Victor Frankl was an Austrian neurologist, psychiatrist, philosopher and author who was also a survivor of German concentrations camps in World War II.  In his book, Man’s Search for Meaning, he wrote that the difference he saw in the men who survived the camps and those who didn’t, was the central issue of “meaning.”  Those who found no meaning in their suffering, succumbed and died.  Those who could find some meaning for what they were experiencing, some redeeming purpose for their suffering, survived.  I would argue that our greatest need today is still to find meaning for our life and our experiences.  Having suicide rates at all-time highs in a nation still prosperous and full of opportunities tells me that people, young and old, cannot find a reason to go on when life gets hard and disappointment dims their dreams.

Before coming to Christ, I struggled with depression as a college student.  Even in my 20’s, I already sensed a futility to life.  The idea of simply working for 75 years to bring home a pay check and then to die, was a very unfulfilling view of my future.  I had no sense of who I was or why I was or of any purpose beyond the moment. The thought of the rest of my life feeling that way was debilitating.  Discovering Jesus changed that. Jesus and the destiny assigned to me in heaven, gave my life purpose – not just for the years I have in this body, but for eternity.  When I began to discover who God had made me to be, I found fulfillment in the path laid out for me.

Satan loves to blind us from our purpose and the meaning that every experience has for our destiny.  One of his primary strategies is to make us feel disqualified for anything beyond disappointments and failures.  He takes those setbacks and whispers to us that we are unworthy of anything more and that our lives will simply be a series of failed attempts to find love and happiness.  

Paul says something interesting in his second letter to the church at Corinth. He wrote, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. (2 Cor. 1:3-4). Let me highlight a couple of truths from this passage and then tie it into the concept of “meaning.”

First of all, we will all experience troubles – failure, loss, hardship, betrayal, and pain.  It is the fabric of this world. If we believe that God has promised us a trouble-free existence then we haven’t read the Bible carefully and we will experience a great deal of disappointment. The fact that we suffer is not abandonment by God any more than pain and injuries in a football game are the coach’s fault.  It is simply part of the game and the price you pay to participate. Expect it.  Prepare for it.  Deal with it. Like all top athletes, you will have to play injured at times,  but God does promise that we win in the end.

Secondly, it is in the midst of trouble that we most clearly experience the hand and comfort of God if we will receive it. Remember, God did not keep Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego out of the fire.  He simply joined them in the fire.  It is when we struggle that we truly discover God in our lives if we are open to the discovery.

The other great truth in the passage is that whatever we receive from God in our suffering and even failures, we are to use to help others who are coming down that same dark road behind us.  

After years of ministry to hurting people, I have clearly seen that true healing only comes when we use our own pain from the past to comfort and direct others.  That ministry to the broken and the hurting gives our own suffering meaning.  It redeems our pain so that it has value. If we can find no purpose for what we have gone through or are going through, we inevitably blame God for being unfair or of betraying us.  We will then wither like those in the Nazi concentration camps who could find no meaning in what they were going through.  However, when we see God’s purpose for our suffering or have faith that he will use it for something significant, we can become partners with him in overcoming evil.  

Let me quickly say that God is not the cause of our suffering, but he will use it so that what we have gone through has redeeming value. The devil tries to convince us that our losses, abuse, and failures have disqualified us from our destiny –  that because we have failures in our past, God will not or cannot use us. He tries to convince us that our losses and failures determine our identity for all time. That is not true.  Those things that brought pain and even shame into our lives actually equip us to minister to others.   Those are actually the very things that make us qualified. 

I have served in full time ministry long enough that I have known several church leaders whose lives seemed to have been charmed.  They grew up in great Christian homes, had amazing careers, had “perfect” kids, and simply had no history of abuse, divorce, failure , or besetting sin that I knew of.  They were great people, but in every church the people I worked with – the abused, the divorced, the single mothers, those struggling with addictions -would never have gone to those men and women for counsel.  They not only feared being judged, but more than that, believed that those “charmed” individuals would simply have no empathy or understanding of their situation.  In order to be a perfect High Priest for us, Jesus had to be tempted in every way as we are. We need to be able to tell others that we have been down the same muddy roads as they are travelling now.  Our own hurts, betrayals, losses, and sin give us the wisdom and the credibility hurting people need when God has led us out of our own pain and shame.

I love Elevation’s recent song, Graves Into Gardens, as it speaks of how God redeems even death and turns it into something full of life.  He can do that in our own lives as we find our own meaning in Him and the destiny that Jesus has purchased for us.  The key is not to let out past define us, but to let the lessons we have learned in Christ, prepare us to pass God’s comfort on to others who also have a destiny in him. 

Have you ever considered the “impossibility” of successfully living out the commands of Christ in his Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) on a daily basis? In this sermon, beginning with the “blessed are’s,” he shifts the standard of judgment from behaviors to the heart and our thought life.  He says that instead of murder being the standard, if you even remain angry at your brother, you are in danger of judgment.  Instead of physical adultery being the standard, lusting after a woman in your heart is just as sinful.  He commands us to love our enemies and to pray for those who are intent on doing us harm.  He warns that we must not judge another or we will be judged with the same judgement.  Participating in gossip is a form of judgment.  Considering myself more righteous than another is judging.  Having a critical spirit and accusing others of not measuring up is judging. We could go on, but Jesus set a very high standard for holiness in the courts of heaven.

 How do we get through the day without violating these commands in some way?  Those commands define the standards and the goal.  Thankfully, grace makes up the difference.  But if we ever think we are doing well spiritually, we only need to read those three chapters in Matthew and hold them up to our own hearts objectively to see how much we need Jesus – every day.

One of the beatitudes (blessed are…) that always catches my eye is, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matt.5:8).  In a season where the church is crying out for the presence of God in our worship and manifestations of God in our lives, I wonder how much a lack of purity hinders our ability to see God.  If you read the Psalms of David, there seems to be a real sense in which he had vivid visions of God in the temple.  Perhaps, they were occasional, but his songs reflect a true hunger to see God again, to take in his majesty, and to be overwhelmed with his glory.  I think we are crying out for those same things again, but I wonder if our standard of purity has become relative rather than biblical.  

We are surrounded daily by a tsunami of illicit sexuality, profane language, graphic violence, blatant and bold dishonesty, and perversion.  By cultural standards, Christians avoid the worst of those things, but by heavenly standards I suspect we carry much more impurity than we want to acknowledge. What we become calloused to in our culture, what we normalize, is still highly offensive to the Holy Spirit.  For instance, the apostle Paul commanded, “But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people” (Eph.5:3). 

 All I have to do is look at Face Book pages of believers I know, to understand that our standards for modesty, environments we hang out in, and even language don’t come close to biblical standards.  And yet, we must think that God is good with our standards or we wouldn’t post some of those things all over the internet for others to admire.  We must remember that we’re are not graded on the Bell Curve against how others perform, but we are to be judged by the pure and holy standards of heaven that never change.  

In 1939, the famous movie Gone with the Wind was released.  This “classic” nearly did not make it past the movie censors because Rhett Butler told Scarlett O’Hara that he didn’t “give a damn.”  That kind of language in a movie was shocking and outraged those who were concerned about America’s moral climate.  Think about what we now consider normal and acceptable in movies and television in terms of language, nudity, sexuality, adultery, and so forth.  Our standards have fallen so far, that we typically would push back against those censors as being archaic and prudish rather than questioning our own standards of morality and purity.  

I have to monitor these issues in my own life, so I know how subtly we can become calloused to the sin around us and lose our sense of shame and outrage when our culture not only offends God, but boasts about the sin and recruits others to join in.  We can’t control the world around us, but if we want to see God, as we claim we do, purity – by His standards – is something we must consider.  

We cannot lower the standards of God’s holiness but must ask him to give us his sensitivity to sin once again in our own lives and hearts so that we are constantly recognizing the compromises in our soul and pulling those weeds from the garden where we want to meet with God. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

There are a lot of great thinkers and writers in the world…especially in the Christian world.  When I read something that is noteworthy or that resonates in my spirit, I like to share it with you.  Stephen Mansfield is a New York Times best selling author.  He is a pastor, an historian, and an expert on leadership development.  I want to quote from a recent piece he wrote in his blog Leading Thoughts.

Stephen wrote, “One of my favorite words is ‘legendary.’  Today it means merely something that is famous enough to be celebrated in our time. Yet it comes from the Middle Latin word that meant something worthy to be written down and remembered for generations. I love that idea.  Lives and deeds that are worthy to be written down and remembered. People who live in such a way that they inspire generations.  Frankly, I want to live like that.  I want you to as well.  

A great leader is meant to inspire greatness in others.  He or she is in place to awaken largeness and nobility and an epic vision in the souls of people … Yet I have to tell you that many leaders wrap themselves in the aura of the legendary.  This, I’m sorry to say, is particularly true among people in Christian ministry. They have some challenges.  They achieve some victories. Good things come of it.  Then, unfortunately, their vision shifts from making others legendary to presenting themselves as legends to be honored … Here is the core truth.  You might be a legend one day.  I hope you will be.  I’m here to help.  Yet don’t become legendary by assuming that you are and presenting yourself as such.  You become legendary by enabling other people, empowering them to rise to the greatness possible in their own lives.”

For those of us in leadership or that aspire to leadership, I think this a great reminder of a core biblical truth.  Jesus taught his disciples, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave— just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” 

Many ministries that have begun to bear great fruit have been damaged by leaders within the ministry that begin to use the ministry as a platform for their own significance.  The old healing evangelists of the early 1900’s had a term for it.  They said, “Don’t touch the glory.”  What they meant was to never take credit for what God is doing.  Give him the glory rather than yourself.  Historically, those who forgot that maxim ended poorly or even tragically. Spiritual pride is not a quality of Christ, but of Satan. It was spiritual pride that caused Satan to lose his place in heaven. We need to guard against that quality springing up in our own hearts or in the hearts of others that lead with us.  

Pastors, especially, have been given to the church in order to equip others for service in the kingdom.  The Passion Translation puts it this way, “He has appointed some with grace to be apostles, and some with grace to be prophets, and some with grace to be evangelists, and some with grace to be pastors, and some with grace to be teachers.  And their calling is to nurture and prepare all the holy believers to do their own works of ministry, and as they do they will enlarge and build up the body of Christ” (Eph. 4:11-12). 

As leaders, we are to equip others for the good works prepared in advance for them.  We are to launch them into fruitful ministries of their own with a vision for achieving great things in the kingdom of God. If the ministry is about our significance, we can never let others accomplish more than ourselves because, then, our significance would be diminished.  If we seek the applause of men, we will find ways to limit what others do who serve in our ministries so they cannot outshine us.  If we seek the applause of heaven, however, we will launch as many as we can who will be even more effective in ministry than we have been.  We will encourage and launch them to develop greater gifts than we have known personally.

In talking to pastors in other churches, it seems that ministries in which “miraculous gifts” are up front, are very susceptible to spiritual pride.  Like the miracles of Jesus, these ministries tend to draw a crowd and may get more notoriety than most other ministries in the church.. Gifted but immature believers looking for significance in the church are often drawn to these areas and want to “shine” in the eyes of others. If not mentored well, they may grow into leaders who want to be legendary in their own eyes and in the eyes of men rather than heaven.  

I have had conversations in which senior pastors did not want a healing or deliverance ministry in their church because of an experience in the past with such a ministry in which the leaders felt spiritually superior to those who didn’t operate in “the gifts” or engage in spiritual warfare.  The self-assigned legendary status of some leaders created divisions in the church.  These senior pastors had no desire to go down that road again.

All this is to say that we truly need to guard our hearts and the hearts of others who serve with us so that our true desire is to develop and promote others far beyond ourselves.  Jesus humbled himself so that we might be lifted up.  If we will do the same, God will bless our ministries and our leadership…and our “legends” may grow in heaven.

Grace

Most of us remember the story from Matthew 18 of a servant who owed his master more money than he could repay.  When the master called in the debt, the man was helpless to repay so the master decided to sell the man and his family into slavery to recoup part of his losses.  The man fell on his knees asking for mercy and the master, in a moment of compassion, forgave the entire amount and continued to keep him on as a servant.   Immediately after receiving the incredible gift of grace from his master, he ran into another servant who owed him a few dollars.  He demanded his money and when that servant couldn’t pay, he had him put in jail until he could get his money.  When the master heard what had happened, he was furious and put the man whose debt he had forgiven in jail, rebuking him for not showing others the mercy he had received.  Jesus finished the story by saying that God will deal with us in the same way if we don’t forgive others their wrongs toward us, because God has forgiven our unpayable debt through his Son.

The question always arises as to why the servant, who was forgiven the enormous debt, was so unbending toward the one who owed him a small debt.  Of course, he could have just been wicked and perverse.  Once he escaped punishment, he still felt the entitlement to demand from others what was not demanded from him.  Some people whose hearts are hard are just like that.   But there may be another reason that we all need to consider.

In the story, when his master demanded payment, the servant cried out, “Please be patient with me.  If you’ll just give me more time, I will repay you all that is owed’ (Matt. 18:29).  When the master completely forgave his debt, the servant may have understood the forgiveness to simply mean that he had extended the note, but would still require payment later.  If that were the case, the first servant would be desperate to collect all he could as soon as he could from others.

The idea that someone would simply forgive an enormous debt without any expectation of repayment is actually hard to get our minds around.  It seems like one of those “too good to be true” offers that will come back to haunt us later.  For many believers, grace has the same feel.  Many of us still live before God thinking that somewhere along the line, our salvation our security, and his blessings will be based on being better than others.  It’s like college entrance exams…only those in the 90^th percentile will get in.

When we slip into self-righteousness, we have slipped into a kind of “meritorious salvation.”  If I believe I only get the favor of God by being better than most, I will be invested in pointing to my own good qualities and good works while zealously pointing out the failures and flaws of others.  That is the nature of judging others and placing them in a psychological category of being less than me. When we can’t be generous in how we deal with the weaknesses and failings of others, we have missed the meaning of God’s grace.  If I know that I have been forgiven much, based totally on the goodness of God and the full payment of my debt made on my behalf by the blood of Christ, how could I not extend that generosity to others?

If we are quick to judge, condemn, criticize, and gossip…we probably have not yet taken hold of the true meaning of God’s grace.  The belief that we have to prove ourselves better than others to deserve love and favor from God is a huge open door for the enemy. We may want to begin to meditate on grace and ask the Holy Spirit to give us a true revelation of that grace in our own hearts.  It is very freeing to know how much God values me without the need to devalue others.

In the third chapter of Revelation, Jesus writes to the church at Laodicea, “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me” (Rev.3:20). This is a familiar passage to most and most have seen the painting by William Hunt depicting Christ standing in front of a heavy wooden door knocking and waiting. The painting symbolizes Jesus knocking on our hearts.  It’s interesting to think that the one who has all authority in heaven and on earth does not command the door to open but waits on our permission, our invitation.

Permission is a powerful thing.  We need to be sure that we issue constant permission and a constant invitation to Jesus to enter our lives and our hearts. We need to make sure that there aren’t places in our lives and hearts where we deny him permission to enter.  If we aren’t careful, a denial to Jesus becomes an invitation for the enemy.

Satan has permission to tempt those who are in Christ but cannot enter to kill, steal and destroy unless we or those who have had authority over us, give him permission. The “sins of the fathers” give Satan permission to attack the blood lines until those bloodlines are cleansed by Christ and that cleansing depends on our request, our invitation.   Where we personally have unrepented sin, ungodly relationships, or unforgiveness in our lives, that agreement with Satan constitutes permission.

Even when ministering deliverance, we need the one being afflicted to no longer extend permission to the enemy through half-hearted commitment to the Lordship of Jesus or half-hearted commitments to holiness. Any secret sin the afflicted wants to hold onto or leave unconfessed, gives the enemy permission to stay and deliverance becomes a much greater task.  

Both Jesus and the devil are always standing at the door and knocking.  We need to be very sure about who we are inviting in.  

Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life.  Philippians 2:14-16

As we continue to minister freedom and healing in our area, I am constantly confronted with the reality that a great number of people who are saved and forgiven are still bound up in addictions, depression, anger, fear, suicidal thoughts, condemnation, and more. Even without any real reflection, that seems wrong. As we minister to believers in other parts of the country, we see and hear the same thing, so it is not just a West Texas anomaly. 

These Christians have a sense that their struggles are simply to be their unchanging lot in life. Their experience has been that “their church” is powerless to help them other than with prayers that seem to make little difference and encouragement that is appreciated but fades away.  Their churches have sent them into the community to find professional counselors or twelve-step groups and they have not experienced any lasting transformation. They often live in broken relationships or have left a solid trail of those relationships behind them. In a sense, they fear the future because it may even be worse than today.

In many ways, these men and women are no more free than the unsaved men and women in their community. If you put them in a room with an equal number of unbelievers and had them talk honestly about their struggles, you might not be able to tell God’s children from the lost.  That is not God’s intention nor is it what Jesus died for. In the passage from Philippians at the beginning of this blog, Paul clearly is making a case that those who follow Jesus, who have been born again, and have the Spirit of Elohim living in them should stand out in the world like stars against the night.  He declared to the church at Corinth that, “the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power.”  Power is needed to defeat the agents of darkness that torment and to heal deep, gaping wounds from the past before we can become the light of the world. When we say all the right things but display no power, we are not reflecting the kingdom of God.

Through the years, I have talked to several individuals who had been part of witches’ covens or satanic cults.  When I asked them what had drawn them to the “dark side,” the answer was that their lives had been out of control and they were looking for something that could give them a sense of power, control, and security.  They had not found that in Christian churches, so they looked for it in darkness.  These men and women had not failed us, we had failed them.

Of course, we always hear that Christians should not be chasing the miracles but should be chasing Jesus.  Certainly, we can get caught up in the power gifts and supernatural manifestations, but miracles were part of the fabric of Jesus’ ministry and the early church.  Wherever Jesus was, miracles were also present.  Why should it be different today?

A gospel that only gets us to a place of forgiveness but does not radically free us and change us so that we stand out in contrast to our culture is not the gospel that Jesus preached nor demonstrated. If you are part of a church that preaches the Bible, but never displays the power of Jesus Christ in healings, deliverance, prophetic words, and radically transformed lives, then the Bible may be preached but is not being understood.  Stars stand out in stark contrast to the darkness around them. That is the Savior’s desire for his people.  I see it daily in the lives of those who have experienced his power.  So let me encourage you to not accept a powerless gospel.  Seek what you see on the pages of the New Testament.  Those pages were recorded to show what the Christian life should look like, not what it only looked like for a few…long., long ago.

Inevitably, people who have no clear sense of purpose in their lives succumb to depression, restlessness, vague feelings of anxiety, and fatigue.  The fatigue is typically caused by emotional emptiness. Nothing excites them.  Nothing gets them up in the morning.  Life and even relationships become monotonous and each day seems to lose its brightness.

Several years ago, I heard a leading marriage and family therapist say that, in order to be happy and fulfilled, couples must be part of something bigger than themselves and bigger than their marriage.  The same is true for individuals.  Self-focus is a dead end.  At some point, we realize that all the applause, all the purchases, all the trips, all the award shows, and even all the sex and romance, are only drugs that make us feel high and significant for a few hours.  We eventually discover that all that drains away overnight.  In the morning we feel insignificant again. 

Too many Americans are part of nothing bigger than themselves.  The selfie-tsunami on social media is indicative of that.  How many are promoting the smallest details of their lives in some effort to feel significant – week after week?  Again…self-focus is a dead end. It’s counterintuitive, but the key to feeling good about life and about yourself is to shift your focus from self to others and to something bigger than yourself.   One of my favorite authors through the years has been Philip Yancey.  There are a couple of paragraphs in his book, The Jesus I Never Knew, that caught my attention years ago and I roll it out every now and then on this blog because I think his point is so important.  Let me share it with you now.

 “My career as a journalist has afforded me opportunities to interview ‘stars,’ including NFL football greats, movie actors, music performers, best-selling authors, politicians, and TV personalities. These are the people who dominate the media. We fawn over them, pouring over the minutiae of their lives: the clothes they wear, the food they eat, the aerobic routines they follow, the people they love, the toothpaste they use.  Yet I must tell you that, in my limited experience, I have found…our ‘idols’ are as miserable a group of people as I have ever met.  

Most have troubled or broken marriages. Nearly all are incurably dependent on psychotherapy.  In a heavy irony, these larger-than-life heroes seem tormented by self-doubt.

I have also spent time with people I call ‘servants.’ Doctors and nurses who work among the ultimate outcasts, leprosy patients in rural India. A Princeton graduate who runs a hotel for the homeless in Chicago. Health workers who have left high-paying jobs to serve in a backwater town of Mississippi, relief workers in Somalia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Bangladesh, and other repositories of human suffering. The Ph. D’s I met in Arizona, who are now scattered throughout jungles of South America translating the bible into obscure languages. 

I was prepared to honor and admire these servants, to hold them up as inspiring examples.  I was not prepared to envy them. Yet as I now reflect on the two groups side by side, stars and servants, the servants clearly immerge as the favored ones, the graced ones. Without question, I would rather spend time among the servants than among the stars: they possess qualities of depth and richness and even joy that I have not found elsewhere. Servants work for low pay, long hours, and no applause, ‘wasting’ their talents and skills among the poor and uneducated. Somehow, though, in the process of losing their lives they find them.”

The people Yancey speaks of are men and women who have chosen to be part of something greater than themselves because they count their cause as greater than themselves.  Their lives have purpose beyond the next selfie, the next purchase, and the next cruise.  Jesus points us to that same reality when he says, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” and when he says. “Those who lose their life for my sake, will find it.”  There is no greater purpose than serving Jesus and fulfilling the call of the kingdom in your life.  We are called to share the good news, alleviate the suffering of the poor, correct injustice, heal the brokenhearted and set captives free. We are called to be servants. 

Again, the way to find happiness and fulfillment is counterintuitive…get your mind off yourself and onto  the needs of others.  Pursue the call of Jesus. Find your purpose in the destiny Jesus has written for you. Choose servanthood over self-indulgence.  Sacrificing for others is the heart of the gospel and actually is the foundation for the abundant life Jesus promised.   

Sometimes, I need a reminder.  Perhaps, you do too.

I’m reading through Deuteronomy again.  It’s been a while because I, like many Christians, tend to focus on New Testament writing.  However, Paul told Timothy, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16-17). When Paul reminded Timothy of that truth, most of the “scripture” available was the Old Testament.  We should not neglect the Old Testament.  We are not bound to the Law of Moses but in the pages of the O.T. there is a huge amount of revelation about how God deals with men and nations and how he deals with his covenant children.  Those principles are extremely important to know since God is unchanging.

One of the things that my reading in Deuteronomy is reminding me of is the danger of thinking that a casual commitment to the things of God is “good enough.”  Certainly, grace covers our weaknesses and even failures, but the issue is found more in our attitude than in our actions.

God is looking for a people who are sold out to him.  Scripture is filled with promises and cautions for God’s people. These are often stated together and declare something like, “If you are careful to keep all my commandments, you will prosper in the land.”  Notice that the blessings of God are conditional on a heart that desires to be pleasing to God in everything.  I don’t think God is concerned about those who struggle with sin in their lives nearly as much as those who don’t struggle against the sin in their lives. We often walk in a sin that we somehow rationalize as something “God understands.” But God calls us to holiness or, at least, to a heart that sincerely desires it even though we fail from time to time. God calls us to carefully keep all his commandments.

That principle is not a legalistic approach to God or just the flavor of the Old Covenant.  Jesus made some pretty extreme demands on those who would be a disciple. “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple. And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple” (Lk.14:26-27). Jesus is not telling us to literally hate anyone because we are to love even our enemies.  But what he is saying is that if we have to choose between him and anything or anyone else, we must choose him and reject the other.  If we love anyone or anything more than Jesus, we have stepped into the realm of idolatry.

Idolatry was the great sin that God warned Israel about over and over. God declares, “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments” (Deut.5:8-10). 

We typically read that command and dismiss it because we don’t have shrines in our homes to foreign gods.  But if we pursue anything more than God, we are submitting to a form of idolatry.  If I consistently give more attention, more loyalty, more love, more thought, or more priority to anything other than God, I have become an idolator.  

Think of it this way.  Jesus said, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment” (Matt.22:37).  When we love something or someone else more than God, we are functionally committing idolatry.  Love is not always an emotion.  It is often a choice. Simply put, do I choose God or something else that draws my affections away from God?

Again, this is a matter of the heart.   When couples first fall in love, they think about the relationship all the time.  They call.  They rearrange their schedule to spend time with one another.  They think about small gifts that express their affection.  They long to be in each other’s presence.  They put each other’s needs before their own.  They try hard to please the one they love and have no interest in the affections of another…if their love is genuine.  That is the kind of heart, God wants from his people.  If either of them begins to place their affections elsewhere, the relationship is in trouble.   So it is, with God.  His love never strays, but ours has a tendency to do so.

Here we come back to our aspirational values versus our actual values.  We may declare our love for God (aspirational), but the proof is in our choices (actual).  I can’t tell you how often I have heard believers profess their faith and love for God when their lifestyle is little different from the lifestyle of unbelievers except for occasional church attendance.  These believers often choose immoral relationships, partying with friends every weekend, their favorite recreation, etc. over time with God and their spiritual family.  Their Facebook page documents their choices every day.  If you ask them to serve, they just don’t have the time…but they have time for the things they really value.  Of course, somethings aren’t so obvious.  Our desires, our thought life, our choices of what we watch or listen to, etc. aren’t as apparent, but can be just as indicative of a heart that only chooses God when it is convenient and doesn’t cost us anything. 

Idolatry creates a throne in our hearts for Satan and neither he nor God is willing to share the throne.  The difference is that God asks, even pleads, and presents the truth for us to choose.  He always calls us to those things that bless and redeem. Satan, however, calls us to lies and deception and eventual destruction.  For those who profess Jesus, but withhold parts of their lives from his lordship, there is often a real delusion operating that they are loving and serving Jesus. Satan provides a perfect rationalization for everything in their lives outside of God’s will. 

That is why David wisely asked God to search his heart and show him if there (Ps. 139:24) were any things in his life or his heart that were misaligned with the will of God.

What I see in my own life, as well as the life of others, is a contemporary attitude that says if I’m giving God some of the things he asks for, that is good enough. Then I’m careful not to think about my obedience too much because I might find I am out of sync with his will in several areas that I’m not sure I want to surrender this week. That is simply foolishness on my part because an attitude like that keeps me from many of the things God wants to bless me with and open the door for the destroyer to come in like a cancer.

As Israel was preparing to enter the promise land after forty years of wandering in the desert, Moses admonished them when he said, “See, I have taught you decrees and laws as the Lord my God commanded me, so that you may follow them in the land you are entering to take possession of it. Observe them carefully, for this will show your wisdom andunderstanding to the nations, who will hear about all these decrees and say, “Surely this great nation is a wise andunderstanding people.” What other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the Lord our God is near us whenever we pray to him? And what other nation is so great as to have such righteous decrees and laws as this body of laws I am setting before you today?” (Duet. 4:5-8).

God is not interested in getting our left overs or an obedience that it is just “good enough.”  He wants our whole heart so we can receive all that he has for us and so that we can fully fulfill our destiny that he has written in his book (Ps. 139:16).  The truth is that when we shortchange God, we are really shortchanging ourselves.  

Lord give us a heart that loves you without reservation.

Like most people, whenever I am travelling in an unfamiliar area, I often look for some kind of landmark as a reference point so that I can have some idea of where I am in relation to where I have been.  In a city, it might be a tall building.  In the country, it might be a water tower in the distance or a prominent mountain.  When I look back at the reference point, I can know if I am going generally in the right direction or if I have somehow gotten turned around.  We need reference points as we navigate life.

For a believer, the kingdom of God is our reference point. As long as we have our eyes on Jesus and are moving toward the kingdom of God, we know we are in a good place.  The New Testament declares that we are now citizens of heaven.  Paul declares, “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body” (Phil. 3:19-21).

Many believers live as if the kingdom of heaven is somewhere in their future when they begin to walk on streets of gold. Their primary reference point for living is this world, rather than the kingdom of God. We can tell when that is the case by the things that we focus on and identify with.  For instance, if my primary focus and identity is found in a political party, then my reference point for living is in this world and in the natural realm.  If I think of myself first as a Democrat or a Republican and judge or categorize those around me in those terms, then I have given up a kingdom perspective for an earthly perspective.  

It’s not just politics.  If I desire to be a CEO of a Fortune 500 company more than I desire to be a faithful follower of Jesus, then my reference point for living is this world, its values, and its ways.  If my primary identity is tied up in sports, music, the arts, or my career, then I am missing out on the privileges as well as the responsibilities of kingdom citizenship. 

If I think of myself as a citizen of this world now and the kingdom of heaven later, it will limit what God can do through me.  I think the perfect example of those opposing mindsets is found in the account of Jesus “feeding the five thousand” in John 6.  Jesus was preaching around the Sea of Galilee and great crowds were following him. As great numbers of men, women and children settled in on a hillside to hear his teaching, Jesus asked Philip where they could buy bread to feed all those folks.  

Phillip and the rest of the twelve were taken back when he even suggested that they should feed the crowds.  These solid citizens of earth did the quick math.  Phillip announced that it would take more than six months wages to provide just a bite for each person in the crowd.  Andrew had done a quick inventory in the crowd and found only five small barley loaves and two fish.  They announced that the situation was hopeless because the resources simply weren’t available.  There reference point for living was the natural realm.

Jesus, however, saw no such limitations.  His reference point for living was the kingdom of God in which there are infinite resources available to its citizens.  There are no shortages in heaven.  With that perspective, Jesus gave thanks, broke the bread and fish they had into pieces and had the apostles begin to pass out the food.  When it was over, thousands of people had been fed until they were satisfied and twelve baskets full of surplus food were taken up afterwards.  

As a citizen of heaven, Jesus did not fear shortages, storms, or even his enemies.  Remember, he accessed heaven as a man not as God. On several occasions, he rebuked his followers because they had no faith in the provision or protection of heaven, because the world (the natural realm) and its limitations was their reference point. Jesus functioned in this world as the Son of Man.  That means that whatever he did by faith, we can also do and whatever withdrawals he made from heaven are available to us as well. 

One of the most transforming things we can do in our lives is to shift our primary identity from being a citizen of this planet to being a citizen of heaven.   Remember that we are to pray, “on earth as it is in heaven.” As citizens of heaven, we have the privilege of establishing the culture of heaven on earth which means that everyone has enough, everyone has health, everyone has peace, everyone has purpose, and so forth.  We can only do that, however, if we know who we are and what is available to us from the throne of God.  Ask God to give you that perspective.

God’s Purposes for Forgiveness

Sometimes, we feel as if God is being unfair when he commands us to forgive those who have betrayed and wounded us.  We feel as if he wants to give our adversary a free pass while we are left to reap what they sowed into our lives.  The truth that we need to cling to is that God has a father’s heart for us and his commands always lead us to the greater blessing.  He is also a just God, who will inevitably deal with the wrongs and inequities of this world (see Psalm 73). As we wrap up this series, I want to focus on God’s true purposes for forgiveness so that we might br more willing to surrender to his commands.

1. He wants to develop the heart of Christ in us so that we are free to give love and receive love.  Unforgiveness tends to close the door to love as we learn to distrust everyone and close our hearts to them…even those who have never hurt us.  He forgiving heart gives no room to then devil.

2.   Forgiveness minimizes our pain and releases us from that past..We do not have to relive a hurtful moment over and over in order to keep our anger    alive. 

3. It frees us from the past.   Our thoughts are not anchored in the past on our woundedness,  so we can focus on our future with hope. Unforgiveness takes emotional energy.  It drains us as we continue to reflect on our pain and those who hurt us.  We often make decisions based on how the hurtful person might react to what we do rather than on the basis of what is best for us or our family.  Unforgiveness continues to give the perpetrator power over our lives.  We organize our lives around what they did, what they might do again, or what we might do to them.

Too often, we become the thing we hate because we become what we focus on in life. Forgiveness sets us free from that trap. It frees us from the one who has hurt us. When we forgive, our obsession with that person diminishes.  We no longer make decisions based on how he/she might respond or how it might affect that person.  Instead, we can make decisions based on what is best for us and those we love and what pleases God.

4. Forgiveness keeps us from poisoning our own well as our anger, distrust, and bitterness will inevitably spill over onto the ones we love, damaging our current relationships.

5. Forgiveness allows us to look at ourselves and the hurtful situation objectively so that we may learn and grow.  In nearly every situation, we made contributions to the problem.  We all know people who move from relationship to relationship, never recognizing the pattern in their own life that keeps wrecking relationships. As they blame others for their failings, they will never grow though those issues and will never truly find the relationship they long for.

6. Forgiveness creates the possibility that the relationship may be reconciled and that it might be a blessing in the future. We are all imperfect and will inevitably fall short in out relationships.  Forgiveness allows the relationship to continue and grow and even become stronger in many cases.

7.  Forgiveness fosters love.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.  (1 Cor. 13:4-8)

Take note of the phrase, “keeps no record of wrongs.”  That is forgiveness.  The idea is that we don’t keep an accounting of every failing and don’t assign a payment to each disappointment.  If we keep an account, we will either rehearse the bad moments so often that we loose sight of any positive qualities in the person or relationships and will garner an attitude that wants the other to pay up on the perceived wrongs. That will eventually destroy a relationship.   In addition, it will discourage the other person who may be working hard to grow and change because they will sense that whatever they do will never be enough.

8. Forgiveness keeps God’s forgiveness available to us.  God wants to be merciful but he is also just.  Our unforgiveness allows Satan to bring that charge against us in the courts of heaven so that God cannot simply dismiss our unforgiveness. Our decision to forgive allows God to extend his grace as he desires,  Until we forgive, the Judge cannot justly dismiss the charge.

9. Forgiveness prevents Satan from establishing footholds and strongholds in our hearts and in our children’s heart . 

“In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry,  and do not  give the devil a foothold. (Eph 4:26-28) 

 For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.”  (Acts 8:23) 

See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to  cause trouble and defile many.  (Heb 12:15-16) 

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does.  The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds.  We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.   (2 Cor. 10:3-6)

Satan desires to establish a foothold or stronghold in our hearts so that they become poisoned with bitterness, anger, and resentment.  Forgiveness closes the door to the enemy and  again allows us to give love and receive love as God desires.

10. Forgiveness allows God to fulfill his role as Judge toward those who have wronged us and takes us out of that risky position.

Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord.  (Rom 12:19) 

Do not judge, or you too will be judged.  For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. ( Matt 7:1-2)  

Ultimately, we need to trust that the commands of the Father are always in our best interest even if it sometimes seems counterintuitive.  He wants to bless his children and have them walk in freedom.  Because we live in a fallen world filled with broken people, we will have multiple opportunities to forgive.  It will always bless you and those you love to submit to the Father and imitate the Son to do so.