“For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
I failed. I failed God. I made some promises to Him that I would do certain things or refrain from certain negative behaviors, and I broke them. I screwed up. God must hate me. Why doesn’t He just smite me now. I deserve it.
I’m not saying these things for rhetorical effect — I have actually felt this way on recent occasion. The guilt and shame of sin can be so overwhelming that it effectively refashions one’s entire perspective. Everything is tainted, nothing is spared.
King Saul, as recorded in the Old Testament, sinned against God and through weakness failed to deliver God’s righteous judgement against His enemies. His sin led to a removal of God’s favor upon Saul, and Saul’s response was to dive deep into the black waters of madness and despair. Saul was unable to see God as a merciful God of love but instead only saw the force of His wrath.
King David also sinned against God and had a righteous man put in the line of fire in order to steal away his buxom bride and sleep with her. His sin led to a removal of God’s favor upon David and the death of his son borne by the wife he wrongfully took. But David knew the father heart of God. David knew that He bestowed grace on those who feared Him. David knew that as far as the east is from the west, so far will God remove transgressions from those who call on His holy name (Psalm 103:12). David sought the Lord in grief and shame, calling to him for mercy, and God did indeed honor him in his repentance.
David believed in second chances. Paul the Apostle also believed in second chances. Paul, in fact, had more grace shown to him than almost anyone else in the Bible — the very man who zealously persecuted Christians and presided over the death of the first martyr became the undeniable leader of the 1st-century Christian missionary movement and the author of over half of the New Testament. What a transformation! Paul writes that nothing, nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. Oh how true this is! If you have rejected God because of the guilt that chokes you, if you have turned away from God because of the shame you carry inside of you — don’t hold onto the lie that says that God has turned His back on you! He loves you with an everlasting love, and nothing you can do or could ever do has the power to change that. He is waiting for you with open arms, ready to forgive you and receive you into His infinite love and compassion. If your sin is so great that He is unable to wash it away and make you clean again, then Christ’s death upon the cross was in vain.
No matter how many times you fail, no matter how many times you screw up, you can start afresh. Begin anew. Make those same promises again. Make those same commitments again. It’s OK to do a reboot. It’s OK. God is in the second chance business!
I took my camera and my new telephoto lens out onto a favorite little out-of-the-way road of mine. It was hot, the grass was burnt, and the air quality was medicore due to state-wide wildfires. Yet, something I’m coming to realize is that if you can’t find beauty or perspective in the ugliest of situations, you just aren’t looking hard enough. The diamond is waiting to be discovered.
I found my diamond on a little out-of-the-way road when the day was thick and the air smelled like grass-burnt dust.
Good question! I was excited about launching this feature a couple of months ago, but somehow I keep loosing a block of time to work on it. I don’t know if any other bloggers feel this way, but I find it much easier to jot down some thoughts in my head than to try to create a bunch of useful links. Somehow I have a difficult time figuring out which stuff merits attention and which stuff can be discarded.
I’m thinking about doing things differently for next week. Every time I read something or see something on the Web that interests me, instead of bookmarking it for later evaluation, I’ll add it directly to a work-in-progress Speedlink post. That way, when Friday rolls around, all I have to do is edit and publish, rather than write, edit, and then publish. We’ll see how that goes!
Hey, if you have any feedback regarding different tricks to help blogging go more smoothly, I’m all ears!
In thinking about what to post today, a couple of different things came to mind. I recently wrote up a lengthy post lambasting all the “evolutionary psychology” nonsense you hear about in popular science mags and so forth, but after a while the whole topic just became so boring to me I figured why bother stirring up the pot. Then I was going to write about the recent Obama vs. Dobson kafuffle, but since neither character exactly gets my heart all aflutter, I decided to take a pass.
Then I realized something that’s increasingly been bothering me: our society’s addiction to controversy. With the 24 hour news cycle and the YouTube no-holds-barred coverage of every little tiny gaffe or strong statement, controversy is an industry and smears and attacks a modus operandi of the media. It isn’t their fault, of course — they publish controversy because people want it. People buy it in droves.
When’s the last time you read a news article talking about how folks came together for a common good to do something really lovely? Sure, you see something like that occasionally, filed as a “human interest” story — perhaps after some terrible disaster has struck. But, by and large, news is always bad news and our national conversation always negative.
I’m sick of it. I’m sick of the pundits. I’m sick of the stupid “watchdogs” that act like they’re protecting our interests. I’m sick of hearing about the latest leader’s screwup. There are better uses of my time and better ways to spend my energy.
Of course, by talking this way, I’m generating controversy over the idea of controversy. Ironic. Perhaps it’s just an inevitable aspect of human nature, and I should accept it for what it is. But somehow I’m still too idealistic to give in.
Modern life is in many ways a kind of spiritual fog. We blanket ourselves in technology and we wrap ourselves with fantasy, but in reality we are living like slaves rather than kings.
We think we are masters of our fate because we can choose to buy a 42″ HDTV rather than a 37″. We think we are in control of our destiny because we buy a grande-sized Mocha Frappucino. We think that life is good because the ski trip to Lake Tahoe was a heckuva lot of fun.
The best lies are the ones that are 98% truth. The truth of the blessings we have, the beautiful and meaningful things we can be grateful for, is obscured by our selfish desires and our temper tantrums when things don’t go our way. Instead of ruling in the midst of our circumstances, we become enslaved by them. We use that 42″ HDTV to watch porn because our minds are being dictated by damaged passions. We buy that Frappucino to get a quick fix because otherwise the morning would suck and the world would look dimly depressing. We find out that being in Lake Tahoe is not the panacea of tranquility we thought it would be when we arrive back home to a stack of bills (all those Frappucinos and HDTV/Blu-ray/home theater purchases, dontchaknow) and a mile-high workload and an angry family squabble and a sick cat.
The problem is focus. There are so many little things to focus on in our daily routines that we forget the real focus of life: to glorify God and enjoy Him forever (as stated by the Westminster catechism). When we center ourselves on the knowledge of God’s love and fatherhood over us, His sweet children, we begin to see everything in a new way. Somehow the dire problems and conflicts begin to look a little less important, and following in the footsteps of Jesus becomes the singular priority.
“Seek first the Kingdom of God and his rightousness, and all these things will be added to you.” — Matthew 6:33
I’m behind the times when it comes to the hit TV show Lost. I’m making my way through Season 1 via iTunes, and I just finished an episode where one of the characters seeks out another for revenge — to kill that person because of a perceived culpability in the death of a loved one. It got me thinking about a subject I don’t think very often about: revenge.
I’m fortunate in that I’ve never been in a situation where I felt like every fiber of my being was crying out for retribution, for payback, for satisfaction. I’ve never sought out vengeance, so I know for a fact that I’m unable to imagine what it’s like. When I picture someone having killed my brother, or father, or close friend, I don’t even have an emotional category for that.
It’s a natural thing to want to demand that someone pay for what they have done. There must be consequences for their actions. The blood of the innocent cries out for justice. But then I remember that someone has already paid the price. Someone has already suffered the consequences. Someone has already been punished, tortured in loneliness and executed in despair. Such terrible deeds have had their just redress. That person bore the full brunt of a righteous retribution. His name is Jesus Christ.
We don’t think about the death of Jesus in those terms very often. Jesus is always the answer for our sins, for the bad things we’ve done. But Jesus didn’t just die for my sins, or for your sins. He died for the sins of the whole world. And that means ALL of them. Their sins. The sins of a murderer. The sins of an adulterer. That person who in a single moment destroyed your family, your reputation, your livelihood, your reason to live.
You may think you can find wholeness and peace by destroying them in return, but you can’t. Only in the arms of the One who took on the sins of mankind and paid the ultimate price can you find restoration and resurrection. Bring your anger and your sorrow to Him, and He will bring you the justice of eternity.
Album ‘n’ things:
Was hoping to get another Speedlink Friday cranked out but I’ve been too busy working (among other things) on promo materials with Shayne for our upcoming Binary Sea album. So, as much as I hate making this blog have to wait its turn, that’s da way it’s gonna be. Next week should prove more usual. Should is the operative word here.
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For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, Abba! Father! The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
Something is happening to me. I can feel it. I can see it operating in my life. I hear it whispering to me. I know it’s there. It’s my spirit — someone’s gotten ahold of my spirit and has quickened it…made it come alive. My spirit is invading my thoughts, my emotions. My troubled soul is getting a makeover, and my spirit is taking over.
The question isn’t why, it’s how.
How can I exist in two different states at the same time? How can I be still be living in fear, in complacency, in depression and selfishness, and yet I am living in love and in truth, a free man, a victorious king, a warrior who has vanquished powerful foes, an agent of kingdom transformation, an inheritor of a royal priesthood, a child of the almighty God?
I became acutely aware of this strange phenomenon this week. I kept being invaded in my sleep and my daydreams. I’d be caught up in the busyness and stress of the week, ready just to drop dead in weariness and fatigue, and then it’d happen. I’d start singing praises to Jesus! I’d fall asleep on the bus, feeling like something the cat dragged in, and all of a sudden I’d wake up with songs of love to the Lord on my lips. Or I’d be on a break outside, my mind racing and my body aching, and then love for my Creator would begin to wash over me and my spirit would connect with His Spirit and the thanksgiving would begin to flow. Oh, what is happening to me?
My spirit is growing, and its getting aggressive. I’m not talking about the Holy Spirit, I’m talking about MY spirit. The one that was born again into the Kingdom of God many years ago. It was a little baby for so long…but no longer. It is a man. And it is growing. And I am growing, and I can’t escape one simple fact:
God won’t stop until my spirit, intimately intertwined with Holy Spirit, has completely consumed my entire being — my thoughts, my emotions, my dreams, my desires, and my identity — so that it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.
The Misty Edwards song is absolutely true: God won’t relent until He has it all. And I am falling, falling under His glorious spell; His love turning me into something so amazing, so profound, that sometimes it scares me. But it shouldn’t, because God, above all else, is good. And that is a good thing.
JARED WHITE is a musician, a Web developer, a photographer, and a Charismatic Christian who believes that the Spirit of God is moving dramatically across the world today and impacting entire nations with the Gospel of the Kingdom. He writes frequently about living as a disciple of Jesus Christ in the 21st Century and isn't afraid to ask the hard questions — of himself more than anyone.
Regular topics include the intersection of culture and spirituality, miraculous signs and wonders, science and Intelligent Design, creative and prophetic arts, the future of the Church, and the occasional poke into that river of snakes commonly known as politics.
Jared lives in Santa Rosa, Sonoma County, California, and calls Grace Fellowship his spiritual home.
Monday, 14 July 2008, 11:12 am Just spent an afternoon with my new step-nephew on his 1st birthday. Pretty neat...a little bewildering, but I was playing cameraman so the geek persona helped. :)
I failed. I failed God. I made some promises to Him that I would do certain things or refrain from certain negative behaviors, and I broke them. I screwed up. God must hate me. Why doesn’t He just smite me now. I deserve it.
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