Into him, Inculcating his values, Imitating him

Nothing beats being plugged in. It makes for power and forward progress.

In a seminary missions class, Herbert Jackson told how, as a new missionary, he was assigned a car that would not start without a push. After pondering his problem, he devised a plan. He went to the school near his home, got permission to take some children out of class, and had them push his car off. As he made his rounds, he would either park on a hill or leave the engine running. He used this ingenious procedure for two years.

Ill health forced the Jackson family to leave, and a new missionary came to that station. When Jackson proudly began to explain his arrangement for getting the car started, the new man began looking under the hood. Before the explanation was complete, the new missionary interrupted, "Why, Dr. Jackson, I believe the only trouble is this loose cable." He gave the cable a twist, stepped into the car, pushed the switch, and to Jackson's astonishment, the engine roared to life. For two years needless trouble had become routine. The power was there all the time. Only a loose connection kept Jackson from putting that power to work.

J.B. Phillips paraphrases Ephesians l:19-20, "How tremendous is the power available to us who believe in God." When we make firm our connection with God, his life and power flow through us.

Ernest B. Beevers.

There is loose cable that is oft times neglected in our lives too - its our failure to enjoy Christ. We have so much to enjoy in our beautiful world, people, fun times, and activities; but oh to include him, to yearn after him, to treasure his worth - it's a loose cable we can daily neglect.

His is a call to himself. He was perfect - peerless in life; we - shapen in sin. Were he not to come, die, and renew our lives, we would know misery unending. This keystone passage is succinct in its recipe to help us blunt the old life with its pull and passions and find Christ's one - way charter to new, restored life and character.

Luke 14:25-33 NIV

Large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and turning to them he said: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple.  And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.     “Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Won’t you first sit down and estimate the cost to see if you have enough money to complete it?  For if you lay the foundation and are not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule you,  saying, ‘This person began to build and wasn’t able to finish.’     “Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Won’t he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand?  If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace.  In the same way, those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.

Knowing how carefully he was being watched by the followers of Moses, the Pharisees; Christ, on spending time with these false friends, intent on muzzling him, turned to the crowd and spoke these words. His was the ragamuffin message of a culture warrior in the minds of both Pharisee and careless listeners, alike.

His message simply was to pursue and enjoy him, to inculcate his values, to imitate him and model as others reproduce his life.

Our love for him must be an all encompassing one- a love that loves mother, father, brother, sister; but when love for mother, father, brother, or sister encroaches on our ability to make the moral decisions he desires, ours is to live to be approved by Him. His worth must be our priority and provide us the ability to aspire to the high, moral plains he desires us to call home (Colorado is on my mind). When the cross beam was lifted in ancient times, the one lifting it was on a one-way road to death. So as we commit to intimately know him, there's is a death that will take place in us-a death that will take us away from what others may venture to call life. We're to wrap ourselves into his life, to have him formed in us, to prize his devotion to his Father's will-his eyes only for our eternal welfare, his blood given to the last drop.

Enjoying him is an earmark of those committed to reflecting his unalloyed character. There is no following him apart from being dumbstruck and pulled in by his giving life. As living with him draws us in and makes us prize him above all; our love for him will lead to our loving less anything, one, or choice which pulls at our first call, which is to him. Yes, to live is Christ and to die to those passions, which subvert our enjoyment of him is gain.

"Come for everything is now ready"

I recently had an opportunity to give my son a teaching moment, when he tried to leave our dinner table before he should. Everyone is so busy devouring their meals and intent on seeing their favorite TV shows these days that the true meaning of mealtime is almost lost in our zoned in consumption of food at the expense of what dinner really means food, conversation, laughs, and relational bonding. I said to Coen as he left the table before he should, the family table is not a place for dining only, it's a place for talking, for treasured time with those we love.

We know seventy percent of Christ's NT teaching came in parable form. He taught in parables to close the eyes of those hell -bent on evil and to spark the curiosity and illumine those open to truth, which could alter their eternity.

Luke 14:16-24 NIV

Jesus replied: “A certain man was preparing a great banquet and invited many guests.  At the time of the banquet he sent his servant to tell those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’   “But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, ‘I have just bought a field, and I must go and see it. Please excuse me.’     “Another said, ‘I have just bought five yoke of oxen, and I’m on my way to try them out. Please excuse me.’     “Still another said, ‘I just got married, so I can’t come.’     “The servant came back and reported this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and ordered his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame.’     “ ‘Sir,’ the servant said, ‘what you ordered has been done, but there is still room.’     “Then the master told his servant, ‘Go out to the roads and country lanes and compel them to come in, so that my house will be full.  I tell you, not one of those who were invited will get a taste of my banquet.’ ”

First some key thoughts from this marquis passage.

The invitation to dine at the banquet was first only to a select few. When the giver of the invitation found his offer rejected, he gave an open invite. All in street, alley then later road or country lane were to come and dine. The food was ready, but guests were slow to attend this banquet of such significance.

Luke 14:18-20 NIV

“But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, ‘I have just bought a field, and I must go and see it. Please excuse me.’     “Another said, ‘I have just bought five yoke of oxen, and I’m on my way to try them out. Please excuse me.’     “Still another said, ‘I just got married, so I can’t come.’

People were uninclined to attend this dinner. Their reasons for rejecting the dinner were trite at best, considering the one, who'd invited them and his selfless preparing of this feast for these few, who meant the world to him.

John 1:11-12 NIV

He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—

Christ came to his own, the Jews; when they rejected his invite into the kingdom of God, his invite was made open to all. 
There is present application in this parable for people, who haven't made a priority the feast Christ has extended to them. He offers a welcome to a banquet of incomparable privilege, where the attendees are granted access and life they cannot find elsewhere. Those privy to this table, as Jonathan's lame son had unlimited access to David's table, know the dearest of a King, who makes as his dwelling their hearts.  If you've never RSVPed, the time is now as his RSVP may very well end on his soon return to earth. When he comes, the door of opportunity to enter in will be latched shut.

Consider his the call "Come, for everything is now ready."

True Religion

Where once we were mere coals black, cold, and lifeless; we've been lit afire with white hot glow - illumined and set aflame. A danger of our living in our newfound privilege and power is that we live to wear our change so conspicuously that we lose our sense of conscience, that should teach us to walk with quietly held wit and worth, which has as its beginning and end, who we've been made in Christ. The truth is apart from his creative work and change in us we are really nothing but mud, dust stuck together, not life-filled souls that will never know extinction.

In this Luke 14 passage, Christ encountered Pharisees lost in their classy living: religious pundits committed to living rigorously, rule-bound and illustriously and true to their place as the town's toast. They were the standard of how to live. All aspired to live in their footsteps, but thought it near impossible to live up to their tier of purity, privilege, and advantage. Well Christ was hardly impressed and saw the holes in their religion. His concern was that their religion be one, which did more to change them inside-out and to bless less privileged others habitually. Unfortunately, their religion was not only showcased before others, it was worn overtly with the best of intentions. Christ, knowing these Pharisees were misdirected, taught against the religious norm telling them graciously yet powerful powerfully that their pontificating, grandstanding religion was embarrassing and untrue to the way of his Father whom he represented.

Luke 14:1-14 NIV

One Sabbath, when Jesus went to eat in the house of a prominent Pharisee, he was being carefully watched. There in front of him was a man suffering from abnormal swelling of his body. Jesus asked the Pharisees and experts in the law, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?”  But they remained silent. So taking hold of the man, he healed him and sent him on his way.   Then he asked them, “If one of you has a child  or an ox that falls into a well on the Sabbath day, will you not immediately pull it out?”  And they had nothing to say.   When he noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable: “When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited.  If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this person your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place.  But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all the other guests.  For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”    Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or sisters, your relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid.  But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind,  and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

Our relationship with God must be viewed through the mirror of Christ's seamless, self-deprecating life. It must be constantly reviewed to ensure it is maintained and developed. It must be a source of real change to us. The change we feel through that relationship must be much more than the praise people shower on us, which can corrupt into believing ourselves to be great people. We must live to better those, who can give us nothing in return. Giving to those who can reward us for our giving may make for personal greed and a religion that becomes shameless in its quest for recognition and gain.

James 1:27 NIV

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

Walking Under Water Comes Before Walking on Water

Matthew 14 is one of the more intriguing chapters in the Bible. Here Jesus performs miracle upon miracle; however, the context in which he performed these miracles is woefully ignored.

Yes, Jesus would feed many. Sick would touch his garments and find healing - he would later even walk on water; but before he performed these marvels, Christ would lose his dear messenger John in the most macabre way. Herod hated John the Baptist. His miracles and message made Herod seem surprising human to the Jews and took away from his powerful aura as leader. Though Herod would happily had taken John's life - he knew how popular and regarded John was among his own people and the uproar he'd create were he to take away the greatest prophet to have walked the earth.

As luck would have it though, at least in Herod's mind, this happened,

MAT 14:6-12 NIV

On Herod’s birthday the daughter of Herodias danced for the guests and pleased Herod so much that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she asked. Prompted by her mother, she said, “Give me here on a platter the head of John the Baptist.” The king was distressed, but because of his oaths and his dinner guests, he ordered that her request be granted and had John beheaded in the prison. His head was brought in on a platter and given to the girl, who carried it to her mother. John’s disciples came and took his body and buried it. Then they went and told Jesus.

Imagine how this news altered Christ day, mood-his mental well being. John was the ultimate ambassador. He knew his place and lived only to fulfill his calling. 

John 1:7-8 NIV

He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. 

The news of John's death - the manner of his death specifically- made for immense discouragement, maybe even depression in the Christos. To not allow this thought, in my mind, is to deny the 100% humanity of Christ. He had lost his messenger, his predecessor- He was crestfallen, downcast, depressed at least in my mind.

What happened next proves the challenge handling John's death was for Jesus. The Savior himself needed the saving grace of alone time, where he could cry and scream angrily to rhe heavens. He needed time to ask his Father why he'd allow this saint of saints John to be beheaded and have his head handed to evil Herod on a platter. The morbid slaughter of John the Baptist made Christ livid - I imagine it weakened him to the core. I dare say this horrible incident made for Christ being at his weakest ever. Herod, by default, had touched Christ at quick.

Two times before and after Christ's turn to those, who needed help on John's beheading, Christ needed the saving of solitude. Without time to himself-to bare his soul with his Father-he would be worthless to the crowds, a bore, a hollow shell of himself before those who knew him well.

Matthew 14:13, 23 NIV

When Jesus heard what had happened, he withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place. Hearing of this, the crowds followed him on foot from the towns. After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there alone,

There is no walking on water before there is solitude. There is no triumph or helping others before there is time alone to deal with our issues - time to be threadbare and broken before God and others as well, time we can get into the fetal position and near final breath find grace to reach beyond anger and disappointment to depending on God and the lifeblood others give. 

As Christ later would break bread and feed thousands with 12 baskets left over, he thought of the broken body of his brother in arms, John. He also may have thought of his own body, which in time would be broken at the hands of those he called friends.  The world for him was a unforgiving place - a place where the good were trampled on without a thought, where good deeds brought out ill will in others rather than their regard.
If we're to walk on water, we'll need to have the courage to face ourselves. Walking on water requires we walk through some gut-wrenching waters of difficulty. At times we'll find ourselves drowning in self despair and darkness. Our time away will be much more than a day. To walk back into the lives of others too quickly may sieve away at our ability to show deep compassion, which at best is empathy the we gather in the flood waters of difficulty.

Take time to be near drowning alone today. Cry, vent, plead. Be livid, afraid, distraught, helpless. It's the cry of life that prepares us to show compassion to those in need. If we're to short circuit our time needed for healing: we short circuit our ability to help others heal as well.

Take time to walk under water so that you can walk on water.

Sanctus Real - Whatever You're Doing (Something H…: http://youtu.be/iN9J8eqKovY

When Healing Feels Eons Away

When healing is our need, whether physical, spiritual, or emotional; John 5 provides a tool set designed to get us well on our way to savoring God's healing, when he chooses to bequeath it to us.

A lame man virtually lived at a pool Bethesda in search of healing, which would be the portion of the first to breach the pool, when an angel troubled the waters. He cared to live life untroubled by paralysis, which bound him. From him we learn the virtue of actively staying on path so that when he chooses to heal us, we are walking the anticipation, belief, and gratitude becoming of his children.

His Healing Was Unordinary

John 5:6, 8 NIV

When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?” Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.”

God's healing comes to us in his time and way. For some his healing comes quickly: for others it takes times.

His hand of healing is always guided by a perfect purpose greater than our minds and hearts can grasp.

His Healing Was Unorthodox

John 5:9-10, 17 NIV

At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, and so the Jewish leaders said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.”   In his defense Jesus said to them, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working.”

He healed the crippled man on the most unexpected of days.

Christ underscored the purpose of the law; it was to serve a greater purpose.

The law was meant to benefit man not deprive him of his needs, it was to help man, not hurt him by making for missed opportunities.

No time is not a right time for God to further his work of healing in us. Our best interest is Important to him as he call us his children. From the heart, every day, he is compelled to meet our needs.

Charles Finney's conversion experience bears witness to this; it's always a great day to stumble on healing as we, like the man by the pool, live in a frame of mind, where God truly benefit us through his healing work. 

His Healing Was Unprecedented

John 5:16-19 NIV

So, because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jewish leaders began to persecute him. In his defense Jesus said to them, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working.”  For this reason they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God. Jesus gave them this answer: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.

He went against Mishnah laws 39 strong and broke the Sabbath, demonstrating his lordship over it.

Sabbath was made for man not man for the Sabbath. It was was a means to a greater end.

Knowing this lame man had waited on his healing for 38 years, Christ saw the trade off of breaking the Sabbath as less than the loss to be incurred in not healing this man in his desperation.

Christ knows and sympathizes with us in our broken state and stands willing to use his place of power with the Father to show us the love and strength his in his Father to help us.

He moves to heal in his purposed time and way in ways that are incomparable and beyond explanation.

He moves to heal us with a healing that always bears his stamp.

Our healing was meant to be multifaceted -enriching us, expanding his kingdom, and empowering others to more actively wait on him in trust in their path of duty (as they would on a spear to their death, Biblical trust) for his timely healing.

Riding the Edge of Our Potential

Victimized by a mock court intent on labeling him a false upstart, bent on misleading others; he stood his ground before the religious council, knowing he was very God. Later as Pilate gave into the cries for Barabbas, looking past the pleas of his discerning wife; Christ could only despair at the dastardly crave for his death by the howling masses. As he was beaten to a bloody pulp, paraded as king, and shamed by having his beard plucked and being coronated with a crown of thorns; his heart was twice broken over the evil in human hearts. Isaiah put his plight best,

Isaiah 53:3-5, 7, 9-11 NIV

He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.   Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted.   But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.   He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.   He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.   Yet it was the Lord ’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.   After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied ; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities.

As a man, the death most despaired was in his horizon, he was being pushed to the edge of his potential as man. He would have to somehow bear and embrace the thing he feared most as man-death. Wrongfully punished as a criminal; his portion would be death on a cross.

Allow me to liken his fate to the race to the finish of a row crew of four or eight. His was no easy task. As our lead oar man and Captain of our salvation, his was to carry a heavy cross with help up the hill called Skull, where he would be nail-pierced at wrists and feet and raised for all to see, while he bore invisibly the sin saturation of mankind.

Stroke! Stroke!
Ease your forward slide!
A fair league still
To old Cock Hill,
Where Spuyten Duyvil roars.
No time for play;
Give Œway; give Œway!
And bend the driven oars!
When breezes blow
Then feather low
With level blades and true.
Stroke! Stroke!
Stroke! Stroke!
Steady! Pull it thr-o-o-ough!
-Arthur Guiterman

As the weight of sin's sour scourge saddled his bent frame "pull it through" was the cry of his soul. It seemed heaven abandoned him as well, for he cried to God, who had all but forsaken him. Earth had misread him. How could God dwell with man as man? As he tapped deep to the heart of his strength as man; his heart for man as God and reliance on the Spirit of God helped him  "pull it through." He rode to the edge of his potential.

Hebrews 12:1-3 NIV

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.

He'd push up to gain every breath only to be berated on the cross. They'd satire him as one, who came to save others but couldn't save himself.  His death race was something he alone could fathom and be faithful to in spite of the insult, injury, and injustice he would suffer till his last, chosen breath. "Stroke, stroke" he'd continue silent but belligerent in the race, he'd set out to trusting his Father's strength - he would finish the way he'd started. 

Virgil parallels the commitment he'd entered his race to Calvary with well by giving a snapshot of oar men at the starting line of their boat race.

The Boat Race

They are at their places, straining,
Arms stretched to the oars, waiting the word, and their chests
Heave, and their hearts are pumping fast; ambition
And nervousness take hold of them. The signal!
They shoot away; the noise goes up to the heavens,
The arms pull back to the chests, the water is churned

-Virgil

The faith that heaved in the broken heart of Christ from angels strengthening him in Gethsemane would continue to help him to plumb deep to focus on the needy
thief beside him. Riding the wave of his potential, he stroked on saving this sin-laden man, assuring him a place in Paradise. Were it not for his willingness to pull through his own piercing darkness to see through to the potential destiny of the criminal next to him, opportunity would be lost in that moment.

The thief beside him experienced a kingdom come or kairos moment as he was afforded safe harbor on his transition through death's door. While his wellbeing was secured through the words of promise Christ granted him; his avoiding a cavernous plunge in eternity beyond was a credit to the empowering work of angels and Spirit, who partnered to enable Christ to bring this dying thief words of life from the jaws of suffering. The glory of this man's salvation was in the team as it were as it is in rowing.

Reflect on your experiences and accomplishments. Remember the dedication, the pain, the jubilation, the camaraderie -- your family. Remember the feel of the oar in your hand, the swing, the perfect catch, the pull, the drive and the run of the boat beneath you. But most importantly, never forget that the glory is not in you or any individual. Instead, remember that the glory is always in the team." -- Joe Blasko, Novice Coach, Saint Ignatius HS (Cleveland) 1996-97

Christ could picture the open tomb at the end of his race and submitted relyingly to the enabling work of the Spirit to "pull it through" Calvary's dire straits.

Christ rode the edge of his potential. Though they set out to murder him, no one would take his life from him; he would give his life. When he said "it is finished," no Roman soldier would break his bones in attempt to take his life - he'd already given his life. He was no pretender but one devoted to the race he'd committed to on coming to earth. As there is no room for pretense in an oar man, Christ knew that calling down angels to save him on that tree would only serve to undermine his purpose and ruin the eternal hopes of broken men. His unsullied character showed itself in his tapping the limitless potential he had to be faithful till death.

"Physical preparation is, and should be foused on, with fanatic devotion by all good coaches. The practice of racing at true maximal and getting yourself comfortable mentally with riding the edge of your potential, it takes an excellent coach to recognize the importance of that. I know that our coach knows this, and I cannot wait until winter, when he bears down on us and separates the varsity rowers from the pretenders." -- Jeff Lindy, 2000 Tufts Coxwain

I'm so glad Christ was willing to "stroke, stroke," "to ride the edge of his potential" to "pull it through" to the finish, so that our eternity could be secured by his selfless giving of himself in our place to bring us to God.