Promise of a nation day4

“We’re running out of time! You’re going to have to trust me!”

It seems like Jack Bauer says that in every episode of the hit television show 24. The world is in peril. Jack’s the only government agent with the courage and determination to do what needs to be done (even if it means playing fast and loose with the rules), and now there’s someone standing between him and saving the day.

“Please. We don’t have much time. Will you trust me?” Jack asks, and we know that they will.

At some point, the writers might be clever enough to have a character say, “No, Jack, I don’t trust you. Frankly, you haven’t been very trustworthy over the past few years. Your success rate is stellar, but your ethics are appalling.” (Of course, as soon as they say such a thing, they’ll surely become the next casualty of this season’s nerve gas or chemical bomb or nuclear warhead.)

What exactly is Jack expecting when he asks for someone’s trust? Is he asking them to have an emotional level of confidence in him and his vigilante ways? Of course not. He’s not asking anyone to feel anything, he’s asking for cooperation. In some way, he’s asking for obedience. And he knows that obedience comes from trust, not from emotional feelings of security. In fact, emotional security may only come as a byproduct of the kind of trust that feels the fear but does the hard thing anyway.

So it is with God. God comes to us and asks us to trust Him. Does that mean we have to be fearless? Must we stop feeling what we are feeling in order to demonstrate real trust?

No.

Abraham and Sarah were not asked to stop feeling anything they were feeling.

Feel the fear. Feel the disappointment. Feel the weariness and confusion and uncertainty. But do what God says anyway. And know that there is at least one very significant difference between God and Jack Bauer (there are lots, but we’ll just stick to one here so you can get on with your day). God not only has a stellar success rate, His ethics are flawless, too.

For God, what gets done is only a fourth of the equation. God does the right thing at the right time for the right reason in the right way. And when you muster up the courage to trust Him like Abraham did, you’ll find yourself becoming more and more like that, too.

The question you have to wrestle with today is simple. Will you trust Him? Will you trust Him enough to go where He says go and do what He says do? Will you trust Him enough to give, to serve, to rest, to talk, to listen?

You’re running out of time. At some point, you’re just going to have to trust Him. How about today?

 

Prayer

 

Father, I confess that I don’t know where You are taking me during this earthly sojourn and that I often try to go my own way instead because I think I understand it. But I also confess that Your purposes and character are perfect, even when they appear to be otherwise. I know that You cannot do anything that is contrary to Your goodness and that You cannot lie. All that You have promised, You will surely fulfil in Your time, in Your way and in Your power. Teach me to take the risks of radical obedience and ruthless trust so that I will honour and please You. I realise that I can only be truly satisfied when You are glorified. Teach me in my thoughts, words and deeds that trust is a choice. I choose to rest in You and hope in Your perfect character. When I am fearful, I will hold on to You.

In Jesus’s name, Amen

Descendants from Cain to Noah

 Cain married, and his wife had a son, Enoch. Instead of accepting his punishment, Cain started a city in the east and named it after Enoch. Enoch had several sons, including Lamech. Lamech married two wives, Adah and Zillah. Jabal, his son by Adah, became the first shepherd, and Tubal-Cain, his son by Zillah, was the first to make tools of metals. 

Lamech killed a man who offended him. Knowing he might be held accountable, he boasted to his wives that if anyone tried to punish him, he would kill that person as well. 

Eve had another son. She named him Seth, which means ‘in the place of’ (because Cain had killed Abel). During the lifetime of Enosh, Seth’s son, people began to worship the Lord through prayer and sacrifice. 

Adam lived for eight hundred years after he became the father of Seth. He was 930 when he died. The descendants from Adam to Noah lived for hundreds of years, but they all eventually died just as the Lord had said they would. There was one exception. Because Enoch was fully devoted to the Lord, God suspended the penalty of death and took him from the earth. One of Adam’s descendants, Lamech, had a son at age 182 and named him Noah, which means ‘comfort’, because he hoped his son would bring relief from the harsh struggle of living under the curse on the ground. 

Cain and Abel

Adam slept with Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She was amazed, she was able to produce life just like the Lord had done. She named her son Cain and thanked the Lord for giving her a son. She then had another son, Abel. 

When the two boys became adults, they chose different occupations. Abel became a herdsman and Cain a farmer. They both brought an offering to the Lord. Cain merely fulfilled an obligation by bringing some of his harvest, but Abel did his best to honour the Lord, bringing some of the best animals from his herd. God approved of Abel’s offering, but not Cain’s. This made Cain furious. He was red hot with anger. 

The Lord tried to warn Cain. He told him his uncontrolled rage would lead to violence. Cain refused to listen   He tricked his brother by inviting him into one of his fields, and then he killed him. 

The Lord knew what Cain had done but asked him a rhetorical question, “Where is your brother, Abel?” Cain defiantly lied and said he didn’t know. He then expressed his contempt for the Lord with his own rhetorical question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

The Lord told Cain there was an eyewitness to his crime. It was his brother’s blood, crying out from the ground. Because of Cain’s heinous murder of his own brother, the Lord banished him from the ground he had cultivated for his livelihood. Realising he could not survive as a homeless wanderer. Cain was desperate. He complained that his punishment was more than he could endure. Someone would undoubtedly kill him if he was a homeless wanderer. The Lord understood and assured Cain of special protection. Cain was satisfied, but he refused to stay in the presence of the Lord. He went east and lived in the land of Nod (which means ‘land of wandering’)

Promise of a nation day3

 People can live without a lot of things. For thousands of years, people lived without cars, computers, televisions and microwave ovens. People can even live without a sense of hearing or sight or taste or smell. People have been known to live without an arm or a leg or even an eye.

But people cannot live without hope.

Life is hard. We don’t need a psychiatrist to tell us that, we know it experientially. We all experience the aches and pains of getting older. At some point in time, people let us down and life doesn’t turn out the way we thought it would.

Without hope, people give up, sit down and begin the process of dying. Hopelessness breeds despair, hope gives life.

Abraham and his wife, Sarah, did not have an easy path to walk. They’d been barren for so long, bereft of anything tangible. All they had to cling to was a promise from an unseen God. But cling to it they did, with all their might, for they knew that without the hope from that promise, they might as well throw in the towel.

Hope is vital to existence. And the truth about people is that, because we cannot live without hope, we do not live without hope. We all have hope. The issue with which we must all come to terms is where we place it.

Put your hope in another human and you’ll be let down. Put your hope in your children and you’ll be let down. Wealth, job, status, house, car, golf game, even church — none of these are designed to bear the weight of your hopes.

Only God can fill that role. The God of hope gives us hope in the form of a promise and a track record of faithfulness that remains unbroken for thousands of years. He may have let Abraham and Sarah sweat it out for a while, but He never let them down. In fact, generations later, this God would be referred to as “The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

That would be Abraham and his son and his grandson, the founders of the Nation of Israel.

And we’ve never heard of anyone who put their trust in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob getting to the end of life and saying, “I wish I had trusted Him less. I see now how hopeless this whole God-following endeavour really is.”

God doesn’t just offer hope and sustain hope, He actually becomes our hope — the only kind of hope that can see us through the really tough stuff in this life.

 

Prayer 

 

Lord God, just as You prepared and called Abram out of obscure beginnings, so too You laid Your hand upon me and called me to a glorious destiny. But along the journey I realise that there are times when You will take me to the end of my own resources to teach me that only Your resources are sufficient. You call into being that which did not exist and bring life out of barrenness. You have implanted a living hope within me, and You teach me again and again, sometimes through hardship and uncertainty, that any other hope will let me down. By Your loving power, may I put my hope in those things You have promised and not in the people, possessions and positions of this fleeting world. I thank You for the living hope I have received through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

In Jesus’s name, Amen

The consequences

 When the Lord asked Adam if he eaten the forbidden fruit, Adam tried to blame Eve. He said it was her fault. She had given him the fruit. The Lord then asked Eve what had happened, and she blamed Satan. She admitted Satan had deceived her. 

Because Satan had taken the form of a snake to deceive Eve, the Lord cursed both the snake and Satan. The Lord said Satan would be humiliated and he would grovel in dust like a snake crawls on the ground. The Lord also predicted there would be a constant struggle between the followers of Satan and the descendants of the woman, but one of Eve’s descendants would eventually crush the head of Satan.

As a consequence of her disobedience, the Lord said Eve would suffer pain in bearing children, and Adam and Eve’s marriage relationship would suffer from a sinister conflict. Eve now would have a sinful desire to control and manipulate Adam, Adam would attempt to dominate and exploit Eve. 

Because Adam had listened to his wife and had eaten the forbidden fruit, he would always struggle to eat. The soil of the earth would become his enemy, it would produce thorns and thistles. Adam would die and his body would return to the ground from which he was created. 

But the Lord was also kindhearted to Adam and Eve. He covered their nakedness with the skin of an animal. Because of their sin, Adam and Eve forfeited the opportunity to eat from the tree of life, so the Lord expelled them the garden and ordered angels to guard the tree of life. 

The fall

 Their relationship with the Lord and each other couldn’t have been better until Satan came to Eve in the disguise of a snake and raised doubt in her mind about the integrity of God’s prohibition. Satan lied and told Eve she would become like God and would be able to make moral decisions independent of God. 

Satan’s argument made sense. When Eve looked at the fruit, it looked good to eat, so she decided to eat it and then gave some to Adam. They immediately realised they had sinned. Both were overwhelmed with guilt and were shocked when they saw they were naked. Adam and Eve awkwardly tried to cover their nakedness by sewing fig leaves together. 

When the Lord returned to the garden. Adam and Eve were so afraid they to hide. It didn’t work. The Lord knew what had happened. When Adam and Eve didn’t meet him, the Lord called out, “Where are you?” Like a criminal caught in the act, Adam tried to cover up his sin. He told the Lord he was afraid because he was naked, he actually afraid because he knew the Lord would punish him for his disobedience. 

Promise of a nation day2

 Nothing is impossible with God. God can do absolutely, positively anything. The things you think will never happen in a million years can be accomplished in the blink of an eye with God.

Of course, God is also one of the most frustrating people you’ll ever meet. He rarely does things when you think He will. He operates on some other-worldly timetable that frequently has you checking your watch, wondering if He’s ever going to show up.

Some people say, “God is an 11:59 God.”

Abraham probably would have said, “God is a 12:15 God.”

Here’s the truth. God does what He wants when He wants. He will not be rushed by our impatience, but He will not be slowed by our resistance either.

Sometimes slow, sometimes fast — this God is frustrating, alright. But He’s good.

And did I mention that He can do anything? You name it, He can do it. Water in the desert? Just you wait. Food to feed the masses? No problem. He made everything there is, and He started with nothing. If He can do that, then taking a skeptical, old, barren couple and turning them into a great nation is a snap! He can even bring people back to life. Anything you can ask or imagine, He can do and go one better, beyond your wildest dreams.

He can do absolutely anything.

Except one thing. He can’t lie. Once He gives his word, He can’t go back on it. If He says something’s going to happen, take it to the bank, because He simply cannot tell a lie.

It may not happen when you want it or the way that you want it. It may not look like you thought it would. But if God makes a promise, He delivers.

Of course, Abram didn’t know this. God didn’t have much of a track record yet, and Abram hadn’t heard countless stories that attest to the power and faithfulness of God.

But you have.

So, what’s your excuse?

God can accomplish far more than you can think of asking Him. He’s made all sorts of promises to you about being with you and enabling you to do hard things and protecting you and providing for you. His sense of timing is different from yours. His idea of protection and provision may be different from yours, but His faithfulness and power will more than make up for any delays or discomfort you experience.

 

Prayer 

 

Dear Lord, Your ways are past finding out. Just when I think I understand Your direction, I discover that a new level of trust in Your purposes is necessary. As I look back, I realise that You have never let me down, though it often appeared that way when I was going through the trials. As I look ahead, I rest in Your good will for my life. Mine is only an illusion of control — all things are really in Your hands. Like Abram of old, You change my name and my destiny, and You call me to a country and to a promise that seems impossible to fulfil. But by Your grace, I will believe that what You say is true, even when it makes no sense to me. You have called me to trust in You, not to understand all Your ways. Nothing is impossible with You, and I will confidently hope in what You have promised

In Jesus’s name, Amen

Creation/The beginning

 Creation 

 

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. In its original state the earth was empty and dark. Like a bird watching over its young, the Spirit of God hovered over the watery surface of the earth. 

God created light on day one. On day two, he placed the sky between the earth and the heavens. He made land and vegetation on the third day, and on the fourth day, he put the stars, the sun, and the moon in place. On day five, God filled the sky with birds and the oceans with creatures of the sea. God created animals on the sixth day, and finally, last but not least, he made humankind in his image. (This means they were like God in certain ways.) God enriched their lives by providing them food to eat and giving them responsibility for the rest of creation.

When God finished his work, he saw that everything he had made was perfect. There was absolutely no defect in his creation. He rested on the seventh day and set it apart as a day to rest and to remember that God is the creator of the universe. 

The Lord God planted a garden in Eden and made Adam the caretaker. He made all kinds of trees grow in the garden, and in the middle of the garden he designated two trees as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life. The Lord gave man permission to eat from all the trees in the garden except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. He warned Adam that if he disobeyed by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he would immediately die spiritually and eventually die physically. 

The Lord allowed Adam to name all the animals so he would realise none of them were made like him. But the Lord also knew Adam needed a wife. When Adam fell into a deep sleep, the Lord made a woman from Adam’s rib. When Adam woke up, he was thrilled. The woman was perfect. Adam called her ‘woman’ because she was made from his side. God united them in marriage, and though they were naked they did not feel embarrassed or think about exploiting each other. 

Promise of a nation day1

 GENESIS 12

 

The world was in a mess, and nothing seemed to help. So God decided to have a chat with a man named Abram, who lived in a town called Ur.

God said, “Hey, Abram, I’m going to make you into a great nation.”

“What’s a nation?” Abram may have asked.

There weren’t any of those around yet. God may have explained that a nation is like a really, really big family.

“Oh, okay, uh, there’s just this one thing. I don’t have any kids, and my wife is passed the, uh, well, let’s just say that window’s closed. Is that going to be a problem?”

God made a crazy promise to a random nobody who lived in the middle of nowhere that his barren wife would give him at least one child and that through his child, a great nation would come and would bless the entire world. God had no reason to choose Abram (whose name was later changed to “Abraham”). There was nothing about him that would commend him to God or indicate that he was a good choice to be patriarch of the most famous people group in human history. But God chose him anyway.

And if you think about it, Abraham had no good reason to obey God. There was no history, no documented evidence that this disembodied voice, speaking from heaven or behind a bush or wherever it came from, was anything other than last night’s mutton talking back. The promise was so outrageous, so unreasonable, we would understand if Abram had said, “Yeah, right,” and gone on his merry way. But Abram chose to believe anyway.

We have to wonder how exactly Abram explained all this to his wife Sarai (later called “Sarah”). Did Abram go home and try to conceive a child that night? After all, it wasn’t an immaculate conception! How would he explain his suddenly amorous behaviour? See, there was this voice that said we were going to have a child, so I figured we could maybe, well, you know ___.

But there would be no child conceived that night. Days turned to weeks turned to months turned to years turned to decades. Twenty-five long years went by as the already old couple grew ancient. The temptation was always there to give up. Maybe the old fool had imagined it after all. Equally strong was the temptation to take matters into their own hands (so to speak). Maybe the promise didn’t include Sarah but was only for Abraham. Maybe if he found another woman.

But Abraham kept believing. He kept trusting. When God said go, he went. And one day, miracle of miracles, the seed did not land on a barren wasteland as it had all the other times before. It found fertility. There were tears of joy and tears of relief and tears of “I can’t believe it finally happened.” And all three members of the family had to wear diapers!

One random man in the middle of nowhere had enough faith to just keep going and going and going until God came through on His promise. A baby boy was born, and they named him “Laughter.”

 

Prayer 

 

God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, You rule the universe but chose to become intimately immersed in human history on planet Earth. You have gradually unfolded the mysteries of Your sovereign plan in the developing stories of Scripture, and You see ends that are impossible for any of Your creatures to fathom. While we are on this earth, we walk by faith and not by sight, knowing that the only worthy object of our faith is Your unchanging character and Your sure promises. As I read Your Word, I see with greater clarity that faith in Your promises runs contrary to appearances, because You call me to hope in the unseen and the not yet. Yet You have given me the holy invitation to risk everything I have and am on the invisible promises that will not be fulfilled in this life but in the new realm You are preparing for Your people.

In Jesus’s name, Amen 

Warning day4

 Take a deep breath.

Do you believe there will be enough oxygen for you to take another one in a few seconds?

Why?

Where will that oxygen come from?

What or who ultimately provides it?

Sure, there are trees and all sorts of plants that take in our poisonous gasses and provide oxygen in return. But who or what made the trees?

And how did things get set up so perfectly?

Remember your answer to these questions. You will need them at the end of today’s reading.

God’s desire is that people live in harmony with Him, with one another and with all of creation. That is precisely how Adam and Eve lived until they gave in to the notion that they could do a better job deciding where the boundaries were than God could.

Their lives had been characterised by meaningful work and a shame-free relationship. They experienced beauty and creativity.

When the consequences of sin began to spread relentlessly further and deeper, they experienced pain and frustration, chaos and alienation. Sin promised greater freedom, but it led to bondage.

And all of that came about because two people failed to do two simple things, trust and obey.

Of the two, we tend to focus most on obedience. That’s what parents stress with their children. We discipline our kids when they disobey. Society has an entire legal system with paid law enforcement officers to punish and restrain disobedient lawbreakers. What we often fail to notice, however, is that disobedience is usually the result of a lack of trust.

If we trusted God to be both great and good — if we believed Him to be as competent as He is portrayed in the Bible — we would be more likely to obey what He says.

As we think about how our behaviour is to be shaped by our story this week, it might be easy for us to present Adam and Eve’s fruit eating as a cautionary tale about what happens when we fail to obey God’s clear commands. But we’d rather encourage you to focus less on obedience to God and more on cultivating trust in Him.

Every command given in the Bible comes from a God who has our best interests at heart. He does not tell us to abstain from sex outside of marriage because He wants to spoil our fun, He tells us because He knows that such behaviour will ultimately lead us away from the intimacy we truly crave. He tells us to give money away not because He wants us to be impoverished, but because He knows that true freedom is found in a generous spirit.

Obedience that is not based in trust is short-lived at best and tends to produce resentment. That’s not what God wants; it’s not what any father wants with his children. Instead, with trust as the foundation of a healthy relationship, obedience comes naturally.

So how do you begin to cultivate that kind of trust in a God you can’t see? How do you learn just how trustworthy God is?

Easy: Take a deep breath again.

 

Prayer

 

God, I ask for a clearer vision of the blessings of obedience and the pain of disobedience so that I will fear You, hope in You and depend on You. Most of all, I want to grow in trust so that I will take the risks of obedience that run contrary to the world system with its temporal values. May I develop a clearer upward perspective so that I realise in my thinking and practice that only the transcendent can give ultimate meaning to life on earth. Without You I am wretched and hopeless, but when I abide in Your loving presence I enjoy the fruit of love, joy and peace. Grant me wisdom from the Word and the desire to renew my mind in Your timeless truth. Then I will walk in the way of life-giving trust and dependence, and then I will learn the blessings of obedience to what You proclaim for my good.

In Jesus’s name, Amen 

Warning day3

 If human beings are just the accidental product of time plus chance, then there is no rational basis for human dignity. If this is the case, then human life should be viewed as a commodity, and we should only value people for what they bring to the party.

Can they tell funny stories or play an instrument well? Okay, let them in.

Do they have money or connections that might be put to good use? They get to join us.

Are they beautiful to look at? Put them at the table in the front.

The smart, strong, talented, wealthy, beautiful people are valuable, all others must stay behind the velvet rope.

In fact, it might be better — since we’re all just accidents anyway — to systematically weed certain types out of the garden altogether. If we don’t, they’ll continue to be a burden on society.

Few people throughout human history have been willing to take this argument all the way to its logical conclusions. Those who have thought things through, almost without fail, ended up either committing some of the worst atrocities in human history or succumbing to utter hopelessness and despair. Without a proper understanding of human nature, though, it’s difficult to give a reason why we should not walk down either of those paths as far as we can. But there is a reason. Human beings have such tremendous dignity that we must value human life.

Meditate today on the implications of humans created in God’s image. For most people reading this post, the application will have less to do with issues of abortion or euthanasia and more to do with how you treat the people in your own home or workplace. Do you really value them as ones created in the image of God? Or do you treat them like objects?

The dignity of human life is not the only value we can glean from this story. We’ve learned that each and every one of us is utterly dependent on God for the very breath that we expect to fill our lungs in the next moment or two. We must also realise that our minds, clouded as they are with mixed motives, must have guidance from an external Source. There is no created person or thing that can help us live above our circumstances. Only something transcendent can provide the perspective we need to navigate our passage through this world.

Because human beings are dependent upon God, we must value His Word.

The Bible is not simply a rulebook or a textbook or a storybook, it is written to shape our thoughts, our feelings and our actions. Without it, we are left to make our own way in the world — to our own demise. The wisdom found in the Bible is like the air we breathe, it did not come from us, but it must come to us — come into us, in fact — for us to be sustained.

Unfortunately, our first parents failed to value God’s Word and chose to go their own way. Not satisfied to be dependent on God for guidance, they chose to rebel. This decision set in motion a chain of events that has led to despair, anxiety, misery and agony ever since.

We find ourselves in the uncomfortable position of declaring humans totally depraved. There is not one aspect of a human being that is untainted by the devastating effects of sin. Furthermore, there is not one aspect of human society that is pristine or unspoiled. Our own bodies have turned against us, betraying our noblest aspirations, and we often find ourselves feeling trapped in a world without hope. As one biblical writer despaired, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Rom 7.24).

Thankfully, that same writer answered his own question in the next verse: “Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (.25).

Because human beings are totally depraved, we must value Jesus Christ.

After all, this Jesus fellow (who is part of the plural pronoun I pointed out in the last post), valued human beings enough to come and die in our place to rescue us from a catastrophe of our own making. And where do we learn about all that He said and did?

In God’s Word.

 

Prayer 

 

Father, You have loved me and called me to be Your loyal follower, and to find my true pleasure in Your revealed will. You have given all humanity great personal worth and have called us to a high and holy life of other-centered love. As I pursue You, may I also pursue the best interests of the people You have sovereignly placed in my life, so that I will be an agent of reconciliation and of Your grace. You are the eternal well-spring of wisdom, and I want to drink from the water of Your Word and be satisfied. Keep me from being a stumbling block to others and empower me to treat people according to their true dignity in Your image rather than according to the world’s distorted view of status and worth. Let my love and service of others be an expression of my love and service to You.

In Jesus’s name, Amen 

 

Warning day2

 There is a God.

You are not Him.

You may be good, but you are not God.

The Bible is unique among religious literature in many ways. Most noticeably, from the very beginning, we are given a realistic assessment of human nature in its dignity, its dependence and its potential for total depravity. Only the Judeo-Christian Bible describes each facet adequately.

Here in the earliest portion of the Bible, we read that the Creator decided, “Let us make man in our image” (Gen 1.26). It is worth mentioning the plural pronoun in this verse. There’s a clue as to the nature and character of God, and I’ll certainly double-click on that later. For now, we should explore this idea of what it means to be made in the image of God.

An image is a reflection. In this case, it is a person or thing that closely resembles another. We talk about a son being the image of his father. In a similar way, humans have been made to demonstrate something of the character and nature of God. Other parts of creation were good, but nothing else was created in God’s very image. Humans are distinct in this. We’re not just highly developed animals. We’re not just a bundle of body parts and nerve endings. We’re not just overgrown germs. We’re created in the image of God, and this should bring us a profound sense of dignity.

And yet, it’s also very obvious from the first pages of the Bible that we are not God. Created in His image? Yes. But there is a sharp dividing line between the Creator and the creation.

God fashioned the first human “out of the dust of the ground” (Gen 2.7), and then He called that first human “Adam”, which sounds an awful lot like the Hebrew word for “earth,” as in dirt. It’s almost as if God named the first man “Dusty” as a reminder of where the man came from.

Furthermore, that human did not come to life until God had “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life” (Gen 2.7). In a sense, God continues to do this with each and every one of us, giving “all men life and breath and everything else” (Ac 17.25). If God should decide one day to extinguish the sun or to drain all the oxygen out of our atmosphere, we would be helpless to escape our impending doom. It is only because of the benevolent patience of God that we are able to continue living. Only God is self-sustaining.

We are made in His image, but we are completely dependent on Him.

When we cannot content ourselves with this status of being over something (creation) and under something else (God), we fall prey to all sorts of delusions, the most common of which is the notion that our Creator does not have our best interests at heart. It is this thought that may have led Eve astray, and it lies at the root of most of the sin in our lives.

Can you be content with God’s way of being God, or do you secretly think you could do better?

The biblical understanding of human beings provides us with the tension of immense dignity and utter dependence. Any other attempt to understand ourselves and our proper place in the universe will always lead to depravity and confusion. Sin corrupts everything it touches and, unchecked, leaves us in a state of total depravity. In other words, the Bible is very realistic about humans: We’re good, but we’re not absolutely good; we’re bad, but we’re not absolutely bad.

Dignity with dependence or total depravity — the choice is yours.

 

Prayer 

 

O God, You are Lord of heaven and earth, and all things come from You and through You and to You. When You spoke the cosmos into being, You remained the infinite and personal One who is forever distinct from Your created order. You alone are God, and we are Your people who have been granted the immense dignity of being created in Your glorious image. You have called me to be like You in my thinking, my choosing, and my desires and emotions. By Your grace I want to emulate Your character and nature so that I will draw nearer to You. I know that sin and rebellion against Your benevolence only lead to pain, alienation and estrangement in my relationship with You and with others. I want to be content with all You have called me to have and to be, knowing that Your pleasure is my highest good.

In Jesus’s name, Amen 

Warning day1

 Genesis 3-11

 

WARNING: Do not eat the fruit of this tree! If you do, you will die!

Such an odd warning. What was the big deal about the fruit of that tree? It didn’t look poisonous. It looked pretty good, actually. But God made this huge deal out of Adam and Eve not eating this particular fruit off of this particular tree.

Apparently Adam couldn’t figure out why God said what He said, but he knew God meant what He said. So Adam told Eve it would be best to not even touch the tree. And she probably would have been okay, if that serpent hadn’t shown up asking all those questions.

“Did God really say that?”

“Do you really think you’ll die?”

“Why do you suppose God said that?”

All those questions, and no sufficient answers. That’s when the doubts began.

Maybe He didn’t really mean it. The more I look at it, the better it looks. Maybe God is insecure and manipulative. Maybe He doesn’t really have our best interests at heart. He’s not even here right now. C’mon, let’s just try it.

In that moment, the whole world started to come unraveled.

The hook was set and they swallowed the bait, and nothing would ever be the same again. Sin, which before only existed in theory, was now a reality. Work was hard now, and frustrating. Childbirth was painful. Their relationship was strained. Adam seemed distant, preoccupied with other things. Eve seemed clingy and needy, almost desperate for his attention.

God was still there, but it was different. He pursued them, but they found themselves hiding from Him — terrified at what they must look like to Him, frightened that one day He might decide He’d had enough and wipe them off the face of the earth.

Possibly the worst part was what they saw in their children. Right off the bat, the kids seemed to be leaning away from God, away from intimacy with others, away from their own best interests. They seemed bent on their own destruction. Sometimes they did the right thing, but it usually seemed forced. It didn’t seem to come naturally. And then the grand-kids came along, and sin started to spread out wider and wider. More and more kids growing up to be worse and worse, plotting new ways of doing wrong, even working together to rebel. The hook Adam and Eve swallowed appeared to have burrowed its way even deeper into their offspring.

It started as a seemingly harmless act. They just ate a piece of fruit they weren’t supposed to eat. And now kids were killing kids, swearing vengeance, taking multiple wives. It was as if they lacked the ability to restrain themselves, until every thought was only evil all the time.

Finally, God had enough. He decided to wipe the slate clean and start over. He found one guy, Noah, who seemed better than all the others, and then He flooded the earth, saving Noah and his family. Yet as soon as the water subsided, Noah planted a vineyard, grew some grapes, made some wine, got drunk, passed out naked, embarrassed himself and his sons, woke up, and through his hangover haze managed to curse his unborn grandchildren.

Wow, what a mess!

With just one act of disobedience, God’s beautiful creation became the Jerry Springer Show. Families torn apart by violence and deception. Brokenness. Frustration. Alienation. Fear. From that first bite, these have ruled the roost, and no matter how hard we try, we cannot rid ourselves of this awful hook that’s set deeply in our hearts and minds, corrupting absolutely everything.

WARNING: Do not eat the fruit of this tree! If you do, you will die!

Such an odd warning. Apparently God had His reasons for posting it.

 

Prayer 

 

Lord of all creation, You made us for Yourself, and You always take pleasure in granting us every good and perfect gift. Your Word is trustworthy and Your promises are sure. In spite of this, I struggle with trusting You enough to surrender to Your better way. I often succumb to my own devices and desires, foolishly hoping that I can successfully order my life without conscious dependence on You. When I rebel against Your goodness by choosing my will above Yours, I only grasp dust and ashes. Give me the grace to believe that you really do know what is best for me and that I do not. May I cling to Your character and rejoice in Your pursuit of me. I thank You that in spite of my waywardness, You never let me go. May I honour You so that my influence on others will be for their moral and spiritual good rather than their detriment.

In Jesus’s name, Amen

Back to square one day4

 The Creator God revealed in the first few pages of Scripture does not merely create a wonderful garden and place two people in it to lounge around forever. He gives them work to do. First, He calls them to be fruitful and multiply (hooray for sex!). Then He gives them the task of managing the garden. All of creation was under their dominion, just as they were under God’s dominion.

Even after many millennia, this idea that humans are stewards of God’s creation has never been repealed. We should be custodians of the beauty and diversity of this earth. Those who are in a relationship with their Creator should lead the way in matters of environmental concern. Clearly, we must do this with wisdom and discernment, but do it we must.

In our work, however, we would be wise to follow God’s example of resting regularly. In the Ten Commandments given to Moses (more about that presently), God called His people to a weekly period of rest that reflected the pattern He began at creation. We are not obligated to keep the law of the Sabbath any longer, but it is still our goal to manifest an ever-increasing level of godliness in our behaviour. One godly thing we can all do is rest, whether we think we need to or not.

Because humans matter so much to our Creator, our fellow humans must also matter to those of us who seek to reflect His glory in our own lives. This may mean fighting for the rights of the unborn and the elderly. But it means much more than that. It means bringing aid to those in need — water for the thirsty, food for the hungry, companionship for the lonely. It means loving our neighbours —those on the other side of the planet, those on the other side of the street and those on the other side of the political spectrum. God not only values human life, He values human community. In our activities, we should not only champion the sanctity of life but the sanctity of fellowship as well.

There are simple things most of us can do to reflect godliness in our behaviour. For a starter (and this one is far too often neglected among Christians), married people can have sex. There, I stated the obvious! God created sex, and sex is really, really good in the proper context. Enjoy physical intimacy with your spouse as a gift from God. That’s godly behaviour.

Plant a garden or work in the yard. Physical labour is beneficial for your body, mind and spirit. It gets you in touch with the elemental qualities of life. It reminds you that one of the reasons God put you on this planet was to care for it.

Create a work of art. Paint a picture. Mould some clay. Play a song on the piano. Write a poem. God is the greatest artist in the universe, and you’ve been created in His image. Do something to reflect God’s creative spirit.

Take a nap. God put you on planet Earth and gave you work to do. That work is meaningful, but it is not the end-all-be-all of your existence. God rested. You should rest, too.

Have friends over for dinner. Enjoy their company. Build community with them. Let them know how much you value their friendship. God does not simply want a string of relationships with individuals; He wants a relationship with a people — a group that is rightly related to Him and to one another.

Do something for a stranger. Sponsor a child through Compassion International or World Vision. Plan a short-term mission trip. Volunteer in a soup kitchen. Counsel an unwed mother. Adopt a child. Do something out of your comfort zone that shows how much you agree with God that human life and human dignity are worth working to preserve.

While you’re having sex, working in the garden, creating a masterpiece, taking a nap, enjoying a great dinnertime conversation or being an activist, remember this. It’s all worship. The reason you’re able to think, speak, walk, draw, plan, rest, breathe and work is because there is a God who created you for a purpose and has called you into partnership with Him to see His kingdom come and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

If you can’t find cause to worship that Creator, you might need to start over with Monday.

 

Prayer

 

Lord, You have called me to participate in Your purposes through the work I have been given to do during my earthly sojourn. May I do my work with care and excellence in the desire to be pleasing to You. I realise that all things become spiritual when they are done in Your name. May I honour You in my choices and activities and view the works of my hands as a mode of worship. I want whatever I do in thought, word and deed to be honouring to You and edifying to others. I ask for a clearer sense of purpose and calling and for the power to accomplish that for which You have placed me on this earth.

In Jesus’s name, Amen 

Back to square one day3

 The beginning of the Bible does more than reveal something about God’s character and nature (though that should always be among the first things we look for in Scripture), it also reveals something of God’s desire and rights. A creator always has rights to determine what becomes of the creation.

The creation story reveals some things that God values. For example, He values creativity balanced with order and design, He does not create things willy-nilly. There also seems to be a structure to His creation process — but the process is not really a model of efficiency. This God values structure and order, but He seems content to take His time, to linger over things without feeling a need to rush or hurry. It’s not that He wastes time, but He’s not a slave to the clock.

There is order and structure, but diversity seems to be favoured over efficiency in God’s economy of creation. The things He creates are far from uniform. There is no cookie-cutter assembly line producing leaves in heaven, though that would probably speed the process up considerably. Each leaf is unique, individual, different. Each flower, each snow-flake, each person appears to be handcrafted by God.

Furthering my theory that God is not primarily interested in efficiency, it appears that God prefers a rhythm of work and rest to a demanding work schedule. A being powerful enough to create something from nothing could certainly have created everything at once. The God of the Bible did not. He measures Himself, creating just enough for one day, not feeling the need to do too much. And then He rests. He doesn’t need to rest, He isn’t tired. He chooses to rest. He values rest as much as He values work.

The way God’s creation of humans is described reminds us that humans are special, unique among God’s other creations. Only humans bear the image of God, and as such are to be valued above all other forms of creation. We have an inherent dignity that can only be defended from a correct understanding of the first two chapters of the Bible.

We should notice, too, that it is not merely the male gender of the human species that enjoys this privileged place above all creation. Eve was created to be Adam’s companion — his partner — not his maid or his servant. Humans, male and female, enjoy equal status from God’s perspective.

Perhaps the most interesting thing to notice is that above everything else God values, He seems to prize community. As God creates, He steps back and declares things to be good. But then He notices something that isn’t good, Adam is alone. Amid the beauty and diversity of creation, there is no suitable companion for Adam until another human is made. In addition to being a new creation, Eve brings a new creation into the Garden, the creation of community. God doesn’t merely want us to be rightly related to Him, He wants us to be rightly related to one another as well. Community is a prominent theme throughout the Bible.

Creativity. Order and design. Diversity. Rest. People. Community. These are the priorities of God’s heart as it is revealed in the first two chapters of the Bible. Are they ours as well?

 

Prayer 

 

Father, your creation is a magnificent unity in diversity, profound in wisdom, awesome in understanding, marvellous in purpose and rich in elegance. You revel in variety, subtlety, intricacy, information and beauty. All things work together in both the physical and spiritual realms. I thank You for creating and calling me to become conformed to the image of Your Son, and I pray for the grace of holy desire to pursue by Your power what You have called me to become in Christ. I thank You for friendships and alliances with likeminded people, and I am grateful for the manifold gifts and ministries in the Body of Christ. Give me a growing heart for Your people so that I will be embedded in others-centered community as a lover and servant of the people You love.

In Jesus’s name, Amen 

Back to square one day2

 The book of Genesis serves as a window, a lens through which we see our world, our place in the world and the rest of the Bible. We look through it, we rarely look at it. By the time Genesis was written, lots of history had taken place. Adam. Eve. Creation. The Fall. Murder. Exile. Construction. Destruction. Famines. Floods. Dysfunctional families. Genesis was not written as it happened, it was written at least two millennia after the first domino was knocked over.

Before Genesis was written down, Father Abraham — we’ll read his story soon — and his frustrating walk of faith had come and gone. Isaac had been rescued. Jacob had been lamed. Joseph had been sold. Patterns had been established. The family had become a nation within a nation. For 400 years, the Israelites languished in slavery under the oppressive hand of their Egyptian taskmasters.

Then, suddenly, into the deafening silence, God spoke to a man, and through that man God spoke (first) to His people, (next) to His people’s keepers and (ultimately) to all of human history.

And still Genesis had not been written.

As far as we know, the plagues were visited upon the Egyptians, the Red Sea was parted, the Law was given, the Golden Calf was crafted and the spies were convinced that invading the land of their destiny would be a mistake, all of that happened before Genesis was written.

Perhaps there is a sense in which it is because of these stories — and others like them — that Genesis (and the other historical-narrative parts of the Bible) was written. Genesis is written to remind us of what has happened, what God has done and how He has interacted with His people through the first eras of human history. This reminder demonstrates two vitally important principles.

Scripture is always a means to a greater end.

Scripture corrects, reveals and instructs.

It is intended to make us more like the God who authors it. God does not merely desire a transfer of information, He desires our complete transformation.

It is for these reasons that Moses finally put down in writing the stories that had been handed down from generation to generation. He was less concerned with telling us how the world was created than He was in telling us that the world was created and by Whom.

And what a world it is! Intricate design (look at a blade of grass under a microscope), balance (four seasons every year), order (the world keeps turning) and controlled mayhem (kick over an anthill sometime). It is a marvellous place of wonder and beauty. If the creation is this amazing, how amazing must the Creator be?

 

Prayer 

 

What we could not have learned from the glories and marvels of Your world, You have revealed through Your Word. We know from the heavens and the earth that You are all-powerful, utterly wise and everywhere present; Your eternal power and divine nature have clearly been revealed. But it was only through Your special revelation in Scripture that we could know that the One who has dominion over all things is also the Lover of our souls. Your Word is a love letter to the people You created to enjoy forever in loving communion with You. May I be a diligent student of Your Word so that it will renew my mind and give me an eternal perspective as I meditate on your timeless truths.

In Jesus’s name, Amen 

 

Back to square one day1

 GENESIS 1–2

 

Before there was something, there was Someone. Go back as far as your mind will allow you to, millions or billions of years, go back beyond the creation of the world, before the existence of matter and energy, space and time, drive a stake in the nothingness you imagine and an odd thing happens. From behind the mysterious nothingness steps a benevolent Creator to greet you.

This God revealed (but definitely not contained) in the Bible has always existed and will always exist. He exists as a communion of three Persons — infinite, personal, triune, transcendent and immanent all at the same time. It is from this eternal community of oneness that all others derive life, meaning and purpose. It is from this eternal community of oneness that everything that exists is spoken into existence.

From out of the depths of His love, He spoke light into being, separating it from darkness. He created spiral galaxies filled with innumerable stars, related to each other by distances that can only be measured in light years. And out of all the billions of places He could have chosen, He focused His attention on one tiny planet, lavishing upon that blue marble His love and creativity, giving it sun, moon and stars, atmosphere, dry land and water, oxygen, cherry trees and grapevines, hammerhead sharks and falcons, wild boars and hairy apes and llamas. “So much beauty around us for just two eyes to see,” Rich Mullins used to sing. (From, Here in America by Rich Mullins)

And, at last, the pinnacle of God’s creation, humans. Perhaps He created us last as a testament to our inherent dignity — saving the best for last, so to speak. Or perhaps it was so we wouldn’t try to tell Him where to put things.

One thing is pretty clear, He didn’t need our help. It may sound trite and overused, but it’s true nonetheless, God is God and we are not. God created absolutely everything, and into this perfect garden of delight, He placed the man and eventually the woman, giving them dominion over everything else. God was to rule over them, and they were to rule over everything else.

There they lived in unbroken intimacy with God, with each other and with the world around them. It was an idyllic existence.

There was just one rule. Not 10 commandments. Not 613 laws. One rule. They were free to do anything they wanted except this one thing. Obeying the rule would serve as a reminder for them of Who was really in charge. Their Creator, the one who ruled over them, told them to avoid just one thing: Don’t eat the fruit of this one tree.

How hard could that be?

 

Prayer 

 

O Lord my God, You are exalted above all things we can conceive and imagine. Time and space are a part of Your created order — You brought them into being, and You dwell in all times and places. You are the eternal now, the great I AM, the Beginning and the End, the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last. You are present everywhere and You rule all things, from the microcosm to the macrocosm. You spoke, and energy and matter came into being. Your boundless power and wisdom are evident in Your works, and all things derive their being from You. The beauty, radiance and wisdom that abound in Your creation all point beyond themselves to You, their Creator and Sustainer. I ask for the eyes to see Your goodness, beauty and truth as I behold plants, trees, animals, insects, sunrises and sunsets, landscapes and the starry sky. 

In Jesus’s name, Amen 

The End day4

 We’re all dying. It’s inevitable. As hard as we’ve tried, humans have simply never been able to find that elusive cure for death. With all of our medical technology, we’ve managed to stave it off for a few days at most, but it is an indisputable fact. The mortality rate among humans is 100 percent.

For those of us who have placed our faith in Christ, we have the assurance that what comes next is taken care of for us. We need not fear death, because heaven awaits us on the other side.

But most of us have some time standing between where we are now and where we’ll be then. God does not simply get us saved and then take us home. There’s some living to be done between now and then, and we need to think carefully about how our final destination affects our present situation. After all, we haven’t just been saved to something, we’ve been saved for something.

For starters, we should add our voices to those of Christians throughout the ages in praying, “Maranatha! Lord, come quickly!” That’s appropriate. But to that prayer we should add the saying that Jesus taught His earliest followers to pray. Your kingdom come and Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven (Mt 6:10).

In other words, it’s okay to pray “God, get us out of here!” but we must also pray that, in the meantime, God will bring some of “up there” into our “down here.” Moreover, we must be willing to roll up our sleeves in order to work for that reality. Let’s set about bringing something of heaven into our present world.

Cultivate the world. Order it and set it right. Engage the culture rather than withdrawing from it. Faith demands that we engage others and work for their betterment. Hope will sustain us as we engage in this endeavour. Love determines the rules of our engagement.

Remember, our salvation brought about reconciliation with God in every area of our lives. Art, literature, science, education, sleep, entertainment, work — nothing is off limits from the lordship of Jesus Christ. We have reason to believe that we will engage in most if not all of these activities in heaven. Let’s learn how to engage in them in heavenly ways right now.

It’s physically impossible to face in two directions at the same time, but we must learn to do this spiritually. We live in the “in-between” times, in the already/not yet of God’s kingdom. It has come, it is coming and one day it will arrive in all its fullness.

Until it does, let us be salt and light, penetrating society and influencing it for good. Let us make a difference in our world, partnering with God in its redemption, pushing back the darkness and advancing the borders of His kingdom in our generation.

And let’s try to take as many to heaven with us as we can.

 

Prayer

 

You have called me to participate in Your purposes through the work I have been given to do during my earthly sojourn. May I do my work with care and excellence in the desire to be pleasing to You. I realise that all things become spiritual when they are done in Your Name. May I honor You in my choices and activities and view the works of my hands as a mode of worship. I want whatever I do in thought, word and deed to be honouring to You and edifying to others. I ask for a clearer sense of purpose and calling, and for the power to accomplish that for which You have placed me on this earth.

In Jesus’s name, Amen

The End? Day3

 God’s intent has always been to live in relationship with us. Why this should be so is beyond our ability to comprehend, but it is plainly taught through every story in the Bible.

God values relationships. When Jesus was asked to sum up the entire message of the Bible, He said it was all about having a right relationship with God and rightly relating to other people (Mt 22.34-40). It’s important to remember that the two are so entwined that they cannot be separated. In eternity, we will not only be living as individuals in relationship with our Heavenly Father, we’ll be living among others as part of the community of the redeemed.

We would be wise to ponder the idea that many of the people we will live with there are people we have the opportunity to live with here. It seems odd that we might suddenly begin to value them when we meet them in eternity if we have not valued them here. Perhaps beginning to do so is part of the ultimate sanctification. Perhaps we should begin practicing now what will be reality then.

It is also clear from the end of the Bible Story that God values comfort. Not the kind of comfort we think of as laziness and leisure, God is shown comforting His people, especially those who have endured pain and sadness. As His agents on this old earth, as those who actively seek to bring a portion of eternity into the here and now, we should be about the same business of comforting those who grieve. Those who have been hard-pressed and downtrodden in this world finally find rest in God’s presence.

God values people from every nation. So should we.

God values every language. So should we.

God values diversity. As hard as this is for some of us to hear, so should we.

God’s new city is remarkably designed with its cubic architecture and its tree-lined streets. There is room for all of God’s children in their new home. And the design is both new and traditional at the same time. It is new in the sense that nothing like it has ever been conceived before; it is traditional in all the ways it gives honour to things like the 12 tribes of Israel and the 12 apostles. Its very name implies the new and old coming together, New Jerusalem.

As in the very first story, we also see that God loves creativity. His new city has a remarkable design that goes beyond merely functional. It’s beautiful and complex. Whether its gates are actually made of pearls or the city itself made of gold, God clearly intends for us to know that it will be a place of beauty and wonder, complexity and whimsy.

Creativity. Order and design. Diversity. Rest. People. Community. These are the priorities of God’s heart as it is revealed in the first two chapters of the Bible. Amazingly, the very same priorities are revealed in the last two chapters of the Bible.

Are they ours as well?

 

Prayer

 

Your creation is a magnificent unity in diversity, profound in wisdom, awesome in understanding, marvellous in purpose and rich in elegance. You revel in variety, subtlety, intricacy, information and beauty. All things work together in both the physical and spiritual realms. I thank You for creating and calling me to become conformed to the image of Your Son, and I pray for the grace of holy desire to pursue by Your power what You have called me to become in Christ. I thank You for friendships and alliances with likeminded people, and I am grateful for the manifold gifts and ministries in the Body of Christ. Give me a growing heart for Your people so that I will be embedded in others-centered community as a lover and servant of the people You love.

In Jesus’s name, Amen