Tag Jesus

The Brief Joy of Falling Back

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English writer Samuel Johnson wrote sometime in the 1700’s:

Photo by Mike Labrum on Unsplash

“How small of all that human hearts endure,
That part which laws or kings can cause or cure.
Still to ourselves in every place consigned,
Our own felicity we make or find.
With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,
Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.”

By setting the clock back this week we get a bit of joy from an extra hour of sleep, an idea originally suggested by Ben Franklin to preserve candles. But the benefit will last only a few days. Similarly, our kings and other rulers may insist they can offer us lasting rest and joy, but their impact on our lives is much smaller than they (and often we) imagine.  But…

Jesus said, as recorded in Matthew 11:28-30 – “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.“

May Jesus refresh us for the week and work ahead.  Only He can provide the rest and joy we truly desire and need.

Christianity Isn’t Vegas

Todd R 1 Comment

The sign above is posted near the doors on the way out of the sanctuary in my church.  It is a reminder that sharing Christ with the world is not a task only for those who travel away from home to do it as a full-time job.  It is not a task only for those who go into a “hostile” culture.  It is a task for all who would follow Him, but it is not an easy task.

In Matthew 10:27, during a speech about enduring shame and persecution, Jesus tells His disciples: “What I tell you in the dark, say in the light, and what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops.”  For every disciple from then until eternity, this is an encouragement to public Christianity.  The world, including your neighborhood, workplace, and everywhere you go, is the mission field.

What has Jesus taught you “in the dark”?  In your private Bible study and prayer?  In books, blogs, podcasts, or anything else you do in private?

Proclaim on the housetops, though words and actions, how God has blessed you privately.  Don’t keep Him in the dark, but bring Him into the light.

There was an ad slogan that said “what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,” but Christianity is not Vegas.  What happens in church or in private, shouldn’t always stay in church or in private, and when you’re done reading this post, you just may be entering the mission field.

“The Sea was No More”

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  One of my favorite places to be is the ocean.  I love the roar of the waves and the feel of the sand.  I love catching waves with a boogie board or just bodysurfing.  Being in the ocean is my “happy place.”  But will it be that for me in heaven?  Will it be like that, only better, or will it be something completely different?

The Bible doesn’t provide us with a lot of specifics about what the afterlife will be like, but the Apostle John’s vision in Revelation 21:1 says, “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.”  Once upon a time, that last phrase – “the sea was no more” – bothered me a little bit.  How could one of my favorite things on earth not exist in heaven?

Two thoughts have gotten me over that, and I’m no longer bothered by it.

Chaos

First, that “the sea was no more” may not be literal.  What does that mean?  While the sea was part of God’s original creation and declared “very good”, later it is described as a source of chaos and evil, where Leviathan lives and the serpent emerges.  In ancient times, the sea was seen as chaotic and dangerous.  It was something to be feared and avoided.  In Canaan and other ancient societies, many believed there were gods over the sea and when the sea became stormy and unruly, it meant those gods needed to be appeased.  Therefore, when we see Moses parting the sea, or see Jesus calming the sea in a storm, or even walking on the sea, we are seeing God’s power over not only the chaos and disorder of the literal and the figurative sea, but also His power over the supposed Canaanite gods.  In that pantheon, Baal was the storm god and Asherah, the goddess of the sea, was his consort.  So, if “the sea was no more” is meant figuratively, John’s vision tells us that in heaven the sea will no longer be a fearful and dangerous symbol of chaos and death.  Whatever ‘gods’ we imagine rule the sea will be conquered.  The chaos that the sea symbolizes will not exist at all: the entire world will be ordered according to God’s perfect will and mankind’s work to make the whole earth like Eden.  “The sea was no more” is a good thing.

The second thought is that if God says a perfect world has no literal sea, I need to trust Him.  I don’t get to choose what’s in heaven and what isn’t, but God does and is infinitely more qualified to make that decision!  While the images of heaven we get in the Bible are obscure and difficult to understand, they do make it clear that heaven will be more amazing and glorious than anything we could imagine, or that we could achieve ourselves.  “The sea was no more” is a good thing again.

So, whatever your favorite things are here on earth, God has something much better in mind.  It will be the “very good” world He intended from the beginning, no matter what our expectations of it are or what we’d wish it to be.  It will the perfect “happy place” for all of God’s people.

“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.”

Lessons from an Unlikely Idol

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The history of the kings of Judah can read like a back-and-forth between construction of idols by bad kings and the destruction of idols by good kings.  Hezekiah was one of the few good kings, and one reason is recorded in 2 Kings 18:4, which says:

“[Hezekiah] removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan).”

Judah was meant to have only one God, the true God Yahweh, and to destroy anything that would lead them to idolatry.  Unfortunately, worshipping other gods in high places was not uncommon, and neither was worship of Asherah.  What’s interesting about this verse is the mention of this “Nehushtan.”  The origin of this bronze snake that Moses made comes from a story in the book of Numbers.

Photo by Michael Jerrard on Unsplash

As often happened while they wandered the wilderness, the people of Israel complained to God and Moses that they would have been better off if still in Egypt.  They hated the food God was providing and accused Him of leading them into the wilderness to die.  As discipline for this grumbling, “the LORD sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died.”[1]  The people repented and asked for the serpents to be removed, and Moses prayed for them.

The answer was that “Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.”[2]  This serpent being lifted up was later identified in John 3:14 as a prelude to Jesus being lifted up on the cross, but in Hezekiah’s day it had become an idol, an object that took people away from worship of the true God and the then-future Christ.  Instead of being a symbol of salvation, the bronze serpent became a symbol of idolatry, which leads to damnation.

The story of the serpents ends there, and there is no mention that God told the people to keep this bronze serpent, or that God told them to give it a name.  This was probably the beginning of the problem, that Israel added to God’s intentions for it.

So, what are the lessons for us?

Nehushtan, the bronze serpent, was created at God’s command to be an aid to worship, a device for reminding His people of His provision for them, from above.  Instead, it became an idol.  What this tells us is that anything, even something once (or currently) used in worship, can become an idol.  Even things like private Bible study or public singing of hymns can be idols if we use them as ends in themselves and not as a way to worship our only God.  A thing can be an idol not because of what it is, but because of our attitude toward it.

Also, something that is an idol to one person might not be an idol to another.  The bronze serpent was not an idol to Moses, but it was to people in Hezekiah’s time.  So, if we know that something tempts us, that thing might not be a temptation for others, and vice versa.  Therefore, we should not be quick to judge others for doing things that bother us, but may not be a problem for them, and are not specifically prohibited in the Bible.

When Christ was raised up on the cross like the bronze serpent and was raised from the dead like those who survived the bites of serpents, He identified Himself as the only God and the only one worthy of our worship, but He also identified Himself as the merciful one who desires that we be merciful to each other.

Like ancient Israel, we all have Nehushtans in our lives that corrupt our worship, and like the good king Hezekiah, we must remove them from our lives to reform our worship.

[1] Numbers 21:6
[2] Numbers 21:9

You are What You Eat

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You’re probably familiar with that phrase: “you are what you eat.”  You probably also know that it doesn’t mean that if you eat broccoli you turn into broccoli.  What the phrase does mean is that there is a very close connection between what we eat and drink and our overall health and well-being.  Good food is good for us, and bad food is bad for us, but in a broader sense than just its impact on our digestive tract.  By saying “you are” it’s incorporating a bigger sense of your body, and also your mind and general well being.

I was reminded of the phrase when I read Jeremiah 15:16, which says:

“Your words were found, and I ate them,
and your words became to me a joy
and the delight of my heart,
for I am called by your name,
O LORD, God of hosts.”

If “you are what you eat” then what happens if we eat the word of God, and what does it mean to eat the word of God?  We definitely shouldn’t be munching on our Bibles, but similar to eating, we must let what we learn from the Bible (God’s word) become an internal part of us, the very source of our life and energy.  Also similar to eating, it is something we must do repeatedly and regularly, or else we starve.  We should let it continually empower and motivate us to do God’s will, to be His people and to glorify Him.  We can’t “eat” God’s word by keeping it outside of our lives and admiring it at a distance.  We must do what it says.  James puts it well in his epistle:

“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.  For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror.  For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like.  But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.”  (James 1:22 – 25)

As Jeremiah said, “your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart,” James said we “will be blessed in [our] doing.”  But this only happens when we “eat” what we read in the Bible.  We allow it to become an integral part of us, essential to our identity.  We don’t get “joy” and “delight” from God’s word if we keep it outside and admire it from a distance or treat it like we would a textbook. We don’t get “joy” and “delight” if we think it’s only written for other people to do what it says, but not specifically written to us.

Jeremiah says, “I am called by your name, O LORD, God of hosts.” Christians are called by the name of Jesus, the Christ.  We all fall short of who God wants us to be, as do all who are called by His name, but that doesn’t mean we can stop eating.  I think most people can tell the difference between someone who “eats” God’s word and someone who keeps it at a distance or doesn’t bother to learn it and spend time with it regularly.  Someone with true joy is a rare sight!  Someone who delights in God’s word rather than treats it as an academic study, or as irrelevant, or as an exercise in fault-finding, is also a rare sight!

Therefore, don’t ignore God’s word, “eat” it.  Regularly.  Because you are what you eat.