Coming in Humility

bringing good news of great joy

"Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son,"  Hebrews 1:1-2a

"Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel"  Matthew 1:23

"And this will be a sign for you:  you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger."  Luke 2:12

If you were God and you wanted to speak to wayward and faithless people through your son, how would you go about it?  Our human wisdom would send someone clothed in signs of Authority and Glory to command their attention and respect.  But God sent his Son as a newborn child, as weak and vulnerable as human beings can be.  The son's paternity was surrounded by scandal -- and his first place to sleep was a feeding trough in a barn.  Where we would make a big deal, God provided His Son with an incredibly humble beginning.

We know that all through his life, Jesus experienced the humiliation of rejection and the disrespect of religious leaders who tried to discredit and entrap him.  It culminated with the humiliation of the Cross.  Where we try for recognition and significance, Jesus allowed himself to be misunderstood and denigrated.

"all things were made through him..."  Glorious!

God has been speaking to me about this lately by uncovering pride.  He has done this by allowing me to see how angry I can become when I feel dominated.  No one wants to feel inferior or stepped on, of course, but I know (at least in my head) that no one can make me feel that way unless I let them.

When I was wrestling with these feelings in a recent situation, I was reminded that comparison and competition for approval or recognition are signs of striving for a sense of significance once again.  We are created to be significant, not to gain adulation, but to bring something really important and unique to our portion of the world.  But this God given purpose can get so distorted by sin.  The truth is, each one of us is significant because of who God made us to be and because the Spirit of Jesus Christ lives in and through us.  No one can take that away.

it wasn't like our romanticized nativity scenes...

But God had something more to show me!  He reminded me that Jesus laid down all outward evidence of his true significance - his divinity, his glory, his rightful power, in order to be a servant of God's redeeming purpose.  He led me to remember Philippians 2 where I eagerly read:  "Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves....Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men." ( verses 3; 5-7 italics mine)

"Where is he who is born king of the Jews?"

What a lovely time to be thinking about the humility of Jesus as we approach our celebration of His birth.  We now know that it was a magnificent day when Mary laid him in the manger and the heavenly hosts sang to the shepherds in the fields; when the Spirit called wise and learned kings to find him.  Isn't it astounding that these men traveled for many weeks certain that it was their privilege to bring gifts and to worship this child?  We appreciate all this now, but it was mostly hidden then.  There must have been times when Mary and Joseph needed all their faith to remember that the plans and purposes of God Himself were interwoven with their hardships.

It helps me a lot to think that this humble mind of Jesus is ours as well in Him.  Our significance is not measured in earthly terms, but in heavenly ones.  I pray that Christmas will transform my heart this year by the humility of Jesus in the face of his true majesty.  It seems that God is fond of using a still small voice when He shares tremendous secrets.  Only those who listen intently will hear Him.

signs of the Advent at church

"He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power."  Hebrews 1:3a

"Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people." Hebrews 2:17

Thank you, Jesus.

The Tree of Life

seasons change

Yesterday was Thanksgiving Day and I truly hate to confess that it didn't quite live up to the Hallmark Channel/Martha Stewart standard for me.  I really am thankful for so many things and for my relationship with God Himself, but I seem to be in a place of transition or change these days.  It feels like the leaves I see fluttering down outside, some old things are dying away and the landscape is becoming bare.  I can't quite see what the new will look like yet.

God has definitely been calling me to a new level of thankfulness in my heart with reminders on several fronts of how important that attitude is.  I read the devotional Jesus Calling, and every day has been saying something about thankfulness.  But it feels like my contentment meter reading has been tending more to the low side.  So after my Thanksgiving Day let down I knew it was time to take the issue to Jesus in prayer.  After a lot of honest venting and an equally honest look at scripture, I felt God reminding me of His promises to be with me in any and every circumstance.  For this reason, I do not need to be anxious.  In fact, God promises that when I bring my requests to God with thanksgiving, the peace of God will rule in my heart.

Sometimes I can hear scripture like that and its truth will instantly change the atmosphere of my soul.  But this time I didn't have peace and my anxious thoughts continued to rattle around.  

a barren tree

My breakthrough came with this thought popping into my mind:  I was camping out under the tree of the knowledge of good and evil!  That hit some kind of nail on the head for me.  How so?  I saw it fairly quickly -- I was trying to figure out what was "wrong" and what was "right" about me and others who I love and am concerned about.  I was trying to find the path to fixing the wrong things and bringing contentment to my heart.  Sounded reasonable to me.

But we are offered a great privilege - access to the Tree of  Life!  Our first ancestors were banned from it so that they would not live forever in their fallen state.  In their case, release from earthly life apart from God was merciful.  But in Jesus, we are made right.  We are no longer separated from God.  We have eternal life and we have it with God.  By eating from the Tree of Life we gain healing of our souls, we gain wisdom, we become more like Jesus.

a place to prosper

The tree of the knowledge of good and evil is a trap.  It keeps us occupied with things we have no control over and ultimately cannot change.  Jesus is our answer and it distracts us from casting our cares on him and trusting him and being loved by him.  Jesus is our Way (to God, to righteousness, to heaven), our Truth (the dispel-er of the enemy's  lies) and our Life (now and forever).  He is the Source of everything we need.  I don't know about the tree in the Garden of Eden, but I think the "tree of life" is a symbol of Jesus for us.  When we eat of that tree, we are partaking of the promises of God which are "yes and amen" in Christ Jesus.  We are trusting in God's plans to prosper us and not to harm us, to give us a hope and a future.  We experience the satisfaction of enjoying the Presence of Jesus in the midst of whatever is going on.

God described my particular brand of going to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil as trying to know why; trying to do the "right" thing to avert trouble; trying to understand so that I can prepare for the future or fix it; pursuing the outcome that I want.  And He described the tree of life for me as a place of surrender, release, and receiving.  It is where I lay down my expectations, even my needs, and let him provide what He knows is best.  It is where I hear Him, am reassured that I am loved, receive wisdom, encouragement, genuine hope.

God's beauty

Whatever is going on deep inside is not altogether settled.  I think that the image of the change of season when the leaves turn brown and drop off the trees may be pretty profound for me.  A lot of things that I took for granted and enjoyed are being removed, but now I see that their removal makes more room for Jesus in my heart.  I think that is a very good exchange and can say that I am thankful for it.

Scriptures referred to:  Psalm 23:4; Philippians 4:6-7; Genesis 2:9 and 3:22; Revelation 2:7; Romans 3:22-24 and 5:18-19;  Ephesians 2:12-13; John 14:6; 2 Corinthians 1:20; Jeremiah 33:3; Psalm 17:15 and 63:5

Warrior Prayer

The enemy does not want us to pray because prayer is powerful.  We have surely heard that before.  And yet I am often tempted to discard prayer requests for big situations far away from my daily life.  That happened recently with something I received in the mail.  I hate to admit it, but I almost tossed it in the trash because I really can't read all the stuff that comes everyday.  Almost, but I didn't.  I opened it and discovered the article quoted below.  It reminds me of just how enormous our power is to bring God's will about in just the way that Jesus told us to pray: 

our nation needs powerful prayer...

"The greatest agency put into men's hands is prayer.  Prayer from God's side is communication between Himself and His allies in the enemy's country.  Prayer is not persuading God.  It does not influence God's purpose.  It starts with Him. True prayer moves in a circle.  It begins in the heart of God, sweeps down into a human heart upon the earth, so intersecting the circle of the earth, which is the battle-field of prayer, and then it goes back again to its starting point, having accomplished its purpose on the downward swing."*

Prayer like this comes from a relationship with God in which He implants the intention of his heart into ours.  Anyone can receive it, but we often don't.  I imagine that God sees who wants to hear and has faith to act on what they hear.  He also calls and equips certain of his children for this kind of relationship with Him.  It is a high calling.
 

White Sands Missile Range Museum, NM

I had never thought about myself as God's ally living in the enemy's territory, but it is true. God is the Captain of the Armies of Heaven and He invites us to participate in the process of delivering His orders to them through our prayers and declarations of truth.  He gives us a role in getting His will accomplished because He created us for relationship.  We are citizens of heaven even though we still live on the earth in our current bodies.  Ultimately we are learning how to rule and reign with Christ in the future (Revelation. 19:8;14 and 20:4).  That's our true destiny!

I confess that I have been 'way too comfortable with my earthly life, but with the way our country is changing I am realizing more and more how out of step I am.  I may feel like an alien here, but how much better to be an ally of God!  I think we are going to have more and more opportunities to choose where our allegiance lies.   

If we knew we were qualified to pray God's will and see it done, wouldn't we pray more boldly?  The victory was won at the cross where Christ made a public spectacle of the enemy (Colossians 2:15).  Jesus gave us the authority of His Name to use when we pray (John 16:24).  God has given us armor and a sword - His Word (Ephesians 6:14-19), and the Holy Spirit to accomplish His will  (Zechariah 4:6).  We may not be grown up into the fullness of this, but we are progressing in that direction by God's grace.  Dear Father, may we realize who we are beyond the everyday activities of our lives!  We were born, and born again, for such a time as this!

State flags at Mt. Rushmore

*From article:  "Prayer:  A War Measure" by S.D. Gordon in Prayer Point, a Samaritan's Purse magazine, Fall 2012, pg. 30.

The power of waiting

We want to see, but faith is “the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1b ESV).  Or perhaps I should say “I want to see” because that’s what my circumstances have been revealing to me about myself.

I consider myself to be a woman of faith after so many years of learning to let go of my problems to God.  I used to be tense and driven and desperate at heart.  I was fearful and full of unacknowledged grief.  I lived alone even when surrounded by others.  That I should have turned to God and believed that He was real and could be trusted took faith.  The practice of choosing to believe and let go of my controlling actions, and even thoughts, was the practice of faith in practical ways.  God arranged for the rubber to meet the road over and over and over.  And yet He’s not finished.  There is a different kind of faith-action that He’s teaching me about.  It’s really the faith of inaction, or waiting on the unseen.

I wanted to write about waiting on God but He helped me out by putting it together with our hope in the unseen when my daily reading began today at Hebrews 11.  Those first words arrested my attention:  “Now faith is the assurance (substance in NIV) of things hoped for, the conviction (evidence) of things not seen.” 

This really isn’t new, is it?  We often express our faith by waiting for something we hope for.  Maybe we don’t hope with much assurance or conviction, but we hope, we ask God, and we wait.  Maybe it’s for prodigal children to turn back toward home, or for remission of an illness, or strength to endure the decline of a parent.

Sometimes the “hope” can be more like wishful thinking.  And the “waiting” can be an escape from realities that must be faced before real change can occur.  But God says true hope has substance and reality as if what is unseen is already there.  And when we have that what we hope in becomes invincible.

If we have no evidence in the circumstances, no substance of what we long for in our world, no conviction in our heart of truth that defies the obvious external reality, then true Biblical faith gives us evidence and conviction.  It allows us to see what remains unseen.

This is the faith I desire to grow in right now for an important relationship.  There seems to be no more action to take on my part.  There are no right words to say that will open up understanding.  There is just God’s very precious answer to my cries, saying “Let me handle it”.  When everything in me wants to do something or say something or even think something that will fix it or relieve it, His word to me is clear.  He will handle it, and I am to let Him.

And so that’s where waiting comes in.  Waiting on the Lord is not helplessness, it is powerful.  It is the faith that may witness the moving of mountains.  It is being held in the strong heart of God while He does things that no human being can accomplish. 

Zion National Park

Hebrews 11:3 reminded me that “by faith we come to understand that the universe was created by the word of God” and that everything we see, everything, did not come from anything visible.  If God created the mountain from nothing we can see, why wouldn’t He be able to move it at His will?

But this is where we can falter, because we can’t always know or understand His will or purpose.  We can know He is good and that He promises the work all things together for good (Romans 8:28), but we don’t know what it will look like.

Hebrews 11:13 reminds me that Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob “all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar”.  All the heroes of the faith commended in the verses that follow were looking ahead to the promise of Christ.  He was unseen to them in the future and he is unseen to us in the past.  But he always existed and is always real.

I sense God calling me to join hands with those who “lived in tents” while they looked forward to "a city with foundations whose designer and builder is God” (Hebrews 11:9-10); those who “acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on earth” and “desire a better country, that is a heavenly one.” (verses 13 & 16).

This is not to say that the relationship I long for will not come to be in my lifetime, but it is not a guarantee that it will happen as I expect, and it is not the basis for the peace I seek in waiting on God to “handle it”.

I want my peace to be filled with the faith to love rather than self-protection, self-justification or anger.  God offers to hold my heart and hold my hand as I wait with Him and for Him.  This is hard and yet a glorious opportunity.  Is what God is doing more valuable than what I want to see and have now?  I believe, but help my unbelief.  I am waiting.

The danger of trying to be good

I’ve been blogging about obedience and how it comes from a heart of love and trust.  It comes from trust that God will not ask us to obey in anything that is truly and ultimately harmful to us.  It may be hard.  It may require sacrifice.  But God is always good and His sovereignty is working towards good.  Even in the Cross – especially in the Cross – God was bringing great good out of very evil events.  I have been “arguing” for the power of God’s love to bring us into surrender of our own way, and into obedience which leads to the most abundant life we could ever have.

But now let's look at the flip side.  What if we are pursuing goodness wholeheartedly and thinking that we have made progress?  What if our pursuit leads to impatience with the failures of others to cooperate with or live up to our view of what is right?  It's good to see that in our obedience we are becoming better and better, right?  Isn't God pleased with this?

Let me ask another question.  Why did Jesus reserve his harshest words for the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law?  Was it not because they considered themselves much better than the ‘common sinners’ and because they measured their righteousness by their own standards?  They had the law of God, but they missed His heart by a mile in their “obedience”.

It may be true that others need to change, and sometimes we begin to recognize their needs as our own life changes and our vision becomes clearer.  We may encounter things that bother us more than they did before we got "cleaned up".  But if our hearts are being changed, those things begin to arouse compassion, not condemnation. 

Jesus used the analogy of the vine and the branches to teach his disciples how true goodness comes about.  He said “Remain in me, and I will remain in you.  No branch can bear fruit by itself;” (John 17:4a) and “apart from me you can do nothing” (vs.5b).  The fruit of the Spirit, by whom we are connected with Jesus, is “love, joy, peace patience, kindness, goodness, etc.   These qualities come from the Holy Spirit in us and the results (fruit) of living them cannot be self-generated.

Looks good, but it's not real

When a believer is trying to produce good behavior and compliance in himself, or motivate others to do so, he is in danger if he becomes disconnected from the ‘Vine” in the process.  If self-effort seems to be working, the “fruit” is self-righteousness and pride which can easily become haughty, judgmental and condemning of others who don’t try as hard or as “successfully” as he has.  Right away we can see that the “fruit” is rotten.

Behind self-effort can be misunderstanding of our condition as human beings.  We are fallen creatures living in a fallen world and it is only Jesus in us that makes a difference.  I used to try to be perfect because I actually thought I could be good enough if I tried hard enough.  My inevitable failures only cemented my sense of unworthiness and my need to hide my true (and unacceptable) self.  On the other hand, if I was able to make something work, I wanted others to do the same so it would be easier for all of us.  Whichever end of the stick we are holding there's an expectation that life should work if we all just try.  But that is forgetting that without the grace of God working in our hearts we are self-centered  and lost.  The world is never going to cooperate with our agenda for goodness (or with God’s) apart from the saving grace of Jesus’ work on the cross and surrender to the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. This applies in our marriages, our families, our friendships, our work and our church.

(source unknown) 

So what are we to do about all the problems we see?  Or what am I to do if someone says that I am the problem?  There is an answer that applies to both situations.  It is to confess and repent of everything that hinders my connection to the Vine.  I don’t have to fix these things, just tell the Lord that I know they are keeping me from abiding in him and being filled with the fruit of the Spirit. I can thank him by faith for transforming me from within and pray that the other person will be blessed to receive God’s love as well.  People may conform for a time because of fear or shame, but they are transformed by mercy. A transformed heart is able to show mercy to the next person and so the love of God spreads.

Is there a danger in trying to be good?  I think the answer is in "trying".  Desiring to be good is from God but becoming good happens through humble trusting surrender to His love. The "work" is in laying down whatever keeps us locked up in pride or fear or control. Once we lay that down God does what only He can accomplish - give us a new life!

at the Grand Canyon!

When I surrendered the need for change in myself to Jesus, counting on Him to work, I felt gratitude rather than self-satisfaction for the results.   Rather than making demands of others, I saw Jesus was the source of hope for all of us.  It's all about Jesus - and that's why he deserves the glory!


Note: For an excellent teaching on grace and law in relationships click here:  Prodigal Grace Part 2 (10/28/12)