Thoughts on Loving in Spirit
To love someone in spirit IS to love them despite what they do. It sees THROUGH what they do and makes no conditions based on what they do. Basically to love someone in spirit means that we see them as a child of God, blameless before God because of his Grace.
Imagine if I was blameless, never did things wrong and was thus worthy of great friendship from everyone. It would be very easy for you to love me. But that is because I would not have horrible things in your way. I wouldn't have the habits you hate, the struggles you strike out against. I wouldn't do things you hated. Now if you see my habits, my struggles my flawed HUMANITY, it is harder to love me, but you're looking at the wrong thing.
The only reason God loves us unconditionally is because he doesn't even see the things WE base our conditions on. God does not see my habits, struggles and flawed humanity. He sees, "a little child who hasn't been loved enough and who has ceased growing because someone has ceased believing in me." Now if I could love others that way, I love them in spirit because their flesh makes no difference to me. I could care less about their flesh, their struggles, their habits, their hangups and flawed humanity. I love the child who needs someone to believe in him, the spirit who truly is blameless and incased in a flawed human flesh.
When I used to go Perkins in college (Oh how I miss Perkins), I purposefully never saw a waitress as a waitress. I saw her as a person like me, not a person there to take my order, bring my food, end of transaction. She was a person, a child like me who needed someone to believe in her and treat her that way. I loved the Perkins waitress in spirit not flesh, because I did not care that one of them had been divorced 4 times, cussed like a sailor, and had three kids from different men. But I do know that she wept in my arms one night when she was terrified and broken. I loved a waitress in spirit instead of her flesh.
Poser Worship
"But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." John 4:23-24
How often do I truly worship God in spirit and truth? This is the worshiper that God desires, and I wonder on a daily or weekly Sunday basis if I truly worship God in the fashion He seeks from me.
I may, if I am really on my game some days, worship God with my mind as I think about the things of God and this by no means is non-worship, but can I say I have engaged my spirit in moments of worship?
Have I allowed the very heart and core of myself be engaged to and with my worship? Have I been able to lay aside distraction and noise for even an hour on Sunday or a few minutes throughout the week for worship so that my spirit might fully engage with God, who is spirit?
Before I ever sit, stand, or arrive for worship have I prepared my heart, spirit, and will for worship? Can I pray beforehand with John Baillie, "God, grant me, I pray you, a clearer vision of your truth, a greater faith in your power, and a more confident assurance of your love."
What then of worshiping in truth? Can I say I have worshiped God in truth? When I worship God on a daily or weekly Sunday basis, do I do so in alētheia (truth), more than a factuality, but in sincerity? More than fact-checking the words I say, but can I say my heart is sincere in its worship?
I desire to be the sort of worshiper God seeks. That an all-knowing God must seek anything makes the thing he seeks truly hard to find. [Tweet That]
God, may you seek and find a sincere worshiper in me. May I worship you in spirit and not only in mind or empty words. May I not wait until Sunday but know that today and with my whole life I am to give you honor and praise from my spirit to yours with sincerity and honest desire.
Intimacy in the Brokenness
Sometimes I strive so hard at living with the most excellent virtue, in absolute piety, in "Christian perfection" of sorts that I become more and more strained, confined and closed in. We can be so dependent upon upholding the rules and expectations we place on ourselves that we forget the relationship we were intended for. I think of the comparison between the prodigal and his brother. I think of the difference in the levels of intimacy with the father they both resemble. I find that in his brokenness and humility, the prodigal experiences far greater intimacy with the father than does his sinless, pious and self-righteous brother.
The true site of the Christian disciple is one of a man or woman who is able to praise God for all things, including his own sin, he who is not obsessed with the perfect portrayal of self and spirituality. She who is not complacent and shackled by a practical life. He who strives more for the relationship than the rules and understands that he has, is and will fail but can realize that God expects more failure from him than he ever does from himself. She who realizes we do not have to come groveling to God with a clear presentation of our sins and failures IN ORDER TO BE forgiven, but realizes the prodigal's father did not ask for an explanation, and Jesus did not ask the adulterous woman for an apology or confession. The disciple realizes that we will not be judged now or in the end for our sins because we have already been judged and found not guilty, but that God desires we show up in his embrace and accept his love.
Heaven without Jesus
Jesus, I want to love you so much I desire you more than this earth. I want my heart to desire you and not simply the things you give me through the cross or the things you promise in my heavenly home. I want to know that my heart would want nothing of heaven's beauty if you were not there. I want to know that you would not need to wean me from this earth the hard way because I would happily leave any comfort this world offers me to be with you. I want my heart to be more concerned with what you are to me instead of what you did for me. I want your cross to daily be more than a utility and instead focus on the beauty of the One who died upon it. I want to stay awake and long for your coming instead of being comfortable and sleepy where I am.
I want all these things and regret that my heart does not always often live and act the same way.
You are my greatest love, and I want to live in such a way that I do not lie.
Contain
You cannot be far from meonly I can be far from You You fill the earth like the ocean fills a submerged cup
You are not contained but contain
Thank you for Pain
The interesting thing about leprosy is the MAIN ailment is the absence of pain. Because leprosy patients do not feel or know pain, they often do self-destructive things and know nothing of it. They grab splintered rakes and sharp objects with bare hands and know no pain. They wear very tight shoes and create blistering and festering sores they only see and not feel. Leprosy patients are absent of pain, but it is that absence which dissolves the reality of destruction happening to them all the time. We ought to praise God for pain. We are SO quick to get rid of pain when it is that pain which tells us we need aid.
There are parallels to be drawn to spiritual and emotional pain. Without it we would be callous and shut off...which is destructive to our emotions, spirits, and souls. We make it easy by trying to defeat pain. It's like we don't want to hurt, but what if that hurt is exactly what keeps us from destructing. If we felt no pain, we would only be a spiritual leper...an emotional leper. The craziest thing is that lepers are afflicted, but I, as an emotional leper, afflict myself. I resound with lepers of Biblical times and silently scream, "UNCLEAN!" I am a spiritual and emotional leper. I shut off my own pain sensors by covering them up and saying, "I'm not hurt...I'm tired of being hurt...so I won't be anymore...I'm tired of hurting...I'm tired of caring." So begins a self-destructive disease.
I get so terrified of pain that I shut myself off from it, but without it...without being honest about my pain, hurt, real emotion, I just destruct. I am self-afflicted, but can only be healed through the grace of GOd.
In recovery! Experiencing pain with gratitude because at least I feel.
Eye of the Storm
Like any storm, which has an eye, so also is our life.At the center of storms is the eye, which is completely calm and tranquil. When our life is an incredible storm, where everything all around us seems like hellish storm, there is always a peace in finding God at our center. When God is our center, there is always a tranquil peace.
The storm may not disappear and may rage on all around us, but we ALWAYS have the center, to go to for peace IN THE MIDST of our storm.
A little god's prayer
O my God, help my heart forget myself so I can find rest from the weight of being my own little god. I am not as strong or important as I think or believe I am much of the time. I spend so much of my time, energy, and life trying to prove myself.
I have what A.W. Tozer calls 'the burden of pretense'. I want everyone to see my best while I hide my poverty at all costs. It is exhausting. I am a sinful man like every other, yes, but the exhausting part of it all is actually in the effort it takes to look other than and more than I actually am.
I do not have to expend much effort to be sinful or to admit with all of humanity that I am a sinful man. It is exhausting to uphold what I am not. It is exhausting to uphold my little god status. It is heart-breaking when people, as they inevitably must, attack the idol of self I have crafted. It is no wonder we find little peace when so much of our life and reality is spend in tireless and fruitless effort to be and appear more than we really are.
God, rescue me from this tireless effort. I am weary and heavy-laden with this burden. Lay upon me your yoke of meekness and peace. I am not as strong as I think I am or appear to be.
On "Not the Jesus I believe in"
There is common reminder that Jesus was not the messiah they expected to see, but not much has changed in history. So many people have an idea of what they think a king, a god, a messiah should look like and do.
Even while Jesus hung on the cross in Matthew 27, people passed by "hurling abuse at HIm, wagging their heads and saying, 'You who are going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save Yourself! If You are the Son of God, come down from the cross." So when Jesus is doing all those things in a different way than they think He should, they deny Him as king and true God.
IT is still the same today. They mock and ridicule Jesus for not being what they assume He should be. We do not get to define what Jesus should be or do. Yet, this is what believers and non-believers alike will consistently do. We need only accept Christ as He has presented himself to us in Scripture.
On Silva and Following Jesus
Peter's denial of his impending denial in Matthew 26 is a reminder to every follower of Jesus that over-confidence is the first step toward falling. The more confident we are in our own dedication, devotion, and ability to withstand temptation the further down we have let our guard.
We are like a fighter who gets so confident in our ability, we start to let down our guard to a point when our formidable foe takes the chance we gave him in our over-confidence to knock us out.
When Jesus tells his disciples [us] that we will fall away, it ought to be a sobering reminder to take this seriously and realize we are not as strong as we think we are. We ought to humbly keep our guard up.