Health and Wealth

Health and wealth gospel - this is a theology that believes that if a person has enough "faith" they will be healthy and wealthy. They will experience no sickness. If a person gets sick that is because they do not have enough faith.

I believe this is terrible theology. A theology that is not faithful to who God has revealed himself to be, to the bible, or to reality. It is really simply the American Dream packaged in Christian language.
I am not upset that people believe this. No one has perfect theology.

But what really gets me upset is when people walk into a hospital and tell the sick people that they are there because they have a lack of "faith". If they would just have a bit more "faith" then they would be totally healthy.
I have friends who have lost their children to sickness. People have actually told them that their child would not have died if they had more faith. So now not only are they dealing with unbelievable grief and pain but they get some guilt.
People struggling with mental illness are told they will be totally healthy if they have more faith. At times these people are dealing with thoughts of self-hate and loathing. They believe they are worthless and useless. And now they are told God is punishing because they do not have enough of the magic stuff called faith.
I know people who have died of cancer. They were told before they died that if they had more faith then they would get better. So in the last days of their life, instead of preparing to meet to their loving saviour, they are invited to feel inadequate. And to live in fear. After all if you do not have enough faith for God to heal you physically do you really have enough faith to be saved spiritually, to go to heaven?

This is spiritual abuse.
These people are hurting and in deep pain. They a vulnerable and desperate. And now they get wounded by Christians.

Oh, I know some people are going to say they are just preaching the bible. Trying to offer hope. They will cherry pick a couple of verses and say they are being biblical. Taking the bible seriously.
If you want I can debate those verses with you.
However let me ask a question. Before you walk in and heap guilt, shame, and fear on to vulnerable and sick people, have you truly researched the verses you are going to share? Do you know the context in which these verses are written? If Jesus spoke those words (did Jesus even say them?) what is the whole conversation about? What is that chapter of the bible about? What are the surrounding chapters about? The book in which that verse is found what is its main theme? Have you read scholars who disagree with you (where and why are they wrong)? What does the word faith actually mean? Are there biblical scholars who agree with that definition?
This is a lot of work. Of course if you are not willing to do this hard work, why would you think it is acceptable to march in and dish out guilt, shame and fear to the vulnerable?

You want to believe the health and wealth gospel - fine but keep it to yourself.
Enough is enough. I am tired of seeing people being spiritually abused.

Weeping for the city

Jesus weeps as he enters the city of Jerusalem for the last time (Luke 19:41-44).
He is not weeping for himself. Though it is evident that he knows that he moving to the end of his life. He weeps for the city. The city that is about to turn on him and crucify him.
He weeps because Jerusalem is headed for destruction. Because the city failed to "recognize the time of God's coming".

How does one weep for a city today?

I want to be like Jesus. This means learning to weep for the city where I live.
Weeping implies great compassion. This is my first prayer. "Holy Spirit stir up compassion for my town."
Destruction was coming on Jerusalem, which why Jesus wept. Is destruction coming on my city? I cannot see anything like what happened to Jerusalem (being invade by an army) happening to Altona. But people's lives and families are being destroyed. Destroyed through addictions, abuse, selfishness... Am I weeping because of those things?
Jerusalem failed to recognize the movement of God. Is my town failing to see what God is doing (or wants to do)? Can I see how the Spirit is being stifled? Am I weeping because people are blind to God's Spirit?

Passion

What increases our passion for God?

Many different things. 

However some of things that we believe stir up passion only arouse guilt and shame (anyone interested in hearing a sermon on hell, fire and brimstone?).

Personally I find passion in praising and giving thanks in a community.

Last night at a prayer meeting it was good to lift up requests to God in a community, it was even good to visit. But what stirred my heart was when we gave thanks and praised God. 

In the circle, for around 10 minutes, there was non-stop praise. 

I felt my excitement build as I listened as people thank God for who he is and what he has done.

Faith and Prayer

Jesus tells a parable about the need to pray (Luke 18:1-8).

Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. Luke 18:1

After the parable Jesus says,

However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth? Luke 18:8

The question was not "will he find people praying on the earth?"
We begin with prayer and end with faith.

This lead me to ask some other questions:

• Is a lack of prayer evidence of a lack of faith? Little prayer = little faith
• If that is true - the question of "how much faith do I have?" is answered by the question "how much do I pray?"

Meditation – what is it?

So far I have discussed some of the fears that I have had regarding meditation.  I have also discussed quieting my mind.
Meditation is more than simply quieting my mind.  It is a filling of it.

Now to be honest I am struggling in learning how to meditate.  But here are a couple of ways that I have tried to meditate – there may be better ways to do this – I am open to suggestions.

First, meditation is linked with prayer and memorization.  I memorize a passage and then discuss what it means with Jesus.  I am not reading other books or internet sites.  Sitting and praying.  Trying to talk with Jesus.  Exploring and pondering what this means when it comes to the different parts of my life: my marriage or parenting or pastoring or friendships…

Second, is to just ponder one reality of God.  Letting it sink into my being.  For example meditating on his love.  Just sitting attempting to take in the fact that I am the beloved of God.

Meditation – empty your mind?

Is meditation about emptying your mind?
Biblical meditation is more about filling your mind with one thing.

However meditation does involve quieting our minds.  There are some who would object to this claiming that this is just different words for emptying your mind.  But I know that my mind is often chattering. Thinking of the book I am reading, recalling the movie I watched last night, imagining the one I am waiting to come out, reviewing what I need to do today, replaying the conversation that didn’t go so well with my wife, worrying about my kids… and on and on it goes.  Chattering almost non-stop.
Sometimes I just need to quiet my mind so that I can listen better to Jesus.  Quiet my mind so that I can actually focus on what I am reading in the Bible.  Quiet my mind so I can meditate.

A couple of things that I have done that help quiet my mind.
Focus on my breathing for a couple of minutes.
Repeat a phrase.  One I use “Abba, I belong to you”.
When thoughts come in acknowledge my thoughts and then put them aside (sometimes even write them on note pad so I don’t have to worry about forgetting).

Meditation – an invitation for the devil

Fear.
The way I responded to meditation most of my life.  What was I afraid of?

Empty your mind.  I was taught that this was the essence of meditation.
Empty your mind was to invite the devil in.  If I empty my mind a demon was lurking ready to pounce and take control.

Really?

I don’t see any biblical evidence for that.
This whole idea assumes that a Christian can “accidentally” be possessed by a demon.  And it would be “accidental”.  Meditating, even emptying your mind, is not actually violating any commandment.  There is no biblical command saying to not empty your mind.  Also it is not actually saying “Devil please take possession of me.”
So why was I taught this?
Not 100% sure.  Most likely two things were at play.  There was nervousness that meditation could lead us to base our faith on whatever we imagine instead of the bible.  Secondly a nervousness that if we started to meditate, since our church had no resources to teach us, we would go to eastern religions for guidance, ending up mixing our beliefs with theirs.

For the record I do not think that the essence of biblical meditation is emptying your mind.  I will talk about that in another post.  

Meditation – why are we afraid?

Blessed is the one

    who does not walk in step with the wicked

or stand in the way that sinners take

    or sit in the company of mockers,

but whose delight is in the law of the LORD,

    and who meditates on his law day and night.

Psalm 1:1-2

I grew up being afraid of meditation.
There was always this sense of forbidding when it came to meditation. It was taboo.
Certainly everyone would say they believed in meditation.  After all it is in the bible.  But it was hardly mentioned.  When it was, it was in a hushed whispered way.  Not too loudly or clearly.  And move on to another topic quickly.  I learned to study the bible, memorize it, read it but never meditate on it.
Even today the word “meditate” sets off alarm bells for many people.  To say or encourage people to “meditate” is seen as liberal or emergent or New Age.
But there it sits in the bible.

Why are we afraid?

Prayer affects God

Regarding prayer from Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy:

God's "response" to our prayers is not a charade.  He does not pretend that he is answering our prayer when he is only doing what he was going to do anyway.  Our requests really do make a difference in what God does or does not do.  The idea that everything would happen exactly as it does regardless of whether we pray or not is a specter that haunts the minds of many who sincerely profess belief in God.  It makes prayer psychologically impossible, replacing it with dead ritual at best. (page 244)

prayer is a matter of coming to a person other than oneself and asking that they do something that one cannot do oneself.  It is coming to One who has repeatedly invaded human history and continues to do so.  It is intelligently working with him to accomplish ends that fulfill his purposes in creation and in fostering human life upon the earth for a short while.  (page 249)

Trespasses or Debts

The Lord's prayer:

"forgive us our trespasses as we have forgiven those who trespass against us"
Or
"forgive us our debts as we have forgiven our debtors"

Trespasses or debts.

To trespass means that we have violated the rights of another person.
The most common use of this term is to go on to someone's land without permission, to violate their private property.
To ask for forgiveness for our trespasses is to ask to be forgiven for the way that we have wronged others.  To forgive people for their trespasses is to forgive people for how they have violated our rights.
This is very important, extremely important.

To be in debt means that you owe someone something. 
We could be in debt to someone because we have been bad.  Throwing a brick through someone's window for example.
Of course we can also be in debt for a neutral reason.  I am in debt to the bank, not because I am bad but because they hold the mortgage to my house.
Or we can be in debt to someone because they are good.  When someone helps us we feel that we are in their debt.  Someone helps you move and you feel like you need to pay them back some how.  We become indebted to others because of their goodness.

"forgive us our debts as we have forgiven our debtors"

Stop trying to pay God back for his goodness.  Just accept that he is good and he loves you.  
Bless and encourage people without expecting them to pay you back.  Just bless because you are filled with love.

** Interesting side note: I cannot find an English translation that has trespasses, they all say debts.  As far as I can tell trespasses comes for the book of common prayer put out by the Anglican Church.  I have no idea why it says trespass.

Does God speak?

Hearing God is sometimes difficult.

Why does God not speak more?

These are common feelings and questions.

However

In the book of Jeremiah (25:3-7, 35:14-15) God asks again and again

Why do people not listen to me?  

He speaks - persistently - but people do not listen.

The problem may not be that God is not speaking, it may be that I just do not want to really hear what he is saying.  

Religious traditions

Other people's religious traditions, for most of my life, fit into three categories: interesting and/or irrelevant and/or a hindrance to actual spiritual growth.

As I have grown older I discovered the value in other people's traditions.  Encountering God through other people's traditions has opened me up to a fuller understanding and appreciation of God.  

Right now one of the traditions I am exploring is from the Jesuit monks.  They run a website called "pray as you go".  I have been listening/praying as I have been walking my dog in the mornings.  

Why pray?

Sunday's sermon

The passage for this Sunday's service is: Matthew 7:7-12

Other passages:

Luke 11:9-13

Mark 11:22-25

John 14:12-14

Some questions:

Why right after talking about prayer does Jesus then talk about doing good to the people around us?

Do we really believe that God gives good gifts to his children?

Preaching on the Lord's Prayer

This Sunday I am going to be preaching on the Lord's Prayer:
Matthew 6:7-15

Other passages to read:
Luke 11:1-13

Things to consider:
This prayer is very well known. I grew up saying it every day in school. How deeply does this prayer shape the way that we pray?

Should we pray these very words? Or is that just vain repetition?

A while ago I posted an adaptation of the Lord's prayer

Prayer

Prayer changes me.

Many times in my life I have asked "Why bother praying?" If God already knows what I need why bother asking him for anything? And if God loves me then I certainly don't need to beg him to give me good gifts.
Now we can say that prayer in some mysterious way moves the heart of God or releases God to move in the world. This mystery is tied to our freedom. Now if this is case (which I believe that it is) then why should we pray for something more than once? Why not ask God for something once and then move on?

Prayer is more about relationship with God then about convincing God to do something. I know this. I have taught this. But this morning I was struck deeply with the truth that prayer changes me.

Prayer isn't about me convincing a reluctant God to move. It is about me encountering God. As I encounter God I learn what his desires are for the people I pray for. It is about me falling in love with these people. Prayer creates a revolution in my heart where I become open to God and to people around me.
I have to pray so often for the same people and things because I am in such desperate need of God.

Photo contest and prayer

Every year my wife does the best photos of the year (and you get to vote for your favorite). So swing over to her sight to see a few of glimpses of our life.

Here are a couple links to my favorite online prayer sites:
Sacred Space
Prayer labyrinth

Have a blessed weekend.

Happy New Year!

A prayer for the new year:

Lord God,
in whom I find life, health, and strength
through whose gifts I am clothed and fed,
through whose mercy I have been forgiven and cleansed,
be for me Guide, Strength, Savior, and Lord,
all the days of my life.
I offer my prayers through Christ. Amen.
(From Hymnal: A Worship Book)

Merry Christmas

A prayer for Christmas:

Almighty God, you made this holy night with the brightness of the true Light. Grant that here on earth we may walk in the light of Jesus' presence and in the last day wake to the brightness of his glory; through your only Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
(from the Lutheran Book of Worship)

God speaks

If you wonder if God speaks - read this post that wife just made.
Cindy Street