Israel

People tend to associate really closely with certain characters in books or movies.  Certain figures are so much like them that they tend to be wrapped up in the story line, on the edge of their seat waiting for the story to resolve.  For me, Simba was always the character I associated with.  I'm not sure if I've ever watched Lion King and not felt a total connection to him.  It's weird, but he's a ginger and I'm a ginger so it just might make sense.

If we were going to get all intense, which we are, I'd say that I closely associate with characters in the Bible.  Mine is not David, the warrior poet musician who was truly a man after God's heart.  Mine's not Moses or Abraham or any of the famous ones who are renowned for what they've done.  If I'm going to be honest, the character that most fits me is the nation of Israel, not the guy but the nation.

Is that cheating?  If it is, I apologize, but the association remains.  Time after time after time, God's grace covers Israel despite how forgetful they are, turning away from the one who rescued them.  I am Israel.  To prove this, I'm substituting my name for the Israelites in these verses and substituting sin for Egypt

"God looked on [Ben] and was concerned about him." - Exodus 2:25


"The cry of [Ben] has reached me, and I have seen the way [sin] is oppressing him." - Exodus 3:9


God saved me from my sin!  Yay!

"[Ben] did just what the Lord commanded Moses and Aaron." - Exodus 12:50


Yay, God's good, I'm good!

"[Ben} said to them, "If only I had died by the Lord's hand in [sin]!  There I sat around pots of meat and ate all that I wanted, but you have brought me out into this desert to starve me to death." - Exodus 16:3


Wait, wasn't this when I was doing what the Lord commanded?  What happened?  God saved me from my sin, rescued me from my hopelessness, did great miracles, and I'm sitting in freedom wishing that I could be a slave again?  See, I don't realize that freedom didn't mean painlessness or lack of hardship.  My fetters were taken from me, but a desert has been added.  I'm expecting ease and comfort, but God had different plans.  And I want out.


And thus starts the never ending story of God rescuing me from my hopelessness, me turning from Him, me realizing that life without Him sucks, and crying out for Him again.  When do I get it?  I keep turning from the source of all light, I keep turning from the perfect one, because I don't get it!  I'm on fire at one point, and I'm fleeing at the next moment.  But that's not where I'm focusing.  Because even though I keep turning, God's grace keeps receiving me.


"He has remembered his steadfast love and faithfulness to [Ben].  All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God." - Psalm 98:3


"He will redeem [Ben] from all his iniquities." - Psalm 130:8


Bottom line.  My hope rests in Jesus' steadfast love and patience for me, a wayward sinner much like his wayward nation.  


All praises to the one who continues to restore and redeem the wayward; who continues to pour His unfailing love upon His children

Homosexuality and Jesus

LGBT's and the church have had a quite strained relationship in the past.  For some reason, the church has separated people with gay tendencies from those who have other issues.  For this reason, the LGBTQ community has mainly avoided coming in contact with the church, for the church has adopted a spirit of judgementalism and pride over that community.

            I am in no way an expert or an authority on this issue.  I have gay friends, but that doesn’t make me an authority on homosexuality.  That’s like someone saying that they should have a respected word in racial equality because they know black people.  However, you should read this article for the same reason you would read anything that I write: to glean from it the good, true, and wise (in other words, godly), and reject the foolish, prideful, and ignorant (in other words, me).  So my main goal in this is to reject the things coming from my wisdom and knowledge, and to only put on Christ’s love, wisdom, and grace for all of humanity. 

            There is a stigma attached to being gay.  Somehow the church has decided that homosexuality is a worse sin then others, and, in so doing, has rejected people in desperate need of God’s grace.  The ambassadors of Christ’s love have given the world a false message of superiority and pride, and have traded in God’s revolutionary doctrine of grace for a lesser, more-understandable doctrine of decency.  The doctrine of decency says this: that once people become Christians, their problems go away, they no longer struggle with sin, and if they do struggle with sin, their salvation is in question.  The doctrine of decency celebrates God’s grace, but only to an extent.  For once God’s grace seems to be impossible, improbable, or im-palatable, those who follow the doctrine of decency discard the notion of endless grace and a mercy that’s new every morning.  We’ve traded in the gospel of Jesus Christ for something lesser. 

            Here’s the deal though.  The only way to understand fully the doctrine of grace is introspection.  I only understand God’s infinite grace when I look at my own life.  For once I look at my own life, I see God’s mercy.  And when I see God’s mercy in my life, I don’t merely see it at the point of my salvation.  I see it when I’ve tried and failed, stepped and fallen, and run from God.  I see God’s grace in my life when I sin, when I’m too timid to take action, and when I judge other’s for the sins that they’ve committed when I am indeed the worst of sinners.  This is the gospel of grace:  that Jesus stepped from His throne in order to redeem the worst of sinners, to heal the sickest of people, to give grace to the lowest of the low, no strings attached.  God’s grace isn’t a loan, waiting to be paid off.  God’s grace doesn’t come with an I.O.U that demands that He be repaid.

“But Ben,” you’re saying, “I know that God’s grace is great in your life and whatever.  I’ve heard that.  What I want to know is how God’s grace relates to the LGBTQ community.  I want to hear about God’s grace and how it affects lesbian, gay, bi, and transgender people.”

            Here’s the crazy part: that God’s grace and love doesn’t stop at loving and forgiving gay people.  His grace even reaches to the sinners who have rejected loving His children.  His mercy extends to the prideful sinners who have rejected His children and, in so doing, rejected Him.  God’s mercy even covers me.  And I, in humble reverence to God, am allowed to step into His presence, to raise my redeemed hands to the author and perfector of my salvation, side-by-side with the murderers, prideful, gays, lesbians, liars, swindlers, sick, redeemed.  I am invited to share in His glory along with the same people I have neglected.  God isn’t only crazy enough to save gay people and invite them into his presence, He’s crazy enough to save me.  THAT’S THE DOCTRINE OF GRACE!  God didn’t stop at the sick who were crying out for salvation, He even gave grace to the sick guy who thought his sickness was in some way more noble and refined then the others in the hospital!  HE. SAVED. ME.  And if He is the God who loves ME, He is the God who loves EVERYBODY! That’s the true doctrine of grace!

            And so let us approach the throne of God with confidence!  He loved us, so we love Him.  We are redeemed in the eyes of God because He sacrificed His Son in order to save us!  Let us walk, hand-in-hand to the throne room of the Almighty King, knowing that we are forgiven.  And not only forgiven when we have our act together.  Not only forgiven when we’re doing well.  But forgiven even when we have rebelled against our Father.  Let us know grace.

Stories

The author, Donald Miller, states that no movie is about a man who really wants to buy a Volvo.  We aren't lining up in the movie theaters to watch the man gently pat his precious car as tears stream down his face, driving his baby out of the parking lot.  It wouldn't make a good movie.  It would bore us.

Then he goes on to state that while we know that such a plot wouldn't intrigue an audience, many people in the audience are living stories that are very similar to the boring plot line.  We try to save money for a car, or we try really hard to get good grades, or we play video games religiously or we try to get a raise or promotion in our job.  We are living stories that even we would admit wouldn't interest us.  This metaphor gripped me, because in all honesty, I'm living a fairly boring story.

I go to school, in which I get good grades.  I go to church, and enjoy it.  I play piano, and I play it a lot.  I read books, a lot.  I listen to music.  I text.  But where is all this going?  To what end are my actions taking me?  To a decent job with a good family?  To a life of comfort, with no struggles, and not much to fight for?  That's a fine life, but where's the story?  Where's me taking a risk, developing as a character, changing something that needs to change?  Why am I content living a life that wouldn't even excite me if I were watching it as a movie? 

The most popular movie is a movie centralizing in the romance.  A man desperately loves a woman, and he fights through his own flaws and the circumstances that he's in, so that he can woo the woman.  That's all well and good, but I don't want that to be the only indicator of a life well lived.  I don't want to base my life over wooing my love.  I win her love, then what?  "Happily ever after" doesn't really work in reality.  There's conflicts, and jobs, and circumstances, and maybe 50+ more years of living.  When I get married, then what?  My identity has been entirely defined by my spouse, and I have wooed her.  Now what to do with the remainder of my life?  Is it over at the altar, and the rest is the credits?  No, there's something more that I have to be living for,

I think it has something to do with taking risks.  Being daring.  Stepping out of the known and the comfortable and going into the necessary.  Into the unknown, the stuff that changes lives.  Not buying a Volvo, even though that's fine.  Not wooing a woman, even though that's a beautiful thing.  That's not my chief end.  I'm convinced that my job is to let God be known.  I think my job is to love like Jesus loved.  Revolutionary love.  Love that's not dependent on the other person's affections.  But an unconditional love that changes lives and changes circumstances, despite the risk.  It's my time to step out of the audience and into the story line.  It's time for me take a risk and to live a good story, marked by a complete faith in God and in boldness and daring.  The only thing stopping me is me.  So will I step out of the boat, or stay in my comfort?  Will I be changed by love and will I love radically?  To be honest, I don't know.  But I know which way I want to go, but wanting to walk on water and stepping out of the boat are two completely different subjects.  And yet Love drives me, motivates me, and changes me, whenever I come in true contact with it.

"May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you." - 1 Thessalonians 3:12

If Salvation Came From Working Hard

If salvation came from working hard,
From fighting well, and standing guard,
From covering flaws and hiding sins,
And acting like you're fine within.

If joy was found in leaps and bounds,
Past the one who slinks and frowns,
Past the many needing crowds,
To the ones who've got life figured out.

If Christ came to heal the well,
The ones who have no pain to tell,
The ones who never left at all,
Who don't know the scars of when you fall.

There would be no hope for me,
Crying out from broken knees,
Salvation comes from pain and hurt,
But the One's who died but left the dirt.

In His Shadow

I find rest in the shadow of Your wings,
In the wake of Your strength, in the presence of the King.
I find rest in the shadow of Your wings,
when I finally come home from my many wanderings.

I find comfort in knowing that I'm Yours,
In knowing that You love me when I'm covered in my sores.
I find comfort in knowing that I'm Yours,
I'm home in your arms when it rains, when it pours.

I find peace from the cross, where You died.
The cross where You bled, the cross where You cried.
I find peace from the cross where You died,
When I have nothing else, in it's shadow I will hide.

Why do I embrace the cros, when really I should hate it?
Embrace the same place in which God's glory appeared faded?
Why do I embrace the cross, when really I should hate it?
Because the grave that saves has always stayed, quite amazingly vacant.

So I will rejoice in the One who has blessed
Me with everything I need, comfort, peace, and rest.
Despite my insufficiencies, I always will attest,
to His affinity for healing, when all else seems messed.

Truth

Truth is,
you are more than just polluted,
you are more than unworthy,
you are more than just dirty.
You are not your past,
you are not your sin,
your time has not passed,
you're not where you've been.
You're more than your mistakes,
you're more than fallen,
you're more than people's thoughts,
you are more than your heart ache,
you are more than a heart that's darkened,
you are worthy, for you've been bought.
Bought, at an exorbitant price,
bought, because of exorbitant love,
bought, because you are much more,
than what lies will whisper.
For you have the love of Christ,
you have the love of,
the One who knows your
past, but is the builder
of your future, and will
speak life into your veins,
for He will not abandon
you. He fills,
the earth with rain,
cares for his children, His plan is not random.
In Him is your worth,
in Him is your value,
so rise from the dirt,
for the Lord will have you.
You have freedom, you're not frozen,
You are cherished, you are chosen,
for God so loved the earth.

Prodigal

Whine, complain, beg, and ask
Leave, squander, spend, and laugh
Saturated on sin til the stomach is full,
For I am the prodigal.

Abject, gloomy, dark, and bleak,
Shattered, broken, despondent, weak.
Humiliated, hopeless, hungry, alone
The only road now is the road home.

Fallen, destroyed, down, dirty.
Jaded, tired, weary, unworthy.
Shoulder's slouched, head down,
Guilty with my father now.

Seen, pursued, held, hugged,
Cherished, precious, treasured, loved.
Head still bowed, but slowly coming,
Seen by my Father, and He comes running.

Mercy, grace, sinner forgiven.
Restored, refreshed, welcomed, living.
Eat with my Father til my stomach is full,
For He loves the prodigal.