The Word: Shapes – Day 33
Seven Wonders of the Word
“They answered him, “We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, ‘You will be made free’?” Jesus answered them, “Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there forever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.” -John 8:33-36
A young couple that wanted to get married sat in front of me. She was not a Christian, had never been baptized or really ever been to church. They had come to me because the husband to be, had struggled, trying to explain his faith, the Christian faith to this young lady who he wanted to marry. He deeply wanted her to get it, to be baptized to join him in the faith.
Two problems…
1) By his own admission it had been, well… it had been since his confirmation since he had spent any serious time working on, or connecting to his faith. So as much as he tried he was ill equipped to do what he felt needed to be done, thus he brought her to me, the “professional.”
2) Now, this one is by far the bigger problem… She didn’t get it. “What didn’t she get?” you ask… um… just about everything.
Essentially she had no concept of anything outside of what would be needed for her moment-by-moment comfort. The idea of creation; she didn’t care. The concept of God; hadn’t really dawned on her. She did mention that her daddy was getting her one of those new smart phones (I had a comment, kept it to myself). To her the world was made up of two kinds of people, those she liked who did things for her, were her friends or family and those who weren’t in one of the afore mentioned categories. She was thoroughly, completely and one hundred percent convinced that she was perfect. I am not kidding, not even a little.
When she announced this to me at first I though she was kidding. Even the most self assured person I had ever met would be willing to at least confess a flaw or a weakness or two… She was not. I was flabbergasted. I was literally at a loss for words, and that never happens!
When we confess that “we are in bondage to sin and can not free ourselves,” I can think of no truer statement. But as this young lady showed me, we are often so bound, that we don’t even realize that is what it is. This over the years I have found out that this once young lady was sure as shoot’n not perfect. In fact she was so far from it she couldn’t see perfection with binoculars. She was bound to material things, chemicals, popularity and other things that clouded her vision. The good news in all of this, is last time I heard, she was getting a clue, and in that we find the persistence of the call of Christ. Both of them have some way to go, but that’s alright, they are not on the journey alone, and I think that is what finally opened her eyes to what Christ is doing, has done and promises to do, to and for us and that is to show us the truth; the truth of us, and the truth of God’s love for us. When we see this, we we realize what God in CHrist has already done for us, we are freed indeed.
The Word: Shapes – Day 32
Seven Wonders of the Word
“Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” – John 8:31-32
I never saw the movie “A Few Good Men” but I saw the trailers, I have seen a number of spoof’s of Jack Nicholson’s character bellowing out the line… “you can’t handle the truth!” There is if you will pardon me, some truth in that line. It’s not that we can’t handle the truth, its very often we don’t want to. When the truth is known, we lose control, we fear that the house of cards that we have constructed to give us the illusion of freedom will come tumbling down if the truth is truly known.
When Jesus speaks to his disciples, those who had been following them, he was laying bare the illusions that we cling to, that the world and our lives are all about us, that we are the boss, that we have everything in control. I think that is why Jesus addresses those who follow him in this way. To know the truth the real truth is to be exposed to its fullest in relationship to the God of all creation, nothing hidden, nothing reserved, we are fully connected to the Word and in being so known, we are free. Free to be who God created us to be in the first place. The problem is that often we are tempted to be something else, something we think we are supposed to be.
These things, the expectations of what truth is, can be imposed on us by family, culture, friends and even religion itself and we cling to them thinking that we will be truly free if we only… But Jesus points out a little later in John that he is in fact THE TRUTH. It is by connecting to him in relationship, fully known, totally exposed good and bad, that we find that we are loved with a love that not even death can defeat. When we cling to that love, when we draw our strength from that relationship we find that the Word shapes us and guides us into the fullness of truth and life and freedom.
Yes, I know connecting seems to be the opposite of freedom, but we all connect to something, we all align ourselves in some fashion or another, there is no such thing as a freedom apart, there is only freedom within. Jesus tells his disciples then as he does us today that if we want to know the truth, then we need to remain, or dwell in relationship with him and in him we are connected with the fullness of God.
When we are so connected, we find that we are free to live, free to love, free to serve, free to be who we really are, not just what we think we are, or what we think we need to be. The key here is where do you draw your strength from? Is it from the Word, or is it from yourself or other things that appeal to your sense of freedom? Jesus tells us that if we stay connected if we continue in all things we will be made truly free, all other ideas of freedom are forms of bondage, and in that light we very well might not be able to handle the truth. The truth of Christ, will change you, and maybe that is why we struggle with it. We like our own little self defined worlds, but Jesus doesn’t let you stay there with yourself as the center of the universe. The truth calls us beyond what we define ourselves as and into the fullness of what God has created us to be. Often we might squint deeply once we see, but it is in the light of God’s love for us that we not only can handle the truth, we can grow and flourish in this life and in our lives for others and be truly free.
This truth will change you.
The Word: Commands – Day 14
Seven Wonders of the Word
“I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. – Exodus 20:2
“I yam what I yam and that’s all that I yam” – Popeye the Sailor Man
WARNING: There maybe nitpicking ahead!
YOUR NAME IS WHAT?
The author of the Seven Wonders of the Word today points us first back, into the story a good distance. When Moses first asks God for some ID back at the burning bush he gets the response, “I AM WHO I AM.” Now our author doesn’t use the caps, she simply quotes the words, and states that this “ wasn’t a particularly satisfying answer for Moses, and it’s not particularly satisfying for us, either. In fact it sounds like an answer intended to end the conversation.”
Um… I can’t go there. In fact the rest of the verse she is talking about ties in quite nicely with the verse for today and her premise of difference between a relationship of care and a relationship of power and the difference it makes when it comes to the Word “Commanding.”
The verse in Genesis 3 goes this way: “14God said to Moses, ” I AM WHO I AM.” He said further, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘ I am has sent me to you.’” 15God also said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘The LORD, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you’: This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations.” – Genesis 3:14-15
Whoa, you want relationship, you want a name that carries with it a context to understand who God is, I think you have it all right there!
With the I AM in caps God is saying just that, I AM, it is an all-inclusive statement, it wraps everything together. In this statement,
God is reminding, Moses, and the people of Israel of their history, of their relationship, of the promise made to Abraham! It is in my view a particularly satisfying answer! The “ I am” often reminds me of “Popeye’s” statement “I yam what I yam and that’s all that I yam.” That is a very limiting definition. It is in some ways the exact opposite of what God is saying. When Popeye declares that “I yam”, it think it is in the understanding that he isn’t “all that!”
When God declares “I AM” we need to be reminded of what God has done for us, thus the Israelites get the reminder of who God has been most recently for them before the commands are given. These commands and this God is “I AM WHO I AM” and this “I AM” is for us!
Being for us, frees us to be God’s people in the world sharing his care and looking out for the welfare of others. The theological quote for today is one of my favorites from Luther: “A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none. A Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all.”
Back when I was in seminary I used to respond to the inquiry of “how ya doing” with the phrase “i am who i am, no capitals!” What I was trying to say in that statement is essentially that I am a child of “I AM” Knowing that God’s commands are not to squash us, but are given out of a loving concern for our, and all people’s welfare, frees us as God’s children from constantly looking out for ourselves. That is a very freeing gift and one that lets us be little “i am’s” for others.
