Disillusionment: Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

Now that same day two of them were on their way to a village called Emmaus, which was about seven miles from Jerusalem. Together they were discussing everything that had taken place. And while they were discussing and arguing, Jesus himself came near and began to walk along with them. But they were prevented from recognizing him.Then he asked them, “What is this dispute that you’re having with each other as you are walking?” And they stopped walking and looked discouraged.

-Luke 24:13-17

My favorite movie, growing up, was The Wizard of Oz.  And I was also a big fan of Elton John.

Elton John’s song, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, is about disillusionment.  That’s what The Wizard of Oz is about too.

We think that we need to go on a fantastic journey to find something.  But we find out that we we already have it, right at home.  We go on a journey, and get over our illusions.

In The Wizard of Oz, the key phrase is, “There’s no place like home.”  Dorothy had a dream about finding the answers outside her surroundings.  But, everything she needed, was right at home.

I get the idea that I need to be this to be happy.  And it does not do that.  That’s disillusionment.

We also get into a fantasy about how things are when they aren’t that way and that is an illusion.

People who have ‘stars in their eyes’, are people who are overly optimistic and idealistic and naive about set-backs, suffering, human depravity, perseverance, and real love that is sacrificial.  These folks are in for a rude awakening and disillusionment, when reality set in on them.

When disillusionment comes, it is an opportunity the get in touch with reality and grow in authenticity towards yourself, God and others.

We are supposed to dream.  Dreaming is natural.  We are supposed to have passion and follow it.  We do need to find our destiny.

But this is all natural with the supernatural.  Illusion is not natural or supernatural.  Illusion is not real.

Who I am, what God has made me to be, and where God is taking me is real.  My destiny in God is real.  And my inheritance in God is real.  God’s design for me is real.

Same thing with the church.  God’s design for the church is real and authentic, Jesus shaped you could say.

We get into illusions when we use our imaginations outside of God.  When we think about ourselves, the church, or God; outside of interaction with the living God, we might get into illusions.  Illusions are things that are not real and are not true.  They may be well-intentioned, but not real.

The two guys who were walking on the road to Emmaus were disillusioned.  Things did not turn out, they way they had imagined.  They were discouraged.

Jesus asked them why they were discouraged.  Then he was direct with them, calling them foolish and slow.  He taught them through the Old Testament, about how the Messiah had to suffer before his glorification.

Then he asked them, “What is this dispute that you’re having with each other as you are walking?” And they stopped walking and looked discouraged.

The one named Cleopas answered him, “Are you the only visitor in Jerusalem who doesn’t know the things that happened there in these days?”

“What things?” he asked them.

So they said to him, “The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet powerful in action and speech before God and all the people,and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him. But we were hoping that he was the one who was about to redeem Israel. Besides all this, it’s the third daysince these things happened. Moreover, some women from our group astounded us. They arrived early at the tomb, and when they didn’t find his body, they came and reported that they had seen a vision of angels who said he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they didn’t see him.”

He said to them, “How foolish and slow you are to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Wasn’t it necessary for the Messiah to suffer these things and enter into his glory?” Then beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted for them the things concerning himself in all the Scriptures.

-Luke 24:17-27

Their illusion was that Jesus would redeem one way, but the reality was that he redeemed Israel another way.  We have a good goal in mind and think we will get there through a certain way, that becomes an illusion.  But there is another way that is the authentic way, without illusion.

An illusion is when we see something that is not there.  We say, “He fooled himself into thinking…”  That’s an illusion.

We fool ourselves into thinking something about someone that is not true.  We think they are good when they are actually bad.  When we find out the truth, we become disillusioned.

We enter into to a relationship.  Maybe a friendship, maybe a romance, maybe a business relationship.  We assume things are all good, but then something not good happens, maybe even a betrayal.  Then we get disillusioned.

This can happen with church.  We have high hopes and together we are engaged in a very nobel purpose.  Then bad things happen and we get disillusioned and don’t want to play anymore.

I was just thinking about all the pastors out there, who suffer failure, and go into disillusionment with the church.

Disillusionment is painful, but it is actually a good thing.  We need to not be illusioned.  We need to be in touch with reality.

Suffering is reality.  Betrayal is reality.  Love and forgiveness is reality.  Broken people is reality.

God has no illusions about us, so he never gets disillusioned about us. We walk with God without illusions.

There is a paradox in that the path is where we find ourselves, but it is at home where we are our authentic selves.

All of life is a journey towards our ultimate home in and with God.  Life is not a time of just waiting for the event, but becoming the person.  Life is about knowing God and knowing who you are.

To think that we are going on a journey to becoming famous or powerful is a misconception and illusion.

Being the person God created you to be and being loved by God and then loving other people, is the simple calling for everyone.  God can choose to elevate us or not, for a short time or for a long time.

Jesus would not allow himself to be lifted up into the illusions that some people had for him.  Think about it.  Jesus lived in the tension that each of us are called to, to be ourselves and to let God elevate us.

Negative disillusionment goes into cynicism and bitter criticism, that has its root in a distrust of self and a feeling of alienation.

Sometimes a rude awakening precedes a breakthrough into authenticity.  It requires humility.  Humility sometimes only comes through humiliation.

Much of the pain of disillusionment is self-inflicted.  We ran with something that really was a lie, it was not true; and we built our reality around it.

People constantly suffered from disillusionment towards Jesus.  He never caused it, but they did it to themselves.  We have Judas and we have the other eleven misunderstanding him.  We have the fact that at the very end of the gospel account, it says that some people, who had seen and heard him, still did not believe.  And then there is the fact that only a portion of the people that saw him, after the resurrection, made it to the room where the day of pentecost happened.

We can be disillusion with the church.  Jesus has no illusions or fantasies about ideal church life, and neither should we.  If we are idealists, we need to let that go, be disillusioned, and be realists, with Jesus; based on love.

Many of us are disillusioned, disappointed, and distrusting of the church right now.  A great dissatisfaction is out there, among people who are unhappy in church, done with church, or have no regular meeting of the church to call home today.

The danger, which is toxic and poisonous is for us to be overly idealistic, perfectionist, and under an illusion that is elitist about what church has to be like.  I think we have to take people where they are and stand between them and our living God.

The bare bones, simple, and foundation of church life is, Christ, you, and I.  One way or another, we will end up eating and talking together, and then praying together, then being grateful together, and serving each other and then spilling out to serve the world around us and welcome them the table, where Christ is among us.

These are some notes and quotes from Dietrich Bonhoeffer, from his book about Christian community called Life Together.  Bonhoeffer says that God actually hates our idealist illusions about what church life should be.  These are my thoughts mixed in with what Dietrich wrote.

• A ‘wishful image’ of church life will shatter Christian community, if that is the basis on which it is lived.  Idealism.
• Serious Christians bring with them their ideas of what Christian community should be, when they enter into it, and are anxious for it to be realized.  One person says, we need to take communion, another says we must worship together, another says we must pray either laying on hands or interceding, and still another says that we should be evangelizing.
• I have been in several groups where one member came on very strong about how, in order to be an authentic Christian community, we should be engaged in evangelism.  The majority of the community was not interested in that.  There was a tension around this and it would have been better if the group reached a consensus, but instead, the evangelists felt rejected and ‘vetoed’, instead of enfolded and loved.
• The grace of God is at odds with our dreams often.  Our dreams often are not God’s dreams, not from God.  God is more concerned with our ‘one another’s’ than our success.  
• Many church planters have started with a dream, encouraged, supported, and cheered on by others.  When things don’t work, when people resist, they have a lot of frustration.  In their disillusionment, they might get angry at the people, and even bitter with themselves and with God.
• All through this, God is after something bigger and deeper, in grace.  God wants us to really know him and know his love and to know each other and know each other’s love.
• God’s desire is for us to be disillusioned.  That means to let go of illusions and walk in the real.
• Disillusionment is good, if it is riding us of our idealism.  Disillusionment is unpleasant and even appears evil, but it is the pathway to authenticity, reality, and durable community.
• Every idealism is a hindrance to genuine community and must be broken up.
• “Those who love their dream of a Christian community more than the Christian community itself become destroyers of that Christian community even though their personal intentions may be ever so honest, earnest, and sacrificial.”
• God hates our wishful dreams, that are really idealistic illusions, because they breed pride and pretense.  
• Idealists carry a delusional sense of entitlement towards God and fellow Christians, demanding that they get on board with their vision.
• Their ideal replaces the living Christ as the center of community, with themselves as ‘god’.
• My vision.
• My way.
• I am the builder of it, the creator.
• When things do not work, they accuse others, God, and themselves.
• Disillusionment with our brothers or sisters should always drive us the Christ, from whom is the only way that we can live and function together.

(From Life Together and Prayerbook of the Bible, Bonhoeffer; pp. 34-36)

Imposing your control on others, supposedly as a function of leadership, is the essence of spiritual abuse.  I thought of controlling leaders, as I read Bonhoeffer.  When your leadership goes to controlling, you have moved into the dark side.

I am an idealist.  I have gone through disillusionment over and over.  A number of times in my life, I thought that if I believed the word and prayed hard, I would get results.

No dice.  Disillusionment.  Back to reality and authenticity.  Suffering, cross bearing, death, burial, and resurrection.  Living with the risen Christ.

One of the most painful disillusionments for me was my parents divorce.  My ideal for them was shattered and the hurtful brokenness of that was all I could see or feel.  The only way I could see was escape.

I was praying for God to make the pain go away.  And then I got ministry from a beautiful group of  prayer warriors, who ministered Paul’s word from Jesus to me: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is perfected in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9).

I never really comprehended that verse before that.

Jesus has proven to me, over and over that in my disillusionment, he has grace for me to experience and be transformed by.  And to receive it, I must go low.  “Little ones to him belong, they are weak, but he is strong.  Yes Jesus loves me, the Bible tells me so.”

When we try to make the case for our ideal, in the midst of shattering brokenness, that is pride, bitterness, and cynicism.  We blame, complain, and judge; having no grace for others, ourselves, or God.  No gratefulness, no forgiveness, and no happiness.  Just anger, control, and narcissism.

Shattered illusions that do not give way to grace, which is had by humility, becomes cynicism.  Cynical people believe that all of us are only motivated by self-interest.  Cynical people project their own brokenness onto the whole world.

The back-story of a cynical person is a broken heart that did not heal right.  They became deceived, they began to believe a lie.  They made a choice to go on the wrong path, in the wrong direction.

And the only way to get back on the right path is to go back to where you made the wrong turn.

The man who is a wolf in sheep’s clothing, was not always like that.  He may have once been a faithful shepherd, or a sheepdog.  But he got his heart broken and it did not heal right.

That is how a wolf is born that ends up hurting and destroying sheep in the church.  Disillusionment that did not give way to grace through humility, but stayed proud and went to cynicism.

Judas is an example of bad disillusionment.  Intimate with Jesus, but had a different ideal or ideal of who Jesus should be.  And in his cynicism, he betrayed Jesus.

When he realized his mistake, he again did not find grace, but judged himself and executed himself.  He made these decisions, for which he has responsibility.  Satan was involved with him, looked for and found a road into his life, from which he could tempt Judas to do wrong.

Every disciple is tempted to sin and betray Christ.  In our disillusionment, we can turn to the dark side or just give up.  That way of Christ is the receive grace, in humility.

God knows that we will be tempted to go for fame, fortune, success; or just finding ourselves or our destiny.  Maybe we just want to go to school, find a job, find a spouse, and have kids.  Maybe we just want to pay the bills and have a decent grocery store to go to.

Along the path of life, we need to stay grounded in reality, under no illusions about ourselves.

What happened next, in the story of the two men and Jesus, on the road to Emmaus?

They came near the village where they were going, and he gave the impression that he was going farther.  But they urged him, “Stay with us, because it’s almost evening, and now the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them.

 It was as he reclined at the table with them that he took the bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.  Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him, but he disappeared from their sight.

-Luke 24:28-31

There is something profound here, in when Jesus broke the bread and gave it to them, that at that moment, their eyes were opened.  He is the bread of life and his body was broken for our life.  When we receive his life, broken and raised from the dead, for us; we can see him and become disillusioned.

His life and he as the truth, is our reality.

Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, sung by Casey Crescenzo:

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/RN87sNbMoIc?rel=0&controls=0&showinfo=0

When Leaders Fall, Be Civil

How the mighty have fallen!

-2 Samuel 1:19b, 25a, 27a

When an influential television evangelist fell, in the late 1980’s; some Christians celebrated.  The cheering was over that fact that God was cleansing his house.  

A better response is, “How the mighty have fallen!”  

David sang a song of lament and had the song distributed to all of Israel.  The song says, “How the mighty have fallen!”  This sentiment is the proper response when leaders, who had great influence, fall from grace, or are exposed in their hypocrisy, betrayal and sedition.

Remember that our brother or sister is never our enemy, even when they continually act like one and treat us as theirs.

The story of Saul’s death, that led to David leading Israel, in mourning and lament, rather than celebration; is recounted in 2 Samuel 1:9 to 2:7.  Saul was mortally wounded, but not yet dead.  An Amalekite man, someone living in Israel, but not an Israelite while still coming under the rules, regulations, faith and practices of Israel: this man killed Saul, at Saul’s behest.

The young Amalekite man killed Saul and then took his crown and royal armband.  He then journeyed to David’s camp and sought a meeting with David, to give these to David.  As soon as David received the bad news about the deaths of Saul and Jonathan, he and all his closest men went into grieving.

After a short time of mourning and fasting, David questioned the young man.  He found out that the man was someone who was living in Israel.  He was accountable to the laws of God, and should have known better.  David immediately had the young man executed for the murder of Saul.

Then he begged me, ‘Stand over me and kill me, for I’m mortally wounded, but my life still lingers.’ So I stood over him and killed him because I knew that after he had fallen he couldn’t survive. I took the crown that was on his head and the armband that was on his arm, and I’ve brought them here to my lord.”

Then David took hold of his clothes and tore them, and all the men with him did the same. They mourned, wept, and fasted until the evening for those who died by the sword—for Saul, his son Jonathan, the Lord’s people, and the house of Israel.

David inquired of the young man who had brought him the report, “Where are you from?”

“I’m the son of a resident alien,” he said. “I’m an Amalekite.”

David questioned him, “How is it that you were not afraid to lift your hand to destroy the Lord’s anointed?” Then David summoned one of his servants and said, “Come here and kill him!” The servant struck him, and he died. For David had said to the Amalekite, “Your blood is on your own head because your own mouth testified against you by saying, ‘I killed the Lord’s anointed.’”

-2 Samuel 1:9-16

Assisted suicide is not ok.  If an an authority gives an order that goes against God’s orders, we must obey God.  The right thing to do, for the Amalekite man, would have been to stand with Saul and defend him or drag him to shelter, if possible, so that he could die, if he was to die, in peace.

Everything the young Amalekite man did went against God’s laws.  The text makes note of the fact that he was both young and without excuse.  He lived in Israel and the prohibition against murder was well known, and he was young, which did not excuse him.  Perhaps the text is telling us, as the whole book of Proverbs does, that when you are younger, you need to be more careful to learn wisdom and leave folly and gain life experience and not think you know everything, when you do not.

Another notable feature of this story, is that David first mourned.  He mourned first, before trying to assign blame or make a judgement.  He only did the later after he did the former.

David, the warrior, knew how to cry.  That is a huge lesson for us.  Become a warrior, but grieve deeply, when appropriate.  Stoicism is not wisdom, Godly or Christlike.  

David neither reacted in anger nor went into stoic denial.  He mourned and fasted.

Then, after some processing, he interview the young man and had him immediately executed for murder.

David indicted the man from his own words.  You may not kill the one who is the Lord’s.

There was an extreme audacity in the man, in that he thought he was doing the right thing.  The right thing by God?  The right thing by David?  Saul?  No, no and no.

What he did was purely selfish.  It was mercenary.  We can surmise that he was looking out for himself.

He murdered and robbed a dying man, who had mental health issues and was loved by God and David.  The Amalekite was completely deluded to think that this was the right thing to do and that David would congratulate him.

We can become just like this guy and somehow deceive ourselves that sinfulness is ok in certain circumstances.  We kill people, often leaders, with our words.  And we rationalize that it is ok because that person is a heretic, or carnally sinful.

For some Christians, their favorite indoor sport is wishing for the death of leaders, whether Christian (even Catholic) or political.  If you are a self-identified Christian, look at what Jesus said about murder and how religious people commit murder with their words:

For I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never get into the kingdom of heaven.

“You have heard that it was said to our ancestors, Do not murder, and whoever murders will be subject to judgment. But I tell you, everyone who is angry with his brother or sister will be subject to judgment. Whoever insults his brother or sister, will be subject to the court. Whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be subject to hellfire. So if you are offering your gift on the altar, and there you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled with your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.

-Matthew 5:20-4

Somehow, we fool or deceive ourselves into thinking we are on God’s side or God is surely on our side, when we bash, trash and kill someone with our words whom we deem to be under God’s judgement or we  rap on about how bad that person is.

When a corrupt leader falls from grace, is exposed, loses God’s protection and is ravaged by the enemy; that is not our time, our cue, to kill them and steal their jewelry and audaciously try to claim a reward.  No.  

David lived in the tension that we are all called to live in, of the prophetic future beckoning, while the present has not given way yet completely.  How to live into our prophetic destiny without ‘helping’ God and letting God develop you in that tension is what we are all called to.

David led the nation in mourning for Saul.  David knew he was called to be king, but the whole nation was not there yet.  They didn’t get that.  What they may have got and what they may have appreciated about David though, was his abilities as a worship leader, a poet, an artist and a songmaster.  

So, in that sphere of his giftedness where they did see him and appreciate him, he served them, the nation; by disseminating this song of sorrow and lament that also celebrated and said “good-bye” to Saul and is regime:

David sang the following lament for Saul and his son Jonathan, and he ordered that the Judahites be taught The Song of the Bow. It is written in the Book of Jashar:

The splendor of Israel lies slain on your heights.
How the mighty have fallen!
Do not tell it in Gath,
don’t announce it in the marketplaces of Ashkelon,
or the daughters of the Philistines will rejoice,
and the daughters of the uncircumcised will celebrate.
Mountains of Gilboa,
let no dew or rain be on you,
or fields of offerings,
for there the shield of the mighty was defiled—
the shield of Saul, no longer anointed with oil.
Jonathan’s bow never retreated,
Saul’s sword never returned unstained,
from the blood of the slain,
from the flesh of the mighty.
Saul and Jonathan,
loved and delightful,
they were not parted in life or in death.
They were swifter than eagles, stronger than lions.
Daughters of Israel, weep for Saul,
who clothed you in scarlet, with luxurious things,
who decked your garments with gold ornaments.
How the mighty have fallen in the thick of battle!
Jonathan lies slain on your heights.
I grieve for you, Jonathan, my brother.
You were such a friend to me.
Your love for me was more wondrous
than the love of women.
How the mighty have fallen
and the weapons of war have perished!

-2 Samuel 1:19-27

There you have the example of the proper response and a hymn to the fallen leaders.

The last part of this story, that I want to touch on, is in the next scenes.  David asks God, “Now what?”  And God tells him his next move.  And David is anointed king, not over all of Israel, but just over the house of Judah.  

Then we have the report of the men who bravely buried Saul.  We know where David is headed and who he is, but many people at the time were slow to realize this and might have thought that another son of Saul was the next king.  David had to both be obedient to God and be diplomatic with those who were not on-board yet.

The lessons here are that David was bold and filled with faith, but he waited on God to open the doors; and that he was a bridge to the future and not an island that demanded others join him in God’s obvious will.  In other words, David’s feet were firmly planted in the prophetic future of his destiny, while at the same time, his hand was reaching out to others, in kindness who did not get it yet.

The final words in this section are David’s words to men who are grieving and coming to grips with David’s rise to power.  We know God is behind David, that David was God’s choice; but they do not.  And, we can only imagine that if David sat down with them and told them, “Guys, you’ve got to see that I am the one God has chosen!”, that they may not have believed him.

So, he is as kind as he can be and he does diplomacy maybe.  He says these words to these men, as he calls them to grasp the reality of what needs to happen and who he is, saying, “be strong and valiant”.  Why does he say that?  Because more civil war is imminent and he is encouraging them to choose the right side.

Here is 2 Samuel 2:1-7:

Some time later, David inquired of the Lord: “Should I go to one of the towns of Judah?”

The Lord answered him, “Go.”

Then David asked, “Where should I go?”

“To Hebron,” the Lord replied.

 So David went there with his two wives, Ahinoam the Jezreelite and Abigail, the widow of Nabal the Carmelite.  In addition, David brought the men who were with him, each one with his family, and they settled in the towns near Hebron. Then the men of Judah came, and there they anointed David king over the house of Judah. They told David: “It was the men of Jabesh-gilead who buried Saul.”

 David sent messengers to the men of Jabesh-gilead and said to them, “The Lord bless you, because you have shown this kindness to Saul your lord when you buried him.  Now, may the Lord show kindness and faithfulness to you, and I will also show the same goodness to you because you have done this deed.  Therefore, be strong and valiant, for though Saul your lord is dead, the house of Judah has anointed me king over them.”

A lesson here is that God provides the opportunity to do the right thing, but often, people choose otherwise.  This led to the personal destruction for the Amalekite man.  Choosing to be on the side that opposes what God is doing with a person, and David is that person in the lesson of this story, will lead to your own pain, suffering and even death.

And we can not blame God, because God makes provision for our weakness.  Every day, people chose a side that is against God and they will suffer consequences for it that were preventable.  God made provision for them not to be deceived, but they said “no thanks” and drove into the ditch.

There is a way to respond when a leader falls from grace or is exposed.  And there is an improper way to talk, speak and write; that comes from a heart that is not right with God.

There are steps to follow and ways to discern what God is doing.  The first step is to be obedient to the ways of Christ living in me.  Jesus was obedient and kind and was an active participant in waiting upon Father and seeing and doing with Father what Father was doing.

David is “the man after God’s own heart”, said God (1 Sam. 13:14).  His number one thing was passion for God, personally.  Being king was secondary and God’s idea for him. 

David, like many of us, was a reluctant leader, as far as we know.  And he was a passionate God-seeker, musical artist at the genius level and a skilled warrior; who God chose to be king.  

The guy who had been on the hard road for quite a while, spoke out of his experience in suffering and becoming more courageous, when he said to potential enemies in the looming civil war, “be valiant”.  In other words, “You know what the right thing is to do, and it might seem harder and far more dangerous.  Search your hearts, be brave and do the right thing.”  That is what I think David was saying to people who were shell-shocked by Saul’s epic failure and what is next.

I See The Lord Now, Today

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

-Psalm 118:24

I see the Lord now, today.

Today is the day of salvation.  Today is the day of deliverance.  Today is the day to trust God.

Today thank God.  Today trust God.  Today see God.

The Lord is here.  He is on the scene.  The Lord is working.

I see the Lord.  I see Him now.  I am glad, thankful and filled with joy about what I see God doing in my life and in those around me.

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.  There is no better day than today, to begin praising God.  There is no better time to trust Him.

Today is a day to choose to worship Him.  Today we have the opportunity, like no other day, to express our thanks to God.

Today is a day to begin trusting God.  Today we can begin to see God as good.  Today is a new day.

Every day is a day with God.  Every day is a day for God.  Every day is a day God made that we can choose to rejoice and be glad in.

Today is a day when I will choose to see God’s goodness.  Today is a day like no other day.  This day is a day to rejoice in because the Lord is my God.

I see the Lord as good and loving, kind and gracious, filled with mercy and faithfulness.  My heart is glad when I consider God.  Today I will be be filled with joy, because of the Lord.

I am no longer waiting on the Lord, but I now see the Lord and what the Lord has done already.  I am filled with thankfulness today.  I am going to live in today, knowing that God is at work, in me, around me, and in the lives of the people dear to me.

I see the Lord today and I am thankful.  Today is the day that I am letting joy flow.  I am no longer waiting for a breakthrough, waiting for the heavens to open, waiting for a miracle.  Instead, I see the Lord today, where I am.  And I see the Lord in all the people I know.

I am celebrating today.  The Lord is here.  The Lord is mine today.

The Lord has made my day.

I am thanking God and living in what He has done.  I will no longer discount today and short circuit my happiness.  I now see God and will live in today.

I see clearly now.  I see today as the day when the Lord has acted and intervened.  It may have happened yesterday, last week, last year or even many years ago; but I see what the Lord has done now, today.

A seed planted has sprung forth.  A plant planted has flowered.  A tree now is filled with abundant fruit.

I see it now.  I see the Lord today.

It did not happen today, but I see it today.  I am glad today.  I have been waiting for God while God has been waiting for me.

I have gotten up and gotten out and looked around and I now see all the good things.  My heart has changed and I am no longer pessimistic, cynical or negative.  I’m not judging things anymore.

Where I thought I saw ‘impossible’, I now see ‘possible’.  On the hardest places, I now see the Lord and his encouragement.  I sense the Lord saying something like, “If I am with you, you will be ok”.

I don’t don’t sense the Lord saying, “You can do it”, but, “I will be with you”.  I also have a strong, I mean overpowering sense that the Lord says, “I have been with you and I am with you today”.

Don’t misunderstand me,  I am not saying that I sense the Lord saying, “You can not do it”, but I sense the Lord saying that He is with me and has been with me.

I saw one note on Psalm 118, that told me everything: “This is the psalm or “hymn” that Jesus likely sang after the Passover supper with his disciples, before making his way to Gethsemane and Calvary” (TPT, Psalms, p, 253).  

This is the whole backstory on Psalm 118, from Thomas Constable:

This is the last in this series of the Egyptian Hallel psalms (Pss. 113—118). It describes a festal procession to the temple to praise and sacrifice to the Lord. The historical background may be the dedication of the restored walls and gates of Jerusalem in Ezra and Nehemiah’s time, following the return from Babylonian captivity, in 444 B.C.[474] It contains elements of communal thanksgiving, individual thanksgiving, and liturgical psalms. The subject is God’s loyal love for His people. The situation behind it seems to be God’s restoration of the psalmist after a period of dishonor. This would have been a very appropriate psalm to sing during the Feast of Tabernacles as well as at Passover and Pentecost. The Lord Jesus and His disciples probably sang it together in the Upper Room at the end of the Lord’s Supper (cf. Matt. 26:30).

And this is what Derek Kidner wrote, in his commentary (pp. 412-13):

“As the final psalm of the ‘Egyptian Hallel’, sung to celebrate the Passover . . ., this psalm may have pictured to those who first sang it the rescue of Israel at the Exodus, and the eventual journey’s end at Mount Zion. But it was destined to be fulfilled more perfectly, as the echoes of it on Palm Sunday and in the Passion Week make clear to every reader of the Gospels.”

And, I am always interested in seeing the context of a verse.  This is the immediate context, of the previous two verses:

The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.
This came from the Lord; it is wonderful in our eyes.
This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Am here it is, with the preceding five verses, for more context:

Open the gates of righteousness for me;
I will enter through them and give thanks to the Lord.
This is the gate of the Lord; the righteous will enter through it.
I will give thanks to You because You have answered me and have become my salvation.
The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.
This came from the Lord; it is wonderful in our eyes.
This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

This is a twenty-nine verse psalm.  It starts with the words,

Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, His faithful love endures forever.  

And the center verse, verse fourteen, echoes the song of deliverance, from Exodus 15:

The Lord is my strength and my song; He has become my salvation.

These two verses, one and fourteen, are what this psalm is about.  This is what rejoicing in the day that the Lord has made is all about.  Every day is the day of deliverance, with the Lord.

At every Passover, from the days of Moses, up to the night of the last supper; people worshipped the Lord for that day, the day, today: this day.  Every day is the day of deliverance, because that is what God is all about.

We live in the kingdom of God.  The kingdom is already and not yet.  We know this, and neither live in the triumphalism of an over realized eschatology, nor in a futurist theological mindset that says, “it’s all future, so I will just wait”.  Wait for the rapture or wait for God to do the next big thing.

Triumphalism and futurism are both errors and extremes, detrimental, unhealthy and dysfunctional (and fattening).  The kingdom life, the Jesus life, is lived in the already of the kingdom, while eagerly anticipating the not yet and seeing the not yet breaking into today, while still being held back as not (fully) yet.

This is the day that the Lord has made.  I will rejoice and be glad in it.

I see the Lord now.

Today is the day of salvation.  Today is the day of deliverance.  Today is the day to trust God.

Today thank God.  Today trust God.  Today see God.

The Lord is here.  He is on the scene.  The Lord is working.

I see the Lord.  I see Him now.  I am glad, thankful and filled with joy about what I see God doing in my life and in those around me.

Vindication and The Presence of God

A prayer of David:

Lord, hear a just cause; (Listen to me, Lord.)
pay attention to my cry; (It’s my piercing cry for justice!)
listen to my prayer— (My cause is just and my need is real.)
from lips free of deceit. (I’ve done what is right and my lips speak truth.)
Let my vindication come from You, (Lord, I always live my life before your face,)
for You see what is right. (so examine and exonerate me.  Vindicate me and show the world I’m innocent.)

-Psalm 17:1-2 (HCSB, (TPT))

I believe in vindication from God.  God is going to avenge or do revenge on the enemy.

It seems to me that the key strategy of the enemy is to weave lies into the world to stop the progress of the kingdom and the saints.  There is a whole spectrum of lies that are told about God, about faith and about each one of us, to stop us and hold us back.

I can not tell you what you or those you love need vindication from.  But I can tell you that I believe God is about vindicating.

I can tell you that vindication is not something we do for our selves.  Vindication is when God avenges and takes revenge on the enemy.  

He does it all the time.  And it is something that we can expect and do not need to help God do.  He will do it and we can see God do it.

We dwell in God’s presence and God exacts revenge, vengeance and vindication for us against the enemy.

And this is about the enemy and God’s war on the enemy.  This is not about revenge on people or war on people.  Governments and armies and human warfare is a different thing.

Our brothers and sisters are never our enemy, even if they act like our enemy.  The enemy is the demonic realm, headed by satan.  That enemy is involved in mischief, all sorts of lies, murder and destruction in the world, against humans and God’s kingdom.

The enemy has done a whole host of bad things, and God is all about turning that destruction and those lies and the bondage around into freedom and blessing.  Vindication is the word and vindication time is upon us.

 Here are some resources on what vindication is all about.

From vocabulary.com:

Vindication is a sweet thing — when you get vindication, you’ve been proven right or justified in doing something. Everyone accused of a crime craves vindication.

Vindication is good, but it can only come after something bad, like being accused of something you didn’t do. If a teacher thought you cheated, but then announced to the whole class that you didn’t, you’re getting vindication. An accused criminal who is exonerated — cleared of the crime — gets vindication. If you believe something crazy — like that your underdog sports team could win a championship — and it comes true, that’s a vindication of your beliefs.

From, etymolgy.com:

vindication (n.) late 15c., “act of avenging, revenge,” from Old French vindicacion “vengeance, revenge” and directly from Latin vindicationem (nominative vindicatio) “act of claiming or avenging,” noun of action from past participle stem of vindicare “lay claim to, assert; claim for freedom, set free; protect, defend; avenge” (related to vindicta “revenge”), probably from vim dicare “to show authority,” from vim, accusative of vis “force” (see vim) + dicare “to proclaim” (see diction). Meaning “justification by proof, defense against censure” is attested from 1640s.

From Thesaurus.com:

Synonyms of Vindication:  (Primary) exonerate, revenge.  (Secondarily) justification, exoneration, exculpation, acquittal/acquittance, mitigation, apology, compurgation, amnesty, dismissal.

Here is a vindication prayer:

From David’s prayer:

“Lord, hear a just cause; pay attention to my cry;
listen to my prayer— from lips free of deceit.
Let my vindication come from You, for You see what is right.”
(Ps. 17:1-2, HCSB)

And from  a song of David’s:

“They all will stand awestruck, over what God has done,
seeing how he vindicated the victims of those crimes.

The lovers of God will be glad, rejoicing in the Lord.

They will be found in his glorious wrap-around presence
singing songs of praise to God!”
(Ps. 64:9-10, TPT)

About Psalm 17, my first thought was that this is a declarative prayer that asks God to vindicate us:  Asking God to prove we are right.

But then I thought, maybe it means something about being vindicated in relationship with God?

This prayer is asking for God to examine me and exonerate me, showing others that I am innocent of any false charges that have been leveled against me.

In other words, the prayer might be asking for those who would believe something untrue to see the goodness of God in me and in my life, even though I am just a human being who makes mistakes and gets it wrong sometimes.

Is that it, or part of it?

There is also a prayer that says, “Deliver me from the lust of vindicating myself”.

The word, “From your presence let my vindication come! Let your eyes behold the right!”, means; “let me continue to abide in you and somehow in however you, God, choose; let me be in the vindication that is in Christ.”

When I see Jesus Christ as the definition of God.  And when I see Jesus’ death on the cross as the definitional lens from which I see God; it gives me perspective of my life in Christ.

In time, and eternity; Jesus Christ has been vindicated.  And I am vindicated as I am in Christ.

When it says, “From your presence, let my vindication come”, it means that, “In abiding in you, I am vindicated: so let that be, let that come, and let that happen in my life.”

The work or intention of my life is to abide in Christ.  And everything in my life is about my relationship to God.  God is intensely relational.

Every challenge I face, every trial, every argument, every disagreement and every disappointment are occasions or opportunities to trust God, know God, have faith in God, be loved by God and come to know again that God is good.  That is the presence of God from which my vindication comes.

The presence of God is the face of God.  “Lord, I will always live before your face.” (Ps. 17:2)

The presence of God is in the face of God.  Where God faces, God’s presence is.  I want to be before God’s face.

Getting in someone’s face is something we say when we really tell someone off.  But the Bible concept of this is that we want to be in God’s presence.  Seeking God’s face is the intention to be in God’s presence.

To seek God’s face is to ask for an audience with the King and to ask for an increase in God’s presence in our place where we are.

To say, “Vindicate me in your presence”, is to ask God for a transformed life.  We do not know how our vindication will work out or play out with others, but our vindication is what we desire and ask for.

When we say, “Vindicate me!”, we are not telling God to do it or how to do it.  We are giving up our right to do it and agreeing that God is the vindicator.

I am putting all my trust into God to be my judge and make all the right judgments about me and for me.

I don’t think we have to convince God that we are right.  Instead, we are going to live in asking for God to put His gaze on what we are doing and what we are saying and to make it righteous.  Maybe that is what living before God’s face is all about.

“Vindicate me”, is asking God to turn around the false accusations and mis-judgments in my life.  And the “From You”, part means that I want God’s presence in my life.  I want to kisses of God on my face.

To live before God’s face is to live in transparency and honesty.  We are asking God to give us a clear and blessed relationship with God manifested out into the world we live in.

I want to live in God’s embrace so much that when I am accused or mis-judged or slighted in any way, real or imagined; that I just have to look into the face of God and then it is not my problem.  My prayer is that I will live in God’s presence, and all the settling of what is unsettling will come upon me from God.

I want to see God do vindications, vengeance and revenge on the enemy.  The ministry of Jesus, setting captives free and turning lives around is known in the non-believing world.  The fear of God will be known to all and all of us will be in awe at the turn arounds that God does in the lives of people who have been falsely blamed, charged, guilted, disapproved and indicted by God’s enemies.

The wrap-around presence of God and the glory of God is where vindication comes from, overturning the works of the enemy.

We will not just praise God for what we believe, but what he is doing now.  Our praises to God will be for actual works of God in our day to day lives, where in God is vindicating his Children.

Warfare Worship

Then my head 

Will be high 

Above my enemies around me; 

I will offer sacrifices 

In His tent 

With shouts of joy.

I will sing and make music to the Lord.

-Psalm 27:6

There is a place where God lifts our heads up above our enemies and we give high praise to God with shouts of joy, songs and music.  There is a reality of warfare in our lives with the enemy: God’s enemy and our enemy.  There is a key to walking in victory over the enemy, which is simply practicing the presence of God.

There is a place that God has for us, where we are above our enemies, and enjoying God.  Warfare worship is to travel into God and then praise God, sing, and shout from the elevated place of God’s presence, where the enemy can not touch us.

The starting point of worship and warfare is that God is our salvation.  The act of God saving and delivering us immediately brings us into spiritual warfare.  When we are saved or delivered, the first thing that is natural to do, is to thank God and enter into praise and and worship as a life style or way of living.

The enemy is irritated with people who become saved or delivered, like hornets who’s nest has been poked.  The enemy always has limited resources or assets, so they don’t waste energy on those who are captive or deceived, but pursue and war against those who have been set free or are walking in freedom.  They would like to recapture us, or prevent or discourage us from setting others free.

This Psalm starts by saying “The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?”  Fear and salvation are like dark and light.  Light extinguishes darkness.  

There were things that made David afraid and stuff that makes us afraid.  A tactic of the enemy is to get us to fear.  

This is a part of the normal life of the believer.  Having enemies and being saved, delivered, and protected from them, by the Lord is also normal.

Psalm 27 begins with this:

The Lord is my light and my salvation— whom should I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life— of whom should I be afraid?
When evildoers came against me to devour my flesh,
my foes and my enemies stumbled and fell.
Though an army deploys against me, my heart is not afraid;
though a war breaks out against me, still I am confident.

This is a warfare psalm and there are a lot of them.  We could easily read this and take in the fact that David was a warrior and had real battles with real people.  We see and learn how he relied on God in his troubles and on the battle field.

If we were soldiers today, we might take comfort from these warfare psalms.  But as civilians, we might be tempted to set aside the warfare and enemy paradigm or scenario and just draw comfort from the fact that the Lord has saved and is saving us, taking care of us; and we do not need to fear, because God is taking care of us.

That is all somewhat true.  But we can not set aside warfare and the reality of enemies.  Part of the Christian life involves spiritual warfare, with the enemy, which is Satan and the demonic realm.

The context of Psalm 27 is warfare.  When we read psalms like this, we have to decide if we are going to just slice out and set aside the warfare part and say that the writer really was a warrior, who was in war, and he wrote some great things about praise and worship, in the midst of where he was (in warfare).  Or, are we going to take the alternative viewpoint, which is the view that I hold, and that is that we see the whole of the scriptures through Christ, and Jesus Christ, who was and is at war with the enemy, who also has become our enemy.

Basically, what I am saying is that is you are in Christ, you are at war, like it or not.  You and I are warriors.  The bride of Christ is a beautiful lady, who is a warrior.

In that light, we see the warfare psalms, like this one, as instructive for the Christian life, which is a life of warfare.  There are thoughts, beliefs or ideas out there that say that the demonic is not real or they are all somehow gone.  But the truth is that the demonic realm is real and are at war with God and God’s people.

That is my lens through which I apply the scriptures.  David and we have enemies that God saves, delivers, and protects us from.  With that in mind, this in the next thing David writes:

I have asked one thing from the Lord; it is what I desire:
to dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life,
gazing on the beauty of the Lord and seeking Him in His temple.
For He will conceal me in His shelter in the day of adversity;
He will hide me under the cover of His tent;
He will set me high on a rock.

“One thing”, means the main thing or the foremost thing.  Have you ever had one thing you were asking God for?  Something is in the forefront of our minds, and that is how it was with David.

His one thing he wanted, and remember that this is a guy in war, who had enemies after him; the one thing he asked for was to “dwell in the house of the Lord” all the days of his life.  He then fills in his request or vision of his desire by saying that he just wants to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and seek Him in His temple, and be concealed in His shelter.  He then ties this into the backdrop of the warfare he is involved in, saying he desires all this during the day of his adversity, and asks to be hidden under the cover of His (the Lord’s) tent and set high (by the Lord) on a rock.

That is a lot of information or a detailed prayer request.  Some questions arise for me:  What is the house of the Lord?  What is His temple?  What is His shelter?  And what is His tent, that David is referring to?  And how does this apply to me?

• House of the Lord, to dwell in, every day
• Temple of the Lord, to gaze upon God’s beauty and seek Him in
• Shelter of the Lord, He conceals me in
• Tent of the Lord that He hides me under the cover of

It is worth noting that the Temple in Jerusalem was not built yet.  But there was a tabernacle, that we call “The tabernacle of David”, which was a tent.  David might have had the tabernacle (worship tent) in mind.  But it is interesting, that he does not say that he wants to go there and sing, make music, or dance; but that he wants to dwell there, gaze at God there, be concealed there, and be hidden, made under cover there.

This song begins with the statement that the Lord saves me, so I will not be afraid.  He then could have said that he just wants to sing, to worship and praise the Lord.  But, instead, David uses words to express that he desires to dwell with the Lord and just look at the Lord, and become concealed and hidden, in the Lord.

This is a little bit different than singing praise and worship songs.  He says his number one request, with the backdrop of the warfare he is in, that is fear inducing and that he needs salvation from and through; his one thing he asks is to dwell with the Lord.

And then he unpacks that statement to say, everyday, gazing at the Lord’s beauty and seeking Him, coming into the Lord’s sheltering concealment, and being hidden and under cover in the Lord’s tent.  This is what David means by dwelling in the house of the Lord.

Again, the context of his saying these poetic words, is that he was being hunted by evil predators.  He can look out and see a whole army deployed against him.  We know that David was a great and brave warrior, who had others with him usually and knew how to use weapons and fight hand to hand.

But in the oncoming warfare, David’s heart turns to these thoughts about the Lord and rather than praying for victory in the possible oncoming battle, he asks God to let him dwell with Him and life in his presence, everyday; and for him to be able to gaze at the Lord and become wrapped up and enfolded by the Lord, so that he becomes concealed, hidden, and under cover.

The lesson here is that warfare worship can be where we dwell with in the Lord.  It starts with the choice, desire, and action to dwell with the Lord, which often just involves gazing upon Him.  And then what happens, is that we become hidden, concealed, or made to become under the cover of the Lord.

And boom, that is the warfare or a worship warfare lifestyle that this song of David teaches us today.  The dwelling leads to coming up into the place of the Lord, that is above the enemies around us.  From that place, we shout for joy in worship, sing and make music.

We might sometimes have it backwards, when we begin with loud singing and music.  The place to begin with is dwelling, which involves gazing at the Lord and coming into his presence in solemn awe.  It is like the phrase, “peace be still” or “be still and know”.

Then when we come into God’s presence, because his presence has come to us; then we shout, sing, and make music.  Today, we often make music, sing, and shout first before we seek to come into God’s presence.

There are a lot of admonitions in scripture to wait on God.  What if more of our worship and lives of worship was waiting and gazing and dwelling in the quiet first, and then singing, shouting, and making music after God lifts us up?  This is a lesson in worship & warfare that is being illustrated here:

Then my head will be high above my enemies around me;
I will offer sacrifices in His tent with shouts of joy.
I will sing and make music to the Lord.

The word “Then” points back to the preceding verses for context.  He is saying, that after he is able to dwell with the Lord, which is gazing upon the Lord’s beauty and getting so wrapped up in the Lord, that he becomes hidden, concealed or under cover; he is then in a higher place, above his enemies, and from there shouts for joy, sings, and makes music to the Lord.

But getting to the “then” of having dwelt with the Lord, is a struggle of sorts.  There is a transition from being under attack to being in God’s dwelling place and getting lifted up.  The transitional roadway is prayer:

Lord, hear my voice when I call;
be gracious to me and answer me.
My heart says this about You,
“You are to seek My face.”
Lord, I will seek Your face.
Do not hide Your face from me;
do not turn Your servant away in anger.
You have been my helper;
do not leave me or abandon me,
God of my salvation.
Even if my father and mother abandon me,
the Lord cares for me.

Because of my adversaries,
show me Your way, Lord,
and lead me on a level path.
Do not give me over to the will of my foes,
for false witnesses rise up against me, breathing violence.

I am certain that I will see the Lord’s goodness
in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord;
be strong and courageous.
Wait for the Lord.

Previously, David shared where he wants to go, to dwell with the Lord, every day.  He then shares how he believes it will be to dwell with the Lord, and the results it will have, lifting him above his enemies.  But, he comes back to the reality of the struggle to get to the dwelling place.

The last words, “Wait for the Lord”, are the key to how he will get to the place of dwelling, gazing, and being wrapped up in the Lord.  The Biblical idea of waiting is focusing on and being at the service of someone else, like a waiter or waitress in a restaurant.  It is active and on alert.

When we wait on the Lord, we have faith in Him and are focused on him.  Waiting on the Lord is the first step to dwelling with the Lord.  And dwelling with the Lord leads to praising and worshiping the Lord with shouts, singing, and music.

And dwelling with the Lord is the key to spiritual warfare as a life style.  We come up above the enemy through dwelling with the Lord and that results in praise and worship.

If you are being threatened or intimidated and being incited to fear by the enemy, the way of salvation from the enemy and all their unpleasantness is dwelling with the Lord: stepping into the place of gazing upon Him.  Tucking your self into the Lord, and being wrapped up into the Lord.

We have been born into warfare and worship.  This is the way and how of Christ to live: practicing God’s presence for living, for worshiping, and for victory in warfare.

Pain, Suffering, and Jesus

Jesus wept: burst forth into tears (cried).

-John 11:35

Jesus is with us, each one of us, in our pain and loves us.  He said, “I will be with you, even to the end of the age”.

Jesus burst into tears.  Jesus cried from the grief he felt on more than one occasion, and his crying was neither fake nor out-of-control.  He authentically cried.

Sometime between the age of 12 and about 30, the most important man in his life, Joseph, died.  Later, when Jesus had to leave home and his family’s business, that must have been hard.

And his brothers, who grew up with him, thought he was crazy when he began his ministry that we read about.  That had to be painful.

The majority of the people around him either did not get it, did not get him, or did not believe; and were hostile towards him, even wanting him dead.

At the end, the crowd roared, “Crucify him!”.  It was real and authentic hate.  Rejection.

And, in a sense, we were in that crowd.  Something to ponder.

Jesus faced and received persecution and he suffered.

We have a savior who is familiar with grief, with suffering, and with gut wrenching pain – physical and emotional.

The way for us in pain is the way with him.  The life for us is a life of walking with someone who understands.

The challenge for us is to trust God, to let ourselves live in surrender to him.  Hear God say, “I’ve got this and I’ve got you”.  He does not promise that we will not suffer, but he promises to be with us in our suffering.

Being with him is the key.

The only way in suffering is fellowship with Jesus Christ.  He is the rock to stand on in trouble.  And from that place, we can get help, wisdom, counsel, and possibly miracles.

The faulty position is to seek all that and more, but not be wed to him.

We find ourselves in a crisis, a challenge, a set-back, a disappointment, a failure or defeat.  “Help!”, we cry.  We pray desperate prayers and we want to know how to escape this thing and get deliverance and relief.  “Is there perhaps a special way to pray?”, we wonder.  “Is there a book I can read that will tell me what to do?”, we ask.

We look at each other’s lives, from “over the fence”, so to speak; and think the other one has it better.  But when we get closer and hear and see, close up, we find out that our neighbor has their own troubles or challenges, losses, and the crisis they are now facing.  In fact, all of life is filled with challenges punctuated by celebrations.

I can give you two examples of how we look “over the fence”, and assume they are happier or have the life we wish we had, and this, “ain’t necessarily so”.  Money and fame.

Money, more money, does not bring happiness; and people with more money are not happier, on a case by case basis; because happiness is an ‘inside job’.  Contentment is the issue.  Saying, “If I had more money, I would be happy (or happier)”, is a delusion, because of this simple principle: Wherever you go, there you are.

Fame or success does not bring happiness or anything close to peace, but mostly stress and trouble; for those who are not prepared for it.  Most of us are like dogs chasing cars.  If we catch up to and grab or hop into fame, we will not know how to handle it and crash it.

Preparation time and being equipped, in your personal, secret, intimate, behind the scenes life is key or unconditional to managing success when it comes your way.  Pride and arrogance, gluttony and avarice, meanness and sarcasm are all easy and found in the ‘get rich (or famous) quick’, style.  But humility, meekness, love, kindness and generosity are cultivated, over time.

The sustenance for any and every crisis, loss, failure or injustice is in him.  He will not tell you specifically why it happened, but he asks us to give up everything and trust him with our futures, and walk intimately with him.

He still says, “Follow me”.  Obedience to his call leads to your destiny and after obedience comes all the answers you have been seeking.

The life is Christ is a life of unbridled joy and celebration.  But it is also a life of sobriety, in suffering and grieving in fellowship with Christ and often weeping with others who are going through pain.

You Are a God Who Acts on Behalf of Those Who Wait on Him

Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.

-Isaiah 64:4 (NIV)

I am curious, and I anticipate what you will do.  

I have to intentionally bring to mind and come to the realization again that you do things.  

You are a God who acts on behalf of those who wait on him.

I have waited on you and I have seen you act on my behalf.  

You are doing it again right now and I believe you will continue to do so.  

And I will continue to trust you, wait on you, and put my faith in you.

My life is a testimony of your goodness, your acts, your blessings, comfort, and nurture.  

I rest and am activated in your grace.  

I productively live my life, waiting for and anticipating your actions.

My life is filled with awe and wonder at you.  

I marvel at your wisdom, love, and power.  

The only possible response to knowing you is worship.

I praise you, long for you, and weep before you.  

All my heart belongs to you.  

I live in thankfulness for all you have given me today, while anticipating what you will do tomorrow.

Today is beautiful.  

Each day is filled with the fruit of your work in my life and in the lives of my dear ones.  

I wait on you to act on my behalf, as I enjoy the life you have already given me.

I live in curiosity, and anticipation.  

I have brought to mind and realized again that you do things, for me.  

You are a God who acts on behalf of those who wait on him.

Identity: God’s and Your’s

Now the Israelites’ cries of injustice have reached me. I’ve seen just how much the Egyptians have oppressed them. So get going. I’m sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.
   But Moses said to God, “Who am I to go to Pharaoh and to bring the Israelites out of Egypt?
   God said, “I’ll be with you. And this will show you that I’m the one who sent you. After you bring the people out of Egypt, you will come back here and worship God on the mountain.”
   But Moses said to God, “If I now come to the Israelites and sat to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ they are going to ask me, ‘What’s this God’s name?’ What am I supposed to say to them?”
   God said to Moses, “I Am Who I Am. So say to the Israelites, ‘I Am has sent me to you.’” This is my name forever; this is how all generations will remember me.
-Exodus 3:9-15 (CEB)

Picture: Pixabay

Do you have an identity?  I mean a way that you identify yourself.  We might say that we are a self-identified _____.

Moses did not identify himself as a deliverer or even as a leader.  He was just a shepherd, had a family, and lived among a group of people.  In the very distant past, he was in Egypt and had a sort of career and lifestyle that did not work out.

When Moses is confronted by God and called, he asks, “Who am I?”  We might ask the same question.  Perhaps our identity puts us at odds with others and we don’t know how that opposition will work out.

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Moses is perhaps coming from a place of humility when he asks, “Who am I?”  God is restoring him to his calling that did not work out and that Moses had probably given up on.  Instead of saying, “What took you so long?”, or, “You bet I’m your man”, Moses says, in a sense, “Who me?”

I reluctant leader is better than someone with a puffed up idea of themselves.

I don’t see God coddling Moses and explaining how he is the one to lead, to go, to confront Pharaoh.  What God does say is, “I will be with you”.  Your identity will come from God being with you.

That is the key to your identity.  Wherever you have come from, whatever your weaknesses, struggles, or disqualifying traits; your identity is that God is with you.  We get too wrapped up in or tied down with notions of this or that being our identity, and so we say we can’t be with these people and those people are opposed to us.

Like Moses, we might say and others might say of us, that we are  not qualified.  But, God’s says, “I will be with you”.  Imagine being ‘qualified’, but not having God with you.

So, I think that we get too caught up in identity that is outside of just being God’s vessel.  Only God qualifies and disqualifies, ordains and denies.  We need to view others with a spiritual point of view, instead of a worldly perspective (2 Cor. 5:16).

“Who am I?”, is the wrong question.  The real issue, is, “Is God with you?”  And I don’t mean, “God on our side.”  I do mean, “Are you coming in your ‘sent-ness’ by God?”

The better question is, “Who is this God?”  Is God your idea, your explanation, or your ‘teaching’?  Or is this God, the living, being, real God who is.  Not, ‘was’ or ‘will be’; but is.

God is “I Am” because God is being, God is, and God is active.  This is especially important to realize in situations where we have suffered long, and where we assume things will never change and will stay crooked.  It is not true, because of God; who is “I Am”.

God is always alive, always actively involved and knowing what is going on, and always attentive.  God today is the same God who did things in the past.  God does not change and is the same as when he was faithful in the past.

There is no special dispensation of unfaithfulness.

Every day is a new day and a day of possibilities.  Even if or when it does not happen, God is active.  God’s loving, compassionate mercy is always alive and active.

We are broken failures like Moses, but God is that God is, and God is faithful.  Some have given up and believe that bondage is permanent, but God is getting ready to deliver.

The story of God is that God is active and relentlessly alive.  God is always working, being, living; and caring for us.  We can turn away from God, close our eyes, ears, and minds; distract ourselves, delude, and deceive ourselves with things that are not true about God.

But, God is always there, always here, always near.  How close we are to God is our choice.  The cultivation of the relationship is our choice.

God is a living person, the I Am.  God is alive.

Your identity is wrapped up in God.  Each of us have personalities, talents, gifts, and destinies that differ.  But God is the same to each one of us as Father.

Your Life on The Shelf

Do you feel like your life is on the shelf?  Do you feel like you are not living the life you were designed to live?  Do you feel like a big question mark, sitting on the sidelines of life?

Photo: pixabay

If you have this awareness, it is actually a good thing.  Somehow, you are in the wilderness, in some aspect of your life.  The wilderness is a common motif in the Bible.

Life on the shelf is where you suffer the loss of something.  You lose your job, you lose relationships, or you lose your place.  You go from active to in active.

Now what?  On the shelf, things shift from outer to inner.  Rather that doing things going outward, God shifts you to intensive inner work.

When we get put on the shelf, there is a dying that occurs, so that God can form Christ’s life in you.  God teaches us to live in his love and be accepted by him, and not live for the applause of people.  A purging happens that can not happen when we are constantly engaged in activities with people.

When we go through a stripping where things are taken away that gave us esteem, it is time to embrace God and find our whole worth in him.  We get to and have to decide how we will spend our time on the shelf.  Will we exercise faith and press into God, even if God seems distant or absent; or will we misbehave?

The choice is ours, bitter or better.  Waiting on God, when there seems to be no tangible reward, because the reward is not immediate, is the test we face.  If we lean into the experience that God puts before us and learn what lessons he is wanting us to learn, then we will be able to say that we were refined and when we come out on the other side, the gold was left.

The time on the shelf is a time to grow in loving God.  It is a time to discover God’s relationship with you: who God wants to be to you and who you are to him.  When we first get put on the shelf, we might view it as punishment or disfavor or failure.  Actually, it is a blessing.

Consider this song:

Ain’t Misbehavin’

No one to talk with
All by myself
No one to walk with
But I’m happy on the shelf

Ain’t misbehavin’
I’m savin’ my love for you

I know for certain
The one I love
I’m through with flirtin’
It’s just you I’m thinkin’ of

Ain’t misbehavin’
I’m savin’ my love for you

Like Jack Horner
In the corner
Don’t go nowhere
What do I care?
Your kisses are worth waitin’ for

Believe me
I don’t stay out late
Don’t care to go
I’m home about eight
Just me and my radio

Ain’t misbehavin’
I’m savin’ my love for you
Like Jack Horner
In the corner
Don’t go nowhere
What do I care?
Your kisses are worth waitin’ for

Believe me
I don’t stay out late
Don’t care to go
I’m home about eight
Just me and my radio
Ain’t misbehavin’
I’m savin’ my love for you

Writer/s: RAZAF, ANDY / BROOKS, HARRY / WALLER, FATS

Time To Fight For Your Life

“Make every effort (Strive, Strain, Fight your way in) to enter through the narrow door, because I tell you, many will try to enter and won’t be able once the homeowner gets up and shuts the door.

-Luke 13:24-5 (ESV, WNT, Knox)

Photo: Pixabay

There comes a time when we must fight for our lives.  Other people can support us, but only we ourselves can choose to fight.  It is true that Jesus saves, but we we must fight to enter into salvation.

Striving has a reputation as a negative word.  We say to each other, “stop striving”.  There is bad striving, where we are not resting in God, and are following our impulses, rather than abiding in the Lord.

Good striving is when we fight for our lives, for our salvation, that Jesus has already paid for.  The door of salvation can not be entered into passively.  There is going to have to be a fight.

The song, “This is it”, by Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald, is a song about fighting to live, that Loggins wrote for his dad.  Kenny’s dad was very sick and Kenny wanted to encourage him to fight for his life.

There’ve been times in my life,
I’ve been wonderin’ why.
Still, somehow I believed we’d always survive.
Now, I’m not so sure
You’re waiting here, one good reason to try
But, what more can I say? What’s left to provide?

Living in “why?” is a place of stuck-ness.   God does not usually answer our “why?” questions.  But what God does is redeem us, transform us, heal us, always giving us hope in him, and God always loves us.  The who and the what are active in our lives, now.

We might have a lot of disappointments and still believe.  We might even be like the man who said to Jesus, “I believe, but help my unbelief”.

Waiting is good, if it is waiting on God.  Waiting on God is active, like a waiter, who is on his or her feet, attentive to those they are serving.  Waiting on God requires action, but is still waiting for his move.  Waiting is good, but there comes a time what God says, “what are you waiting for?  Get up and fight.”

(You think that maybe it’s over,)
(Only if you want it to be.)
Are you gonna wait for a sign, your miracle?
Stand up and fight.

The fight for your life depends on you.  God has made provision, but you have to fight for it.  You must choose to fight, if you want to live.

Signs and miracles are good, but it is a fatal mistake to not ‘strive to enter in’, to not ‘make every effort to enter in’, and to not ‘fight your way’ through the door of your salvation.  A person who refuses to fight for their life, who says they believe God is going to do a miracle or give them a sign, is a fool who is not going to make it.

The Christian life only works as you work it.  You must stand up and fight for your salvation.  This is not to say that you are saved by works.  We are saved only by faith, in Christ.  The faith of the New Testament that is saving faith is a radical giving of your life to the one who saves you, and to do that will be a great struggle and fight for you.

(This is it.)
Make no mistake where you are.
(This is it.)
You back’s to the corner.
(This is it.)
Don’t be a fool anymore.
(This is it.)

There comes a “now time”, a “karios moment“, when you have to do something, when you have to decide to fight.   That is the “This is it” time.  Time to fight for your destiny.

The waiting is over, no, don’t you run.
No way to hide.
No time for wonderin’ why.
It’s here, the moment is now, about to decide.
Let ’em believe.
Leave ’em behind.
But keep me near in your heart.
Know whatever you do, I’m here by your side.

There comes a time when time catches up with you and it is time to make your decision if you will fight, and you must fight.  There comes a time when you can no longer run or hide.  The doorway is in front of you and says, “You must fight to enter in”.

There comes a time when you must stop looking backwards.  God wants you to look forward.  You and God today.  God is always “present-future” with us.

We encourage each other to the fight, to the struggle, to the striving to enter in.  Love is the calling card of Christians towards one another.  So, we can say that we are rooting you on, and whatever you decide to do, we are by your side.

(You say that maybe it’s over.)
(Not if you don’t want it to be.)
For once in your life, here’s your miracle.
Stand up and fight.
(This is it.)
Make no mistake where you are.
(This is it.)
You’re goin’ no further.
(This is it.)
Until it’s over and done.

Be encouraged that the battle is not over.  But your miracle requires for you to fight for it.  You can’t live in passive, delusional, denial any longer.

(No one can tell what the future holds.)
Oh-oh-oh-oh.
(Who makes the choice of how it goes?)
It’s not up to me this time.
(You know.)

Comes a day in every life.

(This is it.) 

Faith is always optimistic.  We reason, without God, when we are hopeless and pessimistic.  Faith, hope, and love always are optimistic about what God might do, can do, and will do; in response to us.

No matter how bad your past has been, no matter how disappointed you have been, and no matter what your dire straights are right now, God can save you.  But you must fight for your life.  God has provided the doorway of salvation, but we must struggle, strive, and fight our way in.

Go for it.