Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Friday, December 10, 2010
Readings for December 10
NASA study flawed: The recent announcement that a new life-form has been found is maybe not such good science after all.
Ethics for Tweeting? Apparently, there are new ground-rules emerging for the popular social media.
"Hallelujah Chorus" at a crowded Macy's in Philly. Just in case you haven't seen this popular video. It's a little sad, though, to think that many there that day -- and many who have viewed it since, to judge by the comments on YouTube -- just don't understand the significance of the lyrics, as if the singers were merely singing "Yada yada" in an especially beautiful way. How will it feel someday to meet that King of Kings and remember singing that song and realize they never knew Him?
Fascinating Budget Puzzle puts you in the position to make the hard choices about the economy and the national budget. Choices reveal priorities. It's harder than talk radio makes it sound.
From Time: The Top Ten of Everything of 2010.
Killer Marriage Tips from two guys who should know. (How did they get Smalley in on this?)
Where Handel got his lyrics for the Messiah. Albert Mohler is prolific, this from a commencement address he delivered this week.
Ethics for Tweeting? Apparently, there are new ground-rules emerging for the popular social media.
"Hallelujah Chorus" at a crowded Macy's in Philly. Just in case you haven't seen this popular video. It's a little sad, though, to think that many there that day -- and many who have viewed it since, to judge by the comments on YouTube -- just don't understand the significance of the lyrics, as if the singers were merely singing "Yada yada" in an especially beautiful way. How will it feel someday to meet that King of Kings and remember singing that song and realize they never knew Him?
Fascinating Budget Puzzle puts you in the position to make the hard choices about the economy and the national budget. Choices reveal priorities. It's harder than talk radio makes it sound.
From Time: The Top Ten of Everything of 2010.
Killer Marriage Tips from two guys who should know. (How did they get Smalley in on this?)
Where Handel got his lyrics for the Messiah. Albert Mohler is prolific, this from a commencement address he delivered this week.
Friday, April 23, 2010
What to Do with the Wounds
Call it News of the Bizarre:
Man admits involvement in conspiracy to slash wife
(Dayton, Ohio) -- An Ohio man has been implicated in a bizarre conspiracy to hire a woman to assault his wife with a knife. According to hospital records, the man, who has no previous criminal record, drove his wife of more than thirty years to an early morning rendezvous, where he delivered her into the hands of Deborah Millett, who over a period of one hour inflicted such serious injuries to the victim that she had to be hospitalized for three days. Questioned about his motives, the man said only that he believed that the attack would be good for his wife. He also admitted that he had never met Millett before that morning and that he had arranged for her to be paid thousands of dollars in exchange for what he called "her services."
The husband visited his wife several times during her hospital stay but never expressed regret for his involvement in the plan. More than six weeks after the assault the victim’s wounds have healed, but doctors say for the next several months she will continue to struggle with fatigue from the severe trauma to her body, even after her wounds have healed. Neither the police nor hospital officials are expected to investigate the attack because Dr. Deborah Millett performed the surgery at Miami General Hospital.
I am happy to report that my wife is doing fine after her surgery.
Yes, I was that man. I drove my dear wife of thirty years to an early morning appointment with a surgeon wielding a sharp knife and arranged for that surgeon to be paid thousands of dollars, all in hopes of my wife's gaining the kind of health and well-being that could be achieved only by going through that ordeal.
I heard a pastor friend once say that surgery is different from most other kinds of medical care. Usually people come out of the hospital feeling better than when they went in. Not so, usually, with surgery. A surgeon wounds to heal, and the patient leaving the hospital often feels worse after the treatment.
It seems odd to me that when we talk about unjust suffering and evil in the world, when we wonder how such suffering and evil could exist in a world created by a wise and good God, it seems odd that we are so quick to excuse God's involvement in that suffering, as if we need somehow to distance Him from the process. God "allows" evil and suffering, we say; He could never actually cause it Himself.
Yet we don't say the surgeon "allows" the cutting of the flesh; the surgeon actually wounds the patient. And we accept without question not only the suffering the surgeon inflicts but also the surgeon's active role in inflicting that pain.
What I learned from my wife's surgery is that if I can trust a highly skilled doctor to wound my wife, I can trust a wise and loving God to inflict (not just "allow") pain in my life. I can give Him permission to hurt me only because I know He's really smart and He really loves me and my loved ones and He will inflict only as much suffering as is necessary to accomplish His purposes, which are always wise and good. I don't need to question or defend His role in that suffering.
He actually does wound us, but He wounds only to heal.
Man admits involvement in conspiracy to slash wife
(Dayton, Ohio) -- An Ohio man has been implicated in a bizarre conspiracy to hire a woman to assault his wife with a knife. According to hospital records, the man, who has no previous criminal record, drove his wife of more than thirty years to an early morning rendezvous, where he delivered her into the hands of Deborah Millett, who over a period of one hour inflicted such serious injuries to the victim that she had to be hospitalized for three days. Questioned about his motives, the man said only that he believed that the attack would be good for his wife. He also admitted that he had never met Millett before that morning and that he had arranged for her to be paid thousands of dollars in exchange for what he called "her services."
The husband visited his wife several times during her hospital stay but never expressed regret for his involvement in the plan. More than six weeks after the assault the victim’s wounds have healed, but doctors say for the next several months she will continue to struggle with fatigue from the severe trauma to her body, even after her wounds have healed. Neither the police nor hospital officials are expected to investigate the attack because Dr. Deborah Millett performed the surgery at Miami General Hospital.
I am happy to report that my wife is doing fine after her surgery.
Yes, I was that man. I drove my dear wife of thirty years to an early morning appointment with a surgeon wielding a sharp knife and arranged for that surgeon to be paid thousands of dollars, all in hopes of my wife's gaining the kind of health and well-being that could be achieved only by going through that ordeal.
I heard a pastor friend once say that surgery is different from most other kinds of medical care. Usually people come out of the hospital feeling better than when they went in. Not so, usually, with surgery. A surgeon wounds to heal, and the patient leaving the hospital often feels worse after the treatment.
It seems odd to me that when we talk about unjust suffering and evil in the world, when we wonder how such suffering and evil could exist in a world created by a wise and good God, it seems odd that we are so quick to excuse God's involvement in that suffering, as if we need somehow to distance Him from the process. God "allows" evil and suffering, we say; He could never actually cause it Himself.
Yet we don't say the surgeon "allows" the cutting of the flesh; the surgeon actually wounds the patient. And we accept without question not only the suffering the surgeon inflicts but also the surgeon's active role in inflicting that pain.
What I learned from my wife's surgery is that if I can trust a highly skilled doctor to wound my wife, I can trust a wise and loving God to inflict (not just "allow") pain in my life. I can give Him permission to hurt me only because I know He's really smart and He really loves me and my loved ones and He will inflict only as much suffering as is necessary to accomplish His purposes, which are always wise and good. I don't need to question or defend His role in that suffering.
He actually does wound us, but He wounds only to heal.
Monday, April 12, 2010
The Suffering of Misunderstanding
Jesus calls us to serve Him by the way of obscurity and misunderstanding, and He has shown us what that kind of service looks like. On the day He died, He was the only one who understood what was actually happening.
The day He died His followers saw catastrophe, and His enemies saw triumph. All of them saw the end of something, they had no way of knowing it was really the beginning of something completely new in the world. On that day only He knew what His death really meant. Part of His suffering was His willingness to be ridiculed as a buffoon or pitied as a martyr.
It is this suffering Jesus who has called us to follow Him, to serve Him in this same way, with this same willingness to be misunderstood.
This kind of suffering is not easy. There is a kind of glory in suffering while people are cheering us on, but that is the privilege of the home team. Christians are not competing in a home game; we know we are in enemy-occupied territory.
Christ-followers must be willing to suffer, in addition to everything else, the embarrassment of being misunderstood. But we would not be the first Christians to be called fools.
The day He died His followers saw catastrophe, and His enemies saw triumph. All of them saw the end of something, they had no way of knowing it was really the beginning of something completely new in the world. On that day only He knew what His death really meant. Part of His suffering was His willingness to be ridiculed as a buffoon or pitied as a martyr.
It is this suffering Jesus who has called us to follow Him, to serve Him in this same way, with this same willingness to be misunderstood.
This kind of suffering is not easy. There is a kind of glory in suffering while people are cheering us on, but that is the privilege of the home team. Christians are not competing in a home game; we know we are in enemy-occupied territory.
Christ-followers must be willing to suffer, in addition to everything else, the embarrassment of being misunderstood. But we would not be the first Christians to be called fools.
Sunday, April 4, 2010
The Empty Or Not Empty Tomb of Jesus
All this talk of the Resurrection power of Christ would be only so much poetry and metaphor if Jesus had not actually risen from the dead, if He had not "risen indeed," as Paul puts it. Without a historical event that actually took place in a certain place and at a certain time, an event that occupies a place in the same space-time continuum that I live in, the motive power of the Christian faith is reduced to an ideal like patriotism or an inspiring notion like "the Spirit of Christmas."
But with the empty tomb, faith in this Jesus takes on an entirely different character. The empty tomb forces me to make up my mind about Jesus. Do I believe He actually rose from the dead? Actually rose? Then what does this Resurrection of Jesus mean?
He's right. This isn't simply a matter of subscribing to a comforting greeting-card philosophy that might make me smile a little. Either the tomb is empty and everything has changed, or He never rose at all and this faith is all a pathetic lie. The Resurrection of Jesus doesn't leave us a comfortable middle ground.
But with the empty tomb, faith in this Jesus takes on an entirely different character. The empty tomb forces me to make up my mind about Jesus. Do I believe He actually rose from the dead? Actually rose? Then what does this Resurrection of Jesus mean?
- What does the Resurrection of Jesus mean with regards to His exclusive claims (to forgive sins, to be the only way to God)?
- What does the Resurrection of Jesus mean when I contemplate my own mortality? when I think about the deaths of my loved ones?
- What does the Resurrection of Jesus mean with regards to my future? the future of this planet?
He's right. This isn't simply a matter of subscribing to a comforting greeting-card philosophy that might make me smile a little. Either the tomb is empty and everything has changed, or He never rose at all and this faith is all a pathetic lie. The Resurrection of Jesus doesn't leave us a comfortable middle ground.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
The Threshhold of Dismay
I suppose it would be odd to speak of dismay as a normal part of a healthy spiritual life, but it seems there is surely such a pattern in the lives of the men God has used profoundly: Abraham at the thought of sacrificing Isaac; Moses at the cantakerousness of the Israelites; David as he runs for his life from the king; the weeping Jeremiah; the suffering Paul; even Jesus in Gethsemene. All were dismayed before they saw God work mightily.
This means, of course, that we must discipline ourselves to take the long view when things seem to fall apart. We must never judge the work of God, in our lives or in the lives of those we love, while the paint is still wet on the canvas. In the timetable of God, what looks like catastrophe is often the prelude to great glory and blessing.
This means, of course, that we must discipline ourselves to take the long view when things seem to fall apart. We must never judge the work of God, in our lives or in the lives of those we love, while the paint is still wet on the canvas. In the timetable of God, what looks like catastrophe is often the prelude to great glory and blessing.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Poor Service
There is an old saying that "the greatest enemy of the best is the good enough." Just so, the greatest enemy of serving God out of gratitude is serving Him out of a mere sense of duty.
"Though I give my body to be burned and have not live, it profits me nothing," said the passionate apostle. God forbid that I should fail to love God because I am, Martha-like, serving Him so well.
"Though I give my body to be burned and have not live, it profits me nothing," said the passionate apostle. God forbid that I should fail to love God because I am, Martha-like, serving Him so well.
Monday, March 29, 2010
His Troubling Question
It is the question which haunts every believer. The Master asks not, "Do you honor me?" or "Will you obey me?" But stripping away all pretense, He asks simply, "Do you love me?"
It hurts that the question even need be asked, though we know why it must: "Then act as if you love me. Care for the weak. Love your wife sacrificially. Befriend your neighbors. Feed my sheep."
It hurts that the question even need be asked, though we know why it must: "Then act as if you love me. Care for the weak. Love your wife sacrificially. Befriend your neighbors. Feed my sheep."
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Cemetery at Gatlinburg
It's odd, sometimes, where a new thought can strike you. Gatlinburg, Tennessee, is not the place where you would expect to have an epiphany, but I noticed something there once while I was eating lunch at a Chinese restaurant on a balcony overlooking the street.
The city of Gatlinburg is a thriving combination of free enterprise and hillbilly chic - a city built on the notion that people will drive for hours to spend lots of money for Elvis memorabilia, a glimpse at the famous Batmobile of the 1960s TV series, a dazzling collection of holographs, Ripley’s Believe-it-or-not displays, a miniature golf-course with “fifty live bunnies running loose on the course,” video arcades, air-brush T-shirts, and Smokie Mountain bric-a-brac shops by the dozen. The atmosphere of the city’s main drag is so carnival-like that an ordinary drug-store in the middle of town seems like a relic from another time and place.
I was eating lunch on an balcony overlooking the busy main street of the little city. From my perch above the sidewalk, the thronging avenue seemed even more bizarre, like Vanity Fair in Pilgrim’s Progress, with pedestrians streaming down both sides of the street.
As my gaze wandered over the sight, I was startled to notice a cemetery on a grassy hill behind the row of shops across the street. Invisible to everyone below me, the sunny little graveyard stood silent vigil over the shoppers, waiting patiently for each in his turn to leave the busy avenue and return to the dust.
The two images were a study in jarring contrast: the quiet, grassy hillside with its little headstones serving as an understated reminder of our common, inevitable Destiny . . . the street below thronging with life, enthusiasm, and imagination. Somehow, the sight of the graveyard gave a sense of ludicrous irrelevance to all of the frantic activity below.
I did not come away from that experience with the sense that the Gatlinburgs of our lives are somehow immoral or even that they are wasteful and frivolous. But I did decide that whatever I do in Gatlinburg ought to make sense not just from where I stand now, here on the street, but also from the long view on the hill as well. The Gatlinburg cemetery was a warning against short-sightedness.
In Jesus’ parable, the rich farmer is condemned not because he had a bumper crop and built new barns, but because he was so very short-sighted. “Thou fool, this day shall thy soul be required of thee.” In all his calculations, the wealthy landowner failed to take into account his own mortality. His viewpoint was limited to his immediate prospects, and he did not notice the yawning mouth of the grave beneath his next step.
It is, of course, equally short-sighted to live in the graveyard. We have all contemplated how we might spend this day if it were our last on earth, but we know we cannot really spend each day in such a mindset (perpetually saying farewell to loved ones, never going to school or to work). Our awkward dilemma is that we must invest our mound of minutes simultaneously as if each were the final moment (because it well could be) but also as if we had thousands left to spend (because we might).
Our Assignment is to occupy each moment so that if our Summons should come, we might lay down our work or our play and turn to meet our Maker without regret. God give us wisdom to remember the view from the hill even while we walk the streets.
The city of Gatlinburg is a thriving combination of free enterprise and hillbilly chic - a city built on the notion that people will drive for hours to spend lots of money for Elvis memorabilia, a glimpse at the famous Batmobile of the 1960s TV series, a dazzling collection of holographs, Ripley’s Believe-it-or-not displays, a miniature golf-course with “fifty live bunnies running loose on the course,” video arcades, air-brush T-shirts, and Smokie Mountain bric-a-brac shops by the dozen. The atmosphere of the city’s main drag is so carnival-like that an ordinary drug-store in the middle of town seems like a relic from another time and place.
I was eating lunch on an balcony overlooking the busy main street of the little city. From my perch above the sidewalk, the thronging avenue seemed even more bizarre, like Vanity Fair in Pilgrim’s Progress, with pedestrians streaming down both sides of the street.
As my gaze wandered over the sight, I was startled to notice a cemetery on a grassy hill behind the row of shops across the street. Invisible to everyone below me, the sunny little graveyard stood silent vigil over the shoppers, waiting patiently for each in his turn to leave the busy avenue and return to the dust.
The two images were a study in jarring contrast: the quiet, grassy hillside with its little headstones serving as an understated reminder of our common, inevitable Destiny . . . the street below thronging with life, enthusiasm, and imagination. Somehow, the sight of the graveyard gave a sense of ludicrous irrelevance to all of the frantic activity below.
I did not come away from that experience with the sense that the Gatlinburgs of our lives are somehow immoral or even that they are wasteful and frivolous. But I did decide that whatever I do in Gatlinburg ought to make sense not just from where I stand now, here on the street, but also from the long view on the hill as well. The Gatlinburg cemetery was a warning against short-sightedness.
In Jesus’ parable, the rich farmer is condemned not because he had a bumper crop and built new barns, but because he was so very short-sighted. “Thou fool, this day shall thy soul be required of thee.” In all his calculations, the wealthy landowner failed to take into account his own mortality. His viewpoint was limited to his immediate prospects, and he did not notice the yawning mouth of the grave beneath his next step.
It is, of course, equally short-sighted to live in the graveyard. We have all contemplated how we might spend this day if it were our last on earth, but we know we cannot really spend each day in such a mindset (perpetually saying farewell to loved ones, never going to school or to work). Our awkward dilemma is that we must invest our mound of minutes simultaneously as if each were the final moment (because it well could be) but also as if we had thousands left to spend (because we might).
Our Assignment is to occupy each moment so that if our Summons should come, we might lay down our work or our play and turn to meet our Maker without regret. God give us wisdom to remember the view from the hill even while we walk the streets.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Five Words from God: A Parable
One night a man had a dream in which God told him five things.
First, God said, "You have no idea how much I love you. You are my beloved. If you understood for just one moment how much I love you, it would change your life forever. I love you far more than you could understand."
The man thought this was good.
Then God told the man, "You have no idea how much I want to bless you, how I long to pour blessing into your life and through your life bless many other people. If you understood for just one moment what blessings I would give to you, the way I want to use your life to bless others, it would change your life forever."
The man thought this also was good.
Then God said, "Tomorrow something will happen to you that will devastate your life. The trauma will be so horrific that you will doubt my wisdom, my goodness, even my existence."
The man thought this was not good at all.
Then God began to tell the man how that horrific, traumatic event would ultimately be a source of blessing in his life, how He would use that man's suffering to bless many people, not just in his lifetime but for many years to come. By the time God had finished telling the man all the good things that would come about because of his suffering, the man was ready, almost eager for his ordeal to begin.
Finally, God told the man one more thing: "Tomorrow, when all this trouble falls on you, you will remember none of this dream."
First, God said, "You have no idea how much I love you. You are my beloved. If you understood for just one moment how much I love you, it would change your life forever. I love you far more than you could understand."
The man thought this was good.
Then God told the man, "You have no idea how much I want to bless you, how I long to pour blessing into your life and through your life bless many other people. If you understood for just one moment what blessings I would give to you, the way I want to use your life to bless others, it would change your life forever."
The man thought this also was good.
Then God said, "Tomorrow something will happen to you that will devastate your life. The trauma will be so horrific that you will doubt my wisdom, my goodness, even my existence."
The man thought this was not good at all.
Then God began to tell the man how that horrific, traumatic event would ultimately be a source of blessing in his life, how He would use that man's suffering to bless many people, not just in his lifetime but for many years to come. By the time God had finished telling the man all the good things that would come about because of his suffering, the man was ready, almost eager for his ordeal to begin.
Finally, God told the man one more thing: "Tomorrow, when all this trouble falls on you, you will remember none of this dream."
Sunday, February 28, 2010
The Day I Learned “Grace”
I know people go to seminary to learn theological terms, and I learned plenty of -isms and -ologies during my summers at Dallas Theological Seminary. But one term - grace - found its mark deep in my heart because of something Michael Green did.
Michael Green was a young professor who taught the required course on evangelism. He was big on personal responsibility and organization. “You’re in seminary now,” he would say. “There’s no excuse for late or sloppy work,” and many other exhortations to that effect.
One of the class requirements was a take-home test, which we were to grade in class on a certain day. As I did every summer at DTS, I had dutifully noted all my due dates for all my projects in all my courses on a calendar after the first day of class, but I had written down the wrong date for this take-home test.
I didn’t realize my error at first. This day I came to my class on evangelism, and I heard my classmates discussing the take-home test, which I knew to be due a week later. As I heard more discussion about the test, I began to feel a little uneasy, then positively sick. The test would be graded in class today, and I hadn’t even taken it!
Summer classes at DTS were a half-day affair. When the instructor announced that we would be grading the test after the morning break, I knew what I had to do. Ironically, he was well into another of his impromptu lectures on responsibility and organization while I hastily gathered my materials, sprang from my chair at the front of the classroom, and, with his exhortations ringing in my ears (“You’re in seminary now . . .”), fled to the library to cram for my take-home test and write some answers that I could grade.
I finished the test shortly before break. When I returned with the class after the break, I felt like a pariah, an outcast. They were all the responsible ones, I was the loser who couldn’t get it together.
Since I knew I deserved no credit whatsoever on this test, I was relieved to score a 72. No one scored 100, although there were a few grades in the low 90’s. So when Dr. Green asked if we would be interested in extra credit, we all jumped at the chance.
In our class on evangelism, we had given a great deal of thought to using terms people can understand. (After all, if we use terms someone doesn’t understand, like "born again" or "ask Jesus into your heart," not much evangelism can actually take place.) For our extra credit question, Dr. Green asked us to define grace in terms the average unchurched person could comprehend.
All of us needed the extra credit (some of us much more than others), so we applied ourselves diligently to the task. As we finished scribbling our common-man definitions of grace, Dr. Green dropped the bombshell when he announced that he would give a 100% on the test to anyone who would write, “I accept your gift of grace,” at the bottom of his test and affix his signature.
Some people, successful ones, have difficulty accepting the biblical doctrine of grace. It seems somehow unfair, as if individual effort were meaningless (which it is). On this day I was very open to Dr. Green’s offer of grace. Some of my classmates, I fancy, almost hesitated to accept his offer because it would mean abandoning the results of all their hard work.
That day I understood what Jesus meant when He announced to the self-righteous religious leaders of His day that prostitutes and tax-collectors would enter the kingdom before they would (Matt. 21:31). I was quiet at lunch that day, even a little embarrassed, when my conscientious friends complained that everyone else got the same grade they did. The object lesson seemed to be lost on them, but not on me. Like my namesake, I appreciated the grace of God because I could see it from the vantage-point of “the chief of sinners.”
Last I heard, Dr. Green is no longer at Dallas; he’s gone on to teach at another school. He may never know the impact he had on me, but his little surprise gave me a glimpse the stunning beauty of the grace of God, who not only withholds the wrath we so clearly deserve, but generously grants us the good favor we do not.
(This piece originally appeared as an editorial in the Christian Citizen newspaper in January, 1994.)
Michael Green was a young professor who taught the required course on evangelism. He was big on personal responsibility and organization. “You’re in seminary now,” he would say. “There’s no excuse for late or sloppy work,” and many other exhortations to that effect.
One of the class requirements was a take-home test, which we were to grade in class on a certain day. As I did every summer at DTS, I had dutifully noted all my due dates for all my projects in all my courses on a calendar after the first day of class, but I had written down the wrong date for this take-home test.
I didn’t realize my error at first. This day I came to my class on evangelism, and I heard my classmates discussing the take-home test, which I knew to be due a week later. As I heard more discussion about the test, I began to feel a little uneasy, then positively sick. The test would be graded in class today, and I hadn’t even taken it!
Summer classes at DTS were a half-day affair. When the instructor announced that we would be grading the test after the morning break, I knew what I had to do. Ironically, he was well into another of his impromptu lectures on responsibility and organization while I hastily gathered my materials, sprang from my chair at the front of the classroom, and, with his exhortations ringing in my ears (“You’re in seminary now . . .”), fled to the library to cram for my take-home test and write some answers that I could grade.
I finished the test shortly before break. When I returned with the class after the break, I felt like a pariah, an outcast. They were all the responsible ones, I was the loser who couldn’t get it together.
Since I knew I deserved no credit whatsoever on this test, I was relieved to score a 72. No one scored 100, although there were a few grades in the low 90’s. So when Dr. Green asked if we would be interested in extra credit, we all jumped at the chance.
In our class on evangelism, we had given a great deal of thought to using terms people can understand. (After all, if we use terms someone doesn’t understand, like "born again" or "ask Jesus into your heart," not much evangelism can actually take place.) For our extra credit question, Dr. Green asked us to define grace in terms the average unchurched person could comprehend.
All of us needed the extra credit (some of us much more than others), so we applied ourselves diligently to the task. As we finished scribbling our common-man definitions of grace, Dr. Green dropped the bombshell when he announced that he would give a 100% on the test to anyone who would write, “I accept your gift of grace,” at the bottom of his test and affix his signature.
Some people, successful ones, have difficulty accepting the biblical doctrine of grace. It seems somehow unfair, as if individual effort were meaningless (which it is). On this day I was very open to Dr. Green’s offer of grace. Some of my classmates, I fancy, almost hesitated to accept his offer because it would mean abandoning the results of all their hard work.
That day I understood what Jesus meant when He announced to the self-righteous religious leaders of His day that prostitutes and tax-collectors would enter the kingdom before they would (Matt. 21:31). I was quiet at lunch that day, even a little embarrassed, when my conscientious friends complained that everyone else got the same grade they did. The object lesson seemed to be lost on them, but not on me. Like my namesake, I appreciated the grace of God because I could see it from the vantage-point of “the chief of sinners.”
Last I heard, Dr. Green is no longer at Dallas; he’s gone on to teach at another school. He may never know the impact he had on me, but his little surprise gave me a glimpse the stunning beauty of the grace of God, who not only withholds the wrath we so clearly deserve, but generously grants us the good favor we do not.
(This piece originally appeared as an editorial in the Christian Citizen newspaper in January, 1994.)
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Christian Paganism
"Take no thought for your life" -- Jesus
"Keep your mind on the 'much more' of your heavenly Father" -- Oswald Chambers
Worry is idolatry, a kind of paganism, really. Jesus said that worrying is something "the Gentiles" do, the kind of thing people might do if they knew nothing about the God of the Bible. But worry can have no part in the life of the Christ-follower, a beloved child of the heavenly Father.
Seeing how and when God provides might be intriguing sometimes, but it should never be worrisome. If God is really the kind of Person we read about in Scripture, the ultimate outcome can never be in question. The only question is one of means, never if but how.
"Keep your mind on the 'much more' of your heavenly Father" -- Oswald Chambers
Worry is idolatry, a kind of paganism, really. Jesus said that worrying is something "the Gentiles" do, the kind of thing people might do if they knew nothing about the God of the Bible. But worry can have no part in the life of the Christ-follower, a beloved child of the heavenly Father.
Seeing how and when God provides might be intriguing sometimes, but it should never be worrisome. If God is really the kind of Person we read about in Scripture, the ultimate outcome can never be in question. The only question is one of means, never if but how.
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