Glorify God In The Disappointments!

This last week I have seen plenty of events making international and local news. Events which have been disappointing from my natural perspective. However I wish to share an interesting revelation I had about disappointment and the way in which God works.

The first disappointment was the sorrow of the massive earthquake which rocked Nepal and killed thousands of innocent individuals. The second was the decision of the Indonesian government to execute, rather than continue to jail, eight convicted drug smugglers. The third disappointment was the loss by decision experienced by Manny Pacquiao.

Each of these three events were disappointing for different reasons. The first was purely disappointing because of the sheer tragedy of the event. The second was disappointing because I, like many other Australians, had hoped that the two Australians might be given a second chance to continue to reform other prisoners (i.e. to preach the gospel and continue the good work God was doing through them) rather than be senselessly executed. The third was disappointing not purely because Manny lost, but because of the nature of the loss - with Floyd Mayweather Jr. acting in such an arrogant manner and running and clinching for most of the 'fight' rather than fighting like a real champion.

The revelation I had however is this: God's plans are so much bigger than any disappointment in life. Ephesians 6:12 says "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms." Each of these three disappointments could lead people to want to be angry with other people, or with God, but the revelation I had is that our real struggle is deeper. It's not against the causes of an earthquake, or the executioners of prisoners or with arrogant prize-fighters. The real struggle is with the spirits and attitudes behind such events.

Obviously this doesn't remove the disappointment, but it's important to know that even if something disappointing happens, that God has bigger and better reasons and plans than we ever know. It's not about WHAT happens, but HOW you let it happen. And that to me is all the difference. You can't control a natural disaster, but you can control how you react to that disaster. You can't control the fact that the death penalty unfairly exists, but you can control how you go to die. You can't control the fact that in a boxing fight one guy fights in a way which is technically fine but yet may not be honorably fine. In fact you can't control anything in life really except your own response to how things happen.

And in all these disappointments I have seen friends responding with compassion to the victims in Nepal. I have seen outcries of anger at the Indonesian government of course, but I have also seen the legacy that those two men left behind in preaching the gospel and forgiving those men who executed them. I have seen people frustrated over how the fight went with Mayweather 'running and hugging' and acting in a manner that is far from a champion (I'm one of them). But you know what I also saw? I saw Manny Pacquiao use the biggest sporting stage this world has likely seen to proclaim boldly that 'Jesus is the name of the Lord' and that all glory belongs to a God who can make something from nothing.

You know who was able to do something similar in the Bible? Job! In Job 1:21, after losing everything, Job has the most powerful revelation of God's grace and the fact that he is mighty and in control. "And he said, 'Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.'" I hope that I can learn this lesson too that Job understood: that everything belongs to the Lord - and His name is as Manny Pacquiao proclaimed is Jesus.

As I am learning: 1 Corinthians 10:31 "So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." And that's what I want to do, in season and out of season, and through every disappointment and excitement!

Having A Sacrificial Heart of Worship

Two Saturdays ago, I went to a seminar on discipleship. The main point that I grasped hold of from this seminary was this: we can focus so much on building the church but Jesus instructed us to 'go forth and make disciples' and that he would build His church. This got me thinking in relation to a whole bunch of other things that I have been learning...

A core call of the church is discipleship: not awesome correographed dance/light/music shows, not fantastic preaching, not any cool or awesome thing that we could make or do. And why are we called to discipleship? I think it's because discipleship is an act of worship and our hearts are made to live lives of worship. Yet so many churches place focus on having a great Sunday service, rather than on building relationships and inspiring their congregations to be engaging and making disciples... And that's not just starting someone on the journey but following through with them so they lead someone else on the journey of following Christ!

It's difficult, it's really difficult. For me to do it I have to give up time and I can be like Martha in the Bible so easily: Luke 10:38-42 "38 Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. 39 And she had a sister calledMary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. 40 But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.”41 But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, 42 but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.”

But that's where it is all about the sacrificial heart of worship! I'm always wanting to encourage people now to be reaching out to who they can and I'm pushing myself to try and do it too where possible. I know there are times recently when I've met and prayed with non-Christian friends simply because I know they needed it, even though to do so was a drain on my time and energy. I love hearing from Jeanille that she engages with her workmates in meaningful conversations about God and church, I love hearing from Jay too that he does the same with his neighbours. I love hearing that all kinds of people in our church are starting to do it, despite their own inadequacies, failings and brokenness. God is moving as we sacrifice our lives in the act of worshipping.

Last Wednesday I went to United Prayer and there the message was on this verse: 1 Corinthians 10:31 "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God." The essential point is that whether you think something is too mundane for you to glory God in, glory Him in that anyway! Praise him when you do something that you do everyday, praise him by the way you drive on the road, praise him by the way you write your essays. Whatever you do, do it for his glory and worship and praise Him!

Last night at EQUIP we looked at Acts 13:22 where it says "22 And when he had removed him, he raised up David to be their king, of whom he testified and said, ‘I have found in David the son of Jesse a man after my heart, who will do all my will.’" I thought it is so powerful that God here has said that David is so much a man after God's own heart that he would do God's will! Not a 'he might do my will' but he will do. Our God is an active God looking beyond the failings of men and women to their hearts: looking for hearts which predominantly worship Him in spirit and truth.

And that's what I want to do. I want my heart to be right before Him so that I will do His will and not my own. I want to be a disciple maker - who makes disciple making disciples. I want to worship in the services on Sundays. I want to love my family and Jeanille how He wants me to love and honour them! I want to have a sacrificial heart of worship like how Abraham did where I can lay it all down to be killed and have faith that He will be faithful to return it from death and utter ash.

I had a revelation yesterday that when God gives us commands it's not because he simply wants us to follow rules and regulations to be strict but because he wants what is best for our hearts. And his rules are best for our heart and soul if we follow them and do what He asks. So my challenge to you is to look at something and ask yourself how you can sacrifice to Him in order to better be free to live worship. I know I'm going to start that challenge myself!

God Looks At Your Heart

1 Corinthians 4:20 For the Kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk; it is living by God's power.
I tend to be a passionate type of person - which is a strength and a weakness in its own ways. Like for instance how I sometimes catch myself responding to news reports emotionally, angry at how twisted the world is. Just earlier this week I found myself hearing about the crimes of the suspect in the murder of a 17 year old girl and caught myself thinking 'this is the type of crime that deserves the death penalty.' But then I retracted my thoughts (after all I don't really believe in the death penalty) as God said clearly to me 'don't you think my grace is enough to redeem everyone? Even this individual?'

As 2 Corinthians 12:9 says "But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me." It's this that enables me to humbly admit that I am weak - according to my own admission of anger towards human injustice I commit a murder of a man within my heart (see Matthew 5) and I deserve death just as much as any criminal. I deserve eternal death - we all do - and when you come to realise this you realise the true power of grace. That I was dead in sin but now can be alive to Christ to live a life of authority.

 In 1 Samuel 16:7 God informs Samuel that His ways are not the ways of mankind: "But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."" It is this look at the heart that is so truly important to God and it's something I continue to learn (and as I was reminded last week God's mercies are new every morning).

My challenge to you is to REMEMBER. To remember the grace God has given you, in order that you might be able to give out that same grace. God cares not about where you are at physically - he cares so much more where you are spiritually in your heart. He wants you to put Him first because it is what you were made for: to walk not in words or broken actions but in the life of God's power. And that's what I want to do more and more and more :)

Equipped to Fear God

Jack was born on the 23rd April, 1992, into a happy family. He had a two-years-older brother and a three-years-older sister and as the youngest boy was the baby of the family. There was just one small thing, like the rest of his family Jack was a zombie. A zombie - like everyone else in the world.
It wasn't so recognisable when he was born, certainly, he looked like any other baby. But as Jack aged and grew, the zombie side of his personality grew with him. At the age of two his teeth began to rot, and a foul odor developed around his mouth. At the age of five he broke his leg - permanently so that he was always dragging it with him like a personal issue wherever he walked (or rather hobbled). By the age of thirteen Jack looked just like the rest of his zombie family: falling to pieces, rotting to the core, every action in life tearing pieces of his flesh apart.
He saw many arguments between his parents, each one ripping the brains and the hearts of his mother or his father irreparably (though they tried to stitch themselves physically together as best as they could). He saw the brokeness in his brother and sister, sinking into alcohol - the drink burning a slow hole through what mess was left of their decaying livers. He felt hopeless, rotting and dead.
By the age of eighteen, Jack had tried everything to make himself feel alive. He tried relationships of varying kinds and levels of commitment. He tried alcohol and other recreational drugs. He tried distracting himself with movies, video games and musical pursuits. But nothing worked.
Until at the age of 22, Jack met a man unlike anyone else he had ever seen. The man looked like any other zombie, but remarkably there was something about his flesh that was clean and pure and free of rot. The odd bruise and scar mark decorated his body - but the stench of death was nowhere to be found. Jack found out that the reason for this clean, fresh look? The blood of the one perfect man to ever walk the planet - the only man without the zombie plague.

Of course the previous is a little allegorical story concept that came to me based on something Ken said yesterday during EQUIP - that really, without Jesus all of us are the walking dead. That we are rotting away and each of our actions destroy and cut and burn us all the more. Some of us try and kill the deadness with other things like drugs, exploring our sexuality, movies, video games and so many other things - but without Jesus it only makes it worse.

Ken was also talking about the fear of God, mentioning how it's meant to be a type of holy respect. He made the comment that so many of us put God into a box, because it's more convenient to turn God into the type of God that we want. We decide he can't be all knowing because somehow His being all-knowing means that we can't have free will (although I consider that a logical fallacy). We decide he can't be all powerful because we want a God who is more like the Roman, Egyptian, Greek or Norse gods - like an immortal human in the sky. The problem is that you cannot respect a human made god because a god which is designed by you is no god whatsoever. To be God is to be alien, holy, above and beyond the flawed nature of humanity. The very fact that God became fully God and fully man in the invested incarnation of Jesus is sheer insanity - it's awe-inspiring and wonderful and should be respected. But again, some of us turn instead to other things.

I know that I have turned to other things at times. I am guilty of indulging my own humanity rather than worshiping the greatness of God. I am thankful that I serve a loving and gracious God who forgives, but I still lack a full revelation of the greatness of God. I need a true balance between the God who loves me, and the God who created a universe with words. In other words, I want to truly worship the God who deserves it - turning from my zombie habits (not eating other people's brains and hearts and fruitlessly stitching up wounds that will not heal) - and live a life of power, not of effort.

I didn't quite finish my above story. If I was to continue writing it, to tell about Jesus allegorically it would run something like this (and there's a really great series of books by Ted Dekker which tell the same kind of allegory - Black, Red and White): But not only was this man perfectly free of the zombie plague. The only man who could ever truly be free, he chose to sacrifice His freedom and become one of the zombies taking the plague upon himself so that through His death He might create the perfect antidote in His blood. For such a perfect man to die was the greatest sacrifice - a sacrifice of love so that others could be freed from the curse of being one of the walking dead. His only command being that those who received the cure were to tell others about this new, free, way to live. And so Jack was left with a choice: accept the cure and the responsibility to tell others about their savior, or to continue to live as one of the many living dead... 

You see, Jesus gave up his all - he became like us and bore a cross for all. Isaiah 53:6 "We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all." His resurrection provides a powerful antidote to our own eternal suffering and provides a new, resurrected way for all of us to live - As Philippians 3:10 says "I want to know Christ--yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death," And yet the only thing that is asked of us is that we spread the message about this cure. My encouragement is that you become equipped and reminded of how great a God we serve and that you too can follow his one simple command of sharing the blessing He gives to you!

The Echoing of Eternity

In the past month, two notable pop culture icons passed away. The first was Leonard Nimoy, famous for his acting portrayal of Spock in Star Trek. The second, early this morning, was the fantasy author Sir Terry Pratchett. Both men left a huge impact behind on people's lives with their creativity and spirit (though I am not aware as to where either men stand in a relationship with God).

There's also a sadder story of someone who left an impact on people's lives. You may have heard about the teenager who left to the middle east to join Islamic State and ended up (from reports) being used as a car bomber. He too left an impact - albeit a horrific one - one that I have been thinking and questioning about. My question roughly being one that puzzles over how anyone could be so lost as to destroy themselves for a cause. For me to be radical for God is to live a life of true happiness and joy - not of hatred that leads me to kill...

On the radio this morning as I drove home, someone mentioned the phrase 'echo in eternity' which instantly reminded me of the famous quote from Gladiator: "What we do in life echoes in eternity." Why I referred to two men who have become popular figures, or a boy who destroyed himself mistakenly, in this context should become rather apparent. I am indicating lives which have their own echoes in eternity. 

Now some Christians look at things like alcohol, partying and films or literature as a waste of time. They might ask me why I would add to the celebration of lives famous for films and books. My answer would be this: that all lives are worth celebrating, because all lives are created by God and should be for God. The ability of an actor to bring joy to someone's life is a great thing and so to is the ability of the author - though they might seem trivial perhaps in the one small moment they touch someone's life positively they might bring that person closer to God. You never know, after all God created our talents to reflect His glory. The problem is that often people use such talents and lives selfishly - ignoring the great fact that this life is but an echo in eternity.

As 1 Corinthians 10:31 says "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God." This is my encouragement for you today - a kind of memento mori (a remembrance of your mortality) but not in a sobering way, in a way that encourages you to bring joy to the world around you. Be the echo of eternity in someone's life: use your gifts to bring positivity and joy to the people around you. I want my writing and communication gifts to be used in Church in anyway sure, but I also want them used everywhere - much as I want to be everywhere I am needed - to glorify God.

Thinking about the fact that this life is not even a mere scratch on the whole concept of all time that has ever been and will be - let alone eternity - can be hugely daunting. It can leave you thinking and questioning what kind of difference you can make. Well as David Mitchell wrote in Cloud Atlas:
"He who would do battle with the many-headed hydra of human nature must pay a world of pain & his family must pay it along with him! & only as you gasp your dying breath shall you understand, your life amounted to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean!" Yet what is any ocean but a multitude of drops?"

It is a quote I love because it points out that life is full of little meaning, pain and hopelessness - that is if you live your life not serving God. It further hints at the fact that you can make a difference as part of a whole group of people together making that difference. Alone you might not feel like you are making a real echo in eternity - but you are never alone if you have the Creator of the universe listening to you. If you live to glorify Him, if you seek Him first, then you become more than just an echo: you become a pleasing cry in His ear - a cry of worship!