Following Jesus Son of God …

Just think about the process.

Over the centuries of Earth history God has interacted with his human creation, speaking to us, caring for us.

From Eden’s paradise where God met Adam and Eve for their daily evening “walk” in the garden, God has come to us, where we are, how we are.

But to go to him, to follow his Son, Jesus Christ back to heaven, we must bow before his redemptive plan.

God has come to us, but we can’t go to him except through Jesus Christ.

(John 14:6 NCV) Jesus answered, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. The only way to the Father is through me.”

We know these things because God has interacted with his people over thousands of years and has chosen some to write down his words.

Think about the diversity of the lives and the times through the Old Testament prophets, the nobility of Daniel from a very young age, the common nature of Amos, “one of the sheep farmers from Tekoa (Amos 1:1 GW), the “here I am” of Isaiah to the “here I go” of Jonah. Isaiah embraced his calling; Jonah ran from it.

A wonderfully amazing process, blending people, world events, time, personal circumstances and cultures to give us exactly the words we need to be able to follow Jesus to heaven.

I sit this morning in my study amazed, filled with wonder and thanks.

Praise you, Mighty God, for the words of eternal life!

I wonder if I won’t be terrified and thrilled at the same time when I come before the throne of God.

I am not one of those who has a problem with the “fear of the Lord.”

I think it a shame that when we feel the need to spin the drastic statements of God’s fear and holiness and reverence.

How my heart longs for that meeting when I bow in perfection before the holiness of my Savior and King.

Flawed and sinful now, but one day I will stand before God in complete acceptance because of the righteousness of Jesus Christ.

I bow before God this morning in my study and how wonderful this is. But I still fight distractions. Sometimes the busyness of life takes my attention away even as I pray, and sometimes the perversities of the dark places of my mind invade this holy time with my God.

But not then. . .

Not on that day when I come before the King of the universe.

The intensity of his holiness and love will leave me consumed in devotion and awe and worship.

How I long for that moment!

(Psalms 19:9 ESV) the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether.

(Psalms 111:10 ESV) The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; all those who practice it have a good understanding. His praise endures forever!

(Proverbs 1:7 ESV) The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.

(Proverbs 9:10 ESV) The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.

(Proverbs 14:27 ESV) The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life, that one may turn away from the snares of death.

(Proverbs 15:16 MSG) A simple life in the Fear-of-GOD is better than a rich life with a ton of headaches.

(Proverbs 15:33 MSG) Fear-of-GOD is a school in skilled living– first you learn humility, then you experience glory.

The summary of events:

She was bad, then I was bad, then she was marvelous.

My wife snapped at me the other evening. So I was angry. She was wrong, but I didn’t want to make the situation worse. I didn’t want to say the things that came to mind. So I left to run an errand (after I threw the checkbook across the room). Oops.

When I got back to the house, I tried to avoid her. The good part of my action was that I didn’t want to say any hurtful things. The bad part was I wanted to make a point and give her the cold shoulder for a little while.

[I’m glad you guys never do anything like this. Please pray for me. Oh, my, sarcasm is dripping into my keyboard. I don’t know if I will be able to finish this post.]

Hang on, I’m coming to the good part.

I’m sitting down taking my boots off and she comes toward me. Dang! My plan of avoidance is falling apart. Alert! Alert! Now she is going to hug me. What is a guy to do? I can’t be mean, just can’t do it. So I raise a feeble “I need some space. Please honor that. Leave me alone for a little while.”

But she moves in for the kill, apologizing for her sharp words as she draws closer.

More “let me alone” pleas fall weakly before her bold approach as she wraps her arms around me and tells me: “I can’t do that. I love you too much.”

Dang, boys! Now that’s love!

We need to live our lives past our myopia.

myopia (m? ??p? ?) noun (Yourdictionary.com)

an abnormal eye condition in which light rays from distant objects are focused in front of the retina instead of on it, so that the objects are not seen distinctly; nearsightedness; lack of understanding or foresight

Too often we do not have the perspective of forever. We see God but we do not see him distinctly, clearly. We have some knowledge of him but we lack true understanding and foresight.

We don’t see past the “room” we are in. By room, figuratively, I mean our space, spiritually, socially. This “room” can be some or all of our social networks: church, family, nation, work, friends, academic peer groups, internet relationships, etc.

Wherever or whatever it is that sets our rules for living and our perspective.

But no matter how good or how Christian our “room” might be, we will be nearsighted unless our roof opens up and we see the glory of God.

We need to live in the presence of God. We need to see our lives as seen by God before his throne. It is a two-way exchange — We give God glory; we are able to receive his abundance because before the throne of God we can actually believe the things he teaches us about life, ourselves and our relationship to our Savior and Creator.

Here is an example in 1 Peter 5.7:

1 Peter 5.6-7 ESV Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, (7) casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

You can’t really cast your anxieties on God until you know something of his greatness and care. Too often we begin at verse seven. Big mistake! Verse seven flows from verse six. The person who has bowed before the throne of God (“under the mighty hand of God”) and trusts him for his timing is the one who based upon the perspective of a mighty God can now trust him with all his anxieties and can know his loving care.

Any “room” without a skylight open to heaven does not allow enough light to penetrate when things on this Earth are darkest.

But a “room” with a view of the throne of God gives us a perspective we never dreamed of.

I’m tellin’ ya’, Dude, it’s so!

Wow, Amos, you’re really bringing out the new stuff today, dude!

Okay, so this is not a new truth but the reality of it may very well be new to one of us.

Basic Premises:

We believe what we want to believe.

We believe what we want to believe unless we let God change our minds.

We will not allow God to change our minds unless we trust him with that one thing.

That one thing is the area that either keeps you from God or if you know him keeps you from his abundance. And actually “that one thing” may shift to different areas of your life. I know it does with me. I sometimes fight God in this because I am either too stubborn or too afraid or too happy with my sin to trust him.

That one thing is that area of your life that God would change but he can’t because you (or I) will not trust him with the results. What we do is we highlight all the other things that we seem to be doing right. After all, let’s not focus on the negative. And God showers mercy and grace on us abundantly. But we come to certain places along the path where he draws our attention to “that one thing.”

Jesus looks at us, loves us, and directs our attention to “that one thing” so we can step forward in his abundance.

The following text in Mark gives an example. A man approached Christ. He had questions and answers concerning eternal life. He had part of it right. He knew some “Bible” and in his mind believed important texts concerning God and his relationship to the people around him.

Let’s look at the text and see how Jesus deals with him from his love for him.

Mark 10:17-22 ESV And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” (18) And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. (19) You know the commandments: ‘Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.'” (20) And he said to him, “Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth.” (21) And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” (22) Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

Many people get so close to Christ but are rebuffed by that “one thing.”

Many Christians get so close to Christ’s abundance but are rebuffed by that “one thing.”

It takes faith, friend, and my how I am learning that as I deal with my severely disabled son. I don’t really want the lessons, would rather not go in this particular direction.

I would rather the fiery ordeal wasn’t fiery, something a little more tame.

But I have to trust God for “this one thing.”

Yip, that’s what I’m saying.

Also, sometimes 20 is 1, or 8 is 1, or 31 is 1. . .

I heard this from Warren Wiersbe several years ago.

Some Christians don’t have twenty years experience in the Christian faith.
They have one year’s experience twenty times.

How true, how true.

What brought this to my mind recently was a man blustering “I’ve been doing this for thirty-nine years.”

And I thought, yip, sometimes 39 is 1 also.

One year of growing, one year of openness and humility, one year of being teachable, one year of starry-eyed awareness of something greater than ourselves, one year of adventure, one year of looking past Earth’s horizon and just almost seeing heaven, one year of the wonder of giving our lives for someone else, one year of believing God is as great as his holy Book describes him to be, one year of being immersed in God’s love and caught up in his purpose.

But the same year lived over and over leads to stagnation. We quit believing, exploring, loving. Lose the wonder, lose the life. No more adventures, no more looking at cloud formations and almost seeing the entrance to Heaven.

We close off God, know what we need to know, our pride becomes our most distinctive feature.

Step off the heavenly trail and all we have are romanced versions of days gone by.

We talk about the good old days and completely miss the vision of Heaven.

Almost all of the Israelites who fled the land of Egypt, who saw God’s greatness on a daily basis as they trekked through the wilderness, almost all the adults never made it to the Promised Land.

They missed the main lesson of the wilderness. They did not learn how to trust God.

They got within a stone’s throw of the Promised Land, standing just the width of the Jordan River away from heaven on Earth, and they couldn’t pull the trigger.

They did not believe that God could “pull it off.”

(Numbers 13:33-14.1 NKJV) “There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight. (14:1) So all the congregation lifted up their voices and cried, and the people wept that night.

They heard the report of giants and cried all night.

Now we come to the account in Deuteronomy where, after wandering in the wilderness because of their previous lack of faith, they are once again standing on the banks of the Jordan River.

Moses recounts their previous visit, Round One of “Going to the Promised Land.”

(Deuteronomy 1:32 NKJV) “Yet, for all that, you did not believe the LORD your God.”

For all what? For God’s daily care and provision, cloud by day, fire by night, protection from enemies, miraculous provision of food and water.

Deuteronomy 1:29-33 MSG I tried to relieve your fears: “Don’t be terrified of them. (30) GOD, your God, is leading the way; he’s fighting for you. You saw with your own eyes what he did for you in Egypt; (31) you saw what he did in the wilderness, how GOD, your God, carried you as a father carries his child, carried you the whole way until you arrived here. (32) But now that you’re here, you won’t trust GOD, your God– (33) this same GOD who goes ahead of you in your travels to scout out a place to pitch camp, a fire by night and a cloud by day to show you the way to go.”

They didn’t learn a d;+=#@ thing!

Why?

I believe a huge part was their grumbling for “the way it was” and the lack of vision for what God had promised.

All along the way they grumbled.

(Exodus 14:11 ESV) They said to Moses, “Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt?”

They accused Moses: What have you done to us?

Think about that one for a minute. “What have you done to us?”

He had answered God’s call and given up his peaceful life in Midian, went back to a land where he had once been wanted for murder and treason, faced off with one of the most powerful rulers in the world for their benefit, was God’s right hand man in orchestrating their escape, provided for them, had stood before God in their behalf, had led them through the wilderness toward the land of their dreams.

And because their perspective was so bereft of faith, they asked: What have you done to us?

Did someone just win the “dumb ass” award for the day?

(Exodus 16:9 ESV)  Then Moses said to Aaron, “Say to the whole congregation of the people of Israel, ‘Come near before the LORD, for he has heard your grumbling.’”

Picture it, God looking in on his children, taking a peek.  Wonder what they’re saying today?

Grumbling.  He hears grumbling.

He had rescued them, was preparing them for a life in Paradise, and all they could bring their minds to think about was “when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full” (Exodus 16.3).

I don’t know what my “meat pot” temptation is for sure, but I pray to God that I can have some perspective when it comes.

Our default mode is to believe what we want to believe. We believe good things about people we like and believe bad things about people we dislike.

Apart from an outside influence that compels us to believe in something beyond ourselves, we are doomed to default mode.

I have recently been listening to lectures presented by Dr. Donald Chittick, a creation scientist. He speaks of all the managed information he dealt with in his academic career. He speaks of the fact that we all interpret life from a particular bias. You may have the bias that you believe in God, or don’t believe in God. You may have the bias that you believe the Bible is true or you may believe that the Bible is not true.

You, and I, receive and process information through our bias.

But there are other processes going on as we handle the various information that comes to us. For one, we agree intellectually that there is a God, the Bible is true, we should listen to God, obey the Bible, yada, yada. . .but do we agree emotionally and volitionally.  The Bible speaks of this as believing with or in or hearts.

However there is one factor that throws the whole idea that we are in the “I believe in God” camp or that we are in the “I don’t believe in God” camp. And that factor is that no matter where we proclaim our intellectual loyalty, we believe what we want to believe. We believe what we think is best for us.

There is an abundance of information concerning the world we live in, its history, its origins, the eco-system. As I listened to the lectures I thought that no matter whose “side” we are on, even though a river of information is available, we live on a small stream which is the current “take” on life.

There is the pagan “take” on life that people buy into where these people don’t examine premises, or implications of decisions (for instance not recycling), or whether the textbooks are intellectually sound. We are getting what we want from the little bit of information fed to us and if we’re happy then we’re happy.

And there is the Christian “take” on life that people buy into where these people don’t examine premises, or implications, or the actual statements of God in Scripture, or whether our personal belief system is truly sound. We are getting waht we want from the little bit of information fed to us and if we’re happy then we’re happy.

Whoops! Wait a minute, seems there is no difference. Yes, thank you, that is my point.

Often there is not difference. If you only believe what you want to believe, then it doesn’t matter which “side” you come down on.

The Christian who doesn’t bow before the majesty of God and who doesn’t allow God inside to change his “actual” (as opposed to professed) belief system is no different than the pagan.

If God is not transforming our minds and lives, we are not godly, merely religious.

Got myself pretty distracted. Oop Arts means “out of place artifacts.” For instance if batteries were found in a culture 1,000 years ago.

Oop Arts LINK

The point I started with was that there is much information about the development of technology and society on this earth that we sometimes do not let the facts speak for themselves but we fit the information into what we want to believe.

Maybe I can develop this more later, but let me finish with this. We all need to examine how large a portion of reality we are leaving out of our philosophy of the sake of the moment. I will believe this because it will get me this now.

But what about later, dude?

 There was one unmistakeable sound as the Israelites left Egypt and traveled through the wilderness toward the Promised Land:  Grumbling.

They grumbled about food, the type of food, water. . .

Grumble, grumble grumble. . .

And here in Exodus we see that God answered their grumbling.

 (Exodus 16:9 ESV)  Then Moses said to Aaron, “Say to the whole congregation of the people of Israel, ‘Come near before the LORD, for he has heard your grumbling.'”

I thought as I read these verses this morning, how sad.  Not, I have heard the prayers of my people, but I have heard their grumbling.  He didn’t hear thanks or praise, just grumbling.

Heaven heard their grumbling.  Does that strike you as sad?

(1 Kings 8:49 NKJV)  “then hear in heaven Your dwelling place their prayer and their supplication, and maintain their cause.

My words and thoughts rise to the heavens, God allows them in, gives audience and he hears grumbling.