This website has some very interesting and useful book summaries. There is a mixture of recent and classic, well-known authors and anonymous, familiar titles and ones that you are unlikely to have heard of.
And they are all free...
http://www.christianbooksummaries.com/past.php
Sunday 28 September 2008
Saturday 27 September 2008
Hungry in the Desert - Part Five
When the disciples reached the other side, they had forgotten to bring any bread. Jesus said to them, "Watch and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees." And they began discussing it among themselves, saying, "We brought no bread." But Jesus, aware of this, said, "O you of little faith, why are you discussing among yourselves the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive? Do you not remember the five loaves for the five thousand, and how many baskets you gathered? Or the seven loaves for the four thousand, and how many baskets you gathered? How is it that you fail to understand that I did not speak about bread? Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees." Then they understood that he did not tell them to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees.
[Matthew 16:5-12]
Here we go again. Jesus and his disciples retreat across Galilee to a desolate place. Robertson’s “Harmony of the Gospels” suggests that this is the fourth trip recorded. (Thomas & Gundry’s Harmony doesn’t specify the number). Whether there were four trips, or more than four trips, there is clearly a pattern that develops. When ministry becomes too intense, Jesus takes his disciples away until things calm down.
And ministry had been intense. Just prior to this trip, Jesus fed the four thousand in a desolate place with seven loaves and a few small fish. And the Pharisees and Sadducees had demanded a sign from heaven!?!?! His popularity, and the accompanying opposition, required him to withdraw. Why? Because neither those who praised him nor those who opposed him understood his mission. That should not surprise us, because neither did his disciples.
Jesus’ disciples were concerned with getting through the day. Amidst a busy schedule, it is easy to forget the basics. Like the plate spinner, we can begin to focus on the thing that is wobbling, without taking time to step back and see what is actually the priority. It is easy to make things complicated. The secret to success is to make the complicated simple.
There has been a running joke within our ministry about my idea of what it takes to run a conference. With conferences of hundreds of students turning up, the issues are quite complex and there are many, many details to keep track of. With the way we run our Mid Year Conferences, an error in the budget of a dollar or so per student can be the difference between breaking even or making a huge loss. But I have said for many years, the key to a successful conference is to have a good venue, a good speaker, and to have students turn up. Keeping the principles simple allows us to make good decisions about the details.
The disciples were worried about the “here and now”, but Jesus had brought them on retreat in order to train them for future ministry. So, he gives them a warning, but it goes straight over their heads. He is warning about dangers posed by outsiders, they think he is pointing out their own failing. (I have done that too – taken a general comment as a personal criticism).
Why warn his disciples about the Pharisees and Sadducees? The religious leaders looked like the good guys. As one commentator put it, no one needs a warning that the guy coming at you with a knife is dangerous. But the Pharisees and Sadducees were the “good guys”. They were religious. They taught the Bible. They sought to honour God with their whole lives. In many ways, the differences between Jesus and the Pharisees, at least on paper, were quite subtle.
The big difference was in their picture of what God was doing in the world. Their teaching, which is what Jesus warns about, reflected their understanding of how God was working and how he was going to work. It was in direct conflict with Jesus’ teaching about the kingdom of God.
How we view God and his work in the world directly impacts our thinking and our actions and our emotions. The challenge Tom Wright poses is,
“If we are beginning to understand what Jesus’ mission was all about, and to make it the foundation of our faith and hope, do we understand what he is doing right now, not only in our lives, but in our world?”
Tom Wright “Mark for Everyone” p.105
We need to get our big picture of God and the kingdom right if we are going to make wise and godly decisions about life and ministry in the detail.
One illustration of this comes from the business world. Many companies have moved, over recent decades, to a more flat organisational structure. The employees on the “frontline” – at the retail store, or on the factory floor – have been given more and more responsibility to make decisions that used to rest with middle management. Now there are two ways of helping those frontline employees make the right decisions.
The first way is to think of every possible scenario that they might face, decide ahead of time what the best response would be (from an organisational point of view) and develop a system – a training program or a manual – which would then empower those employees to respond appropriately. The weakness of this high control approach is that it is well nigh impossible to anticipate every possible scenario. And the multitude of scenarios and variations result in manuals that are like a series of phone books that no one can really absorb.
The second way is the impart a clear and compelling vision of what the whole organisation is working towards, and a set of values that the organisation wants expressed as it works towards that vision, and then release the employees to make up their own responses within those parameters. This is incredibly motivating for employees who are given real power to make real decisions. The greatest challenge for the organisation is to keep the vision fresh and at the forefront of everyone’s minds.
Some people, when warned to watch out for the teaching of the Pharisees, want to go through the details of their “training manuals” and query whether each proposed solution was right or wrong. But what I think Jesus is doing here with his disciples is warning them that the Pharisees’ whole vision and values were coming from a wrong place. If the disciples followed the details of the Pharisees teaching it would eventually lead them to adopt a wrong picture of God and how he worked in the world.
Now let’s return to the moment when the disciples took Jesus comment as a personal criticism. Obviously it was because they were focussed on the here and now issue of the bread. And Jesus rebukes them for that too. Over and over again he has taught them not to worry about their physical needs. Twice now in Matthew’s gospel he has turned a few loaves into enough bread to feed thousands, with basketfuls left over. And still the disciples are concerned that they haven’t adequately provided for themselves.
We experience anxiety when we fail to recall God’s previous acts of provision. How many times, and in how many ways, has God provided for you? And yet with each new challenge, do you immediately respond with anxiety and fear? One of the things I admired about Dr Bill Bright (founder of Campus Crusade) was his faith. As I read his biography it became clear to me that he was not born with an amazing faith. It was not bestowed upon him in a unique moment by a benevolent God. It was like a muscle that he exercised. God called him forward into the unknown and each step was an adventure into the unknown that required faith in the God whom he did know. His first efforts at fundraising were for thousands of dollars, but within a few years of launching the ministry they needed to acquire a headquarters that meant raising millions of dollars. No one sets out initially to raise millions of dollars. You have to build up to it. As you learn to trust God to provide a little, he will then challenge you to trust him for more.
When you are surrounded by plenty, you don’t need to trust God. But God’s vision and values for the world invite you to engage with something much bigger than the resources you currently have, or can access yourself. That’s the life of faith. If you are living within your current resources – time, money, influence, ability, knowledge – and if you think that is all that God expects of you, I wonder if you have accepted some view of God that is not the one revealed in the Scriptures. Faith means living out trust in God. If we are relying on ourselves, we aren’t trusting God. If we aren’t trying things which are beyond ourselves, we are relying on ourselves. But the reed will splinter in our hand. We need to, and we are called to, trust in God.
And what about those times when we try to trust God and it all falls flat?
Firstly, consider whether we are still in the desert. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be satisfied” was Jesus promise. But when will they be satisfied? Unlike the crowds who had a bit of a tummy rumble as the sun was setting, Jesus endured 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness and he was HUNGRY! I’d hate to last 1 day or 7 days or 39 days in the desert, and then conclude that God wasn’t going to provide and give up.
Secondly, consider what provision we are hungering for. What is “righteousness”? JP Moreland describes two contrasting views about the goal for our lives. He begins,
“From Old Testament times and ancient Greece until this century, the good life was widely understood to mean a life of intellectual and moral virtue. The good life is the life of ideal human functioning according to the nature God Himself gave to us… the successful person was one who knew how to live life well according to what we are by nature due to the creative design of God…. So understood, happiness involves suffering, endurance and patience because these are important means to becoming a good person who lives the good life.”
[Love Your God with All Your Mind, JP Moreland, P.35]
Then he continues,
“According to the modern view, the good life is the satisfaction of any pleasure or desire that someone freely and autonomously chooses for himself or herself. The successful person is the individual who has a life of pleasure and can obtain enough consumer goods to satisfy his or her desires.”
[Love Your God with All Your Mind, JP Moreland, P.37]
Let me finish this part with one final quote, from Tom Wright. In Mark’s account of this episode, Jesus quotes from Jeremiah 5:21 saying,
“Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear?”
Tom Wright says that the Pharisees and Sadducees in Jesus’ day reminded Jesus of the people of Jeremiah’s day,
“People were so caught up in their own concerns, and so unconcerned about injustice and wickedness in their own society, that God had no alternative but to abandon them to their fate at the hands of foreigners”
[Tom Wright, Mark for Everyone p.105]
[Matthew 16:5-12]
Here we go again. Jesus and his disciples retreat across Galilee to a desolate place. Robertson’s “Harmony of the Gospels” suggests that this is the fourth trip recorded. (Thomas & Gundry’s Harmony doesn’t specify the number). Whether there were four trips, or more than four trips, there is clearly a pattern that develops. When ministry becomes too intense, Jesus takes his disciples away until things calm down.
And ministry had been intense. Just prior to this trip, Jesus fed the four thousand in a desolate place with seven loaves and a few small fish. And the Pharisees and Sadducees had demanded a sign from heaven!?!?! His popularity, and the accompanying opposition, required him to withdraw. Why? Because neither those who praised him nor those who opposed him understood his mission. That should not surprise us, because neither did his disciples.
Jesus’ disciples were concerned with getting through the day. Amidst a busy schedule, it is easy to forget the basics. Like the plate spinner, we can begin to focus on the thing that is wobbling, without taking time to step back and see what is actually the priority. It is easy to make things complicated. The secret to success is to make the complicated simple.
There has been a running joke within our ministry about my idea of what it takes to run a conference. With conferences of hundreds of students turning up, the issues are quite complex and there are many, many details to keep track of. With the way we run our Mid Year Conferences, an error in the budget of a dollar or so per student can be the difference between breaking even or making a huge loss. But I have said for many years, the key to a successful conference is to have a good venue, a good speaker, and to have students turn up. Keeping the principles simple allows us to make good decisions about the details.
The disciples were worried about the “here and now”, but Jesus had brought them on retreat in order to train them for future ministry. So, he gives them a warning, but it goes straight over their heads. He is warning about dangers posed by outsiders, they think he is pointing out their own failing. (I have done that too – taken a general comment as a personal criticism).
Why warn his disciples about the Pharisees and Sadducees? The religious leaders looked like the good guys. As one commentator put it, no one needs a warning that the guy coming at you with a knife is dangerous. But the Pharisees and Sadducees were the “good guys”. They were religious. They taught the Bible. They sought to honour God with their whole lives. In many ways, the differences between Jesus and the Pharisees, at least on paper, were quite subtle.
The big difference was in their picture of what God was doing in the world. Their teaching, which is what Jesus warns about, reflected their understanding of how God was working and how he was going to work. It was in direct conflict with Jesus’ teaching about the kingdom of God.
How we view God and his work in the world directly impacts our thinking and our actions and our emotions. The challenge Tom Wright poses is,
“If we are beginning to understand what Jesus’ mission was all about, and to make it the foundation of our faith and hope, do we understand what he is doing right now, not only in our lives, but in our world?”
Tom Wright “Mark for Everyone” p.105
We need to get our big picture of God and the kingdom right if we are going to make wise and godly decisions about life and ministry in the detail.
One illustration of this comes from the business world. Many companies have moved, over recent decades, to a more flat organisational structure. The employees on the “frontline” – at the retail store, or on the factory floor – have been given more and more responsibility to make decisions that used to rest with middle management. Now there are two ways of helping those frontline employees make the right decisions.
The first way is to think of every possible scenario that they might face, decide ahead of time what the best response would be (from an organisational point of view) and develop a system – a training program or a manual – which would then empower those employees to respond appropriately. The weakness of this high control approach is that it is well nigh impossible to anticipate every possible scenario. And the multitude of scenarios and variations result in manuals that are like a series of phone books that no one can really absorb.
The second way is the impart a clear and compelling vision of what the whole organisation is working towards, and a set of values that the organisation wants expressed as it works towards that vision, and then release the employees to make up their own responses within those parameters. This is incredibly motivating for employees who are given real power to make real decisions. The greatest challenge for the organisation is to keep the vision fresh and at the forefront of everyone’s minds.
Some people, when warned to watch out for the teaching of the Pharisees, want to go through the details of their “training manuals” and query whether each proposed solution was right or wrong. But what I think Jesus is doing here with his disciples is warning them that the Pharisees’ whole vision and values were coming from a wrong place. If the disciples followed the details of the Pharisees teaching it would eventually lead them to adopt a wrong picture of God and how he worked in the world.
Now let’s return to the moment when the disciples took Jesus comment as a personal criticism. Obviously it was because they were focussed on the here and now issue of the bread. And Jesus rebukes them for that too. Over and over again he has taught them not to worry about their physical needs. Twice now in Matthew’s gospel he has turned a few loaves into enough bread to feed thousands, with basketfuls left over. And still the disciples are concerned that they haven’t adequately provided for themselves.
We experience anxiety when we fail to recall God’s previous acts of provision. How many times, and in how many ways, has God provided for you? And yet with each new challenge, do you immediately respond with anxiety and fear? One of the things I admired about Dr Bill Bright (founder of Campus Crusade) was his faith. As I read his biography it became clear to me that he was not born with an amazing faith. It was not bestowed upon him in a unique moment by a benevolent God. It was like a muscle that he exercised. God called him forward into the unknown and each step was an adventure into the unknown that required faith in the God whom he did know. His first efforts at fundraising were for thousands of dollars, but within a few years of launching the ministry they needed to acquire a headquarters that meant raising millions of dollars. No one sets out initially to raise millions of dollars. You have to build up to it. As you learn to trust God to provide a little, he will then challenge you to trust him for more.
When you are surrounded by plenty, you don’t need to trust God. But God’s vision and values for the world invite you to engage with something much bigger than the resources you currently have, or can access yourself. That’s the life of faith. If you are living within your current resources – time, money, influence, ability, knowledge – and if you think that is all that God expects of you, I wonder if you have accepted some view of God that is not the one revealed in the Scriptures. Faith means living out trust in God. If we are relying on ourselves, we aren’t trusting God. If we aren’t trying things which are beyond ourselves, we are relying on ourselves. But the reed will splinter in our hand. We need to, and we are called to, trust in God.
And what about those times when we try to trust God and it all falls flat?
Firstly, consider whether we are still in the desert. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be satisfied” was Jesus promise. But when will they be satisfied? Unlike the crowds who had a bit of a tummy rumble as the sun was setting, Jesus endured 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness and he was HUNGRY! I’d hate to last 1 day or 7 days or 39 days in the desert, and then conclude that God wasn’t going to provide and give up.
Secondly, consider what provision we are hungering for. What is “righteousness”? JP Moreland describes two contrasting views about the goal for our lives. He begins,
“From Old Testament times and ancient Greece until this century, the good life was widely understood to mean a life of intellectual and moral virtue. The good life is the life of ideal human functioning according to the nature God Himself gave to us… the successful person was one who knew how to live life well according to what we are by nature due to the creative design of God…. So understood, happiness involves suffering, endurance and patience because these are important means to becoming a good person who lives the good life.”
[Love Your God with All Your Mind, JP Moreland, P.35]
Then he continues,
“According to the modern view, the good life is the satisfaction of any pleasure or desire that someone freely and autonomously chooses for himself or herself. The successful person is the individual who has a life of pleasure and can obtain enough consumer goods to satisfy his or her desires.”
[Love Your God with All Your Mind, JP Moreland, P.37]
Let me finish this part with one final quote, from Tom Wright. In Mark’s account of this episode, Jesus quotes from Jeremiah 5:21 saying,
“Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear?”
Tom Wright says that the Pharisees and Sadducees in Jesus’ day reminded Jesus of the people of Jeremiah’s day,
“People were so caught up in their own concerns, and so unconcerned about injustice and wickedness in their own society, that God had no alternative but to abandon them to their fate at the hands of foreigners”
[Tom Wright, Mark for Everyone p.105]
Monday 22 September 2008
Hungry in the Desert - Part Four
Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a desolate place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns. When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them and healed their sick.
Now when it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, "This is a desolate place, and the day is now over; send the crowds away to go into the villages and buy food for themselves." But Jesus said, "They need not go away; you give them something to eat." They said to him, "We have only five loaves here and two fish." And he said, "Bring them here to me." Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass, and taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And they all ate and were satisfied. And they took up twelve baskets full of the broken pieces left over. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
[Matthew 14:13-21]
This miraculous account of the feeding of the five thousand is the only miracle that is recorded in all four gospels – the three synoptics and John. It is a powerful story that can be looked at from several different angles. And the different gospels use the story differently. Mark says that Jesus and his disciples withdrew to rest after a busy period of ministry. Luke says they went to Bethsaida after the disciples reported on the results of their mission. John seems to suggest Jesus left when the opposition from the Jews grew strong. Matthew emphasises that, while the disciples were away on their mission, Jesus heard of Herod’s interest in him and decided to withdraw to a different location. There is little difficulty in synthesising these different accounts and multiple purposes. The point here, though, is that I want to examine Matthew’s account and mostly limit myself to examining what Matthew has to say about this amazing event.
The first thing to notice is that Jesus, himself, withdrew to a desolate place. Amidst the busyness of ministry, and despite the demands on him, he felt that it was essential to spend time alone. It is obvious from the story that he took his disciples with him, even though the text doesn’t mention them in the opening verses. But his purpose was to be alone, to pray. This is evident in the verses following this account. In Matthew 14:22-23 it says,
“Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray.”
For Jesus, as we saw in Part One, communion with his Heavenly Father meant withdrawing to a desolate place. For Jesus to pursue intimacy with his Father, he sought solitude. I am someone who enjoys passionate music and solid Bible teaching. I love joining with others in corporate worship. But I am also an “internal processor”. I like to work things out in my head. I find that I need significant time alone, without distraction, to really think through issues, and allow God to speak to me. Have you noticed the tendency in most churches today to program the weekend service so tightly that there are no “dead spots”. There is no time for reflection. It is all music, announcements, speaking, etc.? I have enjoyed that change from the more traditional church I grew up in. But I have also become aware of missing the reflection, and I need to build that into my devotional life as well.
Jesus built it into his life, yet the crowd did not immediately allow it.
The crowds heard that Jesus was leaving, and they followed him. They pursued him so enthusiastically, that they actually arrived at the “desolate place” ahead of him! The crowds had been stirred up by the mission of the Twelve (Matthew 10), who had travelled through all the towns and villages in the region proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and demonstrating its power.
The key characteristics of the crowd in this story are:
1) Their eagerness to follow Jesus; and
2) Their need – both the needs of the sick, and their need for food.
Let’s skip down to the part of the story where it becomes obvious the crowd needs food. These people have eagerly pursued Jesus, to the point where they have found themselves without the food they need. Why are they without food? Because they were so eager to pursue Jesus, who was meeting other needs they had, such as for healing. Perhaps we could argue they had pursued the kingdom of God recklessly. They had put it first. I’m not saying they had done so altruistically, or exactly as Jesus had urged his followers to do in Matthew 6. But surely we cannot read this story and not think of Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 6 (which we looked at in the last part). And this should cause us to examine the story from the perspective of the crowd.
Normally when I read this story, I see the disciples as the main characters to identify with. They are the ones whose perspective on “how things work” is being challenged by Jesus. They are the ones with whom Jesus is contrast. But the crowds are the example of eagerly pursuing Jesus to a desolate place.
Is Jesus able to meet all the needs of the crowd? The disciples propose a solution that the crowd meets their own need for food from their own resources. The disciples argue that they themselves don’t have enough resources to meet the needs of the crowd. They appear anxious. Worried.
And at this point the kingdom breaks in. In a move reminiscent of the Passover feast and anticipating future communions, Jesus took the bread, said a blessing and broke it. He gave the broken bread to his disciples, who passed it on to the people. And we don’t know how, but at the end, after all those who had eagerly pursued the kingdom of God had eaten their fill and were satisfied, each disciple had one basketful left over.
This miracle is an example of the promise Jesus made in Matthew 6:33,
“But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”
Let’s think about the cross. The great need of those who hunger and thirst after righteousness is righteousness. Who could provide enough righteousness for everyone? The good deeds of all those who followed God throughout the Old Testament couldn’t. Every single one of them blew it with sin. Where could we find enough righteousness for everyone? The slaughter of bulls, rams, lambs, goats, doves, the burning of grain and incense could not. They were simply a shadow of a future reality. As God says in Hosea 6:6, “For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” The point is not how do we cover our sin, but how do we become righteous. Where could we find enough righteousness for everyone? Not in the saints who, over the centuries, have sought to follow Jesus. There is no excess of good deeds that anyone can perform to outweigh their offense against God. There is no storehouse of good deeds done by others that we can tap into.
Rather, what happened on the cross is foreshadowed by this miracle of the feeding of the five thousand. The righteousness of one perfect man who lived a sinless life, but was broken on our behalf, was multiplied (being mediated through the apostle’s message) so that all who pursue the kingdom of God might be satisfied.
It is natural, when considering how the Father might provide for us, to look at the available resources. Someone somewhere has to have the money to buy our bread, our drink and our clothes. That is how life normally works. But in the kingdom, Jesus is not limited to the way life normally works. This is not to say we should be reckless or fail to plan. The Bible has many exhortations to good stewardship. But at the end of the day, pursuing the kingdom is not determined by finances, it is determined by faith.
I have found that living supported by a team of ministry partners has brought this truth to light over and over again. I worked, as most people do, in a secure, well-paid job. The accounting firm worked us hard, but paid us regularly. And then I determined that God wanted me to work with university students. It was an interesting experience, that Friday afternoon, walking into Willie Seaton’s office and tendering my resignation. My colleagues in the office didn’t understand how I would now get paid. What is “living on support”? But since 1995, I have seen God provide regularly, faithfully, generously – and, sometimes, miraculously. I cannot claim to have perfectly pursued the kingdom of God, or to have walked in faith without anxiety every step of the way. But I can claim to have seen God provide everything I need, and more.
Those who pursued Jesus, and the kingdom of God, into this desolated place sat on the green grass, ate broken, blessed bread and fish were satisfied.
Now when it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, "This is a desolate place, and the day is now over; send the crowds away to go into the villages and buy food for themselves." But Jesus said, "They need not go away; you give them something to eat." They said to him, "We have only five loaves here and two fish." And he said, "Bring them here to me." Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass, and taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And they all ate and were satisfied. And they took up twelve baskets full of the broken pieces left over. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
[Matthew 14:13-21]
This miraculous account of the feeding of the five thousand is the only miracle that is recorded in all four gospels – the three synoptics and John. It is a powerful story that can be looked at from several different angles. And the different gospels use the story differently. Mark says that Jesus and his disciples withdrew to rest after a busy period of ministry. Luke says they went to Bethsaida after the disciples reported on the results of their mission. John seems to suggest Jesus left when the opposition from the Jews grew strong. Matthew emphasises that, while the disciples were away on their mission, Jesus heard of Herod’s interest in him and decided to withdraw to a different location. There is little difficulty in synthesising these different accounts and multiple purposes. The point here, though, is that I want to examine Matthew’s account and mostly limit myself to examining what Matthew has to say about this amazing event.
The first thing to notice is that Jesus, himself, withdrew to a desolate place. Amidst the busyness of ministry, and despite the demands on him, he felt that it was essential to spend time alone. It is obvious from the story that he took his disciples with him, even though the text doesn’t mention them in the opening verses. But his purpose was to be alone, to pray. This is evident in the verses following this account. In Matthew 14:22-23 it says,
“Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray.”
For Jesus, as we saw in Part One, communion with his Heavenly Father meant withdrawing to a desolate place. For Jesus to pursue intimacy with his Father, he sought solitude. I am someone who enjoys passionate music and solid Bible teaching. I love joining with others in corporate worship. But I am also an “internal processor”. I like to work things out in my head. I find that I need significant time alone, without distraction, to really think through issues, and allow God to speak to me. Have you noticed the tendency in most churches today to program the weekend service so tightly that there are no “dead spots”. There is no time for reflection. It is all music, announcements, speaking, etc.? I have enjoyed that change from the more traditional church I grew up in. But I have also become aware of missing the reflection, and I need to build that into my devotional life as well.
Jesus built it into his life, yet the crowd did not immediately allow it.
The crowds heard that Jesus was leaving, and they followed him. They pursued him so enthusiastically, that they actually arrived at the “desolate place” ahead of him! The crowds had been stirred up by the mission of the Twelve (Matthew 10), who had travelled through all the towns and villages in the region proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and demonstrating its power.
The key characteristics of the crowd in this story are:
1) Their eagerness to follow Jesus; and
2) Their need – both the needs of the sick, and their need for food.
Let’s skip down to the part of the story where it becomes obvious the crowd needs food. These people have eagerly pursued Jesus, to the point where they have found themselves without the food they need. Why are they without food? Because they were so eager to pursue Jesus, who was meeting other needs they had, such as for healing. Perhaps we could argue they had pursued the kingdom of God recklessly. They had put it first. I’m not saying they had done so altruistically, or exactly as Jesus had urged his followers to do in Matthew 6. But surely we cannot read this story and not think of Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 6 (which we looked at in the last part). And this should cause us to examine the story from the perspective of the crowd.
Normally when I read this story, I see the disciples as the main characters to identify with. They are the ones whose perspective on “how things work” is being challenged by Jesus. They are the ones with whom Jesus is contrast. But the crowds are the example of eagerly pursuing Jesus to a desolate place.
Is Jesus able to meet all the needs of the crowd? The disciples propose a solution that the crowd meets their own need for food from their own resources. The disciples argue that they themselves don’t have enough resources to meet the needs of the crowd. They appear anxious. Worried.
And at this point the kingdom breaks in. In a move reminiscent of the Passover feast and anticipating future communions, Jesus took the bread, said a blessing and broke it. He gave the broken bread to his disciples, who passed it on to the people. And we don’t know how, but at the end, after all those who had eagerly pursued the kingdom of God had eaten their fill and were satisfied, each disciple had one basketful left over.
This miracle is an example of the promise Jesus made in Matthew 6:33,
“But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”
Let’s think about the cross. The great need of those who hunger and thirst after righteousness is righteousness. Who could provide enough righteousness for everyone? The good deeds of all those who followed God throughout the Old Testament couldn’t. Every single one of them blew it with sin. Where could we find enough righteousness for everyone? The slaughter of bulls, rams, lambs, goats, doves, the burning of grain and incense could not. They were simply a shadow of a future reality. As God says in Hosea 6:6, “For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” The point is not how do we cover our sin, but how do we become righteous. Where could we find enough righteousness for everyone? Not in the saints who, over the centuries, have sought to follow Jesus. There is no excess of good deeds that anyone can perform to outweigh their offense against God. There is no storehouse of good deeds done by others that we can tap into.
Rather, what happened on the cross is foreshadowed by this miracle of the feeding of the five thousand. The righteousness of one perfect man who lived a sinless life, but was broken on our behalf, was multiplied (being mediated through the apostle’s message) so that all who pursue the kingdom of God might be satisfied.
It is natural, when considering how the Father might provide for us, to look at the available resources. Someone somewhere has to have the money to buy our bread, our drink and our clothes. That is how life normally works. But in the kingdom, Jesus is not limited to the way life normally works. This is not to say we should be reckless or fail to plan. The Bible has many exhortations to good stewardship. But at the end of the day, pursuing the kingdom is not determined by finances, it is determined by faith.
I have found that living supported by a team of ministry partners has brought this truth to light over and over again. I worked, as most people do, in a secure, well-paid job. The accounting firm worked us hard, but paid us regularly. And then I determined that God wanted me to work with university students. It was an interesting experience, that Friday afternoon, walking into Willie Seaton’s office and tendering my resignation. My colleagues in the office didn’t understand how I would now get paid. What is “living on support”? But since 1995, I have seen God provide regularly, faithfully, generously – and, sometimes, miraculously. I cannot claim to have perfectly pursued the kingdom of God, or to have walked in faith without anxiety every step of the way. But I can claim to have seen God provide everything I need, and more.
Those who pursued Jesus, and the kingdom of God, into this desolated place sat on the green grass, ate broken, blessed bread and fish were satisfied.
Wednesday 17 September 2008
Hungry in the Desert - Part Three
“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?
And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
"Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Matthew 6:25-34 [ESV]
I couldn’t write about Matthew’s thoughts on hunger and overlook this passage. In these verses, Jesus unpacks for us one of the major stumbling blocks we face when hungering and thirsting after righteousness: fear or anxiety.
But this section begins with the word “therefore”, which directs our thoughts back to the previous verses. Earlier in the chapter, the focus on Jesus’ teaching was on the practice of spiritual disciplines, or the “practicing of righteousness” (6:1). The first thing he says is “when you give…”, and then “when you pray…” and thirdly “when you fast…” (Notice it is “when”, not “if”. Even for fasting). The goal of these practices is not to accumulate wealth on earth, which is vulnerable, but to store up treasure in heaven, which is secure. After instructing his followers in the three “practices of righteousness”, Jesus concludes each with the promise “And your Father in heaven who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matthew 6:4, 6, 18) So the challenge Jesus issues just prior to our passage is clear: “You cannot serve God and money”.
Anxiety (“μεριμνατε”) comes from the root phrase μεριζειν τον νουν (“dividing the mind”). Many of the older commentaries focussed on the question, “what does this mean about planning for your life?” This is an important question, and the simple answer is that this passage does not preclude planning or ambition, it addresses worry or anxiety.
Anxiety is the result when you try to control or manage things beyond your power. In ministry, this is the world I live in constantly. There is no way that I can control who gives money to support us. I cannot control who or how many will respond to the gospel. I have no power over students to make them grow in their faith, to make them turn up to meetings or Bible studies. Anxiety is a constant threat in ministry. I can try to compensate by over-controlling other areas of my life, or imagining situations where I am powerful and in control. But becoming a control-freak or imagining a fantasy life is not pursuing righteousness. They lead me into the desert - a wasteland of broken relationships, half-baked ideas, distractions and self-indulgence. The answer is not fantasy but faith.
Faith is the only responsible response because it is responding to the reality of the one who really has all the power and who really is in control. Jesus provides three reasons for placing my trust in God.
Firstly, he is the one who gave me life and who made my body (v.25). His power was not exhausted by the act of creation. His power is limitless. His love is boundless. Surely the God who gave me these greater things, my life and body, will also provide me with the lesser things to accompany them - food, drink and clothing. It reminds me of one of my favourite verses, Romans 8:32, where Paul talks about sanctification following justification,
“He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?”
We have not exhausted our Father’s generosity, his grace. Just as he gave us life, he wants to provide food, drink and clothes for us. Just as he has saved us, he wants to make us righteous, mature, godly, competent fellow-workers in his kingdom.
Secondly, Jesus compares our situation with the seemingly ridiculous situation of the birds and the flowers (v.26, 28-30). I am fascinated by the behaviour and beauty of the birdlife in Sydney. It is so diverse. The sounds, the colours, the quirks of so many different species just grab my attention. Just yesterday I was walking through the bushland behind our place and saw a sulphur crested cockatoo poking its head out of its nest in a hole in a gum tree about 40’ off the ground while others from the flock circled around squawking raucously. And as I get older, I am gaining appreciation for the aesthetic beauty of flowers in the garden. I even planted bulbs! Jesus says that these displays are the result of God’s providential activity. And we are worth more to God than these lesser creations.
Thirdly, worry is unproductive because we are powerless to make significant changes anyway (v.27). We cannot make ourselves taller. We cannot delay death for a day. I wrote back in part one that we use our (God-given) creativity and capability to mask our true dependence on God. As soon as I wrote that we cannot delay death a day my mind started arguing with the statement. What about healthy living? Regular exercise? Modest diet? Life support? But these are trivialities compared the great overarching truth that we do not determine our birth or our death. Those control points should, like wandering through a spiritual desert, remind us of our constant dependence on God.
But in our Western society we have isolated ourselves from those control points. Once upon a time, a whole family lived under the same roof and went through all of the stages of life together. Children were birthed in the family home, not some sterile maternity ward. Grandparents grew frail and forgetful amidst the hustle and bustle of family life, not in some retirement village or nursing home. Children grew up seeing birth and death regularly. Most of the young adults I know have never seen a dead body or had anyone close to them pass away. We have lost the accompaniment to the rhythm of life. We become soloists rather than members of a full orchestra. We depend totally on our own skill for the end result. Yet the Psalmist is able to write:
"O LORD, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days;
let me know how fleeting I am!
Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths,
and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath!
Surely a man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nothing they are in turmoil;
man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather!
[Psalm 39:4-6]
To fail to trust God, to choose instead to anxiously pursue our own power and control, is to act like the Gentiles – those who do not know God. In other words, we may say we are following Jesus but in practice we are living like atheists. The life of faith requires faith, not just a commitment to an alternative lifestyle. Faith may be lived out in the alternative lifestyle (i.e. support-raising may be done as an expression of faith in God, or by following a system that “works”) or it may not. It may be lived out in the mainstream lifestyle (e.g. employment), or it may not. Only an atheist would deny that God is the source of their ability (mental, physical, etc.) and opportunity to earn money through their occupation. Yet as followers of Jesus it is all too easy in our materialistic, humanistic culture to attribute any success we have to our own capability and creativity, and to ignore God.
A friend of mine shared recently that a new role he had at work was beyond his ability to perform or to meet the expectations placed on him. He confessed that he was praying for God to enable him to do what he needed to do. I have had a similar experience as I have taken on new roles in ministry over the years. Initially it is very easy to feel inexperienced, lacking capability and to express dependence on God. But when the competence and experience comes, then my awareness of my dependence on God also waned.
Still, Jesus is commanding us to be single minded in our pursuit of the kingdom of God and his righteousness, not dividing our attention between God and money. Our divided mind comes when we fail to acknowledge reality, when our beliefs fail to lead us to faith.
What are we to believe?
Firstly, that the God who created us – gave us a body and life – values us sufficiently to provide everything else we need.
Secondly, we are powerless to control so many of the outcomes we become anxious about.
Thirdly, that God the Father knows everything we need, and is committed to providing it.
Do you accept these points as true? Do they frame the foundation of your life? How do they affect the way you live? How do they affect your prayer life? How do they affect your ideas about your career?
As the nation of Israel stood on the verge of entering the Promised Land, God renewed his covenant with them. He began by reminding them of their journey out of Egypt and said,
I have led you forty years in the wilderness. Your clothes have not worn out on you, and your sandals have not worn off your feet. You have not eaten bread, and you have not drunk wine or strong drink, that you may know that I am the LORD your God… Therefore keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do.
[Deuteronomy 29:5-6, 9]
When we think about God promising to provide for our food, drink and clothing in Matthew’s gospel, how can we not recall his amazing provision for Israel during their 40 years of wandering. His purpose was to shape them into his covenant people, a people who would know him, follow him, be blessed by him and be a light to the world. The example of the Israelites should be both an encouragement and a warning to us. Do not be anxious or have a divided mind. Instead, pursue God’s kingdom and his righteousness.
And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?
And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
"Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Matthew 6:25-34 [ESV]
I couldn’t write about Matthew’s thoughts on hunger and overlook this passage. In these verses, Jesus unpacks for us one of the major stumbling blocks we face when hungering and thirsting after righteousness: fear or anxiety.
But this section begins with the word “therefore”, which directs our thoughts back to the previous verses. Earlier in the chapter, the focus on Jesus’ teaching was on the practice of spiritual disciplines, or the “practicing of righteousness” (6:1). The first thing he says is “when you give…”, and then “when you pray…” and thirdly “when you fast…” (Notice it is “when”, not “if”. Even for fasting). The goal of these practices is not to accumulate wealth on earth, which is vulnerable, but to store up treasure in heaven, which is secure. After instructing his followers in the three “practices of righteousness”, Jesus concludes each with the promise “And your Father in heaven who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matthew 6:4, 6, 18) So the challenge Jesus issues just prior to our passage is clear: “You cannot serve God and money”.
Anxiety (“μεριμνατε”) comes from the root phrase μεριζειν τον νουν (“dividing the mind”). Many of the older commentaries focussed on the question, “what does this mean about planning for your life?” This is an important question, and the simple answer is that this passage does not preclude planning or ambition, it addresses worry or anxiety.
Anxiety is the result when you try to control or manage things beyond your power. In ministry, this is the world I live in constantly. There is no way that I can control who gives money to support us. I cannot control who or how many will respond to the gospel. I have no power over students to make them grow in their faith, to make them turn up to meetings or Bible studies. Anxiety is a constant threat in ministry. I can try to compensate by over-controlling other areas of my life, or imagining situations where I am powerful and in control. But becoming a control-freak or imagining a fantasy life is not pursuing righteousness. They lead me into the desert - a wasteland of broken relationships, half-baked ideas, distractions and self-indulgence. The answer is not fantasy but faith.
Faith is the only responsible response because it is responding to the reality of the one who really has all the power and who really is in control. Jesus provides three reasons for placing my trust in God.
Firstly, he is the one who gave me life and who made my body (v.25). His power was not exhausted by the act of creation. His power is limitless. His love is boundless. Surely the God who gave me these greater things, my life and body, will also provide me with the lesser things to accompany them - food, drink and clothing. It reminds me of one of my favourite verses, Romans 8:32, where Paul talks about sanctification following justification,
“He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?”
We have not exhausted our Father’s generosity, his grace. Just as he gave us life, he wants to provide food, drink and clothes for us. Just as he has saved us, he wants to make us righteous, mature, godly, competent fellow-workers in his kingdom.
Secondly, Jesus compares our situation with the seemingly ridiculous situation of the birds and the flowers (v.26, 28-30). I am fascinated by the behaviour and beauty of the birdlife in Sydney. It is so diverse. The sounds, the colours, the quirks of so many different species just grab my attention. Just yesterday I was walking through the bushland behind our place and saw a sulphur crested cockatoo poking its head out of its nest in a hole in a gum tree about 40’ off the ground while others from the flock circled around squawking raucously. And as I get older, I am gaining appreciation for the aesthetic beauty of flowers in the garden. I even planted bulbs! Jesus says that these displays are the result of God’s providential activity. And we are worth more to God than these lesser creations.
Thirdly, worry is unproductive because we are powerless to make significant changes anyway (v.27). We cannot make ourselves taller. We cannot delay death for a day. I wrote back in part one that we use our (God-given) creativity and capability to mask our true dependence on God. As soon as I wrote that we cannot delay death a day my mind started arguing with the statement. What about healthy living? Regular exercise? Modest diet? Life support? But these are trivialities compared the great overarching truth that we do not determine our birth or our death. Those control points should, like wandering through a spiritual desert, remind us of our constant dependence on God.
But in our Western society we have isolated ourselves from those control points. Once upon a time, a whole family lived under the same roof and went through all of the stages of life together. Children were birthed in the family home, not some sterile maternity ward. Grandparents grew frail and forgetful amidst the hustle and bustle of family life, not in some retirement village or nursing home. Children grew up seeing birth and death regularly. Most of the young adults I know have never seen a dead body or had anyone close to them pass away. We have lost the accompaniment to the rhythm of life. We become soloists rather than members of a full orchestra. We depend totally on our own skill for the end result. Yet the Psalmist is able to write:
"O LORD, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days;
let me know how fleeting I am!
Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths,
and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath!
Surely a man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nothing they are in turmoil;
man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather!
[Psalm 39:4-6]
To fail to trust God, to choose instead to anxiously pursue our own power and control, is to act like the Gentiles – those who do not know God. In other words, we may say we are following Jesus but in practice we are living like atheists. The life of faith requires faith, not just a commitment to an alternative lifestyle. Faith may be lived out in the alternative lifestyle (i.e. support-raising may be done as an expression of faith in God, or by following a system that “works”) or it may not. It may be lived out in the mainstream lifestyle (e.g. employment), or it may not. Only an atheist would deny that God is the source of their ability (mental, physical, etc.) and opportunity to earn money through their occupation. Yet as followers of Jesus it is all too easy in our materialistic, humanistic culture to attribute any success we have to our own capability and creativity, and to ignore God.
A friend of mine shared recently that a new role he had at work was beyond his ability to perform or to meet the expectations placed on him. He confessed that he was praying for God to enable him to do what he needed to do. I have had a similar experience as I have taken on new roles in ministry over the years. Initially it is very easy to feel inexperienced, lacking capability and to express dependence on God. But when the competence and experience comes, then my awareness of my dependence on God also waned.
Still, Jesus is commanding us to be single minded in our pursuit of the kingdom of God and his righteousness, not dividing our attention between God and money. Our divided mind comes when we fail to acknowledge reality, when our beliefs fail to lead us to faith.
What are we to believe?
Firstly, that the God who created us – gave us a body and life – values us sufficiently to provide everything else we need.
Secondly, we are powerless to control so many of the outcomes we become anxious about.
Thirdly, that God the Father knows everything we need, and is committed to providing it.
Do you accept these points as true? Do they frame the foundation of your life? How do they affect the way you live? How do they affect your prayer life? How do they affect your ideas about your career?
As the nation of Israel stood on the verge of entering the Promised Land, God renewed his covenant with them. He began by reminding them of their journey out of Egypt and said,
I have led you forty years in the wilderness. Your clothes have not worn out on you, and your sandals have not worn off your feet. You have not eaten bread, and you have not drunk wine or strong drink, that you may know that I am the LORD your God… Therefore keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do.
[Deuteronomy 29:5-6, 9]
When we think about God promising to provide for our food, drink and clothing in Matthew’s gospel, how can we not recall his amazing provision for Israel during their 40 years of wandering. His purpose was to shape them into his covenant people, a people who would know him, follow him, be blessed by him and be a light to the world. The example of the Israelites should be both an encouragement and a warning to us. Do not be anxious or have a divided mind. Instead, pursue God’s kingdom and his righteousness.
Monday 15 September 2008
Hungry in the Desert - Part Two
Part Two:
"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”
Matthew 5:6 (ESV)
"Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied."
Luke 6:21 (ESV)
While teaching the beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus refers to hunger. This is not a physical hunger, but a strong desire for righteousness that is best described by the gnawing ache we have for something without which we cannot live.
The beatitudes are a list of wonderful promises. The poor, the starving, the destitute will have their longings fulfilled in the kingdom that Jesus is inaugurating. There is a promise of satisfaction.
There is a battle between different Christian traditions as to whether the beatitudes refer to material satisfaction (i.e. justice for the poor and oppressed) or to spiritual satisfaction (i.e. for the spiritually poor and needy). I don’t know if we have to choose between the “freedom for the oppressed” interpretation (which usually relies on Luke’s account of the beatitudes) and the “saving our souls” interpretation. With our “now but not yet” kingdom of God, I think there is room for both meanings.
Some have also suggested that the desire for righteousness, or justice, is limited to the poor and oppressed who do not have the power to demand (political, economic) justice in this world. I think, however, that Jesus is referring to our desire for spiritual righteousness, which is also definitely beyond our power to obtain by ourselves. But is that righteousness, which can only come from God, the righteousness of being justified by faith (i.e. the rightness of God received, even though we are not perfect) or is it the righteousness of a totally transformed, sanctified life? I don’t think anyone who has been truly justified can be satisfied by anything less than total transformation – of themselves and of the world.
And this leads us to think about what is meant by righteousness. It is more than just fulfilling the legal code, the Law, as the Pharisees aimed to do. It is more than fulfilling the moral code. Righteousness is about right-relatedness. It is about being in right relationship with God and with each other. To hunger and thirst after righteousness, then, is to hunger and thirst for a right relationship with God – not just to begin the relationship, but a “whole of life” relationship. It is also about being in a right relationship with those around us – which means we must treat them honestly, fairly and lovingly. Who is our neighbour? Jesus’ response is, “Anyone in need”. Therefore it is appropriate to talk about righteousness in terms of political or economic justice in the here-and-now, because it flows out of a right-relatedness with God in the hear-and-now.
To hunger and thirst for righteousness means, then, that we recognise at the core of our being our own unrighteousness, our wrong-relatedness to God and each other, and we set out on a quest to find what we are missing. And as I reflect on my own culture, I see a desperate lack of awareness of our own unrighteousness. The dominant deception is that “I’m an ok bloke” or “she’ll be right”. The quests people are on at the moment are for increased consumption – the fleeting satisfaction that comes from a new TV, or a fancier car, or a better job. They are looking for greater security. Amidst the fast pace of life, it is easier to skip over our failures – our failures to keep our word or to live in healthy relationships or to examine our morals. In Part One we considered Jesus’ model of stepping away from the hustle and bustle and seeking his Father. In such periods of reflection, we should not be surprised to be confronted with our failures and weaknesses and our sin. That is the true “us”. And we should be especially aware when we are in close proximity to the totally perfect and Righteous One. Hungering and thirsting for righteousness must lead us to the Righteous One.
The first time I remember responding to the gospel was when I was 8 years old. I remember standing with a few other children after Sunday School being led in a prayer by a teacher. But as important as that moment was, and has been, there were other times through the years I became aware of my sinfulness. I remember, as a teenager, crying out on my bed to God saying that, if I didn’t really surrender to him when I was 8, then I was doing it now. It wasn’t until I joined Student Life that I was taught about assurance of salvation, and how to deal with subsequent sin in my life. Each time I become aware of my unrighteousness, rather than run from God, I now know I should turn to him, ask for his forgiveness and commit to following him again.
The focus of the beatitudes is on being “blessed”. This picks up the Old Testament theme: from Yahweh’s promise to Abraham (Genesis 12:3), and to Israel through Moses (Genesis 27). God’s people were “blessed” by being the objects of God’s affection and favour. Being blessed is more than just being happy. It is a whole sense of well-being that comes from God’s favour.
Blessing comes through having these needs, these longings for right-relatedness satisfied. The promise of satisfaction comes through very strongly in each of the beatitudes. Yet the method of satisfaction is not mentioned.
I should note here that the phrase “will be satisfied” is future tense, passive voice. In other words, it is something that will happen to those who “hunger and thirst”; it is not something they do for themselves. In the context, it is God who satisfies those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. No one can satisfy themselves out of their own resources. Only God, the Righteous One, can give us righteousness and make us righteous. The question becomes, how can we put ourselves in a place where God will cause us to be satisfied?
The beatitudes are not the whole sermon. The whole sermon, known as the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, goes for 3 chapters. Its focus is on life in the new reality of the kingdom of God. Jesus talks about his follower’s relationship with the outside world, the place of the Law, spiritual disciplines, dependence on God, relationships with others – especially fellow believers - and finishes with a warning about building to withstand a storm. Luke’s account is briefer, it only goes for one chapter, and covers only some of the material in Matthew – loving your enemies, judging others, and building to withstand a storm.
Is there to be found in these sermons a method of blessing or satisfaction? I think the common conclusion to these sermons is the key. Let’s reflect on Luke’s account of Jesus’ conclusion:
"Why do you call me 'Lord, Lord,' and not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But the one who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the stream broke against it, immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great."
Luke 6:46-49 (ESV)
This is the more confronting version of the parable (compared with Matthew’s version). But there are three simple actions that Jesus spells out as being necessary to survive the storm:
1) coming to him;
2) hearing his word; and
3) doing his word.
May I suggest that those of us who want to satisfy a hunger for righteousness follow these three steps?
Firstly, we come to him. We don’t look elsewhere for our needs to be satisfied. We focus our attention on him. We acknowledge his supremacy. We don’t look to others to satisfy our hunger, although we need to be open to whatever God uses to satisfy us. Our attention must be on him. Our first priority is to get our relationship with God sorted out. And that is not a complicated or long process. It simply means that we humble our hearts before him, admit to our failures, brokenness, sin, pride, and selfishness. Our only source of true righteousness is from God the Father through Jesus Christ. The righteousness of God was proven when Jesus died in our place – he dealt with sin once and for all. When we are united with Christ, we receive his righteousness. As Paul says in Romans 5:17,
If, because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ.
Secondly, we hear his word. Jesus’ word reveals to us the reality that God created, the reality of the emerging kingdom of God. And as we listen to him speak we realise that he places demands on us – on how we think, what we say, what we do. Our priorities are challenged. We have choices to make. We have to choose to align ourselves and our lives with the reality he reveals to us. This battle for the will is not a once-for-all experience. We need to keep hearing Jesus’ word (by which I mean the whole Bible), keep listening to him, and keep choosing to live in light of his word. As Paul says in Romans 5:15,19:
What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! … For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.
Finally, we do his word. This supernatural life is the normal Christian life. It is only possible because we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, who seeks to live Jesus’ life through us. Satisfaction comes when we choose to live in light of this new reality, this emerging kingdom. That is when we experience the blessings of being a Spirit-empowered Christ-follower. We learn to side-step the errors of sin which cause us and those around us so much pain. We learn to practice the disciplines that bring healthy bodies, minds and relationships. We experience the blessings in the here-and-now and into eternity. But do not think that such blessing is only comfortable and pleasurable. Take heed of Jesus’ last line in the beatitudes:
"Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Matthew 5:11-12 [ESV]
Compare this to Paul’s words,
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
Romans 5:1-5 [ESV]
"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”
Matthew 5:6 (ESV)
"Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied."
Luke 6:21 (ESV)
While teaching the beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus refers to hunger. This is not a physical hunger, but a strong desire for righteousness that is best described by the gnawing ache we have for something without which we cannot live.
The beatitudes are a list of wonderful promises. The poor, the starving, the destitute will have their longings fulfilled in the kingdom that Jesus is inaugurating. There is a promise of satisfaction.
There is a battle between different Christian traditions as to whether the beatitudes refer to material satisfaction (i.e. justice for the poor and oppressed) or to spiritual satisfaction (i.e. for the spiritually poor and needy). I don’t know if we have to choose between the “freedom for the oppressed” interpretation (which usually relies on Luke’s account of the beatitudes) and the “saving our souls” interpretation. With our “now but not yet” kingdom of God, I think there is room for both meanings.
Some have also suggested that the desire for righteousness, or justice, is limited to the poor and oppressed who do not have the power to demand (political, economic) justice in this world. I think, however, that Jesus is referring to our desire for spiritual righteousness, which is also definitely beyond our power to obtain by ourselves. But is that righteousness, which can only come from God, the righteousness of being justified by faith (i.e. the rightness of God received, even though we are not perfect) or is it the righteousness of a totally transformed, sanctified life? I don’t think anyone who has been truly justified can be satisfied by anything less than total transformation – of themselves and of the world.
And this leads us to think about what is meant by righteousness. It is more than just fulfilling the legal code, the Law, as the Pharisees aimed to do. It is more than fulfilling the moral code. Righteousness is about right-relatedness. It is about being in right relationship with God and with each other. To hunger and thirst after righteousness, then, is to hunger and thirst for a right relationship with God – not just to begin the relationship, but a “whole of life” relationship. It is also about being in a right relationship with those around us – which means we must treat them honestly, fairly and lovingly. Who is our neighbour? Jesus’ response is, “Anyone in need”. Therefore it is appropriate to talk about righteousness in terms of political or economic justice in the here-and-now, because it flows out of a right-relatedness with God in the hear-and-now.
To hunger and thirst for righteousness means, then, that we recognise at the core of our being our own unrighteousness, our wrong-relatedness to God and each other, and we set out on a quest to find what we are missing. And as I reflect on my own culture, I see a desperate lack of awareness of our own unrighteousness. The dominant deception is that “I’m an ok bloke” or “she’ll be right”. The quests people are on at the moment are for increased consumption – the fleeting satisfaction that comes from a new TV, or a fancier car, or a better job. They are looking for greater security. Amidst the fast pace of life, it is easier to skip over our failures – our failures to keep our word or to live in healthy relationships or to examine our morals. In Part One we considered Jesus’ model of stepping away from the hustle and bustle and seeking his Father. In such periods of reflection, we should not be surprised to be confronted with our failures and weaknesses and our sin. That is the true “us”. And we should be especially aware when we are in close proximity to the totally perfect and Righteous One. Hungering and thirsting for righteousness must lead us to the Righteous One.
The first time I remember responding to the gospel was when I was 8 years old. I remember standing with a few other children after Sunday School being led in a prayer by a teacher. But as important as that moment was, and has been, there were other times through the years I became aware of my sinfulness. I remember, as a teenager, crying out on my bed to God saying that, if I didn’t really surrender to him when I was 8, then I was doing it now. It wasn’t until I joined Student Life that I was taught about assurance of salvation, and how to deal with subsequent sin in my life. Each time I become aware of my unrighteousness, rather than run from God, I now know I should turn to him, ask for his forgiveness and commit to following him again.
The focus of the beatitudes is on being “blessed”. This picks up the Old Testament theme: from Yahweh’s promise to Abraham (Genesis 12:3), and to Israel through Moses (Genesis 27). God’s people were “blessed” by being the objects of God’s affection and favour. Being blessed is more than just being happy. It is a whole sense of well-being that comes from God’s favour.
Blessing comes through having these needs, these longings for right-relatedness satisfied. The promise of satisfaction comes through very strongly in each of the beatitudes. Yet the method of satisfaction is not mentioned.
I should note here that the phrase “will be satisfied” is future tense, passive voice. In other words, it is something that will happen to those who “hunger and thirst”; it is not something they do for themselves. In the context, it is God who satisfies those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. No one can satisfy themselves out of their own resources. Only God, the Righteous One, can give us righteousness and make us righteous. The question becomes, how can we put ourselves in a place where God will cause us to be satisfied?
The beatitudes are not the whole sermon. The whole sermon, known as the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, goes for 3 chapters. Its focus is on life in the new reality of the kingdom of God. Jesus talks about his follower’s relationship with the outside world, the place of the Law, spiritual disciplines, dependence on God, relationships with others – especially fellow believers - and finishes with a warning about building to withstand a storm. Luke’s account is briefer, it only goes for one chapter, and covers only some of the material in Matthew – loving your enemies, judging others, and building to withstand a storm.
Is there to be found in these sermons a method of blessing or satisfaction? I think the common conclusion to these sermons is the key. Let’s reflect on Luke’s account of Jesus’ conclusion:
"Why do you call me 'Lord, Lord,' and not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But the one who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the stream broke against it, immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great."
Luke 6:46-49 (ESV)
This is the more confronting version of the parable (compared with Matthew’s version). But there are three simple actions that Jesus spells out as being necessary to survive the storm:
1) coming to him;
2) hearing his word; and
3) doing his word.
May I suggest that those of us who want to satisfy a hunger for righteousness follow these three steps?
Firstly, we come to him. We don’t look elsewhere for our needs to be satisfied. We focus our attention on him. We acknowledge his supremacy. We don’t look to others to satisfy our hunger, although we need to be open to whatever God uses to satisfy us. Our attention must be on him. Our first priority is to get our relationship with God sorted out. And that is not a complicated or long process. It simply means that we humble our hearts before him, admit to our failures, brokenness, sin, pride, and selfishness. Our only source of true righteousness is from God the Father through Jesus Christ. The righteousness of God was proven when Jesus died in our place – he dealt with sin once and for all. When we are united with Christ, we receive his righteousness. As Paul says in Romans 5:17,
If, because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ.
Secondly, we hear his word. Jesus’ word reveals to us the reality that God created, the reality of the emerging kingdom of God. And as we listen to him speak we realise that he places demands on us – on how we think, what we say, what we do. Our priorities are challenged. We have choices to make. We have to choose to align ourselves and our lives with the reality he reveals to us. This battle for the will is not a once-for-all experience. We need to keep hearing Jesus’ word (by which I mean the whole Bible), keep listening to him, and keep choosing to live in light of his word. As Paul says in Romans 5:15,19:
What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! … For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.
Finally, we do his word. This supernatural life is the normal Christian life. It is only possible because we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, who seeks to live Jesus’ life through us. Satisfaction comes when we choose to live in light of this new reality, this emerging kingdom. That is when we experience the blessings of being a Spirit-empowered Christ-follower. We learn to side-step the errors of sin which cause us and those around us so much pain. We learn to practice the disciplines that bring healthy bodies, minds and relationships. We experience the blessings in the here-and-now and into eternity. But do not think that such blessing is only comfortable and pleasurable. Take heed of Jesus’ last line in the beatitudes:
"Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Matthew 5:11-12 [ESV]
Compare this to Paul’s words,
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
Romans 5:1-5 [ESV]
Wednesday 10 September 2008
Hungry in the Desert - Part One
Hungry in the Desert
These thoughts have been provoked by a sermon I heard recently, which linked in with some reading I have done over the past few years in the areas of church history and spiritual disciplines. As I write I become keenly aware of how impossible it is to perfectly communicate truth. Only Scripture is able to do that. I have errors in my understanding of the material and failures in my ability to communicate what I am thinking. I ask for grace if you read this.
Part One:
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him,
"If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread."
But he answered,
"It is written, "'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"
Matthew 4:1-4 (ESV)
Have you ever been in a spiritually dry place? This is the place where it seems like God has disappeared, reading the Word of God tastes like ashes, prayers seem to dissipate into mist and every action is drudgery. Where did the term “spiritual desert” come from anyway?
There is a rich history of deserts appearing among the followers of the faith. Right back in Old Testament times, Moses led the children of Israel for forty years of wandering through the wilderness. That desert experience, the Exodus, shaped the nation forever. They were totally dependent on Yahweh for food and water. Their physical dependence was to inform their spiritual dependence.
Elijah and John the Baptist also had desert experiences. Both were fed directly by God’s provision. Elijah was fed by ravens. John received locusts and wild honey.
And then we come to Jesus. He was no wilderness prophet. He moved from town to town and appeared in Jerusalem several times. He only retreated to the wilderness when his ministry was threatened by too much opposition or popularity. But at the beginning of his ministry, he was sent by the Spirit into the desert. Matthew 4:1 explains the purpose of Jesus’ wilderness adventure – it was to be tempted by the devil.
Jesus was in the wilderness for more than a month, and God did not feed him. No ravens. No locusts. Jesus was fasting. And he was hungry.
One thing I have learnt from my own desert experiences is just how dependent on God I am. When everything is going well, when every praise song lifts my heart, when the Bible seems to radiate with an inner glow, when every conversation seems to be Spirit-led I can get caught up in my own activities and in the music, the Bible and the people I am speaking with. But when they get stripped away, then I am forced to pay attention to the one who provided all those things for me.
I’m also reminded of the phrase, “… who have never known hunger”. It referred to a generation who had been raised during a time of plenty. Food was plentiful and the main squabbles among the children were over what they wanted for breakfast. And I compare that to terrible footage I have seen of desperate people crowding around the UN truck that is distributing sacks of food at a refugee camp. The children fight to survive.
I have used physical fasts to develop self-discipline over my body and to train myself to be aware of God’s presence and providence. I have never done a 40 day fast. I know people who have. They report that the hunger cravings lessen after the first few days, but energy levels also drop. They felt weaker, more vulnerable. I can imagine Jesus feeling this way, and having to confront the devil.
And the devil’s first temptation was to ask Jesus to use his power, as the Son of God, to satisfy himself, to provide for himself.
Jesus was the Son of God. That was his true identity. And he had true power. We are also the children of God. That is our true identity. Jesus is our brother, as well as our Lord. And we have true power. We are capable of creativity. We are capable of producing. We are capable of managing the resources God has made us stewards of. We can feed and clothe ourselves. We were placed by God, not in a wilderness, but in a garden. Even when we were cast out, we did not find ourselves destitute. Our world is resource rich. We complain to each other about the limited nature of fossil fuels – but we have guzzled our way through oceans of black oil and mountains of coal for decades and still have several oceans and mountains to go! And then there is nuclear energy and sustainable energy. We indulge ourselves, using our creativity and our capability to provide for ourselves, masking our true dependence on God.
How do we heighten our awareness of our dependence on God? Natural disasters can do it. Have you noticed that a natural disaster is anything that is too powerful for us to control? A hurricane, a storm, or an earthquake only produces a natural disaster if it is of such a category that it blows apart our manmade control mechanisms. In the wealthy West we have developed systems that cope with all but the worst events. Many developing nations suffer tremendously with even the smallest event.
When an event does occur that overpowers our control mechanisms, we suddenly become aware of the vulnerability of our drinking water, our food and our shelter. But few of us want to have a disaster force us to recognise our vulnerability. Is there another way?
Throughout history spiritual disciplines, such as fasting and solitude, have been used by men and women who want to pursue an awareness of their dependence on God. The desert fathers were influenced by the examples of Jesus and John the Baptist and influential in writing about their experiences in the 3rd and 4th Centuries. For example,
I shall speak first about control of the stomach, the opposite to gluttony, and about how to fast and what and how much to eat. I shall say nothing on my own account, but only what I have received from the Holy Fathers. They have not given us only a single rule for fasting or a single standard and measure for eating, because not everyone has the same strength; age, illness or delicacy of body create differences. But they have given us all a single goal: to avoid over-eating and the filling of our bellies... A clear rule for self-control handed down by the Fathers is this: stop eating while still hungry and do not continue until you are satisfied. St. John Cassian
[http://www.balamandmonastery.org.lb/fathers/indexsayings2.htm]
Discussions of wilderness experiences and dependence on God readily drift towards issues of fasting, solitude and physical needs. But we need to return to where we began: spiritual deserts and spiritual dependence.
In Matthew 4:4 Jesus responded to the devil’s temptation with the oft-quoted statement, “'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” More urgent than discovering our physical dependence is recovering our spiritual dependence.
Just as we are capable of great creativity and production to satisfy our physical needs, so we are with our spiritual needs. And it is not wrong to do so. God gave us these capabilities to use for his glory. The command in the garden was to work the land. The command with spiritual gifts is to help each other grow to maturity.
And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ…
Ephesians 4:11-13 [ESV]
God designed us to live in community. Each believer within the community is interdependent on each other member exercising their spiritual gifts for the good of the whole. This is the normal and spiritual path for progress.
But I have been involved in community, when the community is functioning properly, and my heart has been right before God, and still felt spiritually dry. As I have reflected on these experiences, the effect of the dryness has been to test whether I am truly following Jesus for his sake, or whether I am pursuing feelings of well-being, pleasure or purpose instead. In other words, will I still choose to follow Jesus when I am feeling discontent? Will I still choose to follow Jesus when I don’t find pleasure in it? When it becomes drudgery? Will I still follow Jesus when I can’t see the purpose in it?
At these times I am reminded of a little motto that I heard many years ago,
“Don’t doubt in the dark what you learnt in the light”
The darkness, the dryness, is a time when we question what we know. Is God still good if I he doesn’t make me feel good? Is God still there if I don’t sense his presence? Is God still in control if I can’t see his point in the events I am living through? What is the condition of my heart?
Things learnt in the desert seem to sit deeper in my mind. Decisions made in the desert seem to nestle deeper in my soul. They are hard lessons, tough decisions. But they shape me. And they are grounded on the bare rock of God. They haven’t been made amidst the noise of the crowd, with the temptation of feel-good, or with the promise of achievement. Reality has been laid bare. I have faced it, and decided to align with it. It reminds me of Deuteronomy 8:2,
“And you shall remember the whole way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. “
[Deuteronomy 8:2, ESV]
Jesus was confronted by the devil in the desert, stood firm and forever proved his authority over him. His desert experience prepared him for his ministry. In the same way, our desert experiences are to be welcomed as they prepare us for what lies ahead.
These thoughts have been provoked by a sermon I heard recently, which linked in with some reading I have done over the past few years in the areas of church history and spiritual disciplines. As I write I become keenly aware of how impossible it is to perfectly communicate truth. Only Scripture is able to do that. I have errors in my understanding of the material and failures in my ability to communicate what I am thinking. I ask for grace if you read this.
Part One:
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him,
"If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread."
But he answered,
"It is written, "'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"
Matthew 4:1-4 (ESV)
Have you ever been in a spiritually dry place? This is the place where it seems like God has disappeared, reading the Word of God tastes like ashes, prayers seem to dissipate into mist and every action is drudgery. Where did the term “spiritual desert” come from anyway?
There is a rich history of deserts appearing among the followers of the faith. Right back in Old Testament times, Moses led the children of Israel for forty years of wandering through the wilderness. That desert experience, the Exodus, shaped the nation forever. They were totally dependent on Yahweh for food and water. Their physical dependence was to inform their spiritual dependence.
Elijah and John the Baptist also had desert experiences. Both were fed directly by God’s provision. Elijah was fed by ravens. John received locusts and wild honey.
And then we come to Jesus. He was no wilderness prophet. He moved from town to town and appeared in Jerusalem several times. He only retreated to the wilderness when his ministry was threatened by too much opposition or popularity. But at the beginning of his ministry, he was sent by the Spirit into the desert. Matthew 4:1 explains the purpose of Jesus’ wilderness adventure – it was to be tempted by the devil.
Jesus was in the wilderness for more than a month, and God did not feed him. No ravens. No locusts. Jesus was fasting. And he was hungry.
One thing I have learnt from my own desert experiences is just how dependent on God I am. When everything is going well, when every praise song lifts my heart, when the Bible seems to radiate with an inner glow, when every conversation seems to be Spirit-led I can get caught up in my own activities and in the music, the Bible and the people I am speaking with. But when they get stripped away, then I am forced to pay attention to the one who provided all those things for me.
I’m also reminded of the phrase, “… who have never known hunger”. It referred to a generation who had been raised during a time of plenty. Food was plentiful and the main squabbles among the children were over what they wanted for breakfast. And I compare that to terrible footage I have seen of desperate people crowding around the UN truck that is distributing sacks of food at a refugee camp. The children fight to survive.
I have used physical fasts to develop self-discipline over my body and to train myself to be aware of God’s presence and providence. I have never done a 40 day fast. I know people who have. They report that the hunger cravings lessen after the first few days, but energy levels also drop. They felt weaker, more vulnerable. I can imagine Jesus feeling this way, and having to confront the devil.
And the devil’s first temptation was to ask Jesus to use his power, as the Son of God, to satisfy himself, to provide for himself.
Jesus was the Son of God. That was his true identity. And he had true power. We are also the children of God. That is our true identity. Jesus is our brother, as well as our Lord. And we have true power. We are capable of creativity. We are capable of producing. We are capable of managing the resources God has made us stewards of. We can feed and clothe ourselves. We were placed by God, not in a wilderness, but in a garden. Even when we were cast out, we did not find ourselves destitute. Our world is resource rich. We complain to each other about the limited nature of fossil fuels – but we have guzzled our way through oceans of black oil and mountains of coal for decades and still have several oceans and mountains to go! And then there is nuclear energy and sustainable energy. We indulge ourselves, using our creativity and our capability to provide for ourselves, masking our true dependence on God.
How do we heighten our awareness of our dependence on God? Natural disasters can do it. Have you noticed that a natural disaster is anything that is too powerful for us to control? A hurricane, a storm, or an earthquake only produces a natural disaster if it is of such a category that it blows apart our manmade control mechanisms. In the wealthy West we have developed systems that cope with all but the worst events. Many developing nations suffer tremendously with even the smallest event.
When an event does occur that overpowers our control mechanisms, we suddenly become aware of the vulnerability of our drinking water, our food and our shelter. But few of us want to have a disaster force us to recognise our vulnerability. Is there another way?
Throughout history spiritual disciplines, such as fasting and solitude, have been used by men and women who want to pursue an awareness of their dependence on God. The desert fathers were influenced by the examples of Jesus and John the Baptist and influential in writing about their experiences in the 3rd and 4th Centuries. For example,
I shall speak first about control of the stomach, the opposite to gluttony, and about how to fast and what and how much to eat. I shall say nothing on my own account, but only what I have received from the Holy Fathers. They have not given us only a single rule for fasting or a single standard and measure for eating, because not everyone has the same strength; age, illness or delicacy of body create differences. But they have given us all a single goal: to avoid over-eating and the filling of our bellies... A clear rule for self-control handed down by the Fathers is this: stop eating while still hungry and do not continue until you are satisfied. St. John Cassian
[http://www.balamandmonastery.org.lb/fathers/indexsayings2.htm]
Discussions of wilderness experiences and dependence on God readily drift towards issues of fasting, solitude and physical needs. But we need to return to where we began: spiritual deserts and spiritual dependence.
In Matthew 4:4 Jesus responded to the devil’s temptation with the oft-quoted statement, “'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” More urgent than discovering our physical dependence is recovering our spiritual dependence.
Just as we are capable of great creativity and production to satisfy our physical needs, so we are with our spiritual needs. And it is not wrong to do so. God gave us these capabilities to use for his glory. The command in the garden was to work the land. The command with spiritual gifts is to help each other grow to maturity.
And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ…
Ephesians 4:11-13 [ESV]
God designed us to live in community. Each believer within the community is interdependent on each other member exercising their spiritual gifts for the good of the whole. This is the normal and spiritual path for progress.
But I have been involved in community, when the community is functioning properly, and my heart has been right before God, and still felt spiritually dry. As I have reflected on these experiences, the effect of the dryness has been to test whether I am truly following Jesus for his sake, or whether I am pursuing feelings of well-being, pleasure or purpose instead. In other words, will I still choose to follow Jesus when I am feeling discontent? Will I still choose to follow Jesus when I don’t find pleasure in it? When it becomes drudgery? Will I still follow Jesus when I can’t see the purpose in it?
At these times I am reminded of a little motto that I heard many years ago,
“Don’t doubt in the dark what you learnt in the light”
The darkness, the dryness, is a time when we question what we know. Is God still good if I he doesn’t make me feel good? Is God still there if I don’t sense his presence? Is God still in control if I can’t see his point in the events I am living through? What is the condition of my heart?
Things learnt in the desert seem to sit deeper in my mind. Decisions made in the desert seem to nestle deeper in my soul. They are hard lessons, tough decisions. But they shape me. And they are grounded on the bare rock of God. They haven’t been made amidst the noise of the crowd, with the temptation of feel-good, or with the promise of achievement. Reality has been laid bare. I have faced it, and decided to align with it. It reminds me of Deuteronomy 8:2,
“And you shall remember the whole way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. “
[Deuteronomy 8:2, ESV]
Jesus was confronted by the devil in the desert, stood firm and forever proved his authority over him. His desert experience prepared him for his ministry. In the same way, our desert experiences are to be welcomed as they prepare us for what lies ahead.
Monday 8 September 2008
Driscoll on Sydney Evangelicalism
Last Monday Mark Driscoll spoke at a Ministry Training event for young leaders. I was hoping to go, but it was the day before my Greek exam. But I am pleased to see that at least one of his sessions has been published at the link below:
http://www.sydneyanglicans.net/insight/driscoll_18_obstacles_to_effective_evangelism/
As I read his comments I had a few thoughts:
1) I am old! Not in the "near death" sense of old, but in the "no longer young" sense of old. I could relate to his comments about his own ministry (although mine has been on a much, much, much smaller scale!). He planted a church which grew to 8,000 before his finished his theological studies. I have just handed off the leadership of the Macquarie ministry, which I spent 9 years growing and leading, in order to focus on finishing my theological studies (by the time I'm 40, hopefully, which is 2 years away).
In December 2003 I wrote an article for our Student Life leadership conference entitled, "Where are our barbarians?" which picked up many themes that Driscoll spelled out.
2) I have long been trying to lead so that our ministry engages both the mind and the heart. I agree with Driscoll that the meetings run by evangelicals in Sydney are boring. I want passion in what I engage in. But I also want substance. Why does Sydney end up being a choice between either/or rather than both/and?
Anyway, that's enough. Read the article for yourself. It's worth it.
http://www.sydneyanglicans.net/insight/driscoll_18_obstacles_to_effective_evangelism/
As I read his comments I had a few thoughts:
1) I am old! Not in the "near death" sense of old, but in the "no longer young" sense of old. I could relate to his comments about his own ministry (although mine has been on a much, much, much smaller scale!). He planted a church which grew to 8,000 before his finished his theological studies. I have just handed off the leadership of the Macquarie ministry, which I spent 9 years growing and leading, in order to focus on finishing my theological studies (by the time I'm 40, hopefully, which is 2 years away).
In December 2003 I wrote an article for our Student Life leadership conference entitled, "Where are our barbarians?" which picked up many themes that Driscoll spelled out.
2) I have long been trying to lead so that our ministry engages both the mind and the heart. I agree with Driscoll that the meetings run by evangelicals in Sydney are boring. I want passion in what I engage in. But I also want substance. Why does Sydney end up being a choice between either/or rather than both/and?
Anyway, that's enough. Read the article for yourself. It's worth it.
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