Sunday’s sermon begins our study of the Ten Commandments, the first of which is “You shall have no other gods before me,” (Ex 20:3). This week’s blog post, originally published Oct 11, 2019, explores the theme of idolatry in the human heart (mine in particular).
 
The story is told in 1 Samuel 5, but it provides a useful metaphor for my own spiritual battle.

Disaster struck when the Israelites foolishly carried the Ark of the Covenant into the battlefield as a good-luck charm: the Philistines prevailed in the battle and captured the sacred Ark. They carried the Ark into the temple of their god Dagon and set it up there, alongside the carved image of their deity.

The next morning they discovered that Dagon had toppled during the night. They set him up again.

The next morning after that, they found Dagon not only again toppled over, but also the head and hands of the image had been broken off.

Eventually, the Philistines realized they had no business keeping the Ark, and they sent it back to Israel.

Centuries earlier, God had said to His own people: “You shall have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3). In Samuel’s account, God now says the same thing to the pagan nation of Philistia: don’t try to set up an idol alongside the One True God.

God says as much to us.

To me.

And I have had to learn who my Dagon is and what it means to let God topple the idol of my heart.

Tim Keller has put his finger on the essence of idolatry: An idol is any good thing that we treat as the ultimate thing.

“What is an idol?” he writes in his book Counterfeit Gods. “It is anything more important to you than God, anything that absorbs your heart and imagination more than God, anything you seek to give you what only God can give.…

“An idol is whatever you look at and say, in your heart of hearts, ‘If I have that, then I’ll feel my life has meaning, then I‘ll know I have value, then I’ll feel significant and secure.’”

In other words, it is not the goodness or badness of the thing itself that makes it an idol; it is how I treat it, what role that thing plays in my mind and heart.

This means that any number of valid and worthwhile passions can assume the role of an idol:

• Love for my family

• Love for my country

• Desire to excel in ministry

I think there are three diagnostic questions to see whether I have inflated a good thing into an ultimate thing, an idol:

1. The question of my expectations: What am I trusting to protect me and provide for me?

2. The question of my interior life: What ideals inform my fantasies? What anxieties gnaw at the edges of my mind?

3. The question of my settled life posture: What is forming my habits?

And now it’s time for me to fess up, to admit what I have come to recognize as my own idol, my own Dagon that God is toppling in my heart and life.

I’ve always been a people-pleaser.

I’ve always wanted people to like me. Maybe it’s because I am the first-born. Maybe it’s because I’m an introvert.

Whatever the case, whatever the cause, I was that kid who always got into more trouble for what he didn’t do than for what he did. I was not the daring one who challenged authority; I was the high-achieving kid hungry for approval.

You may ask how a people-pleaser could last 40 years in the classroom. Fortunately, I learned early on that seeking the approval of my students was a non-starter. I learned as a young teacher how to grow thick skin and move ahead with my plans for my students despite their complaints and their dark speculations about my motives. I knew what we needed to do, and I took us toward that goal.

But when I left the classroom and landed in the pastorate, things changed. I quickly discovered what I call the “5:17 Principle.” In 1 Timothy 5:17, Paul tells Timothy that elders are “worthy of a double honor.”  I noticed right away that after I became a pastor people treated me differently, with more respect and deference. Somehow, the words “Pastor Paul” sounded so much finer than just “Paul.”

I’ve got to admit that that felt good.

And I quickly realized how easy it would be to become addicted to that kind of positive feedback from people, how easy it would be to become an approval junkie.

In other words, I recognized that my desire for approval and affirmation and validation (all legitimate desires in their own right) could become my idol:

• My expectations: It was possible for me to look to human affirmation to provide the protection and provision that only God could provide.

• My interior life: It was possible for me to let the drive for human approval shape my ambitions, and I could easily be dominated by a fear of human disapproval.

• My ministry posture: And it was easy to imagine myself shaping my ministry practices toward that end: doing what I needed to do to earn strokes and avoid criticism.

What I have discovered is that sin has a way of deeply entangling itself into my life. Excising sinful behaviors isn’t a simple matter, more like brain surgery than amputation. It’s complicated.

It is the mercy of God that He topples our idols, that He won’t let Dagon stand alongside Him.

He is ruthless with our idols because He refuses to give us over to our sin. If we would see it, He wants to reveal to us the pathetic hopelessness of looking elsewhere for what only He can give us.

It hasn’t been pleasant for me to admit all this to myself, but it has been revelatory. It’s been a kind of epiphany for me to recognize these toxic patterns in my heart. God’s Spirit still has a lot of work to do in rehabbing my expectations, my interior life, and my habits. But I am trusting God’s Spirit and God’s Word to carry that work to its completion.

Maybe you too are an approval junkie, and you have read all this with a kind of chilling recognition of your own life patterns.

Or maybe you are tempted to worship a different idol, some good thing that you are tempted to inflate into idolatrous proportions.

Regardless, know this: God will not let any idol stand in your life. In His mercy He will repeatedly topple your Dagon until you see the folly of trying to serve two masters.

Persevere,                                                                                                         
Paul Pyle     
Pastor of Discipleship

I hesitate to be too candid about my own experiences in these pages. For one thing, I don’t want these posts to be about me. I want to train our eyes toward Jesus. But we do use these pages to think out loud about what it means to follow Jesus in our world, so it is worthwhile for me to give an account of my own struggles along the way to help other struggling pilgrims.

A few weeks ago, I set aside a day to be alone with God. My plan was to go to a local park for several hours. I took with me only a few resources: a journal, the Scripture (a copy of the psalms), a favorite devotional.

My three goals for the day:

1. To try to sit quietly with God for at least one hour (an attempt to clear my head and decompress)

2. To journal during the day, to provide a play-by-play account of what I did and how it went; I did this for two reasons: to focus my thoughts and energies and to have a record to reflect on later

3. To copy Scripture (John 15:1-11) onto notecards as an aid to memorization

When I got to the park, I sat down at a picnic bench to be in silence. I had determined, mostly out of curiosity, to keep track of all the thoughts that came to my mind during my period of silence. I wanted to know: just how bad is my spiritual/mental ADHD?

Here are some of the thoughts that came to my mind as I attempted to sit in silence and clear my head:

• One of my favorite songs, “Give Me Jesus,” kept running through my head. (It could have been much worse.)

• I thought maybe I should take a hike.

• Then what I thought about while I was walking:

• I thought about how I should have brought a walking stick. We have several at home. Next time…

• I thought about my friend Dave Rough, who hiked the entirety of the Appalachian Trail (averaging about 15 miles per day).

• I was glad I got past that woman with the fierce-looking dog, with whom I was careful not to make eye contact (neither the dog nor the woman).

• It’s warmer than I thought it was going to be.

• These flying insects are a nuisance.
  

After my walk, I wondered why I’m having so much difficulty settling my mind down. The discipline, of course, is in quieting the mind. My problem isn’t that I don’t know how to do that (what could be simpler?). It’s much worse than a lack of skill: I can’t even imagine myself doing that.

By 2:30 I was back home. Too many distractions at the park (other people, and the insects). Of my three goals, I was able to accomplish all three of them, more or less. I did journal, and I did copy the Scripture (which I carry around in my pocket now for review), and I did spend an hour trying to settle my mind before God.

But settling my mind was – and still is – a great struggle.  

This hasn’t always been so difficult.

I used to spend a day alone with God once or twice a year when I was a teacher. And I didn’t have so much trouble focusing my mind then. My mind is racing now much more than when I was younger. I didn’t have a smart phone or the internet then, so there’s that to consider…

Apparently, quieting my mind is going to take longer than one day. As I mentioned in a previous post, I have begun to recalibrate my daily habits to slow my pace (paying more attention to the speed limit, cutting back on social media on my phone). I will need to persist in those disciplines, and I will need to think about what else I can do to calm the churning waters within.

I’m experimenting now with silence in the car while I drive: no more podcasts or audio books or sports talk. None of those things are wicked deeds, of course, but they may be hindering me from settling and clearing my mind.

This is not a confessional, nor is it an exhortation.

I am not seeking absolution, nor am I recommending that others pursue the same practices. I am only giving a frank account of how things went that day and how things are going now. On my day alone with God I didn’t set out to get a better gauge on my limitations, but that’s what happened. That day I learned that I have a long way to go.

Fortunately, my Teacher, who usually speaks in “a still, small voice,” is wise and patient, and He is committed to helping me learn. He has promised to complete the work He started in me.

Persevere,                                                                                                         
Paul Pyle     
Pastor of Discipleship

As I mentioned in a previous post, I’m trying to wrap my head around Jesus’ teaching on “abiding” in John 15. As I’ve meditated on the first two verses, I’ve come to the conclusion that anyone who follows Jesus should expect to suffer.

I’m not talking about suffering of persecution. There’s that, too, of course. Anyone who aligns his or her priorities with the King who has invaded our realm should expect to suffer at the hands of those who oppose that King. He told us to expect as much (John 15:18-25).

What I’m talking about is the inevitable suffering of the branches attached to the Vine, regardless of whether they are fruitful or barren.

As I’ve meditated on the first two verses of John 15, I’ve drawn two conclusions:

1.       The vineyard is never in a static, settled state. Thanks to the ceaseless labor of the Vinedresser, the vineyard is constantly improving, constantly growing more fruitful.

2.       The work of the Vinedresser is violent. He does a lot of cutting.

The Father – the Vinedresser in Jesus’ analogy – is ruthless with the shears.

Jesus describes it this way: “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit” (John 15:1-2).

We are told that barren branches suffer the pain of being cut away. Later in the chapter we learn that those branches are gathered into bunches to be burned (v. 6). I’m still trying to work out what that means in the context of discipleship, but suffice it to say, this is one kind of suffering no one wants. (It is, perhaps, the suffering that would be faced in the coming days by Judas, one of the disciples who heard Jesus’ words that night.)

The fruitful branches do avoid that kind of suffering, but they don’t avoid suffering altogether. They too are cut back, pruned so that they can be even more fruitful.

Why so much cutting of the branches that are actually doing what they ought to be doing? It is because the Father envisions so much more in the fruitful branch. With its limited outlook, the branch understands only the counterintuitive facts that it is bearing fruit and yet is still suffering the cutting.

I remember hearing of a visitor to a sheep farm. She saw the sheep being herded toward a large tank, where they were shoved down under the liquid, submerged completely, not once but twice, clearly against their will. The visitor asked what was happening to the hapless sheep. She was told that they were being dipped into a chemical bath that would protect them from threats to their health, threats like parasites and lice.

The visitor asked the question we often find ourselves asking in such moments: “Do the sheep understand that?”

And that’s the problem, isn’t it?

We have no difficulty understanding suffering that we’ve brought on ourselves by our own sin and folly. And we understand that some of our suffering comes from the fact that we live in a broken world filled with broken people.

But it’s the counterintuitive suffering that is so hard to understand, when there’s such a disconnect between the way we’re living our lives and the outcomes we experience.

I just don’t get this, God. I know my life isn’t free from sin, but I’m fighting against sin in my life and in my heart. And my ministry is apparently fruitful. Where did this suffering come from? What can this sudden heartache possibly mean for me right now?

That’s the moment when we must remind ourselves that our suffering is never for nothing; we must remember that God’s purposes are always wise and good, wiser than if we managed things ourselves and better than if we had never experienced the suffering.

Suffering, even apparently random and meaningless suffering, is actually part of our sanctification, it is part of God continually bending the trajectory of our lives toward holiness.

And thankfully, He’s got bigger plans for us than our comfort and security.

Persevere,                                                                                                         
Paul Pyle     
Pastor of Discipleship

I can’t remember a time when we’ve had so much unexpected tragedy and heartache befall our people in the span of a few weeks. So many of our people are experiencing the sudden death of a loved one. They were walking through their ordinary lives one moment and in the next step they found themselves walking through the Valley of the Shadow of Death.

This recent cascade of bad news got me thinking. In the days leading up to their catastrophe, these sufferers didn’t know they were moments away from life-changing news. Though they couldn’t know it then, they were enjoying a blissful ignorance in those quiet days. And then the worst happened.

But since catastrophe often comes as a total surprise, this could also be true for any one of us right now. For all we know, any one of us could be days away from that phone call that makes our blood run cold. Any one of us could find that our next step takes us into that Valley.

I have always used the expression “Valley of the Shadow of Death” to describe what people go through when they are dealing with bereavement: hearing the devastating news for the first time, breaking the news to loved ones, the tears at the funeral, the disorientation of trying to adjust to the new normal.

But I’m beginning to see that I was wrong; given the uncertainty of our lives and the brokenness of our world, it’s clear that we’re all living in that Valley right now. Our occasional encounters with death only bring to our attention the sure fact of mortality.

This is pretty morbid stuff, Paul.

Not really. We don’t like to think about it, but all I’ve done is point out the obvious: we and our loved ones all have an appointment with death. Long before any of us were born, God knew – God had already determined – the total number of our days (Psa 139:16). Just as surely as God ordained that I would be born on July 4, 1956, He has in His wisdom already ordained the date of my death.

If I remember that my days are surely numbered, if I know that I’m walking through the Valley of the Shadow of Death even at this moment, I need to recall the rest of that psalm (Psalm 23):

Even though I walk every day in the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I don’t need to be afraid.

Why? Because the Good Shepherd is with me. His protection and discipline comfort me.

He sees to it that my cup overflows as He plays host to me in the very presence of my enemies.

I can be sure that His goodness and mercy will be close beside me all the days of my life (however many there may be), and ultimately I will dwell in the house of the Lord not just for a while but forever.

Forgetfulness about our mortality can be especially devastating to our spiritual formation.

• Forgetting that we and our loved ones will, in fact, die at some preordained moment in time, we vainly imagine that we are all entitled to such a long life that we need not consider death.                                                                   

• Forgetting that we and our loved ones in Christ are in the hands of the Good Shepherd, when we do think of death we’re wracked with anxiety.    

In this fretful, forgetful state of mind, we can choose to handle all this the way our death-averse culture has taught us: don’t think about death, pretend it will never happen.

Or we can keep these two facts steadily before our eyes as we walk this day in the Valley of the Shadow of Death:

       1.       We have a finite number of days to live in this life.                                                                                                                                                            

   2.       All our lives – both this life and the next – are in the hands of the   
                Good Shepherd, who loved us and gave Himself for us.

I want to live out the rest of my days in the Valley with a quiet confidence in the Good Shepherd. He has proven Himself faithful all my life.

He will be faithful to the end.

Persevere,                                                                                                         
Paul Pyle     
Pastor of Discipleship

Decades ago, when I worked in the Men’s Department at a local department store, I remember being impressed at the unvarying pace of the unflappable Mr. Shuff.

Regardless of how busy we were or how impatient customers were, Mr. Shuff had one speed: slow. I never saw him stride purposefully, and I certainly never saw him scurry. Mr. Shuff always shuffled from one place to another.

He was no sluggard, mind you. He moved with purpose, and he was competent and focused.

But he never hurried. He simply refused to let other people’s urgency accelerate his pace.

I realize now what I so admired about Mr. Shuff: his internal processer operated at a different speed – a slower, healthier speed.

And that’s how I want to emulate Mr. Shuff. I want to slow down on the inside.

What does this have to do with discipleship?

Here I quote my journal (and fair warning: as I articulate my inner thoughts, it will sound irreverent, but it is what I was thinking as I wrote):

I’m still stumped on the “abiding” so many Christians talk about. I realize that when I read John 15 [Jesus’ teaching on “abide in me”] there’s a part of me that is tapping its foot impatiently. “Get to the point already, Jesus,” I say to myself. “What exactly do you want me to do? Just tell me so I can get on with it.”

Or, as C.S. Lewis put it once: “Inner silence is for our race a difficult achievement. There is a chattering part of the mind which continues, until it is corrected, to chatter on even in the holiest places.”

How do slow down my inward processor and silence my chattering self?

No easy formula here, because I got into this state by cultivating bad habits over decades. But there are two small, specific steps I have decided to take now.

I mentioned in a previous post that I’m reading John Mark Comer’s Relentless Elimination of Hurry. His chapter titled “Slow” has twenty specific suggestions. Two caught my eye:

1.       Deleting social media apps from my phone: I’ve noticed that the pace of scrolling through a social media feed is far quicker than the pace of reading. I can scroll mindlessly, but I cannot read mindlessly. I took Comer’s advice. I have deleted social media apps from my phone. I still have access to social media on my iPad, but not on the device I have with me at all times. If I want to kill a few minutes on my phone, it’s playing Scrabble or reading a book on my Kindle app or reading an article from my news feed – all activities that engage me at a slower, more thoughtful pace.

2.       Observing the speed limit: This one surprised me, but as I contemplated what Comer had to say, I realized that I often exceed the speed limit even when I don’t need to. Why am I in a hurry if I’m not late? This new commitment to observing the speed limit isn’t about conscience or my testimony as a Christian or fear of getting a ticket (though all of that matters). Nor is this a hard and fast rule (sometimes I am running late). This is about disciplining myself to slow down, both outwardly and inwardly. And I’ve discovered that easing up on the accelerator somehow has a calming effect on my mind.

I am not exhorting readers to delete apps or watch their speed more closely. I’m only reporting on what I’m trying to do. Obviously, there’s a lot more to slowing down my interior speed than refraining from social media and observing the speed limit. A lot more. But these two baby steps are a start.

One big step

There’s another spiritual discipline I’d like to explore that may help me slow down.

Although it sounds like a radical new idea, it is actually an ancient Christian practice: the discipline of silence and solitude. It is radical in its simplicity, being silent and alone with God for an extended period of time.

I recently heard someone recount a time he spent a day in solitude with God. He said it was sometime between the fourth and fifth hour he felt something shift in his spirit. It took that long for his mind to slow down and become clear so he could think and pray without distraction.

A whole day in quiet solitude? Even four or five hours is, of course, inconceivable for speed-addicted me. Solitude is what prisons use to punish recalcitrant inmates, and I’m supposed to go into solitude on purpose?

This is a discipline I intend to explore. I’ll report later.

In the meantime, I want to do whatever it takes to learn how to slow down, to recalibrate my inner clock so that I can walk with Jesus at His pace, not mine.

Persevere, Paul Pyle Pastor of Discipleship

It is no surprise that the Dane Ortlund’s book Deeper begins with a chapter entitled “Jesus.” His whole point is that we grow spiritual not primarily by improving our behavior or sharpening our theology or experiencing deep spiritual emotions but by deepening our love for Jesus. Unless all those other things – behavior, theology, passions – flow out of and contribute to a deepening love for Jesus, they are worse than useless; it is actually dangerous to make behavior or knowledge or feelings the focus of our spiritual growth.

The title of his second chapter, however, is a surprise: “Despair.” Ortlund argues that so long as we try to hang on to our self-respect, so long as we imagine that God’s role in our spiritual lives is to help us improve on what we already have, we will never grow deep in our love for Jesus.

Despair, says Ortlund, is essential at the beginning of our spiritual life: “Fallen human beings enter into joy only through the door of despair. Fullness can be had only through emptiness. That happens decisively at conversion.”

This is true.

Jesus has nothing to offer the complacent and self-sufficient.

Before Jesus is good news, I must know the despair of my own sin. The truth is that the whole Gospel message actually begins with despair. You remember the familiar “Romans Road” plan of salvation. It begins with bad news: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (3:23) and “The wages of sin is death” (6:23).

In other words, despair is the front door to Christian faith. Until I am ready to admit that I cannot manage my sin and guilt, I am not ready to hear the Good News about Jesus.

But, says Ortlund, that sense of despair must continue in healthy spiritual formation. Ortlund argues that despair “remains an ongoing rhythm throughout the Christian life. If you are not growing in Christ, one reason may be that you have drifted out of the salutary and healthy discipline of self-despair.”

Did he lose you when he used the expression “salutary and healthy discipline of self-despair”? There could hardly be a more counter-cultural notion in our secular culture of the Sacred Self.

Of course there is an unhealthy despair, but this is different. This is the healthy despair at our futility of our efforts; that despair prompts us to pivot toward healthy dependence on the work of the Spirit.

Why is this healthy despair necessary? Because the same sin that separated me from God before I knew Christ continues to infect my inner life even now. (Don’t I know it!) Puritans called it “indwelling sin,” and it will be a struggle for every believer so long as we inhabit these corrupt bodies in this corrupt world.

So I am just as dependent on Christ in my ongoing spiritual formation as I was at the moment of salvation.

This has not always been clear to me. For decades because I thought my dependence on Jesus ended once I was saved; after that, it was up to me to grow in Christ.

This is why I failed to understand Paul’s exhortation to the believers in Colosse: “As you received Christ Jesus the Lord [that is, in a posture of utter dependence], so walk in him [in the same dependence], rooted and built up in him and established in the faith” (Col 2:6-7).

My love for Jesus will be only as deep as my despair of ever managing things on my own.

If I think of God as my co-pilot, I am giving myself far too much credit and robbing Him of His glory.

If my arrogance keeps me from acknowledging the ongoing presence of sin in my life, if I vainly imagine that I can manage my spiritual life on my own steam, I will keep Jesus at arm’s length, and my love for Him will be shallow and insubstantial.

God isn’t my side-kick, someone there to bail me out only when I get into difficulty. No, my despair of ever managing things on my own is a constant reminder that I need to depend on His wisdom, grace, and power this moment, and the next.

Persevere, Paul Pyle Pastor of Discipleship

In the day in age where you can google and listen to some of the “greatest” sermons ever preached, incredible choirs, worship bands, etc., your local church may end up paling in comparison. Going to church may feel like choosing to watch highlight reels of John Paxton when Michael Jordan is right at your fingertips. Paul’s first letter to the Church at Corinth addresses a concerning report he has heard about the church. They are separating into factions determined by which Christian leader they like the most.  

Like most of his letters, Paul’s intro tills the soil of his readers’ hearts to remind them of their reality in Christ and condition them to receive his appeals. Paul’s intro to the Church at Corinth reminds them of whose and what they are, the Church.  

Paul begins by addressing whose they are and what they are. “To the church of God that is in Corinth.” And what is the “church of God”? it is “those sanctified in Christ Jesus.” The Church is plural, communal, not singular or individual. Paul writes to “the church” to “those” sanctified and called to be “saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours.”  God’s Church is made up of those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be holy together, not alone, with all who call upon the name of Jesus.  

Because of what the Church is, it has God’s blessing. Paul states that grace and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ be to you (the church, the called, the sanctified).  

Gratitude for the Grace of Jesus

Paul is always praising God for the grace the Church in Corinth has received that was given to them in Christ Jesus. In every way this church has been enriched in Christ in all knowing and speaking. This group is not lacking anything; in fact, because they have Jesus they also have every gift they need for the task at hand; the waiting for the revealing of their Lord Jesus Christ.  

Reminder of Christ and His Work

Christ is the one who will sustain the Church at Corinth till the end. Jesus’ sufficient sacrifice ensures that the Church of Corinth will be guiltless in the day of Christ. For God is faithful, He is the one who called all Christ followers into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.  

Considering the above reality, Paul appeals to the Church at Corinth as brothers, by the name their Lord Jesus Christ, that they all agree, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be unified in the same mind and the same judgment.  

Paul’s appeal is that the Church would have an accurate understanding and convictional belief about whose they are, what they are, and what that practically means. Here we hear echoes of Christ’s prayer to His Father in John 17 about the unity He desires for all those who will believe in Him. Jesus desired a unity that resembled the unity he enjoyed with his father.  

Why is Paul making this appeal?  

It had been reported to Paul about some quarreling among the people of the Church. Divisions, fighting. Specifically, the people have all started to have a preferred “Christian” leader. They were elevating Paul, Cephas, and Apollos higher than they ought, and they were bringing Christ down. After stating clearly the issue He has heard about He asks probing questions to bring these believers back to what is true: “Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?  

The obvious answer to these rhetorical questions is “No.”  

What is Paul getting at?  

If their “oneness” is centered on anyone or thing other than Christ then the Cross is emptied of its power, for they are trusting in their own wisdom and not the Good News of Jesus.  

Do they really want to be following what they think is best? Especially if what they think is best is something other than, or in addition to, Christ.   

These divisions that Paul is hearing about are troubling because they reveal a spirit within the church that is anti-Christ. A spirit in the church that creates division. A selfish spirit. A spirit that is not content with Christ alone.  

If a Church is dividing over their preferences, or preferred Christian leader, they have forgotten their identity. Rather than validate their thoughts on their preferred Christian leaders Paul is appealing to his brothers to see that dividing over preferences is the wisdom of the world. Paul’s point is this: Hasn’t the Gospel made the world’s wisdom foolish? Why then are we reverting to the world’s wisdom? Worldly wisdom makes your church experience about your own personal preferences, about you. God has made that type of wisdom utterly foolish. All we have is all we need: Christ crucified and resurrected on our behalf.  

To help them see this Paul takes them back to the state they were in when they were called by God. They were not wise by worldly standards, they were not powerful, or of noble birth. So why are they starting to think they are wise now? No, God chose what was foolish in the world to shame the wise, God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong.  

The application for us at Patterson Park becomes quite clear.  

Let us remember, and remind each other, of whose and what we are. Let us elevate the Giver of gifts and blessings not those who have particular gifts and blessings. The Giver gets the glory. Our fleshly desire is to elevate and compare, but that is the worldly wisdom that God has put to death in us through Christ. May we by faith make our existence all about the glory of THE ONE who called us, saved us, sanctified us, and will bring us home. We don’t boast in our preachers, our church ministry initiatives or programs, etc. We boast in the Lord.  

 26 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards,[c] not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being[d] might boast in the presence of God. 30 And because of him[e] you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, 31 so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.” – 1 Corinthians 1:26-31

Persevere,                Joey Turner        Pastor of Student Ministry                                                                                      

As promised, copies of Deeper are now stocked on the Discipleship Resource bookshelf outside the Family Life Center. They are available for a suggested donation of $10, but if you want one, take it regardless of your ability to pay.

I heard Joey Turner say once that when someone is struggling with sin, his real problem is that he doesn’t love Jesus enough.

He’s right.

When I struggle with some besetting sin, it’s not just that I love my sin too much (though that is also true) but that I love Jesus too little. The fact that I am insufficiently enamored with Jesus makes it easy to lie to myself and first wander and then plunge into sin.

In his book Deeper, Dane Ortlund argues that the secret to spiritual growth does not lie in doing more or trying harder; growing in Christ means growing deeper in our love for Him. So it comes as no surprise that the first chapter in the book is simply entitled “Jesus.”

Ortlund tries to show that we cannot move forward spiritually when our view of Jesus is weak and vague: I’m not disregarding the real discipleship already at play in your life and the true discoveries of the depths of Jesus Christ you have already made. But let me ask you to open yourself up to the possibility that one reason you see modest growth and ongoing sin in your life—if that is indeed the case—is that the Jesus you are following is a junior varsity Jesus, an unwittingly reduced Jesus, an unsurprising and predictable Jesus.

What does this mean?

Every happily married man knows this one thing: “I married out of my league.” (I know I did.) Every happily married man is continually in awe that his wife chose him.

That is the mindset Ortlund is talking about. Growing in Jesus is not about improving my behavior or sharpening my doctrine or experiencing deeper passions (as essential as all that is). In fact, behavior modification and doctrinal study and spiritual emotions that don’t deepen my love for Jesus are spiritually toxic.

Before everything else, growing in Jesus is growing in awe-filled affection for Him.

For the disciple, everything else is a means to that end. Family life, professional life, relationships with neighbors, private thoughts, public ministry, spiritual disciplines… everything else revolves around that one essential: learning to love Jesus more deeply.

So how can I deepen my love for Jesus?

There are obvious answers we shouldn’t overlook: If I want to know and love Jesus more, I should spend time with Him in His Word and in prayer.

But the truth is that there is no simple formula for deepening my love for Jesus.

Why? Because most of this kind of growth takes shape in my inner life – in my affections, my imagination, my ambitions, my priorities – and since my heart is notoriously sin-addled and deceptive, this will be a life-long struggle.

But there is good news: we have an excellent Teacher in this school of discipleship.

Jesus told us that His Spirit has undertaken the task of bending the trajectory of our lives toward holiness, and He who began this good work in us will carry it on to completion on that Day (Phil 1:6).

Until that Day, let’s persevere in learning to love Jesus more deeply.

Persevere,                                                                                              Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

Warning: this blog post poses a question without answering it. This is the first in a series as I think out loud about how to answer the question.

This is one of those times when a single message seems to be coming at me from multiple directions simultaneously:

1. I am to speak to a group of men and boys at the “Men of Action” event this weekend. The topic assigned to me seems curiously out of sync with the action-oriented theme of the event. I am to speak on holiness, which is clearly not something you do, it’s something you are. I do think they are onto something in assigning me this topic (holiness) in this context (action), but the connection isn’t intuitively obvious. I’m grateful that the leaders of the men’s ministry have given me the opportunity to think through this connection.

2. Browsing Barnes and Noble recently, a title caught my eye: The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. (And yes, that is the title, including the strikethrough on the final word.) As I began reading the book, I saw the author refer to Dallas Willard, a giant in the literature of spiritual formation whose line of reasoning has always eluded me.

3. I heard someone say recently that he thinks John 15 is his favorite discipleship text. John 15 is all about abiding in Jesus. And he mentioned another author I’ve never been able to get into, Andrew Murray and his book Abiding in Christ.

I keep hearing that I need to learn how to “be” before I try to “do,” but I just don’t get it. It’s as if I am not fluent in a language that is essential to the vibrant Christian life.

I’m aware of the danger of pushing the “do.”

Since I became Pastor of Discipleship, I have been thinking about how to encourage people in the direction of the holy habits (prayer, Scripture engagement, service, etc.) The last thing I want to do is create a high-demand atmosphere of legalism around the spiritual disciplines, a lose-lose environment where people either “succeed” in the disciplines and cultivate a self-righteous pride or “fail” and slide into self-loathing. As we’ve said in these pages before, neither arrogance nor despair is the goal of the spiritual habits.

In his book Deeper Dane Ortlund argues that “some Christians think we grow through purer behavior, others through sharper doctrine, and others through richer emotions.” I grew up in a Christian tradition that emphasized the first (behavior) and third (emotions) but didn’t really say much about the second (doctrine).

While Ortlund acknowledges that all three are essential in balanced Christian development, genuine spiritual growth is deeper than all of them. “Real change,” says Ortlund, “comes through this reality: the life of God in the soul of man.”

Exactly how does spiritual formation come through the reality of “the life of God in the soul of man”?

This is mystifying.

For a guy whose thinking bends toward the practical – “what does it look like when…?” – a phrase like “the life of God in the soul of man” is nearly incomprehensible.

I am coming to realize that my whole understanding of what it means to grow in Christ is focused on technique: on doing, not being. I can think and read and talk forever about what to do to grow in Christ, but ask me about what it means to abide in Christ, and I draw a blank.

How do I explain how to do abiding?

I can see that I’ve got a lot to learn.

And unlearn.

Stick with me as I think out loud in these pages about what it means to grow spiritually by learning how to “abide in Christ.” We’ll use Ortlund’s Deeper as a guide.

And in case you think this book isn’t for you, here’s how Ortlund concludes his introduction:

We’re not after behavior modification in this book. I’m not going to talk to you about setting your alarm earlier or cutting carbs. We’re not even going to reflect on tithing or church attendance or journaling or small groups or taking the sacraments or reading the Puritans. All of that can be done out of rottenness of heart. We’re talking about real change. And we’re talking about real change for real sinners.

If you confess the doctrine of original sin but at the same time feel yourself to be doing pretty well as a Christian, you can put this book back on the shelf. This book is for the frustrated. The exhausted. Those on the brink. Those on the verge of giving up any real progress in their Christian growth. If you not only subscribe to the doctrine of original sin on paper but also find yourself proving the doctrine of original sin in your daily life, this book is for you.

(Look for Deeper on our Discipleship Resource bookshelf in the coming weeks as we think together about what it means to abide in Christ.)
 

Persevere,                                                                                              Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

Last month PPC sent me and my wife on a one-week mission trip to Albania, where I spoke in two different conferences for teachers hosted by members of Albania’s International School Project, a ministry of Cru.

The International School Project got its start in Moscow in the early 1990s.

Campus Crusade for Christ (as it was then known) showed the Jesus Film in a Moscow theater. High-ranking members of the Russian Education Department were in attendance and approached the Crusade staff after the film. “Can you help us? Can you develop a curriculum based on the Jesus Film for our students?”

The Education officials explained that with the fall of Communism, there was no real ethics curriculum in Russian schools. What passed for ethics under Communism was only Communistic propaganda: allegiance to the Party and its goals were all students ever learned about ethics and morality. The officials knew that with the demise of Communism they needed to reboot their ethics curriculum, and in the Jesus Film they saw something they wanted for their students.

But it was a big ask: they were talking about some 65,000 public schools across the vast expanse of the Russian Federation (spanning nine time zones!)

Crusade staff had no idea how to write a curriculum on ethics and morality for Russian students, but that, of course, didn’t stop them. But having written the curriculum, how could they deliver it to such a vast audience?

Evangelical organizations from around the world united to form the CoMission, an alliance of Christian groups mobilized to take the new curriculum into Russia’s schools. It was an enormous undertaking because it involved dozens of large groups going to Russian cities to convene Convocations for educators. Each convocation would feature plenary speakers in the morning (on topics like worldviews and professional development), then breaking into three tracks in the afternoon: elementary, secondary, and administrative. Each track then broke down into small groups, each with an American leader and a translator.

The work was gargantuan, not just because there were so many teachers in Russia but also because each convocation called for a team of 40-50 people plus translators for the small groups. The CoMission also included people who would live for a year in the Russian cities where the curriculum was introduced to help teachers implement it in their classrooms.

My first ISP trips

The Association for Christian Schools International (ACSI) was a partner in the CoMission; the school where I taught at the time – Dayton Christian High School (an ACSI school) – granted me leave time to go on my first ISP trip in 1993. A member of our PPC fellowship, Bob Clements (then a DC principal) also went on the same trip and roomed with me. We both served as small group leaders in two convocations in the Russian cities of Penza and Vladimir.

As ISP began to expand other countries, I got more opportunities to work with them.

About ten years later I learned that another DC administrator, Lee Reno, was leading ISP trips to Mongolia, where the work was just getting started. I signed up to go on the trip in 2003 and served again as a small group leader. Lee recruited me to deliver the worldview lectures the next year, and I went on several more trips to Mongolia delivering the worldview lectures in Convocations.

Another ISP trip leader recruited me to give the same worldview lectures in Convocations held in Guatemala and Honduras. (Nanette went on two of them with me and served as a small group leader.)

ISP in Albania

When we got involved with the summer camps in Albania in 2017, I discovered that ISP Albania was part of the leadership team that sponsored the camp. I approached the leader of ISP Albania to ask if he could use my help in their work outside the camps.

The conferences ISP Albania sponsors in the spring serve as a kind of precursor to the summer camp. ISP puts on professional development seminars that are recognized by the Albanian government for professional credentials, so teachers are eager to come to them. ISP staff then cultivate relationships with the teachers over the months that follow and then invite them to the summer camp in July.

For my seminars last month I was told to provide two lectures on each day of the conference: a personal development topic and a professional development topic. The first day I spoke on “The Art of the Apology” and the four types in the Book of Proverbs (wise, simple, foolish, scorner). The second day I spoke on the subject of emotional capital and three key principles of servant leadership.

I used the talk on emotional capital to introduce the Gospel: Jesus’ story of the prodigal son is such a vivid picture of the grace that God has shown us. It was at the lowest point of trust and loyalty that the father of the foolish, rebellious young man showed such kindness and grace.

We recently heard from Alma, one of the ISP staff members who worked with us last month: “Thank you for praying for the conference. There was one dear friend, Shqiponja, who wrote that she believes in Jesus, and there were several who said that they want to learn and commit more to God. I was surprised how many were touched by the topic on reacting to correction [the four types from Proverbs] and servant leadership. I've been encouraged to see seeds of growth in several of my teacher friends. Pray that God will help them get rooted in His truth and love! Thank you very much for your partnership!”

I want to echo her thanks.

I am so grateful for PPC’s vision and generosity in supporting so much gospel work over such a vast expanse of ministries both locally and around the world.
Thanks especially for sending me and Nanette to work with our dear friends in Albania!

Persevere,                    Paul Pyle Pastor of Discipleship                                                                                 

I once heard someone summarize the Bible in four words: “God wants everybody back.”

And that is the impetus behind Jesus’ Great Commission to take the Good News to people who don’t know that God loves them so much that He gave up His Son to bring them home.

The early church obeys Christ’s command.

The Book of Acts opens with Jesus outlining what it would look like when the church carried out His instructions in ever-widening circles: “You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem… in [the surrounding region of] Judea… [then crossing ethnic boundaries] in Samaria… and to the uttermost parts of the earth” [all people groups everywhere] (Acts 1:8).

Two millennia later that work is still ongoing, as missionaries keep bringing the Good News about Jesus to groups that have never heard of Him.

But I’ve long thought it odd that as important as the Great Commission is – and I do believe it is a prominent theme running throughout the Bible – the Great Commission mandate is not reiterated as an imperative in the epistles. We hear Jesus give His people their marching orders – “Spread out and tell everyone what happened” – and we see the church doing that in the Book of Acts. But we don’t hear the writers of the epistles tell people over and over again to witness to their neighbors and loved ones. In fact, there is precious little in the epistles about how we interact with non-believers (Col 4:5-6; 1 Pet 2:12). There seems to be an assumption that believers’ normal, daily interactions with non-believers will result in people coming to faith.

And it seems that this is precisely how the early church did grow, at least in the beginning. After the explosive growth on the Day of Pentecost – when the Spirit was poured out on God’s people and the church was born – there was continued numerical growth from that point on.

Then we reach the decisive point.

Luke tells us that the church in Antioch – a largely Gentile congregation – was praying together one day when the Spirit told them to send their two key leaders away to evangelize elsewhere.

I’m sure there was some considerable anxiety about losing those two men. Barnabas was the mature, encouraging representative of the mother church in Jerusalem, and the young, brilliant Saul of Tarsus, formerly a vicious enemy of the church, was now an energetic Christian leader.

But there was in the Spirit’s prompting a recognition that as vital as personal evangelism had been in spreading the Good News, the scope of personal interactions wouldn’t be broad enough to carry out Jesus’ instructions. The church would have to take deliberate steps to launch the Gospel into other places where Jesus was not known; fulfilling the Commission must involve sharing the Good News with strangers, not just friends and family.

The cost was high for that fellowship in Antioch.

They lost two key leaders. Somehow other leaders had to step in to take the place of the mature Barnabas and the gifted Saul.

The cost was high for Saul as well. He never returned to anything like a quiet, settled life. Though he did stay in some places for as long as a few years, he mostly traveled from city to city planting churches or checking with churches he had planted before. Beyond that, he suffered great personal harm, mostly at the hands of Jewish opponents to the Gospel message he carried with him.

But the cost of cross-cultural ministry is always very, very high, both for the missionary and for everyone else in the church as well.

When my father was stationed in Taiwan, the only American school in our city was Morrison Academy, a missionary school, so the student body was an interesting mix of military brats and MKs (missionary kids).

As I got to know my MK friends, I came to understand how difficult it was for their families to leave home and hearth to devote themselves full-time to cross-cultural missions. I knew that my dad’s assignment to Taiwan had an expiration date on it. We would finish his assignment there and then go back “home” to our life in the States.

But my MK friends had grown up as “third-culture kids,” not at home as Americans there in Taiwan nor totally at home in the States, either. Both they and their parents were paying a heavy price to bring the Good News to the people of Taiwan.

So why all the bother?

Why invest all the effort? As with all examination of our motives, we find we have mixed motives about doing the work of evangelism.

Primarily, our Lord and Master Jesus told us to do this work, so we must do it. Regardless of other motivations, His command is in itself sufficient.

But there’s more.

As we’ve written before in these pages, the most compelling reason for telling anyone else about Jesus is neighbor-love.

When I was part of some of the early missions efforts in Mongolia in the early 2000s, I remember thinking what it would be like to be part of the story some Mongolian matriarch would someday tell her extended family: “I remember when the Christians came to our town. That was the first time I had heard about Jesus. That day changed my life forever.”

What wouldn’t I be willing to give up to be part of that moment in that woman’s life and family?

But my presence there wasn’t a solo flight. I had traveled halfway across the world to be part of that team, but my wife had also played a role and paid a steep price: she was holding down the fort at home while I was gone for three weeks every year when I was making those trips. And there were dozens of donors who helped pay for my expenses. All of us together contributed to my being there to tell people far away about Jesus.

And it has always been so.

As with Barnabas and Saul and the visionary church in Antioch, it has always been a massive group effort to take the Good News about Jesus to places where He is not known.

We may never know in this life what effect our efforts will have. But we do know this much: Jesus told us to go, and both the going and the sending are a great privilege.

So let’s take the Good News to our neighbors and co-workers, and let’s send the Good News to people elsewhere who have never heard of Him.

When Jesus returns, I want Him to find me – to find us – busy doing what He told us to do.

Persevere,                                                                                              Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

This was the meditation on Isaiah 53:4-6 I used in the Good Friday service.

When we see a calamity come down on the head of a man, our first response often goes to the question of cause:

“Why?”

“Why must this person suffer such great sorrow?”

And sometimes, we find ourselves indulging the self-righteous instinct to suspect we know the answer to that question: the sufferer must have done something wrong.

This is nothing new.

This tendency to blame the victim actually has ancient precedents.

In the oldest book in the Bible, we hear Job’s friends tell him that his calamities must be God’s judgment for some secret sin, so he should confess and repent.

Hundreds of years later, on seeing a beggar who had been blind from birth, Jesus’ disciples ask Him a casual theological question: “Whose sin is the cause for this man’s suffering? His or his parents’?”

This the theological assumption we find underlying Isaiah’s words about the Suffering Servant of the Lord, a man whose life would be filled with sorrows of all kinds:

• The Suffering Servant would know grief and carry a burden of sorrow.

• He would be regarded as one stricken by God and afflicted.

• The Suffering Servant would be pierced and crushed and wounded.

• He would experience the chastisement, the severe punishment, of God.

• The Suffering Servant would bear the public shame of iniquity and guilt.

But this time, says Isaiah, there is a twist. The great sorrow and humiliation we see in this man is due to no fault of his own.

As we read Isaiah’s haunting words about the man who would bear such great suffering, and we discover that we ourselves are the cause of His sorrow:

Surely he has borne our griefs
    and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
    smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
    he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
    and with his wounds we are healed.
All we like sheep have gone astray;
    we have turned—every one—to his own way;
and the Lord has laid on him
    the iniquity of us all.

So we see that the one who is the object of pity and scorn and ridicule is actually standing in place of the guilty. The one who should be filled with sorrow, the one who should be stricken and crushed and wounded, the one who should experience the severe punishment of God and the shame of iniquity… that guilty man stands apart and only observes another suffering in his place.

I am that guilty man.

And Jesus is the One Isaiah saw enduring the blows that should have fallen on me. Jesus is the One who suffered in my place, in the place of all who would put their trust in Him.

And yet on the day that Jesus stood in the place of sinners, He was the only One who understood what was happening. Everyone else misinterpreted what they saw. All they could see was a martyr’s noble death or the well-deserved end for a troublemaker.

But Jesus knew what He was doing that day. He was suffering in my place, in the place of all who would put their trust in Him.

How can we respond to such great generosity, such breath-taking, unexpected kindness?

We cannot respond in kind.

We cannot recompense the Father for giving up His Son.

And even if we gave our entire life to serving Jesus, we could not pay Him back for what He’s done for us.

All we can do is receive His kindness with profound gratitude and say with the Apostle Paul, “Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift.”  

Persevere,                                                                                              Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

The Normandy Invasion was not just another amphibious assault.

This was the largest seaborne assault in history. It involved eight different navies, almost 7000 vessels, and nearly 160,000 troops.

The sacrifice of life that day was unspeakable. Allied casualties included more than 4000 dead in the first 24 hours, many thousands more injured, and many tens of thousands still to die and suffer life-changing injuries in the months to come as the Allied forces struggled to consolidate their gains in northern France.

Although no one could be sure of it at the time, that massive military operation turned out to be the decisive moment in the war. Once the Allies had established a foothold in France, the war in the European theater had turned the corner. There would be many more battles and many more lives lost, but the eventual outcome of the war – the Allied victory over Nazi Germany – began to come into focus in the months that followed that awful June morning.

Had Germany been able to repel the Allied invasion, the entire war could have taken a different course, and the history of the twentieth century might well have been the story of fascist domination of the entire planet. So it would not be an exaggeration to say that the Normandy Invasion changed the entire trajectory of modern human history.

In other words, though they couldn’t see it then, now we can see that there was a “now but not yet” sense about that bloody June day on the beaches of Normandy.

Now…

In one sense, World War II ended that day as the Allies could now begin their long drive toward Germany. Although the Nazis put up a ferocious fight after Normandy, they were mostly in a posture of a fighting retreat from that bloody morning in 1944 until “VE Day,” when the Allies accepted Germany’s unconditional surrender of its armed forces on May 8, 1945.

Before the Invasion, the threat of fascist domination of the planet was a real possibility, and it would take nothing less than a ghastly sacrifice of blood to overthrow the power of the Nazi war machine. The Normandy Invasion was that sacrifice.

…but not yet

In another sense, the end of the war was “not yet” as there were many more battles to fight before the end of the conflict. The German army put up its final attempt at resistance in the famous “Battle of the Bulge,” where German forces mounted a surprise attack aimed at encircling and dividing Allied forces. Almost 200,000 more German and Allied personnel were killed in that five-week battle. But with the outcome of that battle in favor of the Allies, it was finally clear that the Nazi military project would ultimately fail.

In the death and resurrection of Jesus, we have the Normandy Invasion of human history.

The Incarnation of the Son of God – His stepping onto the stage of human history – was nothing less than an invasion. In the virginal conception of Jesus, we have not just the inception of another human life; in the fetus in Mary’s womb we have God Almighty Himself invading our realm.

And when Jesus began His public ministry, He used the language of invasion when He announced that the Kingdom of God had arrived. His agenda was wholly unlike anything anyone expected: He was welcomed by none of the existing institutions of His day. That’s because His Kingdom was not just another political agenda or cultural renewal project. He came to the first century world not just to take sides but to take over.

But as dramatic as the arrival of the Son was, and as dramatic as His miracles were, as electrifying as His teaching was, it was neither his conception and birth nor his awesome power nor His teachings that changed the trajectory of human history. The decisive moment came in His gruesome and humiliating death.

Why did Jesus have to die, and why did He have to die in such agony and disgrace?

Because even the Almighty couldn’t just wave His hand and make the power of sin and death go away. In His death and resurrection, Jesus battled not just the powers of a corrupt Jewish hierarchy and a brutal Roman regime; Jesus was at war with the malignant and ferocious powers of sin and death, and nothing less than a ghastly sacrifice could overcome those powers.

“The power of sin and death” isn’t just a theological concept, even for us pampered Americans. It is a power and force we know all too well; we encounter that power when we see a marriage dissolve, when we visit the cancer ward, when we see newsreels of natural disaster or the ravages of war.

But Jesus faced down all the power of sin and death in His agony: in the treachery of one of His own, in the abandonment of His closest friends, in the corruption of His people’s leaders, in the casual brutality of the Roman state, and finally, in death itself. At the cross Jesus drank the cup of His Father’s wrath down to the dregs.

And in His awful sacrifice, He changed the course of human history.

In the cross and the empty tomb, Jesus crippled the power of sin and death and guaranteed the outcome of our own struggle against the power of sin and death. Since that first Easter morning, God’s people can look forward with confidence to the New Creation that is now surely coming.   

But we are living between the “now” of His death and resurrection and the “not yet” of His ultimate triumph.

We still suffer, and our loved ones suffer.

And our suffering comes at us from all directions: from our living in a broken world (disease and injury, natural disaster, death), from the brokenness of those around us (fractured relationships, crime), and from our own indwelling sin (the harm we ourselves inflict because of our own wicked hearts). Even though we are followers of our Triumphant King, we know the power of sin and death all too well.

So, yes, even after Jesus’ history-changing suffering and victory, we continue to suffer. But we suffer, as Paul said, “not as others, who have no hope” (1 Thess 4). Because we know how the Story ends, our suffering is diffused with the bright shadow of holy confidence.

We know that the One who endured our suffering and rose in triumph will someday come and make all things right.

And that is the hope that sustains us between the “now” and the “not yet.”

Persevere,                                                                                              Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

Vivian and her husband Trent are missionaries with Cru. They have been part of the Patterson Park fellowship since 1994.

Along with John and LouAnn Mohler, the Hyatts are co-leading the summer missions trip to Albania. If you might be interested in joining that team, contact Trent at trent.hyatt@cru.org or John Mohler at jmohler@pattersonpark.org.
 
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” 1

The tiny patchwork squares, stitched together by hand into row after row of alternating light and dark, began to form the quilt top by which it was named: “Sunshine and Shadow.”

It was a sunshine year for Trent and me: 1989, and we were celebrating our twentieth anniversary in a big way. We had entrusted our two youngest children to good friends near our home in southern Germany and had driven our three oldest to a summer camp in northern Germany. After seeing them settled in, we climbed into our car and looked at each other. We were going to be alone for two whole weeks. We had not been alone for so long as a couple since before we had children. We felt giddy.

What followed were glorious, seemingly interminable days of discovering what became favorite places in northern Germany, Denmark, and Sweden—two weeks of renewing our marriage and just having fun. In those days before internet and micro-planning travel routes, we simply struck out, finding charming places to sleep at night and investigate by day. Every element of those two weeks seemed magical. We thought of it as our second honeymoon, as indeed it was.

Sunshine.

I had taken the quilt pieces with me. I could hand sew in the car as Trent was driving or in the evenings when he read to me. I felt I was stitching memories together with the quilt. It was a thing of beauty growing under my hands, and it symbolized something of the joy of our marriage.

I did not know how symbolic it was yet to become.

When daily life returned, I could work on the quilt only sporadically. But it continued to grow during that year, 1989, slowly, piece by piece and row by row, light and dark, sunshine and shadow.

1990 followed 1989, unsurprisingly.

In 1990, Trent’s cancer was discovered.

That year was memorable for other reasons: doctors, hospitals, surgeries, weekly chemo, weakness, fears for the unknown future, check-ups for tumor markers.

Shadow.

I rarely had time to sit down. There were five children and their schedules to be seen to, relentless housework, caring for my husband. Blessedly, there were friends who came in time of need, friends indeed.

When I did have ten or fifteen minutes, I picked up the quilt. Those rows of little colorful squares grew in significance as well as number. To be creating something beautiful, something that required concentration and effort, seemed to indicate hope—hope that there is a future, something to work toward, something satisfying, something that will be realized only in time, like planting a tree.

Though 1990 and chemo eventually came to an end, regular check-ups continued, along with their accompanying fears: will a new tumor be found? Check-ups, in fact, that lasted five years. Those years were marked by sunshine but also by repeated bouts of shadow. With cancer, you never quite breathe freely until the shadow passes again.

Sometimes, life can be so dire that even shadow is a weak comparison. Sometimes, the worst happens. Or, the worst multiplies, as it did for the man Job, as told in the Bible. 2

This historical person seemed to have everything going for him: wealth, houses, lands, cattle, a thriving family, an excellent reputation. Then he lost everything in a series of calamities, including his children. The friends who came to comfort him only made things worse by their assessment of his situation. His reputation foundered on their conclusions that his plight was somehow all his fault. Even his wife could not think of a helpful thing to say or do. Job’s sunny life was plunged into deep shadow, even darkness.

I love Job. I love him for this: “Shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity?” In the throes of despair—which he felt keenly—he could recognize a higher principle of life. He attributed to his Maker the source of both the sunshine and the shadow.

What Job could not know (I've read the end of the story!) is that his adversity would be turned into great good and even beauty in time.

Is it too far-fetched to think that something beautiful can come out of my shadows? Or—even more to the point—out of me? Truthfully, Job wasn’t looking for beauty, just relief. Beauty is not the first thing I look for, either, when the shadows come. I want to undo them, want life to go on as it was before the thing that caused the shadows happened—futile wanting.

Twenty-five years after our shadow year, we celebrated Trent being cancer-free. There was joy, there were tears. There was deep thankfulness. Messages from two doctors, one of whom discovered the cancer, jolted us: they had thought Trent would not survive.

The end of Job’s story, too, clearly jolted him, beyond his wildest expectations. He saw with new clarity that his tenuous trust was well-founded. Accepting his lot as from God was itself a thing of beauty that he realized only in time.

The “Sunshine and Shadow” quilt now hangs on our bedroom wall. The quilt is finished, but I am reminded that, in all probability, the shadows are not. Will I dread them in sunshine years? Or will I remember their source and the possibility of great good coming in time?

1 Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
2 The Book of Job
 
This blog post was taken from Vivian’s blog. See her other work at https://www.vivianhyatt.com/blog.

Persevere,                                                                                              Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

I once heard someone summarize the Bible in four words: “God wants everybody back.”

And that is the impetus behind Jesus’ Great Commission to take the Good News to people who don’t know that God loves them so much that He gave up His Son to bring them home.

The early church obeys Christ’s command.

The Book of Acts opens with Jesus outlining what it would look like when the church carried out His instructions in ever-widening circles: “You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem… in [the surrounding region of] Judea… [then crossing ethnic boundaries] in Samaria… and to the uttermost parts of the earth” [all people groups everywhere] (Acts 1:8).

Two millennia later that work is still ongoing, as missionaries keep bringing the Good News about Jesus to groups that have never heard of Him.

But I’ve long thought it odd that as important as the Great Commission is – and I do believe it is a prominent theme running throughout the Bible – the Great Commission mandate is not reiterated as an imperative in the epistles. We hear Jesus give His people their marching orders – “Spread out and tell everyone what happened” – and we see the church doing that in the Book of Acts. But we don’t hear the writers of the epistles tell people over and over again to witness to their neighbors and loved ones. In fact, there is precious little in the epistles about how we interact with non-believers (Col 4:5-6; 1 Pet 2:12). There seems to be an assumption that believers’ normal, daily interactions with non-believers will result in people coming to faith.

And it seems that this is precisely how the early church did grow, at least in the beginning. After the explosive growth on the Day of Pentecost – when the Spirit was poured out on God’s people and the church was born – there was continued numerical growth from that point on.

Then we reach the decisive point.

Luke tells us that the church in Antioch – a largely Gentile congregation – was praying together one day when the Spirit told them to send their two key leaders away to evangelize elsewhere.

I’m sure there was some considerable anxiety about losing those two men. Barnabas was the mature, encouraging representative of the mother church in Jerusalem, and the young, brilliant Saul of Tarsus, formerly a vicious enemy of the church, was now an energetic Christian leader.

But there was in the Spirit’s prompting a recognition that as vital as personal evangelism had been in spreading the Good News, the scope of personal interactions wouldn’t be broad enough to carry out Jesus’ instructions. The church would have to take deliberate steps to launch the Gospel into other places where Jesus was not known; fulfilling the Commission must involve sharing the Good News with strangers, not just friends and family.

The cost was high for that fellowship in Antioch.

They lost two key leaders. Somehow other leaders had to step in to take the place of the mature Barnabas and the gifted Saul.

The cost was high for Saul as well. He never returned to anything like a quiet, settled life. Though he did stay in some places for as long as a few years, he mostly traveled from city to city planting churches or checking with churches he had planted before. Beyond that, he suffered great personal harm, mostly at the hands of Jewish opponents to the Gospel message he carried with him.

But the cost of cross-cultural ministry is always very, very high, both for the missionary and for everyone else in the church as well.

When my father was stationed in Taiwan, the only American school in our city was Morrison Academy, a missionary school, so the student body was an interesting mix of military brats and MKs (missionary kids).

As I got to know my MK friends, I came to understand how difficult it was for their families to leave home and hearth to devote themselves full-time to cross-cultural missions. I knew that my dad’s assignment to Taiwan had an expiration date on it. We would finish his assignment there and then go back “home” to our life in the States.

But my MK friends had grown up as “third-culture kids,” not at home as Americans there in Taiwan nor totally at home in the States, either. Both they and their parents were paying a heavy price to bring the Good News to the people of Taiwan.

So why all the bother?

Why invest all the effort? As with all examination of our motives, we find we have mixed motives about doing the work of evangelism.

Primarily, our Lord and Master Jesus told us to do this work, so we must do it. Regardless of other motivations, His command is in itself sufficient.

But there’s more.

As we’ve written before in these pages, the most compelling reason for telling anyone else about Jesus is neighbor-love.

When I was part of some of the early missions efforts in Mongolia in the early 2000s, I remember thinking what it would be like to be part of the story some Mongolian matriarch would someday tell her extended family: “I remember when the Christians came to our town. That was the first time I had heard about Jesus. That day changed my life forever.”

What wouldn’t I be willing to give up to be part of that moment in that woman’s life and family?

But my presence there wasn’t a solo flight. I had traveled halfway across the world to be part of that team, but my wife had also played a role and paid a steep price: she was holding down the fort at home while I was gone for three weeks every year when I was making those trips. And there were dozens of donors who helped pay for my expenses. All of us together contributed to my being there to tell people far away about Jesus.

And it has always been so.

As with Barnabas and Saul and the visionary church in Antioch, it has always been a massive group effort to take the Good News about Jesus to places where He is not known.

We may never know in this life what effect our efforts will have. But we do know this much: Jesus told us to go, and both the going and the sending are a great privilege.

So let’s take the Good News to our neighbors and co-workers, and let’s send the Good News to people elsewhere who have never heard of Him.

When Jesus returns, I want Him to find me – to find us – busy doing what He told us to do.

Persevere,                                                                                              Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

And Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” And they cast lots to divide his garments. – Luke 23:34

Father Forgive Them

One of my favorite lines from Ghost Ship’s song “Son of David” is this: “The blind won’t gain their sight by opening their eyes.”

Early in Jesus’ ministry Jesus gave his followers some alarming instructions. They went something like this: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. If you only love those who love you, what reward do you have? Even the most deceitful people do that. And if you only greet your friends, you are just like everyone else. You must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect, not just good by comparison, but perfect (Matthew 5:44).

A few years later we find Jesus on the cross. His enemies have lied about him, shamed him, spit on him, tortured him, mocked him, and wrongfully accused him; his friends have left him and denied him; his people are now executing him in public next to actual criminals. And somehow in the middle of his own suffering his heart is to intercede on behalf of his accusers for God’s forgiveness, because they don’t know what they are doing.

Later in the song by Ghost Ship they write, “If I could see, I would follow, too.”

For They Know Not What They Do

What we see in the words of Christ gives us a whole theology of regeneration, a right understanding of evangelism, and much more.

First, people who do not know Christ are blind and deaf to the Gospel. If they could see it and hear it, they would follow and believe. These people have no idea what they are doing. God knows this, but no one else does. In the face of their anger, hate, lies, and fear, Jesus teaches us to pray that God would forgive them, for they know not what they do.

Notice what Jesus is not saying: “Father, punish them for their sin.” The New Testament reveals an ignorance that accompanies us in our sinful unregenerate state, yet Christ, in his suffering, acknowledges and intercedes for those blind souls who put him there. Instead of the common frustration, disdain, fear, and contempt people hold for those who speak, act or think negatively towards Christians, Christ expresses compassion and offers intercession to God for their forgiveness.

At school, in your social group, or on your sports team you may be afraid to admit that you are a Christian. You may fear receiving unloving comments or actions if you proclaim your faith. Christ tells us we are to expect this as we follow him. It would be a mistake to remove ourselves from any and all possibilities of interaction with those who believe different than us.

On the contrary, to follow Christ is to be willing to wisely walk into relationships with those who believe different than us, to love them, remembering that salvation is a work of the Lord not our efforts. What we needed, and what the world needs, is someone with the power to open blind eyes and remove the deafness in ears.
 
Here’s how Paul describes that blindness in one of his letters: “And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake” (2 Corinthians 4:4).

So we can see that it is not just sin that blinds us, but Satan himself has blinded us. Therefore we look to and pray to the one who has the power over sin and death: Jesus, the one who loves those who do not know what they are doing and intercedes on their behalf for God’s forgiveness.

If we must be perfect as God in heaven is perfect, then we have no hope in clearing the record of our past sins. There is no act, or culmination of works, we can accomplish to perfect ourselves before a holy God. There are no steps we can take that would satisfy God’s wrath towards all this unholiness in the world and in us. Far worse than a builder with no plans or a sailor without a compass, when we find ourselves outside of the regenerative work of God through Jesus Christ our Lord, we are hopelessly lost.

Jesus’ love for sinners and his prayer for his enemies reflect at least two amazing things – First, man’s only hope is God’s interceding power on their behalf. It’s not about trying to be good or comparing myself to others, but in trusting God’s means of salvation for sinners. The Second amazing thing: God desires to save sinners through Jesus Christ.

The chorus and ending of the song goes like this,

I cannot leave this gate
Since I cannot see my way
But I can stand and call His name
No, I could never leave this gate
But I will stand and shout His name
And I will count on His grace

Son of David, have mercy on me
Son of David, have mercy on me
Son of David, I want to see
Son of David, have mercy

I was blind, now I see
Jesus saved me
I was blind, now I see
Jesus saved me

Persevere,                                                                                              Joey Turner      
Pastor of Student Ministry

Last week we talked about seven stages for reaching our neighbors with the Good News about Jesus. This week we follow up as we drill down on the fourth stage: “Normalizing God-talk.” In this week’s post, Matt Hardy, a member of our fellowship, shares four ways to kick-start a spiritual conversation.

According to a 2019 Barna study, more than 95% of practicing Christians believe that being a witness for Christ is an essential part of their faith and that the best thing that could ever happen to someone is for them to know Jesus.

I think it's safe to say that Jesus agrees! The gospel writer Mark records that after His resurrection Jesus said to His disciples, "Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation" (Mark 16:15). Then moments before his ascension into heaven, He sought to assure them saying, "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth" (Acts 1:8). 

That same call to share the Gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit is ours today. Yet there are several factors that curb our enthusiasm for sharing our faith. Among them is the decline of religion in America and a growing cultural suspicion of people of faith.

Despite seeing the Lord at work in hundreds of spiritual conversations over my twenty-eight years in full-time ministry, I often feel these same fears and a general reluctance to initiate spiritual conversations with others. When the Lord prompts me to initiate a spiritual conversation with someone, I don't always obey or know where to begin. Maybe you relate. I have, however, found that if I'm willing to take the first step of faith in those situations, the Spirit of God provides the discernment I need, directing the conversation along the way.

As I think about how the Lord often moves me from a place of fear and reluctance to a surrendered heart that's willing to initiate a spiritual conversation with someone, several things come to mind. 

First, the Lord often prompts me to pause and pray (inconspicuously) when I'm among others who don't know Him.

When the impulse to pray enters my mind, it's easy to resist it and tell myself any number of excuses (this person isn't interested in God, you'll make a fool of yourself...). But if I submit and pray, the game is on! You see when we pray, we allow God to move us past our fears and reluctance to a place of obedience to engage in a conversation wherever He wants it to go. 

A second way I've seen God open a door for me to initiate spiritual conversations is by practicing the art of noticing.

Matthew 9:36 says of Jesus that "when he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a sheep!" He "saw" the crowds, noticed their harassed and helpless state without a shepherd, and He had compassion on them.

When we take time to notice something about someone else and ask them about it, a conversation is born that God can direct as He pleases. I've asked people to share about a religious tattoo I noticed on their arm or a school logo on their hoodie, or I’ve affirmed them for something caring I saw them doing. Sometimes, those conversations lead to spiritual things and sometimes they don't, but either way they feel noticed and valued.

As Doug Pollock puts it in his book  God Space, "Noticing is a prerequisite to caring about others and serving them in tangible ways that smuggle the Gospel into their hearts." 

Two weeks ago on a flight to Austin, Texas, I noticed that the woman seated next to me had a Bible in her lap. I asked her what part of the Bible she was reading and it led to a two-hour conversation about our common faith in Christ and shared with one another about our desire to lead out spiritually in our families and at work.

On another flight a year earlier, I heard one of the flight attendants say to someone that she wished she could go back to school. Moments later as she strapped in for our descent and arrival, I mentioned I heard her comment and asked why she would love to go back to school. Sensing I really wanted to hear more, she immediately opened up about several poor life choices and the nagging sense that her life lacked real purpose. She asked if I felt a sense of life purpose and that gave me the opportunity to share how placing my faith in Christ has given me a deep sense of purpose in all areas of my life.  

A third way God commonly opens a door for me to initiate spiritual conversations is by asking inquisitive questions that allow someone to share as little or much as they feel comfortable to share.

Recently, I asked a college basketball coach why he continues to coach at a small, under-resourced college when he most certainly had other opportunities elsewhere. He responded (fighting back tears) about his burden to do more than build a successful basketball program but also to build young men who will be great husbands, fathers and leaders in their communities. When I asked him why that was so important to him, he shared that Jesus had transformed his life and he wanted to use basketball as a means to bring his players into a relationship with God. 

I've learned that when you ask someone more about their intrinsic motivations for what they do or why certain things are important to them, it often leads to more honest conversation and relational trust. Questions like "Why is that important to you?" and "Can you tell me more about why you feel that way?" show that you care about their core values and beliefs and open the door for more genuine conversation about what and why we believe about ourselves, about life and God. 

A fourth avenue I've seen God use to create space for a spiritual conversation is the word "sometime.”

Often the notion of talking about one’s spiritual beliefs or experiences in the moment feels too personal or threatening. But I’ve found that if an idea is tossed out for some other time in the future, people often warm up to it. For instance, I might say "Joe, you said something in passing the other day that I can't get out of my mind. You mentioned that your parents got a divorce at the same time your church went through a split. Sometime, if you're willing, I'd love to hear more about that and how you got through it. Would you be up for that?" Those types of casual invitations into deeper conversations make people feel seen and valued, and they create safe space for meaningful conversations on their timetable. 

In an age when there are so many polarizing views about politics, injustice and seemingly something as trivial as how you like your eggs cooked, it can be hard to believe spiritual conversations about God are even possible in the workplace or even in our homes. But we can be assured that God is working in ways we can't see in the lives of every person we meet and He is eager to use us to spread the sweet aroma of the Gospel if we're willing to step out in faith. 

Matt and his wife Sally work with Athletes in Action in Xenia. God Space is available on our Discipleship Resource shelf outside the Family Life Center.

Persevere,                                                                                              Matt Hardy   
Athletes in Action

I recently attended a workshop on how to reach my neighbors with the Good News about Jesus. The workshop was hosted by Dave Holmes, pastor of Centerville Grace Brethren Church, who told us the story of the seven steps he has taken to reach out to the people who live in his neighborhood.

But before he started with the steps, he pointed out that Gospel-sharing has become a cross-cultural endeavor in our post-Christian culture.

He’s right, of course.

The Gospel simply doesn’t resonate with people now the way it used to. Gone are the days when Christianity and the church were automatically accorded a respectful hearing. In agricultural terms – and the Scripture describes evangelism in just those terms – the soil must be prepared before seed can be planted.

Hence seven stages.

When Dave asked, “What is the first stage?” I answered, “Get to know their names.”

Wrong.

Stage One: Prayer

The first stage doesn’t directly involve my neighbors. It involves me and God. I begin by praying for my neighbors, by name if I can.

We pray for our neighbors for their sake as well as ours. We ask that God will begin to prepare their hearts to hear about Jesus. In Jesus’ Parable of the Soils (Matt 13), there are four kinds of soil, but only one kind of soil is productive. We pray that God’s Spirit will prepare our friends’ hearts to receive the seed of the Word.

But the very act of praying for our neighbors changes us as well. As we pray, God deepens our love for our neighbors so that our love for them more closely reflects His love for them.

Stage Two: Loving well by acts of service

We open the doors to friendship with acts of service. These are not grand gestures but small acts of kindness we extend to our neighbors – shoveling snow, taking them a plate of fresh-baked cookies, helping organize a block party.

But – and this surprised me – Dave said that this might also involve being willing to be served. As we make friends of our neighbors, they may very well reciprocate by serving us. And we must be willing to enter into those relationships by being served as well as serving.

Stage Three: Building relational trust

Here’s where we begin to address the credibility gap that the church has in our culture. People don’t want to hear us talk about Jesus until they know they are safe with us.

We can demolish that safe space by jumping in to correct our neighbors’ faulty notions of the church or the Bible. But we don’t build trust by being right; we build trust by listening patiently and carefully.

Dave pointed out that we will know we’re building trust when our neighbors invite us into their space. They may invite us into their homes, or they may invite us to one of their kids’ concerts or games.

Dave’s neighbor invited him to a Dave Matthews Band concert. Dave went with his neighbor. It was a new kind of experience for Dave, but when his neighbor invited him, he went to that concert to deepen his growing friendship with his neighbor.

Stage Four: Normalizing God-talk

Spiritual conversations can be awkward in our culture, and this step is difficult for many of us. But the Gospel is a story that must be told, so words are necessary.

Once we’ve gone through the first three steps and established a safe place for this kind of intimacy, one easy way to talk about God with our unbelieving friends is to ask if we can pray for them.

When your neighbor tells you about a difficulty they are facing, you can ask if it would be all right if you could pray for them. If they’re comfortable with the idea, you can do that right then, in their presence, with them. If you sense that they wouldn’t be comfortable with that, you can pray for them offline, when you're not with them, then follow up later to find out how things are going.

Stage Five: Reading the Bible together

Dave suggests buying them a Bible. He suggests an easy translation like the New International Version or New Living Translation. And he even suggests that the Bible we give them be a study Bible, so that they can begin to find answers to their questions as they read.

If your neighbors are readers, assign brief sections to discuss next time you’re together. If they’re not readers, read it when you are together or even read it aloud as they follow along.

A few warnings:

1. Don't start with John’s gospel –– theologically rich as it is – but with Luke’s gospel. Luke tells lots of stories and shows us lots of situations where Jesus is reaching out to broken, marginalized people. 

2. When you’re talking together about what they’ve read, don’t throw cross-references at them. Stick to the text you’re reading together, even though you know about that great cross-reference in Hebrews. Too much too soon and they’ll quickly be overwhelmed.

3. Don’t be the “Bible Answer Man.” Don’t be quick to use your own life-long familiarity with Scripture to provide all the answers too quickly. This is a discovery, and they need to discover as they go.

Stage Six: Unveiling the Gospel

As you are reading the Bible together, you can begin to ask questions to help them begin to understand the Good News about Jesus:

• Who does Jesus say He is?

• What does He want for you?

• What does He want from you?

Stage Seven: Asking for a response

When the time is right, you can ask gently if they’re ready to make a decision about Jesus. But don’t rush this step. Your neighbor is not ready for this step until you’ve earned trust and made sure they have at least some understanding of who Jesus is and what He claims to be.
 
Don’t be in a hurry to close the deal.

This entire process can take years, so don’t get impatient. And it might not even end in your neighbor coming to Christ.

But that is not your concern. Your task is to love your neighbor well and leave the results to the only One who can change hearts.

It’s clear to everyone – both inside and outside the church – that our culture is collapsing. But, says Dave, “What the church sees as a collapsing culture Jesus sees as a ripening harvest.”

Let’s begin by praying for our neighbors.

Then let’s begin to serve and befriend them.

And throughout the process, let’s trust the Lord of the harvest to do His work in the hearts of the people we’re around every day.
 
One of the titles on our Discipleship Resources Shelf (outside the Family Life Center) expands on these ideas, especially the idea of opening doors through service and pivoting to spiritual conversation in a way that is natural and not forced. Check out God Space by Doug Pollock.

Persevere,                                                                                              Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

"Find your true self” is a mantra for our age. The assumption is that we are blind to the true essence of who we are, and we must search for that true identity.

We are told that once we find our true selves, we can live “authentically,” that is, we can live out the version of ourselves that we finally discover.

There are two problems with this naïve and shallow approach:

1. Finding an accurate picture of who I am can be complicated. The waters of our inner self get murky with narratives imposed on us by our culture (which is confused) and by our tendency to lie to ourselves (the most dangerous lies). 

2. When we do finally discover that true identity, we are not likely to appreciate what we find. After all, remember Jeremiah’s description of the human heart: “deceitful above all things and desperately wicked… Who can know it?” (Jer 17:9).

So that’s our dilemma: Once we do unearth our true self, we’re not likely to be encouraged by what we find. The human heart is, as Calvin put it, a factory of idols.

My wife and I enjoy watching British crime dramas. Occasionally we will see a confession scene in which the killer is not defiant or smug but incredulous. She tearfully confesses to the crime but can hardly believe she is capable of that sort of violence: “That’s just not who I am!”

But we all know that it’s not just murderers who have this problem. We all have an idealized self-image, a version of ourselves that expresses our aspirations. And we all live with the tension between those two versions of ourselves, those two identities: the kind of person we know ourselves to be and the kind of person we want to be.

This tension, of course, is nothing new.

It is the human condition Paul described in such exquisite detail two thousand years ago in Romans 7:18-19: “For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.”

Left to my own devices, I will never be able to connect those dots between the kind of man I am and the kind of man I want to be. My heart is too broken and corrupt to let me go there.

But the Gospel disrupts and subverts that tension between the kind of person I am and the person I long to be.

My identity in Christ replaces that simple, binary tension with a new, more complex tension. Now, thanks to God’s intervention in my life, that tension is far more glorious and far more hopeful.

1. Yes, I still struggle with sin. The Puritans had a name for the continued presence of sin in the heart and life of the believer. They called it “indwelling sin.” It should come as no surprise that even the heart of the believer continues to be corrupt; so long as we are in this flesh, we will continue to struggle, and our hearts will continue to manufacture idols.

2. But the Gospel declares that I am “in Christ.” This means that when the all-knowing, all-seeing One beholds me, He doesn’t see my fickle, corrupt heart, which causes so much pain to me and others. Instead, He sees the glorious purity and righteousness of His Son, who died in my place. Somehow, incredibly, I stand sinless before the eyes of the Holy One of Israel!

3. …and the Spirit is sanctifying me. God has taken it upon Himself to bend the trajectory of my life toward holiness. He has committed Himself to connecting those dots, making me the kind of person I’ve always longed to be. As Paul so helpfully put it, “He who began a good work in you will carry it to completion on the Day of Christ” (Phil 1:6). In my herky-jerky, three-steps-forward-two-steps-back spiritual progress, it is so good to know that the final outcome of my long battle with sin is assured not by my faithfulness but by God’s faithfulness.

This is why the Gospel is such good news.

The Gospel means I don’t have to excuse or minimize or justify my sin. Because I am secure in my identity in Christ, the Gospel frees me to acknowledge and confess my sin and my shortcomings.

But the Gospel never leaves me there with my sin. The Gospel also calls me to repent and abandon my sin and turn to righteousness, and it assures me that because of what the Spirit is doing in me, that righteousness will be mine not just in theory or aspiration but in fact and in truth!

I wish I could tell you that once you apprehend this glorious truth, you’ll never forget it.

But the truth is that we are forgetful creatures.

This is why we must continually preach the Gospel to ourselves.
We must continually remind ourselves of who we are in Christ, and we must constantly lean into the power of the Spirit to make real in our lives what is already true before the eyes of God.

Persevere,
Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship

Sometimes one of our blog posts generates a lot of response. This one, from a few years back, seems to have touched a nerve for many people.
 
I grew up despising the Pharisees. After all, in every episode of the gospels where they appear, they were Jesus’s implacable opponents. And Jesus himself denounced them as hypocrites (Matthew 23).

In Jesus’s day, the Pharisees were widely admired for the strict adherence to the Law, but thanks to their portrayal in the gospels, the word “pharisaical” now carries only negative connotations of pious self-righteousness and judgmental hypocrisy.

Then one day it struck me: I was more like the Pharisees than I realized, certainly more than I wanted to admit.

• They were men of the Word.

• Their blind-spots were cavernous.

• They had turned spirituality into performance art.

• And their hearts were stony.

In other words, they were far too much like me.

I was reminded of that unpleasant epiphany this week as I’ve been thinking about Jesus’s parable of the lost son. Of all Jesus’s stories, this is one that so clearly and so beautifully illustrates God’s love for lost sinners.

But to see that parable only as a portrayal of the gospel is actually missing the point of the story. Jesus told that story, along with two other stories of lost things found (the lost coin and the lost sheep, Luke 15), in response to the Pharisees who criticized Jesus for his social engagements with unsavory sorts – social outcasts like prostitutes and tax collectors.

Jesus told three stories of lost things found – and the great rejoicing that followed – to explain why he would spend time with the sort of people the Pharisees so scrupulously avoided.

The story of the lost son doesn’t have a fairytale ending. After he comes to his senses and returns home in disgrace, and when the father graciously forgives him (he doesn’t even let him finish his confession!), the story turns then to the elder brother’s sullen response.

And if the Pharisees had been listening closely, they would have realized that when Jesus got to the elder brother, he was talking about them. He was inviting them to see how their reaction to Jesus’s unorthodox friendships looks from God’s point of view.

You remember how it goes: when the elder brother learns that the father has welcomed home his wayward brother – the same man who had disgraced the family in the community – he storms out in a cold fury.

The story ends sadly, not with the elder brother repenting and joining in the celebration of his lost brother’s return but with the father pleading for him to give up his resentment and self-righteousness and join the party.

I remember a book I read once that brought me to an “elder brother” moment.

The Persecutor by Sergei Kourdakov (now out of print) was written by a man who had headed up a local goon squad for Soviet authorities. His crew was made up of street thugs, martial artists, boxers, and other men skilled in doing violence. 

Their job was to break up secret Christian meetings and terrorize the Christians. They would get word from an informer of a secret meeting going on, and on the way to the meeting they would decide whether to go fast or slow in carrying out their mandate.

If they chose the fast mode, they would crash into the service and thrash everyone there. When they were finished with their grisly work, they would go out to get drunk.

Sometimes they chose to go slow: they would break into the meeting and secure the premises to ensure that no one could escape. Then they would take out the worshipers one at a time to beat and abuse them. And then go get drunk.

As I read about how Kourdakov treated my brothers and sisters in Christ, the rage grew in me. It peaked when I read the episode in which his team put a sixteen year old Christian girl, naked, into a large jail cell where several men arrested for public drunkenness were spending the night.

I knew the book was published by a Christian publisher, so I knew how it was going to end, with his coming to put his faith in Christ.

What surprised me was my own reaction to the story of his conversion.

I found that I wasn’t happy that God has saved him from wrath. I didn’t rejoice that the grace of God in Christ could redeem even such a man. I remember being resentful, disappointed that this vile man would never have to pay for what he had done.

He got off scot-free. It just wasn’t fair.

Of course it wasn’t fair. The gospel isn’t about God treating us fairly; it’s about how he treats us kindly and mercifully because he visited his wrath on his Son instead.

When I found myself reacting with resentment at the good news of Kourdakov’s conversion, I realized that I was playing the role of the elder brother in Jesus’s story. Instead of rejoicing over the return of the lost sinner, I was sulking because I knew he would never receive the punishment he deserved.

So, yes, the parable of the prodigal son is a vivid portrayal of the gospel. Many gospel elements are so beautifully displayed – sin, repentance, grace, forgiveness, redemption. But to read the parable only as a picture of the gospel is to miss the point: the story of the lost son is actually a cautionary tale.

In reality, there are two lost sons in Jesus’s story.

The rebellious son comes to repentance and returns to his father’s gracious embrace. But as the story ends, the dutiful son is on the outside looking in, lost in his self-righteous arrogance and redemption. He is lost in his own “far country.”

Since Jesus leaves the story there – with the father pleading with his self-righteous son to relent and join the celebration – we don’t know if the elder brother did, after all, repent of his own sin and return to the father.

Which was precisely the point: the Pharisees were the elder son. Would they recognize and acknowledge their own sin and repent?

Henri Nouwen’s book The Return of the Prodigal Son explores this parable in great detail. As I have been reading it recently, especially as Nouwen turns the spotlight on the elder brother, I have realized again how much I have in common with the Pharisees, the men at whom Jesus aimed this story.

Nouwen notes that repenting of wild rebellion is so much easier than repenting of self-righteousness. The younger son’s rebellion was so obviously immoral that everyone could see that he was in the wrong. He was the last one to see what was obvious to everyone else all along; he comes to his senses, and he repents, and he returns.

But Nouwen points out that the self-righteous arrogance of the older brother is intertwined with virtue in a way that makes it difficult for him to detect and even more difficult to repent of. After all, why would he need to repent of having done his duty by his father for all those years? The very idea that a conscientious man would need to repent of his sin is offensive!

And thus, as I have meditated again on Jesus’s parable, this high-achieving, dutiful man of the cloth has had to come face to face with his own sin. I can see in the Pharisees –and now cannot un-see – an ugly reflection of my own sin.

Which explains the title.

Almost.

Paul, you may ask, if you are acknowledging for yourself that you have Pharisee-like tendencies, why the plural in the title?

Why “Pharisees R Us”?

I chose the plural partly because of the obvious play on words (“Toys R Us”) and partly because “Pharisee Am Me” would be awkwardly Yoda-like.

But also – mostly – because I believe that my malady is not unique. In fact, I believe it is a contagion that has made its home in many of our hearts.

In a church culture where we condemn sin and praise virtue, it’s easy to build a list of respectable sins that we are willing to overlook in ourselves, even as we roundly condemn the sins of others. It’s easy, then, to reinforce one another’s self-righteous judgmentalism.

I heard a story once about a pastor who told his deacon board that their next meeting would be in the local bar. The men sat there nervously in that unaccustomed atmosphere for an hour before the pastor said it was time to leave. Later one of the deacons asked why the pastor had insisted that they go through that weird exercise.

“I just wanted you to see what Sunday morning in church feels like for some people.”

Ouch.

“Pharisees R Us” indeed.

May God’s Spirit convict us of our sin and bring us home from our own far country.

Persevere,
Paul Pyle      
Pastor of Discipleship