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Love and Sacrifice in Our Many-Splendored Kingdom

by | Feb 23, 2021 | Devotional, Gospel living, Weekly Gospel Meditation

Love and Sacrifice in Our Many-Splendored Kingdom

….and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation,

And you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.” Revelation 5:9-10

Dr. Irwyn Ince, in his beautiful book, The Beautiful Community: Unity and Diversity and the Church at Its Best, recalls the day he first learned that his skin color differentiated him. The ten-year-old New Yorker had traveled with his family to Disney World for the first time. He was playing in a hotel pool with another young boy. The boy asked Ince to use his float, and Ince readily agreed. But when Ince asked his new friend if he could borrow his float, the boy said flatly, “No. You’re colored.” Ince, who grew up in a multiethnic neighborhood and had not known his color could be a hindrance, told his Indian-American teacher about the incident. She replied simply, “Well he doesn’t know that he’s colored too. White is also a color.” (The Beautiful Community, 13).

The story demonstrates an essential truth sometimes forgotten by the white Euro-Christian culture: the many-splendored kingdom of God will be  multiethnic, multiracial, and multi-variegated. There is, in fact, no dominant culture status in our heavenly kingdom. In order to begin growing more fully into our identity as priests of this kingdom, many of us need to do two things: first, search our hearts in prayer to see if there be any “grievous way” in us (Psalm 139:23-24), and second, spend more time imagining this many-splendored kingdom.

Some of us may need to hear and heed Frederick Douglass’ piercing observation: “Between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference.”.⁠1  For example, as a white American Christian, I need to ask, “Do I prefer my dominant culture status?” Probably. Do I prefer the comfort and familiarity of “my way”  of doing church? Probably. Am I willing to experience discomfort for the sake of the current minority, so that our community reflects the beautiful community in which we will one day dwell forever? I hope so. As I humble myself in confession, the Holy Spirit reshapes me, making me more suited to dwell in the many-splendored kingdom of priests.

In addition to praying and searching our hearts, we also need to immerse our imaginations in this kingdom of priests composed of colorful characters from every tribe, language, people, and nation. As we read Revelation 5:9-10 and Revelation 19:6-9, we imagine the multicolored priests of the kingdom heading to a kingdom feast. A coffee-colored New Delhi woman robed in a turquoise and silver sari strolls arm in arm with a pale Okinawan woman robed in a scarlet and gold kimono. A midnight-black Nigerian woman decked out in a tangerine-colored tie-dyed wrapper is escorted by a sun-browned Mexican vaquero sporting his best black cowboy boots. The kingdom feast features a lavish spread of the most delectable foods in the world—Turkish delight and fried turkey, seaweed salad and Salade Niçoise, peanut curry and collard greens, snowflake cake and apple strudel.

Dear friends, extraordinary wonders await us in the many-splendored kingdom. Let’s remember that we’ve already been recreated by Christ to be priests in this kingdom. And as we await the day when God’s kingdom will be fully consummated, let’s prepare for eternal life there by building beautiful communities made up of wildly diverse people with wildly diverse tastes. By God’s grace, may we taste of this kingdom delight today.

Prayer

Father, forgive us for the ways we seek comfort in our smaller stories of church and community. Open our eyes to see the beauty of your kingdom and prepare our hearts to worship in this many-splendored kingdom you are creating. In Jesus’ name. Amen

Further Encouragement

Read Revelation 5:8-10, 7:9, 11:9, 14:6; Ephesians 1:10.

Listen to “O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing.”

 For Reflection

In what ways does your church and community reflect the many-splendored kingdom of God? In what ways could it grow in becoming more like this many-splendored kingdom?

The Beautiful Community is an affiliate link. That means I make a few cents if you purchase it after clicking on that link.

1 Quoted in “The Radical Christian Faith of Frederick Douglass,” D.H. Dilbeck,

https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2018/january-february/frederick-douglass-at-200-remembering-his-radical-christian.html

When Changing Our Minds Is a Good Thing

by | Feb 16, 2021 | Devotional, Lent, Weekly Gospel Meditation

When Changing Our Minds Is a Good Thing

Dear Friends, as Lent begins tomorrow, I wrote this meditation about repentance, a little understood and less embraced essential truth of the Christian life. Remember, if you’d like forty (free) printable Bible verses to help you in your preparation for Easter, you can get yours here.

Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near. Matthew 3:2. 

I stared glumly at the stoplight, willing it to turn. I was uneasy under the harsh glare and loud shouting of the slender young street preacher on the corner. With his Bible raised high like a bludgeon, he screamed, “Repent!!! The kingdom of heaven is near!!!!” Is it any wonder many of us cringe at the call to repent?

As kingdom servants, though, we must recapture the message of repentance as a powerful call to change that comes with the enabling power to change. First John commanded it. Then Jesus commanded it (Matthew 3:2, 4:17). We cannot ignore their call. To embrace repentance, we must understand at least five things about repentance.

First, repentance can’t be severed from the gospel, the “good news” that Jesus came to bring. After John was arrested, Jesus came, “proclaiming the good news of God,” telling people, “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!” (Mark 1:14-15). The good news—our Saving King has come, leads to the bad news—we must repent of our sins, which leads to the good news—trusting our Saving King for salvation.

Second, repentance is a complete and utter change of heart, mind, soul, body, the only logical response for a citizen of the kingdom of God. It is a radical change of mind about the king we serve and the kingdom we inhabit. Repentance turns us away from the kingdom of self we so often seek, the kingdom of security and significance, of houses and cars and kids and followers and likes. 

Third, repentance generates grief, deep sorrow for putting ourselves on the throne. That grief turns us happily toward the king who, because he loves and delights in us, died for our sin. As we return to the king, we seek first the things of the kingdom of heaven.

Fourth, repentance bears fruit as we seek the things that matter to Christ: faith and hope and love; trust and imagination and sacrifice, things that can’t be found in a condo on a beach or a grade on an exam. 

Finally, the most important thing we need to know about repentance is what the young street preacher failed to share—the power to repent comes from the Holy Spirit. While we are too blind to see our allegiance to self-rule, the Spirit graciously (and sometimes painfully) removes those blinders, opening our eyes to our sin. While we are too hardened of heart to change our ways, the Spirit softens our heart, making it pliable. To repent, we must collapse on Christ, and we must do it again and again and again. 

Dear friends, join me in repenting, in collapsing before the true King for all of the things we need for “life and godliness” (2 Peter 1:3). In “repentance and rest” is our salvation (Isaiah 30:15).

Holy Spirit,

Use your laser of love to heal the cataracts clouding our vision of the true kingdom. Draw our eyes to gaze on the majesty and mercy of our one true king. Compel us to collapse on Christ every day, every minute, every hour, in repentance, for his kingdom is near. 

In Jesus’ life-changing name we pray. Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read Matthew 3:1-12; Matthew 4:12-17; Mark 1:14-15; 2 Corinthians 7:10.

Listen to “Patient Kingdom” by Sandra McCracken.

For Reflection

Have you ever “cringed” at the call to repentance because of the way it was given? What realities of repentance give you hope to obey Jesus’ command? 

A Prayer about Holy Sexuality in a Sexually Insane World

by | Feb 9, 2021 | Gospel living, Prayer, Weekly Gospel Meditation

A Prayer about Holy Sexuality in a Sexually Insane World

This week, the week of Valentine’s, seems like a good time to pray about sexuality in a sexually insane world. Please join me in this prayer of confession and hope, and please share this prayer with others. 

“This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one. Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.” Gen. 2:24-25, NLT

“Let there be no sexual immorality, impurity, or greed among you. Such sins have no place among God’s people. Obscene stories, foolish talk, and coarse jokes—these are not for you. Instead, let there be thankfulness to God.” Eph. 5:3-4

Most merciful, Creator God, we come to you, weighed down by the sexual insanity of this world, deeply broken over our own deceitful lust and greed, and profoundly thankful for your everlasting mercy.

We praise you for your creation of holy and exuberant sexuality.

We praise you for your exquisite design of sexual love expressed in the context of marriage—two sinner-saints joined together in lifelong covenant. You knew that there would be inexpressible joy coupled with heart-shattering grief. You knew the man would fail the woman in silence. You knew the woman would try to take life into her own hands. You created and redeemed sexual love in marriage for your glory.

Lord, we confess that not one of us is free of sexual immorality. Some of us let our eyes linger long on someone else’s spouse; others darken our minds with words and images that have nothing to do with your holy sexuality. We consume others, not caring how our lust may wound them or grieve you.

Lord, we also confess that we have failed to protect our young.

We don’t know what to do with a culture of adolescents that sext and hook up in school hallways, so we give reprimands but refuse to enter hard conversations.

Rather than recognize and respond to the horrifying news of young children being sexually trafficked, we change the channel to something more soothing.

We tell women and men who have suffered sexual abuse that what happened wasn’t really a big deal or that the other person didn’t really mean it.

In the midst of all of this sexual insanity, Lord, we bow before you, marveling at your mercy and forgiveness.

The apostle Paul had it right when he offered thanksgiving as the holy alternative to sexual immorality.

We thank you…

for creating holy sex.

We thank you…

for your healing love that meets us in the midst 

of our sexual brokenness.

We thank you…

for your compassion and mercy for the abused, the oppressed, and the addicted.

We thank you…

for never shaming or humiliating us, 

but inviting us to flourish in the healing mercy of our faithful and ever-loving Savior, Jesus Christ.

In his precious and holy name we pray. Amen.

Getting Unstuck: The True Story of a Well-Loved Woman

by | Feb 2, 2021 | Lent, Weekly Gospel Meditation

Getting Unstuck: The True Story of a Well-Loved Woman

Dear Friends,

As February begins, we focus on three important stories in the calendar: Black history month, Valentine’s Day, and Lent, the beginning of a time to prepare our hearts for Easter. Today, I thought what better way to tie all of these themes together than to consider the truest love anyone has ever known, the love that transcends all human divides, the sacrificial love that transforms us wholly. Enjoy this excerpt from From Recovery to Restoration, and the story of a marginalized woman who became a true worshiper of Jesus. 

Come and see a man who told me everything I ever did! Could he possibly be the Messiah? John 4:29, NLT

Recovery can make us feel stuck—stuck in isolation, stuck in guilt—whether legitimate or false, stuck in joylessness. The Samaritan woman of John 4 knew something about being stuck. She was stuck in a disastrous cycle of loving and losing men. Into this mucky rut, Jesus pursues her and pursues us, freeing us to do what we were made to do—to enjoy and glorify God.

The lonely Samaritan woman went daily at high noon to draw water, seeking to fill her thirst. She expected to be alone then, to escape the harsh glares of her disapproving community. Imagine her astonishment when a Jewish man crossed the cultural and racial divide to speak to her, a woman, a Samaritan. Imagine her astonishment when this Jewish teacher seemed to know “everything” about her, that the man she was currently living with was not her husband. Imagine her astonishment when this Jewish teacher didn’t splash condemnation on her but instead poured out the truth and hope that her thirsty heart craved (John 4:9-26).

Jesus did not come to condemn the Samaritan woman, nor did he come to condemn us; he came to expose our need for a Savior. He came to her and to us to restore us to community, to cover our shame, to fill our thirst. Jesus was on a mission from the Father, seeking out people who would “worship in spirit and in truth” (4:24 NLT), people who would enjoy and glorify God.

When the Samaritan woman reckoned with the truth about her condition and realized Jesus was the Messiah, she was instantly, radically changed. She dropped her water jar and headed to town, back to the very same people she had previously avoided, to share the good news: “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?” (John 4:29 NLT). She was un-stuck. She moved freely and joyously, running un-self-consciously. She must hurry to tell others, because the news she had was so great to give.

The Samaritan woman’s radical transformation highlights Jesus’ mercy to us when we are stuck in the ruts of recovery. Jesus seeks us in our hiding to draw us into community with the triune God and with fellow believers. He seeks us in our joylessness to remind us of our joy in him. He seeks us in our thirst to supply the living water that frees us to worship the Father in spirit and in truth.

When we seek out the Jesus who has already sought us out, we will be restored as worshippers of the Father. We will be unstuck, freed to move far beyond the recovery room. We will run with the Samaritan woman, moving out into the world to tell others about the Messiah who came to save us from our sins. We will enjoy and glorify God.

Prayer

Jesus,

In this season, when we feel so stuck, we cry out to you. Free our hearts, souls, minds, and spirits so that we might tell others the good news about you. In your saving name. Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read John 4:1-42.

Listen to “Joyful, Joyful” by Casting Crowns at https://youtu.be/AfNS0nxHXhc.

For Reflection

In what ways do you feel stuck right now? Ask Jesus to free you to see God’s might and mercy in this area. 

From Recovery to Restoration cover

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Change of Plans: How God Works by Changing Our Plans

by | Jan 26, 2021 | Gospel Coaching, Weekly Gospel Meditation

Change of Plans: How God Works by Changing Our Plans

As we come to the end of this month of focus on setting goals and making plans, I want to encourage you that even when things don’t go as planned, God is at work redeeming us and his cosmos. Enjoy this excerpt from The Waiting Room: 60 Meditations for Finding Peace & Hope in a Health Crisis. 

‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ says the Lord. ‘They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.’ Jeremiah 29:11, NLT

  • I was planning to write a devotional or perhaps a book on how to keep a prayer journal.
  • Our son was planning to move to Ithaca, NY to begin a master’s program in vocal performance.
  • My husband and I were planning to travel to New York City to celebrate our 35th

Before the CT that changed everything, we had plans, and they weren’t bad plans. But God had something different in mind. There is nothing like a health crisis to redirect our attention from our plans for life on this earth to God’s plans for our eternal lives, starting…now. As 88-year-old J.I. Packer, renowned theologian, affirmed after learning that he had macular degeneration, “God knows what he’s up to…. And I’ve had enough experiences of his goodness in all sorts of ways not to have any doubt about the present circumstances…. Some good, something for his glory, is going to come out of it.”[i]

I’m afraid we too often quote Jeremiah 29:11 and its hopeful note of “plans for good, plans with a future and a hope” without considering the context in which it was written. The Israelites, God’s people, have been exiled to Babylon from their home in Jerusalem after repeated disobedience and multiple warnings to repent. The Lord directs the Israelites to seek and pray for the welfare of Babylon, to build houses and marry and have children there, even as they wait for the Lord to return them to their home. The stint in Babylon was all part of God’s greater plan to bless the Israelites and to bless the world.

Just as God planned redemption and restoration for the Israelites, he has worked his redemption plan for Christians. The plan is for our Christlikeness to be magnified and for his gospel to be multiplied. If we trust in God’s plan, we have hope when disaster apparently befalls us. We are to continue seeking his face, even in the exile of the waiting room. As we wait, we know that God is completing the good work that he has begun in us (Phil. 1:6), and that one day soon Christ will return and restore all broken things. Such are God’s glorious plans for a future and a hope that we are looking forward to as we wait.

Prayer

Lord, help us to understand that our plans too often focus on building “houses” here: careers, families, wealth. Your plans far exceed ours, as you are intent on building us into a temple, a people who glorify you in all that we are and all that we do. Thank you that you have a better plan for us. Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read Jeremiah 29:1-11; Philippians 1:6; and 1 John 3:2.

For Reflection

What plans of yours or a loved one have been disrupted by this season in the waiting room? Ask God to help you trust him to work his good plan in your life.

 

[i] J.I. Packer, in interview with Ivan Mesa, J. I. Packer, 89, “On Losing Sight But Seeing Christ,” Gospel Coalition, January 14, 2016, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/j-i-packer-89-on-losing-sight-but-seeing-christ/. Accessed May 2, 2018.

 

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Christ’s Power for Our Weakness

by | Jan 19, 2021 | Suffering, Weekly Gospel Meditation

Christ’s Power for Our Weakness

Dear Friends, as we continue to consider goals and planning, it’s also good to recognize the frustrations we may experience in our weakness and how God may be working to restore us. Enjoy this meditation from From Recovery to Restoration: 60 Meditations for Finding Peace & Hope in Crisis. 

 Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.  2 Corinthians 12:9, ESV

The twenty-something athlete next to me at PT grunted and groaned as she struggled to lift the five-pound weight with her legs. I glanced at her. Her upper body displayed the strength she had gained as a college tennis player. Her left leg was still striped with strong musculature. But her right leg, which had been braced for two months after surgery for an Achilles tendon rupture, was scrawny and weak. Like the college tennis player, we will experience previously unimagined degrees of weakness when we are recovering from a crisis. The good news of the gospel is that in our weakness we discover our greatest strength: Christ’s power and grace are sufficient for all of our needs.

To demonstrate this counterintuitive principle, Paul shares how he was met by God in his weakness. First, he explains, “For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself” (2 Corinthians 1:8). In that place of weakness, he learned the strength of relying not on himself but on the “God who raises the dead,” the God who “delivered us from such a deadly peril” and who, Paul knew, would continue to deliver him (2 Corinthians 1:8-10).

Later in the letter, Paul shares how Jesus joined him in his weakness. Paul suffered from an unspecified ailment, which he describes as a “thorn in the flesh,” “a messenger of Satan to harass me” (2 Corinthians 12:7). Paul asked Jesus repeatedly to remove it, but Jesus denied him, saying, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). And that is why Paul boasts of his weakness.

Paul returns to the theme one more time before closing his letter to the Corinthians. This time, he connects knowledge of weakness with restoration: “For we are glad when we are weak and you are strong. Your restoration is what we pray for” (2 Corinthians 13:9). Here, the word “restoration” means being built up inwardly, becoming more mature. Paul understood that as we embrace our weakness, we become more fully who God designed us to be. As we discover God’s bountiful provision for our weakness, our faith grows strong, and the body of Christ is built up. This is what it means to “aim for restoration” (2 Corinthians 13:11).

Crisis and recovery offer us the opportunity to experience God’s surpassing strength for our profound weakness. Let’s embrace our weakness, for through it, Christ’s image is being restored in us.

 Prayer

Lord,

We confess, we’re not crazy about being weak. Most people brag about their strength. Help us to boast in our weakness, realizing it leads us to rely on you, the God who raises the dead. Even as we face our fragility, grow our desire for Christ’s strength in us. Amen.

Further Encouragement

Read 2 Corinthians 12:1-10; 2 Corinthians 13:9-11.

Listen to “How Firm a Foundation” by Wendell Kimbrough.

For Reflection

What weakness are you struggling with? How is your weakness leading you to rely on God? How are you discovering Christ’s grace to be sufficient for this season?

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