Live In the Now, Man!

I’ve not been a big fan of the fall since my early 20’s. Not really sure why, but it just seems to be a fairly bleak season for me. Since getting married and starting a family, it’s been hard to not embrace some aspect of the fall as all other members of my family are born within a 3 week period during the fall. So, my disdain for the fall doesn’t really sit well with the rest of my family.

Always one to try to better myself and figure out how I can improve, I pondered some deep thoughts during a drive the other day. I was trying to figure out why I have this tendency to get so down in the fall. As I began to inwardly reflect, I made two observations about myself: 1) I have a tendency to always have a 5-year plan and 2) my 5-year plan takes my focus off of the “hear and now.” I know that it doesn’t sound like much, but it was pretty ground-breaking for me. I mean, who doesn’t want to plan for the future? Who doesn’t want to have a map of how things will play out in the next 5 years? Who doesn’t want that sense of security (albeit false)?

As I continued to reflect, I thought about the two extreme scenarios that I could find myself in. The first scenario is reflecting so much on the future that I completely neglect the present (which is sort of what I feel like I do sometimes). The other scenario is the complete engrossment in the moment that there is an almost irresponsible approach to the future: no plans, just go with the flow. Neither scenario really seems viable to me. My reflection led me to think of Jesus and his short 33 years of life on the earth.

If ever there was someone who had the potential of being focused on a future event, it was Jesus. Theologians differ on their opinion of whether or not Jesus truly knew his future and fate. The ones who question it base it on the fact that in order to become human, he needed to forego some of his divine attributes (i.e., omnipresence – Jesus could not be in two places at once). Regardless of that, he was pretty aware of what was going on considering that he specifically instructed people who he had healed to not speak of what had happened to anyone for fear of his death coming prematurely. But Jesus took advantage of every moment, every opportunity, every meeting that he had. He didn’t waste a minute. The most amazing thing about it is that while focusing on the moment, he never lost sight of his purpose and his mission: he still had his eyes on the future.

That focus on his mission also helped him to not be caught up in the moment. His perfection allowed him to not get bogged down in some of the things that you and I might find ourselves tempted by. He did things with purpose, he never did things to get attention first, that might have been a result, but it was never the main purpose.

It would be easy for me to say, “But he’s Jesus!” and that’s a pretty fair assessment. I’m not perfect, nor have I ever claimed to be. But, am I not to strive for perfection and Christ-likeness? What is my main mission and purpose in life? To glorify God and enjoy him forever. Everything that I do needs to be focused on that. Problem is, I live in a culture that is telling me that it’s all about me, that I need to know my future, that I need to plan it out accordingly because the future is really “in my hands.” Jesus said in Matthew 6, “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?'”

Again, there’s a fine line that we walk here between faith and responsibility, especially when we have families. But, if we look at a good portion of the world, I don’t think they’ve got their portfolios in order or their 401Ks all maxed out. In fact, some of them are barely making it through the day. They didn’t know how they were going to eat today, but somehow they made it. They’ll go to sleep, maybe lulled to sleep by the moans of their starving kids, and deal with tomorrow’s problems when…and if…they awake.

Yeah, it’s bleak. I told you, I don’t like the fall. But seriously, can we put things in perspective and realize that when we go about our lives in a purposeful and intentional way, living in the moment, we have the potential for having a huge impact for the future. If we get bogged down with our 5-year plans, we’ll miss a ton of opportunities that God throws our way, and we won’t ever get them back again.

May we learn from the one who taught us to keep our eye on the purpose while embracing every moment. May we, in the words of Thoreau, “live deep and suck out all the marrow of life”, allowing ourselves to be used by the one who knows what the future holds…and has the perfect 5-year plan all figured out.

Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.“

How Are You Following?

Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to him those he wanted, and they came to him. He appointed twelve—designating them apostles—that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach and to have authority to drive out demons. These are the twelve he appointed: Simon (to whom he gave the name Peter James son of Zebedee and his brother John (to them he gave the name Boanerges, which means Sons of Thunder); Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him. (Mark 3:13-19)

Have you ever read a passage for the 100th time and caught something that you never saw before? That’s the beauty of Scripture, it is living and breathing and continually penetrates into our very core to transform us to be more Christlike.

I was reading this passage the other day and a phrase that is probably mostly overlooked stood out to me: that they might be with him. As I continue on in my own spiritual formation, I realize that God is not sitting there with a checklist of what I am accomplishing to be a better disciple of Christ. Instead, he is asking for total commitment and for time. When he called the first apostles, the plan was for them to spend as much time with Jesus as possible in order that they might be trained by him and grow in their relationship with the Father, through the Son.

Somewhere along the way, we got the idea that we were supposed to be bound to the Law, the very Law that Paul tells us we are no longer bound to. Although we have been saved by grace through faith, we continually try to come up with ways that we can earn our salvation. It is hard to accept grace. It is hard to think that someone would give us such a gift just because he loves us. So, we make every effort to feel like we are “earning” it.

God requires total commitment on our part, how are we doing with that? I know that I fall short. Things can push that time out of the way. I can begin to become very pharisaical and make every effort to “earn” my salvation. The Father is calling us to spend time with him that we might become more like his Son every day. That time does not always need to be filled with “stuff.” God speaks to us through his inspired Word and he speaks to us when we pray, but the Bible has stories of God’s speaking in the midst of silence. The best relationships are ones where neither party feels the need to fill the air with useless babble or meaningless conversation, sometimes more can be said in silence than with words.

So, how are you following the Master? Are you walking close, carrying your list, and checking things off as you go. Or are you content to stand in his presence, allowing him to transform you in whatever way he sees fit?

Submission, Part II

That dirty word “submission” really gets a bad rap. I remember hearing messages from Ephesians 5 where Paul tells wives to “submit to their husbands” because the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church. It’s funny, I remember hearing messages about that first part of the passage, but I don’t remember hearing the charge to husbands in the next passage. Maybe I wasn’t listening too hard. Maybe I zoned out. Regardless of what happened, it wasn’t until years after hearing some of these messages that I really looked at the rest of the passage.

I had heard complaints about this passage from mostly women. Looking back on it, I have to say that their complaints were justified. If you don’t take into account what Paul says after this, then you only see a portion of his definition and ideal for submission. After Paul writes about wives submitting to their husbands, look at what he says to the husbands:

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church— for we are members of his body. "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

I really think that the reason that this passage evokes such strong negative responses is because of the lack of emphasis on Paul’s emphasis. There are 12 verses in this passage, 3 directed towards wives, and 9 directed towards husbands. Why has there been more of an emphasis on 25% of this passage without a stronger emphasis on the other 75%?

I can only speculate here, but I would venture to guess that it would be much easier for a woman to submit to her husband if she truly feels loved and valued by him. If she feels that he would give anything for her, wouldn’t she feel the same way in return? The husband’s responsibility is being compared to Christ’s love for the church. Christ gave himself up for the church in order that she might be made holy and blameless. Wives are to be top priority to their husbands.

Now, I slowly begin to slump down in my chair as I read through this passage. I realize how far short I fall when loving my wife the way that Christ loved the church. I realize that I have not taken my directive from the Lord as serious as I should. It becomes even more of a conviction as I realize that I have two little boys who will watch me and base their love for their future wives on what they see Daddy doing.

In my 8 years of marriage, I have never played the “I’m your husband so submit to me” card with my wife. I pray that in the next 50+ years of my marriage that I never will. If I am doing what I am supposed to be doing, I won’t even have to ask, it will be a natural progression. Submission is a two-way street and if it’s only one-way, then it’s not really submission. Husbands, we can redefine submission when we truly live out Paul’s words to us: to love our wives as Jesus loved (and loves) the church. When we start doing that, I think we will begin to see that mutuality of this word that has been abused and misused.

Husbands, may God give us strength and wisdom to know how to sacrifice ourselves for the wives that God has blessed us with, and that he uses to make us better servants of Him.

The Vilifed Villain

Unless you are complete anti-fan of sports and the media, you have probably heard at least something in the past week or so about Michael Vick being reinstated to play in the NFL and being signed by the Philadelphia Eagles. I have not been purposely following the public’s reaction to this, only eavesdropping. But I have seen a few different things that have really made an impact on me.

1) Tony Dungy is a remarkable man.

This coming from a New England Patriots fan. While he coached the Colts, I knew that Dungy had a fairly outspoken faith. He wrote a book that all Christian football fans seemed to “eat” up. My understanding was that Dungy, of his own accord, went to visit Vick in prison. Maybe he saw it as his responsibility to act as a spiritual mentor to Vick. The Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Thessalonians 5:11, “Therefore encourage one another and build each other up.” Tony Dungy has surely done this with Vick. Regardless of any personal feelings that one may or may not have for Dungy, what he has done is to be obedient to his biblical calling.

I know that there are some who have called him a “media hound” for having jumped into a situation that he was not directly involved in, but that is worldly talk. Remember Paul’s words that the gospel is foolishness to those who are perishing, the concept of what Dungy has done is so foreign to most people that it’s no wonder that they have accused him of being selfish, that’s the only way that some of them would have jumped into a situation like this, if they knew that they would get something out of it.

I believe that what Dungy has done for Vick is a model that the church can use in handling situations of accountability and church discipline. I can’t think of a more redemptive way of dealing with this situation than what Dungy has done. If our churches would only start fostering the kind of discipleship that encourages people to come and walk alongside people who have made mistakes, this world would be a much better place.

2) Michael Vick is not out of the woods yet.

While the road to recovery has begun for Vick, he still has a long way to go. There are so many skeptics out there who are probably just watching in hopes of seeing him fall again. I was having a conversation with some friends the other night and one of them mentioned that in getting involved with all the dog-fighting activities, he was just being true to the environment that he had been raised in, living the “thug” life. Can you take the “thug” out of Vick? No, but God can. That is what true transformation is all about, it’s the new creation that Paul speaks of, the putting off of the old self and taking on a new persona, the persona of one who is following hard after God.

I think that’s why the relationship with Dungy is so key. Vick is not going to succeed on his own, he needs help and more importantly, accountability. Dungy can be that for him if Vick allows him to be. I can imagine that Dungy won’t tolerate a lot though, he has been gracious, but I am sure, based on his coaching history, that he will pursue the goal of being a redemptive factor in Vick’s life as if both of their lives depended on it. While it would seem silly to me for Vick to even think about going back to his old ways of getting involved in any kind of activities involving animals and fighting, I have never been in his shoes before, and can’t even remotely understand what the draw was to it to begin with. But in plain and simple English: he would have to be an idiot to even think about going back there again.

Many people have said that there’s no such thing as a third chance, which again, is a fairly worldly concept, but I think it’s a fairly accurate statement from where Vick sits. To make another mistake of the proportion that he did before would only him to be completely ostracized by the world, more than he already has been.

3) Killing dogs vs. killing people.

At the risk of being put on PETA’s blacklist, if we cry out against killing dogs shouldn’t we also do the same for babies who are murdered every day? I am not saying that I support cruelty to animals, but what I am saying is “be consistent.” If we are going to make such a stand against hurting and killing animals, a stand which I think is well-justified, we should make equally or more of a stand for human rights. When we start valuing the lives of animals over people, we continue to show ourselves as to a world that has truly lost its way.

Michael Vick made a mistake, some would say that it was a stupid mistake, but he has paid the penalty that our court system has said that he needs to pay. He has been released from prison and hopes to become a “productive member of society” again. Can we stop vilifying the guy and start encouraging him? I wonder how the people who have been so adamantly outspoken against Vick would react if they were in his shoes, what would they do? Would they hope that everyone would vilify them as well, giving them no benefit of the doubt whatsoever? I doubt it. So, give the guy a chance, and if you’re a follower of Christ, pray for him, that he might stay on the path of righteousness.

4) Only time will tell.

Ultimately, only time will tell what will happen with Vick. He could become one of the greatest comeback stories in sports history. I think we all have smiled a little bit when we have watched those kinds of stories on TV. Vick has the opportunity to make a serious impact to the world, and especially to the younger generations. Unfortunately, we have elevated athletes to a place in our country where we discourage education in favor of millions of dollars. It seems like a no-brainer when you look at it, especially if you were raised with next to nothing. But here’s an opportunity for Vick to show some of the younger generation, who has idolized athletes like him, that everyone makes mistakes and not only admitting your mistake, but changing your lifestyle is essential to moving on.

Maybe you have seen the press recently on Josh Hamilton of the Texas Rangers. He was one of those stories. He made a huge impact at the 2008 All-Star Game and there were stories around where he had come from. He came back from an addiction to drugs and alcohol to be a signed Major League baseball player. And he’s a pretty impressive player, at that.

Apparently, last January, while preparing for the following season, Hamilton went into a bar to get something to eat. He ended having a drink that turned into about 10 or 12 drinks and was pretty wasted. Once the news broke that this had happened, people started coming out against Hamilton. They said that he should quit playing baseball, that he had committed the “unforgiveable” sin, and other wonderfully encouraging things.

Hamilton held a press conference to discuss what had happened, the details of what he said can be found here: http://rangersblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2009/08/hamilton-transcript.html
Josh’s wife said this in a statement on a blog, “Josh is a wonderful man, father and husband who happens to be human. We are all flawed and that's why we need a Savior.” More of her words can be found here: http://rangersblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2009/08/here-are-some-of-katie-hamiltons-thought.html

There seem to be a lot of similarities between Vick and Hamilton and I think that Vick can gain some insight from Hamilton’s success and recent mistakes as well. People will only be looking for Vick to fail, like it or not, he needs to be living a life above reproach, even taking Paul’s words in 1 Timothy to heart in how he lives. The slightest misstep on his part will “seal the deal” for him in the public’s eyes, and like Hamilton, Vick will be criticized and vilified even if he makes a mistake and admits it. So the best option is to just not make those kinds of mistakes anymore.

I really think that this whole situation is such a great example of the need for community within the Body of Christ. Despite what kind of advice the world might throw at us, we cannot live our lives as islands, independent of other people, and think that we will stay “clean and sober.” The only way to live a life that is above reproach is to make yourself accountable to someone. We are called to encourage one another and build each other up, that’s not a suggestion! Regardless of whether you know Michael Vick or Josh Hamilton, they are part of the same body and so, we should be praying for them.

My prayer is that God can use these guys with their successes and their failures to make an impact for His kingdom and His glory. Our treasure is in jars of clay, fragile and sometimes broken vessels which house the glory and grace of our Lord Jesus Christ who has saved us into the community of God. May we all learn to walk in community as we strive to live lives above reproach.

It's All About Me

I am a worship leader. Just about every Sunday, I lead the musical portion of the worship services at my church. I have been doing this full-time for 5 years and before that I had done it on a part-time basis for about 15 years prior. Despite this experience, I am constantly learning, constantly trying to implement new things, and always ready to acknowledge that as much as I have learned, I still have a long way to go.

In all of this time, I have seen and experienced a lot. I could come up with a fairly extensive and broad list of my discoveries, but I think I can narrow a list down to two things from a theological viewpoint of leading musical worship:

1) Worship leaders need to improve their theology
2) Worship songwriters need to write more singable music that promotes a holistic theology

It probably sounds harsh, but let me take each of these and explain.

I need to confess that I am far from perfect and I fall into all of the traps that the average worship leader can fall into. I find the latest songs and sing them because they are familiar. I choose songs based on what kind of energy they can evoke. I find “pet” verses that I can share instead of exploring Scripture for new ways to see and know God. I do not always strive to be as excellent as I should strive to be.

We, as worship leaders, cannot grow comfortable. Whether or not you lead music or preach or have a major part in your worship services, this is essential. Theology is “God Talk”, it is the way that we talk about and understand God. He is infinite and while we may appreciate certain aspects of who He is, we should never cease to find new ways of seeing Him and knowing Him. His mercies are new every morning and those mercies should be explored and sung about. The moment that we stop learning about God and who He is, is the moment that we should beware of our hearts becoming lukewarm or cold. He is bigger than we can imagine and his love for us is wide and deep.

We love to sing songs about how wonderful, faithful, gracious, and awesome that He is, but we often neglect seeing Him more holistically. Jeremiah, the prophet, wrote an entire book of Lamentations. He was known as the “weeping prophet.” The Old Testament prophets brought messages of peace and hope, but they also brought messages of judgment and wrath. There were calls to repentance and faithfulness. Where are those songs in our repertoires?

We want to sing songs that make us happy so that we can come out smiling like a certain Texan who shall remain nameless. We want people to feel good when they come to church so that they come back, or so that they will tithe generously. We want people leaving with a sense of “having met God” and having been embraced by Him.

I’m not saying that all of those things are bad, but is that all that there is? Are there not times that people should leave the presence of God having felt like Isaiah: that they were unclean and unworthy to stand before a Holy God? Our encounters with God should not be limited to the feelings that we leave with or the emotions that are evoked from us. Instead, they need to express the true and genuine characteristics of people who have deepened their relationship with the One who created them.

To be honest, I struggle with what this looks like for us in the church. This is a cultural shift from who and what we have become in the church and as long as it has taken us to get to this point, the solution will not take place overnight. That’s where the second observation comes in: we need to start writing music that begins promoting a holistic theology. We need to start writing music that doesn’t promote such an individualistic viewpoint of salvation and theology but instead, promotes the community of God that we are a part of when we come to faith in Christ. There needs to be less “me” and more “we.”

When we are saved through Jesus Christ, we are not only saved from the bondage of sin into which we were born, but we are saved into the community of believers, the church of Jesus Christ that transcends all time and space. We are saved into a community of fellowship, accountability, and faith. We can keep on singing songs about what Jesus has done for me, how he saved me, and how he loves me, but that’s not the whole story. We have to tell the rest of the story.

I would love to hear some thoughts about this process and what it looks like for other people and just how we might move, corporately, towards a more holistic theology in our musical worship.

Everything's Broken!

I will get around to the second part of my Submission post soon, but I felt that this topic was too important to neglect. I actually feel like this topic, in a strange sort of way, relates to the topic of submission, so I hope that it might act as a segue.

I was reading something the other day that troubled me. The conversation started with a question of why we attend church? To me, that’s a pretty fair and legitimate question, one that I have grappled with over and over. While I have struggled with the Bride of Christ on the earth, I have often gone back to a quote that is attributed to Martin Luther, “The church is a whore, and she is my mother.” I’m not sure if Luther was truly the author or not, but authorship is not the point, the fact is that the church is imperfect but she still belongs to me and I am still responsible to her.

The church is imperfect because she is made up of fallible and imperfect people like me. Yet, God chose her to be His agent of change in the world through the Holy Spirit. You might love her, you might hate her, but if you are a follower of Jesus Christ, you still have an obligation to be a part of her. I am not dictating that we all need to be a part of a mega-church, but I am saying that we need to be part of a community of believers that comes together for the sake of, among other things, worship and service. That's going to look very different depending on where we are geographically and culturally, but fellowship and coming together are essential parts of it.

The writer of Hebrews writes in chapter 10:
Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

These are some great reasons why the “church” needs to continue to meet and exist: to spur one another on and to encourage one another. Do you see the “one another” there, not once, but twice? The church is not about you, it’s a community made up of individuals but not focused on the individual, but focused on a purpose which is much greater good than the individual. The church’s purpose is to build the Kingdom of God, God’s community on earth.

What troubled me the most about what I read were comments from people who had, at least temporarily abandoned church. They want to do church by themselves, giving money to the things that they want to give money to, serving the ministries that they want to serve, and doing things that, in my opinion, make the focus not outward but rather inward. They have couched their reasoning in language that makes it seem as if their motives are noble and I legitimately think that some of their motives are, but it still seems a cop-out to me.

As I read the comments about retreating from church I began to realize why divorce has become such a viable option for even those in the church. Instead of staying and facing the difficulty of redemption, reformation, repentance, and restoration, why not just bail and start over again? We run away instead of dealing with the hurt and making efforts to be part of the change. How is that a viable option? We serve a God who is in the business of redemption, not complete destruction and rebuilding. When the world was destroyed by the flood in Genesis, God made a covenant with Noah that He would never again destroy all living creatures as He had done. Yet giving up on “church” is disowning her as our mother and ultimately saying that God’s change agent on the earth is incapable of accomplishing His will. It seems to be questioning whether He can really do what He said that He would do through the people that He said that He would do it through.

I have been in church long enough to have seen that we have sufficiently screwed things up. Prior to my current ministry position, I have had my fair share of being "burned" by people in ministry who should have acted better and who should know better than to have done what they did. I have seen how our focus as the body of Christ has been distorted by things that we think are the issue when things that are happening right under our noses are not being addressed and confronted. But I still remain a part of church.

Are there times when it's legitimate to take a "break" from church? I have seen people who have taken a hiatus from church, I think that I have been one of them, and I have to say, I can't blame them. There are times when there have been sufficient hurts and healing needs to take place. All possible avenues for change have been taken and nothing but brick walls have been encountered. I just wonder if we stay and fight as hard as we could. I wonder if the efforts that we make mean have really brought us to a place where we should just abandon the church or if we should not instead seek out way that we can make a difference where we are, albeit small. We all want to change the world, but it's not going to happen in one swift action, it's going to happen one life at a time.

I often wonder if we have such a distorted ecclesiology (the doctrine of the church) that it would be unrecognizable to the 1st century church. But can’t God redeem it? In Scripture, He remains faithful and true to Israel despite her gallivanting around and “sleeping” with other lovers. Should we not remain faithful to the Bride of Christ?

There is legitimate criticism out there regarding church budgets and why we spend as much as we do on some of the things that we do. At the same time, there are churches that strive to be 50/50 churches, operating on 50% of their budget and giving the other 50% away. I'm not saying that we have "figured it out" when it comes to church and how it should be done, but just because we have not successfully found the balance does not mean that we pack up our things and say "to hell" with the institution.

Our own sanctification, our becoming like Jesus, is not something that happens overnight, despite what you may hear some people say. Why should we expect that the church is going to wake up one day and find that everything is perfect? There were issues with the church when it first began, there are issues with the church today, and I think that there will still be issues with the church when Christ returns, does that mean that we stop striving? Galatians 6:9 says, "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time, we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." Persistence and perseverance need to be characteristics that followers of Jesus Christ exhibit.

Here’s a challenge for those of you who have given up on church or “organized” religion: why not be change agents within the change agent? Why not make efforts to see that God redeems His body? Why not pray that God might get loose and have His way? Even though many of us might think that we can objectively look at the church, our vision is still distorted by sin and we cannot see as clearly as we think that we can. The church is the church because it is made up of people who call themselves followers of Christ, if the followers of Christ on earth are not organized and representative of him, we are being disobedient to our purpose, our mission, and God’s goal for humanity: redemption, restoration, and community with their Creator and with their fellow creations. At the risk of sounding cheesy, the words of a song have been running through my head as I think through all of this: If you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make a change. Change needs to start with us first, then we can change the world.

When we are faced with hardship and difficulty, it’s a cop-out to bail. Why not face the difficulty? Did God not say that He would give us everything that we need to accomplish His will (Hebrews 13:21)? If God bailed on us every time that we failed, there would be no redemption, no forgiveness, and we would all be destined to remain separated from God. Let’s not forget Jesus’ words in Luke 12, “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” If we who have been saved by grace and who are continually forgiven by such grace should give up on the church who is desperately in need of grace, God help us all!

Submission, Part I

I met with a friend and mentor recently to begin a process of relational accountability and discipleship. Although I have only been in full-time ministry for 5 years, I have been in the church my entire life. I have seen the good and the bad of church, sometimes one has felt more prevalent than the other. I have experienced the pressures that congregations put on their pastors from two different angles: as a pastor and as the son of a pastor. I have had to remind myself on countless occasions that I am following Jesus, not any pastor, denomination, or church. I have learned that one of the most important things for us to do as Christians is to be in relational community with each other, submitting ourselves to each other in order that we may be an example of the Gospel to those who are walking in darkness.

I have also seen, both personally and in the media, the many who have fallen as they tried to maintain the appearance that everything was going “great” when all the time they were hiding an addiction, a relationship, or some other skeleton that lurked in their dark closet. Trying to live up to the expectations of people combined with the “I can handle this all by myself” attitude is a recipe for certain failure. When I see brothers or sisters in moral failure, I cannot say that I would never do that. As Paul reminds us in Romans 7, we are still influenced by our “flesh” and can be pulled in different ways if we are not careful.

It seems easy to say these things, but much more difficult to actually accomplish them. From the beginning, we have wanted things our own way; we have wanted to raise ourselves to the same plain as the God who created us. Our culture reinforces the sense of entitlement with which we already struggle within our flesh. We feel as if we deserve to be on the same plain as God. If we feel that we are worthy of being equal to God, why would we ever consider submitting ourselves to each other, fallible human beings?

Paul tells us in Ephesians 5 that we are to submit ourselves to each other out of reverence for Christ. But what can be gained by this kind of submission? Frankly, I think that the word “submit” gets a bad rap. If you look it up in the dictionary, among the many definitions is this “to subject to some kind of treatment or influence.” Other than the obvious depravity that stretches to our very core from original sin, there is one reason why I believe we aren’t comfortable with the idea of submission: we are not willing to build vulnerable relationships.

Yes, we can all say that we have deep and intimate relationships with people, including our spouses, but how deep and intimate are they? We all still house secrets within us, things that we are unwilling to share, and why? Because we are afraid of getting burned, we are afraid that someone will breach our trust and reveal those secrets to the world. Everything that is contained within us will eventually come out; we can only contain it for so long. Wouldn’t it be better to let it come out with someone that we trust?

God did not create us to live alone. He specifically created Eve for Adam, not just for the propagation of humanity, but because He said that it was not good for man to live alone. While many have used that as the basis for the marriage covenant, it also means that we all need relationships that extend deeper than Facebook or Twitter. While all of our social networking resources are great for connecting, they cannot replace face to face or live conversation, they still leave us alone and by ourselves. Only in face to face or live conversations can we build meaningful relationships that will allow for the kind of accountability that Paul talks about.

So what happens when we build these kinds of relationships? We begin to see the picture of submission in a different way than oppressive or bound in chains. We instead see it as freedom, freedom to be ourselves, freedom from the bondage of loneliness, freedom from the bondage of the things that we are hiding deep down inside because we are afraid to share them. And we share because true relational submission is reciprocal, both are willing to share and be vulnerable. If it isn’t, then it is just a different form of slavery and we are in danger of being in bondage to something or someone else.

Like I said before, submission has gotten a bad rap. We can't allow words to be hijacked because of the way that they have been used, abused, and misused in the past. If we are going to show that submission is not a dirty word, the only way that we can do it is by living it out in our lives, submitting to one another. Only then will the world that we live in realize that there's something more to what we say than empty words and wind.

Coming soon: Submission, Part II