You like to trust in yourself. How’s that going for you?
Jesus entered the world and said, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15).
He invited us to quit trusting in ourselves to rescue ourselves and make us right with God. He did all the work. That’s the good news (gospel). The best trust fall exercise ever.
Hell is the English word for hades (Greek), broadly the place of the underworld. The recent inaccurate end-of-the-world predictions aside — which, while misguided on specifics and delivery, are actually helpful on this one point: getting the message out there — God’s judgment is real. For all of us.
If God is good and just and since He promises to reconcile all things because of His great love, then there will be judgment. Lots of it. Complete justice.
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Following up on the last two quotes (here & here), let’s consider a new pursuit of greatness:
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Following up on that last quote, let’s consider what happens when our talent is ahead of our true character:
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When we lack integrity, we use power to control. When we lead with integrity, we use power to bless.
From Uprising:
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Yesterday I mentioned that Kari and I will be in London for a brief time, leaving in about a month. We’ve been invited to come speak at the annual Single-Minded Conference, intended for singles in the United Kingdom. (Some of the great people we will meet may be reading this here. Thank you for reading!) We love those in the college and career stage, and recognize the challenges of following Christ faithfully while single.
Many who are single tend to think of themselves as simply ‘not yet married,’ though others plan to remain single in the future. Either way, there’s no need to think of ourselves ultimately as defined by these categories, as if that is our ‘status’ in life. Yes, we call it that on forms — what is your marital status? — but there is so much more, as we know. Our ‘status’ may describe us for a moment, like when updating one’s Facebook status, but our true identity is deeper than a status update.
The popular culture of the world feeds us messages along these lines: you need to be in a relationship. (With someone hot.) And you need to be hooking up with that person, or someone else, because love won’t just find us. Go get yours; be on the prowl. The advertising that comes our way underscores this point: you’re empty and need this (___________) to fulfill you. So drink this beer and magically all these tan, fit people with perfect white teeth will be in your life partying it up with you. And you’ll be having insane amounts of fun! Buy this phone and you’ll be so hip that others of the opposite sex will offer you much more than their mobile number. We compare their highlights (airbrushed and glamorized) with our typical day and realize there is a huge gap. Let’s mind that gap and go have an awesome life — or so we’re told.
The hidden message: unless you’re in a relationship, you’re nothing. So we must do everything we can to erase this deficiency and become something and somebody, right? So we try to make ourselves as attractive as possible, dressing to be noticed, buying things to impress people so we can be in relationships that make us matter as people. We give up our bodies, because, after all, sex is just physical, right?
The church world tends to follow the same attitude, but with a so-called ‘holy’ twist — if you’re not married, you’re missing out. The church thinks of those who are married and those who just haven’t quite made it to marriage. Until then, you’re nothing. And you shouldn’t be having sex.
Not true.
Well, it is true that we shouldn’t be having sex before marriage. But why? (More on that in a future post.) But let’s get more focused on this be-married-or-in-a-relationship idea.
I love being married, and am grateful God brought Kari and I together. As amazing as she is, she’s not my savior. She fulfills me in a way God designed, but she cannot fulfill me ultimately. Without Kari I would still be a man created in God’s image. Without Christ I would be nothing. So I guess in one sense we can honest that unless we’re in a relationship — in communion with Christ — we are in fact nothing and nowhere in life.
For a weekend in late June we look forward to joining the faithful voices and godly mentors who are pouring into the lives of singles. As Matt Kottman, pastor in Leatherhead and organizer of the conference wrote me:
“Many singles are trying to find their satisfaction in their status (whether as singles staying single, or as singles desperate for marriage) rather than their status and identity in Christ and his gospel. Our prayer is that this conference would apply the gospel, giving these singles a singleness of heart.”
I can imagine that in Europe, and specifically in the UK, the men are just like us in the States — having little understanding of what it means to be a man in the biblical sense. We shirk responsibility and sacrifice, wanting to keep our ‘options’ open. We confuse ‘fun’ with being entertained, and have forgotten all the fun we can have when we live courageous and sacrificially with God. Because there are few godly examples to follow, we can get a warped view of what it means to be a man. Same for the ladies, who are told that their physical attractiveness is what defines them. They’ve noticed that good and godly men are so hard to find that they may not even exist — so how about you just settle for whoever likes you? Truth is, life is meant to have so much more meaning, beauty, intimacy, adventure, purpose, and joy than that!
In traveling to London and the UK, we are grateful for the support of our local church, with time given to go invest oversees, and the partnerships we have with missionaries there. In future posts I will share more about who we will be visiting, a bit about why I’ve always wanted to visit the UK, and other adventures we plan to have while there.
To all those we will meet: thank you for sharing your story with us.
Kari and I are grateful for the opportunity to travel to London in just over month from now, to speak at a conference, encourage missionary pastor friends in the UK, and preach with a church community there.
Each Friday until then, on my day off, I’ll post a brief description of why we are going, who will we be with, what we will be speaking, and how this trip connects to our ministry here in the States.
I’ve always wanted to go to my family’s homeland, the UK. Look for the first post tomorrow.
Tim Keller speaking on Jesus [mp3; thanks to Peter Artemenko for creating the kinetic type illustration]:
Jesus is the true and better Adam who passed the test in the garden — His garden, a much tougher garden — and whose obedience is imputed to us.
Jesus is the true and better Abel who, though innocently slain, has blood now that cries out, not for our condemnation, but for acquittal.
Jesus is the true and better Abraham who answered the call of God to leave all the comfortable and familiar and go out into the void not knowing wither he went to create a new people of God.
Jesus is the true and better Isaac who was not just offered up by his father on the mount but was truly sacrificed for us. And when God said to Abraham, “Now I know you love Me because you did not withhold your son, your only son whom you love from Me,” now we can look at God taking his son up the mountain and sacrificing him and say, “Now we know that You love us because you did not withhold your son, your only son, whom you love from us.”
Jesus is the true and better Jacob who wrestled and took the blow of justice we deserved, so we, like Jacob, only receive the wounds of grace to wake us up and discipline us.
Jesus is the true and better Joseph who, at the right hand of the king, forgives those who betrayed and sold him and uses his new power to save them.
Jesus is the true and better Moses who stands in the gap between the people and the Lord and who mediates a New Covenant.
Jesus is the true and better Rock of Moses who, struck with the rod of God’s justice, now gives us water in the desert.
Jesus is the true and better Job, the truly innocent sufferer, who then intercedes for and saves his stupid friends.
Jesus is the true and better David whose victory becomes his people’s victory, though they never lifted a stone to accomplish it themselves.
Jesus is the true and better Esther who didn’t just risk losing an earthly palace but lost the ultimate and heavenly one, who didn’t just risk his life, but gave his life to save his people. Who didn’t just say, “If I perish, I perish,” He said, “When I perish, I’ll perish for them, to save My people.”
Jesus is the true and better Jonah who was cast out into the storm so that we could be brought in.
Jesus is the real Rock of Moses, the real Passover Lamb, innocent, perfect, helpless, slain so the angel of death will pass over us. He’s the true temple, the true prophet, the true priest, the true king, the true sacrifice, the true lamb, the true light, the true bread.
The Bible’s really not about you—it’s about Him.
My wife Kari has a review of a great new book, Veneer: Living Deeply in a Surface Society. She begins:
Sometimes a book impacts us by introducing something new–ideas, facts, information, thoughts. The impact is in the novelty or newness, and we’re changed.
Other times a book impacts us because somebody says exactly what’s in our hearts but could never put into words.
I recently read a great book that did just that. It’s called Veneer.
Veneer is about living deeply in a surface society. I read it cover to cover hardly coming up for air, and told Jeff, “I’m not sure if I love the book so much because it challenges me or simply because it says all the things I’d like to say but have never known quite how.” With grace, humility, wit, and intelligence, Tim Willard and Jason Locy share history, facts, and cultural critique with the aim of a sharp-shooter. And they point at themselves first.
They point out the fact that historically people purchased items for functionality, need, and pleasure. But in the 1500s Queen Elizabeth I recognized the need for a unifying force for her country and decided that she would become that force, so she recreated herself as an icon, a godlike figure that a nation could love and cherish.
In order to do this she lavishly spent, ridiculously spent in order to create an awe and splendor always about her that gave her the aura of a goddess. Naturally, the effect trickled down. The noblemen began that same sort of spending, as she set the standard for nobility all those around her began to follow suit in order to keep up with the social competition within the court.
Trickle, trickle, trickle. We’re doing it today.
More on this good book in future posts here at the blog. Let’s end Veneer.
As one who lives with chronic back pain, it was great to find this great infographic at Mashable for pointing out:
Via: Medical Billing And Coding
TechCrunch has a guest post by Semil Shah, “The Illusion Of Social Networks.” An excerpt:
Surely, the benefits of participation [in social media & networks] are well-documented, but there are costs, too. While information is being channeled through these social networks, the fact remains the same illusions created by television have mutated into a stronger strain within social media. While more interesting information gets to us faster, the downside is that the new channels—and, we are all the channels—sometimes unknowingly create “little white illusions” that, over time, compound into something that may or may not reflect real life.
Well, life is full of illusions. And on social networks, those illusions are amplified. Many who broadcast are not who they appear to be. I don’t say this negatively—rather, this is the magic of social networks. All of the tools we have to update our status, to share pictures, to broadcast location, and any other signal empower us all to express ourselves online and (hopefully) eventually help us end up where we’d like to be.
The dark underbelly, however, is that much of the content we consume through these networks are highly subject to illusion. We may get the impression that folks are more famous, powerful, influential, or informed than they really are, or funnier or nicer than they really are. Social networks naturally concentrate and amplify particular voices, no matter whether those voices are right or wrong. We’ve all at one time at least fallen prey to these false signals, myself included, further fueling the engine of social networks.
Reminds me of part of first half — on the “language of culture” — in Veneer: Living Deeply in a Surface Society, by Tim Willard and Jason Locy. More from that book in future posts.
![ASK [Almost] ANYTHING.](https://i0.wp.com/detheos.us/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/ask_almost_anything_320.png?w=240)
Students ask awesome questions. Many times curiosity drives their exploration of faith and truth, and we want to reward their wonderings with some godly wisdom and timely truth. A few times a year we do this in our ASK [Almost] ANYTHING sessions with the middle schoolers at Willamette Christian Church. Today we tackled these questions students have been asking.
We’re received questions about relationships:
And on Christian living:
Questions about God: