The Great Revelation

Luke 2:15 NIV

When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about."

My earliest memory of Christmas was when final proof came that Santa Claus was real.  I was perhaps four or five years old and Christmas Eve, I heard a loud banging around on the porch, a boisterous, “ho, ho, ho” and a firm knock on the door.  My mom urged me to open the door and go out on the porch and I found the most beautiful tricycle in the world sitting there.  I shouted with glee, jumped up and down and gazed in wonder at what Santa had left for me.  The joy of Christmas was gloriously physical, encompassing, radiating.  Of course, my take on Christmas is much more sophisticated now and so is yours but, I wonder if that makes us better.

Christmas was not always Christian, at least in regard to the time of the year we celebrate it.  We know that it was first a pagan holiday, a time of drinking and carousing.  Yet, it did not immediately “clean up its act” even after the Christian community took it over and made Christmas a time of celebrating the birth of Jesus.  There was much about the reveling that made it a fearful time for good families who avoided the drunken mobs running the streets during Christmas.  It really was not until the Protestant Christians of Germany embraced Christmas fully as a time of honoring the Christ child that Christmas took on its holiness and wonder.

The night Jesus was actually born a great split in the cosmos occurred as the supernatural met the natural in a spectacular display.  Rarely do we see the supernatural beings of God’s universe; they remain almost entirely hidden from us.  Abraham came upon them.  Elisha did too, along with Samson’s parents and Jacob.  They are generally spotted only in dreams if at all.  Of the many billions who have come and gone, only a handful have ever seen God’s angels and knew they had.  However, that one night, whose date has been forgotten by the world, a small cadre of shepherds were stunned by their sudden appearance.

Only Luke records the moment.  The other Gospel writers and apostles failed to mention it when they wrote their parts of the Bible.  There was nothing notable about the night to warn the shepherds of what was coming as far as we know.  No meteor showers, lunar eclipses or bright Christmas stars paved the way.  It just happened without warning; a split second the shepherds were tired and bored and maybe even hungry and the next, the heavens exploded before them.  And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. (Luke 2:8-9 NIV) A single angel was enough to throw the shepherds into panic.  We certainly must not skirt quickly past the included note that the “glory of the Lord shone around them”, but, it was the solitary angel that shook them violently.  This consideration should not be taken lightly.  When the supernatural crashes down upon the natural, there is shock and amazement.  The senses are almost always dazzled and overwhelmed.  The spiritual core of humanity cannot take in the supernatural casually.  A violent eruption occurs within that shakes the ground of those who come upon it.

We know that the presence of the angel did not bring this to a conclusion though.  More of the night exploded with wonder as the shepherds took in the glory of God.  Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests." (Luke 2:13-14 NIV) Imagine the spectacle of it and how shook they all must have been by what they witnessed.  Not a single shepherd could have been unmoved.  Before the sky filled with supernatural though, the first angel announced happily to the shepherds, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.  Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.  This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger." (Luke 2:10-12 NIV)

How would you have responded to this declaration?  What would you have done if you heard this strangely electrifying news?  Would you have continued to stay with your sheep that night?  Would you have kept watching your show or checking Facebook?  Would you have worked on your dinner or gone through your emails or maybe even headed off to bed?  Not everyone who comes upon the supernatural is transformed by it.  Plenty, like the Israelites who gave little thought to the God who revealed Himself to them in a cloud with lightning and great glory, simply go on with the day as if nothing much happened.  Such was not the case though with these shepherds!  When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about." So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. (Luke 2:15-16 NIV)

When God reveals Himself to you, it is a supernatural event.  No one comes to Christ without the Spirit of God intervening.  It is not an intellectual exercise, not a logical conclusion, this matter of being born again.  This is always a work of the supernatural Presence of God who makes it clear that you must come to Christ for salvation.  It never is just you and your mind making this connection.  Always God must be there for you to trust Him, want Him.  Any other religious or political or intellectual consideration can spring from just you but not this.  Jesus must enter your mind if you are to ever become actually Christian, truly a new creation in Christ.  The conclusion of the text is one of the most heartwarming accounts found anywhere in literature.  When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them.  But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.  The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told. (Luke 2:17-20 NIV)

When the supernatural meets you; when God invades your heart, you are stirred with either resentment toward Him or devotion to Him.  Satan and the Israelites who rebelled against God each did so because the glory of the Lord was frustrating to them and felt like a hindrance to what they wanted.  For the shepherds, it was the beginning of eternal life, the start of joy.  What does God do for you?  Does He stir up resentment and disappointment?  Do you get aggravated by what He expects of you or are you thrilled by His love for you, captivated by His presence in you?  Have you the pleasure of the shepherds in you; joyful that He is there with you?  You can quickly tell who has your heart, the devil or supernatural Jesus.  If it bugs you that Christ seems to expect so much of you, wants more out of you than you are willing to give, then Satan is more your friend than you might be willing to admit.  But, if there are no boundaries to how far you will go to glorify and bring honor to Jesus, then you are close to where the shepherds were, to where Jacob was and where Mary was as she sat with the crucified Christ in the tomb.  What sort of reaction does the presence of God here stir in your heart as you come before Him now?  Are you with the shepherds in this, full of joy at what the Lord has done in you or are you a bit cranky that He expects too much of you?

One or the Other

2 Corinthians 4:5 NIV

 For we do not preach ourselves,

but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake.

Who Runs The Show?

A few years ago a little Chihuahua mix showed up in our yard without tags.  Two of the kids were the first ones to spot the little dog and they thought they noticed someone in a parked car watching to see what happened to the dog and when they picked her up, the woman drove away.  Pretty soon it was clear the puppy was a part of our family and I cannot say which is true: we adopted her or she adopted us.  Early on, Salsa, as we named her, responded to me as the alpha male.  She quickly came when I called her and although others in the family might give her a command, it was hit or miss whether she would obey.  Our daughter taught her cute tricks and Salsa loved everyone in the home and everyone loved her but my voice always brought her obedience even if others might find her stubbornly resistant to doing what they said.  Even now, when someone must get her back, it is me that can push her to obey if no one else can.

The Civil War in the United States was not about slavery although that was the spiritual issue.  The Civil War was fought over authority.  Who would make the decisions for the entire country?  That was the question at hand and it is the chief issue for each person today and from the beginning of time.  Who directs the soul?  We make religion unnecessarily complicated.  Most intuitively comprehend its essence but it is a ball of tangled twine when put in human hands.  The question we face today and since the first humans walked the earth is, “Who runs the show for you?”  We have lots of possible candidates.  Science.  Political figures.  Celebrities and You-tube stars.  Parents.  Spouses.  Employers.  Allah.  Shiva.  Fame.  Fortune.  Yourself.  Christ.

The very first sin in the world was initiated not by lust or even desire but by a question as to who runs the show.  Pay careful attention to the interaction between Satan and Eve.  It begins with a rather innocuous question.  Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?" (Genesis 3:1 NIV)  Essentially Satan was asking Eve if she was sure what God said.  Eve replied without hesitation. The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.'" (Genesis 3:2-3 NIV)  There was no fumbling for an answer.  She stated precisely what the Lord told her husband Adam before she was made.  And the Lord God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." (Genesis 2:16-17 NIV)

So Eve was not unaware of the command of God.  She knew exactly what the Lord’s instruction was.  Quickly Satan came back with the most devious of insinuations.   "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."  (Genesis 3:4-5 NIV)  It was subtle, this intimation.  “You can’t count on God to tell you everything.  I know what I am talking about and I can help you enjoy life better.  Trust me in this!”  Eve fell for the trap.  Her loyalty shifted and Satan gained her trust.  Most are like Eve.  They don’t even realize what they have done before its too late.  Rather than be God’s through and through they take up some other lord for a bit and then as they go along, it is not God at all but Satan who is trusted.  Nothing about this transaction seemed weird or devious to Eve.  It was not premeditated or spiteful.  Satan gained Eve’s confidence and off she went like a child chasing the ice cream truck down the street

Most of us don’t decide that Satan is our great friend and advisor.  We aren’t a part of some devilish cult!  Yet we give ground to Satan in our hearts and without knowing what we have done, great tracts of our reasoning and decision making become Satan’s.  It killed Eve and it kills us too.  Not immediately and never grotesquely but comfortably, casually.  Nothing illustrates this quite so eloquently as the brief comment the Apostle Paul makes at the end of his life.  Writing to his good friend Timothy, Paul sadly tells of how his once faithful co-worker Demas gave ground to Satan and changed his mind on God.  Do your best to come to me quickly, for Demas, because he loved this world, has deserted me and has gone to Thessalonica.  (2 Timothy 4:9-10 NIV)  “Loved this world” is code in the Bible for taking up with Satan.  It sounds rather comfy though.  “Loved this world.”  Warm and cozy like sitting in front of the fireplace as a toasty fire burns brightly, loving the world seems reasonable when put before you by Satan.  It just means that you like to be comfortable, you want to enjoy life.  Do what makes you happy.  Yet, dogging our steps as we slip through the door and into the world is that what was true for Eve and then for Adam is true for all of us.  “The wages of sin is death…”

If you knew Demas, you probably would say that he was a good guy.  He may have been witty, smart, talented, working for good causes.  Yet, there was something terribly wrong with him and it was that Jesus was not Lord of all for him.  Christ was a companion, a great source of insight and important to him but not Lord and that is the dividing line in life.  Either, Christ is Lord and King over you or Satan is reasonable and makes sense to you.  It is fascinating the account of Joseph and his unyielding allegiance to God.  We cannot say how Joseph acquired such persistent loyalty to the Lord.  It probably was not his mother who pushed him along there because she famously stole away from her father his household idols.  Joseph was firm in his commitment to God and it manifested itself in his response to temptation.  When Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers and came to be a servant of the Egyptian Potiphar, Potiphar’s wife tried her best to seduce him.  Joseph’s response to her revealed his fidelity.  How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?"  And though she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even be with her.  (Genesis 39:9-10 NIV)  This was real commitment to God that transcended cool interests and enticing opportunities.  It was loyalty.

When Jesus gave the summons to James, John, Peter and Andrew to come follow Him, it was not about what most stress.  Nearly every teacher of the passage emphasizes the wrong aspect of it.  Read Jesus’ invitation in its entirety. "Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men." (Matthew 4:19 NIV)  When you follow Jesus and really do follow Him, not just when it is convenient or necessary or reasonable, He remakes you.  What is so damaged and wrecked by sin becomes His to heal and make perfect.  In the disciples’s case, Jesus said He would make them into fishers of men.  What might He do with you if you choose Him over Satan at the moment there is a choice between the two?  It is impossible to know just now but you will find that He will do this.  He will remake you and could there be a more wonderful and desirable gift you could ever receive?  Depression and discouragement will be taken out of you when you are fiercely loyal to Jesus.  Anger and addiction will be removed also.  Even the hurts and brokenness caused by sin will be carefully and tenderly done away with in you if you are loyal to Jesus.  So many Christian people struggle to be free of the damaging effects of sin in them and they could be made right by ceaseless loyalty to Christ.

Elijah put it to the people of his time this way.  "How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him." (1 Kings 18:21 NIV)  Either it is God or it is Satan.  Waffling between the two leads to every plague of the heart.  Consider just how badly warped both Adam and Eve were psychologically after only one time choosing Satan over God.  They were afraid of God, disconnected from each other and self-loathing.  Imagine the complexity of brokenness hundreds and thousands of times choosing Satan over Christ brings.  Jesus put it another way.  "No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.”  (Matthew 6:24 NIV)    It is either Christ or Satan at any moment and you must decide who it will be that runs the show.  You can always tell when someone has let Satan lead them around and be the one guiding them.  They lack the supernatural peace only Christ can give those who follow Him.  Remember just what Jesus says to each of us who come to Him.  "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28 NIV)

Bethel

Genesis 35: 1 NIV

Then God said to Jacob, “Go up to Bethel and settle there...

Where Are You Going?

We recently went camping with my brother’s family and my sister and her daughter up near Yosemite.  While there, the key to our car broke apart.  The metal part came out of the plastic fob that holds the chip which activates and deactivates the alarm system.  I could make the key work by using pliers to turn the metal section of the key while holding the fob near the key but I ran the risk of snapping off the part of the key I was using to grip it.  We went to a hardware store to have a duplicate made but it didn’t work.  My brother used his phone to try and find out how to get a replacement key and contacted the Toyota dealer closest to our campground. He was told that a new key would cost nearly $400. That was a stunning price and so he kept trying to find someone who had could help us get another key.  The suggestion was made that we go to a locksmith and see if someone could replace it for us but we did not know where to go or who to ask.  Finally it was time to leave and I was able to use the pliers to turn the key and we made our way back to “civilization”.  It was a four hour trip and I did not stop on the way for fear I could not restart the car.  As I drove, I kept pondering the dilemma.  Should I just go to a Toyota dealer near our house and pay the $400 or try to find a locksmith and see what could be done.  Mary Jo, once we got phone service, went on line to try and find a locksmith near our home but did not get a call back from one and the other said he was not equipped to fix the key.  He did though suggest a locksmith in the town next to our city and when we called there we were told he thought he could fix it.  When we got to the shop, the locksmith was able to replace the car key for just $35.  As we made our way home, I thought just how foolish I would have been to have gone straight to the Toyota dealership rather than following my brother’s advice and try to locate a locksmith.

There is a great risk you take when it comes to your life with God.  You can without grasping what has happened, lose track of Him.  It is a subtle shift, one that barely registers in you but it happens and without warning you find yourself away from God and on your own.  You probably won’t realize it, which makes it difficult to undue.  We were at a campground with hundreds of campers there but only about ten of them came to a worship service offered on Sunday morning.  If the collection of campers at the campground fit the national average, somewhere around two hundred or more identified themselves as Christians but saw no need to attend the worship service they easily could have attended.  Of course there were probably a wide range of excuses many had for not participating but the majority most likely just did not see a need to obey the Bible and worship with God’s people on Sunday and they were oblivious to what effect that would have on them.  The Christian community is at a critical crossroad and you might be too.  How far will you go with your life in Christ?  Is it important enough to you to make it your top priority or will you like so many other American Christians drift away from God and be comfortable casually going along on your own?

The Bible has a fascinating case study that must be considered if we care about this life with God.  Jacob, the son of Isaac and grandson of Abraham, famously finagled out of his brother his birthright as the oldest son for a pot of soup and then tricked his father into giving to him the blessing intended for that same brother Esau.  Esau grew distraught over his change in fortune.   Esau said, "Isn't he rightly named Jacob? He has deceived me these two times: He took my birthright, and now he's taken my blessing!" Then he asked, "Haven't you reserved any blessing for me?"  Isaac answered Esau, "I have made him lord over you and have made all his relatives his servants, and I have sustained him with grain and new wine. So what can I possibly do for you, my son?"  Esau said to his father, "Do you have only one blessing, my father? Bless me too, my father!" Then Esau wept aloud. (Genesis 27: 36-38 NIV)  Esau became so infuriated by how Jacob had stolen from him the blessing his father had for him that he plotted Jacob’s murder.  When Jacob caught wind of Esau’s fury, he fled for his life to the home of his mother’s brother, some four hundred miles away.  Over twenty years Jacob stayed there, marrying a pair of sisters and gained their maids as concubines.  Altogether Jacob had thirteen children, a daughter and twelve sons.  Finally, Jacob was so fed up with his conniving and scheming father-in-law Laban that he was willing to risk his life and face the wrath of his brother rather than spend one more day living under Laban’s “rule”.

                                                                                                              

Jacob’s return to his homeland was no mere whimsy.  The Lord directed him back home.  In a dream, God ordered him to leave Haran and go back to where he met the Lord the first time.  “I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and where you made a vow to me. Now leave this land at once and go back to your native land.” (Genesis 31:13 NIV)  Jacob packed up his family and left but not without trepidation.  He was afraid of leaving his controlling father-in-law and Jacob was terrified his brother still wanted him dead.  Almost home, Jacob was told by his servants that just ahead of him Esau, his brother, was approaching with four hundred men.  In great fear and distress Jacob divided the people who were with him into two groups, and the flocks and herds and camels as well.  He thought, "If Esau comes and attacks one group, the group that is left may escape." (Genesis 32:7-8 NIV)  Panicked, Jacob prayed to God for help.  Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children.   But you have said, 'I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted. (Genesis 32: 11-12 NIV) 

How many of us have been in a similar situation, desperate for God’s help, we pray for Him to rescue us.  The Lord did save Jacob from his brother’s wrath.  In fact it went far better than he expected; Esau shockingly wanted to rebuild the brotherly bond he once shared with Jacob.  Rather than seeing God was in all this, Jacob turned down the opportunity to move close to Esau and his family and instead settled in Shechem.   The choice of where to set down roots seemed inconsequential to Jacob at the time.  He had “arrived safely” at Shechem Genesis 33: 18 tells us or as the Hebrew text reads, “in peace” or “shalom”.  In other words, Jacob felt pretty good about his move.  However Shechem was “hell” for his daughter and the devil’s playground for his sons.  Dinah, Jacob’s daughter, was raped there and two of her brothers in a fit of rage and lust, murdered all the men of the town and stole their livestock.  Crushed by the wickedness of Shechem and his own sons, Jacob found the Lord was still there with him.  Then God said to Jacob, "Go up to Bethel and settle there, and build an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you were fleeing from your brother Esau." (Genesis 35:1 NIV)

Before Jacob set off from Haran and moved his family south into Canaan, the Lord made it clear to Jacob who He was.  “I am the God of Bethel…”, not Shechem.  It was never Shechem God chose for Jacob to take his family, it was Bethel!  However, Jacob was not paying attention to the Lord and it cost Jacob’s family dearly.  Shechem was Jacob’s Sodom, his Egypt.  The happiness he had that his brother no longer wanted to kill him was like a spiritual drug for it numbed his fervor for God.  The lack of attention to the Lord’s guidance had proved disastrous.  He took his eyes off the giver of peace and put it on the pleasure of peace.  God is patient with our distracted minds but just like checking your cell phone when driving can cost you your life or the lives of others, the failure to keep your eyes on God can be devastating.  Nothing excites Satan more than when God’s people are distracted by all the stuff they are doing and they don’t have time to think about what the Lord is saying to them.  Before you know it, you give in to a little temptation here and disobey a scripture there and life begins to spin out of control.  You become so disoriented by Satan’s subtle prodding that the God of strength and wisdom will be a distant memory. You will find yourself thinking just like any pagan would and the fruit of the Spirit God so eloquently described in Galatians 5: 22 disappears.

Consider just how wrecked Jacob’s family was spiritually.  As soon as he heard from the Lord that he needed to move to Bethel and build an altar there for worshipping God, Jacob knew that his family had big changes to make.  So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, "Get rid of the foreign gods you have with you, and purify yourselves and change your clothes. (Genesis 35:2 NIV)  Notice how bad it was.  So they gave Jacob all the foreign gods they had and the rings in their ears, and Jacob buried them under the oak at Shechem. (Genesis 35:4 NIV)  Satan had worked its way into the fabric of his family but Jacob had the courage and conviction to root Satan out and start over.  What a tremendous joy it is to be so full of God that He bursts out of you wherever you go!  With their hearts right, Jacob and his household practically sparkled with holiness and spiritual power.  Then they set out, and the terror of God fell upon the towns all around them so that no one pursued them. (Genesis 35:5 NIV)

Like a rat making a nest in your house, the impulses of Satan work their way into you and refuse to leave on their own.  We do this, we say that and don’t give a thought to whether it is of God or not as if it doesn’t matter but it matters greatly.  There is a Shechem for every one of us and if we take our mind off the Lord, we will find ourselves there and think everything is alright but it isn’t.  God’s power will have left us and we no longer have Him working with us.  We will say and do things that are more of the devil than they are of Christ and like Samson, we won’t realize we are making a mess of what we have been given.  But then, in our Lord’s patience and mercy, He will make Himself known to us and we will have to decide if we will go to Bethel or not.  When we get rid of our own foreign gods and do away with the stuff that we love more than Christ, we will find that the power of Jesus crucified and resurrected fills us and the fear of the Lord falls on those who come across us.  As you build your life with Christ and set your mind on Him at a moment by moment basis, you will have a way of knowing just what to do and when to do it that will be supernatural and unexplainable to human reasoning.  Make Bethel your home and stay away from Shechem.

Hope

Micah 7: 7 NIV

But as for me, I watch in hope for the Lord.  I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me…

Why Is There So Much Waiting?

The other day I needed to call the city garbage service because the church recycling dumpster hadn’t been emptied.  I spent twenty minutes waiting on the phone for someone to help me.  Later I tried to figure out how to get my new Bluetooth speaker to sync with my computer.  I searched on line for solutions and nothing worked.  After an hour going through various options trying to locate the Bluetooth device in my laptop, I discovered that I did not have one so I would need to buy a device to plug into it that would allow me to have Bluetooth.  The next morning I went down to an electronics store only to discover that it did not open for another hour and so I returned to my office and went on with my work.  That night I returned to the electronics store and purchased an inexpensive device that would give me Bluetooth capability.  In the morning I opened the packaging and installed the adapter.  It worked.  I excitedly turned on my speaker and tried to connect to it with my computer.  No sound came through my speaker…at least no musical sounds.  I could tell that it was wirelessly connected to my laptop because the speaker actually told me it was but I could not get it to play my songs from ITunes.  I was able to finally get in touch with a service representative from the company that made the speaker and after an hour on the phone with her trying various suggestions for getting it to work, I discovered that the Bluetooth wasn’t the problem nor was the speaker.  It was ITunes.  I then contacted Apple services to try to find out why ITunes would not let me connect with the wireless speaker and all the service rep could offer was to download the latest version of ITunes.  This of course took time and didn’t change anything.  He was supposed to call me in an hour to see if downloading the new ITunes version took care of the problem.  Hoping that he might be able to provide a solution, I counted down the minutes until the Apple rep promised he would get back in touch with me.  I regretted getting the speaker.  I regretted getting my laptop.  I regretted having music on my computer.  Yet I still had hope that I could eventually get the speaker to work with my computer but all the waiting seemed like a terrible waste of time. What a hassle!

It may seem to you like half your life is spent waiting.  You wait for the traffic to clear.  You wait in line at stores.  You wait to see your doctor.  You wait for programs to download.  You wait for your children to finish their work.  You wait for phone calls or text replies.  You wait for work to end or school to finish or graduation to come or the wedding to arrive.  You wait to be loved.  You wait to get over illnesses.  You wait for answers that never seem to come.  Many times you wait and do not even know if all your waiting was worth it.  Yet you do wait, hoping that something good will come of all your waiting.  For many the waiting is so painfully long that they weep silently by themselves.  Others get angry and take out their frustration on their family members.  Some grow depressed.  Plenty stop trying.  Many lose hope!  Waiting takes its toll on you.  It can break your heart and sometimes your health.

One of the most famous verses in the Bible indicates that waiting can be good for us.  But it is not just random waiting; it isn’t every kind of waiting that helps us.  A particular type of waiting is what improves our lives.  The King James Version of the Bible translates it this way.  But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint. (Isaiah 40:31 KJV)  Notice the difference in how the NIV translates this same verse.  …but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. (NIV)  The King James version translates the Hebrew verb Kavah as “wait” and the NIV makes it “hope”.  The difference between the two at first glance seems wide.  Few of us like waiting, but hope, that sounds good.  Hope is what you do within; wait is what is forced upon you.  We wait because we have to wait.  We hope because we choose to hope.

Yet if you think about it, waiting is something that is required for hoping.  Hope cannot occur if there is not something delayed; something that potentially is on the way.  Hoping without waiting is like having an ice cream sundae without ice cream.  Hope is by definition a form of waiting.  You can of course wait without hope but you cannot hope if you do not wait.  Now our verse that we just considered makes a distinction that must be pondered.  There is a waiting that is not “upon the Lord” and hoping that is not “in the Lord”.  Only hoping or waiting that has the Lord at the center of it is promised a renewing of strength.  Your waiting that does not make God its object might result in renewed strength but there is no promise of it.  Hoping or waiting that makes God the reason for hope or the object of waiting always results in a growing stronger, a moving forward and going somewhere.

The Bible warns about certain kinds of hope.  Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth… (1 Timothy 6:17 NIV)   Likewise, it is foolish to hope your power can protect you. When a wicked man dies, his hope perishes; all he expected from his power comes to nothing. (Proverbs 11:7 NIV)  Entire countries and city states have hoped that all they have accumulated in trade and industry will keep them safe but they have been proven to be terribly wrong in such hope.  Tyre has built herself a stronghold; she has heaped up silver like dust, and gold like the dirt of the streets. But the Lord will take away her possessions and destroy her power on the sea, and she will be consumed by fire.  Ashkelon will see it and fear; Gaza will writhe in agony, and Ekron too, for her hope will wither.  Gaza will lose her king and Ashkelon will be deserted. (Zechariah 9:3-5 NIV)  The horse in the Bible and other ancient writings has long symbolized the vast assortment of weapons of warfare that armies count on to bring them victory but there is not a weapon invented that can save a nation from God’s judgement. A horse is a vain hope for deliverance; despite all its great strength it cannot save. (Psalm 33:17 NIV)  In the end, death puts a stop to all hope not resting in God.  For what hope has the godless when he is cut off, when God takes away his life? (Job 27:8 NIV)

What is often misunderstood about hope is that there are two types of hope.  The first is a hope based upon evidence that is contrary to what will take place.  It is like hoping you will be proven right that the earth is flat.  Adam was wrong to hope that following Eve’s lead would make them both happy.  King David was wrong to think that gathering more wives would improve his life and Sarah was wrong to put her hope in letting her husband sleep with the slave girl Hagar.  The outcome of hope is not always happiness or peace or security or contentment.

The second sort of hope is built on evidence that is aligned with what shall take place.  The evidence may be slight, nearly nonexistent, like Mary and Martha hoping Jesus would save their brother Lazarus but what hope they had was placed in something that would happen. Their hope of course was proven right when Christ raised their brother fron the dead.  Neither the amount of evidence nor the sort of evidence is what determines if a particular hope should continue.  All that matters is what the outcome will be.  Now this is where it gets tricky.  When God looked at Adam and Eve, even after they sinned, He had hope that He could turn their lives around.  Why?  Because He knew what He was going to do for them!  When Jeremiah looked back at Jerusalem and the walls of the city that had been destroyed, the buildings that had been wrecked and burned to the ground, the dead bodies scattered about, he had hope that it would be rebuilt because the Lord told Him it would be.  The thief dying on the cross next to Jesus had hope that he had a wonderful life ahead of him because Jesus told him that the same day he would be with Christ in paradise.

What makes hope, hope?  It is not the evidence you possess or the lack of evidence there, it is the fact that the object of your hope has not yet come to pass.  Hope must always involve waiting.  Hope does not exist if there is no waiting.  What you want to happen or expect to happen or dream of happening is stalled for one reason or another; that is why you hope.  Hope though must be carefully considered.  Not all hope is the same.  There is hope that will break your heart and hope that will give you joy.  In the Bible there is the account of a woman who seemed to be infertile or perhaps was.  Her misery over being childless was extreme.  When God told Hannah through a prophet Eli that she would have a child, she left the Temple happy because she was certain that it was God telling her she would become pregnant.  All the time she stayed in Jerusalem with her husband and as she traveled back to her home, this woman maintained hope that she would eventually be a mother.  It had not happened and even when she became pregnant, before she knew she was pregnant, she had to rely upon hope to see her through.  But then when she gave birth to a son, Hannah no longer had hope of motherhood because hope did not exist there any longer.  When Josiah the King gathered his army and went off to fight the Egyptians, he had hope that he would defeat them.  But, he did not have any indication from God that he would succeed and when he died in battle, Josiah’s hope died with him.  It matters what is the basis of our hope.

Years ago the Lord told me that Mary Jo and I would have Rachel our daughter.  It was just as certain that Christ spoke to me about this as if a voice filled with thunder burst into my ears.  Of course, we did not have Rachel yet.  I had hope that we would have Rachel and now we do.  I also at one time hoped that I would make my high school basketball team but I did not.  My hope was based not upon what God shared with me but upon my own desire to make the team.  It matters what your source of hope is.  How do you know if your hope is built upon God or not?  It is difficult at first.  Many times you will be wrong. But there are certain things in the Bible that are clear and sure but have not come to pass yet.  You know your hope in those things is hope generated by God.  You must never back off from hoping about them.  But what about praying for things to come to pass?  Why is it so important that we pray for things?  Prayer is hope…it is always hope.  But it is a mixture of hope in God and hope in what you want, hope generated by your thoughts.  How do you know that when you pray, your hope is from God or from you?  For a while you don’t.  You are guessing.  But as your ability to hope in God grows by means of your experience of faith in Him and love for Him, you will hope more and more through God and less and less through yourself.  You will begin to realize what should be an object of hope for you and what shouldn’t because you will know what Christ is saying to you about it.  Eventually, your hope will be the same as God’s hope and when that is so, every prayer you pray will come to be.

In the Bible we are told that hope is always going to exist, that we will never get past waiting.  We will forever be anticipating something of God, looking forward to something from Him.   And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13:13 NIV)  Waiting, just like hope, will always be with you and me.  It is not an enemy.  It is a mechanism by which our faith grows and our love for Christ deepens.  Hope in anything is a waste of time if it does not start with your love for Christ and your confidence that He loves you and that He will work everything out in your life so that eventually you will be perfect in every way.  When you have that sort of hope, hope in Christ, hope in His love for you, it will be wonderful waiting for what comes next.

But as for me, I watch in hope for the Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me.  Micah 7: 7 NIV

Self-Discovery

If we are not careful, we will live as if God does not exist.  We are not atheists by declaration or by determination but rather by our disregard for God's presence in and about us.  Sin is the absence of God in what we do and think.  It rarely is blatant rebellion against God's rule;  it is almost always a careless looking away from Him so that matters can be settled quickly and easily.  Whether it is the fueling of a lust or the dampening of a once passionate affection for all things  Christ, Sin begins with passive aggression.  Remember that you become Satan's ally once you turn aside from God's rule of you.  Adam just wanted to please his new wife and took the fruit because it seemed like God wasn't looking.  A Lord so great and so all-consuming cannot reveal Himself completely until you choose Him in the silent quarters because to have life in Him you must choose Him freely without compulsion.  No one can decide for you if His redemption is good enough to take whole-heartedly; it is your call.  When you do, the Holy Spirit begins to work in you a growing disgust for everything that doesn't have the smell and taste of Christ living in it.  The most miserable people in the world are Christians who have stopped being disciples for a while and taken to the corners of faith where Christ is shadowy and troubling.  The fruit never tasted good; it just seemed good and once it was grabbed by Eve and then Adam the power of its pull was in the loss of trust in God to make all things right and truly good.  It was always a lie that God didn't have Adam's best interests at heart and that is where we begin to go when we stop thinking about and with Christ.  The mind not on God quickly descends into darkness.  Satan doesn't care much what distracts you...whether it be an "Eve" or an "apple" or the fanatic infatuation with self, it is fine with him.  Satan wants you disoriented enough to not care if Christ is with you or not.  Once you turn to God however, the powers of Heaven are brought to bear in you and you have all the mercy and love of Christ at your disposal to live in the limitless joy His personality in you can bring.

But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.  John 3: 21 NIV

Poor Me

Numbers 20:2-5 NIV

 Now there was no water for the community, and the people gathered in opposition to Moses and Aaron.  They quarreled with Moses and said, "If only we had died when our brothers fell dead before the Lord!  Why did you bring the Lord's community into this desert, that we and our livestock should die here?  Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to this terrible place? It has no grain or figs, grapevines or pomegranates. And there is no water to drink!"

Have You Been Given a Fair Deal?

During one of my trips to Russia, I was shocked to discover as I was about to board the plane back to the U.S. that I didn’t have my ticket with me.  This of course was not the end of the world.  The airline could simply look on the computer and find that I had purchased the ticket for that flight and reissue me a ticket and boarding pass.  That is what I thought would happen.  Apparently the Russian airline did not keep records of tickets issued in a data base and I was going to have to purchase a new ticket if I was going to board the plane.  Terribly annoyed, I gathered my luggage and trudged over to the customer relations window and waited to meet with a service representative.  By the time someone was able to speak with me, I missed my flight.  What was worse, the airline people said they could not find any record of me buying a ticket with them and that if I wanted to fly out of Moscow, I would have to purchase a new ticket.  What was I to do?  It seemed incredibly unfair for me to have to pay for a ticket I had already bought so I sat in the airport and stewed, waiting for someone with more authority than the ticket clerks to help me.  In the meantime, all the other flights leaving Moscow for London where I was to transfer were booked.  I began to feel sorry for myself.  “Why did I have to pay extra money to fly home?”  “Why wasn’t God helping me?”  “How come I had to miss my flight?”  “What sort of airline treats its customers so unfairly?”  I finally called the school where I had spent two weeks lecturing and complained to the director about my terrible situation.  He told me to hire a cab and come back to the school and figure out what to do there.  Now I had to spend fifty dollars for a cab ride back to Moscow.  What a joke!  What a waste of money!  I just knew the cab driver would overcharge me too!  Where was I supposed to stay when I got back to Moscow?  What would I have to pay for a hotel room?  Why did this have to happen to me?  It wasn’t right that I sacrificed so much to come and teach in Russia and then to have to put up with this.

Have you ever felt sorry for yourself?  Of course you have!  You have been mistreated and misunderstood.  You haven’t had enough money to get what you wanted or take the sort of trip you would like to take.  So-called friends have ignored you and taken advantage of your kindness.  You don’t get paid what you deserve.  Everyone else gets to relax while you have to keep working.  Why did you have to get sick now?  How come your car had to break down where it did?  Why did you have to get hit or your house robbed?  The work you do isn’t appreciated.  There is so much that isn’t fair in life!  How come God doesn’t take better care of you?

Perhaps you can relate to Ahab and his attempt to buy a field near his house.  He went to the owner of the field with a quite reasonable proposal.  Ahab said to Naboth, "Let me have your vineyard to use for a vegetable garden, since it is close to my palace. In exchange I will give you a better vineyard or, if you prefer, I will pay you whatever it is worth." (1 Kings 21:2 NIV) Ahab, although king of the land, did not use his political power to force Naboth to sell to him.  He nicely and respectfully tried to work out a deal with him.  However, to King Ahab’s surprise and dismay, Naboth refused to sell the land.  When nothing Ahab said could convince Naboth to sell his vineyard, King Ahab literally went back home to his bedroom and sulked.  Ahab’s wife later found him in his bed, refusing to eat because he felt so sorry for himself.

This is a brilliant example of how self-pity operates.  Almost always it is a product of lust.  Many mistakenly think of lust as merely some sort of misguided sexual desire but it is much more than that.  Lust as we see it in the Bible is the wreckage of desire.  “I want this now and I must have it.”  It could be anything that becomes an object of lust.  I want someone to respect me.  I want to be appreciated in this home.  I want that job.  I want a better income.  I want to buy that car.  Desires are built into you by God and they are important to your personality.  However, a corrupted desire is rooted in the unwillingness to wait for God to satisfy the desire His way.  When King Saul tried to kill David because of his jealousy over David’s popularity, his longing to kill David flowed out of his lust for respect.  Jacob lusted after his brother Esau’s place in the family and betrayed his father and his brother by trying to wrest it away from Esau by deceit.

When a lust is not fulfilled, when we don’t get what we want and we are not willing to wait for God to satisfy the desire we have in His way within His time frame, self-pity is the result.  I want this and I want it now.  If I don’t get it, I feel sorry for myself and become either angry or depressed.   She must love me.  He must treat me fairly.  They must respect me.  I deserve to have a better salary.  Lust, the unwillingness to let God work things out for me so that my desire can be fulfilled in the way He wants, leads to self-pity which can disconnect me from God and replace God’s joy and peace with misery.  The great sin of Job’s friends was that they pushed him into self-pity.  Rather than encouraging Job to patiently wait for God to sort things out for him, they prodded Job to become dissatisfied with God by insisting the Lord was punishing him for sins he knew he had not committed.  The more they accused Job of hidden wickedness, the more Job’s dissatisfaction with God grew.

The great lie of Satan which he first tried with Eve is that God is not good enough to make your life right.  This festering discontent with the Lord bubbles up into bitterness, frustration and depression.  It saps us of our moral strength and incites rebellion against God.  Listen to how Satan sowed the seed of discontent in Eve.  "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman.  "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."  (Genesis 3:4-5 NIV)  “God is keeping you from something good and it is not fair the way He is holding you back.”  Lust refuses to accept God’s plan for how to have one’s needs met.  Self-pity is our response to a lust that poisons our heart before we engage in outright rebellion against God.

There are two principles that every single person must be taught and if they are embraced, the peace of God can be attained.  The first is: God is in complete control of your circumstances.  Satan isn’t.  Luck isn’t.  Others around you are not.  God is in complete control of your circumstances.  The second is:  If you are in love with God, then every circumstance in life is good for you.  Why would you feel sorry for yourself if you know that God, who loves you with unlimited affection, is in charge of your life and will make it perfect in every way if you just trust Him?  Consider how Joseph from the Old Testament long ago discovered that these two principles were true.

When he was seventeen, Joseph’s brothers, out of jealousy, (or more precisely because of lust) sold him into slavery.  For twelve years his life wasted away first as a slave and later it got even worse after he was unjustly sent to prison.  Everything that happened to Joseph was unfair, at least from a human standpoint.  He did not deserve to be a slave and certainly it was not right for him to be in jail.  But you must remember and it needs to be certain in your mind, God is in complete control of your circumstances and everything that happens to you will make your life better.  At the age of twenty-eight, the Lord put Joseph to the test.  Into the prison where Joseph languished came two former employees of Pharaoh, king of Egypt.  One was Pharaoh’s chief baker and the other his cupbearer.  Both were sent to prison because of Pharaoh’s dissatisfaction with them.  On the same night, each had a dream that baffled and troubled him.  Joseph asked them to tell him their dreams because as Joseph put it, “Do not interpretations belong to God?”  After Joseph explained to the cupbearer what the Lord was telling him through his dream, Joseph asked him to try to get Pharaoh to release him from prison.  He added this bit of commentary about why he was in jail.  For I was forcibly carried off from the land of the Hebrews, and even here I have done nothing to deserve being put in a dungeon." (Genesis 40:15 NIV)

In this one simple statement, Joseph showed that he had not yet learned to live by the two principles.  He did not believe it was God who brought him to prison and he did not see any good coming out of it.  As a result, Joseph had sunk into self-pity.  What Joseph did not realize and perhaps could not know was that the Lord was preparing him for the great task that only someone with tremendous humility and unbending loyalty to God could perform.  To make such a person, the Lord had to put him through slavery and unjust imprisonment and in it all learn to trust the Lord and stay loyal to Him no matter what.  Joseph was being prepared to become second in command of Egypt and bring the knowledge of God to that pagan nation.  All arrogance and self-pity and lust had to be squeezed out of Joseph before the Lord could entrust him with this responsibility.   Finally, after two more years in jail, Joseph was ready to trust God in any and every circumstance and believe that no matter what he faced, the Lord was good.  How do we know Joseph learned that the two principles were true?  When Joseph was finally freed by Pharaoh and Pharaoh put him in charge of running the country, his brothers who had sold him into slavery came to Joseph begging for food to feed their starving families.  Rather than making his brothers pay for what they had done to him, he reassured them that he did not blame them for selling him into slavery but rather was thankful God let him go through what he did.  "So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt.” (Genesis 45: 8 NIV)  Later, after their father died, Joseph reassured his brothers once more that God put him in Egypt for good both for him and many others including his brothers and their families.  But Joseph said to them, "Don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God?  You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” (Genesis 50:19-20 NIV)

How much happier and more peaceful we would be if we could just see things like Joseph did.  Everyone around us would be uplifted by our approach to  life.  We would be encouragers rather than discouragers.  We would lift up the spirits of those who are feeling down and be like a breath of fresh air everywhere we go.  There is no reason to feel sorry for yourself if you know that Christ is in charge of your life.  If Christ could take the brutal beatings and barbaric crucifixion He suffered and turn it into salvation for you and the rest of the world, then He can and will work out everything we face with perfect care.

The Loss of Self-Realization

Ephesians 4:17 NIV

So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking.  

If You Could Do Anything With Your Life, What Would It Be?

You may know that my first year of college I decided to be a chemistry major in an effort to qualify for medical school.  It was of course a respectable degree to pursue…at least if I could do it.  It required lots of hard work and many who choose chemistry as their major don’t complete it because it is so challenging.  What interested me most about this selection of a major was that it was respectable and would push me to maximize my abilities to accomplish the goal of being a medical doctor.  No one tried to discourage me; I was generally told to pursue my dreams and that I could accomplish whatever my heart desired.  Few of us would not want to pursue our dreams and I was no exception to this normal approach to life.  If I could not be an NBA basketball player, I might as well be a medical doctor.  It seemed reasonable to me and I believed I could achieve this goal.

You could say that the expression that defined me at this point in my life was, “I got it.”  You hear “I got it” often in sports.  If a fly ball is hit to the outfield, one of the outfielders yells, “I got it!”  Volleyball players scream out “I got it” to let their teammates know they will receive the ball.  If a fish is on your line, you might yell, “I got it” to let everyone in on your impending accomplishment.  But you also say “I got it” if you are going to answer the phone or open the door for whoever is there.  Psychologically, “I got it” means that you can handle your problem; you don’t need help.  You may tend to like the independent type, the “I got it” you who relies on yourself to “get the job done.”  The term for “I got it” is “self-realization” and it is now about a century old.  Self-realization or “I got it” is generally the object in therapy of nearly every worker in mental health.  “Be all you can be” which is nearly the same as “you got it” has a noble feel to it and who would argue that it should not be your goal in life.  Yet you know that just because everyone else seems to hold to a particular view does not mean that it is the best way of seeing something.  Could it be that “be all you can be” is not the approach you should take to life?  Is there the possibility that you ought to evaluate this philosophy critically…maybe self-realization is not what is best for you or me?

There are several ways self-realization is practiced.  I have a talent and I want to maximize it.  I have an interest and I want to pursue it.  I have an opinion and I want to express it.  I have a goal and I want to chase it.  This line of thinking is often found in the Bible and although the term “self-realization” is not used, the expression of it in normal sorts of ways is often described in case studies that are provided in God’s word.  Lamech is not a familiar character in the Bible but he certainly was a dramatic figure.  His life is well summarized in his own words.  Lamech said to his wives, "Adah and Zillah, listen to me; wives of Lamech, hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for injuring me.  If Cain is avenged seven times, then Lamech seventy-seven times." (Genesis 4:23-24 NIV)  Although this is rather extreme, Lamech is expressing precisely the spirit of self-realization.  Self-realization is the determination to assert my will over my environment both internally and externally.  In this case Lamech decided that when he was wounded he had every right to kill the man who wounded him and then he did it.  He expressed himself and his morality by extending outward his influence.  Without independence, self-realization is not possible.  For Lamech, he took self-realization to the outer edges by killing the man who put limits on his happiness and comfort.  He referenced God but certainly never consulted with God nor did he act in conjunction with God when he decided to kill the young man who hurt him.

A second example of self-realization is also found in the book of Genesis.  The strange account of Jacob stealing his father’s blessing from his older brother illustrates how far some will go to extend the boundaries of self.  Rather than being satisfied with what he had as his mother’s favorite and heir to much of his father’s fortune, Jacob tricked his father into giving him the spiritual blessing the father intended to pass on to Jacob’s twin brother Esau.  Jacob said to his father, "I am Esau your firstborn. I have done as you told me. Please sit up and eat some of my game so that you may give me your blessing." (Genesis 27:19 NIV)  If it were not for the murderous anger it provoked in Esau, this could be labeled typical sibling rivalry.  Take it out of the context of family relations and you might make the case that Jacob was just fulfilling his destiny.  God had told Jacob’s mother that Esau or Esau’s descendants would eventually serve Jacob or Jacob’s descendants.  Jacob was following his dream of rising beyond his brother in influence and power by snatching away the blessing of his father.  One must wonder if Jacob ever gained much satisfaction in stealing his brother’s blessing as he immediately had to flee for his life and then spent twenty years living under the domination of his future father-in-law.  How far should one go to live out one’s dream?

A third example, this time from the New Testament, illustrates the reason why self-realization must never be our goal.  The often recounted attempt of Peter to correct Jesus is on the surface rather comical but Jesus did not treat it lightly.  The disciple “meant well”.  He thought Jesus was not trusting the Father enough when our Lord told the disciples that He would soon be killed by the religious authorities.  Without noticing at all that Jesus promised He would on the third day after death be resurrected, Peter made sure his opinion was voiced.   Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. "Never, Lord!" he said. "This shall never happen to you!" (Matthew 16:22 NIV)  Jesus’ response was not pretty.  “You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men." (Matthew 16:23 NIV)  Here we have precisely put the essence of self-realization.  There is in Peter a disconnect between himself and God and he is not aware of it taking place. Peter means well.  He has what he thinks is good advice for Jesus but he is thinking without God and becoming spiritually a part of Satan’s rebellion.  It seems so innocuous, self-realization.  All you want to do is make something of yourself, build something you care about, use your mind to be creative, enjoy life.  Who could argue against that?  Peter had a good idea and it made sense to him yet our Lord blasted his advice out of the water.

Consider the rebuke of Jesus carefully.  “You don’t have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”  This may seem so minor a criticism but it is actually the sin that defines all Sin.  Take note of Jesus’ warning in John 15.  "I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.  If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. (John 15:5-6 NIV)   If you rationally contemplate this statement, it would seem that the most important determination you can make is to live your life out completely aligned with Christ.  There is no warning in scripture more severe than this that one might be “picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.”  If this is disturbing, this possibility of being thrown into the fire and burned, then the goal of being attached to the vine, of remaining in Christ should rise above every other concern one has.  What good is it to realize your dreams, utilize your talents, enjoy your days and speak your mind if by doing so you are not remaining in Christ…if it all is completely outside life with God?  In self-realization, you take charge of your life and do as you see fit but that is not Christianity; that is a meager and impoverished alternative to Christianity.

Paul expressed perfectly what a normal Christian life is.  I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. (Galatians 2:20a NIV)  When you put your faith in Christ as your Savior, Christ becomes a part of you.  Your personality, who you are, is now Him and you and that is you as a person.  It is no longer just you; that person is dead but the you that exists as a result is Christ and you.  As you go about your day, you become conscious of Christ in you and it matters because He gives you wisdom, He strengthens you and encourages you and as you trust Him with what is happening with you, God’s peace takes over and His joy gets worked into you and it makes sense to remain in Christ because that life with God is grander than you ever imagined.  The life without Christ is an inadequate, empty and insufficient life that becomes nothing more than rubbish.  The life with Christ is a miracle of God and you.  The bigger Christ gets in you through your obedience to Him, the bigger you become.  Self-realization will only take you to the edges of you and the sin you have corrupting you.  Christ in you is you without limit and becomes closer and closer to perfection as you build your life with Him.  Just look closely at how Jesus lived His life; without worry or fear, full of love and forgiving, kind and having not an ounce of envy for what others had.  That is where we are heading, that is the direction we are going…for with Christ joined to us, we will become perfect.

Let us consider just one aspect of what it means to have Christ be a part of us.  He said, “my peace I give you”.  What does that mean?  Think for a moment about the time Jesus was in the boat with His disciples and a furious storm arose that brought terror to the disciples.  Meanwhile Jesus slept without a care in the world, unperturbed by the winds and waves raging.  When the panicked disciples awakened Him, Jesus calmly replied, "You of little faith, why are you so afraid?" (Matthew 8:26 NIV)  Now, what kind of life could you and I have with that peace available to us?  It is astounding to think just how big our lives could be if we let Jesus, living within us, play a bigger role in us!