The Hidden Life

Living Inside-Out to Release God's Blessing

Bryan Fraser

Copyright © 2005 by Bryan Fraser

The Hidden Life: Living Inside-Out to Release God’s Blessing

by Bryan Fraser

All rights reserved solely by the author. The author guarantees all contents are original and do not infringe upon the legal rights of any other person or work. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the permission of the author.

Unless otherwise indicated, Bible quotations are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.

Also by Bryan Fraser:

You Can't Start Over, but You Can Start Today: God’s Heart for Men in Recovery

Winning a Generation Without the Law: How the Apostles Won the Western Mind

No Demons, Please... We're Evangelical: The Spiritual Roots of Addiction

To Ellenor,

who lives the hidden life

Table of Contents

Preface

Chapter 1. The Mystery of Fruitfulness

Chapter 2. The Diversity of Spiritual Fruit

Chapter 3. Bearing the Fruit God Has Chosen For Me

Chapter 4. The Need to Slow Down

Chapter 5. Restoring the Biblical View of Reality

Chapter 6. Wild Grapes: Separating Ourselves from the Works of Darkness

Chapter 7. Weeds in the Field: Getting Our Finances in Order

Chapter 8. The Destructive Power of the Tongue

Chapter 9. The Bitterness that Defiles Many

Chapter 10. God is Not a System!

Chapter 11. A Hole in the Wall: Hidden Hypocrisy

Chapter 12. Judging: Our God Given Obligation

Chapter 13. High-Risk Christianity

Chapter 14. The Most Important Decision

Postscript

Preface

But My servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed Me fully, I will bring into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it.  Numbers 14:24

The Christian life is a struggle to make the unknown a reality.  It is a struggle to an upward call that is completely beyond human experience and imagination.  We are called to attain what we have not seen using powers we do not comprehend.  Over and over again, the Bible teaches us that the key to spiritual victory is winning the battle within; that is, living openly, consistently and transparently before God.  All the forces of hell are bent on preventing us from achieving this one thing.  For to the degree that we neglect the inner man to focus on the external and the superficial, our efforts in spiritual work are futile and powerless.

This book is about who we are in our secret places; in other words, who we really are as opposed to who we think we are, who we say we are, who we wish we were or who we plan to be.  It is about who we are when all the outer layers are stripped away and the hidden life is laid bare before God.  Confronting who we are can be acutely painful, almost overwhelming.  But it is only when we approach the cross as who we really are that our pain intersects the grace of Christ's blood and He can transform us into who He means us to be.

The pages following contain many challenges, but few words of comfort.  I do not apologize for my conviction that the evangelical landscape is overcrowded with much misplaced comfort in these days, comfort that too easily allows us to settle for so much less than our Lord calls us to be. I instead commend the reader into the care of the true Comforter.  For He is more severe, yet more gracious; more demanding, yet more patient; more intolerant, yet more understanding than the well-intentioned voice of human comfort could ever be.

Bryan Fraser

Fort Nelson, British Columbia

August 2005

Chapter 1.  The Mystery of Fruitfulness

For God will bring every work into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil.  Ecclesiastes 12:14

WHAT HAVE YOU GOT BURIED UNDER YOUR TENT?

A Christian’s true identity is revealed in the hidden life.  He reveals it in the choices he makes when there is no recognition to be had and no reputation to gain.  He reveals it when he can choose the right thing or the wrong thing and no one else sees what he does.  These are the choices that reveal the genuine person.   Transparency before God is a high calling.  Many will exhibit acts of sacrifice, of selfless labor, of every form of Christian virtue when they are in the public eye.  But few attain to that lofty status of character where they are truly impartial to whether their conduct is public or not.  Achieving consistency between our hidden and public lives is one of the greatest challenges facing the Christian and is, in fact, the ultimate confession of belief in God.

As much as our spirits desire to live openly before God, the flesh compels us to follow a double standard and is quick to exploit any opportunity it finds to lead us in that direction.  It prompts us to readily remember our acts of obedience and to quickly forget our hidden sins.  The flesh prompts us to compartmentalize the various areas of our lives, deluding us into thinking that hidden sin in one area will not affect the others.  But the Apostle tells us that the body is “knit together by what every joint supplies” (Ephesians 4:16).  Things that have no apparent connection in the natural world are knit together in the heavenlies.  Israel was scattered on the battlefield of Ai because of the secret sin of Achan’s family (Joshua 7).  Even though their sin had no natural connection to the logistics of the battle, Israel’s entire effort was rendered ineffective.  The flesh also lulls us into complacency because of God’s delay in bringing our secrets to light.  Even though we formally confess that the Lord “will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the hearts” (1 Corinthians 4:5), this judgment often seems far off and unreal.

Living in this world, we are attuned to its laws of causation and consequence.  We have learned what things we must do in the natural world to achieve results in the natural world.  But Jesus calls us to bear fruit that remains, that is, His genuine fruit that will withstand the fire of judgment (John 15:16).  When we apply natural strategies to spiritual objectives, the result is either barrenness or perishable fruit.  Using earthly methods and techniques, the clever workman can achieve any result he desires.  He can gather, build, harvest and in every way appear to be bearing the fruit that remains.  Our natural eyes cannot distinguish perishable fruit from that which remains, so similar do they often appear.  But, the Day will show each one’s fruit for what it is (1 Corinthians 3:13).

The purpose of this book is to consider the goal of fruitfulness in our lives and bring about in the reader a shift of perspective from the natural to the revelatory.  For if we desire to see genuine fruit in our lives, we must submit to God’s revealed conditions for fruitfulness.  To the great distress of the flesh, what this ultimately means is that we bear fruit in accordance with our faithfulness in those matters where men hurry past but where our Lord waits and watches.

WHY WE NEED TO SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF

We bear fruit through faithfulness in the small, obscure details of obedience.  The disciple who bears fruit is the one who makes no distinction in his heart between small and large matters or between hidden and visible matters.  He submits to the heavenly equation stating that “he who is faithful in what is least is faithful also in much” (Luke 16:10).  He is faithful when the matter seems trivial, he is faithful even to his own apparent disadvantage and he is faithful when no one else will ever know.  He understands that it is the hidden life, not the outward presentation, that moves God “to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him” (2 Chronicles 16:9).  For if we disregard small things while attending to large things, then it is plain that our first priority is pleasing men rather than serving our Lord Who sees all things.

Yet, it is easier to accept this principle as a formal theological premise than to apply it as a working, hands-on lifestyle.  For every fibre of our beings compels us to live as if we must work to bear fruit.  But the truth is just the opposite: that we must actually work to become barren.  When, through our hidden sin, we break fellowship with Christ, we can bear no fruit.  Our Lord plainly teaches us that “without Me you can do nothing (John 15:5).”  Here is the stumbling block that leaves so many Christians in a condition of barrenness.  Our secret compromises and shortcuts move us away from His presence.  We try to compensate for this separation by multiplying our outward efforts to bear fruit, but to no avail for “without Me you can do nothing.”

The disciple who fully comes to grips with this reality is forever transformed in his perspective on his spiritual condition.  He is no longer impressed with much outward activity that is widely celebrated as being “great works of God.”  He gains a new appreciation for those few spiritual fathers whose consistent lives set them apart from the rest.  But most important, he comes to understand that it is in fact God, not himself, Who brings forth fruit.  He comes to understand that God mysteriously brings forth fruit not in those who display the greatest outward devotion, but in those who are without hypocrisy in their hidden lives.  In short, he comes to understand that God brings forth fruit not in those who do, but in those who are.

This principle of fruitfulness runs cross grain to the instincts and desires of the natural man.  For the natural man strives to bear fruit to God through works that are highly visible, that do not cost him personally and that enhance his reputation among men.  He is especially attracted to service that is highly esteemed among men, but is an abomination in the sight of God (Luke 16:15). He wants to ignore and forget the small, hidden acts of disobedience that he places in the “non-spiritual” compartment of his thinking.  Having made this artificial division between “spiritual acts of service” and “secular matters of disobedience,” he then deludes himself as to who he really is. He thinks that his true identity lies in the public presentation that he puts on display.  He thinks that he can bear fruit to God by offering up his visible works and sacrifices.  But if his secret, hidden life is full of compromise, then all of these efforts are as the offering of Cain and amount to nothing (Genesis 4:5).

HIDING FROM THE CROWD AND IN THE CROWD

When we speak of hidden sins, there are two kinds to distinguish: those we hide from others and those we hide from ourselves.  The sin we hide from others is the more common understanding of ‘secret sin.’  We are acutely conscious of this sin, heavily under its conviction and determined to conceal its presence from all others.  David’s adultery with Bathsheba is an example of this kind of sin.  Secondly, sins we hide from ourselves are those that we have pushed to the back burner of our consciences and rarely consider.  We generally commit these sins collectively.  We fall into behaviors that are so widespread that we sense the safety of numbers: “If nobody else is concerned about it why should I be?”  Sins of the tongue such as gossip and backbiting are scarcely noticed if they infect the whole community.  It is only when we are cornered and confronted that we confess such speech for the disobedience that it is.

The natural man, coveting his secret sins, wants to “immediately forget what kind of man he was” (James 1:24) and move ahead to consider what he will “do for God.”  He wants to make a plan, get to work and generate results.  Like Simon the sorcerer (Acts 8), he believes that he can bear spiritual fruit by imitating techniques he observes in godly disciples. He focuses not on who he is, but on what he does.  He seeks to cover over his failings by exerting even greater effort.  He keeps up a frantic schedule that helps him avoid close examination of his true spiritual condition.  He imagines that he can ignore areas of compromise and disobedience, yet still bring forth fruit.  But God will have none of this.  There is no shortcut, no end run around God’s principle of fruitfulness.

YOU CAN’T DO GOD’S JOB AND HE WON’T DO YOURS

God has chosen the imagery of agriculture to teach us this important principle of fruitfulness.  The Bible is filled with lessons drawn from elements of agriculture: harvests, fields, seeds, rain, vineyards, crops, sowing, reaping and so on.  Through these pictures, we see a recurring theme of man’s dependence on God in bearing fruit.  In Psalm 1, man is responsible for staying rooted in the well-watered riverbed.  In the parable of the sower (Matthew 13), man is responsible for being good soil.  In the allegory of the vine (John 15), man is the branch responsible for remaining attached to the vine.    Each of these pictures shows that man has a critically important role in fruitfulness.  He is to ensure that the necessary conditions for fruitfulness are met.  But he cannot, through his efforts, bring forth fruit.  It is God and God alone who miraculously brings forth the fruit in response to man’s obedience and faithfulness.  This “division of labor” between God and man in these agricultural pictures is given to teach us the unfathomable mystery of fruitfulness: that we must depend completely on the Lord of the harvest who brings forth His fruit in its season.

In the ancient, agrarian world of the Bible, people were utterly dependent on the cycles and processes of the harvest year.  They patiently submitted to their roles in the harvest cycle and looked to God to show his lovingkindness toward them by bringing forth His harvest.  Modern man, however, is far removed from this primitive dependence on the seasonal elements.  He sets his own schedule and is the captain of his production.  In modern agricultural science, we design genetically superior seed.  We fertilize, irrigate, decontaminate and irradiate our crops to the extent that the uncertainties of crop yields are greatly reduced.  The urbanite, even further removed from the agricultural cycle, simply buys his produce in the supermarket and hardly gives a thought to its source.  This technological revolution has transformed us into a culture that is able to produce what it wants when it wants it.

Within this technological context, Christian thought easily drifts away from the fundamental division of responsibility between God and man so clearly taught in the Bible.  Conditioned by the production-oriented mentality of modern, technological society, we work harder at trying to bring forth fruit and less on who we need to be in order for God to bring forth fruit.  We labor to bring forth fruit through goal-oriented strategies and programs while neglecting the obligations of personal holiness, self-control and sacrifice.  We assume that our visible, structured ministries will overshadow our inadequacies in spiritual discipline.  We look to the secular social sciences to learn how to attract and retain the maximum numbers of people.  We make “church growth” a prescriptive methodology instead of a divine miracle.  We measure fruitfulness almost exclusively in terms of attendance and numerical growth.  Numerical growth is always viewed positively, regardless of the message used to achieve this growth, or the spiritual condition of the resulting crowds.

In our desire for numerical growth, we quickly look past the price required to bear spiritual fruit: separation, discipline, and death to self.  We replace these demands with a message designed to attract the multitudes.  Instead of calling people to lose their lives for Christ, we enable people to feel comfortable with their compromised lives.  Given the choice between ten committed disciples and 100 interested adherents, we tailor our efforts to produce the latter.

Our preaching assumes that, if it can just attract a crowd, people will somehow become committed disciples later on.  We become like contemporary child educators who believe that the best way to stimulate children’s interest in writing is to have them write whatever seems good to them without regard for spelling, grammar or sentence structure.  Supposedly, children will learn to correct all these errors later on.  But they do not.  These students spend their lives unable to write or spell well.  In the same way, those who begin their spiritual journeys with the idea that Christianity is all about "how Jesus is going to make me feel good about myself" do not easily change their perspectives later on.  We forget our mandate to teach every new disciple the true cost of fruitfulness.

This book will look at our fruitfulness in Christ by reversing the usual perspective of considering what we need to “do” to bear fruit.  It will instead focus on a number of common problem areas in our hidden lives that can choke off the fruit that God would otherwise bring forth.  We need to realize that not all the visible results of our religious activities are genuine spiritual fruit.  We need to focus on our own responsibilities and stop trying to take over God’s unique role in fruitfulness.  Most of all, we need to grow in our appreciation of the mystery and the “otherliness” of fruitfulness, becoming like the farmer who, scattering his seed on the ground, marvels that “the seed should sprout and grow, he himself does not know how” (Mark 4:27).

Meditation and Response

1. What hidden places in your life did the Holy Spirit highlight to you as you read this chapter?

2. Which of these places are most precious to you and seem like the most difficult ones to leave behind?  Confide your thoughts to the Lord.

3. Can you think of a time when you tried to bear spiritual fruit using your natural strength?  As accurately as you can, describe the result.

Chapter 2.  The Diversity of Spiritual Fruit

What is spiritual fruit?  What are its forms and varieties?  These are critically important questions because a disciple who takes his faith seriously at all must come to an understanding of what he is to produce.  The term “fruit,” when used figuratively in the Bible, means "the result of an action, condition or influence."  The specific influence which brings forth fruit in a Christian’s life is the indwelling Holy Spirit.  As I stressed in Chapter 1, the presence of the Spirit in a disciple brings forth fruit when its growth is not inhibited by factors preventing its reaching maturity.  In this sense, fruit is the final and visible manifestation of a hidden, inner reality.  This is the core idea in the concept of spiritual fruit: that an exterior veneer cannot conceal the inner substance.  This principle of the visible manifestation revealing the inward truth is clearly seen in Matthew 7:15-20:

Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them.

Two important aspects of God’s principle of fruitfulness are expressed in this passage.  First, there is the impossibility of inward and outward inconsistency: a thing will always manifest outwardly according to its inner substance and nature.  This manifestation can sometimes be delayed and apparent only in the latter stages of maturity, but it is certain just the same.

LOOKING FOR ORANGES IN APPLE TREES

Second, we see the corollary truth that a thing can only produce "fruit according to its kind" (Genesis 1:11).  It cannot choose to bring forth a different kind of fruit.  To use the language of the analogy, not only is a good tree unable to bear bad fruit, it is unable to bear another kind of good fruit.  It will only bear that kind of fruit that is consistent with its nature and purpose.  This principle is essential to a proper understanding of fruitfulness.  There are, in fact, numerous kinds of fruit.  Some kinds are to be brought forth by all Christians at all times.  Other kinds will be brought forth in certain situations and not in others.  It is certainly a mistake for a Christian to focus exclusively on a single kind of fruit and feel defeated if he does not see that particular variety produced at a time of his own choosing.  Listed below are six kinds of fruit described in the New Testament.  This list is not necessarily exhaustive, but is intended to show the diverse nature of spiritual fruit.

Godly Character.  In several letters to the churches, the fruit of the Spirit is shown to be attributes of godly character (Galatians 5:22-32, Ephesians 5:9).  These qualities are not natural in origin, but arise as a Christian daily submits his life to the rule of God.

Church Growth.  Jesus specifically identified the ingathering of God’s elect as fruit.  “Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest! And he who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together” (John 4:35-36).  In this context, “fruit” and “harvest” are synonymous terms for the addition of disciples to the church.  Paul also referred to growth resulting from his missions work as fruit (Romans 1:13, 16:5; Philippians 1:22).

Financial Offerings.  Paul referred to a gift from a Gentile congregation to Jewish Christians as fruit in Romans 15:28 (See also Philippians 4:17).  This offering definitively demonstrated that the Spirit was dissolving the rigid barriers between Jews and Gentiles in the church.

Thankfulness.  In Hebrews 13:15, expressions of thanksgiving to God are called fruit:  “Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.”  The Spirit prompts the disciple to thank God for all things where previously there was complaining and cursing.  The Bible refers to this supernaturally transformed attitude as fruit.

Good Works.  “And let our people also learn to maintain good works, to meet urgent needs, that they may not be unfruitful” (Titus 3:14).  The Spirit will prompt Christians to works of service, helps and mercy as His influence grows in their lives.

BUT I DON’T WANT TO SMELL LIKE DEATH!

The Hardening of the Lost.  This kind of fruit is intentionally listed last because it will seem unexpected to many readers.  Calling the hardening of the lost a spiritual fruit is a concept not well understood or frequently discussed.  Yet it recognizes the fact that the Spirit-filled disciple impacts people both positively and negatively:  “For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To the one we are the aroma of death leading to death, and to the other the aroma of life leading to life” (2 Corinthians 2:15).  As a Christian deepens his relationship with his Lord, the fragrance of Christ on him will grow stronger.  This does not mean, however, that his spiritual aroma will have an increasingly positive influence on people.  On the contrary, those who oppose the sovereign rule of God will smell the aroma of death on him all the more strongly!  The Christian has no control over people’s responses.  His only duty is to keep the fragrance of Christ pure and unmixed with other aromas.

God has appointed some persons for destruction (Romans 9:22) and He sometimes uses his elect to complete the hardening of those who reject His Son.    Paul was used of God this way in Acts 19:8-9,

And he went into the synagogue and spoke boldly for three months, reasoning and persuading concerning the things of the kingdom of God. But when some were hardened and did not believe, but spoke evil of the Way before the multitude, he departed from them and withdrew the disciples, reasoning daily in the school of Tyrannus.

God used Paul’s faithfulness to harden those He had prepared for wrath.

I previously stated that “fruit” and “harvest” are synonymous terms when used to refer to the ingathering of the elect.  However, “harvest” also refers to the gathering of those destined for punishment and destruction, as shown in Revelation 14:15-19:

And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to Him who sat on the cloud, "Thrust in Your sickle and reap, for the time has come for You to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe." So He who sat on the cloud thrust in His sickle on the earth, and the earth was reaped. Then another angel came out of the temple which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar, who had power over fire, and he cried with a loud cry to him who had the sharp sickle, saying, "Thrust in your sharp sickle and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth, for her grapes are fully ripe." So the angel thrust his sickle into the earth and gathered the vine of the earth, and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.

The overall picture that we need to see is that the harvest at the end of the age includes both the elect and the lost.  Our Lord has sent forth His disciples to participate in the harvesting of both.  As much as we desire that all should come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9), we must accept the fact that many will be hardened by the fragrance of Christ upon us.  This hardening is a very real fruit of the Spirit.

YOU CAN’T PICK DAFFODILS IN FEBRUARY

As God patiently waits for His Word to have its full effect in the world, the ingathering of the elect will be uneven and unpredictable.  In certain times and places, many will be saved and added to the church.  Other times, the church will languish as whole cultures seem to turn away.  We must be careful that we do not assume that a better strategy, a better crafting of our message, or a better understanding of cultural distinctives would necessarily have produced a different response.  God pointedly told Ezekiel that He was sending him to a people who would not repent:

"Son of man, I am sending you to the children of Israel, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against Me; they and their fathers have transgressed against Me to this very day. For they are impudent and stubborn children. I am sending you to them, and you shall say to them, "Thus says the Lord GOD.' As for them, whether they hear or whether they refuse--for they are a rebellious house--yet they will know that a prophet has been among them (Ezekiel 2:3-5).

The great temptation we face at this point is to tinker and adjust the message we preach in until we achieve a more positive response from our hearers.  We have convinced ourselves that the presentation of the gospel must produce a positive response in every place at all times.  But this is not the case.  A careful survey of church history will show that the church has always been expanding in one region while falling into decline in another.  The gospel presented in the same way with the same faithfulness in two different places may produce very different kinds of fruit.  If God has appointed us to bear a certain kind of fruit for a season, then we will have no success attempting to bring forth something different.

What is called for here is a change in perspective in how we perceive fruitfulness.  Despite the many kinds of fruit that God brings forth, there is the near-universal assumption today that a non-growing church is an unfruitful church.  We must have our numbers!  There can be any number of reasons for stagnation in church growth.  Churches can be afflicted with apostasy, rebellion, pride, hidden sins or other factors that withhold God’s blessing.  If these flaws are inhibiting growth then they certainly need to be rooted out.

But if a church is in a position of humility and obedience before the Lord and is still not seeing numerical growth, then it needs to consider its way carefully.  God may lead it to start doing some things differently, but then again He may not.  Jesus drew tremendous crowds when he healed the sick and promised people relief from the backbreaking religion of the Pharisees.  But when he preached hard things difficult to accept, “many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more” (John 6:66).  Are we willing to accept this yoke?  Certainly there are times when the Lord’s primary calling on a church is simply to stand fast in its confession, that the people “will know that a prophet has been among them.”

Meditation and Response

1. Ask the Spirit to show you what kinds of fruit He is calling you to bring forth.

2. Pray for your pastor and church leadership: that they would have godly insight to know how to lead the people into the fruitfulness God has prepared for them.

3. Think of three Christians close to you that are bearing spiritual fruit.  Encourage them by confirming the fruit you see manifest in their lives.

Chapter 3.  Bearing the Fruit God Has Chosen For Me

FINDING THE ONE THING YOU MUST DO

The word of God comes to us in two forms of revelation: the inspired Scriptures which reveal God’s nature and will to all peoples, and the voice of God, being His specific guidance to individuals.  We recognize that both forms of revelation come from the same Holy Spirit so that in all communication from the mind of God there is perfect unity and agreement.

There is a general obedience required of all of us regarding God’s revealed will in the Bible.  We are to obey God’s laws, keep ourselves from sin and live according to the wisdom He has given us in Scripture.  But there is another level of communication that is equally important in fulfilling God’s purposes in our lives. God would speak to me individually and show me the specific works that He has for me.  When an army goes into battle it has two sources of guidance.  First, there is the plan of attack that is drawn up beforehand.  But as well, there are the field commanders who give specific orders to soldiers while the battle is in progress.  Both the plan of attack and the field orders are essential for victory.

When we consider the various Bible heroes God used to accomplish His purposes we find again and again that an essential ingredient in their effectiveness was the voice of God. God told them something very specific to do and when to do it. They obeyed and brought forth the fruit God had prepared for them.  Not only did these saints need to exercise faith, but they also required a specific instruction in which to place their faith:

         Noah was to build an ark, and not do a great many other things that may have seemed good to him.

         Abram was to leave his homeland and go to a specific place that God would show him.

         Moses was to return to Egypt after forty years in the desert and not a day sooner.

         Jonah was to go not to any city, but to Nineveh because that was where God had prepared his work.

In the same way, without hearing the voice of God, the church’s mission will not go forward.  Neither will our personal callings reach their fulfillment and potential.

DO YOU WORK HARD OR SMART?

We will accomplish a lot more for God if we work smart rather than hard.  The voice of God is something entirely different from all the human wisdom we think will accomplish God’s work: self-sacrifice, self-denial, all kinds of grand projects, schedules and strategies. It is an unfortunate truth that much of our activity done in the name of God springs from our own imaginations and ambitions. We get anxious because we don’t see any progress. Nothing is happening. We think we have lost our way.  So we must act. We must step forward with a plan of action. Something! Anything!  Numbers 14:39-45 tells the story of some people who felt they just had to do something.

Then Moses told these words to all the children of Israel, and the people mourned greatly.  And they rose early in the morning and went up to the top of the mountain, saying, "Here we are, and we will go up to the place which the LORD has promised, for we have sinned!" And Moses said, "Now why do you transgress the command of the LORD? For this will not succeed.  Do not go up, lest you be defeated by your enemies, for the LORD is not among you.  For the Amalekites and the Canaanites are there before you, and you shall fall by the sword; because you have turned away from the LORD, the LORD will not be with you." But they presumed to go up to the mountaintop. Nevertheless, neither the ark of the covenant of the LORD nor Moses departed from the camp.  Then the Amalekites and the Canaanites who dwelt in that mountain came down and attacked them, and drove them back as far as Hormah.

How can we explain this disaster?  Israel was in the right place.  They were supposed to be in Canaan.  They also understood their calling.  They were to drive the Amalekites and Canaanites out of the land.  But they rebelled against the voice of God:  “Not today.  Not on this mountain.  Do not go up for the Lord will not be with you.”  They had the battle plan right, but they did not hear the voice of their commander.

This passage is a wonderful example of good intentions and hard work.  Good intentions and hard work do not accomplish the will of God.  We accomplish the will of God by waiting, hearing His voice and obeying.  The Israelites were trying to accomplish the right thing, but in the wrong way at the wrong time. They worked hard, but they sure didn’t work smart.  God doesn’t want us to do that.  He doesn’t want us to work hard. Jesus says, “My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” God wants me to work smart.  Simon Peter is a perfect example of the mentality of the hard worker.

When He had stopped speaking, He said to Simon, "Launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch." But Simon answered and said to Him, "Master, we have toiled all night and caught nothing; nevertheless at Your word I will let down the net." And when they had done this, they caught a great number of fish, and their net was breaking (Luke 5:4-6).

Just like Israel in Canaan, Peter was generally doing what he was supposed to be doing.  He was a fisherman.  He has fishing in the right lake.  He had the right kind of boat and the right kind of nets, but he had caught no fish.  What was missing?  It was not until the Lord showed him the exact location and the precise timing that he was successful.  Up until that time they had toiled all night and caught nothing.

ALMOST OBEDIENCE

So often we are very close to being effective for the Lord.  We understand our callings and our spiritual giftings.  Maybe we have even had prophetic confirmation of the work before us.  But we never seem to break through into the kind of blessing, productivity and confidence we know God promises.  Why is that?  The answer is often a hearing problem.  Listening for the voice of God requires a very childlike submission to God that the natural man simply doesn’t like.  We are naturally action oriented.  We are organizers and doers: "Size up the situation, find a plan that worked somewhere else, plug it in here and let’s get on with it."

In order to appreciate Peter’s fishing adventure, we need to put ourselves in his place.  That’s not hard to do because we’re cut from the same cloth he is. That is, until God teaches us otherwise, we place our experience and reasoning ahead of the voice of God. If we expanded Peter's response, it would be something like this:

Look Master, I know fishing. I didn't start doing this yesterday. This is my business and this lake is my territory. I know when to fish and where to fish. If there were any fish here, we would have caught them. We've been at it all night. We need to get some sleep so that we can come back out here tonight.  If we just keep at it, sooner or later we’ll hit it right and catch a few fish. Nevertheless, at Your word I will let down the net.

We can almost hear Simon's tongue click and his eyes roll as he grudgingly submits to Jesus.

We try to force our way through life that way, don’t we: doing what seems right and sensible and prudent and familiar?  In our stubbornness, we take the attitude that, if God wants me to take a different road, he can put up a detour sign. But we can’t hear the voice of God when we’ve got that attitude.  As painful as it is to the flesh, we need to put that earthly, prideful stubbornness to death.  Pride is a major obstacle to hearing the voice of God.  We want to be seen as someone who knows what’s going on, someone who can see the course ahead, someone who is wise, cautious and discerning.  But you don’t have to read the Bible very long to see that most of God’s instructions to his servants were illogical, foolish and outright ridiculous when seen from a natural viewpoint.  Several examples will show how the God’s approach to fruitfulness is specifically designed to break down our pride.

         God’s Tax Payment Schedule.  "Go to the sea, cast in a hook, and take the fish that comes up first. And when you have opened its mouth, you will find a piece of money; take that and give it to them for Me and you" (Matthew 17:27).

         God’s Travel Planning.  "Go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her. Loose them and bring them to Me" (Matthew 21:2).

         God’s Hotel Reservation Method.  "And He sent out two of His disciples and said to them, "Go into the city, and a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him. Wherever he goes in, say to the master of the house, "The Teacher says, "Where is the guest room in which I may eat the Passover with My disciples?"' Then he will show you a large upper room, furnished and prepared; there make ready for us" (Mark 14:13-15).

         God’s Philosophy of Ministry.  "And being assembled together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father" (Acts1:4).

         God’s Plan of Evangelism.  "Now an angel of the Lord spoke to Philip, saying, "Arise and go toward the south along the road which goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza" (Acts 8:26).

         God’s Leadership Selection Process #1.  "So he, trembling and astonished, said, "Lord, what do You want me to do?" Then the Lord said to him, "Arise and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do" (Acts 9:6).

         God’s Leadership Selection Process #2.  "As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, "Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them." (Acts 13:2).

         God’s Plan of Evangelism #2.  "Now when they had gone through Phrygia and the region of Galatia, they were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the word in Asia. After they had come to Mysia, they tried to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit did not permit them. So passing by Mysia, they came down to Troas. And a vision appeared to Paul in the night. A man of Macedonia stood and pleaded with him, saying, "Come over to Macedonia and help us." Now after he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go to Macedonia, concluding that the Lord had called us to preach the gospel to them" (Acts:16:6-10).

For the most part, these instructions are humiliating.  God intends for them to be humiliating.  God wants to put us in situations where, if someone asks why you did that, the only answer you have is “the voice of God told me.” Because until we are humbled and learn to hear His voice, we can’t accomplish His work.  We can do our work, but we can’t do God’s work. So let’s summarize two main points presented so far:

1. Hearing the voice of God is a normal and necessary way that God leads us into his work,

2. Hearing the voice of God is a process designed to make us humble and keep us humble.

HOW TO HEAR GOD WHISPER IN THE STORM

I now want to turn to the question of how we hear the voice of God.  Jesus' analogy of the sheep and their shepherd provides an excellent picture of learning to hear the voice of God.

...he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. And when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. Yet they will by no means follow a stranger, but will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers (John 10:2-5).

The sheep come to know the shepherd’s voice through familiarity, by hearing that voice day in and day out: calling his sheep, giving direction, singing, scolding.  In the same way, the Christian must come to know God’s voice through familiarity.

As I stated above, the written word of God in the Bible and the voice of God to us individually are one and the same.  It is a seamless word and there is no contradiction.  When we study, meditate and meet with God in the Bible, we come to know His voice.  Through the Bible we learn what His voice sounds like.  We learn the voice of God when it is merciful, when it is severe, when it is encouraging, when it rebukes, when it is tender and when it is harsh, when it says move ahead and when it says “Wait.”  For the voice of God is all these things.  It is exactly the same with our family members.  Through familiarity we come to know their voices.  All we need to hear is a sigh or a single syllable and we know what mood they’re in, if they’re tired, happy, sad, content or discouraged.

In the same way, a doctor studies everything he can about the human heart. He listens to recordings of every known heart condition. He listens to patients’ hearts day in and day out. Why does he do this? So that when he listens to your heart he can hear what’s going on. An auto mechanic listens to cars all day and learns which parts make certain noises. Why does he do this? So when you drive in and ask him why your car doesn’t work he can hear what your car is saying?  Familiarity.

The sheep can hear the shepherd’s voice because they know his voice and they do not know the voice of strangers.  There are many other voices all around us competing with the voice of God: earthly wisdom, lies of the enemy, deceitfulness of the flesh, the pride of life.  These voices all compete for our attention and beckon us to follow.

Some of us know these voices very well, but we don’t know the voice of God.  So even when He speaks to us we can’t hear Him.  God’s voice is unfamiliar and drowned out by more familiar voices.  Interestingly, there is a strong correlation between Christians who are strangers to their Bibles and Christians who are constantly in crisis and distress.  God is speaking words of comfort, encouragement and guidance to them, but they can’t hear His voice.  It is strange and distant.

In recent years, a tremendous interest in prophecy has arisen in the church.  Prophecy is a marvelous gift and a source of encouragement and guidance.  But some Christians try to substitute prophecy for the time they should be spending in their Bibles.  They try to sustain themselves exclusively on that diet.  This is a serious error because prophetic prayer ministry and prophetic counseling will be of little value to a Christian who has not learned to feed himself on the word of God.  If I'm sick because of a poor diet and I go to my doctor, he is not going to reach into his bag and pull out a magic pill that will heal me.  He’s going to tell me what foods I must start eating to get well.

The Shepherd calls His sheep by name. God’s sheep are able to hear His voice because they know His voice.  And because they hear His voice He is able to call each one by name.  If we want to walk with God in the high places and hear Him call us by name there is no shortcut around the discipline of Bible reading.  We can’t achieve this with Christian books or sermon tapes or conferences or any other substitute, as useful as these may be in their own right.  We've got to be in the Bible ourselves and asking the Lord to fill up our minds with His thoughts.  That’s the only way to learn to know His voice.

HAVE YOU INSTALLED YOUR SOFTWARE?

There are a variety of ways that God, through His Holy Spirit can call us by name.  God can use an audible voice, an angel, dreams, visions or prophecy.  But the most common way the Lord calls us by name is through Scriptures that we have either memorized or read meditatively.  These benefits are described in Proverbs 6:20-22.

My son, keep your father's command,

And do not forsake the law of your mother.

Bind them continually upon your heart;

Tie them around your neck.

When you walk, they will lead you;

When you sleep, they will keep you;

And when you awake, they will speak with you.

The word of God here is pictured as God’s law which is passed down from generation to generation, parents to children. Note three specific benefits of binding the word of God on our hearts:

         When you walk, they will lead you.  As we go through your day the Scriptures we memorize will guide us through specific encounters and appointments.

         When you sleep, they will keep you.  Demonic dreams, satanic suggestions and night terrors trouble some Christians in their sleep.  Memorizing Scripture provides protection from these attacks.

         And when you awake, they will speak with you.  Did you know that God wants to have a briefing with you each morning on the upcoming day?  The daily horoscope in our newspapers is a demonic counterfeit of what God offers us.  But as in everything, God was first.

Taken all together, we call this process illumination.  It is where the Holy Spirit will quicken a Scripture in its proper context and apply it to a specific situation or decision in my life. And in a way that you can’t describe, but that you know is God, He says, “this is for you right now.”  But of course the requirement for this to happen is that our minds have to be programmed with the word of God.  If we’ve got 99% free disk space on our hard drives then the Holy Spirit hasn’t anything to work with!

God desires to bring us into fruitful work by leading us with His own voice.  But we must choose to make the required investment.  We can set aside the time for prayerful Bible reading, learn to hear the voice of God and walk in our callings; or we can allow the cares and distractions of this world to push God away to the point where His voice is lost among many others.  Ultimately, our decision will make the difference as to whether we work hard or work smart.

Meditation and Response

1. Can you think of a time when ran ahead to serve God on your own terms?  What was the result in your life?

2. When was the last time God gave you some specific direction that you would never have come to yourself?  How did you know it was Him?

3. If you do not read your Bible regularly, start reading schedule today.  Before you read, always ask the Lord to speak to you directly through His written word.

Chapter 4.  The Need to Slow Down

“…that you also aspire to lead a quiet life…” 1 Thessalonians 4:11

“…that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence.” 1 Timothy 2:2

NOT JUST A QUIET TIME, BUT A QUIET LIFE

In order to bear fruit, a Christian must covet solitude.  What I mean by this is that he must jealously guard his life against the whirlwind of distractions that would overwhelm it.  The biblical injunction to lead a quiet life is not a call to forsake the affairs of this present world, but to exert our proper dominion over them.  Jesus, our perfect example, led a quiet life even in the midst of the many demands placed upon Him.  He recognized the importance of intermittent retreat and quiet in maintaining fellowship with His Father.  It was His times of solitude and meditation that allowed Him to do “what He sees the Father do” (John 5:19).  It was this environment of quietude that gave direction to his active work and He moved seamlessly between solitude and action.  We find His interaction with the world measured, intentional and purposeful.  In the same way, the wise disciple will judge the activities that solicit his attention and grant to each the time and place it deserves.  He will learn to see his withdrawal from the world as being as much a contributor to fruitfulness as his participation in it.

But the reality is that Evangelicalism has created an artificial dichotomy separating active and passive obedience.  The Evangelical is more oriented toward viewing outward initiative as the essential trait of true discipleship.  He understands the basic expression of his faith as being intentional action as opposed to passive meditation.  He is uncomfortable with the idea of spending too much time and energy cultivating the inner places of the soul.  We exalt aggressive and practical action in our religion, but attribute little value to reflective solitude.  “What does it accomplish?” we ask.  We would storm the gates of the enemy, but decline to enter into the sitting room of our Lord. For the most part, whatever time we allocate to spiritual life goes to activity rather than solitude.

Christians today have lost perspective of the importance of solitude in fostering fruitfulness.  Like the culture around us, we are becoming increasingly insensitive to the need for quietude.  Instead, we are conditioned to require constant stimulation and activity.  We must have music or television on at all times at home.  We cannot exercise without headsets plugged into our ears.  We cannot travel without reading materials in our hands.  Our weekends are filled from Friday evening to Monday morning.  Our vacations are booked and planned months in advance.  An unscheduled evening is considered “free” and available to be taken up with some amusement or social diversion.

The problem with this picture is not that these activities individually are wrong.  Nor is any one of them necessarily in direct conflict with Christian discipleship. The problem is that the modern Christian has lost his sense of “spiritual equilibrium.”  A decorator knows when too much color, too many pictures and too many pieces of furniture overwhelm a room.  A chef understands that too many ingredients and spices will conflict with each other and ruin a recipe.  But the Christian today does not perceive when his spiritual environment has reached that critical threshold of clutter that is incompatible with fruitfulness.  At best, he settles for an occasional “quiet time” when we are actually called to lead quiet lives.

A quiet life is essential to developing intimacy with Jesus.  It is not possible to develop intimacy simply through allocating scheduled times when we tell Him what we need.  We would not consider this a normal way to relate to family members.  Why do we consider it adequate to live with our Lord this way?  Family members become like one another through being around each other all the time.  In the same way, we conform to the image of Christ by abiding in Christ.  The expression “abiding in Christ” can become an overused spiritual cliché, but it simply means maintaining an environment that allows us to perceive His presence.  Certainly, Jesus is always present with us.  But if we are overwhelmed with other influences clamoring for our attention, then we are hardly aware of Him.  The fruitful disciple must have intimacy with his Lord.  He must learn His ways, His preferences, His promptings and His specific words of guidance.

SOUNDING THE CHARGE TO BATTLES ALREADY WON

The evangelical Protestant is at a peculiar disadvantage in addressing the issue of solitude in his life.  His heritage makes him immediately suspicious of this line of thinking.  Its flavor is too much like Catholic mysticism for his liking.  Solitude is not a highly regarded value in modern evangelical thought.  The values of meditation, contemplation, retreat, isolation and silence are often viewed as being too self-absorbed and self-centered.  Such a focus on personal development is considered to be at odds with the outward-looking call of the Great Commission.

The history of the Protestant struggle against pagan asceticism is largely responsible for Evangelicalism’s lack of interest in the biblical call to a quiet life.  The early Church was heavily infected with pagan heresies condemning the body and its appetites, the physical world, involvement in public commerce and the social orders of marriage and family.  Although well intentioned, the Church mistakenly integrated many of the teachings of these heresies into Christian thinking.  In this way, such practices as celibacy, poverty, self-torture and monasticism came to be seen as the primary avenues to sanctification. The disciple who wished to subdue the flesh and fully submit his soul to God pursued an abandonment of the physical world and its social orders.  Flight from the world rather than transformation of the world became the highest form of Christian devotion and commitment.  A thousand years later, the Protestant Reformation waged and won a bloody war against these distortions of the Christian faith.  It stressed the doctrine of justification by faith over against the attainment of holiness through artificial regimes of self-denial.  It preached Christian liberty in all matters not unlawful as opposed to an authoritarian code of human origin.

The Evangelical is a child born out of this conflict.  He understands the struggle that was fought on his behalf and knows where the battle lines have been drawn.  Yet, as is so often the case with later generations, he continues to sound the call to muster the troops for battles already won.  He too easily raises the banner of Christian liberty even to his own hurt.  In the matter of solitude, he is so focused on displaying his freedom from human law that he neglects to submit to God’s true law (Psalm 119:97).  He would rather disregard the call to solitude than even appear to be subject to the traditions of men.  We call this definition by negation.  It is the practice of identifying ourselves more by what we wish to avoid than by what we want to become.  We fall into this error when we become so preoccupied with avoiding a particular error that we reject the genuine gift of God that we have seen distorted elsewhere.  This is a perilous path for a Christian to follow.  In choosing it, many have missed much blessing and opportunity.  Within modern Evangelicalism, the abuse of Christian liberty is a far greater threat to our spiritual welfare than the prospect of a lapse into medieval asceticism.

The fruitful disciple joyfully subjects himself to the law of solitude.  He extends liberty to all others, but he himself is a bondservant.  He has trained himself to include conditions of solitude in his daily and seasonal schedules.  When he senses that his spiritual environment is overcrowded he quickly submits to the Spirit’s prompting and withdraws.  Many will try to convince him to fill up his schedule with so-called “good and profitable” activities.  Others will judge his discipline as being overly legalistic.  But he knows the value of quietness to his fruitfulness and holds to his course.

Meditation and Response

1. Can you think of a time when the Spirit called you to withdraw or slow down?  What was your response?

2. Ask the Spirit to show you any activities or routines in your life that are keeping you from the quiet life he desires for you.

3. As you move to "de-clutter" your life, ask God to speak guidance into your life regarding a matter that has been difficult to understand.

Chapter 5.  Restoring the Biblical View of Reality

“As he spoke these words, many believed in him.  Then said Jesus to those Jews who believed in him, If you abide in my word, then you are my disciples indeed.” John 8:30-31

WE CAN’T BE DISCIPLES YESTERDAY OR TOMORROW

Christianity, in its essence, is a commitment to following Jesus today.  This is a fundamental principle of fruitfulness, and yet, we constantly find ourselves trying to live either in the past or in the future.  Regarding the past, the Lord is not particularly interested either in our greatest accomplishments or in our worst failures.  Regarding the future, He has that same attitude toward all our great plans for tomorrow. Jesus taught in this passage that discipleship consists of my choices and actions today.  Discipleship is not defined by what I did yesterday or what I plan to do tomorrow.  Jesus neither denied nor confirmed the reality of these Jews’ belief in Him.  But He immediately pointed them to the proving ground of commitment: discipleship. “If you abide in My word, then you are My disciples indeed.”

The act of confessing the lordship of Jesus Christ and believing in Him is essential for receiving eternal life.  James 2:19 reads “You believe that there is one God; You do well: Even the demons believe - and tremble.”  As James says, the person who confesses and believes in Jesus does well, but that step of faith is but the entryway to discipleship.  A confession of faith does not make one a disciple and Jesus made this crystal clear to these Jews.  A disciple is one who continues in the word of Jesus today and every day.

A believer is not the same thing as a disciple.  A believer is defined by what he did yesterday, at a point in time when he made a confession of faith.  A disciple is defined by what he does today, as if today was the only day he had on this earth.  The fact that someone confesses to be a believer tells us nothing at all about his discipleship.  We know something about his past, but his life today is another question altogether.

During his ministry on earth, Jesus was surrounded by believers.  There were meetings where believers numbered in the thousands and crowd management was absolutely impossible.  Jesus had to go out of his way to escape the crowds and avoid being mobbed.  But by the time He went to the cross, He didn’t have many disciples.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A BELIEVER AND A DISCIPLE

There is all the difference in the world between a believer and a disciple.  Jesus was willing to go to the cross and entrust His Church into the care of the disciples who would remain behind.  But He does not place this same trust in believers: “Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, in the feast day, many believed in His name, when they saw the miracles which He did.  But Jesus did not commit Himself unto them, because He knew all men” (John 2:23-24).  Jesus understood that a confession of belief does not make someone a committed servant in whom he could depend.  The majority of the believers who followed Jesus around the countryside eventually lost interest in discipleship and drifted back to their own affairs.

A disciple of Jesus is someone who has committed to following the path Jesus walked.  He suffers the same things Jesus suffered and faces the same insults and humiliations his Master suffered before him.  A believer, on the other hand, still has a foot in both worlds and weighs the cost of every step of commitment as he goes along.  Many of the prominent Jews who met Jesus showed this lack of commitment.  “Nevertheless among the chief rulers also many believed on Him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess Him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue:  For they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God” (John 12:42-43).

Another difference between believers and disciples is that only disciples understand the methods and strategies that Jesus uses to build His kingdom.  A believer will try to accomplish God’s work using man’s ways.  This is seen in the behavior of Simon the sorcerer in Acts 8:9-24:

But there was a certain man called Simon, who previously practiced sorcery in the city and astonished the people of Samaria, claiming that he was someone great, to whom they all gave heed, from the least to the greatest, saying, "This man is the great power of God." And they heeded him because he had astonished them with his sorceries for a long time. But when they believed Philip as he preached the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, both men and women were baptized. Then Simon himself also believed; and when he was baptized he continued with Philip, and was amazed, seeing the miracles and signs which were done. Now when the apostles who were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them, who, when they had come down, prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit.  For as yet He had fallen upon none of them.  They had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit. And when Simon saw that through the laying on of the apostles' hands the Holy Spirit was given, he offered them money, saying, "Give me this power also, that anyone on whom I lay hands may receive the Holy Spirit."  But Peter said to him, "Your money perish with you, because you thought that the gift of God could be purchased with money! You have neither part nor portion in this matter, for your heart is not right in the sight of God. Repent therefore of this your wickedness, and pray God if perhaps the thought of your heart may be forgiven you. For I see that you are poisoned by bitterness and bound by iniquity."  Then Simon answered and said, "Pray to the Lord for me, that none of the things which you have spoken may come upon me."

Before his conversion, Simon understood how to get what he wanted in the world.  He knew how to influence people and make things happen.  But after he believed, none of these skills could be translated into bearing spiritual fruit.  In contrast, Paul describes how the work of the gospel must be done by disciples who understand God’s strategies: “For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience that we conducted ourselves in the world in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God, and more abundantly toward you…For we are not, as so many, peddling the word of God; but as of sincerity, but as from God, we speak in the sight of God in Christ”  (2 Corinthians 1:12; 2:17).

When we look at the growth of the church as it is described in the book of Acts, we see almost no emphasis on the Christians as believers.  Acts is the story of disciples, not of believers.  The word ‘believer’ occurs only once in the book of Acts.  And in that passage Luke is identifying new Christians at the moment of their conversion.  The word ‘disciple’, on the other hand, appears 31 times.  We constantly read about what the disciples did, where they went and how the Spirit empowered them to do God’s work.  The church grew and prospered not because it was filled with believers, but because it was filled with disciples.

We read in Acts 11 that the disciples were first called ‘Christians’ in Antioch.  The people of Antioch observed that these strange people were doing all the things that Jesus had done.  Therefore they called them ‘Christians’ or ‘little Christs,’ which was actually a sarcastic label.  We did not name ourselves.  So from the very beginning, Christians were recognized and named not by what they believed, but by what the world saw them doing.

In fact, if we look at the whole New Testament, we see that the word ‘disciple’ appears 271 times, compared to about three occurrences for ‘believer.’  From this perspective, it is interesting that the word ‘disciple’ is not in the contemporary evangelical vocabulary.  We don’t use it.  We refer to ourselves as Christians or believers, but not as disciples.  The most common and descriptive term for the people of God in the New Testament has been edited from our vocabulary.

This is a telling observation because the western church tends to define itself by what it believes rather than by what it does.  We categorize ourselves into denominations based on belief systems about Jesus rather than by actions and practices.  However, the New Testament takes no interest whatsoever in believing apart from discipleship.  The biblical view of reality is that being and doing are inseparable. This was the ancient Hebrew worldview and it is the biblical worldview: that any entity in the universe does what it is and is what it does.

ARE YOU A SON OF ABRAHAM…OR OF ARISTOTLE?

As Christians, we have to realize that the enemy has cast a great delusion over the world that teaches that thought and action can be conveniently separated.  In the history of western thought, this idea was first put forth by Plato and further developed by Aristotle.  It is the idea that there is an essential reality beyond the physical life we live and observe; that this hidden world of thought and ideas is actually more real than the physical world: “Live any way you like because your true essence in Christ is defined by how you think about him.  This so-called reality is separate from your actual day-to-day life in the material world.” As we can imagine, this philosophy is very attractive to the flesh.  It is also easy to see that, although we cite Plato and Aristotle, the real author of this philosophy is Satan himself.

The early church fathers were very strongly influenced by Aristotle’s philosophy and this pattern of thinking has permeated western thought ever since.  Professional pollsters continue to tell us what percentages of the population believe in the Bible, the resurrection, the existence of Satan, etc.  We’re immersed in this culture that puts such great emphasis on what we think; that if we only think the right things then that defines who we are.

As Jesus continues to rebuke these Jewish leaders, He draws a clear distinction between what we believe and what we do.  They based their argument for authenticity on the faith and obedience of Abraham: "Abraham is our father” (John 8:39).  The complaint Jesus had against them is not that they believed wrongly.  The problem was that their lives did not match their confessions.  “You claim to be Abraham’s sons, but you don’t do the things that he did.  Nothing about your lives gives me reason to connect you to him.  If you’re not doing his works, don’t talk to me about what you claim to be.”

The biblical worldview is clearly set forth in Matt. 7:17-18: “Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.”  In the biblical view of reality, there is simply no concept of a Christian not doing the things of discipleship.  “If you are a good tree, you bear good fruit; if you are a son of Abraham, you do the works of Abraham; if you’re a duck, you quack, swim and paddle.”  We are very prone to fall down in this obligation one inch at a time.  Almost imperceptibly, we drift away from our basic, daily obligations and increasingly try to find our identity in orthodox confession.

Our society is tired of believers.  People are tired of hearing what believers believe.  People are not impressed by a “Jesus” who is simply the object of a belief system.  But people are totally amazed by a “Jesus” who is the center of a committed life lived out before their eyes.  A disciple of Jesus is the most attractive person in the world.  People aren’t tired of them.  What our Lord is saying to us is to make sure that we are doing His works today and every day in the real world that we live in.  We need to avoid the error of being only believers.  Jesus has called us to be disciples.

Meditation and Response

1. What is an area of faith where your practice has been inconsistent with your confession?  Ask God to show you a practical application for your daily life.

2. Think of a recent criticism of the church or Christianity that you have heard in the media.  Was the criticism fair or unfair? Why?

3. Can you think of an example of a worldly strategy that your church uses to accomplish spiritual work?  Think of a better approach to this task and support your answer from the Bible.

Chapter 6.  Wild Grapes: Separating Ourselves from the Works of Darkness

“And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness…” Ephesians 5:11

MAKE SURE YOU READ THE WARNING LABEL

The diligent disciple must often give attention to the negative, as well as to the positive commands of his Master.  Sometimes it is the prohibition that is critical in achieving an objective.  Warnings such as “do not mix these ingredients,” “do not exceed this speed” or “do not remove this cover” are meant to save us from damage and injury.  In this verse we find such a prohibition that is linked to our fruitfulness.  We are to avoid any association with works of darkness.  They are unfruitful by their nature.  They will pollute and sterilize the otherwise fertile soil of our spiritual lives.

This principle illustrates the folly of exerting positive effort to bring forth fruit while, at the same time, exposing ourselves to works of darkness that will suppress its growth.  Yet in our minds, we easily divorce these two practices, imagining that we can successfully keep them apart and unmingled.  We ignore the reality that a spring cannot send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening (James 3:11).

God has thoroughly prepared us to bear fruit.  The Christian has the Spirit of God living within him and is, by nature, fruitful.  If he abides in Christ (John 15), that is, if he keeps his relationship with Christ in reasonably good repair, then he will bear fruit.  God’s thorough preparation of his people for fruitfulness is beautifully shown in Isaiah’s parable of the vineyard:

A song of my Beloved regarding His vineyard:

My Well-beloved has a vineyard

On a very fruitful hill.

He dug it up and cleared out its stones,

And planted it with the choicest vine.

He built a tower in its midst,

And also made a winepress in it;

So He expected it to bring forth good grapes,

But it brought forth wild grapes.

"And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah,

Judge, please, between Me and My vineyard.

What more could have been done to My vineyard

That I have not done in it?

Why then, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes,

Did it bring forth wild grapes?  (Isaiah 5:1-4)

“What more could have been done to My vineyard that I have not done in it?” the Lord asks rhetorically.  The parable makes it clear that God has provided all the ingredients necessary for fruit: good soil, choice vines and careful tending of the vineyard.  But somehow foreign vines have taken root the vineyard.  And what is more: these vines have not been introduced by an enemy as in the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares, but by God’s own people.  The result is wild grapes useless for any good purpose.  This imagery teaches us that we bear fruit not so much by what we do, but rather by what we avoid.

If wild grapes are planted in the vineyard, nothing else matters: not the quality of the soil, not the quality of the vines, not the efforts of the vinedresser.  If we want to bear fruit for Jesus, guarding the purity of the vineyard is more important than tending the vines.  Or to put it plainly: keeping my life unstained from the pollution of the world is more important than the things I try to do to bear fruit.  When we consider the whole picture of the parable, this is obvious.  The vines are good, the soil is good, God tends the vineyard, He prunes the vines.  But if we plant wild grapes...

WHAT ARE YOU POURING ON YOUR GARDEN?

The following parable illustrates how this applies in our lives.

There was a man who had a bare patch of ground on his property and he decided that he would plant a garden so that he could have some vegetables in the fall.  So he cleared out the rocks and weeds, broke up the soil, hoed the soil into rows, planted his seeds and watered the garden.

The following week, he was changing the oil on his car.  He had always dumped the waste oil on that patch of ground so, without giving it much thought, he poured the oil on his garden.  When the plants finally started to emerge, they had a strange color and low vigor so he decided to see what the garden store had to say.  They recommended some fertilizer that would supplement any minerals that the soil might be lacking.  So he applied the fertilizer and felt sure that the garden would flourish now.

The following week, the man was painting his house.  He had always dumped used paint thinner on that patch of ground so, without giving it much thought, he poured the paint thinner on his garden.  The plants now started to show definite signs of distress and were droopy and yellow.  So he decided to see what the garden store had to say.  They recommended some manure that would enrich the organic content of the soil and keep it moist.  So he applied the manure and felt sure that the garden would flourish now.

The following week, the man was refinishing furniture.  He had always dumped the used varnish remover on that patch of ground so, without giving it much thought, he poured the varnish remover on his garden.  The plants were now in real trouble.  The leaves had holes and brown spots and many plants had died.  So he decided to see what the garden store had to say.  They recommended Dr. Greenthumb’s Super-Grow Miracle Tablets which were guaranteed to jumpstart any garden.  So he applied the tablets and felt sure that the garden would flourish now.  But despite the fertilizer, manure and the miracle tablets, the garden continued to go downhill.  Only a few of the plants were still alive at harvest time and none of them produced any edible fruit.

The folly of this man is clear and we can see it easily.  How could he be so foolish to think that the treatments he was buying at the garden store would overcome the impacts of the poisons that he was pouring on his garden?  The man lived in two realities. On one hand, he had dedicated that patch of ground to a new purpose.  On the other hand, he was polluting the ground the way he always had previously.

The poison that this man poured on his garden was a much larger factor in the final outcome than the fertilizers.  If he had simply avoided polluting his garden with engine oil, paint thinner and varnish remover, he would have had a fruitful harvest.  Even without the fertilizers, the plants would have produced a good crop.  The extra fertilizers might have given the garden a boost, but the critical thing was to avoid polluting his garden in the first place.

The flesh deceives us to act just like this gardener.  It prompts us to be double minded.  It entices us to pollute our lives with things we shouldn’t get involved in and then turn away and imagine that we’re going to do things for God and somehow bear fruit.  James describes this person in 1:23-24: “For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.”  If I am polluting my life with things I do, things I watch, things I read and places I go; I can’t just turn aside temporarily, attend a whiz-bang Christian conference for a few days and think that the equation is somehow going to produce a fruitful harvest.

We are to discern those things that we allow into “our garden.”  We are to separate good from evil and maintain a wall that keeps the evil from polluting our garden and rendering it fruitless. The Bible, from beginning to end, reveals a God who separates and divides.  He began his creative work by separating in Gen 1:4: “And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.”  He will conclude his work of judgment by separating in Rev. 22:14-15: “Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city. But outside are dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie.”  God is always separating: light from darkness, good from evil, the holy from the profane, the righteous from the unrighteous.

A BLACK AND WHITE VIEW OF THE WORLD

But whereas God separates good from evil, the world places everything on a relative scale somewhere between the two.  God would have us view the world in terms of good and evil, whereas the world would have us only see shades of grays: “some things are not so bad; others are a little better. Whatever works for you.  No boundaries, no limits.”  How many of us like being called a black-and-white thinker?  It’s an insult, isn’t it?  We much prefer to think of ourselves as enlightened, as reasonable, as open-minded, as balanced.  We even fool ourselves into believing that people will be attracted to Jesus if we can show them how much we have in common with the world.

Do you know what the Bible says about all this?  It instructs us: "Come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you" (2 Corinthians 6:17).  There is nothing very balanced or open minded about that command, is there?  We don’t like calling things unclean.  It makes us stand out as different, strange and narrow-minded.

THERE’S NO LIBERTY FOR A BONDSERVANT

The Christian who would bear fruit must get past this attitude and take on the role of a bondservant. A bondservant considers only his master’s priorities and not his own preferences.  He jealously guards his vineyard and asks, “What affect will this thing have on my harvest.”  He separates that which will destroy his harvest from that which will enhance it.  The immature Christian, on the other hand, asserts his right to partake.  “There’s no law against this.  No one can tell me what I can let into my vineyard.” The immature Christian is concerned with what things he is allowed to do much like a child is concerned with what freedoms he is allowed: how late he can stay up, how long he can stay at his friend's house, how much he is allowed to spend. The concept of Christian liberty is very prominent in the immature Christian’s decisions.

Proper management of our Christian liberty is essential to our fruitfulness.  The definition of Christian liberty is freedom from being judged by others in matters of faith and conduct above what is clearly set forth in the Bible.  Liberty describes the horizontal relationship between two persons of equal status.  In the context of our Christian faith, it means that one person may not impose his own standards of conduct on another.  I do not have authority to tell a Christian brother what movies to watch, or another how to invest his money or another how many nights a week to spend at home, or another how to spend his leisure time, or another what he can eat and drink.

But just because we don’t have to listen to each other, it doesn’t mean we don’t have to listen to the Holy Spirit.  Liberty has absolutely nothing to do with a Christian’s vertical relationship with the Holy Spirit.  If we bring every choice before the Holy Spirit He will tell us exactly what can stay and what has to go.  Liberty plays a very minor role in the bondservant’s decision making.  He maintains his right to Christian liberty, but he rarely appeals to it.  When he makes his choices, he no longer asks "Do I have the freedom in Christ to do this?  He asks instead "How will this choice affect my fruitfulness?"

When we are uncertain about any course of action, Paul's admonition in Philippians 4:8 provides a marvelous standard.  I call it the Holy Spirit filter:

Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy--meditate on these things.

Whatever can pass through this filter can enter our vineyard.  If it can’t pass through this filter, then it’s got no business in our lives.

What have you let into your vineyard?  What are you reading that has no place on your shelf?  What impurities do you allow your eyes to behold that go down into your very soul?  What do you allow into your physical body that desecrates God’s holy temple?  What path do your feet tread where you would be ashamed to walk arm in arm with Jesus?  If you feel the Holy Spirit "leaning on you" in these matters, then you may have some business to take care of with Him.  Pull those wild vines out of your vineyard!  Close the gates, repair the broken wall and allow God’s fruit to come forth.

Meditation and Response

1. Within your own Christian culture, can you identify three forms of "spiritual pollution" that are largely ignored?  Why do you think these practices are tolerated?

2. Identify a sin that the world views as "not really being that bad."  How would you say the world's opinion on this matter influences Christian thinking?

3. Ask the Holy Spirit to show you any habits or practices in your life that you need to forsake in order to move forward in your spiritual maturity.

Chapter 7.  Weeds in the Field: Getting Our Finances in Order

hoard    (hôrd, hrd) n. A hidden fund or supply stored for future use

"…the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.” Matthew 13:22

THE ENTANGLED SOLDIER

The real danger of money for the Christian is not so much addiction to the pleasures it can provide, but the deceitfulness of money itself.  The Christian who ignores God’s principles for money management will soon have his perspectives distorted.  He will seek his security in that which can bring no security.  He will fear that which cannot touch him and he will see great value in those things that are worthless.  It is through these deceptions that the mismanagement of money prevents Christians from walking in fruitful discipleship with Jesus and ultimately leads to barrenness.

The New Testament is explicit regarding the disastrous effects money can have on our fruitfulness: “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24).  This statement is not a prohibition, but an observation of fact.  Note that Jesus does not say, “You may not serve God and mammon.”  If Jesus had prohibited us from serving God and mammon, then we could conclude that serving these two masters simultaneously is a possibility.  But He says “You cannot serve God and mammon.”  What He means by this is that it is an impossibility.  It is inconsistent with our natures.

Paul expressed the same sentiment in 2 Timothy 2:4: “No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier.”  ‘Entangle’ is a very expressive metaphor.  It provides the perfect picture of what the apostle wants to say.  The dictionary definition of 'entangle' is: “To twist together or entwine into a confusing mass.”  The soldier who entangles himself with the affairs of this life has his obligations so confused that he can no longer focus on his primary objective: that of pleasing Him Who enlisted him as a soldier.

TWO COMMON CHRISTIAN MONEY MYTHS

However, the Bible clearly recognizes that we must deal with money during our time on this earth, so where do we cross the line?  Exactly what practices constitute the entanglement and servitude that Scripture warns against?   In comparing what the Bible says about money to what we commonly teach ourselves about money, what emerges is a popular, evangelical catechism that is an impure mixture of Bible doctrine, eastern philosophy and ancient Roman law.  The result of this blending is that we often condemn ourselves on points where Jesus would not condemn us and we justify ourselves in matters where He would rebuke us.  So I want to begin by examining two common errors regarding the Christian and his relationship to money.

The first error is asceticism.  This is the practice of pursuing poverty as a means of achieving spiritual purity.  It had its origins in Middle Eastern philosophy and spread into the early church through the monastic orders.  Asceticism teaches that a person is sanctified through separating himself from all material enjoyments: money, sex, wine, good foods, property, worldly ambition, etc.  While asceticism bears the outward appearance of self-denial, it is, in reality, intensely inward looking and self-centered.  The ascetic is narrowly focused on his own condition to the neglect of the Great Commission’s call to “go therefore and make disciples of all the nations.”  The legacy of asceticism remains even in post-Reformation thought today, causing many Christians to suspect that money is somehow dirty and unspiritual.  While they readily accept the affluence afforded them by western society, they suffer from a false guilt that they really should not enjoy their prosperity too much.

But the truth is that God gives money as a blessing and source of enjoyment to His people.  In contrast to the error of asceticism, several scriptures show that God gives money to His people for their pleasure.  Proverbs 3:9 reads, “Honor the Lord with your possessions, and with the firstfruits of all your increase; so your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will overflow with new wine.”  The same high view of material blessing is found in Ecclesiastes 5:18-19: “It is good and fitting for one to eat and drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labor in which he toils under the sun all the days of his life which God gives him; for it is his heritage. As for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth, and given him power to eat of it, to receive his heritage and rejoice in his labor--this is the gift of God.”  Jesus was entirely consistent with these Old Testament teachings in Mark 10:29-30:

‘I tell you the truth,’ Jesus replied, ‘no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age (homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—and with them, persecutions) and in the age to come, eternal life.’

The second error that has crept into the church comes from ancient Roman law and is the concept of absolute free enterprise: that a person is totally free to use his own money and property any way he wishes without constraint or interference from any other party.  Evangelicalism has recruited this idea to support the concept that God doesn’t care what we do with our money, as long as we “have the right attitude toward it.”  I call this an error because the common teaching we hear today is that, once I present my offering to God, the remainder is mine to manage however I please.  This idea is a departure from the biblical concept of stewardship: that the remainder as well as the offering belong to God and must be managed according to His instructions and principles.

FOLLOW THE MONEY

Evangelicalism presents very little instruction on what God requires of the portion we keep for ourselves.  This quote from an actual published sermon on wealth illustrates this viewpoint perfectly: "[Jesus’] concern is with our attitude towards wealth. It is not what a man has, but what he thinks of what he has, that matters to Jesus. There is nothing wrong in having wealth, even enormous wealth; what counts is a person's attitude towards that wealth."  The Bible’s teaching about money is exactly the opposite of this myth.  Whereas the myth claims that a man can choose what attitude he will have toward his money, the Bible teaches that his attitude will follow after his money.

The clearest verse stating this truth is Matt 6:21, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”  This is such a simple, unambiguous statement!  Jesus described the way our hearts really work.  He warns us that mismanaged money quickly ensnares and enslaves us.  Yet the myth is repeated constantly: that Christians can put their treasures in one place and somehow direct their hearts in a different direction.  And so we end up with these two strangely contradictory misconceptions: (1) that we have liberty to do as we please with our money and can still keep our hearts pure towards God, and yet, (2) we would really be better off spiritually if we separated ourselves from God’s material blessings.

GO TO THE ANT

The watershed of God’s direction for money management is divided into two biblically defined practices: ‘storing’ and ‘hoarding.’    These practices are contrasted very precisely in the Bible and, once we understand what they mean, we get a clear picture of what the Lord requires of us in our money management.

Storing is the practice of setting aside sufficient resources to last through one’s normal economic cycle.  By ‘economic cycle’ I refer to the normal interval of one’s income or harvest.  Ancient Israel was an agrarian culture that harvested crops in certain seasons and then stored the harvest for use during the rest of the year. So Israel’s economic cycle was the agricultural year.  This cycle required the people to build barns to store enough supplies to see them through to next year’s harvest. The Bible views wise planning and prudent storing of the required supplies to be a positive virtue.  "In the house of the wise are stores of choice food and oil, but a foolish man devours all he has" (Proverbs 21:20).  "Go to the ant, you sluggard; consider its ways and be wise! It has no commander, no overseer or ruler, yet it stores its provisions in summer and gathers its food at harvest" (Proverbs 6:6-8).

We apply the principle of storing to our own circumstances depending on our cycle of income.  The one who receives a paycheck every two weeks must plan and store his money until the next payday.  The one who is self-employed with a more irregular income must store more than that.  The farmer who harvests two crops a year needs to store his harvest income until the next harvest six months away.  The point we want to see here is that the biblical concept of storing is limited to what a person needs for the term of this recurring income cycle.

A GRIEVOUS EVIL UNDER THE SUN

Now let’s contrast storing to hoarding.  We can think of hoarding as an abuse of storing and is defined as “the allocation of wealth to a hidden fund or supply stored for future use.”   Inherent in the concept of hoarding are two assumptions: (1) the availability of wealth surplus to the requirement of my economic cycle and (2) the fear of a future shortage of supply.  Hoarding is always tied to fear and anxiety about the future.  The owner chooses to direct his surplus into a future supply fund rather than re-circulating it into some immediate use.  The Bible’s condemnation of hoarding is clearly seen in several Scriptures:

         “People curse the man who hoards grain, but blessing crowns him who is willing to sell”  (Proverbs 11:26).

         “I have seen a grievous evil under the sun: wealth hoarded to the harm of its owner” (Ecclesiastes 5:13).

         "’They do not know how to do right,’ declares the LORD , ‘who hoard plunder and loot in their fortresses’" (Amos 3:10).

         ”Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days” (James 5:3).

The point where we cross the line from storing into hoarding is where we take income that is surplus to our present need and set it aside for the purpose of removing the uncertainty of future need.  God forbids this use of our money.  This is precisely how the rich fool got into trouble.

Then He spoke a parable to them, saying: "The ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully. And he thought within himself, saying, 'What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops?' So he said, "I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I will store all my crops and my goods. And I will say to my soul, "Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry."' But God said to him, "Fool! This night your soul will be required of you; then whose will those things be which you have provided?' "So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God" (Luke 12:16-21).

We see the principles of both storing and hoarding in operation in this parable.  The original barns that the man tore down were of the normal size required for storing as we have already discussed.  At this point, God has no complaint against him.  The man did not oppress the poor, nor did he acquire his wealth dishonestly.  He is free to enjoy God’s material blessing (asceticism rejected).  But once the man acquired wealth surplus to the needs of his harvest cycle, he violated God’s prohibitions against hoarding and laid up enough provision for many years (absolute free enterprise rejected).

Another application of hoarding is the principle of manna.  Manna was the miraculous food that God provided every night for the children of Israel when they were wandering in the wilderness.  God’s purpose in sending the manna was to train Israel to depend on his daily provision and to have no fear for the future.

This is the thing which the LORD has commanded: "Let every man gather it according to each one's need, one omer for each person, according to the number of persons; let every man take for those who are in his tent."' Then the children of Israel did so and gathered, some more, some less. So when they measured it by omers, he who gathered much had nothing left over, and he who gathered little had no lack. Every man had gathered according to each one's need. And Moses said, "Let no one leave any of it till morning." Notwithstanding they did not heed Moses. But some of them left part of it until morning, and it bred worms and stank. And Moses was angry with them (Exodus 16:16-20).

Israel’s economic cycle during this period was 24 hours.  In this setting, hoarding was defined as keeping more manna than was required for that day.  God’s condemnation of hoarding is seen in that the leftover manna bred worms and stank.

Hoarding has become the unspoken “acceptable” sin within Evangelicalism. It is a debilitating sin that robs the church of financial resources, blinds Christians to their peculiar callings, and dulls their spirits to the needs around them.  Hoarding is practiced under various benign terms such as “saving,” “investing,” and “retirement planning.”  We defend these practices by calling them sensible, realistic and responsible.  But in reality, hoarding is blatant disobedience.  The result is fear, anxiety, spiritual dullness, poverty of resources for God’s work, the onset of rationalism toward God’s word, and unfruitfulness.  Despite the many Scriptures that speak directly against hoarding, it is widely practiced and seldom rebuked.

HOW RICHES DECEIVE US

I want to list four impacts of hoarding on a Christian's life:

1. Hoarding draws a Christian away from the biblical injunction to live for today.

"Therefore do not worry, saying, "What shall we eat?' or "What shall we drink?' or "What shall we wear?' For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble” (Matthew 6:31-34).  Jesus could hardly have spoken more plainly: Don’t worry about what you will eat, drink or wear.  Seek the Kingdom of God and all of your needs will be supplied.

2. Hoarding dulls the Christian’s spirit towards the call to bear fruit.  “Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful” (Matthew 13:22). Notice especially how Jesus calls riches deceitful.  Mammon is deceitful because it reverses the role of master and servant.  Do you notice how the world tells us that when we hoard, our money is working for us.  But Jesus says just the opposite.  When we hoard, we are serving mammon, not the other way around.  Why is that?  Because when we hoard, we never have enough.  Ecclesiastes 5:10 says, “Whoever loves money never has money enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income.”  Hoarded money chokes the fruitfulness of the word because the owner becomes obsessed with tending it, growing it and keeping it safe.

Proverbs 23:5 says, “Cast but a glance at riches, and they are gone, for they will surely sprout wings and fly off to the sky like an eagle.”  The man who hoards is always worrying that his wealth will do exactly that.  Will it be secure?  Will it be stolen?  Will it be lost through inflation, business failure, market crash, or fraud?  He has no time to attend to the fruitfulness of the word.  He has stored his wealth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal and it demands his full attention.

3. Hoarding produces fear, anxiety and restlessness.  “The sleep of a laboring man is sweet, whether he eats little or much; but the abundance of the rich will not permit him to sleep” (Ecclesiastes 5:12).  "Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them” (Matthew 6:25).  Hoarded treasure allows us no rest; we can never get it out of our minds even when we try to sleep.

4. Hoarding leads us into an unbiblical attitude of isolation and independence from God. Proverbs 18:11 says, “The rich man's wealth is his strong city, and like a high wall in his own esteem.”  The retirement industry has programmed Christians to walk in lock-step with the world:  “Build up your hoard during 40 years on the job and then, if you get there, you can live for ten or twenty years in your own airtight fortress without depending on anybody.”  Is this the picture we find in the Bible?

God says to us, “Enjoy My world.  Enjoy its riches, its bounty; satisfy yourself with all of the good things that money can give you.  I’ll give you all you need.  But don't hoard.  Don't try to make yourself independent of Me.”  The man who hoards cannot hear the call of God on his life because he has already built his future in his own mind.  He must manage and protect his hoard today and then spend it tomorrow.  How can he hear the voice of God calling him to the work of the kingdom?

What can we believe God for?  We pray in the Lord’s Prayer, “Give us this day our daily bread.”  Can we believe God for our daily bread?  That’s a simple enough thing to believe in, isn’t it?  I could ask 10,000 Christians that question and every one would answer 'Yes, Absolutely'!  Why then do so many of us hoard up for the last days as if our God is made of wood or stone?  The answer is unbelief.  Unbelief!  For if we cannot believe God for our daily bread, then how can we believe in Him to save the lost, heal the sick and raise the dead?  The sad answer is that we cannot.  This is the cost of hoarding.  For if we can’t believe God for money, then we can’t believe Him for anything.

Meditation and Response

1. In what ways do you find that money brings anxiety into your life?  In what ways do you find it a blessing?

2. Review your own money management in light of the storing/hoarding distinction.  Ask the Spirit to show you any changes you should make in how you handle your finances.

3. Can you think of a time when your use of money produced guilt?  Was this false guilt created by a wrong view of money or genuine guilt brought on by the Holy Spirit?

Chapter 8.  The Destructive Power of the Tongue

My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.  For we all stumble in many things.  If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body.  Indeed, we put bits in horses' mouths that they may obey us, and we turn their whole body.  Look also at ships: although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires.  Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how great a forest a little fire kindles!  And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity.  The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell.  For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and creature of the sea, is tamed and has been tamed by mankind.  But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.  With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so.  James 3:1-10

HOW TO BE PERFECT

When we think of factors that determine our fruitfulness, taming the tongue does not come to mind.  On the surface, there seems to be nothing especially critical about keeping our tongues under control.  When we think of advancing the work of the church and the kingdom of God, we immediately think of more high profile ministries: evangelism, healing, spiritual warfare or prophetic intercession.  I have never heard of a conference on taming the tongue.  And yet the truth is that our untamed tongues will do more to inhibit fruitfulness than all of these other ministries will ever do to advance it.

The religious man is naturally inclined to want to do visible, exciting things for God and ignore the routine, hidden duties. But the spiritual man is called to be faithful in the small details of holiness so that God can put him in charge of greater things. We can think of many examples in our everyday lives where the basics are the key to success. The doctor tells us to eat moderately, exercise and get plenty of sleep if we want good health.  The mechanic tells us to change our oil every 3,000 miles if we want the engine to last.  The dentist tells us to floss every day if we want to keep our teeth.  These warnings all have the same message: if we don't keep up with the basics, there is no magic bullet that is going to compensate for our neglect.  The management of our tongues is exactly like that in our spiritual lives.  Whatever good things we want to see happen will be thwarted if we do not tame our tongues.

James explains that “If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body.”  Now this is an extraordinary statement!  If the apostle had left the first part of this sentence blank, what might we speculate makes a perfect man?  That he resists all temptations that come upon him?  That he sells all he has and gives it to the poor?  That he prays day and night?  That he devotes himself to good works and denies his own pleasure?

But James bypasses these obvious “spiritual” answers and focuses instead on our tongues.  An untamed tongue will quickly render ineffective all the other works, prayers and offerings we make to God.  James goes on, “See how great a forest a little fire kindles!  And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity.  The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body.”  This principle can apply to an individual or to a whole church.  All of our efforts at ministry, evangelism, encouragement, prayer, reconciliation and service will be defiled if our tongues are out of control.

WHAT WORDS DO

We are all familiar with the saying, “Actions speak louder than words.”  But the Bible does not say this.  James tells us in Chapter 2 that words of faith without works are dead and hypocritical.  But he immediately follows in Chapter 3 with the warning that a few idle, evil words will destroy our works completely.  Our words speak very loudly, so we need to understand how to be good stewards of our tongues.  In order to see why our use of words is so important, we need to first look at an overview of the biblical view of words themselves: what they are, where they come, and the power they have.

Psalm 33:6,9 reads: “By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth...For he spoke, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.”  There are two fundamental principles of speech we need to see here: (1) words have their origin in the spiritual realm.  God, who is Spirit and who exists eternally before all created matter, in His wisdom, decreed that the universe would come into existence at the command of His word; (2) His word has power, it calls into existence that which was not, it forms order out of chaos, it names that which was unnamed.

The most distinctive feature of the Christian view of the universe is the belief that there is an invisible spiritual realm that controls and gives definition to the observable physical realm.  In contrast to this principle, anyone who has been educated in any public institution in western society during the last 150 years has been taught in no uncertain terms that the physical universe is a closed system; that the physical forces that we can observe and measure are only influenced by other physical forces that we can observe and measure.  Now this is a very good way to do science.  In fact, science must be done this way.  In my work as a forester, I base my practice on the assumption that the physical world can be observed and measured, and that the physical world is going to behave the same way tomorrow that it does today.  This scientific method has made possible the standard of living that we enjoy today.

But the secular worldview that dominates in western thought today has gone further than this.  It has emphatically stated that this observable, physical universe is all there is: “Talk about God and heaven if it makes you feel better about the meaning of life.  But don’t talk to us about the spiritual realm and the physical realm interacting and influencing each other.  We can’t see it, we can’t measure it and we don’t want to know about it.”

Now the reason I’m bringing all this up is not to try to argue the Christian viewpoint to the secular skeptic.  But I want to point out that, as Christians, we live in this intellectual environment all the time and, if we’re not careful, we fall into this same mindset that declares the physical realm to be more real than the spiritual realm.  But the Bible declares, “By the word of the Lord the heavens were made.”  Words have power to call into existence that which was not.  James tells us that we have been made in the likeness of God.  We are like God.  Two aspects of this likeness come to bear on the subject of speech.  First, God has bestowed a measure of His authority on man and made him a steward over His creation.  Second, God has made us unique among all His creatures in that, like Him, we have the facility of speech.  We use words.

This combination of authority and speech is clearly seen in Genesis 2:19: “Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them.  And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name.”  Do you know that you exert this same authority over creation?  God makes us stewards over different relationships in his creation. He gives us friends, brothers, sisters, co-workers, government leaders, husbands and wives.  And whenever we speak of someone in a particular way, we exert influence on him to become like that. God has bestowed this authority on our words, whether we are conscious of it or not.

BINDING AND LOOSING

Every one of us has had things spoken over us in the course of our lives that have had tremendous influence and power.  There have been words of encouragement, guidance, edification and motivation that have empowered us to accomplish and achieve.  But we can also recall words of ridicule, accusation, slander and insult that pulled us down and pointed us toward failure and hopelessness.  Words are not just ideas that vanish into the past once they are released.  But they carry enduring authority, either to bless or to curse.  Words have tremendous power.  Perhaps the most direct declaration of this truth is in Proverbs 18:21: “Death and life are in the power of the tongue.”  Depending on how we speak of another person, we can bring him life or we can kill him.

Another aspect of the interaction between the spiritual realm and the physical realm is spiritual warfare. The Bible constantly reminds us of the ongoing spiritual warfare between the forces of God and the forces of Satan.  In the context of spiritual warfare, the spiritual realm is referred to as the heavenly places, the heavenlies or sometimes, simply heaven.  Even though God’s final victory is assured, there are real battles being fought over regions, over countries, over cities and over individuals.  And God has called us to participate in this spiritual warfare using words. Ephesians 6:12 says, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.”  God has given us authority to influence the outcome of this battle.  We are to wrestle against these powers.

Matthew 16:19 shows us how this authority is applied, “And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." This declaration made to Peter is our inheritance as the church and it is a foundational statement about our words and their authority in spiritual warfare. The expression “binding and loosing” has its origin in a practice in ancient Israel of bringing a difficult question of conduct before a rabbi.  The rabbi considered the matter and then rendered a judgment as to whether a particular proposed course of action would be forbidden or permitted.  If he forbade the person from going ahead with the action, he was said to “bind” it.  But if he gave permission for the action, we was said to “loose” it.

So what the Lord is saying to Peter here is that our words carry authority to influence and direct the course of spiritual warfare in the heavenlies.  The forces of Satan are intent on spreading murder, suffering, spiritual blindness, confusion and destruction.  If we speak and pray words of life, of edification, of hope, of encouragement, of mercy, of forgiveness, of reconciliation, then the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places are weakened and driven back.  It is in this way that we bind them; that we prohibit them from carrying out their objectives.

If, on the other hand, gossip, slander, whispering, grumbling, faultfinding, complaining, backbiting and divisiveness characterize our speech, then Satan’s forces are strengthened and released to accomplish their objectives within the physical realm.  Or, as Jesus says, they are loosed.  As an example, one of the sad realities of Evangelicalism is the short tenure of pastors.  So many pastors move from one church to another throughout their careers or leave the ministry altogether.  Several years ago, I recall hearing of one denomination where the average term of a pastor was two years.  These pastors were defeated not by their workloads, but by the words of their own people.  They were cursed in the spiritual realm and doomed to failure by those who whisper and find fault.  Yet these people are largely ignorant of the tremendous power of their words to release the forces of hell against their pastors.  We must not whisper or grumble against our spiritual leaders.  If we have an issue, we must take it to them directly.  If we still can’t abide with how they see things, we should go someplace else.  Don’t stay and grumble against them in secret.  The stakes are too high.

OPENING OUR MOUTHS IS SERIOUS BUSINESS

Now given this understanding about the power of our words, let’s consider the matter of gossip.  Gossip is defined as critical talk about another person, regardless of fact, that does not have the specific intent of impacting that person in a positive manner.  Notice two things about gossip: (1) Gossip does not require the specific intention of harming another person.  Speaking critically about another person qualifies as gossip simply if we have no productive reason for doing so.  This points to the false view that there are three categories of words:  words that build up, words that hurt and words that are neutral.  But there is actually no neutral speech.  Everything we say is either helpful or hurtful. Everything we say either builds up or tears down.  Everything we say either advances the kingdom of God or impedes it.  So if we find ourselves droning on, and if we find that the subject of our conversation is someone who is not there, we need to be especially watchful.  Proverbs 10:19 gives us a sober warning: “When words are many, sin is not absent, but he who holds his tongue is wise.” (2) Gossip can be composed of true facts.  But if the hearer has no reason to learn of those facts, the communication is gossip.

An examination of several reasons that people gossip can be helpful in diagnosing its presence in conversation.

         Because of pride: the desire to demonstrate to a third party that we have discernment about what’s really going on with someone.

         For self-advancement: the desire to emphasize that someone has more problems, weaker character, poorer judgment, less intelligence or a worse attitude than I do.

         Because of low self-esteem: the desire to pull someone down to my level.

         To gain acceptance: the desire to gain approval from someone who will be sympathetic to my opinion.

         Because of jealousy: the desire to harm someone I envy.

         Because of bitterness: the desire to injure someone who has injured me.

We can train ourselves to hold up our words about other people against this checklist.  And if it fails at any point, it is probably gossip.

Opening our mouths is serious business.  And yet, we are called to open our mouths and speak forth God's words of life.  What makes the management of our tongues so difficult is that the proper use of our tongues can seem so similar to the wrong use of our tongues.  We are called to teach, to discern, to judge, to pray, to prophecy, to exhort, to counsel.  Yet almost before we realize it, prayer can turn into gossip, discernment becomes faultfinding and judgment becomes divisiveness.  It is hard to imagine a narrower road than the course of pure and edifying speech, however following some basic guidelines can help us manage our tongues:

         If you don’t need to talk about someone don’t.  If I train my conscience in these principles, it will generally tell me when I am crossing over the line.  “A talebearer reveals secrets, But he who is of a faithful spirit conceals a matter” (Proverbs 11:13).

         Discipline yourself not to listen to gossip.  You may hurt some feelings once in a while, but you will build up the church.  “He who goes about as a talebearer reveals secrets; Therefore do not associate with one who flatters with his lips” (Proverbs 20:19).

         Let your praise and encouragement be genuine and let your criticism be necessary.  “Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers” (Ephesians 4:29).

         Husbands and wives: practice godly speech with your spouse.  Don’t think that all these principles are suspended within the bond of marriage.  Filter what you say to each other just as you would with anybody else. “Nevertheless let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband” (Ephesians 5:33).

In Matthew 12:36, Jesus issues a warning that reflects on the weighty responsibility of our tongues: “But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment.”  On the surface this seems strange and unfitting.  Will not the Lord have great crimes and injustices to attend to in the day of judgment?  Will he not have His hands full with issues so much more serious than words we have long forgotten?  But when we consider the power, the authority, the great capacity to deal life or death with our words, we come to understand what a solemn responsibility he has given us.

So let us be careful in using this amazing gift of the tongue.  Let us offer praise when all we hear is condemnation.  Let us speak of hope when we are surrounded by cynicism.  Let us speak healing when it is fashionable to maim and tear down.  And finally, let us remember that it only takes one idle word to destroy a life that God has created in His own likeness.

Meditation and Response

1. Can you think of some typical situations in your life when you are tempted to gossip?  How can you better manage your tongue in these settings?

2. How does this view of the authority of your words change your perspective on the power of prayer?

3. We are called to edify, or build up one another (1 Thessalonians 5:11).  Ask the Lord to show you specific words of edification to speak to those close to you.

Chapter 9.  The Bitterness that Defiles Many

“Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Thus no spring yields both salt water and fresh.” James 3:11-12

"Look carefully lest anyone fall short of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up cause trouble, and by this many become defiled; lest there be any fornicator or profane person like Esau, who for one morsel of food sold his birthright.” Hebrews 12:15-16

A HURT THAT CAN’T BE RESTORED

We all realize that personal hurt and betrayal are an unfortunate part of life.  As we move beyond such an injury, only two roads are available to us: forgiveness or bitterness.  Bitterness is defined as an intense hostility or hatred.  But the particular aspect of bitterness that distinguishes it from hatred is that it is an affliction of the victim.  Bitterness is a hatred generated by an injury that cannot be restored.  Bitterness always involves an irreversible hurt to the victim.  “I was hurt.  I was robbed.  I was betrayed.  And I can never get back to that previous state.”  The injury is fixed in history and it cannot be undone.

Another peculiar aspect of bitterness is that the bitter person assumes he has a right to be bitter, in fact he may actually enjoy it and find his identity in it.  Bitterness brings the illusion of having control over the offending party.  For this reason, people will often persist in bitterness for years.

Among Christians, bitterness is easily confused with the spiritual fruit of longsuffering. Longsuffering is the quality of showing patient endurance toward the failings of others. Bitterness results, however, when we internalize hurts others have inflicted on us. The bitter Christian often imagines that his continuing silence and avoidance of a past hurt is longsuffering. But unless true forgiveness that is grounded in the blood of Jesus Christ has occurred, bitterness quietly takes root.  The picture of bitterness as a root is very telling. The root of bitterness grows beneath the surface and is not easily evident in its early stages. It is only later, as the writer tells us, that it springs up and causes trouble.  In previous chapters, we have seen the principle stating that spiritual fruit is incompatible with foreign plants.  It will not grow where there are wild grapes or weeds in the field.  Nor will spiritual fruit come forth where the root of bitterness has sprung up. We are warned, therefore to look carefully lest we fall short of the grace of God.

WHY TIME DOESN’T HEAL

As an example of a victim of bitterness, the writer to the Hebrews gives us Esau, the son of Isaac.  The story of Esau and the Edomites who descended from him is one of the great tragedies of Bible history.  It tells us how one event, occurring almost beyond the limit of recorded history led to 2,000 years of jealousy, cruelty and, ultimately, the destruction of a nation.

As is always the case with bitterness, this episode begins with a personal injury in which Jacob cons Esau out of his birthright as the firstborn son.

Now Jacob cooked a stew; and Esau came in from the field, and he was weary.  And Esau said to Jacob, "Please feed me with that same red stew, for I am weary." Therefore his name was called Edom.  But Jacob said, "Sell me your birthright as of this day."  And Esau said, "Look, I am about to die; so what is this birthright to me?"  Then Jacob said, "Swear to me as of this day." So he swore to him, and sold his birthright to Jacob.  And Jacob gave Esau bread and stew of lentils; then he ate and drank, arose, and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright (Genesis 25:29-34).

Although his own impulsiveness and lack of self-control are largely at fault, Esau has been victimized by his brother’s treachery.  The crime against him is permanent.  He will always be second.  And so in this way the root of bitterness is planted.  It begins to grow and it drives a wedge between the two nations descended from these brothers: Israel and Edom.  It is important to note that the treachery of Jacob against Esau is never resolved.  Neither brother ever brings it to the surface.  Jacob does not ask for forgiveness and Esau does not offer it.

Immediately after this episode, Jacob flees the country and is gone for a number of years.  Then, after both brothers have made their fortunes, Jacob returns.  The reunion of Jacob and Esau is fascinating because it is so typical of how bitterness is denied and glossed over:

Now Jacob lifted his eyes and looked, and there, Esau was coming, and with him were four hundred men. So he divided the children among Leah, Rachel, and the two maidservants.  And he put the maidservants and their children in front, Leah and her children behind, and Rachel and Joseph last.  Then he crossed over before them and bowed himself to the ground seven times, until he came near to his brother.   But Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they wept.  And he lifted his eyes and saw the women and children, and said, "Who are these with you?" So he said, "The children whom God has graciously given your servant."  Then the maidservants came near, they and their children, and bowed down.  And Leah also came near with her children, and they bowed down. Afterward Joseph and Rachel came near, and they bowed down.  Then Esau said, "What do you mean by all this company which I met?" And he said, "These are to find favor in the sight of my lord."  But Esau said, "I have enough, my brother; keep what you have for yourself."  And Jacob said, "No, please, if I have now found favor in your sight, then receive my present from my hand, inasmuch as I have seen your face as though I had seen the face of God, and you were pleased with me.  Please, take my blessing that is brought to you, because God has dealt graciously with me, and because I have enough." So he urged him, and he took it (Genesis 33:1-11).

Despite all of the tears and emotion we see here, what is most telling is what is not said.  Neither brother brings up the birthright matter.  Esau attempts to minimize the injury by his statement in v. 9: "I have enough, my brother; keep what you have for yourself." Do you catch the flavor of Esau’s attitude here?  It illustrates two common characteristics of bitter people. First, bitter people maintain that there is nothing to forgive. “Oh, it was nothing; I’ve gotten over it; I‘m big enough to put it behind me.”  But the reality is that old injuries that are never truly forgiven are not resolved. Second, the bitter person assumes he has a right to be bitter.  People can actually enjoy bitterness because it gratifies the flesh and provides an energy that they learn to rely on.

How must we deal with bitterness to be free from it?  The world offers two poor solutions to bitterness: either to keep it in and be sick or to let it out and defile many.  Keeping it silently inside is no solution, but neither is venting bitterness outwardly.  The result of talking through one’s bitterness to others is to draw them into it as well.  The only effective and permanent way to be free from bitterness is for the injured party to forgive the offender unilaterally.  Now by unilaterally, I mean the bitter person must forgive regardless of what the offender does.  The offender may never apologize, may never admit to the injury, or may not even be aware of the injury.

BUT I HAVE A RIGHT TO BE BITTER!

This requirement is a common stumbling block for bitter people.  They say, “He’s the one who hurt me.  It’s up to him to come and apologize.  If he apologizes then I’ll forgive him.”   Well, what if he never apologizes?  Are you going to nurse your bitterness for the rest of your life?  And all too often the answer is: “Darned right I am; I have a right to!”  Esau faced the challenge to forgive Jacob and he failed.  He chose instead the way of pride and denial: "I have enough, my brother; keep what you have for yourself."

Now we want to trace this root of bitterness through Esau’s descendants, the Edomites, and see how it grows.  After the account of Jacob and Esau closes, the Edomites disappear from the Bible narrative for about 500 years.  Then, all of a sudden during Israel’s desert wanderings with Moses, Edom comes into the picture.  We pick up the story in Numbers 20:14-21:

Now Moses sent messengers from Kadesh to the king of Edom. "Thus says your brother Israel: "You know all the hardship that has befallen us, how our fathers went down to Egypt, and we dwelt in Egypt a long time, and the Egyptians afflicted us and our fathers.  When we cried out to the LORD, He heard our voice and sent the Angel and brought us up out of Egypt; now here we are in Kadesh, a city on the edge of your border.  Please let us pass through your country. We will not pass through fields or vineyards, nor will we drink water from wells; we will go along the King's Highway; we will not turn aside to the right hand or to the left until we have passed through your territory."'   Then Edom said to him, "You shall not pass through my land, lest I come out against you with the sword."  So the children of Israel said to him, "We will go by the Highway, and if I or my livestock drink any of your water, then I will pay for it; let me only pass through on foot, nothing more."  Then he said, "You shall not pass through." So Edom came out against them with many men and with a strong hand.  Thus Edom refused to give Israel passage through his territory; so Israel turned away from him.

In the course of five centuries, the bitterness of Esau has matured and flowered.  We see here the principle that bitterness is not healed by time.  Exactly the opposite has occurred: the root of bitterness has sprung up and defiled many.  Edom knows exactly who Israel is and remembers Jacob’s treachery very clearly.  Bitterness remembers details.  One of the best indicators of a root of bitterness is a detailed memory of a past hurt.  If someone claims to have forgiven his offender, but can still remember the tiniest details of an incident 20 years past, we should be skeptical.  When genuine forgiveness occurs, the Holy Spirit causes those memories to fade away.

From that time forward, Edom maintained an active feud with Israel and tension between the two nations grew.  In fact, Edom’s bitterness toward Israel became so intense that one entire book of the Bible is devoted to Edom’s bad attitude: the book of Obadiah.  The occasion of this prophecy is that Edom is actually celebrating the defeat of Israel by an invading army.  And the Lord says to Edom, “You had better get a new attitude or I will do a lot worse to you.”  Let’s look at some of Obadiah’s prophecy:

For violence against your brother Jacob, Shame shall cover you, And you shall be cut off forever.  In the day that you stood on the other side-- In the day that strangers carried captive his forces, When foreigners entered his gates And cast lots for Jerusalem-- Even you were as one of them.  "But you should not have gazed on the day of your brother In the day of his captivity; Nor should you have rejoiced over the children of Judah In the day of their destruction; Nor should you have spoken proudly In the day of distress.  You should not have entered the gate of My people In the day of their calamity. Indeed, you should not have gazed on their affliction In the day of their calamity, Nor laid hands on their substance In the day of their calamity.  You should not have stood at the crossroads To cut off those among them who escaped; Nor should you have delivered up those among them who remained In the day of distress.  "For the day of the LORD upon all the nations is near; As you have done, it shall be done to you; Your reprisal shall return upon your own head (Obadiah 10-15).

The person who nurses a root of bitterness long enough will rejoice in trouble that comes upon his offender, as if there is some justice in it.  Edom hated Israel with an intensity that defied any rational explanation.  Esau’s bitterness had consumed them.  In fact, Edom’s days were numbered.

The climax of Edom’s violence against Israel comes during the final hours before the crucifixion of Jesus.  The death of Jesus was brought about by an unlikely partnership: the Jews and the Romans.  The role that each of these nations played in his crucifixion is well known.  But for one brief moment, at the height of the drama, the Romans and the Jews stood aside and the fate of Jesus was thrust upon Edom.

After hearing the accusations against Jesus, we find Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor over Judea, trying to avoid hearing the case.  Then through an incidental remark by one of the Jews, Pilate discovers that Jesus is actually a citizen of Galilee to the north.  This is Pilate’s escape clause because he can legally dump the whole affair into the lap of the governor of Galilee, Herod Antipas.  And Herod is an Edomite.

For 2,000 years, the root of bitterness had wound its way from Esau down to Herod.  Herod was a treacherous and cruel man and was, in a sense, the personification of Edom’s bitterness.   Edom had refused to accept God’s decree that God would bless the nations through Israel and not through Esau.  So Edom’s final opportunity to forgive Jacob’s injury is given to Herod.  We read the account in Luke 23:8-12:

Now when Herod saw Jesus, he was exceedingly glad; for he had desired for a long time to see Him, because he had heard many things about Him, and he hoped to see some miracle done by Him.  Then he questioned Him with many words, but He answered him nothing.  And the chief priests and scribes stood and vehemently accused Him.  Then Herod, with his men of war, treated Him with contempt and mocked Him, arrayed Him in a gorgeous robe, and sent Him back to Pilate.  That very day Pilate and Herod became friends with each other, for previously they had been at enmity with each other.

Herod’s failure to come to terms with God’s chosen anointed one marks the final chapter of Edom’s history.  Forty years later, the Roman army invaded Edom.  They brought such destruction that it was impossible to tell where the cities had stood and where the crops were grown.  And so, just as Obadiah prophesied, there are no Edomites today.

PULLING OUT BITTERNESS BY ITS ROOT

This story of Esau’s bitterness against his brother offers us several lessons about bitterness and how we must deal with it.  First, we must accept God’s grace on God’s terms.  God ordained that all nations would be blessed through Israel.  But as far as Edom was concerned, God should have chosen us.  It was our birthright that Jacob stole.  Edom never accepted God’s blessing on God’s terms.

Second, the grace of God will make no apologies for the past.  It will not re-write history.  Whatever hurts and betrayals we have suffered are a permanent part of our past.  When we forgive those who have hurt us, God promises to bless us richly, but He does not promise to restore the same things that we lost.

Finally, true forgiveness that frees from bitterness can only be accomplished through the blood of Jesus.  The natural man cannot pull out the root of bitterness. The natural man cannot erase those hurtful memories.  The natural man cannot restore the lost years and the stolen opportunities.  Freedom from bitterness is a supernatural transaction.

Meditation and Response

1. Has someone stolen something from your life that can never be restored?  If you have never dealt with this hurt properly, go to the Lord in prayer and tell Him that you forgive this person unconditionally.

2. Pray for your church, that roots of bitterness would be unearthed and pulled out.  This is a spiritual transaction, because many people do not consciously realize that they are nursing bitterness.

3. If you have trouble releasing bitterness against someone, meditate on the total sacrifice of Jesus, Who had everything He had taken from Him, in order that you and I might have eternal life.

Chapter 10.  God is Not a System!

"Because of the multitude of oppressions they cry out;

They cry out for help because of the arm of the mighty.

But no one says, ‘Where is God my Maker,

Who gives songs in the night,

Who teaches us more than the beasts of the earth,

And makes us wiser than the birds of heaven?'” Job 35:9-11

WHEN THE SYSTEM DOESN’T WORK

There is a rigid mindset common to all monotheistic religions that regards God not as a genuine person, but as an inflexible system of cause-and-effect inevitabilities.  God is not an intimate, trusted friend; He is the paymaster who measures out wages due for services rendered and promptly punishes every infraction.  It was this mindset that sought to uncover the sin responsible for the blind man's loss of sight (John 9:13-34).  It is this same mindset that believes that our obedience effectively puts God in our debt, making His blessing a balance owing that He is obliged to bestow.  And according to this mindset, fruitfulness always follows from the right methods dutifully applied.  If you work the system, the system works.  Guaranteed!

As if in response to this common distortion of our heavenly Father’s attitude toward His children, the Bible gives us the account of Job.  Job’s story is that of a man whose “God,” so to speak, quit working.  When the bottom fell out of Job’s life, God did not respond in the way the “system” demanded that God should.  Job’s losses were staggering.  He lost all of his ten children and all of his property in one day.  Then he lost his health and all of his social standing in his community. But as great as all of these trials were, Job’s greatest affliction was that, in the midst of his troubles, he couldn’t find God: “If only God would tell me where He is in all this I would be satisfied.” The one thing Job wanted from God was a word, an answer, an explanation of what was happening.

Yet even when the story is concluded and Job’s fortunes are restored, an explanation is not part of his package.  Job does not find his satisfaction from learning of the “divine wager” between God and Satan.  Instead, Job receives a revelation of God’s majesty and mystery that completely dissolves his complaint about the “system.”

The Book of Job confronts us with the question: “What are you made of when life goes sour and God is nowhere to be found?  Christian, can you stand in your faith when the ‘system’ crashes?”  When we consider Job’s experience, we should check our own spiritual attitudes.  Do I only rejoice in my God when he keeps me in my comfort zone?  Or do I have a deeper basis for my relationship with Him?  When God does not play by our rules, we are very susceptible to bearing resentment against Him: “Who does He think He is, treating me this way?”  Holding God hostage is a hard way to make a living, yet it is far too common among Christians going through difficult times.

God drove Job to the very limits of spiritual endurance.  Very few of us will face the extremes of his trial.  But all of us who follow Christ are going to encounter times when we hurt and we can’t find God’s hand in it.  When we find ourselves in that place, the trial will pass less painfully if we can learn from the experience of Job.

ASKING GOD FOR GOD

The book of Job can be difficult to interpret because much of what the characters say is false.  Job’s friends are unsure about the nature of Job’s affliction.  We find them probing and speculating about God’s justice and Job’s failures.  But it is Elihu, the last and youngest speaker, who drives right to the core of the matter: “...no one says, ‘Where is God my Maker, Who gives songs in the night‘”?  The natural man seeks out God my Provider, God my Healer, God my Deliverer, God Who scratches wherever I itch.  But where is the man who says, “I just want to know the God Who made me.  I want to know Him simply because He has created me with the capacity to know Him and He has not given that capacity to a cow or to a seagull.”

It is only this man who is truly in relationship with his God.  All the rest, who only run after God for the immediate needs He satisfies, will never have God for Himself.  The man who seeks after God simply as a means to other benefits makes Him one god among many.  Such a man is an idolater of the subtlest variety, but an idolater just the same.  Christendom is full of such people who trumpet their faith only as long as God continues to give them what they ask for.  God exists primarily to give them life, liberty and happiness.  As long as they prosper, they know that God is good and walking alongside them.

According to this theology, if you play the system right, you will always prosper-- guaranteed.  Conversely, if your life is not working out, then you have obviously slipped up somewhere because the system always works.  You must be in sin.  If you will just find the missing link and make amends, then God will deliver you because the system always works!

WHAT WE GAIN WHEN GOD DOESN’T ANSWER

But what happens when, one day, God doesn’t answer?  I cry out just as I always have for the same things God has always given me, but His arm does not appear.  The book of Job tells the story of how Job and his friends learned that God is a person, not a system.  Job learned this truth by passing through what this passage figuratively calls “the night.”  “The night” symbolizes whatever unpleasant experiences and conditions of life we wish would pass us by: trials, uncertainty, troubles, affliction.  Job learned, as we need to, that, if our only response to the night is to plead for daybreak, then we miss a good deal of how God prepares us to bear His fruit.

A Christian’s capacity to sing songs in the night will be strongly correlated to his fruitfulness and his spiritual fitness in general.  Night is an ideal picture to teach this spiritual lesson for three reasons.  First, night is a time of limited visibility.  In the dark of night we cannot see many things that are actually present.  We must learn to rest in the fact that God can see the way ahead when we cannot.  “I will guide you with My eye” (Psalm 32:8).  The disciple who would bear fruit must be able to focus on the business at hand even when he faces great uncertainty about tomorrow.

Second, the duration of night is measured.  Night is a temporary darkness that inevitably gives way to daylight.  Neither the very good times nor the very bad times in our lives continue indefinitely, but each gives way to the other.  Fruitfulness requires us to work through both extremes and avoid being carried away by either.  The Christian who is alternately crushed by trials and swelled up by success will not be stable in his work.

Third, night is a necessary condition for the maturation of fruit.  In order for many plants to bring forth their fruit, they must pass through cycles of night and day, summer and winter, heat and cold, rain and drought.  Fruitfulness does not result from an atmosphere of perpetual comfort and absence of stress.  The spread of the gospel over the centuries gives ample evidence of this principle.  Historical persecution from within and outside the Church, political oppression, economic instability and physical disasters have all stimulated Christians to greater fruitfulness at various times.

There are those who argue that, when a Christian is suffering, God’s one and only interest is to relieve that suffering as quickly as possible.  If that Christian only “had enough faith,” then God would do just that.  But the Holy Spirit has seen fit to include the book of Job in our Bibles to teach us that suffering is more complicated than that.  One purpose of suffering, given in verse 10, is that we might learn to ask the question, “Where is God my Maker, Who gives songs in the night?”  The capacity to know God my Creator and rejoice in His presence even when night prevails is a great source of strength to those who develop it.

In Acts 16, Paul and Silas were imprisoned in the darkness of a Philippian jail.  We read that “…at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.”   Pay close attention to the fact that they were both praying and singing.  Prayer shows confidence in the future of God, but singing shows confidence in the presence of God.  They were no doubt praying for deliverance, but they were singing as well.  In order to cope with suffering, a Christian needs both.  It is a great mistake for Christians to wear themselves out with lots of prayer, but no singing.  In the midst of their night, the only comfort they will accept is the approaching dawn.

When Job’s tragedies came upon him, he began his search for comfort as many of us do: by demanding light.  He wanted to know where God was in all this.  Job made the mistake that we all make from time to time.  We think that we will be comforted by gaining some small insight into God’s design for our lives.  Yet in taking this position, we place ourselves in the center of the universe and displace God.  The Christian who will only be comforted by an answer to his most immediate problem will only have that comfort until his next problem comes along.  But the Christian who learns to sing a song in the night receives an enduring comfort that will not be swept away by changing circumstances.  In the end, Job did not find his peace until he beheld God as He truly is: eternal, sovereign and holy.

Learning to sing a song in the night is a crucial step in our discipleship.  We can only mature spiritually if we learn to sing God’s song in the blackest dark of night.  The heartiest, most stirring song of mid-day is of no value when the terror of the night falls upon us.  A Christian must be able to sing God’s night song when only eternity is in view and all else is hidden.  Our fruitfulness depends on learning songs in the night.  The eternal fruit that God would bear through us must pass through the night in order to reach its maturity.  There is no other way.

Meditation and Response

1. Do you frequently try to "figure out what God is doing?"  Have your efforts brought you peace or anxiety?

2. Think of a trial in your life that has passed.  How would you rate your "songs in the night" while you were passing through this trial?

3. Identify a time in your life when experienced the "peace of God, which surpasses all understanding" (Philippians 4:7).

Chapter 11.  A Hole in the Wall: Hidden Hypocrisy

THE LEAST RELIABLE INDICATOR OF OUR HEARTS

The Christian who would bear fruit must understand how God sees.  God is looking for good soil to bring forth his fruit.  The intrinsic qualities of good soil are found in the unexposed layers that are hidden from casual view.  Only when one digs deep to inspect the soil will he find the attributes that will enhance or inhibit fruitfulness.   In the same way, God looks for the inner qualities and secrets of those who would bear his fruit.

The story of Eliab, David’s brother, illustrates how God sees:

Now the LORD said to Samuel, "How long will you mourn for Saul, seeing I have rejected him from reigning over Israel? Fill your horn with oil, and go; I am sending you to Jesse the Bethlehemite. For I have provided Myself a king among his sons."  So it was, when they came, that he looked at Eliab and said, "Surely the LORD's anointed is before Him!"  But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not look at his appearance or at his physical stature, because I have refused him. For the LORD does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart" (1 Samuel 16: 1, 6-7).

Now I suspect that no one had ever talked about Eliab this way before.  It was plain to everyone that Eliab was the right man for the job.  Even the prophet Samuel, who had endured so much disappointment over King Saul’s failures, was convinced that Eliab had the right qualities.  But in a single moment, Eliab saw his ambitions disintegrate, for the Lord does not see as man sees.

When God says that he looks at a man’s heart, this means that God does not focus on the more public indications of human character.  From God’s perspective, the outward appearance is the least reliable indicator of the heart.  We all put our best foot forward when we’re at church.  A man’s behavior at his workplace gives a slightly better picture of his character.  An even closer approximation of his true identity is his life at home.  But the clearest measure of a man’s heart is what he does when he is alone and no one will ever find out.  This is the heart that God sees.  And, in fact, this is who we are.

God will not tolerate a hidden interior hypocrisy.  Outward religion is not a veneer that will divert God’s eyes from our secret behavior.  In the eighth chapter of Ezekiel, God took the prophet on a secret tour of the temple, the “house of religion,” and showed him what was really going on.

So He brought me to the door of the court; and when I looked, there was a hole in the wall. Then He said to me, "Son of man, dig into the wall"; and when I dug into the wall, there was a door.  And He said to me, "Go in, and see the wicked abominations which they are doing there." So I went in and saw, and there-- every sort of creeping thing, abominable beasts, and all the idols of the house of Israel, portrayed all around on the walls.  And there stood before them seventy men of the elders of the house of Israel, and in their midst stood Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan. Each man had a censer in his hand, and a thick cloud of incense went up.  Then He said to me, "Son of man, have you seen what the elders of the house of Israel do in the dark, every man in the room of his idols? For they say, "The LORD does not see us, the LORD has forsaken the land"' (Ezekiel 8:7-12).

Despite all of Israel’s outward piety, this is what the Lord saw: “what the elders of the house of Israel do in the dark, every man in the room of his idols.”  The way a person conducts his private life determines how the Lord regards him.  So we read in Psalm 90:8, “You have set our iniquities before You, our secret sins in the light of Your countenance.”  The hidden life is the one that sits front and center before God’s eyes.

THE SIN OF THE HIGH HAND

The Christian who harbors a secret indulgence lives in an isolated situation.  He has severed all access to fellowship with Jesus.  He has no access to cleansing, forgiveness or sanctification.  This pattern of fellowship is described in the Law of Moses.  According to Moses, there were two kinds of sin that could break fellowship with God.  We find these described in Numbers 15.  The first kind of sin is the unintentional sin.  This is either a sin committed in ignorance, where I didn’t know that my action was wrong until afterward, or it is a sin committed impulsively, without any prior thought or planning.  An unintentional sin could be taken care of quite easily: “So the priest shall make atonement for the person who sins unintentionally, when he sins unintentionally before the Lord, to make atonement for him; and it shall be forgiven him” (v. 28).

The second kind of sin is the presumptuous sin.  The Hebrew text refers to this as the sin done with the “high hand.”  This sin is described in verses 30-31:

But the person who does anything presumptuously, whether he is native-born or a stranger, that one brings reproach on the Lord, and he shall be cut off from among his people. Because he has despised the word of the Lord, and has broken His commandment, that person shall be completely cut off; his guilt shall be upon him.

This sin is a premeditated defiance of God’s commend.  Here is the person who knows perfectly well what God requires, but brazenly sets his will toward disobedience regardless.  God’s verdict is that the presumptuous sinner shall be completely cut off; his guilt shall be upon him.  He has no access to the sacrifice that restores fellowship with God.

For the Christian, the distinction of the presumptuous sin is not discarded under the new covenant of grace.  The New Testament clearly reinforces the concepts of unintentional and presumptuous sin.  The pattern of the unintentional sin is found in 1 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”  When we fall into sin through impulsive submission to “the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life” (1 John 2:16), Jesus is both our priest and our sacrifice.   Through Him, we have atonement for our sin and restoration of fellowship with the Father.

But the condition of the presumptuous sinner is described in Hebrews 10:26, “For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins.”  There no longer remains a sacrifice for the Christian who abides in wilful, presumptuous sin.  He has no fellowship with Jesus.  He has no access to the Father through prayer.  Any outward appearance of religion in his life is artificial because he has withdrawn himself from the fountain of grace and life.

The real tragedy of the presumptuous sinner is that he doesn’t realize anything is wrong.  He still prays.  He still worships.  He still confesses his “lesser” sins.  But he is a grape plucked from the vine.  He sees himself and his religious life in a way entirely different than God sees him.  He sees the outward things of his life as being more substantial than his presumptuous sin.  And yet the one thing he wants to conceal and forget is the one thing God sees: his secret sin.

But just as God sees our secret sins, so he also sees our hidden righteousness.  Proverbs 22:29 reads, "Do you see a man who excels in his work? He will stand before kings; He will not stand before unknown men." Here is the picture of the man who lives and works consistently outside of the king's presence.  His conscience is his guide to excellence, regardless of his setting.  In the proper time, the king will take notice and elevate him to his proper position.

WHEN GOD HAS FORGOTTEN ME

I think that every Christian at some point in his life is convinced that the King has forgotten him.  "I've been left behind.  I played by the rules, I did everything I knew to do and for what?"  Psalm 37:1-8 speaks directly to the person in this funk:

Do not fret because of evildoers,

Nor be envious of the workers of iniquity.

For they shall soon be cut down like the grass,

And wither as the green herb.

Trust in the LORD, and do good;

Dwell in the land, and feed on His faithfulness.

Delight yourself also in the LORD,

And He shall give you the desires of your heart.

Commit your way to the LORD,

Trust also in Him,

And He shall bring it to pass.

He shall bring forth your righteousness as the light,

And your justice as the noonday.

Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for Him;

Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way,

Because of the man who brings wicked schemes to pass.

Cease from anger, and forsake wrath;

Do not fret--it only causes harm.

I don't think anyone had a better case against God than Noah did.  He was the only man left in the world who served God.  And nothing ever changed.  There must have been days when he wondered what the point was.  "I'm going to be 700 pretty soon.  What difference has all my righteousness made?  God doesn't see.  Nothing ever changes."  Of course, the day came when things did change: "I have seen that you are righteous before Me in this generation" (Genesis 7:1).  God knew who Noah was and all the things that he did.  At the proper time, God brought forth Noah's righteousness as the light.

If you find yourself in an obscure place far from where you want to be, then consider carefully what has been set before you.  Remember that the King is watching.  Remember also that He does not see as man sees.  It's a struggle for us to see as God sees, but the righteousness we do in the darkness is not hidden from Him.  He has seen it and he will bring it to light.  When God decides to exalt those loyal to Him he will defy the odds and deliver your justice as the noonday.

Meditation and Response

1. Is there a familiar idol in your secret room that needs to be destroyed?  Pray for the Lord to bring you a trustworthy prayer partner that can receive your confession and give you support in abandoning this idol permanently.

2. Pray for your leaders and pastors that they will withstand the attacks of the enemy in the area of secret hypocrisy.

3. Have you been faithful in a particular area and received no answer or recognition?  Ask the Lord to give you strength and endurance to walk in the timing of His answer.

Chapter 12.  Judging: Our God Given Obligation

EVANGELICALISM’S FOUR-LETTER WORD

Modern Evangelicalism is marked by a well-intentioned reluctance to judge others that stems from the very correct desire to be inclusive.  Certainly the gospel, if it is to be the true gospel of Christ, must be inclusive of all who would bow at the foot of the cross.  The church must be blind to the former sins and mistakes of all who would come to Jesus.  As I have already stressed in Chapter 5, the Christian life is lived before God today.  Past sins are wiped away by the blood of the Lamb.  But the sword cuts both ways.  Those who would come to Christ today must also repent of today’s sins.  Repentance is God’s prerequisite for mercy; so must it also be the church’s.

However, it is commonplace today for the church to tolerate the fellowship of confessing Christians who are living in sin and are unrepentant.  The explanations given for excusing their behaviors are various:

         They are working through difficult issues in their lives,

         They are very close to turning away from their sin,

         They are new Christians who don’t understand what repentance means,

         Their life circumstances make repentance too difficult right now,

         It’s better to at least have them among us where we can gradually push them in the right direction.

Underlying the church’s failure to judge the sin in its midst is the assumption that these unrepentant Christians are, in fact, fruit: that if the church is full on Sunday morning then our ministry must be bearing fruit.  In reality, misplaced mercy prohibits true fruitfulness and will ultimately bring forth stagnation and barrenness.

The question of judging is made especially difficult by the current culture of tolerance, acceptance and diversity that we find all around us.  The heart of the philosophy of diversity that our society presents today is the pervasive message of relative moral truth:

         “My truth is true for me and your truth is true for you.”

         “Every group has its own truth.”

         “No one is wrong, but neither is anyone right.”

Within this culture of diversity, no belief can be allowed to call itself ‘true’ at the expense of calling another belief ‘false.’ When Pilate asked Jesus, “What is Truth?” he was reciting the mantra of our present culture of diversity.  Absolute truth is the one concept that cannot be tolerated in our society of tolerance because everyone has the equal right to be told that what they believe is OK and true for them.  Within this social contract, the ultimate objective is to avoid judging anybody.

So when Christians speaks of right and wrong, or moral truth or sin, we are told that we are judging and that we must stop it.  If the man on the street knows one verse from the Bible, it is Matthew 7:1 "Judge not, that you be not judged.”  The world would have us believe that there is some sort of righteous humility in keeping our opinions to ourselves and never criticizing another’s behavior or conduct.  We have been duped by this widespread view of pseudo-righteousness and, as a result, judging has become a four-letter word in Evangelicalism today.

On the surface, the New Testament’s teaching on judging can easily appear contradictory: we are to judge, but then we are not to judge.  An examination of a few passages illustrates this apparent riddle.   Matthew 7:1 says, “Judge not, that you be not judged” but 1 Corinthians 2:15 counters: “But he who is spiritual judges all things.”  Luke 6:37 is more emphatic: “Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned.”  But Philippians 1:9 declares, “And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment.”  Romans 14:4 warns us, “Who are you to judge another's servant? To his own master he stands or falls.”  Yet 1 Corinthians 14:29 instructs us: “Let the prophets speak two or three, and let the other judge.”

Who are we to judge? Who are we not to judge?  How, when and why?  The fact is that the Bible calls us to judge in some ways and not in others.  The key to understanding these distinctions is to consider the range of meanings of the word ‘judge.’  In New Testament usage, ‘judge’ has three basic meanings: (1) measurement against a standard, (2) comparison and (3) condemnation.  Simply put, God requires us to do the first while forbidding us to do the last two.

1.  Measurement against a standard

An example of this kind of judging is the statement: “The car is traveling over the speed limit.”  This statement amounts to holding the speed of the car up against a measurable standard (the posted speed limit), but excludes the observer’s personal opinion of that speed limit.  This concept of judging arises from the illustration of the plumb line in Amos 7:8, “Behold, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of My people Israel.”  God’s standards, as revealed in the Bible, are the “plumb line” against which we are to judge human behavior.  Also, when we refer to the Bible as the ‘canon,’ we derive this usage from the Greek word meaning a measuring rod.  John 7:24 says that we are to “judge with righteous judgment."  That is, we are to judge people against God’s measuring rod rather than our own subjective standards.

Judging as a measurement against God’s standards is the only kind of judging that we are authorized and commanded to do as Christians.  Two conditions accompany this obligation.  First, we must exclude our personal preferences and opinions from this measurement.  We are not to accuse anyone of being a lawbreaker where God has made no law.  Second, we are to avoid hypocrisy.  To the best of our understanding, we are to satisfy our own consciences that we have removed the plank in our own eye before we try to remove the speck in our brother’s eye (Matthew 7:3).

However, this second condition must not be understood as requiring a moral perfection that will never be achieved in this life before we can judge.  This misconception is frequently heard as a reason to avoid speaking judgment: “Oh, we’re all just sinners painted with the same brush, so what right have we to judge anybody?”  This false humility often disguises a moral laziness and is a rationalization of the many instructions we find in the New Testament to judge and exercise discipline.  Judging is not an earned privilege; it is a command.  The church’s obligation to discipline presupposes an obligation to judge:

         “Those who are sinning rebuke in the presence of all, that the rest also may fear” (1 Timothy 5:20).

         “Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted” (Galatians 6:1).

         “Brethren, if anyone among you wanders from the truth, and someone turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:19-20).

Before we can discipline, we must judge. And this judgment is to be done by real, fallible people who stumble on occasion themselves.  It is not a pleasant task.  In fact, anyone who enjoys it is likely not well suited to it.  The one who points out his brother’s sins should do so with tears, not with an attitude of triumphal superiority.  But judging must be an integral part of our spiritual lives because the underlying premise of this process is that God’s law is a source of life, light and prosperity.

2.  Comparison

In this context, judging means comparing one person to another in order to rate their relative righteousness or unrighteousness.  An example of this kind of judging is seen in the statement: “The award panel judged the first, second and third place winners.”  We are forbidden from doing this.  We judge in this way when we compare our lives to others and decide whose sins are more severe in the eyes of God: “I thank You that I am not like other men--extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector.  I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess” (Luke 18:11, 12).

It is not difficult to pick out the faults of others.  Our society today is a battlefield of addictive behaviors, rebellion and tragic lifestyle decisions.  Dysfunctional behaviors are passed down from one generation to another.  It is an easy thing for someone who has his life in fairly good order to compare himself to someone with more visible failings.  But what of that hidden rebellion in my heart that the Holy Spirit pointed out long ago?  1 Timothy 5:24 warns us: “Some men's sins are clearly evident, preceding them to judgment, but those of some men follow later.” Which will God judge more harshly: the obvious sins which are clear for all to see or the hidden sin that is coveted and protected?   I can compare myself to someone who has left behind a clear trail of mistakes, but how do I know what he’s been given compared to what I’ve been given:   “For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required” (Luke 12:48).

The biblical prohibitions against comparing my righteousness to that of others are crystal clear: “Do not judge according to appearance” (John 7:24).  And again, “So then each of us shall give account of himself to God. Therefore let us not judge one another anymore” (Rom 14:12, 13).  It is evil for us to compare ourselves to others.  We need to remember that each of us has only a dim understanding of the utter blackness of our own sin.  We also need to remember that God will judge others according to standards we know nothing about and is free to judge one person according to a different standard than another.  For these reason the apostle wisely counsels us: “In lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself” (Philippians 2:3) because I don’t know what God is expecting of me compared to what he is expecting of others.

3.  Condemnation

The third meaning of judging is the issuance of a verdict on someone’s eternal destiny or the punishment that is appropriate to his offence.  This act of judging is shown in the statement: “The court issued a judgement of three years imprisonment.”  As with comparison, we are forbidden from doing this.  Again, the scriptures prohibiting this are numerous and explicit:

         “Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned” (Luke 6:37).

         “Who are you to judge another's servant? To his own master he stands or falls” (Romans 14:4).

         “Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge another you condemn yourself” (Romans 2:1).

         “There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you to judge another?” (James 4:12).

         “Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the hearts. Then each one's praise will come from God” (1 Corinthians 4:5).

WHEN JUDGMENT IS GRACE

We constantly hear the complaint of the world that the church judges it.  In some cases the world is right.  If we compare or condemn, then we have overstepped our bounds and their accusation is justified.  But in most cases, where the church simply proclaims the word of God, it is His word that judges the world, not the church: “He who rejects Me, and does not receive My words, has that which judges him--the word that I have spoken will judge him in the last day” (John 12:48).

Fruitfulness requires that we judge with righteous judgment and carry out God’s discipline when discipline is called for.  It is a painful duty.  We will be called hypocrites and we will be called merciless.  But our role in judgment is neither to dispense mercy nor condemnation.  Our role is to be God’s light in the world and so we are when we submit to this difficult calling.  Perhaps the greatest encouragement to faithfulness in this matter is to realize that, in this current age, God’s judgment is grace.  Every place we set our feet- we are God’s message not only of righteousness, but also of grace.  Our homes, our workplaces, our towns, every place we go is blessed and preserved because we are there.  The world will never know this.  The world will never thank us.

In the movie It’s a Wonderful Life, we see the story of a man who was overcome by the pressures of life.  His stress finally brought him to a place where all he could see was his failures.  His plans had fallen through.  He had let down people who had depended on him.  He finally makes the statement that it would have been better if he had never been born.  And then he has the chance to see his world without him in it.  Without his light and his preserving influence that world is a dark and hopeless place.  It’s a Wonderful Life is such a wonderful movie because it’s true.  God has placed every one of us in the circles we walk as judgment- but in being God’s judgment, we are His grace.

Meditation and Response

1. Think of a time when you avoided judging someone when you had an obligation to proceed.  What made you turn away?

2. Identify an incident of disciplinary judgment in a church that you have attended.  Did the leadership handle the matter properly?  Why or why not?

3. Can you think of a time when someone brought righteous judgment into your life?  How did you receive it and what was the spiritual outcome?

Chapter 13.  High-Risk Christianity

Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.  John 12:24

“RISK” DOESN’T APPEAR IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

The concept of 'risk' in the Christian life is a contradiction.  Risk, by its definition, is the assessment of probabilities and percentages. A stock market investor realizes that his investment always carries a certain risk of losing its original value or even disappearing completely.  He assesses this risk against the potential profit and makes his decision accordingly.

The risk a Christian takes in obeying God is not like this at all.  Suppose God leads me to undertake a work in a certain location.  If I have heard God’s voice accurately (please refer to Chapter 3), there is no issue of probability as to whether God will provide.  The Christian does not step out in faith because God is generally pretty reliable and comes through more often than not.  On the contrary, if the thing is from God, no matter how outlandish or unusual it appears at face value, it will succeed.  Alternatively, if it is not from God, no amount of planning, preparation or resources can prevent its failure.

We believe these tenets to be true and yet we live with our feet firmly planted in this world and are easily swayed by its conventional wisdom.  In our weakness, we too easily assess the "risk" of a venture according to the extent of our sight and the strength of our arms.  One of the most perilous encounters in decision-making can occur when a young person approaches an older Christian for counsel regarding a step of faith.  The bright-eyed youngster is filled with hope, devotion and marvelous expectations.  He sets his vision before the elder and seeks his blessing in stepping forward.  Now certainly we have all witnessed rash decisions of youth and have probably made some ourselves.  All too often the great plan does not come together, enthusiasm turns to despair, hope turns to bewilderment and the discouraged pilgrim quietly tries to piece together the life he left behind.

But hold on...  Was the problem really impatient immaturity and inexperience as we so quickly assume?  Or was the venture simply not of God to begin with?  It is at this point that the wise counselor must tread with care.  For an equally unfortunate outcome is for the older Christian to look only to his own experience and throw cold water on a genuine calling.   How many of us would have counseled young David according to the wisdom of Saul: "You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him; for you are a youth, and he a man of war from his youth" (1 Samuel 17:33)?  For 99 other young men, the counsel would have been valid, but for David, this thing was from God.

Those who walk with God will receive marching orders from time to time that defy common experience and conventional wisdom.  Our Lord will send us in directions where we cannot see the way, the means or the purpose.  Should we refer to these decisions as "risks"?  I think that we can use term legitimately when we consider the fact that obedience often costs things dear and precious to us: friends, reputation, material wealth, comfort or security.   In this sense, our "risk" is in not knowing how God will respond to our obedience regarding these things.  But in the final analysis, it is important to note that the word 'risk' does not appear in the New Testament.  The God of the inspired writers is clearly a God Who acts in accordance with His word, not One Who is subject to the probabilities of worldly uncertainty.  As we consider our way in this life, the most critical issue in our decision-making must not be the degree of departure from the ordinary, but rather hearing clearly from Him Who orders our steps (Proverbs 16:9).

WHEN A LEPER CRASHES YOUR PARTY

As in all things, Jesus modeled this level of obedience for us to follow. Immediately following the Sermon on the Mount, a leper approached Jesus and confronted Him with some very serious risks.  The encounter between Jesus and the leper must be rightly understood as a temptation as difficult as any He endured during His time on earth.  It was an encounter that threatened His reputation, His ceremonial purity and, ultimately, His capacity to atone for the sins of mankind.  In reaching out to this leper, Jesus set an example for us in showing us the things we must risk if we want to see spiritual fruit in our lives.  This meeting is recorded in Matthew 7:28-8:3,

And so it was, when Jesus had ended these sayings, that the people were astonished at his teaching, for he taught as one having authority, and not as the scribes.  When He had come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed Him. And behold, a leper came and worshiped Him, saying, "Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean." Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying, "I am willing; be cleansed." Immediately his leprosy was cleansed.

We have the tendency to regard the man Jesus as a sort of superman: a peculiar hybrid creature being half-man and half-God. Our minds naturally drift in this direction when we consider His miracles. Yet Jesus was fully and completely man, willingly sharing all the same limitations and weaknesses common to the rest of us. We read in Philippians 2:8-9 that Jesus, "being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men." Jesus voluntarily emptied himself of His divine attributes, that he might fully identify with us in our weakness.

Jesus was a man unlike any other who has ever walked the earth, but He was still a man and, as such, was totally dependent on His Father for every work He performed.  Jesus could not do anything He wanted at any time.  He healed the leper instantly. Yet in unbelieving Nazareth, we read “He could do no mighty work there, except that He laid His hands on a few sick people and healed them" (Mark 6:5).  Just like you and me, Jesus could only do what He saw His Father doing.

It is only because Jesus was one of us that He can claim to be our example. The multitudes regarded Jesus as a celebrity; they praised Him as the hero of the nation; they applauded Him as the greatest miracle worker the world had ever seen.  They did not, however, regard Him as an example to be followed.  This is the fundamental distinction that separates the multitudes that follow Jesus down from the mountaintop from the disciple who follows Him to the cross. Jesus is our example.  We read in 1 John 2:6, “He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked.”  In all that Jesus did, He left for us an example that shows us how our lives should pattern His.

The appearance of the leper before Jesus is an unexpected turn of events.  In an instant the carnival atmosphere is dead silent.  The crowd holds its breath, waiting to see how Jesus will deal with this unclean outcast.  A moment before, Jesus appeared to be in complete control, riding the wave of the crowd’s approval into Jerusalem.  But the leper’s request has put all that at risk.

Service to God and risk go hand in hand.  The Christian who says to God, “Here I am; use me,” must certainly expect that his comfort, his plans, his security will all be put at risk.  God demands that we take risks. Risk is the process of transferring ownership of our objectives from ourselves to God. Without risk, there can be no final achievement of God’s true spiritual purposes.

CAUTION: MULTITUDES AHEAD

The first risk we see in this passage is the risk of reputation. What would the multitudes have thought if Jesus failed to heal the leper?  When Jesus pronounced the cleansing of the leper, how did He know the power of God was going to show up?  The answer is that Jesus kept such close fellowship with His Father that He was able to act in accordance with His Father’s will. Is this any different than what we are called to do?  When Jesus did the works of God, He had to exercise the very same dependence on His Father that you or I are called to express.

It rarely occurs to us that Jesus was tempted with the same doubts, fears and reservations we feel when we call on God to act.  This is confirmed in Hebrews 4:15,  "For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin."   Would you be tempted to doubt if a leper told you that you could heal him?  Well, then Jesus was tempted too.  That’s what the Scripture says.

God seems to delight in putting the reputations of his servants on the line.  Noah had to build an ark on dry land, Moses had to toss his staff down before Pharaoh, and Joshua had to march Israel into the Jordan River.  Each of these men had to lay down his reputation and trust God to lift it up again.  God always maintains the reputations of His servants, although He does so on His own schedule.

The second risk Jesus faced is risk of rejection.  Before the leper appeared, Jesus was the champion of the multitudes.  Everybody was on His side. But mixing with lepers was not what they had in mind. Leprosy was the most feared and loathsome disease in the ancient Near East. The leper’s body literally decayed from the outside in.  The hair fell from the head and eyebrows; the fingernails loosened and dropped off; the fingers and toes slowly fell away, along with the nose, the eyes and the tongue.  There was no question that any association with this man was going to cost Jesus a lot of popularity.

If we follow the life of Jesus from His baptism to his trial before Pontius Pilate, we can trace His gradual rejection by the multitudes.  Jesus mixed with too many fringe elements; His teachings on sin and money and sacrifice got too pointed.  Literally, "multitudes" refers simply to a great number of people.  But in the New Testament, it also assumes a qualitative sense.  It refers to the majority of hearers of the gospel who take only a passing interest in the phenomenon of Jesus.  They watch from a safe distance and take cover in the anonymity of the crowd.  Their attitude toward Jesus conforms to whatever they see around them.  They move forward as long as the majority moves forward, but they keep their options open and are ready to disappear if things get uncomfortable.  The multitudes are attracted to Jesus as long as His road is parallel to their own; as long as His agenda enhances their personal objectives.  The multitudes love the promises of Jesus, but have no stomach for His cross.

As Jesus draws nearer to the cross, the attitude of the multitudes turns from that of adoration to rejection and condemnation.  We see the culmination of this betrayal in Matt 27:20,

“But the chief priests and elders persuaded the multitudes that they should ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus. The governor answered and said to them, "Which of the two do you want me to release to you?" They said, "Barabbas!" Pilate said to them, "What then shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?" They all said to him, "Let Him be crucified!"

The multitudes are not quite sure if Jesus Christ fits in with their priorities and objectives.  They find Christianity attractive in a general sort of way, but some of the demands of Jesus are too costly, too extreme, too unreasonable.  The person who maintains this attitude and hangs back with the multitudes is playing a most dangerous game.  For in the end, if he does not decide for Jesus against the multitudes, then he will reject Jesus utterly.  When Jesus returns there will be no middle ground.  The one who would follow Jesus must risk rejection by the multitudes.

The final risk Jesus faced is the risk of everything.  When the leper expressed his faith, Jesus stretched forth His hand and touched him.  In order to appreciate how incredible this action was, we need to consider everything that leprosy stood for in Israel.  Besides being a horrible physical disease, leprosy was one of the most serious forms of ceremonial uncleanness according to the law.  A leper was permanently unclean and everything he touched became unclean.  The leper was to live outside the city limits- not only as a safeguard of community hygiene, but to symbolize his ceremonial uncleanness.

When a leper traveled anywhere near other people, he had to shout, “Unclean, Unclean” as he approached.  When people heard this warning they would get out of the way as fast as they could.  Nobody wanted to be around a leper. Not only did they face the risk of contracting leprosy, but anyone who touched a leper became ceremonially unclean himself.  Now the orthodox thing for Jesus to do in this situation is to withdraw and separate from the leper.  After all, according to the law, Jesus would become unclean Himself.  The watching multitudes understood this perfectly.

By the time Jesus began His ministry, the Pharisees had become the most influential sect in Judaism.  Their basic objective in religion was separation from the unclean.  In fact, the term ‘Pharisee’ means ‘the separated ones.’  Their basic motivation in life was to express their devotion to God by withdrawing from all that was unclean.  The Pharisees calculated very precisely which people in society were the worst sinners.  And then they carefully avoided any contact with them.  And they concluded that God must have this same attitude.

Now to be fair to the Pharisees, they had good reason to think the way they did.  After all, the law taught that the unclean always infected the clean, never the other the other way around.  For example, suppose a man was out plowing his field and he stumbled onto a gravesite.  That man would be ceremonially unclean for seven days.  If he sits in a chair, the chair becomes unclean.  If someone else comes along and sits in the chair, then that person becomes unclean.  All of these laws were given to teach how infectious sin is.  The nature of sin in the world is to spread to whatever it touches.  This is basically how the Pharisees viewed the world.  The Pharisees wanted to be pure, so they simply figured out every person and situation they needed to avoid.

THE LAW OF CONTAMINATION IN REVERSE

What the Pharisees failed to understand was, that when the Spirit of God comes into contact with uncleanness, the whole process is reversed.  The Spirit is not infected by the unclean, but the unclean is purified.  What Jesus did next was the most astounding thing these people had ever seen.  Jesus drew near to the leper, stretched forth His hand and touched him.  Jesus embraced sin.  He identified himself with it completely.  At that moment, the law of sin, unrelenting since the fall of Adam, was superseded.  Rather than being contaminated Himself, the power of God flowed from Jesus to cleanse the leper.

We need to understand clearly what was at stake here.  Jesus, the Lamb of God, was on His relentless journey to the cross.  Now the law required that only the blood of a lamb without blemish could accomplish our redemption.  If Jesus becomes contaminated with leprosy, He is disqualified from going to the cross for us.  Jesus knew perfectly well what He was on earth to do.  And yet He risked everything for the sake of a filthy, diseased outcast that nobody else cared about.  He put everything on the line.

I don’t know precisely what God will call you to risk.  But I can tell you what your risk will look like.  It will require you to disregard much of your experience.  It will contradict logic and reason.  It will immediately cause some friends and family to oppose you.  It will cost you something you thought you could not afford to lose.  But as you consider what God requires of you and get quiet before Him, you will hear His sure and unwavering voice: “Go ahead.  I’m in this.  I’m with you.  I will honor your risk.”

Meditation and Response

1. When has the Lord asked you to do something that was likely going to cost you something precious?  What was your response?

2. Think of a time when the Lord asked you take a risk and He gave you something better than he took away.

3. Pray for the Lord to show your church leadership a risk that He would have them take.

Chapter 14.  The Most Important Decision

But he left his garment in her hand, and fled and ran outside. Genesis 39:12

WHEN GOD WAITS AND WATCHES

There is a road that each of us must travel before we will bear the fruit God intends for us.  For each of us the road is different.  It is known to God and He has prepared it specifically for each one of us.  It is a temptation we must resist, a sin we must lay down, a decision we must make, an ambition we must place on the altar.  God prepares us, molds us, chastens us and then leads us to this fork in the road.    He waits and watches to see what we will do.  He will not intervene.  The decision to travel the road is ours alone.

I want to be very specific about the road I am describing here.  I am not referring to an unclear decision where I am uncertain about what my choice should be.  God is not capricious that He would cause my destiny to hinge on a particular choice when I honestly do not know which way to turn.  But the road I refer to is one where there is no question about the decision that must be made.  It is a decision that proves my character, my convictions and my faithfulness to the values I claim to hold.  It is a decision that will cost something very dear to me, that will humble me, that will offend the flesh, that will cause false friends to desert me.  If I refuse to take that road, then my life in Christ becomes a contradiction and a great gulf is opened between my hidden and visible lives.  But by choosing the road, my faith is vindicated and God’s blessing on my work is activated.

Perhaps nowhere else in the Bible is this principle illustrated more explicitly than in the life of Joseph.  The theme phrase of Joseph’s story is: “the Lord was with him.”  Even during those years when Joseph’s life was filled with tragedy, the Lord was determining the steps that would eventually make him the most powerful man in Egypt.  Joseph’s life bore the fruit it did only because he chose to take the road that God prepared for him.  Everything that God had planned for Joseph followed from his decision to run from Potiphar’s wife.  Although he had no idea of its consequences at the time, it was Joseph’s most important decision.  By choosing that road, Joseph demonstrated that he had the character God required for what lay ahead.  With Joseph, as with each of us, his road was peculiarly suited to his calling and his circumstances.

Joseph’s decision challenged him in two areas where he was most vulnerable and most susceptible to rationalization.  First, he was facing a life of forced celibacy in Egypt.  As a Hebrew slave in Egypt, he was a social pariah.  It was detestable for an Egyptian even to eat with a Hebrew, let alone to give his daughter to one.  So his temptation appealed to his sexual desire and also questioned the character of God: “Who is this God of yours Who treats you like this?  You should be home in your father’s house, enjoying the wife God has given to you.”  A common element of temptation is the allegation that God has failed to provide for our needs so we had better grab what we can for ourselves.  Second, Joseph would likely pay a high price for spurning the woman’s advances.  He knew that his exalted position as overseer of Potiphar’s house was quite an achievement for a young man and that she had the power to ruin him if she chose to.  It would be very prudent to submit to her and avoid stirring up her anger.  Joseph had every reason to submit to her seduction: sexual gratification, keeping his job, staying out of prison.  Life had not been kind to Joseph.  Didn’t he have the right to salvage what comfort and security he could find?  Who would have faulted Joseph for looking after himself?  His only reasons for resisting her were intangible from the world's viewpoint: character and conviction.

THE DECISIONS WE DON’T GET TO MAKE

When Joseph fled from Potiphar’s house, he did not realize that he had made the most important decision of his life.  But God saw a man who had no variance in his hidden life, a man who held to his convictions regardless of the immediate disadvantages of doing so.  The distinctive thing about the history of Joseph is that this decision is really the only one that he made prior to Pharaoh’s appointment.  For the most part, other people determined the major events of his life:

Joseph was…

         Appointed to be a shepherd,

         Shown favoritism by his father,

         Given dreams by God,

         Sent to Shechem by his father

         Sold into slavery by his brothers,

         Taken to Egypt by slave traders,

         Purchased by the captain of Pharaoh’s guard,

         Prospered in his job by the Lord,

         Made overseer of his master’s estate,

         Propositioned by his master’s wife,

         Put in prison by his master,

         Made overseer of the prison by the warden,

         Given the interpretation of the butler and baker’s dreams by God,

         Given the interpretation Pharaoh’s dreams by God, and

         Made head over all Egypt by Pharaoh.

God determined all these events for Joseph.  Joseph didn’t plan any of this and certainly wouldn’t have if he had had any input!  In one sense, the “big” decisions were not Joseph’s, but God’s.  But as we understand the story from heaven’s perspective, Joseph’s one, small choice, made without any warning or forethought, was the big decision.  It was the choice that God had to see if Joseph would really make.  Within Potiphar’s house were all the comforts of the world.  As long as Joseph remained there, he would enjoy the prestige and security that came with his position.  But Potiphar’s house was not his rightful home.  Deep inside, Joseph knew this.  When the time came that he had to choose, Joseph made the right choice.  Joseph made the right choice in his hidden life, when “none of the men of the house was inside” (Genesis 39:11), when only he and God would know.

The Christian who would bear genuine, abiding fruit must likewise obey the call to flee from Potiphar’s house.  Joseph had his God-appointed time in Potiphar’s house, but the day came when his convictions and the demands of the world collided.  He had to choose.  And God provided the precise time and place where that choice was to be made.  Our God is a God of details and specific appointments.  Because of one small, secret decision where we obey, we find ourselves at precisely the right spot to catch the big train that God has scheduled for us.  This is how God brings forth His fruit.  His ways are mysterious beyond all understanding.

Potiphar’s house represents the outward, visible life that we control.  As long as we remain, we are masters of a house that is familiar, predictable and comfortable.  It is a place where we can disguise our true identities and receive prestige, honor and reputation from the world.  But we can bear no abiding fruit there.  For Potiphar’s house is a house under judgment.  Judgment against Potiphar’s house was delayed, but all of its fruit was later destroyed in the plague of locusts.  They “…ate every herb of the land and all the fruit of the trees which the hail had left. So there remained nothing green on the trees or on the plants of the field throughout all the land of Egypt” (Exodus 10:15).  The Christian who has compromised his hidden life will not appear much different from the one who is consistent and faithful.  He will go about his work looking much like the faithful servant.  But his fruit is the fruit of Egypt.  It is the work of wood, hay and straw that will not survive the day of fire (1 Corinthians 3).

YOU CAN’T SEE GOD’S FORK IN THE ROAD ‘TIL YOU’RE PAST IT

No matter how carefully we plan, life will take different turns than we would have chosen.  “A man's heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps” (Proverbs 16:9).  We see our lives from the earthly perspective.  We see ourselves setting everything up, making opportunities and plotting our way.  But heaven looks at that same life and sees God walking ahead, preparing the road.  It is God, Himself, Who makes our opportunities and leads us to the place of decision.  Someone may ask, “Can I recognize this crucial fork in the road?”  In hindsight, we often can.  Many fruitful disciples can look back to a particular turn in the road and discern how God began to bless them richly after they had made a difficult choice they knew was required.

But we can rarely recognize this crucial road as we approach it.  We see what we think are critical decisions coming up, we give them all the attention and prayer support we can muster and they often come to nothing.  Another time, we must make a quick decision with little warning and it becomes a pivot point for all that follows.  When God sets this road before me there will rarely be an obvious connection between this decision and the outcomes of other matters important to me, especially spiritual matters.  We are not able to choose which of our decisions become the ones that release God’s blessing into our lives.

It must be this way.  For it is only when a Christian regards all of his decisions as being equally significant, only when he has a single set of criteria for making both his hidden decisions and his public decisions that he can be assured of making the right choice in the crucial decision.  In the final analysis, the most important decision is every decision!  The Christian who would bear fruit to God must break free from the “double-standard” stronghold that holds this world captive.  He must cultivate consistency and transparency in all of his conduct and affairs.  The discipline of the fruit-bearing Christian is a high and difficult calling.  The flesh will protest against it, mock him and use every strategy to lure him back to the compromised dullness of this passing world.  But “when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him” (James 1:12).  Do you want to settle for anything less?

Meditation and Response

1. Think of a time when a "small" decision to do the right thing changed your life in a very significant way.

2. Can you identify some spiritual fruit that resulted from things that followed?

3.       Ask the Lord to show you any inconsistencies in your decision making between "large" and "small" decisions.

Postscript

We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.  John F. Kennedy

Long distance runners describe a condition popularly known as "runner's high."   It is a sensation of well-being, euphoria or happiness that is achieved only after the runner has passed beyond the normal threshold of physical endurance.  Although it is debated whether the condition is physiological or psychological, those who experience it identify a common trait: that the conscious mind is irrationally freed from its focus on the physical stress the body is enduring.  Two aspects of runner's high parallel the Christian's pursuit of a transparent life and deserve our attention.

First, achieving runner's high requires that the runner surpass the comfortable limits of known physical realities.  He must reject the body's demand to quit as it encounters the rational threshold of pain and exhaustion.  In the same way, the Christian who wishes to see the power of God bring forth enduring fruit in his life must be willing to break through many comfortable thresholds that attempt to define his reality.  There is no greater attack launched by the enemy than that thrown against the Christian who sets himself to righteousness in his hidden life.  He must persevere past the point where his own strength fails and appeal to God to provide His strength.

Second, the runner must cross this threshold alone.  He must reach down into himself and decide that he wants to achieve something beyond the ordinary.  He cannot compare himself to the other runners because he has no way of knowing their inner struggles.  He knows only his own pain.  The Christian who desires to live transparently before God must also cross the threshold alone.  No one else will judge his hidden life to know if he passes the test or not.

In his first letter to Timothy, Paul bemoans the tragedy of those who have shipwrecked their faith by violating their consciences (1 Timothy 1:19): Christians who were progressing well, but fell into heresy and corruption.  Yet an equally tragic outcome is the Christian life never lived at all.  Here is the ship that is fully fitted for service, yet never leaves the safety of port for the open sea.   It sails back and forth in the harbor where it was built, ferrying mundane and familiar cargo.  While I have made a few references to the church body in this book, I write primarily to the individual Christian.   Christian fellowship is a marvellous gift from God that provides us with encouragement, friendship, strength and belonging.  But just as all gifts of God are potentially subject to abuse, community can also allow us to hide from ourselves and settle for a spiritual life of indifference and non-commitment.

It is an easy thing for us to blend into the crowd and merely assume the appearance of one who has taken up Christ's yoke.  No one will ever accuse us and no law will ever condemn us for mediocrity.  The Christian who only looks after the appearance of his visible life will attract little attention and will draw no criticism.  In community, he has the luxury of keeping the inner man as invisible as he chooses.  As far as all can see, his life is in order, he keeps short accounts and contributes what is expected of him.  Yet in all this he is but a ship puttering about the safe confines of the harbor, outfitted for an ocean voyage never taken.

Christian discipleship, on the other hand, is synonymous with the exploration of the perilous and the unknown.   Every page of the New Testament beckons us to challenge the set of realities the world delivers to us and to sail out of the harbor into uncharted waters.  This is our inheritance in Christ.  For each one of us, there is a "runner's high" that God calls us to achieve; that place where we step out in obedience and walk with God at a level outside of the laws and economy of this present age.  It is in this place and nowhere else that we stand without contradiction before our God.

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Table of Contents

Preface

Chapter 1. The Mystery of Fruitfulness

Chapter 2. The Diversity of Spiritual Fruit

Chapter 3. Bearing the Fruit God Has Chosen For Me

Chapter 4. The Need to Slow Down

Chapter 5. Restoring the Biblical View of Reality

Chapter 6. Wild Grapes: Separating Ourselves from the Works of Darkness

Chapter 7. Weeds in the Field: Getting Our Finances in Order

Chapter 8. The Destructive Power of the Tongue

Chapter 9. The Bitterness that Defiles Many

Chapter 10. God is Not a System!

Chapter 11. A Hole in the Wall: Hidden Hypocrisy

Chapter 12. Judging: Our God Given Obligation

Chapter 13. High-Risk Christianity

Chapter 14. The Most Important Decision

Postscript