Here's something that is fascinating to me as a human being. It's something that most people don't even notice because it's so ingrained in culture. People have an unmistakable need to worship something. Everyone I've ever met worships something. This is not like the times of old where people carve statues and such and bow down to them and pray to them. No, we're much more civilized. (*cough cough*)
In this country most people worship celebrities, money, or political figures (which I still consider celebrities, but lets stay on track here.) If you don't believe me, stop and think about it for a minute. How many people are obsessed with various famous people? They follow their tweets, their latest life situations in the 40 billion (perhaps an underestimate) magazines or tv shows entirely dedicated to celebrity gossip. For those who (like me) tend to avoid the whole celebrity thing, there are other big traps that are very easy to fall into. For instance: money and/or power. I group them together because they act very similar. When you don't have them you tend to want them, when you have a little bit, you get addicted and want more, and when you have a lot, it tends to completely destroy you. This isn't ALWAYS the case, but let's be honest. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely and Jesus says "its more difficult for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven."
Now, I'm not saying that liking a celebrity is wrong, or that having money or power is wrong. What I am saying is that the worship of these things is wrong. When something of this nature (or anything else that isn't God) is your primary focus, even if you just "need to make more to make sure my family is taken care of..." then we are idolaters.
The ONLY way, to get beyond this and find true satisfaction in this life is to worship God, The Creator. The Maker of heaven and earth. The one who designed you and allowed you to breathe that last breath you just took.
He's the one that designed us to have this need to worship, and He WANTS us to worship with everything in us. The thing is, He wants us (and rightly so) to worship HIM. That's what He made us for. He made us to glorify His name.
What's even cooler about this, is that when we glorify Him, we are most satisfied. Nothing else in this world compares to knowing God. Nothing. We are made to worship God, and because of that, there is NO greater joy or happiness than when you do.
I'm no theologian, but I have managed to figure this much out. If you want the opinion of a theologian, go read a couple posts down to learn what John Piper has to say on the issue of gaining satisfaction. It may just open your eyes to something you've never seen before.
As always, feedback is appreciated.
- Nathan
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
RIP
Okay, so this is a heavy topic. A few weeks ago one of my friends from middle and high school committed suicide. You see, recently, he had been getting into things that weren't good. I'll spare you details out of respect for the family, but he posted on facebook what he was doing, and I saw it and I felt a pull as though I should reach out to him... but I didn't. I made excuses in my head such as "I'm really busy," and "It's been so long since we've hung out anyways, it'd just be awkward, what would I say?" ..... It's so easy to make excuses isn't it? Well I made one excuse too many, and now he's dead.
Everyone is quick to tell me that it's not my fault, and I couldn't have known and blah blah blah... and to an extent, they're right, I didn't directly make the decision to take a life. On the other hand, they are dead wrong. I had EVERY opportunity to reach out and at least make an attempt at reconnecting with him and try to pull him up a little bit. But, I didn't.
What my hope is in bringing this to light is this: That you *NOT* brush this under the table, that you not throw me a pity party, that you not ignore this. Just think of someone that you know, that you care about, that you can reach out to. I know how easy it is to make excuses, but just think for a minute. Now imagine you get a phone call in a few minutes saying that they found that person dead.
Morbid? Well, maybe, but just keep tracking with me here for a minute. Seriously think about this. (Side note: Ecclesiastes states that it is better to go to a house of mourning than a house of feasting. Why is this? It reminds you how short of a vapor our lives are on this earth.) What if you got that phone call? How many chances can you look back on that you passed up that could've made a difference in their life? Let this disturb you.
Let it sink in.
Think about it, they're now dead, and YOU had the power to do something, but you didn't.
Why?
Because it may have been slightly socially awkward?
Was their death worth avoiding a tiny bit of potential awkwardness?
Thankfully, (hopefully,) their death hasn't actually happened yet. You STILL have the opportunity to make a difference. Please, if you have any heart at all, let this speak to you. Stop reading this post and pray for that person. It will still be here when you get back.
Now, make intentional steps to reach out to them. If you're really serious about it, post what you're going to do as an "I will..." statement in the comments, I'll follow up with you and hold you accountable.
Now go, and do something about this. Go and reach out to your friends and acquaintances who are lost or drifting around, who need to be reached out to.
Everyone is quick to tell me that it's not my fault, and I couldn't have known and blah blah blah... and to an extent, they're right, I didn't directly make the decision to take a life. On the other hand, they are dead wrong. I had EVERY opportunity to reach out and at least make an attempt at reconnecting with him and try to pull him up a little bit. But, I didn't.
What my hope is in bringing this to light is this: That you *NOT* brush this under the table, that you not throw me a pity party, that you not ignore this. Just think of someone that you know, that you care about, that you can reach out to. I know how easy it is to make excuses, but just think for a minute. Now imagine you get a phone call in a few minutes saying that they found that person dead.
Morbid? Well, maybe, but just keep tracking with me here for a minute. Seriously think about this. (Side note: Ecclesiastes states that it is better to go to a house of mourning than a house of feasting. Why is this? It reminds you how short of a vapor our lives are on this earth.) What if you got that phone call? How many chances can you look back on that you passed up that could've made a difference in their life? Let this disturb you.
Let it sink in.
Think about it, they're now dead, and YOU had the power to do something, but you didn't.
Why?
Because it may have been slightly socially awkward?
Was their death worth avoiding a tiny bit of potential awkwardness?
Thankfully, (hopefully,) their death hasn't actually happened yet. You STILL have the opportunity to make a difference. Please, if you have any heart at all, let this speak to you. Stop reading this post and pray for that person. It will still be here when you get back.
Now, make intentional steps to reach out to them. If you're really serious about it, post what you're going to do as an "I will..." statement in the comments, I'll follow up with you and hold you accountable.
Now go, and do something about this. Go and reach out to your friends and acquaintances who are lost or drifting around, who need to be reached out to.
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Happiness or Christianity? or... Happiness in Christianity?
When I was in college I had a vague, pervasive notion that
if I did something good because it would make me happy,
I would ruin its goodness.
I figured that the goodness of my moral action was
lessened to the degree I was motivated by a desire for my
own pleasure. At the time, buying ice cream in the student
center just for pleasure didn't bother me, because the
moral consequences of that action seemed so
insignificant. But to be motivated by a desire for happiness
or pleasure when I volunteered for Christian service or
went to church-that seemed selfish, utilitarian, and
mercenary.
This was a problem for me because I couldn't formulate an
alternative motive that worked. I found in me an
overwhelming longing to be happy, a tremendously
powerful impulse to seek pleasure, yet at every point of
moral decision I said to myself that this impulse should
have no influence.
One of the most frustrating areas was that of worship and
praise. My vague notion that the higher the activity, the
less there must be of self-interest in it, caused me to think
of worship almost solely in terms of duty. And that cuts the
heart out of it.
Then I was converted to Christian Hedonism. In a matter
of weeks I came to see that it is unbiblical and arrogant to
try to worship God for any other reason than the pleasure
to be had in him. Let me describe the series of insights
that made me into a Christian Hedonist. Along the way I
hope it will become clear what I mean by this strange
phrase.
1. During my first quarter in seminary I was introduced to
the argument for Christian Hedonism and one of its great
exponents, Blaise Pascal. He wrote,
All men seek happiness. This is without
exception. Whatever different means they
employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of
some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is
the same desire in both, attended with different
views. The will never takes the least step but to
this object. This is the motive of every action of
every man, even of those who hang
themselves.1
This statement so fit with my own deep longings and all
that I had ever seen in others that I accepted it and have
never found any reason to doubt it. What struck me
especially here was that Pascal was not making any moral
judgment about this fact. As far as he was concerned,
seeking one's own happiness is not a sin; it is a simple
given in human nature. It is a law of the human heart as
gravity is a law of nature.
This thought made great sense to me and opened the way
for the second discovery.
2. I had grown to love the work of C. S. Lewis in college.
But not until later did I buy the sermon called "The Weight
of Glory." The first page of that sermon is one of the most
influential pages of literature I have ever read. It goes like
this:
If you asked twenty good men today what they
thought the highest of the virtues, nineteen of
them would reply, Unselfishness. But if you
asked almost any of the great Christians of old
he would have replied, Love. You see what has
happened? A negative term has been
substituted for a positive, and this is of more
than philological importance. The negative
ideal of Unselfishness carries with it the
suggestion not primarily of securing good
things for others, but of going without them
ourselves, as if our abstinence and not their
happiness was the important point. I do not
think this is the Christian virtue of Love. The
New Testament has lots to say about self-
denial, but not about self-denial as an end in
itself. We are told to deny ourselves and to
take up our crosses in order that we may follow
Christ; and nearly every description of what we
shall ultimately find if we do so contains an
appeal to desire.
If there lurks in most modern minds the notion
that to desire our own good and earnestly to
hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I
submit that this notion has crept in from Kant
and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian
faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing
promises of reward and the staggering nature
of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it
would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not
too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted
creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and
ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an
ignorant child who wants to go on making mud
pies in a slum because he cannot imagine
what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the
sea. We are far too easily pleased.2
There it was in black and white, and to my mind it was
totally compelling: It is not a bad thing to desire our own
good. In fact the great problem of human beings is that
they are far too easily pleased. They don't seek pleasure
with nearly the resolve and passion that they should. And
so they settle for mud pies of appetite instead of infinite
delight.
I had never in my whole life heard any Christian, let alone
a Christian of Lewis's stature, say that all of us not only
seek (as Pascal said) but also ought to seek our own
happiness. Our mistake lies not in the intensity of our
desire for happiness, but in the weakness of it
*This is an excerpt from Desiring God by John Piper
I have personally gone through a struggle very similar to this growing up. ‘Waste not, want not’ was the attitude I was (unintentionally) raised with to have when it came to life in general. I was under the impression that those people that went out and had lots of fun all the time were Godless. This thought process pushed me away from the Lord altogether. For quite a while, I wanted nothing to do with a being up in the sky that just wants me to be bored and not enjoy life. While I still do not want anything to do with a being like that, I eventually experienced God in a different way. All of a sudden I understood that there was immense joy to be found in Him and that through Him was the only way to pure, untainted happiness. I still often struggle with being far too easily pleased, but more and more I am focusing on the true joy found only in the Lord God.
I wonder how many of you have gone through similar thought patterns, or if anyone is currently struggling with this type of thinking? Maybe you disagree to an extent, whatever your thoughts, I would love to hear them.
-Nathan
if I did something good because it would make me happy,
I would ruin its goodness.
I figured that the goodness of my moral action was
lessened to the degree I was motivated by a desire for my
own pleasure. At the time, buying ice cream in the student
center just for pleasure didn't bother me, because the
moral consequences of that action seemed so
insignificant. But to be motivated by a desire for happiness
or pleasure when I volunteered for Christian service or
went to church-that seemed selfish, utilitarian, and
mercenary.
This was a problem for me because I couldn't formulate an
alternative motive that worked. I found in me an
overwhelming longing to be happy, a tremendously
powerful impulse to seek pleasure, yet at every point of
moral decision I said to myself that this impulse should
have no influence.
One of the most frustrating areas was that of worship and
praise. My vague notion that the higher the activity, the
less there must be of self-interest in it, caused me to think
of worship almost solely in terms of duty. And that cuts the
heart out of it.
Then I was converted to Christian Hedonism. In a matter
of weeks I came to see that it is unbiblical and arrogant to
try to worship God for any other reason than the pleasure
to be had in him. Let me describe the series of insights
that made me into a Christian Hedonist. Along the way I
hope it will become clear what I mean by this strange
phrase.
1. During my first quarter in seminary I was introduced to
the argument for Christian Hedonism and one of its great
exponents, Blaise Pascal. He wrote,
All men seek happiness. This is without
exception. Whatever different means they
employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of
some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is
the same desire in both, attended with different
views. The will never takes the least step but to
this object. This is the motive of every action of
every man, even of those who hang
themselves.1
This statement so fit with my own deep longings and all
that I had ever seen in others that I accepted it and have
never found any reason to doubt it. What struck me
especially here was that Pascal was not making any moral
judgment about this fact. As far as he was concerned,
seeking one's own happiness is not a sin; it is a simple
given in human nature. It is a law of the human heart as
gravity is a law of nature.
This thought made great sense to me and opened the way
for the second discovery.
2. I had grown to love the work of C. S. Lewis in college.
But not until later did I buy the sermon called "The Weight
of Glory." The first page of that sermon is one of the most
influential pages of literature I have ever read. It goes like
this:
If you asked twenty good men today what they
thought the highest of the virtues, nineteen of
them would reply, Unselfishness. But if you
asked almost any of the great Christians of old
he would have replied, Love. You see what has
happened? A negative term has been
substituted for a positive, and this is of more
than philological importance. The negative
ideal of Unselfishness carries with it the
suggestion not primarily of securing good
things for others, but of going without them
ourselves, as if our abstinence and not their
happiness was the important point. I do not
think this is the Christian virtue of Love. The
New Testament has lots to say about self-
denial, but not about self-denial as an end in
itself. We are told to deny ourselves and to
take up our crosses in order that we may follow
Christ; and nearly every description of what we
shall ultimately find if we do so contains an
appeal to desire.
If there lurks in most modern minds the notion
that to desire our own good and earnestly to
hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I
submit that this notion has crept in from Kant
and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian
faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing
promises of reward and the staggering nature
of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it
would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not
too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted
creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and
ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an
ignorant child who wants to go on making mud
pies in a slum because he cannot imagine
what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the
sea. We are far too easily pleased.2
There it was in black and white, and to my mind it was
totally compelling: It is not a bad thing to desire our own
good. In fact the great problem of human beings is that
they are far too easily pleased. They don't seek pleasure
with nearly the resolve and passion that they should. And
so they settle for mud pies of appetite instead of infinite
delight.
I had never in my whole life heard any Christian, let alone
a Christian of Lewis's stature, say that all of us not only
seek (as Pascal said) but also ought to seek our own
happiness. Our mistake lies not in the intensity of our
desire for happiness, but in the weakness of it
*This is an excerpt from Desiring God by John Piper
I have personally gone through a struggle very similar to this growing up. ‘Waste not, want not’ was the attitude I was (unintentionally) raised with to have when it came to life in general. I was under the impression that those people that went out and had lots of fun all the time were Godless. This thought process pushed me away from the Lord altogether. For quite a while, I wanted nothing to do with a being up in the sky that just wants me to be bored and not enjoy life. While I still do not want anything to do with a being like that, I eventually experienced God in a different way. All of a sudden I understood that there was immense joy to be found in Him and that through Him was the only way to pure, untainted happiness. I still often struggle with being far too easily pleased, but more and more I am focusing on the true joy found only in the Lord God.
I wonder how many of you have gone through similar thought patterns, or if anyone is currently struggling with this type of thinking? Maybe you disagree to an extent, whatever your thoughts, I would love to hear them.
-Nathan
Monday, July 18, 2011
The Love of God
This is a repost from a couple of months ago on my facebook page. What a great reminder.
So I've heard it said many times that sacrifice is "giving up something you love, for something you love even more." With that in mind, let me quote you about half a page from Francis Chan's book Crazy Love.
'When I look at my relationship with God as a chore, a sacrifice, then *I* am getting the glory-- not God. I keep saying, "Look what I have sacrificed for God..." or "Listen to what I do for God. Its hard, exhausting really...."
Instead, when we sacrifice, give, and even suffer, we can rejoice because we know that God rewards us. We are always the recipients of His great and manifold gifts. Not the givers. Never the givers. David Livingston, a missionary to Africa during the 1800's once said during a speech to students at Cambridge University, "People talk of the sacrifice I have made in spending so much of my life in Africa.... I never made a sacrifice. We ought not to talk of 'sacrifice' when we remember the great sacrifice which He made who left His Father's throne on high to give Himself for us." '
Then it hit me. Think about it. If sacrifice is giving up something you love for something or someone you love even more, then Christ, THE Jesus Christ, the one who made the universe, the one who allowed you to breathe that last breath you just took, the one who made molecules and atoms and quarks and oxygen and nitrogen and sunsets and music and trees and EVERYTHING else in the universe, THAT Jesus, loves us more than he loved equality with God. He sacrificed that, gave Himself up, came to this earth as a baby to live a perfect life and die the most brutal excruciating death you can imagine because He loves you, and me.
Wow. I mean, really..... WOW. I know it's mostly basic stuff that most of us have heard all our lives, but have you ever taken that perspective, that GOD loves YOU more than He loves being God, and was willing to sacrifice that as part of His pursuit of you.
I'm constantly amazed and blown away by His love for us... and the more I learn about it and the more I understand it, the more excited and amazed I get about it. What better feeling is there than that of being loved? And who could possibly be better at loving than the God who IS love?
So I've heard it said many times that sacrifice is "giving up something you love, for something you love even more." With that in mind, let me quote you about half a page from Francis Chan's book Crazy Love.
'When I look at my relationship with God as a chore, a sacrifice, then *I* am getting the glory-- not God. I keep saying, "Look what I have sacrificed for God..." or "Listen to what I do for God. Its hard, exhausting really...."
Instead, when we sacrifice, give, and even suffer, we can rejoice because we know that God rewards us. We are always the recipients of His great and manifold gifts. Not the givers. Never the givers. David Livingston, a missionary to Africa during the 1800's once said during a speech to students at Cambridge University, "People talk of the sacrifice I have made in spending so much of my life in Africa.... I never made a sacrifice. We ought not to talk of 'sacrifice' when we remember the great sacrifice which He made who left His Father's throne on high to give Himself for us." '
Then it hit me. Think about it. If sacrifice is giving up something you love for something or someone you love even more, then Christ, THE Jesus Christ, the one who made the universe, the one who allowed you to breathe that last breath you just took, the one who made molecules and atoms and quarks and oxygen and nitrogen and sunsets and music and trees and EVERYTHING else in the universe, THAT Jesus, loves us more than he loved equality with God. He sacrificed that, gave Himself up, came to this earth as a baby to live a perfect life and die the most brutal excruciating death you can imagine because He loves you, and me.
Wow. I mean, really..... WOW. I know it's mostly basic stuff that most of us have heard all our lives, but have you ever taken that perspective, that GOD loves YOU more than He loves being God, and was willing to sacrifice that as part of His pursuit of you.
I'm constantly amazed and blown away by His love for us... and the more I learn about it and the more I understand it, the more excited and amazed I get about it. What better feeling is there than that of being loved? And who could possibly be better at loving than the God who IS love?
Friday, July 15, 2011
Restoration song
You bring restoration
You bring restoration
You bring restoration
to my soul
You've taken my pain
You call me by a new name,
You've taken my shame
And in its place You give me joy
You take my mourning
turn it into dancing,
You take my weeping
turn it into laughing,
You take my mourning
turn it into dancing,
You take my sadness
turn into joy
You give me joy
You give me joy
You give me joy
In my soul
Halleleujah!
Halleleujah!
You make all things new
All things new
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
LeCrae
With every breath I take, every heart beat,
Sunrise and the moon lights in the dark street,
every glance, every dance, every note of a song,
All a gift undeserved that I shouldn't have known,
Every moment I lie, every moment I covet,
I'm deserving to die, I'm earnin Your judgment
I, without the cross, there's only condemnation
If Jesus wasn't executed there's no celebration
So in times of the good, in times of the bad,
For any time I've had it all, I will be glad
I will boast in the cross, I'll boast in his name
I will boast in the sunshine, boast in his fame
Whats my life if it's not praising You?
And every dollar in my bank account is vain pursuit
I do not count my life as any value, or precious at all,
Let me finish my race, let me answer Your call!
Sunrise and the moon lights in the dark street,
every glance, every dance, every note of a song,
All a gift undeserved that I shouldn't have known,
Every moment I lie, every moment I covet,
I'm deserving to die, I'm earnin Your judgment
I, without the cross, there's only condemnation
If Jesus wasn't executed there's no celebration
So in times of the good, in times of the bad,
For any time I've had it all, I will be glad
I will boast in the cross, I'll boast in his name
I will boast in the sunshine, boast in his fame
Whats my life if it's not praising You?
And every dollar in my bank account is vain pursuit
I do not count my life as any value, or precious at all,
Let me finish my race, let me answer Your call!
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Exerpt from "The Irresistible Revolution" by Shane Claiborne
Shouting the gospel with our lives:
Remembering the invitation that Mother Teresa always gave to curious seekers, we have from the beginning invited people to "come and see." And people have, hundreds. As and evangelical, the only way I know to invite people into Christian faith is to come and see. After all, I'm not just trying to get them to sign a doctrinal statement, but to come to know love, grace, and peace in the incarnation of Jesus, and now in the incarnation of the body, Christ's church. So if someone asked me to introduce them to Jesus, I would say, "come and see. Let me show you Jesus with skin on." Sometimes we have evangelicals (usually from the suburbs) who pretentiously ask how we "evangelize people." I usually tell them that we bring folks like them here to learn the kingdom of God from the poor, and then send them out to tell the rich and powerful there is another way of life being born in the margins. For Jesus did not seek out the rich and powerful in order to trickle down his kingdom. Rather, he joined those at the bottom, the outcasts and undesirables, and everyone was attracted to his love for people on the margins. (We know that we all are poor and lonely anyway, don't we?) Then he invited everyone into a journey of downward mobility to become the least. As the old Franciscan slogan goes, "Preach the gospel always. And when necessary, use words." Or as our seventy-year-old revolutionary Catholic nun, Sister Margaret, puts it, "we are trying to shout the gospel with our lives." Many spiritual seekers have not been able to hear the words of Christians because the lives of Christians have been making so much horrible noise. It can be hard to hear the gentle whisper of the Spirit amid the noise of Christendom.
Remembering the invitation that Mother Teresa always gave to curious seekers, we have from the beginning invited people to "come and see." And people have, hundreds. As and evangelical, the only way I know to invite people into Christian faith is to come and see. After all, I'm not just trying to get them to sign a doctrinal statement, but to come to know love, grace, and peace in the incarnation of Jesus, and now in the incarnation of the body, Christ's church. So if someone asked me to introduce them to Jesus, I would say, "come and see. Let me show you Jesus with skin on." Sometimes we have evangelicals (usually from the suburbs) who pretentiously ask how we "evangelize people." I usually tell them that we bring folks like them here to learn the kingdom of God from the poor, and then send them out to tell the rich and powerful there is another way of life being born in the margins. For Jesus did not seek out the rich and powerful in order to trickle down his kingdom. Rather, he joined those at the bottom, the outcasts and undesirables, and everyone was attracted to his love for people on the margins. (We know that we all are poor and lonely anyway, don't we?) Then he invited everyone into a journey of downward mobility to become the least. As the old Franciscan slogan goes, "Preach the gospel always. And when necessary, use words." Or as our seventy-year-old revolutionary Catholic nun, Sister Margaret, puts it, "we are trying to shout the gospel with our lives." Many spiritual seekers have not been able to hear the words of Christians because the lives of Christians have been making so much horrible noise. It can be hard to hear the gentle whisper of the Spirit amid the noise of Christendom.
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