Relentless Joy: Humility and Joy

This weeks devotion is an excerpt from “With Jesus in the Upper Room” by Maxie Dunnam. Maxie D. Dunnam is the former president and chancellor of Asbury Theological Seminary. He is now Senior Pastor Emeritus and Executive Director of CCGlobal at Christ United Methodist Church in Memphis.

CONSIDER THIS

There is true humility and there is affected humility. Look at the contrast between Jesus and Peter. When Jesus came to Peter to wash his feet, Peter resisted: “Lord, do not wash my feet” (author’s paraphrase). I’m sure there was real sincerity in that. But sincerity and humility are not the same.

Peter was struggling in his relationship with Jesus, struggling with his own life, struggling with what was going on because things were not turning out as he thought they might when he left his fishing boat and followed this itinerant preacher. And he certainly didn’t understand what Jesus was doing. He couldn’t understand why Jesus was deliberately taking the position of a servant, so he acted humbly and backed away from Jesus because he didn’t want his leader washing his feet. It was a kind of affected humility.

But not the humility expressed by Jesus. The humble know who they are. Jesus knew who He was; Peter did not yet know who he was. In our culture, it is easy to have distorted notions about humility. We think of it as a kind of cowering, taking a backseat kind of style. In our most mistaken notions, we stereotype the humble person as being without strength, allowing people to take advantage of them, and staying in the shadow. That’s not true humility.

A father made this confession. Every night he would bring work home from the office;
lots of work, work he would begin doing right after the evening meal. One night his son
asked him why he brought all this work home. He explained, probably too adult-like, that
he was a very busy person, his job was demanding, and he just had more work to do than
he could get done at the office.

I like what the little boy said. From his world, and the way they did it at school, he asked, “Well, in that case, why don’t they put you in a slower group?”

Is anything more needed—to know who we are and, thus, to be genuinely humble? This means knowing our weaknesses, as well as our strengths. Perhaps more than anything else the humble not only know they are vulnerable, they know their Source of power. They live from the inside out, not the outside in. The humble have power, but the power is not so much in them as through them.

I’m not a baseball fan, but I relish sports stories of perspective and power, of humility and greatness. One of my favorite stories speaks to this issue of humility, of living from the inside out, not the outside in.

After the Dodgers won the Pennant in 1988, they gave their star pitcher, Orel Hershiser, a three-year contract for 7.7 million dollars. Though I have real problems with that sort of price tag on sports stars, it does say that Hershiser was a phenomenal player.

In Game Two of that series, Hershiser was pitching. He got two doubles and a single at bat, as many hits and more total bases than he allowed the competing team. He ran the bases like Jackie Robinson, and shut out Oakland 6–0.

Then came the fifth and final game. Folks wondered if Hershiser was going to make it again. He had to talk his manager into letting him stay in when he got into trouble in the eighth inning. He went on to win the series by winning that final game 5–2.

What fans remembered for a long time, though, was watching Hershiser on television on the bench in the top half of an inning, leaning back, mouth wide open, singing to himself that last night. It wasn’t until later on that we learned exactly what he was doing.

He was singing to himself two songs: The Doxology—“Praise God from whom all blessings flow . . .”—and a contemporary Christian tune by the late Keith Green called “Rushing Wind.” A line in that song goes: “Rushing wind, blow through this temple, blowing out the dust within.”1

Hershiser said he wanted to cleanse his mind of all the clutter of the world in that moment, to block out the pressure, and concentrate on the game at hand. This was a convincing picture of living from the inside out, not the outside in. As with Jesus, so with Hershiser and us, when we know who we are, we know our Source of power.

Relentless Joy: Suffering and Joy

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by Casey Page Culbreth entitled, “Suffering and Hope.” Casey Page Culbreth is a worship pastor at Grace Church in Cape Coral, Florida.

CONSIDER THIS

My dad has dementia. My family found out about it three years ago and we have been walking together through the progression of this disease ever since. I’m an only child and my biggest fear has always been losing my parents. I’m watching my greatest fear come true with my dad, little bit by little bit.

This past year we had to have a conversation with dad about the need for him not to drive anymore. I was surprised to find myself leading the conversation. I was the one to ask my father, my authority, to give away the last vestige of his independence.

I tried to be positive throughout the conversation and dad was also trying to handle it with grace. The only one crying was my mother. But afterwards, when I said goodbye and hit the end button (we were talking on Skype since I live far away), this numb mix of sadness, anger, and disbelief came over me. I walked like a zombie to my bedroom and got ready for bed.

It wasn’t until later, as I was trying to go to sleep, that the tears came. I began to heave deep groans that I couldn’t stop. I started to yell at the empty room, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!”

In that moment, I desperately needed to feel God’s presence. I needed to hear him tell me that he was here, that there was hope for my dad and for my family. But I felt nothing and heard nothing. The lack of that felt assurance that my Abba was with me hurt just as much as the reality of slowly losing my father.

Our sufferings bend us low with our faces hard pressed toward the ground.

We all have leprous sores somewhere that give us such pain.

We cry out to God with the Israelites,

Oh that you would burst from the heavens and come down!

These kinds of cries are Advent cries. Advent is the season to allow ourselves to heave, to scream, to cry over our own lives and in solidarity with the screams and cries of the world.

The leper in the Gospel of Luke was near death, simply existing in the last stages of his disease. Perhaps he had lost the assurance that God was with him like I had as I cried over my father.

But that wasn’t the end of his story . . . and it’s not the end of mine…and it’s not the end of yours.

God did come down…and he walked with his own dusty feet into this man’s valley of death.

Oh, that you would burst through the heavens and come down!

Jesus reached out and touched him. “I am willing,” he said. “Be healed!”

I don’t always feel that God is with me. I can often despair that perhaps he is not. At the same time, there are moments when I encounter such sparks of unexpected beauty. In these moments, exultant joy overflows within me as I remember that I am the beloved and that God is truly here.

Relentless Joy: A Foundation For Joy

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by Matt LeRoy entitled, “Joy to the World (Or How to Write a Better Song).” Matt LeRoy is the co-pastor of Love Chapel Hill Church. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

Philippians 2:6-11
6 Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God as something to be grasped;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.

CONSIDER THIS

One of the first songs of this season is the anthem, “Joy to the World.” Originally intended to be a song about the Second Coming of Jesus, subsequent generations adopted it as the theme song of his first coming at Christmas. This classic was penned by the prolific hymn writer Isaac Watts, one of more than 700 works created by Watts in worship of Jesus. When he was a young man, he frequently complained about the music he was experiencing in church. He called it boring, hard to sing, and lacking true heart-level zeal. Finally, his father challenged him to stop complaining and do something about it. If you don’t like it, change it. Write a better song.

And indeed he did. 700 times over.

While “Joy to the World” is one of the first songs of this season, scholars believe that today’s passage from Paul’s letter to the Philippians is one of the first songs of the Church. It is quoted in this letter as if it is a hymn or poem familiar to the hearers, an early form of liturgy expressing worship of the Word made flesh. Notice the pattern carved out in the lines. They begin with Jesus in the highest possible place, naming him as being in very nature God. Then, he steps into our story, making his descent into flesh and cross and grave. Then the grand pivot as he is raised up once again in resurrection and exalted glory above all things. This is the Great Reversal of humanity’s story. On the one hand, we knew harmony with God in the Garden, but that wasn’t enough. We grasped after equality with him. Jesus, on the other hand, being in very nature God did not consider equality with God as something to be grasped. We were convinced to make something of ourselves. Jesus made himself nothing. While our sin follows a trajectory of fall and brokenness and death, his death pioneers resurrection and healing and life.

In the Garden, sin silenced the melody.
In Advent, Jesus writes a better song.

And we get swept up in it. We hear the Lord himself rejoicing and singing over us, and we start to pick up the melody again, learning the rhythm, feeling out our part. We join the better song and sing out the anthem of the first Advent and the Advent yet to come, “Joy to world! The Lord is Come. Let Earth receive her King.”

AND THE WORD BECAME FLESH AND MADE HIS DWELLING AMONG US.

Summer Psalms 2022: The Final Word

This week we want to share with you a devotion from Seedbed entitled, “Like A Mustard Seed”. Seedbed is a twenty-first century movement and media platform whose mission is to gather, connect, and resource the people of God to sow for a great awakening. You can learn more about Seedbed here. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

TEXT

Matthew 13:31-35

He presented another parable to them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field; and this is smaller than all other seeds, but when it is full grown, it is larger than the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches.”

He spoke another parable to them, “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three pecks of flour until it was all leavened.”

All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables, and He did not speak to them without a parable.  This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:

“I will open my mouth in parables;

I will utter things hidden since the foundation of the world.”

NASB

COMMENT

A mustard seed—small and insignificant, but growing to encompass the garden.  Yeast—small and insignificant, but enabling the whole loaf to rise.  But when we hear “kingdom,” we do not think small and insignificant.  We want a mighty kingdom, a quick fix, a strong and sure redemption that makes all things new right now.  But the kingdom of heaven is more subtle.  The kingdom of heaven moves more slowly, starts more trivially, seems nondescript and irrelevant and altogether unimportant.  But the transformation it brings is no less sure, no less complete, no less magnificent.  The King of this kingdom is more than able to bring it to pass; he is its Maker, Keeper, and Lover.  To him, everything existing is no more than a mustard seed; he is more than able to bring his kingdom subtly.

READING

Also He showed me a little thing, the quantity of a hazel-nut, in the palm of my hand; and it was as round as a ball.  I looked thereupon with my mind’s-eye, and thought, “What may this be?”  And I received the answer, “It is all that is made.”  I marveled how it might last, for I thought it was so small it might suddenly disappear.  And I received the answer, “It lasts, and ever shall last, because God loves it.”  And so Everything has its Being by the love of God.

In this Little Thing I saw three properties.  The first is that God made it, the second is that God loves it, and the third that God keeps it.  But what He is who is the Maker, the Keeper, and the Lover, I cannot tell; for until I am fully united to Him, I may never have full rest nor true bliss.  That is to say, till I be so fastened to Him, that there is nothing created betwixt my God and me.

—St. Julian of Norwich (1342-1416)

Resources:

Summer Psalms 2022: The Two Greatest Books

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by Richard J. Foster entitled, “Understanding Study”. Richard J. Foster is the founder and past president of Renovaré, has served as a pastor and teacher, and is a prolific writer. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

Study is the process whereby our minds take on an order conforming to the order of whatever we concentrate upon. Garbage in, garbage out; or conversely, beauty in, beauty out. It really is as simple as that. This is why the wise old apostle Paul urged us to set our minds on ​“whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable.”

What makes study a Christian spiritual discipline is the content of our study as well as the spirit by which we engage in our study. 

The content of our study consists in all those things that lead to the glory of God. For the Christian, our study focuses primarily upon two great ​“books”: Scripture and ​“the book of nature.” With regard to Scripture, we begin by quieting ourselves until we can be attentive to the Word in Scripture. Then: We read. We reflect. We absorb. We allow Scripture to read us. We apply Scripture to our living. With regard to nature, the process is much the same, except that our ​“reading” comes by way of observing and listening. Then: We reflect. We absorb. We allow nature to read us. We apply the lessons of nature to our living. 

The spirit in which we engage in our study is an overall spirit of humility. We come with open hands and open heart. We become subject to the subject matter. We come as student, not teacher. We come as wholehearted learners. We stand under the text of Scripture, under the book of nature. Without this pervasive spirit of humility, study will only produce arrogance in us. A haughty spirit undermines humility of heart. Arrogance and a teachable spirit are mutually exclusive. 

There are four well-recognized steps in study. The first is repetition. Repetition regularly channels our minds in a specific direction, thus ingraining habits of thought. Ingrained habits of thought can be formed by repetition alone, thus changing behavior, even if we do not understand what is being repeated. 

The second step in study is concentration. Concentration centers our minds. It clears away the clutter of a thousand stimuli and forces us to focus on one thing only. This focus allows us to be truly present where we are. 

Comprehension is the third step in the discipline of study. All of us have had the experience of reading something over and over and then, all of a sudden, we understand what it means. This ​“eureka” experience of understanding catapults us to a new level of growth and freedom. It brings insight and discernment. 

The final step in study is reflection. While comprehension defines what we are studying, reflection defines the significance of what we are studying. Reflection allows us to see things from God’s perspective. 

Study produces joy. Like any novice, we will find it hard work in the beginning. But as our proficiency grows, so will our joy. Study is a discipline ordained by God for the training of the mind in ​“righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.”

Resources:

Summer Psalms 2022: God's Presence in Scripture

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by Timothy Tennet entitled, “God, the Mighty Fortress: Psalm 48. ” Timothy C. Tennent is the President of Asbury Theological Seminary and a Professor of Global Christianity. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

CONSIDER THIS

This is a psalm of praise for the mighty fortress in Jerusalem, which was the pride of every Jew. Not only was it built on a high place, but its towers, ramparts, and citadels were extolled for the security they promised. The psalm challenges the people of God to “walk about Zion, go around her, count her towers, consider well her ramparts, view her citadels, that you may tell of them to the next generation” (vv. 12–13).

At first glance this may seem like a psalm completely irrelevant for a Christian worshipper. However, it is important to notice a small detail in this psalm that makes it a pointer to something far greater. As a point of fact, the temple being referred to in Psalm 48 was not built on Mount Zion. Originally, Mount Zion referred to a Jebusite fortress attacked and seized by David on the eastern hill, whereas the temple was built on the western hill. However, the name Mount Zion carried so many associations with the Jews that it was gradually applied to what is today the Temple Mount. In other words, the term “Mount Zion” became a type or symbol for the fortress of God. Later, in the New Testament, “Mount Zion” refers to the “heavenly Jerusalem” (Heb. 12:22; Rev. 14:1).

The symbolic use of words like Jerusalem and Mount Zion is important for us. When we celebrate Mount Zion, we are celebrating the impregnable fortress of God himself. All the references in the Psalms to Jerusalem, the temple, Mount Zion, and so forth are, at the deepest level, longings for the presence of God. The New Jerusalem does not even contain a temple. You may recall that in John’s vision he says, “I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb” (Rev. 21:22 ESV, italics added). This psalm points to that which is beyond stones or citadels. Indeed, Jesus told his disciples as they were admiring the temple, with its massive stones and towering citadels, that “there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down” (Mark 13:2 ESV). This psalm points us to God himself, the ultimate citadel of strength and protection.

Summer Psalms 2022: The Oldest Psalm

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by J.D. Walt entitled, “How the Psalms Work More like Orange Juice Concentrate than Simply Orange” J.D. Walt is the Executive Director of Seedbed.com. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

CONSIDER THIS

Growing up, we didn’t have the present-day luxury of bottled juices such as Simply Orange. We actually got those little cans out of the freezer, often thawing them overnight, and mixed the contents with water to make our orange juice. The cans contained an ingredient known as concentrate, a thick, syrupy, profoundly orange substance. I used to love prying the lid off early before breakfast and sneaking a small spoonful of the stuff into my mouth. It produced a bit of a mouth-explosion effect of goodness. But who could take more than a spoonful? The taste vividly remains with me.

That’s what the Psalms are like and how they work. They gather up all of the glorious details from Scripture of the character of God and all of the dastardly depths of the human condition and combine them into a powerful concentrate. We can only take about a spoonful at a time. And that’s okay, because over time they mingle with the water that is our lives and result in something unexpectedly good. At times the concentrate is so strong that it’s bitter; at other times it tastes pleasantly sweet.

Song 90 gives us a massively concentrated contrast between the incomprehensible infiniteness of God and the frail finiteness of human beings:

Before the mountains came to be,
or earth sprang from Your word; 
From everlasting to the same,
You, only You, are God.

You turn men back to dust and say, 
“Return, O sons of men”;
For dust we are, to dust return; 
we go to dust again.

We need this concentrated reminder. As for me, “dust, dust, dust, dust. You, only You, are God.”

Something about actually singing these songs brings out the fullness of their taste. And, yes, it is a bit of an acquired taste. It will take time. Just sing this one today.

Summer Psalms 2022: God is Dependable

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by Timothy Tennet entitled, “Starting the Day on the Right Path: Psalm 5.” Timothy C. Tennent is the President of Asbury Theological Seminary and a Professor of Global Christianity. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

CONSIDER THIS

If Psalm 4 (last week’s daily text) sets forth the basic framework for evening prayer, Psalm 5 is the pattern for morning prayer: “In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation” (v. 3). Morning prayer is essential for setting ourselves on the path of the way of righteousness. As the day begins, we draw the line and put ourselves on the right side of righteousness. Before the day begins to unfold and we have even the first opportunity to squander our time, engage in evil thoughts and conversations, do any evil deed, or, in general, lose our moral courage to stand in the way of righteousness, this morning prayer sets us on the right path. We remind ourselves at the outset that God takes no “pleasure in evil” (v. 4). He does not dwell with the wicked, and in the end, the “arrogant cannot stand in [his] presence” (v. 5).

Today, Christians are inundated with a domesticated, overly sentimentalized view of God. This psalm shakes us awake and calls us to realign our thinking about God according to Scripture, not popular sentiments and cultural trends that can easily crowd out a biblical perspective on life. One of the biggest surprises comes in verse 5, where the psalmist declares that God hates “all who do wrong.” It is important to remember that when the Bible refers to love and hate, it does not correspond particularly well with the ways those two words are used today. For example, the word hate does not refer to any kind of angry emotion God has toward someone, as might be reflected in the phrase, “I hate you.” Rather, when the Bible says God “hates” something, it means that he stands covenantally opposed to it. He stands with a drawn sword in the way of sin; he does not go along with it. To “hate” all those who do wrong is to “stand against” all those who oppose God’s righteous reign and rule in the world.

We need this daily reminder that God will someday return to judge the world and establish his reign. Indeed, Psalm 5 is one of the key passages that Paul quotes in Romans 3 to establish the captivating sinfulness of the world: “Their throat is an open grave; with their tongue they speak deceit” (v. 9; see Rom. 3:13). The only hope we have of escaping God’s righteous judgment is to “take refuge” in the Lord (v. 11). The “shield” (v. 12), which the psalmist promises will protect the people of God, is in fact brought back to us in the book of Ephesians. Paul tells us to “take up the shield of faith,” which is to cast ourselves upon the mercy and grace of Jesus Christ. This, in turn, enables us to “extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one” (Eph. 6:16). It is through Christ that we are finally established as the people of righteousness.

Colossians: All Of Us

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by J.D. Walt entitled, “The Highlight Reel” J.D. Walt is the Executive Director of Seedbed.com. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

CONSIDER THIS

And so it ends. Colossians is in the books. Before we leave it behind, I wanted to revisit a few of my favorite highlights. Let’s tip these dominoes one more time.

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the saints and faithful brothers and sisters in Christ in Colossae: Grace to you and peace from God our Father. (Col. 1:1–2 NRSV) 

The issue is not whether we will live in Colossae or not. We must live there or Cincinnati or Centerville or wherever it is we have been appointed to live. The question is whether we will live in Christ or not. Will I become a bona-fide in-Christ-one? This is the awakening we must have. This begins to happen when my attention turns from my disgruntlement with the insanity around me to my discontent with the incongruity within me. When this awakening becomes greater and greater within us it leads to the awakening becoming greater and greater around us.

In our prayers for you we always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. You have heard of this hope before in the word of the truth, the gospel that has come to you. Just as it is bearing fruit and growing in the whole world, so it has been bearing fruit among yourselves from the day you heard it and truly comprehended the grace of God. (Col. 1:3–6 NRSV)

To be sure, the gospel is the message of what God has done for us in Jesus Christ, but in a far greater sense, the gospel is who Jesus Christ is to us and in us and through us for the world. The gospel is not a body of knowledge about who God is and what God has done. It is actually knowing God.

May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. (Col. 1:11–14 NRSV)

I think I used to think I didn’t need to be rescued, that I wasn’t one of those kinds of people. Sure, I knew I was a sinner, but not that bad. I just needed a little Sunday school-esque straightening of the collar. Now I know better. The kind of sinner I thought I was is actually the worst kind of sinner because we think since we didn’t ride the Titanic to the bottom of the ocean we somehow don’t need as much grace as the ones who did. Now I recognize this as a lie from the pit of hell. The dominion of darkness is oh-so-deceptive. We all must be rescued, especially me. In fact, I will never become a real Christian until I know I am a real sinner.

The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. (Col. 1:15–16)

We must see Jesus. We were made to behold him. His life, not in general but in a thousand specifics, must become our vision. His preexistence, preeminence, conception, birth, life, words, deeds, miracles, relationships, signs, sermons, parables, prayers, suffering, passion, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, return, and eternal reign must become our holy obsession. This is the message Paul offers the Colossians and the Columbians, the Americans and the Africans, and everyone else. We must see Jesus. We must fix our gaze upon him.

I want you to know how hard I am contending for you and for those at Laodicea, and for all who have not met me personally. My goal is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. (Col. 2:2–3)

The way is together. Here’s the part that is not apparent to those of us who happen to be twenty-first-century Americans. When Paul identifies the mystery as “Christ in you,” what he really means is “Christ in y’all.” The you, as is the case so often in the New Testament, is plural. The New Testament rarely addresses me as an isolated, individuated, privatized person. To be sure, God addresses me personally, but my identity is not primarily as an individual. In fact, this is more a sign of my brokenness. I simply cannot know who I am outside of my relationship with God. And here’s the kicker: I can’t know God apart from other people. That’s where we want to push back.

Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. (Col. 3:5). 

What would it mean to walk that last mile, escorting my sins to the death chamber? How many times have you walked your sins to the death chamber only to walk them back to the cell again?

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. (Col. 3:12)

Compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience aren’t virtues to which we must aspire. No, they are our uniform. Think of them as the pads a football player wears in order to play the game. Mustn’t this be what Paul means when he says, “clothe yourselves”?

The dominoes keep on tipping. May they never stop.

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Colossians: New Clothes

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by Dallas Willard entitled, “Acknowledging God In All We Do.” Dallas Willard Dal­las was an ordained min­is­ter who spoke at church­es and Chris­t­ian orga­ni­za­tions world­wide. He was a found­ing mem­ber of Ren­o­varé. He wrote, among oth­ers, Ren­o­va­tion of the Heart, Hear­ing God, and Know­ing Christ Today. Dal­las is sur­vived by his wife Jane, son John, daugh­ter and son-in-law Becky and Bill Heat­ley, and grand­daugh­ter Laris­sa, who con­tin­ue his lega­cy and work. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Don’t put your con­fi­dence in your own under­stand­ing. In all your ways acknowl­edge him, and he will direct your path.” Proverbs 3:5 – 6

“What ever you do, whether in word or deed, do it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giv­ing thanks to God and the Father by Him.” Colos­sians 3:17

It is very impor­tant to under­stand that these vers­es rep­re­sent the gospel of the king­dom of God. They rep­re­sent the invi­ta­tion to take our whole life into the king­dom of God and learn how to live the life God has giv­en us in the pow­er of God. When I under­take all my activ­i­ties, I am not doing them on my own, I am doing them in con­fi­dence, vision, and expec­ta­tion in the spir­it and char­ac­ter of Christ. If I am writ­ing a paper or prepar­ing for a con­fer­ence or out­lin­ing a course, I don’t just do that look­ing to myself, I do that in expec­ta­tion that God will act with me.

The gospel of the king­dom of God which Jesus preached, ​“Repent for the king­dom of heav­en is at hand,” is pre­cise­ly the good news that, in every­thing I am and do, God invites me to invite him to be my co-work­er. He invites me to look to him, to act and move in tan­gi­ble ways no mat­ter what it is.

Go back to that verse in Proverbs, ​“In all your ways acknowl­edge him.” What does that mean? It means that we rec­og­nize he is God, and we acknowl­edge his author­i­ty in what we are doing. When I set up a course, or when I under­take to trans­late some­thing from Ger­man into Eng­lish, or what­ev­er I am doing, writ­ing a paper, com­pos­ing a book, I expect God to direct me. I expect there to be a move­ment in my life that is more than me.

Now that won’t hap­pen if I don’t acknowl­edge him. I have to acknowl­edge him; I have to rec­og­nize him. Take the verse in Colos­sians 3:17, ​“What­so­ev­er you do, whether in word or deed, do it in the name of …” What does that mean, ​“do it in the name of” — say the name as I do it? No. It means that I do it in behalf of him. I do it in place of him. So when I walk into a room to give a lec­ture, I say to myself, ​“How would Jesus do this?” And I do it on his behalf.

Dis­ci­ple­ship means learn­ing to acknowl­edge God in all we do — and it takes a lot of learn­ing. You actu­al­ly nev­er get done learn­ing because you are always learn­ing, and increas­ing­ly you are able to acknowl­edge him in all of your ways. You are able to do every­thing you do in word or deed on behalf of the Lord Jesus Christ.

As you do that, among oth­er things, your fear and anx­i­ety dis­ap­pear because you aren’t out there on the limb by your­self. You are actu­al­ly watch­ing God in action in your life. You stop sec­ond guess­ing your­self and lam­bast­ing your­self because you did­n’t do it right.

You have now heard the gospel that you are accept­ed by God where you are, that he put you there. You’re in your world to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth — and it is God who makes that pos­si­ble. You accept the fact that you are finite, that you make mis­takes, that you’re not per­fect. And in so doing you get on with the work that God has appoint­ed to flow through your life as you become the per­son he intend­ed you to be.

You see, God has very high aims for you and me. His aim is that each one of us becomes the kind of per­son he can empow­er to do what we want. I am going to say that again. You and I are being trained and cul­ti­vat­ed and grown to the point where God can empow­er us to do what we want. Now you rec­og­nize that a lot of work has to be done on our ​“wan­ter” before that can hap­pen. But that is what life is about. And that’s what we are learn­ing to do as dis­ci­ples of Jesus Christ.

Special Guest - Seth Van Tifflin

 
 

Every so often, we will have a guest speaker at CrossView Church. We are so grateful for the gifted women and men that serve the Lord through teaching the word. This week we hear from Seth Van Tifflin. Seth serves as the Executive Director of In Better Hands and is part of the Free Methodist World Missions team in Asia. Seth is an incredible leader and In Better Hands is doing important work in Asia. You can find out more information about Seth and In Better Hands in the links below.

Usually, when we have a guest speaker, we will not have a weekly devotion. We encourage you to watch the message again at some point throughout the week and listen to the discussion podcast.

Blessings on you and your week.

Pastor Kyle

Colossians: Fully Living

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by J.D. Walt entitled, “Are You Filled with the Fullness of God?” J.D. Walt is the Executive Director of Seedbed.com. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

Ephesians 3:20-21

20 Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

CONSIDER THIS

I can’t believe I left it out. Somehow I managed to write a devotional comment on Ephesians 3:19 and failed to mention the most earth shattering part of the verse. Here it is again—v.19b.

that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

It’s the point of the whole prayer—of being strengthened with power through his Spirit in our inner being so Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith—SO WE COULD BE ROOTED AND ESTABLISHED IN LOVE, so we could grasp, together with God’s people, how high and deep and long and wide is the love of Christ—SO WE COULD KNOW THIS LOVE THAT SURPASSES KNOWLEDGE, and all to the glorious end. . .

that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God

I’ve said it before. I will say it again. It’s either not true, or we aren’t getting it. Either Jesus got it wrong or we’ve missed the point. And we know Jesus got it right. So where does that leave us?

Today’s text draws out a very critical distinction. We see it between v.20a and v.20b. See if you can spot it.

20 Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, 

We don’t struggle so much with v.20a. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think[.] God can do anything. Nothing is impossible with God. Further, Paul notes, when it comes to God’s ability, our asking and thinking is way too small. Note the three words Paul strings together to make the point: far more abundantly. There is no limit to God’s ability.

The problem comes in v.20b. “according to the power at work within us[.] Here is where we miss the point. I said this a few verses back, but it bears repeating. If you were to listen to most of my prayers you might come to the conclusion that I believe God mostly works outside of, around and even in spite of people. I pray for God to   give us a great awakening. I ask God to help people in need, to heal the sick, to feed the hungry, to deliver the oppressed and so on. For all practical purposes I am asking God to work beyond or outside of human agency.

Today’s text challenges not only this way of praying but this overall way of understanding the relationship between God and people. God can do it all right, but he chooses to do his work according to the power at work within us[.] We pray so often for God to “show up” in our gatherings and in the midst of our impossible situations with little regard for the fact that God’s primary and preferred way of doing far more abundantly than all that we ask or think is according to the power at work within us[.]

When God comes to save the world he comes as a person in Jesus of Nazareth. When God sends the Holy Spirit, the Spirit visibly anoints, fills, marks and seals twelve people. The Spirit is not working in some kind of spiritually “at large” dimension in the air. The Spirit works directly, humanly yet supernaturally through men and women.

This text and so much of the rest of the New Testament has me asking a lot of questions about how we speak and sing of God’s presence and Jesus and the Holy Spirit. We sing of God filling places, spaces and rooms; even atmospheres and certainly we have biblical precedent for this—in the Old Testament tabernacle and temple. But people of God, where is the Temple now? Two words: within us. Where is Jesus now? Two words: within us. Where is the Holy Spirit now? Two words: within us. 

So why are we missing this? Is it that we are afraid of it somehow becoming about us and not about God? We are so prone to this either-or way of thinking. It is either God or us, as though there is only so much to go around and we could somehow “rob” God of his glory. Either God gets the glory or we do? What if this entire way of thinking is wrong? What if, in fact, all glory is God’s glory and what if there is no limit to God’s glory, and what if it is within God’s divine prerogative to share his glory with people? What if that is the whole point of the Church—to be a community of human beings who together carry, embody, demonstrate, and exude the glorious presence of God in the world.

Isn’t that the point of v.21?

to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Colossians: The Next Step - "You All"

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by David A. deSilva entitled, “Why Relating to Other Believers Is Essential Christian Practice” David A. deSilva (PhD) serves as Trustees’ Distinguished Professor of New Testament and Greek at Ashland Theological Seminary.

The images used by New Testament writers to speak of the church, both in its global totality and in any given local manifestation, are all collective images. They are images in which the individual member’s significance is found in his or her place as a vital part of the larger whole.

The image that most pervades the New Testament is the image of family. Indeed, to speak of this as an “image” is to speak too timidly about the assertions made throughout the early Christian Scriptures. Being family is the new reality for those who have attached themselves to Jesus. Jesus himself is remembered to have begun this process of redefining family. On one occasion, as he was teaching a large group in something like a house, his mother and his brothers were standing outside and seeking to get in a word with him. When someone told Jesus about them, he replied:

“Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” Pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” (Matt. 12:48b–50 NIV; see also Mark ­3:33–35; Luke 8:21)

While this word would no doubt have been difficult for his biological family to hear and process, it clearly articulated Jesus’ vision for the kind of community his followers would offer to one another. They were to share with one another the level of attention, commitment, and investment that was normally reserved for one’s blood relations. Jesus spoke this in an environment in which following him would typically provoke rejection by one’s blood relations. Those who suffered being ostracized and cut off from their natural families for Jesus’ sake would be able to find a new and larger family among Jesus’ followers. Because of the emotional, social, and often material support of this new family, the many alienated individual followers of Jesus would be able to persevere in their commitment to him and not succumb to the social pressures seeking to shame them into turning back from that commitment.

As Jesus assured Peter and all who followed him:

“There is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.” (Mark 10:29–30)

Finding in one’s fellow followers of Jesus a family that would take the place of the natural relatives that they left behind—or that dissociated themselves from the Christ-follower—remains critically important for believers in hostile environments around the world today. But it is also a critically important network of encouragement, support, and companionship if disciples in any environment are to attain the heights of the holiness and commitment to which Christ calls us all.

Early Christian preachers latched onto this facet of Jesus’ teaching and pushed it even further. Paul, for example, spoke of Jesus’ achievement on our behalf in terms of bringing about our adoption into God’s family.

In Christ Jesus you are all sons [and daughters] of God, through faith. (Gal. 3:26 ESV)

But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons [and daughters]. And because you are sons [and daughters], God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” (Gal. 4:4–6 ESV)

Jesus, Paul, and other New Testament voices call us to bestow upon one another the status of being our family as a necessary consequence of God’s bestowing upon me, upon you, upon him, and upon her, the status of being God’s sons and daughters together. The adoption of which Galatians 4:4–6 and other texts speak is an adoption into a new household, a new family, and not into a merely private relationship that I enjoy with God. And together with acknowledging one another as the family that God has brought together, the family that God has given to each one of us, we are called to show one another the care, commitment, and mutual responsibility that we owe one another as family. We might define family—somewhat tongue-in-cheek—as the people you can’t really get rid of, the people who remain with you in some sense even when you’re not together, not agreeing, perhaps not even speaking. This is even truer of the family that God has brought together, for he has done so for eternity. What would our relationships with other Christians look like if we gave these relationships the priority that such a faith claim makes on their behalf?

Far and away the most common term used to name or address another Christian in the early church is “brother” or “sister.” New Testament authors speak of the global Christian community as a “brotherhood and sisterhood” (1 Peter 2:17; 5:9) and on several occasions specifically lift up “brotherly and sisterly love” (in Greek, philadelphia) as the particular species of love that Christians are to show one another (Rom. 12:9–10; 1 Thess. 4:9–10; Heb. 13:1; 1 Peter 1:22; 3:8; 2 Peter 1:7). It is, of course, appropriate that the sibling relationship should emerge as the particular family relationship that we all share with one another, since we have all been adopted together by the same Parent into his family thanks to the mediation of the one “natural” Son in the divine household. Many facets of the ethos that the New Testament writers sought to nurture are related to this most basic identification of one another as “family” and, particularly, as “brothers and sisters.” The relationship shared by siblings was generally held to be the closest and most enduring of relationships in the first-century context. And we will see as the study continues to unfold, that a great deal of how we are urged to treat one another in the New Testament reflects the ideal behavior of brothers and sisters toward each other in Greek and Roman ethical writings. Sharing resources with one another, prioritizing unity and seeking to live harmoniously with one another, cooperating rather than competing with one another, forgiving one another—these were all ways in which natural siblings were urged to behave in their interactions with one another.

The Church as Building

A second image for the church found throughout the second half of the New Testament is that of a building. This is a metaphor that overtook the reality as churches came to refer to physical buildings in which Christians gathered rather than identifying the gathered Christians as (part of) the spiritual building that God was fitting together for God’s own dwelling. Such confusion was not yet possible in the first century or two of the Christian movement’s existence, before Christians began building separate structures dedicated to the common life and worship of the local community of believers. Rather, they understood that the gathering of Christ-followers was the “church,” as reflected, for example, in Paul’s statement: “When you come together as a church” (1 Cor. 11:18, emphasis added), never “in a church.” In such a context, the authors of 1 Peter and of Ephesians could liken the growth of the global community of Christ-followers to the construction of a new kind of temple for God’s dwelling:

Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 2:4–5)

In [Christ] the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God. (Eph. 2:21–22)

A stone, no matter how well shaped and polished, is not much of a temple. But as such stones are brought together—so these authors would suggest—a suitable house for God comes into being. Sacred space has always been important to human beings in their quest for the divine; these New Testament authors make the bold claim that such sacred space is not architectural, but social. It is the space occupied by those who have been made new in Christ and, as those who have received mercy, have been made a new people together (1 Peter 2:10). We know God’s presence and offer to God the worship and service that is God’s due more fully when we come together collectively as the temple in which God dwells and collectively as the “holy priesthood” that has been consecrated together as agents for divine service.

The Church as Body of Jesus Christ

A third image is that of a body, a single entity composed of many distinct parts, a single whole no part of which can be cut off from another except in the direst circumstances and never without deep sorrow, pain, and awareness of loss. The image, prominent in the letters of Paul, was developed first by Greek philosophers reflecting on the cosmos as a whole. These philosophers likened the universe to a single, complex organism. It was a body of which all living beings and other facets of material creation were parts, contributing their various functions to the overall working of the whole, and within which God was the animating soul. Paul seized on the image to describe the Christian community, both local and global, animated by the Holy Spirit as its unifying and life-giving force.

For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. (Rom. 12:4–5)

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. . . . If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. . . . The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.”. . . Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. (1 Cor. 12:12–14, 17–18, 21, 27)

The image allows Paul to drive home several points about Christians in community. The focus of God’s redemptive action is not on me living out my faith well, but on us living out our faith well in a coordinated fashion with one another. No one of us can accomplish all that needs to take place for Christian community to function properly and flourish. No one of us can achieve God’s vision for us on our own, because God’s vision is a vision for an us and not a me. Those who say that they can be Christian without “going to church” (that is, without “coming together as a church”) and those who believe that their faith is a “private matter between me and God” have either rejected or not grasped Paul’s gospel. Paul wanted Christ-followers to understand that each one of them was more akin to a hand or an eye or a liver—vital when embedded in and working as part of the whole, but something else entirely when disconnected from the whole. The image of a body made up of many parts drives home the fundamental interdependence that Christians share with one another and, by implication, the systemic dysfunction that results when we fail to fulfill our function on behalf of the whole body.

Brothers and sisters in one, great family. Stones fitted together into God’s own dwelling. The many parts of a well-functioning and flourishing body. These images provide us with points of entry into how we are to think about our connection with one another—namely, that this connection is central to our Christian identity. They also guide us as we think about our responses to and responsibilities for one another. God has joined us together for eternity and joined us together now for our own and one another’s eternal good.

God’s Spirit indeed lives in each one of us, but there is another, indispensable dimension of encountering God as a result of our having been brought together with and joined to one another. God has placed each of us in the context of the larger body—whether we conceive of this in terms of our local Christian assembly or in terms of the global body of Christ—so that we could receive the benefits of what other Christians contribute to our lives and our walk of faith and so that we might contribute beneficially to their lives and their walk of faith. If we are to know, experience, and realize God’s vision for us, we need to lay aside the value of independence and embrace the New Testament vision for interdependence, each one with each other in the body of Christ, the household of faith.

Colossians: Two Words That Change Everything - Week 2

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by Dan Wilt entitled, “A Brief History of The Holy Spirit in the Scriptures” Dan Wilt is a member of the Seedbed team. He has decades experience as a pastor, worship leader, teacher, and leader of creatives across the globe.

CONSIDER THIS

We’re coming to the conclusion of our journey through the Scriptures, exploring the Person and work of the Holy Spirit. Like looking at a photo album after a wonderful trip, let’s take a few moments to worshipfully view all the places we’ve been.

Today, awareness of the activity of the Holy Spirit is as vital to the Church as it has ever been. The Spirit invites us to an infilling, a deep drink, of the living water Jesus offers us.

Jesus said to his disciples, “Receive the Holy Spirit” in John 20:21-22. As we open ourselves to the Holy Spirit today, there will be parties of salvation and joy (Acts 2:1), a few things will get moved around (Acts 2:2), we’ll be filled with the fire of love for others (Acts 2:3), and we’ll be empowered with gifts for the mission of loving the world to life in Jesus’ name (Acts 2:4-8,11b).

We learn from the Old Testament (the Hebrew Bible), that the Holy Spirit is the Breath of God (ruakh) and the Original Artist (Gen. 1:1), bringing beauty from chaos (Gen. 1:2), animating human life (Gen. 2:7), and sustaining all things seen and unseen (Gen. 2:1). The Holy Spirit speaks to people (Gen. 15:12a), helps us obey (Gen. 22:1-2), rushes to a humble heart (1 Sam. 16:13a), and renews us in worship (Ps. 51:10-12). 

The Holy Spirit is with us everywhere (Ps. 139:7-10), leading us to the good life (Ps. 143:10), stirring praise in our spirit (Exo. 15:19-21), and welcoming us to awakening moments (Exo. 3:2-4). The Spirit gives us prophetic discernment (Gen. 41:38), works through our skills (Exo. 31:1-6), orchestrates such-a-time-as-this moments (Est. 4:12-14), and uses God-hearing leaders (Jud. 4:14). The Spirit gives us a heart of flesh (​Eze. 36:26-27), calls a kingdom of priests (Exo. 19:4-6a), pours out God’s presence (Joel 2:28-29;32a), and rests on the Messiah (Isa. 11:1-3). The Holy Spirit empowers the Good News that sets captives free (Isa. 61:1-2a), and gives us life (Job 33:4).

We learn from the New Testament that Jesus was with the wind (pneuma) of the Holy Spirit at creation (John 1:1-5), and the Spirit gives us the strength to obey (Luke 1:35)—working powerfully through a person aware of the Father’s love (Matt. 3:16-17). The Spirit makes us born again (John 3:5-8), is our Helper (John 14:16-17), reveals Jesus (John 15:26), and guides us into all truth (John 16:13). The Spirit glorifies Jesus (John 16:14-15) and reveals to us the depths of God (1 Cor. 2:9-12). The Spirit always builds up the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:12-14), empowers us with the Father’s love (Rom. 8:14-15), and teaches us what to say when we need to declare our faith (Luke 12:11-12). By the Spirit we learn how to walk on the path of life (Gal. 5:16-17), experience freedom (2 Cor. 3:17), gain the fruitful character of Christ (Gal. 5:22-25), quench our spiritual thirst (John 7:37-39), and come out of deserts with power (Luke 4:1-2;14-15). 

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Jesus’ Resurrection within us (Rom. 8:11), lavishly given by the Father (Luke 11:13), showing us the way of love (1 Cor. 13:1-6) and equipping us for ministry with profound spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 12:1-3). That Great Symphony of spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 12:7) is expressed through the Church, and gifts are distributed to all (1 Cor. 12:4-6), many and abundant (1 Cor. 12:7-11), for the building up of the local church (Rom. 12:4-8).

The Holy Spirit strengthens the Body through gifted leaders (Eph. 4:11-13), speaks to us through the Scriptures (2 Tim. 3:14-17), through impressions and intuitions (Acts 20:22-23), through gifts of wisdom (James 3:13,17; Col. 1:9-12), and through the Body of Christ (Acts 13:2-4; Rom. 12:5). The Spirit is a deposit and guarantee of resurrection and the New Creation to come (2 Cor. 5:5), helping us wait in hope (Gal. 5:5), giving us divine perspective (Ps. 73:16-17), and opening us to the Father’s love (Gal. 4:6). 

We are strengthened inwardly by the Spirit (Eph. 3:16-19), and invited to partner in the healing of the world (John 16:7). The sword of the Spirit is God’s Word (Eph. 6:17), and worship is to flow from us in Spirit and in truth (John 4:23-24). The Holy Spirit gives us righteousness, peace, and joy (Rom. 14:17), fills the temple of the Church (1 Cor. 3:16), and helps us in our weakness (Rom. 8:26-27). And the Holy Spirit does much, much more.

While experiences with the Holy Spirit can’t be manufactured, they can be nurtured. Breathe deeply of the Holy Spirit, and drink deeply of the living waters Jesus’ promised. The Church of Jesus Christ is given the gift of the Holy Spirit—for the sake of the world. 

Receive the Holy Spirit!

THE PRAYER

Jesus, I receive the Holy Spirit! My heart is full just reading about your work in history, and your work in us as your Church. Come, Holy Spirit, I receive you with my whole heart; fill me with your presence. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Colossians: Christ In All - Week 1

This week we want to share with you a devotion written by J.D. Walt entitled, “Did You Know You Are A Worship Leader?” J.D. Walt is the Executive Director of Seedbed.com. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

COLOSSIANS 1:15–18 | The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy.

Consider This

I am a worship leader. No, I don’t play guitar and lead songs, but I am a worship leader. You are too. It’s our highest calling and one that will never end. Our lives will be defined by our worship, and our worship will, for better or worse, lead the worship of others.

Some of you don’t know that I work for a seminary. Seedbed is a mission of Asbury Theological Seminary. Before I got involved with Seedbed, I served eleven years as the dean of the chapel on our Kentucky campus, which means I served as a pastor to hundreds of men and women preparing to serve the church.

A major part of the job involved designing and leading corporate worship for three different gatherings throughout the week—coming to about a thousand gatherings before we were done. Our main objective was to lift up as beautiful and big and bold a vision of Jesus as possible every single time. The inside joke was we approached Jesus in worship like we approached voting in Arkansas in the old days— early and often. How soon could we begin talking about Jesus? How quickly could we say his name? What stories could we tell about him? Every time he gets lifted up, he draws people to him.

Here we are, only fifteen verses in, and Paul is casting an utterly stratospheric vision of the Son of God. He does this in all his letters: Jesus early and Jesus often. Check out the first few lines of it again:

The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (vv. 15–17)

We must see Jesus. We were made to behold him. His life, not in general but in a thousand specific ways, must become our vision. His preexistence, preeminence, conception, birth, life, words, deeds, miracles, relationships, signs, sermons, parables, prayers, suffering, passion, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, return, and eternal reign must become our holy obsession. This is the message Paul offers the Colossians and the Colombians, the Americans and the Africans, and everyone else. We must see Jesus. We must fix our gaze upon him.

Why is this so important? Because we become like what or whom we behold. We will behold someone or some- thing. That we will worship is a given. Whom or what we will worship is up for grabs. Because we are made in the image of God, and because Jesus is the image of God, and because we will not find our true selves until we find ourselves in him, we must see Jesus.

As his life becomes the source and substance of our lives, we become the people God imagined when he first imagined us. As we become those particular people, our lives (and, particularly, our relationships) lead his worship and others see the vision. Like it or not, we are worship leaders, you and me. Where are we leading those we seek to lead?

The Prayer

Abba Father, we thank you for your Son, Jesus, who leads us all in triumphal procession. He is the image of the invisible God; the firstborn over all creation; the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world; the Alpha and Omega; the One who holds all things together, in whom we live and move and have our being. Open the eyes of our hearts to see him in all his lowliness and in all his exaltedness. We must see Jesus. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

The Questions

  • How does today’s daily text both challenge and encourage you?

  • How will you “turn your eyes upon Jesus,” as the 1920s hymn encourages us to do? How will Jesus more and more become your vision?

  • What does a daily habit and practice of beholding Jesus look like for you? How can that grow? You will only grow as this grows.

Easter Sunday 2022

This week we want to share a devotion written by Dan Wilt entitled, “The Spirit of Resurrection Lives In You.” Dan Wilt is a member of the Seedbed farm team. He has decades experience as a pastor, worship leader, teacher, and leader of creatives across the globe. We hope this devotion encourages you today.

CONSIDER THIS

I would like to officially announce the launch of a new form of communication for followers of Jesus, called “Resurrection-Speak.” Resurrection-Speak is a form of communication in which our words, actions, and calendars reveal to everyone around us that we are a people who are raised with Christ (Rom. 6:4; Col. 3:1), and who plan to live forever.

Resurrection-Speak is the kind of talk that comes out of a person who is living, as Irenaeus of Lyons put it, “fully alive” in the presence of the Father.

We are raised with Christ now, we are filled with the Spirit now, we are motivated by a new and living hope now. Our baptism imaged it in a way that is more than a symbol. Symbols are simply pictures of ideas. Baptism is a sacred action; it is an action that, as Evelyn Underhill put it, actually does something. Like the exchange of a wedding ring or a welcome embrace, when you and I were baptized, it didsomething in us—it performed a work within us—it marked that we were no longer dead in sin; we were raised with Christ.

Resurrection-Speak is full of faith, full of hope, and full of love (1 Cor. 13:13). It sounds shockingly assured of things we hope for, confident of things that are unseen by the naked eye (Heb. 11:1). Resurrection-Speak comes from a heart that is so aligned with the New Creation ahead that it injects its promises into the now without even thinking. 

The prayers for others that emerge from someone who practices Resurrection-Speak have a ring of spiritual authority, and reveal a more-than-a-conqueror faith (Rom. 8:37) behind it. Those prayers don’t sound like waffling attempts at poetry, well-intentioned to comfort but based more on the sincere compassion of the pray-er than on the steadfast promises of God (2 Cor. 1:20).

If the “Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead” lives in you (Rom. 8:11), then the Spirit gets to do the talking, the acting, and the planning. Would the Father communicate continual worry, despair, anxiety, or fear in the face of challenging situations? Would the Father communicate the sorry story that hope is elusive, God’s intervention is sporadic, or sin is an option? Would the Father plan a calendar that doesn’t include seasons of prayer, caring for the poor, or gathering to worship with the saints?

Along with you, my mortal body needs some Spirit-ual life right now. Don’t wait for eternity to be-up, show-up, or to sing-up the faith that has been strengthening believers to be like Jesus for millennia. 

Holy Spirit, teach us the art of Resurrection-Speak—until our lives match up with your promises.

THE PRAYER

Jesus, I receive the Holy Spirit. You have said that I will live forever, in your loving presence. Come, Holy Spirit, help me live my life in light of the eternity that is ahead. In Jesus’ name, amen.

THE QUESTION

How do your words, actions, and calendar reveal where your hope lies? Is there anything you could change in any one of those categories that resonates more fully with the reality that you are a new creation, a raised-from-the-dead disciple of Jesus?

Palm Sunday 2022

This week we want to share a devotion written by Ben Witherinton entitled, “When Love Comes to Town: Jesus’ Triumphal Entry” Dr. Ben Witherington is faculty member teaching at Asbury Theological Seminary. We hope this devotion encourages you today.

CONSIDER THIS

Matthew’s account of the triumphal entry does indeed show the disciples and crowds apparently honoring Jesus as he rides in on a donkey. By riding a donkey rather than a mature horse, he avoids the image of a returning war hero. But Jesus is not that sort of king. It seems likely that Jesus got his disciples to requisition the animal he rode from one of his local disciples in Bethany, namely, from the family of Lazarus, for the account says that all the disciples had to say was, “the master has need of it.” The account mentions palm branches, and the waving of the palm branches was used to celebrate the Maccabean victory retaking Jerusalem.

It must be admitted that probably Jesus’ riding in on the donkey, coupled with the pilgrims saying “Hosanna,” then coupled with the palm branches raised all sorts of expectations about Jesus being some sort of new messianic or prophetic leader that might solve Jerusalem’s problems, or even triumph over the Romans. But again, Jesus was not that sort of king and was not setting out to set up that sort of kingdom in Jerusalem. Notice, even with all the fanfare, that the end of the segment has the resident of Jerusalem asking who in the world is this exalted person, to which the crowd only answers, “Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth.” They do not necessarily suggest he is the Messiah.

It is, however, possible that in the case of someone like Judas, if he had previously been a political zealot, that this entry signaled to him that Jesus would perhaps take over things in Jerusalem, and the cleansing of the temple (Matthew 21:12–13) might well have been interpreted as a symbolic gesture suggesting Jesus would clean house. But then when Jesus reiterates he came to die, not to start a coup, this must have crushed the hopes of anyone with zealot inclinations about kicking out the Romans. Perhaps that is why Judas does what he does at the end of the week.

Matthew is interested here, and in what follows in the Passion narrative, in emphasizing that what happened during this week was a fulfillment of one prophecy after another. Part of the reason for this is not just that Jesus did some unusual and unexpected things, but especially that no one was expecting a crucified Messiah, not even Jesus’ disciples, despite what he kept telling them. Citing scriptures repeatedly is Matthew’s way of saying this was God’s plan all along, however much it did not meet the expectations of the crowds, the authorities, and even the disciples. Jesus did not come to meet their expectations or demands, but rather to do God’s will, and God’s will was that his Son fulfill the prophecies and ransom captive Israel. He also came to meet our needs.

Questions for Reflection

  1. How do the symbols of Jesus’ entry provide clues to his mission and identity?

  2. What is ironic about the expectations of the crowds and disciples? How does Jesus ultimately fulfill these expectations?

Shaped By Jesus - Courage

Today’s devotional is an excerpt from Celebration of Discipline written by Richard Foster. Richard Foster is founder, past president and current team member of Renovaré. Having studied at George Fox and Fuller Theological Seminary, Foster has served as a pastor and taught worldwide on spiritual formation. We hope this devotion encourages your faith.

The touchstone for the biblical understanding of submission is Jesus’ astonishing statement, ​“If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Mark 8: 34). Almost instinctively we draw back from these words. We are much more comfortable with words like ​“self-fulfillment” and ​“self-actualization” than we are with the thought of ​“self-denial.” (In reality, Jesus’ teaching on self-denial is the only thing that will bring genuine self-fulfillment and self-actualization.) Self-denial conjures up in our minds all sorts of images of groveling and self-hatred. We imagine that it most certainly means the rejection of our individuality and will probably lead to various forms of self-mortification. 

On the contrary, Jesus calls us to self-denial without self-hatred. Self-denial is simply a way of coming to understand that we do not have to have our own way. Our happiness is not dependent upon getting what we want. 

Self-denial does not mean the loss of our identity as some suppose. Without our identity we could not even be subject to each other. Did Jesus lose his identity when he set his face toward Golgotha? Did Peter lose his identity when he responded to Jesus’ cross-bearing command, ​“Follow me” (John 21: 19)? Did Paul lose his identity when he committed himself to the One who had said, ​“I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name” (Acts 9: 16)? Of course not. We know that the opposite was true. They found their identity in the act of self-denial. 

Self-denial is not the same thing as self-contempt. Self-contempt claims that we have no worth, and even if we do have worth, we should reject it. Self-denial declares that we are of infinite worth and shows us how to realize it. Self-contempt denies the goodness of the creation; self-denial affirms that it is indeed good. Jesus made the ability to love ourselves the prerequisite for our reaching out to others (Matt. 22:39). Self-love and self-denial are not in conflict. More than once Jesus made it quite clear that self-denial is the only sure way to love ourselves. ​“He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matt. 10:39).

Again, we must underscore that self-denial means the freedom to give way to others. It means to hold others’ interests above our interests. In this way self-denial releases us from self-pity. When we live outside of self-denial, we demand that things go our way. When they do not, we revert to self-pity — “ Poor me!” Outwardly we may submit but we do so in a spirit of martyrdom. This spirit of self-pity, of martyrdom, is a sure sign that the Discipline of submission has gone to seed. This is why self-denial is the foundation for submission; it saves us from self-indulgence.