managing life in the old world (there’s a new world coming)

When I think of how life is on the planet, and all the harmful things we humans do to ourselves, oftentimes out of ignorance, I often can only shake my head. It’s all relative for sure, and none of us are going to live forever in this life, nor at a certain point will we want to. A lot of innovations can end up being harmful, I especially think of dietary, but that includes chemical compositions used in materials for other things such as building and grounds. There really is no end to the list of either toxic, or somehow detrimental to one’s health substances which we regularly take into our bodies. Usually for most of us small amounts of all that stuff ends up being offset by other factors, or is not harmful enough. But too much of this or that, or a combination of such might push us over the edge, past the threshold so that our health begins to deteriorate.

We should try to become more aware of possible problems. I google and find what some might say, how broad the range is of those who say it, and then I look up the Wikipedia article to see if any such concerns are raised in it. I want to hear what others are saying, but hope to verify that with good scientifically sound clinical studies.

All of that to say something like this: We live in a world and during a time when not all is well which we take in, some of that being unavoidable. And death is inevitable. We want to do as well as we can on our part to remain as healthy as possible as long as possible. But in Jesus there is something better: the promise of a new world coming in the new creation in him.

He built his sanctuary like the heights,
    like the earth that he established forever.

Psalm 78:69

When we who value science read a passage like that, we might just shake our heads. Except for the promise that the One who made all things in the first place will remake them in the new creation in and through Jesus. There indeed is a new world coming. This old world wasn’t meant to last, except for all the good in it, that will. All things will be made new, which surely means only that which is created and therefore good. The new creation will be something like what the real world we know ought to be.

Yes, we humans try to do better apart from our greed and carelessness. But we still fail, even with our best efforts. In that world there will be no more accidents, no more failures. We can’t always avoid catastrophe in this life, even with all of our best efforts. But we rest in the promise of God that a new world is indeed coming. And we want to rest in God himself: the Triune God, that God’s love is with us in a life not meant to last, and through Jesus to take us into the even more real and abundant eternal life which will last forever. That no matter what we face or experience in this life, that God is with us in Jesus to help us through even the worst here, and to bring us with others into the new world to come in him.

a new (for me) thought on dealing with anxiety (worry)

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Philippians 4

As much as anything, and probably more, I’ve struggled with a low grade (sometimes high) anxiety most all of my life. If it’s the right kind minus obsessive compulsive tendencies, so as to take care of details on a job, that’s one thing. But when it amounts to thinking and acting as if life and its outcome depends on me rather than God, then that’s quite another, the latter not good at all.

I’ve had kind of inklings of this thought before, but not as plain as day like this: What if instead of first becoming anxious (or worrying; see NRSV in above link), I would immediately, as soon as something, or some thought occurs which will threaten my peace and result in anxiety, what if I would immediately bring that before God just as the passage quoted above says? After all, it doesn’t tell us not to be anxious after we have become anxious, and strictly speaking, it’s not about dealing with anxiety at all, although that’s the way I’ve used this passage in my life. It’s really about avoiding anxiety and worry in the first place.

Realistically, I say, it is hard to avoid anxiety in this life. It seems nearly like an automatic part of life for me. Of course there surely is a healthy anxiety which is different than the anxiety referred to here. That kind can comport with a faith in God, total dependency on him, and interdependency on others. But the anxiety we’re to avoid amounts to a lack of faith in God, somehow not believing God’s word, and thinking and acting as if all depends on us.

Of course we need to do exactly as this passage in Philippians 4 says. But the above link will make it clear that it’s in the context of rejoicing in the Lord always. And reading the entire book of Philippians will put it in the context of a life that is Christ, and is bent on moving toward the goal of conformity to him, and God’s calling in him. And beyond that, though the book of Philippians is definitely the place to start, we actually need the entire Bible to help us in providing needed context for not being anxious, or worrying by keeping the instructions here.

It is radical and abrupt, and surely not something we will simply step into unerringly, since we’re so used to being anxious and worrying in a way which at least weakens faith. We need to take it little by little, and learn a new way, so that over time, we can learn a new habit, and more and more avoid anxiety, yes completely in some measure in this life.

A new thought to me, one I look forward to working on in whatever days the Lord has left for me in this life.

a witness to Jesus

There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.

John 1

The light referred to here is Jesus himself. John the Baptizer, known as John the Baptist, is the John mentioned here.

Essentially as a writer of this blog, and I hope in all of life, I see myself as a witness to the truth and reality that is in Jesus, to Jesus himself.

Before whatever witness I have is ended, I hope to do some serious work and sharing, of course from other sources who have actually done the work themselves, concerning Jesus’s resurrection and the historicity, as well as compelling evidence to it as an actual event. Indeed, our Christian faith is built on that; without the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, we have no faith at all. Just a set of good platitudes, perhaps, but all of the truth of scripture is in some way predicated on, and rises and falls by the resurrection of Jesus. That is how the promises of God are fulfilled, how we can makes sense out of all of the story we find in scripture, in the first place.

I am quite dependent on the reality of Jesus, of God in Jesus, the Father and the Holy Spirit, which I base my entire life on. This is both personal and communal in its faith, so that we receive it and must follow as individuals, and we do so along with others as the church. This reality determines the measure and place of everything else, of the United States along with other nations, as well as entities. And that encourages me to try to take seriously everything, to sort out the good and the bad in it, from the standpoint of God’s grace and kingdom come in Jesus.

That said, this reality is essentially personal to me, along with being communal. And from that, I witness to Jesus himself. As it tells us in Revelation, both to the word of God, and the testimony about Jesus. We simply tell others about Jesus. He is the good news of God, along with all the truth surrounding him.

That is what I’m about, more than anything else, I hope. Being a witness, and pointing others to the one, in and through whom I, along with others live. In the faith, hope and love, and the eternal life which is in him, in Jesus our Savior and Lord.

encouragment to keep on keeping on

Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

1 Corinthians 15

For many reasons, it’s easy to want to give up at times, to throw in the towel. There is often so much pressure, and so much that could go wrong, and at times does go wrong. And we live in a world in which evil too often gets the upper hand and seems successful, and in which there’s little good that doesn’t have some admixture of evil. And if we honestly look at ourselves, we have to admit that we’re far from perfect, flawed and definitely not all together. We most certainly haven’t arrived. And all too often it can feel like our wheels are spinning.

But then we turn to scripture, and specifically to the great resurrection gospel passage in 1 Corinthians 15. The conclusion of it, quoted above suggests that it is meant to be an encouragement, as well as careful instruction during a formative time in the faith once for all entrusted to God’s people. Because of Christ’s death for our sins, and resurrection from the dead, we are given assurance that somehow what we do here and now in this present state matters. That it has effects beyond what is apparent, what the eye can see.

So the resurrection to come in and through Christ is not ony something we look forward to as a present day hope for the future, but also is meant to impact our lives in the present, that not only are we now living in the resurrection power by the Spirit, even while still in our mortal existence, but that this promise gives lasting significance to what we do in the here and now.

If this wasn’t the case, then it would most certainly seem indeed that “all we are is dust in the wind.” But God has promised to bring that dust back together beyond this mortality into immortality. And somehow with that, our works which proceed out of faith, as well.

And so that gives me pause, to not only want to do well, but to also avoid doing poorly. A straight arrow to us that what we do, our work matters. Both in our words and deeds. As we look forward to the time when all of our labor in the Lord comes together to be shown that it was not in vain, and we continue on in the love, goodness, grace, and indeed the life of our risen, resurrected Lord.

dialing down expectations

One of the greatest problems of society, and of us in our lives is the problem of unrealized expectations, or probably more accurately and helpfully put, unrealistic expectations. One of the most in your face and crudest kind out there is that of the health and wealth, prosperity gospel preachers. They are a dime a dozen, and not worth any of it. I would not mince my words to one, whose letters and whatever it was he sent back, was aimed at a poor man who was grasping on to whatever hope he had to recover from the dementia which was setting in, sending in x number of dollars to get this or that blessing from someone who is (or was) exceedingly wealthy himself.

I am not referring here, I hope, to lack of faith, so that we don’t expect God to fulfill his promises, and rather than shoots six or seven or more arrows out there, we only shoot three like that faithless king of Israel of old. Not at all. We ought to trust in God and in God’s promises to us in Jesus, even literally. So that we do expect nothing less than the righteousness, joy and peace in the Holy Spirit promised to us in the kingdom now present in Jesus (Romans 14). Yes, we do ourselves and no one else any favor, when we don’t believe God’s promises to us.

But we need to read the entire Bible, not just the precious promise part. There’s plenty in there which you’re either not likely to find, or never would see in a precious promise book, whatever good such books might actually do. Yes, we need the “very great and precious promises” of God (2 Peter 1) for sure, and we need to hold on to them for dear life. But we need to see them in the context of taking up our cross and following, and being ready for “the dark night of the soul,” as well as arming ourselves for the spiritual warfare by being willing to suffer as Christ did (1 Peter 4).

I don’t care for that kind of message, myself, or at least there’s a large part of me which doesn’t. On the other hand, there’s another part of me which does, I suppose the inherent skeptical part, and for the good of me and others, it is best that I swallow the entire revelation of God given to us in the word, and through Christ, not just the parts that I like. The parts which may not taste as well at first, anyhow, may be the most nourishing and good for the soul, but we need it all. We need to really take in, and perhaps dwell at length on sections we might, left to ourselves, ignore, like the book of Lamentations, to name just one book among many other such parts of scripture.

Dialing down expectations might help us sift the wheat from the chaff, as we learn the way and freedom of self-restriction in place of the lie of unlimited freedom (Alexander Solzhenitsyn), the way of Jesus, and as we embrace that way both outwardly and inwardly, the way of the cross. And then find the true love of God and abundant eternal life as we look forward to the fulfillment of all of God’s promises, in and through Jesus.

do we really believe?

In liturgical churches every Sunday, worshipers recite usually the Nicene Creed, which begins with:

We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, the maker of heaven and earth, of things visible and invisible.

I like that practice, though it’s seldom used in churches we’ve been a part of. It is suggestive of the reality that our faith is not just an indiviudal faith, but communal. Like Paul said, we can be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith. And it is about what we believe in terms of what God has revealed in what theologians call general and special revelation. Fulfilled in Jesus and the good news in him.

The intellectual belief shouldn’t be underplayed; it is important. But if we really believe that, it means we’re taking God at his word, and therefore trusting him. It is a personal, experiential faith which concerns all of life. We believe in and trust the God who created everything, and promises to make all things new in the new creation in Jesus.

When it comes right down to it, our faith is pretty well worthless if it doesn’t involve the nuts and bolts of where we live, and if it doesn’t get beyond just our concerns to concerns for others, to God’s concerns, the interests of Jesus. Faith isn’t some mere religious belief which is nice for Sunday at church, but is hardly an afterthought in real life. It is about nothing less than all of life, or it is nothing at all since it’s not living up to what it is said to be.

We believe because of God’s testimony to us in Jesus, in the gospel, and because of God’s grace through that testimony. We have the witness in ourselves by the Holy Spirit, that even as the gospel accounts compellingly make clear, Jesus indeed rose from the dead, a bodily resurrection. And God’s promise in him won’t stop until all evil is judged, and all things are made new. And that hope begins in this life, with the faith and love which accompany it.

What we truly believe because of God’s grace in and through Jesus.

praying boldly

We had a visiting pastor, whose message (“Getting Unstuck“) got me to thinking. Maybe sometimes we get lax in praying, because we lose heart, and wonder if it really matters (another good link on prayer). I wonder for myself if I’ve got into the habit of simply praying, if I pray at all, rather than praying boldly.

Praying boldly is not just about how we pray, but what we pray for, as well. Do we pray little prayers, and therefore as if to a little god? Or do we pray big prayers, as to the God revealed in scripture, fully in Jesus?

We don’t have, because we don’t ask God, and the prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective (James). Jesus said that if we ask anything in his name, which includes not only access, but harmony with that name, he will answer us, or grant us our request (John). And we’re not to let go, but to keep asking, like the widow who pleaded to the unrighteous Judge for justice, who finally gave in to her pleas, only to get rid of her (Luke).

A little bit really done, surely goes a long way. But to learn how to pray effectively and potently like that, will only encourage us to do so all the more. We need to make certain things, and really any and everything, big and small, a target of our prayers to God. As we await his answers to us, in and through Jesus.