"Traveling the Routes of Life..."

“Transiting Life According to My Way or God’s Way”

All of the following is to say that for most, it is easier to have a healthier expectation of a local transit system than to have a healthy expectation of God and His ways.

THE EXAMPLE OF THE TRANSIT BUS:  When was the last time you went to catch a bus and did one or more of the following?

Demand that the bus be there waiting when you arrived at the stop in order to avoid inconvenience.

Demand that the bus arrive in order to avoid unpleasant weather or a bad situation.

Demand that the bus stop be situated where it was most convenient.

Demand that the bus arrive on your schedule and/or according to your plan no matter the effect on others.

Demand that the bus travel on routes that are pleasant.

Of course this is most ludicrous.  The transit system plan insures that the bus arrives according to a schedule designed to fit with a greater plan?  Perhaps it is traffic volume, a city’s traffic flow pattern, the number of riders, where and when those riders typically travel, high use facilities such as shopping malls, etc.

BEFORE WE BEGIN:  Before continuing be clear about one very important thing.  God is not the prisoner of His own good ideas and thus He is free to interrupt our expectations of Him according to His good pleasure.  He is to be trusted beyond our understanding and we must be willing to accept His interruptions whether they be quiet or dramatic!  He is the great healer, the provider, the One who blesses, the destroyer of spiritual strongholds, the one who commissions signs and wonders, and the One we call on to be against the evil one and his kingdom of darkness.  However, there is a problem and we need to think about it in terms of man's limitations!

CONCERN - MAN’S LIMITED VIEW:  As one does not expect the bus to be there according to one’s personal plans, pleasures, purposes or agendas, so too one does well not place those expectations and others like them upon God and His interventions in the lives of His followers.  Consider the following.

God's Love?  Most certainly God does love each and every person.  However, such love is expressed in ways one may not understand.  The example is that of a parent who expresses love in a way that may not be understood or accepted by the child.  

Consider as well the matter of what God likes.  He may love everyone but that does not mean that He likes everyone.  To be in the favor or the "like" relationship with God means that one seek to live a life which is pleasing to the Heavenly Father (More about this in a later post).

Man's View:  Remember man’s view is limited by many factors.  To suppose that any one person has the grand plan is to suggest that the finite fully understand the Infinite.

Man's Supposition:  As one makes way through life, it is to say the least naive to suppose one knows the best course to follow and/or the best course of action.  From my Navy days consider the following.  Imagine a ship transiting the entrance to a sea port without soundings, navigational aids, navigational charts, and/or a channel master.  God is the ultimate Channel Master who knows best the channel in which His follower’s lives are to flow individually and corporately.

God's Timing:  Consider too that to demand God to be there upon one’s own schedule is very often to limit one’s view of God's intervention.  

When one enjoys the event we call a Divine encounter, most often it is best experienced when God shows up or intervenes in one's life in an unexpected manner at an unexpected moment.

MAN A GOD? A SUBTLE TRAP:  Consider this question.  Do you recognize these words, “…You will be like God?”  Yes, from the earliest records of mankind in the Garden of Eden, it was all about man placing himself in God’s position.  That which was once presented as a temptation now has become ingrained in man’s depraved thinking and the ultimate expression of the “self.”  

Whether tacitly or directly stated such insidious thoughts often becomes a part of one’s mental content and process.     Unfortunately such cannot be limited to those outside of the Church for it has made inroads into those of faith.  It all sounds so good, designer god on my terms at my time. 

RESPONSIBLE SURRENDER:  It is far better to surrender indeed commit to and live out the words, “Not my will but Thine be done.” Immediately some will counter that it is some kind of “Christian Fatalism.”  That is to say they counter with the criticism that such commitment means; “I am absolved of any and all responsibility when I pray, ‘Not my will but Thine be done’.”  Not so!

Join me back in my Navy days for another illustration.  In order for a ship to have steering, it must be underway.  In other words, a ship dead in the water and unanchored is at the mercy of current and tide.  Such is also true of the Christian. 

In order for the “Thy will not mine” to work one must go forward in one’s faith.  However, one must also be willing for such plans and purposes as are in place to be interrupted.  Neither does it serves God’s purposes to be unwilling to go in ways found to be inconvenient—God’s way is always comforting and confidence building but often found to be not convenient.

All of the preceding is to say that for most, it is easier to have a healthier expectation of a local transit system than to have a healthy expectation of God and His ways.

THE CHALLENGE:  Trust in the Lord and do not give in to the propensity to try to figure it all out for such is always limited by our finite perspective.  Leave such to the side and God will lead in the path in which one should go, the path that lines up perfectly with His Kingdom plan.

"Fad of Faith or Balance"

picture from flickr.com

It was a warm day at Andersen AFB, Guam.  An official from the denomination of which I am a part and I were standing on the airfield control tower catwalk looking out over the field.  This man was a pastor to those who pastor local congregational pastors.  To say he had a strategic view of ministry in general and problems of those in ministry would be an understatement.
 
In the previous few years he had been involved in the discipline of two very prominent public religious figures.  These were men who had major international ministries and whose television ministries had touched millions worldwide.  Both had very different problems but both had failed and fallen under not just legal scrutiny but that of our shared denomination. 

As we visited he commented to the effect that the more he saw of Christian service the more he valued balance.  He certainly understood the meaning of what he had better than most.

Balance conveys the idea of equilibrium or "...be equal with... ...bringing into equilibrium..." and "...harmony between parts... ...balance of power..." (http://www.etymonline.com/index.php).  Balance synonymously shares company with words such as poise, steadiness, and stability.


For years the comment of this pastor has been at the fore of many of my thoughts and attendant concerns as there seems to be a need on the part of the Church general and the local congregation to chase one fad or another.  Yet, when we look at the Judeo-Christian Scriptures over and over again we see examples of those who have sought to do so and thus have been rash in judgement, extreme in statement, imbalanced in behavior, and/or have been carried about by every wind of doctrine (Ephesians 4:14).

Notice that the Scripture just referenced does not suggest that it is errant doctrine.  It was just out of balance doctrine which at first they embraced and then as they became more and more involved it began to control them and carry them just as the wind carries a feather.

This is most troubling in that it involves not just the principles but those surrounding them.  However, those examples are provided for the warning of all who care to heed such.  In today's world there is no dearth of those who even when counseled and challenged do not pay attention and believing they have special light plunge onward in some doctrinal pursuit or another.

Some of the Fads of Faith I have observed are as follows.  There was the Charismatic movement which went and still goes well beyond the Scriptural models of doctrine and ministry.  Later there was the Grace movement and it seemed every one was publishing books on the subject of grace.  The Laughing movement.

Part of the Charismatic movement moved off into new revelation which was at times taken over the Scriptures just referenced.  The Inner Healing movement was popularized by a former President's sister while that President made being a saved Christian popular--somehow we never got around to the Lordship part of being a Christian.

While my Pentecostal theology is well in tact and based on the balances and principles set forth in Scripture, others made speaking in unknown languages necessary for salvation.  Yet others denied the validity of the experience and attendant practices.  The Prosperity gospel with its notions of material prosperity as an end is at this writing still influencing many.  Part of that movement is the notion "...what I speak will be so and I claim it to be so." 

Shall I go on?  There are those who have imported Eastern religion into Christianity and claimed "special" truth.  There is the Soaking movement that seems to be gaining traction, only time will tell where it will take many.  Of recent date I've been discussing with another the his notion that God's will is that all are healed. What has been left untreated in this posting is the various beliefs about the deity and/or humanity of Jesus Christ.

The sad truth is that people make these choices without giving any thought to the consequences and outcomes.  Certainly and has been said by many, "God gives you the power to choose but not the consequences."  It is those consequences that have carried many off into error and ultimately defeat of their faith.

This is not to disparage those who participate in these movements, for I am sure that most are good people who are seeking a deeper religious experience.  However, good people can be deceived as they follow religious tangents.  If one will look at the effects of many of these movements in the lives of people, one will find those who are hurt, disillusioned, and who feel disenfranchised--just plain left out because they have not had some "special" experience or some special "blessing."

As well, within these movements and those like them are the "special" and the "blessed" who have had this or that special experience or revelation of the "truth."  If great care is not taken, that specialness can lead to a spiritual smugness as one falls further into the deception of new revelation and new directions of "truth."

What is needed is a balance of faith.  Just as the pastor said on the catwalk that sunny day in Guam.  It is a grave error to suppose that one can dissect out any of the essential Trinitarian Orthodox doctrines from the others and then interpret the others by that doctrine.  Neither can one legitimately emphasize any one doctrine to the detriment or exclusion of the others.  This would be so much the more so with non-essential doctrines.

Even a cursory reading of Church history past and present will reveal an historical landscape that is littered with movements and those who have populated those movement that have tried to make such doctrinal dissections.  Even a cursory visit with those of the less developed world will reveal that these things do not work in their world.  They have no choice but to cling to the reality of a real faith and not wander off into speculative doctrine.  It seems to me that if it does not work in their world why should we expect that God ordained it for the western church?  Something is wrong!

Further consider that the genuine Christianity that has survived throughout the ages of Church history did perfectly well without these fads of faith, we then would do well to steer clear of them and chart a course back to the pure milk of the Word of God and bath that pure word in generous amounts of prayer.  It is then that the doctrines based upon those words of life, give life!  Living that close to and in conformity to the Scriptures may not be comfortable but it is in that place that we find the comfort of the One who inspired those Scriptures, the Comforter!