The defining principle undergirding living the christian life is self sacrifice. How serious one's commitment is to the savior is made obvious by how much one is willing to give. Jesus is the one who introduced the whole concept when he told His first followers "Anyone who does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of me."(Matt 10:36) First thoughts of this taking up of crosses generates images of Marine Corps drill sergeants, or for women, what's involved in the push to care for small children while holding down a full time job! The thought is "it will be hard, but doable." Take up my cross? How hard is that? I'll just clench my teeth and do it!
The bad news is, it's actually much worse than that! When Jesus spoke these words, the cross was the favored method of execution. One reason it was used was that besides killing the one suspended from it, it also made a public spectacle of their death agony. Witnesses of the event were also being taught what not to do by seeing what they had to look forward to if they repeated the same error! You were supposed to be very afraid of that happening! What kind of respect could be maintained by anyone involved in this extremity? You weren't supposed to want to repeat this, or God forbid, volunteer to go through it! Yet that is exactly what Jesus is saying we need to do! He's saying we need to die!
Further illumination on the spiritual meaning may be gained by comparison with another of Christ's analogies where He told Nicodemus, "You must be born again to enter the kingdom of heaven." If you remember the response of Nicodemus, he was bewildered, wondering aloud how such a physical reality could be accomplished!
What Jesus is speaking of is the total change of perception, perspective, and worldview that comes from leaving unbelief to live by faith. What Jesus is saying is that the old guy, the one affiliated with the world, has to die!He does not pass away quietly. A new creation, a bond servant of Christ, has to be born! It is done publicly as a witness to others!
A new mind will be obvious in all following behavior. Now comes the actual living of the faith written of with such sublime poetry in the Bible. "But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world."(Gal 6:14) "This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith."(1 John 5:4) We are now free! "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are (born) in Christ Jesus......who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit." (Rom 8:1,4) Let's celebrate because we have died and all things are now new!
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
The Most Dangerous Prayer
When faced with the rigor of the daily ritual, most of us tend to have an escapist mentality. We find ways to "deal with the stress." Have you ever used daydreaming or imagination to make life more exiting? Yearned for an adventure? Wished you could have lived the life of a famous person?
Your adventure is at hand! Hidden beneath the surface of this material world, there are in operation vigorous forces clenched in the combat of the ages. Spiritual beings titanic in power clash in an upheaval to rival the most violent, convoluted plot of any of our spy or adventure films.
Where do we come into this story? Malevolent darkness and radiant messengers of mercy wait, poised for action, over the human form cast down on it's knees. The action of battle has been suspended to await the outcome of the whispered prayer issuing from the lips of the prostrate man. The outcome hangs on this moment of time.
What prayer is it that the dark princes dread, yet the powerful servants of God give their joyful attention to? Both sides know that the balance of power is about to shift. The ranks of the sons of God is about to be augumented. In abject weakness and need, a new soul is about to be born with the confession "Jesus, please be my Lord!"
The kingdom of God has won more territory in the most bitterly contested area of all, that of the human soul. In humbleness, the inheritance of one has changed from condemnation to priestly authority.
The time is at hand and the day is now to secure your place in God's victory! To participate in the great adventure, submit yourself to Jesus while the great drama still unfolds!
Your adventure is at hand! Hidden beneath the surface of this material world, there are in operation vigorous forces clenched in the combat of the ages. Spiritual beings titanic in power clash in an upheaval to rival the most violent, convoluted plot of any of our spy or adventure films.
Where do we come into this story? Malevolent darkness and radiant messengers of mercy wait, poised for action, over the human form cast down on it's knees. The action of battle has been suspended to await the outcome of the whispered prayer issuing from the lips of the prostrate man. The outcome hangs on this moment of time.
What prayer is it that the dark princes dread, yet the powerful servants of God give their joyful attention to? Both sides know that the balance of power is about to shift. The ranks of the sons of God is about to be augumented. In abject weakness and need, a new soul is about to be born with the confession "Jesus, please be my Lord!"
The kingdom of God has won more territory in the most bitterly contested area of all, that of the human soul. In humbleness, the inheritance of one has changed from condemnation to priestly authority.
The time is at hand and the day is now to secure your place in God's victory! To participate in the great adventure, submit yourself to Jesus while the great drama still unfolds!
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Pride
Anyone who has listened to what God has to say on the subject of pride is aware that His perspective is completely alien to our own. Our wisdom has sayings such as "Keep your head up" and " They can take everything from you but your pride". A merely human view equates pride with a love of one's self and sees it as an essential foundation of loving others. However, without God, acts of loving and giving become choices to be weighed in the balances. Without God, our first priority is always ourselves. Without God, our own needs always outweigh our available resourses, therefore the needs of others get left behind.
Anger and resentment are the harvest of a world of neediness. In this enviroment of brutal competition, pride is a defense mechanism. It is how I tell myself that I am better than you. It is why I see myself as more worthy and deserving of your love and devotion than you are worthy and deserving of mine. Pride is my wall of protection around my pain and vulnerability so I can keep you from robbing me of my resources. Pride's operational dysfunction is it's isolationist agenda.
Such a worldview sees God at the top of the heap of evildoers, who by virtue of a strength greater than our own, makes arrogant demands of us. Unfortunately, when we chose to shut God out , we imprison ourselves in an abject poverty of existence, in a living death. A natural mind cannot, on its own, comprehend the principals of the realities of God. Him who's heart is a fortress of pride will not yield to love in the face of all the persuasions at the disposal of diety.
This is the reality of who God is, that He made Himself into nothing and took on the form of a servant, the form of a man. As a man, he was obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross! (Phil 2:8,9) This is the mind of Christ, that when he gave a demonstration how we are to treat each other, he washed the feet of his disciples! This is the way He works, when he informed His disciples that the one who wants to be first in His kingdom must be the servant of all the others, as Jesus Himself is.
God says that He mocks proud mockers but gives grace to the humble. (Proverbs 3:34) If He allows us to reap the bitter harvest of pride while we yet draw breath, then He will be assisting us to open our eyes to our lifeless condition so we may approach Him with humility (to learn from Him). Perhaps He might grant us a glimpse of the depthless value of this love that He offers us! Perhaps we might learn to imitate this inexhaustible fountainhead of love and humility.
Anger and resentment are the harvest of a world of neediness. In this enviroment of brutal competition, pride is a defense mechanism. It is how I tell myself that I am better than you. It is why I see myself as more worthy and deserving of your love and devotion than you are worthy and deserving of mine. Pride is my wall of protection around my pain and vulnerability so I can keep you from robbing me of my resources. Pride's operational dysfunction is it's isolationist agenda.
Such a worldview sees God at the top of the heap of evildoers, who by virtue of a strength greater than our own, makes arrogant demands of us. Unfortunately, when we chose to shut God out , we imprison ourselves in an abject poverty of existence, in a living death. A natural mind cannot, on its own, comprehend the principals of the realities of God. Him who's heart is a fortress of pride will not yield to love in the face of all the persuasions at the disposal of diety.
This is the reality of who God is, that He made Himself into nothing and took on the form of a servant, the form of a man. As a man, he was obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross! (Phil 2:8,9) This is the mind of Christ, that when he gave a demonstration how we are to treat each other, he washed the feet of his disciples! This is the way He works, when he informed His disciples that the one who wants to be first in His kingdom must be the servant of all the others, as Jesus Himself is.
God says that He mocks proud mockers but gives grace to the humble. (Proverbs 3:34) If He allows us to reap the bitter harvest of pride while we yet draw breath, then He will be assisting us to open our eyes to our lifeless condition so we may approach Him with humility (to learn from Him). Perhaps He might grant us a glimpse of the depthless value of this love that He offers us! Perhaps we might learn to imitate this inexhaustible fountainhead of love and humility.
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