One Christian concept that puzzles me is the idea of “glorifying God.” God is already at the top of the glory heap. You can’t get any more glorified than the maker of the universe, right? So what does it mean to glorify God? And what did Jesus mean when, dreading the pain and death that was ahead for him, he discards the prayer, “Father, save me from this hour” for “Father, glorify your name?”
“Glorification” is not a word we use much nowadays – and when we do, it tends to be hyphenated after the word “self.” Like so much in our culture, glorification is all about us (even if self-glorification is frowned upon…) A quick google search on “glorify” elicited several sets of definitions, each of which included two slants on the word. One meaning is to praise, or to act in such a way as to make manifest the glory of God. The other meaning is nearly opposite – it appears the word “glorify” has become associated with attempts to elicit praise or affirmation when it is not justified.
I’m pretty sure Jesus meant the first definition. But he doesn’t say he is going to glorify God – rather he says to God, “Father, glorify your name.” God is to glorify himself – and if we take Jesus as our model, it seems that the way God glorifies himself is through the actions of faithful men and women laying down their privileges and prerogatives, even their self-interest, for the sake of others.
This is not how we tend to think about glory! But then, at the very heart of our Christian story is a Master washing the filthy feet of his followers to demonstrate what their ministry was to look like. And one day later we see that same King naked, caked with muck and blood, suffocating on a cross, abandoned and humiliated. And that, the Gospel of John suggests, is his moment of greatest glory. It is when the Father is most glorified in the Son.
That heavenly Father answered Jesus’ prayer: “Then a voice came from heaven, ‘I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.’” It is a voice of affirmation and reminder to Jesus that he is walking in his Father’s will, living out the fullness of God’s mission to restore and redeem all of creation. Perhaps it kept him going in the increasingly dark and tense days ahead.
As followers, imitators of Christ, how can we best glorify the God who made us, loves us, empowers and nurtures us? Where are we being called to lay down our privileges and prerogatives, even at cost to ourselves? Sometimes we can discern that best by noticing who we do not want to serve or humble ourselves to. Sometimes that is exactly where God is calling us to allow Him to work through us.
And it is God who will work through us. We can’t glorify God if we’re cut off from God. Just as a flower in bloom brings glory to the plant of which it is a part, so we bring glory to God as a part of God. If we don’t know exactly how to glorify God, perhaps we can just allow God to glorify himself through us. Jesus did.
3-18-15 - That Seed Thing
When we are faced with doing something difficult, it can help if we remind ourselves what good will come of it. That’s what got me to the gym this morning, and keeps me eating healthfully most of the time. But those are pretty superficial examples.
How about a parent who works a couple of jobs to ensure college money for her children? That outcome is a long way off, and yet worth the sacrifice. Or “altruistic organ donors” like the Connecticut woman who recently offered a kidney to anyone who was a match, kicking off a round robin of surgeries in which four couples who were not matches for each other donated kidneys to other spouses, resulting in four kidney transplants and eight surgeries in one day.
In this gospel passage, we see Jesus confront his upcoming passion and death, and remind himself why he had so much pain and loss ahead. “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”
In the natural world, whether in our gardens or in our bodies, growth does not happen without death. New skin grows as old cells die and are sloughed off. Chicks can’t hatch unless the egg breaks. Babies aren’t born without trauma to the mother’s body. Butterflies need to demolish their cocoons. And yes – seeds cannot bear fruit unless they are buried in dark earth, and broken open so that the new life within them can be brought to fullness.
That is our calling as followers of Christ – to follow him into the dark, allow ourselves to be broken and transformed from a seed into a seedling, and then a plant that bears abundant fruit. That’s pretty much the trajectory of a disciple. Every ounce of energy we spend clinging to what we have, what we love, what we can see, is energy not spent allowing ourselves to be planted, broken, transformed and flourishing.
"Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life."
This is also our calling as the Body of Christ, our calling as congregations to allow ourselves to be broken open, inconveniently, even painfully, our patterns and presuppositions challenged and changed, so that we can bring life and fruit to hungry people around us.
Where are you discerning a call to be like a seed that is planted, broken, transformed and made fruitful? Where are you on that cycle? It’s one we repeat more than once in our lives… sometimes more than once in a week! Maybe it helps to remember that we are following Jesus into that dark earth, and that he is with us in the seed process. As he said, “Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.”
We not only follow him into the dark earth. We live in the promise that, like him, we have emerged into new Life, that Life which never ends. Do all seeds know the glorious outcome of their process? If we must cling to anything, let it be that promise, that Life we have already begun to live.
How about a parent who works a couple of jobs to ensure college money for her children? That outcome is a long way off, and yet worth the sacrifice. Or “altruistic organ donors” like the Connecticut woman who recently offered a kidney to anyone who was a match, kicking off a round robin of surgeries in which four couples who were not matches for each other donated kidneys to other spouses, resulting in four kidney transplants and eight surgeries in one day.
In this gospel passage, we see Jesus confront his upcoming passion and death, and remind himself why he had so much pain and loss ahead. “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”
In the natural world, whether in our gardens or in our bodies, growth does not happen without death. New skin grows as old cells die and are sloughed off. Chicks can’t hatch unless the egg breaks. Babies aren’t born without trauma to the mother’s body. Butterflies need to demolish their cocoons. And yes – seeds cannot bear fruit unless they are buried in dark earth, and broken open so that the new life within them can be brought to fullness.
That is our calling as followers of Christ – to follow him into the dark, allow ourselves to be broken and transformed from a seed into a seedling, and then a plant that bears abundant fruit. That’s pretty much the trajectory of a disciple. Every ounce of energy we spend clinging to what we have, what we love, what we can see, is energy not spent allowing ourselves to be planted, broken, transformed and flourishing.
"Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life."
This is also our calling as the Body of Christ, our calling as congregations to allow ourselves to be broken open, inconveniently, even painfully, our patterns and presuppositions challenged and changed, so that we can bring life and fruit to hungry people around us.
Where are you discerning a call to be like a seed that is planted, broken, transformed and made fruitful? Where are you on that cycle? It’s one we repeat more than once in our lives… sometimes more than once in a week! Maybe it helps to remember that we are following Jesus into that dark earth, and that he is with us in the seed process. As he said, “Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.”
We not only follow him into the dark earth. We live in the promise that, like him, we have emerged into new Life, that Life which never ends. Do all seeds know the glorious outcome of their process? If we must cling to anything, let it be that promise, that Life we have already begun to live.
3-17-15 - The Hour Has Come
You’d think it would have pleased Jesus to hear that Greeks were asking to meet him. It meant his message of freedom and transformation in God’s love was spreading. That’s how I would react. “Yay! Growth! Expansion! My efforts are paying off!” But Jesus wasn’t just like many of us. He knew his mission went deeper than the healing and conversion of individual people. His mission was to bring freedom and transformation to the entire cosmos. And something about hearing that these Greeks wanted to meet him signaled to him that the final part of his mission was about to start.
Philip had gone to Andrew with the message from those visitors, and together they’d come to tell Jesus. “Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” He talks about dying and bearing fruit, losing your life and servanthood (we’ll explore that tomorrow…) And then he gives voice to his anxiety and sorrow. “‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—“Father, save me from this hour”? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.’”
The synoptic gospels show Jesus wrestling with his mission in the Garden of Gethsemane, just before his betrayal by Judas and his arrest by the temple guard. But as John tells it, it is here, some time before his passion fully begins, that Jesus starts to feel the dread and turmoil, the desire for some other plan to be revealed. It’s a poignant reminder of how much he suffered doing what he did for us as a full human person, with all the human emotional load to carry. He had to anticipate the betrayal, the abandonment by his closest friends, the injustice, the physical pain. He had to carry that load long before they beat him and made him carry his cross to Calvary. It begins now, here. The hour has come.
Does it help us to know that Jesus experienced anxiety and dread, irritation and anger, that his soul could be troubled? I hope it does – for it reminds us that there is really nothing we can suffer that Jesus did not, including rejection and loneliness, misunderstanding and exhaustion. It gives us another way to connect with him in our spirits, when we feel these emotions, when we face challenges in our lives.
“The hour has come.” So much human experience can be contained in those words. The hour to give birth, or leave this world. The hour of an examination, an interview or being fired. The hour of diagnosis, of being sentenced, of hitting bottom, of admitting a deep truth about ourselves.
What comes up for you when you hear those words, “The hour has come?” Are you overtaken by dread of what lies ahead or regret for what cannot be recovered? Either is ground for prayer, to ask for the grace to receive the gifts and the challenges of this day, and remain centered in God’s presence here and now.
In his earthly life and ministry, Jesus was bound by time in the way we are, time moving inexorably toward an event, a conclusion, a beginning. He inhabited that hour and every hour afterward until he hung for those six hours on the cross. And then he was released into the eternal Now, where he exists eteranally, outside of time, from which he inspires and empowers us to participate in his mission of reclaiming, restoring and renewing all of creation to wholeness.
When we are made anxious by the “hours” that are momentous for us, we have a remedy. We can meet Jesus, in prayer, in that land where it is always Now.
Philip had gone to Andrew with the message from those visitors, and together they’d come to tell Jesus. “Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” He talks about dying and bearing fruit, losing your life and servanthood (we’ll explore that tomorrow…) And then he gives voice to his anxiety and sorrow. “‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—“Father, save me from this hour”? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.’”
The synoptic gospels show Jesus wrestling with his mission in the Garden of Gethsemane, just before his betrayal by Judas and his arrest by the temple guard. But as John tells it, it is here, some time before his passion fully begins, that Jesus starts to feel the dread and turmoil, the desire for some other plan to be revealed. It’s a poignant reminder of how much he suffered doing what he did for us as a full human person, with all the human emotional load to carry. He had to anticipate the betrayal, the abandonment by his closest friends, the injustice, the physical pain. He had to carry that load long before they beat him and made him carry his cross to Calvary. It begins now, here. The hour has come.
Does it help us to know that Jesus experienced anxiety and dread, irritation and anger, that his soul could be troubled? I hope it does – for it reminds us that there is really nothing we can suffer that Jesus did not, including rejection and loneliness, misunderstanding and exhaustion. It gives us another way to connect with him in our spirits, when we feel these emotions, when we face challenges in our lives.
“The hour has come.” So much human experience can be contained in those words. The hour to give birth, or leave this world. The hour of an examination, an interview or being fired. The hour of diagnosis, of being sentenced, of hitting bottom, of admitting a deep truth about ourselves.
What comes up for you when you hear those words, “The hour has come?” Are you overtaken by dread of what lies ahead or regret for what cannot be recovered? Either is ground for prayer, to ask for the grace to receive the gifts and the challenges of this day, and remain centered in God’s presence here and now.
In his earthly life and ministry, Jesus was bound by time in the way we are, time moving inexorably toward an event, a conclusion, a beginning. He inhabited that hour and every hour afterward until he hung for those six hours on the cross. And then he was released into the eternal Now, where he exists eteranally, outside of time, from which he inspires and empowers us to participate in his mission of reclaiming, restoring and renewing all of creation to wholeness.
When we are made anxious by the “hours” that are momentous for us, we have a remedy. We can meet Jesus, in prayer, in that land where it is always Now.
3-16-15 - We Want To See Jesus
We’ve just come to the end of another round of evangelism training offered by the Episcopal Church in Connecticut. Some 35 people from five churches gathered for six weeks to learn how to seek and engage in spiritual conversations in which they could naturally and graciously share their stories of God’s goodness. And while this usually happens in the context of connections we already have in our lives, on the last session, this past Saturday, we went out in four teams to try our evangelism muscles in public. One group went to a local pub, one to a restaurant, one walked the local town and my group went to a mall, where a couple of us held up a sign saying, “Want a Prayer?” and prayed with people.
Our team probably had the most connections, praying with about nine people, some of whom wanted to feel more in touch with God. We all discovered, though, that it is very hard to start the “God conversation” out of the blue. How much easier it would be if we’d had the experience that Jesus’ disciple Philip did during a festival in Jerusalem one day: “Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’” (This week's Gospel passage is here.)
This suggests that news about Jesus, his teachings and miracles, had traveled beyond the Jewish community into the Roman and Hellenistic cultures of that region. Did these Greeks come hoping to see a miracle they could talk about back home? Did they crave a nugget of divine wisdom to chew on? Or did they want to get to know Jesus as the Messiah? We aren’t told what motivated them, only that they were eager enough to meet Jesus, they found someone they hoped could introduce them to him.
There are more such folks in our lives than we think. In the mall on Saturday, many more people passed us than stopped, but to think that nine people came up to strangers for prayer in the middle of a mall during the 45 minutes or so we were there… that tells me that this spiritual thirst I’m always hearing about actually does exist. And we have Living Water to share.
We don’t have to go looking for such people; the Spirit is already stirring their hearts. But we sure need to stop hiding from those who are actually looking for the spiritual gifts we have! Most are not going to cross the threshold of our odd, if beautiful, buildings at the odd times of the week we happen to be in them. We need to go out to where people are, and let them know how to find us. My own congregation has a team preparing to go and offer prayer on the streets of Stamford, and see what connections we might make.
Where and how might you be being called to make Jesus known in your community? If you have an idea, ask God to bless it. If you don’t have a clue, tell God you’re open to ideas. And then look for how God might answer that prayer. God is not shy – when God wants us to do something, and we’re open, we’ll know.
We may not often hear those words that Philip did, “Sir, we want to see Jesus,” but I believe there are many, many people who hold that desire. And the way they’re going to see Jesus in our time is through us, the Body of Christ, getting out of our buildings and beyond our Sunday schedules and making Jesus visible.
We are all Philip, and all we are asked to do is introduce people to the Jesus we love and worship.
He’ll do the rest.
Our team probably had the most connections, praying with about nine people, some of whom wanted to feel more in touch with God. We all discovered, though, that it is very hard to start the “God conversation” out of the blue. How much easier it would be if we’d had the experience that Jesus’ disciple Philip did during a festival in Jerusalem one day: “Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’” (This week's Gospel passage is here.)
This suggests that news about Jesus, his teachings and miracles, had traveled beyond the Jewish community into the Roman and Hellenistic cultures of that region. Did these Greeks come hoping to see a miracle they could talk about back home? Did they crave a nugget of divine wisdom to chew on? Or did they want to get to know Jesus as the Messiah? We aren’t told what motivated them, only that they were eager enough to meet Jesus, they found someone they hoped could introduce them to him.
There are more such folks in our lives than we think. In the mall on Saturday, many more people passed us than stopped, but to think that nine people came up to strangers for prayer in the middle of a mall during the 45 minutes or so we were there… that tells me that this spiritual thirst I’m always hearing about actually does exist. And we have Living Water to share.
We don’t have to go looking for such people; the Spirit is already stirring their hearts. But we sure need to stop hiding from those who are actually looking for the spiritual gifts we have! Most are not going to cross the threshold of our odd, if beautiful, buildings at the odd times of the week we happen to be in them. We need to go out to where people are, and let them know how to find us. My own congregation has a team preparing to go and offer prayer on the streets of Stamford, and see what connections we might make.
Where and how might you be being called to make Jesus known in your community? If you have an idea, ask God to bless it. If you don’t have a clue, tell God you’re open to ideas. And then look for how God might answer that prayer. God is not shy – when God wants us to do something, and we’re open, we’ll know.
We may not often hear those words that Philip did, “Sir, we want to see Jesus,” but I believe there are many, many people who hold that desire. And the way they’re going to see Jesus in our time is through us, the Body of Christ, getting out of our buildings and beyond our Sunday schedules and making Jesus visible.
We are all Philip, and all we are asked to do is introduce people to the Jesus we love and worship.
He’ll do the rest.
3-13-15 - Do What Is True
I have found this week’s gospel reading a challenge - these words of Jesus to Nicodemus that are both wonderfully affirming and yet clearly set a boundary between those who accept the gift of God in Christ, and those who choose darkness. (Jesus does not comment directly about people of different faiths; we can interpret his words narrowly or generously.) It's been heavy going, navigating the flow of his ideas and how to interpret them.
We end on a high note though, as Jesus closes his discourse with this observation: “But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”
I was struck by that phrase, “Those who do what is true.” I expected it to say, “Those who do what is good.” But “good” is a very subjective measure. What one person considers good might be harmful to another. What is true, though – if we define “true” as guileless, transparent, without any falsehood – no one can argue with that. It just is.
It bothers me when people equate being a Christian with "being good." If we were good, we’d have had no need for Christ, and no need to be a Christian. I believe that being a Christian is about acknowledging how “not good” we can be, and how much we need God. When we accept that Christ did not come to condemn us, and that God receives as we are, we find ourselves more often choosing the good. So let’s take “being a good person” out of this.
What about being true, though? That yields some room for growth. To be a person without guile, without falsehood, without hidden agenda, totally transparent – that is a worthy goal, and one that we can attain only if we see ourselves with humility and clarity. I believe we can also only achieve it if we allow the Spirit of God to work in us, to dismantle the false personas in us, the fears that cause us to pretend or withhold the truth.
In that sense, we not only strive to be true. We must allow ourselves to be trued – the verb form referring to the way a builder will bring something into the exact position or alignment needed for it to function properly. Just as an object cannot “true” itself, so we must be “trued” by the power of God, the only one who knows exactly how we are to be aligned, because he’s the one who made us.
What we can do is make it our heart’s desire to become a person without guile or falsehood or hidden needs or strategies. We can start to notice when something we say is less than the truth, and revise it. We can pay attention to the circumstances in which we seem to feel the need to hide behind a mask of who we think people want us to be, rather than being fully, gloriously who we are, faults and all.
I got very anxious yesterday, because an event I was in charge of was not going well – the person doing the food was late, the speaker was late, many people who’d registered did not show up. I felt it reflected badly on me. I had to remind myself that I was only upset because I worried about what people thought of me. When I separated out my role from that of others, and stopped taking responsibility for more than was really mine, I began to calm down, to become more true. That’s the kind of attention I mean.
I think the Carpenter of Nazareth knew something about how to "true" materials. I want to let his Spirit true me into proper alignment. As I become a person who “does what is true,” I come more and more to the light. Will you join me?
We end on a high note though, as Jesus closes his discourse with this observation: “But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”
I was struck by that phrase, “Those who do what is true.” I expected it to say, “Those who do what is good.” But “good” is a very subjective measure. What one person considers good might be harmful to another. What is true, though – if we define “true” as guileless, transparent, without any falsehood – no one can argue with that. It just is.
It bothers me when people equate being a Christian with "being good." If we were good, we’d have had no need for Christ, and no need to be a Christian. I believe that being a Christian is about acknowledging how “not good” we can be, and how much we need God. When we accept that Christ did not come to condemn us, and that God receives as we are, we find ourselves more often choosing the good. So let’s take “being a good person” out of this.
What about being true, though? That yields some room for growth. To be a person without guile, without falsehood, without hidden agenda, totally transparent – that is a worthy goal, and one that we can attain only if we see ourselves with humility and clarity. I believe we can also only achieve it if we allow the Spirit of God to work in us, to dismantle the false personas in us, the fears that cause us to pretend or withhold the truth.
In that sense, we not only strive to be true. We must allow ourselves to be trued – the verb form referring to the way a builder will bring something into the exact position or alignment needed for it to function properly. Just as an object cannot “true” itself, so we must be “trued” by the power of God, the only one who knows exactly how we are to be aligned, because he’s the one who made us.
What we can do is make it our heart’s desire to become a person without guile or falsehood or hidden needs or strategies. We can start to notice when something we say is less than the truth, and revise it. We can pay attention to the circumstances in which we seem to feel the need to hide behind a mask of who we think people want us to be, rather than being fully, gloriously who we are, faults and all.
I got very anxious yesterday, because an event I was in charge of was not going well – the person doing the food was late, the speaker was late, many people who’d registered did not show up. I felt it reflected badly on me. I had to remind myself that I was only upset because I worried about what people thought of me. When I separated out my role from that of others, and stopped taking responsibility for more than was really mine, I began to calm down, to become more true. That’s the kind of attention I mean.
I think the Carpenter of Nazareth knew something about how to "true" materials. I want to let his Spirit true me into proper alignment. As I become a person who “does what is true,” I come more and more to the light. Will you join me?
3-12-15 - Cover of Darkness
Ah, think of it. Walking in the light. Transparency. Integrity. Truthfulness.
Good lord, we’d have nothing to watch on TV if this is how humanity operated! Most drama is driven by bad choices followed by cover-ups, which necessitate more lies and bad choices and behaving differently with different people – and before you know it, no one can trust anyone else.
Which, if you attend to the story of Adam and Eve and the serpent, is pretty much how we got into this mess in the first place. A bad choice, followed by a cover-up (even if those fig leaves didn’t cover much…), which necessitated more lies and bad choices. For some people this becomes a way of life, so entrenched that even when something wakes them up – say a light dawns – they are unable to change to a light-based operating system. They are too attached to the darkness.
These are the kind of people Jesus refers to when he talks about those who are condemned by their choosing to remain in darkness, even after the light has come: “And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed.”
We probably all know some people like this, lovers of darkness, so given over to self-will and exploitation of others they become evil themselves. There are plenty of those kind about, but they are a distinct minority, and I daresay none of the readers of Water Daily are to be found among their number. So what does this have to do with us? We are not lovers of darkness.
No, we are not. BUT… can we be a little too comfortable with the shadows? Are we oriented toward the negative, to the bad news, the worse outcome? Are we quicker to criticize than to compliment? Faster with the reasons something won’t work than why it might? Too ready to give voice to unhappy possibilities instead of speaking our desires into the air? This is how the world teachces us to think. God-Life invites us to change our way of thinking and speaking. We may not be people of darkness, but I think many of us can do some work on truly embracing the light. I sure can.
Today try to make a point of listening to yourself – both your internal monologue and external conversation. Hear what you’re saying – are your words life-giving or squashing? Notice when you make a negative assumption about yourself, another, or a situation. And if you do – and believe me, I do it a lot – don’t jump all over yourself. Just say, “Hmmm. Wow. I do that more than I realize. God, where is the life in this situation? Show me how you love this person. Show me how you love me.”
We are used to dramas based on bad choices, lies and conflict. We’re so used to that, we can’t imagine a story that’s all good having any dramatic tension at all.
But what if we’re wrong? Wouldn’t it be a kick to give it a try and find out?
Good lord, we’d have nothing to watch on TV if this is how humanity operated! Most drama is driven by bad choices followed by cover-ups, which necessitate more lies and bad choices and behaving differently with different people – and before you know it, no one can trust anyone else.
Which, if you attend to the story of Adam and Eve and the serpent, is pretty much how we got into this mess in the first place. A bad choice, followed by a cover-up (even if those fig leaves didn’t cover much…), which necessitated more lies and bad choices. For some people this becomes a way of life, so entrenched that even when something wakes them up – say a light dawns – they are unable to change to a light-based operating system. They are too attached to the darkness.
These are the kind of people Jesus refers to when he talks about those who are condemned by their choosing to remain in darkness, even after the light has come: “And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed.”
We probably all know some people like this, lovers of darkness, so given over to self-will and exploitation of others they become evil themselves. There are plenty of those kind about, but they are a distinct minority, and I daresay none of the readers of Water Daily are to be found among their number. So what does this have to do with us? We are not lovers of darkness.
No, we are not. BUT… can we be a little too comfortable with the shadows? Are we oriented toward the negative, to the bad news, the worse outcome? Are we quicker to criticize than to compliment? Faster with the reasons something won’t work than why it might? Too ready to give voice to unhappy possibilities instead of speaking our desires into the air? This is how the world teachces us to think. God-Life invites us to change our way of thinking and speaking. We may not be people of darkness, but I think many of us can do some work on truly embracing the light. I sure can.
Today try to make a point of listening to yourself – both your internal monologue and external conversation. Hear what you’re saying – are your words life-giving or squashing? Notice when you make a negative assumption about yourself, another, or a situation. And if you do – and believe me, I do it a lot – don’t jump all over yourself. Just say, “Hmmm. Wow. I do that more than I realize. God, where is the life in this situation? Show me how you love this person. Show me how you love me.”
We are used to dramas based on bad choices, lies and conflict. We’re so used to that, we can’t imagine a story that’s all good having any dramatic tension at all.
But what if we’re wrong? Wouldn’t it be a kick to give it a try and find out?
3-11-15 - No Condemnation
Time was when I adjusted my computer’s screen saver to scroll through Romans 8:1 –
“There is no now condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
As one whose inner critic tends to work overtime, that’s how badly I needed to be reminded of God’s affirming love. I consider this is the heart of the Good News Jesus came to convey – that God has transformed the judgment we so fear into love. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”
Lest we doubt this message of affirmation, Jesus makes it clear in the next sentence:
“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
Why did for Jesus to clarify this matter? Was a different message being conveyed by the leaders of Israel, that God was not pleased, that people were in trouble? It would not be hard to draw such a conclusion, living under the tyranny of the Romans, the latest in a string of conquerors. In a culture that saw prosperity as a sign of blessing and misfortune as an indication of sin, people might be quick to see in their circumstances God’s punishment for unfaithfulness.Thus the idea that God’s representative, his very own son, should have arrived on the scene in person – that could feel like, “Uh oh, we’re in trouble now….”
And so the importance of these words to soothe and open hearts: “God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
But Jesus isn’t saying there is no condemnation anywhere – his next words suggest it is possible, even likely, for those who have been presented with the truth about Jesus Christ and have chosen not to believe:
“Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God.”
Is this “condemnation” for those who do not believe in the name of the only Son of God a punishment – or is it simply the consequence of their choice? God may not have sent his Son into the world for condemnation – but he didn’t say he would remove the consequences of our choices. People are free to draw near to God’s love, or to turn away.
Are those who have no interest in Jesus’ salvation still covered by it? What do we mean when we say Jesus took on all the sin of all the world on the cross? Did he redeem even those who choose not to believe in his power to redeem? Who deny any need of salvation? Those who believe in universal salvation would say so. Those who believe each person has to say “yes” are left wondering.
And all this “on the one hand,” “on the other hand” makes my head hurt. It actually gets in the way of my receiving the gift I believe Jesus wants to offer us – to accept his grace, to allow him to take us off all the hooks we have ourselves dangling from, that we’re not good enough, smart enough, wise enough, compassionate enough. Enough!
The Son of God did not come into the world to condemn the world. The Son of God came to fulfill his father’s mission to reclaim, restore and renew all things and all people to wholeness in Christ. I’m taking that deal.
“There is no now condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
As one whose inner critic tends to work overtime, that’s how badly I needed to be reminded of God’s affirming love. I consider this is the heart of the Good News Jesus came to convey – that God has transformed the judgment we so fear into love. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”
Lest we doubt this message of affirmation, Jesus makes it clear in the next sentence:
“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
Why did for Jesus to clarify this matter? Was a different message being conveyed by the leaders of Israel, that God was not pleased, that people were in trouble? It would not be hard to draw such a conclusion, living under the tyranny of the Romans, the latest in a string of conquerors. In a culture that saw prosperity as a sign of blessing and misfortune as an indication of sin, people might be quick to see in their circumstances God’s punishment for unfaithfulness.Thus the idea that God’s representative, his very own son, should have arrived on the scene in person – that could feel like, “Uh oh, we’re in trouble now….”
And so the importance of these words to soothe and open hearts: “God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
But Jesus isn’t saying there is no condemnation anywhere – his next words suggest it is possible, even likely, for those who have been presented with the truth about Jesus Christ and have chosen not to believe:
“Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God.”
Is this “condemnation” for those who do not believe in the name of the only Son of God a punishment – or is it simply the consequence of their choice? God may not have sent his Son into the world for condemnation – but he didn’t say he would remove the consequences of our choices. People are free to draw near to God’s love, or to turn away.
Are those who have no interest in Jesus’ salvation still covered by it? What do we mean when we say Jesus took on all the sin of all the world on the cross? Did he redeem even those who choose not to believe in his power to redeem? Who deny any need of salvation? Those who believe in universal salvation would say so. Those who believe each person has to say “yes” are left wondering.
And all this “on the one hand,” “on the other hand” makes my head hurt. It actually gets in the way of my receiving the gift I believe Jesus wants to offer us – to accept his grace, to allow him to take us off all the hooks we have ourselves dangling from, that we’re not good enough, smart enough, wise enough, compassionate enough. Enough!
The Son of God did not come into the world to condemn the world. The Son of God came to fulfill his father’s mission to reclaim, restore and renew all things and all people to wholeness in Christ. I’m taking that deal.
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