I recently returned from India. It was a challenging time. A time of seeing what really matters in life and ministry. I was, amongst other things, compelled by simplicity. Why do we make this so complicated when Jesus spent all his time making it so simple? God forgive us!
I also learned from India was that I need more faith. I think that the curse of the western world that I live in is a lack of faith. As my old pastor used to say, ‘faith is the magic with God’. I’m starting to see how right he was. We can’t be any use to God without faith. In fact, without faith it is impossible to please God. We are saved by grace through faith. Faith is the door into all of the blessings that God has laid up for us in Christ.
The truth is that we can’t even see God without faith. Without faith all we will see is some watered down philosophical construct, which might make us feel God about our lives for a season, but which won’t provide transformation in us. Without faith we won’t see God, just a dim reflection in a mirror of our own pitiful souls.
Without faith we will always attempt to change our lives through our own efforts. We will seek to help ourselves to healing. We will become skilled in the language and liturgy of psycho-babble, heck, we might even construct a watertight theology around it, but we won’t see change. Our worship will become narcissism, self-obsessed squandering, empty tunes with empty hearts. Without faith God will not listen to our singing and preaching. It will be empty noise to Him and He will take no pleasure in it.
Only faith pleases God. Not effort. Not perfection or excellence. Not aesthetic. Not performance. Not knowledge. Not anything. Only faith worked out in love.
So how can we grow in faith? The first and most important step is to take our eyes from ourselves and put them onto God. Only when we choose to centre our lives on the character, nature, size and stature of God will we grow in faith.
The bible calls this Fear of the Lord.
We need to learn it. We need to be schooled in the power and size of God, the same God who could crush the universe just by ceasing to will it into existence. This is the God we serve. He owes us nothing. We owe Him everything. We revolve around Him, not He around us.
Faith grows in this environment. We must repent of our self-obsession and offer our bodies to God for His use. We must tear down the biggest idol and obstacle we have in seeing God as who he is. Us. We have to learn to fear God again and to live with big visions and big expectations.
Friday 30 July 2010
Monday 26 July 2010
The many or the few
I see a disturbing pattern in the world today, which I believe is as prevalent in the Christian community as the ‘real world’. It’s an obsession. It’s the desire to impact the many, to make a big impact in the world. To start movements that will affect hundreds, thousands, even millions. For God, of course. For His glory. So that He might become famous.
Only it’s not that simple is it? Yes, we want God to be glorified, but we position things so that our name might be lifted up by association. He can have the starring role, but we will take the Oscar for supporting actor.
And so we seek to achieve our godly aims by ungodly means. Self-promotion and exaggeration through social media, coupled with gossip about what others are not doing as well as we are. Pushing ourselves forwards to opportunities that our characters are not strong enough to bear and pushing others down when they threaten us. How do I know all of this? Well, it’s in my heart too. It’s the sinful striving of the unrestrained human heart.
At the heart of the matter is, I believe, a misunderstanding regarding what matters most to God. We seem to think that God is into the big spectacle, the event, the mega-strategy and the big impact. But He’s not. That’s not the way He plays the game. Think about it, He appeared to an insignificant man called Abram and promised to make Him great. He continued that promise through a people who had nothing to call their own other than their relationship with Him. They were always closest to Him when they reveled in their insignificant place in His mighty plan. He appeared in flesh in Jesus. A small town carpenter born in a stable, who spent most of his public life homeless and on the run.
God doesn’t need our PR. He chooses to use us in His plan out of His grace, but He doesn’t need us and He never will. He is far more interested in seeing us be good to the few than trying to impact the many. That is one of the fundamental truths we can garner from Jesus’ own ministry. Yes, Jesus spoke to very large groups, but we gather that this was peripheral to His ministry. It wasn’t the centerpiece. The cornerstone was his interaction with a small group of people. That’s the lasting impact that he had on the earth.
“But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.” (1 Cor 1.27)
Yet we still trust in the outwardly wise thing, rather than choosing the simple and humble task of loving one another in small things. Why are we so fascinated with the big splash which we hope will affect the many, when He died an ignominious death after a lifetime set on impacting the few?
Why are we so focused on being significant people? We have forgotten that in striving for significance we are ruling ourselves out of the greatest plan there is, of being a small cog in the big wheel of God’s plan. It does not matter whether or not people (Christian or otherwise) know who we are. What matters is Jesus knows who we and approves of our work for him.
“Seek first my Kingdom”, Jesus says, “and all these things will be added unto you as well”. As we meet with Jesus all of our priorities are completely re-ordered and we see what truly matters once more.
Only it’s not that simple is it? Yes, we want God to be glorified, but we position things so that our name might be lifted up by association. He can have the starring role, but we will take the Oscar for supporting actor.
And so we seek to achieve our godly aims by ungodly means. Self-promotion and exaggeration through social media, coupled with gossip about what others are not doing as well as we are. Pushing ourselves forwards to opportunities that our characters are not strong enough to bear and pushing others down when they threaten us. How do I know all of this? Well, it’s in my heart too. It’s the sinful striving of the unrestrained human heart.
At the heart of the matter is, I believe, a misunderstanding regarding what matters most to God. We seem to think that God is into the big spectacle, the event, the mega-strategy and the big impact. But He’s not. That’s not the way He plays the game. Think about it, He appeared to an insignificant man called Abram and promised to make Him great. He continued that promise through a people who had nothing to call their own other than their relationship with Him. They were always closest to Him when they reveled in their insignificant place in His mighty plan. He appeared in flesh in Jesus. A small town carpenter born in a stable, who spent most of his public life homeless and on the run.
God doesn’t need our PR. He chooses to use us in His plan out of His grace, but He doesn’t need us and He never will. He is far more interested in seeing us be good to the few than trying to impact the many. That is one of the fundamental truths we can garner from Jesus’ own ministry. Yes, Jesus spoke to very large groups, but we gather that this was peripheral to His ministry. It wasn’t the centerpiece. The cornerstone was his interaction with a small group of people. That’s the lasting impact that he had on the earth.
“But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.” (1 Cor 1.27)
Yet we still trust in the outwardly wise thing, rather than choosing the simple and humble task of loving one another in small things. Why are we so fascinated with the big splash which we hope will affect the many, when He died an ignominious death after a lifetime set on impacting the few?
Why are we so focused on being significant people? We have forgotten that in striving for significance we are ruling ourselves out of the greatest plan there is, of being a small cog in the big wheel of God’s plan. It does not matter whether or not people (Christian or otherwise) know who we are. What matters is Jesus knows who we and approves of our work for him.
“Seek first my Kingdom”, Jesus says, “and all these things will be added unto you as well”. As we meet with Jesus all of our priorities are completely re-ordered and we see what truly matters once more.
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