Out of Context

This is probably on of the most misused verses in today's American Christianity - Stop Taking Jeremiah 29:11 Out of Context by Thomas Turner at Relevant

It’s written on graduation cards, quoted to encourage a person who can’t seem to find God’s well and doled out like a doctor explaining a prescription: Take Jeremiah 29:11 a few times, with a full glass of water, and call me in the morning. I think you’ll feel better.

“‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future’” Jeremiah 29:11 tells us—possibly one of our most beloved, yet most misunderstood, verses in the entire Bible.

Sure, it might make a person feel better, but this verse as we often prescribe it is being taken completely out of context. It doesn’t mean what people think it means. It’s time to back up and see what the author of Jeremiah is actually saying.

When it comes to reading the Bible, we can sometimes be so familiar with the words on the page that we read them, but we don’t really understand them. We see the words and hear the words, but we don’t make any sense out of them. Familiarity can breed laziness, and so many of our misunderstandings about the scriptures happen because we are too familiar with the passage to look it with fresh eyes. If we would come to the Word of God with fresh eyes more often, we would realize that some of our most common interpretations of Scripture passed down to us don’t make much sense when viewed within the context of the passage.

Like any author worth his salt, the writer in Jeremiah begins by stating the subject of the passage: “This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon ... “ (Jeremiah 29:4).

This verse, quoted to countless individuals who are struggling with vocation or discerning God’s will, is not written to individuals at all. This passage is written to a whole group of people—an entire nation. For all the grammarians out there, the “you” in Jeremiah 29:11 isn’t singular, it’s plural. And you don’t have to be a Hebrew scholar to realize that “one” versus “many” is a big difference.

And the verse just before it is perhaps even scarier. For in Jeremiah 29:10, God lays down the specifics on this promise: that He will fulfill it “after seventy years are completed for Babylon.” In other words, yes, God says, I will redeem you—after 70 years in exile. This is certainly a far cry from our expectation of this verse in what God’s plans to prosper us really mean. He did have a future and a hope for them—but it would look far different than the Israelites ever expected.

So what? Some of you may be thinking. Even when the verse is taken out of context, it still offers value, right? God does know the plans of individual people, so it’s just as well to keep prescribing Jeremiah 29 for those seeking God’s plan for their life, right? Well, yes and no.

We need to let the Bible speak to us, not allow our own personal bent to speak into the Scriptures. If Jeremiah 29 is speaking to the nation of Israel, and not just one person, then we should start with the truth in the Scriptures. Context matters—God speaks at a particular moment in time, to a particular people group, for a reason.

What this means is that God has plans for a whole group of people, namely the nation of Israel. And if we read on in the Scriptures we find that this promise was fulfilled: those in exile returned, and the nation of Israel was restored for a time. God made a promise through the prophets, and that promise came true.

But that’s not the end of the story, either. There is something to the out-of-context prescriptions that so many make using this verse. God is a God of redemption, after all, and He wants to redeem people and put them on a path of wholeness, just as He wanted the nation of Israel to be redeemed and whole again.

As John Calvin says about this passage, the prophet is speaking not just of historical redemption, for that period in time, but also of “future redemption.” For the Israelites, God listened to their prayers when they sought Him with all their heart, and in His time, He brought them out of exile.

But how does any of this apply to us today? Can we still take heart in such a beautiful promise—even though it was spoken to people long ago, people in a far different situation than ours?

First and foremost, we are all in this together. This verse does not apply to isolated individuals or to a broad community. It applies to both, together, functioning as one. The image painted here is one of individuals in community, like the Body of Christ which Paul talks about. Here are a bunch of people, worshiping God together, hoping for a future redemption.

The theologians Stanley Grenz and John Franke explain in their book Beyond Foundationalism just how a community “turns the gaze of its members toward the future.” The future in Jeremiah is one that is bright—one that everyone in the community through prayer and worship seeks as their collective future hope. Many of us want to desperately know the plan that God has for each one of us as individuals, but let the prophet Jeremiah remind us that it’s not all about us, and it might not look like what we think.

Even more important than our decision about which college to attend, which city to move to or what job offer to take is the future hope of the Kingdom of God foretold by the prophets and fulfilled in the reign of our now and coming King. In this way, the promise of Jeremiah 29:11 is bigger than any one of us—and far better.

Grace In The Moment

GRACE, AGONY & COMPASSION: "Such grace is given for crisis moment, and it does not mean that anyone...is free from low periods of depression and recurrent agony from time to time. We must not expect each other to float above the reality of loneliness and wondering 'What if…'"

    ~ Edith Schaeffer, Affliction

Tickled Ears

Love me some J. Lee Grady! - 4 Ear Tickling Doctrines You Should Never Tolerate

Many today are worried about the Zika virus. But I'm just as concerned about certain destructive doctrines that are spreading like an epidemic.

During a recent trip to Uganda, friends there told me of a growing church in the capital city of Kampala that has been infected by the most serious form of American-style "hypergrace" teaching. This church attracts hundreds of young people who like the idea that they can fornicate whenever they want and still be right with God.

False doctrines are nothing new. In the first century, Paul sternly warned Timothy about certain preachers who know how to slice and dice God's Word to make it fit what people want. He wrote in 2 Timothy 4:3-4: "For the time will come when people will not endure sound doctrine, but they will gather to themselves teachers in accordance with their own desires, having itching ears, and they will turn their ears away from the truth and turn to myths."

The King James Version says the crowds who crave this reconfigured gospel "have itching ears." The Greek word here, knēthō, can mean "to tickle" or "to itch." It means that people will gravitate toward teachers who tell them what they want to hear instead of what they need. And while the Bible sharply rebukes the teachers of these dangerous doctrines, Paul also blames the people who ravenously consume this distorted message.

The warning is clear: Be careful what you listen to!

There are many false doctrines circulating today, but there are four that have spread widely in the modern Pentecostal/charismatic movement. You may not be able to stop the person who is preaching these heresies, but you should never, ever submit to this teaching or support it financially. Don't ever believe these four lies:

Lie No. 1: You don't need to repent of your sin or focus on sin. This is the crux of the "hypergrace" movement. While it is true that many legalistic Christians don't understand God's love and forgiveness, we can't swing the pendulum to the other extreme and portray God as being lax about sin. God is still holy, and true grace gives us the power to live a holy life. If a preacher minimizes repentance, or says you should never worry about sin in your life, you should run out the door.

Lie No. 2: You can live however you want to live sexually. Jesus Himself warned us in Revelation 2:20 about the influence of "Jezebel" in the church. He said she was leading Christians to "commit acts of immorality." You can see tolerance of sexual sin in many segments of the church today. Catholic bishops allowed their own priests to commit child sexual abuse for years; mainline churches have embraced same-sex marriage. But their error is no worse than that of certain charismatic preachers who minimize or ignore the sin of adultery and cohabitation among straight people. We should never evaluate a minister just by what he or she preaches; we should also take note of what he or she refuses to confront from the pulpit.

Lie No. 3: You can buy God's blessings. I do not believe in a poverty gospel, but the prosperity gospel that emerged in this country in the 1980s almost ruined our witness. The greedy televangelist who manipulated audiences to give in the offering so he could buy airplanes or mansions will give an account for every soul he turned away from Christ. Especially egregious are the preachers who promised people healings, spiritual gifts or the salvation of loved ones in exchange for a $500 "seed" offering. God's blessings are free. Shame on those who merchandised His anointing.

Lie No. 4: God never calls us to suffer. Whenever the church enters times of prosperity and ease, our message gets soft. This happened during the 1980s, when preachers in silk ties told us we could name and claim whatever we wanted in Jesus name. And while the verses they quoted about faith certainly apply to prayer, they mixed the message with the idea that life with God is like a bowl of cherries and that any hardship that comes our way is from the devil. These preachers avoided 1 Peter 4:1, which says: "Therefore, since Christ has suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same purpose."

I don't know about you, but I don't trust an arrogant preacher who says he never has struggles or problems. I don't follow a man because he has a Lexus or a four-car garage; I look for a broken minister who walks with a limp. The preacher who says Christians don't suffer has never felt the fire of God's testing, and he is likely an illegitimate son since he has never known the Father's discipline.

God is cleaning up His church today, and He is refining the message we preach. Don't prop up or support the false doctrines of the past. Purge their influence from your life and embrace the true gospel—the message calls each of us to take up our cross, die to our own desires and be mature disciples.

A Flourishing Life

Below is an excerpt from a post by Darryl Dash discussing Andy Crouch's new book Strong and Weak: Embracing a Life of Love, Risk and True Flourishing.

,,,The premise of the book is simple. We are meant to flourish, and flourishing requires two things that at first don't seem to go together. "Here’s the paradox: flourishing comes from being both strong and weak." Or, to put it in a form of a 2 by 2 chart, we're to embrace both authority and vulnerability.

It's easy to miss this paradox. In my talk, I'd focused on the grace that's found in weakness, reflecting on the Lord's words to Paul: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness" (2 Corinthians 12:9). I'd inadvertently glorified what Crouch calls the withdrawing/suffering quadrants, missing the quadrant of flourishing (authority and vulnerability). Crouch's model helped me understand that we're meant to be weak and strong in equal measure.
Flourishing, though, isn't about health, wealth, growth, affluence, and gentrification. We know this because Jesus, our model for flourishing, didn't live an affluent life. Flourishing means that we care for our communities, especially those who were most vulnerable. It means that we avoid the temptations of withdrawing into safety, or grasping for power, just as Jesus did.

I was most moved by how Crouch weaves the gospel into this model. The path to flourishing is a path that takes us through suffering:

Surprisingly, rather than simply moving pleasantly into ever greater authority and ever greater vulnerability, we have to take two fearsome journeys, both of which seam like detours that lead away from the prime quadrant. The first is the journey to hidden vulnerability, the willingness to bear burdens and expose ourselves to risks that no one else can fully see or understand. The second is sacrifice, the choice to visit the most broken corners of the world and our own heart.

"Without a doubt," Crouch writes, "this is the greatest paradox of flourishing: it is only found on the other side of suffering— specifically, our willingness to actively embrace suffering."

The implications for leadership are profound. "Leadership does not begin with a title or a position. It begins the moment you are concerned more about others’ flourishing than you are about your own. It begins when you start to ask how you might help create and sustain the conditions for others to increase their authority and vulnerability together."
Strong and Weak is a book that manages to be both simple but profound. It's worth four dozen self-help books. This book helps us understand the right path to flourishing, and how to help others take it too. It's a path that Jesus took before us — a path that looks like dying, but one that leads to real life.

Present In Suffering

'We must rest in the sufficiency of Christ’s sufferings for us before we can even begin to suffer like him. If we know he loves us unconditionally, despite our flaws, then we know he is present with us and working in our lives in times of pain and sorrow. And we can know that he is not merely close to us, but he is indwelling, and that since we are members of his body, he senses our sufferings as his own (cf. Acts 9: 4; Col 1: 24.)"

- Tim Keller

Offerings

"Accept your loneliness. It is one stage, and only one stage, on a journey that brings you to God. It will not always last. Offer up your loneliness to God, as the little boy offered to Jesus his five loaves and two fishes. God can transform it for the good of others. Above all, do something for somebody else!" 

            - Elisabeth Elliot

Facing Suuffering

"Christian, You Will Suffer" from Stand to Reason Blog:

I had a brief interaction with an atheist on Twitter a couple of weeks ago that unexpectedly turned to the issue of suffering when she said:

'You clearly never had a time you were hurt. I don’t mean sick. I don’t mean heart broken. I mean literally a near death experience or rape or abusive relationship…. You can keep floating on a [expletive] cloud thinking Jesus will do everything for you but it’s a lie. What makes you so special?'

That surprised me at first because it didn’t seem to have anything to do with the tweet she was responding to, and I was confused as to why she would assume I’d never been through anything traumatic. But then in subsequent tweets, when she revealed she had been raped, it became clear that her trauma had played a central role in her becoming an outspoken, obviously angry “antitheist.” She’s a self-described antitheist now because she thinks Christianity teaches Jesus “will do everything for you” to give you a perfect life, and now she knows that’s a lie. The rape proved her understanding of Christianity false.

So it made sense for her to reason that since I believe Christianity is true, I must still be under the delusion that Jesus is making my life special, which means I obviously never encountered any evil or suffering to shake that delusion.

Hear me, everyone: This is a failure of the church.

A friend of mine who was deeply suffering once said to me that many Christians are in for “an epic letdown” when they realize their preconceived notions about what God is expected to do for us are false. Pastors who preach a life-improvement Jesus are leading people down this precarious path to disillusionment.

If suffering disproves your Christianity, you’ve missed Christianity. The Bible is filled with the suffering of those whom God loves. The central event of the Bible is one of suffering. Love involves suffering. “We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” That means suffering.

But Christianity also promises justice for evil. And grace. And life from death. Resurrection. New bodies. Hope. Jesus is the only hope for true pain. Without Him, there’s nothing left to do but rail against God with the most perverse insults imaginable.

The truth is that even if you’ve been taught these things, a time will come when an experience will make this real to you, and then you will struggle to learn how to entrust yourself to God when you can’t trust He’ll protect you from pain and tragedy, can’t trust that things will get better. The only thing you can trust is Him. That He is good. That He knows what suffering is. That if He was willing to give His son over to death for us “because of His great love with which He loved us,” then we know His love won’t stop there—He’ll withhold nothing else from us that we should have. The good He seeks for us is to reveal Himself and conform us to the image of His Son. We will suffer no pain without purpose.

Go to the Christians who learned this before you—Richard Wurmbrand, Elisabeth Elliot, Joni Eareckson Tada, Helen Roseveare, Corrie ten Boom, Kara Tippetts—Christians who learned through torture, death, disability, rape, terror, and terminal disease the truth of Paul’s “secret” to facing a life of pain: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” 

I said to the atheist, “Those who suffer know Him better,” and I meant it. He is the God who knows suffering. He is the God who suffered. He is the God who works beauty through suffering. He is the God who resurrects.

Avoiding the Extremes on Healing

Far too much of the teaching out there on healing is at the extremes: Either "name it and claim it" or rejoice in your suffering. Glad to find this relatively balanced word on seeking physical healing by Larry Keefauver at Charisma:  4 Truths About Faith and Healing 

When God doesn't heal now, you can apply essential truths about faith and healing that are anchored in Scripture. I've identified four key actions we should take when we face a serious illness:

1. Have others join their faith to yours in bringing your infirmity to Jesus. "When the sun was setting, all those who had any that were sick with various diseases brought them to Him; and He laid His hands on every one of them and healed them" (Luke 4:40; Matt. 8:16; Mark 1:32-34; 2:3-12).

Don't try to face sickness alone. An essential key to healing in the New Testament is the power of corporate faith and praying in agreement with others (see Matt. 18:19-20). When you gather with others to pray, the presence of Christ dwells in your midst. Because He is the Great Physician, with His presence comes healing power.

Throughout the healing miracle accounts in the Gospels, we observe that friends brought the sick to Jesus. In Mark 2, a paralytic man was brought by his friends to Jesus. The Syro-Phoenician woman brought her daughter to Jesus (see Matt. 15:22; Mark 7:24-30). A father brought his demonized child to Jesus (see Matt 17:14-18; Mark 9:17-27; Luke 9:38-42).

Join your faith with others to seek the Great Physician. When sickness has weakened, fatigued and discouraged you, seek out others who will pray in faith.

2. Seek to receive a touch from God. The woman with an issue of blood exercised her faith by going outside and searching for the Healer. She did all she knew to do to reach out through a crowd and touch Jesus (see Matt. 9:20; Mark 5:25-27; Luke 8:43-44).

When you are sick, you might be tempted to isolate yourself from settings in which you can touch and be touched by the presence of Christ. At times, you may not feel like going to worship services. You may feel too weak to sing and praise God. You may be too tired and discouraged to call the elders of your church to anoint you with oil and pray in faith for you.

Resist this temptation to stay at home in isolation. Healing flows through the body of Christ. His body is the church. Break out of your loneliness and seek the Healer.

3. Submit yourself to the authority and will of Christ, trusting Him as your Healer. The centurion's faith in Christ opened a door for his servant to be healed (see Matt. 8:5-13; Luke 7:1-10). Likewise, the authority for your healing does not rest in you or your faith. Claiming your healing and speaking the right words do not guarantee your healing now or at any future time. Your faith opens a door for you to receive your healing from Christ.

I prayed with a woman who demanded that God heal her. When I questioned her attitude, she exclaimed, "I have the authority as a child of God to command God to fulfill His promise of healing for me." She believed a common myth that has been spread by some faith teachers, who believe that we can command God to do our bidding.

Our authority isn't over Christ but in Christ. We reign with Him in heavenly places (see Eph. 2:4-7). The sons of Sceva presumed to have healing authority but quickly learned that authority rested in the person of Jesus, not simply in the repetitious use of His name (see Acts 19:13-16).

The truth is that all authority for every matter, including healing, rests in Jesus: "'All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth'" (Matt. 28:18). From Christ we receive imparted authority to say what He says and to do what He does. Submit to His authority for your healing.

4. Believe on His Word, not someone else's advice or counsel. Whenever Jesus spoke the Word, people were healed (see Matt. 8:8, 16; Luke 7:7). The psalmist said, "He [the Lord] sent His word and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions" (Ps. 107:20). Listen to the Word of the Lord for your healing. No one else's word, faith or assurance will do. When God doesn't heal now, trust His voice and believe His Word.

Proverbs 4:20-22 reads: "My son, give attention to my words; incline your ear to my sayings. Do not let them depart from your eyes; keep them in the midst of your heart; for they are life to those who find them, and health to all their flesh."

When God doesn't heal now, trust His Word--not your circumstances or human advice. God has not abandoned you. He's not taking a vacation. He is right there by your side as you put your trust in His tender care.

Suffering For Others

Read more at Paul Tripp's post on  Ministry in Suffering

How to Pray For Pastor Saeed

From a good post by Dr. Gary Tuck at Trans-formed:

Pastor Saeed Abedini. If you don’t know that name, you should google it and learn at least some basic facts … because, if you are a Christian, he is you. That’s right. There is a fundamental solidarity of all followers of King Jesus. But Saeed Abedini is just the single best known of, I don’t know, hundreds? thousands?

What I want to speak to is the issue of how we can help. Like many of you, I have read many updates over the past several months on Pastor Saeed’s situation and efforts to persuade the Iranian government to release him and efforts to get our government to pressure Iran. (Thanks especially to Jay Sekulow and ACLJ.)

As we continue to pray for him and his family to be strong, to grow stronger not weaker in his faith, and to be bold as long as he is incarcerated, I should think Paul’s words in Ephesians 6:19-20 might have some legitimate application to Saeed’s situation: “[Pray] for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.” (ESV).....

Please read the whole thing at the link. He then concludes:

.......I think we need to include these stories and people more regularly in our prayer lists. I am praying that God will lead me and my wife to a particular connection (as yet unknown to me) of His choice for us to support by prayer and who knows what other way to alleviate some suffering by our Lord’s family, our brothers and sisters.

One more thought: I urge you to begin becoming informed about mistreatment of fellow Christians. I have started with “Voice of the Martyrs,” persecution.com and persecutionblog.com.

He Isn't Interested in Your Best Life

Jeff Dunn at IMonk hit a home run this week with "The Homily" 

...I hate to be the bearer of reality, but not everything in this life is going to go your way. Even more to the point, God does not have your best interests in mind. God has his own best interests in his mind. And at times, his interests make our lives miserable. You want an example? Look at Job. God wanted to prove to the Accuser that Job would still praise God even if all of his “blessings” were taken away. God’s glory was on display, not Job’s comfort or prosperity. Do you want another example? How about Mary? God chose this young, engaged-but-not-yet-married girl to bring his Son into the world. How did that “bless” Mary? Her life was forever changed from what she had most likely envisioned.

The Gospel of Jesus does not guarantee us to become winners. As a matter of fact, Jesus championed losers. In his parables, he presented God as one who is constantly seeking after what has been lost. A lost coin. Lost sheep. A lost son. Jesus came, he said, to seek and to save the lost, not the found, not the blessed. Not the winners.

As a matter of fact, Jesus said the greatest loss we could ever experience would be if we sought to save our lives, to become winners. Luke tucks an interesting verse into Jesus’ teaching on his second return: Whoever seeks to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it. Winners become losers, and losers become winners...

....St. Paul tells us that God’s power is perfectly seen in our weakness. And that when I am weak is when I am truly strong. So I will rejoice in my sicknesses, in my distress, in my despair. I will rejoice when things are not going my way, when my life is turned upside-down by unforeseen circumstances. When I realize I am a loser, then I can take comfort in knowing Jesus has come to seek and to save me. This is the Gospel of Jesus.

This morning, remember that God is focused on his glory. And as hard as that may be to understand, and even harder to accept (for we are a very selfish lot), we are to be focused on God’s glory as well.

Persecution in 2013

From Joe Cater - 9 Things You Should Know About the Persecutions of Christians in 2013:

1. Christian churches around the world have set apart the month of November to remember and pray for the persecuted church, through the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (IDOP).

2. According to the U.S. Department of State, Christians in more than 60 countries face persecution from their governments or surrounding neighbors simply because of their belief in Christ.

3. With the exception of four official state-controlled churches in Pyongyang, Christians in North Korea face the risk of detention in the prison camps, severe torture and, in some cases, execution for practicing their religious beliefs. North Koreans suspected of having contact with South Korean or other foreign missionaries in China, and those caught in possession of a Bible, have been known to be executed.

4. In Syria, Christians are increasingly becoming the target of violent attacks. Catholic and Orthodox groups in Syria say the anti-government rebels have committed "awful acts" against Christians, including beheadings, rapes and murders of pregnant women. A special 'Vulnerability Assessment of Syria's Christians' conducted by the World Watch unit of Open Doors International from June 2013 warned that Syrian Christians are the victims of "disproportionate violence and abuse." They warned further that Christian women in Syria are particularly vulnerable to sexual abuse.

5. In August 2013, Egypt faced what has been called the the worst anti-Christian violence in seven centuries: 38 churches were destroyed, 23 vandalized; 58 homes were burned and looted and 85 shops, 16 pharmacies and 3 hotels were demolished; 6 Christians were killed in the violence and 7 were kidnapped.

6. The bloodiest attack on Christians in Pakistan's history occurred in September 2013. Two suicide bombers exploded shrapnel laden vests outside All Saints' Church in the old city of Peshawar. Choir members and children attending Sunday school were among 81 people killed. The attack left 120 people wounded, with 10 of them in critical condition.

7. During an attack on a shopping mall in Nairobi in September, Islamic terrorists asked people for the name of Muhammad's mother or to recite a verse from the Quran in order to identify non-Muslims. One of the terrorists announced, "We have come to kill you Christians and Kenyans because you have been killing our women and children in Somalia. Any Muslims can go."

8. Four Christians in Iran will get 80 lashes each this month for drinking wine during a communion service. Ahmed Shaheed, UN special rapporteur on human rights in Iran, said that it is common practice for Christians to be punished for violating theocratic laws. In the UN report Shaheed wrote: 'At least 20 Christians were in custody in July 2013. In addition, violations of the rights of Christians, particularly those belonging to evangelical Protestant groups, many of whom are converts, who proselytize to and serve Iranian Christians of Muslim background, continue to be reported.'

9. An average of 100 Christians around the world are killed each month for their faith. (Note: There are several sources that claim the numbers are as high as 100,000+ a year. In the absence of solid evidence for those numbers, though, I chose to go with the more empirically verifiable estimate.)

Scars a Resource for Healing

"As the prototype for a new way  of being human, and as the one who awakens us to our true selves, Jesus shows us how our scars can become a resource for healing, instead of a source of shame. That's not to say that whenever we bring our suffering to Jesus, everything is easily or magically healed and we will never feel the pain again. But it does mean that even in the darkest moments there is yet a blessing - a deep revelation of our belovedness that is as profound as the hurt that we feel."

Prototype: What Happens When You Discover That You Are More Like Jesus Than You Think, by Jonathan Martin, page 109

Presence of the God Who Suffers

"When we have suffered profoundly, we are given something much better than answers for 'why.' We are given the presence of a God who suffers and who makes His own wounds a resource for our healing."

Prototype: What Happens When You Discover That You Are More Like Jesus Than You Think, by Jonathan Martin, page 97

The God Who Knows Despair

“Christianity alone among the world religions claims that God became uniquely and fully human in Jesus Christ and therefore knows firsthand despair, rejection, loneliness, poverty, bereavement, torture, and imprisonment.

On the cross he went beyond even the worst human suffering and experienced cosmic rejection and pain that exceeds ours as infinitely as his knowledge and power exceeds ours. In his death, God suffers in love, identifying with the abandoned and godforsaken.

Why did he do it? The Bible says that Jesus came on a rescue mission for creation. He had to pay for our sins so that someday he can end evil and suffering without ending us.”

        — Tim Keller,   The Reason for God    (New York, NY: Dutton, 2008), 30

We Grieve With Them

When the news broke on Saturday that Rick & Kay Warren's 27 year old son, Matthew, committed suicide  I grieved along with most Christians, and prayed for comfort and strength for the Warrens. My son is the same age as their son. I can't imagine the full horror of their pain. 

However, there are some, including some professed believers, who have used this tragedy to intensify their criticisms of Rick Warren, his teachings and his ministry. How insensitive and cruel can someone be? That form of spiritual bullying has no place among the people of God. No matter what you may think about Rick Warren's books, teaching and ministry, this is NOT the time for criticism.

Beth Moore's passionate, powerful written response, Sadness and Madness, said it best. Here is her conclusion.

But even now at the hardest moment of their lives the Warrens can teach something vital if we are willing to learn. Their heartbreak demonstrates what has always been true but has never been more profoundly overlooked: these who serve us publicly also suffer privately. They are not caricatures. They are not just personalities. They are people living on a painful planet with the rest of us.

The Warrens will come forth like gold. The enemy will not win. They will fight the good fight. They will finish the race. They will keep the faith.

I love the Body of Christ. I don’t want want to get cynical. I don’t want to sit around and hate the haters or I become one. But this morning I just want to say this. We can love each other better. Let’s do. People have enough hurt. Let’s be careful with one another.

Please read her whole article at the link.

Pray for Rick and Kay Warren. Grieve with them. They are our brother and sister. They are grieving  They need us.  The following note appeared on Rick Waren's Twitter feed last night:

7h

Grieving is hard.Grieving as public figures,harder.Grieving while haters celebrate your pain,hardest.Your notes sustained us

May the Lord give them much comfort and grace.

Self Revelation From Crises

From Michael Kelley at Forward Progress

You see it all the time. You feel it yourself. Life is rocking along at a steady clip, and then… BAM! Something happens. Something dramatic. Drastic. Paradigm shifting. Something that, though you don’t yet know the full fallout, you know when it happens that this event will be a dividing point in your life.

There was life before the diagnosis…

Before the job loss…

Before the hard conversation…

Before the revelation…

… and life after. And nothing will be the same.

Our lives are marked by these moments of crisis. And in that moment of crisis, when the earth is emotionally shifting under your feet, “stuff” starts to come out. You get angry. Or frustrated. Or worried. Or that long dormant sin starts to become a temptation again. The temptation, as we look at the remnants of life after that dividing point, the shards of broken relationships or the broken down finances or the busted up sense of self, is to look to that pink slip or call from the doctor’s office or difficult conversation as the point of causality. It’s the thought that this unexpected occurrence, whatever it is, caused these other things to come up.

But it didn’t.

Crisis doesn’t create; it only reveals what’s been there all along......

Read it all at the link - It's worth the time. 

Making Safe Places

Here's Tullian Tchvidjian on making churches safe places for those who are suffering or grieving to share their pain and weakness without condemnation. The answer, of course, is in the gospel- specifically the truth that Jesus became strong for us so we can admit our weakness.


  For more on this topic, read Tullian's book Glorious Ruin: How Suffering Sets You Free.

We Are Actors, Not Directors

More from Tullian Tchvidjian, Glorious Ruin: How Suffering Sets You Free:

"The gospel frees us to speak honestly about the reality of pain, confident that nothing rides on our ability to cope with or fend off suffering. Before we can even begin to grapple with the frustrations and tragedies of life in this world, we must do away with our faithless morality of payback and rewards.....We must return to the beginning (and end) of the whole affair: the cross." (Page 68)

:While God does indeed use the suffering in our lives, He is interested in much more than improvements in your personality or circumstantial happiness; He is interested in saving you. He is more than your Helper; He is your Redeemer. We do not have the primary role in this drama after all; we are the actors, not the directors. Sometimes it requires getting on our knees for us to see the truth." (page 69)

Tullian on Fox

Tullian Tchvidjian was on FOX & Friends this morning talking about his new book Glorious Ruin (among other subjects) And yes, they butchered the pronunciation of his name.

Tullian is one of my favorite authors and I consider him one of the most influential Christian leaders in America today. Can't wait to read the new book.