Being a more careful eater isn't the only lesson of the clothing portion of 7, though. It's amazing what God reveals when we try to bring less of us to the table and rely more on Him. The physical aspect of 7 wasn't too terrible. I rather liked the simplicity of not worrying about what I would wear each day. Date night happened to fall on the next-to-last day of this fast, and my husband noticing I had been wearing "the" black sweater all day, commented, "I guess you'll be wearing the tiger shirt?" Leopardy-print, but whatever, and wear it I did. Despite the fact I'd worn that shirt ten times in the past week, we had a lovely date.
The spiritual aspect has been tough. I feel that God is really calling me to the carpet on a few things. It's amazing what doors fasting open, doors you'd rather keep closed but know deep down rifling through the skeletons is the only thing that will bring true freedom. I imagine many readers wonder why I am so willing to share my struggles, my hopeless clumsiness, and mishaps so freely, and one reason is that I believe if I struggle and wrestle with these issues, there's a pretty good chance someone else does, as well. I hear you and I'm on your side. The main reason is that I want this blog to be a place that honors and glorifies God. For so long, I've prayed about what to do with my writing gift, and I've felt God whisper, use it to bring Me glory, and that is my prayer.
This all began with a sincere prayer while studying Nehemiah, where I asked God to break my heart for what breaks His...and He did. He answered my prayer by showing me that His heart breaks for the least, which I've discussed in previous posts. Recently, I prayed that He would continue to break my heart for what breaks His, and this past couple of weeks, I've felt Him saying strongly that His heart breaks for the lost and the complacency that has gripped American Christians. I've spent a lot of time searching and wrestling. I've read Not A Fan, Follow Me, and Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart. I've studied scripture and read more in Jen Hatmaker's bible study version of 7, and the theme is recurring. Jesus longs for all to know Him. This Lenten season I challenge you to also evaluate your walk with Jesus, to truly examine where you are on your faith journey.
One of the hardest things for me this past few weeks is doing what Paul calls us to do in Philippians 2:12 "to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling." Many of us who claim to follow Christ prayed the "sinners prayer" at some point where we asked Jesus into our hearts. We quote John 3:16, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life." And, of course this verse is the truth, but belief, I'm convicted is much more than a mental acknowledgement of Jesus as God's son. James tells us even the demons believe and shudder. Salvation is Christ's work on the cross and it is not accomplished by works, but James also tells us that faith without works is dead. I like what Greear says in Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart, "Salvation does happen in a moment and once you are saved, you are always saved. The mark, however, of someone who is saved is that they maintain their confession of faith until the end of their lives. Salvation is not a prayer you pray in a one-time ceremony and then move on from; salvation is a posture of repentance and faith that you begin in a moment and maintain the rest of your life." Jesus tells us to follow Him. If we've experienced the saving grace of the Risen Lord, yet live our lives as if nothing's happened then I think we need to search our relationship with Him.
I've been preparing to present at my church during our Lenten study on our response to the cross. James Miller in the book we're using, Looking at the Cross, asks "What does repentance look like in the church? In your life? Are there clear distinguishable marks of a repentant community? In what ways has the cross of Jesus made a difference in the way you've chosen to live? If we're honest, the answer might be it hasn't made much of a difference at all. A. W. Tozer offers this blunt assessment, 'Among the plastic saints of our times, Christ has to do all the dying and all we want to hear is another sermon about His dying- no cross for us, no dethronement, no dying. We remain king within our little kingdom...and wear our tinsel crown with all the pride of Caesar; but we doom ourselves to shadows and weakness and spiritual sterility.' Jesus won't allow this. When he calls us to discipleship, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, "he bids us come and die.' So Jesus says, if any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me....those who want to save their lives will lose it and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel will save it.'" This, church, friends, followers is what we are called to, yet we cling to the world, to our idols, to our comforts and ignore the lost, the hurting, the dying, the orphaned all while claiming to have the power of the living Christ in our hearts. It's time to wake up.
The deposit of the Holy Spirit is the promise to those in Christ. If we've received the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives, is it even possible to continue in our life of repetitive rebellious sin, not slip ups (none of us is perfect or will be here) but a lifestyle of sin. We're being made perfect, but we're told throughout the New Testament that the old is gone, the new is come. We die to self and live in Christ. We are a new creature. We move forward not stuck in the same old sour attitudes of our old selves. Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit changes us; it makes us new. It's impossible to meet the risen Christ and not be transformed. If we're stagnant, maybe we don't know Him, yet.
Matthew 7: 21 is a verse that often makes my blood run cold: "Not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven....then I will announce to them, Depart from me you lawbreakers, I never knew you!" To stand before Christ thinking you're saved because you recited a prayer yet never obeyed his commands or walked with Him in this life and be told to depart is too much for me to bear. Jesus tells us in John that if we love him we will obey his commands. Jesus wants a relationship; he doesn't want time carved out on Sunday morning, He wants all of us. Paul called himself a bond slave to Christ and we, me included, are giving him a lethargic effort at best on Sunday morning. Following comes at a cost but a cost that is worth every moment. When we surrender, we begin to live life abundantly. So how do we obey His commands if we never study them? How do we fall in love with Jesus if we never spend time with Him? He commands us to give up our life, our desires and embrace His. The King of the universe pursues us in love, and we run afraid he will make us uncomfortable. God isn't here for us; we're here for Him. In our human pride, we fight this truth, but my prayer is that he'll crush my pride, break me, pierce my heart, and give me the desires of His heart.
One of Jesus's greatest commands, the command He gave as He ascended into heaven, is found in Mathew 28 where we are told to "Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to observe everything I commanded." This and in His commands to tend to the least of these is where I feel we as Christians are being called out. When was the last time you shared your faith? We act as if eternity for the lost doesn't hang in the balance. Jesus and the rest of the New Testament are clear that those who don't follow Christ will spend eternity separate from Him. When he separates those on his right and left, he's sorting them for a reason. When He tells those He never knew to depart, they are departing from His presence. When Paul says the gospel is foolish to those who are perishing, what do we think he means by perishing? It isn't something we like to think about, but it's our mission, our ministry, each one of us is called to spread the gospel. How awesome is the gospel: that God loves you, that He died for you, that He left the comfort of heaven to come to earth to serve, and if we believe, repent, confess, and follow Him, we can spend eternity in bliss, yet we keep this to ourselves. I think we have to ask ourselves a few questions. Do we really believe Him? Do we really believe in the power of the gospel, and if we do, then what's holding us back? If eternity hangs in the balance, what is keeping us from sharing Jesus?
Please know I am asking myself these same questions, and I am holding myself accountable. As a private tutor, my business offers a great ministry opportunity. I have a student who I've been tutoring for over a year, and he's asked me questions of a spiritual nature, which I completely flub and stutter through then kick myself for missing a perfect opportunity. This past week, I decided to call his mom. With my heart beating so loudly in my ears that I couldn't even hear her answer the phone, I explained that her son had asked questions and as a follower of Christ, would she mind if I gave him some age-appropriate books and answered honestly any questions he had? She said she would be thrilled that they were having trouble finding a church, etc. What a door God opened! My cowardice almost kept me from sharing the gospel. It was awkward, I sounded weird, but Jesus held my hand, and I imagine gave me a little high five as I left the library that day. Eternity hangs in the balance, friends.
I also think part of our problem with Christians is that we cling to this world too tightly. We fail to live with an eternal perspective. This life is just a passing glance. As Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians, what we see now is but a dim reflection of what will be. If we lived with an eternal perspective and loosened our grip on the things of this world, how differently would we live? We don't adopt or foster because it's inconvenient. We don't visit the widowed because we have to watch American Idol, but what if we loosened the bonds of our selfishness and self-preservation and threw caution to the wind, trusted Christ, and reached out to those around us? How much richer would life be? None of us is guaranteed tomorrow. You could walk out your front door tomorrow and get hit by a truck. (As much as we use this, clearly it's happened at least once, right?) Life is but a moment and we waste it chasing temporary gods that will never fill the void meant to be filled only by Christ. What if we quit running, opened our hearts, and followed and served with abandon?
I recently read a disturbing statistic that many children leave their faith because they saw no real evidence of it in their own parents lives. What if we're losing this generation because they see no evidence of the risen Christ in believers' lives? What if we look so much like everyone else in the world, that non-believers see so little evidence for the power of Christ that they had rather stay away and sleep late on Sunday? We bemoan the crumbling culture, yet we worry more about "holiday" trees and Walmart saying "happy holidays" than whether or not we are living the evidence of the gospel. Millions are starving, millions are orphaned, millions are dying without the saving grace of the gospel. Are we the salt and light of the world or not? I realize I've been tough on us, but God has really opened my eyes this past few weeks to what is breaking his heart. God loves us enough to die for us, He reaches down from heaven and pursues us, He saves those who will seek Him with sincerity, His grace and mercy abound. It is in love that our response is obedience. We obey because we love the one who first loved us. I close with verses from 1 John. I challenge you this Lenten season to come to Him with a repentant heart and a desire to fall in love with our Savior. I hope that our prayer is that He will change the desires of our heart and gives us a willingness to obey.
1 John 2:3- 6 This is how we are sure that we have come to know Him; by keeping His commands. The one who says, "I have come to know Him, yet doesn't keep His commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him But whoever keeps His word, truly in him the love of God is perfected. This is how we know we are in Him. The one who says he remains in Him should walk just as He walked.
