This shaping happens to everyone. Me? I'm a 'Tweener' born in the gap between the Baby Boomers and the Busters. I don't belong anywhere - yet inherit values from both.
Now, I'm way oversimplifying the complexities here. There are more factors that influence our thoughts -- for example, our experiences and our wounds will color our thoughts about God. On the other hand, some of our convictions are clearly revealed to us by God and are true to his self-revelation.
But...it ought to at least move us to identity our assumptions and their sources. After all, we are interested in what is real and true, aren't we?
]]>Answer: False. This is also surprising to many.
Acceptance alone will not restore a person. Only restoration restores. We are indeed fully accepted by God; yet we needed something more -- a new life and power to love well. Otherwise, what you have is a fully-accepted dead person: much like pardonning and accepting a corpse. The corpse needs life.
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Were you surprised, even troubled, by any of the answers? Do you agree with them?
I've put together a quick quiz to find out what people know (or what they are convinced they know about 'grace.') I've used SurveyMonkey.com to create this short quiz.
The answers to the quiz may be quite surprising to some - even for those who have been walking in grace for years.
The quiz is short - only seven true/false questions.
I'll be revealing the answers this weekend here on the blog.
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Your heart can be trusted now because it is no longer 'deceitfully wicked.' If you follow Christ, it would be wrong to mistrust your heart: It would be at cross-purposes with what God is doing in your life to constantly hold your desires under suspicion.
I recently asked a group of men to raise their hands if they thought that trusting their hearts was the right thing to do. About a third of the hands went up. The majority thought that holding their heart under suspicion was the biblical thing to do. As we unpacked the truth of their new hearts, given to them when they said 'yes' to Jesus, we exposed the debilitating assumptions they were taught about their hearts.
I explained that within the new heart Jesus gave them came new and noble desires -- and that dismissing those desires as selfish or inherently wicked would prevent them from doing certain things like:
But not all desires are created equal
There are, of course, competing desires that can be whispered to us, but those desires are not ours. They are either whispered by the Enemy, or our culture, or our 'flesh' (which is no longer us, not our real self); but those desires are not our desires. False desires are like thorns lodged in the skin -- they are embedded in our bodies, but not of our bodies. The thorns cry out for our attention, but our health lies in the vitality already present in our bodies. Our concern must focus on what's most alive and already present within us. That's where God focuses his energy.
Ask God to reveal the desires of your heart.
Stay with the process. It's what he's up to in your life. Trusting your heart is biblical.
Law enforcement and the military have a term for an inappropriate or mistaken response that was mislearned during training, a behavioral script that gets laid down during the officer's training that would clearly not be helpful in a real situation, or perhaps even yield a deadly result. The term is "training scar."
David Grossman, in his book, On Combat, describes an officer-in-training who learned how to grab a gun out of a would-be criminal's hand. During practice, the officer would grab a gun from a colleague, then give it back to him in order to rehearse it again. During a real confrontation with an assailant, the officer surprisingly grabbed the gun from the man's hand, then gave it right back to him. Fortunately, the officer's partner dispatched his own weapon and shot the attacker. The officer who had learned an inappropriate response during training -- giving the gun back -- nearly cost someone's life. That's a training scar.
The Church today is functioning with numerous training scars, or behavioral scripts that are not serving us well. These scripted beliefs are wreaking havoc on The Body. These rehearsed patterns of thought are perhaps even neurologically wired into our brains in ways that lock the spirit and body (Spirit and Body) into dis-ease. The training scar I'm particularly concerned about is our continuing belief that the human heart remains dark, inwardly bent and sinful even after Christ has given the Christian a new heart, goodness and identity at their conversion.
We have remained in the Old Covenant approach to relating, refusing to pass over into the New. Listen to most sermons on any given weekend, and you'll discover the following ingrained script: "Your heart is still selfish and prone to wander. Kill you heart and call that 'holiness.' It's our job to help you behave more like a Christian so that you can do more, be more committed, and stop being so spiritually inept. You don't really want to follow God, so we'll pressure you into becoming like him."
The script of "New creation in Christ, but bad heart, still" is the pervasive training scar of the day. It is not the Gospel. And the result to the unwitting Christian is this wound: "You're not pleasing to me. Try harder." ---------------------------------
For more on behavior scripts, see Laurence Gonzales' books, Deep Survival and Everyday Survival. "Training scar" gun story, from Everyday Survival.
]]>"I want to know you more so that I can like you."
I wish I was farther ahead in my journey of more than four decades, that I didn't need to ask God to help me like him more. So often we Christians have been pressured to love him with all our hearts, minds, bodies and souls; yet fail to ask if we even like the guy we're following. Would I be drawn to him; find myself eager to get some face-time with him?
As I processed this with Jesus, I didn't feel any scorn or guilt from him. Rather, I felt understanding: "I know you want to like me more; but your mental image of me has been so colored by poor teaching and false assumptions. I'm not mad at you for this."
So I'm praying, "I want to like you Jesus. Let's strip away all imagery and conviction that has misrepresented your true heart."
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A Mountain Search and Rescue unit gets a call that a climber has fallen on Mt. Hood, near Portland Oregon. The climber's pick axe failed to grab when he attempted to lodge it into a unstable pocket of ice. There was nothing to stop his fall. Other climbers found the body, mangled and barely alive, one-thousand feet down from where he started to slide.
When the mountain rescue unit got there, multiple bones were shattered, including the spine, and the climber was bleeding from his ears and nose. Rescue workers knelt near the bleeding body and spoke reassuringly to it: "We accept you."
And then they did nothing else. To comfort the climber, they again offered, "We accept you. You are loved and safe now." But nothing else was done - no attempt to discern the man's vitals or assess his awareness of surroundings. No attempt to stabilize and transport the body.
Only, "You are loved and accepted. It's o.k. now."
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O.k., so I made up the story to demonstrate something. It is not enough for Christians to see themselves as merely loved and accepted by God's grace. That's a beautiful thing; but it won't restore a person or give them back the capacity to live well -- There was great damage that needed healing.
God is smarter than that. He restores us by equipping us with a new and noble heart so that we can relate well, live well, and enjoy this new grace we've been given. Anything less would be as cruel as the clearly shallow and insufficient 'hope' the mountain rescue unit offered the dying climber.
What have you been taught about 'grace' and 'acceptance.' Was it enough?
]]>What exactly did Jesus accomplish for us? I really believe that He brought us to a place of being able to be with the Father, unrestricted and free. That's how I life my everyday life with Him. But I really don't know how to see myself...am I really good now and therefore can go to the Father, or still the same old me, but completely accepted through Christ's dying on the cross, and that being accepted as I am gives me the hope and strength to be able then to change.
Her confusion is understandable and common to many Christians: Am I merely accepted by Jesus (which is a beautiful thing in itself) but am still essentially the same person I was before I met him; or did he do something to me -- making me truly good and pure of heart?
The trouble with seeing ourselves as only forgiven and accepted is that is doesn't solve the root problem -- a diseased and fatally-incapacitated heart. If Jesus were to 'accept' us without giving us the capacity to love and relate well to him, we would not be able to live or love as he did -- unable to fulfill the command to "love God with all your heart...." It would be a cruel and unfair expectation on God's part.
Further, we would be debilitatated and diminished in our capacity to love others: "Love one another as I have loved you." You can't love like Jesus unless you have his heart. And that's exactly why his offer includes acceptance ... and a gloriously new heart.
The salvation Jesus offers is a rescue of the heart. It has to be. There is no loving and living well without a reborn, alive and supernaturally-vibrant heart.
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Is this understanding of the Gospel what you were taught?
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Let me also be clear that there must be discernment involved. Launching into your dream or calling without having heard some directive from God can be foolish and bring about unnecessary pain. Listening for his counsel and wisdom is critical. That having been said, don't allow pragmatism to prevent you from taking the necessary, God-inspired risks that will bring you further into your place in the Story.
Pragmatism's favorite word is "how?" Someone has to answer that question, but we can leave that to our Supply Captain who has any and every resource at his disposal.
God recently asked me and my wife to move our family 1,000 miles with no job. I knew that's how he wanted us to proceed because it's what I had been hearing for two years. Believe me, it was tempting to hedge our bets and say, "Sure we'll move, God; if you give us a job first." Or, "Let's wait until we've got some good job leads."
In fact, our trust did waver during the journey. Other's we hoped would support us thought we were nuts. But in the end, we moved without a job. And God showed up. Brilliantly. He provided a job for my wife that couldn't have come any other way than by his intervention. That's just one of the ways in which he took care of things.
Pragmatism could have killed our dream, for we did not have a clue as to "how" God was going to provide. But our Supply Captain always has something up his sleave...
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One of the ways is to locate the wound. There are many cuts, punctures and breaks we've suffered, but if you look, there will be a central defining wound -- perhaps going back to childhood. That wound will carry a heartbreaking message with it, a sentence of despair.
In my case, the journey from childhood to adulthood was a cycle of being missed and dismissed. I had something to offer, yet no one seemed to affirm it or draw it out. There was no one to call out my gifts and the heart I wanted to offer. The Church didn't help. With crushing force, I was thrown out of pastoral ministry because I challenged assumptions leaders were making. Though truthfully, I never fit the mold. I had too much passion about what I wanted to offer, and the institution said there was no place for me ... over and over again. The institution thought my role was dutiful compliance, as they ordered me to take on whatever scripts and roles they thought were necessary to keep the religious machinery going.
The wounding over the last four decades was clear: "No one wants what you have to offer."
A wound of rejection. A cycle of dismissal.
The very thing I wanted to offer was being shut down.
Locate the wound. Your wound will be the ashes out of which your glory and brilliance rise. Jesus is in the process of redeeming and healing your wound, turning shame into glory. The very thing at risk of being shut down and sabotaged is the very thing you are called to.
So you might guess that over four decades, I searched hard and long for validation and clarity. I was desperate to know what I was called to. "How do I find out? What are the particulars of my calling?" And God brought people into my life to call out and affirm the gifts and passions they knew were there. Slowly I began to heal.
Remember that your wound will be a clue to your glory. You might guess that, because of my own wound, I enjoy helping people recover their own identity, longings, and offerings. I want them to get their noble and unique heart back.
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Have you discovered your wound and how it points to your glorious new identity?
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In my last post, I told you about Dan Allender's book, To Be Told -- know your story, shape your future. Here are some great quotes from the book that I think you may find helpful:
The unique glory you offer:
What about God am I most uniquely suited to reveal to others?
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Living by the wrong scripts:
They have lived less in the light of the story of God and more by the inevitabilities of life's demands. In other words, they allow circumstances to write their story.
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We have permission to shape our story:
We are called to co-author the ending [rest of our story] according to the themes that the primary Author has penned for us. We are called to take up our pen and follow him. It is the enormous humility of the sovereign Author to give us a voice in the dialogue. And not only does he want us to write, but he cheers us on.
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Discovering your calling:
But how in the world do we know our calling? I've seen that our calling always seems associated with the name that God gives each one of us.
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Vicarious living:
Too many people are missing their story because they're watching the stories of others.
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Your unique role:
God has ... given us a role that will reveal something about him that no one else's story can reveal in quite the same way.
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I'm reading a great book by Dan Allender called, To Be Told - God invites you to co-author your future. Discover how your tradegies to this point have shaped your story and "unnamed you," sabotaging your identity.
And then learn how God wants to work with you to shape the rest of your story; so that you can live in your true and glorious name. What does God want to say to the world through you, your unique story?
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Why desire matters in our journey -- Jim tells the story of how his 5-year journey to find a better town for his family and a more sustainable life has now come full circle; and how desire was the glue that held his dreams together when he wanted to give up. You will also discover that your deep desires matter to God and that he will use them to give you answers and direction.
Download Jim's podcasts (The Good and Noble Heart podcasts) on iTunes.
]]>“It is the childlike mind that finds the kingdom.” - Charles Fillmore
“If you have not chosen the Kingdom of God first, it will in the end make no difference what you have chosen instead.” - William Law
“For me Christianity is about the Kingdom, not about the Church: it has to do with human growth and development not church growth and development.” - Michael Taylor
“The doctrine of the Kingdom of Heaven, which was the main teaching of Jesus, is certainly one of the most revolutionary doctrines that ever stirred and changed human thought.” - H.G. Wells
"Earth is crammed with heaven,and every common bush afire with God;
But only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries."
- E. Barrett Browning
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