A lesson from Indy

My husband is a diehard Indiana Jones fanatic. By this I mean he can quote any line in any movie, we have the Indiana Jones glasses, fedora, whip, even the Indiana Jones potato head. One time, he read through the Indiana Jones manual – in one day! Now that is crazy. So one day in an attempt to indulge his passion for Indy, we watched The Kingdom of the Chrystal Skull. At one point in the movie Indiana is on a motorcycle with his son, rides into the library and skids under the tables in classic Jones style. He slides to a stop in front of one of his students, who conveniently has a question – Indiana looks at him and says kid, to be a true archaeologist you sometimes have to get out of the library.

What a poignant phrase – sometimes, you have to get out into the world. A maxim I think many of us should take to heart. Often, to be productive Christians, we have got to get out of the church. It is so easy to go to church on Sunday morning, worship on Sunday night, only shop at Christian stores, and only spend time with Christian friends. The reality is that, while church is an imperative, there is a world full of lost and dying people waiting for us to spread the light of Christ. How can they know about what Christ has to offer if we are too busy surrounding ourselves with Christians to show them?

In Mathew 28:19 Jesus says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” We hear this verse all of the time, but I think the English translation does not represent the true spirit of these words. Often we listen to this scripture and think, man I have to go! I have to spread God’s word! But in the original Greek, the verse is translated “as you are going.” Therefore, as we are going throughout our day we are called to make disciples. Rather it be at work, the coffee shop, or in line at the supermarket, we are directed to make disciples. This kind of scares me – I mean, how in the world do we do that?

The answer is simpler than you may think. St. Francis of Assisi once said, “preach the gospel everywhere you go and if necessary use words.” We speak more with our lives than our mouths. Can you imagine the effects if we loved the unlovable, took in those that the world turned their back on, and forgave when it was not deserved? What if people saw that there was something different about us, just by watching our actions? What a testimony that would be! But first, we have to get out of the church. We have to step out of our Christian circles, and set an example for a world that is thirsting for truth, and starving for something different. They see our steeples, our Christian shirts, and the crosses on our checks – but what they want is to see our actions. Let’s set the world on fire – minister without saying a word – and step out of the church to win souls for the Lord.

The Humble Servant

As I read this morning, I came across Daniel 10. In this chapter Daniel sees a vision –  a revelation so intense that he mourned for three weeks. In this vision, Daniel saw a man and became stricken with fear causing him to “fall into a deep sleep.” Can you imagine? You know, I used to be afraid to see angels because every time people in the Bible see them, the messenger has to say “don’t be afraid.” I thought I could just save my fear, and pray to God not to send me an angel – probably the strongest prayer I ever prayed as a child was dear Lord Jesus, PUHLEEEZZZZ do not send me an angel tonight – I am so scared!  And clearly, Daniel is so terrified he falls into a deep sleep until the man who appeared to him touched him and woke him up. The man then goes on to say in verse twelve, “Do not be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to them.” This verse hit me like a dagger in the heart – God heard Daniel once he humbled himself and sought to gain understanding.

I don’t know about you, but often I set off into my prayers and say what I should say, and forget to humble myself and truly seek to gain the understanding only God can give. The implication in this verse is that there was a time when Daniel did not humble himself, but upon humbling himself Daniels prayers became pleasing to God.  Let’s seek to truly humble ourselves and seek divine wisdom and understanding so that our lives and prayers become a pleasing sacrifice to God – one that God both hears and blesses.

The truth is, God is yearning to work miracles with our lives – to bring us to our fullest potential. The problem is that to be able to do this, we must humble ourselves and seek God’s understanding. It was only at this point that Daniel became the man of God he was, and God heard and responded to him.  It is only at this point that God can make us into new creations. To truly embody the Christ like life, we have to humble ourselves and seek God’s wisdom. We can go to church three days a week, pray every morning and night, and serve countless hours, but if we withhold our hearts it is useless. God wants you – every cell of you – unadulterated and surrendered to his perfect wisdom.

Utter Surrender

So here I am sitting, sipping my green tea and reading through the pages of Jeremiah. Until this point in my life I always thought that prayer, although important, seemed to be a gift to some and not to others. While I fell in the latter category, I woke up this morning with the urge to learn how to pray. Low and behold, it seems I found out that prayer, while a gift, is something every Christian ought to seek to do. A quick glance over the classics on prayer will display the importance of the discipline. This prayer is not confined to closing your eyes and folding your hands, or even declaring healing, but rather a life of prayer. As God unveiled this revelation to me, it seemed a tsunami wave hit me in the face – I cannot even focus for five minutes, how can I live a life of prayer? Doesn’t God know that prayer is not my gift? I don’t even understand prayer, yet, we are all called to be prayer warriors. My mind runs in circles in a vain attempt to comprehend prayer, and why some seem to “get it” and I definitely don’t. BUT I am called to do it. So this particular morning I embarked on my prayer journey, hoping beyond hope that God could make something beautiful out of my intentions. My prayer – simply for God to teach me how to pray.

In reading Richard Foster’s book Celebration of Discipline,  he made the revolutionary observation that when praying for others the disciples never said “if thy will be done.” The reason being, the disciples drenched themselves so much into God’s will that they knew what God wanted them to do. So I have embarked upon the journey to having this kind of faith – being in this deep, unadulterated, communion with God.

It did not take long on this prayer journey, actually all of five minutes, to realize all of my efforts are vain. There is absolutely no action I as a human can take to bring me closer to God because my flesh always gets in the way. The only thing I can do is surrender – surrender, what a word. It is at this point my meditations turned to realization of my futile efforts. You see I, as I presume many others do, udder “Lord I surrender” as I am drifting off to sleep, or barely waking up in the morning. While I say I surrender, do I truly seek it? You see, the truth is that to truly surrender, pray, or know God’s will we have to stop. Stop our flesh – completely die to ourselves and let God work a miracle in ourselves. I think this is the greatest miracle God ever works –greater than igniting wood drenched in water, or making a burning bush talk. This miracle takes something like me, rotten through and through, and completely changes it to be whiter than snow.

While it appears we should sink into depression over our lack of ability to do anything right, it is just at that point of humility God steps in and says this is what I have been waiting for – for you to step aside. Not to utter the words I surrender, but to truly remove yourself so you can have divine surrender and divine communion. What a revelation – something taught time and time again through millennia, yet so hard to grasp.

I truly think God looks at me sometimes in bewilderment and says what in the world are you doing?? I made you and I can’t even figure you out – don’t you know what I could do if you would just stop and listen to me?? Yet somehow, even though I can’t make myself worthy, God steps in and covers me, but this only happens when I fall utterly abandoned, humbled, and willing at the foot of my savior with an un-quenchable thirst for divinely inspired surrender.