Tag Jesus

What Wisdom Means to Me

Todd R 1 Comment

I’ve had some sort of working definition of “wisdom” for most of my life.  I think most of us have.  As a teenager, I remember joking that it was the ability to learn from other people’s mistakes.  It sounded teenager-wise, but how do I know what’s a mistake?  Later, I read somewhere about wisdom being something like “skill at living life”.  Also sounds useful, but perhaps vague and worldly feeling.  Even later in life, I started thinking of it as “being able to make decisions based on facts, instead of based on wishful thinking.”  This has been even more useful, but which facts do you follow?  How do you choose between two “true” options?  What if you don’t have all the needed facts?

I think my current definition is better: Wisdom is the ability to choose between the path of righteousness and the path of the wicked.  In the Psalms and the Biblical wisdom literature like Proverbs, there is a contrast between these two paths, and the idea that moral decisions are like choosing a route between places.  You can be on one path or the other, and with wisdom, “you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path”[1]

Moving down a path is an action, and therefore, wisdom is about taking the right action, not about what we know, believe, or say.  It’s not about accumulating facts.  Facts matter, but they aren’t wisdom all by themselves.  Adding the context of the Great Commandments[2], wisdom is what tells us how to love God and others actively, and in a way based on obedience that leaves the results to God.  For example, in the book of Acts, Ananias didn’t minister to Saul, the notorious persecutor of Christians, because Ananias thought it would end up well for himself[3], he did it because God told him to, and God knew that future Saul was Paul, the author of much of the New Testament.  Ananias didn’t decide based on the facts as he knew them, but he adjusted the facts in light of revelation from God.  Also, wisdom might sometimes tell you the best action is to do nothing, to not to do something specific.  Sometimes wisdom flashes a red light while others are flashing green.  “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death” – Pr. 14:12 and 16:25.

Photo by Alex Shute on Unsplash

This way of thinking about wisdom explains why the Way, the Truth and the Life must be a Person, not a set of rules or a philosophy.  Truly, only each of us, in our individual relationships with God through the Holy Spirit, can learn wisdom.  Only in a relationship with this Person can we figure out what our purpose and identity in the body of Christ is.  This wisdom is proactive and specific to each of us.  Nobody else’s situation is your situation, and nobody else has the same relationships, abilities, and resources.  Books, advice, and experience can be helpful, but we each need to “taste and see”[4] the Holy Spirit in us, working at our very core where only He can reach, and directing us down the right paths at the right times.

True wisdom will put us on a path that provides us, and this world, a taste of heaven through us.  It is informed by a justice and righteousness – God’s law and Christ’s character – that is not of this world.  With wisdom we can build and create new things on the cornerstone of Christ.  The world might not like it, but the world is not your Creator who is all wise.  Therefore, pray for and seek God’s wisdom as the immensely valuable treasure that it is!

[1] Proverbs 2:9
[2] Matthew 22:37-39.  In short, love God and love your neighbor.
[3] Acts 9:13
[4] Psalm 34:8

Lessons from an Unlikely Idol

Todd R 1 Comment

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

The Cross and Power

Todd R 1 Comment

“And being found in human form, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” – Philippians 2:8

Here Jesus endured the powerlessness that many feel. At any moment, Jesus could have chosen to free Himself from the cross, but He actively maintained His powerlessness for hours through the torture for our benefit. Any time we think power is the answer, we must consider this.

Photo by Wim van ‘t Einde on Unsplash

Holiness is Like a Bowl of M&Ms?

Todd R 4 Comments

Rock stars get a bad reputation for big egos and decadent lifestyles, and often for good reason.  But sometimes it’s just a misunderstanding.  Over the years, rock band Van Halen has been criticized over the infamous “brown M&M” clause in their contract with concert promoters.  Listed among many requirements, including how they want the stage set up and safety concerns, was buried a requirement that there should be a bowl of M&Ms backstage.  But not just any bowl: it had to have absolutely no brown-colored M&Ms.  This clause gained the band a bad reputation, because what kind of egomaniac would make someone go through the work of picking out every brown M&M?  Don’t all the colors taste the same anyway?

Photo by Sebastian Gómez on Unsplash

However, the clause had nothing to do with the band’s taste in M&M flavors or colors.  In addition to all the contract terms needed to cover many “important things,” they also needed a quick and easy way to know that the workers at the arena had thoroughly read the contract.  The M&Ms were that way.  Because of the “brown M&M” clause, as soon as the band walked backstage, seeing the bowl of M&Ms would immediately let them know the “important things” would be covered as well.

What’s this story doing on a Christian blog?  In the Bible, God describes His relationship with His people as a covenant, a form of contract, in this case between a King and His subjects.  Some parts of this agreement – consider the long descriptions of the tabernacle and temple in the Old Testament – may seem dull and insignificant.  Much of Exodus 25-27, and most of Exodus 35-40, detail the design of the tabernacle as given by God to Moses.  The collection of the materials, the work of the craftsmen in building the various parts, and finally Moses setting up the completed tabernacle are listed in seemingly repetitive and pointless detail.

However, in addition to God wanting His tabernacle set up correctly, the mere accumulation of detail also makes a point – that God cares about every single detail of His covenant with His people.  Nothing is to be ignored, just like the bowl of M&Ms.  But this concern for detail does not mean that He holds every violation we commit over our head to make us feel guilty.  Instead, it makes two points:

First, anything less than holiness is not good enough for God.  If He accepted less, He would not be just.  As one brown M&M was too much for Van Halen, or one drop of cyanide would be too much to put in our glass of water, one instance of sin is too much for God.  Therefore, only Jesus, by living the perfect life, could be acceptable to God the Father.  Fortunately for all of us, Jesus’ righteousness is offered to us freely.  He met the standard of perfection for us.

Second, the level of detail lets us know that He cares about every detail of our lives.  We can talk to Him about anything because there is nothing He is not concerned about or is not interested in hearing from us, or able to lovingly walk alongside us through.  David wrote in Psalm 23:4 that:

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
            I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
            your rod and your staff,
            they comfort me.”

The rod and staff of our Good Shepherd are not there to punish us, but to guide and lead us through every experience we have in this world, good or bad, and into the next world, where all is holy and good.  His covenant with us – His contractual promise – is to be our God, and we are to be His people.

Our Father in heaven cares about every little thing.  Even brown M&Ms.

Being a Master at Washing Feet

Todd R 3 Comments

English author Samuel Johnson said, “The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.”  I recently read The Residence, a book of real stories about White House staff over the years.  In a chapter on how staff often go unnoticed comes this humiliating negative example:

President [Lyndon] Johnson often undressed in front of staffers and was famous for rattling off orders while he was sitting on the toilet.  Once, reporter Frank Cormier was shocked to see Air Force One Steward Sergeant and Valet Paul Glynn kneel before the president while they were in midair and wash his feet – all the more so because Johnson never once acknowledged Glynn.

“Talking all the while, Johnson paid no heed except to cross his legs in the opposite direction when it was time for Glynn to attend to the other foot,” Cormier observed.[1]

When looking for an example of a servant being humiliated, author Kate Andersen Brower chose the washing of feet.  Worse than having someone undressing in front of you and worse than being bossed around from a toilet.

Photo by Felicia Montenegro on Unsplash

Jesus, looking for an example of how his disciples should serve and love each other, chose the same act, but from a different perspective and with a different attitude:

“Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him.” – John 13:3-5

Jesus does not need anything from us, we cannot provide anything He cannot provide for Himself, but He showed us how much He cares by washing His disciples’ feet.  He was willing to experience humiliation for His people, and He asks us to care in the same way:

“For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.” – John 13:15-16

“The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.”

Ask Him to give us compassion for those with dirty feet, and to give us the strength to serve as He did.  Because He has washed our dirty feet again and again.

[1] Brower, Kate Andersen.  The Residence: Inside the Private World of the White House.  (2015).  P. 88.