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Essence of the Core: Means
March 2, 2008 Reverend William ‘Buck’ Day
We are going to turn now to God’s word, a good place to turn. I invite you to follow along; we are going to read two passages, one first out of Luke and then a second out of Matthew. So I invite you to follow along as we read God’s word for us this morning.
Luke 6:43-45 No good tree bears bad fruit nor does a bad tree bear good fruit; for each tree is known by its fruit. Figs are not gathered from thorns, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush. A good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of the evil treasure produces evil.
Matthew 22:36-40 “Teacher, which commandment in the Law is the greatest?” He (He being Jesus) said to them, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And the second one is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the laws of the Prophets.”
This is God’s word for us this morning. So I invite you to join me in prayer.
Mighty and Holy God, We thank you for your word. Lord we ask that your Spirit will be fully present here and that we would hear what you have for us this day. Lord we thank you. We ask it in Christ’s name. Amen.
What I have in front of me is a year-end report from a young guy that I have had the opportunity to watch grow up in Christ, and I wanted to read just the first introductory paragraph from his year-end review. It says this:
Dear Friends and Family, Well it’s been a year since I started full time ministry working with Youth With a Mission. I can’t believe it. It seems like yesterday I was saying my goodbyes. It has been an incredible year. A few weeks back I was sitting underneath an umbrella tree in South Africa, taking some time reflecting on the year and all the ways that I have seen God impacting people’s lives. As I sat there in the cool African shade, I felt incredibly privileged to be a part of it, serving multiple countries on three continents, working with our discipleship training students, leading teams overseas, mentoring students, working with our urban team teaching and speaking home and abroad. The longer I sat underneath the tree the more excited I got about this upcoming year. I love what I am doing. Thanks so much for all of you being a part of it through your prayers and support and without them none of this would be possible. You are changing the world. Thank you. I miss you and hope to see all of you real soon. Karl
Last year Karl was in South Africa, as we heard; he was in Egypt, he was in Russia. He took teams to each of those countries as well as an Urban Ministry in downtown Orlando. Karl is an example of living out the character of Christ in his life and before those that he leads. The thing that you don’t know about Karl is that I knew Karl before he began to work with Youth With a Mission. I knew him when he was in high school. He went to Minnehaha Academy and sadly, like too many Christian kids, his profession didn’t always match his actions. He was involved with partying and drinking and drugs like so many who maybe don’t know Christ. But then I also had the opportunity to watch how God kind of grabbed this guy. He grabbed him and began to mold him into a man who is now living a Christ centered life. He is now producing fruit a hundred fold and I am blessed, I think, to know him. When I read that the first time I started crying, just because I know where he’s been and I know what he is doing now. I’m blessed to know him and call him a brother in Christ right now. He’s living the kind of life that we have been talking about over the last four weeks. He is living that life, hear me when I say this, not because he is traveling around the world, not because of the things that he is doing; but he’s living a Christ centered life because his heart is fully surrendered to God. It is fully centered in who God is and that is what is making Karl so fruitful. So I read that to you this morning because I want to hold him up as an example of what it means to put on the character of Christ. That is what our work has been over this series, the Essence of the Core. We have been talking about spiritual transformation, changing the very core of who we are.
Well, as a result of that we have looked at a vision for transformation. We said our vision is none other than Jesus Christ himself, and taking on his kingdom and living out his kingdom in our world. We have talked about intention a couple weeks ago, making that conscience decision to be obedient to Christ. Now we move onto the last piece, means. How do we bring a solid vision and a good intention to completion? We want to attack that today on a couple different fronts. One we want to attack it on the hows, if you will, the hows of the means. I know that’s a little awkward; but how do we do that? And then we will look at the actual what, what is involved in some of these means to begin to apply this good vision and solid intention. So with that let’s start with the hows, and look at how do we know if we are moving towards Christ centeredness? We set that up a couple weeks ago as this is where we want to be. We want to put Christ at the center of our lives just like Karl. How do we know when we are making progress? The proof of our transformation goes back to our scripture that we just read. Take a look at your fruit. What kind of fruit are you producing in your life?
Galatians 6 is obviously one of those natural starting points, that is called the Fruits of the Spirit in that section. It lays out what, when the Spirit is fully alive in you, what kind of fruit gets produced. But beyond that we can also just look at what’s going on in our lives, what kind of fruit is coming out in our lives as well? It is there then that we overlay that with the great commandments that we read in the second scripture.
Does the fruit that is being produced in our lives increase love for God and increase love for others? That is the litmus test. Or does the fruit that we produce build up God, build up others, build up ourselves? Or is it the other way around, does our fruit tear down God, tear down others, tear down ourselves? That is the measuring stick. That is a measuring stick that they used in that Reveal study we talked about from Willow Creek a couple weeks ago on measuring how we move towards Christ centeredness. What they said was it is a combo platter. That measuring stick of loving God and loving others is a combination of our attitudes as well as our behaviors, and that is what we need to begin to look at in our lives.
Well that kind of gets the ball rolling for the hows, if you will, of the means. What kind of fruit do we bear? Let’s continue then. One of the other things I think we can say about the hows of this means is that it is about whole life training, not trying. Simply trying to exert our will so that we begin to compel ourselves to take on the character of Christ will not work. Just simply willing ourselves to do it will not work, because our actions are the result of an interplay of all the parts of who we are, our spirit which is also our will and our heart. Those three terms are synonymous for the things we are talking about. It is the interplay of the will, our mind, our body, our social context and eventually our soul; and we will talk more about those as we go on with our next series after Easter. But, our actions have all those things in play. So a lot of times our actions come from our will, actually giving in to some of these other areas of our being, overriding our will. So we go “O.K. I’ll do that.” Like I said, that is what we will talk about after Easter in: Transforming the Core. It is about training every area of our lives, those areas I just listed, training every area of our lives to begin to conform to Christ’s character. If you notice, it is training; and training in and of itself infers that this is a learning process. We need to take time to become Christ centered. It is not going to happen overnight. It is a process. It is a process when applied consistently and diligently will produce the kind of results we are talking about that we see in people like Karl and people like I know are in this congregation.
That also then leads into another one of the hows. Because it is a process, because it does take time, give yourself some grace. Give yourself some grace. O.K. Realize that we still have our sinful natures that we continue to battle with. We will continue to battle with them until Christ returns or we die. That is just part of what it means to be human and living in a fallen world. But when we do blow it, as we begin to try to minimize that sinful nature, understand that we are still going to blow it; we are still going to make mistakes. We are still going to catch ourselves with attitudes, and we’ll go, “Awww, Man. That is so self-centered” rather than being Godly centered, or Christ centered. Know that that happens. As we grow in this process and we begin to take on Christ’s character, we will begin to recognize that quicker. We’ll begin to recognize that quicker and we will be able to say, “O.K. Forgive me, Stew.” “Forgive me, God.” “Restore me, God.” We will do that quicker as a result of it as well because we know that it is a process and we are giving ourselves some grace. We understand that we are in process; and, in fact, as we seek to live out that obedience, we will begin to understand and see that we need more of God’s grace, not less. We will need more of God’s grace because we will have a better view of who we truly are. We will begin to see ourselves more as God sees us and we will understand how much farther we still have to go. So give yourself some grace in this process. We are all on this road together.
Another how that fits into this, I think, is that it requires us to be an active participant, not passive. I heard a saying that I think is true here. A gentleman was saying, “You know, we can by accident lose our way from God. That can happen. But we can’t by accident, find our way to God.” It just doesn’t happen that way. We are not going to kind of stumble onto God. We can stumble away from God but we can’t stumble towards God. The meaning is that the process of taking on Christ’s character requires the relentless participation and discipline in applying what we are talking about for growth. As part of that, it is not about direct effort but it is about indirect effort. Don’t let me lose you here, O.K., because that speaks to our last part of this; and, that is, this work needs to be under and in the Holy Spirit. We need to work with the Holy Spirit in this process of taking on Christ’s character.
For many people in the Presbyterian Church even the notion of actually even saying “the Holy Spirit” or talking about it is a revelation. We don’t talk much about the Holy Spirit. We should, but we don’t; and so consequently we don’t know much about the Holy Spirit. We maybe have not taught about it. So we probably haven’t been able to say that, oh, maybe, that was God’s Spirit working here. We aren’t wired that way but it is a process that we can learn. But that is what we need to begin to think about.
The theologian Dale Bruner says of the Holy Spirit, “It is the shy member of the Trinity.” I like that, “the shy member of the Trinity.” It is the shy member of the Trinity because it works only as it is welcomed into a person’s life. It is there, but it has to be welcomed. When it is welcomed, we still need that process of learning how the Holy Spirit speaks to us and being able to understand how the Holy Spirit moves in our lives.
Jesus says in John 6:63 that his “words are Spirit and Life.” And what he means by that is that obedience to Christ’s words will allow us to better hear the Holy Spirit and will help us lead a life more fully in the life of the kingdom – the things we talked about with vision. That’s where part of this direct effort is indirect, because it is about listening and learning from the Holy Spirit as the Holy Spirit guides us and gives us words that will direct us and will conform us. Jesus also said that “the Spirit will lead us into all truth” in John 16. As we become more adept at listening and following the Holy Spirit’s leadings, we become more dependent on the Holy Spirit, as well. We look for the Spirit more. We expect the Spirit to show up and to work and, as a result, be become more grateful when we can point to it and say, “Thank you, Lord. Thank you that your Spirit was here.” So that is kind of the applying of the hows of this thing called the means that we are shooting for. That’s how we apply a good vision and solid intention.
Now let’s move on to the whats then. This is applying that. What do we need to do to begin to work with the Holy Spirit to take on Christ’s character? What are some of the practices, if you will, that will help that happen for us? As we begin to think about this it is not rocket science. What I mean by that is we do not need to recreate the wheel. It is really looking back through history at people who have walked faithfully with Christ. What kind of things have they done to draw them close to Christ? We need then to begin to do that and apply that to our lives consistently and diligently. We are not creating something new here. We are simply taking what has worked in the past and saying, “Let’s be consistent and apply it in our lives as well.” One of those starting points is what might be called spiritual disciplines. Spiritual disciplines typically include things like silence, prayer, fasting, study, worship and solitude. There are lots of very good books that will help us understand what might be considered the classic spiritual disciplines. This is probably one of the classic books around that; it is called A Celebration of Discipline. I think this book is pushing thirty years old now, by Richard Foster. If you have not experienced the classic spiritual disciplines, this would be a great read for you because it walks through those different areas and helps you understand how it works, what it looks like, how it feels, why we do it, some of those kinds of things. Great book for you if you have not read it. Another one, this is called The Spiritual Formation Workbook. It has been put together by some folks, including Richard Foster; it comes out of a Renovaré experience. This is something that could be used in small groups very easily. It walks through some of these classic spiritual disciplines. So as part of your small group if you are looking for something like that, this might be a very good resource for you to do and to talk about it and read about it and try to talk about what that means for our lives. Just a couple resources for you to be aware of around this idea of spiritual disciplines.
Now having said that, let me take just one of those areas and let’s kind of talk about it a little bit. I want to talk about solitude a little bit. Henri Nouwen was a Catholic priest who was very adept at helping people understand and come closer to Christ. Henri Nouwen calls solitude, “the furnace of transformation.” It is in solitude where we can escape the entanglements of society and our false views of ourselves. Solitude, for what we might think it is, is really a place of battle. It is a place of battle. Think about Jesus when he was in the wilderness. He was in the wilderness for how long? 40 days. O.K. good. Just want to be sure you are tracking with me. He was there alone, right. He was facing the temptations of the devil. Talk about a battle – forty days alone facing the evil one with temptations. So if that was Jesus’ battle in solitude, our solitude will be no less of a battle; let’s just put that right up front. O.K. Because when we are in solitude, we encounter our false self and we also face our loving God who offers us Himself as substance for our new self. Catch that? In solitude, God comes to us and lets us take on His character in that process and that’s the new self that begins to emerge out of solitude. Solitude is a place of conversion, not retreat. It is not a retreat time; it is a conversion. It is refining, not retiring. It is simply nothing short than rebirth. Solitude allows us to slow down, to turn towards God, to surrender, and that is what Christ centeredness is; it is about surrendering ourselves to Christ. In the scriptures we hear about how Jesus went alone, before the sun went up, to go and pray with the Lord. He wanted to be alone with the Father. He needed that time of solitude. If Jesus needed that, how much more do we? How much more do we need that kind of solitude? And when you think of solitude, don’t make it a heavy thing. Don’t make it a real burden. I don’t think that’s what Jesus wants for us. But it is about finding a place you won’t be bothered; and maybe it starts with just fifteen minutes to start. Just fifteen minutes, don’t take anything, just try to quiet your mind and focus on Christ. If you are afraid of distractions, maybe you just repeat a verse of praise as a part of that. When you get distracted, because you will, because it is part of that training process, when you realize you are distracted just go, “I am sorry Lord. Let’s get back to this again. Let me come back and focus myself.” Then you refocus yourself and you start over. Solitude, one of the spiritual disciplines for us.
Another one of the whats is the immersion and constant application of scripture in our lives. That’s one of those things that the Reveal study from Willow Creek also showed. As people move from seeking to Christ centeredness, application and involvement and taking in scripture have always been apart of it; that is a key piece for moving us towards Christ centeredness. O.K. And obviously bible study is one of the ways that we normally kind of default to in terms of how to do that. We need to that; we need to study the bible. But I want to give you a couple other ways to begin to think about that. One is reading scripture. Now I know a lot of us, we typically try to read scripture, and we just read to try to either get through it or just reading for information. There are times that we need to do that. But I want to give you another way to begin to think about how we read scripture. I want to encourage you to maybe take a smaller passage of scripture and just read it a little slower. Read it a little slower, read it a couple times, try to put yourself in the situation, whatever the situation is that you’re reading; and, as you do that, begin to say, “God, what do you want to teach me in this. What do you want to show me out of this passage?” It is about listening to what God has for you in this word. It is about listening and learning. Sometimes it is called bible meditation; our class, that we offered on Wednesday nights that we finished a couple weeks ago, was about practicing that experience. It is something that we can do; and I invite you to consider taking a passage of scripture and just kind of living with it in that time when you are alone.
Another way to get scripture into our soul: memorization. Memorization. How many of you have ever attempted to memorize scripture? Raise your hand if you’ve tried to do that. O.K. Good stuff. How many of you can still remember some of the verses you memorized? Take a look folks. Keep your hands up. Take a look. That’s good stuff. That’s how scripture gets from your book into here; that’s a key piece. Lots of ways to do it – you can do it verse by verse; you can do larger passages at a time. Do it with somebody, that makes it more fun; it also makes it more accountability so you work at it a little bit more. So immerse yourself in scripture as another one of the ways we begin to take on the character of Christ.
Another one is to serve. Simply serve. When we serve, it requires us to humble ourselves, to put others and their needs before us. As a rule we don’t like doing that. We don’t like doing that and that is exactly why we need to do it. You know, I was thinking about this image of a blacksmith; and you know a blacksmith takes the iron and he has it in the fire and takes it out and then begins to work on it, molding it into the shape of whatever the blacksmith wants to make. I think that is kind of what serving is. When we serve, we become the iron in Jesus, the blacksmith’s, hands; and, as we serve, Jesus molds us into who he wants us to be. He said, “I came to serve not to be served and I have done this as an example for”, who? Us, “for you,” He said. He humbled himself taking the form of a servant. I have heard in some churches that a prerequisite for leadership in their church is that you have to serve in the church. I don’t mean just serve in any way. I mean you start by setting up chairs; you start by cleaning the bathrooms. What would happen if we asked our leaders to do that here? That’s part of the refining fire of service of taking on Christ’s character?
Another one of the whats is community. Being part of a community, being part of a community of followers of Christ allows us to know each other and to be known by others to a place where we can be accountable to each other. Another one of those key points coming out of the Reveal study is accountability is a huge deal. You grow and you take on more of Christ’s character when you’re held accountable. It is an important part of it; but beyond accountability, it is also about the connections that are built with community. We’ve talked about that here even this last fall. We all want, we all need good friends. That is part of how God has wired us up and that is what community gives us. It is sharing our lives, sharing what’s working in our lives, what’s not working in our lives, letting other people coming around us in our time. Let me also add this. Community is not meant to be closed. When those outside of a community can’t enter into that community, it is not a community at all. It is really just an elitist group at that point. Jesus said “Go and make disciples,” inferring that we are to go and bring people into this community, this life transforming community, sometimes referred to as the new community.
Well there you have it. We have vision, intention, and now we have the means. It is the VIM for Christian spiritual transformation. That is just for step one, folks, just step one. After Easter we will visit the other half. I think the other half is going to be much more difficult, because it is going to be much more applicable in terms of our everyday lives and the things that we do, talking about things like feelings, like thoughts, our social contexts, our bodies. It will be good stuff so I invite back for that as we talk about: Transforming the Core.
Would you pray with me please?
Lord God, Thank you that you show us the path, and that’s what you have done in this series. Lord I ask that we would have the courage to walk it; we would have the courage to surrender ourselves the way Karl did and is doing. Lord shape us into the men and women that you see us to be, that we might bring glory to you, and bring your light to the world. We ask that in your name. Amen.
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