If You Don't Like What Phil Said . . .

. . . you probably won’t like much of what Jesus has to say about sin either.  Go ahead, bash away without reading the rest if you want.  Won’t bother me a bit.

And just a head’s up: It’s gonna get graphic up in here shortly.  This is your warning.    

Here’s what got Phil in trouble with A&E:

"Start with homosexual behavior and just morph out from there. Bestiality, sleeping around with this woman and that woman and that woman and those men.  Don't be deceived. Neither the adulterers, the idolaters, the male prostitutes, the homosexual offenders, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers-they won't inherit the kingdom of God. Don't deceive yourself. It's not right."

If this bothers you, Jesus bothers you.  You might be mad at Phil.  But you’re also mad at Jesus because this is from His Word.    

Here are a few things that Jesus said that would get Him in trouble with A&E:

“But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” – Matthew 5:28

“This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.” – John 3:19-20

“He went on: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly.  All these evils come from inside and defile a person.” – Mark 7:20-23

You see, everybody likes the warm fuzzy Jesus.  But not too many people are comfortable with the holy Jesus.  The Jesus that tells the truth about sin.  The Jesus that tells the truth about what’s evil and what’s righteous.  The Jesus that calls sinners to repentance and says in John 14:6, “I am the way, the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.”  The Jesus who says in Matthew 7:13-14, “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.  But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”

Jesus came to save us from sin, reconcile us to the Father and adopt us as sons and daughters of heaven.  He came to make us holy, pure and righteous. 

Here’s our problem.  We don’t like to talk about how Jesus calls us to holiness and about the reality of the yuck factor of sin.  We want a Jesus who sanitizes and waters down the truth and longingly pats on the head and says, “It’s OK if you love things that defile you and kill you.”

Phil’s in trouble because he speaks candidly about what I call the yuck factor of sin.  In our culture’s attempts to silence the Gospel, our culture has tried to remove the yuck factor of sin.  More specifically, Phil’s in trouble because he talks about the yuck factor of sexual sin. 

"It seems like, to me, a vagina - as a man - would be more desirable than a man's anus. That's just me.  I'm just thinking: There's more there! She's got more to offer. I mean, come on, dudes! You know what I'm saying? But hey, sin: It's not logical, my man. It's just not logical."

Let’s be frank about gay sex for a minute.  God created us in his image.  He gave men penises and He gave women vaginas.  At creation, God tells Adam and Eve to enjoy sex with one another.  We were created to have pleasure from sex.  Just like everything else in creation, we’ve taken what God calls good and defiled it. 

Our culture wants us not just to tolerate, but to celebrate men sodomizing other men. Our culture wants us not just to tolerate, but to celebrate women putting foreign objects inside of other women.  Our culture wants us to say, “You know, I think it’s good and beautiful and wonderful for a man to stick his penis in the anus of another man.  I think it’s good and beautiful and wonderful for a man to take this organ that God gave him for procreation and recreation and stick it in the place of another man that was made to excrete waste that’s full of all kinds of toxins and bacteria.”

Are you disgusted by that?  Good!  You should be, because God is.  Sin has a yuck factor to it, and we shouldn’t try to sanitize it. 

Did you notice something else in what Phil said?  And what Jesus said?  And what the entire testimony of Scripture says?  It’s not just about sex.  It’s not just about gay sex.  It’s about all kinds of sin.

"Don't be deceived. Neither the adulterers, the idolaters, the male prostitutes, the homosexual offenders, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers-they won't inherit the kingdom of God. Don't deceive yourself. It's not right."

Idolatry, greed, drunkenness, slander and lying.

Scripture doesn’t discriminate against specific types of sin.  All of it has a yuck factor that we shouldn’t try to sanitize and rationalize.  But we want a God who rationalizes and excuses our sin.  We call this love.  But it isn’t love at all, at least in the way that God’s Word talks about love.  Love seeks to bring out the best in other people – holiness, purity and righteousness.  Love doesn’t turn a blind eye towards sin and bondage.  Love does something about it, and that’s what God has done for us through Jesus Christ!

And here’s why I don’t have a single problem with what Phil Robertson said; why I don’t feel any need to explain it away.  Phil Robertson’s been there.  He knows what it’s like to live far from Jesus.  He knows what it’s like to defile himself sexually.  He knows what it’s like to be a drunk, swindling, slanderous, greedy idolater.  He knows what it’s like to stand face to face with Jesus and be torn apart because of the gravity of our sin, and our hopelessness without repentance.  And he knows the reality of the power of Amazing Grace to save wretches like him and me. 

Even if you don’t have 26 minutes to watch the whole film, watch until the 8 minute mark and you’ll see:

The Good News of Jesus isn’t good at all until we all – me, Phil Robertson and you – come to the realization that we are sinners in need of a Savior.  It isn’t good at all until we realize the wretchedness of our sin and the beauty of what Jesus has done to reconcile us and make us whole.  It isn’t good at all until we realize Jesus did this for us. 

Phil Robertson said that in his interview with GQ, and goes to great lengths to talk about what this mean for him in the I Am Second video.  You probably didn’t catch this part of his interview with GQ:

"If you simply put your faith in Jesus coming down in flesh, through a human being, God becoming flesh living on the earth, dying on the cross for the sins of the world, being buried, and being raised from the dead-yours and mine and everybody else's problems will be solved. And the next time we see you, we will say: 'You are now a brother. Our brother.' So then we look at you totally different then.”

"We never, ever judge someone on who's going to heaven, hell. That's the Almighty's job. We just love 'em, give 'em the good news about Jesus - whether they're homosexuals, drunks, terrorists. We let God sort 'em out later."

God hates sin.  And God loves sinners.  Notice I didn’t say, “BUT God loves sinners.”  It’s not an either/or proposition.  It’s a both/and proposition.  Here’s what Jesus says about it in John 3:16&17: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.”

Jesus didn’t come to make bad people good or good people better.  He came to bring dead people back to life.  People who are spiritually dead because of our sin – all kinds of sin.  All throughout the Gospels, we see this.  In Luke 15, Jesus was criticized for spending time with “notorious sinners.” Jesus didn’t get crucified because He was a nice guy.  Jesus got crucified because He called people to repentance; claimed to have the power to forgive sins and turned the world upside down. 

I have loved Phil Robertson and what he stands for, and I still do.  Is he Jesus?  Absolutely not.  Is he infallible?  Absolutely not.  But he’s a brother in Christ that loves Jesus, loves people and believes that God’s put him in a position to share the truth of the Gospel.   

Look closely at the life of Phil Robertson.  Listen carefully to his words.  This is really what he's saying: "This is a true saying, and everyone should believe it: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners -- and I was the worst of them all." - 1 Timothy 1:15. 

He, like the Apostle Paul, isn’t “ . . . ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: ‘The righteous will live by faith.’"  - Romans 1:16&17

Don’t feel sorry for Phil.  I can’t imagine him wanting anybody to do that.  I have a suspicion that Phil is far more concerned about being faithful to Jesus than he is about pleasing a television network and tickling the ears of a culture bent on self-destruction.  Are we?  

What Does It Really Mean?

Although you might not guess it by looking at me, I do work out on a pretty consistent basis - Running long distance (I can hit 5 miles on most days) at a steady pace; running short distances at a more intense pace; lifting weights and doing some workouts on an x-box disc.  The reason it doesn’t show is because I often still eat too much.

But when I do exercise, I try to exercise to a point of near exhaustion.  Sometimes I just come in from a run and lay on the floor.  When I lift weights, I lift in my basement and when I’m done I’ll huff and puff and groan all the way up the steps.  And more often than not, my wife Jessie will ask, “You alright?” 

I’ve come to believe though that what she really wants to say, but doesn’t because she loves me, is “What the hell’s wrong with you?  If you’re gonna die, go do it somewhere else.”  I told her this once.  It didn’t go over so well, as you might imagine. 

Saying what you mean, and meaning what you say is pretty important to me.  Our culture values euphemism and tolerance over truth though, so that often feels like a losing battle to me.  Not something I really get worked up about too often. 

How about you?  Is authenticity and honesty important to you?  If it is, today’s reading from 1 John 5 has something vitally important to say to those of us who say that we love God.

In v.v. 3, John says this: “This is love for God: to obey his commands. “

In other words, when we say that we love God, it should actually mean something.  It should be revealed in the way that we live our lives.  John’s letters are all about the love of God for us and about how we live out our love for God.  Over and over and over again, John reminds us that the love of God actually means something beyond feelings and sentiment.  The love of God, as I talked abouthere, means that God demonstrated his love for us by sending His Son Jesus to save us from our sin; to reconcile us to our Father by adopting us into his family; and by promising us the incredible gift of eternal life in Heaven through His death and resurrection.

So when we say that we love God in return, it only makes sense that our actions would demonstrate that we love God.  I mentioned a few weeks ago in a sermon that it seems that many people, including myself more than I care to admit, don’t take obedience to God as seriously as we should.  We’re not passionate and focused on becoming like Jesus.  We’re not serious about the calling of Jesus to pursue righteousness and holiness in our personal lives and in our relationships with others.  Too often, we seek the lowest common denominator in regards to obedience to God.  We tend to be more focused on what we can get away with on our way to Heaven than we are about putting behind our past and living like sons and daughters of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. 

Verse 3 continues with these words: “And his commands are not burdensome.”  I think too often we think about what we can’t do, instead of what we have the privilege of being and doing when we’re in Christ.  

It reminds me of a girl named Shawna who was in my youth ministry many years ago.  She had a pretty rough home life, and things weren’t easy for her.  During her middle school years, she was saved by Jesus and really started experiencing some incredible transformation and healing in her life.  But by the time she got to high school, she was really struggling in her walk with Jesus.  There were some kids in our youth ministry who had trusted Jesus as their Lord and Savior who had never been baptized and wanted to be.  I encouraged Shawna to consider taking this step of obedience and to really go public with her faith. 

She was brutally honest with me, which made me weep for her, but which I also appreciated.  She told me that she didn’t want to make that commitment because she wasn’t ready to yet.  She wanted to smoke pot or drink when she wanted to.  She wanted the freedom to have sex with her boyfriend.  She wanted to live her life and experience all of these things.  She saw obedience to God as a burden that would rob her of her freedom to do these things.  At least she really said what she meant. 

Sadly, she was so confused.  What she though was freedom just increased the burden on her tender, bruised heart.  What she saw as a burden would really bring her freedom.  Although her story was kind of extreme, you and I are really no different when we balk at obedience to God because we see it as a burden, instead of the freedom it really is. 

V.4 says, “. . . for everyone born of God overcomes the world.  This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.”  Having victory over the sin in our lives, and overcoming temptation, is one of the greatest gifts that God gives us through Jesus.  While our struggles against sin and temptation might seem like a burden to us at the time, they are preparing us for victory and freedom. 

I love hearing victory stories of faith.  People who have overcome drug and alcohol addictions that were killing them.  Couples whose marriages have been healed and restored by Jesus.  Teenagers who battled depression and suicidal thoughts who understand the magnificent love of God for them and are walking with Him.  I could listen to and recount these stories for hours. 

But the common theme is this: these people loved God because they saw His love for them expressed in Jesus.  They realized that obedience to God born of their love for Him was not another burden in their lives, but was the path to the freedom and victory that God wants to birth in all of our hearts. 

Maybe your story isn’t quite as dramatic.  I know mine isn’t.  My struggles to be obedient to God seem mundane and even easy in light of many of the stories that I’ve been privileged to be a part of.  But when we say we love God, do we really mean it?  Is it revealed by our obedience to God’s commands as revealed in Scripture?  Is our faith merely an intellectual assent to the promises of God, or do we live as if we believe those promises? 

What does your love for God really mean for you?  Is it something that’s brought about transformation, victory and freedom in your life?  Or are you still looking for the lowest common denominator? 

Is There Anything Better Than This?

It’s deer season in Pennsylvania, one of my favorite times of the year!  It’s been even better last year and this year, now that my son Isaac is hunting.  I love experiencing deer season in a whole new way with him!

Last year, we hunted hard to get him a shot at his first deer.  After a week of close encounters, he shot a spike one evening after school and made a great shot on it!  It was one of the most thrilling moments of his life, and one of the most thrilling moments of my life.  It was even better than shooting my first deer.   

 

Hunting is one of a handful of things that I’m really passionate about, outside of my family and being a pastor.  I love to fish.  I love the Steelers.  I love watching my kids play sports.  I can be in the midst of doing any one of these things, and think to myself, “It doesn’t get much better than this.”  A lot of you can relate.  Whether it’s pursuing a hobby or passion; spending time with your family; or maybe even working at a job that you love and find to be very rewarding and fulfilling. 

But there is one thing that is better than any of the things in life that can bring us joy and pleasure.  And that is just knowing that we are loved by God!  In today’s reading from 1 John 3, the Apostle John begins the chapter with these words: “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us . . .”

We often don’t think about what a wonderful truth that is.  God’s love is often something I take for granted, and I bet most of you do as well.  In our pursuit of everything else we enjoy in life, we tend to forget this most basic and fundamental truth of our faith.  We are loved by God, and really, there’s nothing better than this!

Let’s get Greek for a minute.  The NIV translation completely misses an important word that appears in the Greek: Horao.  It should actually read, “See how great . . .”  And seeing here is far more than just a casual glance.  It means to perceive with the heart and mind; to meditate; and to deeply experience the thing that you are beholding.  In this case, it’s an invitation to drink deeply of the truth that God loves us.

As we continue on in verse 1, we see that it’s a love that he lavishes on us.  Lavish is such a powerful word.  It conjures up images of the finest things in life.  Things of great value and worth that are given or shared willingly with others.  Things that are absolutely incredible, but which we don’t deserve.  I don’t have many things in life that could be described as being lavish.  Not my house.  Not my car.  Not my clothes or possessions.  But God’s love for me is one of the lavish things that I do have.   And because of that, it’s the best thing that I have in my life.

God’s lavish love for us – a love that He invites us to perceive with our hearts and minds and to deeply experience – is far more than just a sentimental or excited feeling.  We live in a culture today that is very, very confused about what love really is.  Most of our cultural expressions of “love” are really lust.  Lust is self-serving and exciting.  Lust is fleeting and based on physical, tangible things like appearance and hormonal reactions in our bodies.  Love is self-sacrificing.  It can be exciting, but it also sustains and carries us through the mundane and even difficult times of life.  Love is enduring and eternal and is based on our worth as people who are created in His image.  

The love of God never stops and never quits!  When we are mired in sin and disobedience, the love of God pursues us!  When we walk through the darkest times in life, the love of God sustains us!  When we don't feel like loving God, he still loves us!  We most clearly and perfectly see the love of God for us in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  If you want to know what love looks like, look at Jesus. 

The love of God is magnified when we look at what remains of v.1: “. . . that we should be called children of God!”  The Biblical concept of being called something is deep.  Almost every name in the Biblical narrative has a deeper meaning that adds to the richness of the text.  And to be called a child of God is much deeper than being a biological child.  This means that in his great love for us, God has chosen us to receive a name that is borne of a great desire of His to be in relationship with us.  The entire testimony of Scripture – from Genesis through Revelation – makes a significant distinction between those who are children of God and those who are not.  The children of God – which is what we are when we have been reconciled to Him through Jesus Christ – are the special possession and heirs of the Father.  The children of God are the beloved of God. 

That’s pretty deep and cranial for a blog post but God has declared that this truth is something that we should meditate on and consider deep within our being.  As we wrestle with this wonderful truth, it just makes me wonder, “Is there anything better than this?”  Really.  Is there anything better than knowing deep in my heart and mind that God not only loves me but has chosen me for a relationship with Him?  Is there anything better than knowing that in His love, God sent Jesus to save me and to give me eternal life?  And remember, eternal life isn’t just life that starts when we die.  It’s a new life that begins the moment that we put our faith in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. 

Charles Spurgeon was one of the greatest preachers in history, and his writings and sermons demonstrate a deep and rich awareness of the truth of 1 John 3:1.   Yesterday, on a Facebook page devoted to sharing hisquotes, this was shared: "Surely there is no greater comfort under Heaven than a sense of sin forgiven and of reconciliation to God by the death of His Son!"

There’s nothing better than this! 

As you consider this, I’d invite you to consider what you’re pursuing today in your life.  Where’s your focus?  How are you spending your time?  How are you spending your money?  What consumes your thoughts and the deep places of your heart?  Is it something that’s really better than the love of God? 

It doesn’t mean that we quit life and go live in a desert.  But it does mean that as we live our lives that we always keep the love of God for us at the forefront of what we do and our thoughts about ourselves and others.  The remainder of 1 John 3 in a nutshell is this: Live like you believe that there’s nothing better than this!  As we focus on God’s love, we focus on becoming like Jesus.  As we focus on God’s love, we have a desire to purify ourselves.  As we focus on God’s love, we focus on the fact that when we sin, we can be forgiven.  As we focus on God’s love, we focus our desires on what pleases God.  And as we focus on God’s love, we focus on loving others and helping them to know this great truth: There really is nothing better than God’s love for us. 

Don't Just Kill 'Em With Kindness

If you have a pulse you’ve been hurt by somebody in your life.  All of us have.  For some of us, the hurt happened in our homes growing up; through words or action, or even inaction.  For others the hurt began in our pre-teen years with the words of bullies or people that we thought were our friends.  As we’ve grown into adulthood, we’ve been hurt and betrayed in ways too numerous to count. 

Hurt can linger in our hearts for years, decades or even a lifetime.  I know that the hurt in my own life bubbles up from time to time, resulting in anger and resentment and can leave me reeling with feelings of self-loathing because I believe the words of the ones who have hurt me. 

One of the ways that many of us have been taught to deal with people that hurt us or offend us is to kill them with kindness.  We’ve all had that co-worker, neighbor or acquaintance that always makes our blood pressure rise when they walk into the room.  And we’re told to rise above it, put on a happy face and to be sickly-sweet in their presence, as if that will change them for good.  To some degree, this can work in our favor, but it’s not a complete picture of what we’re called to do as followers of Jesus. 

In today’s reading from 1 Peter 3, God’s word says this in v.v. 8-11: “Finally, all of you, live in harmony with one another; be sympathetic, love as brothers, be compassionate and humble.  Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult, but with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing.  For, "Whoever would love life and see good days must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from deceitful speech.  He must turn from evil and do good; he must seek peace and pursue it.”

So what does all of this mean?  How is it somehow better than just killing ‘em with kindness?  I’m glad you asked.

V.8 paints a picture of an important reality in life.  Not everybody is going to be just like us.  To live in harmony means that we realize that we’re all different.  Harmony in music is achieved when different notes of music are played or sung at the same time and yet produce a beautiful sound.  We’ve got to learn to harmonize our lives with the people around us that are different than we are and realize that there can be beauty in that as we learn to live, work or play together, and ultimately be in life-giving relationships with them. 

Sympathy, love, compassion and humility are rare characteristics in our culture today, and characteristics that only come about in our lives when we’re rooted in the love of Jesus.  This is far more than just killing ‘em with kindness.  When we kill others with kindness, we’re doing something on a superficial level while harboring feelings of resentment or even hatred.  Sympathy, love, compassion and humility require an all in, radical abandonment of our desire to get even.   

As we seek to live like Jesus, there’s no room in our lives for retaliation, sarcasm and getting even – which, really, is at the root of killing someone with kindness.  These are the ways of the world and not the ways of the Kingdom of Heaven.  The relational priorities of God’s Kingdom are magnified for us when we look at the sympathy, love, compassion and humility of Jesus. 

Imagine if instead of radically abandoning everything to reconcile us to God, Jesus came instead to kill us with kindness.   What would that mean for us?  It would mean that we’re still dead in our sin, because the cross goes far beyond killing us with kindness.  It would mean that we’re still enemies of God and not reconciled to him through the blood of Jesus.  It would mean that there’s no healing of the deep scars in our own hearts.  We would still be lost people, wondering and wandering in our sin and brokenness. 

In v.11 God’s Word tells us that we “. . . must seek peace and pursue it.”  Doing this isn’t easy.  And it isn’t fun.  It wasn’t for Jesus, and it won’t be for us.  I’ll admit this: I like to live with a chip on my shoulder and a “screw you” kind of attitude.  During my time in Colorado last week (which I wrote about here), I was confronted with this reality.  I’ve experienced some deep emotional and spiritual hurt and pain in my life over the last 10 years that I didn’t realize had so deeply scarred my heart and mind.  Too much of the past 5 years of my life and ministry have been spent insulating myself from people so that they can’t hurt me and living with a chip on my shoulder and a screw-you attitude.  Because I haven’t sought and pursued peace, I’ve pushed the hurt deeper and deeper and it’s messed me up! 

Sometimes we don’t have the opportunity – and sometimes we shouldn’t even try to create the opportunity – to seek peace and pursue it.  Being hurt by careless words and actions is not the same as being hurt and destroyed by intentional physical, sexual or verbal abuse.  I’m not suggesting that we should pursue face-to-face peace and reconciliation in those situations.  Sometimes our pursuit of peace has to come from a distance, and only from the deepest reservoirs of the grace of Jesus in our hearts. 

But sometimes, as followers of Jesus, it’s good and right and healing to go back to some of those people that have hurt us as we seek to “turn from evil and do good.” (v.11).  In The Message, a paraphrase of the Bible, it says in v.13, “If with heart and soul you're doing good, do you think you can be stopped?”

God is honored and Jesus is glorified and magnified when we seek to do good in our relationships by pursuing peace and reconciliation.  Three of the most powerful words that a person can hear are, “I forgive you.”  Think of what it meant in your own life when you really believed that God, through Jesus Christ, forgives your sins and wipes away your past.  How healing was that for you?  How freeing was that for you?  How beautiful was that for you?

Think of what that could mean for the people in your life that have hurt or wounded you.  Killing them with kindness won’t heal them.  It won’t free them.  And it won’t show them the beauty of Jesus.  But pursuing peace and reconciliation with them will. 

I'm Not Home Yet

Last week my wife Jessie and I had the incredible opportunity to spend 3 ½ days at The PottersInn at Aspen Ridge outside of Colorado Springs with 4 other couples from around the US at a Pastor and Spouse Retreat.  We tacked on an extra day of rest and relaxation at the beginning of the week, and neither of us realized quite how much we needed all of it! 

There is an incredible beauty about the Rocky Mountains that I can’t even begin to explain or comprehend.  For those of us who have spent the majority of our lives in the eastern 2/3 of the US, we can’t really even begin to imagine it until we’ve been there.  This was my fourth trip to Colorado, and here’s what I particularly noticed this time:

·      Although oxygen is a little bit tougher to come by at 9,500 feet in elevation, the air is so clean and crisp.  When you ascend a flight of stairs or walk a hill, the burning in your lungs almost feels good.  It reminded me that every breath we take is a gift from God. 

·      Here in Western PA, I’ve heard that 75% of the days throughout the year are cloudy or overcast.  I don’t know if that’s true, but it sure feels like that for most of the days from November through March.  In Colorado, it seems that the sun is always shining, and despite the chill of being at elevation and the wind, the sunshine is always warm and inviting.  It reminded me that even in times of darkness and gloom, that the light of Jesus is always waiting to burst forth.

·      The terrain around Colorado Springs is a study in contrasts.  In the high plains at the foot of the Rockies, when you look to the east, everything is drab – tans, browns, olives, and muted greens.  Even most of the buildings and houses are built to blend in.  It’s funny to see familiar franchises – McDonalds, Starbucks and Walmart – that are built to blend in to their surroundings.  At the Potters Inn, we were in the shadow of the snow dusted Pikes Peak and could see the stunning snow covered Sangre de Christo mountains to the south.  The evergreen forests were a deep, rich green.  From one of our vantage points on a hike to The Crags in Pike National Forest, we could look out over the landscape and see three of the most shimmering, crystal blue reservoirs that I’ve ever seen.  It reminded me that even in the wilderness when most things seem dead and hopeless, that there is abundant, beautiful life all around.

Our time in Colorado last week was incredible.  It was incredibly refreshing and rejuvenating from a physical standpoint.  How wonderful and beautiful it was to spend 4 days alone with my wife away from our kids and to reconnect in ways we haven’t connected in years.  As parents with kids who are 12, 10 and 3, physical rest and times of peace and solitude are at a premium.  We had permission to rest physically, mentally and spiritually.

But our retreat also included some intense, even exhausting work, in our own hearts and minds and in our relationship as a husband and wife.  It was work that otherwise probably wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t made the commitment to get away from home and our kids for a few days. 

Despite being absolutely amazed by my surroundings, each time I’ve visited Colorado, Colorado has never felt like home to me.  I’ve always enjoyed my time there, but it’s never felt like home.  As we boarded our flight from Denver to Pittsburgh last Friday night, I knew that I was going home and I was looking forward to it.

One of the greatest challenges of our faith journey with Jesus is learning how to take what we’ve experienced in those deep, life-changing, mountain top experiences with God and to live them out in our daily lives.  In today’s reading from 1 Peter 1 in our Daily New Testament Reading Plan, the Apostle Peter talks about this in the first chapter of his first letter.  He begins his letter with this salutation in v.1: “. . . To God’s elect, strangers in the world, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia Bithynia . . .”

As followers of Jesus, we’ve always got to remember that we’re not home yet.  As people “who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ . . . (v.2),” we are strangers in the land in which we live. 

In the days since I’ve been home from Colorado, I’ve had a deep longing to go back.  Not to live there, but to drink in more of what I was experiencing in my journey with Jesus in a place and time that wasn’t cluttered with the demands of daily life.  It’s certainly not a complaint because I’m blessed to be able to do the things I do and live the life I live, but there is a longing to escape again and to just be still and quiet with God.  It’s good to be on the mountain top – literally and metaphorically – because that’s what we’re made for.  That’s when we’re most alive and aware of the transforming work that God needs to do in our lives. 

But that’s not where most of us live.  We live in the Pontuses, the Galatias, the Cappadocias, the Asias and the Bithynias.  We live in places and have demands in our lives that constantly remind us of the fact that even though this might be home on earth, this is not the home that we were created for.  Although we don’t get to live on the mountain top, the grace and majesty of God that we experience there helps us to navigate the daily grind of our lives.

One thing that Scripture always promises to followers of Jesus is this: we will have trials and face problems in life.  Peter says so in v.6.   But look at God’s promise to us in v.7.  “These (trials) have come so that your faith – of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire – may be prove genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.”

Our faith in our daily life is a precious gift – more precious and of greater worth than gold.  Realizing that we’re not home yet and that we’re not yet all that God has created us to be, is an exercise in faith building.  One of the deepest things I learned in Colorado last week is that I still have a long way to go in believing and living out the promises of God in my life in every area of my life – as a follower of Jesus, as a husband, as a dad, as a friend and as a pastor. 

There are days when I hate the fact that I’m not home yet.  I hate the fact that I’m a stranger in a strange land.  And yet as I endure the process of becoming like Jesus and being transformed, my hope is in Jesus and what I have in him – new life because of his resurrection; the riches of heaven as an heir of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords; the power of God that shields my life; and the joy that I can have in all of these things (v.v. 4-6). 

As you and I struggle to live this life and to become like Jesus, we have incredible hope as we journey towards our heavenly home.  Jesus isn’t an escape from this life, and isn’t an escape from our trials and problems.  The power of Jesus at work in us transforms us as we long to be home.  As Rick Warren once said, the power of Jesus at work in us turns our test into a testimony; our mess into a message and our misery into a ministry.  This is what it means to live as strangers in a strange land longing to be home while we hold onto the hope that we have in Jesus. 

The Supremacy of Jesus

If you’re friends with me on Facebook, you probably saw something I posted earlier this morning.  There has been an article making the rounds for the past few days called, “Marriage Isn’t For You.”  It’s good.  It’s nice.  It points us in the right direction.  But for me, it’s really just kind of ho hum.  In my post, I shared Ephesians 5:22-28 and said that it’s much bigger, better and beautiful than the article that’s been going around.

Why?  Some might say I’m a killjoy or curmudgeon.  Many that know me would say you’d be right on the curmudgeon part.  But it’s because I believe that the way of Jesus – which is the way of the Word of God – is far superior to some words written by a mere man about not being selfish in marriage.  Ephesians 5:22-28 is far superior to “Marriage Isn’t For You” because Ephesians 5:22-28, and the entirety of Scripture, is about Jesus and his supremacy and superiority over everything.

Today’s reading from Hebrews 8 continues on with the overarching theme of Hebrews in laying out the supremacy of Jesus.   The focus today in this chapter is about the supremacy of the priesthood of Jesus. 

Hebrews was written to a group of Jews who had become Christians.  Shocking, I know, especially given the name of the letter.  We see throughout Hebrews that God is providing instruction to these people, and to us today, about the efficacy of the priesthood of Jesus and how it is far superior to the Levitical priesthood established under the Old Covenant in the Old Testament. 

Verse 1 establishes the fact that the priesthood of Jesus is superior because he is a priest ministering on our behalf in the throne room of heaven, at the right hand of God.  This is great news for us today, just as it was for this group of Jewish Christians nearly 2,000 years ago.  Many followers of Jesus today have a limited understanding of how atonement for sin was accomplished in the Old Testament under the Old Covenant that God established with his people through the prophet Moses. 

Because God is perfectly holy and righteous, He cannot tolerate sin.  To be in right relationship with God requires atonement for sin, and under the Old Covenant, God demanded a blood sacrifice for the forgiveness of sin.  The demand of a blood sacrifice for sin is an incredible picture of the reality of sin in our lives – sin leads to death.  Through the sin of Adam and Eve, sin brought the punishment of physical death for the human race.  And sin also brings with it the punishment of spiritual death in our separation from God.

Under the Old Covenant, priests were continually offering sacrifices on behalf of the people of God.  The book of Leviticus prescribes many different types of sacrifices for different types of sin, many of which required that the blood of perfect animals be offered as atonement for sin. 

I don’t know if you’ve ever killed and cut open an animal before.  As a hunter, I have many times.  It’s messy.  It stinks.  It’s labor intensive with an animal as big as a deer.  This was life for the Israelites.  Day after day.  Week after week.  Month after month.  Year after year.  It was a never ending process.

And what made it all the more difficult was that many of these sacrifices were required to be offered by a priest who was a sinful and broken as the people for whom he offered the sacrifice. 

I would imagine that for the people and for the priests, the process of offering sacrifices caused a lot of anxiety and fear.  Is my animal perfect?  Did I offer the right sacrifice for the right sin?  Are there any sins I forgot to make sacrifices for?  Am I offering this sacrifice with a clean heart and clean hands?  Will God accept my sacrifice and offering?

All of these things – the process, the doubt, the never-ending nature of offering sacrifices – point to the supremacy of Jesus as our Great High Priest.  John the Baptist called Jesus “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”  Jesus not only stepped into the role of priest and performed the function perfectly, but he was – and still is – the only perfect sacrifice that has ever been made for sin. 

V.3 tells us that, “Every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices, and so it was necessary for this one also to have something to offer.”  What Jesus offered was Himself.  On our behalf.  Because he loves us and wants to free us eternally from the punishment of sin.  This is why, “. . . the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is the mediator is superior to the old one, and it is founded on better promises.” 

What does it mean for us?

It’s a matter of the heart.  Verse 10 tells us this. “This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

Our right standing with God happens when our hearts and minds are made new by the power of Jesus and the supremacy of his sacrifice for our sin. It means that Jesus is all that we need to be made right with God, and to experience forgiveness that is full and complete and eternal.  Our forgiveness and our right standing with God come through Jesus and Jesus alone.  No priest or pastor makes us right with God.  No ritual or ceremony makes us right with God.  Good works and being a good person don’t make us right with God.  Only the sacrifice of Jesus, and trusting fully in that sacrifice make us right with God.

In a culture whose highest virtue and value is tolerance, what God’s Word teaches us is dangerous and world-tilting.  Jesus is our only hope.  Jesus is our only salvation.  Jesus is the only way to be made right with God.  This is the supremacy of Jesus.    

Icing and Sprinkles

Wow, realized this morning it’s been over a month since I’ve written anything here.  So to those of you who appreciate this blog, my apologies.  Good to be back at this today, and to wrestle with God’s Word.

So, one of the things I look forward to every week is hanging out with the teens from our church during ALIVE Teens, which we host at our house on Wednesday nights.  Last night was our Costume Party and our ALIVE Teens Director Julie had a great lesson planned in conjunction with this.

She made a bunch of cupcakes – half of them were iced and half of them weren’t – and offered them to the kids.  The iced ones were beautiful – orange icing with little bat and pumpkin shaped sprinkles.  The un-iced ones weren’t beuatiful.  Just plain, drab vanilla cupcakes.  Of course most of the kids went for the iced ones.

But Julie had baked cotton balls into the iced cupcakes.  It was really funny to watch the kids take these huge bites of cupcakes and cotton balls and get these awkward looks on their faces.  And of course, Julie, being the awesome person that she is had a jar of frosting and another batch of cupcakes for the kids.

Her lesson in all of this was based on 1 Samuel 16:7 and how the attitude of our hearts is much more important to God than our outside appearances.  I think that this is also a great illustration of one of the truths that we find in today’s reading from Hebrews5, which begins by talking about the supremacy of the priesthood of Jesus for our salvation and ends in v.v. 11-14 by exhorting us to take our growth and transformation seriously.

We don’t know for certain which human author The Holy Spirit worked through to pen the book of Hebrews, but we do know that the author was writing to a group of Christians who were struggling with grasping the basics of the faith and taking their faith seriously as we see in v.11:  “. . . you are slow to learn.”  V.12 certainly seems to be written with an air of exasperation, when the writer says, “In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again.  You need milk, not solid food!”

The issue for this audience ultimately was about their lack of commitment to training themselves to distinguish good from evil.  Like the kids at youth group last night choosing the fancy, iced cupcakes, many followers of Jesus make superficial decisions because we haven’t taken seriously the calling of Jesus to live lives that are marked by inward transformation of our hearts and minds.  V.14 says, “But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.” 

When you’re faced with a situation in life, are you grown up enough to think through the consequences of the decision you make regarding that situation?  Are you drawn to shiny, pretty things like icing and sprinkles that offer fleeting, carnal satisfaction or are you a Christian that has studied God’s Word, prayed through the situation and is able to think through the consequences of how you react in the situation?  Have you used the tools of Scripture study, prayer and fellowship with other believers to train yourself to think like Jesus? 

One of the most disheartening things for me as a pastor that cares deeply about the people that God has called me to lead is seeing people who just don’t care about their transformation.  It’s sad to me to see saints who have been incredibly faithful for a season of life all of a sudden quit caring about transformation and honoring God and continuing to grow and mature.  I think it breaks God’s heart as well.

In my decade plus of ministry to teens and adults, I’ve come to hate apathy.  And really, this is what v.v. 11-15 are about.  Apathy is the greatest danger to my own faith journey.  When I’m apathetic about my own growth and transformation, I’m impotent to do the things that God has called me to do.  I hate when I get apathetic about my growth.  When you’re apathetic about your own growth and transformation, you’re impotent to do the things that God has called you to do. 

When we’ve decided to follow Jesus, our lives are about so much more than icing and sprinkles.  Our lives are not about what’s easy and what brings us the most pleasure.  Our lives are about dying to ourselves; learning to hate evil and sin and to love righteousness and holiness; and living for the Kingdom of God.  Sometimes, like the plain, drab, un-iced cupcakes that the Jesus life seems mundane and boring.  Sometimes, it means enduring hardship and suffering as God refines us and our priorities.  Sometimes, it means leaving relationships that are look beautiful on the surface but toxic to our hearts as we pursue holiness and righteousness. 

What are you choosing in your life right now? Are you apathetic about the condition of your heart and mind?  Are you missing out on opportunities to honor God and grow His Kingdom because you’re enamored with the icing and sprinkles?  Are you having an impact on the people that God has placed in your life, or are you impotent because of your apathy?