Why? (Focus On Grace, October 2013)

Posted on August 3, 2014 by DHawthorne

There is a story on the Internet that details a conversation a college chemistry professor had with his three-year-old daughter (you can see the whole thing HERE). It starts our simple enough: little Sarah asked her Daddy if he was in the shower. When he said he was, she rejoined with the inevitable “Why?” that is the favorite of very young, inquisitive children. Dad very patiently answers her questions, and each answer evokes yet another “Why?” from the little girl. At first, his answers are simple enough for a three-year-old, but gradually, as they range from “Why does the shower get you clean?” to “Why does soap grab the dirt?”, he starts to get a technical. He never seems to be impatient with her, but the answers become more and more opaque until they are a lecture on the differences between Pauling and Mulliken electronegativity scales … and at last Sarah is quiet for a few seconds, and says, “I don’t get it.” And Dad’s answer is, “That’s OK. Neither do most of my students.”

It seems to me that Christians are a lot like young Sarah when things happen in our lives that we don’t immediately understand. We don’t have much trouble with good and happy events; right away we praise our Heavenly Father, rejoice in His goodness, and move on. But when it’s not so good, from our perspective, right away we start with the, “Why?” He’s always patient and gentle with our questions, but sooner or later, if we press at it, we come to a place where we just don’t get it.

I think there are three basic types of answers we get from the Lord. And one is, “it’s for our correction.” Proverb 3:11-12 says, “My son, do not despise the chastening of the LORD, Nor detest His correction; For whom the LORD loves He corrects, Just as a father the son in whom he delights.” We have a tendency to get hung up on that word, “chastens,” and immediately think of it as being rebuked for sin. But the Hebrew word actually used there has a broader meaning than that … it can mean instruction and teaching as well as our English sense of chastening. But the implication is you are drifting (or striding boldly) in a direction the Lord doesn’t want you to go in, and He’s going to steer you away from it. Sin doesn’t need be a part of it, it could as well be simple ignorance or being mistaken, and the correction is a gentle nudge in the right direction. But the most important thing to take away from it is that God is not looking to call you into account for your sins and misdeeds (as a Christian, that was dealt with on the cross), it is your own good that He is planning. Job 5:17 says, “Behold, happy is the man whom God corrects; Therefore do not despise the chastening of the Almighty.” It may not seem like a happy time to you, but that is the goal: Psalm 30:5, “For His anger is but for a moment, His favor is for life; Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning.” And one more point I would like to make about correction, is that there is no point to it if it’s not clear what you are trying to correct. That would be like randomly punishing a child a week after their misdeed with no explanation; you would not be correcting that child at all, only confusing them. Likewise, if the Lord is correcting you, there is no mystery about it. If He wants you moving in a different direction, and you are being open and honest with Him, you will know what He is trying to correct in your life.

The second answer is that God is granting you an experience that you will one day be able to help others with. 2 Corinthians 1:3-5 says, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also abounds through Christ.” We can hardly comfort others in areas in which we have no experience. We can sympathize, we can pray, and we can just plain be there for a suffering friend, but to offer any substantive help to them to get through a bad time, we have to have gone through something like it ourselves. I can well imagine the grief a parent might have at the loss of a child, and I could say many things to them … but a lot would be mere sympathy. I have never had a child of my own, much less lost one. I cannot know what it really feels like, nor could I offer anything but very general advice on how to cope with it. But someone else who has gone through such an experience might be of real help, the kind I could never give.

Now I want to pause on that thought and add something I consider very important. I do not think it wise or good or in any way beneficial to “blame” traumatic experiences on God merely prepping us to help others with similar bad experiences. God may very well use what He teaches you that way in the future, but He never does just one thing at a time in our lives. There will be other reasons intertwined with your bad experiences, and trying to sort out the labyrinthine orchestrations God sets His hand to, and reduce them to something simple and easy to understand, is bound to be incorrect. After all Job went through, when God finally got through to him, his response was, “You asked, ‘Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?’ Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, Things too wonderful for me, which I did not know,” (Job 42:3).

Which leads to what I think is God’s most frequent response to our “why?”’s. The stock answer is, “for God’s glory.” When the disciples asked Jesus whose sin cause a man to be born blind, Jesus’ answer was, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him,” (John 9:3). But everything, on the bottom line, is to God’s glory. Yes, we can and we should praise and glorify God in bad situations when we are trusting in His love and power. But that’s not an answer; it’s accurate, but doesn’t speak to the question in our heart. And that is when we have to remember our college professor and his little daughter. His final answer to her was so far beyond her ability to comprehend, it was really no answer at all. And like her, sometimes all we can say in response is, “I don’t get it.” We have to trust that a God who loves us does not randomly afflict us. We have to recognize that if He tried to answer us fully in all things, we would only be be bewildered. We must content ourselves with the knowledge that He will tell us “why” when He can, and when it profits us … and when He does not, that it is all to the good all the same.

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Being Real (Focus On Grace, September 2013)

Posted on July 27, 2014 by DHawthorne

I have a Facebook account. I’m not one to play games on it; in fact, I categorically refuse all game requests. I don’t worry about my privacy … I never post anything on it that I care whether the whole world sees it or not. I just use it to keep track of friends and family, and it’s been a valuable tool for that. Still, limited as my use may be, I often see posts from people that run along these lines: I really like/dislike *this particular thing or issue* … if you like/dislike it, copy everything I just said about it and post it on your Facebook page too! Similarly, once in a while I get an e-mail of the same order: Here is a very worthy/unworthy cause (insert dissertation on why) … please CC it to everyone in your address book so they can know about it too.

I have no difficulty with people using Internet tools to share causes and beliefs that are important to them. In fact, I would encourage it – if done rightly. It’s the whole copy/paste/distribute method that bothers me. For a start, if you aren’t the originator, it takes very little thought or effort to send it around. I would much rather see people making heartfelt, personal appeals. You also don’t always know if the matter is current … it may be something that has been circulating for years. There was a young boy suffering from cancer who wanted cards mailed to him so he could get in the records book before he died, and an e-mail call went out to fulfill his wish. He’s recovered and a grown man now, but he still gets cards, because the original e-mail is still circulating in various forms ( Snopes Shergold article). And, though it may not cost you anything to cut, paste, and repeat, it costs someone. Anything that traverses the Internet uses data storage somewhere, and uses up transmission bandwidth, especially if millions of people are copy/pasting it. The cost, according to a NY Times article in 2003, estimated the total cost for spam to be anywhere from $10 billion to $874 billion in the USA alone (which of course, includes all spam, not just copy/paste spam, but even if that amounts to only a small fraction, it’s still a lot of money).

But even if you set aside all those reasons, my biggest difficulty with it is that so many people engage in it not because they are moved by the cause, but because they feel like they would be held in lesser regard if they didn’t jump on the bandwagon. In other words, they do it because of social pressures, and anyone passing along a message for that kind of reason, in the end, is being phony. It isn’t necessarily hypocritical, because a person might actually believe in the cause. It’s just that they are only sharing it because they feel like they have to, and wouldn’t share it, at least that way, without those pressures.

The Bible doesn’t speak directly about the phenomenon of social pressure. But one passage that touches on the matter, is 1 Corinthians 13:1-3: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.” Notice that Paul is never once saying that to do those things is meaningless, but to do them without love is meaningless. I believe that very neatly applies to social pressures as well. After all, is your goal to please God, or to please men (Gal. 1:10)? The two are frequently inimical, and if you are bowing to social pressure, you are pleasing men. The question is, is your heart also engaged in a way that God can be pleased too?

If you think about it, this issue goes well beyond Facebook and e-mails. How about the way you speak in church? Are your praises from the heart, or do they roll off your tongue because you think people expect them from you? When you serve, do you do so because you are convinced it is the Lord’s calling, and it is a thing you must do for His sake? Or do you serve because you were asked, and were afraid to say no and maybe be thought less of? Or even worse, because your pride was tickled, and you thought this area of service elevated you in people’s eyes? When you sing, is it because the words expressed in that song are the words of your own heart, or is it just because you don’t want to be the only one not singing? When the pastor gives a challenge from the pulpit, do you raise your hand, or stand, because you are truly moved to make a commitment, or because everyone else around you is doing so and you feel like the odd one out?

Even our service to other men, outside of church, ought to be heartfelt and sincere (Eph. 6:5-8). Do you do your work grudgingly, just to get the paycheck? Or do you treat it as another expression of your service to God, which in fact it truly is?

And so the bottom line is, are you real? Is your faith real (Rom. 6:17), and are your actions real? Do you worship in spirit and truth (John 4:14)? This is something God wants from all of us, genuine sincerity, and actions that reflect what is in our hearts.

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As a Child

Posted on July 20, 2014 by DHawthorne

There is a young boy that lives near me, and when school is in session, he often walks through my neighborhood towards the local grade school when I am on my way to work. And he likes to sing. When I first noticed him, that was what caught my attention. He carried some manner of electronic music player, with long white wires leading to his ears, and he wasn’t the least bit shy about singing along as he walked. His eyes were half-closed, his head moved side-to-side with the tune, and his mouth clearly formed the words to the song that was playing. I remember thinking, “Oboy, I bet the other kids love to make fun of him for that!” But if they did, he obviously didn’t care. I’ve seen him quite frequently since, and he often isn’t singing softly at all; there are times I can hear him a block away. I’ve even caught him mixing it up with one of those speaker-microphones that amplify your voice when you speak into them. He was having a great time with the thing, growling and shouting into it, and watching people jump. This is not a self-conscious, bashful grade-schooler. But mostly he just sings, and he obviously loves it.

Most children get past that lack of self-consciousness at an early age. When they are very small, they are likely say anything that pops into their head, and do whatever they like without a second thought of who might think less of them for it. When I was somewhere around three or four, I walked into the living room where my Mom was entertaining some of her lady friends, with my pants around my ankles, because I wanted some motherly assistance with my bathroom cleanup. A ten-year-old would have been mortified at the very thought. In fact, I think only a year or two later, I would have been mortified … I am certainly less than comfortable now when my sister, who was an eyewitness, tells the story at family gatherings. But sometime before adolescence, children start caring what kind of impression they make with others. By the time they are teenagers, it’s one of the most important things in the world to them. When we are adults, we don’t often think of it overtly, but it’s a reflexive, subconscious thing to do what we consider “normal” to our own social sphere. I imagine that my young neighbor might still listen to music when he’s on the way to high school a few years from now, but I’m willing to bet he won’t sing out loud on the street.

For the most part, this is all to the good. No one likes to be in the same train car on their morning commute with someone singing aloud to their favorite music. And not many would enjoy a party where even one person spoke his or her mind without the slightest concern how it would be taken. If everyone was doing it, most of us would walk out within minutes, if we waited even that long. There is, after all, a reason we learn to be self-conscious, and it is directly related to the social pressures that we consider normal. But we also often learn to overdo it. How many people spend their entire lives doing what’s expected of them instead of what they love? According to the author Bronnie Ware, who wrote the book “the Top Five Regrets of the Dying,” this is regret Number One. An article in Forbes.com puts it at number six. Social pressure can be a good thing, but it can be a bad thing as well.

Which begs the question, where do you draw the line? There is a tendency in people to look at things like this in strict black-and-white terms. If you aren’t a full-out rebel, you are a conformist drone. If you don’t like your job, quit right now, burn your bridges, and start that cat herding business you always wanted! That last is a good way to wind up homeless and eating at a soup kitchen, and people who give advice like that are selling something. But even a lifestyle you adore is going to have it’s down moments, its times of drudgery, its stresses and pain. And a lifestyle of boring regularity is going to have its times of happiness and satisfaction. It’s very easy to compartmentalize all endeavor, slap labels on it, and gripe about about whatever you don’t have. Yet how many of those people who named their deep regrets for those interviewers and authors wouldn’t have regrets just as deep if they had decided differently?

I think almost all of them would. The problem wasn’t what they did or didn’t do, it was what they made important. If being well-accepted by your peers truly is what you have made most important in your life, chances are you will eventually regret it. If utterly ignoring your peers is what you made most important, you might find you regret that just as much. The difficulty is that life is just too short to do everything. So what you make the most important in your life is going to be what you spend the most of your time at. And the things that really are important are going to get neglected. All of our lives are limited, either in time or resources, and most likely both … we can only do so much, and what we wind up doing will be guided by what we give the priority to. So the only way to not have a life chock-full of regrets is to make the things that are truly important the most important things to you as well. But that means you cannot let others decide for you what is important, you have to make that call yourself, and then you have to make it your priority. Kids don’t have that problem. They like something, they do it; they want something, they try to get it. They don’t let other people’s opinions get in the way much. And as adults, I think we can safely make the assumption that conforming to societal norms in superficial matters of behavior is probably a good thing, but letting your concept of those norms steer you in the deepest matters of life is probably a very big mistake.

So what’s important? Almost everyone agrees that relationships are. Friends and family first, as is often said. As a Christian, I say that my relationship with God is the most important thing, but even God says we need to put a priority on our relationships with each other (John 13:34-35, 1 Peter 4:8, 1 John 3:11, 1 John 4:11-12. to name just a few). John even takes it a step further in 1 John 4:20, where he writes, “If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?”. According to Scripture, it’s not even possible to love God if you don’t love your brother as well (and in the epistles of John, brother is used as a synonym for fellow believer, not necessarily a brother of blood relation).

Personally, I think everything that is really important boils down to how much we care for each other. I love books, and my default behavior is to stick my nose in one and not come out until I have to. But if I spend too much time reading, I become restless and unsatisfied. I have to get out and interact with other people. And I’m an introvert … too much time socializing, and I feel like I have to run and hide. But I still need to do it, and I have to fight the urge to spend too much time alone, or only with my wife. And that is because relationships are important, and our relationships with each other reflect on how well we maintain our relationship with God.

What else is important? For one thing, pretty much anything that supports our ability to care for each other. That necessarily includes things like food, shelter and clothing, because if we shuffle off this mortal coil, we aren’t in much of a position to help others or show how much we care for them. The ways in which we maintain relationships and care for each other are important too, and those things vary from person to person with our abilities and talents. It’s important to take care of ourselves, spiritually, physically, mentally and emotionally, for the same reason … but also because we cannot function properly if we do not. Sometimes that means just doing what we, personally, enjoy. And that’s another thing that children excel in, just plain having fun. If you watch small children at play, you can see that it spreads as much joy as they take from it. Which is yet another point: what’s in our hearts flows out to others (Matt. 12:34-35), good or bad. So if our lives are filled with joy and love, it’s going to spread.

Christians make much of a child-like faith because of what Christ said in Luke 18:17. But what does it really mean? I think, in part, it’s just what I have been saying here. Like children, we have to put the things that are truly important to us first. Of course, our concept of what is important is qualified by our perceptions as adults. We don’t need to sing out loud on the streets to be “as a child,” but we do need to sing. And if we remain quiet, if we fail to live out the most important aspects of being a human being, which are to love God and each other, we are going to leave this world with regret and sorrow, and we will fail of the potential God has given us in Christ.

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Learning To Ride

Posted on July 6, 2014 by DHawthorne

My father was a patient person. He wasn’t around a lot when I was a child; he worked two jobs that had him out to “The Office” before I got up for school, and home after I went to bed. His second job took him away on weekends. But he managed to teach me a few things nonetheless, and what left the deepest impression was how he taught me to ride a bicycle. You see, I was a clumsy kid, and bookish as well. Physical things did not come naturally to me, and I did not have the instincts and reflexes that most kids my age had. Time after time, he would try to explain to me how to balance, the importance of keeping moving, etc., and as often as not I just gave him that deer-in-the-headlights look as I crashed to the ground. But he never gave me a hard time about it, caught me if he was close enough, and carefully went over it all again. In retrospect, I think he must have despaired of me ever learning. It wasn’t as if he had a lot of time to spare, but I do not recall a single incidence of exasperation or anger.

And eventually, it just clicked. My body figured out what he was trying to teach me, and my brain made all the right associations to keep my elbows off the pavement. And from that time on, I rode that bicycle everywhere. My two proudest possessions in all my youth were my first new spider bike, and the 10-speed I later received as a grade school graduation present. On weekends, I cruised the neighborhood on my bicycle; I took it to the corner store when I wanted to spend my allowance, and I rode it to my friends’ homes. I biked to church and to youth group meetings, sometimes with a guitar tucked under one arm; after I finished high school, I even rode it to work when the weather permitted. I adored my bicycle … I didn’t even love my first car quite so much.

Dad’s lessons had paid off. If he had made it an unpleasant experience of recriminations and shaming, it’s possible I may have learned anyway. If he shouted at me every time I made a mistake, or failed to understand what he was teaching, I also might have eventually learned anyway. If he watched me fall and blamed me for my own tears, or kicked me when I was on the ground, I still might have got the lesson. But I don’t think I would have loved it. At best it would have been something necessary to get around on until I got a car, and at worst, maybe I never would have learned after all. But I wanted desperately to learn, and when I did, it was sheer joy. And I don’t think it would have been if my father wasn’t so patient and gentle in the process of teaching me.

So why is it that Christians so often act like learning how to live a righteous life needs to be an experience in shame? I understand that for one to be able to fully appreciate the propitiatory work of Christ, one first has to understand the need for it … and that means understanding sin, and God’s view of it. Sinners need to know they are sinners, or they cannot know they need a Saviour. But once they do, and have accepted that Jesus is that Saviour, it’s not a matter of browbeating and harsh discipline that will make them live a life pleasing to Him, it’s a matter of wanting to please Him.

And yet, to my astonishment, I have many times sat in various churches and listened to the preacher upbraid his congregation as if what they needed most was to be more ashamed of themselves in order to live better. Furthermore, the congregation members themselves will nod their heads as if they deserve this, and then declare their unworthiness among each other like they were somehow proud of it. “Oh,” they mourn, wringing their hands, “I am not nearly as good a Christian as I should be.” Well, here’s a newsflash: no one is, this side of heaven. And yet, Christ died and paid for those sins and shortcomings, and they are trusting that His sacrifice was sufficient for that purpose.

In 2 Corinthians 5:17 it reads, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” There is more to that statement than is often first attributed to it. Christians will earnestly tell you how their lives have changed, and how they no longer view their old ways as they once did. And that’s very true, as far as it goes. But it is not simply an expression of how a Christian has been forgiven, and is therefore no longer viewing life through the lens of a fallen creature: it’s an expression that the Christian’s fundamental nature has changed. Not only do they view things differently, they see things they were incapable of seeing before. And not only do they want to stop living a life of sin, they fervently desire to live a life of righteousness.

Which is not to say the process is simple or instantaneous. It is demonstrably neither. There is not a believer alive today that can honestly tell you they have walked perfectly with their Lord since the day they received His grace. Most will tell you they struggle daily with the flesh (and the rest are just keeping quiet about it). But they want that life of righteous living, and they want to please God. They don’t need anymore to be told to stop sinning; they know they need to stop. They need to be taught, patiently and gently, how to stop sinning. And they need to be taught without the condemnation that so many seem to feel is necessary.

But let me make something clear. I am not talking about people who are knowingly and deliberately living a sinful life out of rebellion or unwillingness to apply what they accept as true to their behavior. I am talking about those who are struggling to live a godly life and not doing so well at it. I think that distinction is part of what Jude talks about in Jude 1:22-23 – “And on some have compassion, making a distinction; 23 but others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment defiled by the flesh.” Jude is probably referencing unbelievers in that verse, but I do believe the concept applies to believers as well. Rebellion is not to be tolerated, and can’t be dealt with gently; though I also feel like I have to point out if a person doesn’t agree with you on what the Bible says, that doesn’t necessarily mean they are rebelling against God. After all, you might be the one who has it wrong.

Here are some other key verse on the matter:

Rom 8:1-4 – “1There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”

Rom 8:9 – “But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.”

There is some good stuff in-between I left out for the sake of brevity, but put those concepts together. The first I saw that passage, I assumed Paul meant that there is no condemnation for Christians who live according to Christ’s standard of living (i.e., not sinning). Indeed, that seems to be the way most Christians view it. But verse nine negates that idea entirely. There is no condemnation if you are Christ’s, period. A related passage in 1 John 3:5 says, “And you know that He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him there is no sin.” That’s a more controversial verse, because there are a lot of different opinions about what it says, but I think the simplest interpretation fits, and that it is saying exactly what Romans 8:1 is saying, that sin (in the legal sense, not the fact that it exists) and condemnation don’t apply to the believer anymore, as Christ took all that away with His death on the cross. The punishment for sin is gone, Christ paid it.

And here’s one more I think pertinent: Col 2:23 – “These things indeed have an appearance of wisdom in self-imposed religion, false humility, and neglect of the body, but are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.” And what “things” was he referring to? The rules and regulations we place on godly living (Col. 2:20). And if rules and regulations are of no value in keeping us from sin, however can beating each other up over sinful behavior help? Instead of encouraging people to live righteous lives, we discourage them, try to make it onerous, and put a stigma on the whole process that even the ungodly world sees as a burden and something to keep away from. Furthermore, it puts a subtle emphasis on living a godly life in the power of the flesh, which is just not possible.

The goal, however, is still a righteous life. Sin is still sin, and every rule and every law in Scripture is designed to teach us what sin is, so we can stop doing it and do what is right instead, beginning with trusting Christ to deliver us from it (Gal. 3:24-25). And after that, it’s the power of what Christ has done to change us, not nagging and condemnation, that enables us to live lives that are blameless. We need to encourage each other in the love of Christ. We need to help each other understand what things we could do better so that we may avoid stumbling. We need to understand cause and effect in our lives better, and clean up the things that all but force us into bad decisions and sinful reactions. But we also need to do this in a patient and gentle way, like my father’s bicycle riding lessons, or all we will manage in the end is to re-enforce brokenness in people’s lives, and add to their frustration. In that, there will be no joy, because every gain is bitter and fleshly. And that is not how Christ has called us to live.

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The Meaning of Trust (Focus On Grace, August 2013)

Posted on June 29, 2014 by DHawthorne

I’m in the habit, at the end of my work day, to stop for a beverage on my way home. When I’m working at the office, there’s a little gas-station shop right down the street that I like to stop at, and there is almost invariably someone there, at the end of their day, buying lottery tickets. It generally takes them a bit longer to pick what kind of tickets they want, or choose their numbers than it does for me to buy a coffee or tea, or I probably would never notice them; but as it is, the delay gets me to thinking, why do these people play the lottery at all? They likely all have hopes and dreams for a windfall, and daydream about what they would do if they won big, even if they are well aware how slim their chances of actually winning are. Like the NY Lottery Commission likes to advertise, “Hey, you never know.”

Which sometimes gets me thinking, what would I do if I suddenly found myself with a large sum of money to my name?

Nowadays, the very first thing that springs to mind is I would quit my job, and use the freshly released time to re-train myself for another career. I’d certainly also donate a fair amount to the Lord’s work, and depending how big the payout was, maybe buy a home. There have even been a few times, when running such possibilities through my mind, that I was tempted to buy a few tickets myself. After all, what would it hurt if I only spent my pocket money? I have no fear of developing a gambling problem, and my money is carefully budgeted … when it’s out, it’s out, and I simply don’t buy anything else until my budget allows more. So I wouldn’t suddenly be impoverishing myself, or doing without something like groceries. Worst case, I’d miss a coffee or two, and I could probably stand to do that anyway.

And whenever that kind of thought crosses my mind, another follows close after: the harm is, by buying a lottery ticket, I would be declaring that I don’t really trust God to give me what I need to do His will. I’m saying that what I have isn’t enough, and what I can earn by the strength God has given me isn’t enough. There may be some who can honestly say to themselves, “this is just another way of God providing, if it should ever happen,” but I’m not one of those people. For me it would plainly be something more like, “Lord, you just aren’t coming through for me in this, so do you mind a little help?” And the Lord doesn’t need any help with providing.

The scriptures are very clear about that. Consider what Christ said in Luke 12:21-32:

“Then He said to His disciples, “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; nor about the body, what you will put on. 23 Life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing. 24 Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap, which have neither storehouse nor barn; and God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds? 25 And which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? 26 If you then are not able to do the least, why are you anxious for the rest? 27 Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 28 If then God so clothes the grass, which today is in the field and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will He clothe you, O you of little faith? 29 “And do not seek what you should eat or what you should drink, nor have an anxious mind. 30 For all these things the nations of the world seek after, and your Father knows that you need these things. 31 But seek the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added to you.”

We have a loving God, one who cared enough to send His Son to die for us. He certainly knows our needs, and He is more than able to provide for them. Our difficulties mainly occur when we make up our minds just exactly how God ought to provide for us … and then, if we are strictly honest with ourselves, we get nervous that He might have other ideas. But what does verse 31 in the passage above say? If we seek His kingdom first, that is, we seek His will and seek to advance the purposes of His kingdom here on earth, the other needs will take care of themselves. That doesn’t mean we’ll (necessarily) hit the lottery if we are short on grocery money. We might instead find the supply in the form of a gift, or an unexpected bonus … or any number of things. He never promised us wealth, just supply. The missionary Hudson Taylor once said, no doubt thinking of this very passage, said “God’s work, done God’s way, will never lack God’s supply.” And God’s work doesn’t not just include missions, evangelism, and ministry; it includes your own perfection as a child of God: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them,” (Eph. 2:10); and “And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight,” ( Col 1:21-22).

The other thing to remember is this does not only apply to money, food and shelter; but to health and circumstances as well. I spent most of the month of July in 2013 being ill, from bronchitis to sinus infections, to pneumonia and a 48-hour hospital stay. During much of that time, I chafed at not feeling well enough to perform my normal activities, and not even having a clear enough head to pray or meditate properly. At one point, I couldn’t pray at all … but I found I could sing hymns to myself, and it was a great comfort. But what could possibly be God’s point in allowing that? There was no unconfessed sin I was secretly and unrepentantly harboring; I didn’t feel through any of it that God was trying to grab my attention and pull me in another direction (in fact, I was too muzzy for that anyway). I don’t know why God let me get sick. But I have to trust He had reasons. I may discover them someday, or maybe I never will. But, as Job said, in the book bearing his name, Job 13:15a, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”

But my last point is this: if you can trust that God will supply what you need to accomplish His purposes, then what you have is what you need, and when you do need more you will get it … and probably, not before you need it. You might need to learn how to deal with uncomfortable circumstances. You might need to learn how to get out of those circumstances in a godly way. You might even need a windfall … but if we accept and trust we truly are God’s workmanship, and His goal is to perfect us, we have to trust that whatever it is we need, He will provide it when it’s needed.

And that is the real meaning of trust. It’s the ability to confidently go through life, knowing that no matter what happens, you are in the hands of a loving God, and He will supply your needs. It’s the assurance that if you are going through bad times, they are necessary either for your correction (Heb. 12:6) or for you growth (2 Cor. 4:11), or simply to glorify God (John 9:3). It means, like the hymn says, “Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say, it is well, it is well, with my soul,” simply because you trust Him.

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Planting Seeds (Focus On Grace, July 2013)

Posted on June 22, 2014 by DHawthorne

In 1995, a movie was released titled “Mr. Holland’s Opus.” It traced the career of a musician who took a job as a high school music teacher in order to spend more time with his new wife and write an orchestral symphony. At first, he had trouble with the job and his fellow staff members; his wife became pregnant, and he had to use the money he saved to fund his symphony to buy a home. His son turned out to be deaf, and he struggled with relating to a boy that he couldn’t share music with. In short, he became embroiled in the issues of life, and his dreams had to be set to the side.

Mr. Holland eventually became a caring and devoted teacher, and found ways to relate to his deaf son. But years went by, and though he kept working on his symphony, he realized time had run out for him to fund it again or produce it. Eventually, he was forced to retire early when his school’s music program was canceled … and on his final day as a teacher, his wife, son, and students conspired to have his symphony performed, with him as director. The movie closed with the symphony playing majestically, the camera panning around the auditorium, and you saw all his former and current students, his friends on staff and his family … all of the people he touched in the course of his life. It was then you realized that the opus of the movie’s title was not the music at all. It was the people whose lives Mr. Holland changed.

Christians often have to struggle with a similar course of events. It is human nature to be attracted to the big, bold, flashy life works, and even introverts and quiet, self-effacing people like to be recognized at least once in a while. But wide recognition, or even the fulfillment of personal dreams, typically only happens to a few. Most of us go through our lives, doing our daily deeds and reaping modest rewards for modest efforts. And we have a tendency to think somehow we aren’t doing enough, and feel as if, at the end of our lives, we will have nothing to show for it. We want the Lord to give us an “important” job, and we say it is to glorify Him … but if we are really honest with ourselves, we might realize that the glory we seek is our own.

In Colossians 3:23-24, we read: “And whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance; for you serve the Lord Christ.” Note the use of the word “whatever,” in that passage, with no respect to how important you might think that “whatever” may be. And the person we are doing it for is the Lord Himself … who will Himself reward us, for it is Him that we serve in the mundane facts of our daily existence.

But an even more important thing to remember, I believe, is that the simple, mundane works of life might turn out to be more important than you realize. The apostle Paul isn’t generally one we go to when we consider every-day, average life, but look at what he says in 1 Corinthians 3:6-9: “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase. Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor. For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, you are God’s building.” Paul is quite content to take a lesser role in that scenario. He just planted the seeds. His friend Apollos watered them, and he doesn’t even mention the harvester. But the entire work, from start to finish, was the Lord’s, and everyone involved had a role in making a productive field or a sturdy building. In the end, it’s the Lord’s doing, but Paul acknowledges that we also have a role, and not one of those roles is any more or less important than any other, because every one of them is needed.

So then, are you loving your neighbor as yourself (Lev. 19:18 … and for a real interesting variant, Rom. 13:10)? Are you speaking all truth in love (Eph. 4:15)? Are you rejoicing in the Lord always (Phil. 4:4)? Are you fruitful in every good work (Col. 1:10)? Every act of love and obedience to the Lord done in the presence of another is a seed planted. It’s a seed that may or may not bear fruit, depending largely on the person who receives it, but it is a seed nonetheless. And every seed has the potential to be a plant or a mighty tree … you have no way of knowing. In fact, it doesn’t matter: God wants you to be laying down those seeds no matter what.

In this life, you may never have Mr. Holland’s blessing of seeing all the people you have touched. But you are touching them … and in your case, is it for good or for evil? Plant the seeds of a righteous life, the righteousness that Christ Himself imparted to you on the cross, and let God bring those seeds to harvest.

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America, We Have a Problem … (Focus On Grace, May 2013)

Posted on June 15, 2014 by DHawthorne

You pretty much have to be living in a cave these days to miss the fact that there is a raging debate in our country about gun control. There has been horrific story after horrific story about fatal shootings, the worst of which, in many eyes, that ended in the death of twenty children and six adults in an elementary school in Newtown, Ct. There have been others; most of them have been seared in our memories as they happened, and no few of them involved children and young people. One view of the gun control debate says that shootings like this can be prevented if we crack down on gun sales and restrict them further, perhaps eliminate them. Another side says if even more people were armed, they could protect the innocent more readily when a crazy person storms in, guns blazing. Yet another take on the debate is that it doesn’t matter what kind of gun ownership is illegal or not, because those inclined to use them criminally are already criminals … what do they care if they break another law?

None of these views are entirely without merit, and none of them really cover the entire matter. Lawmakers all agree on one point: it’s a complex issue. News coverage and media opinions, almost always biased towards one side of the debate or another, tend to play that down and try to make it look like the politicians are seeking a cop-out, but it’s the truth that it’s complicated. And what about the acts of violence that don’t involve guns? In early April, a college student is alleged to have sliced up more than a dozen people with a hobby knife. More recently, there were the bombs made from pressure cookers, of all things, that killed three and maimed many others at the Boston Marathon. Yet no one is seriously talking about regulations to control X-Acto knives or pressure cookers. Why the focus on guns?

In my opinion, to a large degree, people are reacting to the gun control question with sentiment and emotion, not reason and facts. And that goes for all sides of the debate, because the arguments neglect the fact that guns are not the real problem … not any more than hobby knives are the problem, or pressure cookers are the problem. The real problem, the one that’s not being talked about very much, is that there are people so self-centered that they think it’s somehow all right to violently lash out at others when they can’t get what they want out of life. And those looking on and passing judgment, would far rather blame an object than admit it is a human flaw that is causing the trouble.

Because it’s not a new problem. Abel never did anything to his brother Cain that we know about, but when God rejected Cain’s offering but accepted Abel’s, Cain was so thoroughly upset that he murdered him (Gen. 4:3-8). And that was the very first generation of humanity. Cain’s kind of reaction has existed in history ever since, to one degree or another, and now we are seeing it on a regular basis. Report after report hit the news of disgruntled employees, or former employees, shooting up the people they worked with; or teenagers gunning down their classmates, or stabbing them. It’s happened enough with post office workers that we even call a certain class of violent rages “going postal.” And the heart of it is pure envy. What these people are saying, with their violent acts, is essentially, “I’m unhappy with my lot in life, and therefore I’m going to make others unhappy too” … which they accomplish in an utterly reprehensible fashion. Yet somewhere deep inside, they must feel justified, and that they have a right that was denied them, and their actions are somehow making it right.

And the simple fact of it is they are not. Its seems obvious enough from the outside, when you are looking at an extreme case like a mass shooting, or a bombing, but how about when it’s just office gossip about the young go-getter who passed someone up for a promotion? Or that snide over-the-fence chat with a neighbor about just how the fellow two doors down could possibly have afforded that new car? Or that catty remark in church about that person who seems just a bit too together than could possibly be for real? All of it is envy, and though the degree of it varies so greatly, the core is the same, and it’s all poison. And why are we surprised, when we allow all the little poisons to spread so freely, that every now and then, someone who is broken or pushed beyond their limits, let’s a whole lot of it spill out?

We need to remember what God said to Cain, before he let his particular poison bear its fruit: “If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. And its desire is for you, but you should rule over it.” (Genesis 4:7). There is no place for envy in our lives to any degree, because if we give it a place, it will rule over us. And if we do well for ourselves, we can rejoice that others do well too. There is only one way for us to accomplish that, and it is to, “… above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful,” (Colossians 3:14-15).

Yes, America has a problem, and America is not alone. The problem in the simplest terms, is sin. And the answer can only be Jesus, and the fruit borne of His Spirit in our lives as we learn to love others as He has loved us.

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If You Love Me … (Focus On Grace, March 2013)

Posted on June 8, 2014 by DHawthorne

I once attended a church that set great store on how a Christian behaved. How you dressed, the words you used in conversation, the kinds of books you read, how you entertained yourself, and how much you participated in church events … all these things were subtle, but very real, indicators of just how “spiritual” you were regarded to be. No one would suggest that your behavior was your way of earning God’s grace, but it was widely regarded as an indicator of how well you had received God’s grace. People that didn’t live up to accepted standards were looked down upon, not without compassion, but it was a condescending compassion. And though many of the behaviors so measured were behaviors described as righteous in Scripture, many also were not. They were just the accepted interpretation of how a Christian ought to be.

As best as I know, it’s no longer that way at that church; they’ve had many changes in leadership and the congregation over the years. But it was very much that way at the time, and such an atmosphere in a church can be utterly stifling. People go around hiding what they do in private, for fear someone would judge them less spiritual. People put on airs, and act out their views of “correct Christian behavior,” with a great deal of spiritual pride, carefully masqueraded as piety. If you have a differing opinion about something widely agreed upon, you keep it to yourself. If you even have questions, you are very careful what you ask about and how, so you don’t tip anyone off that you aren’t as “spiritual” as they.

Now, in my old church, you could learn a great deal about the Bible, as it was something they emphasized strongly; and because God is faithful, there were those who grew in the grace and knowledge of Christ anyway. But the church made it difficult. The most insidious aspect of it was that, on the surface, you couldn’t tell the truly spiritual from the ones putting on airs … they did the same things, went to the same events, and even spoke the same way. If you were sensitive enough, you might pick up on a vague feeling of wrongness, but until you were there long enough to know people really well, you would never know they weren’t all wonderful Christians. And though I personally could not point at any church I know today and say that is the prevailing atmosphere, I do say with confidence that the same attitudes have a tendency to crop up anywhere the Bible is taught. It is a very human reaction … it starts as a sincere desire to please the Lord. But where it goes wrong is when Christians attempt to please the Lord in the same ways that they lived their lives before they came to know the Lord.

The church at Galatia had a problem like this. I would recommend reading through the entire book, because there is a lot of good teaching in there on the subject, but lets focus for the moment on Galatians 3:2-3 –

“This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?–Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh?”

The Galatian church was influenced by Jews who had a tradition of strict obedience to the Jewish Law. They accepted Christ when introduced to Him, but these Jews convinced them that being a good Christian meant being a good Jew and they took it a step further and said you couldn’t be a good Christian unless you were a good Jew, and obeyed all of the Jewish Law. So Paul had to reprimand them, and remind them they were not slaves, but sons (Galatians 4) of the Living God, and that the Law was meant to teach them a higher form of obedience (Gal. 3:24). He even expressed dismay that their attitudes indicated some were not even really believers (ch. 4, v.11). Because, as Paul pointed out in 3:3, outward adherence to the Law is an act of the flesh, not of the Spirit. And that is exactly the heart of the problem. It is always good to do what is right, but simply doing good is not what God wants of us, and it’s not what Christ died for. He wants us to be good as well.

Let me indulge in a very simple illustration. Just about everyone will agree that knowingly speaking falsehood to another is bad, and telling the truth is good. But telling the truth is something even unbelievers can do, and there have been outright wicked people who prided themselves on their ability to do so regularly. If one of these “honest” unbelievers comes to know the Lord, it is no big thing for them to continue to be honest. They did it before, and they can continue in it, by sheer strength of will and entirely in the power of the flesh. So is their truthfulness an indicator of what God has done in their life? No, it’s not. But, if after they have become a Christian, they have also come to love the truth as an expression of the One True God, and they delight in expressing it for that reason … well, that’s another matter, isn’t it? But the end result is the same: they tell the truth.

And here is why the difference in how that truth is spoken is important. Take a look at what Christ says to His disciples just before He was crucified in John 14:15 –

“If you love Me, keep My commandments,”

and then link it with what He says in John 15:10-12 –

“If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.”

This is an extraordinary and powerful statement, and I think it illustrates exactly what God’s goal is for us. And you have to take in the context of that entire passage, which spans several chapters; Christ is talking about them knowing Him, knowing the Father, abiding in Him, and being like Him … the list goes on. But the heart of it is God’s love for us, and His desire that we love Him and each other the same way. If you need more convincing, read as well the book of 1 John, and take special note that John repeats Christ’s instruction in 1 John 3:23 –

“And this is His commandment: that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, as He gave us commandment.” And again, in Matthew 22:37-40 – “Jesus said to him, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.’”

There is also 1 Corinthians 13; Scripture does not stint on passages that repeat this theme.

But it isn’t love if all you are doing is following a set of rules. It doesn’t matter if the rules are good ones, and it doesn’t matter if the end result, in terms of outward behavior, is the same. It doesn’t matter if the rules are ones you made in our own mind as to what God wants from you, or if they were handed down by a respected teacher. God’s goal is for your actions to spring from a changed heart that He has renewed, and to act out of love for Him and for those others He loves as much as He loves you.

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What Are You Doing? (Focus on Grace, February 2013)

Posted on June 1, 2014 by DHawthorne

When I was a young man, I worked as a counselor at a Christian camp. This was the kind of place where people shipped off their kids, to spend a week in a Christian environment, hear about the Lord, and learn from Scriptures … all while having some grand fun in a campground that had rustic cabins, horseback riding, boating, swimming, and crafts. It was a formative experience for me; the Lord taught me a lot of important things about what it is to serve Him while I was there, and I like to think He worked through me to teach my charges a lot of important things too. Many of those kids professed Christ during my tenure, and there were steps taken with local churches to follow through with them, so overall, I think it was a great ministry that helped a lot of young people find the Lord.

But, there was one big negative aspect to that camp and how it was run: it was utterly exhausting. My week started just past noon on Sundays, and ended just past noon on the following Saturday. During the week I had exactly half a day off between breakfast and lunch on Wednesdays, and each morning I had only an hour break for devotions with the camp pastor (which I mostly struggled desperately to keep my eyes open in, much less participate). The rest of the time, I was with the kids. I played with them, did sports with them, and taught Bible lessons to them. I had my meals with them, and I slept in the same cabin as them. It was a grueling schedule, and when I went home for the summer in mid August, I barely did more than eat and sleep for a full two weeks. But it wasn’t just the counselors like myself, the entire staff worked like that, and the director himself ever worked any less than 12-14 hours a day. He told us during orientation that he considered it nothing less than his Christian duty to spend his strength that way for the ministry, and he expected the same from everyone who worked there as well.

On the surface, and certainly to me at the time, this seemed like a reasonable attitude for a person whose goal it was to serve the Lord. Did not Christ give His very life for us? Why should we hesitate to spend our own in His service? So I started to feel guilty when my strength flagged. I was young and strong, and much older staff was running circles around me. I just dug in and tried harder, and ignored my body’s complaints. The term wasn’t in vogue then, but anyone will recognize it today: I burned out. I made it through my first summer, but when I came back the following year, something snapped. I was overcome by anxieties I couldn’t explain, and by doubts, and I wound up quitting after only a week. I made up all manner of excuses, but looking back it’s very obvious to me that deep inside I was rebelling against being so used again. The spirit was willing, but the flesh had had quite enough, and since I would just admit I couldn’t keep the pace, I broke down instead.

I’ve had over 35 years to think about what happened to me at that camp. I don’t think the camp director was not wrong or misguided to push himself the way he did. He clearly had the stamina and calling to do so, and he didn’t seem to suffer for it. But I, on the other hand, was working hard to live up to his expectations. We were presented with the idea that any good Christian would work just as hard as the guy that was gifted with a surfeit of strength, whether they were so gifted or not. And that kind of attitude prevails in many ministries; it’s all a blessing and honor to suffer for the Lord as you give yourself to His service.

But what does the Bible really say about it? Here is the passage I eventually fell back on when I was wallowing in guilt for not being able to keep up: “Now it happened as they went that He entered a certain village; and a certain woman named Martha welcomed Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus’ feet and heard His word. But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached Him and said, ‘Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me.’ And Jesus answered and said to her, ‘Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.'” (Luke 10:38-42).

Notice, Jesus did not praise Martha for all the good things she was doing for His sake. It almost appears, from that passage alone, that He wasn’t impressed by her service at all. But Mary, He did praise. You see, Mary thought it more important to learn from Jesus than to do things for Him. Of course, there is a balance to be made as well; in James 2:18 it says, “But someone will say, ‘You have faith, and I have works.’ Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” Who you are determines what you will do, and true faith gives birth to good works. But it’s the faith that comes first. It’s the heart that seeks Jesus that comes first. Works grow out of those things, not the other way around. But works themselves are not anywhere near as important as the heart they reveal.

Furthermore, take a look at what Paul said in Philippians 3:7-8 : “But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ.” What were the things Paul counted loss? Look at the preceding verses, it was all the stuff that he did, supposedly in the name of the Lord. It counted as nothing to him because he didn’t do them in the true knowledge of Christ. He says more along similar lines in 1 Corinthians 13; nothing that is done without love is of any value, and love springs directly from the knowledge of God (1 John 4:7-12).

So then, what are you doing? Are you merely serving the Lord, spending your strength for His sake? Or are you learning of Him, and loving as He does? If it’s the latter, your works are gold, silver and precious gems … but if the former, they are mere wood, hay and stubble, no matter how good you think they really are (1 Cor. 3:12). As Christians, our foremost goal must be to know Christ and love Him, and then let our works from that heart.

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Getting It Right (Focus on Grace, January 2013)

Posted on May 25, 2014 by DHawthorne

Picture, if you will, a man. He is young, still somewhat idealistic, passionate and energetic. His friends, if asked to describe him with one word, would say things like, “faithful,” “devout,” and “intense,” and they would mean those things in the best possible way. He is utterly devoted to his god … he prays daily, he never misses a worship service, and his participation is fervent and sincere. His charitable acts are well-known. He is held up as a good example in his community. And one day, incensed with the wickedness he sees in the world, he straps a bomb around his waist and blows up a local cafe.

Up until that last line, I could have been describing a believer. And most reading this might think, OK, it’s a Muslin extremist. But what if I changed that line to say, “And one day, incensed with the wickedness he sees in the world, he picks up his rifle and waits outside an abortion clinic until the doctor appears, who he then shoots to death”?

Extremism is not limited to any particular religious or ideological group. In fact, it is often indistinguishable from true devotion to a casual observer, until that moment when it expresses itself in an action no right-minded person would condone. But it doesn’t have to be some overt act or horrifying behavior; sometimes it’s an attitude that flies below everyone’s radar. It might be a subtle disapproval of anyone who doesn’t do exactly as they do. It might be a condescending air, or condemning spirit that people can see, but brush off as a character quirk. It might be nothing visible at all to others.

But there is one thing all extremists of any degree share, and that is the absolute conviction that they are right. They have formed their ideals, however they have formed them, and they reject with prejudice every thought that opposes what they have decided to be true. Often, in fact, almost always, they can back their position up with whatever they consider scripture, even though others who use the same scriptures disagree. Even some who diligently study the Bible can get things wrong, and their actions show quite clearly that their understanding of the Bible is different from other people’s, who have studied it just as much.

There are two major difficulties I can see with this particular state of mind, putting aside when it devolves into full-blown-crazy extremism. The first is when a person is utterly convinced they are right about something, yet they are wrong; and second is when they are utterly convinced they are right, and they truly are, but they hold to it for the wrong reasons. And I’m not at all certain the latter is any better than the former.

Hebrews 11:6 states that without faith, it is impossible to please God. But a great many people, Christians included, think that faith and conviction are the same thing. A solid faith might lead to conviction, but it is still possible to be convinced of error. But the Bible also teaches us what faith really is: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen,” (Hebrews 11:1). In other words, faith is the recognition of a truth outside yourself that is not evident to your own senses. If I say to you, “I have an office chair in my living room,” it takes no faith at all on my part: I’m sitting in it as I write this, and both my sight and my tactile senses confirm it exists. But if you are confident in my trustworthiness, and take my word that this chair exists, then you have faith in what I have said. You believe me, and you too are convinced I have an office chair in my living room. If you heard the same thing from another person, let’s say, someone who has only been in my home once, there could be some doubt about the chair. Maybe they misremember it, or maybe I got rid of it since they visited. Can you see the point? Your faith is only as good as the person you have faith in. And I think this is exactly what pleases God: faith in Him. Not faith in what others say of Him, and not whatever ideas you have come up with on your own about Him, but the recognition and understanding of Him that comes from God Himself.

Of course, this requires that God speaks to us, and it requires that we recognize His voice, and we understand Him. He speaks to us through the Bible … which is precisely why we call it the Word of God. But how can we have any confidence we understand the Bible correctly? And how can we be sure we are not drifting towards an extremism that’s based on our own understanding, and not the Lord’s truth?

Look again at Hebrews 11:6, with some emphasis on the second half of the verse –
“… for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” God is not going to leave us dangling, He will reward us if we seek Him.
John 16:8-13 – “And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: of sin, because they do not believe in Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged. I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.” God has left the Holy Spirit specifically to help us understand Him, His Word, and what is right.

John 1:18 – “No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.” This is an integral part of the gospel; Christ came to show us who the Father is, and one of the ways that He showed us was by dying to pay the price for our sins. With such a loving God, can we really be afraid that we will get it utterly wrong? Yes, we will sometimes make mistakes. Yes, we will sometimes take another’s word for spiritual things and get them wrong. But we can be assured that for as long as we are diligently seeking Him, we will find Him (Matt. 7:7-8).

So then, if we desire to please God, we must earnestly seek to know Him. And we must be diligent to rightly understand the Bible (2 Tim. 2:15), as the Holy Spirit guides us (John 16:13). We cannot simply accept what we have been told without seeking to understand it rightly ourselves, and we cannot quickly latch on to any concept that pops into our heads without prayerfully considering it in the light of God’s word.

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