Thanking the universe

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More and more I read people on social media “thanking the universe” for their new job or their new relationship, and also sometimes expressing hope that the universe will come through for them – sort of smooth their path to whatever it is they want. I’ve seen this expression way more than I’d like to in the posts and tweets of the formerly churched – and as a former student lay-minister I know a lot of formerly churched people, unfortunately.

I’m not exactly sure what’s with this, but I think it has something to do with that stubborn Imago Dei in each one of us. Reverence and loving fidelity to the God of the Bible (the giver of all good gifts) and in his only begotten Son is anathema in many of our subcultures, but that stubborn

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, programmed-in desire persists for something outside ourselves to worship provide help and salvation. This spiritual habit of the formerly churched doesn’t pass away easily, evidently, so perhaps re-branding its object is the path of least resistance.

I have an idealistic and at times even poetic mindset and even I know that “the universe” is for the most part a howling void that not only doesn’t care about me, it doesn’t have the ability to care about me. It is a created thing, in fact the sum of all created material; marvelous and awe-inspiring and glory-declaring but in no way, shape or form is it sentient.

One who wants to believe that there’s something in the universe to be worshiped or supplicated is obviously not a materialist but is more like a pantheist – here in the midst of our supposedly sophisticated and advanced post-modern times.

I can’t help thinking: how much more rational it is to worship and call out to the Maker of the universe rather than to what he has made?

. . .because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. – Romans 1:25 ESV

I’d like a boring president

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“The President of the United States is our employee. The services he and his legislative cohorts contract for us are not gifts or benefices, We have to pay for every one of them, sometimes with our money, sometimes with our skins.

If we can remember this, we’ll get a good, dull Cincinnatus like Eisenhower or Coolidge. Our governance will be managed with quiet and economy.” – P.J. O’Rourke, Give War a Chance

Yes. Here we are in 2016, raving at each other and ourselves about which strong-man/strong-woman will destroy the things (and people) we hate and “make great” the things we claim to love. All the while hardly considering how any one of the current front-runners can serve up, in reality, the red-meat they are feeding us rhetorically while working in good faith within our constitutional framework. Many of the supporters of the front-runners – at the moment Sanders

, Clinton and Trump – almost seem to think running roughshod over the separation of powers and ruling via executive fiat and “deals” is a feature, not a bug.

I’d like someone who is boring, humble, competent, respectful of his/her place in the constitutional order and our nation’s place in the world order, and who understands that cults of personality and savior-complexes, while fun for the moment, are ultimately destructive.

I don’t expect to be satisfied on any of these wants this time around, and perhaps never.

“Bae”

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This (kind of) goes along with something I wrote recently.

I was reminded also of our brilliant human choosing mechanisms by some good friends today arguing on Facebook about the fitness of one of the presidential candidates solely on the basis of “not liking his face”.

Abraham Lincoln would not have gotten far in 2016.

We’re doomed.

Work towards holiness

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Bethany gives her thoughts on Christian behavior. I rather like this:

It’s not okay to just go around talking about how “totally depraved” we are and do nothing about it. Yes

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, we’re sinful and evil. Fix that. Work towards holiness. And that doesn’t mean that we need to be more judmental and righteous and make sure everyone lives to our standards. No, to be more holy means to be merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love. That is God describing himself in Exodus 6. Wanna be more like God? Be that. He says himself to leave the vindication and judgement to him. That’s the part he doesn’t want us to be like.

There are ways that I could be more unashamed of God and the gospel, but I will never apologize for trying to be a better person and caring about this world or this life. Don’t be a jerk. Be a light of the gospel to a dying world. Be kind. Be loving. Help someone out physically, not just spiritually.

Emphasis mine.

Fit

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Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead -Galatians 1:1 ESV

I rather like Paul’s defiant tone here. God calls. He equips. It doesn’t matter if you match the profile

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, it doesn’t matter if you “aren’t a good fit” according to the experts. If he’s called you to something, he will fit you for it, in spite of and regardless of what anyone else thinks.

The Bible is rife with misfits whom God called to do great, daring, amazing things and who then went on, in his power, to do them. He, who raised Jesus from the dead, chose a church-persecuting religious zealot who opposed Christ to become a world changing missionary for Christ. He can do whatever he wants through you.

Our God is completely wise, expertly accurate, and keenly discerning at all times. He does all things well and therefore he doesn’t choose the way we do**.

Thank God.

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2:40 AM moments

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What does success look like?

With the particular clarity that 2:40 AM sometimes provides,  I know that in the spiritual realm it doesn’t always (or perhaps I should say it almost never) looks the way the world and our flesh thinks it should.

I say almost never because I believe that for every “we prayed,  caught a vision,  and grew from four people to four thousand” story,  for every “three college students got together to pray and out of this came national revival” story, there are thousands of stories where four people grew to twelve or shrunk to 2.

Success in God’s eyes, I believe,  looks like faithfulness,  regardless of how that manifests itself; faithfulness in all the things no one sees. Prayer,  for instance (an area in which I particularly struggle). Consistency. Love. The faithfulness to finish one’s part in the race and be able to pass the baton to the next person who may be the one who gets to break the tape and hear the cheers of the crowd.

It includes the faithfulness to join, full-throated and open hearted,  in the cheering throng, in anonymity. To trust the One who calls and equips to have called and equipped you precisely as he meant to

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,  to accomplish what he set out to do.

To this point,  hopefully according to God’s purpose and not,  I pray,  due to my own cowardice,  sloth, bad priorities or lack of faith,  I generally find myself as the one who is getting the water bottles filled and making sure the runners have the right shoes.  Most days I’m OK with that. But there are some 2:40 AM moments in life when this pattern I’ve lived, repeatedly and through the decades,  causes me to wake up from a troubled sleep.

Lord,  please bring clarity. Please loosen my grip on what I consider mine so my hands will be free to wield the towels, equipment bags, water bottles and first aid kits necessary for the other runners to cross the victory line.

What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.

– 1 Corinthians 3:5-9 ESV