The ugly awful

The news out of Harrisburg, PA yesterday was heartbreaking. A grand jury investigated sexually predatory behavior in the Catholic church going back 70 years. The published report listed 301 priests who preyed on children leaving thousands of people confused, afraid, feeling alone in their shame.  One man, in his 50’s who had been the victim of a priest, heard the name of that man on the list of predators and slowly shook his head, his story now confirmed after so many years.  He said, “I’m free, I’m free.”  Compounding the ugly was the awful revelation that church authorities did little or nothing to stop the evil, usually just moving a priest who was exposed to a new town.  It is hard to even imagine the reasoning that justified those decisions.

I want to distance myself from that. I want to insist that I am different, don’t you?  Let’s be reminded that as horrific as this story is, we are all capable of doing things we hope never see the light of day. 

The history of humanity is full of chapter upon chapter of stories that confirm the preacher’s inspired words declaring that “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is? But I, the Lord, search all hearts and examine secret motives. I give all people their due rewards, according to what their actions deserve.” (Jeremiah 17:9-10, NLT)  Perhaps you are getting angry, insisting that you are not like those awful men who preyed on children while representing Jesus.  I surely hope that we are not doing those things, and yet we do fail.  Sin is so common, so lacking in originality, that is accepted as ‘normal.’ 

That being true, let’s look into our own lives, away from the dark and sordid account of that grand jury report.

Ever been so angry you hated someone if only for a day or two? 

Jesus says that kind of anger is kin to murder.  
Remember His famous words about adultery? 

If we spend time indulging fantasy, we have taken steps towards the reality.  

Which of us has not just wanted to have his own way, disregarding the need of another?

That selfishness does not reflect the goodness of God, does it?

As much as some resist the fact, the truth is that we are universally resistant to the will and way of God. We all need a Savior! Against the backdrop of our failures, there is this bright light of hope, redemption, and transformation!  

Paul, a man who had been full of self-righteous rage, who hated Christ and Christians, knew grace first-hand. The Spirit found him, invited him to give himself to the Lord Jesus, and changed him who had been “chief of sinners.”    

He says, "Once you were dead because of your disobedience and your many sins. . . .  By our very nature we were subject to God’s anger, just like everyone else. But God is so rich in mercy, and he loved us so much, that even though we were dead because of our sins, he gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead. (It is only by God’s grace that you have been saved!) For he raised us from the dead along with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms . . .  God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it. For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago." (Ephesians 2:1-10, NLT)

My prayer is for a new heart. I want to care deeply for those victimized by sinful people. I want to shine brightly with Christ’s love in a world of darkness. By the Spirit, I desire to be an agent of redemption and transformation – starting in me!   

Yes, my prayer is this, our word from the Word. What a promise from the heart of our Father. "I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws." (Ezekiel 36:25-27, NIV)

______________

Father, make us whole and then make us healers.

Let your Light shine on us and then through us.

May we love the Truth and then be willing to speak it.

Help us, Holy Spirit, to listen, learn, and love.

In Jesus’ Name.

Amen

You just don’t get it

Ever found yourself  in a conversation that you could not understand? I was talking computer jargon with someone the other day. Another person who was standing there looked at us blankly, then she laughed and said, “Well I hear the words but I have no idea what you are talking about.”  I tried to include her, simplifying what I was saying but she was still lost, lacking the experience that would have made sense of the words.

True Christianity can be like that. When I speak of ‘dying to Self,’ or ‘forgiving without reservation,’  I see some who hear the words without really being able to understand them. I am not defending the common practice of ‘insiders’ who use coded language or who thoughtlessly speak in the exclusive language of the Church. We are ambassadors of Christ and His kingdom and as such we must make every effort to make His message accessible to those who hear us.  But there are limits to the understanding of spiritual matters.

Paul tells us this. "No one can know a person’s thoughts except that person’s own spirit, and no one can know God’s thoughts except God’s own Spirit. And we have received God’s Spirit (not the world’s spirit), so we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us. When we tell you these things, we do not use words that come from human wisdom. Instead, we speak words given to us by the Spirit, using the Spirit’s words to explain spiritual truths. But people who aren’t spiritual can’t receive these truths from God’s Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them and they can’t understand it, for only those who are spiritual can understand what the Spirit means. Those who are spiritual can evaluate all things, but they themselves cannot be evaluated by others. For, “Who can know the Lord’s thoughts? Who knows enough to teach him?” But we understand these things, for we have the mind of Christ." (1 Corinthians 2:11-16, NLT)

The Gospel is first revealed by the Spirit to us!  When He speaks to us, moving us to desire Him, and we respond with faith, a new way of ‘knowing’ opens to us. We become people who think beyond the natural world into eternity. Let me quickly add --- this insight is no reason for pride.  If we become proud of our ‘knowledge’ we sin against God, growing cataracts in the spiritual eyes He’s opened by His grace.

What happens when those who are not filled with the Spirit attempt to explain spiritual matters?  We get all kinds of false teaching.

One is a system of religiosity based on human effort.

Knowing God and accepting His grace in Christ through faith gets replaced with a message of ‘do’s and don’ts,’ regulations and rituals. It cannot work because we can never be ‘good enough’ to merit God’s love no matter how disciplined or moral we might be.

Another error is one all too common in our world that makes the Gospel into a scheme for producing the life we desire!

The philosophers that teach this say things like “Jesus wants you to be …”  and then encourage their hearers to fill in the blank with their heart’s desire. It is a cross-less ‘gospel’ that over promises and under delivers. It takes certain words of Jesus and turns them into a guarantee of happiness and prosperity.  It encourages a ‘worship’ that is more about stirring up human emotion than encountering the living God. It is more about self-help than following Him.  Millions love this ‘gospel’ because they can understand it with the natural mind.  It makes sense, so they say, that God would want to bless me, feed me, comfort me, and give me all that I want because He loves me.

Hearing the Gospel that tells of Jesus’ love, His willingness to enter our desperate situation to save us with sacrifice, and invites you and me to do the same with our world makes no sense to a person who is not alive to the eternal god. Jesus’ invitation to love Him more than family, more than Self, to ‘take up the Cross and follow Me’ are noble words that the mind without the Spirit cannot make a reality.  The fact that God can love and save a terribly wicked person is beyond the reach of the natural mind that insists that God is for the good alone.  (In the natural mind ‘Good’ is always relative to where we stand not fixed on the revealed truth of God!)

The mystery of faith is that Christ has died, Christ has risen, and Christ will come again.  On that foundation we build our lives around His invitation to be disciples, even as we ‘work out’ the implications of knowing Him as both Savior and Lord in our day to day lives.  And, ‘ because we live by the Spirit, we keep step with the Spirit.’

Here is a word from the Word. I pray it will not cause us to be lazy in thought or study. That is not the intent of this passage. Rather, may this passage bring us to humble prayer, to a place where we allow the Holy Spirit to make God’s truth our guide.  "So where does this leave the philosophers, the scholars, and the world’s brilliant debaters? God has made the wisdom of this world look foolish. Since God in his wisdom saw to it that the world would never know him through human wisdom, he has used our foolish preaching to save those who believe. It is foolish to the Jews, who ask for signs from heaven. And it is foolish to the Greeks, who seek human wisdom. So when we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense. But to those called by God to salvation, both Jews and Gentiles, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God." (1 Corinthians 1:20-24, NLT)

Abba, open my eyes, enlighten my heart,

and keep me where You can lead me.

I ask that I will have Your Mind,

That I will see as You see,

and, by Your grace, that I will live and speak,

in a way that You desire for Your glory.

In Jesus’ Name. Amen

____________

Listen To Our Hearts
(worship along at this link)

How do you explain

How do you describe

A love that goes from east to west

And runs as deep as it is wide

You know all our hopes

Lord You know all our fears

And words cannot express

The love we feel

But we long for You to hear

So listen to our hearts

Hear our spirits sing

A song of praise that flows

From those You have redeemed

We will use the words we know

To tell You what an awesome God You are

But words are not enough

To tell You of our love

So listen to our hearts

If words could fall like rain

From these lips of mine

And if I had a thousand years

Lord I would still run out of time

If You listen to my heart

Ev’ry beat will say

Thank You for the life

Thank You for the truth

Thank You for the way

Geoff Moore | Steven Curtis Chapman

© 1992 Primary Wave Brian (Chapman Sp Acct) (Admin. by BMG Chrysalis US)

Songs On The Forefront (Admin. by Capitol CMG Publishing)

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CCLI License # 810055

Flat on his face, disgraced!

One of my role models in ministry was accused of sad, selfish sinfulness last month, disgraced even as he was preparing to hand off the church he planted forty years ago, one that grew to be one of the largest in America. He wrote several best-selling books about the Christian life. I heard him speak several times over the years and he inspired me with a practical, down to earth message about living for Jesus in this world.   

Now, like David, my lament is this - “How the mighty have fallen in battle!" (2 Samuel 1:25, NIV)  

Thinking about the pain in his family, about his wife’s sense of betrayal, about the other women he’s apparently discarded along the way, about his church in disarray – fills me with a mix of emotions including fear, anger, and sorrow.  Knowing how to deal with those who stumble and fall is hard, isn’t it?  He’s not an especially evil man and I am not prepared to throw out his books, erase his memory, or vilify him as many are doing.  For many the only possible response is to distance themselves from the man as quickly and as far as possible. Some, for a time apparently, tried to cover it all up, to protect him from his disgrace. Others are publishing harsh, critical statements that, at least to me, read as hateful. Thousands of us who saw him as a role model are disappointed because we fell into the trap of making him that man we saw only in his public persona a Christian celebrity. We allowed ourselves believe that because he had a well-known name, was a popular speaker and a best-selling author, that he breathed a different kind of air, living in a world apart from our ordinary one.  In fact, now we know that he is a ‘sinner saved by grace’ just like the rest of us.

If I could sit down for an hour with him today, I would just want to listen, to encourage him to do what he can to make restitution to those he’s hurt, to own his failure, and to receive the immeasurable grace of God that defies our human understanding.  Whatever he has done, whoever he is in private, I know that God loves him with a love that deeper than the pit his sin has dug!

Here a couple of conclusions that I have formed from Bill’s story.

The first is that we all are capable of great good and great sin.

Those who are pointing fingers, self-righteously castigating this man, need to read St. Paul’s words again. “Don’t be so naive and self-confident. You’re not exempt. You could fall flat on your face as easily as anyone else. Forget about self-confidence; it’s useless. Cultivate God-confidence.”  (1 Corinthians 10:12, The Message) We need not walk around in fear of the world, our sinful nature, or the Devil however we need a healthy respect for the lures of temptation that comes to each one of us.

Second, we need to resist the temptation to turn our leaders into celebrities.

Leaders are there to serve us.  We make a huge mistake that complicates their lives and confuses us when we turn the famous and gifted Christian musicians, pastors, and authors, into people we think are larger than life. When we do this, we fail to pray for them. Their ‘ministry’ becomes more important to us than knowing Jesus. And, if they fall, we find ourselves disillusioned, bitter, and angry. Paul reminded the Corinthian Christians that their love of name and personality was a mistake. His words to them are words for us!  "Christ Jesus … has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: “Let him who boasts boast in the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 1:30-31, NIV)

There is powerful forgiveness and unbelievable restoration available to those who turn from sin to God, who own their sin without excuse, and seek Him.  Are you struggling with temptation today? We all do. It is no cliché to say that there is victory in Jesus!  Are you watching another struggle to get back on their feet after taking a terrible fall?  Love them, pray for them, come alongside of them to offer a hand.

Here is a word from the Word.  God use it to keep us on our feet for Jesus’ sake.  "If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth. But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness. If we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that his word has no place in our hearts. My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous. He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world. And we can be sure that we know him if we obey his commandments." (1 John 1:8-2:3, NLT)

________

Come Ye Sinners

(a beautiful old folk hymn)

Come ye sinners poor and needy

Weak and wounded sick and sore

Jesus ready stands to save you

Full of pity love and power

I will arise and go to Jesus

He will raise in His arms

In the arms of my dear Savior

Oh there are 10,000 charms