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The God-Directed Life

Read: Proverbs 3

“Don’t be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead, fear the Lord and turn away from evil.” (Proverbs 3:7, NLT)

One of the most theologically insightful observations ever made came from, oddly enough, the long-running comic strip Pogo: “We have met the enemy, and he is us!” Yes—amen!  That is pretty much true about us, isn’t it?  We are our own worst enemy.  And the sooner we come to grips with that irritating little reality, the sooner we can get on the road to a satisfying and successful experience of life.

For that very reason, King Solomon said that we shouldn’t be impressed with out own wisdom, or as The Message puts it, we shouldn’t “assume that we know it all.” Rather, we should “run to God and run from evil!” (Proverbs 3:7, MSG). Think about that.  To begin with, we are not to assume (you know what they say happens when we assume) that we are self-sufficient. Rather, Solomon says we ought to lean into God’s sufficiency by, one, running to him and two, by running from evil.  By the way, those two actions—running to God and running from sin—are major themes in Proverbs.  Proverbs refers to having sense enough to run to God as “the fear of the Lord” and having sense enough to run from sin is having “wisdom and discretion” (see the previous blog on Proverbs 2:11).

Now the more famous verses in Proverbs 3 that go before and come after verse 7 are important to note here.  Proverbs 3:5-6 instruct us as to how we can “run to God”: We are not to rely on our own smarts—our brainpower is not that impressive anyway. Rather, we are to make God the first, continual and final source of authority in our lives.  If we do that, God himself guarantees to direct our decisions.

“Trust God from the bottom of your heart; don’t try to figure out everything on your own. Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; he’s the one who will keep you on track.” (Proverbs 3:5-6, MSG)

By allowing God to direct the daily decisions of our life, then he also takes responsibility for the outcome of those decisions.  Proverbs 3:8-10 tells us that a God-directed life will produce a body that is lean and mean with a healthy sheen.  Think I am kidding? Read on,

“Your body will glow with health, your very bones will vibrate with life!” Proverbs 3:8, MSG)

Furthermore, Solomon assures us that the God-directed life will produce a fat wallet.  Seriously—here is what Proverbs 3:9-10 (MSG) says,

“Honor God with everything you own; give him the first and the best. Your barns will burst,  your wine vats will brim over.”

Not bad, huh! I think I’ll take the God-directed life over the me-directed life.  How about you?

So my friend, your biggest worry today is not the economy or the environment or some enemy.  It is you!  But if in things big and small you will run to God and run from evil, you will be on the way to a life of success, satisfaction and significance.

“Where there is no enemy within, the enemies outside cannot hurt you.” ~African Proverb

Winning At Life:

Practice stopping throughout the day to talk to God.  Before you make a decision, for sure, but even when you are in a quiet moment of contemplation, when you are watching a television show or listening to talk radio on the way to work, or after you have had a conversation, be sure to include God.  Ask him what he thinks, what he wants, and if he will help.

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Wise Choices

Read: Proverbs 2

“Wise choices will watch over you. Understanding will keep you safe.”  (Proverbs 2:11, NLT)

Harry Emerson Fosdick wrote, “He who chooses the beginning of a road chooses the place it leads to. It is the means that determine the end.” The ability to choose the right road is what wisdom, or what the NIV calls discretion, is all about.

The dictionary defines discretion as judgment; power to decide.  It is the ability to judge right from wrong and to choose that which is wholesome from that which is harmful. Solomon, one of the wisest men who ever lived, tells us that discretion—the power to choose plus the decision to choose wisely—is one of the main ingredients to successfully navigating the sometimes rough and dangerous waters of life.

How many lives have been shipwrecked by a lack of discretion?  How many careers have been ruined by an absence of understanding?  How many marriages have failed and families destroyed because of poor judgment?  How much potential has been wasted because someone didn’t make wise choices?  Here’s a sobering exercise: Go back to your high school yearbook ten, twenty, or thirty years after your graduation and chances are you will see the wreckage of far too many people who squandered one opportunity after another simply by failing to exert discretion.

The practice of discretion, or the lack thereof, tells a great deal about who we are and where we are headed in life.  Listen carefully to the wise words of Eleanor Roosevelt: “One’s philosophy is not best expressed in words.  It is expressed in the choices one makes…” She goes on, as does Solomon in Proverbs 2, to place the responsibility of exerting discretion and making wise choices squarely at our feet:  “And the choices we make are ultimately our responsibility.”

God has given you a wonderful gift—the ability to choose wisely.  Simply exercising discretion today will keep you from disaster tomorrow.  I trust that you will use that gift to its fullest potential.  The choice is yours!

“In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves.  The process never ends until we die.” ~Eleanor Roosevelt

Winning At Life:

Ask someone who knows you well and has observed you over the years to evaluate your life in the areas of wisdom and discretion. Ask for their honest opinion, and be ready to hear their answers.  Be even more ready to take immediate action if changes are appropriate.

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Sin Resistant

Read: Proverbs 1

“My child, if sinners entice you, turn your back on them!” (Proverbs 1:10, NLT)

It was Oscar Wilde who said, “I can resist just about anything—except temptation,” Oh yeah, me too!

God’s Word says that you and I are on a glorious journey, but the truth is, this is no easy trip. An infinitely glorious and eternally rewarding one—yes; but easy—no!  In fact, Jesus said that the path we’ll travel on is straight and narrow, and not too many will actually find it, much less successfully walk it. To stay on this path, Jesus went on to say, there will need to be some self-denial, cross bearing, and intense focus.

That means today (let’s let tomorrow worry about tomorrow), you will have to say “no” to what this Proverb calls sinners: “My son, if sinners entice you, do not give in to them.” (Proverbs 1:10) The fact of the matter is, these “sinners” are all along your way, devilish hecklers disguised as adoring fans whose one and only assignment is to entice you down an alternative path, a shortcut to pleasure that, in reality, always fails to deliver what it promises while saddling you instead with nothing but disappointment, pain and loss.

Sorry to have to be the one to break it to you like this, but those “sinners” are waiting for you as you head out the door to wherever your glorious journey will take you today—to work, to school, to play, or even staying indoors to serve God in the daily routine required by your assignment at home.  Here’s the thing: You’ve got to be alert to them, be discerning to their sugar-coated manipulations, and ready to give them a throaty “no way” when they ply you with their counterfeit divines.

I’m sure you already know this, but these enticing “sinners” may not be real, live people.  They may be subtle arguments that enter your mind, or slick operators coming through the airwaves, or simple desires at work within your soul, or sinful systems at work in the world that throughout the day routinely pull you away from God as sure as the gravitational pull of the moon working twice a day on the tides.

They’re called temptations, by the way, and you are called to resist them.  And you can!  And if you will, the real prize at your journey’s end will far outweigh any of their mouthwatering promises.

“Temptation usually comes in through a door that has deliberately been left open.” ~Arnold Glasow

Winning At Life:

Read and meditate on I Corinthians 10:1-13.  Identify some of the “ways out” God has given you in every temptation.  Today, look for those divine exits—and take them.

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Proverbs, Here We Come!

If you are following the 2011 Bible Reading Plan I have promoted in my devotional blog, you have now finished your second cycle through the Gospels.  I trust that you are on a glorious journey that will lead you to a deeper and more rewarding relationship with Jesus than you have ever known before.

This plan calls for two more cycles through the Gospels this year, and I want to encourage you to continue on.  What a joy it is to saturate our spirits with the life and love, ministry and teaching, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, Lord and Savior!

With that said, I will not be blogging on the Gospels for the time being.  Rather, since I will be preaching this summer in my church, Portland Christian Center, through the book of Proverbs, I will also be bringing devotionals each day during the months of July and August from this wonderful collection of God-breathed wise sayings .  So I would like to invite you to add to your daily Bible reading by including a chapter in Proverbs each day.

Proverbs has thirty-one chapters—one for each corresponding day of the month.  Beginning July 1, start with Proverbs 1, and allow the Holy Spirit inspired wisdom of King Solomon to fill your mind and inform your way.  Following this daily plan will take you through Proverbs twice, which I think will produce a delightful and unforgettable summer experience for you.

Soli Deo Gloria!

Ray

“The Word of God well understood and religiously obeyed is the shortest route to spiritual perfection. And we must not select a few favorite passages to the exclusion of others. Nothing less than a whole Bible can make a whole Christian.” ~A.W. Tozer

 

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The Tip of the Iceberg

Read: John 21

Jesus also did many other things. If they were all written down, I suppose the whole world could not contain the books that would be written. (John 21:25, NLT)

The Apostle John ends his gospel account of the life, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus with this remarkable commentary: “What I’ve written here about Jesus, you don’t know the half of it. In fact, since I’ve been with him night and day for three and a half years, I’ve gotta tell you, this is just the tip of the iceberg!”

Wow!  As you read through the four Gospels, it is hard to imagine that much more could be added to what Jesus did and said.  I suppose the Holy Spirit limited the inspired thoughts and pens of these men in order to present to us only what our finite minds could absorb.

Even then, we have trouble getting our brains around Jesus, don’t we? I mean, how do you top the incarnation, the immaculate conception, and his miraculous birth at Bethlehem?  Then there is his sinless life—what do you do after that? What more can be added to the Sermon on the Mount? Can anyone illustrate Christianity better than Jesus did with his parables? What about his miracles—how could you improve upon the feeding of the 5,000, the deliverance of the Gadarene demoniac, the healing of the blind man, the walking on water, or the raising of Lazarus?  Is there any “wow factor” left after the crucifixion—and the empty tomb?

Even though we would love to know more, mercifully, we have been given Jesus in bite-sized chunks.  And just with that, we will spend a lifetime in wonder, awe and gratitude for the life, love, death and resurrection of this marvelous Savior and Lord.  Even if all we ever had of Jesus was John 3:16, you and I would have enough to keep us undone with love for all eternity—and then some.

So what do you do for an encore with Jesus? Only one thing remains, which John alluded to back in John 14:3,

“When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am.”

It is probably a good thing that we didn’t get any more details than that, because there is only so much the redeemed mind can absorb this side of heaven!

“Only Christ could have conceived Christ.” ~Joseph Parker

What If God Took Over?

S.D. Gordon wrote, “Jesus is God spelling Himself out in language that men can understand.” To as much as our finite minds can handle, the incomprehensible God has made himself comprehensible in Jesus.  Get to know Jesus and you will get to know God.  Spend some time meditating on John 3:16 today—I think you will appreciate God a whole lot more.

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Spiritual Clingers

Read: John 20

“Don’t cling to me,” Jesus said, “for I haven’t yet ascended to the Father. But go find my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” (John 20:17, NLT)

Imagine Mary’s surprise—and joy—at hearing that familiar voice tenderly whisper her name as she stood before the tomb of Jesus: “Mary!” (John 20:16) She turned to see what she had never expected to find when she left early that morning to care for the Lord’s crucified body. Jesus was alive!  And Mary was so overcome with a thousand different emotions all at one time that she grabbed onto Jesus like she would never let go again.  She had lost him once, she was not about to let that happen twice!

If you are a parent and have ever lost your child in a department store, you will understand that scene: After minutes that seem like hours of panicked searching, you find that child, and while you feel like giving them the mother of all spankings, instead you hug them so tightly they almost suffocate.

That is exactly what Mary did, but in grabbing on to Jesus, she becomes a timeless picture of our tendency to cling to yesterday in order to feel good about today.  We do that in a variety of ways:

  • We fiercely cling to a “spiritual high” from yesterday, wanting it replicated today.

  • We fiercely cling to wounds from disappointment, failure and hurt, and as a result, fear, guilt, and un-forgiveness now controls, if not defines our lives.

  • We fiercely cling to the attention we get by being needy.

  • We fiercely cling to immature views developed in our spiritual adolescence of a God who winks at sin, who doesn’t punish wrong, who must not care about us because he let bad things happen or who is nothing more than a Divine “sugar daddy” who gives everything we want.

Mary was a spiritual clinger; she was guilty of all those incomplete and immature views. Jesus, however, refused to let her stay in that frame of mind, so he said to her, “Don’t hold onto me!” (John 20:17)  The word “hold” is hapto in the Greek text, and it means, “to cling, to desperately grasp onto!” Grammatically, in the negative it means to stop doing what you always do—and are now doing again. Jesus is really saying, “Quit hanging on to your warm, fuzzy memories of past experiences of me. That limits your view of who really I am. Raise your expectations!” In the rest of verse 17, he says to Mary, “I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God!”

Jesus is pointing to a whole new order. He is more than just the crucified Savior who can forgive your past. He is more than just a rabbi (John 20:16) who gives you guidance and stability in the present.  He is the risen Lord who, by virtue of his own transformation from death back to life, has the authority to transform your life today—and every day from here to eternity. And now he is going to the place of authority from where he will be your constant advocate, constant empowerer, and constant companion—in other words, your living Lord. Jesus is more than Savior—he is also Lord.

Finally, the light dawned for Mary.  She got it! Mary went and found the disciples in John 20:18 and said to them, “I have seen” … not “the teacher” … not “the Savior” …but “I have seen the Lord!”

I hope you will get it too!  Stop clinging to your immature and incomplete views of Jesus. He is not only your Savior—the one who forgives you of your sins, he wants also to be your Lord—the one who will rule over your moment-by-moment life.

“There is not an inch of any sphere of life of which Jesus Christ the Lord does not say, ‘Mine.’” ~Abraham Kuyper

What If God Took Over?

Is there any area of your life that does not belong to Jesus?  Your thought life? Language? Use of money? Friendships? Sex life? Attitude and treatment of others? If he is not Lord over any one of these areas, he is not Lord at all.  So hit your knees and surrender to his Lordship—and never turn back.  You will not regret it!

 

 

 

 

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Weekend Meditation: Imperfect But Passionate

Read: John 18-19

Meanwhile, as Simon Peter was standing by the fire warming himself, they asked him again, “You’re not one of his disciples, are you?” He denied it, saying, “No, I am not.” (John 18:25, NLT)

Peter usually takes a beating when evaluated alongside the eleven disciples.  He gets labeled as the stumbling, bumbling, think-before-you-speak, foot-in-the mouth, inconsistent goofball from Galilee, who for reasons God only knows, got chosen to be one of Jesus’ first disciples.  Good old Peter—the first century version of Gomer Pyle in the Lord’s little band of foot soldiers.

But let’s give Peter some credit. He may not have been perfect—by a long shot—but he sure was passionate! And he was there—at least give him that. In John 18, as Jesus was arrested and brought to trial, when everyone else but John had fled, Peter figured prominently. He was like a bull in a china shop—passionate, yes; perfect, no—but he was there:

He whacked off the ear of one who came to arrest Jesus. (John 18:10-11, NLT) Passionate—but misguided!

He surreptitiously followed as the High Priest’s SWAT team took Jesus to jail. (John 18:15-17, NLT)  Passionate—but fearful!

He stood among the soldiers as they warmed themselves by the fire. (John 18:18, NLT)  Passionate—but silent!

He denied knowing Jesus when questioned, but at least he was there to be questioned. (John 18:25, NLT)  Passionate—but weak!

He doubled down on his denial when questioned again. (John 18:26-27, NLT)  Passionate—but fundamentally flawed!

Yes, Peter was all of those things we’ve said—there is no doubt about it—but passionate? You bet—imperfect, but passionate to the core!  Perhaps that is why Jesus gave Peter so much public attention and placed him so prominently on his leadership team. Like the very flawed King David, Peter had a heart after God.

God can use people like that. In fact, I suspect God prefers them over the perfect.  Oh, and just a little hint: There are no perfect people, only those who think and act like they are. Of course, I am not excusing Peter’s imperfection; only explaining it. But I think the reason the Gospel writers included Peter’s gaffes with regularity was not to put him down as the dunderhead we often think he is, but to remind us that God uses imperfect people, especially the passionate ones!

“Passion, though a bad regulator, is a powerful spring. ” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

What If God Took Over?

Ask God to give you greater passion.  Pray for self-control and wisdom, too—but if you are like me, you probably need more passion than the other two.