In the Desert

Recently I’ve been watching my DVDs of Star Trek: The Next Generation. In one episode, Data meets Spock and comments on the fact that Spock has spent his life trying to suppress his human side and the emotions that go with that, while Data has been trying to become more human and wishes to experience emotions. I’d have to say I would usually agree with Spock on this one. In my experience, emotions most often represent a loss of control and are usually undesirable. That’s one of the reasons that I find depression hard to cope with. I don’t like feeling out of control, like I could start crying at all kinds of inconvenient times.

I just came across these comments in A Praying Life, by Paul E. Miller (57-58):

“In fact, God wanted me depressed about myself and encouraged about his Son. The gospel uses my weakness as the door to God’s grace. That is how grace works... John Landsburg [Landsberg], a sixteenth-century Catholic monk, summarized this well in his classic A Letter from Jesus Christ....

‘...In fact I don’t want you to rely on your own strength and abilities and plans, but to distrust them and to distrust yourself; and to trust me and no one and nothing else. As long as you rely entirely on yourself, you are bound to come to grief. You still have a most important lesson to learn: your own strength will no more help you to stand upright than propping yourself on a broken reed. You must not despair of me. You may hope and trust in me absolutely. My mercy is infinite.’”

It is an uncomfortable truth that God doesn’t want us to be stronger, but weaker. He doesn’t need us strong enough to do His work, but weak enough to let Him do His work for us and through us. I heard a radio spot on Judges 6 where Gideon is told, “Go in the strength you have,” not in the strength he didn’t have. In the next chapter, God intentionally weakened the army down to 300 men so that He alone would get the credit. In 2 Corinthians 11:30 and 12:9-10, Paul boasts in his own weaknesses because they display God’s strength.

Our culture values the strong, independent, assertive, and self-controlled. God values the poor, meek, thirsty, and sorrowful who know they need His strength (Matthew 5:3-12). The strong don’t really need God. The weak know they can’t live without Him.

Even though I’ve contended with depression most of my life, I hate when it flairs up and leaves me feeling weak and vulnerable. My pride kicks in and says, “You aren’t supposed to feel this way. You should be able to hold it together. You can’t let others know you still have this struggle.” This is an arid place to dwell.

Miller draws on the many stories of the desert in Scripture:

“The hardest part of being in the desert is that there is no way out. You don’t know when it will end. There is no relief in sight... The still, dry air of the desert brings the sense of helplessness that is so crucial to the spirit of prayer. You come face-to-face with your inability to live, to have joy, to do anything of lasting worth... The desert becomes a window to the heart of God. He finally gets your attention because he’s the only game in town... The best gift of the desert is God’s presence” (184-185).

Life can often feel like a desert—empty, lonely, fruitless. But God takes pleasure in making the desert bloom, bringing life to lifelessness. That is a reason for hope and perseverance.

“The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus; it shall blossom abundantly and rejoice with joy and singing” (Isaiah 35:1-2 ESV).

© 2018 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com.

In the Light

I’ve been thinking about sin lately, and I’m not the only one. It so “happens” that the sermon at our church this week was on 1 Corinthians 10:1-13. Just a few days ago, Desiring God posted this article by Garrett Kell, If They Fell,So Can You, which is well worth reading.

What factors may cause us to give in to temptation?

• We don’t recognize something as sin, such as the more subtle sins of pride, gossip, or envy.
• We may have adopted the world’s standards in regards to sexuality, relationships, and money.
• We let ourselves become vulnerable through fatigue, stress, and busyness.
• We have slacked off in pursuing God through Scripture, prayer, and worship.
• We have become relationally isolated from fellow believers.
• We keep our sin secret due to fear and shame.
• We feel unique because we can’t see the sins that others struggle with.
• We judge our private sins to be less of a problem than someone else’s visible sin.

The solution to all of those is abiding in community with the Body of Christ to keep one another accountable. Together we pursue God and bring truth to light—the truth about God and about ourselves.

Another recent article by Jared Wilson on The Gospel Coalition quotes Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Life Together:

“He who is alone with his sin is utterly alone. It may be that Christians, notwithstanding corporate worship, common prayer, and all their fellowship in service, may still be left to their loneliness. The final break-through to fellowship does not occur, because, though they have fellowship with one another as believers and as devout people, they do not have fellowship as the undevout, as sinners. The pious fellowship permits no one to be a sinner. So everybody must conceal his sin from himself and from the fellowship. We dare not be sinners. Many Christians are unthinkably horrified when a real sinner is suddenly discovered among the righteous. So we remain alone with our sin, living in lies and hypocrisy. The fact is that we are sinners!”

Wilson goes on to say, “I know people are mean, I know people are judgmental, I know people act weird and get messy and cause problems and are really inefficient for the ways we normally like to do church—but if we believe in the gospel, we don’t have a choice any longer to live in the dark. How about we stop being shocked to find sinners among the ‘pious’ and start shocking the fearful with grace?”

I wonder what the church would look like if this were the common experience? I’ve seen it happen on a small scale among a few friends, and it always makes me long for more. It’s hard to live in true Christian community if we’re all hiding secrets from one another. Dare we risk walking in the light?

“But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin” (1 John 1:7 ESV).

© 2018 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com.

Unhidden

Every now and then I wish that the Protestant church had not abandoned the sacrament of confession. While I understand that that was a byproduct of acknowledging the priesthood of all believers, I think that for many Christians today it has become the “priesthood of no believers” or perhaps the “priesthood of me.” No, we don’t require a priest to serve as an intermediary between us and God, but there is something sacred that happens in fellowship when one believer is able to remind another based on Scripture, “God has forgiven you and He loves you.” Those words draw us closer to one another and to God as we look toward the cross of Jesus Christ.

Certainly there were abuses in the Catholic Church in the use of the confessional, penance, and the selling of indulgences. And there were those like Martin Luther who felt so burdened by his own sinfulness that he spent excessive amounts of time trying to remember and confess every sin that might possibly separate him from God. He hadn’t yet learned the freedom of grace and mercy in Christ. Those abuses and errors required correction and the Reformation was greatly needed. Unfortunately, I think many modern Christians may have taken things too far. There are many who see no need for the local church at all. They believe they can live out their faith without any input from anyone else. They refuse to accept that gathering together is a spiritual discipline that is necessary not only for their own growth in sanctification, but also for the growth of others. We are all weakened when some try to go it alone.

Specifically as it relates to confession, participating in close fellowship with others provides opportunity for accountability, encouragement, and reminders of the truth of God’s Word. I know there have been times when I’ve needed someone keeping me accountable for my actions, not so that they could enforce penance but so that I remember that there is someone who cares whether I stand or fall. (There is such a thing as beneficial shame that provides an extra incentive to endure.) There have also been times when I’ve needed such a person but I’ve opted not to find someone, and that is always a recipe for failure sooner or later.

Accountability to another person also serves as a reminder of the seriousness of sin. Without accountability, we can easily dismiss or rationalize our pet sins. With accountability, we see more of the eternal and relational consequences of sin, but also the abundance of grace that comes through Jesus’s death on the cross.

James wrote, “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working” (5:16 ESV). Yet that seems to be the last thing many of us would choose to do. Confessing to one another is a way of agreeing with God that sin matters, grace abounds, God’s love endures, and we matter to Him and to one another.

Charles E. Moore wrote in Called to Community: The Life Jesus Wants for His People:

“Confession means far more than unloading one’s problems on someone else or striving for personal betterment. We bare our souls before our brothers and sisters for the sake of building up the body of Christ. Only by sharing life to this degree can we show the world that Jesus really does have the power to forgive sins, set burdened people free, and restore broken relationships.”

Paul David Tripp wrote:

“Confession shouldn’t be this scary thing we do our best to avoid. Sin, weakness, and failure shouldn’t be the constant elephant in the room that we all know is there but can’t (or won’t) talk about… It should be liberating, not understood as a moment of personal and relational loss. Our confession should be propelled by deep appreciation and gratitude toward God, who has made it possible for us to no longer fear being exposed.”

Olan Stubbs put it this way:

“Sometimes being honest with another person eye to eye about our sin forces us to be more honest with ourselves about our sin and ultimately more honest with the Lord… Whether it’s a small group, or an accountability group, or some other arrangement, we all need the help of other Christians in the church to assess, call out, and rebuke our sins, and to encourage us in holy living. Take advantage of the great gift God has given in providing not only forgiveness (Romans 8:1) and sin-killing power (Romans 8:4) by faith, but also other believers (Romans 12:5–8) to whom we can confess our sins and have them speak truth and grace back to us.”

I challenge all of us, myself included, to consider how we can better facilitate true community through the vulnerability of confession.

“Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy” (Proverbs 28:13).

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On a related note, Sam Storms had a couple recent blog posts that are worth reading on the importance of church membership:

http://www.samstorms.com/enjoying-god-blog/post/10-things-you-should-know-about-church-membership

http://www.samstorms.com/enjoying-god-blog/post/why-do-people-object-to-the-concept-of-membership-in-a-local-church

© 2018 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com.

It Is Written

The following is some theological speculation that I’ve been mulling over in recent months. I don’t claim to have a corner on truth, but this just helps me to make sense of some parts of Scripture…

I’ve come to think of this life as being a book in God’s hand. I’m sure the metaphor breaks down at some points as all metaphors do. Psalm 139:16 (ESV) says, “Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in Your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.” If all our days were already written, then the book is completed and the end is sure. This should be a reason for peace and trust in the Author. Should we still pray? Yes, because that is method God has ordained for us to interact with Him. As many have said, prayer doesn’t change God, it changes us. Prayer affirms our faith and shapes our understanding of God’s greater plans.

Jesus is referred to as the “Word made flesh” (John 1:14) and the “Author of life” (Acts 3:15). The Author chose to enter His own story for the good of His people. He provided the necessary solution to the problem of sin. Only the Author could resurrect His own character.

Time, from Creation to the Second Coming, is contained within the book. God is outside of time. “Do not overlook this one fact, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Pet. 3:8). We see time as a fixed construct, passing by second by second, but God sees all of time in His hand.

The choices we will make are already known to God, but not to us as the characters in the book. Because we are created by God with certain characteristics, we fulfill the plot that God has already written. (Perhaps our free will is not so free as we may think.) Some characters are written with evil intentions. “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20). “For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, ‘For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed in all the earth’” (Romans 9:17). But as Paul points out in Romans 9, such people are still responsible for their actions and will be judged accordingly.

The image of a completed book also helps clarify some of the conflicting views on death. If a character dies in a realistic novel, you don’t expect them to reappear in a later chapter as either a ghost or a real person. (I won’t get into other types of fiction.) Let’s say the character dies and comes out of the book into the hand of the Author. If the book contains time and God is outside of time, where or when is that character from the perspective of those still in the book? His body in the book is dead. He may or may not be conscious of being in God’s presence, depending on how you understand Scripture. (N.T. Wright interprets Revelation 6:9 to say that the dead are awaiting the resurrection under the altar of God, which presents some interesting images.) But think about this, if the character is consciously with God, do you think he’s going to be asking to get back into the book to see how the rest of someone’s story was written or to try to change it? Perhaps this explains how Moses and Elijah appeared to Jesus at the Transfiguration (Matt. 17:3). They were written back in for a few paragraphs.

At the conclusion of the book, all the characters will be brought outside its pages to face the final Judgment. And my interpretation of 1 Corinthians 15 is that immortality will be granted to those who have put their faith in Christ while the rest will cease to exist, as characters whose roles in the book have ended and as pages burnt to ashes in the fire. I imagine the book has enough pages to keep a fire going for quite some time. The fire may be eternal even when the book is gone. And maybe the marriage supper of the Lamb is a cookout, since Jesus seemed to like fires on the beach (John 21:9).

When we move into eternal life in the new heavens and new earth (2 Peter 3:12-13), it will be as if we’re moving from a two-dimensional world into a three-dimensional one, out of the book and into reality. What we’ve experienced here is but a shadow of what is to come (Col. 2:17, Heb. 10:1), and just a dim reflection in the mirror compared to what we will one day see (1 Cor. 13:12). That makes me even more anxious to see that new world. But until that day, we might as well enjoy the story as it continues to be revealed to us.

“I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now… Come further up, come further in!” –C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle

© 2018 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com.

Among Friends

I read the following quote from Dietrich Bonhoeffer (originally from Life Together) in a compilation of writings titled Called to Community: The Life Jesus Wants for His People.

“If we do not give thanks daily for the Christian fellowship in which we have been placed, even where there is no great experience, no discoverable riches, but much weakness, small faith, and difficulty; if on the contrary, we only keep complaining to God that everything is to paltry and petty, so far from what we expected, then we hinder God from letting our fellowship grow according to the measure and riches which are there for us all in Jesus Christ… The more thankfully we daily receive what is given to us, the more surely and steadily will fellowship increase and grow from day to day as God pleases.”

Moments after reading that, I read another part of the same Bonhoeffer quote in Messy Beautiful Friendship, by Christine Hoover (a book I would recommend):

“The man who fashions a visionary ideal of community demands that it be realized by God, by others, and by himself. He enters the community of Christians with his demands, sets up his own law, and judges the brethren and God Himself accordingly… When things do not go his way, he calls the effort a failure… So he becomes, first an accuser of his brethren, then an accuser of God, and finally the despairing accuser of himself.”

I find that to be both convicting and frustrating. As Hoover spells out in her book, we all make assumptions about friendship and fellowship, and more often than not our assumptions are based on what we want and need for ourselves. Some of our assumptions may be biblical, but many are not. I sometimes find myself thinking things like:

• If people were really committed to our church, so many would show up for Bible study that we’d have groups meeting every night of the week.
• If we were pursuing real fellowship, we wouldn’t have so many people who feel alone and isolated.
• If people really cared about one another, it wouldn’t be so hard to get real conversations going.

I wrestle with finding a balance somewhere between selfishly expecting too much from people and apathetically expecting nothing from anyone. As I read the scriptural “one another” admonitions, I still believe that the modern church ought to raise the bar for what we expect in relationships—love one another, outdo one another in showing honor, live in harmony with one another, welcome one another, instruct one another, comfort one another, serve one another, bear one another’s burdens, be kind to one another, encourage one another, exhort one another, confess your sins to one another, pray for one another, show hospitality to one another, abound in love for one another… 

But at the same time, I realize that my needs and desires may differ from others in both type and intensity because we have different types of responsibilities, homes, and interests. And if we are building relationships based on our commonalities, rather than our differences, it will likely take more intense effort in more condensed periods of time. Tim Keller said, “In a busy culture like ours, all our other loves will push themselves upon us. Friendship takes incredibly deliberate time.”

It is not always easy to be thankful for what we do have rather than bemoan what we don’t. We also need to consider whether we are expecting from people what only God can give. I completely agree with Hoover that:

“In our wish-dreams, we tend to make people our gods. We look to them—at least I have—to know us intimately at all times, to meet our every need, to be there when we want them near, and to love us unconditionally and perfectly, when the map points only to God as having these abilities” (37-38).

I think we probably all have some learning and growing to do in our relationships with one another in the Body of Christ.

“Gracious Lord Jesus, I need to know You as my friend. It is not for some specific blessing I ask, but for the greatest of all blessings, the one from which all others flow. I dare to ask You for a renewal of the wonderful friendship that makes the conversation called prayer a natural give-and-take divine dialogue… Open my mind so I may see myself and my relationships from Your perspective” (Lloyd John Ogilvie, Praying Through the Tough Times, 222).

© 2018 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com.

Meditation on Romans 8

Romans 8 has long been one of my favorite sections of the Bible. The following are some thoughts I’ve had this week.

1-4- “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

God does not condemn me because my life is hidden with Christ in God (Col. 3:3). He does not look on my sin but on Christ’s perfection. I have been set free from the condemnation of my sin, along with its power to trip me up. I don’t have to fulfill the law perfectly because Jesus already did. Condemnation from other people or from myself is out of place and has no ultimate weight.

5-11- “You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you.”

I confess I often do set my mind on the things of the flesh, but because I have the Holy Spirit, I am not obligated to the flesh. I have a choice where I will set my mind. When I do set my mind on the flesh, the result is fleshly—discontentment, discouragement, lust, pride, envy, etc. But when I set my mind on the things of God, the result is spiritually fruitful—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control (Gal. 5:22-23).

12-13- “But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”

The flesh cannot and will not put itself to death. Fighting the desires of the flesh by my own strength will always fail. Only by the transforming power of the Spirit can those fleshly deeds and desires be killed.

14-17- “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.”

I have been adopted into God’s family, and I have all the rights of the Son of God Himself. I need not fear my heavenly Father, but I can come to Him as a child with my needs, my desires, my weakness, and my failures.

18-21- “For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.”

This world is really messed up by sin. My sin, the sins of others against me, broken bodies and minds, death, destruction—one day it will all be cleaned up and made new. Till then I must wait and endure.

22-25- “But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”

I often get discouraged and impatient with my progress in sanctification. [Would I dare turn that sentence the right way around and say that I am discouraged with God’s progress in my sanctification?!] I keep thinking that I should be farther along, that I shouldn’t have these same struggles, that God expects better of me. When those same old temptations come along, pride tells me to try to rely on myself, while shame tells me I am already a failure just for being tempted. I groan with the seeming futility of this life, but I eagerly long for the day when all temptation, sin, and brokenness will be a thing of the past.

26-27- “The Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”

Without the intercession of the Spirit and the Son, I don’t know where I would be. I am certain that God has spared me from some moments of temptation that would otherwise have made me fall into sin. He has made a way of escape for me through Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 10:13).

28-30- “For those whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son.”

God’s will is my sanctification, but He has ordained that it will not be completed until the last day (Phil. 1:6). I will one day fully reflect the image of Christ, but until that day I will groan with the weight of this world.

31-34- “He who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things?”

God has already given me all I really need—salvation, forgiveness, the righteousness of Christ, adoption, a secure future, the promise of perfection one day, etc. If I feel I’m lacking something, I’m either mistaken or I’m being impatient about waiting.

35-37- “In all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.”

I often don’t feel like a conqueror. I feel weak and susceptible. But Christ has won the victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil. Even if I lose a battle, the war is not lost—it’s not time to give up, but to recoup to fight another day. The Commander sees what I cannot see—that the end of all battles is very near, and the verdict has already been determined.

38-39- “[Nothing] will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

And for that I give thanks.

© 2018 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com.

What Do You See?

After Jesus was arrested, Peter followed along behind. Luke records the following:

“Then a servant girl, seeing him as he sat in the light and looking closely at him, said, ‘This man also was with Him.’ … And a little later someone else saw him and said, ‘You also are one of them.’ … And after an interval of about an hour still another insisted, saying, ‘Certainly this man also was with Him, for he too is a Galilean” (Luke 22:56, 58, 59 ESV).

Although Scripture doesn’t specify, Luke gives the impression that at least the first girl recognized Peter from having seen him with Jesus. Matthew’s account says that one of the three people commented on Peter’s accent. His Galilean heritage was evident in some way.

Similar events occur in the book of Acts. “Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus” (4:13). This time Peter didn’t deny it even though it brought danger to him. “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard” (4:19-20). The appearance of the resurrected Christ and the coming of the Holy Spirit gave Peter an assurance and confidence that he didn’t have before.

Another passage in Acts is worth mentioning. Paul encountered a crippled man at Lystra. “And Paul, looking intently at him and seeing that he had faith to be made well, said in a loud voice, ‘Stand upright on your feet.’ And he sprang up and began walking” (14:9-10). Something about the man’s appearance revealed his faith. Was it a twinkle in his eye? A look of desperation? Was he trying to get up even before he was healed?

All that makes me wonder—what do people see when they look at you or me? Do they recognize that we have been with Jesus? Do they see that we have faith? Do they hear it in our “accent” and the words we use? Do they know that it is because of Christ that we live and act the way we do? Conversely, do our words and deeds show that our loyalties are no different from the rest of the world? Do we blend into the crowd so well that no one would suspect us of being Christians?

When we interact with other people, do we look for signs of faith in them? It seems to me that evangelism has to start there. It’s easy to go through life not even seeing the people around us—the cashier, the waitress, the mechanic—they just become blurred faces on the way to somewhere else. I know I’m often guilty of this. I suspect that if we took the time and effort to really see people, we’d see a lot more evidence of faith than we might think, whether it is someone who is searching for the truth or someone who is growing in their faith. That can then become the starting point for a deeper conversation and opportunity for connection.

My challenge for all of us is to take a look at our own lives to see what’s showing, but also to look at those around us and really see them.

“But in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect” (1 Peter 3:15).

© 2018 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com.