To Pursue or Not Pursue

What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith; but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at that law. Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as though it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone, just as it is written, "BEHOLD, I LAY IN ZION A STONE OF STUMBLING AND A ROCK OF OFFENSE, AND HE WHO BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED." (Romans 9:30-33)

These statements, like many others in this chapter, produce some intense questions in my mind that I ask God to explain to me. I find that when I face my questions that want to arise out of my uneasiness instead of looking for quick pat canned answers that the results are much more enriching.

The surface reading of these verses seem to somewhat imply again that maybe God is arbitrary like so many claim Him to be based on their reading of this chapter. But what I am starting to see more clearly here is a good example of the difference between living from the heart or living focused on the externals in a left-brain religion. Even in my own experience I have noticed that many of the people who feel genuine and real to me (a spirit-perceived thing) are often not necessarily very religious. Of course I have grown up in a culture where that is immediately labeled as dangerous and suspicious, but I now realize that much of that thinking comes from a fear-based religion and is not in harmony with the Spirit of God's kingdom.

The real children of God, as Paul makes quite clear earlier in this chapter, are not defined by the group or family they belong to but by their internal relationship and response to the voice of God in their soul. And the external results of listening to those inner promptings will often look very different than the prescribed external performances that religious people demand to be seen in the life. Here Paul is once again stepping on the toes of prejudice of all religious people in stating openly that those who are found to have “righteousness” – whatever that is – are not necessarily those who appear to be the most religious. Because what we have been trained to view as correct external behavior and religious correctness is riddled with subtle deceptions that keep us from seeing people the way God sees them.

As I look at these verses some semantic questions come up as usual for me to explore. I notice that both descriptions here – the ones describing Gentiles and Jews – talk about pursuing. But the Gentiles do not pursue and yet they actually get results that the Jews, who do pursue, were working very hard to achieve but fail to enjoy. This is another good example of God's upside-down kingdom according to the way we view things. But in fact it is our perspective that is actually upside-down which makes us only think that God's ways are seemingly reversed. It is our own paradigms that have to be changed and our own assumptions and prejudices that need to be released before we can begin to enjoy the synchronization with God and His people that we were designed to enjoy.

Another question that arises again for me relates to the real definition of the word “righteousness”. This has been a lifelong question that refuses to be satisfied easily. There are far too many simplistic and confusing explanations out there about this word and I insist on keeping my mind open to understand more clearly what the Bible really means when it uses this word. It has been one of the most confusing and almost obscure words for me all of my life partly because, I suspect, it has been abused so badly and particularly because the living examples of people who supposedly demonstrated it in their lives produced such mixed messages to the right brain.

Looking at these verses with my formula-happy left brain (which is not always a counter-productive exercise) I notice that there are certain ingredients in both of these descriptions but that show up in different ways in each “equation”. There is the element of “pursuit”. Then there is the results of that pursuit, though the word is different for each which I find very significant. Maybe that is a description of the outcome of the formula. Then there is the elements of “righteousness” and “faith”. I notice that there is an extra ingredient in one of the equations – “law” and “works”. What that extra element seems to result in is the production of something called a “stumbling stone” which prevents them from fully grasping the very thing they are working so hard to get. By implication it is stated that they experience the emotion of “disappointment” as a result.

So how do all of these pieces fit together? Well, I am again out of time, but if you would like to comment or participate feel welcome to join me in my journey through Romans.

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Real Sin of Sodom

What was the real sin of Sodom?

Most people's immediate reaction when the word Sodom is mentioned is to assume that the sin they were destroyed over was homosexuality. In fact, that belief is so pervasive and long-standing that the word Sodomite is used to describe a homosexual. But what does the Bible say – not what our assumptions have been?

I was a bit surprised as I compiled the following list from perusing through many of the verses that refer to Sodom throughout the Bible.

Hypocrisy – lots of religion, pleasant religion, but not connecting with God.

Committing of adultery and walking in falsehood (adultery meaning more than just physical).

Not valuing what is really sacred.

Becoming cruel.

Immature leaders who attack the righteous and the mature.

Symbolic Sodom loathed her husband and children.

Lack of hospitality.

Arrogance, abundant food and careless ease, but she did not help the poor and needy.

Those who have despised the oath by breaking the covenant.

Seared conscience – are not bothered by other's sin.

Failing to care for the widow, orphan and stranger.

Indulging in gross immorality and going after strange flesh.

By dreaming, defiling the flesh, rejecting authority, and reviling angelic majesties.

It is rather interesting that very little of the Bible's descriptions of the problems of Sodom and the surrounding cities have to do with homosexuality, even though that is almost exclusively what we associate with it today. I think this is strong evidence of another major blind spot in Christianity in this area. It is so popular to bash homosexuals and “Sodomites” today in Christian circles but it looks to me like most of the sins that God found so offensive in Sodom are sins that are quite overlooked or minimized in the minds and lives of most Christians.

It is just as Isaiah said previously: "Unless the Lord Almighty had left us descendants, we would have become like Sodom, we would have been like Gomorrah." (Romans 9:29 NIV)

It is just like the schemes of Satan to deceive us into thinking that if we are not homosexual then we are not in danger of the judgments that fell on Sodom and Gomorrah. While we quietly support or join the obnoxious voices of self-righteous critics who loudly denounce “homos” and “queers”, doing everything in their power to heap shame and condemnation on them, it will be found in the light of heaven that those who join the accuser in his spirit of condemnation are in reality many times more guilty of the real sins that shut down the party in Sodom.

This statement comes in the context of addressing religious prejudices and pride that blind people to the truth about what it means to be righteous and the truth about how God views people. If we want to experience the joy of real righteousness and live a life of faith and intimacy with the heart of God, we will have to take seriously the messages of warning about the real sins of Sodom and not hide behind ignorant complacency or pretentious piety.

If one takes the time to review the original story of Sodom and the surrounding culture with a new paradigm of truth, it will be seen that the spirit of inhospitality, selfishness and living for self-gratification at the expense of others was far more central to the problems of Sodom than was the outward symptoms of homosexuality. Romans 1 makes it clear that homosexuality is simply a symptom of suppressing the truth about God, not a root cause in and of itself. And if we are really honest, all of us – and particularly Christians – have suppressed a great deal of truth about God. It may be that our resultant symptoms look quite different than those we condemn, much more like those described in chapter 2. But most things we focus on as being “sin” are really symptoms of sin. For sin at its essence is clinging to lies about our loving heavenly Father who created us to live in vital and intimate connection with His heart and in unselfish harmony with each other. When we abandon that life-giving relationship in favor of independence from our only Source of life we begin to experience more and more of the symptoms that are commonly viewed as sin.

But keeping our attention focused on trying to suppress, manipulate, avoid or regulate symptoms does little to nothing to heal the cause of those symptoms. The people of Sodom had rejected that vital connection with God even though they lived amidst some of the most luxurious blessings of God on the face of the whole planet.

In looking at a map of that region I am confident that before the upheaval of Sodom's destruction that the Jordan river flowed all the way to the Red Sea and that now-desert landscape was then rich and luxuriant with the most productive land in all the earth. Genesis 13:10 states that at that time the valley through there was well watered and like the garden of the Lord. I would suppose that this refers to the Garden of Eden or something similar. In any case, it was almost completely opposite of anything seen there today.

After the destruction of Sodom and the surrounding territories, which I believe was at least partially an eruption of some kind of volcanic activity, the natural flow of the Jordon was cut off, the surrounding countryside was ruined from all the acidic elements spewed up from the eruption and the following years produced what is now the Dead Sea and the arid, barren landscapes that dominate that region.

What is the message in Romans 9:29? What is the resemblance that we would have to them if it were not for the “seed” or remnant that the Almighty has left us? Is it the results of the destruction of those cities that we would look like or is it the culture and problems and way of thinking and living that allowed that destruction to take place?

What is the “seed” or “remnant” that God has left us? What is the important lessons that we need to learn from the warnings of Sodom? Why did Paul place this quotation at this place in the flow of his letter to the Romans?

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Taking Heed to My Spirit

As I am going through some of the familiar emotions and experiences that are somewhat unique to holidays I am trying to be more observant as to what is going on inside myself and learn how to better respond to typically triggering situations. I am hoping that maybe I am maturing enough and have learned enough about how to act like myself to maybe be able to have a different response and potentially different outcomes this year than what usually happens. That is not to say that there is not enormous pressure to react and fall into the same rut and routine and role that has been ingrained in my family for many years. Many of the same triggers and assumptions are still in place and unfortunately still have a great deal of influence inside of me. But I do not want to go on being a pawn in the hands of the false gods that have ruled inside of me for so many decades. I want freedom to become a reality enough that it becomes attractive to others who observe a difference in my attitude and actions.

Today's reading from My Utmost was a perfect fit for my current circumstances right now and one that I need to maybe even frame and hang on my wall where I could read it quite regularly. It addresses probably the weakest area of my life that I struggle with and that God has been working to shore up and repair for many years – my generational inheritance of a negative spirit and a fault-finding, critical view of others.

Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us: for we are exceedingly filled with contempt. Psalm 123:3.

The thing of which we have to beware is not so much damage to our belief in God as damage to our Christian temper. “Therefore take heed to thy spirit, that ye deal not treacherously.” The temper of mind is tremendous in its effects, it is the enemy that penetrates right into the soul and distracts the mind from God. There are certain tempers of mind in which we never dare indulge; if we do, we find they have distracted us from faith in God, and until we get back to the quiet mood before God, our faith in Him is nil, and our confidence in the flesh and in human ingenuity is the thing that rules.

Beware of “the cares of this world,” because they are the things that produce a wrong temper of soul. It is extraordinary what an enormous power there is in simple things to distract our attention from God. Refuse to be swamped with the cares of this life.

Another thing that distracts us is the lust of vindication. St. Augustine prayed—‘O Lord, deliver me from this lust of always vindicating myself.’ That temper of mind destroys the soul’s faith in God. ‘I must explain myself; I must get people to understand.’ Our Lord never explained anything; He left mistakes to correct themselves.

When we discern that people are not going on spiritually and allow the discernment to turn to criticism, we block our way to God. God never gives us discernment in order that we may criticize, but that we may intercede.

Chambers, Oswald: My Utmost for His Highest : Selections for the Year. Grand Rapids, MI : Discovery House Publishers, 1993, c1935, S. November 23 (emphasis mine)

As I read this my mind immediately connected with an observation that became clear to me yesterday that is more evident when people get together for holidays. I have observed that when there is extended time together (or even alone sometimes) when there is little to do and it seems we are simply waiting for the “big event” to happen, like a big meal or opening presents or..., that the down-time creates a sense of uneasiness, boredom and a feeling of irritation begins to grow inside that becomes an atmosphere that is ripe for increased conflict between loved ones. This is harder to notice because the external reasoning for getting together is ostensibly to share more love and affection for one another through the traditions and routines of a holiday. But ironically the holidays that we suppose are going to enrich our relationships too often become flash points of unresolved tension and opportunities for new misunderstandings to create dissension and pain in our relationships.

This aspect about holidays has led me over the years to almost dread them myself. On the one hand I deeply crave time together with those I want to deepen my love with but at the same time this repeated experience of potential conflict and pain makes me afraid. Some people's solution to this problem is to fill the time with all sorts of planned activities so that there is reduced time for conflict. That may work to some extent and may even be helpful to a point, but it also can be a means of trying to control those around us against their will or be a means of filling the time with lots of shallow externals that allow us to hide from the deeper issues and fail to truly deepen our bonds of affection.

When I read today's Utmost I realized that this is one of those “tempers of mind” that distracts us from God. His Spirit is present during these times to mediate and bring about reconciliation, which is the special gift that God wants us to experience if we will pay attention to the condition of our spirit and ask for His intervention. I long for deeper internal bonds of love with my family and those God is bringing into my life. I am tired of being a source of pain and negative feelings to those around me. I am tired of this heavy weight of instant fault-noticing that my mind has been wired to use in viewing others. I want a different outlook renewed in the image of heaven that notices the good things about others first, instead of after strong effort and struggle. I want to have a humble, forgiving, accepting, caring spirit that feels natural instead of feeling like I have to force myself to think that way.

So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:17-21 NRSV)

God, I choose to cooperate with this work of Yours in me. Make Your work of reconciliation more clear in my mind and fill me with a spirit of gratitude and appreciation for who You really are and what You are doing. Help me to live in Christ and demonstrate more openly the effects of Your reconciliation in my life and spirit and relationships. Teach me how to be a reconciler myself drawing others to Your magnetic love for all of us.

Only the Remnant

What, if any, is the problem with believing that God is arbitrary?

Some of us object to the idea that God “uses” some people to be the “bad guy” and seemingly forces them to fill the role of being the counterpart to make Him look good. But do we have the same problem when it comes to the next part where it appears that He arbitrarily accepts people to be His children who were not considered the “favored ones” by His “chosen people” on earth?

Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, "THOUGH THE NUMBER OF THE SONS OF ISRAEL BE LIKE THE SAND OF THE SEA, IT IS THE REMNANT THAT WILL BE SAVED; FOR THE LORD WILL EXECUTE HIS WORD ON THE EARTH, THOROUGHLY AND QUICKLY." (Romans 9:27-28)

The Bible explicitly states repeatedly that only a remnant will be saved. This idea of a remnant is very appealing to many small groups of people who wish to style themselves as the remnant and arrange any number of proof texts to support that claim, some more convincingly than others. How can we know if our claims of being the true remnant are any more valid than the next group? How can we be so certain that we are not victims of our own intense desire to the favored ones of God while deceiving ourselves into believing that very thing in the process?

Self-deception is so insidious because it is so imperceptible. When a I am self-deceived I will have an extremely hard time coming to realize it because all my lines of reasoning and thinking is geared toward defending my position. So if most of the information coming into my mind is employed in defending my claim that my select group is the remnant and all conflicting data is filtered out or rationalized away, it becomes nearly impossible for me to ever admit that maybe I am not all that I claim to be.

I believe that this is where the real problem becomes exposed, where I am not learning to live from my heart but am only living an intellectual religion, thriving on ever-increasing knowledge about God and the Bible but failing to engage my heart and emotions and passionately seeking for a deeper intimacy in a dynamic love affair with Jesus.

For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God. (Romans 2:28, 29 NAS95)

Not as if we were able by ourselves to do anything for which we might take the credit; but our power comes from God; Who has made us able to be servants of a new agreement; not of the letter, but of the Spirit: for the letter gives death, but the Spirit gives life. (2 Corinthians 3:5-6 BBE)

It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. (John 6:63 NRSV)

The concept of remnant is in contrast to the idea of strength by numbers. As humans we naturally gravitate toward the idea that when an increasing number of us agree about something or some system of belief then we must be right. Even when we claim to not go agree with that mentality it still infects our thinking anyway. We feel more and more confident as our church swells in numbers while at the same time criticizing other churches that grow faster than ours. We want to believe that we are right, that God is on our side and that our beliefs are correct in contrast to everyone else who disagrees with us.

God reveals that only a small number of people will make up the group that will be “the chosen”, receive salvation and live in harmony with His requirements. But it seems that the majority of religious people believe that they are included in that number and this thinking often causes them to look upon those outside their select group with some degree of contempt. How can we feel so smug that our spin on Scripture is the right one and that our claim to being the chosen remnant is the one that is described in the Bible? What is the real basis for our assurance that we need not question our identity as the remnant? Are we willing to challenge our assumptions and examine our motives and take another closer look at what the Bible is really saying about this “remnant”?

I believe that one thing we need to do is to be careful to look at the context in which references to the remnant are placed in the Bible. It is far too easy to lift select verses and fit them together to produce convincing “proofs” that we fit the description and that everyone should agree with us. I am not saying that every claim of being the true remnant is false, but truth is not afraid of intense examination and healthy, critical evaluation. Truth is consistent and only becomes more appealing and settled when looked at from many angles under close scrutiny. I would like to see why Paul used this reference to “the remnant” in the context of my study of this chapter and the context of the whole book of Romans. It may reveal some important insights that I need to understand in relation to my desire to be a part of the true “remnant that will be saved.”

First of all I notice that he talks about the remnant in direct contrast to numbers like the sand of the sea. This is in reference to the thinking of Israelites and whatever that reasoning involved in this respect.

I also notice that the context touches strongly on the religious prejudice of Israelites and their exclusive mentality as being the only chosen ones of God. In relation to that the repeated emphasis throughout this whole book is the need to understand and live the life of faith in relation to God in contrast with a religious life of focus on the Law and performance and rules.

The following verse brings up a very interesting reference to Sodom and Gomorrah that I am learning may be a source of misunderstanding by most people. I have been learning quite recently that the assumptions we have about Sodom and Gomorrah may completely miss the truth about the true sin of those people and therefore miss the application that needs to be learned for ourselves. Quite possibly our false assumptions about the real problems exhibited in those cities has become a blind spot so that we miss the real message God desires us to understand when we are warned about not repeating their sins.

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Pride and Prejudice

Root causes produce symptoms which in turn become cause for more symptoms which in turn become cause for...

This is one reason it is often difficult to identify a real root cause in our heart. It is not too hard sometimes to look back a little bit to see that there is something deeper behind our current problems or driving our present emotions, but then we often settle for that first discovery being the original underlying issue instead of continuing to question and allow the Spirit to extend the trail back even further to unmask the real root cause. Maybe that is some of what I am starting to see here in Romans 9.

It seems to me that the end of this chapter is getting down to the deeper roots of the problems of religious addiction and prejudice. We should not think for a moment that this was a problem unique to the Jews of Jesus' day and we don't have much of that problem ourselves. Just because our symptoms are different because of our culture and lifestyle, does not in any way detract from the seriousness of our sickness. Anyone who finds themselves depending on any kind of performance whatsoever to impress or influence God's actions or feelings toward them without a growing abiding trust in His consistent love and passion for them is suffering under the illusions of this addiction. Romans was written to help us see our real problems so that we too can become free and get our priorities corrected, so we can learn to live the real life of joy and peace that we were designed to enjoy in the presence of God.

Here is what I am seeing expressed in the span of this chapter.

First, Paul identifies his kinsmen, the Israelites, whom he has great desire for to see change and let go of their prejudices that are keeping them from experiencing the goodness of God. He reminds them that their religion and people-group was the one that God had selected to be the channel for revealing Himself to humanity and they were gifted with all the “good stuff”.

Next he begins to make the bold assertion that in fact, the only real Israelites are those who are living a life of faith. And faith is believing the real truth about God and responding to His goodness and cooperating with His way of doing things (I'm not talking about religious works). Even though the Jews thought they were doing what God wanted they had failed to allow their hearts to connect with Him but only offered Him their externals. They were trying to make their outside look good while clinging to their independence and selfishness and control on the inside. So Paul claims here that not all Jews are true Israelites and the composition of the real Israel is based on a different criteria than what the Jews were used to using.

It is from this point that Paul launches into the stories that create so much confusion in our minds about how God relates to us and that make Him appear arbitrary. But we must remember the point that Paul is trying to enforce here and not lurch into making opposite assumptions about God due to our own misconceptions and bad previous experiences that we bring to the table. Otherwise we will miss the incredible blessing and insights that lay just beneath the surface waiting to shock us with the truth that God is much better than we ever suspected. I have been unpacking some of these discoveries over the past few days in my digging through this chapter and now I am starting to see this even bigger picture.

It is also helpful to remember the context of Paul's own life and experience in helping us to understand some of the things he mentions here. When Paul talks about vessels in this chapter he remembers God's specific reference to himself as a “chosen vessel” during his own conversion in Damascus. When he talks about Jewish obsessions with keeping the rules to become righteous he is speaking from years of personal experience in doing that very thing himself. When talking about making a gigantic paradigm shift from living an external-oriented religious life to being transformed on the inside into a compulsive love-slave of his Savior, he is a living demonstration of what he is talking about.

Toward the end of chapter 9 he moves even deeper to expose the underlying roots that powered much of the Jewish performance system. He begins to talk about an area of their thinking that was sure to inflame the outrage of most Jews and has similar effects on religious people today if they begin to understand what he is really saying. It is the idea that somehow God favors religious people – our group in particular – and has less love or favor for those who are outside that favored group.

Every time the Jews were confronted about this prejudice by any of God's messengers including the Son of God Himself they reacted with outrage and blindly succumbed to their feelings of resentment. When we find ourselves reacting to something with immediate and intense anger it is very often because we are unwilling to face the fact that our beliefs are not defensible by real truth. So we use anger and rage, force and intimidation to cover up the fact that our prejudices are really just a sham that we are unwilling to face and confess.

Paul puts his finger on this most sensitive issue when he explicitly talks about the various references from the Word of God that show God's real disposition toward humanity and the role of the Jewish people. The prophecies had declared centuries before that God fully intended to embrace all kinds of people Jews and non-Jews alike as His children. The things Paul writes in these last few verses are nothing short of extreme blasphemy in the minds of most Jews but will also have the same effect on us today when it exposes our own religious bigotry. We may have changed the words and labels but we still indulge in the same sorts of bigoted thinking and exclusive behavior in the way we treat people who are not part of our church or our club or our country.

Paul identifies this as a stumbling block for anyone who trips over being religious instead of believing in the real God of compassion, love and truth. All we have to do to apply this to our own situation is to substitute the name of our clique in place of Jews or similar references in this passage, and the name of those outside our clique in place of Gentiles. Then we will begin to feel the squirm inside us as our discomfort begins to reveal our own narrow, selfish beliefs and our notions of the exclusiveness of God. Even his references to the idea of “remnant” in these verses has given us another title to parade as a means of thinking that God favors our group over everyone else.

It is very true that only a remnant will be saved just as God told the Jews of old. But for us to simply assume that we are that remnant and are favored above all others by God is to blindly place ourselves in the very position and attitude that the Jews in Jesus' day held and that Paul is exposing here. Indeed, a remnant will be saved. But we must look carefully to see what the real identifying marks of the remnant are instead of just assuming that our simplistic spin on prophecies give us the inside scoop on the favor of God. We have focused for too long on the external symptoms of the remnant and have largely overlooked the fact that the remnant are a people who are primarily those connected at the heart level to the heart of God and are living a life of faith even when they didn't realize they were doing so – who did not pursue righteousness. (9:30)

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