Something Greater...

As I read through Matthew 12, I am amazed at the authority with which Jesus speaks.  His authority, which is noted by the people at the end of Jesus' Great Sermon (Matt. 5-7), is the reason they follow him.  It's part of what gives Jesus his wow-factor.  But it isn't as though he just walks up to people, whoever they are, and just says, "Hey!  I'm great."  Not at all.  On the contrary, there is almost a hiddenness to his glory.  He heals people of all their diseases, and then orders them "not to make him known." (12:16)  We are told this is to fulfill Isaiah's prophecy of God's true servant, who "will not wrangle or cry aloud, nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets" (12:19; Isaiah 42:1-4) 

Matthew 12 gives us a picture of the greatness of Jesus as he explained it to people on a daily basis. 
In conversation with Pharisees, he tells them a story about temple priests who break the sabbath and punctuates his point - "I tell you, something greater than the temple is here."  As they belly-ache about how he doesn't toe the line on their particular sabbath observances, he tells them a story about David taking bread, and closes with "the Son of Man is lord of the sabbath."  Later, they ask Jesus for a sign of who he is.  He warns them that the Ninevites received Jonah, and now the Pharisees are in trouble because "see, something greater than Jonah is here."  Likewise, he warns them that the queen of the South, or Sheba (Yemen in today's map) visited Solomon and was amazed at his wisdom.  She will stand in judgment over this generation, Jesus says, because "see, something greater than Solomon is here!" (12:42)

The intensity of the back-and-forth exchanges between Jesus and these people captures our attention.  It is easy to overlook what Jesus is saying about himself.  Greater than Jonah, Solomon, the temple, the Sabbath?  How much greater?  How "great" are you?  No wonder these strict monotheists wanted to "destroy him" (12:14)

I think of something Scottish pastor and theologian P.T. Forsyth wrote in 1909.  "All the great Christian teachers impress us with the fact that their teaching is far ahead of their experience, and that they built better than they knew.  Even Paul preached a Gospel greater than anything he attained in his own soul...whereas our impression of Christ is just the converse...He received from none the Gospel he spoke.  He found it in himself.  Indeed it was himself.  He only preached the true relation between God and man because he incarnated it, and because he established it."

Christ is something greater.  To Jonah, Solomon, the temple, P.T. Forsyth would add the Apostle Paul and every Christian teacher.  What can we add to this list today?  Because here is what this means today: 

First, everything good in this world, I mean that is truly good, is shaped by the Word of God.  Jesus himself is the Word of God.  Even you and me, to the extent that we are "good trees" that bear "good fruit" (12:33) it is because Jesus created us anew in his death and resurrection.  So let's give thanks and speak to him face to face - our God in the flesh, greater than all he has created. 

Secondly, know that he is God.  It is common to read something like this: "Jesus is humble, so he would never say that we was greater than the gods of other religions."  This would be a far different Jesus than we are seeing in Matthew 12 or any other part of the Bible.  Yes, Jesus was humble - the humble servant who "will not wrangle or cry aloud, nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets."  He was humble in that he was really human, just like each of us.  Not God merely masquerading as a human.  But also "something greater than..."  He is also God, the only God.  The same Jesus who claims to be "something greater" in Matthew 12 claims to have "power over everything in heaven and on earth by Matthew 28.  With his Father and his Spirit who lives within us, Jesus is God - not like us at all - who came down and became like us in every way so he could bring us to himself.  We are greater, because something greater than us is here.  Very good news, because all that he is, anything that he claims to be - this is the gift he gives to us.  For he gives us himself.

A Miracle Hidden Within Us

The coffee pot is sputtering.  The scent fills the air.  I sit in our family room and pray.  I am doing next to nothing, but trying to be present to the one who made all things.  He cares about who and what I do today.  He has given gifts of new life and a new heart.  I want to understand what they are, what they mean for me, and what use they might have in the world today.

God is my Father.  He has orchestrated all things - sent his Son to become human, sent his Spirit to bind me to him, and acts mightily in and through every moment of my life to bind me closer in relationship to his fullness.

Jesus is my brother, my friend, my God.  He is the one who meets me in the pit of my own sin when I confess to him.  He is there everytime - at the cross.  When I can't even remember all that I might possibly have to leave at the cross, I am still comforted, because he has already removed all of it.  Through baptism, I am buried with him.  I have died in him.  Everything I fear the most has already been faced by Jesus on my behalf - death, yes, but also sin-death - the one that comes as payment for sin, for Paul writes, "the wages of sin is death."  This, too, has come to pass.

The sun hasn't even risen yet today.  But my Lord has.  Jesus rose from the grave.  Through faith, I rise with him to a new day, a new life, that I can't even begin to comprehend.  The new life I imagine in heaven - this is real right now.

I can't quite believe it!  Its too wonderful.  In a few hours, the world will be so normal, so ordinary.  Could it really be true?  Only in him.  Only in Christ.  I have to figure out a way to keep my eyes on him today, not out of fear.  I am convinced at least of this - that God is merciful beyond what I can imagine.  But I have to figure out a way because I love him, because I want to be with him.

Do you ever wonder why it is that your brain is so powerful, so amazing in all that it does - and yet it doesn't seem to understand itself?  Or that your heart, which sends vital, nutrient-rich blood all over your body, doesn't send a message to your brain each day of how important its work is?  These are hidden miracles within us.  So it is, I think, with the new heart and the new mind through the Holy Spirit's presence in us.  Hidden, alive, working - God lives within you.  Where will we be led today?

Too much for us to handle on a Wednesday morning in January?  Perhaps!  But it is still early.  The day has not quite begun yet.  I have a fighting chance of being like King David - "The Lord is my light and my salvation - whom shall I fear?" (Psalm 27:1)

God, it is written in 1 Peter 1:12 that angels long to understand what it is you have done in crucifying us in the death of your Son and raising us to life in him.  Angels long to know and feel what it is that is taking place in our lives.  Give us eyes to see each other today as children of the Father, dearly loved and treasured - to live a peaceful but busy day, content with you.

The People (Reflections on the 12/9 sermon)

Kevin spoke last week about how part of the fulfillment of God's great prophecy is the formation of a particular group of people.  This means that God's plan to redeem the world came, in part, through the everyday worship and faithful living of the people of God.  Our Old Testament tells of this plan - that through creation in Genesis, law-giving in Exodus through Deuteronomy, prophecy, worship, sin, and repentance God was preparing a people who knew him, loved him, and followed after his ways which were given in his word and in his law.  I don't know many Jewish people, so I experience them primarily through the OT.  Perhaps many of us do.  But even if that is true, we should remember that not just anybody wrote the Bible, but a particular people who lived, dressed, ate, and related to one another in very specific ways according to what God had revealed to them.

If we remember that, behind the life-giving words of the Old Testament were actual lives, we will remember that we're no different.  We speak what we live.  We live what we speak.  Traditions come from the way we live together over time.  Traditions characterize our church life.  They also characterize our family life.  They shape and form our year, forming pillars around which we decorate.  Valentine's in February.  Birthdays.  Easter in March or April.  Halloween in the October.  Church on Sunday.  Thanksgiving in November and Christmas now.

Traditions are hard to sustain.  I once started a tradition of watching "Mary Poppins" with my family on New Year's Day.  It fizzled out after a few years.  Even nations that seem like they'll go on forever seem to have an expiration date.  Rome was called "the Eternal City" and its empire sure seemed to fit the bill.  When it collapsed, after 1000 years of existence, it caused a crisis.  It may be hard to believe that we are only several hundred years into our American government!  Now think of the Jews!  Their traditions have survived for over 3000 years!  This is because the Jews were never people who read their Bible in private, but folks who developed their whole life around reading, praying, worshiping God, sacrificing, confessing, observing sacred days such as Passover and Pentecost.  They did this as a whole community, presenting every person, animal, acre of ground, and thought to God so that they would be formed into his people.  Israel - the ones who love God and love one another.

As Christians, we believe that the gospel - that Christ came, lived, died, and rose from the grave - allows us to live, die, and rise in Christ so that his Holy Spirit can come and form within us this holy life that God revealed to his people over so many centuries.  The gospel makes us gospel people - living risen-from-the-dead lives in freedom.  Just like the Jews, in fact because of them, we offer every person, place, and thing in our lives to God in worship.  We can't do that as private Christians.  We need each other for this.  None of us can live the Christian life alone.

Reflection Questions:
1) Do you have someone with whom you can share your prayers and experiences of who God is?
2) What seasons and traditions most form the rhythms of your life?
3) What opportunities are there for you to live the Christian life with others this coming year?

The Promise (A Reflection on the 12/2 sermon)

Gary Parrett, a professor of ministry at Gordon Conwell, tells a story of teaching in Sri Lanka.  He was addressing a group of pastors about implications of the Fall of humanity.  He spread his hands outwards and downwards and said as pointedly as he could: "Everything fell apart."

Parrett continues: "My translator - a dear friend and key church leader in Sri Lanka - did his part well, matching me not only in word but also in gesture.  As he spread his own hands outward and downward, his right hand struck a glass full of water on the table in front of us.  The glass flew onto the concrete floor and shattered, water flowing everything.  After a moment's pause, I remarked, "Perfect!" and, following the translation, we all laughed at having witnessed, accidentally, the ideal illustration for my point." (Parrett, Teaching the Faith, Forming the Faithful, 24)

It is hard for me to imagine my life like this.  I am "flawed", "not perfect", "rough around the edges", "a work in progress".  I struggle to look at my life like this shattered glass.  Because even with my flaws, I like to think that I'm still functional.  I'm still good.  But unless I were an artist, I can't think of a single functional use for this sort of shattered glass.  Indeed, Parrett's story continues.  A pastor in the front row quietly swept up the glass and threw it away.

He notes that God might have easily done the same.

How differently the story would be if that were the case.  Imagine how small your Bible would be if it only ended at Genesis 3!  99% of your Bible tells the different story - the story of a promise-making God, a redeeming God, who has a plan to make it all right again.  A God who did not sweep us up and throw us away.

As we continue in the sermon series, we will see what God did with us instead of throwing us away.  After making his promise, he chose for himself a people.  Then, he informed them of his plan.  Finally, "in the fullness of time" he set the place, and arrived as the person.

The shattered glass is destined to be remade.  As C.S. Lewis writes in his Screwtape Letters, "(God) did not create the humans - He did not become one of them and die among them by torture - in order to produce candidates for Limbo; 'failed' humans.  He wanted to make Saints; gods; things like Himself." (193)  Picture the stained glass window in the sanctuary!  This is our destiny.

And this is what it means for the promise of Genesis 3 to be fulfilled, for the offspring of the woman to crush the head of the serpent. (Genesis 3:15)  "The God of peace will shortly crush Satan under your feet." (Romans 16:20)  "For (Christ) must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet." (1 Corinthians 15:25)  "But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law..." (Galatians 4:4)  "Since, therefore, the children share flesh and blood, he himself likewise shared the same things, so that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death." (Hebrews 2:14-15)  "Everyone who commits sin is a child of the devil; for the devil has been sinning from the beginning.  The Son of God was revealed for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil." (1 John 3:8)

The life, death, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ deals with our most formidable adversaries - sin, death, and the devil - which have hounded us from the beginning.  We are destined to become like Christ in his resurrection - unable to die again.  If we are in Christ, no sin is too great to hinder this promise.  There won't be a piece of that shattered glass that God won't use in remaking you in Christ.  None of it will be wasted.  None of it thrown away.  This is the Promise.

Reflection Questions:
1) What are some of the shattered pieces of your life that you hope for Christ to put back together?
2) Paul says that these shattered pieces, these sins, are nailed to the cross of Christ, and have died with him.  How would your life look if you trusted that this were true?
3) What pieces of shattered glass from your life have you already seen God make into the beautiful stained glass window of your life in Christ?  In other words, what failures on your part has God already used to make you more like him?      

Attitude of Gratitude (A Reflection on the 11/25 sermon)

Jeff encouraged us on Sunday to reach out to people we love and let them know we are grateful for them.  With the Wednesday mens' group, we were actually given a sheet with which to list those people, and a blue ribbon to pin on them!  I was grateful for this mid-week reminder to express how grateful I am.

Jess and I just returned from a trip to Dallas, TX for Thanksgiving.  I saw my family - my father, mother, grandmother, uncle, brother, sister, and my sister's (surprise) new dog.  Since we weren't there on a Sunday, I was glad to know that my family planned to go to a Thanksgiving morning worship service at my home church.  Going to worship with my family was such a, well, familiar feeling.  The same people were early and ready to go.  The same people (including me!) were running a little late.  When we walked into the narthex - the street entrance to the church - the space was cramped with robed choir members and pastors preparing to process, all beginning to sing the opening song.  I found a few faces I hadn't seen in seven or eight years.

A minute later, the whole family was together, taking up an entire pew.  We weren't the only ones, either.  The family seated behind us had reunited from as far away as South Africa.  How many other families were celebrating Thanksgiving this way?  Meanwhile, as the choir proceeded down the center aisle, I recognized person after person from my time in the choir there.  Then, I watched as the pastors followed them. Some I have known for years and two, a Kenyan and a Chinese pastor, reflect a changing community.  As I thought about my time with the choir and the beautiful music we sang together, about the pastors who have been God's instruments for giving me faith in Christ, and about the new outreaches of my church to reach the world through the Dallas community, the entire church was singing "Now Thank We All Our God".  I was way too choked up to sing at this point.  And I love to sing!  Ask anyone!  I literally couldn't sing a word of the song because my soul was so flooded with the beauty of our faithful God.

A mountain top experience, for sure.  Perhaps you had one this past week too!  But what is God saying to me through that?  What is God saying to you?  For me, I think it is something like this: "Chris, you are so protective of the most valuable parts of your life.  But I spoke all things into being.  Your life, your faith, your church, your family - they are all words I spoke into being.  I sustain everything, and I sustain you."

Perhaps you had a mountain top experience this past week as well.  Perhaps you feel depleted and aren't sure how to give thanks.  Either way, take this into a conversation with your heavenly Father.  As you give your thoughts and words to him, he will show you who he is, and who you are.

Reflection Questions:

1) What surprised you this past Thanksgiving week?  Did a particular moment catch you off guard, and become less or more than what you expected it to be?

2) Who is the hardest person for you to thank?  What do you wish you could say to that person?

3) Read Psalm 33, and reflect particularly on verses, 8-9.  What does it mean for your life that God spoke everything that exists into being?  What are the implications for the things that are most under your control?     

Psalm 44, Romans 8, and "being killed all day long"

"Because of you we are being killed all day long, and accounted as sheep for the slaughter." (Psalm 44: 22)

Wow!  Perhaps we can read this and say, "I've felt that way."  Thanksgiving often brings extended families together.  And perhaps it is with our families that we see this idea played out.  Mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, brothers and sisters, and so on and so forth, saying one version or another of: "I've worked so hard for you...don't you care?"  The people we are closest to can be the hardest to love.  There are joyous, mountain-top experiences for sure.  But there are also deep valleys.  It is difficult, (even agonizing sometimes) to learn to live with the ones we love.  "For you we are being killed all day long."

If you read Psalm 44, you can recognize this same tension that we all know: "I've worked so hard for you...don't you care?"  Only Israel is a nation often at war with other nations.  Their soldiers were literally "killed all day long."  As hard as this sounds, it is worsened by the hope they have of a better life.  For Israel is the family of God.  They are his special possession and family.  The family struggles are all the more painful because they believe so strongly in the faithfulness of God.  Their faith is being tested.  They wonder, "Where are you, God?"

We all know what this is like: we encourage, remind, "love on" one another to make the right decision.  And sometimes it blows up in our faces!  We think, "Surely, if God was really here right now, things would be different."

Jesus and his cross make sense of all of this.  He gave everything up for us.  He came down from his throne in heaven to become like us.  If you think that is a long way to go, he then gave up that life to die for us.  He gave everything. 

Just think about "everything" for a second.  Everything you are afraid of.  Everything that poses a challenge to you.  All obstacles.  Jesus promises us that all of it is placed under his power through his death on the cross because he gave everything.  Do you believe that?

Paul did.  He thought about "everything" to describe this.  "Who will separate us from the love of Christ?  Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?" (Romans 8:35) These were probably things Paul was afraid of.  He placed them under Christ's power because he believed Christ dealt with them for good.

Then he quotes Psalm 44, "As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all day long."  Like the Hebrews, we wonder why God isn't with us when we suffer.  But Christ makes sense of this.  Suffering is awful.  But look at Christ's life.  Wasn't God with him all the way?  Didn't God do the most amazing things through him, especially the things he suffered? So it is with us.  From this Thanksgiving to the next, as we encourage, remind, and love on our friends and neighbors, it will get messy.  Like anytime I'm about to cook anything, I remind myself, "it will get messy."  But when it does, we pray, "Christ, bring life from this death."  Bring joy from this pain!  This is the power of God at work in everyday life.  Pride and ego will keep us from loving others because we don't want to get hurt.  We can't let that happen.  This sort of thing has to die.  So may we let Christ kill it in us all day long through his Spirit alive in us.

So when we are with our loved ones, don't settle to be "close, but not too close"!  We are meant for so much more.  More of you, God, and more of those I find hardest to love.       

I Believe in Jesus...but it's my Stuff (Part 1) (Reflection on 11/4 Message)

Kevin preached on Sunday about “our stuff”.  But before we get to the specifics, let’s think again about the big picture of the series.  Each week, the sermon title begins with “I Believe in Jesus…”.  The meaning of this is clear.  As Christians, we all want to be in a position in life where we are saying “Yes” to Jesus.  None of us wants to be in the position of taking exception to what the Lord longs for us to do anywhere in his word.  We leap to him, are content with him, and long to be with him forever.

And each week we move from this ringing affirmation to a different topic where we hesitate.  These are the topics that cause us to wonder what we’re getting ourselves into.  Are we in over our heads?  Can we afford to follow Jesus in this way and what will that mean about the way we have been living our lives?  Aren’t I the boss of myself?  Isn’t my sex life entirely up to me?  Isn’t my stuff my stuff?

As we go through the series, the challenge to each of us is to ask: “Is my affirmation of Jesus whole-hearted?”  “Do I hesitate?”  If we do hesitate, we do well to look into our lives for the obstacles to a more joyous, whole-hearted walk with the Lord of the universe.  He is the vine.  We are the branches.  But a branch with too much on it needs to be pruned.  Why?  Because it will break if the burden is too heavy.  Our load is lightened as we give more of our possession, our “stuff”, to be used for God’s glory.

God will use it.  Jessica and I moved into our home two weeks ago.  Our four U-Boxes were waiting for us.  Within them were all the sofas, chairs, mattresses, books, file cabinets, dishes, and all manner of “stuff” that we hadn’t seen in months.  It was great to see it all again.  But our time without them had been of a long enough duration, that we had started to wonder, “How much of this do we really need?”  Well, we haven’t sold anything yet!  Nor do we necessarily intend to.  (In fact, we’ve bought more stuff!)  But we are living the question Kevin posed to us.  “Whose are these…really?”  We are comforted in our hearts that our prayer is: “Lord, use this space for ministry.  Use our home for Christ’s glory.”

In Revelation 21, John is describing the glorious city of God.  There’s no temple, for the Lord God himself is the temple.  The city has no sun or moon to shine for the glory of God is its light.  In verse 24, we find this line: “The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it.  Its gates will never be shut by day – and there will be no night there.  People will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.”  What might this glory and honor be?  We might have a clue from another passage that speaks about God’s eternal city: Isaiah 60:11,13.  “Your gates shall always be open; day and night they shall not be shut, so that nations shall bring you their wealth, with their kings led in procession…the glory of Lebanon shall come to you, the cypress, the plane, and the pine, to beautify the place of my sanctuary; and I will glorify where my feet rest.”

What do these texts tell us about our “stuff”?  Well, it appears that we can expect some redeemed, transformed version of cultural goods to furnish the heavenly city.  “The cypress, the plane, the pine” will be in the city.  In another part of Isaiah, we learn that “the ships of Tarshish” will be there.  Can you imagine building a grand enough ship that God himself considers it worthy to adorn his heavenly courts? 

It is true that nothing and nobody will simply sail into heaven.  Everything of this earth must undergo a transformation, a humbling, a judgment. And indeed, both Isaiah and John in Revelation both condemn goods that are used to worship anything other than God.  God promises to “shatter” the ships of Tarshish in Psalm 48.   We all have to get the death out of us.  This is why Jesus came.  He is the life from death.  It is given to us through faith in him. 

As we look forward to the last day, these passages lead us to expect that the city of God will be populated not only with redeemed people, but redeemed things, possessions – redeemed “stuff”.  Andy Crouch writes, “The new Jerusalem will be truly a city: a place suffused with culture, a place where culture has reached its full flourishing.  It will be the place where God’s instruction to the first human beings is fulfilled, where all the latent potentialities of the world will be discovered and released by creative, cultivating people.” (Culture Making, 169)

Perhaps we can say this: you can’t take it with you.  But if it the Holy Spirit used it to make you more like Christ, don’t be surprised if you see it in the heavenly city. 

David had a slingshot and five stones with which to accomplish God’s will.  Will they be in heaven?  Only God knows!  But these passages teach us that your stuff matters to God.  The stuff of creation is of eternal use to God.  What does that say about our things?  What is our prayer for our possessions?

Reflection Questions:

1)    Have you ever found difficulty parting with a prized possession when you found a better purpose for it?

2)    In his fascinating book, Culture Making, Andy Crouch writes “…human beings, in God’s original intention and in their redemptive destination, cannot be separated from the cultural goods they create and cultivate at their best.”  Think of tables, chairs, meals, vehicles, clothing, roads, (or anything else humans make of creation).  What role did these play in making you who you are in Christ?

       3) What is your prayer for your home and possessions?