Golden Gate Bound

Just another post to say that my other blog at misterjoshuaray.wordpress.com is up and running. The screenshot is of the biggest update recently (and so far!). So if you want to hear a bit about SEMINARY then hit the jump :)

I don't know that I'll update this much more-this was big enough news that I wanted it to be here on the old blog too though. 

A Moody Response

I came across this short anecdote and couldn't help but share it! It was definitely convicting for me because I'm so often quick to criticize when I probably should address my own shortcomings. Anyways, the story is about the evangelist Dwight L. Moody:

"One day a lady criticized D. L. Moody for his methods of evangelism in attempting to win people to the Lord. Moody's reply was "I agree with you. I don't like the way I do it either. Tell me, how do you do it?" The lady replied, "I don't do it." Moody responded "I like my way of doing it better than your way of not doing it."

Wow. Talk about a truth bomb. God, help me to obey you and your commands first instead of trying to hold others to your standards hypocritically. 

Sacrificing Sacrificed Food

"All things are lawful, but not all things are helpful. All things are lawful, but not all things build up." -1 Corinthians 10:23

Lately I've been wrestling a bit with the surprising ways that my own selfishness can interact with the freedom that we have in Christ. That might sound like an odd combination, but it's a very real concern that I'm still in the process of wrestling with. Let me explain a bit.

Sometimes I feel like the believer in 1 Corinthians 8 who just doesn't have a problem eating food in an idol's temple. Although there are many so-called gods in heaven and earth (v-5) I know that in actuality there is one God (v-6) and that "food will not commend us to God. We are no worse off if we do not eat, and no better off if we do" (v-8). What does it matter where I eat this? God made it and I do all things to his glory, so it shouldn't matter, right? In isolation, this is not a bad argument. Paul is agreeing that there's nothing inherently wrong with the actions of the believer who would do something like this (although there's a distinction he draws later with actually participating in idol worship through this food in chapter 10).

The problem with this line of thought comes when other believers who hold different convictions enter the picture. We see this in verse 7 of chapter 8: not everyone has the same attitude towards food sacrificed towards idols and "their conscience, being weak, is defiled." We run the risk, then, of harming our brother and sister by our own actions (v-11). And not only that: "Thus, sinning against your brothers and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ" (v-12).

By wounding another believer's conscience, I sin against Christ. That's a scary thought, folks! By disregarding those surrounding me, I risk destroying the brother for whom Christ died. That is a sobering thought.

For the sake of argument, Paul asks: "Am I not free?" (9:1) Can't I do what I want without thinking of these other brothers? Paul shifts examples from food sacrificed to idols to raising support from local churches and other rights he has as an apostle to show that even he isn't immune from this struggle of thinking of others first instead of being selfish with the grace that God has given him.

Paul's conclusion is that "we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ" (9:12). Think of others before yourself and don't let your choices/behavior, which you can control, influence others negatively. Paul goes on to talk about being "a servant to all" (v-19) and doing this all "for the sake of the gospel" (v-23) and then warning against idolatry (the first portion of ch. 10), before arriving at perhaps the most famous part of this passage and how I began this post: "All things are lawful, but not all things are helpful. All things are lawful, but not all things build up" (10:23). But what is "helpful"? What "builds up"? Paul's answer is the next verse.

"Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor." (10:24) What ultimately matters is the rest of the body. What ultimately matters is my brothers or my sisters. I must love them as Christ has, i.e. sacrificially. I must honor them and thusly bring glory to God, not myself. It isn't easy, but it's what we're called to do. As we follow Paul's example and Christ's example (11:1), we must deny ourselves for the sake of others and live lives that embrace grace not selfishly but selflessly.

God, help me to think of others first. Thank you for the grace that you've given me and the freedom I have to walk in it, but help me to "pursue what makes for peace and mutual upbuilding" (Rom 14:19) and not my own selfishness. Thank you for your sacrificial love-may my love grow to resemble yours more and more every day. 

Forbidden by the Spirit

I've been thinking a lot about closed doors lately. Closed doors aren't what we typically want. When we have an opportunity (or THINK we do), seek God's will and receive a firm "No" as the answer despite our fervent prayers...well it typically isn't cause for celebration. Instead the focus often turns to ourselves.

"What did I do wrong?" or "Why is God punishing/holding out on me?" tends to be my default reaction when a door slams shut in front of me. If only I hadn't sinned so badly this week or if only God really loved me maybe the answer would have been different. So when the next opportunity comes, it's time to shape up and be on "best behavior" so that we'll somehow be worthy of the carrot God seems to be hanging out in front of us.

That doesn't seem to be how God decides to open or close doors in the Scriptures. Instead of seeing closed doors as God's punishment or petulance, the Word paints a picture of God working for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose, which is to become conformed to the likeness of His Son [paraphrase of Romans 8:28-29]...even (and especially) through closed doors.

The Apostle Paul, the author of those words, knew from personal experience what it was to not be able to proceed in the direction that he wanted to go. On his second missionary journey Paul wanted to go to Asia and Bithynia. I'm sure that he had grand plans for the people there and that he was excited to be bringing the gospel to these people who so desperately needed to hear the Truth.

Acts 16 tells us that the Paul and his companions were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to go to Asia and that the Holy Spirit did not permit them to go into Bithynia (v 6-7). If ever there was a set of closed doors, it was on that mission trip: Plans A and B right out the window! If I were in Paul's shoes I think I'd have been just a bit confused. Didn't God want Paul to be preaching and spreading the Word? Why would the Holy Spirit keep them from doing ministry like that?

In a message called "The Need of the Hour," Dawson Trotman shared his interpretation of these events:

Paul found closed doors, but closed doors to him weren't the problem. I believe those closed doors were used of God to show him the open doors he was to go through next.

Closed doors are closed because God has another door that He wants us to go through. It turned out pretty well for Paul: instead of either of his first two plans, he and his companions ended up going to Macedonia. Their stops on this second missionary trip included the cities of Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, and Corinth. Sound familiar? The churches that were planted as a result of the doors into Asia and Bithynia being closed resulted in at LEAST five epistles (Philippians, 1 and 2 Corinthians, and 1 and 2 Thessalonians) and perhaps the strongest and most faithful church that Paul planted (the Berean church is described in Acts 17:10-12).

When God closes a door in front of us, we have two options: we can either question God or we can submit to His sovereignty and trust that this closed door is an expression of His mercy rather than His judgement. Which will you choose?

Phil 1:29

"For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only

to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake..."

Desert Song

***This is my 75th post on Praises with a Skillful Song!***

This is my prayer in the desert

When all that's within me feels dry

This is my prayer in my hunger and need

My God is the God who provides

This is my prayer in the fire

In weakness or trial or pain

There is a faith proved of more worth than gold

So refine me Lord through the flame

Lately I've been dwelling on the idea of wilderness. It's one thing to sing a song like "Blessed be Your Name" and belt lyrics like "Blessed be Your name / When I'm found in the desert place / Though I walk through the wilderness / ... / On the road marked with suffering / Though there's pain in the offering" in the midst of our very American-flavored Christianity without much in the way of suffering, persecution, or hardship.

For the first time in what I would term my maturing personal relationship with Christ I've walked through a (small in some regards, not so small in others) wilderness this summer. Sure I'd had hardship these past few years, but it was always in the midst of a season of blessing and growth. I'd known that I was going to be experiencing a change in seasons with graduation and transitioning into doing EDGE with The Navigators, I just wasn't exactly sure what that was going to look like. It's turned out to be much different than I expected.

At the beginning of the summer I felt like the theme verse for this coming season in my life was the first verse of II Samuel chapter 2. After a period of waiting on God, David asks God if he should go up to one of the cities of Judah. God's answer is "Go up." David asks where he should go and God provides a specific city/path for him to follow: Hebron.

Honestly, it's been much more difficult than I'd expected. David goes up and is crowned King of Judah within three verses. Not that I was expecting to come away with a five-figure check after just one face-to-face, but what I was expecting was closer to the idea of green pastures and quiet waters and not anything like the valley of the shadow of death.

I should have expected it to be more difficult and here's why: Jesus set the example for all of us with a perfect life, right? Well not that any of our lives will line up experience for experience with his, but Jesus had to go through the wilderness before beginning His ministry too. Matthew 4:1 reads, "Then Jesus [after His baptism] was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the Devil." Now I could literally go on for paragraph after paragraph and keep sharing, but I'll curtail my thoughts into two main points: the Spirit's leading and Jesus sustenance in the desert.

The same God that led David with the words "Go up" led Jesus into the wilderness and that same God is leading me now. And before God led David up to be crowned king He had David endure years of living, you guessed it, in the desert and running for his life from Saul. I still feel that II Samuel 2:1 is my theme verse for the present, but what I'm supposed to learn from it is completely different than I expected. It's easy to follow God when He's leading us where we want to go. Do I still follow Him when things don't turn out how I thought they should?

Before Jesus could begin His ministry, God used the wilderness and the Devil's temptations to expose what Jesus' true priorities were and where His soul was rooted: the Word. When everything was stripped away from Him, including food to eat, what did Jesus cling to and rely on? It was the Scriptures that sustained Him in the desert and enabled Him to stand up to the Devil's schemes. Am I looking for life in my own efforts and the approval or support of others or in God's Word to me?

Do you trust God to lead you, even if it isn't in the direction you expected? Where are you rooted: the world, or the Word?

Here's a video of Hillsong's "Desert Song" (the lyrics from the beginning of this post)-I've gained a much deeper appreciation for it over these past few weeks.

Lord I give You my life, I give You my all

There is a tension that runs through the narrative of the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation: Obedience versus Sacrifice. It's the theme of first and second chances (and third, and fourth, and so on). Read any book in the Bible and the conflict between these two ideas jumps right out at you. It's inescapable.

Out of the two options, God has a preference for which one we give to him. When rebuking Saul's choice to disobey God and not wipe out the Amalekites but spare some of their herds and offer some as burnt offerings, Samuel asks this question: "Why then did you not obey the voice of the LORD?" (1 Samuel 15:18, NASB). Saul is confused. What did he do wrong? It's not as if he was keeping the flocks for himself-he spared the flocks for a burnt offering, after all! "I did obey the voice of the LORD" (v 19, emphasis mine) he responds. He destroyed the Amalekites to the man and the things that they kept were to be sacrifices to God. Where is the error in that? Samuel's response leaves little doubt as to what Saul's mistake was:

"Has the LORD as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams" (v 22).

Obedience is better than sacrifice. Disobedience, even for the sake of sacrifice, is not acceptable. One of the other numerous passages that deal with the tension between these two ideas is found in Jeremiah 7:22-23:

"For I did not speak to your fathers, or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices. But this is what I commanded them, saying, 'Obey my voice, and i will be your God, and you will be my people; and you will walk in all the way which I command you, that it may be well with you.'"

Obedience predates sacrifice. The first recorded command in the Bible comes in Genesis 2:16-17, where God commands Adam not to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The first recorded sacrifice is found in the next chapter, Genesis 3:21- "The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them." God killed animals and made clothes from the skin for Adam and Eve. Because of Adam's sin, it is impossible for us to fully and completely obey, thus the necessity of sacrifice.

Sacrifice covers the shame that comes from disobedience. In the case of Adam and Eve, the first sacrifice literally covered their shame, their nakedness. In the same way, all future sacrifices served as a temporary covering for shame and sin.

Obedience and sacrifice were finally reconciled on the Cross. Just as Abraham's obedience involved the sacrifice of his son Isaac, Jesus' sacrifice was the ultimate obedience to the Father. Before his sacrifice, we had no hope of measuring up to the Law and obtaining salvation through obedience. Now, however, "[We] have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer [us] who live, but Christ lives in [us]; and the life which [we] live in the flesh [we] live by faith in the Son of god, who loved [us] and gave himself up for [us]" (Galatians 2:20).

We can still fall into the trap of trying to cover our shame and sin ourselves, via sacrifice. The good old Gospel of Works is never far away from our thoughts and attempts to please God. That's why Paul doesn't stop with verse 20 in Galatians 2, but continues: "I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly" (v 21). By reverting to a works-based attempt to save ourselves via our own efforts and sacrifice, we invalidate Christ's sacrifice.

"Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship" (Romans 12:1). God wants our hearts and our obedience, and through the Cross He's enabled us to give it to him. What's holding you back?