Reflections over a McGriddle

Sep 10, 2005

Lunching at Popeyes

I get together with a group of college-age guys each week to encourage them and challenge them in their spiritual growth. Most of the time, we pick a book to read through and dialogue about. Right now, it’s John Piper’s Don’t Waste Your Life.
We were all pretty floored by chapter 7. Piper recounts the battle of Iwo Jima in the Pacific. Here’s an excerpt:
“The hard statistics show the sacrifice made by Colonel Johnson’s 2nd Battalion: 1400 boys (many still teenagers) landed on D-Day; 288 replacements were provided as the battle went on, a total of 1688. Of these, 1511 had been killed or wounded. Only 177 walked off the island. And of the final 177, 91 had been wounded at least once and returned to battle….
“The Marines fought in World War 2 for 43 months. Yet in one month on Iwo Jiima, 1/3 of their total deaths occurred. They left behind the Pacific’s largest cemetaries: nearly 6800 graves in all…”

Chiseled in stone outside one of the graveyards is this:
When you go home
Tell them for us and say
For your tomorrow
We gave our today.

The point Piper goes on to make is that others have given their lives for us. However, the ultimate cause and sacrifice is the one that Jesus Christ proclaimed and made. True freedom comes only through Him. Whether you are a Christ-follower or not, you must acknowledge that there have been great sacrifices made for our freedom. Yet we get frustrated with a long line, a slow internet connection, or a steak not cooked just right. Is this what they died for? For our convenience? I think not.
Jesus Christ died on a Calvary hill 2000 years ago. For what? Our comfort? I think not.
Can we pause our pursuit of self-satisfaction long enough to consider how we might help bring freedom and hope to others? It’s not about you.

Sep 10, 2005

Can we say “Others?”

Sunday I taught from Philippians 2.13-14. One of the things that has continued to be evident from the study of Philippians that I’ve been doing is simply the concept of OTHERS. You can’t read the New Testament (or even the OT, for that matter) without being struck by the “one anothers” in the Bible.
The Bible is primarily a book guiding our relationships with the Father and our relationships with others. We are told to “work out” our salvation, and I think that primarily means to get out of you what is put in you by God. When we trust Jesus to be our Lord and commit to follow Him with our lives, we given so much by Him. The rest of our life becomes a great struggle to allow what God has put in us to be worked out of us. Our default is to just keep good things to ourselves. It’s the epitome of selfishness.
So, try this this week:
? On Sunday afternoons, create a “Focus List.” Put on the list everything that is coming up for the next week – meetings, classes, appointments, etc. Then simply write “OTHERS” on that list. Begin to think and meditate on how you might shape your week and your days to include others in them. Write a note of encouragement to someone, send someone an anonymous financial gift that you know is struggling, make a phone call, mow a yard while someone is away, etc. Just begin to tear down the throne of self and replace it with a healthy, Christ-centered love for others.

Sep 10, 2005

A Sheep’s Tale

I stood. The colors leapt off the shelves in front of me. With my head cocked sideways, my eyes hungrily devoured the vertical titles, one after another. I needed another book like I needed a black eye. Yet, they beckoned.

No, Carolyn will kill me. I don’t need another book. About the time I have fought off the temptation to buy, I noticed his new book. It glowed.

Boy, that looks great! I know full well that I have yet to read his last three on my shelves at home, each as attractively packaged as this beauty two feet away.

Then I did the unthinkable. I retrieved it from its niche, and I opened it. The crisp white pages had a fragrance somewhere between fresh cut grass and a cake right out of the oven. The smooth linear black type marched efficiently across the spread, leaping the gutter effortlessly.

I left the bookstore $15 poorer but happier for the future knowledge I would one day find time to absorb.

As I reflect on that day (and other days like it) in the bookstore, a startling thought sacks my conscious like an angry linebacker. Those books that most appealed to me were a silent indicator of my current frame of mind, my mood, and my attitude. Could a trip to the bookstore really be indicative of how I am? Well, at least that day it did. The books I looked at and the one I purchased told me something. They told me that I hurt.

It is an alarming revelation, and one for which I cannot simply slap the snooze. Not only was I hurt, but I was hurting. Much like that vague awareness you have that the faucet in the kitchen is dripping, I believe I was aware of my hurt, but for whatever reason, I had chosen to be martyred by emotional pain.

This account may or may not be for you. It is a record of my journey. It may or may not echo with familiarity. It’s a multi-faceted story with many twists and turns. It is the story of the lost sheep and his desperate search for his shepherd. It is also the story of the sheep’s failure and the shepherd’s success.

Life was good. I was a seminary student in Fort Worth, Texas, and a minister in a large, metropolitan church. My faith was vibrant and alive. I had a never-a-dull-moment, just-trust-the-Lord, everything-works-out, isn’t-being-a-Christian-exciting outlook on faith and fully expected the next Great Awakening to occur on my watch. My vision was boundless, and my head was in the clouds.

I was so intent on seeing the star of Bethlehem and its glory that I forgot the stigma of the cross and its shame. I knew in my head that bad things happen to good people and sometimes life doesn’t work out like you want it to, but if the rain really did fall on the righteous and wicked alike, I had stayed dry under a relatively large umbrella of idealism. That is, until the phone rang.

I was at my desk at Tolar Baptist Church then. I was the Associate Pastor/Minister of Youth. Carolyn and I had been engaged just a few months.

“Jeff, it’s cancer,” she said as we learned about Hodgkin’s Disease for the first time in our lives. Three months of radiation treatment later, her Hodgkin’s was halted, and the doctors declared my fiancee cancer-free – just in time for our wedding.

I asked God a lot of questions in those days: Why did this happen to us? I had sold a promising advertising business to come to seminary, and this is the reward I get, God? Just show us that we’re on the right path… Thanks for helping us through this, but don’t do this again, OK?

I still tackled my ministry with starry-eyed optimism, but I no longer felt invulnerable. God had allowed life to happen to me. The beginnings of cynicism pitched a pup tent on the outskirts of my consciousness and planned a longer camping trip later.

The Winnebagoes of disillusionment wheeled into my life for a protracted excursion two years later.

The following is an excerpt from my journal on October 31, 1994:

Two days ago, the doctors told us that Carolyn, my wife of two and one-half years, has Hodgkin’s Disease again. Hodgkin’s is cancer of the lymph nodes. We go Saturday at 6 p.m. to get a CAT scan.

The slap of the news is numbing. I had holed up in the library at seminary to digest a dozen different opinions about Paul’s theology before my evening doze, I mean dose, of Systematic Theology. I casually glanced at my Donald Duck watch only to have it quack back at me about my immanent tardiness.

My book bag leapt to my shoulder, as I drained the last of my Diet Caffeine Free Dr. Pepper. I breezed by the pay phone on my way to Scarborough Hall. A faint impression gently nudged me, and I did an about-face, picked up the cool black plastic receiver. Purposeful punches soon rang a phone an hour away in Garland, Texas. My wife answered. I intended simply to see if she needed anything on the way home.

“Hey there, hon,” I said.
“Jeff… hold on.” Her voice was not right, but she clicked over to her other call to say goodbye before I could decipher it. My intuition screamed. Just as suddenly, she was back. And she was sobbing.
“It’s cancer,” she said.

Another phone call with the same script. The cancer was back. I hung up and drove myself downstairs to my car. I had been in the world’s largest theological library. Surely the answer to our sufferings and an intelligent explanation of God’s perspective lay in one of its many volumes, but how do you search for answers when life won’t give you time?

I couldn’t focus on my work at the church, now First Baptist Church of Garland. I had forgotten about the “Basics for New Baptists” class that I was supposed to teach on Wednesday night. Its members were gracious to understand my absence. Thank the Lord it was Friday now. Surely the weekend would help me catch my breath and my bearings.

I sat at my desk, straightening it again when thunder clapped. The antique car that was a pencil sharpener clinked as the rumbling vibrations intruded into my office. Channel 4 had been right – a severe thunderstorm had violated the complacent afternoon and promised to snarl Friday’s rush hour traffic unforgivingly in the metroplex.

By the time I left the church to walk the two blocks to our home, the drenching had slowed to a drizzle. It had been three days since we learned about Carolyn’s cancer.

I stood in the chilling fall rain waiting for the Garland Fire Department. My house was on fire. The gray smoke defied the rain. It billowed from pipes on the roof and seeped from under the eaves. I laughed in disbelief as the relentless drizzle slowly conquered my dry clothes. Was this really happening, I wondered? I thought, “At least this will take our minds off the cancer for a while…”

Two weeks after the fire, three after Carolyn’s diagnosis. With the diligence of Sherlock Holmes, I examine myself emotionally. Nothing. Nada. It’s like staring into a black hole. We were staying at La Quinta Inn, and rather enjoying ourselves. Our insurance agent had taken extra measures to see that we were treated like royalty. Our belongings had been shipped off to a warehouse somewhere in Dallas to be treated for smoke damage. We had found another rental house for less money and were preparing to move in.

It was during this time that I bumped into God. It wasn’t a particular moment. I didn’t burn my hand on a flaming bush. I saw no star. But I felt His presence. He cared. He loved me. And He would see us through the days of transition, chemotherapy, and stress that were to come. He promised. And through circumstance after circumstance, His rod and staff guided me in his ways. His voice was unmistakable.

Though my “tough” questions remained unanswered, I discovered with joyful reassurance that it wasn’t answers I wanted after all, it was Him. My pride had led me to demand my Shepherd work in my prescribed ways. He refused and continued to tend his flock as I, His sheep, wandered.
Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t leave the faith or curse God. I just began meeting my needs my way instead of letting my shepherd do it. Everything looked fine from others’ viewpoint, but I was lost. I had strayed and didn’t know my way home.

Scripture told me that the Lord was my shepherd and I should not want, or need anything else but Him. When King David wrote that, he was writing after the fact, I was sure. He had found God to be that way. His confidence haunted me. I felt more like, “If the Lord is my shepherd…” I knew he was, but I felt like he wasn’t.

And that’s where my account ends. You may have been expecting some Lucado-type conclusions that would blow your socks off, but it is hard to conclude powerfully when my experience taught me the value of meekness. I learned how to be a sheep. Sheep are meek.

Carolyn was declared cancer-free for the second time after her chemotherapy treatment which ended in July 1995. We live daily in God’s grace that it will not come back. We are expecting our first child in March 1997, a miracle in itself. My confidence in my shepherd is stronger now than ever, not because I found Him to be trustworthy, wonderful, holy, or compassionate, though He is all those things. My confidence is strong not because I found Him to be anything, but because in my confusion and doubt, He found me.

Sep 10, 2005

Approval Addiction

I originally wrote this intended to be an interactive Bible study for use in a small group… Hope it’s useful for you in some way…

Take a look at any magazine targeting young adults today. Take a look at the latest sitcom or Hollywood offering. What do you see? What do you notice? If you spend any time at all viewing these, you’ll come away with a couple of things. First of all, our culture is obsessed with sexuality. Bosoms, butts, and “beefcake” dominate the pages and screens of our society. Second, you will also notice the “possession obsession.” Everyone is wrestling to have the latest and the next.

“Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ.”
(Galatians 1.10)

What is behind these two rivers of cultural obsession? Though sexual desire is powerful, and man needs some basic things to exist, there is a deeper current that flows beneath these streams. It is the desperate desire of every person to find approval, to know that they are accepted, to be “ok.” How we all long to know that who we are brings another person pleasure, that we are approved! Life would be hopeless and void if we thought we our very existence was insignificant and meaningless.

Listen to one person’s search for meaning… (http://www.his.com/~mmeyerdc/p10.htm)

Is all of life reduced to an “E-ticket”? What would you do if you believed your life didn’t matter? Where would you go to fill the void within you?

And so the rat race is run. People everywhere are desperately trying to fill their lives with things and people in order to find approval and feel like they “matter.” The problem with this race is that it has no finish line. You will never arrive at a point where you feel like you matter or have received deep approval.

Consider Barbara Eden. A recent A&E Biography show detailed her full life. You may know her better as the wish-granter from “I Dream of Genie.” At one point, she rode the clouds of society’s approval as her show sat proudly atop the Nielson ratings. She made the talk show rounds, and was featured on dozens of magazine covers. She was at the pinnacle, having won the approval of a nation.

What would if feel like to achieve this level of approval? This level of fame and wealth?

In spite of this position of affluence and influence, Barbara’s biography revealed a woman who was deeply unhappy. Multiple marriages and a deep struggle with insignificance continued to plague her! Why?

How could someone so successful be so unhappy?

You might as well ask King Solomon, who was far more successful, a shining star on the world stage of his day. He amassed more wealth, honor, and wisdom than any before him, but he discovered that having the approval of the world was:

“Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” (Ecclesiastes 1.2)
Solomon discovered that in order to be at peace, there is only one person’s approval that matters:
“…For without Him, who can eat or find enjoyment? To the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God… (Ecclesiastes 2.25-26)

And that is what our nation’s pursuits are missing. That is what the Genie lacked. They all tried to find their approval in men before they found their approval in God. Perhaps St. Augustine said it best: “Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee.” (from Augustine’s “Confessions”)

Have you ever been caught up in the Rat Race of Approval Seeking? What does it feel like? What do you think about Augustine’s comment?

You might think it’s difficult to earn God’s approval. It might seem easier just to work for the body that the magazines say you ought to have. Or wear the clothes that culture dictates will earn its approval. Or drive the SUV that guarantees a turned-head and an admiring glance. Won’t these get you the approval you crave easier than trying to please God?

The astounding truth of scripture will relieve you. When looking for the first king of Israel, the prophet Samuel tried to pick someone based on how they looked and the impact their appearance would have on others. But he learned that God had a different way of evaluating:

“But the LORD said to Samuel, “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” (1Samuel 16.7)

God doesn’t give his approval based on what you do. How cool is that? You earn God’s approval by who you are. You character, the condition of your heart, is what matters to God.

Can you guess what is the most approval-generating characteristic that you can have before God?

Try this verse on for size:

“And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.” (Hebrews 11.6)

Why is faith so important to God? Does God really not care about what you do?

It’s not that God doesn’t care about what you do. It’s just that who you are comes first. God, as Creator, put the craving for approval in your heart so that you would seek Him. The problem comes when we try to fill that desire for approval with lesser things. Cars, clothes, and the common can never satisfy your soul. Your soul is spiritual and craves the approval of the Spirit. In other words, we settle too soon. Theologian C.S. Lewis said, “We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”

What do you think about C.S. Lewis’ comment? What can a person do to win God’s approval?

Sep 10, 2005

The Work Behind the Word

In today’s society, we hate wait. Gimme a remote or a shorter line at Wal-Mart. But don’t make me wait. I believe our lives as Christ-followers are radically atrophied by this mindset of the moment, this need for now. God’s Word has some challenging things to say to those who would follow Jesus’ way amid the rush of unreality.

The Work Behind the Word: Following, Waiting, and Miracles

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55.8-9
“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8.12
“They follow the Lamb wherever He goes.” Revelation 14.4
“When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice.” John 10.4
“Come, follow me.” Mark 1.17 (Simon and Andrew)
“Follow me.” Mark 2.14 (Levi)
“If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” Matthew 16.24
“Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.” Psalm 27.14
“Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; He rises to show you compassion. For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for Him!” Isaiah 30.18

You also see waiting in Psalm 37.7, 40.1, Isaiah 26.8, and Acts 1.4.

James, John’s brother, is killed.
Peter is jailed.
King Herod Agrippa begins persecution campaign (picking up where Saul left off.)

What appears to be defeating from one viewpoint is viewed completely differently from the viewpoint of faith. See Acts 12.24.

When there is a commitment to intimate communion, God will clearly reveal His instructions and activity.

See Phillip and eunuch
See Peter and Cornelius (10.2, 9)
See Ananias and Saul (9.11)
See Peter and church (12.5)

Learning to listen to God again. This has radical implications for us today. We must listen to our Lord and seek Him earnestly so that we will be in tune for when he speaks. Our prayer and waiting upon Him puts us in a position of spiritual readiness. Our fervency and consistency enable us to turn down the volume of the world and to slow down the pace of our lives so that we can hear and see and discern what God is doing. He is at work! He desires us to wait on Him instead of work for Him (or program for Him).

What if your current schedule conflicts with God’s schedule for you? What if a ministry’s schedule conflicts with what God has scheduled for them? Is it possible to be so focused on “serving God” or “ministry” that we actually miss God?

Could it be that our witness is ineffective today because we’ve quit following the God of the Good News and appropriated the Good News as our message rather than God’s? Have we stolen the Gospel from God to achieve our own ends?

We do not have God’s power to connect to the message we preach. Therefore, we must substitute programs and logic and propositions in the place of the Spirit and His power. Our evangelism is powerless because we no longer know how to follow God. We are at a loss. We don’t want to wait; we don’t want to stop. In golf terms, we need to let God “play through.” We are delaying His progress by our slow and pitiful play.

Practical -
Waiting does not mean inactivity. Rather, waiting is a state of vigilance.

Sep 10, 2005