Tag Archives: identity

What is poverty?

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What if poverty isn’t about a lack of food, money, or clothing?

What if our attempts to help the poor can actually hurt them?

Good intentions aren’t enough.

Brian Fikkert—co-author of When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself 1, and founder and executive director of the Chalmers Center (whose vision is for “local churches to declare and demonstrate to people who are poor that Jesus Christ is making all things new”)—looks at the deeper meaning of poverty [video]:

We were created for a relationship with God, self, others, and the rest of creation.

It’s a beautiful mess.

—

Let us commit to learning together how we can walk with the poor in humble relationships, rather than only providing temporary handouts to them. We cannot “fix” them. Only Jesus can.

I too am poor.

You are too. 

—

Continue reading →

  1. I can think of no better book on poverty and truly helping the poor than When Helping Hurts (Amazon, WTS Books). ↩
 

Listening to life advice: how should we live?

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The currency of our culture is life advice.

Everywhere we look, someone is offering a better way to life. A better you.

This week we’ve asked all the RENEWers to take note of all the life advice they hear. Lean in on conversations, jot down what others share on social media, even listen to your parents! Everywhere and all the time people around us are answering the question, “How should we live?”

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This vital question comes from the Gospel Grid 1, a way of orienting our hearts and minds around God’s Word and His world.

In four questions the “grid” covers the basics of reality and purpose:

  1. Who is God?
  2. What has He done?
  3. Who are we?
  4. How do we live?

Have you noticed that we tend to reverse the order?

As broken people we take that last question and make it primary: How should we live? Then drawing from our successes or failures at living well, we carve out an identity for ourselves, figuring out who we are. This leads us to view what God has done in the world through the lens of self: what has God done for me?

On the basis of how we live, and who we think we are, leading to how we see God’s activity in our lives, we then arrive at a view of God. Either He’s been good and gracious, or He’s been less than stellar, not meeting our expectations. When we look at our circumstances … God’s got some explaining to do!

Society places self at the top of the pyramid, beginning with me, myself & I in all our questions. We take the place of God. We turn the Gospel Grid upside-down.

I’m convinced this is why so much life advice is shared — this is how I live, and you should too! (Cue the infomercial smile: “It worked for me, and it can work for you!”) In the midst the message of the Gospel seems like another pitch to adopt a new lifestyle, maybe a less awesome one than you’re working on right now. Add a little Jesus to your life; He’ll make it all better.

What life advice have you heard this week?

Was it helpful? How will that solid advice eventually let you down? Lets come back to the first question — forgetting ourselves and our circumstances for a moment — who is God?

  1. Thank you to the fellow students at Soma School Portland 2013 and the leaders of Bread & Wine for helping me re-discover the Gospel Grid, and re-apply it to my heart, life, and church family. ↩
 

Where’s your elephant? Does it have a name?

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“Daddy, I didn’t have these all night. I didn’t. I just now grabbed them.” So said Heidi proudly early this morning as she showed me one of her stuffed kitties and her snuggly koala. It’s a big deal when we find any stuffed animal in this home. These ones weren’t missing, just forgotten out in the loft before settling into bed last night. Somehow she managed to overlook their absence. So happy to see them this morning!

20130206-053314.jpg That got me thinking about the last year of change for our family. And the bigger “Family,” the Church. 2012 may be remembered in the broader Evangelical Church world as the year pastors really got serious about talking about talking about making disciples. Discipleship was the elephant in the room that we finally named. It was like, “This is really important! Let’s make sure we’re making disciples. Really.”

Previous years could be summed up with words like “authentic worship,” and “be missional,” discovering “God’s Kingdom,” “become an influencer,” and whatever you do make it “Gospel-centered.” These are all good emphases.

Yet with all the buzz and new trends, it sort of seems like we’re collecting elephants the same way my kids gather up all their stuffed animals before going to sleep. Missing one is reason to panic. Can’t sleep in peace without them all. But during daylight more than a few are set aside as the kids pursue the days fun.

More than once Kari and I have said at bedtime, “Clackamas (the stuffed leopard) has to sleep outside in the loft. I’m sorry that disappoints you, but he’ll be alright; he’s wild and can fend for himself. In the morning you can see him. And tomorrow night you can be sure to grab him along with all of your animals and bring them to bed before brushing your teeth.”

Having all the animals ready for bed means planning well ahead of the moment you notice they’re missing. For something to be added, something must give.

This got me thinking more about recent trends and the hype and confusion surrounding Christians today. Why do the lives of most Christians look essentially the same as the rest of society? Why are we missing out on the power, the conviction, the joy, peace and creativity God plans for His children? Where is the Kingdom of God we’re told by Jesus has already come? Continue reading →

 

WHOs before DOs: when you really need to know who you are.

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Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
—Galatians 5:25

How many times have we been asked to do this exercise? Especially at the new year:

  • List out your priorities as you want them to be. 

Of course we’re supposed to put God first, then family second, or wait, maybe we’re supposed to put ourselves first, but then what about our spouse, and then work is a must so where does that fit in?

Here’s what I’ve noticed:

  • No matter how many times I’ve listed out my priorities it’s never revolutionized my life.

Here’s what’s revolutionized my life:

  • Understanding that it’s not knowing my primary priority that matters but knowing my primary identity.

Continue reading →

 

Identity: everything grows and flows from there.

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Do you focus on your main priorities, or your primary identity?

Kari writes:

How many times have we been asked to do the exercise?

List out your priorities as you want them to be … Of course we’re supposed to put God first, then family second, or wait, maybe we’re supposed to put ourselves first, but then what about our spouse, and then work is a must so where does that fit in? I’ll tell you what:

 

No matter how many times I’ve listed out my priorities it’s never revolutionized my life. 

Here’s what’s revolutionized my life:

 

Understanding that it’s not knowing my primary priority that matters but knowing my primary identity. 

 

We do what we do because we are who we are.

What gave rise to this thought? Galatians 5:25:

Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.

 

A conclusion:

What if I look at my to-do list with that in mind? Keeping in mind that everything that I do I do as a disciple of Jesus Christ, called to fulfill His great commission and be His ambassador here on earth?

 

No where in Scripture are we called to find balance. Our notion of “finding balance” is cultural. Christ calls us to take our whole life — work, play, service, both sacred and secular — and drench it in the water of His Spirit so that as we move about this world we’re soaking wet, dripping all over the world, spreading the gospel not because we’re handing out tracts but because we’re handing out hope.

 

We’re kind, patient, loving, gentle … our life displays the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-24).

 

What is our identity? Are we citizens of earth or citizens of heaven? Our identity determines how we live. We can walk in step with the world, running to keep up with the passing pleasures of each new year, or we can walk in step with the spirit, knowing that in His presence is fullness of joy.

{Grateful for my wise, gracious wife. Thanks, Kari!}

Photo by See Margaret

 

Preservers of the world

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Below is a description of the early Christian community (c. AD 130), written to a political leader or other authority figure in the Roman Empire, named Diognetus. The author writes in hopes of communicating the truth about Christianity and thereby gaining clemency for Christians under persecution:

“… [The Christians] display to us their wonderful and confessedly striking method of life.”

“They dwell in their own countries, but only as aliens [1 Pet 2:11]. As citizens, they share in all things with others, and yet endure all things as foreigners. Every foreign land is to them as a their native land, and every land of their birth is as a foreign land to them.”

“The soul is imprisoned in the body, and yet preserves that very body; while Christians are confined in the world as in a prison, and yet they are preservers of the world.”

— Found in Invitation to Christian Spirituality: An Ecumenical Anthology, John R. Tyson, ed., pp. 58-60. Cited as “The Epistle to Diognetus,” in Roberts and Donaldson, eds., TANF, Vol. I, ch. 5-6, pp. 26-27.

Thoughts:

Christians who know this identity in Christ (as foreigners, aliens and sojourners, yet having a heavenly home) will have an identity in the world — being fully present and loving to those around them. They know where they belong because they know to Whom they belong. The imperatives (commands) of the Christian life are rooted in the prior work of God, which is the engine that propels us forward. I found myself rejoicing not so much in a prescription for how to live but a description of how in Christ we can be in His world. Amazing enabling grace!

Earlier in the letter the author states the plain truth of how believing in Christ inevitably makes one the best citizens around [he’s an objective observer] — Christians dwell, share, endure, marry, beget children, obey, love, etc. (Most striking to me is the absence of modifying clauses like “should,” which would give an out to the weak Christians. The writer gives no fancy to a concept of a hypocritical life. The absence of this passive language is more my fault than his, for we have come to accept wishy washy nominalism for self-described Christians.)

The message is embodied in such a way that the people’s lives demand a Gospel explanation. In effect he is giving a gospel explanation as he tells the what and the why of how Christians (are to) see ourselves in this world. I felt like I was reading a summary of the implications of Romans 12 (humility before God, the church family, and outsiders in the world). He ended in stating plainly “Christians love those who hate them,” which lept off the page to me. We are not merely okay will be accepting or neutral towards those who harbor anomosity towards us (noting they themselves may not totally realize why they do so as agents under the sway of the Evil One). How true that as we move upward we are compelled to move outward, missionaries of love like the true Missionary God who loved His enemies (us) and gave Himself for our sake.

Are you a preserver of the world around you? In what way? Get close, step into the mess, be all there.