Category: Uncategorized

Lay your burdens down

Although I am often named by some as a prayer intercessor, I don’t necessarily identify myself as one.

    As believers in Jesus Christ we are all called to pray to God on behalf of others. Jesus was a man of prayer. He not only instructed and urged His followers to pray (Matthew 6:6), but he also provided assurance that prayers “in His name” would be answered (John 14;13-14).

     So, if a prayer intercessor is someone who takes seriously Jesus’ call to pray, cares about others, and believes that prayer in the name of Jesus will be answered, then I am more apt to see myself in the moniker.

     This basic, but important, description of a prayer intercessor shouldn’t mask the fact that there is a vast array of approaches to prayer. This is as different as each person who has ever knelt, folded their hands, or bowed their head in prayer.

     For me, this means tapping into the heart of God by first getting honest with Him about the condition of my own heart.

     I recently drove to one of my favorite “seeking God in prayer” spots not too far from my home. I was feeling burdened from an unknown source. My experience with this feeling told me that it could be about something inside me or it could be about someone else’s needs.

     As it turned out, I was the one who needed a burden lifted. In this special place, alone with the One I trust and love most, the words and emotion spilled out regarding several troubling situations and individuals I had encountered in recent weeks and months.

    I was delighted to discover that I had only to open my mouth to find relief. I honestly acknowledged that things were not as good they should be and confidently declared, from a God-centered perspective, what exactly I thought would make things better. It felt gloriously freeing to give the burden to God. I let it go. The peace was heavenly.

    Then a thought came to mind about a past, extremely troubling time when I had cried out in anguish and desperation to God in prayer. In the midst of my prayer, I recalled feeling a gentle nudge to stop praying in this way. I got a sense that the emotional intensity of my prayer was “too deep, too dark, too extreme” for my physical body to handle. This prayer had the potential of actually causing me physical harm.

     So, I stopped praying in that heightened emotional way. I still kept the reality of my situation in mind but changed my perspective to include the truth from Psalm 23:6 “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.”

     A tangible shift happened when I gave God the burden I was carrying. I felt a release from significant stress. My body relaxed. My breathing lightened. This was God meeting my immediate need (both spiritual and physical) to be at peace.

     Science tells us that our bodies are negatively affected when we are stressed. This physical fact and Jesus’ consistent “Shalom” message during His public ministry years should leave us with the understanding that seeking peace, even in the midst of intense prayer and intercession is God’s most excellent way.

     When Jesus said, “my yoke is easy and my burden is light” He was teaching us an important lesson. When it comes to the weight of all that ails mankind, only He can bear it.

     Our part is to come alongside Him from time-to-time to see what He sees, love what He loves, and feel what He feels, but all the while allowing Him to do the heavy lifting.

     So, come to Jesus all you who are weary and you will find rest!

Live in God’s Kingdom

     It seems that the differences between the kingdom of the world and the Kingdom of God are becoming more and more distinct. It would be a mistake to think that this is just a sign of the modern times. In fact, these two kingdoms (clearly delineated by Jesus in John 18:36) have always been, are, and will always be exact opposites.

     If you want to know what the Kingdom of God is like; take the kingdom of the world and turn it upside down and inside out. Jesus went to great lengths during His public ministry to make this truth known so that His followers would understand that there is a difference in which one they choose to live. This was the point of John 15:19 where Jesus said “If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” And then Paul reinforced this in 1 John 2:15-17:  “Do not love the world or the things in the world. The love of the Father is not in those who love the world;  for all that is in the world—the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, the pride in riches—comes not from the Father but from the world. And the world and its desire are passing away, but those who do the will of God live forever.”
     The following is how Greg Boyd, author of the Myth of a Christian Nation, describes the differences:
     The kingdom of God looks and acts like Jesus Christ, like Calvary, like God’s eternal, triune love. It consists of people graciously embracing others and sacrificing themselves in service to others. It consists of people trusting and employing “power under” rather than “power over,” even when they, like Jesus, suffer because of this. It consists of people imitating the Savior who died for them and for all people. It consists of people submitting to God’s rule and doing his will. By definition, this is the domain in which God is king.

     Jesus’ kingdom is “not of this world,” for it contrasts with the kingdom of the world in every possible way. This is not a simple contrast between good and evil. The contrast is rather between two fundamentally different ways of doing life, two fundamentally different mindsets and belief systems, two fundamentally different loyalties. Here are five ways that it is different:

  1. A contrast of trusts: The kingdom of the world trusts the power of the sword, while the kingdom of God trusts the power of the cross, which is radical forgiveness (ital. added by blog authors). The kingdom of the world advances by exercising “power over,” while the kingdom of God advances by exercising “power under.”
  2. A contrast of aims: The kingdom of the world seeks to control behavior, while the kingdom of God seeks to transform lives from the inside out. Also, the kingdom of the world is rooted in preserving, if not advancing, one’s self-interests and one’s own will, while the kingdom of God is centered exclusively on carrying out God’s will, even if this requires sacrificing one’s own interests.
  3. A contrast of scopes: The kingdom of the world is intrinsically tribal in nature, and is heavily invested in defending, if not advancing, one’s own people-group, one’s nation, one’s ethnicity, one’s state, one’s religion, one’s ideologies, or one’s political agendas. That is why it is a kingdom characterized by perpetual conflict. The kingdom of God, however, is intrinsically universal, for it is centered on simply loving as God loves. It is centered on people living for the sole purpose of replicating the love of Jesus Christ to all people at all times in all places without condition.
  4. A contrast of responses: The kingdom of the world is intrinsically a tit-for-tat kingdom; its motto is “eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” In this fallen world, no version of the kingdom of the world can survive for long by loving its enemies and blessing those who persecute it; it carries the sword, not the cross. But kingdom-of-God participants carry the cross, not the sword. We, thus, aren’t ever to return evil with evil, violence with violence. We are rather to manifest the unique kingdom of Christ by returning evil with good, turning the other cheek, going the second mile, loving, praying for our enemies. Far from seeking retaliation, we seek the well-being of our “enemy.”
  5. A contrast of battles: The kingdom of the world has earthly enemies and, thus, fights earthly battles; the kingdom of God, however, by definition has no earthly enemies, for its disciples are committed to loving “their enemies,” thereby treating them as friends, their “neighbors.” There is a warfare the kingdom of God is involved in, but it is “not against enemies of blood and flesh.” It is rather “against rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” (Eph 6:12).
     This is not to say that Christians are called out of the world. In fact, again, just the opposite is true; we are called into the world to bring light by exclusively employing the culture, power and rules of God’s Kingdom.
     And what is the culture, power and rules of God’s Kingdom? Paul spells this out in Romans 14:17, “For the Kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.”
     Also, the word “righteousness” in this scripture passage is quite different than the meaning the world would assign to it. In the Kingdom of God righteousness is a matter of following the inward law of conscience (Romans 2:14); in the kingdom of the world righteous is measured by how much one aligns with the outward law of prohibition. The righteousness of the Kingdom of God is integrity, virtue, purity of life, uprightness, and  thinking, feeling, and acting that lines up with God’s character and nature.
     As citizens of the Kingdom of God, the challenge is to remain open to the voice of the Holy Spirit regarding what we think, how we engage others, and what motivates us.  If Christians persist in trying to live in two kingdoms, their actions will mask the truth that the world has a Savior who gives “hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:11).”
     We propose the idea that God’s pure love, which is the basis of His Kingdom, is difficult to reject. Will Kingdom of God citizens be rejected by the world if they are living according to the love of God? Who would ever consider the message of God’s love bad news?
     In the story of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32), the only unhappy person remaining by end of the story was the son who lived on the generous father’s property and didn’t think his brother deserved to be welcomed back home and treated like a prince. Imagine if the father would have sent his obedient hard working son, to meet his brother at the gates of the city. What would he have said to his brother? What would we say to him? What would you have said to him?
     Are we acting like worldly gatekeepers or like ambassadors of God  “who so loved the world that He gave His only Son” (John 3:16)

 

Our God doesn’t hate

Jesus instructed in Luke 14:26,  “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”

Trying to reconcile this statement with the nature and character of the same Lord who extends unconditional and abundant grace, forgiveness and mercy should be problematic for most Christians. What? Jesus wants us to hate our family members, our loved ones, and ourselves? 

The good news is that the problem is not routed in any inconsistency having to do with the nature and character of our God but in the understanding of the ancient meaning of the Hebrew word pronounced “soneh.” This is the word in the original text translated in the passage in most Bibles as “hate.” The problem is also routed in our tendency to make Jesus into our own image. We are the ones who hate. God does not hate. God is love.

This same word, “soneh,” is translated as “hated” in Malachi 1:3, “but Esau I have hated.”

According to Dr. Eli Lizorkin-Eyzenberg, president of Israel Bible Center, the correct translation of the ancient Hebrew word “soneh” is closest to “preference” and, as is the case throughout the old testament, needs to be understood in context with the people and times in which the word was spoken.

For instance, God greatly blessed Esau (Gen.33:9) and even warned the Israelites not to attack the sons of Esau or risk the withdrawal of His protection from them (Deut.2:4-6).

“In fact, the Torah narrative is developed in such a way that anyone hearing the story of the stolen blessing and Jacob’s deception of the blind-elderly Isaac would sympathize with Esau instead of Jacob,” writes Dr. Lizorkin-Eysenberg in Israel Bible Weekly. “There is no question that God loved Jacob with His covenantal love (a different kind of love and care than he had for Esau) but He did not ‘hate’ Esau.”

And didn’t Jesus say that one of the two greatest commandments is to love your neighbor as you love yourself? As someone said lately, “You hate yourself? Look out neighbor!”

In our human fumbling around to correctly capture the true essence of God, any current translation of the word “soneh” seems to miss the mark. It is obvious that “hate,” as the word is understood today, is completely wrong but even “preference” is difficult to reconcile to the all-loving character and nature of God.

It is troublesome to say that God has a preference for one over another. After all, Paul made it clear in Galations 3:28, “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”

This word “soneh” might be better understood in line of how much we are interested in opening ourselves to God’s ideal order and to what degree are we receptive to and a conduit of God’s love. Esau must have felt less loved by God but looking at the story through the lens of Jesus, we would probably agree that the first born blessing system was what the Israelites had created back then. This is likely rooted in the pagan tradition of sacrificing your firstborn in hopes of earning divine favor, but God had settled that ritual with Abraham and Isaac. That didn’t change the belief however that there is something special about the firstborn that makes “him” superior to any succeeding brothers or sisters. But, in reality, this human-contrived first-born system didn’t and couldn’t diminish God’s love for any one.

Applying the word “soneh” and the translation as “preference,” however, is more accurate in the passage in Malachi 2:16 about our covenantal God “hating” divorce, which is a breaking of covenant. It would seem that our actions can and do have a measure of God’s best, second best, etc. to them.

In this passage, God prefers covenant keeping over covenant breaking. However, divorcing an abusive spouse is quite different than divorcing because someone has fallen in love with someone else. These are both covenant breaking actions but they have different levels of acceptability in both the spiritual (Kingdom) and physical (world). But even in this example of God “hating” something, it is us and our lack of love that is the problem not God’s.

God’s love for His creation is constant and consistent. He can’t love us any greater and He won’t love us less.

For what other reason, than that it would sink in once and for all, does the Holy Spirit inspire a dear 80-something pastor’s widow to frequently recite these words, “God loves us when we’re right and when we’re wrong. He loves us when we’re weak and when we’re strong. He’ll never ever change, He’ll always be the same? Because God is God and He IS LOVE.” 

Perhaps what it really comes down to is whether or not we trust God, assume the best about Him and His ways, know that his intentions toward us are always good, and that His “preferences” are about His most excellent plans and purpose and not about His affection for us.