Your Attitude is Your Witness

Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world
Philippians 2:14-15

It’s a shame that the American church is not regularly regarded as those who never grumble or dispute. Perhaps that might be true elsewhere, but it isn’t here.

The command to never never grumble and fight is based on a Christian mentality––literally the same mind as Christ himself which is explained to be found in his humility, lowliness, and willingness to consider others before himself (vv. 2-11).

One of the lies about happiness is that you will find it in “self care” and essentially pursuing selfish activities. While the meaning of these activities certainly varies, the scriptures frame the true source of happiness in a radically different direction: outward service and selflessness. This is where the joy of Christ emanates from the service of Christ, like warmth glowing from firelight.

The inner joy found from living in and with Christ in his service is simply attractive. Those without it will find it freeing, illuminating, transforming.

Find your joy in living as Jesus, and let your attitude be your witness to a world thirsting for genuine contentment. After all, he is calling you.

Caiaphas Did Not Know

Jesus said to him, “You have said so. But I tell you, from now on you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven.”
Matthew 26:64 (ESV)

They struck him after he said that. They spat on him. They hated him. They accused him.

They crucified him after he said that.

What the high priest Caiaphas did not know was that the man of glory did not lie. Truly he is seated at the right hand of Power and truly he is coming again on the clouds of heaven.

And we rejoice that he says this.

We wonder at him. We glory in him. We long for him. We take hope in that he says this.

For the reality of his coming is as comforting a truth that you can find. One day he will come and make all things new. Every sickness healed, every sorrow salved, every corruption made pure.

While we toil against the evil in this age, both within and without, we thank the one who sits in power and has promised to come again.

He is coming again. We know it and are glad.

Give us life in your ways!

Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things;
and give me life in your ways.
Psalm 119:37 (ESV)

Oh Lord, we yearn for life. The pursuit of you and your ways will give us this life, but something stands in the way: worthless things. Not pure evil, not wretchedness. Nothing utterly sinful––though these things can and do stand in our way.

But most often that which keeps us from experiencing the spiritual life of active union with God is the worthless. The distraction. The tweet, update, or post. The photo, clip, or meme. These things are of little worth. Their utility in the future kingdom is nonexistent. They are temporary. They wither away down the timeline and are eventually forgotten.

These worthless things keep us up at night and keep us distracted throughout the day. Why do we fill our attention with these things? Often so that we can ignore greater problems, responsibilities, or the pain in our lives. So we can escape.

Christian, go to God and run from these worthless things. Their appeal is deception, their substance of nothing. For we can feast and feast and feast again on media and still be famished.

But the Lord satisfies. Even one draught of his love brightens the eyes, encourages the heart, and focuses the mind. You can go forth into your trial with life.

God, turn our eyes from looking at worthless things, and give us life in your ways!

Let me not wander!

With my whole heart I seek you;
let me not wander from your commandments!
Psalm 119:10

Lord, this is our desire. To seek you with our whole hearts. To be undivided. We want no part of our inner lives to be against you. We want the inner-shalom, the wholeness and peace arising from an uncorrupted mind. To be wholly for God. To be seeking him in all places and times, in every work and season. And indeed, to find him too.

We proclaim it, we believe it––and yet we know our capacity to falter is ever around us. So the second line is a prayer. As quickly as intent is declared, reality is feared: “Let me not wander!”

Christian, God will sustain you. Be dependent. Not too proud to ignore that even our boldest proclamations waver without the presence of God which can buttress a shaky foundation. We need his guiding hand, his sustaining Spirit, his life-giving presence.

God and Vinedresser to this limp branch, give me a heart to seek you, and let me not wander!

Relaunching, Re-envisioning

I am relaunching the blog today––which if we are honest, never got off the ground in the first place. But all the same, here we go again.

Inspiring the Enjoyment of God

The mission behind these writings and works is Inspiring the Enjoyment of God. What do I mean by this? I want to write in such a way that it helps readers enjoy God personally. Jesus came to this earth to make himself known that we might know him and share in his joy.

These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.
John 15:11

So, if Christ’s goal for us is this type of relational enjoyment––both now and forever––then I will make this my main aim too. To gaze upon his glory, enjoy him, know him––even be known by him.

So that is the aim going forward: to continually choose the good portion of sitting in Christ’s presence and experiencing his joy. And it’s my aim for this blog too. As C.S. Lewis said, “the delight is incomplete till it is expressed.” Or as John the Apostle wrote: “we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete” (1 Jn 1:4).

It makes me really happy to see others delight in God––and so I write.

Stiff-Necked

Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you, lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.”
Exodus 33:3

God says to the Israelites while in the desert, “go on your way, but I’m not joining. You are stubbornly turned away from me, so I cannot go with you.” What does it mean to be stiff-necked? It means to be stubborn. It means the people don’t look to God and also that they won’t. It’s a bleak view of the people. And on account of this condition, God says he won’t go.

However, Moses has a relationship with God though, and he implores God:

And he said, “If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.”
Exodus 34:9

He tells God, “no, please go up with us for the precise reason that we are stiff-necked––and pardon our sin.”

What a bold and incredible request. Of course it is grounded in God’s promise that he clings to (undoubtedly based primarily on the important revelation of God’s name in between these verses), but it is opposite what we would expect. God himself says, “I’m not going. You are stiff-necked.” Moses says, “no that’s precisely why we need you.”

God is both the deliverer and the justifier. The people could not go up in their own strength and deliver themselves in order to see God put them in right-standing. Nor could the people justify themselves by righteousness in order that God might go with them to deliver them. God does both. He delivers, and he justifies.

Moses’ response to God’s challenge and self-proclamation is full of faith in Grace.

God is both your deliverer and your justifier.

He walks among us

In John’s revelation, he records Jesus’ introductory words:

Revelation 1:17–2:1 (ESV)
¹⁷When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, ¹⁸and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades. ¹⁹Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this. ²⁰As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.
2 “To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: ‘The words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden lampstands.

I am encouraged today, by the nearness with which Jesus still interacts with his churches. Jesus, who is alive forevermore, sends a message through John to his churches. He holds the churches in his hand. He assigns angels to each of them. He walks among them.

Too often I forget this glorious thought of my king walking among the churches. He walks among us. Jesus, who said he would be with us until the end of the age (Matt. 28:20), meant that with us he would really be. What a beautiful, frightening, and comforting thought. He really is with us. So let us take heart.

Refined through fire, now free

⁹ “For my name’s sake I defer my anger;
for the sake of my praise I restrain it for you,
that I may not cut you off.
¹⁰ Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver;
I have tried you in the furnace of affliction.
Isaiah 48:9-10

God will redeem and rescue the house of Jacob out of Babylonian captivity for his name’s sake. For the sake of his praise, he will cut short the days of affliction and bring them back.

The curious line is v. 10: “Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver.” Moyter is helpful here:

Silver endures the crucible until all dross is gone. Were the Lord to deal with his people just like that, nothing would remain (1:22). Therefore, though he brings his people through trials, there is always a limit set: they are never treated as they deserve, always for the fulfillment of his purpose (Heb. 12:10).
J. Alec Motyer, Isaiah: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 20, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1999), 341.

Indeed, even in his judgment, God is gracious. He does not carry the just punishment through to completion but spares Israel. God made perfect justice later through Jesus (Rom. 3:25).

So too does God spare us from what we deserve. We are not refined as silver but are spared for his praise. So may we praise.

God’s Glory

God’s glory

is a weight of reality.

It is a thick atmosphere

of sublime presence.

It is tangible.

To be in it

is to drown

in a sea of light and of pleasant fire.

It is that which you are immediately lost in

yet never felt so yourself.

It is home,

it is peace.

The glory of God

envelopes man,

outside and in.

One is undone,

both compacted under the mountain of God,

yet filled and bursting forth into everything

by his love.

He is all.

In all and over all.

He is.

To “Nu” or Not to “Nu?”

The NIV ‘11 of 1 Thessalonians 2:7a:

Instead, we were like young children among you…

The ESV:

But we were gentle among you, …

Based on the NIV, I was going to write a post about how we are to be humble in our Gospel-sharing, but then the ESV went and ruined that by suggesting that the word is “gentle” instead of “young children.”

This comes down to a textual variant in the manuscripts. Some say ἤπιοι (“ēpioi,” meaning gentle) and others say νήπιοι (“nēpioi,” meaning infants/children). The preceding word ends in a nu (“ν”), so the question becomes, did a scribe mistakenly duplicate the nu or was it accidentally deleted?

Here is the context of the NIV, 1 Thessalonians 2:7-8

7 Instead, we were like young children among you. Just as a nursing mother cares for her children, 8 so we cared for you. Because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well.

And the ESV:

7 But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children. 8 So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us.

As you can see, other questions abound here concerning the other various clauses. (Remember, there was no punctuation when these words were transcribed. All of that had to be decided upon later). These modifications seem to be due to our little textual variant.

What does this tell us? Well, a little nu can make a big difference! But, what does this say about scripture? I’m sure God could have sovereignly overridden this error if He wanted it to remain perfect!

So why didn’t He?

Of course I cannot know, but maybe God allowed this–yes, rather small and insignificant–mistake to persist to remind us of our humanity–our distinct “otherness” in relation to God. While there is no fault in Him, we fail to simply copy things down.

Or, perhaps it is to remind us that God uses people to accomplish his purposes. All throughout the Bible we find God’s plan being carried out by men and women unqualified to do so. God uses people like Samson, Gideon, and Saul: selfish men who hardly seem reliable for noble tasks. And yet, God uses them.

And whether or not we get all of our nu’s in the right places (we can’t), God can employ us too. Even for the missions we are sure to taint along the way.