Of course you have said it, "I will be happy when this circumstance pans out". The question is not if we say and think that, but how often we do. What is life designed to do, make us happy? Is our real purpose to be "happy"? So often we live as if the goal of life, that is, the reason for our existence is nothing more than to be happy. Now, I like being happy and I like convenience, but I have to ask, is that really why I exist? If happiness is the purpose of existence, we are in for a miserable, empty life.
The philosophical principle that drives most Americans is simple, happiness is the highest good and my circumstances must always be easy and without hardship. The hardest lesson for people to learn is that we were born to experience trials and affliction. In fact, from birth we are created to experience pain, grief, hardship, and affliction. I am sure that as you read this, you think I am crazy because we have been lulled to sleep with the subtle lie that happiness is what is most important. But consider with me for moment a few things that may show you the evidence of the matter.
Happiness, the most prominent reason for divorce in our country is irreconcilable differences. Now, I am no lawyer, but I have witnessed divorce, and I can tell you that irreconcilable difference is another way of saying, "I am not happy any more with this particular person." Is the chief end of marriage happiness, because I always thought that marriage was about love and sacrifice. I thought marriage was about laying yourself down for the good of another. As a married man, I am happy with my wife, but even when I am not, that never changes the fact that I love her.
Happiness, our children are taught from day one, that they exist to be made happy. In an age where self esteem rules the day and we are more worried about our children's temporal happiness rather than the eternal state of their heart, we are seeing the dividends of such a philosophy. As a man who has worked with teens for almost 10 years, I see first hand what this "happiness" principle is doing to our children. We are raising children who are apathetic, rebellious, and convinced that the world exists to benefit them. I see a generation of young people are disillusioned and indifferent, primarily because they see that happiness is such a fleeting thing and yet they have been programed to live with happiness as the highest good. It is enough to make one cry out and say, "who shall deliver us from this..."
So, life goes on to the tune of, "I will be happy if...", "I will be happy when..." And so I ask you, when does it really stop? In Psalm 17, we find a very curious detail. David says in the final verse, "...when I awake, I will be satisfied with your likeness." Happiness or the lack thereof is really about being satisfied. Being satisfied however is deeper than being happy, it is being joyful and content. It is being at peace with circumstance and life. One can be content and not be happy; one can experience joy in the midst of pain. Joy and contentment flow from one place, God, the Creator and Sustainer of the universe. David speaks truly when he says that the essence of satisfaction is being an imitator of God. God created us to reflect His image to the world, not to be happy in the humanistic sense. When was the last time that we prayed for God's grace to go one more mile rather than deliverance from pain? When was the last time we prayed for peace rather than prosperity?
Happiness is not the chief end of man, holiness is! We all seek happiness, when was the last time that we genuinely prayed for God to make us holy?
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Friday, February 27, 2009
A Little Nugget to Chew on...
This is a quote taken from D.A. Carson's, A Call to Spiritual Reformation: Priorities from Paul and His Prayers:
A little something to think about as those of us who desperately want to see God move. It is a call to examine ourselves and ask if we really want revival for the church. I pray this will help bring about some of the conviction that the church needs.
"How can we intercede for our church, if we secretly hold some of its
members
in contempt? How can meaningfully pray for revival, if what we want
is some abstract
blessing called revival and do not care to see people
revived? If we harbor
bitterness and resentment, praying is little more
than wasted time and
effort. Before we go any further, this is the time to
examine your own
heart, honestly and humbly. It is always the time to do
so but especially
when you seek to approach the God whose peerless holiness and
forgiveness
are the immutable standards of his people."
A little something to think about as those of us who desperately want to see God move. It is a call to examine ourselves and ask if we really want revival for the church. I pray this will help bring about some of the conviction that the church needs.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Pink Floyd and the Gospel: Comfortably Numb pt. 1
No okay! This is not some apologetic for why the band Pink Floyd is a Christian band and all humanity should see through the smoke and mirrors and see them as they are....committed to Christ. Do they have something to say to those of us who are followers of Christ; absolutely!
Whether you like reading or not, most will admit that they like a good story. This is evidenced in how much we spend on movies each year. Largely, music is the same way. A song or album takes you to a place, because it is typically telling you a story. No one does it better than Pink Floyd. Now, I will concede that some people do it as well as Floyd, but I cannot be convinced that anyone does it any better than them. Whether you like the album The Wall or not, it has some fascinating things to say to the American church.
On disc 2 of the wall, there is a very popular and familiar song called Comfortably Numb. Lets set the context shall we...This entire album is a reflection by Roger Waters about growing up during and after WWII and living with the extreme psychological impact it had on him. He is giving us his story and the realty that fame and fortune don't cure all things, there is something in the human heart that needs a deeper, more lasting solution. In life we have two choices really, we anesthetize ourselves, superficially speaking of course, and build walls, hence the album; or we seek to deal with the issues at a heart level. So, we come to the song comfortably numb, and it is a chilling indictment upon the church today. (yes, I am about to explain how I make this leap)
So, the song begins with a deep, reflective question: "Hello, is there anybody in there, just nod if you can hear me, is there anyone home?" I sometimes hear that line and wonder to myself, what is the difference between deadness and numbness. The question is a desperate search for life and wanting fully to see some semblance of something real. This is the initial check for vitals. It is simply trying to find some remnants of living and being that once existed but seem so far away. If you are in the church, this hits home. We have been numbed by comfort and ease. We have been lolled to sleep on the American dream and now we are finding that the trivial pursuits have left us cold, numb, and lifeless. We wonder where the spiritual feast is, where is the wine of joy and gladness? We abandoned them long ago in search of something finite and dying and now our existence is primarily a numb walk through life searching for something else. (don't worry, I am not that hopeless, I will be getting to the good news)
We continue: "Come on now, I hear you're feeling down, I can ease your pain, get you on your feet again." Ah yes, the age old surface approach right. All of life is about killing pain so that even if we can't feel pleasure we don't have to feel pain. This one line accurately sums up the church in a nutshell. We have catered to the idea that Christianity is about experiencing pain less and being happy. You must understand that Waters is writing from a secular worldview, and even he understands that this is not the final remedy. This is where the church sells out primarily, ease the pain right? We have forgotten how to pray, "give me grace to walk through the pain."
Continuing: "Relax, I need some information first, just the basic facts, now can you show me where it hurts?" Are we really able to assess ourselves? To a degree yes, but there is something bigger going on here. I hope you are seeing it, the diagnosis is that if we handle surface issues, we need not go any further. Do you know where this leads? Straight to death! Because underneath it all, a heart is dying.
So comes the chorus, and it is penetrating: " There is no pain you are receding A distant ship, smoke on the horizon. You are only coming through in waves. Your lips move but I can't hear what you're saying. When I was a child I had a fever My hands felt just like two balloons. Now I've got that feeling once again I can't explain you would not understand This is not how I am. I have become comfortably numb." Do you see the pervading sense of helplessness that is displayed here? He says that you are only coming through in waves, i.e. there is no consistency, no security, only stagnated attempts at help. Then comes the stake through the heart, your lips move but I can't hear what you say. Why does this describe the church? I will tell you why, because we hear the voice of culture on the surface, and are missing the Word of God in the heart. The Scriptures speak very clearly to us, but it is like we are trapped now behind the wall we created. He says that this numbness is not how he is, in other words, it is not the essence of who he is. Neither is numbness the essence of the church, but we have embraced it. If we have numbed our self to God, why in the world to we expect people of culture trying to become unnumb to be attracted to us? So, we come to it, the climax of the song.
Perhaps I am making a stretch. But as I consider a man making a search of his life and finding that he has grown comfortable in the numbness of his existence, I see that as almost prophetic to where the American church is today. We are for the most part, cold to one another, condemning of one another, and critical of one another. We have very little community and we are losing relevance by the day. We have grown to love the comfort of numbness, but the gospel will not let us stay there. We need confession, we need community, and ultimately we need Christ . We need to the church to be the church and not be an extension of some exclusive club that we think makes us better than other people. God, give us grace to walk through the pain and to seek numbness no longer.
Whether you like reading or not, most will admit that they like a good story. This is evidenced in how much we spend on movies each year. Largely, music is the same way. A song or album takes you to a place, because it is typically telling you a story. No one does it better than Pink Floyd. Now, I will concede that some people do it as well as Floyd, but I cannot be convinced that anyone does it any better than them. Whether you like the album The Wall or not, it has some fascinating things to say to the American church.
On disc 2 of the wall, there is a very popular and familiar song called Comfortably Numb. Lets set the context shall we...This entire album is a reflection by Roger Waters about growing up during and after WWII and living with the extreme psychological impact it had on him. He is giving us his story and the realty that fame and fortune don't cure all things, there is something in the human heart that needs a deeper, more lasting solution. In life we have two choices really, we anesthetize ourselves, superficially speaking of course, and build walls, hence the album; or we seek to deal with the issues at a heart level. So, we come to the song comfortably numb, and it is a chilling indictment upon the church today. (yes, I am about to explain how I make this leap)
So, the song begins with a deep, reflective question: "Hello, is there anybody in there, just nod if you can hear me, is there anyone home?" I sometimes hear that line and wonder to myself, what is the difference between deadness and numbness. The question is a desperate search for life and wanting fully to see some semblance of something real. This is the initial check for vitals. It is simply trying to find some remnants of living and being that once existed but seem so far away. If you are in the church, this hits home. We have been numbed by comfort and ease. We have been lolled to sleep on the American dream and now we are finding that the trivial pursuits have left us cold, numb, and lifeless. We wonder where the spiritual feast is, where is the wine of joy and gladness? We abandoned them long ago in search of something finite and dying and now our existence is primarily a numb walk through life searching for something else. (don't worry, I am not that hopeless, I will be getting to the good news)
We continue: "Come on now, I hear you're feeling down, I can ease your pain, get you on your feet again." Ah yes, the age old surface approach right. All of life is about killing pain so that even if we can't feel pleasure we don't have to feel pain. This one line accurately sums up the church in a nutshell. We have catered to the idea that Christianity is about experiencing pain less and being happy. You must understand that Waters is writing from a secular worldview, and even he understands that this is not the final remedy. This is where the church sells out primarily, ease the pain right? We have forgotten how to pray, "give me grace to walk through the pain."
Continuing: "Relax, I need some information first, just the basic facts, now can you show me where it hurts?" Are we really able to assess ourselves? To a degree yes, but there is something bigger going on here. I hope you are seeing it, the diagnosis is that if we handle surface issues, we need not go any further. Do you know where this leads? Straight to death! Because underneath it all, a heart is dying.
So comes the chorus, and it is penetrating: " There is no pain you are receding A distant ship, smoke on the horizon. You are only coming through in waves. Your lips move but I can't hear what you're saying. When I was a child I had a fever My hands felt just like two balloons. Now I've got that feeling once again I can't explain you would not understand This is not how I am. I have become comfortably numb." Do you see the pervading sense of helplessness that is displayed here? He says that you are only coming through in waves, i.e. there is no consistency, no security, only stagnated attempts at help. Then comes the stake through the heart, your lips move but I can't hear what you say. Why does this describe the church? I will tell you why, because we hear the voice of culture on the surface, and are missing the Word of God in the heart. The Scriptures speak very clearly to us, but it is like we are trapped now behind the wall we created. He says that this numbness is not how he is, in other words, it is not the essence of who he is. Neither is numbness the essence of the church, but we have embraced it. If we have numbed our self to God, why in the world to we expect people of culture trying to become unnumb to be attracted to us? So, we come to it, the climax of the song.
Perhaps I am making a stretch. But as I consider a man making a search of his life and finding that he has grown comfortable in the numbness of his existence, I see that as almost prophetic to where the American church is today. We are for the most part, cold to one another, condemning of one another, and critical of one another. We have very little community and we are losing relevance by the day. We have grown to love the comfort of numbness, but the gospel will not let us stay there. We need confession, we need community, and ultimately we need Christ . We need to the church to be the church and not be an extension of some exclusive club that we think makes us better than other people. God, give us grace to walk through the pain and to seek numbness no longer.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
I Just Stood There....
So much of life these days seems to be problem management. If there is an issue, you address it, something broken, you fix it. The Christian world is not much different really. Issues come to the forefront and we are trained to meet them head on. Sometimes I get so paralyzed and the gravity of a situation, I just stand there. There is nothing to say, nothing to do, all you can do is stand there. As a pastor, I feel that surely I must be able to come up with something, but not today. Today was one of those days when I just stood there. I was watching a father cry and grieve and mom do the same as they watched their 8 year old boy lay there in a hospital bed, and they were told that he has an aggressive, possibly terminal disease. My heart breaks even now because in reality there is nothing to say, so I just stood there.
If you are not a parent, you may say man that's terrible, but you can't really relate. Just standing there watching your child possibly die knowing that there is nothing you can do is gut wrenching. Why do we always feel that we need to fix it? At the heart of it for me, is that I cannot stand suffering especially is one so young and full of life. But the question remains...
Sometimes I wonder if people who are not in submission to the Lord ask themselves if times like these shake my faith or any believers faith. Of course it does! I echo Lane Staley from Alice in Chains, "Why does it have to be this way?" But in the end, all I can do is stand...
So, we just stand there, but maybe standing there is better than trying to fix it. I am often reminded of some words by the apostle Paul and they do give me hope "And having done all, stand firm." That Statement comes in the context of spiritual warfare, but the truth of it is more broad. Obviously we want to fix issues, but it is not up to us to always fix, many times we are simply called to stand faithfully. I know, it flies in the face of the modern American mentality. We are programed to think and believe that we can do anything, when in actuality, we can do nothing of ourselves. We don't have the strength, counsel, or wisdom to fix things, but the Holy Spirit does. The quiet call is to stand firm in the faith. The faith that says God is sovereign, the faith that says that Jesus never leaves us nor forsakes us, the faith that enables us to be faithful.
Today I just stood there; tomorrow I will go and stand some more. I am learning that standing is all we really want anyway. We just want someone to stand with us and bleed with us. Jesus bled for us, He died for us, now the call in our lives is to bleed with His people and to count our own selves dead for the sake of His people. None of us control our lives, but in the end it is always comforting to know that we are not standing alone. So yes, I just stood there today, and you know what, when tomorrow rolls around, I will stand some more...
If you are not a parent, you may say man that's terrible, but you can't really relate. Just standing there watching your child possibly die knowing that there is nothing you can do is gut wrenching. Why do we always feel that we need to fix it? At the heart of it for me, is that I cannot stand suffering especially is one so young and full of life. But the question remains...
Sometimes I wonder if people who are not in submission to the Lord ask themselves if times like these shake my faith or any believers faith. Of course it does! I echo Lane Staley from Alice in Chains, "Why does it have to be this way?" But in the end, all I can do is stand...
So, we just stand there, but maybe standing there is better than trying to fix it. I am often reminded of some words by the apostle Paul and they do give me hope "And having done all, stand firm." That Statement comes in the context of spiritual warfare, but the truth of it is more broad. Obviously we want to fix issues, but it is not up to us to always fix, many times we are simply called to stand faithfully. I know, it flies in the face of the modern American mentality. We are programed to think and believe that we can do anything, when in actuality, we can do nothing of ourselves. We don't have the strength, counsel, or wisdom to fix things, but the Holy Spirit does. The quiet call is to stand firm in the faith. The faith that says God is sovereign, the faith that says that Jesus never leaves us nor forsakes us, the faith that enables us to be faithful.
Today I just stood there; tomorrow I will go and stand some more. I am learning that standing is all we really want anyway. We just want someone to stand with us and bleed with us. Jesus bled for us, He died for us, now the call in our lives is to bleed with His people and to count our own selves dead for the sake of His people. None of us control our lives, but in the end it is always comforting to know that we are not standing alone. So yes, I just stood there today, and you know what, when tomorrow rolls around, I will stand some more...
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
And You Brutus...
We all know it, the very essence of betrayal. Shakespeare captured it in his classic work Cesar. The very fibre of humanity is betrayal. It started in the garden...Adam and Eve betrayed the command of God and the ripple effect is staggering. Shakespeare gives us a glimpse in the person of Brutus as he stabs Cesar, a friend, a trusted man in the inner sanctum. How does one deal with betrayal? Betrayal in Eden brought spiritual and physical death, but as relational creatures, how do we respond?
Well, there are two ways really. Either we harbor bitterness and let the betrayal sink us into the depths of despair, or we do what a Cesar in Rome would never do, we address it and forgive. Jesus did some amazing things as He walked the earth, and I sit in awe at how He handled betrayal. Both Peter and Judas betrayed Him, and He ever sought restoration. Judas, the son of perdition, would not be reconciled, but Peter, that is a different story. Peter followed the example of his father Adam, he turned his back on God, yet there God the Son stood, eager to extend the hand of brotherhood.
What Shakespeare seeks to show is the heart of man, but the Word of God is the antithesis to Cesar. Shakespeare gives us the heart of man, but the Bible gives us the heart of God. Here is the clincher...the heart of man has changed very little since Adam, or Shakespeare. Betrayal is still a staple of humanity. But the real question is, who is the worse sinner, the betrayer or the one who repays evil for evil? But redemption shows us the heart of God in color as it were. Man is so reluctant to extend forgiveness and redemption and yet God is so willing; even at the price of the Son.
Many sit on our right and left and we claim to love them, yet we betray everyday those whom we "love" and we harbor bitterness toward those who betray us. A river of hypocrisy flows, and yet we justify our own hypocrisy, giving good reason why our own bitterness is worth hanging on to. Bitterness is the cancer of the soul and as long as we keep it, we hang on to death.
A real issue is that we seek so quickly to mend a broken heart and I am not sure that a broken heart is designed to be mended or needs to be. In our natural state we are broken vessels that need the completion of Christ. Betrayal or bitterness never really describe what we have experienced, but rather they describe who we are without the constant intervention of Christ. Brutus is who we all are and will always be as long as sin is alive in our flesh. So, knowing that, what is the real pain of betrayal? It is the constant reminder that we are miserable failures who have no hope of keeping a standard. Why can we not one will ask...because we never really intend to and apart from Christ we simply cannot.
Well, there are two ways really. Either we harbor bitterness and let the betrayal sink us into the depths of despair, or we do what a Cesar in Rome would never do, we address it and forgive. Jesus did some amazing things as He walked the earth, and I sit in awe at how He handled betrayal. Both Peter and Judas betrayed Him, and He ever sought restoration. Judas, the son of perdition, would not be reconciled, but Peter, that is a different story. Peter followed the example of his father Adam, he turned his back on God, yet there God the Son stood, eager to extend the hand of brotherhood.
What Shakespeare seeks to show is the heart of man, but the Word of God is the antithesis to Cesar. Shakespeare gives us the heart of man, but the Bible gives us the heart of God. Here is the clincher...the heart of man has changed very little since Adam, or Shakespeare. Betrayal is still a staple of humanity. But the real question is, who is the worse sinner, the betrayer or the one who repays evil for evil? But redemption shows us the heart of God in color as it were. Man is so reluctant to extend forgiveness and redemption and yet God is so willing; even at the price of the Son.
Many sit on our right and left and we claim to love them, yet we betray everyday those whom we "love" and we harbor bitterness toward those who betray us. A river of hypocrisy flows, and yet we justify our own hypocrisy, giving good reason why our own bitterness is worth hanging on to. Bitterness is the cancer of the soul and as long as we keep it, we hang on to death.
A real issue is that we seek so quickly to mend a broken heart and I am not sure that a broken heart is designed to be mended or needs to be. In our natural state we are broken vessels that need the completion of Christ. Betrayal or bitterness never really describe what we have experienced, but rather they describe who we are without the constant intervention of Christ. Brutus is who we all are and will always be as long as sin is alive in our flesh. So, knowing that, what is the real pain of betrayal? It is the constant reminder that we are miserable failures who have no hope of keeping a standard. Why can we not one will ask...because we never really intend to and apart from Christ we simply cannot.
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