Santification – Drive By Theology

Hollywood: the New Moral Majority

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2017 is the year that Hollywood got religion.

What they are learning the hard way is that only he who has not sinned can cast the first stone. And that’s precious few in Hollywood. It’s a slippery slope when people who abuse women call out other people for abusing women- or- when sinners call out sinners. So let the Torquemada-style Inquisition begin. Circular firing squad anyone?

So is it time to go back to the good old days of the Judeo-Christian sexual ethic?

Although that sounds attractive, “the good old days” didn’t work in the old days, either. The one thing that Hollywood and the Moral Majority have in common is a set of rules that they can’t live by.

The Moral Majority had its own Harvey Weinsteins. So maybe setting up a bunch of rules isn’t as effective as it sounds. That’s just religion.

Religion is a set of rules by which we are accepted.

Hollywood and the Moral Majority are religions. And rules can never change us in a way that makes a difference.

The Moral Majority made flabby, cultural Christians. And that doesn’t always make you a true believer. You like the rules, the Christian concepts that are part of God’s common grace- they certainly make the world work better- but even you’re not able to do them in way that really makes you different from the other rock throwers.

Any set of rules, any morals- without the gospel, is just religion. Throw in God and you have theism- a general idea of God- with a strong moral code.

Trying to be moral in a way that is culturally influential- even when it makes intellectual sense- won’t last for long- apart from the real heart change brought by the gospel.

It’s like asking an ant to carry a boulder on its back.

When you know that you have a Savior in Jesus who was moral in every way that you have failed to be- and who took the penalty for that failure for you- that should be doing something to your heart.

If its not- if your not interested in where true moral authority resides- and how you can please the one who did what you couldn’t- the One who loves you despite your failure- you should be worried.

Oftentimes, when Christians have power- we focus on the morality part- on Christian culture- rather than the actual gospel- rather than in the weakness and love of a Savior- who if you love him- and you really get what he did for you- brings morality- and “doing the right thing” into your life anyway- through the heart change that only the Holy Spirit can bring.

So not only do we know what’s right, we genuinely want to do it, too.

When Are We Truly Ever Happy?

The happiest people I’ve known are also the ones who I’ve watched selflessly serve others.

My Grandma and my wife are two people in my life who exemplify this. They are people pleasers. Now, there are good and bad people pleasers.

The bad ones want something out of you. But both these ladies are simply happiest when they are making others happy. They just do it to do it. Why?

Jesus, who is the perfect human image of God, fully pleases God, and it delights Jesus to do it, as only one perfect Being can please another. It’s part of the perpetually pleasing back and forth of the members of the Trinity.

As humans, we are made in the image of God, so we have some sense of it, too. That’s why when we please other image bearers, it just makes us happy.

You can only find happiness in either the true image or the image bearer. You can’t find it in yourself or in an inanimate object, because its something that has to be reflected back at you by another Being.

Happy in the True Image: It’s a not-so-vicious circle. We live by God’s good- are happy in it- so we do more of God’s good- and are even happier. And since God is most pleased with us when we love and obey Him, so we are pleased and content, too.

And Happy in the Image Bearer: what brings happiness in others, bring happiness in us. And who doesn’t like being around happy people? So when we please others- love your neighbor style- they are happy, and so are we.

So we are designed to do good things. And the degree to which we are able to do those good things- we’re happy when we do it, and less happy when we don’t.

Benchmark Disconnect

Why is there sometimes a disconnect between our situation and our happiness? We’ve got “the job,” the kids are getting straight A’s, we had a great family vacation. But we’re still not happy. So its onto the sports car, 401K and beach house. If we achieve it, why do we still feel blasé?

True happiness is not achieved by meeting a life benchmark. Because God has connected our happiness to Himself.

The grace of God’s love is the spring-head from which all other graces flow:

joy at work,
in parenting,
relationships and anything else that’s important to us.

It’s only when we do these things in the context of Him that we will feel fulfilled.

If you’ve never given your life to Christ, if you haven’t taken Him up on his offer to reconnect you to God, you’ll just keep chasing what’s next. Because we’re designed to be connected to God.

Unfulfilling=disconnect.

If you are Christian, you can get stuck chasing what’s next, too. And it’s because you’ve made your benchmarks the same as everyone else’s: perfect parenting, big promotion, fat 401K, and lake house with a boat out back.

Unfulfilling=disconnect.

Or instead, your benchmarks are based on being good. But in benchmark obedience, we obey, but our reaction time is sluggish, its not as complete as it used to be, and our attitude is a little off.

Unfulfilling=disconnect.

For the Christian, in both cases, we’ve reverted back to benchmarks to gain acceptance, rather than knowing we’ve already been accepted.

And when that spring of grace seems to dry up, it sends sickly and sluggish waters through the spiritual system, clogging your spiritual life.

Sure, you’re connected to God by Jesus, but its rabbit ears instead of FIOS. You feel something is missing.

Only in remembering the grace by which Christ saves us can the channels of grace to your heart be unclogged.

Connection reestablished… via the gospel.

Out of Focus

All at once, the law shows us God’s holiness and our own sin. And it doesn’t just reveal sin, it stirs it up.

Now, let’s be clear, the law doesn’t cause sin. Sin is already there. At best, its buried in a shallow grave where it can easily claw its way out. But the law brings to the surface what we find hard to see. It shows what a Holy God requires. And it shows me that I’m really bad at it.

Therefore no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin. Romans 3:20

But the law not only reveals sin, it stirs it up in us, too. The law actually antagonizes the sin. It aggravates it. Draws it out of us like an Epsom salt bath.

The law is holy and just, but sin works its way in when we hear it. It actually makes us want to sin. Think about it. What happens when someone tells you that you can’t so something? Naturally, you want to run right out and do it. Try telling a toddler (or teen) what they can’t do and see what happens. Then look in the mirror. Because every human is hard wired with authority issues.

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The law tells us what to do- our hearts rebel at the thought of someone in authority over us, who knows better than we do what’s best for us- and sin has its way.

The answer- adjust your focus.

Focus on the law alone and you’ll fail. And even if you are a little successful, the tiniest voice will still whisper, “good job.” That’s works righteousness, i.e. sin.

So apart from Christ, any good work starts us down the road to earning it. And that doubles down on our sin. For then, even when we do good, we are doing bad.

Law out of focus is law done out of the sight of Christ.

You can only properly approach the law through Christ, in whom we can and want to do all things as we remember what he has done for us.

You can never do law out of view of Christ. You must always hold the law in one hand and Christ in the other.

An Un-hypocritical Love

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Law starts with love. Because how did Jesus say we are to do the law? By loving God and neighbor as ourselves.

Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. Romans 12:9-10

“Love must be sincere…” And then Paul continues in the chapter with all these things we should be doing: hating evil, clinging to good, being joyful, patient, blessing those who curse us, etc.

And not just love, but sincere love. If we’re focused on the list, box checking, refrigerator list Christianity, even though they are all things you should be doing: you are practicing hospitality or sharing with those in need…there’s a danger- we may have a secret ulterior motive.

One of our motivations is the hope that we’ll be loved back.

So, in that case, you’re really doing it for yourself. It’s self-love.

What can I get out of it?
Will people like me more?
Will God love me more?

Self love is not sincere love. Sincere means without hypocrisy. And if we’re not sincere, we’re hypocrites. Self love is hypocrisy.

We’re not really doing it because we love others, we’re doing it because we love ourselves.

Check out how we learn to do it the right way, in love, here:

Desert of Sin

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We’re all told to do something we can’t.

In Numbers, God’s people are told that in order to obey the law, they are to make all kinds of sacrifices to God. But they can’t.

They are told to make grain, oil and and wine sacrifices and offerings, but they don’t have any of that.

They’re in the desert.

And there’s no Desert Costco where they can get it. But Numbers also envisions a future where they will be able to obey. The promised land.

We, too, are told to obey and can’t. But scripture envisions a future where we can, too.

We don’t have to stay no-growth stuck. Israel was stuck with just manna. But someday they would enter Canaan and have the ability to obey.

Despite their failures and sin.

In the same way, we’re able to obey. Because we have a sacrifice that allows us to. Jesus.

Hopefully, more and more each day, our failure and sin turns to loving obedience as we grow in our love for the ultimate sacrifice.

The gospel takes us on this journey from having to obey to wanting to obey.

And obedience is the gateway drug.

We may not even want to at the time, but after we do- we’re like wow, that was pretty cool. And then we act shocked and surprised that God really does know what’s best for us… and our heart changes a little more.

Dirty Windshield Effect

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Sometimes during winter, the chemicals on the road put a light film on my windshield. At night, when I am driving on a dark road alone, I really don’t notice it.

But when an oncoming car shines its headlights onto my windshield, that slight, unnoticeable film makes it almost impossible to see. I had no idea that something that potentially blinding was there until it got illuminated.

God’s Word is the set of headlights that reveals the junk that keeps us from seeing things as they are. Stuff in front of us, on a collision course even, that we might not have even noticed before.

Psalm 119:105 states:

God’s Word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.

Christian, God is at work, even in your darkest times. But God’s will, the Law He has written in His Word and in our hearts, may become clouded over and difficult for us to see in the middle of it.

Church family helps to hold and aim that lamp as an instrument of God, helping us to see clearly and putting us back on the road. That’s one reason that Life Groups are so important.

True change can only be accomplished if we allow the Holy Spirit to rewrite our code with God’s.

Ezekiel 36:26- I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.

Jeremiah 31:33- I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

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Jesus gives us a risky new way of Being Human. How do we do it? How do we live this new way? The difference is in who is keeping you. Someone is always keeping us. We’re either keeping ourselves or someone else is. 1 John 5:18 says:

the One who was born of God keeps them safe, and the evil one cannot harm them.

Who is the One “born of God”? Jesus.

When we keep ourselves, we base our worth on how well we do what the world expects of us. How well we keep all the balls in the air.

But when Jesus keeps us- the pressure comes off. What he did for me- accepting me even though my kids aren’t perfect and I didn’t get the job I wanted. That freeing.

Being “Born of God” gives us a whole new way to begin to be human in the way that God originally designed us. We gain a new understanding of both ourselves and Jesus that changes our hearts. And because its Jesus who keeps us, we can take the risks associated with this new way of living.

Click to listen to the whole thing…

https://www.cedarrun.net/sermons/being-human/

Big God- small god

A small god can manage the list of dos and don’ts that we have posted on the fridge. But only an infinitely big God can dole out grace in the huge amounts that we need every day. We make him small when we limit him to being the genie for our prayer requests.

Compared to what God expects of us as beings created specifically to love, worship and obey him- the most on fired up Christian only taps a minuscule fraction of their potential to live for god. And though I wound him daily with my self serving attitude, my lack of awe of his greatness and grace- he still comes back to me and says, you can do better, I know it because I made you. I know it because I love you like my own Son. We will never understand the depth of what he has done for us through the gospel. If we spent every waking minute of our lives pondering the peaks of gospel off in the distance, we would still never make it past the foothills.

Don’t be paralyzed by shame, but do continue daily repentance. Your salvation isn’t finished with the sinners prayer. But it moves toward the finish line as our hearts melt and change over God’s grace and response to our sin.

Word vs. Works

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Now, you’ll get no argument from me that churches are primarily Word Ministry based. Practically, para-church organizations are better equipped to serve communities. But every church should have a couple of gateway programs that do community outreach as part of their discipleship program.

A couple of years ago, the church I attend started a community service program called Send Seventy, modeled after Jesus sending the disciples out in pairs. Send Seventy was designed to get people out into their neighborhoods to serve. It platformed out of our Life Group ministry- so that people could go together and support one another as they tried something new. Hopefully, three things would happen:

Together, people could overcome their trepidation to try something new.
Once they tried it, service would become something they wanted to do, rather than a burden or just another thing on the to-do list. (Enter sanctifying Holy Spirit:)
They’d be motivated to find a place that fit them and continue serving.

Gateway programs like this are important in combatting community service lethargy. Many people, myself included, shy away from service because its new and intimidating not to know anyone or what to do- we’re uncomfortable. A gateway service program called Salt and Light is run by our church at a local homeless shelter ministry. It’s led and supported by a regular and dedicated leadership team from the church, but with plenty of room for people to get out of their pews and try it out.

Church community service programs should be designed to introduce people to service so that they can find their own service home and routines in their own contexts, neighborhoods and comfort zones.

Did Send Seventy work? Well, it worked for me. I’ve shared my struggles with serving and new routines and busy-ness. But after a few tries (and few bad fits), I found a place in my neighborhood where I feel comfortable, know the people and can serve regularly.