More Golf Cart Thoughts . . .

In my last post (Food for Thought . . . ) I used the example of a child driving a golf cart ten feet when told not to as a way to illustrate to ourselves our own heart toward God. I'm not going to repeat it here, but I'll assume you've read it (or you can read it by clicking on its link above).

I had another thought about it that was helpful to me. In that thought I could picture the same kid who disobeyed. But this time, instead of just being told not to drive the cart, he is told something like, "Don't drive the cart because it is out of oil and the engine will burn up (if it was a gas engine)." Or, "Don't move the cart because I discovered a sink hole under the dirt in front of it."

In any of these type of examples, what if the child, who would have otherwise driven the cart when told not to, now says, "Oh! OK," and doesn't drive the cart because they now understand the reason why not to (and, implicit in this, they agree with the reason why not to)? This further reinforces the pride and arrogance and rebellion of the child, even though they obeyed! Why? Because they obeyed because THEY understood and agreed. If they hadn't, they wouldn't have.

In the golf cart example I gave in the previous post it was clear to me that a reaction of, "Wow! He punished you like that for only driving it ten feet! That's harsh!" was a reaction that puts the person being given instruction in the place of "god" and judge. The true heart that understands authority would say, "Wow! I can't believe you drove the cart when he told you not to!"

In this example of obedience because of agreement there is nothing different. If we say, "Good boy. He didn't drive the cart," we are again focusing on the action and not the heart because he would have if he didn't agree with the reasons! He is still rebellious and proud and arrogant!

Again taking this back to us and God, it is a fair question to ask, "Do I obey when I understand why God is telling/asking something, but I don't if it doesn't make sense to me?" This is something we actually often cultivate when we say things like, "God says not to XX, and it makes sense because if we do there is a risk of YY or ZZ." This isn't to say that it is bad to explain how wise God is as a witness to His greatness, but it is dangerous if understanding is made a portion of obedience.

God is holy. He is set apart. He is the Creator. Far be it from the Creation to have the arrogance and pride and foolishness and rebelliousness to demand more before we obey than to simply know God said it.

Food for Thought . . .

In my last post (Just a Bunch of Sticks?) I shared some thoughts I'd had about an Old Testament account of a man being killed for collecting wood on the Sabbath. I shared how my first reaction had been to assess the severity of the crime in terms of the action of the man, and not the heart. I first thought of it as a severe punishment for simply collecting sticks, until I believe God showed me that the true sin wasn't picking up sticks, it was the rebellion against God that was at the heart of the man who would pick up sticks when God expressly told them in the Ten Commandments not to work on the Sabbath, on the day He'd set apart as holy.

Last night at Men's Group we were talking about this and how casual we can become with God and our understanding of His holiness, and I felt like God gave me an example that spoke to all of our hearts there, and helped a lot. I wanted to share it in case it helps you as well:

Some people we know have a golf cart that grandchildren and visiting kids are taught safety points about and how to drive. They are then given a driving test for it, and if they pass they are approved to drive around the property. It is pretty slow and safe, but the people take it seriously and the kids are taught to as well. The example that I felt God gave me was of the man telling a child not to drive the golf cart. The child goes out and drives it ten feet. The man then punishes the child in some hypothetical way—say takes his license for a month and maybe something else.

In this situation someone might easily say, "He did all that to you for driving the cart ten feet?!" The proper answer is, "No, he did all that because I disobeyed." That is the heart of it. Five feet. Ten feet. A mile. The distance doesn't matter. What matters is that he was told not to do something and he did it anyway. It is revealing of a much deeper sin than driving ten feet. It is revealing of a heart of pride and rebellion and self-focus.

We can learn a lot about ourselves by putting ourselves in the position of someone the child comes and complains to. Would we feel like, "That is harsh! I can't believe he did that to you for driving it ten feet!"? Or, would we feel like, "I can't believe you went out and drove it when he told you not to!"?

Once we answer which one of those responses would be ours we then can ask ourselves if we are consistent in that application. When God says something, do we weigh the action (putting ourselves in the place of god and judge), or do we say, "My God said it and that is enough for me."

The question is not if the action seems big or small to us. The true measure of our heart is whether the fact that God said it is big or small to us. That reveals it all.

Collecting wood. Eating fruit. Driving a cart ten slow feet. Murdering someone. Adultery. In our minds, when we look at them, we can easily rate them as small or big. But rebelling against God? That should always be huge to us, and if it isn't I think it should be a warning sign. And that is truly what is at the core of it all.

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Another Morsel: Tonight we wanted to surprise our girls and borrow a DVD from someone that they'd been wanting to watch, but after some emails and phone calls it didn't work out and we didn't tell them. I wonder how many times in our life it seems to us like God isn't moving, but in reality He is doing all sorts of things on our behalf. Can we trust His love and heart for us when we can't see His hand at work?

Just a Bunch of Sticks?

In my reading through the Bible this morning I came to Numbers 15:32–36 which says:

While the people of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the Sabbath day. And those who found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation. They put him in custody, because it had not been made clear what should be done to him. And the Lord said to Moses, "The man shall be put to death; all the congregation shall stone him with stones outside the camp." And all the congregation brought him outside the camp and stoned him to death with stones, as the Lord commanded Moses. ESV

I read something like this and there is this reaction in me that says, "Wow! He was just picking up sticks! It wasn't even something bad!" And . . . that reaction tells me more about my view of God than I like to admit.

As much as I can teach about God's holiness, and how He breathes out stars, and how amazing and worthy of our awe and worship He is, etc., a reaction like that reveals to me how much of that knowledge of God is in my head and hasn't captivated my heart.

Why not, instead, would I have had the reaction, "Oh, man! This man has such a wicked heart to rebel against God! To do things His way and not God's!" A failure to react that way gives me insight into the heart of why I can, at times, be so casual with the "little" sins. I am seeing it as an issue of degrees and about the action, and not about the rebellion—not about the incredible pride and arrogance of thinking I can do what I want when God—the holy Creator of all—has said something different about it. In reality, I think I can judge what is truly OK and what isn't. I may not say that is my reality, but my actions reveal it is.

It is similar to Adam and Eve—"so you're telling me that they and all mankind to follow got a death sentence and cut off from God for eating fruit!?" No. That isn't the reason. It is for the pride and rebellion of the heart that thinks it can do things its own way and that it is OK to do so. It is for the heart that thinks it, better then God, can define what is OK and what isn't. It is about a trust—a faith!—that is greater in myself then it is in Him.

We must never forget, God loves our faith and without it Hebrews tells us it is impossible to please Him. When the Israelites came to the promised land it was GOD that told them to send in the spies! He didn't sucker them into the land and then have them realize what they were surrounded by so they had no choice to rely on Him. He had them spy it out and see exactly what they were up against so then they could choose—sight (what they saw in front of them), or faith in God who had promised them both the land and His presence. They didn't trust Him and He says of them (in different places throughout the Bible) that they were in unbelief, not following Him, disobedient, stiff-necked, hardened hearts, not mindful of the works He had performed among them, faithless. And, though they would have been the first to say they believed in God's existence, HE said of them that they didn't believe in Him.

God is looking for so much more than simply our acknowledgement that He exists (even the demons believe, and tremble the Bible says). He is looking for us to believe in Him in the way that commits our life to Him, to trust in Him, to follow Him.

Eve's sin is similar. Before she ever saw the tree as good for food, pleasing to the eye, or desirable to make one wise she first had doubt about God and His love and His Word and His trustworthiness. Then, after entertaining those doubts about God, she came to the place where she believed she could better take care of her needs, pleasure, and wisdom apart from God and His ways then doing it God's way. She walked out of trust of God, and trusted more in herself. She walked out of faith in God.

When we assess sin by the action ("he was just picking up sticks!), instead of realize it is a heart of rebellion and disobedience to God, we can tend to water down what sin really is and lose the reverence of the the holiness of God. I am reminded of when David was bringing the ark back to Jerusalem. It is found in 2 Sam 6:5–7

And David and all the house of Israel were making merry before the Lord, with songs and lyres and harps and tambourines and castanets and cymbals. And when they came to the threshing floor of Nacon, Uzzah put out his hand to the ark of God and took hold of it, for the oxen stumbled. And the anger of the Lord was kindled against Uzzah, and God struck him down there because of his error, and he died there beside the ark of God. ESV

Did Uzzah die because he steadied himself or the ark when the oxen stumbled. Is that really worthy of a death sentence? No. Uzzah died because, first and foremost, David decided to do something his way and blew off a holy God's commands about how the ark would be handled (even "religious" things can be sin). Then Uzzah died because a holy God said the ark would not be touched and he touched it. As long as we say he died simply for touching the ark we have missed the point. He died for the rebellion and haughtiness that said, "Even though God said one thing I can do it my way" (sorry Frank Sinatra).


It is an important lesson for us to learn (and relearn, and relearn . . .). Whenever we assess sin by the action instead of seeing it as rebellion we have lost our grip on God's holiness and who He is. We do things "our way" because we are looking left and right, instead of up. Left and right we can always find some reason, or someone else's life, that will justify us. Looking up into His holiness, and across the gap to the blood-stained cross, will remind us of what sin really is. It is not an action, it is a heart.

May I never lose sight of the fact that my sin, my "casual choices," are rebellion against God no matter how insignificant they seem. May I fear my heart, and may I embrace faith—a complete trusting of my life to Him and His ways because I have complete trust of Him and His Word and His love and His faithfulness.

sINsight

I am about half way through the non-fiction book The Big Story by Justin Buzzard. So far I am blessed by it and its reminder that, despite the sometimes overwhelming immediacy of stuff in our life, we are part of a story far bigger than us, that begins with God, and gives us meaning and purpose and hope and context for our life and the world around us. I have found that it is so easy to get lost in the daily grind that we forget the majesty and calling and breathtaking scope of the big picture we are a part of, and the incredible direction and perspective it gives us when facing the situations in front of us.

As I often do when beginning a non-fiction Christian book I try and learn more about the author and what they believe, etc., and in so doing I found a couple of blog posts by Justin that have also blessed me. The one about pastors I posted a link to yesterday, and there was also one called Sin, Not Sins that I found helping me with a subtle, but very powerful perspective shift. I'll summarize it here, along with some other thoughts on sin that have been helping me a lot. Some are from Justin's blog or book, others are thoughts I've had and things I've seen in God's Word that his book has helped me see more clearly.

In his blog post Justin points out how we often can think of our sins in that way, as sins—plural. Doing so can diminish the issue and encourage us to be "self-sufficient" (my words) in battling them. For example, if I see my problem as ______ and _______ and _______ (fill in your sins, or issues) then the temptation is to look to self effort, self improvement, and more willpower to solve them. "If I try harder at this" or "If I do that" or ??? Rather, he says, think of our problem not as sins (plural) but as Sin (singular) and suddenly we see that while the manifestation of Sin may take many forms, the real problem is Sin itself. I can "beat" this issue or that by trying hard enough, but Sin will still rise its ugly head in some other area or temptation or struggle.

When I realize my problem is not sins (individual issues) but Sin, then I realize the true depth and scope of this problem I face, and am immediately brought to the realization that God alone can help me. Helping others realize this as well will help them understand every man's need for God. I found this shift in seeing things he wrote about in his blog post match well with something he mentioned in the book, and that basically Adam and Eve's bite was a small bite, but it was about big rebellion. I thought, "How many times we fall into that trap and self justify ourselves by saying this or that sin is small, or not as bad as others, etc. when the real issue is not that sin choice, but the rebellion that made us make it." Suddenly, when we face it that way, we can't hide behind weighing our sins on some scale, but we are struck square in the face with realizing that rebellion is the root of our problems and it is huge for us all. Again, a tiny shift in thought can explode a new revelation or way of seeing things. We might say, "What's the big deal about biting a piece of fruit (or, add your own choices in here instead)?" That's not the big deal. The big deal is rebelling against God and deciding we can find our own pleasure, provision, and wisdom apart from God and His ways and Word. I know I've written about that a lot over the last few years, but it struck home in a fresh way through Justin's ways of wording it.

Another point that Justin made in his book that really struck me as true to life is how Satan causes us to focus on the few prohibitions in a sea of permissions. In a midst of a garden filled with blessings and permission stood one prohibition, and yet that is what Satan drew their attention to. How often I find in my own life and in the lives of people I work with that our eyes go to what we can't do, can't have, etc., and are drawn from the joyous reality of all we have and are in Christ. Then, when we "taste" of Satan's fruit (whatever we choose to pursue in rebellion and in the arrogance of thinking we can do it better our way than God's), we find the lemon isn't so sweet and we wonder why our life, our relationships, etc. have blown up and left collateral damage all around us. Surprise! Satan hates us, and Jesus has warned us Satan comes only to steal, kill, and destroy.

Satan is the father of lies. I understand that. I spent many hours lying yesterday. I was a blatant, misrepresenting liar. I went fishing with a friend in our fellowship and spent hours trying to disguise this death bringing hook of entrapment in a way the fish would think it was the real deal and good food so they'd bite the disguise and find themselves embedded on the hook and soon on my plate. Fortunately for the fish I am not a good liar and I didn't catch any, but Satan is far better. As long as we continue to address individual sins and neglect the much larger umbrella issue of Sin and Rebellion that lie at the heart of them all, we will forever struggle in futility and a roller coaster life as we think we can be smarter than both Satan and God, by simply trying more and trying harder and being wiser. The fish in Lake San Antonio are safe for another day, but we won't be with that attitude.