Even if you are not involved with a life group at The Mount, I’d encourage you to grab the book and read along with us.

for his kingdom…

Our culture is infatuated with “better”. That takes on various forms, from beauty to money, but our life is often dominated by the thirst for “better.” And though God desires a holy people who will represent him, his idea of “better” doesn’t always align with ours. His ways of making us “better” don’t always sit well with us. They seem costly. Over-the-top even. They require sacrifice, pain and humility. They don’t guarantee success, monetary gain, or professional advancement. They don’t even promise respect or companionship sometimes.

For God is working in you… That simple phrase is rooted in Christ’s attitude. Just a few verses earlier Paul points his readers to Christ, who “emptied” himself, taking on the form of a man, being humbled, becoming a slave. And then Paul has the audacity to offer himself to his readers:

But even if my life is to be poured out as a drink offering to complete the sacrifice of your faithful service (that is, if I am to die for you), I will rejoice, and I want to share my joy with all of you. and you should be happy and rejoice about this and rejoice with me.

Philippians 2:17-18

Emptied. Poured Out. These are not the kinds of words we like to think about. But there is great joy in abandoning ourselves to God. Paul knew it. He pointed the Philippians to the joy Christ experienced knowing that his suffering was followed by God seating him in heaven as sovereign of all. Paul requests that the Philippians would rejoice with him in his call to suffer for the gospel. While we may think of these words with negativity or even loathing, Paul finds them to be powerful and life-changing. They are breath-taking, having the power to trade our misguided passions for God’s spirit and power. This is how God works in us, giving us the “desire to obey” and the “power to do”.

As God transforms us, it will not always be in the ways we might have hoped. It will be more costly than we planned, but more rewarding as well. It will require us to hand over what is dear, so that God can give us what is better.

Can you describe your life as “poured out” for the call of God? How can you hand over the routine of life and allow God to us it and work within it? What is God asking of you?

Your strong right hand is filled with victory.

Psalms 48:10

The simplicity of God’s power and supply is this: He manifests His power in this world for His glory that more lost people will cling to Him. God supplies His power through the faithful people that will point and lead the lost to Him when His power is manifested. God’s power is not evident through those who desire to claim God’s glory for themselves. God’s deep desire is to have relationship with the men, women, and children who were all made in His image. God uses His great power to help accomplish His end of the relationship.

It was God’s power that set the Ten Commandments before Moses with the burning bush that was not consumed. It was God’s power that allowed Jesus to be born of virgin mother. It was God’s power that was in the miracles of Christ’s hands. It was God’s power that raised Christ from death on the third day. It was God’s power that gave all authority to Christ and it is God’s power that allows His Holy Spirit to dwell in us.

All God’s power manifested on earth is for His glory. God is not a narcissistic attention monger. God uses His glory as he does suffering – to draw people closer to Himself. Calling on God’s power without the purpose of His glory is a faithless and selfish act. It is the essence of using God’s name in vain. God chooses to supply His power through some more than others and it is out trust in His full knowledge as creator and father to accept His timing and choice in that supply. When we remove our selfish desires we are able to praise and thank Him for His power no matter by which manner God chooses to manifest it.

That sound familiar?

It’s that panic you feel when you realize that you missed a day’s Bible study, and have to make it up, likely by doubling up a day. It’s that hour-a-day Beth Moore study that makes you ask yourself, “Why me, Lord?”. It’s showing up at the prayer meeting, not because you care so much about prayer, or God, but you know that you won’t hear the end of it if you miss. It’s doing the right and expected things to be noticed, but just barely – not so much that people stand in awe, but not so little that they wonder about you.

But read the words of Paul:

For we speak as messengers who have been approved by God to be entrusted with the Good News. Our purpose is to please God, not people. He is the one who examines the motives of our hearts.

1 Thessalonians 2:4

We have been entrusted with life-altering news. The God of the universe dwells within us, empowering us to accomplish his plans. How unfortunate it is when we got bogged down doing the routine just to keep others from thinking more or less of us! We have so much greater motivation and encouragement to live for Christ, to dig deep in his word and to live in conversation with him.

If you feel like you are collapsing under the weight of people’s expectations for you, take courage! God loves you, and wants to have a rich relationship with you. God sees the effort you are making to defend against temptation and sin. He notices the advances made to control your thoughts, to guard what you see and hear. You don’t have to please, or fear the judgment, of any other.

So make every effort to study, to pray, to keep your body and its desires in check. Look constantly for opportunities to serve and give, freely. Live in community expecting God to use it to challenge what you have learned, what you are becoming. Make no mistake, the spiritual disciplines are valuable for developing godly character. Just don’t wed that to our culture’s insistence on “more, bigger, and faster”. Deal?

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.

Colossians 4:2, NIV

In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.

2 Timothy 4:1-5, NIV

True north is the direction along the earth’s surface towards the geographic North Pole.  On maps published by the United States Geological Survey, and the U.S. military, true north is marked with a line terminating in a five-pointed star.  How fitting is it that a star should be the icon for true north!  Revelation 22:16 says, “ I, Jesus, have sent my angel to give you this testimony for the churches. I am the Root and the Offspring of David, and the bright Morning Star.”  Jesus also says in the gospel of John, “Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’.”  In the same way that you would want to find true north if you were lost in the woods, so we need to know the source of absolute Truth to find our way to eternal life.

In this day and age of moral relativism, where what is acceptable truth for one person isn’t necessarily acceptable truth for another, we need to be certain of what absolute Truth is so that we do not lose course.  We are warned in 2 Timothy 4:3-4 that a time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine.  Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.  They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.  I am fully convinced that that time has come!  We live in an era of tremendous turning away from the Truth in pursuit of whatever trendy philosophy is being prescribed as the source of real happiness.  From popular T.V. psychologists and personalities spouting out non-biblical counsel on every subject imaginable to the latest miracle drugs and diet pills promising to help us look and feel perpetually young, to infomercials guaranteeing us that we can become a millionaire overnight selling products online from the comfort of our recliner at home, myths abound!  We don’t want to hear about how much we need God, we’d rather hear about how much we need the latest Blackberry or cooking phenomenon to bring us true happiness.  I mean, “He who dies with the most toys wins, right?”  Wrong.  He doesn’t win, he just dies.  Empty. Lost.

We are told in Colossians 4:2 to devote ourselves to prayer.  We’re to be watchful and thankful.  Watchful for what?  Thankful for what?  Watchful for the Second Coming of Jesus and the final fulfillment of absolute Truth.  Crazy as it may sound to all who would seek to find fulfillment in the temporary trappings of this world, Jesus really is the way, the truth and the life.  He really is the ONLY way to heaven, and the only path by which we can experience eternity with God.  All other versions of truth are mere phonies in the shadow of God’s true light and they lead to eternity as well, but not eternity with God.  They lead to an eternity apart from God, in a place called Hell.  That is fact.  That is truth.  Strong words?  Perhaps, but true words, nonetheless.

That is why we must devote ourselves to prayer and keep our heads in all situations.  We cannot afford to drift and veer off course in this life, for just as a hiker in the woods who is lost is in perilous danger, so anyone who remains spiritually lost when this life is over does so to their own eternal peril.  We are admonished to preach the Word, to be prepared at all times to correct, rebuke, and encourage others with great patience and careful instruction.  We are to endure hardship and do the work of an evangelist (share the Good News of Jesus Christ with others), and devote ourselves to prayer!  Eternal destinies are on the line.  We must not miss this!  We know the Truth.  We know Him personally, and we must help others come to know Him personally also.

And we must also be thankful…thankful for the fact that Jesus has revealed Himself to us and that He has not only made the Way known, but that He IS the Way!  We are privileged beyond words to have the gift of eternal life provided for us through the death and resurrection of God’s only Son, Jesus, and in our gratitude for that gift, we must devote ourselves to helping other people realize their need to be thankful for that gift as well.

There is no single greater purpose for our existence on earth than to worship God for His unspeakable grace and mercy to each of us, and to help other people worship Him also.  We must devote ourselves to that purpose, everyday!

Most of us may have been tempted to respond to such an accusation with something like, “Fasting?  You want to talk about fasting!  I just recently got back from a 40-Day Fast in the desert!  Anybody here able to top that?!”  But, Jesus doesn’t respond anything like that.  He wasn’t interested in seeking human honor for something He did before His Father in secret. Instead He uses a few illustrations.  The first is this:

Do wedding guests mourn while celebrating with the groom?  Of course not.  But someday the groom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.

Matthew 9:15

It was customary for groomsmen in those days not to fast until after the wedding banquet had ended.  Weddings lasted for 7 days during that time, and groomsmen and guests alike were expected to participate in the celebration joyfully!  Jesus is making the point that there was no need to fast during that time because they were in the presence of the Groom!  In John 3:29, John the Baptist uses another wedding illustration as he refers to Jesus as the bridegroom and himself as the best man.  Jesus was instructing them to not make an issue about fasting while He was with them.  Soon enough He would be removed from their presence, but until then, none of the disciples needed to fast, but rather they should celebrate His Presence joyfully!

Besides, who would patch old clothing with new cloth?  For the new patch would shrink and rip away from the old cloth, leaving an even bigger tear than before.  And no one puts new wine into old wineskins.  For the old skins would burst from the pressure, spilling the wine and ruining the skins.  New wine is stored in new wineskins so that both are preserved.  (9:16-17)

Jesus uses two more practical applications to help us understand that tradition (the way things have always been done) should never become a straightjacket that hinders us from embracing the Good News of Jesus’ Kingdom and the abundant life that Good News brings to us all.

Ecclesiastes 3 reminds us that there is a time for everything.  Jesus wasn’t telling those present that day that fasting was inappropriate all the time.  There is a legitimate time and place to exercise the spiritual discipline of fasting.  But, it wasn’t while they were in the Presence of Jesus, for there was no need to mourn, for the Bridegroom was with them, and in order to draw closer to God, all they need do was walk up to Him.

Is it appropriate for us to fast in the here and now?  Sure, I believe so.  Though Jesus is constantly with us by the Presence of His Spirit, we are not tangibly able to touch Him as the disciples could that day.  There will come a day when we are just as physically in the Presence of the Bridegroom as the disciples were, and on that day we will celebrate.  There will be no more need for fasting, ever.  For we will be in the Presence of the Bridegroom for all eternity.

Fasting is not a show of strength. It’s not about who can live on the most grueling diet, under the most painful and emotionally-crushing circumstances. You can fast the month, proving to yourself and everyone your devotion and will power. But God looks deeper, and  our attempts to please him in our own strength are doomed to failure. He desires change deep in our hearts, causing a change in the way we think and the things we desire. All to often, our attempts to control the flesh by will power alone end up enslaving us to our desires all the more.

Read the following, out of Colossians. How does it relate to the practice of fasting? How does it relate to other spiritual disciplines?

So don’t let anyone condemn you for what you eat or drink, or for not celebrating certain holy days or new-moon ceremonies or Sabbaths. For these rules were only shadows of the real thing, Christ himself. Don’t let anyone condemn you by insisting on self-denial. And don’t let anyone say you must worship angels, even though they say they have had visions about this. These people claim to be so humble, but their sinful minds have made them proud. But they are not connected to Christ, the head of the body. For we are joined together in his body by his strong sinews, and we grow only as we get our nourishment and strength from God.

You have died with Christ, and he has set you free from the evil powers of this world. So why do you keep on following rules of the world, such as, “Don’t handle, don’t eat, don’t touch.” Such rules are mere human teaching about things that are gone as soon as we use them. These rules may seem wise because they require strong devotion, humility, and severe bodily discipline. But they have no effect when it comes to conquering a person’s evil thoughts and desires.

Colossians 2:16-23

Pray today, thanking God f0r the nourishment that comes from him. Thank him as you seek the renewal of your mind, towards a heart and walk that resembles that of Jesus himself.

When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show men they are fasting. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to men that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

Matthew 6:16-18

Jesus is clear that we should not put on a show of suffering as we fast. And Jesus is not suggesting putting on a show of celebration, either. Oil and washing the face would be normal elements of hygiene. The Expositor’s Bible Commentary offers, “The point of v.18 is not to draw attention to oneself, whether by somber mien or extravagant joy. Jesus desires reticence, not deception. And the Father, who sees in secret, will provide the reward.” The suggestion of secrecy is not a request to deceive. It is instead a call to humble patience before our Lord, devoid of self-seeking.

This also would suggest something about how we should fast. It would be so easy in our busy culture to take the leftover time and have it absorbed into the course of our day. Any time that would have been spent eating is spent working. Any time spent on whatever being absorbed into the routine; this would be a shame, to put the body in subjection and to fail to offer it to Christ in the least! Fasting is more than just the giving up of something, it is also the giving over of something, to someone.

So it is left to you to offer yourself. Whether it be a regular pattern of days, or a prolonged fast – whether in determined prayer for some particular burden, or the daily needs of the saints in accomplishing God’s will. May we all learn what it means to long for Jesus and his return!

]]> http://devotionals.themountchurch.com/2010/09/21/up-and-over/feed/ 0 http://devotionals.themountchurch.com/2010/09/20/made-into-one-people-with-no-division/ http://devotionals.themountchurch.com/2010/09/20/made-into-one-people-with-no-division/#comments Mon, 20 Sep 2010 05:00:19 +0000 jeradbell http://devotionals.themountchurch.com/?p=1541

That there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.

1 Corinthians 12:25

Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.

Colossians 3:11

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God,

Ephesians 2:19

I’ve always been drawn to team sports. The drive to the common goal, the denying of self for the good of the team, and the underdogs working together to topple the all-stars just put me on the edge of my seat. High school sports are the purest of team sports. There is no organized recruiting or compensation for performance. The pool of talent is generally only made up based on geography and the individuals that come together for the love of the game. The common goal unites many different backgrounds and different personalities. The most successful teams keep sight of the betterment of the team for their motivation. They are able to put aside all differences of race, beliefs, economic status, age, and intelligence so that their focus is increased performance as a team. The uniform even highlights the team aspect. Every player sheds their personal identity to unite under the same identity in pursuit of victory.

Our desire to be a part of something bigger than ourselves is part of us created in the image of God. The Holy Trinity is three different parts, but all together the fullness of the Holy Trinity: Father God the creator, Jesus Christ the savior, and the Holy Spirit the presence within us.

If we are individually created in the image of God in unity how can we think that we can be divided as a body? We have been called and commissioned individually with all our differences for the same mission. We have received the same uniform in the Holy Spirit by our redemption through Jesus Christ’s blood on the cross. In that calling we are required to lay aside our differences in game plan and submit to the captain and coach that we may be united together to share in the victory. Focusing on our differences will only weaken us and distract us from the goal. As a united people we share the burdens of loss and share in delight and joy of His glory in the victory.

Responding to the call of the coach means that we trust his understanding more than our own understanding and own will. The player called to the field doesn’t do his team any good when he or she refuses to play the position that they’ve been called for. We can choose to complain and be distracted by a current situation or difference in opinion about music or schedule or a change in the staff and weaken the body. Or we can choose lay aside our own selfish desires to focus on the calling for which we have been saved.

I may still get a ring at the end of the season, but I will know if I was on the sidelines pouting or on the field contributing when the clock runs out.

Prayer and journaling both give us this same ability to look back. Hopefully, we will see how far we have come. We look back and read, thinking, “I can’t believe I was so scared of following Jesus that time…”. Or, “God really has helped me learn how to fight that temptation.” Other times, we read and see that there is much work to do. And in those times, the Spirit challenges us to take what we see from the past and look forward to what God can do. Because the alternative is wallowing in guilt – being stuck, unwilling to follow where our Lord is going. Which is why Paul warns,

No, dear brothers and sisters, I am still not all I should be, but I am focusing all my energies on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I strain to reach the end of the race and receive the prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us up to heaven.

Philippians 3:13-14

You may not be a big “writer”. If that is the case, have you found an effective way of “looking back” to see how far the Lord has brought you? Do you think it is encouraging, or more of a distraction, to look back at the moments that have shaped you? I’d be interested to hear any thoughts, and you are welcome to comment on this post.

As a final thought, our culture tells us that our past does not define us. The intent with such comments is that we can “rise above” anything. But the reality is that we are shaped by what we go through. Trust Christ and follow him no matter what your past looks like! Don’t think of your past as something that haunts you. Recognize it as something God can use to continue the work of building his kingdom.