I may not agree with all of them, but I did gain some insights. I always think it is beneficial to the larger body of Christ when we get to hear from diverse voices, so I greatly appreciate works like this one.

The main reason I am promoting this book is that they have made it available for FREE to anyone. You can get your copy here: https://www.frankviola.org/whereisgod/

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My gratitude and appreciation go out to Kaitlyn for her willingness to share her thoughts and insights with us!

Please let me know what you think of this episode.

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Links/Resources

• For those wanting resources for simple church practices, check out www.gimsimple.net to find at-home lessons, slides to facilitate a group study of Marc’s book, and many other tools and resources, including videos, articles, book recommendations, and much more.

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When we originally started back in the day as Grace In Motion, these were the activities and lessons we started with.

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I am so excited to share this interview with my audience. Get ready to be inspired, challenged, and encouraged. This is a great follow-up to our series on “Finding Your Voice” with young adults.

In this episode, we hear from Lorie Payne (last name was Goggin at the time of recording), Executive Director of Reset Mentoring in Williamson County. Reset Mentoring works with youth in the juvenile justice system in central Texas.

From their website:

Working exclusively with Williamson County Juvenile Services, 
Reset Mentoring is a non-profit organization that was created to help teens RESET their lives... Whatever that looks like for them! Over the past 10 years, we have found that one size fits all just doesn’t work. The teens we work with are as different as you and me. They have their God-given talents, dreams, and future and we have found that for them to succeed long-term we need to walk alongside them in their next best step.

Lorie’s bio:

Lorie is a mom to three grown children, Maggie, Mason and Sarah and a nana to her two sweet grandbabies who she absolutely adores, Frankie and Maxton! In addition to raising children of her own, Lorie is a published author and has worked with teens in both church and school settings. When she began volunteering inside the Williamson County Juvenile Justice Center in November of 2009, she never imagined that God would call her to begin a faith-based mentoring program to help youth at-risk in our community. However, over the last 14 years, she has used her degree in education plus her background in managing call centers and instructional design to help create programs and build teams to come around the youth once they have been released back into the community. Besides nana and mother, it has been her favorite role, and she hopes to continue building bridges and safety nets that will allow the teens that Reset Mentoring serves to continue to develop, learn and grow into their full potential.

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As part of our podcast series on Voice, Marc interviews Lindsay to discuss the process for young adults to find their voice, how religion and education systems have helped or hindered that journey, and if there is such a thing as the voice of God.

This is part 2 of 2. If you missed part 1, find it here.

The entire interview is available on YouTube!

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As part of our podcast series on Voice, Marc interviews Lindsay to discuss the process for young adults to find their voice, how religion and education systems have helped or hindered that journey, and if there is such a thing as the voice of God.

This is part 1 of 2.

OR you can watch the entire interview now on YouTube!

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When I was in college I had to take a few Religion courses to meet the requirements of my university. In one course I wrote a paper about the teachings in the New Testament related to the rapture, which is the idea that Christ-followers (believers) are going to suddenly be transferred from earth to heaven at the Second Coming of Jesus. As a young Christian, the rapture was presented to me as a fact. My assignment was not to judge its validity as a doctrine but more so to argue for or against the biblical claims related to it. I don’t remember many of the details, but I do recall the difficulty in reaching a conclusion. Decades later I don’t feel any more confident in understanding what the Bible teaches about this topic.

I have, though, learned two important points since my “baby Christian” days. One, ideas around rapture theology, dispensationalism, and end-time prophecies are fairly new in terms of church history. Many of the popular claims about how Jesus will return or how the world will end have surfaced within the past 200 years! Two, certain end-time (aka. eschatological) doctrines have been significantly instrumental in national policy and world affairs to a degree I never realized. 

There are two outstanding podcast episodes (Part 1) (Part 2) from The Holy Post that cover this topic well through interviews with Daniel Hummel. 

Coincidentally, I recently finished reading The Delusion of Crowds by William J. Bernstein.1 Bernstein writes (p. 238):

“To get a ground-level sense of America’s current cultural polarization, watch Left Behind, a B-movie starring Nicolas Cage as airline pilot Rayford Steele. On a flight from New York to London, Steele’s plane suffers the inexplicable disappearance of dozens of passengers and a collision with an apparently pilotless airliner and is then improbably guided by Steele’s daughter to a fiery emergency landing on a stretch of abandoned highway.

The film, which chaotically shifts between scenes of mayhem in Steele’s aircraft and on the ground, neatly separates its viewers into two groups: those who find the plot line bizarre and kick themselves for watching it, and those who consider it an entertaining version of a story as familiar as Ocean’s Eleven or Casablanca.

Nowhere is the nation’s cultural divide more noticeable than that cleaved by dispensationalism: To one side lie those to whom it supplies the very real prospect of salvation from a fearsome Tribulation and eternal damnation; and to the other side it seems a belief system that, to the extent they’re aware of it at all, echoes the incoherent jumble of Left Behind.

As you can infer, Bernstein is critical of dispensationalism2 and the Left Behind series, and for good reason. Coincidentally, although this perspective had become, and continues to be, wildly popular among many mainstream evangelicals in the latter half of the 20th century, it is almost universally dismissed by scholars and seminaries. The negative effect of this end-times obsession has raised confusion, fear, and deception to fever pitches, which fits the theme of Bernstein’s book of mass hysteria resulting from crazy teachings.

Bernstein briefly chronicles the contribution of Robert Anderson in the late 19th century because of its foundational influence on 20th-century prophecies among dispensationalists. Anderson’s work, Bernstein contends, can be seen as the basis for many predictions from people like Jerry Falwell, Hal Lindsey, and Tim LaHaye. As many others have done, Anderson drew from his interpretations of the Old Testament book of Daniel (chapters 8-9) to create a timeline with quite fanciful calculations for events in the late 1800s. (p. 205-207)

Hal Lindsey perpetuated the idea of the world ending by 1988 because of his interpretation of Matthew 24:34, thinking that “these things” will happen within a generation of the 1948 establishment of Israel. (p. 248) Lindsey took the end-time prophecy of dispensationalism to the masses with his book, The Late Great Planet Earth. It was the best-selling non-fiction book of the entire decade of the 1970s, so much so that the Mutual Insurance Company of New York began to offer policies that would pay off left-behind beneficiaries of raptured policy owners. (p. 250)

The Moral Majority, founded by Jerry Falwell and Paul Weyrich, “burst onto the national scene with their opposition to abortion and gay rights, determination to ‘clean up’ television and the movies, and fervent support for the state of Israel.” (p. 253) At the same time, other influential factors included the late Pat Robertson’s 700 Club, Christian Zionism, and the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ).

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Christian Zionism supports a return of Jews to the Holy Land, and the rights of the nation-state of Israel as formed in 1948, and sees these things as necessary fulfillment of Biblical prophecy. So, for many Christian Zionists, what happens with Israel is inextricably linked to end-time predictions. More specifically, as Bernstein points out, “A small piece of land, the site of the Temple Mount, takes center stage in many eschatological theories among Jews, Christians, and Muslims” (p. 218-219). 

I am a novice when it comes to these theories of end-times prophecy and apocalyptic literature so I won’t try to explain them any further here. I leave that to the experts like Hummel. What I do want to reiterate is just how much Bernstein and Hummel and others have reinforced my concern with the way Christian doctrines are presented to children and youth. Because of our misguided attempts to be faithful to the gospel, we make up stuff about heaven, hell, the rapture, and how the world will end. We scare a lot of people at a young age or turn a lot of people off to God altogether. We major in what we don’t know (how things will end) and dismiss what we do know (Jesus says His followers will be known by their love.) to get people “saved.”

The focus on what if over what is presents enough of a problem, but we have made things worse by hitching all of this bad theology to politics. Some people are deceived into thinking only one political party has this all figured out. They think it is worth fighting for and anyone who believes differently or even doubts it, is an infidel.

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This post is largely for my own brain to process this information. It is complex and I am not the best at making perfect sense of it all. But I will end by contending that we are better off teaching our children to see the needs and people around them here and now and focus their energy on these things. I may not know how the world will end or what exactly happens to a person after they die, but I do know that Jesus clearly taught and commanded us to love. 

What does all of this have to do with how we teach and raise the next generation? Quite a bit, actually. See, modern evangelicalism has run with this theme of getting people to heaven after they die as the prime objective of the Christian faith. More than anything else, they present this as the top reason for knowing and following Jesus.

As I write in my book, “I submit we would be better off, as would our children, if we spent more time on what is right before our eyes in this life than on the unknowns of the afterlife.” It is with humility that I acknowledge I, and really we, know almost nothing about what happens to us after this life. The late Dallas Willard wrote, “The damage done to our practical faith in Christ…by our confusing heaven with a place in a distance space…is incalculable.”

Knowing that our concept of heaven is a source of great hope for many people, professing Christians or not, I don’t enjoy giving this caution. But to be honest, we need to resist obsession with the afterlife as an escape from this life. Not everything about believing in God comes down to getting our ticket punched to go to heaven when we die. There is real work God is doing in and through His creation here and now in this life.

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When I was in college I had to take a few Religion courses to meet the requirements of my university. In one course I wrote a paper about the teachings in the New Testament related to the rapture, which is the idea that Christ-followers (believers) are going to suddenly be transferred from earth to heaven at the Second Coming of Jesus. As a young Christian, the rapture was presented to me as a fact. My assignment was not to judge its validity as a doctrine but more so to argue for or against the biblical claims related to it. I don’t remember many of the details, but I do recall the difficulty in reaching a conclusion. Decades later I don’t feel any more confident in understanding what the Bible teaches about this topic.

I have, though, learned two important points since my “baby Christian” days. One, ideas around rapture theology, dispensationalism, and end-time prophecies are fairly new in terms of church history. Many of the popular claims about how Jesus will return or how the world will end have surfaced within the past 200 years! Two, certain end-time (aka. eschatological) doctrines have been significantly instrumental in national policy and world affairs to a degree I never realized. 

There are two outstanding podcast episodes (Part 1) (Part 2) from The Holy Post that cover this topic well through interviews with Daniel Hummel. 

Coincidentally, I recently finished reading The Delusion of Crowds by William J. Bernstein. Bernstein writes (p. 238):

“To get a ground-level sense of America’s current cultural polarization, watch Left Behind, a B-movie starring Nicolas Cage as airline pilot Rayford Steele. On a flight from New York to London, Steele’s plane suffers the inexplicable disappearance of dozens of passengers and a collision with an apparently pilotless airliner and is then improbably guided by Steele’s daughter to a fiery emergency landing on a stretch of abandoned highway.

The film, which chaotically shifts between scenes of mayhem in Steele’s aircraft and on the ground, neatly separates its viewers into two groups: those who find the plot line bizarre and kick themselves for watching it, and those who consider it an entertaining version of a story as familiar as Ocean’s Eleven or Casablanca.

Nowhere is the nation’s cultural divide more noticeable than that cleaved by dispensationalism: To one side lie those to whom it supplies the very real prospect of salvation from a fearsome Tribulation and eternal damnation; and to the other side it seems a belief system that, to the extent they’re aware of it at all, echoes the incoherent jumble of Left Behind.

As you can infer, Bernstein is critical of dispensationalism and the Left Behind series, and for good reason. Coincidentally, although this perspective had become, and continues to be, wildly popular among many mainstream evangelicals in the latter half of the 20th century, it is almost universally dismissed by scholars and seminaries. The negative effect of this end-times obsession has raised confusion, fear, and deception to fever pitches, which fits the theme of Bernstein’s book of mass hysteria resulting from crazy teachings.

Thank you for reading Closer Than You Think. This post is public so feel free to share it.

Bernstein briefly chronicles the contribution of Robert Anderson in the late 19th century because of its foundational influence on 20th-century prophecies among dispensationalists. Anderson’s work, Bernstein contends, can be seen as the basis for many predictions from people like Jerry Falwell, Hal Lindsey, and Tim LaHaye. As many others have done, Anderson drew from his interpretations of the Old Testament book of Daniel (chapters 8-9) to create a timeline with quite fanciful calculations for events in the late 1800s. (p. 205-207)

Hal Lindsey perpetuated the idea of the world ending by 1988 because of his interpretation of Matthew 24:34, thinking that “these things” will happen within a generation of the 1948 establishment of Israel. (p. 248) Lindsey took the end-time prophecy of dispensationalism to the masses with his book, The Late Great Planet Earth. It was the best-selling non-fiction book of the entire decade of the 1970s, so much so that the Mutual Insurance Company of New York began to offer policies that would pay off left-behind beneficiaries of raptured policy owners. (p. 250)

The Moral Majority, founded by Jerry Falwell and Paul Weyrich, “burst onto the national scene with their opposition to abortion and gay rights, determination to ‘clean up’ television and the movies, and fervent support for the state of Israel.” (p. 253) At the same time, other influential factors included the late Pat Robertson’s 700 Club, Christian Zionism, and the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ).

Christian Zionism supports a return of Jews to the Holy Land, and the rights of the nation-state of Israel as formed in 1948, and sees these things as necessary fulfillment of Biblical prophecy. So, for many Christian Zionists, what happens with Israel is inextricably linked to end-time predictions. More specifically, as Bernstein points out, “A small piece of land, the site of the Temple Mount, takes center stage in many eschatological theories among Jews, Christians, and Muslims” (p. 218-219). 

**Note for full disclosure: Currently, I fall into the camp that sees the rebuilding of the Temple as unnecessary since Jesus Christ came and finished the work of the sacrificial system once and for all. His followers became the living temple since His Spirit is in, and among, us wherever we are. God is not bound to a location or structure. 

I am a novice when it comes to these theories of end-times prophecy and apocalyptic literature so I won’t try to explain them any further here. I leave that to the experts like Hummel. What I do want to reiterate is just how much Bernstein and Hummel and others have reinforced my concern with the way Christian doctrines are presented to children and youth. Because of our misguided attempts to be faithful to the gospel, we make up stuff about heaven, hell, the rapture, and how the world will end. We scare a lot of people at a young age or turn a lot of people off to God altogether. We major in what we don’t know (how things will end) and dismiss what we do know (Jesus says His followers will be known by their love.) to get people “saved.”

The focus on what if over what is presents enough of a problem, but we have made things worse by hitching all of this bad theology to politics. Some people are deceived into thinking only one political party has this all figured out. They think it is worth fighting for and anyone who believes differently or even doubts it, is an infidel.

This post is largely for my own brain to process this information. It is complex and I am not the best at making perfect sense of it all. But I will end by contending that we are better off teaching our children to see the needs and people around them here and now and focus their energy on these things. I may not know how the world will end or what exactly happens to a person after they die, but I do know that Jesus clearly taught and commanded us to love. 

What does all of this have to do with how we teach and raise the next generation? Quite a bit, actually. See, modern evangelicalism has run with this theme of getting people to heaven after they die as the prime objective of the Christian faith. More than anything else, they present this as the top reason for knowing and following Jesus.

As I write in my book, “I submit we would be better off, as would our children, if we spent more time on what is right before our eyes in this life than on the unknowns of the afterlife.” It is with humility that I acknowledge I, and really we, know almost nothing about what happens to us after this life. The late Dallas Willard wrote, “The damage done to our practical faith in Christ…by our confusing heaven with a place in a distance space…is incalculable.”

Knowing that our concept of heaven is a source of great hope for many people, professing Christians or not, I don’t enjoy giving this caution. But to be honest, we need to resist obsession with the afterlife as an escape from this life. Not everything about believing in God comes down to getting our ticket punched to go to heaven when we die. There is real work God is doing in and through His creation here and now in this life.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.ctyt.net/subscribe

Originally published June 2023

The Rule of Life podcast team with Practicing the Way has done it again. They released another series on a spiritual practice, fasting, that has challenged me. The episodes are filled with a good combination of information and inspiration. Here is my reflection and summary of my learning.

First of all, simply put, fasting is not eating. It is going without food. Many times, people will say they are “fasting” from shopping or electronics or some other activity. That may be a form of abstaining, but it is not fasting. Only in the West do we seem to confuse this point when we really know better. If your doctor tells you to fast before a procedure, then we all know they mean to not eat. You don’t show up at the hospital the morning of your operation and say, “I am prepared. I fasted from Facebook last night.” This basic and fundamental point is important because fasting only makes sense if we have a theology of the body.

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Fasting introduces “whole body hungering” for God. The body is not just a shell. We are holistic beings and our bodies are temples for the Holy Spirit. In the West, we tend to overemphasize our mind in discipleship and spiritual formation (I am totally guilty of this!), but the harder reality to comprehend is that we also receive spiritual formation through our body, including our stomach specifically. This realization aligns with my understanding of a person as a whole and an integrated being. We are spiritual, physical, intellectual, emotional, and social. (I often use the acronym S.P.I.E.S. to highlight this point.) The stomach, with its physical needs and desires, ties these dimensions together.

I cannot skip over the fact that fasting is often unpleasant. Fasting humbles me precisely because it is physically challenging and exposes my limitations and weaknesses. As I offer my whole self to God through fasting, He can change me in a variety of ways. For example, He uses my regular biological processes, such as digestion and ketosis, to impact me. After a substantial time of fasting, autophagy begins to take place within the body. This word literally means “self-eating.” Autophagy is the body’s way of cleaning out damaged cells and reusing old cell parts. It is basically our “cellular recycling system.”

Having said that, a Hebraic understanding may mean that fasting is more of an affliction of the soul than the body. While a fast has physical benefits, our focus is on spiritual renewal to grow in holiness. God can show mercy to us while meeting the brokenness in our bodies. Fasting may humble us as it brings us to the end of ourselves in a very real way. It weans us off of the pleasure principle (“Just do what feels good at the moment.”), reveals and reorders our desires, and draws on God’s power.

Next, fasting has been a common Christian practice throughout church history. It was the norm for the earliest believers to fast twice a week. (This was something I had never heard before!) Fasting unites me with others. One of the mindset shifts for me, while listening to this series, is that fasting can be much more communal than individual when I recognize the spiritual way it bonds me to others. There are literally Christ-followers around the globe fasting right now. This is true on any given day at any given moment. Fasting is a way to have a shared practice with believers who may be very diverse. It reminds me that I am part of a universal church body. Not only that, I am also building on the legacy of Christians who have gone before me. I am critical of so much of church history because of its misguided pursuit of power and domination in many cases, but the connection to previous generations of the church through fasting fosters humility.

Third, and most importantly, fasting can help me unite with God. This is the ultimate objective. Fasting and prayer must be understood in terms of relationship and formation, not transaction. Fasting is not “performed” to get God to do something for us as much as sharing ourselves with God to allow Him to do something IN us. It provides a tangible opportunity to have our inner being shaped by Him. What nourishment can my soul find in Him while my body is deprived of physical nourishment? When my flesh is in submission to my will by the grace and power of the Holy Spirit, then is it possible for my spirit to be more alert and attuned to God’s will?

It is also important to consider a gentle warning here. Fasting is not about trying to work this out for oneself. Dr. Cook cautioned about the use of fasting to gain control of something in one’s life, almost as a form of self-help. Fasting is not a tool to make you a better you apart from Christ.

Fasting is another way, similar to prayer and worship, for us to partner with God so that He can protect and provide for us in ways that only He can. He can fight the enemy on our behalf. We can find forgiveness for sin and strength for holiness. This is especially true when we are down. In our society, when we have something go wrong, even the death of a loved one, we tend to turn to food for comfort. Strangely, the body often does not even want or need food while grieving. How many times does a person express they have no appetite while suffering, yet we usually hold up food as the answer? Scot McKnight is referenced in the podcast for making the point that “body grief” is one of the purest examples of what fasting is all about. Sometimes the first step in making something right is to lament or feel sorrow in the body. 

Finally, fasting gives us a chance to uphold justice. Tyler Staton was interviewed in the last portion of the series. Tyler discussed the relationship between fasting and justice. “Justice is not abstract and cannot be done from a distance,” he said. Justice is not independent of righteousness. In fact, this raises another Bible translation issue for us because often the same original word is used for both justice and righteousness. (I have even heard before that entire cultural groups, like Hispanics and Latinos, have the word translated “justice” in their Bibles because they already have a social, communal perspective of life. Holy living is expressed through relationships. At the same time, many English Bibles translate the word “righteousness” because it carries more of an individualistic - between me and God - kind of feel to it. We overemphasize a personal, private relationship with God as the avenue for holiness.) The truth is justice flows from intimacy with Christ and it requires proximity to others.

In the end, I see the need to explore and practice fasting more, not because it will earn points with God. God will not love me any more or less if I fast. What I see, though, is that I can pray with my body. I can open myself to discovering more of what God can do and already is doing. I can heighten my sensitivity to the spiritual realm. And honestly, I need to re-evaluate my relationship with food anyway. I know it could be healthier and now I recognize it as a “trailhead,” an invitation to walk down a path of deeper exploration and healing.

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I had the wonderful opportunity to talk to Seth and Melanie Studley about my book, You Don’t Have To Do That.

LISTEN TO THE INTERVIEW HERE.

The Studleys have a fantastic marriage and family podcast and coaching business. They cover all kinds of topics, including communication, sex, emotional regulation, faith, and much more. What I appreciate about their podcast is that they are honest, raw, and real about these topics. They often have guests on who are experts in their fields and can give the audience wise advice and additional tips and resources.

I reached out to them and they were kind enough to invite me on their show to discuss my book. I recommend listening to it over watching it because, as the saying goes, I have a face for radio. The truth is I was so intent on concentrating on what they were saying and trying to listen carefully.

Anyway, many thanks to the Studleys! I encourage people to check out their website and podcast, including returning to their first season.

Please share your likes, comments, and even critical feedback on my conversation with them. I would love to hear from you!

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Originally published April 2023

Quick question: Which of the following well-known 5-letter names means the most to the church?

Trump?

Biden?

Jesus?

I think we all agree on what the answer should be, but how do we determine what the answer actually is?

How about this? Pastors, do your congregations seem to talk and post more about either of the first two names on social media, especially regarding their hope, or fear, for the future?

Parents, would your children say that it matters more to their faith what Trump does, what Biden does, or what Jesus does, based on what you are teaching and modeling to them?

Please note I am not saying that people should not have opinions about politics, and it is perfectly fine to discuss and share your perspectives. What I am asking is if your faith is preoccupied with the activity of one of these five-letter names.

Because, honestly, to me, it seems the media and society are latched on to how the “church” feels about, and follows, T-R-U-M-P or B-I-D-E-N more than J-E-S-U-S. Professing Christians feed this twisted and warped view of the faith when they make judgments about whether someone is a Christian or not by their loyalty to Trump or Biden. It’s crazy! The loyalty to Jesus is what matters, and that is not demonstrated in voting patterns, but in the fruit of the Spirit.

So, here is an idea. A challenge. What if we went one week, one month, or any set period of time, tying evidence of sincere Christian faith only to how we relate to Jesus, and not to Trump or Biden?

Some argue that standing up for Trump or Biden is a sign of devotion because someone is willing to take a stand for truth. They contend it is a demonstration of their conviction to Christian ideals or Biblical principles. But we know better!

We know what Jesus taught. Love for enemies is what makes a believer different. The fruit of the Spirit, being patient and kind and gentle, toward others, is the way to live by Christ. Showing the next generation that love drives out fear, and that our eternal destiny is not tied to what we mark on a ballot, could be a place to start.

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Pastor, parent, churchgoer…perhaps this week make it a point to spend more time reading, reflecting, listening, praying, and talking about Jesus than those other five-letter names.

Maybe you will learn something and draw closer to Jesus.

Maybe you will see and treat your opponents differently.

Maybe you will be less fearful and combative and stressed.

Maybe it’s worth a try.

J

E

S

U

S

Five letters. That’s all.

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Originally published March 2023

I am leery of pulling random Scriptures out of context and seeing how they can be applied to our situation today, something I used to do ALL THE TIME! However, I also believe there are exceptional verses in the Bible that apply almost perfectly in any context at any time in any place. In my mind, the first part of Hebrews 12 is one such passage. I still approach it here for the message it sent 2000 years ago, but I believe it is one we can run with (pun intended) today just as well.

The preceding chapter, Hebrews 11, weaves a thread through the historical record of incredible faith. Examples like Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Joseph, Moses, Rahab, and countless martyrs fill chapter 11. “All of these people we have mentioned received God’s approval because of their faith” (verse 39). 

Hebrews 12 starts by reminding the hearers and readers from so long ago that they are surrounded by this great cloud of witnesses who have finished their race. Thus, the new direction, “let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus.”

The opening verses of this chapter seem to deal with a great effort or struggle on our part. To run in 12:1 is to strive with full effort. The “race” marked out for us could easily be translated as “conflict” or “fight.” It says we need perseverance, which is patient endurance. In other words, get ready to go at it and be in it for a long time.

The only way to endure is to fix our eyes on Jesus. The verb is aphorao, which means to look away from all else and focus one’s gaze on one thing. That one thing is actually one Person. He is the pioneer, the originator, the founder, and the perfecter, the finisher, of our faith. He starts it and completes it while carving out a path and authoring our story on the path. It is remarkable how active He is in the process.

Our job in the race is to focus solely on Him, to consider Him (as verse 3 puts it). The idea comes from a Greek word analogizomai, which means to “think upon intently.” The practice described by this word is that of moving through a thought process to reach a conclusion. It involves repeated nuanced reflection that advances up to new levels of truth.

I appreciate that Hebrews 12 is yet another illustration of the active role God plays in our spiritual formation. Even a passage that seems, on the surface, to be all about our effort, is one more example of how the New Testament doubles down on this idea that we are actually just along for the ride and Jesus is in the driver’s seat. Just like so many other analogies, such as the Vine and the branches, the two trees in the Garden of Eden, the Potter and the clay, the Spirit being like wind, and many more, we discover God is in control and we are not.

There is no list of rules to follow. There is no checklist to complete. There are no religious duties to fulfill. We are to remain in Him. We are to respond to Love. As He leads. As He lives.

Originally published March 2023

From the About section of the Rule of Life podcast, “The Rule of Life podcast is designed to guide you in arranging your everyday life around being with and becoming like Jesus.”1 It is hosted by John Mark Comer and produced by Practicing the Way.

What I want to do here is process “out loud” with you what I am learning, thinking, and feeling as a result of this podcast series, especially since I wrote a book entitled You Don’t Have To Do That, which contains a section that specifically addresses the Sabbath. So, right off the bat, let me be upfront. I fall more into the camp that sees Sabbath as a type for which Christ is the antitype. In other words, the Sabbath was instructive about the need for rest and worship, which is now fulfilled through a relationship with Jesus. Basically, He has become our Sabbath. For the sake of time and space, I will leave it at that oversimplification. At the same time, I have thoroughly enjoyed the Rule of Life podcast series on the significance of practicing Sabbath in our lives, and I don’t believe these two positions are at odds.

A quick tangent, for whatever reason, not long after publishing my book, which essentially contends one does not have to rely on religious structures for spiritual nourishment, I found myself longing for some type of liturgical practice. I began watching Lutheran church services online for a while and enjoyed the peace and meaning within the liturgy and routines. I liked the designation of time for prayer, reflection, corporate and responsive readings of Scripture, etc. My wife was questioning if I had lost my mind since I had just spent years writing a book that said no one had to do these kinds of things at the direction of a pastor in an organized church. But this is what I need people to understand. You do NOT have to do them! There is the freedom to walk away at any point. However, they can still serve as great vehicles for focusing on and receiving God’s love and guidance. Like conversation starters or date nights in a marriage, they are practical tools that may help nurture the relationship.

So, with that disclaimer, let’s get back to Sabbath and the Rule of Life podcast. One of the things I love about their teaching is how it is grounded in a larger framework of our need to rest in Christ. They state, “It is important that we work out our salvation from rest, not for it.” They directly confront the fact that we are addicted to hurry. It caused me to reflect on the extent to which I am tempted to think that if I can accomplish more I can achieve peace. The reality is I am already enough and I can receive peace through Sabbath rest. Time with God can liberate me from being desperate for everyone around me to think highly of me. We are invited to see our identity as something God creates and then entrusts us with. Rest becomes the occasion I can find joyful acceptance of my place in the universe. Resting in God is beneficial to us on many levels.

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Turning to Sabbath, in particular, the hosts of the podcast remind us Sabbath is a gift before it is a command. Whether we have to keep it or not, the practice of Sabbath is still helpful. Engaging in rest in Christ is always abundantly necessary. It literally helps us remain in Christ, our one job, and prepares us for eternity. Sabbath is the claim that we can live into our eternal rest right now. Sabbath reminds us that we are not meant to hold it all together but that Christ holds everything together. It can be another opportunity to be happy and grateful for the ways God intentionally invites us into relationship with Him. The practice of Sabbath is another opportunity to build the capacity for surrender.

The podcast does a nice job of addressing real-life barriers to Sabbath. The hosts categorize fear of missing out (FOMO) as resistance against Sabbath. Our desire for a constant digital connection to know what other people are doing drives us away from Sabbath. It is important for us to determine what are the demands of what it means to be fulfilled and where we are going to find that fulfillment. The show wrestles with the fact that internal restlessness will often surface when trying to rest in God. Rather than reject it, we can befriend it and learn what it is telling us. It may very well be exposing a need only God can meet. Often, discontentment is the only way to healing. Pain is so often the way in.

I especially appreciate how they had this discussion without bringing in any guilt or shame. In fact, they made it clear the Sabbath discussion does not have to be framed in terms of good and evil. Productivity is not inherently bad. There was genuine transparency about the shared human experience. The truth for me, and all of us, is that once I actually intentionally stop and rest, difficult feelings may emerge. Sadness or anger can be a real part of the Sabbath. If that happens, they give the best advice: FEEL it! Don’t avoid it. Go ahead and meet the feelings face-to-face, knowing that no feeling is final. Sabbath is a safe place to sit with emotions.

While developing a theology of rest, we are simultaneously developing a theology of work. Just as rest is necessary, work is necessary. Work is love made visible. Work is healthier when it is moved from consumerism to contribution. Contributing to society in order to bring healing and wholeness in partnership with Christ is hard work.

In the end, after reflecting on all the power available to us when we rest in the presence of God, we don’t want to forget that God is joyful. Do you still recognize God in that light? Do I see that Jesus can be fun to hang out with? Some of the time will be heavy and some of it will be light. God will know which is beneficial and our job is to simply receive and respond accordingly. Yet again, for any of this to make sense, we come full circle back to the question I always say is the main one to ask: Who is Jesus to you? If he is not someone with whom you would enjoy spending time, then none of this other stuff about Sabbath or rest really matters. 

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To my friends in church leadership roles (with an open invitation for others to eavesdrop),

You will unlikely come out with the same amount of explicit hubris as Alec Baldwin’s character, Dr. Jed Hill, in the 1993 movie, Malice, as he exclaimed, “I am God.” Nonetheless, the tendency toward a Messianic complex among clergy is real so it doesn’t hurt to run a self-diagnostic of your own mental and spiritual health every now and then. Be aware of the subtle signs you may be thinking more highly of yourself than you ought. The delusion does not suddenly appear one morning with you waking up and announcing, “I’ve realized I am the savior of the world.” Though it can come that dramatically, as history demonstrates with a number of insane cult leaders, more often it will slowly creep into your words and actions as you try to guide others along a spiritual path. I believe there are gradual rationalizations centered on false (bad) beliefs that we can watch out for to avoid this trap.

Bad Belief #1: “I have been called to shepherd the flock.”

It is easy to convince ourselves that we are responsible for protecting the sheep from the big bad wolf. If we can stand in the pulpit and preach the truth and expose heresy, then we can validate ourselves as good shepherds who are keeping the good things in and the bad things out. Those things may start out as love, joy, peace, and the such on the good side, with envy, strife, self-centeredness, and other vices on the bad side. But it usually isn’t long before the “things” become people. We begin to promote certain humans and warn against others, as in lifting up some individuals and tearing down others. We advise people who they should or should not fellowship with. A pastor can take it upon himself to be the judge of who qualifies to be in and out of the flock. Before we know it, our claim is, “The poor innocent sheep need me to be safe from the threats out there. I am faithfully doing my job to protect them as God called me to do.”

This perspective is troublesome for a couple of reasons. First, we forget our battles are not against “flesh and blood” but against evil powers. We let the very forces we should be warring against take root in our minds so that we see enemies all around us, especially if they hold different beliefs or political persuasions. Our preaching about right and wrong devolves into a list of types of people to attract or avoid. We become Pharisees.

Second, Jesus clarifies there is only one shepherd and He is it! Furthermore, He declares that He will manage the gate to the sheep pen and control who gets in and out. In fact, not only will He manage the gate; He lets it be known He will just go ahead and be the gate. The shepherding role is sufficiently filled by the perfect Person. Imposters need not apply. Anyone else, even while preaching behind a pulpit, who tries to take over or get into the sheep pen in other ways is a thief intent on destruction. Jesus is quite plain about this topic. He is direct and forthright.

Bad Belief #2: “I have been called to build the church.”

With the best of intentions and full sincerity, a pastor can sense a call to plant a church or construct a building in order to expand the kingdom of God. To be intentional about congregating with others is not what I have in mind here; it is perfectly appropriate to assemble as the body of Christ. When the objective shifts to requesting funds or allegiance so that we can “build a church” it becomes a problem.

Since we commonly define “church” wrongly from the outset, we mistakenly pursue the wrong mission. We don’t need to build church buildings to expand the kingdom of God any more than we need to build movie theaters or shopping malls or bowling alleys, but we are confused by thinking of church as a place to meet or an event to hold. We like to view church this way because we can control the parameters. We can decide when and where and who and how it happens. However, once we rightly accept more accurate descriptions of church as empowered people on mission or followers of Jesus in action or the called-out community of faith, we recognize the parameters are set by God. It requires divine animation for the church to be a reality of this kind.

Again, Jesus is crystal clear. He said He will build His church. Hell won’t overcome His church because it is universal, eternal, and Spirit-led. You may have a skill set to organize people around a common mission or hold an audience for a time with your words, and there is no fault in using your skills, but take caution in proclaiming a call to build the church since God already called His Son to do so. As far as I can tell from the Bible, God hung up the phone afterward. He does not have a church-planting directory of pastors’ names on standby in case His Son doesn’t come through.

Bad Belief #3: “I have been called to produce spiritual growth.”

Personally, I admit this one has been my Achilles’ heel. I was convinced that I could coordinate and program spiritual growth similar to academic progress. I treated spiritual growth as a curriculum endeavor. It didn’t help that I had a master’s degree in Christian education by completing coursework or that we called our teaching time “Sunday School”!

There is a strong temptation to develop discipleship models that keep people coming back for more. By offering Sunday School classes, youth group events, seminars, workshops, and programs, we ensure interested participants become dependent upon us for their instruction. I never saw a problem with this because I felt called to do it. I thought God wanted some people to have this role as an occupation. My error, which is so common in Western Christianity, is that I equated knowledge with spiritual growth. The end game was an accumulation of facts and doctrines. I often hear this goal in the way people talk about heaven. “I can’t wait to get to heaven to ask God…” or “When I get to heaven I will finally know why…” or “We won’t have all of the answers until we get to heaven.” We are so obsessed with knowing that we have substituted perfect knowledge for salvation. So many people describe this aspect of heaven, which I don’t even find in the Bible, and virtually never mention the true prize of heaven, eternally being in the presence of Christ. Still, we chase knowledge rather than rest in God. I honestly don’t hear much difference in the way many Christians talk about heaven and the original temptation to know more in the garden of Eden. The serpent presented knowledge as more valuable than life, and I don’t see that we have progressed much past that sales pitch, “You will be like God.”

Church leader, listen carefully, I was wrong in thinking that I could coordinate and program anyone else’s spiritual growth. I was wrong in thinking that by filling people’s heads with knowledge I was making disciples.

This is tricky because knowing more and learning facts absolutely can be, and should be, part of the fundamental process for genuine discipleship. Repentance, after all, is a change of mind, a new way of thinking. There is certainly a cognitive component to holistic growth, but the knowledge necessary for spiritual maturity does not come by listening to sermons and attending classes without having heavy doses of social interaction, dialogue, and service alongside others. Even if we wanted to reduce spiritual instruction to an academic task, brain science has made it clear that people need to be engaged physically, emotionally, and socially to learn and retain information. The brain filters incoming stimuli by their usefulness to our survival first, then their emotional impact and relational relevance.

What we find in scripture is a pattern of ordinary, untrained people being qualified for ministry and evangelism, not by attending classes and programs, but by an encounter with Jesus and receiving His Spirit.1

Furthermore, the ultimate game-changer for me came in the discovery that the gospel is a foolish message, a truth that only makes sense when illuminated by the Spirit. When we reduce the transmission of the gospel to merely human efforts through our education and training programs, we miss the single most essential element of the gospel. The revelation of the gospel is spiritual. Contrary to our normal way of thinking, the Bible teaches us that the gospel cannot be understood by the human mind. It takes supernatural revelation. It is SPIRIT-ual, only revealed and received by God’s Spirit. In fact, it is so senseless without the Spirit that it causes people to stumble. Only by the Spirit does the foolishness of the gospel transform into salvation. There is no other way for Christ crucified to become majestic Power.2

Despite this truth, I spent countless hours in higher education and ministerial courses studying the gospel in preparation to adequately explain it to others. Think about that. I was invested in a process to humanly orchestrate the very thing God said we could not and should not do!

I can relate to the pastor who is totally bewildered while reading this article. What, then, are we supposed to do? Are we not to teach others? There is definitely still a place and need for guidance and instruction. (I concede that is exactly what I am doing here.) The difference is that it comes from side-by-side journeying together, not from a stage. It does not happen with one person being active in front of a passive crowd. The teaching that has any chance of leading to true discipleship constantly points to Christ and is relentlessly reproducible. It is not hindered by hours tucked away in sermon preparation. It is serendipitous because it happens in real-life situations. Ultimately, spiritual growth is transferred by loving. The curriculum is love and the instructional delivery method is love. The unit test is not reciting facts or displaying knowledge; it is the display of the fruit of the Spirit.

Conclusion

The clergy-laity distinction is a dubious one on its face. It does not exist in the kingdom of God, but it is the basis of just about everything in the organized Christian religion. The truth is God does not need or want individual human superstars to shepherd flocks or plant churches or be in charge of the spiritual growth of other people. Each of these activities is reserved for the Spirit of God.

There is much pressure within some church circles for a pastor to be a strong leader in these areas, but don’t give in to it. Resist the urge to boost your ego and let God do His job. If you already see that you have made mistakes based on the bad beliefs above, then it is a simple fix. “Lord, forgive me. You can have Your job back. I will simply follow you moving forward. Amen.”

But I recognize the problem goes deeper. I have lived it. The truth is these myths have led to an identity crisis for Christian leaders. Frankly, it is an ego boost to answer Jesus' call rather than my own. I get to be needed, save people, bring healing, preach the truth, be the head, shepherd the flock, etc. It is humbling to embrace the truth that I, like any other follower of Christ, am meant to be a body part, not the head. I am meant to be a sheep, not a shepherd.

An honest self-assessment is difficult. This goes for parents, mentors, teachers, and all caregivers, as well as pastors and youth leaders. The question is not what will happen to our children without us. The correct question is, What will happen to them without Jesus?

It is time to be FREE. Yes, pastor, you are created and called…just not to be Jesus. You are not called to save, heal, or judge anyone. You are to remain in Jesus, NOT replace Him.

Originally posted December 2022

My stepdad, Glenn Gates, died one year ago today. Christmas, last year, was obviously different. Every other holiday this year has been the first without him. The most recent was Thanksgiving. At that meal we shared some thoughts, prayed, and lit a candle to remind us of his light, also giving us a symbolic way to have him present. The other thing we did, which I think would have pleased him the most, was enjoyed the food and fellowship.

This Christmas will be different again if that makes any sense.

It will be happy at times, and it will be hard at times.

I know that is true every day for my mom. Not just holidays.

This year was the first college football season without Glenn. He was a huge college football fan, and for whatever reason, an LSU fan. He liked the Longhorns too. A few times this fall I have reached for my phone to send him a quick text message during one of the close, hard-fought Saturday battles on the gridiron as we had a habit of doing while he was alive. In fact, his last messages on my phone were about college football.

My mother, and indirectly, the rest of us, have found a Godsend in the form of a program called GriefShare. From the introduction in the GriefShare workbook, “GriefShare is a network of thousands of grief recovery support groups meeting around the world. GriefShare is a program with direction and purpose. With GriefShare you will learn how to walk the journey of grief and be supported on the way. It is a place where grieving people find healing and hope.”

I attended a few sessions of the program and purchased the materials (workbook and access to videos). The program works with a combination of expert video instruction, including mental health professionals and spiritual leaders, small group discussions, and personal reflection. The resources are very high quality and the organization of the entire program is excellent!

I am taking a pause from the usual stuff I write about here to simply acknowledge that many people are facing tough losses, and the holiday season exaggerates their pain instead of relieving it. More than that, though, I want to plug GriefShare to let people know there are quality resources out there that also have an emphasis on making sense of God through the process. Christ is such a key figure in our grief journey and being honest with Him as we mourn is something we figure out with the help of others. If you are going through a hard time because of the loss of a loved one, then you may want to consider checking out GriefShare.

In one of our recent small, simple church group meetings, as we are studying a book about anger, we discussed the realization of knowing that God, for whatever reason, has chosen to be One who does not always remove our pain from us. In fact, He rarely does so. Instead, He prefers to draw close to us and walk with us through the pain. We learn so much more about Him and ourselves that way. Pain in this world leaves us with a great deal of mystery, saturated with the unknown and lack of certainty, questioning why so often. Perhaps in a painless world, we would have it all figured out and not wonder or imagine.

I am one who likes to avoid pain. I certainly don’t request it, but I do acknowledge that only in our real world does hope have any meaning and power. In a fictitious world without pain, I can’t imagine I would know anything about love or honor, or grace either.

Tonight, we will gather with family at one of Glenn’s favorite restaurants and celebrate some recent events and accomplishments together while remembering him. We will miss Glenn, but we will also smile and be grateful for the part he played in helping us get to where we are today.

Blessings to you this holiday season!

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If you go online to GotQuestions.org you can find an extensive answer to the question, “What does the Bible say about Christian responsibility?”

Parts of the response found there include the following comments (in bold).1 My thoughts are below (in italics).

• “This, then, is the believer’s responsibility: to stand firm in the faith and give himself completely to the Lord.”

  • One of the primary responsibilities listed is taking a stand.

• “…when our hope in the resurrection is clear and certain, we will have great motivation to be attending to the responsibility we have to ‘always giving ourselves to the work of the Lord’.”

  • We are responsible to give ourselves to the “work of the Lord.” If that is the case, then it is critical that we define what constitutes the “work of the Lord.” It sure would be ideal if Jesus ever came out and did this explicitly and we could find it in the Bible. (Hint, He did, and we will later in this article.)

• “The Bible teaches us that our responsibility as believers is to work uncompromisingly as the Lord has gifted us and leads us in this life. … We are responsible for our money, time, energy, talents, gifts, bodies, minds, and spirits, and we should invest in nothing that does not in some way contribute to the work of the Lord.”

  • What I learn from this answer is that my gifts and talents are a big part of my responsibility.

• “Simply put, our responsibility lies in working for the Lord, whether it is in ‘looking after orphans or widows in distress’ (James 1:27), giving to the hungry, the naked, visiting those in prison (see Matthew 25:35-36), serving in our workplace (see Colossians 3:22), or doing whatever we do (Colossians 3:23).”

  • Many wonderful endeavors are listed here. So, it seems that the theme associated with Christian responsibility is work. The phrase “working for the Lord” is the simple expression of our responsibility according to this answer.

I open with these statements from GotQuestions.org because they are typical of the responses I often hear when people refer to being responsible Christians. It is all about what we must do to remain in good standing. The approach is similar to what you would find in a staff handbook of an organization. Being a good Christian for the Lord is comparable to being a good employee for the company, or so it is made to seem that way.

Is it, though? Are we meant to just take the word responsibility like the rest of the world and lay out a set of DO’s and DON’Ts?

I say an emphatic NO! Taking this usual perspective on what responsibility means in the Christian life misconstrues the gospel and removes the mystery and majesty of God’s love. Our to-do list makes us no different from any other religion or secular job description. That dramatically cheapens the sacrifice of Christ. There has to be a better way to look at Christian responsibility.

Before we do that, though, let’s highlight the main corrective to the GotQuestions.org response. It is not centered on Jesus. Paul’s words are quoted a lot. James is cited. A few of Jesus’s words in Matthew are included. But overall, it is the kind of response you get when one combs through Bible passages looking for phrases that tell people what they should do. It is a logical way to find the answer. It is just not the right way. They attempted to answer the question, “What does the Bible say about Christian responsibility?” The better question is, “What does Jesus say about Christian responsibility?”

This significant shift makes all the difference. Remember, the theme of their answer is that Christian responsibility equates to doing the work of God according to the Bible verses they selected. Well, guess what? There just so happens to be a verse in John 6:29 in which Jesus Himself clarifies, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”

Let’s start any discussion of Christian responsibility with Jesus. Instead of a list of tasks, He tells everyone that the work of God is not many things but one thing. God’s work is to believe in Jesus. To believe in Him is to first believe Him. Trust Him. Take Him at His word. That is the work God has given us.

Still, this question of Christian responsibility is one that does not go away so easily. So, let’s take a crack at it from another angle that still keeps Jesus at the forefront.

It is important to understand responsibility as response-ability. To be responsible is to be response-able. Simply, someone is only being responsible in as much as that person knows how to respond and can do so. You cannot hold someone responsible unless they have been equipped and supported with the knowledge and resources to know how to respond in a given situation. For instance, we cannot hold students responsible for learning in our education systems until we have provided them with effective ways to learn. We must literally teach them how to respond to new teachings. This view of responsibility is true in all kinds of endeavors. A person cannot be expected to respond to a play call in sports, a recipe in the kitchen, or a flat tire on the road without first being equipped for each of these situations. Most of the time, equipping involves modeling and practicing. Then, responsibility can be expected.

So when it comes to this idea of Christian responsibility, we must first ask, To what (or whom) are we responding? The Christian religion prepares people to respond to God's law. Jesus equips people to respond to God’s love. Everything about raising the next generation concerning faith rests upon this distinction.

A response to the law, which we are no longer under, demands that we do. We must know the laws and fear the enforcement of those laws. We must justify ourselves to the lawgiver. God is someone to be appeased. Our duty is to teach others how to follow the laws, as well. In this mindset, the response-able thing to do is teach our children what the Bible says about sin and hell and how to avoid both.

When my daughters were young, we would play all kinds of games, have living room movie nights and “campouts,” dance, pretend, laugh, and read stories. We would imagine we were in an airplane taking off when we left the house in our car. On each occasion, my daughters would simply respond to their father’s love. They had to do nothing but receive the experience. They were free to enjoy the relationship.

The way we train our children to respond to love is the same way we would train a plant to respond to photosynthesis or teach a garden to receive rain. We do not have to convince the plant photosynthesis is necessary. We don’t tell our garden that rainfall is good for it. We do nothing but let it be. The only way there is a problem is if we block the sunlight from the plant over enough time or shield the garden from the rainfall. Likewise, our children are already designed and destined to receive God’s love just by being alive. There is only a problem if we come in with a different doctrine or gospel other than Christ that interrupts God’s pure love. When we tell our children what they must do to be good Christians, we put a canopy over the garden. We introduce a lie that obstructs the whole truth from getting through.

Could this be why Jesus did not keep telling us to make children like adults, but rather directed adults, on multiple occasions, to become like little children if they wanted to enter and understand the kingdom of God? Before my daughters were able to experience the fun times I described, each of them was an infant. As their parent, I did all of the work. I held them. I changed them. I fed them. They couldn’t even burp on their own. They had one job. Receive. Receive whatever the father did for them. With them.

This is the picture we can have in mind when we consider the “born again” experience. It is not captured in a declaration of a doctrinal belief. It is not in agreement with all the words of a “sinner’s prayer.” It is that time when we realize our one job in life is to receive the Father’s love, that it is all we are capable of and all we are meant to do. When we realize this state of full dependence, that is the new birth, new life. That is what it means to be born again.

Jesus had a conversation with a religious teacher and explained this point to him. He told him it is impossible to see God’s kingdom without being born again. In John 3, when the man, named Nicodemus, expressed confusion at the idea, Jesus clarified that a person must be born of the Spirit. Then, He described just how out of our control this experience is. “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with anyone born of the Spirit” (John 3:6-8).

Jesus emphasizes that He is the only one qualified to talk about how anything works related to heaven. No one else has been there and no one else can describe how to get to heaven so all of our talk about how to obtain eternal life is foolish. It is a simple matter of making sure everyone knows eternal life is found in believing in Jesus. This conversation is the context for the most quoted verse in the Bible, John 3:16. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”2

Sometimes, you might find it worthwhile to read John 15 while making a list of what God (the Vine) does and what we (the branches) do in the parable. It is remarkable how prevalent the subtle teaching is throughout the New Testament that we are indeed meant to simply remain and receive while God is the force at work. If we are able to respond to that truth, then we have found the heart of Christian responsibility. At the same time, ironically, we find out that most of what we are told is Christian responsibility is quite an irresponsible view of the gospel.

I want to close with an excerpt from the pen of DeVern Fromke, a teacher and author whose ministry spanned much of the 20th century as he traveled to many places around the world. He wrote:

The basic lesson for time or eternity that we as humans are to learn is that we are vessels capable of containing God. The distortion of life that we got as a consequence of the fall makes it appear that life is “activity.” We like to live, to use our minds and wills. But the truth is that the secret of life is not activity, it is receptivity.

God is the invisible Person, the only real Person in the universe. He is the love, the life, the wisdom, the all; but being an invisible Person, He must have a means of manifestation. The whole universe manifests Him and shows forth His glory, but God is still a Person. And you cannot see a person just in light, or in music, or in color. You can see something of him, but you cannot see that he is a person.

So God created persons to express His own Person by them. The basic purpose of human beings therefore should be to become the vessels that contain Him. That means our permanent habit has to become receptivity rather than activity.

Love always makes it as easy as it can. God is love, and He has made humanity as easy as He can. If life is not easy for us, it is because we are not quite right yet. And the easiest possible function a person can conceive of is the function of receptivity. You just receive what is poured on you; you just take it. Nothing else.

If you look at nature, you see that a tree does not produce one leaf by activity. Vegetation receives. It has sunlight and moisture poured on it. What it receives it uses, but activity is only a product of receptivity. Thus did I begin to learn the basic secret of life.3

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