Following Jesus Son of God …

Are you ever surprised by how little faith you have?  I am.

I am not saying this as we sometimes do, slobbering around in false modesty, being “proudly” humble (yech) and all.

I am confessing my bewilderment at how little faith and trust I have in God at times, how I will roll through life and forget about God and his greatness.

Amazing.

How can I do that?  How do I get to that place?

As I was praying on the way to work a few mornings ago, feeling discouraged and encouraged at once as I shared this time with God, I spoke this to God — “But you are all I have.”

Now, initially that may seem good, but here is what occurred to me as I said it.  “Wow, Dave, how big of you.  God must really feel better that you have acknowledged him in this way.  He has probably been waiting all morning for someone to give him his due.”

Then a wave of realization of God’s patience and graciousness rushed over me.   Oh, Lord, I am so thankful you understand us in the way you do.

“You are all I have.”

How big of me.  It is true but come on, Dave, God is everything.

Could it be that God may just be able to do something about all the “situations” that I was struggling with?

Oh me of little faith.

Praise you, Father!  Great is your faithfulness and graciousness.

I am within a few chapters in Revelation of finishing my “yearly” read through the Bible which began on March 15, 2006.  Yes, it has taken over 1 1/2 years, but as I have said before that is quite alright.  The important thing is the continuous pursuit of an audience with God through the reading of his words.

Why do I bring this up?  To encourage you to step out in this wonderful adventure.  Nothing will benefit your walk with God more than reading his words, letting him teach you and living out the lessons you receive directly from the Most High God.

Just think wash and rinse cycles.  God words washing over and through your life daily, washing away misconceptions, washing in eternal perspective, rinsing away the dirt of the road, and our pettiness, and the darkness and confusion of our rebellious hearts.

So, okay then, attaboy, Dave!

Surprised by the truth.

Do you “come upon truth” as you read God’s words or are you always after some truth, proving a point, winning an argument, preparing a Bible lesson?

Okay, so you aren’t argumentative but you pursue fanciful interpretations or you manufacture your encouragement from the Scriptures. You wouldn’t say it out loud but you think you need to help God by putting a good spin on his words. You randomly open the Bible close your eyes and point to a verse and hope God says something.

I believe for many Christians that their study is way too self-directed. We find what we were looking for, or so it seems, but never more. The greatness and majesty of God never pop out at you as you round a corner in life. You don’t have “wow” moments. God doesn’t take your breath away.

You are trapped by what you already believe instead of being freed by the truth.

(John 8:31-32 NKJV) Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. (32) And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

The truth of God will free us even from ourselves. Note the progression Jesus directed the believing Jews toward: abide/are disciples/shall know truth/truth shall make you free.

The Jews who opposed Christ as described in 8.33ff were imprisoned by their religious knowledge. They wanted a savior but Jesus was beyond their framework of belief. They couldn’t accept what they didn’t have figured out already.

This text is one of my “come upon the truth” texts as a result of regularly reading the Bible and listening to God. The statement “the truth shall make you free” is certainly powerful, but seeing Christ’s words in context captured me.

What is my approach?
Do I study the Bible to find freeing truth or do I abide in, live in, his words and then walk as a disciple and then know the truth and then be freed by the truth.

I think I heard it expressed like this before: “You don’t even know what you don’t know.”

And this is what happens when we are puffed up with our knowledge of God’s word but are not letting the words transform us by renewing our minds.

Can you be filled to brim with Bible knowledge and not have truth? Yes.

Because your self-directed, self-contained approach to the words of God imprisons instead of frees you.

What might help?

An intentional plan or discipline to continually read through the Bible and live what God brings to your heart. That is really what I started out to say. Read God’s word and let God speak to you. Let him teach you. There is a time for study and searching, but I believe many pass on God’s gracious invitation to sit before him and hear his voice in this way.

Life-changing. Yes-siree!

Just ask me. I’ll tell you. Seriously. My life and theology has been changed more through my continuous reading through the Bible than anything else. I can’t say it enough.

It is always a good thing to better understand what it means to be a servant of the Most High God, to be able to grasp more of the vision and purpose of our worship and service to him, thus these thoughts.

What is audio?
Audio refers to sound or the production or reproduction of sound.

Maybe you haven’t thought of yourself as an iPod, or a Sansa, Zen, Gigabeat, iRiver or Muvo.

But you can “play” audio. The question is whose music are you playing? What audio files are the people around you hearing? And then there is the greatest opportunity of all which we will mention shortly.

First a little anatomical background.

How do we make sound or audio?

Voicing: A voiced sound is produced when air expelled from the lungs causes the vocal folds to vibrate. This produces a fundamental tone accompanied by several non-harmonic overtones.

Vocal folds: The vocal folds, also known popularly as vocal cords, are composed of twin infoldings of mucous membrane stretched horizontally across the larynx. They vibrate, modulating the flow of air being expelled from the lungs during phonation.

The vocal folds are open during inhalation, closed when holding one’s breath, and vibrating for speech or singing, for instance, opening and closing 440 times per second when singing A above middle C.

These thoughts were instigated this morning as I prayed. As it is so often, very simple, common things in our lives are a “story unto themselves” and that is what happened this morning as I thought of the simple process of reading and then audibly expressing the words of God.

I was preparing some readings for our worship service, and it just “occurred” to me what went on in the process of people standing and reading the words of God – the physical aspect of speaking, and the spiritual aspect of the physical action, as in our voice boxes being instruments for God.

I allow my physical body to be an audio instrument for God by air and Wind. Wind or air goes through the vocal folds and we have audio. The Wind of God courses through our hearts, we read God’s words and the words become audible. God uses the physical equipment he has given us as we bow before him and let his Wind blow, like putting the needle down on an old record.

Thus God’s audio players.

So I wanted to draw the attention of the people reading and listening this morning to the opportunity and the blessing. What is that opportunity and blessing? Allowing God to use us to voice his words, to be God’s audio instruments, his iPod or Gigabeat, for a few moments that we and others might hear his words.

You see the “files” were written down for us by men in preceding generations who gave way to the Wind of God and allowed him to use them as he saw fit. God breathed the words to them, and they wrote them down, preserving the files for thousands of years.

(2 Timothy 3:16-17 MSG) Every part of Scripture is God-breathed and useful one way or another–showing us truth, exposing our rebellion, correcting our mistakes, training us to live God’s way. Through the Word we are put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for us.

God breathed his words through some so that we would have them written down. God uses some to voice his words – audible expression of what he has had written down for us, air expelled across your vocal folds, the Wind of God expelled across your willing hearts.

So the next time you are tempted to think it is just Scripture reading, maybe think again – air expelled through the vocal cords, the breath of God expelled through the human instrument.

We can hear God now! Yes, we can hear God now!

I need to remember that God is God.  That is what I told myself this morning on the way to work as I was so worried about my oldest son who has “lost” much (maybe most) of his sanity.  Oh, my, just writing that shreds my heart a little bit more.  Yes, it is true and so sad.  As I told my wife the other evening after talking with my son:  “Sometimes I am too sad to talk about it.”

LJ is about to lose his job and working and providing for himself means so much to him.  Too sad.  And what are we going to do if that happens?  Can we take care of him?  Will he let us?

And tomorrow’s troubles were pounding me to the ground.

I’m thinking that maybe it was not me, but the Spirit of God, who interrupted my downward spiral with:  “Remember God is God.”  Yes, thank you, yes, God is God.

He really is; he really knows; he really cares.  He will give us grace and strength for what happens with our son.

But it is still so sad, a young man with so much promise.  He developed his mental illness over the last six or seven years.  Cause uncertain.  We can only speculate but has it ever been gut-wrenching!

(1 John 1:9 NKJV) If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

If I am faithful and just, and really, really mean it – “cross my heart and hope to die, stick a needle in my eye,” and really repent – I mean not lip-service repent, but the real thing, really changing my mind and the direction of my life, and promise to never do this again, God will forgive me (I hope!), but I still have to remember the cleansing part – clean up my act, work on my pride, because God is going to get tired of this over and over again asking for forgiveness.

I mean. . .What do I expect him to do if I keep coming to him, confess, sin, confess, sin? It’s not like he’s going to keep forgiving and cleansing.

Even though. . .that is what the text says, I think I probably just need someone to explain this to me. Hmm…

But now wait a minute here. I’m thinking that I should have at least 490 times before God cuts off forgiveness from me. Isn’t that kind of the quota that Jesus taught Peter? It might be hard to keep track of but at least I would have something in black and white.

Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven” (Matthew 18:21-22 ESV).

Peter maybe thought he was really being generous throwing a seven out there but Jesus slapped a seventy times seven on him. If you think that is raising the bar, some people get really carried away and say that Jesus didn’t even mean a specific figure but that he meant as long as they keep sinning, we keep forgiving; that even if they don’t ask for forgiveness we should still be ready and willing to forgive and to have an attitude of kindness and forgiveness toward them.

This is getting really confusing; almost like God sets a higher standard for me than for himself.

And then there is that time when Jesus was teaching the disciples how to pray.

(Matthew 6:14-15 NCV) Yes, if you forgive others for their sins, your Father in heaven will also forgive you for your sins. (15) But if you don’t forgive others, your Father in heaven will not forgive your sins.

I think the next time someone wants my forgiveness I am going to have to make sure they are really serious about this for their own good, no cheap grace here. I might have them do the “cross my heart, needle in the eye” thing for emphasis. Then I could tell if they are really sincere. I mean I don’t want to promote some milk-toast theology; people gotta’ pay, baby. That’s how our world works. Do the crime; do the time.

Whew! Now only one more hurdle. I am told to forgive others as God in Christ forgave me.

(Ephesians 4:32 ESV) Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

I might have to work on this one for a while. Maybe read a few books; attend a seminar; listen to some messages on being really, really serious and meaning it and getting right before God kind of stuff. And being committed and sold out too. Walk the aisle, baby, that’s where it’s at!

Yeah! That might do it.

If that all doesn’t work, possibly I can get someone to challenge me. You know – “double-dog dare me” to never sin again.

God would be proud of me then.

He said, “What do you think God is going to do if you just keep confessing your sins again and again?”

I thought (actually muttered in a whisper), “He is going to forgive me and cleanse me.”

(1 John 1:9 NKJV)  If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Duh!  It is what God had his spokesman communicate to us in written form in his holy book the Bible.

This is not original with me by any stretch, but if your view of grace does not allow room for abuse, then you do not understand grace.

Of course someone may “take advantage” of this teaching.  But are they really?  Do we really know what is going on in his or her life?

Do we know what “wash cycle” or “rinse cycle” this person is in his walk with God?

Christ’s death at Calvary provided a sufficient supply of grace and forgiveness to wash the worst of sinners and to keep the process going until perfection happens.

But that is in heaven.