wishing for a revelation

When you face a tough decision, do you ever wish that God would tell you what to do, as Moses experienced at the burning bush (Exodus 3), or as Samuel experienced one night as a boy (I Samuel 3)?

While people today still experience those kinds of things, spiritual author Dallas Willard writes that ‘the interior or inner voice…is the preferred and most valuable form of individual communication for God’s purposes. God usually addresses individually those who walk with him in a mature, personal relationship using this inner voice… (Hearing God IVP Books 2012, 118).

Does that mean that if I sense that God has guided my mind in a certain way, that’s a divine revelation upon which I can act? Not so fast.

1. Paul of Tarsus writes, …do not despise inspired messages. Put all things to the test; keep what is good and avoid every kind of evil (1 Thessalonians 5:20-22, Good News). In other words, process in community what you think God told you. “When God speaks to us…[i]t does not…prove that we have correctly understood what he said. The infallibility of the messenger and the message does not guarantee the infallibility of our reception…” (Willard 42). Other people who know you can challenge your thinking. Invite that challenge.

Does that mean that if my support community and I sense that we know what God wants me to do, then we’re OK? Not so fast. The Christian church has a long history of very good decisions – caring for the poor, the sick and the prisoner, for starters. But the church also has a long history of very bad decisions – the Crusades, supporting slavery, apartheid and racial segregation, partnering with colonialism that exploited indigenous people.

2. But each of those very bad decisions goes clearly against the Bible’s teaching. Looking back, it’s easy to see that each of those decisions made Jesus very sad. In Christ’s family there can be no division into Jew and non-Jew, slave and free, male and female. Among us you are all equal. That is, we are all in a common relationship with Jesus Christ. Also, since you are Christ’s family, then you are Abraham’s famous ‘descendant,’ heirs according to the covenant promises (Galatians 3:28-29, The Message). If Jesus does not discriminate racially, socially or on the basis of gender, then Jesus’ followers have no basis for doing so either. The second thing you and your community need to think about is, “What does the Bible say?” And that doesn’t mean, “Can you find a Bible verse to justify what you want to do?” The proponents of racial discrimination had their favourite verses, torn from the verses’ context and used to achieve the very opposite of what Jesus wants for humanity. Rather, you need to ask “What does the Bible say that Jesus feels about this issue?”

3. And that brings us to a very important third thing you need to think about, as you try to figure out the right way forward. He [God] guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way (Psalm 25:9). You need to have “’a real preference for God’s will….God guides…by swaying the judgment. To wait before him, weighing candidly in the scales every consideration for or against a proposed course, and in readiness to see which way the preponderance lies, is a frame of mind and heart in which one is fitted to be guided, and God touches the scales and makes the balance to sway as he will. But our hands must be off the scales…’” (Pierson, George Mueller of Bristol and His Witness to a Prayer-hearing God (Baker & Taylor, 1899 in Willard 52). In other words,
a) check all your biases, assumptions and motives at the door, desiring only to do what God wants you to do. Offer yourself as putty to God, allowing Him to form your life as He wishes (Jeremiah 18:1-6; Isaiah 45:9).
b) weigh the pros and cons of each option
c) keeping your hands off the scales, how are you thinking about this? If you’re humbly seeking God will instead of asking God to rubber stamp your personal preference, God will guide your decision. Follow the conclusion to which you come. “’But our hands must be off the scales, otherwise we need expect no interposition [intervention] of his in our favor’” (Pierson in Willard, 52).

God is willing to guide your thinking. Check your thoughts with others, in the light of the Bible, humbly. No need for astrologers, spells or fortune tellers. If you’re a Jesus follower, ]w]hat we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us (1 Corinthians 2:12). It’s a safe, friendly universe with a God who loves you and who communicates with those He loves.

becoming a giant

Jesus answered. ‘…whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.’
Then Judas (not Judas Iscariot) said, ‘But, Lord, why do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?’
Jesus replied, ‘Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching….But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.’ John 14:21-27

How does one become a spiritual giant; that is, the kind of person to whom people come for advice and about whom people talk for years, decades, centuries after they died because they were such amazingly insightful and spiritual people? Wouldn’t it be nice to have such an impact?

Nicholas Herman was born in France in about 1614, over 400 years ago. Because he was born into a very poor family, he was forced to join the army simply to get enough to eat (Wikipedia).

While in the army, at age 18, he saw a leafless tree one winter day. He thought to himself “that within a little time the leaves would be renewed, and after that the flowers and fruit appear[. H]e received a high view of the providence and power of God, which…set him loose from the world, and kindled in him…a love for God” (Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God Spire 1998, 12, 15). And that’s how his relationship with God began – by thinking about nature’s wonders.

After sustaining an injury, he left the army. He got a job as a valet, or footman, but this didn’t go well because “he was a great awkward fellow who broke everything” (Lawrence 15).

He decided to become a monk, and joined “the barefooted Carmelites” (Lawrence, 12. You can read about them on the internet.). They assigned him to work in the monastery kitchen – which was something he expected to very much dislike (Lawrence 20), and for which he wasn’t well-suited, because he was lame (Lawrence 19). This became his work for much of the rest of his life. At the monastery he got the name Brother Lawrence.

As a monk, the day started with time for prayer alone. In this time he thought about God, convincing himself that God was real, and surrendering himself to God. And “by this short and sure method he exercised himself in the knowledge and love of God, resolving to use [all his energy] to live in a continual sense of His presence” (Lawrence 28-9).

And then it was off to the kitchen, where he thought about all the things he had to do that day. With the day’s to-do list in mind, he prayed,

Oh my God, since Thou art with me, and I must now, in obedience to Thy commands, apply my mind to these outward things, I [ask You to give] me the grace to continue in Thy presence; and to this end do Thou prosper me with Thy assistance, receive all my works, and possess all my affections (Lawrence 29).

And then he got to work, staying in conversation with God as he worked, asking for God’s help with whatever the task was, and giving God the results of his efforts (Lawrence 29).

When he had finished, he evaluated how well he’d done the task. If it was well done, he thanked God. If he’d messed it up, he asked God to forgive him “and, without being discouraged, he set his mind right again, and continued his exercise in the presence of God as if he had never deviated from it” (Lawrence 30).

When he had to do something very difficult, he would pray, “Lord, I can’t do this unless you give me the ability to do it.” For example, the monastery once sent him on a buying expedition. There were two problems with this. First, he was not good at business. Second, what he was sent to buy was on a boat, and because he was lame he couldn’t walk on the boat. He prayed, “God, I’m here doing your work.” He went onto the boat. The only way he could get around on the boat, because of his disability, was by rolling across the top of the cargo. But he got the job done, and it turned out well. And that’s how it turned out every time. He always found that God answered his prayer by giving him more than enough strength to get the job done (Lawrence 19).

Those watching him noticed “that in the greatest hurry of busyness in the kitchen he…was never hasty or loitering, but did each thing in its season, with an even, uninterrupted composure and tranquility of spirit. ‘The time of business’, said he, ‘does not with me differ from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clatter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, i possess God in as great tranquility as if I were on my knees [in church in worship]’” (Lawrence 30).

And so he did his daily task “purely for the love of God” (Lawrence 26). “[H]is prayer was nothing else but a sense of the presence of God, his soul being…insensible to everything but divine love, and that when the appointed times of prayer were past, he found no difference, because he still continued with God, praising and blessing Him with all his might, so that he passed his life in continual joy; yet hoped that God would give him somewhat to suffer when he should grow stronger” (Lawrence 26-7). In later years he repaired sandals (Wikipedia). (The barefooted Carmelites were allowed to wear sandals.) He died in 1691 at the age of eighty.

And so we have a story of a big, clumsy, physically handicapped cook with a physically demanding job who prays and is in love with God. It’s a story of someone who doesn’t think he’s suffering!

But despite his low-level position, people began to come to him for spiritual guidance. Some of them wrote down what he told them. Other people wrote to him for advice, and kept the letters of spiritual advice he gave them. These conversations and letters became the book The Practice of the Presence of God. “[N]o man…knows how many editions there have been, how many millions have read these words.” And so over 325 years after a big clumsy cook died, people are still reading the book that records his conversations and letters of advice to people about how to live joyfully with God while doing their daily tasks.

How does one become a spiritual giant? By taking literally Jesus’ words in John 14. Make Jesus’ teaching the roadmap for your life, and Jesus promises to make His home inside your mind. His own Spirit will guide your decisions. And if a big clumsy cook can become a spiritual giant, so can you and I!

Thinking heavenly thoughts

When you think about heaven – the place where God lives, and where those who have made Jesus the leader of their lives go when they die – what picture comes to mind? In the comic strips, I usually see people in long white robes standing on clouds, perhaps holding harps. Is that your image? Well, 2000 years ago the Creator of the universe came to earth as the human Jesus of Nazareth – and that’s not the picture He painted!

Jesus told stories about many things. One of His subjects was how people should live before His return, and what would happen to them after His return, both if they had followed His commands and if they had not. In one of those stories (Tasker, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries: Matthew Eerdmans 1961, 237), Jesus said,
[T]he kingdom of heaven…will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his wealth to them. To one he gave five bags of gold, to another two bags, and to another one bag, each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. The man who had received five bags of gold went at once and put his money to work and gained five bags more….
After a long time the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. The man who had received five bags of gold brought the other five. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘you entrusted me with five bags of gold. See, I have gained five more.’
His master replied, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness’ Matthew 25:1, 14-21.

If the master’s return represents the end of life on earth, then what do we see from this story for those whose lives were surrendered to Jesus, the master?

First, Come and share your master’s happiness suggests that heaven is a place of celebration. That’s a good start, isn’t it?

But there’s more.
1. One scholar says that I will put you in charge of many things means “I will ‘give you a sphere where you will have more scope’ (Tasker 237).” Dallas Willard, noted writer of Christian spirituality, says, “This present universe is only one element in the kingdom of God…And within it the…now risen Son of man…is…preparing for us to join him (John 14:2-4)….And we will actively participate in the future governance of the universe.
“We will not sit around looking at one another or at God for eternity but will…’reign with him,’ in the endlessly ongoing creative work of God. It is for this that we were each individually intended, as both kings and priests (Exodus 19:6; Revelation 5:10)).
“Thus, our faithfulness over a ‘few things’ in the present phase of our life develops the kind of character that can be entrusted with ‘many things.’ We are, accordingly, permitted to ‘enter into the joy of our Lord’ (share your master’s happiness)….His plan is for us to develop, as apprentices to Jesus, to the point where we can take our place in the ongoing creativity of the universe.” Willard, The Divine Conspiracy HarperSanFrancisco 1997, 378. In other words, heaven is not a place for sitting around, but for creative activity of a higher order than anything we have yet experienced.

2. A year or two before he passed away at the age of 77 in 2013, Willard added a punch line. He said that one of the greatest areas of service in the church is serving older people. He said that they need to hear that their life isn’t over. Rather, it’s hardly begun! (Willard, Hearing God DVD InterVarsity 2012, Session 3) In other words, as older people face the discouragement that can attend the loss of ability and health, they need to hear that faithfulness with the abilities they have, however many or few they be, leads to joy and greater responsibility in the hereafter.
How does one do that in old age? So long as a person has mental capability, he or she can still pray for others, encourage others, share the experience of years graciously with others. I only repeated part of Jesus’ story above. There was another servant who received only two bags of gold; that is, he had fewer abilities than the man who received 5 bags of gold. And he also doubled the investment, producing another two bags of gold. The master’s response was identical to the words spoken to the man with more abilities and more productivity. Faithfulness with a few abilities yields the same joyful response as faithfulness with many.

Harps? Maybe if you’re a harpist.