Self-Sufficiency

I have realized how much our society and culture in this country prizes self-sufficiency. We have to do it ourselves. We earn whatever we get, we get what we deserve, we put in the effort, do the work and pull ourselves up by our boot straps. I have found that biblically, that mind set is pretty close to heresy. Instead of recognizing it, we have just adapted it into the church, and it's not new.

When Martin Luther was a young man in the monastery, he had the duty to serve communion. He was terrified because he knew he wasn't good enough. He learned to hate God until he found true grace. Luther worked so hard to please God, but always aware of his own short comings. He was more self aware than you or I. If we were as keenly aware of our sin as Luther, we would probably end up in the same place Luther did. He spend time incapacitated by his guilt, struggle and hatred. As I look at Luther, I see that there are stages or groups. It appears to me, there are basically three groups or stages.

The first group are the pharisees, the Roman Catholics, the legalists, who believe they are good enough. These are arrogant, prideful people who exist in the church who believe they have kept the law, done the work, are good enough and God owes them. Most of them would never say that, they would never admit it, but deep down that is how they feel. I'll admit that sometimes I struggle not to be there, after all, I'm a seminary trained pastor. I read, write, study, teach, preach, live and learn, always focused on God. Right? Did you see what the first letter of that horribly arrogant sentence was? "I". I am the subject, God is the object. Look at what "I" do. I made the decision, I have free will, I walked the aisle, I said the prayer, I found Jesus, I read my Bible, I go to church. God is auxiliary to my "religious" activities. This is where Martin Luther found himself, working to be good enough.

The second group is where I end up after spending time in this mode. It's where Martin Luther ended up. Disenfranchised, bitter and grieved. Martin Luther came to hate God. As John Lynch said in his message "True Faced", "pleasing God turns into how much I do to keep Him pleased". There is always more to do, more to read and study and work at. I can always be better, always be busier, more productive, sin less, care more and try harder. Eventually, I become so tired, my soul weary, my flesh exhausted. We blame God, the church, the Bible, we say things like "I don't like institutionalize religion", but the reality is we despise ourselves. We hate our faults, our short comings, and we feel inadequate, but we don't want to admit that, so we blame everything outside of ourselves. We are mad and angry at God because we are working so hard to do something He never asked us to do. We work so hard to be perfect when all along, He only asked us to trust Him. Sometimes we get a glimpse of that, and we become more angry. "How dare you ask me to give up my effort of self-sufficiency, after all, don't you want me to be better?" Does it resonate in your soul? Can you feel it? Your pride, your desire to pull yourself up by your boot straps, your desire to be in control. You want to do it, you want to fix it, you want to do it yourself. It began as soon as you became self-aware, at the age of two, you began. You wanted to do it yourself, be self-sufficient. We grow and learn to be more independent, it's part of our human nature. No one has to teach us how to be selfish or stubborn, self reliant or arrogant. So here you are. You are mad at God because you can't do it yourself, and you are mad at God because He wants you to trust Him and not try to do it yourself. You want to, yet you can't and the more you try the more bitter you become. This is why Christianity is dying in America. We are learning we can't do it. We are finding that our flesh, our temptations and our short comings easily master us. We are controlled by our fear and by our inadequacies. The only thing worse than being inadequate is being inadequate and unable to do anything about it yourself.

The third option is the place I desire to be, but I can't get there. Here is the problem, I struggle to get there on my own, and in my struggle I become self-sufficient for a short time. I quickly burn out, and I can't find the way to trust without striving on my own power. I am working to learn grace, which becomes a contradiction. I know it can be done, I believe Martin Luther did it. I believe that John Calvin did it, and gave us some keys in reformed theology. We kick and struggle against reformed theology because it takes the power away from us. We hate it, because we lose control. Somehow I must find a way to relinquish control. I can't find a way to live inside the paradox. I must find a way to live out my faith as a response, instead of living out my response to find grace. The Christian world as a whole is not helping me. I read books and articles and listen to messages and songs that tell me how to do the things I need to do in order to get a "spiritual life". If I just pray more, read more, go to church more, give more, then I'll get there. I can't find a method that's not a method. My entire life falls back into me trying to please God, which then becomes on what must I do to keep Him pleased. My Heavenly Father slowly degrades into the Heavenly School Master, ready to punish or reward me based on my merit. After all, shouldn't we get what we deserve?

So here I sit, coming back full circle. Striving to live in grace, but finding myself neck deep in works. Wanting happiness and fulfillment, not grace and relationship. All the time focused on me, what I did, what I do and what I want. I feel trapped and suffocated by my inability to escape the prison I have constructed for myself. The ironic part is I know God wants to free me, and for whatever reason, I can't or I won't allow Him to do so. I feel the inner struggle of Paul as he writes "Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?"Romans 7:24 (ESV). So I trust in words of Christ to Paul. “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” 2 Cor 12:9 (ESV). Even as I am trapped in this prison of my own making, even as I can't escape and I can't figure out how to get it right, I am still being saved from myself. Maybe I can't see it. It seems to me that Paul couldn't see it, feel it or grasp it either, but grace. Amazing Grace. It's sufficient for even me, the wretch that I am.

Limited Atonement

I have often struggled with the teaching of limited atonement. I understood it in concept, but thought it was a purposeless doctrine. That was true until I read an article that was against the Doctrine of Substitutionary Atonement.

Substitutionary Atonement states that Jesus died in my place. When He was on the cross, He bore my sins. By dying, He took the punishment for my sin. He died in my place. He was my substitute, because the punishment He suffered should have been mine.

If Substitutionary Atonement is true, that means my sins were atoned for when Jesus died on the cross. He bore then 2,000 years ago. That leads us to two places. The first is the Armenian viewpoint, of unlimited atonement, which states that everyone has the potential for salvation, which means that Christ bore the sins of everyone at Calvary. While it sounds to good and pleasing to stay that Christ bore the sins of every person on the cross, it makes salvation a work. Let's elaborate.

If Christ bore the sins of everyone, and died as a substitute for everyone, then everyone is atoned for, yet not everyone is saved. What is left in the salvation process? Acceptance. That means that we earn salvation though accepting it. That is a gnostic teaching. Either the work is acceptance, understanding, belief or surrender, all those things are dependent upon me. I am therefore responsible for my own salvation, and I am not saved by grace through faith, but rather I am saved by knowledge though faith. I am saved by receiving the atonement. Is that scriptural, or is that humanism?

The alternative is Limited Atonement. It's the reality that God prepared some for salvation since before the foundation of the world, elected them, their sins were paid for on Calvary and they receive grace. We find this in Romans 9.

19 You will say to me, therefore, “Why then does He still find fault? For who can resist His will?” 20 But who are you—anyone who talks back to God? Will what is formed say to the one who formed it, “Why did you make me like this?” 21 Or has the potter no right over His clay, to make from the same lump one piece of pottery for honor and another for dishonor? 22 And what if God, desiring to display His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience objects of wrath ready for destruction? 23 And [what if] He did this to make known the riches of His glory on objects of mercy that He prepared beforehand for glory— 24 on us whom He also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?

Romans 9:19-24 (HCSB)

So I assume some of you reading this point don't agree with me. After all, why would we be commanded to seek and knock, and what is the value of preaching? What about Romans 10:9 and 10:13?

But how can they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe without hearing about Him? And how can they hear without a preacher? 15 And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: How welcome are the feet of those who announce the gospel of good things! 16 But all did not obey the gospel. For Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed our message? 17 So faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the message about Christ.

Romans 10:14-17 (HCSB)

Perhaps you are asking about those verses, about evangelism and what is the point if people are already redeemed. It's a tricky subject I'll admit. So let's go deeper, let's get woven.

In my theological offering of Woven Theology, I have stated that Gods unconditional call and election works in concert with God's foreknowledge, our response and responsibility. That means we are elected and called by God without any work or merit of our own. We know that we are chosen, we are saved and redeemed by grace. It's God who gives grace, we cannot and do no earn it, it's for the glory of God. We also know that our belief has an impact that we believe and we trust God and we are saved. So, we can't be saved without belief, we don't believe without Grace, we don't get grace unless we are chosen, we don't get chosen unless we believe. How?

I think the key comes for a verse in Joel.

I will repay you for the years

that the swarming locust ate,

the young locust, the destroying locust,

and the devouring locust—

My great army that I sent against you.

Joel 2:25 (HCSB)

There is a spiritual reality that sometimes things flow backwards, work in recompense. In Joel, Israel was disobedient, and they were punished. They repented and God re payed the punishment, and it became like the punishment never happened. God can work backwards, can buy back, pay back and restore things to how they were before.

Woven theology stays that you believe because God gives you the ability and the grace to believe, and you have the ability and grace from God because you believe. The reality is that you were called and predestined to believe if you are a believer, and God gave His son for you, and your sins are atoned for because of Grace. We share and we pray for others, because prayer, obedience and response are the mechanisms in which God operates as He predestines those from the foundation of the world. Overwhelmed? We are just getting warmed up.

Losing sight

I have discovered about myself that I so often lose sight of some of the most important things in my spiritual development. The first is living by grace, and not by self effort. I am so hard on myself, trying to do all the things I am suppose to do. The second is part of the same issue, which is having a simple faith. I sometimes over think, over analyse and forget to just trust and believe. Simple faith and living by grace. In my line of work, my spirituality becomes work, and I begin to look at everything as work. Bible study for the sake of me growing closer to Jesus gives way to me studying for my job. Prayer becomes something I do in my job, and this new year I am trying to live my grace and have a simple faith. That doesn't mean I will stop my work on Woven Theology, or I will stop thinking about eccelsiology and church structure, but in doing so, I am resolved to not let my relationship with Christ suffer.

Worship

As I considered worship lately, I have changed my perspective slightly. What is worship? To find the answer, I started looking in the most honest of places. Kids. Do you ever watch kids worship? Step back, outside of your religious mindset and look at unchurched kids. Look at 3rd-5th grade boys who love sports. They have the purest form of worship, it comes straight from the heart. They worship sports figures. When I was that age, it was Michael Jordan. Everyone had Air Jordans when I was 6th and 7th grade. Kids wore Bulls hats and shirts, and the real die hard fans, they had a jersey. Kids on playgrounds everywhere stuck their tongues out when they shot baskets.

True worship, the most pure form of worship is emulation. It's identification, it's concentrated attention given. Why have we turned it into a form that most people can't identify with? Sure, some will worship in song, but if we are honest with ourselves, if worship is emulation, aren't we worshipping the Worship leader more than God? Who are we mimicking on a Sunday Morning? Just food for thought. I welcome your comments.

Disciple or Convert?

When it comes to your faith, are you a disciple or a convert? You may wonder, “what’s the difference?” There is a difference of night and day. A convert is happy just coming to a Sunday Morning service. A convert may pray before a meal. A convert owns a Bible or two. A convert is someone who has found “religion”. Every religion has converts. You can be converted to and from anything, Muslim, Buddhist, Catholic, Baptist, even Atheists. It simply means you have been converted to an affiliation. You now identify yourself as part of the group.

This is so different from being a disciple. Jesus never called ‘converts’. He never said to go and make converts. He never told anyone to come be His convert. He told them to be His disciples. A disciple is someone who studies under the Master, who learns His trade, His style, learns to be like Him. A convert follows rules and traditions, but a disciple follows the Master.

In your walk, in your life, how are you behaving? Are you following the rules, the traditions, going through the motions? Are you doing the same things you’ve always done, because you have always done it? That is how the Pharisees lived, they valued the tradition and the ritual. They were converted to the Jewish religion, but missed the most important relationship. The promised Messiah came and stood in front of them, but they were so clouded by their tradition, their religion, the missed Him. We see it happen today, in the modern church. Folks come in, sit though a worship service, get in their cars and go home, ever meeting the Master, never becoming a disciple.

So which are you? Who do you follow? Are you following someone who talks about Jesus, or do you follow Jesus? Do you follow tradition, or the teachings of men, or the words of our Lord and Savior? In Matthew 7:21-23, Jesus told us: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. ²²On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ ²³And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’

The keys to becoming a disciple are all about the Master. Reading the word, spending time in Bible study. Going to Him and seeking Him in prayer and meditation of the Word. It’s being about the business of the Master, sharing the Gospel, helping the hurting, supporting your brothers and sisters in Christ. It’s about Worship, which in its purest form is emulation of your Master. So, when it comes to your faith, are you a convert, or a disciple?

Not blogging, thinking

So I have a lot to blog about, but none of the thoughts complete enough to put down. I want to blog about Woven theology, I am working on the first few weaves, but I don't have then done enough to put down. I have some church-related stuff, organic based ministry thoughts- to put down, but they are not complete enough to write. I have some thoughts on Spirituality to put down, but I am not far enough or convinced enough to put anything down. Basically what I am saying is, I haven't forgotten about my blog, just haven't had a complete thought to blog yet. I'll work on it.

Dawson's Creek Syndrome

I have had a theory for a number of years, but I don't think I have ever written it down. Today, I am going to explain the phenomenon I call Dawson's Creek Syndrome.

First, I have to admit I have never seen Dawson's Creek, but it sounded like a fitting name, because the show is a teenage drama. There have been plenty of teenage drama shows, and many, many more for adults. Each of these shows (and almost any show, movie or book) have the same basic plot progression. We all learned it in 8th grade, you remember. First, we have a protagonist that meets with some sort of antagonist. There ensues some sort of crisis which hits a climax, and then comes a resolution.

So the question of the ages, does art imitate life or does life imitate art has a limited answer with Dawson's Creek Syndrome, we imitate art. We (as a society) have become so enamoured with these dramas, that we begin to feel like this is what our life needs to reflect to have value. So we begin to mimic this cycle in our lives.

The issue comes in when there is no drama. The only option is to create drama. We get bossy, we become nosey, we get gossipy, we get angry, we become involved in something that isn't any of our buisness, the entire purpose is to create drama. Most of the time (almost all of the time) we are totally unaware that we are doing it. It's just natural, it's a natural response to this need to feel valid. We want to feel important, the people on TV, they are important, so if we can imitate them, we feel important.

I originally came up with this theory when I worked with High School and College students, but adults are just as guilty. It happens most often in relationship with friends, significant others, people you work with, or attend church with. The creation of drama, conflict and things of the like, which create the cycle in order to feel important. Do you have DCS?