Believing What the Bible Says About God

We need to consider whether we actually believe the Bible or not. We generally do not in this one area:

We have been fed a pack of lies about who God is, about God being the source of all kinds of evil, but we miss the foundational underlying truth: God isn’t actually evil. He’s actually good. Seriously. We don’t really believe it.

We need to understand, deep in our soul, that this is who God is. We say, “God is good,” but we believe all kinds of evil accusations about him! We (our culture) blames him for death (“God took her.”) and disaster (“an act of God!”) and trouble (“Well, he must be teaching me patience.”) and we blithely accept it (“His ways are higher than my ways… sigh.”) and we even quote scripture (“Look! It SAYS God did that! Why, it must be that simple!”) to support our naïve belief that God does nasty things. 

Let’s look at the record: 

Psalm 34:8: “Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him”: God is actually good. This is who he is. A good God does good things. 

1 John 1:5: “This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all”: So nothing of darkness can come from God because he has no darkness to give to anybody. The only thing he can give is light. 

Romans 12:2: “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will”: God’s will is only about goodness, about pleasing us, about perfection. This is something that can be tested; we can know this. Moreover, we are to be like this, our will is to be like this. 

James 1:13a: “When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone…”: God doesn’t have anything to do with evil. There is someone else (fairly often ourselves) that is responsible for the evil that survives in our presence. 

Matthew 13:28a: “‘An enemy did this,’ he replied.” When evil comes in among the people of God (in this parable of the tares), Jesus defines it as something done by his enemy. 

Matthew 7:11: “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!” : paraphrase: If you roughnecks can figure out the difference between a good gift and a bad gift, you can seriously trust your heavenly Father to give only good gifts. In other words, bad things do not come from God. 

John 14:9: “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.” We have a brilliant revelation of who God is, of who the Father is: He’s like Jesus. They’re so unified, they’re so alike, that if we have seen one, we’ve seen the other. You want to know what God is like? Look at Jesus. 

John 1:18: “No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him”: So we must trust what Jesus says about God more than we trust our own perception, because we ain’t never seen him right. Everything else we believe about God must be interpreted through what Jesus says about Him.

Hebrews 1:3a: “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of [God’s] being”: So we must trust what Jesus shows about God more than we trust our own perception. Jesus is the clearest (“exact”) revelation about God’s character. Everything else we believe about God must be interpreted through who Jesus is.

There is a principle of Biblical interpretation: if you see something in an obscure passage (eg. in a story, in a passage that’s teaching on a different topic, in a passing comment, in an unclear passage), then we MUST refer to the clear passage to interpret it. We cannot just see something done in the Bible and then all go do what someone else did, or we’d all lie to the Holy Spirit like Ananias did, or we’d all hang ourselves like Judas did. So what’s the clearest revelation of God’s nature?

The Bible itself clearly says that the “exact” revelation about who God is has been given to us: it’s Jesus, who is the Incarnate Son of God, who best reveals the nature and character of God to us. He is the very best revelation about who God is: if we believe something about who God is, but it isn’t found in the life of Jesus, or it isn’t found in what Jesus teaches about who God is, THEN IT ISN’T WHO GOD IS! 

Do we believe the Bible or not? I vote to believe the Bible. 

Replacing God With God's People

When we take it upon ourselves to be responsible other believers, to be their warning of possible error, possible deceiving spirits, then we are working from the assumption - I'm not sure we often see it - that protecting believers is our work. I believe that is a faulty foundation.

I try (with only moderate success, I grant) to work from the assumption that it is God's work to protect his children - using other children sometimes in that process, no doubt, but it is his work. I recall Jesus claiming, "I will build MY Church," and I don't remember him delegating that to anyone else at any point.

Let's assume that I never once err in my identifying what is of God and what is from deceiving spirits - and that of course is pure fantasy at best - then perhaps I have saved them the inconvenience of being sidetracked for a short while. But in the meantime, I have denied those immature believers the opportunity to hear from God themselves, substituting my own words in the place of His words, substituting my leading instead of His leading.

I do not believe that this is in their best interests for us to replace God's leadership in peoples' lives with our leadership, our protection.

And although it might make me feel important, I do not believe it is in our best interests either.

A Change of Seasons

I guess that there was a season where God was blessing it, but I think the blessing has moved on. I think we’re coming to the end of the season of the anointing being on those whose full-time work is “in the ministry.”

I suspect that the blessing was less on “full time ministry” than it was on “ministering in His name,” but it sure looks to me like that season – whatever it was – is now over.

There are still some people in “full time” ministry who walk in favor, in the midst of God’s move today. But if you look closely, they are mostly in the work of equipping others, sending out a new generation of “ministers” who generally have no title, have no ministry paycheck. They are spreading the good news, demonstrating the Kingdom at their “secular” (whatever that means) work, and the secular mission-field pays their living.

As a result, they have a credibility among the world that those who make their living from purveying the gospel never had.

I invite the saints of God to work hard, forcefully, to rid themselves of the religious heresy that “full time ministry” is better ministry. It’s not. It’s actually a hindrance, though it is a comfortable hindrance.

The best ministry nowadays, and generally the best anointing, comes to those who live and work and eat and sleep among the world to which they minister.

That means that those whose “day job” gets in the way of “their ministry” probably have the more effective ministry. And many of those whose “full time job” is ministry, find their work less effective, when measured by Kingdom standards. 

Milk or Meat?

There are a couple of places in the NT where the apostles contrasted the intake of believers, using the metaphor of “milk” as the food for babies against “meat” as the food for mature men & women. (1 Corinthians 3, Hebrews 5, 1 Peter 2 are the clearest.)

The apostles (Paul, the anonymous author of Hebrews, and Peter) all seem to reference something similar to John’s stages of Christian growth (1 John 2:12-14): that there are clearly stages of growth for us as Sons of the Most High. John makes it clear: believers in different stages of growth have different needs (for a discussion of those stages, see here: http://bit.ly/QMANqF)

Reflecting on this, I observe several things:

§         There are several places where believers are described as children, as milk-drinkers, often bemoaning the fact that by this stage of their growth, they should be eating meat and changing the world.

§         There appear to be NO places where any of the apostolic writers of the NT acknowledge a group that has progressed from milk-drinking to meat-eating. This may be simply because the epistles were all written to address problems among one church or another, and the churches that made the transition didn’t need corrective letters. There is no epistle to the church at Antioch, for example; it may be that this early center of the Church may have gotten some things right, though we have no record of it.

§         When we are young believers, we require milk. And when we become mature believers, milk is still good.

§         We are expected to progress beyond the basics. We are expected to graduate from being nourished by the “elementary principles” of “milk” to digesting and being nourished by “meat.”

§         So much of the church in our day has not even well learned the “elementary principles”; These are the “milk” or “baby food” of Christian nurture (Quoting Hebrews 6:1 here):

1.      repentance from dead works and of

2.      faith toward God, of

3.      the doctrine of baptisms (note the plural), of

4.      laying on of hands, of

5.      resurrection of the dead, and of

6.      eternal judgment.

A number of prophets and apostles are speaking of the need, now upon us, but growing in necessity, of believers being established enough in theses topics that they are comfortable (and safe) moving on to more challenging topics. In fact, Holy Spirit has been speaking to a substantial number of believers about what some of those more meat-like discussions will be about, but they would only serve as a distraction in this conversation.

As He speaks to me about some of the meatier topics of growth that I see coming to us, I am reminded of two applications that have relevance in this conversation:

1) There will be people (possibly people who are invested in a spiritual “milk-delivery service”) who will not understand of believers’ need for meat, who will speak against it (even accusing meat-eaters of apostasy and heresy), and, sadly, who will succeed in preventing hungry believers in their sphere of influence from obeying the scriptures and pursuing more advanced topics.

2) Those who choose to leave the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, and go on to perfection, not laying again the above foundation, will likely have to go on in the face of such opposition. A very likely booby-trap will be to engage argumentative milk-delivery devotees in extensive discussion about the need for meat, though it will be necessary to discern between those committed to not moving on from milk from those who have only known milk but long for more. A wiser response may be just to “set our face like flint” toward digesting and practicing that which Father is feeding us, and leaving the nay-sayers to themselves.

I believe it will be valuable to recognize in advance (if it is in advance) the opposition that will be confronting us more and more as we run the race set before us. Such battles are often won in advance, when we make our determined decisions of how we will respond before we meet the opposition.

How will you respond when faced with this choice? Will you choose a steak knife, or a warm bottle?

Forgiveness & Healing: An Important Distinction

There’s an uncomfortable contrast between forgiveness and healing.

We forgive those who wound us, and with the grace that Jesus is so generous about pouring into our lives, we can (eventually) forgive even the most debilitating, the most wounding, the most egregious offenses against us.

More, we need to forgive those offenses. In some way (see Matthew 6:14), our own forgiveness is tied to how we forgive others. And we’re commanded to forgive (see Matthew 18:23-35), so it’s pretty important.

But forgiving is not the same as healing. The act of forgiving the one who hurt me does not – in and of itself – heal the wound that they caused. Forgiving them is about not holding the offense in my soul against them, about no longer looking for revenge (whether actively or passively) against them, about not allowing a “root of bitterness” to grow in my spirit to make accusations against my offender and against God. That’s powerful stuff, but it’s not the same as healing the wound that came from their offense.

On the cross, Jesus forgave the people who nailed him there, but he still died from the wounds. In Acts 7, Stephen forgave those who wounded him by throwing stones, but he, too, died from that stoning.

I’ve seen confusion among believers about this in two manifestations:

1) “I’ve forgiven them for wounding me. So why am I still wounded? I thought that forgiving them would make it stop hurting!”

2) “But you forgave me! Why aren’t you trusting me? Why are you still acting like you’re hurting there? I guess you didn’t REALLY forgive me, did you!”

The reality is that forgiving and healing are two completely different issues. One might as well ask, “Why am I broke at the end of the month? It’s still raining in the Northwest, isn’t it?” Well, yes, it is still raining in the northwest, but that doesn’t actually have anything to do with your personal spending habits! In similar manner, there is not a direct correlation between forgiving and being healed.

It’s worth noting that there IS a small-but-significant connection between forgiving and being healed: we receive healing more easily when we’ve forgiven. But don’t be distracted by that small issue: healing is not an automatic result of forgiving.

We must forgive, of course, and there are enough reasons to forgive to fill a book. We could fill another book on the differences between forgiving someone and trusting them in the same way again. Frankly, they would be fine books, but that’s not the purpose for this article, which is to shoot down the false belief that “My forgiving you brings me healing.” It’s a small step in the process, and an important one, but it is not the healing.

I can forgive you for shooting me in the knee, but I will still walk with a limp until my knee is healed. 

Bring the Light

How many times have you heard this warning: “Brother, we got to be careful because Satan comes as an Angel of light.”

I’ve been “warned” by sour-faced people not to trust my Father’s voice, warned not to trust Holy Spirit, warned to stay away from Father’s angelic messengers, warned against healing the sick or raising the dead or any of the fun things that Father has prepared for his children. 

Apparently, because the devil, who is a copycat and a corrupter, copies and corrupts some of God’s generous gifts, there are some who think that the right answer is to avoid the gifts.

That’s like warning me to never use $20 bills, because criminals counterfeit $20 bills. Or never to drink water, because vodka is clear like water, and you know vodka’s not as good for you as water. What? 

First, let’s abandon this foolishness that we need to run screaming away from anything the devil does. Yeah, I get it: he’s a pain in the butt: he’s a liar, and his work is about stealing, killing & destroying. And yeah, I have figured out that those are bad things. I get that. 

Here’s the thing: if I’m watching to make sure that I never do anything the devil is doing, then A) my eyes are on the devil, not on Jesus, and B) the devil is directing my actions; Jesus is not. That would, under normal circumstances, mean that I was being led by the devil rather than by God. That’s not acceptable to me.

You see, the devil’s under my feet. He and his realm are required to submit to me and the authority I carry from my place in Jesus, from being the Creator’s beloved son, with whom He is well pleased. 

In fact (and this will be scary to some folks), the devil and I have one job description in common: we are both working to expand our kingdom as far and as wide as we can. Of course, he’s working to expand the “kingdom of darkness” and I’m working to expand the Kingdom I share with my Father: the kingdom of light. And you know what happens when light and darkness collide: nothing. Light shines unhindered in the darkness; if anything, the enemy’s darkness only serves to show off God’s light better.

So should I be afraid because the devil counterfeits some of the good gifts Father gives me? No way! Fear is not my inheritance! 

Should I at least try to avoid the devil’s deception? Um… duh! Of course. 

But just because I’m avoiding the counterfeit doesn’t mean that I run whimpering away from the real thing that is being counterfeited. The fact that there is a counterfeit proves that the real thing is valuable, it’s profitable. In fact, it’s worth the risk of counterfeiting and getting caught.

Yes, there are false spirits. I don’t listen to them. Yes there are demons masquerading as angels of light. I don’t fall for that. Yes, there is such a thing as demonic healing. I don’t go there. In fact, don’t even pay attention. 

My job is not to run from darkness. My job is to bring the light.

With Visibility Come Critics

I started this blog on a bit of a lark. Father was challenging me to write consistently, and I created a new identity for that writing just to separate my passion for the Kingdom of God from my family. (In my mind, one of the cruelest things a father can do to his children is make them “preacher’s kids.”)

But it seems that people are eager to discuss things of the Kingdom, and so this blog has gained more of an audience than I ever expected, and therefore more influence than I ever imagined. 

And as I’ve gained influence, I’ve gained critics. Whoa. What a new concept! Some of them have been enemies. I’ve never had enemies before! Some have just been passionate about their bondage, and hate the freedom in God that I’ve been writing about. Some want to advertise their products to the people who read my wall (in a word: no!). And some of them want to fix me.

Now let us be clear: I’m brand new at this business of having critics, enemies, fixers. I have clearly not responded with maturity every time: to become mature, one requires experience, and I lack that experience. (But I’m growing in it. I think that’s good....)

The last group confuse me the most: the people who want to fix me. Honestly, I don’t get it.

First of all, I’m not aware that I’m broken, at least not by Heaven’s standards, which are the primary standards I care about. But that’s normal: most people think they’re not broken. And for that reason, I treasure a large handful of relationships with men and women whom I have learned to trust. They know me, and they have both permission and invitation to speak into my life. I submit my doctrine and my practice of Kingdom life to them. I regularly seek out their criticism and course corrections, which they are kind to share with me. When they do, I try to I try to respond well, but I’ll admit to struggling sometimes. I’m as human as anyone else that I know.

But these “fixers” decide on their own that I have one glaring fault or another (usually related to the radical concept that God is actually good), and they find ways to barge into my life with an agenda of fixing me. Some of them have been relatively forthright about it. Some have been more surreptitious about it, not revealing that this was their goal until I stopped listening to their endless criticisms. Some complete strangers have offered to “mentor” me. Many have acknowledged that the only reason they’ve friended me was to fix me. Manipulation has been common.

Not infrequently, their attempts to fix me, a complete stranger to them, have been completely works-based, have been littered with abuse and accusation, and have been clearly targeted at bringing me back into the bondage from which Jesus has set me free. Many of them are clearly dysfunctional themselves, though that’s not necessary a complete disqualifier (Peter was pretty dysfunctional, when you think about it; Paul had a hideous past life!)

I bring this topic up for two reasons:

First, to state publicly that I am not currently seeking new mentors, and I do not, in fact, submit myself to complete strangers for correction. If you do not know me personally, you’re not a candidate to fix me; if we have not been friends for a number of years, you are not a candidate; if you don’t know my name, you are not a candidate; if you haven’t opened up your life in the process of building relationship, you are not a candidate.

This is not because I’m trying to keep correction out of my life (quite the contrary!). It’s because correction – or ANY ministry – must come through relationship. If we don’t have a relationship, then it ain’t gonna work, no matter how hard you try, and no matter if I invite your criticism or not. Ministry flows out of relationship. No relationship, no ministry.

The second reason I bring this up is because many other people around me are also moving rapidly and publicly into freedom. I’m not special: if the fixers come after me, in order to “repair” the freedom that I’m enjoying, then they’ll probably come after you, too, in order to “redeem” you from freedom, from grace, from the Kingdom.

So I’m trying to pull the sheet off of the deceiver, I’m trying to shine a light into the shadows: if you see someone skulking there, my advice is: Don’t invite them to speak into your life from the shadows.

Yes, it is wise to seek counsel, and counsel to whom we’ll actually listen and submit to. And since this kind of a relationship is foreign to most western Christians, we’ll have to be very intentional as we seek it out. But this needs to be a relationship-first kind of thing. Just because someone has a big ministry, or a big reputation or a big mouth does not qualify them to mentor you.

And anyone – ANYone – who is trying to take you or me back into the shadows is not worthy of listening to.

A Brief Guide to The Rapture.

A little history about the doctrine of the Rapture. (Note that this is not a theology paper; this is an article about following God.)

First, the term "rapture" does not appear in scripture. The general idea is there (specifically in 1 Thessalonians 4:17), but it is not the same concept that is taught today called “The Rapture.” It has nothing to do with the “Left Behind” books’ theology!

Much of our concept of The Rapture comes from Cotton Mather, the 17^th century Puritan, and master of the Salem Witch Trials. It gained traction in the teaching of John Nelson Darby in the 1830s, just after he left his denomination, the Church of Ireland; some historians report that he used this sensational new teaching to garner more speaking engagements (a practice that continues today). Contemporary church leaders, including Charles Spurgeon, rejected Darby’s teaching. But he wrote a translation of the Bible and started a minor denomination, so people take him seriously. 

The reality is that the Bible has very little to say about the Rapture, apart from acknowledging, in the context of the dead being raised, that one day we will be “caught up” with God in the air. Note that this was expressly given as comfort to those grieving dead loved ones, not as a theological foundation for eschatology. (As a general practice, we don't build major theological points on minor, unclear passages that are focused on other issues!)

Having said all that, it does appear that some points about the Rapture could do with being emphasized:

*        The big point in Scripture is that believers who die before Jesus returns will not be separated from Him. The Resurrection of the dead is for real. This is the main scriptural teaching about “The Rapture.”

*         The idea of being caught up with Jesus seems worth pursuing, even today. A number of contemporary prophets (and many believers) encourage pursuing the experience, though not in a physical sense, rather in terms of what might be called “day trips to Heaven.” This sounds like a great use of our time. “I believe in the Rapture,” says Bob Jones. “I do it every day!”

*         The Bible - and therefore the earliest apostolic doctrine - carefully avoids clear teaching on the subject, which should be a clue to us. Moreover, Jesus clearly said (Acts 1:7) that figuring out the details of the end times was a distraction of the real work that he has set before us (Acts 1:8). It could be reasonably concluded that end times theology (including the Rapture) is largely a distraction from our actual assignment: a theological time-waster.

*         The current teaching of the Rapture (The Left Behind version) is completely contrary to God’s ways: it’s taught as an escape from persecution, sneaking out the back door before a season of tribulation starts. God has never demonstrated the value of keeping some favored people from having to deal with difficult times, while letting other, less-favored people suffer from them. The idea of removing the only people who can bring comfort to afflicted people is not in him. If anything, he has historically sent his people into the midst of the trouble in order to be light in the darkness. Therefore, it is more likely that he would send his people into the midst of the tribulation. (See 1 Corinthians 16:8-9 and 1 Thessalonians 2:2.)

There are two clear action points that I can see, when thinking about the Rapture.

1.       God has apparently not intended that we understand the details about the end of the world. It would be wise, therefore, for me not to focus on what he is not focusing on.

2.       It will be a much better use of my time either working to prevent trying times, or preparing people to cope with trying times, rather than teaching people to expect a “Get Out of Tribulation Free” card.

Our job is “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven.” At least within our sphere of influence.

An Expanded Understanding of Corporate Worship

In my experience with God, coming to Him in worship is a glorious thing, and there are several interesting things that happen when I'm in his presence worshiping.

One of the things that I've observed that happens in that place is what I am calling freedom in creative expression. I noticed it first when playing an instrument in a worship band: it's like I'm a better musician in His presence than I was ten minutes before. It's certainly easier to sing spontaneously in that place, and my instrument is more responsive to me there, too.

In some places, we've recognized that other creative expression is released in worship, and some worship events now have artists painting during worship. Occasionally a dancer will be part of the worship ream, too.

Prophetic expression, which I would argue is also a creative expression, is also freer when in association. That's why Elisha said "Bring me a minstrel," when he needed to prophesy to an ungodly king, and why prophetic ministry often comes during or after worship.

And that's about as far as I've ever seen it taken, at least publicly.

The question occurs to me: why should the musicians (and maybe a painter or prophet) get all of the fun? Do we think that the other gifts don't count as much, or that they wouldn't benefit from the anointing as much?

Occasionally, I've taken it a little further. Sometimes during corporate worship, I've snuck off in a corner and drawn on the anointing that is in God's presence with my writing, or in study, wielding my teaching gift. I'm sure that others have done this, too; I've just never met them. (I know: now my secret is out!)

I'd love to experiment with: how far could we take the idea of exercising whatever gift we happen to have as an expression of worship?

What would happen if we blessed teachers and scribes and writers and poets to worship in the corporate gathering with their gifts, too? What if we made room to experience the results of their gifting, like we listen to the work of the guitarist's and the drummer's giftings?

What if we gave space to tattoo artists, to graffiti artists, to mimes, to potters and sculptors and chefs and jewelry makers and leather workers and wood carvers and pipe makers and hair stylists and massage therapists? Who was it that decided that their gifts weren't appropriate to worship our Heavenly Father with?

Obviously, I'm just letting the thoughts run free here (as I'm worshipping, actually), but I can't get away from the question: how far can we take this? How many more people can we release to worship God in the community with the gifts that God has given them?

(Curiously, as I sat in a small corporate worship environment, compelled to write these thoughts on a mobile device, at the same time a prophet friend of mine, a writer, was outlining the same topic, having been drawn into it unexpectedly in a private time with God.)

God's Heart, In Golf Jokes and Flashmobs

There’s an old joke:

Jesus, Moses and an old man were teeing off on the 16th hole on heaven's golf course.

The 16th hole is a short par 3 over a lake. Moses is the first to tee off; he steps up and swings, and the ball dives right for the water.

He quickly spreads his arms, the water parts, and the ball rolls across the bottom of the lake and up on to the green.

The others complement him on his shot, and Jesus steps up for his turn.

Like Moses, Jesus' ball heads straight for the water, but when it gets there, it bounces and then rolls across the surface of the lake, until it, too, rolls up onto the green.

After showering him with complements, the old man steps up to take his shot. His ball also dives for the lake, but it bounces off the back of a turtle in the lake, and onto the far shore. There, a squirrel picks up the ball and quickly heads for the woods.

As the others begin to laugh, a hawk swoops down and picks up the squirrel. The hawk flies over the green, the squirrel struggles and the ball falls out of the squirrels mouth, bounces once on the green, and then drops neatly into the cup. 

Jesus turns to the old man with a smile and says, "Nice shot Dad!"

That’s actually one of my favorite jokes ever, largely because it is a good illustration of how God works: spectacular detail, looking for all the world like happenstance, coincidence. Yet all the time, he’s working behind the scenes, holding all things together by the power of his Word.

OK. Hold that in your mind.

Now reflect for a moment on one of the current trends in marriage proposals: The flashmob proposal. I’m afraid that I think they’re rather cheesy, but these guys didn’t consult me before they did the deed, so I suppose my opinion doesn’t count much. Here’s one example:

It has made me think. Like the golf joke, these proposals demonstrate something of the way the God does things: careful attention to a lot of details in order to spectacularly demonstrate love, to draw the beloved’s attention to the guy on his knee, and to invite that beloved lady into a lifetime love relationship. They’re maybe a little more direct than God is, after all, they need to be able to edit it down for an effective YouTube post; God has a lifetime to work out his proposal.

Sure, taking a lifetime to woo us is more complicated, but being omniscient, he can handle that; he’s pretty big, you know. What’s more challenging is the issue of free will. He’s committed to honoring free will: yours, certainly; but in addition, he works out his lifetime flashmob proposal to you in an environment of raging free wills, without abrogating a single person’s free will. (He doesn’t even – yet – hinder demonic free will, a fact which is highly inconvenient, actually.)

So the circumstances of our lives are arranged for the purpose of demonstrating – of spectacularly demonstrating – his love for us, of drawing our attention to the guy on his knee (his amazing Son), and of inviting us, his beloved, into a lifetime – an eternity-time of love relationship.

So for me, amazing golf shots aside, I think I’m learning to recognize his fingerprints in the circumstances of my life, displaying his love, drawing my attention to his son, and inviting me into an eternity of love relationship with an amazing lover.

And I guess I’m probably going to be reminded of God’s amazing courtship every time I see another cheesy flashmob proposal video. God is, fortunately, not so cheesy, but every bit as much the romantic.

[Editor's note: If you can't see the video, click on the title of the post ("God's Heart, In Golf Jokes and Flashmobs") and view it on the webpage. Thanks!]

Dealing With Bombs

I share this as a testimony. You know I love testimonies.

I had a dream. In the dream, or maybe it was a vision: I was working my way through the sparse underbrush of a very large hill. I was searching out unexploded ordinance: bombs that hadn’t gone off, and I knew that some of them were nuclear bombs.

My friends and I were cleaning out the area so that kids could play safely in the bushes and grasses there. My job was to find the bombs hidden under the bushes, behind the clumps of grass. There weren’t a lot, but it was more than I expected.

When I found one, I put it into the basket I was carrying (really? Carrying nukes in a basket?), and hand the baskets to others who took them off to other places, and came back each time for more.

As I was dreaming, while I was pulling a shiny silver bomb out from behind a clump of tall grass, Father began interpreting the dream I was still in the middle of for me. (I’ve never had that happen before!)

“You recognize these bombs?” and suddenly, I knew that these were issues in my life where offenses could grow. These were wounds, lies that I’ve believed, curses, and other detritus in my soul that could explode and cause problems. “Yes, sir,” I replied.

“And you recognize that this dream is just symbolic? That solving these issues in the real world is going to take more than just picking up the bombs and putting them in your basket?” I understood that he was right: these are real issues and they need real solutions.

The dream had prophetically pointed out that there were bombs, danger points (and I suspect we all have some). We can identify the bombs by prayer, by prophecy, by soul-searching, maybe by inviting input from godly friends.

I also recognized that he wasn’t commenting on the solutions that they needed, just that the issues needed something more than “prophetically picking up a bomb” and putting it in my basket. I was welcome to choose the solutions I was comfortable with: repentance, healing prayer, power of God, therapy, washing in the Word, and more.

I observe that God is speaking to a number of his kids in this season about getting rid of offenses, removing the stumbling blocks from our history; in fact, it’s a little freaky how many began hearing this topic at the same time. If you’re in this season, embrace it as from God, and work with him to remove the hindrances to moving forward.

We’re in this together.

A Lesson on Our Angels.

I love testimonies. They say so much good stuff about God! And the whole concept of “testimony” (“μαρτυρία,” an interesting word on several levels) includes the concept of “What God has done, he is willing to do again.” I love that.

I was watching over a baby-Christian who was dying. She was 90 years old, freshly saved, and had just been diagnosed with cancer. When I asked, Father said, “The cancer will not take her, but it is her time to go.”

As I said, she was dying, but she was taking her time about it. She had been in dancing on the edge of Eternity for several weeks; it was hard on her and everyone who loved her to watch her suffer. I came to visit her again, and she never saw me, but she grasped my hand weakly as I sat with her and prayed for her. The room was full of a measure of peace, and I loved her. I wanted her to be able to lay hold of that peace.

I needed God’s perspective, so after a while, I walked over and stood by the door, ducked into the Spirit realm, and talked with Father about it. “What’s holding her back, Father?” and immediately I had a vision. There in the spirit realm, she was travelling a winding road in the midst of fields of wildflowers, and she was almost to the bridge. But there were several demons who were holding her back, taunting and tormenting her in the process. I understood that they were gaining some strength from their torment of her. It angered me.

“What do I do, Father? I’m seriously not ready to pray for her to die, even though you’ve already told me that this is her time.”

What followed was one of the more startling experiences of my life with God. He said, “Release our angels to clear the way for her,” and with that one sentence, a whole lesson was downloaded into my spirit.

A little background: I was raised in a liberal church, and then trained in an evangelical church, both of which adamantly, fanatically, insisted that I must never pay attention, especially never try to communicate with or (horrors!) command angels! Oh my goodness! That would be tantamount to abandoning faith in God in favor of gibbering in the corner with tinfoil on my head. Those who taught me had encountered people who had gone way off the deep end about angels, always talking to angels, always listening for what the angels said. Some of them actually had worn tinfoil on their heads and chosen to sleep under bridges. Bluntly, this was a doctrine built on fear, but it was the doctrine I had been raised on, and God was countermanding it.

So with the instruction to “Release OUR angels…,” Father schooled me. He took me through several scriptures, in that nanosecond. The conversation went like this: “Angels are servants of the Kingdom, yes?” “Okaaay.” “And you’re an heir of the Kingdom, yes?” “Yeaaaah.” “Are you doing the work of the kingdom, working to accomplish My will?” “Yes!” “Well, then the angels are available to serve you in this!” “Oh! Okay!”

I stood there at the door, my eyes bugging just a little, thinking through what I’d just heard. If I understood correctly, I had specifically been invited by my Heavenly Father to – not command, exactly – but “release” the angels to do the thing that Father had already assigned them to do. And as a result, again, if I understood correctly, my aged friend would then die. Yeah, she’d be with Jesus, yeah, it was her time, but dang!

I reached over, touched her cheek, stood back up, took a deep breath. I looked Father in his tender-hearted eyes, and spoke. “As a son of the Kingdom, and in the Name of Jesus, I release the angels that Father has assigned to this woman to carry out their assignments and to remove the demons hindering her.”

The next morning, we got the call. “She has passed over.” We met the hospice nurses there. My friend had the most peaceful expression on her face. She'd crossed the bridge in joy. 

When a personal revelation is supported, as this one was, both by scriptural principles and by the way actual facts turn out, I pay attention. But I wasn’t settled on it so quickly.

We talked about it afterward, and as we debriefed, Father and I talked about Matthew 26:53. That’s where, in the Garden, Jesus declares, “Or do you think that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He will provide Me with more than twelve legions of angels?” I’ve always dismissed that verse: He’s the Son of God, He can do things I can’t.

“My child, yes, Jesus is My Incarnate Son. But when He came to Earth, He emptied Himself of the prerogatives of his deity. His ministry on Earth was not as God incarnate: that would be nothing that you could ever aspire to; it would be no model of what you could do and be. Everything He did on Earth, He did as a man. Son, don’t write his example off so quickly.”

So I’m still learning. 

There Is No Hell Prepared For Sinners (Don't jump to conclusions here...)

Let me just come out there and say it: There is no hell that has been prepared for "sinners." Dante was wrong.

Now don't jump to conclusions. That doesn't mean that there isn't something hellish; there is. The Bible doesn't talk much about it, and I can understand: it's an ugly subject.

Jesus taught about "everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels." Maybe this is the "lake of fire" of Revelation 20. Sure sounds like it.

But did you see who it's prepared for? It's prepared for the devil and the rest of the angels that followed the angel named Lucifer when he was tossed on his ear out of Heaven. 

It's a topic that the Bible never answers very clearly (for all that there are a lot of Bible thumpers that seem to have all the answers!), so I can't speak clearly about it except this: it isn't prepared for people.

I guess there are some people who are so completely committed to the things of demons (often called "sin"), that they refuse to be separated from them. I guess that when the devil and his angels are chucked into that "everlasting fire" that the people that refuse to let them go... well, ... they go with them.

(I understand that this is not consistent with what you and I were taught in Sunday School. The truth is that a lot of what we were taught in Sunday School can't be supported by the Book. Let's stick to the book.)

Running the Race

I’ve been frustrated at some people recently, but I think I may be doing the same thing that they’re doing. I hate it when that happens.

In the past couple of decades, God has awakened a bunch of stuff inside of me, and I’ve gone from being a “faithful churchgoer” and a “good Christian” to being a lover. I’m running this race with more passion and more determination and more energy than I have since I was first saved.

As a result, I’m further along in the race than I used to be, the race I refer to as “That I might know Him!” Some of the people I used to jog alongside are still jogging, and we don’t fellowship as much any more, because I’m running with pretty much everything I have, and they’re still jogging. I don’t mean this to sound prideful, but I’m running ahead of where they’re running, and we aren’t close enough in the race to treasure the same things any longer.

Recently, a friend got in my face. He’s running the race, and very recently, God has lit the fire in him that He has lit in me, so my friend is running as hard (at least) as I am now, but he’s starting from way back there, from among the joggers. Among the joggers, my friend is now leading the pack.

He read some of the things that I’m posting, describing some of the new treasures that Father has been unveiling as I’ve run hard these last couple of decades, and my friend, who is still running among the joggers, didn’t understand the treasures that I’ve recently found. So he got in my face, and frankly, he ripped me a new one. “I’ve never heard of these things! These new revelations can’t be from God! Nobody that I’m running with has ever heard of them.”

Frankly, it hurt. It hurt a lot. But “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles.” Father comforted me, and showed me the race we were running. And then he showed me the bigger picture.

My friend was making a mistake: he was running ahead of a pack of runners, ahead of everyone he used to be jogging with. That was a glorious thing, and Father is real proud of him. But my friend was only looking at the people that are following after him: he’s only looking behind him, and so he thinks that he’s running at the head of this race, leading everyone who is running in this race, able to speak and able to correct every runner in the race. He’s not looking ahead, not seeing the multitude of runners that are ahead of him, many of whom have been running hard for so long that they’re several turns ahead of him, out of his sight beyond him.

And so it’s hard for him to think of others running ahead of him, who might have revelation that he doesn’t have yet, but which he will have, if he keeps running as well as he is now. But when he encounters those other runners now – on Facebook or some other social venue – he thinks they’re running the wrong race, because they’re running a path he knows nothing about, and he thinks he has to correct us.

So I get hit with this fiery dart, and so I look back to see where the “attack” is coming from, and I see it’s coming from my friend running behind me, my friend who doesn’t yet understand the things that I’m discovering in God. I realize, it’s out of love – or at least out of concern for his friend – that he’s wounding me, that he’s slowing me from my own race, that he’s drawing my attention behind me.

And my attention is indeed behind me, helping some people catch up, dodging others who want to “fix” me, and remembering how I used to be a contented old jogger, back in the day, thankful that I’ve learned to run.

Part of me wants to slow down my pace, to drop back in the race to where I can run side-by-side with my friend. But Father reminds me that this can’t be a solution: there will always be someone slower than me, maybe someone who’s dropped out of the race altogether, who’s offended by the fact that others are making progress and he is not: someone will always be offended at those who are running the race. It’s death to stop running, and Someone else has already died for them, Someone else is encouraging them to run their own race, and He’s a capable coach: I can trust my friends to Him.

Father then gently pointed out that I’m doing the same thing. I’m looking behind me, at the people I’ve passed, at the people catching up. I’ve taken my eyes off the prize. I had started to measure my progress by those behind me. That’s a mistake!

He reminds me of the rules for this race: “And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”

Looking forward, I’m startled to discover we are in fact surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses! Oh my! I’d lost track of them.

Come on! Let’s run!

Remarkably Intelligent People vs God's People

WARNING: Politically incorrect musings ahead. Just trying to examine a tough topic honestly. 

I’ve been visiting with some Remarkably Intelligent People recently (I didn’t know IQ scores went that high! Scary!) I’ve observed that a number of them have real difficulty being Christians and relating to the God of the Bible. (Not all, just a large fraction.)

It occurs to me that one reason may be because of God’s followers. Aw, heck: several reasons may be because of God’s followers. Let me explain.

Because of the merciful nature of God, and of his people (when we do it right), Christianity does understandably draw a lot of broken people who find mercy or acceptance (hopefully both) that they may have had difficulty finding elsewhere. The reality is that broken people make broken choices, sometimes justify those broken choices, and sometimes their understanding of God is characterized by those bad choices. For example, if I were to condemn you for not living up to my own moral standard, and then declaim that this is the way God is, a Remarkably Intelligent Person is probably intelligent enough not to be drawn to a god characterized by moralistic bigotry.

But in addition, in many of the Hallowed Halls of the Faith, thinking is not only not encouraged, it is occasionally actively discouraged, even (foolishly) presented as a conflict to faith. “Evolution can’t be true, because the Bible says God created everything” not only misses the point of the conversation, it demonstrates that people who think are not welcome to that conversation.  

And then there’s the issue that Christians very often speak gibberish. In our more lucid moments, we sometimes call it “Christianese,” but it's gibberish. We make noises that nobody else uses, and expect other people to know what our strange vocalizations mean. Very often, we’ll abbreviate a whole conversation into just a conclusion, bypassing the fact that it took someone (hopefully ourselves) months to arrive there. For people with very healthy minds, the process is the point of the conversation: they’re not interested in taking our word for something we figured out months ago.

For example, I’ve been known to say, “God said it; I believe it; that settles it,” as a reminder of the precious conclusion I arrived at from a very long, very personal evaluation of what I understood about the scriptures. That declaration is meaningful to me, but not to the Remarkably Intelligent Person who hasn’t been through my year-long analysis. But if I just quote it, merely because someone I respect said it and I think it gives credibility to my argument: please just don’t go there. That’s insulting to intelligence in general.

Finally, all of the Remarkably Intelligent People I know – whether they are Christians or not – know what the Bible says. Generally they know the Book better than I, even the unbelieving Remarkably Intelligent People, and I’ve been studying it for 40 years! One of the characteristics of remarkable intelligence is the ability to see the remarkable difference between what the Bible declares Christians should be like (Jesus set up this booby-trap in John 17:23), or the incongruity between the vengeful God preached from the OT and the God of Love as he reveals himself in the NT. The fact that most of God’s people can’t reconcile either mismatch is also not overlooked.

I am NOT trying to say that Christianity isn’t a good fit for intelligent people. Nor am I trying to say that we need to live up to their standard of intellectual analysis.

What I AM suggesting is nothing new: let’s not be stupid. Let’s see if we can speak English (or another actual language) instead of religious gibberish. Let’s take the time to figure out what we actually believe, and more importantly for our own growth: why we believe it.

In other words, let’s learn to be genuine people, relating genuinely to God and to each other. And let’s learn to feed ourselves.

COMMENT: These are politically incorrect musings. I've just been trying to examine a tough topic honestly. If you're offended: please get over it; this isn't about you. 

Interpreting Scripture (and Theology) Through Jesus

I’ve been thinking about how we handle some of the more incongruous portions of scripture.

The book of James, for example. Martin Luther wanted to toss the book out of the Bible; he called it the “Epistle of Straw,” and he had a good reason: James is such a completely different presentation of God than the rest of the New Testament. It doesn’t mention Jesus’ name even once. How can we have a book of the Bible that doesn’t point to Jesus?

But eventually, we figured it out. James’ epistle doesn’t stand alone. It stands in context with the rest of the NT, and we interpret James’ comments about the value of works, for example, in the light of the rest of the revelation about who Jesus is and what he has done.

Because Jesus is all about grace apprehended by faith instead of by works, we know how to interpret James’ words about works: through the life of Jesus, through the cross of Jesus. James is talking about working out our faith, working from the forgiveness we’ve received, not working to earn forgiveness.

If we didn’t interpret those passages, through the life of Jesus, if instead we used James’ words about works to define Jesus (I have met some confused, law-based people who have), then we could seriously misunderstand Jesus.  

We’ve figured out how to interpret James. Why do we not, I wonder, apply the same lesson to Revelation?

We should take the difficult to understand fire-and-brimstone passages of Revelation, and interpret them through the very clear revelation of the life and words of Jesus. “OK. Jesus taught us that God is perfect love, and Jesus himself took all condemnation on himself on the Cross. So how do I understand the four horsemen in that light?”

But there aren’t very many people who do that. I’ve met hundreds of people who take this most-bizarre, most difficult-to-interpret book of the New Testament, and use it to define Jesus by employing their best guess about what the strange imagery and bizarre metaphors are referencing. It requires that they completely ignore the clear revelation of the life of Jesus in four first-hand testimonials, and we ignore the clear revelation of his own teaching.

I am NOT saying that either James or Revelation are not inspired scripture, or that we can do without their teaching. I AM saying that we must interpret these passages through the greater revelation of Jesus, and not use them to define our understanding of Jesus. We always use the clear passage to define the less clear passage, and there is no clearer understanding of God than the person of Jesus.

Jesus rebuked people who would “strain out a gnat, but swallow a camel.” I’ve met a bunch of those people. That’s gotta give them indigestion.

Jesus is the clearest interpretation of God that there has ever been: God himself became human, and walked among humans so that we could know who God is. We need to base our understanding of Scripture off of that clearest revelation; everything else that we think we understand about God must be interpreted through the life of Jesus. If we hold a belief about God that is inconsistent with him, then we need to let it go.

We need to apply the lessons we’ve learned from the book of James to Revelation and other less-clear passages about who God is.

Does God Harm People?

Does God harm people? Does he beat up his kids? Does God bring sickness, disease, even death, in order to accomplish good in his kids?

One verse that people use to support this theological drivel is Hebrews 12:6, which reads (in the NKJV):
 

For whom the LORD loves He chastens, And scourges every son whom He receives."

A quick glance at a Greek lexicon will help us.

The Greek word used for “chasten” is παιδεύω. The Strongs lexicon (http://bit.ly/TbnnDR) says the primary meaning of παιδεύω is:

1) to train children
   a) to be instructed or taught or learn
   b) to cause one to learn

Since the immediate context is about fathers training their children, and specifically compares God’s fathering to human fathering, this is an excellent contextual fit. The idea is more of a firm coach than a child-abuser, and the context, very much about fathering, supports the concept of instructing, training, coaching.

By contrast, when was the last time you heard of a father that brought home a polio virus to infect his son as an expression of his love? What loving dad would cut his daughter’s brake lines so she’d crash and spend a month in ICU? Who in their right mind would respect such a father or hold him up as an example for others to follow? [Hint: it wouldn’t be God!]

Does he train us hard? Well, when was the last time that a competent coach who trained his players gently? Did they every win anything? Sure, training is hard. But it is not abusive. It's not about sickness, death and destruction; that's somebody else's job description. Jesus came that we “may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.” (Romans 10:10)

The second half of the verse is considered metaphor by Greek language scholars, and it is in the Hebrew pattern of “parallelism”: the second phrase complements or clarifies the first phrase: Yes, God trains his kids. “For whom the Lord loves, he trains, and he spanks his sons when they need it.” Parallel ideas: the first phrase tells us how to interpret the second phrase.

A better theological foundation about the nature of God is found earlier in Hebrews: in 1:3, the Bible declares, “The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being.” Note: “Exact representation.”  

In other words: Whatever is true about God’s being is demonstrated in Jesus. In other words, if you don’t see something in Jesus, you’re in error if you believe it about God.

A lot of people have this OT image of God always ready to smite someone, always ready to judge people with death and disaster. That’s poppycock! How many people did Jesus smite? How many did he kill? How many times did someone come to Jesus, “the exact representation” of God’s being, asking to be healed, only to be told, “No, it’s better if you stay sick, because you’re learning something from the sickness.”

That, of course, is the theological equivalent of saying, “The devil – whose job it is to steal, kill and destroy – can do a better job of raising God’s kids through stealing killing and destroying, than God can do through loving them.” That, I’m afraid, is profitable for nothing more serious than fertilizing your tomatoes: run away from such stinky, libelous accusations of God’s character!

Someone will say (and often loudly and rudely): “But God judges sin! God is holy!”

Yes, God is holy. And yes God judges sin; in fact he has already judged sin: Jesus was judged for sin! He was crucified, nailed to a tree, because of sin; because of all sin! In fact, “while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)

So then, whose sins did Jesus miss? Whose sins are still un-judged? Whose sin is too big for the sacrifice of the Incarnate Son of God? Who did God overlook in his dying for the entire world? There ain’t none! (Though you and I know that there are some folks that are working hard to reject his payment for their sin; that’s a different conversation, and involves Revelation 20.) 

Let’s acknowledge that God is actually good, and let’s expect goodness from him.

Home Fellowship or Church Fellowship?

There has been a fair bit of discussion among Believers recently about what it means to “go to church” or “be part of a church.” 

The illustration (it’s not model) that the Bible gives us for where the church met in Jerusalem is in Acts 5:42: “Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Messiah.”

[Note that there were at least 5000 believers (Acts 4:4) in the temple courts (Acts 5:12), and they had no PA system. It was not physically possible for one man to stand in front of that many people and communicate well with them all. Either they had miraculous sound reinforcement (I think Jesus used this method sometimes), or each apostle taught a more modestly-sized portion of the larger crowd. Either way, they spent more time (every day) meeting in homes.]

Later in Jerusalem, and also in Asia, Paul showed another model when the persecution showed up: Act 19:9 “But when some were hardened and did not believe…. he departed from them and withdrew the disciples, reasoning daily in the school of Tyrannus.”

Paul did make use of synagogues, but as places to practice evangelism, not the place for the fellowship of the saints: the synagogue was their history, but not their community any longer: they were no longer the People of the Law.

I observe that the Biblical model involves Christians meeting in public spaces (the temple courts were perhaps the social equivalent of the shopping mall; the School of Tyrannus might equate to the local high school gym) for training. But it’s clear that the church was more equated with people’s houses in the Biblical model (Acts 8:3, Romans 16:5; 1Cor 16:19; Colossians 4:15; Philemon 1:2.…). Some say that the only reason they met in people’s homes was persecution, and that may be a factor, but that factor doesn’t seem to be a major issue in the Book.

I also observe that when the church was meeting among the Jewish people, it used Jewish methods and settings (temple grounds), but when it met among the gentiles, it used gentile methods and locations (School of Tyrannus). It appears that while Christianity – the Church – came from Jewish roots, it is not a Jewish function. The Judiazers were one of the greatest heresies opposed by New Testament apostles. The apostolic conclusion: you don’t need to become or to stay Jewish in order to become a Christian.

In our “Western Culture”, we make everything into a mass-production factory. We’ve done it with education in the public schools, with government, with sports, with our shopping malls. So of course we’ll do it with our church-life.

My point is NOT that mass-producing Christian fellowship is inherently evil. My point is that it that it is equally not evil to choose a different model for fellowship.

I home-schooled my kids, for about half of their education. In hindsight, they preferred the homeschooling to the public schooling, and I observe that they learned more during those years, they encountered far less social “drama”, and they where happier in the non-factory education model rather than the factory model. Home-schooling is WAY more work than shipping the kids off to the local public school, which is rather factory-like.

I shop at WalMart. A little bit. (I figure that my prayers for the company have more authority if I have an investment in the company, but that’s another conversation.) But I also shop at the local farmer’s market. The factory shopping experience has more variety, and often has a lower cost-of-participation (selling price), but the quality of food that I get at the farmer’s market is hugely superior. In addition, the instruction I get from the farmer’s market about how to use the item that I’m purchasing is light years ahead of what I get from the factory.

As for sports, I prefer to play Frisbee golf with my friends rather than watch the Seahawks or the World Cup on TV. It’s way better exercise, better fellowship, and the relationships forged there actually means something, whereas the pro sports have no eternal significance that I can discern. On the other hand, I don’t ever have sore muscles from watching the factory sports on TV, and I can switch channels freely when I get bored.

In the same way, I’ve learned (the hard way, frankly) that farmer’s market version of church, the home-school version of fellowship produces a superior product, albeit at a greater cost.

We have this value system in America that if it isn’t done on a big scale, it isn’t really the right way to do it. I’m looked at as weird because I don’t have a TV and don’t like the shopping mall. And so many American Christians appear to look down on their brethren and, er… “sistren” who choose to find their fellowship outside of the American Church Factory.

I say all this to say this: Christian fellowship in the home is actually “more Biblical” (found more commonly in the Bible) and more historically accurate (existed long before) than the building of large and expensive “church” buildings.

People who choose home fellowship should not feel inferior to people who choose the large, formal setting for their fellowship. The mega-church is not somehow “better” Christianity. Neither should people whose primary fellowship is in the home feel or declare superiority to others who find a place in the large fellowship.

Let’s find ways to enjoy unity, to celebrate each other.