What will you choose?

       These past months have been hard, so hard on so many levels. For many of us, the fall began with the unimaginable loss of the precious daughter of dear friends. And then COVID with all it's fear, destruction, and death.  Then terrible racial injustice exposed and the tragedy, the ugliness that this horrific sin still endures and divides. Oh forgive us and help us, Lord Jesus. And then the vitriol, the bitterness, the political divisiveness that threatens to literally tear this nation that we love apart.
         The continuing weight of it all, the ongoing isolation and loneliness from quarantine, the bone-deep sadness and perplexity and fear...Abba, we're weary and uncertain and look to You for hope, for deliverance, for strength, for redemption. Help us, show  us, lead us, revive us again, Father. Yes, we don't know what to do but our eyes are on You. (II Chron.20:12)
       But then I open our Heavenly Father's eternal Word, and His God-exhaled words breathe hope, sustenance, faith, and peace into my heart. He renews my mind and restores my perspective, and I realize afresh that He is in control. He is our Peace. He is the reconciling Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. And He is the conquering Lion of Judah who destroys sin, hatred, bitterness, death and despair and rises triumphant over it all for us, for you, for me.
         "Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other, as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful." (Col.3:12-15)
         Jesus is our Hope. He is our Way-maker. He is our Strength. He is our living Word, and He's given us His written Word that will transform our hearts, renew our minds, and redeem our culture.
         So the question is, how then will we live?  Will we fall back in despair or will we trustingly follow our Savior wherever He leads?  Will we give in to the negativity of the culture around us or will we choose to be salt and light? Will we choose the path of bitterness and recrimination or will we choose the path of forgiveness and restoration? Will we be led by fear or will we be led by faith?  Will we quietly blend in with the darkness or will we boldly shine the light and love of Christ?
         We choose. You choose. I choose. Yes, the darkness around us is thick, indeed, but the tiniest, weakest little flicker of candlelight will obliterate the darkness around it. We can be that light. Because remember--it's not our light...it's the unconquerable, unending, unfailing Light of the World that shine through us. We're not the source--He is. And because He is the Light, we know that His "light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it." (John 1:5) 
           Maybe we need to stop trying so hard to shine, and simply choose, as His beloved, to have Him do the shining. We just need to obey...and that means forgive as He has forgiven us.  To forbear, to show compassion, to be kind, and above all, to love.
          We don't have to have it all figured out...just love as He's loved us.  Just shine His light. We don't have all the answers...but we have Jesus and He does.
          I'll close with the lyrics to a new song by Rascal Flatts--"How They Remember You"--that in many ways, says it all. The first time I heard it the other day, the tears flowed. I encourage you to go listen to it and remember that we all have the choice to be the love and light of Christ in this world.

Sprayed my name on a water tower
Carved it in an old cottonwood tree
Signed a bunch of high school yearbooks
So they wouldn't forget about me
It wasn't 'til I saw my daddy's name in stone I knew
It ain't a question of if they will
It's how they remember you

Did you stand or did you fall?
Build a bridge or build a wall
Hide your love or give it all
What did you do? What did you do?
Did you make 'em laugh or make 'em cry?
Did you quit or did you try?
Live your dreams or let 'em die?
What did you choose? What did you choose?
When it all comes down
It ain't if, it's how they remember you

When you're down to your last dollar
Will you give or will you take?
When the stiff wind blows the hardest
Will you bend or will you break? (Will you break?)
You're gonna leave a legacy, no matter what you do
It ain't a question of if they will
It's how they remember you

Did you stand or did you fall?
Build a bridge or build a wall
Hide your love or give it all
What did you do? What did you do?
Did you make 'em laugh or make 'em cry?
Did you quit or did you try?
Live your dreams or let 'em die
What did you choose? What did you choose?
When it all comes down
It ain't if, it's how they remember you

         Oh Father, help us to build bridges rather than walls; to love rather than to hide; to refuse to quit but by Your grace and for Your glory, to keep trying, keep giving, keep forgiving, keep helping, keep encouraging, keep loving, keep shining.  When they remember us, might they simply see You.
        To You--the Light of the World--be all the glory.

Not fear but power, love, and self-control

        "For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control." (2 Tim.1:7)
        Lord, I know this intellectually, but help me to live it out experientially.
        I haven't been able to put my finger on it exactly, but as I've pondered it, it seems that I'm battling a vague and deep-seated sense of fear and anxiety over all that has been happening in our world. First the corona virus and all the uncertainty, isolation, division and destruction that this virus wrought on our world . And then, all that has surrounded the tragic, terrible death of George Floyd...the wounds that have split open, the ugly racism that has been exposed, the anger, the sorrow, the suffering, the vitriolic divisions. It's been both heartbreaking and convicting. It's engendered both lament but also fear. What will the future hold? Where will this end?  What if we respond in the wrong way? What are we to do to help make a difference? What does it mean to be salt and light in this situation? 
        I don't know...but my Savior does. He knows what it means to walk right into pain, division, and difficulty and bring healing, hope, grace, and light. He steps right into the brokenness. He never shies away from the hard conversations.
        As Jesus prepared to go to Calvary for our sins, He--who was and is fully God--knew full well the incalculable weight of all the sin that would soon be laid upon Him and the infinite amount of suffering He would endure.  And yet, we're told, "When the days drew near for Him to be taken up, He set His face to go to Jerusalem." (Luke 9:51). Or as some translations put it, He "set His face like flint." Such steely, unwavering determination to go straight into the horrific, cosmic battle for our souls which would cost Jesus His life...but would give us ours. Oh thank You, Lord Jesus.
        So when we ponder Jesus and His suffering for us, when we "consider Him who endured from sinners such hostility against Himself" for us, how can we grow weary or fainthearted? (Heb.12:3) How can we shirk the hard conversations? How can we seek to avoid all discomfort and pain in our desire for self-protection and self-preservation? How can we choose comfortable isolation over uncomfortable loving? How can we succumb to fear of the future when He calls us to reject our fear and act on our faith in Him. To act on our faith in the One who holds the future in His nail-scarred hands and promises that He is with us always, even to the end of the earth
        Yes, I know these things intellectually, but yet that stubborn fear wants to wrap it's icy tentacles around my heart. 
        To my fearful "what if, what if, what if?," the answer is "But God..." 
        But God's Word promises that the Lord has given "us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control."
        That "spirit of fear" I claim to feel?  It's not from the Lord who has given us His Spirit to dwell within us.  No, that fear is not from Him, so I, so we, need to reject and refuse it and instead act in accordance with the Spirit of power, love, and self-control that our heavenly Father has given us.
         By the power of the Holy Spirit, away with you fear--you ugly, destructive, paralyzing, unloving, unbelieving, joy-sucking, peace-destroying fear.
         Instead, by God's grace and for His glory, might we act in obedience to the gentle yet powerful promptings of His Holy Spirit--to trust, to love, to forgive, to sacrifice, to be salt and light, and to live with joy, hope, and gratitude in our hearts, words, and actions.  We can't, but He can. 
        Thank You, Father, for Your unfailing, unchanging Word. Thank You for our saving, living Savior. And thank You for the indwelling, empowering Holy Spirit. Help us this day and everyday to be led by faith, not by fear. You've promised us that we have Your Spirit of power, love, and self-control, so please enable us walk in step with the Spirit, by Your grace, for Your glory.
        To God be the glory.

But God...

        "But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male or female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus." (Gal.3:25-27)
        "And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those of the household of faith." (Gal.6:9-10)
        The events of the past few weeks have been beyond heartbreaking. What a vicious, pernicious sin racism is. To think that our nation continues to confront this hideous sin of devaluing the worth of some human beings based simply upon the color of the skin. How can this be? What is wrong with the heart of mankind?  How can one human being treat another human being this way?
         And yet, what is wrong with my selfish, prideful, stubborn heart?  As Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote in The Gulag Archipelago, “If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?”
          Like so many of us, I have wept to see the evil that resides in the human heart--and the horrific price that has been paid by generation after generation because of the sin of racism.  Generation after generation of African Americans hurt beyond anything I can understand (but I'm trying) but also of the countless generations of those whose hearts have been warped, twisted, and destroyed by their hatred. 
         Yet even as I want to cast stones at that sin, God shows me my own heart with its dividing line of good and evil. My lack of self-sacrificial love and compassion. My desire for my own way.  My idolatry of comfort and security. My pride. My impatience. My determined love of self.  Oh, my sin, too, is relentless and stubborn and hideous.
        But God...oh such beautiful words, "But God..." 
        "But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved--and raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages He might show the immeasurable riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast." (Eph.2:4-9) 
        But God is rich in mercy.
        But God loves us with His great and perfect and beautiful love.
        But God saved us even when we were absolutely dead in all our hideous sin and made us alive in Christ.  Because God doesn't make bad people good...He makes dead people alive. Including you, including me.
         But God has saved us by His grace--His utterly unearned, utterly undeserved grace--and raised us up to the heavenly places with Christ to show us the immeasurable riches of His grace in kindness.  God's immeasurable riches--I cannot even begin to fathom this...but oh how thankful I am...
        ...and humbled because it has absolutely nothing, nothing, nothing to do with my worth or ability or performance.  It's all by His unmerited, underserved, amazing grace. Which means no one can boast. Not Billy Graham or Tim Keller or Ann Lotz or the most godly person you or I know.  And most certainly not me!  Oh mercy, definitely not me.
          Yes, it feels an awful lot like our world right now is on fire. The problems seem impossibly  difficult, the pain immeasurably deep, the anger and fear frighteningly great...but God.
           Not us, but God.
           Now is the time to listen.  To learn. To seek to understand more than to be understood. To weep with those who weep. And to pray, to trust, to hold up our empty hands to the sovereign King and Kings and admit, "we don't know what to do, but our eyes are on You.” (II Chron.20:12)
         Lord, we don't know what to do, but our eyes finally, finally are fixed on You. You alone. You are able. You took the sin and pain and hatred and racism of all the world upon Yourself, Lord Jesus, and You conquered every bit of it at the cross.  So we look to You. We trust You. We depend upon You. We ask You to cleanse us, to help us, to lead us, to teach us, to equip us, to shine Your light and love through us. May we be vessels of Your grace, forgiveness, hope, and sacrificial love to the world around us. Help us not to become weary in doing good in the hard, holy days ahead but to keep our eyes fastened on You as we run this race ahead of us, all by Your grace all to Your glory.
         How we praise You that even for the worst of our sins, we can loudly proclaim "But God..."
         To God, to our Savior Jesus who is the Way-Maker, the Reconciler, the Redeemer, be all the glory forever and ever. Amen.