Currently Reading Respectable Sins: Confronting the Sins We Tolerate By Jerry Bridges see related

How Far we travel on that path . . .

When I talked about the Romans 1 passage last time, I mentioned the fact that Jerry Bridges discussed that very passage in his book, Respectable Sins.  I’d like to share some of that here:

In Romans 1:18-32, Paul gives a vivid description of the downward moral spiral of pagan humanity of that day, as God gave them up more and more to the wicked inclinations of their evil hearts.  Near the beginning of that description, Paul writes, “Although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened” (verse 21, emphasis added [by Bridges]).

So their ever-increasing wickedness actually began with their ungodliness (failure to honor God as God) and their unthankfulness to Him.  Their actual moral degradation was a result of God’s judgment on them as He progressively gave them up to greater and greater perverse forms of immorality and other evil expressions.  We can easily discern from this section of Scripture that unthankfulness is a serious matter.  It may seem like a small sin to us, but God takes it seriously.

Failure to honor God or give thanks to Him is obviously characteristic of present-day culture.  And so is the increasing decadence of our age.  In fact, the description of moral depravity (see Romans 1:24-32) could be applied to our age with hardly a change of words.  One wonders if again it is God’s judgment for failure to honor Him and give Him thanks.  Surely, as believers we do not want to contribute to the occasion of God’s judgment.  But we do contribute if, along with society at large, we fail to give Him the thanks due Him.  In fact, we may be more guilty because as believers we should know better.  Jesus said, “Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required” (Luke 12:48).  Because we believe that the Bible is the Word of God, we are more responsible to obey it.  And part of our obedience is giving thanks to God always and for everything.

There is no question that the increasing moral decadence around us is appalling and scary.  We often wonder how bad it will get.  But the next time we judge those people we need to ask ourselves if we have in some way contributed to their downward spiral into moral corruption through our own failure, along with theirs, to honor God and give Him thanks.  (Respectable Sins, pp. 82-83.)

I don’t like to quote such a lengthy bit from a book, usually, but I thought all of that was worth examining.  I had never considered the possibility that my own ingratitude contributed to the decadence of society at large, but I think he is right.  It does.

This provoked some more thought about this passage that I use to think was about “those” people.  I can see myself following along its spiral – from the failure to honor God, to ingratitude to God, to futile thinking and a darkened, depressed heart, into idolatry, which is loving anything or anyone more than I love God.

Have you ever learned that someone you knew and respected had gotten involved in adultery or some other sexual promiscuity?  I know I have.  I’ve been shocked.  “How could s/he do that?!?” I have wondered.  Now, I think I understand.  I always thought before it was about making provision for the flesh, allowing themselves to be put in compromising positions with another person and then giving into temptation.  I thought it was about lust.  I don’t mean to suggest that those things are not involved, and I don’t doubt that to the person who has fallen into that kind of sin, it would seem to have been all about all of that.

But the truth is that what got them to that point of compromise was putting one step in front of the other.  It started with a “trivial” neglect of spiritual things as they went about life, and became a lack of gratitude.  That ingratitude led to futile thinking.  Futile thinking is such a clever way Satan has of helping us avoid growth.  It involves believing that you’re stuck with the problems in your life because they are all somebody else’s fault, which makes you oblivious to all the things you need to change in yourself, personally.

It all comes naturally, leading to depression, idol worship, and then, one foot in front of the other, they found themselves . . . “degrading their bodies with one another” (Romans 1:24).

Now, instead of looking at those falling into these sins with a lot of condemnation, thinking, “How could s/he do that?” I instead marvel at the grace of God.  How is it that more of us don’t fall into such sin?  How is it that God caught my attention while I was being ungrateful, thinking futile thoughts and redirected me?  I am so grateful He did and aware, in a way I was not before that, “There but for the grace of God go I.”

And I am sad when I hear about people possibly falling into such sins.  Not angry, as I might have been in the past.  Not self-righteously condemning.  Just sad.  They didn’t jump out of that spiral of sin until it was too late.  I am grateful for God’s grace toward me, and hope they find it, too.  In seeing God’s provision with a heart of gratitude, they can escape the dizzying spiral they have been on for a while.

I hope I am making some sense here.  It all made so much sense to me, but does it to my reader?  I don’t suppose there are many left, but I hope any that are left can understand what I tried to convey!

Currently Reading Respectable Sins: Confronting the Sins We Tolerate By Jerry Bridges see related

The Danger of Ingratitude

I started reading this book about a week ago.  Our church sent out a newsletter talking about using it for Sunday School.  It described the book, and I thought, Oh, I’ve got to read that book!  Then, the Lord opened my eyes to the ingratitude toward God in my own heart.  I knew it was there, but I was struggling with setting it aside and finding that attitude of thankfulness.  My life was the pits, you know.  Everything was going wrong, and it was all somebody else’s fault.  I was the innocent victim of bad circumstances.  What was there to be thankful for? 

Then I found out that though I missed Sunday School, they talked about the chapter on unthankfulness.  Okay, Lord.  I’ll buy the book.  I know You want me to.   

What prompted the realization of my own ingratitude was remembering something a friend told me years ago.  A mutual friend of ours had fallen into homosexual sin.  I emailed this friend because for some reason, I thought she would be a good one to talk to.  Perhaps she’d have some idea of what I could say or how I could respond to friend number one.  I believe the Lord put that thought in my head, because the insight she offered helped me understand this sin in a way I never had before. 

I was shocked when she confessed that several years before I met her, in Bible college no less (where I met her, not where her past happened), she had been involved in a lesbian relationship.  She had been discipled by some Christians after she became a believer, and they directed her to Romans 1.  “Homosexuality,” she explained to me, “is the culmination of a spiral of sins that begins with ingratitude toward God.”

I remember thinking about that years later.  When she had explained that to me, suddenly, that sin didn’t seem so strange and foreign.  I’ve been ungrateful to God before.  Who hasn’t?  I suppose we’ve all started the trip down that spiral, and it is only God’s grace that keeps us from reaching the end.  But what follows that?  How far down that spiral had I traveled?

Let’s look at Romans 1:21-32:

For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator — who is forever praised. Amen.

Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.  

Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them. (NIV)

 It was the recognition that my thoughts were futile that so recently opened my eyes to what my present problem was.  I was fuming about my horrible lot in life, and how I was a victim, and how even character flaws of my own were because other people made me that way.  In the middle of these thoughts, I realized that my character flaws were the responsibility of no one but myself, and I was thinking futile thoughts.  Years ago, when I looked at the passage above to see how far I had traveled down that spiral, I recognized that I had had futile thoughts.  I looked it up a couple of weeks ago and saw that I had arrived at the next step.  My foolish heart was darkened.  I felt like a helpless victim, you know.

The problem was not anyone else I wanted to blame.  The problem was my own ingratitude to God.

There’s more to this story.  To my surprise, Jerry Bridges addresses this very passage in the chapter on unthankfulness.  So many things make more sense to me now, including why people fall into sins you would never expect them to.   

I’m getting ahead of myself.  I’ll delve into it more deeply next time.

God Uses Weak, Foolish People

It has been a while since I blogged here.  My priorities have changed, I guess, and this blog is presently a back-burner item.  Maybe someday, I’ll come back to it as a more regular thing.  For now, I decided to come back and post a little something, mostly because I enjoyed using it as a spiritual journal, of sorts, and I learned something I want to continue pondering for a while at least. If I record it, I can come back to it later.

The first thoughts relate to the message in church on Sunday.  I hope I can remember it well enough.  I’ve lost track of the outline from the bulletin, so all I can offer are some memories of what I gleaned.  First let’s look at the relevant portion of Scripture, which is found in Luke 22:31-34:

"Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers." 

But he replied, "Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death."

Jesus answered, "I tell you, Peter, before the rooster crows today, you will deny three times that you know me."   (NIV)

Our pastor told us that the first you, as in “Satan has asked to sift you as wheat,” was plural.  In other words, Satan didn’t single Peter out; he wanted to challenge all the disciples.  Jesus prayer, on the other hand, and his reference to it here are singular.  I’m sure Jesus prayed for the others, but he is telling Peter of his prayer specifically for Peter.  Of course, Jesus knew what Peter would do.  He knew Peter’s failure was coming, even while he prayed.

Peter’s reply was one of pride.  The pastor cautioned us about believing ourselves to be strong against sin.  Peter was not relying on the Lord to strengthen him in the face of temptation to turn his back on Jesus.  He was counting on his own courage and willpower.  It was Peter’s pride that led to his failure a few short hours later.

So, the pastor encouraged us, if we feel inadequate in our struggle against sin, that is actually a good thing.  It is evidence of humility.  If we think we won’t be tempted in a particular area, we may well be preparing to fail!

Peter’s failure actually helped him as a leader in the church after the death and resurrection.  It showed that God can use flawed people to accomplish his Work among people here on earth.  If God could use a man like Peter, who committed a horrible sin like denying Christ at the time of his trial and crucifixion, then He can use the rest of us, however flawed and imperfect we are.

Last night, I was reading in Acts 4:8-13, and that point about these flawed, ordinary people came to light again:

Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them: "Rulers and elders of the people! If we are being called to account today for an act of kindness shown to a cripple and are asked how he was healed, then know this, you and all the people of Israel: It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed. He is

"'the stone you builders rejected,

which has become the capstone.  

Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved."

When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.   (NIV)

What threatened the wicked church leaders soon after Jesus’ death and resurrection?  Was it Peter’s spiritual magnitude?  Was it his great poise and sophistication?  Was it his giftedness in the area of public speaking?

No.  They recognized that these were “unschooled, ordinary men.”  Instead of being impressed by Peter and John after they healed a crippled man and spoke with courage about what they believed, they were scratching their heads.  “What is it about these guys that pulls and persuades people?  They’re nothing special!  They’re just plain old boring, ordinary fishermen, for crying out loud!”

This was so very encouraging to me.  When I look at what I am and what I should be, I’m not impressed.  I don’t see myself strongly resisting temptation.   I see myself giving in and failing to measure up time and time again.  I’m nothing special.  How could God ever use me?

He used Peter.  He uses the weak and foolish people to do His work.  Here is a related passage, of great comfort to boring, ordinary me, from 1 Corinthians 1:20-31:

Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.

Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things — and the things that are not — to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God — that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.   Therefore, as it is written: "Let him who boasts boast in the Lord."   (NIV)

Runaway Pork Chops -- My Sweet, Funny Little Girl

They say that the first thing you are supposed to do when you cook is verify that you have all necessary ingredients.   

You would think, by now, I would know I need to do that; I’ve run into that kind of trouble before.  But why do you really need to verify when you remember, personally, going to the store and buying the required ingredients?  I knew that the key ingredients, for my dish, were boneless pork chops, apples, and a stuffing mix package.  Each item, I knew I had made certain to buy when I went to the store.  I distinctly remembered putting them in the cart.  Checking would have been a waste of my time, wouldn’t it?

The first thing I did was prepare the stuffing mix.  I boiled the water and butter, added the mix, turned off the heat, covered it and moved on.  When I was ready to add it to the skillet at the end, it would be waiting for me. 

Next, I cut up, cored, and peeled four apples.  I’m not really fast at cutting vegetables, but it didn’t take too awful long.  No need to worry about them turning brown, since I would add them to the skillet to cook along with the pork chops.  Apples don’t start turning color as quickly as something like potatoes do, anyway.

Next, I got out the skillet and started some butter melting.  It was time to brown the pork chops before adding the other things that cooked along with them.

I opened the refrigerator to get out the pork chops.   

I guess you know, by now, what happened.  I turned the refrigerator upside down.  I must have opened that door and checked inside it for the missing pork chops ten times in the next half hour.  Then I checked the freezer.  I called J in, whose job it is to put away the refrigerated items when we get home from the store.  He so often finds things I can’t see.  He came up empty.  As a matter of fact, he never remembered seeing them, either.  I went out the freezer in the garage.  Sorry.  They weren’t there, either. 

I know I bought them.  I actually pulled out the receipt and checked it, twice.  At first I didn’t see it, but then I did find them listed.  Pork chops.  We paid for them!  They had to be here!  So I looked, all over again. 

I finally concluded that somewhere between the check-out counter and the kitchen, the Pork chops were mislaid. 

All that time I had spent preparing dinner.  G was still at work in our only car.  It was too late to start cooking something else.  G wasn’t going to be able to stop at the store tonight, either.  The skillet was dirty with nothing but butter.  The apples sat waiting to be added to ingredients that weren’t going to show up, as did the stuffing.

I froze the stuffing and apples for another time.  Thawing them won’t be convenient, but that’s better than letting them go to waste.

Does this sort of thing happen to anybody other than me?

* * *    * * *   * * *

This afternoon, K and I had some fun together, just the two of us.  The bigger kids were playing outside in the snow.  I changed her diaper and we danced together to one of her CDs, played together on the bed, looking at ourselves in the mirror.  Then I got up to leave the room.  “No, don’t go, mom!”  K begged.  She had enjoyed our one on one time. 

“Mommy’s hungee,” I said, repeating the way she talks.  (Most two consonant syllables are shortened to just one the way she talks.  For example, play, pray, spray, and pay all sound like pay when she says them.  But that is another topic.  Maybe I’ll document them here another day.)  “You ate earlier, but I haven’t yet, and I’m hungee.”  Seeing that she was still disappointed, I promised her I would fix my food and bring it back in to spend some more time with her.

When I returned, she said to me, “Hungee sounds funny when you say it.”  I guess you had to be there.  I thought that was really funny.  I was just talking the way I learned to talk from her! 

As I have discussed here before, I nurse my toddlers.  (Several times recently she has told me, “I wike your milk, mommy!”)  At the end of our time together in the bedroom, I nursed K.  While I did so, I told her, “You’re my little nursling.” 

She patted me back.  “You’re my big nursing,” she agreed. 

Kids can be so funny without ever meaning to be!

Currently Reading Calm My Anxious Heart: A Women's Guide to Finding Contentment By Linda Dillow see related

His Love Endures Forever

I have been really struggling with something the last few days.  I was dealing with something very difficult.  The details are not important, but I felt very hurt.  I was crying, praying about it.  “I don’t understand why you permitted this, Lord?  Why do I have to face this struggle?  If I didn’t I wouldn’t have to . . .”  Then it dawned on me.  God had permitted this to force me to grow, to do the hard thing. 

Sometimes, the struggles we deal with are overcome in a moment.  We make the decision to do what is right, and there is no turning back.  We are convinced that we have done right, glad to have made the choice to do right, and are now ready to move on to other things.  Other times, the decision to do right is a daily, hourly, moment by moment thing.  Just because I made the choice yesterday, or even an hour ago, doesn’t mean I’m inclined to do it this minute.  I think many, many such struggles are this variety.  An addict overcoming his addiction.  My precious little boy choosing not to read after bedtime.  Choosing to forgive someone who has wronged you.  Choosing not to give in to a temptation that you’ve fallen prey to so many times before.

This was one of those things.  As I have mentioned before, I’ve been reading in this book about worry.  Linda Dillow was talking about 1 Peter 5:6-7.  I’ll offer its text here:

Humble yourselves, therefore, under God's mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. (NIV)

She said that the word for “cast” means literally, to hurl, or to throw (Calm my Anxious Heart, pg. 124).  Because my struggle involves some worry, I did that, threw the problem to the Lord for Him to handle, humbled myself to trust in His sovereignty.  Then I read some more from my Bible, which happened today to be Psalm 136.

This Psalm is one that has been hard for me to understand in the past.  It has a repeated refrain, in every single verse, sometimes after no more than a phrase, “His love endures forever.”  I found the interruption to the train of thought distracting.  It made it hard to appreciate either God’s Love or the point of the phrases and sentences interspersed throughout.  It came across to me, before tonight, like nothing more than a constant interruption.

Tonight, I finally got it.  It was a recitation, a review of Israel’s history.  Here is how it begins, in verses 1-5:

Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good.
      His love endures forever. 
Give thanks to the God of gods.
      His love endures forever. 
Give thanks to the Lord of lords:
      His love endures forever. 
to Him who alone does great wonders,
      His love endures forever. 
Who by His understanding made the heavens,
      His love endures forever.  (NIV)

I guess it actually begins with a declaration of God’s supremacy and goodness, then spends a little time on the early history of the world, then transitions to Israel’s history.  With each aspect of history, it repeats the refrain, “His love endures forever.”  The point is this:  Everything that happens to God’s people is evidence of God’s enduring love.

Remember my question of why God had permitted this struggle?  Yes, even in this, “His love endures forever.”  What a great encouragement that was.  I hope it is encouraging to you.