myself (notice how many “I”s are in this blog) and keep me wanting to live for a kingdom bigger than my own. You will never ever know how you have blessed me. I feel like I have given one tenth of what you have given me, but I want to do more.

So who am I? I am not my weaknesses or my strengths. My greatest strengths apart from God become my biggest weaknesses and the biggest obstacles to me being who God wants me to be. My greatest weaknesses in the hands of God will turn into His perfect strength working in and through me to impact the world around me. I am BELOVED, BLESSED and BECOMING LIKE JESUS. My Abba is very fond of me.

As always, I believe. Help my unbelief.