Tag: remain on the vine

Your Redemption Draws Near

Posted on by Hilarey

I once said to my grandma, “I wish Jesus would come back.” It wasn’t during a trial. I think I was just feeling the irritation of living. I had a bill due, or something equally inconsequential.

She said, “Yes, I hope so too. But, not yet.”

I was shocked. Maybe even a little worried that she didn’t want Christ to return at that very moment. I mean, you get a crown just for longing for his return! Why wouldn’t she want him to come immediately?

I hadn’t yet known the pain of a lost loved one. The pain of longing for someone you love more than yourself to be reconciled to God before it’s too late.

It isn’t easy to balance these two longings (Christ’s return and the salvation of loved ones) inside the same heart space. When I spoke that to my grandma, I was being selfish. The Lord tarries, desiring none would perish.

During that season, we attended a church that gave regular prophecy updates. Jesus’s return occupied much of our attention, maybe more focus than bringing God’s kingdom here to earth through actions and stewardship.

Conversation about The End Times was casual—albeit with a heightened sense of macabre excitement. “God is going to come back and punish everyone but me! The earth will be filled with the blood of evil unbelievers and those who vote Democrat.”

Our blind anticipation about eternity did a little damage. Like someone who gives up living, preparing to plan their funeral, rather than do anything to bolster their life. Although, in some seasons of pain—selfish is all you can muster.

But focusing solely on eternity means sacrificing his gift of abundant life now. Both for yourself and what you have to give others.

It is selfish to wag your head at an earth “headed to hell in a handbasket.” And to harden your heart against those leaving the faith—drawing comfort that it’s just predestination. I read something recently that said, “a salvation that requires someone else’s destruction is too small a salvation since ‘everyone belongs to God.’”

It is the Kindness of God that Draws to Repentance

You could speak like Paul if you loved like Paul. But if we aren’t willing to give up our salvation for someone else—we should be careful how we instruct, exhort and justify “the end” in our minds.

Always question doctrine and interpretation that causes you to turn your heart away from humanity.

Long for his return, for the reconciliation to the lover of your soul… but not at the expense of bringing his kingdom here to earth in the meantime. I often think about an ending scene in Schindler’s List. While people thank him for their lives, Schindler can only stare at his watch and lament that he could have sold it to save more.

A Thief in the Night

If you think it’s hard to live now, in a fallen world, fearing the future loss of your freedoms… read scripture about the end. You might not be so eager to usher it in, other than the glorious result of reconciliation. Christ’s analogy to birth pangs is perfect. For most of pregnancy, there is still so much left to do to prepare for the arrival. You don’t want birth to happen until you’re finished getting ready. You’re eventually willing to go through labor to have the baby in arm, but you never wake up and think, “Today is a good day for hours and hours of the worst pain I’ve ever experienced and possible death.”

There’s an interpretation about the destruction of the temple in 70 AD and the Parousia, or second coming of Christ, being the same event. But I favor the “already and not yet” duality of scripture. It shows up in too many places and correlates to our entire faith-walk. For example, we are already redeemed, but sanctification is still happening in our sinful bodies until we will be changed in heaven. We are already, and not yet, justified.

So, even though Christ was teaching in the temple in Luke 21, I believe the passage has use as instruction for us.

Verses 34-36: But watch yourselves, or your hearts will be weighed down by dissipation, drunkenness, and the worries of life—and that day will spring upon you suddenly like a snare. For it will come upon all who dwell on the face of all the earth. So keep watch at all times, and pray that you may have the strength to escape all that is about to happen and to stand before the Son of Man.

Pray to Escape

When you read Revelations, Matthew 24, and Luke 21, there are common threads to pray that you will escape or you will endure. Certainly, God does not give us a spirit of fear, so fear is not an appropriate response to the discussion. We are safe, we cannot be snatched from God’s hand. We should lift our eyes and watch for redemption, but we shouldn’t disregard the warnings either. There is tension here—just like the tension of balancing a longing for Christ’s return and longing for the salvation of loved ones, first.

Sometimes it seems like the easiest answer is for the end to arrive, but instead of looking forward to your enemies being crushed under God’s feet, spend your energy on the concept that those who endure to the end shall be saved.

Pray to Endure

Most Jews didn’t recognize Jesus because they had purposed in their minds what the coming Messiah would look like. Don’t become so fixated on how you expect the end to play out that you’re unprepared.

Luke 21 verse 19 says, “by your patient endurance you will gain your souls.” Make sure you really believe what you believe, memorize and take his word into the deep inner parts. Prepare for labor before victory.

Blessed is Everyone Who Eats Bread in the Kingdom of God

Posted on by Hilarey

The first time I heard the scripture in Matthew 7:21-23, I quickly applied it to others. In subsequent readings, it unsettled me. I’ve come to a place where it keeps me company with a content sort of fear and trembling. I don’t get it, but I accept it. It goes:

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'”

I mean, if someone is performing dead works and doesn’t know God—they realize they’re a fake, right? Apparently not, if they say “Lord” and are surprised when they don’t get to enter heaven.

One method I used during the “it must apply to a different flavor of Christianity than mine” season, was to lump whole denominations into the story. There were surely more chosen in my denomination…otherwise I’d switch (non)denominations. So, it must be the ecumenical Baptists because they let everyone in. Or maybe it’s the Southern Baptists because they don’t let anyone in—even light.

It doesn’t apply to me

Have you ever sat in a sermon thinking about someone who needed it more than you? When I consider this, it’s funny to assume that something which separates my bone and marrow will cut someone else the same. If there were catchphrases which always reaped the lost, we wouldn’t need the word to be living.

Blessed Assurance

Don’t get me wrong, we shouldn’t be insecure about our salvation. We can have an anchor for the soul if we continue in the faith and submit to sanctification. So maybe that passage in Matthew applies to the “one and done prayer” people who think repeating Roman’s Road after someone else negates all other inner spiritual transformation…

Maybe it applies to me

I’m only kidding to point out that it’s difficult to sit and let every bit of the message be personal. It’s easier to separate ourselves and think in terms of “us” and “them” when we read things like that section in Matthew or the parable of 10 virgins. No one expecting to go to the feast wants to be locked out. It feels a little like self preservation to define who is/will be on the outside. But dismissing this story too quickly offers temporal feelings of safety at best. And at worst, it might put you on the wrong side of a locked door.

I’m writing this post especially to believers who feel outside—unwelcome in church. The people who have separated you as “them” might just be afraid to internalize warnings in scripture. It is to a Bible reader’s detriment to accept the many promises in the New Testament without acknowledging how much of it is believer-correction and believer-warning.

I’m intrigued how often I hear the sentiment from a scholar, “There are many interpretations of this passage,” and then from a layperson, “Two things can’t be true and I know what this incomplete sentence in the King James Bible means, so you’re wrong.”

It is also to our detriment to merely collect information. “What does the Bible say about that?!” Then fortify the walls around our understanding of doctrine so we never feel the painful disruption of Christ changing us.

Everyone is invited

When a man exclaimed in Luke 14, “Blessed it is everyone who eats bread in the kingdom,” Jesus replied with another parable. The scene is a landowner who has prepared a feast and wants his tables filled. The invitees give excuses why they cannot come:

Buying a field
Managing the necessities to work it
Getting married

Buy dirt and find your soul mate (or at least someone who turns you on) is American, not biblical. Even though we were told to be fruitful and multiply, and land and kids are a good way to secure your earthly future, they are not what we were made for. The house and kids package is not inherently righteous or unrighteousness.

But rather, it seems to be a distraction from the actual landowner’s kingdom-invitation: to feast in heaven with outcasts.

Citizenship and progeny

Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to the LORD say, “The LORD will surely separate me from his people”; and let not the eunuch say, “Behold, I am a dry tree.” Isaiah 56:3.

Some impact is lost if your Bible translation says stranger, foreigner, or sojourner. All languages change, but English, especially, is a moving target. If you use relevant terms like migrant farm worker, or “illegal” (undocumented immigrant) you’ll sit up a little straighter when you read the Old Testament. Because I don’t know any strangers, but I do know immigrants.

Eunuch is another term that doesn’t live in our modern vernacular. You don’t hear many people talking about a life of celibacy. Of course, that might be because if anyone said they planned to live a life of celibacy, most (Protestant) churchgoers would correct them, “You mean, you’re still waiting for God to bring you a mate.” Or, if someone says they are celibate-gay, the latter part typically overshadows the calling.

Jesus mentions intersex, people who have had their sexuality ruined by others and people who simply choose celibacy in Matthew 19:12, “For there are eunuchs who were born that way, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others—and there are those who choose to live like eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. The one who can accept this should accept it.”

I was told there would be bread here?

We should give even more contemplation to the promises given to the foreigner and the eunuch in Isaiah 56 because it seems to highlight two big controversies in American churches. Immigrants and celibate-gay/people who can’t or won’t have sex. I like the NIV title added for chapter 56. “Salvation for Others.”

The Other

Specifically, the one without a land or a people who joins themself to the Lord will be brought to the holy mountain (you know the place—everyone is fighting over it) and permitted into the house of prayer.

Specifically, the one who has given their sexuality to God, who holds tight His covenant, will have a monument within God’s house that surpasses sons and daughters.

Buying land
Managing your stuff
Getting married

It is the “them” or “other” who enters God’s sabbath rest that will be gathered with the chosen Isreal.

But regardless of whether you identify in the “us” or “them” group, let anyone who thinks that they stand take heed, lest they fall.

The Ordination of Humankind

Posted on by Hilarey

Twelve is a significant number in the Bible. There were 12 tribes of Israel, and Jesus chose 12 disciples. He even chose 12 knowing there would be one who was a betrayer. So I imagine all the times Christ looked him in the eye, giving him every chance to follow and believe instead of choosing what he knew Judus would choose. Because, oh, the mercy of God.

With the significance of the number, it’s easy to see that the remaining disciples felt incomplete. The new covenant people needed to start with the same symbolism. So they prayed and chose a new disciple by casting lots.

I once heard a preacher say that the disciples chose Matthias, but God choose Paul. So who really was the final apostle? Or is the position still open?

Most of the time, I appreciate Paul’s sarcastic tone. Like when he says he is “in no way inferior to the so-called super apostles.” Irreverence intended. In fact, people might not have respected Paul because of his humility, weak eyes, or thorn in the flesh—instead preferring men who crown each other with awards and boast of their own credentials.

God is no respecter of persons. But humankind sure loves to elevate and diminish our fellow sojourners.

I’ve been ruminating about how we disregard some and ordain others, so this idea of the 12th apostle came to mind. When I searched out details, I discovered an article which argues that even though the Matthias isn’t mentioned again in the New Testament, neither are of most of the other disciples. Additionally, Matthias died as a martyr—just as most of the other disciples. So I laughed at myself, realizing I further proved my point by giving Paul more credence as the 12th disciple just because he got more airtime.

I’m reading Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster with my prayer partners and the writer says, “The history of religion is the story of an almost desperate scramble to have a king, mediator, a priest, a pastor, a go-between.” Don’t you love that language? I can picture the desperate scramble of humans fumbling on their hands and knees groping for a go-between, instead of God.

Foster says the reason is that interaction with God changes you. The Israelites wanted Moses to speak to God as a mediator, “lest they die,” so that they could “maintain religious respectability without the attendant risks.”

Attendant risks of change

You’ve probably heard it said that our church is not a proper body if it is one mouth and many ears. For decades, modern western Christianity has wanted to go about life the same as unbelievers, knowing one slice of the pie (our rightness before God) is taken care of by the pastor on our payroll. Then we can show up and enjoy a tidbit. Check. Just chose the right pastor.

“They can be saved, but they can’t be ordained.”

When someone told me this, part of my brain shut down and I lost reasoning faculties. So, I didn’t get the chance to clarify if he meant someone sleeping with his girlfriend was more ordainable than someone who wasn’t attracted to girls. Neither did I ask him, ordained for what? Teaching, hospitality, administration, prophecy, the role of elder?

It’s one thing to go to seminary so you can frame Goldleaf paper with several signatures of elite humans, and another to go so you might grope for God. So don’t defer undue reverence to the pulpit. Just the double portion due, and material needs.

For a time, I gave rides to a woman without a car. Someone at the Bible study discovered and applauded me for taking care of her. But she also mentioned that I should get authorized by the church as a mentor. Then, I could really do her some good. I didn’t bother to go into details that I received as much as I gave from this woman of God. But, I thought it was interesting that people even want minor acts of sharing to be confined under the banner of the corporation.

If you’re called by the unconfinable Spirit of God, you’re ordained in the truest sense. And, Believer, you are called by God.

There is a downside to acting autonomously, or living in a vacuum. You can create a kind of Petri dish where skewed doctrines thrive. But it isn’t like mega churches don’t go askew, hand-in-hand, following the piper and light show.

I am not opposed to coming under the covering of a brick and mortar church. But what does it mean if you have a specific call on your life? It means you follow God, not man.

One reason to have a proper church hierarchy in the large gatherings is to avoid chaos. I am sure you can think of other reasons. Add them to the comments.

But we can’t let just anyone who says they come in the name of God to place themselves in authority. In Acts 18:24-28, Apollos wanted to go to Achaia, so after some of his doctrine was corrected by a husband and wife team, the brethren sent him with letters of reference.

It matters who writes the letter

My mom remembers hearing an itinerant preacher as a girl. In retrospect, Jim Jones gave her the creeps. But I’m sure he had letters and phone calls preceding him which said, “You have got to hear this guy,” signed by someone important. He rode the wave of public endorsement at some point. You know, before he murdered his followers.

It’s easy to get frustrated with the way our modern church body operates. But instead of severing ourselves from the heart and life-flow, we need to ask what part we are and who ordains us.

And for what?

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” Ephesians 2:10 (ESV)