When we become tight-fisted with our passions and convictions we allow them to define us, and we spend a lot of energy defending them from challenge and new information or nuance. We also judge people more harshly who don’t share our convictions. But when we open our hands, recognize we’re all on a journey, we are far more likely to humbly explore what we believe and be more gracious towards others.
Ultimately, our hope and confidence comes from Jesus, not the government. We cannot live and die by our vote. We cannot celebrate our preferred candidates taking office as if it’s the coming of the Kingdom. We cannot be expected to align with candidates on every single plank in their platform; in fact, I would put forth that Christians should not agree with every platform our political parties take. Hence, the lesser of two evils justification. Conversely, if you do support every position one party takes over the other, you may need to do some introspection about where your allegiances lies.
The politics of Jesus cannot be easily coopted by human institutions.
Pursuing our calling doesn’t always equate to warm fuzzy feelings, and it comes with some degree of suffering and discomfort, but over time we begin to see the fruit in how it shapes us to look more like King Jesus. We can find contentment, knowing our lives have purpose and direction. This is more than mere happiness, because the pursuit of happiness often leaves us wanting. We are willing to suffer for meaning.
It is no accident that you were born in this moment in history. There is something here for you to offer a broken world. It can feel overwhelming, you have to pace yourself, and you may have to learn how to convert your privilege from an insulated life to a position of opportunity, but none of it is a mistake.
The Holy Spirit does much of the work of redeeming our inner and outer worlds. Inwardly, we learn to develop virtue through a co-laboring with the Spirit to help us become more like Christ. Outwardly, we co-labor with the Spirit to affect the lives of others through the spiritual gifts. One of the most interesting developments I see in the modern church landscape, in this country today at least, is the wedding of inner Spirit work through the contemplative traditions and the outer Spirit work through the charismatic/pentecostal traditions. The reality is we need both, and as these two rooms in the Christian household commune and share space with one another, the better we will all be for it.
Recognizing that we all have different personalities opens us up to two things. First, we realize that not everyone thinks, feels, and acts the way we do, and that’s okay. It’s actually a relief, because we need other ways of seeing the world to broaden our own. This means we can be more graceful to others in how they function. Secondly, our vision of the God-revealed-in-Jesus broadens as we realize Christ is transcendent enough to encompass and redeem all our personalities.
God is not in the business of scrapping bits of your personality and replacing them as one would with a broken machine; rather, God engages in the all-important Kingdom work of redemption - giving new value and purpose to the raw elements of who you are. When your personality traits are redeemed, they reflected the beautiful and full humanity of Jesus. This is what it means to be Christ-like.
The more we learn how to love in places that are not like our own, the more we are able to transcend our categories of who is or isn’t worthy of love, and the more we learn to inhabit our true identities as being “in Christ”. Steadily we find, as we go to the “ends of the earth”, that there is no real boundary to compassion that this cross-shaped love cannot overcome. It is Jesus’ care and consideration for this journey of love that he first sends us to our personal Judea, and when the time is right to our personal Samaria, so that we can expand the circumference of our love to meet all people, everywhere.
Part of the healing work God does in our lives is to carefully parse through the elements of our origins, teaching us to let go of what no longer serves us or the Kingdom, while magnifying those qualities that best reflect the character of God and become our best contributions to the advancement of the Kingdom. The plot of our lives goes deeper than the surface appearance of things; it speaks to a general spirit or attitude that might pervade our stories before we really encounter the God Who turns curses into blessings. The more closely we can name this spirit, the more preciously we can name the specific character of the spirit of God that enters in and brings us to new life. Once you were one way, but because of God’s work in your life, you are becoming something more.
Story is the realm of the Father, Who is intimately with us on the journey and turns curses into blessings. This is true for human history, and it is true for your personal history. Learning how to read your story as the Father has worked in it will help you understand how the Father desires to work through it for the sake of the world.
Calling can be seen as the way in which each of us specifically fulfill that common purpose through the uniqueness of our stories, our personalities, and our gifts. The beauty of understanding our individual calling as part of the larger purpose of the church is that we don’t feel the pressure to take the whole mission upon ourselves. We learn to trust that, as we steward well what God has placed on our hearts, others will do the same for their part in the larger picture. In this way, God weaves together a grand narrative that celebrates diversity, as we all contribute out of our gifts and limitations. There is tremendous relief in not holding the burden of the whole great commission, and with it a renewed call to responsibility to really understand what we’re each called to do.
It’s all too easy to think that giving ourselves what we deserve is self-care, and sometimes that is true. Yet, so often our problem is not that we have too little, but too much. The privilege we swim in turns blessings of provision into a numbing agent that blinds us to the outer world. We become enslaved to what is available to us, and we’re guided by our incessant hunger for more, denying the fact that we’re already so full.
As we recognize Jesus as the One to whom we offer our whole selves, how might that flow out into the world, into our community, and into our individual lives? Many of our leaders brought up words like reorientation, renewal, energy, momentum, release. In addition, two common images arose - that of the throne of God, and the river.
Recently I have been sitting under the heavy weight of these confusing times - the pandemic disorienting our rhythms and the moments we take for granted, the mass exodus from church among young Christians, and more. It has caused me to feel despair, anger, and powerlessness to do much about it. Yet even as my mind spins in place out of frustration and my heart breaks from the weight of change, my soul is still seeking out the face of God.
The most fruitful work will be the most difficult and will take a long time…
All our deepest desires are met in the coming of King Jesus…
What does it practically look like to live peaceably?…
Vapor, vapor. Everything is vapor. Lord, show me what I cling to in vain, and teach me to let go, so that I can rest in your presence…
It is with both joy and sadness we say goodbye to our most recent series, CHARISMATA. Over the past fifteen weeks we have explored the spiritual gifts, given to us by the Spirit of Jesus to love people back into relationship with God…
