Do not think me gentle because I speak in praise of gentleness, or elegant because I honour the grace that keeps this world. I am a [wo]man crude as any, gross of speech, intolerant, stubborn, angry, full of fits and furies. That I may have spoken well at times, is not natural. A wonder is what it is. (Wendell Berry)

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Six months today.

Ug. Support raising is booty. I don't want to be in the United States right now and I certainly don't want to be working at Denny's. I'm beginning to get frustrated with it all. I know the money will come and I know the Lord wants me back in Madrid, but it's the whole process of getting there and all the steps I have to go through that take effort. I'm just generally irritated right now.
My time with the Lord was going good for a while and then not so good because I never can seem to be faithful. I'm starting to get apathetic. Like- I just don't want to do anything at all, good or bad. I just want to sit and wait for something to happen. Blech. Bad feelings.
I know it's just a matter of time before I snap out of this funk- I'm a lot less dramatic this time, as in I know this wont last forever... it probably wont even last that long, but it's still a sucky place to be. I guess that's what a full six months here without Christian fellowship- real fellowship- will do to a person. Although, I guess that's just me blaming my crap on the lack of other people.
I can't believe I've been here for six months. I don't know whether that's encouraging or that makes me want to give up.

Thursday, June 12, 2008

No mind has conceived.

"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him."- Isaiah 64:4


I can't tell you how many times I've glossed over this verse and thought, wow, I wonder what great thing God has for me. I read it again a day or so ago in First Corinthians 2 where Paul is talking about what God has freely given us. Then it dawned on me. This verse was being quoted from Isaiah. This verse is about Jesus.

God is telling the Jews that their minds could not conceive of the gift he would be bringing them, the gift above all gifts, the gift of Jesus' atoning death on a cross. No one could have guessed that this gift would be the murder of God, who had come in the flesh, at their own hands.

This was the gift for those who loved God! This gift was infinitely more loving than merely delivering Israel physically and putting a Jewish man on the throne. No eye could envision scourging God, no ear could feign hearing the curtain rip! How much more loving an action than protecting that curtain!

When I expect God to protect my interests, or even my own self, am I asking for something less loving than what he has for me? My life might be more glorifying to God if he rips me rather than shields me. We must let God rip that which he originally knit together.

Friday, June 06, 2008

Thursday, June 05, 2008

I Corinthians 1:30ish

So I've been going through First Corinthians. It's been great. I've been learning a lot and I feel like I should share some of it so WOOH.

1:30 "It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus who has become for us wisdom from God- that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption."


In this verse, Paul is equating wisdom with righteousness, holiness and redemption. Since they don't mean the same thing, it occurred to me that he's not saying that they are the same thing, but that they are equal in some other way. So I looked at the things righteousness, holiness and redemption have in common. The two things that we know about them we might not know about wisdom- that they are 1. freely given by God and cannot be earned and 2. that they are vital in a relationship of intimacy with Christ.

The first idea, that they are free gifts of grace, means that we cannot earn wisdom. I didn't really know this. I mean, the book of James talks about the Lord giving wisdom to he who asks for it, but it never occurred to me that you cannot gain wisdom by your own might any more than you can gain holiness or redemption. This is important for a couple of reasons- study can make you more knowledgeable, but like the rest of 1 Corinthians says, Christ crucified is foolishness to the world. Only the Lord gives wisdom which is great because you can be the dumbest buck on the planet but be wise if you know the gospel and have an intimate relationship with God.

That brings me to my second point. The value of righteousness, holiness and redemption lies in the fact that they open up a way to the Lord and keep that channel open. I never thought that wisdom might be important to this relationship- but the more I thought about it, the more it makes sense. Wisdom is the benefit that comes from reaping the fruits of righteousness, holiness and redemption. If we come to know the Lord and continue to know him- we gain wisdom from that- which then in turn means that wisdom is our intimate knowledge of God. It cannot be gained by mere study or knowing about God- it can only be gained as we give ourselves to the Lord and he in turn gives himself back. True wisdom only has value in its ability to bring further into that relationship of intimacy.

So basically, spending time with the Lord equips you to spend even more time with him- which is what's special about heaven, which brings more heaven to earth, which means that the kingdom of God comes a little bit more as we gain wisdom and redemption and wooh.