July 13 Esight, 2008

“For I have a strong desire to see you, and to give you some grace of the spirit, so that you may be made strong.”— Romans 1:11 BBEGrace doesn’t make us soft. It doesn’t make us weak. It makes us strong. It strengthens, builds up, and establishes.

The subject of God’s grace has a long and jaded history in God’s church. During the middle ages, the church of the “dark ages” made God’s grace very expensive. Penance and price were required to obtain absolution, and the assuaging of the wrath of an offended God. Then came the reformation and, although it was a step in the right direction, it wasn’t quite far enough. The reformation theorized that, in order to obtain God’s grace, we only need to repent, confess, and believe. This only proved to cheapen God’s grace. Sure it was less expensive, but it still required something from us first and thus it was stripped, robbed of its power.

When we see a concerning condition in the church, in other peoples lives, or even ourselves, we are often tempted to resort to a “get it right” approach. A Pep talk ensues which seeks to motivate us to reach the standard that we are ever lifting higher. But Paul’s thought here is quite different. He desired to share grace in order to strengthen and build up the church.

What few have realized is that the answer to expensive grace and to failing morality is not to make grace less expensive. In other words, the solution is to reveal God’s grace as neither expensive nor cheap . . . it’s FREE!

“In the matchless gift of His son, God has encircled the whole world with an atmosphere of grace as real as the air which circulates around the globe. All who choose to breathe this life-giving atmosphere will live, and grow up to the stature of men and women in Christ Jesus.” (E. G. White, God’s Amazing Grace p. 238)

Before you did anything, and even if you never do anything, God has already poured out heaven for you. He has encircled you, every moment of your life, with an atmosphere of Grace that is as real as the air you are breathing. Watch closely how this affects our hearts as compared to our previous two prospects.

When God’s grace is dependent on something we do first, all we are left with is the satisfaction that we’ve met all of the requirements and that our carcass will get to live for eternity. We are left with an ever present, low rumbling of uncertainty in our core that suggests we still may not have truly done enough.

On the contrary, when we realize what God’s grace really is, that we have done nothing to be made worthy of it, and grasp that it has always been surrounding us “freely,” something happens in the human heart. Love awakens love. We cease to be concerned with if we “make it.” We cease to matter. Our only concern becomes wanting to know how to genuinely say “thank you” to this God whose love we have underestimated. There is assurance, but even greater still, there is a change in our center. We begin to enter into the philanthropic nature of God rather than our egocentric concern of our own affairs. We begin to be obsessed with only one desire, one focus: What can I do to show Him how much I appreciate Him? What can I do to love Him the way He loves me? Our focus shifts from trying to do enough to be saved, to realizing that what we do never seems to be enough to truly say “thank you.” And that, my friend, is conversion. “He died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves.” (2 Corinthians 5:15)

God’s grace truly is amazing, if you can see it.

“For the grace of God has come, giving salvation to all men.” Titus 2:11 BBE

“God has wrought out salvation for every man, and has given it to him; but the majority spurn it, and throw it away. The Judgment will reveal the fact that full and complete salvation was given to every man, and that the lost have deliberately thrown away their birthright possession.” (E.J. Waggoner, The Glad Tidings, p. 23)

The condition of the church today is not a reflection of the loose culture in which we live, but the result of a century of gazes fixed on the law rather than the life changing, matchless grace of our altruistic, benevolent God.

Consider.

I wish you God’s best this week!

July 9 Esight, 2008

“For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food.”—Hebrews 5:12Recently, I had the privilege of spending the evening with an old friend. As these moments often do, the topic turned, at one point, to the subject of God. My friend is not what you would call religious, but very deep. There were three areas around which my friend was troubled.

First, the subject which plagues all but the shallow: IF God is good, why so much suffering? Then, the subject drifted into God’s wrath or anger, and, finally, why Jesus had to die. It is amazing to me how many of us think we have it all figured out, myself included. As I listened to the questions that were plaguing my friend, I was struck with how profound human minds and hearts, which take time to simply be honest, can be. I must admit that this was not a discussion where we arrived at too many solid conclusions, but what we both walked away with was the overwhelming conviction of three things.

First, our religious conditioning has left us ill-equipped to truly understand and know God’s heart.

Second, we both felt that, in our crying out to God and telling him “I don’t understand,” God was whispering back, “That’s right. You don’t. But you will. I am not like you. And you really don’t know me as well as I’d like. But we are not done yet.”

And lastly, this is the stuff eternity will be made of. We will be pondering complexities of the love with which we are loved everyday throughout forever. This is the “deep” Paul referred to. (see Ephesians 3:14-19). This is the “solid” food that nourishes the starving soul of humanity.

I used to think of the subject of God’s love as the fluff. You know, the down in the comforter kind of stuff that’s soft and keeps you warm. But Paul did not look at God’s love so lightly. Carefully consider the words here in Hebrews:

“For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil. Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, of instruction about washings and laying on of hands, and the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment.” (Hebrews 5:12 – 6:2)

Did you catch what the milk really is? That Jesus was the Messiah, repentance, faith, externalities, and doctrines such as the resurrection and the judgment. Don’t misunderstand me. These are not bad, just “elementary.” Once you’ve got ‘em, you’ve got ‘em. It’s time to move on! Let God take you deeper into the subjects which surround His character, His love, and the contradiction between Himself and us. Get to Know Him as He truly is. This is that which challenges the sharpest minds, satisfies the deepest longings of ones heart, and, with arms wide open, welcomes a lost soul HOME.

With the aim of beginning that journey today will you, along with me, give God permission to begin eternity now? He is right. We don’t understand . . . yet. We are looking through a “glass dimly lit.” But one day soon we will see. We will know as we are known. One subject will swallow up every other: the unabashed love of a God, though unrequited, for a world embracing every heart-ache. His is a love which, for time and eternity, will be proven . . . unequalled.

I wish you God’s best this week!

June 29 Esight, 2008

“I run in the path of your commands, for you have set my heart free.” —Psalm 119:32 NIVWhat does it mean to run? What does it meant to have had your heart set free?

The answer to these questions lies in the nature of the path which David states he runs in. In his letter to the believers in Rome, Paul states, “If there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, ‘You shall love . . .’”(Romans 13:9) Each and every command given us from the God of this universe is based upon one principle and one principle only—Love! (Matthew 22:40) It’s the path of God’s self-abandoning, other-centered, selfless love that David has been set free to run in. Selfless love. Ponder that. How is one set free to live, move, and breathe in the other-centered love of God?

David stated that it was his heart that was set free. This is more than mere mental assent to a list of doctrinal facts. It is more than the submission of the will to a series of behavioral expectations. His heart was set free! Did you catch that? David had an encounter with something lasting, deep, life-altering, and converting that had radically changed him from the inside out! What is it that does this to a person and how do we experience it?

This quite possibly might be the most important question a soul can ask. It is this experience that the Bible calls Salvation. Paul again states, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation.” (Romans 1:16) It’s the gospel! The gospel is what accomplishes in us this change. It’s in the gospel the we truly begin to See. It is in the gospel that we encounter a love from God as our hearts have never tasted. (1 John 4:7,8) Would you like this experience dear reader? Do you, like David, desire for your heart to be set free so that you can run in the wide expanse of the love upon which everything in His kingdom is based? Take some time this week to “turn your eyes upon Jesus,” my friend. Look to the Gospel for it is there that we are able to look into His eyes and catch a glimpse of His imploring gaze.

May the things of this world “grow strangely dim.”

I wish you God’s best this week.

June 22 Esight, 2008

“Love is patient, love is kind . . . it does not seek its own.” —1 Corinthians 13:4-5I would like to ask you a very serious question this week and I would like you to ponder it honestly. If there were no heaven to gain or hell to shun, would you still be a Christian? If there were no eternity, just this life and this life only, would you still be a friend of God?

This question is well worth considering because its very heart reveals our innermost motives for why we do what we do. For many, we want to be saved. We want to live forever! But Jesus very clearly stated, “Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it” (Matthew 16:25). This is alarming to many, as their primary motive for serving God is to “save their life.” Yet, is this really the low level of relationship God intended for us?

First, serving God simply for what we get out of it is very egocentric. Serving God because one does not want to go to hell and die is not conversion, it’s self-preservation. Conversion is where a person’s center changes from themselves to others. With conversion the self dies, without the contingency of immortality.

Second, to paint God as a being who manipulates people through fear of punishment or hope of reward is sick. I’m not saying there is no heaven or hell, but is God holding these up before us to force us into behavioral conformity, or is He holding up His love seeking to win us at a deep heart level to friendship with Him, the Lover of our souls? Meditate on this statement. What does it mean to you?

“The exercise of force [manipulation] is contrary to the principles of God’s government; He desires only the service of love; and love cannot be commanded; it cannot be won by force or authority. Only by love is love awakened.” (White, The Desire of Ages, p. 22)

Hear me. Our God lived for us when He thought there was no heaven in it for Him.

“I am reckoned among those who go down to the pit; I have become like a man without strength, forsaken among the dead, like the slain who lie in the grave, whom You remember no more….” (Psalm 88:4-5, emphasis added.)

“But now with the terrible weight of guilt He bears, He cannot see the Father’s reconciling face . . . Satan with his fierce temptations wrung the heart of Jesus. The Saviour could not see through the portals of the tomb. Hope did not present to Him His coming forth from the grave a conqueror, or tell Him of the Father’s acceptance of the sacrifice. He feared that sin was so offensive to God that Their separation was to be eternal.” (White, The Desire of Ages, p. 753, emphasis added.)

Doesn’t He deserve to have you live for Him even if there was no heaven in it for you? God is so beautiful, so self-abandoning, so other-centered, and so selfless that even if we were to get nothing out of this in return for ourselves, He is simply worthy of being loved the way He loves us!

Would you like to enter into a friendship with God based on these principles, rather than just the egocentricity of what’s in it for you? We have been told what is needed to attain this friendship.

“Love is the basis of godliness . . . But we can never come into possession of this spirit by trying to love . . . what is needed is the love of Christ in the heart.” (Ellen White, Christ’s Object Lessons, p. 384)

We need to know the love that Christ has for us in His heart. Before we can have God in our hearts, we must know, believe, and feel that we are in the heart of God. Then, and only then, will love, by love, be awakened. Only then will love truly become the compelling power in our friendship with this being called God. This is why Paul so desperately prayed that “with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all Christians the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.”(Ephesians 3:18-19, The Message) For “God is love.” (1 John 4:8)

Only then will we be able to say with all sincerity, “The love of Christ constrains us . . .” (2 Corinthians 5:14).

I wish you God’s best this week.

June 15 Esight, 2008

This is what the Lord says: “A voice is heard in Ramah, mourning and great weeping, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because her children are no more.”—Jeremiah 31:15I would like to ask you to pray for some very dear friends of mine who, just this week, lost their ten year old son. I have found that it is important to ask the right questions, in times like these, rather than those which culturally plague us as Christians.

Loss is always hard. There are no words that can comfort when a loved one is “taken” as some say. But there’s something inapt about the word “taken.” We use it so flippantly, especially here in the South. Taken by whom? For what reason were they taken? If you are on this end of the loss, what reason could possibly be good enough? These are the questions we ask when we lose someone we love. These words are especially hard when that person is your child. Parents were not meant to bury their children.

God does not take children. He does not have a higher purpose for such a thing. My God gave up His own child for me. He does not need mine for Himself, yet this is what we feel. “God why did you . . .? ” are the words that roll so easily off our tongues. Even still, “God why didn’t you . . .?” So, what is God’s role when “death, like a gypsy, comes to steal the ones we love?” We read that “the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.” (John 10:9-11) This is not the activity of our God.

To be honest, the answer is not as simple as we would like it to be. We are living in a world where thousands of millions of free moral decisions have been being made for thousands of years. Those free decisions have set in motion chains of events that are now intersecting with other chains of events that are undoubtedly too complex for us to understand. What I do know, nevertheless, is that God is not up there like the Wizard of Oz pulling levers and pushing buttons to make things happen. Rather, many times, it’s these free decisions that tie God’s hands. Our free will, which He respects infinitely, sometimes gets in the way of His will. Because God grants freedom, there is now an environment created where, at times, even God doesn’t get His way.

What ties His hands? Why does it often feel so arbitrary? I don’t know the answer to these questions, but I do know that one day God will pull back the veil and show us, not why He didn’t, but why He couldn’t. The role God is playing is of One who is doing everything possible to prevent and stop as much suffering as we are setting in motion. “Time and chance happen to them all.” (Ecclesiastes 9:11) I know this does not comfort our heart, but it does bring not to be blaming God when we need Him the most.

Unfortunately, we cannot be assured that we will never encounter loss, that nothing will ever break our hearts, or that no circumstance will ever wound our innermost soul. That which we hold dear may, in fact, be taken. But God does not do this. God did not create the type of world in which we are living today . . . we did. Yet, even in the midst of this chaos, God does promise four things: First, nothing pierces our hearts that does not also pierce His. It is not simply our wills that are being violated, but His own will as well. Second, He will make an absolute end of all this disarray. One day, we will feel His soft, but strong, hand wiping against our tear stained cheek. Third, He will make such an end that we can be assured that this pain will never surface again in this universe. This chaos will not be repeated. Finally, nothing will happen to us that is larger than what God’s grace can pull us through. Much more, good will be brought out of these incidences in spite of the harm that we have suffered.

We can know that whatever breaks our hearts can also, by God’s grace, become a source of some of the greatest blessings in our lives. Nonetheless, God doesn’t allow these things in order to bless us. God does not need evil to do good. Still, God can come after the fact and, by the miracle of His grace, bring great good out of our deepest pain. For that, at the very least, we can be thankful. We needn’t be thankful for the events that break our hearts, but thankful for the grace of a God whose heart is so much larger, whose arms are so much stronger, whose chest is so much broader than anything that could possibly enter in to touch us with pain.

I close this week’s thoughts with the words of a song that I have found to be a source of consolation and reassurance in my own times of loss.

“You have led me to the sadness, I have carried this pain on a back bruised, nearly broken, I’m crying out to You.

I will sing of Your mercy that leads me through valleys of sorrow to rivers of joy.

When death, like a gypsy, comes to steal what I love, I will still look to the heavens, I will still seek your face.

But I fear you aren’t listening because there are no words. Just the stillness and the hunger for a faith that assures.

I will sing of Your mercy that leads me through valleys of sorrow to rivers of joy.

While we wait for rescue with our eyes tightly shut. Face to the ground using our hands to cover the fatal cut.

Though the pain is an ocean tossing us around, around, around. You have calmed greater waters, higher mountains have come down.

I will sing of Your mercy that leads me through valleys of sorrow to rivers of joy.”

(Aaron Sands, Dan Haseltine, Charlie Lowell, Stephen Mason,and Matt Odmark)

I wish you God’s best this week. Please pray for my dear friends.