Matthew 6:24: Trying To Rep Both Sides

No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. - Matthew 6:24

When my wife was a real estate agent and I was her trusty sidekick, it was a big deal when she would get a client-either a buyer looking to find a house or a seller looking to put theirs on the market. She was responsible to represent the buyer to sellers or represent the seller to potential buyers to the best of her ability. When the deal was concluded, my wife would receive a commission for her work and the other agent-the one who represented the other party-would also receive a commission.

There was always the question: could a real estate agent do both? Could you represent the buyer and the seller and thus get both commissions? The answer was (I don't know now) yes, it was legal. But it was full of potential difficulties. Sure, in a normal case, things flow smoothly and everybody is happy. But what if issues come up?

Real estate agency has always contained the danger that the agent would pursue the sale at the expense of the people involved. Maybe by glossing over an issue with the property or contract conditions that were not in their best interest. The commission can be an incentive for personal advantage at the expense of those you represent. In our experience, when you represent one party, they are "your" people and you can feel an attachment to their well-being. We were so involved in the lives of my wife's clients that I once presided at their wedding. This can change when you represent both people and neither party is "your" people. Instead it is you (the agent) and them (the buyer and seller).

But the real danger comes when there is a conflict between the parties. If you try to represent both sides, you are either squeezed or you end up favoring one or the other.

This is the issue Jesus highlights when he refers to "two masters". It seems good when you are receiving the benefits from both sides and all is going well. When they come into conflict, in terms of goals, dreams, hopes or even failures, that is when you see which is really directing your heart. The fault line in your heart can be ignored before the earthquake, but it is waiting for the tension to build to a point where the tectonic plates of our desires must go different directions.

I believe that God leads us into difficulties and temptations to reveal to us where our loyalty lies. He knows to where our heart tends, but we are often ignorant of its inclinations (or deceiving ourselves).

One of my favorite parts of the Lord's prayer is "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." It is a puzzling phrase that even has given the pope trouble recently. But I see it as the prayer of a man or woman who wants rescue from the divided life before God must use stuff in our life to make it obvious to us.

God, please show the way out of the split-loyalty life before you have to use more drastic measures to draw it to my attention. In my mind, I call this the coward's plea: a request made from someone who knows he is flawed and accepts that God should do whatever it takes to make him whole, but prefers the gentler path if possible.

This requires careful examination of what is tugging at your heart. What is delighting you? Or maybe more telling, what is frustrating or irritating you? I have found that finding the root cause of these questions often reveals something that wants to be rep'd on an equal footing with God in my life. Sometimes it isn't clear because my heart is full of mixed motives swirled together and the Spirit must be involved to help me sort it all out. Sometimes it is frustration for the right reasons: for example, my heart is frustrated that the world is not as it ought and I long for something better. But usually, it is my own desires to be recognized or to be central. I can't rep both myself and God.

Psalm 29: Untamed Holiness

"But holiness is in wild and furious opposition to all such banality and blandness, the specialty of sectarian groups who reduce life to behaviors and cliches that can be certified as safe: goodness in a straitjacket, truth drained of mystery, beauty emasculated into ceramic knickknacks...This God-life cannot be domesticated or used; it can only be entered into on its own terms." - Eugene Peterson, As Kingfishers Catch Fire

After many years of church growing up, it certainly seemed that holiness was some sort of synonym for boring. It was static. It was the throne room of God where he sat in perfection and we all sort of stood around watching him be perfect.

But the writer of Psalm 29 seems to have a different idea:

Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness. - Psalm 29:2

Sounds pretty Sunday-school-esque. Safe. But then:

The voice of the Lord is over the waters; the God of glory thunders. The Lord thunders over the mighty waters. The voice of the Lord is powerful. The voice of the Lord is majestic. - Psalm 29:3

Holiness is being set apart, whether by nature (as God) or by designation (by God). While it is true that we are made in his image, there is so much more to God that we do not and cannot possess. This gap creates a tension that we are tempted to resolve by imagining God as a bigger, cleaned-up version of ourselves. There is an other-ness-a transcendence-to God that we are not equipped to fathom and this means that every encounter with the holy stretches us and even confuses us. It cannot be tame or bland because it is wholly not our own.

Listen to his voice! Here in Psalm 29, as in Genesis 1, he speaks his creative word over the swirling chaos of the waters and the world leaps. The world responds, not with the gentle dance of the sugar-plum fairies but with visceral leap of the created towards its creator.

The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars; the Lord breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon. He makes Lebanon leap like a calf, Sirion like a young wild ox.
The voice of the Lord strikes with flashes of lightning.
The voice of the Lord shakes the desert; the Lord shakes the Desert of Kadesh.
The voice of the Lord twists the oaks and strips the forests bare. - Psalm 29:4-9a

Only the cardboard-cutout of God is ho-hum. Sometimes I have enshrined my impressions of God from earlier in my faith walk. Sometimes I have chosen convenient caricatures of God that make him more manageable. Sometimes I have reduced the eternal person-hood of God into a few impersonal principles that can be obeyed and therefore controlled, but not loved.

God, destroy any image in me which is short of yourself. It is a continual breaking of me, finding that my imagination lacks the capacity. At the same time, I am happy because you are so different and so immense and so undiscovered. Let me join in response to the beauty of your holiness where "...in his temple all cry, 'Glory!' (Psalm 29:9b)

Mark 1:15: Where to Look for the Kingdom of God

"Repentance is not an emotion. It is not feeling sorry for your sins. It is a decision. It is deciding that you have been wrong in supposing that you could manage your own life and be your own god; it is deciding that you were wrong in thinking that you had, or could get, the strength, education and training to make it on your own..." - Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, ch. 2.

In a recent meeting with friends of mine, someone commented that he was struck by the fact that repentance was not "feeling sorry." Another friend commented, "My wife always tells me, 'Don't say sorry. Do sorry.'" Some habits are so ingrained and lead to "sorry" so often, that they become discouraging.

I think that I am too comfortable with the way things are-content to maintain an uneasy truce with my selfishness. There is a subconscious cost-benefit analysis going on and repentance seems too expensive. Perhaps I rationalize my response-downgrading the rating of my selfish, caustic actions by telling myself that I must attend to more pressing matters .

“The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!” - Mark 1:15

Jesus tells me that kingdom of God is close-so very close-but it lies on the other side of repentance. It is not a one-and-done event, it is a day-by-day decision that "the kingdom of God is close when I turn to God and away from myself." It says every justification or accommodation of my selfish nature is damaging to my self and those I care about most.

Where do I start? For myself, I find that what irritates me is often a big clue as to where my self is active. Recently this has been a sense of entitlement that makes me upset at other drivers, other shoppers or other people in restaurants-how slow they are, how inconsiderate they are, how inefficient they are. My discipline during this post-Easter season has been taking slow lanes and slow aisles and then, when my habitual irritation rises up, to talk with God about it. There have been a lot of conversations lately. This is repentance for me right now.

How about you?

"Repentance is the most practical of all words and the most practical of all acts. It is a feet-on-the-ground sort of word." - Eugene Peterson, ibid.

Psalm 145:15-16: All The Things Which Had To Go Right

The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food at the proper time. You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing. - Psalm 145:15-16

I was marveling at how many things had to go right in order for my morning to work out. When I say "my morning" I usually am referring to the time period from 5:30 am, when I wake up, until about 9:00 am, when I head into work. Since I usually get the breakfast going, I'm first awake in the house, turning on the lights, heater, and coffee maker, then opening the blinds and setting out our morning medications. Then I start breakfast.

Breakfast was nothing special: a smoothie. But it contained an a startling number of pieces. There were pineapple chunks from the Philippines in a can made in Mexico. Yogurt, milk and honey produced in northern California. Mangoes from Mexico. Bananas from the Dominican Republic. Each of these were grown by people, packed by people, shipped by people, distributed by people, trucked by people, stocked by people and, eventually, sold by people to me.

These are all thrown into a blender with a similar story. In all, thousands of people touched these foods and components and cartons and containers of cartons before they reached me. Just so I could push a button, whir the ingredients around for 30 seconds and pour a refreshing morning meal.

Once my youngest has descended and imbibed this invigorating elixir, it's off to the bus stop where she gets on a bus. A bus. Driven by a lady who waves at my wife when she sees us out walking. Maintained by a few hardworking guys at the school bus yard. Built and customized by a team from hundreds of components provide by other companies, each with their own work force.

That's just breakfast and the bus. Think of how many things had to go right just for me to have a normal morning. There is a grace in that-the sustaining, providential (or common) grace of God which allows us to live and work. These verses from Psalm 145 actually simplify the incredibly complex processes through which God works to even give us the simplest of good things, such as our food.

Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. - Matthew 6:8

Consider what this simple verse means when coupled with our Lord's prayer, "Give us this day our daily bread." Not only did he know our need before we prayed, but had to have kicked off his answer days, months or years before we asked so that, at the right time, he could give it to us.

So spend a moment today and thank God for all of the things which had to go right.

Ephesians 4:11-13: Measuring Up

So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. - Ephesians 4:11-13

When I lived in the Philippines, going to the market was a daily task for the apartment that I shared with the church's pastor. Each vendor would have their fruits and vegetables and cuts of meat arranged in the open air or under a sheet metal roof for you to push and prod and sniff so that you could test their freshness. You would specify a weight or quantity and the price was negotiated. Then your goods would be measured: weighed, counted or fit into a 10# tin can. I remember rice, specifically, which we could measure in gantas. We were only two in my apartment, so we never bought caban (50 kilos). If the vendor was your friend (your suki), they might let the rice mound a little bit in the measuring can. Times like these helped me to appreciate it when the Bible remarked that "Differing weights and differing measures— the Lord detests them both." (Proverbs 20:10)

More recently a different sort of measure struck me. when Paul commented that the "body of Christ" (the church) is supposed to be built up by the Spirit-gifted individuals until we attain the whole measure of the fullness (or stature) of Christ. For a moment, I want you to envision yourself as a teaspoon-the kind of spoon you use to put sugar into tea. The teaspoon is a very modest sort of measuring device.

Now-if you are a teaspoon-what sort of measuring device do you suppose Christ would be? I don't know either, but for the sake of discussion I am thinking of the large plastic buckets that can hold a 20 pound bag of rice or flour in my house. If that doesn't do it for you, imagine two Home Depot buckets stacked on top of each other.

Teaspoon. Big ol' bucket.

Back to Paul. He is saying that Christ gave these people in the church who pour into us and build us up until we have the fullness of the measure of Christ. My teaspoon just isn't big enough to hold the bucketful of the presence and character of Christ. So either I'm going to spill over. Not a bad thing. Or God is going to have to grow me up to handle the amount of Christ's goodness that he wants me to handle. It isn't just on his wish list for me, we are reaching (attaining) this goal. Paul says "...that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." (Phil. 1:6)

Teaspoons and buckets weren't common as measure devices in Bible days. But jars were. Jars could be measures-like ephahs and omers. Sometimes I suspect that we worry about the weak areas in our lives giving out because of external pressures: job, finances, desires, relationships, etc. But maybe we should rejoice that the full measure of Christ is actually on the inside, trying to burst forth and the weak places are those places which give way to His grace sooner: "But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us." (2 Cor. 4:7)

Or, as Eugene Peterson said, "This God-life cannot be domesticated or used; it can only be entered into on its own terms. ... Holiness did not make God smaller so they could use God in convenient and manageable projects. It made those men larger so God could give out life through them, extravagantly, spontaneously."[1]

[1] Peterson, Eugene H.. As Kingfishers Catch Fire: A Conversation on the Ways of God Formed by the Words of God (p. 80). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Ephesians 2:4-5: Competing Responses to Disruptions

The most holy and necessary practice in our spiritual life is the presence of God. That means finding constant pleasure in His divine company, speaking humbly and lovingly with him in all seasons, at every moment, without limiting the conversation in any way. ~ Brother Lawrence 

How do we practice the presence of God? During a panel discussion "Less Disruptions, More Presence" this past Sunday at our church there seemed to be two competing strategies towards coming into God's presence. The first is the path of solitude. The second is the path of rhythm.

One of the underlying assumptions in all of these discussions is that the presence of God is not a normal part of human existence. We don't naturally experience him, the kingdom of heaven or, indeed, much of anything spiritual.

And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. - 1 Corinthians 2:13-14 (ESV)

When choosing sin, we lost our spiritual sense-the sense that allows us to experience directly God's kingdom. Elisha asked and God enabled a servant to see the horses and chariots that surrounded them. We often speak of the God (through his Spirit) speaking with us or stirring us or nudging us. What sense are we using? We lack the vocabulary to even describe it, so we borrow other sense words: "Hear the Lord." "Taste and see that the Lord is good."

There is a sense-a spiritual sense. We were not born with it, but we are all capable of it through regeneration in Christ. It was there in Eden, and part of God's design for all humans and it died with sin. 

But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. -  Ephesians 2:4-5

But this sense-even among the regenerate-is atrophied. So while hearing the Spirit (what word should I use!?) through this reawakened sense is startling and sweet, we are not used to it. Think of it as a drinking nectar through a micro-pipette. While we have been conditioned from birth to experience the world through our five senses, we have relatively little experience sensing spiritually. As a result, we often don't notice, or if we notice, we misinterpret what we experience. So the presence of God and the voice of God get drowned out by a thousand other sensations that pour into our brain every minute.

The path of solitude addresses this deficiency by removing distractions. Solitude uses silence to allow the "still, small voice" to break through into our consciousness. We can, with practice, hear God and enter his presence and, over time, widen our sensitivity so that the information that we can handle widens from a micro-pipette-sized flow to a straw-sized flow to maybe even a fire hose. In the same way that physical therapy restores an underused muscle to full capacity, the practice of solitude can restore our underdeveloped spiritual sensitivity to a greater capacity to hear and sense God.

One of the spiritual directors (Dan Maust) on Sunday related this path to "prayer dreaming". It takes advantage of the silence, where our brain will naturally wander-sometimes in predictable and sometimes in unpredictable. Rather than fighting this, he suggests that we pray and ask God into each of the items that pass into our thoughts during silence. I have found that long periods of silence, such as those in long drives or airplane flights, often provide the quiet that creates the context for God to speak and me to listen.

I think this is important because we are often too busy, even in our "quiet" times. Why? Because we have filled it with books and Scripture chapters and prayer lists that never leave room for God to speak because we have pre-determined the agenda.

The path of rhythm addresses this deficiency differently, by inviting God into the craziness of everyday life. Rather than removing distractions, it strives to invite God into the distraction using a "familiar, humble and very affectionate conversation with the Lord Jesus." Brother Lawrence comments:

The time of business does not differ with me from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clatter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were on my knees. ~ Brother Lawrence

Both of these paths are important. We must widen the channel that flows between us and God. The path of solitude helps with that. But the path of solitude takes a rather negative view of disruptions. Should we reject disruptions as moving us away from God's presence-a posture of retreat in the face of what is happening in the environments where God has placed us?

No, rather the path of rhythm takes these "distractions" or "interruptions" as a beat in the musical score. We converse with God at these situations and attune ourselves to his voice.  The problem with an over-emphasis on this approach is the risk of allowing the external world to determine the agenda, rather than allowing God to insert his agenda.

My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. - John 10:25

Spend time in quiet. Invite God to each situation.

Luke 15:32: Lost and Found and Hiding

"...he was lost and is found." - Luke 15:32b

The story of the lost sons (or the prodigal son) is a familiar one to anyone with even a passing familiarity with the teachings of Jesus. Here is the subversive genius of the son of man's storytelling on full display, with its evocative imagery, masterful use of irony and insider's view into the heart of God.[1] But what has been bugging me for the past few months is this last verse from the story: "he was lost and is found."

Referring to the younger son, it begs the question: who "lost" him and who "found" him? We often use these terms in Christian circles in the reflexive voice: he lost his way or she found herself, referring to someone regaining direction or purpose in life. When looking at Jesus story then, we focus on the character of the two sons. The younger son loses his way, running from the father and in a moment of insight finds his way back to his father. The older son loses his way, physically close but emotionally far away and, in moment of angry disclosure, reveals his bitterness towards his father.

But, as accurate as these insights about the two sons may be, it is not how Jesus is using the terms "lost" and "found". In the parallel story of the lost sheep, the shepherd loses one sheep and then goes to find it. In the story of the lost coin, the woman loses one coin and then sweeps and searches to find it.  So ,also, the father loses his sons and wishes to find them.

How did the father lose them? Not by negligence or ignorance, but by conscious and deliberate choice. They chose to hide. Physically or emotionally, they separated themselves.

How did the father find them? This is interesting. With the coin and the sheep, we see immediate, directed action to recover them. But with the sons, the father seems passive, permissive and even impotent. Why? Because his sons must want to be found.

Imagine if the father sent out his hired men to find the younger son in the foreign land and forced him to return. Imagine if the father forced his older son to attend the banquet thrown for the younger son. The father does not just want their presence, he wants their hearts. So the most active, effective thing the father could do to find them is to wait and welcome.

Both sons wanted the bounty of the father, but without the father (cf. Luke 15:13, 15:29b). They are lost. The father waits for both sons and welcomes both sons to the feast. The story ends with the father waiting to see if the older son is willing to be found.

It is a question the Father still asks: are you willing to be found or do you still want to hide?

The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. - 2 Peter 3:9

[1]A masterful treatment can be found in the slim volume Prodigal God by Tim Keller. See http://www.timothykeller.com/books/the-prodigal-god.