Sycamore

Religion says,  “Motivation is based on fear and insecurity.“

But the gospel says, “Motivation is based on grateful joy. “

-Tim Keller

Found this golden paragraph at the Spyglass (check it out to make sense out of this post’s title):

“We hear God saying, ‘Obey me, obey me, obey me’; but what God is really saying is, ‘Trust me. Trust me. Trust me.’”  …yes, God wants our obedience, but not out of fear, or duty, or desire for reward, or any of the other reasons we come up with; God wants us to obey him because we trust that he truly knows what is best for us, and wants what is best for us, and is at work to do what is best for us.

Books on prayer are tough to read and, I’m assuming, tough to write.  It’s hard to strike a balance between something that has scripture and not just a bunch of quotes, something that’s practical and not just a bunch of theory, and something that’s achievable for the average Christian and not a bunch of “super spiritual stories.”

I have never read a better book on prayer than Paul Miller’s A Praying Life. Seriously.  My prayer life is significantly different because of this book.  I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Kevin DeYoung’s review says it all: “Read the book. I found in it much wisdom, honesty, and hope. The best thing I can say about it is that after reading the book I not only want to pray more, but feel like I can.”

Here’s a sampling of quotes (it’s hard, there are a lot of good quotes):

“Jesus does not say, ‘Come to me, all you who have learned how to concentrate in prayer, whose minds no longer wander, and I will give you rest.’ No, Jesus opens his arms to his needy children and says, ‘Come to me, all who are weary and heaven-laden, and I will give you rest.’  The criteria for coming to Jesus is messiness. Come overwhelmed with life. Come with your wandering mind. Come messy.”

“If you are not praying, you are quietly confident that time, money, and talent are all you need in life. You’ll always be a little too tired a little too busy. But if, like Jesus, you realize you can’t do life on your own, then no matter how busy, no matter how tired you are, you will find the time to pray.”

“Your heart can become a prayer factory because, like Jesus, you are completely dependent. You needed God ten minutes ago; you need him now. Instead of hunting for the perfect spiritual state to life you above the chaos, pray. As your heart or your circumstances generate problems, keep generating prayer. You will find that the chaos lessens.”

Religion says,  “I obey-therefore I’m accepted.”

But the gospel says, “I’m accepted-therefore I obey.”

-Tim Keller

This is making the rounds on the internet, and that’s because it’s a really great thing to dwell on. David Powlison writes a psalm describing life without God as our leader:

I’m on my own.
No one looks out for me or protects me.
I experience a continual sense of need. Nothing’s quite right.
I’m always restless. I’m easily frustrated and often disappointed.
It’s a jungle — I feel overwhelmed. It’s a desert — I’m thirsty.
My soul feels broken, twisted, and stuck. I can’t fix myself.
I stumble down some dark paths.
Still, I insist: I want to do what I want, when I want, how I want.
But life’s confusing. Why don’t things ever really work out?
I’m haunted by emptiness and futility — shadows of death.
I fear the big hurt and final loss.
Death is waiting for me at the end of every road,
but I’d rather not think about that.
I spend my life protecting myself. Bad things can happen.
I find no lasting comfort.
I’m alone … facing everything that could hurt me.
Are my friends really friends?
Other people use me for their own ends.
I can’t really trust anyone. No one has my back.
No one is really for me — except me.
And I’m so much all about ME, sometimes it’s sickening.
I belong to no one except myself.
My cup is never quite full enough. I’m left empty.
Disappointment follows me all the days of my life.
Will I just be obliterated into nothingness?
Will I be alone forever, homeless, free-falling into void?
Sartre said, “Hell is other people.”
I have to add, “Hell is also myself.”
It’s a living death,
and then I die.

But there’s a lot of hope, because this “antipsalm” doesn’t have the final word.  Jesus does.  I highly encourage you to read some comments from David here.

It’s hard to think of a “nicer” song than Knowing You.  You know the one:

“Knowing You, Jesus
Knowing You - there is no better thing
You’re my all, You’re the best
You’re my joy, my righteousness
And I love You, Lord”

It’s got an early eighties vibe, just before “Praise Choruses” became “worship songs.”  Jesus is “the best.”  You can almost see the soft lens video of the worship team - eight vocalists, each with their own mic, the ladies with big hair and at least half the guys with Magnum PI mustaches.  The song feels like it’s got no teeth.  And most of us sing it that way.

But get to verse three, and while the melody stays the same, the song finds some serious bite:

“Oh to know the power of Your risen life
And to know You in Your sufferings
To become like You in Your death, my Lord
So with You to live, and never die”

That’s harder to sing.  And if you’re only listening to the melody, you might just miss the words you’re singing altogether. That’s the risk of singing in church - you can get caught up in the campfire groupthink of music.  Even big dudes in church can catch the bug that tells them it’s fun to sing in a big group.  But that’s not what we’re there for.  We’re singing to God.

Worship in song is completely bogus unless it corresponds to your worship in life.  One of the major reasons we sing to God is because we know that these things are true - not just fun to sing.  And so when we call all creatures of our God and King to lift up their voice and with us sing, we aren’t just excited about the rhyme.  We’re excited that God is worth every molecule on this earth raising it’s voice to His praise.  When we sing that God is more than enough for us, it’s not because we like the turn of phrase.  It’s because we believe that there’s nothing on this earth that can satisfy us more than Jesus Christ.  And when we sing that we want to become like You in Your death, my Lord, we don’t do it because of the soothing melody.  We do it because we believe that Jesus wasn’t kidding when He said you have to lose your own life to save it.

Your life should say the same thing outside of church as your lips say inside of church.  If it doesn’t, then you’re making yourself a hypocrite in front of God.  Which should make you grieve over your sin, point you back to the cross of Christ, and put some heart behind your voice when we sing songs like:

In Christ alone, Who took on flesh,
Fullness of God in helpless babe!
This gift of love and righteousness,
Scorned by the ones He came to save.
Till on that cross as Jesus died,
The wrath of God was satisfied;
For ev’ry sin on Him was laid—
Here in the death of Christ I live.

There in the ground His body lay,
Light of the world by darkness slain;
Then bursting forth in glorious day,
Up from the grave He rose again!
And as He stands in victory,
Sin’s curse has lost its grip on me;
For I am His and He is mine—
Bought with the precious blood of Christ.

My wife, and now Matt Kleinhans, have taken to giving me tiny calendars with a different church sign for every day of the week. Some of them are corny, some of them are heretical, and every once in a while you find some encouragement. Each week I’ll grab something special from one of those categories and share it with you. Occasionally, I’ll make some comments.

Today’s comes from Monday, June 1:

You don’t become a missionary by crossing the sea
but by seeing the cross.

I think there’s something to this one.  In Isaiah chapter 6, the prophet sees a vision of the Lord and is humbled to his core because of his sin.  But when an angel touches his lips with a coal from the altar, he is cleansed - and when the Lord says, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Isaiah replies, “Here am I, send me!”

Sometimes it’s easy to receive God’s gift of salvation, find our security there, but forget that there are others out there like us before Christ found us - lost, enslaved to sin, without hope in the world, and (usually) completely unaware of it.  It’s easy to be complacent, and think that what makes a missionary is someone who is particularly “passionate” about the lost and leaves the country.

What you’re really saying is that you think it’s super that some people are moved by lost souls going to judgment.  You’re just not really into that sort of thing.

Anyone who sees the cross knows that to be like Jesus, you lay down your life so that others can have a relationship with God.  That’s not about going to another country.  It’s about going to the foot of the cross, every day.

Lately we’ve been talking about “ministry” a lot at Shoreline.  The book of 1 Thessalonians has a lot to do with what real ministry looks like - and it confronts a lot of our misconceptions.  For example, a lot of Christians hear the word “ministry” and think of being a full time pastor (the same way we talk about future pastors “going into ministry”).  But the Bible is clear that every Christian is supposed to be “in ministry.”  And this looks a lot different than carving out extra hours during the week to act like the pastor of a church.

A lot of people I know feel overwhelmed by the idea that they should be “ministering” to others.  But, as we’ve learned, ministry isn’t a job description, with quotas and specific roles.  It’s the love you have for God and for others expressing itself through biblical actions.  Do you love your neighbor?  Then go and act on that love.  Sometimes that’s mowing a lawn, sometimes that’s watching a ball game, sometimes that’s sharing the gospel.  Over time, it usually looks like all three and more.  Do you love your friend in small group?  Then go and act on that love.  Sometimes that’s memorizing scripture with them, sometimes that’s eating food with them, sometimes that’s praying with them.  Over time, it usually looks like all three and more.

It doesn’t take more than the gospel of Christ and love for others to start ministering to people - so there’s no point in waiting until you have you “niche” carved out to start.  You just love people like Christ loved you.  That’s it.  One great example of this is a guy named John Bell, from Toronto.  He’s a pastor, but he’s just doing what any believer can do - loving the people around him.  Here’s a snapshot of his guest blog over at Challies.com:

The Lord went ahead of me. I stepped into the first coffee shop I saw, a Timothy’s at Church and Alexander. I found out later that this is the gay coffee shop in all of the Greater Toronto Area. (See the Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_and_Wellesley). Its clientele is mostly middle-aged men. I bought my coffee and looked around for a place to sit. The tables are very small and the seats are close together—perfect for evangelism, though I’m sure that was not the original intent!

…By presenting the gospel in this fashion (which is the same way I present it to heterosexuals) I have yet to have someone become outraged over my perceived intolerance—though I am sure that day is coming! In fact, being straight and conservative has worked in my favor because they see that I must really care about them to come into an environment where I’m a fish out of water to tell them a message that I know they will find offensive. And I do really care for them. Many of them come from backgrounds where they would have believed something similar to what I believe about the authority of God’s word, from a Catholic perspective, but have since “moved on.” Perhaps I am young and deluded in their opinion, but I’m a nice guy and they put up with it, because they can see that I love them, and often times they will say, “We will hear you again on this matter”. They like the fact that I am willing to be their friend, even if I don’t condone their beliefs. I think that shows an integrity and respect; they respond to it and are willing to reciprocate.

I do all this because I love the LGBT community. They are a community comprised of individual eternal souls. Sadly, they are culture that has almost no contact with biblical Christianity in any form. How many drag queens can count a born again Christian amongst their friends? Very few, to our shame.

It doesn’t take a Bible degree, specialized apologetics training, or years of experience to walk into a coffee shop and be friendly and loving to the people around you.  It just takes you walking into the coffee shop.

Get off the couch.  Stop waiting.  Just love people.  And as you have questions along the way (you will, and they’ll be hard), get in touch with your pastors.  Our job is to equip the saints for the work of ministry - you saints are on the front lines.

Pencil sculptures.  Seriously.

David Wayne, known for some time as the JollyBlogger, has cancer.  And it’s given him some good practical perspective that he recently wrote about:

When I found out I had cancer I came to realize that life up until that point was like living in fantasyland.  I had live in relative comfort, peace and prosperity all my life and had never had to face any of the real hard things in life.

…it could be that the low ebb of Christian devotion and commitment we often see is directly tied to the fact that death is not a daily reality that we confront.  Unless we are old, or a soldier in battle, or have a terminal disease, very few of us see death as something that could happen to us.  And because of this, we can always wait till tomorrow to get serious with Christ.

The Bible calls our lives “vapors,” and warns us that we should number our days.  But how many of us pursue that kind of mindset?  It’s easy to say things like “you never know when your time will come,” but then make decisions as though you’ve got all sorts of time left.

Jesus’ death and resurrection was the final triumph over death. Living a life trying to forget that death exists doesn’t give Christ honor as the lamb who was slain.  But a life where death is real, and sunk it’s sting into Christ, who then rose in victory - that is a life that honors King Jesus.