Zechariah 2:1-5
Then I lifted up my eyes and looked, and behold there was a man with a measuring line in his hand. So I said, "Where are you going?" And he said to me, "To measure Jerusalem, to see how wide it is, and how long it is." And behold, the angel who was speaking to me was going out, and another angel was coming out to meet him, and said to him, "Run, speak to that young man, saying, 'Jerusalem will be inhabited without walls because of the multitude of men and cattle within it. For I,' declares the Lord,'will be a wall of fire around her, and I will be the glory in her midst.'"
I normally like to take the end of year season and seek the Lord to see what the new year might bring, its a discipline that harks back to the days when I apprenticed under a very prophetic pastor who bordered on highly apostolic in his approach...this mentor would actually fast the week between Christmas and New Years and New Years Eve was always a very prophetic event because he would seek the Lord until he had a word for the church.
I've learned to be slightly less intense but remain somewhat focused, my intention during the holiday season is to enjoy family and friends and not to get to spiritually minded...however in the back of my mind there is a residue of prophetic motivation that actually looks forward to this season if nothing more than for the element of declaration and proclamation we gravitate towards.
This year as I approach the heart of the Father towards us and our assignments I am deeply convinced that His intention towards us is to invade our year with more of the "more" of Himself...that what God actually plans on doing this year is just showing up unannounced and full of Glory...
This will be a year of the "Lightning" of God...you know that moment when the fabric separating heaven and earth tears and in that instant we see the brightest flash of light as heaven presses in on earth with its glory!
That is after all what lightning is, its not some earthly electrical phenomena as sciency people will try to describe...in my perspective lightning is when the fabric that separates heaven and earth tears and heaven starts pouring in unannounced until the angels are able to sew it back up and keep heaven on the other side...it happens instantaneous because angels of course move at the speed of thought, but for a brief moment we see into heavens bright light and no matter how dark the night or how intense the storm, heaven shows its intention...it is always poised to invade and only the Father and a host of angels can keep the Son from rushing in and gathering up His Bride for the eternal love affair we were made for!
This is how Jesus himself describes his return...its as "the lightning cometh out of the east and shines to the west"-Matthew 24:27
This next season is going to be problematic for the angels...they are going to be intensely busy, sewing back the fabric of earth as Heavens love and the dreams God has for us just explode into our lives without warning...
Many of us have began to gradually believe...you know the "too-good-to-not be-true" message...we call it the gospel, but its bigger than we have ever imagined...and some are starting to consider that the dreams in our hearts, the longings unfulfilled, the romance of heaven is actually true and better than that...it is coming true for us...individually, specifically...and right before our eyes...
What would the next season look like if God invaded and said to you..."Those dreams...?..." "Yeah I know, it seems impossible and you have not a clue how to get there...hop in I've got just the vehicle you need to get there NOW! Holy Spirit, Lets go!"...
In one of my visions many months ago the Holy Spirit grabbed my inheritance and said "Get in"...and I jumped in a red sports car as He drove recklessly from heaven to earth, faster than I could imagine and laughing all the way...I literally had to hold on with both hands and for the first time in my life I understood that He IS like a mighty RUSHING wind...the Holy Spirit loves to go extremely fast!
So this is what I am sensing God wants to do for us as we end this year and begin a new season, its a repeat of the "double", its a renewal of the "Year of Jubilee" because these are not simply seasons God wants us to walk in they are life calls...
This next year will be marked by dreams coming true over-night, hope will no longer be deferred and we will see the lightning of God perform it...whats more God will be the glory right in the middle of our lives, we will see abundance and growth unlike anything we've dreamed about...
So whats the condition?
Yep, that right, all true prophetic quotient has an element of condition upon it...whats our part in this adventure?
Well as I look at Zechariah there are three things that stand out to me...
The first thing is like the prophet we need to "lift up our eyes"...in other words we need to get our vision up off the ground and natural, and we need to elevate where we look...what this means in a practical sense is we need to not look upon our own resources and abilities, and better yet we need to lift up our eyes from looking at our sense of failure or history past...
Many times as God calls us into greater and higher callings we get trapped looking at our own ability and our history and we focus not on what heaven offers, but instead on what earth lacks...
Don't do that...learn to always look UP.
Focus your gaze and hope on things above...this is rather biblical and will require discipline...but its time.
The second condition we need to meet is we must cooperate with heavens measuring process...that means expecting supernatural and angelic visitations, preparing for an accelerated lifestyle (run speak to the young man-vs.4), and understanding that we do not have the measuring line of life, God does...
What this means in a practical sense is that God is the one who determines who and what we are surrounded by...
Many times we think we know what we are capable of, or perhaps more realistically think we know what we are NOT capable of...maybe its loving someone He brings into your life, maybe its accomplishing a dream that you feel you are not prepared for, but what this means in the real world, is that God is in charge and we need to let His measure of us be the one we respond to rather than what history, Doctors, practical common sense, limited resources, and a host of other measuring devices might say...
We need to agree with Gods measure of us, even if we don't feel ready, or think it should take much longer...this is one area I think we might be prone to miss it most, in areas that we feel should take much more time...please remember time is simply a measurement...and it is subject to God, not the other way around...your time is in His hands...if He says you're ready...guess what? You are! Feelings are a terrible way to measure things...you're better off using the "measure of faith"...
The last condition is subtle...but essential...it is found in the statement... "Inhabited without walls..."
God desires to be the glory in our midst...He wants to partner with us in this grand adventure...but in order for Him to dwell in our midst, we need to learn to live without walls...
What does that look like?
Well its obvious that part of it means we will live depending on the Lord Himself to defend us...He refers to being a "wall of fire around her"...
This condition might be the deal breaker for many...it requires moving into a new level of trust and vulnerability with others...
See living without walls means I learn to live in a place of transparency and becoming vulnerable to people close to me...
I am not going to pretend that this will be easy, nor do I believe it requires we live without boundaries...not even God lives without healthy boundaries, there are defined and clear lines around our character and our core that need protecting...
But this element of living without walls...on some level it will require that you create relationships of trust where you let people into your world, maybe not a lot of people, maybe just one or two, covenant and kingdom connections...but this element of living without walls has to become tangible...or its simply a metaphor and the glory in the midst will be reduced to a metaphor as well.
Do I trust God enough...to trust some of His people into my areas of life where I have been quite adept at defending myself?
Do I want His glory in the middle of my life enough to trust someone else to come near and not harm me?
Many of us have been deeply wounded and we have built walls around areas of our hearts and for good reason...it was not safe...
But now...God wants to invade...
He wants to make those hidden dreams a living reality of love and fulfillment...
And in order to do that...we have to lower the walls and let the Holy Spirit come in and tutor us into the "all things"...that Jesus purchased...
So here's my challenge...are you lifting up your gaze? Are you letting God determine what you can handle and are you cooperating with angelic visitation? And are you ready to let the walls down?
If so...you can expect to become a habitation of God and see a wall of His fiery Presence fulfilling your deepest dreams and hopes...that is His plan for you...this is what HE longs to do...
Who's up for that?
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Tuesday, December 06, 2011
How I celebrate, and why...
Christmas...
You really can't bring it up without some level of controversy...
Some saints celebrate, others don't...
Stores depend on it, and our culture seems to exploit it and make it less religious every year.
Our society is dividing along the lines of making this season simply a "Holiday", and "Don't take the Christ out of Christmas"...the battle lines are drawn and everyone has an opinion.
You know what I mean.
So in my assignment to live life more intentionally I have had to go out and conquer some of my more primitive concepts, things wrapped up in my belief system and daily culture that I have practiced or believed without intentionally pursuing a definitive reason for...things like the atonement (punitive or ransom?), Sabbath (which day is holiest?) and now I come to Christmas...is it pagan and am I participating in an ancient custom that has no roots in Christianity?
My good friend Andrew will chuckle and say "Its all pagan"...we have a bit of an inside joke on what parts we are willing to embrace and which parts are the by products of our culture...but he's right...on some level its ALL pagan.
What to do, oh what to do?
Basically when I look at things that fall into "tradition" or established practices I try to look and see if it is one of three things:
1. Culture
2. Preference
3. Kingdom
Everything we do will fall into one of these baskets, and there is nothing wrong with this process, it is part of life and just the way things are, in fact I do not believe it offends God when some things do not fall into the Kingdom basket, we are after all reading this on computers using electricity and language that is the product of culture and preference...we cannot avoid living in a culture and having a preference, from the clothes we wear to the haircuts we pay for, everything will fall into one of these definitions.
I'm going to take the gloves off for a moment and show you what's in my heart because I have come face to face with many close friends and relationships that embrace postures ranging from "Yes we celebrate" to "Never" and whats more this division does not stop at Christmas, it reaches down into the foods we eat, the days we keep, birthday celebrations, video games, sugar, decorating, seafood, Harry Potter and immunizations...
The difficulty I have in approaching this subject is that it deals with our basic core nature as RELIGIOUS creatures and how we interact with other RELIGIOUS beings...
Before you freak out at my calling us "religious" like its a bad thing, let me define it for you:
We are religious spirits, it is a vital part of our make-up and it goes all the way back to the garden when even before the fall, Eve (who was not named until AFTER the fall) said "Of the trees in the garden we may freely eat but of the tree in the midst of the garden God has said "you shall not eat it, NOR SHALL YOU TOUCH IT LEST YOU DIE...
She added a phrase that we have no proof that God actually said...
Notice the slight shift that happened?
God never said they could not touch it...but somehow even before she ate the woman had adjusted her posture and ADDED to the one simple commandment of "don't eat it"...its as if she is thinking:
"If not eating it makes God pleased, just think how much more He will be pleased if I don't even go near it! I will make God more pleased by not touching it..."
This might seem like a subtle or insignificant adjustment in understanding but it is not, it is a massive redefining of how we approach God...it moves His approval of us, OUT of His character and into our performance.
This is the core of all religion, it is what drives us and defines who we are as religious beings...
It defines us not by what we believe, but instead by what we don't do...
"That group, they don't speak in tongues..."
"They don't believe in dancing..."
"They don't meet on Sunday..."
"They don't eat pork..."
"They don't_________________" fill in the blank...
I'm actually kind of glad we got booted out of the garden because without a doubt we would have created a church that "touches" the tree and a group that "doesn't touch" the tree...
How would like to be in a church that is called "touchers"....yikes!
My real difficulty is not the definitions and boxes we throw each other in, my challenge is to honor the gift of God that resides in a person or group that holds to a different religious culture than what I have, and before you go getting offended at my definition that what you are practicing is simply a religious culture and preference and NOT kingdom, lets just let the Bible define Kingdom for us:
"For the Kingdom of God is NOT, eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit-Romans 14:17"...this verse is defining what the Kingdom IS, by adjusting what we think it is NOT...
Gods basket for what He defines Kingdom does not have eating or drinking in it at all...
In Gods definition of His kingdom, He completely removes your behavior based upon the daily practices and moves it all over into the Holy Spirit...if you take out the parenthetical phrase "not" and strip the verse down it says:
Gods government, His Kingdom...its in the Holy Spirit...
You want to know what Kingdom is? Better plug into the Holy Spirit...you don't get to define it strictly from the Bible.
And where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty...that means options...
If you define Kingdom without the Holy Spirit, you have removed life and moved over to the letter of the law which brings death...(2 Cor.3:6)
God does not want you to define Kingdom without His input...its "in" the Holy Spirit...if you want to see what it is...you gotta go "in".
This chapter in Romans (the addition of chapters and verses is something we haven't even started debating yet, it was ADDED much after the original manuscripts were written, so is it pagan or preference?) starts off with a commandment to recieve one another, but NOT for the purpose of debating things that are doubtful...and you may say "There is NO doubt in my mind these are pagan practices"...to which I respond:
Really?
So what about the cultural contamination that we are importing something pagan?
How big an issue for us is the pagan influence supposed to be?
Lot's of other things are pagan and we don't throw them out, tattoos, rock music in our worship, wooden crosses (was Roman not Jewish), and if we are honest there are a host of other issues we are not comfortable with but like to ignore, like the admonition for our women to keep silent in the churches...this was in response to a direct cultural influence but we don't practice it now...
We are already practicing a bit of cultural "editing" as it were and frankly I don't have a problem with this, my issue is lets be honest.
Are we being true to toss out some and not all?
Or are we no longer under the Law, and frankly only required to follow the instruction of Acts 15:20 which is the only law the early Apostles would lay upon the gentiles...?
The entire book of Galatians becomes problematic in this debate...
And to be honest...we don't throw out baptism and communion because they had pagan roots do we? Of course not.
Baptism at the time of Christ was widely celebrated as a way to be initiated into salvation by the Greeks, the Romans, the Hindus, the Egyptians...as a matter of fact the practice of baptism as a means of removing sin and joining into a religious faith was so widely known that at least two of the early church fathers (Justin Martyr and Tertullian) actually had to write explaining that we were not practicing the same ritual as the pagans, even though it looked identical, Justin Martyr actually admits the practice predated Christianity and explained that the devil was trying to prophesy and claim the practice as his own...
The Eucharist (communion) has plenty of pagan examples just google Lectisternia by the Romans...Mithra, Adonis, Attia, Isis and Osiris all practiced a covenant meal long before the Christians did.
My point is when someone tells me these things are not debatable I must respond and say, be honest and consistent, if you are going to throw out things for the reason that they have pagan roots, you gotta throw out baptism and communion as well...
Frankly I don't care why you throw them out if it makes you feel better, but if you are doing it as a salvation issue, if you are suggesting that your daily eating and drinking habits are getting you into the Kingdom...I gotta say "foul"...15 yard penalty for dishonesty...if you toss these things out simply because they have pagan roots, where's your consistency?
If these issues cannot be made into Kingdom "qualifiers" then we need to be careful about how we present them.
We have absolutely no power in ourselves to get into the kingdom through behavior, the minute we pretend we do we are back at the tree thinking "if I don't touch He will be more pleased"...
So you point to the fact that Jesus himself introduced the Eucharist and baptism, so these things are no longer pagan...I totally agree...for us as believers these things no longer are tainted from culture because Jesus redeemed them...but is this a pattern of the Kingdom, or a one time shot? Didn't he suggest we are to "occupy" till He comes?
Define occupy...if we do it like the recent protest we are in trouble because all that's left is a big mess and a stain on our reputation.
I am not at all suggesting we need to celebrate and embrace anything and everything, that is not my point, my point is when we draw a line around what we will embrace and what we will not embrace, be it Sabbath, Christmas, Easter, covering our heads, church buildings, pastoral models, etc...ad infinitum...that line can only be drawn around ourselves and it is drawn with the hand of faith or we are in trouble.
The Bible will tell us that if you don't eat, or observe one day...do it unto the Lord, and if you do eat, and observe all days the same, do it unto the Lord, and then will instruct us to not put offense into the path of our brother...
If you celebrate you are not allowed to despise the guy who doesn't, and if you don't celebrate you are not allowed to judge the guy who does, we are to pursue peace and things that build up one another...
These two postures, to despise, or to judge are the issues we must face regarding culture and practice...to despise means to "set at nought"...or basically count as nothing, and to judge means to "call into question", or to condemn...our problem isn't just about holidays though...it's our culture and our preferences that create issues, we despise tattoos and metal bits in peoples faces, or we judge people in business ties and suits as stuffy and stiff, religious and legalistic...
We are judging and despising Gods kids and our own family and its not healthy...no wonder the world stays away...
Lets play it forward and see what this might look like:
So suppose you come to me and say "I practice only the Jewish Feasts" "I don't eat pork" or "I observe one day as the Sabbath"...
My immediate response is really? So you're a Jew? When was the last time you sacrificed a real live lamb?
Are you wearing garments that have mixed fabrics?(Duet.22:11) Do you wear slacks as a woman? (Duet.22:5) Do you listen to rock music (Eccl. 7:5) Do you shave? (Lev. 21:5) Do you have tattoos? (Lev. 19:28)...hows that whole thing of women being under the law of her husband working out for you? My immediate response is snarky, demeaning and a little arrogant.
I have drawn a big circle of faith and put you inside and said you are weaker than me...I have assigned less value to your faith than to mine.
But this immediate response is wrong...regardless of what I believe about keeping the law ...
(My personal posture is that if you are determined to keep ANY of it in your own strength you are required by that same law to keep ALL of it in your own strength which is impossible (James 2:10), and I'm just not that strong, your milage may vary, and I am not allowed to force this issue or control you with my doctirne)
What I have done with you is "set at nought", or basically said, you're wasting your time...I have suggested that what you practice is not valuable, in other words I have not assigned any value to what you practice (or refuse) because I might have faith to eat seafood, or pork or play cards, or work on Saturday or celebrate Christmas my lines of behavior do not have the right to say your lines of behavior are not valuable.
In order to keep peace as a core practice I need to assign a value to what you practice...I need to honor who you are and how you practice your faith...I need to say and truly believe that what you bring into my Kingdom box is worthy and I need to honor you for practicing what you do.
So what if I believe that these things are irredeemably pagan? And you come to me and say you are going to get a Christmas tree (Jeremiah 10:2-5), or eat shrimp(Duet 14:9-10) or pork (Lev. 11:7), or work on the true Sabbath (lots of verses look them up yourself)...?
My immediate response is that you are defiling yourself with pagan and unbiblical practices that, this defilement makes you unclean and is an abomination to the Lord and why on earth would you want to offend God like that? Don't you have a heart to follow the Lord and keep His commandments, don't you want to live a holy life? Can't you see that these are PRACTICAL admonitions and you are choosing death over life?
But my immediate response is wrong...because I have called into question not only your motive, but your faith, I have judged you as someone unwilling to please the Lord in your behavior...I have drawn my circle of faith and behavior and have excluded you because you are not pure, I have judged you.
In both situation the common problem is honor...how can I honor what God honors?
What the Bible directs us to, is to honor Gods people and not get into debates over culture, to assign a value to one another that allows a free exchange of life to flow without punishing one another by judging or isolation.
One of the big problems is BOTH postures invite the idea that Gods approval of us is based on our little circles of what we do..."If I don't touch the tree, He will be more pleased"...
But Gods approval of you will never, ever, not in a millions years be based on what you do, it must be completely based on His character and how He views us in Christ or we are in deep do-do...
Our approval in God is based solely upon the life of His Son...and His Son touched lepers, healed on the sabbath, and got baptized like the Greeks and Hindus...but He also wore only one type of fabric, practiced the Jewish Festivals, and lived without sin...
God declares that both groups, the "touch" and the "touch nots" are powerful, valuable and to be given honor without restriction, and to do that in a way that faith is not damaged.
So where am I at in the process?
When it comes to my approval before God, I am completely dependent on His character and not my performance...I cannot throw in one Bible reading, one day of fasting, or one habit of holy-day into the mix...He approves of me because He placed me in Christ and approves of Him...my behavior has NOTHING to do with my approval...
...but my behavior is not separate from my heart, my actions follow my belief system, so if I love Him I will want to please Him in all things...my behavior will reflect His heartbeat and His value system, and the main things in His heart are the things He loves, they are His children, NOT the things He hates, my beliefs which will drive my behavior must be on what makes His heart beat with joy, and that focus will ALWAYS be on loving His kids...
I celebrate for the same reason that I get my hair cut, I am trying to impact and be a part of my culture without becoming stained by either fear of disappointing God by performance, or becoming so enamored with my culture that I have no respect for Gods Presence.
What about a tree? Yep I've read Jeremiah 10:1-5...and my personal problem with it is, this passage could very well be describing a cross just as easily as it is a Christmas tree, and frankly I ma not ready to toss out all the crosses in my life because they are in my home, my church, my friends homes and I cannot make a distinction in practice to having a cross and having a Christmas tree based on this verse...I don't worship the cross anymore than I do the tree...there is no biblical support for owning a cross.
But the issue for me isn't so much about personal practice and believe as much as it is about culture and displacement...
See I believe that until we own the culture we will not be able to establish anything better, that by withdrawing from our culture we create a void in the human religious sphere that the enemy is to eager to occupy...where we as believers abdicate culture as corrupt and unworthy, we create an opportunity for the darkness to own and dominate...
We are called to be leaven, to be salt, to occupy and to bring everything in our world under the subjection of Gods kingdom...I don't believe that is possible where we disengage and avoid...
The Old Testament model was to "come out", remove and avoid...if you touch the unclean you become unclean...but Jesus changed all that, when He touched a leper they were made whole, when He faced an adulterer she was restored not stoned...the Kingdom of God is much more powerful than the little lines of culture and preference that we want to draw and establish...
Yes I know all about the Sun god and Constantine and how we changed the calender and how the birth date we circle is overwhelmingly NOT historically accurate...I am not uninformed or ignorant...I have studied the pagan roots of these holidays and even what we do every week...
But I'm just trying to be completely honest...if I toss out these things because their roots are pagan, I have to get rid of all the crosses and baptism and communion and quite a few other cultures and preferences that are in all of our lives...
Or...I can say the Kingdom of God is righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, and rather than create a list of rules and circles and touch-nots that allow me to devalue or reject my brothers and sisters in Christ...I can assign honor to what you practice and say thank you for your dedication to purity, I benefit and I know it...and hopefully you can give thanks and assign honor to my faith in displacing the devils agenda to own holidays and celebration and joy and his plan to corrupt that, because if we abandon it, he will completely ruin it for the entire planet.
We both do it unto the Lord...both postures have value and should be honored...
Some of us are called to settle, to establish the building and make it permanent we are called to be the building of Christ, and some of us are called to advance, to be mobile in our world and act like the body of Christ...this duality, this paradox that we are both a building and a body is something we need to embrace with faith and not debate about things that are in doubt...
It is not my intention to convert you or defend my posture, frankly it will take a lot more than I have offered to change some of my best friends practices and I am just not willing to waste my time on what I believe are minor and minuscule issues that have the power to separate us and keep us at a distance from one another.
I need and love these people to much to get hung up on the touch or touch-nots that we have adopted based on our own particular journey of faith...
I desperately want to honor the journey that has brought these people in to my life and celebrate the story that each journey tells.
You may disagree...thats ok...we need to be able to honor what each person brings even if we don't completely agree or understand one another...we gather around His Presence...not our individual approaches to the tree of the knowledge...
Lets agree to honor the journey and celebrate the story that God has woven into the fabric of our fellow travelers...
You really can't bring it up without some level of controversy...
Some saints celebrate, others don't...
Stores depend on it, and our culture seems to exploit it and make it less religious every year.
Our society is dividing along the lines of making this season simply a "Holiday", and "Don't take the Christ out of Christmas"...the battle lines are drawn and everyone has an opinion.
You know what I mean.
So in my assignment to live life more intentionally I have had to go out and conquer some of my more primitive concepts, things wrapped up in my belief system and daily culture that I have practiced or believed without intentionally pursuing a definitive reason for...things like the atonement (punitive or ransom?), Sabbath (which day is holiest?) and now I come to Christmas...is it pagan and am I participating in an ancient custom that has no roots in Christianity?
My good friend Andrew will chuckle and say "Its all pagan"...we have a bit of an inside joke on what parts we are willing to embrace and which parts are the by products of our culture...but he's right...on some level its ALL pagan.
What to do, oh what to do?
Basically when I look at things that fall into "tradition" or established practices I try to look and see if it is one of three things:
1. Culture
2. Preference
3. Kingdom
Everything we do will fall into one of these baskets, and there is nothing wrong with this process, it is part of life and just the way things are, in fact I do not believe it offends God when some things do not fall into the Kingdom basket, we are after all reading this on computers using electricity and language that is the product of culture and preference...we cannot avoid living in a culture and having a preference, from the clothes we wear to the haircuts we pay for, everything will fall into one of these definitions.
I'm going to take the gloves off for a moment and show you what's in my heart because I have come face to face with many close friends and relationships that embrace postures ranging from "Yes we celebrate" to "Never" and whats more this division does not stop at Christmas, it reaches down into the foods we eat, the days we keep, birthday celebrations, video games, sugar, decorating, seafood, Harry Potter and immunizations...
The difficulty I have in approaching this subject is that it deals with our basic core nature as RELIGIOUS creatures and how we interact with other RELIGIOUS beings...
Before you freak out at my calling us "religious" like its a bad thing, let me define it for you:
We are religious spirits, it is a vital part of our make-up and it goes all the way back to the garden when even before the fall, Eve (who was not named until AFTER the fall) said "Of the trees in the garden we may freely eat but of the tree in the midst of the garden God has said "you shall not eat it, NOR SHALL YOU TOUCH IT LEST YOU DIE...
She added a phrase that we have no proof that God actually said...
Notice the slight shift that happened?
God never said they could not touch it...but somehow even before she ate the woman had adjusted her posture and ADDED to the one simple commandment of "don't eat it"...its as if she is thinking:
"If not eating it makes God pleased, just think how much more He will be pleased if I don't even go near it! I will make God more pleased by not touching it..."
This might seem like a subtle or insignificant adjustment in understanding but it is not, it is a massive redefining of how we approach God...it moves His approval of us, OUT of His character and into our performance.
This is the core of all religion, it is what drives us and defines who we are as religious beings...
It defines us not by what we believe, but instead by what we don't do...
"That group, they don't speak in tongues..."
"They don't believe in dancing..."
"They don't meet on Sunday..."
"They don't eat pork..."
"They don't_________________" fill in the blank...
I'm actually kind of glad we got booted out of the garden because without a doubt we would have created a church that "touches" the tree and a group that "doesn't touch" the tree...
How would like to be in a church that is called "touchers"....yikes!
My real difficulty is not the definitions and boxes we throw each other in, my challenge is to honor the gift of God that resides in a person or group that holds to a different religious culture than what I have, and before you go getting offended at my definition that what you are practicing is simply a religious culture and preference and NOT kingdom, lets just let the Bible define Kingdom for us:
"For the Kingdom of God is NOT, eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit-Romans 14:17"...this verse is defining what the Kingdom IS, by adjusting what we think it is NOT...
Gods basket for what He defines Kingdom does not have eating or drinking in it at all...
In Gods definition of His kingdom, He completely removes your behavior based upon the daily practices and moves it all over into the Holy Spirit...if you take out the parenthetical phrase "not" and strip the verse down it says:
Gods government, His Kingdom...its in the Holy Spirit...
You want to know what Kingdom is? Better plug into the Holy Spirit...you don't get to define it strictly from the Bible.
And where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty...that means options...
If you define Kingdom without the Holy Spirit, you have removed life and moved over to the letter of the law which brings death...(2 Cor.3:6)
God does not want you to define Kingdom without His input...its "in" the Holy Spirit...if you want to see what it is...you gotta go "in".
This chapter in Romans (the addition of chapters and verses is something we haven't even started debating yet, it was ADDED much after the original manuscripts were written, so is it pagan or preference?) starts off with a commandment to recieve one another, but NOT for the purpose of debating things that are doubtful...and you may say "There is NO doubt in my mind these are pagan practices"...to which I respond:
Really?
So what about the cultural contamination that we are importing something pagan?
How big an issue for us is the pagan influence supposed to be?
Lot's of other things are pagan and we don't throw them out, tattoos, rock music in our worship, wooden crosses (was Roman not Jewish), and if we are honest there are a host of other issues we are not comfortable with but like to ignore, like the admonition for our women to keep silent in the churches...this was in response to a direct cultural influence but we don't practice it now...
We are already practicing a bit of cultural "editing" as it were and frankly I don't have a problem with this, my issue is lets be honest.
Are we being true to toss out some and not all?
Or are we no longer under the Law, and frankly only required to follow the instruction of Acts 15:20 which is the only law the early Apostles would lay upon the gentiles...?
The entire book of Galatians becomes problematic in this debate...
And to be honest...we don't throw out baptism and communion because they had pagan roots do we? Of course not.
Baptism at the time of Christ was widely celebrated as a way to be initiated into salvation by the Greeks, the Romans, the Hindus, the Egyptians...as a matter of fact the practice of baptism as a means of removing sin and joining into a religious faith was so widely known that at least two of the early church fathers (Justin Martyr and Tertullian) actually had to write explaining that we were not practicing the same ritual as the pagans, even though it looked identical, Justin Martyr actually admits the practice predated Christianity and explained that the devil was trying to prophesy and claim the practice as his own...
The Eucharist (communion) has plenty of pagan examples just google Lectisternia by the Romans...Mithra, Adonis, Attia, Isis and Osiris all practiced a covenant meal long before the Christians did.
My point is when someone tells me these things are not debatable I must respond and say, be honest and consistent, if you are going to throw out things for the reason that they have pagan roots, you gotta throw out baptism and communion as well...
Frankly I don't care why you throw them out if it makes you feel better, but if you are doing it as a salvation issue, if you are suggesting that your daily eating and drinking habits are getting you into the Kingdom...I gotta say "foul"...15 yard penalty for dishonesty...if you toss these things out simply because they have pagan roots, where's your consistency?
If these issues cannot be made into Kingdom "qualifiers" then we need to be careful about how we present them.
We have absolutely no power in ourselves to get into the kingdom through behavior, the minute we pretend we do we are back at the tree thinking "if I don't touch He will be more pleased"...
So you point to the fact that Jesus himself introduced the Eucharist and baptism, so these things are no longer pagan...I totally agree...for us as believers these things no longer are tainted from culture because Jesus redeemed them...but is this a pattern of the Kingdom, or a one time shot? Didn't he suggest we are to "occupy" till He comes?
Define occupy...if we do it like the recent protest we are in trouble because all that's left is a big mess and a stain on our reputation.
I am not at all suggesting we need to celebrate and embrace anything and everything, that is not my point, my point is when we draw a line around what we will embrace and what we will not embrace, be it Sabbath, Christmas, Easter, covering our heads, church buildings, pastoral models, etc...ad infinitum...that line can only be drawn around ourselves and it is drawn with the hand of faith or we are in trouble.
The Bible will tell us that if you don't eat, or observe one day...do it unto the Lord, and if you do eat, and observe all days the same, do it unto the Lord, and then will instruct us to not put offense into the path of our brother...
If you celebrate you are not allowed to despise the guy who doesn't, and if you don't celebrate you are not allowed to judge the guy who does, we are to pursue peace and things that build up one another...
These two postures, to despise, or to judge are the issues we must face regarding culture and practice...to despise means to "set at nought"...or basically count as nothing, and to judge means to "call into question", or to condemn...our problem isn't just about holidays though...it's our culture and our preferences that create issues, we despise tattoos and metal bits in peoples faces, or we judge people in business ties and suits as stuffy and stiff, religious and legalistic...
We are judging and despising Gods kids and our own family and its not healthy...no wonder the world stays away...
Lets play it forward and see what this might look like:
So suppose you come to me and say "I practice only the Jewish Feasts" "I don't eat pork" or "I observe one day as the Sabbath"...
My immediate response is really? So you're a Jew? When was the last time you sacrificed a real live lamb?
Are you wearing garments that have mixed fabrics?(Duet.22:11) Do you wear slacks as a woman? (Duet.22:5) Do you listen to rock music (Eccl. 7:5) Do you shave? (Lev. 21:5) Do you have tattoos? (Lev. 19:28)...hows that whole thing of women being under the law of her husband working out for you? My immediate response is snarky, demeaning and a little arrogant.
I have drawn a big circle of faith and put you inside and said you are weaker than me...I have assigned less value to your faith than to mine.
But this immediate response is wrong...regardless of what I believe about keeping the law ...
(My personal posture is that if you are determined to keep ANY of it in your own strength you are required by that same law to keep ALL of it in your own strength which is impossible (James 2:10), and I'm just not that strong, your milage may vary, and I am not allowed to force this issue or control you with my doctirne)
What I have done with you is "set at nought", or basically said, you're wasting your time...I have suggested that what you practice is not valuable, in other words I have not assigned any value to what you practice (or refuse) because I might have faith to eat seafood, or pork or play cards, or work on Saturday or celebrate Christmas my lines of behavior do not have the right to say your lines of behavior are not valuable.
In order to keep peace as a core practice I need to assign a value to what you practice...I need to honor who you are and how you practice your faith...I need to say and truly believe that what you bring into my Kingdom box is worthy and I need to honor you for practicing what you do.
So what if I believe that these things are irredeemably pagan? And you come to me and say you are going to get a Christmas tree (Jeremiah 10:2-5), or eat shrimp(Duet 14:9-10) or pork (Lev. 11:7), or work on the true Sabbath (lots of verses look them up yourself)...?
My immediate response is that you are defiling yourself with pagan and unbiblical practices that, this defilement makes you unclean and is an abomination to the Lord and why on earth would you want to offend God like that? Don't you have a heart to follow the Lord and keep His commandments, don't you want to live a holy life? Can't you see that these are PRACTICAL admonitions and you are choosing death over life?
But my immediate response is wrong...because I have called into question not only your motive, but your faith, I have judged you as someone unwilling to please the Lord in your behavior...I have drawn my circle of faith and behavior and have excluded you because you are not pure, I have judged you.
In both situation the common problem is honor...how can I honor what God honors?
What the Bible directs us to, is to honor Gods people and not get into debates over culture, to assign a value to one another that allows a free exchange of life to flow without punishing one another by judging or isolation.
One of the big problems is BOTH postures invite the idea that Gods approval of us is based on our little circles of what we do..."If I don't touch the tree, He will be more pleased"...
But Gods approval of you will never, ever, not in a millions years be based on what you do, it must be completely based on His character and how He views us in Christ or we are in deep do-do...
Our approval in God is based solely upon the life of His Son...and His Son touched lepers, healed on the sabbath, and got baptized like the Greeks and Hindus...but He also wore only one type of fabric, practiced the Jewish Festivals, and lived without sin...
God declares that both groups, the "touch" and the "touch nots" are powerful, valuable and to be given honor without restriction, and to do that in a way that faith is not damaged.
So where am I at in the process?
When it comes to my approval before God, I am completely dependent on His character and not my performance...I cannot throw in one Bible reading, one day of fasting, or one habit of holy-day into the mix...He approves of me because He placed me in Christ and approves of Him...my behavior has NOTHING to do with my approval...
...but my behavior is not separate from my heart, my actions follow my belief system, so if I love Him I will want to please Him in all things...my behavior will reflect His heartbeat and His value system, and the main things in His heart are the things He loves, they are His children, NOT the things He hates, my beliefs which will drive my behavior must be on what makes His heart beat with joy, and that focus will ALWAYS be on loving His kids...
I celebrate for the same reason that I get my hair cut, I am trying to impact and be a part of my culture without becoming stained by either fear of disappointing God by performance, or becoming so enamored with my culture that I have no respect for Gods Presence.
What about a tree? Yep I've read Jeremiah 10:1-5...and my personal problem with it is, this passage could very well be describing a cross just as easily as it is a Christmas tree, and frankly I ma not ready to toss out all the crosses in my life because they are in my home, my church, my friends homes and I cannot make a distinction in practice to having a cross and having a Christmas tree based on this verse...I don't worship the cross anymore than I do the tree...there is no biblical support for owning a cross.
But the issue for me isn't so much about personal practice and believe as much as it is about culture and displacement...
See I believe that until we own the culture we will not be able to establish anything better, that by withdrawing from our culture we create a void in the human religious sphere that the enemy is to eager to occupy...where we as believers abdicate culture as corrupt and unworthy, we create an opportunity for the darkness to own and dominate...
We are called to be leaven, to be salt, to occupy and to bring everything in our world under the subjection of Gods kingdom...I don't believe that is possible where we disengage and avoid...
The Old Testament model was to "come out", remove and avoid...if you touch the unclean you become unclean...but Jesus changed all that, when He touched a leper they were made whole, when He faced an adulterer she was restored not stoned...the Kingdom of God is much more powerful than the little lines of culture and preference that we want to draw and establish...
Yes I know all about the Sun god and Constantine and how we changed the calender and how the birth date we circle is overwhelmingly NOT historically accurate...I am not uninformed or ignorant...I have studied the pagan roots of these holidays and even what we do every week...
But I'm just trying to be completely honest...if I toss out these things because their roots are pagan, I have to get rid of all the crosses and baptism and communion and quite a few other cultures and preferences that are in all of our lives...
Or...I can say the Kingdom of God is righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, and rather than create a list of rules and circles and touch-nots that allow me to devalue or reject my brothers and sisters in Christ...I can assign honor to what you practice and say thank you for your dedication to purity, I benefit and I know it...and hopefully you can give thanks and assign honor to my faith in displacing the devils agenda to own holidays and celebration and joy and his plan to corrupt that, because if we abandon it, he will completely ruin it for the entire planet.
We both do it unto the Lord...both postures have value and should be honored...
Some of us are called to settle, to establish the building and make it permanent we are called to be the building of Christ, and some of us are called to advance, to be mobile in our world and act like the body of Christ...this duality, this paradox that we are both a building and a body is something we need to embrace with faith and not debate about things that are in doubt...
It is not my intention to convert you or defend my posture, frankly it will take a lot more than I have offered to change some of my best friends practices and I am just not willing to waste my time on what I believe are minor and minuscule issues that have the power to separate us and keep us at a distance from one another.
I need and love these people to much to get hung up on the touch or touch-nots that we have adopted based on our own particular journey of faith...
I desperately want to honor the journey that has brought these people in to my life and celebrate the story that each journey tells.
You may disagree...thats ok...we need to be able to honor what each person brings even if we don't completely agree or understand one another...we gather around His Presence...not our individual approaches to the tree of the knowledge...
Lets agree to honor the journey and celebrate the story that God has woven into the fabric of our fellow travelers...
Wednesday, October 05, 2011
Slave or Friend?
When you think about God, do you imagine someone who makes demands, someone who has a strict code of behavior you are required to meet, or someone who genuinely wants to be with you?
Here's an easier approach...when you come to pray to the Father does your approach require you to first repent, or start out with some kind of thanksgiving, is there a picture in your mind of someone distant that it will require a lot of effort to convince, maybe you feel more comfortable with the Son, so its sort of a backdoor to Gods kitchen approach in prayer?
Now forget about that for a minute...and lets think about a time when you were in love, think about the feelings of euphoria and infatuation and try to remember in that state did you ever want to control the person of your desire?
Could you ever imagine that the person you were in love with needed to be forced to do what you wanted, because of your love?
Was there ever a time when you loved an imperfect human that your love for them would want to take away their free choice and force them to love you?
Would you have been happy with a forced obedience even if it looked real but never knowing the heart of the person...or would your love always allow the freedom to choose and with that freedom also give the power to be whomever they wanted to be?
As I have been dialoguing with my concepts of God, I am coming to the conclusion that Gods goal for me is to be His friend...He wants to empower me and actually is calling me to live from a different place than my earthbound frame seems focused on...
That place is not simply some kind of heavenly geography, it is also a place of preference and power that is not limited to time and space.
True love always gives the power to choose to the object of its affection, because love empowers, fear enslaves...
What that means is that bad choices are always available...
And with bad choices consequences are inevitable...love does not protect us from the consequences of bad choices...
Love will warn us, but love will not control us...
Love will offer us the best, but love will not force us to choose the best...
Love will make us responsible for our own choices, but love will not belittle us or demean us for our choices...
Love will allow consequences to teach us regardless of how painful the lesson, but love will not use punishment as a teaching tool...
Where there is fear, love has not matured...
Where there is fear, slavery is not far behind...
Where there is fear, we have not seen God...
In the Bible the fear of the Lord is always connected to the understanding that the consequence of a bad choice is a life lived below the Fathers love and desire for us and that can mean simply living below our potential with meager possibilities or even going so far as experiencing death without hope...the fear of the Lord teaches us to depart from evil because...well it's evil....
So do you fear the Lord and understand that He loves you enough to let bad consequences teach you, or are you afraid of Him, and thus a slave to demands that you can never satisfy?
Do you see the Father as someone who longs to be your friend...or someone you cannot approach?
A slave doesn't know or care about what his master is doing except to avoid the masters anger...most of the time a slave is looking for ways to avoid his master...
So here's the tough question you must ask yourself...do you use tiredness, busyness, lack of discipline, or apathy and passiveness to avoid the Father...or are you becoming friends?
Slave or friend?...your prayer life declares the reality and you know this is true.
Selah.
Here's an easier approach...when you come to pray to the Father does your approach require you to first repent, or start out with some kind of thanksgiving, is there a picture in your mind of someone distant that it will require a lot of effort to convince, maybe you feel more comfortable with the Son, so its sort of a backdoor to Gods kitchen approach in prayer?
Now forget about that for a minute...and lets think about a time when you were in love, think about the feelings of euphoria and infatuation and try to remember in that state did you ever want to control the person of your desire?
Could you ever imagine that the person you were in love with needed to be forced to do what you wanted, because of your love?
Was there ever a time when you loved an imperfect human that your love for them would want to take away their free choice and force them to love you?
Would you have been happy with a forced obedience even if it looked real but never knowing the heart of the person...or would your love always allow the freedom to choose and with that freedom also give the power to be whomever they wanted to be?
As I have been dialoguing with my concepts of God, I am coming to the conclusion that Gods goal for me is to be His friend...He wants to empower me and actually is calling me to live from a different place than my earthbound frame seems focused on...
That place is not simply some kind of heavenly geography, it is also a place of preference and power that is not limited to time and space.
True love always gives the power to choose to the object of its affection, because love empowers, fear enslaves...
What that means is that bad choices are always available...
And with bad choices consequences are inevitable...love does not protect us from the consequences of bad choices...
Love will warn us, but love will not control us...
Love will offer us the best, but love will not force us to choose the best...
Love will make us responsible for our own choices, but love will not belittle us or demean us for our choices...
Love will allow consequences to teach us regardless of how painful the lesson, but love will not use punishment as a teaching tool...
Where there is fear, love has not matured...
Where there is fear, slavery is not far behind...
Where there is fear, we have not seen God...
In the Bible the fear of the Lord is always connected to the understanding that the consequence of a bad choice is a life lived below the Fathers love and desire for us and that can mean simply living below our potential with meager possibilities or even going so far as experiencing death without hope...the fear of the Lord teaches us to depart from evil because...well it's evil....
So do you fear the Lord and understand that He loves you enough to let bad consequences teach you, or are you afraid of Him, and thus a slave to demands that you can never satisfy?
Do you see the Father as someone who longs to be your friend...or someone you cannot approach?
A slave doesn't know or care about what his master is doing except to avoid the masters anger...most of the time a slave is looking for ways to avoid his master...
So here's the tough question you must ask yourself...do you use tiredness, busyness, lack of discipline, or apathy and passiveness to avoid the Father...or are you becoming friends?
Slave or friend?...your prayer life declares the reality and you know this is true.
Selah.
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Divorce and the Angry God
So I'm in this state of paradox where I am finishing my book on divorce while simultaneously rewriting my primitive soteriology...(which for those of us who stay out of the big kitchen of theology basically means what I believe about God)...yes I am rethinking some of the secondary and even primitive concepts about God, who He is, and why Jesus died, as well as contextualizing some of the second tier ideas like hell and wrath and etc...
Pretty heady stuff when you wrap it up in gravy ladle theology terms, but in the words of my heart I am simply coming to terms with concepts that I have never fully thought out but held some sort of belief about.
So what do you believe about God? Did He pour out His wrath on Jesus (as I have held for most of my life in agreement with the *penal substitution model) or was the cross a ransom and covenant event?
I have come to the recent conclusion that God is not mad, never really was for more than a brief moment, His anger last for but a moment but His mercy endures forever...so the idea that the cross is the shock absorber of Gods wrath has slowly been drifting away like a broken toy that I slept with for 50+ years...it seems familiar and strange to get into rest without it, but I have known in my heart that there was something broken about it and just could not put my finger on it.
We can blame Anselm (Bishop of Canterbury), but the truth is we are prone to make God in our own image, short tempered, bitter and unhappy...
Obviously I have been doing some heavy lifting in the research department because suddenly I realized that most of my model about control, anger, relationships, punishment, sin and life, the resurrection, atonement and even hell have all had their foundation in an idea of God that made Him seem angry all the time, ready to punish disobedience at the drop of a hat and frankly no fun to be around...a God who would vomit around sin and would evaporate His Presence anytime we wandered away from the straight and narrow...
Regardless of what you believe about why Jesus died and who killed him, this IS the lifestyle and culture you develop if you hold to the *penal substitution model of the atonement, you can say something different but your behavior will naturally gravitate to a concept of God that is based upon rules and code-books, laws and punishments, control and fear...
The natural outworking of understanding that Jesus diverted the wrath of an angry God at the cross is to move into a relationship of fear and rule keeping because He is after all a consuming fire and cannot look upon sin...and we must stay ever so near the cross which functions like a blood soaked shield that keeps the rays of Gods anger from vaporizing our rebellious souls...bad people no cookie for you!
As I begin to dismantle this idea it occurs to me that a lot of what I have accepted about divorce has come to me through the filter of an angry God model...after all "God hates divorce"..thus Malachi 2 declares to us and we use this verse as the main bully stick to keep people in control when their relationships cannot be controlled...
Anyone who knows my personal journey would never beat me up, for all practical reasons I was "biblically divorced" in every sense of the righteous word...but that did not stop the aftershocks of an angry and now disappointed God from showing up in my head and questioning me when I ached to be married again...
I can tell you this much..I AM NOT MADE TO BE A EUNUCH...I do not want to be, do not like the idea and have no desire to be alone and its not even mostly about sex, its about reigning in life with a co-regent, its about having someone to share the victory, defeats and adventure with... its about relationship and life and laughing and hanging out doing nothing as well...
I love the idea of growing old with someone, getting to know them until I can make the perfect cup of whatever for them and fluff their pillows just right and instinctively know what color of curtains they would choose...its about intimacy of soul and its what most of us were made for...
Some of us don't care anymore...and if that's you make a statement and stay single and clear the pond for the rest of us...I cannot think of anything more fun than getting to know someone on such a level that I can make them laugh anytime they need it...and if that is not in you then may you find peace and quiet with your cats and ministry to the isolated...but isolation is not part of my genes...I do not want to be alone...not with the assignments I have been given.
This drive to reconcile who I am and what I have encountered (divorce) has made me plunge head first into these primitive ideas about God because as I read scripture I find glaring statements about remarriage that make it seem like I must remain single or commit adultery...(Matthew 5 and 19 come to mind)
Even reading the early church fathers gave me no respite...brutal language that implied a God who would not tolerate remarriage under any circumstance unless the other party was dead...
The tension this created inside me was almost unbearable, here I am a hopeless romantic and love a God who will hate me if I want to remarry...
I know I am painting extremes here, but its important that I communicate what I felt...see what you believe about God isn't simply information, it is also an emotion, it has the power to liberate or subjugate, it can create freedom or slavery, it can make you powerful or powerless all depending on what it is you believe about the One who made you...
If God is always angry at sin and sinners, then there are no excuses, you must tow the line, and any deviance from the gospel facts whether you knew them or not must incur His displeasure...He's mad for crying out loud, don't bother him with this sex drive He put inside you, He expects you to ignore it since He does, and all that talk about romance, what is wrong with you? The world needs saving, your little wants and desires are wasting His time, grow up and get over it, you blew it and no longer qualify for a good life of relationship (for which you were created)...suck it up buddy....
If Gods unhappy then the least you can do is be unhappy too!
God hates divorce, says so right there in Malachi (written to Jewish men who were abandoning their wives and sending them away empty handed and destitute much like the Pharisees in Jesus day)...
When I finally began to take off the "wrath of God" lenses that I had been living the bible through a different thought began to emerge in my heart...
The God who hated divorce got divorced in Jeremiah 3 so that through divorce He might destroy the power of divorce and set free forever those who were subject to bondage through the shame and despair of divorce (paraphrasing Romans)...
And the God who divorced Israel is now planning on marrying the Bride of Christ, so unless He kills Israel we might need to rethink our concepts of remarriage and adultery...
What I am trying to say is that the concept of Gods wrath and anger being poured out on Jesus has the potential to color everything in your world and if you are divorced like I am, the power of that model will make you miserable...
But what if the cross was actually God rescuing broken slaves from the marketplace of sin and death?
What if the cross was essentially the great blood cutting of covenant that invites us into intimacy and deep deep fellowship with the greatest Lover in the universe?
What if the primary message of the cross is not "I am angry and sin must be punished" but instead it is "I love you so much I will become vulnerable to your deepest desires and transparent and safe and stretch out my limbs to embrace you with no defense against you, I will make a covenant with you so deep that it will require me to raise you up in a new kind of life that is centered on joy and peace and righteousness that I place inside you because I love you so much I want you right next to me all the time...?
Our puny rules about divorce don't stand a chance against a God with that kind of love, a God who entered into the death of not only sin, but also the death that divorce brings so He could conquer it and bring the life that went missing...
Remarriage is to small a word...upgrade is what He is after...divorce for a true believer while tragic and painful, when seen in the light of God resurrection power is actually a romantic upgrade...
At least that's the theory I am now exploring...
A final picture...what if Gods heart is so big that Jesus on the cross is His engagement ring to you?
What if Gods primary drive to you is relationship and not "fixing" you? I'm not at all suggesting that we are not broken and in need of repair, but I am beginning to entertain the notion that God truly wants us to be powerful in His presence...He's after a bride, someone who captivates His heart and makes it beat faster, someone whom He would gladly give all things...this sounds more like the New Testament to me...
What if you've stolen His heart and He's crazy about you?
A final picture...what if Gods heart is so big that Jesus on the cross is His engagement ring to you?
What if Gods primary drive to you is relationship and not "fixing" you? I'm not at all suggesting that we are not broken and in need of repair, but I am beginning to entertain the notion that God truly wants us to be powerful in His presence...He's after a bride, someone who captivates His heart and makes it beat faster, someone whom He would gladly give all things...this sounds more like the New Testament to me...
What if you've stolen His heart and He's crazy about you?
(*Penal Substitution is the name theologians give the idea that the cross was about Jesus taking on the wrath of God because His honor has been insulted and He must punish sin,the cross is essentially "punitive"... my issues with this model is that it splits up the Godhead so that one part is mad=Father, one part is nice=Son and one part is apathetic=Spirit...
Besides that it disallows God ever forgiving sin.. if sin MUST be punished then how can God ever forgive sin, forgiveness and paying for sin are two completely different things one is not like the other and you must choose one because either it is forgiven or it is punished but it can't be both.
So the substitution model goes contrary to what the New Covenant is declared to be about in Jeremiah and the Hebrews...the model I am currently embracing and exploring is referred to a the "Ransom theory" or Christus Victor and was held by ALL of the early church fathers until about 1000 AD when Anselm developed his version of the substitution model...)
Besides that it disallows God ever forgiving sin.. if sin MUST be punished then how can God ever forgive sin, forgiveness and paying for sin are two completely different things one is not like the other and you must choose one because either it is forgiven or it is punished but it can't be both.
So the substitution model goes contrary to what the New Covenant is declared to be about in Jeremiah and the Hebrews...the model I am currently embracing and exploring is referred to a the "Ransom theory" or Christus Victor and was held by ALL of the early church fathers until about 1000 AD when Anselm developed his version of the substitution model...)
Monday, August 01, 2011
Life date
So...its been a couple of years since my youngest left the nest, two of the five get married in the next few months, leaving the baby bird who has flown the coop un-covenanted and near the beach.
But it also leaves a big freaking hole inside my house, my home, my routine...
I've been a golden retriever loyal and guarding for over twenty years, never chasing the rabbits in the yard, always sleeping near the end of the beds and now the beds are made and the chew toy conversations are all done on iPhones and Droids...
There's a huge sucking sound every-time I close the front door when I come home, its the sound of...nothing.
No one here but the ghost of memories and a few high school trophy's and prom dresses...and me.
I'm down to "raw" emotions, and memories...because the feedback loop is closed.
I can handle "raw" its not like its my first rodeo, nothing prep's you for "raw" like the phone call I got when the oldest rolled the explorer with the two youngest in the car and the baby bird learned to fly by going out a window with the help of Angels...that initial information tsunami will forever be etched into my psyche as the primary definition of "raw"...as usual my Keeper was their Keeper and the only loss was a pile of metal and glass that we mistakenly trust with our treasures on a daily basis.
I think my only fear of space travel would be getting cut off from the mother-ship during a space walk and drifting away into empty space...its not like you need volumes of space to experience that, it can happen in the space you've lived for the last 18 years.
When they cut the leash so they could run free, it left me in a state of confusion because now I am just as free and can't remember why we chase rabbits in the first place...and the obvious question is:
"Aren't you a little old to be chasing rabbits?"
Who gives a rip?
Besides what am I gonna do sit down on the porch and wait for no one to come home?
So I've decided to take a "Life-Date", you know go on a date with my life, find out a little about myself see if I can hook up with me...
It should be interesting...I'm thinking 40 days as a good Biblical number...
We shall see where the road takes me...and just a warning to the rabbits out there...
No more leashes...
But it also leaves a big freaking hole inside my house, my home, my routine...
I've been a golden retriever loyal and guarding for over twenty years, never chasing the rabbits in the yard, always sleeping near the end of the beds and now the beds are made and the chew toy conversations are all done on iPhones and Droids...
There's a huge sucking sound every-time I close the front door when I come home, its the sound of...nothing.
No one here but the ghost of memories and a few high school trophy's and prom dresses...and me.
I'm down to "raw" emotions, and memories...because the feedback loop is closed.
I can handle "raw" its not like its my first rodeo, nothing prep's you for "raw" like the phone call I got when the oldest rolled the explorer with the two youngest in the car and the baby bird learned to fly by going out a window with the help of Angels...that initial information tsunami will forever be etched into my psyche as the primary definition of "raw"...as usual my Keeper was their Keeper and the only loss was a pile of metal and glass that we mistakenly trust with our treasures on a daily basis.
I think my only fear of space travel would be getting cut off from the mother-ship during a space walk and drifting away into empty space...its not like you need volumes of space to experience that, it can happen in the space you've lived for the last 18 years.
When they cut the leash so they could run free, it left me in a state of confusion because now I am just as free and can't remember why we chase rabbits in the first place...and the obvious question is:
"Aren't you a little old to be chasing rabbits?"
Who gives a rip?
Besides what am I gonna do sit down on the porch and wait for no one to come home?
So I've decided to take a "Life-Date", you know go on a date with my life, find out a little about myself see if I can hook up with me...
It should be interesting...I'm thinking 40 days as a good Biblical number...
We shall see where the road takes me...and just a warning to the rabbits out there...
No more leashes...
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Messages Before the grave
These are sms from my brother to me and back...I'm the ones in green, he's the ones in grey...it was close to this time last year...he started getting worse, and worse...I had no idea how bad he really was...
Anyway these are some of the last messages we had between each other...
I miss him...
Anyway these are some of the last messages we had between each other...
I miss him...
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