Heroes, Danger, Goodness and Prostituted Women

Dan Allender May 31 2011 - 3 Comments

There is an ache for heroes, danger, and goodness and it is found uniquely in our day caring for exploited men and women and children. I need to make several confessions before proceeding into this entry. First, I believe we desperately need people who rise, in fact, tower, above the mendacity and mediocrity of our day. I asked a group of Pastors (5) how many in their church they would consider to be passionately and irrevocably committed to the Kingdom of God and all its privileges, responsibilities, and calling. Each looked at me like I was demented. I figured it was because I seemed to be questioning their integrity or the goodness of their flock. In fact, it was because they knew the numbers were so low it boggles incredulity. One said, “I have a congregation that regularly has 600 at Sunday worship and I’d answer about 10-20.” The others agreed the numbers were that low in each of their congregations.

I do not wish to digress about whom we see as worth our admiration—sports figures, Christian rock stars—celebrities in the fields of music, ministry, and words, and people with mega-millions. It is a rant that I have neither the energy nor interest to sustain. However, I do know my heart needs heroes—men and women who have lived with imaginative abandon and foolish savvy to build the Kingdom of heaven on earth. A hero is an ordinary person who seizes the opportunity to step into the maelstrom to rescue, to care for those caught in the dark cruelty of their situation. It could be an ordinary motorist who sees a car turned over in the ditch and the early flames of disaster licking at the spent fuel on the ground, who stops and rushes to the car to find trapped children and their mother. He risks his well being to offer rescue. Later, when told he is a hero, he looks startled and a bit chagrined and says, “Nope. I just did what anyone would do in that situation.” A hero sees their act not as one of bravery and choice; instead, it is a divine necessity put upon them because they were granted the privilege of being there before anyone else was on the scene. Every hero is too frightened to feel heroic and too focused to ponder long whether they should act.

I need heroes because the church seems so often tragically associated with rich bozos who own radio stations and predict the coming of Jesus in May or October, 1994 or 2011 or whenever, whatever. I cringe as the most recent absurdity that takes the focus of the news delivers our ‘message’ in the clothes of a clown. I simply need to know that someone is doing more than merely furthering their career or bearing the slings and arrows of the common complaints that are no more worthy to be addressed than a kind and gentle invitation—I plead with you to grow-up.

I need to know that the gospel actually takes a few men and women into realms of danger and goodness to offer life when all that exists is death. I need Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Corrie Ten Boom. It is good to know such men and women existed on this earth—but I am a hungry man who needs to know face to face someone who enters darkness with little regard for the naysayers or the voices of reason. I met her this past week. I actually met many such women and a few men this last week at the International Christian Alliance on Prostitution conference.

A second confession is that I believe anyone unaware or untroubled by human trafficking and prostitution is similar to the baker whose shop was outside of Dachau and who said when interviewed, “I had no idea such a terrible thing was happening.” It defies incredulity. It is not only impossible; it is the utter loss of human dignity as a shining lie is held unto as more precious than the darkest truth. We have well passed the hour when Christians can say, “I just didn’t know. I thought it was happening in Asia or Africa, but not in my home town.”

Prostitution exists in every nook and cranny of our land. The average age of a prostituted women entering the ‘life’ is 13. Not one prostitute enters fully of her own volition, or untouched by sexual harm and exploitation well before she turns her first trick. And it is the same all over the world—the church condemns and turns away in self-satisfied self-righteousness.

10 Years ago, due to the arrest of my 16 year old daughter for alcohol possession and her eventual decision to return to faith, and the subsequent decision to go to Siberia to work in an orphanage, she learned that many of her ‘girls’ would leave only to become trapped in the sex slave trade industry. She returned angry and as an advocate. I listened and was too busy to do anything other than to feel sad. In turn, she hooked my wife and my wife awakened me, literally by her tears often at night, and metaphorically by reminding me that my central calling is to sexually exploited and damaged people. It might seem obvious that I’d see the connection, but I am a coward and slow to dawn on the obvious when I am afraid.

And for 10 years I have been cautiously putting my toe in these dark waters—teaching and interacting with front line care givers who put their lives, reputations, and hearts on the line each and every day to go where few dare to enter. And then I facilitated a small group for 4 women who chose to consider the impact of their own story on their decision to enter the realm of human trafficking.

I met Cara, Renee, xxx, and Kimberly. I met four heroes. I will only introduce you to one, in part, because she is the only one so far to put her story into print. Now let me come clean as to the purpose of this blog—buy her book. This is not a book review or endorsement—it is a plea. Her name is Kimberly Smith and the title of the book is Passport Through Darkness (David C. Cook, 2011). Her website is MakeWayPartners.org.

Milton and Kimberly were missionaries in Spain when they discovered the reality of human trafficking near their home. They got involved and the trafficker threatened the life of their children. It rocked their worlds and rechanneled their labor. It also ruined their capacity to turn away and remain quiet.

Kimberly weaves an intricate and raw story of honesty and struggle with heartbreaking elegance. She is led to start an orphanage in war-torn, godforsaken Sudan. All the voices of reason said it was utterly impossible since the closest supplies were nearly a thousand miles away and only 3 miles of paved roads existed in that infrastructure barren land. And that was the least of her troubles. The Janjaweed, the militant Muslim raiders killed, raped, and stole at random. Pirates and thieves paroled the battered dirt roads. There was no one on the ground, but one man, a Sudanese Lost Boy who was caring for hundreds of orphans who had to sleep in trees to avoid being eaten by hyenas and lions during the night.

And Kimberly decided to build an orphanage and to do so without her husband. The story is mind-boggling. Milton who is a type one diabetic simply could not accompany her to Sudan. He remained behind to care for their kids and provide financial and ministry support. When I read of his courage to let his wife follow the calling of God, I wept. Actually, I swore and wept. How could this be God’s plan? How could God ask a husband and wife who adored each other and found strength and solace to make such a demanding, and at times, what I felt to be an unbiblical decision? I raged simply at the thought that God could separate my wife and I –or call us to danger, or even extremity. It is too much. But then I read on. And what I thought might turn into a lovely story of God shows up, riding on a white steed, his blue passport in hand, the sword of righteousness and mercy in the other, didn’t occur. Instead, the story turns from momentary offerings of goodness and love to the dark reality that no one can stop the daily carnage of starvation, disease and human cruelty. But somehow this frail reed didn’t get broken or the flickering candle allowed to be snuffed out. That alone is incomprehensible. But far more than that, the story is not merely about doing good as the earth totters and seems to come off its hinges. It is a story of redemption—the story of Kimberly and Milton. The story has so many layers and complexity it felt like I was reading a novel. But it is not—it is hauntingly true.

She writes,

Once asleep, I often dreamed of children scrambling up trees to claim their branches for the night—safe from hyenas. The next morning reality would break in with the sun as I bandaged orphans from wild dog attacks or stitched their split foreheads from falling out of the high bough of their tree bed. Or worse yet, I counted the missing children of who we would find no remains.

Living this life with orphans made it easy for me to understand we must build safe housing for them, regardless of the risks or cost. It is not such an easy leap for those who don’t hear the cackle, wipe off the blood, sew up the skin, or count the MIA orphans the morning after. Those who haven’t seen or heard the orphan’s life tend to rationalize the expense per unit, per square foot against the fear of war potentially destroying their investment: a building.

I have looked into this woman’s eyes and she knows the mystery of death and resurrection. Do I? Am I far more caught up in the cost and the practicality of my calling or the holiness of being a witness and a presence for those who have little or no hope?

Let me tell you the sequence of events of reading her book. I met Kimberly in my small group. I knew only a few hazy portions of her story. I had not read her book. But what I met in that group was a passionate, brilliant, sensitive and wild woman who had had more than a few experiences of taking on or at least encountering strong, opinionated Christian male leaders. It would be unethical to tell a single iota of the time with her and the other three. But suffice it to say, she knows her story—up to a point. And when we reached the point where it would cost her dearly to name and enter domains of heartache that seemed too severe to suffer, she entered that dark realm with eyes blazing (at me) and mostly at the evil one. She is a warrior who simply will not forsake the call to destroy all forms of darkness. She is a prophetess who will not settle for truth for others and a form of livable truth for her self. To be in the group was to watch a valiant woman take on evil and come out dirty, bloody and triumphant.

And then I read her book on the flight home. I began weeping in the first half hour and I was mesmerized and captured for 5 hours straight. The book haunted me. Here is a woman who is willing to hear hard truth about her own story from a total stranger with no trust, no history, and no basis for considering my words. And she struggled, fought against, and debated those issues with me in the group, finding for herself the true truth uniquely meant for her heart. And though that took courage, I later read she has been to the cruelest heart of darkness on this earth and found the passion to rise and suffer the stories of hell for another day.

What does it mean to be a kingdom of God hero? Enter darkness, especially your own. Enter that darkness with sufficient humility that it can only be called foolishness. And to the degree you find the bright and beautiful light of the kindness of God, then take that light to the darkest world that God calls you to enter and then let the voracious winds of hell try and suffocate the minuscule light you offer in his name. Come to see if you find God to be real, true, and good.

There are matters of my heart that I have been too frightened to name and hold as central to my calling. The particulars are not relevant at this moment. In reading A Passport through Darkness and gazing into the daunting, playful, death-knowing and resurrection believing eyes of Jesus it is time for me to say, “I must build an orphanage.”

29 Simple Ways To Be Fit

Steve McKinney May 18 2011 - No Comment

Far too often fitness is presented as complicated and confusing.

Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Being fit comes from living the following simple everyday practices:

1. Throw out your big dinner plates. Using small plates at home effortlessly reduces calorie intake and promotes weight loss.
2. Make exercise a regular part of your life. Create a network of accountability with workout partners or by working with me, your local fitness expert.
3. Know what you want to accomplish. Visualize the end result of your hard work.
4. Believe in you. I know that you CAN accomplish your goals.
5. Don’t be a wimp. Keep the intensity high during your workouts. Remember that you don’t want to kill time; you want to burn calories and strengthen your body through intense exercise.
6. Drink water all day long.
7. Know when to ask for help.
8. Incorporate High Intensity Interval Training into your routine by doing bursts of high intensity rather than exercising at a single steady pace.
9. Maintain your metabolism by eating a healthy snack or meal every three hours. This food should be unprocessed, low in fat and high in fiber.
10. Forget will-power; it’s about WANT-power. How badly do you want it.
11. Never eat processed foods. These items are high in empty calories and contain a plethora of chemicals that are harmful to your health.
12. Fat contains twice the caloric density of carbohydrates and protein, so limit the amount of it that you eat. Fill your diet with lean protein and carbohydrates from leafy plants and whole grains.
13. It’s OK to be a skeptic. Watch out for products that are labeled as ‘health food’. Always read the nutrition labels and make your own informed opinion.
14. Talk is cheap. Act now and get the job done.
15. Exercise with people that are in better shape than you. This will encourage you to push your limits.
16. Never indulge in negative self-talk.
17. Don’t drink calories.
18. Pay attention to everything that you eat.
19. Keep consistent. Exercise at least three or four times each week.
20. Expect more from yourself.
21. Never eat High Fructose Corn Syrup. It spikes your blood sugar levels and encourages your body to store fat.
22. Eat plenty of whole plant foods. Vegetables, fruits and whole grains are filled with fiber and antioxidants, great for good health and weight loss.
23. Do your cardiovascular exercise after weight training to encourage more fat burn. Your stored sugars will be depleted during the weight training then your body will rely on fat stores to get you through the cardio workout.
24. Breakfast should be a balance of carbohydrates, protein and fat to get your metabolism going strong.
25. If you know that you deserve better…then go get it.
26. Challenge yourself during each workout. Try something new and exciting.
27. Set specific, measurable goals and track your progress.
28. Even if they are whole grain, eat carbohydrates sparingly. Carbohydrates are quickly stored as fat.
29. Put an end to your struggle to get and stay fit. Email me today to get started on a proven fitness program that will change your life and body forever.

Print this list and place it somewhere that you’ll see every day.

Recipe of the Week

Favorite Green Beans

Green beans are low in calories and packed with vitamins and healthy fiber. This dish comes together quickly and the flavors are deliciously tangy.

Servings: 2

Here’s what you need:

• 8oz fresh green beans
• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• 1 Tablespoon dijon mustard
• 2 teaspoons brown rice vinegar
• 3 Tablespoons diced yellow onion
• dash of salt and pepper

1. Steam the green beans until soft, yet still with a slight crunch.
2. In a medium bowl whisk together the remaining ingredients. Add the green beans and toss together.
3. Transfer beans to serving dish and enjoy.

Nutritional Analysis: One serving equals: 94 calories, 4g fat, 9.5g carbohydrate, 3.3g fiber, and 2g protein.

Fitness Tip of the Week

Not Too Sweet

If want to lose weight, cut the sugar out of your diet. Sugar encourages fat storage by causing your insulin levels to rise. Try natural low-calorie alternatives to sugar, such as stevia.

MINISTRY FAST AND FURIOUS

Pete Alwinson May 10 2011 - No Comment

It’s a Friday morning, at 7:00. I’m taking Jessie to school and we’re a bit late out the door. I’ve already had several cups of brew (coffee…coffee…come on! Not that…coffee is a vitamin, God’s organic gift to the world) and I have to be at the airport at 9:30 for a 10:30 flight. I haven’t shaved yet, I’m not fully packed, and I have to meet Caron at the auto shop to leave her car to get worked on, bring her home, and then go with her to the airport. She needs my truck while I’m gone cause…well you got it, hers is broken.

So we haven’t figured it out yet…but after dropping my daughter off I call Caron and tell her, cause I’m hyper efficient, that I’ll meet her at the auto shop right after I drop Jessie off. I get there and Caron’s not there yet. I’m there cranking out some emails on my iPhone when she calls, annoyingly interrupting my emailing…”Where are you?” “I’m at the place…where are you?” “You’re at the wrong place. Different shop.” “Ah…I’ll be there in 15 minutes.” I was there in 20 or 22 minutes, being that it’s morning. But I always over promise and under deliver when it comes to time. Always. I’m still trying to be realistic with time. Why haven’t I, spiritual giant that I am, gotten my time under control?

Driving to pick up my wife: I’m nursing some definite frustration with HER because she didn’t tell me where she was taking the car and why she was taking it there when we never take the car there. Never. I haven’t felt like really yelling at any body like that in a long time.

But I’m going (if I ever get out of town) to speak at a men’s retreat and one of my points is going to be that as a man it is my responsibility for setting the tone in the home…not my wife’s. I’m the spiritual leader of the family…right? Ya…I should love my wife as Christ loves the church, as a prophet, priest and king. Sacrificial leadership. Servant leadership. I believe that and try to practice it. And my leadership role which I love was bearing in on me. Something’s gotta change…I have got to lead better than this.

When I rolled up into the other repair shop and we saw each other we were both calmed down (can you imagine it…she was frustrated with me!), and we both said practically the same thing: we’re too busy and we merely assumed that we each knew where the car was going to be taken. We’re too busy, we didn’t talk, we assumed too much. The morning (and weekend) all worked out with no time to spare…I flew out on time…whew…no one on this plane knows me and I have no responsibilities for two and a half hours.

Confession is good for the soul, even if it’s in black and white on the internet: I still do ministry too fast and furious. I have trouble saying no. While I plan my weekly schedule and teach my seminary students to plan their schedules well (“If you fail to plan, you plan to fail” might be a cliché…but it’s still true a lot of the time), I still have more to do than I can do. My margins are horrible sometimes. Richard Swenson would look at my week and would shrug his shoulders at me and say something like, “You’ve read two of my books, what else can I do? You gotta get some margin in your life.” Ya, I teach your stuff man. Ministry, life too fast and furious. A lot of the time I’m only relaxed and focused when I’m not in town. My favorite place is an isle seat on an airplane ‘cause no one knows me (usually), and I if I can yank open a book quick enough no one will talk to me. Blessed freedom to think, pray, experience slow and peaceful rather than fast and furious.

Ministry too fast and furious for you? Can you relate? What’s your Friday morning story, or Monday or Sunday story? Ok, so no fixing you or me here, but here’s where I stand; I can do no other than to admit that I’m in a love-hate relationship with fast and furious. I like to feel important and I like to be busy but I just hate being too busy. I want to be alone from all people more than I care to admit. Love-hate. And I can do no other than to admit that I really am not busy so that God will like me as much as I am busy so that I will like myself and that others will like me. I get the Gospel 50%. I hardly ever try to impress my Father; He knows too much. Really, I’m not being spiritual, I’m being honest. I’m not a pastor to earn my way to heaven or to get His approval. I have it, I know. I’m His son forever because of His will and Jesus’ Cross and for no other reason. The other 50% of the Gospel is just now, at my advanced age, starting to sink in: I can’t fill up the abyss of my soul in this life by activity and people pleasing…only someone Infinite can do that. So the Gospel is starting to free me from others, and from frantic activity. As Pascal said, “All men seek happiness, this is without exception.” He doesn’t criticize us, he merely states the obvious. As Lewis says, our desires are not too strong but too weak…”we are too easily pleased”. (Go back and read the sermon, THE WEIGHT OF GLORY…you’ll love it). For me, part of the freedom for which Christ set me free, is freedom for too fast and furious ministry.

Oh, before I leave, I want to tell you a couple of things. Writing this took longer than I had planned. I thought it would flow more quickly. Poor scheduling again. But I had built in some free time after this so that I could run home and see my family before leaving to speak and hang out with the guys of our church. The other thing is I still like speed. Vin Diesel’s “Fast Five” movie, his, what 5th in 10 years just came out and when it comes out on DVD I’ll watch it. I know, I know, it’s not great theatre. There’s no message there. No redemption theme, I know. It’s just, I love speed. And the Father seems to whisper to me sometimes, “Look son, you can go as fast as you want, but you’ll miss me and your family and others. And you just don’t have to go quite so fast. Get the other 50% of the Gospel son. I’m here!”

He’s there for you too. Isn’t He a great Father?

Rethinking Progress

Tullian Tchividjian May 03 2011 - 1 Comment

The gospel has me reconsidering the typical way we think about Christian growth.

It has me rethinking spiritual measurements and maturity; what it means to change, develop, grow; what the pursuit of holiness and the practice of godliness really entails.

What’s been happening in me recently is similar to what happened in me when I first became a Calvinist back in the Winter of 1995.

Everything changed.

I began to read the Bible with new eyes. The sovereignty of God and the sweetness of his unconditional grace were EVERYWHERE! I remember thinking, “How did I miss this before? It’s all over the place.”

Well, the same thing has been happening to me with regard to how I think about Christian growth.

If we’re serious about reading the Bible in a Christ-centered way; if we’re going to be consistent when it comes to avoiding a moralistic interpretation of the Bible; if we’re going to be unswerving in our devotion to understand the many parts of the Bible in light of its unfolding, overarching drama of redemption, then we have to rethink how we naturally and typically understand what it means to “work out our salvation with fear and trembling” (Philippians 2:12).

In his 2008 movie The Happening, writer, producer, and director M. Night Shyamalan unfolds a freaky plot about a mysterious, invisible toxin that causes anyone exposed to it to commit suicide. One of the first signs that the unaware victim has breathed in this self-destructing toxin is that they begin walking backwards—signaling that every natural instinct to go on living and to fight for survival has been reversed. The victim’s default survival mechanism is turned upside down.

This, in a sense, is what needs to happen to us when it comes to the way we think about progress in the Christian life. When breathed in, the radical, unconditional, free grace of God reverses every natural instinct regarding what it means to spiritually “survive and thrive.” Only the “toxin” of God’s grace can reverse the way we typically think about Christian growth.

For a whole host of reasons, when it comes to measuring spiritual growth and progress our natural instincts revolve almost exclusively around behavioral improvement.

It’s understandable.

For example, when we read passages like Colossians 3:5-17, where Paul exhorts the Colossian church to “put on the new self” he uses many behavioral examples: put to death “sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.” He goes on and exhorts them to put away “anger, wrath, malice, slander” and so on. In v.12 he switches gears and lists a whole lot of things for us to put on: “kindness, humility, meekness, and patience” just to name a few.

But what’s at the root of this good and bad fruit? What produces both the bad and good behavior Paul addresses here?

Every temptation to sin is a temptation, in the moment, to disbelieve the gospel–the temptation to secure for myself in that moment something I think I need in order to be happy, something I don’t yet have: meaning, freedom, validation, and so on. Bad behavior happens when we fail to believe that everything I need, in Christ I already have; it happens when we fail to believe in the rich provisional resources that are already ours in the gospel. Conversely, good behavior happens when we daily rest in and receive Christ’s “It is finished” into new and deeper parts of our being every day— into our rebellious regions of unbelief (what writer calls “our unevangelized territories”) smashing any sense of need to secure for ourselves anything beyond what Christ has already secured for us.

Colossians 3:5-17, in other words, provides an illustration of what takes place on the outside when something deeper happens (or doesn’t happen) on the inside.

So, going back to Philippians 2:12, when Paul tells us to “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” he’s making it clear that we’ve got work to do—but what exactly is the work? Get better? Try harder? Clean up your act? Pray more? Get more involved in church? Read the Bible longer? What precisely is Paul exhorting us to do? Clearly, it’s not a matter of whether or not effort is needed. The real issue is Where are we focusing our efforts? Are we working hard to perform? Or are we working hard to rest in Christ’s performance for us?

He goes on to explain: “For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (2:13). God works his work in you—which is the work already accomplished by Christ. Our hard work, therefore, means coming to a greater understanding of his work. As I mentioned a few posts ago, in his Lectures on Romans Martin Luther wrote, “To progress is always to begin again.” Real spiritual progress, in other words, requires a daily going backwards.

I used to think that when the Apostle Paul tells us to work out our salvation, it meant go out and get what you don’t have—get more patience, get more strength, get more joy, get more love, and so on. But after reading the Bible more carefully, I now understand that Christian growth does not happen by working hard to get something you don’t have. Rather, Christian growth happens by working hard to daily swim in the reality of what you do have. Believing again and again the gospel of God’s free justifying grace everyday is the hard work we’re called to.

This means that real change happens only as we continuously rediscover the gospel. The progress of the Christian life is “not our movement toward the goal; it’s the movement of the goal on us.” Sanctification involves God’s attack on our unbelief—our self-centered refusal to believe that God’s approval of us in Christ is full and final. It happens as we daily receive and rest in our unconditional justification. As G. C. Berkouwer said, “The heart of sanctification is the life which feeds on justification.”

2 Peter 3:18 succinctly describes growth by saying, “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Growth always happens “in grace.” In other words, the truest measure of our growth is not our behavior (otherwise the Pharisees would have been the godliest people on the planet); it’s our grasp of grace–a grasp which involves coming to deeper and deeper terms with the unconditionality of God’s love. It’s also growth in “the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” This doesn’t simply mean learning facts about Jesus. It means growing in our love for Christ because of what he has already earned and secured for us and then living in a more vital awareness of that grace. Our main problem in the Christian life is not that we don’t try hard enough to be good, but that we haven’t believed the gospel and received its finished reality into all parts of our life.

Gerhard Forde insightfully (and transparently) calls into question the ways in which we typically think about sanctification and spiritual progress when he writes:

Am I making progress? If I am really honest, it seems to me that the question is odd, even a little ridiculous. As I get older and death draws nearer, I don’t seem to be getting better. I get a little more impatient, a little more anxious about having perhaps missed what this life has to offer, a little slower, harder to move, a little more sedentary and set in my ways. Am I making progress? Well, maybe it seems as though I sin less, but that may only be because I’m getting tired! It’s just too hard to keep indulging the lusts of youth. Is that sanctification? I wouldn’t think so! One should not, I expect, mistake encroaching senility for sanctification! But can it be, perhaps, that it is precisely the unconditional gift of grace that helps me to see and admit all that? I hope so. The grace of God should lead us to see the truth about ourselves, and to gain a certain lucidity, a certain humor, a certain down-to-earthness.

Forde rightly shows that when we stop narcissistically focusing on our need to get better, that is what it means to get better! When we stop obsessing over our need to improve, that is what it means to improve! Remember, the Apostle Paul referred to himself as the chief of sinners at the end of his life. It was his ability to freely admit that which demonstrated his spiritual maturity–he had nothing to prove or protect because it wasn’t about him!

I’m realizing that the sin I need removed daily is precisely my narcissistic understanding of spiritual progress. I think too much about how I’m doing, if I’m growing, whether I’m doing it right or not. I spend too much time pondering my failure, brooding over my spiritual successes, and wondering why, when it’s all said and done, I don’t seem to be getting that much better. In short, I spend way too much time thinking about me and what I need to do and far too little time thinking about Jesus and what he’s already done. And what I’ve discovered, ironically, is that the more I focus on my need to get better the worse I actually get. I become neurotic and self-absorbed. Preoccupation with my performance over Christ’s performance for me makes me increasingly self-centered and morbidly introspective. After all, Peter only began to sink when he took his eyes off Jesus and focused on “how he was doing. As my friend Rod Rosenbladt wrote to me recently, “Anytime our natural incurvitas (fixture on self) is rattled, shaken, turned from itself to that Man’s blood, to that Man’s cross, then the devil take the hindmost!”

So, by all means work! But the hard work is not what you think it is–your personal improvement and moral progress. The hard work is washing your hands of you and resting in Christ’s finished work for you–which will inevitably produce personal improvement and moral progress. Progress in obedience happens when our hearts realize that God’s love for us does not depend on our progress in obedience. Martin Luther’s got a point: “It is not imitation that makes sons; it is sonship that makes imitators.”

The real question, then, is: What are you going to do now that you don’t have to do anything? What will your life look like lived under the banner which reads “It is finished?”

What you’ll discover is that once the gospel frees you from having to do anything for Jesus, you’ll want to do everything for Jesus so that “whether you eat or drink or whatever you do” you’ll do it all to the glory of God.

That’s real progress!

Expectations…the road to disappointment!

Lea Clower April 25 2011 - No Comment

I must admit that I have learned more useful information about living the Christian life from AA than I have at church. But when my “stinking thinking” became transformed by other “successful” alcoholics, those who were not only dry but more importantly “sober”, it has been amazing to realize that the principles learned were Biblical grace…towards others and towards self.

Some of you are about to discount everything I say because the third step of the 12 Steps states: “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.” In the early days of AA they operated with only two books, The Big Book (which is the guide book of AA) and The Big, Big Book (which is the Bible). Now let’s be real honest, don’t you tell people about “God as you understand Him?” With that said, give me a break and keep reading, and as Steve says, “If you don’t, you’ll get the fever and die.”

Back to expectations…for most of us, expectations are actually demands. When we expect something to happen, or a person to respond/act in a certain way, we actually have “planned an outcome”. Our expectation has moved from a “hope so” to a “have to”. We have asked God to do something when we’ve actually expected Him to answer in a certain way. Making plans is a good thing. Planning outcomes is a bad thing. As a matter of fact, it has also been said, “If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans.” When a “want to” becomes a “have to” then we are in trouble!

My good friend, Jim Suddath, and I were talking just the other day about this very thing, and Jim said, “I just have to lower my expectations.” My response was “No, you need to have no expectations.” Al-a-Non teaches that “Expectations are pre-meditated resentments.” Think about it…if in my heart of hearts, my expectations are really demands or planned outcomes, and the expectation is not met, then resentment is usually my first response. So it is really in my best interest, and it “gives God the freedom” to answer our hopes and prayers anyway He wants to.

The next objection is usually, “Can’t I expect good things to happen or at least hope they will?” “Won’t lowering my or having no expectations, let people off the hook of their responsibility?” The answer to both objections is yes. Yes, you can expect good things, and hope for them, but most of us have moved the expectation to a demand…a want to a need. And secondly, yes, you need to let that person off the hook, because you are not a policeman, only the Holy Spirit can fill that role. We are encouragers, not watch dogs. And if I put my hope in someone rather than in the Lord, then I WILL be disappointed more often than not.

Another way to look at expectations has a lot to do with my “daily experience with God” and the “hind-sight of His hand at work”. Said theologically, it begs the question, do I believe in my heart, not my head, that God is sovereign and that God is good…at the same time? I have found in so many situations that we worry and are anxious because we pray about something or someone, but don’t really “leave it with the Lord.” I figure out how I want Him to answer, the ways He can orchestrate my answer, and then get about the work of making my answer come true. This is a two fold issue: 1] I don’t trust God because I know bad things happen to good people, and 2] if I don’t worry, agonize, and/or do something, then I’m not doing my part. In response to issue #1, after years of experience, including alcoholism ( it’s been 30 years since my last drink, but only 20 years of sobriety), the death of my third son, near divorce more times than I can count, and being fired from most jobs I’ve had in the ministry (it’s more politically correct to say that I have been offered the “opportunity to exercise my gifts elsewhere”), I don’t trust God to do things my way, but I do trust Him to do things the best way. And in response to issue #2, doing nothing is called waiting which is often times doing the most important thing you can. There’s an old say that, “Nothing is often a good thing to say, and more often a good thing to do.” It doesn’t feel like the American Christian, culturally appropriate thing to do, but it is Biblical to wait and see God show up in His time and in His way.

Finally, I want to quote my pastor, Eric Reaves. “The thing going on in your life is not the thing going on in your life.” It is so much deeper and more important than what is right in front of you. God’s “severe mercy” is often His greatest teaching tool…but it takes time and pain. Is God sovereign and is God good at the same time. I know it doesn’t feel like it right now, but you hang in there. Someday it will.

“What is in your life that is beyond the scope of Christ’s power?” The answer is simple, nothing. Living through, surviving the answer is what is hard.

“What part(s) of you need to die and be raised in the power of Jesus?” The answer is I, my agenda and my expectations need to die, Mt 10:39 “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Quite amazing; living my life results in death, putting my life to death results in life. But also quite amazing, though God “seems backwards”, He’s right and His way works.

Eric helps me a whole lot, but he does make me think and look at things more and more from a kingdom perspective. My expectations keep me thinking in a personal perspective, and for me that’s not very healthy.

Hope this helps!
Lea

Fear and the Fight of Faith

Tom Wood April 12 2011 - 1 Comment

In the movie Braveheart, there is a terrific scene where the Scottish army, under William Wallace, is soundly defeated at Falkirk because of the treachery of one of the main Scottish Lords, Robert the Bruce. His father had worked out an arrangement with the King of England, Edward Longshanks.

The “Bruce” is horrified at what he has done, and goes to see his father who is in hiding because of his leprosy.

His father said, “It’s what had to be done, to protect the future of the family, increase your lands, and in time, you will have all the power in Scotland.”

Robert the Bruce replies, “Lands, men, titles, power, nothing.” “Nothing?” his father incredulously responds. “Yes, I have nothing,” Robert shouts back. “Men fight for me because if they don’t I throw them off my lands, starve their wives and their children.”

Why do I keep on keeping on with Jesus?

Jesus told a story about a nobleman who went to be crowned king. As he was leaving he gave 10 of his servants 3 months wages and told them to put the money to work. One of the men gave the full wages back when it was payment time. He said, “I kept it hidden because I was afraid of you—you are a hard man. You take what you didn’t give and you reap what you didn’t sow.” Wow. That’s really honest isn’t it?

Do I serve God out of fear that he will “throw me off his land, and starve my wife and children.” I totally have enough faith to believe that God can take it all away. Every bit of it. “I knew you were a hard man…you take…”

But that is not very Gospel is it? Of course God loves me. He sent Jesus… “He who spared not His own Son, will He not also give us all things?”

So it really is the fight of Faith isn’t it? The Fight to believe in God’s promise and God’s love. To live as an adopted son, not a servant who fears his Master will take it all away, throw me off his lands and starve me out. I am at the heart of it, a Pharisee, and I hate that.

Why do you serve God in a job you are tired of doing? Why continue to follow God’s ways when you are so unjustly treated, when people are saying all sorts of things about you? Can the security of God’s love really be enough? Is the gospel penetrating deeper into your awareness as a son or daughter? He really isn’t mad at me anymore! He really is for me!

The scene in Braveheart ends with these lines…Robert the Bruce adds, “Those men who bled the ground red at Falkirk, they fought for Wallace and he fights for something that I‘ve never had. And I took it from it from him when I betrayed him; and I saw it on his face on the battlefield.”

His father says, “All men betray. All men lose heart.” The Bruce, shouts at him, “I don’t want to lose heart. I want to believe, as he does.” Me too. I want to believe in the Jesus who was totally betrayed for my sake—who gave it all up, so I could be rich in God!

Giddy-up

Dan Allender April 04 2011 - 3 Comments

It was not meant to happen.  I sat down in front of the television and intended to watch the last bit of the news before going up to bed to read.  The news ended and the programming turned to a local travel show.  I was also multi-tasking as I traversed the Internet on an aimless search that occasionally bumped into something intriguing but I flitted from screen to screen in a vacuum.

I knew something was wrong.  There were pulses of energy that were met with a brain freeze that stymied any thoughtful decisions.  I sat and watched the next show which was the day’s accounting of the foibles, errata, and boggling idiocy of our most salacious stars.  I sucked this down with shame but I didn’t turn my eyes.  Soon the programming brought a silly family show about a family that is written to resemble my own but sufficiently bizarre that I can feel secure that we are not that abnormal.  Another show passed, then another.  I was caught in the hypnotic glow of the interplay of the sound on the television and the passing websites explored for little more than the initial intrigue of the home page.

I knew I was wasting away the night.  I had email to finish, a novel I was enjoying; I could join my wife in bed, sleep, if I only chose to get up, but instead I surrendered to the darkness of banality.  When NCIS came on, I watched the entire show though I could have predicted each line and nuance of the drama.  I then went to the perambulation of the remote and clicked through the channels in a final frenzy of boredom.  When the late local news came on it was a signal that I had gamboled away nearly 5 hours of my life in the seduction of nothingness.  I felt like crap.  I binged and I felt dirty, stupid, and empty.  Debauchery comes in many forms.

The next day I blew it off as a need to chill out.  No big deal.  But there was a film over my heart and I felt neither freedom, anticipation, or goodness about the day.  It is in moments like this I have far too often ignored the ache, dismissed the greasy presence over me, in me, as an inevitability of living in a fallen world.  Buck it up, partner, throw your leg over the saddle and mosey on to round up the little doggies.  I am a professional soul herder and not every day is lively or lovely.  For whatever reason, this day was different.  Jesus smacked my steed and I was left standing before him and I heard him say, “How about you and I sitting for a while?” 

Most of the time I am fond of Jesus.  I like to engage the one I read about in the B-I-B-L-E. I know he is God.  I know he is human and I love to watch and think about the manner in which he traverses the dirt and uneven terrain of Palestine.  I just don’t like him interrupting my day too often, especially when the conversation is going to be about me, or us.  I am linked to a tradition of cessationists that are comfortably assured that the gifts of the Spirit that showed up in Bible days ceased when the Apostolic era ended.  One can never trust the level of disorder those unruly gifts might create unless the Apostles are present to clean up the mess and toss out the imposters with impeccable wisdom.  I don’t recall the other reasons I am not allowed to believe in the gifts of the Spirit but it has made my life far less complicated and more lonely. 

Nevertheless, he smacked my horse’s rear and I stood alone before him and he moseyed me to sit next to him. How do you prefer to receive this story?  Metaphor? Illustration?  Dream sequence?  Or in my mind’s eye, I saw him dressed like a cowboy and he hit my horse and I stood before Jesus and he sat on his haunches and invited me to sit.  I did.  But I’m not limber enough to do anything other than sit on my derriere.  Now the rest of the discussion I will distill into content and not tire you with the process.  It didn’t last terribly long—about a half hour.  You are certainly welcome to dismiss this story as exaggeration, narcissistic hubris, or if you know portions of my story a chemically-induced, imaginative flash-back to a by-gone era.  Whatever it was, whatever he is, I was unnerved. 

The central question he asked was not what I expected.  It seldom is.  He wanted to know why I found the glory he offers me so troubling.  The debauchery of the night before came after two weeks of exhausting and utterly amazing stories of heartache and redemption.  Suffice it to say, I spend most of my days in the dark tunnels of sexual violence—shame, addiction, idolatry, cruelty, and occasionally redemption.  In countless ways, I am a sin eater.  When redemption comes it invariably surprises me.  I am thrilled but always surprised and somewhat leery. Why then?  Why not later or before?  In some form it is a drive to understand, to comprehend so I can replicate it for others.  On the other, it is a deep suspicion with change, of any sort.  And it is as well, a relentless hunger to be in the presence of God’s glory.

What I can tell you about the conversation is it was tender and kind.  The words he spoke about the Sabbath conference and how our group leaders walked into dry, angry, and exhausted hearts to humbly invite the warriors we served to hear the delight of the Father brought tears streaming down my face.  And he blessed me.  I led those good men and women who fought in the small groups; I taught and prayed for them.  But the words he spoke to me about my heart as a leader still make me blush.   

As unnerved as I was I still had not connected the words I heard to the night before.  The conversation ended rather abruptly.  He got up and walked away to get coffee.  I looked around and I was staring at the same television that had captured me the night before.  The screen was dark.  I felt no urge to turn it on, but I couldn’t take my eyes off of it. 

My heart felt alive and strong and I wondered why the night before I felt so dead.  And it seemed so simple.  I was tired.  I had no energy left for anyone or anything and I wanted to plunge into a numb, hyper-stimulated nothingness so that I didn’t have to think, feel, or choose anyone or anything.  It wasn’t primarily my exhaustion that was at war with my senses.  It was glory.  I simply had no space left, no capacity to bear up under the combined labor expended and glory experienced.  I could bear nothing more of the presence or kindness of God.  To have done so I would have had to collapse in his arms and cry like a child.  I would have had to ask him what he thought of me and my labor and heard his words or risked the static silence of my jumbled brain.  Instead, I used television as a pornographic mockery of all that I had experienced to tune out his voice or silence my need for his words.  What I fled from was his kindness and what I ran smack into was his presence. 

The word that kept coming to mind was debauchery. It was loud and insistent. I know its meaning. But something compelled me to look it up in the dictionary. It comes from the French word debauch—to lead away from duty. It is what I had done. I had allowed myself to be seduced, to indulge in a sensuous affair to escape my duty. But what dawned on me in the aftermath of the night’s indulgence and the comical and odd conversation with cowboy Jesus was he had seduced me from duty—not in my sin of the night before—that is mine alone, but in his casual, nonchalance and invitation to not get to work but to hear him, to receive from him, the very kindness that I most desire and yet so often steer far from. He led me away from duty. Oh, kind and crafty Jesus, how do you want to enter our flight from you? How do you want to make yourself known to us, to speak? What do you want to say to our most weary and hardened heart?  How Jesus do you wish to debauch us from duty to receive from you the delight of your heart? 

7 Secrets to Maintain Weight Loss

Steve McKinney March 22 2011 - No Comment

If you’ve ever lost weight, you know how hard it is to keep it off.

Ever wonder why some people are able to keep weight off, while others put it right back on? Read on for the 7 Secrets to Maintain Weight Loss. (And if you still have pounds to lose, these 7 secrets will help you too.)

Secret #1: Keep on Moving

If you’re serious about keeping the weight off, you need to be serious about your workouts. Keep your activity level high, both in and out of the gym. Your workouts should consist of both cardiovascular training and strength training. While out of the gym make an effort to move as much as possible by taking the stairs, going for walks or jogs and participating in recreational activities.

Secret #2: Be a Healthy Eater

Sorry, you can’t go back to eating at the drive through and expect to maintain your weight loss. Focus on these 3 aspects of healthy eating:

1. Keep calories low. Gone are the days of eating mindlessly. Be aware of everything that goes into your mouth, whether by journaling or simply keeping a mental tally.
2. Be careful. Eat small portions, avoid high-calorie foods and check nutrition labels. You don’t have to swear off chocolate forever, just eat it occasionally with portion control.
3. Eat a balanced diet. Include a variety of fruits and vegetables, lean meats and whole grains.

Secret #3: Turn off the TV

The average person watches a whopping 35 hours of television each week. People who successfully maintain weight loss, on the other hand, watch an average of 7 hours or less. TV watching encourages snacking and puts you in a sedentary position on the couch. Spend less time in front of the TV and enjoy longer lasting weight loss.

Secret #4: Keep it Simple

While it is important to keep a variety of fruits and vegetables in your diet, your diet should be fairly simple. Create a repertoire of basic whole foods: fruits, vegetables, lean meats, whole grains, beans and nuts. When you cut down on your options it becomes easier to stick to your plan, making weight loss guaranteed.

Secret #5: Track Yourself

Your biggest fear is gaining back every solitary lost pound, but don’t be afraid of your scale. Weigh yourself at least once each week to monitor any gains. If the numbers begin to climb then reduce calories and increase your exercise.

Secret #6: Eat for the Right Reason

Emotional eating is one of the top reasons that people are overweight. It’s very important that you view food as fuel, not as an answer to deeper emotional needs. When food becomes more than just fuel, the pounds quickly add up. If you want to keep your weight under control, you’re going to have to eliminate emotional eating.

Secret #7: Forget All-Or-Nothing

No one is perfect – not even you! There will be days when you eat more calories than you should have. There will also be days when you miss a workout. Don’t let small slipups send you into a tailspin of all-or-nothing sabotage. Simply get back to your healthy lifestyle rather than letting yourself backslide into your old habits.

Don’t be one of the many who skip these 7 secrets and instead return to life pre-weight loss. You worked hard to be where you are – you deserve to keep it.

I’m always available to help you achieve any fitness or weight loss goal. Email me to get started on a solid exercise program that will change your body and life forever.

Recipe of the Week

Garlic Asparagus

Your diet should be filled with vegetables, with asparagus at the top of the list. This asparagus recipe is easy to make and tastes great. Serve it with a piece of white fish, chicken breast or other lean meat for a healthy meal.

Servings: 4

Here’s what you need:

• 1 bunch asparagus
• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• 1 1/2 Tablespoons garlic, minced
• dash of salt and pepper
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Cut off the tough ends of the asparagus.
2. In a casserole dish, combine the asparagus, oil, garlic, salt and pepper. Bake for 15-20 minutes, until tender.
3. Remove from oven and mix in the lemon juice. Serve and enjoy!

Nutritional Analysis: One serving equals: 47 calories, 2g fat, 5g carbohydrate, 2g fiber, and 3g protein.

Fitness Tip of the Week

Reinvent Yourself

Recent advances in neuroimaging techniques have discredited the old saying: You can’t teach an old dog new tricks. Scientists have discovered that the brain actually has dynamic properties throughout life. This means that your brain is always evolving. Through practice, you are able to change your habits and change yourself.

So go on, reinvent yourself!

BACK IN! CLIMBING OUT FROM UNDERNEATH IT…

Pete Alwinson March 15 2011 - No Comment

So it’s been months since I’ve written a blog…I know, I know. “Pete must have dropped off the planet, or been raptured.” The Rapture would have been nice for sure. No, I’ve been underneath it…and I am currently climbing out from underneath it. I’ve missed writing and hearing back from you guys. What happened to me? Mmmm…my guess is that what happened to me has happened to most of us pastors in the last few years (for many of us it’s been 2008 to the present). We’ve been underneath IT.

What’s IT? Since 2008 the ministry has not been the same for me…how about you? Budget restraints, watching every penny, staff cut backs with the inevitable questioning, “Well who will do these ministries now that Fred is leaving us?” (One church I know had to let go eight staff at the beginning of 2008, we lost one in fall 2009 and not replaced that person until recently.) Most of us as pastors are pretty “can do” and so, we do IT. IT being the Ministry…or ministries. “I’ll do that, and if you take that activity, I’ll also take these other three things.” So we do take on the duties of other staff who have left or had to be let go; we divvy up the duties, and before we know it we are underneath it…the ministry load. Frankly, I can’t stand merely maintaining and have never been good at only managing existing ministries and feel good with the status quo. I want to make progress…do more…and if we were going to do more it was going to be…on less. “Lord between you and me we can get ‘er done.”

I tried…and got underneath it…how about you?

Along the way, grace has come, and I’m getting out from underneath it, but since I’m writing this on Saturday you can tell that I’m not completely out from underneath the load.

Let me tell you a couple of lessons I’m learning. My ministry focus has always been motivating, encouraging, disciplining and developing men. The daily mantra for me is: “As the men of the church goes, so goes the church. A church will never get beyond the quality level of its men.” Businessmen have been my focus and I identify with the guy in business, but during these past months I’ve come to love and appreciate pastors so much more than ever before. Why? Maybe it’s because of the load we carry that few of our people really understand. The time load, the preparation load, the leadership load, the secrets of our people that we bear, along with their bad choices and the crazy stuff that happens in a broken world to them that inevitably intersects our world. We pastors really are in a unique role that few outside our world understand. And I love you for not giving up, for being courageous, for leading with a limp (as Dan Allender has written), for being an example to me, for messing up, repenting, getting grace and moving on, for being underneath the pile of ministry, IT, and slugging it out…I love you guys, and I want you to know I love you. I’ve been learning that while underneath it.

Another thing I’ve been learning as I’ve been underneath it is that I need the love of my friends and fellow pastors too. Steve Brown tells me he loves me and he knows more dirt on me than most. My friend Pat Morley (of Man in the Mirror), tells me he loves me, and he’s known me a long time…he shouldn’t but he does. Another friend called me the other day…Gregg…just to see how I was doing. I wince when guys say they love me, ok? I’m more comfortable with…”Hey I sure do appreciate you man.” That’s my line. Appreciate. Appreciate vs love. Mmmmmm…after being underneath it, I need more than appreciation. I’m going public with this: I need to be loved too. I’m not invincible, I’m vulnerable, I’m weak. I hate it…I need to be loved. I’ve got this friend Tom at church. Every Sunday he hugs me. I’m getting used to that, and like it more and more…but is it manly?! Live underneath it long enough, and your heart will break. God’s love through others becomes a glue of sorts that puts you back together. I’ve been learning that underneath it.

Ok, one more lesson…I’ve come to love and compete less with you guys…even the superstars. I went to a conference with my staff the other day where two superstar pastors talked about leadership and how they built their church to 3 million in attendance on a weekend…ok, not that many, but close. I sat there listening with so much less envy than ever that it surprised me. These guys are super gifted leaders and communicators and I’m glad they are on our side! It was so freeing to not have to be them, but to not compete with them either. In fact, yep, I love them.

Being underneath IT is good, I’m beginning to see, since it is teaching me to love and receive love. You’re right…you were going to say it…I know…I can write it in Greek but still learning it in English: “The greatest of these is love…”

I’m back. I’m out from underneath it and better for it. Let me know how you’re doing….

We’re in this together and I’m glad…and, oh yes…I love you.

Pete Alwinson

PS…A great read: Stan Toler’s Practical Guide for Ministry Transition, How to Navigate Personal Change Personally and Professionally Stan Toler, Wesleyan Publishing House. 182 pp

I’m Addicted

Tullian Tchividjian March 08 2011 - No Comment

I’m addicted to the gospel. It burns inside of me. And it seems to get hotter ever day. I can’t stop thinking about it, talking about it, writing about it, reading about it, wrestling with it, reveling in it, standing on it, and thanking God for it. For better or for worse, my focus has become myopic. My passion has become singular. Lesser things don’t distract me as easily. I’m not as anxious as I used to be. I don’t fret over things as much. I’m more relaxed. What others think of me (either good or bad) doesn’t matter as much as it used to. I’m enjoying life more. The pressure’s off. I actually think I’m beginning to understand the length and breadth of the freedom Jesus purchased for me.

Jesus plus nothing equals everything–the gospel– is daily becoming for me more than a theological passion, more than a cognitive reality. It’s becoming my functional lifeline! And it’s this rediscovery of the gospel’s power that is enabling me to see that,

Because Jesus was strong for me, I am free to be weak;

Because Jesus won for me, I am free to lose;

Because Jesus was Someone, I am free to be no one;

Because Jesus was extraordinary, I am free to be ordinary;

Because Jesus succeeded for me, I am free to fail.

This is beginning to define my life in brand new, bright, and liberating ways. I believe God wants this liberating truth to define your life as well…and the life of the church corporately. Because I’m telling you right now, when you begin to understand that everything you need and long for, in Christ you already possess—it enables you to live a life of scandalous freedom, unrestrained fearlessness, and unbounded courage. When you don’t have anything to lose, you discover something wonderful: you’re free! Nothing in this broken world can beat a man who isn’t afraid to lose! And when you’re not afraid to lose you can say crazy, counterintuitive stuff like, “To live is Christ and to die is gain!” That’s pure, unadulterated freedom.

This is why I tweet as much as I do. I’m processing the gospel all day long in 140 characters. Therefore, from time to time I post some of my more recent tweets to show you how God is working the gospel deeper into me and what I’m learning. Twitter has become for me an online personal journal. I hope you can benefit from the things God is teaching me.

Enjoy…

• The banner under which Christians live reads “It is finished.”

• Our security is in Christ’s achievement for us, so now we’re free to admit our weaknesses without feeling like our flesh is bring ripped off our bones

• Only when you realize that the gospel has nothing to do with your obedience but Christ’s obedience for you, will you start to obey!

• At no point in time, either before God saves you or after, does your behavior determine God’s love for you.

• Since a Christian’s value and identity is anchored in Christ and is not anchored in being right, the gospel frees us to admit we’re wrong.

• The gospel frees us from trying to impress people, prove ourselves to people, and make people think we’re something that we’re not.

• The gospel transforms us precisely because it’s not itself a message about our transformation but Christ’s substitution.

• The gospel frees us to realize that while we matter, we’re not the point.

• “Doing” will become instinctive and spontaneous only when our hearts become deeply gripped by what’s been done!

• Only the gospel can liberate us from the miserable, unquenchable pursuit to make something of ourselves by using others.

• Because everything we long for we already possess in Christ, we’re now free to love people, not use them.

• Our improvement comes from God’s approval; God’s approval does not come from our improvement.

• Christ fulfilled all of God’s conditions on our behalf so that our relationship with God could be unconditional.

• The gospel frees you from the pressure of having to make something out of yourself.

• Christian, the level of passion with which God loves you is not determined by the level of passion with which you love him. The Son’s passion for you secured the Father’s passion for you.