Faith without works is dead (another picture-less post)

How many times have you heard the scripture "faith without works is dead"?  I know I've heard it hundreds of times. Maybe thousands. I have nodded my head in agreement. I have "amen"-ed. I have pondered it. I have wrestled with it. I have been confused by it. I have come to understand it. I have been confused by it again.

Sunday night, the East Rock family looked into Romans 2 together. Watch out! You who think you've got things all figured out. You religious. You "guides to the blind". God's judgement is for ALL sinners. The religious and the pagan. His salvation is, indeed, also for ALL sinners, if we will but let his kindness lead us to repentance, thus fulfilling its intention.

During this talk of judgement and the law and faith, that familiar verse from James 2 was referenced: Faith without works is dead. And all of a sudden, like a flash of light, it struck me as the most true and obvious fact in the world. I am always putting my faith in something, whether it be God, money, my husband, myself. And that faith is always followed by actions. If I have faith in money, and my husband says he wants to give away $14.00, my heart beats a little faster, and my mind tries to figure out how much that will set us back on our monthly budget, and my mouth says "Why would you do that?"

I had, all during the previous week, been struggling to understand the tension between salvation being only by grace through faith, and the reality that blessing comes when we obey God. It's not like I thought God should bless me even if do everything in obstinate disobedience to Him (or did I?), but I didn't understand how God could save me and sanctify me freely (on my part), yet demand obedience as part of the deal. I had been asking Him to help me understand this, and He answered that night (and in several other ways prior to that night---thought this seemed to be the turning point, sort of like Jacob's turning point after he wrestled with God all night and got a new name). When I have faith in __________, it Necessarily follows that my thoughts and actions will follow that faith. They just can't do anything otherwise. So, when I have faith in God, my whole self will follow Him totally. I believe Lord, help my unbelief!

This post is ugly

Hi, my name's Cristina, and I'm an idolater. "Of what?", you say? Of anything. Everything.

Here's something I posted yesterday on our "Life Together Group" (church small group) page on facebook:

"God seems to keep telling me in the last couple of days that I've forgotten my first Love. and i have this feeling He intends to strip some things away, so that I will remember that He alone is my portion. But I'm scared of what that means. I want to be free to love and serve only Him...but I'm afraid of the process hurting. I don't want to be paralyzed by fear, but that's where I feel like I am right now. Pray for me?"

This morning I got up, ironed two shirts for Casey, kissed him goodbye. I made my coffee, poured a cup of water, ate my waffle with peanut butter and honey (delish). I wanted to do anything but sit down with God and His Word. I wanted to run away. I wanted to hide somewhere, just like Adam & Eve did in the Scripture Casey and I read last night. Post-sin, they suddenly realized they were naked, and they felt shame. So they hid themselves. I can relate.

I made myself sit down and start reading Genesis. We are reading through the Bible in a year, chronologically, with our church fam. Read my five chapters, read the questions in our book that goes along with our reading, tried to think of some answers...tried to talk to God. "Okay, enough..." Got on facebook. Read something a brother had commented on what I posted yesterday. I didn't like it:

"The whole lost your first love thing is often because we've supplanted God. This question might be rhetorical, but what has stolen your heart? What you love more then Him is probably what he'll strip away. It's especially crazy to know that God is allowed to do that; not just with little things like owning nice gadgets or cars or clothes, but He's also allowed to take away our health and our loved ones and our income security and all our hope in this world. Ugh."

It was too true, and nothing that "tickled my ears", so to speak. Scrolled and scrolled and scrolled. Read a lot of stupid things. Read a few requests for prayer...tried to "throw up" a few prayers...half-heartedly. Went back and re-read that comment that I didn't like. Realized it's futile to ignore a truth about God because I don't like it. Thought about this sheet of questions I got while I was at a mid-year conference during my time in EA. It's called "Gospel Diagnostics".

"Gospel Diagnostics" is a fancy name for "20 ways of asking you the same question, namely, what are you worshiping instead of the One True God?" And, like I said, I'll worship almost anything, if I think it will bring me your security, happiness, distraction, comfort, warm fuzzies, etc. I mean, really...it's ridiculous. You want an example? Wait, I can't give you one, because I worship your opinion of me, and if I tell you what goes on in my mind, I promise you won't like me as much as you used to. At least, that's what I tell myself. But, since God just pointed out to me how absolutely insane it is to care more about what you think than what He thinks, I will share an example.

Saturday night, Casey and I picked up a couple of girls we've gotten to know through church to go to the Warehouse (if you don't know what that is, you should just ask me later to give more detail, but basically it's a big building where kids can hang out and play bball, games, etc. and hear about Jesus). Casey, being the more free spender of our family, was happy to buy them all kinds of snacks and then to treat us all to dinner at Wendy's afterward. Me, the very-much-saver of the family, is adding up how much we're spending the whole time. I know, I know, we were only at Wendy's...how much could we really spend? But, remember, this logic doesn't matter for someone who is a saver. Feeling we'd spent so much that we would now be in debt for the rest of the month, I woke up Sunday morning anxiously thinking about how much we'd spent. We visited a church with our neighbors. As they passed the offering plate, Casey asked if it was okay with me to just put the rest of the cash he had in the plate. Thinking at first that he probably just had a couple dollars, I was like "whatever, sure." But, suddenly, I remembered it was actually $14.00. "Why do you want to do that," I quickly asked him. "Just as a way of saying, 'I trust you, God,'" he said. Stuck in a place where I had to either show my true nature and demand that he not put the money in, or protect my image and pretend to trust God, I begrudgingly said, "Okay, well, do what you feel you should." In that moment, God pricked my heart. Stabbed my heart?... Really? $14.00? I can't trust God for fourteen tiny little dollars??? He owns the cattle on a thousand hills for goodness sake! And the hills too, as Tim Bowes would point out.

You know what? I don't really have a nice conclusion to wrap this all up, except to say, my heart is deceitfully wicked. God, cleanse my heart! I guess this is, really, just a confession of my true nature, and my longing for God to change me mixed with my fear of what that really means, and how bad that surgery might hurt. "I know that nothing good lives in me, that is in my flesh...who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! There is now therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, for the law of the Spirit of life has set me free from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do.By sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, in order that, the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (see Romans 7 and 8...I totally mixed up translations in here too...who cares...it's a good Word.).

Lord, set me free.

"Evidence, Boy!"

I think a lot. Perhaps too much. I think a lot about everything that's wrong in my life. Definitely too much--because there's so much that's right.  I'm convicted every time I look back at the story of the wandering Israelites--the story of how God delivered a people from slavery in Egypt to become a people for his own possession, a people for him to bless and lead into the Promised Land where they would enjoy serving him rather the heavy-handed Egyptians.  Yet, this group of people never entered the Promised Land, or rather their first generation didn't.  Instead their first generation wandered the desert for 40 years till they all but 2 faithful ones died off.  Why? Because they complained. They complained about missing the meat-pots they ate while slaves in Egypt, discontent with the adventure God was leading them on.  Not believing that there was better in store for them at their destination, better RIGHT IN FRONT OF THEM leading them as a Pillar of Cloud by day and a Pillar of Fire by night--the Holy Presence of Jehovah.

God allowed a whole generation of Israelites to die off because they complained and did not treasure his Grace.  So why am I still here?  What have I missed out on?

God has been even more gracious to me.  "Evidence, boy!", my friend Tim shouts at me often.  He's good to do that.  I have a beautiful wife who loves the God who made her, loves the husband He's given her.  I have a great family.  I have a great church family--men who are like real brothers to me, who love me genuinely and look out for me.  An awesome small group I get the joy of leading. And then there's all those American "essentials"...the ability to brush my teeth everyday, the roof over my head, A/C, two cars, shirts & feckless ties for work 5 days a week.  That's right, I get Saturdays off too.

So as I mope tonight over not having the cable requisite for witnessing Kobe's impending Olympic glory, not having seen Dark Knight Rise yet, not having more money, more charisma, or more time to do some things I want to do (like blog)....well, the Evidence weighs against me and finds me guilty, of complaining. Of blindness to see "Wow my life is great...Really, it is. It's not naivete, this is real."

Romans 8:32 paraphrase, "God who did not even spare His own Son but freely gave Him to us, how will He not also with Him give us all things He's promised?"  The verdict: God is overwhelmingly good to me.  And His presence & approval is all I'll ever need for everlasting satisfaction.  Even if the list above was clipped, His presence would fill up the lack.  None of those blessings are enjoyable apart from Him, but He illumines each one.

God created me to know Him & enjoy Him forever. Wow.

Birds and Flowers

Photo Credit

When Casey & I got engaged, he had been working at the Call Center for about two months & I was unemployed. It's not like we weren't eating or anything, but we weren't exactly rolling in cash either. How exactly we were going to afford furniture for an apartment, let alone a honeymoon, was a mystery to us. 

As time went on, God provided these pieces of the puzzle for us, from places we couldn't have known about if we'd tried to figure it out. A free bedroom set from friends of friends. Free furniture from different family members. The way He kept surprising us like that---it made me a little bolder in my asking. I started asking Him to provide for our honeymoon. And He did. "Whoa! God can do that?"

By the time our wedding day rolled around in late July (side note: Happy 2nd anniversary Casey Ray---plus a week and a day), what had already been a sweet passage of Scripture to us, was now our life. You can actually find the Scripture in two places---Matthew 6, and Luke 12. Birds and flowers. Jesus is like "Look! Look at the birds, and look at the flowers---they don't do  ANYTHING and God feeds them and clothes them...and you are worth so much more than they are!"

Matthew 6:33 says "Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be added to you as well." That's it! That's it?? That's all I have to do?? Just seek God, seek His kingdom, and He already knows what I need and will delight to provide it, as a Father delights to care for his daughter? Yes. That's it.

I love how that verse (in Matthew 6) is followed up in Luke 12. Verse 32 says "Fear not, little flock, it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." Wow. (Another side note: if you struggle to understand God as your Father, and you want to hear an amazing sermon on this verse, go look up John Piper's sermon on Luke 12:32 at www.desiringgod.org---for me, it was life-changing.). So, not only do I not have to worry about my Father God providing for my physical needs, but I also don't have to worry about the one thing He's told me to seek (His kingdom) either, because it's His good pleasure to give it to me! Amazing.

God is still Very much teaching (ingraining?) this to us. I would guess, mostly, because we forget it so quickly. We spend over our budget, like we did this month. OVER budget. And we don't know how it's gonna work out, but I hear God whispering to me each time we're faced with a choice to trust Him or hold onto our money more tightly --I hear him telling me to trust Him. That's it---just trust Him. And then I find a $20 bill I had stuck in a journal from college graduation, and a $10 bill in the backseat of my car (I don't normally have cash in my car, so don't ask me for a ride hoping to find some). And then I get paid more than we expected for the month (the extra pay equal to the amount we went over budget). So, I realized this morning that to God we were never "over budget". We were never "in the red". He knew EXACTLY how this would all pan out. And that is why Matthew 6:31-32 says "So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?'or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them."

This is so freeing! God sees the big picture. I don't. I can trust Him as my Father to provide for these needs, and so I am liberated to solely seek His kingdom and His righteousness! Let it be Lord.