Look Up

When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor. When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, "What is it?" For they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, "It is the bread the LORD has given you to eat." --Exodus 16:14, 15 (NIV)

The grassy area next to my car was littered with small, round, green things. My curiosity was piqued. At first I thought maybe it was a patch of toadstools or some other such plant life that had sprung up from the ground. Taking a step back to survey the surrounding area with a larger view, I saw a palm tree. Quickly scanning the trunk of the tree, I solved the mystery. The round things on the ground were dates. They had fallen from their position atop the date palm tree.

Life is full of things we may not understand or things we haven't seen before. From our vantage point we can only see so far. It's not until we stand back and look up that we get a clearer perspective. Nothing falls to us here on earth that hasn't passed under God's watchful eye. When we are confused or upset by the things we see around us, our first response should be to turn our thoughts heavenward.

Like the children of Israel, we may find ourselves in a fog, shivering in the cold dampness of the morning. But as the dew disappears, we will see that God has not forgotten us. He has been with us throughout the night. He continues to provide for us at every turn, feeding us in body and spirit. Daily we are strengthened for life's journey by the blessings he gives. Even when we are in the barren deserts, we are nourished by the bread of heaven. God sends us peace and comfort as we look to Him in prayer.

Reflecting Pool:

When has God fed you in the desert?
What do you discover when you turn your eyes heavenward?

Who Put the "I" in Worship?

You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God… –Exodus 20:5a (NIV)

At least once a week, Christians around the world make an effort to attend what are sometimes referred to as worship services. The westernized world generally regards worship as any action of honor and adoration directed to God. Church attendance in and of itself is worship; tithing is worship; singing hymns and songs of praise is worship. As wonderful and important as each of those elements are, somehow they fail to embody the true essence of what it is that God desires from us.

Lately I have been contemplating the true meaning of the word worship. In doing so I have seen that the way I engage in worship is not quite on target with how God’s word defines it.

The word itself is an English translation used to represent two separate Hebrew words or ideas. The first means, literally, to bow down or genuflect. The second definition encompasses attitudes and actions of service. For the Hebrew people and Jews today, Torah study is worship, keeping to the law is worship....it is not worship in the same sense that Christians understand it.

When the temple curtain symbolically ripped in two at the time of Christ’s death, the ritualistic aspects of worship,particularly those involving who could come into God's presence to ask for forgiveness of sins, were abolished. No longer do we need a high priest to intercede for us. We can worship God in his presence just as we are. This is why the New Testament terminology for the word “worship” is slightly different from what we find in the Old Testament. Proskuneo literally means “to kiss toward” or “to bow down.” The second word, latreuo, means “to honor.”

Throughout scripture, the emphasis is not on the person doing the worshipping, but the One being worshipped. As we prepare to come into God’s presence this upcoming Sabbath, let us not focus on unimportant details, but rather on the most important detail—God. The Lord’s Day is not just an hour out of our weekly schedule where we dress up and feel good about being a Christian. It is about contemplating God’s holiness, honoring him, and bowing at his feet with humility. He who is the great I AM is worthy of our adoration and dutiful worship.

Hasty Words

Do not be quick with your mouth, do not be hasty in your heart to utter anything before God. God is in heaven and you are on earth, so let your words be few. --Ecclesiastes 5:2

I had done it again. In my eagerness to send out a new email I paused only long enough to spell-check my words instead of scrutinizing my use of language. My embarrassing grammatical error seemed to leap from the page. There it sat, glaringly obvious, yet somehow subtle. The apostrophe dangled between the t and s like an eyebrow cocked in disapproval.

My greatest attempts to craft a well-written composition can be undone by such thoughtless errors. So also can my Christian testimony and credibility be called into questions as a result of a careless or hasty word.

I am still learning how to be more disciplined when it comes to controlling my tongue. Sometimes my selfish desire to be the center of attention overrides my willingness to adhere to God's standards of speech. In my lifetime I have likely spoken far more worthless words than beautiful ones, and that is a painful reality to face.

God has blessed me with two very powerful avenues of communication. One is in the way I use my words to connect with people; the other is how I connect to God himself. Sometimes I take that for granted, particularly when it comes to my prayer life. At times I have treated prayer as little more than a silent exchange of words. In such cases I have railed to acknowledge how extraordinary it is that I, an unholy sinner, am allowed to enter into God's presence.

In addition to learning how to reign in my loose tongue, I know that my attitude regarding prayer needs an adjustment as well. God deserves more from me than hasty words, clumsily thrown together without forethought. As I re-examine my heart, I expect that my words--spoken or written--will be laced with meaning.

Deliberate Days

To the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind. --Ecclesiastes 2:26

Somewhere in my office there's a desk; it's just not visible right now because multiple maps and aerial photos lie strewn across it. One all-encompassing map containing all the information and features I need does not exist. In order for me to draw a map of my own for a specific site, I need to merge several maps into one final product. Each map and photo on my desk is an important component of the process, even if in a small way.

Life is like that too. Each day is a deliberately apportioned piece of the overall picture. Nothing that happens to us occurs outside of God's plan. No event is insignificant. Although God is not bound by time and space, we are. I don't think it is his desire that we waste a single moment of life here on earth. Even if we were to live for 100 years, we would still only get to see each season change 100 times. Life seems quite finite when I think about it in those terms.

Does this mean that we should "eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die"? Are we to quit our jobs, end our relationships and go off to far-flung reaches of the world just to say we've done so?

Personally, I choose to live a life worth of honor from the One who give us life and breath on a daily basis. This may not mean I'll ever pack my bags for a whirlwind tour of each continent. It may not mean I'll even get to see the seasons change 75 more times. However, it will mean that I will spend my days and hours as deliberately as they have been apportioned. Each moment is like a map of God's will for me. I dare not dismiss or overlook a single one.

The Art of Communication

The Lord said to him, "Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say." --Exodus 4:11-12

Salvation. Justification. Redemption. These words, without context can take on just as many meanings as the number of individuals who hear or read them. Redemption could mean cashing in aluminum cans. Justification could mean validation of certain feelings or actions. Salvation? Salvation could be the name of a band for all I know! To most Christians, these three words are related and they are all part of the "Christianese" vocabulary we use to describe what it is we believe and why.

One of the most difficult parts of explaining and sharing our faith with people who have limited or nonexistent church background is the language barrier. How can we communicate what we know to be true and real without alienating the people we want to reach the most? Evangelizing, witnessing, proselytizing, or whatever you prefer to call it, must involve prayer, a willing heart, and most importantly, a child's vocabulary.

After praying for God to open up an opportunity for us to share our faith we need to be willing to actually follow through and do so. When those opportunities arise, our best bet is to keep it simple. Those of us who have been in the church for a long time can easily settle into vocabulary that is "churchy" in nature. We need to be aware that not everyone understands the same concepts we do.

Think of it like this. Suppose a physicist was trying to explain gravity to a child. Any physicist is well-versed in Newton's laws and knows that objects fall to the earth because the force of gravity between that object and earth will cause the object to accelerate toward the center of earth at a rate of 9.8 meters per second squared. The truth of that statement is quite complex and the information is too complicated. A more basic description is to say "what goes up must come down." The truth of Newton's law is still present, and the concept is much easier to grasp that way. The simplified version is just as true as the scientific one, but now a child can understand it.

Similarly, when sharing the gospel, we should stick to God's truth, but do so in a simple way. The sentence "Jesus loves you" is a simplified version of the reality of the relationship behind the the words justification, redemption, and salvation. Jesus loves you. It's a simple version, but it is in my opinion one of the best places to begin.

In all of our conversations with others about our faith, we need to remember to glorify God both in how we explain him and how we treat the other person. Our responsibility is to plant the necessary seeds in the other person's heart. God is the one who is responsible for taking care of those seeds once they are planted. We cannot force someone to hear us, but if we can communication effectively and at least get them to listen, then that's a start.

God's Rules

And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, "The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation." --Exodus 34:6-7

The passage above contains the words that were spoken to Moses just before he came down the mountain to deliver the ten commandments to the Hebrew nation. These verses outline not only why God's commandments are important, but why it is important that we follow them. God's character is displayed as a wide spectrum, ranging from compassionate and gracious to a punisher of many generations.

Many of us, myself included, have a difficult time thinking about the fact that we have a loving God who punishes children. Then I realized that God's punishment, in any form, is actually a loving action. Loving parents do their best to love their children in a way that they hope will result in them growing up to be responsible adults. This does not happen without rules and discipline.

It would be very strange for God to declare that he loves us, but then do nothing to set up some boundaries that keep us from being hurt or from hurting others. He gives us his commandments so that we can live a life that is blessed as the result of making good decisions. What if God were to tell us simply to "be a moral person" but then gave us no guidelines for how to do so? Out of his goodness and love, he provides instructions for us so that there is no mistake about how he wants us to live.

When I think about God as our heavenly father, it helps me to think of him like I do my earthly parents. Good parents set up household rules. My parents had rules about how late I could stay up, how old I had to be before I was allowed to date, and what types of movies I was allowed to rent. These rules we established so that I would limit my exposure to things that would harm me. Breaking the rules resulted in disciplinary action, which to my adolescent brain at the time, seemed stupid or unfair. Now I realize that the punishment for breaking the rules was certainly far less severe than the damage that could have been done to my spiritual, physical or emotional well-being if the rules hadn't existed in the first place.

For example, one house rule was that we could not rent or watch movies that were rated "R". I once broke that rule and rented "Good Will Hunting" hoping to convince my dad that it really wasn't that bad. A mere 15 minutes into the film, we had lost track of the number of f-bombs that were dropped. My dad turned off the VCR, ejected the tape and told me to never bring anything like that into the house again. Although I didn't argue, I thought at the time that he was being unreasonable. When I got to college, I was constantly around a group of people who used language not unlike the dialogue in R-rated movies. The more I heard it, the more I realized that my parents had done a great thing by keeping that kind of language out of our home. Crude language not only makes people sound uneducated, but it is offensive to many people of the general public.

God's rules, like my parents' house rules, serve to protect us from ruining our testimony as a Christian. His punishment for breaking the rules is just, and exists to form us into a person who is more Christ-like. God's character is one that is loving and he demonstrates his love by putting a protective set of guidelines around us to keep us from being foolish or harming ourselves on different levels. God's punishment is also a way that he loves us. Hebrews 12 talks about why God disciplines his children--it is because he is a loving parent. We can't ignore God's punishment, and we can't claim that a God who punishes sin is a God who is unjust. His commandments and punishments exist because he is a God of love. He punishes us until we learn from our mistakes. His punishment serves to restore us unto himself, because that is where we belong.