God Stoops Down

As I’m nearing the end of Ed Welch’s book Running Scared, I came across this comment about 1 Peter 5:6-7:

“Our natural tendency is to go it alone, or, if the load is too heavy, to call a friend to help. But Peter paints a different picture. In an act that could never have been conceived by a human being, the King comes and beseeches us to lay our burden on him… Peter is doing his best to persuade us to be a new people who call out to the Lord. Let Peter persuade you. He begins by exhorting us to know that our God is the Creator God. He holds history in his hand. He delivers with a mighty hand, the grandest display being the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ… In keeping with his character, he continues to serve; he invites us to cast our burdens on him as we would cast burdens on an ox… In one of the amazing paradoxes of the kingdom, when God takes our burdens and takes the position of a servant, he reveals our inability and his sufficiency” (266).

Throughout Scripture God pursues relationship with people. He made covenant after covenant (Noah, Abraham, Moses, David), not requiring people to serve Him, but telling them what He wanted to do for them. God delivered the people from Egypt before He gave them the law. His grace preceded His standards. The people were to obey because they had been delivered from slavery, not in order to be delivered. He sent Jesus as the mediator of the New Covenant so that we who are sinful and insufficient might become part of His eternal family. And He continues to pursue us when we are wandering sheep. We can’t make ourselves worthy of His attention or mercy.

In no other religion does a supreme being stoop down in love in order to bring people up. What god is there that doesn’t first demand obeisance and obedience before consenting to fulfill a request? What other god says you can “cast all your cares on Him because He cares for you”?

I’ve slowly been reading Mark Twain’s Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World. He spent a fair amount of time describing the religious practices in India and all the things people go through to try to appease the many gods. It’s humorous but also sad that people can expend so much time, effort, and money to curry favor with gods that are no gods. The One true God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4 ESV). And He makes it possible for us to come to Him, not because of our obedience but because His grace and the perfect sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

He not only saves us, but invites us to come to Him with all our cares and concerns. It’s really dumbfounding if you think about it. We can quickly start to take it for granted if we’ve been around church for very long. The God who created the universe and sustains it by His power desires a relationship with us. His ears are attentive to our prayers. He knows our very thoughts, because He is not a disinterested omnipotent being, but a loving Heavenly Father.

As we enter this season of Lent and approach our Easter celebrations, may we not forget the wonder of what we have because of Jesus Christ. May the truth astound us and bring us to new heights of gratitude and thanksgiving.

“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

Running Scared

I’ve been reading Ed Welch’s book Running Scared, which seems pretty relevant to where I find myself these days. The following are several quotes that caught my attention, along with a few of my own thoughts.

“There was a time when the biblical commands ‘Do not worry’ and ‘Do not be afraid’ put a quick end to hopes that there was anything attractive to say to fearful people. It seemed as if the biblical counsel was ‘The law says don’t fear, so don’t. End of story.’ But there are at least two different ways to say ‘Don’t worry.’ One is a judicial warning, which has a threatening overtone; the other is a parental encouragement, which aims to comfort. Scripture has both, but Luke placed the accent on parental encouragement [in Luke 12:22-34]” (9-10).

I don’t think this is a thing of the past. It seems very much alive today. I agree that the overall tone of the biblical narrative regarding fear is encouragement, not condemnation.

 “There are, of course, treatments for fears and anxieties. Medication dulls the physical symptoms, psychological treatments address the thoughts. If you are afraid to fly because you keep thinking the place will crash, you can replace that thought with another. I’ve flown many times before and nothing has happened. It’s the safest way to travel. This might help, but it rests on the premise that fear submits to logic, which is a dubious assumption. In reality, fears are rarely logical. Or, as fearful people might protest, they are very logical. If the statistics on plane crashes indicate that they are extremely rare, the statistics also say that planes do crash and people actually die in plane crashes. Someone is going to be that 1 in 100,000” (23-24).

“As worry veers out of control, cool heads try to help. First, they state the obvious: Worry doesn’t help. Second, they add that worry has more in common with astrology than it does careful weather forecasts. Then, if nothing else works, helpers try to assuage the worrier by making the environment more secure, if possible… It takes something more powerful than logic and statistical probabilities to assuage our fears and anxieties” (52-53).

The supra-rationality of fear is one of the most aggravating things about it. There is no logic that will automatically calm fears. Thus we try to control the uncontrollable.

“Behind this desire for control is the gnawing awareness that we are merely human… by design we are limited and we know it. No matter how much we rail against our dependency on other people, we really are dependent people with limited control… Since independence only works during the really good times, the obvious answer would be to seek God. The problem is that God, the One in control, does not seem to exert much control. Trust him or not, bad things will happen” (40-41).

If faith in God guaranteed immunity from difficulty, we’d have no problem sharing the gospel and convincing people to follow Him.

 “[Is it] wrong to be afraid? Is it sinful? Maybe, but put those questions on hold. The emphasis in Scripture is, ‘When I am afraid, I will trust in you’ (Ps. 56:3). The issue isn’t so much whether or not we are afraid and worry. Scripture assumes that we will be afraid and anxious at times. What is important is where we turn, or to whom we turn when we are afraid. The God who calls you to trust in him when you are afraid will spend a great deal of time showing you that you can trust him” (69).

So we return to the basics: God is faithful, He loves us dearly, He knows what we’re going through, He is with us in every situation, and He will help us endure whatever He allows to come our way.

“Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for He gives to His beloved sleep” (Psalm 127:1b-2).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

God's Treasure

I wrote the following during our Sunday school lesson today on the building of the tabernacle in Exodus 36-40:

From guilt to grace the people turned
To worship God, the One they’d spurned.
They gave their treasure to provide a place,
A reminder of God’s saving grace.

Will we likewise give our best
Or will we put Him to the test?
Our lives are His, and all we own
Belongs to God and God alone.

Forgive us when we hold too tight
To things we own and think we’re right.
Lord, open our hearts and hands to You
To give the worship You are due.

Use our lives to give You glory.
Use our mouths to tell Your story.
May we always worship You
With all we have and all we do.

“Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20 ESV).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

Anxious for Nothing?

Multiple times lately I’ve been frustrated by the things I see written by pastors and Christian authors on the subject of anxiety. It usually goes something like this: Jesus commanded in Matthew 6:25, “Do not be anxious” and Paul repeats that command in Philippians 4:6. Therefore, when we are anxious we are exhibiting a lack of faith and are sinning by breaking that command. While there is a measure truth there, I think many authors overstate the case. In part, I think that is due to the wide variety of experiences that are referred to by the word “anxiety” both scripturally and in our lives today.

I noticed this week another comment that Paul made in Philippians 2:28 (ESV) regarding Epaphroditus: “I am the more eager to send him, therefore, that you may rejoice at seeing him again, and that I may be less anxious.” In addition, Paul said in 2 Corinthians 11:28, “And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.” Should this then be interpreted as Paul confession his sin and repenting of his anxiety? I don’t think so. There is no indication of that being the case.

Even when Jesus spoke to Martha in Luke 10:41-42, He didn’t tell her she needed to repent. He said, “You are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.” It was a gentle correction, not condemnation. Likewise, when ministering to people who are anxious for whatever reason, it is not helpful to tell them “You’re sinning and need to repent.” Nor is it helpful to say, “You just need to trust God.” Throwing cliches at the person does not fix anything, and in fact may contribute to greater anxieties about lack of faith.

Anxieties, fears, and concerns exist for a reason. God made us with natural physical, mental, and emotional responses to danger in order protect ourselves. He also gave us logical minds to help us plan for the future and think through how we should respond to potential circumstances. However, in a fallen world, our bodies and minds do not always function as they should, and our responses are often out of proportion to reality. Some of our responses to anxiety can be sinful and do need to be confessed and changed, but many others need simple encouragement and counsel to deal with the sources of anxiety and to learn better coping methods.

This has really hit home with me lately as I’ve coped with the fallout of watching my house be broken into before Christmas. The lingering fears are greater than logic would justify. Though steps for greater home security have been implemented at my house, nothing can totally eliminate the anxiety. In no way do I believe my anxiety is sinful or reflects any lack of faith. I know God is in control and He is with me in every situation, and I trust Him to take care of me. (Incidentally, PTSD is not limited to military personnel and has a wide variety of causes, symptoms, and intensities.)

As I shared with my pastor recently, faith is worked out and grows through testing. None of us have perfect faith yet. In my opinion, anxiety is an opportunity to grow in faith in the midst of painful and divided thoughts and emotions. God can and will use difficult events and circumstances to develop our faith and teach us to depend on Him more fully one day at a time.

“This is my comfort in my affliction, that Your promise gives me life” (Psalm 119:50).

Text and photo © 2019 Dawn Rutan. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

The Uninvited Companion

Often I will download Kindle books when they are available for free, and sometimes I discover a hidden jewel. Such is the case with The Uninvited Companion: God’s Shaping Us in His Love through Life’s Adversities by Scott E. Shaum. (However, it is no longer free.) I haven’t finished reading it yet, but here are a few quotes from the first half:

“God created the human soul to require suffering in order to mature. He has also designed the redemptive process to necessitate suffering” (8).

“If you carefully listen to my story, you will hear assertions that God took me into seasons of deep pain to bring about unfathomable transformation that otherwise (humanly speaking) would never have taken place… Honestly, the journey has really stunk at times. Yet I like the fruit it has produced in me through the required endurance of this journey” (36).

In Romans 5:2-5 and James 1:2-3, Paul and James “can say they rejoice in suffering because they have come to learn a significant spiritual truth: something profound is going on in us as we endure through hardship. What we find is that they are not rejoicing in the pain but in what our glorious God does in us through pain” (45).

“God’s glory, who he is—namely, a God of love—comes into clearer focus as we grow in our communion with him in the midst of life’s hardships. Experiencing God’s love is the fruit of a matured character, which is the fruit of perseverance, which is the fruit of suffering. Thus, Paul rejoices in suffering because he ultimately wants to know the Father’s love for him in increasing ways” (46).

“Faith is a trait that will be tested. Your faith will be tried—you can count on it. The trying of our faith is as certain as the goodness of our God” (53).

“God does not expect us to be competent to handle all of life’s challenges on our own. No, we need a Savior, and we need him again and again. Every breathing moment of my existence, I need to be saved. Every turning toward God is an expression of faith” (55).

“God does not always resolve hurts in our lives, but he always promises his presence for good purposes” (57).

Shaum highlights an important truth. Our natural tendency, even within the church, is to do everything we can to avoid or remove painful circumstances. Whether we espouse a prosperity gospel or not, we tend to associate God’s blessing with ease and comfort. But what if His intent is to mature us and strengthen our faith through testing and trials? Would we rather be comfortable or faithful? Can we pray as Shaum did, “Allow this to continue for as long as you want, to do whatever you want in my life” (38)? I’ve prayed that before, though I’ve also prayed at times, “Lord, I don’t think I can take any more of this.”

Ironically, I’m also reading a fiction book that made a similar connection. In The Pilgrim of Hate by Ellis Peters, Brother Cadfael notes, “He has gone far along a difficult road who has come to the point of seeing that deprivation, pain and disability are of no consequence at all, beside the inward conviction of grace, and the secret peace of the soul. An acceptance which can only be made for a man’s own self, never for any other” (52).

While there are many books that wrestle with the “problem of pain” and question why God allows bad things to happen to good people, there are few that I’ve found like Shaum’s that so clearly illustrate the good purposes God accomplishes in our lives through pain and difficulty. We can fight against the trials of life and try to escape them, or we can embrace them as part of God’s design to draw us to depend on Him and to conform us to the image of His Son.

“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:2-4 ESV).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

Truth and Error

I’ve been reading the three epistles of John, and it struck me how blunt he is about the false teachers that were creeping into the early church. He repeatedly points to signs of the truth. Here are just a few:

“If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth” (1 John 1:6 ESV).

“Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness” (1 John 2:9).

“No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also” (1 John 2:23).

“If you know that He is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of Him” (1 John 2:29).

“By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother” (1 John 3:10).

“By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God...” (1 John 4:2-3a).

“Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son” (2 John 9).

John obviously thought that false teachers were a significant danger to the church, and he warned the believers to be on their guard. I think we can tend to be guilty of “chronological snobbery” (to use C.S. Lewis’s excellent term) and think that we are immune to that danger. Obviously the early church didn’t have all the Scriptures compiled and Christians didn’t have multiple copies of the Bible sitting on their shelves, so they didn’t have a quick reference for orthodoxy. But on the other hand, they also didn’t have access to billions of books, podcasts, blogs, and Facebook posts that claim to be proclaiming truth but could be based on anything from rumor and innuendo to the so-called prophets of other religions. If anything, we need even more discernment to sift through all the information that bombards us every day.

All around us there are people who claim to have some kind of relationship with God, and they may even claim to know Jesus Christ, but they aren’t pursuing righteousness and living in the light. There are those who say they are Christians, but they do not love others as Scripture commands. Even within the church there are many who are “cultural Christians” but don’t have true faith. Although the image is alarming, I think there will be a long line of people to whom Jesus says, “Depart from Me, I never knew you” (Matthew 7:23), because “The gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction and those who enter by it are many” (v. 13).

In our culture of tolerance and acceptance, we may unwittingly be allowing heretics to preach their own gospels in our churches and homes. We each need to seek truth in God’s Word and allow the Holy Spirit to cultivate discernment in us. Only when we know well the One who is the Truth can we be free from the deceptions that the enemy throws our way.

“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits” (Matthew 7:15-16a).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.

Be the Light

Several recent discussions and sermons have reminded me of these Scriptures:

“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows Me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12b).

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden... In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:14, 16).

“Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world” (Philippians 2:14-15 ESV).

John the Baptist is introduced in John 1:7-8 by saying, “He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light.” In many ways, the same could be said about every Christian. We are to bear witness about the Light of the World. We are to be conduits of His light in this dark world. I wonder how we’re doing these days? In many situations it seems easier to hide the light in order to avoid conflict with unbelievers. Yet there are other topics unrelated to our faith where we embrace conflict just to state our own opinions. It seems a bit incongruous, no?

I believe we could all be more effective bearers of the light, and perhaps the first step is to learn to be “quick to listen and slow to speak” (James 1:19). As nice as social media can be, the biggest problem is that it makes us all quicker to speak and less likely to actually listen. We feel compelled to like, comment, or share posts without considering whether it is wise or helpful to do so. Since it is true that there is “a time to keep silence, and a time to speak” (Ecclesiastes 3:7b), we all need to slow down and ask which time it is.

Another aspect of bearing the light is revealed in Ephesians 2:10: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” We are all called to good works that God has prepared for each of us. Some of those works are fairly routine—providing for our family members by earning a living, praying for one another, participating in a local church and supporting its ministries. Some good works may be a bit more radical—moving overseas as a missionary, loving our enemies, simplifying our lifestyle in order to commit more resources to ministry. There are all sorts of Christian good works and each life will be a little different.

The real question is whether an unbeliever would see anything unusual about your life that would point them to the light of Christ. Can they tell that you are not just a good person but a faithful Christian? As the old saying goes, “If being a Christian were a criminal offense, would there be enough evidence to convict you?” Or how many of us would dare to say with the Apostle Paul, “Join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us” (Philippians 3:17)?

Since the New Year is often a time for evaluating our lives and making changes, I would suggest that prayerful consideration should be given to how to let God’s light shine through us in the year ahead.

“Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith” (Hebrews 13:7).

© 2019 Dawn Rutan. Unless otherwise indicated all images are copyright free from pixabay.com. The opinions stated do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or employer.