for Christ and for the gospel

Over a nine year period, Ray Romano, star of the sitcom, Everybody Loves Raymond, rose from struggling comedian to one of the highest paid actors on television.  After the taping of the last show, in May 2005, Romano came out and spoke to the studio audience and reflected on his past and future, now that the show had finished its run.  He took out a piece of paper, a note his brothers had stuck in his luggage the day he moved from New York to Hollywood to pursue fame and fortune, nine years earlier.  He read from the note, “My older brother Richard wrote, ‘What does it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and loses his soul?’” Choking back tears, Romano continued, “Now I’m going to work on my soul.”  

I don't know if Ray Romano ever did work on his soul, but I know where that verse came from.  It was from our passage on Sunday, Mark 8.34-38.  I also know that the choice between "working on our soul" or pursuing the best that this life has to offer, is a choice each of us has to make, not just those of us who are pursuing fame and fortune.  The better choice, by far, is in favor of the life God has to offer us in Christ Jesus, the life of discipleship.

An interesting note about our passage on Sunday is that, although some form of these three verses appears in every gospel, Mark has one detail the others don’t.  In the other places where these verses appear, Jesus says, “but whoever loses their life for my sake will save it.”  In Mark's version, however, Jesus says, “but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.”  What an interesting detail.  It’s not only for Jesus’ sake that we must be willing to deny ourselves, take up our crosses and follow him.  It is also for the sake of the gospel, or, more literally, the “Good News.”  And what is that Good News?  

The Good News is salvation by grace through faith in Christ.  The Good News is the mission of Jesus, God’s purposes in the world.  The Good News is intentional lives lived by faithful, missional followers of Jesus in the 97% of our waking hours lived outside of church and church related activities.  And the good news is not just about where we go when we die.  It’s also about how we live while we’re here.  We need good news here and now, not just in the hereafter.  Working on our soul, as Romano put it, is about the mission to which God calls us as well as our own personal relationships with Christ.

Some scholars believe that Mark's version of Jesus' words, here, became a rallying cry for the Early Church, especially when facing persecution: "For Christ and for the gospel!"  What a fitting cry for our lives of discipleship today and for the mission to which God calls us.  May that be your cry and mine as we seek to know God, follow Jesus and pursue God's purposes in the world, this week and always.  Amen.

how then shall we live?

A friend and I meet nearly every week at a favorite restaurant for lunch.  We've been doing so for years.  Every week the same people wait on us and tend to our needs.  Just recently my friend began asking the names of those who serve us every week so that we could better know them.  He even keeps track of their names in a note on his phone.  What a great idea!  Now we can pray for them by name and be open for what God might want to do in and through me (us) when we dine there.  As the Apostle John reminded us on Sunday, And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life.  And this life is in his Son.  Whoever has the Son has life.  Whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life (1 John 5.11-12).

John's words are straightforward and blunt.  The temptation, of course, is to aim them at those who do not yet have the life John speaks of, as if they were weapons.  But John's words are written first and foremost to us - those of us who claim to know God, follow Jesus and pursue God's purposes in the world.

Even though John's straightforward words are not intended as weapons, they are intended to inform and equip us as followers of Jesus.  If eternal, abundant, God-intended life is only found in the Son of God, how then ought we to live our lives, go about our business and engage in our relationships with others?  What difference should it make?  What ought our attitude be toward those who do not yet have the life God offers us in and through his Son?  If God really did "so love the world that he gave his one and only Son," what are we to do with that message in the 97% of our waking hours lived outside of ECC and ECC-related events?

Certainly we do not have to preach it on street corners (though that may indeed be what God calls some to do).  Nor do we have to inject our faith into every conversation we have with those who do not yet have the life we have.  Rather, we ought to begin, I think, with prayer.  Let us pray for our neighbors and co-workers, family members and friends and those we barely know.  My hope is, as I begin to more intentionally pray for my friends at the restaurant (and my neighbors and family members as well), that God will open doors, ears and hearts for us to bear witness to the testimony of eternal life in Christ Jesus.  We all need to be reminded from time to time, as church consultant Bill Easum says, "Jesus always comes to us on his way to someone else."

holding our tongues

One of the things I often try to do in this blog each week is put forth something I wish I had said, but didn't have the time, or forgot to say.  That is the case this week.

On Sunday, for all who were there (for those who weren't you can listen here), we looked at Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in Daniel 3.  What a great story of faith and unbending trust in "the God of gods and the Lord of kings!"  I love how our three heroes simply refuse to bow.  I said on Sunday that we ought to learn something from the purity and strength of faith exhibited by  Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego (I have thus far resisted the temptation to refer to them as "Rack, Shack and Benny" and will continue to do so, even though it's a mouthful).  When brought before King Nechadnezzar and challenged to bow down to the statue or be burned alive, they simply stated their case and faced the consequences.  The same could be said of Christ.

As I've continued to think about their situation, however, I'm struck by what they didn't say.  I mean, they're done for, right?  The king is already ticked enough to throw them into the furnace.  What have they got to lose?  This would be a perfect time to call Nebuchadnezzar names or belittle his authority.  After all, the king can't do any more to them than he is already planning to do.  Go ahead, we might say to them.  Say what you want to say.  Call him names, cast dispersions on his character, throw a good zinger his way!  It won't make any difference now.  After all, he's the bad guy, right?  He's opposing God and demanding everyone to take part in idolatrous practices, for crying out loud!  Let him have it!

But they don't.

Look again at their powerful words to the king: Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to him, “King Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us from Your Majesty’s hand. But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.” (Daniel 3.16-18, NIV)

So simple, so powerful, so honorable.  They told the truth, but they did not "embellish" it with slander or unkind talk toward the king.  We would do well to learn from them today, I think.  So much of the "Christian" rhetoric I hear, see in print and on bumper stickers is slanderous and unkind.  Such talk - whether aimed at ordinary people with whom we live and move and have our being or those who hold (or seek to hold) public office - is inappropriate for those who claim to know God, follow Jesus and pursue God's purposes in the world.  We do not have to be unkind, even as we seek to be unbending in our allegiance to God. We do not have to withhold grace, even if we have strong opinions about policy.  

The book of James warns us, The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.... With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness.  Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be.  Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring?  My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water. (James 3.6-12)

The call of James, Christ, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego remind me of a statement made by John Ortberg at last week's Global Leadership Summit.  When referencing the election year and the way in which so many of us sometimes conduct ourselves, John stated, "What if, this election year, people associated Christians with humility and civility" instead?  May it be so, Lord Jesus, in me and in us, today and always.  Amen.

just a coincidence?

One thing that I constantly tell our teens at youth group is that I don't believe in coincidences.  At all.  Everything that ever happens, I believe, happens for a reason.  In both the great blessings in life and the great challenges, I believe that God is actively involved in allowing these things to happen for a greater glory.

I choose to believe this because, mostly, it gives me peace that I would otherwise not be able to have.  If I can trust that God is completely in control of a situation and walking along side me as it happens, it gives me great peace to know that, regardless of the outcome, God has seen this happening from His place above time.

We are fortunate to be living in the time after Jesus has lived, died, and resurrected.  We can look back at the Rahab's and the Joshua's and the many, many others in the Old Testament who wondered how their lives would ultimately be fulfilled and realized in God.  We can look back, through Christ, and recognize the beauty of His handiwork in their lives that stands the test of generations.

If we struggle to see how our present challenge is going to end, let us remember God's faithfulness to those who came before us.  Let us find peace that our God is not a God of random coincidences, but of divine preparation and intervention.  He is a Father who sacrificed His own Son so that anyone could experience life with Him.

That is certainly no coincidence.