18 Reflections on 2014

18 Reflections on 2014

Last year I wrote a brief post on the 35 things that I learned and reflected upon in 2013. This year has been crazy and a whole lot has happened. I failed my God over and over and over again. I tripped and stumbled my way through 2014 but God was gracious, merciful, and loving enough to continue walking with me, just as he has promised. And along the walk, he has been growing me, teaching me, and guiding me. Here are some brief reflections on the past year of my walk with God.

1/1/14

1.  Having high expectations for yourself and others leads to growth. But make sure to be merciful and loving upon failure to meet those expectations.

2. We don’t invite to join our mission, he has already set out his mission and we must align ourselves with it.

3. God occasionally provides us with what we want, but always provides us with what we need.

4. Be willing to jumpstart a friends car at 7am when its -20 out. Friendship is worth it.

5. Even more important than a to-do list is the rare but important stop-doing list. Churches need to make a stop-doing list yearly to remain healthy.

6.  It is in our darkest times when God is most obviously present among us.

7. Difficult people smooth out our rough edges and give us the opportunity to become more like Christ.

8. We don’t decide what gifts we have, God gives them to us and the people around us affirm them in us.

9. If you don’t know what it means to hunger and thirst for God then you need to spend more time conversing with him.

10. Read through Deuteronomy every single year at least once.

11. The most underrated thing in the world: To feel inspired.

12.  If we are looking for direction from God about our future, we should start by looking and what God has done in our past.

13. True Generosity means not giving within your means, but beyond your means.

14. 24% of Evangelical Christians tithe. Are you one of them?

15. From Christ Church in Oxford, England: “What a thing of beauty. You cannot capture the beauty of this building with a photograph. The history screams from within the walls, the stain glass windows, and the pews themselves. Echoes and memories of millennia of worshippers seeking God. The bride of Christ has been being prepared for thousands of years from all around the world. What a beautiful thought.”

16. I fell asleep on May 22 in a featherbed in a castle in the English Countryside. What?

17. “I mustn’t dwell on the sad feeling of saying goodbye, for it means that there was something wonderful to say goodbye to.” – Leaving Scotland

18. Practice consecration before significant spiritual events.

Thank God for another year to live and serve him on this earth. Remember that your life belongs to God.  Seek him more and walk closer with him in 2015. Grace and peace be with you! Love you all!

Graves of Craving

I am a picky eater. A very picky eater. There have been many times in my life where wonderful food was placed in front of me, by no work of my own hands or any effort on my part, and yet I rejected it and complained about it. Though this makes me sound snobbish, selfish, ungrateful, and rude, it doesn’t seem like a big deal. The account we have in Numbers 11 is a similar one, though on a grander scale with much more at stake.

Israel has been rescued from slavery and delivered by God. He took care of them, providing manna (bread from heaven) for everyone. Exodus 16:17-18 tells us that everyone received exactly what they needed, no more and no less. Yet they began to complain. Even though the manna was sweet and delicious and tasted like “a pastry cooked with the finest oil”, they were not content. They craved meat and complained about what they had been given. Their leader Moses was burdened so much by their complaints and discontent that he cries out, “I can’t carry all these people by myself. They are too much for me. If you are going to treat me like this, please kill me right now.” God heard the cry of his faithful leader and lightened his spiritual burden of caring for such a great number of discontent people.

However, God did not respond so gently to the complainers. They recalled the “Free fish [they] ate in Egypt, along with the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic.” Free? They were enslaved! They worked from sunup till sundown, being beaten and whipped and punished as slaves. No food they enjoyed in slavery was truly free. Now, ironically, after being delivered by God and rescued from that slavery, and given truly free food, exactly how much they needed, they still complained. We do this too often today – God has rescued us from the slavery of sin has given us exactly what we need, and yet as free people we crave the earthly pleasures that we had in slavery. And how will it turn out for us?

God responds by giving the complaining people exactly what they want, meat and lots of it. He stirs up a wind that brings countless quail to the feet of the people. In fact, there was so much, the people had to walk for an entire day just to find land that wasn’t filled with meat. The sinful, complaining, discontent people got exactly what they wanted. But, “While the meat was still between their teeth, before it was chewed, the Lord’s anger burned against the people, and the Lord struck them with a very severe plague.” They even named the place “Graves of Craving” because of the disease and death that came from the meat they had so greatly desired. Sometimes God gives sinfully discontent people with twisted notions of what they need versus what they want, exactly what they want, and the end result is plague and death.

Be careful that you do not become sinfully discontent, craving the false freedom and false pleasure of slavery, for God may just give you exactly what you want.

Netflix and Hebrews 6

Let’s be honest, who doesn’t love Netflix? It is one of the few (sarcasm) websites that allows us to appease our addiction to media, pop culture, and anything that plays on television. Netflix offers tens of thousands of movies and TV shows to its almost 30 million subscribers who have spent an estimated 2 billion hours of video streaming. That's a lot of time and a lot of users. What can Christians learn from Netflix?

As I shared briefly in my last post, I think Netflix helps us understand this very difficult passage in Hebrews 6 concerning people who have tasted the Gospel and then fallen away.

It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace. – Hebrews 6:4-6

First it must be noted that the word “Impossible” should not be too highly scrutinized, God can and does do anything he wants to. The author is merely making the point that it is extremely rare and very unlikely that a person would taste the Gospel, reject it, and then return to accept it. It happens often that a person will “taste the Gospel” or in other words - taste the heavenly gift, share in the Holy Spirit, taste the goodness of God’s word and power, and still reject it. People can cognitively understand as well as have their eyes opened to the true meaning of the Gospel and then choose to deny, reject, and have nothing to do with it. And just like any food you try, if you have tasted and hate it, it is very unlikely that you are going to want to eat it again.

I signed up for a free month subscription with Netflix almost a year ago. I got to enjoy all the benefits that a paying subscriber would, except for free. In a manner of speaking, I tasted the goodness of Netflix. But then, at the end of my free month, I had to make a choice. I had to decide if being a full-time member of the Netflix community was worth the cost. I enjoyed all the benefits for free, with a low level of commitment, and now I had to decide if I liked what I tasted enough to pay for it. Netflix was more than willing to let me taste their membership (in fact they had so much faith I would love it, they offered me 3 more free trials). But after a time, they told me, “We are so glad you tried us out, but if you really want to be a part of this, it is going to cost you.” If I’m willing to pay the price, I can enjoy all the benefits of being a member of the Netflix kingdom. I had to measure it, count the cost, and decide if it was worth it to me. And if I decide that it isn’t worth the cost, it is very unlikely that I will change my mind in the future.

It is nearly impossible for someone to truly taste the Gospel and count the cost, decide it isn’t worth it, and then change their mind. Jesus himself tells us to count the cost before following him. It is a price that many people are not willing to pay. In one of the most profound paradoxes of all time, God offers his love, his goodness, and his Spirit freely to all, but we must be willing to pay the price.

35 Thoughts For You From 2013

I spent the last few hours reading back through the journal/notebook/whatever you want to call it that I have kept in the past year. If you do not often record your thoughts, your day’s events, or what you are learning, I strongly encourage you to do so. It is only by looking at where we once were that we truly see where we are and how far we have come. This is a compilation of the best thoughts, words of advice, etc., from my journal of 2013. I hope they somehow bless you. Enjoy!

1.     For teachers and leaders – a quote from C.S. Lewis’ The Four Loves, “If we are any good, we must always be working towards the moment at which our pupils are fit to become our critics and rivals.”

2.     On friendship – It is unhealthy to merely want friends. You will never find true friends just because you were looking for them. “The very condition of having friends is that we should want something else besides friends.” (The Four Loves) Friendship is birthed from shared vision or experience, not from the desire to have friends alone.

3.     On your friends – Good friends bring out the best, the wisest, or the funniest in you. They make realized the beauty of the person that has always been there. Find friends who bring out the best in you and everyone else.

4.     On stewardship – Why is it that we have become so wise at using our money and resources wisely in order to have as much as possible, yet we often neglect to view the Gospel and our responsibility to it in the same way?

5.     None of us have yet reached our full earthly potential. Ask God to help you get there.

6.     “There is no manner of life in the world more sweet or more delicious than continual conversation with God.” – Brother Lawrence

7.     Sometimes God will break your fingers to get your hands off of what will eventually destroy you. – Ian Simkins

8.     Serve with fear, rejoice with trembling – Psalm 2.

9.     Moral purity CANNOT be the focus of your life or your Christianity. That is NOT the Gospel of Jesus.

10.  Hebrews 6 – A helpful analogy - It is possible to taste the Gospel and then reject it. Like a Netflix free trial: I have tasted the goodness of a free subscription, but they tell me that if I really want it, its going to cost me something. And if I am willing to pay the price, I can enjoy all of the benefits of being a member of the Netflix kingdom. I have to measure it, and decide if its worth the cost. If I decide that it isn’t, it will be hard for me to change my mind. It is nearly impossible for someone to fall in love with something they tasted once and rejected. Once I have tasted a food and found it to be something I did not like, you will have a hard time getting me to try it again. This is how some people can taste the Gospel and reject it.

11.  Psalm 5 – God saves, protects, and guides those who love him.

12.  Allow discipline to make your weaknesses grow into strength.

13.  Exodus 13 – God knows his people and what they can handle and responds accordingly. Sometimes, God is most obviously with us when we most obviously need him.

14.  God is always speaking if we will listen.

15.  Exodus 14 – When we stop questioning God’s authority and being afraid of our circumstances, and instead choose to be still and allow God to fight for us, God will move between the darkness and us, and will display his power on our behalf. He will part seas and demolish the enemy, which is always puny to him, and will deliver his people from the shadows of darkness.

16.  You have been called to store up eternal treasures, start investing in those and stop wasting your time on temporary treasures.

17.  Seek out solitude and silence on a regular basis.

18.  The world is burning and you don’t care. Grab a hose.

19.  Sometimes regress is progress.

20.  God sovereignly brings together people who need each other. Look around: Who do you need and who needs you?

21.  Don’t make God that loser friend you’re embarrassed to talk to when other people are around. Pray often. Do not ever be ashamed to talk to God.

22.  Act on God given inspiration and take a bold leap. And know that if you fail, it was about the journey.

23.  Think outside of your world on a daily basis. Look at, think about, and pray for the big world around you.

24.  On relationships – Grow in the relationships that bring you closer to God. Change the ones that don’t. Give up the ones that stand between you and God.

25.  Be phantasmagoric in a good way. Look it up.

26.  Leaders – protect your flock at all costs. You will give an account.

27.  Love and obey God and he promises he will take care of you.

28.  Remember who God is and what he has done for you. Thank him for specific things daily. Praise him simply for who he is daily.

29.  God is Holy and his love is perfect.

30.  God has been faithful. He has walked with me in my pain, in my struggles, in my joys, in my triumphs, and in my failures. Oh what a great thing Jesus has done that somehow God cares enough about stupid sinful me to walk with me and to love me, teach me, and grow me every step of the way. Thank you God.

31.  God uses difficult people to make you more like Himself.

32.  Crave the presence of the Lord. If you don’t really want him around, he won’t be.

33.  All Christians should be making new Christians. All pastors should be making new pastors. All churches should be making new churches.

34.  God is willing to blow up anything that becomes a wedge between you and him, even if it is a good thing in and of itself.  

35.   It is okay to wrestle honestly with God. But be prepared for a difficult response from God.

Thank God for 2013. Seek him more in 2014. Grace and peace be with you. Love you all!