Like an apple tree among the trees of the forest is my beloved among the young men.
I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste.
(Song of Songs 2:3 ESV)
I know your deeds, your tireless labor, and your patient endurance. I know you do not tolerate those who do evil. Furthermore, you have diligently tested those who claim to be emissaries, and you have found that they are not true witnesses. You have correctly found them to be false. I know you are patiently enduring and holding firm on behalf of My name. You have not become faint.
However, I have this against you: you have abandoned your first love. Do you remember what it was like before you fell? It’s time to rethink and change your ways; go back to how you first acted.(Revelation 2:2-5 The Voice)
If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.
If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing.
If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.
(1 Corinthians 13:1-7 The Message)
When I become so busy that I don’t have time to revel in God’s love, I have nothing left to give. Without knowing deeply how much he loves me and wants to spend time with me I become a performance-oriented, fear-based person who spews dire predictions instead of faith, cynical expectations in place of hope, condemnation rather than love. I hear God speaking about a better way. I hear him inviting me to return and lay my head against Jesus’ chest, until I can hear his heart beating for me. Everything good thing flows from there.
I’m thanking you, God, out in the streets, singing your praises in town and country. The deeper your love, the higher it goes; every cloud’s a flag to your faithfulness. Soar high in the skies, O God! Cover the whole earth with your glory!
(Psalm 108 The Message)
“God is Light.” “God is Love.” That which professes to be light yet lacks love, is not of God; while that which calls itself love, but is not according to light is equally not of God.
– J. Charleton Steen
“And if we truly believe that God the Father is love, then we must therefore believe that He, as a Father, is patient, kind, and gentle. He doesn’t envy, He isn’t proud, He’s not rude, He’s not self-seeking, He’s not easily angered, He keeps no record of wrongs. He doesn’t delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. He always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. He never fails.”
― Darren Wilson, Filming God: A Journey From Skepticism to Faith
Well, it’s the season of my number-changing day, as my little granddaughter calls it.
This time of life has potential to be depressing for some of us. The question that crops up in this decade is, “What have I done with my life?”
This blog is about change, and I often write about leaving the past behind and pressing on to become who we are meant to be. In spite of many deeply regrettable choices I have made in the past, I am learning to say, “It’s grace that has brought me safe thus far.”
Sometimes it’s easier to forgive others than it is to forgive ourselves, but moving forward also means letting go of the debt accrued against ourselves by ourselves. In the same way that forgiving others means letting go of the expectation that they will somehow, someday, make up for things they stole or failed to provide, forgiving ourselves means letting go of the expectation that our past selves can ever make up for offenses against our future selves. I’m not talking about not taking responsibility; I’m talking about recognizing the futility of the task of trying recoup lost years by striving, and instead emptying our hands of false coping skills, so that God can provide the love and acceptance we still so desperately need.
I thought about Paul, the writer of so many letters to young, struggling believers. I wonder how he lived with the fact that he hated followers of Jesus so much that he had them dragged out of their homes, imprisoned, and even, in the case of Stephen, executed. He called himself “the chief of sinners” for what he had done. And yet, with the weight of that knowledge, he was also able to grasp the reality of God’s forgiveness. He knew he was loved, not just for the person he was going to become, but for the person he was at that very moment -for the person who had not yet “attained.” He could say, “By the grace of God I am what I am.”
I asked the Lord for a word from Him that would show me where I am and give me a sense of direction. I feel like I’m so far behind where I should be. I lost so many years to sympathy-addiction and depression that I have felt a kind of desperate need to make a difference in the world while I still have a bit of time left. I want to get busy and do something important for God.
The word I feel he is giving me for this year is “simplify.” The words of this song describe my feelings:
What can I do for You?
What can I bring to You?
What kind of song would you like me to sing?
‘Cause I’ll dance a dance for You
Pour out my love to You
What can I do for You beautiful king?
‘Cause I… can’t thank You enough.
…
All of the words that I find… and I can’t thank You enough.
No matter how I try… I can’t thank You enough.
Then I hear You sing to me: “You… don’t have to do a thing
Just simply be with me and let those things go
‘Cause they can wait another minute
Wait… this moment is too sweet
Would you please stay here with Me
And love on Me a little longer
I’d love to be with you a little longer
‘Cause I’m in love with you
(from “A Little Longer” by Jenn Johnson)
I’ve spent a lot of years wading through good and bad doctrine and theology, healthy and unhealthy forms of church structure and methodology, and proper and improper ways to express worship. If I were to classify my relationship with churchianity on Facebook it would be “complicated.” Today, if you were to ask me for my personal statement of faith, it might simply be:
Jesus Christ, Son of God, crucified, buried, raised from the dead and coming again. And this Jesus, who showed us who God really is, loves me. Holy Spirit tells me so. In the cross of Christ, offensive to the self-made, and foolish to the logical, is all my expectation.
By the grace of God, I am what I am. Present tense.
If that’s good enough for the Creator of the Universe, it’s good enough for me.
We hear much of love to God; Christ spoke much of love to man. We make a great deal of peace with heaven; Christ spoke much of peace on earth.
– Henry Drummond
The one who fears punishment has not been completed through love.
We love because He has first loved us.
(1 John 4:18,19)
The thing about fear is that once you are influenced by it you can be convinced to distrust your own sense of who God is and who you are and hand over spiritual discernment to “the experts” because they claim “extenuating circumstances.” This is how every major cult has started (including the philosophical movements that claim to be non-religious). It’s uncanny how often it manifests first in paranoia-based views of the future, followed by rigid authoritarian hierarchical structures, then strange attitudes toward sex and marriage and family structure. History repeats itself.
The thing about love is that it does not manipulate or coerce. Jesus’ love sets us free.
‘Tis grace has brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home.
One of the most common commands given thoughout the Bible is “Fear not.” One of the most common promises, repeated over and over in the Bible, is the promise of God’s goodness. The Hebrew word checed, variously translated as goodness, kindness, mercy, favour, grace or steadfast love is used over 240 times in the Old Testament alone. We don’t have a word in English that combines the ideas of strength, steadfast love and generosity, so we have to make do with several words or a word combination. Lovingkindness is one of them.
Praise the Lord. Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love [checed] endures forever. (Psalm 106:1)
The New Testament word charis is usually translated as grace.
And God is able to make all grace [charis] abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance [perisseuo] for every good work. (2 Corinthians 9:8)
The word translated “abound” here, persisseuo, means abundant, overflowing, exceeding a fixed number, excelling, exuberant, extremely rich, over and above, hyper. What is grace that is not “hyper?” Almost enough grace? Barely adequate grace? Scratch-and-dent grace? OK, but you’d better watch it next time grace? Is there anything about God’s grace that is less than amazing?
Can we honestly give God too much credit and not be overwhelmed with thankfulness and praise for every good thing He gives? Can we dare to freely join his His big picture plan with abandon?
Can we stop blaming God for the consequences of our own sinful choices? And can we please stop attributing to Him the works of the evil one, the thief who comes to steal kill and destroy? What is it that overcomes the evil one’s accusations and constant messages of fear and doom and the oldest doubt in the world, “Did God really say?” Is it not by the power of the blood of Jesus Christ, by telling our God-stories, and being willing to voluntarily love Him back with everything He has given us, including our very lives?
And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death. (Revelation 12:11)
God knows we seem to need to hear both messages a lot –Fear not, and His lovingkindness endures forever. The assurance of checed is given 240 times in the Old Testament alone. Strangely I find both messages stir up a deep anger in many people who consider themselves to be dutiful Christians. I’m always surprised when stories of God’s goodness in times of trouble when we rely on him, and times of need when we expect Him to give us provisions for the tasks he assigns us, elicit angry responses of “Yeah, but….”
Still, I can’t condemn them when at times I find myself worrying about the future. I hear the Lord asking me, So what has brought you through troubles and tribulations so far?
Grace. Your lovingkindness.
Then don’t be afraid.
Grace, abundant, amazing, overflowing, steadfast, loving, kind, merciful grace will continuously be with you, because I have promised to never leave you, and checed and charis are part of My character. I don’t lie. I don’t change. I AM love. I give abundant grace.
I promise. That’s why I gave my only Son. That’s why my Holy Spirit lives in you. I AM love.
Charis: Subject to Change 