2023s
December 14, 2023
Philippians 3:7-11
Advent, Day 12
“But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith. I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.”
I love this passage. It's one my favorite passages in all the Scriptures. It is one of those that just resonate deeply within my soul.
I remember hearing this passage preached by Sinclair Ferguson at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, MO. I will never forget his Scottish brogue booming out verse 11.
This desire to know Christ has become the driving force of my life. More than anything I want to truly know Christ. This knowledge that moves beyond facts and figures. I want to have an experiential knowledge of Christ.
The problem with this is that it means I have to experience a tension that never ends.
This tension of resurrection life and suffering.
Too often we want to believe that if we are walking closely with Christ then life will be easy and good. The fact of the matter is that as we know Christ we are going further up and further in to experiential relationship with him. This means experiencing resurrection life and suffering. The tension of the two is the means by which know Christ intimately.
During Advent we are reminded that in the midst of the suffering there is a longing for the resurrection life that will ultimately win out. So, we look toward his second Advent. The Advent of all things being made new and all suffering ceased.
Today I'm wrestling with, “Am I embracing the tension of resurrection life and suffering or am I just trying to avoid suffering?”
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December 12, 2023
Isaiah 4:2-6
Advent, Day 10
“Then the Lord will create over all of Mount Zion and over those who assemble there a cloud of smoke by day and a glow of flaming fire by night; over everything the glory will be a canopy. It will be a shelter and shade from the heat of the day, and a refuge and hiding place from the storm and rain.”
I've never thought about the glory of God being a shelter and a refuge.
This ties in a bit with yesterday's passage about knowing who God is and that providing confidence, I think.
The storms of life will come. That's a given. Nobody gets through this life unscathed. All of us are going to face pain, heartbreak, and grief. The question is what will we do when that pain, heartbreak, and grief become present in our lives?
We can fight. We can flee. We can freeze.
Or so the contemporary wisdom goes.
But, what if there was something else that we could do? What if we could rest? What if we could find rest in the knowledge that the glory of God offers refuge and shelter in the storm?
I typically fight when hard stuff comes. Anger is my default emotional response. I don't get sad, I don't get scared, I get angry.
Over the last few years though I have been learning from watching my friend die that there's a different path. There is this path of rest. This way of yielding to Divine love and in so doing grieve and also find joy. It's a tension of the already but not yet that gets played out in real time.
Today I'm wrestling with the question, “Can I choose to rest in the glorious divine love in the face of grief and pain?”
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December 11, 2023
Psalm 27
Advent, Day 9
”...even then I will be confident.”
Psalm 27 was one of the readings today and it has this little line, “even the I will be confident.”
I am thinking a lot about what it means to be confident right now for a series of talks that I will be giving in March, so of course this popped off the page.
The Psalm opens with a declaration of the identity of who God is for the psalmist. God is described as the light, salvation, and stronghold. Because of this the psalmist declares that they have no fear.
How little fear does the psalmist have?
“Though an army besiege me, my heart will not fear; though war break out against me, even then I will be confident.”
I can't imagine what it would be like to have an army besiege me or war break out against me, but I'm pretty sure that I'd experience deep fear. If these bad things would befall me, would I still have confidence?
It turns out that confidence in this situation is rooted in the sure knowledge of the identity of the Divine. The psalmist doesn't wonder or doubt who the Divine is. There is no question in the psalmist's mind that the Divine offers light, salvation, and is a stronghold.
Having a sure sense of who God is what provides a foundation that offers confidence, even in the midst of great distress.
Today, I'm pondering: “Do I have a deep awareness of the grace, mercy, and lovingkindness of God so that when I face the storms of life I will have confidence?”
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December 7, 2023
Hosea 6:1-6
Advent, Day 5
“Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears.”
This is one of those passages that grabs me consistently in so many different ways. I read it and sit, almost stunned by its beauty and its challenge to my soul.
This morning the line quoted above was like a 2x4 between the eyes.
How often is this true of me regarding God?
Whenever I don't get my way with God my love grows cold so quickly. Whenever I experience any disappointment with my wants and desires my love dissipates.
“Whenever” happens more than I'd like to admit.
I am sure glad that Amy's love for me is not like my love for God.
What's wild to me is that God has an amazing track record in my life. When things really matter, God has made God's presence felt in my life. God in God's grace has helped me gain perspective sooner rather than later in those seasons of significant pain.
God's love for me has been enduring. God's love for me has proven faithful.
Yet, my love for God is like the morning mist.
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December 6, 2023
Luke 21:34-38
Advent, Day 4
““Be careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness and the anxieties of life, and that day will close on you suddenly like a trap.”
I've been meditating on today's passage for a few hours now and something has clicked in my heart as I have pondered on it.
A number of years ago God broke me of my legalism about all sorts of things. But, then God needed to break of my legalism about not being legalistic. That was a fun (yeah let's call it that) journey.
What got my mind spinning was the connection between carousing, drunkenness, and the anxieties of life. I can see how carousing and drunkenness aren't good things and are choices that I make. But, the “anxieties of life?” I felt like I was in a segment from Sesame Street's “one of these things is not like the other.” How could Jesus compare the first two to the third?
Well, it finally clicked when my mind was able to connect Jesus' prescription for the problems he listed. Namely, “watch and pray.”
Carousing is defined as, “the activity of drinking alcohol and enjoying oneself with others in a noisy, lively way.” Drunkenness is drinking alcohol to excess. Anxiety is, “a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome.”
Jesus prescribes us to watch and pray otherwise our hearts are weighed down by these things.
Enjoying time with friends and enjoying alcohol are not bad in and of themselves. It's when we take them to a place of excess that they become problematic. Planning for the future and counting the costs for tomorrow aren't bad things until they are taken to a place of excess.
Alcohol has not been an issue for me in my life. My drug of choice is food. Food is where I find control and seek emotional solace.
If Jesus were specifically speaking to me he would say that I need to be careful otherwise my heart will get weighed down with gluttony and the anxieties of life.
In this season of Advent we are in this time of waiting that begins in the darkness. When the world is dark we begin to feel out of control. So, we start grabbing for anything that makes us feel like we have control again. Food, drink, anxiety. If we are not careful these things will weigh our hearts down. We will find ourselves in a very real sense, out of our minds.
So, we watch and pray.
Isn't it interesting, there's not a single mention here of reading the Scriptures or meditating on God's word. No, the call is to watch and pray. That is, we are to seek to enter into the presence of the Divine through prayer.
I think Jesus calls us to this because if we can acknowledge that we are not God and if we can acknowledge that we can trust God to be in control, then we will find freedom from the anxieties of this life. We can enjoy a good meal without becoming gluttonous. We can enjoy a good party with friends without it becoming carousing.
When we have found peace, that wholeness of self and rest in God, then we will find freedom.
This is the hope of Advent.
It is a hope of freedom to joy rooted in the God that cares for all things.
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December 5, 2023
Micah 4:6-13
Advent, Day 3
In that day,” declares the LORD, “I will gather the lame; I will assemble the exiles and those I have brought to grief. I will make the lame my remnant, those driven away a strong nation.”
This verse is fascinating to me.
Honestly, it challenges me and at the same time encourages me.
I am astounded by the God that self-identifies as the one who brought people to grief. There's no running from it. Through Micah's voice the God of the universe owns that fact that God has brought people to grief.
What do we do that?
How do we respond to it?
Let's be clear, this prophet is writing to a people in exile. A people that was indeed being judged by the divine. So, perhaps my (and maybe your) immediate response needs to be a bit tempered. The grief here is due to the experience of exile and judgement.
OK, fair enough.
Yet, the focus here is not on the judgement. But, it is on the other aspect of this, namely, that God will gather, assemble, and make strong.
In the midst of grief and exile God is at work doing something that will undo all of it.
This gives me hope.
I don't know about you, but when life gets messy I wonder, “where is God?” It turns out that God is working in the background and that I can hope that there will be a great undoing. If God does this for those whom were disobedient and under judgement, how much more so will God do this for those this side of the resurrection?
As I read and ponder these words and thinking about what the prophets said about exile and the remnant, I realize more and more how the message of resurrection and reconciliation in Christ carried such power.
Advent allows us to enter into the waiting through holy imagination that those before us lived through. They lived through the hope of the coming of the undoing. We get to experience the undoing every day.
Today I'm thinking about, “Will I recognize the undoing of grief all around me?”
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December 4, 2023
Micah 4:1-5
Advent, Day 2
They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore.
As we fully enter into the Advent season, I am looking forward to reading and meditating on the prophets. Each year most of the readings come from them during this season.
Advent is a time of preparation and fasting and waiting and hoping.
As I read Micah 4:1-5 today there was all kinds of good stuff in just a brief passage. But, the second half of verse three resonated deeply with me.
I don't know about you, but my heart is breaking because of the war and violence that seems to be everywhere. Israel and Hamas, Russia and Ukraine, the genocide of the Uighurs in China, the ongoing violence in Haiti, the never-ending wars on the continent of Africa, not to mention the violence that leads news broadcasts locally every day.
Of war and violence there seems to be no end.
All would seem hopeless if I didn't have the hopeful promise of a day coming when, “They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.”
What is fascinating to me is the beginning of verse three, “He will judge between many peoples and will settle disputes for strong nations far and wide.” This is not a pie in the sky kind of hope. This is a rugged and real hope. The days of peace will not be without disputes. It's just that the day I long for will have the disputes settled without violence because the Lord will settle them.
Oh how I long for this day!
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December 1, 2023
Psalm 80:1-19
“Restore us, LORD God Almighty; make your face shine on us, that we may be saved.”
This repeated line in Psalm 80 rings out to me today.
This psalm opens by crying out for help and as the cry continues there seems to be a recognition that the people deserved a rebuke from God. The first time this line is uttered it is in reference to a perceived persecution but then the second time it is in light of the recognition of rebuke.
We live in a day and age where Christians, especially Evangelical Christians, feel like they are being persecuted. From much of my reading about culture and politics this feeling of persecution is what lead the majority of my brothers and sisters in Christ to support Donal Trump for the presidency. They are afraid and they want a strong man to protect them. As I look around I don't see any persecution. I see loads of persecution complexes but no real persecution.
I think what we are seeing is that many of us are confusing persecution with rebuke.
As I look on my own life, any time that someone calls me out for my failing to love well I initially receive it as persecution. It is often not until I have had time to reflect that it was a good an proper rebuke and I can confess, concur, and change.
On the whole, the American Christian church appears to be in the midst of a season of rebuke and we sure don't like it.
We have failed to love well.
I have failed to love well.
Today I'm wrestling with, “How can I grow in receiving rebuke not as persecution but as an opportunity to grow in love?”
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November 27, 2023
2 Timothy 2:19-26
“Don’t have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments, because you know they produce quarrels.”
Do you know how to get something to go “viral” on the internet? Make a foolish and stupid argument.
It's easy. I've had a few.
Do you know what happens after a time though? Your soul begins to wither. You become cynical and jaded. Your heart hardens. Happiness is found in other people's distress and anger.
It's gross.
Over the last number of years I've begun to intentionally avoid such things on the internet. I will have hard conversations in person. Because when we sit face to face we can't forget that the other person in made in God's likeness. But, even then, I am constantly on guard about whether or not the conversation is beneficial or if it's just arguing for the sake of arguing.
Particularly, this is true about sports and politics.
It's becoming more true of just about anything.
I want to be a person that discusses difficult things. I want to be a person who speaks up against injustice. I want to be a person that speaks for the truth.
I do not want to be involved in foolish and stupid arguments.
The latter demands that I listen and be fully present in the hard conversations. It requires me to hear what the other person is saying and noticing when the discussion has jumped the shark.
Today, I'm wrestling with this, “Am I fully present in the midst of difficult conversations or am I only concerned with winning an argument?”
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November 20, 2023
Romans 2:1-11 (The Message)
“Those people are on a dark spiral downward. But if you think that leaves you on the high ground where you can point your finger at others, think again. Every time you criticize someone, you condemn yourself. It takes one to know one. Judgmental criticism of others is a well-known way of escaping detection in your own crimes and misdemeanors. But God isn’t so easily diverted. He sees right through all such smoke screens and holds you to what you’ve done.”
Do you ever read the Bible and think, “Well, that bit was written just for me!”?
That happened this morning. As I ponder on this passage I am reminded of that old saying, “When you point the finger that someone, there's three pointing back at you!”
Over the last week I have a multiple conversations with people about this idea of taking the log out of our own eye before trying to remove the speck from our neighbor's eye. It is amazing to me that I continue to have to wrestle with this in my own life. You would think that after kindergarten I'd have figured it out.
But, no.
Here I am still a judgemental jerk on so many levels.
I experience happiness when “those” people get it. I make excuses my people blow it.
What is it with me and this desire to judge others?
Well, this passage reminds me that it means there are likely issues in my own life that I'm seeking to distract myself and God from. Once again I find myself needing to do ever greater introspection to be sure that I'm seeking to love well.
I think I'm coming to learn that growing in my faith is like becoming stronger in the gym. As you get stronger you have increase the weight that you lift so that you can continue to grow stronger. As I go deeper into my faith I have to go deeper still into seeing the shadows of my own life to bring light to them.
Just because the shadow isn't as long as it used to be doesn't mean it's not there. I am learning that I can notice it most clearly as I judge others. That's the flashing light that says, “Hey bub, you to shine the light over here and deal with this!”
Today I am pondering, “Do I think that I can distract God from my shortfalls by pointing out the falling short of others?”
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When Religion Goes Bad
God-washed power pollutes everything it touches but there is hope
Over the last year I've read three books that have caused me significant pause.
The first was, A Church Called Tov by Scot McKnight and Laura Barringer. The second was, Jesus and John Wayne by Kristin Kobes Du Mez. The third was, The Flag and the Cross by Phillip Gorski and Samuel Perry.
All three of these books evaluate the state of the American Evangelical church from slightly different perspectives. A Church Called Tov offers a prescription and hope for how to be a church that is good. Jesus and John Wayne looks at the historical development for how the American Evangelical church became the church that we see all around us. The Flag and the Cross is a data driven book that takes a look at White Christian Nationalism.
These three books have helped me answer the question, “Why?”
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Why are we in the situation that we are in? What has happened to the American church? How did we get to a place where the many people are more aligned to political agendas than they are to the cause of Christ? Why are we seeing so many pastors falling morally? Why are so many people waking up to realize that they have been abused spiritually by the men and women that they have entrusted their souls to?
Why?
While all three of these have slightly different angles, I think they are all wrestling with the same fundamental question. How does religion deal with having power? Specifically how does Christianity handle power? Even more specifically, what happens when Evangelicalism ascends to a place of significant cultural and political power?
I would encourage you to read the books, They are accessible and have been helpful.
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As I have pondered what these authors have written I have come to realize that there is a significant rot in the heart of American Evangelical Christianity.
Christianity has always thrived when it was not in power. It is a faith that was formed in the crucible of persecution. As power has shifted to the West, Christianity came with it. Over the last 150 years or so we have seen Christianity come to the fore as a power in and of itself.
One would hope that a faith that is rooted in self-sacrifical love, love of neighbor, and love of enemy would handle power well.
Sadly, we have failed the test.
We have failed the test corporately and we have failed individually as well.
What I am seeing all around me is the reality that power corrupts and God-washed power corrupts infinitely more.
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C.S. Lewis wrote in his Reflections on the Psalms, “If the Divine call does not make us better, it will make us very much worse. Of all bad men religious bad men are the worst. Of all created beings the wickedest is one who originally stood in the immediate presence of God.”
Christianity has been gutted from the inside out. In much of American Christianity there is little spiritual formation or moral formation. It is all about “getting people saved.”
“Pray this prayer and get saved.”
The desire to sell eternal fire insurance has created a culture that is a mile wide and an inch deep. We are reaping now what we have sown over the last seventy years or so.
Christianity is now a token to trade for positions of power. It is no longer a life transforming faith.
In those first decades of the Christian faith it was known as, “The Way.” There was a lived aspect to Christianity. The expectation was that following in the way of Jesus was of utter importance.
Today? Today we simply disregard the teachings and ways of Jesus if they get in our way of power.
We have seen the rise to power of the “religious bad men.”
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Is there any hope?
I think so.
If we can first acknowledge the reality that many of us hunger and thirst for power more than we do righteousness, that would be a good start. We need to own up to the fact that the grievances that many have toward the institution of the church are real and true.
We need to learn again the importance of spiritual formation for the one who is seeking to follow Jesus.
There must be a re-ordering of our lives. The way of Jesus must be first. This is what Jesus meant when he said, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple. And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:26)” Jesus is arguing for a re-orienting of our lives.
Jesus' way is ultimately self-sacrificial rooted in love. When Jesus was offered power he said, “No.”
In the letter to the Philippians, Paul of Tarsus challenged the church there to relate to one another in light of the way of Christ. He wrote of Christ,
“Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death — even death on a cross!”
There is hope. It is rooted not in the pursuit of power but in the pursuit of sharing the mind of Christ.
I desperately want this to be true of me. I so badly want to be a person for who is living the way of Jesus rooted in self-sacrificial love.
I can not change the world. I can change me and I can model this way for those whom have trusted themselves to my spiritual care.
It is high time for the rise of the religious good people.
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November 16, 2023
Judge 2:6-15
“After that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the LORD nor what he had done for Israel.”
There may be no more enduring meme than the angry old guy yelling, “Get off my lawn!” It seems that every generation feels like the “youth” are terrible and only getting worse. They look at the world and say, “These darn kids are hopeless.”
The younger generation mocks the older as well. “OK Boomer,” is the refrain that rings out these days.
Perhaps it's human nature to dislike the young or the old.
What strikes me is that so often we complain about the “youth” without taking a moment to consider the reality that those of us in the previous generations are responsible for the emerging generations.
Do we really care?
The emerging generations don't appear out of nowhere. They parented and raised by someone. Who could it be? Oh, yeah, the previous generations.
As I read this passage it finally hit me that the people in the previous generations didn't continue to pass on the stories of the God-Who-Saves to the next. Eventually, the people found themselves alone in the wilderness so to speak. It isn't the fault of the emerging generation.
I am coming to think that every emerging generation is a reflection of the inner realities of the previous generation.
Think about that for a moment.
We take what is in us and implant those values and principles into those we raise. They then embody those things. If we don't like what we see, it's our fault, not theirs. People can only ultimately only know what they've been taught.
And more is caught than taught.
Wait, what?
How we live is the clearest display of what we really think and believe. That gets caught by the emerging generations.
What we see in them that we appreciate and despise are things that we as the previous generation implanted in them through our display of life and what we specifically taught. Some of it also a reaction against the things that they see as hypocritical and wrong (which it almost always is).
The question I'm pondering, “How am I displaying for the emerging generations the life of love, grace, and mercy?”
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November 15. 2023
Jeremiah 31:31-34
“I will be their God, and they will be my people.”
Self-centeredness has been on my mind lately due to the readings that have I been meditating on this week. As I come to this little passage where God unveils the next development in God's covenantal relationship with God's people, I am struck by the communal aspect of it.
In American Christianity we have often been enamored with the individual. We make all our heroes into John Wayne types. Strong, solitary, and not needing anyone. Yet, this is not what we actually see in the Scriptures. All of the heroes of the faith were deeply embedded in community.
Our fascination with the individual has bled over into our understanding of what God is up to in the world. We think of God as saving individuals. Yet, it appears that there is something more that God is doing. God is out here redeeming for God-self a people.
A community. A body. A congregation. A people.
I have heard so many messages about taking verses like this and individualizing it. This absolutely misses the point.
As I grow older and (I think) wiser, I am coming to the conclusion that it is not possible to walk with God alone. We walk with God in community.
The question I'm pondering today, “Am I opening myself to community or am I isolating myself?”
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November 14, 2023
Nehemiah 8:1-12
“Then all the people went away to eat and drink, to send portions of food and to celebrate with great joy, because they now understood the words that had been made known to them.”
Nehemiah is one of those books in the Bible that get used for “leadership” retreats and the like. It always amazes me how we can take these ancient texts and make them fit into whatever we want them to fit. Nevertheless, that's not the point.
As I meditated on this passage this morning I was struck by the closing verse about how the people went away to celebrate because they understood the Scriptures. It was striking because it challenges my understanding of my calling in the realm of preaching or communicating the Scriptures to God's people.
I have always thought of the task before me to be one of challenging God's people to consider the Scriptures in such a way that brings about life change. But, did I miss the boat? Have I missed something important in my calling?
I think perhaps I have.
Could it be that the result I ought to be hoping for is for people to experience joy?
As I grow in my faith I experience more joy. Why? Because I grasp more fully the depths of God's grace and love for me and others. Maturing in faith leads to greater love and greater love leads to greater joy.
It turns that I've not been thinking about the end of my pastoring the people who have trusted their spiritual life to me. I've only thought about the process. It's like in parenting, if I'm raising children I do things very differently than if I'm raising adults.
I want to be a pastor that is focused on building joy in the people who entrust themselves to my care.
Today I'm pondering, “Am I leading to people to joy and celebration or to something less?”
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November 13, 2023
Psalm 78
“They willfully put God to the test by demanding the food they craved.”
This psalm is one that constantly grabs my attention. It does so on multiple levels. Today, as I sit here meditating on it verse 18 almost levitated off the page.
It wasn't the putting God to the test bit that jumps out. It is the “demanding the food they craved,” bit.
I am such a selfish and self-centered person. So much of my feelings toward the Divine is related on whether or not my cravings are met. I don't think in my life I have ever experienced need. (At least not knowingly, I am sure that my mom would be able to tell me some behind the scenes times when things were really hard.)
During the first few years of our marriage finances were tight. We laugh about taking rolled coins to Hot 'N Now for date nights. But, even then, we had all our needs met. We had food and housing and clothes and vehicles and gasoline. There was no need that we had that wasn't taken care of.
There have been times that I have had some significant desires for material items and those were not able to be met. “Oddly”, it was during those when I felt like the Divine was farthest from me.
Golly gee why was that?
Because my wants and desires weren't being met.
Now, let's be very clear, I am not equating seasons of deep and abiding pain with what I'm wrestling with. I have friends who have lost children and spouses. Questioning the presence and care of the Divine in those times is not what I'm wrestling with today.
No, I'm wrestling with this sense of feeling like God has failed me because I haven't received my wants and desires like a spoiled child.
I think this is what the psalmist is getting at with this line about the “food they craved.” God was providing for the need of the people but they wanted more. They wanted their cravings met. Jesus fed the 5000 and they chased him around the lake, wanting more.
My belly, my cravings, my desires drive so much of how I move through the world.
Today I'm wrestling with the question, “Am I learning to be content or am I being overtaken by my cravings?”
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November 10, 2023
Psalm 78:1-8, The Message
“We’re not keeping this to ourselves, we’re passing it along to the next generation— GOD’s fame and fortune, the marvelous things he has done.“
This theme of passing things along to the next generation has been running through a lot of my reading lately. I wrote about it a bit on November 6 and the need to be intentional with relationships.
Today, I'm struck by this idea of passing along the stories of “the marvelous things he has done.”
It reminds me of a conversation that I had with my son a few years ago. He asked, “Dad, how do you do it?”
“How do I do what?”
“You coming alongside people in some of the hardest things in their life. How do you keep believing in God?”
“That's a really good question. I think what happens is that every time I walk through one of those seasons of life with people I learn something new and I learn something that I also need to let go of. But, I bring with me the things that I've learned in the past about God too. Nothing happens in a vacuum. So, I have this whole history with God that I bring with me and that history teaches me how to hold on in the midst of the hurt.”
“Oh. That's deep.”
“I'm a well.”
“Huh?”
“You'll get it some day.”
As I meditate on this verse today I am reminded how important it is to share with our children the stories of where we have seen God care for us and provide for us. The stories of God's faithfulness in the midst of our struggles.
It's the struggle that makes the provision beautiful.
The question I'm thinking about today is, “Do I remember how God has cared for, provided for, and done marvelous works in my life?”
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How Do You Read the Bible?
What if meditation was the key to reading the Bible?
I was in high school and attending something called a Summer Institute at Eastern Michigan University. Rising high school seniors could attend the institute in a number of disciplines. I attended this two week experience for music. It was an amazing couple of weeks and I met some really fun people.
It was at this Summer Institute that I was first exposed to meditation. We sat on yoga mats and were told to clear our minds. Then we focused on breathing. It wasn't long before most of us were asleep, myself included. I didn't really get the whole meditation thing.
Over my years in ministry I have come to love Eugene Peterson. The translation of the Bible that he lead, The Message, has been salve to my weary soul. His books have inspired and challenged me to know end. He is, in so many ways my spiritual mentor. I want to be a pastor the way he was. I want to love well and write and preach and care for my neighbors.
As I was reading his beautiful little text, Eat This Book, I was shocked by the discovery that he was in many ways primarily writing a book about meditation. Eat This Book is a book about spiritual reading. The primary question that Peterson wrestles with is this, “How do we read the Bible?”
Many of us read the Bible as though it is a rule book or an encyclopedia. We mine it for information that we can then use. The thing is, that's not what the Bible is. The Bible isn't a textbook or a set of rules or a history text. No, the Bible is the collection of people's interactions with the Divine.
Does the Bible have rules? Yes. Does the Bible have information? Yes. Does the Bible have history? Yes.
But, the Bible is not really any of those things. It is qualitatively different. It is a collection of stories that are all used to tell one story. This is a magnificent story about a God whose engages people with “love-in-action”. So many other god stories are about capricious gods seeking to win the affection of their adherents. It's hard to tell the difference in those stories between the gods and the people. The stories of this God are similar but different. What I find different is that they are stories of a God who takes the initiative through love-in-action, ultimately becoming like the very ones God seeks to save.
As I was saying, Peterson is writing about how to read the Bible focuses his attention on meditation. This punched me between the eyes because ever since that day at EMU I have never been a fan of meditation. It always seemed to be nothing more than a good excuse to have a nap. (Now that I think about it, perhaps I should have leaned into it sooner!)
Peterson writes, “Meditation is the primary way in which we guard against the fragmentation of our Scripture reading into isolated oracles. Meditation enters into the coherent universe of God's revelation. Meditation is the prayerful employ of imagination in order to become friends with the text. It must not be confused with fancy or fantasy.”
Why does he write this?
He writes this because meditation of the Scripture breaks us free from our approach to it as a rule book or encyclopedia or history text. When we study it, we break it down into atomistic pieces and as a result can fragment the text beyond recognition. This, I think, is one of the reasons that we have seen such a spiritual degradation in our American evangelical context. We read certain verses in isolation from one another in such a way that we think they exist in a vacuum. But, the verses of the Bible exist in an organic connection to one another. We need to let them into our lives.
As Peterson writes, we need the Scriptures to become our friends.
You don't befriend a person by learning all their key facts.
Know, you befriend a person by being with them. You get to know them beyond their bare details.
Have you ever been to a bad funeral? I have. Bad funerals are the worst. A bad funeral is one where the officiant clearly doesn't know the person who has died. They simply relate some facts about the person and then read a few Bible verses and that's that.
I've also been to some really good funerals. These are funerals where those who speak knew the person. They tell stories and often there is laughter. But, they also communicate to those there what was most important to the person who passed away. These funerals are the good because there is a depth of friendship that permeates the whole experience.
Meditation on Scripture is the act of getting to know the text.
You read it. You meditate on it. You ponder it. You wrestle with it. You let your imagination run with it.
The primary Hebrew word in the Old Testament that we translate as “meditate,” is hagah. It carries the idea of murmuring, pondering, imagining. It can also have this idea of “make like” or “to compare.” It's interesting to consider these latter ideas.
When we meditate on the Scripture and we allow our holy imagination to become engaged perhaps it brings us to a place where we might be able to begin making this world like the kingdom of God? Perhaps we bring a little heaven on earth if we spent more time meditating on the Scriptures?
As I learn more about the practice of meditating on the Scripture I find that it shapes my view of the world. I become more hopeful. I become less cynical. More and more I see the world through a lens of grace and mercy and love.
Perhaps if pondered this text more and studied it a little less, we would become more loving?
May we ponder together this beautiful story of the loving-in-action God!
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November 9, 2023
Psalm 70
“Let those on the hunt for you sing and celebrate.”
Throughout my life of faith the hardest thing for me has always been the reality that I can not experience God with my senses. You would think that this would create in me a lack of belief, yet it has not. Why? Because I think I see all around me the effects of God.
I guess it's like that truism, “I can't see the wind but I can feel it's effect.”
I think about this a lot. How can I believe when I can not see?
Some would say, “This is where faith comes in.” I suppose that's true. But, it is not very satisfying.
As I read this psalm today this line, “Let those on the hunt for you sing and celebrate,” really grabbed my attention. I've been thinking about it all morning.
There is something called the Baarder-Meinhoff phenomenon. This is what we call that phenomenon that happens when you start noticing things that you never saw before. For instance, you buy a yellow car and all of a sudden you being “seeing” yellow cars all over the place. Were they never there before? Of course they were. But, for some reason you just didn't notice them. Now, you do.
In a very real sense, what you seek to see you will find.
I see God in so many things. I see God in God's creation. I see God through the creative process. I see God in technology and science and medicine.
Where I see God the most is in the self-sacrificial loving-kindness of people. I look around and am amazed by the way people love. So many, I'd say the vast majority of people that I know love so well. Sure, there are people that I experience as unkind, yet I also see them love other people well.
As I look for God and see God in the people around me it causes me to rejoice.
What I'm pondering today is, “Am I looking for God?”
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November 8, 2023
Matthew 15:1-9
“Why do you use your rules to play fast and loose with God’s commands?”
I am sure that someone with religious authority would never, and I mean never, create rules to “play and fast loose with God's commands.”
Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but this is happens all the time.
If I'm really honest with myself I know that I have done this. I have used my authority as a religious leader to make rules so as to get people to do what I want them to do or to manipulate a situation for my benefit.
It's gross. I have elsewhere written about this. I have sought forgiveness from those people to whom I have done this and now I am hyper aware to ensure that I don't do this. It's one of the reasons that I don't post a lot about politics directly or specifically. When it comes to those things they are just my opinions and opinions are like arm pits, hairy, stinky, and you have two.
I think that those of us with religious authority are constantly at danger to do this very thing. We can create “interpretations” of Scripture to use it as we will. I see this in relation to morality and politics most often. What's really fascinating is when religious leaders do this to avoid many statements made by Jesus.
“Love your neighbor as yourself.” “Love your enemy.” “Pray for those who persecute.”
The list could go on.
We do a lot of work to explain those away or to make it so that “love” looks like us being in control or getting our way. Yet, this is not the way of love. The way of love calls for self-sacrifice. It is a determined effort to want the best for the other.
Today I'm wrestling with this, “Am I living in such a way where love rules or that I love rules?”
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November 7, 2023
Psalm 128
Blessed are all who fear the LORD, who walk in obedience to him.
I don't like the word, “obedience.” It makes me feel like God is some sort of task master. I do like the word, “blessed.” I like the idea that God is doing something special for me.
These double feelings are ones that I'm guessing I'm not alone in having. If we are really honest with ourselves we prefer “blessed” over “obedience.”
What am I supposed to do with my two sets of feelings?
Perhaps, I need to think about them a bit differently. What if blessed is related to obedience but not in the sense that blessed is a reward but as a state of being living an obedient life? Is that splitting hairs? Perhaps, but it resonates a bit with me.
Eugene Peterson in the Message translates this passage like this, “All you who fear GOD, how blessed you are! How happily you walk on his smooth straight road!”
Do you see the slight difference in how Peterson takes this from the NIV in the opening? He translates “obedience” as “happily you walk on his smooth straight road.” One might even say that as we walk on the way we experience blessing.
I want to live God's way. When I live God's way I am blessed. The blessing is not the result of obedience. The blessing is the reality, I experience this state of being through walking on God's smooth, straight road.
What I'm wrestling with today: “In whose way am I walking, mine or God's?”
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November 6, 2023
Joshua 4:1-24
And then he told the People of Israel, “In the days to come, when your children ask their fathers, ‘What are these stones doing here?’ tell your children this: ‘Israel crossed over this Jordan on dry ground.’
Maybe it is because I just spent significant time with my daughter at her college campus; perhaps it's seeing the little ones running around at missional community; but this story from Joshua 4 hit me particularly hard today.
This idea of passing along the stories of God to the generations to come is something so very beautiful.
Every Sunday I experience an extreme juxtaposition. In the morning I serve a congregation that is predominantly comprised of men and women who are older than I am. In the evening I serve a congregation of people who are younger or the same age as I am. Some of the younger families have little children. This stark contrast each week is something that is beginning to leave a mark on me.
As I think about this passage in Joshua 4 it strikes me that older people of faith need to be around younger people of faith. They need to be able to tell the stories of God's faithful work in their lives.
Younger people of faith need to be around older people of faith. They need to hear the stories of God's faithfulness in generations past.
When we don't have the cross-generational conversations then we are in danger of forgetting God's faithfulness.
Throughout the story of the people of God we are told to remember. Often there are these moments where physical reminders are crafted to force the question. Of course to remember demands that we are intentional to hold on to the good and the beautiful things that God has done. We are to reminisce and share the stories otherwise they will get forgotten.
It is these stories of God's faithful past that help us hold on to hope in the midst of the difficult present that we inevitably find ourselves in.
The question I'm pondering today is this, “Am I intentional in my relationships with those older and younger so that through them I might embrace hope?”
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November 2, 2023
Romans 2:17-29
“You can get by with almost anything if you front it with eloquent talk about God and his law.”
This passage in Romans is one that I think about often. I have come to the conclusion that for those of us Christians in the United States, particularly, should likely find our parallels with the Jewish people that Paul addresses more so than the Gentiles. Why? Because we are the people who have largely grown up with the Bible and religion and God-talk.
When I read myself as the religious person in Romans 2, I can almost hear the record scratch.
Over the years I have become an expert at God-talk. I read and study the Bible. I read and study theology. It is what I do. As a result, there is a constant temptation to simply God-wash anything I want.
Particularly in today's cultural milieu if I simply use the right words and phrases I could get away with just about anything.
Our Christian culture cares so much more about words than it does about the content of our character. I recently saw a quote from a famous pastor that said, in effect, all that matters is our words. Say the right words and how you live your life doesn't matter.
As I reflect today on my life I am struck by how flippantly I have used phrases that God-wash actions and ideas that I want to be true or OK.
Here's the question I'm meditating on today, “Is God's word changing me from the inside or am I using God's word to keep me from changing?”
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Silence Is Scary
Entering into silence can spiritually form us
There's only a few sermons that I've heard that I remember. As I write that I want to make sure you understand what I'm not saying, I'm not saying that sermons are unimportant. I think they are very important. The sermons I remember are likely not sermons that someone else remembers. They are moments in time that God uses in the lives of people.
There was one sermon in particular that my friend, Doug, gave a number of years ago. He was talking about how noisy the world is and how quiet God's voice can be. All during the message he had an iPod playing very quietly and then at the end he had us all get quiet and all of a sudden you could hear the music.
This shook me.
I am a noisy person.
When I enter a space I do so loudly. In social settings you know where I'm at all times. It's not that I'm trying to be the center of attention, I'm just loud. My voice carries and so does my laugh.
It is not just my outward presence that is loud. My interior life is loud too. As I grew up I always had a TV on or music playing. When I sat down to do homework the TV had to be running. When I was in seminary I wrote and researched and studied in busy coffee shops, intentionally.
For most of my life I have not liked the quiet. When things get quiet my thoughts get loud. I am not necessarily a big fan of those thoughts all the time. It can be disconcerting for me to allow my thoughts to run rampant.
Silence is scary.
This past summer I took two nights to just get away for a silent retreat. I shut down my phone. I didn't listen to music (well, that's a whole story in and of itself). I did allow myself to listen to a baseball game while I ate dinner.
I was alone in a cabin.
I went hiking alone in the silence and solitude of nature.
Leading up to these two nights away I was in a state of high anxiety because I was worried about being silent and alone for those 48 hours. I had never been a lone, truly alone, for that length of time.
Silence is scary.
I wish I could say that I heard the audible voice of the divine during my retreat. I did not. I also wish I could say that there was some sort of profound awakening that I experienced. But, I did not.
What did happen is that I faced my fear of silence.
It took almost a solid 24 hours for my mind quiet down. To really and truly be able to focus my attention on something other than my own thoughts. When that happened it was the most remarkable thing.
My mind could finally focus.
I was reading in the book of Jeremiah and some other commentaries that I brought along with me. I devoured the text.
Even more interesting was during my time hiking I was meditating on the Lord's prayer a stanza at a time. As I did, in that silence, those lines came to life for me. I do not really know how to explain it, but it was like I had never experienced them before.
Ever since then, something has happened within me. I have begun to delight in silence.
In the mornings I awake around 6 am-ish and drink coffee in the quiet dark house. It's become my favorite part of the day. I used to have a compulsion to turn on SportsCenter or something else. But now, my day begins with about 90 minutes to 2 hours of almost total silence.
Silence isn't scary anymore.
Silence has become a gift.
It is in the silence where I am learning to meet God.
I suppose there's a reason that silence has been a significant part of spiritual formation for many in the Christian tradition. I need silence now like I need water to drink or air to breathe. I can tell when I haven't had enough silence. My mind runs and spins and sleep is hard to come by.
It is in the silence where freedom from the weight of the world is offered and received.
When was the last time you were silent? What's stopping you? What do you think might happen if you entered into silence?
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November 1, 2023
Psalm 34:1-10, The Message
“Look at him; give him your warmest smile. Never hide your feelings from him. When I was desperate, I called out, and GOD got me out of a tight spot.”
When I'm going through something heavy or hard I often think, “Why am I feeling this way? Compared to what so many others are going through this is nothing.”
Often, when I feel like this, I will not pray because I don't want to burden God or in some sense I think that these feelings are not worthy to be brought to God.
One of the first things that I learned in my young Christian life was that feelings don't matter. They are nothing more than the caboose of a train that is driven by the fact of God's word and faith. This left me in a state where I was constantly trying to hide, stuff, or in so many other ways ignore my feelings.
That was so misguided. The idea that our feelings are nothing and they don't matter to God is such an unhelpful and unbiblical idea. This might be one of the most destructive things that I have had to undo as I have matured in my journey of faith.
I love this line, “Never hide your feelings from him.” God cares about our feelings. God can handle all our emotions, big and small.
As I ponder these verses it strikes me that the psalmist probably saw or experienced God's hand getting him out of a tight spot because he had brought all his feelings to God. By not hiding, the psalmist was open to seeing how God was at work in the world.
The question I am going to be wrestling with today is this, “Am I hiding my feelings or my internal life from God?”
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October 31, 2023
James 2:14-18
“Isn’t it obvious that God-talk without God-acts is outrageous nonsense?”
I have a friend whose favorite saying is, “acta non verba,” this translates to “actions not words.” He's one of those people who will do anything for you. His actions clearly demonstrate that the words he uses have meaning.
Many of us are good talkers.
We know the right things to say. But what about our actions? How often do you promise to do something but then don't follow through?
I want to say that never happens to me, but it does. It probably occurs more often than I'd like to admit. Oh sure, I have a good “reason,” but the reality is that it's just an excuse.
It is really hard for me to admit that.
There's a really helpful book about the rise of the church in the Roman Empire entitled, The Patient Ferment of the Early Church by Alan Kreider. In it he writes about how the verb, “look,” was central to the practice of the early church. Kreider argues, convincingly I think, that we have lost this idea of a new way of living in the world.
Perhaps, we could sum up much of the modern church as a lot of God-talk and not much God-acts.
Perhaps, I could sum up much of my own life this way.
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