Violent Night (an alternative Christmas story)

This is from my book The Great Invasion.

In Revelation 12:1-7 we have an unfamiliar nativity story. Eugene Peterson writes: “This is not the nativity story we grew up with, but it is the nativity story all the same.”  

This is why C.S. Lewis referred to the birth of Christ as an act of war. Christmas, said Lewis, is about "The Great Invasion." In chapter 7 of Mere Christianity, writes:  

"One of the things that surprised me when I first read the New Testament seriously was that it talked so much about a Dark Power in the universe--a mighty evil spirit who was held to be the Power behind death and disease, and sin... 

Christianity agrees that this universe is at war. But it does not think this is a war between independent powers. It thinks it is a civil war, a rebellion, and that we are living in a part of the universe occupied by the rebel.

Enemy-occupied territory--that is what this world is. Christianity is the story of how the rightful king has landed, you might say landed in disguise, and is calling us all to take part in a great campaign of sabotage."

Christmas Eve was the night before the Great Invasion. The creatures were stirring, even the mouse. We see this upheaval in the non-holiday telling of Christmas found in Revelation 12:1-7. It reads: 

A great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his heads. His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might devour her child the moment it was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. The woman fled into the desert to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days. 

    And there was war in heaven.

What’s happening here is this.  

1. The woman is not Mary, but the messianic community, the ideal Israel.

2. Out of the messianic community is born a child, a Messiah. 

3. The seven-headed red dragon is Satan (Rev. 12:9; 20:2). 

4. Satan is looking to devour this child; AKA Jesus the Christ.

Mary has already been prophetically warned about such things. In Luke 2 we read that...

... the old man "Simeon took him [baby Jesus] in his arms and praised God, saying:

"Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel."

The child's father and mother marveled at what was said about him. Then Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother: 

"This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too."

Violent night  

Holy night  

All's not calm.  

All's not bright

Christmas Eve - that violent night when the Light of the World descended into darkness.

(Pp. 77-79)

The Joy of Living Without Things

 

                (Our grandchildren, Levi and Harper)

The biblical idea of contentment is circumstance-independent. As are peace, joy, love and so on. 

The "fruit of the Spirit" is circumstance-independent. Were this not so, things like inner peace would be conditional, and that's bad news for all of us. That is, "IF I have _________, THEN I will have inner peace."

This "If... then" mentality results in our being captive to our circumstances.

Philip Yancey shares this story In his excellent book on prayer.

"I remembered reading the account of a spiritual seeker who interrupted a busy life to spend a few days in a monastery. “I hope your stay is a blessed one,” said the monk who showed the visitor to his cell. “If you need anything, let us know and we’ll teach you how to live without it.”" (Yancey, Prayer, Kindle Locations 1012-1015)

CHRISTMAS AND THE POWER OF HUMILITY

This is a year old, so the dates don't line up with the present. Nonetheless, I am re-posting it for Christmas week. Blessings!

Horizontal Church vs. Vertical Church (The Presence-Driven Church)

(Preaching at Faith Bible Church in New York City (Flushing))

The Vertical Church is a people group of Jesus-followers who desire nothing more than God's earth-shattering presence, and who experience that presence whenever and wherever they gather. The presence of God is the glue that holds them together. This is the meaning of Jesus' words about "whenever two or more gather, there I am in their midst." That's all that's needed: Jesus in our midst.

The Horizontal Church needs more than "Jesus in our midst," even to the exclusion of Jesus, leaving only us and "our midst." Here people have been seduced by the god of relevancy. Many are good people who have been mis-discipled. They have been taught - by culture - to rely on their own natural charisma to attract consumer-seekers. 

Much energy and money is spent on catering to the prevailing cultural ethos and its chronos-mentality; hence, there are temporally choreographed services because people (it is assumed) will pull out their cell phones if the earth-shattering presence of God hovers among them for more than an hour. The Horizontal Church unwittingly adds to Scripture, and has Jesus saying, "whenever two or more gather, with a fair trade coffee bar and stage lighting and short services and apps and creative add-ons, there I am in their midst, if only for an hour."

Horizontal churches burn people out in striving to measure up to the ever-shifting bar of cultural coolness. Even name changes and stage lighting cannot rescue these sinking vessels. (Vertical Church is not essentially about external makeovers, not that serving coffee or tight blue jeans are evil.)

James McDonald has written: 

"Eventually everyone vacates church where God is not obviously present and working. Getting people back to church is pointless unless God comes back first— that’s what Vertical Church is all about!

Ritual church, tradition church, felt-need church, emotional-hype church, rules church, Bible-boredom church, relevant church, and many other iterations are all horizontal substitutes for God come down, we all get rocked and radically altered, Vertical Church.

The problem is you can’t fake glory. You can’t manufacture it, or manipulate it, or manifest it at will. Only God Himself can bring glory into a church, and when He does, communities get shaken and lives get changed, and the fame of Jesus Christ curls continuously upon the shore of human hearts like a Hawaii 5-0 wave. Church is supposed to be a tsunami of glory every Sunday, and that is what we gather for." (MacDonald, Vertical Church: What Every Heart Longs for. What Every Church Can Be, Kindle Locations 104-105)

McDonald says, "In Vertical Church God shows up, and that changes everything."

***
I know McDonald has his problems. But he is correct about vertical and horizontal churches.

Search Me, O God

 

University of Michigan campus. "Angry Neptune," by Michele Oka Doner.

Search me, O God, and know my heart.

- Psalm 139:23

You have searched me, Lord, and you know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise;

You perceive my thoughts from afar.

You discern my going out and my lying down;

you are familiar with all my ways.

Before a word is on my tongue

You, Lord, know it completely.

You hem me in behind and before,

and you lay your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,

too lofty for me to attain.

- Psalm 139:1-6

I have gone to quiet places and sat silently before God for countless hours, requesting God to search me and know me. I cannot know myself fully. I am easily deceived about myself, thinking I am one thing while I am another.

Theistic philosopher Dallas Willard writes:

"The hidden dimension of each human life is not visible to others, nor is it fully graspable even by ourselves. We usually know very little about the things that move in our own soul, the deepest level of our life, or what is driving it. Our "within" is astonishingly complex and subtle - even devious. It takes on a life of its own. Only God knows our depths, who we are, and what we would do." (Willard, Renovation of the Heart, 17)

At least I am aware that there is a profound epistemic gap between my feeble cognitive abilities and an omniscient God. This compels me to do the one thing I can, which is:

Get before God and pray, "Search me."

Purity Is the Result of a Great Longing

 

                                                                       (Our back yard)

(I'm re-posting this for someone who asked. Someone told them that God affirms premarital sex. I think not.)

1 John 3:2-3 say:

We know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, 

for we shall see him as he is. 

All who have this hope in him purify themselves, 

just as he is pure.

This is not a religious thing, not some legalistic command accompanied by an angry face telling us to "Be pure!" It is a RESULT. 

It is the RESULT of an GREAT DESIRE. Purity is a fruit of desire-attachment.

This GREAT DESIRE is TO BE LIKE HIM. 

This GREAT DESIRE to BE LIKE HIM is fueled by a HOPE. 

This HOPE is the expectation that one day WE SHALL SEE HIM as he is.

All who share this hope desire and admire Him and long to not only be with Him but to be like Him. We want to be like Jesus, not to impress anyone, but because we are His children and children want to be like their parents. Like Father, like daughters and sons.

I become what I long to behold. One day I shall behold Christ face to face. N.T. Wright writes:

"What an amazing moment! To come face to face, eye to eye, with the people he had loved but never seen. There is something transformative about eye contact. People who spend a lot of time looking at one another sometimes come to resemble each other. Perhaps this is because they are instinctively copying one another’s facial expressions until their muscles and tissue begin to be reshaped in that way. Imagine beginning that process at last after years of love which had been expressed through words and touch but never before through sight." (N.T. Wright, The Early Christian Letters for Everyone, p. 149)

Our deepest longing is to come face to face with Him. "To see his smile, to catch his facial expression, to begin to know him in a whole new way." (Ib.)

All who have this GREAT DESIRE purify themselves now as the RESULT of wanting to be like Him.

Purity is the result of a great longing.

True Praying Breeds Compassion for Others

                                                               (Praying at Redeemer)

1 John 2:7-11 tells me -  If I say I know God and love him but hate my beloved Christian brothers and sisters, I'm walking in darkness and blindness. Since God has no fellowship with darkness (in him there is no darkness at all), I disfellowship myself in the act of hating.

These verses haunt me, because I have hated other Christians. At the point of my hatred I have not known, loved, or followed Jesus. Worshiping Jesus as Lord on Sunday morning and hating people is just acting, and hypocritical.

A Jesus-follower who hates others is a contradiction. Because "God so loved the world," right?

The antidote to my hate-filled heart is a Spirit-transformed, Jesus-shaped heart. So, I am praying for a heart of love.

I want to look at others with the same compassion Jesus had. I want to love and forgive others from the heart, as Jesus did when he hung on the cross. I want the freedom Jesus had from a spirit of victimization.

How can this happen? One way is in the act of praying for others. True praying breeds compassion. And togetherness.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes:
"A Christian fellowship lives and exists by the intercession of its members for one another, or it collapses. I can no longer condemn or hate a brother for whom I pray, no matter how much trouble he causes me. His face, that hitherto may have been strange and intolerable to me, is transformed in intercession into the countenance of a brother for whom Christ died, the face of a forgiven sinner. This is a happy discovery for the Christian who begins to pray for others."[1]

---

[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together, 86

A Disciple Grows in Compassion

 (I'm re-posting this for a friend.)

​Jesus looked on the crowds and, 

seeing they were like sheep without a shepherd, 

had compassion on them.  

Matthew 9:36

In my fifty-four years of following Jesus, my compassion for people has grown.

The word compassion means to feel with others. Jesus told me, years ago, that my capacity for feeling with others must increase. Here is one way Jesus has mentored me in compassion.  

I had just finished my seminary degree. My plans were to go immediately to a doctoral program. This did not happen. I applied to two universities. Both applications were too late. I would have to take a year off my studies.  

I needed a job. My sister-in-law Lora was working as a teacher at United Cerebral Palsy Center of Will County, Illinois. She suggested I apply as a teacher's assistant.

I interviewed with the Director of the United Cerebral Palsy Center. Her name was Gretchen Lantz. For part of the interview she took me to the boys' bathroom. She said, "I don't want to mislead you. You will be spending a lot of time in this room toileting handicapped boys and young men."  

I took the position. Over the next year I fell in love with students like James, Helen, David, Jimmy, Tony, James, and Gail. My heart aches a bit as I write these names. I grew to feel with them. That feeling is still part of me. Jesus, my Lord and Teacher, had a brilliant idea for me. He was mentoring me in having a heart of compassion.

When the year was over, I enrolled in a doctoral program at Northwestern University. I continued working as a teacher's assistant at the Cerebral Palsy Center for two additional summers. The disabled students had become my instructors.  

I began to look at others in order to understand, not judge. The more understanding I gained, the more I felt with them. Just as Jesus is able to “sympathize with our weaknesses,” so am I.  

This is how disciples of Christ feel. Apprentice yourself to Jesus, and you will experience the same.  

I would not be Jesus's disciple if I looked down on the people Jesus came to rescue. In my weakness, Jesus came to me and loved me. In the same way, I am to love others.  

Disciples of Christ go deeper. This is where the Pharisee missed it, as he said, “Thank God that I am not like these other horrible people.” He failed to understand that he was. The result was, no compassion.  

The secret to a compassionate heart is understanding. The more I comprehend about a person, the more I feel as they feel. The more I feel as they feel, the more I love.  

I want to be more like Jesus! He sympathizes with my weaknesses. His influence causes me to grow in compassionate understanding of others. Who am I to look down on others in their infirmities?  

My dear brothers and sisters, I long for this to be your experience.

DECLARATIONS  

I am increasing in compassion towards others.  

I focus on understanding people, not judging them.  

I know that understanding always precedes evaluation.

My heart goes out to people who are struggling.  

I am a rescuer of people.  

As a student in the School of Jesus, I am learning how to love as Jesus loves.

(From my book 31 Letters to the Church on Discipleship.)

Deconstruction (Not What You Think It Is)

                                                                           (Cancun)

The culture war is a battle for the meaning of words.

In her book Another Gospel Alisa Childers gives her definition of 'deconstruction.'  She writes:

"In the context of faith, deconstruction is the process of systematically dissecting and often rejecting the beliefs you grew up with. Sometimes the Christian will deconstruct all the way into atheism. Some remain there, but others experience a reconstruction. But the type of faith they end up embracing almost never resembles the Christianity they formerly knew." (Childers, Another Gospel?: A Lifelong Christian Seeks Truth in Response to Progressive Christianity, p. 24).

Elsewhere she adds, "[Deconstruction] has little to do with objective truth, and everything to do with tearing down whatever doctrine someone believes is morally wrong."

That's incorrect. 'Deconstruction' has nothing to do with "tearing down," and its antonym is not "reconstruction." Childers uses a pop-version of 'deconstruction' as dismantling or tearing down. If 'deconstruction' were but another way to say "tearing down" then its employment is uninteresting, and hermeneutically impotent. 'Deconstruction,' in the scholarly sense, is far more interesting and provocative.

Pay attention now. This is from David Gunkel's book Deconstruction.  

"If you ask someone to explain it [deconstruction], what you typically get is a rather confused shell game of word substitutions, where “deconstruction” is loosely associated with other concepts like “disassembly,” “destruction,” “reverse engineering,” or “the act of taking something apart.” 

Despite the circulation of these familiar (mis)understandings, the term “deconstruction” does not indicate something negative. What it signifies is neither simply synonymous with destruction nor the opposite of construction. As Jacques Derrida, the fabricator of the neologism and progenitor of the concept, pointed out in the afterword to the book Limited Inc: “The ‘de-’ of deconstruction signifies not the demolition of what is constructing itself, but rather what remains to be thought beyond the constructionist or destructionist schema.” For this reason, deconstruction is something entirely other than what is typically understood and delimited by the conceptual opposition situated between the two terms “construction” and “destruction.” In fact, to put it schematically, deconstruction comprises a kind of general strategy by which to intervene in this and all the other logical oppositions and conceptual dichotomies that have and continue to organize how we think and how we speak. (Pp. 1-2. Italics mine. See Gunkel's chapter on deconstruction's (Derrida's) indebtedness to Hegel.)

Let's give a hat tip to Jacques Derrida. "Deconstruction" originated with Derrida. Since then, it is used in a variety of ways that are alien to what Derrida was saying. Often, perhaps always, the more a term is used, and as it enters public domain, it becomes misused, and gets vaguer and vaguer. This is what has happened to "deconstruction," which in America, has become synonymous with "destruction."

Now...  fasten your seat belts or, perhaps, just eject...  here is one of the best explanations of "deconstruction" I have read. It's from Christopher Norris's book Derrida.

Don't be offended as I say this. If you don't have some grasp of what Norris is saying, then you don't understand deconstruction. If you don't understand deconstruction, then wisdom says don't use the word. But, alas, this is what people do. I've done it too; viz., use words that, when I am pressed, I am unable to explain.

Norris writes:

"Deconstruction is neither 'method' on one hand not 'interpretation' on the other. In fact it is not too difficult to come up with a concise formula that would make it sound very much like a 'method' and yet describe accurately some of Derrida's most typical deconstructive moves. What these consist in, very briefly, is the dismantling of conceptual oppositions, the taking apart of hierarchical systems of thought which can then be reinscribed within a different order of textual signification. Or again: deconstruction is the vigilant seeking out of those 'aporias', blindspots or moments of self-contradiction where a text involuntarily betrays the tension between rhetoric and logic, between what it manifestly means to say and what it is nonetheless constrained to mean. To 'deconstruct' a piece of writing is therefore to operate a kind of strategic reversal, seizing on precisely those unregarded details (casual metaphors, footnotes, incidental turns of argument) which are always, and necessarily, passed over by interpreters of a more orthodox persuasion. For it is here, in the margins of the text - the 'margins', that is, as defined by a powerful normative consensus - that deconstruction discovers those same unsettling forces at work. So there is at least a certain prima facie case for the claim that deconstruction is a 'method' of reading with its own specific rules and protocols. And indeed, as we shall see, the above brief account of Derrida's deconstructive strategy does provide at least a fair working notion of what goes on in his texts." (p. 19)

Let me add a teaser here. For Derrida, deconstruction considers all subject predicate sentences (of the form S is P) false. To understand deconstruction includes understanding why Derrida thinks this way. And it is to understand why, for Derrida, writing is inferior to speech. But who has time to understand such things, except for a pastor like me who only works for two hours on Sunday mornings?

(And, BTW, deconstruction, when understood, has some intractable philosophical problems. Scientists like Richard Dawkins and Stephen Pinker despise it. That's another story...)

What Is "Deconstruction?"

 

(Sterling State Park, Lake Erie, Monroe)

The culture war is a batt4le for the meaning of words.

In my recent book I "deconstruct" progressive Christianity. To understand this, one must know what "deconstruction" is. In popular culture it is synonymous with "destruction," with its antonym being "construction." If that's all "deconstruction" means, then it's unnecessary, except perhaps as used to impress others with a big word.

Here's from my book, chapter 15.

"What is “deconstruction?” It does not mean “to destroy.” Please pay attention to this. Postmodern scholar Mark C. Taylor writes: 

“The guiding insight of deconstruction is that every structure—be it literary, psychological, social, economic, political or religious—that organizes our experience is constituted and maintained through acts of exclusion.” (Quoted in "Derrida: The Excluded Favorite," by Emily Eakin.) 

What deconstruction is, is this. You unravel an event, or a text, to expose what is not there, yet presences itself as required for what is there. Deconstruction is about finding what is excluded, what is absent. Because what is there is only fully understood by what is not there. For example, the letter a is not b, but cannot be understood apart from the excluded b. 

James Faulconer writes, "I take that to be the general meaning of the word deconstruction as Derrida has used it: not just using our words and concepts against themselves, but showing what has been left out or overlooked… Deconstruction is used to show that a work does not adequately address something, not that it should have."...

Deconstruction points to marginalized ideas. Christopher Norris, in his biography Derrida, writes, “To 'deconstruct' a piece of writing is therefore to operate a kind of strategic reversal, seizing on precisely those unregarded details (casual metaphors, footnotes, incidental turns of argument) which are always, and necessarily, passed over by interpreters of a more orthodox persuasion. For it is here, in the margins of the text - the 'margins', that is, as defined by a powerful normative consensus - that deconstruction discovers those same unsettling forces at work.”

(Piippo, Deconstructing Progressive Christianity, pp. 219 - 221)

For those who appreciate expertise, here are explanations of deconstruction in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. If you don't understand this, then you don't understand what deconstruction is.

Definitions of Deconstruction – mostly upon Jacques Derrida’s death (2004)

“Mr. Derrida's name is most closely associated with the often cited but rarely understood term "deconstruction." Initially formulated to define a strategy for interpreting sophisticated written and visual works, deconstruction has entered everyday language. When responsibly understood, the implications of deconstruction are quite different from the misleading cliches often used to describe a process of dismantling or taking things apart. The guiding insight of deconstruction is that every structure -- be it literary, psychological, social, economic, political or religious -- that organizes our experience is constituted and maintained through acts of exclusion. In the process of creating something, something else inevitably gets left out. These exclusive structures can become repressive -- and that repression comes with consequences. In a manner reminiscent of Freud, Mr. Derrida insists that what is repressed does not disappear but always returns to unsettle every construction, no matter how secure it seems.”

Mark C. Taylor, “What Derrida Really Meant,” NYT Op-Ed, p. 26, Oct 14, 2004.

“[H]e was known as father of deconstruction, method of inquiry that asserts that all writing is full of confusion and contradiction, that author's intent could not overcome inherent contradictions of language itself, robbing texts of truthfulness, absolute meaning and permanence.”

Jonathan Kandell, “Jacques Derrida, Abstruse Theorist, dies in Paris at 74.”

NYT-Arts, October 10, 2004, p.1.

Derrida himself (qtd. [selectively] in Kandell):

“[In a] 1993 paper he presented at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, in New York, [Derrida] began: ‘Needless to say, one more time, deconstruction, if there is such a thing, takes place as the experience of the impossible.’

and

“[T]o Dinitia Smith, a Times reporter, in a 1998 interview. ‘Deconstruction requires work. If deconstruction is so obscure, why are the audiences in my lectures in the thousands? They feel they understand enough to understand more.’ / Asked later in the same interview to at least define deconstruction, Mr. Derrida said: ‘It is impossible to respond. I can only do something which will leave me unsatisfied.’"

“Derrida partly provided the thrill of sheer nerve: daring to write something that wouldn't just modify interpretations but challenge the entire philosophical and literary enterprise. His was an imperial ambition, one inherited from Nietzsche and Heidegger: don't reinterpret. Uninterpret. Show not just that some formulations are mistaken, but that all are. And that, moreover, they have to be. Show how all of Western thought is based on a type of ignorance or incompleteness, that everyone

who claimed to get the point was missing the point.” Edward Rothstein, “The Man who Showed us How to Take the World Apart,”

NYT-Arts, Oct 11, 2004, p.1.

“Deconstruction, Mr. Derrida's primary legacy, was no exception. Originally a method of rigorous textual analysis intended to show that no piece of writing is exactly what it seems, but rather laden with ambiguities and contradictions, deconstruction found ready acolytes across the humanities and beyond -- including many determined to deconstruct not just text but the political system and society at large. Today, the term has become a more or less meaningless artifact of popular culture, more likely to turn up in a description of an untailored suit in the pages of Vogue than in a graduate seminar on James Joyce.”

Emily Eakin, “The Theory of Everything, RIP”, NYT Week in Review, p. 12.

More on... "Deconstruction"

                                                                        (Ann Arbor)

The culture war is a battle for the meaning of words.

One of my recent books is Deconstructing Progressive Christianity. In it, I define the term "deconstruction." Perhaps this is the most misunderstood word in America today. 

Here is what it does not, and does, mean, to vaccinate us from the fetid swamp of banality,

"Despite this seemingly unrestrained proliferation of the word across the vernacular, “deconstruction” remains a kind of slippery signifier and empty placeholder. We all kind of know or at least think we have a sense of what the word indicates. And yet, if you ask someone to explain it, what you typically get is a rather confused shell game of word substitutions, where “deconstruction” is loosely associated with other concepts like “disassembly,” “destruction,” “reverse engineering,” or “the act of taking something apart.”

Despite the circulation of these familiar (mis)understandings, the term “deconstruction” does not indicate something negative. What it signifies is neither simply synonymous with destruction nor the opposite of construction. As Jacques Derrida, the fabricator of the neologism and progenitor of the concept, pointed out in the afterword to the book Limited Inc: “The ‘de-’ of deconstruction signifies not the demolition of what is constructing itself, but rather what remains to be thought beyond the constructionist or destructionist schema.” For this reason, deconstruction is something entirely other than what is typically understood and delimited by the conceptual opposition situated between the two terms “construction” and “destruction.” In fact, to put it schematically, deconstruction comprises a kind of general strategy by which to intervene in this and all the other logical oppositions and conceptual dichotomies that have and continue to organize how we think and how we speak."

Gunkel, David J.. Deconstruction (The MIT Press Essential Knowledge series) (pp. 1-2). MIT Press. Kindle Edition.

There you go. If you don't understand that, then you don't understand deconstruction. 

Come, Now Is the Time to Behold Him

(Black-capped chickadee,
on our back deck)

Thomas Merton writes:

"If we are fools enough to remain at the mercy of the people who want to sell us happiness, it will be impossible for us ever to be content with anything. How would they profit if we became content? We would no longer need their new product. The last thing the salesman wants is for the buyer to become content. You are of no use in our affluent society unless you are always just about to grasp what you never have." (Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, 86)

Come, now is the time to purchase. And be discontent.

On the other hand, Paul writes, in Philippians 4:12 - I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.

He writes out of a simple, impoverished context. Paul did not have a closet full of clothes, a garage full of toys, a refrigerator filled with food, and a 401K. "Plenty" for Paul was our "in need." "In need" for Paul was our destituteness. But he had learned some things. One was "the secret of being content in any and every situation."

Contentment, for Paul, was not contingent on economic security or material possessions. He experienced contentment, whatever the situation. Real contentment is not circumstance-bound. I'd like that, wouldn't you? What's the secret?

It's an open secret that Paul found strength and contentment in Christ, the hope of glory, within. Having Christ within implies contentment and satisfaction. What could be greater than internalizing the Lord of heaven and earth? The world works hard to get us to forget this.

This season, remember.

Be not distracted.

Come, now is the time to behold Him.

Another Simple Secret to a Healthy Marriage

 

                                                       (Saugatuck, MI)

(I'm re-posting this for a friend.)

Last week Linda and I celebrated our 51st wedding anniversary. We drove four hours to a Michigan beach town and spent four days together.

We walked, talked, sat on the beach, read books, had some good meals, sat by the pool, browsed, shopped, ate some fudge, and I had cherry peach pie. On the way home Linda led us in a praying time.

We gave gifts. And said the words, "Thank you."

"Thank you" is part of our marital arsenal. "Thank you" is a super weapon. We say these words, to each other, a lot.

"Thank you for the gift."

"Thank you for mowing the lawn."

"Thank you for the tuna salad sandwich."

"Thank you for doing the dishes."

"Thank you for finding my phone."

"Thank you for the reminder."

"Thank you for washing the clothes."

"Thank you for making the bed."

"Thank you for vacuuming." 

"Thank you for the flowers."

"Thank you for all you do for me."

Thank you, thank you, thank you...

When people fail to say "Thank you" it can come off as entitlement. We see the entitlement disease in Luke 17:11-19.

11 Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee. 12 As he was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy[a] met him. They stood at a distance 13 and called out in a loud voice, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us!”

14 When he saw them, he said, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” 

And as they went, they were cleansed.

15 One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. 16 He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan.

17 Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? 18 Has no one returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?” 

19 Then he said to him, “Rise and go; your faith has made you well.”

When you stop saying "Thank you," often, you are taking the other person for granted.

Saying "Thank you" places you in a vulnerable position. This is why some don't say the words.

We don't have the perfect marriage. But we have both told God "Thank you," countless times, for bringing us together. We spoke these words again, both to God and to each other, as we celebrated 51 years.

Saying "Thank you" is one of our little secrets to a healthy marriage.

***

See also  One Simple Secret to a Healthy Marriage.

A Third Simple Secret to a Healthy Marriage

Hearing God & the Manifestation of Prophecy

                               (Baptism - Ferris State University students)

Here are notes from when I was with Real Life Campus Ministry of Ferris State University. On "Hearing God and the Manifestation of Prophecy." 

Ps 126:5-6 - Those who sow with tears

    will reap with songs of joy.
⁶ Those who go out weeping,
    carrying seed to sow,
will return with songs of joy,
    carrying sheaves with them.

Is It Possible to Hear From God?

On occasion, in my Philosophy of Religion classes at Monroe County Community College, I have told my students that I hear from God; that God speaks to me. I share this in the context of the many God-discussions that take place in this class which revolves around issues of the existence or non-existence of God, and the nature of the God of theism.

I do hear from God. God does speak to me. These claims should shock no one who is a Christian theist. Our Scriptures tell us to expect this. Dallas Willard asks, “Should we expect anything else, given the words of Scripture and the heritage of the Christian Church?” (Willard, Hearing God Through the Year, 12)

The ancient Israelites heard the voice of God speaking to them out of the fire (Deut. 4:33).

The prophet Isaiah had first-hand experience in hearing from God.

Isaiah 58:9, 11 says:

Then you will call, and the LORD will answer; 

you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I…

The LORD will guide you always; 

he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land 

and will strengthen your frame. 

You will be like a well-watered garden, 

like a spring whose waters never fail. 

For the past 42 years I have spent several hours each week going to a solitary place and praying and listening.

I am certain we can hear from God, for these reasons:

1. Scripture tells us we can and should expect to hear from God.

2. Personal experience has verified this for me.

3. The testimonies of many other Jesus-followers throughout history attests to the reality of God speaking to his people, both individually and corporately.

4. “Prayer” defined as “taking with God about what we are doing together” implies that God is our dialogical partner.

This relates to the New Testament spiritual gift of prophecy, since ““Prophecy” can be defined as “the reception and subsequent transmission of spontaneous divinely originating revelation.” (Wayne Grudem, The Gift of Prophecy)

The “reception” of revelation from God requires “hearing” God. I assume this is possible. If it’s not, then the gift of prophecy Paul mentions in 1 Corinthians 14 is not possible.

“Prophecy” is a word from God that is, precisely, something beyond my own wisdom. Such a prophetic word from God transcends my own thinking.

Prophecy is an “I would never have thought of that” kind of moment. In this regard it is different from a prepared sermon, although one hopes that in sermon preparation the preacher hears from God.

Ben Witherington writes:

• A prophecy certainly was not a sermon by 20th-century standards. It was a spontaneous utterance prompted by the Spirit (cf. vv. 29 ff.) and based on a sudden and uncontrived revelation from God (v. 30).

It was controllable by the speaker, however, and was unlike pagan ecstatic utterances of the Dionysiac sort. In Christian prophecy both the mind and the spirit are edified.

Note: I’ve read and talked with some who say “In the past people heard directly from God, but since we’ve had the Bible this has stopped.” I have never agreed with that, one reason being the Bible itself tells us we should expect to hear from God. 

John Piper – There is no text in the New Testament that teaches the cessation of these gifts. [emphasis mine] But more important than this silence is the text that explicitly teaches their continuance until Jesus comes, namely, 1 Corinthians 13:8-12.

While it may be hard at times to discern if that voice in your head is from God or not, this difficulty does not eliminate the possibility of hearing from God. The following is not logical:

1.           I don't hear from God.

2.           Therefore it is not possible to hear from God.

How Can We Discern Whether We are Hearing from God or Not?

I have found that hearing God’s voice has been an acquired ability. My threefold counsel on how to hear God’s voice is as follows.

1. Spend much time with God, in his presence.

2. Saturate yourself in the Christian Scriptures.

3. Hang around people who do #s 1 and 2.

I assume hearing from God is possible, that God is able to communicate to us, and desires to do so. Surely we can expect God to assist us in the listening process.

My Desire to Prophesy

Linda and I talk with many who share their struggles with us.

A few times the results have been astounding, even miraculous.

Yet there remain many who are stuck in their addictions, bondages, and illnesses.

At times we are clueless, having no answers, and sometimes seeing no path to walk on.

Our own strength and wisdom is far from enough.

On the other hand, the God we believe in is all-knowing and all-powerful and all-loving. Such a Supreme Being is able to see the Big Picture, the Path to freedom. What if we could resource Him?

Who wouldn't want to access that? Not for some personal show of power that acts like we are the originator of brilliant God-ideas.

If we truly love people and want them to have life abundantly, who wouldn't want the gift of prophecy? Who wouldn't long for such manifestations that would strengthen, comfort, and encourage those we love and care for?

That's why I desire to prophesy. Not for my own self and glory, for the sake of others, with all glory being given to God.

I'm praying that this Pauline desire to prophesy would be the desire of your heart.

Dwell deeply in His presence today. Listen for His voice. When He gives you a strengthening, comforting, and encouraging word for another Jesus-follower, risk sharing it with them. When I do this I don't add "Thus saith the Lord." I often say, "I feel God has given me something to share with you. Check it out, between you and God, for yourself.
 

ONE MORE THOUGHT…  The gifts are for everyone.

The early church did not hand out "Spiritual Gift Inventories," so people could find out what their spiritual gift is. I think that's a misunderstanding. The situation was more fluid and organic than that. 

In 1 Corinthians 12:4-7 Paul writes:

4 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5 and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; 6 and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. 7 To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.

Gordon Fee, in his brilliant commentary on First Corinthians, writes:

""Each one," standing in the emphatic first position as it does, is [Paul's[ way of stressing diversity; indeed, this is how that diversity will be emphasized throughout the rest of the paragraph. He does not intend to stress that every last person in the community has his or her own gift...  That is not Paul's concern. This pronoun is the distributive (stressing the individualized instances) of the immediately preceding collective ("in all people"), which emphasizes the many who make up the community as a whole." (589)

Fee writes that what "each one" was "given" was not a "gift,' but a "manifestation of the Spirit." "Thus each "gift" is a "manifestation," a disclosure of the Spirit's activity in their midst... [Paul's] urgency, as vv. 8-10 make clear, is not that each person is "gifted," but that the Spirit is manifested in a great variety of ways. His way of saying this is that, "to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit."" (Ib.)

This is about the Spirit manifesting himself within the Jesus-community, and not a statement about spiritual gifts being given to people once and for all. 

Desire the manifestations of the Spirit.    

Books That Can Help You Understand Prophecy
  

·                     Wayne Grudem, The Gift of Prophecy in the New Testament and Today. This is the best scholarly text on prophecy by an excellent New Testament theologian who embraces the spiritual gifts for today. Especially valuable is Grudem's explanation of the distinction between prophecy in the Old Testament and in the New Testament.

·                     Jack Deere, The Beginner's Guide to the Gift of Prophecy. Jack is an excellent biblical scholar who values the gift of prophecy in the church today. This is a very helpful, clearly written book.

·                     Jim Goll, The Seer: The Prophetic Power of Visions, Dreams, and Open Heavens. We've used this in our ministry school. I found it to be very wise and practical.

·                     Dallas Willard, Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship with God. Outside of the Bible this is one of the books to read on the matter of hearing the voice of God. 

***

John Piper on Spiritual Gifts Today (and Especially Prophecy)

I'm thankful for John Piper's views on spiritual gifts as being for the church today. Here's Piper talking about this, from here.

“I am one of those Baptist General Conference people who believes that “signs and wonders” and all the spiritual gifts of 1 Corinthians 12:8-10 are valid for today and should be “earnestly desired” (1 Corinthians 14:1) for the edification of the church and the spread of the Gospel. I agree with the words of Martyn Lloyd-Jones, preached in 1965:


“It is perfectly clear that in New Testament times, the gospel was authenticated in this way by signs, wonders, and miracles of various characters and descriptions . . . . Was it only meant to be true of the early church? . . . The Scriptures never anywhere say that these things were only temporary — never! There is no such statement anywhere.” (The Sovereign Spirit, pp. 31-32)

. . . I want to argue in this section that the New Testament teaches that spiritual gifts (including the more obviously supernatural or revelatory ones like prophecy and tongues) will continue until Jesus comes. The use of such gifts (miracles, faith, healings, prophecy, etc.) give rise to what may sometimes be called “signs and wonders.” Therefore, signs and wonders are part of the blessing we should pray for today.

There is no text in the New Testament that teaches the cessation of these gifts. [emphasis mine] But more important than this silence is the text that explicitly teaches their continuance until Jesus comes, namely, 1 Corinthians 13:8-12 . . . .
. . . Both of these phrases (“seeing face to face” and “understanding as we have been understood”) are stretched beyond the breaking point if we say that they refer to the closing of the New Testament canon or the close of the apostolic age. Rather, they refer to our experience at the second coming of Jesus . . . .

This means that verse 10 can be paraphrased, “When Christ returns, the imperfect will pass away.” And since “the imperfect” refers to spiritual gifts like prophecy and knowledge and tongues, we may paraphrase further, “When Christ returns, then prophecy and knowledge and tongues will pass away” . . . .

Therefore, 1 Corinthians 13:8-12 teaches that such spiritual gifts will continue until the second coming of Jesus. There is no reason to exclude from this conclusion the other “imperfect” gifts mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12:8-10. Since these include miracles, faith, healings, etc., with which we associate “signs and wonders,” there is clear New Testament warrant for expecting that “signs and wonders” will continue until Jesus comes.

Now add to this conclusion the forthright command in 1 Corinthians 14:1, and you will see why some of us are not only open to, but also seeking, this greater fullness of God’s power today. This command says, “Make love your aim, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.” And it is repeated twice: “Earnestly desire the higher gifts” (12:31); “Earnestly desire to prophesy and do not forbid speaking in tongues” (14:39).

I wonder how many of us have said for years that we are open to God’s moving in spiritual gifts, but have been disobedient to this command to earnestly desire them, especially prophecy? [emphasis mine] I would ask all of us: are we so sure of our hermeneutical procedure for diminishing the gifts that we would risk walking in disobedience to a plain command of Scripture? “Earnestly desire spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.”

I have come to the point of seeing that the risk lies in the other direction. 

It would be a risk not to seek spiritual gifts for myself and my church. [emphasis mine] It would be a risk not to pray with the early church, “Grant your servants to speak your word with boldness while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through your holy servant Jesus.” Disobedience is always a greater risk than obedience.

Much of my experience disinclines me to “earnestly desire spiritual gifts,” especially the gift of prophecy. However, I do not base my prayer for such spiritual empowering on experience, but on the Bible. [emphasis mine] The Scripture is sufficient for all circumstances by teaching us the means of grace to be used in all circumstances. And I agree with Martyn Lloyd-Jones that one of the means of grace needed in our day is the extraordinary demonstration of power by signs and wonders. Here is what he said:

“What is needed is some mighty demonstration of the power of God, some enactment of the Almighty, that will compel people to pay attention, and to look, and to listen. . . . When God acts, he can do more in a minute than man with his organizing can do in fifty years.” (Revival, pp. 121-122)