Discipine and Delight

Delight must be pursued through the process of discipline.

Or in other words, discipline facilitates delight. Discipline helps me create a well-ordered heart so I can love Jesus well. And I think that's what's really central to this whole idea. Discipline continually prepares my heart for worship.

My life can look really good on the outside, and my heart can be a mess. I can be disciplined - going through the motions, checking off Bible reading and church attendance, and my heart can be dead. Or there are times when I can be super excited about God, but experiencing no real growth because the excitement is emotional and ungrounded. Real, sustainable growth requires both discipline and delight.

About five months ago, I put down a tile floor in our house. It's the self-stick tile, so it wasn't that complicated, but I was proud of tackling my first major home improvement project on my own. Recently, some of the tiles in the bathroom have been pushing up, and we've noticed a little water on the floor after showering. Though I caulked and everything was theoretically sealed, water would seep through some of the tiles. Over the past month, we've taken extra care to avoid dripping water and cleaning it up. The water stopped seeping through and everything seemed okay.

Today I went to glue down the tiles that hadn't stuck well, and realized the whole bathroom area floor was soaked. Mold was growing, and none of the tiles were usable. From the outside, it still looked fine. There were a few flaws, a few tiles that appeared to need minor damage control, and a small problem that needed extra care, but nothing indicated a huge problem. And yet it's the inside that counts. I don't know how we hadn't smelled it yet, but once the water and mold was fully revealed, there was no denying the issue. Minor touchups were no longer on the table. Full force replacement was now necessary.

My heart can be the same way. My life can look pretty good on the outside, but once you get past the minor exterior damage, nothing short of full restoration can satisfy.

Discipline is a process that allows good maintenance. It makes me aware of the issues that need to be addressed in my heart before they come spilling out and damaging everything I'm involved in. This isn't to say by practicing the disciplines I fix myself, but rather, I am intentionally and regularly presenting and surrendering myself to God, expecting Him to be at work in me.

Duty and Delight

"When I surrender everything to Him and focus on just loving Jesus, my checklist isn't so important, and sanctification takes care of itself."

This is a concept I've wrestled with a lot the past three years, as I've sat under Jeff, the current youth pastor at church. His life verse is Philippians 2 - "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose." His emphasis is that our work is to surrender and do nothing - not try to fix our selves or become better Christians - and let God do what He will in us. He says that as American Christians, we really struggle with works based salvation, regardless of what we profess to believe. And I can't deny that American culture certainly elevates independence and Lone Rangers and pulling yourself up by the bootstraps.

I disagree mildly about how Jeff applies this though. He once told the youth group not to read their Bibles until they wanted to. His point is extremely valid, especially for kids who have grown up in the church with a checklist of dos and don'ts. And I think it's a great exercise, for a set period of time. Because when it comes down to it, human hearts are prone to wander and to desire things that shouldn't be desired. Far too often, as Lewis explains, our experiences with joy leaves us chasing more stuff instead of pointing us to the only source of Joy.

I want to delight in God and in communion with Him through serious study of His Word. But sometimes, the delight just isn't there. And while I agree that resorting to duty isn't the point of Christianity, there has to be a balance. I'm coming to discover that often, discipline has to jump start desire.

Love and Obey

For some reason, the Bible songs I learned as a little kid have been randomly skirting through my head. I guess after 10+ years of lying dormant in the dark recesses of my mind, they wanted to be remembered. Particularly, a Donut Man song has made me ponder recently.

Picking up my socks, hanging up my clothes, helping with the dishes, doing what I'm told. It's just another way of saying "Lord I love you."

You teach me in your word, to love is to obey. And if I learn to love, then I will obey. It's just another way of saying "Lord I love you."

To love and obey, it's the only way, even if it's not the easiest thing to do.

Wow. I'm a little impressed with my memory. Didn't know until just now I could whip out the whole song. It's just this one line that has kept me thinking

And if I learn to love, then I will obey.

I feel like sometimes in the midst of all the things I do, I forget that at the end of the day, my only duty and delight is to love Jesus. When I surrender everything to Him and focus on just loving Jesus, my checklist isn't so important, and sanctification takes care of itself. For it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose.

Chesterton has this great line about if you have a fixed heart, then you have a free hand.

It all comes back to the heart. Orthokardia.

"God's will for my life"

God is good.

After years of hearing Him whisper, I finally heard what He's been trying to tell me the past three years. Especially this past year, I've been looking for the wrong things. Reading Francis Chan's book Forgotten God definitely helped me crystallize some of these thoughts, but it's been incredible to see God confirm His word through so many different circumstances.

My dwelling place, my security, my home, my future is in Christ and Christ alone. If I look for these things in any other place, I will never be satisfied.

I do not have the right to seek or know "God's will for my life." It's not biblical to know "God's will for my life" as I usually mean the phrase. It sounds spiritual, but it's really just a demand for God to let me know what He's going to do the next five, ten, twenty, fifty years. And God doesn't work that way. He called Abram to go when Abram had no idea where he was going or where He would end up. We're called to walk by faith, not by sight, and sight is what I have been demanding of God, in a super spiritual nice way. Right.

But that fact is, I know God's will for my life. Scripture's pretty straightforward here. Love God. Love people. Follow Jesus. Walk in step with the Spirit.

And in His grace, He's given me more specifics - use media to mobilize the Church for the sake of the Unreached. Do I have any idea what this will practically look like? Heck no. But for the first time, I'm okay with that.

I have no right to ask/demand to know anything beyond this. I'm not supposed to know the five year plan or have my retirement figured out. I'm called to pick up my cross and crucify myself and follow Jesus and be faithful to obey in the little things every single day. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Honestly, I've been somewhat surprised to find the freedom in this, because it's definitely terrifying, too. But real grace is a terrifying thing. Radical grace demands radical discipleship, and there is nothing Jesus does not demand I give up. My flesh is terrified, but my spirit is at peace. Aslan may not be safe, but He is good. He is faithful. And right now, that's all I need to know.

Call and Response

So to make things clear after the last post, I'm not trying to be a complete Scrooge.

Mark Alexander, editor of the really cool and ever insightful Patriot Post, had this to say about Christmas:

For my family, Christmas is much more than a day, a season or a collection of memories and rituals. Christmas is a lens through which we endeavor to view all things -- the universe of our Creator and His purpose for us -- every day.
(emphasis mine)

It's not about the day or the season. It's about the Truth that was revealed - Incarnated - and how this demands a response. It impacts everything I do, everything I am. It shapes my worldview. I must celebrate it. Now, the celebration may not look traditional, but there has to be a response to the Truth. God's Gift cannot be ignored.

Alexander continues:

"However, it can be difficult at times to comprehend God's plan for us -- after all, how are we to discern our minuscule role in the enormity of His creation? In fact, in our home, we can become so distracted by the daily challenges, demands and routines that we sometimes neglect to seek His purpose for us."

I'm guilty, on both accounts. But its not the first as much as the latter that condemns me. God doesn't expect us to comprehend the plan He has not yet fully revealed, but He does require that we seek Him. It's not that complicated really, but I make it so...impossible. But truly, one thing and one thing only will keep me straight: seeking the face of God.

Alexander relates a conversation he had with his son, who was feeling confused and disconnected from God.

"God is always there, even if temporarily obscured from our vision.

We talked about explorers who crossed vast oceans in tiny vessels, setting their course by the North Star for places yet to be revealed.

When we make God our North Star, we are guided precisely along the path He has prepared for us, even though we do not know where it leads. However, as was the case with those early mariners, when we lose sight of our North Star, we must hold steady our direction until we find His guiding light again, correct our course and carry on.

Light overtakes darkness, but only if we open our eyes."
(emphasis mine)

Os Guiness has a similar thought in his book The Call:

"First and foremost we are called to Someone, not to something or to somewhere."

The where? and what? and when? and why? and how? don't really need to be asked if I truly understand Who I am following.

I'm not trying to be overly simplistic, because that doesn't help anything. And its not to say that I won't be asking these same questions tomorrow.

It comes down to a question of how much I trust Him.

May I have eyes to see and ears to hear, that I would stop kicking against the goads.

Alexander, Mark. "Christ's Mass 2008: Our Guiding Light." Patriot Post Vol. 08 No. 52. 22 December 2008.

I know I am loved by the King

"I know I am loved by the King and it makes my heart want to sing..."

I saw this quote, which is part of a song by Chris Tomlin, and it just jerked something inside of me. 

The King loves me. 

• Me! with all my pitiful mistakes, my repeat failures, my willful disobedience, my flaws and shortcomings. 
  
• Me! with all my lofty dreams and misplaced priorities and great imagination- all the things He must prick and rupture. 
  
• Me! the sinner He died to save long before I even knew or cared that He existed. 
  
• Me! now the sinner saved by grace, who keeps testing the limits of that grace -albeit often unconsciously- as I  stray and sin, yet again.
  

me. 

The King loves me. 

How, why, I do not know. But if I know even the littlest part of this truth (because Truth is Truth, even if we don't understand all of it yet), that The King loves me, how can I not sing? How can I not LIVE - truly live, as in the zoe life, abundant life, the life that is Christ? How can I desire sin, much less actually do anything that would in any way separate me from this King?

I know sanctification is process, it takes a lifetime, my old man is struggling with the new life in Christ, yada yada yada. I get that. We can't just jump from point A to point B and be done with it. 

BUT IT SEEMS TO ME that there should come a point of no return. A time when I realize all that I have in Christ and the absolute trash of the world. There should come a place where I understand, at least a little, of who Jesus The King is, and what He offers me - and this should propel me past all the entangling sin and the dead weight and the crap that beckons me to stay in and of this world. 

There should come a point when all I desire is to know Jesus, and Him crucified and risen and alive- when that is all I want, and no sin or pain or hell will keep me from pursuing this. 

Some would call this the moment of salvation, but perhaps it's more like Wesley's second work of grace or something. I don't know. But we see Paul struggling with his sin (Romans 7) long after justification and well into the process of sanctification. I think there comes a point in our Christian walk when we must choose to pursue God after we've experienced 'salvation.' I'm not making statements on predestination and that debate, or writing systematic theology to be studied by posterity (in other words, don't overanalyze what is spilling out of my gut into cyberspace). 

I'm just at a place of no return where I must choose radical discipleship or fall back and be content with the recycled religion I can spew out of my dark heart so easily. 

What would my life look like if I actually lived as if "I know I am loved by the King." I think my heart would be doing more than singing - I think it would be changing the world. 

I've been told that the only appropriate answer to radical grace is radical discipleship. I've been given radical grace. Let's see what radical discipleship looks like.