Servant Resources

Trust, Delight, Commit and Rest

I enjoy proverbs. Not only the ones found in scripture, but also those created in different cultures. One of my favorites comes from a saying by a friend’s grandmother. It’s simple, but carries a lot of weight:

 

If you’re frettin, you ain’t trustin

 

You can only have it one way. You’re either trusting God in your circumstances, or you are worrying about the outcome. If you’re not sure, check your thoughts. Are they thoughts of concern, or thoughts of faith?

 

Psalm 37 has been a great comfort to me in times of difficulty or hardship. David writes out of his own experience with God.  He says:

 

Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun. Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; do not fret when men succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes.

 

David outlines 4 elements of finding peace in troubled times in this segment of scripture…

 

1.       Trust.  In other words, “to have confidence in.” Do I have confidence in the living God that he will accomplish what he has promised on my behalf? Confidence to take him at his word regardless of how things seem to be?

 

2.       Delight. The original language carries the meaning “to make merry over.” To dance about, to jump for joy, to be elated. This seems to be the hardest of them all. But note that he does not say to take delight in the circumstance, but rather, to delight in Him.

 

3.       Commit. This means “to roll.” It would be like rolling a boulder over a cliff. Once it reaches the tipping point, there is no return. It is committed; it is gone.

 

4.       Rest. The KJV translates this as “silence.” Be silent before the Lord. Come aside with him, away from the noise of the world and he will lead you beside the quiet waters, he will restore your soul (Psalm 23).

 

These four phases are built upon each other. You cannot rest without committing you cannot commit without delighting in him and you cannot delight without trusting.

Tactics of the Enemy

I’d like to look more closely at the tactics of the enemy of our souls. I outlined them in the last post, but want to take a closer look at how they come at us.

 

·          The Lust of the Flesh has to do with what we feel. It is an attack on the heart. It has to do with the cravings of sinful man and desires of a physical nature. These are wrong desires, the appetite of indulgence and inappropriate sensual pleasures.

 

·          The Lust of the Eyes has to do with what we see. It is an attack on the soul. It has to do with the insatiable desire for more and is an attempt to fill the emptiness of our being with things. It is delighting in riches and in rich possessions. This includes covetousness, or wanting what others have.

 

·          The Pride of Life has to do with what we think. It is an attack on the mind. It has to do with boasting in possessions and achievements. It is an empty assurance that trusts in its own power and resources. It is an ungodly presumption which trusts in the stability of earthly things. It includes thirsting after honor and applause.

 

To understand these tactics is only the first step. We want to do more than simply understand them, we want to move beyond understanding to victory. Jesus spoke directly to these three tactics in a passage of scripture recorded in Mark 8:34-36.

 

·          Victory over the Lust of the Flesh comes through submission to Christ’s life in you. Jesus first spoke of denying yourself. To deny yourself is not the same as practicing self-denial. Self-denial is not eating that second piece of chocolate cake—denying yourself gets to the very heart of your being. It is what John the Baptist meant when he spoke of Jesus saying; “He must become greater, I must become less.” To deny yourself is to say “no” to the very essence of your being. To reject who you are and accept who he is. To put aside personal ambition and self-seeking, self-serving actions. It is to live out Jesus’ words to his father in the Garden of Gethsemane; “not my will, but (your) will be done.”

 

·          Victory over the Lust of the Eyes comes through identification with Christ’s death for you. Jesus spoke next of picking up your cross. The cross is a symbol of death. The way to life, as a Christian is through death. The world clings to life out of the fear of death, the Christian embraces death in order to find life. To pick up your cross is to carry it daily, moment by moment. A hymn writer once put it this way:

 

I take O Cross your shadow, for my abiding place, and ask no other sunshine than that of Jesus’ face; content to let the world go by, to know no gain or loss, my sinful self, my only shame, my glory, all the Cross.

 

To pick up your cross is the recognition that the things of the world hold no more allure, attraction or charm to me than to a man in a casket. It is living out what Paul wrote in Galatians 2:20 – I have been crucified with Christ, nevertheless, l live, yet not I, but Christ who lives in me.

 

·         Victory over the Pride of Life comes through availability to Christ’s will through you. Jesus spoke lastly of following. To follow Christ simply means to go where he is going. Where was he going when he made this statement? He was on his way to face the most difficult trial of his life—death on the cross at Golgotha. Why was he willing to go there? Because of Love.  Love submits itself to hardship, pain and suffering to accomplish the impossible. Christ gave up all his rights and privileges to face death—for you. And he asks you to give up the rights and privileges of this world to follow him in dying to your own way.

 

Where does the enemy attack you most easily to keep you from desiring God?

·          Your heart?

·          Your soul?

·          Your mind?

 

What particular tactic does he use to trip you up most frequently?

·          The Lust of the Flesh?

·          The Lust of the Eyes?

·          The Pride of Life?

·           

What is your defense against these tactics to assure victory?

·          Submission to Christ’s life in you?

·          Identification with Christ’s death for you?

·          Availability to Christ’s will through you?

Hungry and Thirsty for God

I remember the summer I spent working for a landscaper. I mostly mowed lawns all day. One particularly hot day I had been mowing for several hours. I was becoming dehydrated and all I wanted was ice cold water. I stopped at a convenience store and saw a bottle of Perrier water. Now, this was back in the day when you didn’t buy water at the store. I had no idea what Perrier water was, but I thought that it would be the most clear, refreshing water ever, so I bought it.

 

I climbed back into the truck and took a big gulp of Perrier and immediately spit it out. It wasn’t anything like I had expected it to be. I was looking for water to quench my thirst and I got carbonated fizz and an acidic taste. So I did what any self-respecting teen would do—I pulled over at Burger King and got a coke!

 

We’ve all experienced hunger and thirst. We feel them at various levels throughout the day. It’s a concept that is easy for virtually anyone at any age to understand. And so God uses this as a model to explain how we should feel toward him. He says that we should hunger and thirst for him.

 

Yet we sometimes find ourselves not hungry and not thirsty for him. What keeps this intense craving, this all-encompassing desire for him away? We are attracted away from him to other things that we think will fill our hunger. We are barraged daily by media, sales and advertisements promising to fulfill what we believe are our needs.

 

Beyond the pull of the world, we must also recognize the work of the enemy of our souls. There is one who seeks to fill our lives with all kinds of distractions. Understanding how he comes and what he attacks with can help us to overcome these obstacles.

 

Satan attacks believers on three basic levels. John spoke of these in I John 2:16 when he wrote:

 

For everything in the world, the cravings of sinful man, and the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does, comes not from the Father but from the world.

 

The King James translation of the bible describes them as the Lust of the Flesh, the Lust of the Eyes and the Pride of Life.

 

Throughout history, men and women have fallen prey to these 3 central temptations. We can go back to the earliest record and see how this holds true since man first waked the earth. See Genesis 3:1-6 for the background story of Satan tempting Eve in the Garden.

 

Genesis 3:6 sums it up by stating; “When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food (Lust of the Flesh) and pleasing to the eye (Lust of the Eyes), and also desirable for gaining wisdom (The Pride of Life), she took some and ate it.”

 

These are the tactics our enemy uses to distract us. They are the strategies he employs to keep us from hungering and thirsting after God. To begin to combat them, we must first recognize them. Once we see how he comes at us, we can prepare ourselves to face them.

Our Inheritance

I inherited some porcelain figurines from my grandparents. I remember my ancestors each time that I see them. They hold a high sentimental value and a low monetary value.  It may seem surprising to hear that each of us has inherited something. You may believe that you have no inheritance, yet there are things as simple as inheriting a parent’s looks or temperament. Not every inherited thing is as grand as a fortune. For Christians, the bible speaks of an inheritance as well. I’d like to focus on one in particular-the inheritance promised to the meek.

 

David wrote in the psalms that the meek will inherit the land and enjoy great peace. (Psalm 37:11). Jesus spoke along the same terms when he preached his sermon on the mountaintop – he said that the meek would inherit the earth.

 

So God says to us that the Christian who lives under God’s authority, submitting their free will to his will, and embraces his direction, will have an inheritance…that inheritance is the earth. I must admit that this particular passage has never been too appealing to me. It doesn’t do much for me. Jesus pronounces it as a blessing, but the benefit of receiving the earth doesn’t seem to be that great of an attraction.

 

If he is speaking of the physical earth, then why would I want it? What would I do with it? I may be attracted by the beautiful areas of the earth…the majestic mountains, the beauty of the forests or the tranquility of the seashore. But if I inherit the earth, then I must inherit it all; good and bad. I must also inherit the slums, the places where people live in garbage dumps and filthiest places as well.

 

If Jesus is speaking of the political earth, as in the center of power, then that comes with its own issues as well. For power is always coupled with responsibility. Even absolute power comes with the responsibility to govern. And to govern mankind means to be constantly in conflict with man’s unwillingness to be governed.

 

So what is this blessing of inheriting the earth? What is its value to me as an heir of the family of God?

 

The real value on any inheritance is in the eyes of the recipient. I recall a fairly recent TV commercial showing siblings in a stuffy lawyers office, as he read to them from a will. The older two siblings received homes and valuable possessions, but the younger brother only received 1,000 acres of uninhabitable swampland. You could see on the faces of the others; that they believed he ended up with the least desirable inheritance. Then the commercial cuts to a shot of the youngest brother, laughing and shouting as he careens his jeep through the mud of the swampland! To him, it was the greatest inheritance ever!

 

Our inheritance as well, must be viewed from the right perspective in order for us to appreciate it fully. God has more in mind than us inheriting the earth as we know it—physically and politically. I believe that he is referring to the earth depicted in Revelation 21:1; a new heaven and a new earth. A world…a land…a kingdom that is yet to be.

 

We don’t see this new world very clearly because we are surrounded by the world in which we live. We are bombarded with the thought that this is as good as it will ever be. We must get everything we can this time around and must take matters into our own hands to fill our lives with what we need in order to be as comfortable as possible.

 

Yet Christ tells us that this life and this world is paltry in comparison to what is prepared for us in eternity. We must fight the natural inclination to focus on this world to the exclusion of the next. It is far better for us to focus on his future kingdom and to bring that kingdom perspective to all we are doing in this world.

 

It is written that in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was the first of God’s creation and while it is not the center of the universe, it is the center of his attention. He is working to bring it back to his original intent, and in the process create a people worthy of inheriting it. And I desperately want to be a part of that plan. To this end I challenge myself to live in the meekness of my soul before the amazing author of history.

Living In Meekness

What are the characteristics of someone living in meekness before God? What does it look like? I believe that there are two primary perspectives I’d like to explore:

 

The first characteristic is submission.

 

Following Christ’s purposes for your life is an act of submission. It is the very essence of meekness. Moses was referred to as being the meekest man alive. Yet his actions were extremely brave when viewed for the outside.

 

As you submit to God’s actions and requirements in your life, in complete meekness before him, he will challenge you. He will force you out of your comfort-zone and stretch you in new ways. He will ask you to do things that you are not comfortable doing, that you don’t like doing, that you don’t want to do! But that is the basis of meekness—the living out of the belief that God knows what is best for me.

 

That is what makes life an adventure. It’s living out the reality of what we say we believe. Blessed are the meek, Jesus said. Blessed are those who humbly submit themselves to God’s actions in their lives; without challenging him, and who live accordingly. Because meekness is based in submission to God’s will.

 

What is the greatest gift that God has given to mankind? Could it be the power to choose? The Christian who lives out meekness through submission is one who gives their greatest gift back to God by submitting their free will to his will. They are those who say; not my will, but yours be done…may your kingdom come, may your will be done.

 

The second characteristic is embracing his will.

 

You can submit without embracing the direction. It’s like the little boy whose mother wanted him to sit in his chair. He refused. After considerable pressure being applied, he sat. But he stated for all the world to hear; “but I’m standing up on the inside!”

 

Standing up on the inside is to outwardly submit to the Lord’s direction, but in your heart you are churning, angry and not with the program at all.

 

So how d o I welcome submission, how do I embrace it? It is helpful to understand that it is his hand that guides you and that the end result is the most beneficial. You must believe that God has your highest in mind. That he has the authority and ability to direct your life to its highest end.

 

It is dangerous to believe that after enough years on this earth that we know enough of life to make our own choices, projecting what the future will be—that we can see far enough to discern the repercussions of our actions. But he is the only one who can clearly see the end from the beginning. Yet it is hard for us to accept that, we struggle with it.

 

The ways by which God leads us often include troubles. We naturally want to protect ourselves from pain and difficulty, but he want to prove himself to us in the tough things of life. It’s been said that ships weren’t made for the harbor where the sea is calm and the breezes are refreshing. They are made to withstand the tempests of the sea and can only be truly tested in the storms.

 

Are you welcoming what he allows in your life? I may not understand what is occurring, I may not enjoy it, but I know that nothing happens that he does not allow and that he cannot use for his glory in me. He promises to work all things together for good in my life and my responsibility is to trust him and take him at his word. Looking diligently for what he wants me to learn or see in the process—embracing submission to his will.