The Sort of Person Who Prays

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not be in want. (Psalm 23:1)

For Thine is the kingdom, and the power and the glory forever. Amen.

I haven't usually thought of the beginning of Psalm 23 as having to do with prayer. Lately, though, God has been teaching me about prayer, so it has been on my mind. Why shouldn't it be about prayer? Prayer is the primary means by which God desires to fulfill my desires.

Prayer is not just about my desires, however. A mistake I have made, though, is that I have often assumed it had nothing to do with my desires. Somehow praying God's will had become mostly praying, "Not my will." My desires need an overhaul, but ignoring them or pretending that they don't matter is not God's way of changing them. He wants to redeem my "wanter" so it is in line with his will.

I see this as having desire that are my own and yet also within his will. I do not think that God merely wants to control me anymore than I merely want to control my children. He wants to teach me and help me grow into Christ-likeness, where all I do is in unity with him and also fully my own.

I felt joyful at the realization that the first part of this growth is realizing that he wants to give and provide for me completely, so that I will have no unfulfilled desire - "I shall not be in want." What else would a loving father want?

Then I understood that the end of the Lord's Prayer may not only be a word of praise, but a recognition that God will answer all my requests because he has the kingdom, the power, and the glory, and he wants to share them with me. He wants to give his kingdom without end, his power without limit, and his glory without diminishing.

Really, I find that God wants pray-ers as well as worshipers (aren't they the same, really?). He seeks those who pray because he wants to give them what they ask for. Whatever barriers I have can be overcome with this desire: to become the sort of person who prays and is answered. This is God's will, his desire, and I can share it with him.

Lord, let these words be written on my heart: "I shall not want" and "For Thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever." You have so much to give and yet I receive very little. Increase my faith and hope in your good promises. Change my heart into a faithful one that walks with you. Isn't this what belief and trust are really about? To stay with you, I need to know and trust your goodness, Father. Impress such knowledge on me. Amen.

Salvation Is a Life: Character Transformed

I believe there are probably many ways to explain how salvation is a life. I have a tried to write out a few of them and they seem to dissolve into abstractions. I guess in order to explain this idea, I would start with my own experience.

Salvation became a life for me when I realized that if I am not being saved from my sins in this life, why should I expect that I would be saved later? It sounds strange, I imagine, but when I read Romans 5:4 several years ago and realized that from character comes hope, I saw why I had felt so much despair. My character was essentially unchanged. There had been some shuffling around of habits and thoughts, but essentially I saw that I was not much different than I had been ten years before.

The process that God led me through was essential to my understanding that salvation is a life, but the beginning came from this fairly simply idea: "A gospel that does not change my character now is not really good news to me." I see that as another way of communicating that salvation is a life because character will not change without a life change.

I believe that salvation must begin now if it's to being at all. Salvation for a whole life is made up of many little "salvations" or deliverances. I feel that if my character remains static, it should make me wonder whether my salvation is effective instead of questioning the nature of salvation. The changes (deliverances) may be small, but over time they should be noticeable. Desires, feelings and thoughts change as well as facial expressions, habits, and bodily actions. I have had the painful experience of seeing and hearing myself on videos from ten to fifteen years ago. My anger and worry was so apparent!

I guess that the message of salvation is a life comes down to locating salvation in general with the little "salvations" of life. Also, if salvation is the coming of God's kingdom into this world, the first place I would come to realize that his kingdom comes is in my life, in my body in particular, since it is the primary realm I rule. When God's rule breaks in, it would have to be in my body, in my character. If God's rule does not come into and through my body, then I can see why I worried it might not come at all.

So talking about this with crowds of people may being with questions of character followed by the message that we can see salvation as a life in the transformation of character. It is God's kingdom coming into a person's life.

Rambling on, I see that the message of the resurrection is the message of transformation. It begins small and invisibly. The rebellions and uprisings in my character against God are quelled one by one. As they are quieted, my very body begins to change in habit, expression, strength, and rest. Resurrection will be the end of it, not because I can foresee such changes in myself, but because it is promised.

Certainly I will not "work" my way to resurrection, but since resurrection is the ultimate transformation of myself, I suspect that salvation presently would be transforming in its nature. With my body as it is currently, I don't anticipate my transformation can go very far, but if salvation has a lot to do with transformation, then my body will certainly feel the effects and react to it. The same power that raised Jesus from the dead is active in the transformation of my life, including my body (Ephesians 1:18-21).

Salvation, then, comes through the body. Christ showed this in his incarnation and resurrection. We cannot be saved without our bodies being part of it in action as well as in effect. We cannot be saved merely spiritually - as unbodied - but always as embodied. Jesus came to show us this very fact. Salvation is found nowhere else because there is no one else who saves the body. Resurrection recognizes and blesses our bodily existence and gives us hope for transformation even now, in these corruptible bodies. Ignoring the body ignores the incarnation and the resurrection and leads to empty religion. Christ brought the body into the Godhead so it might become eternal.

Without this, our bodies would have no destiny other than destruction apart from God. Without our bodies, we do not exist. We are embodied spirits. I do not know how we could exist otherwise. Apparently we can't because Christ's saving action has to do with saving the body as well as the spirit.

Lord, I sense something big here. Lead me and open my eyes to your wonderful plan of salvation that included our bodies. Amen.

The Cross Comes From Love

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son. . . (John 3:16).

The Cross of Christ does not make God love us; it is the outcome and measure of His love for us. (Andrew Murray, With Christ in the School of Prayer, 6th Lesson)

Perhaps for a lot of people it goes without saying, but for myself I was moved by this thought: God loved me before Jesus died on the cross. He does not need the cross in order to love me, long for me, and be a Father to me.

Somehow the idea of the cross bringing peace between God and myself gave me the idea that he was angry with me and wanted to do me harm. This, of course, does not line up even with the most elementary of Bible verses, John 3:16. Fortunately it does not read, "For God was so fed up with the world that he gave his one and only Son. . . ." The cross is not the antidote for God's scorn and hatred of me, but the outcome of his love for me.

The peace he bought with the cross was not to relieve his anger by punishing Jesus, but the peace of bringing a rebellious and empty soul like mine into his good grace. I needed peacemaking, not God. He always loved me, but now his love has been made known completely through the finished work of Jesus, who suffered becoming a man, living with men, and dying at the hands of men. As Dallas Willard puts it, "The very best people put to death the very best man."

The cross is indeed necessary for my coming to God, but not because of a problem with God. He loved me and the world, so he sent his Son. Certainly God gets angry. Certainly there is wrath. Like me, God hates the things that come between himself and his children and threaten to destroy them. The cross is powerful medicine to cure the illness I have. The cross is triumph over the evil in and around me. The cross is what I need to live in its example as well as in its reality. The message of the cross is not this: "Someone needs a beating."

So I am even more grateful for this sacrifice of Jesus and his Father. Jesus did not take a beating from his Father; he took one from us. I could not come to him by any other means.

Lord, because you loved me so much, you had to humble yourself before me and my kind, even to the point of being shamefully put to death. This is the story of your love and the most poignant picture of it. You have laid yourself down so low so that even I could find you. There is no other way. Without understanding and living out of the knowledge and trust in this love, I am hopelessly ignorant of the kind of God that you are. Open my eyes more. Guide me further in this love. Amen.

Sometimes Not Praying Is Better

Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. (Matthew 5:44)

The connection between love and prayer here is not accidental. I have often heard and understood this as a way of dealing with hatred toward my enemies: "It's impossible to hate someone you're praying for." This does not seem to hold water for myself, nor for other people who pray for their enemies, like the pray-er in Psalm 137:8-9:

Daughter Babylon, doomed to destruction,

happy is the one who repays you

according to what you have done to us.

Happy is the one who seizes your infants

and dashes them against the rocks.

Not very appealing. I can't say I've prayed that way, but then I haven't had my children killed in front of me, either.

So either I am left to redefine love or redefine prayer. I want to start with prayer. First of all, prayer is not about having love and pleasant feelings all the time. Nor is it about pretending to care about what I don't really care about. Nor is it pretending to love someone I dislike or even hate. Unfortunately, the kind of praying that I have been taught and that I practice often is merely pretending to be more loving, more concerned, and more forgiving than I really am. It is disconnected from my life and really just becomes a lot of words. One thing that can be said about that atrocious prayer from Psalm 137 is that it is not pretended.

Secondly, although prayer is, at its heart, requesting, it encompasses so much more than mere requesting. Prayer really comes from how I live my life. If I have no blessings for my enemies, then I have yet to grasp what love is and Who it is that loves me and Who loves the one that I dislike so much. My requests reflect the sort of heart that I have been cultivating. I must admit that my prayers are far more stunted than I would like. I do not like pretending, so I find that I don't do much praying.

Can I pray my way into loving other people? Not usually. The direction of transformation is from the inside out, according to Jesus - "wash the inside of the dish and the outside will become clean, too" and "by their fruits you will recognize them." But my current practice of avoiding prayer certainly doesn't help either. Like all change, I must begin be seeing something better, something greater and then say, "I want to be like that. God help me."

The truth behind praying for my enemies so that I might come to love them is this: I cannot convince myself to love my enemies through mental tricks: trying to convince myself that I should or that they really aren't that bad or that I really am worse than they are, etc. Prayer must come in because transformation involves not just new thoughts, but new actions and intentions. Instead of being ready to do harm or say nasty things, I need to find myself ready to not do harm and bless them. I must be ready to join in God's kingdom which is overcoming evil with good.

In this way prayer becomes a spiritual discipline (though it is never only a discipline). Love is an indirect result of such prayer rather than a direct result. If I pray so that I feel like loving my enemies, then my prayer is about me more than about them. Like the psalmists, I lay my frustrations and malice before God instead of taking it out on my enemies. (This working out things with God can be plainly seen in Psalm 73). This will prevent me from pretending or harming.

Next, prayer places me next to God where I can hear his concerns and desires. This is where prayer can become so much more than well-wishing and general platitudes. Somehow God desires to work with my desires for other people by making my requests both my own and ones that are also his own. The reason: my prayers will be answered. I will truly be given what I ask for!

This is why prayers are not merely requests. The psalms are prayers so unlike a list of concerns because for my concerns to be truly heard and understood requires confession, praise, pondering, wonder, and so much more. Faith is connected to prayer because it involves the whole person. Faith certainly has to do with my desires being strong and real, but also with my desires being true. So prayer becomes work, a work in me and on me, so that I can truly work with God on other people and other situations. Also, prayer moves me to serve and act in the sense that only when I am ready to act with love and concern have I truly prayed.

Like so many things I think I see much further than I really am. How can I hope to live in this kind of prayer? Many of my habits are against me. I guess one step I am taking is that I don't want to pretend and often avoid such situations where pretending prayer is practiced. Currently, I am in the midst of learning how to not harm other people, but forgive them and let them be. My "help" often comes in the form of judgment or condemning, even if it seems to be well-meaning advice. In prayer, perhaps I should try to avoid mere well-wishing or praying just so I can pray something.

This next step I am fumbling toward, like when Nathan, my son, took his first steps looking like a drunken sailor. I long to live intercession as Jesus did and does. I see prayer as the primary labor of disciples on which all other labors are built and grow. Like so many other parts of a spiritual life, the prevailing attitude is just to pray "something" rather than not pray at all. I think this will never bring about the kind of prayer that prevails. This is why the disciples said, "Teach us how to pray." They did not know what or how to ask.

I suppose this must be approached like anything else. When I meditate on the Bible, I wait for God to show me something, to instruct me about what he wants me to see. So when I pray for people and situations, I need to wait on God for guidance and instruction. Since he wants my desires to be part of it too, it will not merely be a list of requests, but thoughts, feelings, and pictures from my own mind impressed with the his understanding and power.

In short, I guess the instruction is:

1. Do not pray as the hypocrites do, pretending so that they can just say something.
2. Be real with God, even if it is ugly. Always be ready to cry out, "Help my unbelief and lack of love!"
3. Wait on the Teacher to develop true faith and true desire in my prayers, as he would have.

Lord, you know these ideas on prayer are shots in the dark. You know I don't know much of what I am talking about. I only know that much of my prayer is broken because it remains unanswered. I truly do not know how to pray. Teach me to be like you. Amen.

Jesus Fills the Scriptures

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Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law and the Prophets. I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. (Matthew 5:17)

But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. (Psalm 1:2)

I looked up the Greek word for "fulfill" and found play-rah'-oh, which means in this case to meets the demands and fulfill the promises of the Law and the Prophets. The real question comes when I ask, "How?"

The thought that God brought to me before I looked up this information is that Jesus fills up the Scriptures with his very being and life. That is why he could tell the Pharisees that even though they study the Scriptures because they think they will find life in them, what they really need is to find Jesus and have life through him. This implies that Jesus himself is the life of the Scriptures. So I think of him filling them with life, animating them.

This fits well with the idea in Matthew 5:17 of Jesus fulfilling the demands and the promises of the Law and the Prophets. Instead of Jesus fulfilling them merely through an exchange of his life for mine, he also fulfills them by infusing his life into mine in such a way that the Scriptures become something I can truly live and not merely read. His salvation then becomes not merely and exchange or a bargain, but a way of living.

But even more helpful for me was the comfort of the Bible being full of Jesus. The truth of the matter is that I can enjoy him and his presence through the words of the Bible. Although I may be tempted to neglect the Scriptures for a variety of reasons, all I do is find myself distanced from Jesus and knowing him less. For this journey, my days of weariness and sadness are days that I need more of him, not less.

Drinking deeply of his presence through the written Word comes most through short phrases and single ideas. I am comforted by the idea that Jesus did not come to destroy the written word or devalue it, but rather to make it a grand path to his life, his heart, and his mind. Certainly it is not enough in itself, as the Pharisees found out, but it is sufficient to be used mightily by Jesus in my life. I love the Bible, but not merely for itself, but where it comes from and where it leads me to.

Lord, even if no one else wants to drink from the cup of Scriptures, which are full of you, let me not grow weary or discouraged. A while ago I gave in and said I would be a "fanatic" for you and your written word if you wanted. I have seen you use it to reform my mind and change my heart by teaching me to delight in hearing you through the Bible more than delighting in being right through it. Keep my heart pure. Amen.

The Reward of Fear

The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever. (Ps. 19:10)

Do not store up for yourselves treasure on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but store up for yourselves treasure in heaven where moth and rust do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal. (Mt. 6:19-20)

Much dreaming and many words are meaningless. Therefore, stand in awe of God. (Ecc. 5:7)

In the first part of Matthew 6, Jesus takes pains to explain that I must "be careful not to do [my] acts of righteousness before men to be seen by them." The motivation is for keeping them secret is missing out on the "reward from [my] Father in heaven." What is this reward?

Jesus gives a clue that the reward is in heaven by immediately following the three "acts of righteousness" with instruction on where to put my savings account: heaven. "Build up a savings in heaven and you'll never face a recession or loss or robbery." My ears are accustomed to hearing that savings as mere after-life promises.

Not that such promises are empty. They just do not cover the whole plan. The savings is not only a 401k, available only after my final "retirement" from this age. It is an active reservoir from which I draw each day, which is why Jesus confidently explains that I need not worry about my life or my body in the face of such abundance. (Mt. 6:25)

The reward that God promises is incorruptible. It does not fade or fail. It is permanent. In this sense, it is much more than a savings, which is kept for special occasions or rainy days. This reward is meant to be used like a spending account and enjoyed, not hoarded, because it cannot be lost.

So what sort of reward does secret and sincere giving, praying, and fasting yield? What sort of reward dissipates with seeking of people's approval or the fear of their criticism? The reward is the fear of God. It is pure and endures forever. It is meant to last and meant to be enjoyed.

Fear is the seeking of someone's approval, and, by implication, avoiding their disapproval. With impersonal objects, like lightning and gravity, I place myself favorably with the force so that I do not incur its "wrath." Similarly, with people, fear is a positioning of myself in their favor so as to avoid their displeasure. When people's approval becomes important, desire for God's approval disappears. Similarly, when God's approval is most important, the need for people's approval disappears.

If the fear of God is pure, it is free from any foreign object. The fear of God shares no other fear. When someone fears God, they do not need to fear anyone or anything else. I need only position myself favorable with God and nothing else need worry me. It alone beings a singleness of mind, a true focus. All other fears bring distraction and a fragmented life. This favorable position with God, that is, having his approval, is based solely on my relationship with his Son. He says, "This is my Son. Listen to him!"

The fear of God endures forever. It cannot rust, rot, or be stolen. This seeking of God's approval remains strong beyond all other forces because he freely grants his favor to those who seek him. The reason the "fear" endures is that God's favor and love are everlasting. I seek his approval and he grants it and shows how I might live in it more and more. God grants immediate favor for anyone who seeks it. Yet he has so much more to give. His pleasure and delight in me are endless. So as I seek his approval in my life, I find God shows me more of his goodness and also shows me more of my goodness in him.

This continuing fear places me in right relationship with God. I seek him. I listen to him. I avoid his displeasure. I do what pleases him. My greatest satisfaction is in pleasing him. Such fear is the heart of the humility that opens God's kingdom to me (Mt. 18:3). Through the knowledge of his Son, I know that God is on my side, walking with me and helping me always, even as Jesus did in his earthly life. Such fear leads me to die to my own desires when they conflict with God's even as Jesus died. My old life dies and a new one is born where I do not live for myself, but for God. The resurrection shows that the way is clear for this life even past the death of this body.

Such a reward outweighs all others. The treasure of bringing a smile to God will never pass away. Giving, praying, and fasting please him not because they are religious, but because when practiced well, they open my heart to fearing God. Through them I learn to see and desire his approval above everything else and avoid his disapproval with all that I am. They teach me of his love and his ways, so that his smile is my smile.

Lord, I long to fear you more. Let this seeking of approval not be one of seeking to make you like me, but one of pleasing you as you already like me. You are my friend and my companion as well as my Father, who I long to please. I am so glad you already approve of me thanks to Jesus, my companion. Let me come with him to you and hear you say that you are well-pleased. Amen.

The Need to Be Needed

My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods. . . (Psalm 63:5)

In a world best described in Psalm 63:1 as a "dry and weary land where there is no water," there apparently is hope of satisfaction. The psalm reports a grand feast available in the praise and wonder of God. Such a feast is not merely figurative, but real. It is real sustenance.

Because it is a real sustenance, the lack of such a relationship with God - one filled with wonder, praise, and fulfillment - is a real emptiness. Thus it is important that the world keep such "food" figurative and other-worldly.

But that is beside the point that I sensed God was making to me this morning. When faced with this psalm of satisfaction in God, I asked him, "I know that you do not need people, but love them intensely. How can I grow into this?"

At the back of this question is a realization that the critics and opponents of Jesus hated the crowds of people and yet feared them and loved their respect, their fear, and even their approval. Jesus was the opposite apparently. He loved the crowds and had compassion on them, but did not fear them, nor need their respect, fear, or approval.

The answer was quick this time. "You need to be needed. Instead you just need to know that you are needed." As I chewed on that, two things came to mind. First, I could readily grasp what it was like to be with a person who needs to be needed versus one who knows that they are needed. One argues, pushes, and begs. The other offers, waits, and longs.

I have a large need to be needed. This need wars with my satisfaction in God often. This thought opened up a second thought. The desire to be needed is not bad in itself. I think it is grounded in the knowledge that I am unique and therefore significant. With an eye on myself as a creation, I see that my need to be needed can be satisfied with the knowledge that God has a place and work for me to do that is unique to my condition and being. This is where my need to be needed can find a home.

So Jesus says, "You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. You are important." Although the earth is full of the waste of much that is important and focused on trivialities, God will not waste what he has made. Even those who rebel against him will find they are part of his purpose of showing his love to everyone. That being said, God's desire is for each person to take their place in his kingdom, creating, building, loving. It is a marvel that there is room enough for everyone without having mere copies.

I need to let go of that need to be needed and embrace the knowledge that I am needed because of what God is making in me. Also, each person is important because of what God is making in each of them. It is very possible that my need to be needed sidetracks people from their calling and purpose when I want them to affirm mine. No doubt encouragement is a good thing, but it will never satisfy that gnawing need for approval.

I hope to experience more of that Psalm 63 satisfaction by letting go of that need to be needed and reflecting frequently on how God has a place and work for me in his kingdom. From Psalm 63, thankfulness and praise may help me to find that satisfaction. I am learning how that thank God for who I am and where I am as I recognize more of who he is and where he is. In this way praise lead back to thankfulness. The more I see and know that God longs for intimacy with me and is deeply involved in my life from day to day, the more I understand that he wants me to be with him and work with him on very real things in my world.

Lord, forgive me for weighing my desire to serve others mostly against how much they will fill my need for approval. It pushes me toward seeking recognition and away from loving people. Teach me contentment in my assigned post so I might serve other people with love and without an eye toward greatness of any kind. Have mercy on me, Father. Your approval is all I need. Amen.