something far more interior: faith expressed in love

There is much in the book of Galatians but the paramount issue is what the Gospel of Jesus Christ is and isn’t. Paul is furious in the letter and a big part of his wide-eyed name calling is that some scum bags were trying to be extra spiritual and say you weren’t a Christian if you didn’t follow their lead. Pious Christians can easily read this now and be appalled at those who demanded circumcision as part of salvation... yet we do the same thing all the time. There is always the, ‘If I had Jesus plus ____’ then I’d know I’m REALLY saved; or the, ‘She does [or doesn’t do] _______ so she MUST not be saved.’ We like outward indicators. All of us do, no exception.

But Paul says in Galatians 5 that the Gospel has something to do with a far more interior issue: faith working through love: the issue of the heart. (I hear you mumbling your counter arguments of citing James and Micah 6.8 and so on, hold your britches and listen). The Message puts a section of Galatians 6 very clearly: ‘[Those who would try and add to the Gospel] want an easy way to look good before others, lacking the courage to live by a faith that shares Christ's suffering and death. All their talk about the law is gas. They themselves don't keep the law! And they are highly selective in the laws they do observe. They only want you to be circumcised so they can boast of their success in recruiting you to their side. That is contemptible’

No need to cut things off. Jesus is enough. There is not some secret spiritual key that if you do God has to love you more (remember that whole Jesus dying for you and raising from the dead thing?). No more hoops to jump through. Jesus did it for you. You want to memorize Romans? Okay. You can’t use it to leverage against God though (and this should free you that if you sputter and forget about it for a week or year you can start up again, no condemnation [chapter 8]).

I think it is easier for us to control our outward actions and appearance and so we make those things the standard for salvation or justification or sanctification or our standing with God (or someone else’s); outward actions are easy to compare and I like comparing myself–wrongly–to other people so I can make sure I’m okay with God. A lot of the Pharisees and these bozos in the Galatia region and our own hearts are living in fear when we attempt to lower God’s standard of perfection into a few simple rules. We are terrified that Jesus isn’t enough. But he is.

What seems most wild and elusive, like trying to ride and untamed stallion, is our own heart. Yet this is where the magic happens, this is where God brings the change. We are told that God exchanges the old heart and gives a new one that actually wants to follow his way.

People were always asking Jesus if he was the One and as proof they always wanted signs. Jesus was usually pretty ticked at the interrogation. Salvation is here. It comes through what Jesus did. See it. Bask in it. Don’t you dare water it down with your rules either, for if you steal a Christian’s joy by confusing the Gospel with your rules God will crush you.

you. are. clean.

The grace of God should really weird us out. We should find God’s kindness appalling. Some words often used are scandalous and audacious, shocking and not making much sense. God’s grace should leave us dumbfounded and confused! If it doesn’t....I don’t think you get it. Maybe you have forgotten how powerful his grace is; maybe you have forgotten you need it and live on it.

Think of the most terrible immoral act you can and realize God has forgiven people who have done such things. Many of us have gone through some stomach wrenching things in life, things which we would rather forget. I once asked my grandpa, who is a World War 2 vet, what the War was like–I wanted some cool stories!!–but he thought a moment, looked at me and said, ‘Some things should be forgotten.’ But even these things which ought to be forgotten God can forgive! Yes, the child molester, the rapist, the murderer, the spouse abuser, the dictator, the adulterer, the pimp and prostitute, the child trafficker, the legalist, the terrorist, the politician, the liar...and yes, YOU! God, through Jesus’ work, can clean even you! He can say, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ And it be true! Getting blown away by God’s grace is a natural reaction to it because the math equation is unfair! But God did it, his love secured the Cross where Jesus died and defeated death and God’s love secured Jesus’ resurrection so we can get lost in the wilderness of love for all eternity starting now.

There is a song by the duo Shane & Shane, it is called ‘Embracing Accusation.’ It is a slow song that has a sinner being reminded via the Devil of his failures and sin. ‘He’s right’ the singer says, and he is! The Devil accuses us of our past sins and our potential to continue screwing up; ‘he is singing the song of the redeemed’ the songs goes on. The whole song is building until the crescendo which gives me goose bumps typing this out:

‘The Devil’s singing over me an age old song/
that I am cursed and gone astray/
Singing the first verse so conveniently over me/
He’s forgotten the refrain.
Jesus Saves!!’

That’s how the song ends: Jesus Saves!! Don’t you worry how it is all gonna be fixed, how you’ll put your life back together, how everyone else will react. God, through Jesus, has saved you. In the Father of all things, in the ruler of all, in his eyes you are not guilty anymore, no more shame, only grace!

Monday is for Morons: 02-20-2012

The Gospel is for you!

Do you believe it?

It is a fact, so.... deal.


Let's pretend for a moment you have a best friend, he or she is THAT person. You are two peas in a pod, you know each other more and better than anyone else. You don't have to finish one another's sentences because who wants that, really? You WOULD do anything for this person. You've experienced much of life together, gone through the fun and the easy and the tough and terrible.

What if the hardest situation and circumstance came two days ago. Your amigo in arms needed you the most, more than ever before.... and you completely abandoned them; you left your best friend in the whole world out to dry. They needed your presence and you were not where on the map; they needed your words and you were silent; they needed you and you were purposely running away?

Let's pretend your best friend is God.

The Apostle Peter didn't have to pretend, he owned this scenario; he lived it. He is the reality of this idea, its fulfillment. Peter--the rock!--told Jesus, 'Everyone else may leave you when the crap hits the fan but not me, not this guy.' It was not long after that Jesus was taken capture, tortured and killed and Peter was found in the dark, cold night writhing in bitter weeping and feeling like he betrayed the world in leaving Jesus' side. Can you imagine the thoughts that might have run through Peter's head? He confessed earlier that Jesus was it, that Jesus was the son of God, the long awaited Messiah who'd save the world! He heard the voice of God affirming these facts too. And he did not have the moxie to say he even knew Jesus, let alone die with him.

You may have a sense of this in your own life as well. You feel that your sin is another spit in the face of God. You think, 'If I REALLY loved God I would not keep failing and sinning!'

Sometimes I'm surprised that it was Judas and not Peter who ended up killing himself. To think of the guilt and depression which engulfed Peter....too much it seems.

Some days later Peter and the boys came to shore from sailing. As Peter stood on the cool sand, the smell of his lineage flowing through his nostrils he heard his future... his present; Jesus made sure that Peter knew that the God whom he betrayed loved him.

This is for you. This is the Gospel. Your sins are many, God's grace laughs at them because the punishment for those sins has already been paid for in Jesus' death on the Cross.

I’m a Gentile. How Ya Doin?

Last night I taught a few willing listeners about some of the things the Apostle Paul is talking about in his letter to the Saints in Ephesus, specifically the second chapter, verses 11 through the end.

There is a lot going on in this passage and I’m not starting it all up. One point, however, stuck out to me, it glared and glistened as it dribbled out of my mouth last night: I’m doubly undeserving of God’s grace.

The Jews, as Paul talks about in Romans 3, were some privileged dudes. They had all the oracles and promises of God; they had the Temple; they had–for good and bad–the whole history; they had Abraham and Isaac and Jacob; they had their promised land and their circumcision (yikes!). The Gentiles (this includes myself and probably most of you), by contrast, had nature... boom! Yea. That is about it. Paul talks in Romans 1 that the Greeks had nature to reveal to them the God of the Universe and even that truth we all suppressed....umm....I think with their divine inspiration the Israelites had a leg-up in this case.

So thinking about the fact that no human being had the right to be called God’s children (first part of Ephesians 2), we can throw some more impossible into this cake and say that Gentiles (non-Jews) were not even a consideration for this dance.... we weren’t even a name that had been crossed-out, we were not even written down in the first place!.... or so it seems.

In Romans 9 and onward Paul discusses how Gentiles were the most unlikliest of unliklies to receive the blessing and mercy and grace of God’s salvation. No one deserves God’s mercy. But if anyone did it was the Jews. And here I am, as Gentile as a pork sandwich on Passover Day, receiving daily the full benefits of Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross and the glory of his resurrection. This is amazing! Now go ponder how great you are in light of that (pour me some sarcasm, please!)

The Legend of Legacy

Have you ever dreamed about how you would be remembered? How history would speak of you? I have. I’ve had tons of crazy and exciting ideas regarding the way generations down the road would perceive me in all my glory. When I first became a Christian, in my silly zeal I wanted to be a missionary somewhere dangerous with the hope of being martyred!

But we hear it all the time don’t we? ‘What’s going to be the legacy you leave behind?’ ‘How will you make an impact on the world?’ ‘Will your decedents be proud of who you were?’ But more awkward, if you are a Christian: ‘What will history say of your work for the cause of Christ?’ ‘How many people will greet you in Heaven who, if it were not for you, would not be there’ ‘How many people will you have discipled?’ ‘Will you have an -ism attached to your last name because of your scholastic or dynamic ministry?’

Oh the burden of building such a great legacy! You need to get workin on that yesterday! You need to do so many great things and impact so many important people who will then go on to influence a certain nation who has never heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ before!

Unfortunately we have traded an act of love in for a a ragged, selfish and melting dream of meaning something in the world, of being someone, being known; we have tainted good charity for me-zeal.

As one pastor pointed out, ‘What was your great, great, great grandmothers name?’ You know what, if it wasn’t for ancestry.com you’d be unknown to your own great, great, great grandchildren, but even then they will, more than likely, not know you–who you are, what you were like, how you smiled, what made you tick.

It is hard to find people in the Bible who care about their legacy like we are so often told to do. And the guys and gals we do find in the Bible who are concerned about such things end up on the opposite side of God’s favor because they were worried about how they would be remembered, not how they loved their Maker and their fellow human beings.

Remember in the book of Esther, the idiot Haman was trying to promote himself and wanted all his friends and family and nation to worship him . . . but he ended up being hung on his own gallows. Remember Peter how he stuck his neck out when he said, ‘Lord, I’ll not forsake you’–he was saying, ‘look at me! I’ll be better than everyone else!’–but he too ran away when the possibility of persecution came. Or the king in Daniel who lost his marbles and lived like an animal so God would make him see that he was nothing. Or most pointedly the author of Ecclesiastes who taught that all things in this world, no matter how great you made them or influenced them, will be passed on to someone else who didn’t do a thing to deserve it.

You see, Christians are those who already know who they are. We are a people who do not have to prove ourselves. We are humbled beyond understanding simply because we are God’s children. We have no need of impressing others. We have no need of making sure we have left indelible impressions on hundreds by our speeches and acts. No, we Christians are more concerned about Jesus than ourselves; we are happy being described by the word mere. If someone wrote a book about most of the incredible followers of Jesus, we might be bored to tears because God looks at the heart not at all the sparkling achievements we're so use to applauding.

To understand that to be enveloped in Christ is what is most important is to understand everything with regard to this legacy making mess. You will be forgotten by the world and your family, it is the law of life. But you will never be forgotten by your Father. The mystery is that His legacy is yours.

Monday is for Morons: 10-31-2011

Jesus was just beaten to a bloody and disgusting mess. He was being called names and maligned. After the long nails went through his hands and he was stapled down to the cross. They, without concern of smoothness or being ginger, flopped the cross upright in the hole in the ground. The joking and final flop of the cross into the hole further ripped skin and stretched tendons. There Jesus hung. A picture of poverty portrayed, paradoxically to save.

Then the guy next to him and an 'ahah!' moment. Maybe he saw Jesus earlier in his life; as he was walking around the city heard of Jesus' claims, saw a miracle or two. Or maybe he had never met him before but,picking up on the jeers, discerned who Jesus was. Regardless, here he is suffocating along side the Son of God. 'Jesus,' he whispers out between breaths 'remember me in paradise.' Can you believe it?! I mean this guy was feeling sorry for himself, for at his 'death bed' he realized what an idiot he had been his whole life. I mean people steal because they don't work, right? Sure, live your whole life like you want then at the end whine like a baby and seek repentance, what a moron!

But wait. The disfigured face of Jesus clearly claws out a sentence, 'Today, you will be with me in paradise.' WHAT!?!

The truth of it all is that Jesus' mercy and grace and love and compassion and patience are far greater, far more shocking and scandalous than we could ever have imagined. It does not take a life-time of good deeds and bible reading to enter to bliss of Christ's presence forever. It takes the realization that all your friends already know, you're a rotten to the core sinner. But Heaven is stock full of rotten apples like you! What's one more? There is no sin too large that God, like Gallagher, won't obliterate to bits! Smashing it to that it covers the earth as they life at the sin's triviality.

You have a sack full for God to smash? That's okay, he has both the time and the power for it. 'But these are some really big ones!' you reply. He has it covered, he'll just bring out a bigger hammer. Hurry, find your forgiveness in Jesus' work, go now, before you feel so guilty again that you think he could never forgive you.

Monday is for Morons: 08-28-2011

It’s Monday. Today is the day that reminds us how long a week is and how quickly the weekend goes. Monday is a status—How are you today? It’s Monday—as if we all know what is going on this day, we are all familiar with the feelings that the Monday sun shines on. Monday is the day of whining and pouting. Monday is the day of sighs and complaints. Monday, somehow, is the day I forget what Jesus has done… therefore Monday is for morons like me.

I hope to use this sometimes dreadful day as a quick reminder of God; a simple word to give hope and a fresh, crisp breath in our forgetful souls; something just enough to get us by until the sometimes-good-sometimes-bad Tuesday.

So before you kick your dog, be rude to your spouse, or pour coffee on your co-worker here is God:

Romans 8.31: ‘If God is for us, who can be against us?’ The quick answer is everyone; everyone can be against us, the whole world! But God IS for us. You are in God’s corner. God is fighting on your behalf. God has established victory for YOU! Yes, he already knows your wicked and stupid and miserable and gross sins, but he has forgiven them, all of them. He fights for you; he has won for you; he has succeeded for you! Let’s not let the Monday drag us down but let us instead be glad in Jesus’ work for us. It is finished and nothing will change that. Don’t think that you can outsin the grace God has freely given; kick such thoughts to the curb and keep on keeping on. Take your emptiness to God and be reminded anew of the smile under which you, Christian, always and forever will sit under. The only smile that matters: God’s.

Simon Says What? Acts 8.18

Simon was a guy who was a magician. He made his living, as far as we can tell from the New Testament book of Acts, from performing magic or tricks: he did something and people wanted it. In fact Simon amazed people in Samaria, the town where he polished his gig. Simon was pretty happy about his accomplishments and thought of himself as 'someone great.'

Simon was not some ding-dong pulling rabbits out of his hat, he probably had some real power. Remember in the Old Testament when Moses was trying to convince Pharaoh to let Israel go, some of the Egyptian magicians were able to perform some of the same 'miracles' Moses was able to do; Simon was no illusionist.

Well after Philip came and preached to he people how they were sinners headed straight off the cliff and into God's rightful judgment, but Jesus died for them and His payment was for all who entrusted themselves to Jesus; after the gospel was revealed, people trusted in Jesus, even Simon. So he set aside his chicken bones and wand and followed Philip around as Philip met with people and elaborated on this new found Jesus. Simon wanted to learn from a guy who knew Jesus Christ.

It wasn't too long before Philip, by the working of God's power, did some pretty cool miracles himself. He probably healed some folks and other supernatural things, so much so that Simon, the self proclaimed pretty awesome guy, was flat amazed. More so, Peter and John--some more disciples of Jesus--came into town and by the laying on of hands gave the Holy Spirit of God to the new believers of Jesus Christ. Well Simon is doing head stands at this point and it flat broke on comprehension so he, like any respectable entrepreneur, offers the Apostles some cash so that he may have this same power.

This is when Peter flips out, 'May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money...your heart is not right with God.' Basically Peter said no.

Aw but his intent was good, he wanted to help others; Peter must have been scarred and on a power trip. We see in verse 22 that it is Simon's very intent that was wrong.

We do not have the same gift as Peter, giving the Holy Spirit to others. But we do have the ability to give the Gospel to others and the very same foul intent which resided in Simon is often in us: we want to be the doing person in order to be be the person who is known for doing.

The Gospel, the fantastic news of Jesus paying our sins is free to us, free to all humanity. But the Gospel is never a means of self-promotion or self-recognition; the Gospel is all about Jesus. Jesus did not do what he did in order to provide a tool for his followers to be thought of as holy rollers who got it goin on. Quite the opposite: Jesus died for nobodies to be known and know the Creator and Sustainer of all life, to have a right and good and joyful relationship with God, the Almighty.

Sometimes we use our wisdom and pleasant speech to only gain respect and credit from others; we, being the messenger of the life-giving message, want to get in on the warm-fuzzies and pat ourselves on the back for all we have done. Friends, we have done nothing and Christ has done everything.

The great part is that even when we act like Simon and have moments of stupidity God is graciously accepting us, delighting in our turning afresh to Him. Simon, after receiving his verbal shellacking, says to Peter, 'Pray for me' he desires to walk back to God, confessing his idiocy and sin. No matter what you have done--10 years ago or 2 seconds ago--the path to God is always open and there are never any toll booths.

Leviticus Full of Grace: Why I Love the OT

‘I’m glad I don’t have to worry about doing those anymore.’ Let me guess, if you could even get THROUGH the book of Leviticus that last sentence sums up most of what you learned from reading it. I mean, exempting a few bits here and there of narrative where some died, the book is an eye-lid closing 27 chapters of seemingly worthless, old, Eastern regulations for worship. You may second guess if you still WANT to know the God who would ‘inspire’ such writing!
Well, as seems the normal case, after reading the book over and over, consulting smarter people who can give historical, cultural, and Biblical context, and praying—often in confused frustration—I have come to appreciate and even . . . yes . . . genuinely ENJOY this ridiculous book.

We must first understand that Leviticus is part of a story: it is squished between Exodus—which ends with the glory of God descending on the tent of meeting, showing God’s presence with the people—and is succeeded by Numbers—which has more regulations and laws, some narrative of astounding things and people wildly and frequently complaining… and a huge census. So Leviticus is not a Maverick book sitting alone at the bar of the Bible smoking a cigarette with a half-empty pint in front of it; it is no rogue, but a thread in the fabric of, not only the first 5 books of the Bible (called the Pentateuch), nor the whole Bible, but a glimpse into the character of God Himself.

So we should conclude, then, that God is full of rules and is killer at making us bored? No. Prior to Leviticus God approached people, and not many of them it seems. He CAME to Noah, Abram, Jacob, Joseph, Moses; no mega-churches by this time in the Bible. Culturally at this juncture in history such lack of interaction between the common man and the divine was not abnormal. If you can remember some Egyptian history or maybe the movie Stargate, the ruler of a people either considered himself entirely or in part divine but he was the mouth, the between-man of the normal people and the divine entity. So when God, who created everything, decides to not only dwell among His people, but give direction on how the poor bum who’s always asking for change can worship Him, as well as everyone else in Israel, this would have blown everyone away; this is like Steve jobs saying, ‘But wait, there’s one more thing’ near the end of his keynote speech of new Apple products, when that ridiculously crazy thing comes out; this was beyond tweet worthy info, beyond really our understanding: it was brand new on the Earth and it was historically and culturally and socially and personally new and different and counter. Now the people, the everyman, can GO to God and worship Him.

Along this same thread, Leviticus is rigorous about social equality in worship; as the New Testament (NT) book of James points out, it is easy to say, ‘oh, that guy with lots of money gives more, he must be a better person.’ Leviticus says no; we see that if people are not able to give a bull, they can give a goat, if not that then something less expensive all the way down to some grain. We see this played out as Jesus’ parents in the NT were only able to give 2 birds for an offering—they did not have much money. So not only was worship not exclusive to the rich, but standing with and before God was not for the wealthy, it was for all who joined God. Interestingly enough too God did not order the people to go into debt, asking always for the most lavish of gifts from everyone. He wanted worship not things.

Leviticus also teaches that sin is costly. We find it very hard, but we must understand that for many people—and those who grew up on farms have a leg up here—giving their lamb or bull or any of their animals for sacrifice was almost equivalent to giving up your pet dog or cat. When you went to offer gifts to God, it would be sad and hard; this would be a reminder to the people of Israel that sin not only meant something, it took away life, it caused pain and made you uncomfortable; there is a price to sin, namely death. Making it even more clear—and as my generation would say, ‘real’-- In Leviticus God lays it out that the person who gives will himself participate in the act of worship, which was again, not normal for the time—it was always the priest who would perform the sacrificing. The farmer literally had a hand in worship.

It is easy to read the section where God says, ‘Be holy for I am holy’ as a negative and impossible claim; but again, it was not an impossible hoop to jump through to get to God, rather it is a GRACE that GOD HAS MADE A WAY TO HIMSELF WHERE PREVIOUSLY THERE WAS NO WAY. When He says be holy, we should hear: join in doing what I do, come along WITH me.

Leviticus gives a context for understanding what is going on in the NT. Without Leviticus and other regulations and laws we miss how significant and outlandish many of Jesus’ acts were, from the lady who was hemorrhaging, to Jesus’ interaction with unclean lepers, to, as mentioned already, Jesus’ parents. Without understanding Leviticus, much of the NT is a dark room which we can only get a vague sense of what is present in it.

There is SO much in this book that is admittedly hard to understand and can be boring. But it is the Christian’s book to know: it further substantiates and reveals the character of the Almighty to us. We cannot sell the book short by saying it is outdated and all we can glean is that Christ fulfills this stuff. LEVITICUS IS ABOUT THE GOOD NEWS, THE GOSPEL WHICH HAS BEEN AROUND FOR CENTURIES: God chooses to love and allows Himself to be worshipped by those who will follow Him and love Him with their all. He makes a way where there is no way, He tumbles the wall of previous impossibilities, so that we may know Him.

Much more can be helpfully said but hopefully this will draw you into curiosity for this great book, and will lead you further into understanding the character and heart of the God of the Bible.

I was greatly helped by John Milgrom’s commentary and Gordon Wenham’s commentary and Mark Dever’s manuscript found in this book, as well as by audio from Jay Sklar; but AS ALWAYS, nothing can trump constantly reading the book of focus and praying for understanding.

With every post I hope that if you have questions, concerns, complaints, caveats, or anything else that starts with a ‘c’ you can feel welcome to pose them.