Answering the Door

Image by Aunt Owwee via Flickr

I have been thinking a lot about the phrase “God with us” lately.  His presence seems to be an ever present and reoccurring theme for me as of late. I have come across the verse from Revelation 3: 20 a number of times recently so I been meditating on its meaning.

Here i am! I stand at the door and knock.  If anyone hears my voice and opens the door I will com in  and eat with him and he with me. (NIV)

Richard Foster comments on this passage in this way,

“The wonderful verse ‘I stand at the door and knock…’ was originally penned for believers and not unbelievers. We who have turned our lives over to Christ need to know how very much he longs to eat with us, to commune with us.He desires a perpetual Eucharist feast in the inner sanctuary of the heart.” (Celebration of Discipline)

I can’t help but think that so many of us are lost in life or feel disconnected from God because we have simply ignored the knocking. Could it be that  our lives have become so full of busyness, technology, running from place to place, that we have simply not noticed that Jesus has been knocking on the door waiting for us to take the time to invite Him in and commune with Him.

Pursuing God…

I just started to read Tozer’s The Pursuit of God and after having finished the chapter, I have found a friend in Tozer.  He writes:

All social intercourse between human beings is a response of personality to personality, grading upward from the most casual brush between man and man to the fullest and most intimate communion of which the human souls is capable.  Religion, so far as it is genuine is in essence the response of created personalities to the Creating Personality, God.” (page 13)

Tozer goes on to quote John 17:3 “This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.”

I wonder how our lives might be impacted if our religion was less about appeasing God and more about knowing God.  John seems to sum it up pretty clearly…life eternal is found in knowing God.  All the other stuff that goes into our religion is secondary to,  if not even further down the priority list , than knowing God.  Do you know him?

Reflection on The True Story of The Whole World…

Craig Bartholomew and Michael Goheen assert some meaningful themes in their book.  Their focus on story, specifically the story of the whole of history, and our place within that story has far reaching implications for our lives. I also found the thread woven throughout the text regarding our potential as created beings to be a refreshing reminder that a cynical view of humanity (which I am often guilty of) isn’t what God has in mind.  The overall thrust of the book is in sync with the creation, fall, redemption, consummation worldview.  While the wording is certainly a little different, the authors seem to affirm that this is indeed the proper perspective to have about the story of creation.

There wasn’t a great deal of new information for me in this text, however, I did find that the telling of the story of from the beginning to the inevitable “Return of the King” to be a great refresher on the overarching narrative told to us in the Bible.  The Old Testament portions within the text were a great summation of God’s faithfulness to Israel and the world.  I was also appreciative of the questions that followed the close of each chapter. They were challenging to think about and useful in meditation as I thought about my own place in the Creation narrative .  I was personally challenged to think harder about my place in the story and about what I am doing to help others discover their place in the story.  More specifically, I was reminded of God’s patience and longsuffering in Act 3 as the authors spoke about the prophetic role Israel’s prophets. What an Awesome and patient God we serve. Also on a more personal note, I found the discussion about story and narrative to be reminiscent of some of Stanley Hauerwas’ essays regarding narrative as a connecting point to our church communities.  It is very cool to see seemingly separate life experience tie together to teach something about God.

I think the most influential aspect of this book on my future role as campus ministry will be the running theme of potential in the creation.  This theme is a clear call to see the potential in each and every student regardless of background, ethnicity, class, religion, etc.  Because we are all created in God’s image, we are special and valuable to Him.  It is for that very reason that each student (and truthfully every person) has value and potential.  The truth of this idea then, points to the fact that each student is worthy of our relational investment in their lives.  Furthermore, I think one of the primary roles of campus ministry is to help each student develop their God given potential to be who He has created each student to be.  In that process, we help contribute to each student finding their place in God’s story of His creation.

I could also see using this book with college students as a tool for a basic survey of the Bible, especially for those with limited or no Biblical knowledge.  It is a great introduction to some of the major players in scripture and more importantly it points to what God is up to in the individual lives of each person as well as God at work in all of human history.  It is far from exhaustive, but it is a great place to begin to actively engage students to live life with a Biblical worldview and to get excited about the coming consummation and the return of our king.  I could definitely see offering this book out as a tool to the students on WVU’s campus in the hope that they will begin to or continue on their path of discovery to find their place in God’s narrative.

Breaking through to Community…

Confession is not only good for the soul, it is also good for the community.  Bonhoeffer explains the value of confession to the community in Life Together.

In Confession, the break through to community takes place.  Sin demands to have a man by himself.  It withdraws him from the community.  The more isolated a person is, the more destructive will be the power of sin over him, and the more deeply he becomes involved in it, the more disastrous his isolation.  Sin wants to remain unknown.

To be in community is to be known to some degree and our sin rages against this.  Our sin isolates us from those we would be in community because it want us to create walls and build barriers to keep who we really our secret and in so doing keeps us from every having to change our behavior.  The Gospel demands something entirely from us.  It seeks confession and full disclosure.  It shuns the idea of hiding, preferring  instead vulnerability and authenticity.  The Gospel provides us with a choice: to continue to live in sin and therefore isolation or to choose full disclosure and community.  Our natural inclination is to fear confession and vulnerability.  Its frightening to imagine placing our trust in another, but in order to build a stronger life together, we must find the courage to confess to the Father in and through Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit.  We must also find the courage to confess to one another so that we remove ourselves from isolation and into relationship and accountability.  No easy task for any of us, but nothing Jesus asks of us is ever easy…its just right.

Not the Way It's Supposed to Be…

A quick survey of the world around us would show us that things are a bit…broken.  Cornelius Plantinga Jr. wrote a book called Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be: A Breviary of Sin. In the opening chapter of the book he references the movie Grand Canyon to make a profound point about the world around us:

In the film Grand Canyon, an immigration attorney breaks out of a traffic jam and attempts to bypass it.  His route takes him along streets that seem progressively darker and more deserted,  The the predictable Bonfire of the Vanities nightmare: his expensive car stalls on one of those alarming streets whose teenage guardians favor expensive guns and sneakers.  The attorney does manage to phone for a tow truck, but before it arrives, five young street toughs surround  his disabled car and threaten him with considerable bodily harm.  Then, just in time, the tow truck shows up  and its driver – an earnest genial man – begins to hook up the disabled car.  The toughs protest: the truck driver is interrupting their meal.  So the truck driver  takes the leader of the group aside and attempts a five – sentence introduction to metaphysics: “Man”, he says, “the world ain’t supposed to work like this.  Maybe you don’t know that, but this ain’t the way its supposed to be.  I am supposed to be able to do my job without askin’ you if I can.  And that dude is supposed to be able to wait with his car without you rippin’ him off.  Everthing’s supposed to be different than what it is here.”

How many of us have wondered down progressively dark streets in our own lives only to realize we are alone in the dark and in real trouble because we were looking for an easier way out?  How many of us have said the same words or at least thought those same words spoken by the tow truck driver.  The world we live in is more than just a little broken.  Plantinga goes on to discuss in his book the affect of sin on humanity, the world, and all of creation for that matter.  If you are looking for a good book on the power and influence of sin, then check out his book. I highly recommend it.  Plantinga will challenge you to think about sin as more than just a wrong action.  He will challenge you to think about sin as  condition of the soul. I would also recommend checking out the movie Grand Canyon as well.  Both are strong investigations into the human condition.