God's Fingerprints

Photo by Kolby Milton on Unsplash

Yesterday, our congregation hosted a big, annual Christmas party for clients with the local hospital system's mental health treatment services. This has everything you could want in a holiday shindig: piles of food and plenty of desserts to go around, a visit from Santa Claus, caroling, and kids playing elf and passing out every gift off your list. Elvis even shows up and sings (that's when some spontaneous dancing broke out this year). 

It's a really joyful time.

The book of Acts is the story of the news about Jesus crossing the borders of Judea and reaching to the ends of the earth (1:8). At first, the apostles are preaching to fellow Jews, and so their presentation of the gospel is bursting at the seams with Old Testament references. Peter spends 25 verses preaching and teaching on Pentecost in Acts chapter 2, and 11 of those 25 verses are direct quotations from the Old Testament. That's because his audience knew the scriptures, and they understood themselves as the children of Abraham, followers of Moses who were awaiting a "Son of David" savior. This was their story.

Richard Beck has pointed out that, in Acts 14, for the very first time, we see the gospel preached to an audience made up entirely of pagans who've never heard of Abraham, Moses, or David. That isn't their story. There are no Jews or God-fearing Gentiles in the crowd at Lystra—these people worshipped Zeus, and Hermes. 

So how does Paul introduce his unbelieving listeners to the God of the Jews?

Even though these folks don't know the scriptures, this God, Paul insists, hasn't left himself without a witness. "He has shown kindness by giving you rain from heaven and crops in their seasons; he provides you with plenty of food and fills your hearts with joy.” (14:17) The kindness of the Lord that we experience in our ordinary lives witnesses to God. It's the testimony telling the world about the God of the Bible. 

How do we experience God's kindness? What are the specific things Paul mentions that testify to God? He points to rain from heaven, crops in their seasons, food—and what else? 

Joy. 

Joy testifies to the one who made heaven and earth. 

Joy is evidence of a God who has plans to prosper us and not to harm us, to give us a hope and a future. 

Joy points us towards the God who so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in him wouldn't perish, but have everlasting life.

Joy is God's fingerprint. It reminds us that, though we may not see him with our eyes, God's been here. God's at work. And God's work, God's desire for us, is that we would have life and have it more abundantly (John 10:10), that our joy may be complete (John 15:11).

And just think: whenever you can bring some of that joy to another person, you're working side by side with our Lord, making, even in just a small way, the kingdom come and God's will be done on earth, the way it is in heaven. That's what happened at our Christmas party yesterday. Elvis impersonators, tambourines, banana pudding, and fried chicken—some days that's exactly what the Kingdom of God looks like. That's how you know, God's been here.

I hope you experience real joy this Christmas, that you see God's fingerprints all around you. I also hope that you and I will start to wonder: how can I bring joy to someone else this holiday season? How could I leave God's fingerprint on someone's life this Christmas?

You can listen to this week's devotional right here:

Hope for the Hopeless

Do you remember Hagar, from the book of Genesis?

Hagar was a slave girl of Abraham’s wife Sarah. As the years passed and their promised child still didn’t arrive, the couple started getting nervous about God’s timetable, and Sarah started scheming: Hagar would sleep with Abraham and conceive an heir for the octogenarian. Her plan worked too well: Hagar, when she realized she was pregnant, “no longer respected” her barren mistress (16:4). Sarah, in response, “dealt harshly” with her (16:6), causing the young woman to run away.

Now Hagar, a slave girl forced to bear her master’s child, is wandering alone in the desert, with no idea where to find shelter or provisions and no place to make a home for her son. It’s hard to imagine a more desperate, hopeless situation for a young girl to find herself in.

And that’s when it happened. “The angel of the Lord found Hagar beside a spring of water in the wilderness, along the road to Shur.” (Gen 16:7) When she must have thought all was lost, Hagar was found. I love that it tells you exactly where she was when that angel appeared: beside the spring along the road to Shur. I can just imagine Hagar telling the story, ‘I was on the road to Shur, and I got to the spring—you know the place—and that’s when I heard this voice…’

The angel assured her that she could return home and told her,

“You will give birth to a son. You are to name him Ishmael (which means ‘God hears’), for the Lord has heard your cry of distress…”

Thereafter, Hagar used another name to refer to the Lord, who had spoken to her. She said, “You are the God who sees me.” She also said, “Have I truly seen the One who sees me?” (16:11, 13)

In Hebrew, “the God who sees me” (verse 13) is a name: El-roi. That’s who the Lord was to Hagar. The God who found her, heard her cry, and saw her.

Hagar’s story is an example of something we see a lot in scripture: how God arrives just at the moment when you feel most lost and alone, when things seem most hopeless, right when you’re tempted to despair. There and then is when you hear the voice of God.

A vulnerable girl roaming, parched and pregnant, through the desert.

Slaves wailing as their Egyptian masters murder their newborns.

A fisherman out of his boat and out of his depth, flailing in the waves, crying out for a Savior.

A body tattered with nail, spear, and thorn holes lying in a pitch-black tomb, the entrance stonewalled shut.

And that’s when God shows up.

That’s because, no matter how dark and desperate your circumstances are, God is El-roi. The Lord sees you and hears you. And, because God is El-roi, the God who sees, there is always hope.

You can listen to this devotional right here:

Redefining "Enemies"

This past Sunday, I preached about peace and what it would take to bring a little more peace to our everyday lives and relationships. One of the scriptural passages I shared was Romans 12:20-21:

“If your enemies are hungry, feed them.
    If they are thirsty, give them something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap
    burning coals of shame on their heads.”

Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.

Another verse we heard came from the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5, red letters straight from the mouth of Jesus: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (5:43-44)

Both of these scriptures, you probably noticed, address the topic of enemies. Paul and Jesus give us a new, Christian definition of what an enemy is: an enemy is someone you love. It’s someone you do good to, caring for them and supporting them when they're needy. It’s someone you pray for.

That’s what an enemy is, for a Christian.

One of the sicknesses plaguing the Church in America today, I believe, is that we treat people with whom we disagree like they are enemies, and then we don’t treat those enemies like we are Christians. We identify this person or that group as our enemies, but we act like enemies aren’t people we’re supposed to care for and support and pray for and do good for. We act like an enemy is not someone you love. Instead, we embrace the world’s definition of "enemy": someone to be disrespected, loathed, and thwarted at every turn. Like I heard another pastor say once, the problem is not that Christians fight—it’s that we don’t fight like Christians. That’s a problem because, no matter how righteous you believe your cause is, it’s an unbiblical and unfaithful approach to your opponents.

If my faith consistently does not affect the way I treat people who don’t like me, and I don’t like them, if it doesn’t affect how I talk to and talk about people with whom I have profound disagreements, then it’s just a Sunday morning faith. I’m not denying myself and taking up my cross daily (Luke 9:23). I’m not opening my heart up to the Lord—only the parts of it that he won’t try to rearrange.

But, this Christmas, the Prince of Peace is calling us to follow him.

Are you using scripture’s definition of "enemy," or the world’s?

Who is that enemy you have not loved?

What would it look like to do good to them this week? What would be the first step towards praying for them?

How is Jesus challenging you to be a faithful, Christian enemy to someone today?

You can listen to today's devotional right here:

The Work of the Evil One

In my sermon on Sunday, I mentioned a verse from 2 Corinthians chapter 4, where Paul says that “the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.” (4:4) Hearing Paul talk about a lowercase ‘g’ “god of this world” probably sounds a little odd, but I bet you can guess whom he’s referring to: Satan is the so-called “god of this world” who’s trying to blind people to the gospel. That reminds me of what Jesus says in the parable of the sower in Matthew 13:

A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up… When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what is sown in the heart; this what was sown on the path. (13:3-4, 19)

Again, the evil one—Satan—is at work to keep people from receiving the gospel message. Apparently, that’s one of the goals of the evil spiritual forces in the world: to keep the good news from taking root in people’s hearts.

What I’m left wondering is, What does that look like? How, exactly, do these spiritual powers blind us and snatch away from us the words God’s Spirit whispers to our hearts?

I’m tempted (very tempted) to talk about cellphones right here. They have this uncanny ability to somehow tune out everything going on outside your head (like the other people trying to talk to you) and everything going on inside your head, too (like God’s “still small voice”). I think that kind of distraction is absolutely a powerful tool for Satan and very useful for snatching up gospel seeds in our hearts. Some of us need to take that more seriously.

But maybe it would be more useful if each of us investigated our own lives to uncover the methods Satan uses on me.

When I read something in scripture or a devotional that challenges me or inspires me, what snatches that away? When I feel God speak through a song, a sermon, or a conversation, what can eventually blind me to the message I'd heard?

Is it my phone?

Or is it my temper?

Maybe it’s my preoccupation with the news, or my anxiety about the future.

It could be that really good looking someone who just walked through the door, or the person who gets under my skin who walked in after them.

The busyness at work, the craziness at home, my favorite menu item at the restaurant I’m driving to, or the driver behind me who ought to have his license revoked—whatever it is, whether it’s a steady habit, a regular temptation, or a flash of disruption, it erases everything else that was written on my heart a moment ago. It snatches. It blinds.

You can find Satan in gut-wrenching atrocities and manipulative lies, but you don’t have to look anywhere so shocking. You’ll see Satan wherever the hope of forgiveness and promise of new life we have in Jesus is uprooted or obscured. If you investigate, I imagine you’ll find your heart and mind are smudged with diabolical fingerprints. Because evil does not want you to hear, doesn’t want you to know, doesn’t want you to find the life that you were created for.

Maybe we need to start investigating our lives, uncovering Satan’s methods, and rooting them out.

Listen to this week's devotional here:

Enduring Love

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash

When I think of scriptures that talk about gratitude, the first passage that comes to mind is Psalm 136. You might recognize it as that one really repetitive psalm:

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.
His love endures forever.

Give thanks to the God of gods.
His love endures forever.

Give thanks to the Lord of lords:
His love endures forever.

to him who alone does great wonders,
His love endures forever.

who by his understanding made the heavens,
His love endures forever.

who spread out the earth upon the waters,

      His love endures forever. (136:1-6)

It's a song of thanksgiving to the Lord for all of God’s “great wonders.” The verses ahead describe the first Passover and the crossing of the Red Sea (136:10-15), the journey through the wilderness (136:16), and the conquest and settling of Canaan (136:17-22). The examples are all different, but each one illustrates the same thing, the words of the refrain: His love endures forever.

Israel filled their praises with specific and tangible instances of the enduring love of the Lord. They gave thanks and sang of God’s love because they had seen it. They could point to it. If this psalm had been expanded by Christians in New Testament times, they might have said,

He emptied himself, taking the form of a slave,

His love endures forever.

He assumed human likeness,

His love endures forever.
He was obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross,

His love endures forever. (see Phil 2:5-8)

The incarnation—when the Son of God became a human being—and the cross are specific and concrete instances of the enduring love of the Lord. That’s love you can point to.

But where have you seen that love in your own life? If you were going to expand the psalm, what instances of God’s enduring love would you point to? I want to challenge you, today or tomorrow, to write another few verses and add your praise to this song. Name some specific and tangible examples of the love of God that you’ve experienced, and then call them what they are: his love enduring forever.

The four final verses of Psalm 136 declare:

He remembered us in our low estate
His love endures forever.

and freed us from our enemies.
His love endures forever.

He gives food to every creature.
His love endures forever.

Give thanks to the God of heaven.

      His love endures forever. (136:23-26)

Happy Thanksgiving. I hope you see the enduring love of the Lord all around you this holiday.

Listen to this week's devotion right here:

A Bunch of Hypocrites

“They’re a bunch of hypocrites!”

Have you ever heard someone talk about churches like that? Maybe you’ve said it yourself.

I get it. I've spent as much time around church folks as anybody over the last 25 years, and, on occasion, I've seen the judgment, the meanness, the gossip, and the moral lapses that you hear about.

But could there possibly be a redeeming message to take away from Christians’ endless inconsistencies and failures?

In a great book called Jesus Outside the Lines: A Way Forward for Those Who Are Tired of Taking Sides, pastor Scott Sauls points out all of the hypocrites we meet in the stories of scripture:

• Paul wrote about gentleness (it’s a fruit of the Spirit!), but he didn’t always use it when writing about his opponents.
• Peter happily welcomed uncircumcised Gentiles into God’s family—unless the circumcised Jewish believers from Jerusalem were watching.
• Noah was supposed to be the most righteous man in all the world, but he drank himself legless.
• King David kept composing psalms after what he’d done to Bathsheba and Uriah.

Just to name a few! But, after he points this out, Sauls says,

“It is the hypocrisy… in the Bible that sometimes encourages me more than anything else. It reminds me that God’s relentless grip on me, not my relentless grip on God, keeps me in his love.”

Hypocrisy isn’t something to be celebrated, but it is a reminder of a central gospel truth: it’s God’s grace that saves us, not our ability to do all the right things and avoid all the wrong things. My feeble grip on God is enough, because it’s his strong grip on me that does the saving. Sinful Christians actually shine a spotlight on the love, faithfulness, and mercy of our God. Like Romans 5:20 says, “Where sin increased, grace increased all the more.”

And because we serve a God whose forgiveness pardons sinners and whose grace embraces even hypocrites, Sauls says, he has the

freedom to be honest about my sins, shortcomings, and inconsistencies… I can allow my hypocrisy to be brought into the light by God and others. I can also invite God and others to help me forsake my hypocrisy and grow into the person God has created me to be.

Once we admit that Christians are going to fall short and that the church will never be free of hypocrisy, we don’t have to pretend to be perfect anymore. Everybody sins. Hypocrisy happens. You can own your faults and sins, instead of trying to hide them or justify them. And once you own them, you’re in a position to repent and change.

Yes, Christians are a bunch of hypocrites. And the sooner we’re honest about it, the sooner the Holy Spirit can enter our hearts and lives and start to heal and transform our hypocrisies by God’s power and grace.

You can listen to this week's devotional below:

Our Golden Calf

Recently I preached on the infamous scene in Exodus 32 where Aaron casts a golden calf for the people of Israel to worship. It’s a pretty shocking moment, really. The people haven’t even finished finalizing their covenant with the Lord, and they’re camped at the foot of a mountain blazing with God’s glory (24:17). Yet, they seem to think it’s a very sensible thing to exchange “the glory of God for the image of an ox that eats grass” (Ps 106:20), to trade the God of the plagues and the Passover, the God who stomped through the Red Sea like a kid in a puddle, for an inanimate object they just made out of old earrings. (32:2-4)

After everything that’s already unfolded in Exodus, this scene exposes the sad truth about idolatry. No matter how brightly that gold glistens, it pales in comparison to the Great I Am.

In that sermon I said that modern idolatry is more subtle than the Old Testament variety. Offering sacrifices to a golden statue should set off any modern believer’s alarm bells. The idols that seduce us today don’t demand literal worship—they simply ask for more and more of our time, money, energy, and devotion.

This point really came home to me a few days after I preached the sermon, when I was at a Bible study on Ephesians, and we read Ephesians 5:5: “For of this you can be sure: No immoral, impure or greedy person—such a person is an idolater—has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.”

I typically think of greed as an issue of stewarding your resources well. Are you using what God’s given you to satisfy your desires, or to pursue God’s? Are you heaping up non-essentials, while some Lazarus lies at your gate, going daily without life’s most basic essentials? (See Luke 16:19-21.)

But Ephesians isn’t concerned with our priorities, our contentment, or even the needs of our struggling neighbors.

Ephesians is concerned about idols, and it calls greed idolatry. This is the subtle kind: you don’t bow down to anything, but you set your heart on material things that make life more pleasant. If I devote my life to working for money to spend on more possessions, I’ve devoted my life to more possessions. And if that’s what I’ve set my heart on or devoted my life to, how can they belong to Jesus?

I’ve often heard Christians lament our culture’s gradual acceptance of certain practices—unrestrained sexuality, widespread profanity, Wednesday and Sunday sports for kids, pervasive cohabitation, the list goes on. I rarely hear anyone worrying over our deep-seated consumerism. Yet, it seems to me, that our commercials, store displays, online ads, and shopping apps are training all of us, every day, in greed. They’re teaching us what to desire—the next car, the new tool, the latest device, the handiest appliance, the trendiest look.

Meanwhile, scripture and the Church try to point our desires in a different direction: “As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.” (Ps 42:1-2)

Are you paying attention to which desires preoccupy your mind?

Have you ever stopped to evaluate your contentment and your desire for more?

What can you do today to guard Jesus’s place at the center of your life from any would-be challengers?

You can listen to today's devotional below!

Israel's Magic 8 Ball

By the time you reach Exodus 28, all of the epic stories of deliverance from slavery are over. The Red Sea has been crossed. Manna has been miraculously delivered. Water has poured from rocks. The only popular story still to come is the incident with the golden calf in chapter 32. Almost everything else here in the last part of the book is instructions for building the tabernacle (a tent where the Lord will dwell with the people) and its various accessories and descriptions of building the tabernacle and its various accessories. There's lots of detail and lots of repetition. 

Chapter 28 is focused on crafting the garments for the priests to wear when they're serving at the tabernacle. If you're into sashes, gold embroidery, and scarlet yarn, this is the chapter for you. To me, this stuff gets pretty mind-numbing after a while, but I did find myself chewing on one odd detail when I reread this chapter recently: the Urim and Thummim.

What's the Urim and Thummim, you ask?

While describing the priest's breastplate, it says,

put the Urim and the Thummim in the breastpiece, so they may be over Aaron’s heart whenever he enters the presence of the LORD. Thus Aaron will always bear the means of making decisions for the Israelites over his heart before the LORD. (28:30)

They are the “means of making decisions for the Israelites.” Scripture is pretty spare on the details, but the priest somehow used the Urim and Thummim to inquire of the Lord, when the Israelites wanted to discern God’s will (see Numbers 27:21 and Ezra 2:63). They sound like some kind of Magic 8 Ball that speaks for the Lord. “Yes definitely.” “My sources say no.” “Ask again later.”

Now, why would the people need these mysterious objects to help them know God's will? They were just given laws detailing exactly what the Lord wanted from them. Not only do they get the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20, but they then receive dozens of more detailed laws applying the Ten Commandments to different, everyday scenarios (in chapters 21-23). God already told them what to do, in black and white. So what are the Urim and Thummim for?

There's not one verse in the entire Bible, much less in Exodus, that discusses gambling. 

There's no verse that tells you exactly how much of their money Christians should give away, only that we should be generous and ready to share (1 Tim 6:18). On a related note, there's no precise definition of greed, nor is there ever a clear line drawn between innocent desire and covetousness. 

How do you balance being a "friend of sinners" (like Jesus) and "bad company corrupts good character"? (1 Cor 15:33)

Do "love your enemies" and "turn the other cheek" apply in times of war? Can Christians take up arms against the enemies of their nation?

I could go on. 

Some situations are too complicated for a simple "Thou shalt not." If you want to follow Jesus faithfully in all the moments of life, having laws isn't enough. You need the Urim and Thummim, too. You need discernment.

Today, we don't have an Urim and Thummim. Those are long gone, and it’s not even clear what they were or how they worked. There are no more Magic 8 Balls for discerning God's will for your life.

What we do have are: 1) the words of scripture, 2) the example of Jesus, and 3) the guidance of the Holy Spirit. These won't always yield as clear answers as we'd like, though. There may be times when there's more than one right option. There will be moments when you pray, study, and listen, and you're still not sure what God desires—but it’s time to make a choice. Sometimes you'll make the wrong choice (and then grace abounds).

Discernment isn’t always simple or easy. But it’s essential. The Bible, long, deep, and inspired as it is, will not resolve every predicament or question in black and white. Maybe that’s God’s way of teaching us to rely on Him, not just a book. To “trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding,” to “in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.” (Prov 3:5-6)

So, how are you inquiring of the Lord and trying to discern God’s will in your life today?

Listen to this week's devotional right here:

Your Daily Bread

When Jesus tangles with the devil in the desert, the first temptation he faces springs from his hunger. “After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.” (I bet!) “The tempter came to him and said, ‘If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.’” (Matt 4:2-3) Jesus famously fires back, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” (4:4) I like how Eugene Peterson put it in The Message: “It takes more than bread to stay alive. It takes a steady stream of words from God’s mouth.”

Words from God’s mouth were Jesus’s bread. They were what sustained him.

Forty days in the desert, hunger and an offer of bread: this scene is a sort of reenactment of Israel’s desert wanderings, for 40 years, which included rumbling stomachs, grumbling words, and the daily miracle of bread (manna) from God.

The first time they complain to Moses about food is in Exodus chapter 16. This is when the Lord begins to provide the daily bread for the Israelites. There’s one strange condition attached to the manna, though:

Then Moses said to them, “No one is to keep any of it until morning.” However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell… Each morning everyone gathered as much as they needed, and when the sun grew hot, it melted away. (16:19-21)

The manna was literally daily bread: it arrived every day, and it lasted only for the day. Tomorrow, you’d have to get back out there and gather it again.

Now, remember what Jesus said about bread in the desert. “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.” Words from God’s mouth were his bread. They sustained him in a way literal bread couldn’t—it takes more than that to stay alive.

If we’re going to follow Jesus’s example, we need words from God’s mouth to feed us. We feed our bodies with meat and grain and fruits and vegetables, and we feed our hearts, souls, and minds with God’s words.

And, like the Israelites discovered in Exodus 16, this work must be done daily. Theologian Walter Moberly writes, “Yhwh’s bread is not the sort that can be kept overnight. It can only be collected afresh each new day.” The bread we need from God, his words, won’t keep. You can’t live today off of what you gathered yesterday. Reading scripture, listening for the Holy Spirit in prayer, conversing with brothers and sisters on the journey alongside you—these things nourish us, but what you did yesterday, last Sunday, last week, isn’t enough to sustain you today. You have to get back out there and gather it again.

What are you doing today to feed your heart, soul, and mind? Other voices in the world will gladly feed your anger, suspicion, greed, prejudices, and lust with their words, every single day. So, what are you doing to maintain a healthy diet, to receive the words you need the most?

“It takes more than bread to stay alive. It takes a steady stream of words from God’s mouth.”

Listen to today's devotional right here!

Is It Time to Get Moving?

You probably know the story of the Hebrews crossing the Red Sea after their escape from Egypt. You might have that scene from The Ten Commandments or The Prince of Egypt permanently stamped in your memory from when you were a kid.

What you may not remember—what I didn’t remember but noticed recently—is something the Lord says to Moses just before the epic miracle on the beach that day. Moses offers the people this rousing call to courage and faith:

“Don’t be afraid. Just stand still and watch the LORD rescue you today. The Egyptians you see today will never be seen again. The LORD himself will fight for you. Just stay calm.” (Exodus 14:13-14)

Stand still and watch the Lord rescue you today! I read that and think, ‘Yeah! That’s it! Sometimes you just have to put yourself in God’s hands and leave all the rescuing up to him.’

But then, in the next verse, the Lord speaks: “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the people to get moving!” (14:15)

Moses told them, “stand still.” God said, ‘Why are you just standing there? Get moving!’

Sometimes you just have to put yourself in God’s hands and leave all the rescuing up to him. But this was not one of those times. This was one of those times when you need to get busy doing your part to see God’s purposes accomplished in the world. Even in a moment that demands a miracle, like the Red Sea crossing, you may have a part to play. Your efforts, however small they feel, may be a part of God’s solution. A critical part, even. The Lord could have evaporated every single drop of water in that sea, and it wouldn’t have done any good if the people hadn’t laced up their shoes and walked across.

Thomas More, a saint in the Catholic Church, once prayed, “The things, good Lord, that we pray for, give us the grace to labor for.” Praying and crying out to God are beyond valuable. Yet, you shouldn’t settle for prayer if God is sending you out as a laborer. When the Lord says “get moving,” it’s time to get up off your knees.

Think about the struggles you’re enduring, the dreams you’re concocting, and the needs you’re staring at right now. Are you standing still, watching for the Lord’s rescue, when you really ought to get moving? Don’t stop praying! But do start considering: how could I be a part of God’s solution?

Gripe like Moses

A few weeks back, I wrote about blaming God and how so many of the prayers in the book of Psalms are quick to let God have it when life goes off the rails. I was reminded of that recently while reading in Exodus. Moses and Aaron go to Pharaoh for the first time in Exodus 5. But this initial “Let me people go!” backfires spectacularly:

That same day Pharaoh gave this order to the slave drivers and overseers in charge of the people: “You are no longer to supply the people with straw for making bricks; let them go and gather their own straw. But require them to make the same number of bricks as before; don’t reduce the quota. They are lazy; that is why they are crying out, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to our God.’ (5:6-8)

Instead of securing the Hebrews’ freedom, Moses and Aaron only made their workload heavier.

When the Israelite foremen give Moses a piece of their mind for getting them into this mess, Moses turns around and gives God a piece of his:

Moses returned to the Lord and said, “Why, Lord, why have you brought trouble on this people? Is this why you sent me? Ever since I went to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has brought trouble on this people, and you have not rescued your people at all.” (5:22-23)

Moses places the blame squarely on God. You brought trouble on this people. I spoke to Pharaoh in your name. You have not rescued your people. Moses knows how to point the finger at heaven as well as any of the psalmists.

Now, the psalms are prayers, meaning they are our words to God. What you don’t get in Psalms is God’s response. But in Exodus, the Lord speaks.

So, how does God respond to Moses’s resentful accusations? Does he chastise his servant? Maybe put him in his place? Does he threaten him for his impertinence, or explain that Moses simply can’t understand his mysterious ways?

Chapter 6, verse 1:

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh: Because of my mighty hand he will let [my people] go; because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of his country.”

God doesn't chastise or threaten. God tells Moses: this isn't over yet. It's as if he says, 'You think I did all of this, Moses? I'm about to show you what I can do.'

God doesn’t berate Moses for his accusations and anger but reassures him that things won’t always be this way. Because Moses wasn’t wrong. The Lord agreed with him: this isn’t the way things should be. We do need to do something about this.

The next time you find yourself ready to gripe at God, to tell the Lord, “Why have you brought all this trouble? Was this your plan? You haven’t rescued us at all!”, don’t reverently bite your tongue. Go on and gripe, like Moses. Tell the Lord exactly what you think. 

You might be surprised to hear God respond: ‘You’re right. And I’m going to do something about it.’

You can listen to this week's devotional here:

Broken Instruments

We've been working our way through the book of Exodus in our Wednesday night Bible study for the last few weeks, and something that's come up a few times along the way is Moses's imperfections. What do we learn about Moses in the first few chapters of the book?  

• He's a murderer and fugitive from the law (2:11-15)
• He wasn't even committed enough to his Jewish heritage to circumcise his son (4:24-26)
• He's a poor public speaker (4:10)
• He's considered an Egyptian, not a Hebrew, by on-lookers (2:16-19)

Moses has a few strikes against him with the Egyptians and with the Hebrews. Sure, he has some unique qualifications for the job, too. He has experience and knowledge of both the Egyptian and Hebrew cultures. He clearly has a heart for the plight of the Hebrew slaves. But he's hardly an ideal candidate for going to Pharaoh, demanding "Let my people go!", and leading Israel out of Egypt. He has some serious imperfections.

Moses's story reminds me of something I heard Rick Warren say in an interview a couple years ago. He remarked that, "God only uses broken things. If he used perfect things, nothing would get done."

Yes, Moses had some brokenness, some imperfections. Everyone does. But God looked past that and called Moses, and, as a result, there were impossible miracles and astonishing deliverance. One of the foundational moments and defining acts of salvation in the story of scripture was accomplished: the Lord conquered Pharaoh’s power, emancipated the slaves, and established a nation. Everything else that comes in the story of the Bible—David and Solomon, Jonah and Daniel, Mary and Jesus—all of it is only possible because the Lord used Moses, imperfections and all.

Maybe God’s calling you today. Maybe the Lord has a job for you, but, like Moses, you’ve got a list of excuses, of reasons why God should go find somebody else. You might even have some very good reasons! Your brokenness intersects with God’s purpose, and you don’t see any sense in even trying. You’re just not the ideal candidate, not a perfect fit for this job.

But Moses already showed us just what God can do with broken and imperfect people. The Lord can accomplish impossible miracles and astonishing deliverance—through you. And it doesn’t take a sea rushing out of your way to astonish. Bread falling from the sky isn’t the only kind of impossible.

Bread in somebody’s pantry, where there’s usually cobwebs.

A shelter for women and children making room for more beds, more deliverance.

Someone who lives on the street feeling noticed, respected, and loved.

A ride to the doctor for the shut-in who’s had to cancel too many appointments.

A whole week sober for the first time in years.

A father telling his child “I’m sorry” for the first time ever.

These are the kinds of miracles that the world outside your window needs. Nothing supernatural, per se. No Red Seas or manna required. Just an imperfect but willing instrument in God’s able hands. How might you make a difference and make the world look more like that today?

Don’t think it can’t be you. God only uses broken things

You can listen to today's devotional below:

A Soul at War

“Beloved, I urge you as aliens and exiles to abstain from the desires of the flesh that wage war against the soul.” – 1 Peter 2:11

I was reading in 1 Peter the other day, when this verse caught my eye. There are desires of the flesh that “wage war” against our souls—they’re relentlessly hostile towards and destructive to our souls.

Well, that’s kind of alarming.

So what are these “desires of the flesh”? These sound like things we should identify, so we can avoid them, don’t you think?

1 Peter goes on to describe how to “conduct yourselves honorably” (2:12) in relation to governing authorities (2:13-17) and within your household (2:18-3:7). Then come a few verses that, based on what they’re promoting, suggest a few “desires of the flesh” to me:

-          Division (3:8)

-          Hardheartedness (3:8)

-          Apathy and hate (3:8)

-          Arrogance (3:8)

-          Getting payback (3:9)

-          Evil words (3:10)

-          Deceitfulness (3:10)

-          Sowing conflict (3:11)

That phrase, “the desires of the flesh,” also pops up in Galatians chapter 5. Paul calls on his readers not to “gratify the desires of the flesh,” because those desires are opposed to the work of the Holy Spirit (5:16-17). And unlike Peter, Paul was sure to outline exactly what he meant:

Now the works of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, debauchery, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. (5:19-21)

There’s some overlap between the two—notice especially division and sowing conflict in 1 Peter and strife, quarrels, dissensions, and factions in Galatians—but between these two letters, we get a pretty wide range of “desires of the flesh.”

Your habit of returning fire any time you feel you’ve been criticized or insulted.

That quarrel in your family or your church that you have no interest in deescalating.

Your confidence that you know better and see things more clearly than those idiots who think this or do that.

The nights out getting drunk with your buddies.

Those lustful thoughts you don’t mind indulging and the dirty websites you don’t mind visiting.

These things may seem more or less harmless. You may not have ever given a second thought to the morality of it all—why would you? It’s pretty normal behavior. And some of it you’re enjoying quite a bit!

But Peter wants us to recognize the reality: these desires of the flesh that you’re enjoying are hostile to you. They’re trying to destroy your soul. They want to sharpen your self-interest and dull your love. They aim to normalize harshness, to break habits of understanding or apologizing, and to grease the wheels of toxic cycles. They want to leave you content with your sins and disinclined to pursue transformation.

Well, what are we supposed to do about it?

1 Peter does gives us a powerful challenge in 3:8-9, but, as much as I love those verses, it’s Paul’s words that I think we need the most. How are we supposed to avoid falling into the trap of the “desires of the flesh”? He follows up his catalog of “works of the flesh” (5:19-21) with some familiar words:

By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (5:22-23)

If you want to combat the desires of the flesh waging war against the soul, step one is to invite the Spirit to plant something new in you, to cultivate in your heart the antidotes to the poison apple the flesh offers.

You need reinforcements to win this war. It’s time to bring the Holy Spirit to the front line.

 Listen to this week's devotional right here!

God's Agenda

Last week I shared some thoughts on a charge brought against God in Mary Doria Russell’s novel, The Sparrow. Faced with tragedy (and a priest’s unsatisfying response), one of the characters, Anne, cries: “What sticks in my throat is that God gets the credit but never the blame... Either God’s in charge or He’s not.”

I have a tendency to do this, to give God praise for the good things in life but to exonerate God in the wake of loss and pain. What am I supposed to tell the Annes in the world, though, when they cry foul?

Today I want to share one more thing about all of this. Anne insists, “Either God’s in charge or He’s not.” I, personally, don’t believe that God is “in charge.” At least, not in the way that she means.

I do believe that God has a plan for the world, and that one day God’s plan will be accomplished. That’s the promise of Revelation 21 and 22. Nothing will stop that, "For the Lord of hosts has planned, and who will annul it? His hand is stretched out, and who will turn it back?" (Isa 14:27) In that sense, God is in control and steering everything towards a particular outcome.

But I don’t believe that God plans and arranges everything that happens in the meantime, that all of the good and the bad in life are a part of God’s will.

Here’s what I believe about what God is up to in the world:

I believe that God works all things together for good for those who love him (Rom 8:28).

I believe that God’s plans are meant to prosper us and not to harm us, to give us a hope and a future. (Jer 29:11)

I believe that the Lord has multiplied his wondrous deeds and his thoughts toward us, that if I proclaimed and told of them, they’re more than can be told. (Ps 40:5)

I believe in a God who wants to make the world “very good” again (Gen 1:31), who doesn’t want anyone to perish (2 Pet 3:9), who’s going to destroy death (1 Cor 15:26) and the one who has the power of death, the devil (Heb 2:14). I believe in a God who came to earth to welcome outcasts, heal the sick, raise the dead, and, ultimately, taste death for everyone (Heb 2:9).

I give God the credit and not the blame because, to me, God’s agenda is only ever to work good for this world. That is God’s business day in, day out. Not orchestrating and running all things under heaven, but seeking the good, the salvation, and the eternal life of all. Anything else is a result, not of God’s desires or will, but of human sin or nature’s brokenness. That's the reason we don't always see things working together for good, why circumstances will harm us and not prosper us. Though they can't thwart God's eternal plans for us, human sin and nature's brokenness are powerful forces at work in the world that often do prevent God's desires for our lives here and now.

And those are exactly the things that Jesus sought to make right when he walked the earth: turning men and women from sin and bandaging up the wounds caused by a broken world.

That's how I see the Lord and the Lord’s work in the world.

Anne still may not be satisfied, I know. And maybe she's right. The picture in scripture is certainly messier and blurrier than these few verses make it sound. But this is the theology I live with. Every day I try to be one of this God's people. 

And, to me, that's not a God who deserves blame. That’s a God who inspires awe and gratitude.

Listen to today's devotional right here:

Blaming God

I just finished a powerful, haunting novel by Mary Doria Russell called The Sparrow. It’s a sci-fi story about a team of Jesuit (Catholic) missionaries who travel to a recently discovered alien world to make contact with the extra-terrestrial peoples there. There’s so much beauty and depth in this book that I often had to put it down and take time to digest what I’d just read.

One scene that I’ve been chewing on for a couple weeks followed the death of one of their party, the puzzling illness of another, and now the disappearance of two more of their companions. One of the priests and a doctor named Anne are talking through it all, when she asks where was God’s plan in the death of their colleague or in the possible loss of their two missing friends.

“God knows,” he said, and there was in his tone both an admission of defeat and a statement of faith.

“See, that’s where it falls apart for me!” Anne cried. “What sticks in my throat is that God gets the credit but never the blame. I just can’t swallow that kind of theological candy. Either God’s in charge or He’s not.”

This isn’t the first time I’ve heard that complaint about Christianity, but it is the first time I’ve stopped and considered how I’d answer it.

Now, I feel a little out of my depth here, honestly. I’ve lived a pretty comfortable life. The worst thing that’s ever happened to me is a bad Star Wars movie that came out once. I exaggerate—but I haven’t had a particularly hard life. I’ve lost family and friends, sometimes suddenly and unexpectedly, but most of my experience of suffering has been second-hand. I’ve helped people bury their spouses and their children. I’ve witnessed shocking poverty and need, as well as the effects of depression, addiction, and suicide. So, while I admit I’m not the ideal candidate to answer Anne’s question, I also like to think that I’m not totally unacquainted with the moments in life that make people ask it.

So why does God get the credit but never the blame?

I think this is a good question. Maybe it's one you've asked yourself before. I want to share two things. I’ll just mention one this week and get into the other one next time.

The first thing is, if you have been hurt or disappointed and want to blame God, tell him so. Don’t hold those feelings back. God can handle it.

After all, the Lord gave us the book of Psalms.

“How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?” (13:1)

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?” (22:1)

“You placed me down in the deepest pit, in places dark and deep. Your anger smothers me; you subdue me with it, wave after wave.” (88:6-7)

I don’t think that blaming God for something is unfaithful. In fact, sometimes, I think that’s exactly what faith looks like. That’s what it looked like for the authors of scripture. That’s even what it looked like for Jesus, on the cross (Matt 27:46).

And that faith made them cry out to God in their hurt.

If you stumble over this question, like Anne did in the novel, then maybe the answer isn’t scriptural arguments or theological speculations. Maybe the answer isn’t thinking about God. Maybe the answer is talking to God—giving God a talking to. It could be that the way through this struggle is less intellectual and more relational, less about getting everything straight in your head and more about getting some things straight between you and God.

You can listen to this week's devotional below!

Care of Your Time

Photo by charlesdeluvio on Unsplash

John Wesley, the father of the Methodist movement back in the 1700s, believed that the first rule for holy living is care of your time. A Christian must take great care, must be very intentional, in how she spends her time, because the things you give your time and attention to form you. But I think Wesley’s rule could perhaps use an update for the 21^st century. In a world of omnipresent electronic media, “care of your time” often just means “care of your screen time.”

Think of all the time you spend in front of screens during the day—besides the hours you put in for work or school:

You turn on cable news when you get home and leave it on in the background all evening.

You scroll social media first thing in the morning, while you’re eating, before bed, or in between chores or tasks, looking at folks’ vacation pictures and laughing at their memes.

You peruse the news or opinions from your preferred outlets or newsletters.

You window shop on Amazon, eBay, and Etsy, or you place a grocery order through the Walmart app.

You login to Netflix or HBO Max after dinner to jump back into your latest TV binge.

You open Twitter to find out what we’re indignant about today or join in the rant of the hour.

You rush home from church to catch the Saints game or start the morning with College GameDay before the big game Saturday night.

Really, how much time do you get without any screens or media trying to grab your attention? How much actual peace and quiet is there in your day?

There’s a verse from Romans I think about often that says, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (12:2) Do not be conformed, but be transformed.

The things we give our time and attention to will form us—whether that’s a steady stream of media conforming us to this world, or the powerful presence of God’s Spirit transforming us. One way or another, you’re going to be formed, but, with a little care of your time, you can be strategic about who or what is forming you.

Step one towards “care of your time,” may simply be paying attention. Paying attention increases awareness, and awareness facilitates intentional change. Maybe start asking yourself some questions like these:

• Have you noticed how much screen time you’re getting every day? Do you have a way of keeping track (like the Screen Time feature on an iPhone)?
• Are you being purposeful when you turn on the TV or pick up your phone—or are you doing it out of sheer habit?
• What gets put off or neglected in your schedule (or in your relationships!) because of time carelessly lost to electronic media?
• Are you as consistent in daily spiritual practices as you are in daily media consumption? If not, is there some screen time you can repurpose for seeking God’s Spirit and transformation?

The End of Division

I’ve been sharing, the last couple of weeks, about how I see the story of the Bible as the story of God repairing everything that was broken in the Garden of Eden. And I’ve talked some about how I see Jesus fitting into that story, but I want to mention one other, essential character in God’s plans: the Holy Spirit.

Like with Jesus, there are so many ways you could describe the Spirit’s role in God’s work to heal the world from the wounds of Eden. But I want to focus on one other story from Genesis that you’ve probably heard before, the Tower of Babel.

Now the whole earth had one language and the same words… And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks and fire them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves.” (11:1, 3-4)

Babel, though it’s a little later in the narrative, is another example of the brokenness brought on by the first couple in the garden. After all, the serpent first tricked Eve with the promise “you will be like God” (3:5), and now we have men and women trying to move in to heaven, making their home in the very dwelling of God.

The consequence, famously, is that “the Lord confused the language of all the earth; and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth.” (11:9) Now, all the people were divided, by language and by geography.

Fast forward to the book of Acts in the New Testament. Jesus has ascended back to heaven, and the believers are waiting in Jerusalem for the arrival of the Holy Spirit. Then, in a roar of wind and the glow of “tongues of fire,” the Spirit arrives—and the disciples begin to speak.

At that time there were devout Jews from every nation living in Jerusalem. When they heard the loud noise, everyone came running, and they were bewildered to hear their own languages being spoken by the believers. They were completely amazed. “How can this be?” they exclaimed. “These people are all from Galilee, and yet we hear them speaking in our own native languages! Here we are—Parthians, Medes, Elamites, people from Mesopotamia, Judea, Cappadocia, Pontus, the province of Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt, and the areas of Libya around Cyrene, visitors from Rome (both Jews and converts to Judaism), Cretans, and Arabs. And we all hear these people speaking in our own languages about the wonderful things God has done!” They stood there amazed and perplexed. “What can this mean?” they asked each other. (2:5-12)

What does this mean?

It means that the Holy Spirit is undoing the consequences of Babel. God’s repairing the devastation of Eden.

A scattered people are gathered together. Languages once confused by God are now made clear by the Spirit of the same God. The barriers of geography and communication that sin necessitated no longer need divide us, because God is making humanity like new again, freed from Sin’s power over our lives. We may still succumb to its siren song at times, but we are no longer Sin’s slaves—the Spirit has set us free. (Rom 8:2)

Seeing the effects of Babel rolled back reminds me that everything broken will be repaired. There’s no hurt or loss from sin you can point to that Jesus and his Spirit are not working to heal and restore. Every last trace of Sin’s dominion over us and over this world will be wiped away. Everything, Revelation promises, will be made new. (21:5)

Even our broken relationships and divisions.

You can listen to today's devotional here: