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Confidence In The Un-Random God

God’s Always Working His Plan

SYNOPSIS: There’s nothing random about God; He leaves nothing up to chance. That means for the believer, coincidence is simply God choosing to remain anonymous. As sovereign Lord of the universe, He is ruling over the details of history to bring about His flawless plan. What may seem like happenstance or fate, God has foreordained, caused, or permitted in His perfect will. Coincidence is simply a sovereign act for which He chooses to remain unseen, a miracle for which He prefers anonymity. Yes, He is in control of all things — and that includes your life. So today, and every day, put your confidence in the unrandom God!

Confidence in the un-random God

MOMENTS WITH GOD // Claim Matthew 2:5,15,18,23

For thus it is written in the prophets…

The birth and life of Jesus Christ, the Son of God and Savior of the world, was not the product of random events. It was the direct result of prophetic fulfillment. Thus the phrase linking Christ’s life to Old Testament prophecy is repeated four times in this second chapter of Matthew’s Gospel.

Those details of Jesus’ life had been laid out in the mind of God from eternity past and had been written down in the inspired utterances of the prophets of old hundreds of years before Christ was born. The fulfillment of scores of prophecies in minute detail of the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus leaves us with a pretty amazing track record of prophetic accuracy…leaving no doubt that those prophecies detailing His second coming will most certainly be fulfilled, too.

There is nothing random about God; nothing is left up to chance. The God of the Bible is the sovereign Lord of the universe and is ruling over the details of history to bring about His flawless plan. What may seem like happenstance or coincidence, God has foreordained, caused, or permitted in His perfect will. Coincidence is simply a sovereign act of God for which He chooses to remain unseen, a miracle for which He prefers anonymity.

God is in control of all things, and that includes your life. David wrote in Psalm 139:16,

You saw me before I was born.
Every day of my life was recorded in your book.
Every moment was laid out
before a single day had passed.

God’s Word invites you to live with amazing confidence today, knowing that He is in control of all things, including even the smallest details of your life. Therefore you can say, “all things will work together for my good and His glory.”

Take A Moment: Offer this prayer of confidence to God: Lord, I will live confidently and expectantly this day, and this year, knowing that my life is a part of Your greater plan. Take over my life completely and may every detail of my existence serve Your purposes perfectly and bring great glory to Your great name.”

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True Love Never Gets Irritated!

If It Irritates You In Others, God Wants To Change It In You

Synopsis: How do you turn the emotion of love into the motion of love for someone who’s getting under your skin? How can you act lovingly toward a chronic irritant? One of the most powerful motivations for loving that person who is not too loveable at the moment is to realize that what irritates you about them is truly the pathway for you to discover what God desires to change in you. Whoever is irritating you today, leverage that irritation for personal growth. The famous Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung was right, “Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.” For that reason, thank God for the growth opportunity He is providing you through that irritating friend!

New Article: True Love Never Gets Irritated

Make Love Work // 1 Corinthians 13:5 (TLB)

Love is not irritable or touchy.

Irritable people … you have them in your life; I do, too! Yet true love, God’s love flowing through us, is never irritable; instead, it is always patient and kind…and grateful! So how do you turn the emotion of love you feel for the one who is getting under your skin into the motion of love … how can you act lovingly toward them?

One of the most powerful motivations for loving that unlovely person is to realize that what irritates you about others is truly the pathway for you to discover what God desires to change in you. Whoever or whatever is irritating you today, leverage it for change and growth in yourself…and thank God for the opportunity! As CarlJung noted,

Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.

Who is irritating you today? Take a moment to think about what Nancy Pearcey writes, “In today’s grievance culture, it seems that some new group is always coming forward to complain that they are offended. It can be easy for Christians to pick up the same victim language. But our motivation for speaking out should not be only that we are offended. After all, we are called to share in the offense of the Cross. We are called to love the offender. Christians will be effective in reaching out to others only when they reflect biblical truth in their message, their method, and their manners.”

So today, remember that the one who is irritating you so much is likely the very person God has chosen to perfect His will in you. Since that is true, consider that they are truly a gift from God to you!

Take A Moment: Stop immediately and give thanks to God for the people who are irritating you! They are God’s gift to motivate you to address what He wants to change in you.

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Storms Happen

But So Does God

SYNOPSIS: There is nothing quite like the unleashed power of nature to remind you of how small, insignificant, and truly powerless you are. A fierce storm can be quite unnerving. And so are personal storms! You may be going through one right now. In many respects, the fury of nature is nothing compared to the devastating power of a personal storm. As surely as that storm reminds you of how small, insignificant, and powerless you are, I want to remind you that your God is bigger than your storm, and He is going to see you through it. That’s not to minimize the sense of desperation your storm has brought upon you, but stay secure in this: While storms happen, so does God! In fact, Psalm 104:4 says He makes the fierce winds and the flashing lightning His servants. He will make them yours, too!

Moments With God // Claim Psalm 104:7,32

But at your rebuke the waters fled, at the sound of your thunder they took to flight… he who looks at the earth, and it trembles, who touches the mountains, and they smoke.

There is nothing quite as unnerving as the fury of nature. I’ve never been in a massive earthquake, but the minor ones I’ve been in have been enough to make me shake in my boots. I’ve never been in a hurricane, but I’ve been on the outskirts of a small tornado, and its aftermath blew me away. I’ve never seen hailstones the size of a softball, but I got caught in a storm that pinged me with golf ball-sized hail, and it was enough to send chills up and down my spine.

There is nothing quite like the unleashed power of nature to remind you of how small, insignificant, and truly powerless you are.

Then there are personal storms! You may be going through one right now. In many respects, the fury of nature is nothing compared to the devastating power of a personal storm. In any given week, a half-dozen people will describe to me their own personal storms—everything from unbelievably huge financial crises to untreatable physical ailments to unrelenting relational disasters to unyielding emotional trauma—truly big, hairy, audacious personal gale-force storms. And for the most part, from what I can tell at least, those storms are not the fault of the ones forced to endure them.

You see, storms happen!

I would rather face nature than go through what many of those people are going through. At least a tornado, an earthquake, or a hailstorm comes to an end—and then you can pick up the pieces and begin to rebuild. Most of the time, a personal storm has no end in sight. And when you are in one, you are constantly reminded of how small, insignificant, and truly powerless you are. But there is One who is bigger than the storm. And the psalmist reminds us,

He makes the clouds his chariot and rides on the wings of the wind. He makes winds his messengers, flames of fire his servants. (Psalm 104:3-4)

If you are in a personal storm, I don’t know how long or how devastating it will be, but I do know that God will make your storm his servant—which means that since you belong to God, he will make your storm servant to you as well. God will work the storm for your good—his promise, not mine!

I don’t mean to minimize the sense of desperation your storm has brought you—I think I understand a little of what you are going through. But as surely as the storm reminds you of how small, insignificant and powerless you are, I want to remind you that your God is bigger than your storm, and he is going to see you through it.

Storms happen—but so does God!

Take A Moment: Are you going through a storm? Just remember: God is bigger than your storm. And he is over the storm, so call out to the One at who rebuke the storm must flee.

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Are There Limits To Unselfish Love?

Love Is Not Selfish—Some Clarifying Thoughts

SYNOPSIS: If a relationship goes off the rails, when is it time to, in Christ’s famous words, shake the dust off your feet and move on or to keep offering patient, unselfish, sacrificial love? The key to understanding which is appropriate is the biblical context for either option. The shake-the-dust context was hostile unbelievers and the love-is-not-selfish context was relationships in the body of Christ. Big difference! And in each context, back then and right now, God expects us to exhibit a merciful heart. Mercy, which is simply loving-kindness flowing in our thoughts, words, and actions, triumphs over judgment as we respond to both insolent unbelievers — even when divine judgment is forthcoming — as well as believers who irritate us — even when divine discipline is forthcoming. In the case of the latter, keep in mind that irritation is not the same as a moral offense — and it is wisdom to discern the difference —  so keep the default set to unselfish love.

Make Love Work // 1 Corinthians 13:5 (NLT)

Love does not demand its own way.

Last week, after my Love Is Not Selfish post where I appealed to believers to reject the cancel culture/ghosting a friend secular mentality that has invaded the American Church, a friend wrote to me with a great question: “What about washing the dust from your feet and declaring them — evil people — a lost cause, as Paul wrote in the New Testament?”

So let me clarify my thoughts. As always, context is king. In 1 Corinthians, Paul is generally speaking to issues and abuses among brothers and sisters in the Corinthian church, and there were a bunch!

Specifically, in chapter 13, Paul is talking about propriety in worship: how the believers are to carry out loving relationships within that church and how they are to offer their everyday lives as an offering to God (which, broadly, is what worship truly is, see Romans 12:1-2) as well as how they are to lift their praise in songs and through spiritual gifts during corporate gatherings (which is worship narrowly defined). In the case of worship, both broadly and narrowly defined, they are to treat each other with the deferential, edifying love Paul describes in chapter 13, which he defines in verses 4-8a,

Love is very patient and kind, never jealous or envious, never boastful or proud, never haughty or selfish or rude. Love does not demand its own way. It is not irritable or touchy. It does not hold grudges and will hardly even notice when others do it wrong. It is never glad about injustice, but rejoices whenever truth wins out. If you love someone, you will be loyal to him no matter what the cost. You will always believe in him, always expect the best of him, and always stand your ground in defending him.…love goes on forever.

From this context, we then can apply that deferential love to general Christian brother and sister relationships, as I am doing in these “Love Is” blog posts. When a relationship in that context goes off the rails because of indisputable moral grievances (and not just things that rub our preferences the wrong way), in Matthew 18:15-20 Jesus gave us a process for taking the conflict to church leaders for resolution.

According to Jesus, to resolve a conflict with a God-honoring outcome, the most foundational and critical principle that must be followed comes from His opening words: “If a brother sins against you.” The operative word is “if.” That is, the offended party must assess whether the offense was truly a sin, or if it was simply an act that irritated or violated their personal preferences.

In my experience facilitating conflict resolution, much of what people find offensive never rises to the level of a sin that needs to be confronted. In these cases, the offended party was, in reality, the culprit, and simply needed to grow thicker skin, develop greater tolerance, and/or learn to more effectively communicate their upset with the offender with grace and love.

Jesus also provided another essential to conflict resolution: once it has been determined that the offense was indeed the result of a sin, the issue is to first be addressed privately, just between the two parties. Too many people are quick to jump past this hoop and go right to group involvement. If you have not first addressed your hurt with the offender, do not take it to others and try to get them on your side. God will not honor that kind of action, and it will not produce what God desires most within His family: reconciliation in broken relationships.

However, Jesus does provide a clause by which others should be drawn into the dispute if the sinning party won’t listen to you. That is when others may need to be brought in to mediate and reconcile the offense. These participants should be godly and objective representatives of Christ’s church (not necessarily church officials, but simply mature, respectable Christians, although church leaders do, or should, carry the weight of final authority in disputes). And here is something very important that believers must recognize: Christ himself has placed His mantle of authority on this group to settle the dispute and if need be, administer discipline to an unrepentant brother or sister—discipline that will stand up even in the courts of heaven: What you bind on earth is bound in heaven; what you release on earth is released in heaven. (Matthew 18:18)

A final essential piece to conflict resolution is that the desired outcome is restoration. Jesus said, “If the other person listens and confesses it, you have won that person back.” Unfortunately, some people believe that getting what they want is the goal. It is not. Resolving the dispute, forgiving the offense, restoring the relationship, and preserving the harmony of the church is the outcome most honoring to God.

You can read more on Jesus’ approach to conflict resolution in a blog I wrote.

Now about “Shake the dust off your feet.” This is an altogether different context, which has to do with proclaiming the gospel and calling for repentance to a resistant, if not hostile, group of unbelieving people. Only when you have exhausted your gospel appeal can you then proclaim God’s judgment and walk away. Yet even then we must remember how Jesus modeled the proclamation of impending judgment to an unbelieving city: He wept over Jerusalem when she had rejected him? “O Jerusalem, how I would gather you as a hen gathers her brood under her wings … but now your city will be left desolate.” (Matt 23:37) There was no glee as Jesus announced judgment; rather, love is still pouring forth from His broken heart.

So, the context of both “love is not selfish” and “shake the dust off your feet” is the key to balancing when to nurture a loving relationship with someone who has offended you and when to proclaim loving judgment upon a hostile unbeliever. Mercy, which is nothing more than loving-kindness flowing from our hearts, triumphs over judgment as we respond to both wayward believers— even though loving discipline is on the way, as well as wicked unbelievers — even though God’s righteous judgment is on the way.

Take A Moment: Check out my post Merciful Judgment for a deeper look at this idea of merciful judgment.

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A Frivolous Miracle Or An Extravagant God

He Is Lord For Your Ordinary Needs

SYNOPSIS: Jesus gladly turned water into wine for a wedding reception—such a “frivolous” miracle—to reveal the Father’s extravagant generosity for our ordinary wants and needs.

Moments With God // John 2:11 (NLT)

This miracle at Cana in Galilee —turning water into wine at a wedding—was Jesus’ first public demonstration of his heaven-sent power. And his disciples believed that he really was the Messiah.

Turning water into wine! Really? For your first miracle, you choose to keep the party guests happy by miraculously making sure there is a free flow of adult beverages? Wouldn’t it have been more impressive in announcing to the world that you, the Messiah, have arrived by raising a dead person back to life or by performing some other more worthy miracle—like supplying a starving family with food or creating money for a destitute widow or by healing a young child dying with leukemia?

Doesn’t running out of wine at a wedding seem like a first-world problem? And doesn’t God stooping to supply the new, improved wine seem a bit frivolous? So why this frivolous miracle as Jesus’s inaugural miracle?

Well, only God knows the answer to that question, but here’s what I think: what might seem like a frivolous miracle is really the introduction of an extravagant God.

You see, many of us have been conditioned to believe that God doesn’t intervene in relatively unimportant human affairs when more pressing concerns are on His plate, like war, global warming, human trafficking, or widespread injustice. We have trouble believing that the Almighty intervenes in our ordinary, unimportant, trivial affairs.

But does he? Well, sometimes! Can I expect that of Him? Does He care about my wedding reception or my favorite sports teaming winning a match or my missing iPhone? Should I really be bothering Him with my ordinary, unimportant stuff?

I don’t mean to be irreverent, but it doesn’t hurt to ask! Jesus helped His mom, who was likely coordinating this wedding, out of a jam by changing ceremonial water, which theologically, may very well represent the limits of human fallenness, into party wine, which represents the liberality of divine grace. Jesus didn’t have to. It wasn’t on His agenda. He wasn’t responding to a life and death need. But He did it anyway.

What that shows us is something pretty cool: The extravagant nature of this God revealed in a miracle you and I probably wouldn’t have dared to ask for.

That’s the God I want and need every day of my life. And that’s the God we’re offered in Jesus!

This “frivolous” miracle brings a distant, unreachable God out of the heavenly realms and right into our humble realities. It’s not only interesting; it’s purposeful that verse 11 says the very first place Jesus chose to “reveal his glory” was somewhere very ordinary. He chose a home for His first miracle. He went public at a wedding in a wide spot in the road called Cana.

So, what does that tell us? Simply this: Jesus desires to be real—and to reveal God—in your daily ordinariness, too. He wants to reveal glory—God’s manifest presence—in the nitty-gritty reality of your life: your marriage, family, work, school, and private world. It also means that He cares about what you do in your ordinary days—your marriage, job, school, private times—your life outside the sacredness of church. God doesn’t want to just show up for you at church on Sunday mornings. He wants to be real, and powerful and close, even in your unexciting, uneventful moment-by-moment world.

Nothing about your life is too insignificant to qualify for God’s extravagant grace—apparently not even the beverages on the menu at your party!

That’s the God you and I want and need every day of our lives. And that’s the God we’re offered in Jesus!

Take A Moment: Make a list of your wants—not your needs—and take them before God in your prayer time. As you do, reflect on this verse: “You can ask Him for anything, using my name, and I will do it, for this will bring praise to the Father because of what I, the Son, will do for you. Yes, ask anything, using my name, and I will do it!” (John 14:13-14)

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If You Play With Fire …

Some Things Will Burn Us Beyond Remedy

SYNOPSIS: “Adultery will reduce you to a loaf of bread; sexual indiscretion will prey upon your very life,” according to Proverbs 6:26. In other words, you mess around with sexual immorality (or any immorality for that matter), you’re toast! God never intended for our sexual needs to be in the driver’s seat of our lives. Our brain was meant to occupy that position, and our moral core was meant to be our navigator. If you are facing a temptation today, get your brain and your moral core together and let them do their job!

If you play with fire

Moments With God // Claim Proverbs 6:27

Can a man scoop fire into his lap without his clothes being burned?

“If you play with fire, you’re going to get burned!” That’s what my father used to say to me, and I’m sure his father said to him, and his grandfather said to his father. The reason fathers the world over have to say it is that it seems there is just an innate curiosity little boys seem to have with fire. I’m sure even before matches were invented, back when man lived in caves, wore animal skins, and first discovered fire, some troglodyte dad was telling his son, “Trog, you poke fire with stick, you get bad burn!”

Okay, maybe it didn’t happen quite that way, but around 3,000 years ago Solomon mused in Proverbs 6:27, “Can a man scoop fire into his lap without his clothes being burned?” Of course, Solomon’s point is that what is true of physical fire is also true in the spiritual realm—we’re drawn to the very things that can burn us beyond remedy. This chapter in Proverbs mentions three of the biggies:

An unspiritual pursuit of wealth: Specifically, Proverbs 6:1-5 warns us about one of the riskiest, and therefore worst kinds of financial transactions of all: entering into a business partnership without prayerful and careful planning. Solomon doesn’t care whether the business opportunity has great potential or not, he just says agreeing to it apart from God’s wisdom is the height of foolishness. This is particularly true if the business deal is a get-rich-quick scheme, which seems to be the implication here.

If you’ve entered into a deal without doing due spiritual diligence, chances are, you’re going to get yourself burned! The wisest thing you could do would be to quickly and graciously extract yourself from your foolish partnership and chalk it up to a lesson learned the hard way.

If you’ve gone into hock with your neighbor or locked yourself into a deal with a stranger…Don’t waste a minute, get yourself out of that mess! (Prov 6:1, Message)

An irresponsible approach to success: Perhaps the most common way we play with fire is by rejecting the common sense approach to work and wealth that simply rolls up its sleeves, sees the responsibilities before it, doesn’t over-think what needs to be done, just seizes the day and gets after it.

Solomon describes this approach to life in Proverbs 6:6-11 by illustrating the work ethic, of all things, the ubiquitous ant. More success stories are birthed from the ant’s I-work-hard-for-the-money life philosophy than any other. Far too many people in our day, lured by lust for quick fame and easy fortune, are waiting for their ship to come in. The problem is, they’ve never put their ship out to sea. God will reward you with the good life, but he expects you to get up in the morning, grab your lunch pail, put on your hard hat, and get to work!

A day off here, a day off there, sit back and take it easy—Do you know what comes next? Just this: You can look forward to a dirt-poor life! (Prov 6:10-11)

An uncontrolled sexual appetite: Need I say more? Solomon knew from first-hand experience what we have observed in the lives of countless high-profile people—men and women—in our lifetime who have crashed once-promising careers and have burned sterling reputations by allowing their sexual drives to do just that: Drive their behavior.

God never intended for our sexual needs to be in the driver’s seat of our lives. Our brain was meant to occupy that position, and our moral core was meant to be our navigator. As strong as our sexual drive is, and as susceptible as it is to temptation, just mark this down: If you give in to your sexual desires apart from God’s plan for sexual satisfaction within marriage, you’re toast man! That’s what Proverbs 6:26 says,

The adulteress will reduce you to a loaf of bread, sexual indiscretion will prey upon your very life. (Prov 6:26)

Well, there you have it. You keep poking your stick in those three fires and eventually, you’re going to get burned. There’s nothing really profound about Solomon’s teaching here; he’s just telling it like it is. And like that little ant in verses 6-8 which doesn’t need anyone to help it discover the deeper, hidden meaning of life, neither do you. The ant just does the right thing. I hope you will, too!

Now, as someone famous has said, go do the right thing.

Take A Moment: Think carefully about this and answer honestly: Are you playing with fire by the unspiritual pursuit of wealth, an irresponsible approach to success, or an uncontrolled sexual appetite? Being truthful and accountable in these three areas may mean the difference between a blessed or a cursed life

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Unselfish Love Is True Love

Loving People Don't Demand Their Own Way

SYNOPSIS: We live in an age of outrage. The grievance industry is alive and well. Say the wrong thing and you’ll get canceled. And if you think that’s outside the church, think again! Over the past few weeks, I’ve interviewed dozens of pastors from around the country who’ve told of too many heartbreaking stories of church members who’ve been ghosted, canceled, and met with hostility by other “believing” family members and church friends these past two years over politics, pandemic protocols, and cultural concerns. And all of them, like me, have personally experienced the same. What selfishness! Friends, this ought not to be in Christ’s family! Love—agape love—doesn’t ghost a friend or cancel a family member or express outrage when people don’t believe like you, vote like you, or please you. Love does not demand its own way.

Love is not selfish

Make Love Work // 1 Corinthians 13:5 (NLT)

Love does not demand its own way.

Love is not selfish. You would agree, right?

But think of the selfish nature of our current culture, not only outside but inside the church, which is supposed to be the family of God, characterized by followers of Jesus loving each other no matter what, being loyal to each other no matter what, expecting the best of each other, no matter what, standing their ground in defending each other, no matter what.

“Ghosting” a friend. Cancel culture. The age of outrage. If you think that’s outside the church, think again! Over the past few weeks, I’ve interviewed two dozen pastors from around the country who’ve told of too many heartbreaking stories of church members who’ve been ghosted, canceled, met with hostility by other “believing” family members and church friends these past two years over politics, pandemic protocols, and cultural concerns. And all of them, like me, have personally experienced the same.

What of Christ is there in that?

Friends, there’s no place for this in the Body of Christ. Love—agape love—doesn’t ghost a friend or cancel a family member. It doesn’t demand that people believe like you, vote like you, or live their lives to please you. Love does not demand its own way.

But if you have, I admonish you to repent before God and go to that person you’ve treated unlovingly and ask for their forgiveness. Listen: a friend is born for adversity (even adversity in the relationship), family loves at all times (even when you disagree over mandates or candidates), and unity in Christ is far more important than any temporal earthly concern (including current political beliefs).

Love never, ever demands its own way!

Love—agape love—doesn’t ghost a friend or cancel a family member or express outrage when people don’t believe like you, vote like you, or please you. Love does not demand its own way.

#afriendisbornforadversity

Take A Moment: Have you dismissed a friend recently? If you have, today would be a good day to say you are sorry, to God, and to that friend!