Holiness

Holiness is a word I think about a lot. I didn't think about it much when I was younger, primarily because I didn't understand the word other than it was associated with God. But the word simply means to be set apart. As Christians, we are to be holy as God is holy, we are to be set apart like Jesus was set apart.

A number of years ago, bracelets with the letters WWJD were very popular. It stood for "What Would Jesus Do?" The bracelet was a reminder to ask that question in a variety of circumstances. However, a question I like better is, "Is it holy?" Will my choice set me apart and make me more like Christ, or does my choice make me seem more like the world?

The Bible does not condemn the consumption of alcohol, after all Jesus made water into wine, but is it holy to party it up at a bar? Does doing this activity make you look more like Christ or more like the world? I have seen Christians in bars who look a lot more like the lost the saved.

The Bible tells us that there should not be even a hint of sexual immorality among us. So do we avoid cohabitation with members of the opposite sex while we're still single or do we live together like the world does?  The world does not question single men and women living together, but they may notice your stand to not do that because you want to avoid even the hint of sexual immorality.

The Bible does not condemn smoking, but we know smoking is unhealthy. Do we choose to honor our bodies as God's temple?

When we are around people who cuss and swear, do we cuss and swear too or do we set ourselves apart in our language?

When we are around people who are gossiping, do we take part or do we refrain and set ourselves apart and choose to love those who are being talked about?

When we see the person no one wants to be around sitting by themselves, do we leave our group of friends to be a friend to the friendless at the risk of our own reputation because that is what Jesus would do and did do?

These are just some of the things I think about when it comes to holiness.

Can't let God down

So I posted this video on my Facebook page last night and I woke up this morning thinking about it. In fact, I've been thinking about it all day.

It's a Christian skit put on by two guys, but the skit kind of hit me between the eyes. In the skit, which I will post below, one guy represents God who shows up with a hammer and chisel to chisel out the things in the other guy's life that don't belong.

Several things in the video made me think, but the one that was such an eye opener for me was when the guy told God that he had let him down so many times. God's response? "No, you were never holding me up. I hold you up with my victorious righteous right hand and don't you forget that. In this relationship, I hold you up."

I have often struggled with feeling how much I've let God down and how disappointed He must be in me. So when I heard that in this skit, it just hit me hard. I don't hold God up, so I can't let God down. God holds me up, so He can let me down, but He is perfect and therefore won't let me down. I may think He has let me down because I may put unrealistic expectations on Him, but for what He has promised, He will never let me down.

Furthermore, God knows my future. He has no expectations that I can let Him down in because He knows what I'm going to do before I do it. It is impossible to let God down because He has no unrealistic expectations. He has no need for expectations in His infinite knowledge of us. He knows the mistakes I'm going to make before I make them. When I make them, I'm not letting Him down. Rather, He's holding me in His hand, ready to chisel, to discipline me, not in anger for my making mistakes, but in love for wanting to help me, like a father would love His naive child.

I think expectations are a human invention. I think we all have them and we place them on others without them realizing it and we become disappointed when others don't do what we expect them to do. So I think we should strive to live without expectations - of others and of ourselves. We should live each day striving to live as the Bible commands, and when we mess up, to realize we haven't let God down, because He is holding us up and nothing is a surprise to Him. In fact, He accepted us when we first made a commitment to Him knowing all the mistakes, all the sins we would commit for the rest of our live as His children, and still has chosen to accept us with that knowledge. We cannot let God down, we need only surrender to His love and discipline for our lives.

Creation

Watched a video about creation tonight with high school students. I have heard a lot on this topic in my lifetime. I remember hearing about it when I was in high school, when I was in college, and as an adult. I don't jump into debates about it for debate sake, just like I don't jump into debates really about anything for debate sake. However, I do feel strongly about it and so here are some of my thoughts on creation...

1. God created everything in one six literal days and we understand days and rested on one literal day. In Genesis, it clearly states there was morning and there was evening one day. This was not a "figurative" day meaning millions of years. One morning, one evening, one day. Pretty clear. God says it very plainly for us to understand. If you don't want to believe that, then you open the entire Bible for man's interpretation and take away from the authority of scripture.

2. Evolutionists have the same evidence as those who believe in creation. They simply come up with different theories on how the evidence came to be. They try to argue that their methods are "truth," but they're just theories. Because unless you have a person who lived millions of years ago to verify their theory, it's not proven, it's an unprovable theory. However, with the Bible, we have someone who did exist when everything came into being and has told us about it. So, do we want to believe fallible, flawed human beings living today trying to tell us how the universe came to be, or do we want to believe the perfect creator who said He made everything and how He did it?

3. A lot of belief of evolution comes from people who do not want to believe God or a being higher than themselves who has more power and control. They want to believe that they have power over their own destiny and they don't like the idea of going to hell if they don't accept Jesus, but instead of surrender to Jesus, they try to come up with theories to believe instead of Him. Thus any belief of creation proclaiming Jesus is a threat to their false security. I had an anthropology professor once say to the class on the first day that not all questions are equal and he did not want to hear any questions challenging his position on evolution.

Isn't it interesting how threatened evolutionists feel by creationism? I do not feel threatened by evolution at all. Rather, I know what I believe regarding it and will defend my beliefs if ever challenged. (apologetics)

Bottom line...

1. What is more comforting to believe in? That we are cosmic accidents without a soul and when we did, there is nothing or that a all-powerful God created us out of love and died to save us because He loves us and wants to spend eternity with us where we will never die and there will be no more crime, pain, suffering, sickness, death, etc...?

2. Consider the miracles we see in the Bible after creation. Why is it so hard to believe God could create everything in six literal days? I am in awe of His power and might and majesty. He could create all this in six days, it humbles me into understanding how small I am in comparison to Him and His greatness. It reminds me of how worthy He is to be praised and adored. And shouldn't that be the point? All that God has done, all that He created, His infinite imagination and ability to breathe life from nothing, how dishonoring for us to try and say He is not that powerful and mighty. Why do we want to make God little? I for one want to believe in a God big enough to create a universe in six days, a God who is not the devil's equal so He can squash the devil like a bug at any time He wants, a God who has the power to end all my troubles, wipe all my tears, give me a new immortal body immune to the disease of sin, and love me with a neverending perfect love.

My God is bigger than man's attempt to diminish His power and abilities.

My own harshest critic

The Bible warns us not to judge others, but I think sometimes we may need to take that verse and apply it to ourselves - do not judge yourself.

I am my own harshest critic - to the point I struggle to really believe God accepts me with all my flaws and imperfections. It becomes easy to push aside verses that say things such as "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." In the words of Mark Lowry, "Woke up this morning with the years I spent hanging heavy on my mind. At times I see so much in me, I wish I'd left behind."

As my pastor said in his sermon tonight, sometimes it's easier to see God as the master and I'm the slave, making me fearful to approach Him, rather than understanding He is the loving father who wants and will always make decisions for me that are in my best interest, even if I don't understand them.

I get frustrated that unresolved issues from my past have had a severe negative effect on my behavior and feel He must be angry that I have not resolved them by now. But a loving father would not hate his child because they struggle so much. A loving father is overwhelmed with compassion and a desire to help his child overcome the things that continually bring them down. And God moreso, for His patience is far greater than man's patience and His love far greater and perfect than man's love. And so I need to remind myself He is a loving dad, more loving than my earthly dad (which is saying a lot because my earthly dad is pretty loving).

Last night I had a dream that I was a teenager in a youth group and some guy in the youth group was making me mad to the point I finally had enough and punched him as hard as I could in the face. I'm always so much more bold and daring in my dreams than in real life. I was immediately afraid that I would get in trouble and took off running. Eventually the youth pastor in my dream found and caught me, but when I looked at his face, rather than seeing the anger I expected, I saw concern and compassion. At that moment I woke up, but I woke up feeling good and I think God was representing himself in my dream as that youth pastor, that in truth, when I keep wanting to run from God for fear of being in trouble, in truth, He is chasing after me because He is worried about me, full of compassion and concern and wanting to help me, not lecture me.

So I think I need to take the verse about not judging and apply it to myself and stop condemning myself all the time. God is more patient with me than I am with myself and the negative self-talk does not come from the lover of my soul who died to save me.

Life hurts

Jesus said, "In this world, you will have trouble."

He did not say "might." He did not say "maybe." He said "will."

It's so easy to question God when the hurt comes. When life does not turn out like we expect. When we encounter hardships and struggles that seem anything but Godly. When we encounter a person who seems to hate us without reason. When we encounter Christians who are rude and exclude us because we don't fit their ideal image of what a Christian should be.

Life hurts.

I am reminded of a song Steven Curtis Chapman once sang.

Jesus suffered more than we ever will and yet God was with Him. And one thing Jesus promises is that when life hurts, He is right there with us.

Belonging

I think one of the most fundamental needs of human beings is the need to belong. The need to feel accepted and wanted. The need to fit in without having to change who we are. It affects people of all ages, male and female.

So often we try to become like others to be accepted by others and end up feeling miserable. A person who can see the beauty in a person who is not like themselves and accept them, befriend them, is a wonderful and blessed gift. For Jesus did not surround Himself with people like Him, but loved everyone without demanding they change. His message was simple - repent from sin, stop sinning, follow me.

God created each person unique with their own personality and abilities. So often people come to church looking to belong and when we ignore them or push them away because they are different, we instill in them the belief that God doesn't accept them. May we strive to make every person feel wanted and that they belong with us in the family of God.

Forgiveness

I could probably write forever on this topic. There is just so much to say about it. I am certainly nowhere near perfect at it. Wish I was.

As Christians, we often feel the need to defend ourselves rather than ask for forgiveness.

"The Bible doesn't say it's a sin."

But as Christians, we're called to be mindful of those weak in their faith. If others see me drinking alcohol and they struggle with it believing it to be a sin, or else they think it okay and develop a drinking problem, some of the responsibility for that lies on me. So I will be mindful of that.

 "You misunderstood me." "I didn't mean it that way." "You're being too sensitive."

We're putting the blame on the other person that their feelings are wrong and they should not feel that way. We think they need to toughen up, develop a thicker skin, and not let what we say or do bother them.

It is not kindness to dismiss the hurt in others, especially if it was caused, even inadvertently by us. Instead of justifying myself, which is weakness, saying to that person, "I am sorry, will you please forgive me?" shows great humility and strength. The world would say the former is strength and the latter is weakness, but God is not like us. After all, the Bible says the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom.

Patience

They say patience is a virtue. More importantly, it is a fruit of the spirit.

I think patience is incredibly hard in our fast-paced "me" society. We want what we want and we want it now. We have high-speed internet, smart phones, hand-held computers, high-tech automobiles, lots of cool technological gadgets and gizmos, etc..., etc..., etc...

I think as Christians, we often under value patience. We joke that we need more of it, but I think we fail to realize how damaging our impatience can be on others. The person of weak faith or weak conscience who we see us as impatient can so easily transfer that onto God and believe God must be impatient with them as well. And so inadvertently, we have instilled a wrong message of who God is through our impatience.

The same can be said when we don't show love, compassion, kindness, mercy, forgiveness, etc...

The more Christians a person encounters who shows them impatience, the more they form this negative, unbiblical view of who God is.

Now we're not perfect, but it's not right to get mad at the person by telling them that we're not perfect. Explain it with love and patience and ask their forgiveness when we've been impatient with them. I think I'll talk about forgiveness tomorrow.

Introversion

All my life, I've been an introvert trying to live as an introvert. It seems that the message I kept hearing from people, be it in school or church or the work place, was that the way to succeed in life was to be extroverted. Everyone loves a charismatic personality, right?

But when you are an introvert trying to act like an extrovert, it tends to come out all wrong. Then you feel miserable and try to compensate, but everything just seems to make a situation worse. Then you withdraw because of the stress of it all, and then people see you as being mad at them when in truth, you are freaked out at the idea of making things worse and are afraid.

Yet God created introverts. People to be creative thinkers, who thrive in solitude and value deep conversations with one person rather than mingling with a larger crowd. Crowds stress me out. I will avoid concerts or sports events because I don't want to be in a crowd. I prefer to go to the movie theater at a time when I think it will be less crowded.

Only recently did I have someone point out to me that I was an introvert and that person told me it was okay to be that way. Slowly I am accepting that and trying to understand my place in the word as an introverted child of God.

It's rather cool how God makes people so different from one another, and yet how He can bring us together with all of our strengths and weaknesses in a rather odd blend of gifts and talents to create something beautifully messy that glorifies Him.

Trusting God

Why is it so hard to trust God?

I think for me, I've had so much hurt in life that I've come to expect it. It's easy when I read the Bible to believe that promises written about were specific to a certain person or group of people at a certain time in history... and that He couldn't possibly mean those promises for me today.

I think it's harder to trust God too when the prayers that have meant the most to me in this life were not answered. I listen to sermons on faith and become all the more discouraged that perhaps my prayers were not answered because I lack enough faith, but when I try to tangibly understand faith in terms of how to have more, faith seems like a very philosophical subject and I haven't the faintest idea how to acquire more faith. And so I become discouraged and give up trying, thus feeling like God must be very disappointed in me.

But perhaps the truth is, I must trust God even through unanswered prayers, because God knows more than I do and there is a bigger plan at work. I suppose Job must have really struggled to trust God in all that he went through, and yet we see God's ultimate purpose for Job's life that all the struggles, all the heartaches, all the sickness, all the brokenness... all of it led to more blessings on Job's life than he could have ever thought possible, especially when he was in the midst of darkness.

So perhaps when all around me seems dark, when the struggle is great and the heartache even greater and all I can do is cry out, "Where are you, God?!" Perhaps I need just be still and trust that God will eventually come through and the blessings on my life for patiently waiting and trusting that He will come through will be greater than I can believe or imagine.

Trusting God is not easy. It takes patience and discipline and faith and belief that He is good, He is all powerful, and He loves me.

Be Still

I just feel like sharing one of my favorite songs that just helps me to relax when I am stressed or anxious or fearful or whatever.  "Be Still" by Steven Curtis Chapman

Psalm 46:10: "Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth."

I have a lot of trouble just being still. I always want to be doing something. But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places to pray. Sometimes, we just need to remember to be still before God.

Healing

So I've been thinking about the word "healing" a lot lately. I've recently come face to face with some childhood issues that never healed because I buried the memories and forgot them. I am only beginning to understand all the ways it has negatively affected my life.

I made the decision to follow Jesus when I was 12, after the issues had ended, but by that point I had buried and forgotten what had happened. Now as an adult, I've found myself questioning why God hasn't healed me. Why wouldn't he heal me rather than allow what happened to affect me in so many ways. After all, how can I be effective in my witness to other people when relating with people causes me so much fear and anxiety? And then I struggle with feelings that I have failed Christ and how He must be so ashamed with me for not having overcome all that has held me back.

But I have been reminded that God is a patient, kind, and loving God. Slow to anger, abounding in love.  I don't think I can begin to understand how much compassion He really has for me.

So then - why no healing? I am reminded of the Kutless lyrics, "Even if the healing doesn't come and life falls apart and dreams are still undone. You are God, You are good, forever faithful One. Even if the healing, even if the healing doesn't come."

I think perhaps the point isn't that we are healed and then can serve Him. I think the point is we serve Him in our brokenness, when we are still in need of healing, living in faith that the healing will one day come, even if it's not in this life. To not give up and become discouraged by our wounds, but to press on.

Refuge

Refuge is one of my most favorite words in the English language. Sanctuary is another. The two words are interchangeable in my opinion. They essentially mean the same thing - a safe place.

As a teenager, one song we sang frequently at church camp was titled, "Sanctuary." The lyrics simply state: "Lord prepare me to be a sanctuary, pure and holy, tried and true. With thanksgiving, I'll be a living sanctuary for you."

As a teenager, I really didn't understand what those lyrics meant. Now more than 20 years later... I still really don't get it. What I do know is that what I feel inside most often is not a safe place, but a place of constant turmoil. Fears and anxieties wage war with the Spirit of Peace who lives inside me. My selfish nature rages against the Holy Spirit's self-sacrificing nature. I hear so many words of advice that would sound good, but does not seem to agree with the Bible. More often I feel torn between my sinful nature and the nature of God which is at work to transform my life.

I am not a sanctuary. But I find refuge when I lay my burdens down, stop trying to do things my way or get what I want, and just rest in Jesus. He is my refuge. My safe place.