Refocus

For not one of us lives for himself, and not one dies for himself; for if we live, we live for the Lord, or if we die, we die for the Lord; therefore whether we live or die, we are the Lord's. (Romans 14:7-8)

I have been thinking about this verse off and on for quite awhile since I started this chapter in Romans wondering what it really means. It seems that the way it is usually approached is so idealistic or vague that it doesn't seem to make a lot of sense in everyday life. I am praying for more insight about what God wants me to know about these verses.

What comes to mind this morning is that religion has become so self-focused and human-centered that God is trying to remind us that the center of all our attention needs to be outward focused and directed toward His heart. This comes right at the end of a whole passage delineating differences between beliefs of people within the body of Christ that conflict with each other. Now it appears that Paul is saying that focusing on our differences is not nearly so important as focusing on God.

If we view our relationship with God like spokes on a wheel then this would make a lot of sense. If viewed from a position on the opposite side of the wheel, other spokes will be very much out of line with our viewpoint and opinions. It will be very easy for us to compare others position on issues with our own and criticize, condemn and pass judgment on their views. But the same would be just as easy for them to do to us. Conducting ourselves in this way only tends to highlight our differences and create more and more division and disharmony within the body. No matter how right we may feel we are, pointing out perceived faults in others tends to only alienate and tear down the work that the Holy Spirit is seeking to accomplish at the heart level.

In these verses I see a call to realign our thinking and focus back onto what is important and what will bring us closer to the real and only point of legitimate reference for any Christian. Religion is not something we are to perform to earn anything from God. No matter where we are coming from theologically, if we center our focus on God, seeing truth about Him more clearly for ourselves and deepening our affections for Him ahead of everything else, then we will inevitably find ourselves coming closer and closer to each other as we approach the common center of all truth.

Not one of us lives for himself... I sense that Paul is writing from within a social context of community experienced by the early church that is so foreign to most of us today that we do not really understand most of the implications and assumptions of those within that body of believers. While they certainly had a lot of personal problems and each person was very much in a healing process, there was a level of transparency, vulnerability and mutual love and trust that would be shocking and even frightening to most people in churches today. I believe most people who now consider themselves quite religious would be scandalized by the level of openness that was required in order to participate in that early community.

When Paul talks about one of us, he is referring to those who have chosen to be absorbed into the body of Christ and fully participate in community with all its implications. I have to admit that not only is my church a very long ways from reflecting that kind of unity and openness but that I have never even seen a community or group of people who were experiencing that kind of intimacy. I certainly believe that God fully intends for us to live in that kind of oneness with each other and it will happen with or without us very soon. I am quite hungry to find and experience the kind of fellowship as described in the New Testament church but am also very skeptical of claims by people today to have achieved this kind of community. When they are more closely examined it is usually found that they are carefully orchestrated image management programs that are trying very hard to create the external symptoms of community life without properly addressing the root causes and creating an atmosphere where hearts can really thrive in a safe environment.

The early New Testament church was so energized, quite literally, by the dynamic inner power and working of the Holy Spirit that it was downright dangerous to your very life to try to join yourself to that intimate fellowship of vulnerable believers unless your were willing to dismantle all of your charades and masks you had acquired throughout your life. Ananias and Sapphira found out the hard way that you had better not mess with the intense power surging through a real church that is full of transparency and healing power from the very real presence of God in their midst. They thought that they could maintain their status quo of pretension like everyone else they knew that was part of typical religion, but they discovered too late that this was no typical religion. This was the real thing and the power in this religion was a great deal more than they had bargained for.

Quite literally, the early believers had to choose between continuing to live for themselves or to surrender control and authority over their hearts to the one and only Lord worthy of that role. It is important to note that they were not surrendering control of their hearts and minds to any human leader. That is how most counterfeit religions work. True spirituality does not assign any human being to be the channel of control over anyone else. In Christ's kingdom there is only one Master and that is the humble, graceful, kind and perfect Jesus who is no different now than when He lived here physically on this earth.

Every person in the true body of believers must be connected and subordinated directly to the Lordship of Jesus Himself individually from their heart and not to any other lord. Everything in their life then flows out of that relationship with Jesus and the intimacy that is enjoyed with Him is openly shared with all others who are likewise fully submitted to the complete authority of Jesus within their hearts. Intimacy is one of the most important things our hearts were created to enjoy and thrive on but has been mostly lost through the effects of sin in our world.

The counterfeit of true intimacy for which our heart constantly craves is the myriad offers of satisfaction through the various means and adaptations of everything sexually oriented in our world today. Satan knows that we crave intimacy almost more than life itself and he has spent thousands of years perfecting complex counterfeits that hold out convincing promises to satisfy that insatiable longing within us. But every one of them when indulged in leave us empty and even more hungry for the real thing. The deeper a person gets into the counterfeits the more intense and obvious they become aware of their deep need for real intimacy.

It sounds all too much like a cliché, but at the deepest level it is still unavoidably true: Jesus Himself is the only way we can find the intimacy that we each crave so deeply. Even the intimacy enjoyed by Christian couples within the context of true marriage is only a dim taste of the real intimacy that Jesus desires to ravish our heart with in direct connection with His own heart. This intense hunger inside of us has only one food that will hit the spot, and we can never feel really satisfied until we are realigned with our original wiring diagram, repaired and restored to our original destiny and purpose. Only when we are properly in intimate relationship with our Creator can we experience the true joys of pure, satisfying intimacy within the fellowship of true believers. Whether we live or die, we are the Lord's.

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Might and Power

...'Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,' says the LORD of hosts. (Zechariah 4:6)

Yesterday I got to pondering this verse I heard quoted in a talk that has had an impact on me recently. As I thought about it I asked God what the difference is between might and power. In my thinking the two are nearly synonymous. I felt the need to look them up in the original and do some personal research to find out what this verse is really implying, because the underlying truth of this passage is very important to know if I want to be successful in life. So this morning I have taken some time to look up these words as well as peruse a number of other places where they are used in the Old Testament to pick up the sense of their meanings and applications.

Might: translated from the Hebrew word chayil. This version of strength implies external power through collectiveness. It refers to power or the threat of power by amassing resources such as wealth or armed groups of men. It is often tied to the idea of intimidation by the amassing of forces of some sort. It also refers to wealth implying the ability to use that as power over others. In both cases it seems to infer the power gained through the amassing of collective resources. It is also often interpreted as the phrase, mighty men of valor.

Power: translated from the Hebrew word koach. From what I can gather from its many uses throughout the Old Testament, this word is used to describe power or strength that is generally more internal in nature. Part of this is what we sometimes refer to as 'intestinal fortitude'. It also refers sometimes to physical strength such as with Samson, but it seems to always be linked with the will and emotional strength.

So what I am starting to sense here is that God is telling me that it is not by external amassing of force and/or resources, neither is it by my own internal resources of either physical ability, emotional strength or force of will, but it is something outside of these resources by which God's will and plans will be accomplished in my life: namely, His Spirit.

What I find very interesting is a verse in Deuteronomy that also uses both of these Hebrew words and appears to me to be something of a parallel to this passage. But you shall remember the LORD your God, for it is He who is giving you power (koach) to make wealth (chayil), that He may confirm His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day. (Deuteronomy 8:18)

It is not by my abilities or resources, either individually or collectively with others that I am to live and carry out God's plans for me. It is by letting go of my desires for control and instead letting God infuse me with His presence and His Spirit to synchronize me with His heart and His ways. Saying it another way, it is not by trying harder but by resting more completely in peaceful confidence in God's goodness, sovereignty, abilities and plans under every circumstance and in every situation.

This “formula” then, can be applied to nearly every situation in which I find myself, particularly in my spiritual life. If I find myself stressing out about the immaturity and dysfunction of those around me, I need to remember that it is not up to me to “fix” them or cause them to grow up. I must relax and remind myself that they are God's projects and not mine in any way. If God happens to assign me a bit role to play in assisting with their growth, then I need to be faithful to follow His guiding. But it is still none of my business as to the apparent success or failure of His work in their hearts and lives. The only thing I need to pay attention to is my own willingness to keep infused with the right spirit which will produce an atmosphere of peace in the midst of any confusion or clamor.

Even in my own life I am not to fret and worry about how I am going to get rid of my bad habits, my dysfunctional ways of relating to others or my own doubts and confusion and faults. If I will give God ongoing permission to have His way in my life no matter how I feel, He is faithful to honor that permission and to cleanse me from every attitude and spirit that is not in sync with His ways and His heart. Jesus takes full responsibility for my salvation, which is the process of restoring and healing me. I need to listen to the real message of this verse and not keep trying to resort to my own schemes and innovations to accomplish what I think is God's will, either in other's lives or in my own.

It is not by collective collusion, force, or even human wisdom that God's work and will can be accomplished. Neither is it by increasing my skills, my knowledge and pushing harder with my plans that God's ways can come to fruition. It is only by synchronizing more thoroughly my own spirit with the Spirit of Jesus that His ways and atmosphere will begin to be seen both in my own life and in my influence which will infect the spirit of those around me.

Judge Not

"Do not judge, and you will not be judged; and do not condemn, and you will not be condemned; pardon, and you will be pardoned. Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure--pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return." (Luke 6:37-38)

Judgment is usually indulged in when some wrong inside of someone else resonates with some similar root or fault in our own hearts. This text is simply an explanation of a universal principle, a law of reality, a truth that defines the way our minds naturally function.

If I judge someone, by doing so I am really exposing and amplifying the same or very similar fault in my own life. I am really giving notice to all around that I have the problem which I am accusing someone else of having. Even though I may re-label the issue so as to try to avoid detection myself, the very fact that it arouses intensity in my emotions betrays the fact that something is unresolved in my own heart and needs healing.

Therefore you have no excuse, everyone of you who passes judgment, for in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things. (Romans 2:1)

So when Jesus says that I should not judge if I do not want to be judged, part of the meaning of these words is that when I stop judging others I also stop judging myself; when I stop condemning others I stop feeding the atmosphere of condemnation that has surrounded my own heart and mind. Ironically, it may be found that we ourselves are the greatest source of the condemnation that we feel. We try to blame others for condemning us or think that God is making us feel condemned. But God says very clearly that He is not condemning anyone and even if others try to condemn us it is still our own choice as to what we will believe.

If condemnation from the outside resonates with self-condemnation on the inside, then it will feel so true that it will set up camp in our hearts and continue the destructive work of eating us alive from the inside out like a cancer. The true function of the real body of Christ is to create a safe, non-condemning atmosphere in which a person can once again breath and thrive in truth and grow in maturity. The true community of believers is to reflect for each other the true nature of God Himself who is never a source of condemnation.

We will know by this that we are of the truth, and will assure our heart before Him in whatever our heart condemns us; for God is greater than our heart and knows all things. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God. (1 John 3:19-21)

This verse shows very clearly that one of the results of freedom from condemnation is confidence. Conversely, the effects of sin through condemnation is to rob us of our confidence. Notice also the double application of the first part of this verse that addresses both sides of our being, our left brain intellectual, logical side and then our right brain, heart-oriented side. Knowing and assurance come from both sides of our brain being in agreement and engaged in the process of restoration to wholeness and peace with God (salvation). We will be in growing agreement with truth and our hearts will also have more and more assurance which is just as important if not more.

Also note that this verse highlights what I pointed out before, that it is really our own hearts condemning us that is the real problem. When we find ourselves under the condemnation of our own heart it feels like we are hopelessly lost in slavery to our own deranged sinful flesh trying to hijack our spiritual experience. John tells us here that the way to get out of this desperate predicament is to choose to believe the superior authority of God in this matter and refuse to be sucked into the conclusions of our natural feelings. As our feelings are ignored in favor of real truth from God, they will soon change and begin to align more closely to our choices to believe real truth and then our own heart can be trained to no longer condemn us. The more we train our heart to not condemn ourselves the more confidence we will enjoy in our growing intimacy with our true Father and with fellow believers.

Who's the Judge?

Who are you to judge the servant of another...?

But you, why do you judge your brother? Or you again, why do you regard your brother with contempt? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. (Romans 14:1)

It occurred to me yesterday yet another aspect of this question to a person who finds themselves judging someone else. If I believe that I can justifiably judge someone, whether it be their opinions, their doctrines or especially their motives, then very clearly I consider myself adequate and capable enough to fill the role of a judge. But in doing so I am attempting to supplant God as the only one qualified to accurately judge and evaluate a person created in His image.

It also occurred to me that far too much evangelism for the church is conducted along these very lines. I realize that we recoil with anger or disbelief if this is proposed, but the fact is that much of our evangelistic techniques is to point out other people's faults and false beliefs in contrast to our own beliefs and then attempt to convince them that ours are better and they should come over to our side, they should join our church.

This kind of approach has made me feel very uneasy for many years and I now see one of the reasons why. I believe that instead of focusing on our differences and trying to coerce others by arguments or threats of punishment by God if they refuse to agree with us, we should be seeking to look for the good in others, look for where God is already at work in their lives and hearts and affirm that connection of the Spirit that even they may not yet be aware of. Then as we earn their trust and confidence we can, by example and genuine, selfless love and service, attract them into a deeper connection with the God who is crazy about them and loves them passionately and desires more than anything else to restore His lovely image in their lives no matter how messed up they may appear to others.

Some might become frightened at this evangelistic proposal, believing that it would fail to properly indoctrinate people, which in the back of most of our minds is the only purpose of evangelism in the first place. But I strongly believe that we must challenge our assumptions for our own selves as to what it really means to be a Christian and be willing to be far more vulnerable, transparent and open about our own need for healing and growth and our own dysfunctions and problems. We must become much more aware that true spirituality has much more to do with the condition of our spirit and our relationships with both God and with others than it has to do with what list of doctrines we happen to be able to memorize.

I can't remember anywhere in the Bible where God's people were supposed to subscribe to a list of doctrines in order to please God and belong to a church. But I do see a great deal in the Bible about emphasis on attitudes, on the way those in the body are to relate to each other and the picture of God that we project to a very skeptical world. So how is it that we have now come to assume that religion primarily consists of a list of doctrines instead of focusing more on the way we treat each other and our implicit trust in the righteousness of Jesus and the power of God to transform our inner beings?

Maybe it is because we are caught up in the heady, deceptive, self-focused obsession of acting like a judge and doing so somehow helps us to avoid facing our own issues, triggers and problems. Most of us have been caught in the trap of believing that appearance is everything, that attending church regularly is more important than attending to our hearts, that intellectual beliefs are more important than the spirit that permeates the atmosphere around us. Maybe acting as a judge is so addictive that even when we begin to see that maybe it is wrong we just can't let it go because it is the biggest thing that helps us cope with our pain, it prevents us from having to face our own problems head-on, it makes us feel valuable and important and even better than others. And because we all desperately crave feeling valuable we are terrified of facing these practices for what they really are because they have such a long, successful history of growing the numbers of our church and making us feel good about ourselves.

Am I falling into the very trap that I am describing here? Am I judging those around me in a self-righteous spirit while holding myself aloof? I pray that God will keep my eyes open and that I will not be caught in the very sins which I can see in my own church, but I know that I am equally very vulnerable. Refraining from describing a problem does not make it disappear. But equally true, condemning another person for being caught in that problem does not give them great motivation to admit their condition. I should know, I have lived under condemnation and judgment for much of my life.

I am all too aware of the example of my own father who was quick to point out sins in the lives of other church members but equally quick to deny that what he was doing was judging them. I always found this frustrating and very hypocritical on his part. It seemed that it was much easier for him to simply change the definitions of the words that described what he was really doing than it was for him to admit that maybe he was wrong in his attitudes and resultant actions. Over the years he caused far too much damage in the hearts of many people around him, especially in the local church, and much of the bitterness that was produced still lingers in some hearts yet today that I am left to deal with in his place. So I have a very real example of the results of judging and the ill effects that result from this kind of false activity within the body of Christ.

So what are the true answers to the questions that Paul poses for me here?

Who are you to judge?

I am a person who thinks I am capable of passing judgment on someone else's motives because I want to make myself look better in the eyes of people and of God. Of course I can't admit that this is my motive, but the evidence betrays that. In doing this I am really supplanting the role of God in their lives.

Why do you judge your brother?

Because I want to keep the focus away from my own faults and the easiest way to do that is to keep attention on other people's faults and sins. But in doing so I am setting myself up as the standard by which to measure their lives. That really means that I am trying to replace Jesus' role as the only example to follow.

The last statement in verse ten is the real wake-up call to shock us into reality if we are willing to believe the truth implicit in it. Every single one of us is going to have to appear before the judgment seat of God. Now, the immediate reaction of the heart whenever we hear that summons is always determined by the opinions you have about what God is like and how He feels about you.

My dad believed that appearing in judgment meant that he would be carefully cross-examined as to whether he successfully point out other people's sins sufficiently to avoid being liable for them. One of his clarion passages that guided his activities was Ezekiel 3:17-21. He lived in so much fear about God from these verses that he felt compelled to point out other's faults whenever he thought he perceived them in order to avoid God's condemnation on himself. His assumptions about what these verses mean were far more important for him than this passage in Romans 14.

But the fruit of all that fault-finding was not more righteousness in the church but an overflowing of bitterness and resentment in the hearts of all around him while his own heart overflowed with bitterness. While denying that he was judging he would accuse others of judging him whenever they suggested that maybe his course was not conducive to real growth or was the true will of God for His children. But as the fruit of his labors matured it became clear to many around him that this was a path very different from that of Jesus' example for us. For myself, I determined that I would try to avoid at all costs following in his footsteps in this area and it has served as a sharp warning for me for many years.

And that warning is very much needed, for I have many of the same tendencies that my dad displayed. It is far too easy for me to judge others for whatever reasons I may have, known or unknown to me. But the warning has also helped me seal my lips many times when I feel the urge to criticize others in the church. I have seen firsthand the terrible effects of unbridled criticism and fault-finding and I want my life to become an example of a better way of relating to others and obedience to the Word of God. I have been under a lot of conviction in this area for a long time and it is something that I have to keep a constant check on. But God is faithful and is ready to warn me each time my flesh rises up to point out sins in other's lives. He also reminds me of how much of those same faults still are active in my own life.

This chapter of Romans is coming to be much more than I expected for me personally. But I am very glad that the Spirit is convicting me through the Word, because it means that I can grow, can transform, can escape the traps and pitfalls that caused previous generations to create so much heartache and trouble in the lives of many around them. I look to the faithfulness of God to transform me into His image. I do not have to remain stuck in the sins of the fathers, even if they are deep ruts that I find myself following in. God is powerful to save and I choose to have Him in charge of my destiny and as my daily mentor. I choose to accept His authority for me today and seek to discover His more perfect, loving ways to spread the truth about Him among those I meet.

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