Only Dead People See God!

Moses had the audacity to ask God: “Show me your glory.” And God agreed to show Moses the backside of His glory, saying “you shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen…for no man can see Me and live!” (Exodus 33)

If not one can see God and live, then logically, can we not say that only dead people can see God!?

I find two “dying to live” principles that derive from this Old Testament decree (no one can see God and live) that relate to us as New Covenant believers:

First, Jesus said blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. The only way our hearts can be ‘pure’ is to die to our sinful and self-centered selves. So to see God, we must surrender, or die to, our self-centeredness. The wonderful result is a God-centeredness that changes the way we see all of life.

Second, since only ‘dead’ people see God, doesn’t it make sense that the ‘deader’ we are to self-life, the more alive we become God-life, and the more we see God.

Consider yourself dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus…and pursue peace with all men and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord (Romans 6:11; Hebrews 12:14).

As Long as We Desire Things, We Cannot be Satisfied with Just God

I was having coffee with a friend yesterday and he was telling me how much God had blessed him in his business in the last several years, and now he is experience (like many others!) a substantial decrease in income. Though he didn’t actually say it, the implication was that he was not presently experiencing God’s blessings.

And almost immediately, the thought came to me: God is still blessing him, but in a different way. How is God blessing him? By depriving him. Wow! You say to me, ‘Greg, you actually believe deprivation is a blessing?’ And my answer is a resounding “yes!” Isn’t that what God did in the wilderness? He deprived Israel of leeks and onions so they would learn that His Presence was more to be treasured than even food and water. The blessing is this: God uses deprivations to free us from dependency (which can become idolatry!) on “things.” Those who have no longing for God Himself become preoccupied with things.

As long as we still desire things, we cannot be satisfied with just God!

Through many deprivations, God blesses us! God changes our inner being that we might truly come to have a hunger for God for Himself.

"...besides Thee, I desire nothing on earth. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever..." (Psalm 73:25-26)

Don't Look Back!

Years ago, in my studies in psychology, I learned about “regression.”

Quite simply, regression is a temporary reversion to a childish behavior rather than handling stresses in a more adult way. An example would be a man who throws a temper tantrum when he doesn’t get the promotion he expected! Or a woman who reads romance novels, watches soap operas and eats a quart of ice cream to escape feelings of rejection. All regression is not bad. There’s nothing wrong with a grown man wanting to fly a kite or play basketball with his buddies. Or a grown woman shopping at the mall with her girlfriends (or reading a romance novel!). But ultimately, we all need to find GODLY ways of dealing with our stressors.

Scott Peck said it well: “Many people are either unwilling or unable to suffer the pain of giving up the outgrown which needs to be forsaken. Consequently, they cling, often forever, to their old patterns of thinking and behaving, thus failing … to truly grow up and experience the joyful sense of rebirth that accompanies the transition into greater maturity.”

I can think of no better example of regression than Lot’s wife in the Old Testament. Unable to make a complete break with Sodom, she looked back, turned into a pillar of salt, losing the new opportunities that were promised to her. God said: Do NOT look back. She did. Why? Was she thinking about what and who she had left behind more than she was thinking about the new experience that awaited her? Was she unable to let go of the familiar for the unknown? At the moment of crisis, she regressed. And she lost it all!

As you go through the crises of your life, you will be tempted to look back; you will be tempted to revert to the old comfortable, familiar ways you used to use to deal with crises. Will you regress? or progress? Don’t be like Lott’s wife. You may be saved, but you will lose the opportunities God has planned for you. As the world around us becomes more insecure and uncertain, let us be careful how we respond. Let us be like Jesus: “ … who for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2). Look forward, look up, look higher.

Jesus said, “No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:62).

The World is Too Much with Us

The title of this blog posting is the name of a sonnet by William Wordsworth. It was written in 1807, expressing his view that people were too caught up in “making it” to pay attention to the beautiful things in nature. We can easily use the same words to express our concern that Christians not allow the affairs of everyday life, careers, family, and even church activities to monopolize their time and attention and miss seeing the things that God is doing.

Even as our nation and the world seem to be ‘breaking’ apart, so also God will use these anxious times to break us, His children, from the world’s attraction, and in this process, we will see how much we still love this world. During a time of material prosperity and spiritual bankruptcy, the prophet Hosea warned Israel they need to “break up your fallow ground, for it is time to seek the Lord” (10:12).

Trials and tribulations—and all sufferings—are meant to break us, detaching us from earthly things. But it is very difficult to detach yourself from this world when you are prospering and things are going well. But when we are suddenly deprived of the “things that are seen”, we realize how tenuous is our hold on them, reminding us we are but “strangers and aliens” here—just passing through! And then our attachment begins to loosen.

And conversely, the deprivation provokes us to think more about the glory which is waiting for us. And our ‘groaning’ increases, as we eagerly await the revealing of our sonship in Christ, and the redemption of these mortal bodies. (See yesterday’s blog posting: “Are You Groaning?”)

Are You Groaning?

With all the economic uncertainty right now, have you noticed that people are holding on to the slightest ray of hope that things will turn around?

There was a section on the evening news the other night about people who don’t believe things will turn around anytime soon—“doom sayers” making dire economic predictions: a new Great Depression, bread lines, riots. In his blog last month, David Wilkerson predicted riots and fires in the cities of America, much like the Watts riots of the 1960’s.

Whatever is happening, I know this: “the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now…for the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God” (Romans 8:22, 19). Paul says all of creation (humans, animals, fish, plants) is waiting to be released from the bondage of Satan and his world system, i.e., “the god of this world.” And with increase of natural disasters: flooding, tornadoes, hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, who cannot see that the world is in the throes of child birth! What is being birthed? The fullness of time is about to give birth to God’s kingdom and the ‘sons’ of God are about to be revealed. That’s us! We are about to throw off these mortal bodies and enter into our new eternal, divine state!

But Paul also says: “and not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.” As I look around and listen, I do not hear people groaning and eagerly waiting for this to occur. It seems that many Christians, like the earthlings among whom we live, are not groaning to be released into our final hour. Rather we too are simply holding on to our earthly investments, waiting, and watching for the slightest ray of hope that things will get better.

Please do not misunderstand me. I am not hoping for world destruction, for the pain and suffering of humanity. Nor am I wishing for apocalyptic destruction to come upon the earth. But I am longing, even groaning, for the return of Jesus and the revealing of the sons of God. That doesn’t make me a doom sayer! It makes me a ‘groaner.’ Are you groaning too?

Do You Love Me?

My last post was kind of a ‘downer,’ as we used to say. Hating one’s life is not an uplifting message. Jesus said His disciples would be known by their love (not their 'hate'!).

But we must be careful to explain that Jesus did not mean “self-love.” No, the antidote to self-loathing is not self-love. It is love of God for us, and our love for God. John says we love Him because He first loved us (1 John 4:19).

How much do you love Jesus? One indication of how much you love Him is whether you are obedient to His teaching (John 14:23). As you look at your own shortcomings, you probably question your love for Him and you realize how much more you need to love Him.

Such was the case with Peter. After Peter had greatly disappointed Jesus (and himself!) by denying Him at the defining moment of commitment, Peter was embarrassed and ashamed. He must have felt like a complete failure. So at the end of the John’s gospel, we find Peter leading a partial band of disciples back to the Galilee to go fishing. Perhaps Peter thought “at least this is something at which I am not a failure.” But guess what? Peter and the disciples failed to catch a single fish. Standing on the shore, Jesus (whom they did not recognize) called out for them to cast their nets to the other side. And of course they had a huge catch. At that moment, they recognized Jesus. And Peter jumped out of the boat and swam to shore. Can you see how much Peter must have loved Jesus?

But then, as they sat around the fire, eating the fish Jesus has prepared for their breakfast, Jesus asks Peter: “Do you love me?” Peter is unable to answer, using the same word for “love” that Jesus uses. Jesus says: “Do you agapao Me.” The word agapao could be translated “joyful obedience and commitment.” Peter answers: “Yes, Lord, I love You,” but using the word phileo. The word Peter uses is a weaker word for love, used generally for “friendship.”

It seems to me that Peter was embarrassed to say the he “loved” Jesus, after failing Him. Peter self-perception of past failures and the subsequent self-loathing distanced him from Jesus. He felt unworthy to receive Jesus love. And he felt he had failed in his love for Jesus.

Do you distance yourself from Jesus in the same way? Let us remember that is His love for us—an unconditional love—that is the basis for our love relationship. Whatever sins you have committed, the worst thing you can do is to distance yourself from Him. Do not let this keep you from receiving His healing love at that moment, and to pursue Him with all your heart.

Do You Ever Hate Yourself?

Do you ever do something stupid that just makes you hate yourself? If you have read my book, you know that I struggled with poor self-esteem to the point of hating myself. But I am quite sure that is NOT what Jesus meant when He said: "If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own life, he cannot be My disciple" (Luke 14:26).

This has got to be one of the least understood of all of Jesus' teachings. But to “hate” yourself is just another (perhaps stronger) way of saying that a disciple will have to "deny himself" if he is to be like Jesus. Denying our self, then, is the same as hating our own life. But what is it we are to hate? We must hate the life that we have inherited from Adam—our life IN Adam. We have to hate that life IN Adam before we will truly love our life IN Christ.

While the power of Adamic life was destroyed at the Cross (Romans 6:6), the residual self-life, we call “flesh,” remains. And it is ‘un-crucified flesh’ that keeps us from experiencing our life IN Christ. Unless we hate this ‘self life,’ we will never be able to follow the Lord wholeheartedly.

To hate our own life is to give up seeking our own rights and privileges, to stop seeking our own reputation, to forsake our own ambitions and interests, and to stop seeking our own way, in a word, surrendering our “will.” There is no other way to gain the abundant life that we have IN Christ.

Jesus is the LAST and the SECOND!

Today is Easter Sunday. How can one who has written a book called “Are You Dying to Live the Abundant Life?” and developed a ministry around the “dying to live abundant life” principles not speak out on this day? So, to all of my friends I say “Blessed Resurrection Day.”

In 1 Corinthians 15:45, Christ is referred to as the LAST Adam, and in verse 47, as the SECOND Man.

As the LAST Adam, Christ put an end to the first creation, including all who were born of “sinful” Adam. When Jesus died on the cross, he took our sinful humanity on Himself, took the punishment, bringing complete and final closure to that first creation (Romans 8:3; 2 Corinthians 5:21).

As the SECOND (Adam) Man, Christ becomes the firstborn of the New Creation: He is born from above; He is the beginning of what-Paul-calls the “NEW MAN:" One NEW MAN in Christ (Ephesians 2:15; Colossians 3:10).

"If anyone is in Christ, he is a NEW creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become NEW" (2 Corinthians 5:17). And now, “just as Christ was raised from the dead…even so we should walk in the NEWNESS of life” (Romans 6:4).

Beware of the "New" Cross

Listen to the words of A. W. Tozer, spoken over 50 years ago:
The new cross says “come and get.” And a selfish human … will use the Cross for his own benefits, whereas the old rugged Cross says, “Come and give.” … God has intended that this Christian life shall be based on this one principle: The new life is lived not unto self, but unto God. Whereas the old Cross was meant by God to be the symbol of death and detachment from the old Adam life, this new substitute cross does not intend to slay the sinner but just redirect him. It gears him to a cleaner, jollier way of living and saves his self-center and ambition. To the self-assertive it says: “Come and assert yourself in the Lord.” To the religious egotist, it says: “Come and do your boasting in the Lord.” To the thrill seeker it says: “Come and enjoy the thrill of Christian fellowship.” The modern message is slanted in the direction of the current vogue, thereby catering to human taste and reasoning.

[The new cross] lets Adam live without interference. His life motivation is unchanged; he still lives for his own pleasure, only now he takes delight in singing choruses and watching religious movies instead of singing bawdy songs and drinking hard liquor. The accent is still on enjoyment, though the fun is now on a higher [moral] plane.

Beware of Cross-less Teaching

Now, because we are celebrating Easter weekend, I must comment here about a current trend in the Evangelical church: a popularized version of Christian teaching that offers abundant life without the cross. This teaching says: “Believe in yourself! Follow your dreams and fulfill your destiny.” We must be leery of any teaching that is not founded on this principle: the cross is God’s means for fulfillment. This “new” gospel allows one to find fulfillment in one’s desires, never questioning one’s motive. This “new” teaching (it’s not really new; it began in the Garden of Eden!) says you can be “like” God and do anything. Beware of such cross-less teaching! The Bible says in the latter days people will be “lovers of self.”

What Do You Think You Are Entitled To?

For almost 25 years, I worked for the US government administering the Food Stamp Program in the western states. The Food Stamp Program is called an Entitlement Program. Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are also Entitlement Programs.

As I read the news and daily letters to the editors, I have observed that within the context of the current economic crisis in America, people are increasingly looking to government for help. Americans are seeing government resources as something, they, as individual tax-paying citizens, are entitled to. Now, you know me well enough to know I do not intend for this blog to be a political commentary. So why am I bringing up the issue of “entitlement.” Because there is a wonderful spiritual analogy (yes, you knew that was coming, didn’t you!).

Listen to the definition of “entitlement”:“Entitlement is a guarantee of access to benefits because of rights, or by agreement through law. It also refers, in a more casual sense to someone's belief that one is deserving of some particular reward or benefit. It is often used as a pejorative term in popular parlance (i.e. a 'sense of entitlement').”
It is this second half of the definition I want to draw your attention to. As cross-carrying, self-denying followers of Christ, we must be very careful not to become caught up in our cultural movement toward entitlement. The tendency of natural, self-centered men is to think they are entitled to a good life—the ‘good life’ being defined as that which meets my needs and suits my purposes. Once we have surrendered government of our lives to Holy Spirit, we must surrender this “natural” sense of entitlement.

If we get seduced by this spirit of entitlement so rampant in our culture, we may find ourselves at odds with God’s purposes, and tempted toward bitterness whenever circumstances are contrary to the things we “thought” God should do. Be careful about that little voice in your ear, saying, “you deserve better than this.” It is not God’s voice!

Receiving God's Assignments

When I was able to retire from my government job last year, I was excited that I would now have the freedom to do the things I wanted to do. No longer conscripted into some supervisor’s arbitrary assignments, I would set my own schedule, be master of my own time.

Not long into my retirement, however, I realized how foolish my idealized version of “life after employment” was. I soon found myself constrained by circumstances that prevented me from doing what I wanted to do. At first, I was resentful. I was in the middle of writing a book. Surely, it could not be God’s plan to allow circumstances into my life that would interrupt my work for Him. I resisted; and I even refused to give up my right to my freedom. It was mine. I had earned it. I was entitled to it. But gradually, as Holy Spirit broke me of this self-centered vision of my life, I realized these allegedly constraining circumstances were there by God’s design, accomplishing God’s purposes. In fact, they were God’s assignments.

I have learned, and am learning, that God constrains us (prevents us from carrying out our plans!) in order to produce something greater—His Plan! Jesus called this ‘pruning.’ The vinedresser prunes the branch so it may bear more fruit. Unfortunately, we are prone to see this pruning as constraining. But God’s work requires these constraints if we are to mature. And His assignments are anything but arbitrary. They are purposeful. Every assignment is preparation for greater blessing and opportunity, for time and eternity.

(If you want to make God laugh, tell him about YOUR plans!)

Why do Cats Purr? And Why do People Eat Chocolate Chip Cookies?

We have a male cat named Asher (which means “happy”). And he is. He purrs more than any cat I’ve ever known. Since I am as curious as a cat, I did an internet search to find out what makes a cat purr. This is what I found. Most of the cat experts think a cat purrs as a way of self-soothing or self-comforting.

I realize people do that too! Purr!? Well, no, but they do SELF-COMFORT!

When you and I are stressed, whether it is the pressures of everyday life or we are in some difficulty, or are suffering in some way, we long for comfort. When I am in a stressful circumstance, I am tempted to eat more—and not just anything; I desire sugar and chocolate. Put those two together and what do you get? Chocolate chip cookies! This is my “comfort food.” And when my life is especially chaotic (out of my control!), I long for my routine. I find my routine to be very comforting. Don’t you!? I like it when things are predictable, when things are safe.

The last few weeks of my life have been anything but predictable. My father was admitted to the hospital after throwing up blood. Over a period of two weeks of tests, waiting for results, followed by more testing and waiting, the diagnosis was given: he has cancer. The outcome (prognosis) is currently not as clear as we might like. So there will most likely be many more unpredictable days ahead.

In light of this, I know how silly it sounds for me to say I am tempted toward comfort food and routine, but in fact this is exactly how I want to respond. I want to eat chocolate chip cookies while sitting in my recliner in front of a mindless TV program. But for me that is regressing. And God loves me to much to allow me to regress. God is taking me higher. In this ‘trial’ I have found God (indwelling Holy Spirit) to be so much more comforting than I ever known before. I am knowing him as Comforter. Whenever we are suffering, God is Ever Present to us in comfort. The antidote to suffering is not ‘natural’ comfort (we call them creaturely comforts). It is spiritual comfort. It is the Presence of God in the midst of the trial. As Moses enters the Wilderness (the place of testing), God says to him: “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you Rest.”

Listen to the words of Paul as he explains this principle of ‘trial and comfort’, of ‘suffering and comfort’.

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ” (2 Corinthians 1:3-5).

When you are in a difficult situation, you will be tempted to self-comfort. While eating chocolate chip cookies may not appear particularly sinful, you will be falling short of the greater thing the "God of all Comfort" wants to teach you. Let Him be your comforter!

What Kind of Thought House do you Live in?

If you are like me (and I think you are!) when life’s “earthly” circumstances come at you, you can easily get very ‘earthbound.’ By earthly circumstances, I am referring to the day-to-day business as well as certain episodic trials, like the serious illness of a loved one, or a financial loss, etc. During these times, we are tempted to let our minds go to these natural events; we have a difficult time doing what Paul says to “set our minds on things above.” Or, as I would say instead of thinking “divine” thoughts, I am thinking earthy thoughts!

Thinking is arguably the most important human trait. With our thoughts and all the faculties of our mind (imagining, learning, meditating, planning, scheming, brainstorming) we can invent things and change the world.

But more to the point of this teaching, our thoughts create the inner world in which we live—our thoughts are the “house” we live in! What kind of “inner world” are you creating with your thoughts? What kind of “thought house” are you living in? Paul says, “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right… pure … lovely… let your minds dwell on [think] these things.” The Bible affirms that what you think about and what you tell yourself is crucial to your faith (Romans 12:2). And the wisest man who ever lived said, “...as [a man] thinks in his heart, so is he…” Proverbs 23:6.

Who do you think you are? Do you need to do some "thought house cleaning?"