The Closer You Get the Further You Feel

I'll be mowing the lawn and pulling weeds this morning. Mowing the yard is not a big deal to me. Asher hops up on "the tractor" as he calls it and we have a big time cutting the grass. The thing I hate is pulling weeds. That is misery. I usually do a terrible job of it too because I hate it so much.

Pulling weeds is a lot like the sanctification process. God is working to rid our lives of sin. That's what sanctification is. Each day and week that goes by we must constantly be watching and be aware of ways in which our natural desires lead us away from God toward a self-centered self-dependent way of life. That is where sin comes from. The moment we decide we do not want to live in dependence upon and obedient to God, we sin. That is what happened in the garden. The selling point on the apple was that Adam and Eve would be gods meaning they would no longer be dependent on the God.

As we grow closer to God, we will become more and more aware of the sin that so easily entangles us and causes us to stumble. At the start of our journey with God we begin to remove sins that are easily detected. Over time those big visible sins may come back, but they are easily seen and removed. Over time the sins of the mind, heart, and attitude become visible to us. Those are the more difficult sins to realize and repent of. The person that can recognize those sins is a mature believer.

Interestingly, the more you grow in your faith and get closer to God the more sin you will actually see in your life. D.A. Carson writes, "genuinely righteous people invariably become more aware of their personal guilt and need for forgiveness than those who have become so foul and hard they cannot detect their own shame." (For the Love of God : A Daily Companion for Discovering the Riches of God's Word. Volume 1, July 2). Each day you will repent of sin just as I regularly have to pull weeds from my yard. The problem with sin and weeds is that they both keep coming back. When you are walking closely with God, you will see your sin more clearly. That means that the closer you are to God the further you will feel.

In time you will even see that some of the good you are doing comes from a heart of sin. Isaiah 64:6 "All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags". Our desire to look spiritual, to get noticed and appreciated, or to feel important and have our egos stroked can inspire us to do good. But that good is a way for us to be praised like a god. With that attitude we will be walking the same path of Adam and Eve. It is a path of sin.

So what can we do. Is there any hope. Romans 7:24-8:2 "What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. 1Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, 2because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death."

Our only hope is Jesus. The Gospel truth is that in Christ we are forgiven not because we earned it or because we can live up to what we've been given. We are forgiven and loved by God by grace through faith.

Live by faith and the Holy Spirit will work in and through you to weed out that sin. But don't get discouraged with your feelings. The closer you are to God the more aware of your sin you will be, which might lead you to feel further from Him. Remember that in Christ you are in God and God is in you. You are not far from Him nor is He far from you. He is in you and with you and for you!

All We Need to Succeed

Carrie and I visited the Biltmore Estate yesterday. Wow! Those people were stupid rich. They had more stuff than they could keep up with. They had to have an army of staff to care for their property and home. It was amazing. The house is an architectural masterpiece. The land is gorgeous. We found a place down by Bass Pond and just basked in the glory of our God that made all of this. We marveled, though, at how those skilled workers took what God made or ordered it in such a beautiful way.

It is easy to come away from a place like that I think, "I want that!" I want that much stuff. I want a house with a yard like that. It is easy to think, "I could really raise some great kids in that kind of house and with that kind of wealth." (And sound like Jon and Kate, but that's for another day.)

The reality check came for me today during my time alone with God. I was reading Spurgeon and was reminded that God has already given His children all that we need. As a matter of fact, God has given us more than we've even put to good use. Think about it. God has given you gifts of His love and grace that you haven't even applied and experienced yet.

God has given us more than we know and all that we need to succeed in being the person He created us to be in Christ.

2 Corinthians 9:8 "And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work."

“When I stand before the throne
Dressed in beauty not my own;
When I see thee as thou art,
Love thee with unsinning heart;
Then, Lord, shall I fully know—
Not till then—how much I owe.”
C. H. Spurgeon, Morning and Evening : Daily Readings, June 30 AM.

What Defines Your Relationships?

Do you look to the past pain or the future potential of your relationships with key people?

Every relationship has its good days and its bad days. Sometimes relationships that last a long time or are meant to last through life have very bad days. At some point, once the dust clears and all has been confessed and forgiven, each person must make a decision. They must decide if they will let the past pain or the future potential of the relationship define their direction.

If you go the pain route, you can be sure where you'll end up. You'll end up with no trust, no passion, and no hope. You'll tolerate each other and miss the best of what each person can bring to the table. It's a lose-lose deal.

If you go the potential route, you cannot be sure where you'll end up, but at least you will have given the relationship a second chance. Going the potential route means you give each other a credit on trust. Trust is earned, but you give credit for what they haven't earned based on the possibility of what could be. If they blow, they blow it. If they bless it, you are both blessed.

So what are you basing your key relationships on: past pain or future potential?

Every Life Is a Construction Site

Every person on this planet is under construction. Some are being built by their Maker. Others are destroying themselves with the help of the Accuser and other people. God wants to build us into the likeness of His Son. When we allow God to restore our lives with His love and grace, we become human the way God intended us to be. We become the temple where God dwells. That is what God desires us to be - His dwelling place, His temple. (Ephesians 2:22 "And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.")

Satan is our enemy and accuser. "Satan - adversary; accuser. When used as a proper name, the Hebrew word so rendered has the article 'the adversary'” (Easton's Bible Dictionary). He desires to destroy us. He desires to devour us so that there is nothing left for God to enjoy. (1 Peter 5:8 "Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.")

So every person on this planet is a construction site. The life of each one is either being constructed as a temple or it is being destroyed by the enemy.

Not only is God and Satan at work, but we are also at work in other people's lives. Each one of us has the power to build up or destroy. Our words have power in other people's lives. They have the power to help or to hurt. Scripture tells us to use our words to build up. (Ephesians 4:29 "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.")

So who are you in business with. Are you working with God to build others up into what God created them to be? Or are you working with Satan and accusing them causing them pain in the destruction process?

Make no mistake about it. You are either building others up or tearing them down. You are either helping them be the dwelling place of God or you are destroying what God desires to abide in. Every life is a construction site. Are you helping people or hurting them?

Join God and be like God by enjoying the blessing of being a blessing. Build people up.

UP

I went with the big kids to see the movie "Up" in 3D. It is a great movie. It has all the ingredients that make a movie a must see for me. It had humor, a tug at the heart, and a message to walk away with.

The humor was the dogs. The dogs are hysterical. I am looking forward to the day, when Asher is old enough to get a dog. Age really isn't the issue, but that is the best way to explain it. Asher would kill a dog or a dog would kill him at this point. Or my wife and I would kill them both. We have to wait until death is not a probable outcome before we get a dog.

The heart tug was the story of the man and the boy. The man loves his wife. I love to see a man who loves his wife. A man ought to adore the bride he sought and convinced to marry him. It made me thankful for the sweet wife the Lord gave me and that I begged and pleaded with to marry me.

The boy comes from a split home and it reminds us that divorce stinks. It's bad for the husband and the wife. It's bad for kids. It's bad for society. People that marry need to stay together. And they don't need to simply live under the same roof and tolerate each other. They need to love each other and care for the other more than they do themselves. Marriage works when both a husband and wife make sure that they give more than they get and love their spouse the way Jesus loves those He's redeemed.

The message, along with the fact that divorce stinks, is that life is an adventure. Even though the adventures of our lives are not always the ones we thought they'd be. Our life is meant to be an emotional, relational, communal adventure that we take with God as our guide. We have to let go of what is behind and strain forward toward what is ahead. God has the adventure planned for us. It's going to be hard. There will be days when we will hate it. Sometimes we will love it. Most of it will be forgotten. But when we take it with the people and the God we love, it's quite a ride.

It was a good movie and a good day. Hope you had a good one too.

Find It & Kill It Before It Kills You

Jim Collins shares an experience he had with his wife in his book "How the Mighty Fall." They were on a jog in Colorado on a steep trail. He couldn't keep up with his wife. She was a picture of health. A few months later they discovered she had breast cancer. Although she appeared to be a picture of health when she was running the hill, she was actually carrying the carcinoma that would lead her to two mastectomies. She looked healthy, but she was actually sick with a disease that, if not discovered and dealt with, would have killed her.

Collins uses this story to explain what can and does happen to organizations. They look can healthy and can seem to be functioning well, but actually have something within them that could cause them to stumble and fall.

He writes, "I've come to see institutional decline like a staged disease; harder to detect but easier to cure in the early stages, easier to detect but harder to cure in the later stages. An institution can look strong on the outside but already be sick on the inside, dangerously on the cusp of a precipitous fall."

The entire book is about the stages of decline an organization goes through before it becomes unhealthy to the point of irrelevance or death. I am reading this book because I do not want the family or the church I lead to fail. I do not want to be oblivious or ignore the signs that could protect us from something that could destroy us. I love my family and I love my church and I am responsible to protect and provide for them as I lead them. It is my prayer that this book will help me.

As I was thinking about familial and organizational protection, I started thinking about my life and the individual lives of my family and the people of the congregation I serve. Each one of us has something inside of us that is at work to destroy us spiritually, mentally, and emotionally. And once that is done that destructive force will leave us no longer desiring a physical existence. This sickness is sin. It is in us and around us. It desires along with Satan to have us and destroy us.

We must be vigilant in seeking out the sin in us and be ruthless in destroying it. The puritan pastor John Owen said, “Be killing sin or it will be killing you.” This is easier said than done, but it must be done. Sin in the early stages of our life is harder to detect, but easier to kill. Sin in the later stages is easier to detect, but harder to kill. We must constantly be on the look out for sin and kill it in the early stages by confessing it and repenting of it to Jesus.

What can we do to identify sin in its early stages? Just as a woman needs to get a regular mammogram, so we must regularly look into our lives for the sin that so easily entangles and hinders us from becoming healthy human beings.

Here are some basic things to do:

1. Spend time in Scripture to seek to understand the nature of God. When we see and worship the greatness and holiness of God, we will more easily be able to identify the sin that is in our own life. When we see God's grace, we can confidently find forgiveness in repentance.
2. Spend time in prayer asking God to reveal your sin to you.
3. Spend time with someone of the same gender that you love and trust and allow them to examine your life. Tell them what you are thinking about. Tell them what you are feeling. Tell them what you do that makes you feel alive, full of hope, important, and happy. If if doesn't honor God, then it's an idol. And as all idols do, it will fail you at some point and cause you to fall.
4. Ask those you love and trust to pray that you would see your sin and find forgiveness in repentance.

Remember that if you are not a believer in Jesus Christ, you are on your own. You must deal with your sin on your own. That means you have no hope. As humans, we are incapable of destroying the sin that destroys us. We have will power to fight off the common stuff, but that will power produces pride, which always leads to a fall. Sin is too ingrained in us. It is a part of us and our world. We all need a savior. We need the One who can take away the punishment and power of sin. We need the One who frees us from the penalty of sin, which is death to God and gives us the power to overcome sin, which is life and love. Only Jesus can do that. Jesus is the One. He is the only hope. It is in Him alone that salvation is found.

If you are a believer, remember that you are not alone. Jesus is with you. He promised (Matthew 28:20 "And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age”.) He has sent His Spirit to guide us into all truth. (John 16:13 "But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth.") The Holy Spirit will reveal sin to us and Jesus will deliver us from it. As the redeemed children of God, we have the power of Jesus dwelling in us and God's Spirit directing us. We have been given everything we need to identify what will cause us to fail and remove it before it does. (Romans 8:31-32 What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?)

So what's in your life? What's in your marriage? What's in your family? What's in your circle of friends? What's in your church? What is in all of those that is working like a disease to destroy what is good and of God?

Chillin' Mostly

I've had a tremendous morning and the afternoon ain't bad either.

I got up and ran at 5 am and was back by 7 am to get some personal time with God. Carrie and I took her car to get it checked out. The ABS light was coming on and going off from time to time. Turns out it's not just the breaks. It's gonna' be expensive, but so it goes in life. Everything breaks and dies. It's part of the consequence of the fall.

I spent the rest of the morning listening to message from the SBC in Louisville and one from Advance '09. The thing I am hearing over and over is that the church in North America is in trouble. It sounds like there are pockets of progress, but a whole lot of decline. I do not pretend to know what we must do to turn the tide. I don't know that we can do much. We are so fragmented as the body of Christ. It seems that the church as a whole in North America has gotten so side-tracked and side-ways with each other on secondary and tertiary issues that we do not have time for the Great Commission. It seems that the church in North America has also gotten side-tracked with self. Let's face it most people in the church are more upset about the economy and politics than they are people they don't know in danger of a life and eternity without God. I don't have any statistical data to back that up other than the fact the church in North America is in decline.

I don't know what to do about the whole world or North America, but I do know what I'm supposed to do. My responsibility and yours, if you are redeemed blood-bought, spirit-filled friend of Jesus, is to love Jesus, love the people of the church, and love lost people. It is our job to make our individual church the most loving place on the planet and seek to share the hope we have in Jesus - our redeeming resurrected God.

I hope you are having a good day. I am about to try and finish up Mark Driscoll's book "Vintage Church." It is really good.

I might even slip in and get some shut eye with Asher. He thinks that's funny.