Heart Hardening

10.30.11

Mark 6.52 52 ...for they had not understood about the loaves; their hearts were hardened. NIV

Really. Can you blame them? I mean for their hardened hearts. They had just witnessed something that didn’t add up and they couldn’t understand. Who feeds five thousand people with five biscuits and two small fish? Who drives a legion of demons out of a weirdo to then see him dressed, acting normally, and in his right mind? Who goes into a dead girl’s room and calls her back to life? Who walks on water? Who is it that one need only touch the hem of His garment and she would be relieved of her malady of twelve years? And their hearts were hardened – go figure, they couldn’t understand and their minds just couldn’t take it all in…

That’s the power of God! God does things in our lives and we can’t believe Him for it. He doesn’t do what we want Him to do and we cry out and grumble at Him for it. Who is God? WHO ARE WE!? Such is the condition of the human heart. But really, I can’t blame the disciples for their incredulousness – they had just witnessed some pretty heavy stuff.

These days I am asking God for things. We prayed and asked Him for an affordable house to move into and today we are going to meet with the landlords to go over the paperwork and sign the lease. We prayed and asked Him for a job for me that would meet our financial needs and help us to get out of debt: and He provided that. I have been working at that job for two months now. I have been asking for success at my job and I’ve been finding it all along the way. God does miraculous things for us and sometimes we can’t mentally handle it.

It might be because our hearts are harder than we know. It might be because we think somehow we deserve God’s punishment and not His blessing. It might be because God does things to us and for us that are outside of our arrogant expectation of what would, could, or should happen. It requires just as much faith to receive from God as it does to believe from God. Even Heaven itself is going to require faith.

To get rid of heart-hardness requires also that we think better about God and about ourselves. God deserves our highest thoughts and the unshakable confidence on our part that He is going to take care of us – even in the weirdest ways on the most mysterious days. That’s God.  And it is also going to require that when we pray and ask God for whatever, that we ask and then accept that He’s heard, and will act in accordance with His perfect will and our best interest. That belief includes His every yes, no, or wait. Whatever His answer we must courageously accept that it is perfectly right for us.

And we must learn to let God be God. He isn’t us and we isn’t Him. We must let God do and trust that whatever He does is because He infinitely, eternally, and unshakably loves us. Belief in God is knowing that He is for us and not against us. Belief in God is knowing that He can work in and through our lives despite our worst efforts so that His perfect plan will be worked out.

Heart hardening in the beginning is natural but it must, as we learn to live with Him, begin to diminish because God has in store for us good things that are way beyond what we can ask or even imagine. We must ask big, expect big, and then grow big in our faith and reliance upon Him! Amen? When that happens heart-hardening becomes a thing of the past.

Obvious Illustrations

10.29.11

Mark 4.3-34 33 With many similar parables Jesus spoke the word to them, as much as they could understand. 34 He did not say anything to them without using a parable. But when he was alone with his own disciples, he explained everything. NIV

If we’re not careful, we might get the impression that Jesus unfairly played favorites with the twelve and everyone else got leftovers. In Mark 4.11-12 it says, [Jesus] told them, “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables so that, “‘they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!’” (NIV)

But the truth is Jesus always used parables to make His point: He used simple, practical, and obvious illustrations from life to help His hearers understand who He was, who God was, and what He was doing. Their problem was because of their heads and hearts, they couldn’t make the connection between parables and reality.

Most of the time in life (and I’m going way out on a limb here (a parable)) we tend to focus only on what is happening to us without really thinking about why it is happening to us. And circumstances will do that to us if we let them. God however, desires we look at the deeper meaning of things and try to factor the presence of His Hand into our thinking so that we may learn from Him and experience Him in every area of our lives. For instance, what can we learn from just having a cold? How can we use disappointment to help us see the presence of God? What good is pain – really?

Jesus spoke to them through parables and I think He speaks to us by His word and through our everyday life experiences. We should – at the end of each day – be able to retrace our steps through the day and see where God may have been taking us… and whether we got there or not. It starts by meditatively reading His word and then going into our day armed with that knowledge. If we are to, whether we eat or drink or whatever we do, do all for the glory of God, then what does that really look like? If my purpose in life is solely Him, then what are the components of my every day that help me live accordingly? And what are the things that I see in life and nature all around me that continually help to turn my thoughts toward my Loving Creator? Jesus’ parables weren’t rocket science and neither are my life experiences. I ‘ve said before and I’ll say again: life isn’t about how much money I make, how happy I am, whether I’m ‘successful’ or not: life is all about knowing and experiencing God to the point that I can truly say: Yes, Lord it was all done for Your glory!

Today, we are starting the process of moving again. We Turks, it seems, move a lot. Circumstances are what they are and we are transplanting from one place to another within our little community. I see God’s hand in the process and I see that even in something as mundane as packing it all up just to move less than two miles to unload it all again, God is there with us and we rejoice in His provision (in a place to move to) and in His presence (in the process.)

And guys, if we can accept it, our very lives can actually be parables (living testimonies) to the people around us who don’t yet know God or His goodness, mercy, and love to those who call Him by Name. What’s God showing you these days? Can you see it?

What We Didn't Deserve

10.28.11

Job 19.28-29 28 “If you say, ‘How we will hound him, since the root of the trouble lies in him,’ 29 you should fear the sword yourselves; for wrath will bring punishment by the sword, and then you will know that there is judgment.” NIV

I don’t think Job could embrace why what was happening to him was happening to him. To be sure, he had moments of terrific doubt; his confidence was shaken, and all that he had relied on up to this point seemed useless and small. Tragedy can do that to a person. Especially when it is out of the blue… as tragedy seems mostly to be.

When things go wrong, my guess is most of us tend to look inward and ask, “What did I do?” I know people looking at us think that. I believe that was Job’s case. Unfortunately for Job his friends asked the same question: what did you do!? They were convinced that Job was being punished for some huge, secret, unforsaken sin. In their thinking, it had to be – why else would anyone suffer at the level Job was suffering if they hadn’t done something wrong?

The Book of Job is not just a clever story with sound intellectual point and counterpoint. Job’s is the real story of a real guy who experienced real tragedy, who had real friends who were really convinced that Job had done something really wrong to get what he got: to them that is how life worked: a series of paybacks. And here is Job’s defense…

“Since you are convinced I did something wrong to deserve this; and you’re going to attack me until you get me to fess up to what you are sure is the truth; since we’re going to play that game, then beware: you should fear the sword yourselves; for wrath will bring punishment by the sword, and then you will know that there is judgment.” In other words, don’t think you’ll escape if this is your only understanding of what is happening to me. If you think I am being punished, watch out: you will be too! Job was right: we cannot assess one set of reasoning just to one person that we can’t or won’t to others – the reasoning applies to all of us!

How often I have danced the dance inside when someone I don’t care for gets what I think they deserve. No one gets what they deserve – at least according to God. And if there is a truth for me today it is this: No one gets what they deserve because God is working in everyone’s life to give them what they don’t deserve: life. We are all sinners and deserve death. Ultimately we will get what we choose, but because of His love, mercy, and grace we don’t get what we deserve. Yes, there is wrath, and yes, there is a death and after that to face the judgment; but getting what we deserve…? Job was trying to tell his friends not to think that way about God.

 And hell? Hell is the destination of our choosing. Sitting in hell for eternity will be the cost of denying the goodness and reality of God who went way out of His way to give us what we didn’t deserve…

If Only

10.26.11

Acts 26.32 32 Agrippa said to Festus, “This man could have been set free if he had not appealed to Caesar.” NIV

Many times in my life the if’s have prevented me from doing something. Once when I was pastoring a church, I was asked by a men’s organization to submit a copy of my mission, goals, vision, etc. as a church, and that if I did, I would be considered for a possible financial grant. They rejected my response because I missed the due date by one day and they wouldn’t allow me any grace. If only I’d sent it in one day earlier. I even had a good excuse for being late.

Paul was considered by Festus and Agrippa (Acts 25-26) to be innocent. They heard his case and came to the reasonable conclusion that Paul had done nothing wrong and his Jewish accusers were just jealous of him. They would have set him free if he hadn’t appealed to Caesar. If only Paul; if only you hadn’t had to have your way! If only!

If only’s are under God’s control. God uses if only’s. God had a much bigger plan for Paul and his freedom wouldn’t have worked in God’s plan. God used Roman Law to His advantage and put Paul right in the middle of it. Agrippa and Festus could only see the if only and Paul’s continued incarceration – God saw Paul sharing the Gospel with Nero, the emperor. And Paul wasn’t any worse for wear because of it.

The if only’s can drive you crazy if you let them: if only I’d… But remember God uses all of our if only’s (both good and bad) to transform us in, and conform us to, His will. God’s purpose for our lives is greater than any if only’s we happen to run across. God is not short-changed by if only’s.

I’ve had several if only situations that are especially painful to me when I think of them. But in the greater scheme of things they are the times when I needed to learn something and in retrospect they were just tools along the way. If only’s will never stop; they’ll continue until we die, but in heaven I think we’ll be able to look back and see them in perfect clarity for what they really were in our lives: useful tools to guide us down the right path – God’s path.

And sometimes it is especially helpful to remember that Paul’s if only was designed by God for something greater than Paul’s immediate release. Had he been released, the Jews probably would’ve hunted him down and killed him out of revenge. They were probably saying something like, “Dang! If only he’d not appealed…he’d be dead by tonight!” If only’s work both ways.

I might opine my if only’s but I must remember and trust that God uses them to His advantage and His advantage is mine as well because He is my Father and He looks out for me… even when I miserably wail, if only!

With God at Starbucks

10.22.11

Job 13.3 3 But I desire to speak to the Almighty and to argue my case with God. NIV

There are many occasions in life when I wish I could just sit down at coffee and argue my case with the Almighty. After all, He is the Almighty. And don’t the Almighty’s do the almighty: like solve all of my problems and give me what I need to succeed? Seems like they ought with a Name like Almighty. I mean, it makes perfect sense to me…

Like Job, the only feed-back I get from the Almighty is this: trust Me; read My word, hang on every promise I’ve made, and trust Me. Seems like it would be so much simpler if He and I could just do Starbucks for about an hour and hash things out; I’d even buy.

Job’s story is very interesting because it seems God saw things in Job that Job didn’t see in himself. Job’s argument was he wanted to justify himself before God and show why he wasn’t deserving of the treatment he got; but God appeared to be uninterested in Job’s position. And according to chapters 1 and 2 of Job, God had bigger fish to fry with Satan’s accusations of God’s treatment of Job B.C. before calamity.

My problems are miniscule compared to Job’s. I haven’t suffered like he did. I haven’t experienced the utter collapse of my life like he did. But I do face things in my life that sure seem big to me. And I really want God’s help to face them and overcome them. What God saw in Job was a pure heart: Job loved God not for what he got but for Who God was. Said Job: Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him. Job knew which side of the toast was buttered.

God, however, doesn’t work in our lives because we know what side of the toast is buttered. God doesn’t work in our lives to give us what we want; He works in our lives to perfect what He’s begun in us through Jesus Christ. And He does so without having long conversations with us about how it’s going all going to pan out or how we feel about His methods. Job was dying for an explanation and God wasn’t going to give him one until He was good and ready. Job’s whining wasn’t winning. And mine won’t either.

Job’s success was not the result of a conversation with God and getting God to give him the gory details of all life was going to deal him. Job’s success was when God had to intervene and stop Job from going down a mental dead end that might’ve cost him his faith (I think that began about chapter 38 of Job’s book). God does do that for us as well; He intervenes to get us to stop thinking one way and get us to think another. Thank God for that every time you can – it’s a HUGE gift.

In the meantime, our job – yours and mine – is to seek God diligently with all of our heart. Hebrews 11 says: And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. (v 6) Whatever those rewards are I’m betting they’re better (infinitely so) than sitting down with God over a steaming cup of today’s blend and arguing why I think my way is better than His and why I want Him to give me what I want. He thinks my character is more important than that.

Sometimes God’s silence is deafening and sometimes I just need to plug my ears in faith and watch with wonder as He leads me right where He wants me to be: trusting Him the whole way…