Tag: acceptance

You Have Found Favor with God (Luke 1:26-38)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year BLeave a comment
The Annunciation, by Liviu Dumitrescu

Six months after Elizabeth had become pregnant, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a city in Galilee. The angel went to a virgin promised in marriage to a descendant of David named Joseph. The virgin’s name was Mary.

When the angel entered her home, he greeted her and said, “You are favored by the Lord! The Lord is with you.”

She was startled by what the angel said and tried to figure out what this greeting meant.

The angel told her,

“Don’t be afraid, Mary. You have found favor  with God.

You will become pregnant, give birth to a son,
and name him Jesus.

He will be a great man
and will be called the Son of the Most High.
The Lord God will give him
the throne of his ancestor David.
Your son will be king of Jacob’s people forever,
and his kingdom will never end.”

Mary asked the angel, “How can this be? I’m a virgin.”

The angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come to you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the holy child developing inside you will be called the Son of God.

“Elizabeth, your relative, is six months pregnant with a son in her old age. People said she couldn’t have a child. But nothing is impossible for God.”

Mary answered, “I am the Lord’s servant. Let everything you’ve said happen to me.”

Then the angel left her. (God’s Word Translation)

The Annunciation, by Angel Zárraga

Most of life is lived in the mundane. For the most part, we go about our business and deal with the daily grind.  That’s because we are common ordinary people.

So, we can especially relate to Mary. She is rather plain. Mary is of junior high age. If she were living in our day and age, Mary would likely be wearing clothes from the local Goodwill. She cannot read, because girls of her day rarely did.

Mary’s parents make all the decisions that affect her life, including the one that she should be married to an older man named Joseph. We don’t know if she even liked him. She lives in a small town that most people can’t even point to on a map. 

One night, this young girl is visited by the brightly beaming divine messenger Gabriel, whose name means, “God has shown himself mighty.” Mary stands there in her flannel nightgown; her life very quickly moving from the ordinary to extraordinary. The juxtaposition could not be more pronounced:

  • a mighty angel and a plain teen-ager
  • a messenger of the Most High God and a girl barely past puberty
  • holy angelic light in a simple candlelit bedroom
  • awesome power and complete vulnerability

Mary, compared to Gabriel, is defenseless, fragile, and overwhelmed. She’s in over her head. And that’s why we can relate to her. We can get our human arms around Mary. She’s like us. She has faced life with little power to make it turn out the way she planned. Forces beyond her control have rearranged her life and altered it forever. Mary is the Matron Saint of the Ordinary. We can totally understand why she responds the way she does.

Young Mary’s initial reaction was to be greatly troubled. She was disturbed, and was shaking in her ratty old slippers. The angel confidently told Mary that she had found favor with God. In other words Mary was quite literally “graced” by God. 

The situation was not that Mary had some extreme spirituality; but rather that God simply chose her to be the mother of Jesus. 

And Mary needed to come to grips with what was happening to her. This was not what she was looking for.  Becoming pregnant with the Savior of the world was not an answer to prayer for Mary. This was not on her agenda. 

Mary immediately sensed the crazy disconnect between what was being told to her and who she was. After all, she was a plain ordinary girl from the hick town of Nazareth, and she was being told that she would raise a king.  Maybe somebody in heaven screwed up. It could very well be that Gabriel got the wrong girl. Perhaps the angel’s Google map popped up the wrong town to visit. 

Relating to Mary, we can totally understand that she would question how in the world all this was going to happen. Not only is Mary ordinary, and far from royalty, but she is also very much a virgin. None of this made any sense whatsoever.

But the angel lets Mary know that God specializes in the impossible. I understand why many English translators chose to phrase the original rendering as “for nothing is impossible with God.” But I rather like a more literal translation which is “for there is nothing outside of God’s power.” 

There is nowhere we can go, no place on earth, no situation whatsoever that is beyond God’s ability, reach, and power to effect the divine will.

We do not always get straightforward answers to our questions about God. Yet, Mary asked a question and got a straight answer. She really can be pregnant with Jesus because the Holy Spirit will come upon her and overshadow her with power. 

If the story were to end here it would be a great story.  But to me the most astonishing part of this narrative is Mary’s response to what was happening to her.

Mary believed the message and took Gabriel’s words at face value. And so, having believed, she then submitted herself completely to God’s will for her life. 

I think we might totally understand if Mary simply said in her ordinary way that she was not prepared for this.  We would completely “get it” if Mary pushed back on what the angel said to her.

We could relate if Mary just dismissed it all, like Scrooge in the Christmas Carol, with the angel and his message being all humbug as if it were just “an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato.  There’s more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!”

And yet, Mary not only believed, but she also humbly submitted herself to what was happening. And, to me, this is what we need to relate to most about Mary – not her being just a plain ordinary person in a non-descript village, but stepping up to the calling she received. 

We, too, have received a calling in our lives. We, too, have been given the power of the Holy Spirit. And we, too, are ordinary people who have been given a very extraordinary task. 

It seems to me that our response today can and ought to be the same as Mary: “I am the Lord’s servant; may it be to me as you have said.” 

The Church is pregnant with possibilities because of the Holy Spirit. We know the end of Mary’s story. She gave birth to Jesus. She raised him in her plain ordinary way. She watched him grow up. She saw him embark on his ministry to proclaim that the kingdom of God has come near. 

Mary did not always understand what Jesus said or what he was doing. And she experienced every mother’s nightmare: seeing her beloved son killed in a terribly gruesome manner right in front of her eyes. 

Yet, just as the Holy Spirit was with the birth of Jesus, so the Spirit was with Jesus at his resurrection from the dead. Jesus, like his earthly mother, lived an ordinary life in a very extraordinary way. And today Jesus invites us to do the same. 

Because Jesus accomplished his mission of saving people from their sins and establishing a kingdom that will never end, he has given us the same Holy Spirit to follow him forever and call other people to follow him, too. 

The Christian life may often be difficult; but it is really not complicated. It’s rather simple, just like Mary. 

Mary responded to God’s revelation with faith, choosing to fully participate in what God was doing. “I am the Lord’s servant” is to be our confession, as well. “May it be to me as you have said” is to be our cry, along with Mary. 

The message Christians proclaim is that Jesus saves – he delivers from sin and Satan and will restore all things.

May you know the presence and the power of God today and always, through knowing Christ Jesus the Lord of all. Amen.

Struggling to Accept (Habakkuk 2:1-5)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year BLeave a comment
The prophet Habakkuk cries out to God, by Unknown 19th century artist

I will stand at my guard post.
I will station myself on the wall.
I will watch to see what he will say to me
and what answer I will get to my complaint.

Then the Lord answered me,
“Write the vision.
Make it clear on tablets
so that anyone can read it quickly.
The vision will still happen at the appointed time.
It hurries toward its goal.
It won’t be a lie.
If it’s delayed, wait for it.
It will certainly happen.
It won’t be late.

“Look at the proud person. He is not right in himself.
But the righteous person will live because of his faithfulness.
Also because wine is treacherous
he is arrogant and never rests.
He has a large appetite like the grave.
He is like death—never satisfied.
He gathers all the nations to himself.
He collects all the people to himself. (God’s Word Translation)

The prophet Habakkuk is unique among the prophetic books of the Old Testament. It is more an account of the prophet’s own wonderings and questions before God, than it is bringing a specific word from God to the people.

The book of Habakkuk revolves around the prophet’s queries to the Lord; the Lord’s responses; and the prophet’s struggles to wrap both his head and his heart around those answers.

Habakkuk struggled with the rampant sins of injustice and unrighteousness amongst his own people. He contended with God about how long all this was going to go on. Today’s Old Testament lesson is something of a lament – grieving the loss of justice and righteousness, and longing for God’s salvation from the nation’s troubles. Habakkuk was determination to name the evil, bring it before God, and wait with a determined spirit for a divine response.

The prophet asked a question, and waited for an answer. His complaint is an age old one. He was weary of seeing injustice day after day, of observing the arrogant and the wicked exploit the poor and the needy. He wanted to hear from God; and when the awaited response finally came, it wasn’t what Habakkuk was expecting.

Habakkuk’s first question is one that many today can relate to:

How long, O Lord, am I to cry for help,
but you will not listen?
I cry out to you, “There’s violence!”
yet you will not come to the rescue.
Why do you make me see wrongdoing?
And why do you watch wickedness? (Habakkuk 1:2-3, GW)

God answered the prophet’s question. And Habakkuk didn’t like the answer, at all:

I am going to send the Babylonians,
that fierce and reckless nation.
They will march throughout the earth
to take possession of lands that don’t belong to them. (Habakkuk 1:6, GW)

The problem with this answer, is that, even though the prophet’s own people were unjust and violent, the Babylonians were an even worse lot of people. It was nonsense to Habakkuk that God would use an evil nation to judge God’s own people. So, the prophet asked yet another question of God:

Why do you keep watching treacherous people?
Why are you silent when wicked people swallow those
who are more righteous than they are? (Habakkuk 1:13, GW)

There are many persons who freely admit they are sinful. There is a problem, however, when a person points to others whom they believe are more sinful than they are. Habakkuk, like many contemporary believers, essentially says, “Well, I’m a sinner. I’m not perfect. But I’m not like the Babylonians! They don’t even worship God! And they do a lot worse things than I do!”

If one wants divine judgment, then one must be content with whom it comes from, and how it is done. Otherwise, the person seeks to be the judge, instead of letting the Lord handle the trouble.

We all struggle with navigating the injustice of this world. People of faith will discern that they must trust the Lord by viewing God’s deliverance and actions with a big picture perspective. They remember that God has acted with faithfulness and justice in the past; and the Lord can do it again.

Believers may have to endure some dark valleys, hard circumstances, and plenty of suffering; yet they trust that God will show up. They only need to wait patiently for divine deliverance. Eventually, we all need to conclude with the prophet, after waiting and wrestling over God’s divine plan for the situation we don’t like:

Though the fig tree does not bud
    and there are no grapes on the vines,
though the olive crop fails
    and the fields produce no food,
though there are no sheep in the pen
    and no cattle in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord,
    I will be joyful in God my Savior.

The Sovereign Lord is my strength;
    he makes my feet like the feet of a deer,
    he enables me to tread on the heights. (Habakkuk 3:17-19, NIV)

The prophet finally accepted the words of God; and, despite the circumstances, this willingness to receive those words opened to him the possibility to take joy and confidence yet again in the Lord.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardships as the pathway to peace; taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that He will make all things right If I surrender to His will; so that I may be reasonably happy in this life, and supremely happy with Him forever in the next. Amen.

Grateful to God (1 Thessalonians 2:13-20)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
Apostle Paul, by Ivan Filichev

And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is indeed at work in you who believe. For you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of God’s churches in Judea, which are in Christ Jesus: You suffered from your own people the same things those churches suffered from the Jews who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out. They displease God and are hostile to everyone in their effort to keep us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. In this way they always heap up their sins to the limit. The wrath of God has come upon them at last.

But, brothers and sisters, when we were orphaned by being separated from you for a short time (in person, not in thought), out of our intense longing we made every effort to see you. For we wanted to come to you—certainly I, Paul, did, again and again—but Satan blocked our way.For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? Indeed, you are our glory and joy. (New International Version)

Reception and Acceptance of God’s Word

The Apostle Paul, in all of his letters to the churches, was attentive to affirming those things which are good amongst the believers; and not only the aspects of church life that needed change and/or repentance.

For the Thessalonians, Paul was profoundly grateful to God for the people’s receiving of the Word and their accepting it as from God. Perhaps there is no greater affirmation than this for the Christian.

In order to receive and accept God’s Word, people must know it. And people cannot know God’s Word unless they take the time and effort to read it and discover it for themselves.

Scripture reading is a foundational spiritual practice for Christians everywhere, and for all of Christ’s Church throughout the earth. Church worship liturgies, as well as individual Christians’ daily disciplines of faith, ought to be thoroughly saturated with Holy Scripture. Yet, many churches are believers, sadly, are not.

I am specifically calling out the conservative evangelical church on this. Although they claim to be Bible-centered, with an extended time for the sermon, there is a paucity of actual Scripture contained within those gathered times.

Too much of the preaching fails to truly explain Scripture, and there are virtually no Scripture readings or references outside the sermon and in the worship service. This is a travesty, and also a testament to the biblical ignorance of so many evangelicals.

What’s more, the evangelical impulse for a “personal quiet time with the Lord” is, in reality, practiced by precious few believers – and usually consists of little more than a daily crumb of the Bible.

I perhaps sound cranky and crotchety. Yet in a previous life, I was an evangelical Pastor for many years, and know the frustrations and challenges of attempting to bring biblical literacy to such churches and Christians. There’s a better way, but alas, that is a topic for another time and another post.

Imitators and Sufferers with God’s Churches

The true muster of a Christian and any Christian Church is the desire, speech, and action of actually following the words and ways of Jesus. It was the Lord Jesus himself who said:

“Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also.” (John 15:20, NIV)

“In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

Jesus (John 16:33, NIV)

Paul was thankful for the Thessalonians because of their solidarity with the other churches; and their willingness to suffer as Jesus did. What’s more, they did not try to reinvent the wheel, but affirmed the sound practices they saw in the original churches of Judea and imitated those good things.

This was not a matter of pragmatism, that is, just doing something that worked somewhere else and adopting it for yourself. Instead, Paul was talking about following the example of the first and earliest of churches. Those churches were made up of Jewish Christians who received a lot of persecution from their fellow Jews.

The Thessalonians, too, received grief and belligerence from the same sort of people, trying to bully them around and tell them what to do. But the believers held fast to the pattern of teaching and living they observed from both Paul and the churches who endured suffering in Judea.

It’s one thing to express belief. It’s quite another thing to suffer for those beliefs and experience persecution for them. God will handle the persecutors on Judgment Day, not us. It’s our job to remain faithful and persevere in the Christian life until that Day comes.

Glory and Joy in God’s Presence

For the Apostle Paul, glory and joy was not found in his great intellect and persuading many people, or his many accomplishments of planting churches and defending the faith. Paul’s highest joy was found in people coming to know Christ and living for Jesus.

His glory was in the hundreds of relationships established with people, and all the believers he mentored. In other words, Paul’s glory and joy was the real names and faces of people he encountered and gathered into the one Church, for whom Christ died and sacrificed himself.

It wasn’t even a thought in the Apostle’s big old head to gain glory for himself, or to pursue joy for it’s own sake. Rather, Paul discovered that real joy and glory comes in fulfilling the mission give to him by Christ:

To make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; teaching them to receive and accept God’s Word, to become imitators and sufferers with God, and to glory and joy in God’s presence.

Almighty God, Father of all mercies, we your unworthy servants give you humble thanks for all your goodness and loving-kindness to us and to all whom you have made.

We bless you for our creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life; but above all for your immeasurable love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ; for the means of grace, and for the hope of glory.

And, we pray, give us such an awareness of your mercies, that with truly thankful hearts we may show forth your praise, not only with our lips, but in our lives, by giving up ourselves to your service, and by walking before you in holiness and righteousness all our days, through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory throughout all ages. Amen.

Be Careful What You Ask For (Numbers 11:18-23, 31-32)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment

Now tell the people, ‘Purify yourselves for tomorrow; you will have meat to eat. The Lord has heard you whining and saying that you wished you had some meat and that you were better off in Egypt. Now the Lord will give you meat, and you will have to eat it. You will have to eat it not just for one or two days, or five, or ten, or even twenty days, but for a whole month, until it comes out of your ears, until you are sick of it. This will happen because you have rejected the Lord who is here among you and have complained to him that you should never have left Egypt.’”

Moses said to the Lord, “Here I am leading 600,000 people, and you say that you will give them enough meat for a month? Could enough cattle and sheep be killed to satisfy them? Are all the fish in the sea enough for them?”

“Is there a limit to my power?” the Lord answered. “You will soon see whether what I have said will happen or not!”…

Suddenly the Lord sent a wind that brought quails from the sea, flying three feet above the ground. They settled on the camp and all around it for miles and miles in every direction. So all that day, all night, and all the next day, the people worked catching quails; no one gathered less than fifty bushels. They spread them out to dry all around the camp. (Good News Translation)

I can just imaging the dialogue around the campfire at night with some of the ancient Israelites. Out in the middle of nowhere, delivered from Egyptian slavery, but not yet to the Promised Land, they were feeling the awkward space of being in-between those two places:

“Manna, again!? Geez, are we ever going to get anything else to eat?”

“Doesn’t look like it, does it? Every single day we get up, go out on the desert, collect the manna, eat it all day, go to bed, then get up and do it all over again.”

Do you remember back in Egypt, we had garlic and leeks and stew and meat? Oh, glorious meat! Sometimes I think we were better of there. Dang it, I want meat! Don’t you want meat, too!?”

“Yeah, I’m sick of this manna. Hey, there’s Moses. Get us some meat, Moses! Did you bring us out here to bore us to death with manna!? What are you doing about it? Where are you leading us? Where’s the meat?”…

And on and on it goes, the murmuring about food and conditions in the desert.

When life is topsy-turvy and upside-down, it is so amazingly easy to grumble and complain. The ancient Israelites sometimes didn’t have water to drink. They had a limited diet of manna. They were anxious, nervous, and scared, wondering if things would get better, or not. The people were in a life-and-death sort of situation.

How would you respond?

Complaining, unlike our emotions such as fear, is a volitional response. We choose to grumble. The problem with gripes and complaints is that it sets a person down a dark path. The criticisms and grievances begin easily and are seemingly harmless, that is, at first. They are, however, anything but innocuous or innocent.

The murmuring under the breath did not stop with getting meat to eat. If we look ahead in the story of God’s people in the exodus event, the moaning and complaining quickly returned. The people became so disillusioned with their circumstances that they began longing for the “good old days” back in Egypt when they had plenty to eat and drink, forgetting about their cruel bondage in slavery. (Exodus 16:1-3)

The psychological progression continued with beginning to blame their situation on God, as if the Lord were some mean malevolent deity. From that point, it was inevitable that the people would disobey God and eventually succumb to the idolatry of the golden calf. (Exodus 32:1-8)

Despite the grand celebration of leaving Egypt and experiencing a miraculous deliverance through the Red Sea, the people quickly forgot because of their present mundane circumstance of eating manna every day.

If they were spiritually healthy, they would realize that the mighty God who saved them with incredible acts of power would care for them in a desert. Yet, for many, there was no faith to be found in a new situation they had not faced before.

Failure of faith begins neither with ignorance nor an egregious sin. It begins with grumbling and complaining. And if allowed to run amok, complaints will bear the fruit of discouragement, disobedience, and finally, a disavowal of God.

Sometimes, if you want something bad enough, God will give it to you. And you won’t like it. That’s because the heart has already been attuned to grumbling and murmuring. The heart’s hunger will never be satiated; it’s sick. And it can become so sick that a heart transplant is needed – an altogether new heart. Yet God will even help with that:

And I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and give you a tender, responsive heart. And I will put my Spirit in you so that you will follow my decrees and be careful to obey my regulations. (Ezekiel 36:26-27, NLT)

Acceptance means practicing a conscious effort to acknowledge and honor difficult situations and emotions. Fully accepting things as they are, instead of ignoring, avoiding, or wishing the situation were different, can be a critical step in moving through a difficult experience to experiencing more meaning.

Learning to be satisfied and content begins with accepting our current reality and present circumstances. The state of our minds and our hearts will determine whether we will ever be happy or not. When we discover how to synchronize ourselves with the groove of God’s Spirit, then we shall enjoy an abundant life of contentment – no matter the situation.

May we be able to say along with the psalmist:

I will bless the Lord who guides me;
    even at night my heart instructs me.
I know the Lord is always with me.
    I will not be shaken, for he is right beside me.

No wonder my heart is glad, and I rejoice.
    My body rests in safety.
For you will not leave my soul among the dead
    or allow your holy one to rot in the grave.
You will show me the way of life,
    granting me the joy of your presence
    and the pleasures of living with you forever. (Psalm 16:7-11, NLT)