4SpiritualSecrets

“I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some.” (ICorinthians 9:22)

The greatest missionary, teacher, pastor and author in the history of the church of Jesus Christ has given us his philosophy of service.  If you look up the verses that precede and follow the one I have quoted, you will understand the verse above more completely.  Paul writes that even though he was born free – when large percentages of populations in cities like Corinth and Rome were born slaves – he has deliberately chosen to make himself the slave of every person he meets.

To the Jew he will become as a Jew to reach a Jew.  To people who were legalistic he will become as a legalist to reach such a person.  To those who were secular and completely without moral standards he would become as one of them (within certain limits), to win immoral people.  To those who were weak (and I think he pointed to his temple when he used that word), he would become as weak that he might gain the person who was weak.

Paul was severely persecuted by the Jews.  He positively hated legalism.  Before and after his conversion he lived an extraordinarily holy life.  He was one of the greatest minds of his day.  But he adjusted himself to what others were that he might win them for Christ.

Have you ever opened a conversation with the question, “How may I serve you?” As you relate to people have you allowed the thought to cross your mind “How far am I willing to go to serve this person?” What is your philosophy of service?  What do you think it ought to be?

‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to Me.’ (Matthew 25:40)

Jesus taught that we are to be God passionate people (Matthew 7:7-8; Luke 11:9-10.) We are to ask, seek and knock.  Seeking is intense asking and knocking is intense seeking.  Jesus attached a tremendous promise to this teaching.  He promised that everyone who asks will receive and everyone who seeks will find and everyone who knocks will find himself or herself standing before an open door.

He was not referring to forgiveness of sins or salvation, but to our individual pursuit of God in prayer.  When people take this seriously and pursue God in the context of a sincere prayer life, they often describe their pursuit of God by gesturing upward.  My own personal pursuit of God was greatly helped by a short poem:

In one of His great discourses Jesus provided a basis for this when He taught that when we describe our pursuit of a deeper relationship with Him, we should not only gesture upward but stretch out our arms horizontally.  We should do this because we will find Him when we give a cup of cold water to the thirsty, some food to the hungry, provide clothing to the naked, take in a lonely stranger and visit the sick and those in prison.

When these words of Jesus take on human flesh they look like Mother Teresa.  What would these words look like if they took on your mortal flesh?

“But the LORD said to him, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’” (1Kings 19:9)

Elijah was one of the greatest prophets who ever lived.  First Kings 18 reports one of the greatest days a prophet could possibly have when Elijah led the chosen people of God into a great and mighty revival.  In response to his sermon, they shouted that they were going to put God first.  As an evidence of their fervent dedication to God they helped him kill 850 false prophets of the wicked King Ahab and his depraved Queen Jezebel.

The very next day when Elijah received a message from Queen Jezebel that she was going to kill him, this great and brave prophet ran into the wilderness then slumped down in exhausted despair under a broom bush tree and asked God to kill him.  God did not kill him but He did answer his prayer.  He fed him with supernatural bread then put him in a deep sleep.  This gave Elijah the strength to travel to a cave where God asked him “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

If this can happen to a great man of God, this can and does happen to all of us sooner or later.  Elijah was having a pity party.  With my severe physical limitations if I get anywhere near a pity party I immediately sink like a cannonball in a swimming pool!  In East Africa they have an often repeated Swahili saying: “pole sane!” It means “Poor pitiful you – poor one – so sorry for you!”

Writing as one who cannot survive a ‘pole sane’ pity party I warn you to flee this temptation like a plague.  It’s a blueprint for a burnout.  If this finds you having a pity party let God ask you “What are you doing here?”

“…  And what does the LORD require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?” (Micah 6:8)

The great prophet Micah asked a very important question.  In effect, his question was what are the divine requirements of God? What does God expect, require, demand, and command from me?  He gave three answers to his question.

His first answer was that we should do justly.  In other words, we should be a conduit of justice. We should stand up against injustice anytime and anywhere we see injustice.  Since we live in a world that is filled with injustice this could be very dangerous.  Jesus Christ did this perfectly and it got Him crucified.

Micah’s second answer is that we should love mercy.  Mercy is unconditional love.  This is the chief characteristic of the love of God.  David believed that the mercy or unconditional love of God would follow or pursue him all the days of his life.

Micah’s final answer to his profound question was that we are to walk humbly with our God. Humility has consistently been a characteristic of the great old souls we have known in this life.  C.S. Lewis wrote that pride is the mother of all sins and we read in the Proverbs that God hates pride.  If Lewis was right we can see why God would hate pride because He hates sin.

Are you willing to be the person Micah profiled?  There is a sense in which we cannot become that just, merciful and humble person through our own efforts.  But these three answers do give us a profile of the person God wants us to be.  Are you willing to let God give you the grace to be that person?

“…  But the ones that fell on the good ground are those who, having heard the word with a noble and good heart, keep it and bear fruit with perseverance…So pay attention to how you hear. To those who listen to my teaching, more understanding will be given.” (Luke 8:15, 18)

In one of the greatest teachings of Jesus He taught a parable about four ways people hear the Word of God.  We might call it: “Four Men in a Pew – Which One are You?”

According to this parable the first man is wearing a hard hat because he doesn’t understand what he hears.  The second man has a hard heart. His volition or will is not penetrated.  The third man has what we might call the hard choices.  He understands and he wants to apply the Word.  The weeds are things like riches, pleasures, work and worry.  He has to choose. We might say he loses the Word in the weeds because he makes the wrong choices.

The fourth man is described above.  When he hears the Word of God he keeps it and obeys it.  The first three do not hear the Word correctly and they bring forth no fruit.  In other words, nothing happens.  So, the bottom line conclusion is that we must pay very close attention to how we hear the Word of God.

Think of the challenge this presents to all those who teach the Word.  When you teach, seventy five percent of the time nothing happens unless you penetrate the understanding, the will, and the priorities of those you teach.  This means we must pay very close attention to the way we teach and hear the Word of God.

“Again, the kingdom…is like a merchant seeking beautiful pearls, who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had and bought it. Again, the kingdom…is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” (Matthew 13: 44-46)

These short parables present a beautiful picture of joyful, total commitment to King Jesus and to His kingdom.  They say to us, “If Jesus is anything to you then He is everything to you, because until Jesus is everything to you, He isn’t really anything to you.” 

 They also say to us that we have not really seen the kingdom of which Jesus is teaching until we see that this kingdom is the greatest thing we have ever seen.  The kingdom for which Jesus is recruiting subjects, is worthy of a joyful total commitment from those who follow Him.  These parables teach that we will never really understand or appreciate the kingdom until we are joyfully willing to surrender everything we have, and everything we are, to the King Who leads this kingdom.

 Decades ago, a group of nuns made recordings when they were on leave from their sacrificial work as medical missionaries in Africa.  “The Singing Nuns” as they were called sang, “A man found a treasure, it was hidden in a field.  He bought the whole field for joy.  He bought the whole wide field for joy!” They obviously knew by real life experience the meaning of these parables.

 The application of these parables is not just for singing nuns – it is for me and for you.

“If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone” (Romans 12:18).

 In this verse the Apostle Paul is informing us that we have boundaries of responsibility.  The J.B. Phillips translation puts it this way: “In as far as your own responsibility goes, live at peace with every man.” In all our relationships we have a responsibility.  That responsibility has a point at which it begins and there is a terminus where our responsibility ends.  We can’t control what the other person in that relationship does or does not do.  We can control, and we are responsible for, what we do in every relationship.

This is not only true in our relationships but in every other area of our life.  There is a hymn which laments, “Oh what needless pain we bear…” I often think of that phrase.  We bear so much needless pain because we do not accept the boundaries of our responsibility.  Into each life some pain must fall.  I have my share and I’m sure you have your share.  But nobody should tolerate the thought of needless pain!

There is so much needless pain in our life because we do not accept the limits of our limitations in that dimension for which we are responsible in our relationships.  This truth can set us free from so much pain in difficult relationships.  Paul is prescribing that we must acknowledge and accept our responsibility boundaries.

Someone has written that all nature is red in tooth and claw.  If we will fill and take Paul’s prescription we will be saying to the one in relationship with us, “Life is not a rat race or a dogfight because I am not a dog or a rat.”

“But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He rewards those who diligently seek Him.” (Hebrews 11:6)

The author of what is called the faith chapter of the Bible presents what we might call “The Hall of Faith.”  He parades by heroes of faith who showed us by the way they lived what faith is.  Before he exhibits these walking definitions of faith, the author writes some introductory thoughts about faith.  He writes that without faith it is impossible to please God or come to God.  He adds that if we want to come to God or please God we must believe two things about God: We must believe that He is, and that He rewards those who diligently seek Him.

In two places (in Matthew 7 and Luke 11), Jesus taught that we should continuously – and with perseverance – ask, seek, and knock.  He gives a great promise with this exhortation.  He promises that everyone who asks in this way will receive, and everyone who seeks in this way will find, and the one who knocks in this way will discover that the door on which they are knocking will open to them.  Seeking is intense asking and knocking is intense seeking.

Jesus was not talking about salvation when He gave this exhortation.  He was teaching us how to diligently seek God. According to the author quoted above this is a prerequisite to pleasing God and coming to God.  Can there be such a thing as an authentic believer who does not want to come to God and please God?

If you want to come to and please God find out what it means to diligently seek God.

He said, “It is finished!” And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit. (John 19:30)

The Roman Empire used the word “Tetelesti” when they crucified someone, or when a prison sentence had been completed.

Crucifixion was one of the favorite methods of execution by the Romans.  They crucified whole villages that did not pay their taxes.  Almost any act of what they considered a refusal to obey them could be punished by crucifixion.  They left the naked crucified bodies on crosses for weeks until the vultures picked the bodies clean to inspire terror in the lives of those they had conquered.

Jesus was obsessed with the work the Father had given Him to do.  He told His apostles that His meat was to do the will of His Father and to finish His work.  He said that He must do the works of His Father while it was day because the night was coming when no man could work.  When He was about to be arrested and taken to His death by crucifixion, in prayer to His Father He told the Father that He had glorified Him because He had finished the works He was given to do.

When He was convinced that His suffering on the cross was a sufficient sacrifice to forgive the sins of the world, He announced that glorious reality with a loud cry which in English translates “It is finished!” By providential irony for this glorious reality He chose that word “Tetelesti.”

By devotional application this means that there are no works we can add to what He finished for us on that cross.  Another application would be to ask, “What has begun in our life because of what He finished for us on that cross?”

“Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer …let your requests be made known to God.” (Philippians 4:6)

Have you ever heard any one confess,“I guess I’m a control freak?” My response to that confession is “Welcome to the human family!” The truth is we’re all control freaks.  Both Jesus and Paul taught that we should not be anxious.  What they both meant was don’t worry.  They also both taught us not to worry about the things we cannot control – like the height of our body or the lives of other people.

Speaking as one control freak to another, the thing that really freaks us out is what we cannot control.  In what the Alcoholics Anonymous people call the “Big Book,” there is an illustration with which all of us control freaks can resonate.  We think that life is a stage on which we are directing a play.  The people in our life are characters in that play.  As the play director we give them their scripts and their cues but when they don’t respond to our direction, our frustration drives us into a bottle or some other addiction.

When I was a student I had a mentor who wrote a poem with these lines: “You can’t control the weather or rainy days, but you can control the emotional climate that surrounds you.  You can’t control the height your head will be from the sidewalk, but you can control the height of the contents of your head.”

After quite a few of those his punch line was “Why worry about the things you cannot control? Accept the responsibility for the things that do depend on you.”

Follow the advice of Jesus and Paul and don’t worry about what you can’t control.