Limping, Leaning, Learning, Loving

"Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of the Lord Jesus might be made manifest in our body." (2 Cor. 4:10)

The Christian life is one of continual growth and change - we go from strength to strength, from faith to faith, from glory to glory. New life should be continually springing forth.

In order for new life to issue forth, there must be death, and that is a continual process also - "always" bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. We should never reach the point where we become secure, satisfied, and set in our ways. This continual dying is the result of wanting to be like Him, of seeing ourselves in the light of His love and mercy as poor and unworthy sinners. This should repeatedly lead us to new and fresh repentance.

I raised my children to be independent of me, to be able to function in the world without me - to know how to complete a task, hold down a job, treat their spouse, drive a car, pay the bills, and all the other things that go into that. And now they do in fact live on their own and no longer need my provision or my care or my oversight.

But it is not that way in God; we should continually grow in dependence on Him. I wanted to grow more and more holy so I would not have to keep running to Jesus for forgiveness; but the more I am in this Way the more I come to realize the extent of my own wretchedness and my continual need for forgiveness and cleansing by the blood. "Always - always - always" bearing about that dying.

I thought I had learned the principles of the faith and knew the scriptures pretty well. But that kind of knowledge can actually lead to a separation from God. I have been learning lately that I need to allow the Lord to continually speak to me through His Word; I cannot walk alone in my own understanding. When the psalmist speaks of gaining understanding, he is referring to God's understanding, not our own.

This continual dying is to self, but it is not self-centered; that can tend to self-glorification and further separation from God. Paul calls it the "dying of the Lord Jesus." Everything must be His, and for Him, nothing of self. Oh, how self loves to get the glory, even in dying out.

How do I get more of His life? By dying to more of my own, in everything. That should lead to increasing dependence on Him. God smote Jacob on the thigh so that he halted the rest of his life. We do not become great for God, but great in God - limping, leaning, learning, loving, losing all to gain Him.

I See A Man

I see a man opon a tree,
I see His life expiring;
From heaven He came to win my soul,
His pursuit of me untiring.

I hear Him with His dying breath
Forgive the ones who slay Him;
How could a man in such a state
Pardon those who betray Him?

Such condescending love I see,
I feel my cold heart waking;
As He hangs there opon the tree
'Tis moved to thorough breaking.

His now I am, and His alone;
None other can e'er claim me.
I'll follow on where'er He goes,
Even if He slay me.

The bleeding love of Calvary,
Full measure of devotion;
'Tis higher far than mountains
And deeper than the oceans.

He Is Not A Tame Lion

Oh, He has answered my prayers, and He has provided, and He has blessed. But He is not a tame lion. Through all that He has inexorably worked toward His own purpose and His own goal in my life. I haven't been able to put Him in a cage. I haven't been able to crack the whip. I haven't been able to make Him jump through hoops.

He is a Savior and a Friend, but He is also a Lord and a King and a Judge, too. He is gentle and He is strong. When Aslan walked towards them in "The Magician's Nephew," the children could not hear him walking because the pads on his feet were so soft, but the ground shook underneath him. That is not a tame lion.

He will not be satisfied with second best, with half way, with good enough, with less than perfect. He is bound and determined to see His image formed in my life - in our lives. He continues to prod and to poke at areas in my life that are not pleasing to Him. He doesn't say "Well, now, I suppose that's alright the way it is." No - only the best will do for Him.

Sometimes I wish I could tell Him that I'm happy with myself the way I am now. I've had more than a few years of being reminded of my weak points and my sins and my shortcomings. A tame lion would accept that. But He is not a tame lion. The devil may be like a roaring lion, but our heavenly Aslan is the Lion of the tribe of Judah, and He shall see His reward and be satisfied.

The north wind continues to blow, the wind of judgement and reproof. We must be as willing to hear that from Him as we are to hear "I love you," "well done," "come unto me and rest." The Bible says that the judgments of the Lord are in all the earth; let us receive His judgements and accept them and say "Yes, Lord - I know that's the way I am. Change me and make me to be like you." "Purge me with hyssop, wash me and I shall be whiter than snow."

Aslan took Edmund off and talked to Him; we're not told what they talked about. We are assured that Aslan was stern but not angry, but we don't know what He said.He will likewise deal with each of us in the depths of our own hearts and say things to us that are just for our ears. May we hear what He is saying to us. May we take it to heart. May we be changed like Edmund was changed.

He gave His life for us. He shed His blood for us. He went to Hell for us. He rose again for us. Let us welcome His words to us and be changed.

By Him And For Him And For His Pleasure

"For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or prinicpalities, or powers, all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist." (Col. 1:16 and 17)

I have spent all the time I care to spend arguing about creation versus evolution. I find that these discussions focus only on the material realm, since that is all the evolutionists care about, and never take into consideration the whole spectrum of the invisible creation. Of course, "scientists" would dismiss that out of hand since invisible things can't be seen. But invisible things are more real than seen things because they are eternal and will never fade, rot, rust, or decay.

The "creation or evolution" discussions don't get past the question of "Did God create everything" and look into the fact that it was Jesus who did the creating. When God does anything, He does it by His Son. We come up short in God if we leave Jesus out of any equation. Everything is by Him and for Him. Let Christ be magnified in all we say and do.

And Jesus didn't just create everything and leave it free to develop on its own. He didn't just cause the initial creation and then withdraw from His creation to watch it from afar. No, by Him all things consist. He holds all things together. He has been forever involved on an intimate basis with each aspect of His creation. Never for a second has He taken His hand off that which He created. The atom spinning wildly, the neutrons and protons, are all held together by the word of His power. Were He to remove His hand it would all spin out of control and universal chaos, disruption and meltdown would ensue.

That alone probably answers the questions about where did the dinosaurs go and how did the moths change and where's the missing link and all that, although I don't feel like pursuing that now. It's enough for me to know that He is in control.

Moreover, John the Revelator tells us that all things "are and were created for His pleasure." (Rev. 4:11) (I think I'll have to think about the "are" part in that verse a lot more before I even begin to understand it; is He still creating?) Evolution gives no reason for existence; the creation story in its entirety gives the best reason possible - its all for the Lord's pleasure. There is no better reason to live for than that. He must take pleasure in the sunrise and the sunset, in the bird's song and the falling snow. He must take pleasure in the chipmunk with his cheeks stuffed full of treasure and my dog dancing in circles to greet me when I come home every day. He must take pleasure in the grand sweep of the Rocky Mountains and the vast array of stars and planets and nebulae and galaxies.

And He takes pleasure in His people - He sings over us, He rejoices over us, He shouts over us. Shout to the Lord all the earth, let us sing, honor and majesty, praise to our King. Nothing compares to the treasure I have in You.

The light from the low-hanging clouds is gray at best. The ground is sodden from the seemingly continual dripping of rain, and the air is chilly and damp.

A far cry from a few weeks ago when we were in the height of the holiday season. Two months of bright colors, tantalizing food, beautiful music and high expectations came crashing to a close on January 2nd and the new year began in earnest. Now there's no holiday in sight until May and life couldn't be more ordinary. No decorations, no Christmas cookies and candies, no carols - this is indeed the "bleak mid winter."

This is always the hardest time of year for me, perhaps because I enjoy Christmas so much. Every year I'm hit with the reality of reality, right in the face. (If that's not you, I'm sorry to drag you into my misery.)

But just imagine if there were no miraculous birth to celebrate. Then all of life would be like this mid-winter stretch from January to springtime. Life would be nothing but work and bills and ... what? Certainly not the truth we know that there came One in the midst of the drabness and despair of the human condition to raise us above it.

Maybe Christmas is a gift to make us think how all of life should really be - impregnated with the Presence of the Holy One. Oh, it's not the tree or the cards or the lights or the food - it's Jesus. Christmas is a kind of earnest, a light in the darkness, to let us know that He makes all of life to shine.

Shine on me, Light of the World.

He is come, He is here, He has promised to never leave us or forsake us. Seasons come and seasons go, but the Faithful One is with us forever.

That Was Then, This Is Now, and Jesus Is Coming

I grew up watching the Lone Ranger, Hoppy, and Roy, secure in my vision that way out west was a land where good guys wore white hats, real men sat tall in the saddle, and evil was always defeated. While I grappled with the intricacies of 5th-grade arithmetic I knew that out there was a place where cowboys beat Indians and bad guys every time.

World War II was over, Korea was coming, and both were fully supported here at home; the Nazi and Communist menaces were soundly defeated and the world was a safe place. Mom was always there when I came home from school and Dad would be along in time for supper.

TV was invented and everything was black and white. Prices went up but the Iron Curtain and the Berlin Wall came down. Soldiers were good guys.

Oh, there was the Cold War and the threat of nuclear annhilation ... but then, there were Roy and Hoppy.

Of course, things have changed. Now I grapple with the intricacies of working in a company that's going out of business, and knowing that Christopher Columbus was a bad guy, that the Indians should have beat the cowboys and pilgrims, that Viet Nam was a bad thing, that my military service wasn't appreciated.

Oh where, oh where, have the good times gone? Abraham, Martin and John have been killed, and Bobby and Malcolm, too. I had a boy's vision of a world that wasn't broken and didn't need mending, but I lived through the 60's and saw it all begin to fall apart, when college professors took drugs and encouraged their students to do the same, when our best hopes were gunned down in cold blood in front of our eyes on TV and we watched them laid to rest in long processions that tore our hearts out.

I'm not longing for the past to come back because the future is living in my heart. I want to lift Him up and see all men drawn to Him. I want to see that New Jerusalem, the city of God where all men are brothers and weapons are turned into plowshares. I want to see the faint light that is gleaming become a strong and steady beacon for all people to see.

On for Jesus. Seek His face and His strength. Things may seem worse than they ever were, but that's when God is at His best. Darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people, but the Lord shall arise upon thee and His glory shall be seen upon thee.

I'm thinking about the paradox of living in two worlds - one of spiritual reality and the other of material reality. Knowing that Jesus is Lord, that He lives in me, that He rules and reigns, that the Kingdom of God is a present reality, and knowing that I still have to go to work every day and spend the majority of my waking hours worrying about bits and bytes, brings home the dichotomy of this Christian life.

How I'd like to be off somewhere in a monastery or some secluded spot in the woods engaged with my Beloved. Instead, I'm sitting here in my cubicle with a "to-do" list that's getting longer by the hour and a "done" list that's getting shorter.

But I have found that Jesus is present with me here in my cubicle, and that He is able to help and to cheer and to guide. I'm not free from the realities of life but I'm free in Him from the pressure, from the "terror that flieth by noonday," from worry and fear, from "what-if's" and "if only's," from office politics and the uncertainties of working for a company that's shutting down.

If Jesus isn't Lord in my cubicle then He's not Lord anywhere. If He doesn't know the answers to my problems then He couldn't create a universe. But He is here, He does know, and I'm asking for grace to continually turn my heart to Him, to focus my gaze on His wonderful face, and to open my ears to the sound of His voice. "The voice of my Beloved, lo, He comes."

Golden Goodness

This quote is from "The Magician's Nephew" by C.S. Lewis:

"Both the children were looking up into the Lion's face as he spoke these words. And all at once (they never knew exactly how it happened) the face seemed to be a sea of tossing gold in which they were floating, and such a sweetness and power rolled about them and over them and entered into them that they felt they had never really been happy or wise or good, or even alive and awake, before. And the memory of that moment stayed with them always, so that as long as they both lived, if ever they were sad or afraid or angry, the thought of all that golden goodness, and the feeling that it was still there, quite close, just round some corner or just behind some door, would come back and make them sure, deep down inside, that all was well."

Passion

It is not always safe or easy to follow our passion, but we should do so at all costs. The alternative is a life of mediocrity. We may fail, but at least we will fail trying. How much better to fail trying than to get to the end and wonder if it could ever have been but not be able to find out. And if that passion is God, then we won't fail, if we seek Him with our whole heart.

Is there a passion burning brightly
Deep with your breast,
A hidden fire no man can see
But to you it's life and death?

Then fan the flame of that desire
And take the higher road;
Walk not the common ways of man
But seek the face of God.

Helpless

I had a mental image of Jesus lying prostrate in the manger and hanging vertically on the cross - helpless in both instances and His own body forming a cross that way. As I thought on that I realized that His whole life was a sacrifice, from birth to death. Almighty God became totally helpless, to help us to know Him.

He lay helpless in the manger,
He hung helpless on the cross,
Our times of greatest gain
His times of greatest loss.

His life a sacrifice
In His birth and in His death,
God's love for every man
Who ever drew a breath.

For God took human form
In Bethlehem's manger rude,
And took all human sin
Upon a cross of wood.

When God became a man
He laid His glory by;
The Word who had made worlds
Became a baby's cry.

Then He was lifted up,
Impaled His hands and feet,
A bloody sacrifice
Sin's thralldom to defeat.

Helpless now no more
His succor He extends
To all who would receive
This gift - to be His friends.

Helpless now are we
For we can but believe,
Our greatest triumph now
Is simply to receive

The life of Him who came
To bless the human race,
And drink in to the full
The wonders of His grace.

Identification

The wonder of it all is that God so identified with mankind that He took on human flesh, actually became as we are. Nowhere else in the annals of history or religion did God become a man save in Jesus Christ. How cheap is our festivity compared to this glorious truth, that He loved us enough to become like us, to lift us up from the pit we're in and make us like Himself so that He might have fellowship with us.

Oh love of God so great,
So grand, so full, so free,
Born a virgin peasant's babe,
Identified with me.

Like me in birth and life,
He took my place in death,
Took my sin and took me in,
Paid my awful debt.

One sad and lonely night
The love of God came down;
With but a manger for a bed,
He as a man was found.

The Word of God made flesh -
Oh, can it really be
That God would take on human form
And make Himself like me?

From Bethlehem's lowly barn
I see Golgotha's tree;
From stable rude to cruel cross
To die and set me free.

How can I thank Him now?
Such love all words transcends;
He identified Himself with me
That I might be His friend.

The Shepherd And The Fisherman

I was a young shepherd that night on the hillside
When angels announced the good news;
We ran to the stable and saw the young child there
And I think that he saw us, too.

For he smiled up at me from his bed in the manger
With a smile that I'll never forget.
It warmed my poor heart like the glory from heaven;
To this day, I remember it yet.

For I saw it again while I mended my nets
On the shore of blue Galilee;
With a voice that was winsome and the smile I remembered
He said "Matthew, come follow me."

Then later I asked if perchance he remembered
When I saw him that night as a child;
With an arm 'round my shoulder and a gleam in his eye
He looked back at me and just smiled.

The Inn ... A Manger

I was struck by the contrast between "the" inn and "a" manger in the Christmas story in the book of Luke: Jesus was laid in a manger because there was no room in the inn. In that lies the entire contrast between man and God, between our ways and His ways.

"The inn...," so proud, so pretentious,
So wanton, so worldly, so wise;
"A manger...," so homely and humble,
So simple in stature and size.

The inn...the place of man's efforts
And all that his strength can achieve;
A manger...so meek and so humble,
So weak that it has to believe.

The inn...so crowded with pleasure,
Pomposity, power and pride;
A manger...so empty and helpless,
No strength from it's own supplies.

The inn..the place of man's glory,
The show case for all he has done.
A manger...the place of man's weakness
Where alone is exalted the Son.

The inn...our reason and wisdom,
No place for the Heaven-sent One.
A manger...our poor hungry hearts
With room for Jesus, God's Son.

The Little King of Christmas

The little King of Christmas
Lies on a bed of hay,
With a robe of swaddling clothes
And vessels made of clay.

His palace is of wood,
The floor of earthen sod,
A carpet made of straw -
The dwelling place of God.

Poor shepherds are his court
And oxen on him wait;
For light he has a star,
A barn for an estate.

The wind blows through the slats,
He shivers in the cold;
Rest now, my little King,
You're safe here in the fold.

This is my King for aye,
With him my lot I cast -
The little King of Christmas,
Until my life be past.

A Tale of Two Trees

Two trees stood in the forest wood
Growing together side by side;
From one came the manger where Jesus was born,
From the other the cross where He died.

So close together yet so far apart,
And really they looked quite the same;
Yet on one would He be adored by the world,
On the other would men curse His name.

One brought Him life and one brought Him death,
One held His little, sweet head;
One held the nails through His hands and His feet
And was stained with the blood that He shed.

Lord Jesus, I would bring Thee life;
Let me be a manger tree,
And cradle Thee within my arms,
Beholding Thy nativity.

Little Pilgrim

Oh, little pilgrim, I can see you
Lying on the rough-cut hay.
How long a journey have you taken
To bring you where you are today?

For you came from the realms of glory,
From the courts of heaven far,
To this rude and lowly manger,
Lying here beneath a star.

I think you know how I am feeling,
For I am on a journey, too;
My heart has so long been a wand'rer,
But it finds rest here next to you.

Your look tells me that I can stay here,
And here is where I want to be.
Could it be, while I was seeking
You, you were seeking me?

So Approachable

Had he come as the King of kings, in great pomp and majesty, he would be out of our reach; but He came as a little baby, wrapped in humility and swaddling clothes, so approachable.

Had he come as the Lord of lords, in great power and glory, he would not invite inquiry; but he came in weakness and he died in weakness, so approachable.

Had he come as judge, we would be terror-stricken at the thought of entering his presence; but he has come as Saviour, inviting us to fellowship with him, so approachable.

Had he come as God as God, we would run from him; but he came as one of us ("And the word became flesh and dwelt among us") so we can run to him, so approachable.

How can we stay away?

Christmas Journey

Wise men coming from afar,
Guided by a blazing star,
Bring myrrh and gold and frankincense,
Gifts they brought at great expense,
To worship in the King's presence.

But shepherds in a nearby field
Had the same to them revealed;
Nothing in their hands they bring,
They could not give to Him a thing,
Poor as they are, they see the King.

And we may come from where we are -
It doesn't have to be so far.
And if our gift be small or grand,
He wants what's in our heart,
Not what's in our hand.

The Baby Born in a Barn

Were He born in palace instead of a barn, then only the privileged would have access to Him, only the monied and fortunate would be able to come into His presence. But the angels announced the good news to some shepherds working the night shift, out in the fields. Not to the priests, not to the aristocracy - but to poor shepherds the angels came.

That means there's room there for the lowest of the low and the poorest of the poor. That means that everyone can come to stand before the baby born in a barn - from the highest to the lowest, from the richest to the poorest, from the highly educated to the ignorant and out-of-the-way.

There's room there for you and me, and whosover will may come. Let's come before Him in praise and worship, now and forever. Our God has made the way.

Happy Thanksgiving

We're off to Boston on Wednesday to spend Thanksgiving with number one son and his family. He works in high tech and has been laid off more times than he can remember, so he doesn't have a whole lot of sympathy for my plight. We're looking forward to seeing our two granddaughters (both in their 20's); they both speak Spanish fluently, so I guess their parents will be left out of the conversations.

Comunidad, our latino church, is growing. Each of the last 3 Sunday nights it's been packed out and we have had to get more chairs to seat the people. A lady who had headaches worse than migraines for 7 years was delivered from them; her family is now on fire for God. They were all coming to church before that but now they have a fresh zeal and desire for God.

Pat has started a ministry for the latino children during the Sunday evening service. They really enjoy it and it frees the main meeting up so the parents can focus on the Lord.

I'm off work this week. I'm enjoying the weather with the leaves falling and the wind blowing - real fall weather that brings the holidays with it.

On Thanksgiving, remember - you are what you eat!