Hardly Easy.

The Lesson

I woke up Tuesday morning at 5:30AM. 

An early start, to be sure. I had for a purpose and mission, which I chose to accept, to babysit (in my eyes) the most adorable baby chub monkey in the world. 

I find that when I'm up extremely early in the morning, while not completely functional, I think a lot. I think deeply. Early mornings are the times when I think with a deep consideration. My thoughts click on a much more serious level, and the weight of their considerations really hits home. 

Christianity is most certainly not for the faint of heart.

Christianity is not easy in any sense. It is the most difficult thing in the world to be a Christian. And I am not talking simply about persecution or trials, or the matter of trusting an invisible God. 

Sacrifice is painful. Surrender is hard. 

I considered the people I cared about who aren't Christians, or even the prospect of what it would be like to date a non-Christian. As much as you love and cherish these people in your life and want God for them, you have to step back, and realize just how much of a miracle your life as Christian is in the first place. The reason you came to faith, was by grace alone. As far as I can understand, the prospect of giving up everything in your life, sacrificing your whole entire life to God, is not something natural. 

The act of giving up all rights to yourself, and to your natural desires is wild and daunting. And yet that is what God wants from every human being. He wants relationship (Christ is our example of the perfect relationship), and from that flourishes, obedience. Obedience born out of love, willing and unyielding. 

Oswald Chamber explains it well:

"In our natural life our ambitions change as we grow, but in the Christian life the goal is given at the very beginning, and the beginning and the end are exactly the same, namely, our Lord Himself. We start with Christ and we end with Him—”. . . till we all come . . . to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ . . .” (Ephesians 4:13), not simply to our own idea of what the Christian life should be. The goal of the missionary is to do God’s will, not to be useful or to win the lost. A missionary is useful and he does win the lost, but that is not his goal. His goal is to do the will of his Lord."

God does not have in mind for us the goal to self-serve, let alone serve to in order to win the lost. Our goal is in obedience to Him. A Christian's goal is to become like Christ - one whose Spiritual life (the life of Christ) has overcome the natural life, which results in absolute obedience to the Father. This is a feat, not natural to man, and absolutely unfathomable to the non-believer. It is a transformation not possible by human means or efforts. 

So what does God want from us? 

God's desire is that every human being enter into relationship with Him, one that resembles that between Christ Jesus and Himself. 

Obedience is costly. People generally do not like sacrificing their earthly wants and desires, for we use these things to lead our lives and dictate our choices. Christianity demands sacrifice, it is a 'religion' that cries out for the practice of sacrifice. Because, in order to enter into our intended supernatural purpose, we must surrender the natural. 

"23 And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me." (Luke 9:23) 

This here is the image of the life of a Christian on the earth. This is the picture of obedience, love and devotion. We come to this point because of the grace of God. We cannot realize the end of ourselves on our own, we cannot simply "give up" our sinful nature. At the end of the day, we need grace - the unmerited intervention of the power of God in our lives.

And by grace, we enter into the most fulfilling relationship we were made for, and we will be utterly satisfied in Christ. 

The Connecting Point

This thing happens where God gives me a lot of answers and leaves me to decode the puzzle. I am given a lot of knowledge, but the true application and deciphering of how it applies in my life is usually lost. I spew out the wisdom, but cannot really understand how I need to use it. To anyone else it seems clear, but to me, I have trouble seeing the point.

Through the grace of God, I get the point of this tidbit though. I need to start treating my relationship with God as an actual relationship with someone I truly love and cherish. I can't put it in its own category. I can't segregate it and say it's "that special relationship" over there, and here are all my other relationships over here. It is a relationship, pure and simple, no different than any other I have, except for the fact that it is the most important one. 

I'm in this relationship not because I have to. No one maintains communication with a friend simply out of habit. We share similar interests, and values for one, and there is much more that draws me to them. Take an interest in your Lord. Sure, this is prodded by the Spirit in you, but you also have to feed that desire, and help it to blossom. 

Find every excuse to cherish God and to enjoy Him. 

Satisfied in You.

The Hunger Games

Since I started getting regular workouts in, my appetite has become rather ravenous. 

Picture yourself the hungriest you've ever been. 

Imagine yourself filling up on chips, and only chips.

It's not satisfying. It sucks. Maybe the salt and the flavor appease your taste buds and growling stomach for a while. But then you realize that you hunger for something more, something that will help your body gain strength and be mobilized and ready for the day. 

My kind of games.

I've been pretty mopey lately. Yet again. I'm hungry, hungry for the next thing in life. For a job, for a relationship, for a place of my own etc, etc.  

It would seem that every time I'm mopey I write about it. Therefore, it comes across as if I'm always that way. Truth be told, I write about the mopey times because God uses these moments for great impact. 

I'm still in the process of being unemployed, still in the process of searching for a job, or a career path. The hunger for the next thing pains me a lot these days.

It's funny how you can think you're relying on God, and start out the journey with a Godly perspective and lose it the next month. Discipline and training are never done it would seem. Perspective needs constant forming and reforming. Godliness needs to be fed. 

I'm still waiting on things. And maybe that's the problem. I may tell myself I'm waiting on God, but I'm really still waiting for Him to bring things to me. Don't get me wrong, I'm still doing things, I'm still actively pursuing activities and doing things I'm responsible for. I guess I'm just not waiting on God Himself. I'm hungering and thirsting not after the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, but after things. Things in this world that satisfy as much as chips satisfy a starving marathon runner. 

Satisfaction Guaranteed

There's something to be said for being satisfied in God. A wise friend of mine told me that he had been used to waiting for the next best thing to come along his whole life. And every time it would come, it would never satisfy. 

I was laughing to myself Tuesday morning, sarcastically poking fun at my situation. "He's got this job, she's got that job. She can afford to do this, he can afford to supplement his hobbies..and Leah, all you have right now in abundance, is God." As if to only have God were a bad thing. Right? 

I know I've lost sight of God's perspective. It's easy to do when you don't spend enough time really keeping your heart meditating on God's word. This is a necessary discipline, much like positive self-talk and self-confidence. But why?

As I've said before, the only kind of prosperity that matters is that of the gospel; overcoming of the natural life by the spiritual life - holiness. This is the spiritual battle at war within you. What is that Spiritual life? It is the life of Christ Jesus in you. And that life must be nourished and fed. 

The spiritual disciplines of reading the Word of God daily, praying and singing praises, worshiping regularly are all vital to nourishing the Spirit of Christ in you. 

45 The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks. (Luke 6:45)

You feed the nature in you. Someone who feeds the Spirit of Christ in them will inevitably find their satisfaction in the Lord, they will inevitably overflow in obedience to God, in goodness.

Think back to when Jesus drove out the tax collectors and those selling all sorts of what nots in the Temple. We can feed that worldliness in us, and fill the temple of God with idols and junk, or we can feed the Spirit of Christ in us. 

All that we desire to satisfy us, or wait upon that is not solely Christ, can be considered an idol. 

I was reminded that there is a whole lot of evil spirits out there, ready and waiting to pounce, to take control, to fill the empty house. To me this speaks to the fact that we do not have time to fill up on idols or junk. If Christ is central, let us seek Him, let us nourish the spirit of Christ in us.

In my time of unemployment, all I have is God. 

I'm so "poor", and yet so rich because all I have, and have been given is time to seek God. 

There's a perspective for me. 




On another note, the title of this entry came about because all that came to mind immediately as I wrote it was this very appropriate song: 

Live Long and Prosper.

I believe in the prosperity gospel.

Let me show you why.

We are exclusively made for the purpose of God. 

This is why Christians "prosper". 

This is why Christians overcome. Because we live in the purpose of God. 

We live according to the will of God. Prosperity does not happen because God wants to see us happy, or because we asked for things in order that we might use them, even for "generous" purposes. Rather, prosperity looks like anything that God gives us (whether situational or material) that accomplishes His will. Prosperity's result is not with me getting what I asked and pleaded and harassed God for. Prosperity comes to fruition with the Gospel coming alive in me; with holiness being refined in me and with reconciliation to God by the work of Christ in me. 

"Live long and prosper." Thanks Spocky

Prosperity is about thriving. It is about flourishing in the good and the bad. Why? Because in each case the situations refine us; they are meant to bring about our holiness, they are meant to turn us towards God. The victory is not in overcoming sin (Christ already did that), or in the bad being taken away. The victory in every turn of events is about the spiritual life overcoming the natural life in us. 

In each promise, whether it be Jeremiah 29:11, Joshua 1:9, Romans 8:28, etc, they speak not of earthly gain for its own sake, but gains or losses for the sake of the gains of the Kingdom of God. Spiritual gains. Spiritual successes. God's gains. 

I believe in the Prosperity Gospel. As a Christian, I believe in the accomplishing of the will of God through me by the power of Christ in me. I believe not in my own prosperity, but of the prosperity of the Gospel of Christ. 

I do not believe in a prosperity gospel that says the bad will go away when I beg God to take it away. I do not believe in a prosperity gospel that says I will get what I ask God for just because I want it. I am not saying "Don't bother asking God for things," ask, seek, knock, but don't be so blind as to think this one thing is the only solution to your desires. Keep your head and heart open. If anything, ask yourself, how does this thing I am asking for accomplish the will of God in me? God changes us through prayer, and not the other way around. 

In truth, I do not fully know what is really good for me, but I trust that a good Father knows what is good for His kids, so I will ask Him what He has in store for me. Because a prosperity gospel is not prosperous in the least if it does not have for a result the prosperity of the Kingdom and purpose of God. 

2 Corinthians 5:11-20 speaks about the gospel, in terms of 'The Ministry of Reconciliation'. It says that Christians are not Christians because they simply do good. Apart from Christ, nothing we do measures up to God's standard. Christians are Christians because Christ came to reconcile us to our Father in heaven. We are Christians because God wants us to be reconciled to Himself, and in turn, the love of Christ compels us to advance the gospel, to see its prosperity in the lives of others who also need the same reconciliation. 

God promises us prosperity. He promises us victory and success. But in what? In conquering the natural life. In seeing His will be accomplished. Because as a Christian, what greater, richer joy do we have than in seeing our Father's will come to pass? 

Kissing Comfort Goodbye.

The Dumbest Thing.

"That's the DUMBEST thing I ever heard," Bill Cosby exclaims, after a clip of Victoria Osteen expressing her worldly views on obedience to God plays. 

"I just want to encourage every one of us to realize when we obey God, we're not doing it for God—I mean, that's one way to look at it—we're doing it for ourselves, because God takes pleasure when we're happy. So, I want you to know this morning: Just do good for your own self. Do good because God wants you to be happy," she continued. "When you come to church, when you worship Him, you're not doing it for God really. You're doing it for yourself, because that's what makes God happy. Amen?"

There isn't much else that can be said about these words that hasn't already been said by every Christian on this continent. 

This is the world we live in, replace God with "Yourself". 

Her words made me angry. So angry. How dare she cheapen the value of a life on the earth, how dare she cheapen grace and God!

And yet I still feel a pang of sadness. Because as crazy as she sounds, little does she know, she has pinpointed the heart of a lot of people and Christians alike. 

We may understand that what she said is completely wrong, ludicrous and stupid, and yet I think I remember a time where I lived like this. I may not have believed and said that "I will serve God because He cares about my happiness and that's why I obey," but I sure acted like it. I believed that I loved God and I served Him because I wanted to please Him, and that my life was not about myself. But I know I have known those things, and yet acted so differently. 

There are many days where I have said "surrender" but have acted in an attempt to bend God's will to my own happiness. 

Holiness.

Oswald Chambers said it best: "We are not destined to happiness, nor to health, but to holiness," and, "God is not some eternal blessing machine for men to use." 

To be 'holy' means to be set apart for God. Holiness is a characteristic of a Christ-follower, someone truly set apart, putting aside all earthly desires to follow God. 

Surrender is necessary to holiness; we surrender because we desire God, we desire holiness. If I didn't surrender it was because I didn't know why I should. It's because I believed that my desires were more important that God's. As an example, if I pray for healing it should be because I desire God to use this healing in order that I may be refined, and that this person may be refined for holiness, and not just because I want it to happen. 

It's a question of motives again. When we pray, when we worship, when we serve, do our actions line up with God's desires, and for a right-standing relationship with Him, for holiness? Anything less than aligning with God just doesn't cut it. 

"Today we have far too many desires and interests, and our lives are being consumed and wasted by them. Many of them may be right, noble, and good, and may later be fulfilled, but in the meantime God must cause their importance to us to decrease. The only thing that truly matters is whether a person will accept the God who will make him holy. At all costs, a person must have the right relationship with God." -Oswald Chambers, Destined to be Holy

Goodbye Comfort, Goodbye Safety.

How much do you prize your comfort? Your happiness?

In this world we can't stand unhappiness or discomfort. Pain is not our friend, understandably. I've seen many people, including myself, try to escape the pain and discomfort by consuming ourselves in something or someone(s). Anything and everything to avoid the lessons God has for us in the pain. While God can heal us through people or things, there is trouble when things or people become the substitute to God; when we try to find our healing in people or things, and rely so fully on them instead of on God. Problems arise when things or people, instead of exemplifying God, and amplifying Him, consume us. 

The funny thing is that God will keep bringing us to trials and scenarios until we learn to fully rely on Him. He brings us to scenarios that cannot be overcome by simply burying yourself in people or things. 

Is your comfort, or happiness worth more than enduring the trials and hurdles that God uses for your holiness?

People who say that Christianity is not comfortable or safe are absolutely correct. It's the farthest thing from comfortable. You forego your comfort, and happiness for holiness, for a right-standing relationship with God. God is in the business of creating saints, not happy people. 

Even in the lack of comfort and happiness, there is still peace and hope in the Christian life. God is the great comforter, and there is still love, joy, patience, goodness, gentleness etc, and these transcend happiness and comfort. You'll find you often discover these in the midst of suffering or obstacles. 

We have Israel to thank as an illustration for our own lives. Hosea is the perfect example of wayward hearts and wanderers, a people constantly seeking pleasure, happiness and security with another. 

Hosea 14 is a "Plea to return to the LORD," that Israel would not look to anyone else to lean on, or to "save" them, but God. 

Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God,
    for you have stumbled because of your iniquity.
2 Take with you words
    and return to the Lord;
say to him,
    “Take away all iniquity;
accept what is good,
    and we will pay with bulls
    the vows[a] of our lips.
3 Assyria shall not save us;
    we will not ride on horses;
and we will say no more, ‘Our God,’
    to the work of our hands.
In you the orphan finds mercy.”

(Hosea 14:1-3)

Hello Discipline, Hello Holiness.

"They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in His holiness." (Hebrews 12:10) 

Nobody ever learned anything by never going through hard times. You don't find your courage when the sun is shining and everything is going your way. You don't realize your helplessness and sin on your "best" days. Unfortunately for us, it takes hardship and troubles to teach us. We must be refined for Holiness. Gold cannot be purified any other way than to be refined through fire. 

Life lived for happiness, fueled by material things really does de-value the life you have been given. Because in the end, those things turn to rubble and ash when you die. 

Life on earth for a Christian is all about holiness; it is about learning to walk in the Spirit-filled life, pursuing, learning and living out a right-standing relationship with God. 

"16 So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. 17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, 18 as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal." (2 Corinthians 16-18).