I’ve been reading 1John the last few days.  It has been hard to read and internalize.  there is so much here and I am only in the first couple chapters, going back over and over.  I had a chance to eat my sandwich today at work and read a bit through chapter 2 and 3.  I have to admit that a lot of what John puts down here is haunting.  He leaves little room for error on your interpretation and John, via the Holy Spirit, leaves much much room for personal reflection.  throughout these chapters, right from the beginning is the stark contrast of what marks a person that belongs to Christ and what marks a person that doesn’t.  I have only to read a few lines at a time to be confronted with… ME.  The big ugly me that is behind everything that someone might see from the outside.  In chapter 1:8-10 we see that we are deceiving ourselves if we say we have no sin, that we are a liar.  We see that if we confess our sins, He will forgive us.  It says in verse 6 that we cannot have fellowship with him and walk in darkness.  Here in this area there is no both-and.  I cannot love God and hate my brother.  We will see that later, but that is the gist of it.  We can’t be both.  But what exactly does that mean?  We have to keep track of context here because we will all likely admit that we are not perfect and that we have dark evil thoughts and we have times that our flesh fights against us to get us to sin.   I believe that this is a good area to look at the fruit of our lives.  I don’t think that this is saying if you have a moral failure, you are doomed.  It talks about us admitting and confessing to God our sins and His faithfulness and justness to forgive us our sins.  This shows that we are not perfect and that we are dependent upon another to justify us.  I believe the error would be to be arrogant and believe that we are self-righteous, self reliant and beholden to no one.  The error would be to think that we have fellowship with God based on ourselves and our performance, not that of Christs.  We would have to ask ourselves, are our lives, in general and overall, producing Godly fruit, spiritual fruit, are we growing, being transformed?  Are we challenged in our faith?  Are we loving?  are we hiding things?

Yesterday I mentioned having an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.   We have to have this advocate, we cannot stand on our own nor say look at my good works, for those good works are as filthy rags to the Lord.  Again in chapter 2:28, we see our need for Jesus.

1John2:28 And now, little children, abide in him, so that when he appears we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming.  29If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him.

So, we see our need to abide in Him.  He is going to appear one day.  It gets closer all the time.  No one knows when Christ will come, but we do know that He will come again, that is what He has promised.  There are lots of different views on the end times, but at some point, He will reappear like He left, and this time it will be to judge.  Our lives, though not perfectly lived, should at least resonate with a desire to live righteously, even if we fail in carrying it out.  I think that there is a difference in living with righteous intent before God and living in such a way that your efforts are to hide your real actions and agenda from those around you.  For instance, if you are confronted on a sin and it is real and you are guilty, is your first notion to justify, or are you struck by your blindness or failure to extinguish the sin.  Do you live in opposition to what you know to be right, knowingly going against that which God has informed us is wrong and not healthy for us?

These are all things that we have to consider as we look at these words of John.  They are practical and they are convicting.  No, we are not perfect, but we are still responsible for our actions.  As believers, we are covered by Christ’s work, but are we living in response to His work or by presuming upon His grace?  Only we can answer these questions on our own walk.

I see in this flesh of mine a desire to run and hide, a desire to do things in secret, in darkness.  I see in this body something fighting against that desire, knowing that it is not best for me, no matter how much fun or thrilling or satisfying it might seem at the time.  This  “something” is the Holy Spirit.  I am still able to sin, but more importantly I am able to choose not to sin.  I can choose life.  I can choose righteousness.  There are things that I still fail at, every day, whether it is anger or snapping or selfishness.  there are also things that God has extinguished and keeps at bay by His power, things that marked my life before, that people knew me by and by His grace I have laid them down and may He never release me from His grip that I might return to that life.  And may God continue to empower me to fight my flesh, ever more valiantly as I struggle towards the prize of knowing Him more and understanding His word until that day that I must stand before Him.  For I know that I cannot say “Look at my life Lord, it is my claim on eternity.” for I know that will only gain me death.  The only thing I can say is that “I am a sinner, and I am not worthy of eternity,  by your Grace I trusted in your Son and believed that He paid the price in torment and death meant for my sin.  I don’t understand it, but that is all I have.”

I shutter to think of that time.  I mean, have you ever thought what you would say to GOD?  say to HIM in your own defense?  You don’t get a lawyer.  In fact, you get an accuser, you know that voice that continually tells you how awful you are.  The one that tried to convince the Lord how awful Job was?  I don’t think that we here in America and the autonomy we have can really start to put together what it is to stand before the Lord of the universe and give an account.  I can’t.  I mean, it was hard to even write those words because of my fear of sounding trite, cliche or flippant about talking to the Lord of all creation.  If you look throughout the bible when the Lord appeared or Angels were sent, people hit their face, people were blinded, people were silenced, people died.  Here we often seem to think “well, I’ll just explain to God how good I am and he will see it my way and it will all be good and he will overlook all those other things that I did.”  I somehow don’t think that is how it is going to be, but I don’t think we think that through, because we have rarely ever stood before a king, or even a judge who held our lives in our hands.  We just bee-bop through life thinking it is all good.  And down here, in America in the last century or so, it has been pretty good, and for many of us, we have probably gotten our reward.

But I do trust that the Lord is good and just, and that is exactly why I shutter, because I know the depths of my sin.  I don’t understand the grace I have been given.  It has nothing to do with me.  Even so, I do look forward to that time, to enter into eternity with God, the most beautiful being, eternal and infinite.  But for now, I have to reflect on just what I am in light of these verses.  I cannot be both in the dark and in the light, but I can be a sinner that confesses my sin and be covered by the blood of Christ and trust in Him.  that is my hope.  It is all I have.  May He continue to eradicate the sin that dwells within me.

Today I was back at the grind.  working, hacking away at a keyboard, and email and looking through correspondence and documentation and making suggestions.  I went to bed the night before about 10:30 and I arose about 6am.  6:02 actually, as Vernon McGee had not yet started preaching when my clock radio kicked in.   I jumped in the shower and then made a quick sandwich downstairs, warmed up an old cup of coffee and jumped in the car and headed to work.  My desire is really to survive on less sleep.  I really would benefit from living on about 4-5 hours of sleep.  those extra 3 hours would make things much better for me.   But the way I have been architected is to need more sleep than that and if I try to steal awake time, I will pay for it within 3 days time.  So, I’m learning to just get 6 hours and call it good.  It doesn’t help that the night before that we were out helping some friends until 3am with a family emergency.

Today, my overall mood was better though, tomorrow is my last day of my tapering steriods.  I’m hoping that has been a major contributor to my dark cloud overhanging me.   I am purposefully waiting to get past the end of these drugs to see where I am emotionally.  With things the way they are at work and at times with Kiana and with the world around, I lose grip on reality and can build some pretty ugly scenarios in my head.  I need not do that and I do not want to despair and plummet into worry.  I want to have faith that is strong and unshakable, I think to do that and be that, you have to be shaken, and you have to have proven to you that it will be ok.  Not that the proving or the miracle will fix it.  obviously the entire bible is full of examples where people saw and believed and still they were shaken, still they turned away.  My only hope is for God to hold me still under the barrage of things that come my way.  That He would enable me to stand.

thankfully in the midst of this short darkness that has cropped over me, I have been more spiritualy aware, more aware of my need and my dependence.  I have realized that I am inconsistent and that I need the word pouring into me.  I mentioned that I ran out of the house this morning at 6:30.  I had no quiet time.  I did have 30 minutes of Luke poured into me via my MP3 player and I did get some on the way home and then I did get some time in the word this evening after I arrived home.  My desire is to have my quiet time in the morning, but I have not been able to consistently hold that time for any amount of time.  I know now that it is something that I have not committed myself to.  Mainly because I like sleep and often sleep is more desirous than anything,  especially getting up to go to work.  I am not the best reader or attender in the early morning either, which makes me hesitant.  I have also realized that for the most part, and a big cop out, is that I have not had a standard quiet time because I know that it is a check box for me to justify myself.   Check, had quiet time, I’m good.  I need not have that terrible attitude towards this special time.  And I need not avoid a quiet time all together when it is the one thing that I need most of.  I need a balance there and I don’t know how to get it.  My plan is first, to have a plan, because without one nothing happens, and then try to carry it out and pray that God would bless it and enable it.   I’ll post and see.  It could be that an evening time will just be best given my crazy life.

Today I have been reading 1John in preparation for the upcoming book study in 1John we will be studying at Matthias’ Lot.   I have enjoyed previous journeys through this book and I also have some memory verses coming back to mind from these first couple chapters.   In light of some of my recent areas of thought, 1John2:1 popped out at me.

My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.  But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous.

I like this verse as it points out something that I need to keep reminding myself of. My hope is in Christ, not me. I’ve proven over and over not to be able to carry anything out, but Christ has done all. I am not accepted by God for following rules. I am accepted by God for believing in His Son and having faith that His work on the Cross and His resurrection has freed me. My hope is that my life will reflect my belief in that truth and my responses to life will be less and less sinful. But that is not how I am accepted. If I do sin, Christ is still interceding for me. That was one of the big revelations for me in Luke and Hebrews. Christ is the intercessor, He is the great High Priest, the eternal High Priest and so He intercedes for me, continually. I can go to Him at any time. I get to go to Him at any time. He has covered my sin, past, present and future. I pray that I will not fall, and I take courage that Christ has me and that the devil cannot accuse me any more (Romans 8). These are the things I need to hear. What God has done. How beautiful He is. How I will someday see Him face to face. It is good to be starting out again…

I’ve been sick now, or was sick, for about 3.5 months straight.  coughing, whooping, wailing, hacking, etc. etc.  You get the drift.  I went to the doctor after the first 3 weeks and got some meds.  I never really got “better”.  I got a little better, but I held on the cough.  I guess it is a thing going around, a trend so to speak.  In any case, I went back about 12 days ago now and I got some more stuff.  This time part of the prescription was Prednisone which is a steroid, which has side affects.  the first 3 days were unbelievable energy.  the next 6-9 days were unstable darkness and clouds over my personality and thoughts and sanity.  It has been really hard.  Tomorrow is my last dose and I’m glad.  I don’t know how long it will take to get back to some semblance of normal.  I’m hungry and thirsty all the time, I have stomach problems, I’m easily agitated and grumpy.  I’m paranoid and anxious.  I know, not much different than normal, but it does feel a lot different to me and it is something that no matter what, I can’t convince or work myself out of.  I have had a few ok days, but mostly just yucky as far as emotions go.  I’ll be glad to get back to me so to speak.  Better life thru chemicals?  I don’t know.  I’m feeling much more better physically.  No coughing, hacking, wheezing.  But mentally, spiritually, emotionally?  I’m a zombie or a freak or an angry guy.  Just give me a minute, I’ll be something different.

Many praises today though, I was aware of my condition and although it likely didn’t appear like it from the outside, I was more prayerful about overcoming it, asking God for patience and strength and the ability to still handle people with grace that I didn’t want to do.  I failed several times, but I was aware and God kept me mindful of Him and His Word.  I need more, to be saturated more.  The reading I did today didn’t seem to penetrate or stick.  But my awareness of my need stayed all day, even in the darkest moments.  Praise Him.

On sundays our church meets in homes across the wider community of st. charles.  That’s because we meet for corporate worship together on Wednesdays and that is when the sermon is delivered and the larger body of our church (matthias lot) meets together.  We call our sunday gatherings Lot Families.  You may wonder about this model and the name of the church and there is some substantial significance to the name, and there is a lot of background to why we meet like we do.  Matthias was the one chose by lot (casting of lots) to replace Judas who betrayed Jesus.  The lot fell to Matthias.  Now this is important because they prayed over the people they thought might be a fitting and Godly replacement.  In the end, they submitted themselves to God’s sovereignty over even the casting of the dice in who was going to be the one chosen to bring integrity and fulfillment back to the 11, making them again 12 like Jesus had originally chosen.  As far as our wed-sun model, well, if over your life of going to Church you have rushed and rushed and argued all the way to church, only to cover your anger and frustration on the Lord’s day to get your religious deal done and get on with your day, then you might be in need of revisiting the concept of the Sabbath.  The Sabbath, which the Lord set up in the beginning, was to show us that we could have rest.  It is a shadow of the eternal sabbath that is coming when we join Him in eternity, but God set up this rhythm of 6 days and a day of rest.  A day of freedom.  I would say not necessarily freedom to do what ever we want, but freedom to put down our work and utensils and worries and cares and celebrate what God is doing and what He has already done and what He is continuing to do.  It allows us to realize that things are not dependent upon us.  We can let go of the wheel, the reigns, the control and throw up our arms in praise and joy and freedom and celebrate the God that has bought us this freedom with His very life and His very blood.

so on sundays, we meet together, have a meal (breakfast lunch or brunch) we talk and get to know one another, we play a game or something, we do worship and Word with the kids and then the adults too break into the Word and share with one another and challenge one another and edify and encourage one another.  there is joy and sorrow, prayer and petition, laughter and crying.  You live with one another.  We are so busy any way, it gives us a chance to slow down, care for others and have others care for us and for us to point and redirect each other back to our Savior, back to Christ who saves.

there is nothing wrong with traditional church…  and there is nothing wrong with this other model that we have joined.  as long as we are worshipping in spirit and truth to the Glory of God, then may His name be praised.  I love lot families and I love congregations.  I love the body of Christ and I pray that He would further that in me and that He would use me in ways to build up others around me as He has built me up through them.  May you find joy in your church body and may you be surrounded and encouraged by Christ Followers.  Amen.

From the beginning of my Christian walk, I have been quietly and steadily searching for that perfect friend that would be there regardless and that it would be rock solid friendship and that it would be safe and that it would be awesome and cool and that it would erase all those pains and memories of rejections that came from broken friendships in the past. This has not been my experience. First of all, I’m a sinner and often times I can be a flake. I try not to be. But the expectant looking for this friendship has continued to reveal that I’m not the perfect friend and that all people are still people who are fallible and sinful. There are good people out there and good people still can let you down. It is hard to sort out, especially when we put on our “judgement role” and we look at people that are our friends and we see that they have sin and we can’t believe that they can say they are a Christian while they are stuck or involved in that sin. We can’t understand how that could be. When in fact, in other ways, we have sins in our own lives that we are either aware or unaware of others may be saying the same thing of us. This is hard to navigate, since Jesus told us Himself not to attempt to pull the speck out of our brother’s eye when we ourselves have a log in our own eye. How do you rightly point out the faults of others and also handle your own. To ignore and overlook is wrong and yet to judge without mercy will bring judgement without mercy upon you as well.

In 12 years as a Christian I have gone through several relational difficulties with different people over the years. The common denominator there is me. And the universal denominator is sin. I have had unstated expectations of friends that they didn’t even know they were being held to live up to. I have been hurt in silly ways that were stupid and I have been hurt in big ways that were awful. I hate the pain, I do, but in hindsight, those things, those pains have brought forth a lot of revelation about me and about my own weaknesses that I would not have seen had I not gone through the pains that I did. When a friend lets you down, it is hard. When a friend that you hold in high esteem and regard lets you down it can mess with you. You question who they are? Who you are? Just what it is to be a person who says that they follow Christ. Initially you point your finger at them in disbelief. Then, after you get your breath, you realize that you are cut of the same cloth, that there are terrible things wrong with you, that you are not void of the same faults, but wrought with them and you also say that you follow Christ.

Here is where I believe that your foundation and your rooting in Christ makes a difference because from here on out you can either listen to yourself or you can preach to yourself the gospel. When I say listen to yourself, I take that from CJ Mahaney’s Humility book where he talks about us spending too much time listening to ourselves, to the flesh, to the self that is self focused and not enough time preaching and talking to ourselves the words of God.

Because I was hurt and have been hurt and getting a pretty good track record going on this people are letting me down train, I sort of shut down emotionally. “Shields Up” so to speak. I isolated myself and avoided close friendships. My messed up reasoning, as far as I can tell, has been that for one “I’m just going to get hurt again” and for two, “I’m just going to mess something up because I’m a sinner too”. Now, although there is truth in both of those statements, it is not the complete truth. For one, those sentences all focus on me and make no reference to the redeeming work of Christ. First and foremost Christ came to glorify the Father in His obedience and in that He brought peace between those that would believe and God again which was lost at the fall. Christ also came to heal and make all things new and so He also came to restore and redeem relationships. I sort of skipped out on this thinking.

I tend, if you ask my wife, to be a perfectionist, as wrong as I know it is. I don’t like to do things that have a potential of failure and so since that pretty much can be just about everything, I sometimes stall out in attacking things and moving out on things, because I simply might fail and for some reason failure is not an option. We’ve discussed this point before. Well, when this sort of thinking comes head to head with bad thinking and lack of hope, it makes for bad life choices, decisions and it hurts your faith to some extent (or acts as a means to identify a problem and therefore strengthen your faith, thus this post).

At this point I wasn’t willing to be in close relationships because I might get hurt or I might mess up. And next I sort of quit doing all the things that I was doing in ministry because I felt that because I was messing up, I would probably mess up more or that I was really not being who I said I was because I was bound to mess up again.

Stick with me here, I know this is sort of fuzzy, but it’s sort of clear in my mind, which is the important part because it’s helping me get better. I’m prideful and don’t want people to know I’m messed up. I’m stupid because I think that people don’t know I’m messed up and that same stupidity and pride keeps me from wanting to put myself out there to make mistakes that others know I’m going to make or am capable of making anyway and all the while Satan wins because I’m not engaged, I’m not on the front lines, I’m basically in pitty party haven.

So this cycle has been ongoing, whether real strong or not. That friend that I’m looking for, well, they are not going to materialize for me here on earth, at least not as a normal person. Over all this time God has been pointing out the fact that all these people that you keep putting your faith and your hope in are not HIM. He is the only one that can be that person, who I can trust and confide in without wondering or losing. There is sure to be pain and discipline and old habits that creep in and dumb tendencies. He is the only one that can make promises (and He has made many promises to His people) and carry them out without fail. Not necessarily how we might choose, but He is God and it is His creation.  He is the only one.  But that enables me to then go and be a friend to others and not levy on them some expectation that is unattainable by us sinners.  And it makes it possible for me to see clearer that we are all just sinners in need of a savior and in need of friends that will point us to our Savior, Christ.

So, I’m not out of the tunnel. I think I see light up ahead. I need to understand how to “know” God more and not just in an intellectual sense, but to be in prayer like we were last night on a regular basis, to be in consistent quiet time in His word, to spend time knowing Him through His word and through prayer and through pondering all these things. I need to understand the nature of the Holy Spirit better. I need to understand and separate “doing” and “being”. I need to understand more about doing what is right, even when it is hard and how my willing choice in that is involved and how that meshes in with God’s sovereignty. I believe that God is sovereign. I believe that from the fall we are messed up. I believe that He turns us towards Him. I believe that He does it all for His purposes and His glory. I believe He is in the act of making all things new, bringing us towards the Day of the Lord. I will never understand how all that works, but I know that it still does not get me off the hook for responsibility. I think sorting some of that out and thinking through that will help get over this feeling of hopelessness that there is no purpose because I might mess up again or I might fall. IT IS NOT ABOUT ME. It’s not even about whether I rise or fall. It’s about God and His son is already risen. God so choosing could pick up my pieces again, or leave them fallen. If I believe and have faith, He will bring me into eternity.

Jesus, Jesus, How I trust you. How I’ve proved you o’er and o’er. Jesus Jesus, Precious Jesus, O FOR GRACE TO TRUST HIM MORE.

May this be ever more my call. And my understanding of my need. In all the pain and loss and joy, He has not yet let me down though I deserved it.

I don’t consider these past 2-3 years a loss, though sometimes it felt like a bleak barren wasteland, but I see it all as part of God’s purpose to shut me down in ways that would make me more present in my family as needed with the struggles we are in and to make me realize my fruitless searching for something to satisfy is right in front of me if I only would open my eyes, lift up my hands and open my mouth and accept it.

God is merciful and mighty to save.

Amen.