More - Not hungry for God

October 18, 2011

Of all the stuff I have tried over the last ten years, I think this experiment has received the most passionate of responses.  

For those just dropping in, I am in a season of not hungering and thirsting for the Lord.  I am not going after God.  BUT, what I am doing is seeking to be fully obedient to Him moment by moment.  My mindset is like Israel being led by God out of Egypt and into the promise land.  I see myself as needing more to obey than to set the course.

How can you not hunger for God and expect to grow, or even be a Christian?  My response is “I know God has promised to reward those who seek after Him, I also know all who seek Him find Him. But is there another way?”  And answer to “is there another way” is –yes.  

In history some who were called saints, some who performed miracles, and some who lived extremely holy lives did what I am doing now. (I said it that way to bias my argument.  How sad that I felt like I could not convince simply by saying “Godly people”).   I didn’t just come up with this idea, I took it from them.  Jesus Himself also did what I am seeking to do.  Jesus did what He saw the Father doing.  Jesus also taught us that His sheep know His voice.  Combining all these I feel like this season of discipline is about overcoming my American spirit of elitism and humanism by practicing the humility of obedience.  What leader wants to be told what to do?  What missional purposeful ministry wants to put their agenda on hold and wait on the Lord?  I am not saying they should.   I am saying I am giving myself to discover if there is another way.

We appeal to the fact that Christ went about doing good, and we hold that the true imitation of Him consists in doing as He did rather than in being as He was. The hermits thought differently. Philanthropy was, in their view, an incidental result, as it were, a by-product of the religious spirit. Here, no doubt, there is a great gulf fixed between us and them. There is a difference of ideal. It is possible to aim at doing good, and snatch now and then, as opportunity offers, a space for the culture and of spirituality, for the "making" of the soul. It is possible also to shape life for the attainment of perfection, welcoming, as it may happen to offer itself, the chance of usefulness. The latter was the ideal of the hermits. Is the former ours? Surely the purest altruism will decline to accept it. We recognise, when we are at our best, that what we ought to aim at is that good should get done, and not that we ourselves should do it.

Hannay, James O. (2010-07-05). The Wisdom of The Desert (pp. 17-18). Unknown. Kindle Edition.

I am overwhelmed at times with the calls to do all the good we can.  One troubling of my soul is all the pushing aside of others so that we might be the one who wins the prize.  I must be the healer; I must be the prophet, the apostle or even the servant.  We share the works of God very little.  Being driven, not abiding in Christ and bearing much fruit, is the new call to order.  We once thought that apart from Him we could do nothing, but now we do a great many things.  Our independence is more productive than the old school of trust and obey.  

Teresa of Ávila shares a list of items that assist a person in union with God – transformation.  One of the items on her list is to not seek the right form but simply obey God, moment by moment.  She coaches us away from trying to do things right in order to get God to bless us and encourages us to humbly submit to the Lord.  I think I will keep trying this for a little while longer.

Beware, God is God

October 15, 2011

I am once again in a situation where I discover that God is much more passionate than I am.  While I was seeking to undergo this little discipleship exercise to become more in union with Him, it appears God is taking advantage of me and the situation to do much more.  God is after my heart; again and again I live as though God is mainly after my behaviors, my outward behaviors.  God is tricky in the way He works and takes the little that I intend to do and seeks to impact the whole core of my being.  Beware, God is God.

I was going along quite well seeking to live moment by moment in being obedient to the Lord.  This method of living life, as opposed to making a plan and setting a purpose, was going to be a 30 day exercise for me.  It was going well; more peace, more freedom to listen…

Then I started to have the same symptoms that I have had twice before.  I started to run a fever and had a pain in my butt where an internal infection lurked in the past.  I was challenged to the core to set an agenda on my own behalf to get God to move and heal me.  My mind started racing to gather all the information I could, what could I do to get God to move in my behalf- what I could I do.

But Rod, aren’t you on a discipleship exercise where you moment by moment do the will of the Lord and trust Him to lead you into all that you need?  Sure, that is what I am doing when I am not taking care of myself and right now, since I am not feeling well, I need to take care of myself.  Wouldn’t you?  Would you trust God to lead you into healing?  Wouldn’t it be foolish to trust God to take you where you already know where to go?

I thought of what it must have been like for Israel to be in the wilderness on day 2 and most of day 3 without water.  I have gone some time without water, but never with my family in tow and never with no solution waiting.  It is one thing to be thirsty and you need to get back to the car or next lake.  It is another thing not to know if there is even a next lake.  I suppose that most of the time in the wilderness, there is not.  Most Israelites probably knew this even if they lived most of their lives in Egypt.

In my little discipleship exercise I have learned it takes more faith to trust God to lead then it does to trust God to reward you for your efforts.  Both take effort.  It may be the case that following takes more effort than leading and asking God to bless, confirm and reward; but I am not sure yet.  Following God, in the discipleship exercise was one thing, in the face of potential sickness, is another.

I think this revealed a fatal flaw in my understanding and knowledge of God.  I keep thinking of God mostly as a man.  I keep considering that God is mostly concerned about my outward behavior, my actions.  God may not be mostly concerned about these though.  It may be the case that God is mostly concerned about my heart, my thoughts, my motives.  It will be a cruel day of judgment if the leaders of the body of Christ have taught God’s children to control the outside but not be transformed in the inner man; that is if God is going to judge the thoughts and intents of our heart.  

Could God be so aggressive as to desire that our thoughts and motives be filled with His intention and will?  Could the love of God and power of God intend to work so deep as to transform the inner person into a whole new kind of person?  

The first two days I was feeling sick, fever and pain, a couple of friends prayed for me.  I was seeking to practice a following heart and not be aggressive in my need, but more humble in my following.  When these people prayed for me I was overcome by the love of God.  I do not say “overcome” to try to get you to agree with what I am saying, I want to give an accurate testimony.   When they prayed love came over me.  For me this was quite different.  I have felt the power and presence of God numerous times.  I have been prayed for many, many times and have felt God’s compassion through His children.  But this time I was overcome by love.  What I was aware of was the fact that I did not deserve their love or the Fathers.  Love was in that moment a free gift that I did not have a right to.

Numerous times for me I have felt a right to the love of God.  In seeking to live rightly before the Lord I made plans and effort to end up in a certain spot.  That spot was “being loved”.  I wanted God to love me and I was going to do what it required to be loved.  This past week I was divorced from that mindset.  I was not seeking God to mature me but simply loving Him by obedience.

In reflection I think I have it in my mind that hard work = deserved love.  When I set a goal, even the goal of being more like God, and work hard to achieve that goal, I believe that I deserve His love.  Love for me on the motivational level is no longer freely given, it is achieved.  Without that mindset and in these situations, love was overwhelmingly free.  It was my whole awareness of how vastly unworthy I was of love that enhanced love to overcome me.  

So in these ramblings I was to reflect to myself and possible others, that following God via obedience is a lifestyle that may require more faith.  A possible reward for this may be a deeper understanding and possible a deeper experience of love.  In addition, if you are thirsty, it takes some effort to stay a follower and not run off by yourself to deal with the issue.

October 11, 2011 Observations

October 11, 2011

Observations

 (Philippians 4:11) 

Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am.

I have noticed that focusing on the Spirit within, the ability to focus on the self is greatly diminished.  Gazing to follow the Spirit brings a security not lived out in “serving to do right” from a human performance method.  In just this short time I notice that I have more peace when I seek simply to obey the Lord , as opposed to managing my behavior.  I will probably need some outside verification that I have not fallen into a “more selfish” pit, but I think my outward actions are more in line with Christ also. 

One surprise that I have found is in listening.  When I am not is self-manage mode, I have time to listen to others.  I do not feel the compulsion to respond or defend my position or actions.  It is more like I feel more sorrow for past mistakes, and a longing not to dwell on them or allow them to rule over me.  So I think I am open to the Spirit and others more, I grant them a more true entrance into my emotions and thoughts.  It seems like the Spirit highlights failure so that we move forward into Christ likeness.  The Spirit choosing to have us dwell on our faults and failures only when we are not “getting “the lessons we need.

The first hours of this adventure I could feel a ripping of the souls’ delight away from my thoughts of pleasure.  How can being holy be pleasurable?  I feel a ripping, pulling, tearing away from my security of future fun.  To trust the Master for fun, what faith is needed for this?

In reading the Desert Fathers I have considered their thoughts.  To desire Christ Jesus you must have seen him.  This seeing is not a vision but an unfolding of Christ into our hearts.  Some who write on this describe it as seeing the Lord in a mirror.  The clearer the vision of the Lord the more a person desires to behold Him more.  When the vision is in a broken mirror, containing reflections of other things and distorted views, so also is the desire to see the Lord continually fragmented.  Pride would have us seek to “self fix” the mirror.  Humility would have us be a good steward of what we have received.  Pride calls out, “I can do better”, humility whispers, “Lord Jesus have mercy on me”.   I am aware of the two men who stood before the alter to pray.

What gain is Christ to the soulish man

In every way it seems

For un-separated from self he lives

And Christ heals everything

Does God tease us?

Does God tease us with answered prayer? Does He hold answered prayer before us like some goal or carrot or does He simply value a relationship with us? God could give us endless provision but longs to give us endlessly of himself.

NOT hungry for God

A while back I was reading some of the stories and teachings of those who desired to be conformed to the image of Christ Jesus following the “Christianization of Rome”.    This was a time when Christianity and culture became mixed together.  The practices of Christianity became a mainstream way of life and lifestyle and numerous behaviors and mindsets of Roman and Greek culture became standard expression of Christians in that region.  I think it would be incorrect to believe that “BANG” and all of a sudden something happened where Christianity and culture became mixed.  I think that whenever the grace of God took hold of people, and others saw the result, the merger began.

So out of the blending of culture and Christianity people went into the wilderness to find a way that would assist them in being holy.  One of the ongoing criticisms of this group was that they are some of the most selfish people to ever pursue the Master, for what they did was to leave humanity behind, to leave behind doing good in order to serve themselves. 

There are seven cardinal spiritual sins and a humble study of these would benefit most of us today.  For that quest I would suggest starting with John of the Cross.  Could we not argue that any effort that was focused on improving the self is selfish and therefore, unlike Christ?  Or would we say that loving God with highest priority and loving ourselves as others is not selfish, but loving obedience?  The truth is that reason, our own minds, cannot tell us what the Lord is requiring of us.  Obedience is the only way to perfection and doing good works or study or having an anointed ministry will not do. 

So, I am going to take some time (30 days or so) and see if NOT hungering and thirsting for God will bring an advance in transformation.  I am going to NOT be desperate for the Lord.  I am going to try to live out an ancient pathway of obedience and seek to mortify human pride and envy.  For me this is what the quest for transformation tends to be most about.  I want to be holy, not to be like Christ, but to be someone who is holy.  I want to be transformed, anointed, spiritual, powerful, and insightful so that I am all these things.  For somewhere in my thinking is the idea and emotions that being conformed to the image of Christ is rewarding, esteeming, deserving honor of others, praise worthy and financially beneficial. 

All this hungering and thirsting after the Lord goes beyond effort and into selfish pride.  I am speaking of me now; I'm not projecting this to others.  I have come to reduce the grace of God to personal effort.  I think very "American", where "I can be all that I want to be."  My Christian transformation is starting to look more like an Army commercial than an inward transformation.  Human effort, the "driveness" of hunger, has replaced the deepest pathway to conformity.

John 6:35  Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.

Over and over again I have heard numerous people refer to our life on earth as being reflective of “as it is in heaven”.  I tend to think we take our idea of what heaven is like, project it into our theology, and then bring back to earth our idea of heaven so that we have a system that has God desiring what we want and think best.  When I have read the passages of the Bible that reflect heaven I have found many things that I wish were not there.  There is a lamb slain, a Master pierced, an accuser of the brethren, death and destruction in the hands of the Lord's servants, and more.  So, the argument I am now going to use is invalid unless you disagree. 

If heaven does not have hunger, why do we use it as the primary motivator of fullness now?  Why do we take ungodly things and seek to make ourselves Godly by the use of them?  Is it by telling big lies that we learn not to lie?  I am not sure I want an answer to this.

Back from my ramblings and thinking again of John 6:35.  Can you come to God now or only in eternity?  Can I today have a life of never thirsting or hunger?  Was the woman at the well being deceived?  Did Jesus offer her a place of no thirst now, or was it just a metaphor for something yet to come?

Matthew 5:6  "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

When we read this do we consider more of the hunger and thirst than the promise of satisfaction?  Do we tend to work this passage backward?  I am not satisfied so therefore I must hunger and thirst more.  Would this logic tend to train us to earn and deserve our grace from the Lord? And on the point of earning grace, I think we dwell in the American Church.  I believe most of what we do is to earn.  We earn financial blessings, we earn anointing, we earn status, we earn titles and positions, and all this without being conformed to the image of Jesus.

Jeremiah 23:5-6  "Behold, the days are coming," declares the LORD, "When I will raise up for David a righteous Branch; And He will reign as king and act wisely And do justice and righteousness in the land.  (6)  "In His days Judah will be saved, And Israel will dwell securely; And this is His name by which He will be called, 'The LORD our righteousness.'

What if Matthew 5:6 was telling us to hunger for the Lord and be satisfied with Him?  Not practicing a lifestyle of ever more spiritual greed, not living out life for more, but living in love with God who amply supplies all we need for this life and the next.  Is the pathway to transformation the one of ever needing more and more?  What if contentment, thanksgiving, rejoicing in every circumstance and humility, were much more beneficial than hunger?  What if less was the pathway to plenty and dying the way to life.

Luke 15:17-19  "But when he came to his senses, he said, 'How many of my father's hired men have more than enough bread, but I am dying here with hunger!  (18)  'I will get up and go to my father, and will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight;  (19)  I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me as one of your hired men."'

Is there food in the father’s house and is His dwelling place in heaven?  Can you dwell with God now and be feed?  Do even servants, hired men have provision from the Lord or do they live life hungry?

So, I am going to try, for about 30 days, being satisfied with the Lord and seeking to obey Him fully moment by moment.  This is not my idea but I got this method from those who went before me and sought, not just to do good like Jesus, but to be transformed in their inner man – to become Christ like.  I am visualizing myself like the people of Israel who were being led by God into the wilderness and toward the promise land.  I am trusting that I am being led, that daily manna is provided without hungering for it.   I am going to try to live like God loves me and is directing my steps and that my passion for Him is not needed for Him to do a better job.  I am going to try and embrace circumstance with peace, to except what I perceive as lack as discipline and not be motivated by need. 

I will meditate on the 70 plus verses on satisfaction and the handful on contentment.  Here is my first.

(2 Corinthians 12:9)  And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.