Getting up early really DOES build character

This morning was the second-to-last Tuesday morning men's Bible study for the fall over at church. Last spring was the first one but I didn't make it all the way through; being on the road combined with lots of other excuses led to me bailing on it about halfway through. This time, though, God granted me the drive to get my ass out of bed at 5am and get ready to make it there by 6:15. It's been one of the most fruitful things I've been involved in, and my table leader has made a huge impact on me, in terms of how I am approaching the people around me and how I'm approaching my quiet time with God. In my search to put things down that separate me from God, I often forget that the biggest thing we're called to do is love Him and those around us, and that part of that call is to go into the world and make disciples for Christ. I can't say that I've got any disciples following me around, but I do have a group of men who are pursuing Christ alongside me and who encourage me in my bad times and celebrate with me in the good, and through whom God has given me hope for the future and a lot of strength. So while the professional musician in me despises waking up while it's still dark, thankfully the Spirit's been a lot stronger.

I've been worn out lately, just feeling tired, especially after our trip out of town and back where I was up for about two days straight. In spite of that, I'm glad to be reminded on days like this that God's still there, when it's so easy for me to start feeling weighed down with my own problems. I wrote last time that I was feeling really introspective, and I talked with the guys about that today. It was getting to the point where it was interfering with my ability to do life in any way. Introspection is good to a point where it drives you to put down something that's destructive, but as with everything else on earth it quickly becomes destructive when uncoupled from real submission to God. I've found myself going into "I need to fix this or God will be mad at me" mode several times, and even though I know it's wrong and wholly unbiblical, it's hard not to think like that. I still struggle with sin--but of course I do. I'm justified, but I'm not perfect; at the same time, I need to continue to live in confession with the believers I'm close to, and to keep looking to Christ in those times when I feel tempted.

Beau preached this Sunday, and he spoke on the issue of anxiety, how it leads us to try to control our lives yet frustrates us with our inability to do so. This can be good to a very limited degree in that it brings us to realize that we're on a wrong course, but so many of us (myself included) have a hard time letting Him drive. Matthew 6:22-23 says, "The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!" I grow more anxious when I spend my time looking at the things that concern me--the things that tempt me to sin, the possible problems to com in the future--because they begin to overwhelm me. I need to look to God because He's the one in control, He's the one who's set me free, and He's the one who gives me the strength to endure and the ability to rejoice. I'm gonna pull over and let Someone Else drive.

Workin' on down

I'm continuing my new job and things are going well at Ye Olde Musick Shoppe. Sold a sax with a very nice commission attached, and felt good about that, which of course led me to thoughts of "am I taking joy in receiving this, or in knowing that God is providing for me?" I am amazed that God has instilled a lot of patience in me, because I know under other circumstances always being so introspective about little things like that would piss me off after a while. However, it's the little things that always seem to get in the way, always seem to grow quickly into big things that drag me off course. Grumbling about someone who annoys me becomes grousing about every person I encounter, which becomes an unloving attitude. Lingering on a girl's picture for a little too long rushes headlong into lust. It's for these reasons I've been reading another Piper book. Of course, Piper is not the Word, but he does help me understand it. I'm thankful that so many great minds have been reconciled to God--John Piper, C.S. Lewis, Francis Schaeffer, Jonathan Edwards, and many others--to shine truth's light on the Word.

Lately I've been in Colossians, but I've felt pulled into the Psalms a lot. I was named after King David and I feel like I have a lot in common with him; I swing back and forth between a deep devotion and love for God and suddenly finding myself running headlong into some dumbass decision that I know better than to do. Psalm 145 is it for me today:

I will extol you, my God and King,
and bless your name forever and ever.
Every day I will bless you
and praise your name forever and ever.
Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised,
and his greatness is unsearchable.

One generation shall commend your works to another,
and shall declare your mighty acts.
On the glorious splendor of your majesty,
and on your wondrous works, I will meditate.
They shall speak of the might of your awesome deeds,
and I will declare your greatness.
They shall pour forth the fame of your abundant goodness
and shall sing aloud of your righteousness.

The LORD is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
The LORD is good to all,
and his mercy is over all that he has made.

All your works shall give thanks to you, O LORD,
and all your saints shall bless you!
They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom
and tell of your power,
to make known to the children of man your mighty deeds,
and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom,
and your dominion endures throughout all generations.

[The LORD is faithful in all his words
and kind in all his works.]
The LORD upholds all who are falling
and raises up all who are bowed down.
The eyes of all look to you,
and you give them their food in due season.

You open your hand;
you satisfy the desire of every living thing.
The LORD is righteous in all his ways
and kind in all his works.
The LORD is near to all who call on him,
to all who call on him in truth.
He fulfills the desire of those who fear him;
he also hears their cry and saves them.
The LORD preserves all who love him,
but all the wicked he will destroy.

My mouth will speak the praise of the LORD,
and let all flesh bless his holy name forever and ever.

Covering all sides

As anyone who knows me can say, I am a long-time admirer of C.S. Lewis and his writings. I find him to be incredibly insightful into the state of both the individual believer and non-believer, and of the church as a whole, even to the modern day. As they say, the more things change the more they stay the same, and reading a book like Mere Christianity can be very revealing when he speaks critically about the state of the church in his day, or how in his day as in ours people on all political sides were willing to take up the Word as a political club to get what they want but not at all willing to submit their lives to its Author.

Lewis was a prolific writer and me being a prolific reader, naturally I continue to take in as much of him and others as I can. When someone asks me "What stirs your affections for God?" I always respond with "reading the works of those who love Him and writing about how they impact my life." But all this introduces new opportunities into my life for the sin of pride, as I build my knowledge and read more and more, and spend more time writing about it.

But what's the answer? Not to run hard the other way, becoming someone who divests himself of the mind on the idea that "it's not spiritual," as though the Spirit can only be made manifest in overwrought emotions. As C.S. Lewis would say, that's an example of Satan getting us to argue about which of two equally wrong ideas are better (there I go again). Rather, there must be a central truth to govern it all, to put it all in place, and that's Christ. It's why Paul says in 2 Corinthians 10 that believers are at war, and as part of that war we "take every thought captive to obey Christ."

A place I have trouble with this is when I come to face down my sin of lust. It's hard to combat a deep sexual desire with knowledge--knowledge becomes this ethereal thing, hard to pin down, hard to make practical in that moment. I know a lot of things that I don't put into practice, but then, a philosophy that makes no impact on the life of the one who holds it isn't much of a philosophy. So clearly knowing a lot and reading lots of great writers is not enough. I have to submit all of my desires to Him, and do the hard work that will result in my greatest desire being for God. Only in that do I find myself a step closer to growing into a Godly man, rather than a boy held captive by his whims like a piece of paper blown about in a storm. Even then, though, I'm not the ultimate captain of my fate--rather, I am trading the destination-less tumble that is my life under my own command for the straight and steady course laid out by Christ, with its destination of true joy with God.

Or to go back to the war analogy, on my own I'm under fire in the battle field, no communication and no plan, with certain death looming. Submitting to Christ I am given strategy and tactics, I know which way I'm going, and death holds no fear for me, because no matter how today turns out He's still there. There's real joy, real pleasure to be had there, and I pray that when things get difficult God will make me just as mindful of this at that point as well.

My prayer tonight

Psalm 143

Hear my prayer, O LORD;
give ear to my pleas for mercy!
In your faithfulness answer me, in your righteousness!
Enter not into judgment with your servant,
for no one living is righteous before you.

For the enemy has pursued my soul;
he has crushed my life to the ground;
he has made me sit in darkness like those long dead.
Therefore my spirit faints within me;
my heart within me is appalled.

I remember the days of old;
I meditate on all that you have done;
I ponder the work of your hands.
I stretch out my hands to you;
my soul thirsts for you like a parched land.

Answer me quickly, O LORD!
My spirit fails!
Hide not your face from me,
lest I be like those who go down to the pit.
Let me hear in the morning of your steadfast love,
for in you I trust.
Make me know the way I should go,
for to you I lift up my soul.

Deliver me from my enemies, O LORD!
I have fled to you for refuge!
Teach me to do your will,
for you are my God!
Let your good Spirit lead me
on level ground!

For your name’s sake, O LORD, preserve my life!
In your righteousness bring my soul out of trouble!
And in your steadfast love you will cut off my enemies,
and you will destroy all the adversaries of my soul,
for I am your servant.

Monday: off to war

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church...--Colossians 1:24

It's funny that this is the verse I ran into today after the last few days of dealing with proponents of the prosperity gospel. Paul is not submitting with annoyance to God in hard times--this man is rejoicing as he suffers. This is not normal for humanity. Who likes to suffer? I know I don't. But he had been so transformed by the power of the Gospel that he looked at suffering for Christ's sake as something to take joy in. Whether or not he was happy is debatable, but happiness and joy are not the same thing.

Paul has an eagerness to pursue Christ that I desire in myself. I have grown deeper in my affections for Him, but at the same time my desires and my faith are still immature. I know more than I did, I am stronger than I was, and all this comes from God and through His hand, not from anything I've done. Yet I consistently seek more of Him. In God I find real growing joy, even in the midst of pain; in God I find the only thing that inspires me to be excited that doesn't bore me eventually. I pray that I will have the courage to be a minister of the Gospel today to those I interact with, and for courage when the enemy's attacks come. Whatever may come, He is there and He's always moving and working in me, and for that I am more grateful than even I can express; He is life and whatever else comes, no one can strip that from me.

Upcoming performances

I wanted to post about stuff coming up that I'll be performing at. Specifically, I'll be playing with Quentin Moore at the DFW Neo-Soul Extravaganza. Quentin is a great musician who's recently released his first album of soul/R&B music that gets back to the roots of R&B, and I've enjoyed covering the bass parts on tuba for the last few months now. This will be a big show featuring a lot of different acts; check out the commercial for it here:




There will be free food and drink specials, and admission is only $10. The event will be held in David A's Club at the Sterling Hotel, 1055 Regal Row in Dallas; doors open at 8pm.

The dangers of pleasure; or, idolatrous gratitude

Some time ago I used this blog as an extended comment space to respond to someone I had engaged in debate on a YouTube video. As I am obviously taken with the capacity for long-windedness, 500 characters just doesn't cut it when I'm trying to make a point, and it certainly isn't sufficient when the subject is absolutely of crucial importance to the state of the human heart--mine, yours, and all of ours. The video in question for today is thus, a video of Mark Driscoll of Seattle's Mars Hill Church displaying a clip of Houston's famous pastor Joel Osteen of Lakewood Baptist Church. The clip Mark shows is a good summary of Osteen's general thesis of ministry:





I don't think I need to tear apart the specifics of what Osteen says any more than Mark does; he addresses the salient points. As always, however, any videos critical of Osteen often attract his supporters, who look upon those who would be critical of him as people who just want to "tear him down," as people who are simply jealous of his success (which is funny given that two of his most vocal critics, Driscoll and my own pastor Matt Chandler, run churches that each run thousands of people across multiple campuses every Sunday), or as simply not understanding that everybody has something different to offer the body. Often used as an example for this is the biblical principle that the body of Christ is just that--a body, with different parts that all require each other, and to be certain the call to exhort is an important one. The problem comes when you are exhorting people to be strong in something that is unscriptural. In particular I'll be responding to these comments from sapphiredewdrop:

he is only concentrating on a partial truth. every pastor(even us) have a certain gift or a "special" message. each one is a piece of the puzzle. also this pastor could present the truth without downing another pastor. Downing another does not show humbleness. and joel is pointing out the promises in the bible that has already been given to us.

and

The Bible...which is the Living Word of God does offer us health(instructions on healing). Healings are shown throughout the Old and New Test. Salvation is the center of our faith but there is still a world out there and a Satan who will try to steal,kill, and destroy. Sometimes when a person feels they must give up the words Olsteen shares from the Bible can be a great help. And the preacher is not telling Olsteen he is telling his congregation.

and finally

Also, Jesus was not born poor.
Many of his relationships were good, esp in the end when he rose.
I think this pastor is looking at things before the resurrection of Christ.
Because in the "end" Jesus was a victor. In fact in Col. 2 it says that he was triumphant over them by the cross.

First of all, I want to establish that this is not about Joel Osteen as a person, nor is it to say "He's not a believer because he says x." I don't know his heart, I don't know the essence of his relationship with God, but I do know what comes out of his mouth, and it is that which I will be addressing. Additionally, I pray that anything I say here that is contrary to what the Word lays down as truth would be called out as such or simply fall on deaf ears...or blind eyes, in this case. This is a serious matter of dealing with what is a major issue within the American church, and one on which I have felt personally convicted over past praying and ways of thinking--that is, looking to God as though He is my means of getting to x, rather than looking to God as the goal I am striving for, closeness and joy in Him above all other things.

My primary contention comes with what I argue is the central point of Osteen's entire speech in that clip, and indeed his ministry in general, laid out in this phrase that lies as the hinge of the entire segment:

You are not a sick person trying to get well, you are a well person fighting off sickness.

Not only is this statement incredibly dangerous to the life of a believer, it's 100% unscriptural. It is, in fact, the polar opposite of what God says our natures are. If we were still living in Genesis 2, then yes, he'd be right at least in that particular statement--but we aren't. We're in Genesis 3 (or, as Driscoll would say, in Acts 29), and we're living in a broken world, with broken sinful hearts. The Bible has a lot to say about the condition of the human heart, but it's best summed up in Jeremiah 17:9:

The heart is deceitful above all things,
and desperately sick;
who can understand it?

Right there Scripture undeniably opposes the idea that we are naturally well--on the contrary, we are naturally in a state of rebellion, opposed to God, opposed to what is righteous and He who is righteous. We are full of sin and live in sin, and it's only because of His grace that we are able to find any freedom. Man's wisdom is not sufficient and should not be trusted--this fact is serious enough that Proverbs says it twice:

There is a way that seems right to a man,
but its end is the way to death.--Proverbs 14:12

and

There is a way that seems right to a man,
but its end is the way to death.--Proverbs 16:25

Yet Osteen is not focused on the way to God; rather, it's what we can get from God that he is concerned with. Even the things that are good on their face--health, an end to depression and low self-esteem, an end to pain--are dangerous if they become our idols. It is, as Jonathan Edwards calls it, the "joy of the hypocrite." The hypocrite's joy is not based in closeness with God, but rather, in the idea that "God rejoices in me! God makes much of me!" which leads to "I must be a great person if God loves me so much!" This belief was just as alive and just as dangerous in Edwards' time as it is today.

Jesus has called those who would follow him to the realization that in order to be healed, they must first know that they are sick, not well.

After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, "Follow me." And leaving everything, he rose and followed him.

And Levi made him a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them. And the Pharisees and their scribes grumbled at his disciples, saying, "Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?" And Jesus answered them, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance."--Luke 5:27-31

"After this," by the way, refers to three specific miraculous acts Jesus performs in the beginning of his ministry: He calls the first disciples after causing them to catch a huge amount of fish simply by casting their nets on the other side of the boat, He cleanses a leper, and He heals a paralytic. So clearly God does perform miraculous acts in the lives of those whom He calls. But these were in the course of bringing people to realize how much they needed Him, and of demonstrating His authority on Earth. Jesus could have healed all people on the planet with a single thought, yet He did not. And here in this passage we see that the only people who were able to experience the real joy that comes with closeness to Christ were those who were innately aware of their broken states; those who looked at themselves as being righteous because of their acts were able only to see a threat to their position.

Yes, God heals, God brings prosperity, God can make a man rich. He also can and will allow sickness and pain to enter a man's life, and He can take away everything you have. This is why it is crucial to understand the truth behind the phrase "God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him." Not in His things, not in His promises, but in Him. This is a difficult concept to deal with, but the Bible is not known for being full of easy-to-digest concepts, nor is it known for being a book that endorses the general direction of mankind. In John 5 Jesus goes to a pool that once a year was stirred up, and whoever was first able to enter the pool was healed of whatever their problem was.

In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, "Do you want to be healed?" The sick man answered him, "Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me." Jesus said to him, "Get up, take up your bed, and walk." And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.--John 5:3-9

Jesus healed one man, out of many. Why did He do this? Surely He could have healed all of them, it was certainly within His power. But He healed the man because it was what was in obedience to God's will:

So Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel. For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will."--John 5:19-21

Jesus lived in express obedience to the will of His Father--and just as it was the will of God that the lame man should walk, it was also the will of God that the others who were there should not be healed. This is a side to God's hand in this world that is hard to understand, and impossible to appreciate if you look to God as Giver of Stuff, as a divine Santa Claus who takes away the nasty things and gives you good times. To extend Piper's famous phrase to its next logical conclusion based on the Word: God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him in the midst of loss.

While Osteen makes the wrath-absorbing reality of the cross of Christ almost incidental to "the world out there," the Bible makes it clear that this is in fact the true center of reality, and in ignoring this he misses the entire point. When Osteen says "Our original state is total freedom" he does his congregation a huge disservice in not only teaching contrary to the Bible, but in telling them that the normal way of life, without any call to seek God, to submit to Him, or to understand His Word, is goodness. Anyone with access to a television can tell you this is a lie, and surely those who tie themselves to the philosophy that God is naturally there to provide good times in this life will find nothing but disappointment.

So what does this mean--why pursue God? I mean, really now, if God's going to do what He's going to do, what do we get out of it? This is not some sort of Kantian "good is good because it's good" argument. On the contrary, there absolutely is reward, but it is not for earthly reward that we do this:

"Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."--Matthew 6:19-21

But what are we laying up in heaven? Some sort of eternal vault filled with bars of gold? Jesus brings up the matter of the heart, and we already know that the human heart is naturally a broken, sinful thing that seeks itself above all other things, but we also know that the heart is healed through God's work in us, over a lifetime of sanctification as God brings us to deeper and deeper realization of who He is and what His love truly means for us. What God is doing in us over our lives as the power of the Gospel transforms us, is showing us the true order of created things as He intended it to be--and it has nothing to do with being rich, or poor, or sick, or well. Those people who were closest to Jesus when He was on Earth died very horribly for His name and so that they might be examples for how much more valuable Christ is than anything else on Earth.

Mark 10:45 says:

"For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."

Not "The Son of Man came not to be poor but to give us freedom from poverty." Not "The Son of Man came not to be sick but to give us freedom from sickness." Not "The Son of Man came not to die but to give us freedom from physical death." Quite the opposite, in fact--in pursuing Christ the biggest realization and the most truly freeing one--true freedom, not this "freedom from lack of stuff" business--is laid out in Psalm 118:6

The LORD is on my side; I will not fear. What can man do to me?

Not "Man will be unable to hurt me because God's on my side" but rather "Let man hurt me. Let him kill me. I have God, and he can't take that away." Or as Paul put it succinctly in Phillipians 1:21:

For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

And as Jesus says in Matthew 16:25:

"For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it."

Over and over and over again, the Bible calls us to realize that its entire point, its purpose for existing, is to point us to God. What God brings into our lives is incidental and temporary, whether pain or pleasure, loneliness or closeness with another, wealth or poverty. Joel Osteen turns God into the means to get what we want to get. The Bible calls that idolatry, and calls us to repent of it; the Scriptures call us to the true joy that is closeness with Christ and freedom from our obsession with the temporal things of this world. I only pray that I take this as seriously in my heart in difficult times as I do in good times.

I invite sapphiredewdrop and anyone else to respond and point out where I've gone wrong, but at the same time I challenge you to base your critique in the Word, not in a personal problem with the way Mark Driscoll preaches or any other personal dislike. There's nothing wrong with saying "I don't think that he is a pastor that would bring me into a closer relationship with God," but if you can't refer to the Bible to defend Osteen without proof-texting or if you just can't refer to the Word to defend him, you might want to put a critical eye to yourself and where you are in relation to what the Bible actually says. I will not attack you or call you names, but I will a heresy a heresy. Beware what you believe, because it's your eternal soul at stake, and we should take Paul's charge in Phillipians 2:12 to "work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" very seriously.