Everything sorted for a four and a half hour flight?

Yesterday I boarded my plane at Gatwick, London, heading for two weeks in Pathos, Cyprus. I had everything sorted, an aisle seat, flip flops, coffee, a Bill Hybels book on leadership, the latest Soul Survivor worship album plugged into my ears, and an ipod freshly updated with pod-cast’s and sermons I was eagerly waiting to listen to.

So there I was sitting in an Easy-Jet 747, flight number EZZE12, looking painfully like the perfect stereotype of a young middle class Christian leader. I think I even had a highlighter in my bag ready to illuminate any classic Hybels leadership wisdom! In that moment I thought I had everything sorted for a “God-centered” four and a half hours, but as usual I missed a bit of the point and God challenged me in a very different way.

Over the top of my book I noticed a guy a few seats ahead turning around to talk to the women who was sitting next to me, they obviously were together but due to the lack of Easy-Jet seat allocation, had been split up, but were making it pretty apparent to everyone in the rear of the plane that they pretty upset about it. And It became clear to me that “I was the solution,” and my seat offered the peace that, by now, the other passengers were looking for. All I had to do was offer my seat to the guy and everyone would be happy. I gave the situation another few seconds of thought and then turned Tim Hughes up a bit and turned the page.

This continued for an hour or so, until the women turned to me and asked me if I would mind moving, and of course, now I had been asked, of course I wouldn’t mind. And I even joked a little that “I had thought of offering it an hour ago!” Her response then completely stopped me in my tracks. She said “Why didn’t you then?” To which of course I didn’t have a response other than to make a kind of awkward embarrassed face at her.

Something hit home in that moment, I was so wrapped up with my christian book, my christian worship album, my coffee and flip flops that I missed the most simple way I could have demonstrated Christ’s love in such a basic way. What’s the point of reading leadership books if we can’t lead ourselves in very basic demonstrations of love. Maybe it’s just me, but i’m sure this applies to many of us. Let’s not let anything get to the point where someone turn’s to us and say’s “Why didn’t you then,” lets get in their first as Christ would have done.

Eight years ago, September 11, 2001, America was attacked by Islamic terrorists. Shortly after, our nation went to war against those who perpetrated this evil. It has been a long and costly struggle. And today, as then, those of us who follow Jesus continually weigh that cost and wonder, “What is the Godly response to violence and injustice?” For 2,000 Christians have debated this question and different streams of our faith have answered it differently. For some, a violent response to violence is never justified. For others, war, while never desirable is sometimes, and under some conditions the better of several bad options.

On, Sunday, September 16, 2001 I addressed the congregation of North Heights Lutheran Church, in St. Paul, Minnesota. Below is manuscript of that message. We’re eight years removed from those terrible days, yet the questions still present themselves. While there are other Biblical perspectives, here is one “Christian” answer to the question, “Is war ever justified?”

Jesus’ words are inconvenient today. As the days pass and the horror of the New York and Washington attacks settle into the cracks in our souls, one bitter question still resounds: how do we love these enemies? In the first days we stumbled through cycles of crushing emotion. That first Tuesday was sat around kitchen tables, or in office cubicles in stunned disbelief. On Wednesday we stood awkwardly over our children’s beds trying to comfort their fears. On Thursday we lay awake into the night, haunting images of falling towers and weeping widows playing in our brains. On Friday we prayed, a nation so awkward on her knees. On Saturday we woke with the bile of rage fuming in our bellies: war, at once everywhere and no-where with each one of us a citizen soldier alongside the tireless firemen in Manhattan and the heroic hostages who stormed the cockpit over Pennsylvania. On Sunday, we walked into familiar worship spaces looking for some stitch to seam up the tatters. And what did we find? Jesus’ words agitating rather than comforting our souls. “Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you.”

The war, we are told is progressing into new theaters. But our rage is still very real. And it is good rage. Anger like ours is a sign of health, for our morally lethargic society is finally calling something absolutely evil. Some wonder, “is this God’s judgment; has our sin removed God’s protective hand?” Perhaps. But God never begets chaos. He is, even now using it to bring about his better purposes, but such carnage is nothing but the spawn of Hell. These deeds were evil and we are right to respond with anger.

But right anger is a dangerous companion. It can so easily turn and pollute our souls. Animals lash back against assault in a chemical, defensive instinct. We know this impulse, for we are, on one level, animals. But we are not mere animals. We are spirit creatures made in God’s image, called by God to rule our instincts with spirit. So we must distinguish righteous anger from vengeful wrath.

And we draw this line with love. Yes, love – the startling marriage of anger and love. Which leads then to a first question: How can I love my enemies when there is not a flicker of natural tenderness within me? In one sense this is the essence of being Christian: we can never do any command of Jesus. In fact the entire Christian life is impossible. Only Jesus can be a Christian, and only Jesus can live his will and way through me. As Dr. Morris Vaagenes is so fond of saying: “I can’t, you can, please do, thank you…”

But then, a second question: how do I love my enemies… or more accurately, how do I let Jesus love them through me? Here we find some surprises.

We bless them. Paul speaks directly: “Bless those who curse you” (Romans 12:14). Now “to bless” is something far more than to simply “wish the best.” Covenant blessing is a supernatural release of grace from one person to another, an unction that the blessed one might fulfill their supernatural destiny. Jacob (Genesis 49) “blesses” his 12 sons that they might each live out their intended purposes. To bless is to literally impart upon someone the presence of God, which will mean goodness as well as judgment. To bless our enemies is to ask that the weight of God’s fullness would be heavy upon them, and that they would submit under the pressure of His holiness, and realize the full potential of their lives.

Now to bless Muslims has particular significance. For our Muslim cousins (even those few who sanction this kind of holy war against the West) are aching for such favor from God. Their bitter hunger goes back to Genesis 21 when Ishmael the son of Abraham not granted the promise of covenant was sent away to the desert to live by his own wits and strength. And in the desert Ishmael’s children remain – the Arabs of today. The good news we bring to them is that in Jesus the same blessing of Isaac is available to all Gentiles – to Ishmaelites as well the rest of us. What they bitterly fight to gain can be theirs by faith! So we bless our Muslim cousins with the knowledge of the favor of God’s covenant for them.

We pray for them. Jesus directs us: “pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44). Why pray? Prayer is an act of intentional passivity, asking God to act where we can not. Before Nehemiah confronted Artaxerxes, the Persian King who held the Jews in exile he prayed. As a result, God bent the man’s intention (Nehemiah 1:10, 2:4). We might strike an enemy’s physical life, but no human can reach in to alter the heart or intent of another soul. In fact whenever one soul tries to bend the will of another, the effort ends in bitterness. God however can mold motives and attitudes, even the intentions of our enemies. In this, our greatest weapon against their violence is prayer for their souls.

We forgive them. In the prayer Jesus taught us we utter: “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass…” Forgiveness is imperative! In fact if we do not forgive, even the worst offenses against us, we ourselves are not forgiven (Matt. 6:14). But what is genuine forgiveness? It is not a warm emotion. It is not mustering the will to “like” our foes, or overlook their offense. Biblical forgiveness is a legal matter, a covenant agreement. When we forgive we release a justified charge against another and in the process turn the prosecution over to God. He will exact the justice. Paul says it this way: “Leave room for God’s wrath.” And so we shall. By forgiving, we step aside and let God lift his leveling hand. And He does and will. For all his ways are just, and unlike our imperfect vindictive forces, His wrath is strategically redemptive.

We overcome them. Evil begets more evil. But when we intervene to “overcome evil with good” (Romans 12:21) we turn evil deeds to an end their perpetrators did not intend. Joseph wept before his brothers saying “you intended to harm me, but God intended it for good” (Genesis 50:20). Paul (Philippians 1:12) claims that the injustice of imprisonment was turned to good because he redeemed the situation and made it an opportunity to share the gospel with Roman soldiers.

But how is this love for our enemies? When we do good in the face of evil we stop some of the affect of wickedness. We cover some of their guilt and lesson their eternal accountability for havoc wrought in God’s order. The heroic deeds of firemen, the blood donated, the financial gifts to families have birthed good in the world that was not here before September 11. And thus heroic love intended for helpless victims turns out, ironically, to be merciful love for the terrorists, for it dims their shame.

We stop them. Love has many faces. And there are times when we must lift a hand and halt the evil. Revenge belongs to God (Romans 12:19). Still, at times we must institute force to stop the chaos of wickedness. Jesus himself was not above using force in his ministry. He did so in the temple when he turned the tables of usury (Luke 19:42). This proves true, even if that force involves death. “Turning the other cheek” is a personal strategy for love. In corporate arena’s love takes on more complicated expressions. In the original language the commandment is “thou shalt not murder” not “thou shalt not kill.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer made a choice to join an assassination plot against Hitler, and he called it love, love for the victims but also for Hitler himself. How? C.S. Lewis, echoing St. Augustine who wrote of “just war” says that love must sometimes act forcefully. If we believe in an eternal judgment then stopping an evil person, even by killing him, can be merciful, for it stops him from further polluting the world and thus incurring darker damnation upon himself and those he influences. Worse things than death can beset a human soul.

Since September 11, 2001, all this dense theology is suddenly starkly relevant for us. We are a nation at war. But we are not the first to face this question of right violent resistance. Every generation of followers of Jesus has wrestled with the reality: some of you in the Second World War, in Korea, in Vietnam, in the Gulf, or as police officers or reservists today. Our purpose, as Christian-Americans is 1) to prayerfully and faithfully support our government and 2) to stand as a prophetic voice reminding our government of the love and mercies of God. Even in the midst of military fury we must insist that militant actions be driven not by vengeful wrath, but by aggressive, persistent, creative love, love in forms that on the surface may not look familiar, but are nonetheless vigilant mercies.

]]> http://prodigalmagazine.com/when-love-means-war/feed/ 1 http://prodigalmagazine.com/are-you-thankful-for-your-wife/ http://prodigalmagazine.com/are-you-thankful-for-your-wife/#comments Wed, 11 Mar 2009 02:33:34 +0000 tmanzer http://prodigalmagazine.com/?p=2757

Many men praise their wives from time to time but how selfish is that praise? Are you thankful for your wife because of all the ways that she blesses you? Are you thankful for her beauty; her home cooked meals; her funny jokes or those special times alone. It is important to be grateful for all her blessings but is that really a spirit of thankfulness?

The Bible says in 1 Thessalonians 5:18, “…give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” It does not say be thankful in all good and comfortable circumstances. If we apply this to our marriages then it means be thankful for our wives at all times. Are you thankful for your wife when she is sick? … When she is unattractive? …when she is depressed? … When she is disabled? …When she is struggling with mental illness? …When she does not want you to touch her? …When she is struggling with her weight?

I heard a story about an awful auto accident that left a young wife very disabled. While she was still in the hospital rehab she received divorce papers from her husband. His only explanation was that “he did not marry her for this.” It’s easy to get angry at this selfish punk but have we ever lapsed into self-pity just because the house needs cleaning.

Think of the worst day in your married life and asked yourself if you expressed thanks in the middle of that dark moment. Did you complain? Do you blame? Do you get mad at God and ask him how He could hate you so much? Thankfulness is truly real when expressed in the debts of pain and trail.

I believe that the spiritual discipline of thankfulness is rooted in a holy belief that circumstances do not dictate God’s blessing. We live in a day of very shallow faith. We ask God to bless us with things and whine when he does not pay our credit card bill.

1 Timothy 6:6, “But godliness with contentment is great gain.”

She is God’s gift and all of His gifts are very good. However, she is not God’s gift to make you happy or comfortable. In this modern age “materialism” is one of the great enemies of marriage. It causes couples to buy homes way beyond their means or to get into debt instead of waiting for God to provide. It also causes men to view their wives in a dehumanizing “value” context. I love her because she makes me happy, she cleans the house, she cooks great and I’m attracted to her. The suffocating weight of this type of entitlement love has destroyed many marriages. Selfishness is the soul cancer that kills love with criticism, disapproval and condemnation, when a man’s shallow expectations of his wife are not fulfilled.

We need to see our wife as God’s child. We need to love her with a holy love that accepts her as God made her. Selfishness is the enemy of genuine love and wise is the man that hates every hint of his selfish core.

“In 1636, amid the darkness of the Thirty Years’ War, a German pastor, Martin Rinkart, is said to have buried five thousand of his parishioners in one year, an average of fifteen a day. His parish was ravaged by war, death, and economic disaster. In the heart of that darkness, with the cries of fear outside his window, he sat down and wrote this table grace for his children:

“Now thank we all our God
With heart and hands and voices;
Who wondrous things hath done,
In whom his world rejoices.
Who, from our mother’s arms,
Hath led us on our way
With countless gifts of love
And still is ours today.”

Here was a man who knew thanksgiving comes from love of God, not from outward circumstances.”

So are you really thankful for your wife? Is she a gift from God? Do you praise God for her strengths and express equal thankfulness for her weaknesses? Is your contentment with her based on circumstances of a changing life or is there a deep abiding gratitude to God for the special gift God gave you in your wife.

“You can bear your own faults, and why not a fault in your wife?”- Benjamin Franklin

“He is well paid that is well satisfied.”- William Shakespeare

“Christians can be and ought to be content with the simple necessities of life…First, when you have God near you and for you, you don’t need extra money or extra things to give you peace and security…God is always better than gold…Second, we can be content with the simplicity because the deepest, most satisfying delights God gives us through creation are free gifts from nature and from loving relationships with people. After your basic needs are met, accumulated money begins to diminish your capacity for these pleasures rather than increase them. Buying things contributes absolutely nothing to the heart’s capacity for joy…Third, we should be content with the simple necessities of life because we could invest the extra we make for what really counts (God’s kingdom) —John Piper from Desiring God, 1996, P. 102-103, Used by Permission,

Yes. I just titled this article of mine after a 90’s club hit by the singer Haddaway that can also be found in the SNL movie “A Night At The Roxbury” and the sketches that spawned it entitled, “The Roxbury Guys”.
  All [slightly obscure] cultural references aside, the question “what is love?” is one that still lingers and haunts in the musings of middle-school kids and aged adults alike. Over the decades, people have had interesting, insightful and often humorous things to say about love:
 

    ”Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence” – H. L. Mencken
 
    “Love is, above all else, the gift of oneself.” – Jean Anouilh
 
    “To love is to receive a glimpse of heaven.” – Karen Sunde
 
    “Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come.” – Matt Groening (creator of The Simpsons and Futurama.)
 
    “I believe love is primarily a choice and only sometimes a feeling. If you want to feel love, choose to love and be patient.” – Real Live Preacher blog (December 16, 2002, reallivepreacher.com)
 
    “Love all, trust a few. Do wrong to none.” – William Shakespeare [1]
 
 

Obviously, as evidenced by the slew of quotations above, there are many different viewpoints on what exactly love is. In my personal opinion I think each idea holds some valid truth — albeit somewhat convoluted or hidden at times. Some hold a cynical view of love (see the Matt Groening quote), yet others hold a blissful view of it (see the Karen Sunde quote), and I am sure that each had their reasons for saying or writing what they did on the subject. This is all beside the point, however. The motive for such quotes is not what I intend to explore, but rather the subject of their pontification. I want to look at what exactly is love.
 
According to the American Heritage dictionary, love is defined as the following:
 
  

  Love, (n.); A deep, tender, ineffable feeling of affection and solicitude toward a person, such as that arising from kinship, recognition of attractive qualities, or a sense of underlying oneness. [2]

 
 From the vantage point of an English professor, this is a good definition for the word “love”. However, I believe the editors of the dictionary have missed the true heart of love. John 15:13 says:
 

    Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. [3]
 

 
From this we see our definitions are at odds with one another, each offering a seemingly valid point of view — but which is the correct one? Can love be just a feeling of kinship or brotherhood, or is it something deeper, something that would drive a man to die — giving up the most precious thing a man can possess, his life — for someone else? How many people do you know would die for a feeling or affection? Could it be that love is not merely a feeling, but an action — a choice — as well? The answer is a resounding “yes”. Love cannot merely be a feeling and still be the cause for all of the successful marriages and whole families. Feelings are transient. Emotion is fleeting. Like plastic, when a relationship built upon nothing but emotion and feeling is put through the fire of adversity, it melts away leaving the empty core of a foundation that never really was. This is the cause of so many families falling apart, marriages failing, and moral shortcomings in the world. Our culture and our media is so fundamentally grounded on the idea that love is a feeling and it is eating away at the core of what family and marriage should be based upon: choices. It’s the Brad Pitts and the Britney Spears and the Alec Baldwin’s and the Madonna’s of the world that promote and pervade their doctrine of “love is a feeling” not by what they say but how they do.
 
Lets talk about Britney for a minute. William Penn once wrote the words, “Never marry but for love; but see that thou lovest what is lovely. [4]” I think we can all honestly say that Britney Spears’ first marriage — which lasted a whopping 55 hours [5] — was not founded on love. Call me judgmental or insensitive, but the facts speak for themselves. Love would never marry and then annul the marriage a little over two days later because, and I quote, she [Ms. Spears]:
 

    …lacked understanding of her actions to the extent that she was incapable of agreeing to marriage because before entering into the marriage the Plaintiff and Defendant did not know each others’ likes and dislikes, each others’ desires to have or not have children, and each other’s desires as to State of residency. [6]
 

How can we call this love? I think the better question is how is any of this anything but insanity? Take a moment to imagine what kind of message this has sent to the public. Could it possibly be something along the lines of, “its alright to start and end relationships based on how you’re feeling at the time”? Oh, God, I hope not — but my hopes on this issue are most likely unfulfilled. This is not love. This is how we show our children what is right and wrong: by letting them look at the idols of today and by letting our children emulate those role models. Regardless if these very public figures want to be or like being role models, they are heroes to the youth of today. The example they set, either intentionally or unintentionally, is followed by teens and children all around the world. But that is not to place all of the blame on them. We as peers and parents have failed them as well. We have been silent on what is right and wrong, what is love and not.
 
So let us show them love.
 
Love is patient. Love is kind. Love is unselfish. Love does not keep track of wrongs. Love is forgiving. Love is good. Love is faithful. Love is appropriate. Love is peaceful. Love is self-controlling. Love is discipline. Love is pain when pain is necessary. Love is kindness. Love is giving. Love is charity.
 
The previous statements are paraphrased or adapted from various places in throughout the Bible, including 1 Corinthians 13 and the fruits of the spirit. All of them are connected in a way. If you look closely, you can find it. Each statement has an implied choice associated with it. Patience is a choice, the choice to wait. Kindness is a choice, the choice to care. Unselfishness is a choice, the choice to put others first. Can you see the pattern developing? Love is not the result of an uncontrollable emotion; or rather, infatuation. Love is a conscious, deliberate attempt to invest in a person: to intentionally impact their life with goodness, mercy, kindness and charity.
 
So how does this translate into “romantic” love? Very simply, actually. “Romantic” love is simply regular phileo (or brotherly) love in combination with the emotion and an intellectual and spiritual bond between the two people. I know, I know; it sounds cold and scientific, but in reality it is a full, fulfilling, overarching and ethereal love. Emotion without connection and action is empty. Such also is connection without action and emotion and vice-versa. When we connect with a person on a intellectual level (or, “like” in the language of today’s youth), we want to show them we “like” them and are interested in getting to know them better (develop the spiritual bond). We do things to show them we care — buy flowers, stay up all night studying with them for their big exam the next day, go out for coffee, write cutesy little notes with dumb poems in them, or whatever it is people do these days. Some of these actions are just nice, like buying flowers and writing little notes, and tend to make people happy. But it is the self-sacrifice of staying up all night studying, or encouraging them when they seem down, or forgive and forget when they offend, and even draw boundaries when necessary. It is these actions that say “I love you” the loudest, much louder than any words could ever be spoken. What you will find is out of this self-sacrifice and elevation of someone else over yourself is the emotion starts to make a re-entry into your life. You find you don’t want to live without the other person, that you want to spend every day of your life with them, and everything else the emotion, the feeling, tells you. But this is different. This is no longer emotion gone wild but rather it is emotion under control. It is emotion with a brain.
 
The heart of real, true love can be summed up in the lines of two songs:
 
“Love is a verb.” – “Luv Is A Verb”, Free At Last, dc Talk; 1992
 
“I would give much more than I would ever ask for.” – “The Hamburg Song”, Under The Iron Sea, Keane; 2006
 
 
 
 
———————————————-
[1] – All quotations courtesy of QuotationsPage.com; 2008
[2] – The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition; Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
[3] – John 15:13, King James Version; 1611
[4] – Courtesy of QuotationsPage.com; 2008
[5] – Associated Press, “Judge Dissolves Britney’s ‘Joke’ Wedding”; Jan 6, 2004 (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3869708/)
[6] – The Smoking Gun, “Las Vegas Judge Grants Spears’ Annulment Request”; Jan 5, 2004 (http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/britneyannul1.html)

I am a twenty-two year old college student who is somewhat socially awkward and I’m still trying to figure myself out in many ways. One thing I do know, however, is that I tend to over-think things just a wee bit too much. Recently, one of those over-thought topics has been marriage.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: “you’re only twenty-two years old, what in the world are you doing thinking about marriage?” Well…you have a point. Regardless, the point of this isn’t why I was thinking about it, but what I was thinking about it.

Good old chivalrous tradition states that the man (myself in this case), if he intends to marry a woman, should first ask for her hand in marriage from her father. This tradition has slowly died with time, but there are a few of us who still hold to a lot of the “old-fashioned” ways. (Personally, I think asking her father is going to be a lot more intimidating than asking her. If you don’t know if she wants to marry you, don’t ask yet…it should be obvious what her answer is going to be.) Asking the father is more than just asking him to give away his daughter, it is asking for his blessing as well (blessing by a parent, yet another dead good tradition).

In thinking about all of this, I realized something: as a Christian, God is your father. Not just your father either, He is also your love’s father. If we, as humans, ask for the blessing of a human being (who is not able to wield any kind of supernatural blessing-power); should we not ask the blessing of our heavenly Father, the creator of the universe, first before all others? This requesting of God for His blessing and for the hand of the woman in marriage (because, ultimately, she belongs to God just as everything else does) should not be an event characterized by sheepish asking or sly wordplay — it should be an occasion of joy and of peace.

I think my absolute favorite illustration of God in a way our human minds can grasp is one of a little child. We are the small children, exuberant and joyful, walking through a store (aka, life with all its amusements and paths and distractions). When a little child, walking through a store like a Wal-Mart or a Target, sees a toy or something he/she wants, what do they do? They run and grab it and come running back to their parents. Sometimes they just throw it in the cart and don’t even ask, expecting their parents just to buy it for them. Sometimes they stand there, in euphoric excitement, and entreat their parents to buy the toy or whatever it is. At that point, the child is filled and is bouncing with expectation, happiness, joy, and the daydreaming of what life would be like with that item. The child’s parents, because they love their child, want to give him everything he asks for and then some. But because they love their child, they cannot. More often than not, the parents tell their child “no” — dashing the hopes of the child on the cruel rocks of reality — because it is not in the will of the parents. But sometimes, when it is in the will of the parents, they will say “yes”. At that moment, the child’s sense of happiness — that euphoria — instantly doubles, despite seeming to have already been at a peak. For the rest of the day / week / month / etc, life is good for that child because he or she got that certain toy.

It should be the same way with marriage. When we [guys] fall in love with the woman of our dreams, we should go running to God (that is not to say the relationship up to that point has been without prayer and study of the Bible, but rather I am denoting a turning point in the personally spiritual side of that relationship), face full of smiles and heart full of joyous expectation, asking, “God, can I keep her?!?!”. We should run to God, our loving Father, and ask for our heart’s desire. God is not a mean, cold or cruel God. He is a God of love, and a Father that loves to see His children happy and full of joy. Read what Zephaniah 3:17 says:
The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.
God delights in you! How utterly mind-blowing is it to think about the God of the universe singing joyfully over his children?

Psalm 37:4 says that if we delight ourselves in the Lord, then he will give us the desires of our hearts. Read that phrase again, the desires of our hearts. He wants to give us what we want and what will make us happy! So many people, in an attempt to become all-powerfully non-self-centered completely deny themselves happiness and only seek what God wants…but God also wants to give us what we want!. If we, as children of God, follow after Him and find our delight in Him, He will give us what our hearts most desperately desire. For the man completely in love with a woman, that desire is to be with her the rest of his life. If she is truly what his heart desires, and if she is good and perfect for him, then God wants to give her to him! God takes pleasure in giving to his children! There are many, many verses in the Bible that deal with God giving, and there is a reason for that: God loves to give to us! James 1:17 says, “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” Notice the words “good” and “perfect”. Those words are descriptors of the gift, but they are also conditions. What we ask for of God MUST be good and perfect, in and of itself and for us. Luke 11:9-13 says:
So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!
Jesus flat-out tells us to ask God for whatever we desire. No secret language or convoluted wording, just regular, plain and in your face. “Ask and it will be given to you…” is so simple. Ask, and you will receive.

God wants to give us our deepest, most desperate, and most fulfilling desires contained in our hearts; all we have to do is ask. If they be good and perfect, and good and perfect for us, then He will give them to us. Do not be afraid to be like that child in the store, asking his parents for something. If you want to marry the love of your life, run to God. Don’t walk, don’t be timid, and don’t be shy. Hebrews 4:16 says we should “…approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” We need not cover our faces or cower in fear and shame before God, but rather come to Him as sons and daughters, righteous before Him, full of smiles, giddy with anticipation, and with all joy and happiness in our hearts. God is our father, we are His children and He delights in us and in giving us what we ask because He loves us. So ask.

I know I will.

My topic, generally speaking, is religion. Specifically my topic is Christianity. More specifically, love.
Today, in the modern church, there are many ideas floating about as to what it really means to be a Christian and to live the “Christian life”. Many people, and pastors, think and teach that if you are a good person and you invite people to church that you are doing your part as a good Christian.
How wrong they are.

Jesus Christ, while here on this earth, didn’t just invite people to the synagogue to hear him speak. He didn’t just act like a good person. He loved people. He loved the lovely and the unlovable. The most poignant example of this could probably be found in John 8. To summarize the passage, a woman has been brought before Jesus, the woman having been caught in the act of adultery with a man not her husband. The men who had brought her to Jesus wanted to stone her — the punishment according to Jewish law — to which Jesus replied with the famous saying “he who is without sin, cast the first stone”. He then forgave her and sent her on her way. No altar call. No giant outreach event. No invitation to church. Now, if our idea of a good Christian life is based on these ideas, then by our own definition Jesus Christ was not a very good Christian! Obviously, since our faith and our belief systems are founded on the life and death and life of Jesus [1 Corinthians 15], we are the ones who are in error. This warrants a fresh and new look at what the Christian life actually is, and I hope to provide this in the next paragraphs.

To the new Christian, I think one of the most confusing passages in the New Testament can be found in Matthew 25. Verses 31-46 (NIV):

31″When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. 32All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

34″Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

37″Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

40″The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’

41″Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

44″They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

45″He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

46″Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”

Now what could sheep and goats possibly have to do with the Christian life? Well, nothing, really, but the passage has a lot to offer for the new perspective. This passage is a picture of our final judgment and has a small list of what were being judged on. Think of it as a study guide of sorts. In school, if there was a big test or and exam coming up, the professor would often give out a study guide so the students would know what is on the exam. God has done the same thing, but instead of an exam, we’re being tested on our life. Take note of the six distinct attributes used here to describe persons in need: hungry, thirsty, stranger, naked, sick, prisoner. We are being tested on how we react to and act toward people who fall into not just these groups, but people in general. Take note to the second group of those being judged, especially to how they respond to the Lord. The phrase “when did we see…” implies passivity — an un-willingness to seek out the needy, the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, and the forgotten. How much does this sound like Christians today, who let life happen to them, waiting for an opportunity to share Christ? The only problem with that mindset is the opportunity never comes if you’re not looking for it. Instead of being passive, we are called to be pro-active in our lives. James 1:27 says this (NASB):

“Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.”

Note the word usage in the second half of the verse: “to visit”. The verb “visit” is not a passive verb; rather it is an aggressive, proactive word. No one has ever accidentally visited someone. The verb “to visit” implies a sense of purpose, a mission, a reason for the action. James is calling us to be purposeful and deliberate! On top of that challenge, he offers an incentive: please God. Take a look at the first part of the verse. James is giving us the secret to what God desires for us. The verse could be understood this way:
This is what God finds pure and holy, and what you should do: go find orphans and widows — the lowliest of the low — and help them in their distress. Also, keep yourself clean from the filth of the world.
Now once you have found those you are going to help, what exactly should you do?
Ephesians 4:2 puts it plainly (YLT):

“With all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love…”

The word “forbear” means to go with; to endure together. Essentially what Paul is telling us to do is to find those who are unlovable or unlovely, and endure with them in their plight. These two verses, combined with Matthew 25, give us this simple and effective plan of action:
(1) Find those who are in need.

(2) Stay with them. Endure with them.

(3) Meet their needs.

Coincidentally, this act is also called by another name: love.
Love, as an idea, has been perverted and twisted over the many years to the point where no one really knows what love is anymore. Love is complex, yet deceptively simple. Love is a choice and an action. In order to show love to someone, you must decide to love them in the first place. That is the choice. To act on that choice — to love them — is the action. 1 Corinthians 13:3-13 gives us a list of the attributes of love:

3And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.

4Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant,

5does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,

6does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth;

7bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away.

9For we know in part and we prophesy in part;

10but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away.

11When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.

12For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known.

13But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Verse 3 gives us a chilling warning: even if you do all of these things and have not love — or do not choose to love — everything you have done is meaningless. Even though it starts with a curse, the passage ends with a promise: if you act according to these guidelines, if you love your fellow man, you will be rewarded in heaven (v9-10). Notice that nowhere, in any of these passages, is anything stated about passing out tracts or being obnoxiously loud and outspoken about Jesus. Granted, there is a time and place for that, but not every day.

But wait, if we never say anything about God, and instead just help people, how will we share the gospel? Let’s take a look at John 13:34-35:

34″A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

The question of “how” is unmistakably answered for us right here: we don’t have to say anything. A Christian need not initiate the conversation if their life asks the questions for them. Now, I am not saying to never talk about the Gospel; what I am saying is act, then if someone initiates it, speak. Jesus said your actions, how you treat others, will reflect who you serve. If you love others, people will know you love Jesus. If you treat others poorly, they will know you love yourself most of all.
One of my favorite evangelism stories was told by Stephen Christian, singer from the band Anberlin, about a mainstream tour they were on. It was the last night of the tour and Stephen had been praying about the fact that he hadn’t had any opportunities to share Christ with any of the artists or crew on the tour. That very night after the show, one of the crew came up to him and asked him why the band never went out and partied after shows and didn’t partake in the usual festivities the other bands on tour did. Sensing an opportunity, Stephen started explaining that the guys in the band were Christians and had made a decision to live differently. Minutes later in the conversation, Stephen noticed a small crowd around him and the original crewmember listening to him lay out the Gospel. Only God knows what kinds of seeds were planted that night, but the story illustrates the point that you don’t have to be outwardly outspoken about your faith to sharer Jesus with people. Just living, and loving, shows who you serve.

And that is what the Christian life is all about: love.

Jesus Christ, the founder of our faith, loved people. He fed the hungry. He clothed the needy. He healed the sick. He visited the weak.

True religion, true Christianity, is this: to love the unlovable, the unlovely, and to meet their needs with compassion and grace.

As a romantic, I am always thinking of ideas to be creative with my wife, Abby, yet as an idealist and with a propensity for passivity, ninety percent of those ideas never come to fruition. But, I was not going let our first Christmas together slip by without a “you’re-theonly-one-for-me” moment.

There is always a slight fear in me when I step into the spontaneous, unknown world of

romance. “Will she like it?” “What if it flops?” “Is it selfish?” “What if we get in bad moods

and ruin it?” “Couldn’t I be more productive with this time?” “Wouldn’t it be better to go

straight to bed, than waste good sleep time?”

Abby is much more detail-oriented than I am. When I come up with an idea, she lovingly

questions how it is really going to function. She takes care of the details of things she owns

quite well, and gets upset when they are not cared for. Abby generally adopts new ideas

much more quickly, if they have been primed beforehand.

But this romantic idea was simple and genius, and I believed it would start a spicy, yearly

Christmas tradition in our home. It would go off without a hitch!

During the Christmas season, the first lights to get turned on in the morning and the last

ones to get turned off at night are on our Christmas tree. The thousand little bulbs provide

such a comfy-soft atmosphere, that they scream romance!

After a full Christmas day of gatherings with both of our families, we finally made it home

by nine or ten at night. We both get energized from quieter times in our life, so events that

require much socializing usually leave us both a bit worn. And it’s no secret that the

offspring of tiredness is typically crabbiness.

So we were both a bit on edge as we pulled our Jeep into its parking spot, and rustled

through the incredible fresh snow to our back door. Usually when we are crabby, we avoid

each other by doing things on our to-do list. Productive… yes…but not effective. We hide

behind busyness to avoid the conflict on hand.

But tonight’s conflict was mild. If ten is burning rage, and one is a passing argument, then

our Christmas day crabbiness was like a two. So she distracted herself in the kitchen doing

dishes, and I thought it was the perfect time for me to begin implementing my suave plan.

I went upstairs and began to shred the sheets from our mattress. Three short months of

marriage had released a small amount of wisdom in how to interact lovingly with her

personality. So, I yelled from upstairs, as I lifted the mattress up off of its frame, “I am

planning something, Abby… Have an open mind!” And for emphasis I repeated, “Have an

open mind, babe,” as I rounded the corner to slide the mattress on edge down the stairs.

The mattress slid easily down the wooden stairs. In my giddy excitement, I would have

ridden the thing like a toboggan-if only our stairwell had been wide enough!

I braced myself for the climax of the surprise, as it would soon be revealed to Abby. With

the mattress still on edge, I tentatively rounded the corner at the bottom of the stairs where I

immediately came into direct line of sight of Abby standing at the kitchen sink.

My face was beaming. I was so proud of my idea, and the fact that I was actually

implementing it. Ignoring the crabby, fearful and lazy thoughts, I was really doing it!

Abby’s attention to detail and care for her possessions drew her to speak quick sharp word,

“Are the sheets on that?”

 ”No,” I said and responded quickly hoping to appease her and win her over, “Only the mattress cover!”

“Oh great,” she replied sarcastically, “something even more permanent to get dirty.”

“Calm, David, Calm” I said to myself as I moved the mattress from the hallway to the living

room floor in front of the Christmas tree.

But rage triggered explosively inside me. My mind raced with thoughts. The pain of her

criticism had dug into my core. “She cares more about this *&^(* mattress than about us. I

try to be creative and pursue her; I try to be romantic, and look where it ends up. See if I

ever try anything creative again!”

In a matter of 30 seconds the conflict had jumped from a three to a seven. My kettle was

steaming, so as soon as the mattress hit the floor, I decided to pick it right back up again and

bring it back upstairs to return it to its usual spot. If she cared so much about the mattress,

then from now on it would stay in its nice, safe place in our bedroom. No romantic night

sleeping in front of the Christmas tree for her!

I hoped she would realize how tragic her comments were. I would show her how she had

messed up, and screwed everything up. So, I huffed in child-like stubbornness, hoping my

anger would lead to incredible strength to get the mattress back up the stairs by myself.

I only got halfway up the stairs before I realized that the weight and bulk of the mattress

would prevent me from getting it up the stairs by myself. I would need her help to get the

mattress back up. How annoying to humble myself to ask for her help. I wanted to

“punish” her.

So I relented slightly and asked for her help, but I wouldn’t talk to her anymore. I won’t let

her thaw my icy shoulder. I won’t forgive her for days-or ever. She had to realize how

much she hurt me, and never do something so painful again. She had to learn.

We got it back up the stairs, and I slid it back to our room and then to the frame.

My heart went dormant as rage was now pumping my blood. I hastily made the bed, then

brushed aggressively past Abby, who was standing in the doorway to our room, hoping for

reconciliation. “I will not back down,” I thought. “I am hurt, she has to pay! She owes me. I will

make her pay!”

I did my normal bathroom routine, avoiding the mirror, avoiding the beastly look that must

have been on my face, and climbed into bed. As far as I could get on my side of the bed, I

knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep. I knew we needed to reconcile. I knew she was ready, but

I felt no strength. My rage overpowered me.

We knew we were on the same team, and that someone else was the enemy, not each other.

We had attended a marriage conference before we were married. At this conference, we had

learned that our sin needed to come up, out, onto the cross. We had learned that the cross

would always be where we could come back together. It was like the fork in the road that

we would both return to when there was conflict. Conflict was always a result of one or

both of us leaving the humble foot of the cross and forgetting the freeing work that was

accomplished there. As a result, a month or two into our marriage, we put a 4′ high cross in

our spare bedroom.

That Christmas night, we had both walked away from truth, pledging allegiance and loyalty

to ourselves, not to Christ.

Abby, was the first to humble herself and return to the cross. She was sobbing there, in thes

spare bedroom on her knees, as I was lying in bed raging, wondering how I long I would

have to be silent to her to even up the score. After ten minutes or more Abby came into our

room and gently asked if I was going to join her at the cross. At first, I didn’t even answer.

She asked me again before I responded,

“Yeah, when I am ready, in a little while” I muttered stiffly.

She went back to our spare bedroom and cried out again, “Jesus, we need you!” And

repeated and sobbed again and again, “Jesus, we need you!”

And I heard His voice in my heart saying, “Forgive as I have forgiven you. I have forgiven

you of so much! How can you hold unforgiveness towards her? Pick up the stupid mattress,

take it back downstairs, and invite your wife to join you. That is the only way this will end.”

I could not humble myself. Stubbornness held me pinned to the bed. I wanted revenge. I

would not move. Yet I knew reconciliation was sweet, not to mention how great forgiveness

is. I knew I wanted my life to write a great story, and that reconciliation is foundational for a

great story. But knowing and acting were not aligning.

Somewhere I must have inhaled a mustard seed, because I received just enough push to get

me out from under the covers. I met Abby in the dark room, on her knees in front of the

greatest symbol of healing and reconciliation, the cross. What was frozen, melted. What was

rage, softened. What was hurt, healed. What was judgment, forgiveness. No magic words,

no persuasion, no manipulation. We shared pure humility as we stared our Maker and

Savior in the face at the foot of the cross where He redeemed us from all our junk.

We had experienced our own resurrection! We were dead, but now alive. And life in

marriage is a powerful thing!

We grabbed the mattress together, with the pad still on it, and drug it down the stairs. We

brought down the sheets, and pillows and made the bed in front of the dimly lit tree. With

redeemed energy we undeservedly came together to experience spirit to spirit intimacy under

the tree.

A beautiful, unexpected Christmas gift that we will cherish and re-cherish for years to come.