June 15th, 2011 by Mark Carlson
Good Lovin’
Do you suppose there might be a correlation between fear of pain and fear of love? Just observing people in our own realm of relationships, we can readily detect that anyone who balks at the prospect of having to sacrifice won’t likely be a “poster person” for a good “lover” either. Love and sacrifice are inseparable, aren’t they? Love has an “other” orientation, doesn’t it?
When have you loved without at some point experiencing pain? At some point, love promises pain. And sadly it delivers on that promise.It offers an open invitation for it. So, why do we seek it, risk love, participate in it? I suppose it’s because we personally sense a greater opportunity for gain or pleasure by loving than by choosing not to love and thus deprive ourselves of love’s benefits. We seek the potentially greater reward by loving than the fear over the perceived risks. Maybe we’re blind to the risks. I think sometimes that happens too.
Parents are expected to love their kids. We even plan to have them because we have a reservoir of love we feel a need to impart to them. God is like that too. He’s not just love, but He certainly is full of love. In His reservoir of perfect, “no prerequisites” quality of love, He wants to lavish us with Himself to the point where this “God love” in us overcomes any sense of fear we may have in releasing it to others. Growing to understand God’s love, we come closer to knowing that we are secure in His love. It is a love that requires no fear. No fear of loss. No fear of abandonment. No fear of being regarded “less.”
Is there risk that the love we give won’t be appreciated or reciprocated? Sure! Is there risk for God that His offer of love might be rejected? Certainly! This happens daily – by the millions. Even so, He never loves in vain. Neither do we. Never. Expressing love is always worth it, regardless of any dividends or return. Because expressing love is expressing God. That’s always a good thing. And we are told in 1 John 4:18 “There is no fear in love.” That’s a God kind of love. Good lovin’. Only God can do it. And love of this quality only God can create and channel through you and me. Love fearlessly!
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June 8th, 2011 by Mark Carlson
On the Road to Find Out
Years ago, singer songwriter Cat Stevens performed a song called “On the Road to Find Out.” Isn’t our journey towards a broader and deeper and more fulfilling faith much the same?
Knowledge of God and understanding of the biblical paths of truth and faith are meant to be a growing and expanding experience in a “seeking” Christian’s life. This “road to find out” is much the same for someone “seeking” to explore the claims of the bible and Christian faith to determine their interest in moving farther down the road . . . or not.
Belief can be an eye opening and soul enriching process for those who choose to pursue it. If we begin at all, we begin by just “starting” to believe, just as the honest novice proclaimed in Mark 9:24
Saying, “Lord I believe. Help my unbelief.” Such honesty, I believe, is to be commended – not belittled. Too often those a little “farther down the road” react with judgment instead of encouragement towards those whose infant faith is developing. I hate it when that happens. Jesus even affirmed those having an open, trusting, child-like faith.
Certainly there are many facets of faith we should or will eventually know for certain. God’s love, His sovereignty, His compassion, His sense of justice, the ability to discern God’s will, and much much more. But even as we begin to grasp the essences of these not so elementary attributes and concepts, we are only starting to believe. We would be wise to keep our minds and spirits open to the “developmental work” of the One who guides us on the road to finding out, and take pleasure in His company as we sojourn together.
The Christian experience will always be one of finding out. People who profess they have “found it out” tend to worry me.
Mark Carlson
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May 19th, 2011 by Mark Carlson
God’s grace really does defy description or explanation. It flows by the will of God to destinations we might deem undeserving. But isn’t that the point? First of all, it’s His grace and it flows at His discretion – where – when – and how much. But the impact of God’s grace stands out the most when He directs it towards those most lowly or who exist in the darkest shadows – even to those who would be most surprised to receive it.
We sing about how amazing it is, this grace. Take time to think about it. Where and how is grace touching your life? It is all around us. Really, it is! Or did you just think you were “lucky?”
Mark Carlson
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January 25th, 2011 by Mark Carlson
I Love You More
I received these sentiments in a birthday card recently and had to reflect on them and how they applied to my relationship with Christ. Consider them yourself:
”Of all the things that fill our everyday lives . . . .
Of all the things that compete for our time, our energy, and our attention . . . .
I love you more”
I have to be honest. There’s still a lot of competition in my life for the attention and affection that is rightly due God. There is no major idol or object of desire that I am aware of that stands out above all others or ahead of my love for God. Not family. Not work. Certainly not things. I can be very Spartan. Maybe it’s more of a percentage thing, where my attention and affection and devotion and worship just aren’t at 100%.
What is 100% anyway? How can I measure? How can we measure? I don’t trust in the Lord with ALL my heart. I do still sometimes lean on my own understanding. I don’t think I love the Lord with All my heart, mind and strength. Who does? This could get depressing, looking for some visible, knowable standard of measurement. Yes, thank you, I know Jesus did all this quite well.
My fallback is this. God lives in me. I have given Him my heart, mind and soul as best I knew at the time (which was pretty limited), and I did commit to surrender to and cooperate with the work He chooses to do in my life to conform me to the image of His son. My love for God will never equate with the perfect love He has for me and you. So I choose not to wrestle (much) with my progress on the journey. There really is no “How’s My God Relationship” dial 1-800-ASK-GOD to get valid feedback like there is on the back of the tractor trailers we see driving by.
So I rest and say like King David, “Search my heart, O God.” And I try to listen as His Spirit speaks, keeping me on the path and in-between the guard rails and with growing sensitivity to the inner voice of God. I am getting better than I was at hearing the fainter whispers, but there are still times He uses the megaphone. All because He loves me, has patiently begun a work in me, and will be faithful to complete, yes complete the work He desires to do in me even though I don’t and won’t know just what that looks like. Because I know these things, I have what I need to love Him more, and in a way that seems to be acceptable to Him.
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January 18th, 2011 by Mark Carlson
Five P’s
Probably all of us have heard them before: Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance. Reminds me of Army Basic Training and a very colorful yet effective Drill Instructor. But the Five P’s have spiritual application too, you know.
If you have been committed to Christ for some time, you’ve probably figured it out by now that Jesus doesn’t do a lot of “rescuing” as we face life’s tough challenges. If you want to top that off with a potentially unsettling thought, here’s one. Jesus Himself was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. (Matthew 4:1) Point being, if this tempting and testing was part of God’s process in refining and “proving” Jesus, it’s not a leap to think He would do (or does) the same with us in His effort to conform us to the image of His Son.
Jesus, through His Spirit, is less of a rescuer and more of an “accompanier.” He’s with us – walking with us through the “stuff” that worries and frightens and challenges us. Seldom, if ever, does He zap us out of it, though it’s pretty natural for us to pray that He would. His life with the disciples is a pretty clear demonstration of that. He is concerned that we are left “standing” after our temptations and trials, not that we avoid them or don’t experience their refining potential.
So, what happens when you are led into stressful and challenging, maybe even crisis situations? How have you prepared yourself to face, endure and overcome them? Over a three year period Jesus actually stretched the faith and minds of His disciples to help prepare them for the mission ahead – a mission of confronting and attempting to comfort a broken world with Jesus’ message of redemption, restoration and victory. These 12 common men were not ready, they became ready. They listened. They remembered Christ’s words. They misunderstood and so they questioned. They watched, and sometimes failed to believe. They tried to follow Christ’s example. They practiced. They sometimes failed. They often succeeded. Each left us a unique legacy.
How about you? Have you crumbled? Will you falter? For all that life and the enemy and maybe even God will throw at you, what are you doing to insure that you survive, you carry on, you
re- invest Christ’s passion, power and promise into our broken world? How are you preparing and protecting yourself? We’re in a war! Prepare! Plan!
Mark Carlson
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January 4th, 2011 by Mark Carlson
Check it Out
Matthew 7:21-23. These are alarming and potentially frightening words from Jesus. Read them for yourself. We can talk the “talk” of Jesus; do works that simulate the works of Jesus – even miraculous deeds – and still hear Jesus say “you were never mine because I was never really yours.”(Paraphrase) And to be called an “evildoer” because of my pretentious acts? How could I miss it? How could I have fooled myself and missed the main thing?
Certainly the “will of God” Jesus speaks of does not exclude the “works” He references here. But preceding anything we “do” is our desire and efforts to cultivate intimacy with God from which our new desire “to do” stems from. Am I as diligent to develop and preserve closeness with God as I am to be busy about doing “kingdom business?” Yes, works are part of our Christian experience. But they had best be byproducts instead of credentials.
What about you? Are you sure your future with God is certain, based on your love commitment to Him on His terms rather than possibly being deceived by just doing the “stuff” we “good Christians” sometimes fall back on? I would suggest we check it out. And check often. An awful lot depends on it.
Mark Carlson
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December 28th, 2010 by Mark Carlson
Believer or Experiencer?
I suppose it could just as well be said, “Player or spectator?” But the point of asking “Believer or Experiencer” has a lot to do with the way we have become conditioned through our traditional Western “church life” experience. I realize I am generalizing when I say this condition presents itself more through the lives of those who were born and raised in the church rather than those who came to faith more recently or from a less conventional route. And I apologize for the generalization. But there is truth to it. Those who were not raised in the church probably see this more clearly than others.
There is something cultural to both our Christianity and our mainstream “church” experience. I am not saying our experience may be part of some watered down conspiracy. I don’t sense anything malicious or even intentional. But gang, the church has been somewhat benignly asleep at the wheel while the culture has shifted around it. It seems inevitable that we are always a bit slow to respond – but we have to respond. It’s not so much a failure to market the “product” as it is to demonstrate Jesus in a relevant manner to our present day culture. Ours is not the same religiously receptive culture our Momma grew up in. A lot of people just plain don’t like us!
We have become more domesticated than God intended, intimidated by a hostile culture that says to our face, “We aren’t buying what you’re selling, and we’re just not interested.” Jesus did a lot of teaching. No doubt. (In some of our bibles, He even highlighted what He wrote in red letters.) We are at a time in history when the average person doesn’t give a flip about our Christian faith or the church. Our culture moves increasingly in that direction. (call this post-modernism if you wish) To many the existence of the church is irrelevant. Our presence as “salt and light” to the world appears to them as more shadow than substance.
Part of the reason for our “non-presence” is that the church continues to be pretty much geared towards more education / indoctrination than learning and practicing appropriate” rules of engagement” with our culture. Much of the church still views discipleship simplistically as “one more bible study” or discovering biblical minutia than carrying on the hefty part of Jesus’ ministry of communicating the gospel, reaching the lost, healing the hurts, and serving the needs of others in practical ways.
Yes, the gospel is central. Yes, we need to be anchored to truth to capture the fundamentals of the faith. But our balance tilts toward the cerebral and ministry to “self” rather than towards equipping believers in how to personally touch lives with Christ’s love. “One more class” will not achieve what Christ calls His “A team” to accomplish with Him. We have been given the ministry of reconciliation. We are Christ’s ambassadors of hope and good will. We are to teach and reach. Reach and teach. Winning the right to be heard by first listening and helping – and speak when the opportunity presents itself. Let’s get in the game and see what happens.
Mark Carlson
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December 21st, 2010 by Mark Carlson
No Plan B
Remember the old posters of Uncle Sam, pointing his finger with the words, “I Want You in the U.S. Army?” Uncle Sam aside, God wants to use us . . . you and me. We have always been part of His plan. Plan A, that is. And by the way, God has no Plan B. So report for duty, soldier! Sometimes we are tempted to respond like Moses. We think of all sorts of excuses why we can’t do things for God. Moses said, “Who am I to go – I am slow of speech and tongue?” Sound a little like you? God said, “Go, I’ll be with you and help you speak and teach you what to say.”
You see, it’s not as important as to who you and I are in this equation, but who is with us – - -God! Even when we fear we won’t “get the words right” or “I wish I had said this or that,” God is and will be there to give us appropriate words. Remember, He is the hand, we are the glove! Scripture says in 2 Cor. 3:5, “Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God.” That is just cause for us to relax from our hesitation and fears and act. Go.
What holds you and me back? Fear. Fear of what they’d think of me. Fear of them rejecting me. Fear of them ridiculing me. Fear of me messing up. All of these fears have one thing in common. They’re all about me! Seldom is our fear that we are neglecting God’s direction or disobeying Him. Are you able to see yourself, with Christ in you, as a “rescuer?” Rescue takes my eyes off myself and focuses on others. After an earthquake or a 911 tragedy, rescuers appear to have greater concerns than the fear of what would happen to them if they search and rescue. It’s what will happen to the dying person if they don’t go in. Courage is not the absence of fear; it’s the disregard of it. Spiritual service and spiritual rescue are completely God things. It’s not about you and me.
Mark Carlson
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December 14th, 2010 by Mark Carlson
How’s It Growing?
Do you ever think about it? What’s different now about me in my life as a believer that was not the same months ago? I don’t know where one goes to get a “spiritual” measuring stick or mirror, but it does make sense to do some self evaluation every now and then. Christian growth, sometimes called “maturity,” is pretty much expected of us. David did this and left us Psalm 139:23-24.He said “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way of everlasting.”
Let me suggest five habits or “disciplines” which are useful to kind of check ourselves out. These are not “practices” God requires in order for Him to stay pleased with us. They are more like exercises we do to keep fit and maintain our spiritual edge. Take some time before the Lord and quietly ask Him to evaluate the following with you in light of where you were some months ago.
Don’t be afraid to give yourself a modest pat on the back where you see encouraging signs. Ask the Holy Spirit to give you a nudge where you seem to be stuck or sliding. I put them in alphabetical order because I am not certain if there is a descending order. Here goes: Fellowship (your relationships with other believers); Giving (of your time, talent and treasure); Prayer (talking with God and listening to Him) Serving (within the body and to the world); Study of God’s word (just like it’s the air we breathe, the bread we need). You might ask, what about “worship?” I reply, worship is present within all of these five disciplines, not merely something separate we “do.”
Mark Carlson
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December 7th, 2010 by Mark Carlson
Re-forming
C.S. Lewis said in Mere Christianity, “God became man to turn creatures into sons: not simply to produce better men of the old kind but to produce a new kind of man.”
If you are a Christian, God’s truthful word says we have been radically changed from the inside out. (2Cor. 5:17) New creatures with new natures. A God-resembling nature. Not perfect. Not yet. But transforming.
Our task in cooperation with God, is to allow Him to make us in practice what we already are in “position.” In essence, to begin to live as we are already seen by Him. And what a pleasing sight we are from His vantage point. May God help us first to see ourselves as kindly as He does, and then in gratitude to Him live accordingly.
Mark Carlson
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